Lester Del Rey

“ I'll have to remind you we're under orders to investigate all habitable planets on a line back to Earth. I vote we follow orders. Jeremy?"
The xenologist shrugged faintly. His ash-blond coloring, general slimness and refinement of features gave him a look of weakness, but his voice was a heavy, determined bass. "I stand pat. We didn't explore the last planet enough. I vote we go back and make a thorough job of it."
"Home—at once!" The roar came from the squat, black-bearded minerologist, Graves. "God never meant man to leave the world on which He put him! ”

“ The first had gone out in a direction opposite to that of the Clarion and had returned to report a regular decline in culture as the distance of habitable worlds from Earth increased. The nearest was in a medieval state, the next an early bronze culture, then a stone-age one, and so on, down to the furthest explored, where the native race had barely discovered fire.
It had been either impossible coincidence or the evidence of some law nobody has been quite ready to accept, save for the newly spreading fundamentalists, who maintained it proved that Earth was the center of the universe. ”

“ Then a period when religion seems to be in the decline. Then a revival, and a return to faith in the prophecies. All religions agree on those prophecies, Lenk. Revelations refer to the end of Armageddon, when the whole world will wipe itself out before the creation of a better world, in one planet-wide war. The old Norse legends spoke of a Fimbulvetr, when the giants and their gods would destroy the earth in war. And these green-skinned peoples had the same religious prophecies. They came true, too. Armageddon. Contagious Armageddon. ”

“ It would carry spores from planet to planet—and in the exact direction needed to account for what we've seen. Races were more advanced back that way, less so the way we first went, simply because of the time it took the spores to drift."
"And what about the destruction?" Lenk asked woodenly. Their faces were getting him—they looked as if they believed it. "Is there another disease spore to drive races mad?"
"Nothing like that. Just the natural course of cultures when they pass a certain level," Jeremy answered. "I should have seen that myself. Every race follows the same basic pattern. ”

“ Over the green people, three vaguely reptilian monstrosities were hovering, at least twice the size of the others, all equipped with the fanged whips Lenk had seen. One of the green men was apparently trying to defend himself with a huge T-shaped weapon, but the others were helpless. The reptilian monsters sprouted great ugly wings of glaring red from their shoulders. ”

“ Space travel—travel at faster than light speeds—had to make a difference. There were the other worlds on the other side of the sun, where men were already planning to colonize. Even if a world might normally blow up in a final wild holocaust, it would have its whole racial pattern changed when it began to spread out among the stars. It would have to have a revival of the old pioneering spirit. ”

“ He heard Graves moving about in the galley, singing something about graves opening, and grimaced.
Besides, Jeremy had admitted that they didn't have all the answers. The mystery of the vanished skeletons remained—and until that was accounted for, nothing could be considered explained.
He forgot about the skeletons as he began planning how he'd wangle his way into one of the colonies. Then, even if catastrophe did strike Earth in another thousand years or so, the race could go on. Ten more years, and man would be safe.... ”

“ Lenk headed directly for the control room. He began setting up the proper directions on the board while Jeremy finished the account.
"But something's hitting the planets," he objected. His hand found the main button and the Clarion began heading up through the atmosphere on normal gravity warp, until she could reach open space, and go into hyperdrive. "Your monsters prove to be only people—but it still doesn't explain the way disaster follows a line straight toward Earth! ”

“ If it would vaporize calcium in the bones, it would vaporize some of the parts of the weapons we found." Jeremy moved a rook, considered it, and pointed. "Check. And there are always some parts of skeletons that will last more than a thousand years. I've got a theory, but it's...."
Pale light cut through the viewing port, and a gong sounded in the room. Lenk jerked to his feet and moved to his screens.
"Maybe we'll know now," he said. "We'll be landing on a planet in about an hour. And it looks pretty much like Earth, from here." ”

“ Lenk suggested.
Jeremy shook his head vigorously. "No dice, Captain. See that belt? It's plant fiber—something like linen. No gas strong enough to eat up a body would leave that unharmed. And they had skeletons, too—we've found models in what must have been a museum. But we can't even find the fossil skeletons that should be there. Odd, though."
He prodded about among the weapons, shaking his head. "All the weapons in places like this show evidence of one homogeneous design. ”

“ Judging from the size of the furniture, they had been slightly larger than men but not enough to matter. The pictures on the walls were odd mostly for the greenish tints of the skin and the absence of outward noses or ears. With a little fixing and recoloring, they might have been people. ”