Robert Donald Locke

“ Get this, Garth. They say that all the vertebrates, and particularly all mammals, will have to develop new germ-resistant species—or the plague will eventually kill off even the strongest. What's more, those damned Asiatics are in the same boat with us, at last."
Garth mulled over the news. He said, "Then, any survivors on earth will have to mutate into something other than mankind?"
"That sums it up...." Edwin Dollard raised his highball. "Here's to homo the sap," he said in mock salute to the vanishing human race. "The chump had a short life but a merry one—on Terra, anyhow. ”

“ But loping easily along as his ancestors might have pursued a baboon or antelope, Shir K'han overtook the screaming human. He seized his obese bulk by the waist and lifted him high above his head. While Dollard kicked and moaned, the feline bore him back to the air vehicle and deposited him in a wire mesh cage in the flying craft's cockpit. A tangle of the sticky ropes descended from the cage's roof, further entangling the trapped industrialist and serving to reduce him to helplessness. ”

“ His eyes made out a man-like apparition in a white smock buttoned to a metal harness, a tall lithe figure whose curiously pointed face regarded him with unblinking interest.
"You are come to, I notice," the creature said, employing a rasping blurred form of English. "I am Shir K'han, of the people of Tegur, detailed to interpret your meager tongue, oh frozen primate."
"You're not human ... but at least you're intelligent," Dollard snorted. "Where am I?"
"On board a vessel of the Tegurian fleet, bound for the home planet." ”

“ If not by the human race, by its successor—whichever race or species, if such could happen, that mutated successfully enough to produce a plague resistant strain and then evolved a rational brain.
Civilizations rose and toppled in cycles, he knew. Sometime in the near future or even the far future, another civilization would emerge on Terra and another race would conquer the stars. ”

“ Dollard said.
"You can bet their first reaction would be to dismantle the ship at sight," Garth informed him. "Lucky we're getting out in time. If the mobs couldn't pilot the vessel themselves, it'd be human nature to see to it that nobody else got to do so, either. Misery loves company—even in the face of death." ”

“ Dollard supplied. "Perhaps there will, more probably there won't. What does it matter? There's only one chance in a thousand of licking the plague ... from the way the bacteriologists are wailing. And even if the race does survive, what sort of existence would it have—battling who knows what kind of monsters some of the other forms of life are bound to change into? No, I'm here to tell you, Garth, the remainder of the race is better off—exterminated. The few plague-free people we'll find on Venus will be enough to launch a greater, prouder race—provided, of course, that I'm their leader." ”

“ In fact, we still debate whether you primates could have been intelligent enough to have founded your culture without the aid of some early Tegurians. We Tegurians have been superior to the anthropoids as far back as our own history goes, which is to the days of the Great Impetus—the epoch when our race was gifted with great powers and the primates degenerated."
"Nonsense," scoffed Edwin Dollard. "Get me off this sadistic table—and I'll demonstrate how smart I am." He squinted, studying the feline's high-domed head and furry chin. ”

“ He'd supervised a lot of Dollard's underhanded work for him, Garth told himself as he waited for the hypo stimulant to react. But murdering helpless men had been something he had rebelled at. And now that Dollard had deserted him, at least he would have company on Terra during his last days of life. It was an outcome Garth had anticipated, although he had been unable to predict just when Dollard would launch his surprise attack. ”

“ Hardiest of all forms of life, as proved in the last days of the reptilian age, are the carnivorous mammalian orders; these members are generally the most adaptable, intelligent and ubiquitous of living types. And by their conquest of their stubborn environment, they have proven themselves equally the fiercest.
Thus, it was not surprising that eventually the derelict spaces between the inner planet of Sol were once again the scene of traffic; not bristling traffic perhaps, but sufficient to present concrete proof a new intelligent race had developed on Terra. ”

“ And They are scraggly skulkers, hiding out in the brush of the second planet—the world you knew as Venus. But even so, many of them have been known to react quite viciously when captured."
"Then, there are humans left?"
"I see you recognize the difference between our race and yours at once." Shir K'han stiffened with pride. "The gap is quite great."
Dollard noticed a very faint striped pattern could be traced in the fuzzy growth on Shir K'han's bared arms.
"Yes, some members of the previous culture do survive," the feline continued. "Puny specimens. We have been forced to hunt them down. ”

“ Garth replied, rubbing his nose and grinning wryly. "My wife is on Venus, where the plague can't reach her. And I promised myself days ago that Dollard should never be given the opportunity to infect that planet. That's one promise that has been kept. ”

“ Apparently, to your misfortune, your training failed to include a knowledge of five-body equations ... so you never arrived at the proper heading you needed to take."
"Naturally, not," the revived industrialist snapped in answer. "But that couldn't be helped. I never professed to be a super-competent astrogator. In my world, in my time, I was a leader of my race—a builder of factories and machines."
"Our archeologists have dug into the ruins of your civilization—without, however, a great deal of curiosity," said Shir K'han coldly. "We found little in it to interest us. ”

“ At the sight, Dollard grunted. "Efficient toxin," he commented. "Good work."
alking contemptuously past the bodies, the tycoon approached a work shack which had housed the space ship mechanics. He picked up an aluminum platform-ladder which rested on the trampled grass. Swinging it above his head, he brought it back to the vessel and hooked it against the rear fin so that the tubular platform lodged itself against the ship's lowest loading hatch.
He turned to Garth. "Too bad we can't run an engine-to-mech check, before taking off. But no mechanics." ”

“ By virtue of their exalted rank, they have the right to the choicest of foods. Since the dawn of our history, the flesh of primates has been our greatest delicacy—but it has grown scarcer and scarcer, until now it is virtually non-existent. ”

“ It was then, while the ship was still a thousand miles from the no-pull point where free-wheeling alone had been known to carry vessels out of Terra's gravitational range and into Venus' orbit, that disaster struck. The fuel being fed to exactly half of the rocket tubes choked out, and the blast from the remaining tubes increased proportionately. ”

“ He walked over to the stricken mechanics and administered an injection into the neck muscles of each man. The counter-toxin took hold, speedily erasing the depressant effect of the drug Garth had originally fed the men—a non-fatal dosage of an irritant similar to the one Dollard had ordered be used to slay them. ”

“ In your epoch, primates ate many domestic animals who differed less in intelligence quotient from them than differ civilized Tegurians from human primates like yourself ... the gap today is much greater.... ”

“ When he awoke, he was chilled and hungry. The ship had passed into the shadow of Luna and its bulkheads no longer conducted heat to the convecting air envelope inside from the outer plates, generally warmed by solar radiations. It took him sometime to get warm again. ”