Robert H. Rohrer

“ He could not allow it to; for patterns had been invoked in his mind that suggested what the creature would do with the power derived from Brenner's impulse if it ever absorbed it all; patterns which pictured the absorption of all life on other worlds, and a single great pattern of electrical current crisscrossing in spiderweb fashion throughout the universe; a strong, unbreakable chain of intelligence, sated with the impulse of every fish, bird, insect, and man in existence. ”

“ He stopped his reforming process and, summoning all the power he could, glided toward the impulse.
When he did this, the impulse became definitely stronger; slowly his delicate, crystalloid form became more and more conscious of it; its power rose and rose, until it reached an almost unbearable intensity.
Waves of hunger beat against Rahll, as they had for centuries; but here, here at last, was satisfaction. His jagged cannibal's pattern roused itself, waiting for the new impulse to come within striking distance. And then.... ”

“ As soon as a branch of the alien impulse accepted Rahll's own impulse as natural, Rahll would move blocks into the channels of that branch and absorb it.
First he examined the branch devoted to sensing odors. Yes, it would be child's play to cause an impulse to transmit through the odor channels to the central hub, where it would be interpreted as an odor....
Brenner sat hunched over the controls of the spaceship. Damm! How had he gotten so far away from Base? There weren't any planets here for millions of miles in all directions; only blackness. ”

“ His puny blocks were unable to hold up against the continuous, non-chemically produced stream of electricity from the generator. More and more impulse flowed into his body, more and more inflexible impulse, which he could not twist into his cannibal's thought-pattern, torrents of perfectly stable electricity, slowly influencing his own pattern as he had expected to influence the impulse, influencing his into a frozen, stable, inflexible pattern of continuous hunger-satisfaction. ”

“ He knew that Rahll was waiting outside, waiting to consume the last weak impulse in Brenner's body; he also knew that Rahll would probably automatically consume any electrical impulse of a frequency harmonious with the creature's that was of the same level as Brenner's without noticing that it came from a generator instead of Brenner, because of the hunger that threatened to overpower Rahll and render him insensible in the lust for food. ”

“ But no sign had come, and Rahll's shape had slowly become warped with weakness and hunger into the jagged form of a pattern which had never been seen in the old community.
The pattern of a cannibal. The only central thought-form which activated him now was to Find Impulse and to Absorb Impulse; to absorb flexible impulse into his wavering frame and twist it to his own form, so he would live, so he could exist for a while longer, so he could branch out and find more flexible impulse to eat and twist to his pattern. ”

“ Rahll's cannibal-pattern contracted and protracted in the black void. The faint blue lines of his form glowed a bit more strongly now than they had before, although the great hunger still shook his frame.
His thought-forms wove in and out in visions of power, a power he had never thought of possessing back in the time of the Great Pattern, a power with which he could absorb everything, every—
And then Rahll's thought-form twisted into a totally unfamiliar shape. And he thought of Hale.
He could picture Hale only vaguely; a big man—man ”

“ Brenner cut Hale off and began to think about Earth. And home. And Barbara. And the nameless little thing who must have come months ago, and whom he would have seen within a year if he hadn't been so Godawful stupid as to lose himself out here.
Well, at least he had the radio. And a good supply of food. And the knowledge that Hale would be keeping all channels clear for a call from him.
He frowned. He should have been able to make radio contact with Base long before this. Perhaps his trouble was in the radio....
Suddenly a strange odor touched his senses. Brenner frowned, sniffing. ”

“ Here we are, a space station a million miles from anywhere, and he has to lose our best craft for us! I knew that blinkety-blank halfwit would pull some lame-brained stunt like this. I knew it, I knew it, I.... ”