Darkover Landfall by Marion Zimmer Bradley

“He’s dead, sir,” Ewen said quietly, “he died from the bites of poisonous insects. I’ll make a complete report later.”

“Make it to the Medic Chief,” the Captain said, “I’m not qualified to understand anyway. You others can bring up your reports at the next meeting–tonight, I suppose. Mr. MacAran, did you manage to get the calculations you were hoping for?”

MacAran nodded. “Yes; as near as we can figure, the planet is somewhat larger than Earth, which means, with the lighter gravity, that its mass must be somewhat less. Sir, I can discuss all that later; just now I must ask you one question. Did anything unusual happen here while we were gone?”

The Captain’s lined face ridged, displeased. “How do you mean, unusual? This whole planet is unusual, and nothing that happens here can be called routine.”

Ewen said, “I mean anything like illness or mass insanity, sir.”

Leicester frowned. “I can’t imagine what you could be talking about,” he said. “No, no reports from Medic of any illness.”

“What Dr. Ross means is that we all had an attack of something like delirium,” MacAran told him. “It was the day after the second night without rain. It was wide spread enough to hit Camilla–Lieutenant Del Rey–and myself, on the peaks, and to hit the other group almost six thousand feet lower down. We all behaved well, irresponsibly, sir.”

“Irresponsibly?” He scowled, his eyes fierce on them.

“Irresponsibly,” Ewen met the Captain’s eyes, his fists clenched. “Dr. Zabal was recovering; we ran off into the woods and left him alone so that he got up in delirium, ran off on his own and strained his heart–which is why he died. Judgment was impaired; we ate untested fruits and fungus. There were–various delusional processes.”

Judith Lovat said firmly, “They were not all delusional.”

Ewen looked at her and shook his head. “I don’t think Dr. Lovat is in any state to judge, sir. We seem all to have had delusions about reading one another’s thoughts, anyway.”

The Captain drew a long, harried breath. “This will have to go to the Medics. No, we had nothing like that here. I suggest you all go and make your reports to the appropriate chiefs, or write them up to present at the meeting tonight. Lieutenant Del Rey, I want your report myself. I’ll see the rest of you later.”

“One more thing, sir,” MacAran said. “This planet is inhabited.” He drew out the flint knife from his pack, handed it over. But the Captain barely looked at it. He said, “Take it to Major Frazer; he’s the staff anthropologist. Tell him I’ll want a report tonight. Now if the rest of you will excuse us, please–”

MacAran felt the curious flatness of anticlimax as they left the Captain and Camilla together. While he hunted through the camp for anthropologist Frazer, he slowly identified his own feeling as jealousy. How could he compete with Captain Leicester? Oh, this was rubbish, the Captain was old enough to be Camilla’s father. Did he honestly believe Camilla was in love with the Captain?

No. But she’s emotionally all tied up with him and that’s worse.

If he had been disappointed by the Captain’s lack of response to the flint knife, Major Frazer’s response left nothing to be desired.

“I’ve been saying since we landed that this world was habitable,” he said, turning the knife over in his hands, “and here’s proof that it’s inhabited–by something intelligent, at least.”

“Humanoid?” MacAran asked, and Frazer shrugged. “How could we know that? There have been intelligent life-forms reported from three or four other planets; so far they have reported one simian, one feline, and three un classifiable–xenobiology isn’t my specialty. One artifact doesn’t tell us anything–how many shapes are there that a knife could be designed in? But it fits a human hand well enough, although it’s a little small.”

Meals for crew and passengers were served in one large area, and when MacAran went for his noon meal he hoped to see Camilla; but she came in late and went directly to a group of other crew members. MacAran could not catch her eye and had the distinct feeling that she was avoiding him. While he was morosely eating his plateful of rations, Ewen came up to him.

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