Resurrection by Van Vogt, A. E.

It was the old argument, but reluctantly now Enash ad-mitted there was something to be said for that point of view.

He forgot that, for the fourth man was stirring.

The man sat up. And vanished.

There was a blank, horrified silence. Then Captain Gorsid said harshly, “He can’t get out of there. We know that.

He’s in there somewhere.”

All around Enash, the Ganae were out of their chairs, peer-ing into the energy shell. The guards stood with ray guns held limply in their suckers. Out of the comer of his eye, he saw one of the protective screen technicians beckon to Veed, who went over. He came back grim. He said, “I’m told the needles jumped ten points when he first disappeared. That’s on the nucleome level.”

“By ancient Ganae!” Shun whispered. “We’ve run into what we’ve always feared.”

Gorsid was shouting into the communicator. “Destroy all the locators on the ship. Destroy them, do you hear!”

He turned with glaring eyes. “Shuri,” he bellowed. “They don’t seem to understand. Tell those subordinates of your to act. All locators and reconstructors must be destroyed.”

“Hurry, hurry!” said Shuri weakly.

When that was done they breathed more easily. There were grim smiles and a tensed satisfaction. “At least,” said Vice-captain Mayad. “he cannot now ever discover Gana. Our great system of locating suns with planets remains our secret. There can be no retaliation for” He stopped, said slowly, “What am I talking about? We haven’t done anything. We’ve not responsible for the disaster that has befallen the inhabitants of this planet.”

But Enash knew what he had meant. The guilt feelings came to the surface at such moments as thisthe ghosts of all the races destroyed by the Ganae, the remorseless will that had been in them, when they first landed, to annihilate whatever was here. The dark abyss of voiceless hate and ter-ror that lay behind them; the days on end when they had mercilessly poured poisonous radiation down upon the unsus-pecting inhabitants of peaceful planetsall that had been in Mayad’s words.

“I still refuse to believe be has escaped.” That was Captain Gorsid. “He’s in there. He’s waiting for us to take down our screens, so he can escape. Well, we won’t do it.”

There was silence again as they stared expectantly into the emptiness of the energy shell. The reconstructor rested on metal supports, a glittering affair. But there ‘was nothing else.

Not a flicker of unnatural light or shade. The yellow rays of the sun bathed the open spaces with a brilliance that left no room for concealment.

“Guards,” said Gorsid, “destroy the reconstructor. I thought he might come back to examine it, but we can’t take a chance on that.”

It burned with a white fury. And Enash, who had hoped somehow that the deadly energy would force the two-legged thing into the open, felt his hopes sag within him.

“But where can he have gone?” Yoal whispered.

Enash turned to discuss the matter. In the act of swinging around, he saw that the monster was standing under a tree a score of feet to one side, watching them. He must have arrived at that moment, for there was a collective gasp from the councillors. Everybody drew back. One of the screen technicians, using great presence of mind, jerked up an energy -screen between the Ganae and the monster. The creature came forward slowly. He was slim of build, he held his head well back. His eyes shone as from an inner fire.

He stopped as he came to the screen, reached out and touched it with his fingers. It flared, blurred with changing colours. The colours grew brighter, and extended in an intricate pattern all the way from his head to the ground. The blur cleared. The pattern faded into invisibility. The man was through the screen.

He laughed, a soft curious sound; then sobered. “When I first awakened,” he said, “I was curious about the situation.

The question was, what should I do with you?”

The words had a fateful ring to Enash on the still morning air of that planet of the dead. A voice broke the silence, a voice so strained and unnatural that a moment passed before he recognized it as belonging to Captain Gorsid.

“Kill him!”

When the blasters ceased their effort, the unkillable thing remained standing. He walked slowly forward until he was only a half dozen feet from the nearest Ganae. Enash had a position well to the rear. The man said slowly: “Two courses suggest themselves, one based on gratitude for reviving me, the other based on reality. I know you for what you are. Yes, know youand that is unfortunate. It is hard to feel merciful. To begin with,” he went on, “let us suppose you surrender the secret of the locator. Naturally, now that a system exists, we shall never again be caught as we were.”

Enash had been intent, his mind so alive with the potentialities of the disaster that was here that it seemed impossible that he could think of anything else. And yet, a part of his attention was stirred now. “What did happen?” he asked.

The man changed colour. The emotions of that far day thick-ened his voice. “A nucleonic storm. It swept in from outer space. It brushed this edge of our galaxy. It was about ninety light-years in diameter, beyond the farthest limit of our power. There was no escape from it. We had dispensed with spaceships, and had no time to construct any. Castor, the only star with planets ever discovered by us, was also in the path of the storm.” He stopped. “The secret?” he said.

Around Enash, the councillors were breathing easier. The fear of race destruction that had come to them was lifting.

Enash saw with pride that the first shock was over, and they were not even afraid for themselves.

“Ah,” said Yoal softly, “you don’t know the secret. In spite of all your great development, we alone can conquer the galaxy.” He looked at the others, smiling confidently. “Gentlemen,” he said, “our pride in a great Ganae achievement is justified. I suggest we return to our ship. We have no further business on this planet.”

There was a confused moment while their bubbles formed, when Enash wondered if the two-legged one would try to stop their departure. But when he looked back, he saw that the man was walking in a leisurely fashion along a street.

That was the memory Enash carried with him, as the ship began to move. That and the fact that the three atomic bombs they dropped, one after the other, failed to explode.

“We will not,” said Captain Gorsid, “give up a planet as easily as that. I propose another interview with the creature.”

They were floating down again into the city, Enash and Yoal and Veed and the commander. Captain Gorsid’s voice tuned in once more:

“.. . As I visualize it”through the mist Enash could see the transparent glint of the other three bubbles around him “we jumped to conclusions about this creature, not justified by the evidence. For instance, when he awakened, he vanished.

Why? Because he was afraid, of course. He wanted to size up the situation. He didn’t believe he was omnipotent.”

It was sound logic. Enash found himself taking heart from it. Suddenly, he was astonished that be had become panicky so easily. He began to see the danger in a new light. Only one man alive on a new planet. If they were determined enough, colonists coud be moved in as if he did not exist.

It had been done before, he recalled. On several planets, small groups of the original populations had survived the destroying radiation, and taken refuge in remote areas. In almost every case, the new colonists gradually hunted them down. In two instances, however, that Enash remembered, native races were still holding small sections of their planets. In each case, it had been found impractical to destroy them because it would have endangered the Ganae on the planet. So the survivors were tolerated. One man would not take up very much room.

When they found him, he was busily sweeping out the lower floor of a small bungalow. He put the broom aside and stepped on to the terrace outside. He had put on sandals, and he wore a loose-fitting robe made of very shiny material.

He eyed them indolently but he said nothing.

It was Captain Gorsid who made the proposition. Enash had to admire the story he told into the language machine. The commander was very frank. That approach had been decided on. He pointed out that the Ganae could not be expected to revive the dead of this planet. Such altruism would be unnatural considering that the ever-growing Ganae hordes had a continual need for new worlds. Each vast new population increment was a problem that could be solved by one method only. In this instance, the colonists would gladly respect the rights of the sole survivor of this world.

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