Livestock had been imported early on, and vast tracts of fields and pastures had soon replaced the trees. Several sizeable cities had grown up, in the area of most salubrious climate, though the climate had deteriorated greatly after the forests and seas had died. Off-world fish had been imported to restock the seas, and prey animals had been brought in for the hunt, though both failed to flourish, forcing the people to turn to non-blood-sports for their amusements.
If any planetary population could be said to be contented, the Aresians were the most likely candidates. They were well settled in a world structured much to their liking by their own hard work. Their only problem was that wresting a living from the planet took increasing effort the longer they lived upon it. The planet that had been settled with such dedication was no longer as fruitful as it had been.
In 747 Post Settlement, a new syndrome emerged to trouble the medical professionals on the planet, though it was subsequently determined that the syndrome might have existed undetected for four or five decades previously. All the victims were persons of middle age or older. A typical case might be a man or woman who arose one morning complaining of feeling “odd,” though not odd enough to seek medical care. The person went about the daily routine more slowly than usual, slowing still more as the days passed, often commenting to friends and family that something important had been misplaced and could not be found. This might go on for thirty or forty days, after which the patient simply stopped moving entirely.
While under care, the typical patient continued quiet and withdrawn, content to sit and stare into the middle distance without being interested in food or drink or conversation, though some of the afflicted still wondered aloud where they might have put whatever it was that was missing. When urged to communicate, a patient might remark that speech took too much energy away from his or her trying to remember something very urgent, and persistent questioning caused agitation.
Without exception, the afflicted would continue in this vein, whether calm or agitated, until a sudden cry of what seemed to be joy was followed by a fit of laughter and then by an hour or so of unintelligible murmurings which carried a great weight of hopelessness and pain, followed by a lapse into unconsciousness swiftly followed by death.
There were at first only a handful of such patients, but their numbers grew with each year that passed. It was thought by some that a poisonous asteroid or comet or cloud of cosmic material had impinged upon the planet to cause these effects as well as the weirdness that had occurred on “the Strange Night,” as it came to be called.
Ygdale Furnashson was High Chieftain among the Aresians. He had three sons, and in the manner of the historic quests of his people—and having already sought such advice as was available from scientific and off-planet sources—Ygdale sent his sons out among the settled worlds to question whether any people, anywhere, had any information that would cast light on what had happened to Ares on the fateful night and whether that event had anything to do with the current plague.
The two older boys found nothing helpful except the fact that a similar disease was decimating the populations on Chamis and had already virtually destroyed Verben’s World. Counting Ares, this meant half the settled planets in the area were in trouble. The younger son of the Chieftain found some additional information, though it was not what he had been looking for. He came home to report that he’d heard rumors that on Haven not only was settlement doing very nicely, but men were living to be several hundred years old. Additionally, Haven was rumored to trade the long-life substance, whatever it was, for off-world goods and services. The stuff had been bought and used by a few people on Chamis and Verben’s World, all of whom, it was said, were still alive.
This was enough for Ygdale to work with. Though unaccustomed to protracted thinking, he could do it when necessary. He queried further, learning that the Lord Paramount of Haven had a fondness for shopping, that he much enjoyed brightly colored booklets, copiously illustrated, with elaborate and even fanciful claims and descriptions of the merchandise. Ygdale had such a catalog prepared forthwith, touting the advantages of an Aresian security force. He also arranged bribes to several of the Lord Paramount’s servants to be sure that the Ares-Force booklet was always on top of the pile. He reminded his sons that taking an advantage of an opponent’s weakness was not at all dishonorable.