The Dark Design by Phillip Jose Farmer

The Jules Verne lifted above the Valley, and the wind sent it spanking along northeasterly. After an hour it lost much of its strength, but the craft was still moving in the right direction. It was also steadily ascending. Frigate took over the pilot’s post at 4877 meters or a little over 16,000 feet of altitude. To stop further ascension, he valved off hydrogen in driblets. When it began to sink, he turned the burner on. From then on, the pilot would be busy trying to maintain the vessel within a 2000-meter zone while losing as little gas as possible and running the burner at a minimum.

Frigate’s neck and shoulder pained him very much. He would be glad when he was relieved and could get under the cloths and stretch out. One drink of booze wouldn’t hurt him and it might ease the agony.

So far the voyage had been mostly hard and fast work, some stomach-squeezing danger, and much boredom. He’d be happy when the final landing was made. Then the events of the trip would start to take on the patina of amusing adventure. As time passed, it would gain a golden glow, and it would all seem wonderful. The crew would tell exaggerated stories, making their perils seem even more hairbreadth than they had actually been.

Imagination was the great cozener of the past.

Standing by the vernian, the only illumination the cold starlight and the instrument bulbs, all but himself asleep, Frigate felt lonely. Tempering the loneliness, however, was pride. The Jules Verne had broken the record for nonstop balloon flights. From lift-off to this point, it had floated approximately 4824 kilometers or 3000 miles. And it would cover much more distance-if all went well- before it was forced to land.

And it had been done by five amateurs. Except for himself, none had ever been in a balloon on Earth. His forty hours in hot-air balloons and thirty in gas balloons did not make him a veteran aeronaut. He’d logged more time on this flight than all his hours on Earth.

The crew had gone on a voyage which would have made history if it had been on the native planet. Their faces would have been on TV screens worldwide, they’d have been feted and banqueted, they could have written books which would become movies, the royal­ties would have rolled in.

Here, only a few would ever know what they had done. Even a smaller number would refuse to believe them. Not even a few would know if the voyage ended in the deaths of the crew.

He looked out a port. The world was bright starlight and dark shadows, the valleys like snakes crawling, serpents in march order. The stars were silent, the valleys were silent. As quiet as the mouths of the dead.

That was a gloomy simile.

As silent as the wings of a butterfly. It recalled the summers of Earth in his childhood and youth, the many-colored flowers of the backyard garden, especially the sunflowers, ah, the tall yellow sunflowers, the songs of birds, the savory odors of his mother’s cooking drifting to his nose, roast beef, cherry pies, his father playing the piano …

He remembered one of his father’s favorite songs, one of his own favorites. He’d often sung it softly while on night watch on the schooner. When he did so, he saw in his mind a small glow far ahead of him, a glow like a star, a light that seemed to travel before him, guiding him toward some unnamed but nevertheless desirable goal.

“Shine, little glow-worm, glimmer, glimmer, Shine little glow-worm, glimmer, glimmer.

Lead us, lest too far we wander. Love’s sweet voice is calling yonder.

“Shine, little glowworm, glimmer, glimmer, Shine little glow-worm, glimmer, glimmer.

Light the path below, above. And lead us on to love!”

Suddenly, he was weeping. The tears were for the good things that had been or might have been, for the bad things that had been but should not have been.

Drying his tears, he made a final check and roused the little Moor for his watch. He crawled under the cloths, but his neck and shoulders drove sleep away. After trying vainly to sink into blessed oblivion, he got out to talk to Nur. They continued a conversation that had gone on, day and night, for many years.