Pisces II laughed. "Now how could one lose his mind? It goes with him
everywhere."
"All right," Ingomar said. "I meant, have you become insane?"
"Of course not," Pisces I said. "We are peaceful entities. We
intentionally developed this argument to break the monotony of life
here."
"Is it so bad as that?"
"It is terrible. Will you take us aboard?"
Ingomar did not answer, but switched the communicator off and busied
himself with recording his observations. He took advantage of their
continued presence and took photographs.
Finally, after several hours, they leapt into the air and flew away
toward the distant mountains. Ingomar was sorry to see them leave, and
more than once checked his instruments for signs of a coming storm in
case they were right. But nothing outside had changed.
After they had left he opened the ship and stepped outside, taking
readings with instruments to record the character of the planet. He
trudged through the eternally drifting sand, looking for some sign of
life. No plants, insects, animals anywhere. Only the fine, mobile sand,
occasionally an outcropping of rock not yet eroded away. And the heat!
Ingomar was forced to turn the controls of his environment suit almost
all the way up to keep comfortable. Then, when the sun receded behind
the ghostly barren mountains, the cold came creeping in. Ingomar turned
his controls in the other direction, while walking back to his ship. He
was afraid he would not keep the cold outside.
The landscape, with the sun's absence, was dark and fearful. Shadows
moved in the wind, shadows of drifting sand that took on the
shapes of monsters lurking in the darkness. Ingomar was not one to
frighten easily, but the night took on such ominous sighs and moans
and movements that his imagination began to magnify them beyond
recognition. When he finally saw the ship loom up before him he ran,
stumbling toward it. He fumbled in the darkness for the control knob
to open the lock and found it at last. He leapt inside, accompanied by
a cold blast of wind and sand, and stood there panting, hearing his
heart pound in his ears.
The night was long and lonely. He was too far from civilization for
his radio equipment to bring the comfort of familiar sounds. He tried
to read, but found concentration impossible. He thought of the birds,
wondering where they were now, how they kept from freezing to death at
night. He rewrote his notes, adding remembered facts and impressions.
Finally he decided sleep was the most painless way of spending the
night, and swallowed a small capsule designed to induce total sleep for
at least six hours.
* * * * *
He awoke the next morning standing on his head.
The bed, horizontal the night before, was now vertical. The whole room
was vertical. Panic swept over him like a wave of burning fire. He
scrambled to the airlock. It opened grotesquely.
The ship, which last night had stood so proudly, now lay on its side.
And in his drugged sleep he had not known when it fell. For Ingomar,
the bottom dropped out of everything, and his heart dropped with it.
There was no resetting of a ship once it had fallen. This took special
equipment. Ingomar Bjorgson was a doomed man, and he knew it.
While he stood outside in the morning sun, staring at the horrible
spectacle before him, the two birds alighted, one on each side.
"Why didn't you listen to us?" Pisces I said in an accusing tone.
"Yes," Pisces II echoed angrily. "You make me sick, thinking you're
so smart, coming down here in your big ship and strutting around like
you think you're a God, or something. Now, how big do you feel? Do you
realize that this is our first opportunity to leave this planet? I've a
good notion to peck your stupid eyes out right here and now."
"Leave him be," Pisces I said. "He may not be so bright, but I think
he would have taken us with him, after he got used to us and saw how
harmless we are."
Pisces II leapt at him, almost knocking Ingomar off his feet. "Shut up!
I've a good notion to peck your eyes out, too."
"Oh, stop it!" Ingomar said wearily. "We're all doomed to spend the
rest of our lives here. How was I to know that the storm would be so
bad? My instruments gave no indication whatever."
"Actually, it was our fault," Pisces II said, more calmly. "We failed
to mention the nature of the storm. We thought you knew. It was a
magnetic storm. A shifting of magnetic currents surrounding the planet.
We had no idea that you would think of the weather."
They walked with him around the fallen ship. It was not injured, that
much Ingomar could see. The soft bed of sand had cushioned its fall. If
it could only be righted! Ingomar knew it was impossible.
"It is pointed toward that knoll out there. See? Suppose we all got
inside and blasted off. We would slide along and maybe when we reached
the knoll we'd have enough speed to keep on going in a straight line
until we could point her nose upward."
Ingomar shook his head, but he appreciated the suggestion. It indicated
that they were willing to try anything. He knew their motives were not
entirely philanthropic, but he liked them more for it, anyway.
He said, "There is only one way out, and that is for someone to come in
and get us."
"Well," Pisces II said, "What are you waiting for? Call them."
"I can't. We are too far out for communication."
The two gray birds eyed one another in disbelief. Pisces I scratched
his breast impolitely. Then he said, "Are you telling us that you have
come this far from your own solar system, knowing that you could not
call for help, if necessary?"
Ingomar nodded.
* * * * *
Pisces II snorted through his beak, and scratched in the sand.
"Stupidity," he said. "There is no other word for it."
"Yes, there is," Pisces I answered, somewhat sharply. "In fact, there
are several possible words. Bravery. Desperation. Actually I think
it is a combination of both. I am sure that you are aware how rare
intelligent life is in the universe. When you heard of us, you rushed
out here at once. I would call it bravery to go beyond the sound of the
voices of your kind. You are desperate because you are lonely in an
almost empty universe."
"We must help him," said Pisces II.
"Of course. But first let's make him comfortable. It will be a long
wait."
"Thank you," Ingomar said, moved by their sympathy. "But you cannot
help. Or do you have a way to send messages?"
"Yes, in a way," Pisces II said, "You see...."
Pisces I lifted a huge wing and knocked Pisces II in the sand. He
turned to Ingomar. "Do you promise to take us with you, if we should
succeed in getting help?"
Ingomar did not think it over. "Yes," he said.
"Then we will do it. But first we must make you comfortable. Do you
have equipment for shelter, besides the ship?"
"Yes, there is the bubble. It can be expanded to become a house."
"Get it," Pisces II said.
Ingomar did. He dragged it outside and began to unfold it, in
preparation for inflation. But Pisces II stopped him. "Not here," he
said. "It will be a long time. Our calculation is that it will take at
least forty-five days to get help. The trip from your planet alone is
at least forty days. You will not wish to stare at your toppled ship
for so long. I suggest we go beyond the first knoll."
Pisces I laughed and said to Ingomar, "For once he is using his brain.
We will carry it."
He grasped the bubble in his claws, flapped his enormous wings and
sailed off. Soon he returned, and among the three of them all his food
and books and any equipment he might need was carried over the knoll
out of sight of the wrecked ship.
"We will not return," they said, "until the rescue ship arrives. So
make yourself comfortable. Do not stray too far from the ship. This is
the most miserable planet in the universe. Give us plenty of time. We
know we can summon help, but we do not know how long it will take. We
may need as many as seventy-five days."
Ingomar settled down to wait.
* * * * *
The fierce, burning sun had turned Ingomar's face and naked arms into
fried areas of intense pain, but he regained consciousness when he felt
the coolness of the ointment. It penetrated deep down, under the burned
skin, into flesh and muscle, soothing injured cells.
He opened his eyes. He moved his head. The eyes were burned and
bloodshot, but he could see a ship standing a hundred feet away. It was
not sleek and long, pointing its needle nose at the sky, though. It was
round, dull white, like a giant egg laid by a giant bird.
Bird? Ingomar chuckled, senses returning, thinking through his pain of
Pisces I or Pisces II laying an egg. Then he laughed aloud.
He stopped, quite abruptly, and looked again. The egg was still there,
but it was not an egg. It was actually a ship and the airlock was open
and Pisces II was backing out, dragging a sort of stretcher on wheels.
"It's a ... a ... ship!" he exclaimed, tears running down his cheeks,
over the ointment. "Whose ship is it?"
"Ours," said Pisces I.
"Yours?" Ingomar said, after a long pause while the pain raged over
his skin. He tried to sit up, and Pisces I got behind him and pushed,
nudging him upright. "Where did you get it?"
"Oh," Pisces II interrupted. "We had it all the time."
"Shut up!" Pisces I yelled. "He asked me."
"Hold your tongue," Pisces II retorted hotly, "or I'll take off and
leave you here. I've had enough of you in the past century to last a
lifetime."
Pisces I said to Ingomar, "Pay no attention to that peasant." He helped
Pisces II push the stretcher next to Ingomar. Then he pushed a lever
and the stretcher reduced itself to ground height. It was too short
for Ingomar's body, having been designed for the body of a bird. "He's
right, though," Pisces I continued, giving the stretcher a kick because
it wasn't long enough. "We had the ship all along. It was despicable of
us to deceive you, but our ship was defective, and we needed yours for
parts."