Where be these enemies?- Capulet! Montague!
See what a scourge is laid upon your hate..
W. Shakespeare. Romeo and Juliet
The new star shone ominously in Quest's porthole.
The Faetians maintained a shocked silence.
Suddenly, Gor Terr jumped to his feet.
"Technology! Damned technology! It's to blame for everything. I, Gor Terr, the last of Faena's engineers, am the first to r-renounce civilization! To the forests! To the forests! To the caves! Wild Faetians on a wild Terr!" he boomed, foaming at the mouth. ."If anyone r-refuses to leave the r-rocket. I'll wring his neck. Let not a single metal part r-remind wretched people that they were once cultured. Beasts are much higher and nobler!"
His friends tried to calm the engineer down, still unwilling to admit to themselves that his mind had become clouded.
"Please try to understand, Gor Terr," said Ave reassuringly, "that the five Faetians left on Terr can only have one purpose-not just to survive, but to preserve civilization, to hand down the heritage of reason to future generations..."
"R-really?" roared Gor Terr with a glare at Mada.
Embarrassed, Mada turned away.
"There must be cultured Faetians after us," confirmed Ave Mar, "and our duty is to preserve for them the knowledge we possess."
"High-flown r-rubbish!" bellowed Gor Terr. "I hate those words and I hate all those instruments. Even touching the damned metal drives me frantic."
"Gor Terr will have to pull himself together," said Ave Mar, raising his voice. "He's an engineer, and he'll stay an engineer to the end of his days."
Gor Terr roared with laughter.
"So that your sons can learn how to make r-rockets out of wall partitions? So that they can learn to slaughter animals, and then their own kind?"
"Never shall the Faetians on Terr learn how to kill their own kind!" exclaimed the outraged Ave Mar. "It will be the most terrible thing if we bow down in our grief. No! Only energy, faith in ourselves and resourcefulness will save what is left of the Faetian race."
"For what?" asked Gor Terr gloomily.
"For the triumph of reason!"
"High-flown words again! What d'you want?"
"I want you to think about what kind of building the Faetians are going to use when they're in the forest, what apparatus and parts will have to be taken from here to the new house, and how we can gradually dismantle the rocket: it's the only source of metal on Terr."
"Dismantle?" echoed Toni Fae in fright.
"Yes," confirmed Ave Mar. "We won't need a spaceship any more. The Faetians will use its walls for axes, knives, spear-points and arrows. We have enough metal to last us several generations for that purpose. By that time, Gor Terr's pupils and their descendants will have learned to prospect for ore here and to smelt it. Civilization must be preserved!"
Mada looked at her husband with rapture. How many times had he presented himself to her in a new aspect, stronger, firmer, as one who knew which course to adopt!
"Filthy despot!" roared Gor Terr. "He wants to make us serve his unborn offspring! I've had enough of blind obedience to a Dictator who aimed for a disintegration war and achieved it! No! I won't tolerate any authority over me! I don't want to obey anybody's orders, least of all those of an offspring of Danjab's R-ruler!"
"Gor Terr, my dear," intervened Mada gently, putting her hand on his massive hairy arm. "Think what you are saying. We have no dictators here, or rulers, or their children. There are only Faetians, united by common grief and a common fate. Weren't you the one who dreamed of workshops on Terr? You shall have workshops here in which we, your comrades, shall work for you, and then..." She looked into his eyes and added, "I shall raise helpers for you."
Gor Terr scowled, glaring malevolently from under his beetling brows. Mada's maternal tone soothed him a little. But not for long. He soon relapsed into his former fury and, without listening to anyone, began smashing up the spaceship's control levers, bending them, trying to wrench them out of their sockets.
To save the Faetians, the madman himself and keep the ship's equipment intact, Mada ordered Gor Terr to be confined to the airlock which was used for going out into space.
The noisy struggle with the Faetian strong man distracted the Faetians from their common misfortune. The immediate blotted out what was far away. And only after the hatch had been fastened down behind Gor Terr did Ave Mar and Toni Fae, exhausted and shattered, collapsed into the armchairs at the control panel. They stared dismally in front of them, panting for breath.
Mada was busy near the dispensary. She had decided to give Gor Terr an injection and administer a shock that would bring him to his senses.
All attempts to go into the airlock, however, merely provoked further attacks of frenzy. They could not even serve him his food.
Such was the unhappy way in which the Faetians spent the first days of their permanent exile. Below, in the common cabin, Faena's most distinguished scientist lay dying; above, in the airlock, the last surviving engineer had gone raving mad.
Toni Fae was deeply depressed.
He heard Ala Veg's voice again during a routine session of electromagnetic communication with Deimo. It was remote and sad. She talked about the meaninglessness of existence, about her husband's serious illness, about the total lack of change and how the station chief, as before, hated the roundhead couple. She said that she despised life. She was terrified at the thought of the distance that separated her from Toni Fae. Was life worth living? She suggested that Toni Fae and she should both put an end to their own lives during the next communications session.
Toni Fae could not hold out against this and agreed. He stole from Mada's dispensary an ampoule of stupefying gas, a large dose of which could be fatal. After he had inhaled a little of it, he felt blissfully happy, could not stay on his feet, swayed and sang a silly song about a lizard which ate its own tail. He then collapsed and went to sleep. Mada guessed what had happened, found the ampoule hidden on his person and confiscated it. When he came round, he made the discovery that Mada's language could be far from endearing.
Toni Fae succumbed to apathy. Everything around him seemed dismal and wretched. Even the world of nature had changed. There were no more colourful sunsets on Terr. Night gave way to dull daylight. It never stopped drizzling, and a patchy grey pall of mist clung to the tree-tops level with the portholes of the control cabin. There were no golden apples left in the forest.
When twilight descended on Terr, it reminded them of their own gloomy planet.
Misery and homesickness seemed capable of destroying the will to live in all the other Faetians, as had happened with Toni Fae.
Mada, however, in whom nature had stirred a sense of responsibility for all, sick and well alike, could not give in to despair. She had to look after Um Sat, feed everybody, keep an eye on Toni Fae and encourage Ave with an affectionate glance from time to time.
Ave Mar was conducting himself with dignity. He had obligations which none but he could fulfil: it was necessary to go hunting in the forest. Gor Terr couldn't help him now. Ave would go out of the ship, leaving Mada in a state of permanent anxiety, but he always returned before dark, and with his kill. By the will of circumstances, Ave, a passionate believer in the preservation of the lost Faena's civilization, was having to lead a very primitive mode of life. He had stopped using firearms, saving the ammunition for more urgent occasions. He had made a bow and he practised archery. Using his natural strength, he could draw a bowstring so that the arrow with its hand-made head could pierce a stout tree-branch right through.
Once, Ave Mar brought back a big fat bird hit by one of his arrows. Careful not to disturb Um Sat, the astronauts assembled in the control cabin, talking quietly amongst themselves. Mada began inexpertly plucking the hunting trophy, pleased that it would make a good bouillon for the sick man.
Toni Fae was adjusting the electromagnetic communications set, hoping for a session with Ala Veg. Mada warned him that if he made a fool of himself again, she would ban communications with Deimo. Toni sheepishly bowed his head.
Ave Mar was relaxing after his hard day in the rain while hunting in the forest.
Mada looked round at the porthole and screamed. The snarling face of a Faetoid was staring into the cabin. His shoulders and chest were matted with curly hair, his skin showing through underneath. No thought was readable in the crazy eyes.
Only Ave Mar realized that this was Gor Terr lowering himself by rope, not a wild beast that had made its way to them. The madman had evidently torn his clothes into strips and knotted them together to make a rope. He had opened the outer airlock hatch, climbed outside and was now descending the ship's fuselage.
In an attempt to head him off, Ave Mar rushed to the transition hatch, tore through the common cabin and disappeared into the lower airlock. He shinned down the vertical ladder, hardly touching the rungs on the way.
But however agile Ave Mar may have been, Gor Terr had time on his side.
Ave Mar was only just getting out of the lower airlock when the escapee was already clinging to the end of the home-made rope. No rational Faetian would ever have risked jumping from such a height. But Gor Terr was not being rational. He dropped to the ground in front of Ave Mar, jumped up below him, as if on springs, and made a dash for the forest.
Without realizing what he was doing, Gor Terr ran into the forest straight on to the path beaten by the animals on their way to the watering place. It was sodden after the rain and his feet slipped and slithered apart. But he was conscious of only one thing: he was being pursued. He leaped aside into a small glade, unrecognizable after the rain, since it was covered with muddy puddles that disappeared into the mist. Gor Terr never suspected that there was a bog hidden underneath the wet green surface. He dived into a cloud of mist hanging over the grass and disappeared.
Ave Mar, who had been following on his heels, stopped dead. Then he immediately dashed forward. His feet sloshed through the slime. He took several careful, squelching steps and suddenly saw Gor Terr in the mist. He looked as if he was sitting down on the green grass. Only his head and torso were visible above it. It took Ave Mar a moment to realize that Gor Terr had sunk waist-deep into a quagmire.
Until recently, Ave Mar, used to dwelling in the civilized cities of Faena and to driving a steamcar along magnificent highways, had never suspected that it might be possible to sink up to the waist in the soil like that. Ave had wandered into this bog a few days back when the rain had started pouring down. But his instinctive caution, aroused by the foul, stinking mud that was squelching underfoot, had saved him, making him skirt the deceptive glade with its murky puddles. This time, however, he could not back away; he rushed to Gor Terr's assistance. He immediately sank knee-deep into the quagmire. He made a movement to extricate himself and realized that he was sinking into the mire himself. Fortunately, he was not as heavy as Gor Terr; moreover, he was nearer to the edge of the bog. Avoiding sudden movements, he lay down and began to extricate himself by crawling, as if swimming over a shallow surface covered with wet grass.
Once he felt himself on firmer ground, Ave stood up, glanced over his shoulder and saw Gor Terr. Now only his head was showing above the grass and his outstretched hands, with which he was clutching at some roots. Gor managed to turn his head and look at Ave Mar, his bulging, glazed eyes staring out of the mist. Every movement he made sucked him down still further.
Ave Mar felt his horror physically and stopped in spite of himself, but read such reproach in the doomed man's eyes that he shuddered. Ave abruptly turned back, crawled out a little way and, although he hardly felt himself on firm ground, jumped to his feet, ran to the nearest tree and tore off a dangling liana.
When he returned to the cloud of mist hanging over the grass, he had some difficulty in making out the shaggy head and the outstretched hands.
At the sight of Ave Mar, Gor Terr's rounded eyes came to life again and shone with entreaty, hope and even joy.
Ave Mar threw the end of the liana to the sinking man. Understanding glimmered in Gor Terr's eyes and he grabbed at the line.
Ave Mar was now faced with the impossible-to drag the gigantic Gor Terr out of the quagmire. Ave Mar had nothing like the strength to do such a thing. But with the liana he had brought a crooked branch which he had broken off a tree. He drove it into a firm mound and began winding the liana onto it as if onto a windlass.
Turn by turn, he gradually pulled Gor Terr out so that the latter finally managed to lie flat and crawl along, as Ave had done before him.
At last, a mud-plastered Gor Terr rose to his full height in front of Ave.
"You're not bad as an engineer, Ave Mar," he said. "Thank you."
These words meant more to Ave Mar than any diagnosis. He now realized that the deadly danger to which Gor Terr had been subjected in the bog had administered the nervous shock needed to save him from insanity. Gor Terr had come back to his senses.
"What happened? How did I end up here? Weren't we out hunting together? Who undressed me? Your wife will take me for a Faetoid."
"She'll be happy! You've been seriously ill."
"R-really?" Gor Terr was astonished. "But I've certainly been having nightmares. I dreamt the Dictator had thrown me into prison."
"That's all over. Don't think about it any more. There are more important things to be done. We can't live in the rocket any longer. We have to deliver food and water to the top. The Elder can't go outside."
"Then we'll have to build a house in the forest."
"I must admit I don't know how to do that. I'm only a theoretician."
"But the theoretician figured out how to rig up a windlass quickly enough. With a helper like you, it would be easy to knock up a house in the forest. I can already see how to set about it."
Mada couldn't believe her eyes when she saw Ave Mar and the recently crazed Gor Terr chatting amiably together on the way back.
"I don't understand this at all," whispered Toni Fae. "Oughtn't we to help Ave Mar tie him up?"
"No, certainly not!" exclaimed Mada.
With the instinct of a Sister of Health, she had grasped that years of training and care couldn't have given as good a result as what had happened in the forest.
...The unfamiliar thudding of axes was heard in the forest.
The enormous, round-shouldered Dzin, wringing out her wet ginger hair with her long hands, crept up to the spot where the mighty stranger, who had put paid to a Spotted Horror and to many of Dzin's fellow tribesmen, was now slaying trees. And yet he wasn't eating them.
Hidden in a thicket, squatting on her haunches and holding her heels with her forepaws, she was watching as he and another, who had hair only on his head, were hitting the trees with strange sticks that had what looked like wet, glittering ends. Their strength was so great that the tree fell down like a slain beast. Then the strangers skinned the trees with their clubs, breaking off all the branches, and the tree became straight and smooth. They shortened the tree with a screaming stick, then dragged it over to the other slain trees and forced them to fit together.
In this way, they helped to raise from the ground a huge tree that was empty inside. It looked like a cave.
Almost as soon as the strangers had finished banging their sticks, Dzin would hide in a thicket so as to come to the summons of the thudding noise on the next day.
Ave Mar and Gor Terr never suspected that their work was being watched. They knocked together a frame thought up by Gor Terr without any metal fixings. The work was nearing its end.
Many instruments and much equipment had to be transferred to the house into which the astronauts had to move.
Gor Terr and Ave Mar went to the ship to fetch all these things. So as not to disturb Um Sat by hammering in the common cabin, they went straight up to the control cabin. Assisted by Ave Mar, Gor Terr began breaking off the levers and rods on which the electromagnetic communications apparatus was secured.
At this point, the always quiet and tactful Toni Fae flew off the handle.
"Gor Terr and Ave Mar can kill me first," he screamed hysterically, "but I won't let anything in the spaceship be damaged."
Gor Terr bellowed with laughter, as during his recent crazy spell.
"D'you want me to pay you off, kid, tie your hands together and dump you in an empty airlock? I feel sorry for you. Just get this into your head: no one needs my Quest any more. I shall be the first to break it up. So out of the way, my dear Toni Fae."
"Kill your old friend first!"
Ave Mar turned to Mada in his astonishment.
Her face was troubled and her eyes were sad.
"Get out of the way!" roared Gor Terr.
"Stop," came a feeble voice from the hatch. Overcoming his weakness, Um Sat climbed up into the control cabin. (Gor Terr involuntarily froze in front of Toni Fae, not thrusting him aside after all.) "Stop," repeated Um Sat. "The spaceship Quest is inviolable. Everything is changing in the life of the Faetians. They must choose a new way."
Again Ave Mar looked at the alarmed, saddened Mada.
Gor Terr stood still in bewilderment. Toni Fae rushed to the electromagnetic communications apparatus.