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  NOVA 2

  Introduction

  Harry Harrison

  Zira Left Unguarded...

  Robert Sheckley

  “East Wind, West Wind”

  Frank M. Robinson

  The Sumerian Oath

  Philip José Farmer

  Now+n, Now-n

  Robert Silverberg

  Two Odysseys in the Center

  Barry N. Malzberg

  Darkness

  André Carneiro

  On the Wheel

  Damon Knight

  Miss Omega Raven

  Naomi Mitchison

  The Poet in the Hologram...

  Ed Bryant

  The Old Folks

  James E. Gunn

  The Steam-Driven Boy

  John Sladek

  I Tell You, It’s True

  Poul Anderson

  And I Have Come Upon...

  James Tiptree, Jr.

  The Ergot Show

  Brian Aldiss

  Copyright © 1972 by Harry Harrison

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the Publisher.

  All the characters and events portrayed in these stories are fictitious.

  Printed in the United States of America.

  INTRODUCTION

  Science fiction is as American as apple pie. Or at least it used to be. This is no longer true. There has been an international upsurge of interest in the medium that is very heartening to anyone involved in it.

  Of course the father of modem science fiction, H. G. Wells, was English, and there have always been a good number of British writers working in the field ever since. But, until recently, their primary markets were American magazines and publishers. Kingsley Amis, in one of his more penetrating moods, was heard to remark that “science fiction is written by Americans and Britons and not by women and foreigners.” There is just enough truth in this to make it relevant as well as funny. There are some excellent female science fiction writers, but all too few of them writing all too little. (Though we are lucky enough to have a Naomi Mitchison story in this Nova, as well as one in the first.) And, until quite recently, there were just no other science fiction writers of international caliber outside of the English speaking countries. However, it must be admitted that an exception can be made for the Soviets who have produced an indigenous form of science fiction that seems very fusty and old-fashioned by our standards. There is hope that they will improve.

  Then very suddenly, within the past decade, a number of countries discovered science fiction. Discovered in this context means that publishers around the world became aware that they could make money by selling this particular brand of fiction. Since there were no home-grown writers whom they could turn to, they were forced to buy translation rights from the American and British publishers. It is interesting to note that they knew just what to buy since there were science fiction enthusiasts eagerly waiting to advise them in every country. These were fans who read science fiction in English and who were as enthusiastic and knowledgeable as any American fan. Soon the major writers could count upon a steady trickle of income from foreign sales, plus occasional decorative copies of their works in exotic bindings and languages. (They could also count upon the occasional outright theft of a book since a number of countries take a much more lenient view of copyright laws than America and Great Britain. The Soviet Union is not a member of the Universal Copyright Convention so they pirate our books just as we pirate theirs—legally. Not that this in any way cheers the writers or fattens their bank accounts. I recently obtained a copy of an anthology in Latvian containing one of my stories. The entire book, containing only American stories, had been translated from the Russian. This means that not only had all of these stories been stolen and reprinted in Russian, but the crooks had sold the rights all over again and made more money for themselves.)

  These publishing successes of translated books encouraged local writers to try their hands at science fiction, so local German, Italian and Japanese schools sprang up. In the beginning they disguised their national character and pretended to be true American Anglo-Saxon writers. Roberta Rambelli, who later became one of Italy’s leading editors and translators, wrote her first science fiction under the pen name of “Robert Rainbell.” It consisted of stories all about great guys named Milton Woodrich and Morton G. Moore. This is all part of the past now and indigenous writers are proud of their work and the distinctive difference that national culture supplies.

  Yet the familiar, popular science fiction authors all over the world are still the same as they always were. The truth of this was driven home to me by the First Brazilian Science Fiction Film Festival that was held in Rio de Janeiro last spring. A number of foreign writers and film makers were guests of the festival, and the writers participated in a science fiction forum held in conjunction with it. Among the people there were Robert Sheckley, Philip Jose Farmer, Damon Knight, Poul Anderson and Brian W. Aldiss. Robert Silverberg was invited but was in Africa and could not make it. If these names seem strangely familiar it is because they all have stories in this volume. Andre Carneiro was chairman of the science fiction sessions and his work is represented here as well.

  Rio was an experience not soon forgotten. Brazil is a country bigger than the United States, busy, throbbing, vital—and fascinated by science fiction as this festival proved. Yet home-brewed science fiction is still new on the scene there. Dr. Leo L. Barrow, translator and close student of Brazilian letters, writes:

  “With notable exceptions like Andre Carneiro, Fausto Cunha, and Dinah Silveira de Queiroz, few Brazilians write science fiction. Perhaps more should. Brazilians with their rich African heritage, and their jovial optimistic way of not facing the harsh realities that surround them, have a natural gift for the blending of reality and phantasy.

  “Andre Cameiro sees little difference between science fiction and other good literature. He feels that science fiction may be the type of literature most closely linked to the evolution of humanity, since it studies man’s problematical side projected into the future. All Brazilian literature tends to see reality and the human essence through a very special lens, with a strong touch of native stigmatism, which gives them a fascinating new dimension.”

  What I find of particular interest is that Cameiro’s writing is concerned with the approach to reality, J. G. Ballard’s “inner space.” (Ballard was also in Rio—as were many American writers.) More than one author in this anthology writes a story concerned with an approach to reality. This is either a complete coincidence, a virus caught in Brazil, or a new thing on the wing in science fiction. I prefer to believe the latter. (Ed Bryant caught the infection and he was safe in his stirrup buckle factory while the others were sweating and sipping beer on the beach in Copacabana.)

  There is a new awareness in science fiction. It is a product of the same awakening that is producing student interest in ecology and Presidential attention to pollution. It is a slippery feeling that all is not quite so right with this perfect world, that the superpatriotic bumper sticker Love America or Leave It is too simplistic, in addition to being downright stupid. It is a suspicion that the sticker, Change America or Lose It, is much closer to the truth, and a feeling that the governor is missing from our run-away technology and that a new one had better be fitted. At once.

  This new-found awareness of science fiction writers is reflecte
d in this anthology. Perhaps they are being churlish to scrutinize so closely the science half of their craft, but I do not think so. Science is not being doubted—just questioned. And there is a world of difference between these two words. The efficacy of big science, unplanned and uncontrolled science, is being looked at, not the basic concepts. Accepted values are being questioned and goals—planned or unplanned—examined from all sides. That this is a good cause goes without saying.

  Yet these writers are still entertainers; they have not forgotten that important aspect of their art. In looking at the world with new eyes and asking new questions they still write good stories. Better stories perhaps because they are looking at problems vital to continued existence on this spaceship Earth.

  And they are also laughing. At least seven stories in this collection are sparked with wit—and two of these are downright funny. This is a wonderful change that I hope continues. There is little enough around to laugh at these days and all contributions are gratefully accepted.

  Harry Harrison

  Zira Left Unguarded,

  The Jenghik Palace in Flames,

  Jon Westerly Dead

  by Robert Sheckley

  There is a noble tradition of great and epical adventure in science fiction. Beginning, perhaps, with Edgar Rice Burroughs, it continues through the wide screen space opera epics of E. E. Smith, Ph.D., on through Jack Williamson, and even the very young John W. Campbell, Jr. Lately it has begun to be called “sword and sworcery,” but this is just the most recent protean form the continuing epic tradition has taken. I record this all historically because here, that exceedingly fine writer and wielder of a mordant typewriter, Robert Sheckley, has finished off the up until now endless saga, written finis to those mighty tomes, killed the entire literature dead. Read on—if you dare!

  The bulletin came through blurred with fear. “Somebody is dancing on our graves,” said Charleroi. His gaze lifted to include the entire Earth. “This will make a fine mausoleum.”

  “Your words are strange,” she said. “Yet there is that in your manner which I find pleasing . . . Come closer, stranger, and explain yourself.”

  I stepped back and withdrew my sword from its scabbard. Beside me, I heard a metallic hiss; Ocpetis Mam had drawn his sword, too, and now he stood with me, back to back, as the Megenth horde approached.

  “Now shall we sell our lives dearly, Jon Westerley,” said Ocpetis Mam in the peculiar guttural hiss of the Mnerian race.

  “Indeed we shall,” I replied. “And there will be some more than one widow to dance the Passagekeen before this day is through.”

  He nodded. “And some disconsolate fathers will make the lonely sacrifice to the God of Deteriorations.”

  We smiled at each other’s staunch words. Yet it was no laughing matter. The Megenth bucks advanced slowly, implacably, across the green and purple moss-sward. They had drawn their raftii—those long, curved, double-pointed dirks that had struck terror in the innermost recesses of the civilized galaxy. We waited.

  The first blade crossed mine. I parried and thrust, catching the big fellow full in the throat. He reeled back, and I set myself for my next antagonist.

  Two of them came at me this time. I could hear the sharp intake of Ocpetis’s breath as he hacked and hewed with his sword. The situation was utterly hopeless.

  I thought of the unprecedented combination of circumstances that had brought me to this situation. I thought of the Cities of the Terran Plurality, whose very existence depended upon the foredoomed outcome of this present impasse. I thought of autumn in Carcassone, hazy mornings in Saskatoon, steel-colored rain falling on the Black Hills. Was all this to pass? Surely not. And yet—why not?

  We said to the computer: “These are the factors, this is our predicament. Do us the favor of solving our problem and saving our lives and the lives of all Earth.”

  The computer computed. It said: “The problem cannot be solved.”

  “Then how are we to go about saving Earth from destruction?”

  “You don’t,” the computer told us.

  We left sadly. But then Jenkins said, “What the hell—that was only one computer’s opinion.”

  That cheered us up. We held our heads high. We decided to take further consultations.

  The gypsy turned the card. It came up Final Judgement. We left sadly. Then Myers said, “What the hell—that’s only one gypsy’s opinion.”

  That cheered us up. We held our heads high. We decided to take further consultations.

  You said it yourself: “ ‘A bright blossom of blood on his forehead.’ You looked at me with strange eyes. Must I love you?”

  It all began so suddenly. The reptilian forces of Megenth, long quiescent, suddenly began to expand due to the serum given them by Charles Engstrom, the power-crazed telepath. Jon Westerley was hastily recalled from his secret mission to Angos II. Westerley had the supreme misfortune of materializing within a ring of Black Force, due to the inadvertent treachery of Ocpetis Marn, his faithful Mnerian companion, who had, unknown to Westerley, been trapped in the Hall of Floating Mirrors, and his mind taken over by the renegade Santhis, leader of the Entropy Guild. That was the end for Westerley, and the beginning of the end for us.

  The old man was in a stupor. I unstrapped him from the smoldering control chair and caught the characteristic sweet-salty-sour odor of manginee—that insidious narcotic grown only in the caverns of Ingidor—whose insidious influence had subverted our guardposts along the Wall Star Belt.

  I shook him roughly. “Preston!” I cried. “For the sake of Earth, for Magda, for everything you hold dear—tell me what happened.”

  His eyes rolled. His mouth twitched. With vast effort he said, “Zirn! Zirn is lost, is lost, is lost!”

  His head lolled forward. Death rearranged his face.

  Zirn lost! My brain worked furiously. That meant that the High Star Pass was open, the negative accumulators no longer functioning, the drone soldiers overwhelmed. Zirn was a wound through which our life-blood would pour. But surely there was a way out?

  President Edgars looked at the cerulean telephone. He had been warned never to use it except in the direst emergency, and perhaps not even then. But surely the present situation justified? . . . He lifted the telephone.

  “Paradise Reception, Miss Ophelia speaking.”

  “This is President Edgars of Earth. I must speak to God immediately.”

  “God is out of his office just now and cannot be reached. May I be of service?”

  “Well, you see,” Edgars said, “I have this really bad emergency on my hands. I mean, it looks like the end of everything.”

  “Everything?” Miss Ophelia asked.

  “Well, not literally everything. But it does mean the destruction of us. Of Earth and all that. If you could just bring this to God’s attention—”

  “Since God is omniscient, I’m sure he knows all about it.”

  “I’m sure he does. But I thought that if I could just speak to him personally—”

  “I’m afraid that is not possible at this time. But you could leave a message. God is very good and very fair, and I’m sure he will consider your problem and do what is right and godly. He’s wonderful, you know. I love God.”

  “We all do,” Edgars said sadly.

  “Is there anything else?”

  “No. Yes! May I speak with Mr. Joseph J. Edgars, please?”

  “Who is that?”

  “My father. He died ten years ago.”

  “I’m sorry, sir. That is not permitted.”

  “Can you at least tell me if he’s up there with you people?”

  “Sorry, we are not allowed to give out that information.”

  “Well, can you tell me if anybody is up there? I mean, is there really an afterlife? Or is it maybe only you and God up there? Or maybe only you?”

  “For information concerning the afterlife,” Miss Ophelia said, “kindly contact your nearest priest, minister, rabbi, mullah, or anyone else on the ac
credited list of God representatives. Thank you for calling.”

  There was a sweet tinkle of chimes. Then the line went dead. “What did the Big Fellow say?” asked General Muller.

  “All I got was double-talk from his secretary.”

  “Personally, I don’t believe in superstitions like God,” General Muller said. “Even if they happen to be true, I find it healthier not to believe. Shall we get on with it?”

  They got on with it.

  Testimony of the robot who might have been Dr. Zach:

  “My true identity is a mystery to me, and one which, under the circumstances, I do not expect to be resolved. But I was at the Jenghik Palace. I saw the Megenth warriors swarm over the crimson balustrades, overturn the candelabra, smash, kill, destroy. The governor died with a sword in his hand. The Terran Guard made their last stand in the Dolorous Keep, and perished to a man after mighty blows given and received. The ladies of the court defended themselves with daggers so small as to appear symbolic. They were granted quick passage. I saw the great fire consume the bronze eagles of Earth. The subject peoples had long fled. I watched the Jenghik Palace—that great pile, marking the furthest extent of Earth’s suzerainty, topple soundlessly into the dust from which it sprung. And I knew then that all was lost, and that the fate of Terra—of which planet I consider myself a loyal son, despite the fact that I was (presumably) crafted rather than created, produced rather than born—the fate of divine

  Terra, I say, was to be annihilated utterly, until not even the ghost of a memory remained.

  “You said it youself: ‘A star exploded in his eye.’ This last day I must love you. The rumors are heavy tonight, and the sky is red. I love it when you turn your head just so. Perhaps it is true that we are chaff between the iron jaws of life and death. Still, I prefer to keep time by my own watch. So X fly in the face of the evidence, I fly with you.