“I’m Hester Hanshaw. Ship’s engineer.”
“What’s that?”
“I keep the engines running.”
Keech looked impressed. “All the time?”
“I mean I fix them,” Hester told him, “if something goes wrong.”
Looking skyward, Keech said, “All those clouds have engines? Fancy that.”
Covering her exasperation by a change of subject, Hester said, “What kind of carpentry do you do?”
“Oh, the usual. Sacrificial altars, caskets, suspended cages to put sinners in.”
“Cheerful line of work.”
“Tough to build things that last,” Keech commented, “with the yellow rain all the time. But we won’t have that anymore, will we, now that Juju-Kuxtil is here?”
“You mean Councilman Luthguster?”
“The million names of God,” Keech said solemnly. “Which one is that?”
“Number eighty-seven,” Hester said. “What’s in this soup? No, don’t tell me.”
On Achum’s other side sat Captain Standforth, brooding at his soup, and on his other side sat Astrogator Pam Stokes, brooding at her slide rule. “Fascinating,” she mumbled. “That asteroid belt.”
“Pam?” The captain welcomed any distraction from that soup; things seemed to be moving in it. “Did you say something?”
“This system contains an asteroid belt,” Pam told him, “much like the one in our own Solar System.”
“Oh, the asteroid belt,” the captain said, his mind filling with unhappy reminiscence. “I always have a terrible time navigating around that. You barely take off from Earth, you’re just past Mars, and there it is. Millions of rocks, boulders, bits of broken-off planet all over the place. What a mess!”
“Well, the asteroid belt in this system,” Pam said, “has an orbit that’s much more erratic. In fact…” Swiftly, she manipulated her slide rule. “Hmm. It seems to me…” She gazed skyward, frowning.
So did the captain, though without any idea what he was supposed to be looking at. He blinked, and a yellow stone dropped into his soup, splashing oily liquid in various directions.
“Of course!” said Pam, pleased with her calculations.
A stone bounced off the table near Councilman Luthguster’s right hand. A stone thunked into a platter of dilbump and slowly sank. A paradiddle of stones rattled in the center of the circle of feasters.
“The yellow rain!” cried Achum in sheerest horror.
Screams. Terror. The natives fled into handy burrows while the people from the Hopeful stared at one another in wild surmise. More stones fell. Achum dropped to his knees beside Councilman Luthguster, hands clasped together: “Juju-Kuxtil, save us! Save us!”
“It’s a meteor shower!” Ensign Benson cried.
“No,” Pam said, utterly calm, “it’s the asteroid belt. You see, its eccentric orbit must from time to time cross this—”
Clambering clumsily to his feet, Luthguster shouted, “Asteroids? We’ll all be killed!”
Taken aback, Achum settled on his haunches and gaped at the councilman. “Juju-Kuxtil?” Meantime, more stones fell.
Bewildered, the captain said, “Pam? Shouldn’t we take cover?”
“According to my calculations,” Pam answered, “this time we’re merely tangential with—”
A good-sized boulder smacked into the earth at Luthguster’s feet. In utter panic, spreading his arms to keep from losing his balance, he shrieked, “Stop!”
Still calmly explaining, Pam said, “it should be over almost at once. In fact, right now.”
She was right; no more rocks fell. Slowly, the natives crept back out of their burrows, peeking skyward. Achum, faith restored, bellowed, “Juju-Kuxtil did it! He did it!”
“Juju-Kuxtil! Juju-Kuxtil!” the natives all agreed. Then they joined hands and danced in a great circle around Luthguster, singing, “For he’s a jolly good savior: for he’s a jolly good savior.”
After the adoration, Luthguster and the captain and Pam and Ensign Benson met on the command deck of the Hopeful for a conference. “I think it’s obvious what’s happened here,” Ensign Benson began.
“They think I’m God,” Luthguster said complacently.
“Heaven has become debased, degenerate.”
“I beg your pardon,” Luthguster said.
Captain Standforth cleared his throat. “Uh, Billy says they have human sacrifice.”
Luthguster assumed his most statesmanlike look. “I don’t believe we should be too harsh in our judgments, Captain. These people aren’t all bad. We shouldn’t condemn a whole society out of hand.”
“Of course not,” Ensign Benson said. “First, we have to understand why a society behaves a certain way. Then we condemn it.”
“According to the old records,” the captain said, “they were perfectly nice people when they left Earth — cleaned up after their farewell picnic and everything.”
“But no small settlement,” Ensign Benson said, “could survive a constant, unpredictable barrage of rocks from the sky. Everything they ever built was knocked down. Every machine they brought with them was destroyed. Every crop they planted was pounded flat. No wonder they returned to barbarism. You have to be hit on the head with a lot of rocks to think the councilman here is God.”
Luthguster puffed himself up like a frog preparatory to an answering statement; but before he could make it, Hester came in with Keech. Each carried an armload of yellow rocks. “Captain,” Hester said, “request permission to show a visitor around the ship.”
“Nice cloud you got here,” Keech said.
“His name’s Keech,” Hester explained. “He’s a carpenter; seems a little brighter than most. Thought I’d try to explain engines to him.”
“Certainly, Hester,” the captain said. He never denied anybody anything. “What are you doing with all those rocks?”
“Going to analyze them,” Hester said.
“Very good idea,” the captain said. He didn’t know what analyze meant.
Hester and Keech left, and Ensign Benson turned to Pam, saying, “Do these rockfalls happen often?”
“Very.”
“Every day?”
Pam shook her head. “Not necessarily. According to my calculations, the planet’s orbit intersects the asteroid’s orbit so frequently, in such a complex pattern, that to most people, it would seem utterly erratic.”
“Could you work out the pattern?”
“Of course. As a matter of fact, there should be another brief shower later today.”
“Then I’m glad,” Luthguster said, we’re all in the ship.”
“Billy isn’t,” the captain said. “He asked permission to go for a walk with the human sacrifice.”
“Bad,” Ensign Benson said. “When the rocks fall, the natives will lose faith in the councilman. They’ll want revenge.”
In the engine room, Hester explained engines to Keech, who looked bewildered but interested. “And from the generator,” she was saying, “electricity is stored in these cells for later use.”
“Pretty clever,” Keech admitted. “Given the right education and equipment, a human being could do the same stuff you angels do.”
“You’re beginning to catch on.”
Bong, said the ship. Keech look startled, Hester annoyed. Bong, bong, bong, bongbongbong. “Yellow rain!” Keech cried.
“I wish it would lay off,” Hester muttered.
“Do you realize,” Keech demanded, what all this is doing to my faith?”
On a blasted plain, amid evidence everywhere of prior bombardments, Billy and Malya reclined and kissed. All at once, she pulled back, frowning at him, saying, “Are you sure you’re a supernatural being?”