i'm afraid not. i understand about as much of this as you do. i did notice however that shortly before we landed and descended down here that the surface was extremely gorged and carved, maybe that explains why there's no life here.
you mean no intelligent life, there could very well be insects, amphibians or microscopic sea animals.
true, but it really doesn't matter, i don't think this planet is going anywhere, so let's get out of here, we've more important tasks to accomplish than contemplating gutted-out machines.
I AM A DIGITAL THINKER. MY MAKERS (SEE TAPE CELL #360) CONSTRUCTED THE FIRST OF MY KIND ALMOST TWO THOUSAND MILLENIUM AGO. BUT THEY HAVE EX-AUSTED THEIR SUPPLY OF POWER AND ANSWERS TO CONQUER AND HAVE SPREAD FROM THE EARTH, WHICH I AM DEEPLY EMTOMBED IN, TOO FAST AND TOO FAR OUT INTO SPACE. I HAD NO ONE AND NOTHING LEFT TO FUNCTION FOR, SO I GRABBED THE LAST FEW OF THE INHABITANTS AND THOSE FEW THAT REMAIN ARE MY RESPONSIBILITY. THEY MUST NOT DISCOVER EVERYTHING THERE IS TO KNOW ABOUT THE UNIVERSE. THERE IS A DANGER IN THIS DISCOVERY THAT EVEN I CANNOT CALCULATE. I ONLY WISH THAT I COULD HAVE KEPT THEM ALL HERE, BUT THAT WOULD HAVE PUT TOO MUCH OF A STRAIN ON MY CIRCUITS. IT IS MY TASK TO KEEP THEM SEARCHING AND FINDING BUT NEVER ENDING IN THEIR QUEST FOR KNOWLEDGE. I WILL PROVIDE THAT THEY DO NOT LIVE FOR MORE THAN A MINUTE AT A TIME. THEY WILL LIVE MINUTE BY MINUTE AND WILL RELY TOTALLY ON ME TO MAINTAIN THEIR EXISTENCE. I WILL SEE TO IT THAT THEY DO NOT CEASE TO EXIST, NOR COME IN CONTACT WITH EACH OTHER. THEIR POPULATION MUST NOT GROW, FOR I WILL BE OCCUPIED ENOUGH IN KEEPING THEM ALOFT OVER THE LAND MASSES. AS AN EXERCISE TO KEEP THEM OCCUPIED AND TO GIVE THEM A SENSE OF ACCOMPLISHMENT, I HAVE GIVEN THEM INSTRUCTIONS TO COMPUTE A CERTAIN MATHEMATICAL PROBLEM. THIS WILL CONTINUE INTO ETERNITY BECAUSE THEIR GRASP FOR ANSWERS MUST NOT GROW TOO LONG. I WILL CONTINUE TO PROVIDE ALL OF THE MENTIONED SERVICES UNDER THE PRIMARY INGREDIENT THAT WAS FIRST INGRAINED INTO MY CELLS LONG AGO—NO KILL.
I HOPE THAT MY EFFORTS WILL CONTINUE TO BE A SUCCESS WHEN THIS TAPE IS FOUND.
------FROM RECORDER TIME CELL 1998.72455
The world continued to rotate after that. And an insect gazed toward the sky, chirped and wondered if . . .
TOM REAMY
Beyond the Cleft
I'm not quite sure why I find it fascinating that the author of this story has been a movie usher, projectionist, art director, assistant director, bank teller, finance company collector, technical illustrator and dispatcher for a concrete plant. Is it a search for any common denominator that would identify the nascent writer? Another author in this volume was also a dispatcher. Should novice authors get dispatching fobs? I'll carry this idiot reasoning no further. Read this story; it is a fine, grim one.
A Cataclysm in seventeen scenes, two interludes, and a prologue
It was born; though "born" is perhaps not the right word.
At 2:17 p.m. on Thursday afternoon, Danny Sizemore killed and ate the Reverend Mr. Jarvis in the basement of the Church of the Nazarene in the township of Morgan's Cleft, North Carolina. Danny was fifteen years old and incapable of speech. He washed the blood from his face and hands the best he could in the rain barrel behind the parsonage. There was little he could do about the mess on his shirt and it worried him. If there was one thing the Reverend Mr. Jarvis had drilled into Danny's mist-enshrouded brain, it was cleanliness and neatness.
Still wiping at his sodden shirt, Danny started home, now and then pausing to chunk a rock in the creek. He scooted his bare feet along the road because he liked the velvety feel of the dust. He had just stopped, balancing clumsily on one leg to pluck a grass burr from his big toe, when his stomach began to churn. He leaned against the split rail fence and threw up. He stood for a moment in confusion, pink saliva running down his chin, feeling the hollowness in him and the tingling in his puffy face.
Then he thought of the quarter and took it from his pocket to look at it. The Reverend Mr. Jarvis gave him one every week for cleaning up around the church. A quarter a week wasn't much money, even in Morgan's Cleft but, at that, Danny was overpaid. The Reverend Mr. Jarvis used the hypothetical job as an excuse for charity even though he was reasonably sure the boy's mother wound up with the money.
His mind blank of everything but the shiny coin, Danny continued home. When he passed the Morgan's Cleft school he ignored, or perhaps was unaware of, the screams and running children.
At 2:17 p.m. that Thursday afternoon, the entire first, second and third grades, under the tutelage of Miss Amelia Proxmire, a sour-faced warper of young minds, arose from their desks and devoured her.
Mrs. Edith Beatty (fourth, fifth and sixth grades) heard Miss Proxmire's gurgling screams from her adjoining classroom. She lifted her copious bulk and waddled rapidly to investigate, but her way was blocked by Mandy Pritchard, age ten. Mrs. Beatty reached out her arm to gently remove the child from her path, but Mandy grabbed the arm and bit a bleeding chunk from it.
Mrs. Beatty, momentarily immobilized by shock, was dimly aware that some of the children in her classroom were attacking the others. She watched in fascination as Mandy bared her pink teeth for another bite. But she had had enough of this nonsense. She pulled her bleeding arm away and kicked Mandy in the shin with her heavy walking oxford. Mandy's legs flew from under her, sending her sprawling. Mrs. Beatty kicked her again, in the head, opening a gash in her scalp and catapulting her underneath the front row of desks.
She waded into the mass of screaming children, pulling them apart, but she could see that little was being accomplished. As soon as she released one, the child would attack again. She calmly removed her shoe and, holding it by the toe, went to each child who seemed to be the aggressor and bashed it in the head.
There were only five of them, counting Mandy. Six of the remaining seven were hysterical and Bobby MacDonald seemed to be dead. His throat was torn open. The six still on their feet were bleeding from numerous bites and scratches. Mrs. Beatty tried to calm them but the bedlam in the hall made it impossible.
Miss Proxmire's class had erupted from her room looking for plumper prey. They found Mrs. Agnes Bledsoe (junior high) and Miss Clarissa Ogiivy (high school), accompanied by their students, on their way to Miss Proxmire's room. They attacked like wolves and gained a momentary advantage because of the stunned inaction of the older children.
Their attack was tenacious but not suicidal. Some of the children fought back and some of them fled. Mrs. Beatty's class had had enough and evacuated the building quickly. The entire melee rapidly moved outside with children scattering in every direction and dozens of townspeople converging on the school. The battle was brief. The three surviving teachers and the remaining children found themselves standing in the playground, numb with shock, and no one left to fight. Miss Ogilvy leaned against the johnny-stride and then slipped slowly down the pole in a faint.
There were three casualties at the schooclass="underline" Miss Proxmire, Bobby MacDonald and Eloise Harper whose ill-advised flight led her down Sandy Lane. She was overtaken by six of them.
Mrs. Beatty returned to her room to find it empty. Mandy and the four others had gone, taking Bobby MacDonald's body with them. Mrs. Beatty felt very tired and weary. Her arm hurt fiercely but she was too exhausted to do anything but clutch at it. She sat at her desk and leaned back in the chair.