Short Fiction - Ray Bradbury (short story to read .TXT) 📗

delicately dancing on a web of stars. His eyes flicked open behind the glassite sheath, and saw the Constellation. Kriere smiled. His hands came up. He knew he was about to be rescued.

Burnett smiled right back at him. What Kriere didn’t know was that he was about to end a ten-years’ war.

There was only one way of drawing Lethla off guard, and it had to be fast.

Burnett jabbed a purple-topped stud. The star-port clashed open as it had done a thousand times before; but for the first time it was a good sound. And out of the star-port, at Sam Burnett’s easily fingered directions, slid the long clawlike mechanism that picked up bodies from space.

Lethla watched, intent and cold and quiet. The gun was cold and quiet, too.

The claw glided toward Kriere without a sound, now, dreamlike in its slowness.

It reached Kriere.

Burnett inhaled a deep breath.

The metal claw cuddled Kriere in its shiny palm.

Lethla watched.

He watched while Burnett exhaled, touched another lever and said: “You know, Lethla, there’s an old saying that only dead men come aboard the Constellation. I believe it.”

And the claw closed as Burnett spoke, closed slowly and certainly, all around Kriere, crushing him into a ridiculous posture of silence. There was blood running on the claw, and the only recognizable part was the head, which was carefully preserved for identification.

That was the only way to draw Lethla off guard.

Burnett spun about and leaped.

The horror on Lethla’s face didn’t go away as he fired his gun.

Rice came in fighting, too, but not before something like a red-hot ramrod stabbed Sam Burnett, catching him in the ribs, spinning him back like a drunken idiot to fall in a corner.

Fists made blunt flesh noises. Lethla went down, weaponless and screaming. Rice kicked. After awhile Lethla quit screaming, and the room swam around in Burnett’s eyes, and he closed them tight and started laughing.

He didn’t finish laughing for maybe ten minutes. He heard the retriever claws come inside, and the star-port grind shut.

Out of the red darkness, Rice’s voice came and then he could see Rice’s young face over him. Burnett groaned.

Rice said, “Sam, you shouldn’t have done it. You shouldn’t have, Sam.”

“To hell with it.” Burnett winced, and fought to keep his eyes open. Something wet and sticky covered his chest. “I said this was my last trip and I meant it. One way or the other, I’d have quit!”

“This is the hard way⁠—”

“Maybe. I dunno. Kind of nice to think of all those kids who’ll never have to come aboard the Constellation, though, Rice.” His voice trailed off. “You watch the shelves fill up and you never know who’ll be next. Who’d have thought, four days ago⁠—”

Something happened to his tongue so it felt like hard ice blocking his mouth. He had a lot more words to say, but only time to get a few of them out:

“Rice?”

“Yeah, Sam?”

“We haven’t got a full cargo, boy.”

“Full enough for me, sir.”

“But still not full. If we went back to Center Base without filling the shelves, it wouldn’t be right. Look there⁠—number ninety-eight is Lethla⁠—number ninety-nine is Kriere. Three thousand days of rolling this rocket, and not once come back without a bunch of the kids who want to sleep easy on the good green earth. Not right to be going back any way⁠—but⁠—the way⁠—we used to⁠—”

His voice got all full of fog. As thick as the fists of a dozen warriors. Rice was going away from him. Rice was standing still, and Burnett was lying down, not moving, but somehow Rice was going away a million miles.

“Ain’t I one hell of a patriot, Rice?”

Then everything got dark except Rice’s face. And that was starting to dissolve.

Ninety-eight: Lethla. Ninety-nine: Kriere.

He could still see Rice standing over him for a long time, breathing out and in. Down under the tables the blood-pumps pulsed and pulsed, thick and slow. Rice looked down at Burnett and then at the empty shelf at the far end of the room, and then back at Burnett again.

And then he said softly:

“One hundred.”

Defense Mech

Oh, my god, do you realize how far from Earth we are? Do you really think about it? It’s enough to scare the guts from a man. Hold me up. Do something. Give me sedatives or hold my hand or run call mama. A million cold miles up. See all the flickering stars? Look at my hands tremble. Feel my heart whirling like a hot pinwheel!

The captain comes toward me, a stunned expression on his small, tight face. He takes my arm, looking into my eyes. Hello, captain. I’m sick, if that’s what you want to know. I’ve a right to be scared⁠—just look at all that space! Standing here a moment ago, I stared down at Earth so round and cloud-covered and asleep on a mat of stars, and my brain tore loose and screamed, man, man, how’d you get in a mess like this, in a rocket a million miles past the moon, shooting for Mars with a crew of fourteen others! I can hardly stand up, my knees, my hands, my heart, are shaking apart. Hold me up, sir.

What are hysterics like? The captain unprongs the inter-deck audio and speaks swiftly, scowling, into it. I hope he’s phoning the psychiatrist. I need something. Oh, dammit, dammit!

The psychiatrist descends the ladder in immaculate salt-white uniform and walks toward me in a dream. Hello, doctor. You’re the one for me. Please, sir, turn this damned rocket around and fly back to New York. I’ll go crazy with all this space and distance!

The psychiatrist and the captain’s voices murmur and blend, with here and there an emphasis, a toss of head, a gesture:

“Young Halloway here’s on a fear-jag, doctor. Can you help him?”

“I’ll try. Good man, Halloway is. Imagine you’ll need him and his muscles when we land.”

“With the crew as small as it is, every man’s worth his weight in uranium. He’s got to be cured.”

The