The rest of the officers accompanied Harkaway, all of them with the air of attending a funeral rather than a rebirth, Iversen noted nervously. They weren't armed, though, so Bridey couldn't be turning into anything dangerous.
Now it came to pass that the thor'glitch's mid-section, having swelled to unbearable proportions, began to quiver. Suddenly, the skin split lengthwise and dropped cleanly to either side, like a banana peel.
Iversen pressed forward to see what fresh life-form the bulging cavity had held. The other officers all stood in a somber row without moving, for all along, Iversen realized, they had known what to expect, what was to come. And they had not told him. But then, he knew, it was his own fault; he had refused to be told.
Now, looking down at the new life-form, he saw for himself what it was. Lying languidly in the thor'glitch skin was a slender youth of a pallor which seemed excessive even for a member of a green-skinned race. He had large limpid eyes and a smile of ineffable sweetness.
"By Nopus Secundus," Iversen groaned. "I'm sunk."
"Naturally the ultimate incarnation for a life-form would be humanoid," Harkaway said with deep reproach. "What else?"
"I'm surprised you didn't figure that out for yourself, sir," the first officer added. "Even if you did refuse to read Harkaway's book, it seems obvious."
"Does it?" Smullyan challenged. "Does it, indeed? Is Man the highest form of life in an irrational cosmos? Then all causes are lost ones!... So many worlds," he muttered in more subdued tones, "so much to do, so little done, such things to be!"
"The Flimbotzik were telling Harkaway about theirownlife cycle," Iversen whispered as revelation bathed him in its murky light. "The human embryo undergoes a series of changesinsidethe womb. It's just that the Flimbotzik fetus developsoutsidethe womb."
"Handily bypassing the earliest and most unpleasant stages of humanity," Smullyan sighed. "Oh, idyllic planet, where one need never be a child—where one need never see a child!"
"Then they were trying to explain their biology to you quite clearly and coherently, you lunkhead," Iversen roared at Harkaway, "and you took it for a religious doctrine!"
"Yes, sir," Harkaway said weakly. "I—I kind of figured that out myself in these last few weeks of intensive soul-searching. I—I'm sorry, sir. All I can say is that it was an honest mistake."
"Why, they weren't necessarily pet-lovers at all. Those animals they had with them were.... By Nair al Zaurak!" The captain's voice rose to a shriek as the whole enormity of the situation finally dawned upon him. "You went and kidnaped one of the children!"
"That's a serious charge, kidnaping," the first officer said with melancholy pleasure. "And you, as head of this expedition, Captain, are responsible. Ironic, isn't it?"
"Told you all this spelled doom and disaster," the doctor observed cheerfully.
Just then, the young humanoid sat up—with considerable effort, Iversen was disturbed to notice. But perhaps that was one of the consequences of being born. A new-born infant was weak; why not a new-born adult, then?
"Why doom?" the humanoid asked in a high, clear voice. "Why disaster?"
"You—you speak Terran?" the captain stammered.
Bridey gave his sad, sweet smile. "I was reared amongst you. You are my people. Why should I not speak your tongue?"
"But we're not your people," Iversen blurted, thinking perhaps the youth did not remember back to his greechi days. "We're an entirely different species—"
"Our souls vibrate in unison and that is the vital essence. But do not be afraid, shipmates; the Flimbotzik do not regard the abduction of a transitory corporeal shelter as a matter of any great moment. Moreover, what took place could not rightly be termed abduction, for I came with you of my own volition—and the Flimbotzik recognize individual responsibility from the very first moment of the psyche's drawing breath in any material casing."
Bridey talked so much like Harkaway's book that Iversen was almost relieved when, a few hours later, the alien died. Of course the captain was worried about possible repercussions from the governments of both Terra and Flimbot, in spite of Bridey's assurances.
And he could not help but feel a pang when the young humanoid expired in his arms, murmuring, "Do not grieve for me, soul-mates. In the midst of life, there is life...."
"Funny," Smullyan said, with one of his disconcerting returns to a professional manner, "all the other forms seemed perfectly healthy. Why did this one go like that? Almost as if hewantedto die."
"He was too good for this ship, that's what," the radio operator said, glaring at the captain. "Too fine and brave and—and noble."
"Yes," Harkaway agreed. "What truly sensitive soul could exist in a stultifying atmosphere like this?"
All the officers glared at the captain. He glared back with right good will. "How come you gentlemen are still with us?" he inquired. "One would have thought you would have perished of pure sensibility long since, then."
"It's not nice to talk that way," the chief petty officer burst out, "not with him lying there not yet cold.... Ah," he heaved a long sigh, "we'll never see his like again."
"Ay, that we won't," agreed the crew, huddled in the corridor outside the captain's cabin.
Iversen sincerely hoped not, but he forbore to speak.
Since Bridey had reached the ultimate point in his life cycle, it seemed certain that he was not going to change into anything else and so he was given a spaceman's burial. Feeling like a put-upon fool, Captain Iversen read a short prayer as Bridey's slight body was consigned to the vast emptiness of space.
Then the airlock clanged shut behind the last mortal remains of the ill-fated extraterrestrial and that was the end of it.
But the funereal atmosphere did not diminish as the ship forged on toward Earth. Gloomy days passed, one after the other, during which no one spoke, save to issue or dispute an order. Looking at himself one day in the mirror on his cabin wall, the captain realized that he was getting old. Perhaps he ought to retire instead of still dreaming of a new command and a new crew.
And then one day, as he sat in his cabin reading the Spaceman's Credo, the lights on theHerringbonewent out, all at once, while the constant hum of the motors died down slowly, leaving a strange, uncomfortable silence. Iversen found himself suspended weightless in the dark, for the gravity, of course, had gone off with the power. What, he wondered, had come to pass? He often found himself thinking in such terms these days.
Hoarse cries issued from the passageway outside; then he heard a squeak as his cabin door opened and persons unknown floated inside, breathing heavily.
"The power has failed, sir!" gasped the first officer's voice.
"That has not escaped my notice," Iversen said icily. Were not even his last moments to be free from persecution?
"It's all that maniac Smullyan's fault. He stored hismk'oogin the fuel tanks. After emptying them out first, that is. We're out of fuel."
The captain put a finger in his book to mark his place, which was, he knew with a kind of supernal detachment, rather foolish, because there was no prospect of there ever being lights to read by again.
"Put him in irons, if you can find him," he ordered. "And tell the men to prepare themselves gracefully for a lingering death."
Iversen could hear a faint creak as the first officer drew himself to attention in the darkness. "The men of theHerringbone, sir," he said, stiffly, "are always prepared for calamity."
"Ay, that we are," agreed various voices.
So they were all there, were they? Well, it was too much to expect that they would leave him in death any more than they had in life.
"It is well," Iversen said. "It is well," he repeated, unable to think of anything more fitting.
Suddenly the lights went on again and the ship gave a leap. From his sprawling position on the floor, amid his recumbent officers, Iversen could hear the hum of motors galvanized into life.
"But if the fuel tanks are empty," he asked of no one in particular, "where did the power come from?"
"I am the power," said a vast, deep voice that filled the ship from hold to hold.
"And the glory," said the radio operator reverently. "Don't forget the glory."
"No," the voice replied and it was the voice of Bridey, resonant with all the amplitude of the immense chest cavity he had acquired. "Not the glory, merely the power. I have reached a higher plane of existence. I am a spaceship."
"Praise be to the Ultimate Nothingness!" Harkaway cried.
"Ultimate Nothingness, nothing!" Bridey said impatiently. "I achieved it all myself."
"Then that's how the Flimbotzi spaceships were powered!" Iversen exclaimed. "By themselves—the Flimbotzik themselves, I mean—"
"Even so," Bridey replied grandly. "And this lofty form of life happens to be one which we poor humans cannot reach unassisted. Someone has to build the shell for us to occupy, which is the reason humans dwell together in fellowship and harmony—"
"You purposely got Harkaway to take you aboard theHerringbone," Iversen interrupted wrathfully. "You—you stowaway!"
Bridey's laugh rang through the ship, setting the loose parts quivering. "Of course. When first I set eyes upon this vessel of yours, I saw before me the epitome of all dreams. Never had any of our kind so splendid an encasement. And, upon determining that the vessel was, as yet, a soulless thing, I got myself aboard; I was born, I died, and was reborn again with the greatest swiftness consonant with comfort, so that I could awaken in this magnificent form. Oh, joy, joy, joy!"
"You know," Iversen said, "now that I hear one of you talk at length, I really can't blame Harkaway for his typically imbecilic mistake."
"We are a wordy species," Bridey conceded.
"You had no right to do what you did," Iversen told him, "no right to take over—"
"But I didn't take over," Bridey theHerringbonesaid complacently. "I merely remained quiescent and content in the knowledge of my power until yours failed. Without me, you would even now be spinning in the vasty voids, a chrome-trimmed sepulcher. Now, three times as swiftly as before, shall I bear you back to the planet you very naively call home."
"Not three times as fast, please!" Iversen was quick to plead. "The ship isn't built—we'renot built to stand such speeds."
The ship sighed. "Disappointment needs must come to all—the high, the low, the man, the spaceship. It must be borne—" the voice broke—"bravely. Somehow."
"What am I going to do?" Iversen asked, turning to the first officer for advice for the first time ever. "I was planning to ask for a transfer or resign my command when we got back to Earth. But how can I leave Bridey in the hands of the IEE(E)?"
"You can't, sir," the first officer said. "Neither can we."
"If you explain," Harkaway offered timidly, "perhaps they'll present the ship to the government."
Both Iversen and the first officer snorted, united for once. "Not the IEE(E)," Iversen said. "They'd—they'd exhibit it or something and charge admission."
"Oh, no," Bridey cried, "I don't want to be exhibited! I want to sail through the trackless paths of space. What good is a body like this if I cannot use it to its fullest?"
"Have no fear," Iversen assured it. "We'll just—" he shrugged, his dreams of escape forever blighted—"just have to buy the ship from the IEE(E), that's all."
"Right you are, sir," the first officer agreed. "We must club together, every man Jack of us, and buy her. Him. It. That's the only decent thing to do."
"Perhaps they won't sell," Harkaway worried. "Maybe—"
"Oh, they'll sell, all right," Iversen said wearily. "They'd sell the chairman of the board, if you made them an offer, and throw in all the directors if the price was right."
"And then what will we do?" the first officer asked. "Once the ship has been purchased, what will our course be? What, in other words, are we to do?"
It was Bridey who answered. "We will speed through space seeking, learning, searching, until you—all of you—pass on to higher planes and, leaving the frail shells you now inhabit, occupy proud, splendid vessels like the one I wear now. Then, a vast transcendent flotilla, we will seek other universes...."
"But we don't become spaceships," Iversen said unhappily. "We don't become anything."
"How do you know we don't?" Smullyan demanded, appearing on the threshold. "How do you know what we become? Build thee more stately spaceships, O my soul!"
Above all else, Iversen was a space officer and dereliction of duty could not be condoned even in exceptional circumstances. "Put him in irons, somebody!"
"Ask Bridey why there were only forty-five spaceships on his planet!" the doctor yelled over his shoulder as he was dragged off. "Ask where the others went—where they are now."
But Bridey wouldn't answer that question.