Planet of the Damned
XVI
Ulv joined them as they looked down at the exposed brain of themagter. The thing was so clearly evident that even Ulv noticed it.
"I have seen dead animals and my people dead with their heads open,but I have never seen anything like that before," he said.
"What is it?" Brion asked.
"The invader, the alien you were looking for," Lea told him.
The magter's brain was only two-thirds of what would have been itsnormal size. Instead of filling the skull completely, it shared thespace with a green, amorphous shape. This was ridged somewhat like abrain, but the green shape had still darker nodules and extensions.Lea took her scalpel and gently prodded the dark moist mass.
"It reminds me very much of something that I've seen before onEarth," she said. "The green-fly--_Drepanosiphum platanoides_--andan unusual organ it has, called the pseudova. Now that I have seenthis growth in the magter's skull, I can think of a positiveparallel. The fly _Drepanosiphum_ also had a large green organ, onlyit fills half of the body cavity instead of the head. Its identitypuzzled biologists for years, and they had a number of complextheories to explain it. Finally someone managed to dissect andexamine it. The pseudova turned out to be a living plant, ayeastlike growth that helps with the green-fly's digestion. Itproduces enzymes that enable the fly to digest the great amountsof sugar it gets from plant juice."
"That's not unusual," Brion said, puzzled. "Termites and humanbeings are a couple of other creatures whose digestion is helpedby internal flora. What's the difference in the green-fly?"
"Reproduction, mainly. All the other gut-living plants have to enterthe host and establish themselves as outsiders, permitted to remainas long as they are useful. The green-fly and its yeast plant have apermanent symbiotic relationship that is essential to the existenceof both. The plant spores appear in many places throughout the fly'sbody--but they are _always_ in the germ cells. Every egg cell hassome, and every egg that grows to maturity is infected with theplant spores. The continuation of the symbiosis is unbroken andguaranteed."
"Do you think those green spheres in the magter's blood cells couldbe the same kind of thing?" Brion asked.
"I'm sure of it," Lea said. "It must be the same process. There areprobably green spheres throughout the magters' bodies, spores oroffspring of those things in their brains. Enough will find theirway to the germ cells to make sure that every young magter isinfected at birth. While the child is growing, so is the symbiote.Probably a lot faster, since it seems to be a simpler organism.I imagine it is well established in the brain pan within the firstsix months of the infant's life."
"But why?" Brion asked. "What does it do?"
"I'm only guessing now, but there is plenty of evidence that givesus an idea of its function. I'm willing to bet that the symbioteitself is not a simple organism, it's probably an amalgam of plantand animal like most of the other creatures on Dis. The thing isjust too complex to have developed since mankind has been on thisplanet. The magter must have caught the symbiotic infection eatingsome Disan animal. The symbiote lived and flourished in its newenvironment, well protected by a bony skull in a long-lived host.In exchange for food, oxygen and comfort, the brain-symbiote mustgenerate hormones and enzymes that enable the magter to survive.Some of these might aid digestion, enabling the magter to eat anyplant or animal life they can lay their hands on. The symbiote mightproduce sugars, scavenge the blood of toxins--there are so manythings it could do. Things it must have done, since the magter areobviously the dominant life form on this planet. They paid a highprice for the symbiote, but it didn't matter to race survival untilnow. Did you notice that the magter's brain is no smaller thannormal?"
"It must be--or how else could that brain-symbiote fit in insidethe skull with it?" Brion said.
"If the magter's total brain were smaller in volume than normalit could fit into the remaining space in the cranial hollow. Butthe brain is full-sized--it is just that part of it is missing,absorbed by the symbiote."
"The frontal lobes," Brion said with sudden realization."This hellish growth has performed a prefrontal lobotomy!"
"It's done even more than that," Lea said, separating theconvolutions of the gray matter with her scalpel to uncover a greenfilament beneath. "These tendrils penetrate further back into thebrain, but always remain in the cerebrum. The cerebellum appears tobe untouched. Apparently just the higher functions of mankind havebeen interfered with, selectively. Destruction of the frontal lobesmade the magter creatures without emotions or ability for reallyabstract thought. Apparently they survived better without these.There must have been some horrible failures before the right balancewas struck. The final product is a man-plant-animal symbiote that isadmirably adapted for survival on this disaster world. No emotionsto cause complications or desires that might interfere with puresurvival. Complete ruthlessness--mankind has always been strong onthis anyway, so it didn't take much of a push."
"The other Disans, like Ulv here, managed to survive without turninginto such a creature. So why was it necessary for the magter to goso far?"
"Nothing is necessary in evolution, you know that," Lea said. "Manyvariations are possible, and all the better ones continue. You mightsay that Ulv's people survive, but the magter survive better. Ifoffworld contact hadn't been re-established, I imagine that themagter would slowly have become the dominant race. Only they won'thave the chance now. It looks as though they have succeeded indestroying both races with their suicidal urge."
"That's the part that doesn't make sense," Brion said. "The magterhave survived and climbed right to the top of the evolutionary heaphere. Yet they are suicidal. How does it happen they haven't beenwiped out before this?"
"Individually, they have been aggressive to the point of suicide.They will attack anything and everything with the same savage lackof emotion. Luckily there are no bigger animals on this planet. Sowhere they have died as individuals, their utter ruthlessness hasguaranteed their survival as a group. Now they are faced with aproblem that is too big for their half-destroyed minds to handle.Their personal policy has become their planetary policy--and that'snever a very smart thing. They are like men with knives who havekilled all the men who were only armed with stones. Now they arefacing men with guns, and they are going to keep charging andfighting until they are all dead.
"It's a perfect case of the utter impartiality of the forces ofevolution. Men infected by this Disan life form were the dominantcreatures on this planet. The creature in the magters' brains was atrue symbiote then, giving something and receiving something, makinga union of symbiotes where all were stronger together than any couldbe separately. Now this is changed. The magter brain cannotunderstand the concept of racial death, in a situation where it mustunderstand to be able to survive. Therefore the brain-creature is nolonger a symbiote but a parasite."
"And as a parasite it must be destroyed!" Brion broke in. "We're notfighting shadows any more," he exulted. "We've found the enemy--andit's not the magter at all. Just a sort of glorified tapeworm thatis too stupid to know when it is killing itself off. Does it havea brain--can it think?"
"I doubt it very much," Lea said. "A brain would be of absolutely nouse to it. So even if it originally possessed reasoning powers theywould be gone by now. Symbiotes or parasites that live internallylike this always degenerate to an absolute minimum of functions."
"Tell me about it. What is this thing?" Ulv broke in, prodding thesoft form of the brain-symbiote. He had heard all their excited talkbut had not understood a word.
"Explain it to him, will you, Lea, as best you can," Brion said,looking at her, and he realized how exhausted she was. "And sit downwhile you do it; you're long overdue for a rest. I'm going to try--"He broke off when he looked at his watch.
It was after four in the afternoon--less than eight hours to go.What was he to do? Enthusiasm faded as he realized that only half ofthe problem was solved. The bombs would drop on schedule unless theNyjorders could understand the significance of this discovery. Eve
nif they understood, would it make any difference to them? The threatof the hidden cobalt bombs would not be changed.
With this thought came the guilty realization that he had forgottencompletely about Telt's death. Even before he contacted the Nyjordfleet he must tell Hys and his rebel army what had happened to Teltand his sand car. Also about the radioactive traces. They couldn'tbe checked against the records now to see how important they mightbe, but Hys might make another raid on the strength of thesuspicion. This call wouldn't take long, then he would be freeto tackle Professor-Commander Krafft.
Carefully setting the transmitter on the frequency of the rebelarmy, he sent out a call to Hys. There was no answer. When heswitched to receive all he heard was static.
There was always a chance the set was broken. He quickly twisted thetransmitter to the frequency of his personal radio, then whistled inthe microphone. The received signal was so loud that it hurt hisears. He tried to call Hys again, and was relieved to get a responsethis time.
"Brion Brandd here. Can you read me? I want to talk to Hys at once."
It came as a shock that it was Professor-Commander Krafft who answered.
"I'm sorry, Brion, but it's impossible to talk to Hys. We aremonitoring his frequency and your call was relayed to me. Hys andhis rebels lifted ship about half an hour ago, and are already onthe way back to Nyjord. Are you ready to leave now? It will soonbecome dangerous to make any landings. Even now I will have to askfor volunteers to get you out of there."
Hys and the rebel army gone! Brion assimilated the thought. He hadbeen thrown off balance when he realized he was talking to Krafft.
"If they're gone--well, then there's nothing I can do about it," hesaid. "I was going to call you, so I can talk to you now. Listen andtry to understand. You must cancel the bombing. I've found out aboutthe magter, found what causes their mental aberration. If we cancorrect that, we can stop them from attacking Nyjord--"
"Can they be corrected by midnight tonight?" Krafft broke in. He wasabrupt and sounded almost angry. Even saints get tired.
"No, of course not." Brion frowned at the microphone, realizing thetalk was going all wrong, but not knowing how to remedy it. "But itwon't take too long. I have evidence here that will convince youthat what I say is the truth."
"I believe you without seeing it, Brion." The trace of anger wasgone from Krafft's voice now, and it was heavy with fatigue anddefeat. "I'll admit you are probably right. A little while agoI admitted to Hys too that he was probably right in his originalestimation of the correct way to tackle the problem of Dis. We havemade a lot of mistakes, and in making them we have run out of time.I'm afraid that is the only fact that is relevant now. The bombsfall at twelve, and even then they may drop too late. A ship isalready on its way from Nyjord with my replacement. I exceeded myauthority by running a day past the maximum the technicians gave me.I realize now I was gambling the life of my own world in the vainhope I could save Dis. They can't be saved. They're dead. I won'thear any more about it."
"You must listen--"
"I must destroy the planet below me, that is what I must do.That fact will not be changed by anything you say. All theoffworlders--other than your party--are gone. I'm sending a shipdown now to pick you up. As soon as that ship lifts I am going todrop the first bombs. Now--tell me where you are so they can comefor you."
"Don't threaten me, Krafft!" Brion shook his fist at the radio in anexcess of anger. "You're a killer and a world destroyer--don't tryto make yourself out as anything else. I have the knowledge to avertthis slaughter and you won't listen to me. And I know where thecobalt bombs are--in the magter tower that Hys raided last night.Get those bombs and there is no need to drop any of your own!"
"I'm sorry, Brion. I appreciate what you're trying to do, but at thesame time I know the futility of it. I'm not going to accuse you oflying, but do you realize how thin your evidence sounds from thisend? First, a dramatic discovery of the cause of the magters'intransigency. Then, when that had no results, you suddenly rememberthat you know where the bombs are. The best-kept magter secret."
"I don't know for sure, but there is a very good chance it is so,"Brion said, trying to repair his defenses. "Telt made readings, hehad other records of radioactivity in this same magter keep--proofthat something is there. But Telt is dead now, the recordsdestroyed. Don't you see--" He broke off, realizing how vague andunprovable his case was. This was defeat.
The radio was silent, with just the hum of the carrier wave asKrafft waited for him to continue. When Brion did speak his voicewas empty of all hope.
"Send your ship down," he said tiredly. "We're in a building thatbelonged to the Light Metals Trust, Ltd., a big warehouse of somekind. I don't know the address here, but I'm sure you have someonethere who can find it. We'll be waiting for you. You win, Krafft."
He turned off the radio.