I Conclude My Log

This is the story of a dead man. I think I have known that all along, but denied it to myself as I - as everyone - denies it. We are all going to die, of course, but death is something we prefer to stay unseen and remote. Even I, who have seen many deaths in the course of my life, have always regarded my own death as no more than a distant possibility. It has been a matter to put aside for now, while I get on with the important business of living. And why not? To live our lives only in preparation for their end would be to repudiate their significance - to throw the gift back into the giver's face as something unwanted and of little worth. Like you, I have wrapped my death up in its cerement, and put it in an old suitcase, and stored it in the attic, as an article that may be useful some day but is only getting in the way at the present.

I have said previously that I am determined to hang on to life by every means available to me. That remains true, despite what I have just written. It is a question of self-awareness, no more.

- 0 -

Some mornings I awoke full of optimism and plans for the day ahead. Others were a windowless wall of despair and best written off, except for fulfilling the basic obligations of survival. This day - the sixteenth since my landing - started well. The interior of the cave became light enough to open my eyes and I rose and went outside to perform the necessary and see what kind of day it was. The Blessd sun had already ascended halfway to the zenith so the hour was clearly well advanced. It was warm; the sky was clear to the west and cloud-mottled to the east, promising a certain coolness later. So, I should make the best of the sunshine while it lasted. I had been finding the transition between the open air of the mountainside and the closeness of the cave rather too abrupt for my liking and it had struck me that I could recover the tarpaulin and spars that had comprised my shelter next to the El Dorado's conning tower and make a kind of portico in front of the cave's entrance. It would be pleasant, I thought, to sit out there on sunny evenings and read one of the books from the small library I had salvaged from the ship. In addition, the cave's interior was becoming cramped with stores, not all of which needed to be kept indoors.

As usual, then, my first objective was to visit the El Dorado. The valley where she lay was located about three hundred feet below the level of the cave and a few hundred yards eastwards around the land. As I scrambled down the slope towards her I could not help but notice that my feet had already begun to wear a recognisable path in the ground. That started off a train of thought in my mind that ended with a determination to search the cabins and common rooms for boots and shoes. Sooner or later I would be needing replacement footwear. I was still compiling additions to my mental list of items to take from the ship as I rounded the pinnacle of rock where I had attached the mooring rope.

What came as such a terrible shock to me as I reached for the rope to grip and help me around the outcrop is, I am sure, no surprise to you, my sophisticated reader. But if you have any trace of empathy in your heart you will get a slight hint of my feelings when I found that the rope was no longer where I had left it. You will understand that I was so stunned that I stood still for a moment and held my hand against my chest. You will maybe have experienced that sensation of the land dropping away beneath your feet, the darkening behind the eyes, the harbingers of despair; like the first pain of a wound before your body comprehends how badly it has been hurt. And you will understand too that hope - the blessing and curse of us all - warred with conviction in my mind; the conviction, unfounded yet on concrete evidence, that the ship had gone. I knew that I would have to step out onto the ledge next to the valley and discover the truth.

So I did step out onto the ledge and I did look across to the El Dorado's resting place and I did see that she was gone and it was a different kind of shock; as the sight of the body of a loved one lying on the mortician's table is different from hearing the news, brought by a grave-faced proctor or tired surgeon, that she has died. I sat down on the bare ground and let darkness swoop over me and then - needing to know everything - I jumped up again and stumbled up to the saddle of the col and shaded my eyes and gazed downwind. And perhaps I saw a shining silver disc, illuminated by the Blessd sun, far distant and receding before the trade-wind. I stood and watched for a very long time until it had completely disappeared from my view.

- 0 -

I had not been able to carry every item that I had removed from the El Doradodirectly up to the cave, so there was a cache of stores lying by the foot of the valley. Moving those articles - especially the heavy ones, such as pieces of furniture and machinery - kept me busy for two or three days after the ship's departure. It also kept me from brooding on my loss; except that I could not help doing so in the darkness of my cave when sleep would not come. I alternated between blaming myself and absolving myself from blame. Yes, I could perhaps have secured the ship better, but no, I had done what I could under the circumstances. Yes, I should have spent more time taking everything possible from the wreck - for now that the El Dorado was gone I could call her that as I would not have done to her face, as it were - but no, I had had to establish myself in my new home, and that had taken time.

I am where I am and I must live with it - yes that was sane, that was right, that was the correct and constructive way to deal with my predicament; but I kept picturing myself in the time before, when we were still together. Does this sound maudlin? Carrying on in this way over a mere ship? Then I am sorry; for irritating you, for wallowing in my grief, for not facing facts. But I am sorry for you too, for it must be that you have yet to lose someone or something dear to you; and you do not yet know how it feels, and when it does happen to you - as it must - you will be left lost, rudderless, and in need of someone to show you the way you must go.

- 0 -

It is now fourteen days now since I lost the ship. Most of those days are missing from the log, not just because they were blank to me, but also because they were full of labour and weariness and I fell into bed at the end of each one unable to do anything but sleep. But every night my slumbers were disturbed by sounds of movement and I sat up despite my tiredness, startled by some clatter or rumble or creak transmitted through the stone. During the day, as before, I had to concentrate on my immediate needs. Water was the first. I arranged all the containers I possessed in such a way that they would collect and store rainwater. I used the tarpaulin that would have furnished me with an outdoors shelter to line a natural declivity in the mountainside and make a cistern; which reservoir would, I hoped, serve to tide me over dry spells. It was out of the question to attempt to bring sea-water up from tide level and distil fresh drinking water from it. I could not carry such a weight of water the thousand or more feet up to the level of the cave; not on a regular basis. And besides, apart from a limited supply of spirit which was all I had to cook with, I had no fuel to boil a condenser.

The water situation was manageable, I thought; the rain fell most nights and often during the day. Food was another matter entirely. I estimated that the preserved supplies, such as tinned meat, vegetables and milk, that I had rescued from the ship would last me no more than thirty days. Thirty days! And then, starvation. That was a grim outlook.

There were only two possible sources of food available to me. Firstly, the sea. There might be sea-kelp, or any number of other kinds of vegetation that I could collect from the rocks when the tides were out. There would doubtless be molluscs to pry from the crevices. From time to time the body of one of the greater or lesser beasts might be washed up, but it would be unlikely to remain there for long; the land fell away too steeply, and I would not be the only hungry creature competing for its flesh. That thought made me shudder, as I need hardly tell you.

And secondly, the air. Those of you who are land-dwellers will wonder what I mean, but that is only because you do not know the skies as the airmen do. You have not seen the aeroforms as they have.

History tells us that the first landers observed that the aeroforms flew unconcernedly over land and sea, taking no especial notice of the land except to gain enough elevation to avoid damage to themselves as they flew over its solid surface. But since man's introduction of trees, with their snagging branches, and birds, with their sharp beaks, Glory's native fliers have become shy of the lands and their coasts, and they either avoid them altogether or fill their sacs as they approach the shores and raise themselves high above them. Landlubbers usually only see the aeroforms as black dots against the open sky, but for we airmen it is a different matter.

If only I were able to wield my pen with the skill of a writer like Currer Bell! He was able to evoke the landscapes of Earth so vividly that, even at this distance of space and time, the reader feels he knows the moors, fields, houses and schools of Bell's England as well as he does his own land on this, our world of Glory. But I do not have his talents, alas, and a simple bald description must suffice instead.

I have seen the aeroforms in their home seas and from their native altitudes. I can tell you about their different shapes, and why some are orange, some blue, some pink and some a livid white. I understand their cycles of life and death - how important their dependent streamers are to their stability and survival. And, most importantly at this present time, I understand how they find and ingest their food, for I have seen it many times from the bridge of the El Dorado. We often see the aeroforms flying in squadrons great or small, in their constant search for food. All scan the ocean, but one creature will be the first - floating higher than its fellows with its sac fully inflated. It can see furthest, and it is its duty to seek out the stain - green against blue - that betokens a layer of plankton floating near the surface. It sees a likely patch; and in a fraction of a second it has vented its gas and fallen rapidly to the tide level. The others follow; they have seen it, or heard the characteristic flutter of escaping methane, or caught its reek. There is a downwards rush, and soon a whole flotilla of aeroforms is hovering a few feet above the sea, with their hungry streamers trailing in the water, sucking and filtering the plankton up into their stomachs.

What a sight it is! Like a multicoloured hive of bubbles hugging the ocean, the creatures cluster together; feeding, mating and, I believe, talking to one another. It has been said that a really big plankton-field can attract a crowd of three or more thousand aeroforms at a time. I have never seen as many, nor perhaps will I, for when the outliers of the herd sense the approach of an oncoming vessel they signal to their peers, and suddenly gas reinflates their flaccid sacs and they make a dash skywards, safe from we humans in our clumsy craft. And that is the best moment of all; this instant of flight, this soaring heavenwards, streamers flying beneath them like pennants. No other world under the Blssed sun can show such a sight as this. I have known a watch of hard-bitten veteran airmen break into spontaneous applause for the sheer uplifting joy of it.

It is a foul atrocity; that I now have to try to hunt and kill these beautiful creatures for food, but my need drives me on to do things that I would not do otherwise. I have taken to watching the skies for them and haunting the leeward shore of the land. It seems to me that from time to time plankton or algae must drift against the land and attract the aeroforms to it. If and when that happens I will be ready, with a lance that I have made from one of the El Dorado's spars. The mere thought of killing, even for food, fills me with revulsion, but I know that when the time comes my empty belly will not permit me to refrain from doing what I must do if I am to stay alive.

I have wondered in the past why good men sometimes commit dreadful acts. Now I know, though I am very far from being a good man.

- 0 -

The strangest thing has happened. Beyond belief, if I had not seen it, but now that I have had some time to think about it I am full of foreboding.

It had been seven days since I made my spear. My stores had been running down inexorably, although it had rained several times and my improvised reservoir had several gallons of fresh water in it. I had been practicing throwing the spear and found that I could achieve a range of fifteen yards or more and an elevation of several feet. Every morning I used the glass I had rescued from Captain Hugo's cabin to look into the east, hoping to spy some oncoming aeroforms illuminated by the dawn light, and today I saw a flock of maybe a dozen at a range of no more than a mile or two. My hopes rose, and I ran down to the tide line, which was high this morning. So much the better, I thought, if I had to carry the body of an aeroform up to my cave.

I reached the tide line at more or less the same time as the fliers. They were bunched together near to a small inlet, their streamers dipping into the lapping waters. Immediately I got there I realised that the best way of killing one of them was also the worst, Ideally, I would stand up the slope a bit and throw my spear downwards onto the upper hemisphere of the creature's gas-bag. But that, I recognized now, would be madness. If I succeeded in holing its sac, the aeroform would fall into the sea, where I would not be able to reach it. If I missed it, I would lose my spear. I would have to go right down to the shoreline and wait until they took off. Then, if I hit one, it would fall on the land and my weapon would be safe.

I picked my way carefully down to the tide line. The water was slowly receding, which was a relief - I would not get caught by an incoming tide, slowly though it would move on this steep mountainside. Then, moving inchwise so as not to alarm the creatures while they fed, I crept around the inlet until I was almost at right angles to the shore. Good, this was the perfect position. I squatted down and waited while the aeroforms sucked up the nutrient laden water, filtering it and spilling the waste fluid from the collar where their streamers joined the lower part of the sac. It would not be long now

And it was not - only a few minutes. One of the aeroforms, glistening a brilliant green in the morning sunlight, lifted its trailing streamers free from the water and began to drift slowly onshore and uphill. This was my moment! I leapt to my feet, pulled back my arm and pitched the spar with all my strength, straight at its bulging gas-bag. I stepped back with the force of my throw and nearly fell into the water. But had I hit it? I hardly expected success with my first attempt at spear-throwing.

Yes There was a shriek from above and a powerful whiff of gas. The aeroform's sac rippled and heaved. I had injured it; mortally, I hoped (but still my shame and horror welled up in my throat and threatened to choke me). I ran uphill after it as it lurched and fell towards the rocky ground, reaching it just as the first of its damply clinging streamers began to snag against the boulders. I think I intended to jump on top of it and force the rest of the gas out of it before slashing it open with my knife and grounding it for ever. But just as I was about to make my leap I was struck forcibly in the back of the head and knocked to the ground. I rolled over onto my back and looked up.

It was another aeroform - a blue one this time. I covered my face with my arm, afraid that it was going to attack me, but no, it had another aim in view. It floated over me, rolled up the hillside beyond and, to my utter amazement, wrapped its streamers around the body of its fallen comrade, now almost completely deflated, and pulled itself down onto it. Then with a tremendous whoosh of gas it blew its own sac up to an extraordinary size and shot up vertically, with its companion held tightly to itself. I rose to my feet and looked on, completely astonished. I had never seen such a thing; never heard of such a thing. I watched the pair through the glass as they gained height and sailed up the side of the mountain, awed and, I have to admit, almost brought to tears by what I had seen. It was such a contrast - I, the human, intelligent and civilised and murderous, and this, the beast, faithful, and ready without hesitation to risk its life for another. I would like to be able to finish by saying that the two linked aeroforms disappeared into the sky and that I resolved never to try to harm any of them again. But I cannot, not because of any epiphany I may have experienced within myself, but because of the vile, horrible thing that was to happen next.

Up they flew, never straying far from the rising side of the mountain, until it became clear that they were going to pass directly over the crest of the peak. I had not felt the need to climb so high, and to take the risk of falling and hurting myself merely for the sake of reaching the top had not seemed worthwhile. But I watched closely as they soared and I was not surprised when as they passed the last ridge, they suddenly raced upwards at a terrific speed, caught as I supposed in an updraft such as the El Dorado had sometimes experienced when passing over the more mountainous lands. My glass followed them as they rocketed skywards so I clearly saw what took place then; the sudden change in the aeroforms as first their streamers and then their bodies started to blacken and give off sharp jets of smoke. Some hidden fire was pouring heat into their bodies and cooking them alive. They suffered the most appalling agonies, I know, for my ears were skewered by their combined screams of pain. Those cries did not last long, for with a shockingly loud concussion the straining sac of the leading aeroform exploded in a bright red flare of light and the pair fell from the sky and disappeared behind the peak, trailing blue-orange fire after them.

The remaining aeroforms flew low overhead and brushed by the northerly side of the land, preferring to risk piercing their gas-bags against the rocks and thorns of the hill-side rather than pass over the deadly peak above. I sat and rocked back on my heels, stunned and not ready to weep just yet.

- 0 -

The theory - or hypothesis, if you prefer - that I have formed is one that I must test. It will be at great hazard to myself, I know, but my life becomes more and more worthless each day as my food runs out. It is this - that the land on which I am stranded is volcanic and becoming increasingly active. The roaring noise that woke me all those nights ago was the sound, I am convinced, of magma finding a new way to the surface and the rumbling, rattling and scraping that I have heard since are pieces of loose material falling back onto the molten rock or being ejected from the volcano's cone. I think it was the hot air rising from the crater that caused the sudden headlong flight of the aeroforms and a spark or flaming cinder that ignited their gas-bags and killed them. True, I have smelled no sulphurous gases, but the wind blows towards me from the open sea and away from the land and I think it not so very improbable that I have not noticed them.

I am going to climb to the summit of this land and find out the truth for myself. There is enough food remaining in my reserves to last me for a three-day ascent and, although I have no expertise in scaling the rocks, I shall take it slowly and use the materials - spikes and cords, mostly - that I saved from the ship to help me.

I shall leave this book here by the side of my bed, in the hope that I will be able to continue with it on my return from the heights. If, as may well turn out, I do not return, it will serve as my memoriam. To you my reader, I say: be kind and do not judge me too harshly, for we are human, you and I, with human failings, and though we fully deserve the sternest justice for our misdeeds, still we may hope for mercy.

And now farewell! I shall depart in a few minutes, once I have secured my home and read one last chapter of Mister Bell's book. I feel we are linked, Currer Bell and I, across the centuries and the light-years, for even though we leave nothing more than words - those fleeting things - behind us, yet we may both some day, though we know it not, be remembered.

Cameron Alexander Powell BSc MD, of the LAV El Dorado, in this 323rd Year of Glory.