Read Online Worlds of Edgar Rice Burroughs by Mike Resnick, Robert T. Garcia - Free Book Online
Authors: Mike Resnick, Robert T. Garcia
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shell, then drew back her hand. Now it was she who asked me, “What can it be, O Carson? What can this thing be?”
“This is no insect,” I replied. I turned to study the dragonfly. “This is a machine. The creation of some clever artisan, but it is not a living thing.”
We advanced toward the head of the segmented, seeming beast. As we stood staring awestruck into its huge faceted eyes, one of them rolled back like a gigantic eyelid to reveal a cockpit and a set of controls, and seated at the controls a pilot clad in flight-suit, complete with helmet and goggles.
“Thank you,” I stammered. “You saved us. But—who are you, and what does this mean?” Never in my time on Venus had I seen any sign of the technological development necessary to build so advanced a flying craft as this magnificent artificial creature.
Searching my memory for details of my studies of the insectivora of the world during my sometimes ill-spent college days, I recognized this machine as a remarkable mechanical recreation of Odonata Anisoptera Synthemistidae . Its four gossamer wings shimmered in the pearl-like glimmering of an Amtorian afternoon. Its six legs held it in precarious balance.
The pilot did not respond to my query, but instead gestured with one gloved hand to the compartment behind the cockpit. Nodding his head, this mysterious figure indicated clearly that Duare and I were to climb into the dragonfly and prepare for flight.
When you have been saved from a Hobson’s choice between two forms of death each more horrible than the other by a total stranger who invites you to join him in a magnificent aircraft, you do not quarrel. Duare and I accepted this mysterious stranger’s invitation with alacrity.
We climbed into the aircraft, and the pilot reached for a handle and swung the artificial eye back into place. He threw a switch, and the mechanical dragonfly raised and lowered its wings twice. Another switch, and I could feel the six legs flex, then straighten, and the artificial dragonfly was airborne.
Looking ahead over the pilot’s shoulders we could see that the faceted false eyes of the dragonfly were transparent when viewed from inside the craft. By craning my neck I was able to get a view of the terrain over which we passed.
We crossed mile after mile of lush jungle, but eventually this gave way to a grassy savannah—not populated by any more of the deadly fearmharr arrachtachs that had menaced Duare and myself and from which this mysterious aviator had saved us, or so I hoped.
Giant beasts grazed on the rich plant life beneath us. Huge Venusian—Amtorian—mammals such as roamed the Americas before the last ice age gazed skyward to see this strange object passing overhead, then returned to their grazing, unconcerned.
We rose toward the planet’s perpetual cloud cover and passed over a ridge of jagged granite peaks, then dipped again to skim the ground in the next valley. As if Nature had separated the two adjacent lowlands, this next savannah was populated by an even more astonishing array of beasts. If not dinosaurs, then surely these creatures were Amtor’s analogs of them. I saw something that looked remarkably like a triceratops placidly grazing until it was surprised by the attack of a bonapartenykus—a feathered dinosaur whose fierce claws and teeth belie its otherwise benign appearance.
I would have been curious to observe the battle between these two giant beasts out of Earth’s multimillion-year past, but the dragonfly continued onward, our pilot never taking his eyes off the controls and the passing landscape, totally ignoring Duare and myself.
Now we approached another range of jagged granite peaks. I had lost all track of time and had no idea how long we had been flying over Amtor’s amazing landscape. But as the aircraft initiated its climb into the new range of mountains, I felt the temperature drop precipitously.
For the first time since arriving on Venus, I actually felt cold. The
“This is no insect,” I replied. I turned to study the dragonfly. “This is a machine. The creation of some clever artisan, but it is not a living thing.”
We advanced toward the head of the segmented, seeming beast. As we stood staring awestruck into its huge faceted eyes, one of them rolled back like a gigantic eyelid to reveal a cockpit and a set of controls, and seated at the controls a pilot clad in flight-suit, complete with helmet and goggles.
“Thank you,” I stammered. “You saved us. But—who are you, and what does this mean?” Never in my time on Venus had I seen any sign of the technological development necessary to build so advanced a flying craft as this magnificent artificial creature.
Searching my memory for details of my studies of the insectivora of the world during my sometimes ill-spent college days, I recognized this machine as a remarkable mechanical recreation of Odonata Anisoptera Synthemistidae . Its four gossamer wings shimmered in the pearl-like glimmering of an Amtorian afternoon. Its six legs held it in precarious balance.
The pilot did not respond to my query, but instead gestured with one gloved hand to the compartment behind the cockpit. Nodding his head, this mysterious figure indicated clearly that Duare and I were to climb into the dragonfly and prepare for flight.
When you have been saved from a Hobson’s choice between two forms of death each more horrible than the other by a total stranger who invites you to join him in a magnificent aircraft, you do not quarrel. Duare and I accepted this mysterious stranger’s invitation with alacrity.
We climbed into the aircraft, and the pilot reached for a handle and swung the artificial eye back into place. He threw a switch, and the mechanical dragonfly raised and lowered its wings twice. Another switch, and I could feel the six legs flex, then straighten, and the artificial dragonfly was airborne.
Looking ahead over the pilot’s shoulders we could see that the faceted false eyes of the dragonfly were transparent when viewed from inside the craft. By craning my neck I was able to get a view of the terrain over which we passed.
We crossed mile after mile of lush jungle, but eventually this gave way to a grassy savannah—not populated by any more of the deadly fearmharr arrachtachs that had menaced Duare and myself and from which this mysterious aviator had saved us, or so I hoped.
Giant beasts grazed on the rich plant life beneath us. Huge Venusian—Amtorian—mammals such as roamed the Americas before the last ice age gazed skyward to see this strange object passing overhead, then returned to their grazing, unconcerned.
We rose toward the planet’s perpetual cloud cover and passed over a ridge of jagged granite peaks, then dipped again to skim the ground in the next valley. As if Nature had separated the two adjacent lowlands, this next savannah was populated by an even more astonishing array of beasts. If not dinosaurs, then surely these creatures were Amtor’s analogs of them. I saw something that looked remarkably like a triceratops placidly grazing until it was surprised by the attack of a bonapartenykus—a feathered dinosaur whose fierce claws and teeth belie its otherwise benign appearance.
I would have been curious to observe the battle between these two giant beasts out of Earth’s multimillion-year past, but the dragonfly continued onward, our pilot never taking his eyes off the controls and the passing landscape, totally ignoring Duare and myself.
Now we approached another range of jagged granite peaks. I had lost all track of time and had no idea how long we had been flying over Amtor’s amazing landscape. But as the aircraft initiated its climb into the new range of mountains, I felt the temperature drop precipitously.
For the first time since arriving on Venus, I actually felt cold. The
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