The Songs of Distant Earth Read Online Free PDF

radiation.”
    “When we got closer, we realized that didn’t prove a thing. Thalassa has a very dense ionosphere. There might be a lot of medium – and short-wave chatter going on beneath it, and nobody outside would ever know. Microwaves would go through, of course, but maybe they don’t need them, or we haven’t been lucky enough to intercept a beam.”
    “Anyway, there’s a well-developed civilization down there. We saw the lights of their cities – towns, at least – as soon as we had a good view of the nightside. There are plenty of small industries, a little coastal traffic – no large ships – and we’ve even spotted a couple of aircraft moving at all of five hundred klicks, which will get them anywhere in fifteen minutes.”
    “Obviously, they don’t need much air transport in such a compact community, and they have a good system of roads. But we’ve still not been able to detect any communications. And no satellites, either – not even meteorological ones, which you’d think they’d need … though perhaps not, as their ships probably never get out of sight of land. There’s simply no other land to go to, of course.”
    “So there we are. It’s an interesting situation – and a very pleasant surprise. At least, I hope it will be. Now, any questions? Yes, Mister Lorenson?”
    “Have we tried to contact them, sir?”
    “Not yet; we thought it inadvisable until we know the exact level of their culture. Whatever we do, it may be a considerable shock.”
    “Do they know we’re here?”
    “Probably not.”
    “But surely – our drive – they must have seen that!”
    It was a reasonable question, since a quantum ramjet at full power was one of the most dramatic spectacles ever contrived by man. It was as brilliant as an atomic bomb, and it lasted much longer – months instead of milliseconds.
    “Possibly, but I doubt it. We were on the other side of the sun when we did most of our braking. They wouldn’t have seen us in its glare.”
    Then someone asked the question that everybody had been thinking.
    “Captain, how will this affect our mission?”
    Sirdar Bey looked thoughtfully at the speaker.
    “At this stage, it’s still quite impossible to say. A few hundred thousand other humans – or whatever the population is – could make things a lot easier for us. Or at least much more pleasant. On the other hand, if they don’t like us – ”
    He gave an expressive shrug.
    “I’ve just remembered a piece of advice that an old explorer gave to one of his colleagues. If you assume that the natives are friendly, they usually are. And vice versa. “So until they prove otherwise, we’ll assume that they’re friendly. And if they’re not …”
    The Captain’s expression hardened, and his voice became that of a commander who had just brought a great ship across fifty light-years of space.
    “I’ve never claimed that might is right, but it’s always very comforting to have it.”

7. Lords of the Last Days

    I t was hard to believe that he was really and truly awake, and that life could begin again.
    Lieutenant Commander Loren Lorenson knew that he could never wholly escape from the tragedy that had shadowed more than forty generations and had reached its climax in his own lifetime. During the course of his first new day, he had one continuing fear. Not even the promise, and mystery, of the beautiful ocean-world hanging there below Magellan could keep at bay the thought: what dreams will come when I close my eyes tonight in natural sleep for the first time in two hundred years?
    He had witnessed scenes that no one could ever forget and which would haunt Mankind until the end of time. Through the ship’s telescopes, he had watched the death of the solar system. With his own eyes, he had seen the volcanoes of Mars erupt for the first time in a billion years; Venus briefly naked as her atmosphere was blasted into space before she herself was consumed; the gas giants exploding into