Needle

Chapter II. SHELTER

THE FIRST visitors were gulls. One by one they descended, attracted by sight and smell, and began tearing at the carcass of the shark. The Hunter withdrew to the lower parts of the body and made no attempt to drive them off, even when they pounced upon the eyes of the great fish and speedily deprived him of visual contact with the outside world. If other life forms came he would know it anyway; if they didn't, it was just as well to have the gulls there.

The greedy birds remained undisturbed until mid-afternoon. They did not make too much progress in disposing of the shark-the tough skin defied their beaks in most places. They were persistent, however, and when they suddenly took wing and departed in a body, it was evident to the Hunter that there must be something of interest in the neighborhood. He hastily extruded enough tissue from one of the gill slits to make an eye and looked cautiously about him.

He saw why the gulls had left. From the direction of the trees a number of much larger creatures were coming. They were bipeds, and the Hunter estimated with the ease of long practice that the largest weighed fully a hundred and twenty pounds, which, in an air-breather, meant that the addition of his own mass and oxygen consumption was unlikely to prove a serious burden. Much closer to him was a smaller four-legged creature running rapidly toward the dead shark and uttering an apparently endless string of sharp yelping sounds. The Hunter placed it at about fifty pounds and filed the information mentally for future use.

The four bipeds were also running, but not nearly so rapidly as the smaller animal. As they approached, the hidden watcher examined them carefully, and the more he saw the more pleased he was. They could travel with fair speed; their skulls were of a size that gave promise of considerable intelligence, if one could safety assume that this race kept its brain there; their skins seemed almost entirely unprotected, giving promise of easy access through the pores. As they slowed up and stopped beside the hammerhead's body, they gave another indication of intelligence by exchanging articulate sounds which unquestionably represented speech. The Hunter, to put it mildly, was delighted. He had not dared hope for such an ideal host to appear so quickly.

Of course there were problems still to be solved. It was a fairly safe bet that the creatures were not accustomed to the idea of symbiosis, at least as the Hunter's race practiced it. The alien was sure he had never seen members of this race before, and was equally sure he knew all those with whom his people normally associated. Therefore, if these beings actually saw him approaching, they would almost certainly go to considerable lengths to avoid contact; and even if this proved futile, forcible entry on the Hunter's part would create an attitude highly unlikely to lead to future co-operation. It seemed, therefore, that subtlety would have to be employed.

The four bipeds remained looking down at the shark and conversing for only a few minutes, then they walked off a short distance up the beach. Somehow the Hunter got a vague impression from their attitudes that they found the neighborhood unpleasant. The quadruped remained a little longer, examining the carcass closely; but it apparently failed to notice the rather oddly placed eye which was following its movements. A call from one of the other creatures finally attracted its attention, and as the Hunter watched it bounded off in the direction they had taken. He saw with some surprise that they had entered the water and were swimming around with considerable facility. He marked down the fact as another point in their favor; he had seen no trace of gills in his rather careful examination of their bodies, and as air-breathers they must have had a considerable margin between their ability to absorb oxygen and their actual need for it to remain under water as long as he saw one of them do. Then he realized that there was another good point: he could probably approach them much more easily in the water.

It was evident from their behavior that they could not see very well, if at all, under water-they invariably raised their heads above the surface to orient themselves, and did this with considerable frequency. The quadruped was even less likely to see him approaching, as it kept its head above water at all times.

The thought led to instant action. A threadlike pseudo-pod began groping rapidly toward the pool an inch or two under the sand. The eye was kept in operation until most of the jelly-like body had crossed the four-yard gap, then another was formed at the water's edge, and the Hunter drew the rest of his body into a compact mass just below it The operation had taken several minutes; winding among sand grains had been an annoyingly devious mode of travel.

The water was quite clear, so it was not necessary to keep an eye above the surface to direct the stalk. The mass of jelly quickly molded itself into an elongated, fishlike shape with an eye in front, and the Hunter swam toward the boys as rapidly as he could. In one way, he reflected, it was really easier to see under water. He could use a concave lens of air, held in shape by a film of his own flesh, which was far more transparent than an optical system composed entirely of the latter substance.

He had intended to swim right up to one of the boys, hoping his approach would not be noticed and his efforts at contact marked by swirling water or his subject's friends -they were indulging in acts of considerable violence as they swam and plunged. However, it speedily became evident that only luck would bring him in contact with one of the creatures, since they swam much more rapidly than the Hunter could; and, realizing this, he found what seemed to be an excellent means of making an under* cover approach. He suddenly noticed beside him a large jellyfish, bobbing rather aimlessly along after the manner of its kind; and with his attention thus diverted, he saw that there were quite a number of the things in the vicinity. Evidently the bipeds did not consider them dangerous or they would not be swimming here.

Accordingly, the Hunter altered his form and method of locomotion to agree with those of the medusae and approached more slowly the area in which the boys were playing. His color was slightly different from that of any of the other jellyfish but these, in turn, differed among themselves, and he felt that shape must be a more important criterion than shade. He may have been right, for he got almost up to one of the bipeds without apparently causing any alarm. They were fairly close together at the moment, and he had high hopes of making contact-he did, in fact, with a cautiously extended tentacle, discover that the varicolored integument covering a portion of their bodies was an artificial fabric-but before he could do any more, the subject of his investigation slid to one side and moved several feet away. He gave no sign of alarm, however, and the Hunter tried again. The approach ended in precisely the same fashion, except that this time he did not get so close.

He tried each of the other boys in turn, with the same annoying near-success. Then, puzzled by a phenomenon which seemed to be exceeding the generous limits of the law of chance, he drifted a short distance away and watched, trying to learn the reason for it. Within five minutes he realized that, while these creatures seemed to have no actual fear of jelly-fish, they sedulously avoided physical contact with them. He had chosen an unfortunate camouflage.

Robert Kinnaird avoided jellyfish almost without conscious thought. He had learned to swim at the age of five, and in that and each of the nine subsequent years of his life he had enough first-hand experience with their stinging tentacles to assure his avoiding their company. He had been fully occupied in ducking one of his companions when the Hunter had first touched him, and even though he had dodged hastily on noticing the lump of jelly in the water beside him he had not really thought about the matter-if he did, it was merely a brief reflection that he was lucky not to have been stung. He forgot the incident promptly, but his attention had been sufficiently diffused by it to prevent the thing's again approaching so closely.

About the time the Hunter realized what was wrong, the boys grew tired of swimming and retired to the beach. He watched them go in mounting annoyance, and continued to watch as they ran back and forth on the sand playing some obscure game. Were the mad creatures never still? How in the Galaxy could he ever come in contact with such infernally active beings? He could only watch, and ponder.

Ashore, once the salt had dried on their sun-browned hides, the boys did finally begin to quiet down and cast expectant glances toward the grove of coconut palms between them and the center of the island. One of them seated himself, facing the ocean, and suddenly spoke.

"Bob, when are your folks coming with the grub?"

Robert Kinnaird flung himself face downward in the sun before replying. " 'Bout four or half-past, Mother said. Don't you ever think of anything but eating?"

The redheaded questioner mumbled an inarticulate reply and subsided flat on his back, gazing up into the now cloudless blue sky. Another of the boys took up the conversational ball.

"It's tough, you having to go tomorrow," he said. "I kind of wish I was going with you, though. I haven't been in the States since my folks came out here. I was only a kid then," he added serenely.

"It's not so bad," returned Bob slowly. "There are a lot of good fellows at the school, and there's skating and skiing in the winter that you don't get here. Anyway, I'll be back next summer."

The talk died down and the boys basked in the hot sunshine as they waited for Mrs. Kinnaird and the food for the farewell picnic. Bob was closest to the water, lying stretched in full sunlight; the others had sought the rather inadequate shade of the palms. He was already well tanned but wanted to get the last possible benefit out of the tropical sun, which he would miss for the next ten months. It was hot, and he had just spent an active half-hour, and there was nothing at all to keep him awake…

The Hunter was still watching, eagerly now. Were the peripatetic things really settling down at last? It looked as though they were. The four bipeds were sprawled on the sand in various positions which they presumably found comfortable; the other animal settled down beside one of them, letting its head rest on its forelegs. The conversation, which had been almost incessant up to this point, died down, and the amorphous watcher decided to take a chance. He moved rapidly to the edge of the pool.

The nearest of the boys was about ten yards from the water. It would not be possible to maintain a watch from the Hunter's present position and at the same tune send himself under the sand to a point below the now-motionless body of his intended host. He must, however, keep the other in sight. Once more camouflage seemed indicated, and once more the ever-present jellyfish seemed to fill the need. There were a number of them lying on the sand motionless; perhaps if he moved slowly and emulated their shape the Hunter could escape notice until he was close enough for an underground attack.

He may have been excessively cautious, since none of the creatures was facing his way and all were nearly if not entirely asleep, but caution is never really wasted, and the Hunter did not regret the twenty minutes he took getting from the water's edge to a point some three yards from Robert Kinnaird. It was uncomfortable, of course, since his skinless body had even less protection from the hot sun than the jellyfish it was imitating; but he stood it, and eventually reached a point which his earlier experience suggested was close enough.

Had anyone been watching the large medusa lying apparently helpless a few feet from the boy at that moment he might have noticed a peculiar diminution in its size. The shrinking itself was not remarkable-it is the inevitable fate of a jellyfish on a hot beach-but the more orthodox members of the tribe merely grow thinner until only a cobwebby skeleton remains. This specimen dwindled not only in thickness but in diameter, and there were no remains whatsoever. Until it was almost completely gone, of course, there was an odd little lump in the center which preserved its size and shape while the body vanished around it; but this at last went, too, and no trace remained except a shallow depression in the sand-a depression which that careful observer might have noticed extended all the way from the water's edge.

The Hunter kept the eye in use during most of the underground search. His questing appendage at last reached sand that was more closely compacted than usual and, advancing very cautiously now, finally encountered what could only be living flesh. Robert's toes were buried in the sand, since he was lying on his stomach, and the Hunter found that he could operate without emerging at all to the surface. With that fact established, he dissolved the eye and drew the last of his mass out of sight below the sand-with considerable relief as the sunlight was cut off.

He did not attempt to penetrate until his whole body had been drawn through the sand and was wrapped about the half-buried foot. He surrounded the limb with extreme care, bringing himself into contact with the skin over several square inches. Then and only then did he commence interstition, letting the ultra-microscopic cells of his flesh slide through pores, between skin cells, under toenails-into the thousands of openings that lay unguarded in this, to his way of thinking, singularly coarse organism.

The boy was sound asleep, and remained so; but the Hunter worked as fast as possible nevertheless, for it would have been extremely awkward to have the foot move while he was only partly inside. Therefore, as swiftly as was compatible with extreme caution, the alien organism flowed smoothly along the bones and tendons in foot and ankle; up within the muscle sheaths of calf and thigh; along the outer wall of the femoral artery and through the tubelets within the structure of the thigh bone; around joints, and through still other blood vessels. It filtered through the peritoneum without causing sensation or damage; and finally the whole four pounds of unearthly life was gathered together in the abdominal cavity, not only without harming the boy in the least but without even disturbing his slumber. And there, for a tune, the Hunter rested.

He had a bigger oxygen reserve this time, having entered from air rather than water. It would be some time before he needed to draw on his host for more. He was hoping, if it were possible, to remain exactly where he was for an entire day, so that he could observe and memorize the cycle of physiological processes which this host undoubtedly performed differently from any he had known before. At the moment, of course, the creature was asleep, but that would probably not be for long. These beings seemed pretty active.

Bob was aroused, like the other boys, by the sound of his mother's voice. She had come silently, spread a blanket in the shade, and arranged the food on it before speaking; and her first words were the ancient "Come and get it!" She would not stay to help them eat it, though cordially and sincerely pressed to do so by the boys, but went back through the palm grove to the road that led to their home.

"Try to be back by sundown," she called to Bob over her shoulder as she reached the trees. "You still have to pack, and you'll have to be up early in the morning." Bob nodded, with his mouth full, and turned back to the food-laden blanket.

After disposing of the meal, the boys sat, talked, and dozed for the standard hour after eating; then they returned to the water, where they indulged further in games of violence; and at last, realizing that the abrupt tropical night would soon be upon them, they gathered up the blanket and started for the road and their respective dwellings. They were rather silent now, with the awkwardness natural to their ages when faced by a situation which adults would treat either emotionally or with studied casualness. The farewells, as they passed their respective dwellings, were brief and accompanied by reiterated and reciprocated promises to "write as soon as you can."

Bob, proceeding at last alone to his own house, felt the mixture of regret and pleasurable anticipation which he had come to associate with these occasions. By the tune he reached home, though, the latter feeling had gained the ascendant, and he was looking forward with considerable eagerness to meeting again the school friends he had not seen for more than two months. He was whistling cheerfully as he entered the house.

The packing, done with the tactful assistance of his mother, was quickly completed, and by nine o'clock he was in bed and asleep. He himself considered the hour rather early, but he had learned the value of obedience at certain times very early in life.

The Hunter was able to remain quiescent, as he had hoped, for some hours-till well after Bob was asleep, in fact. He could not, however, last an entire day; for no matter how quiet he remained, the mere fact of living used up some energy and consequently some oxygen.

Eventually he realized his store was growing low, and he knew it would be necessary to establish a supply before the need became desperate.

He knew, of course, that his host was asleep, but this in no way decreased his caution. He remained for the time being below the diaphragm, not wishing to disturb in any way the heart he could feel beating just above it; but he was able to find without effort a large artery in the abdomen which offered no more resistance to penetration than had any other part of the human organism thus far. He discovered, to his intense satisfaction, that he could draw enough oxygen from the red cells (he did not think of them by color, since he had not yet seen them) to supply his needs without seriously diminishing the quantity that passed through the vessel. He checked this fact very carefully. His whole attitude in the present exploration was utterly different from that which had directed his actions within the body of the shark, for he had come to look upon Robert in the light of a permanent companion during his stay on the earth, and his present actions were ruled by a law of his kind so ancient and so rigid as to assume almost the proportions of an instinct.

Do nothing that can harm your host!