The Time Ships. Stephen Baxter

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СКАЧАТЬ buried deep in the hollowed-out earth? What terrible tortures were the Morlocks devising for me? Was I doomed to spend the rest of my life in this alien barrenness?

      For a period I was quite unhinged, by my isolation and my awful sense of being stranded. I did not know where I was, nor where the Time Machine was, and I did not expect to see my home again. I was a strange beast, stranded in an alien world. I called out to the dark, alternately issuing threats and entreaties for mercy or release; and I slammed my fists against the bland, unyielding Floor, without result. I sobbed, and ran, and cursed myself for my unmatched folly – having once escaped the clutches of the Morlocks – to have immediately returned myself to the same trap!

      In the end I must have bawled like a frustrated child, and I used up my strength, and I sank in the darkness to the ground, quite exhausted.

      I think I dozed a while. When I came to myself, nothing in my condition had changed. I got myself to my feet. My anger and frenzy had burned themselves out and, though I felt as desolate as ever in my life, I made room for my body’s simple human needs: hunger and thirst being primary among them.

      I returned, tired out, to my light shaft. That pressure in my bladder had continued to build. With a feeling of resignation, I picked up the pail that had been provided for me, carried it off into the dark a little way – for modesty’s sake, as I knew Morlocks must be watching – and when I had done I left it there, out of sight.

      I surveyed the Morlock food. It was a bleak prospect: it looked no more appetizing than earlier, but I was just as hungry. I picked up the bowl of water – it was the size of a soup bowl – and raised it to my lips. It was not a pleasant drink – tepid and tasteless, as if all the minerals had been distilled out of it – but it was clear and it refreshed my mouth. I held the liquid on my tongue for a few seconds, hesitating at this final hurdle; then, deliberately, I swallowed.

      After a few minutes I had suffered no ill effects I could measure, and I took a little more of the water. I also dabbed a corner of my handkerchief on the bowl, and wiped the water across my brow and hands.

      I turned to the food itself. I picked up one greenish slab of it. I snapped off a corner: it broke easily, was green all the way through, and crumbled a little like a Cheddar. My teeth slid into the stuff. As to its flavour: if you have ever eaten a green vegetable, say broccoli or sprouts, boiled to within an inch of disintegration, then you have something of its savour; members of the less well-appointed London clubs will recognize the symptoms! But I bit into my slab until it was half gone. Then I picked up the other slabs to try them; although their colours varied, their texture and flavour differed not a whit.

      It did not take many mouthfuls of that stuff to sate me, and I dropped the fragments on their tray and pushed it away.

      I sat on the Floor and peered into the dark. I felt an intense gratitude that the Morlocks had at least provided me with this illumination, for I imagined that had I been deposited on this empty, featureless surface in a darkness broken only by the star images beneath me, I might have gone quite mad. And yet I knew, at the same time, that the Morlocks had provided this ring of light for their own purposes, as an effective means to keep me in this place. I was all but helpless, a prisoner of a mere light ray!

      A great weariness descended on me. I felt reluctant to lose consciousness once more – to leave myself defenceless – but I could see little prospect of staying awake forever. I stepped out of the ring of light and a little way away into the darkness, so that I felt, at least, some security from its cover of night. I took off my jacket and folded it up into a pillow for my head. The air was quite warm, and the soft Floor also seemed heated, so I should not go cold.

      So, with my portly body stretched out over the stars, I slept.

       8

       A VISITOR

      I awoke after an interval I could not measure. I lifted my head and glanced around. I was alone in the dark, and all seemed unchanged. I patted my vest pocket; the Time Machine levers were still safely there.

      As I tried to move, stiffness sent pain shooting along my legs and back. I sat up, awkward, and got to my feet feeling every year of my age; I was inordinately grateful that I had not had to leap into action to fend off a tribe of marauding Morlocks! I performed a few rusty physical jerks to loosen up my muscles; then I picked up my jacket, smoothing out its creases, and donned it.

      I stepped forward into the light ring.

      The trays, with food cartons and toilet pail, had been changed, I found. So they were watching me! – well, it was no more than I had suspected. I took the lids off the cartons, only to find the same depressing slabs of anonymous fodder. I made a breakfast of water and some of the greenish stuff. My fear was gone, to be replaced by a numbing sense of tedium: it is remarkable how rapidly the human mind can accommodate the most remarkable of changed circumstances. Was this to be my fate from now on? – boredom, a hard bed, lukewarm water, and a diet of slabs of boiled cabbage? It was like being back at school, I reflected with gloom.

      ‘Pau.’

      The single syllable, softly spoken, sounded as loud to me in all that silence as a gun shot.

      I cried out, scrambled to my feet, and held out my food slabs – it was absurd, but I lacked any other weapon. The sound had come from behind me, and I whirled around, my boots squealing on the Floor.

      A Morlock stood there, just beyond the edge of my light circle, half-illuminated. He stood upright – he did not share the crouching, ape-like gait of those creatures I had encountered before – and he wore goggles that made a shield of blue glass which coated his huge eyes, turning them black to my view. ‘Tik. Pau,’ this apparition pronounced, his voice a queer gurgle.

      I stumbled backwards, stepping on a tray with a clatter. I held up my fists. ‘Don’t come near me!’

      The Morlock took a single pace forward, coming closer to the light shaft; despite his goggles, he flinched a little from the brightness. This was one of that new breed of advanced-looking Morlock, one of which had stunned me, I realized; he seemed naked, but the pale hair which coated his back and head was cut and shaped – deliberately – into a rather severe style, square about the breast bone and shoulders, giving it something of the effect of a uniform. He had a small, chinless face, something like an ugly child’s.

      A ghost of memory of that sweet sensation of Morlock skull cracking under my club returned to me. I considered rushing this fellow, knocking him to the ground. But what would it avail me? There were uncounted others, no doubt, out there in the dark. I had no weapons, not even my poker, and I recalled how this chap’s cousin had raised that queer gun against me, knocking me down without effort.

      I decided to bide my time.

      And besides – this might seem strange! – I found my anger was dissipating, into an unaccountable feeling of humour. This Morlock, despite the standard wormy pallor of his skin, did look comical: imagine an orang-utan, his hair clipped short and dyed pale yellow-white, and then encouraged to stand upright and wear a pair of gaudy spectacles, and you’ll have something of the effect of him.

      ‘Tik. Pau,’ he repeated.

      I took a step towards him. ‘What are you saying to me, you brute?’

      He СКАЧАТЬ