The new red growths were everywhere. Months ago a storm–wind blew while somewhere, not too far distant, other red puffballs were bursting and sending their spores into the air. Since it was only a windstorm, there was no rain to wash the air clean of the lethal dust. The new kind of puffball—but perhaps it was not new: it could have thriven for thousands of years where it was first thrown as a sport from a genetically unstable parent—the new kind of puffball would not normally be spread in this fashion. By chance it had.
There were dozens of the things within a quarter–mile, hundreds within a mile, and thousands upon thousands within the area the tribe normally foraged in. Burl had seen them even forty miles away, as yet immature. They would be deadly at one period alone—the time of their bursting. But there were limitations even to the deadliness of the red puffballs, though Burl had not yet discovered the fact. But as of now, they doomed the tribe.
One woman panted and moaned in her exhausted sleep, a little way from where Burl tried to solve the problem presented by the tribe. Nobody else attempted to think it out. The others accepted doom with fatalistic hopelessness. Burl's leadership might mean extra food, but nothing could counter the doom awaiting them—so their thoughts seemed to run.
But Burl doggedly reviewed the facts in the darkness, while the humans about him slept the sleep of those without hope and even without rebellion. There had been many burstings of the crimson puffballs. As many as four and five of the deadly dust–clouds had been seen spouting into the air at the same time. A small boy of the tribe had breathlessly told of seeing a hunting–spider killed by the red dust. Lana, the half–grown girl, had come upon one of the gigantic rhinoceros–beetles belly–up on the ground, already the prey of ants. She had snatched a huge, meat–filled joint and run away, faster than the ants could follow. A far–ranging man had seen a butterfly, with wings ten yards across, die in a dust–cloud. Another woman—Cori—had been nearby when a red cloud settled slowly over long, solid lines of black worker–ants bound on some unknown mission. Later she saw other workers carrying the dead bodies back to the ant–city to be used for food.
Burl still sat wakeful and frustrated and enraged as the slow rain fell upon the toadstools that formed the tribe's lurking–place. He doggedly went over and over the problem. There were innumerable red puffballs. Some had burst. The others undoubtedly would burst. Anything that breathed the red dust died. With thousands of the puffballs around them it was unthinkable that any human in this place could escape breathing the red dust and dying. But it had not always been so. There had been a time when there were no red puffballs here.
Burl's eyes moved restlessly over the sleeping forms limned by a patch of fox–fire. The feathery plumes rising from his head were outlined softly by the phosphorescence. His face was lined with a frown as he tried to think his own and his fellows' way out of the predicament. Without realizing it, Burl had taken it upon himself to think for his tribe. He had no reason to. It was simply a natural thing for him to do so, now that he had learned to think—even though his efforts were crude and painful as yet.
Saya woke with a start and stared about. There had been no alarm,—merely the usual noises of distant murders and the songs of singers in the night. Burl moved restlessly. Saya stood up quietly, her long hair flowing about her. Sleepy–eyed, she moved to be near Burl. She sank to the ground beside him, sitting up—because the hiding–place was crowded and small—and dozed fitfully. Presently her head drooped to one side. It rested against his shoulder. She slept again.
This simple act may have been the catalyst which gave Burl the solution to the problem. Some few days before, Burl had been in a far–away place where there was much food. At the time he'd thought vaguely of finding Saya and bringing her to that place. He remembered now that the red puffballs flourished there as well as here—but there had been other dangers in between, so the only half–formed purpose had been abandoned. Now, though, with Saya's head resting against his shoulder, he remembered the plan. And then the stroke of genius took place.
He formed the idea of a journey which was not a going–after–food. This present dwelling–place of the tribe had been free of red puffballs until only recently. There must be other places where there were no red puffballs. He would take Saya and his tribesmen to such a place.
It was really genius. The people of Burl's tribe had no purposes, only needs—for food and the like. Burl had achieved abstract thought—which previously had not been useful on the forgotten planet and, therefore, not practised. But it was time for humankind to take a more fitting place in the unbalanced ecological system of this nightmare world, time to change that unbalance in favor of humans.
When dawn came, Burl had not slept at all. He was all authority and decision. He had made plans.
He spoke sternly, loudly—which frightened people conditioned to be furtive—holding up his spear as he issued commands. His timid tribesfolk obeyed him meekly. They felt no loyalty to him or confidence in his decisions yet, but they were beginning to associate obedience to him with good things. Food, for one.
Before the day fully came, they made loads of the remaining edible mushroom and uneaten meat. It was remarkable for humans to leave their hiding–place while they still had food to eat, but Burl was implacable and scowling. Three men bore spears at Burl's urging. He brandished his long shaft confidently as he persuaded the other three to carry clubs. They did so reluctantly, even though previously they had killed ants with clubs. Spears, they felt, would have been better. They wouldn't be so close to the prey then.
The sky became gray over all its expanse. The indefinite bright area which marked the position of the sun became established. It was part–way toward the center of the sky when the journey began. Burl had, of course, no determined course, only a destination—safety. He had been carried south, in his misadventure on the river. There were red puffballs to southward, therefore he ruled out that direction. He could have chosen the east and come upon an ocean, but no safety from the red spore–dust. Or he could have chosen the north. It was pure chance that he headed west.
He walked confidently through the gruesome world of the lowlands, holding his spear in a semblance of readiness. Clad as he was, he made a figure at once valiant and rather pathetic. It was not too sensible for one young man—even one who had killed two spiders—to essay leading a tiny tribe of fearful folk across a land of monstrous ferocity and incredible malignance, armed only with a spear from a dead insect's armor. It was absurd to dress up for the enterprise in a velvety cloak made of a moth's wing, blue moth–fur for a loin–cloth, and merely beautiful golden plumes bobbing above his forehead.
Probably, though, that gorgeousness had a good effect upon his followers. They surely could not reassure each other by their numbers! There was a woman with a baby in her arms—Cori. Three children of nine or ten, unable to resist the instinct to play even on so perilous a journey, ate almost constantly of the lumps of foodstuff they had been ordered to carry. After them came Dik, a long–legged adolescent boy with eyes that roved anxiously about. Behind him were two men. Dor with a short spear and Jak hefting a club, both of them badly frightened at the idea of fleeing from dangers they knew and were terrified by, to other dangers unknown and, consequently, more to be feared. The others trailed after them. Tet was rear–guard. Burl had separated the pair of boys to make them useful. Together they were worthless.
It was a pathetic caravan, in a way. In all the rest of the Galaxy, man was the dominant creature. There was no other planet from one rim to the other where men did not build their cities or settlements with unconscious arrogance—completely disregarding the wishes of lesser things. Only on this planet did men hide from danger rather than destroy it. Only here could men be driven from their place by lower life–forms. And only here would a migration be made on foot, with men's eyes fearful, their bodies poised to flee at sight of something stronger and more deadly than themselves.