It set out on the journey, but long before it reached the food, its energy ran out. Mass, converted back to energy to make the trip, was used up. It shrank.
Finally, all the energy was gone. It was a spore, drifting aimlessly, lifelessly, in space.
That was the first time. Or was it? It thought it could remember back to a distant, misty time when the Universe was evenly covered with stars. It had eaten through them, cutting away whole sections, growing, swelling. And the stars had swung off in terror, forming galaxies and constellations.
Or was that a dream?
Methodically, it fed on the Earth, wondering where the rich food was. And then it was back again, but this time above the leech.
It waited, but the tantalizing food remained out of reach. It was able to sense how rich and pure the food was.
Why didn’t it fall?
For a long time the leech waited, but the food stayed out of reach. At last, it lifted and followed.
The food retreated, up, up from the surface of the planet. The leech went after as quickly as its bulk would allow.
The rich food fled out, into space, and the leech followed. Beyond, it could sense an even richer source.
The hot, wonderful food of a sun!
* * * *
O’Donnell served champagne for the scientists in the control room. Official dinners would follow, but this was the victory celebration.
“A toast,” the general said, standing. The men raised their glasses. The only man not drinking was a lieutenant, sitting in front of the control board that guided the drone spaceship.
“To Micheals, for thinking of—what was it again, Micheals?”
“Antaeus.” Micheals had been drinking champagne steadily, but he didn’t feel elated. Antaeus, born of Ge, the Earth, and Poseidon, the Sea. The invincible wrestler. Each time Hercules threw him to the ground, he arose refreshed.
Until Hercules held him in the air.
Moriarty was muttering to himself, figuring with slide rule, pencil and paper. Allenson was drinking, but he didn’t look too happy about it.
“Come on, you birds of evil omen,” O’Donnell said, pouring more champagne. “Figure it out later. Right now, drink.” He turned to the operator. “How’s it going?”
Micheals’ analogy had been applied to a spaceship. The ship, operated by remote control, was filled with pure radioactives. It hovered over the leech until, rising to the bait, it had followed. Antaeus had left his mother, the Earth, and was losing his strength in the air. The operator was allowing the spaceship to run fast enough to keep out of the leech’s grasp, but close enough to keep it coming.
The spaceship and the leech were on a collision course with the Sun.
“Fine, sir,” the operator said. “It’s inside the orbit of Mercury now.”
“Men,” the general said, “I swore to destroy that thing. This isn’t exactly the way I wanted to do it. I figured on a more personal way. But the important thing is the destruction. You will all witness it. Destruction is at times a sacred mission. This is such a time. Men, I feel wonderful.”
“Turn the spaceship!” It was Moriarty who had spoken. His face was white. “Turn the damned thing!”
He shoved his figures at them.
They were easy to read. The growth-rate of the leech. The energy-consumption rate, estimated. Its speed in space, a constant. The energy it would receive from the Sun as it approached, an exponential curve. Its energy-absorption rate, figured in terms of growth, expressed as a hyped-up discontinuous progression.
The result—
“It’ll consume the Sun,” Moriarty said, very quietly.
The control room turned into a bedlam. Six of them tried to explain it to O’Donnell at the same time. Then Moriarty tried, and finally Allenson.
“Its rate of growth is so great and its speed so slow—and it will get so much energy—that the leech will be able to consume the Sun by the time it gets there. Or, at least, to live off it until it can consume it.”
O’Donnell didn’t bother to understand. He turned to the operator.
“Turn it,” he said.
They all hovered over the radar screen, waiting.
* * * *
The food turned out of the leech’s path and streaked away. Ahead was a tremendous source, but still a long way off. The leech hesitated.
Its cells, recklessly expending energy, shouted for a decision. The food slowed, tantalizingly near.
The closer source or the greater?
The leech’s body wanted food now.
It started after it, away from the Sun.
The Sun would come next.
* * * *
“Pull it out at right angles to the plane of the Solar System,” Allenson said.
The operator touched the controls. On the radar screen, they saw a blob pursuing a dot. It had turned.
Relief washed over them. It had been close!
“In what portion of the sky would the leech be?” O’Donnell asked, his face expressionless.
“Come outside; I believe I can show you,” an astronomer said. They walked to the door. “Somewhere in that section,” the astronomer said, pointing.
“Fine. All right, Soldier,” O’Donnell told the operator. “Carry out your orders.”
The scientists gasped in unison. The operator manipulated the controls and the blob began to overtake the dot. Micheals started across the room.
“Stop,” the general said, and his strong, commanding voice stopped Micheals. “I know what I’m doing. I had that ship especially built.”
The blob overtook the dot on the radar screen.
“I told you this was a personal matter,” O’Donnell said. “I swore to destroy that leech. We can never have any security while it lives.” He smiled. “Shall we look at the sky?”
The general strolled to the door, followed by the scientists.
“Push the button, Soldier!”
The operator did. For a moment, nothing happened. Then the sky lit up!
A bright star hung in space. Its brilliance filled the night, grew, and started to fade.
“What did you do?” Micheals gasped.
“That rocket was built around a hydrogen bomb,” O’Donnell said, his strong face triumphant. “I set it off at the contact moment.” He called to the operator again. “Is there anything showing on the radar?”
“Not a speck, sir.”
“Men,” the general said, “I have met the enemy and he is mine. Let’s have some more champagne.”
But Micheals found that he was suddenly ill.
* * * *
It had been shrinking from the expenditure of energy, when the great explosion came. No thought of containing it. The leech’s cells held for the barest fraction of a second, and then spontaneously overloaded.
The leech was smashed, broken up, destroyed. It was split into a thousand particles, and the particles were split a million times more.
The particles were thrown out on the wave front of the explosion, and they split further, spontaneously.
Into spores.
The spores closed into dry, hard, seemingly lifeless specks of dust, billions of them, scattered, drifting. Unconscious, they floated in the emptiness of space.
Billions of them, waiting to be fed.
ONE MAN’S POISON
Hellman plucked the last radish out of the can with a pair of dividers. He held it up for Casker to admire, then laid it carefully on the workbench beside the razor.
“Hell of a meal for two grown men,” Casker said, flopping down in one of the ship’s padded crash chairs.
“If you’d like to give up your share—” Hellman started to suggest.
Casker shook his head quickly. Hellman smiled, picked up the razor and examined its edge critically.
“Don’t make a production out of it,” Casker said, glancing at the ship’s instruments. They were approaching a red dwarf, the only planet-bearing sun in the vicinity. “We want to be through with supper before we get much closer.”