Alan Dean Foster - Humanx 1 - Midworld

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World with no name.

Green it was.

Green and gravid.

It lay supine in a sea of sibilant Jet, a festering

emerald in the universe—ocean. It did not support

life. Rather, on its surface life exploded, erupted, mul-

tiplied, and thrived beyond imagining. From a soil

base so rich it all but lived itself, a verdant magma

spilled forth to inundate the land.

And it was green. Oh, it was a green so bright

it had its own special niche in the spectrum of the

impossible, a green pervasive, an everywhere-all-at-

once, omnipotent green.

World of a chlorophyllous god.

Save for a few pockets of rancid blue, the oceans

themselves were green from a surfeit of drifting plant

life that nearly strangled the waters. The mountains

were green until they blended into green froth; only

at the heights did lichens battle with creeping ice as

on most worlds waves warred with the land. Even

the air had a pale green cast to it, so that looking

through it one would seem to be staring through

lenses cut from purest peridot.

There was no question of the planet's ability to

support life. Rather, it was a question of it's support-

ing too much life, too well.

Even so, in all the life that grew and flew and

fought and died on the most fertile globe in the heav-

ens, there was not a single creature that thought—not

in the manner in which thought is usually and com-

fortably denned.

It must be considered that that which inhabited the

world with no name regarded the universe in a fash-

1

ion other than usual ... if anything did so at all.

Oh, there were the furcots, of course, but they had

not even a name that could be called a name until

the people came.

They arrived, these people did, on the way to

some place else. To the commander and officers of

the colony ship, who studied and cursed and ranted

at their controls and coordinates, it was a clear case

of a malign accident. This was not the planet to which

their automatic pilot should have brought them. Now

they were in orbit, with no fuel to go anywhere else,

without proper equipment to settle on this world, with-

out time or way to call for help. They would have

to make do with this calamitous landfall.

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The colonists voted a Soviet ballot and set about

the matter of bringing civilization to this world. They

were tired and desperate and overconfident, but un-

prepared.

They put down in that green hell. It filtered out

the preponderance of human chaff from the seed

grain right quick and neat, and ate them alive. And

it changed those it did not.

Mankind in those early days was used to controlling

the universe, by force if necessary. Those who held to

such practice did not beget a second generation on

the world with no name. A few, less constrained by

pride and more resilient, survived and had children.

Their offspring grew up with no illusions about the

supremacy of humankind or anykind. They matured

and observed the world around them through different

eyes.

Roll the log.

Give and take.

Bend with the wind.

Adapt, adapt, adapt.. .1

II

Born watched the morning mist rise and dreamed

of the sun. He snuggled deeper into the cranny in the

thomabar tree and wrapped his cloak of green fur

more tightly about himself. Thoughts of the sun

cheered him a little. Hard work, much climbing, and

courage had gifted him with that sight three times in

his modest lifetime. Not many men could boast of

that, he prided himself.

To see the sun one had to climb to the top of the

world. And crawl to the crown of one of the Pillars

or emergents that were the world's buttresses. To as-

cend to such places was to court death from the host

of ravenous shapes that drifted and soared in the Up-

per Hell.

He had done it three times. He was among the

bravest of the brave—or as some in the village in-

sisted, the maddest of the mad.

The damp mist thinned further as the rising sun

sucked moisture from the Third Level. He shivered.

It was dangerous as well as uncomfortable to rest

comparatively exposed so early in the day, when all

sorts of unpleasant things roamed the canopy world.

But dawn and dusk were the best times for hunters

to hunt, and Bom counted himself their equal. A

good hunter did not hide away safe while others took

the best game.

He thought of calling to Ruumahum, but the big

furcot was not close by, and a yell now would surely

scare away potential kill. For the moment he would

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have to do without the comfort of his companion's

hulking warmth.

That Ruumahum was within calling distance Bom

did not doubt. Once a furcot was joined to a person

3

it never strayed far until that person died. When

he died . . . Born angrily shrugged off the thought.

These were useless musings for a man engaged in a

hunt

Three days out from the village now and he had

encountered nothing worth taking. Plenty of bush-

ackers, but he would walk the surface itself before he

would return to the village with only a bushacker or

two. He burned with remembrance of Losting's return

with the carcass of the breeder, remembrance of the ad-

miration and acclaim accorded the big man. Small

things, frivolous things, but nevertheless he burned.

The breeder had been as big as Losting, all claws

and pincers, but it was those threatening claws and

pincers that were filled with the best white meat, and

Losting had laid them at the feet of Brightly Go and

she hadn't refused them. That was when Bom had

stormed out of the village on his present, and thus

far futile, hunt.

He had never been able to match Losting in size

or strength, but he had skill. Even as a child he had

been clever, faster than Tlis friends, and had taken

every opportunity to prove it. Though none questioned

his abilities now, he would have been appalled to

learn that everyone considered him a bit reckless, a

touch crazy. They wouldn't have understood Bom's

constant need to prove himself to others. In this one

way, he was a throwback.

Now he was soloing again, always a dangerous sit-

uation. He concentrated on shutting himself off from

the world, blended with the foliage, became a part of

the prickly green, virtually invisible in the meandering

pathway of the cubble.

The mist had fled, rising into the Second Level.

The air was clear although still moist. Bom's view of

the big epiphytic bromeliad several meters down the

vine was unobstructed. The huge parasitic blossom

grew from the center of the cubble, parasite feeding

on parasite. Broad spatulate leaves of olive and black

backed the green bloom. Thick petals grew tightly to-

gether, curving out and up to form a water-tight basin.

As was usual following the evening rain, it was now

filled with fresh water a meter deep. Eventually, some-

thing worth killing would come to partake of it.

Around him the forest awoke, the hylaeal chorus of

barks, squeaks, chirps, howls, and screeches taking up

where less loquacious nocturnal cousins had left off.

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He was discouraged enough to consider trying an-

other place, when he detected movement in the

branches and lianas above the natural cistern. He

risked edging forward, momentarily breaking the cam-

ouflage of his wavy green cloak. Yes, a definite

rustling, still well above the cubbleway, but traveling

downward.

Moving as little as possible, he shifted the snuffler

from its resting place. The meter-and-a-half-long tube

of green wood was six centimeters around at its back

end, narrowing to barely one at its tip. Gently he

slid it out on the hump of wood in front of him. It

rested there motionless, like a leafless twig. He sighted

it on the cistern. Reaching into the quiver slung across

his back under the cape, he pulled out one of the

ten-centimeter-long thorns it held. Holding it care-

fully by its fan-shaped tail end, where it had been

snapped from the parent plant, he slid it into the open

back end of the snufiler.

The sack slung next to the quiver produced a tank

seed. It was bright yellow, veined with black and

slightly bigger around than a man's fist. Its leathery

surface was taut as a drum. Bom eased it into the

back of the snuffler, then latched the backblock in

place. Above, the rustling had become a crashing and

bending of thick branches.

Wrapping his right hand around the pistollike trig-

ger and using the other to steady the long barrel,

he settled himself on the weapon, still as a statue.

Concentrating on the bromeliad, he strove to reach

out and become one with the plant.

See what a fair resting place I offer, he thought

tensely. How spacious this cubble limb, how broad

and tasty its companions, how clear and fresh and

cool the water I have caught so patiently just for you.

Come down to me and drink deep of my well!

A lost breeze blew, rifBing leaf tips on the bromeliad.

Bom held his breath and prayed it would not carry

5

his scent to whatever was making its ponderous way

downward.

A last loud crunching of parted vegetation, and

the vertical traveler showed himself—a dark brown

cone shape, covered with stubby brown fur. At the

flat end of the cone two long tentacles reached out.

Red-irised eyes tipped them. Evenly spaced around

the cone-shaped body of the grazer were four thickly-

muscled arms, which held it suspended between upper

and lower branches with the aid of the prehensile

tail that extended from the point of the cone.

Nearly two meters of bulk, five times Bora's weight,

the grazer would be difficult to kill. The thick, close-

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matted fur would be hard to penetrate, but only a

thin bristle covered (he flat base of the cone. To

strike there Born would have to wait until the creature

turned toward him. The tiny round mouth set in the

center of the base was harmless, lined with four op-

posing sets of flat grinding teeth. But those arms could

reduce the cubble path to splinters. A man would

come apart much more easily.

One arm shifted its grip, grabbed a lower branch.

The tail curved down to grip the same support. Then

the upper and left arm let go and the grazer swung

lower still. Born wished he had prepared a little more

thoroughly, setting out a second tank seed and jacari

thorn. Now it was too late. A single slight movement

from him and the grazer would be gone in a blur

of arms and tail. It could travel up, down, or sideways

through the forest with tremendous speed. It could

also circle behind a man almost before he had time

to turn.

It paused on the liana directly above the cistern.

The tail and double-handed grip rotated it slowly as

it looked in all directions. Once, it seemed to Born

that the weaving eyes stared straight at his hiding

place, but they neither stopped nor hesitated and

swung on past. Apparently satisfied with the state of

the neighborhood, the grazer dropped to the cubble.

Three arms supported it in a semistanding pose on

the outer edge of the bromeliad. It leaned forward,

the broad flat face dipping down to the water. Born

could hear slurping sounds.

6

The real problem was: when he whistled, would

that massive head turn left or right? If he guessed

wrong, he would lose precious, perhaps decisive, sec-

onds. Making his choice, Born slid the tip of the

snumer slightly in the grazer's direction. He pursed

his Ups and let go with a low, stuttering whistle. The

grazer wouldn't touch meat, but flowerkit eggs were

a delicacy.

At the sound of Bom's imitation of a female flower-

kit's danger call, the big head came up and around

and stared directly at him. Letting out a short, nerv-

ous breath, the hunter pulled hard on the trigger. In-

side the barrel a long, sharpened sliver of ironwood

shot backward, punctured the tank seed's stretched

skin. There was a soft bang as the gas-filled seed

exploded. The compressed gas was further compressed

by the narrowing barrel of the snufiler. Thus pro-

pelled, the jacari thorn shot outward and hit square

center of the grazer's flat, bristly face, just above

the mouth and between the two eye stalks.

All four jaws dilated. There was a horrid choking

shriek. The aural catalyst set off the surrounding

forest, and the panicked howling and crying continued

for long moments.

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The grazer took a hopping, threatening jump to-

ward Born, shook briefly as it landed barely two

meters away, and collapsed down off the cubble. But

the paralyzed hands and tail held it firm to the big

vine. Those powerful, multidigited fingers would have

to be cut or pried open.

He watched the creature steadily. Grazers had a

way of playing dead until their attacker came close,

when they would unexpectedly reach out to clutch

and rend with limb-tearing violence. But this one

didn't even quiver. The thorn had pierced its brain

and killed it instantly.

Bom sighed, put the snumer down and stood up,

stretching cramped muscles. The green fur cloak fell

freely from his neck. Taking his bone skinning knife

from his belt, he stepped free of the sheltering crev-

ice and walked down the broad vine toward the limp

shape.

Easily five times his mass. Born mused, and almost

all of that edible! But tasting it in one's mind and

cooked over a hot fire were two different things.

There was now the small matter of getting the prized

carcass back to the village and dealing with hungry

scavengers along the way. The sooner they left here,

the better.

Bending over the edge of the cubble, he got busy

with the knife. Muscle and tendon parted as he cut

at the hands and tail which held it fast. The grazer

fell into the foliage just below.

A voice like an idling locomotive sounded sud-

denly behind him. Bom leaped instinctively, sailed out

and down before grabbing a branch of the cubble

and jerking to a muscle-biting stop. Panting, he turned

and looked back up. He had recognized the rum-

bling even as he jumped, but too late to stay the

reflex action.

Ruumahum stood looking down at him from the

main bole of the cubble. The furcot moved closer,

all six of his thick legs gripping the wood. The ursine

face peered at him, the three dark eyes set in. a curve

over the muzzle staring down mournfully. Great claws

scratched at the branch.

Born shook his head and swung himself onto the

vine.

"I've told you often, Ruumahum, not to sneak up

on me like that."

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"Fun," Ruumahum protested.

"Not fun," Bom insisted, making use of a herba-

ceous stalk to return to his former level. A short

jump and he was back on the cubbleway. Grabbing

Ruumahum by one of his long floppy ears, he pulled

and shook by way of making his point.

The furcot was as long as the grazer, though not

quite as massive. He was also incredibly powerful,

quick, and intelligent. A furcot pack would be the

scourge of the canopy world were it not for the fact

that they were lazy beyond imagining and spent most,

of their lives engaged in fulfilling a single passion-

sleep.

"Not fun," Bom finished, with a last admonishing

yank. Ruumahum nodded, walked around-the hunter,

and sniffed down at the grazer below.

8

"Too old not," he rumbled. "Good eating . . 9

much good eating."

"If we can get it back Home," Bom agreed. "Can

you manage?"

"Can manage," the furcot replied, without a mo-

ment's hesitation.

Bom bent over the edge, studied the corpse. "It

struck a pretty solid branch, but it could easily slip

off. Do you want to pick it up, or circle beneath

and catch it when I shove it free?"

"Circle, catch."

Bom nodded. Ruumahum started downward, mak-

ing a wide circle to take him below the grazer. Once

positioned, Bom would move directly down until he

could push it off. Neither of them wished to descend

after a tumbling carcass to unpredictable depths, to

levels unknown.

There were seven levels to the forest world. Man-

kind, the persons, preferred this, the Third. So did the

furcots. Two levels rose above this one, to a sun-

bleached green roof and the Upper Hell. Four lay

below, the Seventh and deepest being the Lower and

True Hell, over four hundred and fifty meters below

the Home.

Many men had seen the Upper Hell. Bom had seen

it three times and lived. But only two legendary fig-

ures had ever made their way to the Lower. To the

surface. To the perpetually dark swamp, a moist land

of vast open pits and mindless abominations that

crawled and swam and ate.

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Or so they had claimed. The first had not been

of whole mind when he returned and had died soon

after. The second had returned with several important

parts of himself gone, but had confirmed the ravings

of his companion, though he, too, screamed almost

every night.

Not even the furcots, hunting back through ancestral

memories, could tell of one of their kind who had ever

descended below the Sixth Level. It was a place to

be shunned. Understandable, then, that neither man

nor companion desired to go hunting there for fallen

prey.

Ruumahum appeared beneath the grazer and

growled. Born shouted an answer and started down.

The grazer was still hanging from the branch when

he reached it, but a single shove was enough to dis-

lodge it. Bracing himself, Ruumahum dug the claws

of rear and middle legs into the hard wood of the

cubble. Reaching out slightly, he slammed both fore-

paws, either of which could crush a man's skull

with much less effort, deep into the body of the

grazer, just below the tail. -

With Bom's aid, the grazer was then balanced

evenly on Ruumahum's back. Forepaws steadied the

dead weight while Bom tied it securely with unbreak-

able fom from the loops at his waist, passing the line

several times round the carcass and under the furcot's

two bellies. He knotted it and stood aside.

"Try it, Ruumahum. Any shifting?"

The furcot dug all three pairs of claws into the

wood and leaned experimentally to the left, then

right. Then he shook deliberately, raised his head, and

lowered his hips."Shift not. Born. Good rest."

Bom studied the huge bulk with concern. "Sure

you can make it all right? It's a long way Home,

and we may have to fight." The load was consid-

erable even for a mature furcot as big as Ruumahum.

The latter snorted. "Can make . . . not sure of

fighting."

"All right, don't worry about it. Kill or no kill,

if we get into any real trouble I'll cut you free." He

grinned. "Just don't go to long sleep on me halfway

between here and Home."

"Sleep? What is sleep?" Ruumahum snorted. The

furcots possessed a peculiar sense of humor, all their

own that only occasionally coincided with that of per-

sons. As Bom was a bit peculiar himself, he under-

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stood their jokes better than most.

"Let's go, then."

Back to the hiding place to retrieve the snuffler

and sling it snugly across his back. Then there was

only one more thing to do. Born walked back past

the heavily laden Ruumahum and stopped at the

brim of the bromeliad which had attracted such ex-

cellent prey. He ran his hands caressingly over the

broad leaves and strong petals. Hands cupped, he

10

bent to drink deeply from the clear pool .that the

unlucky grazer had sought. Finishing, he shook the

droplets free and wiped wet palms on his cloak. He

stroked the nearest leaf again in silent tribute to the

plant, and then he and Ruumahum started the ar-

duous trek Homeward.

It was a green universe, true; but its stars and

nebulae were brilliantly colored. Cauliflorous air-trees

growing on the broad branches of the Pillars and

emergents bristled with fragrant blossoms of every

conceivable shape and color, some exuding fragrances

so pungent they had to be avoided lest olfactory

senses be smothered forever. These perfumed blooms

Bom and Ruumahum avoided assiduously. Their lo-

calized miasmas were as deadly as they were sensu-

ous. Vines and creepers put forth flowers of their

own, and in places aerial roots bloomed with their

own flowerings. There were color and variety to make

Earth's richest jungles seem pallid and wan in com-

parison.

. Although plant life held dominance, animal life was

also abundant and lush. Omithoid, mammaloid, and

reptiloid arboreals glided or flew through winding

emerald tunnels. They were outnumbered by crea-

tures that swung, crawled, and jumped along gravity-

defying highways of wood and pulp.

The steady cycle of life and death revolved around

Bom and Ruumahum as they made their way over

crosshatched tuntangcles and cubbies and winding

woody paths back toward the village. A drifter with

helical wings pounced upon an unwary six-legged

feathered pseudolizard, was swallowed in turn when it

chose to land on a false cubble. The false cubble

looked almost identical to the thick wooden creepers

Bom and Ruumahum strode across. Had Bom stepped

on it he would have lost a foot at the least. The

false cubble was a continuous chain of interlocking

mouths, stomachs, and intestines. Both drifter and

pseudolizard vanished down one link of the toothed

branch.

It was close to noon. Occasional shafts of light

reached the Third Level, some digging even deeper

11

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to the Fourth and Fifth. Mirror vines shone every-

where, their diamond-shaped reflective leaves bounc-

ing the sun and sending life-giving light ricocheting

hundreds of meters down green canyons to places it

otherwise would never reach. Noontime was the cres-

cendo of the hylaeal symphony. Comb vines and

resonators formed a verdant vocal background for the

songsters of the animal kingdom. They would have

astonished a curious botanist, as would the mirror

vines.

Born was no botanist. He could not have defined

the term. But his great-great-great-great-great-

grandfather could have. That knowledge had not kept

him from dying young, however.

Eventually the damp night mist slid about them

with feline stealth. The cheerful raucousness of the

creatures of light gave way to the sounds of awaken-

ing nightlings, whose grunts were darker and deeper,

their cries closer to hysteria, the booming howls of the

nocturnal carnivores a touch more menacing. It was

time to find shelter.

Bom had spent much of the last hour searching

for a wild Home tree. Such trees were rare and he

had encountered none this afternoon. They would have

to settle for less accommodating temporary quarters.

One such lay ten meters Overhead, easily reached

through the interwoven pathways of the forest canopy.

What disease or parasite had caused the great woody

galls to form on the branch of the Pillar tree neither

Bom nor Ruumahum could guess, but they were grate-

ful for their presence. They would serve to gentle

the night. Six or seven of the globular eruptions were

clustered together on the branch. The smallest was

half Bom's size, the largest more than spacious enough

to accommodate man and furcot.

He tested the biggest with his knife, found it far

too tough for the sharpened bone—just as he had

hoped. If his skinning blade could not penetrate the

woody gall, the chances of some predator coming in

on them from behind were small. He untied the dead

grazer—it was already beginning to smell—from

Ruumahum's back, slid the hulk onto the branch.

12

Ruumahum stretched delightedly, fur rippling as the

muscles in his back popped. He yawned, revealing

multiple canines and two razor-sharp lower tusks.

Under Bom's direction, the furcot went to work on

the gall with both forepaws, ripping open nearly all of

one side. Together they wrestled the carcass into the

cavity. Working carefully and smoothly, Bom tied his

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Alan Dean Foster - Humanx 1 - Midworld

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