Jonah of the Jove-Run
By RAY BRADBURY
They hated this little beat-up old guy. Even
if his crazy cosmic brain could track a
meteor clear across the Galaxy, why did he
have to smash the super-sensitive detectors?
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Planet Stories Spring 1948.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
Nibley stood in the changing shadows and sounds of Marsport, watchingthe great supply ship TERRA being entered and left by a number ofofficials and mechanics. Something had happened. Something was wrong.There were a lot of hard faces and not much talk. There was a bit ofswearing and everybody looked up at the night sky of Mars, waiting.
But nobody came to Nibley for his opinion or his help. He stood there,a very old man, with a slack-gummed face and eyes like the littlebubbly stalks of crayfish looking up at you from a clear creek. Hestood there fully neglected. He stood there and talked to himself.
"They don't want me, or need me," he said. "Machines are better,nowadays. Why should they want an old man like me with a taste forMartian liquor? They shouldn't! A machine isn't old and foolish, anddoesn't get drunk!"
Way out over the dead sea bottoms, Nibley sensed something moving. Partof himself was suddenly awake and sensitive. His small sharp eyes movedin his withered face. Something inside of his small skull reacted andhe shivered. He knew. He knew that what these men were watching andwaiting for would never come.
Nibley edged up to one of the astrogators from the TERRA. He touchedhim on the shoulder. "Say," he said. "I'm busy," said the astrogator."I know," said Nibley, "but if you're waiting for that small repairrocket to come through with the extra auxiliary asteroid computator onit, you're wasting your time."
"Like hell," said the astrogator, glaring at the old man. "That repairrocket's got to come through, and quick; we need it. It'll get here."
"No, it won't," said Nibley, sadly, and shook his head and closed hiseyes. "It just crashed, a second ago, out on the dead sea bottom.I—felt—it crash. I sensed it going down. It'll never come through."
"Go away, old man," said the astrogator. "I don't want to hear thatkind of talk. It'll come through. Sure, sure, it has to come through."The astrogator turned away and looked at the sky, smoking a cigarette.
"I know it as a fact," said Nibley, but the young astrogator wouldn'tlisten. He didn't want to hear the truth. The truth was not a pleasantthing. Nibley went on, to himself. "I know it for a fact, just likeI was always able to know the course of meteors with my mind, or theorbits or parabolas of asteroids. I tell you—"
The men stood around waiting and smoking. They didn't know yet aboutthe crash out there. Nibley felt a great sorrow rise in himself forthem. That ship meant a great deal to them and now it had crashed.Perhaps their lives had crashed with it.
A loud speaker on the outer area of the landing tarmac opened out witha voice: "Attention, crew of the Terra. The repair ship just radioed ina report that it has been fired upon from somewhere over the dead seas.It crashed a minute ago."
The report was so sudden and quiet and matter-of-fact that the standingsmoking men did not for a moment understand it.
Then, each in his own way, they reacted to it. Some of them ran forthe radio building to verify the report. Others sat down and put theirhands over their faces. Still more of them stood staring at the sky asif staring might put the repair ship back together again and get ithere safe and intact. Instinctively, at last, all of them loo