Foreword

The last two chapters of this otherwise outstanding story have always bothered me. The Zealanders could not have flown to Labrador in a helicopter.

It's not really John Wyndham's fault. He wasn't an aeronautical engineer, and we know far more about aircraft today than they did in 1955. We know that it's physically impossible to build a chemical-fueled helicopter that can fly 20,000 miles on one tank of gas. After a certain point, fuel consumption increases exponentially with distance, and 20,000 miles is far beyond what is even remotely possible. The Leonardo da Vinci rotor was also…a big mistake.

The story needs an aircraft that can fly 10,000 miles in 5 days, stop in the middle of a howling wilderness with no air-traffic control and no runway, pick up passengers and then fly home, all without refueling. It should not require the Zealanders to have anything beyond 1990's technology. Definitely no anti-gravity!

Fortunately, we do know of such an aircraft: a zeppelin.

Here is my alternate ending of The Chrysalids, picking up at the end of the Fringes battle and the Zealanders' arrival in a zeppelin instead of a helicopter.

Chapter 1

Suddenly he stiffened. His bow came up like a flash, bent to its full. He loosed. The shaft took my father in the left of his chest. He jerked, and fell back on Sheba's hindquarters. Then he slithered off sideways and dropped to the ground, his right foot still caught in the stirrup.

The spider-man threw down his bow, and turned. With a scoop of his long arms he snatched up Sophie, and began to run. His spindly legs had not made more than three prodigious strides when a couple of arrows took him simultaneously in the back and side, and he fell.

Sophie struggled to her feet and began to run on by herself. An arrow pierced right through her upper arm, but she kept on, with it lodged there. Then another took her in the back of the neck. She dropped in mid-stride, and her body slid along in the dust…

Petra had not seen it happen. She was looking all round, with a bewildered expression.

"What's that?" she asked. "What's that queer noise?"

The Zealand woman replied, "Don't be frightened. We're coming. It's all right. Stay just where you are."

I could hear the noise now. A strange multi-toned droning sound, gradually swelling. One could not place it; it seemed to be filling everywhere, emanating from nowhere.

More men were coming out of the woods into the clearing, most of them on horseback. Many of them I recognized, men I had known all my life, all joined together now to hunt us down. Most of the Fringes people had bolted into the caves, and were shooting a little more effectively from their cover.

Suddenly one of the horsemen shouted and pointed upwards.

I looked up, too. The droning sound had grown louder, and now faded to a whisper as a vast silver-blue shape began gliding into view high above us. Within seconds everyone in sight had stopped whatever they were doing to stare at it. The droning rose again and the huge…thing slowed and turned, until it finally stopped directly above the clearing as the sound faded to a low hum.

Several of the horsemen shook free of their daze and shot arrows towards it, but they fell back far short of the target, presenting more of a hazard to their fellows than to the floating apparition. Others unslung their guns and began the laborious task of reloading them on horseback.

"We are here. We see you. Take cover, and do not move." The Zealand woman's mind-voice startled us.

Something was happening high above our heads. Our view of the great blue shape was no longer clear. A kind of fine mist had appeared in the air below it, shot with quick iridescent flashes, slowly descending towards the clearing, and us.

The Fringes folk took advantage of the distraction to shoot a volley of arrows from their caves, felling a few men and horses, rousing the posse from their bemusement to return fire. The few who had gotten their guns reloaded now turned them on the more obvious threat. We heard shouts and screams from below us, following the shots.

The mist had settled below the treetops now, and as I looked down again I saw a few glistening threads, like cobwebs, drifting past the mouth of Sophie's cave. Then more and more of them, giving sudden gleams as they twisted in the air and caught the light.

The shooting fell off again. All over the clearing the invaders lowered their bows and guns and stared upwards. They goggled incredulously, then those on the left jumped to their feet with shouts of alarm, and turned to run. Over on the right the horses pranced with fright, whinnied, and began to bolt in all directions. In a few seconds the whole place was in chaos. Fleeing men caromed into one another, panic-stricken horses trampled through the flimsy shacks, and tripped on the guy-ropes of tents flinging their riders headlong.

I sought for Michael.

"Here!" I told him. "This way. Come along over here."

"Coming," he told me.

I spotted him then, just getting to his feet beside a fallen horse that was kicking out violently. He looked up towards our cave, found us, and waved a hand. He turned to glance up at the long shape in the sky, which was lower than it had been. The main body of mist was settling into the clearing proper, still glinting with rainbows.

"Coming," repeated Michael.

He turned towards us and started. Then he paused and picked at something on his arm. His hand stayed there. "Queer," he told us. "Like a cobweb, but sticky. I can't get my hand…" His thought suddenly became panicky. "It's stuck. I can't move it!"

The Zealand woman came in, coolly advising, "Don't struggle. You'll exhaust yourself. Lie down if you can. Keep calm. Don't move. Just wait. Keep your back on the ground so that it can't get around you."

I saw Michael obey her instructions, though his thoughts were by no means confident. Suddenly, I realized that all over the clearing men were clawing at themselves, trying to get the stuff off, but where their hands touched it they stuck. They were struggling with it like flies in treacle, and all the time more strands were floating down on them. Most of them fought with it for a few seconds and then tried to run for shelter in the trees. They'd take about three steps before their feet stuck together, and they pitched on to the ground. The threads already lying there trapped them further. More threads fell lightly down on them as they struggled and thrashed about until presently they could struggle no more. The horses were no better off. I saw one back into a small bush. When it moved forward it tore the bush out by the roots. The bush swung round and touched the other hind leg. The legs became inseparable. The horse fell over and lay kicking — for a while.

A descending strand drifted across the back of my own hand. I told Rosalind and Petra to get back into the cave. I looked at the strand, not daring to touch it with my other hand. I turned the hand over slowly and carefully, and tried to scrape the stuff off on the rock. I was not careful enough. The movement brought the strand, and other strands, looping slowly towards me, and my hand was glued to the rock.

"Here they are," Petra cried, in words and thoughts together.

I looked up to see the gleaming object, now floating some ten yards above the treetops, with some sort of boxlike affair descending from a square opening in its bottom on four long ropes. The droning sound rose again for a moment, then faded. A few seconds later the remaining filaments in the clearing were pushed down, and a waft of air carried them outwards.

I saw some of the strands in front of the cave-mouth hesitate, undulate, and then come drifting inwards. Involuntarily I closed my eyes. There was a light gossamer touch on my face. When I tried to open my eyes again I found I could not.

It needs a lot of resolution to lie perfectly still while you feel more and more sticky strands falling with a feathery, tickling touch across your face and hands; and still more when you begin to feel those which landed first press on your skin like fine cords and tug gently at it.

I caught Michael wondering with some alarm if this was not a trick, and whether he might not have been better off if he had tried to run for it. Before I could reply the Zealand woman came in reassuring us again, telling us to keep calm and have patience. Rosalind emphasized that to Petra.

"Has it got you, too?" I asked her.

"Yes," she sent. "That wind, or whatever it was, blew it right into the cave — Petra, darling, you heard what she said. You must try to keep still."

The droning noise was gone now, and the succeeding silence was shocking. There were a few half-muffled calls and smothered sounds, but little more. I understood the reasons for that. Strands had fallen across my own mouth. I could not have opened it to call out if I wanted to.

The waiting seemed interminable. My skin crawled under the touch of the stuff, and the pull of it was becoming painful.

The Zealand woman inquired, "Michael? — Keep counting to guide me to you."

Michael started counting, in figure-shapes. They were steady until the one and the two of his twelve wavered and dissolved into a pattern of relief and thankfulness. In the silence that had now fallen I could hear him say in words, "They're in that cave there, that one."

There was a creak from the ladder, a gritting of its poles against the ledge, and presently a slight hissing noise. A dampness fell on my face and hands, accompanied by a strong, sharp smell, and the skin began to lose its puckered feeling. I tried to open my eyes again; they resisted, but gave slowly. There was a sticky feeling about the lids as I raised them.

Close in front of me, standing on the upper rungs of the ladder and leaning inwards, was a figure entirely hidden in a shiny white suit. There were still filaments leisurely adrift in the air, but when they fell on the headpiece or shoulders of the white suit they did not stick. They slithered off and wafted gently on their downward way. I could see nothing of the suit's wearer but a pair of eyes looking at me through small, transparent windows. In a white gloved hand was a metal bottle, with a fine spray hissing from it.

"Turn over," came the woman's thought.

I turned, and she played the spray up and down the front of my clothes. Then she climbed the last few rungs, stepped over me where I lay, and made her way toward Rosalind and Petra at the back of the cave, spraying as she went.

Michael's head and shoulders appeared above the sill. He, too, was bedewed with spray, and the few vagrant strands that settled on him lay glistening for a moment before they dissolved. I sat up and looked past him.

The dark blue box stood in the clearing, still connected to the — sky-ship? — by what proved on closer observation to be two ropes ascending from each top corner. Double doors in one side of it stood open, revealing it to hold one more suited figure and nothing else. Two others were standing guard, holding guns like none I had ever seen before.

The clearing itself looked as if a fantastic number of spiders had spun there with all their might and main. The place was festooned with threads, appearing more white than glossy now; it took a moment or two of feeling something was wrong with them before one perceived that they failed to move in the breeze as webs would. And not only they, but everything, was motionless, petrified.

The forms of a number of men, and horses, too, were scattered among the shacks. They were as unmoving as the rest.

A sudden sharp cracking came from the right. I looked over there, just in time to see a young tree break off a foot from the ground, and fall. Then another movement caught the corner of my eye — a bush slowly leaning over. Its roots came out of the ground as I watched. Another bush moved. A shack crumpled in on itself and collapsed, and another…it was uncanny, and alarming…

Back in the cave there was a sigh of relief from Rosalind. I got up and went to her, with Michael following. Petra announced in a subdued, somewhat expostulatory tone, "That was very horrid."

Her eyes dwelt reprovingly and curiously on the white-suited figure. The woman made a few final, all-encompassing passes with her spray, then pulled off her gloves and lifted back her hood. She regarded us. We frankly stared at her.

Her eyes were large, with irises more brown than green, and fringed with long, deep-gold lashes. Her nose was straight, but her nostrils curved with the perfection of a sculpture. Her mouth was perhaps, a little wide; the chin beneath it was rounded, but not soft. Her hair was just a little darker than Rosalind's, and, astonishingly in a woman, it was short. Cut off nearly level with her jaw.

But more than anything it was the lightness of her face that made us stare. It was not pallor, it was simply fairness, like new cream, and with cheeks that might have been dusted with pink petals. There was scarcely a line in its smoothness, it seemed all new and perfect, as if neither wind nor rain had ever touched her. It was hard to believe that any real, living person could look like that, so untouched, so unflawed.

For she was no girl in her first tender blossoming, unmistakably she was a woman — thirty, perhaps; one could not tell. She was sure of herself, with a serenity of confidence which made Rosalind's self-reliance seem almost bravado. She took us in, and then fixed her attention upon Petra. She smiled at her, with just a glimpse of perfect, white teeth.

There was an immensely complex pattern which compounded pleasure, satisfaction, achievement, relief, approval, and most surprisingly to me, a touch of something very like awe. The intermixture was subtle far beyond Petra's grasp, but enough of it reached her to give her an unwonted, wide-eyed seriousness for some seconds as she looked up into the woman's eyes, as if she knew in some way, without understanding how or why, that this was one of the cardinal moments in her life.

Then, after a few moments, her expression relaxed. She smiled and chuckled. Evidently something was passing between them, but it was of a quality, or on a level, that did not reach me at all. I caught Rosalind's eye, but she simply shook her head, and watched.

The Zealand woman bent down and picked Petra up. They looked closely into one another's faces. Petra raised her hand and tentatively touched the woman's face, as if to assure herself that it was real. The Zealand woman laughed, kissed her cheek, and put her down again. She shook her head slowly, as if she were not quite believing.

"It was worthwhile," she said, in words, but words so curiously pronounced that I scarcely understood them at first. "Yes. Certainly, it was worthwhile!"

She slipped into thought-forms, much easier to follow than her words.

"It was not simple to get permission to come. Such an immense distance, more than twice as far as any of us has been before. Such a great risk, and cost, to send the ship, and good fortune that it was available. They could scarcely believe it would be worth it. But it will be…" She looked at Petra again, wonderingly. "At her age, and untrained — yet she can throw a thought half-way round the world!" She shook her head once more, as if still unable to believe it entirely.

Then she turned to me. "She has still a great deal to learn, but we will give her the best teachers, and then, one day, she will be teaching them."

She stood beside Sophie's bed of twigs and skins. Against the thrown-back white hood, her beautiful head looked as though it were framed by a halo. She studied each of us thoughtfully in turn, and seemed satisfied. She nodded. "With one another's help, you have managed to get quite a long way, too; but you'll find that there is a lot more we can teach you." She took hold of Petra's hand. "Well, as you've no possessions to collect, and there's nothing to delay us, we might as well leave now."

"For Waknuk?" Michael asked in words.

It was as much a statement as a question, and she checked her first step towards the cave entrance, to look at him inquiringly.

"There is still Rachel," he explained. "And Sally and Katherine, and Mark. They could still be alive."

The Zealand woman considered. "We can't. I'm sorry, but the risk is too great."

"It wouldn't take long. It isn't far — not for your sky ship," Michael insisted.

She shook her head regretfully. "It's not just the distance. We would have to cross their territory, find our people, extract them, and then escape with the whole countryside alerted to our presence. This child," she waved Petra's hand back and forth, "is the only reason we were permitted to come here. I cannot authorize such a reckless undertaking, risk her life, and all of ours, for — I'm sorry — four merely ordinary people, three of whom are most likely dead."

There was a pause while we appreciated the situation. She had made it clear enough, and she stood motionless, holding Petra's hand, waiting sympathetically and patiently for us to accept the necessity.

In the pause one became aware of the uncanniness of the silence all about us. There was not a sound to be heard now. Not a movement. Even the leaves on the trees were unable to rustle. A sudden shock of realization jerked a question from Rosalind. "They're not — they're not all — dead? I didn't understand. I thought—"

"Yes," the Zealand woman sent to us, simply. "They're all dead. The plastic threads contract as they dry. A man who struggles and entangles himself soon becomes unconscious and suffocates. It is more merciful than your arrows and spears."

Rosalind shivered. Perhaps I did, too. There was an unnerving quality about it — something quite different from the fatal issue of a man-to-man fight, or from the casualty roll of an ordinary battle. We were puzzled, too, by the Zealand woman, for there was almost no feeling in her thoughts over what had been done here.

Rosalind was almost in tears, unable to speak in words. "But…you just — you killed them all, like it was nothing. Like…drowning rats. Don't you feel anything?"

The woman looked at her coolly, then opened her mind to us and showed us the depth of her sorrow and pity. "Of course we do. Of course this killing weighs on us. We value all life; even theirs." Rosalind shuddered and leaned heavily against me, as I leaned against her. The Zealand woman closed off her mind and continued in her oddly-accented words, "But never doubt that we value our own lives most of all. We kill when we must, in self-defense; they would kill us simply for existing, and being unlike them."

None of us could argue with that. Accursed is the Mutant! was drilled into them from birth, and if my father was more zealous than most, still they had all come here committed to killing or capturing us, to dragging us back in chains to be interrogated, tortured and probably killed in the pursuit of any others like us. Even so, Rosalind still looked, and felt, doubtful.

The Zealand woman spoke directly to her, forcefully. "We are at war, and this was necessary. Even their crude weapons are a threat to our ship. This is the largest zeppelin we have, and the only one capable of making this journey. If it is damaged or destroyed, we could all be killed; even if we survived the crash we would be stranded here for years, and our prospects for survival would be doubtful at best. We chose not to allow them that chance. They would not hesitate to kill us, by any means, if they got an opportunity."

Rosalind nodded, reluctantly, though I could still feel her drawing comfort from me. The Zealand woman nodded towards the cave mouth. "Let's be on our way, before more of those people come here."

Michael still looked obstinate, but he led the way to the rickety ladder. We climbed down cautiously, one by one, past caves choked with white webbing, covering still forms. The Zealand woman must have cleared the ladder on her way up. She followed Rosalind, carefully watching Petra, ready to catch her if she fell. We all reached the bottom safely and walked to the box, webs crunching faintly under our feet.

Michael stopped a yard from it and turned to face us. "I'm not going with you."

Rosalind understood instantly. "You're going back to Rachel. But, Michael—"

"She's quite alone," said Michael. "Would you leave David alone there, or would he leave you?"

There was no answer to that. The Zealand woman looked at him, baffled. "Then you would both be alone. What future can there be for you in this place? If Sally or Katherine still live, they may yet be forced to give up your names. You would get no warning before they took you."

"We're not staying there," Michael said with great determination. "We're going to Zealand."

He had succeeded in surprising her. "It would take you more than a week to reach her, and return. We can't stay here that long, and we can't send the zeppelin back. Not just for you."

Michael grimaced but said only, "I know."

The Zealand woman was watching him with sympathy and admiration in her eyes, but she shook her head gently. "It is a very long way — and there are huge expanses of awful, impassable country in between," she informed him. "We only made it with great difficulty."

"That is a problem," he acknowledged. "But the world is round, so there must be another way to get there."

"There is no guarantee of that," she warned. "Even if there is another route, it would be long and hard — and certainly dangerous."

"No more dangerous than to stay in Waknuk. Waiting for the day when we, or our children, would be found out, and hunted down…" He regarded her, with a daunting purpose in his eyes. "Besides, how could we stay now, knowing that there is a place for people like us, that there is somewhere to go? Knowing makes all the difference. Knowing that we're not just pointless freaks — a few bewildered Deviations hoping to save their own skins. It's the difference between just trying to keep alive, and having something to live for."

The Zealand woman gazed intently at him for a long time. "Give me a minute."

Her eyes stayed on him, but she was no longer looking at him. She was suddenly in communication with someone on board the ship overhead, at a speed and on a level where I could make almost nothing of it. Another joined in, and another, until more than a dozen 'voices' were buzzing away in our heads. Rosalind and I looked at each other uncertainly. If this was an example of what we still had to learn…the prospect was intimidating.

The conference-buzz ended. Her eyes focused outward again. "We have reached a consensus. We will take you to Rachel, and bring her with us. We will try to find Katherine and Sally as well."

Now it was Michael's turn to be baffled. "I thought…"

"I could not authorize such a diversion on my own," she explained. "All of us, together, can. We were already troubled by the thought of leaving anyone behind, but considered the risk too great. Your convictions have made…a notable impression upon us." She gestured to the box and said in words, "Get into the lift. We will leave this place, and begin making our plans."

Michael nodded and turned around. I led Rosalind into the 'lift' after him, and the Zealand woman followed me, leading Petra. The two guards looked around the clearing one last time and stepped inside, pulling the doors shut behind them. One dropped a locking bar across them while the woman sent a short thought we didn't catch. Both guards slung their outlandish guns over their shoulders and started unfastening their hoods.

The lift's interior was about six feet square and seven high; not crowded for eight people, but there wasn't room for many more. The Zealand woman directed us to use some handholds attached to the walls, and we found out why when it tilted and swayed, accompanied by tearing noises from under our feet. Small windows in all three walls, and the doors, held our attention. The clearing dropped away below us, buried under its shroud of webbing. The man who'd stayed in the lift sent out a rather plaintive thought, and was answered with amusement.

The Zealand woman caught our puzzled feelings. "He's hoping he won't get tasked with cleaning the bottom of the lift."

We all chuckled and Michael said, "I wouldn't mind doing it, if somebody would show me how. I'd like to get a closer look at it."

The man, a freckle-faced young fellow with blue eyes and short reddish hair, grinned cheerfully. "Be glad ta show ya, mate! Name's 'Arvey." He stuck out a hand, and Michael shook it.

The guards were a dark-haired woman with gray eyes and a brown-haired, brown-eyed man. They both looked at us curiously, but politely, and refrained from showering us with questions. We all resumed looking out the windows.

We were above the trees now and could see quite a distance across the broken Fringes woodlands. It really didn't look all that Deviant from here. We felt and heard a bump, then saw something dark slide down and cover the windows. A few seconds later the door windows were uncovered and we could see a floor dropping down outside. There was a thump as the lift stopped moving, then two clunks. The man raised the bar and they both opened the doors and stepped out.

The blonde woman exited next, still holding Petra's hand. "Follow me. We'll get you settled, give you a chance to wash up, and then meet in about an hour." We got a sense of uncomfortable amusement from her. "I don't mean to be rude, but I'm afraid you're all a little ripe."

Her name was Yvonne. She led us down a long hallway, past door after door on both sides. This 'zeppelin' was enormous on the inside, bigger than any building I had ever seen. After a minute or so something began to feel quite odd inside my ears, and sounds became strangely muffled. As I wondered what was happening, Petra tugged at Yvonne's hand. "My ears feel funny."

She let out a short burst of apology and embarrassment and told us, "Oh, how silly of me. Of course, you would never have experienced it. I'm sorry." She started to explain about air pressure, and altitude, and equalizing the middle ear, then stopped herself and simply showed us how to swallow, yawn and work our jaws to relieve the sensations. She told us this would happen whenever the zeppelin rose or descended more than a short distance. "When we descend, you may need to pinch your nose and blow, very carefully, to equalize the pressure, then fine-tune it. You should get the hang of it in a short time."

Yvonne showed us to four small but comfortable rooms along the ship's 'port' side — the left side, to us — and the 'head' (bathroom) across the 'passageway' (hall). Petra immediately came to my room, and we were quickly joined by Rosalind. We heard all manner of odd noises around us, and gazed out the large window as the ground fell away below. I was beginning to wonder if we could see all the way to Waknuk when there was a knock behind me. We all turned to see Michael standing in the doorway.

"Petra," he asked, "do you think you could reach Rachel for me?"

Petra put out the inquiry, in her forceful way. "Yes. She's there. She wants to know what's happening," she told him.

"Say first that whatever she may hear, we're all alive and quite all right."

"Yes," said Petra presently. "She understands that."

"Now I want you tell her this," Michael went on, carefully. "She is to go on being brave — and very careful — and in a little time, a day or two, perhaps, we shall come and fetch her away. Will you tell her that?"

Petra made the relay energetically, but quite faithfully, and then sat waiting for the response. A small frown gradually appeared.

"Oh dear," she said, with a touch of disgust. "She's gone all muddled up and crying again. She does seem to cry an awful lot, that girl, doesn't she? I don't see why. Her behind-thinks aren't miserable at all this time; it's sort of happy-crying. Isn't that silly?"

We all smiled, and Michael added, "Tell her that we'll talk to her again very soon. We might need her to do some things, but she has to be very quiet and careful."

Petra nodded, and half-blinded us one more time. "She says okay."

Michael and I insisted that Petra and Rosalind use the 'head' first, but they came back a minute later asking where the bathtub might be. Our queries prompted Yvonne to send us all a quick rundown on Shower, Shipboard, Operation And Use Of. We were encountering all sorts of new things.

The Zealanders had made arrangements for the people they set out to rescue, and we all found clothing that fit well enough. Rosalind and Petra were uncomfortable in dresses shorter than they were accustomed to, and without the crosses they had worn all their lives, but when Michael told us that clinging to the symbols of that repressive society we had left behind made no sense, we had to agree. They would adjust, in time. Yvonne told us how to take our old clothes to the ship's laundry; after our showers we too noticed how…malodorous they had become.

Author's Notes

Yeah, the Zealanders' lift kind of looks like a Tardis. It has to be a box, and it has to be some color, so why not blue?