It was purely by accident that he passed Earth in his galactic travels. But it became a matter of design that he land there, because—

The Vegans Were Curious

By Winston Marks

[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Imagination Stories of Science and Fantasy December 1954 Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]

The little sun was almost a light-year out of his way, and he could have made it on to Sirius without stopping. But the thirst within him was strong. The delicious, yellow sun with its rich corona and tiny, tantalizing streamers was too tempting to pass up. Even before its gravitic currents were strong enough to be of utility, he was decided. He would pause. He would gorge himself. He would drink until he was blue-white.

The thought was the first pleasant, sensuous one he had allowed himself on the long journey. In his haste to indulge, he ignored the nine planets which normally would have attracted at least a curious glance from him. Not until he veered physically to avoid the third planet from the sun was he distracted from his goal.

A bevy of the clumsy little spaceships from distant Vega were swarming just outside the planet's turgid atmosphere. As he approached, one of the Vegans noted his presence and hailed him.

"Greetings, Sirian! Stop a bit and give us your worthy opinion."

Although the message took but half a micro-second, the Sirian was almost past the planet's pale satellite before he could repolarize his photons and reverse his direction. Being the haughty creatures they were, the Vegan's invitation was both unusual and provocative.

The Sirian noted, as he returned, that the flight of one-man-disks seemed gathered about a mushroom-shaped cloud of opaque, gaseous matter, entirely cold except for a modest radio-activity.

When he shot out an open query, the Vegan answered, "They did it! Those incredible little organic creatures down on the surface."

"Creatures? You mean there is an intelligent organic life-form on this planet?" the Sirian asked somewhat incredulously. He had passed this system a hundred times without suspecting such a thing.

"Well, not exactly intelligent in a galactic sense, but likely you'll agree 

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