I read this about 30/40 years ago. I don't remember if it was a short story or book.  What I remember of it :   Some aliens arrive at earth; they don't find any living humans, just empty cities. They go to one museum and revive an Egyptian mummy. When it's alive, it keeps asking where his servants are. They don't get any information from the mummy so they kill him again. Later on they revive another human, who turns out to be more intelligent than the aliens.   I don't remember much of what happened from this point on, except:   In the end the human starts to revive other humans.   Some one can tell me what story, name of book.
4766
I'm trying to locate a short sci-fi story I read years ago about a human that is "resurrected" by an arrogant and malignant alien species that discovers him in a "museum" on an earth where the inhabitants, though very advanced, had been wasted by a close encounter (I believe) with a neutron star. He is the third or fourth human they "reconstruct" and it turns out that he is an advanced mentalist, disappearing at the moment of his "resurrection". He outwits the aliens and eventually tricks them into plunging their ship into the sun in order (they think) to prevent him from finding out where they come from. Any suggestions?
15033
I read this book many years ago and it had a nice plot. For the life of me I can't remember the name or author so I need help.  Story: one asteroid shaped object appears close to Earth orbit or in the Sol system.  People get on board and start exploring. They find machines/computers that can teach them anything in a very short time (languages, crafts etc).  Towards the end, something happens and one of the characters goes into a long tunnel where he/she opens a portal in time with the help of a device he/she has.  In the epilogue it states that he has been transported back in time to Egypt.  I think there were no pyramids.  Sorry for being brief but this is all I remember. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.
81724
I am trying to identify a fix-up novel, where I think I only remember a sub-story from the middle.  It was probably published at least fifteen years ago, but I cannot pin down the date better than that.  The main character volunteers to travel to an alien world (maybe with the first intelligent aliens humans have identified?).  A remote probe had sent back some visual data on the aliens, before the aliens destroyed the probe.  The main character has some history as an amazing explorer or risk-taker, and he is sent to try to establish communication with the aliens.  His chance of coming back alive is rated as being very low.  I don't think it's clear what happens to him on the aliens' planet.  Maybe he doesn't remember it, or he thinks that his mission was a failure, and he eventually decides to return to Earth.  However, upon his return, it turns out that the aliens have modified him, in an attempt to enable communication.  He has become an overpowering telepathic projector; every thought and emotion in his mind is communicated to everyone near him.  This is extremely unpleasant at close range.  (I think there's a scene where his girlfriend is really, really trying to have sex with him after he comes back, but she is ultimately unable to.)  Eventually, he decides that he cannot live around people any more.  I don't recall where he goes, although I think the last part of the book features people from Earth trying to get him back for another mission (perhaps one for which his uncontrollable telepathy might be useful).
27238
This science fiction short story is about a team of astronauts/space explorers who land on an alien planet. An alien entity, that exists in a gaseous state, is lurking at the bottom of a well or hole. It briefly inhabits the body of each astronaut it encounters, seeing from their POV and causing them to go crazy/die/kill the others. When one man dies the entity jumps into the body/mind of another.  The story is narrated by the alien entity, and everything is from its point of view. It overhears the astronauts' conversations as they try to figure out what is happening.   It is a stand-alone short story (maybe 6 or 7 pages), and it is not part of a larger novel. I have a feeling this may be one of Ray Bradbury's later short stories (but I could be wrong). I must have encountered this story in an anthology of relatively well-known scifi stories. I read it around 2007, but the story is probably from the 1960s/1970s.
87325
I read this short story a few years ago but I cannot remember the title or author. It was about a human scientist on another planet who was studying the native flora and fauna, trying to find something edible for humans. Does anyone know the title of this story?
107031
This was a short story/novella published in Gardner Dozois's "The Year's Best Science Fiction" series. It was probably included somewhere around the 2003 20th edition, give or take a number of years.  The story is about 3 or 4 high school friends, one female, who embark on a journey of discovery by traversing down an ancient stairway into the depths of a steep deep ravine to search for the remaining traces of the "ancients." The friends don't really know where their lives are headed and are each descending the ravine in search of some inner truth.  Near the top, the stairway is well maintained but as they descend deeper it becomes more ancient and dilapidated until it is barely traversable. As they near the bottom, where the ancients had their cave dwellings, one person finds his inner strengths, one wills himself out of existence, and the female finally understands everything.  Believe me, the story is magnitudes better than my description of it.  Can you please identify it?
61000
I'm hoping someone can help me as this is driving me nuts! Context and Chronological info I'm trying to find the title/author of a short story that I read in some or other anthology ages ago. I couldn't give you an exact date but I'd say it was probably 50s/60s. Plot The human population has increased to the point where input and output of resources on Earth is in exact equilibrium. As such, no other living matter can be permitted to exist, as its use of resources would throw this equilibrium out of balance. One man in a vast tower block has managed to hide some flowers, and, I think, one or a few small animals - perhaps a mouse. These are detected by the relevant authorities, and the story ends when an official arrives at the apartment and requires the man to destroy them - the last non-human living things on Earth.
31047
I am seeking a short story where a man rescues an alien from a cruel hanging ceremony, but the alien turns into a shrub. It turns out the hanging ceremony was a way the aliens,of humanoid form, had developed to prevent themselves turning into a non-motile   mature form and to retain their humanoid form.The young ones were muscular and agile, but after the ceremony the older ones were emaciated and weak. By saving the young alien, the man is horrified when the rain starts and the young alien turns into a shrub ! The joke at the end is that the spaceman telling the story recounts how the unfortunate kind  man carts the shrub around the universe with him from job to job, and doesn't know he has the wrong shrub. He had grabbed it in the rain storm as they hurried to take off in their space ship while the angry aliens approached to rescue their young one. This was probably written in the late 1950's. One phrase in the story describes the spaceman doing maintenance, tightening bolts in rotation as per the service manual.
14365
More than a decade ago, I read a short story about a small group of people at the end of the world. The story was premised on some sort of mass-produced device which took ambient heat and turned it into power. The devices had been overused, and now the world was freezing.   I think the people were essentially bandits; the main character may have been a woman who lured men to her house and killed them for their body heat? There was also a strong implication that one person she had done this to was an alien who had come to warn that the devices were destroying the world.  I think the story was in a hardbound collection, and I think the collection was from the late 70's or very early 80's.  (Calling it a "short story" is just meant to distinguish it from a full novel — it may have actually been a novella or similar.)
80722
When I was young, I read a chilling story of astronauts coming to an unknown planet and found to their delight  the occupants were all members of their family who were deceased. Each crew member goes off to their respective childhood homes to relive memories.   One astronaut however in the same bedroom as his brother suddenly wonders if aliens may have searched the memories of himself and fellow crew members and used this to gain power over the intruders. His brother asks suspiciously what he's thinking and doesn't believe the answer. The last scene shows astronauts being buried by aliens whose faces melt from human into something terrifying.   Anyone know the name of the story and author? I thought it might be something like Coming Home, but only a guess.
45378
It might be a short story or it might be a novel. It must be before 1972 because I read it in my youth and I am OLD.  The following is very impressionistic.  There is a multidimensional/not of this Earth/alien artifact-like tunnel.   Picture a long, perhaps transparent, storm drain like structure sitting in a field but with an opening on only one end.  It is the subject of a lengthy investigation/exploration that has cost many lives. An instrumented investigator enters the "tunnel" and makes the exact movements that his predecessors have made, advancing until he must do something original at which point he survives and a new "move" is added to the list of correct moves or he is destroyed and a "move" is added to the list of things to be avoided at that point.  I remember absolutely nothing else about the work except that (I hope central) feature.
97360
I'm trying to find an English-language short story I read in a collection about five to ten years ago (I don't have any idea of the original publication date).    Here's everything I remember:   The story is about human astronauts landing on an alien's planet, from the alien's point of view. Every organism on the alien planet is part of a single hive mind, and they can telepathically infect the humans (the aliens view this as beneficial, as any mind separated from the hive must be suffering), but choose not to once they realize that there's an entire planet of humans out there. The narrator alien is an organism that was designed by the hive to mimic a non-essential component on the spacecraft, so it can stow away when the humans return to Earth. The narrator alien is preparing to infect all of Earth as soon as the shuttle's door opens, but the component it replaced was the wire that opens the door, so it is fried instantly by the current.   Despite knowing all these elements of the story, I haven't had luck Googling it, because so many of these elements are very common sci-fi themes on their own, and I don't remember any unique names/terms.  I don't remember if I read this in a Sci-fi anthology book, or in a magazine (like 'Asimov').  Thanks in advance if anyone can help me track this one down, it's been bugging me for a long while.
47104
I once read a SF short story in the 80's, but I can't remember either the name nor the author. The protagonists are two alien anthropologists (one shaped like a tiger, the other like a dragon, I think) intent  on secretly studying two Terran explorers. The Terrans (dubbed "the big one" and "the small one") we soon learn are a couple and at one point they get in some kind of danger.  The two alien anthropologists decide to save them and manage to do so without revealing themselves, thus also "saving" their study.
99872
I remember this story being told to me about this alien race that observed this planet and its intelligent life. They find out that the planet will soon die due to the sun or something and want to send a rescue mission to save the people.  Turns out the people have already figured this out and saved themselves. The plot twist is that this planet is actually earth and the civilisation is the human race.   I’ve been trying to find what this story is but I haven’t found anything. Does anyone have an idea? I believe it isn’t an incredibly long story. Nor is it pessimistic — it’s actually a very optimistic story of the human race.
68043
The story is basically told from an alien's point of view. Essentially they observed us from far off, deemed us as violent and a danger to the universe, and set course (asteroid or something) to kill us. They kept observing and saw all the art and beauty we created and realized we were actually not so bad, but by then they couldn't stop it. So it was sort of also an apology letter to Earth in the end.  First read it like a year ago online and I can't find any trace of it anymore, nor can I recall the site it was on. Anyone know what short story this is?
12005
I would like to know the title and author of a short story I read a long time ago. It's about 3 men in space. They were sent to different planets to catch other organisms on different planets. Presumably to bring back to Earth and put in zoos. The ship they are on breaks down. They notice that the animals on the planet, instead of running away, curiously walk up to them. The animals are too friendly and easy to capture. They cannot fix the spaceship and after a few days, one of the men attempts suicide by slitting his wrists. His attempt fails. They look outside on the planet and they find their homes that they had on earth. The men realize that they were captured by aliens and that they were meant to live on this "alien zoo."
90838
Many decades ago, I read a short story about a time traveler who asks an archaeologist for help.  He convinces the archaeologist that he can time travel by bringing him back a freshly killed dinosaur (small one.)  The time traveler needs help because when traveling back in time to the age of the dinosaurs he met a girl and wants to transport her back to the present.  However only one person can travel in time at a time so he needs the archaeologist at the other end to wait for the girl.  The archaeologist agrees to help.  Unfortunately after the traveler goes back he and the girl find themselves in the middle of a battle between aliens on Earth.  They are chased by a dinosaur and never make it back to the present.  The archaeologist meanwhile is digging for evidence that the traveler went back in time and the story or my recollection of it ends with that.