The Sweeper of Loray

Two Earthmen arrive on Loray, a world of primitives, seeking exotic specimens. Professor Carver wants knowledge; his assistant Fred wants sersee juice, the miraculous substance that can heal wounds fatal to any civilized species. When Fred witnesses a hunter literally brought back from death, he becomes obsessed with obtaining the juice. His methods grow desperate, then violent, then irreversible. The substance doesn't just heal Fred. It transforms him into one of the very people he came to exploit. When Fred needs him most, Carver must decide: help his transformed assistant, or protect his reputation as an eminent Earth scientist. He chooses himself. This is sharp science fiction that doesn't flinch. Sheckley, often dismissed as merely comic, delivers something far more unsettling here: a precise, unsentimental indictment of colonial arrogance and the lazy assumptions that let 'civilized' men see 'primitives' as less than human. The ending still stings sixty years later.