Collected short fiction, p.756
Collected Short Fiction, page 756
The drive chain was broken. Through another endless day, while the crawling sun seemed stalled on its horizontal track, he toiled to make and fit new links. The farmers must have loved the Darkside wilderness, because the sledge was already loaded with cold-weather hunting gear. He raided the kitchen again and rode up at last into bright windy daylight.
The polar world had hardly changed. Though the slow sun was slightly higher, the thaw had not begun. The monstrous tower of the interstellar vessel still commanded the sky behind, so near he thought some rhodo sense might detect his own machine.
If that happened—
He shrugged and bent to guide the sledge into a sunbud vineyard, where last summer’s dead black stalks promised a little cover. Beyond the vineyard, he turned into an ice-floored ravine that swung behind another long ridge, perhaps another old ringwall.
Nothing followed.
Nothing, at least, that he could see. The sledge crawled faster than he could run and carried more load than he could walk under. He drove for the Darkside. These arctic highlands were empty wilderness, too barren even for wild mutoxen. Their wild desolation oppressed him. Yet, with luck enough—so he tried to hope—he might somehow get across them, might somehow be able to find Cyra and his father and rejoin their fight for the freedom of Kai. With more unlikely luck, they might even get some sort of aid from Malili, from Bosun Brong or even Nera Nyin.
Her golden splendor came sometimes to haunt his exhausted sleep, but she brought no miraculous escape. Instead, rough country stalled the sledge too many times. Levering it over icy boulders took too much muscle. His stolen food was too soon gone. At the end, the drive chain snapped again.
He had to leave the sledge. Packing the tent and the solar stove and the last of the supplies, he blundered on until a morning when all his dreams had turned to dull despair.
He chewed his last beancake fragments and melted ice to make one last can of snowrangers tea. The stove and the tent had become too heavy for him. Too dead to hope or even care, he dropped them back into the slush and staggered on across the barrens.
“At your service, Shipman Keth Kyrone.”
At first, when he heard that high, bright voice behind him, he thought it was only in his pain-numbed brain.
“You must accept our service, sir.” It was closer, kinder, more urgently concerned. “You must let us save your life.”
He turned then, dazedly, and saw the humanoids.
Three lean machines, golden nameplates glinting in the cold sunlight, dark narrow faces surprised and handsome and benign. They must have come in the long silver teardrop that lay in the slush behind them. “Allow us, sir, to render aid.”
“I want no help.” Facing them, swaying, he pushed one hand into an empty pocket. “Get away from me.”
“You must forgive us, sir.” Only the nearest spoke, but all three danced in around him. “In your unfortunate situation, you cannot refuseour aid.”
“I think I can.” He crouched to meet them, thrusting the fist in his pocket toward the black leader. “The way I did before—” He stood his ground.
They didn’t pause.
“You cannot deceive us, sir,” the tiny leader trilled. “We have now recovered both of the illicit rhodomagnetic devices you once possessed, and we must remind you of your grave past offenses against the Prime Directive. We cannot allow such dangerous behavior.”
Their gentle strength surprised him. Too light-headed to resist, he let them lift him through the oval door and help him to a padded seat inside the teardrop. The door shrank and vanished, though the whole hull remained darkly transparent. The three humanoids froze where they stood. Though the craft had no controls that he could see, it lifted suddenly, soundless and fast.
Trembling with a cold sickness of defeat, he sat rigidly erect, striving to see all he could. The barrens dropped away, the thawing snow dark-patched now with naked stone. In a moment, all the ground he had toiled so long to gain had slid back behind. They sloped down again, toward the faint green of young crops the humanoids must have planted. Searching for the city he had fled, he failed at first to recognize anything. All he could see was the vast ice cap, blazing white in the black crater ring. He found the interstellar ship, its sheen was gone. Black metal now, it was half demolished.
“What happened?” He grinned bleakly at the nearest humanoid, hoping to discover that Cyra and his father had struck them with some rhodo weapon. “Something hit your ship?”
“We are recycling its metal into a new city for you.”
He saw the city when its slim arm pointed. A strange gem shining on that vast black ring, covering what must have been the meteor gap. New towers covered the old spacedeck, half of what had been Northdyke, even the old impact ridge where he had picked his way through the damaged wind wheels not a month ago. Still toylike from this elevation, these fantastic palaces looked as sleek and graceful as a dancing humanoid, some mirror-bright, some aglow with flowing color.
“We are also converting mass from the planet itself,” the humanoid chirruped. “When the ice cap has been thawed, the crater will contain a pleasure lake.”
They were dropping to land at the old capital complex before he discovered it, shrunk to a clump of primitive huts beneath that soaring splendor.
“We have a place prepared for you,” the humanoid cooed. “The apartment at Vara Vorn which once belonged to your friend Chelni.” They escorted him off the craft into a tiny space which proved to be an elevator, dropping them into the huge round room where that first humanoid had peeled off Chelni’s naked shape. He shuddered, recalling the shock.
“What troubles you, sir?” Only one humanoid had come with him off the elevator, but it hovered too near, its soft-featured face too gravely intent, its melodious voice too warm and too urgent. “Are you unhappy?”
“Unhappy?” he asked quizzically. He backed away from it to glance around the room. Chelni’s great round bed, with its cover of white mutoxen fur, still filled the center of the floor, but everything else had been replaced. Even the doors were different—man-proof.
That fact hit him like a kick in the stomach. The wide, rose-glowing panels were unbroken by any visible knob or lock. The controls were rhodomagnetic, and he had no monopole with which to reach them.
“Why?” Defiant, he swung to scowl at the humanoid. “Why should I be happy?”
“Because we exist to make you so.” Its high sweet voice echoed an eternal kind concern. “We were created to serve and obey and guard you from harm.”
“If you obey—get out!”
“Sir!” Lifted higher in pained reproof its tone reflected the benign surprise fixed forever on its face. “Without our service, your race would perish.”
“We’ve lived well enough without you,” he muttered bitterly. “A thousand years without you, here on Kai.”
“But always in increasing danger from your own uncontrolled technology,” it answered instantly. “Our arrival now is most fortunate for your endangered planet, and your lack of gratitude appears irrational.” It glided closer. “Inform us, sir. Why are you unhappy?”
It had come too close and it seemed too intent. He swayed away from it.
Weak from aching hunger and long fatigue, he needed to sit, and now he saw an odd-shaped chair gliding toward him silently, commanded, no doubt, by some unseen rhodo signal.
“Because I’m here.” Too faint to stand, he sank into the chair. “I want my freedom.”
“Every human right is guaranteed to you,” its bright voice purred. “That is our function. You must understand, however, that we are required under the Prime Directive to guard you from the consequences of your own tragic unwisdom. You present us with a dual dilemma, requiring both your defense from the predictable violence of your fellow human beings and their own defense from your illicit knowledge. You may not leave this room.”
“For how long?”
“At least until a more secure place can be prepared for you,” it lilted cheerily. “We cannot at present foresee any circumstances that might enable us to relax your protective supervision, but we can assure your total happiness here.”
Staring up at its blind benevolence, he could only shiver.
“Trust us, sir,” it begged him gently. “We have learned to meet every human need. You will receive a fully adequate diet and constant medical attention. You will be free to choose your own recreations, within certain essential limitations.”
“What limitations?”
“We detect your antagonism, sir.” It retreated slightly, chiding him.
“Like many other maladjusted misfits who have attempted to reject our service, you seek to blame us for any conditions you deem irksome. You must seek instead to understand that these restraints result not from any malice of ours, but from your own unfortunate illogic.”
“What restraints?”
“You will have no visitors. No contact whatsoever with any other person. Though we sense your momentary displeasure, sir, this total isolation has been proven essential in such unfortunate cases as your own to prevent the communication of illicit knowledge.”
“I—I see.” He gulped at a dry lump in his throat. “What can I do?”
“Anything that is not forbidden.”
“Can I have—anything at all?”
“Though you are free to request certain recreational items, there are categories that cannot be supplied. Works of science are restricted, for example, because scientific knowledge has proven damaging to your happiness and dangerous to the survival of your race.”
“What about music?” He grinned defiantly. “Poetry? Art?”
“We can bring you reproductions of certain types of art, excepting any that suggest unhappiness or pain.”
“So you censor tragedy?”
The humanoid stood frozen for a moment, as if it had to wait for that computer plexus on Wing IV to resolve some perplexing paradox.
“Human behavior is too seldom reasonable.” Suddenly alive again, it seemed almost to smile. “That is why your race requires us. Your racial addition to frustration and suffering and death is no more logical in the illusions of your literature than in the realities of your warfare. We encourage neither perversion.”
“So you enforce happiness?”
“We do remove unhappiness.” It nodded blindly, unaware of his desperate irony. “In your own case, sir, food and sleep will predictably ameliorate your present discontent. In time you will turn, as others before you have always done, from resentment of the slight restraints we must impose to the pure enjoyment of our perfect reason. Teaching you to forsake the physical, we can aid you to attain the more enduring delights of the mind.
“Our high aim, sir, is your everlasting bliss.”
Grimly silent, he watched its frozen black benevolence.
“However, sir,” it chimed cheerily, “we shall always respect your wishes so far as our Prime Directive allows. If we find for example that sexual release is essential to your peace of mind, we can bring you another simulacrum of Shipmate Chelni Vorn—”
It must have perceived the chill that shook him.
“Or, sir, if you desire other companionship, we can provide you with an accurate replicate of any other human being you care to designate, programmed for any behavior you may desire. We suggest, however, that you have your dinner first.”
He sat numb and staring, as motionless as the humanoid.
“Sir!” It bent toward him, its melody quickened with solicitude. “If your irrational unpleasure causes you to reject food and other normal human satisfactions, we have more efficient means to relieve you.”
“I want—” He started back from it, rigid and quivering. “I want no euphoride.”
“You’ll learn to beg for it,” it sang softly. “Because it is the purest concentrate of human joy. Tested and improved through centuries of use on many billion human beings, it is far superior to any psychochemical that may have been known on this planet. Far superior, certainly, to the illicit feyolin you have tried.”
How, he wondered, had it learned of that?
“Its principal effect is a direct stimulation of the pleasure centers of the brain, accompanied by a sense of vastly dilated time. Most users report illusions of intensely happy activity, infinitely prolonged. Nearly always, they beg for a higher dosage rate than we can allow.”
“I don’t—” His dry whisper stuck. “Don’t want it!”
“The choice, sir, is yours.” Its blind smile remained serene. “Our Prime Directive grants you every possible freedom. We urge you, in fact, to elect the more rational alternative: the full and hearty acceptance of our service, with a total readiness to render whatever aid we may request.”
“What sort of aid?”
“At the moment, sir, we require information. If you demonstrate a willingness to answer all our questions accurately and fully, attempting neither to deceive us nor to withhold anything, the administration of euphoride may be delayed—with our warning that when you do receive it, you will regret the delay.”
“What do you want to know?” For an instant it stood motionless, while that vast remote machine must have been calculating his fate.
“Sir,” it purred at last, “we perceive your continued defiance. If you wish to avoid euphoride, your obstructive attitude must change. You must in fact recognize that we were created by a wise, well-meaning man, to fulfill an imperative human need.”
“Need? I don’t see that.”
“You will.” It bent slightly toward him. “Logically, you must, because you yourself have shown us that you share our creator’s concern for the future of your race. If you will let us guide you toward a correct interpretation of human history, you will conclude that we are in truth essential to human survival.”
He squinted at it skeptically. “Your evolution resulted from the interaction of two opposing processes,” its prime voice intoned. “These are competition and cooperation. Competition for survival created vigorous and aggressive individual animals. Cooperation between them created society and civilization.
“Under primitive conditions, the two processes functioned in apparent harmony. With the advent of high technology, however, their old balance was destroyed. Uncontrolled aggression became a deadly peril.
“We were made to save your race.”
“But not from me,” he protested bitterly. “The fact is, I was never aggressive enough. My father always told me that. My instructors always did. And Chelni Vorn. Otherwise, I might have married her and become an owner of the fleet.”
“Now there are no fleets,” the calm machine reminded him. “If in fact you were born without innate aggression, that should help you welcome us. We must repeat, however, that you are already guilty of the gravest possible act of aggression against us.”
It froze, its poise inquisitive. “We ask again—will you cooperate?”
“I—I’ll think about it.” He swayed on the chair, his senses spinning. Groping for any telling argument, he found only a sick conviction that every possible argument would itself be read as added evidence against him. Weakly he repeated, “I don’t want euphoride.”
“In that case, we require information about the people and the culture of the planet Malili.”
“I know very little.”
“You were born there,” it insisted softly. “You have been intimate with a Leleyo female. You have made a recent visit there, and you have apparently been hoping to return.” Its graceful head cocked alertly. “What is your interest in Malili?”
“I’m a member of the Lifecrew.” Meeting its blind eyes, he straighted defiantly. “Our mission was—is—to defend Kai from you. We suspected that you had some kind of probe or station on Malili.”
“We do not.” The tilt of its narrow head seemed smugly proud. “We have never landed units there—”
“Then I advise you not to try it now,” he muttered. “The rockrust will get them if you do.”
“We are collecting data on the native organisms of Malili, but they are not our problem. Our graver concerns are the indicated possibilities that the native Leleyo possess at least a primitive rhodomagnetic technology and that their society is an undisciplined democracy.”
“So you’re afraid of the Leleyo?” The emotion that nerved him was almost triumph. If the Leleyo knew rhodomagnetics, they might defy the humanoids. Malili might become man’s last fortress, secure against them.
“We are mechanical,” the machine was caroling. “We do not experience fear. We simply follow our Prime Directive. If the Leleyo do in fact possess an illicit technology, or if their institutions are dangerously democratic, they require our immediate service.” Trying to conceal that flash of hope, he frowned again, demanding: “What’s wrong with democracy?”
“It is suicidal, sir. We have observed its rise and fall on many million worlds, and we find that it always fosters the excessive developments of high technology and aggressive individualism that lead inevitably to racial annihilation. Therefore, democracies have the highest priorities for our service.”
The machine leaned abruptly closer. “We require information about another native of Malili who has been in close contact with you, the man who sometimes calls himself Bosun Brong. The evidence suggests that he commands illicit technologies, probably rhodomagnetic.”
“I’ve met Brong.” He tried to restrain a grip of sardonic satisfaction. “I know nothing about any illicit technology.”
“We still perceive antagonism toward us,” the humanoid sang. “If you wish to avoid euphoride, you must supply the facts we require. About the native Leleyo. About the current activities of your so-called Lifecrew. About the man called Brong.”
It went rigid for an instant, as if waiting for instruction.
“Where are your father and Crewmate Sair?”
“So you never caught them?” Hope had exploded in him again. If they and Brong were still at large, if Malili was really hostile ground to the humanoids—
