"That is an actual observation of my own, Professor, and doesn't rest merely on what I was told."
"And that shift of balance has something to do with the rate of spontaneous deminiaturization."
"That is my own thought. I cannot state it as fact."
"Hmm." Friar sipped thoughtfully at his cofFee and said, "The trouble is that all this is superficial. It tells us about the behavior of the miniaturization field, but nothing about how the field is produced. - And in decreasing the value of Planck's constant, they leave the speed of light untouched, you say?"
"Yes, but that, as I emphasized, means that maintaining the miniaturization field costs enormously in energy. If they can couple Planck's constant with the speed of light, increasing the latter as they decrease the former - But they don't have that yet."
"So they say. It was in Shapirov's mind, supposedly, but you were unable to get it out."
"That's right."
Friar remained lost in thought for a few minutes, then shook his head. "We'll go over everything you've said and deduce what we can from it, but I fear it won't help."
"Why not?" asked Rodano.
"Because none of it goes to the heart. If someone who had never seen a robot or heard anything about any of its component parts were to report a robot in operation, he could describe how the head and limbs moved, how the voice sounded, how it obeyed orders, and so on. Nothing he could observe would tell him how a positronic brainpath works or what a molecular valve is. He would not even have an inkling that either exists, nor would those scientists who would work from his observations have any.
"The Soviets have some technique to produce the field and we know nothing about it, nor does anything Morrison can tell us help us there. They might have published material that led up to it, not aware that something crucial was in the making - that was what happened in the mid-twentieth century, when early work on nuclear fission was published before it was understood that it ought to be kept secret. The Soviets didn't make that mistake with miniaturization, however. Nor have we succeeded in retrieving information concerning the matter through espionage or by the luck of having some key personnel on the other side defect and come to us.
"I will consult with my colleagues on the Board, but on the whole, Dr. Morrison, I'm afraid that your adventure in the Soviet Union, however daring and praiseworthy has - except for your confirmation that miniaturization does exist - been useless. I'm sorry, Mr. Rodano, but it might as well not have happened."
Morrison's expression did not change as Friar advanced his conclusion. He poured himself a little more coffee, added cream judiciously, and drank it without haste.
Then he said, "You're quite wrong, you know, Friar."
Friar looked up and said, "Are you trying to say that you know something about the production of the miniaturization field? You had said that -"
"What I'm going to say, Friar, has nothing at all to do with miniaturization. It has everything to do with my own work. The Soviets took me to Malenkigrad and the Grotto in order that I might use my computer program to read Shapirov's mind. It failed at that, which is perhaps not surprising, considering that Shapirov was in a coma and near death. On the other hand, Shapirov, who had a remarkably penetrating mind, referred to my program as a 'relay station' after he had read some of my papers. That's what it turned out to be."
"A relay station?" Friar's face took on a look of puzzled distaste. "What does that mean?"
"Instead of tapping Shapirov's thought, my programmed computer, once inside one of Shapirov's neurons, was acting as a relay, passing thought from one of us to another."
Friar's expression became one of indignation. "You mean it was a telepathic device."
"Exactly. I first experienced that when I was aware of an intense emotion of love and sexual desire for a young woman who was on the miniaturized ship with me. Naturally, I assumed it was my own feeling, for she was a very attractive woman. Nevertheless, I was not aware of any conscious feeling of that sort. It was not until several other instances of the sort that I realized I was receiving the thoughts of a young man on board ship. He and the young lady were estranged, but the passion between them existed, nevertheless."
Friar smiled tolerantly. "Are you sure you were in condition, on board the ship, to interpret these thoughts properly? After all, you were under tension. Did you also receive similar thoughts from the young lady?"
"No. The young man and I exchanged thoughts, involuntarily, on several occasions. When I thought of my wife and children, he thought of a woman and two youngsters. When I was lost in the bloodstream, it was he who picked up my sensations of panic. He assumed he had detected Shapirov's miseries by way of my machine - which remained in my possession when I was adrift - but those were my feelings, not Shapirov's. I did not exchange thoughts with either woman on board, but they exchanged thoughts with each other. When they tried to catch Shapirov's thoughts, they detected similar words and feelings - from each other, of course - which the young man and myself did not."
"A sexual difference?" said Friar skeptically.
"Not really. The pilot of the ship, a male, received nothing at all, either from the women or from the other men, though on one occasion, he did seem to get a thought. I couldn't say from whom. My own feeling is that there are brain types, as there are blood types - probably only a few - and that telepathic communication can be most easily established among those of the same brain type."
Rodano interposed softly, "Even if all this is so, Dr. Morrison. What of it?"
Morrison said, "Let me explain that. For years I've worked to identify the regions and patterns of abstract thought within the human brain with some unremarkable success. Occasionally, I would catch an image, but I never interpreted that properly. I thought it was coming from the animal on whose brain I was working, but I now suspect that they came when I was fairly close to some human being who was in the grip of strong emotion or deep thought. I never noticed that. My fault.
"Nevertheless, having been stung by the general indifference and downright disbelief and ridicule of my colleagues, I never published the matter of catching images, but modified my program in an attempt to intensify it. Some of those modifications were never published, either. Thus, I entered Shapirov's bloodstream with a device that could more nearly serve as a telepathic relay than anything I had ever had before. And now that, at last, my thick head has absorbed exactly what it is that I have, I know what to do to improve the program. I am sure of that."
Friar said, "Let me get this straight, Morrison. You are telling me that, as a result of your fantastic voyage into Shapirov's body, you are now certain you can so modify your device as to make telepathy practical?"
"Practical to an extent. Yes."
"That would be an enormous thing - if you could demonstrate it." The skepticism in Friar's voice did not disappear.
"More enormous than you perhaps think," said Morrison with some asperity. "You know, of course, that telescopes, whether optical or radio, can be built in parts over a wide area and, if they are coordinated by computer, can achieve the function of a single large telescope, one much larger than can practically be built in a single piece."
"Yes. But what of that?"
"I mention it as an analogy. I am convinced that I can demonstrate something of the same sort in connection with the brain. If we were to have six men united telepathically, the six brains would, for the time, act as one large brain and, in fact, be beyond human in intelligence and in the capacity for insight. Think of the advances in science and technology that could be made, advances in other fields of human endeavor as well. We would, without going through the tedium of physical evolution or the danger of genetic engineering, create a mental superman."