Document G: Dr. Chandra Cartier
I respectfully dissent from Drs. Kendrick and Ebron. Dr. Kendrick’s thesis, taken in the extreme, might be extended to every lifeform on every world, but I believe that the hazard on Gehenna is more specific, without claiming that it is mindful or sapient. The danger is in ourselves, that humankind and human civilization have failed so miserably here and that we are raising atavistic suspicions of aliens in our midst. I object to the proposition that human beings be quarantined and observed in poverty, disease, and ignorance to protect the supposed value of native life which has not evidenced any creative capacity. I object to the proposition that there is not relative value involved, the value of human beings trapped in a situation of squalor and futility, neither of which may be scientific terms, but both of which have stark value on a world whose last civilized inhabitants named it Hell. I propose on the contrary that it would be a crime against humanity to wall ourselves off from these people. On the contrary, we should bring hospitals, educational facilities, and bring these survivors into the modern age, at least to the extent that they become capable of transforming Gehenna into a viable colony. From the neolithic to the space age may be too great a leap for one generation; but metal plows and engines to pull them are not too great a leap; rejuv and modern medicine are not too great a leap; aid in years of bad weather, advice in agriculture, the judicious importation of plants and livestock, all these things are minimal response to this human suffering. I do not dignify with a response the suggestion advanced by Dr. Ebron that neither humankind nor native life might count against the ideal of ecological restoration: he is correct; the idea is inhuman. As for Dr. Kendrick’s debate of values, it is attractive only in the abstract. Taken in substance it would have starved our species out of existence as soon as it had conceived the theory: our intelligence, whether anthropocentric or otherwise, advises us that we have ensured the survival of terrene species by our actions. Whales survive in the oceans of Cyteen; bears and seals and other species on Eversnow. Was this moral? Is it moral for us to have left our ancestral Sun? Human history is collision, not stasis. It is inhuman not to preserve these people in a reasonable quality of life. There must be a perimeter established here within which humanity can retreat to remain human; and that perimeter must be defended with whatever measures are necessary until investigation has established what we have done on this world. The fact that this world has reduced one well‑equipped human effort to the neolithic is eloquent enough argument that humankind has to be wiser in its dealings with this environment and what lives here.
vii
Alliance HQ to Newport/Gehenna Mission
Couriered by AS Boreas
…Equipment and personnel arriving with this message will permit the expansion of a secure perimeter to include the landing site and town and fields as well as a river access. Establishment of permanent health care and educational facilities for Newport/Gehenna citizens should be given a high priority, but security of Alliance personnel and equipment must not be compromised in the process, regarding force of nature or force of arms, and not excluding the possibility of action by Union agents or native lifeforms.
This office has contacted Union colonial offices with a further request for data on humanitarian grounds and there has been some negotiation opened in this matter, but progress is likely to be minimal and slow.
In the absence of further information, the mission is instructed to establish a perimeter as wide as possible without conflict and within the limits of available equipment and security and tactical considerations. Conflict is to be avoided with humans and native life, but this prohibition does not extend to the function of effective fencing devices. The Bureau draws no conclusion on the sapience or competency of the Calibans and awaits further data which the mission will supply.
The priorities of the mission will be as follows:
to secure the area of its own operation
to determine whether any activity of any other outside agency might exist; if so, to take appropriate measures
to secure the area of the town and adjacent villages necessary for establishment of a viable economy
to assist colonists with medical and educational facilities
to encourage trade with the center of colonization in preference to trade with those in outlying areas, with a view of centralization of economy and facilities and the establishment of an Alliance‑influenced capital which will tend to draw scattered human settlements toward the landing site by the attraction of food and stability, minimizing future political difference
to educate all available citizenry in hygiene, agriculture, small manufacture, and government
to defend against encroachment by native agency by the use of whatever force is minimally sufficient to deter the attempt, up to and including lethal arms.
Closely following this equipment delivery another ship will follow, bringing a station module and personnel for the core of a permanent manned orbiting port, which will monitor the majority of Newport planetary surface and serve, with the addition of a shuttle by future shipment, to maintain constant surveillance and flow of supplies.
It is not Bureau policy to permit a colony to suffer failure from neglect. The human inhabitants regardless of origin are now an Alliance polity but must be dealt with under Section 9 procedures as a first contact. The mission is urged to provide answers to questions of local sapience, and particularly to assist the station when operational in determining what planetary areas might be developed without contact with high lifeforms.
Of high priority, therefore, is the establishment of a landing area at Newport Base…
viii
Newport Base briefing room
“Then the decision is to exploit,” Ebron said, “in potential disregard of native life.”
“It’s a political decision,” said Kendrick. “We’re in the proposed path of expansion. They wantGehenna. That’s what it comes to. Union seeded it, we cultivate it–they’re happy, you understand that? They’re actually relieved the population’s sunk to the stone age. And devil take the calibans.”
“That’s off the record,” Cartier said.
Kendrick drew a breath and let it go again. “That’s off the record. Of course it’s off the record. You had your way, didn’t you?”
“No,” said Cartier. “Unfortunately I didn’t.”
ix
Year 72, day 130 CR
The Hills
It was many a day that Pia Elder sat atop her hill, watching the coming and going in the camp, a long hard walk for an old woman, and the first such walk of the spring. Cloud was panting when he had come so far, and relieved that the old woman was here.
His heart was beating very hard when he came up the slope, partly because the old woman was sitting very still (but she often did that) and his mother had done that when she was dead; and partly because he was afraid of this old woman, who was thin and dry as a stick and strange enough to do things like this, coming out before dawn to look at a place she would not go.
“Ma Pia,” he said very quietly, and circled to the side of her and came facing her, squatted down with his elbows tucked between his knees. It was cold in the morning wind. He was cold. He shivered, looking into a face wrinkled like old fruit and eyes like black Styx stone, water‑smoothed and cold. She let her hair grow. Neglect, he guessed. “Ma Pia, father he wished was you well, ma Pia.”
A while longer the implacable eyes gave him nothing. Then Pia Elder lifted a bony arm from beneath her blanket.
“New buildings this spring.”
He looked, turning his head and turning on his haunches. It was so that there were more buildings in the camp, tall and strange buildings. Perhaps the old woman was being conversational with him. He looked back at her hoping that it would be easy to get her home.