‘I can't say, Uncle Siever,’ sighed Marlene.
Genarr said, ‘Well, let me repeat what it told you. Stop me if I'm wrong. It said its pattern “stretches out”; that it is “simple in every spot and is complex only taken together”; that it is “not fragile”. Am I right?’
‘Yes, you are.’
‘And the only life we have ever found on Erythro are the prokaryotes, the tiny bacterialike cells. If I don't want something that's spiritual and immaterial, I'm stuck with those prokaryotes. Is it possible that those little cells, which seem separate, are actually part of one world-girdling organism? The mind pattern would then be stretched out. It would be simple in every spot and would be complex only when taken together. And it would not be fragile, for even if large sections of it were killed, the world organism would scarcely be touched as a whole.’
Marlene stared at Genarr. ‘You mean I've been talking to germs?’
‘I can't say certainly, Marlene. It's only a hypothesis, but it fits beautifully and I can't think of anything else that would explain it as well. Besides, Marlene, if we looked at the hundred billion cells that make up your brain, each one of them, taken by itself, isn't really very much. You are an organism in which all the brain cells are clumped together. If you talk to another in which all the brain cells are separate and linked, let us say, by tiny radio waves, is that so very different?’
‘I don't know,’ said Marlene, obviously disturbed. ‘But let's ask another question, one that is very important. What does this life-form - whatever it is - want with you?’
Marlene looked startled. ‘He can talk to me, Uncle Siever. He can transfer ideas to me.’
‘Your suggestion, then, is that it just wants someone to talk to? Do you suppose that once we humans came, it realized for the first time that it was lonely?’
‘I don't know.’
‘No impressions to that effect?’
‘No.’
‘It could destroy us.’ Genarr was talking to himself now. ‘It could destroy us without trouble if it grew tired of you, or bored with you.’
‘No, Uncle Siever.’
Genarr said, ‘But it definitely hurt me when I wished to get in the way of your connection with the mind of the planet. It hurt Dr D'Aubisson, your mother, and a guard.’
‘Yes, but he hurt you all with only just enough force to stop you from interfering with me. He did no further damage.’
‘It goes to all these lengths to have you outside on the surface just so that it can talk to you, and have companionship. Somehow that doesn't seem to be enough of a reason.’
Marlene said, ‘Perhaps the reason is something we can't understand. Perhaps he has so different a mind that he couldn't explain his reason, or, if he did, that it would make no sense to us.’
‘But its mind is not so different that it can't converse with you. It does receive ideas from you and transmit other ideas to you, doesn't it? You two do communicate.’
‘Yes.’
‘And it understands you well enough to try to make itself seem pleasant to you by taking on Aurinel's voice and face.’
Marlene's head bent and she fixed her eyes on the floor in front of her.
Genarr said softly, ‘So since it understands us, we may be able to understand it, and, if so, you must find out why it wants you so. It could be very important to find that out, for who knows what it is planning? We have no way of finding out except through you, Marlene.’
Marlene was trembling. ‘I don't know how to do that, Uncle Siever.’
‘Just do as you have been doing. The mind seems friendly to you, and it may explain.’
Marlene looked up and studied Genarr. She said, ‘You're afraid, Uncle Siever.’
‘Of course. We're dealing with a mind far more powerful than ours. It may, if it decides it doesn't want us, do away with us all.’
‘I don't mean that, Uncle Siever. You're afraid for me.’
Genarr hesitated. ‘Are you still sure that you're safe on Erythro, Marlene? Are you safe talking to this mind?’
Marlene rose to her feet and said, almost haughtily, ‘Of course I am. There is no risk. He will not hurt me.’
She sounded supremely confident, but Genarr's heart sank. What she thought scarcely counted, for her mind had been adjusted by the mind of Erythro. Could he trust her now? he wondered.
After all, why should this mind built up of prokaryotes in their trillion trillion not have an agenda of its own, as, for instance, Pitt had? And why shouldn't this mind in its anxiety to fulfill that agenda, show all the duplicity of Pitt?
In short, what if the mind were lying to Marlene for reasons of its own?
Was he right to send Marlene out to that mind under such conditions?
But did it matter whether he was right or not? Had he a choice?
34. Close
‘Perfect,’ said Tessa Wendel. ‘Perfect, perfect, perfect.’ She made a gesture as though she were nailing something to the wall, firmly and hard. ‘Perfect.’
Crile Fisher knew what she was talking about. Twice, in two different directions, they had passed through hyperspace. Twice Crile had watched the pattern of stars change somewhat. Twice he had searched out the Sun, finding it a bit dimmer the first time, a bit brighter the second. He was beginning to feel like an old hyperspatial knockabout.
He said, ‘The Sun isn't bothering us, I take it.’
‘Oh, it is, but in a perfectly calculable way, so that the physical interference is a psychological pleasure - if you know what I mean.’
Fisher said, playing the devil's advocate, ‘The Sun's pretty far away, you know. The gravitational effect must be pretty close to zero.’
‘Certainly,’ said Wendel, ‘but pretty close to zero isn't zero. The effect is measurable. Twice we passed through hyperspace, with the virtual path first approaching the Sun obliquely and then receding at another angle. Wu did the calculations beforehand, and the path we took fit those calculations to all the decimal points we could reasonably ask. The man's a genius. He weaves shortcuts into the computer program in a fashion you wouldn't believe.’
‘I'm sure,’ murmured Fisher.
‘So there's no question now, Crile. We can be at the Neighbor Star by tomorrow. By today - if we're really in a hurry. Not very close, of course. We may have to coast inward toward the star for a reasonable period of time, as a precautionary measure. Besides, we don't know the mass of the Neighbor Star with sufficient precision to take too many chances on a really close approach. We don't want to be hurled off unexpectedly and have to work our way back.’ She shook her head admiringly, ‘That Wu. I'm so pleased with him, I can't begin to describe it.’
Fisher said cautiously, ‘Are you sure you don't feel a little annoyed?’
‘Annoyed? Why?’ She stared at Fisher in surprise, then said, ‘Do you think I ought to be jealous?’
‘Well, I don't know. Is there a chance that Chao-Li Wu will get the credit for working out superluminal flight - I mean, the true details of it - and that you'll be forgotten, or remembered only as a forerunner?’
‘No, not at all, Crile. It's nice of you to worry on my behalf, but matters are secure. My work is recorded in full detail. The basic mathematics of superluminal flight are mine. The engineering details I have also contributed to, although others will get the major credit for designing the ship, and should. What Wu has done has been to add a correction factor to the basic equations. Highly important, of course, and we can now see that superluminal flight wouldn't be practical without it, but it's just the icing on the cake. The cake is still mine.’
‘Fine. If you're sure of that, I'm happy.’
‘As a matter of fact, Crile, I'm hoping Wu will now take the lead in developing superluminal flight. The fact is, I'm past my best years - scientifically, that is. Only scientifically, Crile.’
Fisher grinned. ‘I know that.’
‘But scientifically, I am over the hill. The work I've done has been the mining of the concepts I had when I was a graduate student. It's been a matter of about twenty-five years of drawing conclusions, and I've gone about as far as I can go. What's needed are brand-new concepts, entirely new thoughts, a branching off into uncharted territory. I can't do that any more.’