“Don’t look up,” Merrick warned. “The crystal can catch a human being faster than it can them. This is hypnotic engineering. The rhythm of the syllables and their proportion to the length of word and sentence are computed to correspond to typed encephalographic curves. Nothing is left to chance. When they have reached this stage of conditioning they are almost ready for release and purchase by human beings. Only a severe stimulation of the brain can break down the walls we have built in their minds.”
Erikson made a gesture as though darkness were streaking his vision. He was shaken badly. “But where do they—where do they come from?”
“The State maternity hospitals, of course,” Merrick said, “Where else? The parents are then sterilized by the Health and Welfare Authority as an added safeguard. Births occur at a ratio of about one for every six million normals.” He smiled mirthlessly at the Prophet of Human Supremacy. “Well? Little man, what now?”
Honest realization still refused to come. It needed to be put into words, and Sweyn Erikson had no such words. “I see only that you are taking children of men and disfiguring—”
“For the last time,” gritted Merrick, “These are not human beings. Genus homo, yes. Homo chaos, if you choose. But not homo sapiens. I think of them,” he said with sudden calm, “As Homo Supremus. The next step on the evolutionary ladder….”
At last the words had been spoken and the flood gates were down in the tortured brain of the Prophet. Like a sudden conflagration, realization came—and with it, blind terror.
“No! Nonono! You cannot continue this devil’s work! Think what it would mean if these things should ever be loosed on the world of Man!” the Prophet’s voice was a steadily rising shrill of fear.
Han Merrick looked out across the rows of pallets, each with its burden of a superman, bound like Prometheus to the rock, helpless in hypnotic chains. It struck him again that his life had not been well spent. He looked from his charges to the ranting fear-crazed rabble-rouser. The contrast was too shocking, too complete. For the “androids” were, in fact, worthy of a dignity even in slavery that homo sapiens had never attained in overlordship. Merrick knew at last what he must do.
Racial loyalty stirred, but was quickly smothered in the humiliation of man’s omnipresent thievery. For it was thievery, Merrick thought. Man was keeping for himself the heritage that was the rightful property of a newer, better race.
He took the automatic from his jumper and leveled it at Erikson’s chest. He felt very sure and right. Though he knew that he was sealing the death warrant of his wife and his friends, the memory of their vacillations anesthetized him against any feeling of loss. He waited until Erikson screamed one word into the transmitter imbedded in his flesh—
The word was: “Attack!”
—and in the next instant, Han Merrick shot him dead.
The fanatics on the ridges heard the Prophet’s command and sprang to comply. Energy swept out of the grids, through the coils of the projectors and out over the blind cube of the Creche.
Han Merrick felt the first radiations. He felt the beginnings of cortical hypertrophy and screamed. Every synapse sagged under the increasing load of sensitivity. The pressure of the air became an unbearable burden, the faintest sound became a shattering roar. Every microscopic pain, every cellular process became a rending, tearing agony. He screamed and the sound was a cataclysmic, planet-smashing hell of noise within his skull. He sagged to the floor and thinking stopped. He contracted himself, pulling legs and arms inward in a massive convulsion until at last he had assumed the foetal position. After a long while, he died.
Every human being within the Creche died so, but there was still life. The energy that killed the lesser creature freed the greater—just as Merrick had known it would. Unhuman matter pulsed under the caressing rain. A thousand beings shuddered at the sudden release of their chains. The speakers ranted unheard. The crystals turned unwatched. The bonds forged by homo sapiens snapped and there came—
Maturity.
This, now, is the Creche, Anno Domini 3000. A great mile-square blind cube topping a ragged mountain; bare escarpments falling away to a turbulent sea. For ten centuries the Creche has stood so, and the Androids still come forth, now to lift their starships to the Magellanic Clouds and beyond. A Golden Age has come. But, of course, Man is no longer the Master.
Transcriber’s Note:
This etext was produced from If: Worlds of Science Fiction November 1953. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.
Copyleft
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net.
This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
http://www.gutenberg.org/3/2/1/0/32104/
Produced by Sankar Viswanathan, Greg Weeks, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will be renamed.
Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project Gutenberg™ electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG™ concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and research. They may be modified and printed and given away—you may do practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is subject to the trademark license, especially commercial redistribution.
To protect the Project Gutenberg™ mission of promoting the free distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work (or any other work associated in any way with the phrase “Project Gutenberg”), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project Gutenberg™ License (available with this file or online at http://gutenberg.net/license).