Balance of Power Page 2

  The colonists had never come to terms with Attica. Not even with the region of Lambda where they had established themselves. They had never managed to get ahead of the game. Things had gone wrong from the beginning—little things, but too many to cope with easily. Like the colonies Kilner had visited, this colony had had a hard time. The local life-system had reacted against the invasion in a thousand subtle ways. After the first few years of establishing their crops and building their homes and planning all the great things that they were going to do the colonists had found a tide slowly turning against them. The crops from Earth had begun to yield less and less as time went by. They had developed allergy problems.

  When they had tried to cultivate local produce on a large scale they had affected the ecological balance of the area and created problems. Local pests and parasites, normally controlled by the balance of nature, had become uncontrollable. They had been forced to fight for their sustenance, and for their lives. One by one, they beat the problems, but one by one more emerged. A colony on an alien world, no matter how effective the survey has been, has a great deal to learn, and the processes of learning can be expensive.

  Lambda’s colony had never managed to get into the positive feedback loop in which their endeavors would have made subsequent endeavors much easier. All their efforts had been sidetracked into the simple battle for survival. They had faced no major crises, but one long enduring series of sub-crises. They had not managed to start their industrial revolution, despite knowing how. They knew where to find the iron ore, the coal, the oil...but they just could not free the manpower to begin the necessary flow of supplies.

  Knowing how had, in a way, made it worse. It had made them frustrated, had given them a bitter sense of failure.

  The visit of the Daedalus would almost certainly turn the battle their way. Our laboratory could put right their food-supply problems without too much difficulty. We could engineer their crops to suit the changed circumstances, and help to eliminate the pests. At the very least we could win them another decade’s breathing space. On top of what they already had, that should be enough. The feedback process would begin.

  But our arrival hadn’t made them any happier. In a way, it had reminded them of their failure. They had not made it on their own. Now they needed help. They resented our coming. They resented the necessity of what we had come to do. I couldn’t blame them for that.

  I’d left Conrad and Linda to take care of the routine work in the colony, largely because I felt that it was my turn to join Mariel as part of the contact team. I’d felt guilty at the time, but now I was regretting my determination. I felt I’d missed out on Wildeblood, remaining in the colony while Conrad and Linda went with Mariel, but by now I was quite prepared to miss out again, if only I could be sure that this particular expedition would some day sail safely home. Curiously, I would have felt a lot safer had there been someone else along. The responsibility of being Mariel’s sole companion and guardian weighed a little heavy upon me. But there had been no way that we could spare another biologist, and Karen had been required because there was a good deal of work to be done on the ship’s equipment and stores. We hadn’t had much of a chance to effect repairs on Arcadia; we had to do work now if we were going to complete our mission by going on to a sixth world.

  “The trouble is,” I mused, aloud—feeling obliged to make some contribution to the anxious conversation—”that they really are going to find Delta alien. The two continents were never connected at any time during the entire geological history of this planet. Such continental drift as there has been has simply been a partial fragmentation of the initial land masses. The living things on the two continents have to go right back to the initial invasion from the sea to find a common ancestry—and even there the characteristic marine fauna of this continental shelf is very different from that of Lambda’s except at the microscopic level.

  “Delta is much more heavily forested than Lambda over the entire southern bulge, except for a grassland plain in the middle and some mountainous regions. Only in the north, where it begins to thin out into the curlicue do you have conditions similar to those in the colony. The colony has a complex weather pattern because of the relative nearness of the three seas, but Delta doesn’t. Its rainfall is much more seasonal. That’s why the colony was planted on Lambda, of course—but it also means that Delta has evolved a life-system very different from what you’re used to. Most significantly, there are the aliens. But it’s not just them. The birds you saw resting in the rigging are unfamiliar species—and every other species of bird, animal or reptile that we see will be unfamiliar, too. It isn’t the kind of terrain your men are used to. They’re not going to be able to feel at home there.”

  I could have added more. I could have added that the aliens themselves were likely to prove fearsome. They would be about a head taller than Ogburn, who was a big man by colony standards—even the females would be his size—and their faces would have what seemed to a human to be an inherent ferocity—a nose like a cat’s, with the same split upper lip and front teeth built for rending as much as for slicing. Their ears would be perched high at the sides of their heads, tufted like those of a lynx. Their bodies would be covered with a light but usually highly colored fur, dappled yellow and brown. They would be bipedal, but would be bound to give the impression of a gorilla rather than a man.

  “We have to think of something to maintain our equilibrium,” said Nieland. “I’d offer them more money, but it isn’t mine to offer, and we’re a long way from the places they can spend it. I almost wish that I could promise them loot of some kind...an El Dorado lost in the forests. Something that would make their minds come alive.”

  “That’s a dangerous policy,” I said.

  “And they wouldn’t believe me anyhow,” he added.

  I glanced at Mariel, knowing that she wasn’t going to like my next suggestion, but seeing no alternative.

  “We’ve only one reasonable incentive to offer them,” I said. “And that’s to offer to shorten our stay. Say that if they get the base established quickly, and can make contact with the aliens without much trouble, then we’ll cut our stay by half. If they know that the faster we get things done the faster we can go home, they’ll work.”

  “It won’t leave us enough time,” said Mariel. “I have to have time.”

  “These men don’t have our sense of mission,” I told her gently. “They’re not stupid men, or even particularly unreasonable men...but you know their priorities and understand their anxieties better than anyone. You know that our aims mean nothing to them. If we try to force them to do everything our way they’re just going to get angrier. They already think we’re insane.”

  “You may say they’re not stupid,” she said, “but they have closed minds. They’re not willing to listen to argument. That’s not reasonable.”

  “All the more reason for compromise,” I said. “If we can’t make them see our way of thinking...then we have to concede ground to theirs.”

  “It seems a pity,” said Ling.

  “But there’ll be another day,” said Nieland. “Once we’ve been here and returned home, the dam is broached. We’ll have proved it can be done. That’s the main thing. We can always come back.”

  “You can,” said Mariel.

  “Our first priority is to help the colony,” I reminded her. “The contact mission is secondary. You know that I think it’s important—hell, you know that I feel almost as strongly as you do. But it won’t be the end of everything if you can’t follow through as you’d like to. You’ve already achieved a great deal on Wildeblood. You don’t have to prove yourself all over again.”

  “You don’t understand,” she said. The way she said it made me feel that I didn’t.

  “Nevertheless,” I said, “that’s how we’re going to do it. We establish the base. We try to make contact. If they’re ready to come and talk to us, okay. But if they’re not interested we’re not chasing them...and if they show any sign of
hostility we get out. Fast.”

  “That doesn’t give me a chance to get over any barriers,” she complained. “And these people need that chance. Who else is going to get over any difficulties the way I could? Is there anyone in the colony with the gift of tongues? If the other expeditions really were destroyed by the aliens then my talent may be the only hope we have of finding out why and making sure that it doesn’t happen again. The colony can’t isolate itself forever...someday, now or in a thousand years, it’s going to have to contact the aliens.”

  “Miss Valory,” said Nieland, gently. “We have other things to think of. We will establish contact with the natives one day. It is not necessary that it should be done now. Your talent might help. I believe that it would. But this may not be the time. We have to go at our own pace.”

  I could see that she was fighting tears of disappointment. But she seemed to be winning. The voyage hadn’t been easy on her—the crew weren’t the best of traveling companions. There were other women on board, but that didn’t make her invisible. There are times when it must be pretty near hell to be able to read the thoughts of the people looking at you...especially if you’re an adolescent girl.

  When we’d finished playing the hand we put away the cards. We had killed the game. I took Mariel back to her cabin, and left Ling to talk it over with Nieland. Somehow they’d work out a convenient formula for haggling with the crew.

  CHAPTER THREE

  “It’s a bad break,” I said, settling down on the floor. The cabins weren’t exactly de luxe. I had a table and a little leg room. Mariel had only the bunk.

  She lay down on the bed and stared up at the ceiling. The lamp was attached to the wall above the pillow, and it cast a shadow across her face when she put up a hand to shield her eyes from its direct glare. I couldn’t see her expression.

  “It’s okay,” she said. “I know how things are. They’re an ugly lot and they’re in a bad mood. But it just seems so ridiculous that we can be beaten by such a stupid thing. After the Salamen, I was sure I could talk to these people, sure I could get to know them. I was convinced that I could learn more about them in six weeks than an army of exobiologists in six years. I am convinced...but to come so close and not get the chance....”

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  “It’s not your fault. I’m as worried as you are. They’re unpredictable because they’re so tense.”

  “Are they giving you any trouble?” I asked awkwardly.

  The question embarrassed her as much as it did me. “No,” she said. “They just look. If I couldn’t get used to that...where would I be? Even back on Earth, when I was fourteen....”

  Now she was eighteen. She’d grown into her rather gangly frame. She looked a lot less awkward. She was plain, but she wasn’t unattractive.

  “It’s not your last chance,” I said quietly. “The next world has alien indigenes, too. And after that...if all goes well....”

  “If,” she said. She said it very flatly, very bitterly.

  “You’re afraid, aren’t you?” I said. “Afraid of your talent...burning out.”

  She turned on her side to look at me, as if astonished by my perception. She was used to knowing what other people thought. She wasn’t used to them knowing what she was thinking.

  “How...?” she began.

  She stopped, because she could see what I was thinking. Put into words, it was something like: I’m not a fool. Even I’m not totally insensitive.

  “They do, you know,” she murmured. “They always do.”

  “Maybe people just learn to hide them,” I said.

  “And maybe they learn to destroy them,” she said, softly. “To save themselves.

  “Is that what you’d like to do?”

  “No. It’s the last thing in the world I’d like to do. I don’t believe the thesis. I suspect that talents have to die, because if they don’t....”

  “...people go crazy,” I finished for her. “Not necessarily. Nobody knows.”

  “I know,” she said, in a fierce whisper. “When you’re a child, it doesn’t matter. A child is outside the adult social world...self-involved, self-possessed. All children are mad, by adult criteria. But as they grow up, we expect them to become sane. How can you take your place in the adult world when you can read minds? When so much depends on rules and conventions and ethics and self-concealment...how can there be any place in a world like that for something like me?”

  “We’ve adjusted,” I said. “Aboard the ship. Even me. It’s four and a half years now. Maybe I took a long time. But I’ve adjusted now. We all have.”

  “The ship’s a microcosm,” she said. “Not a world. It’s just six people, forced to live so close to one another that there can’t be any such thing as privacy. We all know one another’s souls inside out. What does a little thought-reading matter? But in the real world...in the complex world of millions of people, where no one knows anyone except perhaps inside marriage, and maybe not then...I’m outside. I’m an offense against life itself. As a child, I was a freak...but as a person, passing myself off as a person....”

  “Stop it,” I said.

  She curled up a little, as though her body were instinctively seeking a fetal position which it could no longer quite accomplish. Her eyes were still on my face.

  “Do you know what I believe?” she said, in a strange tone that didn’t quite belong to her voice. “I believe that talents vanish like magic with virginity. The moment I initiate myself into the human race, it’ll be gone just like that!”

  I looked away. “You can’t believe everything,” I said, trying to find a way to veer away from the subject. “Not all at once.”

  “Yes I do,” she answered. “All the conflicting theories—all the cute psychological analyses. I believe them all. I believe that I’ll have to lose my talent to stay sane. I believe that it will vanish away like a childhood neurosis once my formal initiation into the wonders of sex is over. I believe it all. And now you see why I can’t be sure that there’ll be another chance. Ever.”

  “If it does fade away,” I said, again awkwardly, “it won’t be the end of the world.”

  “It won’t be the beginning,” she said, bitterly.

  “Even if there was to be no other opportunity,” I said—slowly, because I was treading dangerous ground—”you wouldn’t have failed. What you did on Wildeblood...you’ll always have that. And that was important. That was the first. No one can ever take that away from you. You made contact—real contact—with an alien species. You got inside their heads, into their way of thinking. No one can deny you that one success. Maybe you’ll get a chance to repeat it, maybe you won’t. The situation here doesn’t look too good. But you mustn’t get into this state of bitter desperation. You mustn’t.”

  I had built up pace and intensity while I spoke. I watched her relax slightly. Her eyes, with the pupils gaping in the dim light, were fixed upon my face as she looked right into my mind. She could probably have offered a clearer description of what was there than I could.

  “Thanks, Alex,” she murmured.

  “For what?” I asked, uneasily.

  “For caring.”

  There were little tears in the corners of her eyes.

  I wished that Karen was with us. Or Linda. They, I felt sure, could have done a much better job of caring. It wasn’t really my line. It didn’t involve examination, analysis and taking census. They were my fortés. Empathy I was always short of.

  “Just fight it,” I said, feeling that something that sounded like advice was called for. “You have the power. Power to look inside people’s heads—and the power to support the power. It’s a matter of keeping it all straight. Don’t let it slip. Don’t let anything hurt you. I’ll do everything I can to get you another chance. Everything. But if it doesn’t work out...don’t hurt yourself.”

  She shut her eyes. It was a kind of signal. She was letting me alone...taking the pressure off. It was a chance to think something that she wouldn�
��t see, but I knew full well how meaningless that chance really was.

  Among the Salamen, I remembered, she’d been happy. Maybe the first and only time she ever had been happy. How comforting to be among aliens, when you can be free from the double vision that afflicts you among your own kind. She expected a lot from the aliens of Delta. Maybe far too much. Even after one success, there was no way to be sure that they wouldn’t have a bad effect on her...like the people of Dendra. The Salamen had been amphibians—remote from humanity. Maybe just remote enough.

  I stood up, and touched her lightly on the shoulder. “All right?” I asked.

  “Sure,” she replied.

  I closed the door quietly behind me, and went to my own cabin, next door. I had to pick my way very carefully to the bed—the floor was very cluttered. Once there, I sat down. Almost automatically, I took up a sample of seawater from the table and dipped in a pipette, to take droplets for a series of slides. It wasn’t really work—just something to settle my mind, and to make it change gear.

  It was very late when I finally went to sleep.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  If the findings of the first Daedalus mission were lumped in with our findings so far, then the Attica colony could be identified as “normal.” The others we had visited were, in one way or another, “aberrant”—affected by unique factors. The pattern of slow and steady decline—or, at least, failure to progress—which we found here was a repeat of something Kilner had found no less than four times. Forewarned of the probability, we had been charged with the task of finding out why. We knew that it wouldn’t be a simple answer.

  Before we had set sail, Nathan had warned me not to underestimate the importance of Attica in our series of scheduled stops. If we were to present a good case for the resumption of the space program, then we would have to take into account all six of the worlds at which we were supposed to call. Some of the situations we’d found looked very bad, some looked passably good. But each of the first four, he reminded me, was a unique case. Each of them might be set aside as atypical if the argument got very tight. But not Attica. Attica was typical. There were a lot of colonies like this one. If the debate were to come anywhere near deadlock—if the vote ran close—then our performance on Attica might well be the deciding factor. Here, our findings could be generalized.