Ascents of Wonder, page 4
They set off through the low undergrowth. Elbowing their way through the vines and bushes, Diva imagined them tripping over some surly Fury who had settled down for an evening’s rest. He mentioned the possibility to Airyn. She told him not to worry; that the Furies were mostly nocturnal and wouldn’t be sleeping now. Somehow that didn’t improve things.
This was one of the sink areas, where the rain water . that ran off the crater wall usually collected. All but the most rocky areas were covered with wet, heavy undergrowth. Here was where the arthropods flourished, thought Diva dourly as he picked a sluglike creature off his sleeve. The fact that his suit was completely sealed didn’t forestall his revulsion, “Shh, we’re here.” Airyn stopped and peered carefully through the leaves before her. She motioned Diva to do likewise.
The herd was standing in a stony meadow, chewing sagely at the tall grass that sprang up in patches between the rocks. Some seemed to be sleeping. Airyn shot a flashlight beam into a group of them. Those that were awake blinked at the glare, then dropped their heads again. They stepped into the clearing.
Diva walked aimlessly among the herd, amazed at the total indifference they were showing toward him. “Aren’t they afraid of Furies?”
“Not really. Furies mostly eat the smaller animals; they’ll only attack a solitary Dantean, and then rarely.
A Danty in a herd has very little to fear.”
“Well, something’s going to affect them… . That one,” he said, pointing at a cow standing apart from the others some meters away. “We’re going to provoke a response out of that one or damn well kill it in the attempt.”
He took a few steps toward the animal and stood watching it a moment. Then abruptly he bent and picked up a stone. “Watch this,” he said. He flung the stone at the Dantean. It struck its left flank.
The creature jerked and turned its head. It was a young cow. Diva took another several steps toward her. “Shine a light on me; let it get a good look.”
“Diva—”
He hurled another stone. It hit the animal just under the ribs. She regarded him with an expression of frank alarm. “Aaaaaaahh!” he yelled, trying to imitate the cry of a Fury. He charged the creature.
“Diva—!”
The cow bolted and disappeared noisily into the bushes. Diva ran after it. “Hurry up!” he shouted back at Airyn before plunging into the undergrowth. She stared after him a second, then followed at a dead run.
The Dantean had apparently had difficulty moving through the heavy growth, for as Diva burst into a clearing he saw the creature just up ahead of him. Once into open ground, however, it picked up speed. He scooped up another rock and threw it. The Dantean gave a yelp and bounded up a rocky slope.
Diva grinned. The slope was a pile of rubble that had eroded off a shale cliff. The cliff itself was unclimbable, The Dantean could reach the top of the pile, but it could go no further and, with Diva at the bottom, could not go back down. He had it trapped.
He began clambering up the slope. He went up on all fours, squinting ahead to see the creature in the treacherous eclipse light. He remembered the incident of earlier in the day and realized his stupidity a split second too late.
The projectile struck him high in the chest, just below the shoulder. He went tumbling backward, clutching frantically at nothing, striking rock, rolling down. The hillside quickly turned upside down, then righted itself and rushed at him. He struck it. Bits of loose rock and pebbles were dislodged by the impact and went skittering down the slope. He dug his heels into the stones, trying to arrest his tumbling-siiding before he started a rockslide or broke his neck, Airyn’s scream came dimly through the earphones.
—And suddenly he was still, lying at the bottom of the slope in a haze of rock dust. He lay half buried in the loose rubble, ignoring the bruises that were darkening under his clensuit, ignoring Airyn’s calls as she ran toward him, ignoring the bits of rock that still came rolling down the hill. He lay there unmoving, his attention focused solely on the object that lay half a meter from him, the innocuous little artifact that screamed Fool! Fool! to all he had thought and said.
It was a crude stone hammer.
“The head came from a section of strata overlaying a gas pocket,” said Fostoevitch, fingering the stone in his hand. “The strata were still molten then, and the hot gas forced itself up and out into the air. When the rock cooled, the vents that the gas had escaped through were preserved. The hole in the rock”—he held it up, poking two fingers through the opening—“is a cross section of one of the gas vents, a perfectly round hole. The rock itself must have been uncovered when the strata were splintered and pushed up to the surface by some geological upheaval millenia ago. It’s been lying on the ground to be picked up since then.
“The handle,” he continued, picking up the short stubby stick and holding it out to be examined, “is from one of the native trees. From the edges of it, we can assume that it was not chopped or cut from the rest of the trunk, but merely broken off after the tree had died and gone brittle. Observe: It is nearly a third of a meter long, and about three centimeters thick. It could quite easily be picked up by the Dantean hand.
“The pieces were both there, simply lying on the ground. All the creature needed to do was stick the shaft into the hole in the rock, like so; and presto! you have a primitive but quite effective weapon. Not so, Mr. Ghalandi?”
Diva grinned ruefully and rubbed his shoulder. “I’ll give them that, all right. But that the Danty I was chasing actually made that thing is something I’m inclined to doubt. If for no other reason, then because I don’t think she could have had the time to find the parts lying conveniently about and put them together.”
“No; I agree. Your subject could not have made this tool. Look at the end of the shaft, the end that was stuck into the stone. See how dark and shiny the wood is? The shaft has been rubbing against the inside of the hole for a long time, weeks at least. Whoever did make the tool apparently left it on top of the rockpile, and your friend the Dantean found it in a moment of need. But that doesn’t really matter. What is important is the fact that the bludgeon was made by a Dantean, if not this particular specimen. That seems to answer any question of the creatures’ intelligence.”
“Not totally, though,” said Diva. “Not enough. Tm not making any decision on the creatures with this much unexplained data on them. The stone hammer doesn’t clear up the matter—we’re actually more in the dark than before. Until we do understand the reasons for their actions, their sentience is still as much in question as ever.”
They looked at him, sudden hostility on their faces. Diva could see the thoughts behind their eyes as clearly as if they had uttered it aloud: Is he going to backstab us now? Irritated, he said, “And this doesn’t have anything to do with Furtherance or Cessationism.” Get it out in the open; confront them with it.
“We aren’t going to imply that you would hold back a decision on the Danteans for personal reasons,” the senior xenobiologist said stiffly. “However, we do need a decision, and the Portalship is delayed here until we get one.”
“That doesn’t concern me,” said Diva. He was getting a little angry. “You asked Earth for help; now you have to abide by the decision of the advisor it sent. You people may be in a hurry, but I’m not going to be rushed into making any sort of judgment until I am convinced that I know enough about the problem.” He looked at Airyn. “It’s a matter of personal principle.” Airyn opened her mouth, closed it, then sat back tiredly. She was obviously still harried from her encounter, chasing Diva, watching him attacked, seeing him fall, thinking him dead. She said, “We’re willing to help you in any way we can. Do you want time to gather more data?”
“I want to assimilate the data I have now.”
“Fine, then.” Fostoevitch was all business; he couldn’t see why the other two were so haggard, so shaken. “We’re agreed that these acts are apparently the product of a sentient mind. It has also been noted that the Danteans will act in this manner only under extreme circumstances. What we have to determine now is what circumstances, and why, and whether that means that the creatures are intelligent or not.” “We already know the circumstances,” Diva said. “The Danteans have all acted this way when threatened. The first time, an air skimmer landed squarely in their midst—they were frightened. In the second, the Dantean was being threatened by a Fury. The third time, a Danty was being attacked by me. In each case, the creatures were being either threatened by the unknown, or by something known and understood to be dangerous.”
“But the first time, we didn’t threaten them; we merely showed ourselves.”
“Yes, but in that very act you threatened them. They were threatened with the most basic thing of all: fear of the unknown. Any creature, confronted with something he is unfamiliar with and doesn’t understand, is frightened.”
“All creatures? Or just animals?”
“All creatures—humans included. How do human beings react to the unknown?”
“Fear and enticement,” said Fostoevitch.
“Right,” said Diva. “Fear and enticement. Your landing the first time was probably the first true encounter with the unknown they ever had, and they reacted instinctively. They were threatened—they reacted.”
“What about the enticement part?” asked Airyn.
“All creatures are fearful of the unknown; only intelligent creatures are enticed by it as well. The Danteans showed fear, or at least reacted accordingly, but where’s the enticement?”
“Hram. That’s a point. Danteans never really show themselves to be fascinated with the unknown, do they? They just sit around.” Diva frowned. “Why would a species as apparently intelligent as this be curious about the unknown?”
“Maybe the unknown doesn’t have anything to offer them,” said Fostoevitch.
“Even monkeys show curiosity toward strange things, and they’re certainly less intelligent than—pardon me?”
“Maybe the unknown can’t offer them anything,” he repeated.
“No, that can’t be true; the base of all cultural progress is the—hey! Hold it!” The two stared at him. “I think you’ve got something there. Let me think a minute.”
He squinted up at the ceiling, his lips moving slightly. After a moment he looked down. “I’ve got it,” he said. No fanfare, no big smile, just the quiet simple statement of one who has reached a solution he has been seeking and is now finished, tranquil, almost serene.
He said, “Consider the nature of human progress. Simply stated, all progress results from exploration— exploration of the unknown. Man gets curious, he goes off and explores new places. Maybe he would find a better place to live, a more favorable climate, easier hunting. Other animals wouldn’t leave an area unless they were forced out by some catastrophe. But Man’s curiosity drew him over the hill and out looking for other places, and it is that which gave him dominance over the Earth.
“Now look at the Danteans in the light of that. An intelligent Dantean is sitting around; he gets curious. Wonders what it’s like elsewhere. So he gets up and goes off looking about.
“The thing is, here there’s nothing to gain by exploring. The Life Zone is isolated in the middle of an uninhabitable hell, so no good can come of any animal going over the mountain to see what’s on the other side. In fact, it’s as good a way as any to get himself killed. Any Dantean that gets too curious and goes off to find a way out of the Zone, or leaves the herd to look at interesting flowers, stands a good chance of removing his anomalies from the gene pool, permanently. Multiply that over a thousand generations and you are left with a species in which there are no wonderers any more, just sheep.”
“Good God,” said Airyn. “Negative natural selection.”
“Precisely. Intelligence is suppressed. Not completely, though; there are times when a Danty should be able to think, and fast. Because of that, he doesn’t actually lose his ability to think; he just represses it. When an emergency arises, he undergoes a hysterical reaction, and his dormant intelligence awakens. He is able to cope with the situation, the way a hysterical human can lift hundreds of pounds if sufficiently adrenalized.”
“What an utterly fascinating system,” said Fostoevitch, in wonder.
“Fascinating?” said Diva. “It’s ghastly. A nation of sheep, in the fullest sense of the word. Thinking creatures, capable of creation, of thought, of God knows what, all stunted and deformed and twisted into mindlessness by their environment. Think of the potential, simply wasted!” He shuddered. “Nothing in nature is supposed to be ugly, but this is repulsive.”
“Why?” said Airyn slowly. “They have a paradise, don’t they?”
“What?” Diva stared at her, “Are you alluding to—”
“Why not? The analogy fits, doesn’t it? These creatures couldn’t be happier than the way they are now, in spite of their defor—”
“Excuse me,” interrupted Fostoevitch, “But exactly what are you two talking about?”
Airyn said, “I’m raising a point in reference to a discussion Mr. Ghalandi and I had earlier regarding Cessationism and Furtherance.”
Fostoevitch stared. “Lieutenant Larsen! You were specifically told not to—”
“No, no, let her speak,” Diva said. “I’m very interested in what she has to say, though I doubt she can justify it.”
“Thank you. I was just pointing out that there seems to be a certain incongruity in Mr. Ghalandi’s revulsion toward the Danteans. After all, they have a literal paradise in their little Zone. They have an unlimited abundance of food, their predators are few, and there is no risk of changes in the future that might upset this cozy situation. All in all, it seems quite a bit like the way Mr. Ghalandi would like the Earth to be, so I don’t quite understand his distaste.”
Diva rubbed his chin and stared thoughtfully into space. After a bit: “I don’t think your analogy holds. What I would like to see would come about by choice; what they have is nothing but the blind product of evolution, with no reason or moral choice involved.”
“Quibbles. You weren’t talking about moral choice before, you were talking of the physical good of mankind. And it is the physical good of the race that natural selection looks after. I maintain that the reasons hold; the ends are the same.”
Diva said slowly, “I—I think you may have a point. But you’re generalizing now, trying to simplify an extremely complex thing into a simple analogy.”
“I don’t think so. The situation may be complex, but the motivation behind it is rather more basic. You have been considering space exploration—all historical exploration, in fact—only in view of its bad points. You speak of Manifest Destiny, the subjugation of lesser technological cultures and the destruction of civilizations, but you don’t mention the economic and techno- , logical advancements that these same things have brought about, improvements that allowed the good life on Earth that you praise so to come into being in the first place. Sure, there were evil sides to what went on, but look at the whole picture. More basically, however, you’re ignoring a very important aspect of the human personality. The urge to explore, to find, to seek out new and strange things is not just something that can be set aside after it’s brought us to the point of civilization. It’s a central part of a human being—part of his soul, if you will. It is more than just a means, it is an end in itself. To be a human is to have this thing, and we haven’t striven to build a civilization just to reach the point where we can renounce our humanity. Forgive me for my galloping optimism, you know how out of contact with current affairs I’ve been, but I consider it a measure of man’s assurance that he will continue to flourish that we are still engaging in the exploration of the unknown, and I don’t just refer to Furtherance, but all aspects of exploration. It is, after all, the only thing that man can do. He cannot do otherwise and remain man. The only alternative is—” She gestured meaningfully at the door. “What we saw out there.”
For a long time Diva did not speak. He stared off into space, seemingly oblivious to the pair of eyes upon him. Then suddenly his eyes snapped back into focus; he turned to Airyn and said, “I don’t know, you may be right. I have to think about this a while.” He turned to Fostoevitch. “I think that should be all for tonight, Mr. Fostoevitch. You’ll have my decision in the morning, in writing. I trust that will suit your needs?”
“Your decision? Fine, great. We can finish up with that. You can be back on the shuttle by noon tomorrow then, if you’re eager to leave.”
Diva smiled. “I don’t think I’m in that much of a hurry any longer.” He turned to Airyn. “Airyn Larsen, you’re a shrewd and perceptive scientist. I must thank you for your insight and point—it is well taken. I don’t know whether you’re right or not—T still think you overlooked a few things—but I assure you that I am going to think about it.”
She smiled. “That’s all I could ask of anyone,” she said.
Love Among the Symbionts
by J. Michael Reaves
Eight a.m. In a few minutes Sammy will come to wake me and wash me and dress me, I lie listening to the distant sound of the river washing over the rocks. Through the wire mesh of the quonset hut’s window I can see birds building a nest in the pine trees. The first strong wind will rip it apart, scatter twigs and bits of straw all over the woods. If the birds knew that, I wonder, would they keep on building?
Tomorrow. The man with the power comes tomorrow, to audit the books and reach his decision. It will be final—either we’ll get the money and supplies to continue our commune, or we’ll all go back to families, care centers, jobs at the Goodwill. The government giveth, and the government taketh away. The chances don’t look good.
I feel even more helpless than usual.
There is a knock on the door, and Sammy enters. “How’re you feeling today, Marcus?” he asks, trying to sound cheerful. As if you expect an answer, Sammy. He lifts me from my bed, and we go through the routine of morning: a quick sponge bath, a trip to the head, and then he dresses me in jeans and a pullover sweater. He’s become very efficient over the last few weeks at dressing me. I’m sure some parts of the ritual still bother him, particularly wiping me after I do my business on the john, but after all, he volunteered. We all help each other. .
