Collected Short Fiction, page 479
The public in general began to forget the entire dispute. Mars, after all, was remote and unimportant to the public, and, in any event, the actual colonization was something that concerned the next generation more immediately than this one. Apathy prevailed. Merrill himself, though never did he lose sight of the urgent need for some resolution to the dilemma, no longer could afford to dwell on the problem with the same single-minded intensity he had displayed in February and March. It became a continuing but subliminal source of worry for him, like a mild toothache.
He was, therefore, hardly thinking about the problem at all when he stumbled over the solution.
It was early in June. The General Assembly, virtually through with its agenda, was planning to adjourn in a few days. The Security Council had one minor item left on its schedule, and then it, too, would adjourn.
Dane Merrill was busily making plans for his vacation. He and Ellen would fly to Yucatan for a month, they had decided. There, among the unspoiled remnants of a dead civilization, it would be possible for them to relax and forget some of the cares of a living one. Merrill had one new problem to consider: Secretary-General St. Leger was making noises about retiring, again.
St. Leger’s term had another year to run, and he was certain of re-election if he wanted it; but St. Leger, it seemed, had had enough of diplomacy. At the age of sixty-seven, he longed for his native Quebec.
Which left Merrill on the spot. He was the logical choice as St. Leger’s successor; for the last eight years he had worked hand in glove with the older man, and he was trusted by all. But, Merrill knew, some time in the near future the colonization question would have to be resolved, and the responsibility would be his if he happened to be in office at the time. Merrill had never shirked responsibility, but this was one situation that threatened to become explosive. He was a modest man: he seriously doubted that he would have the inner resources necessary to prevent the war that might so easily develop over the terraforming-versus-pantropy issue. But he wondered whether anyone else, St. Leger included, could deal with such a situation if it arose.
In any event, that still lay in the future. Now, in a few days, he would be on vacation.
He would be able to relax.
That night, three days before the Assembly was due to adjourn, the Merrills were engaged in what was for them a most unusual pastime. They were watching the video set. He and Ellen had grown tired of reading, tired of listening to music tapes, tired of all the diversions of intelligent people. The strain of the past few months had sapped the vitality from them. Almost in desperation, they flicked on the video, hoping for relaxation.
The screen brightened. An unctuous, oily voice said, “Very well, Mr. Pulaski. You’ve hit the fifty thousand dollar bracket, now. The choice is yours—will you retire with what you’ve got, or will you take a shot at a hundred thousand? Double or nothing, Mr. Pulaski. What do you say?”
“Oh, dear,” Ellen exclaimed. “It’s a quiz show! We can find something more interesting than—”
“No,” Merrill interrupted in an odd voice. “Leave it.”
Ellen shrugged. “If you say so, Dane.”
The camera centered on an insignificant man in a brown checked suit—a small, puffy-faced man with watery gray eyes and a few strands of hair plastered to his scalp. The man in the screen seemed frozen in decision. Then he said, “I’ve done O.K. so far. I think I’ll risk it.” Pandemonium burst loose in the studio audience. The announcer bellowed raucously: “He’s going to do it! Ladies and gentlemen, he’s going for double or nothing! There’s a man with faith in his intellectual abilities, all right! Will you re-enter the isolation booth, Mr. Pulaski?”
“Dane, please. Do we really need to watch—”
“One minute, Ellen.”
“For one hundred thousand dollars, now,” said the announcer in vibrant tones. “You have thirty seconds to consider your reply. For one hundred thousand dollars, Mr. Pulaski: can you name the first eight rulers of the Carolingian Dynasty of France?”
“Uh . . . Pepin the Short . . . then Charlemagne . . . ah, let’s see . . . Louis I . . . wait a second, now, after him comes Charles I—”
With an abrupt motion Merrill jabbed down on the remote-control switch of the video, and the intent face of Mr. Pulaski vanished as the screen went dead. Ellen glanced up in surprise.
“First you want to watch it, then you shut it off at the most interesting moment! Dane, there are times when I just don’t understand—”
“I’ve got the answer,” he broke in. He felt a great inward calm. If only they would listen to him, now!
“You know the names of those kings?”
“I don’t mean that. I’ve got the answer! Where’s the phone? I’ve got to call St. Leger right away:”
“. . . Turning to the subject of United Nations news, the topic of planetary colonization, considered a dead issue for this session since the tabling motion on the eleventh of April, is apparently very much alive again. A closed committee meeting to discuss new proposals has been called by Secretary-General St. Leger for tomorrow afternoon. Representatives of East and West will be present at the meeting, but no details were forthcoming on the nature of the new proposals.”
—video newscast, 6:11 p.m. June 12, 2052.
There were seven men in the small, simply-furnished private office that Secretary-General St. Leger reserved for private top-level conferences of this sort. St. Leger and Dane Merrill sat behind a low table, facing the others. In front of them and to their left sat Wu, the chief Chinese delegate to the U.N., and Hwang, the head of the pantropy project. At the other side of the room sat U.N. Delegate Kennedy of the United States, Michael Reed, and a short, vigorous-looking man who was Dr. Manly Halliburton, chief of operations of the terraforming project.
It was a warm, almost murky mid-June day. The room’s two air conditioners purred steadily, but without any perceptible effect. A kind offense humidity prevailed in the room.
St. Leger, looking tired, rumpled, and disheveled, said, “Gentlemen, I’ve called you all together for one final attempt at cracking the deadlock that now exists. Several days ago, my colleague here, Mr. Merrill, whom I believe you all know, came to me with a set of new and intriguing propositions for settling the crisis. I gave Mr. Merrill’s ideas careful study, and have found that there is validity in them.” St. Leger sighed heavily. “In order to save time, gentlemen, and to insure absolute clarity of communication, I intend to relinquish the chair of this meeting to Mr. Merrill. Are there any objections to my doing this? Good. Mr. Merrill, you are now presiding.”
St. Leger was obviously relieved at the opportunity to give his three hundred pounds of bone and blubber some rest. He sank back into his chair and pointedly rolled it a foot backward from the table. Merrill nodded. He was in charge of the meeting. He was no longer the loyal, efficient, and anonymous Secretariat stafI’man. He was in charge.
He scanned the faces—the two enigmatic yellow ones, the three tense, anticipatory white ones. He moistened his lips. He said, “Gentlemen, before we get down to specifics, I’d like to establish one general point of fact. We of the United Nations, are we not, are directly responsible to the peoples of the world. If we act in a manner obviously not in the best interests of humanity, we will be replaced by others who have the popular-interests more at heart. Is there anyone here who would care to deny this? Mr. Kennedy, you were the one who made this point quite clear to me at our little conference earlier this spring.”
No one spoke. All five were fidgeting uncomfortably, wondering what Merrill had in store for them. Merrill went on: “We will consider that point established. Very well: the next point I wish to make is that it is in the best interests of humanity to extend our civilization to other Worlds. I don’t think there’s any need to demonstrate that particular argument with a set of syllogisms.
“To continue—we must establish colonies on other worlds. But if the present crisis continues we will never succeed. Is this acting in the public interest? Of course not! The contending factions in this dispute are acting magnificently in the service of their own national interests—but are doing a disservice to the more important cause of Earth. Therefore, we must in all conscience find some way to break the deadlock that now prevails. I have several suggestions, which Mr. St. Leger has approved.”
“Let’s hear them,” Michael Reed grumbled. “Get to the point, will you?”
Merrill restrained the impulse to glare at the paunchy industrialist. “All right. Point One; we must colonize Mars immediately. And the only method of colonization that we can consider, I’m afraid, is terraforming.”
The flat, dogmatic statement produced the expected result. Hwang’s jaw drooped in astonishment, while Wu went virtually livid with shock. On the other side of the room, Kennedy looked utterly startled, Halliburton was blinking in disbelief, and Reed, recovering from his amazement, was beaming contentedly.
Then the stasis broke. Wu was on his feet, exclaiming vehemently but with massive self-control, “I must ask for an explanation of this statement, Mr. Merrill! What you have said is a slap in the face of the entire Eastern world. Is this your idea of compromise? To declare categorically that your particular nation’s method must be used?”
Merrill said tiredly, “Please sit down, Mr. Wu. No insult to the East is intended, and I’ll explain as soon as you’ll let me. My statement wasn’t an expression of my alleged pro-Western sympathies. I’m simply pro-Earth, Mr. Wu. We of the Secretariat have forced ourselves to place our feelings above individual national viewpoints, difficult though that sometimes is.”
“May we have your explanation, then?” Wu said, smoldering. “But I warn you now that we have no intention of surrendering in this manner.”
“If you wouldn’t think of it as a battle,” said Merrill, “you wouldn’t have to fear surrender. But the explanation is quite simple. Pantropy is a great biological achievement—but it would be political suicide for us to sponsor it on Mars. Terraforming is the only workable answer for that planet.”
“I fail to see—”
“The reason,” Merrill steamrollered. on, “is this. We are beholden to the peoples of the world for our mandate to govern them and to spend their money. This is an overcrowded planet, Mr. Wu. According to the 2050 census, Earth’s population is almost nine and a quarter billion. And though we’re making progress on population control, finally, we’re still going to be faced with problems of congestion and overcrowding for centuries to come.
Particularly, Mr. Wu, in the Eastern half of the world.
“Very well. We are about to take a giant step into space. We are about to put human life on Mars. But suppose we put pantropic life there, Mr. Wu? A great biological achievement—but does that make Mars accessible to human pioneers? Certainly not. It closes Mars forever to humanity! What we need now, Mr. Wu, is a world up there that will capture the imagination of the nine billion people of Earth. A world that the common man can see justification for building. A world that offers opportunity for the pioneer, and a world that offers hope for relief from overcrowding. Not a world populated by what would essentially be an alien species of our own creation.
“We’ve overlooked this all along, on both sides—that the average man pays the bill, and calls the tune. What I’m saying now, gentlemen, is a reflection of the grim realities of political life. Up till now we’ve been debating this on a pretty abstract plane. It’s time to come down to the ground and face the fact that if we use pantropy to settle Mars, we’re going to lose the sympathy and support of the people of Earth. And your people, Mr. Wu, are going to be the first to yell—because they don’t give a damn about scientific prestige, not down there on the dirt level; they just want a place for overflow people.
“Not for themselves, by the way—by and large, 99-9% of the people of Earth would rather do almost anything than have to go off and colonize a terraformed Mars. But the psychological fact remains that they would think pioneering was a good thing—for someone else. They would back us. Spending money to terraform Mars would appeal to everyone. Pantropy is subtler; it won’t go over.”
“So,” Wu said slowly, “you ask us to drop our proposal in the name of sheer realpolitik?”
“Bluntly, yes,” Merrill said. “The time has come to talk bluntly. We have to win popular support if we want to stay in office long enough to get a space program going. We’ll never win support if we vote pantropy for Mars. It has to be terraforming.”
“The dilemma has two prongs,” Wu said. “I grant that terraforming is more likely to capture the popular imagination than pantropy. But we have backed our position strongly. How can we abandon it now? It seems that we are lost no matter which way we turn.”
Merrill shook his head. “You don’t have to abandon your position. The last thing I’d like to happen is the scrapping of pantropy. You see, Mr. Wu, it’s my private feeling that pantropy is potentially a much more important scientific development than terraforming.”
The sudden change of expression on the faces of the three Westerners was amusing. For the past five minutes they had sat complacently, smug and contented because of Merrill’s unexpected firm stand for terraforming. But now he had yanked the rug out from under them. They looked stunned.
“Would you mind explaining that statement, Mr. Merrill?” Reed demanded loudly.
“Certainly. Terraforming is a process of limited value, useful only when a world is basically similar to Earth to begin with. You can alter Mars’ climate and atmosphere—but could you ever change Jupiter’s gravity or cope with Mercury’s extremes of temperature? I’m afraid not.”
“Neither can Hwang and his pantropists create beings who can stand up to such conditions,” Halliburton snapped.
“Not yet,” Merrill said. “But the concept of pantropy is an open-ended one. It’s still new, but it has great potential. Once you can make simple genetic changes, you can go on to learn how to make more complicated ones. It’s going to be easier to redesign human beings than to redesign really non-Earthlike planets. So we must continue pantropy research, and back it with cash. Some day, we’ll be traveling to the stars. We’ll find planets out there, and they may not be Earthlike planets. Pantropy will be our only help then.”
“All very heartwarming,” Wu said sourly. “But this does not solve the problem of immediate saving of face. I cannot explain to my people that we have yielded rights to Mars in return for the promise of the stars. It is . . . ah . . . too abstract a proposition for them to accept gracefully.”
“I realize that,” Merrill replied. “And I’ve devised a second proposal. In order to keep pantropy alive, we’ll need double-or-nothing legislation—authorizing colonization of both Mars and Venus.”
Hwang protested, “But we are not able to create pantropic forms for Venus yet!”
“I know. I’ve spoken with pantropists and terraformers, and I’ve done some research besides. I’ve learned that neither side thinks it can handle the job of planting life on Venus right now—although both insist it can be done eventually, given enough time and money. If you’ll pardon me, Dr. Halliburton, I don’t think it’s likely that terraforming will ever be useful on Venus.” Cutting off Halliburton’s reply, Merrill added, “And also, that pantropy will be applicable there only after decades of continued progress. With terraforming and pantropy in their present state of development, neither science can handle the problem of making Venus livable right now. But both can.”
“Both?” said Hwang and Halliburton simultaneously.
“Yes. Both. The atmosphere of Venus is too corrosive for humans to breathe. And there’s no simple way of converting that poisonous stew into something humans could breathe. On the other hand, pantropy isn’t currently capable of developing a race whose metabolic processes could get along without oxygen. But consider this, Doctors Hwang and Halliburton: how about a co-operative project? Partial terraforming of Venus, to an extent that would make it livable for a species within the abilities of pantropy to create?”
A look at the faces of the two scientists told Merrill he had scored a direct hit. “Meet halfway,” he went on. “You’re each necessary, but not individually sufficient, for establishing life on Venus. We need to nurture the fledgling science of pantropy. And we need an inhabited Venus. It would be an economic outlet, and also a third point of view in the solar system—the third vertex of a triangle of inhabited worlds. Do you think it could be done?”
“We could certainly try,” Halliburton admitted quietly.
“And I think we would succeed,” Hwang added.
“Let me sum up, then,” Merrill said. He was sweat-soaked and nearly drained of energy. “The only way to break the deadlock is with a double-barreled bill. Mars must be terraformed, to provide an immediate population outlet and a means of getting the public to approve what we’re doing. Venus will be populated by pantropic life forms, once the terraformers have eased the way there. And terraforming and pantropy will work hand in hand from now on. New techniques will be perfected. Information will be shared. The spread of Earthmen throughout the universe will be made possible. Can we count on your support for such legislation?”
He stared at Kennedy. The tall American squirmed, fidgeted, shrugs’. Yes, he said finally.
Mr. Wu?” Merrill asked.
The Chinese knotted his delicate fingers tightly in indecision. “It is the only way, I suppose.”
Reed chuckled bitterly. “For a while, at the beginning of this meeting, I thought we had won. That it would be terraforming all the way. But I see that it isn’t really that way at all. Actually we’ve lost, in the long run. We’ve taken the first round, that’s all.”
“Hardly,” Wu said. “It is we of China who have lost. Mars will be terraformed. We have been forced to give ground.”
“No,” Merrill said sharply. “You’re dead wrong, both of you. The only loser has been petty national pride. Individually, you can each consider yourselves losers, if you want to. But Earth is the real winner!”
