Sense of Obligation Part 9

The a.s.sistant had a doubting look that he didn't succeed in hiding. He also had trouble believing the literal truth. He placed the small stack of file folders on the desk.

"These are the reports to date, everything we have uncovered about the Disans. It's not very much; however, considering the antisocial att.i.tudes on this lousy world, it is the best we could do." A sudden thought hit him, and his eyes narrowed slyly. "It can't be helped, but some of the staff have been wondering out loud about that native that contacted us. How did you get him to help you? We've never gotten to first base with these people and as soon as you land you have one working for you. You can't stop people from thinking about it, you being a newcomer and a stranger. After all, it looks a little odd...." He broke off in mid-sentence as Brion looked up in a cold fury.

"I can't stop people from thinking about it--but I can stop them from talking. Our job is to contact the Disans and end this suicidal war. I have done more in one day than all of you have done since you arrived. I have accomplished this because I am better at my work than the rest of you. That is all the information any of you are going to receive. You are dismissed."

White with anger, Faussel turned on his heel and stamped out. Out to spread the word about what a slave-driver the new director was. They would then all hate him pa.s.sionately which was just the way he wanted it. He couldn't risk exposure as the tyro he was. And perhaps a new emotion, other than disgust and defeat, might jar them into a little action. They certainly couldn't do any worse than they had been doing.

It was a frightening amount of responsibility. For the first time since setting foot on this barbaric planet Brion had time to stop and think.

He was taking an awful lot upon himself. He knew nothing about this world, nor about the powers involved in the conflict. Here he sat pretending to be in charge of an organization he had first heard about only a few weeks earlier. It was a frightening situation. Should he slide out from under?

There was just one possible answer, and that was _no_. Until he found someone else who could do better, he seemed to be the one best suited for the job. And Ihjel's opinion had to count for something. Brion had felt the surety of the man's convictions that Brion was the only one who might possibly succeed in this difficult spot.

Let it go at that. If he had any qualms, it would be best to put them behind him. Aside from everything else there was a primary bit of loyalty involved. Ihjel had been an Anvharian and a Winner. Maybe it was a provincial att.i.tude to hold in this great big universe--Anvhar was certainly far enough away from here--but honor is very important to a man who must stand alone. He had a debt to Ihjel and he was going to pay it off.

Once the decision had been made he felt easier. There was an intercom on the desk in front of him and he leaned with a heavy thumb on the b.u.t.ton labeled _Faussel_.

"Yes?" Even through the speaker the man's voice was cold and efficient with ill-concealed hatred.

"Who is Lig-magte? And did the former director ever return from seeing him?"

"Magte is a t.i.tle that means roughly n.o.ble or lord, Lig-magte is the local overlord. He has an ugly stoneheap of a building just outside the city. He seems to be the mouthpiece for the group of magter that are pus.h.i.+ng this idiotic war. As to your second question I have to answer yes and no. We found Director Mervv's head outside the door next morning with all the skin gone. We knew it was him because the doctor identified the bridgework in his mouth. _Do you understand?_"

All pretense of control had vanished and Faussel almost shrieked the last words. They were all close to cracking up, if he was any example.

Brion broke in quickly.

"That will be all, Faussel. Just get word to the doctor that I would like to see him as soon as I can." He broke the connection and opened the first of the folders. By the time the doctor called he had skimmed the reports and was reading the relevant ones in greater detail. Putting on his warm coat he went through the outer office. The few workers still on duty turned their backs in frigid silence.

Dr. Stine had a pink and s.h.i.+ny bald head that rose above a thick black beard. Brion liked him at once. Anyone with enough firmness of mind to keep a beard in this climate was a pleasant exception after what he had met so far.

"How's the new patient, doctor?"

Stine combed his beard with stubby fingers before answering. "Diagnosis: heat-syncope. Prognosis: complete recovery. Condition fair, considering the dehydration and extensive sunburn. I've treated the burns and a saline drip is taking care of the other. She just missed going into heat-shock. I have her under sedation now."

"I'd like to have her up and helping me tomorrow morning. Could she do this--with stimulants or drugs?"

"She could--but I don't like it. There might be side factors, perhaps long-standing debilitation. It's a chance."

"A chance we will have to take. In less than seventy hours this planet is due for destruction. In attempting to avert that tragedy I'm expendable as is everyone else here. Agreed?"

The doctor grunted deep in his beard and looked Brion's immense frame up and down. "Agreed," he said, almost happily. "It is a distinct pleasure to see something beside black defeat around here. I'll go along with you."

"Well you can help me right now. I checked the personnel roster and discovered that out of the twenty-eight people working here there isn't a physical scientist of any kind--other than yourself."

"A scruffy bunch of b.u.t.ton-pushers and theoreticians. Not worth a d.a.m.n for field work, the whole bunch of them!" The doctor toed the floor switch on a waste receptacle and spat into it with feeling.

"Then I'm going to depend on you for some straight answers," Brion said.

"This is an un-standard operation and the standard techniques just don't begin to make sense. Even Poisson Distributions and Pareto Extrapolations don't apply here." Stine nodded agreement and Brion relaxed a bit. He had just relieved himself of his entire knowledge of Societics and it had sounded authentic. "The more I look at it the more I believe that this is a physical problem; something to so with the exotic and ma.s.sive adjustments the Disans have made to this h.e.l.lish environment. Could this tie up in any way with their absolutely suicidal att.i.tude towards the cobalt bombs?"

"Could it? Could it?" Dr. Stine paced the floor rapidly on his stocky legs, twining his fingers behind his back. "You are b.l.o.o.d.y well right it could. Someone is thinking at last and not just punching b.l.o.o.d.y numbers into a machine and sitting and scratching while waiting for the screen to light up with the answers. Do you know how Disans exist?" Brion shook his head no. "The fools here think it disgusting, but I call it fascinating. The have found ways to join in a symbiotic relations.h.i.+p with the life forms on this planet. Even a parasitic relations.h.i.+p. You must realize, that living organisms will do anything to survive.

Castaways at sea will drink any liquid at all in their search for water.

Disgust at this is only the att.i.tude of the over-protected who have never experienced extreme thirst or hunger. Well, here on Dis you have a planet of castaways."

Stine opened the door of the pharmacy. "This talk of thirst makes me dry." With economically efficient motions he poured grain alcohol into a beaker, thinned it with distilled water and flavored it with some flavor crystals from a bottle. He filled two gla.s.ses and handed Brion one. It didn't taste bad at all.

"How do you mean parasitic, doctor? Aren't we all parasites of the lower life forms? Meat animals, vegetables and such?"

"No, no--you miss the point! I speak of parasitic in the exact meaning of the word. You must realize that to a biologist there is no real difference between a parasitism, symbiosis, mutualism, biontergasy, commensalism--"

"Stop, stop!" Brion said. "Those are just meaningless sounds to me. If that is what makes this planet tick, I'm beginning to see why the rest of the staff has that lost feeling."

"It is just a matter of degree of the same thing. Look. You have a kind of crustacean living in the lakes here, very much like an ordinary crab.

It has large claws in which it holds anemones, tentacled sea animals with no power of motion. The crustacean waves these around to gather food, and eats the pieces they capture that are too big for them. This is biontergasy, two creatures living and working together, yet each capable of existing alone. Now, this same crustacean has a parasite living under its sh.e.l.l, a degenerated form of a snail that has lost all powers of movement. A true parasite that takes food from its host's body and gives nothing in return. Inside this snail's gut there is a protozoan that lives off the snail's ingested food. Yet this little organism is not a parasite as you might think at first, but a symbiote.

It takes food from the snail, but at the same time it secretes a chemical that aids the snail's digestion of the food. Do you get the picture? All these life forms exist in a complicated interdependence."

Brion frowned in concentration, sipping at the drink. "It's making some kind of sense now. Symbiosis, parasitism and all the rest are just ways of describing variations of the same basic process of living together.

And there is probably a grading and shading between some of these that make the exact relations.h.i.+p hard to define."

[Ill.u.s.tration]

"Precisely. Existence is so difficult on this world that the competing forms have almost died out. There are still a few left, preying off the others. It was the co-operating and interdependent life forms that really won out in the race for survival. I say life forms with intent; the creatures here are mostly a mixture of plant and animal, like the lichens you have elsewhere. The Disans have a creature they call a vaede that they use for water when traveling. It has rudimentary powers of motion from its animal parts, yet uses photosynthesis and stores water like a plant. When the Disans drink from it the thing taps their blood stream for food elements."

"I know," Brion said wryly. "I drank from one. You can see my scars. I'm beginning to comprehend how the Disans fit into the physical pattern of their world, and I realize it must have all kinds of psychological effects on them. Do you think this has any effect on their social organization?"

"An important one. But maybe I'm making too many suppositions now, perhaps your researchers upstairs can tell you better, after all this is their field."

Brion had studied the reports on the social setup and not one word of them made sense. They were a solid maze of unknown symbols and cryptic charts. "Please continue, doctor," he insisted. "The Societics reports are valueless so far. There are factors missing. You are the only one I have talked to so far who can give me any intelligent reports or answers."

"All right then--be it on your own head. The way I see it you've got no society here at all, just a bunch of rugged individualists. Each one for himself, getting nourishment from the other life forms of the planet. If they have a society, it is orientated towards the rest of the planetary life--instead of towards other human beings. Perhaps that's why your figures don't make sense. They are setup for human societies. In their relations with each other these people are completely different."

"What about the magter, the upper-cla.s.s types who build castles and are causing all this trouble?"

"I have no explanation," Dr. Stine grumbled. "My theories hold water and seem logical enough up to this point. But the magter are the exception and I have no idea why. They are completely different from the rest of the Disans. Argumentative, bloodthirsty, looking for planetary conquest instead of peace. They aren't rulers, not in the real sense. They hold power because n.o.body else wants it. They grant mining concessions to offworlders because they are the only ones with a sense of property.

Maybe I'm going out on a limb. But if you can find out _why_ they are so different you may be onto the clue to our difficulties."

For the first time since his arrival Brion began to feel a touch of enthusiasm. Plus the remote possibility that there might even be a solution to the deadly problem. He drained his gla.s.s and stood up. "I hope you'll wake your patient early, doctor. You might be as interested in talking to her as I am. If what you told me is true, she could well be our key to the answer. Her name is Professor Lea Morees and she is just out from Earth with degrees in exobiology and anthropology, and has a head stuffed with vital facts."

"Wonderful!" Stine said. "I shall take care of the head not only because it is so pretty but because of its knowledge. Though we totter on the edge of atomic destruction I have a strange feeling of optimism--for the first time since I landed on this planet."

IX