A Science Fiction Omnibus

by Brian Aldiss

  ‘Well,’ grinned Theremon, ‘I was proposing to take charge of the publicity. I can handle things so that only the ridiculous side will show. It would be hard to stand, I admit, because I’d have to make you all out to be a bunch of idiots, but if I can get people laughing at you, they might forget to be angry. In return for that, all my publisher asks is an exclusive story.’

  Beenay nodded and burst out. ‘Sir, the rest of us think he’s right. These last two months we’ve considered everything but the million-to-one chance that there is an error somewhere in our theory or in our calculations. We ought to take care of that, too.’

  There was a murmur of agreement from the men grouped about the table, and Aton’s expression became that of one who found his mouth full of something bitter and couldn’t get rid of it.

  ‘You may stay if you wish, then. You will kindly refrain, however, from hampering us in our duties in any way.’

  His hands were behind his back, and his wrinkled face thrust forward determinedly as he spoke. He might have continued indefinitely but for the intrusion of a new voice.

  ‘Hello, hello, hello!’ It came in a high tenor, and the plump cheeks of the newcomer expanded in a pleased smile. ‘What’s this morgue-like atmosphere about here? No one’s losing his nerve, I hope.’

  Aton started in consternation and said peevishly, ‘Now what the devil are you doing here, Sheerin? I thought you were going to stay behind in the Hideout.’

  Sheerin laughed and dropped his tubby figure into a chair. ‘I wanted to be here, where things are getting hot. Don’t you suppose I have my share of curiosity? I want to see these Stars the Cultists are forever speaking about. A psychologist isn’t worth his salt in the Hideout. They need men of action and strong, healthy women that can breed children. Me? I’m a hundred pounds too heavy for a man of action, and I wouldn’t be a success at breeding children. So why bother them with an extra mouth to feed? I feel better over here.’

  Theremon spoke briskly, ‘Just what is the Hideout, sir?’

  Sheerin seemed to see the columnist for the first time. He frowned and blew his ample cheeks out, ‘And just who in Lagash are you, redhead?’

  Aton compressed his lips and then muttered sullenly, ‘That’s Theremon 762, the newspaper fellow. I suppose you’ve heard of him.’

  The columnist offered his hand. ‘And, of course, you’re Sheerin 501 of Saro University. I’ve heard of you.’ Then he repeated, ‘What is this Hideout, sir?’

  ‘Well,’ said Sheerin, ‘we have managed to convince a few people of the validity of our prophecy of – er – doom, to be spectacular about it, and those few have taken proper measures. They consist mainly of the immediate members of the families of the Observatory staff, certain of the faculty of Saro University and a few outsiders. Altogether, they number about three hundred, but three-quarters are women and children.’

  ‘I see! They’re supposed to hide where the Darkness and the – er – Stars can’t get at them, and then hold out when the rest of the world goes poof.’

  ‘If they can. It won’t be easy. With all of mankind insane; with the great cities going up in flames – environment will not be conducive to survival. But they have food, water, shelter, and weapons –’

  ‘They’ve got more,’ said Aton. ‘They’ve got all our records, except for what we will collect today. Those records will mean everything to the next cycle, and that’s what must survive. The rest can go hang.’

  Theremon whistled a long, low whistle and sat brooding for several minutes. The men about the table had brought out a multichess board and started a six-member game. Moves were made rapidly and in silence. All eyes bent in furious concentration on the board. Theremon watched them intently and then rose and approached Aton, who sat apart in whispered conversation with Sheerin.

  ‘Listen,’ he said. ‘Let’s go somewhere where we won’t bother the rest of the fellows. I want to ask some questions.’

  There were softer chairs in the next room. There were also thick red curtains on the windows and a maroon carpet on the floor. With the bricky light of Beta pouring in, the general effect was one of dried blood.

  Theremon shuddered. ‘Say, I’d give ten credits for a decent dose of white light for just a second. I wish Gamma or Delta were in the sky.’

  ‘What are your questions?’ asked Aton. ‘Please remember that our time is limited. In a little over an hour and a quarter we’re going upstairs, and after that there will be no time for talk.’

  ‘Well, here it is.’ Theremon leaned back and folded his hands on his chest. ‘You say that there is going to be a world-wide Darkness in a few hours and that all mankind will go violently insane. What I want now is the science behind it.’

  ‘No, you don’t. No, you don’t,’ broke in Sheerin. ‘If you ask Aton for that – supposing him to be in the mood to answer at all – he’ll trot out pages of figures and volumes of graphs. You won’t make head or tail of it. Now if you were to ask me, I could give you the layman’s standpoint.’

  ‘All right; I ask you.’

  ‘Then first I’d like a drink.’ He rubbed his hands and looked at Aton.

  ‘Water?’ grunted Aton.

  ‘Don’t be silly!’

  ‘Don’t you be silly. No alcohol today. It would be too easy to get my men drunk. I can’t afford to tempt them.’

  The psychologist grumbled wordlessly. He turned to Theremon, impaled him with his sharp eyes, and began.

  ‘You realize of course, that the history of civilization on Lagash displays a cyclic character – but I mean, cyclic!’

  ‘I know,’ replied Theremon cautiously, ‘that that is the current archaeological theory. Has it been accepted as a fact?’

  ‘Just about. In this last century it’s been generally agreed upon. This cyclic character is – or, rather, was – one of the great mysteries. We’ve located series of civilizations, nine of them definitely, and indications of others as well, all of which have reached heights comparable to our own, and all of which, without exception, were destroyed by fire at the very height of their culture.

  ‘And no one could tell why. All centres of culture were thoroughly gutted by fire, with nothing left behind to give a hint as to the cause.’

  Theremon was following closely. ‘Wasn’t there a Stone Age, too?’

  ‘Probably, but as yet, practically nothing is known of it, except that men of that age were little more than rather intelligent apes. We can forget about that.’

  ‘I see. Go on!’

  ‘There have been explanations of these recurrent catastrophes, all of a more or less fantastic nature. Some say that there are periodic rains of fire; some that Lagash passes through a sun every so often; some even wilder things. But there is one theory, quite different from all of these, that has been handed down over a period of centuries.’

  ‘I know. You mean this myth of the “Stars” that the Cultists have in their “Book of Revelation”.’

  ‘Exactly,’ rejoined Sheerin with satisfaction. ‘The Cultists said that every two thousand and fifty years Lagash entered a huge cave, so that all the suns disappeared, and there came total darkness all over the world! And then, they say, things called Stars appeared, which robbed men of their souls and left them unreasoning brutes, so that they destroyed the civilization they themselves had built up. Of course, they mix all this up with a lot of religio-mystic notions, but that’s the central idea.’

  There was a short pause in which Sheerin drew a long breath. ‘And now we come to the Theory of Universal Gravitation.’ He pronounced the phrase so that the capital letters sounded – and at that point Aton turned from the window, snorted loudly, and stalked out of the room.

  The two stared after him, and Theremon said, ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘Nothing in particular,’ replied Sheerin. ‘Two of the men were due several hours ago and haven’t shown up yet. He’s terrifically shorthanded, of course, because all but the really essential men have gone to the Hideout.’


  ‘You don’t think the two deserted, do you?’

  ‘Who? Faro and Yimot? Of course not. Still, if they’re not back within the hour, things would be a little sticky.’ He got to his feet suddenly, and his eyes twinkled. ‘Anyway, as long as Aton is gone –’

  Tiptoeing to the nearest window, he squatted, and from the low window box beneath withdrew a bottle of red liquid that gurgled suggestively when he shook it.

  ‘I thought Aton didn’t know about this,’ he remarked as he trotted back to the table. ‘Here! We’ve only got one glass so, as the guest, you can have it. I’ll keep the bottle.’ And he filled the tiny cup with judicious care.

  The psychologist’s Adam’s apple wobbled as the bottle upended, and then, with a satisfied grunt and a smack of the lips, he began again.

  ‘But what do you know about gravitation?’

  ‘Nothing, except that it is a very recent development, not too well established, and that the math is so hard that only twelve men in Lagash are supposed to understand it.’

  ‘Tcha! Nonsense! Boloney! I can give you all the essential math in a sentence. The Law of Universal Gravitation states that there exists a cohesive force among all bodies of the universe, such that the amount of this force between any two given bodies is proportional to the product of their masses divided by the square of the distance between them.’

  ‘Is that all?’

  ‘That’s enough! It took four hundred years to develop it.’

  ‘Why that long? It sounded simple enough, the way you said it.’

  ‘Because great laws are not divined by flashes of inspiration, whatever you may think. It usually takes the combined work of a world full of scientists over a period of centuries. After Genovi 41 discovered that Lagash rotated about the sun Alpha, rather than vice versa – and that was four hundred years ago – astronomers have been working. The complex motions of the six suns were recorded and analysed and unwoven. Theory after theory was advanced and checked and counter-checked and modified and abandoned and revived and converted to something else. It was a devil of a job.’

  Theremon nodded thoughtfully and held out his glass for more liquor. Sheerin grudgingly allowed a few ruby drops to leave the bottle.

  ‘It was twenty years ago,’ he continued after remoistening his own throat, ‘that it was finally demonstrated that the Law of Universal Gravitation accounted exactly for the orbital motions of the six suns. It was a great triumph.’

  Sheerin stood up and walked to the window, still clutching his bottle. ‘And now we’re getting to the point. In the last decade, the motions of Lagash about Alpha were computed according to gravity, and it did not account for the orbit observed; not even when all perturbations due to the other suns were included. Either the law was invalid, or there was another, as yet unknown, factor involved.’

  Theremon joined Sheerin at the window and gazed out past the wooded slopes to where the spires of Saro City gleamed bloodily on the horizon. The newsman felt the tension of uncertainty grow within him as he cast a short glance at Beta. It glowered redly at zenith, dwarfed and evil.

  ‘Go ahead, sir,’ he said softly.

  Sheerin replied, ‘Astronomers stumbled about for years, each proposed theory more untenable than the one before – until Aton had the inspiration of calling in the Cult. The head of the Cult, Sor 5, had access to certain data that simplified the problem considerably. Aton set to work on a new track.

  ‘What if there were another non-luminous planetary body such as Lagash? If there were, you know, it would shine only by reflected light, and if it were composed of bluish rock, as Lagash itself largely is, then, in the redness of the sky, the eternal blaze of the suns would make it invisible – drown it out completely.’

  Theremon whistled, ‘What a screwy idea!’

  ‘You think that’s screwy? Listen to this: Suppose this body rotated about Lagash at such a distance and in such an orbit and had such a mass that its attraction would exactly account for the deviations of Lagash’s orbit from theory – do you know what would happen?’

  The columnist shook his head.

  ‘Well, sometimes this body would get in the way of the sun.’ And Sheerin emptied what remained in the bottle at a draught.

  ‘And it does, I suppose,’ said Theremon flatly.

  ‘Yes! But only one sun lies in its plane of revolutions.’ He jerked a thumb at the shrunken sun above. ‘Beta! And it has been shown that the eclipse will occur only when the arrangement of the suns is such that Beta is alone in its hemisphere and at maximum distance, at which time the moon is invariably at minimum distance. The eclipse that results with the moon seven times the apparent diameter of Beta, covers all of Lagash and lasts well over half a day, so that no spot on the planet escapes the effects. That eclipse comes once every two thousand and forty-nine years.’

  Theremon’s face was drawn into an expressionless mask. ‘And that’s my story?’

  The psychologist nodded. ‘That’s all of it. First the eclipse – which will start in three-quarters of an hour – then universal Darkness, and, maybe, these mysterious Stars – then madness, and the end of the cycle.’

  He brooded. ‘We had two months’ leeway – we at the Observatory – and that wasn’t enough time to persuade Lagash of the danger. Two centuries might not have been enough. But our records are at the Hideout, and today we photograph the eclipse. The next cycle will start off with the truth, and when the next eclipse comes, mankind will at last be ready for it. Come to think of it, that’s part of your story, too.’

  A thin wind ruffled the curtains at the window as Theremon opened it and leaned out. It played coldly with his hair as he stared at the crimson sunlight on his hand. Then he turned in sudden rebellion.

  ‘What is there in Darkness to drive me mad?’

  Sheerin smiled to himself as he spun the empty liquor bottle with abstracted motions of his hand. ‘Have you ever experienced Darkness, young man?’

  The newsman leaned against the wall and considered. ‘No. Can’t say I have. But I know what it is. Just – uh –’ He made vague motions with his fingers, and then brightened. ‘Just no light. Like in caves.’

  ‘Have you ever been in a cave?’

  ‘In a cave! Of course not!’

  The psychologist studied the young man with a frown.

  ‘I dare you to draw the curtain.’

  Theremon looked his surprise and said, ‘What for? If we had four or five suns out there we might want to cut the light down a bit for comfort, but now we haven’t enough light as it is.’

  ‘That’s the point. Just draw the curtain; then come here and sit down.’

  ‘All right.’ Theremon reached for the tasselled string and jerked. The red curtain slid across the wide window, the brass rings hissing their way along the crossbar, and a dusk-red shadow clamped down on the room.

  Theremon’s footsteps sounded hollowly in the silence as he made his way to the table, and then he stopped half-way. ‘I can’t see you, sir,’ he whispered.

  ‘Feel your way,’ ordered Sheerin in a strained voice.

  ‘But I can’t see you, sir,’ the newsman was breathing harshly. ‘I can’t see anything.’

  ‘What did you expect?’ came the grim reply. ‘Come here and sit down!’

  The footsteps sounded again, waveringly, approaching slowly. There was the sound of someone fumbling with a chair. Theremon’s voice came thinly, ‘Here I am. I feel… ulp… all right.’

  ‘You like it, do you?’

  ‘N-no. It’s pretty awful. The walls seem to be –’ He paused. ‘They seem to be closing in on me. I keep wanting to push them away. But I’m not going mad! In fact, the feeling isn’t as bad as it was.’

  ‘All right. Draw the curtains back again.’

  There were cautious footsteps through the dark, the rustle of Theremon’s body against the curtain as he felt for the tassel, and then the triumphant ro-o-o-osh of the curtain slithering back. Red light flooded the room, and with a cry of joy There
mon looked up at the sun.

  Sheerin wiped the moisture off his forehead with the back of a hand and said shakily, ‘And that was just a dark room.’

  ‘It can be stood,’ said Theremon lightly.

  ‘Yes, a dark room can. But were you at the Jonglor Centennial Exposition two years ago?’

  ‘No, it so happens I never got around to it. Six thousand miles was just a bit too much to travel, even for the exposition.’

  ‘Well, I was there. You remember hearing about the “Tunnel of Mystery” that broke all records in the amusement area – for the first month or so, anyway?’

  ‘Yes. Wasn’t there some fuss about it?’

  ‘Very little. It was hushed up. You see, that Tunnel of Mystery was just a mile-long tunnel – with no lights. You got into a little open car and jolted along through Darkness for fifteen minutes. It was very popular – while it lasted.’

  ‘Popular?’

  ‘Certainly. There’s a fascination in being frightened when it’s part of a game. A baby is born with three instinctive fears: of loud noises, of falling, and of the absence of light. That’s why it’s considered so funny to jump at someone and shout “Boo!” That’s why it’s such fun to ride a roller coaster. And that’s why that Tunnel of Mystery started cleaning up. People came out of that Darkness shaking, breathless, half dead with fear, but they kept on paying to get in.’

  ‘Wait a while, I remember now. Some people came out dead, didn’t they? There were rumours of that after it shut down.’

  The psychologist snorted. ‘Bah! Two or three died. That was nothing! They paid off the families of the dead ones and argued the Jonglor City Council into forgetting it. After all, they said, if people with weak hearts want to go through the tunnel, it was at their own risk – and besides, it wouldn’t happen again. So they put a doctor in the front office and had every customer go through a physical examination before getting into the car. That actually boosted ticket sales.’

  ‘Well, then?’

  ‘But, you see, there was something else. People sometimes came out in perfect order, except that they refused to go into buildings – any buildings; including palaces, mansions, apartment houses, tenements, cottages, huts, shacks, lean-tos, and tents.’