Prelude to Foundation f-1

by Isaac Asimov

  “All Westerners on Helicon, eh? How dull! But it doesn’t matter. Takes all kinds.” (He left Seldon wondering at the fact that there were Easterners, Southerners, and Westerners, but no Northerners. He had tried finding an answer to why that might be in his reference searches and had not succeeded.)

  And now Randa’s good-natured face was looking at him with an almost ludicrous look of concern. He said, “Are you all right, Seldon?”

  Seldon stared. “Yes, of course. Why shouldn’t I be?”

  “I’m just going by sounds, my friend. You were screaming.”

  “Screaming?” Seldon looked at him with offended disbelief.

  “Not loud. Like this.” Randa gritted his teeth and emitted a strangled high-pitched sound from the back of his throat. “If I’m wrong, I apologize for this unwarranted intrusion on you. Please forgive me.”

  Seldon hung his head. “You’re forgiven, Lisung. I do make that sound sometimes, I’m told. I assure you it’s unconscious. I’m never aware of it.”

  “Are you aware why you make it?”

  “Yes. Frustration. Frustration.”

  Randa beckoned Seldon closer and lowered his voice further. “We’re disturbing people. Let’s come out to the lounge before we’re thrown out.”

  In the lounge, over a pair of mild drinks, Randa said, “May I ask you, as a matter of professional interest, why you are feeling frustration?”

  Seldon shrugged. “Why does one usually feel frustration? I’m tackling something in which I am making no progress.”

  “But you’re a mathematician, Hari. Why should anything in the history library frustrate you?”

  “What were you doing here?”

  “Passing through as part of a shortcut to where I was going when I heard you . . . moaning. Now you see”—and he smiled,—“it’s no longer a shortcut, but a serious delay—one that I welcome, however.”

  “I wish I were just passing through the history library, but I’m trying to solve a mathematical problem that requires some knowledge of history and I’m afraid I’m not handling it well.”

  Randa stared at Seldon with an unusually solemn expression on his face, then he said, “Pardon me, but I must run the risk of offending you now. I’ve been computering you.”

  “Computering me!” Seldon’s eyes widened. He felt distinctly angry.

  “I have offended you. But, you know, I had an uncle who was a mathematician. You might even have heard of him: Kiangtow Randa.”

  Seldon drew in his breath. “Are you a relative of that Randa?”

  “Yes. He is my father’s older brother and he was quite displeased with me for not following in his footsteps—he has no children of his own. I thought somehow that it might please him that I had met a mathematician and I wanted to boast of you—if I could—so I checked what information the mathematics library might have.”

  “I see. And that’s what you were really doing there. Well—I’m sorry. I don’t suppose you could do much boasting.”

  “You suppose wrong. I was impressed. I couldn’t make heads or tails of the subject matter of your papers, but somehow the information seemed to be very favorable. And when I checked the news files, I found you were at the Decennial Convention earlier this year. So . . . what’s ‘psychohistory,’ anyway? Obviously, the first two syllables stir my curiosity.”

  “I see you got that word out of it.”

  “Unless I’m totally misled, it seemed to me that you can work out the future course of history.”

  Seldon nodded wearily, “That, more or less, is what psychohistory is or, rather, what it is intended to be.”

  “But is it a serious study?” Randa was smiling. “You don’t just throw sticks?”

  “Throw sticks?”

  “That’s just a reference to a game played by children on my home planet of Hopara. The game is supposed to tell the future and if you’re a smart kid, you can make a good thing out of it. Tell a mother that her child will grow up beautiful and marry a rich man and it’s good for a piece of cake or a half-credit piece on the spot. She isn’t going to wait and see if it comes true; you are rewarded just for saying it.”

  “I see. No, I don’t throw sticks. Psychohistory is just an abstract study. Strictly abstract. It has no practical application at all, except—”

  “Now we’re getting to it. Exceptions are what are interesting.”

  “Except that I would like to work out such an application. Perhaps if I knew more about history—”

  “Ah, that is why you are reading history?”

  “Yes, but it does me no good,” said Seldon sadly. “There is too much history and there is too little of it that is told.”

  “And that’s what’s frustrating you?”

  Seldon nodded.

  Randa said, “But, Hari, you’ve only been here a matter of weeks.”

  “True, but already I can see—”

  “You can’t see anything in a few weeks. You may have to spend your whole lifetime making one little advance. It may take many generations of work by many mathematicians to make a real inroad on the problem.”

  “I know that, Lisung, but that doesn’t make me feel better. I want to make some visible progress myself.”

  “Well, driving yourself to distraction won’t help either. If it will make you feel better, I can give you an example of a subject much less complex than human history that people have been working for I don’t know how long without making much progress. I know because a group is working on it right here at the University and one of my good friends is involved. Talk about frustration! You don’t know what frustration is!”

  “What’s the subject?” Seldon felt a small curiosity stirring within him.

  “Meteorology.”

  “Meteorology!” Seldon felt revolted at the anticlimax.

  “Don’t make faces. Look. Every inhabited world has an atmosphere. Every world has its own atmospheric composition, its own temperature range, its own rotation and revolution rate, its own axial tipping, its own land-water distribution. We’ve got twenty-five million different problems and no one has succeeded in finding a generalization.”

  “That’s because atmospheric behavior easily enters a chaotic phase. Everyone knows that.”

  “So my friend Jenarr Leggen says. You’ve met him.”

  Seldon considered. “Tall fellow? Long nose? Doesn’t speak much?”

  “That’s the one. —And Trantor itself is a bigger puzzle than almost any world. According to the records, it had a fairly normal weather pattern when it was first settled. Then, as the population grew and urbanization spread, more energy was used and more heat was discharged into the atmosphere. The ice cover contracted, the cloud layer thickened, and the weather got lousier. That encouraged the movement underground and set off a vicious cycle. The worse the weather got, the more eagerly the land was dug into and the domes built and the weather got still worse. Now the planet has become a world of almost incessant cloudiness and frequent rains—or snows when it’s cold enough. The only thing is that no one can work it out properly. No one has worked out an analysis that can explain why the weather has deteriorated quite as it has or how one can reasonably predict the details of its day-to-day changes.”

  Seldon shrugged. “Is that sort of thing important?”

  “To a meteorologist it is. Why can’t they be as frustrated over their problems as you are over yours? Don’t be a project chauvinist.”

  Seldon remembered the cloudiness and the dank chill on the way to the Emperor’s Palace.

  He said, “So what’s being done about it?”

  “Well, there’s a big project on the matter here at the University and Jenarr Leggen is part of it. They feel that if they can understand the weather change on Trantor, they will learn a great deal about the basic laws of general meteorology. Leggen wants that as much as you want your laws of psychohistory. So he has set up an incredible array of instruments of all kinds Upperside . . . you know, above the domes. It hasn
’t helped them so far. And if there’s so much work being done for many generations on the atmosphere, without results, how can you complain that you haven’t gotten anything out of human history in a few weeks?”

  Randa was right, Seldon thought, and he himself was being unreasonable and wrong. And yet . . . and yet . . . Hummin would say that this failure in the scientific attack on problems was another sign of the degeneration of the times. Perhaps he was right, also, except that he was speaking of a general degeneration and average effect. Seldon felt no degeneration of ability and mentality in himself.

  He said with some interest then, “You mean that people climb up out of the domes and into the open air above?”

  “Yes. Upperside. It’s a funny thing, though. Most native Trantorians won’t do it. They don’t like to go Upperside. The idea gives them vertigo or something. Most of those working on the meteorology project are Outworlders.”

  Seldon looked out of the window at the lawns and small garden of the University campus, brilliantly lit without shadows or oppressive heat, and said thoughtfully, “I don’t know that I can blame Trantorians for liking the comfort of being within, but I should think curiosity would drive some Upperside. It would drive me.”

  “Do you mean that you would like to see meteorology in action?”

  “I think I would. How does one get Upperside?”

  “Nothing to it. An elevator takes you up, a door opens, and there you are. I’ve been up there. It’s . . . novel.”

  “It would get my mind off psychohistory for a while.” Seldon sighed. “I’d welcome that.”

  “On the other hand,” said Randa, “my uncle used to say, ‘All knowledge is one,’ and he may be right. You may learn something from meteorology that will help you with your psychohistory. Isn’t that possible?”

  Seldon smiled weakly. “A great many things are possible.” And to himself he added: But not practical.

  22

  Dors seemed amused. “Meteorology?”

  Seldon said, “Yes. There’s work scheduled for tomorrow and I’ll go up with them.”

  “Are you tired of history?”

  Seldon nodded his head somberly. “Yes, I am. I’ll welcome the change. Besides, Randa says it’s another problem that’s too massive for mathematics to handle and it will do me good to see that my situation isn’t unique.”

  “I hope you’re not agoraphobic.”

  Seldon smiled. “No, I’m not, but I see why you ask. Randa says that Trantorians are frequently agoraphobic and won’t go Upperside. I imagine they feel uncomfortable without a protective enclosure.”

  Dors nodded. “You can see where that would be natural, but there are also many Trantorians who are to be found among the planets of the Galaxy—tourists, administrators, soldiers. And agoraphobia isn’t particularly rare in the Outworlds either.”

  “That may be, Dors, but I’m not agoraphobic. I am curious and I welcome the change, so I’ll be joining them tomorrow.”

  Dors hesitated. “I should go up with you, but I have a heavy schedule tomorrow. —Still, if you’re not agoraphobic, you’ll have no trouble and you’ll probably enjoy yourself. Oh, and stay close to the meteorologists. I’ve heard of people getting lost up there.”

  “I’ll be careful. It’s a long time since I’ve gotten truly lost anywhere.”

  23

  Jenarr Leggen had a dark look about him. It was not so much his complexion, which was fair enough. It was not even his eyebrows, which were thick and dark enough. It was, rather, that those eyebrows were hunched over deepset eyes and a long and rather prominent nose. He had, as a result, a most unmerry look. His eyes did not smile and when he spoke, which wasn’t often, he had a deep, strong voice, surprisingly resonant for his rather thin body.

  He said, “You’ll need warmer clothing than that, Seldon.”

  Seldon said, “Oh?” and looked about.

  There were two men and two women who were making ready to go up with Leggen and Seldon and, as in Leggen’s own case, their rather satiny Trantorian clothing was covered by thick sweaters that, not surprisingly, were brightly colored in bold designs. No two were even faintly alike, of course.

  Seldon looked down at himself and said, “Sorry, I didn’t know—but I don’t have any suitable outer garment.”

  “I can give you one. I think there’s a spare here somewhere. —Yes, here it is. A little threadbare, but it’s better than nothing.”

  “Wearing sweaters like these can make you unpleasantly warm,” said Seldon.

  “Here they would,” said Leggen. “Other conditions exist Upperside. Cold and windy. Too bad I don’t have spare leggings and boots for you too. You’ll want them later.”

  They were taking with them a cart of instruments, which they were testing one by one with what Seldon thought was unnecessary slowness.

  “Your home planet cold?” asked Leggen.

  Seldon said, “Parts of it, of course. The part of Helicon I come from is mild and often rainy.”

  “Too bad. You won’t like the weather Upperside.”

  “I think I can manage to endure it for the time we’ll be up there.”

  When they were ready, the group filed into an elevator that was marked: OFFICIAL USE ONLY.

  “That’s because it goes Upperside,” said one of the young women, “and people aren’t supposed to be up there without good reason.”

  Seldon had not met the young woman before, but he had heard her addressed as Clowzia. He didn’t know if that was a first name, a last name, or a nickname.

  The elevator seemed no different from others that Seldon had been on, either here on Trantor or at home in Helicon (barring, of course, the gravitic lift he and Hummin had used), but there was something about knowing that it was going to take him out of the confines of the planet and into emptiness above that made it feel like a spaceship.

  Seldon smiled internally. A foolish fantasy.

  The elevator quivered slightly, which reminded Seldon of Hummin’s forebodings of Galactic decay. Leggen, along with the other men and one of the women, seemed frozen and waiting, as though they had suspended thought as well as activity until they could get out, but Clowzia kept glancing at him as though she found him terribly impressive.

  Seldon leaned close and whispered to her (he hesitated to disturb the others), “Are we going up very high?”

  “High?” she repeated. She spoke in a normal voice, apparently not feeling that the others required silence. She seemed very young and it occurred to Seldon that she was probably an undergraduate. An apprentice, perhaps.

  “We’re taking a long time. Upperside must be many stories high in the air.”

  For a moment, she looked puzzled. Then, “Oh no. Not high at all. We started very deep. The University is at a low level. We use a great deal of energy and if we’re quite deep, the energy costs are lower.”

  Leggen said, “All right. We’re here. Let’s get the equipment out.”

  The elevator stopped with a small shudder and the wide door slid open rapidly. The temperature dropped at once and Seldon thrust his hands into his pockets and was very glad he had a sweater on. A cold wind stirred his hair and it occurred to him that he would have found a hat useful and, even as he thought that, Leggen pulled something out of a fold in his sweater, snapped it open, and put it on his head. The others did the same.

  Only Clowzia hesitated. She paused just before she put hers on, then offered it to Seldon.

  Seldon shook his head. “I can’t take your hat, Clowzia.”

  “Go ahead. I have long hair and it’s pretty thick. Yours is short and a little . . . thin.”

  Seldon would have liked to deny that firmly and at another time he would have. Now, however, he took the hat and mumbled, “Thank you. If your head gets cold, I’ll give it back.”

  Maybe she wasn’t so young. It was her round face, almost a baby face. And now that she had called attention to her hair, he could see that it was a charming russet shade. He ha
d never seen hair quite like that on Helicon.

  Outside it was cloudy, as it had been the time he was taken across open country to the Palace. It was considerably colder than it had been then, but he assumed that was because they were six weeks farther into winter. The clouds were thicker than they had been on the earlier occasion and the day was distinctly darker and threatening—or was it just closer to night?

  Surely, they wouldn’t come up to do important work without leaving themselves an ample period of daylight to do it in. Or did they expect to take very little time?

  He would have liked to have asked, but it occurred to him that they might not like questions at this time. All of them seemed to be in states varying from excitement to anger.

  Seldon inspected his surroundings.

  He was standing on something that he thought might be dull metal from the sound it made when he surreptitiously thumped his foot down on it. It was not bare metal, however. When he walked, he left footprints. The surface was clearly covered by dust or fine sand or clay.

  Well, why not? There could scarcely be anyone coming up here to dust the place. He bent down to pinch up some of the matter out of curiosity.

  Clowzia had come up to him. She noticed what he was doing and said, with the air of a housewife caught at an embarrassing negligence, “We do sweep hereabouts for the sake of the instruments. It’s much worse most places Upperside, but it really doesn’t matter. It makes for insulation, you know.”

  Seldon grunted and continued to look about. There was no chance of understanding the instruments that looked as though they were growing out of the thin soil (if one could call it that). He hadn’t the faintest idea of what they were or what they measured.

  Leggen was walking toward him. He was picking up his feet and putting them down gingerly and it occurred to Seldon that he was doing so to avoid jarring the instruments. He made a mental note to walk that way himself.

  “You! Seldon!”

  Seldon didn’t quite like the tone of voice. He replied coolly, “Yes, Dr. Leggen?”

  “Well, Dr. Seldon, then.” He said it impatiently. “That little fellow Randa told me you are a mathematician.”