Prelude to Foundation f-1

by Isaac Asimov

  There might, of course, be more than one crease leading away from the copse, but he dimly made out some of the sprigs of berries he had seen coming in, which now looked almost black rather than bright red. He could not delay. He had to assume he was right. He moved up the crease as fast as he might, guided by failing sight and by the vegetation underfoot.

  But he couldn’t stay in the crease forever. He had come over what had seemed to him to be the tallest dome in sight and had found a crease that cut at right angles across his line of approach. By his reckoning, he should now turn right, then sharp left, and that would put him on the path toward the meteorologists’ dome.

  Seldon made the left turn and, lifting his head, he could just make out the curve of a dome against the fractionally lighter sky. That had to be it!

  Or was that only wishful thinking?

  He had no choice but to assume it wasn’t. Keeping his eye on the peak so that he could move in a reasonably straight line, he headed for it as quickly as he could. As he got closer, he could make out the line of dome against sky with less and less certainty as it loomed larger and larger. Soon, if he was correct, he would be going up a gentle slope and when that slope became level he would be able to look down the other side and see the lights of the meteorologists.

  In the inky dark, he could not tell what lay in his path. Wishing there were at least a few stars to shed some light, he wondered if this was how it felt to be blind. He waved his arms before him as if they were antennae.

  It was growing colder by the minute and he paused occasionally to blow on his hands and hold them under his armpits. He wished earnestly he could do the same for his feet. By now, he thought, if it started to precipitate, it would be snow—or, worse yet, sleet.

  On . . . on. There was nothing else to do.

  Eventually, it seemed to him that he was moving downward. That was either wishful thinking or he had topped the dome.

  He stopped. If he had topped the dome, he should be able to see the artificial light of the meteorological station. He would see the lights carried by the meteorologists themselves, sparkling or dancing like fireflies.

  Seldon closed his eyes as though to accustom them to dark and then try again, but that was a foolish effort. It was no darker with his eyes closed than with them open and when he opened them it was no lighter than when he had had them closed.

  Possibly Leggen and the others were gone, had taken their lights with them and had turned off any lights on the instruments. Or possibly Seldon had climbed the wrong dome. Or he had followed a curved path along the dome so that he was now facing in the wrong direction. Or he had followed the wrong crease and had moved away from the copse in the wrong direction altogether.

  What should he do?

  If he was facing the wrong direction, there was a chance that light would be visible right or left—and it wasn’t. If he had followed the wrong crease, there was no possible way he could return to the copse and locate a different crease.

  His only chance lay in the assumption that he was facing the right direction and that the meteorological station was more or less directly ahead of him, but that the meteorologists had gone and had left it in darkness.

  Move forward, then. The chances of success might be small, but it was the only chance he had.

  He estimated that it had taken him half an hour to move from the meteorological station to the top of the dome, having gone partway with Clowzia and sauntering with her rather than striding. He was moving at little better than a saunter now in the daunting darkness.

  Seldon continued to slog forward. It would have been nice to know the time and he had a timeband, of course, but in the dark—

  He stopped. He wore a Trantorian timeband, which gave Galactic Standard time (as all timebands did) and which also gave Trantorian local time. Timebands were usually visible in the dark, phosphorescing so that one could tell time in the quiet dark of a bedchamber. A Heliconian timeband certainly would; why not a Trantorian one?

  He looked at his timeband with reluctant apprehension and touched the contact that would draw upon the power source for light. The timeband gleamed feebly and told him the time was 1847. For it to be nighttime already, Seldon knew that it must be the winter season. —How far past the solstice was it? What was the degree of axial tipping? How long was the year? How far from the equator was he at this moment? There was no hint of an answer to any of these things, but what counted was that the spark of light was visible.

  He was not blind! Somehow the feeble glow of his timeband gave him renewed hope.

  His spirits rose. He would move on in the direction he was going. He would move for half an hour. If he encountered nothing, he would move on five minutes more—no further—just five minutes. If he still encountered nothing, he would stop and think. That, however, would be thirty-five minutes from now. Till then, he would concentrate only on walking and on willing himself to feel warmer. (He wiggled his toes, vigorously. He could still feel them.)

  Seldon trudged onward and the half hour passed.

  He paused, then hesitantly, he moved on for five more minutes.

  Now he had to decide. There was nothing. He might be nowhere, far removed from any opening into the dome. He might, on the other hand, be standing three meters to the left—or right—or short—of the meteorological station. He might be two arms’ lengths from the opening into the dome, which would not, however, be open.

  Now what?

  Was there any point in shouting? He was enveloped by utter silence but for the whistling of the wind. If there were birds, beasts, or insects in among the vegetation on the domes, they were not here during this season or at this time of night or at this particular place. The wind continued to chill him.

  Perhaps he should have been shouting all the way. The sound might have carried a good distance in the cold air. But would there have been anyone to hear him?

  Would they hear him inside the dome? Were there instruments to detect sound or movement from above? Might there not be sentinels just inside?

  That seemed ridiculous. They would have heard his footsteps, wouldn’t they?

  Still—

  He called out. “Help! Help! Can someone hear me?”

  His cry was strangled, half-embarrassed. It seemed silly shouting into vast black nothingness.

  But then, he felt it was even sillier to hesitate in such a situation as this. Panic was welling up in him. He took in a deep, cold breath and screamed for as long as he could. Another breath and another scream, changing pitch. And another.

  Seldon paused, breathless, turning his head every which way, even though there was nothing to see. He could not even detect an echo. There was nothing left to do but wait for the dawn. But how long was the night at this season of the year? And how cold would it get?

  He felt a tiny cold touch sting his face. After a while, another.

  It was sleeting invisibly in the pitch blackness. And there was no way to find shelter.

  He thought: It would have been better if that jet-down had seen me and picked me up. I would be a prisoner at this moment, perhaps, but I’d be warm and comfortable, at least.

  Or, if Hummin had never interfered, I might have been back in Helicon long ago. Under surveillance, but warm and comfortable. Right now that was all he wanted—to be warm and comfortable.

  But at the moment he could only wait. He huddled down, knowing that however long the night, he dared not sleep. He slipped off his shoes and rubbed his icy feet. Quickly, he put his shoes back on.

  He knew he would have to repeat this, as well as rubbing his hands and ears all night long to keep his circulation flowing. But most important to remember was that he must not let himself fall asleep. That would mean certain death.

  And, having carefully thought all this out, his eyes closed and he nodded off to sleep with the sleet coming down.

  RESCUE

  LEGGEN, JENARR— . . . His contributions to meteorology, however, although considerable, pale before wh
at has ever since been known as the Leggen Controversy. That his actions helped to place Hari Seldon in jeopardy is undisputable, but argument rages—and has always raged—as to whether those actions were the result of unintentional circumstance or part of a deliberate conspiracy. Passions have been raised on both sides and even the most elaborate studies have come to no definite conclusions. Nevertheless, the suspicions that were raised helped poison Leggen’s career and private life in the years that followed . . .

  ENCYCLOPEDIA GALACTICA

  25

  It was not quite the end of daylight when Dors Venabili sought out Jenarr Leggen. He answered her rather anxious greeting with a grunt and a brief nod.

  “Well,” she said a trifle impatiently. “How was he?”

  Leggen, who was entering data into his computer, said, “How was who?”

  “My library student Hari. Dr. Hari Seldon. He went up with you. Was he any help to you?”

  Leggen removed his hands from the keys of his computer and swivelled about. “That Heliconian fellow? He was of no use at all. Showed no interest whatever. He kept looking at the scenery when there was no scenery to look at. A real oddball. Why did you want to send him up?”

  “It wasn’t my idea. He wanted to. I can’t understand it. He was very interested. —Where is he now?”

  Leggen shrugged. “How would I know? Somewhere around.”

  “Where did he go after he came down with you? Did he say?”

  “He didn’t come down with us. I told you he wasn’t interested.”

  “Then when did he come down?”

  “I don’t know. I wasn’t watching him. I had an enormous amount of work to do. There must have been a windstorm and some sort of downpour about two days ago and neither was expected. Nothing our instruments showed offered a good explanation for it or for the fact that some sunshine we were expecting today didn’t appear. Now I’m trying to make sense of it and you’re bothering me.”

  “You mean you didn’t see him go down?”

  “Look. He wasn’t on my mind. The idiot wasn’t correctly dressed and I could see that inside of half an hour he wasn’t going to be able to take the cold. I gave him a sweater, but that wasn’t going to help much for his legs and feet. So I left the elevator open for him and I told him how to use it and explained that it would take him down and then return automatically. It was all very simple and I’m sure he did get cold and he did go down and the elevator did come back and then eventually we all went down.”

  “But you don’t know exactly when he went down?”

  “No, I don’t. I told you. I was busy. He certainly wasn’t up there when we left, though, and by that time twilight was coming on and it looked as though it might sleet. So he had to have gone down.”

  “Did anyone else see him go down?”

  “I don’t know. Clowzia may have. She was with him for a while. Why don’t you ask her?”

  Dors found Clowzia in her quarters, just emerging from a hot shower.

  “It was cold up there,” she said.

  Dors said, “Were you with Hari Seldon Upperside?”

  Clowzia said, eyebrows lifting, “Yes, for a while. He wanted to wander about and ask questions about the vegetation up there. He’s a sharp fellow, Dors. Everything seemed to interest him, so I told him what I could till Leggen called me back. He was in one of his knock-your-head-off tempers. The weather wasn’t working and he—”

  Dors interrupted. “Then you didn’t see Hari go down in the elevator?”

  “I didn’t see him at all after Leggen called me over. —But he has to be down here. He wasn’t up there when we left.”

  “But I can’t find him anywhere.”

  Clowzia looked perturbed. “Really?—But he’s got to be somewhere down here.”

  “No, he doesn’t have to be somewhere down here,” said Dors, her anxiety growing. “What if he’s still up there?”

  “That’s impossible. He wasn’t. Naturally, we looked about for him before we left. Leggen had shown him how to go down. He wasn’t properly dressed and it was rotten weather. Leggen told him if he got cold not to wait for us. He was getting cold. I know! So what else could he do but go down?”

  “But no one saw him go down. —Did anything go wrong with him up there?”

  “Nothing. Not while I was with him. He was perfectly fine—except that he had to be cold, of course.”

  Dors, by now quite unsettled, said, “Since no one saw him go down, he might still be up there. Shouldn’t we go up and look?”

  Clowzia said nervously, “I told you we looked around before we went down. It was still quite light and he was nowhere in sight.”

  “Let’s look anyway.”

  “But I can’t take you up there. I’m just an intern and I don’t have the combination for the Upperside dome opening. You’ll have to ask Dr. Leggen.”

  26

  Dors Venabili knew that Leggen would not willingly go Upperside now. He would have to be forced.

  First, she checked the library and the dining areas again. Then she called Seldon’s room. Finally, she went up there and signaled at the door. When Seldon did not respond, she had the floor manager open it. He wasn’t there. She questioned some of those who, over the last few weeks, had come to know him. No one had seen him.

  Well, then, she would make Leggen take her Upperside. By now, though, it was night. He would object strenuously and how long could she spend arguing if Hari Seldon was trapped up there on a freezing night with sleet turning to snow?

  A thought occurred to her and she rushed to the small University computer, which kept track of the doings of the students, faculty, and service staff.

  Her fingers flew over the keys and she soon had what she wanted.

  There were three of them in another part of the campus. She signed out for a small glidecart to take her over and found the domicile she was looking for. Surely, one of them would be available—or findable.

  Fortune was with her. The first door at which she signaled was answered by a query light. She punched in her identification number, which included her department affiliation. The door opened and a plump middle-aged man stared out at her. He had obviously been washing up before dinner. His dark blond hair was askew and he was not wearing any upper garment.

  He said, “Sorry. You catch me at a disadvantage. What can I do for you, Dr. Venabili?”

  She said a bit breathlessly, “You’re Rogen Benastra, the Chief Seismologist, aren’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “This is an emergency. I must see the seismological records for Upperside for the last few hours.”

  Benastra stared at her. “Why? Nothing’s happened. I’d know if it had. The seismograph would inform us.”

  “I’m not talking about a meteoric impact.”

  “Neither am I. We don’t need a seismograph for that. I’m talking about gravel, pinpoint fractures. Nothing today.”

  “Not that either. Please. Take me to the seismograph and read it for me. This is life or death.”

  “I have a dinner appointment—”

  “I said life or death and I mean it.”

  Benastra said, “I don’t see—” but he faded out under Dors’s glare. He wiped his face, left a quick word on his message relay, and struggled into a shirt.

  They half-ran (under Dors’s pitiless urging) to the small squat Seismology Building. Dors, who knew nothing about seismology, said, “Down? We’re going down?”

  “Below the inhabited levels. Of course. The seismograph has to be fixed to bedrock and be removed from the constant clamor and vibration of the city levels.”

  “But how can you tell what’s happening Upperside from down here?”

  “The seismograph is wired to a set of pressure transducers located within the thickness of the dome. The impact of a speck of grit will send the indicator skittering off the screen. We can detect the flattening effect on the dome of a high wind. We can—”

  “Yes, yes,” said Dors impatiently.
She was not here for a lecture on the virtues and refinements of the instruments. “Can you detect human footsteps?”

  “Human footsteps?” Benastra looked confused. “That’s not likely Upperside.”

  “Of course it’s likely. There were a group of meteorologists Upperside this afternoon.”

  “Oh. Well, footsteps would scarcely be noticeable.”

  “It would be noticeable if you looked hard enough and that’s what I want you to do.”

  Benastra might have resented the firm note of command in her voice, but, if so, he said nothing. He touched a contact and the computer screen jumped to life.

  At the extreme right center, there was a fat spot of light, from which a thin horizontal line stretched to the left limit of the screen. There was a tiny wriggle to it, a random nonrepetitive series of little hiccups and these moved steadily leftward. It was almost hypnotic in its effect on Dors.

  Benastra said, “That’s as quiet as it can possibly be. Anything you see is the result of changing air pressure above, raindrops maybe, the distant whirr of machinery. There’s nothing up there.”

  “All right, but what about a few hours ago? Check on the records at fifteen hundred today, for instance. Surely, you have some recordings.”

  Benastra gave the computer its necessary instructions and for a second or two there was wild chaos on the screen. Then it settled down and again the horizontal line appeared.

  “I’ll sensitize it to maximum,” muttered Benastra. There were now pronounced hiccups and as they staggered leftward they changed in pattern markedly.

  “What’s that?” said Dors. “Tell me.”

  “Since you say there were people up there, Venabili, I would guess they were footsteps—the shifting of weight, the impact of shoes. I don’t know that I would have guessed it if I hadn’t known about the people up there. It’s what we call a benign vibration, not associated with anything we know to be dangerous.”