Battle Station

by Ben Bova

  By creating future worlds and scenarios, science fiction writers can also reaffirm the values of today’s society in ways that ordinary fiction cannot. Much of Robert A. Heinlein’s work throughout the 1950s and well into the 1960s, for example, was nothing less than an affirmation of the traditional American values of individual freedom over the threatening dangers of foreign invasion, collectivism, and oppression. The true villains of The Puppet Masters are not alien invaders from a moon of Saturn, but the hostile hordes of Russian and Chinese communists whom many Americans saw as a threat to the United States in the 1950s.

  But not all of science fiction has a political slant to it, nor are all science fiction stories written specifically to be social commentary. Certainly the field has its share of sheer adventure tales, out-and-out “space operas” that make no pretense of social importance.

  Yet, if we look deeper into such stories, we see that even here, symbolism is at work on every page. The symbols are no longer politically inspired. Nor are they symbols in the psychological sense, necessarily, where objects or characters represent hidden thoughts from the writer’s subconscious mind. Certainly the psychological symbolism is present; no human being can create a work of fiction without the subtle guidance of the subconscious, and such psychosymbolism is sure to leave an imprint that a trained observer can detect. But the symbolism that is specific to science fiction is of a more conscious, rational, deliberate type.

  Take a look at a space opera—even one as shallow as the motion picture Star Wars. Inevitably, such stories deal with a young man leaving his home and parents (often they are adoptive parents) to seek his way in the large world beyond the limits of his youthful environment. Frequently the young man is actually a prince, or some other potentially powerful figure, yet does not know it. The story becomes, then, a tale of his discovery of himself and his own abilities. This is an old, old tale: the voyage of self-discovery, the fictional (or mythological) treatment of the transition from adolescence into adulthood. Every culture on Earth has such tales. They tell the youngsters two things: one, that the turmoil of adolescence happens to everyone; and two, that at the end of the turmoil lies the new world of the successful adult.

  In recent years science fiction and its companion field of fantasy have seen the growth of tales of young women’s transition from adolescence into adulthood. Written mainly by women, this trend reflects the growing power of the women’s movement in modern society.

  While the underlying psychological symbols of such tales are very much the same, whether they are science fictional space operas or the mystical spirithaunted ordeals of a primitive tribe, in science fiction the trimmings and trappings of the tale deal quite consciously with modern technological society. Spaceships replace spirit-voyages. Laser guns replace magic amulets. And the hero’s challenge usually requires him to learn how to use science and high technology for the purposes of good, against an enemy who would use such knowledge for the purposes of evil. In the less technological and more fantasy-oriented women’s stories, dragons, unicorns, and even bloody swordplay are very much in evidence. But often they are “explained” in terms of the physical, biological, or social sciences.

  Vonda N. McIntyre’s novel Dreamsnake, for instance, utilizes biochemistry and anthropology where a typical space opera would use astrophysics and electronic engineering.

  One of the major reasons for the tremendous popularity of science fiction among teenagers is that it speaks powerfully to the young reader in terms that today’s adolescents instinctively react to, mainly because the symbols it uses are symbols that the teenagers recognize and respond to, even though the recognition may be unconscious. Science fiction is not the “escapist” literature that some critics believe it to be, a genre which allows the reader to forget about the trials and troubles of today’s world. Just the opposite. Science fiction examines today’s world much more closely than any other form of fiction. Only those critics who fail to understand that the settings and gadgetry in science fiction are symbols of today’s reality see the field as “escapist.”

  It’s powerful stuff, symbolism. Like a whisper that can be heard only inside one’s own mind, it speaks directly to the reader. It cuts through the visible lines of the story and evokes an unconscious, emotional response deep inside the reader’s psyche.

  To write science fiction (or any fiction) effectively, the writer must be aware of the symbolic: how to create it, how to recognize it, how to use it.

  Symbolism need not be so subtle that only a trained analyst can spot it. In Frank Herbert’s classic Dune, it is obvious to even the most casual reader that Paul Atreides symbolizes all the messiahs that human societies have longed for since the beginning of time. As he metamorphoses into the godlike Maud‘Dib, he transforms the society around him. Herbert is clearly telling us the message of the messiah, that the only way to save the world is to change it, that we cannot become godlike without the pains and turmoils of basic, wrenching change. The planet Arrakis, the desert world called Dune, becomes a world-sized symbol of change; by altering it from a wasteland to a new Eden—a change that we instinctively feel is good and beneficial—Maud’Dib destroys the society and the people that we have come to admire.

  Symbols can be used in many ways. In my own novel Colony, the very idea of a huge, man-made habitat floating in space equidistant between the Earth and the Moon became a symbol of the vast gulf between the extremely rich and the desperately poor. The symbolism was quite conscious and deliberate. Hanging there in space, built by a consortium of the wealthiest multinational corporations on Earth, the space colony is so far away from our world that only the very richest people can afford to go to it. In fact, it was built by the leaders of the powerful corporations specifically to be a haven for themselves and their families, a place where they can live in comfort, safety, even splendor—without being threatened by the masses of billions of unruly poor people on Earth.

  The space colony becomes a symbol within a symbol, because terrorists—who claim to be fighting to help the poor people—decide to destroy the colony as a symbolic act of their hostility to the very rich and all their privileges.

  Another form of symbolism runs through Colony. The hero of the novel is a “perfect man,” a genetically engineered test-tube baby who has never been on Earth. Born in the space colony, he has never left its comforts. Physically as strong and healthy as it is possible for a human being to be, David Adams carries within his head a miniature implanted electronic communications device which puts him in direct contact with the colony’s computerized library. In other words, here we have an Adam in Eden, physically perfect and secure, possessed of all the knowledge he wants.

  Except for knowledge of Earth. Naturally he leaves the colony, escapes to Earth, and learns of how the rest of humankind lives.

  Like the space colony itself, David Adams is a symbol of the best that modern science can achieve. The colony, though, because it is a lifeless structure of metals and minerals, symbolizes what technology can achieve. David, a living example of human perfection, symbolizes what we must be if we are to use our technology for the betterment of the human condition.

  In a more recent novel of mine, Test of Fire, a slightly different form of symbolism showed itself. In this story, much of the Earth has been destroyed by a gigantic solar flare which set the sunlit half of our world afire. While civilization on Earth has sunk to almost a medieval level, the small human outpost on the Moon was virtually untouched by the solar flare, because it was dug deep underground. The lunar outpost is almost self-sufficient; not quite, it still needs certain critical supplies from Earth. And the pitiful remains of civilization on Earth need the technology and scientific knowledge of the lunar pioneers.

  The novel deals with this dichotomy and its resolution. But there is a powerful message in this novel, one that I did not really recognize until the book was nearly finished. Underlying the obvious point that humankind needs both the natural environment of Earth and the technolo
gical knowledge of science in order to survive, is a deeper point: once the human race has established self-sufficient colonies in space, then the continued survival of humankind no longer depends on what we do on Earth.

  Many life forms have appeared on Earth, lived their allotted eons, and then perished into extinction. We human beings now have the power to destroy ourselves with nuclear war or ecological catastrophe. The Sun might one day explode, or some other natural calamity could wipe the Earth clean of human life. But if we have established self-sufficient colonies elsewhere in space, the human race will endure. That is the ultimate justification for space exploration. By expanding into space, humankind can escape the fate of the dinosaurs. A race that has space flight has racial immortality.

  Those are powerful ideas. To deal with them directly, in an essay or some other nonfiction form, is less satisfying than dealing with them in fiction—mainly because fiction allows (requires!) the writer to employ the human dimension. In fiction it is not enough merely to expostulate upon the ideas; the writer must show how these concepts affect human beings, how human lives are altered for the better or the worse.

  To do this, the writer must employ symbolism. Just as the markings we call an alphabet are actually code symbols for sounds of language, the symbols within a story form a code that speaks directly to the human heart. Without symbolism, fiction is lifeless. With the special richness of symbolism that science fiction allows, the complex and sometimes frightening world of today can be examined and understood by studying it in the mirror world of the future.

  Tor Books by Ben Bova

  AS ON A DARKLING PLAIN

  ASSURED SURVIVAL

  THE ASTRAL MIRROR

  BATTLE STATION

  ESCAPE PLUS

  GREMLINS GO HOME (with Gordon R. Dickson)

  THE KINSMAN SAGA (hardcover)

  ORION

  OUT OF THE SUN

  PRIVATEERS

  PROMETHEANS

  TEST OF FIRE

  VOYAGERS II: THE ALIEN WITHIN

  THE FIRST LASER BEAM CAUGHT THEM UNAWARE

  The second laser hit was a high-energy pulse deliberately aimed at the bridge’s observation port. It cracked the impact-resistant plastic as easily as a hammer smashes an egg; the air pressure inside the bridge blew the port open. The six men and women became six exploding bodies spewing blood. There was not even time to scream.

  Commander Hazard grasped the console’s edge with both white-knuckled hands. “You killed six kids,” he said, his voice so low that he barely heard it himself. It was not a whisper but a growl. Buckbee’s lips moved slightly in what might have been a smile, but his eyes remained cold. “We had to prove that we mean business, Hazard. Now surrender your station or we’ll blow you all to hell.”

  BATTLE STATION

  This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.

  BATTLE STATION

  Copyright © 1987 by Ben Bova

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form.

  A TOR Book

  Published by Tom Doherty Associates, Inc.

  49 West 24 Street

  New York, N.Y. 10010

  Cover art by Alan Gutierrez

  eISBN 9781429931144

  First eBook Edition : June 2011