by Ben Bova
He saw snippets of Gandhi’s description of the nonviolent approach to political freedom.
The term Satyagraha was coined by me … the computer spelled out over a scene of police beating unresisting Indian men and women in old, grainy, black-and-white newsreel footage. Its root meaning is “holding on to truth,” hence “force of righteousness.” I have also called it love force or soul force.… I discovered in the earliest stages that pursuit of truth did not permit violence being inflicted on one’s opponent … for what appears truth to the one may appear to be error to the other. And patience means self-suffering. So the doctrine came to mean vindication of truth, not by the infliction of suffering on the opponent, but on one’s self.
Umber sank back in his desk chair and stared at the words of Gandhi. Eyes wide with discovery, he told himself, That’s a form of Christianity! Not by inflicting suffering on one’s opponent, but on one’s self.
That is the way to deal with Waxman and the people around him. Satyagraha. The force of righteousness.
He raised his eyes to the ceiling of his office and his vision seemed to penetrate through it and out into the limitless depths of space.
“Lord, help me in this quest for righteousness.”
He heard no reply, but he neither expected to nor needed to. He had found his way and was fully committed to it, mind and heart and soul.
Yet a thin, hard voice in his mind asked, All right, then. What’s your first step?
THE FIRST STEP
“Please come in, Reverend,” said Raven, gesturing her visitor into her living room.
Reverend Umber stepped somewhat hesitantly into Raven’s apartment. Alicia Polyani was already there, sitting on the sofa beneath the view of Uranus turning serenely on its axis.
“Thank you,” said Umber. “It’s good of you to see me.” He went to the sling chair in front of the sofa and lowered himself carefully into it.
Before either of the women could say anything, Umber began, “I’ve come to ask the two of you to help me organize a cabal, a protest against what Evan Waxman is doing to our habitat.”
Raven glanced at Alicia, then turned back to Umber. “A protest?”
“A nonviolent protest that could break Waxman’s control of Haven.”
“That sounds … interesting,” said Raven.
“It sounds dangerous,” Alicia murmured.
* * *
“This is like looking for a needle in a haystack,” complained Zworkyn.
“It’s there,” said Tómas, sitting on the edge of the sofa in Zworkyn’s living room. The wall screen across the room showed views of the stars from one of Farside Observatory’s wide-field Schmidt telescopes.
“It’s there,” Tómas repeated, without taking his eyes off the star-littered screen. “We just have to find it.”
“A tiny needle in a huge haystack. A minuscule needle in an enormous haystack.”
Tómas shook his head stubbornly. “We’ve estimated what its magnitude should be. We just have to search until we find it.”
Zworkyn stared at the younger man. “Look, Tómas. We’ve set the parameters. We’ve estimated the range of magnitudes that the moon would show, we’ve calculated how far from our solar system it would be. And we’ve found nothing. Nothing even remotely similar to what we’re looking for.”
Tómas nodded absently, still staring at the screen. “All right, so it’s not in this view. We still have six other Schmidt images to look at.”
“It’s dinner time,” Zworkyn grumbled. “Past dinner time.”
“Go ahead and eat. I want to look at the next display.”
Zworkyn shook his head unhappily, but didn’t move from the sofa.
* * *
“Passive resistance?” Alicia asked.
“Yes,” said Umber. “It’s the way to break Waxman’s control. It’s a hard way, a difficult way. It requires enormous self-control, enormous sacrifice—”
“But you expect the people of this habitat to set themselves down in front of the manufacturing tower and let the security police beat them?”
Umber nodded silently.
Raven murmured, “That’s asking a lot from them. Maybe more than they can give you.”
“They wouldn’t be giving it to me,” Umber corrected. “They’d be giving it to themselves. To each other. They’d be winning back control of this habitat.”
“You expect them to allow themselves to be beaten to a pulp?”
“Yes,” said Umber. “And I’ll be the first one in line.”
“I don’t think it would work,” Alicia said. “They’d break and run as soon as the police started hitting them.”
Umber sighed. “Perhaps they would.”
“I would,” said Alicia.
* * *
“Umber’s been in there for a long time,” said Sergeant Jacobi.
The viewscreen in Evan Waxman’s living room showed the passageway outside Raven Marchesi’s apartment. Occasionally someone walked past. But what was going on inside the apartment?
Feeling frustrated, Waxman wondered, “What’s he doing in there with the two women?”
“Getting laid.”
Waxman looked sharply at the sergeant. “Not him. I think he’s impotent.”
“H’mmph.”
Waxman got up from his desk chair. “We should have bugged that woman’s apartment.”
“Now you think of it.”
Shaking his head disconsolately, Waxman said, “Umber wouldn’t let me. He said that people’s private quarters should remain private.”
“Great humanitarian thinker,” Jacobi sneered.
“Well, it’s too late—”
“Hey! Here he comes.” Jacobi pointed to the wall screen, which showed Kyle Umber leaving Raven’s apartment.
Waxman studied the reverend’s face as he started up the passageway. “He looks very serious. Very somber.”
Jacobi huffed. “He didn’t get laid.”
PLANNING
“Let them hit me?”
Raven nodded.
“But that’s crazy.”
“It’s passive resistance,” she said. “It’s worked in the past, back on Earth.”
Raven was sitting on the sofa in the living room of her quarters, Alicia beside her. Sitting on the sling chair facing them was Syon Shekhar, head of the habitat’s plumbers guild. Small, thin almost to the point of emaciation, dark of skin, hair and eyes, his face was set in an expression of dismayed disbelief.
“You want me to tell my people to go out and sit on the lawn in front of the Chemlab Building and allow the security guards to beat them?”
Raven nodded, tight-lipped.
“Get real,” Shekhar snapped. “That’s crazy.”
Alicia repeated, “It’s called passive resistance.”
“It’s called lunacy,” said Shekhar.
“It originated in your country,” Raven coaxed. “Gandhi used it—”
“My country is South Africa,” Shekhar interrupted. “For the past eleven generations.”
“Whatever,” said Raven, undeterred. “Passive resistance can work. It’s worked in the past.”
Shaking his head, Shekhar objected, “So you expect my people to go out and sit in front of the Chemlab Building and let the security goons split their skulls?”
“I’ll let them split my skull,” said Raven.
“And mine,” Alicia added.
“You’re both crazy.”
With a slow smile creeping across her face, Alicia coaxed, “You mean you wouldn’t be willing to do what the two of us intend to do? You’d let us show more guts than you would?”
“You’ll show more guts, all right,” Shekhar countered, getting to his feet. “And brains. And blood.”
Raven stood up too, barely as tall as Shekhar’s thin shoulders. “Will you at least tell your people about it? Will you do that much?”
With a resigned shrug, Shekhar answered, “Sure, I’ll tell them. But they’re not going to go fo
r it, I can tell you that right now.”
“Maybe,” Raven admitted.
* * *
“So how many do we have?” Kyle Umber asked the two women.
The minister was in his own private quarters, sitting in front of the viewscreen that took up most of the far wall of his living room. Raven and Alicia sat huddled together on the sofa of Raven’s living room.
“Not many,” answered Alicia.
“Most of the group leaders were surprised when we told them about it.”
“Shocked.”
Umber bit his lower lip. “This will only work if we have a big turnout.”
“I know,” Raven replied. “But the idea seems to shock them.”
“It’s too new. Too different,” said Alicia.
“Maybe if I tried to explain it to them,” said Umber. “Show them what we’re trying to accomplish.…”
Raven shook her head. “We can’t have you meeting with all the habitat’s group leaders. Waxman would catch on to what we’re trying to do.”
Alicia nodded minimally. “Benjamin Franklin said three people can keep a secret—if two of them are dead.”
Umber nodded back at her. “I just hope Waxman’s not tapping into our communications with each other.”
“No,” said Alicia. “I asked the leader of the communications group and he told me no one has asked to read private messages.”
“Not yet,” breathed Raven.
“Evan would have to bring any such request to the Council for a vote,” Umber said. But his voice did not sound certain about the idea.
“Why couldn’t you record a speech, Reverend Umber,” asked Raven, “so we could give copies of it to the various group leaders.”
Umber’s expression changed from doubt to a glimmering hint of possibility. “A speech,” he said, savoring the idea. “A short, strong speech.”
* * *
The next morning, Umber sat at the desk in his living room, staring at the viewscreen on the wall opposite his sofa. The screen was broken into half a dozen scripts, quotations from brilliant, successful speeches of the past.
“When you decide to steal,” Umber muttered to himself, “steal from the best.”
Leaning back in his comfortable desk chair, Umber began reading. These are the times that try men’s souls. He paused momentarily, then went on. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph.
He stopped and stared at the words of Thomas Paine that he had just quoted. They were good enough to rally the upstart American colonists against the world-girdling British Empire, he thought. Maybe they’ll help to raise the residents of this habitat against Waxman’s tyranny.
He fervently hoped so.
DISCUSSION
When in doubt about what to say, Gordon Abbott always unconsciously tugged at his moustache. He was pulling it now hard enough to make himself wince.
Reverend Umber’s image filled his office’s wall screen, looking uncertain, worried, almost fearful.
Abbott jerked his hand away from his face and asked, “You want me to contact the Interplanetary Council and ask them to give you a hearing?”
Nodding slightly, Umber replied, “So that we can apply for membership to the Council.”
Blinking anxiously at the reverend, Abbott asked, “Why don’t you call them yourself?”
His round face showing obvious distress, Umber admitted, “Because my calls are blocked.”
“Blocked? By whom?”
“Evan Waxman.”
“Your own chief administrator?”
With a lugubrious nod, Umber explained, “Evan has taken control of the habitat’s council. He’s running Haven, not me. He won’t let me contact Earth under any circumstances.”
Abbott pondered that admission for several long, silent moments, consciously keeping his hands folded tightly on his desktop.
“He’s controlling this habitat’s government, then?”
“To a large degree, yes.”
“I see,” said Abbott. He pursed his lips, glanced up at the ceiling of his office, squirmed uncomfortably in his desk chair.
At last he said, “Actually, I’m here at your habitat at your request. I’m not a citizen of Haven. I shouldn’t get involved in your politics.”
“But this wouldn’t involve you in our politics,” Umber replied. “All you would be doing is sending a message from me to Harvey Millard, the IC’s executive director. Let him know that I want to converse with him.”
“And you think that Waxman will let my message go through to him?”
“I hope so. He can’t be blocking all of the habitat’s communications with Earth.”
“You think not?”
“I hope not.”
Abbott stared at Reverend Umber’s round, pinkish face. The man seemed sincere enough. More than that. He looked determined, desperate.
“I know Millard,” he said. “He’s a decent chap.”
“Then you’ll call him?”
“It might be better if I didn’t try to reach Millard directly. I’ve been sending progress reports to my people Earthside. I’ll slip your request into one of them. My next one, in fact. It’s due to go out tomorrow.”
Umber broke into a grateful smile. “God bless you, Dr. Abbott! God bless you!”
* * *
Syon Shekhar hated it when his meetings broke into a hassle of individual arguments. He stood in front of his twelve local organizers, who packed his living room, taking every chair in his quarters and even sitting on the carpeted floor. Hands on his narrow hips, he watched his subordinates gabbling at one another.
Like a pack of stupid chickens, he thought. This idea has unsettled them all. It’s like nothing they’ve ever heard of.
Despite his distaste, he let them squabble for a full five minutes before calling the meeting to order again.
Standing before them, he said, “There’s nothing much to argue about.” The twelve men and women looked up at him with expressions of surprise, uncertainty, even outright fear on their faces.
“Just sit there and let them hit us?” cried one of the men.
“We could get hurt!”
“Or killed!”
Shekhar waved them to silence. “You saw Reverend Umber’s vid, same as I did. He’s asking for our help. Do we give it or not?”
“We can’t order our people to let themselves get beaten!”
“No,” agreed Shekhar. “It’s all got to be completely voluntary.”
One of the women, her voice quavering, said, “Just sit there and let them hit us?”
“That’s what Reverend Umber is asking of us. He’s asking all the people in the habitat. What’s our answer going to be?”
“I think it’s crazy!”
Another of the women scrambled to her feet. “Listen. The security goons are people like you and me. They’re not going to kill us.”
“No, they’ll just make us wish we were dead.”
Shekhar realized this debate could go on indefinitely. Raising his hands, he asked, “All right, all right. Will you tell your people about this? Ask them to show up when Reverend Umber wants us to?”
They reluctantly agreed. Very reluctantly.
SUSPICION
“I don’t like it,” said the security chief. He was sitting at his desk, as usual, but the expression on his hard-bitten face as he stared at his office wall screen showed suspicion, doubt, worry.
“They’re up to something,” the chief muttered.
Sergeant Jacobi, sitting in front of the chief’s desk, nodded agreement. “Yeah, but what?”
The wall screen showed a section of the habitat’s main passageway filled with men and women walking along. But instead of their usual pairs or individuals, most of them were clustered in groups of five or six or more. They were chattering among themselves, too low for the security microphones set into the ceiling to pick up more than a random snatch of a phra
se. Worse, they would occasionally glance up at the cameras and microphones and lower their voices even more.
“They’re up to something,” the chief repeated, his chiseled features set in a grim, hard expression.
Jacobi suppressed an urge to ask again, But what?
The chief focused his steel-blue eyes on Jacobi. “What have you heard?”
With a shrug, the sergeant replied, “Not a helluva lot. Something’s in the wind, that’s for sure. But what it is…” Again he shrugged. “… we don’t know yet.”
“Your informers haven’t picked up anything?”
“I’ve picked up a few hints about ‘passive resistance.’ But what the hell that is and how it fits into the situation here is pretty much a mystery.”
“Passive resistance,” the chief repeated. “Doesn’t sound very dangerous.”
“Maybe not. But just about everybody in the whole damned habitat seems to be in on whatever the hell they’re buzzing about.”
“Everybody except us,” the chief growled.
“We could pick up a couple people at random and squirt ’em with truth serum.”
“And have Umber come howling down on us?” The chief shook his head.
“Maybe if we question the reverend himself…”
“On what grounds? We still have to follow the law. We can’t start an investigation before we know what we’re looking for. This isn’t Chicago, for God’s sake. Or Hitler’s Germany.”
Jacobi didn’t answer. But he was thinking, Umber knows what’s going on. If we could just squeeze him a little, he’d spill his guts.
“So what do we do?” Jacobi asked.
Obviously unhappy, the chief said, “We watch and wait. And lean on our informers.”
We follow the law, Jacobi said to himself. The hoi polloi can keep secrets and we have to try to find out what the hell they’re up to without stepping on any of their precious goddamn rights.
