Off The Main Sequence

by Robert A. Heinlein

  Hoyland’s brow wrinkled again. “That is another thing that I don’t understand. Many of these ancient writings speak of the Trip as if it were an actual moving, a going somewhere, as if the Ship itself were no more than a pushcart. How can that be?"

  Nelson chuckled. “How can it, indeed? How can that move which is the background against which all else moves? The answer, of course, is plain. You have again mistaken allegorical language for the ordinary usage of everyday speech. Of course, the Ship is solid, immovable, in a physical sense. How can the whole universe move? Yet, it does move, in a spiritual sense. With every righteous act we move closer to the sublime destination of Jordan’s Plan."

  Hugh nodded. “I think I see."

  “Of course, it is conceivable that Jordan could have fashioned the world in some other shape than the Ship, had it suited His purpose. When man was younger and more poetical, holy men vied with one another in inventing fanciful worlds which Jordan might have created. One school invented an entire mythology of a topsy-turvy world of endless reaches of space, empty save for pinpoints of light and bodiless mythological monsters. They called it the heavenly world, or heaven, as if to contrast it with the solid reality of the Ship. They seemed never to tire of speculating about it, inventing details for it, and of outlining pictures of what they conceived it to be like. I suppose they did it to the greater glory of Jordan, and who is to say that He found their dreams unacceptable? But in this modern age we have more serious work to do."

  Hugh was not interested In astronomy. Even his untutored mind had been able to see in its wild extravagance an intention not literal. He turned to problems nearer at hand.

  “Since the muties are the seed of sin, why do we make no effort to wipe them out? Would not that be an act that would speed the Plan?"

  The old man considered a while before replying. “That is a fair question and deserves a straight answer. Since you are to be a scientist you will need to know the answer. Look at it this way. There is a definite limit to the number of Crew the Ship can support. If our numbers increase without limit, there comes a time when there will not be good eating for all of us. Is it not better that some should die in brushes with the muties than that we should grow in numbers until we killed each other for food?.

  “The ways of Jordan are inscrutable. Even the muties have a part in His Plan."

  It seemed reasonable, but Hugh was not sure.

  But when Hugh was transferred to active work as a junior scientist in the operation of the Ship’s functions, he found there were other opinions. As was customary, he put in a period serving the Converter. The work was not onerous; he had principally to check in the waste materials brought in by porters from each of the villages, keep books of their contributions, and make sure that no redeemable metal was introduced into the first-stage hopper. But it brought him into contact with Bill Ertz, the Assistant Chief Engineer, a man not much older than himself.

  He discussed with him the things he had learned from Nelson, and was shocked at Ertz’s attitude.

  “Get this through your head, kid," Ertz told him. “This is a practical job for practical men. Forget all that romantic nonsense. Jordan’s Plan! That stuff is all right to keep the peasants quiet and in their place, but don’t fall for it yourself. There is no Plan — other than our own plans for looking out for ourselves. The Ship has to have light and heat and power for cooking and irrigation. The Crew can’t get along without those things and that makes us boss of the Crew.

  “As for this softheaded tolerance toward the muties, you’re going to see some changes made! Keep your mouth shut and string along with us."

  It impressed on him that he was expected to maintain a primary loyalty to the bloc of younger men among the scientists. They were a well-knit organization within an organization and were made up of practical, hardheaded men who were working toward improvement of conditions throughout the Ship, as they saw them. They were well knit because an apprentice who failed to see things their way did not last long. Either he failed to measure up and soon found himself back in the ranks of the peasants, or, as was more likely, suffered some mishap and wound up in the Converter.

  And Hoyland began to see that they were right.

  They were realists. The Ship was the Ship. It was a fact, requiring no explanation. As for Jordan — who had ever seen Him, spoken to Him? What was this nebulous Plan of His? The object of life was living. A man was born, lived his life, and then went to the Converter. It was as simple as that, no mystery to it, no sublime Trip and no Centaurus. These romantic stories were simply hangovers from the childhood of the race before men gained the understanding and the courage to look facts in the face.

  He ceased bothering his head about astronomy and mystical physics and all the other mass of mythology he bad been taught to revere. He was still amused, more or less, by the Lines from the Beginning and by all the old stories about Earth — what the Huff was 'Earth,’ anyhow? — but now realized that such things could be taken seriously only by children and dullards.

  Besides, there was work to do. The younger men, while still maintaining the nominal authority of their elders, had plans of their own, the first of which was a systematic extermination of the muties. Beyond that, their intentions were still fluid, but they contemplated making full use of the resources of the Ship, including the upper levels. The young men were able to move ahead with their plans without an open breach with their elders because the older scientists simply did not bother to any great extent with the routine of the Ship. The present Captain had grown so fat that he rarely stirred from his cabin; his aide, one of the young men’s bloc, attended to affairs for him.

  Hoyland never laid eyes on the Chief Engineer save once, when he showed up for the purely religious ceremony of manning landing stations.

  The project of cleaning out the muties required reconnaissance of the upper levels to be done systematically. It was in carrying out such scouting that Hugh Hoyland was again ambushed by a mutie.

  This mutie was more accurate with his slingshot. Hoyland’s companions, forced to retreat by superior numbers, left him for dead.

  Joe-Jim Gregory was playing himself a game of checkers. Time was when they had played cards together, but Joe, the head on the right, had suspected Jim, the left-hand member of the team, of cheating. They had quarreled about it, then given it up, for they both learned early in their joint career that two heads on one pair of shoulders must necessarily find ways of getting along together.

  Checkers was better. They could both see the board, and disagreement was impossible.

  A loud metallic knocking at the door of the compartment interrupted the game. Joe-Jim unsheathed his throwing knife and cradled it, ready for quick use. “Come in!" roared Jim.

  The door opened, the one who had knocked backed into the room — the only safe way, as everyone knew, to enter Joe-Jim’s presence. The newcomer was squat and rugged and powerful, not over four feet in height. The relaxed body of a man hung across one shoulder and was steadied by a hand.

  Joe-Jim returned the knife to its sheath. “Put it down, Bobo," Jim ordered.

  “And close the door," added Joe. “Now what have we got here?"

  It was a young man, apparently dead, though no wound appeared on him. Bobo patted a thigh. “Eat 'im?" he said hopefully. Saliva spilled out of his still-opened lips.

  “Maybe," temporized Jim. “Did you kill him?"

  Bobo shook his undersized head.

  “Good Bobo," Joe approved. “Where did you hit him?"

  “Bobo hit him there." The microcephalic shoved a broad thumb against the supine figure in the area between the umbilicus and the breastbone.

  “Good shot," Joe approved. “We couldn’t have done better with a knife."

  “Bobo good shot," the dwarf agreed blandly. “Want see?" He twitched his slingshot invitingly.

  “Shut up," answered Joe, not unkindly. “No, we don’t want to see; we want to make him talk."

  “Bobo fix," the sh
ort one agreed, and started with simple brutality to carry out his purpose.

  Joe-Jim slapped him away, and applied other methods, painful but considerably less drastic than those of the dwarf. The younger man jerked and opened his eyes.

  “Eat 'im?" repeated Bobo.

  “No," said Joe. “When did you eat last?" inquired Jim.

  Bobo shook his head and rubbed his stomach, indicating with graphic pantomime that it had been a long time, too long. Joe-Jim went over to a locker, opened it, and withdrew a haunch of meat. He held it up. Jim smelled it and Joe drew his head away in nose-wrinkling disgust Joe-Jim threw, it to Bobo, who snatched it happily out of the air. “Now, get out," ordered Jim.

  Bobo trotted away, closing the door behind him. Joe-Jim turned to the captive and prodded him with his foot. “Speak up," said Jim. “Who the Huff are you?"

  The young man shivered, put a hand to his head, then seemed suddenly to bring his surroundings into focus, for be scrambled to his feet, moving awkwardly. against the low weight conditions of this level, and reached for his knife.

  It was not at his belt.

  Joe-Jim had his own out and brandished it. “Be good and you won’t get hurt. What do they call you?" The young man wet his lips, and his eyes hurried about the room. “Speak up," said Joe.

  “Why bother with him?" inquired Jim. “I’d say he was only good for meat. Better call Bobo back."

  “No hurry about that," Joe answered. “I want to talk to him. What’s your name?"

  The prisoner looked again at the knife and muttered, “Hugh Hoyland."

  “That doesn’t tell us much," Jim commented. “What d’you do? What village do you come from? And what were you doing in mutie country?" But this time Hoyland was sullen. Even the prick of the knife against his ribs caused him only to bite his lips. “Shucks," said Joe, “he’s only a stupid peasant. Let’s drop it."

  “Shall we finish him off?"

  “No. Not now. Shut him up."

  Joe-Jim opened the door of a small side compartment, and urged Hugh in with the knife. He then closed and fastened the door and went back to his game. “Your move, Jim."

  The compartment in which Hugh was locked was dark. He soon satisfied himself by touch that the smooth steel walls were entirely featureless save for the solid, securely fastened door. Presently he lay down on the deck and gave himself up to fruitless thinking.

  He had plenty of time to think, time to fall asleep and awaken more than once. And time to grow very hungry and very, very thirsty.

  When Joe-Jim next took sufficient interest in his prisoner to open the door of the cell, Hoyland was not immediately in evidence. He had planned many times what he would do when the door opened and his chance came, but when the event arrived, he was too weak, semi-comatose. Joe-Jim dragged him out … The disturbance roused him to partial comprehension. He sat up and stared around him. “Ready to talk?" asked Jim. Hoyland opened his mouth but no words came out.

  “Can’t you see he’s too dry to talk?" Joe told his twin. Then to Hugh: “Will you talk if we give you some water?"

  Hoyland looked puzzled, then nodded vigorously.

  Joe-Jim returned in a moment with a mug of water. Hugh drank greedily, paused, and seemed about to faint.

  Joe-Jim took the mug from him. “That’s enough for now," said Joe. “Tell us about yourself."

  Hugh did so. In detail, being prompted from time to time by questions from one of the twins, or a kick against his shin.

  Hugh accepted a de facto condition of slavery with no particular resistance and no great disturbance of soul. The word 'slave’ was not in his vocabulary, but the condition was a commonplace in everything he had ever known. There had always been those who gave orders and those who carried them out; he could imagine no other condition, no other type of social organization. It was a fact of life.

  Though naturally he thought of escape.

  Thinking about it was as far as he got. Joe-Jim guessed his thoughts and brought the matter out into the open. Joe told him, “Don’t go getting ideas, youngster. Without a knife you wouldn’t get three levels away in this part of the Ship. If you managed to steal a knife from me, you still wouldn’t make it down to high-weight. Besides, there’s Bobo."

  Hugh waited a moment, as was fitting, then said, “Bobo?"

  Jim grinned and replied, “We told Bobo that you were his to butcher, if he liked, if you ever stuck your head out of our compartments without us. Now he sleeps outside the door and spends a lot of his time there."

  “It was only fair," put in Joe. “He was disappointed when we decided to keep you."

  “Say," suggested Jim, turning his bead toward his brother’s, “how about some fun?" He turned back to Hugh. “Can you throw a knife?"

  “Of course," Hugh answered.

  “Let’s see you. Here." Joe-Jim handed him their own knife. Hugh accepted it, jiggling it in his band to try its balance. “Try my mark."

  Joe-Jim had a plastic target. set up at the far end of the room from his favorite chair, on which he was wont to practice his own skill. Hugh eyed it, and, with an arm motion too fast to follow, let fly. He used the economical underhand stroke, thumb on the blade, fingers together. The blade shivered in the target, well centered in the chewed-up area which marked Joe-Jim’s best efforts. “Good boy!" Joe approved. “What do you have in mind, Jim?"

  “Let’s give him the knife and see how far he gets."

  “No," said Joe, “I don’t agree."

  “Why not?"

  “If Bobo wins, we’re out one servant. If Hugh wins, we lose both Bobo and him. It’s wasteful."

  “Oh, well, if you insist."

  “I do. Hugh, fetch the knife."

  Hugh did so. It had not occurred to him to turn the knife against Joe-Jim. The master was the master. For servant to attack master was not simply repugnant to good morals, it was an idea so wild that it did not occur to him at all.

  Hugh had expected that Joe-Jim would be impressed by his learning as a scientist. It did not work out that way. Joe-Jim, especially Jim, loved to argue. They sucked Hugh dry in short order and figuratively cast him aside. Hoyland felt humiliated. After all, was he not a scientist? Could he not read and write?

  “Shut up," Jim told Hugh. “Reading is simple. I could do it before your father was born. D’you think you’re the first scientist that has served me? Scientists — bah! A pack of ignoramuses!" In an attempt to re-establish his own intellectual conceit, Hugh expounded the theories of the younger scientists, the strictly matter-of-fact, hard-boiled realism which rejected all religious interpretation and took the Ship as it was. He confidently expected Joe-Jim to approve such a point of view; it seemed to fit their temperaments. They laughed in his face.

  “Honest," Jim insisted, when be bad ceased snorting, “are you young punks so stupid as all that? Why you’re worse than your elders."

  “But you just got through saying," Hugh protested in hurt tones, “that all our accepted religious notions are so much bunk. That is just what my friends think. They want to junk all that old nonsense."

  Joe started to speak; Jim cut in ahead of him. “Why bother with him, Joe? He’s hopeless."

  “No, he’s not. I’m enjoying this. He’s the first one I’ve talked with in I don’t know how long who stood any chance at all of seeing the truth. Let us be — I want to see whether that’s a head he has on his shoulders, or just a place to hang his ears."

  “O.K.," Jim agreed, “but keep it quiet. I’m going to take a nap." The left-hand head closed its eyes, soon it was snoring. Joe and Hugh continued their discussion in whispers.

  “The trouble with you youngsters," Joe said, “is that if you can’t understand a thing right off, you think it can’t be true. The trouble with your elders is, anything they didn’t understand they reinterpreted to mean something else and then thought they understood it. None of you has tried believing clear words the way they were written and then tried to understand them on that basis. Oh, no, you’re al
l too bloody smart for that! If you can’t see it right off, it ain’t so; it must mean something different."

  “What do you mean?" Hugh asked suspiciously.

  “Well, take the Trip, for instance. What does it mean to you?

  “Well, to my mind, it doesn’t mean anything. It’s just a piece of nonsense to impress the peasants."

  “And what is the accepted meaning?"

  “Well, it’s where you go when you die, or rather what you do. You make the Trip to Centaurus."

  “And what is Centaurus?"

  “It’s — mind you, I’m just telling you the orthodox answers; I don’t really believe this stuff — it’s where you arrive when you’ve made the Trip, a place where everybody’s happy and there’s always good eating." Joe snorted. Jim broke the rhythm of his snoring, opened one eye, and settled back again with a grunt.

  “That’s just what I mean," Joe went on in a lower whisper. “You don’t use your head. Did it over occur to you that the Trip was just what the old books said It was: the Ship and all the Crew actually going somewhere, moving?" Hoyland thought about it. “You don’t mean for me to take you seriously. Physically, it’s an impossibility. The Ship can’t go anywhere. It already is everywhere. We can make a trip through it, but the Trip, that has to have a spiritual meaning, if it has any."

  Joe called on Jordan to support him. “Now, listen," he said, “get this through that thick head of yours. Imagine a place a lot bigger than the Ship, a lot bigger, with the Ship inside it, moving. D’you get it?"

  Hugh tried. He tried very hard. He shook his bead. “It doesn’t make sense," he said. “There can’t be anything bigger than the Ship. There wouldn’t be any place for it to be."

  “Oh, for Huff’s sake! Listen. Outside the Ship, get that? Straight down beyond the level in every direction. Emptiness out there. Understand me?"

  “But there isn’t anything below the lowest level. That’s why it’s the lowest level."