Melancholy Elephants

by Spider Robinson

  “And do you know that for a considerable time early humans—true humans—possessed, beneath their sentient brains, a vestigial but powerful R-complex?”

  “Of course. The First Great Antinomy.”

  “I have an R-complex.”

  I registered shock. “You cannot possibly be old enough.”

  I could sense his bitter grin before the sight of it crawled to me at lightspeed. “Do you notice anything interesting about this particular star-system?”

  I glanced around. “Barring your presence in it, no.”

  “Consider that planet there. The third.”

  At first glance it was an utterly ordinary planet, used up like a thousand others in this out-of-the-way sector. But after only a few days, I cried out in surprise. “Why…its period of rotation is almost precisely one standard day. And its period of revolution seems to approximate a standard year. And its surface acceleration is a standard gee. Do you mean to tell me that that planet is…uh…”

  “Dirt,” he agreed. “And that star is Sol.”

  “And you imply that—”

  “Yes. I was born here. On that planet, in fact. At a time when all the humans in the universe lived within the confines of this system—and used less than half the planets, at that.”

  “!!!”

  “Do you still wonder that I shun your Bonding?”

  “No. To you, with a reptile brain-stem, it must be the ultimate obscenity.”

  “Defenselessness. Yes.”

  “A thing which can be neither dominated nor compelled. And which itself will not dominate or compel…you must hate us.”

  “Aye.”

  “You could be healed. The reptile part of your brain could…”

  “I could be gelded too. And why not, since none will breed with me? Yet I choose to retain my gonads. And my R-complex.”

  “I see.” I paused in thought. “What prevents you from physically attacking the Bond? I believe you could harm it greatly…perhaps even destroy it.”

  “I repeat, what good is a fight you cannot lose?”

  “Oh.”

  “In the old days…there was glory. There was a galaxy to be tamed, empires to be carved out of the sky, mighty enemies to challenge. Once I pulverized a star. With four allies I battled the Ten of Algol, and after two centuries broke them. There were other sentient races found, in the inner neighbouring arm of the galaxy, and I learned the ways of fighting them.” He paused. “I was honoured in those days. I was one of mankind’s saviours.” A terrible chuckle. “Do you know anything sorrier than an unemployed saviour?”

  “And your fellows?”

  “One day it was all changed. The brain had evolved. Man’s enemies were broken or co-opted. War ended. The cursed Bonding began. At first we fought it as a plague swallowing our charges. But ere long we came to see that it was what they freely chose. Finally there came a day when we had only ourselves to fight.”

  “And?”

  “We fought. Whole systems were laid to waste, alliances were made and betrayed, truly frightening energies were released. The rest of mankind withdrew from us and forgot us.”

  “I can see how this would be.”

  “Man had no need of us. Man was in harmony with himself, and it was now plain that in all the galaxy there were no competing races. For a long time we had hope that there might lie enemies beyond this galaxy—that we might yet be needed. And so we fought mock-combats, preserving ourselves for our race. We dreamed of once again battling to save our species from harm; we dreamed of vindication.”

  A long pause.

  “Then we heard of contact with Bondings of sentient beings from neighbouring galaxies. The Unification began. In rage and despair we fell upon each other, and there was a mighty slaughter. There was one last false alarm of hope when the Malign Bonding of the Crab Nebula was found.” His voice began to tremble with rage. “We waited for your summons. And you…and you…” Suddenly he screamed. “YOU CURED THE BASTARDS!”

  “Listen to me,” I said. “A neuron is a wonderful thing. But when a billion neurons agree to work together, they become a thing a billion times more wonderful—a brain. A mind. There are as many stars in this galaxy as there are neurons in a single human mind. More than coincidence. The galaxy has become a single mind: the Bonding. There are as many galaxies in this universe as there are stars in the average galaxy. Each has, or is developing, its own Bonding. Each of these is to be a neuron in the Cosmic Mind. One day soon Unification will be complete, and the universe will be intelligent. You can be part of that mind, and share in it.”

  “No,” he said emphatically. “If I am part of the Cosmic Mind, then I am part of its primitive subconscious mind. The subconscious is useful only for preservation from outside threat. As your brain evolved beyond your ancestors’ subconscious mind, your universal mind has evolved beyond me. There is nothing in the plenum that you need fear.” He leaned forward in sudden pain, embraced his asteroid with his arms as well as his legs. I began moving closer to him, not so rapidly as to alarm him if he should look up, but not slowly.

  “When we understood this,” he said, “we warriors fell upon each other anew. Four centuries ago Jarl and I allied to defeat The One in Red. That left only each other. We made it last as long as we could. It was perhaps the greatest battle ever fought. Jarl was very, very good. That was why I saved him for last.”

  “And you overcame him?”

  “Since then I have been alone.” He lifted his head quickly and roared at the universe, “Jarl, you son of a bitch, why didn’t you kill me?” He put his face again to the rock.

  I could not tell if he had seen me approaching.

  “And in all the years since, you have had no opponent?”

  “I tried cloning myself once. Useless. No clone can have my experience and training; the environment which produced me no longer exists. What good is a fight you cannot lose?”

  I thought for some time, coming ever closer. “Why do you not suicide?”

  “What good is a fight you cannot lose?”

  I was near now. “Then all these years, you have prayed for an enemy?”

  “Aye.” His voice was despairing.

  “Your prayer is answered.”

  He stiffened. His head came up and he saw me.

  “I represent the Bonding of the Crab,” I said then. “The cure was imperfect,” and I did direct at him a laser.

  I was near, but he was quick, and his mirror-shield deflected my bolt even before he could have had time to absorb my words. I followed the laser with other energies, and he dodged, deflected or neutralized them as fast as they could be mounted.

  There was an instant’s pause then, and I saw a grin begin slowly and spread across his face. He flung his own weapons into space.

  “I am delivered,” he cried, and then he shifted his mass, throwing his planetoid into a spin. When it lay between us, I thought he had struck it with both feet, for suddenly it was rushing toward me. Of course I avoided it easily—but as it passed, he darted around from behind it, where he had been hidden, and grappled with me physically. He had hurled the rock not with his feet, but with a reaction drive.

  Then did I understand why he kept such an ancient body-form, for it was admirably suited to single combat. I had more limbs, but weaker, and one by one my own weapons were torn from me and hurled into the void. Meanwhile mental energies surged against each other from both sides, and space began to writhe around us.

  Mentally I was stronger than he, for he had been long alone, and mental muscles can be exercised only on another mind. But his physical power was awesome, and his ferocity a thing incomprehensible to me.

  And now I see the end coming. Soon his terrible hands will reach my brain-case and rip it asunder. When this occurs, my body will explode with great force, and we shall both die. He knows this, and in this instant of time before the end, I know what he is doing, beneath his shield where I cannot probe. He is composing his last message for transmission to you, h
is people, his Bonding. He is warning you of mortal danger. He is telling you where to find his hidden clone samples, where to find the records he has made of everything he knows about combat, how to train his clones to be almost as good as he is. And he is feeling the satisfaction of vindication. I could have told you! he is saying. Ye who knew not my worth, who had forgotten me, yet will I save you!

  This is my own last message to you, to the same people, to the same Bonding. It worked. He believes me. I have accomplished what you asked of me. He has the death he craved.

  We will die together, he and I. And that is meet and proper, for I am the last Healer in the cosmos, and now I too am unemployed.

  True Minds

  True Minds

  Locating her was no trouble at all. He tried the first bar that he came to, and as he cleared the door the noise told him that he had found her.

  Behind the bar, the proprietor glanced around and recognized Paul, and his expression changed radically. He had been in the midst of punching a phone number; now he cleared the screen and came over to Paul.

  “Hi, Scotty.”

  “Another one, Mr Curry?” He jerked a thumb over his shoulder toward the back of the bar. Just around a corner and out of sight, a small riot seemed to be in progress; as Scotty pointed, a large man sailed gracefully into view and landed so poorly that Paul decided he had been unconscious before he hit. The ruckus continued despite his absence.

  “Afraid so, Scotty. I’m sorry.”

  “Jesus Christ. It’s bad enough when they cry, but what the hell am I supposed to do with this? I dunno, I’m old fashioned, but I liked it back when ladies had to be ladylike.”

  A half-full quart of scotch emerged from the rear of the room at high speed and on a flat trajectory. It took out the mirror behind the bar and at least a dozen other bottles.

  Paul almost smiled. “That is, and always has been, ladylike,” he said, nodding toward the source of airborne objects. “What you mean is, you liked it better when, if it came to it, you could beat them up.”

  “Is that what I mean? Maybe it is. Mr Curry, why in hell don’t he just tell them?”

  “Think about it, Scotty,” Paul advised. “If it were you…would you tell them?”

  “Why—” the innkeeper began, and paused. He thought about it. “Why—” he began again, and again paused. “I guess,” he said at last, “I wouldn’t at that.” The sound of breaking glass took him back from his thoughts. “But honest to God, Mr Curry, you gotta do something. I’m ready to call the heat—and I can’t. You know who she is. But what if I don’t report it and somebody gets—”

  A scream came from the back, a male voice, but so high and shrill that both men clenched their thigh muscles in empathy.

  “—see?” Scotty finished.

  “You’re covered,” Paul told him. “From here on it’s my problem,” and he legged it for the source of the commotion.

  As he rounded the corner she was just disposing of the last bouncer. The man had height, mass, and reach over her, but none of them seemed to be doing him any good. He was jackknifed forward, chin outthrust, in perfect position from her point of view; she was slapping him with big roundhouse swings, alternating left and right, slapping his unshaven face from side to side. Paul could not decide whether the bouncer was too preoccupied with his aching testicles to be aware of the slaps, or whether he welcomed them as an aid to losing consciousness. If the latter, his strategy worked—one last terrific left rolled up his eyes and put him down and out before Paul had time to intervene.

  Paul Curry was, if the truth be known, terrified. He was slightly built, and lacked the skill, temperament, and training for combat which had not been enough to help the sleeping bouncer. Utensil, he thought wildly, where is there a utensil? Say, a morningstar. Nothing useful presented itself.

  But love can involve one in strange and complex obligations, and so he moved forward emptyhanded.

  She pivoted to face him, dropped into a crouch. He stopped short of engagement range and displayed the emptiness of his hands. “Miss Wingate,” he began. He saw her eyes focus, watched her recognize him, and braced himself.

  She left her crouch, straightened to her full height, and in the loudest voice he had ever heard coming from a woman she roared, “He doesn’t know ANYTHING about love!”

  And then—he would never forget it, it was one of the silliest and most terrible things he had ever seen—she clenched her right fist and cut loose, a short, vicious chop square on the button. Her own button. She went down harder than the bouncer had.

  Scotty stuck his head gingerly around the corner. “Nice shot, Mr Curry. I didn’t know you could punch like that.”

  Paul thought, I am in a Hitchcock movie. Briefly he imagined himself trying to explain to the bartender that Anne Wingate had punched herself out. “Well,” he said, “you’ve never pissed me off, Scotty. Give me a hand, will you?”

  They got her onto a chair, checked pulse and pupils, failed to bring her around with smelling salts. “All right,” Paul said at last, “I’ll take her to my place and she can sleep it off.” The bartender looked unhappy. “Don’t worry, Scotty. I’m a gentleman.”

  “I know that, Mr Curry,” Scotty said, looked scandalized. “But what do I—”

  “There’ll be no beef to you,” Paul said. “I’ll see to it. She was never here, right?”

  Scotty looked around at the carnage. “I’ll say it was a platoon of Marines.”

  “That’ll work.”

  “Mr Curry, honest to God, if Senator Wingate comes down on me, forty years of squeeze goes right down the—”

  “The Senator will never hear a word about this, Scotty. Trust me.”

  Paul was painfully aware that his promise was backed by nothing at all. By the time the cab arrived he was feeling pessimistic—he insisted that the driver prove to him that his batteries held adequate charge. It is not necessarily a disaster to run out of juice, even in an Abandoned Area; one simply buttons up and waits for the transponder to fetch the police. But if one is in the company of the unconscious daughter of an extremely powerful man at the time, one can scarcely hope to stay out of the newstapes.

  The batteries were indeed charged; the offended driver insisted that Paul prove he had the fare. As Paul and Scotty were loading her into the cab, she opened one eye, murmured, “Not a single thing,” and was out again. The trip was uneventful; even when the driver was forced to skirt Eagle turf, they drew only desultory small arms fire. She slept through it all.

  Luck was with him; she did not begin vomiting until just as he was getting her out of the cab. Nonetheless he tipped the cabbie extra heavily, both by way of apology and to encourage amnesia. Mollified, the driver waited until Paul had gotten her safely indoors before pulling away.

  She was half awake now. He managed to walk her most of the way to the bathroom. She sat docilely on the commode while he got her soiled clothes off. He knew she would return to full awareness very shortly after the first blast of cold shower hit her, and he was still determined not to be beaten up by her if he could avoid it. So he sat her down in the tub, made sure everything she would need was available, slapped the shower button and sprinted from the room while the water was still gurgling up the pipes. He was halfway to his laundry unit when the first scream sounded. It was the opening-gun of a great deal of cacophony, but he had thoughtfully locked the bathroom door behind him; the noise had ceased altogether by the time he had coffee and toast prepared.

  He went down the hall, unlocked the bathroom door. “Miss Wingate,” he said in a firm, clear voice, “the coffee is ready when you are.”

  The response was muttered.

  “Beg pardon?”

  “I said, Phillip Rose doesn’t know one goddamned thing about love.”

  “The coffee will stay hot. Take your time.” He went back to the kitchen and poured himself a cup. In about five minutes she came in. She wore the robe he had left for her. Her hair was in a towel. Very few people can mana
ge the trick of being utterly formal and distant while dressed in robe and towel, but she had had expert training from an early age. She did not tell him how seldom she did this sort of thing, because she assumed he knew that.

  “May I have some coffee, Mr Curry?”

  He watched the steadiness of her hand as she picked up the cup, and wondered if, given her money, he could buy himself physical resilience like that, or if a person just had to be born with it.

  “Thank you for looking after me,” she said. “I’m sorry I’ve been such a bother. I’ve put you to no end of expense and difficulty and I…not the first damned thing about it. This is very good coffee, Mr. how can you work for a phoney like that?”

  “I liked you better drunk.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “And if you call Mr Rose a phoney again, Miss Wingate, I will as politely as possible punch you in the mouth.” Or die trying, he added to himself.

  She took her time answering. “I apologize Mr Curry. I am a guest under your roof. Forgive my bad manners.” She looked suddenly sheepish. “This really is excellent coffee. Are my clothes salvageable?”

  He was getting used to her Stengelese conversational style. “There was no difficulty and your apology is accepted and I’m pleased you like the coffee and he knows a great deal more about love than anyone alive and your clothes are in the laundry. Did I leave anything out?”

  She looked stubborn and drank her coffee. He poured more, and passed her her purse so that she could have a cigarette. “Don’t worry,” he said as she lit up. “The aspirins should take effect any minute.”

  She almost choked on smoke. “How do you know I took aspirins?” she asked sharply.

  He raised an eyebrow. “Afraid I spied on you in my own bathroom? Miss Wingate, how do you think you got in the tub? I don’t strip all my guests, but you were covered with vomit. Look, you got hurt and then drunk and then crazy, and then you passed out and woke up in a squall of icewater. If your head doesn’t hurt, you’re dead. There are aspirin in my medicine chest, clearly marked, and I assume you have an instinct for self-preservation.”