[Jan Darzek 05] - The Whirligig of Time

by Lloyd Biggle, Jr.

  "Computers," Darzek muttered, "are never any smarter than the people using them."

  In the end he probably would have to send someone to Cwafcwa, and when that person rendered a report the problem would land on Darzek's desk again and he would have to make a decision - and by that time the industrial complex on Cwafcwa already would be built. It might even have aged to a state of obsolescence.

  Such were the complications of governing a galaxy. Darzek pushed the pile of printout aside and longed again for a crisis.

  A gong sounded.

  Hopefully Darzek stepped to the communications screen and pressed a button. The gong meant that another member of the council was calling, and that member's crisis, if he, she, or it had one, could be as satisfactory as one of Darzek's own. At the very least it would give him an excuse for ignoring Supreme's outpouring of trivia.

  But the figure that greeted him was a disappointment. FOUR, the Fourth Councilor, was charged with matters of science and scientific development, but insofar as Darzek was aware, he did nothing at all. He was the council's nonentity, a faceless life form with a row of sensory humps located across his shoulders. When he was alert, the humps were constantly twitching and jerking as he focused and refocused his organs of sight and hearing, but he rarely was alert. He dozed through most council meetings, and when he did speak it was in echoing platitudes, because his vocal apparatus was located in his stomach, near his brain, and his every remark seemed to arrive from an enormous distance, as though he were his own ventriloquist.

  Darzek began the politely formal greeting that tradition demanded, and FOUR interrupted him impatiently. "May we call on you at once, Gul Darr?'

  "Of course," Darzek responded. The screen went blank.

  So it was a crisis, from a most unpromising sour~. Not only had FOUR omitted the traditional amenities, but he hadn't bothered to tell Darzek whom he was bringing. Frowning, Darzek pressed another button. FOUR of course knew the transmitter code for Darzek's official residence; but a councilor admitted visitors to his official residence, which was equipped with direct links to Supreme, with care. As First Councilor, Darzek possessed unusual powers and prerogatives, and he had reason to be especially wary. He received unknown visitors only in his private residence, and his pressing of the button automatically directed them there.

  He touched off the proper code on his personal transmitter and stepped through.

  FOUR already was waiting for him with two strangers. They were natives of the world of Primores, the artificial world that was at the same time the computer Supreme and the capital of the galaxy. This meant almost inevitably that they were civil servants. Darzek greeted them with grave politeness as FOUR performed introductions:

  UrsWannl, director of the Galactic Survey; and UrsNollf, head of the Department of Astrophysics.

  Darzek escorted them into his study and offered chairs. As was customary in the home of anyone who frequently entertained a variety of life forms, there were seating devices of various shapes and functions available. Darzek's visitors ignored them. Darzek faced them, waiting expectantly to be informed of some looming catastrophe that might add interest to his life for a few days or even a term or two.

  Finally UrsWannl took a step toward the galaxy's First Councilor and blurted, "There is a new star!"

  Darzek looked from one solemn face to the other and then to FOUR, who had no face. He managed to conceal his disappointment. "I'm no astronomer," he said lightly. "Nor am I an astrophysicist. But I distinctly recall reading or hearing that stars are in the process of formation all the time. If that's true, a new star shouldn't be a surprising event. Is the Galactic Synthesis expected to sponsor a christening ceremony?"

  UrsNollf blurted, "This new star should not exist. And yet it does."

  Darzek asked politely, "Are there scientific rules about a star being born?"

  "Call them rules, or laws, or precepts, or scientific principles or whatever you choose," UrsNollf answered tartly. "Certain conditions are absolutely essential. In any event, when a known planet turns into a star -"

  Darzek interrupted politely. "Perhaps we should sit down and consider this unexplained birth from the beginning."

  They selected chairs for themselves, and Darzek perched himself on the edge of the one nearest to them. Primorian natives were almost as strange-looking as FOUR, but the bulging hump set atop their shoulders contained their brains, and they had faces, on heads that protruded from their chests. As civil servants they were fanatically loyal and extremely intelligent. They also possessed a fondness for red tape that was endemic in every bureaucracy Darzek had ever encountered.

  They waited politely until Darzek prompted them. "About this star -"

  "We received a report," UrsWannl said, "of a double-star system where the official chart showed a single star with seven planets. The sun is called Nifron. Have you a projector?"

  "Coordinates?" Darzek asked.

  UrsWannl told him; and Darzek quickly transferred the numbers to a keyboard. Instantly a slice of the galaxy was projected just above their heads. UrsWannl indicated one of the specks of light. "Focus, please." Darzek did so, zooming in on that sun until it had enlarged enormously and its seven planets were visible.

  UrsWannl said, "There are occasional reports of this kind, and invariably, for one reason or another, they prove to be in error. The fact is that by this late date the galaxy has been surveyed and resurveyed, and the official charts have been in use long enough to have had even the most subtle of errors detected. Even so, as a matter of policy, any challenge to a chart is investigated at once."

  "Naturally," Darzek said. "So of course you investigated this one." "Expecting to find that a simple error of observation had occasioned the complaint. Usually the observer happens to see two stars in such an alignment that they can be mistaken for a double star. It's occurred often. Instead, we found that the report was correct. The fourth planet, known as Nifron D, has inexplicably turned into a sun."

  "Inexplicably?" Darzek repeated. The very word made him feel skeptical. Too often the inexplicable merely meant that someone was inobservant, uninformed, misinformed, or stupid. "In all of the galaxy is there no precedence? It seems to me that I've heard of protostars - bodies that are in the process of becoming stars. In my own solar system, the largest planet has been called a protostar or a dark star." _

  "A gaseous planet of the proper chemical composition might contract to the point of turning into a star," UrsNollf said. "But this planet was not gaseous. The system was surveyed carefully. We have detailed descriptions and even surface specimens of each of the planets."

  "Are you saying that the fourth planet was ordinary dirt and rock and so on?" Darzek demanded.

  "It was."

  "That doesn't sound like very promising stuff for star material."

  "Not very," UrsNollf agreed dryly.

  "Has such a thing been known to occur before?" "Never."

  "The world was unpopulated?"

  "A barren planet in an excessively barren system." "Then no damage has been done."

  UrsNollf heaved a sigh. "Only to our carefully established knowledge of physical processes. I refuse to believe that such a thing could happen naturally."

  "If it didn't happen naturally, then an intelligent agency was involved - accidentally or intentionally."

  UrsNollf grunted his assent. "But we can hardly consider it an accident. No one could accidently turn such a planet into a sun. It would have to be done deliberately, and it would involve enormously complicated preparations and expenses. Why would anyone go to that much trouble with a barren planet in a remote and insignificant system? And who would know how to do such a thing? As far as we know, no one."

  Darzek said thoughtfully, "There may be some natural process, something perfectly simple and understandable, that science knows nothing about."

  "There may be." UrsNollf hunched his hump forward. "That is how progress is made in science. We k
eep discovering new phenomena, and we have ·to devise explanations for them - and then we keep revising the explanations as more phenomena are discovered and eventually we arrive at the truth - or at what seems to be the truth. But it'll require a great deal of convincing to make any scientist accept this particular phenomenon as a natural occurrence. Turning that planet into a sun had to be a deliberate act. If so, the implications fall outside the realm of the scientist. This is why we came to you."

  "We're going to investigate the phenomenon in person," UrsWannl said. "We'd like you to accompany us."

  "Thank you, but no," Darzek said firmly. "I'm not any kind of scientist. There's no possible assistance I could give to such an expedition. If I went with you, I'd be a mere passenger. You should take the best experts available."

  After some discussion, the two civil servants agreed. "But we may never find out what happened," FOUR said glumly. "We can hardly land on a sun and look for evidence."

  Darzek saw them to the transmitter. Then he returned to his official residence and the accumulating roll of reports from Supreme. "The problem with acquiring the reputation as a miracle worker," he told himself ruefully, ':is that the audience is never satisfied. It's like eating one potato chip. They even begin to expect a miracle where none is called for. They'll probably find a simple scientific explanation and return home wishing they hadn't mentioned Nifron D."

  His gong rang.

  He pressed the answer button. This time it was FIVE's bright multiplicity of eyes that faced him. The Fifth Councilor was a conical head and a twig of a body surrounded by multifingered tentacles. A brilliant surgeon - her numerous limbs and fingers gave her advantages no human doctor could approach - she was the council's medical authority. Her weak natural voice had to be amplified drastically to be heard, and it had a metallic static about it.

  She said cheerfully, "A mystery for you, Gul Darr."

  Darzek chuckled. He was extremely fond of FIVE, and he admired her competence without reservation. "Another one?" he asked. "FOUR was just here with the director of the Galactic Survey and the head of the Department of Astrophysics. They found a sun where there isn't supposed to be one."

  "This is a much smaller problem," FIVE said. "I've found a patient where there isn't supposed to be one."

  Darzek seated himself and said, "Tell me about it." The Fifth Councilor would not bother him with anything less than a truly unusual mystery.

  "The world is called Skarnaf," FIVE said. Darzek punched the reference and gazed blankly at the sector of the galaxy that was projected in tiny lights above his head.

  "Anything remarkable about the location?" he asked.

  "Nothing," FIVE answered. "And that's what's so remarkable. A youth - a native of the planet - has been discovered there suffering from radiation burns."

  Darzek waited politely.

  "He was hideously burned from a massive overdose of radiation and yet there is no place on the planet where he could have received it."

  "A hospital?" Darzek suggested. "X rays?"

  "Impossible. There is no form of medical radiology that could begin to account for such an overdose."

  "A nuclear power planet?"

  "It's a primitive world. It hasn't progressed as far as anything that old-fashioned. A careful investigation has turned up no place on the planet where he could have been exposed to any kind of radiation."

  "Then he must have suffered it somewhere else," Darzek said. "An accident in space?"

  "That must be the answer. But in that case, how did he come to be found lying by the road in a rural area of Skarnaf? A ship could have put him down by point transmission, but no ship could have approached the planet that closely without detection. Anyway, why would one bother? If it wanted him to receive medical attention, it would have delivered him to a transfer station for transmission to a hospital on the surface. If it merely wished to get rid of a crew member with an embarrassing fatal injury, it would have jettisoned him in space. There's simply no way he could have received his injuries, no way he could have reached the place where he was found, and to further complicate matters the burns were fresh. They happened not long before he was found."

  "You said 'fatal injury.' Was he able to supply any information about himself before he died, or was he found dead?"

  "He was still alive at the time of my report, but of course he was in no condition to communicate anything to his doctors. With the injuries described to me, he couldn't possibly survive. He's probably dead by now."

  "A most intriguing mystery," Darzek agreed.

  "I'm about to go to Skarnaf to see this remarkable victim myself," FIVE announced. "Would you care to accompany me?"

  "Only for the pleasure of your company," Darzek said. "If the victim is already dead, not even your skill can help him, If he's alive, there's no possible function. I could perform to help him. The one thing that would interest me is whether he was able to describe what happened to him before he died. If he was not, then the person who solves this mystery will have to possess powers that elude me."

  "I doubt that, Gul Darr. But it's my duty to investigate medical mysteries, wherever they occur, and I want to make certain that a mystery such as this one can't happen twice - on Skarnaf - or anywhere else."

  "Of course," Darzek agreed. "And if you discover illuminative details that might bring the mystery into my limited sphere of understanding, please let me have them immediately."

  FIVE chuckled. "If I discover anything at all, I'll send a report a once."

  Her image faded.

  Darzek resignedly turned to the pile of printouts. For the moment, at least, Supreme's outpouring had ceased. Darzek cut the strip and slipped the end onto a spindle, for winding. He would give it to his staff, which would winnow the chaff and hand the really difficult or important problems back to him.

  The trouble was that his staff, too, would expect miracles. Suddenly he frowned and returned to his desk.

  A planet had turned into a sun. The galaxy's leading astrophysicist thought it had been done deliberately. In any event, some kind of nuclear process had to be responsible.

  And an individual had been found suffering from a massive dose of nuclear radiation.

  Darzek punched references on his projector, set two suns blinking for identification, and leaned back to study the large slice of the galaxy that had formed above his head. The planets Skarnaf and Nifron D were at least a quarter of a galaxy apart.

  He relaxed and turned off the projector. For a suspenseful moment he thought he'd happened onto a coincidence with frightening implications; but a victim with fresh radiation burns couldn't possibly have acquired them a quarter of a galaxy away.

  "Darzek's Law," he muttered. "Simultaneous events can't be coincidental when the distance between them has to be measured in light-years. "

  3

  The two expeditions departed: FIVE and a few members of her staff for Skarnaf; FOUR, with UrsNollf, UrsWannl, and a large scientific contingent, for the Nifron system. Darzek saw both parties off, returned to his contemplation of Darzek's Law, found its logic unassailable, and again directed his attention at Supreme's outpouring of trivia.

  He had been working on it for six days and had all of the more serious problems solved and most of the lesser ones delegated to staff members capable of handling them, and he was actually considering treating himself to a vacation if he could think of a place where he wanted to take one, when Miss Effie Schlupe walked into his office and plopped herself onto a strangely shaped chair. She was a little older and grayer than he remembered, but despite her seventy-plus years she seemed as vigorously alert as ever.

  Darzek greeted her with amazed delight. "Schluppy! And you haven't even forgotten my transmitter code. How's the fast-food business?"

  Miss Schlupe had been building a conglomerate of food enterprises in the Greater Galaxy, known on Earth as the Large Magellanic Cloud. "Sensational," she said. "I had submarine sandwich and cider
franchises going on four hundred worlds, the hamburger chain was doing nicely, and my frozen yogurt line really took off once I found a milk substitute that would work. But I got bored being a business tycoon, so I sold out."

  Darzek chuckled. "I'm afraid to ask, but - what'd you sell out for?"

  "Spaceships," Miss Schlupe said. "I got myself a fleet. Twenty, in fact. There's a world named Wezzen - know it?"

  He shook his head.

  "They have a fossil fuel that leaves a peculiar slag when it's burned. It's a little like amber, except that it has startlingly beautiful colors. It isn't biodegradable, so they have a disposal problem with it. I agreed to take some off their hands for a very modest price, and I loaded my twenty ships with it."

  Darzek was chuckling louder. "What kind of a price?"

  "Grain. I traded the grain for fuel, and it financed the run back to this galaxy."

  "What'd you do with the slag?"

  "I sold it to worlds where jewelry is popular. Jewelers go wild over it. I rationed it off, just enough to each world to make it seem rare and keep the price up. And whenever I emptied a ship, I sold the ship. You should see my solvency rating."

  "So you got rid of all the slag and all the ships, and now you're a multibillionaire. "

  "Something like that. Except that I kept one ship - the newest and best one. Then I stopped at the world of Yestrux - they specialize in textiles. Know it?"

  Darzek shook his head.

  "I bought a shipload of remnants." She unfolded a square of brilliantly patterned cloth.

  "A bit gaudy," Darzek observed. "You bought an entire shipload of that stuff? What did you do with it?"

  "I brought it with me. I'm going to sell it to the Primorians." Darzek stared at her. "The Primorians are the most sedate and conservative specimens in fifty sectors. They even prefer black handkerchiefs. What would they want with bright pieces of cloth?"