Flight of the Maita Supercollection 3: Solving Galactic Problems Collector's Edition

by Moulton, CD

  He was right about her purpose in calling him. She looked her pleasure at him for his taking these steps without waiting for instructions. He would have to show he DID have intelligence and value here. It was important to him. Her look took a large load from his mind. He had, frankly, come here in selfishness, but had spent time reevaluating his motives. He was getting some self-respect. THAT was different! He had come with expectations of having a long and bitter argument about who was in charge here, but she simply said when he knew beyond question it was the thing to do, do it. She would have his ass if he was wrong. Never forget that!

  There was little progress at the labs, but some handyman had come up with the idea of putting microwave generators in each of the rooms where the actual living virus was used so they could irradiate the places regularly. The single thing they must not have was any kind of truth to the escaped deadly virus stories. It was simply another precaution. It would guarantee that no accidents such as the ones he fabricated would take place. There would be no escaped virus.

  He returned to his room where he spent two hours composing the next message to send, then again turned to the question of the constitution.

  When he did a thing he did it and passed on to other projects. The constitution was not done so took all of his free time. He would stop working on that document when it was completed, not before. He had the overall method of setting up the first government fixed in language and recorded. The rights section was complete and the preamble, which would explain why the document was written, was ready.

  That preamble is very important, but there has to be a way to get across that it is not the constitution itself. The language and power must be expressed in the preamble. It will set the tone for the manner in which the document will forever be interpreted.

  The present situation was what was causing the most problems to him. How could one word the clause that would give the state the right to suspend other rights in case of dire emergency, medical emergency to the forefront? How could such a premise be included in a document that was meant to guarantee freedom?

  Damn! What happened to the lights? This was the first such interruption of power since he came here. Things had been perfectly smooth until now.

  When he still had no power a few minutes later he went out to find that only the one building was affected and only one person was in it at the time – him. He used the com to inform Mi, who said she'd send maintenance.

  A tall thin individual came who incessantly chewed a small glamp twig. Surely he knew the damned things were as much as addicting! – and the fellow moved so slowly! It would take him forever to get this simple little job done!

  He found the trouble surprisingly quickly and repaired it in very little time. Sop expected the job to take two hours, but it took exactly four minutes. That was a switch!

  He offered refreshment to the fellow, who came to his room to check the wiring. The problem had been a wire that had grounded and burned out. There may be damage to the circuit that could cause a fire so the fellow checked every wire in the place. It took a very short time, all the while the fellow seemed to move like a slimetrailer on a blotter. Sop could have sworn the job wouldn't be done for hours.

  The papers with the constitution were laying right there in plain view on the desk and the fellow, named Jak Tall, asked if he could read the notes. Sop agreed that he could use the general public's reaction.

  "This is pretty good," Jak said half an hour later. "If the nation survives this plague and will adopt it – and abide by it – it'll advance us to a point where that alien empire'll respect us. Somehow it's important we gain their respect. The way those asses treated them when they were here I was ashamed to be a Kroon. I really was.

  "You've got the beginning and the end, but there's a space in the middle. It have to do with situations like the plague?"

  "You're a very perceptive person," Sop replied. "I feel I have to include a suspension of certain rights in cases of such vital importance, but I must not make it an easy thing. It must not be something any one person or small group can do. I can predict the horrors of abuse of such a thing. Think what would have happened five years ago if anyone had that kind of power!"

  Tall nodded and chewed the twig determinedly for a moment.

  "Needs a sure time limit, too," he suggested. "Something like 'the national health officer can impose blah blah blah that must be approved by the executive or the legislature or both within ten days or it's automatically off. Judiciary has to concur' – or something."

  Sop stared, fascinated. This man was truly intelligent! Brilliant! He grasped the problem in minutes – and his solution was pretty well what would have to be. The wording was the thing.

  "Suggest something concrete."

  Tall chewed and thought a moment, then said, "Hmm-ummm. Something like 'A national health emergency may be declared by the Chairman of the National Health Agency should there be clear and immediate danger to a major portion of the population of a given area from a health-related cause.

  "Suspension of certain civil rights – maybe specified as assembly or acts that would aid the spread of the disease – may be held regionally or nationally.'

  "That would mean you'd have to include rights of movement, too. The order to continue such suspensions would have to.... The chief executive must sign the order to begin its implementation. The judiciary would be required to extend the order every three days and the joint legislature would be required to vote by majority of both houses within ten days should the suspensions be deemed necessary to extend beyond that time.

  "Such suspensions would be revoted every ten days or something on that order. Automatic stop without the vote being taken."

  "You know, I think we can have something very close to that!" Sop cried. "Thank you!"

  "I always say consider your words before you say 'em, then be short and to the point," Jak answered. "Say 'em before you think and you spend all your time lying about what you really meant."

  This fellow grows on you, Sop thought. I think I have found someone with an enormous natural intelligence to talk to. I can bounce ideas off his reactions and save a lot of time. He goes right to the heart of a matter. What we call a "no frills" type.

  Almost as though Jak were reading his mind he said, "Smart people don't talk to or at others. They talk with them. Nobody ever learned anything while their mouth was flapping."

  How true! That is very much what the Mentan alien said!

  * * * *

  Hal Korr saw the news story that there was suggestion of a horrible accident on the islands that would kill everyone out there and would spread through the rodents for years to come.

  "... this information being based on the very best of authority, a truly unimpeachable source on Long Island where major research is in progress. All communications both ways with the medical facilities are now completely stopped. We have attempted since the initial contact, but no response whatever has been forthcoming. We will not cease in attempts to contact the people there. We have with us now Dr. Nil Ponn who has stated that he has tested positive for the virus or would be on the islands himself.

  "Dr. Ponn, can you tell us how truly serious this thing really is?"

  Hal once met Ponn and saw him as looking rather drawn. "IF, and I repeat, these are only rumors at this point. IF NSV five was developed to survive both in rodents and in primates and IF it has escaped into the environs of the islands it will become a permanent thing there – or long term enough that the difference IS no difference.

  "You must first understand that the virus as we know it now takes three years to incubate in us and more than two to incubate in the rodents. The rodents, the common types found on the islands, are known to begin breeding at less than one year of age so there will be a neverending supply of hosts for the virus. No one – and I mean NO ONE – must ever go to those islands. Not even if we find a cure here. We can't know all about what was developed there and it could start the whole plague over aga
in. I am begging my colleagues there to contact me. We have been exchanging information through radio and we MUST continue to do so. It is vital!"

  Hal turned the set off. He knew, of course, this was Sop's second stage, but why now? The researchers weren't all here yet and this hadn't been anticipated for another year, at least. Why was it happening so fast?

  The reports stated the virus was spreading 93% faster than had been expected and a slow swell of panic was beginning. People would soon begin trying to come to the islands for treatment that didn't exist.

  Hal sighed and walked over to the labs. He'd stayed mostly in the background since coming here, but it was obviously time for him to try to do something. Mi Yinn could give him a role to play if only to help retain his sanity. He had never been the type to twiddle. He must be doing something.

  Mi seemed genuinely glad to see him. She explained contacts with the mainland would be resumed in three days.

  "I've found a drug that slows the action of the virus a small bit in a test tube. We've been trying to find something that will stop the thing from reproducing. That will stop its spread and then we can concentrate on cures for those who already have the infection. I'll take anything at all right now!"

  They talked awhile about various aspects of the disease, but quarantine of areas of the planet was all they could come up with. There was no doubt such a scheme had no chance whatever of working. There was no point in quarantining areas that already had the infection and nothing could be more unlikely than being able to test the entire population of even one city, much less a whole nation. That would require a plan with a strict system composed of thousands of doctors, which Mi Yinn had ready, but it would be futile in this context.

  “Unless we find something the only survivors in fifty years will be small villages of virtual savages in areas like you make your digs in," Mi predicted. "I truly think this is the end of the Kroon. If we'd spent ten percent of the money we spent on war toward research we might have had a serum ready when this thing came along. We're too much educated to kill each other to be able to stop now to fight this. We've forgotten how to cooperate."

  "Now Mi," Hal chided. "Every nation on this world is working full time to beat this thing. It transcends national borders and petty disputes."

  "Oh, sure! Exactly the same research we're doing, scientists in twenty other countries are doing!"

  "That's bad?"

  "You answer that one! When we could each be working on a DIFFERENT angle?" Mi returned bitterly. "If it won't work what least difference does it make how many are researching it? When the duplications are repeated ten thousand times for nothing? When that same time could be used to try a thousand DIFFERENT things? You answer your own question!"

  "I see. We've limited our ability to solve such problems in direct proportion to our ability to get along with each other."

  They were silent for a few minutes, then Hal suggested they take awhile to get a meal and talk about anything but the virus. They then called Enn Far on the secret line to appraise him of the situation on the islands and what the prognosis was at this point. It wasn't encouraging.

  Somehow Hal and Mi both felt much better two hours later when they each went back to their own researches.

  *

  Enn Far hung up the com line and sat back. While he knew the group planned to do this he was relieved to know it wasn't a real accident on the islands. That was something he wasn't at all sure he could cope with. Things were getting very serious now that it was sinking in to the people how real an emergency this was. It would probably be several years before the effects would fully begin to be felt, but an underlying panic was building. One could feel it in the air. People had a fear in their eyes. The damned thing was spreading much faster than had at first been believed possible. All other nations were now coming together to pool their researches so that would possibly help. It would mean a million researchers instead of twenty thousand. Why was Mi Yinn so unimpressed by that?

  Scientists weren't easy to understand. Mi had said that Nil Ponn, the media darling, was very qualified to give advice and Hal said Sop Lett suggested he trust a newsman named Dok Finn to aid in any way the media could. This was a rare time the media wasn't fighting against everything anyone wanted to do.

  The media darling, Ponn, had the virus. He would have been sent to the island, otherwise. He let it be known he continued his researches for the time being. He was both presentable and articulate, which made him the natural choice. He proposed that the people from the networks speak with him through a glass wall, though logic would say there were any number of the media people who had spread the thing among most newsmen already. They made interviews at the scene of the War of the Scrolls! That was most probably where Ponn had picked it up in the first place. He had always been close to the reporters.

  Enn shook his head. This was one HELL of a time to be in a position like his. A nonpolitical ex-priest who was chairman of the ruling council of the largest nation on Kroon immediately after the aliens disrupted the society and destroyed their oldest and strongest institutions with a few words finds himself being attacked by a virus that could easily destroy the entire race. That sounds like a cheap novel! No one would buy the damned thing because the plot's too complicated and far too implausible. These things simply don't happen in real life.

  What about the aliens? If we could only hope the signals will be seen or heard – but signals sent before the beginning of this thing, before the island was even prepared, won't reach an empire planet for three hundred years. There won't be any Kroon by then.

  The people were beginning to be suspicious of one another and little cruelties were becoming part of everyday life. One never knew who might have the virus so he avoided contact. That led to much impersonal rejection, which led to acid returns. To even say hello to a stranger was to expect an insult in return. There wasn't one solitary damned thing he could do about any of it.

  Go on from day to day and hope something will come from those people on the islands. They're our only hope. It was a horrible responsibility and Enn knew every one of them out there felt the weight of that responsibility.

  Enn called the newsman and talked a few minutes, setting up an appointment, then met with the council. He had a good meal ready at 20:00 when Dok arrived and they talked for several hours. Dok was most relieved there was no accident on the islands. He agreed this was probably the only way the researches could hope to progress. As this thing got worse there was little doubt the facilities on the mainland would become swamped with those who were infected. That could easily accomplish nothing more than shutting down research. People in personal panic would end up preventing the very thing that may save them.

  Dok was slightly past middle age, a pragmatist, very sharp and was certainly not going to do anything to damage the research that could save the race. He was a little put out that Sop would trick him, but Enn lied a little. He told Dok that Sop wanted it explained to him that he needed the spontaneity of Dok's mind in the circumstances. It was through Sop's recommendation they were meeting right now. Now Dok knew the truth and the reasons behind it and could be trusted to do the right thing.

  When Dok left, Enn called the scientist, Dr. Nil Ponn, to say he was positive the islands would soon be again in regular daily communication with him, but his researches were now of doubled importance and his government was behind him all the way and blah blah blah.

  That duty handled Enn went to bed. He always had the ability to will himself to sleep and had no trouble this night, though he didn't doubt he would awaken almost as tired as when he went to bed. He was getting used to that, too.

  * * * * *

  Jak Tall strolled through the kitchen area before going to bed. He'd smelled ozone earlier and was sure there was a short somewhere, but couldn't locate it very accurately. He didn't like electrical shorts because of the damage they could do. One never knew when the fire would start. If no one was around it could ruin a whole section of this facility.


  The meters he had attached to each circuit had little recorders to find this sort of problem. He checked each of them carefully, but no circuit was drawing current that was even slightly past what was required.

  He'd smelled the ozone at noonmeal, too.

  Something was wrong here! The place could burn down! He had to do something before this place was twisted wreckage. It could.... Well, it could sustain damage. Most of it was fireproof. Mi Yinn thought of that before the project was off of paper.

  It seemed the only time he'd smelled the ozone was when the stoves were in use so it was those circuits. They didn't ever draw huge amounts of current. Maybe it would be all right.

  He sat on a table and chewed the glamp twig for a moment, then snapped his fingers, went to his shed and returned with a device to read leakage of microwaves. He turned on the ovens and watched as the needle went over to the danger zone near one oven. Microwave leak on oven four had been breaking down the air and ionizing it. It was as simple as that – no short.

  He went back to the shed, returning with his toolbox and some seal. He fixed the oven in ten minutes, tested it and the others again just to be very sure, put his tools away and went to bed. Consider the problem, find it, fix it, relax. That was a basic part of his personal philosophy. Some things were simpler than they appeared on the surface. Most weren't. It was a matter of considering all the angles.

  Jak Tall slept, as always, like an innocent baby. He had a mind that wasn't cluttered with a lot of useless fear and worry. He was honest as the next and moreso than most and didn't owe any man. Best to keep life like that. Know your job, do your job. When it's time to eat, you eat. When it's time to work, you work. When it's time to play, you play.