by Mike Resnick
Herban chuckled and lit up another cigar. “Afraid not. My bedroom is usually filled to the brim with the fattest, nakedest women money can buy. No, boy, you're in one of our basic testing rooms.” “Who do you test here,” asked Rojers, “and for what?” “We test people,” said Herban. “And we test them to see if they're your hypothetical supermen.” “Now I'm thoroughly confused,” said Rojers. “I thought you said we couldn't create supermen, and you sounded damned convincing. Are you telling me now that you were lying?” “Not at all.”
“Then how do these so-called supermen come to be? What lab produces them?” “No lab does. When I said Man will not evolve into a mental superman, I wasn't lying to you. I did not, however, say that a mental superman cannot exist.” “I feel as if I were back in school,” said Rojers in exasperation. “Every time I think I know what you're talking about, you stick another stone wall in front of me.” “Well, I'll admit you've had to discard a lot of wrong assumptions,” said Herban, “but everything I've told you today is both true and noncontradictory. For example, I said that we cannot evolve into mental supermen. That's true. Now I'm telling you that there are indeed mental supermen, and that we work with them down here. That's also true.”
“If we didn't create them, how did they get here?” persisted Rojers. “Pretty much the same way you and I got here: natural selection, natural conception, and very likely natural childbirth as well.” Rojers just stared at him. “You see,'’ continued Herban, “these supermen
aren't mutations—or at least, not in the sense that you've been working on mutations. I'll make it simple
for you. Possibly a million human mutations are conceived every day. Probably half of them are reabsorbed within hours. Of the others, most are such minor mutations as to go virtually unnoticed: a child born with a yellow spot in a head of otherwise red hair, or maybe with a weird-looking birthmark. Some get minor attention, like a baby with six fingers, or with a thin layer of flesh over its anal outlet, or with the potential for only twenty-six teeth at adulthood. Usually they're so minor we don't even notice them. And, to be sure, very few mutations breed on. We still have the appendix, we still have tonsils, we still have hair on our bodies. Despite the fact that there have been some families where no mother has nursed her baby in eighty or ninety generations the female children still develop breasts, sometimes rather large and lovely ones. No, as I said, mutations rarely breed on, and no mutation has yet produced a superman with any more mental capacity than you or I possess. “However,” he said, stabbing the air with his cigar, “no mutation isneeded to produce a mental superman. As I mentioned upstairs, all that's required is for a man or a woman to use one hundred percent—or even fifty percent—of the potential he or she is born with.” “And you've found such people and test them down here?” asked Rojers. “We've been finding such people for four millennia or more,” said Herban. “And yes, we test them here.”
“And what talents have you found?”
“Oh, a little bit of everything. Except for prescience. Usually the hunchers, as we call them, can sense impending events, but never the details. Most often it's simply a feeling of almost unbearable expectation, and rarely does it apply or relate to anyone but themselves. But we've gotten telepaths who can send, receive, or both. We've gotten levitators. We've found teleporters, though there have been only three of them, and two of the three had to be threatened irreversibly with death before they could find the wherewithal to teleport themselves. We've found far more people who are adepts at telekinesis. And, of course, we've gotten some intelligences that have gone right off the scale, brainpower so high that we've still no real way of measuring it.”
“Fantastic!” said Rojers. “And wonderful!” “Fantastic, at any rate,” said Herban dryly. “Still, most of them go home intact.” “What do you mean, go home intact?” demanded Rojers. “Just what I said. Why do you think we're doing all this testing?” “I assume for the same reasons we've been trying to force evolution in the incubator rooms: to create a superman.”
“Butthese supermen have already been created,” pointed out Herban. “Then I would imagine you'd want to train them to use their talents to the best of their abilities, for the good of the Oligarchy.”
“What an absolutely childish answer!” Herban laughed. “If enough of them used their abilities to their maximum potential, the Oligarchy—and Man—would be finished within fifty years or so. No, my idealistic boy, we definitely donot help them become supermen and then turn them loose on society.”
“You mean youkill them all?” demanded Rojers.
“Don't look so damned horrified,” said Herban. “Let's not forget that you have killed just about every single life you've created.'’
“But those were just babies,” protested Rojers. “And more than half of them were still in the fetal state.” “It comes to the same thing,” said Herban. “However, if it'll put your mind at ease, we don't bring them down here for the express purpose of killing them. We have a galaxy-wide structure set up to spot every human with what you might call a wild talent. And considering how many trillions of humans there are, we don't miss very many. Anyway, once they're found—and adolescence is usually the earliest that such traits can be determined by outside observers—they're either brought here or to one of seven similar labs scattered throughout the galaxy.
“Once here, they're tested thoroughly. Before we're done, we know the absolute limits of their abilities; quite often, we find talents eventhey didn't know they possessed. We also run a comprehensive analysis of their genetic structure, DNA code, sperm, ovum, everything that could possibly influence their offspring, though I must admit we've found nothing unusual as yet. That done, we are free to reach one of three decisions. If there is any chance that the talent will breed on—and since we can't determine it genetically, we simply assume it is possible if anyone in the past five generations has displayed any odd talent—they are sterilized. Without their knowing it, of course. And if it seems pretty certain that the talent will not breed on, we'll usually let them return to society, especially if it isn't too spectacular a talent, such as mild telepathy. If it's something really interesting, something that might lead people to demand that we find a way to unleash it, such as levitation, we usually ship the subject off to a frontier world.” “That's two decisions,” said Rojers. “You mentioned three.” “The third should be obvious.”
“Death?”
“Quickly and painlessly, if the talent warrants it,” said Herban. “And, in answer to your next question, it warrants it if it can ever, in any way, prove inimical to Man. For example, if a man's intelligence is so great that no device in our technologically oriented culture can measure it, he's too dangerous to live. Admittedly, that intelligence could conceivably make meaningful communicative contact with some of the races we just can't seem to get through to, or possibly cure every disease known to us ... but it could also mount a navy and a political following that would overthrow the existing order of things. And it's not just intelligence. A man who possesses the power of telekinesis to the ultimate degree can manipulate elements within the core of a star and cause it to go nova. This could be a boon if we get into another war with the Setts; but what if he decides that the government of his own system is totally corrupt? And the same goes for other talents. A legitimate case of prescience—and we haven't come across one yet—could destroy the economic structure of any world that deals heavily in financial speculation. Teleportation? More than half our economy is bound up in interplanetary and interstellar transportation. The ability to master involuntary hypnosis? It would lead to absolute control of a system, possibly of the entire galaxy.
“No, boy, these talents can't be allowed to survive. We don't destroy every highly intelligent man, or every man capable of telekinesis, or every telepath. Only those that can be considered a clear danger. And notice that I didn't say a clear andpresent danger; clear and future dangers are no damned better. And if we can discover the outer limits of a
dangerous man's abilities before he does, it's a lot harder for
him to erect defenses, mental or otherwise, against us.”
“About how many people do you destroy?” asked Rojers. “We bring in about a million a year to each lab center,” said Herban. “There are far more, but most of them are eliminated from further consideration at lower levels. We just get the stinkers. Of that million, we'll return about eight hundred thousand intact, and another hundred and eighty thousand sterilized. As for the other twenty thousand ... well, we potentially save the galaxy a million times every half century or so.'’
“Save it from what?” said Rojers disgustedly. “We don't save itfrom anything,” said Herban very slowly, very seriously. “We save itfor something: for Man. Don't look so morally outraged, boy. I know you're thinking about all the poor innocent supermen who have gone to their deaths down here, all those fine talents who could have made Paradise happen right here and now, and maybe they could have. But I think of three trillion Men who aren't about to give up their birthright to anyone, including their progeny.” “And what about the incubators?” demanded Rojers. “What about all those tiny lives that we create and snuff out every day?”
“They serve their purpose,” answered Herban. “And their purpose is only partially to train you fellers and further develop the subscience of parthenogenesis.” “Oh?” Rojers was still suspicious.
“Absolutely. The talents we deal with down here are very rare sports, even those that might possibly reproduce their traits. But if you ever find a genetic method of unlocking that seventy percent, the human race will happily advance as a whole. It's just that no member of it is going to let his neighbor move up ahead of him.”
“But we haven't found a way to do that in four thousand years!” “And you may not for another four thousand,” agreed Herban. “But it's worth trying. And, in the meantime, Man isn't doing all that badly with his cunning, his sticks, and his stones, is he?” He arose abruptly. “I'll leave you here to think about what I've said; I'll be back in a few hours.” Herban stopped at the doorway and turned to Rojers. “You now have the power to expose a secret that's been kept for quite a few centuries. So consider all aspects of it very carefully.” He left, and the panel slid shut behind him.
Rojers sat and thought. He considered the revelations of the day logically, philosophically, practically, idealistically, morally, pragmatically. Having done so, he frowned and thought some more. When Herban returned for him, he rose silently and followed the Chief of Biochemistry back up to his own level. As they were approaching the incubator room, a brash young man representing the newstapes of a distant system walked up and asked for an interview. “I'm a little busy now,” said Herban, “but I'm sure Dr. Rojers would be happy to spend a little time talking to you.”
Rojers nodded his acquiescence.
“Fine,” said the reporter. “Can you fill me in on the whole operation right from the start?'’ “Certainly,” said Rojers quietly, walking toward the incubators. “Although there's really not much to tell. The Project was set up nearly four hundred years ago to develop a race of supermen, mental giants who could take some high ground that's beyond our reach just now. We haven't come up with our ideal yet, but we're still working on it, to be sure. In fact, you can tell your readers that we may be on the verge of a major breakthrough. I wouldn't be at all surprised if we synthesized a telepathic allele on a human chromosome by the end of this century...”
Herban remained where he was until they were out of earshot. Then, with a sigh, he lit a cigar and returned to his subsurface office. There was a lot of work yet to do before he could go home for the night to his fat naked women.
15: THE WARLORDS
...Thus, as the Oligarchy paused to consolidate, scores of warlords sprang up on the outskirts of the empire. All but one were either ignored or summarily dealt with... —Man: Twelve Millennia of Achievement ...About Grath (?—5912 G.E.) himself, very little is known, except that, though woefully undermanned and outnumbered, he stood up to the imperialistic empire of his race and came within a hairbreadth of triumph. He was unquestionably possessed of the most brilliant military mind of the Oligarchic era and perhaps ofany era—and most of Grath's historic battles are standard textbook reading to this very day... —Origin and History of the Sentient Races, Vol. 8 By all rights, it should have been as close to utopia as made no difference. The Oligarchy had divided, conquered, and consolidated, and for the first time in his galactic existence Man had run out of enemies. Alienenemies, that is.
But two million worlds constituted a lot of territory to belong to one political entity, and so Man fell to fighting against himself once again. Literally hundreds of warlords began springing up around the periphery of the empire; most were beaten down almost immediately, but a handful—such as Grath—began piling up a number of minor triumphs. He stood now, hands on hips, looking up at the heavens from the surface of an uncharted world half a galaxy away from Deluros VIII. The lights of the stars ran together, becoming a vast white blur that seemed to stretch outward to infinity. But that was a visual illusion, nothing more. Grath knew exactly where Deluros was, knew every possible means of approach, knew the long and bloody path he must hew to be able to stand thus on any world from which Deluros was distinguishable from the massive white curtain that he planned someday to rule. First there would be Altair, then the Spica mining worlds to keep up his flow of supplies. These conquests would be followed up by a quick feint toward Earth. The birthplace of the race served no useful military purpose, but it was cherished with an almost religious intensity by the trillions who had deserted it for more promising worlds. The Navy would respond to his move, and then his main forces would wipe out Sirius V in half a day's time. Next it would be on to Pollux, Canphor, Lodin, and finally Deluros itself. Caliban alone would be left unscathed, for Caliban alone was too valuable to destroy.
It would be accomplished neither quickly nor easily. Deluros was not at the geographic center of the galaxy, but it was the very epicenter of the Oligarchy. No approach could be made without passing at least a quarter of a million worlds of the empire, each under the protection of the Oligarchy's vast naval
fleet. And, too, there were the other warlords, who in the beginning would probably cause him even
more trouble than the Navy. Once, years ago, he had arranged a meeting between them in the hope of presenting a united military front to the Oligarchy, but nothing had come of it. Their vision was too small, too short-sighted. They merely wanted a piece of the action; he wanted it all. He had started out with nothing but forty-three followers and one ship. Two years of piracy had increased his personal navy to seventeen ships and more than six thousand men. Piracy was lucrative, and he could easily have continued such an existence indefinitely, but his dreams were grander than the accumulation of mere wealth; and to his gnawing hunger for power he added a shrewd military mind and a forcefulness of character that commanded instant, unquestioning obedience. It was after his first successful clash with the Navy that he began to think in terms of conquest rather than mere looting. True, the odds had all favored his side, but that was inconsequential; it was the first time the Navy had lost even a minor skirmish in more than three centuries, and it shattered the myth of invincibility that had grown up about the forces of the Oligarchy. He next staked out a small area well out on the galactic Rim. Its boundaries encompassed 376 stars which included some 550 planets, about 35 of them inhabited. He allowed himself half a year to become the total master of the area, and beat his self-imposed deadline with more than a month to spare. From there his empire expanded, always on the Rim, always far from the supply bases of the Oligarchic Navy. He avoided any confrontation with the Navy for almost five years, moving slowly, carefully, securing each new addition before moving out once again. Other would-be warlords learned from his successes, and soon they, too, were staking out territorial claims. Some of them, giddy with power, moved too soon against the Navy and were demolished; others tried to
pry loose some of Grath's possessions, with a similar lack of success. Grath always executed the leaders; those underlings who were willing to join him were assimilated into his ranks, and those with exceptional abilities were given better treatment than they had known under their former commanders. At last it was economics that forced him to move against the Oligarchy. He had almost five million men to feed, and was acutely aware of the increased rate of defections among those soldiers stationed on the habitable planets in his domain. The Rim had been all but taken, and no single system, or group of systems, could stand up to his military might. There had been one surrender after another, and his men had grown bored with these bloodless victories. He felt they needed to have a purpose once again, and the only goal remaining that could fire their imaginations and appeal to their lust was the Oligarchy itself. He took his eyes from the stars and turned back to his associates, who were awaiting his orders. “Gentlemen,” he said, “the first blow must be a telling one. To attack a poorly-manned outpost or a small convoy of Navy ships would offer no test to our strength, and would probably not even cause a ripple of concern on Deluros.”
