The Minimum Man

by Robert Sheckley

  The Minimum Man

  Robert Sheckley

  Galaxy, June 1958

  Everybody has his song, thought Anton Perceveral. A pretty girl is like a melody, and a brave spaceman like a flurry of trumpets. Wise old men on the Interplanetary Council make one think of richly blended woodwinds. There are geniuses whose lives are an intricate counterpoint endlessly embellished, and scum of the planets whose existence seems nothing more than the wail of an oboe against the inexorable pounding of a bass drum.

  Perceveral thought about this, loosely gripping a razor blade and contemplating the faint blue veins in his wrist.

  For if everybody has his song, his could be likened to a poorly conceived and miserably executed symphony of errors.

  There had been muted horns of gladness at his birth. Bravely, to the sound of muffled drums, young Perceveral had ventured into school. He had excelled and been promoted to a small workshop class of five hundred pupils, where he could receive a measure of individual attention. The future had looked promising.

  But he was congenitally unlucky. There was a constant series of small accidents with overturned inkwells, lost books and misplaced papers. Things had a damnable propensity for breaking under his fingers; or sometimes his fingers broke under things. To make matters worse, he caught every possible childhood disease, including proto-Measles, Algerian Mumps, Impetigo, Foxpox, Green Fever and Orange Fever.

  These things in no way reflected upon Perceveral’s native ability; but one needs more than ability in a crowded and competitive world. One needs considerable luck, and Perceveral had none. He was transferred to an ordinary class of ten thousand students, where his problems were intensified and his opportunities for catching disease expanded.

  He was a tall, thin, bespectacled, goodhearted, hard-working young man whom the doctors early diagnosed as accident-prone, for reasons which defied their analysis. But whatever the reasons, the facts remained. Perceveral was one of those unhappy people for whom life is difficult to the point of impossibility.

  Most people slip through the jungle of human existence with the facility of prowling panthers. But, for the Perceverals, the jungle is continually beset with traps, snares and devices, sudden precipices and unfordable streams, deadly fungus and deadlier beasts. No way is safe. All roads lead to disaster.

  Young Perceveral won his way through college in spite of his remarkable talent for breaking his leg on winding staircases, twisting his ankle on curbstones, fracturing his elbow in revolving doors, smashing his glasses against plate-glass windows, and all the rest of the sad, ludicrous, painful events which beset the accident-prone. Manfully he resisted the solace of hypochondria and kept trying.

  Upon graduation from college, Perceveral took himself firmly in hand and tried to reassert the early clear theme of hope set by his stalwart father and gentle mother. With a ruffle of drums and a trilling of chords, Perceveral entered the island of Manhattan, to forge his destiny. He worked hard to conquer his unhappy predisposition, and to stay cheerful and optimistic in spite of everything.

  But his predisposition caught up with him. The noble chords dissolved into vague mutterings, and the symphony of his life degenerated to the level of opéra bouffe. Perceveral lost job after job in a snarl of broken voxwriters and smeared contracts, forgotten file cards and misplaced data sheets; in a mounting crescendo of ribs wrenched in the subway rush, ankles sprained on gratings, glasses smashed against unseen projections, and in a bout of illnesses which included Hepatitis Type J, Martian Flu, Venusian Flu, Waking Sickness and Giggling Fever.

  Perceveral still resisted the lure of hypochondria. He dreamed of space, of the iron-jawed adventurers advancing Man’s frontier, of the new settlements on distant planets, of vast expanses of open land where, far from the hectic plastic jungles of Earth, a man could really find himself. He applied to the Planetary Exploration & Settlement Board, and was turned down. Reluctantly he pushed the dream aside and tried a variety of jobs. He underwent Analysis, Hypnotic Suggestion, Hypnotic Hypersuggestion and Countersuggestion Removal — all to no avail.

  Every man has his limits and every symphony has its end. Perceveral gave up hope at the age of thirty-four when he was fired, after three days, from a job he had sought for two months. That, as far as he was concerned, provided the final humorous off-key cymbal clash to something which probably shouldn’t have been started in the first place.

  Grimly he took his meager paycheck, accepted a last wary handshake from his former employer, and rode the elevator to the lobby. Already vague thoughts of suicide were crossing his mind in the form of truck wheels, gas pipes, tall buildings and swift rivers.

  The elevator reached the great marble lobby with its uniformed riot policemen and its crowds waiting admittance to the mid-town streets. Perceveral waited in line, idly watching the Population Density Meter fluctuate below the panic line, until his turn came. Outside, he joined a compact body of people moving westward in the direction of his housing project.

  Suicidal thoughts continued to flow through his mind, more slowly now, taking more definite forms. He considered methods and means until he reached home. There he disengaged himself from the crowd and slipped in through an entry port.

  He struggled against a flood of children pouring through corridors, and reached his city-provided cubicle. He entered, closed and locked the door, and took a razor blade from his shaving kit. He lay down on the bed, propping his feet against the opposite wall, and contemplated the faint blue veins of his wrist.

  Could he do it? Could he do it cleanly and quickly, without error and without regret? Or would he bungle this job, too, and be dragged screaming to a hospital, a ludicrous sight for the interns to snicker about?

  As he was thinking, a yellow envelope was slipped under his door. It was a telegram, arriving pat on the hour of decision, with a melodramatic suddenness which Perceveral considered quite suspect. Still, he put down the razor blade and picked up the envelope.

  It was from the Planetary Exploration & Settlement Board, the great organization that controlled every Earthman’s movements in space. With trembling fingers, Perceveral opened the envelope and read:

  Mr. Anton Perceveral Temporary Housing Project 1993 District 43825, Manhattan 212, N.Y.

  Dear Mr. Perceveral:

  Three years ago you applied to us for a position in any off-Earth capacity. Regretfully we had to turn you down at that time. Your records have been kept on file, however, and have recently been brought up to date. I am happy to inform you that a position is immediately available for you, one which I consider well suited to your particular talents and qualifications. I believe this job will meet with your approval, carrying, as it does, a salary of $20,000 a year, all government fringe benefits, and an unexcelled opportunity for advancement. Could you come in and discuss it with me?

  Sincerely, William Haskell Asst. Placement Director

  WH/ibm3dc

  Perceveral folded the telegram carefully and put it back in its envelope. His first feeling of intense joy vanished, to be replaced by a sense of apprehension.

  What talents and qualifications did he have for a job commanding twenty thousand a year and benefits? Could they be confusing him with a different Anton Perceveral?

  It seemed unlikely. The Board just didn’t do that sort of thing. And presuming that they knew him and his ill-starred past — what could they possibly want from him? What could he do that practically any man, woman or child couldn’t do better?

  Perceveral put the telegram in his pocket and replaced the razor blade in his shaving kit. Suicide seemed a little premature now. First he would find out what Haskell wanted.

  At the headquarters of the Planetary Exploration & Settlement Board, Perceveral was admitted at once t
o William Haskell’s private office. The Assistant Placement Director was a large, blunt-featured, white-haired man who radiated a geniality which Perceveral found suspicious.

  “Sit down, sit down, Mr. Perceveral,” Haskell said. “Cigarette? Care for a drink? Awfully glad you could make it.”

  “Are you sure you have the right man?” Perceveral asked.

  Haskell glanced through a dossier on his desk. “Let’s see. Anton Perceveral; age thirty-four; parents, Gregory James Perceveral and Anita Swaans Perceveral, Laketown, New Jersey. Is that right?”

  “Yes,” Perceveral said. “And you have a job for me?”

  “We have indeed.”

  “Paying twenty thousand a year and benefits?”

  “Perfectly correct.”

  “Could you tell me what the job is?”

  “That’s what we’re here for,” Haskell said cheerfully. “The job I have in mind for you, Mr. Perceveral, is listed in our catalogue as Extraterrestrial Explorer.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “Extraterrestrial or alien-planet explorer,” Haskell said. “The explorers, you know, are the men who make the first contacts on alien planets, the primary settlers who gather our essential data. I think of them as the Drakes and Magellans of this century. It is, I think you’ll agree, an excellent opportunity.”

  Perceveral stood up, his face a dull red. “If you’re finished with the joke, I’ll leave.”

  “Eh?”

  “Me an extraterrestrial explorer?” Perceveral said with a bitter laugh. “Don’t try to kid me. I read the papers. I know what the explorers are like.”

  “What are they like?”

  “They’re Earth’s finest,” Perceveral said. “The very best brains in the very best bodies. Men with trigger-quick reactions, able to tackle any problem, cope with any situation, adjust to any environment. Isn’t that true?”

  “Well,” Haskell said, “it was true back in the early days of planetary exploration. And we have allowed that stereotype to remain in the public eye, to instill confidence. But that type of explorer is now obsolete. There are plenty of other jobs for men such as you describe. But not planetary exploration.”

  “Couldn’t your supermen make the grade?” Perceveral asked with a faint sneer.

  “Of course they could,” Haskell said. “No paradox is involved here. The record of our early explorers is unsurpassed. Those men managed to survive on every planet where human survival was even remotely possible, against overwhelming odds, by sheer grit and tenacity. The planets called for their every resource and they rose to meet the challenge. They stand as an eternal monument to the toughness and adaptability of Homo sapiens.”

  “Then why did you stop using them?”

  “Because our problems on Earth changed,” Haskell told him. “In the early days, the exploration of space was an adventure, a scientific achievement, a defense measure, a symbol. But that passed. Earth’s overpopulation trend continued — explosively. Millions spilled into relatively empty lands like Brazil, New Guinea and Australia. But the population explosion quickly filled them. In major cities, the population panic point was reached and produced the Weekend Riots. And the population, bolstered by geriatrics and a further sharp decrease in infant mortality, continued to grow.”

  Haskell rubbed his forehead. “It was a mess. But the ethics of population increase aren’t my business. All we at the Board knew was, we had to have new land fast. We needed planets which — unlike Mars and Venus — would be rapidly self-supporting. Places to which we could siphon millions, while the scientists and politicians on Earth tried to straighten things out. We had to open these planets to colonization as rapidly as possible. And that meant speeding up the initial exploratory process.”

  “I know all that,” Perceveral said. “But I still don’t see why you stopped using the optimum explorer type.”

  “Isn’t it obvious? We were looking for places where ordinary people could settle and survive. Our optimum explorer type was not ordinary. Quite the contrary, he almost approximated a new species. And he was no judge of ordinary survival conditions. For example, there are bleak, dreary, rain-swept little planets that the average colonist finds depressing to the point of insanity; but our optimum explorer is too sound to be disturbed by climatic monotony. Germs which devastate thousands give him, at most, a bad time for a while. Dangers which can push a colony to the brink of disaster, our optimum explorer simply evades. He can’t assess these things in everyday terms. They simply don’t touch him.”

  “I’m beginning to see,” Perceveral said.

  “Now the best way,” Haskell said, “would have been to attack these planets in stages. First an explorer, then a basic research team, then a trial colony composed largely of psychologists and sociologists, then a research group to interpret the findings of the other groups, and so forth. But there’s never enough time or money for all that. We need those colonies right now, not in fifty years.”

  Mr. Haskell paused and looked hard at Perceveral. “So, you see, we must have immediate knowledge as to whether a group of ordinary people could live and thrive on any new planet. That’s why we changed our qualifications for explorers.”

  Perceveral nodded. “Ordinary explorers for ordinary people. There’s just one thing, however.”

  “Yes?”

  “I don’t know how well you know my background …”

  “Quite well,” Haskell assured him.

  “Then you might have noticed that I have certain tendencies toward — well, a certain accident-proneness. To tell you the honest truth, I have a hard time surviving right here on Earth.”

  “I know,” Mr. Haskell said pleasantly.

  “Then how would I make out on an alien planet? And why would you want me?”

  Mr. Haskell looked slightly ill at ease. “Well, you stated our position wrongly when you said ‘ordinary explorers for ordinary people.’ It isn’t that simple. A colony is composed of thousands, often millions of people, who vary considerably in their survival potentialities. Humanity and the law state that all of them must have a fighting chance. The people themselves must be reassured before they’ll leave Earth. We must convince them — and the law — and ourselves — that even the weakest will have a chance for survival.”

  “Go on,” Perceveral said.

  “Therefore,” Haskell said quickly, “some years ago we stopped using the optimum-survival explorer, and began using the minimum-survival explorer.”

  Perceveral sat for a while digesting this information. “So you want me because any place I can live in, anyone can live in.”

  “That more or less sums up our thinking on the problem,” Haskell said, smiling genially.

  “But what would my chances be?”

  “Some of our minimum-survival explorers have done very well.”

  “And others?”

  “There are hazards, of course,” Haskell admitted. “And aside from the potential dangers of the planet itself, there are other risks involved in the very nature of the experiment. I can’t even tell you what they are, since that would destroy our only control element on the minimum-survival test. I simply tell you that they are present.”

  “Not a very good outlook,” Perceveral said.

  “Perhaps not. But think of the rewards if you won through! You would, in effect, be the founding father of a colony! Your value as an expert would be immeasurable. You would have a permanent place in the life of the community. And equally important, you might be able to dispel certain insidious self-doubts concerning your place in the scheme of things.”

  Perceveral nodded reluctantly. “Tell me one thing. Your telegram arrived today at a particularly crucial moment. It seemed almost — “

  “Yes, it was planned,” Haskell said. “We’ve found that the people we want are most receptive when they’ve reached a certain psychological state. We keep close watch over the few who fit our requirements, waiting for the right moment to make our presentation.”

  �
�It might have been embarrassing if you’d been an hour later,” Perceveral said.

  “Or unfruitful if we’d been a day earlier.” Haskell arose from behind his desk. “Would you join me for lunch, Mr. Perceveral? We can discuss final details over a bottle of wine.”

  “All right,” Perceveral said. “But I’m not making any promises yet.”

  “Of course not,” Haskell said, opening the door for him.

  After lunch Perceveral did some hard thinking. The explorer’s job appealed to him strongly in spite of the risks. It was, after all, no more dangerous than suicide, and much better paying. The rewards were great if he won; the penalty for failure was no more than the price he had been about to pay for failure on Earth.

  He hadn’t done well in thirty-four years on Earth. The best he had shown were flashes of ability marred by a strong affinity for illness, accident and blunder. But Earth was crowded, cluttered and confused. Perhaps his accident-proneness had been not some structural flaw in him but the product of intolerable conditions.

  Exploration would give him a new environment. He would be alone, dependent only on himself, answerable only to himself. It would be tremendously dangerous — but what could be more dangerous than a glittering razor blade held in his own hand?

  This would be the supreme effort of his life, the ultimate test. He would fight as he had never fought before to conquer his fatal tendencies. And this time he would throw every ounce of strength and determination into the struggle.

  He accepted the job. In the next weeks of preparation he ate and drank and slept determination, hammered it into his brain and wove it between his nerves, mumbled it to himself like a Buddhist prayer, dreamed about it, brushed his teeth and washed his hands with it, meditated upon it until the monotonous refrain buzzed in his head waking and sleeping, and began slowly to act as a check and restraint upon action.

  The day arrived when he was assigned a year’s tour of duty upon a promising planet in the East Star Ridge. Haskell wished him luck and promised to stay in touch by L-phase radio. Perceveral and his equipment were put aboard the picket ship Queen of Glasgow, and the adventure was begun.