
forced politeness that Saadya attributed as much to contempt as to envy. Saadya knew well that the real
Seyetik’s ego had been colossal, restless, and fragile in the extreme. During his long life, Seyetik had
produced a seemingly endless stream of papers, books, paintings—and refurbished worlds. Blue
Horizon, New Halana, and the scores of other planets Seyetik had terraformed would stand for ages as
monuments to that ego—masterworks painted on planetary-scale canvases, displayed in galleries of
cosmic proportion.
True, Saadya had not tamed quite so many harsh worlds as had Seyetik. But then, even the great
Seyetik had never set his sights on that mother of all terraforming conundrums: Venus.Which of us, then,
Saadya wondered,has the greater ego?
One of the other two men who stood beside Seyetik spoke up. “Ambition is a fine thing, Gideon,” said
Dr. Kurt Mandl, the second member of the trio, his Federation Standard colored with a thick Teutonic
accent. The rising sun gleamed against Mandl’s bald pate. “For instance, reigniting the fires of Epsilon
119 must have required ambition in no small measure.”
Seyetik cast a wry look at Mandl. “There’s ambition, Doctor, and then there are pipe dreams. Starfleet
has been trying to terraform Venus for how long now? Twenty-five years, on and off? Trying to make
this hellbeast of a planet habitable would put evenmy talents to the test.”
“You make a fine argument for a new approach to the problem,” Mandl replied, offering Saadya a
fatherly smile. “Perhaps the problem with some of the previous Venusian terraforming notions was that
they weren’tsufficiently ambitious.” To the third man, who had not yet spoken, Mandl added, “No
offense intended, Carl.”
The man Mandl addressed appeared to have scarcely heard his colleague’s comments, so enthralled
was he by his surroundings. He breathed deeply of the air. Then, speaking to no one in particular, he
said, “This really is Venus. As it will appear after the terraforming process is finished.”
Saadya enjoyed the awed look on the dark-haired man’s face.This is how Surak might have looked had
he lived long enough to witness peace finally breaking out on Vulcan. Or Einstein watching Cochrane
accelerate the Phoenixpast warp one.
“That’s correct, Dr. Sagan,” Saadya said.
The twentieth-century planetologist squinted at the horizon, examining the brightening sky the way a
jeweler might inspect an intricately cut gemstone. “I can’t see any trace of the parasol you must have
used to cool the atmosphere down. And you appear to have greatly increased the Venusian rotation rate.
I can see that you’re pretty far along in the process. It must have taken millennia to—”
“You’d do best to think of our surroundings as a mere thought experiment rather than a true picture of
the final result, Dr. Sagan,” Seyetik said. “Our young host hasn’t pulled off his prospective miracle just
yet.”
Carl Sagan trained his curious gaze upon Saadya. “So what we’re experiencing is actually some kind
of…simulation?”
Saadya felt his face flush with embarrassment, but he recovered swiftly. “Yes, sir. But it is an extremely
accurate one. My staff and I will make it a reality very soon. The key to that reality is dealing with its
complexity.”