Asimov, Isaac - The Currents of Space

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2024-12-07 0 0 542.12KB 302 页 5.9玖币
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Isaac Asimov
The Scientist
The Ambassador
The Patroller
The Lady
The Squire
The Fugitive
The Captain
The Detective
The Yachtsman
The Renegade
The Captive
The Accused
The Accuser
The Victors
A Year After
and the cool, dark blanket of space about it. Originally, he had intended
a quick report to the local office of the Interstellar Spatio-analytic
Bureau and a quicker retreat to space. Instead, he had been held here.
It was almost like a prison.
He drained his tea and looked at the man across the table. He said,
“I’m not staying any longer.”
The other man came to a decision. It had been slow in coming and
developing, but it was here. He would need time, much more time. The
response to the first letters had been nil. They might have fallen into a
star for all they had accomplished.
That had been no more than he had expected, or, rather, no less.
But it was only the first move.
It was certain that, while fut~ire moves developed, he could not
allow the man from Earth to squirm out of reach. He fingered the
smooth black rod in his pocket.
He said, “You don’t appreciate the delicacy of the problem.”
The Earthman turned to a second grievance. The representative of
the I.S.B. hasn’t arrived.”
“I know it. They are busy organizing proper procedures for this
crisis. Another day or two.”
“Another day or two! It’s always another day or two! Are they so
busy they can’t spare me a moment? They haven’t even seen my
calculations.”
“I have offered to bring your calculations to them. You don’t want
me to.”
“And I still don’t. They can come to me or I can go to them.” He
added violently, “I don’t think you believe me. You don’t believe Florina
will be destroyed.”
“I believe you.”
“You don’t. I know you don’t. I see you don’t. You’re humoring me. You
can’t understand my data. You’re not a Spatio-analyst. I don’t even
think you’re who you say you are. Who are you?”
“You’re getting excited.”
“Yes, I am. Is that surprising? Or are you just thinking, Poor devil,
No, you re not, shouted the Earthman hysterically, because I m
going to walk out. If you want to stop me, kill me, except that you won’t
dare. The blood of a whole world of people will be on your hands if you
do.”
The other man began shouting, too, to make himself heard. “I won’t
kill you. Listen to me, I won’t kill you. There’s no need to kill you.”
The Earthman said, “You’ll tie me up. You’ll keep me here. Is that
what you’re thinking? And what will you do when the I.S.B. starts
looking for me? I’m supposed to send in regular reports, you know.”
“The Bureau knows you’re safely with me.”
“Do they? I wonder if they know I’ve reached the planet at all? I
wonder if they received my original message?” The Earthman was
giddy. His limbs felt stiff.
The other man stood up. It was obvious to him that his decision had
come none too soon. He walked slowly about the long table, toward the
Earthman.
He said soothingly, “It will be for your own good.” He took the black
rod from his pocket.
Only the anxiety.
The Earthman could no longer talk. He could only sit there. He could
only think numbly, Great Space, I’ve been drugged. He wanted to shout
and scream and run, but he couldn’t.
The other had reached the Earthman now. He stood there, looking
down at him. The Earthman looked up. His eyeballs could still move.
The psychic probe was a self-contained unit. Its wires needed only
to be fixed to the appropriate places on the skull. The Earthman
watched in panic until his eye muscles froze. He did not feel the fine
sting as the sharp, thin leads probed through skin and flesh to make
contact with the sutures of his skull bones.
He yelled and yelled in the silence of his mind. He cried, No, you
don’t understand. It’s a planet full of people. Don’t you see that you
can’t take chances with hundreds of millions of living people?
The other man’s words were dim and receding, heard from the other
end of a long, windy tunnel. “It won’t hurt you. In another hour you’ll
feel well, really well. You’ll be laughing at all this with me.”
The Earthman felt the thin vibration against his skull and then that
so hard he had to lean against the bare milk-white wall.
He shouted, “I remember!”
They looked at him and the gritty mumble of men at lunch died
somewhat. Eyes met his out of faces indifferently clean and
indifferently shaven, glistening and white in the imperfect wall
illumination. The eyes reflected no great interest, merely the reflex
attention enforced by any sudden and unexpected cry.
Rik cried again, “I remember my job. I had a job!”
Someone called, “Shoddop!” and someone else yelled, “Siddown!”
The faces turned away, the mumble rose again. 131k stared blankly
along the table. He heard the remark, “Crazy Rik,” and a shrug of
shoulders. He saw a finger spiral at a man’s temple. It all meant nothing
to him. None of it reached his mind.
Slowly he sat down. Again he clutched his feeder, a spoonlike affair,
with sharp edges and little tines projecting from the front curve of
the bowl, which could therefore with equal clumsiness cut, scoop and
impale. It was enough for a millworker. He turned it over and stared
without seeing at his number on the back of the handle. He didn’t have
Rik was stirred by the memory. He said, Let s go to the fields,
Lona.”
“It’s late.”
“Please. Just outside town.”
She fumbled at the thin money pouch she kept between herself and
the soft blue leather belt she wore, the only luxury of dress she
allowed herself.
Rik caught her arm. “Let’s walk.”
They left the highway for the winding, dustless, packed-sand roads
half an hour later. There was a heavy silence between them and Valona
felt a familiar fear clutching at her. She had no words to express her
feelings for him, so she had never tried.
What if he should leave her? He was a little fellow, no taller than
herself and weighing somewhat less, in fact. He was still like a helpless
child in many ways. But before they had turned his mind off he must
have been an educated man. A very important educated man.
Valona had never had any education besides reading and writing and
摘要：

IsaacAsimovTheScientistTheAmbassadorThePatrollerTheLadyTheSquireTheFugitiveTheCaptainTheDetectiveTheYachtsmanTheRenegadeTheCaptiveTheAccusedTheAccuserTheVictorsAYearAfterandthecool,darkblanketofspaceaboutit.Originally,hehadintendedaquickreporttothelocalofficeoftheInterstellarSpatio-analyticBureauand...

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