Dorsai!

Donal

The man was different.

Already, a few people were beginning to say it. And in this fact lay the seeds of a possible difficulty. It was necessary, considered Donal, that a means be taken to lightning-rod such a recognition, and render it harmless.

He stood in that position which was becoming very common with him of late, alone on a balcony of his residence outside Tomblecity, hands clasped behind his back like a soldier at parade rest, gazing out toward the Milky Way and the unknown stars. He heard Anea come up behind him.

“Sayona’s here,” she said.

He did not turn. And after a moment she spoke again. “Do you want me to talk to him by myself?” she asked,

“For a little while,” answered Donal, still without moving. He heard her footsteps move away from him into the bigness of the lounge behind him. He lost himself in the stars again; and, after a moment, there was the sound of a man’s voice and a murmur of conversation between it and Anea’s. At this distance, their words were indistinguishable; but Donal did not have to hear the words to know what they were saying.

Eight months had gone by since he had opened his eyes onto the full universe that was exposed to his view alone. Eight months, thought Donal to himself. And in that short time, order had been returned to the civilized worlds. A parliament of peoples had been formed with an interiorly elected council of thirty-two Senior Representatives, two for each world. Today, here on Cassida, that parliament had voted on its choice for a permanent Secretary for Defense—

Donal’s mind reached out and enclosed the problem of what Sayona would, this moment, be saying to Anea.

“…And then he went around the room, a little before the voting.” Sayona’s voice was now murmuring in the lounge behind him. “He said a word here, and a word there — nothing important. But when he was done, he had them in the palm of his hand. It was just as it was last month when he mingled with the delegates to the full parliament.”

“Yes,” replied Anea. “I can see it how it was.”

“Do you understand?” asked Sayona, looking at her keenly.

“No,” she said, serenely. “But I’ve seen it. He blazes — blazes — like an atomic flare among a field full of little campfires. Their small lights fade when they get too close to him. And he hoods his light, when he’s amongst them, to keep from blinding them.”

“Then you’re not sorry — ?”

“Sorry!” Her happy laugh tore his question to foolish ribbons.

“I know,” said Sayona, soberly, “what effect he has on men. And I can guess his effect on other women. Are you sure you’ve got no regrets?”

“How could I?” But she looked at him suddenly, questioningly. “What do you mean?”

“That’s why I’ve come tonight,” said Sayona. “I’ve got something to tell you… if I can ask you a question after I’m through?”

“What kind of question?” she queried sharply.

“Let me tell you first,” he said. “Then you can answer or not, whichever you like. It’s nothing that can touch you — now. Only I should have told you before. I’m afraid I’ve put it off, until… well, until there was no more putting off possible. What do you know about your own gene history, Anea?”

“Why,” she looked at him, “I know all about it.”

“Not this part,” said Sayona. “You know you were bred for certain things—” He put one old, slim hand on the edge of her float in a gesture that begged for understanding.

“Yes. Mind and body,” she answered, watching him.

“And more,” said Sayona. “It’s hard to explain in a moment. But you know what was behind Montor’s science, don’t you? It treated the human race as a whole, as a single social entity, self-repairing in the sense that as its individual components die off they are replaced by the birth of new components. Such an entity is manipulable under statistical pressures, in somewhat the same manner that a human being may be manipulated by physical and emotional pressures. Increase the temperature of a room in which a man stands, and he will take off his jacket. This was William’s key to power.”

“But—” she stared at him. “I’m an individual—”

“No, no. Wait,” Sayona held up his hand. “That was Montor’s science. Ours on the Exotics had somewhat the same basis, but a differing viewpoint. We regarded the race as manipulable through its individuals, as an entity in a constant state of growth and evolution by reason of the birth of improved individuals among the mass that constituted it. Gene-selection, we believed, was the key to this — both natural or accidental, and controlled.”

“But it is!” said Anea.

“No,” Sayona shook his head slowly. “We were wrong. Manipulation by that approach is not truly possible; only analysis and explanation. It is adequate for an historian, for the meditative philosopher. And such, Anea, have we of the Exotics been, wherefore it seemed not only valid, but complete, to us.

“But manipulation by that means is possible only in small measure — very small. The race is not controllable from within the race; such gene-selection as we did could use only those characteristics which we already knew and understood. And it repelled us from those genes which we detected, and could not understand, and, of course, we could not work with ones we did not know existed, or could exist.

“We were, without seeing the fact, crippled both at the beginning and the end; we had only the middle. We could not conceive of characteristics to breed toward — goals — which were not already presented to us, and already understood by us. That was the proper end, however — truly new characteristics. And the beginning was, necessarily, truly new genes, and gene-combinations.

“The problem was stated long ago; we deceived ourselves that the statement was not meaningful. Simply, it is this; could a congress of gorillas, gathered to plan the breeding of the supergorilla, plan a human being? Discard the line of development of mightier muscles, stronger and longer teeth, greater specialization to master their tropical environment?

“Manipulation of the race from within the race is a circular process. What we can do, the valuable thing we can do, is to stabilize, conserve, and spread the valuable genetic gifts that come to us from outside our own domain.

“William — and you must have known this better than any one else, Anea — belongs to that small and select group of men who have been the conquerors of history. There’s a name, you know, for this rare and freakish individual — but a name means nothing by itself. It’s only a tag hung on something we never completely understood. Such men are unopposable — they can do great good. But also, usually, an equally great deal of harm, because they are uncontrolled. I’m trying to make you understand something rather complex. We, on the Exotics, spotted William for what he was when he was still in his early twenties. At that time the decision was taken to select the genes that would result in you.”

“Me!” She stiffened suddenly, staring at him.

“You.” Sayona bent his head to her briefly. “Didn’t you ever wonder that you were so instinctively opposed to William in everything he did? Or why he was so perversely insistent on possessing your contract? Or why we, back on Kultis, allowed such an apparently unhappy relationship to continue?”

Anea shook her head slowly. “I… I must have. But I don’t remember—”

“You were intended as William’s complement, in a psychological sense.” Sayona sighed. “Where his instincts were for control for the sake of controlling, yours were towards goals, purposes, and you did not care who controlled so long as the control was directed toward that purpose. Your eventual marriage — which we aimed for — would have, we hoped, blended the two natures. You would have acted as the governor William’s personality needed. The result would have been beneficial… we thought.”

She shuddered. “I’d never have married him.”

“Yes,” said Sayona with a sigh, “you would have. You were designed — if you’ll forgive the harsh word — to react at full maturity to whatever man in the galaxy stood out above all others.” A little of Sayona’s gravity lifted for a moment, and a twinkle crept into his eyes. “That, my dear, was by no means difficult to provide for; it would have been near impossible to prevent it! Surely you see that the oldest and greatest of the female instincts is to find and conserve the strength of the strongest male she can discover. And the ultimate conservation is to bear his children.”

“But — there was Donal!” she said, her face lighting up.

“Quite so,” Sayona chuckled. “If the strongest male in the galaxy were wrongly directed, misusing his great strength — still, for the sake of the great value of that strength, you would have sought him out. Strength, abilities, are tools; these are important. How they are used is a separate matter.

“But with Donal on the scene… Well, he was the ruin of all our theories, all our plans. The product of one of those natural accidents, outside our domain, a chance combining of genes even superior to William’s. The blending of a truly great line of thinkers, with an equally great line of doers.

“I failed to realize this, even when we tested him.” Sayona shook his head as though to clear it. “Or… perhaps our tests were just not capable of measuring the really important characteristics in him. We… well, we don’t know. It’s that that worries me. If we’ve failed to discover a true mutation — someone with a great new talent that could benefit the race, then we have failed badly.”

“Why, what would it have to do with you?” she asked.

“It would be in the area where we are supposed to have knowledge. If a cyberneticist fails to recognize that his companion has a broken bone, he is not culpable; if a physician makes the same mistake, he merits severe punishment.

“It would be our duty to recognize the new talent, isolate it, and understand it, we on the Exotics. It may be that Donal has something he does not recognize himself.” He looked at her. “And that is the question I must ask you. You are closer to him than anyone else; do you think Donal may have something — something markedly different about him? I don’t mean simply his superior genius; that would be simply more of the same kind of thing other men have had; I mean some true ability over and above that of the normal human.”

Anea became very still for a long moment, looking beyond rather than at Sayona. Then she looked at Sayona again, and said, “Do you want me to guess? Why don’t you ask him?”

It was not that she did not know the answer; she did not know how, or what she knew, nor did she know how to convey it, nor whether it was wise to convey it. But the knowing within her was quietly and completely certain that Donal knew, and would know what should and should not be said.

Sayona shrugged wryly. “I am a fool; I do not believe what all my own knowledge assures me. It was perfectly certain that the Select of Kultis would make such an answer. I am afraid to ask him; knowing that makes the fear no less. But you are right, my dear. I… will ask him.”

She lifted her hand.

“Donal!” she called.

Out on the balcony he heard her voice. He did not move his eyes from the stars.

“Yes,” he answered.

There were footsteps behind him, and then the voice of Sayona. “Donal—”

“You’ll have to forgive me,” said Donal, without turning. “I didn’t mean to make you wait. But I had something on my mind.”

“Quite all right,” said Sayona. “I hate to disturb you — I know how busy you’ve been lately. But there was a question I wanted to ask.”

“Am I a superman?” asked Donal.

“Yes, that’s essentially it,” Sayona chuckled. “Has somebody else been asking you the same question?”

“No,” Donal was smiling himself. “But I imagine there’s some would like to.”

“Well, you mustn’t blame them,” said Sayona, seriously. “In a certain sense, you actually are, you know.”

“In a sense?”

“Oh,” Sayona made a little dismissing gesture with his hand. “In your general abilities, compared to the ordinary man. But that wasn’t my question—”

“I believe you have said that a name is without meaning in itself. What do you mean by ‘Superman’? Can your question be answered, if that tag has no meaning, no definition?

“And who would want to be a Superman?” asked Donal in a tone halfway between irony and sadness, his eyes going to the depth beyond depth of starspace. “What man would want twenty billion children to raise? What man would cope with so many? How would he like to make the necessitous choices between them, when he loved-them all equally? Think of the responsibility involved in refusing them candy when they shouldn’t — but could — have it, and seeing that they went to the dentist against their wills! And if ‘Superman’ means a unique individual — think of having twenty billion children to raise, and no friend to relax with, complain to, to blow off steam to, so that the next day’s chores would be more bearable.

“And if your ‘Superman’ were so super, who could force him to spend his energies wiping twenty billion noses, and cleaning up the messes twenty billion petulant bratlings made? Surely a Superman could find some more satisfying use for his great talents?”

“Yes, yes,” said Sayona. “But of course, I wasn’t thinking of anything so far-fetched.” He looked at Donal’s back with mild annoyance. “We know enough about genetics now to realize that we could not have, suddenly, a completely new version of the human being. Any change would have to come in the shape of one new, experimental talent at a time.”

“But what if it were an undiscoverable talent?”

“Undiscoverable?”

“Suppose,” said Donal, “I have the ability to see a strange new color? How would I describe it to you — who cannot see it?”

“Oh, we’d locate it all right,” replied Sayona. “We’d try all possible forms of radiation until we found one you could identify as the color you were seeing.”

“But still you wouldn’t be able to see it, yourselves.”

“Well, no,” said Sayona. “But that would be hardly important, if we knew what it was.”

“Are you sure?” persisted Donal, not turning. “Suppose there was someone with a new way of thinking, someone who in childhood forced himself to do his thinking within the framework of logic — because that was the only way those around him thought. Gradually, however, as he grows older he discovers that there are relationships for him that do not exist for other minds. He knows, for example, that if I cut down that tree just below us out here in my garden, some years in time, and some light-years in distance away, another man’s life will be changed. But in logical terms he cannot explain his knowledge. What good would it do you then, to know what his talent was?”

“No good at all, of course,” said Sayona, good-humoredly, “but on the other hand it would do him no good at all, either, since he lives in, and is part of, a logical society. In fact, it would do him so little good, he would undoubtedly never discover his talent at all; and the mutation, being a failure, would die aborning.”

“I disagree with you,” said Donal. “Because I, myself, am an intuitional superman. I have a conscious intuitive process. I use intuition consciously, as you use logic, to reach a conclusion. I can crosscheck, one intuition against the other, to find out which is correct; and I can build an intuitive structure to an intuitive conclusion. This is one, single talent — but it multiplies the meaning and the power of all the old, while adding things of its own.”

Sayona burst out laughing.

“And since, according to my own argument, this ability would do you so little good that you wouldn’t even be able to discover it, it therefore stands that you wouldn’t be able to answer my question about being a superman in the affirmative, when I ask it! Very good, Donal. It’s been so long since I’ve had the Socratic method used in argument against me I didn’t even recognize it when I came face to face with it.”

“Or perhaps you instinctively would prefer not to recognize my talent,” said Donal.

“No, no. That’s enough,” said Sayona, still laughing. “You win, Donal. Anyway, thank you for setting my mind at rest. If we had overlooked a real possibility, I would have held myself personally responsible. They would have taken my word for it and — I would have been negligent.” He smiled. “Care to tell me what the real secret of your success has been, if it’s not a wild talent?”

“I am intuitive,” said Donal.

“Indeed you are,” said Sayona. “Indeed you are. But to be merely intuitive—” he chuckled, “Well, thank you, Donal. You don’t know how you’ve relieved my mind on this particular score. I won’t keep you any longer.” He hesitated, but Donal did not turn around. “Good night.”

“Good night,” said Donal. He heard the older man’s footsteps turn and move away from him.

“Good night,” came Sayona’s voice from the lounge behind him.

“Good night,” answered Anea.

Sayona’s steps moved off into silence. Still Donal did not turn. He was aware of the presence of Anea in the room behind him, waiting.

“Merely intuitive,” he echoed to himself, in a whisper. “Merely—”

He lifted his face once more to the unknown stars, the way a man lifts his face from the still heat of the valley to the coolness of the hills, in the early part of the long work day when the evening’s freedom is yet far off. And the look on his face was one which no living person — not even Anea — had seen. Slowly, he lowered his eyes, and slowly turned; and, as he turned, the expression faded from him. As Anea had said, carefully he hooded the brilliance of his’ light that he might not blind them; and, turning full around at last, entered once more, and for a little while again, into the habitation of Man.