Isaac Asimov - Forward the Foundation

Dors said nothing, merely stared at the man. Slowly she sank into a chair.

Elar smiled and went on, “Of course, with you taken care of, there will be no problem with the Maestro and with Amaryl. The Maestro, in fact, without you, may fade out at once and resign in grief, while Amaryl is merely a child in his mind. In all likelihood, neither will have to be killed. How does it feel, Dr. Venabili, to be unmasked after all these years? I must admit, you were very good at concealing your true nature. It’s almost surprising that no one else discovered the truth before now. But then, I am a brilliant mathematician—an observer, a thinker, a deducer. Even I would not have figured it out were it not for your fanatical devotion to the Maestro and the occasional bursts of superhuman power you seemed to summon at will—when he was threatened.

“Say good-bye, Dr. Venabili. All I have to do now is to turn the device to full power and you will be history .”

Dors seemed to collect herself and rose slowly from her seat, mumbling, “I may be better shielded than you think.” Then, with a grunt, she threw herself at Elar.

Elar, his eyes widening, shrieked and reeled back.

Then Dors was on him, her hand flashing. Its side struck Elar’s neck, smashing the vertebrae and shattering the nerve cord. He fell dead on the floor.

Dors straightened with an effort and staggered toward the door. She had to find Hari. He had to know what had happened.

Hari Seldon rose from his seat in horror. He had never seen Dors look so, her face twisted, her body canted, staggering as though she were drunk.

“Dors! What happened! What’s wrong!”

He ran to her and grasped her around the waist, even as her body gave way and collapsed in his arms. He lifted her (she weighed more than an ordinary woman her size would have, but Seldon was unaware of that at the moment) and placed her on the couch.

“What happened?” he said.

She told him, gasping, her voice breaking now and then, while he cradled her head and tried to force himself to believe what was happening.

“Elar is dead,” she said. “I finally killed a human being. —First time. —Makes it worse.”

“How badly are you damaged, Dors?”

“Badly. Elar turned on his device—full—when I rushed him.”

“You can be readjusted.”

“How? There’s no one—on Trantor—who knows how. I need Daneel.”

Daneel. Demerzel. Somehow, deep inside, Hari had always known. His friend—a robot—had provided him with a protector—a robot—to ensure that psychohistory and the seeds of the Foundations were given a chance to take root. The only problem was, Hari had fallen in love with his protector—a robot . It all made sense now. All the nagging doubts and the questions could be answered. And somehow, it didn’t matter one bit. All that mattered was Dors.

“We can’t let this happen.”

“It must.” Dors’s eyes fluttered open and looked at Seldon. “Must. Tried to save you, but missed—vital point—who will protect you now?”

Seldon couldn’t see her clearly. There was something wrong with his eyes. “Don’t worry about me, Dors. It’s you—It’s you—”

“No. You, Hari. Tell Manella—Manella—I forgive her now. She did better than I. Explain to Wanda. You and Raych—take care of each other.”

“No no no,” said Seldon, rocking back and forth. “You can’t do this. Hang on, Dors. Please. Please, my love.”

Dors’s head shook feebly and she smiled even more feebly. “Good-bye, Hari, my love. Remember always—all you did for me.”

“I did nothing for you.”

“You loved me and your love made me—human.”

Her eyes remained open, but Dors had ceased functioning.

Yugo Amaryl came storming into Seldon’s office. “Hari, the riots are beginning, sooner and harder even than exp—”

And then he stared at Seldon and Dors and whispered, “What happened?”

Seldon looked up at him in agony. “Riots! What do I care about riots now? —What do I care about anything now?”

SELDON, WANDA— . . . In the waning years of Hari Seldon’s life, he grew most attached to (some say dependent upon) his granddaughter, Wanda. Orphaned in her teens, Wanda Seldon devoted herself to her grandfather’s Psychohistory Project, filling the vacancy left by Yugo Amaryl. . . .

The content of Wanda Seldon’s work remains largely a mystery, for it was conducted in virtually total isolation. The only individuals allowed access to Wanda Seldon’s research were Hari himself and a young man named Stettin Palver (whose descendant Preem would four hundred years later contribute to the rebirth of Trantor, as the planet rose from the ashes of the Great Sack [300 F.E.]). . . .

Although the full extent of Wanda Seldon’s contribution to the Foundation is unknown, it was undoubtedly of the greatest magnitude. . . .

Hari Seldon walked into the Galactic Library (limping a little, as he did more and more often these days) and made for the banks of skitters, the little vehicles that slid their way along the interminable corridors of the building complex.

He was held up, however, by the sight of three men seated at one of the galactography alcoves, with the Galactograph showing the Galaxy in full three-dimensional representation and, of course, its worlds slowly pinwheeling around its core, spinning at right angles to that as well.

From where Seldon stood he could see that the border Province of Anacreon was marked off in glowing red. It skirted the edge of the Galaxy and took up a great volume, but it was sparsely populated with stars. Anacreon was not remarkable for either wealth or culture but was remarkable for its distance from Trantor: ten thousand parsecs away.

Seldon, acting on impulse, took a seat at a computer console near the three and set up a random search he was sure would take an indefinite period. Some instinct told him that such an intense interest in Anacreon must be political in nature—its position in the Galaxy made it one of the least secure holdings of the current Imperial regime. His eyes remained on his screen, but Seldon’s ears were open for the discussion near him. One didn’t usually hear political discussions in the Library. They were, in point of fact, not supposed to take place.

Seldon did not know any of the three men. That was not entirely surprising. There were habitués of the Library, quite a few, and Seldon knew most of them by sight—and some even to talk to—but the Library was open to all citizens. No qualifications. Anyone could enter and use its facilities. (For a limited period of time, of course. Only a select few, like Seldon, were allowed to “set up shop” in the Library. Seldon had been granted the use of a locked private office and complete access to Library resources.)

One of the men (Seldon thought of him as Hook Nose, for obvious reasons) spoke in a low urgent voice.

“Let it go,” he said. “Let it go. It’s costing us a mint to try to hold on and, even if we do, it will only be while they’re there. They can’t stay there forever and, as soon as they leave, the situation will revert to what it was.”

Seldon knew what they were talking about. The news had come over TrantorVision only three days ago that the Imperial government had decided on a show of force to bring the obstreperous Governor of Anacreon into line. Seldon’s own psychohistorical analysis had shown him that it was a useless procedure, but the government did not generally listen when its emotions were stirred. Seldon smiled slightly and grimly at hearing Hook Nose say what he himself had said—and the young man said it without the benefit of any knowledge of psychohistory.