Gregory Benford - Foundation’s Fear

This meant scholarship and research had become mostly surprise-free, as well. No one seemed to notice that this robbed them of their central joy: the excitement of the unexpected.

“I will…speak to my department.” Order them to do it, would have been more honest. But one did try to preserve the amenities.

When she had left, Dors came into his office immediately, with Yugo right behind. “I will not work with these!” she said, eyes flaring.

Hari studied two large blocks of what seemed to be stone. Yet they could not be that heavy, for Yugo cradled one in each open palm. “The sims?” he guessed.

“In ferrite cores,” Yugo said proudly. “Stuck down in a rat’s warren, on a planet named Sark.”

“The world with that ‘New Renaissance’ movement?”

“Yeah-kinda crazy, dealin’ with them. I got the sims, though. They just came in, Worm Express. The woman in charge there, a Buta Fyrnix, wants to talk to you.”

“I said I didn’t want to be involved.”

“Part of the deal is she gets a face-to-face.”

Hari blinked, alarmed. “She’d come all the way here?”

“No, but they’re payin’ for a tightbeam. She’s standin’ by. I’ve routed her through. Just punch for the link.”

Hari had the distinct feeling that he was being hustled into something risky, far beyond the limits of his ordinary caution. Tightbeam time was expensive, because the Imperial wormhole system had been impacted with flow for millennia. Using it for a face-to-face was simply decadent, he felt. If this Fyrnix woman was paying for galactic-scale standby time, just to chat with a mathist…

Spare me from the enthused, Hari thought. “Well, all right.”

Buta Fyrnix was a tall, hot-eyed woman who smiled brightly as her image blossomed in the office. “Professor Seldon! I was so happy that your staff has taken an interest in our New Renaissance.”

“Well, actually, I gather it’s about those simulations.” For once, he was grateful for the two-second delay in transmission. The biggest wormhole mouth was a light-second from Trantor, and apparently Sark had about the same.

“Of course! We found truly ancient archives. Our progressive movement here is knocking over the old barriers, you’ll find.”

“I hope the research will prove interesting,” Hari said neutrally. How did Yugo get him into this?

“We’re turning up things that will open your eyes, Dr. Seldon.” She turned and gestured at the scene behind her, a large warren crammed with ancient ceramo storage racks. “We’re hoping to blow the lid off the whole question of pre-Empire origins, the Earth legend-the works!”

“I, ah, I will be very happy to see what results.”

“You’ve got to come and see it for yourself. A mathist like you will be impressed. Our Renaissance is just the sort of forward-looking enterprise that young, vigorous planets need. Do say you’ll pay us a visit-a state visit, we hope.”

Apparently the woman wanted to invest in a future First Minister. It took him more unbearable minutes to get away from her. He glowered at Yugo when at last her image wilted in the air.

“Hey, I got us a good deal, providing she got to do a li’l sell job on you,” Yugo said, spreading his hands.

“At considerable under-the-table cost, I hope?” Hari asked, getting up. Carefully he put a hand on one cube and found it surprisingly cool. Within its shadowy interior he could see labyrinths of lattices and winding ribbons of refracted light, like tiny highways through a somber city.

“Sure,” Yugo said with casual assurance. “Got some Dahlites to, ah, massage the matter.”

Hari chuckled. “I don’t think I should hear about it.”

“As First Minister, you must not,” Dors said.

“I am not First Minister!”

“You could be-and soon. This simulation matter is too risky. And you even spoke to the Sark source! I will not work on or with them.”

Yugo said mildly, “Nobody’s askin’ you to.”

Hari rubbed the cool, slick surface of a ferrite block, hefted it-quite light-and took the two from Yugo. He put them on his desk. “How old?”

Yugo said, “Sark says they dunno, but must be at least-”

Dors moved suddenly. She yanked up the blocks, one in each hand, turned to the nearest wall-and smashed them together. The crash was deafening. Chunks of ferrite smacked against the wall. Grains of debris spattered Hari’s face.

Dors had absorbed the explosion. The stored energy in the blocks had erupted as the lattice cracked.

In the sudden silence afterward Dors stood adamantly rigid, hands covered with grainy dust. Her hands were bleeding and she had a cut on her left cheek. She gazed straight at him. “I am charged with your safety.”

Yugo drawled, “Sure a funny way to show it.”

“I had to protect you from a potentially-”

“By destroying an ancient artifact?” Hari demanded.

“I smothered nearly all the eruption, minimizing your risk. But yes, I deem this Sark involvement as-’’

“I know, I know.” Hari raised his hands, palms toward her, recalling.

The night before he had come home from his rather well-received speech to find Dors moody and withdrawn. Their bed had been a rather chilly battleground, too, though she would not come out and say what had irked her so. Winning through withdrawal, Hari had once termed it. But he had no idea she felt this deeply.

Marriage is a voyage of discovery that never ends, he thought ruefully.

“I make decisions about risk,” he said to her, eyeing the rubble in his office. “You will obey them unless there is an obvious physical danger. Understand?”

“I must use my judgment-”

“No! Involvement with these Sarkian simulations may teach us about shadowy, ancient times. That could affect psychohistory.” He wondered if she were carrying out an order from Olivaw. Why would the robots care so strongly?

“When you are plainly imperiling-”

“You must leave planning-and psychohistory!-to me.”

She batted her eyelashes rapidly, pursed her lips, opened her mouth…and said nothing. Finally, she nodded. Hari let out a sigh.

Then his secretary rushed in, followed by the Specials, and the scene dissolved into a chaos of explanations. He looked the Specials captain straight in the face and said that the ferrite cores had somehow fallen into each other and apparently struck some weak fracture point.

They were, he explained-making it up as he went along, with a voice of professorial authority he had mastered long ago-fragile structures which used tension to stabilize themselves, holding in vast stores of microscopic information.

To his relief the captain just screwed up his face, looked around at the mess, and said, “I should never have let old tech like this in here.”

“Not your fault,” Hari reassured him. “It’s all mine.”

There would have been more pretending to do, but a moment later his holo rang with a reception. He glimpsed Cleon’s personal officer, but before the woman could speak the scene dissolved. He slapped his filter-face command as Cleon’s image coalesced in the air out of a cottony fog.

“I have some bad news,” the Emperor said without any greeting.

“Ah, sorry to hear that,” Hari said lamely.

Below Cleon’s vision he called up a suite of body language postures and hoped they would cover the ferrite dust clinging to his tunic. The red frame that stitched around the holo told him that a suitably dignified face would go out, keyed with his lip movements.

“The High Council is stuck on this representation issue.” Cleon chewed at his lip in irritation. “Until they resolve that, the First Ministership will be set aside.”