Isaac Asimov - Asimov's Mysteries

Jennings labeled it at once the Device. It looked not remotely similar to any instrument either had ever seen, but then, as Jennings said, why should it?

There are no rough edges that I can see,' he said. 'It may not be broken.' There may be missing parts, though.'

'Maybe,' said Jennings, 'but there seems to be nothing movable. It's all one piece and certainly oddly uneven.' He noted his own play on words, then went on with a not-altogether-successful attempt at self-control. This is what we need. A piece of worn metal or an area rich in bacteria is only material for deduction and dispute. But this is the real thing-a Device that is clearly of extraterrestrial manufacture.'

It was on the table between them now, and both regarded it gravely. Jennings said, 'Let's put through a preliminary report, now.'

'No!' said Strauss, in sharp and strenuous dissent. 'Hell, no!'

'Why not?'

'Because if we do, it becomes a Society project. They'll swarm all over it and we won't be as much as a footnote when all is done. No!' Strauss looked almost sly. 'Let's do all we can with it and get as much out of it as possible before the harpies descend.'

Jennings thought about it. He couldn't deny that he too wanted to make certain that no credit was lost. But still-- He said, 'I don't know that I like to take the chance, Strauss.' For the first time he had an impulse to use the man's first name, but fought it off. 'Look, Strauss.' he said, 'it's not right to wait. If this is of extraterrestrial origin, then it must be from some other planetary system. There isn't a place in the Solar System, outside the Earth, that can possibly support an advanced life form.'

'Not proven, really,' grunted Strauss, 'but what if you'reright?'

Then it would mean that the creatures of the ship had interstellar travel and therefore had to be far in advance, technologically, of ourselves. Who knows what the Device can tell us about their advanced technology. It might be the key to-who knows what. It might be the clue to an unimaginable scientific revolution.'

That's romantic nonsense. If this is the product of a technology far advanced over ours, we'll learn nothing from it. Bring Einstein back to life and show him a microprotowarp and what would he make of it?'

'We can't be certain that we won't learn.'

'So what, even so? What if there's a small delay? What if we assure credit for ourselves? What if we make sure that we ourselves go along with this, that we don't let go of it?'

'But Strauss'-Jennings felt himself moved almost to tears in his anxiety to get across his sense of the importance of the Device-'what if we crash with it? What if we don't make it back to Earth? We can't risk this thing.' He tapped it then, almost as though he were in love with it. 'We should report it now and have them send ships out here to get it. It's too precious to-'

At the peak of his emotional intensity, the Device seemed to grow warm under his hand. A portion of its surface, half-hidden under a flap of metal, glowed phosphorescently.

Jennings jerked his hand away in a spasmodic gesture and the Device darkened. But it was enough; the moment had been infinitely revealing.

He said, almost choking, 'It was like a window opening into your skull. I could see into your mind.'

'I read yours,' said Strauss, 'or experienced it, or entered into it, or whatever you choose.' He touched the Device in his cold, withdrawn way, but nothing happened.

'You're an Ultra,' said Jennings angrily. 'When I touched this'-And he did so. 'It's happening again. I see it. Are you a madman? Can you honestly believe it is humanly decent to condemn almost all the human race to extinction and destroy the versatility and variety of the species?'

His hand dropped away from the Device again, in repugnance at the glimpses revealed, and it grew dark again. Once more, Strauss touched it gingerly and again nothing happened. said, lets not start a discussion, for God's sake. This thing is an aid to communication-a telepathic amplifier. Why not? The brain cells have each their electric potentials. Thought can be viewed as a wavering electromagnetic field of microintensities-'

Jennings turned away. He didn't want to speak to Strauss. He said, 'We'll report it now. I don't give a damn about credit. Take it all. I just want it out of our hands.'

For a moment Strauss remained in a brown study. Then he said, 'It's more than a communicator. It responds to emotion and it amplifies emotion.'

'What are you talking about?'

Twice it started at your touch just now, although you'd been handling it all day with no effect. It still has no effect when I touch it.'

'Well?'

'It reacted to you when you were in a state of high emotional tension. That's the requirement for activation, I suppose. And when you raved about the Ultras while you were holding it just now, I felt as you did, for just a moment.'

'So you should.'

'But, listen to me. Are you sure you're so right. There isn't a thinking man on Earth that doesn't know the planet would be better off with a population of one billion rather than six billion. If we used automation to the full-as now the hordes won't allow us to do-we could probably have a completely efficient and viable Earth with a population of no more than, say, five million. Listen to me, Jennings.

Don't turn away, man.'

The harshness in Strauss's voice almost vanished in his effort to be reasonably winning. 'But we can't reduce the population democratically. You know that. It isn't the sex urge, because uterine inserts solved the birth control problem long ago; you know that. It's a matter of nationalism. Each ethnic group wants other groups to reduce themselves in population first, and I agree with them. I want my ethnic group, our ethnic group, to prevail. I want the Earth to be inherited by the elite, which means by men like ourselves. We're the true men, and the horde of half-apes who hold us down are destroying us all. They're doomed to death anyway; why not save ourselves?'

'No,' said Jennings strenuously. 'No one group has a monopoly on humanity. Your five million mirror-images, trapped in a humanity robbed of its variety and versatility, would die of boredom-and serve them right.'

'Emotional nonsense, Jennings. You don't believe that. You've just been trained to believe it by our damn-fool equalitarians. Look, this Device is just what we need. Even if we can't build any others or understand how this one works, this one Device might do. If we could control or influence the minds of key men, then little by little we can superimpose our views on the world. We already have an organization. You must know that if you've seen my mind. It's better motivated and better designed than any other organization on Earth. The brains of mankind flock to us daily. Why not you too? This instrument is a key, as you see, but not just a key to a bit more knowledge. It is a key to the final solution of men's problems. Join us! Join us!' He had reached an earnestness that Jennings had never heard in him.

Strauss's hand fell on the Device, which flickered a second or two and went out.

Jennings smiled humorlessly. He saw the significance of that. Strauss had been deliberately trying to work himself into an emotional state intense enough to activate the Device and had failed.

'You can't work it,' said Jennings. 'You're too darned super-mannishly self-controlled and can't break down, can you?' He took up the Device with hands that were trembling, and it phosphoresced at once.

'Then you work it. Get the credit for saving humanity.'

'Not in a hundred million years,' said Jennings, gasping and barely able to breathe in the intensity of his emotion. 'I'm going to report this now.'

'No,' said Strauss. He picked up one of the table knives. 'It's pointed enough, sharp enough.'