Brian Aldiss - The Complete Short Stories - The 1950s

During the three months’ preparation, during the month-long voyage here in a completely automatic ship, he had chased his mind round to come only to this one conclusion: that through him Man was to be put to a test for fitness. Thinking of the mental homes and hospitals of Earth, his poise almost deserted him; but clenching his fists together behind his back – what matter if the assembly saw that betrayal of strain, so long as the searching eyes of Mordregon did not? – he said in a voice striving to remain firm: ‘So then I have come here on trial?’

‘Not you only but your world Earth – and the trial has already begun!’ The voice was not Mordregon’s nor Ped2’s. It belonged to Arntibis Isis of Sirius III, the Proctor Superior of the Tenth Sector, who had not yet spoken. He stood like a column, twelve feet high, his length clad in furled silver, a dark cluster of eyes at his summit probing down at Stevens. He had what the others, what even Mordregon lacked: majesty.

Surreptitiously, Stevens touched his throat. The device nestling there would be needed presently; with its assistance he might win through. This Empire had no sub-radio; in that fact lay his and Earth’s hope. But before Arntibis Isis hope seemed stupidity.

‘Since I am here I must necessarily submit to your trial,’ Stevens said. ‘Although where I come from, the civilised thing is to tell the defendant what he is defending, how he may acquit himself and which punishment is hanging over his head. We also have the courtesy to announce when the trial begins, not springing it on the prisoner half-way through.’

A murmur circling round the hall told him he had scored a minor point. As Stevens construed the problem, the Ultralords were looking for some cardinal virtue in man which, if Stevens manifested it, would save Earth; but which virtue did this multicoloured mop consider important? He had to pull his racing mind up short to hear Arntibis Isis’s reply to his thrust.

‘You are talking of a local custom tucked away in a barren pocket of the galaxy,’ the level voice said. ‘However, your intellect being what it is, I shall enumerate the how and the wherefore. Be it known then, David Stevens of Earth, that through you your world is on trial before the Supreme Diet of the Ultralords of the Second Galaxy. Nothing personal is intended; indeed, you yourself are barely concerned in our business here, except as a mouthpiece. If you acquit yourself – and we are more than impartial, we are eager for your success, though less than hopeful – your race Man will become Full Fledgling Members of our great concourse of beings, sharers of our skills and problems. If you fail, your planet Earth will be annihilated – utterly.’

‘And you call that civilised – ?’ Stevans began hotly.

‘We deal with fifty planets a week here,’ Mordregon interrupted. ‘It’s the only possible system – cuts down endless bureaucracy.’

‘Yes, and we just can’t afford fleets to watch these unstable communities any more,’ one of the Ultralords from the body of the hall concurred. ‘The expense …’

‘Do you remember that ghastly little time-swallowing reptile from somewhere in the Magellans?’ Ped2 chuckled reminiscently. ‘He had some crazy scheme for a thousand years’ supervision of his race.’

‘I’d die of boredom if I watched them an hour,’ Mordregon said, shuddering.

‘Order, please!’ Arntibis Isis snapped. When there was silence, he said to Stevens: ‘And now I will give you the rules of the trial. Firstly, there is no appeal from our verdict; when the session is over, you will be transported back to Earth at once, and the verdict will be delivered almost as soon as you land there.

‘Next, I must assure you we are scrupulously fair in our decision, although you must understand that the definition of fairness differs from sector to sector. You may think we are ruthless; but the Galaxy is a small place and we have no room for useless members within our ranks. As it is we have this trouble, with the Eleventh Galaxy on our hands. However …

‘Next, many of the beings present have powers which you would regard as supernormal, such as telepathy, deep-vision, precognition, outfarling, and so on. These powers they are holding in abeyance, so that you are judged on your own level as far as possible. You have our assurance that your mind will not be read.

‘There is but one other rule; you will now proceed with your own trial.’

For a space of a few chilly seconds, Stevens stared unbelievingly at the tall column of Arntibis Isis: that entity told him nothing. He looked round at Mordregon, at the others, at the phalanx of figures silent in the hall. Nobody moved. Gazing round at the incredible sight of them, Stevens realised sadly how far, far from home he was.

‘… my own trial?’ he echoed.

The Ultralords did not reply. He had had all the help, if help it was; now he was on his own: Earth’s fate was in the scales. Panic threatened him but he fought it down; that was a luxury he could not afford. Calculation only would help him. His cold hand touched the small lump at his throat; his judges had, after all, virtually played into his hands. He was not unprepared.

‘My own trial,’ he repeated more firmly.

Here was the classic nightmare made flesh, he thought. Dreams of pursuit, degradation, annihilation were not more terrible than this static dream where one stands before watchful eyes explaining one’s existence, speaking, speaking to no avail because if there is right it is not in words, because if there is a way of delivering the soul it is not to this audience. He thought, I must all my life have had some sort of a fixation about judgement without mercy; now I’ve gone psychopathic – I’ll spend all my years up before this wall of eyes, trying to find excuses for some crime I don’t know I’ve committed.

He watched the slow revolutions of Mordregon’s domino costume. No, this was reality, not the end results of an obsession. To treat it as other than reality was the flight from fear; that was not Steven’s way: he was afraid, but he could face it.

He spoke to them.

‘I presume by your silence,’ he said, ‘that you wish me to formulate both the questions and the answers, on the principle that two differing levels of intelligence are thus employed; it being as vital to ask the right question as to produce the correct answer.

‘This forcing of two roles upon me obviously doubles my chance of failure, and I would point out that this is, to me, not justice but a mockery.

‘Should I, then, say nothing more to you? Would you accept that silence as a proof that my world can distinguish justice from injustice, surely one of the prime requisites of a culture?’

He paused, only faintly hopeful. It could not be as simple as that. Or could it? If it could the solution would seem to him just a clever trick; but to these deeper brains it might appear otherwise. His thoughts swam as he tried to see the problem from their point of view. It was impossible: he could only go by his own standards, which of course was just what they wanted. Yet still he kept silence, trusting it more than words.

‘Your point accepted. Continue,’ said Ped2 brusquely, but he gave Stevens an encouraging nod.

So it was not going to be as easy as that. He pulled a handkerchief from a pocket and wiped his forehead, thinking wildly: ‘Would they accept that as a defence: that I am near enough to the animal to sweat but already far enough away to object to the fact? Do they sweat, any of them? Perhaps they think sweat’s a good thing. How can I be sure of anything?’

Like every other thought to his present state of mind, it turned circular and short-circuited itself.