“We have had a great deal of experience with children, so we know that they must not be told too much. There is nothing more you need be told. You will go back now——”
Ross dared interrupt. “But our ship—the others have taken it away——”
Again the soundless laughter. “The ship has not been taken far. Did you think we would leave you stranded here?”
Ross peered hard into the shadows. But only the shadows were there, and then he and Jones were in the shadows no longer.
“Ross!” Helena was hysterical with joy. Even Bernie was stammering and shaking his head incredulously. “Ross. dearest! We thought— And the ship acted all funny, and
then it landed here and there just wasn’t anybody around, and I couldn’t make it go again——”
“It will go now,” Ross promised. It did. They sealed ship; he took the controls; and they hung in space, looking back on a blue-green planet with a single moon.
There were questions; but Ross put an end to questions. He said, “We’re going back to Halsey’s Planet. Haarland wanted an answer. We’ve found it; we’ll bring it to him. The F-T-L families have kept their secret too welj. No wars between the planets—but stagnation worse than wars. And Haarland’s answer is this: He will be the first of the F-T-L traders. He’ll build F-T-L ships, and he’ll carelessly let their secrets be stolen. We’ll bridge the galaxy with F-T-L transports; and we’ll pack the ships with a galaxy of crews! New genes for old; hybrid vigor for dreary decay!
“Do you see it?” His voice was ringing loud; Helena’s eyes on him were adoring. “Mate Jones to Azor, Halsey’s Planet to Earth. Smash the smooth, declining curve! Cross the strains, and then breed them back. Let mankind become genetically wild again instead of rabbits isolated in their sterile hutches!”
Exultantly he set up the combinations for Halsey’s Planet on the Wesley board.
Helena was beside him, proud and close, as he threw in the drive.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
frederik pohl is a double-threat science fictioneer, being the only person to have won science fiction’s top award, the Hugo, both as an editor and as a writer. As a writer, he has published more than thirty novels and short story collections, including The Space Merchants (with C. M. Kornbluth), The Age of the Pussyfoot, Day Million and The Gold at Starbow’s End. His awards include four Hugos and the Edward E. Smith Award. As an editor, he published the first series of anthologies of original stories in the science fiction field, Star Science Fiction, was for many years the editor of two leading magazines hi the field, Galaxy and //, and is currently science fiction editor of Bantam Books. His interests extend beyond science fiction to national affairs (his book, Practical Politics, was a handbook for party reformers in the 1972 election year), history (he is the Encyclopedia Britannica’s authority on the Roman Emperor, Tiberius) and almost the entire range of human affairs. He is currently president of the Science Fiction Writers of America, and makes his home in Red Bank, New Jersey.
cyril M. kornbluth began writing science fiction for publication at the age of fifteen, and continued to do so until his early death in his mid-thirties. In his own right, he was the author of four science fiction novels, including The Syndic, a number of works outside the science fiction field and several score of the brightest and most innovative shorter science fiction pieces ever written. Some of his short stories and novelettes have been mainstays for the anthologists and have also been adapted for television production, such as The Little Black Bag and The Marching Morons. His collaboration with Frederik Pohl has been described as “the finest science fiction collaborating team in history.” Together they wrote seven novels and more than thirty short stories. Among their works are such classics as Wolfbane, Gladiator-at-Law, Search the Sky and The Space Merchants, which has been translated into more than thirty-five languages and has appeared on most lists of the most important science fiction novels ever written.