question, as I see it, is: Do we want war now, while by luck we have the means to win;
or later, when we very probably will not have?
“I use the words ‘very probably will not’ advisedly; with reference to our
ultra-high-acceleration screened battle torpedoes, against which we ourselves have no
defense except a planet-based repulsor. It is practically certain that the Russians do not
have them in production yet. Ilyowicz knew about there and passed the information
along; but he himself was neither an engineer nor a scientist, and-fortunately-we kept the
whole TIMPS project top secret and under psionic guard. The Russians will develop them
in time, certainly; possibly in months, or even weeks. If we wait until they have them in
production we may still be able to vin, but I need not tell you at what appalling cost in
lives.
“Mrs. Jones showed you the large portions of certain munitions plants, and entire areas
that are probably munitions plants, that are hidden under psionic shields. The meaning of
that is clear.
“I now ask the supremely vital question: Ladies and gentlemen of the Board- Shall we
fight now or not?” There was some discussion, but not very much. Every person in the
hall knew the whole story with psionic certainty, and the spirit of Patrick Henry still lived.
The vote was unanimous for immediate war.
The Galaxians’ Grand Fleet, six hundred thirty five superdreadnoughts strong, was in
subspace on its way to New Russia. Fleet Admiral Dann, in his flagship Terra, felt happy,
proud, and confident. Since bombs could not be teleported though competent psionic
screening and the Communists had plenty of competent psiontists, the battle would have
to be fought along conventional lines. However, that was all right. He now had
overwhelming superiority. He also had the TIMPS; which, he was sure, would win the
battle. The worst that could happen was that he couldn’t get them all. A lot of them would
get away by immerging . . . unless that thing Deston and Adams were working on would .
. . maybe . . .
That was the only thing about this whole operation he didn’t like. He called Adams,
aboard the Explorer; which subspace-going laboratory, while traveling in the same
direction as the fleet and at the same velocity, was in no sense any part of it.
“Doc,” Dann thought at him, “I’m going to try again. I know there are only fourteen of you
aboard this time, but God damn it, there’s only one Andrew Adams. You’re the most
important man alive, and nobody in his right mind would call the Big Six expendable,
either. The rest of us are-that’s our business-but if you get killed there’ll be hell to pay
and no pitch hot. I’d probably have to take cyanide or face a firing squad. So won’t you
please, please go back home and stay there?”
“We will not,” Adams replied. “Your solicitude for us does not impress me, and that for
yourself is absurd it is on record that we are working independently of your fleet and
against your wishes. We are conducting a scientific investigation, which may or may not
result in the destruction of one or more Communist warships. It may or may not result in
the loss of one or all of our lives, although we believe that we have a rather high
probability of safety. In any case, the data we obtain will be preserved, which is all that
is important. Whatever else happens is immaterial-the results of this investigation, young
man, are necessary to science,” and Adams cut the telepathic line.
Dann sat back appalled. He had heard of selfless devotion to a cause, but this . . . and
not only himself, but also his wife and the other twelve top psiontists of all known space.
. .
But Admiral Dann had very little time to ponder abstractions. Grand Fleet emerged. Not
in tight formation, of course-really fine control was to come later but most of the
subspacers came out within a few thouand miles of where they had intended to. And
every Galaxian ship, as it emerged, hurled death and destruction. The TIMPS were
launched first, of course; they were the Sunday punch. Thousands of killers erupted, too,
and hundreds of ordinary torps. They were not expected to do much damage-and they
didn’t-but they would fill the ether full of fireworks and they might keep the Communist
needlemen busy enough with their lasers so that some of them might get through. At
least, they’d give the enemy sharpshooters something to do. Then, long before the end
of the fifteen seconds it would take for the first TIMPS and killers to reach their targets,
the big Galaxian battlewagons put out their every course of battle screen, torched up
their every battle beam, and tore in at full drive to englobe the Commie ships and blast
them out of the ether.
All space became filled with the unbearable brilliance, the incomprehensible energies of
hundred-megaton warheads exploding as thick as sparks from a forging ram, and eight
of the Communist ships of war were volatilized at that first blast.
But fifteen seconds at battle tension is a long time; plenty of time for a smart
commander-especially one who has been warned that the enemy may have a weapon
against which he has no defense-to push his IMMERSE button and flit for the protection
of an umbrella. Therefore, five seconds after the first Commie ship had been blown to
atoms-twenty seconds after the battle’s beginning and long before Grand Fleet could
begin englobing tactics against individual Communist ships-the Battle of New Russia was
over. Not one Communist warship remained in space.
There was some defensive action, of course. The Commies had launched a lot of
long-range stuff, too, but it was all ordinary stuff; stuff that could be handled. Defensive
and repulsor screens flared white and beamers and lasermen were very busy men
indeed for a few minutes, but not one Galaxian vessel was very badly damaged or had to
immerse.
Admiral Dann had followed the last few Commies into subspace with his sense of
perception, but they had simply disappeared-with no sign of damage or of violence.
Okay: if they re-emerged to continue the battle that would be all right; if they never
re-emerged that would be still better. Wherefore, after ordering full detection alert, both
up and down, he relaxed-still strapped down at his con-board-and waited to hear from
Maynard.
It is exceedingly difficult, as all psiontists know, to work the Fourth Nume of Total Reality.
What, then, of the Fifth? It had been known, theoretically, for many years, as the realm
of two abysmally fundamental and irreconcilably opposed aspects of that Reality.
First, there was DISCONTINUITY. This was the aspect of complete unpredictability. The
infinity-to-the-infinitieth power of all possible and impossible events could and would
happen; simultaneously, in regular or in irregular sequence, or at complete random, or in
all of these ways at once; completely without justification, reason, or cause.
Second, there was something that was called, for lack of a better term, CREATIVITY.
This was the hyper volume locus of the basic male principle, although sex as such was
only an infinitesimal part of it. It was the aspect or phase-Quality? Ability? Primal Urge?
Power? Force?-backing and binding all being and all doing. It was the-the Will? The
Drive? The Compulsion?to be, to do, to develop, to grow-TO CREATE. It was the
enormous “natural tendency” toward the continuing existence of a universe of order and
of law. Call it what you please, it is that without which-or without the application of which:
language is so helpless in psionicsl -this our universe could not have come into being and
would not even momentarily endure.
Carlyle Deston, the only human being of his time to work the Fifth, reached it the hard
way. He had a hunch, but he could neither show it nor explain it to his fellows. They got
behind him a few times and pushed, but nothing happened. He, however, did not forget it.
It kept on niggling at him, and he kept on nibbling at it, until the two Aceys graduated.
They had something he needed and lacked; a subconscious-and therefore ineradicable
by experience, education, or knowledge innate conviction of superiority to any other race
of man. He added them, and the Funny Four-nobody knew what that uninhibited
foursome could do(-to his pushers; and the thirteen strongest psiontists of his time
rammed his questing ego into and through the psionic barriers in the direction he knew he
had to go.
He went: came back in zero time: and lay in a deep coma for forty hours. He could not
explain, even to hysterical Barbara or to eagerly inquisitive Adams, where he had been or
what he had done or what he had learned. However, he knew what he knew: wherefore
a crew of the finest technicians of Galmetia, working under his minute supervision, built a