The Depths of Time (62 page)

“
And there
’
s the minor matter of transporting three million people from the planetary surface to orbit,
”
Neshobe said.
“
Dr. Vandar, I expect you could pull up the
figures the fastest of anyone here. What is the maximum daily capacity of our surface-to-orbit passenger fleet? Not
the theoretical capacity, but the real numbers for the real
ships that are operational and available.
”

Vandar scribed over his datapage for a moment, then looked up.
“
Approximately six hundred fifty passengers,
ma
’
am.
”

“
Well, then,
”
Neshobe said, figuring quickly.
“
Six-fifty
a day, times four hundred twenty-one days a local year. Just over two hundred seventy thousand a year. Assuming
the entire passenger fleet works around the clock with no
accidents or breakdowns, it will take just over eleven local
years to transport the entire planetary population. As, ac
cording to Dr. Vandar
’
s figures, the atmosphere might be
getting close to unbreathable by that time, things could be
a bit awkward for the last ones to get aboard.
”

“
We can build more transports,
”
Parrige said.
“
Enough to lift everyone—or nearly everyone—off the surface in
time.
”

“
At the same time we
’
re working on an all-out crash
program to build more habitat capacity?
”
Raenau asked.
“
If we commit resources to building ships, how can we
take the same resources and commit them to habitat con
struction? And how long will it take to build more ships and habitats?
”

“
Ma
’
am, it will be difficult, and it will take time, and
we will have to take great risks,
”
said Parrige.
“
But surely
it can be done.
”

“
It is perhaps a minor point,
”
said Koffield,
“
but the
Dom Pedro
I
V
’
s primary cargo consists of fifty Habitat
Seeds.
”

Raenau looked puzzled.
“
What
’
s a Habitat Seed?
”

“
Mmmm? Oh. Perhaps you don
’
t use them anymore. Habitat Seeds are habitat-making robots. Very large and sophisticated robotic machines that are programmed to mine the raw materials for a space habitat, process the materials, and construct the hab with little, or no human intervention. They
’
re one-shot items, and they don
’
t always work. Sometimes a circuit blows out or a subsystem wears out and you
’
re stuck with a half-built hab. But usually they do the job.
”

“
So that
’
s something close to fifty additional habitats that could be built,
”
said Vandar.

“
Possibly fewer,
”
said Koffield.
“
And they won
’
t be large or grand habs, and they won
’
t be stocked with anything. Habitat Seeds produce just the bare bones. But they
’
ll help somewhat, I expect.
”

“
Every little bit is going to help,
”
said Vandar.

“
But even fifty extra habitats won
’
t be help enough,
”
Raenau said, looking at Parrige.
“
That moves the line up the chart, but not by enough. And life is not all lines on charts.
”

Parrige drew himself up in his chair and glared at Raenau, and then at Neshobe Kalzant.
“
I
’
m not a fool, Madam Executive. I realize there would be difficulties, immense ones. But all that is as it may be. It
’
s plain to see that if the planet is dying, expansion of the orbital habitats only makes sense. We could start at once to transport those in most need—those who have been hurt the worst by this slow-motion grand-scale disaster—to the spaceside habitats at once. We can build habitats for the rest in the years to come.
”

“
And the ones left behind will start to tell each other they
’
re being abandoned while the lifeboats are pulling away,
”
said Raenau.
“
How will you handle the panic that will start the second the evacuation begins? Go out to the next rumor riot with some charts and graphs and explain that everything is going to be fine?
”

Parrige
’
s eyes flashed at Raenau.
“
There will be difficulties, but—
”

“
Difficulties!
”
Neshobe half shouted.
“
You make it
sound as if the difficulties are nothing but minor inconve
niences. Thirty-one people died in the last spaceport riot.
We probably lost two or three times that many in ground-
side accidents caused by the panic at other ports. Space
and stars know how many casualties there were in orbit.
What sort of mob are we going to get at the spaceport
when we announce that we have to evacuate the planet
’
s
surface?
”

“
Surely mob panic has no place in determining plane
tary policy,
”
Parrige said snappishly.

Neshobe restrained herself, fighting off the impulse to stand up, cross around the table, grab her old advisor by
the shoulders, and give him a good hard shaking. Instead,
she held her voice in rigid control and spoke in words as
cold and flat as she could find.
“
Senyor Parrige,
”
she said,
“
it is time and past time for you, and everyone else here, to understand that we are dangerously close to the point where mob panic
is
planetary policy. People are frightened now. When this news gets out, they
’
ll be terrified, and angry.
”

“
Of course they will be!
”
Parrige half shouted.
“I’m
terrified, here and now. But as Dr. Ashdin and Admiral Koffield have just gotten through pointing out, if we approach things in a cautious, gradualist way, we
are doomed.
”
Parrige paused a moment, and took a deep
breath before starting to speak again, in lower, calmer
tones.
“
We will squander our time and resources on laud
able but ultimately futile efforts like stabilizing Lake
Virtue. Commander Raenau is right. We can
’
t go to the ragged edge of carrying capacity on the habs. Admiral Koffield and Dr. Ashdin are right to say we can
’
t proceed in a gradualist way. And
you
are right, Madam Kalzant,
when you say that I am casually suggesting that we do the
impossible.

“
But
I’m right
too.
”
Parrige frowned and shook his head.
“
I
know
how bad the orbital-habitat situation is. I
know
the risks of using all available carrying capacity. But we are growing weaker, not stronger. We are expending our resources, not marshaling them. If it is difficult to act
decisively
now,
it will only become more difficult later on, and then more difficult still, until action becomes utterly impossible.
”

Neshobe looked at Parrige in surprise. It was nothing like him to express himself so emphatically.

Admiral Koffield cleared his throat and spoke in a quiet voice.
“
I
’
ve heard that politics was the art of the possible. But evacuating the planetary population is politically impossible. The people on the ground will panic. The more they understand they have to leave, the worse the situation will become. Panic, rumor, riot, profiteering, corruption— there will be no end to it. The people in the space habs won
’
t want to let them in. But, even if evacuation isn
’
t possible, it is absolutely necessary.
”

Neshobe let out a deep breath.
“
Then we must make it possible. Maybe, just maybe, if we educate the public, convince them that the situation is bad, but that if there is time, there will be a chance for an orderly evacuation.
”

“
Yes,
”
said Parrige.
“
That is the way.
”

“
But before we start pointing the way,
”
Neshobe said,
“
we must be sure we are convincing. We have to show them something we don
’
t have. Proof.
”

“
But, Madam Executive,
”
said Vandar,
“
we have Admiral Koffield
’
s preliminary work and my mathematical analysis of it.
”

“
That
’
s a start, yes, so far as it goes,
”
Neshobe said,
“
but it is by no means enough. A crackpot admiral from a hundred years back—and one whose very name is, forgive my bluntness, a curse word for many of our citizens— appears from out of nowhere telling some crazy story about how his magical formula proves We
’
re all doomed. No. I
’
m sorry, Admiral Koffield. We can
’
t even begin to let the news out with your name attached to it. Our Glistern refugees and descendants would reject it out of hand.
”

Koffield shook his head sorrowfully.
“
It
’
s incredible. I must admit that I thought the one bright spot in my being marooned was that people would have forgotten by now. A century and a quarter later, I
’
m still a monster to them because of Circum Central? Even after their planet died?
”
Vandar looked at Koffield in surprise.
“
But don
’
t you— no, of course, you
’
ve only been here a brief time, and it
’
s not the sort of thing someone would tell you in casual conversation. The Glisterns blame you
for
the death of their planet.
”

Koffield stared at Vandar in astonishment.
“
But that
’
s absurd! How could anything I did have caused the collapse of their climate?
’’

Vandar turned his hands palms up and gestured hopelessly.
“
You
’
re quite right that it
’
s absurd—but they blame you all the same. Someone on Glister dug up an old saying, a proverb, from near-ancient Earth:
‘
For want of a nail the shoe was lost. For want of the shoe, the horse was lost. For want of a horse, the battle was lost. For want of the battle, the kingdom was lost. All for the want of a nail.
’
The legend says that the ships you stranded were carrying vital supplies, special equipment, powerful terra-forming technology that would have stabilized the climate and prevented the collapse. What, exactly, was aboard changes from one version of the story to the next. They call you the man who stole the nail.
”

It was plain to Neshobe that Koffield was struggling to calm himself.
“
I did—what I had to do,
”
he said.
“
What I was ordered to do. I did what I did to defend against the very thing my garrison—and the whole of the Chronologic Patrol—were established to protect against—a violation of causality. There were people aboard those ships, colonists and their equipment. I had no intention of harming any of those people, and I will regret it to the end of my days. What I did will
haunt
me to the end of my days. Those people died as a consequence of my actions. If the Glisterns wish to hate me for that, then—then they do no more than I do myself, many a sleepless night.

“
But after the ships were lost, I studied the records of those ships, their manifests, their histories, all I could learn about them. But there was nothing,
nothing
aboard those ships that was not replaceable, and, as a matter of fact, soon replaced. I killed those crews, and many more died because those ships did not reach Glister—but I did not kill a world. Glister died of the same illness that is killing Solace, and not because a few shiploads of equipment were lost.
”

The room went silent for a time. Even the rain spattering down on the roof faded away, and the people around the table sat, still as stone.