Adaptation Read online

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  ADAPTATION

  By MACK REYNOLDS

  Illustrated by Schoenherr

  _When a man has a great deal of knowledge, it becomes extremely easy for him to confuse "knowledge" with "wisdom" ... and forget that the antonym of "wisdom" is not "ignorance" but "folly."_

  FORWARD

  _Hardly had man solved his basic problems on the planet of his originthan he began to fumble into space. Barely a century had elapsed in theexploration of the Solar System than he began to grope for the stars._

  _And suddenly, with an all but religious zeal, mankind conceived itsfantasy dream of populating the galaxy. Never in the history of the racehad fervor reached such a peak and held so long. The question of why wasseemingly ignored. Millions of Earth-type planets beckoned and with alemming-like desperation humanity erupted into them._

  _But the obstacles were frightening in their magnitude. The planets andsatellites of Sol had proven comparatively tractable and those that weresuited to man-life were quickly brought under his dominion. But there,of course, he had the advantage of proximity. The time involved inrunning back and forth to the home planet was meaningless and allEarth's resources could be thrown into each problem's solving._

  _But a planet a year removed in transportation or even communication?Ay! this was another thing and more than once a million colonists werelost before the Earthlings could adapt to new climates, new flora andfauna, new bacteria--or to factors which the most far out visionary hadnever fancied, perhaps the lack of something never before missed._

  _So, mad with the lust to seed the universe with his kind, men soughtnew methods. To a hundred thousand worlds they sent smaller colonies, asfew as a hundred pioneers apiece, and there marooned them, to adapt, ifadapt they could._

  _For a millennium each colony was left to its own resources, to conquerthe environment or to perish in the effort._

  _A thousand years was sufficient. Invariably it was found, on thoseplanets where human life survived at all, man slipped back during hisfirst two or three centuries into a state of barbarism. Then slowlybegan to inch forward again. There were exceptions and the progress onone planet never exactly duplicated that on another, however the averagewas surprisingly close to both nadir and zenith, in terms of evolutionof society._

  _In a thousand years it was deemed by the Office of GalacticColonization such pioneers had largely adjusted to the new environmentand were ready for civilization, industrialization and eventualassimilation into the rapidly evolving Galactic Commonwealth._

  _Of course, even from the beginning, new and unforeseen problemsmanifested themselves ..._

  _from_ "Man In Antiquity" _published in Terra City, Sol Galactic Year 3,502._

  I.

  The Co-ordinator said, "I suppose I'm an incurable romantic. You see, Ihate to see you go." Academician Amschel Mayer was a man in early middleyears; Dr. Leonid Plekhanov, his contemporary. They offset one another;Mayer thin and high-pitched, his colleague heavy, slow and dour. Nowthey both showed their puzzlement.

  The Co-ordinator added, "Without me."

  Plekhanov kept his massive face blank. It wasn't for him to be impatientwith his superior. Nevertheless, the ship was waiting, stocked andcrewed.

  Amschel Mayer said, "Certainly a last minute chat can't harm." Inwardlyhe realized the other man's position. Here was a dream coming true, andMayer and his fellows were the last thread that held the Co-ordinator'scontrol over the dream. When they left, half a century would pass beforehe could again check developments.

  The Co-ordinator became more businesslike. "Yes," he said, "but I havemore in mind than a chat. Very briefly, I wish to go over yourassignment. Undoubtedly redundant, but if there are questions, no matterhow seemingly trivial, this is the last opportunity to air them."

  _What possible questions could there be at this late date?_ Plekhanovthought.

  The department head swiveled slowly in his chair and then back again ashe talked. "You are the first--the first of many, many such teams. Themanner in which you handle your task will effect man's eternity.Obviously, since upon your experience we will base our future policieson interstellar colonization." His voice lost volume. "The position inwhich you find yourselves should be humbling."

  "It is," Amschel Mayer agreed. Plekhanov nodded his head.

  The Co-ordinator nodded, too. "However, the situation is as near idealas we could hope. Rigel's planets are all but unbelievably Earthlike.Almost all our flora and fauna have been adaptable. Certainly our racehas been.

  "These two are the first of the seeded planets. Almost a thousand yearsago we deposited small bodies of colonists upon each of them. Since thenwe have periodically checked, from a distance, but never intruded." Hiseyes went from one of his listeners to the other. "No comments orquestions, thus far?"

  Mayer said, "This is one thing that surprises me. The colonies are sosmall to begin with. How could they possibly populate a whole world inone millennium?"

  The Co-ordinator said, "Man adapts, Amschel. Have you studied thedevelopment of the United States? During her first century and a halfthe need was for population to fill the vast lands wrested from theAmer-Inds. Families of eight, ten, and twelve children were the commonthing, much larger ones were not unknown. And the generations crowdedone against another; a girl worried about spinsterhood if she reachedseventeen unwed. But in the next century? The frontier vanished, thedriving need for population was gone. Not only were drastic immigrationlaws passed, but the family shrunk rapidly until by mid-TwentiethCentury the usual consisted of two or three children, and even thechildless family became increasingly common."

  Mayer frowned impatiently, "But still, a thousand years. There is alwaysfamine, war, disease ..."

  Plekhanov snorted patronizingly. "Forty to fifty generations, Amschel?Starting with a hundred colonists? Where are your mathematics?"

  The Co-ordinator said, "The proof is there. We estimate that each ofRigel's planets now supports a population of nearly one billion."

  "To be more exact," Plekhanov rumbled, "some nine hundred million onGenoa, seven and a half on Texcoco."

  Mayer smiled wryly. "I wonder what the residents of each of theseplanets call their worlds. Hardly the same names we have arbitrarilybestowed."

  "Probably each call theirs _The World_," the Co-ordinator smiled. "Afterall, the basic language, in spite of a thousand years, is stillAmer-English. However, I assume you are familiar with our method ofnaming. The most advanced culture on Rigel's first planet is to becompared to the Italian cities during Europe's feudalistic era. We havenamed that planet Genoa. The most advanced nation of the second planetis comparable to the Aztecs at the time of the conquest. We consideredTenochtitlan but it seemed a tongue twister, so Texcoco is thealternative."

  "Modernizing Genoa," Mayer mused, "should be considerably easier thanthe task on semiprimitive Texcoco."

  Plekhanov shrugged, "Not necessarily."

  The Co-ordinator held up a hand and smiled at them. "Please, no debateson methods at present. An hour from now you will be in space with a yearof travel before you. During that time you'll have opportunity fordiscussion, debate and hair pulling on every phase of your problem."

  His expression became more serious. "You are acquainted with the uniqueposition you assume. These colonists are in your control to an extent nosmall group has ever dominated millions of others before. No Caesar everexerted the power that will be in your educated hands. For a halfcentury you will be as gods. Your science, your productive know-how,your medicine--if it comes to that, your weapons--a
re many centuries inadvance of theirs. As I said before, your position should be humbling."

  Mayer squirmed in his chair. "Why not check upon us, say, once everydecade? In all, our ship's company numbers but sixteen persons. Almostanything could happen. If you were to send a department craft each tenyears ..."

  The Co-ordinator was shaking his head. "Your qualifications are as highas anyone available. Once on the scene you will begin accumulatinginformation which we, here in Terra City, do not have. Were we to sendanother group in ten years to check upon you, all they could do would beinterfere in a situation all the factors with which they would not becognizant."

  Amschel Mayer shifted nervously. "But no matter how highly trained, norhow earnest our efforts, we still may fail." His voice worried. "Thedepartment cannot expect guaranteed success. After all, we are thefirst."

  "Admittedly. Your group is first to approach the hundreds of thousandsof planets we have seeded. If you fail, we will use your failure toperfect the eventual system we must devise for future teams. Even yourfailure would be of infinite use to us." He lifted and dropped ashoulder. "I have no desire to undermine your belief in yourselvesbut--how are we to know?--perhaps there will be a score of failuresbefore we find the ideal method of quickly bringing these primitivecolonies into our Galactic Commonwealth."

  The Co-ordinator came to his feet and sighed. He still hated to see themgo. "If there is no other discussion ..."