He hovered in an N-dimensional space, far from politics.
As soon as Hari returned to Streeling, he went into seclusion. The pandemonium following
Lamurk's assassination were the worst hours he had ever spent.
Daneel's advice had proved useful -- “No matter what I do, remain in your role: a mathist,
troubled but above the fray. ” But the fray was jarring anarchy.
Shouts, accusations, panics. Hari had endured fingers pointed at him, threats. Lamurk's
personal escort drew weapons when Hari finally left the assassination room. His Specials
stunned five of them.
Now all of Trantor, and soon enough the Empire, would be rife with rage and speculation.
The insect-shockers had carried energies stored in tiny positronic traps, a technology
thought to be extinct. Attempts to trace it led nowhere. In any case, there was no link to
Hari. Yet. By tradition, assassinations were kept at a distance, done by intermediaries.
They were also safer that way. Hari's presence was thus an argument against his
involvement -- just as Daneel had predicted. Hari liked that aspect of the matter
particularly: a prediction holding true. In the mob hysteria which followed, no one
assumed he was implicated. Hari also knew his limits, and here they were. He could not
deal with such chaos, except in the broader context of mathematics.
So it was to his familiar, supple abstractions that he fled.
He fanned through dimensions, watching the planes of psychohistory evolve. The entire
Galaxy spread before him, not in its awesome spiral, but in parameter-space. Fitness peaks
rose like ridges and crests. Here were societies which lasted, while those dwelling in the
valleys perished.
Sark. He close-upped the Sark Zone and stepped the dynamical equations at blurring speed.
The New Renaissance would effervesce into lurid cultural eruptions. Conflicts arose like
orange spikes in the fitness-landscape. Stable peaks collapsed. Runoff from them clogged
the valleys, making paths between peaks impassable.
This meant that not merely people but whole planets would be unable to evolve out of a
depressive valley. Those worlds would steep in the mire, trapped for eons. Then --
Crimson flares. Nova triggers. Once used, these made war far more dangerous.
A solar system could be “cleansed” -- a horrifyingly bland term used by ancient aggressors
-- by inducing a mild nova burst in a balmy sun. This roasted worlds just enough to kill
all but those who could swiftly find caverns and store food for the few years of the nova
stage.
Hari froze with horror. He had fled into his abstract spaces, but death and irrationality
dogged him even here.
In the value-free parameter spaces of the equations, war itself was simply another way to
decide among paths. It was wasteful, certainly, highly centralized -- and quick.
If war increased the “throughput efficiency” parameters, then the Galactic system would
have selected for more wars. Instead, Zonal wars had sputtered along, becoming less
frequent. In Sark's future, glaring red war-stains shrank as time stepped forward, jumping
whole years in a flicker. Pink and soft yellow splashes replaced them.
These were more continuous, decentralized decision-trees, operating to defuse conflicts.
Microscopic bringers of peace, these processes. Yet the people involved probably never
guessed that the long, slow undulations were bettering their lives. They never glimpsed
vast agencies outside the blunt agonies and ecstasy of human life.
The “expected utility” model failed to predict this outcome. In that view, each war arose
from a perfectly rational calculation by Zonal “actors, ” independent of previous
experience. Yet wars became unusual, so the Sarkian Zonal system was learning.
It came to him in a flash. Societies were an intricate set of parallel processors.
Each working on its own problem. Each linked to the other.
But no single processor would know that it was seaming.
As Sark, so the Empire. The Empire could “know” things that no person grasped. And far
more -- know things that no organization, no planet, no Zone knew.
Until now. Until psychohistory.
This was new, profound.
It meant that for all these millennia, the Empire had grown a kind of self-knowing unlike
any way of comprehending that a mere human had -- or even could have. A deep knowing other
than the self-consciousness which humans bore.
Hari panted with surprise. He tried to see if he could posssibly be wrong ...
\fter all, feedback loops were scarcely new. Hari knew the general theorem, ancient beyond
measure: if all variables in a system are tightly coupled, and you can change one of them
precisely, then you can directly control all of them. The system could be guided to an
exact outcome through its myriad inter-nal feedback loops. Spontaneously, the system
ordered itself -- and obeyed. in truly complex systems, how adjustments occur was beyond
the human complexity horizon. Beyond knowing -- and most important, not worth knowing. But
this ... He expanded the N-dimensional land- scape, horizons thrusting away along axes he
could barely grasp.
Everywhere, the Empire bristled with ... life. patterns the equations picked out, luminous
snaking runways of data/knowledge/wisdom. All unknown to any human.
To anyone, until this moment.
Psychohistory had discovered an entity greater than human, though of humanity.
He saw suddenly that the Empire had its own landscape, greater and more subtle than
anything he had suspected. The Empire's complex adaptive system had achieved a “poised”
state, hovering in the margin between order and full-spectral chaos. There it had sat for
millennia, accomplishing ends and tasks that no one knew. It could adapt, evolve. Its
apparent “stasis” was in fact evidence that the Empire had found the peak in a huge
fitness-landscape.
And as Hari watched, the Empire veered toward the canyons of disorder.
Hari! Terrible things are happening. Come!
He yearned to stay, to learn more ... but the voice was Dors'.
Daneel said bleakly, “My agents, my brethren ... all dead.”
The robot sat slumped over in Hari's office. Dors comforted him. Hari rubbed his eyes,
still recovering from the digital immersion. Things were moving too fast, far too --
“Tiktoks! They attacked my, my ... ” Daneel could not go on.
“Where?” Dors asked.
“All over Trantor! You and I, and a few dozen others, only we survive ... ” Daneel buried
his face in his hands.
Dors grimaced. “This must have something to do with Lamurk, his death.”
“Indirectly, yes.”
Both robots looked at Hari. He leaned against his desk, still weak. He studied them for a
long moment. “It was part of a larger ... deal.”
“For what?” Dors asked.
“To end the tiktok revolt. My calculations showed that it would have spread rapidly
through the Empire. Fatally.”
“A bargain?” Daneel pressed his lips into thin pale wedges.
Hari blinked rapidly, fighting a leaden weight of guilt. “One I did not fully control.”
Dors said icily, “You used me in it, didn't you? I handled the data Daneel sent, locations
of Lamurk's allies -- ”
“And I had it relayed to the tiktoks, yes, ” Hari said soberly. “Not a difficult technical
trick, if you have help from Mesh-space.”
Daneel's eyes narrowed at this last reference. Then he relaxed his face and said, “So the
tiktoks killed Lamurk's men and women. You knew I would not allow such a mass murder, even
to assist you.”
Hari nodded soberly. “I understand the constraints you act under. The Zeroth Law demands
rather high standards and my fate as First Minister would not justify such a breach of the
First Law.”
Daneel stared stonily at Hari. “So you got around that. You used me and my robots as, as
spotters.”
“Exactly. The tiktoks closely shadowed your robots. They are rather dumb creatures, devoid
of subtlety. But they do not labor under the First Law. Once they knew who to hit, I only
needed give the signal for when to strike.”
“The signal -- when you began your speech, ” Dors said. “Lamurk's allies would be sitting
before screens and watching. Easily reached and already distracted by you.”
Hari sighed. “Exactly. ”
“This is so unlike you, Hari, ” Dors said. “And about time, too, ” Hari said sharply.
“Again and again they tried to kill me. They would have succeeded, eventually, even if I
never became First Minister.”
Dors said with a trace of sympathy, “I would never have suspected you of such ... cool
motives.”
Hari gazed at her bleakly. “Me either. The only reason 1 could bring myself to do it was
that I could see the future -- my future -- so plainly.”
Daneel's face was a swirl of emotion, something Hari had never witnessed before. “But my
brethren -- why them? I cannot comprehend. For what reason did they die?”
“My deal. ” Hari said, throat tight. “And 1 have just been double-crossed. ”
“You did not know robots would die?” Hari shook his head sadly. “No. I should have seen
it, though. It is obvious!” He smacked himself in the head. “Once the tiktoks had done my
job, they could do the work of the memes. ”
“Memes?” Daneel asked. “Deal ... for what?” Dors asked sharply. “To end the tiktok revolt.
” Hari looked at Dors, avoiding Daneel's gaze. “My calculations showed that it would have
spread rapidly through the Empire. Fatally. ” Daneel stood. “I understand your right to
make human decisions about human lives. We robots cannot fathom how you can think in these
ways, but then, we are not built to do so. Still, Hari! -- you made a bargain with forces
you do not understand. ”
“I didn't see their next move. ” Hari felt miserable, but a part of him noted that Daneel
already grasped who the memes were.
Dors did not. “Whose move?” she demanded.
“The ancients, ” Hari said. He explained in halting phrases. Of his recent explorations of
the Mesh. Of the labyrinth-minds who resided in those digital spaces, cold and analytical
in their revenge.
“We robots left those?” Daneel whispered. “I had suspected ... ”
“They eluded you in the early, rough stages of our expansion into the Galaxy. Or so they
say. ” Hari looked away from Dors, who still gazed at him in silent shock.
Daneel asked cautiously, “Where were they?”
“The huge structures at the Galactic Center -- you've seen them?”
“So that was where these electromagnetic presences were hiding?”
"For a while. They came to Trantor long ago, when the Mesh became large enough to support
them.
They live in the nooks and crannies of our digital webs. As the Mesh grows, so do they.
Now they're strong enough to strike. They might have waited longer, gotten better --
except that two sims I found provoked them."
Daneel said slowly, “Those Sarkian sims: Joan and Voltaire.”
You know of them?“ Hari asked. I ... tried to stunt their impact. Sarkian modes are bad
for the Empire. I employed that Nim fellow, he proved inept.”
Hari smiled wanly. “His heart wasn't in it. He liked those sims.”
“I should have sensed that, ” Daneel said. “You have some ability to perceive our mental
states, don't you?” Hari asked. “It is limited. Patterns are more easily sensed if the
”subject has had a certain childhood disease, as it hap-pens Nim was lacking that. Still,
I know that humans are fond of seeing their kind rendered in other media."
Such as robots? Hari thought. Then why have we had taboos against them since antiquity?
Dors was watching the two of them, aware that they were feeling each other out over murky
territory.
Hari said carefully, “The meme-minds blocked Nim when he searched for the sims in the
Mesh. But he worked out quite well when I needed help interfacing with the Mesh. I'll
pardon the fellow, when this is over.”
Daneel said coldly, “Those sims and their kind -- they are still dangerous, Hari. I beg
you -- ”
“Don't worry, I know that. I'll deal with them. It's the meme-minds that worry me now.”
“And these minds hate us all?” Dors asked slowly, trying to grasp these ideas.
“Humans? Yes, but not nearly so much as your kind, m'love. ”
“Us?” She blinked.
“Robots did damage to them long ago. ”
“Yes!” Daneel said sternly. “To protect humanity. ”
“And those older intelligences hate your kind for your brutality. By the time the fleets
of robo-explorers were done, we found a Galaxy suitable for benign farming. ” Hari flicked
on his holo. “Here's an image I brought from the meme-minds.”
Across a darkling plain swept a line of yellow. Harsh winds drove it forward as it
consumed the tall stands of lush grass. Licking flames reached and ate and reached again.
From the bright burning line of attack rose billowing, leaden smoke.
“A prairie fire, ” Hari said. “That is how the robot-explorers of twenty thousand years
ago looked to those ancient minds.”
“Burning up the Galaxy?” Dors said hollowly. “Making it safe for the precious humans, ”
Hari said.
“For this, ” Daneel said, “they wish revenge. But why now?”
“They are at last able ... and they finally detected you robots, distinguishing you from
the tiktoks.”
Daneel asked stonily, “How?”
“When they found the sims I had revived. Working backward from them, to me, they found
Dors. Then you.”
“They can survey that widely?” Dors asked. Hari said, "All digital information from
surveillance cameras, from snooper pickups, microdevices
-- they can fish in that sea."
“You helped them, ” Daneel said.
“For the good of the Empire I made my deal with them.”
Daneel said, “They first killed the Lamurkians, when turned on my robots. Assigning a
dozen tiktoks to each, they overwhelmed our kind.”
“All of us?” Dors whispered.
“About a third of us escaped. ” Daneel allowed himself a hard smile. “We are far more
capable than nese ... automatons. ” Hari nodded sadly. "That was not in the deal.
They ... used me. "
“I think we are all being used. ” Daneel cast a sour gance at Hari. “In different ways. ”
“I had to do it, friend Daneel. ” Dors stared at Hari. “I scarcely know you. ” Hari said
softly, “Sometimes being human is harder than it looks.”
Dors' eyes flashed. “Aliens slaughtering my kind!”
“I had to find a solution -- ” She said, “Robots, especially the humaniforms -- they're
servants, they -- ”
“My love, you are more human than anyone I've known. ”
“ But -- murder!”
“There was going to be murder anyway. The ancient memes could not be stopped. ” Hari
sighed and realized how far he had come. This was power, hovering above all and seeing the
world as a vast arena, its clashes unending. He had become part of that and knew he could
not go back to being the simple mathist ever again.
Dors demanded, “Why are you so sure? You could have told us, we could -- ”
“They knew you already. If I had stalled, they would have taken you two, gone hunting for
the rest.”
Daneel asked sternly, “And ... for us?”
“Both of you I saved. Part of the deal. ” Daneel wilted then. “Thank you ... I suppose. ”
Hari gazed at his old friend, eyes misting. “You ... are carrying too much weight.”
Daneel nodded. “I carried out the imperative and obeyed you.”
Hari nodded. “Lamurk. I was there. Your insects fried him. ”
“Or appeared to.”
“What?” Hari stared as Daneel pressed a button on his wrist, then turned to the office
door. Through it, pausing slightly for the security screen, stepped a man of unremarkable
looks in a brown workman's coverall.
“Our Mister Lamurk, ” Daneel said. “That isn't -- ” Hari then saw the subtle resemblances.
The nose had been trimmed, cheeks filled out, hair thinned and browned, ears sloped back.
“But I saw him die!”
“So you did. The voltage he took fully stopped him for a bit, and had my disguised guards
not begun proper treatment at the site, he would have stayed dead. ”
“You could pull him back from that?”
“It is an ancient craft.”
“How long can a human remain dead before -- ?”
“About an hour, at low temperatures. We had to work much faster than that, ” Daneel said
in measured tones.
“Honoring the First Law, ” Hari said.
“Shading it a bit. There is no lasting harm done to Lamurk. Now he will devote his talents
to better ends.”
“Why?” Hari realized that Lamurk had said nothing. The man stood attentively, watching
Daneel, not Hari. “I do have certain positive powers over human minds. An ancient robot
named Giskard gave me limited sway over the neural complexities of the human cerebral
cortex. I have altered Lamurk's motivations and trimmed some memories.”
“How much?” Dors asked suspiciously. To her, Hari realized, Lamurk was still an enemy
until proven otherwise. Daneel waved a hand. “Speak. ”
“I understand that I have erred. ” Lamurk spoke in a dry, sincere voice, without his usual
fire. “I apologize, especially to you, Hari. I cannot recall my offenses, but I regret
them. I shall do better now. ”
“You do not miss your memories?” Dors probed. “They are not precious, ” Lamurk said
reasonably. “An endless chain of petty barbarities and insatiable ambitions, as nearly as
I can recall. Blood and anger. Not great moments, so why preserve them? I will be a better
person now.”
Hari felt both wonder and fear. “If you could do this, Daneel, why do you bother to argue
with me? fust change my mind!”
Daneel said calmly, “I would not dare. You are different from others.”
“Because of psychohistory? Is that all that holds you back?”
“That, yes. But you also did not have the brain fever when young. That makes my skills
useless. For example, I could not sense your plot to use the tiktoks against the Lamurk
faction, when we met in that open, public place, to enlist my robots' help.”
“I ... see. ” To Hari it was sobering to see by how slender a thread his dealings had
hung. Merely missing a childhood disease!
“I am looking forward to my future tasks, ” Lamurk said flatly. “A new life.”
“What tasks?” Dors asked.
“I will go to the Benin Zone, as regional manager. A responsibility with many exciting
challenges.”
“Very good, ” Daneel said approvingly.
Something in the blandness of all this sent a chill . down Hari's spine. This was power
indeed, played by an ageless master.
“Your Zeroth Law in action ... ”
“It is essential to psychohistory, ” Daneel said.
Hari frowned. “How?”
“The Zeroth Law is a corollary of the First Law, for how can a human being best be kept
from injury, if not by ensuring that human society in general is protected and kept
functioning?”
Hari said, “And only with a decent theory of the future can you see what is necessary.”
“Exactly. Since the time of Giskard we robots have labored on such a theory, bringing
forth only a crude model. So, Hari, you and your theory are essential. Even so, I knew
that I was verging close to the First Law's limit when I followed your orders, using my
robots to shadow the Lamurkians.”
“You sensed something wrong?”
“Hyperresistance in the positronic pathways manifests as trouble standing and walking and
then speaking. I displayed all these. I must have sensed that my robots would be used
indirectly to kill humans. The ancient Giskard had similar difficulties with the boundary
between the First and Zeroth Laws.”
Dors' mouth trembled with barely repressed emotion. “The rest of us depend upon your
judgment to negotiate the tension between those two most fundamental of Laws. I could not
withstand what you have had to endure.”
Trying to comfort him, Hari said, “You had no choice, Daneel. I boxed you in.”
Daneel looked at Dors, allowing conflicted expressions to flit across his face, a symphony
of agony. “The Zeroth Law ... I have lived with it for so long ... many millennia ... and
yet ... ”
“There is a clear contradiction, ” Hari said softly, knowing he was treading in territory
of great delicacy. “The sort of conceptual clash a human mind can sometimes manage.”