And so, she sighed, was Bareimus.
The Bareimus situation was, simply stated, a stinker. By rights it should have gone to Science, or perhaps some sector of the Military, but since it concerned aliens, the problem was all hers. And a hell of a problem it was.
Bareimus was a star about eight parsecs from the Kandor system. It had seven planets circling it at distances of from the 34 to 280 million miles. Two of the planets were inhabited; five were totally devoid of life. The Astronomy Department had decided, by means she could barely begin to understand, that Bareimus was going to go nova, or possibly supernova, within two years. Her job was to evacuate the indigenous populations of Bareimus III and V before the cataclysm took place. The natives of Bareimus V, a docile, philosophically-oriented race of chlorine-breathers, were more than happy to relocate around a stable sun, and the problem there was merely one of logistics. Though “merely,” she reflected, was hardly an adequate adverb to describe the task of moving some two billion beings and their possessions halfway across the galaxy in a year's time. Her troubles—and her incipient ulcer—were being caused by Bareimus III. There was nobody in the
department, indeed in the whole Oligarchy, lacking an opinion on the matter. With one notable exception:
Psychology couldn't make up its collective mind, and that was the root of the problem. The whole thing had begun some five years earlier, when a botanical survey ship made a landing in a clearing near one of the more densely forested regions of Bareimus III. They had thought they were setting down amid some lush green vegetation, but when the crew left the ship they discovered that the tail-first landing had placed them down on a small barren patch of dirt. Nobody had thought too much about it until the time came to Sixth Millennium: Oligarchy 141 collect samples to bring back to their lab—and some of the small green plants they were approaching began running away. They finally caught a couple by hurling a large net at them, and discovered, when they tried to take the plants back with them, that they were once again rooted. They dug up both the plants and the surrounding dirt, took them back to the ship, and determined that they were semicarnivorous. They didn'thave to eat insects and rodents, but they were equipped to do so, and indeed seemed to thrive better with occasional additions of small living things to their menu. They seemed healthier and more vibrant after such meals, and their color turned brighter, leading one of the crew to dub them Greenies, a name that stuck. The next unusual occurrence came later on that same survey trip, when a botanist casually threw a still-lit cigar onto the turf—or onto what had been a Greenie-filled turf an instant earlier. As he released the cigar, the little plants scurried away, giving it a wide berth. Curious, the botanist returned to the ship, lit a cigar, and held it near one of the Greenies. There was no reaction. Then he dropped it on the plant. Despite the fact that the base of its stem was badly burned, it made no attempt to uproot itself and move away. Further experimentation proved that the Greenie samples in the ship showed none of the self-preservation instinct they had manifested in their natural habitat, nor did a reward-oriented experiment using small animals cause them to act in any manner other than that of exotic cousins to Venus Flytraps. The observations and experiments were written up, logged and forgotten. Then, some two years later, another ship landed in the Bareimus system. During their stay among the chlorine-breathers of Bareimus V they discovered a malfunction of their life-support systems, and since the planet-bound population could afford them no help, they sent a message back to the nearest world where they could reasonably expect repairs to be made, and decided to await the arrival of the rescue ship on Bareimus III, where they wouldn't be forced to use any more of their limited supply of oxygen. Their observations of the Greenies were identical to the earlier reports, although they attempted no experiments. However, upon returning to the Deluros system, they presented their information to the Biology planetoid, and eventually someone who was interested enough to read it gathered all the reports together, and still another expedition was sent to Bareimus III, but this time with the express purpose of learning what made the Greenies tick.
The ship landed, and the scientific crew noted all the usual traits of Greenie behavior. Five of the plants were “captured” and taken back to the ship's greenhouse, where they failed to respond to any stimuli. Then they were marked, and placed back where they were found, amid thousands of other Greenies. And now, back among their fellows, they once again responded to heat and other threats. The experiment was repeated numerous times with different Greenies, and always the results were identical. Under laboratory conditions, they acted like any other plant; but placed in their natural environment, they protected themselves at all costs.
Next, a number of Greenies were moved not to the ship's greenhouse, but to a patch of ground a few
miles from the other Greenies. They still responded, but slowly, as if they were befuddled. Their confusion increased proportionately with the distance between them and their home colony, until, at exactly 5.127 kilometers, they once again became inert. The next step was to move larger and larger quantities of Greenies 6 kilometers away from the home colony. When some 2,000 were assembled, from a colony of 11,500, they began to react, but again, very slowly and in much obvious confusion. As their number increased, so did their efficiency, until, with 4,367 Greenies present, they functioned as well as they had in the original colony. And, conversely, as the original colony was depleted to where only about 1,500 remained, all reaction to stimuli stopped. The implications were staggering. Here, undoubtedly, was a group mind at work. Each plant acted as a single cell of that mind. With only 1,500 cells, the mind was mere potential; at 2,000 cells, it was kinetic but retarded; and at 4,367 or more cells, it functioned at peak efficiency. The Greenies’ mass mind represented a phenomenon heretofore unknown in the galaxy, even among those few races possessed of telepathy.
The next problem facing the scientists was of equal or even greater import. Granting that the Greenies, as a group, had a mind, was it a sentient one? Simply having a functioning brain was no proof of sentience; for every intelligent life form that Man had found, there were thousands that lacked the power of abstract thought.
The task was an intricate and complex one, for no vegetation had yet been discovered that even hinted at having the Greenies’ capacity for intelligent action. And no one quite knew how to test a plant for intelligence.
Scores of reward situations were devised, usually with rodents Sixth Millennium: Oligarchy 143 native to Bareimus III. In every case, the Greenies devised ways to catch them. But did that make them intelligent, or merely coldly efficient hunters with thousands of outlets for their senses? No one knew. An entire Greenie colony was transported back to the Biology Department and studied. Thousands of botanists and psychologists created literally millions of tests. Most were discarded out of hand; those that were administered could not produce definite results. The Greenies could crack almost every maze or hunting situation devised, but they showed no interest in anything else. They solved feeding problems that would have stumped even Man, but, once fed, they became mentally inert. Nor could any divisiveness be imposed; feeding one half of the colony while starving the other half did not produce a small-scale vegetable war. And, the scientists concluded, how could it? If half a brain lacks blood or oxygen, it doesn't take up arms against the other half. Still, no one was totally convinced that the Greenies were sentient. It was simply a case of nobody being able to guess what kind of thoughts were entertained by a Greenie's mind. Some telepaths from the distant world of Domar were called in; they all agreed that there was some sort of mentality there, but it was so alien that none of them could either make contact with it or begin to figure out how it functioned. That was where matters stood when it was discovered that Bareimus was about to go nova. And since no one knew what the Greenies were or were not, they had thankfully given the problem to Ulice Ston, who had never even seen a Greenie, and knew next to nothing about botany and alien psychology.