“Care to have a smoke?”
“Sorry,” the emissary said, repressing his disgust. “We don’t indulge.”
“Of course. I forgot.” Gambrell smiled apologetically. “You don’t mind if I smoke, do you?”
Bork shrugged. “Not at all.”
Gambrell flicked the igniting capsule at the cigarette’s tip, waited a moment, then puffed at the other end. He looked utterly relaxed. Bork was sharply tuned for this meeting; every nerve was tight-strung.
The Earthman said, “All right. Just why have you requested this meeting, Emissary Bork?”
“You know our purpose here on Mellidan VII?” Bork asked.
“Certainly. You’re here to enroll the Mellidani in your Federation.”
Bork nodded. “Our aim is clear to you, then. But why are you here, Major general Gambrell? Why has Earth established this outpost?”
The Earthman ran one hand lightly through the close-cropped thatch of graying hair that covered most of his scalp. Bork thought of the vestigial topknot that was his only heritage from the past, and smiled smugly. After a moment Gambrell said, “We’re here to keep Mellidan VII from joining the Federation. Is that clear enough?”
“It is,” Bork said tightly. “May I ask what you hope to gain by this deliberate interference? I suppose you plan to use Mellidan VII as some sort of military base, no doubt.”
“No.”
Bork had gained flexibility during the past few days. He shot an instant rejoinder at the Earthman: “In that case you must have some commercial purpose in mind. What?”
The Earthman shook his head. “Let me be perfectly honest with you, Emissary Bork. We don’t have any actual use for Mellidan VII. It’s just too alien a world for oxygen-breathers to use without conversion.”
Bork frowned. “You have no use for Mellidan VII? But … then … that means you came here solely for the purpose of … of—”
“Right. Of keeping it out of the Federation’s hands.”
The man’s arrogance stunned Bork. That Earth should wantonly block a Federating mission for no reason at all—
“This is a very serious matter,” Bork said.
“I know. More serious than you yourself think, Emissary Bork. Look here: suppose you tell me why the Federation wants Mellidan VII, now?”
Bork glared at the infuriatingly calm Earthman. “We want it because … because—”
He stopped. The question paralleled the ones the Mellidani leader had asked. It produced the same visceral reaction. These basic questions hit deep, he thought. And there were no ready answers for them.
Gambrell said smoothly, “I see you’re in difficulties. Here’s an answer for you—you want it simply because it’s there. Because for eleven thousand years you’ve Federated every planet you could, swallowed it up in your benevolent arms, thoroughly homogenized its culture into yours and blotted out any minor differences that might have existed. You don’t see any reason to stop now. But you don’t have any possible use for this world, do you? You can’t trade with it, you can’t colonize here, you can’t turn it into a vacation resort. For the first time in your considerable history you’ve run up against an inhabited world that’s utterly useless as Federation stock. But you’re trying to Federate it anyway.”
“We—”
“Keep quiet,” said the Earthman sharply. “Don’t try to argue, because you don’t know how to argue. Or to think. Vengo’s ruled the roost so long you’ve reduced every cerebral process to a set of conditioned reflexes. And when you strike an exception to a pattern, you just steamroll right on ahead. You find a planet, so you offer it a place in the Federation and proceed to digest it alive. What function does this Federation of yours serve, anyway?”
Bork was on solid ground here. “It serves as a unifying force that holds together the disparate worlds of the galaxy, bringing order out of confusion.”
“O.K. I’ll buy that statement, even if it does come rolling out of you automatically.” The Earthman hunched forward and his eyes fixed coldly on Bork’s. “The Federation’s so big and complex that it hasn’t yet learned that it died three thousand years ago. Its function atrophied, dried up, vanished. Foosh! The galaxy is orderly; trade routes are established, patterns of cultural contact built, war forgotten. There’s no longer any need for a benevolent tyranny operating out of Vengo that makes sure the whole thing doesn’t come apart. But still you go on, bringing the joys of Federation from planet to planet, as if the same chaotic situation prevails now that prevailed in those barbaric days when your warlord ancestors first came down out of Vengo to conquer the universe.”
Bork sat very quietly. He was thinking: the Terran is insane. The things he says have no meaning. The Federation dead? Nonsense!
“I knew the Earthmen were fools, but I didn’t think they were morons as well,” the emissary said out loud, lightly. “Anyone can see that the Federation is alive and healthy, and will be for eternity to come.”
“Federations don’t last that long. They don’t even last half an eternity. And yours died millennia ago. It’s like some great beast whose nervous system is so slow on the trigger it takes hours to realize that it’s dead. Well, the Federation will last a couple of thousand years more, on its accumulated momentum. But it’s dead now.”
Bork rose. “I can’t spend any further time on this kind of foolish talking,” he said wearily. “I’ll have to get back to my base.” He fingered the glittering platinum ornaments on his stiff green jacket. “And I don’t intend to give up trying to Federate the Mellidani, despite your obstructions.”
Gambrell chuckled in an oddly offensive manner. “Keep at it, then. Keep on mouthing clichés and giving them hollow arguments that fall to flinders when you poke at the roots. We’ve warned the Mellidani. Besides, they can think for themselves, and aren’t impressed easily by big words and gilded phrases. They won’t be suckers for your routine.”
Bork was very quiet for a long moment, staring stonily at the Earthman, trying to see behind those ice-cool gray eyes. At length he said, “Is this all just petty spite on your part? Why are you doing this, Gambrell? If you Terrans don’t want to enter the Federation, why don’t you keep off by yourselves and stop meddling with our activities?”
“Because the Mellidani represent something unique in the galaxy,” Gambrell said. “And because we see their value, even if you don’t. Do you know what would happen if you Federated the Mellidani? Within a century you’d have to exterminate them or expel them from the Federation. They’re alien, Bork. Totally and absolutely and unchangeably alien. They don’t breathe the same kind of atmosphere you do. They don’t digest the same foods. Their lungs don’t work on the principles yours do. Neither do their brains.”
“What does this—”
Gambrell cut him off and continued unstoppably. “They’re a cosmic fluke, Bork. They don’t conform to the oxygen-carbon pattern of life, and they might very well be the only race in the universe that doesn’t. We can’t afford to let the Federation come in here and destroy them. And you will destroy them, because they’re different and the Federation can’t abide differences that can’t be smoothed out by a little deportation and ideological manipulation and genetic monkeying.”