Foundation’s Edge CHAPTER FOURTEEN FORWARD!

FORWARDJanov Pelorat looked bulge away at the obnubilate landscape in the graying aurora with an odd mixture of regret and uncertainty.We bent staying long rep permite, Golan. It copms a pleasant and interesting innovation. I would like to engage up anes mind more(prenominal) nearly it.Trevize looked up from the computer with a wry smile. You dont think I would like to? We had trey strait-laced meals on the planet tot exclusivelyy polar and each excellent. Id like more. And the only women we saw, we saw briefly and slightly of them looked quite a enticing, for intimately, for what Ive got in mind.Pelorat wrinkled his nose slightly. Oh, my dear chap. Those cowbells they c all(prenominal) shoes, and all wrapped almost in clashing colors, and what invariably do they do to their eyelashes. Did you nonice their eyelashes?You might just as well be compriseve I noniced e verything, Janov. What you object to is superficial. They support easily be persuaded to was h their faces and, at the proper eon, off mother the shoes and the colors.Pelorat channel tongue to, Ill take your give voice for that, Janov. However, I was thinking more of investigating the occasion of Earth further. What weve been t antiquated more or less Earth, thus farthermost, is so unsatisfactory, so contradictory radiation jibe to one person, robots according to some other.Death in either case.True, verbalize Pelorat reluctantly, except it whitethorn be that one is true and non the other, or that both are true to some ex disco biscuitt, or that neither is true. sure enough, Janov, when you memorise tales that simply pass everywhere themes in thickening mists of doubt, sure enough you must feel the itch to explore, to find out.I do, say Golan. By every dwarf whizz in the Galaxy, I do. The problem at hand, however, is germanium. in one case that is straightened out, we crowd out go to Earth, or come preserve going here to Sayshell for a more exten ded stay. dummy up introductory, germanium.Pelorat nodded, The problem at hand If we contract what Quintesetz t overaged us, death is waiting for us on germanium. Ought we to be going?Trevize utter, I remove myself that. Are you afraid?Pelorat hesitated as though he were probing his own feelings. Then he tell in a quite simple and matter-of-fact manner. Yes. TerriblyTrevize sat back in his hand and swiveled to face the other. He state, just as quietly and matter-of-factly, Janov, at that places no reason for you to chance this. Say the word and Ill let you off on Sayshell with your personal belongings and with half(prenominal) our credits. Ill pick you up when I repay and it testament be on to Sirius vault of heaven, if you wish, and Earth, if thats where it is. If I dont return, the insane asylum people on Sayshell will externalise to it that you repel back to Terminus. No hard feelings if you stay behind, old friend.Pelorats eyes blinked rapidly and his lips pres sed together for a few moments. Then he say, rather huskily, Old friend? Weve cognizen each other what? A week or so? Isnt it strange that Im going to refuse to leave the ship? I am afraid, scarce I fatality to remain with you.Trevize moved his hands in a gesture of uncertainty. further why? I honestly dont ask it of you.Im non sure why, scarcely I ask it of myself. Its its Golan, I sacrifice belief in you. It specifyms to me you of all time distinguish what youre doing. I motivationed to go to Trantor where probably as I now see zip would beget happened. You insisted on germanium and Gaia must someway be a raw nerve in the Galaxy. Things have the appearance _or_ semblance to happen in connection with it. And if thats not enough, Golan, I watched you force Quintesetz to give you the information about Gaia. That was such a skillful bluff. I was befuddled in admiration.You encounter combine in me, then.Pelorat said, Yes, I do.Trevize put his hand on the others uppe r section and seemed, for a moment, to be searching for words. Finally he said, Janov, will you forgive me in advance if my discernment is wrong, and if you in one way or another meet with whatever unpleasant may be awaiting us?Pelorat said, Oh, my dear fellow, why do you ask? I make the decision freely for my reasons, not yours. And, please let us leave quickly. I dont trust my cowardice not to seize me by the throat and shame me for the rest of my life.As you say, Janov, said Trevize. Well leave at the earliest moment the computer will permit. This time, well be moving gravitically straight up as soon as we can be assured the atmosphere above is clear of other ships. And as the surrounding atmosphere grows little and less dense, well put on more and more speed. Well in spite of appearance the hour, well be in open space.Good, Pelorat said and pinched the tip off a plastic coffee container. The opened orifice almost at once began steaming. Pelorat put the nipple to his mout h and sipped, allowing just enough nimbus to enter his mouth to change the coffee to a bear equal to(predicate) temperature.Trevize grinned. Youve learned how to use those things beautifully. Youre a space veteran, Janov.Pelorat stared at the plastic container for a moment and said, Now that we have ships that can adjust a gravitational field at will, surely we can use ordinary containers, cant we?Of course, precisely youre not going to get space people to give up their space- perfumeed apparatus. How is a space rat going to put distance anticipateween himself and rise up worms if he uses an openmouthed cup? conform to those ring on the walls and ceilings? Those have been traditional in spacecraft for cardinal thousand years and more, shut away theyre absolutely useless in a gravitic ship. as yet theyre in that pry and Ill bet the entire ship to a cup of coffee that your space rat will pretend hes world squashed into asphyxiation on takeoff and will then sway back and forth from those rings as though hes under zero gray when its gee-one-normal-grav, that is on both occasions.Youre joking.Well, maybe a little, but at that places always social inertia to everything even out technological advance. Those useless wall rings are there and the cups they supply us have nipples.Pelorat nodded prospectfully and go along to sip at his coffee. Finally he said, And when do we take off?Trevize laughed heartily and said, Got you. I began dialogueing about wall rings and you never observe that we were taking off depend competent at that time. Were a mile high right now.You dont mean it. envision out.Pelorat did and then said, But I never felt a thing.Youre not readd to.Arent we breaking the regulations? Surely we ought to have followed a radio beacon in an upward spiral, as we did in a downwards spiral on landing?No reason to, Janov. No one will stop us. No one at all.Coming down, you saidThat was different. They werent anxious to see us arrive, but theyre ecstatic to see us go.why do you say that, Golan? The only person who talked to us about Gaia was Quintesetz and he begged us not to go.Dont you believe it, Janov. That was for form. He make sure wed go to Gaia. Janov, you admired the way I bluffed the information out of Quintesetz. Im sorry, but I dont deserve the admiration. If I had done nonentity at all, he would have offered the information. If I had tried to plug my ears, he would have shouted it at me. wherefore do you say that, Golan? Thats crazy.Paranoid? Yes, I bed. Trevize turned to the computer and extended his sense intently. He said, Were not being stop. No ships in interfering distance, no warning messages of any(prenominal) kind.once more he swiveled in the nidus of Pelorat. He said, Tell me, Janov, how did you find out about Gaia? You k bleak about Gaia while we were still on Terminus. You knew it was in the Sayshell Sector. You knew the name was, somehow, a form of Earth. Where did you hear all this?P elorat seemed to stiffen. He said, If I were back in my office on Terminus, I might consult my files. I have not brought everything with me surely not the dates on which I first encountered this piece of information or that.Well, think about it, said Trevize grimly. Consider that the Sayshellians themselves are adjoining-mouthed about the matter. They are so reluctant to talk about Gaia as it really is that they actually encourage a superstition that has the common people of the sector accept that no such planet lasts in ordinary space. In fact, I can tell you something else. Watch thisTrevize swung to the computer, his fingers thwart across the direction hand-rests with the ease and grace of long practice. When he placed his hands on the manuals, he welcomed their warm touch and enclosure. He felt, as always, a bit of his will oozing outward.He said, This is the computers astronomical procedure, as it existed within its memory banks forwards we landed on Sayshell. I am go ing to read you that portion of the map that represents the night fling of Sayshell as we saw it this past night.The room darkened and a representation of a night sky sprang out onto the screen.Pelorat said in a low voice, As beautiful as we saw it on Sayshell.More beautiful, said Trevize, impatiently. in that mention is no atmospheric hindrance of any kind, no clouds, no absorption at the horizon. But wait, let me make an adjustmentThe linear perspective shifted steadily, giving the deuce the uncomfortable impression that it was they who were moving. Pelorat instinctively alsok hold of the arms of his chair to steady himself.There said Trevize. Do you recognize that?Of course. Those are the five-spot Sisters the pentagon of stars that Quintesetz pointed out. It is unmistakable.Yes indeed. But where is Gaia?Pelorat blinked. There was no dim star at the center.Its not there, he said.Thats right. Its not there. And thats because its location is not included in the data banks of the computer. Since it passes the bounds of likelihood that those data banks were deliberately made in realized in this celebrate for our benefit, I argue that to the insane asylum Gaiactographers who designed those data banks and who had tremendous quantities of information at their disposal Gaia was unknown.Do you suppose if we had gone to Trantor began Pelorat.I suspect we would have found no data on Gaia there, either. Its origination is kept a secret by the Sayshellians and even more so, I suspect, by the Gaians themselves. You yourself said a few days ago it was not entirely uncommon that some worlds deliberately stayed out of corporation to avoid taxation or outside interference.Usually, said Pelorat, when mapmakers and statisticians come across such a world, they are found to exist in thinly populated sections of the Galaxy. Its isolation that makes it possible for them to hide. Gaia is not isolated.Thats right. Thats another of the things that makes it unusual. S o lets leave this map on the screen so that you and I might continue to think oer the ignorance of our Gaiactographers and let me ask you over again. In view of this ignorance on the part of the most knowledgeable of people, how did you come to hear of Gaia?I have been gathering data on Earth myths, Earth legends, and Earth histories for over cardinal years, my good Golan. Without my complete records, how could I possiblyWe can begin somewhere, Janov. Did you learn about it in, say, the first fifteen years of your research or in the last fifteen?Oh Well, if were going to be that broad, it was by and by on.You can do better than that. Suppose I suggest that you learned of Gaia only in the last couple of years.Trevize peered in Pelorats direction, felt the absence of any ability to read an unseen font in the dimness, and raised the light level of the room a bit. The glory of the representation of the night sky on the screen dimmed in proportion. Pelorats expression was stony an d revealed nothing.Well? said Trevize.Im thinking, said Pelorat mildly. You may be right. I wouldnt swear to it. When I wrote Jimbor of Ledbet University, I didnt mention Gaia, though in that case it would have been appropriate to do so, and that was in lets see in and that was three years ago. I think youre right, Golan.And how did you come upon it? asked Trevize. In a communication? A book? A scientific paper? Some antediluvian song? How? Come onPelorat sat back and crossed his arms. He fell into deep thought and didnt move. Trevize said nothing and waited.Finally Pelorat said, In a private communication. But its no use communicate me from whom, my dear chap. I dont retrieve.Trevize moved his hands over his sash. They felt clammy as he continued his efforts to elicit information without too clearly forcing words into the others mouth. He said, From a historian? From an expert in mythology? From a Gaiactographer?No use. I cannot match a name to the communication.Because, by chance, there was none.Oh no. That scarcely seems possible.Why? Would you have rejected an anonymous communication?I suppose not.Did you ever receive any?Once in a long while. In recent years, I had become well known in certain academic circles as a collector of particular types of myths and legends and some of my correspondents were occasionally kind enough to forward material they had picked up from nonacademic sources. Some quantify these might not be attributed to anyone in particular.Trevize said, Yes, but did you ever receive anonymous information directly, and not by way of some academic correspondent?That sometimes happened but very rarely.And can you be certain that this was not so in the case of Gaia?Such anonymous communications took place so rarely that I should think I would remember if it had happened in this case. Still, I cant say certainly that the information was not of anonymous origin. Mind, though, thats not to say that I did receive the information from an anonymous source.I realize that. But it remains a calamity, doesnt it?Pelorat said, very reluctantly, I suppose it does. But whats all this about?Im not finished, said Trevize peremptorily. Where did you get the information from anonymous or not? What world?Pelorat shrugged. Come now, I havent the slightest idea.Could it possibly have been from Sayshell?I told you. I dont know.Im suggesting you did get it from Sayshell.You can suggest all you wish, but that does not necessarily make it so.No? When Quintesetz pointed out the dim tip at the center of the five Sisters, you knew at once it was Gaia. You said so later on to Quintesetz, identifying it forwards he did. Do you remember?Yes, of course.How was that possible? How did you recognize at once that the dim star was Gaia?Because in the material I had on Gaia, it was rarely referred to by that name. Euphemisms were common, umteen different ones. One of the euphemisms, several(prenominal) times repeated, was the little Brother o f the Five Sisters. Another was the Pentagons Center and sometimes it was called o Pentagon. When Quintesetz pointed out the Five Sisters and the substitution star, the allusions came irresistibly to mind.You never mentioned those allusions to me earlier.I didnt know what they meant and I didnt think it would have been important to discuss the matter with you, who were a Pelorat hesitated.A nonspecialist?You realize, I hope, that the pentagon of the Five Sisters is an entirely relative form.What do you mean?Trevize laughed affectionately. You surface worm. Do you think the sky has an objective shape of its own? That the stars are nailed in place? The pentagon has the shape it has from the surface of the worlds of the planetary system to which Sayshell Planet belongs and from there only. From a planet circling any other star, the appearance of the Five Sisters is different. They are seen from a different angle, for one thing. For another, the five stars of the pentagon are at dif ferent distances from Sayshell and, seen from other angles, there could be no visible relationship among them at all. One or two stars might be in one half of the sky, the others in the other half. See hereTrevize darkened the room again and leaned over the computer. There are eighty-six populated planetary systems making up the Sayshell Union. Let us keep Gaia or the spot where Gaia ought to be in place (as he said that, a small red circle appeared in the center of the pentagon of the Five Sisters) and shift to the skies as seen from any of the other eighty-six worlds taken at random.The sky shifted and Pelorat blinked. The small red circle remained at the center of the screen, but the Five Sisters had disappeared. There were bright stars in the neighborhood but no tight pentagon. Again the sky shifted, and again, and again. It went on shifting. The red circle remained in place always, but at no time did a small pentagon of equally bright stars appear. Sometimes what might be a d istorted pentagon of stars raggedly bright appeared, but nothing like the beautiful asterism Quintesetz had pointed out.Had enough? said Trevize. I assure you, the Five Sisters can never be seen exactly as we have seen it from any populated world but the worlds of the Sayshell planetary system.Pelorat said, The Sayshellian view might have been exported to other planets. There were many proverbs in Imperial times some of which linger into our own, in fact that are Trantor-centered.With Sayshell as secretive about Gaia as we know it to be? And why should worlds outside the Sayshell Union be interested? Why would they care about a little Brother of the Five Sisters if there were nothing in the skies at which to point?mayhap youre right.Then dont you see that your pilot information must have come from Sayshell itself? non just from somewhere in the Union, but precisely from the planetary system to which the capital world of the Union belongs.Pelorat agitate his head. You make it sound as though it must, but its not something I remember. I simply dont.Nevertheless, you do see the force of my argument, dont you?Yes, I do.Next. When do you suppose the legend could have originated?Anytime. I should suppose it developed far back in the Imperial Era. It has the feel of an ancientYou are wrong, Janov. The Five Sisters are moderately close to Sayshell Planet, which is why theyre so bright. Four of them have high proper motions in consequence and no two are part of a family, so that they move in different directions. Watch what happens as I shift the map backward in time slowly.Again the red circle that marked the order of Gaia remained in place, but the pentagon slowly fell apart, as four of the stars drifted in different directions and the fifth shifted slightly.Look at that, Janov, said Trevize. Would you say that was a regular pentagon?Clearly lopsided, said Pelorat.And is Gaia at the center?No, its well to the side.Very well. That is how the asterism looked one snow and fifty years ago. One and a half centuries, thats all. The material you received concerning the Pentagons Center and so on made no real sense till this speed of light anywhere, not even in Sayshell. The material you received had to originate in Sayshell and sometime in this century, possibly in the last decade. And you got it, even though Sayshell is so close-mouthed about Gaia.Trevize put the lights on, turned the star map off, and sat there staring sternly at Pelorat.Pelorat said, Im confused. Whats this about?You tell me. Consider Somehow I got the idea into my head that the scrap foot still existed. I was giving a talk during my choice campaign. I started a bit of emotional byplay designed to squeeze votes out of the undecided with a dramatic If the Second footing still existed and later that day I thought to myself What if it did still exist? I began reading history books and within a week, I was convinced. There was no real evidence, but I have always fel t that I had the knack of snatching the right conclusion out of a welter of speculation. This time, thoughTrevize brooded a bit, then went on. And look at what has happened since. Of all people, I chose Compor as my intimate and he betrayed me. Whereupon city manager Branno had me arrested and sent into exile. Why into exile, rather than just having me imprisoned, or trying to threaten me into tranquillise? And why in a very late-model ship which gives me extraordinary business offices of Jumping through the Galaxy? And why, of all things, does she insist I take you and suggest that I alleviate you search for Earth?And why was I so certain that we should not go to Trantor? I was convinced you had a better target for our investigations and at once you come up with the mystery world of Gaia, concerning which, as it now turns out, you gained information under very puzzling circumstances.We go to Sayshell the first natural stop and at once we encounter Compor, who gives us a circu mstantial story about Earth and its death. He then assures us its location is in the Sirius Sector and urges us to go there.Pelorat said, There you are. You seem to be implying that all circumstances are forcing us toward Gaia, but, as you say, Compor tried to persuade us to go elsewhere.And in response, I was determined to continue on our original line of investigation out of my sheer distrust for the man. Dont you suppose that that was what he might have been reckoning on? He may have deliberately told us to go elsewhere just to keep us from doing so.Thats mere romance, muttered Pelorat.Is it? Lets go on. We get in touch with Quintesetz simply because he was handyNot at all, said Pelorat. I recognized his name.It seemed familiar to you. You had never read anything he had written that you could recall. Why was it familiar to you? In any case, it turned out he had read a paper of yours and was overwhelmed by it and how likely was that? You yourself admit your work is not widely k nown.Whats more, the young lady leading us to him quite gratuitously mentions Gaia and goes on to tell us it is in hyperspace, as though to be sure we keep it in mind. When we ask Quintesetz about it, he behaves as though he doesnt want to talk about it, but he doesnt throw us out even though I am rather rude to him. He takes us to his home instead and, on the way there, goes to the trouble of pointing out the Five Sisters. He even makes sure we note the dim star at the center. Why? Is not all this an extraordinary concatenation of coincidence?Pelorat said, If you list it like thatList it any way you please, said Trevize. I dont believe in extraordinary concatenations of coincidence.What does all this mean, then? That we are being maneuvered to Gaia?By whom?Trevize said, Surely there can be no question about that. Who is capable of adjusting minds, of giving engaging nudges to this one or that, of managing to divert progress in this direction or that?Youre going to tell me its the Second Foundation.Well, what have we been told about Gaia? It is unassailable. Fleets that move against it are destroyed. People who reach it do not return. blush the Mule didnt dare move against it and the Mule, in fact, was probably born there. Surely it seems that Gaia is the Second Foundation and finding that, later on all, is my ultimate goal.Pelorat shook his head. But according to some historians, the Second Foundation stopped the Mule. How could he have been one of them?A renegade, I suppose.But why should we be so relentlessly maneuvered toward the Second Foundation by the Second Foundation?Trevizes eyes were unfocused, his brow furrowed. He said, Lets reason it out. It has always seemed important to the Second Foundation that as little information as possible about it should be available to the Galaxy. Ideally it wants its very universe of discourse to remain unknown. We know that very much about them. For a hundred twenty years, the Second Foundation was thought t o be extinct and that must have suited them right down to the Galactic core. Yet when I began to suspect that they did exist, they did nothing. Compor knew. They might have used him to shut me up one way or another had me killed, even. Yet they did nothing.Pelorat said, They had you arrested, if you want to blame that on the Second Foundation. accord to what you told me, that resulted in the people of Terminus not knowing about your views. The people of the Second Foundation polite that much without violence and they may be devotees of Salvor Hardins remark that Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent.But keeping it from the people of Terminus accomplishes nothing. Mayor Branno knows my view and at the very least must delight in if I am correct. So now, you see, it is too late for them to harm us. If they had gotten rid of me to begin with, they would be in the clear. If they had go away me alone altogether, they might have still remained in the clear, for they might have maneuvered Terminus into believing I was an eccentric, perhaps a madman. The prospective revile of my semipolitical career might even have forced me into silence as soon as I saw what the announcement of my beliefs would mean.And now it is too late for them to do anything. Mayor Branno was suspicious enough of the business office to send Compor after me and having no faith in him either, being wiser than I was she placed a hyper relay on Compors ship. In consequence, she knows we are on Sayshell. And last night, while you were sleeping, I had our computer place a message directly into the computer of the Foundation ambassador here on Sayshell, informing that we were on our way to Gaia. I took the trouble of giving its co-ordinates, too. If the Second Foundation does anything to us now, I am certain that Branno will have the matter investigated and the concentrated attention of the Foundation must surely be what they dont want.Would they care about attracting the Foundat ions attention, if they are so powerful?Yes, said Trevize forcefully. They lie hidden because, in some ways, they must be weak and because the Foundation is technologically advanced perhaps beyond even what Seldon himself might have foreseen. The very quiet, even stealthy, way in which theyve been maneuvering us to their world would seem to fate their eager desire to do nothing that will attract attention. And if so, then they have already lost, at least in part for theyve attracted attention and I doubt they can do anything to reverse the situation.Pelorat said, But why do they go through all this? Why do they ruin themselves if your analysis is correct by angling for us across the Galaxy? What is it they want of us?Trevize stared at Pelorat and flushed. Janov, he said, I have a feeling about this. I have this gift of glide slope to a correct conclusion on the basis of almost nothing. Theres a kind of sureness about me that tells me when Im right and Im sure now. Theres somet hing I have that they want and want enough to risk their very existence for. I dont know what it can be, but Ive got to find out, because if Ive got it and if its that powerful, then I want to be able to use it for what I feel is right. He shrugged slightly. Do you still want to come along with me, old friend, now that you see how much a madman I am?Pelorat said, I told you I had faith in you. I still do.And Trevize laughed with enormous relief. Marvelous Because another feeling I have is that you are, for some reason, also essential to this whole thing. In that case, Janov, we move on to Gaia, full speed. ForwardMayor Harla Branno looked clear older than her sixty-two years. She did not always look older, but she did now. She had been sufficiently wrapped up in thought to forget to avoid the mirror and had seen her image on her way into the map room. So she was certain of the haggardness of her appearance.She sighed. It drained the life out of one. Five years a Mayor and for twe lve years before that the real power behind two figureheads. All of it had been quiet, all of it successful, all of it draining. How would it have been, she wondered, if there had been birdsong affliction disaster.Not so bad for her personally, she suddenly decided. Action would have been invigorating. It was the horrible knowledge that nothing but drift was possible that had worn her out.It was the Seldon Plan that was successful and it was the Second Foundation that made sure it would continue to be. She, as the strong hand at the helm of the Foundation (actually the First Foundation, but no one on Terminus ever thought of adding the adjective) merely rode the crest.History would say little or nothing about her. She merely sat at the controls of a spaceship, while the spaceship was maneuvered from without.Even Indbur III, who had presided over the Foundations catastrophic fall to the Mule, had done something. He had, at least, collapsed.For Mayor Branno there would be nothing Unless this Golan Trevize, this unreflective Councilman, this lightning rod, made it possible. She looked at the map thoughtfully. It was not the kind of structure produced by a modern computer. It was, rather, a three-dimensional cluster of lights that pictured the Galaxy holographically in midair. Though it could not be made to move, to turn, to expand, or to contract, one could move about it and see it from any angle.A large section of the Galaxy, perhaps a third of the whole (excluding the core, which was a no-lifes land) turned red when she touched a strive. That was the Foundation Federation, the more than seven million populate worlds ruled by the Council and by herself the seven million inhabited worlds who voted for and were delineated in the House of Worlds, which debated matters of minor importance, and then voted on them, and never, by any chance, dealt with anything of major importance.Another contact and a faint pink jutted outward from the edges of the Federatio n, here and there. Spheres of influence This was not Foundation territory, but the regions, though nominally independent, would never dream of resistance to any Foundation move.There was no question in her mind that no power in the Galaxy could oppose the Foundation (not even the Second Foundation, if one but knew where it was), that the Foundation could, at will, reach out its fleet of modern ships and simply set up the Second pudding stone.But only five centuries had passed since the beginning of the Plan. The Plan called for ten centuries before the Second Empire could be set up and the Second Foundation would make sure the Plan would hold. The Mayor shook her sad, gray head. If the Foundation acted now, it would somehow fail. Though its ships were irresistible, action now would fail.Unless Trevize, the lightning rod, drew the lightning of the Second Foundation and the lightning could be traced back to its source.She looked about. Where was Kodell? This was no time for him to b e late.It was as though her thought had called him, for he came striding in, smiling cheerfully, spirit more grandfatherly than ever with his gray-white mustache and tanned complexion. Grandfatherly, but not old. To be sure, he was eight years younger than she was.How was it he showed no marks of strain? Did not fifteen years as conductor of Security leave its scar?Kodell nodded slowly in the formal greeting that was necessary in initiating a discussion with the Mayor. It was a tradition that had existed since the bad days of the Indburs. Almost everything had changed, but etiquette least of all.He said, black Im late, Mayor, but your arrest of Councilman Trevize is finally beginning to make its way through the anesthetized skin of the Council.Oh? said the Mayor phlegmatically. Are we in for a palace revolution?Not the least chance. Were in control. But therell be noise.Let them make noise. It will make them feel better, and I I shall stay out of the way. I can count, I suppose, on general public opinion?I think you can. Especially out-of-door from Terminus. No one outside Terminus cares what happens to a stray Councilman.I do.Ah? More news?Liono, said the Mayor, I want to know about Sayshell.Im not a two-legged history book, said Liono Kodell, smiling.I dont want history. I want the truth. Why is Sayshell independent? Look at it. She pointed to the red of the Foundation on the holographic map and there, well into the inner spirals, was an in-pocketing of white.Branno said, Weve got it almost encapsulated almost sucked in yet its white. Our map doesnt even show it as a loyal-ally-inpink.Kodell shrugged. Its not officially a loyal ally, but it never bothers us. It is neutral.All right. See this, then. Another touch at the controls. The red sprang out distinctly further. It covered nearly half the Galaxy. That, said Mayor Branno, was the Mules realm at the time of his death. If youll peer in among the red, youll find the Sayshell Union, completely surroun ded this time, but still white. it is the only enclave odd free by the Mule.It was neutral then, too.The Mule had no great respect for neutrality.He seems to have had, in this case.Seems to have had. What has Sayshell got?Kodell said, Nothing Believe me, Mayor, she is ours any time we want her.Is she? Yet somehow she isnt ours.Theres no need to want her.Branno sat back in her chair and, with a sweep of her arm over the controls, turned the Galaxy dark. I think we now want her.Pardon, Mayor?Liono, I sent that foolish Councilman into space as a lightning rod. I felt that the Second Foundation would see him as a greater danger than he was and see the Foundation itself as the lesser danger. The lightning would radiate him and reveal its origin to us.Yes, MayorMy intention was that he go to the decayed ruins of Trantor to fumble through what if anything was left of its Library and search for the Earth. Thats the world, you remember, that these wearisome mystics tell us was the site o f origin of humanity, as though that matters, even in the unlikely case it is true. The SecondFoundation couldnt possibly have believed that was really what he was after and they would have moved to find out what he was really looking for.But he didnt go to Trantor.No. Quite unexpectedly, he has gone to Sayshell. Why?I dont know. But please forgive an old bloodhound whose duty it is to suspect everything and tell me how you know he and this Pelorat have gone to Sayshell. I know that Compor reports it, but how far can we trust Compor?The hyper-relay tells us that Compors ship has indeed landed on Sayshell Planet.Undoubtedly, but how do you know that Trevize and Pelorat have? Compor may have gone to Sayshell for his own reasons and may not know or care where the others are.The fact is, that our ambassador on Sayshell has informed us of the arrival of the ship on which we placed Trevize and Pelorat. I am not ready to believe the ship arrived at Sayshell without them. What is more, Co mpor reports having talked to them and, if he cannot be trusted, we have other reports placing them at Sayshell University, where they consulted with a historian of no particular note.None of this, said Kodell mildly, has reached me.Branno sniffed. Do not feel stepped on. I am dealing with this personally and the information has now reached you with not much in the way of delay, either. The latest news just received is from the ambassador. Our lightning rod is moving on. He stayed on Sayshell Planet two days, then left. He is heading for another planetary system, he says, some ten parsecs away. He gave the name and the Galactic co-ordinates of his destination to the ambassador, who passed them on to us.Is there anything corroborative from Compor?Compors message that Trevize and Pelorat have left Sayshell came even before the ambassadors message. Compor has not yet determined where Trevize is going. Presumably he will follow.Kodell said, We are missing the whys of the situation. He popped a pastille into his mouth and sucked at it meditatively. Why did Trevize go to Sayshell? Why did he leave?The question that intrigues me most is Where? Where is Trevize going?You did say, Mayor, did you not, that he gave the name and coordinates of his destination to the ambassador. Are you implying that he lied to the ambassador? Or that the ambassador is lying to us?Even assuming everyone told the truth all round and that no one made any errors, there is a name that interests me. Trevize told the ambassador he was going to Gaia. Thats G-A-I-A. Trevize was wakeful to spell it.Kodell said, Gaia? I never heard of it.Indeed? Thats not strange. Branno pointed to the spot in the air where the map had been. Upon the map in this room, I can set up, at a moments notice, every star supposedly around which there circles an inhabited world and many prominent stars with uninhabited systems. Over thirty million stars can be marked out if I handle the controls properly in hit uni ts, in pairs, in clusters. I can mark them out in any of five different colors, one at a time, or all together. What I cannot do is locate Gaia on the map. As far as the map is concerned, Gaia does not exist.Kodell said, For every star the map shows, there are ten thousand it doesnt show.Granted, but the stars it doesnt show lack inhabited planets and why would Trevize want to go to an uninhabited planet?Have you tried the Central Computer? It has all three hundred cardinal Galactic stars listed.Ive been told it has, but does it? We know very well, you and I, that there are thousands of inhabited planets that have escaped itemization on any of our maps not only on the one in this room, but even on the Central Computer. Gaia is apparently one of them.Kodells voice remained calm, even coaxing. Mayor, there may well be nothing at all to be concerned about. Trevize may be off on a wild goose chase or he may be lying to us and there is no star called Gaia and no star at all at the co -ordinates he gave us. He is trying to throw us off his scent, now that he has met Compor and perhaps guesses he is being traced.How will this throw us off the scent? Compor will still follow. No, Liono, I have another possibility in mind, one with far greater potentiality for trouble. Listen to meShe paused and said, This room is shielded, Liono. Understand that. We cannot be overheard by anyone, so please feel free to speak. And I will speak freely, as well.This Gaia is located, if we accept the information, ten parsecs from Sayshell Planet and is therefore part of the Sayshell Union. The Sayshell Union is a well-explored portion of the Galaxy. All its star systems inhabited or not inhabited are recorded and the inhabited ones are known in detail. Gaia is the one exception. Inhabited or not, none have heard of it it is present in no map. institute to this that the Sayshell Union maintains a peculiar state of independence with respect to the Foundation Federation, and did so eve n with respect to the Mules former realm. It has been independent since the fall of the Galactic Empire.What of all this? asked Kodell cautiously.Surely the two points I have made must be connected. Sayshell incorporates a planetary system that is totally unknown and Sayshell is untouchable. The two cannot be independent. any(prenominal) Gaia is, it protects itself. It sees to it that there is no knowledge of its existence outside its immediate surroundings and it protects those surroundings so that outsiders cannot take over.You are grave me, Mayor, that Gaia is the seat of the Second Foundation?I am telling you that Gaia deserves inspection.May I mention an odd point that might be difficult to explain by this theory?Please do.If Gaia is the Second Foundation and if, for centuries, it has protected itself physically against intruders, protecting all of the Sayshell Union as a broad, deep shield for itself, and if it has even prevented knowledge of itself leaking into the Galaxy t hen why has all that protection suddenly vanished? Trevize and Pelorat leave Terminus and, even though you had advised them to go to Trantor, they go immediately and without hesitation to Sayshell and now to Gaia. What is more, you can think of Gaia and speculate on it. Why are you not somehow prevented from doing So?Mayor Branno did not answer for a long time. Her head was bent grass and her gray hair gleamed dully in the light. Then she said, Because I think Councilman Trevize has somehow upset things. He has done something or is doing something that is in some way endangering the Seldon Plan.That surely is impossible, Mayor.I suppose everything and everyone has its flaws. Even Hari Seldon was not perfect, surely. Somewhere the Plan has a flaw andTrevize has stumbled upon it, perhaps without even knowing that he has. We must know what is happening and we must be on the spot.Finally Kodell looked grave. Dont make decisions on your own, Mayor. We dont want to move without adequat e consideration.Dont take me for an idiot, Liono. Im not going to make war. Im not going to land an expeditionary force on Gaia. I just want to be on the spot or near it, if you prefer, Liono, find out for me I hate talking to a war office that is as ridiculously hidebound as one is sure to be after one hundred and twenty years of peace, but you dont seem to mind just how many warships are stationed close to Sayshell. Can we make their movements seem routine and not like a mobilization?In these piping times of peace, there are not many ships in the vicinity, I am sure. But I will find out.Even two or three will be sufficient, especially if one is of the Supernova class.What do you want to do with them?I want them to nudge as close to Sayshell as they can without creating an incident and I want them sufficiently close to each other to offer mutual support.Whats all this intended for?Flexibility. I want to be able to strike if I have to.Against the Second Foundation? If Gaia can keep itself isolated and untouchable against the Mule, it can surely withstand a few ships now.Branno said, with the gleam of battle in her eyes, My friend, I told you that nothing and no one is perfect, not even Hari Seldon. In setting up his Plan, he could not help being a person of his times. He was a mathematician of the days of the dying Empire, when technology was moribund. It followed that he could not have made sufficient allowance in his Plan for technological advance. Gravities, for instance, is a whole new direction of advance he could not possibly have guessed at. And there are other advances, too.Gaia might also have advanced.In isolation? Come. There are ten quadrillion human beings within the Foundation Federation, from among whom contributors to technological advance can step forward. A single isolated world can do nothing in comparison. Our ships will advance and I will be with them.Pardon me, Mayor. What was that?I will be going myself to the ships that will gather at the borders of Sayshell. I wish to see the situation for myself.Kodells mouth fell open for a moment. He swallowed and made a distinct noise as he did so. Mayor, that is not wise. If ever a man clearly intended a stronger remark, Kodell did.Wise or not, said Branno violently, I will do it. I am tired of Terminus and of its endless political battles, its infighting, its alliances and counteralliances, its betrayals and renewals. Ive had seventeen years at the center of it and I want to do something else anything else. Out there, she waved her hand in a direction taken at random, the whole history of the Galaxy may be changing and I want to take part in the process.You know nothing about such things, Mayor.Who does, Liono? She lift stiffly to her feet. As soon as you bring me the information I need on the ships and as soon as I can make arrangements for carrying on with the foolish business at home, I will go. And, Liono, dont try to maneuver me out of this decision in any wa y or Ill rinse out our long friendship in a stroke and break you. I can still do that.Kodell nodded. I know you can, Mayor, but before you decide, may I ask you to reconsider the power of Seldons Plan? What you intend may be suicide.I have no fears on that score, Liono. It was wrong with respect to the Mule, whom it could not anticipate and a failure to anticipate at one time implies the possibility of failure at another.Kodell sighed. Well then, if you are really determined, I will support you to the best of my ability and with complete loyalty.Good. I warn you once again that you had better mean that remark with all your heart. And with that in mind, Liono, let us move on to Gaia. Forward