Foundation and Earth

Bliss appeared at the door almost at once. “What’s that?” she asked, her eyes big. “An emergency?”

Trevize said, “Not at all.”

Pelorat added eagerly, “We may have located Earth, Bliss. That sound was the computer’s way of saying so.”

She walked into the room. “I might have been warned.”

Trevize said, “I’m sorry, Bliss. I didn’t mean it to be quite that loud.”

Fallom had followed Bliss into the room and said, “Why was there that sound, Bliss?”

“I see she’s curious, too,” said Trevize. He sat back, feeling drained. The next step was to try the finding on the real Galaxy, to focus on the coordinates of the center of the Spacer worlds and see if a G-type star was actually present. Once again, he was reluctant to take the obvious step, unable to make himself put the possible solution to the actual test.

“Yes,” said Bliss. “Why shouldn’t she be? She’s as human as we are.”

“Her parent wouldn’t have thought so,” said Trevize abstractedly. “I worry about the kid. She’s bad news.”

“In what way has she proven so?” demanded Bliss.

Trevize spread his arms. “Just a feeling.”

Bliss gave him a disdainful look, and turned to Fallom. “We are trying to locate Earth, Fallom.”

“What’s Earth?”

“Another world, but a special one. It’s the world our ancestors came from. Do you know what the word ‘ancestors’ means from your reading, Fallom?”

“Does it mean——?” But the last word was not in Galactic.

Pelorat said, “That’s an archaic word for ‘ancestors,’ Bliss. Our word ‘forebears’ is closer to it.”

“Very well,” said Bliss, with a sudden brilliant smile. “Earth is the world where our forebears came from, Fallom. Yours and mine and Pel’s and Trevize’s.”

“Yours, Bliss—and mine also.” Fallom sounded puzzled. “Both of them?”

“There’s just one set of forebears,” said Bliss. “We had the same forebears, all of us.”

Trevize said, “It sounds to me as though the child knows very well that she’s different from us.”

Bliss said to Trevize in a low voice, “Don’t say that. She must be made to see she isn’t. Not in essentials.”

“Hermaphrodism is essential, I should think.”

“I’m talking about the mind.”

“Transducer-lobes are essential, too.”

“Now, Trevize, don’t be difficult. She’s intelligent and human regardless of details.”

She turned to Fallom, her voice rising to its normal level. “Think quietly about this, Fallom, and see what it means to you. Your forebears and mine were the same. All the people on all the worlds—many, many worlds—all had the same forebears, and those forebears lived originally on the world named Earth. That means we’re all relatives, doesn’t it? —Now go back to our room and think of that.”

Fallom, after bestowing a thoughtful look on Trevize, turned and ran off, hastened on by Bliss’s affectionate slap on her backside.

Bliss turned to Trevize, and said, “Please, Trevize, promise me you won’t make any comments in her hearing that will lead her to think she’s different from us.”

Trevize said, “I promise. I have no wish to impede or subvert the educational procedure, but, you know, she is different from us.”

“In ways. As I’m different from you, and as Pel is.”

“Don’t be naive, Bliss. The differences in Fallom’s case are much greater.”

“A little greater. The similarities are vastly more important. She, and her people, will be part of Galaxia some day, and a very useful part, I’m sure.”

“All right. We won’t argue.” He turned to the computer with clear reluctance. “And meanwhile, I’m afraid I have to check the supposed position of Earth in real space.”

“Afraid?”

“Well,” Trevize lifted his shoulders in what he hoped was a half-humorous way, “what if there’s no suitable star near the place?”

“Then there isn’t,” said Bliss.

“I’m wondering if there’s any point in checking it out now. We won’t be able to make a Jump for several days.”

“And you’ll be spending them agonizing over the possibilities. Find out now. Waiting won’t change matters.”

Trevize sat there with his lips compressed for a moment, then said, “You’re right. Very well, then—here goes.”

He turned to the computer, placed his hands on the handmarks on the desk, and the viewscreen went dark.

Bliss said, “I’ll leave you, then. I’ll make you nervous if I stay.” She left, with a wave of her hand.

“The thing is,” he muttered, “that we’re going to be checking the computer’s Galactic map first and even if Earth’s sun is in the calculated position, the map should not include it. But we’ll then—”

His voice trailed off in astonishment as the view-screen flashed with a background of stars. These were fairly numerous and dim, with an occasional brighter one sparkling here and there, well scattered over the face of the screen. But quite close to the center was a star that was brighter than all the rest.

“We’ve got it,” said Pelorat jubilantly. “We’ve got it, old chap. Look how bright it is.”

“Any star at centered co-ordinates would look bright,” said Trevize, clearly trying to fight off any initial jubilation that might prove unfounded. “The view, after all, is presented from a distance of a parsec from the centered co-ordinates. Still, that centered star certainly isn’t a red dwarf, or a red giant, or a hot blue-white. Wait for information; the computer is checking its data banks.”

There was silence for a few seconds and then Trevize said, “Spectral class G-2.” Another pause, then, “Diameter, 1.4 million kilometers—mass, 1.02 times that of Terminus’s sun—surface temperature, 6,000 absolute —rotation slow, just under thirty days—no unusual activity or irregularity.”

Pelorat said, “Isn’t all that typical of the kind of star about which habitable planets are to be found?”

“Typical,” said Trevize, nodding in the dimness. “And, therefore, what we’d expect Earth’s sun to be like. If that is where life developed, the sun of Earth would have set the original standard.”

“So there is a reasonable chance that there would be a habitable planet circling it.”

“We don’t have to speculate about that,” said Trevize, who sounded puzzled indeed over the matter. “The Galactic map lists it as possessing a planet with human life—but with a question mark.”

Pelorat’s enthusiasm grew. “That’s exactly what we would expect, Golan. The life-bearing planet is there, but the attempt to hide the fact obscures data concerning it and leaves the makers of the map the computer uses uncertain.”

“No, that’s what bothers me,” said Trevize. “That’s not what we should expect. We should expect far more than that. Considering the efficiency with which data concerning Earth has been wiped out, the makers of the map should not have known that life exists in the system, let alone human life. They should not even have known Earth’s sun exists. The Spacer worlds aren’t on the map. Why should Earth’s sun be?”

“Well, it’s there, just the same. What’s the use of arguing the fact? What other information about the star is given?”

“A name.”

“Ah! What is it?”

“Alpha.”

There was a short pause, then Pelorat said eagerly, “That’s it, old man. That’s the final bit of evidence. Consider the meaning.”

“Does it have a meaning?” said Trevize. “It’s just a name to me, and an odd one. It doesn’t sound Galactic.”

“It isn’t Galactic. It’s in a prehistoric language of Earth, the same one that gave us Gaia as the name of Bliss’s planet.”