lives, but die eventually. They no longer give birth; the Sun yields too little energy for that. And since they die very infrequently, but don’t give birth at all, their numbers are very slowly declining. And there are no young ones to provide new blood and new thoughts, so the old, long-lived Hard Ones get terribly bored. So what do you suppose they do, Odeen?”
“What?” There was a kind of fascination about this. A repulsive fascination.
“They manufacture mechanical children, whom they can teach. You said it yourself, Odeen. You would rather teach than do anything else but learn—and melt, of course. The Rationals are made in the mental image of the Hard Ones, and the Hard Ones don’t melt, and learning is terribly complex for them since they already know so much. What is left for them but the fun of teaching. Rationals were created for no purpose but to be taught. Emotionals and Parentals were created because they were necessary for the self-perpetuating machinery that made new Rationals. And new Rationals were needed constantly because the old ones were used up, were taught all they could be taught. And when old Rationals had absorbed what they could, they were destroyed and were taught, in advance, to call the destruction process “passing on” to spare their feelings. And of course, Emotionals and Parentals passed on with them. As long as they had helped form a new triad there was no further use for them.”
“But that’s all wrong, Dua,” Odeen managed to say. He had no arguments to pose against her nightmare scheme, but he knew with a certainty past argument that she was wrong. (Or did a little pang of doubt deep inside suggest that the certainty might have been implanted in him, to begin with?—No, surely no, for then would not Dua be certain with an implanted certainty, too, that this was wrong?—Or was she an imperfect Emotional without the proper implantations and without—Oh, what was he thinking. He was as crazy as she was.)
Dua said, “You look upset, Odeen. Are you sure I’m all wrong? Of course, now they have the Positron Pump and they now have all the energy they need, or will have. Soon they will be giving birth again. Maybe they are doing so already. And they won’t need any Soft-One machines at all, and we will all be destroyed; I beg pardon, we will all pass on.”
“No, Dua,” said Odeen, strenuously, as much to himself as to her. “I don’t know how you got those notions, but the Hard Ones aren’t like that. We are not destroyed.”
“Don’t lie to yourself, Odeen. They are like that. They are prepared to destroy a whole world of other-beings for their benefit; a whole Universe if they have to. Would they stop at destroying a few Soft Ones for their comfort?—But they made one mistake. Somehow the machinery went wrong and a Rational mind got into an Emotional body. I’m a Left-Em, do you know that? They called me that when I was a child, and they were right. I can reason like a Rational and I can feel like an Emotional. And I will fight the Hard Ones with that combination.”
Odeen felt wild. Dua must surely be mad, yet he dared not say so. He had to cajole her somehow and bring her back. He said with strenuous sincerity, “Dua, we’re not destroyed when we pass on.”
“No? What does happen then?”
“I—I don’t know. I think we enter another world, a better and happier world, and become like—like—well, much better than we are.”
Dua laughed. “Where did you hear that? Did the Hard Ones tell you that?”
“No, Dua. I’m sure that this must be so out of my own thoughts. I’ve been thinking a great deal about it since you left.”
Dua said, “Then think less and you’ll be less foolish. Poor Odeen! Good-by.” She flowed away once more, thinly. There was an air of weariness about her.
Odeen called out, “But wait, Dua. Surely you want to see your new baby-mid.”
She did not answer.
He cried out. “When will you come home?”
She did not answer.
And he followed no more, but looked after her in deepest misery as she dwindled.
He did not tell Tritt he had seen Dua. What was the use? Nor did he see her again. He began haunting the favored sunning-sites of the Emotionals of the region; doing so even though occasional Parentals emerged to watch him in stupid suspicion (Tritt was a mental giant compared to most Parentals).