"After you answer my second question," Tom countered. "Why are you
afraid of the cities?"
"Afraid? I'm not afraid."
"Yes you are. Oh, you could use the hope of exploring the cities to
lure me up here on this suicide-job, but you knew I'd never be back
to claim my half of the bargain. You're afraid of the cities, and I
think I know why. You're afraid of the unknown quantity they represent,
distrustful of your own leadership when new problems arise...."
"We've worked for more than ten years to make this settlement what it
is," Jason fumed. "We fought and died to keep those marauding lunatics
from wrecking us. We are mankind's last hope! We can't afford to let
others in ... they're not scientists, they wouldn't understand, they'd
ruin everything."
"Mankind's last hope, terrified of men." Tom was suddenly tired, weary
of the whole struggle. But there was something he had to tell them.
"Listen Jason," he said. "The walls you've built around the
settlement weren't meant to keep you from going outside. You're not
a self-sufficient little community ... you're cut off from mankind's
memory, from his dreams, from his ambitions. You can't even start to
rebuild a civilization--and if you do try, don't you think the people
outside will learn about it? Don't you think they've got a right to
share in whatever progress the settlement makes? And if you don't let
them, don't you realize that they'll destroy the settlement?"
Silence.
* * * * *
"I'm a historian," Tom continued, "and I know that a civilization
can't exist in a vacuum. If outsiders don't conquer it, it'll rot from
within. It's happened to Babylonia, Greece, Rome, China, even. Over and
again. The Soviets built an Iron Curtain around themselves, and wiped
themselves out because of it.
"Don't you see, Jason? There are only two types of animals on this
planet: the gamblers and the extinct. It won't be easy to live with
the outsiders, there'll be problems of every type. But the alternative
is decay and destruction. _You've got to take the chance, if you don't
you're dead._"
A long silence. Finally Jason said, "You've only got about a
half-hour's worth of oxygen left. Will you tow the satellite into the
proper position?"
Tom stared at the planet unseeingly. "Yes," he mumbled.
"I'll have to check some calculations with the astronomers," Jason's
voice buzzed flatly in his earphones.
A background murmur, scarcely audible over the crackling static.
Then Ruth's voice broke through, "Tom, Tom, you can't do this! You
won't be able to get back!"
"I know," he said, as he started pulling his way along the lifeline
back to the ship.
"_No!_ Come back, Tom, please. Come back. Forget the satellite. Come
back and explore the cities. I'll go with you. Please. Don't die, Tom,
please don't die...."
"Ruth, Ruth, you're too young to cry over me. I'll be all right, don't
worry."
"No, it isn't fair."
"It never is," Tom said. "Listen, Ruth. I've been dead a long time.
Since the bombs fell, I guess. My world died then and I died with it.
When I came to the settlement, when I agreed to make this flight, I
think we all knew I'd never return, even if we wouldn't admit it to
ourselves. But I'm just one man, Ruth, one small part of the story. The
story goes on, with or without me. There's tomorrow ... your tomorrow.
I've got no place in it, but it belongs to you. So don't waste your
time crying over a man who died eighteen years ago."
He snapped off his suit radio and went the rest of the way to the ship
in silence. After locking the hatch and pumping air back into the
cabin, he took off his helmet.
_Good clean canned air_, Tom said to himself. _Too bad it won't last
longer._
* * * * *
He sat down and flicked a switch on the radio console. "All right, do
you have those calculations ready?"
"In a few moments...." Arnoldsson's voice.
Ten minutes later Tom re-emerged from the ship and made his ghost-like
way back to the satellite's sighting mechanism. He checked the
artificial moon's position, then went back to the ship.
"On course," he said to the radio. "The transmitters are pointing a
little northwest of Philadelphia."
"Good," Arnoldsson's voice answered. "Now, your next blast should be
three seconds' duration in the same direction...."
"No," Tom said, "I've gone as far as I'm going to."
"What?"
"I'm not moving the satellite any farther."
"But you still have not enough fuel to return to Earth. Why are you
stopping here?"
"I'm not coming back," Tom answered. "But I'm not going to beam the
satellite's power to the settlement, either."
"_What are you trying to pull?_" Jason's voice. Furious. Panicky.
"It's simple, Jason. If you want the satellite's power, you can
dismantle the settlement and carry it to Pennsylvania. The transmitters
are aimed at some good farming country, and within miles of a city
that's still half-intact."
"You're insane!"
"Not at all. We're keeping our deal, Jason. I'm giving you the
satellite's power, and you're going to allow exploration of the cities.
You won't be able to prevent your people from rummaging through the
cities now; and you won't be able to keep the outsiders from joining
you, not once you get out from behind your own fences."
"You can't do this! You...."
Tom snapped off the radio. He looked at it for a second or two, then
smashed a heavy-booted foot against the console. Glass and metal
crashed satisfactorily.
_Okay_, Tom thought, _it's done. Maybe Jason's right and I'm crazy,
but we'll never know now. In a year or so they'll be set up outside
Philadelphia, and a lot better for it, I'm forcing them to take the
long way back, but it's a better way. The only way, maybe._
He leaned back in the seat and stared out the observation port at the
completed satellite. Already it was taking in solar energy and beaming
it Earthward.
_In ten years they'll send another ship up here to check the gadget and
make sure everything's okay. Maybe they'll be able to do it in five
years. Makes no difference. I'll still be here._