Pebble in the Sky by Isaac Asimov (best novels of all time .txt) 📗

“Do you mean,” said Arvardan with a strangely faint sensation, “that contact with you now—” He pushed his chair back. He was thinking of the evening’s kisses.

Shekt shook his head. “Of course not. We don’t create the disease; we merely carry it. And even such carriage occurs very rarely. If I lived on your world, I would no more carry the germ than you would; I have no special affinity for it. Even here it is only one out of every quadrillion germs, or one out of every quadrillion of quadrillions, that is dangerous. The chances of your infection right now are less than that of a meteorite penetrating the roof of this house and hitting you. Unless the germs in question are deliberately searched for, isolated, and concentrated.”

Again a silence, longer this time. Arvardan said in a queer, strangled voice, “Have Earthmen been doing that?”

He had stopped thinking in terms of paranoia. He was ready to believe.

“Yes. But for innocent reasons, at first. Our biologists are, of course, particularly interested in the peculiarities of Earth life, and, recently, isolated the virus of Common Fever.”

“What is Common Fever?”

“A mild endemic disease on Earth. That is, it is always with us. Most Earthmen have it in their childhood, and its symptoms are not very severe. A mild fever, a transitory rash, and inflammation of the joints and of the lips, combined with an annoying thirst. It runs its course in four to six days, and the subject is thereafter immune. I’ve had it. Pola has had it. Occasionally there is a more virulent form of this same disease—a slightly different strain of virus is concerned, presumably—and then it is called Radiation Fever.”

“Radiation Fever. I’ve heard of it,” said Arvardan.

“Oh, really? It is called Radiation Fever because of the mistaken notion that it is caught after exposure to radioactive areas. Actually, exposure to radioactive areas is often followed by Radiation Fever, because it is in those areas that the virus is most apt to mutate to dangerous forms. But it is the virus and not the radiation which does it. In the case of Radiation Fever, symptoms develop in a matter of two hours. The lips are so badly affected that the subject can scarcely talk, and he may be dead in a matter of days.

“Now, Dr. Arvardan, this is the crucial point. The Earthman has adapted himself to Common Fever and the Outsider has not. Occasionally a member of the Imperial garrison is exposed to it, and, in that case, he reacts to it as an Earthman would to Radiation Fever. Usually he dies within twelve hours. He is then burned—by Earthmen—since any other soldier approaching also dies.

“The virus, as I say, was isolated ten years ago. It is a nucleoprotein, as are most filtrable viruses, which, however, possesses the remarkable property of containing an unusually high concentration of radioactive carbon, sulphur, and phosphorus. When I say unusually high I mean that fifty per cent of its carbon, sulphur, and phosphorus is radioactive. It is supposed that the effects of the organism on its host is largely that of its radiations, rather than of its toxins. Naturally it would seem logical that Earthmen, who are adapted to gamma radiations, are only slightly affected. Original research in the virus centered at first about the method whereby it concentrated its radioactive isotopes. As you know, no chemical means can separate isotopes except through very long and tedious procedures. Nor is any organism other than this virus known which can do so. But then the direction of research changed.

“I’ll be short, Dr. Arvardan. I think you see the rest. Experiments might be conducted on animals from outside Earth, but not on Outsiders themselves. The numbers of Outsiders on Earth were too few to allow several to disappear without notice. Nor could premature discovery of their plans be allowed. So it was a group of bacteriologists that was sent to the Synapsifier, to return with insights enormously developed. It was they who developed a new mathematical attack on protein chemistry and on immunology, which enabled them finally to develop an artificial strain of virus that was designed to affect Galactic human beings—Outsiders—only. Tons of the crystallized virus now exist.”

Arvardan was haggard. He felt the drops of perspiration glide sluggishly down his temple and cheek.

“Then you are telling me,” he gasped, “that Earth intends to set loose this virus on the Galaxy; that they will initiate a gigantic bacteriological warfare—”

“Which we cannot lose and you cannot win. Exactly. Once the epidemic starts, millions will die each day, and nothing will stop it. Frightened refugees fleeing across space will carry the virus with them, and if you attempt to blow up entire planets, the disease can be started again in new centers. There will be no reason to connect the matter with Earth. By the time our own survival becomes suspicious, the ravages will have progessed so far, the despair of the Outsiders will be so deep, that nothing will matter to them.”

“And all will die?” The appalling horror did not penetrate—could not.

“Perhaps not. Our new science of bacteriology works both ways. We have the antitoxin as well, and the means of production thereof. It might be used in case of early surrender. Then there may be some out-of-the-way eddies of the Galaxy that could escape, or even a few cases of natural immunity.”

In the horrible blankness that followed—during which Arvardan never thought of doubting the truth of what he had heard, the horrible truth which at a stroke wiped out the odds of twenty-five billion to one—Shekt’s voice was small and tired.

“It is not Earth that is doing this. A handful of leaders, perverted by the gigantic pressure that excluded them from the Galaxy, hating those who keep them outside, wanting to strike back at any cost, and with insane intensity—

“Once they have begun, the rest of Earth must follow. What can it do? In its tremendous guilt, it will have to finish