Asimov, Isaac - Foundation Series 21 Foundations by Asimov Isaac

Author:Asimov, Isaac
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf

PART 5

PANUCOPIA

BIOGENESIS, HISTORY OF-...it was thus only natural that biologists would use entire planets as experimental preserves, testing on a large scale the central ideas about human evolution. Humanity's origins remained shrouded, with the parent planet ("Earth ") itself unknown-though there were thousands of earnestly supported candidates. Some primates in the scattered Galactic Zoos clearly were germane to the argument. Early in the Post-Middle Period, whole worlds came to be devoted to exploration of these apparently primordial species. One such world made groundbreaking progress in our connections to the pans, though indicative, no firm conclusions could be reached; too much of the intervening millions of years between ourselves and even close relatives like the pans lay in shadow. During the decline of Imperial science, these experiments were even turned into amusements for the gentry and meritocrats, in desperate attempts to remain self-supporting as Imperial funding dried up...

- ENCYCLOPEDIA GALACTICA

PART 5. PANUCOPIA

1.

He didn't fully relax until they were sitting on a verandah of the Excursion Station, some six thousand light years away from Trantor.

Warily Dors gazed out at the view beyond the formidable walls. "We're safe here from the animals?"

"I imagine so. Those walls are high and there are guard canines. Wirehounds, I believe."

"Good." She smiled in a way that he knew implied a secret was about to emerge.

"I believe I have covered our tracks-to use an animal metaphor. I had records of our departure concealed."

"I still think you are exaggerating-"

"Exaggerating an attempted assassination?" She bit her lip in ill-concealed irritation. This was a well-frayed argument between them by now, but something about her protectiveness always sat poorly with him.

"I only agreed to leave Trantor in order to study pans."

He caught a flicker of emotion in her face and knew that she would now try to ease off.

"Oh, that might be useful-or better still, fun. You need a rest."

"At least I won't have to deal with Lamurk."

Cleon had instituted what he lightly termed "traditional measures" to track down the conspirators. Some had already wormholed away to the far reaches of the Galaxy. Others had committed suicide-or so it seemed.

Lamurk was staying low, pretending shock and dismay at "this assault on the very fabric of our Imperium." But Lamurk still held enough votes in the High Page 150

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Council to block Cleon's move to make Hari his First Minister, so the deadlock continued. Hari was numbed by the entire matter.

"And you're right," Dors continued with a brittle brightness, ignoring his moody silence,

"not everything is available on Trantor-or even known about. My main consideration was that if you had stayed on Trantor you would be dead."

He stopped looking at the striking scenery. "You think the Lamurk faction would persist...?"

"They could, which is a better guide to action than trying to guess woulds."

" I see." He didn't, but he had learned to trust her judgment in matters of the world.

Then, too, perhaps he did need a thoroughgoing vacation.

To be on a living, natural world-he had forgotten, in his years buried in Trantor, how vivid wild things could be.

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