Dimension of Miracles (6 page)

Carmody had no idea of what he was going to say. He was speaking in the desperate hope that the act of speaking would of itself produce meaning, since words do have meanings, and sentences have even more meanings than words.

‘Your problem,’ Carmody continued, ‘is to find within yourself an indwelling functionalism which will have reference to an exterior reality. But this may be an impossible quest, since you yourself are reality, and therefore you cannot posit yourself exterior to yourself.’

‘I can if I want to,’ Melichrone said sulkily. ‘I can posit any damned thing I please since I’m in charge around here. Being a God, you know, doesn’t mean that One must be a solipsist.’

‘True, true, true,’ Carmody said rapidly. (Did he have seven minutes left? Or six? And what was going to happen at the end of that time?) ‘So it is clear, your Immanence and Indwellingness are insufficient to your view of yourself, and therefore are factually insufficient since you yourself, in your form of Definer, consider these qualities to be insufficient.’

‘Nicely reasoned,’ Melichrone said. ‘You should have been a theologian.’

‘At the moment I am a theologian,’ Carmody said., (Six minutes, five minutes?) ‘Very well, then, what are you to do? … Have you ever considered making all knowledge both internal and external (assuming that there is any such thing as external knowledge), of making knowledge your quest?’

‘Yes, as a matter of fact, I did think of that,’ Melichrone said. ‘Among other things, I read every book in the galaxy, plumbed the secrets of Nature and of Man, explored the macrocosm and the microcosm, and so forth. I had quite an aptitude for learning, by the way, though I have subsequently forgotten a few things, like the secret of life and the ulterior motive of death. But I can learn them again whenever I please. I did learn that learning is a dry, passive business, though filled with some pleasant surprises; and I also learned that learning has no particular and peculiar importance for me. As a matter of fact, I find unlearning almost as interesting.’

‘Maybe you were meant to be an artist,’ Carmody suggested.

‘I went through that phase,’ Melichrone said. ‘I sculpted in flesh and in clay, I painted sunsets on canvas and on the sky, I wrote books in words and other books in events, I made music on instruments, and composed symphonies for wind and rain. My work was good enough, I believe; but I knew somehow that I would always be a dilettante. My omnipotence does not allow me enough room for error, you see; and my grasp of the actual is too complete to allow me to bother seriously with the representational.’

‘Hmm, I see,’ Carmody said. (Surely no more than three minutes left!) ‘Why not become a conqueror?’

‘I do not need to conquer what I already possess,’ Melichrone said. ‘And as for other worlds, I do not desire them. My qualities are peculiar to my milieu, which consists of this single planet. Possession of other worlds would involve me in unnatural actions. And besides – what use do I have for other worlds when I don’t even know what to do with this one?’

‘I see that you’ve given the matter a great deal of thought,’ Carmody said, his desperation merging into despair.

‘Of course I have. I have thought of little else for some millions of years. I have looked for a purpose exterior to myself yet essential to the nature of my being. I have looked for a directive; but I have found only myself.’

Carmody could have felt sorry for the God Melichrone if his own situation had not been so desperate. He was confused now; he could feel his time dwindling, and his fears were absurdly mingled with concern for the unfulfilled God.

Then he had an inspiration. It was simple, straightforward, and solved both Melichrone’s problem and his own – which is the test of a good inspiration. Whether Melichrone would accept it was another matter. But Carmody could only try.

‘Melichrone,’ he said boldly, ‘I have solved your problem.’

‘Oh, have you really?’ Melichrone said eagerly. ‘I mean
really
really, I mean you’re not just saying that because, unless you do solve it to my satisfaction, you’re fated to die in seventy-three seconds? I mean, you haven’t let that influence you unduly, have you?’

‘I have allowed my impending fate to influence me,’ Carmody said majestically, ‘only to the extent that such an influence is needed to solve your problem.’

‘Oh. All right. Please hurry up and tell me, I’m so excited!’

‘I wish to do so,’ Carmody said. ‘But I can’t – it is physically impossible to explain everything – if you are going to kill me in sixty or seventy seconds.’

‘I? I am not going to kill you! Good heavens, do you really think me as bloody-minded as all that? No, your impending death is an exterior event quite without reference to me. By the way, you have twelve seconds left.’

‘It isn’t long enough,’ Carmody said.

‘Of course it’s long enough! This
is
my world, you know, and I control everything in it, including the duration of time. I have just altered the local space-time continuum at the ten-second mark. It’s an easy enough operation for a God, though it requires a lot of cleaning up afterwards. Accordingly, your ten seconds will consume approximately twenty-five years of my local time. Is
that
long enough?’

‘It’s more than ample,’ Carmody said. ‘And it’s very kind of you.’

‘Think nothing of it,’ Melichrone said. ‘Now, please, let me hear your solution.’

‘Very well,’ Carmody said, and took a deep breath. ‘The solution to your problem is inherent in the terms in which you view the problem. It could be no other way; every problem must contain within it the seeds of its own solution.’

‘Must it?’Melichrone asked.

‘Yes, it must,’ Carmody said firmly.

‘All right. For the moment I’ll accept that premise. Go on.’

‘Consider your situation,’ Carmody said. ‘Consider both its interior and exterior aspects. You are the God of this planet; but only of this planet. You are omnipotent and omniscient; but only here. You have impressive intellectual attainments, and you feel a call to serve something outside of yourself. But your gifts would be wasted any place but here, and here there is no one but you.’

‘Yes, yes, that is exactly my situation!’ Melichrone cried. ‘But you still haven’t told me what to do about it!’

Carmody took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. ‘What you must do,’ he said, ‘is to use all of your great gifts, and to use them here, on your own planet, where they will be of maximum effect; and use them in the service of others, since this is your deepest desire.’

‘In the service of others?’ Melichrone asked.

‘It is so indicated,’ Carmody said. ‘The most superficial consideration of your situation points the verdict. You are alone in a multiplex universe; but in order for you to perform exterior deeds, there must be an exterior. However, you are barred by your very essence from going to that exterior. Therefore the exterior must come to you. When it comes, what will be your relationship to it? That also is clear. Since you are omnipotent in your own world, you cannot be aided or assisted; but you can aid and assist others. This is the only natural relationship between you and the outside universe.’

Melichrone thought about it, then said, ‘Your argument has force; that much I freely admit. But there are difficulties. For example, the outside world rarely comes this way. You are the first visitor I have had in two and a quarter galactic revolutions.’

‘The job does require patience,’ Carmody admitted. ‘But patience is a quality you must strive for. It will be easier for you since time is a variable. And as for the number of your visitors – first of all, quantity does not affect quality. There is no value in mere enumeration. A man or a God does his job; that is what counts. Whether that job requires one or a million transactions makes no difference.’

‘But I am as badly off as before if I have a job to perform and no one to perform it on.’

‘With all modesty, I must point out that you have me,’ Carmody said. ‘I have come to you from the exterior. I have a problem; indeed, I have several problems. For me, these problems are insoluble. For you – I do not know. But I suspect that they will tax your powers to the utmost.’

Melichrone thought about it for a very long time. Carmody’s nose began to itch, but he resisted the desire to scratch it. He waited, and the entire planet also waited while Melichrone made up his mind.

At last Melichrone raised his jet-black head and said, ‘I really think you have something there!’

‘It’s good of you to say that,’ Carmody said.

‘But I mean it, I really do!’ Melichrone said. ‘Your solution seems to me both inevitable and elegant. And, by extension, it seems to me that Fate, which rules men, Gods and planets, must have destined this to happen: that I, a creator, was created with no problem to solve; and that you, a created, became the creator of a problem that only a God could solve. And that you have lived out your lifetime waiting for me to solve your problem, while I have waited here for half of eternity for you to bring me your problem to solve!’

‘I wouldn’t be a bit surprised,’ Carmody said. ‘Would you like to know what my problem is?’

‘I have already deduced,’ Melichrone said. ‘In fact, due to my superior intellect and experience, I know much more about it than you do. Superficially, your problem is how to get home.’

‘That’s it.’

‘No, that’s not it. I do not use words lightly.
Superficially,
you need to know Where, When and Which your planet is; and you need a way of getting there, and you need to arrive in much the same condition you are presently in. If that were all, it would still be difficult enough.’

‘What else is there?’ Carmody asked.

‘Why, there is also the death which is pursuing you.’

‘Oh,’ Carmody said. He suddenly felt weak in the knees, and Melichrone graciously created an easy chair for him, and a Havana cigar, a Rum Collins, a pair of sheep-lined slippers, and a buffalo-hide lap robe.

‘Comfortable?’ Melichrone asked.

‘Very.’

‘Good. Pay close attention now. I will proceed to explain your situation briefly but succinctly, utilizing only a fraction of my intellect for that task while I use the rest of me for the considerable job of finding a feasible solution._But you will have to listen carefully and try to understand everything the first time I say it because we have very little time.’

‘I thought you stretched my ten seconds into twenty-five years,’ Carmody said.

‘I did. But time is a tricky sort of variable, even for me. Eighteen of your twenty-five years are already used up, and the rest of them are going with extreme rapidity. Pay attention, now! Your life depends on it.’

‘All right,’ Carmody said. He sat forward and puffed on his cigar. ‘I’m ready.’

‘The first thing you must understand,’ Melichrone said, ‘is the nature of the implacable death that is hunting you.’

Carmody controlled a shudder and bent forward to listen.

CHAPTER 9

‘The most fundamental fact in the Universe,’ said Melichrone, ‘is that species eat other species. It may not be pretty, but there it is. Eating is basic, and the acquisition of foodstuffs underlies all other phenomena. This concept involves the Law of Predation, which can be stated as follows: any given species, no matter how high or how low, feeds upon one or more species and is fed upon by one or more species.

‘That sets forth a universal situation, which can be aggravated or ameliorated by a variety of circumstances. For example, a species resident in its own habitat can usually maintain itself in a state of Equilibrium, and thus live out its normal lifetime despite the depredations of predators. This Equilibrium is usually stated as the Victor-Vanquished equation, or VV. When a species or a species member moves to an alien and exotic habitat, the VV values necessarily change. Occasionally, there is temporary improvement in the species’s Eat-Eaten Situation (Vv=Ee plus 1). More typically, there is a deterioration (Vv=Ee minus 1).

‘That is what has happened to you, Carmody. You have left your normal habitat, which also means that you have left your normal predators. No automobiles can stalk you here, no virus can creep into your bloodstream, no policeman can shoot you down by mistake. You are separated from the dangers of Earth, and immune to the dangers of other galactic species.

‘But the amelioration (Vv=Ee plus 1) is sadly temporary. The ironclad rule of Equilibrium has already begun to assert itself. You cannot refuse to hunt, and you cannot escape being hunted. Predation is Necessity itself.

‘Having left Earth, you are a unique creature; therefore your predator is unique.

‘Your predator was born out of a personification and solidification of universal law. This predator can feed exclusively and solely on you. The creature is shaped as a respondent and complement to your characteristics. Even without seeing it, we can know that its jaws are shaped to bite Carmodys, its limbs are articulated to seize and grasp Carmodys, its stomach has the peculiar and unique ability to digest Carmodys, and its personality is designed to take advantage of the Carmodic personality.

‘Your situation has rendered you unique, Carmody; therefore your predator is unique. It is your death that pursues you, Carmody, and it does so with a desperation equal to your own. You and it are bound together. If it seizes you, you die; if you escape to the normal menaces of your own world, your predator dies for lack of Carmodic sustenance.