The Jewels of Aptor

by Samuel R. Delany

"Yes," nodded the Old One, with something like a sigh, "at the beach. We have a science that allows us to do things which to you seem impossibilities, as when we carried you in the sea for weeks without your body decaying. We can enter your mind as Snake does. And we can do much else. We have a wisdom which far surpasses even Argo's and Hama's on Aptor. Will you then cast the jewels into the sea and trust them with us?"

Here Urson interrupted. "How can we give you the jewels?" he said. "How can we be sure you're not going to use them against Argo and Hama once you get them. You say nobody is impervious to them. And we've only got your say so on how long it would take you to fall victim. You can already influence minds. That's how you got us here. And according to Hama, that's what corrupts. And you've already done it."

"Besides," Geo said. "There's something else. We've nearly messed this thing up a dozen times trying to figure out motives and counter motives. And it always comes back to the same thing: we've got a job to do, and we ought to do it. We're suppose to return Argo and the jewels to the ship, and that's what we're doing."

"He's right," said Iimmi. "It's the general rule again. Act on the simplest theory that holds all the information."

The Old One sighed again. "Once, fifteen hundred years ago, a man who was to maneuver one of the metal birds walked and pondered by the sea. He had been given a job to do. We tried to warn him, as we tried to warn you. But he jammed his hands into the pockets of his khaki uniform, and uttered to the waves the words you just uttered, and the warning was shut out of his mind. He scrambled up over the dunes on the beach, never taking his hands out of his pockets. The next morning, at five o'clock, when the sun slanted red across the air field, he climbed into his metal bird, took off, flew for some time over the sea, looking down on the water like crinkled foil under the heightening sun, until he reached land again. Then he did his job: he pressed a button which released two shards of fire metal in a housing of cobalt. The land flamed. The sea boiled in the harbors. And two weeks later he was also dead. That which burned your arm away, poet, burned away his whole face, boiled his lungs in his chest and his brain in his skull."

There was a pause. And then, "Yes, we can control minds. We could have relieved the tiredness, immobilized the fear, the terror, immobilized all his unconscious reasons for doing what he did, just as man can now do with the jewels. But had we, we would have also immobilized the—the honor which he clung to. Yes, we can control minds, but we do not." Now the voice swelled. "But never, since that day on the shore before the Great Fire, has the temptation to do so been as great as now." Again the voice returned to normal. "Perhaps," and there was almost humor in it now, "the temptation is too great, even for us. Perhaps we have reached the place where the jewels would push us just across the line where we have never before gone, make us do those things that we have never done. You have heard our warning now. The choice, I swear to you, is yours."

They stood silent in the high cave, the fire on their faces weaving brightness and shadow. Geo turned to look at the rain-blurred darkness outside the cave's entrance.

"Out there is the sea," said the voice again. "Your decision quickly. The tide is coming in...."

It was snatched from their minds before they could articulate it. Two children saw a bright motor turning in the shadow. Geo and Iimmi saw the temples of Argo in Leptar. Then there was something darker. And for a moment, they all saw all the pictures at once.

A wave splashed across the floor, like twisted glass before the rock on which the fire stood. Then it flopped wetly across the burning driftwood which hissed into darkness. Charred sticks turned, glowing in the water, and were extinguished.