Vulcan's Hammer

"Vulcan 2 won," Barris said.

"Yes." Fields nodded. "He-or it-got virtually all of us lined up on one side, with Vulcan 3 on the other. We ganged up on Vulcan 3." He laughed sharply. "Vulcan 3's logic was absolutely right; there was a vast world-wide conspiracy directed against it, and to preserve itself it had to invent and develop and produce one weapon after an­other. And still it was destroyed. Its paranoid suspicions were founded in fact."

Like the rest of Unity, Barris thought. Vulcan 3, like Dill and myself, Rachel Pitt and Taubma

"Pawns" Fields was saying. "We humans-god damn it, Barris; we were pawns of those two things. They played us off against one another, like inanimate pieces. The things became alive and the living organisms were reduced to things. Everything was turned inside out, like some ter­rible morbid view of reality."

Standing at the doorway of the hospital room, Rachel Pitt said in a low voice, "I hope we can get out from under that morbid view." Smiling timidly, she came toward Bar­ris and her father. "I don't want to press any legal action against Taubma

Either that, Barris thought, or making it a point to listen in on other people's conversations. But he said nothing aloud.

"How long do you think it will take?" Fields said, study­ing him acutely. "The real reconstruction-not the build­ings and roads, but the minds. Distrust and mutual suspi­cion have been bred into us since childhood; the schools started it going on us-they forced out characters. We can't shake it overnight."

He's right, Barris thought. It's going to be hard. And it's going to take a long time. Possibly generations.

But at least the living elements, the human beings, had survived. And the mechanical ones had not. That was a good sign, a step in the right direction.

Across from him, Rachel Pitt was smiling less timidly, with more assurance now. Coming over to him, she bent down and touched him reassuringly on the plastic film that covered his shoulder. "I hope you'll be up and around soon," she said.

He considered that a good sign too.