Forward the Foundation - Isaac Asimov [205]
"I have to work."
"Call in sick if you have to. It's important."
"Well, I'm not sure, sir."
"Do it," said Seldon. "If you get into any sort of trouble over it, I'll straighten it out. And meanwhile, gentlemen, do you mind if I study the Galaxy simulation for a moment? It's been a long time since I've looked at one."
They nodded mutely, apparently abashed at being in the presence of a former First Minister. One by one the men stepped back and allowed Seldon access to the Galactograph controls.
Seldon's finger reached out to the controls and the red that had marked off the Province of Anacreon vanished. The Galaxy was unmarked, a glowing pinwheel of mist brightening into the spherical glow at the center, behind which was the Galactic black hole.
Individual stars could not be made out, of course, unless the view were magnified, but then only one portion or another of the Galaxy would be shown on the screen and Seldon wanted to see the whole thing -to get a look at the Empire that was vanishing.
He pushed a contact and a series of yellow dots appeared on the Galactic image. They represented the habitable planets-twenty-five million of them. They could be distinguished as individual dots in the thin fog that represented the outskirts of the Galaxy, but they were more and more thickly placed as one moved in toward the center. There was a belt of what seemed solid yellow (but which would separate into individual dots under magnification) around the central glow. The central glow itself remained white and unmarked, of course. No habitable planets could exist in the midst of the turbulent energies of the core.
Despite the great density of yellow, not one star in ten thousand, Seldon knew, had a habitable planet circling it. This was true, despite the planet-molding and terraforming capacities of humanity. Not all the molding in the Galaxy could make most of the worlds into anything a human being could walk on in comfort and without the protection of a spacesuit.
Seldon closed another contact. The yellow dots disappeared, but one tiny region glowed blue: Trantor and the various worlds directly dependent on it. As close as it could be to the central core and yet remaining insulated from its deadliness, it was commonly viewed as being located at the "center of the Galaxy," which it wasn't-not truly. As usual, one had to be impressed by the smallness of the world of Trantor, a tiny place in the vast realm of the Galaxy, but within it was squeezed the largest concentration of wealth, culture, and governmental authority that humanity had ever seen.
And even that was doomed to destruction.
It was almost as though the men could read his mind or perhaps they interpreted the sad expression on his face.
Baldy asked softly, "Is the Empire really going to be destroyed?"
Seldon replied, softer still, "It might. It might. Anything might happen."
He rose, smiled at the men, and left, but in his thoughts he screamed: It will! It will!
2
Seldon sighed as he climbed into one of the skitters that were ranked side by side in the large alcove. There had been a time, just a few years ago, when he had gloried in walking briskly along the interminable corridors of the Library, telling himself that even though he was past sixty he could manage it.
But now, at seventy, his legs gave way all too quickly and he had to take a skitter. Younger men took them all the time because skitters saved them trouble, but Seldon did it because he had to-and that made all the difference.
After Seldon punched in the destination, he closed a contact and the skitter lifted a fraction of an inch above the floor. Off it went at a rather casual pace, very smoothly, very silently, and Seldon leaned back and watched the corridor walls, the other skitters, the occasional walkers.
He passed a number of Librarians and, even after all these years, he still smiled when he saw them. They were the oldest Guild in the Empire, the one with the most revered traditions, and they clung to ways that were more appropriate centuries before-maybe