"You’ve only got to look at the size of those ice caps," Hunt commented.

"Yes, exactly. And it was getting worse. The Lunarian scientists figured they had less than a hundred years to go before the ice sheets met and blanketed the whole planet completely. Now, as you’d expect, they had studied astronomy for centuries-centuries before Charlie’s time, that is-and they’d known for a long time that things were going to get worse before they got better. So, they’d reached the conclusion, way back, that the only way out was to escape to another world. The problem, of course, was that for generations after they got the idea, nobody knew anything about how to do something about it. The answer had to lie somewhere along the line of better science and better technology. It became kind of a racial goal-the one thing that mattered, that generation after generation worked toward-the development of the sciences that would get them to places they knew existed, before the ice wiped out the whole race."

Maddson pointed to another pile of papers on the corner of his desk. "This was the prime objective that the State was set up to achieve, and because the stakes were so high, everything was subordinated to that objective. Hence, from birth to death the individual was subordinated to the needs of the State. It was implied in everything they wrote and drummed into them from the time they were knee-high. Those papers are a translation of a kind of catechism they had to memorize at school; it reads like Nazi stuff from the nineteen thirties." He stopped at that point and looked at Hunt expectantly.

Hunt looked puzzled. After a moment he said, "This doesn’t quite make sense. I mean-how could they be striving to develop space flight if they were colonists from Earth? They must have already developed it."

Maddson gave an approving nod. "Thought you might say that."

"But… it’s bloody silly."

"I know. It implies they must have evolved on Minerva from scratch-unless they came from Earth, forgot everything they knew, and had to learn it all over. But that also sounds crazy to me."

"Me, too." Hunt thought for a long time. At last he shook his head with a sigh. "Doesn’t make sense. Anyhow, what else is there?"

"Well, we’ve got the general picture of a totally authoritarian State, demanding unquestioning obedience from the individual and controlling just about everything that moves. Everything needs a license; there are travel licenses, off-work licenses, sick-ration licenses-even procreation licenses. Everything is in short supply and rationed by permits-food, every kind of commodity, fuel, light, accommodation-you name it. And to keep everybody in line, the State operates a propaganda machine like you never dreamed of. To make things worse, the whole planet was desperately short of every kind of mineral. That slowed them down a lot. Despite their concentrated effort, their rate of technological progress was probably not as fast as you’d think. Maybe a hundred years didn’t give them as long as it sounds." Maddson turned some sheets, scanned the next one briefly, and then went on. "To make matters worse still, they also had a big political problem."

"Go on."

"Now, we’re assuming that as their civilization developed, it followed similar lines to ours-first tribes, then villages, towns, nations, and so on. Seems reasonable. So, somewhere along the way they started discovering the different sciences, same as we did. As you’d expect, the same ideas started occurring to different people in different places at around the same time-like, we’ve gotta get outa this place. As these ideas became accepted, the Lunarians seem to have figured also that there just weren’t sufficient resources for more than a few lucky ones to make it. No way were they going to get a whole planet full of people out."

"So they fought about it," Hunt offered.

"That’s right. The way I picture it, lots of nations grew up, all racing each other, as well as the ice, to get the technological edge. Every other one was a rival, so they fought it out. Another thing that made them fight was the mineral shortage, especially the shortage of metallic ores." Maddson pointed at a map of Minerva mounted above the table. "See those dots on the ice sheets? Most of them were a combination of fortress and mining town. They dug right down through the ice to get at the deposits, and the army was there to make sure they kept the stuff."

"And that was the way life was. Mean people, eh?"

"Yeah, for generation after generation." Maddson shrugged. "Who knows? Maybe if we were freezing over fast, we’d be forced in the same direction. Anyhow, the situation had complications. They had the problem of having to divide their efforts and resources between two different demands all the time: first, developing a technology that would support mass interplanetary travel and, second, armaments and the defense organization to protect it-and there weren’t a lot of resources to divide in the first place. Now, how would you solve a problem like that?"

Hunt pondered for a while. "Cooperate?" he tried.

"Forget it. They didn’t think that way."

"Only one other strategy possible, then: Wipe out the opposition first and then concentrate everything on the main objective."

Maddson nodded solidly. "That is exactly what they did. War, or near war, was pretty well a natural way of life all through their history. Gradually the smaller fish were eliminated until, by the time we get to Charlie, there are only two superpowers left, each dominating one of the two big equatorial continental land masses…" He pointed at the map again. "… Cerios and Lambia. From various references, we know Charlie was a Cerian."

"All set for the big showdown, then."

"Check. The whole planet was one big fortress-factory. Every inch of surface was covered by hostile missiles; the sky was full of orbiting bombs that could be dropped anywhere. We get the impression that relative to the pattern of our own civilization, their armaments programs had taken a bigger share than space research and had progressed faster." Maddson shrugged again. "The rest you can guess."

Hunt nodded slowly and thoughtfully. "It all fits," he mused. "It must have been a huge con, though. I mean, even from whichever side won, only a handful would have been able to get away in the end; I suppose they’d have been the ruling clique and its minions. Christ! No wonder they needed good propaganda; they-"

Hunt stopped in midsentence and looked at Maddson with a curious expression. "Just a minute-there’s something else in all this that doesn’t add up." He paused to collect his thoughts. "They had already developed interplanetary travel-how else did they get to our Moon?"

"We wondered that," Maddson said. "The only thing we could think of was that maybe they’d already figured on making for Earth eventually-that had to be the obvious choice. Maybe they were capable of sending a scouting group to stake the place out, but didn’t have full-scale mass-transportation capacity yet. Probably they weren’t too far away from their goal when they blew it. Perhaps if they’d pooled their marbles at that point instead of starting a crazy war over it, things might have been different."

"Sounds plausible," Hunt agreed. "So Charlie could have been part of a reconnaissance mission sent on ahead, only the opposition had the same idea and they bumped into each other. Then they started blowing holes in our Moon. Disgraceful."

A short silence ensued.

"There’s another thing I don’t get, either," Hunt said, rubbing his chin.

"What’s that?"

"Well, the opposition-the Lambians. Everybody in Navcomms is going around saying that the war that clobbered Minerva was fought between colonists from Earth-that must be Charlie’s lot, the Cerians-and an alien race that belonged to Minerva-the Ganymeans, who, from what you said, would be the Lambians. We said a moment ago that this idea of the Cerians being from Earth doesn’t make sense, because if they had originated there, they wouldn’t be trying to develop space flight. We can’t be one hundred percent certain of that because something unusual could have happened, such as the colony being cut off for a few thousand years for some reason. But you can’t say that about the Lambians; they couldn’t have been neck-and-neck rivals trying to develop space flight."