The Legend That Was Earth Read Online Free PDF Page A

said to her companion. "Now there's one I haven't heard before."
    "You see, Roland—the same genes everywhere," Blair said to Cade. Blair was some kind of scientist involved with behavior and biology, formerly with the University of California. Nowadays, he conducted private research, a lot of it at the Hyadean mission, trying to learn more of the aliens' sciences, since just about everything he had believed before they showed up had turned out to be wrong. He had been explaining to Cade that the reason why human and Hyadean forms were so alike, confounding traditional ideas of evolution, was that the genetic programs that directed the building of life forms didn't originate on planets at all, but arrived there as space-borne microbes. Planets were simply assembly stations where cues provided by the local environments triggered the programs to express themselves differently. So, similar environments would produce similar collections of shapes and forms. Earth's was more diverse, hence richer in diversity, that was all.
    "So where do these programs get written in the first place?" Cade asked.
    "They don't know."
    "Do they have any theories about it?'
    "Not really. They've never really thought about it."
    Cade turned his head incredulously. "You're kidding!" Although no scientist, he assumed that would be the obvious question.
    Blair motioned with his glass. He looked the academic, with graying hair brushed to the side and parted, metal-framed spectacles, and a rubbery, expressive face that made a joke of any attempt to conceal his mood. As a concession to the occasion he had donned a dark jacket with tie and slacks. But he could have added an evening shave while he was at it. "That's the amazing thing. Their minds just aren't like that. They don't make big theories that try to explain everything. They just look at the evidence that's there and stick to that."
    "So is that how come they got here, but we didn't get there?" Cade queried.
    "Maybe that's what it needs—just accepting the facts and not trying to go beyond them. They don't have religion either. That's another thing about us that fascinates them. Krossig says Hyadeans could never have come up with anything like that. But they see a lot of what we think is science as being not very different. We get wrapped up in our own inventions and then convince ourselves that what we see is really out there."
    Neville Baxter sauntered by, telling a joke to a petite blonde in blue who was clinging to his arm and looking appreciative. "...and God said, `It doesn't cost anything. It's free.' So Moses said, `I'll take ten!' " He nudged Cade in passing, as if to say, See, even fuddy-duddy, middle-age-spreading New Zealanders can make out okay too .
    The group that included Norman Schnyder had got onto the subject of Terran industries folding because of cheap Hyadean imports, and the increasingly militant political opposition movement. "I've never understood why we need those markets," one of the Hyadeans commented, maybe trying to be diplomatic.
    "Oh, I'd have thought it's obvious," Schnyder said. "To earn currency here that can be reinvested in land. That's where the big payoffs are going to be. Industrial trading is just the key to the door."
    "Isn't that what the guerrilla war in South America is all about... ?" Anita Lloyd began, then faltered as she realized it wasn't a good topic to bring up in polite Terran-Hyadean company. Cade rescued her by stepping closer and moving things along.
    "You're bound to have clashes when different kinds of people meet, and there's change. But it always works out better for everyone in the long run. The hotheads will get hurt, but they bring it on themselves. There's nothing you can do." He smiled as Julia came over with a fresh drink for him, and slid an arm around her waist. "The woman I used to be married to was a hothead like that," he told the group. "Not accepting change; thinking she could stop it. Well, she's not here anymore, and all of