james_davis_nicoll | The Foundation Trilogy: Part Six of Eight

Foundation: Flight From The Mule

This follows immediately on the events of the previous episode. Terminus has fallen and it can only be a matter of time before the trader world of Haven follows it. All appears lost and there is a general air of malaise on Haven.
spoilers
The one ray of hope comes from researcher Eblin Mis, who believes that the mysterious Second Foundation, set up at the same time as the Foundation, might prove the Foundation's salvation. Unfortunately the Second Foundation's location is not known, aside from it being at the other end of the galaxy, and so an expedition consisting of Mis, less-newly-weds-than-before Toran and Bayta Darell and Magnifico, who is on the lam from the Mule since leaving his employ, head to the old Imperial capital of Trantor to see if its library has some clue.

Trantor was sacked some time ago and the capital is now on Neotrantor, formerly the world Delicass. It is a sign of how far the Empire has fallen that the quartet have no trouble obtaining an audience with the elderly and rather senile Dagobert IX. Emperor Dagobert is an amiable old duffer who has no trouble authorizing a salvage operation on Trantor but his son, also Dagobert, is a would-be rapist and Magnifico kills the fellow with weaponized music for the insult to Bayta.

Interestingly, while Magnifico is protective of Bayta, he doesn't seem to have much trouble using an area-effect lethal weapon on the man standing near her husband. I also notice that while Magnifico warns Bayta, he does not warn anyone else.

Trantor is now an agrarian world but while its inhabitants are trading away its metals, they have preserved the great library. Mis proceeds to work himself to death looking for the Second Foundation; aided by a curiously talented Magnifico, Mis demonstrates insight and genius he never had before. Indeed, Mis manages to work out where the Second Foundation is from the deliberately unhelpful records on Trantor. Which is the point at which Bayta guns poor Mis down.

Bayta, you see, has put together all the clues: the way calamity followed Bayta, Toran and Magnifico across the galaxy, Mis's odd fervor, his sudden genius, the fact that the Mule is known to be able to alter people emotions and the fact that large parts of Magnifico's back-story makes no sense and she has concluded that Magnifico is none other than the Mule. Since Mis was about to expose the Second Foundation to the Mule and since the Second Foundation might be as unprepared for the Mule as the Foundation was, poor Mis had to die.

Exposed, Magnifico admits he is is the Mule, rues that his affection for Bayta kept him from altering her mind, gives a bit of his tragic back story (and I am sure the Music of Death he felt the need to compose as a young man figures into it) and then leaves to administer his new Empire. The Second Foundation will have to wait.

He leaves Toran and Bayta alive and unharmed. He could force her to love him but what he valued in her was that her emotions were sincere. He has no expectation of establishing a lasting dynasty; Mules are sterile...

This had comparatively few war crimes compared to previous episodes but made it up with the first attempted rape scene in the series. I cannot help but notice that in general Bayta is the focus of a lot of men's attentions and aside from Toran, who is just a bit of drip, most of the men seem to be poorly behaved at best or actual monsters. At least she gets to be the hero in the end.

Which reminds me, compare and contrast the speeches Crown Prince Rapey McBlasterfodder and the Mule make to Bayta.

I did like that there is an explanation in this story for the sometimes odd decisions people make: there's a telepath screwing with people's minds. That explains so much! And given the hints that the Second Foundation may also be exploring psychic realms, some of the odder decisions in previous stories may have involved some tuxedoed man just off-stage, making hypnotic gestures.

Well, perhaps not tuxedoed.

There's an interesting bit about things that could disrupt the Plan. One problematic item is advancements in technology of the sort that Seldon could not foresee. Is the Second Foundation shaping what fields get researched by the Foundation?

Oh, another thing that occurred to me: FTL in this setting is lickity split fast: do we know no extragalactic expeditions were ever made? The distances to the LMC and SMC are not much larger than the width of the galaxy and ships track that all the time.

I wonder how it is ships track each other across parsecs?