Half-Breeds on Venus

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**Half-Breeds on Venus**
Author	Isaac Asimov
Country	USA
Language	English
Series	Tweenie
Genre(s)	science fiction short story
Released in	Astonishing Stories
Publisher	Popular Publications
Media Type	Magazine
Released	December 1940
Preceded by	Half-Breed

Half-Breeds on Venus is a science fiction short story by Isaac Asimov. Asimov was asked by Frederik Pohl, editor of Astonishing Stories, to write a sequel to his earlier Tweenie story "Half-Breed", and he spent April and May 1940 doing so. He submitted the sequel to Pohl on June 3, and Pohl accepted it on the 14th, running it in the December 1940 issue of Astonishing. Asimov subsequently included the story in his 1972 collection The Early Asimov.

"Half-Breeds on Venus" was the twentieth story written by Asimov, the tenth to be published, the first sequel to an earlier story, and the first to "make the cover", i.e. to be the source of the magazine's cover illustration. At ten thousand words, it was also the longest story Asimov had had published up to that time. In commentary in The Early Asimov, Asimov says that the character of Irene was named after a fellow chemistry student at Columbia University that he had developed a crush on.

[edit] Plot summary

Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

"Half-Breeds on Venus" begins shortly after the final events in "Half-Breed". The three Tweenie ships have landed on Venus, and over a thousand Tweenies, led by Max Scanlon, emerge onto an upland plateau. As Max is getting on in years, he gives his elder son Arthur the task of preparing the underground settlement where the Tweenies will live, keeping out of sight of the planet's human settlers.

Meanwhile, Arthur's younger brother Henry is exploring Venus and flirting with his girlfriend Irene. The two of them come across a lake hidden within a forest, and see a large amphibian creature rise up from it. The amphibians prove to be friendly, much to Max's puzzlement, since the earlier reports from human explorers indicate that the amphibians are very shy. Max notices that their brain-cases are large, and speculates that they might be intelligent. The Tweenies soon realize that the amphibians (or Phibs, as Henry names them) are touch-telepaths, and they learn to communicate with them.

Several months later, the Tweenies are busy setting up their new underground town below a nearby ridge when a group of human settlers crosses over from the far side of the mountains. The Tweenies hide within their town while the humans establish a farming community a few miles away.

One day, Irene and Henry sneak out of the Tweenie town to visit the Phibs. Henry is able to communicate their problem with the humans, and the Phibs suggest a solution. Accompanied by a group of Phibs, Henry and Irene travel for three days to the Venusian lowlands. There, the Phibs use their telepathic abilities to take control of three big, dangerous twenty-legged reptilian carnivores called Centosaurs.

Henry and Irene battle a Centosaur, from the Astonishing Stories cover by Bob Sherry.

The two young Tweenies and their escorts return to the plateau at night just as a storm breaks. The human settlers are startled out of their sleep by the screaming Centosaurs, and at the sight of them they all run. After the humans leave, the reptiles go on to destroy the deserted human settlement. Then the Centosaurs break free of the Phibs' control and try to attack them, but Henry and Irene are able to fend them off with their Tonite ray guns until more Tweenies arrive to finish them off. Irene then falls into a swollen river and Henry jumps in after her. The two are rescued by the Phibs.

When Henry recovers, his father congratulates him on his plan. With so many other places to settle on Venus, the humans are unlikely to return soon to a place they think is infested with Centosaurs. When they do finally return, the Tweenies will be ready for them. The story ends with Henry proposing to Irene.

[edit] Story background

The picture Asimov draws of Venus is one that was common to science fiction stories at the time: that of a hot, primitive world filled with tropical vegetation and large dinosaur-like animals, though Asimov's Venus also includes highlands with a temperate-zone ecology. Asimov's Venus seems to have a period of rotation similar to Earth's, since no mention is made of the days on Venus being either remarkably longer or shorter than those on Earth.

Arthur Scanlon mentions Irene's guardian, making explicit the fact that the Venusian Tweenies includes first-generation Tweenies who are the abandoned offspring of humans and Martians, as well as second-generation Tweenies such as Arthur himself and Henry who are the offspring of Tweenie parents. This implies that humans continue cohabiting with Martians, and that their offspring continue to be rejected by both races. "Half-Breeds on Venus" does not address the fact that these new Tweenies will no longer have a functioning society to join, since Tweenietown, Ohio is now deserted. Jefferson Scanlon, back on Earth, will presumably continue to adopt new Tweenie children, but since he does not know where on Venus the Tweenies have settled, he has no way of sending them on to join the Venusian Tweenies.

Asimov never indicates whether some Tweenies remain on Mars, or whether they are all brought to Earth. The latter seems more likely, since there would be no reason to go to the expense and effort of transporting abandoned Tweenie children to Earth if the native Martians permitted them to remain on Mars. (It is logical to assume that most, if not all, Tweenies are born on Mars, since few Martians would willingly choose to settle on Earth, with its three-times-Martian gravity.)

[edit] Themes

The theme of prejudice is not as prominent in "Half-Breeds on Venus" as it is in the original story, since the Venusian Tweenies go to some pains to avoid interacting with humans. Instead, the dominant theme of the story is the Tweenies' fear of discovery, and their desire to remain isolated from humanity. This is the reverse of the situation in the original story, in which the Tweenies were deliberately shunned by humans, but would have willingly assimilated into human society if they had been allowed to. The Tweenies, after all, having all been raised on Earth, are culturally human. They speak a human language, live in human family groups, and created a human-style community in Tweenietown, Ohio.

In the sequel, the Tweenies have, of necessity, chosen to separate themselves completely from human society, a further step from the segregation they accepted by gathering together in Tweenietown in the original story. They have, in fact, chosen to remove themselves from humanity's notice by maintaining a secret community on Venus.

However, the Tweenies understand that their ultimate goal must be coexistence rather than isolation. Their separation from humanity is only temporary, and they will resume contact with the humans at some time in the future, when they have become powerful enough to defend themselves from human hostility.

The Early Asimov