"Waterclap" is a

science fiction Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel unive ...

short story A short story is a piece of prose fiction that typically can be read in one sitting and focuses on a self-contained incident or series of linked incidents, with the intent of evoking a single effect or mood. The short story is one of the oldest ...

by American writer

Isaac Asimov yi, יצחק אזימאװ , birth_date = , birth_place = Petrovichi, Russian SFSR , spouse = , relatives = , children = 2 , death_date = , death_place = Manhattan, New York City, U.S. , nationality = Russian (1920–1922)Soviet (192 ...

. The story was written at the request of a movie company and was intended to serve as the basis of a film treatment. The author did not want to do the story, and only met with the studio representative as a favor to his publisher, which had already accepted an advance payment for it. When the representative outlined the plot and characters, Asimov knew he could not write such a story, but did not want to refuse at a dinner the film studio was paying for. The draft he wrote did not follow the requested approach. The story was rejected by the studio, and the advance returned at Asimov's request.Isaac Asimov. ''In Joy Still Felt: The Autobiography of Isaac Asimov, 1954-1978.'' New York: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1980, pages 504-505. A later draft was published in the April 1970 issue of '' If'' (May 1970 in the UK edition) and was reprinted in the 1976 collection ''

The Bicentennial Man and Other Stories ''The Bicentennial Man and Other Stories'' is a science fiction anthology written and edited by Isaac Asimov. Following the usual form for Asimov collections, it consists of eleven short stories and a poem surrounded by commentary describing how e ...

''.

Plot summary

Steven Demerest, a safety engineer at Luna City, a colony on the

Moon The Moon is Earth's only natural satellite. It is the fifth largest satellite in the Solar System and the largest and most massive relative to its parent planet, with a diameter about one-quarter that of Earth (comparable to the width of ...

, visits

Earth Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbor life. While large volumes of water can be found throughout the Solar System, only Earth sustains liquid surface water. About 71% of Earth's surfa ...

and takes a trip by

bathyscape A bathyscaphe ( or ) is a free-diving self-propelled deep-sea submersible, consisting of a crew cabin similar to a bathysphere, but suspended below a float rather than from a surface cable, as in the classic bathysphere design. The float is fi ...

to Ocean-Deep, an experimental colony at the base of the

Puerto Rico Trench The Puerto Rico Trench is located on the boundary between the Caribbean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean. The oceanic trench, the deepest in the Atlantic, is associated with a complex transition between the Lesser Antilles subduction zone to the sout ...

, where he meets its chief, John Bergen, and his wife Annette. Ostensibly on a visit to exchange views on safety issues, Demerest is in fact planning to destroy Ocean-Deep. He reasons that if the project is found to be unsafe and thereby abandoned, more funding will be directed by the Planetary Project Commission (PPC) to the lunar colonies and

space exploration Space exploration is the use of astronomy and space technology to explore outer space. While the exploration of space is carried out mainly by astronomers with telescopes, its physical exploration though is conducted both by robotic spacec ...

. When he finds that Annette is

pregnant Pregnancy is the time during which one or more offspring develops (gestation, gestates) inside a woman, woman's uterus (womb). A multiple birth, multiple pregnancy involves more than one offspring, such as with twins. Pregnancy usually occur ...

, he has his first pang of guilt. Nevertheless, he proceeds with his objective and overrides the safety systems that control the airlocks, whilst holding the Bergens hostage with a low-power

laser A laser is a device that emits light through a process of optical amplification based on the stimulated emission of electromagnetic radiation. The word "laser" is an acronym for "light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation". The fir ...

. The Bergens try to talk him out of his object, and feed him a not-entirely-untrue story that Ocean-Deep is in fact an experimental precursor to colonizing

Jupiter Jupiter is the fifth planet from the Sun and the List of Solar System objects by size, largest in the Solar System. It is a gas giant with a mass more than two and a half times that of all the other planets in the Solar System combined, but ...

and other planets. Demerest, realizing that his planned destruction will have the opposite effect to what he intends, surrenders.

References

* Short stories by Isaac Asimov 1970 short stories Works originally published in If (magazine) {{1970s-sf-story-stub