FSF Magazine, February 2007 Read online

  "Just a coincidence?” Wasselthorpe suggested.

  Of course it was a coincidence, Bandar said, and that worried him even more. In the waking world a coincidence was just a random juxtaposition of events, devoid of meaning. But in the Commons, coincidence was the most meaningful circumstance of all, the immensely potent force that tied one thing to another. “Indeed,” he said, “it is coincidence that connects everything to everything else."

  Wasselthorpe's reaction troubled him further. The young man ought to be afraid, yet he was not. He pointed the sword once more. “I must go there,” he said. “Does it mean I will die?"

  Bandar did not think so. The choice of that particular Event was less worrisome than many another he might have chosen. But he warned again that Wasselthorpe must let him be their guide.

  "I will."

  The nonaut took a firm grip on the young man's sword arm. He taught Wasselthorpe a thran and when the rendition was perfect, Bandar cautioned him to continue the chant. It would keep the Location's idiomats from detecting their presence and reacting to them as if they were part of the Event.

  "How bad would that be?"

  "The Dree were appalling,” Bandar said, “and the war to resist them was particularly horrid.” The invaders had been a hive species, each hive telepathically and pheromonically connected among all its members into one entity. They used their concentrated mental powers to enslave other species and force them to work and fight for the hive—especially the latter, because ritual combat was the basis of what passed for culture among the Dree. Status among the competing hives was everything, and status was gained and held by a hive's success on the battlefield.

  Dree fighting style was mainly devoted to capturing prisoners that could be carried back to the captor's hive and tortured. The telepathic Dree relished the anguish, fear, and despair of their victims, just as humans savored the flavors and textures of foods and essences. Fortunately, this strategic imperative meant that all their battle tactics centered on surrounding small groups of enemies for capture. Faced with a well-organized army determined to massacre them, the Dree were heavily outclassed.

  After the initial surprise of the invasion, the Dree were soon rolled up and confined to the territory now known as the Swept. No one wanted to dig them out of their warren of tunnels, so the gravitational aggregator was brought down from space to crush and bury the invaders, along with their unfortunate mind-slaves, beneath the flattened landscape.

  Wasselthorpe appeared to be affected by the tale. “Are you sure you want to go on with this?” Bandar asked.

  "I am somehow called to go this way,” the young man said. “I must see what there is to see."

  Bandar was still weighing his curiosity against his apprehension, though it could do no harm to visit the Event. But he reminded Wasselthorpe not to break off the chant. If either needed to speak, he would use hand signals to warn the other to increase the volume of the thran to keep them both covered.

  He led them to the node, opened the gate, and led them through. They stepped into open land beneath a sky splashed with stars. A wind whispered through tall trees and a stream chuckled not far away. Bandar took quick stock of the scene: they were near the base of a long slope leading out onto flat land where armored war vehicles and assault infantry were converging on the range of hills behind them where the Dree had consolidated their forces. He could hear the clicking and creaking of Dree warriors.

  The sound must have piqued Wasselthorpe's interest because he abruptly ceased chanting. At once, a concentrated beam of energy lit up the area with green light and the ground at their feet bubbled and smoked. Bandar raised his voice and yanked at the young man's arm, bringing him back to an appreciation of where they were.

  They waited briefly until the armored assault had passed them by, then moved downslope and across the stream into a pasture. The hemming was almost complete, and Bandar saw the massive aggregator above the horizon, blotting out the stars.

  Bandar motioned Wasselthorpe to increase his volume again and asked: did he feel any impulse to go this way or that? The fellow looked about him and his attention was caught by something a little way off and he moved toward it. Bandar followed and found a shallow trench that contained the melted remains of some heavy weapon and four carbonized Dree.

  Wasselthorpe stepped down into the declivity and pried the corpses apart with his sword, revealing the intact upper half of one of the invaders. The young man stared at the dead thing until Bandar gestured for him to increase his volume again so the nonaut could speak.

  "No eyes,” he said, looking down at the rounded oblong of brown chitin that was something like a head. It had feathery antennae that, in life, stood upright to detect odor with fine precision. Nerve-rich regions on the torso and head detected vibration and rendered it as sound. At close range it could also detect bioelectrical fields.

  Wasselthorpe regarded the dead Dree without reaction. Bandar questioned him and learned that the young man felt no more urges. Apparently they had done whatever Wasselthorpe's motivating entity wanted done. The nonaut examined the other man closely and was interested to see the trappings of the Hero fade, leaving the young man clad in unremarkable attire.

  He considered summoning an emergency exit again, but departing from the Commons by that route twice in one day could cause disorientation even to the experienced traveler. Instead, he brought out his map and navigated a path through a series of innocuous Locations where they would not even need to hide behind thrans. A short while later, he was able to ease Wasselthorpe through a conduit that would lead him back into normal sleep.

  But Bandar did not then wake himself. Nor did he return to the mission Wasselthorpe's arrival had interrupted. There was no point going to the bridge to study the usual suspects. He had had a good close-up look at the pure archetype that was governing the strange young man. The nonaut wanted to think about what he had seen and so he made his way to a quiet Landscape that consisted of little more than a tiny patch of sand-colored rock, set in an endless ocean and shaded by a single Sincere/Approximate palm tree. No idiomat ever came there, and Bandar had often wondered what role the simple setting could have played in human history.

  But he did not pursue that idle chain of thought now. He wanted to reflect on the unprecedented sequence of events that had occurred since he had introduced Phlevas Wasselthorpe to the Commons. First, the young man had demonstrated an unheard-of ability to enter the nosphere. Bandar had studied naturals who could slip easily into the nosphere, but they did so at the sacrifice of their own identities. They became the archetypes that summoned them, disappearing into them so utterly that they no longer had any individual consciousness: there was only an archetype psychotically stalking the waking world, usually dealing out misery and horror until the authorities intervened.

  But Wasselthorpe had gone in and come out unaffected, as if he merely stepped from one room to another. More shocking still, he had been able to enter Guth Bandar's dream and physically dominate the nonaut's virtual flesh. Most disturbing of all, the young man's consciousness had clearly made a connection with the Hero, yet he had not been absorbed by it. Wasselthorpe's accomplishments represented two highly unlikely results and one that was simply impossible. There had never been, to Bandar's expert knowledge, anyone remotely like him.

  Another worrisome thought occurred as Bandar sat beneath the palm tree. The Hero never went anywhere without the Helper. Bandar had played that role, indeed had slipped into it so readily that it was as if he had himself been suborned by that characteristic entity. Yet here was Bandar, thinking rational thoughts, when he should have been drowned in the soup of psychosis.

  A half-fashioned memory nudged at the edge of his awareness. He reached for it with a nonaut's casual skill but was disturbed to feel it somehow slip away. He sought for it in earnest, focusing a great deal of his trained power, yet still it eluded him. Another attempted grasp, and then it was gone.

  The experience left Bandar trouble
d. It was bad enough that something impossible was going on inside Phlevas Wasselthorpe. But for a lifelong adept of the nosphere to find that elements of his own psyche could deftly avoid his grip brought the strangeness far too close to the essential core of Guth Bandar. Something was going on within him that he was unable to bring to the surface of his mind. To a nonaut, such a state of affairs must be deeply troubling.

  He awakened himself and made his way to the cabin Wasselthorpe shared with Erenti Abbas. He knocked and was admitted by the young man. Bandar inspected him and was satisfied he had sustained no harm from his experiences of the night.

  Wasselthorpe apologized for having overborne Bandar's objections to the mission he had felt compelled to fulfill and for forcing Bandar to guide him.

  Bandar waved away the sentiment. The events were over and he had no intention of repeating them.

  Now Wasselthorpe was wondering if he might someday take up the exploration of the nosphere. He even asked if he might study under Bandar.

  The nonaut felt the skin of his face cool and knew he must have gone pale. He informed Wasselthorpe that it would be kinder if he simply killed Bandar on the spot. “Be assured, I will never again go willingly with you into the Commons."

  Indeed, he meant to ask the Orgulon's captain for the use of his gig to take him away forthwith so that he could never be pressed into the Hero's service again.

  "But what of your research?” Wasselthorpe asked.

  Bandar told him that he could take scant pleasure in it while constantly at risk of being dragooned to his death.

  The danger seemed remote to Wasselthorpe.

  "To me,” said Bandar, “it is inescapable. I am in grave peril if I remain within range of you, and since I do not know what that range is, I shall set the greatest possible distance between us."

  He ended with a mollifying gesture and assured Wasselthorpe that he meant no offense.

  The young man said none had been taken. The matter mystified him.

  Bandar looked up into the young fellow's mildly troubled face and again felt an urge to be of assistance to him. He fought it down and went in search of the captain. That interview was not a success: the captain called in the security officer, whose name Bandar now learned was Raina Haj, and she refused to let anyone leave the ship until the questions regarding the death of the passenger were cleared up.

  "It was no accident,” she said.

  "But how can I be a suspect?” he protested. “I had just emerged from a trance and was under your direct view when it happened."

  "Perhaps you were there to distract me,” Haj said.

  * * * *

  Breakfast had been served and eaten by the time Bandar entered the dining salon. Apparently, Father Olwyn had also come and gone again, leaving the lassitude sufferers and their companions with a new mantra—bom, ala, bom—that would further elevate their chuffe. Brond Halorn, her hair still asparkle with blue-fire gems, was leading the most fervent group of chanters. When she saw Bandar enter and make his way to the remains of the buffet, she threw a challenging stare his way.

  Bandar declined to return her gaze and looked for an empty seat away from her devoted chorus. The only available spaces were within too close a range to Abbas and Wasselthorpe; it would be rude to sit near them without speaking to them. He filled a plate with items from the chafing dishes—all, it turned out, featured variant renderings of the truffles of the Swept—and took it along with a steaming pot of punge back to his cabin.

  He slept for a while, allowing himself an ordinary dream cycle, and awoke feeling refreshed and more cheerful. He went on deck where he found the security officer. Again he offered reasoned arguments; again they were rebuffed.

  "It is not some mere whim that prompts me to seek to depart,” he said. “My psyche is in danger as long as I am in proximity to that young man.” He unobtrusively indicated Abbas and Wasselthorpe, who were standing by the rail.

  An even deeper suspicion crept into Haj's already dubious expression. “What exactly is your relationship to those two?” she said.

  "I have no relationship. I encountered them on the balloon-tram on the way here."

  "Do you often encounter strangers who threaten your sanity?"

  "No, but there is something odd about Wasselthorpe. He is able to do things he should not be capable of."

  The security officer tilted her head to regard Bandar. “Both you and they stand out from the rest of the passengers,” she said. “You arrived claiming a lassitude-affected brother. His illness comes and goes."

  "I am in danger. Last night Wasselthorpe invaded my dream."

  Haj's skepticism visibly intensified. “Uh huh,” she said.

  Bandar concluded there was no point in further argument. He went below and sat in his cabin until boredom made him take up his measurement equipment and go back on deck. If he could not escape, he might as well do something useful.

  He was taking readings from various points of the compass when Wasselthorpe approached him.

  "I have been thinking about what happened last night,” the young man said.

  "I do not wish to be impolite,” said Bandar, squinting at a read-out, “but I must refuse to discuss the matter with you. I would not still be here but Raina Haj will not let me depart."

  "I am sorry you are troubled,” the other said. “For myself, I feel as if a door has opened on a world whose existence I'd never heard of. Yet I grow increasingly sure that there is something for me there."

  "A destiny, perhaps?” said Bandar.

  Wasselthorpe's normally serious expression broke under a sudden surge of excitement. “Yes, exactly! A destiny!"

  "You cannot imagine how frightening that is,” said Bandar. “I do not know what you are or how you can do what you do. But such abilities, yoked to a sense of destiny, then coupled to the power to draw me, of all people, helplessly into your wake, are enough to give me the abdabs."

  "I sense no harm in my fascination."

  Bandar sighed. “Of course you don't. But the Commons is full of surprises, many of them hideously final.” He begged the young man to let him be and told him that he resolved to sleep at odd times so that his dreams might be unviolated, and asked Wasselthorpe not to meddle with any other dreamers he might encounter in his sleep.

  The day wore on. Bandar would again have taken dinner in his cabin, but when he summoned a steward the fellow told him that Raina Haj had decreed that all passengers must dine together. Apparently the security officer had installed surveillance systems in the salon that could read and assess subliminal reactions among the passengers. She hoped some investigatory leads would develop from throwing them all together.

  Bandar decided he would demonstrate that he had no ties to Abbas and Wasselthorpe by dining at their table and making no attempt to hide his face. Two seats had been left empty—the dead man's and his companion's, who was confined to her quarters under guard. The ship's first officer, who had sat there the previous night, was also missing, so that Bandar, Wasselthorpe and Abbas were joined only by a retired couple from the Isle of Cyc, who were introduced as Ule Gazz and her spouse, Olleg Ebersol. He was paralyzed by the lassitude, while her face showed enough animation for both of them. They were enthusiasts of the Lho-tso school of practical enlightenment and she spoke glowingly of mantras and rising chuffe and the cure she expected. Ebersol's opinions on these matters were impossible to determine but Bandar saw genuine suffering in the man's eyes.

  The cuisine was again entirely built around truffles—Bandar wondered if the cruise might be some ploy to market the fungus, though how the lassitude and truffles might commercially intersect was beyond him. After the meal, Father Olwyn again appeared in simulacrum and offered a sermon that Bandar found all too vague, along with an exhortation for all to chant bom, bom ala bom.

  The chant rose throughout the room as Olwyn disappeared. Bandar dismissed the sermon as, “A pile of piety and platitudes,” at which Ule Gazz took offense. The couple went to the other s
ide of the salon, where Brond Halorn was vigorously conducting more than half the passengers in a mass chant. The slap of dozens of hands on tables and feet on floorboards shook the room.

  Phlevas Wasselthorpe once more tried to draw Bandar into a discussion of their mutual experience in the Commons. Bandar again had to fight down an initial urge to help the young man, but he transformed the impulse into a brief lecture: “For your own good, don't go there. And if you find yourself wandering the Commons, please do not seek my company."

  He extracted a promise that Wasselthorpe would not sleep until later in the evening, then retired to his cabin to snatch as much rest as he could before their dreams might again overlap. He dreamt lucidly and the moment his nonaut's senses detected the presence of Wasselthorpe in the Commons, he promptly woke himself and spent the rest of the night in meditation.

  * * * *

  With the tired old sun barely creeping above the horizon, the passengers were summoned to breakfast. Bandar had had enough of the truffles of the Swept—the flavor, though rich, soon cloyed. He took plain cakes and punge and carried them again to the table where Abbas and Wasselthorpe sat, tendered the basic formalities, then ate without offering conversation.

  As he was finishing his second mug of punge Bandar noted that the landship was slowing. The other two men did likewise and turned in their seats to peer out of one of the great round windows. Something attracted their attention and Bandar rose to look over their shoulders. For the first time since he had boarded the Orgulon he experienced a thrill of pleasure.

  "Those are Rover carts,” he said.

  The landship came to a halt near a place where a wide circle of the long grass had been trampled flat. Gangplanks extended themselves and the passengers debarked, the lassitude sufferers in whom the disease was most advanced being transported on come-alongs, small platforms fitted with gravity obviators and normally used to tow heavy baggage.