The Chaos Weapon (6 page)

“So it is written,” said the old man, and he took hold of Wildheit’s arm. “Come, I’ve chambers close enough. There we can talk.”

Wildheit allowed himself to be led off the bridge and into the narrow, untidy streets beyond. The roads were sandy, bearing the occasional imprint of an iron-wheeled cart but
no evidence of mechanical transport. The buildings were largely massive masonry and rough-hewn timber, and the architecture appeared to depend on individual whim rather than on customary style. Thus the structures were simplistic and given to unexpected changes in form and outline. Under the small, wan lamps, the effect was somewhat feudal, yet giving the impression of great permanence.

“What did you read from the laying on of your hand?” asked the marshal conversationally as they walked.

“I learned you are expected, but not welcome,” said Pilon enigmatically. “It’s dangerous for you to be here.”

“You take great pains to guard your city gates. I find that difficult to understand, since none but the Sensitives occupy Mayo.”

“There are degrees of sensitivity. The rarer strains need protection from contamination, and the lesser need protection from the rarer. It’s a difficult matter.”

They entered a large, timbered house, and Pilon reached his hand to take Wildheit’s outer garments. The marshal shook his head.

“There’s no need. My suit automatically adjusts for temperature and contains many things I might possibly need.”

“As you wish!” The old man was scanning Wildheit’s face with a searching look. Coul quivered nervously on the marshal’s shoulder. The god was plainly apprehensive about their situation despite its overall calm. Even Wildheit began to experience a strong sense of foreboding.

The old man began again: “You’re a strange man, Marshal. You carry more death in your pockets than Mayo has seen in all her human history. My eyes won’t tell me, but I sense another being on your shoulder. You represent those with the bloodiest of pasts and an even bloodier future. Yet you are a man with a wisdom and humanity that makes birds sing
and stars shine. It must be very terrifying and painful to be you.”

“Let’s get down to business,” said Wildheit.

They had entered a small, book-lined room furnished only with a few plain chairs and a table. When they were seated, Pilon looked at Wildheit with questioning eyes, but his attention seemed to be divided to rest partially beyond the room’s thick walls. In the darkness beyond the mullioned windows slight noises were beginning to disturb the night.

“What’s your problem, Marshal?”

“Chaos. I assume you know what Chaos is?”

“Reflections of the slow death of the universe. It has many mysteries for us.”

“And for us. That’s what brings me here. The Galactic Federation appeals for your help. Somebody or something is tampering with the patterns of Chaos. They’ve forged it into a selective weapon. This weapon is being used against key individuals, most of whom are vital links in the future of man’s tenure in space.”

“You realize we don’t support the aims and ambitions of the Federation?”

“And I think you realize that were it not for the Federation forces on this edge of the galaxy, Mayo would long ago have fallen to the aliens. Like it or not, the Federation’s existence and your own are inseparable.”

“A good point, Marshal. Please proceed.”

“So far our only defense against the weapon is anticipation—immediate and on-the-spot interpretation of the patterns of Chaos. If we’re to find the weapon and neutralize it, this is vital.”

“And for that you have your computing engines.”

“Nothing smaller than a room or a shipful of electronics. Nothing as mobile as a man. But we’re given to understand the Sensitives have a Chaos Seer. We’d like to secure his cooperation in destroying the Chaos Weapon.”

Pilon placed his hands together and looked at his long, slim fingers for many minutes before replying.

“You’re a painful
and terrifying man, Marshal. The more so because you don’t know what it is you seek. What you ask is barely possible. If it were possible, it wouldn’t be wise. And even if it were wise, the results would not be those you think.”

“I asked for assistance, not for a book of riddles. It’s true that such a seer exists?”

“It’s true there is one. But I doubt the rest of the galaxy’s ready for the contact.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Marshal, why do you think the Sensitives isolate themselves from the rest of mankind?”

“It is said you breed selectively over many generations in order to develop special talents. You can’t tolerate the possibility of contamination by unexceptional bloodlines.”

“That’s only a half-truth. The rest is that, having bred pure strains, we dare not release them on mankind. Their talents are too extreme, too powerful, too liable to be subjected to abuse or perverted to an unforeseen end. You’re a man of wisdom, so you’ll see my point. Would
you
deliver such an extraordinary power into the hands of an idiot child?”

“Is that how you see us?” asked Wildheit.

“That’s how we see the Federation. A marvelous child, but congenitally immature. Its collective psychology is at an emotional level barely above an instinctive reaction. It procreates mindlessly and multiplies because it must, and then it spreads like a cancer through the stars.”

“Sophistry!”

“Is it? We’ve many seers, each with different specialties. Any of them might distort your ideas on what you think you want your society to become. We want no responsibility for what you might do with them—or they with you.”

“I think you overestimate the potential of your seers. In any case, you have given me forewarning. Thus the onus is on us, not on you. I repeat my request for a Chaos Seer.”

The dim noises
beyond the window were growing gradually more distinct. Suddenly he could hear a rhythmic rattle as of wooden sticks clicking together, then a subnote like a deep and resonant horn. Coul was crouched in anticipation, flickering vaguely, always returning to the same attentive pose. Even Wildheit could smell a strong and strange pervasive scent something like Terran violets.

“Something’s going on out there,” he said suddenly to Pilon. “What?”

“The Guardians have come. There are many factions among the Sensitives. Some would side with you; some strike you down. I said it was dangerous for you to be here. But the Guardians will maintain the peace until the Conclave decides what can be done for you—or with you. For a while you must be placed in isolation. I advise you not to resist.”

The safety rings on Wildheit’s weapons’ pouch stripped open at the barest touch of his fingers. Smashing the ancient light to the floor, he moved swiftly to the window and scanned the strange-sounding darkness. Initially he could see nothing, but then began to discern in the roadway the movement of white sticks gripped by unseen hands.

Clickety … Clickety … Clickety …

A vast horn, whose resonance dropped slowly beyond the lower threshold of human perception, bounced his senses with a throbbing pulse that seemed to snatch the power of volition from his mind.

Clickety … Clickety …

The white sticks were a hypnotic focus, filling an unknown void in his brain with an expanding pattern of criss-crossed sounds.

Clickety
…

… and with the deep perfume carrying strange messengers into his lungs and then into his bloodstream, Marshal Wildheit—weapons ready but untouched—spun silently at the window and fell unconscious to the floor.

WILDHEIT awoke in
a vault of white stone, pillared and arched in the manner of a cellar which has to support considerable weight from a building above. Outside it was day, and strong sunlight entering a line of holes each no larger than his fist, made bright pearls of reflection on the polished smoothness of the floor. His immediate concern was for his weapons, but they were gone together with his uniform suit. While he had been unconscious, hands must have stripped him. He was left now with but a simple garment of woven cloth which he endeavored to draw round himself in a manner reminiscent of a toga. Coul quivered uncertainly.

“A fine mess you let me get into,” Wildheit said to the god.

“You were in no danger,” Coul reproved mildly. “It’s no function of mine to preserve you from anything short of death. Who can choose between the strange things humans do to each other? You’re a race pathologically addicted to interfering with the bodies of others.”

“A new moral philosophy is all I need to complete my morning,” said Wildheit morosely.

Shortly he located a door—or rather, several doors. All were stout, smooth, and without obvious locks or other means of purchase. Following a futile attempt to open one with his fingers, he climbed up and managed to look out one of the holes through which the sunlight entered.

He found he was no longer looking at the city, but at what appeared to be a scattered fortress. A long, broad, castellated wall surmounted by a footpath followed the contours
of the landscape as far as he could see. Occasionally a frowning tower broke the continuing line of the wall, and in places a whole village or enclave seemed to be contained within a deviant loop and thus isolated from its surroundings. The notion of containment lent pointed support for Coul’s last critical comment. Coming so soon after Pilon’s jibe about the immaturity of the human race, Wildheit for the first time in his life had a momentary twinge of doubt about the validity of his actions.

Moodily, he continued to explore the cellar, but found nothing of any interest or value. Finally he sat on the floor amid the shafts of sunlight and waited for something to happen. He was not left there long. One of the doors opened and a man dressed in a black loose-fitting tunic came into the cellar. His approach was almost apologetic.

“Marshal Wildheit, I am Dabria, one of the senior Guardians of Mayo. Your apprehension was unfortunate but necessary. Had you consulted your star gazetteer, you’d have found that Mayo was a forbidden world. You should not have made planetfall.”

“I doubt the legality of refusing landing to a space-marshal. Most tyrants would welcome the option. In any case, my mission overrides ordinary considerations. The Federation needs the assistance of your Chaos Seer. How else could I negotiate?”

“We appreciate your needs and your problems. Even now the Conclave debates the issue. But your arrival was unfortunate. Internal tension among the Sensitives runs high. Your coming could be the catalyst which liberates a terrible reaction. You’re a danger to us all.”

“Then I’ll strike a bargain. Return my clothes and equipment, and bring me the Chaos Seer. We’ll be off-planet within the hour.”

“A one-sided bargain.” Dabria was unimpressed. “What do you offer in return?”

“A chance to resolve your internal affairs without my catalytic presence—and freedom from the necessity
of my having to call in units of the Federation Space Force to effect my rescue. That would surely throw your dissidents into a turmoil.”

“A potent threat, but one you’ve no chance of achieving.”

“Indeed? I wouldn’t advise you to put me to the test.”

The guardian moved back toward the door. “I’ve heard of your ability to communicate without equipment. It’s a chance I’ll not take. Perhaps the solution you suggest would be easiest for us both. There’ll be much opposition, but I’ll see what I can do.”

Even as he spoke, the man leaped, his hand moving in one lightning swing to chop at the side of Wildheit’s throat. He reached the garment in which the marshal had been clothed only to find it already empty and still falling through the air. The full force of a blow on the nape of his neck brought Dabria down to his knees, and a wild foot pitched him forward on his face. His momentum carried him across the polished stone to where a pillar intercepted his headlong flight. Dazed, he found his attempted recovery blocked by the pressure of the marshal’s instep threatening to crush his windpipe.

“That was a very stupid thing to try,” said Wildheit disgustedly. “Killing me wouldn’t have solved anything. Next time you’d have had six marshals and an armed cruiser to contend with. Now get out of here and go find me the seer.”

In the Children’s Place, Roamer was watching her grazing animals. All morning she had carefully moved them up the long slope under the guard wall, leaving the grass a close-cropped picture of serenity. Now she directed her charges downward, dividing them equally between the little paths in order to neaten all the banks before she returned the herd to pasture.

Hers was patient, tranquil work. The intelligent ruminants were appreciative of her calm and thoughtful direction, which assured them of full stomachs without
stress or competition. In return, the Children’s Place was cropped and neatened. It was all part of the pattern of interdependence between humans and animals which made life in this part of Mayo such a rewarding experience.

As they neared the completion of the task, Roamer looked back at their collective efforts and was pleased. This was not her place—she was a tenant of an Adolescent’s community—but everyone had to contribute to the welfare of the children. With fair weather, rich grass, and a calm herd, they had achieved today superb results—the milk would be rich and plentiful.

Then as they reached the bottom of the slope, there came an unexpected change in the pattern.

“Ho, Roamer!”

She looked up to see old Pilon on the guard wall, beckoning. She ran toward him, laughing.

“Have you come to play more games today? Did you know I can pick up entropy from right beyond the stars? I think soon I shall be able to reach all the way back to the Big Bang and the creation of the universe.” Then she stopped when she saw how grave was the look on his face.

“Come up here, Roamer. We have to talk.”

“I’m not allowed on the wall.”

“Today you are allowed. The watchmen won’t stop you. I’ve serious news for you.”

“It can’t be the end of the universe, else I’d have seen it coming.”

Hastily she directed the herd into the low pasture and ran to the nearest tower. Unexpectedly the watchmen let her through, and she climbed the dusty, twisting steps and emerged almost breathless on top of the the wall. This was the first time she had ever been on it, and the novelty of the view from the wall’s top gave her a delicious shiver of vertigo.