Zelazny, Roger - Novel 05 (22 page)

 
          
 
"I shall exist only for so long as I am
needed to promote tranquillity, then I, too, shall pass."

 
          
 
"Who is to decide when this time has
arrived?"

 
          
 
"I am."

 
          
 
She laughed.

 
          
 
"Can we count on it?" she said.

 
          
 
"I see no reason not to. I have done it
many times before."

 
          
 
She shook her head, turned to stare at me. She
tried to halt, but I still had hold of her arm and I continued to propel her
toward the pole.

 
          
 
"I get the feeling we are talking two
different languages or something," she said. "One moment you sound
rational, and the next you go off on a tangent. Are you one entity, or is your
name Legion?"

 
          
 
I tightened my will like a vise, and "Get
thee behind me, Jordan," I said within myself.

 
          
 
All right, I'm going, and he was gone.

 
          
 
"I am myself," I said.

 
          
 
"Should I call you Engel?"

 
          
 
"Why not? It is as good as anything. Tell
me why Black wants to get people out of the House."

 
          
 
"He felt it was lobotomizing the race,
turning people into vegetables—and that if they finally did make it outside,
they would be in no condition to survive."

 
          
 
"Our disagreement then is too basic for
argument, since it centers on a matter of interpretation. What has he told you
about me?"

 
          
 
"He told me there is a multibodied enemy
of the people who feels as you say you feel about things."

 
          
 
"Did he tell you how he came to be aware
of this state of affairs?"

 
          
 
"No.”

 
          
 
"What did he tell you concerning his
own—background?"

 
          
 
"Nothing at all."

 
          
 
"You are lying."

 
          
 
She shrugged.

 
          
 
"What are you going to do about it?"

 
          
 
"Nothing, just now."

 
          
 
We entered the jackpole. People kept hurrying
past us, all of them heading downward.

 
          
 
"What if I were to scream?" she said.
"What if I were to refuse to accompany you any farther?"

 
          
 
"You will not. You will come without
causing any difficulties."

 
          
 
"What makes you think so?"

 
          
 
"I have totally engaged your curiosity,
and yours is one of the most active minds in the House."

 
          
 
"What do you know about my mind?"

 
          
 
"I know just about everything there is to
know about you."

 
          
 
"Now you are lying."

 
          
 
This time I shrugged, and smiled. We made our
way around and upward, upward and around.

 
          
 
"... You would have tranked me," she
said after a time, "and acted as if I had been taken ill."

 
          
 
"Perhaps."

 
          
 
Moments later, I collapsed against the wall,
an involuntary cry escaping my lips. She caught my left arm as it flailed the
air, and helped to support me as I was taken by spasm after spasm, the world
advancing, receding, coming apart, being reassembled about me and within me.

 
          
 
"What is it?" she said.

 
          
 
But I could only gasp, "Wait. Wait. .
."

 
          
 
Finally, things fell together, the center
held. I regained my balance, sucked a couple of deep draughts of stale air and
began to move once again. Glenda kept hold of my arm and repeated her question
several times.

 
          
 
"Good old Mr. Black just murdered two
more people," I said, hurrying. "He thinks he has the upper hand now,
and if it is any consolation to you, he may be right."

 
          
 
She did not respond, but hurried along with
me. A few people rushed past us, heading downward. They ignored us completely.
I wondered what had become of the little boy who liked to run in the wrong
direction. In my mind's eye, I saw him standing before an enormous hole in the
wall, turning to stick out his tongue, then racing on through and out across a
starlit field.

 
          
 
When we reached the level of the Chapel things
were brighter than they had been, though still not much better than twilight.
The soft glow of candlelight came from several new directions. The belts
remained dead. I aimed us in the direction from which I had come, wondering if
the apostate preacher had passed out yet.

 
          
 
It was Gene and Jenkins who had died, Winkel
who had yielded to Black's personality assault A moment's work with the
handiest weapon and he held Wing Null. What now?

 
          
 
Me, of course.

 
          
 
I was the last one left Once I was out of the
way, he could get on with his plans, whatever they might be. I regretted that,
if he won, I would probably never understand the exact nature of our
relationship, would never know what it was that he had had in mind all along.
Finding out would almost be worth the ultimate risk. ... I shelved that thought
for the time being, however.

 
          
 
I wanted to run. I wanted to reach the black
door as soon as possible, plunge through it and get things settled, finally.
But I was hurting enough as it was and I knew that my reactions had been
slowed. There was no sense in arriving all out of breath, too.

 
          
 
I also wanted to say things to Glenda. I
wanted to say, "All right, what was it you wanted to tell me when you
invited me to your place as I lay dying?" I wanted to tell her that I knew
her story about having lost a pack of jobs was a lie, that I knew she held a
professorship in engineering. I wanted to ask her why, since she had set me up
for an ambush, she had pushed me out of the line of fire at the last moment. I
wanted to ask her why she was being so cooperative in accompanying me now. And
I was curious whether she was carrying a weapon.

 
          
 
But of course I said none of these things.

 
          
 
We hurried along, passing a few people,
ignoring them and being ignored. All of them seemed headed for one or another
of the services. In due course, we neared the area of my arrival. There was,
unfortunately, a service in progress too near for me to utilize the facility I
desired. It took me close to ten minutes to locate another one in a deserted
area. I sprang the door and swung it open, climbed up, turned, held out my hand
and helped Glenda inside. She did not balk or question this, but followed me
down the incline, her hand on my shoulder.

 
          
 
At the rear, I opened the box and fiddled with
it, knowing she was watching everything that I did. Well, I could fiddle with
her memories, too, later, if there was a later.

 
          
 
The door closed above and behind us. I snapped
the box shut and I took up a position in front of Glenda, a primed grenade in
my left hand, the pistol in my right. If the defense system was set on
automatic, it would not fire when it scanned me, though. If he had it on
manual, I was hoping that Glenda's presence would make him hesitate to push
buttons. If he did not, we still had my body armor between us and a host of deadlies.
Maybe I could knock them out in time.

 
          
 
"I take it this is not a standard
procedure," I heard Glenda say.

 
          
 
"Shift your weight backward. Well be
landing on a level surface," I said.

 
          
 
By the time I finished saying it, we already
had.

 
          
 
I lurched slightly forward despite my stance,
I heard the klaxon begin its warning and I hurled my grenade at the weapons
bank.

 
          
 
I pushed Glenda against the far wall and
shielded her from the explosion that followed Before the echoes had died, I
turned and dashed through the opening portal.

 
          
 
There was no one in sight. The klaxon kept
wailing. I raced ahead.

 
          
 
Rounding the curved corridor's first big blind
spot, I saw that the door to the Comp vault was still open. I swung around the
massive metal frame and entered low, weapon extended.

 
          
 
But there was no need for such an entry. Only
Gene and Jenkins were present, and I already knew that they were both dead. The
manner of their passing was not especially important to me, though I noticed
that Gene had been shot in the left temple and Jenkins had blood on his chest
and abdomen. Faint memories of the attack came into my mind as I looked upon
the scene. It is strange how a terminal mesh works. Had things been the other
way around, they would know my final moments with a terrible clarity. It always
seems to pass with more clarity from older members of the family to the
younger, painfully enforcing a kind of seniority system in the descent of the
nexus. Why this should be so, I do not know. Not that it really matters, I
guess.

 
          
 
I crossed the room and killed the klaxon.
Glenda entered as I was turning away from it, then halted and turned pale. I
went to her, turned her about and pushed her back outside.

 
          
 
"This way," I said, and I led her on
up the corridor.

 
          
 
The door to the Files vault was open also. I
halted when I saw this and proceeded toward it on my own. I edged close, went
in quickly.

 
          
 
It was empty. But before I could relax, sigh,
straighten, my eyes automatically moved to the most important part of the room,
and there they remained.

 
          
 
Pins five, four, three and two had been
pulled. The chair had been swiveled to the right. The helmet hung at a lopsided
angle above it.

 
          
 
It was the ache in my shoulders that made me
realize how tense my muscles had become. I took a deep breath, mopped my brow,
turned.

 
          
 
For a little while, I refused to accept it.
Whoever-— whatever—he was inside, Black had added to it four of my own demons,
three of whom I did not know. As one of the clones, there was no reason why he
could not. But the thought that he might had not occurred to me, until then.
Unprepared as I was, it came to me as a greater shock than anything that had
happened recently, including my deaths and the disruption at Wing 5.

 
          
 
I leaned against the doorframe, keeping an eye
on the corridor. Automatically, I found a cigarette and lit it. I had to think
clearly and act very quickly now.

 
          
 
Locate him. That came first.

 
          
 
All right. He could be anywhere. He could
still be around, or he could have returned to the House. The first thing, then,
was to check with the Bandit, to see whether he had done anything recordable
yet as Winkel. A negative there, and the second thing would be to commence
searching Wing Null for him.

 
          
 
Dimly aware of Glenda's troubled presence, I
returned to Comp. I did not note her reactions to the bodies this time, but she
remained at my side.

 
          
 
But I did not query the Bandit. When I crossed
over to it, my gaze was drawn downward to a red light that winked within the
map of Wing Null that was laid beneath the clear surface of the countertop. It
indicated that a hatch had been opened. If this was not a trick meant to
distract me, then it meant that my quarry could have gone outside, onto the
surface of the planet itself. The chronometer showed me that the hatch had only
been opened about four minutes earlier.

 
          
 
"Damn him! What does he want?" I
said, my mind racing.

 
          
 
Then I made my decision and seized Glenda by
the hand.

 
          
 
"Come on! We are going back next door
again. I have to show you something. It is urgent."

 
          
 
I took her back to the central console in
Files. Fetching out my stiletto, I used it to chip away the blob of solder at
the base of pin one. Then I turned to Glenda and realized that I was still
holding her hand. Her eyes moved from the machinery to the blade to my face. I
put the weapon away and lowered her hand, released it.

 
          
 
"I want to ask a favor," I said.
"It is extremely important and I do not have time to explain what it
represents."

 
          
 
"Go ahead and ask," she said.

 
          
 
"I am about to leave this place and go
outside. I have no idea how long I will be out there, though I only intend it
to be a brief while. When I return I might be confused, incoherent, injured.
That would be the point at which I would need your assistance." I slapped
the chair. "Should this occur, I want you to get me into this chair, even
if you have to trank me to do it." "With what?" she said.

 
          
 
"I'll give you a trank gun in a minute.
If I seem in any way disturbed or—altered—get me into the chair and lower this
hood over my head." I pushed it with my hand. "Then throw these
switches—the entire row beginning at the left and taking them in order to the
end. Everything else is properly set. Then all you have to do is wait until
this blue light comes on. When that happens, pull this pin all the way out of
the board. That's all." "Then what happens?"

 
          
 
"I do not know—specifically, that is. But
it is the only treatment I can think of for what might occur. I have to go now.
Will you do it if it seems necessary—if I am dazed, bewildered?"

 
          
 
"Yes. If you will promise to answer my
questions afterward."

 
          
 
"Fair enough. Please repeat the procedure
back to me." She did, and I hurried her outside once more. "I will
take you to a comfortable place near to the hatch," I said, "where
you can wait, and view the surface outside. You will be able to see me depart
and return." I wondered about that light, though, and decided to show her
how to opaque the window if it became necessary.

 
          
 
"... One other thing," I added.
"I may not be me when I come back."

 
          
 
She halted.

 
          
 
"I beg your pardon," she said.

 
          
 
"My appearance could be different. Well,
I could be another person."

 
          
 
"What you are saying then is that I force
the next person I see under that machine, whether he likes the idea or
not."

 
          
 
"Only if he seems confused, disturbed ..
."

 
          
 
"I'd think anybody would be if you tried
to force him under that thing."

 
          
 
"It won't be just anybody. It will be me,
in one form or another."

 
          
 
"All right. It will be done. But there is
one other thing."

 
          
 
"What?"

 
          
 
"What if nobody comes back?"

 
          
 
"Then it is all over," I said.
"Go home and forget all about this."

 
          
 
"How? I have no idea where we are, let
alone how to get back."

 
          
 
"In the room of the dead men," I
said, "low, and to the left of center on the far wall, there is a small
green panel which controls the transport system. It is fairly simple. You would
be able to figure it out if you had to."

 
          
 
I steered her into the lounge then, and she
drew back against me, uttering a small cry. The window had been transpared. The
moon was out of sight now, but a pale light suffused the landscape, indicating
that the second moon—slower, larger, brighter—was already up, but blocked from
our view for the moment.

 
          
 
"That is not just a picture. That is a
real window, isn't it?" she said.

 
          
 
"Yes," I said, pushing her gently
forward, passing around and fetching her a trank gun. "Do you know how to
use one of these?"

 
          
 
She was advancing toward the window. She
glanced at the gun, murmured, "Yes," and kept going, as if
mesmerized. I crossed over, picked up her hand, placed it on her palm and
closed her fingers over it.

 
          
 
"I have never seen the outside
before—really," she said.

 
          
 
"Well, look all you want. I have to go
now. There is a simple on-off switch to the left there, under the frame. That's
right. That will opaque it for you, if you want."

 
          
 
"Why would I want to? It is
beautiful."

 
          
 
"There is an optical phenomenon—a
blinding light— which comes and goes. You will want to opaque it if it
comes."

 
          
 
"Well, until that happens, I am just
going to look. I—"

 
          
 
"Then goodbye for now. See you again
soon."

 
          
 
"Wait!"

 
          
 
"I've waited too long already."

 
          
 
"But I saw something move out there. It
could have been a man."

 
          
 
"Where?"

 
          
 
She pointed in the direction of the ruins.

 
          
 
"Over that way."

 
          
 
I did not see anything moving and she said,
"Gone now," and I said, "Thanks," and left her standing
there, looking out, wondering whether she was conscious of my departure.

 
          
 
I made my way on up the corridor to the recess
that held the hatch. It was actually a series of three doors, offering various
degrees of resistance and forms of protection. All three were undogged, and I
passed through quickly, pausing only to check out the pistol.

 
          
 
It was cool, and the smells of the night came
into my nostrils—damp, and tinged with the faint halations of growing things.
In a moment, the feeling of novelty faded. I had been outside a few times
before—long ago—and the impressions were not unfamiliar.

 
          
 
I quickly adjusted to movement across the
irregular surface and struck off in the direction of the ruin. The silence was
occasionally interrupted by little chirping noises, whether by bird or insect I
could not tell. I passed through small pockets of fog whenever the ground
dipped appreciably. The stones were moist and slippery. In clear spaces I had a
shadow, so strong had the moonlight become. Turning, I could see the huge,
white orb in its entirety, fat above my fortress now. A few wisps of cloud fled
before it, but the sky was otherwise clear and blazing with countless stars. I
was taken then by a series of peculiar feelings that began, I suppose, with
something of doubt and apprehension.