HARM (15 page)

His monologue had been violently interrupted.

At the back of the cave, a large, black, furry thing had suddenly roused itself from a form of catalepsy and was trying to make its way toward the cave mouth, blundering first into Fremant and then Essanits as it hurried to get out. The goats were plunged into a frenzy.

Chankey snatched up a brand from the fire and rushed up to attack the thing. The thing in its haste had struck the cliff wall opposite and tumbled momentarily to the ground. Chankey was upon it, his knife slashing.

“Spare the poor creature,” ordered Essanits. “It did us no harm.”

“I’ll do
it
harm! Scared the shittle outta me!”

The creature was dying under the blade, oozing a thick liquid which stank of something like butyric acid, the compound which makes human vomit smell disgusting.

Recovering from their startlement, the trekkers came out to gaze at the thing as it lay twitching.

Its body was segmented in six parts, each part sprouting two rather feeble-looking legs, now waving their last. Fine hair covered its every part, except for the last segment, which did duty as a face. Here, four multisegmented eyes were situated. They gleamed in the torchlight with iridescent colors, continuing to gleam so after the creature finally gave up its last struggle for life.

“No mouth!” Fremant exclaimed.

“It must be a what-you-call-it? You know…” Bellamia struggled for words. “Not sort of like a—what? The final form.”

“You mean a larval stage,” said Essanits coldly. At which point he was sent staggering by another of the same species emerging from the cave mouth, and then another. Both made a great whirring noise, as their supposed legs became small wings which propelled them into the air. Luckier than the creature which had preceded them, they did not run into the cliff face. Instead, they circled, still whirring and terrifying the tethered horses, and were away into the dark sky.

Wellmod clung to Fremant’s arm. “I ain’t going back in there!”

“Hang on and we’ll see if any more come out. They must, um, hibernate until Dimoff comes. It’s a signal for them to—well, I don’t know—maybe to change…”

“Well, they appear to be harmless,” said Essanits.

“Except for the filthy stink,” said Chankey. His brand was burning low. They stood there in the darkness, undecided. Wellmod went to calm the horses. Nothing else emerged from the cave, and so they cautiously returned to its shelter and stoked up the fire.

“I
WILL CONTINUE
with what I was telling you,” said Essanits, when they had settled down. “Listen carefully. There are lessons to be learned.

“Thewest in its heyday had enjoyed a policy of laissez-faire. Many people from other parts of the world were welcomed within its borders, to make what they could of a better way of life. This eventually created a weakness within the social structure, so that unison was broken, freedoms curtailed, dissent stifled. Deathwatch beetles bored into the very beams of the culture.

“Many of those from the Middle sector were peaceable. Some, however, were hostile to the Christy-earn culture of Thewest. As they became better organized—using the very communicatium tools devised by Thewest—they inflicted much damage on the structures of Thewest. As the infrastructures were weakened, so the governments became more restrictive—in some cases more tyrannical. Thus the terrorists were achieving their end. Of course, Thewest had its own faults. It made the mistake of invading some territories of the enemy. Gradually, year by year, it was weakened.”

The audience in the cave listened with varying degrees of disinterest compounded by incomprehension.

“The massive
New Worlds
was constructed in a last-ditch attempt to save the values of Thewest. Volunteers were carefully vetted before being deconstructed and inserted into the computerized entails of the ship.

“The very day after the capital city of Thewest was destroyed by a hydrogen bomb,
New Worlds
was launched on its predetermined course for this distant world we call Stygia. The determination was that this great scientific feat was something no endeavor by the relatively hidebound terrorist nations could emulate. Western values would be safe on Stygia.”

Silence fell, reinforcing the darkness and isolation of their situation.

“What about Astaroth?” Fremant asked at last. “Had he got Western values?”

After a pause, Essanits said that Astaroth was “austere”—a good Western value. Unfortunately it had included negative values, too, like an obsessive love of power.

No one said anything more.

As he lay in the darkness, he thought,
I am Paul Fadhil Abbas Ali. Why am I not happy?

The cold, the artificial night, became more intense.

SIX

A
VOICE ASKED
F
REMANT,
“Why did you write what you did?”

He replied that it was only one line. The line about the PM.

“One line can be a fucking signal, can’t it?”

“Not in this case…You promised to let me go free.”

“There’s been an incident. Which prime minister were you referring to in this crap book of yours? The present one?”

“No actual prime minister.”

“But you knew it would be an invitation to terrorists to kill the sitting prime minister?”

“I knew no such thing.”

“How did your wife get involved in all this?”

“All what?”

“ALL THIS, YOU CUNT!”

“She wasn’t involved.”

“You are fucking lying as usual, you fucking little creep. She married you, didn’t she?”

“No. I mean, yes, we were married but she never wrote a word of my book.”

“Yeah? She corrected your grammar, di’n’ she?”

“Yes.” The blow on the side of his jaw knocked him off the stool he was perched on. He sprawled on the floor, thinking he could never move again.

“Get up, you bastard. Don’t just lay there.”

He got up. The interrogation continued.

It continued for another hour. Afterward, he was thrown into darkness, where he lay in pain. The cockroach visited him. The flies buzzed about his ears.

He thought,
I am who I am. Why am I not miserable? Why do I feel so little?

His feelings were muddied and unclear. At least he knew he now hated the British, the nation he had once greatly admired. His uncle, who had been a lawyer in his Uganda days, had read much English literature, with a particular affection for such works as De Quincey’s
Confessions of an English Opium Eater,
with its masterly and elaborate prose, and the learned and abstruse
Anatomy of Melancholy
by Robert Burton.

At night, when the family gathered for the evening meal, his uncle would tell them of these books, sometimes reading aloud the beautiful prose.

Some such books had accompanied his father on his escape to England and formed his own early reading matter. Only later did he realize that he had learned of an impoverished yet dignified England which had passed away. A wave of materialism had overtaken England. A disgraceful hedonism was all, a hedonism often taking the form of riots at football matches, binge-drinking and street violence, vomiting and urinating on pavements, sporadic racism. There was no—or next to no—spiritual life remaining.
The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
was being repeated—in a minor key…

It was for spiritual life he yearned. He longed to leave the sordid England that had imprisoned him. But where to go for refuge? The U.S.A.? Too formidable…Certainly not to the Middle East, where a mental stasis, reinforced by the rigid tenets of the Koran, prevailed. Not to one of those hidebound little hamlets in Saudi Arabia or Iraq, for sure…There was Indonesia, with its dread military regime. There was Malaysia, where matters were relatively benign—but otherwise so foreign to his timid nature. India? Too confusing. China? But the China he admired had transformed itself into a giant, while England had dwindled. He longed for somewhere distant.

Light-years away…

W
HEN THE TWO-DAY DARKNESS CLEARED,
when the scattered blackness of the Shawl tailed off to the west, the trekkers came out of their cave and killed one of the goats, which they roasted over a spit. The horses had eaten all the grass by the cliffside and needed attention. So the men and Bellamia set off again, still chewing the stringy goat meat. Essanits led them, riding on black Hengriss.

For two days and nights they traveled among the wearying mazes of rock. At last they came to a place where comparatively lush pastures beckoned, where no more than the odd rock stood sentinel, as if a monument to something dead. The ground undulated like frozen waves. Here the silence was unbroken, except for scufflings in the grass where many unevolved insects found their home.

While they allowed the horses to graze, they looked about them. The grass gave out ahead, leaving only barren earth and stones. They could see a great distance, where cumulus cloud was piled on the horizon.

“What a dump!” said Chankey. He spat.

“Not too far now,” said Essanits encouragingly. “Be of good cheer, lads.”

As he spoke, Wellmod pointed ahead, gasping.

They looked. They stared.

At a distance from them, something resembling a great sail appeared, moving close to the horizon. This enormous triangular fin was adorned with many colors, colors not bright but subdued, the edge of each color merging fuzzily into the next, so that their diversity created a unity. A pattern was formed, centering near the peak of the sail into an oval target vaguely resembling an eye.

The sail moved majestically, its colors seeming to change slowly as it went. Something in its magnificence left the humans speechless. It was the very essence of unimpeachable beauty.

Fremant’s mind filled with images of sensuality. He recalled fleetingly that he had lain naked with a beautiful pale woman with fair hair. A name came back to him in a whisper—Doris. Then it was gone, such that he could not recall it, and a stifling sense of loss descended on him.

“So so bewful!” exclaimed Bellamia, nearby.

“What can it be?” asked Wellmod in a whisper.

“A vision…”

The sail began to move behind a distant concealing mound. Less and less of it remained visible. Still they stared. Soon only the oblong eye remained, seeming to gaze back at them from the horizon. Then it, too, was gone. For a while they did not speak.

They looked to Essanits for explanation.

“I can only guess…Fremant, have you seen such a thing before?”

“Never.”

“I can only guess that it was a wing of something.”

“Then, could be it was the wing of the black things from the cave? Their next stage of development…”

For all their talk, the immense supposed wing remained a mystery to them.

“Better get moving,” said Chankey, sighing deeply. They had all seen something which represented what they lacked.

O
N THE FOLLOWING DAY,
they came to a great body of water. Reeds fringed its edges, between which the element glittered, reflecting the sun as from a mirror. It was a lake that appeared almost as vast as an inland sea. The waters were still, as if waiting. Fremant recalled his previous alarming experience in a body of water, from which the thing grappled with him.

Essanits pointed to the distant bank, where they could make out a grove of trees.

“That’s our destination. There lies Incessible.”

“But how do we get across this bluggerating lake?”

“The water is not deep. The horses will carry us across.”

“Supposing there is something in the water that will attack us?”

“I don’t think so.”

The sun shone as they stood there indecisively. They were reluctant to enter the water.

Fremant asked what they would do if they found some surviving Dogovers on the far side of the lake. Essanits fixed a glare of burning dislike on him. He replied flatly that they would take any survivors back to Stygia City, and restore them there, should they wish to return. If they did not wish to return, then there would be a ceremony to mark human penitence for the wrong that had been done.

Will they understand that?

Will they not rise up and kill us?

Will they commit group suicide, as the humans had witnessed before?

Essanits shrugged. They must trust in God and hope for the best.

Bellamia asked how they could understand a foreign tongue. She said that she would cook them a meal. It might prove more effective in the way of communication than a ceremony. Food was the universal language, she said.

Essanits gave a grudging assent.

Wellmod said that the Dogovers might kill
them.

Fremant thought, If I die, on the morrow I shall wake in Paradise…

Chankey goaded his mount into the flood.

One by one, the others followed.

T
HE LAKE WATER WAS COLD,
and yet shallow, as Essanits had said. The horses struggled forward. After one hour, they were still not halfway across the lake. After two hours, when the horses were visibly tiring, they appeared to be closing in on the far shore.

Chankey said, “There’s something in the water by us, following us. Keep your guns ready.”

Bellamia and Fremant had already seen a telltale line of ripple on either side of them. Bellamia became very nervous. She tried to spur her horse on, but the animal was too weary to respond. They were all anxious and tense.

Wellmod suddenly gave a cry. A pair of giant mandibles, black in color, flashing in the sunlight, rose from the water. They surfaced from beside Wellmod, who was bringing up the rear, as usual. But the creature was not attacking him. Rather, the huge jaws closed over the last of the string of goats. The goat struggled but, within a few seconds, was dragged below. A great splashing ensued, lasting until a whitish pulp floated up, bubbling, to the surface. Wellmod’s yells of horror vied with the cries of the horses. Essanits quickly brought his horse under control. Chankey’s mount plunged and reared. Chankey, less of a horseman than his leader, was thrown into the water.

He was at once seized by one of the underwater creatures. He rose, spluttering, one raised arm and his neck caught in a pair of the hornlike mandibles. He managed to bring the trapped arm around so that he could grasp one of the threatening jaws; with his other hand he took hold of the other jaw. In his struggle to wrench the two mandibles apart, he dragged his attacker half out of the water. What appeared was something less stag-beetle-like than spider-like, with a balloon body studded with eyes and trailing hairy legs—a monstrous compound of a gigantic insect, gray and beige and blue. Then this tawdry thing dived, and Chankey was pulled under. He rose again, bent backward, face red with agony and exertion. With one desperate heave, he tore the mandibles apart. A yellowish puslike substance spewed out about the waters around him.

Gasping, Chankey hauled himself back on his horse. He lay across its back, gasping.

The water was immediately beaten into a froth. Several pairs of the black horns appeared, then disappeared, as the submerged horrors fought to devour the remains of the broken monster.

Essanits called to everyone to make what haste they could away from the scene. Badly shaken, they pressed on, to gain the shore a few minutes later.

They rode into a sheltering grove of trees well above the waterline, to throw themselves down, exhausted, on the ground. The horses, too, collapsed.

“Are you all right, Chankey?” Bellamia and Fremant went over to him. Chankey was doubled up, his arms clutching each other, his knees near his chin. He rocked back and forth in pain.

“That bastard thing nearly got me. Jupers! Something stung me. But I’m all right…”

Staring up at the foliage above them, Bellamia, sighing, said, “Dreadful! This world where insects predommy—predom—have the upper hand.”

Fremant’s response was to ask if a world where men had the upper hand was much better.

No one made any response to that. He lay there, exhausted. Bellamia propped herself beside him, stroking his wet hair, smoothing his brow, whispering endearments, without a thought for herself.

His heart and mind were filled with love for her as if with a newly opened flower.

Getting to his knees, Essanits began to pray aloud. He stressed his own sinfulness, and that of all men. He claimed that the beautiful sail they had seen was a sign from the Almighty, a promise of redemption. He hoped that they would find forgiveness if they rescued the remnant of the autochthonous race. He begged for their safe deliverance back to Stygia City.

On all these matters he elaborated greatly.

“Oh, for Joe’s sake, do shut up!” said Chankey. “I can’t stand any more of this stuff.”

“I’m praying to save your soul,” said Essanits sternly.

“I just want to ask,” said Fremant, when a loud amen had been pronounced—“if Jesus walked this planet once on a time, did he walk as a man or as an insect?”

“That’s a most irreligious question.”

“No. I’m curious. A man or an insect?”

It was Wellmod who jumped in with an answer. “’Course he walked as a man. He didn’t walk as a lion or a tiger on Earth, did he?”

“That’s why animals don’t go to Heaven, I guess,” Chankey replied. He began coughing violently.

Essanits stood up and ordered them to be on their way.

Fremant helped Chankey to his feet. They picked their way through the trees, climbing the slope as they went.

At the crest of the slope, where the trees gave out, they stood and surveyed a narrow valley. In the valley stood a number of leather tents. Each tent rose to a point and was decorated with colored images. Fremant had seen a similar tent previously.

“We’re here,” Essanits said. “This is the place.” They dismounted, tying their horses and the remaining goats to trees.

“Chankey, you and I will go down on foot and speak to them. Fremant, you and Wellmod and the woman will remain up here. Stay alert in case of trouble.”

“‘The woman’ could kick your aggorant ass,” said Bellamia quietly, as the two men set off.

The tents looked dilapidated. Only one appeared properly maintained. From it emerged a two-legged creature and a dog. They stood defensively, regarding the approaching men.

A white shelf materialized between the two parties. It seemed to stretch the length of the valley. It floated approximately knee-high. Its surface became stippled with small shapes, many of them round, all dun-colored. For part of the time it was transparent.

“It’s their speech!” Fremant called to Essanits. “They’re trying to communicate!”

Essanits and Chankey had halted in puzzlement before the manifestation. They made no attempt at a response. The shelf changed to a reddish color.

Chankey gave a roar of anger. He rushed forward, through the illusory shelf, toward the Dogover and the dog.