To Open the Sky (20 page)

The glass vault of David Lazarus, transported intact at considerable expense from Mars, rested in the center of the operating room, under the watchful eyes of the video cameras mounted in the walls and ceiling. A carefully planted forest of equipment surrounded the vault: polygraphs, compressors, centrifuges, surgistats, scanners, enzyme calibrators, laser scalpels, retractors, impacters, thorax rods, cerebral tacks, a heart-and-lung bypass, kidney surrogates, mortmains, biopticons, elsevirs, a Helium II pressure generator, and a monstrous, glowering cryostat. The display was impressive, and it was meant to be. Vorster science was on display here, and every awesome- looking superfluity in the place had its part in the orchestration of the effects.

Vorst himself was not present. That, too, was part of the orchestration. He and Kirby were watching the event from Vorst's office. The highest-ranking member of the Brotherhood present was plump, cheerful Capodimonte, a District Supervisor. Beside him stood Christopher Mondschein of the Harmonists. Mondschein and Capodimonte had known each other briefly during Mondschein's short, spectacularly unsuccessful career as a Santa Fe acolyte in 2095. Now, though, the Harmonist was a terrifying figure, his changed body concealed by a breathing-suit but still nightmarish and grotesque. A native-born Venusian, looking even more bizarre, clung to Mondschein like a skin graft. The visiting Harmonists seemed tense and grim.

The television commentator said, "It's already been determined that the atmosphere of the vault is a mixture of inert gases, mainly argon. Lazarus himself is in a nutrient bath. Espers have detected signs of life. The tumblers of the vault lock were opened yesterday in the presence of the delegation of Venusian Harmonists. Now the inerts are being piped out, and soon the sensitive instruments of the surgeons will reach the sleeping man and begin the infinitely complex process of restoring the life-impulses."

Vorst laughed.

Kirby said, "Isn't that what'll happen?"

"More or less. Exept the man's as alive as he'll ever be, right now. All they need to do is open the vault and yank him out."

"That wouldn't be very dramatic."

"Probably not," the Founder agreed. Vorst folded his hands across his belly, feeling the artificials throbbing mildly inside. The commentator reeled off acres of descriptive prose. The spidery array of instruments surrounding the vault was in motion now, arms and tendrils waving like the limbs of some being of many bodies. Vorst kept his eyes on the altered face of Christopher Mondschein. He hadn't really believed that Mondschein would return to Santa Fe. An admirable person, the old man thought. He had borne adversity well, considering how he had been bamboozled into his life's career almost sixty years ago.

"The vault's open," Kirby said.

"So I observe. Now watch the mummy of King Tut rise and walk."

"You're very lighthearted about this, Noel."

"Mmmm," the Founder said. A smile flickered on his thin lips for a moment. He made minute adjustments to his hormone flow. On the screen the vault opening was almost completely obscured by the instruments that had dived into the chamber to embrace the sleeper.

Suddenly there was faint motion in the vault. Lazarus stirred! The martyr returned!

"Time for my grand entrance," Vorst murmured.

All was arranged. A glistening tunnel transported him swiftly to the operating room. Kirby did not follow. The Founder's chair rolled serenely into the room just as the figure of David Lazarus groped its way out of sixty years of sleep and rose to a sitting position.

A quivering hand pointed. A rusty voice strained for coherence.

"V-V-Vorst!" Lazarus gasped.

The Founder smiled benevolently, lifted his fleshless arm in greeting and blessing. Delicately, an unseen hand slipped a control rod and the Blue Fire flickered along the walls of the room to provide the proper theatrical touch. Christopher Mondschein, his altered face impassive behind his breathing-mask, clenched his fists angrily as the glow enveloped him.

Vorst said, "And there is light, before and beyond our vision, for which we give thanks.

"And there is heat, for which we are humble.

"And there is power, for which we count ourselves blessed….

"Welcome to life, David Lazarus. In the strength of the spectrum, the quantum, and the holy angstrom, peace, and forgive those who did evil to you!"

Lazarus stood. His hands found and grasped the rim of his vault. Inconceivable emotions distorted his face. He muttered, "I—I've slept."

"Sixty years, David. And those who rebuked me and followed you have grown strong. See? See the green robes? Venus is yours. You head a mighty army. Go to them, David. Give them counsel. I restore you to them. You are my gift to your followers.
And he that was dead came forth... loose him, and let him go."

Lazarus did not reply. Mondschein stood agape, leaning heavily on the Venusian at his side. Kirby, watching the screen, felt a tingle of awe that washed away his skepticism for the moment. Even the chatter of the television commentator was stilled by the miracle.

The glow of the Blue Fire engulfed all, rising higher and higher, like the flames of the Twilight reaching toward Valhalla. And in the midst of it all stood Noel Vorst, the Founder, the First Immortal, serene and radiant, his ancient body erect, his eyes gleaming, his hands outstretched to the man who had been dead. All that was missing was the chorus of ten thousand, singing the Hymn of the Wavelengths while a cosmic organ throbbed a paean of joy.

Eight

And Lazarus lived, and walked among his people again, holding converse with them.

And Lazarus was greatly surprised.

He had slept—for a moment, for the twinkling of an eye. Now sinister blue figures surrounded him— Venusians, hooded like demons against the poisonous air of Earth—and hailed him as their prophet. All about rose Vorst's metropolis, dazzling buildings that testified to the present might of the Brotherhood of the Immanent Radiance.

The chubby Venusian—Mondschein, was it?—pressed a book into Lazarus's hands. "The Book of Lazarus," he said. "The account of your life and work."

"And death?"

"Yes, your death."

"You'll need a new edition now," Lazarus said. He smiled, but he was alone in his mirth.

He felt strong. How had muscles failed to degenerate in his long sleep? How was it that he could rise and go among men, and make vocal cords obey him, and his body withstand the strain of life?

He was alone with his followers. In a few days they would take him back to Venus with them, where he would have to live in a self-contained environment. Vorst had offered to transform him into a Venusian, but Lazarus, stunned that such things were possible at all, was not sure that he cared to become a gilled creature. He needed time to ponder all this. The world he had so unexpectedly re-entered was very different from the one he had left.

Sixty-odd years. Vorst had taken over the whole planet now, it seemed. That was the direction he had been heading in back in the Eighties, when Lazarus had begun to disagree with him. Vorst had begun with a religio-scientific movement when Lazarus had joined it. Hocus- pocus with cobalt reactors, a litany of spectrum and electron, plenty of larded-on spiritualism, but at the bottom a bluntly materialistic creed whose chief come-on was the promise of long (or eternal) life. Lazarus had gone for that. But soon, feeling his strength, Vorst had begun to slide men into parliaments, take over banks, utilities, hospitals, insurance companies.

Lazarus had opposed all that. Vorst had been accessible then, and Lazarus remembered arguing with him against this deviation into finance and power politics. And Vorst had said, "The plan calls for it."

"It's a perversion of our religious motives."

"It'll get us where we want to go."

Lazarus had disagreed. Quietly, gathering a few supporters, he had established a rival group, while still nominally retaining his loyalty to Vorst. His apprenticeship with Vorst made him an expert on founding a faith. He proclaimed the reign of eternal harmony, gave his people green robes, symbols, reformist fervor, prayers, a developing liturgy. He could not say that his movement had become particularly powerful beside the Vorst machine, but at least it was a leading heresy, attracting hundreds of new followers each month. Lazarus had been looking toward a missionary movement, knowing that his ideas had a better chance of taking root on Venus and perhaps Mars than Vorst's.

And on a day in 2090 men in blue robes came to him and took him away, blanking out his guard of espers and stealing him as easily as though he had been a lump of lead. After that he knew no more, until his awakening in Santa Fe. They told him that the year was 2152 and that Venus was in the hands of his people.

Mondschein said, "Will you let yourself be changed?"

"I'm not sure yet. I'm considering it."

"It'll be difficult for you to function on Venus unless you let them adapt you."

"Perhaps I could stay on Earth," Lazarus suggested.

"Impossible. You have no power base here. Vorst's generosity will stretch only so far. He won't let you remain here after the excitement of your return dies down."

"You're right." Lazarus sighed. "I'll let myself be changed, then. I'll come to Venus and see what you've accomplished."

"You'll be pleasantly surprised," Mondschein promised.

Lazarus had already been sufficiently surprised for one incarnation. They left him, and he studied the scriptures of his faith, fascinated by the martyr's role they had written for him. A book of Harmonist history, told Lazarus his own value: where the Brotherhood's religious emotions crystallized around the remote, forbidding figure of Vorst, the Harmonists could safely revere their gentle martyr.
How awkward it must be for them that I'm back,
Lazarus thought.

Vorst did not come to him while he rested in the Brotherhood's hospital. A man named Kirby came, though, frosty-faced with age, and said he was the Hemispheric Coordinator and Vorst's closest collaborator.

"I joined the Brotherhood before your disappearance," Kirby said. "Did you ever hear of me?"

"I don't believe so."

"I was only an underling," Kirby said. "I suppose you wouldn't have had reason to hear of me. But I hoped your memory would be clear, if we ever had met. I've got all these intervening years to cope with, but you can look back across a clean slate."

"My memory's fine," Lazarus said evenly. "I've got no recollection of you."

"Nor I of you."

The resuscitated man shrugged. "I worked beside Vorst. I had disputes with him. That much is beyond question. Eventually I split with him. I founded the Harmonists. Then I—disappeared. And here I am. Do you have trouble believing in me?"

"Perhaps I've been tampered with," Kirby said. "I wish I remembered you."

Lazarus lay back. He stared at the green, rubbery walls. The instruments monitoring his life-processes whirred and clicked. There was an acrid odor in the air: asepsis at work. Kirby looked unreal. Lazarus wondered what sort of maze of pumps and trestles held him together beneath his thick, warm blue robe.

Kirby said, "You understand that you can't remain on Earth, don't you?"

"Of course."

"Life will be uncomfortable for you on Venus unless you're changed. We'll do it for you. Your own men can supervise the operation. I've talked to Mondschein about it Are you interested?"

"Yes," Lazarus said. "Change me."

They came the next day to turn him into a Venusian. He resented the public nature of the operation, but it was idle to pretend that his life was his own any more, anyway. It would take several weeks, they said, to effect the transformation. Once it had taken months to do it. They would equip him with gills, fit him out to breathe the poisonous muck that was the atmosphere of Venus, and turn him loose. Lazarus submitted. They carved him, and put him back together again, and readied him for shipment.

Vorst came to him, feathery-voiced and shrunken, but still a commanding figure, and said, "You must realize I had no part in your kidnapping. It was totally unauthorized—the work of zealots."

"Of course."

"I appreciate diversity of opinion. My way is not necessarily the only right way. I've felt the lack of a dialogue with Venus for many years. Once you're installed there, I trust you'll be willing to communicate with me."

Lazarus said, "I won't close my mind against you, Vorst. You've given me life. I'll listen to what you have to say. There's no reason why we can't cooperate, so long as we respect each other's sphere of interests."

"Exactly! Our goal is the same, after all. We can join forces."

"Warily," Lazarus said.

"Warily, yes. But wholeheartedly." Vorst smiled and departed.

The surgeons completed their work. Lazarus, now alien to Earth, journeyed to Venus with Mondschein and the rest of the Harmonist retinue. It was in the nature of a triumphant homecoming, if one can be said to come home to a place where one has never been before.

Green-robed brethren with bluish-purple skins greeted him. Lazarus saw the Harmonist shrines, the holy ikons of his order. They had carried the spiritualistic element further than he had ever visualized, practically deifying him, but Lazarus did not intend to correct that. He knew how precarious his position was. There were men of entrenched power in his organization who secretly might not welcome a prophet's return, and who might give him a second martyrdom if he challenged their vested interests. Lazarus moved warily.