The Madness Season, page 25
There was a sudden spurt of brilliant flame—the Fire shot up toward the stars—and then both Fire and Bush were gone, and all was silent. I thought quickly enough to hide behind a tomb while it happened, and thus appeared to disappear just when the Fire extinguished itself.
Breathing heavily. Not quite believing what I had just seen. Not knowing what, if anything, to do about it. How is one expected to respond, after witnessing a miracle?
They left. One by one. Some angry, some crying . . . and some making plans. Already. Whatever it all came to, it had to be an improvement. I repeated that to myself several times. And tried to believe it.
"Did I do it right?"
Startled, I looked up. She stood before me—call her Kiri, even a Marra should have a name—her face like that of a child, wanting to please, not yet certain she'd done so. I was no more composed than the priest-Marra had been, but managed only a gasp of surprise, as it all came together.
"You did that. . ."
"It seemed to be an appropriate image—"
I got to my feet and had to fight the urge to reach out and hug her, to hold her against me and let the tears of joy come because I was alive, I was alive! and it was because of her . . . but for centuries I had been undemonstrative, and the habit was too deeply ingrained to be cast aside in an instant. "It was appropriate," I assured her. Joy rang out in my voice. "It was beautiful. You are ... beautiful."
And she was. Not the demon of my dreams, spiritual sibling to the priest-Marra, but something very different. Someone whose face glowed with pleasure as she internalized my praise, pleased to have played the game properly. "I ran across the image while I was sorting through your memories, back in the cave. While you were healing," she added, as though reminding me that she would never commit the unpoliteness of rummaging through my brain while I was awake.
I loved her at that moment, and knew myself crazy for it. "You killed him," I challenged, not quite believing it.
"Oh, no!"
"Drove him off, then?"
"How could I?"
"But the fire . . ."
"That was his own doing," she assured me. "A bit of drama to mark his exit. Well executed, don't you think? Although ..." She frowned. "You have so little to compare it with. Take my word for it, it was very well done."
"So he's still here," I murmured.
"Probably planning out his next Identity right now."
"With no thoughts for ... what you did? What I tried to do?"
She laughed softly. "Do you mean, will he try to 'get even'? That's body-stuff. Don't you realize, by playing his game—win or lose—you confirmed him in his Identity? Paying him one of the highest compliments our people can know?"
I shook my head in amazement. "I don't understand."
She answered me gently: "The embodied rarely do."
I took her hand then. Real. Warm.
"Why did you help me?"
Her brown eyes sparkled with amusement. "Didn't you want help?"
"But you told me—"
"No." She touched a finger to my lips, to silence me. "I thought you might need help. It pleased me to orchestrate it. That's all there is. Don't try to analyze us, Daetrin—not by human standards. You'll only confuse yourself more." She stepped back. "Now, don't you want to get out of here before the natives come back?"
Before I could answer she was gone, transformed through a quick splash of color into a sizable bird of prey. I watched as she rose. As she circled. As she waited for me to join her.
To Suyaag?I wondered. Feeling my weakness. And then I grinned.
"Is there time for dinner on the way?" I called. "I've had one hell of a night."
YUANG: DOME FIVE
Tireza was in the workroom when he returned to it, along with her young charge. She shot Yaan a look that said, Thanks a lot for leaving me alone with him. He couldn't explain in front of the boy how much the Tekk woman had upset him, or that he had needed to go off by himself for a few minutes before he could cope with this particular frustration. He had to settle for nodding her a wordless apology as he joined them, and hoping she understood.
"His native language is Spanish," Tireza offered. "A South American dialect. He also speaks Brazilian Portuguese, some Nahuatl—an Indian tongue—and, for technical purposes, English."
"Well." He offered his hand to the boy, who shook it energetically, and greeted him in English.
"Welcome to our facility."
The boy grinned. "They told me I should speak good English, if I do research. They said it was the language of the colonies."
True enough, Yaan thought. The Tyr tended to divide up its settlers according to racial types, with little concern for cultural or linguistic backgrounds. English's popularity as a second language in the days before the Conquest had provided a necessary link between people whose primary tongues didn't allow them to communicate. "We do prefer English, because of its flexibility. But most of us speak more than one Earth tongue. Tireza and Sung are both familiar with Spanish, I believe." He glanced toward her; she nodded. "We try to preserve every Earth-language we can ..." Incase it ceases to exist elsewhere, he almost said . . . "for linguistic research. I don't believe anyone here speaks Nahuatl; you're encouraged to pass that on, as part of the project. Were you raised bilingually?" The boy nodded. "Asako will want to know that. She's working on the brain's development during language acquisition. You'll meet her later." He sighed. "Of course, doing any research on the human brain is difficult, as we have so few subjects here to work with."
There. That was the prelude. He waited a moment to let the boy digest it, and its implications. "Bearing in mind that crucial limitation," he continued, "one could say that this entire Dome is devoted to the study of the human brain. Molecular psychology, our ancestors called it: the subtle relationship between biochemistry and the mind."
The boy's eyes were glowing; his excitement radiated forth from him with almost tangible substance, so much so that Yaan found himself stepping backward, to get out of its range. Gods of ancient Earth, he thought. This one's going to fall hard.
Damn the Tyr for putting us through this, time and time again. For making it necessary.
"Come," he said, and he forced himself to put an arm around the boy's shoulders. "I'll show you around."
Station by station, he led him through the Dome. Workroom after workroom, he showed him everything there was to see: equipment, personnel, work-in-progress. The boy said nothing, but Yaan could sense that he was puzzled. Deeply puzzled. Once or twice he almost started to question something—but then he subsided, into a tense and uneasy silence, and they went on with the tour.
When at last they were done—when they had seen everything from the molecular storage banks to the dining hall—Yaan brought him back to his cubicle. The boy seemed paler than before, and was considerably more subdued. Putting two and two together, no doubt. Well, it had to happen sooner or later.
"Sir?" he asked, hesitantly.
"Yaan. Call me Yaan. It's an old Earth name." He forced a smile. "I prefer it to an alien number."
"Yaan, then." He seemed deeply troubled. "I am . . . confused. Perhaps. Not understanding. The things you showed me today. This is new research?"
"Yes," he answered quietly. The boy was standing inside his cubicle, and Yaan moved to join him. So the door could be closed. So they wouldn't be overheard. "Yes, this is all new."
The boy took a deep breath; he was Subjugation-born, and clearly not comfortable with questioning authority. "But some of your work . . . like of Danel ..."
"Daniel," he corrected.
"Daniel. With dopamine counts in rattus norvegicus. Maybe I'm ... it seems to me that this was already done, a long time ago. In the late twentieth century, no?"
"Many records of pre-Conquest research were destroyed." Deliberately, boy. Think! "Sometimes we have to recreate our ancestors' experiments. In order to retrieve the data."
"But those figures still exist. I've seen tables containing them. You're from Earth, aren't you? You must know that they exist. That Daniel's work is ... unnecessary. All this information is available on Earth. Has been available, for centuries!"
"But not on the datanets," Yaan said quietly.
The boy looked confused. "No. I saw it in a book. A paper book."
Yaan nodded. Sighed. Pulled a folding panel out from the wall and folded it into chair-shape. "Sit. Go on, sit down. I have something to tell you and you're not going to like it, but I can see there's no point in putting it off any longer. Have a seat," he said forcefully, and at last the boy sat.
"We're an inquisitive species," he began. Nervously pacing, because if he stayed in one place he would have to meet the boy's eyes. And he didn't dare do that. "Wanting to understand everything. But most of all, wanting to understand ourselves. The science we practice . . . you and I, Tireza, Daniel ... it promised answers. Real answers. Biochemical keys that could unlock the secrets of depression, alcoholism, schizophrenia, phobic fixations ... the list is endless. Every facet of human behavior could be understood in terms of molecular interaction within the brain. Once human science understood how those molecules worked, and how to readjust them, it could do anything. Anything.
"That's where Earth science stood, right before the Conquest. Balanced precariously between the promise of enlightenment, and a capacity for self-destruction unsurpassed by anything before or since.
The intricate tangle of laws that we used to protect ourselves was almost as complex as the brain itself; but when one deals with knowledge such as this, one has to be careful. We had the capacity to alter any facet of human behavior. We had already used it to treat the disorders I mentioned; now, we were experimenting with more complex problems. We believed that the only limit on what we could accomplish was that which we set ourselves. In theory, we had the capacity"—and here he stopped pacing, and met the boy's gaze straight on— "to make every man, woman, and child on Earth docile and obedient. It wasn't what we wanted to do. We tried to make sure that our knowledge would never be used that way. But it was possible, you must understand that: it was possible.
"And then the Tyr came. Do I have to explain the rest? As soon as it became clear that the Tyr would triumph, the men who controlled such information knew what they had to do. To let such a tool fall into the hands of a nonhuman enemy was tantamount to species suicide. So certain farseeing members of the scientific community acted to protect themselves and their species. You probably know that a systems operator in Kiev inserted a virus into MedNet, which infected the computer storage of research and medical facilities on six continents; conspirators transferred the program to other nets and within a week, all were wiped clean of pertinent data. Between that action and more blatant physical destruction, the work was eventually done. Oh, you'll find some data still in textbooks, and private notebooks and the like. Like the kind of book you found your tables in. There was no possible way to destroy it all. But by the time the Tyr came, it was no longer obvious that such a science had existed, or that there were men on Earth who knew how to use it."
"But here . . ." the boy asked. "I don't understand."
"What we practice," he answered quietly, "is deception. We work because the Tyr insists that we work.
And because we genuinely hunger to know—that trait we do share with you, I assure you. But in the area of human molecular psychology, we can't afford to make any real progress. So we stall. We divert ourselves onto alternate paths of research. Tireza can tell you things about sleep patterns and dreaming that you never imagined possible. Sung specializes in memory. We know more things now about laboratory rats than rat-kind ever hoped to know. We've accomplished other things, with other animal subjects—but when it comes to human behavior, as you say, it's merely a repeat performance of our ancestor's accomplishments."
The boy's expression was dark. "It is deliberate, then. This ignorance."
"Yes. And absolutely necessary. I hope you see that."
The boy hesitated. "I see . . .a tremendous facility. A facility that we on Earth only dreamed of. I see intelligent men and women permitted to research whatever appeals to them, and given the material support to do so ... and you are throwing it all away!"
"You don't understand—"
"No, you don't understand! Do you think your ancestors, these brilliant men and woman you speak of, do you believe they ever looked at their work and said no, this is too dangerous, let's hide it away and never look at it again. We can unravel all the secrets of the universe, but somebody might abuse the knowledge, so let's go back to playing with rats and forget about it? Do you think they said that?
Knowledge is a dangerous thing. Does that mean we should never seek it out?"
"That's a human equation. When you add in the Tyr—"
"The Tyr wants to understand us. The Tyr built these Domes to facilitate peaceful interaction—"
"The Tyr built these Domes to control us! Because without their supply lines we can't survive a month here."
"It's a warrior race. That how it deals with a threat. But it could have killed Earth's men of learning, instead of bringing them here, if it didn't want to support them. Instead of—"
"Terra! Do you really believe that crap? No—I'm sorry—that's not fair. We believed it ourselves, when this place was first built. Because the first settlers wanted to believe. It fit the human pattern. They swallowed the whole story, and worked hard to forge a link between human and Tyr that would eventually result in our being given some independence. For so they were promised. And do you know what happened? Do you know what they did? They managed to develop a functional sensory interface.
A means of translating sensory input from a human format into Tyr. So that the Tyr could see what we were seeing, and maybe understand us a little better." He paused, but the boy didn't seem to understand.
"Eyes, man, Eyes! Created in this lab, by our people, to foster 'peaceful interaction'—and now used in every human slave camp to make unwitting spies out of our own people! That is why we do nothing, here. Because anything we do accomplish can and will be turned against us!"
The boy's expression was cold, unyielding. "If you convince yourselves of that, then you really can't accomplish anything."
He found himself lacking the energy for an argument. If this had come up first thing in the morning, when he was fresh, he could have carried on all day. He'd met more stubborn earthies than this one, and all had eventually bowed to Domes logic. Some couldn't handle the disappointment, and then, like the last one ...
he shook his head sadly, remembering the day he'd found that body. But no one had the foolishness to question the very game they were playing. He must not be presenting it properly—and in light of his confrontation with the Tekk, and that cryptic visit by the Raayat, he was hardly to blame if his nerves were raw and he was just a little bit edgy.
Which is why he backed off. "Look. It's been a rough day for both of us. I've had some unpleasant guests, and you've been traveling. Why don't we both get some rest, think it over. We'll discuss it in the morning, all right? At work. Maybe Tireza and Sung can explain it better."
I doubt it, the boy's expression said plainly, but he nodded. Stiffly.
"If you need me for anything, I'm up one level and down the hall. Toward the dining hall. Cubicle seven."
"I believe I will be all right," the boy told him.
I believe you will be trouble, but we'll leave that for later.
"We'll talk in the morning," he promised.
* * *
In the morning, however, other things came up.
"What the hell is that doing here?" Yaan hissed to Sung as he entered. At the far end of the workroom was a Raayat—the same Raayat who had so unnerved him the day before, he was sure of it—standing quietly in the corner as if it had every right and every reason to be there. And to make matters worse, it was staring at them.
"Damned if I know," Sung whispered back. "But I'm not going to be the one to tell it to go away . . .
Boss."
Yaan winced at the reminder of his responsibility, but nodded. "We can't let it stay here. Too dangerous a precedent." Nevertheless, it took him a minute to work up enough courage to brave the unblinking gaze of the Raayat, and wend his way across the workroom toward it The Raayat nodded, a curt acknowledgment of his presence; its alien face was maddeningly lacking in all the cues that humans used to read each other.
"Work without surveillance," Yaan said quietly. Amazed that he sounded as calm as he did. Behind him he heard a gasp of surprise—Tireza?—as one more worker entered, and noticed the tableau. "That's the arrangement here. Always has been."
"Work without Eyes," the Raayat corrected him.
"The arrangement existed before the Eyes were developed."
"I am Raayat."
"We're aware of that."
"I . . . have need ... to observe."
Yaan heard the door open again, and quickly shut; that would be the boy coming in. Sung, get rid of him!
"We need privacy," he explained.
"Humans need privacy to work," it mused aloud.
"Yes."
"But you work together. Four of you. Un-privately."
"That's different."
"Because you are human?"
Lacking a better answer, he nodded.
"Because you are . . . individual."
He wasn't quite sure of the point being made, but it sounded good. "Yes."
The Raayat was silent for a moment; musing, no doubt, upon the nature of individuality. Yaan glanced back at his co-workers, and found all three staring at him as though he had lost his mind.
And maybe I have. But there's only so much you can take in a day.
At last the Raayat stirred. When it spoke again, it did so slowly, as though testing out each word as it was chosen. "I ... this body possesses . . . individuality."
