by Ian Wallace
Gorsky muttered in Croyd’s ear, “Bomb in your life-craft irrelevant.”
Her voice came to him from a very long distance away; he shook himself loose from distance, he attended to Gorsky, he reconstructed what she had said, he made no sense of it. He whispered back, “Pardon?”
She hissed, “The bomb that was in your lifecraft during the drill. Irrelevant to the rest of the stuff. Planted by a paranoid second-class reonicist, he hates authority. In the brig now.”
“Good,” Croyd acknowledged. “Watch what is essential.”
Czerny stepped to one side. The young couple, together enthralled, rhythmed to the grass hut, stepped aboard, and quieted, standing before me, who was squat-seated beside a low altar.
And all was still.
Laboriously I got to my feet. And the couple knelt.
I stood wheezing for a moment. Sedately then I queried, “Onu Hanoku, do you wish life marriage to Djeelian Faleen according to the customs of your people?”
He intoned, “Aye.”
“Djeelian Faleen, do you accord in a wish for life marriage to Onu Hanoku according to the customs of your people?”
She replied, “Aye.” And all about us there was tension, for inevitably there had been ship gossip concerning marriage according to the lore of Dari.
Djeel was looking past me. Gorsky told me later that Djeel had been looking at Croyd; he had sustained her gaze for a moment, then had smiled with whole tenderness and had turned to meet the glowing eyes of Hanoku.
I asserted, “According to the customs of your people, before you can be married, Djeelian must be deflowered by the chief of Hanoku’s clan; whereafter you two will pass two nights in chaste and holy prayer before this marriage may be consummated. But Onu Hanoku himself is clan chief, and therefore the deflowering must be accomplished by the protocol chief of these two highest houses on Dari. Now, that protocol chief must be chief of all Dari; and under our new treaty the President of the Interplanetary Union is chief of all Dari. So it is I who must accomplish this defloration. Onu, do you assent to this necessity?”
Thus I publicly and officially confirmed rumor. Never had the ballroom been quieter.
Onu, having glanced at demure Djeel, elevated his chin. “I do.”
“Djeelian, do you assent to this ritual necessity?”
Noticeably pallid, she dropped her head. “I do.”
Now I said clearly, “Onu and Djeelian, by rite you two have the say as to whether the screens of this hut shall be dropped for the privacy of this intimate deflowering; and if you two should disagreee on the question, then in this one matter Djeelian has the final say. Shall the screens be dropped?”
Onu and Djeel together raised their heads and cried sharply in unison, having rehearsed this: “No! Let the defloration be for all to see—complete with the sight of the precious blood that is the token of the bride’s divine virginity!”
A sigh swept the hall. I sighed too, but for another reason.
I faced the bride squarely, and my breathing was heavy. “Djeelian, I am an old man, and I may not bring this off as neatly as your customs may expect. Are you prepared for whatever it will be?”
She gazed up at me openly, trustingly. “Tannen, you are a good chief. Whatever it will be, so be it.”
Onu added, “I want my marriage with Djeel to be absolutely right. Do whatever you can . . . and whatever you will.”
I paused, considering.
Croyd told me later that my face broke then into a radiant smile that was visible on the back of my neck. Reaching down, I grasped the pure white flower necklace of Djeel and wrenched at it, breaking it away from her. I raised this necklace high, examining it while small white flower heads fell away from it and Djeel and Hanoku knelt rapt watching me. I crushed this necklace to my lips with both hands, and I laid this necklace on the small rude altar beside me.
Djeel arose and urged wondering Hanoku to his feet, and they advanced to the altar. Considerately Djeel spilled the contents of her scarlet rhyton on the white flowers of the necklace: blood-red she stained the petals. Turning her face up to Hanoku, she passed the voided cup to him. Having kissed the cup, he laid it upon the flowers; and this action was his own creative response to my synthesis.
Onu and Djeel, clasping four hands, were looking expectantly at me. Behind me, Croyd’s brood was soul-tangible.
I cleared my throat and preambled, “Since by this holy rite I have established for this princess her psychic virginity, which is the best sort of virginity, while spiritually co-fathering her first child by this prince in the presence of all our gods and particularly the friendly gods of Dari, now I claim the father privilege of saying a few words to this couple and to our child who will come.
“Onu and Djeelian, it is for you as lord and lady to lead the synthesis, to make the task of Governor Croyd progressively less necessary until he recognizes himself as a visiting futility and out of sheer ennui goes away from your new-vital Dari. This is the highest meaning of your marriage.
“As now you go into this endeavor, I call upon you and your descendants to be free and easy, respecting and loving your brains and your minds and the mindstuff that your brains and bodies and minds are made of. If something from the old time tastes good intuitively, then use it, but check with your brains to be sure that it may not be counterproductive for its own future. If a logical structure that your brain concocts appears eminently workable, taste it nevertheless with your intuitive minds to be sure that it may not be counterproductive for endlessly growing aesthetic experience; and use it only if it passes this taste test. Never forget that most of your subjects, particularly the least intelligent ones, are dominated by their brains, yet they have minds.
“Onu, be the highest lord of your Dari in a way that will be long-range good for Dari. Djeelian, be the fostering lady of the house for all the small good people of your Dari. Onu and Djeelian, together, in continuous council, re-create your Dari—so well that after your deaths, Dari will keep on re-creating herself.
“Let this creation grow out of your caring for each other. Let your caring spill beyond yourselves, let it overflow your Dari.”
My part was ended then. And it all came over me that I had thought of no way to wind up this ceremony. Inwardly panicking, I called upon the Lord to end it for me somehow.
But Djeelian, gazing at me, feeling no sense of ceremonial trouble, was telling me, “Thank you, our spiritual chief. We shall count these luminous ideas as the substance of your spirited impregnation, and we shall teach them faithfully to the one who is conjointly our child and to all our children.”
Hanoku, though, was gazing at Croyd as he added, “And in this one rare case, the gods of Dari have decreed that a lost deadline makes no difference. We shall burst with private pride whenever we look upon our first child, knowing secretly that in all Dari a tetraploid has never before been born.”
Puzzled, I turned to look at Croyd. Most erect he now stood; and broadly he now smiled at Hanoku, responding, “I have caught the implication, and I bless it. Even when time is my enemy, still I praise Heaven for variability of sequence.”
WHILE CROYD WAS MINGLING with the happy crowd of pseudo-Darians in a Rollicking Rejoice that was fluidly facile by reason of endless flowing upa-upa and jango juice (turned out, like the ceremonial chicken blood and other commodities, by the ship’s redoubtable omnifabricators), Croyd was arrested in midsentence by a Thought. Swinging accurately in its source direction, he saw Pan above him at a balcony rail. Pan nodded, turned, and departed. Croyd finished his sentence, creatively twisting the end of it into a bantering trivial reason for having to leave momentarily; and Croyd went to his quarters.
Pan awaited him, standing at room center, back to Croyd, head down, great shoulders drooping somewhat, although scarcely quite sagging. Bare, brown in his lua-lua, Pan was a young god: this fact Croyd noted, although it did not then or later occur to Croyd that he was in fact admiring himself.
Croyd threw a thought
: projective telepathy was the first power beginning to return to him after the Roland debilitation—in feebleness thus far, however; only Pan or Freya or faraway Greta could catch it.
But Pan elected speech. Without turning, he began, “You see how it is, Croyd? I drew on all the powers either of us ever had in order to bail you out of that fissure and beat down the duke. I might have saved my effort. When I got there, it was all done—done by your ordinary human brain and body, with an assist from a cosmic brain that any other imaginative and competent neuropsychologist could have figured out and used. Croyd, who am I?”
Krell, in the corridor, listened through a door that (owing to a reonic malfunction) had not quite closed behind Croyd.
Meanwhile Croyd was reflecting that his reply had to be as near right as might be. Perhaps telepathic directness? No, that would be salt in the wound; this, Pan had signaled by opting for speech. Who am I? Croyd probed: “As of what date?”
Pan turned to him a sober face. “I see your drift. But you be the one to say it.”
“As of just before we were duplicated, we were one. As of just after, we were two, but we were absolutely identical. Just now, four years later, I am Croyd, you are Pan—we are different. I am what we were, modified by my four years; you are what we were, modified by your four years: you are you, is who—we were identical twins, we are now nonidentical twins. I fail to see why that bugs you.”
“It bugs me because this twin is not and can never be the equal of that twin.”
Croyd went grim. “You sound like a downcast son who notices that he is not yet the equal of his father, and therefore concludes that he can never be his father’s equal. I would kick you in the teeth, Pan, except that you would guiltfully accept the kick and go deeper down into it, minus a couple of teeth.”
Pan went grim. “I ought to storm out of here, Croyd. Instead I am trying to control my temper—normal human controls, Croyd—and keep channels open. Will you get mad if I hurl a system of counterinsults?”
“Of course. But I will try to control it.”
“You are a goddamned prig. This means that I was a goddamned prig. I have revolted from you and from my old self. I am specifically trying not to be as good as you.”
“It’s a damn good revolt, Pan. I couldn’t have done better myself.”
“See what I mean, prig? Condescending, trying to persuade me that I am good.”
“Tell me what you want me to say.”
Silence,
Pan said queerly, “If I tell you, and you say what I want to hear, still you are a prig; but if you deliberately say what I do not want to hear, then you are putting me down. Is that it?”
Croyd waited.
Pan was studying his fingernails. “And since you tacitly assent to my analysis, it follows that you are a prig who is putting me down.”
Croyd waited.
The door vanished; golden Krell strode in with lua-lua aswish, and, ignoring Pan, stood knightly erect before Croyd. “Forgive me, sirrah, I was listening. I ask you for just this instant to suppress all your ultrahuman powers and accept what I now do, decapod-to-man. Will you do this, Croyd?”
Eye-to-eyestalk with Krell: “Bypassing what this is all about, will you kill or cripple me?”
“No, sirrah. I don’t think so.”
“Your honor, Sirrah Krell.”
With a self-telegraphing claw swing to a cheek, Krell felled Croyd, and, still ignoring Pan, departed. The closing door reappeared.
Pan stood looking down on Croyd, and the muscle play in Pan’s face was unusual.
Rolling onto his back, Croyd opened eyes. “What was that for, Pan—do you know?”
Pan said, hard, “He was not trying to tell you a single thing. He was talking to me loud and clear. May I help you up, Croyd?”
“Pray do.”
A moment later they stood facing each other: it was mirror stuff, except that their orientations were reversed Pan commented, “Good man, Krell.”
“Damn good man.”
“What are you doing about Dzendzel?”
“He is aboard ship, comfortably and securely confined. He will be conveyed to his Emperor; there is a relevant treaty clause.”
“I want Roland reified; I will do it myself in our nonspace house. I will take him back with Krell to the decapod colony. I will stay there until I have undone the harm of my negligence; I will then leave Roland as governor and depart. Agreed, Mr. Chairman?”
“I am not chairman. Greta is chairman.”
“I suggest you do her the favor of resuming the chair.”
Pause. Then: “I am committed to the Dari project. And just in passing—is the demand about Roland negotiable?”
“See what I mean, Croyd? I have made precisely two suggestions, and already on both suggestions you are preparing to say no to me.”
“Pan, reflect: you have enough power to transform me into a frog. I repeat: is the demand about Roland negotiable?”
“What is your counterthought?”
“Leave Roland in charge of the brain; it can be useful to the metagalaxy, and Roland is now an incorruptible seneschal. After you have done what you consider to be your job with the Krell people, leave Krell as governor—he is quite the knightly equal of Roland, and he is one of them. Your comment?”
Pan’s jaw muscles knotted. “Done, you bastard. How about the chairmanship?”
“Why do you want me to be permanent chairman?”
“To me it would be a mental hazard if I had to accept you as a fellow renegade. It would strengthen me to know that you were a permanent established prig.”
“Then be easy, brother! I would be your fellow renegade if now I should run out on Dari; by holding course I establish myself as a permanent prig.”
Their half-smiles were quite identical. Pan murmured, “Thus to eat one’s cake and have it too.”
Croyd added, “Nevertheless, I will tell you privately about a secret intention that I have. My Greta will not have to suffer the Galactic burden forever. As soon as Hanoku and Djeel are going the strong way I think they will go, I will hook in with Roland and his brain for a remote hot line of instant communication with Dari and reinforcement of Dari in her finding of her way. And that could be within a couple of years, even. And then I will run out on Dari.”
Soberly now they were not-quite-identical twins, in tune.
Croyd queried, “What will, you do after the Krell folk, Pan?”
“By that time, Croyd—or perhaps a year after—I will have come to decisions about myself. And then I will ask you to help me get entrée to those I will have to start with, whoever they may be, whatever it may be that I will be starting on. And that will be the last favor that I will ask.”
“Instead, as my friend, please be free to ask when you need, leaving me free to say yes or no in terms of my coordinates.”
“Done.”
“Just by the way, Pan—your superior prig friend Croyd let his good friend Chloris die out of pure Croyd stupidity, even when he had at his disposal a cosmic brain.”
“Equally by the way, Croyd—your good friend Chloris died heroically in the stupid process of refusing your order to hold action.”
Pause. Then: “Still by the way, Pan—had you been the powerless prisoner of the fissure lord, and I the powerful rescuer—”
“It would have been the same in reverse. Erase all that.”
“I have, Pan. Except the memory that you did come.”
“Good. I too wish to keep remembering that I did come. And that I was unnecessary to you, Croyd. This is reassuring to me, when I look at it right-end-up.”
“Then we are back in rapport.”
“Completely.”
“We come then to the question of Freya . . .
GRETA AND FREYA AND PAN stood once again on the breezeway bridge of the Croyd-Pan nonspace house. The two identical women clung to Pan’s arms, looking alternately at each other and at Pan. He peered into the nondescript gray. Curiously, the long dresses of
the women fluttered as though there were an impossible breeze.
Greta said across his chest, “I think he has lost his tongue, Freya.”
The other woman answered, “Reverse the positions, Greta, and you would too. Are you sure you want me back? You’ll be letting yourself in for some new and pretty rough memories.”
“Any rougher than what both of us remember from the time before as one woman we met Croyd?”
Freya cat-smiled. “Not rougher, really. Higher level, too. More glamorous, maybe.”
Greta cat-smiled. “Then I have no qualms.”
Freya lost her smile, feeling hard pressure on her ribs from the right hand of Pan. Instantly the Greta smile went away also, and she gazed across Pan at Freya; and then she gazed at Pan, who was Croyd, really.
The women interchanged semidread thoughts: Losing him, we gain him; gaining us, he loses us and frees himself; it is all weird, and friendship somehow resolves itself into an intermingling of identity and regret.
Pan was catching the intermingled thought. (So, aeons away, was Cioyd.) Pan broke it roughly: “Are you both sure that you understand the technique of this rejointure?”
Freya said sharply, “Pan, of course we understand the technique! That was the wrong question!”
He broke away from Greta and seized Freya and embraced her lovingly and bitterly. Greta drifted away, pensive; this was Pan, not Croyd; this was Freya, not Greta, and Pan was losing her, and she was losing him. As Greta, now, Freya would have Pan in Croyd; but Croyd was no longer Pan.
Suddenly and acutely Greta comprehended the whole developed individualities of the four who had been two. The loves were between Croyd and Greta and between Pan and Freya; there was no sharing or tempering, they were stark individual pair-loves.
Freya, must you leave me?
Listen, Pan, let me tell you again how it is.
Greta shivered, trying to exclude from her mind their naked mind exchange. Then she calmed and went open; soon she would be Freya also; she had to know.