Helliconia Winter h-3

by Brian Aldiss

  One side of the head was blackened.

  “It’s beautiful,” a robot partner said.

  “Ugly, you mean.”

  “It was once beautiful to someone.”

  Dating was not difficult. The city had been destroyed 3.2 thousand years earlier, at a time when New Earth was being strenuously colonised.

  The whole planet had been destroyed by nuclear bombardment, and the avian race had perished with it.

  The Outlanders called this planet Armageddon. They remained on the frigid surface for some while, discussing what should be done, spellbound by melancholy.

  One of the powerful leaders spoke. “I think we might agree that we have found here on Armageddon an answer to one of the questions which has plagued mankind for many generations.

  “How was it that when man went into space, he found no other intelligent species? It was always assumed that the galaxy would be full of life. Not so. How was it that there were scarcely any other planets like Earth?

  “Well, we do realise that Earth is a pretty unusual place, where a number of fine specifications are met. Take just one example—the amount of oxygen in Earth’s atmosphere is close to twenty-one percent. If it was twenty-five percent or over, forest fires would be started by lightning—even damp vegetation would burn. On New Earth, the oxygen percentage is eighteen; there are no plants to lock away the carbon dioxide and release oxygen molecules. No wonder the poor boobies there live in a dream.

  “Nevertheless, statistics suggest that there must be other planets like Earth. Maybe Armageddon was one. Suppose a race with a wide-ranging diet reaches supremacy and dominates the planet, as happened on Earth before the nuclear war. That race must use technology to do so—from the club and bow-and- arrow onwards. It masters the laws of nature.

  “The time comes when technology is advanced enough for the race to choose alternatives. It can put out into space, or it can destroy its enemies with nuclear weapons.”

  “Suppose there are no enemies on the planet?” someone called.

  “Then the race invents them. The pressure of competition which technologies generate makes enemies necessary, as we know. And there’s my point. At that stage, poised for a whole new way of life, no longer to be confined to the planet of its birth, on the brink of major discoveries —right then that race is set the big examination question: Can I develop the international social skills required to bring my aggression under control? Can I excel myself and make a lasting truce with my enemies, so that we throw away these vile weapons for good and all?

  “You see what I mean? If the race fails the exam, it destroys its planet and itself, and shows that it was unfit to cross that vital quarantine area space provides.

  “Armageddon was unfit. Its people failed the exam. They destroyed themselves.”

  “But you’re saying everyone everywhere was unfit. We never have found another space-going race.”

  The leader laughed. “We’re still only on Earth’s doorstep, don’t forget. Nobody is going to come looking for us until they know we’re trustworthy.”

  “And are we trustworthy?”

  Amid general laughter, the leader said, “Let’s tackle Armageddon first. Maybe we can get the old place going again, if we press the right button.”

  Further surveys showed what the world had once been. One notable feature was a considerable high- latitude sea which—before the nuclear disaster—had been only partially ice-covered. After the disaster, atmospheric contamination had cooled the umbrella of air, leaving the water of the high-latitude sea warmer than its overlying air. The air was in consequence heated from below, and moisture drawn upwards. Violent high-latitude storms had resulted, probably enough in themselves to finish off any survivors of the nuclear strike. Plentiful snow fell on middle-altitude ground, a plateau once covered by urbanisation. The major glaciation which set in became self-sustaining.

  The Outlanders decided to drop what the leader had called vile weapons on the frozen high-altitude sea, in order to “get things started” again. But the ice wilderness remained an ice wilderness. Here, the local tutelary spirit, the biospheric gestalt, was dead.

  They were now almost out of fuel. They decided to return to New Earth and conquer it. Their discoveries on Armageddon had provided them with a strategy. Their idea was that one—just one— thermonuclear device dropped over New Earth’s north pole would cause heavy rainfall, transforming the planet. The sea could be enlarged; the local zombies could make themselves useful by cutting canals. More kelp could be encouraged to grow, and eventually more oxygen released into the air. The calculations looked good. To the Outlanders, the decision to try just one more nuclear bomb was a sane one.

  So they climbed into their ship, leaving Armageddon to its eons of frost.

  For the people who lived on New Earth, one part at least of their only myth came true. The sky cracked and fell.

  What were the vital differences here? Why could New Earth never recover, while Earth flourished and put forth new forms like the geo-nauts?

  When the terrestrials developed their empathic link with the gossies of Helliconia, a new factor entered the universe. The terrestrials. whether or not they knew it, were acting as a focus of consciousness for the whole biosphere. The empathic link was not a weak thing. It was a psychic equivalent of magnetism or gravity; it bound the two planets.

  A more startling way of putting it would be to say that Gaia communicated directly with her lusty sister, the Original Beholder.

  Of course it is speculation. Mankind cannot see into the greater umwelts about him. But he can train his ample senses to look for evidence. All the evidence suggests that Gaia and the Original Beholder made contact through their progeny’s projecting the link. One can only guess at the ripples of shock that contact caused—unless the second ice age and its ripples of remission provide evidence of that contact.

  It is speculation that Gaia’s recovery was prompted by the refreshment of encountering a sister spirit in the void nearby.

  There were the geonauts: serene, calm, apparently amiable, a new thing. They can be understood not as an evolutionary freak but as an inspiration born of a fresh and powerful friendship…

  While on Helliconia, the august processes of the seasons were in undeniable stride.

  In the northern hemisphere, small summer was nearly over. Frosty nights foretold colder nights ahead. In the winding passes of the Shive-nink Chain, frost already ruled, and the living creatures who ventured there were subject to that rule.

  It was morning. A screaming windstorm, the frigid breath from the pole. The supplies were being stacked away. The phagor and Uuun-daamp were harnessing up their asokins. Seventeen days had elapsed since leaving Sharagatt. They had seen no sign that they were being pursued.

  Of the three passengers Shokerandit had fared best. Toress Lahl had lapsed into speechlessness. She lay in the tent at night as if dead. Fashnalgid seldom spoke, except to curse. Their eyebrows and lashes were frosty white within a minute of leaving shelter, their cheekbones black with frostbite.

  The last section of the trail ran above six thousand metres. To their right, in fuming cloud, was a solid mountain of ice. Visibility was down to a few feet.

  Uuundaamp came to Shokerandit, eyes merry in his frosted face. “Today soft going,” he shouted. “Downhill through tunnel. You ’member tunnel, chief?”

  “Noonat Tunnel?” It was an effort to talk in the wind.

  “Yaya, Noonat. Tonight we be there. Takit drink, bit meal, occhara, gumtaa.”

  “Gumtaa. Toress tired.”

  The Ondod shook his head. “She soon make meat together asokin.

  No much biwack gumtaa no more, eh?” He laughed with closed mouth.

  Shokerandit sensed the man had something more to say. Simultaneously they turned their backs on the others working at lashing up the sledge. Uuundaamp folded his arms.

  “Your friend got tail grow along face.” One quick sly look from his profile.

  “Fashn
algid?”

  “Your friend got tail along face. Team no like him. Team give plenty kakool. Make bad time. We lose that sherb in Noonat Tunnel, ishto?”

  “Has he been molesting Moub?”

  “Mole sting? No, he stick him prodo up Moub las’ night again. Biwack the bag, ishto? She no like. She full baby Uuundaamps.” He laughed. “So we lose in Tunnel, you see.”

  “I’m sorry, Uuundaamp. Loobiss for telling me—but no smrtaa in Tunnel, please. I speak him friend in Noonat. No more biwack your Moub.”

  “Chief, you better lose that friend. Else big kakool, I see.” He laughed and scowled, tapping his forehead, then turned abruptly on his heel.

  The Ondod rarely showed anger. But they were treacherous—that Shokerandit knew. Uuundaamp remained friendly; without at least an appearance of friendship, the journey could never be made; but he had lost face by telling a human of his wife’s disgrace.

  Shokerandit had been invited to copulate with Moub. Such was Ondod courtesy, and Shokerandit would have offended by declining the invitation. But Fashnalgid had done it uninvited, and had broken Ondod law. Ondod laws were simple and stark; transgression meant death, smrtaa. Fashnalgid would be killed without compunction. If Uuundaamp had decided to lose Fashnalgid in Noonat Tunnel, Shokerandit’s plea would count for nothing.

  Both Toress Lahl and Fashnalgid shot him curious looks from their red-rimmed eyes. He gave them no word, though deeply troubled. Uuundaamp was always watching, and would see if Shokerandit passed Fashnalgid a warning. That would count as kakool.

  The shaggy bulk of Bhryeer emerged from the murk, trudging down the length of the sledge. His eyes gleamed cerise as he swung his head momentarily to contemplate them. His morose gaze settled on Shokerandit. There was no interpreting the phagor’s expression.

  He clicked his milt up one ice-encrusted nostril and then shouted above the wind, “Team ready go. Climb your plaze. Hoi’ tight.”

  Harbin Fashnalgid pulled a flask from inside his skins, thrust the neck between his flaking lips, and swallowed. As he stowed the flask away, Shokerandit said, “Be advised, don’t drink. Hold tight, as he said.”

  “Abro Hakmo Astab!” Fashnalgid growled. He belched and turned away.

  Toress Lahl looked appealing!)’ at Shokerandit. He shook his head severely, mutely saying, Don’t give up, bite tightly on the silver fox tail. As they took their places on the sledge, they could just see the bundles that were Uuundaamp and Moub, the latter wrapped in her bright blanket. The dogs were invisible. Uuundaamp brought the long whip forward over his head. Ipsssssisiii. Then the first squeal of the steel runners as they chastised the snow. The place where they had spent the night, marked by yellow stains of human and asokin urine, was immediately lost.

  Within an hour, they were moving downhill towards Noonat Tunnel. Shokerandit felt the sickness of fear in his throat. He would lose face himself by allowing an Ondod to kill a fellow human, whatever the justification. His anger turned against both Uuundaamp and Harbin Fashnalgid. The man was next to him, back hunched in misery. No communication passed between them.

  Their speed increased. They were moving at perhaps five miles an hour. Shokerandit kept staring ahead, squeezing his eyes between cheeks and brow. Only the eternal grey to be seen, although somewhere above was a suspicion of light. Spectral white trees flitted by.

  Beyond the customary noises, the sledge creaks, the whistle of whip, the dog farts, the crack of ice, the wind song, another noise grew, hollow, threatening. It was the sound of the wind keening in Noonat Tunnel. Moub answered it with blasts on a curled goat horn.

  The Ondod were giving warning of their presence to other teams which might be coming in the other direction.

  The suspicion of light overhead was abruptly cut off. They were in the tunnel. The phagor gave a hoarse cry and applied the rear crossbeam brake to slow their progress. Uuundaamp’s whip made a different note as he flicked it just before the nose of his lead dog who bore his name, to slow their pace.

  A freezing wind struck them like a solid object. This tunnel through the mountainside was a shortcut to the Noonat station. The road, by which heavier traffic or marching men went, was some miles longer but less dangerous. In the tunnel, there was always the chance of two sledges meeting head on, the traces of the teams entangling hopelessly as the rival asokins fought to the death, a fatal knife fight taking place. Since the tunnel had been cut to show an almost circular cross-section, it was theoretically possible for teams to pass by driving partway up opposite walls, but this chance was so remote that most drivers spurred onwards in terror, screaming warning as they went.

  There were nine miles of tunnel. What with rockfalls and the force of the wind, the sledge swayed from one side to the other like a rudderless ship.

  The attempt by Uuundaamp to slow down caused greater vibrations. Fashnalgid cursed. The driver and his woman slid to either side of the sledge’s front and stuck heels into the snow to increase the braking effect.

  Bhryeer leaned forward and shouted to Fashnalgid, “You bottle juzz now drop out.”

  “My bottle? Where?”

  As Fashnalgid leant forward over the side of the sledge, looking where the phagor indicated, the phagor struck him a blow across the small of his back. Fashnalgid fell with a cry, landing on hands and knees and rolling over in the snow.

  Immediately, there was a shrill cry from Uuundaamp and he lashed on the asokins. The phagor pulled off the rear brake. They sizzled forward, aided by the slope.

  Fashnalgid was already on his feet. Already he was fading into the dimness. He began to run. Shokerandit yelled to him to come on. The wind roared, the Ondod shrieked, the runners screamed. Fashnalgid was catching up. As he came level with the rear of the sledge, his face contorted with effort, the phagor lifted an arm to strike another blow.

  To be alone in the long tunnel was to face certain death. Other sledges, thrusting through the gloom, would simply run a man over. This was Ondod smrtaa.

  Shouting at the top of his voice, Shokerandit drew his revolver and ran back on his knees over the loaded sledge. He clamped the muzzle against the phagor’s long skull.

  “I’ll blast your sherbing hameys out.” The silver fox tail fell from his mouth and was gone.

  The phagor cowered back.

  “Throw the brake on.”

  Bhryeer did so, but the downhill impetus was such that it made little difference, beyond sending a spume of fine snow over the running man.

  Still the whip whistled and the driver shrieked at his team. Fashnalgid was falling back, mouth open, blackened face distorted. His never-too-certain will was failing him.

  “Don’t give up,” yelled Shokerandit, stretching out a hand to the captain.

  Making a new effort, Fashnalgid increased speed. His boots drummed on the snow as he slowly drew level with the rear of the sledge. Bhryeer cowered out of harm’s way. The wind shrilled.

  Clutching a cord securing the tent with one gloved hand, Shokerandit leant forward and extended his other hand. He shouted encouragement. Fashnalgid was tiring. The sledge was still gaining speed. The two men stared into each other’s wide eyes. Their gloved hands touched.

  “Yes,” yelled Shokerandit. “Yes, leap aboard, man, fast!”

  Their grips locked. Just as Shokerandit tugged, Uuundaamp gave a swerve to the left, flicking the runners of the sledge up the sloping side of the tunnel, and almost overturning his vehicle. Shokerandit was flung free. He clutched at and missed a runner as it sizzled past his face. Fashnalgid stumbled over him and they sprawled flat.

  When they picked themselves up, the sledge was disappearing in the dimness.

  “Lousy biwacking drivers,” Fashnalgid said, bending forward and trying to get his breath back. “Animals.”

  “That was deliberate. That’s Ondod smrtaa—vengeance. Because of your ape tricks with the woman.” He had to turn his back to the wind flow to speak.

  “That stinking tub of lard? He said himself that she was not goo
d enough even for an asokin to enjoy.” He bent double, panting.

  “That’s how they talk, you fool. Now listen, and take in what I say. This tunnel is death. Another sledge may come through at any moment, from one end or the other. There’s no way we could stop it, except with our bodies. We have about seven miles to go, I’d guess, and we’d better do it fast.”

  “How about going back and taking the road?”

  “That way’s about thirty miles. We’ve no provisions and we’d still be walking when dark fell. We would be dead. Now, are you going to run? Because I am.”

  Fashnalgid straightened up, groaning. He said, “Thanks for trying to save me.”

  “Astab you, you arrogant fool. Why couldn’t you have tried to obey the system?”

  Luterin Shokerandit started to run. At least it was downhill. His knee hurt from his fall. He listened for the sound of another sledge but heard only the wind roaring in his ears.

  The footsteps of Fashnalgid echoed behind him. He never looked back. All his faculties were concentrated on getting through the tunnel to Noonat.

  When he thought he could run no further, he made himself keep on. Once there was a gleam of light to one side. In relief, he halted and went to look. Part of the rock of the outer wall had fallen away, revealing daylight. Nothing could be seen but cloud and, just beyond arm’s reach, a stalactite of ice. He threw a piece of rock into the void, listened, but never heard it fall.

  Fashnalgid caught up with him, blowing hard.

  “Let’s get out through this hole.”

  “It’s a sheer mountainside.”

  “Never mind. Bribahr somewhere down there. Civilisation. Not like this place.”

  “You’ll kill yourself.”

  As Fashnalgid was trying to lever his body through the hole in the rock, a distant horn announced an oncoming sledge—this one also arriving from the south. Shokerandit saw a light looming. He pressed into the natural alcove, forcing himself back against the jagged rock close to Fashnalgid.