Starship

by Brian W Aldiss

  Losing a woman could be a serious matter. The Greene tribe comprised some nine hundred souls, of which nearly half were under age and only about 130 were women. Mating duels were the commonest form of trouble in Quarters.

  He was marched in front of the lieutenant. Guard-flanked, the old man sat at an ancient desk, eyes carefully guarded under grizzled eyebrows. Without a movement or sign he conveyed displeasure.

  "Expansion to your ego, sir," Complain offered humbly.

  "At your expense," came the stock response. And then, growled, "How did you manage to lose your woman, Hunter Roy Complain?"

  Haltingly, he explained how she had been seized at the top of Sternstairs. "It may have been the work of Forwards," he suggested.

  "Don't raise that bogery here," Zilliac, one of Greene's attendants, barked. "We've heard those tales of super-races before, and don't believe them. The Greene tribe is master of everything this side of Deadways."

  As Complain gave his story, the lieutenant grew gradually more angry. His limbs began to shake; his eyes filled with tears; his mouth distorted till his chin was glistening with saliva. The desk began to rock in unison with his fury. As he rocked, he growled, and under the shaggy white hair his skin turned a pale maroon. Despite his fear, Complain had to admit it was a brilliant performance.

  Its climax came when the lieutenant, vibrating like a top with the wrath pouring from him, fell suddenly to the ground and lay still. At once Zilliac and his fellow, Patcht, stood over the body, dazers at the ready, faces twitching with reciprocal anger.

  Slowly, very slowly and tremblingly, the lieutenant climbed back on to his chair, exhausted by the necessary ritual. "He'll kill himself some day, doing that," Complain told himself. The thought warmed him a little.

  "Now to decide your punishments under the law," the old man said, in a husk of a voice. He glanced around the room in a helpless fashion. "You know the laws, young man. My grandfather formed them when he formed the tribe. They are next to the Teaching in importance in our ... in our lives. What is all that row outside? Yes, he was a great man, my grandfather. I remember on the day he died he sent for me."

  Fear glands were working copiously in Complain, but in a sudden moment of detachment he saw the four of them, each pursuing an elusive thread in his own being, conscious of the others only as interpretations or manifestations of his own fears. They were isolated, and every man's hand was against his neighbor.

  "What shall the sentence be?" Zilliac growled, cutting into the lieutenant's reminiscences.

  "Oh, ah, let me see. You are already punished by losing your woman, Complain. There is no other available woman for you at present. What is all that noise outside?"

  "He must be punished or it may be thought you are losing your grip," Patcht suggested craftily.

  "Your suggestion was unnecessary, Patcht. Hunter— er, Complain, for the next six sleep-wakes you will suffer six strokes, to be administered by the guard captain before each sleep, starting now. Good. You can go. And, Zilliac, for Hem sake go and see what all that row is outside."

  So Complain found himself outside again. A wall of noise and color met him. Everyone seemed to be here, dancing senselessly in an orgy of enjoyment. Normally he would have flung himself in too, eager as anyone to throw off the oppressive routines of life; but in his present mood he merely slunk around the outside of the crowd, avoiding their eyes.

  Nevertheless, he delayed the return to his compartment. He would be turned out of there now: single men did not have their own rooms. He loitered on the fringes of the merriment, his stomach heavy with expectation of the coming punishment, while the bright dance whirled by. Several groups jigged rapturously to the sound of stringed instruments. The noise was incessant, and in the frenetic movements of the dancers —heads jerking, fingers twitching— an onlooker might have found cause for alarm. But there were few non-participants. The tall, saturnine doctor, Lindsey, was one; Fermour was another, too slow for this whirl; Wantage was another, pressing his maimed face away from the throng; the public stroker was another. The latter had his appointments to keep, and at the proper time appeared before Complain with a guard escort. The clothes were stripped from his back and the first installment of his punishment was administered.

  A crowd of eyes usually watched these events. For once there was something better happening; Complain suffered almost privately. Tomorrow he might expect more attention.

  Pulling his shirt down over his wounds, he went back to his compartment. He entered, and found Marapper, the priest, awaiting him.

  III

  Henry Marapper was a bulky man. He squatted patiently on his haunches, his big belly dangling. The posture was not an unconventional one for him, but his time of calling was. Stiffly, Complain stood before the crouching figure, awaiting greeting or explanation; neither came and he was forced to say something first. Pride stifled everything but a grunt. At this Marapper raised a hand.

  "Expansion to your ego, son."

  "At your expense, father."

  "And turmoil in my id," capped the priest piously, making the customary genuflection of rage without troubling to rise.

  "I have been stroked, father," Complain said heavily, taking a mug of yellowish water from a pitcher; he drank some and used some to smooth down his hair.

  "So I heard, Roy, so I heard. I trust your mind is eased by the degradation?"

  "At considerable cost to my spine, yes."

  He began to haul his shirt over his shoulders, taking his time, flinching a little. The pain, as the fibers of the garment tugged out of the wounds, was almost pleasant. It would be worse next sleep-wake. Finally he flung the garment to the floor and spat at it. Irritation stirred within him to see how indifferently the priest had watched his struggle.

  "Not dancing, Marapper?" he asked tartly.

  "My duties are with the mind, not the senses," the other said piously. "Besides, I know better ways to oblivion."

  "Such as being snatched away into the tangles, I suppose?"

  "It pleases me to hear you taking your own part so sharply, my friend; that is how the Teaching would have it. I feared to find you in the doldrums: but happily it seems my comfort is not needed."

  Complain looked down at the face of the priest, avoiding the bland eyes. It was not a handsome face. Indeed, at this moment it hardly seemed a face at all, but a totem roughly molded in lard, a monument perhaps to the virtues by which man survived: cunning, greed, self-seeking. Unable to help himself, Complain warmed to the man; here was someone he knew and could consequently deal with.

  "May my neuroses not offend, father," he said. "You know I have lost my woman, and my life feels wasted.

  "Whatever I have laid claim to —and that's little enough— has gone from me, or what remains will be forcibly taken. The guards will come, the guards who have already whipped and will whip me again tomorrow, and turn me out of here to live with the single men and boys. No rewards for my hunting, or comfort for my distress! The laws of this tribe are too harsh, priest —the Teaching itself is cruel cant— the whole stifling world nothing but a seed of suffering. Why should it be so? Why should there not be a chance of happiness? Ah, I will run amok as my brother did before me; I'll tear through that fool crowd outside and cut the memory of my discontent into every one of them!"

  "Spare me more," the priest interrupted. "I have a large parish to get around; your confessions I will hear, but your rages must be kept to entertain yourself." He rose to his feet, stretching, and adjusted the greasy cloak around his shoulders. "But what do we get out of life here?" Complain asked, fighting down an impulse to clamp his hands around that fat neck. "Why are we here? What is the object of the world? You're a priest— tell me."

  Marapper sighed windily, and raised his palms in a gesture of rejection. "My children, your ignorance staggers me: what determination it has; 'The world,' you say, meaning this petty, uncomfortable tribe. The world is more than that. We —everything: ponics, Deadways, the Forwards people, the wh
ole shoot— are in a sort of container called a ship, moving from one bit of the world to another. I've told you this time and time again, but you won't grasp it."

  "That theory again!" Complain said sullenly. "What if the world is called ship, or ship the world, it makes no difference to us."

  For some reason, the ship theory, known though generally disregarded in Quarters, upset and frightened him. He tightened his mouth and said, "I wish to sleep now, father. Sleep at least brings comfort. You bring only riddles. Sometimes I see you in my sleep, you know; you are always telling me something I ought to understand, but somehow I never hear a word."

  "And not only in your dreams," said the priest pleasantly, turning away. "I had something important to ask you, but it must wait. I shall return tomorrow, and hope to find you less at the mercy of your adrenalin," he added, and with that was gone.

  For a long while Complain stared at the closed door, not hearing the sounds of revelry outside. Then, wearily, he climbed up on the empty bed.

  Sleep did not come. His mind ran over the endless quarrels he and Gwenny had suffered in this room— the search for a more cruel and crushing remark, the futility of their armistices. Suddenly, tracing over the events which led to Gwenny's abduction, he recalled the ghostly figure that had faded into the ponics at their approach. He sat up in bed, uneasy at something more than the uncanny expertise with which the figure had vanished. Outside his door, all was now quiet. The race of his thoughts must have gone on for longer than he had imagined; the dance was done, the dancers overcome by sleep. Only he with his consciousness pierced the tomblike veil that hung over the corridors of Quarters. If he opened his door now, he might hear the distant, never-ending rustle of ponic growth.

  But nervousness made the thought of opening his door dreadful to him. Complain recalled in a rush the legends of strange beings which were frequently told in Quarters.

  There were, first, the mysterious peoples of Forwards. Forwards was a distant area; the men there had alien ways and weapons, and powers unknown. They were slowly advancing through the tangle and would eventually wipe out all the small tribes; or so the legends ran. But however formidable they might be, it was acknowledged they were at least human.

  The mutants were subhuman. They lived as hermits, or in small bands amid the tangles, driven there from the tribes. They had too many teeth, or too many arms, or too few brains. They could sometimes only hobble, or creep, or scuttle, owing to a deformity in the joints. They were shy; and because of this a number of weird attributes had been wished on them.

  And then there were the Outsiders. The Outsiders were inhuman. Dreams of old men like Eff were troubled perpetually by the Outsiders. They had been created super-naturally out of the hot muck of the tangles. Where nobody penetrated, they had stirred into being. They had no hearts or lungs, but externally resembled other men, so that they could live undetected among mortals, gathering power, and siphoning off the powers of men, like vampires drawing blood. Periodically among the tribes witch-hunts were held; but the suspects, when carved up for examination, always had hearts and lungs. The Outsiders invariably escaped detection— but everyone knew they were there: the very fact that witch-hunts took place proved it.

  They might be gathering outside the door now, as menacingly as that silent figure had faded into the ponics.

  This was the simple mythology of the Greene tribe, and it did not vary radically from the hierarchy of hobgoblins sustained by the other tribes moving slowly through that region known as Deadways. Part of it, yet entirely a separate species, were the Giants. The Forwarders, the mutants, and the Outsiders were all known to exist; occasionally a mutant would be dragged in living from the tangles and made to dance before the people until, tiring of him, they despatched him on the Long Journey; and many warriors would swear they had fought solitary duels with Forwarders and Outsiders; but there was in these three orders of beings an elusive quality. During wakes, in company, it was easy to discount them.

  The Giants could not be discounted. They were real. Once everything had belonged to them, the world had been theirs, some even claimed that men were descended from them. Their trophies lay everywhere and their greatness was plain. If ever they returned, there would be no resisting.

  In the midst of his anxiety, Complain recalled something else: the sound of crying he and Gwenny had heard. The two separate facts slipped smoothly together. The man— the approaching tribe. The man had not been an Outsider, or anything so mysterious. He had merely been a flesh and blood hunter from the other tribe. As simple, as obvious as that. . . .

  Complain lay back, relaxing. His stupidity had been gently nuzzled out of the way by a little deduction. Although slightly appalled to think how the obvious had eluded him, he was nevertheless proud to consider this new lucidity. He never ratiocinated enough. Everything he did was too automatic, governed by the local laws, or the universal Teaching, or his own private moods; this should not be from now on. From now on, he would be more like— well, Marapper, for instance, valuing things— but immaterial things, as Roffery valued the material ones.

  Experimentally, he cast around for other facts. Perhaps if you could collect enough facts, even the ship theory might be turned into sense.

  He should have reported the approaching tribe to Lieutenant Greene. That was an error. If the tribes met, there would be hard fighting; the Greenes must be prepared. Well, that report must go in later.

  Almost surreptitiously, he dropped asleep.

  No aroma of cooking greeted Complain when he woke. He sat up stiffly, groaned, scratched his head, and climbed out of bed. For a time he thought that nothing but wretchedness, filled him; then he felt, underneath the wretchedness, a resilience stirring. He was going to act, was going to be driven to act: how, would resolve itself later. Hauling on his slacks, he paddled over to the door and pulled it open. Outside, a strange silence beckoned. Complain followed it into the Clearing.

  The revels were now over. The actors, not bothering to return to their apartments, lay where sleep had found them, among the bright ruins of their gaiety. Only children called as usual, prodding somnolent mothers into action. Quarters looked like a broad battlefield; but the slain had not bled, and suffering was not yet finished for them.

  A figure was approaching. Not without misgiving, Complain recognized his mother. The law in Quarters, not rigorously enforced, was that a child should cease to communicate with his brothers and sisters when he was hip high, and with his mother when he was waist high. But Myra was a garrulous woman; what her waist proscribed, her tongue discarded, and she talked firmly to her many children whenever possible.

  "Greetings, Mother," Complain grunted. "Expansion to your ego."

  "At your expense, Roy."

  "Look, my back hurts: I don't feel like talking."

  "Of course it hurts, Roy; you mustn't expect it not to. What it'll be like when you've finished your punishment, I shudder to think. I've got some fat I'll rub on it for you, and that'll ease the pores. Remember, Roy, things won't always be bad. Don't let it get you down."

  "Things are always bad, Mother, what's there to live for?"

  "You shouldn't talk like that. I know what the Teaching says about not hiding any bitterness within you, but you don't look at things the way I do. Life is a mystery. The mere fact of being alive------"

  "I know all that."

  Myra looked hard at his angry face, and the lines on hers rearranged themselves into an expression of softness.

  "When I want to comfort myself," she said, "I think of a great stretch of blackness, sweeping off forever in all directions. And in this blackness, a host of little lanterns begin to burn. Those lanterns are our lives, burning bravely. They show us our surroundings. But what the surroundings mean, who lit the lamps, why they were lit. ..." She sighed. "When we make the Long Journey, when our lamp goes out, perhaps we shall know more."

  "And you say that comforts you?" Roy asked scornfully. It was a long while since he had heard the lante
rn parable from his mother. It was soothing to hear it again now, but he could not allow her to see this.

  "Yes. Yes, it comforts me. You see, our lanterns are burning together here." She indicated a spot between them with a small finger. "I'm thankful mine isn't burning alone here, out in the unknown." She indicated a spot an arm's length away.

  Shaking his head, Complain stood up.

  "I don't see it," he confessed. "It might very well be better out over there."

  "Oh, yes, it might. But it would be different. That's what I'm afraid of. It would all be different: everything would be different."

  "You're probably right. I just wish it were different here. By the way, Mother, my brother Gregg who left the tribe and went alone into the tangles------"

  "You still think of him?" the old lady asked eagerly. "Gregg was a good one, Roy; he'd have made a guard if he had stayed."

  "Do you think he might still be alive?"

  She shook her head decisively. "In the tangles? You may be certain the Outsiders got him. A great pity . . . Gregg would have made a good guard. I've always said so."

  Complain was about to go when she said sharply, "Old Ozbert Bergass still breathes. They tell me he calls for his daughter Gwenny. It is your duty to go to him."

  She spoke, for once, undeniable truth. And for once duty was colored with pleasure; Bergass was a tribal hero.

  The rooms in which Bergass had his household were now far in the rear of Quarters. Once, these rooms had been at the leading barricade. As the tribe inched its way forward, they had gradually slipped back; when they had been in the midst of the tribe, Ozbert Bergass had been at the height of his power. Now, in his old age, his rooms lay far to the rear of anyone else's. The last barrier, the barricade between humanity and Deadways, stood just beyond his door.

  In contrast with the temporary cheerfulness of the rest of Quarters, Bergass's passage looked sinister and chill. Long ago, probably in the time of the Giants, some sort of an explosion had taken place. The walls were blackened for some distance, and overhead a hole bigger than a man's length gaped. Here, outside the old guide's doors, no lights burned.