Wheel, coughing hoarsely: “Byron says that when he ran back into the world, Fenton was still out there with Aubrey.”
Adviser, sneezing: “There you are! And if you need any more proof that Fenton’s a Zivver who has conspired with the monsters, you have one of our basic beliefs to go by.”
Wheel: “The one that says any Survivor who consorts with Cobalt or Strontium will become deathly sick.”
They stepped deliberately toward the grotto entrance.
Wheel, with a sniffle: “What’ll we do with him?”
Adviser: “The Pit’ll hold him for the moment.” Another sneeze. “Being a Zivver, he’ll be worth something as a hostage, no doubt.”
When they drew the curtain aside Jared heard several armed Protectors taking their posts outside the grotto.
Wheel Anselm came and stood beside Jared, edging Della aside. “Has he made any wakeful noises yet?”
“He’s not a Zivver!” she pleaded. “Let him alone!”
Jared heard that her face was turned directly toward the Wheel. And again he caught the fleeting impression of her hand brushing hair away from her forehead—away from her eyes, actually.
And now he remembered that just before she had handed him the tubular object the monsters had left behind, she had brought it up before her and held it on a level with her face.
It was her eyes that she was zivving with!
Anselm seized his arm and shook him roughly. “All right—up off that ledge! We can hear you’re awake!”
Feebly, Jared struggled to his feet. Lorenz seized his other arm, but he shook off the grip.
“Protectors!” the Adviser shouted anxiously.
And the guards hurried in.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Although he hadn’t thought it possible, the Upper Level Punishment Pit was worse than the one in Jared’s own world. It occurred to him that it would be hard to imagine a more terrible penalty for wrongdoing. As a detention facility, it was escapeproof. The ledge on which he lay was fully two body lengths below the surface. And it was much narrower than his shoulders, so that an arm and leg had to dangle over the abyss.
Lowered there by rope, he lay motionless for hundreds of heartbeats—until his limbs had become numb. Then, cautiously, he had dropped one of his clickstones into the hole. It had fallen—fallen—fallen. And many breaths later, after he had given up hope of listening to the impact, there was the faintest kerplunk he had ever heard.
From remote distances came the sounds of late period activity—children at play after their Familiarization session, manna shells scraping slabs during mealtime, and a staccato frequency of coughs.
Eventually, the echo caster was turned off for the sleep period and, still later, Della came.
On a cord she lowered a shell filled with food. Then she lay with her head overhanging the mouth of the Pit.
“I almost convinced Uncle Noris you couldn’t be a Zivver,” she whispered disappointedly, “until that epidemic got him excited all over again.”
“That sneezing and coughing?”
The steady flow of her voice wavered as she nodded her head. “They ought to be taking mold, like we did. But Lorenz’s telling them it won’t work against Radiation sickness.”
She fell silent and he let the manna shell clatter against the wall of the Pit. Intercepting the sharp echoes, he quickly put together a composite of the girl’s features. And even more than before, he liked what he heard.
The general configuration was soft and confident. Her hair, slicked back from her forehead, had a pleasant sound and gave her face a sleek, delicate tonal balance. Somehow the total impression had much in common with the wistful music she had stroked from the hanging stones. And he fully heard now how desirable she was for Unification.
He brought another shelled crayfish to his mouth, but paused when he realized that even now she must be zivving. Again he let the bowl strike rock to produce more sounding echoes. And he heard that her face was directed fixedly toward him. He could almost feel the intense steadiness of her eyes.
Now was hardly the time, though, to listen for whatever happened to the things about her whenever she zivved. If there was a lessening of something or other, he certainly wouldn’t be able to detect it while clinging precariously to the ledge.
Nevertheless, he did seize upon one fact that had, at the moment, become clear: since both Darkness and Light were probably connected with the eyes—perhaps especially with a Zivver’s eyes—then the lessness he was listening for would no doubt have a measurable effect on the eyes.
Wait! There was something—back in the Wheel’s grotto, when Della had bent over him to shake him awake. Some of her hair had fallen over her face. And when she had brushed it aside, wasn’t there then less hair before her eyes?
He slumped with a tinge of futility. No—Darkness couldn’t be as simple a thing as hair. That would be too ironic—listening for something he had known all his life. Anyway, Cyrus had said Darkness was universal, everywhere. That meant he would have to listen over a broad area, all around the girl.
“Jared,” she said tentatively. “You’re not—I mean you and the monsters aren’t—”
“I haven’t had anything to do with them.”
Her breath escaped with a relieved sound. “Are you from—the Zivver World?”
“No. I’ve never been there.”
The echoes of his words captured her depressed expression.
“Then you’ve spent your whole life hiding the fact you’re a Zivver—just like me,” she said sympathetically.
There was no point in not encouraging her confidence. “It hasn’t been easy.”
“No, it hasn’t. Knowing how much better you can do things, but having to listen to yourself carefully every step of the way so others won’t find out what you are.”
“I pushed it to a fine point—too fine, I suppose. Otherwise I wouldn’t be down here now.”
He heard her hand slide down along the side of the Pit, as though reaching out for him. “Oh, Jared! Does it mean as much to you—finding out you’re not alone? I never guessed anybody else had to go through the same gestations of Radiation and fear that I did—always afraid of being found out at the next step.”
He could appreciate the close relationship she must feel for him, the way her loneliness was crying out. And he sensed something within himself straining toward the girl, even though he was no Zivver in need of sympathetic response.
She went on effusively, “I don’t understand why you didn’t go hunting for the Zivver World long ago. I would have. But I was always afraid I wouldn’t find it and would get lost in the passages.”
“I wanted to go there too,” he lied. And it was beginning to appear that he could play the role of a Zivver simply by following her lead. “But I have an obligation to the Lower Level.”
“Yes, I know.”
“I don’t hear—that is, I don’t ziv why you didn’t join up with the Zivvers during one of their raids,” he said.
“Oh, I couldn’t do that. What if I tried and the Zivvers wouldn’t take me? Then everybody would know what I am. I’d be driven into the passages as a Different One!”
She rose and stood zivving down into the Pit.
“You’re leaving?” he asked.
“Only until I can figure out some way to help you.”
“How long do they intend keeping me here?” He tried to change position but succeeded only in almost slipping off the ledge.
“Until the monsters come back. Then Uncle Noris is going to let them know we have you as a hostage.”
Listening to her footfalls recede, he was fascinated with the whole range of things that might come out of his association with the girl. Even if Light and Darkness remained elusive, he at least might learn something about this intriguing ability the Zivvers had.
It was past midsleep when Jared, his muscles cramped and aching, finally managed to ease himself into a sitting position. He tapped the manna shell against rock and li
stened. It wasn’t a very wide hole—about two body lengths across, he estimated. And he could hear that, except for the ledge on which he perched, the sides were barren of fissures and outcroppings that might have provided handholds toward the surface.
He brought a knee up against his chest and secured his foot on the shelf. Then, with arms outstretched against the slick wall, he rose bit by bit until he was standing. Slowly, he turned around, pressing his chest against the rock. Reaching overhead, he produced sharp tones by snapping his fingers. And the sudden drop-off in the sound pattern told him that the rim of the Pit was at least another arm’s length beyond his extended hand.
He remained in that position for several hundred beats before he heard all Radiation breaking loose above. Until then there had been only the normal sounds of a world lying dormant in midslumber, with an occasional outburst of coughs ruffling the relative quiet.
Then everything seemed to boil over into a great excitement and confusion as one of the Protectors sounded the fearful warning, “Monsters! Monsters!”
Hoarse shouts, screams, and the audible agitation of people scurrying frenziedly about poured down the Pit.
Jared almost lost his balance as he tilted his head back and became aware that the entire opening above was whispering with silent sound. Unlike the sensation experienced during Effective Excitation, however, there was only one circle of the weird monster stuff. And it didn’t seem to be actually touching his eyes. Rather, it corresponded in size and shape with his audible impression of the Pit’s mouth.
He tottered on the ledge, flailing his arms to keep from falling, then stood with his face pressed firmly against stone as he listened to someone running in his direction.
In the next instant Jared recognized the Adviser’s voice coming from halfway across the world, “You at the Pit yet, Sadler?”
There was another distant outburst of screams as Sadler drew to a halt overhead. “I’m here!” He thudded his spear against rock to sound out Jared’s position on the ledge below.
This time it was the Wheel’s voice that rose in challenge to the monsters: “We’ve got Fenton! We know he’s working with you! Get back or we’ll kill him!”
Another wave of screams suggested that the monsters were ignoring Anselm’s threat.
“All right, Sadler,” Lorenz roared. “Send him to the bottom!”
The spear tip grazed Jared’s shoulder and he winced, sidling along the ledge. It came back again, slipped between his chest and the wall of the Pit and began prying him from his perch. Jared toppled over backward and his arms threshed air as he fought to keep from plunging into the unfathomable abyss.
His flailing hand touched and gripped the lance. He jerked himself desperately upright. He gave the spear a violent tug and the full weight of the man at the other end came along with it.
Abruptly the spear was free in his hand and he felt the rush of air as Sadler went plunging by, screaming all the way down.
The weapon was more than long enough to span the Pit. Jared used it as a prodding stick to locate a minor recess in the opposite side. Wedging its butt into the depression, he propped the point against the wall above him.
Panic subsided as quickly as it had broken out overhead. Apparently the invaders had accomplished their purpose and withdrawn.
Jared hoisted himself onto the wedged spear, reached up, gained a purchase on the lip of the Pit and pulled himself out.
“Jared! You’re free!”
Echoes from her footfalls brought fragmentary impressions of Della racing toward him. And he could hear the soft swish of the coil of rope slung across her shoulder and brushing against her arm.
He tried to get his bearings. But the residual din of dismayed voices was too confusing to indicate which way the entrance lay.
Della caught his hand. “I couldn’t find a rope until just now.”
Impulsively, he started off in the direction he was facing.
“No.” She spun him around. “The entrance is this way. Ziv it?”
“Yes. I ziv it now.”
He hung back slightly, letting her remain a step or two ahead and following the tug of her hand.
“We’ll circle wide, along by the river,” she proposed. “Maybe we can reach the passage before they turn on the central caster.”
And he had been hoping someone would do just that. Of course he hadn’t realized that the clacks which would sound out the obstacles before him would also betray their presence to the others.
His foot contacted a minor outcropping and he stumbled. Eventually righting himself with the girl’s help, he limped on. Then, constraining the anxiety of escape, he composed himself and called upon all the devices he had acquired through gestations of training when he had to learn to detect the subtle rhythm of a heartbeat, the swishing silence of a lazy stream agitated by the motion of a fish beneath its calm surface, the distant scent and slither of a salamander as it crossed moist stone.
More confident now, he listened for sound—any kind of sound, remembering that even the most insignificant noise is useful. There! That lurching catch in Della’s breath as she drew in the next lungful of air. It meant she was stepping onto a slight elevation. He was prepared when he reached the rise.
He listened intently to the other things about her. Heartbeats were too indistinct to be useful except as direct sound. But there was something rattling faintly in her carrying case. He sniffed the imperceptible odors of a variety of edibles. She had packed a good deal of food and one morsel was striking the side of her pouch with each step. The slight flops meant echoes, if he listened attentively enough. There they were now—almost lost among the greater noises from the rest of the world. But they were sufficiently vivid to relay audible impressions of the things before him.
Now he was sure of himself again.
They left the bank of the river, cutting across behind the manna orchard, and had made it almost to the entrance when someone finally turned on the central echo caster.
Immediately, he caught the full composite of a few faint impressions that had worried him for the last few beats—a guard had just arrived to take his post at the entrance.
A moment later the man sounded the alarm. “Somebody’s trying to get out! Two of them!”
Jared lowered his shoulder and charged. He crashed into the sentry, knocking him breathless and bowling him over.
Della caught up with him and they lunged into the passageway. He let her stay in the lead until they had rounded the first bend. Then he produced a pair of stones and pushed ahead of her.
“Clickstones?” she asked, puzzled.
“Of course. If we run into somebody from the Lower Level they might wonder why I’m not using them.”
“Oh. Jared, why don’t we—no. I suppose not.”
“What were you going to say?” He felt perfectly at ease now, with the familiar tones of the pebbles faithfully bringing back true impressions of all the hazards ahead.
“I started to say let’s go to the Zivver World where we belong.”
He pulled up sharply. The Zivver World! Why not? If he was listening for a lessness of something that resulted from zivving, what better place to detect it than in a world where plenty of people were doing a lot of zivving? But could he get away with it? Could he successfully pose as a Zivver in a world full of Zivvers—and hostile ones at that?
“I can’t leave the Lower Level just now,” he decided finally.
“That’s what I figured. Not with all the trouble they’re having. But someperiod, Jared—someperiod we’ll go there?”
“Someperiod.”
She tightened her grip on his hand. “Jared! What if the Wheel sends a runner to the Lower Level to tell them you’re a Zivver?”
“They wouldn’t—” He paused. He’d started to say they wouldn’t believe it. But with the Guardian dedicated to stirring up sentiment against him, he wondered.
When they reached his world, he found it odd that there were no longer any Protectors at th
e entrance. The clear, firm clacks of the central caster did reveal, however, the presence of someone standing there at the end of the passageway. And when he moved closer he received the reflected impression of feminine form, hair-over-face.
It was Zelda.
Hearing them she started. Then, nervously, she probed them with clickstones until they came into the full sound of the caster.
“You sure picked a Radiation of a time to bring a Unification partner back,” she reproved after she had recognized Jared.
“Why?”
“There’ve been two more kidnappings by the monsters,” she answered. “That’s why we’re not defending the entrance any longer. They took one of the Protectors. Meanwhile, the Guardian’s managed to get the whole world worked up against you.”
“Maybe I can do something about that,” he returned irately.
“I don’t think you can. You’re not Prime Survivor any longer. Romel’s taken over.” Zelda coughed several times and it sent the hair flying from in front of her face.
He strode off toward the Official Grotto.
“Wait,” the girl called. “There’s something else. Everybody’s boiling at you. Hear all that?”
He listened toward the residential section. The world was resounding with coughs.
“They blame you for this epidemic,” she explained, “since they remember you were the first to have all the symptoms.”
“Jared’s back!” someone in the orchard shouted.
Another Survivor, farther along the way, took up the cry and passed it on to still a third.
Presently a score of persons could be heard filing out of the orchard where they had been working. Others spilled from the grottoes. And they were all converging on the entrance.
Jared studied the reflected clacks and picked up impressions of Romel and Guardian Philar in the forefront of the advance. They were flanked on either side by a number of Protectors.
Della seized his arm anxiously. “Maybe it would be safer if we just left.”
Galaxy's Edge Magazine: Issue 2: May 2013 Page 29