Pock's World

by Dave Duncan

  Huffle was not the most luminescent object in the galaxy. One of his brothers told him once that he would not rank an M in a stellar catalogue. When Huffle found out what that meant, he injured his brother severely. Another time a cousin said what a pity that the extra intelligence genes his parents had paid for had been spliced in backward. Huffle had understood enough of that crack right away to hurt his cousin even more—his physical genes worked only too well.

  On the brighter side, at nine Pocosin years old he stood well over two and a half meters tall and was broad in proportion. He began to win adult wrestling matches. At ten he took the world belt, and the Hederalian Army was happy to enlist him. His family was even happier.

  Now Private Huffle was on dawn watch with Sergeant Terest, guarding the Thing. He liked Sarge Terest because he did not want to talk all the time about stupid things Huffle did not understand. He mostly just sat and cognized, which was fine with Huffle, who liked to cognize, too. Porn mostly, but sometimes sport. He had a voice implant and a one-to-see-with, but that one didn’t work right, only black and white. The doctors said they couldn’t fix that to let him cognize in color the way most people did. But girls in black-and-white were still girls, even if blood didn’t look as good.

  Guarding the Thing was fun. It looked like a boy, until you looked real hard. It lived inside a shock fence in a cell full of medical stuff that Huffle mustn’t touch. There was a table inside the shock fence, too, but the Thing slept on a mattress on the floor below. That was where the fun came in. Huffle would wait until the Thing was asleep and then writhe it. It would waken with a scream of pain. Huffle would laugh and wait until it went to sleep again. Then jolt it again.

  Terest said it was all right to do this, as long as he held the writhe down low where the cameras wouldn’t see him doing it. The Thing wasn’t even human, he said, so it had no rights, no lawyers or nothing. And Huffle must keep the writhe on a low setting, because he would be in trouble if he damaged it. Huffle usually just kept the writhe set on 2, which was standard and hurt plenty. Often the jolt made the Thing bang itself on the table leg, which was even more fun, but its own doing, so the cuts and bruises were not Huffle’s fault.

  Now the Thing had gone back to sleep, and it was time to jolt it again. Terest was lost in whatever he was watching—probably porn, from the bulge in his shorts. Huffle twisted around so the camera wouldn’t see him slide the writhe out of its holster. He fired, but the Thing didn’t move.

  “That’s funny. Sarge, what’s wrong with the Thing?”

  Terest said, “Huh?” and then, “What’ch mean?”

  “I just writhed it, and it didn’t move. See?” He writhed it again.

  “What’ch set on?”

  Huffle peered at his writhe to make sure. “Standard.”

  “Try 4.”

  Four was one above Agony and one below Convulsions. That ought to be fun! He’d never jolted anyone that hard before. Huffle let the Thing have it. It twitched some and rolled off the mattress, but that was all. No scream.

  “It’s alive, anyway. I’ll try closer.” Huffle got up and walked over until the shock fence was making his hair stand on end and he could look down at the Thing.

  Its eyes were open, staring up at him. It shot a hand through the fence and grabbed his ankle. That was impossible. No one could stand the pain of a shock fence. The Thing looked like it was hurting bad, chewing blood out of its lip, but it kept hold of his ankle. He was going to call out to Sarge to come and see what the Thing was doing, and then…

  Something funny happened. In his head.

  His thumb pushed the setting on his writhe up higher, up past the seal, which meant alarms would go off at HQ. Funny, that, because he hadn’t told his thumb to move at all. The setting went all the way to 7, which was Brain Dead and a division inquiry. His hand turned to aim the writhe across the room at the camera. He wondered why it was doing that. His finger pulled the trigger and the camera exploded in a spray of green sparks. Hey! Pretty! Then his wrist adjusted the aim.

  Terest said, “What’ch doing, you crazy—” and collapsed in a heap as Huffle’s finger moved again, all on its own.

  Now the writhe pointed itself at a control panel on the wall. Pretty blue and red sparks! The tingling of the shock fence didn’t stop, though. The control for that was outside in the corridor.

  Suddenly the Thing yanked Huffle’s foot out from under him. He’d been thrown a time or time in his wrestling career, but not onto concrete. He hit the floor hard, sending the writhe skittering away, far out of reach. The impact hurt, but not like the hurt of having his legs in the shock fence. He screamed and went on screaming.

  He didn’t have to put up with that from a runt like the Thing—he massed three or four times what it did. He kicked with his free boot to smash its chest in. Except that the Thing caught hold of that ankle also and blocked the kick.

  It was smiling, saying things he couldn’t hear over his own screams. It let him squirm and struggle for a little while, all his muscles jerking in violent spasms, bouncing him up and down on the concrete. Then it pulled him farther in, so the fence got his gonads. He had thought he was hurting bad before that happened.

  When Private Huffle passed out, the prisoner hauled him far enough inside the fence so that the charge went into his head. And that was that.

  Chapter 4

  The first attempt on Ratty Turnsole’s life had come just before his twentieth birthday. There had been others since, but for those he had been prepared. He easily convinced the palace guard that he knew all he would ever need know about weapons and martial arts. He was issued a writhe.

  Joy admitted him to the Church of the Mother.

  Bedel swore him in as her consort.

  “And try these,” he added, handing over a small bag. “One at a time, mind! One of them ought to connect your implants to the private network.”

  “Now what, Your Holiness?” Ratty said, adjusting his elbow-length cape. Adjusting his mind to all this was going to take a lot longer. He was nuts.

  Joy was still bouncing up and down with happiness. “Undra! And hurry. We’re going to be late.”

  “Duty left Car One for you,” Bedel said. “You’ll make it.”

  They ran hand-in-hand.

  “What’s Undra?”

  “Undra’s where the World Council meets. Monody presides.”

  Car One would have seated eight in comfort. Apart from Monody and her new consort, it held only two blue-caped guards, Omass and Kropotkin. They were solid and steady-eyed; Ratty decided he could safely leave security matters to them, because they wouldn’t listen to him anyway.

  Joy insisted that he sit beside her, of course. The guards spaced themselves around the circle to balance the craft’s trim, and it took off like a shuttle, eyeballs in. Scenery started hurtling past below them. Car One could outrun anything on Pock’s World, Joy said trustingly. Ratty didn’t mention that he owned two or three that were faster.

  He picked through the disks in the bag, clipping each in turn to his visor headband. The fifth one connected. Joy was there in his mind.

  —Oh, good! Now we can chat. Have you noticed Kropotkin’s muscles?

  Yes, but I still prefer your tits.

  —Stop that!

  You started it. He put the bag away. Now tell me about Undra.

  Pock’s World had many governments; he had forgotten that. Leaders or deputy leaders from the Theriac Emperor on down to independent mayors were meeting to discuss the crisis—and this stripling girl was going to chair their deliberations? But she was Monody, and she would be in contact with Duty and Oxindole through the private network. Hard work for her, it would be a grinding bore for her consort.

  Love and Duty were already elsewhere, trying to calm riots and demonstrations. Even old Wisdom had roused herself to help, cognizing with senior priestesses around the world. This seemed like a waste of valuable pleasure time when everyone was going to die in less than two days, but Ratty must p
retend to believe, just as almost everyone must be pretending to believe. He doubted very much that Duty herself believed her own edict.

  Meanwhile to relax in a luxurious air car with his arm around the most beautiful girl in the world was a precious way to spend his final hours. A line of three volcanoes went by on the left, one of them smoking. Joy was in idling mode, lazily feeding him pictures of her favorite beaches and jungles. She was a bird fancier, and Pock’s had zillions of brightly colored birds. Once in a while she would cognize images of Ratty in copulatory mode, and he would retaliate with memories of her thrashing and moaning in orgasm.

  Love?

  —Yes, love?

  Can you cog Wisdom?

  —Of course.

  I’m a very nosy person…. I’d love to know what happened between her and Brother Andre fifty years ago. That’s about thirty of your years. His church sent him home in disgrace, you know.

  For a few moments there was silence. Then Joy started to snigger.

  Tell me!

  —She says he was trying to convert her. She wanted to audition him as a full time stud. Neither of them succeeded.

  No. But?

  —But they were caught skinny dipping in the hot pool.

  Ratty’s efforts not to explode in laughter were almost successful, but a sort of snorting noise did escape through his nose, loud enough to make Omass and Kropotkin look at him askance. The story was not something he would have included in The Saint of Annatto! But saints were allowed a few juvenile peccadilloes, even skinny dipping.

  Suddenly Oxindole was there in his mind. Evidently the private network did not use file pictures, for he was seated at a meeting with many other people, and he looked as close to frantic as he was ever likely to look.

  —Omass? How soon could you get Her Holiness to Hederal?

  Omass appeared. —Twenty minutes, Consort.

  —Joy, there’s a major riot surrounding the hospital where they’re holding the cuckoo. We want you to go by there and see if you can calm them. People have been killed already, so you’re not to take any risks. Understand that, Omass? If just the sight of Car One doesn’t work, then you’ll probably have to give up and let it happen. And look out for gunfire!

  Faces flashed as Joy and the guard acknowledged. The car banked steeply.

  “Never a dull moment,” Joy said aloud. “What can you show us on this, captain?”

  Omass took a moment to answer. “There’s file records of the commissioners’ meeting with the cuckoo on Toody.”

  “Good!” Joy said, settling back in the crook of Ratty’s arm. “I’ve been meaning to cog those.”

  * * *

  Hederal was a fair-sized city, even by Ayne standards, but the volcano spouting red fire in the distance was typically Pocosin. The ugly compound of buildings called Colonel Cassinoid Veterans Hospital stood in irregular rows, as if jangled by earthquakes. Around it raged a mob that Ratty’s practiced eye estimated at ten or twelve thousand. In some places people were dangerously close to the shock fence perimeter, liable to be seriously hurt if a crowd surge pushed forward. Hovering several hundred meters overhead, Ratty could receive the cognized warnings from the watchtowers and see the flicker of firearms as the mob responded. A couple of buildings were blazing already.

  “Too dangerous!” Kropotkin growled. “We can’t take Her Holiness down near that, Cap’n.”

  Privately, Ratty could not have agreed more. In his view, they should just let the mob have that pear-faced juvenile freak with the bizarre plumbing. Nine, or Umandral, might think of himself as the wave of the future and brag of a billion siblings, but he looked too much like a beetle. Stamp on him! He wasn’t worth risking real people’s lives. How did one persuade the Hederalian army to back off?

  He could tell that Joy wasn’t thinking that way. This was her first big chance. She was excited by the challenge and the images of the alien and the way he was being treated had outraged her. “Can you project me from here, Omass?”

  Pause. Then the guard said hesitantly, “A little lower we could.”

  “They’ve noticed me,” she said. “See all the faces looking up? Take us down and I’ll speak to them.”

  To Ratty’s horror, the two guards looked to him for approval. Damn!

  “Well, if you’re going to cognize them, my love, then I’m the expert. You sit on this side, with that mountain in the background. I’ll sit over here.” The width of the car put them a little farther apart than he liked for interviewing, but it would do. “Can you raise any file pictures of that cuckoo, Captain?”

  —No! Wait! Oxindole appeared.

  Ratty snapped aloud, “Go away we’re busy!” and cut him out. “A still shot of the kid sitting on that table? For god’s—I mean goddess’s—sake, don’t have any mouthing off about ovipositors or being infinitely better or impregnating men.” An image formed in his mind, the freak sitting on the table baring his teeth in what could be taken as a smile. “That’s perfect!”

  He sat down beside Omass. “Give me that, so I can splice it in. Now take us down slowly. Kropotkin, you keep watch for trouble, I mean shooting, and if there’s any nonsense, whisk us out of there at ten gees. Joy, love, relax; you’re too tense. Keep your eyes on me. I’ll do the cognizing. I’ll signal like this when I’m going to put you on, and like this when I’m going to show the cuckoo, and like this when it’s taken off again. We’ll only hold him there a moment.” Definitely, the less the mob saw of Umandral the better.

  “Okay, Captain, take us down.”

  He sat back and smiled reassuringly across at Joy, although it took every atom of his training and experience not to show how terrified he felt. “You got your words ready? Speak aloud, just to me.”

  She nodded.

  “And remember you are talking to your lover. You love them all, even the smelly ones.”

  Omass muttered, ‘Try now.”

  Ratty gave her the signal.

  “I am Monody,” she said. “You are the goddess’s children, and what you are doing is wrong.” She paused and Ratty was just about to ask a question when she went on. “Innocent people are being hurt and killed. That is evil, my friends. It is wrong. It is true that there is a visitor from another world inside the hospital, but he is no threat to you. He came in peace. He is only a child. Would you like to see him?”

  Ratty raised a hand in readiness.

  “His name is Umandral. Here he is. ”

  The boy appeared, smiling.

  Fade back to Joy.

  “That is Umandral,” she said, with a smile. “Does he look dangerous? Does he frighten you? He is our first visitor from the Canaster Sector in hundreds of years, and he deserves a better welcome than a riot. Go in peace and be about your business. I am on my way to Undra, and I came here to pick up Umandral and take him to meet with the World Council. He is an ambassador with an important message to deliver to us.”

  Gaddomit! Where did she get that from?

  “Live and die happy.”

  CUT!

  Joy sat back and said, “Ooof! How did I do?”

  Ratty managed not to scream. “Wonderful, but why did you add that last bit?”

  She smiled nervously. “I couldn’t think of another way to finish. And if we just go away, the mob will come back and get him, won’t they?”

  She had a point there, but the guards were looking mutinous.

  “Take us down, please,” Ratty said. “Land on a roof, drop me, and then go back up high and wait. If anything goes wrong, carry on to Undra without me.”

  The car resumed its descent. Omass’s face twitched as if he were cognizing.

  “Building 17,” he said.

  “Copy 17,” Kropotkin muttered.

  Omass swore under his breath. “Your Holiness, the thing… the alien… they’re saying it killed two guards in the night. They have it confined still, but it’s murderously dangerous.”

  Joy looked aghast. She had told the world she was going to deliver an ambassado
r. How would he look in a straitjacket?

  “Keep going,” Ratty snapped. “I’ll go in there, and I’ll bring somebody out with me, understand? Then the crowd will disperse. Joy, you’d better explain to your mother or Oxindole.”

  “Shut up, Ratty. I’ve got the whole family fighting inside my head.”

  That was not really a bad thing. Ratty had just realized that he was not a proper Pocosin color yet. Some trigger-happy maniac in the crowd might decide he was another alien and pick him off when he landed. And if he came back out with someone, the same reasoning applied even more. Building 17 was near the center of the complex, a long way from the perimeter fence, but an easy shot for even a fairly stupid gun.

  And now the car was rocking in its own backwash, with Building 17 right below it. Even before it touched down, Kropotkin, if he was the current driver, ordered the door open. Ratty jumped out, ignoring Joy’s efforts to hug him. He strode across to the entrance, blinking in the wind of the car’s ascent as it rushed upward to safety.

  There was Joy in his mind. —Darling, are you all right?

  I haven’t had time to be anything else yet. Watch but don’t interrupt.

  The safe light was on over the shaft, so he stepped in and dropped two floors, to ground level. Half a dozen men in military garb were waiting there, glaring at him. A scrawny woman in a white coat he recognized as Doctor Eryngo. Their manner softened slightly when they saw his cape.

  “Consort Ratty,” he said. “What’s the situation, doctor?”

  He was answered by one of the gun boys, with a major’s leaves on his suspenders. “It killed two of my men in the night. It’s still within the shock fence, but it may be armed. We have—”

  “May be? Don’t you know?”

  “It burned out the surveillance equipment. It couldn’t get at the shock fence controls, though. We drilled some holes in the door and hit it with two dormeiscene darts. That’s enough to fell a mirbane.”

  “Lead me there and keep talking. What happened?”

  The officer strode off. Ratty kept pace, although the goon was half a meter taller.