Midnight at the Well of Souls wos-1

by Jack L. Chalker

  “All right. I got Confederacy but nothing else. That is because all Entries continue to think in their original tongue. What they say is automatically transformed in the neural passages to the language of the native hex. You can understand me, therefore you can speak it as I do if you think hard, make your mouth form the word you think. Take it slowly, one word at a time. Tell me your name and the name of your companions. Then try a simple phrase, one word at a time.”

  Wuju concentrated, the fear and panic evaporating. Once this one had been one of her own kind! A potential friend she would need most of all here. As she started to speak she saw what he meant, and adjusted.

  “I-ahm-Wuju,” she managed, and it almost sounded right. Her mouth and tongue wanted to make a different set of words. “Moy frandiz ahar Nathan Brazil ind Cooseen Baht.”

  “Nathan Brazil!” the big Murnie exclaimed excitedly, suddenly very wide awake. The rest of what he said was unintelligible.

  My god! she thought. Does everybody on this crazy planet know Nathan?

  The Murnie suddenly frowned, and scratched the side of his head thoughtfully. “But the other was an old-culture man by description,” he mused, suddenly looking at her again with those huge yellow eyes. “You mean he still looked like his old self?” She nodded, and his great mouth opened in surprise. “I wonder why he wasn’t changed in the Well?”

  “Whahr est Nathan?” she managed.

  “Well, that’s really the problem,” the Murnie answered. “You see, he’s sort of in two places at once.”

  * * *

  He was a former freighter pilot like Brazil, the native told her, on the line for over two hundred years, facing his fourth rejuve and with all his family and friends dead, his world so changed he couldn’t go home. He had decided to commit suicide, to end the loneliness, when he got a funny distress signal in the middle of nowhere. He had veered to investigate, when suddenly his ship had seemed to cease to exist around him, and he had fallen into the Zone Well and wound up a Murnie.

  “They are good people,” he told her. “Just very different. They can use nothing not found in nature or made by hand. No machines at all. They are bisexual, like us—although an alien couldn’t tell who was who. Strong families, communal, with a strong folk art and music—herdsmen who breed the antelope we eat. Very hostile to strangers, though—they would have killed you last night.”

  “Den woi om I ailoif?” she managed.

  “You’re alive,” he replied, “because you killed about two dozen warriors, directly that is, plus the fire and the like.”

  She didn’t understand, and said so.

  “The Murnie nation accepts death naturally,” he explained. “We don’t fear it, nor dwell on it. We live for each day. It’s far more enjoyable that way. What are respected most and valued most are honor and courage. You all displayed that last night! It took raw courage to run the plain, and great honor to keep going until you dropped rather than give in. If you had surrendered, they would still have killed you. But they found both you and Brazil, badly wounded, unconscious in different parts of the stream bed. It would have been cowardly and dishonorable to have killed you. You had gained respect—so they dragged each of you to the camp nearest where you were found, and your injuries were tended to. Our medicine is quite advanced—this is a rough hex.”

  “Nathan!” she exclaimed. “Ist hay arriot?”

  “He was banged up much worse than you,” the Murnie replied gravely. “You’re going to hurt for a while when the herbal anesthetic wears off, but you have nothing more than four or five deep scratches on your back and a lot of bruises. We have treated them, but they will ache.” He paused for a second. “But Brazil, he was much worse. I don’t know how he kept going. It’s not possible. He should be dead, or, at best, totally paralyzed, yet he walked almost a kilometer down that streambed before collapsing. What an incredible will he must have! The Murnies will sing stories of him and tell of his greatness for centuries! In addition to the hundreds of minor bone breaks, the enormous amount of blood he lost from gaping wounds, and a badly lacerated leg, he had a broken back and neck. He got a kilometer with a broken back and neck!”

  * * *

  She thought of poor Nathan, twisted and bleeding, paralyzed and comatose. The thought made her sick, and it was several minutes and several attempts before she could concentrate on speaking Confederacy again. Tears welled up in her eyes, and she couldn’t stop crying for several minutes. The fierce-looking Murnie stood there feeling helpless and sympathetic.

  Finally she managed, “Ist—hay ist stull aliff?”

  “He is still alive,” the Murnie replied gravely. “Sort of.”

  “Hay Ist oncun—uncrunchus?”

  “Unconscious, yes,” the Murnie replied. “I said, remember, that this was a rough hex that prized honor and courage, and had a lot of knowledge and wisdom within its limits. Because Murithel is totally nontechnological, the inhabitants have turned, aside from herbal compounds and muds, to the powers of the mind. Some of these doctors—and they are doctors—have enormous mental powers. I don’t understand the powers, and I doubt if they do. These people study and concentrate over half their lives to develop the powers. By the time they’re strong enough to be useful, the wise men—Holy Ones we call them—are elderly, sometimes with only a few years to live and to teach the next generation.” He paused again, and started pacing nervously, trying to think of how to say it.

  “When Brazil was brought in so battered and close to death,” he said carefully, “he was already, because of his tremendous courage, the most legendary character ever to be here. The Holy One who examined him did what he could, but saw that death was probable no matter what. He summoned five others—six is a magic number here, for obvious reasons—and they performed a Transference of Honor. It has only been done three or four times since I’ve been here—it shortens the life spans of the Holy Ones by a year or more. They reserve it for the greatest of honor and courage.” He stopped again, his tone changing. “Look, I can see you don’t understand. It is difficult to explain such things when I don’t understand it, either. Umm… Are you a follower of any religion?”

  The idea of religion was extremely funny to her, but she answered gently, “No.”

  “Few of us are—or were, in my day, and I’m sure it’s worse now. But here, against these hills and on these plains, you learn that you are ignorant of almost everything. Call it mechanical, if you will, a part of the Markovian brain’s powers, like our own transformations and this world itself, but accept it: that which is us, our memories, our personality, whatever, can be not only transformed but transferred. Now I—stop looking at me like that! I am not insane. I’ve seen it!”

  “Arrh sou stelling moi daht Nathan ist naow e Murnie?” she asked, unwilling to believe but unwilling to disbelieve, either. Too much had already happened to her on this crazy world.

  “Not a Murnie,” he replied evenly. “That would involve superimposing his—well, they call it his ‘essence’—on somebody else. No, when someone’s so respected that he rates a Transference of Honor, he is transferred to the best thoroughbred breeding stag or doe. Don’t look so shocked—they are of such high quality that they are instantly recognized. No one would eat them, or even bother them.

  “If, then, the body can be successfully brought back to health—which is rare or the Holy Ones would never do the Transference in the first place—he is switched back. If not, he is revered, cared for, and has a happy and peaceful life on the plains.”

  “Nathan est un ahntlupe?” she gasped. It was becoming easier to talk, although her pronunciation was still terrible.

  “A beautiful pure stag,” the Murnie acknowledged. “I’ve seen him. He’s still drugged. I didn’t want him coming out of that state until you and I were both there to explain it to him.”

  “Ist der—ist der unny chants dot hes boody wall liff?” she asked.

  “Will his body live?” the Murnie repeated. “I’m sure I don’t know.
I honestly doubt it, but I would have said that the Transference of Honor was more likely than going a kilometer with a game leg, a broken back, and busted neck. The outcome will depend on how much damage he receives beyond what’s already done.”

  Then he told her of Cousin Bat’s rescue. “He obviously could not consider us civilized or Brazil anything more than the victim of primitive medicine. Would you? So he plucked Brazil’s body up and is even now taking it to Czill where they have a modern hospital. If the body survives the trip—and from what was told me I doubt if it survived the night, let alone the trip—the Czillians will know what happened. One of our people is getting the news to them sometime today just in case. They can sustain the body’s functions indefinitely if it’s still alive, though an empty vessel. Their computers know of the Transference of Honor. If they can heal the body, it can be returned here for retransference, but that is not something to pin your hopes on.

  “I said I experienced three Transferences in my eighty years. Of them all, none of the bodies lasted the night.”

  Nathan Brazil awoke feeling strange. Everything looked strange, too.

  He was on the Murnie plain, he could see that—and it was daylight.

  So I’ve survived again, he thought.

  Things looked crazy, though, as if they were seen through a fish-eye camera lens—his field of vision was a little larger than he was used to, but it was a round picture vastly distorted. Things around the periphery looked close up; but as the view went toward the center of the field of view, everything seemed to move away as if he were looking down a tunnel. The picture was incredibly clear and detailed, but the distortion as things around the field of view bent toward the fixed center made it difficult to judge distances. And the whole world was brown—an incredible number of shades of brown and white.

  Brazil turned his head and looked around. The distortion and color blindness stayed constant.

  And he felt funny, crazy, sort of.

  He thought back. He remembered the mad dash, the fire, falling off Wuju—then everything was dark.

  This is crazy, he thought.

  His hearing was incredibly acute. He heard everything crystal-clear, even voices and movements far away. It took him several minutes to sort out the chatter, finally assigning about eighty percent of it to things he could see.

  There were Murnies moving around, and they all seemed to be light brown to him, although he remembered them as green. Suddenly he heard footsteps near him, and he turned to see a huge Murnie that was all very deep brown coming toward him.

  I must be drugged, he told himself. These are aftereffects of some drug they gave me.

  The big Murnie ambled up to him.

  I must be standing upright on a rack or something, he thought. I’m as tall as he is, and he’s at least two meters, judging by his size, large compared to the run-of-the-Murnie crowd around.

  Two grossly distorted Murnie hands took his head, lowered it slightly, so the creature was looking right into Brazil’s eyes.

  The Murnie grunted, and said, in Confederacy, “Ah! Awake, I see! Don’t try to move yet—I want to let you down easy before that. No! Don’t try to talk! You can’t, so don’t bother.”

  The creature walked a few steps in front of him and sat down tiredly on the grass.

  “I haven’t slept in over a day and a half,” the Murnie said with a sigh. “It feels good just to relax.” He shifted to a more comfortable position, and considered where to begin.

  “Look, Nate,” he began, “first things first. You know I’m an Entry, and I’ve been told I’m not the first one who knew you that you’ve run into here. It kinda figures. Well, if your mind can go back ninety years, you might remember Shel Yvomda. Do you? If so, shake your head.”

  Brazil thought. It was an odd name, he should remember it—but there were so many people, so many names. He tried to shrug, found he couldn’t, and so moved his head slowly from side to side.

  “Oh, well, it doesn’t matter. They call me the Elder Grondel now, Elder because I’ve lived longer than fifty years here and that makes for respect. Grondel is their name—means The Polite Eater, because I continue to be civilized. I’m one of two people in Murithel who can still speak Confederacy. We would have lost it, except we ran into each other and practice for old times’ sake. Well, enough of that. I guess I’d better tell you what happened. You aren’t gonna like this, Nate.”

  * * *

  Brazil was stunned, but he accepted the situation and understood why they had done it and why they had thought it necessary. He even felt a deep affection for Cousin Bat in spite of the fact that he had fouled up the works.

  As they sat there, the last of the drug wore off, and he suddenly found himself free to move.

  He looked as far down as possible first, and thought, crazily, This is what Wuju must have seen when she first appeared in Dillia. Long, short-furred legs, much more graceful than hers, with dark hooves.

  He turned his head and saw his reflection against the tent nearby.

  He was a magnificent animal, he thought with no trace of humor. And the antlers! So that’s why his head felt so funny!

  He tried to move forward, and felt a tug. The Murnie laughed, and unfastened him from the stake.

  He walked around on four legs for the first time, slowly, just around in circles.

  So this is what it feels like to be changed, he thought. Strange, but not uncomfortable.

  “There are some hitches, Nate,” Grondel said. “It’s not like a transformation. The body you have is that of a great animal, but not a dominant species. You’ve got no hands, tentacles, or any other thing except your snout to pick things up with, and you’ve got no voice. These antelope are totally silent, no equipment to make a noise. And your only defenses are your speed—which is considerable, by the way, cruising at fifteen or more kilometers per hour, sprints up to sixty—and a tremendous kick with the rear legs. And the antlers—those are permanent; they don’t shed and won’t grow unless broken off.”

  Brazil stopped walking and thought for a while. Arms he could do without if necessary, and the rest—but not being able to talk bothered him.

  Suddenly he stopped and stared at himself. All the time he had been thinking, he had been automatically leaning over and munching grass!

  He looked back at Grondel, who just was watching him curiously.

  “I think I can guess what you just realized,” the Murnie said at last. “You just started munching grass without thinking. Right?”

  Brazil nodded, feeling stranger than before.

  “Remember—you, all of that inner self that’s you—was transferred, but it was superimposed on the remarkably dull antelope brain and nervous system. Superimposed, Nate—not exchanged. Unless you directly countermand it, the deer’s going to continue acting like a deer, in every way. That’s automatic, and instinctive. You’re not man into deer, you’re man plus deer.”

  Brazil considered it. There would be some problems, then, particularly since he was a brooder given to introspection. What did a deer do? Ate, slept, copulated. Hmmm… The last would cause problems.

  There were, as Grondel had said, many hitches.

  How do I fit inside this head? he wondered. All of my memories—more, perhaps, than any other man. Weren’t memories chemical? He could see how the chemical chains could at least be duplicated, the brain-wave pattern adjusted—but how did this tiny brain have room for it all?

  “Nate!” He heard a call, and looked up. Grondel was running toward him from whatever distance this fish-eye vision couldn’t tell him. He would get used to it, he thought.

  He had moved. As he brooded, he had wandered out of the camp and over almost to the herd! He turned and ran back to the camp, surprised at the ease and speed with which he ran, but he slowed when he realized that the distorted vision would take some getting used to. He almost ran the Murnie down.

  He started to apologize, but nothing came out.

  The Murnie sympathized. “I do
n’t know the answer, Nate. But get used to it before doing anything rash. Your body’s either dead or it’ll be even better the longer you give it in Czill. Hey! Just thought of something. Come over here to this dirt patch!”

  He followed the Murnie curiously.

  “Look!” Grondel said excitedly, and made a line in the dirt with his foot. “Now you do it!”

  Brazil understood. It was slow and didn’t look all that good, but after a little practice he managed to trace the letters in the dirt with his hoof.

  “where is wuju?” he traced.

  “She’s here, Nate. Want to see her?”

  Brazil thought for a second, then wrote, very large, “no.”

  The Murnie rubbed out the old letters so it was again a virgin slate. “Why not?” he asked.

  “does she know about me?” Brazil wrote.

  “Yes. I—I told her last night. Shouldn’t I have?”

  Brazil was seething; a thousand things raced through his mind, none of them logical.

  “don’t want,” he had traced when he heard Wuju’s voice.

  “Nathan?” she called more than asked. “Is that really you in there?”

  He looked up and turned. She was standing there, looking awed, shaking her head back and forth in disbelief.

  “It’s him,” Grondel assured her. “See? We’ve been communicating. He can write here in the dirt.”

  She looked down at the marks and shook her head sadly. “I—I never learned how to read,” she said, ashamedly.

  The Murnie grunted. “Too bad,” he said. “Would have simplified things.” He turned back to Brazil. “Look, Nate, I know you well enough to know that you’ll head off for Czill as soon as you’re confident of making the trip. I know how you feel, but you need her. We can’t go, wouldn’t if we could. And somebody’s got to know you’re you, to keep you from straying, and to do your talking for you. You need her, Nate.”

  Brazil looked at them both and thought for a minute, trying to understand his own feelings. Shame? Fear?