by E. C. Tubb
Dumarest was bitter. "Justification, my lord?"
"Fact." Jocelyn took a coin from his pocket, spun it and caught it without looking. "Heldar's fate rested on sheer chance. Had his luck been good, I would have healed him. It was bad. He could not escape his fate." He added, "Because of that, both he and the woman met their destiny."
"Why?" Dumarest put aside his wine. "I do not think you are a cruel man; why play such games?"
Jocelyn turned and strode to the far side of the room; then he turned again to face his guest.
"A man must believe in something," he said. "He must have some sure guide in a world of insane confusion. Jest is such a world. There are three suns, overlapping magnetic fields, cosmic flux in a constantly changing set of variables. We are poor because we are cursed. Astrological influences are strong: men forget, women forget, children die of starvation because they are not remembered, things are left half-built, roads lead to nowhere, diseases change, no two harvests are alike, and everywhere grows a power with a narcotic scent, nepenthe weed. Inhale the fumes and reason takes wing-madness, Earl, madness!"
"Imagine if you can a world on which little can be predicted with any degree of certainty. You sow your seed and wait and forget how long you've waited so you plow and sow again-and ruin the sprouting crops. You keep records and forget what they are for, make notations and find that, today, you cannot read and go for a walk and sit and stay there for days and rise and forget that you sat at all. We live in caverns, Earl. We have to seal ourselves in a miniature world of our own devising because we cannot trust our senses unless we do. And we are poor. Poor!"
His hand smashed down on one of the tables with force enough to shatter the thin legs. Jocelyn looked down at the ruin.
"Poor," he said. "Can you imagine what that means to the ruler of a world? I married Adrienne for her dowry and for the son I hope she will give me. I came to Scar because of accident and because I must follow every chance guide, hoping that fate is leading me to prosperity. I made Jellag Haig a baron because I have nothing but titles to bestow. I need him and his knowledge. He knows his trade. Perhaps he can evolve a strain of fungi to kill the nepenthe weed. If he does, I shall make him a duke. I forced Heldar to test his luck because, on Jest, an unlucky man does not live long. I do what I must, Earl, because I have no choice. And I make a jest of life because, if I did not, I would spend my life in tears!"
* * *
Yeon paused, stepping back to allow Adrienne entrance to her cabin. She opened the door, saw the compartment was empty and gestured for the cyber to follow her inside. A drifting red shadow, he obeyed her command. Patiently he waited for her to speak.
"Have you fully assimilated the tapes on Jest, yet, Yeon?"
"There is much to be learned, my lady."
"Answer the question! Have you?"
He guessed what was on her mind. "There are no laws preventing your claiming the throne should the present ruler die." he said deliberately. "But there is a provision as to the nearest relative. If you had no issue, your right could be challenged. It would mean an inquiry as to who could provide the greatest good. As a stranger, you would have little chance of winning the majority vote of the Council."
"And if I had a child?"
"In that case, there would be no argument. The child would inherit and you would be regent."
She nodded, almost satisfied, but there was one other matter. "If I should be pregnant?"
"Again, an inquiry to determine the ancestry of the child. Tests would be made. It would be far better for the present ruler to recognize his heir. No inquiry, then, would be made." He anticipated her next question. "In the case of you having a proven heir and your husband dying, you would become regent. If you should marry again your new husband would become your consort with no actual power other than a seat on the Council."
She inhaled, expanding her chest. "So I am stuck with the fool until he fathers a child. Is that what you are saying?"
"I am advising you, my lady. I can do no more."
"A pity." But she had her answer. First the child and then, with my position secure, a man to keep me company, a real man. Dumarest? She smiled. Anything was possible. "Very well," she said to the cyber. "That will be all."
Quietly he left the room. His own cabin was on an upper level, a small cubicle containing little more than a cot. Carefully he locked the door and touched the wide bracelet about his left wrist. The device ensured that he would remain safe from spying eyes; no electronic scanner could focus on his vicinity. It was an added precaution, nothing more.
Lying supine, he relaxed, closing his eyes and concentrating on the Samatchazi formulae. Gradually he lost the senses of taste, touch, smell and hearing. Had he opened his eyes he would have been blind. Locked in the prison of his skull, his brain ceased to be irritated by external stimuli; it became a thing of pure intellect, its knowledge of self its only thread of individual life. Only then did the grafted Homochon elements become active. Full rapport followed.
Yeon expanded with added dimensions.
Each cyber had a different experience. For him it was as if he were a crystal multiplying in geometric progression, doubling himself with every flicker of time, the countless facets opening paths in darkness so as to let in the shining light of truth. He was a living part of an organism which stretched across space in innumerable facets each glowing with intelligence. Crystals connected one to the other in an incredibly complex mesh of lines and planes stretching to infinity. He was a part of it and all of it at the same time, the lesser merging with the greater to form a tremendous gestalt of minds.
At the heart of the multiple crystal was the headquarters of the Cyclan. Buried beneath miles of rock, deep in the heart of a lonely planet, the central intelligence absorbed his knowledge as a sponge sucks up water. There was nothing as slow as verbal communication, just a mental communion in the form of words: quick, almost instantaneous, organic transmission against which even the multiple-light speed of supra-radio was the merest crawl.
"Verification of anticipated movement of quarry received. Obtain ring and destroy Dumarest."
There was nothing else aside from sheer, mental intoxication.
There was always a period after rapport during which the Homochon elements sank back into quiescence and the machinery of the body began to realign itself with mental control. Yeon floated in a dark nothingness while he sensed strange memories and associations, unlived situations and exotic scenes, the scraps of overflow from other intelligences, the waste of other minds. They were of the central intelligence of the tremendous cybernetic complex which was the heart of the Cyclan.
One day he too would be a part of that gigantic intelligence. His body would be discarded and his mind incorporated with others, similarly rid of hampering flesh, hooked in series, immersed in nutrient fluids and fed by ceaseless mechanisms.
There were more than a million of them, brains without number, freed intelligences, potentially immortal, working in harmony to solve all the problems of the universe. The reward for which every cyber longed was the time when he could take his place in the gestalt of minds to which there could be no imaginable resistance or end.
Chapter Seven
Dumarest looked at the instrument strapped to his left wrist, studying the needles beneath the plastic cover. One held steady on the magnetic pulse transmitted from the station, the other swung a little as it pointed to the right. He said, "To the right eight degrees. Got it?"
Clemdish bent over a map as he squatted on the ground. "That will be number four," he said, his voice muffled a little as it came through the diaphragm of his suit. "The next will be on the left and then two more to the right." He rose, folding the map and slipping it into a pocket. "We're on course, Earl, and making good time."
"So far," said Dumarest. "Let's hope we can keep it up." He lifted his shoulders, easing the weight of the pack on his back, and checked the rest of his gear with automatic concern. "All right," he said. "Let's get movin
g."
There was an eeriness about Scar in late summer, a stillness, as if nature were preparing for something spectacular, gathering its energies before erupting into violence. The air was oppressive with heat and tension; there was no sound other than that they made as they walked through the weird forest of monstrous fungi.
It was, thought Dumarest, something like walking under water. The suits were envelopes designed to shield the wearer from harmful spores; they were sealed and fed by air forced through filters, trapping body heat until they drenched the wearer in perspiration. Absorbent packs soaked up the excess moisture, but nothing could be done about the heat.
The terrain added to the illusion. The ground was hard, uneven and crowded with delicate growths as though with coral. The towering plants cut off the light from the sun, allowing only a crimson twilight to reach their swollen boles. Fronds of red and black, yellow and puce, deathly white and sapphire blue hung from gigantic mushrooms; there were also buff extensions like the spread ribs of a ladies' fan and warted lumps looking like naked brains. Growth lived on growth and others were deep in the soil.
Through this colorful fantasy they walked, miniature men crawling among nightmare shapes.
"It's hot!" Clemdish halted, face red and streaming behind the transparency of his suit. "Earl, can't we take a break?"
Dumarest maintained his pace. "Later."
They passed their markers on the left and right, Dumarest checking their position as the detector picked up the signal from their slender rods. Once something exploded high above, an overripe cap releasing its spores and sending them in a dust-fine cloud to settle through the heavy air. Finally, when Clemdish was stumbling, his mouth wide as he gasped for air, Dumarest called a halt.
"We'll rest for a while," he said. "Find us something to eat, while I set up the tent."
Safe within the transparent sack Clemdish tore off his helmet and scratched vigorously at his scalp. "I've been wanting to do that for miles," he said gratefully. "I don't know what it is, Earl, but every time I get suited up I want to scratch. I've bathed, used skin deadeners, the lot, but I still want to scratch. Psychological?"
"Probably." Dumarest picked up a piece of the food Clemdish had gathered! He ate, chewing thoughtfully and examining the green-striped fungi. "Candystalk," he said. "Too ripe for good eating. It must be later than we thought."
Clemdish shook his head. "I don't think so. There was some deadman that was really immature." He picked up a fragment of brown and black. "Try this brownibell, it's real good."
It was good to the taste but low in protein and almost devoid of vitamins. The fungi had bulk and flavor but little else. It could be collected and dried for food and fuel, but those who ate nothing else quickly showed signs of degeneration. Those who deliberately selected the caps containing hallucinogens died even sooner, from starvation, parasitical spores, even simple drowning during the winter rains.
Dumarest leaned back, feeling the hot stickiness of his body against the confining walls of the tent. Clemdish had fallen asleep, his flat-nosed face red and sweating and his mouth open to emit a gurgling snore. Dumarest leaned over and placed his hand over the open mouth. The small man grunted, rolled over and settled down in silence.
Thoughtfully Dumarest studied his map.
The sites where they had left the markers were dotted in red, their path was a thin line of black. The place where he had found the golden spore was deliberately unmarked. The detectors were supposed to be foolproof, each instrument able only to pick up a matching signal, but it was wise to take no chances. At harvest time Scar lived up to the savagery of its name.
Putting away the map Dumarest took a sip of brackish water and tried to relax. Sleep was a long time coming. It was too hot and too stuffy, despite the mechanism humming as it circulated clean, filtered air. The ruby twilight was too reminiscent of the interior of an oven. It pressed around the tent giving rise to a claustrophobic irritation.
Finally he drifted into an uneasy doze in which a laughing jester danced around him with a jingle of bells on cap and shoes. The wand in his hand bore an inflated bladder and he kept thrusting it toward Dumarest's face. Then, suddenly, the wand was the glinting metal of a knife and the jester wore the face of Heldar. He snarled and opened his mouth to spit a gush of blood.
To one side a figure cloaked in flaming scarlet watched with burning eyes.
Dumarest jerked awake, sweating, heat prickling his skin. A red glare stabbed into his eyes. From one side the sun shone with baleful fury, the unmasked disk huge as it spread across the sky. Against it drifted a black shape and noise came from men working beneath.
Clemdish rolled, muttered, and was suddenly awake. "Earl! The sun! What's happening?"
"Harvesters," said Dumarest.
As he watched, another towering growth fell with a soggy crash and exposed more of the naked sky. Men grappled with it, hooking lines to the cap and cutting it free so that others could draw it up to the loading well of the raft. As it lifted, sweating, unsuited figures flung themselves at another fungus, their machetes flashing as they hacked at the base.
"Zopolis's men," said Clemdish. "The crazy fools."
They were pieceworkers, risking infection for the sake of easier movement, paid by the load and racing against time to make a stake for the winter.
"Look at them," said Clemdish. "What's to stop them jumping a marker if they find one? They could strip the site and who would be the wiser?"
No one would; but harvesting took time, the teams were large and it would have to be a concerted effort. Dumarest shrugged.
"Well stay here until they've gone," he decided. "There's no point in arousing their curiosity. What they don't know, they can't talk about. Well eat and rest while we've got the chance." He looked at Clemdish. "If the harvesters have got this far the rest won't be far behind," he reminded. "Some of them could be looking for us."
"The rope," said Clemdish. "Don't rub it in."
"I wasn't, but we've got to move fast and get to the hills before anyone else. Once we start to climb we'll be at a disadvantage." He smiled at the serious face close to his own. "So you'd better get your scratching done while you've the chance. Once we start moving I don't want to stop."
"Not even for sleep, Earl?"
"No," said Dumarest, remembering his dream. "Not even for sleep."
* * *
The hills had changed. Now, instead of a scarred and crevassed slope leading up to jagged peaks, a colorful mass of disguising fungi stretched in disarray. There was no possibility of standing back, selecting a route and checking to see alternatives and difficulties. They would have to climb it the hard way, testing every inch and praying they would meet no serious obstacles.
Dumarest flexed his arms. His shoulders ached from the weight of the pack and the necessity of cutting a path. He turned, looking back the way they had come. They had left a trail but how obvious he could only guess.
A growth fell and opened a wider window towards the hills. Clemdish called from where he stood with his machete, "That enough, Earl?"
"That should do it. Find some stones now so we can make a couple of mallets."
Despite their size, the growths were weak. With care it was possible to climb one, but only if it was the the right kind and buttressed by others. As Clemdish moved off, questing like a dog for the required stones, Dumarest chopped a series of steps in a warted bole and eased himself upwards.
Halfway up he paused. The tiny clearing they had made gave him a fair field of view. Carefully he studied the slope ahead.
The ground itself was impossible to see but the fungi provided a guide; some grew thicker and taller than others of the same type. Stony ground? Bared rock inhibiting the smaller growth's development? Water would have been trapped in shallow basins, cups scooped by the action of rain and probably ringed with rock. Such places would provide fertile ground for moisture-hungry rootlets. Certain of the molds and slimes preferred a smooth surface on which to spread.
Exposed boulders would provide such conditions.
Clemdish looked up as Dumarest climbed down from his vantage point. He was crouched over a couple of rocks, lashing a cradle about each so that they could be carried slung over a wrist. Each stone weighed about ten pounds.
"The best I could find," he said, handing one to Dumarest. "But they should do the job. Do we share the stakes?"
"Stakes and rope, both," said Dumarest. The stakes were rods of metal two feet long; the rope was of synthetic fiber, thin but strong. He took a deep breath, conscious of his fatigue, the sticky interior of the suit and the soreness of his sweat-softened skin. They had slept on reaching the hills, but the rest hadn't done much good. "All right," he said. "Let's get at it." The first part wasn't too bad. The lower slope was gentle and it was merely a matter of walking uphill; then, as the gradient became more pronounced, the fungi itself acted as a ladder. Clemdish lunged ahead, fatigue ignored now that he was so near a fortune. He clawed his way around swollen boles, kicking free masses of fragile growth as he dug the toes of his boots into the spongy material. For a while he made good progress then, abruptly, he came to a halt.
"I can't get a purchase up here, Earl." Slime coated his gloves and glistened on his suit and boots. "This damn mold's all over the place."
Dumarest frowned, remembering. "Try moving to your left," he said. "About ten yards should do it."
Clemdish grunted and obeyed. Again he forged upwards, his boots sending little showers of dust and fungi down at his partner, the showers ceasing as he came to a halt again.
Dumarest looked up at an overhang.
"We'll use a stake," he decided. "Slam one in to your right. I'll anchor a rope and try to climb higher. If I make it, you can knock the stake free and use the rope to join me."
It was elementary mountaineering made difficult because they couldn't see what lay ahead. It was doubly difficult because the crushed fungi coated the ground with slippery wetness. Dumarest clawed his way upward, his fingers hooking before he dared to shift the weight from his feet and his toes searching for a hold before he could move his hands.