The beat of the music was insistent, almost hypnotic. Such music is for people who do not want to think. Kari was easy prey to it; like the others, she had found thought a burden of late, for was she not as lost in the gloom of the Torisian outlook as they? The goblet, half empty, was placed in her hands. She held it gingerly, stared for a moment in fascination, then with a rush of unaccustomed abandon raised it to her lips.
No, Kari! No! I cried silently, my fear for her overriding my resolution never to use telepathy. Slowly, painfully, she lowered the glass. She didn’t know, of course, what had been the deciding factor; she had not recognized my communication for what it was. She thought she was stopped by her own last-minute apprehension, as perhaps she would have been even had I not intervened.
“You’re a fool,” the student on Kari’s left told her as she handed him the drink, untasted. “It’s a chance, sure—but it’s the only chance. The only way to get happy, to find out how things are. Because nothing in the whole lousy world means anything; all the answers are within you, if there are answers, and if there aren’t, how can you lose?”
“Does it matter?” said his date irritably, snatching the glass from him. “If she’s afraid, what’s it to us? All the more for the rest of us.” She sipped and, with reluctance, passed it on to me.
Oh, you children, I thought as I took it; you poor, deluded children! If I dropped the thing seemingly by accident, could I save any of them? No, I decided. They had all been there before, and they would go again. They were not children. They were Younglings, and I could not save them from being harmed by drugs any more than I could save their world from the Critical Stage, of which rash experimentation of this kind was perhaps typical. Another item to report, I reflected bitterly: It has been observed that many in the current generation are finding the situation unbearable. They turn inward, through drugs; is that cause or effect, if their planet is truly doomed?
“Come on, Kari,” I said, relinquishing the goblet into the eager grasp of the intelligent-seeming young man with whom I had tried to argue. “Let’s go.”
She rose, not lifting her eyes, and followed me. No one in the circle even noticed; they were oblivious to everything but the progress of the glass. In a little while, I supposed, they would be unaware not only of their surroundings but of their personal identity, which was, after all, the only thing worth defending against the State. The country of your mind is a fascinating realm to explore, he had said. So it is, but not if it’s entered that way; not if you think it will be easier to face than what’s outside.
On the street, though the sun had barely set, the air seemed fresh and cool by comparison with the stuffy room. For a few minutes we walked in silence. Finally, Kari said in a low, flat voice, “I’d hoped that if I ever met any activists, I’d feel as if I might learn to be like them, but I guess I just don’t fit.”
“You wouldn’t want to fit in with that bunch!” I exclaimed, realizing with surprise that she hadn’t seen the difference between the people at the party and the true rebels we had been expecting. “Those weren’t activists, Kari; they were about as passive as they could get.”
“They were defying the State—resisting.”
“Not resisting, retreating. Withdrawing into a world of their own.”
“Maybe it’s a better world.”
“Did it look like one?”
“Not on the outside. Inside—well, from the things they said—”
“From the things they said, I judge that they’ve given up on the human race and are simply looking for some sort of anesthetic. It can’t be had, Kari. The world is the way it is. There’s no place to hide; we’ve got to live in it and bear up under the pressure.”
“I always thought you approved of the underground,” she said accusingly.
“I do, if by underground you mean the constructive one—the Resistance—that’s working to restore democratic government. Surely you know that the Resistance wouldn’t recruit any of those people! They couldn’t be trusted for five minutes.”
“But what if overthrowing the dictatorship is a lost cause?” Kari persisted. “What if the only freedom is in people’s minds, like they told us?”
If there’s anything harder to counter than a clever lie, it’s a truth that’s been honestly misinterpreted. “Freedom is in people’s minds, all right,” I said, “but those kids were destroying theirs.”
“How do you know?” she burst out. “Have you ever drunk any of that stuff, stuff that makes you see? I’ve wanted to, only I never thought I’d have the chance, and now—oh, I wish I weren’t such a coward!”
“There’s quite a difference between cowardice and common sense,” I pointed out. “Drugs like that are dangerous, not to mention being illegal.”
“Practically everything you and I talk about is illegal,” she reminded me. “What you just now said about the Resistance was enough to get us arrested.”
I frowned. It was true that I could scarcely argue against drugs on the grounds of their illegality after working so hard to encourage Kari in her anti-dictatorship sentiments. “I don’t mean dangerous in the sense of the secret police catching us,” I told her. “I mean really dangerous, harmful.”
“Isn’t that just propaganda?” she protested. “A few people go psychotic, maybe, but who’s to say they weren’t on the border anyway? I’m surprised at you, Elana; knowing you, I’d think you’d be insisting that if drugs can open our minds to a new experience, we shouldn’t run away from it. And I wish I dared see what it’s like.”
“That’s like saying you wished you dared swim the Equatorial Ocean,” I said quietly. “Mind-changing drugs aren’t anything to fool around with! I—I remember underneath, perhaps.” I fell back on the old unchallengeable excuse, at a loss for any other authority to explain the strength of my conviction.
Kari was right on one score: If the drug was what I supposed, a primitive psychedelic, then there was indeed something to be experienced. There was far more than the students at that party had an inkling of, but aside from the fact that they were seeking it for the wrong reasons, they weren’t anywhere near ready for it. Very few Younglings are, at any age; even among Federation citizens expansion of consciousness is normally undertaken only by older people. It’s a tremendous challenge—one of the biggest challenges open to us on our home worlds—but the last thing anyone needs is a drug that forces such an experience, because a person who hasn’t the maturity to cope with it is all too likely to be permanently overwhelmed. There are more natural approaches, which someone who is truly ready will discover, just as in rare instances Younglings discover their psychic powers.
Within the Federation, to be sure, these purely mental methods are understood, and the Academy has means of testing readiness as well as ways—safe ways—of teaching its students to confront the various levels of consciousness. I am not uninitiated; while most such training is given at the postgraduate level, all agents get a brief introduction to it, which is considered necessary protection because of what they may encounter in certain Youngling cultures. So the drug wouldn’t have hurt my mind, although it could have done me physical harm since it was undoubtedly some crude poison with unpredictable side effects.
It’s a pity I couldn’t get the point across to Kari. I’ve tried since then, but she doesn’t see it; she still thinks that hidden mental depths can be reached only through chemistry. I can’t help being reminded of the Andrecians, who believed in magic potions.
*
It was only a few evenings later that I turned a corner in the library stacks and came face-to-face with Randil.
We were both overcome with astonishment, but he recovered first; to my amazement, he attempted telepathic contact. Elana! he exclaimed. I’ve been hunting everywhere for you! Why, I’ve been doing my reading in the daytime so that I could search evenings, when you wouldn’t be working. I never thought of your coming here, when you’re not a student.
I managed to retain enough presence of mind to g
ive no answer, but inwardly I was in turmoil. Randil, in Cerne! All along he must have been at the University; we might have run into each other any number of times, and if he had approached me before my encounter with Varned, I might not have been strong enough to withhold response. I was no longer subject to temptation, however. It wasn’t just a matter of my unwillingness to cheat on solo rules, but of the fact that the whole strategy of the mission prohibited contact between agents. Randil knew that as well as I; what business did he have trying to communicate with me?
I had known, of course, that Randil was somewhere on Toris. He had told me of his assignment innocently; on graduation night he hadn’t been aware that I was to receive solo credit from the mission. The majority of the agents, who had already been through their solos, were informed of each other’s whereabouts despite the fact that communication between them was forbidden; so it was natural enough that he should know of my presence in the city. But that he should seek me out was a direct violation of orders.
Elana, what’s the matter with you? he persisted. I know you understand me! You’re not in real trouble, are you? You haven’t lost your telepathic powers?
“I’m sorry,” I said aloud. “I think you’ve mistaken me for someone else. Will you let me by, please?”
I walked quickly through the stacks toward the study area, Randil following. I’ve got to talk to you, Elana, he went on insistently. Something has come up, something that demands action.
At that moment I spotted Kari, waiting for me near the exit, and I made what was possibly the most tragic mistake of my entire life. I joined her, and, feigning embarrassment, I said in a low but clearly audible voice, “Kari, this man thinks he knows me. I—I’m not sure what to say to him. Maybe he really does, and yet—”
She squeezed my hand sympathetically. “Don’t worry, I’ll explain.” Turning to Randil, who was right on my heels, she said, “You’ll have to forgive my friend. She’s been sick, with amnesia, and she can’t remember anything at all about her past. If you do know her, you could be a big help, but if you’re just—well, it’s awfully cruel in this case. So leave her alone, will you please?”
Randil looked puzzled. “Amnesia?” he asked. “Since when?”
Kari mentioned the date. Randil’s face cleared and he said, “I apologize. I made an honest mistake.” Silently he continued, So that’s your cover. And you’re playing it by the book. Elana, didn’t it ever occur to you that the book might be wrong? This world is in danger, serious danger, and something has got to be done about it. I need your help!
I ignored him. Kari shifted her load of books from one arm to the other and said, “Come on, Elana. It’s almost curfew; we’ve got to rush.”
“Wait.” Randil hurried after us. “Look, I’m sorry if I offended you; I wasn’t trying to pick you up or anything.” To Kari he added, “Can’t I take some of those?”
“No, thanks. Elana carries half after we pass the desk.”
“You live near each other, then?”
“We’re roommates.”
He looked at Kari closely, for the first time fixing his attention on her instead of on me. “I don’t want this to sound like another phony gambit, but haven’t I seen you in one of my classes?”
She smiled, blushing a little. “Yes, you have. The science survey lectures. I—I usually sit near the back.”
I waited, surprised but relieved by the ease with which he had been diverted from his determination to communicate. It seems incredible, now, that I could have been so blind to his interest in her.
“Tomorrow,” he told Kari, “I think I’ll sit in back, too.” I did not even see the inherent danger.
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Chapter 4
I have just returned from another long session with my interrogator, a session at which my precomposed confession was again the issue. The thing is not a total fabrication; it does contain a few statements that happen to be true, though they are grossly distorted even in terms of what the Torisians know about me. For instance, the part admitting that I was deliberately made ill as a ploy to establish my cover is indisputable, but the conclusion that this was “a typical Libertarian atrocity in the field of biological experimentation” does not follow. Nor do the reasons given for my alleged actions bear any relationship to what might be a Libertarian’s real ones. Even if I were the spy they think I am, that document couldn’t possibly be taken seriously; it reads like something out of a comic melodrama.
Nevertheless, we go over and over it, for hours on end. I don’t know what my interrogator would do if I did sign it, because actually he doesn’t care a bit about my signature, which he could easily forge. What he wants is to make me believe it. He is well aware that I will never endorse a false confession while knowing it to be false; his hope is that if I can be brought to the point where I can no longer differentiate my true motives from those ascribed to me, the information he is after will be forthcoming.
Crazy though it sounds for anybody to think that a prisoner could really be rendered incapable of telling truth from falsehood, such things do happen among Younglings. That’s one of the grimmer realities that an agent must accept. Younglings are not trained in the control of their own minds, and so sometimes their minds can be bent by others. Men like my interrogator, unfortunately, have developed ways to take advantage of that fact. The ways are complicated; sooner or later, he believes, he will hit upon one that will crush me. He is going to get a surprise.
He does not rely on browbeating alone to influence me, nor even upon pain. No detail is overlooked. My hair has been clipped short, a sign of indecency and shame in Torisian eyes, although it doesn’t affect me as such since there are no taboos against it in my own culture. To this, as to a number of stronger measures, my reaction has been much calmer than he expected. Quite often they can crack someone—especially a woman—more easily through indignities than through torture.
There has been only one incident so far where I nearly lost my composure in his presence. Ironically, it was accidental; it wasn’t even something he had planned.
We had come to the end of an interview, an easier one than some because though I had undergone a longer-than-average physical ordeal, my psychic defense had protected me, and I had meanwhile been free of the need to listen and respond. (It’s much more difficult to stand at attention, with the spotlights focused on my face and my interrogator’s incessant questions hammering away at me—questions to which my answers must be carefully calculated and always, of course, consistent—than it is to sit back and pretend to be enduring extreme agony.) Anyway, as usual we had arrived at an impasse, and the guards were about to escort me back to my cell. The door to the corridor stood open, but the interrogator spoke, halting us.
“You are very foolish, Elana,” he said to me, not for the first time. “Brave, yes—but others have been brave. Others have suffered. Their stoicism got them nowhere; heroes or cowards, they were all led to the same place in the end.” With studied indifference he added, “You realize, don’t you, that even if you proved to be an exception, no one outside these walls would ever hear of it? The Libertarian nations would never know that you had held out.”
“I’m sure they wouldn’t,” I agreed indifferently. I laughed—a little too loudly, perhaps, for fatigue was making me jumpy and there was a certain ludicrousness in the idea that he could not possibly see what I had found amusing.
At that moment, from another room somewhere down the corridor, came an anguished moan, followed almost immediately by a shrill, piercing shriek.
The blood rushed from my face; my skin turned clammy, and I knew an instant of vertigo. It must have been noticeable, for I would have swayed had the guards not been gripping my arms. My interrogator looked at me very intently, wondering, I suppose, why I should be frightened by the cry of someone in pain no worse than what I had repeatedly withstood.
I was not frightened. I was overcome by sheer horror at my own complacency. Though it wasn’t new
s to me that there is nothing unique about the treatment I’m receiving, I had not encountered such eloquent evidence before. I had scoffed at the stresses to which I was subjected, knowing myself a match for them; but the bravery I had been credited with was sham. I have not been truly suffering. There are others, I fear, who have.
*
I must forge ahead with the history of the mission, I suppose. From here on it will be a painful process, for the things that happened aren’t pleasant to recall.
The meeting with Randil marked the end of my brief period of relative serenity. For several days I stayed away from the library, browsing through bookstores instead. Yet I knew in my heart that if he had found me once he would find me again, and that when he did, I would have a real problem on my hands. It had been evident that Randil had tried to communicate not from inability to endure his isolation but with some definite purpose in mind, and although he undoubtedly meant well, I feared that it would lead to no good.
I knew he would find me, yet I didn’t guess how—or how soon. So when one morning on our way to the hospital Kari mentioned that she had a date for the evening, I felt nothing but pleasure. Kari didn’t have enough dates, and I was glad that she had been asked out by someone new and interesting. “What’s he like?” I asked casually.
“He’s different from anybody I’ve ever known before,” she declared enthusiastically. “It makes me feel important, somehow, to think he’d even notice me. You got the wrong impression of him, really you did.”
“I? When did I meet him?”
“At the library the other night,” she confessed.
“Randil!” I exclaimed, too startled to hide my dismay. “You gave him our address?”
“Well, of course; he’s going to call for me.” She looked at me strangely. “I didn’t think you knew his name.”
The Far Side of Evil Page 10