“The alien has liquor in one of his cabinets. Don’t deny it, I’ve seen it. We need you to steal some.”
It was a very serious offense, harshly punished. I knew I could probably get away with it, but my instincts still rebelled. I was not a bad bland. “Why don’t you steal it yourself?” I said.
“Because you’d tattle,” Cholly said nastily.
“No, I wouldn’t,” I said defensively.
“Besides, he keeps it locked now.”
That was my doing, actually. I’d told Magister Galele where I kept the key, but I doubted that he remembered. I always fixed the drinks when he asked for it. “What do you want liquor for?” I said.
“Will you do it?”
I didn’t answer. Cholly said with soft malice, “Remember what you did to Moriston? You want her to know?”
“Okay, I’ll try,” I said.
I stood there for a while, listening to see what they were up to. In my tired mind the memory of Rustim’s ravings already had a surreal quality; but this brought them back with a jolt. If Rustim could have heard this, all his phobias would have taken on life. The blands were plotting some truly major sorcery. Cholly was becoming Rustim’s evil shadow.
Moriston had been sick that day. “Did you see her?” one of the blands whispered. “Her face was yellow. It’s our urine in her blood.” Everyone had seen that she was vulnerable, so Cholly had decided that the time had come to make its move. Tomorrow night, we were going to steal her soul.
The scheme was quite mad, like something out of Cholly’s tales. They thought that, without a soul, Moriston would become like a bland; and whoever got her soul would have the power to outwit everyone. “You’ll see a real Tumbleturn Day then,” Cholly said.
The next morning I told Magister Galele everything, and asked him what I ought to do. He thought it over a while, but at last his interest in documenting a soul-stealing ceremony won out. In the midst of telling me about Xic soul-stealing, he saw how uneasy I was and said, “There’s no danger of the humans finding out, is there?”
“Only if it works,” I said.
He laughed. “Trust me, Tedla, it won’t work. This is just a harmless way of blowing off steam.”
When I found the liquor was low, he actually went out and bought another bottle, just so I could take it down to the roundroom. I poured half of it into another bottle and diluted the rest with water. The Magister thought I was being terribly prudish. “Why not let them have their fun?” he said.
“They’re not used to it. They’ll get just as drunk this way,” I told him.
I hung around Magister Galele’s quarters late that evening, working on some translations, dreading to find out what was going on in grayspace. The Magister finally started to worry that I would miss something, so I braced myself and went out to the kitchen to take off my clothes. I had chosen a baggy uniform that morning; now I strapped the liquor bottle to my body with some sturdy tape, then put on the uniform over it. I couldn’t bend over, but I hoped I wouldn’t have to.
No one but blands saw me on my way to the roundroom. I could tell from the looks they gave me, and the way the ones from other teams avoided me, that news of Cholly’s scheme was all over the Questishaft, and my complicity was well known. No one wanted to be caught in company with a conspirator.
When I got to the hygiene station, Cholly’s coven surrounded me. When they saw the bottle they whooped with excitement and eagerly stripped the tape off my body, seizing the liquor.
“I’ll take it,” Cholly said. I was chilled to see how much authority was already in Cholly’s manner. The others meekly handed the bottle over.
That night, every bland in the roundroom was forced to take a role in the weird ceremony Cholly and its crew enacted.
They started by making us form a circle, sitting on the roundroom floor. Inside, the six or seven main members of Cholly’s cabal formed another ring. As we watched, they helped themselves liberally to the bottle, some of them coughing and grimacing as the fiery liquid burned their throats. When about half the bottle was gone, Cholly got up and went around the outer ring to give everyone a sip. I barely got enough to wet my mouth.
The inner circle began to sway in unison from side to side, chanting a strange incantation. Cholly would say the words, then everyone else would repeat them. They were in no language I had ever heard, but somehow seemed familiar for all that.
The speed of the chanting increased, and soon the inner ring were on their feet, dancing wildly in their circle, still chanting. Cholly gestured the rest of us to our feet, and we began to dance as well—at first hesitantly, then as the rhythm of the chant entered us, more loosely, till we were flying around the circle with wild abandon. I found myself shouting out the nonsense phrases with all the others. The liquor I had swallowed was making me elated and dizzy. The dim roundroom lights seemed to be pulsing, growing lighter and darker in time with our dance. As I joined the pounding rhythm, the distance between the outer and inner rings seemed to be changing—first they were very close, then very far, as if space itself had grown elastic. Reality was liquefying all around us.
A call went up—“Link arms, link arms! Don’t break the circle!” We fell to the floor panting and grabbed hold of our neighbors. As the inner circle did the same, we saw Cholly standing alone in the center, holding something aloft, calling out strange, garbled words. It began to pass the instrument over its body, and I saw that it was a toothbrush—Moriston’s, I had no doubt. As we watched, Cholly put the toothbrush in its mouth, just as Moriston must have done many times, and sucked on it till her saliva mingled with Cholly’s. We watched Cholly swallow, and for a moment everything was perfectly still, poised between event and event in a stasis of expectancy.
Then Cholly’s body went rigid. It fell to the floor, thrashing. The inner circle scrambled to get out of the way. Every muscle in Cholly’s body was jerking and quivering. We watched, horrified. Then Cholly’s mouth opened and a deep, booming man’s voice came out of it. “Where are you?” it said.
It was not Cholly speaking, we were sure of that. Something else had entered the roundroom, something none of us could see, but all of us could sense. I clutched my neighbors on either side more tightly. My bare back, turned to the wall, felt cold and exposed.
Cholly’s mouth opened again, and though its lips moved, the voice did not come from Cholly, but from far away, beyond the roundroom walls. It was a woman’s voice this time, and it said, “I’m coming.”
Then, out of the breathless silence, we heard the sound of a great wind approaching. I felt cold air stirring against my back. Beyond our circle, all light had retreated, leaving impenetrable dark. Past the heads of the blands across from me, I saw tree branches against the sky, and when I looked up there were tiny stars above us. I felt immense open space overhead. Then there was motion in the dark above me, as if something were swooping low out of the night, and I ducked my head down. Inside the circle, Cholly’s body convulsed. Its spine arched painfully backwards, its mouth straining open. A loud, unnatural voice came from its motionless lips: “I am here!”
Suddenly, there was silence. Cholly’s body collapsed and lay limp. No one dared to move.
We sat there a long time, our sweat turning chill, the dim roundroom walls once again around us. At last someone moved, and, as if a trance were broken, we all let go of one another’s arms and drew away into a huddle on one side of the roundroom, leaving Cholly’s body lying motionless by itself. It did not seem to be breathing.
Some of us got a little sleep that night, though I kept starting awake at the imagined sound of wings.
The next morning Cholly’s friends managed to rouse it, though it acted very strangely—eyes staring and dazed, as if it barely recognized where it was. The rest of us avoided it. We showered and dressed fast. When we got to the refectory for breakfast, the blands from other teams asked what had gone on. All over the dining hall I saw clusters of blands gathered around the scattered members of blue team
, mesmerized by the story. Agitation spread like infection across the room.
I was too troubled to join in the rumor-spreading—disbelieving what I had experienced, unable to either explain or discredit it. I knew exactly what Magister Galele would say, and I also knew with a certainty very alien to my nature that he would be wrong.
The time came for us to disperse to our assignments. Normally, the refectory was orderly as the blands began to leave; but this day, the gossip was too engrossing, and no one seemed to be moving toward the exit. The noise of talking filled the room. At last one of the doors to human space opened. In an instant, the blands all fell completely silent as they saw Supervisor Moriston enter.
She still looked yellow and sick, but very much herself. I felt a pang of disappointment, then shame at myself for feeling such a thing. I glanced around, and saw blank disbelief on the faces of other members of blue team.
“What are you dawdling for?” she said in her usual harsh, impatient tone. “Get going.”
The entire roomful of blands stood staring at her in morbid fascination. I heard a whisper pass like a wind through the blands around me—“She’s not human any more.”
Used to absolute obedience, Moriston was at first unable to believe that her orders had had no effect. Then her face turned a ghastly shade of orange, and her fists clenched. She strode to the nearest table and said in a grating voice, “Get to your assignments, morons.”
Who knows what possessed her to pick that table. It was the one where Cholly’s coven was sitting. Of all blands in the room, the ones she chose to confront were the ones most positive in their belief that her soul was gone. They stared at her as if watching an animate corpse cavort in daylight. I’m sure they barely heard what she was saying.
In a rage, she seized one of them by its collar and dragged it to its feet. She gave it a rough shake. “Disobey me, will you?” she raged. She was raising her hand to strike it when she winced and put the hand on her side instead, bending over with a grunt of pain. Her postulant, who had been standing by the door watching, now rushed to her aid, alarmed. As the girl reached her, Moriston’s legs buckled, and the postulant eased her to the floor.
“Now look what you’ve done!” the postulant said to Cholly’s crew. She meant only to scare them; she had no idea that her choice of words confirmed the superstition that had the room in its clutch. When the postulant said, “Carry her into her office,” not a bland at Cholly’s table moved.
We all saw terror come across the postulant’s face then. Her eyes swept around her, seeing some three hundred blands assembled in silent disobedience, and herself alone. She rose slowly to her feet. Then she turned and fled toward the door.
For a moment after she was gone, the room was silent, except for Moriston’s labored breathing. Then an inhuman shriek rose from the front table. Cholly was on its feet, quivering with manic energy. It danced forward to where the supervisor lay. The blands at the back surged forward to see, and I was pressed to the front. Cholly knelt over Moriston, pure insanity in its eyes. It was saying, “The soul, the soul,” very fast under its breath. Suddenly it bent over her and pressed its mouth over hers, sucking the breath out of her body. She struggled desperately, her eyes very large. She finally managed to push Cholly away, then turned her head and vomited blood in a huge pool onto the floor.
As quickly as they had surged forward, the blands now surged back. Cholly was pacing wildly up and down, holding up its hands and shaking them. It was talking incoherently, as if giving orders, but the words made no sense. All around me the whispers rose: “It’s got a soul, Cholly’s got a soul!” And then: “It’s human now.”
Cholly stopped still, then turned to us. Its puny frame had somehow swelled; it looked imposing. “I’m your supervisor,” it said in a commanding voice like Moriston’s. “Kiss my ass, you pubers.” Then, as quickly as it had become Moriston, it changed again. Fear came over its face. “They’re coming!” it shrieked. “I hear the footsteps! Lock the doors! Don’t let them in.” It raced to the door where the postulant had disappeared, and began shoving a table in front of it.
Turmoil erupted. Some of the blands leaped forward to help Cholly barricade the door; others started back in terror; most milled around, surging this way and that, uncertain and frightened.
I fought my way through the tide of blands till I reached the door into grayspace. Behind me I heard a shout, and turned to see three of Cholly’s crew racing after me. Thinking they intended to drag me back, I slipped out, slammed the door behind me, and shot the floor bolt. Moments later I heard the thunderous noise of tables being piled against the door. I turned and fled through the deserted corridors of grayspace.
“Magister!” I cried out as I burst into his quarters. “Where are you? You’ve got to help. Something terrible is happening.”
He came out of his bedroom looking bleary and half-dressed. “What’s the matter?” he said.
“Cholly stole her soul and she’s dying, and the blands are all locked in the refectory—”
“Tedla, calm down,” he said. He made me sit at the table and start from the beginning. Now, months of practice at observing and reporting paid off, and my brain clicked into focus. I described the events of the last night and morning in sequence. As he listened, his face grew very grave. “What’s the situation now?” he asked.
“When I left, they were barricading all the doors. They’re not bad blands, Magister. It’s just that Cholly’s gone crazy, and they don’t know what to do.”
He looked at me a little skeptically. Like every other human, he gave the blands too much credit for intelligence when it came to evil, and not enough when they were good. “Well,” he said, “regardless, we’ve got to help them out. Let me get dressed, and we’ll go down and talk to the supervisors.”
“Not me,” I said.
“Yes, you,” he answered. “You’re the only one who knows what’s going on.”
I waited in an agony of dread while he threw on some clothes, then I followed him out into the corridor. We had no sooner reached the main stair on the Questishaft than a siren went off. It was a horrible sound, starting low and climbing the scale like some primeval animal howl. It’s strange that after so many centuries of civilization such a predatory sound can still strike terror in our hearts. All around the shaft people came to the doors of the shops, looking around to see what was going on. We passed one woman who had a hand-held public address radio pressed to her ear. She called out loudly, “We’re supposed to evacuate the Questishaft! There’s a bland uprising. They’ve taken hostages.”
There were cries of fear then. Some people raced back into their shops to grab valuables and lock the doors; others headed down the spokes toward their residences; still more raced off to find partners and friends. I glimpsed a few shop owners trying to barricade the graydoors. It was useless; human space was so permeated by grayspace that for every access point closed there were three more alternatives. The entire convergence was just a warren of bland-runs.
Magister Galele grabbed my arm and began to walk at redoubled speed. Soon we were moving against the current of traffic as people began to flee. Some called out to Magister Galele to turn around, thinking he didn’t know what was going on.
As we reached level four, the lowest human level, we saw a troop of civil-order martialists in helmets and heavy boots, deploying to cordon off the area where the supervisors’ offices lay. We slipped in just ahead of them.
Inside the Facilities and Service office was a large lobby where, on normal days, people came to register complaints and requests relating to their blands. It was now crowded with martialists, supervisors, and postulants, all in a state of agitation. I saw Moriston’s postulant talking tearfully to a tall woman martialist with sharp cheekbones and a close-shaved haircut, who seemed to be in charge. I pointed her out to Magister Galele. Boldly, he pushed right up to her.
“Excuse me,” he said, “I think we can shed some light on this situation.”
The martialist looked at him as if he were a buzzing insect. Undeterred, he pushed me forward. “Tedla was in the refectory when it all started. Tell them, Tedla.”
The martialist didn’t even let me draw breath. She turned away to say something to one of her lieutenants, who was holding a bullhorn. He raised it and announced, “All postulants and supervisors without direct instructions should report to the west shaft to assist supervisors there in maintaining order. Please move out now.”
There was a general movement of people in the room, and we were pushed away from the martialist’s side. Still hanging onto me, Magister Galele fought his way back toward her. Another martialist stopped us.
“Your bland should go to the westshaft refectory, sir,” she said. “You need to evacuate. This is an emergency situation.”
Just then another officer arrived and reported to the woman in charge, “Pacification force is here.”
“Good,” the martialist replied. “We need to get the murderous vermin contained quickly, or we’re going to have to hunt them down all through their warrens.”
“Are they armed?”
“They have access to knives, bludgeons, that sort of thing. There’s also a lot of sabotage possible. We can’t shut off the gas pipes because the controls are down there.”
“Damn. How far have they spread?”
“That’s what you have to find out.”
A troop of about twenty martialists armed with batons, shockers, and projectile weapons came in. Appalled at the severity of force implied, I whispered to Magister Galele, “You’ve got to stop them! The blands aren’t dangerous.”
There was a stir at the door, and we heard a raised voice: “By god, you will let me in. I am elector of this order. Who called these martialists?”
“Ovide!” Magister Galele called out joyfully. As she came storming in the door, he pushed to her side. “I’ve been trying to tell these pea-brained police what’s going on. They won’t listen; all they want to do is push people around.”
Despite the confusion around us, he had her attention. “What do you have to do with this?” she demanded.
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