Exiles at the Well of Souls

by Jack L. Chalker

  * * *

  They drafted him into the army.

  They gave him two weeks of strict, intense basic training. There was little time to think, and that was as it had been planned. Still, barracks life made him some friends and filled him in on the rest of what was going on. For one thing, he found out that Agitar was allied with Makiem, a hex whose dominant race were giant frogs, and Cebu, a race of flying reptiles of some sort.

  He also learned that Antor Trelig was a Makiem.

  That depressed him. The ultimate irony. To escape from New Pompeii, beat the sponge on a new and alien planet, and wind up back serving Antor Trelig again. Was the Well computer laughing?

  The training was tough but fascinating, though. In hand-to-hand, an Agitar male would simply electrocute his opponent. Although the average energy stored in an Agitar male was several thousand volts—still enough to be lethal—it could potentially store up to sixty thousand volts! An incredible figure. Overload was impossible, but if you were fully charged, any additional energy would be immediately released. The static electricity alone would never generate a terribly high voltage, but it was actually possible for an Agitar to absorb additional electricity from artificial sources or even things like lightning rods. They were totally immune to electrical shock; they could not electrocute one another, but they could actually transfer stored-up energy between themselves. There was a rather unpleasant class on how to absorb the energy from a dying or recently dead comrade.

  Shooting was easy for him; the rifles were different from what he knew, as were the pistols, but all such weapons basically operate on the same principle: aim, push here, and the energy or projectile comes out there.

  Somehow, one never unconsciously discharged, even while sleeping. He wondered about that, worried about the fact that the first time he had done so involuntarily, but they assured him that it rarely happened. But beds were made out of nonconductive, energy-absorbing materials, just in case.

  He also learned, indirectly from his barracks-mates, about the opposite sex. They were smart; on the average, a little smarter than the men, some said. Sex was common and frequent; the Agitar were a horny bunch. But there was effective birth control, plus the Well monitor of the population, so nobody felt inhibited. Marriage was unknown. If you wanted a child, you just found a female that wanted one, too—or vice versa—and had one. If it was male, it was the father's total responsibility to raise it. The female might stay, might walk out. If it was female, the reverse was true.

  There were women in the army, too. Because they could not hold a charge or discharge, they were never front-line troops, but they handled everything else. Most of the upper officers, including the bulk of the general staff, were women, as were most of the technicians.

  The war was not popular. There was some childish enthusiasm born of never having actually seen what a war was like, yes; but most people didn't get overly enthusiastic about it. They saw war as a necessity. A nasty couple of races—the Yaxa and the Lamotien—were even now moving to get the ship parts as well, and they had Ben Yulin under their control to fly it. Better a fully charged Agitar at Antor Trelig's side walking into Obie than a bunch of terribly alien creeps under a not certainly controllable Ben Yulin.

  After two weeks, they transferred him to Air. It wasn't a promotion, really; Air went in first, and took the brunt of front-line casualties. Renard almost gasped when he saw what Air meant. Not planes or sleek ships, no. They were horses. Large, great horses with tremendous swanlike wings along both sides of their sleek bodies. As a classicist, Renard recognized them as the embodiment of the legendary Pegasus, and they were truly grand. They came in all colors—brown, white, pink, blue, green. There was no end to the variety.

  And they flew—tremendously, gracefully, with an Agitar on a saddle, his legs strapped in, on soaring wings. They were somewhat fragile, since they had hollow bones, and he never did quite understand why they flew, but they did and that was enough. They were also much smarter than horses. They responded to verbal commands, slight kicks, pulls on the reins—and they were easy to train, considering their riders had their own shock prods.

  He was assigned one immediately. A beautiful, intelligent animal, green in color. The first time he went up, he had an instructor in front and all sorts of fancy instruments. But, the animals were easy to fly, and by the third day Renard was doing loops and swirls on Doma, the horse's name, as easily as if born to it. They were a natural pair, Agitar and pegasus; they blended together like one organism.

  And there was the tast. It was a steel rod, about three meters long, coated with copper, with a sword-like copper hilt. With an Agitar male holding one, it was an electrical conductor of remarkable efficiency. It was also thin and fairly light for the well-muscled arms.

  In a nontechnological hex, or even some others, the tast was an ultimate close-contact weapon, where pistol or rifle either could not be used or would not work.

  At the end of three weeks they told his class that they weren't really ready, should need six more weeks, but that this was all the training they were going to get. As it was, they would have to catch up to the war.

  Renard decided one thing—had decided it long before, when he found out about Trelig.

  He was not going to die in Trelig's service.

  Lata

  Another dizzying ride on the Krommians had taken Mavra to Lata itself.

  It was a fairyland come to life. The Lata had no cities as such; they were spread out along wooded hills and forest glades. Small shop groups permitted the necessary trade and services, and there was a number of universities, research facilities for those so minded, and places for the artisans, for Lata were an inherently artistic race.

  It was also the only asexual bisexual race she had ever seen. They all looked identical to her except for the colors; all like meter-high girls of nine or ten, and all spoke in lyrical, musical bells. It was an eerie feeling for her, who had always been so small in a world of giants, to suddenly be the tallest person around.

  They were all born without sex; they matured after fifteen to twenty years into biological females, each capable of laying just one egg, which hatched on its own in a few days. Then, over a two-year period, they changed. Female organs vanished, and male organs grew in their place. They were then male for the rest of their lives.

  She asked Vistaru why there were so many females if that was the case. The girl—even though mature, it was impossible to think of the Lata as other than girls—had laughed. "When you change, you get older," she'd replied.

  Mavra ultimately found out that females aged at a rate only a fraction that of males; it would eventually catch up with you, of course, but most put it off as long as possible. Spend forty to fifty years as a ten-year-old flying pixie girl, then have your egg, then have another thirty years as a male, growing older inside.

  That's why the males seemed to be the leaders here. They were older, and had more experience.

  Mavra Chang felt more at ease now than at any other period she could remember in her life except those glorious years of marriage and partnership. There was no pressure here; the people were wonderful and warm. There were no threats, no natural enemies, and, as a high-tech hex, no want of material comfort, either, although they seemed to have made less use of their technical capabilities than other places she was told about. They didn't need it: they were happy.

  The stingers, which could kill—they described the venoming process as something like an orgasm—were their extra edge against neighbors who might think the frail and tiny creatures easy prey. It totally paralyzed for a long period, depending on the victim's size and weight, and too much of it could kill. Less than a dozen races had proven immune to it, and the Lata hadn't had to test their power much in a long while.

  As for Mavra herself, they made new clothing for her to her design, of black stretch cloth, and a heavy coat for cold weather wear. They also cleaned her belt, replaced the strap, and marveled at the compartments and gadgets it con
tained. The same with her boots; they were too worn to be useful, but the gadgets had survived, and a new pair was brighter, shinier, more flexible and comfortable—and even added a few more centimeters to her height.

  They also untangled her hair, cut, combed, and trimmed it in Lata fashion, long and sleek on the top and sides, short in back. When they tested the venom in her nails, it fascinated them. Obie had made a biological adaptation of mechanical injectors; and the system was, said the medical people, amazing and complex. They got her to try the hypno load on a Lata volunteer, and, much to her surprise, the stuff that had failed on the cyclopses worked on the Lata.

  She lived with them for several weeks; it was a peaceful time. The medical people fitted her with a translator, a tiny crystal from the North that was patched in at any one of several points inside her body in a painless, minor operation. This would allow her to understand, she was told, anyone on the Well World, and anyone on the Well World could understand her. The devices were not common or cheap; the operation had been mandated and paid for by Serge Ortega.

  She was both delighted and disappointed: delighted in that she could now speak to and understand these wonderful people; disappointed in that their speech, when translated, lost its wonderful musicality. It sounded like plain old Confederation plain talk with bell-like undertones. Furthermore, the translator was in and of itself a reminder to her that she was not really a free woman, but a captive. These nice people were doing things in their own best political interest, not hers.

  Vistaru explained the problem to her, now easier since she could speak in her own language and be understood. "You are a pilot," she pointed out. "The Yaxa-Lamotien-Dasheen alliance is on the move. So is the Makiem-Cebu-Agitar one. We don't want war. We want that ship destroyed. But we must have someone around who understands it, just in case—as long as the threat remains."

  As long as the threat remains. Mavra wondered how long that would be.

  The map told the story, along with daily war reports. The great sphinxes of Boidol had traded their module for peace, going as far as bringing it to the Agitar border. Gambling that the war would end in no profit for all concerned, they had elected to pass.

  In the North, the great angry butterflies of the Yaxa had poured boiling oil on Teliagin villages and forests, and the Lamotien had spread panic as Teliagin cyclopses suddenly came apart into fifty or more smaller creatures who disrupted everything from behind. The Teliagin, primitive and fearful, surrendered quickly. They allowed the Yaxa and Lamotien to drag the bridge module across the Lamotien border on great carts, eventually helping in the process. The Yaxa were already heading across the Sea of Storms on great wings, first to Nodi Island—a peaceful hex inhabited by a race described as resembling giant walking mushrooms—to receive a sea-landed module being brought to them by the dolphinlike Porigol next door. There, on the Nodi beaches, Lamotien technicians carefully disassembled the mod, and helpless Nodi allowed the parts to be shipped to Zone through their Zone Gate, and thence on to Lamotien. Qasada would be next for the Yaxa alliance.

  In the South, Djukasis was giving fierce resistance, but it was only a matter of days, the reports said. The great bees' hives were being hit by the pterodactyllike Cebu, while Agitar airmen on great Pegasi zapped the Djukasis from the air with their tasts.

  Upset, Mavra asked repeatedly why the Lata would not go in to help the Djukasis, whom they liked and had been friends with for centuries. They always shook their heads and gave the same answer.

  "If we hurt one army without hurting the other, the other has that much more chance of achieving its goals. We must remain neutral until there is some sort of action we could take that would end not one war, but all war."

  In the meantime, Mavra Chang felt more and more a prisoner in a pixie paradise as events passed her by.

  Djukasis

  There was a storm coming. They could see it in the billowing black clouds, hear the distant thunder, and almost feel the glow of approaching lightning.

  The Agitar commander looked at the scene and nodded approvingly. "A fine day to end this mess," she said to the field officers, the men who would lead. "There is much charging potential there."

  "Enough to knock the mounts out from under us," muttered one officer glumly, wondering why commanders who never had to go into battle themselves were always so cheerfully optimistic when explaining what other lives should buy.

  She sniffed. "No defeatism today, Captain! You know as well as I do that the tast and your own bodies will absorb the force. The saddles are insulated. The beast is used to mild shocks. No, conditions favor us. The siege of the Djukasis Zone Gate complex is well along; knock out the rest of their aerial defenses today, and the froggies will easily take it over in the rain."

  They went back to tell their men.

  Renard, too, was watching the storm approach, with far different thoughts in mind. Over the past week he'd become a good fighter, but electrocuting those bees sickened him. He did it only because, if he did not, they would kill him with their projectile weapons and stingers, suicidally if need be. But, those bees were people defending their homes.

  He was also scared. Those bees weren't fools; they had learned, too, that they could turn more quickly than a pegasus; hit the mount in the rear, out of reach of the Agitar rider, and the beast plunged to its own and its rider's death. That had almost happened to him twice now; it had happened to most of his friends already.

  Captain Bir was sarcastic but professional. "The final assault this time, for sure, boys," he told them without any conviction whatsoever. "Same deal. We're supposed to go in just ahead of the storm. When it hits, you'll draw additional charges. Try and get in to the hive itself, give them all the juice you've got. Fry it. As soon as the storm hits, clear out when you've shot your wad. The froggies will drive in with the rain."

  "But that'll leave them with no air support, sir," one of the men pointed out.

  He shook his head. "That's D-Company's job. No, we get the easy part. Just go in ahead and kill everything we can, then get out of there." They chuckled mirthlessly, knowing that their job was the deadly part. "No," he concluded, "just remember that you'll have an easy retreat. They can't fly in the rain as we can. If it's good and hard, just let your mount bring you home."

  Renard nodded with the rest, a plan forming in his mind. He'd seen earlier in the day at the captain's tent a map of the overall route of march. He'd remembered from the moment he'd heard it the official's statement that Mavra Chang was in a place called Lata. The captain had been arguing with another officer, and he'd pointed to the map on his tent wall, saying, "We can't flank that far north, Suo! That's Lata, neutral territory!"

  And it had been northeast of their present position, about a day's flight. The pegasus wouldn't mind rain. It liked rain and storms, with the Agitar to draw the lightning from it. Water rolled off the animal with ease, not weighing it down at all. If that storm were fierce enough, and he had guts enough, he told himself, he was going to desert.

  "Okay, boys! Let's mount up!" the captain called. One last battle, one more battle.

  Here we go, all right. Renard thought grimly.

  * * *

  To the Makiem on the ground, and to the great, red-eyed flying triangles that were the Cebu, it was an awesome sight, even taking into account their different concepts of what was grand. The storm was close now; the sky was filled with great black-and-orange billowing clouds that rumbled and flashed, like lights flashing briefly, across the panorama.

  Against that came the Agitar, tiny specks at first, then growing until they could be individually distinguished across the storm-tossed sky. Great horses of many colors, broad swanlike wings flapping gently in the rough air, in V-shaped formations—dozens of them in the leading wave, then dozens more behind, protecting the flanks.

  They came in fairly low; the maximum altitude of the pegasus was between fifteen hundred and eighteen hundred meters, and they generally stayed lower than that as a safety margin—in
this case much lower, due to the upper-air turbulence, perhaps no more than three hundred meters above the ground troops.

  Pterodactyllike Cebu, red eyes blazing, moved off behind the Makiem ground troops to provide additional cover for the incoming Agitar. Each of the great giant reptiles wore a harness with twin harpoon tubes that could be aimed and triggered by a flick of the head, then dropped down to be reloaded from quivers strapped to their undersides.

  The Makiem could almost feel the great beating of those wings as they passed just overhead, and some of the giant frogs cheered both in optimism and to release the tension from their own impending jump-off.

  The enemy, its forces depleted by near-continuous battle, its reserves pulled in from North and South, waited until the last moment before challenging. Their only hope was to get inside the Cebu defensive screen and strike the great pegasi down by bullet or stinger, even though the latter method would mean their own deaths as well.

  The Agitar were in sight of the objective now; the monstrous hive half above ground rose over thirty meters in the air. It had been badly damaged by cannon fire and past aerial attacks, but it had stood, torn though it was by great gaping holes and scars.

  From its thousands of tiny black pockmarks there appeared to be some sort of reflection of the storm flashes, and it was—from the great, huge, multifaceted eyes of the defenders, who now rose in highly organized, tight-knit swarms to meet the coming foe. The two sides were joined in less than a minute.

  The bees were huge, over a meter long, with menacing stingers to match. But the stingers were also an integral part of their backbone; to use it was to break it off—thus breaking its back and causing death. They depended first on their weapons—projectile-types, since theirs was a semitech hex, contained in the large boxes located under the thorax, operated by one of the eight flexible, clawlike legs that the furred black-and-gold creatures possessed. Spring-wound, they could fire ten rounds a second, with a two-hundred-shot cartridge.