by Brian Aldiss
‘We were looking in the wrong place.’
‘No, no, it was there on Playder, on Doruchak, Millibine, on any one of a million planets encrusted with the tall towers of man’s faith. But you did not stay to look. So you are a – well, I won’t say you are a failure, because I believe a man to be a failure only when he pronounces himself one, but you have failed in your main Life Objective: to lead us instinctively to the peak of man’s greatness.’
He said gently, ‘Ysis, you speak above yourself. Do not forget I was trained on Ravensour itself for a hundred years to be a Seeker, and the instilled instinct of which you speak is still with me and my Life Objective is still untarnished. Accordingly, I have led the Seekers to Earth, which may have been the cradle of mankind, and you must hold your tongue.’
‘The cradle of mankind! Who needs to go back to the cradle?’
Kervis made no answer. He was tired, divided against himself. He acknowledged much of what Ysis said; yet there seemed nothing to do but press on with his investigation.
They had arrived at the settlement to experience only crushing disappointment. All the cities of Earth stood in ruins or sprawled into dust; only in the settlements was there a fair degree of order. But it was immediately obvious to them that political and governmental organisations, without which great civilisations cannot survive, were entirely lacking. The buildings were low and modest, hugging the ground with broad eaves; within, men and women could be seen going naked, though outside they wore casual clothing.
Kervis was immensely disturbed to find what he had been taught to regard as only semi-aware behaviour. The people were singing and making music with punctured wooden pipes; they danced together in the evenings in intricate patterns, round stinking wood fires. Even worse, they let their children run free and play with various species of animal which were allowed to foul where they would and go into the dwellings. Throughout the rest of this galaxy, all this was unheard of. It seemed indeed that Earth was an unlikely place on which to go looking for man’s greatest achievement.
Yet it must be said that the people in the settlement had some virtue. They listened quietly enough while the Seekers told them of the wonders of the universe, of the treatments that could make them purely rational creatures, or extend their lifespans for thousands of years, or transfer their intelligences to other minds. And they seemed willing enough to divulge their alarming habits to the recorders of the party. Among these alarming habits was religion.
It was when Ysis and the Senior Seekers found how much attention Kervis paid to the pathetic details of the local religion that they first officially voiced their impatience to him. Bandareich came before him and said ceremonially, ‘O Kervis XI, it was not to occupy our great minds with these trifles that we travelled these last two and a half thousand subjective years. The Machines report to us that on the last occasion when we were expunging our minds of dross, you did not undergo Ablution; we believe that consequently your brain grows tired. We therefore ask you to undergo Ablution or not to stand at the next Election.’
Bandareich’s words had made it plain how seriously his leadership had slipped. Yet Kervis had not undergone Ablution. The truth was, it had been a psychic shock to him to visit the source of his race, and thus of his being. He had continued to listen to the vague rumours of the settlement’s religion. He had become so interested that he had embarked on this expedition to find their place of pilgrimage, Ani-mykey. The declaration of his intentions had caused a serious split in the ranks of Senior Seekers, most of whom were for leaving Earth immediately. Under the guidance of Banareich, they waited now in the settlement, letting Kervis go off with his year-wife in one vehicle across unknown land.
The desert outside the crawler was giving place to semi-scrubland. He saw a small armoured creature scuttle away into thorn, but could not get a clear glimpse of it because the light was poor. In fact the light was extremely bad. Although the sun was shining, its rays seemed to be absorbed by the layers of cloud that piled up evenly from the horizon. The clouds were black and looked as if they would belch forth torrential rain at any moment. As Kervis stared up at them, he saw Ysis’s face from the corner of his eye. She had withered and aged into an old crone.
The truck swerved under his shock. He swung round to see what had happened. Her face was as normal: pale, unlined, lofty of brow, thin of lip, dark of hair. She stared at him curiously.
‘Kervis, are you ill?’
‘I thought – I’m sorry, the light’s so bad.’
‘Switch the searchlight on. Are you tired? Do you wish me to drive? Put it on automatic.’
Muttering to himself, he switched on the searchlight. As he turned to do it, the crone was back there at the corner of his eye. This time, slowly and fearfully, he turned his head; the illusion vanished; Ysis was as usual, and looking at him in challenging and unfriendly fashion.
He shook his head and tried to concentrate on the road. From the half-seen seat next to his, the withered mummy mocked him.
Now trees were closing in on the road. In the distance, they reared against the smudgy sky where hills were. At any moment, the downpour would start, for though the sun still shone, the clouds made a sickly yellow light that seemed to baffle visibility.
The mummy said, ‘A suitable setting for your final hour, Kervis.’
He watched it dissolve into the calm features of Ysis as he turned and asked, ‘What did you say?’
‘I said that the sun will be set before our return. What are you so nervous about?’
‘Nothing. It’s curious country, don’t you think?’
‘It’s vile country,’ she said contemptuously.
His hands shook on the wheel. The track was good through the forest, but it wound in baffling fashion. The trees seemed like smudges on the glass before his eyes and he lost speed. What have I got next to me? he wondered. Has some change come over Ysis, once so loving; or is this some new thing that has taken Ysis’s place; or is my mind collapsing because I have refused the Ablutions? And what do I do? How my mother, the Matriarch, would grieve to see me like this!
The mummy told him: ‘Incest won’t help you.’
Gritting his teeth, he swung round on it and demanded as it turned into Ysis, ‘What did you say then?’
‘I said that it was as still as Hell here.’
‘Oh, you did, did you? And where did you find the concept of Hell?’
‘You forget I had to attend those boring talks with the religious man in the settlement with you.’
Had he nearly trapped her/it there? Hell: the primitive belief in a sub-world devoted to suffering; and some idea the Earthmen had that you had to go into Hell to rise a full man. Well, perhaps this forest was Hell; it was dark enough to be far underground.
‘What’s the matter with you, Kervis? It is still, isn’t it? Why do you challenge every remark I make?’
Anxious, for some obscure reason, not to agree with her, he gestured at the landscape outside. ‘It’s full of animals,’ he said.
As he spoke, he saw to his horror it was true. The sable trees were as blurred as a bad water-colour under the distortion of light. Among them, so that the trees themselves seemed to be alive, moved huge ungainly forms, more primitive than he could imagine. Try as he might, he could not get a clear glimpse of one. It seemed to him there were several varieties. He yanked the searchlight about, sending its yellow tooth biting into the foliage. The foliage heaved and glittered and kept its secrets; only an odd armoured scale or a vanishing hoof or eye could be caught.
‘See those creatures?’ he asked, turning to Ysis.
They’re only rodents,’ she said indifferently.
Struck by an idea, he turned away so that the aged crone was back beside him and said, ‘Would you mind repeating what you just said?’
‘I said, “You know them, don’t you?”’ the crone told him.
He nodded his head slowly, some of the fright leaving him. He found the crone’s answer more reassuring than Ysis’s evasive remark
; the crone at least faced him with the truth, awful though it was.
Kervis screwed up his eyes and pressed his forehead, wondering why he had just thought that; for he didn’t know the animals in the forest – did he? He looked again. They were still there, bigger perhaps now, for he fancied that now and again one stood on its hind legs and looked at him over the forest. He nearly drove over the tail of one, but it fortunately flicked out of the way just in time. At least he could not see anyone he knew walking in the forest, which was lucky. He had a suspicion that there might be – but that was silly, for he didn’t know any twins. At least Perhaps if he went back …
‘Why have we stopped?’ Ysis asked, as his rolling eye sought her.
‘It’s so hot in here,’ he said. ‘Do you mind if I take my clothes off?’
Impatiently, she reached over and adjusted the air-conditioning, switching the fan on at the same time. ‘Are you ill? Shall I take over the driving?’
‘I must keep control.’
‘You’re losing your grip. Let me into your seat. You can rest. You’re no longer responsible.’
‘No, no, it’s important – I must steer us out of this –’ And as he was talking, her fine flesh was withering and turning brown and her eyes sinking back into her skull and little blotches were rising through her flesh and her mouth alterering shape, the lips turning a flecked purple, opened to reveal dusty old gums guarded by an odd broken bastion of tooth. And the old crone rocked with laughter and said –
As Ysis: ‘You’re in too much of a state to drive. Let go!’
As Mummy: ‘You’re too young and innocent to drive – let’s go!’
She was right though he feared her. He dived past her, opening the door as he went, and jumped down to the ground, rolling lightly over, and picking himself up off his hands and knees. All round him was the barbarous and moist dark. Though it was strange to him, he thought he recognised something, perhaps a haunting smell.
He walked swiftly along the track, which was so narrow that it could only be traversed on foot. As he went he realised that he had been mistaken about the forest, that in fact what he had taken for conifers were gigantic ferns, their fronds rolling and uncurling as if under the pressure of accelerated growth. It was difficult to catch sight of the gorillas, although he could hear them clearly, but he was not afraid of them. His personal worry was that he should not miss sight of the mountain – the Jungfrau, was it? – that would guide him on his way.
But the thought was parent to the deed, or perhaps vice versa, for the forest of ferns was thinning, and beyond was the white-capped spire of the mountain, his landmark, shining clear in the murk. Ani-mykey must be very close.
It seemed that he had been a long while in the forest. As he stood looking ahead, a string of primitive men emerged from among the giant fronds, carrying amorphous objects; the mist prevented him seeing clearly. Ysis was among them wearing a dress she had worn at the beginning of their association. He was glad to see that she was not entirely unfriendly to the Earth people, and held out his arms to welcome her.
‘I thought you were lost.’
‘I thought you were!’
He attempted to kiss her lips, but she turned in his arms and pointed ahead. ‘Is that where you are hoping to get?’ she asked.
The ground sloped away steeply before them. In the depression, the spires of a stone building could be seen.
‘That looks like Ani-mykey,’ he said. He took her hand and led her forward – she had lost her own volition.
They climbed down a steep hillside. At the bottom, there flowed a narrow but swift stream, with Ani-mykey standing on the further bank.
‘Now we shall have to undress,’ Kervis said.
As they stood there, absolutely naked and hairless, he recalled how the primitive men had been covered with hair over their bodies. Ysis wanted to take her camera across, but he persuaded her to unstrap it from her wrist and leave it on the bank. Similarly, he unstrapped the chronometer that fed him an injection against sleep every nine hours, and left it on the bank beside the microcamera. They plunged into the stream.
Fortunately, it was not deep, for neither could swim. He took her hand and led her across, the water splashing under her armpits. It was dauntingly cold; they flopped up the far bank in the mud like two sea creatures climbing from the sea.
‘You’d have thought the pilgrims would have built a bridge here for their own convenience,’ Ysis said.
‘The river may be part of the plan.’
‘What plan?’
‘Finding whatever they seek in their religion.’
‘It’s all nonsense to me, and I’m cold.’ As she spoke, she looked up at the building. The spires grew from the ground and round it, ancient and veined with moss. The great walls themselves, punctuated by windows of diamond shape set high, were stone; and the stone was covered with obscure patterns. Kervis moved nearer to observe the pattern; any small area of it seemed to be intelligible, formed as it was from letters and leaves and the entwined bodies of man and animal; but the structure was so immense that the meaning of the overall pattern – if indeed there was a meaning – was impenetrable.
He began to stride along the walls, which proved to hold bays and towers and recesses, looking for an entrance. Ysis moved reluctantly behind him.
‘Come on!’ he exclaimed, generally dissatisfied with her. ‘Faster!’
‘If you’re looking for a door,’ she said, ‘you’ve just passed one.’
He went back, amazed he could have missed it.
The entrance was set in a square tower, narrow and with a low threshold. The door was of wood, its carvings continuing the riot of carving on the stonework to either side.
Kervis exclaimed in disappointment, ‘This can’t be the main door!’
‘Why do you need the main door? Any door will do if you just want to get in. You do think a lot of yourself if you must have the main door!’
‘You’re mistaken. This is the main door.’
‘But you just said it wasn’t! The whole thing’s a trick, isn’t it? You just want to prove that you’re right.’
That’s not so. I wish to better the whole human race. That’s why we’re here, aren’t we?’
‘I don’t know why we’re here. And I’m not coming in there with you.’
‘It’s important that you should come in.’
‘I’m not coming. Sorry.’
‘Suit yourself. It doesn’t matter to me.’
‘Oh? Then why did you say it was important?’
He looked at her searchingly; perhaps she had aged. ‘Did you ever think something might be important to you, Ysis?’ He bowed his head, and made his way into Ani-mykey.
Inside, in the semi-dark, he tripped over a litter of stuff on the floor and fell among it, squelching as he rolled over. His hands were sticky and slimy, and he saw the modest hall was littered with dead flowers and fruit, presumably offerings brought here by people from the settlements. As he climbed to his feet, he glimpsed robes hanging on one side, and gratefully took one to cover his nakedness. Moving carefully, he walked down the corridor ahead.
The corridor was perfectly plain and austere, only the thick gloom rendering it mysterious. It turned corners and divided more than once before he realised that he was well on the way to getting lost, and that it would be advisable to go back to the beginning if he could and start again. Then he saw something staring at him from the next corner, and dread blotted out thought.
From under lowered horns, eyes could be seen, eyes too full of evil to be other than intelligent, though the form seemed to be that of a beast. It appeared to be waiting. He seemed to discern that its eyes were four. In his ears was a roaring noise like organ music. He could only clutch his gown to him and shiver in it.
He stood there for a long time, and the thing waited patiently for him. Finally it occurred to him that it might be a statue or a model – at least not alive. Very slowly, he approached it. Very slowly, it dissolved
into something else.
When he got to it at the corner, he saw that he was looking at nothing at all resembling the terrifying beast he had imagined. From here on, the corridor was elaborately decorated by carving that often stood away from the wall altogether. The horns were the end of an elephant’s tusk, the eyes acorns clustered on a little bush bowing under the elephant’s tread. Yet he still felt his fear as he walked along the new stretch of corridor, ducking and pushing through a forest of carving. The air was laden with ancient fears.
Whereas the carving on the stonework outside had been extremely formalised, approaching abstraction, here it was executed in the severely naturalistic vein. Fierce animals of prey raked the sides of ruminants whose wounds spurted beads of wooden blood; venomous thorn and gossamer creeper intertwined caught wooden pearls of dew between them; shy forest sprites, arrested in mid-motion, held their heads high with an inquiring eye that seemed to blink; scavenger birds leaned forward with ruffled grainy feathers.
In this unyielding forest which knew only simulated life, it was almost impossible to discover the next turn of the corridor, so prolific was the contorted wood. Kervis wished devoutly that he had brought an axe with him, or one of the weapons from the vehicle, but he was empty-handed. The noise still sounded in his ears. He thought it might be music; it was as loud and intimate as the sound of his bloodstream.
He passed the representation of a primitive being carrying a woman over its shoulder. The being was shown as almost noseless and without forehead; so bestial was its wooden glance that he shrank by it. The girl, tumbled carelessly over the brute’s shoulder, had her eyes closed in a faint. Uneasily past them, he came up against a dead end. A jungle of unliving leaves and creepers united to bar his way. He stood there a moment, looking and probing, and then was forced to return past the brute.
The girl’s eyes were open.
As his own mouth hinged open in terror, so did hers, and she let out a piercing scream. Unthinking, taken over by a superior and mindless force, Kervis lashed out with all the force of his body and caught the brute between the eyes with his fist. It blinked and dropped the woman, slowly raising its great oaken arms towards him. Ignoring the pains shooting up his arm, Kervis hit it again.