Nest of Worlds

by Marek S. Huberath

  The number of nested worlds must be finite for another reason [Zef wrote]. In each Land there is more or less the same number of people, since they are born at pretty much the same rate. In a world 173,204, for example, there would be thirty billion Lands, so you would have five or ten Lands to every person. Since a man and woman would meet once in only fifty to two hundred Lands, it is clear that the population of such a world would die out.

  In addition, giving birth takes about an hour, so there could not exist a world of so high a degree of nestedness that an inhabitant would have less than that time in a Land.

  These birth arguments were better.

  90

  Every evening Lepko sat at the head of Jaspers’s bed, waiting for Crooks to fall asleep. He didn’t want to provoke Crooks with bits of straw falling from the mattress. Jaspers, unable to read while Lepko sat, began to ask him about principles of accounting, which in Darah were the same as in Taayh.

  Soon Jaspers was promoted again and no longer had to stay by the conveyor belt. For hours he walked down production halls with a noter in his hands and recorded, added, transmitted. It was tedious, exacting work. Every hour he had to collect numbers that described current production and inventory, and these he input into the planning machine. In response he got a printout of production for the next hour. He corrected for the latest indicators received, adjusted the work schedule accordingly, and distributed the new orders.

  Then he had fifteen to twenty minutes of free time to read the newspaper. He was barely able to run an eye over the data for food, clothes, shoes produced; the predictions for the goods that would be divided among the older and younger workers. And the cycle began again.

  He looked in on the divisions where the women worked. More and more he hung around the station of one of them. In her gray uniform and the gray kerchief over her pinned hair, she contained surprising subtleties. It might have been the way she cocked her head as she worked; it might have been because, unlike most of the other women along the belt, she was slender, graceful. In any case, Jaspers’s route went by her station. The girl had a long white neck of delicate, fresh complexion. She was young but seemed serious for her age. He learned her name, of course. Heather pleased him more and more.

  He read the book until late at night, or else he set the alarm for four thirty and read at the crack of dawn. The world it presented was so different from the reality of the factory; he was transported. The adventures of the two old women who spent their life traveling without restraints were like a remarkable dream.

  Twice he overslept. The guards were tolerant of his tardiness, because he could calculate the factory’s daily production and set the statistical coefficients accurately. Few others could do that.

  The rigors of physical labor proved too much for Lepko; he died of a heart attack. Jaspers missed him.

  Crooks became quieter, careful. In the barracks he stopped tormenting others. He continued to beat them in the factory, and the victims would return covered with bruises. But Jaspers had deprived him of an evening activity as invigorating to Crooks as going for a walk was to others. For this, Crooks’s hatred of Jaspers was greater than ever.

  91

  After two weeks the results of Jaspers’s tests arrived. Early one morning Lasaille took him from the hall, from his reading. In the corridor he clapped him on the back and shook his hand, taking off his leather glove first.

  “Congratulations,” he said warmly.

  Jaspers swelled with pride, though Lasaille’s hand was too soft.

  They went to the commandant himself. Hullic was tiny behind a massive desk of unfinished plywood. At the production roll calls he seemed solid, old; in reality he was short and rather young. In greeting he shook both their hands and gestured to armchairs.

  Jaspers thought he would float: here he was talking with the commandant.

  “So this is the discovery of the year,” began Hullic playfully, looking Jaspers over with approval. “You did brilliantly, Mr. Jaspers. My congratulations.” That he used “Mr.” meant yet another promotion. “I’m delighted with our new colleague. We’re short of guards . . . You understand, much is demanded. Few can handle it. You’ll be advanced too for this, Lasaille. Issue him a uniform. Give him the training course. Introduce him around, have him meet the crew.” Hullic made a motion that meant that Lasaille knew what to do, and also that the topic was exhausted and he, Hullic, had things to do, so Jaspers and Lasaille should beat it.

  92

  Jaspers was taken to one of the rooms for guards; it accommodated four. Besides him there were Lasaille; the thin, muttering Dub; and Tyang, a garrulous old man who had given Jaspers’s back more than one blow of the stick.

  The uniform was fitted. First Jaspers was covered with some kind of silicon grease, then the modeler put foam on him that hardened on exposure to air. The modeler shaped it, giving it big muscles and broad shoulders. He took elastic cushions and sewed them to the uniform to create the impression of normal proportions.

  When Jaspers put on this uniform, he looked like a weightlifter, a copy of Crooks. They covered his face with a meshed, transparent mask to mold the features.

  During duty the guards were not allowed even to unbutton their uniforms. Here was the reason they all seemed so strong, the reason their rigid, determined faces inspired respect. This alteration of form was indispensable for ensuring obedience among the workers. Lest a new guard be accidentally recognized by his former colleagues, he was stationed in a distant division of the factory.

  Jaspers took the three-month training course. The class was run by a tall, gloomy guard named Koleh. There were three other people in it: two older, heavy women—Gabbie and Josa—and Porz, a slight and pale individual. The content of the lectures amazed Jaspers, as he had been amazed, at the beginning, by the method of selecting guards. They were shown how to drill and how to wear their uniform. A few hours a day of practice in front of the mirror: some movements were permitted, some not—for one’s safety. The cushions under the uniform had to look like muscles, not like dummy padding. A guard must in no way reveal that his body differed from that of a common worker, that he was not far superior physically to a common worker. Even in the event of a direct attack, a guard must not permit himself to be exposed. For this purpose a thin microphone was glued into the mask. Immediately a group of strongmen like Crooks would come to the rescue. So far no guard had been attacked, even though they were few in number and had been chosen for their mental, not physical, abilities.

  When Jaspers had mastered the art of wearing his uniform and moving correctly, instruction began on how to oversee the workers. In this course the students became acquainted with the organization of the factory divisions where they would be stationed. They were told which workers would grow tired (or bored) and at which hours. Everything had been noted meticulously by the guard scientists. An enormous body of information had been gathered, but the high command rewarded an individual for making additional, well-documented observations—gave him one or sometimes even two days of leave, which could be spent in the reading room.

  Then began the lessons in intimidation. The students were taught to speak in a way that inspired dread, to shout in a way that never failed to impose one’s will. Then came instruction in striking with the hand, with the stick. The blow—always a single blow, no more—had to create the impression that the one who struck possessed tremendous strength. The pain of it should be sharp, intense, but of short duration. The blow should cause no permanent harm; its purpose was to spur the worker to greater productivity, not incapacitate him.

  Jaspers opened the book less frequently and with less interest. In comparison with the great responsibilities awaiting him, the fate of the two old women and their lame cat seemed unimportant. Their lifestyle he now considered a kind of social desertion. The world they lived in was falling apart, and increasingly people were shirking their duties. The cities, moreove
r, were not safe, since the wind spread poisonous clouds from the ruins of the chemical factories that could destroy all life in Zatr.

  Jaspers believed that the disintegration of institutions and the closing of the factories had been caused by the lack of professional, conscientious people, the kind who kept society going. The path taken by that world was leading it to destruction. To postpone the inevitable end, he put aside the book. Because he no longer read it, Ozza and Hobeth did not die.

  He stopped seeing Heather. One factor in this decision was the consideration that, by choosing her, he would no longer be able to avail himself of the list of unattached women workers of the factory. Against that great number of possibilities, her charms waned. Using Lasaille’s strategy, for example, he could have a woman who would be leaving Taayh soon. Since a union was annulled immediately by a departure, he could look for another to replace her.

  93

  The night before the first time he was to serve as a guard in a production hall, he had difficulty sleeping. For half the night he tossed and turned, until Dub—who was known for uttering no more than 250 words in the course of a week, including bids during bridge games—said something.

  Jaspers reported for duty an hour early. The shift went without surprises. At first he was disconcerted by the squeak of his own boots and of the strap of the uniform, but he grew to like the sound. He didn’t need to raise his voice once. Koleh, on duty with Jaspers for the initiation, said that it went very well, that Jaspers was perhaps even too formal and correct. It was meant as a compliment, not criticism.

  “Now, Jaspers, you are a different breed of man,” said Tyang, sitting at the table and sipping herbal tea for his ulcers. “You’ll move to Lauhl but remain a guard. Once a guard, always a guard. The workers mustn’t know that, otherwise everything would fall apart. Those who precede must build for those who follow . . .”

  “How do you know this, Tyang?” asked Lasaille. He lay on his bunk, hands clasped behind his head. “We could get to Lauhl and find everything in ruins there, because people might think that if they’re moving on, there’s no reason to leave anything of value behind . . .”

  “There is no ‘we’ and ‘they’ here,” Tyang returned. “Each person changes Land as an individual and finds the world as it is, and therefore nothing unravels. You serve your eight years and nine months and move on.”

  “A generation of destroyers would be a catastrophe,” said Jaspers. “After them, no one would be able to rebuild. A man who wanted to build would know that where he was going he would find only destruction, that if he built, he would leave behind work that had only just begun, with no certainty that those who followed him would continue it . . . Once destroyed, the social mechanism cannot be re-created.”

  “And yet someone created it,” said Dub.

  They fell silent, struck not only by the truth of this statement but also by the fact that Dub had spoken.

  “I always fear what I will find in the next place,” said Lasaille, breaking the silence.

  “Always with the same fear?” asked Tyang.

  “Yes.”

  “I think that any overturning of a world’s system is impossible. The destroyer would have to be a superior individual, and all such individuals are pulled out to serve as guards. You have a recent example right here . . . but all of us are examples. No man will bring down a system in which he advances. It would make no sense.”

  “I don’t like moving. I never know how much time I will lose in the journey,” muttered Lasaille.

  “Sometimes it seems to me that the whole social contract hangs by a thread, and that it is only thanks to us that everything hasn’t gone to hell.”

  “The Nest of Worlds books depict Lands that are coming apart,” said Jaspers. “The more you read, the more things crumble . . . People leave their homes, wander like nomads . . . They don’t build, don’t renew. They have lost faith in what they do.”

  “The stunted descendants of giants?” Tyang said, with a whistling s. He had had a tooth pulled recently, and a false one hadn’t been put in yet.

  Lasaille shook his head. “No. There were never giants. It’s simply that each book begins with the situation given it. The created world changes according to its own laws. And it moves toward decay.”

  “Always?” asked Jaspers.

  Lasaille shrugged. “I don’t know. You’ve seen yourself how slowly the reading goes. Perhaps, ultimately, a kind of equilibrium is achieved, imposed by the conditions given, and the future stabilizes.”

  “I think,” said Tyang, summing up, “that the Nest of Worlds books are telling us not to throw away what we have.”

  94

  Jaspers walked the hall with the regulation spring in his step that he had successfully made a habit. He smacked his black-gloved hand with his stick. He liked to accentuate his presence in this way. The rhythmic smacking could be heard over the roar of the machines, if one was listening for it. Jaspers noted that for a while now the workers, seeing him, appeared to exert less effort, as if slacking. There were half smiles. Or at least he received this impression.

  One worker in particular, young and slender, had a sharp look that seemed to unmask Jaspers, to see through the mesh that covered his face and held the sewn microphone, and through the dummy polyurethane muscles as well. Jaspers didn’t like him. The man was sitting at the conveyor belt now with his back to Jaspers, screwing lids on jars as if his hands were two clubs of wood. Jaspers was certain the slacker—safe in the belief that there was no guard nearby—was ridiculing the discipline of the task, feeling not the least respect.

  In an instant he was at his side. The others were unable, or didn’t dare, to warn the worker. In one well-trained motion Jaspers dealt the required blow to the small of the back. The man groaned and slid to the ground gasping. His mouth foamed, and he began to twitch convulsively. The other workers murmured, and some even stopped what they were doing.

  Jaspers didn’t lose his composure. Calmly, speaking into the microphone of his mask, he summoned medical assistance for the damaged worker.

  Because the murmuring continued, he spread his legs per regulations and took a deep breath.

  “Attention!” he bellowed.

  They all stood at attention. The situation was under control.

  “Back to your seats! Back to work!” The commands sealed his victory.

  95

  “Have a seat, Mr. Jaspers.” Hullic was unexpectedly friendly and direct. “Do you smoke?”

  Jaspers declined. The recent events flew through his head. What had happened was an accident, his striking the worker too hard in the hall, the man now permanently paralyzed. The first time he struck a worker, and it was too hard. He wouldn’t do that again. He would practice carefully to get the force of the blow right. Yes, this would be the only line to take against the chief’s anger.

  “As you know, I’m moving to Lauhl,” Hullic began.

  Too bad, thought Jaspers. For all his faults, he’s been a good chief.

  “I must choose a successor,” Hullic went on. “Which puts me in some difficulty . . .”

  True, thought Jaspers. Lasaille would be the best, but he’s moving too. It’s the old man’s problem, though, not mine . . . But he was flattered that the commandant was soliciting his advice.

  “. . . and the candidates I might consider, they are also all leaving Taayh in the near future. It makes no sense to appoint someone for a few months.”

  Jaspers swallowed.

  “So I have decided that you are the best choice. Your excellent reports, your intelligence. And you will be in Taayh for another two and a half years. What do you think?”

  “Well, first of all, I’m too young,” said Jaspers, managing to collect himself. He wasn’t eager to advance so quickly. It would antagonize his colleagues. “Secondly, you must be aware of that incident in the hall . . . I unintent
ionally crippled a worker. He’s in the hospital because of me.”

  Hullic waved that away. “Cedar?” he said. “I inquired about him. He can move his arms now. He’ll be able to work in a sitting position. It was an accident. And your age is not important. Do you agree to take over my duties as commandant?”

  “Yes, sir,” said Jaspers, hesitating no longer, but in his heart he wasn’t sure he had made the right decision.

  96

  Jaspers was extremely busy. The duties of commandant, it turned out, were difficult and exhausting. He sat at his desk until late. The operation of the food factory, responsible for feeding many thousands of people, was of the utmost importance to Taayh. This fact kept him going, was sufficient reward for his efforts. He recalled the time (though less often now) when he was a simple guard concerned only about rules and regulations. From his current perspective, all other posts seemed superficial.

  He noted how quickly he was aging. Every time he ran his fingers through his hair, some hair came out in his hand. According to the registry he was the youngest commandant of the factory in 123 years, which was flattering, and yet he counted the days until his move to Lauhl.

  By noon he had taken care of personnel matters: complaints, conflicts, requests for transfer. He thought with irony that at noon the guards could eat something, gossip a little, rest. Only members of the high command kept working.

  Today Jesse, a guard for several years, had made an appointment to see him. Jesse was the type who moved from Land to Land, secure in the knowledge that he would never fall in rank. A paper pusher. Jaspers could fall into that rut too, since he had become a guard so early.