I felt somewhat detached from the whole process. It was the first time I’d actually sat back within my body and let the wind do his stuff. I was unconscious in the Drift when he landed the Hooded Swan, and all the rest of his work had been covert or subversive.
It was an odd feeling to be a conscious passenger, but it didn’t feel anywhere near as bad as I’d expected it might. It was almost as though I was frozen still, like the spiders—not against my will, but because I felt that I daren’t move or even think too loudly in case the inner conflict wrecked the wind’s co-ordination. I was bent on becoming a mental foetus—as small and as insignificant as possible.
The important thing was that I was willing, and that I was easy in my mind about the whole thing. I didn’t exactly love the wind, but you don’t have to be in love to know you’re on the same side. I still had my lingering fears about being ‘taken over,’ but familiarity had taken the edge off the fear. The wind and I had lived too long together to be at war.
I stared coolly through the eyes whose movements I no longer controlled. I could see four spiders. One was dead. That left three lurking behind us. I couldn’t remember which one was which and which one was the closest. I thought it was one of the ones I couldn’t see.
I felt Micheal sag to the ground beside me. He lay very still, his body curled around my feet.
Once the novelty of the situation wore off, I became uncomfortably aware of the fact that what we were doing had a distinct flavour of staving off the inevitable. It was difficult to believe that Micheal or Mercede could recover sufficiently within the foreseeable future to get up and start killing spiders, and equally difficult to believe that we could get the spiders before they got us even if they did. We couldn’t keep playing forever, and the spiders certainly weren’t going to go away if and when they got bored. I wondered what the galactic record for long-distance pipe-playing was, and whether the wind’s ability to make better use of my body than I could would help us to break it.
Probably not, I decided. He had a lot more on his mind now than subtle tinkering with the autonomic nervous system. He probably wouldn’t be able to exercise anywhere near the same fineness of control. While he was in full charge, he was probably only a shade more efficient than me. It was undoubtedly possible for me to take over his role as he was taking over mine.
But I didn’t know how.
We were, implicitly, waiting for help. We had no reason to assume that any would be forthcoming in the near future. The forest people would undoubtedly return. But when?
The blackness of night arrived with its usual haste, and robbed us even of the small comfort that seeing the immobility of the enemy had afforded us. There was no light at all except for the mute red glow of the embers of our dying fire. As time went by even the redness faded away, and in the end we were left in the pitch darkness.
The song of the pipes went on and on.
I began to hate it.
Fear began to gather itself within me once again. My time sense seemed to be distorted, and logic told me that more time had passed than I had actually ‘experienced’. But the time factor was nevertheless beginning to get to me. In darkness, I was subjected to a very harsh exercise in sensory deprivation. It was not so much that I could not receive any sensory input, but that I had the feeling of not being able to use my senses. I was impotent within my own body—wilfully so—and the darkness heightened that feeling. It was a situation very conducive to fear, and I couldn’t help gradually descending into it as it tried to take possession of my consciousness.
I knew that the fear itself was dangerous. Fear affects not only the mind, but also the physiology. The source of fear may be located in the imagination, but the process of feeling scared inevitably co-opts the resources of the whole body. In the body, fear is glandular imbalance—adrenaline, vasopressor hormone imbalance, followed by pituitary imbalance. The vascular system carrying the hormones is itself the major site of reaction, but you sense it primarily in your skin. It’s hot or cold, dry or sweating, stretched or heavy. Ultimate fear can black you out, or stop your heart, or...
If the fear that I was allowing to grow got too powerful, it could rob the wind of his own presence of mind. If I lost control of myself, it would have exactly the same effect as his losing control. It could kill us both. He was in the driving seat, but I knew only too well that the man in the back seat was very much a part of what went on in the car. In the Halcyon Drift, I had been forced to black out before the wind could take over, because I was consumed and paralysed by stark terror, and there was nothing to be done with the body while my imagination was feeding it fear.
Something awful could happen here, if I allowed it to.
I fought.
Side by side, the wind and I waged war on circumstance and on our own weaknesses. If the wind gave me any active help, I was unaware of it. If I helped the wind in any way, it was not by conscious volition. But even if there was no overlap between the roles in our collective fight, the mutualism of the moment was obvious, and it made an impression on us both. It brought us far closer together than we could possibly have come by sensible and sane agreement. We were forced together, under pressure, welded to one another by desperation and the threat of bodily death.
The most logical and persistent of all my worries regarding the wind had always been the fact that bodily death was absolute only for me—he could go on to a new host. I had always feared that he might therefore be more careless of my life than I. That night, I found out that I was wrong. While attached to my mind the wind was committed, no less than I. He might have a cat’s nine lives, but he lived them one at a time. In adapting to my brain for the purposes of living therein, he had become completely (but reversibly) humanised. He was forced by the nature of things to exactly the same level of commitment that I was. The logical, ‘objective’ view of his priorities was quite wrong. I discovered that while we were fighting together in the forest.
After that, it was no longer possible for me to remain apart from the wind. Inevitably, this moment was the turning point in the pathology of my own alienation.
I knew that if we were to survive, I would never be exactly the same again.
I conquered my fear.
The music played on and on, and we were steady enough and stable enough now to be sure that we could play until we dropped or until we could no longer co-ordinate the music sufficiently to paralyse the minds of the spiders.
We began to look forward to morning. It was a useful target. We knew that in the morning we would have to play ourselves through the day looking forward to evening, but that didn’t matter. We had to take our markers one at a time. There was no point in contemplating the infinite or the indefinite. The problem was very definitely finite.
Night on Chao Phrya, of course, was not nearly as long as night on most of the other worlds where I had spent time during my years of wandering with Lapthorn. But it passed even more quickly than that because of the disorientation of my temporal perception. I think that on many worlds, our collective mental strength might not have sustained us through the night. Dawn, however, gave us extra strength. It was a blessing to be able to see again, even though we already knew what we were going to see. It helped our hopes to rise.
That extra burst of hope might well have saved our lives.
A few minutes after dawn, Micheal revived, and rolled lethargically away from my feet. He didn’t get up. He remembered the spiders, and lay quite still, with his eyes open. I was very glad indeed to see that he was alive and well.
Mercede awoke also. Before she had a chance to open her eyes and react, Micheal had gripped her arm, and was talking to her. The words tumbled out in a fast, hissing stream. She absorbed it all, and there was not the slightest sign of panic. She did not reply. She remained passive and quiet, and the crypto-arachnids did no more than stir throughout the entire exchange.
I could not see Micheal’s face once he had turned his head to speak to Mercede, so I could not savour
the expression which I imagined was there. I could only guess what he had thought on awakening to find that I had played the spiders into quiescence and kept them there all night.
I think that Micheal was gathering his strength. I feel sure that as soon as he was able he would have tried to do something. What it would have been, I don’t know. He knew more about the spiders than I did, and he might know something which would enable him to kill them without permitting them the freedom which had resulted from my method of attempted extermination. It is far from impossible that he would have chosen simply to take Mercede into the forest and save himself and his sister. I wouldn’t have blamed him. I might well have done the same myself.
But Micheal did not need his strength.
Just as I caught the first ostentatious hint of weakness and distortion in the relentless mournful cadence which the wind was repeating over and over again, a beam of light cut a line through the dim purple morning and one of the spiders burst into flame. My eyes were dazzled, and I didn’t see the rest very clearly, but I know that the beam swung, and the spiders were freed from the spell.
They moved, but they had no chance at all. The gun stopped its constant stream of fire only once, while Danel moved it past us. Then he burned the three which were at our backs.
All seven were aflame within a matter of three or four seconds. It was a beautiful piece of gunplay.
My body was suddenly my own again, and I swung around to make sure that everything was still and safe. Then I whipped around again to face Danel.
It all happened too fast. I just collapsed. As I went down, I saw someone running forward from the trees, overtaking Danel.
It was Alyne.
The panpipes dropped from my fingers and my hip landed on top of them as I folded up.
They broke.
I fainted.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
By the time I awoke, we had gained a great deal more company. There were people everywhere. Forest people, and others.
I half-expected to find a ring of concerned faces peering at me, but my fragmentary dreams of people and spiders and panpipes had taken time away from me, and I did not immediately realise that my faint had released me into a deep sleep and that a good many hours had passed. It was almost night now.
I was propped against a pile of rock, and my head was pillowed on a folded garment of some kind. Micheal and Mercede were laid out to my right, both sleeping, wrapped in blankets and apparently comfortable. Linda and Danel sat between them, watching over them.
Watching over me were Eve Lapthorn and the girl I had met in the hills near Corinth.
‘Hi,’ said Eve quietly, as I sat up and stretched to take away some of the stiffness. I felt pained.
‘Welcome to the party,’ I said. ‘I see you brought home the baby. Congratulations.’
‘Not quite,’ she said. ‘The baby brought me. I was lost in the forest.’
‘Surprise surprise,’ I said, never having doubted for a moment that that was the way it had happened.
I looked at Alyne. Her knees were tucked up under her chin, and she was curling her toes reflectively. Her toes, like her fingers, were remarkably susceptible to curling.
‘Suddenly,’ I said, not particularly to the girl or to Eve, ‘everything is coming up roses. Not only the US Cavalry, but also the golden girl. I haven’t had so much luck in one day since....’
And I stopped, because I couldn’t think of an example. I could tell by the way that my wit ran away with my tongue that I was all right.
Everything was all right, it seemed. The forest people had tidied up completely.
‘Wow,’ I said.
Eve was looking at me with a mixture of puzzlement and amusement. The girl’s expression was quite unreadable.
‘Is Micheal okay?’ I asked. ‘ Eve nodded.
Danel left his brother and sister to come over and look at me. I raised my hand in a mock salute which I meant quite seriously.
‘Thanks a lot,’ I said. ‘That was first-class shooting.’
He hesitated, and then he nodded, but I think he was replying to the salute rather than to what I’d said.
‘You sure you’re all right?’ asked Eve.
‘Sure,’ I said. ‘But hungry. Very, very hungry. Also in need of a shot, but shots we don’t have. I’ll settle for the food.’
‘It’ll only take a minute,’ she said, and she got up and went away. She turned round a few paces away and said: ‘There’s someone who wants to talk to us.’
‘Not Max?’
‘The kidnapper,’ she said.
‘Bully for her,’ I replied. ‘We’ll fit her in after the main course and not a minute before.’ Actually, I was very keen for a chance to talk to someone who could presumably explain this whole sad and sorry mess, but protocol has to be observed.
I returned my attention to Danel and the girl. I knew that neither of them would understand a word I said, so I didn’t bother talking. The three of us just sat quietly together until Eve came back with some food. Nothing happened, but I don’t think the time was wasted. It was something that we sat together. Danel couldn’t thank me for saving his brother and sister any more than I could thank him for saving me. But I think we conveyed what was necessary without a word or a gesture.
The woman appeared immediately after the main course, just as I’d said. Danel left then, but the girl stayed. She didn’t show any reaction at all to the woman. There was no evidence of any hostility between them. So where did that leave the kidnap theory?
‘Your name is Grainger,’ she said.
‘That’s right.’
‘You’re here on behalf of Titus Charlot?’
‘She is,’ I said, pointing to Eve. ‘I only work here.’
The woman didn’t appreciate the flippancy. She could hardly be expected to. After all, she was on the brink of big trouble.
‘It’s all right,’ I said. ‘I don’t think there’s any necessity to take you back if you don’t want to go. The girl will have to come, though. Just explain it all to us, please. Not just for Charlot—for me.’
‘What do you know about the colony?’ she asked
‘Not a lot,’ I told her.
‘Alyne knows you.’
‘We met. I gave her a ride once. She seemed to be in a bit of trouble. I’m afraid I didn’t really succeed in getting her out of it. The cops grabbed her.’
She looked at me, coolly and closely. I think my attitude was putting her off. She obviously knew a lot more about this than I did, but she didn’t know anything about me.
‘Look,’ I said. ‘I think we can short-circuit this fencing process. I’ll tell you where I stand. If Eve wants to tell you something different, that’s up to her. I work for Charlot. I’ve nothing to do with the colony and I know nothing about it. Just for the record, I don’t like Charlot or his methods, but that’s irrelevant. He told me that you’d bribed Tyler and kidnapped the girl. He didn’t know why. He told me you weren’t the girl’s mother, and that seemed to put a little meaning into the kidnap charge. I was sent to bring the girl back, and that’s what I intend to do unless you can give me some very strong reasons which she’s willing to back up. I have no immediate intention of returning you for trial or whatever else Charlot might have in mind. You can stay, provided that you can sort out things with the Zodiac people. Okay?’
‘Alyne can go back,’ she said calmly. ‘We’re finished here. I didn’t take her against her will. She knew what I was doing and why.’
‘Did she understand?’ asked Eve. ‘She’s only a child.’
‘She couldn’t possibly understand the significance of what I was doing,’ the woman admitted. ‘She is only a child. But she is also an Indris. She knew.’
‘Fine,’ I said. ‘We’ll accept that. Tell us the whole story.’
And she did, and this was it:
‘All of the people who were recruited for the colony were volunteers from the territory which was occupied by the Zodiac people. The
New Alexandrians wanted to know what we could show them, and we wanted to know what they could show us. I think most of us intended to come back, but that intention was gradually lost over the years except in one or two of us. There was no point in coming back unless we had something to show for the years we spent on New Alexandria. But we had very little. We learned hardly anything from the New Alexandrians that we had not already learned from the people of the Zodiac. All that we learned was that you cannot understand us.
‘We are alien to you, but you are not alien to us. We do not have any concept of alienness. We do not have any concept of separateness from anyone or anything. We do not think in terms of selves.
‘We have adaptable minds. Some of us have absorbed humanness from you. We cannot become human to our own minds or to each other, but we can become almost human to you. You can be sure of us. You can give us motives. You can give us selves. You can give us everything that you have, and it makes sense to you. But you cannot understand what we are in our language and in each other. You cannot communicate with us as what we are. You can only communicate with the humanness that you give us. You cannot understand our language. You cannot understand what our language is, because it is not the same as yours.
‘Some of us, both here on Chao Phrya and in the Anacaon colony, cannot learn your language because they do not want to accept the humanness that they would have to take into themselves in order to do so. It is the only way for us to learn. The languages do not translate. The other modes of communication you do not have.
‘In the Anacaon language, there is no deception. There is no misunderstanding. There is no philosophy. There is no ontology.
‘The colony on New Alexandria is a glass cage. We watch and we are watched. The profit of that watching is very little. This makes your people watch all the harder. Titus Charlot could never be content with a lack of understanding, and he could never accept the possibility that he could never understand. He experimented. We co-operated, of course.
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