Captive Universe

by Harry Harrison

  Something clicked sharply and a panel fell open, and there was a single large switch inside. Then the observer was upon Chimal as he clutched at it, and they fell together.

  Their combined weight pulled it down.

  8

  Atototl was an old man, and perhaps because of this the priests in the temple considered him expendable. Then again, since he was the cacique of Quilapa, he was a man of standing and people would listen when he brought back a report. And he could be expected to obey. But, whatever their reasons, they had commanded him to go forth and he had bowed his head in submission and done as they had ordered.

  The storm had passed and even the fog had lifted. Were it not for the black memories of earlier events it could have been the late afternoon of almost any day. A day after a rain, of course, the ground was still damp underfoot and off to his right he could hear the water in the river, rushing high against the banks as it drained the sodden fields. The sun shone warmly and brought little curls of mist from the ground. Atototl came to the edge of the swamp and squatted on his heels and rested. Was the swamp bigger than when he had seen it last? It seemed to be, but surely it would have to be larger after all that ram. But it would get lower again, it always had before. This was nothing to be concerned about, yet he must remember to tell the priests about it.

  What a frightening place the world had become. He would almost prefer to leave it and wander through the underworlds of death. First there had been the death of the first priest and the day that was a night. Then Chimal had gone, taken by Coatlicue the priests had said, and it certainly had seemed right It must have been that way, but even Coatlicue had not been able to keep that spirit captive. It had returned with Coatlicue herself, riding her great back, garbed in blood and hideous, yet still bearing the face of Chimal. What could it all mean? And then the storm. It was all beyond him. A green blade of new grass grew at his feet and he reached down and broke it off, then chewed on it. He would have to go back soon to the priests and tell them what he had seen. The swamp was bigger, he must not forget that, and there was certainly no sign of Coatlicue.

  He stood up and stretched his tired leg muscles, and as he did so he felt a distant rumbling. What was happening now? In terror he clutched his arms about himself, unable to run away while he stared at the waves that trembled the surface of the water before him. There was another rumble, louder this time, that he could feel in his feet, as though the entire world were shaking beneath him.

  Then, with cracklings and grumblings the entire barrier of stone that sealed the mouth of the valley began to stir and slide. One great boulder moved downward, then another and another. Sinking into the solid ground, faster and faster, all of them moving, rushing down, crumbling and cracking and grinding together until they vanished from sight below. Then, as the valley opened up, the waters before him began to recede, rushing after the rock barrier, trickling and bubbling away in a thousand small cataracts, hurrying after the dam that had held it so long. Quickly the water ran, until a brown waste of mud, silvered with the flapping bodies of fish, stretched out where there had only been ponds and swamp just minutes before. Reaching out to the cliffs that were no longer a barrier but an exit from the valley, that framed something golden and glorious, filled with light and marching figures — Atototl spread his arms wide before the wonder of it all.

  “It is the day of deliverance,” he said, no longer afraid. “And all the strange things came before it. We are free. We shall leave the valley at last.”

  Hesitantly, he put one foot forward onto the still soft mud.

  The booming of explosions was deafening inside the hall. As they started the observer fell away and cowered in panic on the floor. Chimal held to the great switch for support as the floor shook and the boulders stirred. This was the reason for the location of the carved reservoir below. Everything had been planned. The barrier that sealed the valley must stand on the stone just above the hollowed-out chamber. Now supports were being blown away and the rock weakened. The entire roof was falling away. With a final roar the last boulders tumbled downward, filling the reservoir below with their tops making a broken roadway out of the valley. Sunlight streamed in through the opening and fell upon the paintings for the first time.

  Outside Chimal could see the valley with the mountains beyond and he knew that this time he had not failed.

  This action was irreversible, the barrier was gone.

  His people were free.

  “Get up,” he said to the observer who was groveling against the wall. He pushed at him with his toe. “Get up and look and try to understand. Your people are free too.”

  THE BEGINNING

  Ah tlamiz noxochiuh ah tlamiz

  nocuic

  In noconehua

  Xexelihui ya moyahua

  My flowers shall not die, my songs will

  yet be heard

  They spread

  Endlessly

  1

  Chimal pulled himself down the axis of rotation tunnel, grumbling when his left shoulder touched against one of the bars and the now familiar pain shot down his arm. The arm was getting more useless and painful all the time. He would have to get back to the surgical machines one of these days for another operation — or have the cursed thing taken off if they could do nothing more about it. If they had fixed it correctly in the first place this need not have happened. Not that he had done it much good bashing and battering with it. Still, he had done what had to be done at the time. He must make some time for the surgery, and soon.

  The elevator lowered him back to the area of gravity and Matlal opened the door for him.

  “On course,” Chimal told the guard, handing him the books and records to carry. “The orbit correction is going through just as the computer said it would. We’re cutting a great arc now, curving in space, though we can’t feel it in here. This will take years. But we are now on the way to Proxima Centauri.”

  The man nodded, neither attempting nor desiring to understand what Chimal was talking about. It did not matter. Chimal was talking for his own benefit in any case: he seemed to be doing a lot of that lately. He limped slowly down the corridor and the Aztec followed him.

  “How do the people like the new water that has been piped into the villages?” Chimal asked.

  “It doesn’t taste the same,” Matlal said.

  “Aside from the taste,” Chimal said, trying not to lose his temper, “isn’t it easier than carrying it the way you used to? And isn’t there more food now, and the sick people are cured? What about that?”

  “It’s different. Sometimes it is… not right that things should be different.”

  Chimal didn’t really expect any praise, not from a society as conservative as this. He would keep them healthy and well-fed in spite of themselves. For their children’s sake, if not for theirs. He would keep the Aztec with him as a source of information, if for no other reason. There was no time for him to personally watch the valley people. He had taken Matlal, the strongest man in both villages, as a personal guard in the first days after the barrier had been opened. At that time he had no idea how the Watchers would act and he wanted someone to defend him in case of violence. Now there was no longer any need for protection, but he would keep him as an informant.

  Not that he need have worried about violence. The Watchers had been as stunned by events as had the people in the valley. When the first Aztecs had pushed through the mud and over the broken rock they had been dazed and uncomprehending. The two groups met and passed without touching, unable at the moment to assimilate the others’ presence. Discipline had been restored only when Chimal had found the Master Observer and had handed over the breviary of the Day of Arrival. Bound by discipline the old man had had no choice. He had taken it without looking at its donor, then turned away and issued the first order. The Day of Arrival had begun.

  Discipline and order had pulled together the Watchers, and an unaccustomed vitality had penetrated their lives. Here, now, in their lifetimes,
they were fulfilling the promise that generations had been trained for. If the observers regretted the termination of the time of watching the ordinary tenders and watchmen did not. They seemed, for the first time, to be almost wholly alive.

  While the Master Observer ordered their operations as it had been written. There were breviaries and rules for everything and they were obeyed. He was in charge and Chimal never questioned it. Yet Chimal knew that his blood inerasably marked the pages of the breviary of the Day of Arrival that the old man carried. That was enough for him. He had done what had to be done.

  As he passed the door of one of the classrooms Chimal looked in, at his people bent over the education machines. They had furrowed foreheads for the most part and probably understood very little of what they were watching. That did not matter; the machines were not for them. The best that could be expected was an alleviating of the absolute ignorance that they lived in. Easier lives, better conditions. They needed contentment and health as the parents of the next generation. The machines were for the children — they would know what use to put them to.

  Further down were the children’s quarters. Bare and empty now — but waiting. And the maternity wards, many of them bright and empty too, but it would not be too long until they were put to a good use. Give the Great Designer credit once again, there had been no protests when the booming voices in the hall had removed the taboo against intermarriage, had even said it was the only correct course. Everything had been worked out to the last, finest detail.

  There was a motion inside and Chimal turned to look through the window at Watchman Steel sitting on a chair against the far wall.

  “Go get some food, Matlal,” he ordered, “I’ll be down shortly. Put those things in my quarters first.”

  The man saluted, automatically raising his hand in the gesture of obeisance that he used to a priest, and left. Chimal went inside and sat down wearily across from the girl. He had been working hard, since the Master Observer had left him to his own devices with the navigation and the change of orbit. That was under automatic control now. Maybe he could take time for the surgeons, though it would probably mean some days in bed.

  “How long must I keep coming here?” the girl asked, the familiar, wounded look still in her eyes.

  “Never again, if you don’t want to,” he told her, too tired to argue. “Do you think I’m doing this for my sake?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Then try and think. What possible pleasure could I get from forcing you to look at pictures of babies, pregnant women, obstetric films?”

  “I don’t know. There are so many things that it is not possible to explain.”

  “And a lot that are explainable. You’re a woman, and outside of your training and development, a normal woman. I want to, perhaps, it is hard to say exactly, give you a chance to feel like a woman. I think you have been cheated by life.”

  Her fists clenched. “I don’t want to think like a woman. I am a watchman. That is my duty and my glory — and I do not wish to be anything else.” The little spark of anger burned out as quickly as it had come. “Please let me go back to my work. Aren’t there enough women among the valley people to make you happy? I know you think that I am not smart, that none of us are smart, but that is the way we are. Can’t you leave us alone to do what we must do?”

  Chimal looked at her, comprehending for the first time.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “I have been trying to make you something you are not and preventing you from being something that you want to be. Because I changed I keep feeling that everyone else should want to change too. But what I am has been planned by the Great Designer just as well as what you are. With me, yes, desire to change and understand is the most important thing possible. I hold onto that, no matter what. It is as important to me, and as satisfying, as that thing — what was it — your mortification used to be you.”

  “As it is to me,” she called out, standing and, in a moment of righteous strength opening her clothing to turn out the gray edge of fabric to him that circled her body. “I do penance for both of us.”

  “Yes, you do that,” he said as she closed her clothing, trembling again at her audacity, and hurried out.

  “We should all do penance for the thousands who died over the years to get us here. At least there is finally an end to all that.”

  Chimal looked at the rows of empty beds and bassinets, waiting, and realized not for the first time how completely alone he was. Well, that he could get used to, and it was not very different from the loneliness that he had always known. And they would be coming along soon, the children.

  Within a year there would be babies, and a few years later they would be talking. Chimal felt a sudden identification with those unborn children. He knew how they would look around at the world, wondering. He knew the eager questions that would be on their lips.

  And this time there would be answers to those questions. The empty years of his childhood would never be repeated. The machines would answer their questions and so would he.

  At that thought he smiled, peopling the empty room with the eager-eyed children of his mind. Yes, the children.

  Patience, Chimal, in a few short years you will never be alone again.

  FB2 document info

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  Document creation date: 19.09.2010

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