The Sirian Experiments

by Doris Lessing

  Their Planets 10 and 11 were neighbours: planets of the same sun. I even thought of making a landing on 10, with the excuse of power trouble, but decided to go on, and the first thing I saw on 11 was a group of Giants walking from the terminal to a hovercar. I told myself that I should put aside my readiness for suspicion: but wondered if Klorathy’s plans for me to see the Giants here, at work and occupied, was another way of refusing me. By now I had got into my own hovercar.

  What I could see from the windows was a flat featureless landscape, greyish in colour, under a greyish sky. The sun was pale and large. As I looked, the sun plunged out of sight. A reddish disc appeared over the opposite horizon. A moment later, close to it, came a smaller bilious green disc. These two moved fast across a lurid sky, giving me a sensation of whirling rotation. Looking out made me feel queasy, so I read the information sheet on the wall.

  It said that this planet was a well-lit one, with two fast-moving moons, and its nightside well starred. It had no seasons, but had zones of differing climatic conditions, being generally warm and mild with extremes of cold only at the poles, which were left uninhabited. Visitors should not be surprised to find that most long-term inhabitants wore little or no clothes. They might find they needed more sleep than usual, this being the most common reaction to the fast alternations of light and dark. They would probably lose their appetites for a while. Adaptation might be slow, but a longer acquaintanceship with the planet would …

  As an old hand at interpreting these benign messages, I resigned myself to an uncomfortable time. And in fact fell asleep, for when I woke up it was day again, and we were still skimming over a grey-green surface, under a grey sky. I was looking for something on the lines of the mathematical cities of old Rohanda: on a new planet I was always on the watch for them: they had perhaps become something of a fixation with me. My mental picture of the Canopean Empire included planets covered with these fabulous, these extraordinary cities. I knew there were none on the Canopean Mother Planet … But why not? I had asked Klorathy, one evening among the tents of the savages, where I might see these cities and he said: ‘At the present time, nowhere.’ What I saw now was nothing but a dreary sameness, with at more or less regular intervals rough dwellings like sheds, which I supposed to be some sort of storage shed. And then I saw that outside some were Giants, and had glimpses of a type of creature that did not attract me at all.

  Just as I had understood that these dwellings were what I could expect to see on this planet, and that there were probably no cities, the hovercar stopped suddenly, near one of the structures, and Klorathy came out of it. It was a single-storey building, flat roofed, surrounded by a type of low rough greyish grass, which was clearly the characteristic vegetation. As I entered the place, dark descended again.

  I and Klorathy were alone in a rectangular room, painted white, which was a relief after the dim colours of the sky and the landscape, lit by lines of soft wall lights that automatically came on and went off as the daylight and dark alternated outside.

  Because we were alone I at once began to hope for the exchange of understandings that I associate with real companionship, but it was not to be. My set of mind forbade it: it was defensive, and critical; and my physical state forbade it, too, for I was feeling sick and a little giddy.

  This shack, or shed, had in it some low seats and a table. The window apertures and the doorway had screens that could be pulled over them, but they were open now and Klorathy said at once: ‘Better if you do not shut out the outside: otherwise you won’t get used to it.’

  I submitted. I sat down. On the table was a meal. Klorathy said I would feel better if I ate at once, and I tried to do so, but could not get a mouthful down. Meanwhile, he ate and I watched. The food was standard galactic fare.

  We were sitting opposite each other, the low table between us. He was smiling and easy, I on my best official behaviour, because it was a way of holding myself together.

  I remember thinking that connoisseurs of the contrasts so plentifully offered by the Imperial experience would have found the sight of us two piquant: Klorathy, the bronze man, so strong, well built, solid, with me, who am usually described – affectionately and otherwise – as ‘a little wisp of a thing’, with my yellow locks and my ‘luminously pale’ or ‘unhealthily pallid’ skin – as the case might be. A good deal of our art, the more popular forms of it, dealt with such contrasts, which are found endlessly entertaining, particularly when suggestive or openly sexual. I am not above finding it so myself! But at the time I wanted only to lie down, and in fact, did drop off to sleep suddenly, and woke to see through the apertures, in the full Planet 11 light, contrasts rather stronger than anything I and Klorathy could provide. There was another shed not far away, and outside it two Giants, twice Klorathy’s size and nearly three times my size, one a totally black man, shining in the pale lemon glare, the other a rich chocolate brown, both virtually naked. I had always seen them clothed, because during conferences everyone made sure of being well clothed, regardless of the local climate, for the sake of giving least offence during occasions that were always quite rich enough opportunities for annoyance or criticism. They were magnificent men: I have never seen anything like them. But they were in a group of creatures half their size, who seemed like frail and pale insects – that was the impression they made on me.

  As I looked, the dark swallowed everything, and almost at once the two moons appeared, large and small, lighting everything with a strong yellow glare. Their colours seemed different from when I had seen them in the hovercar, and again I dropped off to sleep, with the strain of it all, and when I woke it was light, and Klorathy was outside, talking to a group of the ‘insects’. They were not much different in plan from the physical structure common throughout our Galaxy.

  They were in fact not very short, being taller than myself, but seemed so, because they were so extremely thin and light in build, and of a silvery-grey colour that made one believe them transparent when they were not. They had no hair on their tall domed heads. Each hand – and it was their hands one had to take note of first – had ten very long fingers, nailless, giving the impression of bunches of tentacles always in movement. They had three eyes, quite round, bright green, with vertical black pupils. There was a pattern of nostrils – simple holes – in the centre of their flat faces, three, or four or even more. No nose. And no mouth at all.

  I was glad that I was able to examine them from a little distance, and even more glad that Klorathy was not there, because I have never been able to overcome an instinctive abhorrence for creatures dissimilar to my own species. This has been my greatest single handicap as a Colonial Servant. Attempts to overcome the weakness have cost me more than any other effort, such as learning languages and dialects, and having to acclimatize myself to places like this Colony 11, with its rapid rotation that one could feel and its violent alternations of light.

  Despite my repugnance, I was able to watch Klorathy’s lips in movement and his animated face, but could not see how they talked, with no mouth. After a time the same two Giants rejoined the group and Klorathy came in to rejoin me.

  I could see no sign in him of repugnance.

  Without speaking, he pulled the low seats to a window, and we sat side by side and observed the two Giants and the ‘insect people’.

  As I was thinking this unflattering description of them, and looking at the tentacles that seemed to flow around them and in the air around their heads, Klorathy said: ‘You are wrong. They are more highly evolved than any but one of our peoples.’

  ‘More than the Giants?’ I could not help sounding sarcastic, the contrast between the noble and handsome black men and the ‘insects’ was so great.

  ‘They complement each other,’ was the reply.

  And he looked at me, leaning forward to impress on me the force of his amber gaze.

  I could not prevent myself sighing – it was impatience, and also tiredness. This atmosphere was exhausting – not the chemical bala
nce of it, though it had slightly less oxygen than I was used to, but suddenly again the sun had gone, and now there was one moon shining blood orange this time, and then appeared the little moon, a sort of greenish colour, and the scene we had been watching, of low greyish grass, the two enormous black Giants, and the cluster of the others, was lit by a horrible reddish light, and the Giants seemed to be made of blood, and the shapes of the ‘insects’ were absorbed, and all I could see was a mass of waving tentacles. I abruptly left my seat and turned my face inwards.

  I said, ‘I don’t think Colony 11 suits me.’ And tried to make it humorous.

  He said nothing and I asked: ‘And you?’

  ‘I spend a good deal of time here.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘At this time, for our present needs, this planet is important to us.’

  I understood that this reply was specific, and contained information that I wanted – had been reaching out for. But I felt ill and was discouraged; my strongest thought was that if after so many ages I could not control an instinctive response to creatures physically different, then it was time I gave it all up and retired!

  ‘It is not the physical difference as such,’ said Klorathy.

  ‘Well then? I suppose they talk with their tentacles?’

  ‘No. Their tentacles are sensors. They sense the variations in the atmosphere with them.’

  ‘And I suppose they use telepathy?’

  We had no races in all our Empire who were telepathic, but had heard there were such races, and believed that Canopus had several. I was being sarcastic again, but Klorathy said, ‘Yes. They are telepathic. The Giants talk like you and me. The others in their own way. The two species get on well enough.’

  ‘And they have no mouths.’ I could not help a shudder.

  ‘Have you not noticed something quite unique about this planet?’

  ‘No. All I know is that it makes me feel very sick indeed, and I am going to leave it.’

  I looked out again. The moons were in the sky, but the sun was, too. The moons, sunlit, were faintly green and yellow in a grey sky, and each sent off a glow of illuminated gases.

  ‘Wait just a little.’

  ‘There are no towns. No cities.’

  ‘And there are no crops growing. Haven’t you noticed?’

  ‘Ah! The Giants have given up eating!’

  ‘No. We import enough food for them. But the people here do not eat.’

  ‘They live on air,’ I expostulated.

  ‘Exactly so. Their tentacles assess the ingredients of the air and they breathe it in according to what is available at any given moment.’

  I absorbed this. It gave me a dismayed, cold feeling. It is not that I am, as our saying goes, eaten by my food, but it does not come easily to imagine life without any at all.

  ‘And the Giants are teaching them, as they did the apes on Rohanda?’

  ‘No. I told you,’ he said gently. ‘They are a balance for each other. Together they make a whole.’

  ‘In relation to what?’

  As I said this I realized I had come out with a real question: one that he had been waiting for me to ask. At once he replied: ‘In relation to need.’

  And my disappointment made me snap out: ‘Need, need, need. You always say need. What need?’

  He did not reply. While I was wrestling with my need to formulate the right question, I fell asleep again, and when I woke up the moons of Colony 11 were absent altogether. The stars were many and bright, though, and I stood looking out into the night, feeling soothed and comforted, but not for long, for soon up sprang the larger moon, and the light was green and metallic and very unpleasant, and I decided at that moment to leave. I could not see Klorathy.

  On the table was a large white tablet, and on it Klorathy had written: ‘The exact disposition of usefulness of this planet according to Need will change in twenty Canopean days. If you feel able to stay until then, I think you should. If not, then perhaps you may care to meet me on Shikasta (Rohanda, if you insist) in the city of Koshi on the eastern side of the central landmass. I have ordered the hovercar to take you to the space-port if you want.’

  It was waiting. I got into it, shut my eyes so as not to see any more of this nauseating planet and had thankfully left it before there could be another descent of its lurid and always different night.

  Twenty Canopean days make a Sirian year. I attended to some other tasks and then went to Rohanda.

  KOSHI

  Instructions from Canopus – ‘may we be permitted to suggest’ – arrived well before I left, and there was plenty in them to make me think. First, there was a change in the protective practices, or rituals. A sharp one, greater than any previous change. I had begun to take for granted certain basic usages that did not alter – nor could, I had thought – but now everything was different. I will not trouble to detail these practices, which were to change again and again thereafter. But it was emphasized that these were of importance, that their exact and accurate practice was vital, and that I should not be tempted to alter them, not for any reason at all, nor at the behest of any person whatsoever, no matter his or her apparent credentials. I am underlining here what was underlined. Certain artefacts were provided for my use. Secondly, I must remember that the planet was now under the domination, for all apparent purposes, of Shammat, and I must be on my guard: this was particularly true of the cities on the eastern part of the central landmass, and Koshi was as bad as any of them. Thirdly, I must remember that the planet, since its axis had been set on a slant, had seasons – Canopus believed that one of our own planets had seasons? – and this had much affected the general temperament, already, of course, thoroughly perverted since the Catastrophe of the failure of the Lock. Fourthly, the predominant stock was now a mix of the old giants and the old natives, with admixtures unplanned and planned from other genes (was that a reminder of my deceptions and errors, I had to wonder), and this hybrid, though physically vigorous, was nevertheless psychologically affected because of a sharp reduction in general life-span, and resulting dislocation of expectations for a certain life-span, and the fact. Fifthly, I should remember that a symptom of the general worsening and corruption was that females had been deprived of equality and dignity, and while I would be able to enter Koshi as a traveller without attracting too much attention, once there I would have to choose my role with the greatest possible care …

  There was a good deal more, too. I made a detour to visit our Planet 13 that had climatic seasons. How did Canopus know so much about us? Again I was prompted to brood about a wonderful espionage system with equipment beyond anything we could imagine. Planet 13′s disabilities were a result of a hotheaded, and to my mind irresponsible, phase of our early Empire. The counsels of maturer minds in our Colonial Service had been unable to prevent a decision to propel a certain planet, then in orbit with several others around a vast gaseous planet, away from its station there, and into orbit around 13, a rich and fruitful planet, where it could make use of 13′s natural resources of water and food to balance its own barrenness. The point was that this thoroughly dreary little world was loaded with every kind of desirable mineral. It was not that I – and my faction – did not want, just as much as the hotheads, to get our hands on these mineral riches but that we were not prepared to go to such lengths, take such risks. I maintain still that we were right: they that they were … The propulsion of 14 was a success. It arrived to take up its orbit around 13, again a planet’s planet, but its ‘pull’ caused cataclysms and catastrophes on 13, disturbing its balance, and making it slant on its axis. There were various species of animal on 13, none particularly attractive, but I have always believed in and supported policies that cause as little damage to indigenous races as possible. The upsets on 13 wiped out millions and completely changed the patterns of fertility – I see that I am talking like Klorathy, when he referred to the horrific cataclysms on Rohanda as the ‘events’. As far as we were concerned, these unfortunate effects on 13 wer
e enough to prove our policy correct: but there is no arguing that 14 has been producing minerals enough to supply all our Empire ever since.

  All I wished, during my stop on 13, was to check briefly on the effects of continual, often violent, climatic change, sometimes from extreme heat to extreme cold. My account of this stopover, which turned out differently – and more dramatically than I expected – will be found in the records, entitled ‘Under a Punishing Moon’.

  It is enough to say here that I learned all I needed about these continual variations.

  When I arrived over the designated area of Rohanda and looked down, it was with the thought that somewhere here I had been buffeted and swept about in the blizzards and torrents during the ‘events’ – and that below me must be the mountain peak where I had rested in my space bubble and seen the fleeing herds of animals and heard their sad, lamenting cry. Now I could see a dozen great cities on a vast plain that was coloured green from its grasses, and deeper green where forests spread themselves. But the grassy areas were showing tints of brown and ochre, and I saw at a glance that deserts were threatening – and was able to diagnose at once that these cities were doomed to be swallowed by the sands. As I have seen often enough on some of our own planets, before we became the skilled administrators we now are. I yearned, as I hovered there in my Space Traveller, to simply descend, give the appropriate orders, see them carried out – and then be able to rejoice that these cities, which looked healthy enough from this height, would live and flourish. It gave me the oddest feeling of check and frustration to know that I could not do any such thing! – that I must keep quiet about what I knew, and must allow my long experience to remain unvoiced. It is not often that an individual as well ensconced in a career, a way of living, as I am – with patterns of work, friends, companions, offspring, and so much varied experience always ready to be pulled into use – it is very seldom, in fact, that one may be attacked suddenly with such a feeling of futility. Of uselessness … which feelings must then at once and inevitably attack much more than an individual sense of usefulness. Again I was afflicted – as I had been before, hovering over the Rohandan scene, but such a different one – with existential doubts. It is not possible to be armoured against such feelings.