Virtual Mode

by Piers Anthony

  He promised to consider. Evidently he did, because soon he did call Ddwng and agree to guide him to the Chip, with certain manly honorable reservations. It was done.

  Colene was the dishonorable one. She dreaded to think of the reckoning she would have with Darius when she did what she hoped to do. But it was better than the choice between lobotomy and loosing the DoOon on the realities. Sometimes deceit was the only way.

  DDWNG took her to a far planet elsewhere in the galaxy. She had given up trying to wrestle with the concept of faster-than-light travel; it was contrary to the physics of her reality, but evidently just fine here. The same went for instant communication across the galaxy, antigravity, and all the rest. Super-science, another name for fantasy, in her home town.

  They would attend an elegant ball in their honor at the chief city of Planet Kyvrn. Mare got Colene garbed for it in a rehearsal, and Horse drilled her on spot protocol. She was the Emperor's newest and youngest consort, and as such the object of much interest. She would be rather quiet in the Emperor's presence, and rather haughty when alone, for her status on this planet was second only to his. She would dance with him once, and thereafter with any man she chose. Stallion went through the steps with her, making sure she would not misstep.

  "But what's my mission here?" she asked.

  "This is a rebellious planet," Horse explained. "You will need to restore it to harmony with the Empire."

  Colene was aghast. "A rebel world? And Ddwng is setting foot on it? And I'm supposed to tame it? Why doesn't he just stick his head in a running meat-grinder while he's at it, and I'll just pick up a section of the galaxy and shake some stars loose!"

  All three Equines laughed. They had learned early that she made jokes, and accommodated themselves to it. She liked them very well. They were nominally subhuman, but actually they were intelligent enough, with Horse perhaps being smarter than she, and they were perfectly comfortable to be around. She wished there were some way to have such companions with her always, without the degradation of such permanent servitude. She had always liked horses, but would have thought that horse-headed human beings would be disgusting. That was not the case at all; they seemed quite natural now.

  "This is not that kind of rebellion," Horse said. "This is a retirement colony. Most of the residents are former Empire officials. Here they are out of power, with no requirements, and discover that they are restive. They would never actually rebel, but their discomfort would be an embarrassment were it known, as this is supposedly an ideal world. It will be your task, in the course of the next three days, to make them comfortable with their situation."

  "It's still preposterous!" she exclaimed. "Does Ddwng expect me to perform magic? I don't know anything about this, and if I did, what could I do? And if I could do anything—three days? I mean, Rome wasn't built in a day, and—"

  "Rome?"

  "Famous ancient city in my reality. Forget it. The point is, this is like—like—impossible!"

  "Evidently the Emperor has much confidence in you," Horse said dryly, twitching his furry ears.

  Colene only wished that Seqiro were here. He might have been able to read the minds of the people, and get a notion how to satisfy them. But he was thousands of light-years away, reverted to his dumb animal stage, awaiting her return. She was on her own, and she didn't like it one bit.

  Or was she? If telepathy existed, and faster-than-light travel existed, and Provos could remember the future here, showing that it was her talent, not restricted to her reality—why couldn't telepathy and FTL merge, and enable her to commune with her friend regardless? Where was it written that the powers of one reality were nullified in another? Maybe some were and some weren't. Maybe Darius couldn't do magic here, but Seqiro could project h;s thoughts instantly across interstellar reaches. She had a receptive mind for him, for sure! If anybody could receive him here, she was the one!

  She lay down, theoretically resting the hour before the ball, and closed her eyes. But she didn't relax, and she didn't care what the monitors thought; they could assume that she was all twisted up by the enormity of her mission. She opened her mind to her true friend.

  Seqiro! Seqiro! Do you read me?

  At first there was nothing. Then there was the faintest response. She focused on that, willing it to become stronger. It had to be him! Seqiro! Read me! I need you!

  Faintly, faintly, she felt his mind.

  I have to find a way to make these folk feel better about being retired and useless. You must read their minds for me, if you can, to get a glimpse of what will do it. That's my only chance not to blow this mission out of space!

  The faint reassurance came. He would do what he could.

  IT was a pretty planet. The terraforming had evidently made it into one big garden, with neatly laid-out cities set up like parkland, so that the houses hardly showed through the trees. Small lakes were everywhere, set between hills, with paths between them. There seemed to be no motorized vehicles; if there was mass traffic, it was out of sight. This was the sort of place she would like to retire to with Darius, if that ever came.

  Of course that was just the image in the screen. She was sure there were slums and garbage and all the rest of the seamy side of civilization. She knew how it was; she remembered Panama. But the illusion was nice, even so.

  Then it was time to get ready. All three Equines pitched in, without regard for modesty; Stallion was drawing something like support stockings up her legs while Horse was fitting her invisible bra for proper uplift and Mare was doing her hair. It was all right; there were no secrets from a person's nulls. In a surprisingly short time they transformed her from ordinary messed-up teenager to a vision of unbelievable loveliness. Each time they garbed her, they seemed to exceed prior records for success. Then Stallion took her to the matterport and via it to landfall.

  She went in a daze through the halls of the receiving complex, feeling the slightly diminished gravity and breathing the slightly strange air. This was a foreign planet, all right; her body knew it. Ddwng was waiting for her at the entrance, resplendent in his own uniform robe of the day. He was actually rather handsome in his brute fashion. She pictured his Swine doing him as the Equines had done her: support stockings, transparent bra, and hair. She had to bite her tongue lest she let slip an indiscreet titter.

  The ball was every bit as opulent as Colene had feared. In her wildest dreams of the distant past—circa one month ago—she had pictured occasions at which she would be the cynosure of all, impressing the ladies with her courtly presence and the men with her sex appeal. Now it had come true, and it wasn't nearly as delightful as her fancy.

  The problem was that she had to watch her manners. She couldn't pick her nose or scratch her bottom or say an uncouth word. Maybe full-grown ladies never even thought of doing such things, but she was fourteen, which was sort of on the verge. There were a number of pleasures of childhood that she wasn't sure she wanted to give up just yet, like computer games, and multi-decker ice cream cones with nuts and fudge on top, and putting whoopee cushions under the padding of seats in houses of worship. Every time she remembered that joke about the man breaking wind in church and having to sit in his own pew, she broke up. In short, she just wasn't quite ready for ladyhood.

  But here she was, ready or not, on the arm of the Emperor of the Milky Way Galaxy (only they called it the DoOon Galaxy here), resplendent as only Mare could make her. Oh, she was breathtakingly lovely, all right; every mirror pillar reflected this phenomenal creature virtually floating along in her glow. She wore a brown gown that exactly matched the hue of her hair, and both had been somehow enhanced to make them seem more livingly lustrous than any ordinary woman deserved. Opalescent sequins glittered as she moved. She could have done without the mirror-polished floor, however; she was afraid her dainty hard-soled slippers would slip, putting her into an inglorious spin. She also wondered just what the men were looking at when they bowed their heads to her and gazed into that reflective surface. Most of
all she was afraid that the butterflies in her stomach would erupt in a grotesque burp, making her die of shame three times before her blush reached full definition. In sum, fun was not the operative term at the moment.

  Be calm. You are making a good impression.

  Her nerves lost their ragged edges. What would she do without Seqiro! She reminded herself that every lady faced the same problems, and most of them survived satisfactorily. Anyway, this wasn't forever. After the first dance things would start getting normal.

  Ddwng brought her to the center of that stage. He made the little nod to the assemblage, and as one those hundreds returned it. Colene remained frozen, as she had been told to do; her turn was not quite yet.

  "I am glad to revisit Planet Kyvrn," the Emperor said. The miniature translation ball Colene wore at her throat, just above the nascent cleavage of her seemingly-too-low but actually-promising-more-than-could-be-delivered decolletage, murmured his words to her. She was surprised to see that many of the attending men and women wore similar balls. Apparently they could not understand Ddwng's language any more than she could. That gave her another shot of confidence. A dozen more like it, and she might even begin to think about being at ease. But it would help if someone else made a slip first.

  "I am sure any questions will soon be resolved," Ddwng continued. "To that end I bring you my consort of the moment, Colene, who will be among you three days." He made an eighth turn toward her, and Colene made the requisite head-nod to him, then did a slow pirouette and bowed more deeply to the audience, so that her upper gown line promised even more of her bosom than before. The material was adhesive, so there was no danger of even a tenth of an inch more exposure than Mare had decreed, which was a relief. She could stand on her head and nothing would pop out. But she might have a problem with her skirt. For a delicious instant she was tempted to do a cartwheel and really wow the audience. But that was her deathwish manifesting, and she had enough to occupy her attention already.

  Then Ddwng took her in his arms and danced with her. He was smooth, evidently coached by his own null of the Porcine persuasion. Colene wondered whether he had sex with Sow. But the image wasn't as insulting as intended, because that female swine was both beautiful and sweet-natured. No Miss Piggy there!

  She followed his steps, and it was exactly as Stallion had shown her. It was a set format, hardly more challenging than the box step, and she could probably do it in her sleep. The weird thing was that moving in unison with Ddwng this way, being lovely in his arms, she could almost fool herself into thinking that he was a decent character. There was just something about dressing up, and about dancing, that made everything seem better than it was. But deep down she would never be fooled. Will you dance with me after my lobotomy, dear? She had to stifle a wry smile; it was her kind of humor. She had been afraid of physical rape, not realizing how much worse things could be. Her reproductive organs cut out of her and put into a cold sere laboratory...

  Suddenly the dance was done. Ddwng made the little bow to her, then spun about and walked away. She was on her own.

  The tableau was frozen. They were waiting for her. She looked at the circle of men, and spied the oldest and by his clothing the most important. Old men were hardly safe, but tended to be less dangerous than young ones. She walked slowly to him.

  "I will dance first with the handsomest," she said. She heard his ball translating as she spoke.

  He stepped forward. "Governor Rrllo," her ball said. "I thank you for this significant privilege."

  They danced in exactly the same fashion as before; the set routine was handy this way. His hands did not stray. Around them other couples now danced also. The ball was under way.

  Engage him in dialogue.

  Yes, so that Seqiro could tune in on Rrllo's focused thoughts. Colene had a mission to perform, and her one-in-a-million chance of succeeding would become even less if she didn't take advantage of every opportunity to try to understand these folk.

  "I didn't really choose you for your handsomeness," Colene said to Rrllo. "I wanted to talk with you."

  "I am shocked to hear that," he replied with a chuckle. Their two translation balls were close together and seemed to be talking to each other. "You thought I would know what's going on behind the scenes?" The translations had become so facile that his idiom was rendered without hesitation into her idiom.

  "Yes. I—" She brought a faintly woebegone look to her face, with little effort required. "I have almost no chance to figure out the problem, let alone solve it, but if there's anything I can do, I'll at least try. I thought perhaps you would help me get started."

  You aren't fooling him, but he is intrigued. You have honored him by selecting him to dance, and he would like to help you. But he is wary.

  "You have a better chance than most," he said. "You have the ear of the Emperor, for the moment."

  "But what is it that the people here want?"

  He shook his head. "That is no mystery. But the solution—that is the mystery."

  "It is all a mystery to me! This seems like a nice planet."

  "It is very nice," he agreed.

  He knows. But he doesn't want to tell.

  "Please, Rrllo! After the ball—may I see you? I mean, visit your house, get to know your family, talk with you off the record?"

  He seemed taken aback. "Nothing is forbidden to a consort. But our private lives are of little interest."

  He remains wary. You may be trying to trick him into saying something treasonous.

  So it was like that. Colene felt that old familiar deathwish-gamble urge coming on. It wasn't that she truly needed to solve this riddle; she expected to fail regardless. It was that when she got into something, anything, the underlying nature of her started taking over, and the decorous rules started suffering.

  "Do you know what Ddwng does to those who displease him?" she inquired.

  The man stiffened. "I know."

  "Then you know that I face lobotomy if I mess up." She wasn't sure how true this was; it probably depended more on whether Darius messed up. But it was certainly a threat against her. And perhaps against any of the residents of the planet who contributed to that failure.

  "That, no," he said. "Surely not merely for failing an impossible mission."

  "Would you gamble on that?"

  He considered, now realizing that his own hide could be on the line too. "I will meet you after the ball. Tomorrow morning?"

  She smiled bittersweetly. "Thank you, Rrllo." She was learning how to handle the reins of power.

  After that, she came close to enjoying the dance, though she kept thinking of the Sword of Damocles. That was the case of the courtier who was given a fine meal to eat, with a heavy sword hanging by a thread over his head; distracted by that threat, he hardly enjoyed the meal. Thus the King showed him the liability of power. Colene now had an excellent notion how the poor man had felt.

  NEXT morning, more appropriately dressed for going places, she went with Rrllo. "Now show me Panama," she said.

  "I beg your pardon?"

  The translator ball hadn't caught up with that one yet. She felt a small morsel of satisfaction. "I would like to see how the other half lives. The folk who don't get to go to fancy balls. Who don't hobnob with the Emperor." For it was in her mind that it would be from this class that a revolution would most likely brew.

  "The servant class," he said. "We can't afford three nulls for each person, but there is a cadre of nulls that passes from house to house to catch up on business."

  Nulls. Her expectation deflated. There would be no revolution there. "I changed my mind. Let's just go to your place and talk."

  "As you wish."

  His place turned out to be an elegant futuristic (to her perception) cottage on the edge of a lakelet, with pleasantly exotic trees and shrubs surrounding it. His wife was exactly the kind she expected, and the neighbors were too. Rebellion? This just didn't seem to be the place for it.

  He remains intrigued by you.
There is a certain naive sincerity you evince which is normally lacking in consorts. He may cooperate.

  "Look," she said forthrightly. "You folk used to have a lot of power in the Empire, and now you've been put out to pasture. I guess that's a comedown. But why would Ddwng think there's a rebellion brewing?"

  "There is no rebellion brewing!" Rrllo protested. "We are satisfied retired citizens."

  "But he has spy-eyes to check every nuance of every reaction of every person. He has to know you're up to something. Why he figures it's anything I can do anything about is beyond me."

  "You are speaking with unusual candor."

  He's getting interested.

  "I'm from another reality. I was on my way to meet my—the man I love, and this reality was between, so I passed through here, and he came from the other side, and now we're both in Ddwng's power and if we don't do what he wants we're in trouble. So I'm doing what he wants. He wants me to fix things here. So if there's anything I can do, I'm damn well going to do it, so I can get on out of this reality. Now, if you'll just tell me what you want, maybe just maybe I can do you and me some good. I admit it's unlikely, but why not give it a try?"

  Rrllo was amazed. "You are from another reality? There has not been a connection between realities in a thousand years!"

  "There is now. Ddwng wants to get our Chip so he can go into other realities. We'd rather not give it to him, but we don't have a lot of choice, so we'll do it. It's better than lobotomy."

  Then she realized that she had made a terrible mistake. She should never have mentioned her knowledge of the lobotomy, because now Ddwng would know she knew, and he hadn't told her. He could have the hint that she had a source of information he didn't know about, and that could expose Seqiro and ruin everything.

  "You are inadvertently speaking treason," Rrllo said.

  She nodded grimly. "Yes, I guess the news is already at Ddwng's HQ. But what does he expect when he abducts travelers and threatens them to make them do his bidding?"