Then an enemy shell exploded against the hull. The ship jolted. Air leaked out. Pressure dropped. This did not affect the Bands, but it touched the still-brawling Monsters immediately. Suddenly there was insufficient oxygen.
A repair robot slapped a brace on the hole and stopped the leak. New air was pumped in to restore pressure. But those moments of oxygen deprivation caused the enhancement enzyme to operate as it was supposed to. The Monsters were gasping—and suddenly sober.
Abruptly there was organization. Monsters brought out emergency space suits: standard operating procedure when under fire. Now they were not dependent on or vulnerable to the ship's air supply. They no longer imbibed the enzyme.
Suited Monsters were all over, assuming command of the equipment. The Bands could not restrain or distract them. The ship had been abruptly lost.
"Get out!" Rondl flashed. "Concentrate on the space-disposal mechanism; make it eject us all!"
They clustered there. This move caught the Monsters by surprise; before they could act to prevent it, the Bands had had themselves ejected into space.
"Scatter!" Rondl flashed. "Avoid their attack!"
The Monsters aboard all the ships tried to shoot down the Bands, but were not successful. Space was filled with futile laser beams and exploding shells. Soon all the Bands were out of range. They had escaped.
But Rondl knew the Bands had lost the battle—and the war. They had tried their best, and fooled the Monsters, and failed either to capture a Monster ship or to significantly impede the Monsters' progress toward Planet Band. Now, as the result of this effort, the Monsters knew what Bands were capable of, and would not be caught this way again.
Tangt, receiving news of this defeat, would proceed to try to save the Bands her way. It just might work—except that Rondl had given her the wrong information. And he wasn't sure he could locate her to correct the lie before they were both recalled to their Solarian hosts.
Chapter 17
The Lie
But by the time Rondl located Cirl, he had changed his mind. Too many Bands had been lost, and the cause of the Monsters was too wrong, to permit a simple hand-over of the Ancient Site. He almost preferred to risk the destruction of all the Bands than to give the gift of victory to the Monsters. Also, he lacked conviction that the Monsters would be magnanimous in victory. They might "teach the Ringers a lesson" by exterminating them as a species.
This was Monster thinking he was doing, he knew—but the very notion of delivering benefit to the forces of wrong, merely to abate further wrongs, was repellent. Appeasement: it had a bad flavor in any framework. And if every species did that, the least scrupulous would inherit the Galaxy. A line had to be drawn somewhere.
Yet he had to be honest with the Bands. It was their species at stake.
Cirl met him gladly, and in that moment he knew he was doing it all for her. She had a right to her own type of existence, and her society had a right to the benefit of Ancient technology to protect that existence.
"Cirl, we must convoke a circle," he flashed immediately. "I have a pressing discussion to initiate."
"Of course," she agreed. "The Monsters are drawing nigh our planet."
They gathered all Rondl's recruits surviving the Monster engagement and formed a huge circle. "Here is the situation," Rondl flashed into it. "We have tried to halt the invasion of the Monsters, and have failed. They will proceed to Planet Band and engage in their usual search schedule, incidentally extirpating the Band species, unless we take one of three courses."
They were with him. They had fought the Monsters and suffered a fifty-per cent attrition. They knew that only Rondl had the capacity to help them.
"First I must inform all of you what some of you have known," Rondl continued. "I am not a true Band. I am a Monster in Band form." A shock flowed around the circle, replete with viscous eddies and return shocks. Some Bands had known, but evidently they had respected his privacy and not bruited it about. Had he flashed this news to the Bands individually, some would have disbanded; but the power of the circle held them securely. Only a shock bad enough to destroy them all would destroy any; the circle unified them, providing the strength of mass.
"I did not know this when I commenced this resistance," Rondl continued. "I had amnesia. I thought I was a Band with a special talent for organization. I had nightmares about Monsters. Then I was recalled to Monster host, complete with bone-filled limbs and turgid eyeballs, and knew that I had been sent here to betray the Band species." Again the shock; this was what the Monsters called strong medicine, delivered abruptly. But these Bands knew him; they had worked with him. They trusted him. Cirl was helping him, flashing a steady pulse of acceptance into the circle, making his ugly confession more acceptable. She loved him, despite what she knew. She made him seem better than he was. What would he do without her!
"But I had come to know the Band mode of life. It is better than the Monster mode. So although I knew myself to be a Monster, I tried to help the Bands. I am sorry that I had to employ Monster tactics of violence and confusion; it was the only way I could see to stop the invaders. And I am sorry it was not enough."
They were all sorry; they had all failed.
The circle asked him: what were the three courses he saw to stop the Monsters?
"None of them is pleasant," Rondl said. "The first is to marshal an even larger force of Bands, and fight more violently than before." A tremor went through the circle at the concept "fight," so he hastily modified the thought to "resist." Then he continued: "Last time we tried merely to disrupt Monster progress, and to take over their ships. This time we would have to try actually to destroy ships and kill Monsters. To cut off their life-support—" But he had to halt; the reaction was so strong the whole circle was in danger of destruction. The Bands—his battle-hardened veterans—simply could not tolerate this sort of input.
"This is not acceptable," Rondl flashed quickly. "I describe it only to show the manner Monsters would act. Monsters are uncivilized; they believe the ends of conquest justify the means of extermination. At least some do; some Monsters are less uncivilized than others. They aren't all evil." He thought of his Solarian wife, Helen, whose views he had only recently come to understand. "If Bands were to adopt the tactics of the unethical Monsters, those Bands would be like me: Monsters in Band form. Because you are true Bands, you must reject this." And the horror subsided. They were Bands, and they did reject it.
"The second course is to give the Monsters what they want," Rondl flashed. "There is an Ancient Site in the Band System, which we know as a pleasant retreat. It was constructed three million years ago by an unknown species who knew more about magnetism than any Galactic species does today. I believe the early Bands discovered this Site, and drew on its nature to shape the devices that channelize the lines on which we travel. Thus Band society became interplanetary and interstellar, with individuals traveling through space in a manner possible to no other species I know of. Without that Site, Bands might have been limited to primitive natural lines, mostly about Planet Band; you would have had to compete for limited living area and resources, becoming less pacifistic. Civilization as we know it now would not have been feasible. But we no longer need to have possession of the Site; we already have the technology from it that we needed to fashion the lines that give us freedom of space and conscience. If we give the Site to the Monsters—if we tell them where it is, so they will no longer need to search so destructively for it—they might take it over and ignore the Bands. We would be allowed to exist; since the Site is not on Planet Band, they should not go there."
The circle considered that. There was no great shock of revulsion. This was the kind of action the Bands could accept, just as Tangt had thought.
"However, I am not certain this would work," Rondl said. "The Monsters could decide the site is too valuable to leave in the vicinity of an alien species. They might decide to clear us out anyway, or they might suspect that there were other Ancient Sites in this System,
and search for them, destroying us anyway. The greed of Monsters has no known limit; they always want more than they possess, and build empires and still are not satisfied, being limited in the end only by force. So though this course is feasible, I do not trust it; it gambles on the goodwill of creatures who have little benevolence toward aliens."
Again the circle considered. The Bands felt Rondl's reservation was well taken; this was a feasible course, but not an ideal one. They were ready to ponder the third course.
More Bands arrived. "They cannot partake of this circle now," Cirl flashed. "They are not prepared for the magnitude and violence of these concepts. Release me, and I shall form a lesser circle with them to explain."
"But I need you here," Rondl protested. "You have been stabilizing this circle."
"I will go," flashed Tembl, the blue philosopher. "I can explain to them."
There was a current of agreement. Tembl had been doing good work, helping to organize; she was competent. The circle abated its viscous current momentarily, allowing her to slide out without ill effect, then closed the gap she left. It would be devastating for a member of a circle to leave without warning, but when there was general agreement and preparation, it became possible. The currents of thought resumed, modified just slightly by Tembl's absence. Every circle, Rondl realized, was a little different from every other.
Rondl resumed his discussion. "The third course is to find a way to repel the Monsters without killing them and without giving up the Site. To win without violence. For this we would need to possess technology greater than theirs. Perhaps tractor beams that would fasten to their ships, swing them about, and hurl them harmlessly back toward Sphere Sol, their home. Perhaps a way to make System Band repulsive to them, so that they flee it voluntarily. Or a way to change their auras so that they become more like those of Bands; then Monsters would not act the way they do now, and could coexist with Bands. The possibilities are endless—if we are only able to discover the necessary technology."
Now the circle thrilled with agreement. This was the best course of all! Individual Bands were already racing ahead, working out what Rondl had worked out. "The Ancient Site! It could have that technology!"
"It could," Rondl agreed. "That Site has never been fully explored; most of its secrets remain untouched. But such breakthroughs are the sort of thing that Ancient Sites are noted for. Certainly it seems worth the try. Unfortunately, we do not at present have possession of that Site. It is in the territory already overrun by the Monsters."
The circle mulled that over, coming to grips with the vicious circle that he and Tangt had encountered: how could they use the Site to prevail, when the enemy already had possession of it?
"We must recover that Site," Rondl flashed firmly, and the circle agreed. "Perhaps only for a short time—only long enough to find the technology that will enable us to prevail. We cannot do it violently; we have already eliminated that course. We must find another way."
They were with him, their beams circling the circle with mounting conviction. "What way?"
"We must cause the Monsters to temporarily vacate Moon Glow, where the Site is," Rondl said. "To depart voluntarily. Then we can move in, occupy it, study it, and perhaps comprehend its treasures in time to save Planet Band."
Now there was doubt. How could the Monsters be persuaded to leave the Moon Glow?
"We shall have to deceive them," Rondl said. "To make them believe the site is elsewhere. Then they will go there, deserting the other moons, and the Bands will be free to go to the real Site without difficulty."
There was a rising disquiet. The circle was having difficulty assimilating this, deception being alien to Band nature. Rondl had to go over the principle again and again, trying to get across his concept of the lie.
At first there was tremendous resistance, as the concept eluded almost all the Band minds: deliberate misunderstanding? A contradiction in terms!
But finally a few Bands began to get it, aided by the great input of the circle. Their shocked revelation sent powerful pulses through the viscosity. Cirl labored to keep the current manageable, though she herself was struggling with the concept.
These few contributed their comprehension to the whole, leaning on the full circle to maintain their equilibrium. Others, too, got it, and hung on similarly. There was a rising tide of excitement and dread as a larger percentage caught on. Finally it elevated into the most powerful current yet, a potent unified emotion of—
"Oh, Rondl!" Cirl's despairing flash came, discrete amid the torrent. "Monster!" The emotion was pure anguish.
And he realized that with comprehension had come not acceptance, but total revulsion. The Bands had finally grasped the alien nature of his thought, and rejected it completely. Exactly as they had rejected the concept of war, before, and—
The circle disbanded. All its components disintegrated—not into component Bands, but into dust. The viscous circle was an entity itself, a temporary one, but possessed, while it existed, of the prerogatives of a living, sapient creature. Properly dismantled, with group acceptance, it reverted to the individuals who composed it; catastrophically sundered, as in this case, it died. When it died, so did its parts.
Only Rondl himself, an alien, managed to retain his personal cohesion. It was not his way to disband when faced with an appalling concept—and to him the concept was not appalling. Faced with several bad alternatives, he had chosen the least destructive one. A small sacrifice of honor for a tremendous gain in lives. He was practical—as the Bands were not.
He was also a Monster. His survival of the destruction of the circle proved it. Had he been a true Band, like Cirl, he would have perished, too. As it was, he was severely shaken, and still hung on to his cohesion with extreme difficulty.
The lie. It had started with the lie he had told Tangt, about the location of the Ancient Site. He had gotten away with that lie, and somehow assumed that he could do so with impunity in the Band culture. But Tangt was not a Band, but a Monster like himself. She would not disband when she learned about the lie, but any true Band would.
No, the lie had started further back—when he deceived Cirl by going unannounced with Tangt. That had been half a lie, for he had not really meant to do it. He had allowed the convenience of the moment to lead him into it. He should have declined to go with Tangt until he had informed Cirl. There was the half-step. Convenience had preempted truth, and after that the lie had become feasible. He had brought this mischief on himself, by failing to react at the outset in an ethical rather than a practical manner. He had chosen the Monster way, and now was paying the consequence.
"Rondl! Rondl!" someone was flashing at him persistently. "What happened?"
It was Tembl. She had escaped disbanding, because she had joined the other circle before the lie.
What had he done? As he settled into some sort of equilibrium, he realized that not only had he lost all his trained Bands except one—he had lost Cirl. His love, his wife.
Again he experienced the terrible urge to disband, to suicide, to join her in oblivion. But he hung on, partly because suicide was not his way, and partly because he knew that only he stood a chance of saving all the remaining Bands from a similar fate. The threat to the species remained, regardless of his personal situation.
"Was it a bad concept?" Tembl persisted.
"It was a lie!" he flashed explosively at her, half expecting her to disband also. But the concept passed her by; she could not grasp it, so was not affected by it.
The species of Band would suffer extinction rather than fight; rather than be party to a lie. That was the way it should be, the way he should have known it would be. He had acted rashly; he should never have presented the concept to them. Now, too late to save his friends, his recruits, or his wife, he realized that.
Yet still there seemed to be no way to save the species except that lie—now more than ever, for his trained troops were gone. Rondl was a Monster; he was able to lie. Only he could save the Bands
—from both the Monsters and the Monster-concepts. He must use the lie—and use it by himself, without initiating any other Band to its awful secret. This burden was his alone to bear. And he would do it, honoring the memory of Cirl, whom he had loved. Whom he would always love. The Monsters were ultimately responsible for her death, for they had invaded; they had sent the likes of Ronald Snowden to interfere with her life. The Monsters would pay. Until they did, he could hardly afford the luxury of grief. That was part of his own punishment, richly deserved, for being what he was. A Monster.
"Let me help you," Tembl said, hovering close.
He perceived her with the clarity of emotional distance. She was eager to take Cirl's place. She was attractive enough. She was competent, intelligent, and extremely adaptable for a Band. But she was a Band. Was he going to take her the route of Cirl, into comprehension of his true nature and thence into suicide? She deserved far better than that!
"Go away," he flashed.
Hurt, uncomprehending, she departed. She had the strength not to disband. Rondl felt more like a Monster than ever. Everything he touched turned to dust. But this time, he believed, he had not taken the half-step of convenience—the convenience of allowing Tembl to cater to him, to please him, to share his burden. He had taken the hard step of rejection, and thereby freed her to live the life of a true Band.
Now he was alone. All his trained, hardened Bands were gone. It would take so long to train new ones that the Monsters would ravage the home planet first. And if he did train new Bands—what would prevent them from disbanding when faced with the necessity for effective action, as these had done? The plain fact was that Bands were not physically or socially constituted to fight. Why did he keep deluding himself that it wasn't so? Fighting was the prerogative of Monsters.
Rondl would have to do it alone, as he had already concluded. Yet what could a single Monster do by himself?