She wasn’t saying the things the media – especially the hostile, pro-Hell media – wanted her to say so they quickly stopped asking her how she felt.
And the pro-Hell side – the Erruns of their world, the people who would keep Hell – had started trying to reach him through their public pronouncements, hinting at a deal that would let Chay go, if he would retract his earlier testimony and agree not to testify again. Prin had given Filhyn and Kemracht permission to try to shield him from this sort of temptation, but there was only so much he could do, especially when journalists – granted interviews and calling in remotely – asked him for his response to such vicariously delivered overtures.
And now, a week before he was due to testify before the Galactic Council, the pro-Hell people had tracked him down.
He knew something was wrong even before he fully woke up. The sensation was like knowing you had gone to sleep on a narrow ledge high on a cliff and woken in darkness to find there was the hint of an edge under your back and nothing there when you stretched out to one side.
His heart thumped, his mouth felt dry. He felt he was about to fall. He struggled to consciousness.
“Prin, son, are you all right?”
It was Representative Errun, the old pro-Hell campaigner who had tried to stop him giving any evidence at all in the parliament two long months earlier. Of course now it felt like he’d known from the start it would be Errun they’d send, but he told himself it was just a lucky guess, a coincidence.
Prin woke up, looked around. He was in a fairly grand, rather cluttered, comfortable-looking room that might have been modelled on Representative Errun’s own study for all he knew.
So, he had not really woken up at all, was not really looking round. They had found a way into his dreams. They would tempt him here, then. He wondered how they’d accomplished this. May as well just ask. “How are you doing this?” he asked.
Errun shook his head. “I don’t know the technical details, son.”
“Please do not call me ‘son’.”
Errun sighed, “Prin, I just need to talk to you.”
Prin got up, walked to the door of the room. The door was locked. Where windows might have been there were mirrors. Errun was watching him. Prin nodded at the desk. “I intend to pick up that antique lamp and attempt to strike you across the head with it, representative. What do you think will happen?”
“I think you should sit down and let us talk, Prin,” Errun said.
Prin said nothing. He went to the desk, picked up the heavy oil lamp, gripped it in both trunks so that its weighted base was upright and walked towards the older male, who was now looking alarmed.
He was back in the seat, sitting facing Errun again. He looked at the desk. The lamp was where it had been. The representative appeared unruffled.
“That is what will happen, Prin,” Errun told him.
“Say what you have to say,” Prin said.
The older male hesitated, wore an expression of concern. “Prin,” he said, “I can’t claim to know everything you’ve been through, but …”
Prin let the old one witter on. They could make him stay in here, stop him from leaving and stop him from offering any violence to this dream-image of the old representative, but they couldn’t stop his attention from wandering. The techniques learned in lecture theatres and later honed to perfection in faculty meetings were proving their real worth at last. He could vaguely follow what was being said without needing to bother with the detail.
When he’d been a student he had assumed he could do this because he was just so damn smart and basically already knew pretty much all they were trying to teach him. Later, during seemingly endless committee sessions, he’d accepted that a lot of what passed for useful information-sharing within an organisation was really just the bureaucratic phatic of people protecting their position, looking for praise, projecting criticism, setting up positions of non-responsibility for up-coming failures and calamities that were both entirely predictable but seemingly completely unavoidable, and telling each other what they all already knew anyway. The trick was to be able to re-engage quickly and seamlessly without allowing anyone to know you’d stopped listening properly shortly after the speaker had first opened their mouth.
So Representative Errun had been blathering on with some homely, folksy little speech about a childhood experience that had left him convinced of the need for useful lies, pretend worlds and keeping those that made up the lumpen herd in their place. He was coming to the end of his rather obvious and graceless summing-up now. Reviewing it with his academic hat on, Prin thought it had been a rather pedestrian presentation; capable but unimaginative. It might have merited a C. A C+ if one was being generous.
Sometimes you didn’t want to re-engage quickly and seamlessly; sometimes you wanted the student, post-grad, colleague or official to know that they had been boring you. He gazed expression lessly at Errun for a moment too long to be entirely polite before saying, “Hmm. I see. Anyway, representative; I assume you’re here to offer a deal. Why don’t you just make your offer?”
Errun looked annoyed, but – with an obvious effort – controlled himself. “She’s still alive in there, Prin. Chay; she’s still in there. She hasn’t suffered, and she’s proved stronger than people in there thought she was, so you can still save her. But their patience is running out, both with her and you.”
“I see,” Prin said, nodding. “Go on.”
“Do you want to see?”
“See what?”
“See what has happened to her since you left her there.”
Prin felt the words like a blow, but tried not to show it. “I’m not sure that I do.”
“It’s not … it’s not that unpleasant, Prin. The first, longest part isn’t even Hell at all.”
“No? Where, then?”
“In a place they sent her to recover,” Errun said.
“To recover?” Prin was not especially surprised. “Because she’d lost her mind, and the mad don’t suffer properly?”
“Something like that, I suppose. Though they didn’t punish her after she seemed to get it back, either. Let me show you.”
“I don’t—”
But they showed him anyway. It was like being strapped into a chair in front of a wrap-around screen, unable to move your eyes or even blink.
He watched her arrive at a place called the Refuge, in some medieval place and time, copying manuscripts in an era before moveable type and printing. He heard her voice, saw her threatened with punishment for voicing doubts about religion and faith, saw her acquiesce and conform, saw her work diligently through the following years and watched her work her way up the shallow, arthritic hierarchy of the place, always keeping a journal, until she became its chief. He saw her sing their chants and take comfort in the rituals of their faith, saw her admonish a noviciate for lack of faith, just as she had been admonished years earlier, and thought he could see where this was going.
But then on her death bed she revealed she had not changed, had not let the behaviour of piety become the reality of internalised faith. He wept a little, and was proud of her, even though he knew such vicarious pride was mere sentimentality, arguably just a typically male attempt to appropriate some of her achievement for himself. But still.
Then he watched her become an angel in Hell. One who delivered sufferers from their suffering, ending their torment – one per day, no more – and taking on a fraction of their pain with every merciful snuffing-out, so that to the extent that she suffered, she did so of her own volition, and meanwhile became an object of veneration, the centre of a death cult within Hell, the miracle-working messiah of a new faith. So she was being used to bring a little extra hope to Hell, removing one lucky winner per day as though in some fatal state lottery of release, to increase the suffering of the vast majority left behind.
Prin was moderately impressed. What an inspired, diabolical way to use one who had lost their mind, to stop others losing theirs, the better t
o torment them more efficiently.
A blink, and he was back in Errun’s study.
“Taking that all at face value,” Prin said, “it provides a fascinating insight into the thought processes of those concerned. And so; this deal?”
The old male stared at him for a moment, as though nonplussed, before he seemed to gather himself. “Don’t go humiliating your own society at that hearing, Prin,” he said. “Don’t presume to know better than so many generations of your ancestors; don’t give in to that desire to posture. Don’t testify, that’s all we ask … and she will be released.”
“Released? In what sense?”
“She can come back, Prin. Back to the Real.”
“There already is a Chayeleze Hifornsdaughter here in the Real, representative.”
“I know.” Errun nodded. “And I understand there is probably no way of re-integrating the two. However, there would be nothing to stop her from living on in an entirely pleasant Afterlife. I understand there are hundreds of different Heavens, enough to suit every taste. There is, however, another possibility. A new body could be found for her. Grown for her, indeed; created specially just for Chay.”
“I thought we had laws about that sort of thing.” Prin said, smiling.
“We do, Prin. But laws can be amended.” It was Errun’s turn to smile. “That’s what those of us lucky enough to serve as representatives do.” He looked serious again. “I can assure you there will be no obstacle to Chay being re-embodied. Absolutely none.”
Prin nodded, and hoped that he looked thoughtful. “And, either way,” he said, “whether she ends up in a Heaven or a new body, there will be no trace left of her being, her consciousness, left in Hell?” Prin asked. Immediately, he felt guilty. He, not the senator, already knew how this was going to play out, and giving the old male false hope was a little cruel. Only a little cruel, of course; within the context they were talking about, it was trivial to the point of irrelevance.
“Yes,” Errun agreed. “There will be no trace of her consciousness left in Hell whatsoever.”
“And all I have to do is not testify.”
“Yes.” The old male looked avuncular, encouraging. He sighed, made a tired-looking gesture with both trunks. “Oh, in time, you might be expected to take back some of what you’ve already said in the past, but we’d leave that for the moment.”
“On pain of what?” Prin asked, trying to sound merely reasonable, pragmatic. “If I didn’t, what then?”
Representative Errun sighed, looked sad. “Son – Prin – you’re smart and you’re principled. You could be set to do very well within the academic community, with the right people taking an interest in your advancement. Very well. Very well indeed. But if you insist on being awkward … well, the same trunks that can help lift you up can keep you pressed down, keep you in your place.” He held up both trunks in a defensive gesture, as though fending off an objection Prin had not voiced. “It’s no great conspiracy, it’s just nature; people are liable to help out people who’ve helped them. Make life difficult for them and they’ll just do the same for you. No need to invoke secret societies or sinister cabals.”
Prin looked away for a moment, taking in the view of the carved wood desk and the highly patterned carpet, wondering idly how deep the level of detail went in such dream-realities. Would a microscope reveal further intricacy, or a blurred pixel?
“Representative,” he said, and both hoped and suspected he sounded tired, “let me be frank. I had thought to string you along, tell you that I’d think about it, that I’d let you know my answer in a few days.”
Errun was shaking his head. “I’m afraid I need your—” he began, but Prin just held one trunk up and talked over him.
“But I’m not going to. The answer is no. I will not deal with you. I intend to make my statement before Council,”
“Prin, no,” the old male said, sitting forward in his seat. “Don’t do this! If you say no to this there’ll be nothing I can do to hold them back. They’ll do whatever they want to do to her. You’ve seen what they do to people, to females in particular. You can’t condemn her to that! For God’s sake! Think what you’re saying! I’ve already asked if there’s any leniency I can ask for, but—”
“Shut up you foul, corrupt, cruel old male,” Prin said, keeping his voice level. “There is no ‘they’; there is only you. You are one of them, you help control them; don’t pretend they are somehow separate from you.”
“Prin! I’m not in Hell; I don’t control what happens there!”
“You’re on the same side, representative. And you must have some control over Hell or you couldn’t offer this deal in the first place.” Prin waved one trunk. “But in any event, let’s not distract ourselves. The answer is no. Now, may I resume my sleep, do I get to wake up screaming or do you intend to subject me to some further punishment in this strange little virtual dream environment we’re inhabiting?”
Errun stared at him wide-eyed. “Do you have any idea what they’ll do to her?” he said, voice raised, hoarse. “What sort of barbarian are you that you can condemn somebody you purport to love to that?”
Prin shook his head. “You really can’t see that you’ve made a monster of yourself, can you, representative? You threaten to do these things, or – if we are to accept your naive attempt to distance yourself from the grisly realties of the environment you so readily support – to let these things happen to another being unless I lie in a manner that suits you, and then you accuse me of being the monster. Your position is perverse, farcical and as intellectually demeaning as it is morally destitute.”
“You cold-hearted bastard!” The representative seemed genuinely upset. Prin got the impression the old male would be out of his seat and attacking him if he’d been younger, or shaking him by the shoulders at the very least. “How can you leave her there? How can you just abandon her?”
“Because if I save her I condemn all the others, representative. Whereas, if I tell you to lift your tail and insert your deal where only a loved one will ever get wind of it, perhaps I can do something to end the obscenity of the Hells, for Chay and all the others.”
“You conceited, presumptuous little shit-head! Who the fuck are you to decide how we run our fucking society?”
“All I can do is tell the—”
“We need the Hells! We’re fallen, evil creatures!”
“Nothing that requires torture for its continuance is worth—”
“You live on your fucking campuses with your heads in the fucking clouds and think everything’s as nice as it is there and everybody as civilised and reasonable and polite and noble and intellectual and as cooperative as they are there and you think that’s the way it is everywhere and how everybody is! You’ve no fucking idea what would happen if we didn’t have the threat of Hell to hold people back!”
“I hear what you say,” Prin told him, keeping calm. Noble? Civilised? Reasonable? Clearly Errun had never sat in on a faculty annual performance, remuneration, seniority and self-criticism meeting. “It’s nonsense, of course, but it is interesting to know that you hold such views.”
“You pompous, egotistical little cunt!” the representative screeched.
“And you, representative, are typical of those with ethical myopia, who feel only for those nearest them. You would save a friend or loved one and feel a glow of self-satisfaction at the act, no matter to what torment that same act condemned countless others.”
“ … You self-important little fuck …” Errun growled, talking at the same time as Prin.
“You expect everybody else to feel the same way and deeply resent the fact that some might feel differently.”
“… I’ll make sure they tell her it’s all your fault when they’re fucking her to death every night, a hundred at a time …”
“You are the barbarian, representative; you are the one who thinks so highly of himself he assumes everybody who means something to him ought to be elevated above all others.” Prin took
a breath. “And, really, listen to yourself; threatening such depravity just because I won’t do as you demand. How good do you expect to feel about yourself at the end of this, representative?”
“Fuck you, you ice-livered, self-satisfied intellectual shit. Your moral fucking high ground won’t be high enough to escape her screams every night for the rest of your life.”
“You’re just embarrassing yourself now, representative,” Prin told him. “That’s no way for an elderly and respected elected officer of the state to talk. I think we ought to conclude this here, don’t you?”
“This does not end here,” the old male told him, in a voice dripping with hatred and contempt.
But end it did, and Prin woke sweating – but not jerking upright screaming, which was something – with a sort of cold dread in his belly. He hesitated, then reached out, tugging on the antique bell-pull for help.
They found something called a thin-band cerebral induction generator. It had been stuck – a little lop-sided, as though it had been done very hastily – to the back of the bed’s headboard. A shielded cable ran from it through the wall to the roof and a satellite dish disguised as a tile patch. This was what had allowed them to take over his dreams. None of it had been there the day before.
Kemracht, Representative Filhyn’s aide, looked him in the eye as the all-wheel-drive bumped down the road in the darkness, taking them to the next hideout. The lights of the second vehicle, following behind, cast wildly waving shadows about the passenger compartment.
“You still going to testify, Prin?”
Prin, who could not be sure that Kemracht was not the traitor in their midst (those faculty committee meetings also taught you to trust no one), said, “I’ll be saying what I was always going to be saying, Kem,” and left it at that.
Kemracht looked at him for a little while, then patted him on the shoulder with one trunk.