‘Float down,’ Guy replied and they circled and circled, riding warm currents of air, into a pearly cloud where they spread out their wings in radiant shafts of light and drifted... and drifted...
Brewster woke up with a foul, sticky mouth. He felt nauseous, febrile and started to shake as soon as he opened his stinging eyes. Bright sunlight fell on his face where he lay on the floor of the entrance hall of Draxton Manor. Nearby, Guy snored contentedly... still Dreaming? Brewster sat up. He felt like weeping. Like laughing. There was no sign of anyone else around, but the dining-room door was open. Tally was sprawled across the table, her thumb in her mouth, smiling. Brewster suppressed irritation (it was only a dream after all) and shook her. She gulped and squeaked and opened her eyes, arms scrabbling on the polished surface.
‘It’s over Tally, welcome to reality,’ Brewster said, his voice sour. Luckily, Warren Blisley was nowhere in sight.
A Manor maid appeared in the doorway and announced that breakfast would be brought in soon. ‘If you’d be so kind as to collect your friends,’ she said with a tolerant smile and disappeared with a brisk step.
Tally was rubbing her face. ‘How long, Brew?’ she asked wistfully. ‘How long?’
Brewster shook his head. ‘One night or two... I don’t know. We’re booked in for two nights remember.’
Tally stared at him carefully for a moment. ‘I hope it’s just been one, don’t you? Because then...’
‘I thought you didn’t hold with drugs,’ Brewster reminded her sharply.
Tally smiled and lay back on the table, arms spread, her hair flowing out in an abundant golden wave around her head. ‘It’s not a drug. It’s not. Warren told me. It’s only a thing that opens doors, that makes the doors visible to us that are there all the time.’
‘Suit yourself,’ Brewster said. He didn’t want to listen to any of Warren Blisley’s theories.
Tally sat up again, her face radiant. ‘I want to go back. I want to improve, play the game. I feel like I was only spectating this time. I want to be powerful! A sorceress! A queen!’
‘A nightclubber? Oh, come on, Tally, pull yourself together. It was a good trip, but don’t get too subjective about it, OK?’
But even as he mocked her, Brewster knew that, like Tally, he yearned to go back, to escape the mundane, to be free, powerful, living in exotica. Because of what Waking Dream could offer, they would make this club their life, as had all the other Beyonders, and they would pay again and again to experience the wonder of the world of fantasy, whatever dangers it might put their real bodies in. How could they know what happened to them as they dreamed? Were they jerking around, mimicking the actions of the game? Who knows? Who cares? They were just beginning and both felt that they had to get back there quickly because they’d wasted so much time before, not doing enough. Waking Dream. Have you had a Waking Dream yet? Would others come to join them? Brewster panicked. What if the authorities got wind of it and somehow prevented them having the Dreams. Perhaps, if they learned enough, they could reach the land of fantasy without the drug. Perhaps he and Tally had been the only ones to take it anyway. Please, please let it be so.
Beyonders began to drift into the room, embracing each other as they met.
Warren Blisley came and put his arms around Brewster and Tally. ‘With us?’ he asked.
Brewster was surprised to find he had no hard feelings left for the man. He nodded for both himself and Tally, who had been overcome by emotion and was now weeping on Blisley’s shoulder. ‘We’re with you,’ he said. ‘Beyond Reality.’
The Germ of Life
The advance sales force of Heinz-Sizoto Ethnic Syndication (Trade Element) had been on Kodiak for several weeks now. The indis were taking their time deciding whether to take advantage of Freezone’s outrageously attractive trading deals (free holidays to other worlds included), perhaps concerned about who was actually going to be taking advantage of who.
The landing team was beginning to get restless, two members of which - Taskell, company liaison officer and Orgida Frame, analysis officer - virtually allowing their professional relationship to decay to combat level.
Orgida had trailed Taskell to the leisure module of the lander, temporary home and institution, and was annoying him intensely as he tried to study the incomprehensible glyphs of a Kodiakny storyball. Orgida made no secret of the fact that she did not particularly like the race native to this world. She was not exactly a veteran member of the company.
‘Well, there’s a danger of... anthropomorphising, isn’t there,’ Orgida was saying, ‘a real danger.’ She bit into one of the indi fruit, munching thoughtfully.
‘These are people, Giddy, not animals,’ Taskell reminded her abstractedly, the ball still held up to his nose.
Orgida hopped nimbly down from the console where she’d been sprawling and batted the ball with her hands.
‘Hey,’ Taskell snapped.
‘I think you should listen, that’s all.’ Orgida said. ‘Weren’t you taught anything at the Academy? You empathise too much.’
Taskell showed his annoyance only by a repressed, nasal sigh. ‘I’m here to work, Giddy. This isn’t a party, or a zoo for that matter.’ He grasped air unsuccessfully in an attempt to retrieve the ball that Orgida had whipped from his fingers.
‘Don’t tell me you understand any of this,’ she said, turning the ball in her hands. ‘It doesn’t say anything. It’s nonsense.’
‘Get back to your video literature and shut up,’ Taskell said. ‘And give me the ball back.’
‘OK.’ Orgida tossed it through the air and it landed on Taskell’s lap. He contained a cry of surprise. Most of her irritating behaviour was caused by boredom, Taskell knew that. The landing party had already seen, examined and AV-mo all the places of interest into which they were allowed. The Kodiaknies were wary of strangers; not hostile, or even impolite, but the landing team of Ecuador 501 knew when they were being kept at arm’s length. It was not an unusual circumstance. After all, in the mythologies of most cultures, aliens dropping from the sky was an event presaging tyranny and conquest. Very few races fell down at their feet and called them gods. They were more likely to greet them with firepower and suspicion.
Orgida was new to the ranks of Freezone Cartel. Taskell suspected she’d been hoping for something more exotic than the work really was. All those recruitment ad promises of far worlds, unbelievable sights and experiences, and the ego-massaging hint of how responsible a position it would be. You Too Can Be An Envoy For the Human Race! The fantasies of centuries encouraged this exaggeration. Trying to convince people they would really benefit from allying themselves to a trading cartel like Freezone was, more often than not, difficult.
Taskell shook his head, sighing, as Orgida flounced off to find someone else to annoy. He tried to concentrate on the book. Perhaps the girl was right. Perhaps he was trying to anthropomorphise the Kodiaknies. They looked no different from human stock; they smiled, they frowned, used all that universal language, but, as Giddy had reminded him, one of the first things he’d learned on his Xenology Studycourse was that it was a big mistake to behave as if people of other worlds functioned and thought like humans did. A mistake learned the hard way, by many unsuccessful pioneers returned home in jars with taciturn, incomprehensible explanations attached. So, the salesmen trod softly nowadays and were trained in the ways of Patience. Such considerations still could not quell the heady lift of pleasure Taskell experienced when he thought about his next meeting with the Kodiakny, Argolk. This was the human pronunciation of the name. In Kodiakny, it sounded more like a hearty belch.
He met her in the evening, a time all Kodiaknies appeared to regard as propitious for conducting business, or it might just have been they’d put aside other more important matters then. Taskell strolled down from the lander through the warm, moist air to the small courtyard of peach-coloured stone just inside the circular wall of the Kodiakny settlement. The visitors called this place Ogoch. As he walked, he reflec
ted on what a delicate world this seemed, from the pale shrinking pastel light to the sweeping, gently swelling hills, to the lacy trees fluttering drooping fronds like nervous fingers. Ecologically, the inhabitants, both animal and plant, lived together in harmony, without waste or ruin. It was almost as if some wry deity, in creating the world, had felt impelled to taint it with one small imperfection. The Kodiaknies, for all their fey daintiness, croaked like frogs.
Argolk was waiting placidly, the yellow plug of the translator Taskell had given her already in place inside her ear. She’d laid a sheaf of wafer pages on the warm stone bench beside her, delicately inscribed with precise, dead- black glyphs. ‘I have news for you,’ her voice murmured in his ear, so close it drowned out the gurgle of the sounds she was really making.
‘Good news from your face,’ Taskell said, smiling back.
Argolk screwed up her face, which appeared faintly oriental in caste, and made a peculiar shuddering gesture.
Taskell already knew this signified agreement and pleasure. He sat down beside her. She had a smell of milky vanilla; almost a cliché, he knew, but there was no other way to describe it.
‘Indeed,’ she said. ‘After much deliberation, the Community Council has decided to give the project a trial.’
Taskell made a jubilant cry and punched the air delightedly. ‘Wonderful! I was beginning to think we’d failed to impress you.’ He smothered his enthusiasm with a business-like calm. ‘So what convinced them?’
‘Well, as you know, they’ve had your samples for some weeks now, and various members of the Council and the Home Guilds have been using them. Their only concern at present is whether the power packs will work out more expensive than the goods themselves.’
‘There’s no reason why the cartel can’t help your people build their own plant to manufacture the packs here on Kodiak...’ Here Taskell broke off with a sheepish grin. ‘Dammit, it seems obscene to suggest such a thing on this world, Argolk. Somehow I just can’t imagine your perfect skylines being blighted by industrial plants, no matter how fetchingly they’re designed.’
Argolk croaked out a laugh which rang in his ears like bell charms. ‘Taskell, we are not all innocent children, you know! We do have factories of our own. The only difference is that we like them to blend in with the rest of our buildings.’ She frowned. ‘Not like the pictures on the tape you lent me.’ She jiggled her shoulders rapidly and executed quick stabbing motions with her arms to signify distaste.
‘Some of those pictures were of mining concerns, Argolk, just asteroids and such. I won’t say my people are the best at building design but we do care a lot about the worlds we work on. We learned a very hard lesson in our own history, believe me.’
Argolk smiled politely, but didn’t ask him to expand upon that. ‘Tomorrow evening, the Council will meet with your people to discuss details. It was proposed I tell you of this tonight so that you might prepare yourselves.’ She stood up, and Taskell was surprised by the pang of alarm he felt.
‘You’re not going, yet, surely?’ he said, too abruptly.
Argolk clutched the papers to her chest. ‘Unfortunately, I have other things to do now. I am in training for promotion, as you know.’
‘Yes, of course.’ She’d already spoken briefly of this to him. Naturally, the translator chose the path of least resistance in converting her words to universal tongue, but he understood she was destined for a higher place within the council hierarchy. It made sense. Despite her apparent frailty, she gave off an air of quiet and ambitious determination. This attribute only added to her unquestionable allure. Taskell sighed and watched her pass through the tall gate on the other side of the yard, into the city itself. He lifted his eyes to gaze up at the spiralling hump of the place. Orgida had called it a termite hill when she’d first seen it. To Taskell, it looked like a benign stone goddess, but then he was known to be rather a romantic.
The landing party were so pleased when Taskell told them of their success they decided to hold an impromptu celebration. Their Captain, Scallion, unlocked his liquor supply with hardly a twinge of the miserly pain it usually caused him. The lander itself, even within the few weeks of being stationary, had evolved from space vehicle to sprawling bungalow, littered with the crew’s personal possessions and souvenirs of Kodiak. Everyone gathered outside the main hatch, where Taskell bathed in the congratulations of his colleagues, allowing them to believe he was wholly responsible for the Kodiaknies’ swift compliance. Privately, he thought the goods had merely spoken for themselves. They were high quality and more than adequate trade for the Kodiakny artefacts.
Orgida, living up to her image of sharp-tongued viper, said, ‘Oh dear, Taskell. Your little tete a tetes with the Kodiakny morsel are destined to be curtailed, it seems.’
Taskell couldn’t help bridling and defending himself. ‘If you’re referring to Argolk, which it’s clear you are, you know very well that she was the representative chosen to deal with us for her people, just as I was.’
Orgida grinned cruelly. ‘A convenient, indeed cosy, arrangement as I’m sure you found.’
‘I wonder whether you’d be saying these things if it had been a man I’d dealt with?’
‘A male amphibian, you mean.’ Orgida yawned theatrically. ‘I for one will not be sorry to leave this place. It’s boring.’
‘And you are culturally dead. Sometimes I wonder why you’re in this business Orgida Frame, I really do.’
‘It’s good money.’
‘Have you no sense of aesthetics?’
She was clearly going to make a sharp, witty reply, then thought better of it, shrugging carelessly instead. ‘I find the primitive innocence of this world annoying, if you must know. So bloody nice. Sickening. It’s like the smell of the place; cloying and sweet. I can’t believe it’s real. In fact, I don’t. It gives me the creeps.’
‘You’re just a cynic used to human cynicism and deceit.’
‘Maybe,’ she answered, in a milder tone than Taskell had expected, ‘but I’m also female, so I trust my instincts.’
Taskell repeated some of this conversation later to the medical officer, Cylya Grant, an older woman, whose common sense he trusted. ‘Is Giddy right, do you think?’ he asked. The remarks Orgida had made worried him just a little, because she’d spoken with such confidence.
Cylya Grant had laughed and slapped his shoulder. ‘You are an oaf sometimes, Task, the woman fancies you. She’s jealous of the Kodiakny girl, that’s all.’
Taskell found this hard to believe, but perhaps it was the explanation.
The following day, Taskell sat on the lander ramp, drinking fruit juice and gazing at the pastel mound of Ogoch. Orgida was right, he supposed, for after the trading deal had been secured the Traveller crew would up landing struts and go. A melancholy thought. Although he had visited many worlds, some pleasant, some uncomfortable, none of them had had such a effect on his soul as Kodiak. He loved it. He was reluctant to leave. Also, after a long career of dealing dispassionately with other races, he had found a people who had touched his heart. Their inscrutability intrigued him, their gestures warmed him, their dainty loveliness pleased his eye. The Kodiaknies were not prey to violent passions; they rolled with the world, calm, inexorable, infinite. In comparison, human beings seemed like quickly moving blurs of anxiety and detachment. He remembered one of the early meetings he’d had with the Kodiaknies, their cautious yet probing questions about other worlds, other cultures. He remembered how they’d said, ‘we have everything we need here’ almost unable to comprehend the benefits of having access to off-world commodities. Likewise, they failed to understand that other races would appreciate greatly the merchandise of Kodiak, the functional graceful, purity of their domestic implements, their pale, wistful art, their simple yet eminently flattering couture. No, the Kodiaknies did not realise what they were; small miracles in the vastness of space. Wars, even competitiveness, were concepts absent from both their language and philosophy.
Th
at evening, the lander crew went in a group down to the cream walls of Ogoch. Already, they talked about where they would go next. Taskell knew this particular team would be broken up now. First a holiday was in order. They’d cross back to the pastoral space station Africa Plate, where Freezone had its administrative HQ, check out their credit balances, and take a well-earned rest, before being assigned to new ships, new destinations. It was unlikely they’d all be placed together again. It was not company policy to keep one team in existence for more than a few assignments. Romantic attachments were destined to ephemerality because of this. Taskell was glad he would soon be parting company with Orgida. Cylya Grant’s revelation the previous evening made him uneasy.
A party of Kodiaknies was waiting for them at the gates, to conduct the visitors to the Council Chambers. This was a building set high in the heart of Ogoch. Taskell felt inclined to look upon the city as one vast building in itself. Everything was joined together, narrow streets curving between the clots of dwellings, shops and workshops. It was a long walk. Another surprising thing about the Kodiaknies was their apparent lack of transport. Argolk had professed they had no need for it. Their technology too seemed minimal yet they were clearly an advanced people. Orgida’s sharp remark sprang to Taskell’s mind. He must stop thinking of these people as human. They were not driven souls in the literal sense, ever searching to break new boundaries of conception and ability. He’d had so little opportunity to study their history, but it was likely they were an ancient culture who’d transgressed the adolescent yearnings still experienced by any other race Taskell had come in contact with. He had not really expected the Kodiaknies to agree to a trade deal.
When the human group reached the Council Chambers, there was no sign of Argolk, as Taskell had hoped for. The Councillors, all wearing sweet smiles and translator plugs, looked as charming and innocent as children dressed up in their parents’ clothes. As the visitors were conducted into an airy, pleasant room set with a long polished table and chairs, Taskell asked where Argolk was. She was their spokesperson after all. ‘She has been a great help,’ he said, to qualify his obvious desire for her presence.