To Conquer Chaos

Encouraged, Conrad said musingly, “When I first realised I thought it must be the shock of what happened to Jasper. Nestamay explained why he had to be killed at once, and it sounded horrible. But then I thought maybe it was going on before that. As I understand it, they have this alarm which signals the arrival of a thing, and Jasper turned it off. If you’ve been used all your life to being warned of danger it must be pretty upsetting to know one time there was no warning.”

“Ye-es,” Yanderman agreed. “But I think it’s even deeper than that. They had no warning about us, did they? There was no alarm to signal our arrival.”

Conrad started. “Do they think we’re dangerous?”

“Try and put yourself in their position. All your life, and during the lifetime of your ancestors, existence at this place they call the Station has had a rigid form, an embracing discipline. You’ve never seen a stranger apart from a newborn infant. Though your traditional lore talks matter-of-factly about transport to other worlds, you’ve never been out of sight of this monstrous dome here. There is only one random factor in your existence: things appear every now and then. Maxall says the incidence is about once in two to three days. It used to be higher, and smaller creatures as well as large ones came through, some of them in swarms which took a month or more to dispose of completely. According to him, one of his own ancestors put a stop to this, but at the cost of losing a great deal of the area under the dome to the creeping plants. It was the lesser of two evils. Several irreplaceable specialists, including men who really understood the traditional lore, had been killed within a single year. You were dozing when we discussed this, I believe.”

Shamefacedly Conrad admitted that was possible. He said, “You mean they’re frightened of us not because we threaten them but simply because our arrival upsets the-uh-the situation they’ve adjusted to?”

“Precisely. Add one more thing, too. Here they’ve been isolated for centuries, charged with a specific task. As a result of losing those irreplaceable men I mentioned, and for various other reasons, they’ve been driven to the verge of admitting failure. They just don’t know what they’re doing any more! All their energy goes in keeping the problem under control. They never advance towards a solution of it. And now our intrusion shows them that all this time the world has been going on outside; things have changed incredibly. Maybe, by this time, their dedication isn’t relevant any more. Maybe it will turn out that everything they’ve sweated and slaved for is useless.”

“I thought they were being very polite to us,” Conrad muttered. “It seemed like an effort.”

Yanderman gave a dry, rustling laugh.

“But-” Conrad fumbled for the words. “But haven’t they had anyone here who could do what I can do? I mean, have these visions of the past?”

“Apparently not. Maxall was explaining to me that the community is now reduced to a mere handful of heavily-inbred genetic lines. This boy who endangered everyone by turning off the alarm had only been spared punishment previously because he represented the sole survivor of a particular line and the only possible mate for Maxall’s granddaughter. Recessive imbecility has already appeared in the Maxall family; the old man was terrified that if Nestamay had children by anyone else this recessive would crop up in them. And a community like this can’t afford to feed unproductive people.”

“What’s this got to do with-?”

“With your gift? Simply that it’s a rarity, and probably due to some factor of inheritance. In this community, the genes endowing people with it aren’t present in anybody’s makeup.”

“I see.” Conrad hesitated. An idea had just struck him which seemed almost presumptuous, but he had to voice it anyway. “Yanderman, is it going to be possible to put my gift to use here? I mean-I mean …” His voice trailed away.

“I don’t know,” Yanderman said. “That’s what I’ve been banking on, naturally, ever since I heard those extracts from the ancient lore which Maxall read to us. There are clues in there which may lead us through the tangled maze of your visualised images to an eventual solution. It would help tremendously if you could gain full waking access to your visions, but I doubt if you’ll ever achieve it. I know Granny Jassy had been trying for nearly fifty years without succeeding.”

“Why not?” That was indeed what Conrad had been thinking of; Yanderman’s offhand dismissal of the chance was a blow.

“Hmmm … You’re asking a difficult question for this time of the night, boy! I’m not sure I understand it fully myself, but I’ll do my best. You’ve got at your visions during most of your life by sitting and relaxing and then letting your attention settle on nothing in particular, right? A patch of sunlight on the ground, maybe, or a white pebble, or the tip of your forefinger-anything like that.”

“Did I tell you that?”

“No.” Yanderman chuckled. “I didn’t even have to ask you. Am I right?”

Conrad shivered. “Y-yes. Absolutely right. Is that the way everyone manages it?”

“Most people do. It’s autohypnosis. Instead of a crystal ball on a chain, I could use my fingertip to make you go into trance. The-No, I’m wandering from the point. I was going to say that when you return from self-induced trance you have difficulty capturing the memories of your visions because so many of the things in them don’t connect with ordinary life, right? If you tried to recount them afterwards, you probably had to leave out a great deal because you couldn’t make sense of it.”

“That’s so,” Conrad confirmed.

“Which probably suggested that you’d had a mere dream. In dreams, logic doesn’t operate, and they’re just as hard to explain afterwards. Now imagine me questioning you during trance. I can’t see or hear what you’re experiencing. I have to put broad general questions, and you describe what you can. But what you’re seeing may not refer to anything you or I ever saw in waking life. For all I know, indeed, you may have had a vision already in which you saw this Station when it was in full operation-Granny Jassy might have had one, or anybody! But because it connected with what I’ve always until now believed to be sheer superstition, the tale of walking to other worlds, I’d have avoided putting the right questions to you. Can you follow me, or am I so tired I’m muddling you?”

“I think I’m following all right. But this reminds me of what I meant to say at the beginning. This girl Nestamay-”

“Who is very interested in you, I notice.”

“If she hadn’t anyone else to choose except the one who got himself killed it’s hardly surprising!” Conrad snapped. “Let me finish!”

“I’m sorry,” Yanderman murmured.

“I’ve seen her in a vision. I tried to tell you earlier, but you said it was a family resemblance. It isn’t! The more I think about it, the more I’m sure. And I tell you something else I’ve remembered.” Conrad half-sat up and turned on one elbow, staring fiercely into the darkness.

“It must be ten years or more since I bothered with a vision of the barrenland for any length of time. Did I tell you I had visions of the barrenland as well as of the area before it was barren?”

“No, but I’m not surprised. Go on.” Yanderman sounded interested.

Conrad took a deep breath. “Well, I’d almost forgotten that I didn’t always prefer to concentrate on the visions of the distant past. I suppose it must have been after I got interested in girls that I settled for that. There are always lots of people in the-uh-the pre-barrenland visions.

“But I did sometimes have visions of the barrenland just being the way it is, with a few people in it here and there. I think I might have got caught up with these after Nestamay’s father came to Lagwich and was taken for a devil. I’d had all the kid’s grandiose dreams of becoming a famous thing-killer like Waygan the hornman, the father of the present one. It was probably with the idea of killing devils instead of things that I thought about the barrenland at all. I kept at it on and off for a year or two, and then lost interest.

“It wasn’t till I realised Nestamay reminded me of something that the memory came back. I didn’t recognise her at once for two reasons, I guess: first, I was trying to recall a person, and in fact it was my soap-carving I was thinking of, and second, she’s changed.”

“Family resemblance is still more likely.”

“No! She’s changed. As though-oh, like growing up. In fact, that’s precisely it! My soap-carving looked like Nestamay as she would have been when she was a little girl, in spite of my trying to make it look like Idris nowadays. What’s more-” He checked with a strangled sound, and then resumed in a near-shout of frantic excitement.

“I’ve got it! That was why I stopped bothering about visions of the barrenland! It was because in them I saw