him.
Darkness broken only by the ghostly shimmer of converted energies, residual forces amplified by the mechanism bought from the entrepreneur which he wore clamped to his eyes. In its field he saw the life-pattern of a lichen, something which moved and crouched against a wall, a shower of tiny motes which provided food for the lurking predator and which fed in turn on things too small for him to spot.
Water splashed as he pressed on his way. If the Sungari were here surely they would have noticed him by now. If the Sungari existed. If he were not plunging hopelessly into the empty world of caverns and tunnels which lay beneath the mountains.
And yet the flying creatures had come from somewhere.
There had to be a hive.
He stumbled and fell and climbed carefully to his feet. The apparatus on his eyes confused him a little but, if he should break it, he would be lost in total darkness to wander blindly through an unknown world. Halting he touched his waist, found the laser holstered there and drew it. Closing his eyes he fired at the ground directly ahead. Adjusting the gain from the light-amplifier he peered from between shielding fingers.
And looked at a palace of marvels.
Light streamed from the place which had received the bolt of energy, the stone still radiating in the visible spectrum, blazing like a sun in the infrared, emitting energy which was caught and retained by the walls and roof to register as a host of scintillating rainbows, each node a sparkling gem, each irregularity a vortex of luminous wonder.
A signal to the Sungari if they should exist.
Dumarest stood waiting, wondering if again the signal would fade to linger as a ghostly luminescence long after he had moved on. Another failure which would join the others he had placed along the path from the upper air.
And then, in his brain, something turned.
It was a numbing pressure which shifted as a worm would shift in loam, as butter would slide over butter, a wave move in the ocean, a hand turn in a hand. A thing which sent him to his knees, head bowed, sweat starting from face and neck to fall and sting his eyes to gather in droplets beneath his arms.
He heard the crying, the thin, pitiful wailing which seemed always to be with him.
And, abruptly, he was in space.
It was there, the stars, the fuzz of distant nebulae, the sheets and curtains of luminescence unhampered by the dulling effects of atmosphere. The void was all around him and he floated, alone in the empty universe as the air gushed from his lungs and the eyes bulged in their sockets and his internal organs began to burst under the pressure of boiling blood.
Dying as he had once died before.
As Chagney had died; died and still drifted, his empty eyes staring at blazing stars, his skin burned by the kiss of blasting radiations, dehydrated, frozen in stasis, still living, perhaps, somehow still aware.
And crying… crying…
'No!' His voice was a gasp of pain. 'No! No!'
Another voice, strange, remote, whispering in the recesses of his brain.
'A sensitive-quickly, the apparatus is erratic. Some malfunction and loss of integration … foreign elements … adjust… align… so!'
Coolness and the aching died. Peace came, the sickening movement within movement vanishing as did the blaze of stars, the fear, the crying, the pain.
Dumarest lifted his head and rose, trembling, aware of the aftermath of strain-aware too that his eyes were no longer covered by the amplifying apparatus.
Then how was it he could see?
The walls glowed with a soft nacreous light to either side. The floor was a dusty amber lined with green. The roof was bathed in an azure haze. The figure of the monk standing before him was a familiar brown.
A monk?
He stepped forward and stared into the cowl seeing a calm and placid face. Brother Jerome? Once he had known the High Monk, but Jerome was dead.
'And so no longer exists in the form you knew,' said the figure. 'But the shape is one you find comforting and trust. Why are you here?'
'I am looking for the Sungari.'
'And have found them. We are the Sungari. You have broken the Pact.'
With good reason, how else was he to ask for aid? And what good was a Pact when no one knew what it was all about? And how was it that an individual claimed plurality? And what was the real shape of the Sungari?
'You will never know,' said the monk evenly. 'And it is best that you do not. Yes, we have the ability to read brains. Those who first came to this world and contacted us used sensitives to communicate. We arranged a mutually agreeable settlement which you must know. Why did you not communicate earlier? We were watching you and your primitive attempts. Almost we destroyed you.'
Curiosity had saved him-one thing at least men and the aliens had in common. And telepathy explained how they first had agreed to cooperate. The talent must have proved a recessive gene and had died from the surface culture.
Dumarest said, 'How is it that I can see?'
'A direct stimulation of the brain. We also adjusted that which was in it. Life persisted due to the radiation of the twin suns. Now it is dormant and will eventually be absorbed but, while it lasts, we can communicate. You want something but what do you offer?'
Another familiar trait or was he misunderstanding the meaning behind the words? How to understand an alien mind? Yet some things all life had in common; the need to feed, to expand, to breed, to find safety. As the Sungari had found it by burrowing deep into the planet using the rock and soil as a barrier against the energy of the suns. Which meant?
'We are not native to this world as you have guessed. Long, long ago a ship was wrecked beyond repair. We did what had to be done and achieved a balance. When those of your race came there was attrition but finally we struck a new balance. Now you come asking for help and offer what?'
'Trade.'
'How?'
'Items can be left for you to collect. In return you provide minerals and other sub-surface products. Later, if mutually agreeable, a closer cooperation can be achieved.'
A hope, but what else had he to offer? As the figure remained silent Dumarest took another step closer. The robe the monk wore seemed to move and, stepping even closer, he saw that it was not solid material but a mass of tiny creatures shifting, each hooked to the other, their bodies providing the illusion.
As others made up the face, the lips, the eyes, the body of the monk.
A hive-but could things so small have the mental power he had experienced? Or was the figure merely an extension of a greater intelligence?
'Is the part the whole?' said the monk. 'If you shear your hair is the hair you or are you the hair? If you should lose a limb which part is you? The part with the intelligence and brain? But what if the brain itself is in many parts?' And then, as Dumarest remained silent, 'Do not try to understand. We are the Sungari.'
Creatures from a different existence to that he had known, perhaps bred on worlds men had yet to reach. Dumarest thought of an ant and its nest, a bee and its hive, a cell and the body to which it belonged. A brain commanding a host of appendages each able to convey information. A computer would be much the same and if its scanners were mobile and obedient-was the Sungari a giant organic computer?
More important-would it help?
'Come,' said the monk. 'You shall see.'
And suddenly dissolved into a mass of glinting particles which rose and spread and spun a curtain before and around Dumarest so that he was enclosed in a sphere of shimmering brilliance which took shape and form and…
He looked down at a world.
It was Zakym, the terrain was obvious but the conviction was stronger than that. He knew and, knowing,
