Midnight at the Well of Souls

Varnett nodded soberly. “Okay. I think I understand,” he said, and vanished.

“Serge Ortega,” Brazil sighed. “What in hell am I going to do with an old rascal like you?”

“Oh, hell, Nate, what’s the difference?” Ortega responded, and he meant it. “This time you won.”

“Are you really happy here, Serge? Or was that just part of the act?”

“I’m happy,” the snakeman replied. “Hell, Nate, I was so damned bored back in the old place I was ready to kill myself. It’s gotten too damned civilized, and I was too old to go frontier. I got here, and I’ve had a ball for eighty years. Even though I lost this round, it’s been great fun. I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.”

Brazil chuckled. “Okay, Serge.”

Ortega vanished.

“Where did you send him?” Vardia asked hesitantly.

“Eighty’s about the average life span for a Ulik,” Brazil replied. “Serge didn’t start as an egg, so he’s a very old man. He has a year, five, maybe ten. I wouldn’t put it past him to beat the system, but why the hell not? Let him go back to living and having fun.”

“And so that leaves us,” Wuju said quietly.

There was a sudden flicker in the image of the Markovian, then a sparkling graininess. The shape twirled, changed, and suddenly standing there in front of them was the old, human Nathan Brazil, in the colorful clothes he had first worn on the ship a lifetime ago.

“Oh, my god!” Wuju breathed, looking as if she were seeing a ghost.

“The God act’s over,” he said, sounding relieved. “You should see who you’re really dealing with.”

“Nathan?” Wuju said hesitantly, starting forward. He put up his hand and stopped her, sighing.

“No, Wuju. It couldn’t work. Not now. Not after all this. It wouldn’t work anyway. Both of you deserve much better than life’s given you. There are others like you, you know—people who never had the chance to grow, as you did. They can use a little kindness, and a lot of caring. You know the horrors of the sponge, Wuju, and the abuse to which some human beings subject others. And you, Vardia, know the lies that underlie the Com philosophy. I’ve talked to both of you, observed you both carefully. I’ve fed all this information plus as much data as could be obtained from a readout by the brain while you were in this room. The brain responded with recommendations on what would be best for you. If we’re wrong—the brain and I—after a trial of what I’m going to do, then you both have the same option that is open to Varnett. Just get near a Markovian Gate—you don’t have to jump into it. Just get passage on a ship going near a Markovian world. If you want, the Gate will pluck you out without disturbing the ship, passengers, or crew. You’ll somehow mysteriously vanish. And you’ll wind up in Zone again. Like Varnett, you will have to take potluck with the Zone Gate again. Once here, again, there will be no returning.

“But try it my way for a while. And remember what I said about your own contributions. Two people can change a world, if they wish.”

“But what—” Wuju started to ask, but was cut off in midsentence.

The two bodies didn’t vanish, they just collapsed, like a suit of clothes with the owner gone. They lay there in a heap on the floor.

Brazil went over and carefully rearranged them so they looked as if they were sleeping.

“Well, now what, Brazil?” he asked himself, his voice echoing in the empty hall.

You go back, and you wait, his mind told him.

What about the bodies? he wondered. Somehow he couldn’t just vaporize them. Though their owners were gone, they lived on as empty vegetables.

But there was nothing else to do, of course. They were just memories for him now, one a strange mixture of love and anguish. He was prolonging the inevitable.

There was a crackle, and the bodies were gone, back to primal energy.

“Oh, the hell with it,” said Nathan Brazil, and he, too, vanished.

The control room was empty. The Markovian brain noted the fact and then dutifully turned off the lights.

ON “EARTH,” A PLANET CIRCLING A STAR NEAR THEOUTERMOST EDGE OF THE GALAXY ANDROMEDA

One moment Elkinos Skander had been perched atop Hain’s back, looking at the control room and those in it. Then, suddenly, he wasn’t.

He looked around. Things looked funny and distorted. He was color-blind except for a sepia tone that lent itself to everything.

He looked around, confused. I’ve gone through another change, he realized. My last one.

A rather pleasant-looking place, he thought, once he got used to the distorted vision. Forests over there, some high mountains, odd-looking grass, and strange sort of trees, but that was to be expected.

There were a lot of animals around, mostly grazing. They look a lot like deer, he noted, surprised. A few differences, but they would not look out of place on a pastoral human world.

He looked down at himself, and saw the shadow of his head on the grass.

I’m one of them, he suddenly realized with a shock. I’m a deer. No antlers like those big males over there, so I must be a doe.

A deer? he thought quizzically.

Why a deer?

He was still meditating on this, when suddenly the grass seemed to explode with yells and strange shapes; great, rectangular bodies with their facial features in their chest, and big, big teeth.

He watched as the Murnies singled out a large doe not far from him and surrounded it. Suddenly they speared it several times, and it went down in wordless agony and lay twitching on the ground, blood running, but still alive.

The Murnies pounced on it, tearing at it, eating it alive.

To be eaten alive! he thought, stunned, and suddenly blind panic overtook him. He started running, running away from the scene.

Up ahead another band of Murnies leaped out of nowhere and cornered another deer, started to devour it.

They’re all over! he realized. This is their world! I’m just food to them!

He ran narrowly avoiding entrapment several times. There were thousands of them here, and they all were hungry.

And even as he ran in exhausted, dizzy circles, he knew that even if he avoided them today he would have to avoid them tomorrow, and the day after, and the day after, and wherever he ran on this planet there would be more of them.

Sooner or later they’ll get me! he thought in panic. By god! I’ll not be eaten alive! I’ll cheat Brazil of his revenge!

He reached the highlands by carefully pulling himself together.

Now that he had decided on a course of action, he felt calm.

There! Up ahead! his mind said joyfully. He stopped and looked over the edge of the cliff.

Over a kilometer straight down to the rocks, he saw with satisfaction. He ran back a long ways, then turned toward the cliff. With strong resolve, he ran with all his might toward the cliff and hurled himself over it.

He saw the rocks coming up to meet him, but felt only the slight shock of pain.

* * *

Skander awoke. The very fact that he awoke was a shock, and he looked around.

He was back on that plain at the edge of the forest. His shadow told him.

He was a deer again.