Exiles at the Well of Souls

“Obie, this is Dr. Zinder,” he told the machine. “Can you break contact with the other computer?”

“Not at this time, Dr. Zinder,” Obie responded, his tone much nicer now, and more tinged with concern. “When we activated the reverse field, we released the tension of the energy controlling our own existence. It brought us here. Apparently the world computer has been preprogrammed for just such an event, but the programmers assumed that anyone who could tap the Markovian equations in such a manner and bring themselves here would be at close to the same technological level as the builders of the world computer. We are supposed to supersede previous programming, tell it what to do next.”

“Where is here, Obie?” Zinder asked.

“The coordinates would be useless, even if I had a frame of reference,” Obie replied. “We are, in a sense, in the center of the tangible universe, or so I gather from what I can make of the other computer’s information circuits.”

Even Trelig understood the implications. “You mean this is the center for all existence of all matter in the galaxy?” he shouted.

“Just so,” agreed Obie. “And all energy, too, except the primal energy that is the building blocks for everything else. This is the central Markovian world, from which, as near as I can see, they recreated the universe.”

That thought sobered all of them. Trelig’s eyes shone, and his expression took on new determination. “Such awesome power!” he said, too low for the others to hear. A blue-white shot didn’t snap him out of it but did bring him back to reality. With such power within his grasp, he still had to survive this experience.

“Obie, can you converse with this big machine?” Yulin asked eagerly.

The computer seemed to think for a moment. “Yes and no. It’s hard to explain. Suppose you had a functional vocabulary of just eighty words? Suppose, in fact, you were only capable of knowing eighty words. And suppose someone from your culture with a doctorate in physics started talking his technical field with you. You couldn’t even absorb all the words, let alone understand any of the conversation.”

“But you could talk to it in those eighty words,” Yulin pointed out.

“Not if you couldn’t even phrase the question,” Obie retorted. “I haven’t the ability even to say ‘hello’ in an understandable manner—and I’m almost afraid to try. There is an incredibly elaborate preprogrammed sequence that I am aware of but cannot follow or comprehend. I don’t dare try. It might wipe out all reality, or the other computer and all reality as well, leaving me as the only thing left. What then?”

The scientists saw what he meant. The Markovians had preprogrammed the computer to turn over everything to their successors, when they reached the Markovian level. It apparently had never occurred to them that a Gil Zinder, a primitive ape, would stumble onto their precious formula millennia before man was ready. The master computer out there was waiting for Obie to tell it to shut down, that new masters were taking over.

But the new masters were three very scared primitives and an equally scared computer, the primitives trapped by the former employees of one of them. The guards, seeing the change in position and realizing that the sponge supply ship would not be coming, knew they were going to die horribly.

But they were going to die free. They were going to take their hated master with them.

“Obie?” Yulin called.

“Yes, Ben?”

“Obie, can you figure out how the hell we can get out of here?”

The computer had anticipated that one.

“Well, you could just wait them out,” Obie suggested. “There are provisions here for a week, and I can create more than enough to sustain you. In three weeks or so all the guards will be dead; in two they will be in no condition to oppose you or do you harm.”

“No good!” Trelig shouted to them all. “There are two ships up there that must be placed under our control—otherwise we’re trapped. Remember, there are a lot of agents and diplomatic people who won’t be affected by the sponge wearing off! With the guards gone wild, some are probably armed by now and might be able to take the ships. If they jump away, we’re stuck for good!”

“Correction,” Obie responded. “There is one ship. Mavra Chang, Nikki Zinder, and a guard named Renard got off in one.”

Gil Zinder seemed to come to life again. “Nikki! Away from here! Obie—did they make it out? Are they back home?”

“Sorry, Dr. Zinder,” the computer said sadly. “The early start for the tests forced my hand. They were taken in the vortex with us, and have since crashed on the Well World.”

The old scientist’s look of hope gave way to despair, and he seemed to crumble. Trelig was upset by a different point entirely.

“What do you mean, forced your hand?” the erstwhile master of New Pompeii snarled angrily. “You treasonous machine!”

Obie was nonplussed. “I am a self-aware individual, Councillor. I do what I must do, and yet I have certain freedom of action outside those parameters. Just like people,” he added, not a little smugly.

Ben Yulin’s mind was the engineer’s. “What did you call that world they crashed on, Obie?” he asked, ignoring the others.

“The Well World,” responded the computer. “That is its name.”

Yulin thought for a moment. “The Well World,” he murmured, almost to himself. Now he looked straight at the speaker. More shots were being exchanged between Trelig and the guards outside.

“Obie?” Ben almost whispered, “tell me about this Well World. Is it just a big Markovian computer, or what?”

“I have to interpolate, Ben,” Obie apologized. “After all, I’m getting this information in bits and pieces and it’s all coming in at once. No, I don’t think so, though. The computer—the Well—is the entire core of the planet. The planet itself seems to be divided into many more than a thousand separate and distinct biospheres, each with its own dominant life form and supporting its own flora, fauna, atmospheric conditions, and the like. It’s like a massive number of little planets. I infer these as prototype colonies for later implantation into the universe in their true, mathematically precise environments. They are alive, they are active, they exist.”

The other two were listening now, fascinated in spite of themselves.

“The three, who crashed,” Gil Zinder tried dryly. “Did they—did they… survive?”

“Unknown,” Obie replied truthfully. “Since they are not part of the Well World matrix, they are not in the computer’s storage. Even if they were, I doubt if they could be picked out. There are too many sentient beings down there.”

“Why don’t you ask him something practical, like how the hell we get out of here?” Trelig snapped, breaking the reverie. “The fact that there’s only one ship left makes the matter even more pressing!”

Yulin nodded, unhappy to break this fascinating new line of discovery but unable to argue with Trelig’s practicality. But the computer was a hostile accomplice; questions would have to be in absolutes. Yulin suddenly felt like he knew what it was like to have to strike a bargain with the devil.

And then, suddenly, without Obie’s aid, he had it. Yulin let out a disgusted exclamation that made the others turn, then slammed his right fist into his left palm. “Curse me for a fool!” he swore. “Of course!” Calming himself down, he asked, “Obie, is your little disk still operable?”

“Yes, Ben,” Obie replied. “But only within its previous limits. The big disk is locked into the Well computer until I or somebody can figure out how to disengage it, and I have no ideas at all on that right now.”

Yulin nodded, more to himself than to the machine. “Okay. Okay. The little one’s all I need now. Obie, you have the formula for sponge, don’t you?”

“Of course,” came the reply, a little startled. “From the bloodstream of a number of early subjects.”

“Uh, huh,” Yulin muttered. He was all business now. “Activate and energize. I want a small quantity of sponge, say five grams, in a leakproof plastic container. The straight stuff. And, I want an additional kilogram of the stuff with the following chemical substitutions.” He proceeded to rattle off a long chemical chain that startled the others.

Zinder was the first to realize where Yulin was headed, and almost moaned, “But—you can’t do that!”

But Yulin could, had ordered it, energized Obie, and the disk was even now swinging out over the circular