Exiles at the Well of Souls

compatriots. Again, their journey was stage-managed so they arrived at their point within minutes of the other. Of course, neither party knows the other is there.”

The snow-creature turned back and stared at the engine module, marvelously intact and preserved, the remains of the great braking chutes still entwined in it.

“Thisis power,” said the Gedemondan, and pointed at the module.

There was a rumbling sound that shook the entire valley. Snow started to fall all around, and the engine module trembled, then started to move, slowly at first, then more rapidly, off the edge of the hanging valley.

It poised for an instant at the edge, then plunged over the side with a roar. But it didn’t just fall—it seemed to break apart, and there was a tremendous rumble and roar. Smoke and flames and white-hot billowing clouds erupted. The thing blew itself up on the way down, and, when it hit the snow below, the explosions continued, making the valley look like a minor volcano for several minutes. When the smoke and roar died away, the last of the echoes gone, there was only a melted, smouldering ruin in the snow, bubbling and hissing.

The Gedemondan nodded in satisfaction. “And so ends the war,” he said with a finality that was hard to deny.

“But if you could do this—why did you wait?” Vistaru asked, awed and a little frightened.

“It was necessary that all sides witness it,” the creature explained. “Otherwise they would never have accepted the truth.”

“All those dead people…” Renard murmured, thinking of his own experiences.

The Gedemondan nodded. “And thousands more now littering the plains. Perhaps this experience will save thousand more in times to come. War is the greatest of teachers, and not all of its lessons are bad. Their cost is just so terribly high.”

Mavra had a different thought. “Suppose the engine module hadn’t landed here,” she asked him. “What then?”

“You misunderstand,” replied the Gedemondan. “It landed here because it had to land here. It could land nowhere else.” He nodded, almost to himself. “A very simple equation,” he muttered.

* * *

They stood there a while in silence, stunned. Finally, Mavra asked, “What happens now? To us? To the warring powers?”

“The warring powers will pack up and go home,” the Gedemondan replied matter-of-factly.

“Trelig? Yulin?” Renard pressed.

“Are too devious to have been caught here,” the creature replied. “They will do as they always have done and act as they always have acted, until the time comes for their equations to solve. They are much entwined, those two, and with you, Renard, and you, Vistaru, and, most of all, with you, Mavra Chang.”

She let it pass. All this talk of her importance seemed ridiculous.

“And us?” she prodded. “What happens to us now? I mean, you’ve pretty well blown your cover, haven’t you?”

“Power is best used judiciously,” the Gedemondan replied. “A simple adjustment, really. You never were picked up by us. You followed an old trail that seemed recently used, and discovered this valley. Then you watched as the engine module destroyed itself, jarred perhaps by too many sounds echoing across the valley and hitting just the wrong points as it fell. Then you made your way east, into Dillia, to report. You never ever saw the mysterious Gedemondans.”

“That’s going to be a hard story to keep to,” she pointed out.

“But it is true,” the snow-creature told her. “Or, as far as your companions are concerned, it will be, the moment you cross into Dillia. We have picked up your pack and supplies and will provide them before you cross the border.”

“You mean,” Vistaru said, a little upset, “you’re going to make us forget all this?”

“All but her,” he replied, gesturing toward Mavra. “But she will get sick and tired of trying to convince you of all this fairly quickly.”

“Why me?” Mavra responded, still puzzled.

“We want you to remember,” the Gedemondan said seriously. “You see, while we developed here along these lines, our children out there in the stars did not. They are all dead now. All gone. The Gedemondans here may yet solve the Markovian problem, but they will never be in a position to implement that solution.”

“And I will?” she asked.

“The square root of minus two,” replied the Gedemondan.

South Zone

“But it just isn’t right,” Vardia, the Czillian, objected: “I mean, after all she did and tried to do.” It pointed a tendril at a photograph. “Look at her. A freak. A pretty human girl’s body, always facing head downward, supported by four mule’s legs. Not even able to look straight ahead. No protective hair or body fat. She’s so vulnerable! Eating like an animal, face pushed into a dish; eating food she can’t even prepare herself. She must have normal sexual urges, yet what will have her, from the ass-end at that? She almost has to wallow in her own excrement just to relieve herself. It’s awful! And so easy to cure. Just bring her here and send her through the Well Gate.”

Serge Ortega nodded, agreeing with all the other ambassador said. “It is sad,” he admitted. “There is nothing I have done in my whole foul life that pains me like this. And yet, you know why. The Crisis Center of your own hex came out with the cold facts. Antor Trelig will never forget that there’s another ship down on the Well World; neither will Ben Yulin. Both can see New Pompeii on clear nights. And if Yulin settles down, the Yaxa will push him into it. We can’t control them or the Makiem—and they can pass through Zone as safely as we. We haven’t the right to stop them. Nations that would not lift a finger in the war would act against us if we militarized Zone. I still hold to the idea that the Northern ship is beyond anybody’s reach, and, Lord knows, both the Czillian computers and I have tried every angle! Some of the Northern races are interested, but the Uchjin are completely opposed, and there’s no way to get a pilot there physically, anyway.”

He paused, then looked at the plant-creature, eyes sad. “But can we take the chance that it is impossible? Your computers say no, and so do my instincts. A Northerner once got South, remember. If we can find how… Trelig won’t stop. Yulin won’t stop. The Yaxa won’t stop. If a solution is possible, no matter how complex and off the wall it may be, even shooting a pilot over the Equatorial Barrier with giant sling shots, somebody will come up with the solution. My channels are pretty good, but so are theirs. If anybody comes up with the answer, we’ll all have it, and it’s a miniwar all over again. And if we aren’t to leave it to Yulin or Trelig, then we’ll need somebody who knows how to tell that computer to take off and land and such— and who can reprogram it for the almost impossible launch situation and acceleration that would be required. The Zinders can’t—even if we knew where and what they were, and we most definitely do not. Nor can a classical librarian like Renard. None of them ever flew a ship. I can’t, either. I’m too out of date. And that ship is still there, still intact, and it’ll stay that way because the Uchjin don’t even understand what it is but think it’s pretty, and because that atmosphere they have is almost a perfect preservative.”

“If only we could get somebody in the North to blow it up,” Vardia said wistfully.

“I’ve already tried that,” Ortega replied swiftly. “Things are different up there, that’s all. So we’ve got a ship that’s a ticking bomb, and maybe, hopefully, it’ll never go off—but it just might. And if we run her through the Well of Souls, we might lose track or control of the only pilot we have!”

He shuffled through some papers, coming up with a photograph of New Pompeii.

“Look at that,” he told her. “There’s a computer there that knows the Well codes and math. It’s capacity-