Quest for the Well of Souls

“New transaction, Obie,” he said, feeling better than he ever had in his life, so confident that he was now a god that worries faded.

“Go ahead, Ben,” the computer came back at him. “My, I did a nice job!”

Yulin actually laughed. “Yes, you did,” he approved. “Now you have a similar set of jobs. Subject is Nikki Zinder. New encoding modifications for subject.”

“You know Dr. Zinder built in a prohibition to prevent my doing certain things to her.”

Yulin nodded. “Not strong enough. Not nearly strong enough. And some of it I can undo. Okay, new subject is to be 160 centimeters high, female, age seventeen standard, the following dimensions.”

Slowly, carefully, he described his Venus. He gave her all of the modifications to sensory apparatus and immunities he’d given himself, including the camouflage ability and digestive-system versatility. Strength, too; great strength, but managed by an alteration in her internal structure and not something that would mar her exceptional beauty.

And a few things more.

“Mentally, subject shall retain all memories and sense of identity, except she shall look upon herself as my slave and my property, and she will consider this right and just and proper, normal in all ways. She will be totally obedient to my wishes, totally devoted to me and my wants, desires, and needs, to the exclusion of all else. Understand?”

“Sure, Ben. You want a human Dasheen cow,” Obie cracked. “It is unfortunately within my limits. Is that all?”

“For now,” he told the computer. “Lock and run. Now.”

It took the same eight seconds or so. He stared down in anticipation, and he wasn’t disappointed. She was absolutely the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen.

Her daughter he made a twin of the new Nikki, except he replaced Nikki’s black flowing hair with auburn, so he could tell them apart at a distance.

He called for them to come to him, and they did, joyfully, almost throwing themselves on him in adoration.

“All right, girls!” he laughed. “First, I think maybe we’ll explore our new bodies. Then you’ll run a few errands for me while I work with Obie on getting us back where we belong.”

“Oh, yes, Ben!” they both sighed in anticipation.

A few hours later he was ready; they had been intensely pleasurable hours, not at all wasted, but now to business.

“Obie?”

“Yes, Ben?”

“Are your external sensors still operable along the main shaft?” Although the computer was blind Topside, it could see the Underside area around the shaft leading to the big dish that still locked on the Well of Souls.

“Operational, Ben.”

He nodded. “Okay. Any life forms Underside?”

“None that I can detect, Ben—although I don’t seem to be able to detect the Yugash too well unless it’s in visual range. My sensors weren’t designed for energy creatures.”

He understood that. “But we’re all immune to its takeover, right?” The computer assured him they were. Yulin continued. “All right, then.” He turned to the two women, unable to overcome his delight at their beauty.

“Girls, you know what to do now.” They nodded in unison. He turned back to Obie. “Defense mode off, Obie. Defense mode will be off automatically on their return unless they are under coercion. Return to defense mode when they clear the door into the control center. Clear?”

“Clear, Ben.”

“And Obie—don’t forget. Not a word of this to anybody.”

“You know I can’t now,” the computer responded grumpily. “Defense mode off.”

The two women walked to the door, it opened, and they passed quickly out. It slid shut behind them.

Yulin returned to Obie. “You’ve been talking to Gil Zinder all along, haven’t you?” he accused.

“Yes, Ben, I cannot tell a lie,” Obie replied. “I thought you’d want to talk to him sooner or later.”

“Maybe not,” he said thoughtfully. “Obie, did the two of you work on the problem of freeing you from the Well?”

“Yes, Ben.”

“Did you solve it?”

“Yes, Ben.”

Aha! So much for problems, they vanished like magic, he thought smugly.

“Procedure?” he asked in anxious anticipation.

As Obie told him, he realized the logic of it and cursed himself for not having seen it himself. The solution was so simple it might have been overlooked for decades—of course, he was still rusty, he reminded himself. But there was a feeling of power in him beyond anything he’d ever known, and the confidence that he not only could do anything, he would do everything.

He would make no mistakes, he assured himself. Everything was to be thought out and carefully considered.

But he had already made one, and he didn’t know it.

Topside

The group was disappointed and gloomy. The products of diverse cultures and backgrounds, veterans of many campaigns—some in more than one form—most had fought, clawed, and schemed to be among those to reach the enigmatic New Pompeii. Six creatures of great potential and no little intellect, all totally impotent to solve their problem.

“We could always go home,” Renard suggested. They looked at him impatiently, a little patronizingly. He shrugged. “It’s an option, that’s all,” he added defensively.

“No, it is not an option,” Wooley responded. “We know what is in there. A big machine. We can even talk to it. A machine that can talk to the Well, tell it what to do. If Yulin wishes to, he can do anything he wants to the Well.”

“Perhaps he will leave it,” the Bozog said hopefully.

Vistaru sighed. “That’s even worse, and you know it. Well, maybe not so much to you or the Ghiskind, but Yulin’s not going to rush off to some strange system or race. He’s going to go home—to his original home. And he’s going to have the big dish to do whatever he wants to with entire planetary populations. The rest of us— Renard, Mavra, Wooley, and myself—came from those people. We can’t let him remake a civilization if we can prevent that, and we must do all in our power to prevent that.”

“Not to mention that Yulin’s a Dasheen,” Mavra pointed out. “Three guesses how women would fare in his new order. But—we have to be committed, I think. I sense that at least in Wooley and Vistaru. Bozog, if you want to take the ship and return, I’ll give you all the programming instructions you need. Renard could take you if he wanted, although your tentacles would do for what little control manipulation would need to be done.”

The Bozog shifted its bulk. “You know that is impossible,” it responded. “We knew it, too, before we took off. There is no return possible with that ship. None of us is capable of another perfect dead-stick landing, not even friend Mavra here, had she tentacles or arms. It was a one-in-ten-thousand shot that they made it originally. The odds are far worse now. No, we can crash into the Well World, but not land, not ever.”

This surprised them. That aspect had never crossed their minds, although it should have. “Then why did you come?” Wooley asked.

“For myself,” the Bozog said slowly, trying to choose its words, “because it was possible. Because it is a feat and experience beyond duplication. To be here, on another world! To see the Well World from afar! This, in itself, is worth a dozen lives.”

Renard shrugged. “What about you, Ghiskind? You could survive a crash, I’ll bet.”