by Mark Hodder
“Yes,” I murmured. “It’s a more plausible proposition.”
“Might it not then also be true,” the Quintessence said, “that these conflicting forces echo through every level of existence, from the macroscopic to the microscopic; in every animal, vegetable, and mineral; in every social structure; in every individual?”
“I don’t oppose the concept.”
“Then in order to gain another context, and thus achieve the meaning, equanimity, and happiness you desire, you must better understand the opposition we have identified.”
A peal of bitter laughter escaped me. I quoted myself: “To do the greatest good, I must know its opposite.” They were the exact words I’d said to Carissa Stark so long ago, and now they were being reiterated by a bizarre intelligence on another world!
“I can help you,” the Quintessence boomed.
“How?”
“The evil you must confront—it is here.”
“It’s—what?”
“If our conjecture has validity, Aiden Fleischer, then Phenadoor exemplifies the perfection of the creator. Under my guidance, it has been a perfectly balanced society. However, it is now at the brink of crisis.”
I gave a slight grunt of recognition and said, “The proclamations mentioned something called the Divergent.”
“Yes. For many cycles, the ocean has delivered to us fewer and fewer newborn, and those we have received have been perverted in thought and spirit. They are filled with deviant ideas and violent intentions. Their minds are closed to me. They are Divergent.”
“The ocean delivers the newborn?”
“The Mi’aata are formed in its waters.”
“And the Yatsill?”
“To what do you refer?”
I opened my mouth to reply but hesitated. The Quintessence wasn’t aware of the Yatsill? What, then, had become of all the Working Class who’d slipped into the ocean as the Heart of Blood rose? If they didn’t swim to Phenadoor, where did they go?
“They’re a species I’ve encountered on Ptallaya,” I said.
“The Mi’aata have little contact with the lesser life forms. They are immaterial.”
“Very well. So what has caused these Mi’aata to become Divergent?”
“It is a mystery—one that has continued without change for a number of cycles. But during this last, there have been further oddities. The number of newborn has unexpectedly risen almost to normal, but they are marred by an even greater degree of mental corruption. Also, they have become organised, and have isolated ten manufacturing plants, where they now construct we know not what. In attempting to find out, we sensed a controlling presence among them, and further investigation led us to discover Clarissa Stark. Wresting her from the Divergent cost many Mi’aata lives and did not have the result we expected, for it was quickly apparent that she was not the presence we had sensed.”
“So this thing that controls them—it is the evil you referred to?”
“It is. We cannot locate it but we know it is here. We can feel its poison, its instability. Whatever else it is, it is most certainly insane. And this creature—”
“Creature? Do you mean to suggest that it’s not a Mi’aata?”
“We do. And this creature, Aiden Fleischer, is the same creature that manipulated your emotions and partitioned your companion’s mind. Obviously, whatever its scheme, you both have a role to play, albeit unwittingly.”
I tensed, and my hand automatically shifted to rest on my sword hilt. I felt disconcerted to find that it wasn’t there.
Hoarsely, I barked, “Explain partitioned!”
“Some areas of Clarissa Stark’s mind have been blocked from us. Other parts have been filled with unusual mathematical formulae. We have tried to decipher them but they loop back on themselves and we become ensnared. Recently, it occurred to us that perhaps this is their very purpose. Clarissa Stark is a decoy. The formulae were planted in her to keep us occupied.”
I felt a pure hard anger ignite inside me.
The Quintessence continued, “This insidious enemy must be located and defeated. That is the task I now assign to you. Fulfil it and you will do a great service to the Mi’aata—and resolve your own difficulties.”
I felt a sudden sourness and resentment. My father’s God had expected me to spread the Word. I’d failed. The Yatsill’s god had expected me to fetch Dar’sayn. I’d failed. Now the Mi’aata’s god wanted me to confront its enemy. It would be nice, I thought, if, just for once, I could set my own agenda.
“Let me see Clarissa first.”
“Your companion is in the care of my Status Four scientists. You will not be permitted to enter Zone Four until I raise you to the appropriate level. I will not award you Status Four until you have served to my satisfaction.”
I considered the three entombed Mi’aata, looked around at the glittering chamber, then sighed and gave a curt nod.
The Quintessence said, “Good. Then, Aiden Fleischer, I hereby declare you Non Status and condemn you to servitude in the mines.”
“Wait! Servitude? The mines? What are you talking about?”
“You will labour alongside the captured Divergent. Befriend them. Interrogate them. Do whatever is necessary to identify the one who is influencing them.”
“But you said they’re insane!”
“Your mission will not be easy. Succeed, and a high position in Phenadoorian society shall be yours. Fail, and you will remain in the mines.”
“I can’t accept those terms! There must be another way!”
“There is none. You have no choice.”
The door behind me vanished and the four guards entered.
“Take him.”
9. Escape
The equivalent of two Earth months, at least, must have passed, and my body, though muscular and toughened by all my trials and tribulations—and, of course, by Ptallaya’s gravity—was at the limit of its endurance.
I’d learned that Phenadoor was honeycombed with tunnels, which varied in size from tall and wide corridors to little more than crawl spaces. One particular passage burrowed at a sheer angle into the mountain’s base then out beneath the seabed where it split into multiple branches. From these, veins of a deep blue crystal had been chipped away at, initially by generation after generation of low-status Mi’aata, and latterly by captured Divergent. The much-prized crystals were a primary component in Phenadoorian technology.
I’d been placed in Unit 22, a work party of nine Divergent, all baffled by my presence, and each responding to it with vagueness, hostility, eccentricity, or incomprehensible madness. Mostly, they avoided me as much as possible. The exception was an individual named Tharneek-Ptun, who appeared inexplicably drawn to me and persistently engaged me in conversations that made little sense and that he carried on whether I acknowledged him or not.
When Unit 22 wasn’t employed on one of the long backbreaking shifts, it occupied quarters carved out of the side of the main passage. The Mi’aata slept in gelatine-filled troughs. This was not the same healing stuff I’d bathed in upon my arrival in Phenadoor and I found its slimy texture unpleasant, so I’d drained my trough and put a rough blanket in the bottom. My bed was hard and uncomfortable, but every time I lay in it I was too exhausted to notice and immediately fell into a deep and dreamless slumber, unconscious even of the continual pronouncements that echoed through the tunnels.
“Wealth and comfort can be yours if you make the well-being of Phenadoor your primary purpose. Those who work the hardest are the most rewarded. Do not doubt. Do not question. Do not lose focus. Remember that, in striving for the betterment of Phenadoor, you are striving for yourself.”
As usual, it was a siren that woke me, and a Mi’aata warden who forced me to my feet. Like all his fellows, the brute was armed with a crystal-topped pikestaff, the tip of which delivered an agonising bolt of energy to anyone it touched. He employed it freely and viciously, jabbing the weapon repeatedly into my ribs. My muscles spasmed, my limbs jerked, and I
let out a cry of pain.
“Get in line outside!” he ordered. “And the rest of you filth! All of you! Outside. Now!”
We stood and shuffled from the small room, lined up in the roughly hewn tunnel, and with the wardens harassing our every step began to walk along it, following its sloping floor downward.
Tharneek-Ptun, at my side, mumbled, “We descend once again, and in doing so fold inward, do we not?”
I gave what had become my standard response to his irrational statements. “Indeed so.”
“And in folding inward we mine our own resources.”
The atmosphere was dense and hot. All the tunnels were lit by glowing crystals and fitted with pipes that sprayed a fine mist of seawater over the Mi’aata to cool them and keep their skins moist. Noisy pumps then removed the water to prevent flooding. While this was beneficial to my fellows, it caused me great discomfort and my skin was covered with sores that couldn’t heal beneath the onslaught of corrosive salt water.
Following a zigzagging sequence of slopes, we were mercilessly prodded along, descending deeper and deeper until, eventually, we reached one of the mine faces.
“Take up your tools and get to it!” a warden snapped.
“Digging ever inward!” Tharneek-Ptun muttered. “How far into your own mind have you gone, Mr. Fleischer?”
“Too far,” I answered. “And you?”
“Right up to the barrier.”
My interest was piqued. So far, my unit had offered little by way of useful information, though the more coherent of them had railed against the social order of Phenadoor, calling it stagnant and self-absorbed. The rest of Ptallaya, they claimed, was primitive and undeveloped, so why not expand into it? But if such sentiment came from a unifying source—as the Quintessence suspected—my fellows appeared to know nothing of it.
“Barrier?” I asked.
Tharneek-Ptun remained silent and hammered at the vein of crystal while a warden passed by, then responded, “That which blocks true revelation. The insurmountable. The impenetrable.”
“And if you could pass this barrier, what would be revealed?”
“My origin. Have you never wondered what you were before you were born?”
“I’m not sure I was anything. Besides, I’m rather more concerned with what I might be now, while I live. What’s the first thing you remember, Tharneek-Ptun?”
“I recall the sea, and being taken aboard an underconveyance. That is all.”
“And New Yatsillat?”
“What is that?”
A warden approached and bellowed, “You two! Less talk, more work!” He thrust his pikestaff into the small of my back. I jerked and cried out, fell and lay twitching, then recovered, struggled back up, and returned to my labours. As my assailant moved away, I snarled in English, “I swear, if that lout comes near me again, I’ll kill him!”
Tharneek-Ptun uttered a cry of surprise and dropped his tools. The warden turned back at the noise. My companion quickly snatched up his implements and attacked the rock face with overt enthusiasm. It was enough to satisfy the guard, who grunted and wandered away. I waited until he was out of hearing range then asked, “Are you all right, Tharneek-Ptun? You’re trembling.”
No reply was forthcoming and the Divergent Mi’aata remained uncharacteristically silent for the remainder of the shift.
I worked on, the muscles of my arms, shoulders, and back becoming increasingly fatigued until they first burned then became totally numb. It was impossible to judge how long we were at the mine face, but by the time the shift ended I was dazed with exhaustion, half-starved, and barely able to stand.
A siren blared.
“Back to your quarters!” a warden shouted.
We formed a line and began the interminable trek back along the tunnel. Barely aware of what I was doing—focused only on putting one foot in front of the other—I knew nothing more until I found myself standing beside my bed.
Behind me, Tharneek-Ptun stretched his limbs, almost doubling in height, and said, “Gaaaah!”
I spun and looked at him in astonishment.
He touched my shoulder with the tip of a tentacle and said, very quietly, “Get some sleep, old thing. But I shall wake you later. We need a little confab.”
“Great heavens!” I cried out. “You’re speaking English!”
He nodded, then moved to his trough and climbed in.
I stood a moment, my mind reeling, then, unable to remain conscious any longer, collapsed onto my blanket and passed out.
Immediately—or that’s the way it felt—I was jogged back to my senses, opened my eyes, and saw him looking down at me.
“Come with me,” he whispered.
I heaved myself out of bed and looked around. The other Mi’aata were dormant. Tharneek-Ptun took me by the wrist, pulled me to the door, peeked out, saw that no patrols were in sight, and dragged me into the corridor. We moved rapidly down the slope, unchallenged—for, logically, it was the upper parts of the tunnel that were guarded, not the lower—until we came alongside a small opening in the base of the right-hand wall. My companion pushed me down onto all fours and propelled me through before squeezing himself in after me.
“Crawl forward,” he ordered.
With my lassitude quickly dissipating, I moved through the tight, irregular tunnel.
“Not much farther, old chap.”
The passage soon widened into a small asymmetrical chamber—a space of softly illuminated crystal surfaces with three other openings in it. Here we stopped.
“Is it really you?” I asked.
“It most certainly is! New Yatsillat. The City Guard. Old Brittleback. It’s all returned to me! What! What! I remembered it the moment I heard you speak English! Harrumph!”
“Colonel Spearjab!”
“Exactly so! Colonel Momentous Spearjab, formerly Yazziz Yozkulu, latterly Tharneek-Ptun, at your service, old boy! Ha ha! I say, what a rum do! What! What! Look at me! I’m a confounded Blood God! Humph! Humph! Humph!”
“But—but—how?”
As soon as I asked the question, the answer came to me. There could be only one explanation! The Blood Gods—the Mi’aata—didn’t invade the Yatsill at all. Rather, it was a case of metamorphosis. The one transformed into the other. The first didn’t understand the true nature of the second, while the second had no memory of the first.
“How? I have absolutely no idea!” Spearjab responded. “I’m as baffled as can be! Harrumph! But you, old chap—how came you to Phenadoor? Hey? What?”
“Your fellow Mi’aata took Clarissa Stark from New Yatsillat and brought her here. I came to find her.”
“She’s here? Why?”
“To distract the Quintessence, apparently. Frankly, I’m surprised your fellows had wits enough to do it. The Divergent—as the more recent generations of Mi’aata are called—aren’t very rational.”
Spearjab raised a couple of tentacles to his head. His four eyes rolled and squinted. He muttered, “Yes. It is jolly difficult to think.”
“The Quintessence says you are deviants.”
“Pah! Phenadoor’s ruler lacks imagination. He resists progress. He demands that everything be rebuilt over and over and develops nothing new. Here, everything is always the same, the same, the same! That is not Mi’aata destiny! We need to create and explore and advance. We must dominate and—”
He stopped and groaned and whispered, “My goodness!”
I placed a hand on his side. “What is it, Colonel? For a moment there you sounded quite different. Are you in pain?”
“Harrumph! There is something crawling around inside the old noggin. Makes it awfully hard to order one’s thoughts, what! It is a—a—a waiting. A gathering. A preparing.”
“Is it sentient? An individual? Here in Phenadoor?”
“Yes, old thing. There.” He pointed up to the left. “It emanates from that direction. What! What! Humph!”
“Colonel, the Quintessence suspects that a hidden presence in the
mountain is controlling the Divergent. Is that what you sense? Could you lead me to it?”
“I rather think I could, yes. Humph! That’s if I can keep my bloomin’ wits about me and stay on the straight and narrow. It wouldn’t do to be subverted! Not at all! What! What! Just not cricket! Not cricket, I say! Give me a moment, would you?”
I waited while Spearjab sat hunched over, his four eyes closed, his mouth quivering with effort. When he finally spoke again, his voice was slurred.
“Difficult. I feel—divided. Divided, I say! But we can proceed. I should warn you, though—it’ll be jolly dangerous.”
“We have no choice, Colonel. We are caught up in some sort of vast plot. My and Clarissa’s transportation to Ptallaya, the dwindling of the Aristocrats, the murder of Yarvis Thayne and the attempt on Clarissa’s life, the increasing numbers of Divergent Mi’aata—all these things are connected, I’m certain. But to what end, and who is responsible?”
“Quite! Quite! But our absence will be noticed. The bally fiends will search for us.”
“Then we must move fast.”
Spearjab looked at me. His speech became less strained. “I say, in New Yatsillat, I was thoroughly miffed to see so many Aristocrats taken by the Blood Gods. But what ho! What ho! Now I know they weren’t taken at all! They are all here—here, I say!—but the poor blighters aren’t aware of themselves. They can’t recall their past existence. I’ve been fortunate, what! In remembering your language, I’ve remembered myself, and I’m thoroughly grateful, old thing. Thoroughly! Now the great revelation—the secret of our origin—must be shared with all the Mi’aata, hey? First, though, I want to know what infernal rotter is meddling with my mind! Harrumph! Follow me. Tally-ho!”
