The Crystal Variation

by Sharon Lee

  She exerted her will, and sleep she did, though the memory lingered.

  II

  SHE WAS CONTEMPLATING ley lines, their shapes and patterns, attempting to gauge the magnitude of force required to effect a branching off a main avenue of event. She was, of herself, powerless to shift the lines, or to cross them, or to affect a branching. However, it was necessary that she understand the art and the consequences of its use. If she survived the Three Dooms, thereby proving herself worthy to engender life. If the life she engendered was fit. If she enforced her dominion. If—

  Attend me.

  The order rang inside her head, bright orange and tasting of manganese—the thought signature of the Anjo Valee dominant, their biology tutor. Obedient, she withdrew her attention from the glittering, seductive lines of possibility and power, rose from her crouch and, with the eleven of her cohort who had survived the First Doom, walked—naked, silent, and identical—down the rough stone hall to the biology lab.

  Their tutor awaited them on the raised platform at the center of the room, the dominant standing with thin arms crossed over her breast, her face bearing its usual expression of impatient irritation. The submissive towered behind her, his face round and blank, eyes staring deep into the vasty mysteries of time and space.

  The twelve of them knelt in a half-ring before the dias, their faces tipped up to their tutor, eyes open and focused on her face. As one, they neutralized their protections, and composed themselves to learn.

  When they were all equally calm and receptive, the dominant smiled, showing small pointed teeth, closed her eyes and broadcast the lesson.

  As usual, it struck the mind hard, its many angles and tiny sharp details seeming to cut the brain tissue itself. Kneeling, she received the thing, taking care to keep her eyes open and steady, and to allow no shadow of pain to disturb her aura as the knowledge sank into the depths of her mind, flowered with a thousand daggered points—and was gone.

  You will now practice the technique, the dominant projected. Anjo.

  On the tile floor before each appeared a lab dish bearing a quiescent portion of protolife.

  Animate your subject, the order came.

  That was easy enough; engendering a nervous system was elementary biology. She extended her thought and probed the clay, teasing out filaments, weaving them into a network. When the weaving was done, she subjected the whole to a deep scrutiny, being certain there were no missed synapses, before releasing a carefully gauged jolt of energy. The protolife twitched, the network of nerves glowed, and she withdrew into her envelope, her hands laying loose on her thighs.

  She must have been slower than the rest at her work, for no sooner had she re-entered the physical plane than the order rang inside her head: Render your subject aware.

  Once again, she brought her attention to the protolife and the steady glow of the nervous system she had created. Awareness—that was more difficult. They had been given the theory in philosophy, but this would be the first opportunity to bring theory into practice.

  Carefully, she made her adjustments, and when she was satisfied, she withdrew to her envelope.

  Kneeling, she waited, long enough for the sweat to dry on her face; long enough to begin to wonder if she had made some foolish error, which had allowed her to finish so far ahead of the—

  Render your subject self-aware.

  Self-aware? Almost, she allowed the thought to take form, but wisdom won out. One did not question the Anjo Valee dominant lightly. Nor was one stupid or slow in completing one’s lesson.

  She returned to the second plane, where she contemplated the pulsing protolife with puzzlement. Self-aware. This went beyond what theory the philosophy tutor had granted them. However, if it were but a simple progression—animation, awareness, self-awareness . . .

  Gingerly, and not at all certain that her instinct was good, she exerted her will once more, fashioning a chamber of pure energy, which enclosed and oversaw the central autonomous system. When it was fully formed and integrated, glowing in her perceptions like an impossibly tiny zaliata, she breathed upon it, and projected a single thought.

  I.

  The energy construct twitched, glowed, dimmed—and flared. Rudimentary thought reached her, barely more than an inarticulate mumble. The mumble grew as it accepted data from the central nervous system and began assessing its situation. Its unique situation.

  Shaken in spirit, she returned to her sweat-drenched envelope. It took all of her will to leave her shields down; and every erg of her strength to keep her eyes open, modestly contemplating the lab dish and the creature which was beginning to cast about for data regarding its environment and itself.

  Her envelope was beginning to shiver. Irritated, she encouraged certain molecules to increase their dance briefly and dried her sweat-slicked dermis. She did not smile, nor avert her eyes from the lab dish. It was too much to hope that her action had escaped the notice of their tutor, the submissive unit of whom was attuned to the ebb and flow of power, from small flares of warmth to the death and birth of star systems.

  In the lab dish, the self-aware protolife continued to gather data, its mutter limping toward coherence. The facts of its existence were simple and straightforward, and because they were the facts of its existence, unalarming. It did not miss the limbs it had never had, it did not repine for sight or for the ability to shape living things from quiescent clay. It—

  Very well. Their tutor’s thought signature was shot with yellow, signaling that she was more than usually impatient.

  You will now access the technique you have been given and use it to physically alter your subject. Be certain that it remains conscious and aware during the change. This is the shape you will bestow—a quick mind-picture of a bulbous body from which three equal tentacles protruded.

  Proceed.

  The technique was deceptively simple, and her first attempt produced two greater tentacles and a lesser. She accessed the technique again in order to make the adjustment, and the creature in the lab dish screamed.

  She watched it closely as it quivered, then rallied and began to collect the data on its new form, stretching out its tentacles and exploring far more of the lab dish than it had known existed. Its terror faded into excitement, into curiosity, into—

  Again, the order came, and the shape this time included an ear.

  Her creature’s horror sublimated quickly into the eagerness of discovery. From somewhere—likely from the Anjo Valee submissive—came sound, patternless and far into the range that she herself could perceive only through her other senses. The creature tracked the noise, building processing space on its own initiative, its muttering intelligible now as it formed theories regarding the sound, its purpose and its possible meaning for itself.

  Again.

  An eye and a fine gripper were added. The creature scarcely felt horror at these newest developments; and the pain of acquiring the alterations bled almost instantly away into greedy wonder. It created additional processing space as it began to creep about the dish, testing the information brought to it through its eye. It looked up, and she received a weird visual feedback—a smooth, lopsided blotch of gold, topped by a second and smaller blotch . . .

  Again.

  The image this time was sharply different—a bony carapace, six multi-jointed legs—three to a side—eyes fore and aft, on flexible stalks. The creature marched forward, learning its strength and its range. The muttering now took into account this state of constant change and accepted it as natural, for it knew nothing else.

  She withdrew . . . mostly . . . into her envelope, while keeping the marching, measuring creature in one small portion of her attention. It was doing well, taking stock, forming theories, testing and adjusting them to accommodate new data. She was proud of it, the child born of her thought and desire.

  As she watched, it discovered the dome over the dish, studied it with front eyes and back, stood on a pair of back legs and used the front ones to gain a sensory impres
sion, exerted pressure—pressure!—and learned that it did not give.

  The muttering was comprehensible now, the thought processes cogent and accessible. It considered the dome in light of its earlier explorations of the floor of the dish, formed the hypothesis that the material was one and the same. Settling back, it stamped its feet against the floor, verifying that the material was unbreakable by the force it might bring to bear. The question of whether it was desirable to break the dome arose and was put aside, pending further data.

  The creature’s eyes extended, and this time she recognized her face in the feedback, her eyes as round and as clear as the dish itself.

  So, we have given, her tutor’s thought intruded upon her observations. Now, we shall take away.

  The image flashed—the very creature in her lab dish, minus the endmost set of legs.

  This was fine work and took a good deal of concentration; she narrowed her perceptions to one, single foci, and did what was required.

  In the lab dish, the creature teetered and staggered, as the now unevenly distributed weight of its carapace pulled it first to one side and then the other. Just as it achieved equilibrium, the tutor broadcast the next template.

  Biting her lip, she removed the foremost pair of legs.

  Her creature wailed, staggered—fell, eye stalks whipping, then focusing. Focusing on the dome. Beyond the dome.

  On her.

  Again.

  This time it was a front eye and a back; then, the order barely discernible in the din of the creature’s horror, pain and fear, another leg, then the ear.

  Bit by bit, the creature was rendered back, until it was yet again a formless blot of protolife. Sentient protolife, its once promising mental acuity crushed beneath the weight of its multiple losses. Its awareness screamed continually, pain eroding the ability to reason, to form a theory, a response.

  Even withdrawn entirely into her body, she could hear it; feel it. There was no word from the tutor, no query from any of her cohort. In the dish, the creature’s anguish spiked, the last of its reason spiraled into chaos—and surely, she thought, that was the end of the lesson.

  She extended her though, stilled the turmoil, blotted out the shredded I, unwove the nervous system, and withdrew again to the quiet of her own mind.

  Orange and yellow flames exploded across her perceptions.

  You will stand! The tutor’s thought slashed at her. Explain what you have just done and your reasons for doing so! The order rang in her head, and no sooner had it formed than she was yanked upward and released. She staggered, got her feet under her, and bowed to the tutor, where they stood on the dais, the dominant allowing her anger to be seen; the submissive staring over her head, to the farthest corner of the room—and beyond.

  I have—

  Speak against the air, the dominant snapped, and her thought burned.

  She cooled the burn site, bowed once more, and straightened, her hands flat against her thighs.

  “I returned the protolife to its quiescent state,” she said, her voice thin and one dimensional. They seldom communicated so, amongst themselves. Lower forms spoke against the air, and by placing this demand upon her the tutor illustrated that she—a student and unpaired—was lower—weaker—than a full dramliza unit.

  As if that point required illustration.

  Upon what order did you undertake this action? Her tutor’s thought fairly crackled, throwing out sparks of yellow and orange.

  She bowed. “Upon my own initiative,” she said steadily.

  It is your LEARNED opinion that the remainder of the lesson was of no benefit to you?

  The rest of the lesson? The thought took shape before she could prevent it. She bent forward in a bow—and found herself gripped in a vise of energy, unable to straighten, unable to continue the bow, unable to move her legs, or her arms, scarcely able to breathe.

  So, you were unaware that there was more? the dominant purred, her thought now showing gleams and glimmers of pleased violet.

  “I was,” she whispered against the air, staring perforce at the tile floor.

  Then you will stand in place of your construct, and finish the lesson out, the dominant stated. Anjo.

  Abruptly, she was released. She gasped in a great lungful of air as she collapsed, tile gritting against her cheek, her limbs weak and tingling unpleasantly with the renewed flow of blood.

  She set her hands against the tile, pushed herself up—and fell flat on her face as her left arm dissolved in a blare of pain so encompassing she scarcely felt it.

  Panting, she rocked back to her knees, to her feet—and down again, cracking her head against the floor, the place where her right leg had been an agony beyond belief.

  Grimly, she got up onto her remaining knee and hand, pain warring with horror as she understood that the tutor meant to—

  One eye was gone, its empty socket a cup of fire burning into her skull. She screamed, then, the sound high and wild—and cut off abruptly as her ears were taken.

  Observe closely, the tutor was addressing the rest of her cohort, the pattern of her thought weaving like a violet ribbon through the pain. Lesser beings may be governed by a system of punishment and reward.

  Acid ate her right arm.

  Judicious reward and implacable punishment . . .

  Her left leg evaporated in a sheet of fire.

  . . . will win unfailing service . . .

  The biology lab vanished as her remaining eye was plucked out.

  . . . and will enforce both your dominion and your superiority.

  The pain increased as the tutor exerted her will on nerve endings and receptors. She could feel the pressure of that terrible regard, as her thoughts skittered and scrambled. She tried to hide from the pain, all her perceptions obscured by it, so that she was blind in truth, and the pain, the pain . . .

  We have taken away much, as is our right, according to our ability.

  She was ablaze; the skin crisping on her bones; her reason spiraling toward chaos. Just like—

  We shall now bestow a small reward.

  Just like her poor creature, which had done so well, for a lower order, built to be dominated, manipulated and—

  Monitor the flux of the emotion ‘gratitude.’

  She was not a base construct. She was not. She would fight. She would—

  She would dominate.

  Atom by atom, she scraped together her shattered will and focused on the roaring source of energy obscuring her perceptions. Pain. Pain could be used.

  Beyond the inferno, she felt the weight of her tutor’s regard increase.

  She thrust her will into the howling depth of the pain—

  The tutor’s regard altered, sparked—

  Using raw power and no finesse whatsoever, she created shields and threw them into place.

  There was an orange and yellow detonation as the tutor’s will slammed into her barriers—but she had no time for that, now.

  The tutor launched another assault, but her protections held. Of course they held. Had she not survived the First Doom? Her shields had withstood the stare of one of the Iloheen; they would hold against a mere dramliza.

  For a time.

  Working with rapid care, she bled off the pain, sublimating it into working energy, using it to rebuild her depleted strength.

  As she dominated the pain, her focus returned and she was able to survey the wreckage of her envelope.

  Tentatively at first, then more swiftly as she began to integrate the fine points of the interrupted lesson, she rebuilt her body.

  Arms, legs, eyes, ears, nerves, dermis . . . As she worked, she considered making alterations—and regretfully decided not to do so. Alterations made in haste and in unstable conditions might later be revealed as errors. Best to wait.

  She did, however, strengthen her shields.

  Then, she opened her eyes.

  Carefully, cocooned in total silence on all perceptual levels, she came to her feet, and raised her eyes to the
instructor’s dias.

  Lower your protections. The characteristic bright orange thought was shading toward a dangerously bland beige, and the taste of manganese was very strong.

  With all respect, she answered—no.

  You may lower them or Anjo will destroy them.

  She looked to the submissive, and found his pale eyes open and focused on her face, with . . . interest . . .

  I will not, she made answer to the dominant. And Anjo shall not.

  Upon what order do you undertake this action?

  Upon my own initiative.

  Ah. The dominant extended her will to the submissive—and froze in time and space as a long Shadow fell across the room and the perceptions of all within.

  The air grew chill and the tile took on a glaze of ice before the Iloheen deigned to speak.

  Discipline has been meted and met. It goes no further.

  Edonai, the Anjo Valee dominant answered, her thought warm against the Shadow’s chill. On the dais, the dramliza bowed low. Those who yet knelt before their lab dishes threw themselves upon their faces on the ice-slicked floor.

  She—she bowed until her head touched her knees, and held it, as the Shadow fell full upon her—

  And was gone.

  Abruptly, the room warmed. Behind her, she heard small noises as her cohort straightened and stilled. She unbent slowly, and looked up to the dais. The dominant did not meet her eyes.

  You will return the specimen to its original state, the tutor ordered the class entire. When that is done, you will wait upon the philosophy tutor.

  III

  THE DOWNLOAD WAS about to take place.

  She, with those of her cohort who had survived the Second Doom, watched from a distance, thought stilled and vital energies shielded, to insure that the tumzaliat would not perceive, and thus seek to attach, their essences.

  In the birthing room, the vessel was readied. Its arms were spread, held thus by chains woven of alternating links of metal and force, the ends melded with the smooth tile floor. Similar chains around each ankle pulled the legs wide. Its head was gripped in a metal claw; a metal staple over its waist held it firm and flat.