FANTASTIC PLANET v2.0

by Stephan Wul

  He paused for a while and raised an arm before continuing:

  ‘Yet the last fiximages are worrying. What are these three massive shapes cleared of parasitic halos by our technicians? Some mentioned spacecrafts! This would be alarming and show astounding technical capabilities. But in this case our concerns should be mitigated by a secret hope, since manufacturing such machines demonstrates in the Oms a desire for escape and exile! It would then be political to try to contact them and assist them in their plans: we would be rid of them… Unfortunately, or fortunately, I don’t think that is the case. It is too early. The Oms are not yet capable of such a feat. I am inclined to favour another hypothesis, substantiated by the opinion of learned scholars and, without even calling on experts, by simple common sense.’

  He wiped his eardrums and pointed at the map of A South hanging behind the delegates from that continent.

  ‘The Oms have picked a port!’ he proclaimed. ‘The nearest port to the Wild Continent. And the three enigmatic objects are ships! Their profile, the shape of the stem, the gangway cover, it’s all there. It is obvious, even to a poorly trained eye!’

  He looked slowly at the four Councillors in turn, and added:

  ‘We must hurry, First Councillors, the Oms are fast. If you don’t act in time, the Wild Continent will soon only be accessible at great cost! If you strike a big blow, even supposing my ideas are nothing more than an old man’s delusions, you will only have fought against a shadow, which will cost you nothing and leave your conscience clear… I have spoken.’

  He saluted by stretching his membranes, said “Happiness onto you” and left the chamber.

  As soon as he had left, the A South First Councillor raised his hand. Three heads nodded to let him speak. He suppressed a smile and said:

  ‘First Councillors, Master Singh is a Traag of considerable merit, a scholar. Though his profession leads him a little too far in his prophecies…’

  A wave of amusement rippled through the assembly.

  ‘…I saw fit to take his warnings into account. The Oms are unquestionably evolving, progressing, and having founded a city could in time constitute a danger… I have thus taken the measures you know; the old port is encircled by a telebarrier. I am counting on your agreement to activate it.’

  ‘Good. From tomorrow the Oms will not be able to leave their city!’

  ‘They’ll still have the sea’, someone joked.

  Everyone smiled.

  ‘To please Master Singh’, carried on the A South First Councillor, i am proposing to send to the port a squad of soldiers. Should the Oms resist, their order will be to sweep everything with hard rays. We could then visit the dead city in order, as Master Singh says, to clear our conscience.’

  Everyone clapped, laughing. The speaker waved to say he had something to add.

  ‘However, let us heed some of his warnings. I personally ordered a bimonthly deomisation on my continent as well as the sterilisation of the more intelligent Oms. I recommend you to adopt similar measures on your respective territories.’

  The First Councillor for B North spoke:

  ‘I support them’, he simply said.

  The other two First Councillors repeated in chorus:

  ‘I support them!’

  They in turn pressed a switch which automatically affixed their seal to the decree registered on the floor below by the debates’ telerecorder.

  The First Councillor for B South raised his hand:

  ‘I propose to adjourn the session for half an hour. When we resume, we will hear the interesting report drafted by my continent’s engineers on the productivity of the food industry.’

  No one objected. The Council only had to deal with minor issues. For such a long time everything

  worked to perfection on Ygam and the administrative machine was functioning so smoothly there was practically nothing to do but let it be.

  Everyone went to frolic for a while in the palace’s pool, happy to have attended a session which changed from the usual monotony.

  ***

  A few days later three army spheres dropped twenty armed Traags near the old port. Safe in their body armour, the soldiers moved through the ruins without coming across any resistance. They knocked down a few walls, searched the sewers, fiximaged some of the stranger installations and set their minds at rest by beaming hard rays throughout the city.

  They had not come across a single Om.

  ***

  When the images taken by the small expedition got to Klud’s First Councillor he chuckled happily and asked for Master Singh on the intercontinental telebox.

  ‘Do you know’, he said to him, ‘what your three ships built by the Oms were?… Three crude representations of fish… Sorry? But yes, Master Singh,

  the fiximages are before my eyes. Three iron sheets cut in the shape of fish; they even carved eyes and scales!… What?… No, you thought these Oms were great sailors, when they were only small fishermen. That is why they settled on the seaside. As for the metal fish, it’s probably some unrefined cult… yes… That’s as far as they’ve gone! I would even go as far as saying that’s as far as they’ve been! Rest assured, there is not a single one left. To tell you the truth the soldiers didn’t come across any, but they sprayed the whole place with hard rays. The Oms must have dug themselves in their deepest underground passages. They will never surface again. As we’re talking their burnt corpses are probably unrecognisable.’

  The First Councillor thought he was reassuring the scholar with the news. But his hopes were thwarted; his red eyes became veiled with vexation and he could feel his eardrums vibrating almost painfully to Master Singh’s bitter recriminations and the vehemence of his words.

  He found it hard to even get a word in: ‘But., but I… yes, of course, I am telling you all got burnt! Listen…’

  In the end he remembered he was First Councillor and he had enough of his interlocutor’s manners. He decided to speak as a First Councillor:

  ‘Enough, Master Singh! If you carry on with this tone of voice, through me you are insulting the Great Council. This would not show much gratitude to a government which has set out to enlarge the museum!’

  The veiled threat seemed to inflame things and

  the First Councillor had to raise his voice further.

  ‘No, no, no! Absolutely not, Master Singh! I do not want to… let me speak, if you don’t mind, I am your First Councillor! And despite our difference in age, I expect to be respected. You forget one thing, Singh: Without me and my A North colleague the other two Councillors would not even have accepted to discuss the issue! You… What? It is possible, but do bear in mind that when the story of the metal fish reaches official circles the laughter will sweep aside all superfluous measures against the Oms. The Council has granted you two deomisations a month and the port’s destruction. Do not ask for anymore eccentricities. I regret using this tone of voice with you, but you pushed me into it. Happiness onto you.’

  The Councillor hung up curtly and puffed with anger. Master Singh was not being reasonable. Admittedly the wandering Oms issue came about and had its moment of topicality. That was fine. But the measures Singh demanded were verging on senile dementia. How about a general mobilization?

  Besides… The Councillor had in his house two Oms, two magnificent creatures full of affection for their master. He just could not imagine that his familiar beasts’ fellow creatures could present such a grave danger for the Traags.

  2

  The Traags had taken action very swiftly, considering the delays caused by their administrative procedures.

  Only two weeks had passed between the time they had fiximaged the port’s ruins and the city’s annihilation.

  However these two weeks were equivalent to almost two earth years for the Oms, and they had got through a considerable amount of work in that time. As well as crossing the ocean, they had dug beneath the lake’s shore and built a hidden port for one of the ships and completely dismantled the othe
r ship to build with the scraps three hundred heavy vehicles suited for driving in the bush.

  Once built, these vehicles were sent to go on reconnaissance in the High Plateaus, the chosen place for their permanent base. The result being that a shuttle of armoured tanks was constantly moving between the landing camp and the high ground, hoisting little by little all the equipment, workers and engineers needed to build a city.

  Terr himself did the journey several times to oversee the building works.

  Finally, tens of thousands of Oms were slowly climbing in long lines through the jungles, flanked by the tanks’ protection.

  Although vaccinated against all possible tropical

  diseases, young mothers and their children practically did not touch the ground before reaching their goal. Terr had confined them to the undamaged ship. They stayed in the tanks for the duration of the trip. That way, accidents were avoided, as the forests were full of wild beasts as well as placid animals only dangerous because of their gigantic size.

  At last, around the time the Traag First Councillor was admonishing Master Singh, the final emigrating cohort was getting ready to depart.

  Terr had made a point of joining them. Apart from two or three inspection trips, he had stayed on the shores of the lake as long as possible to reassure the remaining Oms with his presence. The others did not need him as much. They were living in a healthier and less debilitating climate. But those momentarily forgotten by fate showed signs of nervousness. They needed the Aedile’s prestige and authority.

  One day, a hundred tanks from the new city emerged from the jungle and headed for the camp which was securely entrenched between three enormous rocks. They had been expected for a long time. They were bringing the relief guard for the ship.

  When they entered the camp’s central square in a cloud of dust, a delirious mob came out of the wooden barracks to gather around them. Their arrival meant an impending and tremendous move. The final one.

  The crowd marvelled at the fresh complexion of the two hundred lads who jumped from the vehicles roaring with laughter. They willingly answered all the questions about the High Plateaus and let female Oms kiss them.

  Soon the Aedile arrived. He climbed on a tank’s turret and spread his arms to ask for some silence. He then spoke into a telebox, his voice filling the square: ‘Oms’, he said, ‘I’ve been told the city is ready!’ Cheers came from all sides and Terr had to raise his arms once again to be heard. He carried on, often interrupted by his audience’s enthusiasm:

  ‘This means we can leave… Wasn’t I right to promise you that the Exodus would be a success? At last we’re going to live as a master race!… As for you, the ship’s guards, you’ve lived in the hills for months. Your turn has come to relieve those who’ve been languishing by the lake for so long. I know many of you wonder why we keep this ship, and why we didn’t dismantle it like the other, which would probably have speeded up everything and freed more equipment. I would answer that a little common sense is enough to justify our decisions. We don’t know what the future has in store for us. A ship could still be useful to us. In any case, guards, you know you will be relieved frequently. Now, all of you get ready. Since the evacuation plan has long been finalized we can leave in two hours! Off we go to the new city!’

  Fifteen thousand adult Oms exploded in a formidable cry of hope. In the ship’s nursery two thousand wailing babies were unaware of the future their elders were preparing for them.

  The crowd dispersed in all directions towards the barracks as the tanks were manoeuvring in the dust, some to park, others to turn towards the exit and get into position for the departure.

  Two hours later, the vanguard took to the road, soon followed by groups of two hundred porters each coming before a tank packed with female Oms breastfeeding their babies.

  Although used frequently, the road was barely opened up. Conquered from the jungle, nature recovered it after each passage and it was obstructed by young trees, bushes and gigantic branches. The tanks crushed everything and jolted painfully on the remains of fallen trees.

  From the first stadia one had to squelch through mud. The reddish magma was seeping like a sponge. The tree tops joined high above the track like pillars in a gothic structure. They formed a greenish vault through which shone a strong shadowy light cut in places by oblique sunrays, like a cruelly indulgent lamp lighting up a pond crawling with larvae, or the monstrous skeleton of a bossk leaning against a stump, its sniggering head fallen by its side on a mattress of rotten leaves. Further away a carnivorous plant was voluptuously shaking its tentacles, like a depraved oriental dancer twisting her limbs under the spotlights of a theatre…

  Sinister stories were shared, such as what happened to the first scouts when they set off looking for the way to the Plateaus. Often, exhausted by the climate, their eyes blurred with sweat and their heads buzzing with hallucinations, they had got lost in the jungle. There, deprived of female Oms for such a long time, they really thought they could see a lascivious dancer behind a bush. Forward they went, their hands stretched out towards the plant adorned with all possible seductions, succumbing to a delicious and fatal embrace, emptied of their blood by the plants’ suckers, their faces gnawed by the corollas’ acidic kisses.

  Reassured by their number, the migrants laughed loudly shaking their heads and turning their eyes away surreptitiously to look elsewhere and quickly changing the subject.

  Every two stadia twenty porters climbed on the back of a tank to rest their legs. They actually swapped one exhaustion for another: so as not to slide off because of the vehicle’s jolts they had to cling in unimaginable positions and it was almost a relief when two stadia further they left their place for others.

  After a few gibes and winks were flashed at the female Oms inside the tank and smiles for the children, they jumped on the ground and once again loaded their burden on their shoulders.

  At the fiftieth stadia came the first staging post. There, settled in the gaping mouth of a cave toothed with stalactites, one thousand Oms greeted another fifteen thousand.

  Each washed in the water of a torrent foaming at the bottom of the cave. Doctors dressed wounds, delivered babies and examined the children one by one. Supplies were handed out and everyone fell asleep.

  The Oms nodded off in a deep slumber, lulled by hope. Nine stages to go and they will see the new city!

  The Aedile wanted to lead by example. He had walked like the others and carried his load, two heavy vials of vaccine padded in a package of leaves.

  3

  Lying on a heap of dry grass he was sleeping like a log when the roar of engines bounced off the cave’s walls, echoing thunderously.

  Headlights pierced the darkness; feverish voices could be heard and Terr found himself standing eyes half shut, before realising an Om had woken him up by tapping him on the shoulder.

  ‘What… what?’ he said in a muffled voice.

  ‘Aedile, this is a patrol!’

  Terr rubbed his eyes.

  ‘A… yes, so what?’

  He realised another Om was there too.

  ‘Patrol 4 leader!’ the Om cried out. ‘We’re escorting two hundred Oms to relieve staging post 1. An hour ago we came across a bossk. I had all the engines stop so as not to irritate it, yet it still attacked us.’

  ‘We shot and injured it but it still managed to squash two tanks and burn three quarters of the Oms. We went full speed ahead and we’ve come to warn you. It’s tracking us and seems to know where it’s heading. If we don’t stop it it’ll be here in fifteen minutes. I’m requesting the support of twenty tanks to go and face it.’

  ‘Take fifty tanks if you wish.’

  ‘It wouldn’t be much use. The road is narrow and we’d only get tangled up.’

  ‘All right, take your twenty tanks. I’ll follow you with the others and we’ll outflank it.’

  Terr turned to the Om who had woken him.

  ‘Find me an Om who knows the area well.’

&n
bsp; ‘Well… me, if you want.’

  Babies were bawling all over the place. Terr made for the cave’s luminous entrance opening onto the jungle.

  ‘With such a racket’, he said, ‘the bossk can’t miss

  it.’

  He went out and cast a quick glance at injured Oms lying down and groaning as their burns were being dressed.

  He jumped on a tank with his guide and a group of ten soldiers. The engines purred. Other tanks had gone ahead and could be seen skidding in the mud half a stadia away, like big clumsy stubborn insects.

  Terr leant over the on-board telebox.

  ‘Patrol 4 leader! We’re trying to keep a gap of half a stadia between you and us. Let us know when you catch sight of the bossk!’

  A few minutes later the patrol leader’s voice announced:

  ‘There it is. It’ seen us. It stopped a hundred milistadia from us. We too have stopped. We’re staring at each other straight in the eye. It’s roaring.’

  A powerful growl filled the jungle.

  ‘We can hear it from here’, said Terr. ‘Keep your distance, a hundred milistadia away so it can’t burn you.’

  He leant towards his guide:

  ‘We’re going to outflank it. Left or right?’

  The guided hesitated:

  ‘… Left! There are marshes further away to the right and we’d get stuck.’

  As the tanks veered off in a sea of foliage, Terr spoke again into the telebox:

  ‘We’d better agree so as to avoid an accident. We’re outflanking it to the left, adjust your shooting accordingly! Where is it injured?’

  ‘In its chest and face; the angle was poor and we couldn’t shoot anywhere else.’

  ‘Yes, you can’t get it like that… aim for the legs. It’s more…’

  it’s coming forward!’ yelled the patrol leader.

  ‘Don’t let it get nearer than 40 millistadia! Aim your shooting just below the kneecaps. Try to maim it rather then kill it, it’s easier!… We’re on our way.’