Clarion: The Sequel to Voyage (Paul's Travels)

by C. Paul Lockman

  Gary laughed. “And so you should, Kiri. For what is this place – this planet – if not a place to enjoy what nature and its guardians have brought into being?”

  “You seem to know a lot about where we are,” Haley observed.

  “I do,” he assured her. “For instance, I know with precise certainty that we’ll be seeing a friend of mine soon. Right over there.” Gary was pointing out over the ocean, into the sky. “He’ll be leaving, but not exactly as he came.”

  “You’re not making sense,” Kiri muttered.

  “Perhaps, then, I should begin to do so, for it is important. I have the great honor of sharing with you a mutual acquaintance.”

  “Paul?” Haley blurted.

  “Ah, the informality of true friendship,” Gary commented wistfully. “He is known by so many more official titles, in so many places, that sometimes one forgets what his own mother chose to call him.” He smiled and said, “Yes, Paul. He is my friend. A fellow traveler.”

  Kiri shook her head as if to clear it. “But did you say…he’s leaving?”

  “He is headed,” Gary explained, “to a very dangerous place. In pursuit of someone who seeks destruction”

  “He told us something about that,” Haley admitted. “But he didn’t say it would be dangerous.”

  “Who can say?” the man said with a shrug. “But once Paul departs, you should prepare to receive a number of visitors.”

  Haley was agog. “Visitors? I thought we were just here for a few days, then moving on somewhere.”

  Kiri asked concerned, “Who are these visitors?”

  Gary stood and brushed himself down. “Friends. They will help you to decide how to spend your time on this wonderful island. I assure you, there are yet more rewarding activities than the ones you have already found.”

  Haley blushed and said, “You were watching us?”

  “No, no,” he assured her. “I am no voyeur. But I know love when I see it,” he added, smiling charmingly once more. “Let me give you one last piece of advice. Listen carefully when the visitors arrive. You will learn more from them than from anyone in your lives. Be open with them. Be honest. If they ask about the past, report it truthfully, no matter how much it hurts.”

  “The past?” Kiri asked, already afraid.

  “They can help you. They will,” Gary confirmed. “Simply listen to them.” He glanced longingly out to sea once more. “Here is where I leave you,” he said simply, and set off towards the water.

  “Wait!” Haley cried as Gary waded, waist-deep, into the sea, and just kept going. “You’ll drown!”

  “Tell us more!” Kiri insisted. “Come back!” But ‘Gary’ ignored them, walking steadily deeper, his feet remaining on the sea floor even as his head disappeared beneath, and soon, as the girls watched in amazed fascination, he was gone.

  ***

  Dinner was a selection of hand-picked forest greens, baked in individual dishes topped with chopped nuts and spices. More of the heady, blue liquor was poured. Above, the glowing creatures which hung peaceably among the ceiling beams rotated their color scheme in a slow, luminous ballet, seemingly for their own amusement. “We hope the fruits of our humble efforts are enjoyable?” Serpyter asked.

  His dish emptied, Paul set it aside and took a sip of blue liquor. “It must be an award-winning understatement,” he commented, “to describe the planetary ecology you have created as a ‘humble effort’”.

  Gojn chuckled at this, not for the first time during this dinner. “Can we truly say that this was an act of creation?” he asked. “Could it not equally be described as a discovery?”

  Paul tossed the idea around in his mind. “A discovery reveals that which is already there,” he said. “Before you, there was nothing here. Not even the land and the ocean.”

  “’And God saw everything that he had made, and, behold, it was very good’,” recited Serpyter, calling up an ancient memory. Paul gasped slightly at the oh-so-familiar scripture, here in this most unfamiliar of places. “A wonderful creation myth. Really.”

  “Would it be a waste of time for me to ask how you know the Old Testament?”

  “I find it to be an unreasonable dependence on our suspension of disbelief to claim that a mere week’s work gave rise to all of reality,” Gojn said wryly. “But it’s a comfort to those who know not, and as good a place to start as any.”

  “The truth is the only place to start,” Serpyter retorted. “Anywhere else is a terrible place, surely?”

  They debated back and forth, in old patterns, almost as if for Paul’s bemused entertainment. “How is a caveman society – no disrespect to your illustrious forebears, Paul – supposed to conceive of their land as curved, when they’d never been more than a few tens of meters above it?”

  “What else could be possible?!” Gojn exclaimed. “A giant, long slab of land, rotating in space? Preposterous!”

  “But how could they have known? These gaps in their basic understanding explain religious experimentation, just as they go some way to explaining the mysticism, the uncertainty, the speculation which so marred humankind’s progress.”

  “Dribble,” was Gojn’s good-natured, if terse reply.

  “You must forgive our beloved Gojn,” entreated Serpyter. “He has little patience for those species which were possessed of the intelligence to perceive the truth of their existences but failed to apply it.”

  “Sounds like humanity, to a T.” Paul had defended his species in numerous discussions, and always found it harder than he liked. Such illogic is wholly inexplicable, he remembered Hal saying, especially when it is done willfully. We can forgive errors made in good faith; we cannot condone errors made despite a full knowledge of the facts.

  “Imagine the world they could have created, these loin-clothed proto-heroes, if only they had set aside prejudice and violence. Picture it, Paul... a united, space-faring civilization, striving together toward enlightenment.”

  “But,” Paul told them, suddenly emboldened, “it was violence which made possible the dominance of one group over others. That, in turn, permitted the amassing of resources in centralized political systems, giving rise to urbanism and the concentration of writing, teaching, research and experiment which marked the greatest periods of mankind’s achievements.”

  “Bovine dribble,” muttered Gojn.

  “Oh really?” Paul asked, eyebrow raised. “How do you see it?”

  “Let’s go back together and ask a few people, shall we?” He gestured rhetorically. “Let’s ask the man, condemned by ill luck to live in fourteenth-century France, who is strapped to the rack for wondering aloud whether Jesus genuinely managed to return from the dead. Let’s ask him, ‘dear putrid, suffering sir... tell us... does it salve your wounds to know that, through the concepts responsible for your suffering, millions will one day be able to pipe brainless entertainment directly into their living rooms?”

  “Oh, for the love...” Serpyter had clearly heard these arguments – and, indisputably, this style of discussion – on countless occasions.

  “Or shall we ask the man himself? Do you really believe Jesus thought he was paying – with his life, no less – for us all to have such leisure time that we could grow morbidly obese, ignore our friends and neighbors, and sit there eating cubes of animal fat? Would he have borne his cross with such dignity, then, or thrown it aside in disgust?”

  “He died to ensure free will,” Paul retorted, “if you’re among the believers.”

  Gojn was truly getting into the debate, and as the rotund man stood, Paul was becoming worried he had rapped on a hornet’s nest which might add an unwelcome sting to their evening. “Did he now? I’d prefer to think of it like this: he died to protect the human desire to exist exactly as it wants to.”

  “That sounds a lot like free will to me,” Paul said, standing to face him. “Freedom to be, and do, as we wish.”

  “But what have you done with it?!” Gojn cried. “Has there been an unequivocal release of
the fullest human potential? Absolutely not. Has there,” he checked each point off on his fingers, “been a striving towards a balanced ecology, a genuine stewardship of your planet? Laughably not.”

  Paul stood. “I disagree, and if you’ve seen the last thirty years of Earth’s history, you’d know full well that you’re being disingenuous.”

  Gojn stood likewise. “Am I indeed?”

  “Not to mention, very rude.”

  Serpyter stood and waved them both back to their seats, like a referee sending two strutting boxers to their corners. “Gentlemen, let us all keep our tempers. Gojn, you know perfectly well how much progress the Earth had made up to 2033. Paul was decisive in altering his society’s direction. You’ve seen this, as I have.”

  Gojn sat, but was steaming, not quite angry but intellectually irked. “Mere window dressing,” he hissed. “The fundamental flaws of human nature are allowed to persist. Why?”

  Paul considered this. Allowed to persist; what could he mean? “I’m afraid I have not been in a position to dictatorially insist on changes to the basis of the human condition.”

  “Another sleight of hand,” Gojn suggested pointedly. “You were able to put in place global vaccination programs against a host of diseases, but not against that most destructive of all human ailments.”

  “Which is?” Paul asked, barely controlling his rising temper.

  “Greed! What else could it be? It has controlled the minds and actions of humanity since the very beginning.”

  “All beings must fend for themselves, to ensure their own continuance,” warned Serpyter, keen to mollify his incensed colleague.

  Gojn shook his head emphatically. “If it were a matter simply of survival, such greed could be understood. But humans continue to be greedy long past the point of satisfying their basic needs. They form reward circuits, habituations which demand a constant drip-feed of chemicals to sate illogical and destructive desires.”

  “You mean, they have fun?” Paul raised an eyebrow and asked.

  Gojn took two deep breaths and leaned forward, gathering his patience and genuinely keen to educate this young visitor. “Tell me, Paul, of the most advanced and peaceable society you have ever experienced.”

  “That would be Takanli,” he replied without hesitation.

  “Quite so. A model for us all. A compassionate, altruistic society crammed with creativity and bound by a unity enviable in any group of its size. Wouldn’t you say?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “Would you say that we need more like them? That others of the galaxy’s societies should follow their lead?” Gojn wanted to know, quite aware of the dance on which he was now leading their guest.

  There was silence. “If it’s so perfect a form of collective governance, why did they travel 140 light years to go and find me?”

  Serpyter held up an abrupt hand to silence Gojn before his answer could emerge. “There are many mysteries,” he said blandly.

  Gojn stared agape at his friend. “Should not this one be revealed to him who has been so mightily affected by it?”

  Paul felt his mental ground shift under him. “I know already that Garlidan had a major role in bringing me to Takanli.”

  “He did, he did,” Serpyter confirmed. “It was a bold caprice, quite without the proper authorization.”

  “Quite the scandal,” agreed Gojn. “The theft of your Cruiser left a particularly bad smell.”

  “Theft?” This was the first Paul had heard of Garlidan’s larceny. “I had thought it a gift?”

  Serpyter lead them both onto the walkways which connected the giant trees, their massive trunks thrusting past this level and up into a canopy shrouded in evening clouds. “You’ll find,” he said, “that Garlidan is not only brilliant and highly imaginative, but also given to certain acts of... shall we say, bold caprice?”

  Paul smiled slightly. “That sounds just like him, yes.”

  “He has been a thorn in the side of the Takanli Council for years. Embarrassing them on the galactic stage was not even his most irritating act, but it has caused sufficient scandal for them to issue a warrant.” Gojn exchanged a glance with Serpyter, who looked away with a guilty expression.

  It only took moments. “He was here?” Paul was desperate for information, more now than at any point on this journey. “Why? When?”

  Gojn leaned, relaxed, against a huge trunk and lit a thin, leaf-green cigar. “Visiting old friends,” he said between puffs, “and generally being a great big nuisance.”

  Serpyter smiled at the memory. “He was here to see our work, and to let us know to expect you. When he left, he said he was going to visit another friend. In a very remote system.”

  “Will you be seeing him again?” Paul grappled with what he now knew. The old goat had become more complex in his mischief.

  “We already have,” Gojn said, and walked alone down the walkway, puffing enjoyably on his cigar, until he was out of sight amid the leaves and the evening gloom.

  Paul watched him leave and then turned to pose another question to Serpyter, but the old man had simply vanished. He stood alone in the forest, listening to the alien sounds of its unique species. Behind him, the dark-skinned servant re-appeared and guided him to his sleeping quarters, on a higher level and partly within the trunk of a giant, ancient tree.

  “Good night, Sir. I’ll wake you when you’re needed tomorrow.”

  Paul lay down and tried to sleep, but hours later, still awake, he watched the forest slowly coming to life to greet a new day, his mind a cloud of confusion.

  ***

  He must have been napping, he realized, when the servant appeared and offered him something. Without really thinking, he reached for it and Relocated, with the usual suddenness, to the beach. Even after dozens of these trans-location events, Paul was still not used to the associated disorientation; as he had tried to describe it a hundred times, he was just there, in a new place, without the sense of having traveled at all. The cool sea breeze and the peaceful beauty of the place soon brought his focus to the present.

  Serpyter and Gojn were emerging from the shallows. They were naked except for a thin, pale, aqua-dynamic shroud and each carried a slender object which, to Paul, was unmistakably a surfboard. This place really is a trip. They were both smiling as they approached him, clearly enervated by their oceanic morning workout. Digging their boards firmly into the sand, the two paused for a second to allow their filament shrouds to quickly break up, atomize right there in a moment, and vanish.

  “’To be in the sea, and of the sea, and yet as dry as a mountain pass’,” observed Gojn. “Was this not a poet from your planet?”

  Paul shrugged slightly and tried to ignore the all-too-present nakedness of his companions. “Not one that I have read.”

  “But you must know this,” said Serpyter. “‘If the highest response to the universe is an ecstatic melding with it, then surfing is the best way to spend your time.’”

  “A genius, one must agree. A man who understood our relationship with the ocean,” commented Gojn.

  “Sounds like a Californian,” Paul muttered. “How’s the water?”

  Mercifully, the servant quietly arrived to help the two men dress. Their alabaster skin seemed grossly out of place on this sun-drenched shore. “It was perfect,” Serpyter replied, smiling as he turned back to the terrific view for a moment. “How could it be otherwise?”

  Paul marveled once more at this engineered planet, its continents and currents so deftly designed, its natural systems so beautifully integrated. It seemed quite ridiculous that two men had simply sat down together and designed all of this. And at once, he knew how easily the head-shaking mysteries of nature so quickly engendered thoughts of the spiritual. What was there, of this incredible place, that could not answer the description of ‘divine’?

  They would eat on the beach, it transpired. Their servant, who had still neither spoken a word nor received an audible instruction, brought large, wooden trays of
ceramic dishes covered with light-blue lids. “A rare treat,” beamed Serpyter. “Fresh from the ocean, just minutes ago. You’ll perhaps be new to this?”

  The lids were opened to reveal a slender, coiled, worm-like creature. It’s carapace was divided into a dozen sections, giving it the appearance of an armored sea cucumber. All were still alive, Paul found to his consternation. Serpyter admired his specimen for a while before saying to Gojn, “Would you mind?”

  The still-naked Gojn stood and emitted a strange and lengthy ululation. Longer notes received extreme vibrato, his throat literally shaking with the effort. As he sang in his strained, reedy voice, the creatures began to pull themselves upright, gradually straightening like an unfurling stem. As the song reached its end, they held their incongruous position and began, steadily, to change color. Their original light blue – the color of the ocean, near enough – was transforming into a redder, deeper hue, until the flesh was a deep pink. Once the color permeated the whole animal, their carapace seemed to dislodge itself from the soft body it protected and, scale by scale, fell away.

  “Self-preparing saltwater abalone,” Serpyter announced proudly. “Have you ever seen its like before?”

  Gojn did not wait for an answer, grasping a pink fish-stick from its bowl and dipping it into the prepared sauce. He then munched on the perfectly-cooked creature with obvious delight. Paul was less self-assured, but copied his lead. “The tail is the best part,” Gojn assured him.

  Once they had eaten, the mute but highly efficient servant brought their opaque marquee to protect them from a rising, searing sun. “I thought we’d take some time to talk before you leave,” Serpyter told him.

  “I’m to leave today?” Paul asked, surprised. He worried that he’d insulted them the night before. Or, perhaps, they had simply grown tired of one so simplistic.

  “I’m afraid so. This will, in the end, be your own choice.” Confusion became obvious in Paul’s facial expression.

  “We are also expecting another guest,” said Gojn. “You’ll both enjoy this meeting, I’m sure.”