He had the answer to that: he could tell his lie. Not just a Monster-distracting lie, for that was no longer sufficient. A Monster-killing lie. Poetic justice: Monsters destroyed by a Monster who was the tool of Monsters. Because of who he was and what he was, he just might be able to pull it off.
Now he had purpose. He accelerated, going toward the planet. He needed to locate Tangt, to get his revised lie perfected.
He came to a thickly populated line. "I seek Tangt," he flashed in general. "Can anyone direct me?"
No one here knew Tangt. It took only an instant to verify this; Band communications were very efficient when properly used. He flew to another well-traveled line and flashed again, again without success. He wished there were a better way to locate an individual, but knew there was not. That the society of Bands was anarchistic was part of its beauty—but at the moment it was frustrating.
He kept trying, surveying many hundreds of Bands randomly. And finally, from a purple individual, he got an answer: "I encountered an orange Band of that name yesterday in the green plains region of the planet."
"Thank you!" Rondl flashed. He zoomed toward the indicated region. To Monsters, a planetary surface was eighty per cent of awareness; to Bands only thirty per cent. A given Band could be anywhere in space near a moon or near a planet. What mattered was not matter, but the routing and strength of the magnetic lines. Yet a planet did offer a highly varied terrain, providing interest and diversion, and that was an attractive aspect. Many Band pleasure spots were on planetary surfaces. As was the case with other sapients, the Bands appreciated novelty.
Oh, Cirl—you were of this planet!
By his nature he had slain her, forced her to self-destruction. But no: he could not afford to think about her. Not yet.
When the mountains flattened into a plain and local vegetation turned it green, Rondl began inquiring again. This time the responses were thicker. Soon he zeroed in on Tangt, who was hovering in the vicinity of an outcropping of gray rock. "Tangt!" he flashed. "This is Rondl!"
"Please depart," she flashed. "I am distracted."
"I cannot. I need you to help save the Bands."
"I cannot be concerned with that now."
What was the matter with her? "You must help," he insisted. "Otherwise the whole Band society will be lost, including your own Band husband!"
"My husband is dead," she said.
"Dead?" He had not anticipated this.
"When I told him of my nature, thinking that if your wife could sustain it, perhaps after all so could he—he... he disbanded. Right here. I thought I loved him."
"My wife also disbanded," Rondl said, surprised at this parallel. "When she learned more of my nature. I know I loved her."
"He just wouldn't believe that disbanding is the end!" she flashed. "He told me I could join him—"
"For what it's worth, Cirl consulted with an educated Band who felt it should be possible for Monsters in Band guise to join the Viscous Circle, if they believe in it—or perhaps even if they don't, so long as they really want to find it."
"That is not worth much!" she flashed, then returned to her grief. "Such a good person, but he clung to his superstition. 'If you are more Band than Monster, follow me,' he told me, and just like that he disbanded. And I can't follow."
"They just don't believe in death, or in war, or in deceit," Rondl agreed. "It's a species-wide foible. Maybe that's what it takes to be truly pacifist—turn the other cheek, or whatever—because even if the enemy kills you, he hasn't really hurt you. We humans fight to the end because we don't believe in life after death, not really, no matter what beliefs we claim to hold or what our assorted religions specify. Our absolute horror of death gives it all the lie. All we have is this one life, so we refuse to give it up easily, even when the continuation is painful. We'll cheat, lie—" He broke off his flash. He was setting up to lie to her now—again—and didn't want to give himself away. No honor among Monsters!
"They don't believe in death," she agreed. "Or in any other evil. They really don't believe. So why am I here, marking the gravesite of a mate who left no body? There is no grave! If I am right, he is beyond help or grief; if he is right, he is either laughing tolerantly at me or feeling sorry for my ignorance."
"Exactly," Rondl agreed, feeling his own suppressed grief lighten somewhat. "The Bands die happy. To them it's like cutting losses by resigning early from a game. They don't understand grief. Only Monsters experience that."
"Only Monsters deserve to!" She lifted away from the stone. "Yes, it is fitting that we suffer. Why did you seek me?"
"My effort failed. All my army disbanded except one who escaped by coincidence. I sent her away rather than risk her following the same course."
"Then it must be my way. We must tell the Monsters where the Site is."
Now the lie. Rondl hated this, but steeled himself; it was the only way. He had already paid the penalty for his lie; now he had to squeeze it for maximum advantage. He was fortunate, ironically, that Tangt's grief for her disbanded husband had prevented her from checking on the location of the Ancient Site. "Yes. At Moon Dinge."
"So you said. But we need to pinpoint it better than that, since they missed it before."
"They had reason to miss it. Actually it's near Dinge, not right on it." The lie loomed larger; could he get away with it?
"How can a Site be near a moon?" she demanded. "You mean it's a satellite? They should have spotted that."
"There's a planetoid in the same orbit. You know how populous this System is with debris, with rings and bands of material everywhere. This is just one of those anonymous chunks of rock, similar to the ones we use for Stations in System Sirius, not really near Dinge spatially, but it seems so because of the orbit. Similar designation—fourth orbit out from Planet Band. Not big enough to be considered either moon or subsatellite, but big enough for a Site. Really hidden out there, among thousands of similar chunks. But it's easy to travel back and forth, moon to Site, when the location is known." He was making so much sense he was almost believing it himself.
"An Ancient Site—on a planetoid in moon orbit?" she demanded, seeming to balk at the concept. "The Ancients usually built on solid land."
"So the Monsters assumed, and missed the Site. What do we know about the Ancients? Most of what we see are their three-million-year surviving cellarholes. No wonder the Monster sweep overlooked this one, and perhaps countless others elsewhere in the Galaxy. No one thought to check planetoids."
"Small wonder!" But she seemed to be accepting the idea. After all, the Monsters had missed the Site, so an explanation was needed. "Well, there'll be no trouble locating it now. Do you think it's a live Site?"
"A fair chance. You never can tell about the Ancients."
"That's certain!" She whirled about, riding a line upward. "We must not tell the Bands about this," she flashed back.
"Agreed." Actually, the Bands would not care about the Site itself; in fact they would gladly give it up to make peace. He knew; he had surveyed them. He had been the one to doubt the efficacy of that strategy, fearing the continuing greed and ignorance of the Monsters. But if the Bands knew the truth now, they could flash to Tangt the correct information about the Ancient Site, and that would destroy Rondl's lie. So Tangt's own furtive nature was her undoing; she was protecting the lie that deceived her.
"You're the only one who understands," she flashed.
"It takes a Monster to understand a Monster." Again he felt attracted to her. It was not love of the sort he had held for Cirl; that was dammed back for the moment, so that he could do what he had to do. With Tangt the attraction was plain understanding.
"This is crazy," she said in a flash tinted with romantic invitation. "But shall we—?"
And he thought, why not? This was not Sphere Sol, and their Band mates existed no more.
Yet Rondl had a misgiving. First, his loss of Cirl did not automatically free him to love another; he still loved Cirl. She, at least, had b
een true to her belief, her pattern of life. Certainly he had a kind of camaraderie with Tangt. But it was an affinity of the Monster aspects of their nature, rather than of the sublime. Oh, they both wanted to save the Bands; that was a sublime motive. But that did not mean they needed to make love to one another. Tangt was no better than he was, except that she was not duping him into participation in a lie.
That made him pause. She was his kind, capable of violence and cheating and all the other crimes of Monsterdom. How could he be sure she wasn't duping him?
Yet in what way could she do it? They had agreed to give the Ancient Site to Sphere Sol; that was his lie. They had each lost their Band mates, and she now turned to him for comfort and understanding; where was the problem there?
The question showed the answer. Female Monsters did not operate that way. They were seldom genuinely giving; they sold their sex for some sort of advantage, small or great. His Monster wife Helen always did. She talked of love, but what she wanted was a suitable environment for her offspring. It was a commendable objective—but she had given him short conjugal shrift for years until recently deciding it was all right. And had it never occurred to her that he also might want a suitable environment for his offspring? That he might care for his child as much as she, and not require any bribery to do what was right? Women who sold their bodies openly were termed harlots; those who sold them covertly were considered decent. Both wronged their men and themselves by their contempt for the male mystique. Monsters, all!
So what was Tangt buying? Surely not his green color or forthright personality! Not even his camaraderie; she had not missed him until he located her, just now. So this interest was an on-the-spot thing, as it had been before. Now why should she have no interest in him when they were apart, and want to make love when they were together?
Because, perhaps, she had her own report to make, not necessarily the one they had agreed on. His absence could have meant he was dead, therefore no worry. His presence meant he had survived; therefore she needed to take action. So she was doing so. But what did she really intend?
"You seem pensive," Tangt flashed. "Don't you like me?"
She was definitely up to something! How should he handle this? Was there a way to kill a Band in the guise of making love, perhaps by means of some horrible thought that would force reflexive disbanding, and was that what she planned to do? Or was she trying merely to compromise him, using the act as a lever against him to endorse her story to the Monsters? She might fear he would change his mind later and try to prevent her from reporting on the location of the Ancient Site; he would be less likely to change if he had a more personal commitment to her. Thus she could be using sex purely as a standard precaution, a device to help ensure his loyalty.
Yet if he turned her down, she would know he suspected her motive.
Best to stall, until he had a better notion what she intended. "I find you most attractive, Tangt. But I loved my wife, Cirl."
"Before she died. Of course. And I loved Fomt. Yet now, with each gone—"
What recently widowed female who had loved her husband would within hours be soliciting sex from another male? That decided him. "I cannot at the moment love another Band. The memory is too fresh." And that was no lie.
"Well, we shall soon be recalled to our natural hosts."
To make their reports. But that would happen regardless. How could romance—or sex—affect it? This really bothered him; he did not want to fall into the twin traps of taking Tangt at face value or affronting her and making an enemy unnecessarily. To be a Monster was to have Monster problems! To struggle with lie against possible lie, never being truly sure of oneself or of one's companions. How much better the Band way was! "Maybe we should talk again. As Monsters. Privately."
"Privately," she agreed, after a pause during which, no doubt, she considered the ramifications of this counteroffer. She knew she was unusually attractive in Monster host, so a male might very well prefer to have her that way. "Before making our reports?"
"That could be awkward, since the computer will get at us first. Perhaps before making the reports final."
"Before finalizing them," she agreed. She was surely suspicious now—yet so was he. What kind of a game were they playing with each other? Who was author of the most fundamental lie?
They located a line loop, a place where they could safely leave their Band hosts. A host could survive for a time without an aura, if kept in an environment reasonably secure from dangers. Since Bands did not need anything more than a line for sustenance, there would be no problem about nourishment.
They set themselves up in miniature orbit about a rocky outcropping, and chatted innocently while waiting for the Transfer recall of their auras. "I'm glad these are not the bad old days when a Transferee had to reach an alien Transfer unit in order to return to his natural host," she flashed.
"That was why the early agents, like Flint of Outworld, had to have auras in the range of 200," Rondl agreed. "Not only did they suffer a much more rapid attrition of aura in Transfer, they had to supervise the construction of a Transfer unit to send them back. It took real courage to travel to a foreign host then! But this new system remains uncertain. Some of the losses in this mission may have been mis-Transfers."
"Yes," she agreed. "The old—"
Chapter 18
Triangle
He found himself back in Monster host. It was a shock, no easier to accept the second time. This body revolted him!
Revolted him? It was his own, natural host! He was a man, not a Band! How could he be revolted by his own body?
Because, he realized, he now identified utterly with the Band host. He had been corrupted by the Band form and the Band culture. It seemed the more time he spent in Band host, the stronger the effect was.
Was it something physical? It couldn't be, because all that traveled was his aura. So it had to be something mental or emotional.
That was it. He had seen Heaven. In comparison the human state was Hell, his own trafficking in it hellish. He wished he could simply cut away and slough off the Monster attributes of his personality. He was telling the big lie to save the Bands, a thing they could and would not do to save themselves. It might be the only way, but it was also his shame. How could one of Satan's minions join the company of Heaven, however much he might want to?
I will never see the Viscous Circle, he thought, and grief welled up in him. So corrupt was he, he couldn't even believe it existed.
When the computer interviewed him, he gave the lie. Using mental and emotional devices he was trained for, he almost convinced himself it was the truth, so that the computer could not detect the falsity of it. Computers thought they were infallible; it was a machine illusion. They were fashioned by Monsters, with Monster flaws, and in any event the human will remained more complex than the machine programming. Any Monster with his experience and motive could deceive the essentially naïve computer.
Yet not entirely. "There is an element missing here," the machine said.
Rondl suppressed a reaction of fear, knowing that could give him away faster than any words might. He converted it to righteous ire at the challenge. "You can verify my report against that of the other Transfer agent," he pointed out, contemplating his bone-filled extremities with his paired liquid-inflated eye orbs. There was so much to dislike about this body!
"Hers also has a missing element."
This was falling into place almost too neatly. "Perhaps the two of us should consult again."
"That seems inadvisable at this stage."
Did the authorities suspect? He would have to let it go, at least for now. "As you wish. It's your show now." But he hoped to be back in Band host before the occupation of the supposed Site proceeded. Monster hell would become indeed hellish once his lie became known. Court-martial would be just the beginning. And he had business in the Band region. Without his further input, the Bands would still be wiped out.
They let him go home. He might be under sus
picion, but he had delivered the goods, and they had no tangible evidence against him. They could not interfere without obvious cause; other agents would grow wary if normal practice started getting set aside. Some oddities were to be expected in returning agents, after all.
He wended his way along the free-fall passage, no longer thrilled by the weightlessness. The foreboding was growing: he had betrayed his kind, and lost his Band wife too. The Solarian authorities surely ought to know, unless they were totally out of touch. His future was fast becoming a dead end. Betrayal of one's species was a baleful matter, for internal as well as legal reasons.
Helen was waiting for him. She was garbed in a most fetching cling cloth outfit, her hair puffed out artfully by static electricity, her eyes brightened by luminescent eyedrops. Disgusting artifices.
She realized at once that they were not working. "Your Ringer femme is that important now?"
She knew such terminology grated against his sensitivities; why did she employ it? "My Band wife is dead. I am careening toward a blank wall."
Helen was not stupid. "Then I'd better take you out for a spin in space. Few walls there."
What was she up to? Ronald had no stomach for connivings. In fact, he wished he had no literal stomach, for that was an especially disgusting aspect of Monsterdom. "I think our plans need revision."
"Oh come on! A spin will do you good. Get that post-Transfer depression out of your system." She bullied him out of the yard and along the road to a nether exit. They stepped on the platform, and it slid down and along under their weight, carrying them to the very rim of the barrel that was the residential section. Here the private spacecraft were suspended like lifeboats—which is what they would be if the Station ever suffered serious breakdown. Every resident family was required to maintain its craft in spaceworthy condition, and to use it often enough to keep personal piloting skills sharp. It was also military policy to keep a certain percentage of the ships in space at all times, so that in the event of attack, some of the Solarians here would survive. This percentage varied according to the high command's estimate of the interstellar situation; usually it was low enough so that voluntary excursions filled it. At present it was elevated, because of the System Band "action." Officially there was no war, but the Station was on a war alert. Ronald, as a participant on leave, was not required to put his craft into space, but could if he chose to. That would relieve one conscript of the obligation.
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