Kirlian Quest (29 page)

Maybe the answer was in the two Ancient cubes, now destroyed or deeply buried by the Amoeba. Or those lost cubes might be merely unimportant leftovers, forgotten because of their uselessness: "This cube of Galacto lava-cleanser is the finest product this side of Betelgeuse!" Now he would never know.

Still, he had important news for the surviving members of the Jet archaeological expedition. If this two-culture pattern, this conquest-and-depart pattern, were typical of all the Cluster, it would offer a real insight into the nature and motive of the Ancients. Had they merely destroyed all potential rivals, leaving the more primitive worlds alone? Then why had they disappeared so abruptly, after their victory? Now the answer might be forthcoming.

He retreated to the access-passage and moved toward the surface. There had been no more laser strikes; the Amoeba must have vacated, satisfied the job was done.

He popped out into the cooling pit. There was the globe-ship, hovering in place.

Herald reversed and dived for the tunnel again, trying to get out of range. But this time the laser caught him.

 

 

 

Chapter 8:

God of Tarot

 

 

2
Site destroyed.
2

E
Report: partially activated ancient site destroyed. Aural activity cessation in that locale.
E

&
Detail?
&

X
Confusion. Research unit E reported site destroyed by action unit 2 as directed.
X

&
Precisely. The directive was to nullify, not to destroy site. Require a mechanism detail report from action unit 2.
&

0
Respond, 2.
0

2
Aural activation occurred under surface of planet, inaccessible to ship. Therefore lasers were fired.
2

&
Lasers! An overt attack?
&

0
As executed at the prior activated site within the Quotes segment. Standard operating procedure when target is not immediately accessible.
0

&
You
lasered
both the Quote sites?
&

0
Yes. The first strike triggered the ancient site potential, causing a fission detonation. The second strike merely eliminated the aural unit.
0

&
So now the natives have seen our strength and are fully advised of our purpose! They know we have come to wipe them out. They will oppose us with organized desperation. Our program was predicated upon the assumption that the natives had no direct, specific knowledge of our intent, and would therefore procrastinate via committee until too late.
&

X
They do not seem to have become aware of the specific nature of the threat, and their prior council meeting showed much confusion and disorganization. There has been no change in that situation.
X

&
Perhaps it is not too late. Our mission will be accomplished far more efficiently if they are caught largely unawares. Desist all overt attacks until prime-strike time. Withdraw unit 2 instantly. Henceforth, the term "nullify" shall be taken to mean to render inoperative in subtle nondestructive fashion.
&

X
But the unit should remain to verify complete destruction of the aural generator.
X

&
In this instance the general preempts the specific. All evidence of our presence in local systems must cease. No further overt action shall be taken without my specific authorization.
&

X0
Understood.
0X

 

* * *

 

Herald woke into chaos. /I thought I was dead!/ he flashed, not wholly pleased at being alive. Then he paused, noting the disorganization of environment about him. /Or am I dead?/

He received no answer. Colors swirled about him, showing no ceiling and no support. Yet he felt support, for his body had weight /I am a fool!/ he flashed, realizing where he was.

He
was
a fool—the Fool of Tarot. He was back in his natural host-body of Slash, rolling along, his lens-perceptors aimed at matters of Cluster consequence while immediately ahead was a dropoff into disk-gumming mud. The Tarot Fool was noble, idealistic, well-intentioned, and handsome, the epitome of the finest expectations of civilization.

And of folly, he remembered, as he tumbled over the bank and fell into the muck. In versions of the picture relating to clothed species, an animal was ripping out an embarrassing section of the clothing of the Fool; other versions showed similar indignities. His disks spun frantically, but had no purchase here. The gunk rose over his body, putrid, cloying, revolting, blotting out his senses, suffocating him in its insubstantiality. Blackness—the penalty of foolishness, of idle dreams, of aspirations without foundation.

He screamed: disorganized flashes, a waste of energy. His soft-edged disks twisted. He was a newformed infant Slash, helpless.

Then a creature of competence focused a beam of attention on him. It was huge, with disks of gloriously shining metal, strong tentacles, and tremendously competent laser lenses. /The offspring wakes,/ the Sire flashed.

Immediately, the Mother rolled over to his pit /Come Shortbeam, feed,/ she flashed, all-compassionate.

Herald was overwhelmed by feeling. Oh, how he remembered her, the consolation of his infancy!

Now his imagination expanded to embrace the Slash society of Andromeda. Its civilization forged ahead dynamically on the lasers of its myriad sapients and the labors of its subservient species, conquered one by one as the Sphere of Slash expanded. Power, represented in the Tarot as a card of Galactic empire.

Herald blinked his lasers. He didn't need a review of history! He needed to find out why he was here, and where he was going. /I need a guide!/ he flashed.

"I will be your guide," an alien creature said. It was a male, bipedal, using sound instead of light. All right; Herald was unbigoted about such things. He was garbed in manufactured materials so that most of his torso was concealed. Some creatures were sensitive about exposure of their intake, elimination, or reproductive apparatus. Hence the significance of the animal ripping the cover from such a section in the Fool picture. As though any creature could be rendered less by mere exposure of his functional nature. Behind this entity was a large mechanical structure with huge rotating vanes, possibly a torture device.

/What mode of creature are you?/ Herald demanded, alarmed.

"No creature am I, though once a creature I was, if I may borrow from the literature of my ancestry," the thing said. "I lived on Planet Earth circa two thousand, the time of the Fool years. See, here is the windmill we use for pumping our water."

Suddenly Herald recognized him. /Sibling Paul of Tarot!/ he flashed. /The Patriarch of the Temple!/

"No, I am merely Brother Paul, a humble human creature," the Solarian said. "No patriarch, no temple; the Holy Order of Vision is not of that type. But I will help you all I can, since you seem to be in need, and have called, and this is my purpose in life—and, it seems, in death. Of what region and time are you, that you thus invoke me?"

Herald remembered that the legendary Founder had not had opportunity to witness his impact on the following millennia.

/To you, your repute may seem minor,/ he flashed. /But to me, a Slash of Andromeda twenty-five hundred years after your time, there is no greater name than Sib—than Brother Paul. You are the creator of the Cluster Tarot, one of the great forces in the shaping of the contemporary scene./

"Perhaps you should be
my
guide, not I yours," the Solarian said with a baring of his humanoid teeth that Herald recognized as a smile.

Abashed, Herald retreated. /No offense intended, great Brother! I have no fraction of your insight./

The Patriarch came near, momentarily touching one of Herald's disks. "You have some aura, though!" he murmured as an aside. Then, more formally: "There was no offense, creature of the future. Come, let us explore together: Where are we and what is our purpose?"

/We are obviously in a Tarot Temple, and this is an animation sequence,/ Herald flashed. /I have suffered loss and shock, and I am here to be healed. It is a standard therapy for those of high aura./

"I see. For a moment I feared
I
was the one in shock! I gather you came near to death recently?"

/I was caught by a laser strike from an enemy spaceship. I must have been dug out of the rubble and Transferred to my own body, but suffered such shock that I was referred to a Segment hospital for reconstitution of my mind./

"Uh, yes. Your body was Transferred to a more competent facility for therapy, but your mind recoils from the experience. I believe I understand, now. And so you have conjured me from your past to aid your reorientation."

Brother Paul had some of the details confused, but of course he dated from the time before Transfer had come to his world, and before the formation of Segments. It was unimportant.

/I seem to have done so, great as my presumption is,/ Herald admitted. /It was done from the sincere beam of admiration for you and your works. I perfected my art of healing under Temple guidance, though I am not myself a Tarotist. I owe you much./

"I suffer from some confusion," Brother Paul said, his form shimmering momentarily as if about to fade out. Herald hastily concentrated, and the Solarian became firm again, though the wind machine behind him disappeared. "Thank you," he murmured. "That was a difficult moment. I am accustomed to a more substantial incarnation. Now, please, tell me about you."

/About me?/ Herald flashed. /I am of no consequence. I am not sure I even want to survive./

"That is for us to decide, isn't it? They didn't take all the trouble to put you in an animation chamber without sufficient reason. If you don't work with me to clarify that reason, you are wasting both our time. Not to mention that of the—you call it the Temple?"

/I apologize. What do you wish to know, Sibling Patriarch?/

"Just call me Brother, if you don't mind. You were doing very well on that a moment ago."

/Brother!/ Herald flashed.

"Let's start with this: Why did you conjure a human being, instead of a creature of your own type?"

/I loved a female of your species,/ Herald admitted.

"Ah, I see. So did I, so did I. And I love her yet. There is nothing quite like a sweet, pretty girl, is there!"

Herald was surprised and gratified to discover this region of rapport. He had not thought of Brother Paul as an entity of creature concerns, but of course he had not known the man in life. /Nothing in the Cluster!/ he agreed. /I was in Solarian host, and she—/

"Let's start just a little further back," Brother Paul suggested diplomatically. "This matter of... Solarian hosts?"

/After your time,/ Herald said. /Very well. Today we shift from body to body, since our identities are incarnate in our auras. So I am able to take the form of a Solarian, or any other creature of the Cluster. When in such form, I naturally react in much the manner of the host./

"Ah, yes. So as a human being, you could take an interest in a human girl. No doubt if I were to occupy a Slash body, I would find Slash females interesting, too. Yet this presupposes that no lasting emotion exists...."

/On the contrary. Love is absolute. I suffered shock in Jet host after loss of my Solarian bride./

"I am glad to hear that. Not that you suffered loss, but that there is that amount of continuity regardless of your shifts of form. That suggests that your therapy here will affect all your future hosts."

/Yes. I was running through the Cluster Tarot trumps in order, in the standard reorientation program for those in distress, and—/

"
Cluster
Tarot? I am familiar with a number of versions of the Tarot deck, but not this one. Does it most nearly relate to the Waite, or Thoth, or Light, or—"

/I know nothing of these names. It is the one you created on Planet Tarot,/ Herald explained. /Don't you remember?/

"Oh, I worked out a hundred-card deck for my own analysis, based on my experience there. But that was never published; it was merely an exercise." He paused, glancing with almost beamlike intensity at Herald. "You actually mean
that
deck?"

/Thirty trumps, five suits? That is the Cluster Tarot. Of course it was embellished after your time, and the suits have changed names, and many sub-versions are now extant. In fact I believe every Sphere has its own variation. Most of the popular illustrations for the concepts are much more recent; it is a dynamic, changing thing. But the essence is yours—the basic framework, the interpretations, the life-history aspect and so on. I don't believe any cards have been added since. Except perhaps the Ghost. There has been learned debate whether you actually included that./

"I did have a Ghost Triumph," Brother Paul said. "It stood for the Unknown, the wonder of it, the fear, the hope, the utter change in circumstance fostered by some seemingly random Act of God."

/The God of Tarot. Yes, many creatures worship Him. He—/

"Who is of course the God of all creatures, by whatever name," Brother Paul interposed.

/Yes, all gods are valid. That is fundamental to the Cult of Tarotism. They—/

"That is not precisely what I meant." Brother Paul spread his brown hands in a purely Solarian gesture. "But we drift. I gather you had a Magician father and Priestess mother of your species who raised you from the initial state of helpless innocence that is the Tarot key Zero or Fool, and that your society and government may be likened to the keys Empress and Emperor. Now I have become your Hierophant or Teacher. But I cannot help you until I know you. What is your key Six?"

/We don't use keys any more. Each culture arranges the symbols to suit its convenience, and there is no set order for the representations of the deck. Some species interpret them in terms of paired genders, but this has to change for the species who are unigendered or multigendered. There are similar differences on a number of the basic concepts. If you refer to the one dealing with love, do you mean the romance aspect or the choice aspect? I believe they were once unified./