Brian Aldiss - Non-Stop

Though the disadvantages of having Gregg’s band in Forwards were obvious, the Council was keen to welcome them in; it would mean an end to most of the skirmishing on Forwards’ perimeter and the acquiring of an experienced ally to fight against the Outsiders.

An orderly returned Complain’s dazer and torch to him. He was in his room strapping them on when Vyann entered, closing the door behind her. On her face was a comically defiant expression.

‘I’m coming with you,’ she said, without preamble.

Complain crossed to her, protesting. She was not used to the ponics, danger might lurk there, Gregg might well play them false, she was a woman — She cut him short.

‘It’s no good arguing,’ she said. ‘This is Council’s orders.’

‘You got round them! You arranged it!’ he said. He could see he guessed rightly, and was suddenly deliriously glad. Seizing her wrist, he asked, ‘What made you wish to come?’

The answer was not as flattering as he might have wished. Vyann had always wanted to hunt in the ponics, she said; this was the next best thing. And suddenly Complain was reminded — without pleasure — of Gwenny and her passion for the hunt.

‘You’ll have to behave yourself,’ he said severely, wishing her reason for joining him could have been more personal.

Marapper appeared before they left, seeking a word alone with Complain. He had found a mission in life: the people of Forwards needed to be reconverted to the Teaching; since the more lenient rule of the Council began, the Teaching had lost its grip. Zac Deight in particular was against it — hence Marapper’s argument with him.

‘I don’t like that man,’ the priest grumbled. ‘There’s something horribly sincere about him.’

‘Don’t stir up trouble here, please,’ Complain begged, ‘just when these people have got round to accepting us. For hem sake relax, Marapper. Stop being yourself!’

Marapper shook his head so sadly his cheeks wobbled.

‘You also are falling among the unbelievers, Roy,’ he said. ‘I must stir up trouble: turmoil in the id — it must out! There lies our salvation, and of course if the people rally round me at the same time, so much the better. Ah, my friend, we have come so far together, only to find a girl to corrupt you.’

‘If you mean Vyann, Priest,’ Complain said, ‘have a care to leave her out of this. I’ve warned you before, she’s nothing to do with you.’

His voice was challenging, but Marapper was as bland as butter in return.

‘Don’t think I object to her, Roy. Though as a priest I cannot condone, as a man, believe me, I envy.’

He looked forlorn as Complain and Vyann made for the barriers, where Hawl awaited them. His old boisterousness had been muted by Forwards, where everyone was a stranger to him; undoubtedly, for Marapper, to be a big fish in a small pool was better than being a small fish in a big pool. Where Complain had found himself, the priest was beginning to lose himself.

Hawl, his incredibly tiny head cocked, looked only too glad to get back into the ponics; the reception Forwards had given him had not been notably cordial. Once the little party of three were seen through the barricades, he loped ahead professionally, Vyann behind him, Complain bringing up the rear. No longer a mere freak, Hawl moved with an ability the hunter in Complain could only admire; the fellow hardly seemed to stir a leaf. Complain wondered what could have alarmed a man of his stamp so much that he was willing to forsake his natural element for the unfamiliar disciplines of Forwards.

Having only two decks to cover, they were not long in the ponics. This, in Vyann’s view at least, was all to the good; the tangles, she found, were not romantic; merely drab, irritating and full of tiny black midges. She stopped gratefully when Hawl did, and peered ahead through the thinning stalks.

‘I recognize this stretch!’ Complain exclaimed. ‘It’s near where Marapper and I were captured.’

A black and ruinous length of corridor lay ahead, the walls pock-marked and scarred, the roof ripped wide with the force of some bygone explosion. It was here the explorers from Quarters had run into the eerie weightlessness. Hawl shone a light ahead and let out a fluttering whistle. Almost at once, a rope floated out of the hole in the roof.

‘If you go and grab hold of that, they’ll pull you up,’ Hawl said. ‘Just walk slowly to it and catch hold. It’s simple enough.’

It could, despite this reassurance, have been simpler. Vyann gave a gasp of alarm as the lightness seized her, but Complain, more prepared, took her waist and steadied her. Without too much loss of dignity, they got to the rope and were at once hauled up. They were hauled through the roof, and through the roof of the level above that — the damage had been extensive. Hawl, scorning the aid of ropes, dived up head first and landed nonchalantly before they did.

Four ragged men greeted them, crouched over a desultory game of Travel-Up. Vyann and Complain stood in a shattered room, still almost weightless. A miscellany of furniture was ranged round the hole from which they emerged, obviously acting as a shelter for anyone needing to guard the hole in the event of an attack. Complain expected to be relieved of his dazer, but instead Hawl, having exchanged a few words with his tattered friends, led them out to another corridor. Here their weight immediately returned.

The corridor was filled with wounded men and women lying on piles of dead ponics, most of them with face or legs bandaged; they were presumably the victims of the recent battle. Hawl hurried past them clucking sympathetically and pushed into another apartment filled with stores and men, most of them patched, bandaged or torn. Among them was Gregg Complain.

It was unmistakably Gregg. The old look of dissatisfaction, manifesting itself round the eyes and the thin lips, was not altered by his heavy beard, or by an angry scar on his temple. He stood up as Complain and Vyann approached.

‘This is the Captain,’ Hawl announced. ‘I brought your brother and his fine lady to parley with you, Captain.’

Gregg moved over to them, eyes searching them as if his life depended on it. He had lost the old Quarters’ habit of not looking anyone in the eye. As he scanned them, his expression never changed. They might have been blocks of wood; he might have been a block of wood; the blood relationship meant nothing to him.

‘You’ve come officially from Forwards?’ he finally asked his younger brother.

‘Yes,’ Complain said.

‘You didn’t take long to get yourself into their favours, did you?’

‘What do you know of that?’ Complain challenged. The surly independence of his brother had, from all appearances, grown stronger since his violent withdrawal from Quarters long ago.

‘I know a lot of what goes on in Deadways,’ Gregg said. ‘I’m captain of Deadways, if nowhere else. I knew you were heading for Forwards. How I knew, never mind — let’s get down to business. What did you bring a woman with you for? To wipe your nose?’

‘As you said, let’s get down to business,’ Complain said sharply.

‘I suppose she’s come to keep an eye on you to see you behave yourself,’ Gregg muttered. ‘That seems a likely Forwards arrangement. You’d better follow me; there’s too much moaning going on in here… Hawl, you come too. Davies, you’re in charge here now — keep ’em quiet if you can.’

Following Gregg’s burly back, Complain and Vyann were led into a room of indescribable chaos. All over its scanty furnishings, bloody rags and clothes had been tossed; red-soaked bandages lay over the floor like so many broken jam rolls. A remnant of manners still lurked in Gregg, for seeing the look of distaste on Vyann’s face, he apologized for the muddle.