Jack Chalker: Midnight at the Well of Souls

Again she looked uncertain. “What about us?” she asked. “Won’t we get wet?”

“There’s shelter along the way,” he said casually. “Besides, a little water won’t hurt.”

She let him lead her down the deserted street of the town and out into the countryside. The storm continued to be visual and audible, but not as yet wet. The landscape seemed eerie, illuminated in the flashes.

The temperature had dropped from about fifteen degrees Celsius to around eight degrees due to the storm. She shivered.

He looked at her, concerned, feeling the tremors in her hand.

“Want my shirt?” he asked.

“But then you’ll be cold,” she protested.

“I like cold weather,” he responded, taking off his shirt. His broad, muscled, hairy chest reactivated those funny feelings in her again. Carefully he draped the shirt around her. It fit her like a circus tent, but it felt warm and good.

She didn’t know what to say, and something, some impulse, caused her to lean into him and put her arm around his bare chest. He responded by putting his arm around her, and they resumed walking.

Somehow it felt good, calming, and her anxieties seemed to flee. She looked up at him. “What’s your name?” she asked in a tone of voice she didn’t quite comprehend, but was connected, somehow, in its throaty softness to those strange feelings.

“W—” he started to say, then said, instead, “Kally Tonge. I have a farm not much farther down the road.”

She noticed the bandage on the side of his head. “You’re injured.”

“It’s nothing—now,” he replied, and chuckled. “As a matter of fact, you’re just what the doctor ordered—literally. He said somebody should be with me through the night.”

“Does it hurt much?” she asked.

“Not now,” he replied. “Medicine’s pretty advanced here, although as you know the place is rather primitive overall.”

“I really don’t know much about this world,” she replied truthfully. “I’m not from here.”

“I could have guessed that,” he said lightly. “Where do you come from?”

“I don’t think you’ve ever heard of it,” she replied. “From nowhere now, really.”

“What’s your name?” he asked.

She started to say “Nova,” the name the man had called her, but instead she said, “Vardia.”

He stopped and looked at her strangely. “That’s a Com name, isn’t it?” he asked. “You’re not from any Comworld!”

“Sort of,” she replied enigmatically, “but I’ve changed a lot.”

“On the Well World?” he asked sharply.

She gasped, a small sound of surprise escaping her lips. “You—you’re one of the people from the Well!” she exclaimed. “You woke up in that body, as I did! That head wound killed Kally Tonge and you took over, as I did!”

“Twice when I needed someone you comforted me, even defended me,” he said.

“Wuju!” she exclaimed, and an amazed smile spread over her face. She looked him over critically. “My, how you’ve changed!”

“No more than you,” he replied, shaking his head wonderingly. “ Wow!”

“But—but, why a man?” she asked.

His face grew serious. “I’ll tell you sometime. But, good old Nathan! He sure came through!”

The storm broke, then, and the rain started coming down heavily.

They were both soaked through in seconds, and her fancy hairdo collapsed. He laughed, and she laughed, and he picked her up and started running in the mud. Just ahead he saw his shack, outlined in the lightning flashes, but he misjudged the turn to his walk with his burden. They both tumbled into the road, splashing around and covered with thick black mud.

“You all right?” he shouted over the torrent.

“I’m drowning in mud!” she called back, and they both got up, laughing at each other.

“The barn’s closer!” he shouted. “See it over there? Run for it!”

He started off, and she followed, the rain getting heavier and heavier. He reached the door way ahead of her, and slid it aside on its rollers. She reached it, and they both fell in. The place had an eerie, hollow sound, the rain beating on the sheet-metal roof and wood sides of the barn. It was dark, and smelled like the barn it was. A few cows mooed nervously in their stalls.

“Wooj?” she called.

“Here,” he said, near her, and she turned.

“Might as well sit it out here,” he told her. “There’s a pile of hay over there, and it’s a thousand meters to the shack. Might as well not go through the deluge twice.”

“Okay,” she replied, exhausted, and plopped into the hay. The rain continued to beat a percussion symphony on the barn.

He plopped beside her. She was fussing with her lace pants.

“The mud’s all caked in them, and the sequins are scratching me,” she said. “Might as well get them off, for all the good they’ll do as clothing anyway, even if they are all I’ve got in the world.”

She did, and they lay for a while side by side. He put his arm around her and fondled her breast.

“That feels good,” she whispered. “Is—is that what I’ve been feeling? I thought it was still the pills. Is this what you felt with Brazil?”

“I’ll be damned!” he said to himself. “I always wondered what an erection felt like to a man!” He turned and looked at her. “I’ll show you what it’s really like, if you want,” he said softly.

“I—I think that’s what he wanted,” she replied.

“Is it what you want?” he asked seriously.

“I think I do,” she whispered, and realized that it was what she wanted. “But I don’t even know how.”

“Leave that to an expert,” he replied. “Although I’m not used to this end of things.” He put both arms around her, kissed her and fondled her.

And he kicked off his pants, and showed her the other side of being a woman, while discovering himself what it was to be a man.

The rain was over. It had been over for a couple of hours, but they just lay there, content in the nearness of each other.

The door was still half-open, and Vardia, still dazed and dreamy from her first sexual experience, saw the clouds roll back and the stars appear. “We’ll get you some clothes in the morning,” he said at last. “Then we’ll tour the farm. This rain should do everything good. I was born on a farm, you know, but not my own farm.”

“People—non-Com people—they do that every day?” she asked.

He chuckled. “Twice if they’re horny enough. Except for a couple of days each month.”

“You—you’ve done it both ways,” she said. “Is it different?”

“The feeling’s definitely different, but it’s the same charge,” he replied. “An important part, male or female, is that you do it when you want with someone you want.”

“Is that love?” she asked. “Is that what Brazil was talking about?”

“Not the sex,” he replied. “That’s just a—a component, as he would say. Without the object—without love, without feeling for the other person, without caring, it’s not pleasant at all.”

“That’s why you’re a man now,” she said. “All the other times—they were the wrong kind, weren’t they?”

“Yes,” he replied distantly, and looked out at the stars. She clenched his hand tightly in hers.

“Do you think he was really God?” Vardia asked quietly.

“I don’t know,” he replied with a sigh. “What if he wasn’t? When he was in the Well he had the power. He gave me my farm, a good, healthy young body, a new chance. And,” he added softly, “he sent you.”

She nodded. “I’ve never lived like this,” she said. “Is it all as wonderful as tonight?”