Bob Shaw - The Fugitive Worlds

Suicide, Baten Steenameert? The non-voice held something of the detached pity of a naturalist watching a delicate fly drift closer to a spider’s web. Surely not!

Steenameert glanced at Toller, his eyes unfathomable in the narrow space between scarf and cowl, and lowered the pistol. Toller nodded to him in evident approval of his prudence and—with a deliberate abandonment of conscious intention—drew his sword and in a single swift movement drove the point of it into the crystal wall. He had clamped his left forearm around the handrail, turning his body into a closed system of forces, and the tip of the steel blade buried itself in the shining cells with a power which sent vitreous fragments spinning outwards from the point of impact.

The crystal sphere screamed.

The scream was noiseless, but had no other resemblance to the type of precisely shaped and controlled mental communication employed by the alien. Toller knew, without understanding how, that it was emanating from the walls of the sphere and also from the frozen lake beyond—a multiplied shriek of agony in which chance harmonics and discordant echoes clashed again and again until they hid away and a strange, whimpering non-voice made itself heard…

I have been hurt, Beloved Creator! You did not tell me that the Primitives would be able to damage my body.

Toller, obeying warrior’s instinct, did not allow the unexpected voice to inhibit him or blunt his attack. He had hurt an enemy and that was the signal to press forward with renewed vigor, to go for a kill. His sword seemed to be meeting a peculiar resistance, as though passing through a layer of invisible sponge, but his repeated thrusts were retaining enough force to damage and dislodge glassy cells. In only a few seconds he had shattered an adjacent pair and created a small hole in the sphere.

Changing the style of attack, he used the haft of his sword to strike the damaged area, and in spite of the unseen resistance he succeeded in dislodging the two cells entirely, sending them tumbling away into the outer void. Feverishly inspired, he transferred the sword to his other hand and punched the same area of wall with his gauntleted fist. This time there was no magical barrier to soften the blow and several more of the hexagonal cells, their structural unity weakened, went spinning out of sight, greatly enlarging the hole in the sphere.

The silent, inhuman screaming began again.

Steenameert followed Toller’s example and—bracing himself against the handrail—began raining blows on the irregular edge of the hole, adding to the destructive effect.

In the roaring furnace of Toller’s mind virtually no time passed until the way ahead of him had been cleared and he was outside the sphere and, in weightless flight, closing on a silver-suited figure which was turning to flee. His left arm clamped around the alien’s neck in the instant of collision, and he whipped the sword—which seemed to have returned to his right hand of its own accord—into position for a thrust into the alien’s side.

How did you achieve this? The alien’s words were tinged with revulsion because of the physical contact, but Toller was unable to feel any fear.

You had fully coordinated control of all your muscles, the voice went on, but there was no coherent mental activity that I could detect. It was impossible for me to anticipate your actions. How was it done?

“Be silent,” Toller snarled, hooking a leg around the handrail to prevent himself and his captive drifting free of the metal surface of the station. “Where are the women?”

All you need to know, the alien said imperturbably, b that they are in a place of safety. Again, and to Toller’s bafflement, the mental contact revealed no shadings of alarm.

“Listen to me!” Toller gripped the alien by the shoulder and thrust him to arm’s length, a movement which brought them face to face for the first time. In one searching, wondering, dismayed moment Toller took in every detail of a face which was surprisingly human in the disposition of its features. The principal differences were that the skin was grey; the eyes, lacking pupils, were white orbs drilled with black holes; and the small upturned nose had no central division. Toller could see far back into the nasal cavity, where red-veined orange membranes fluttered back and forth or clung together in tune with the alien’s breathing.

“You haven’t been listening.” Toller, repressing an urge to push himself away from the hideous caricature of a human being, leaned harder on his sword and forced it deep into the reflective material of the other’s suit. “You will tell me what I need to know— immediately —or I will kill you.”

The alien’s charcoal lips slackened into what could have been a smile. At this range? So close? While we are in actual physical contact? No member of a humanoid species could possibly…

Toller’s head filled with crimson thunder. His mind blurred, became a montage of smeared visions of Vantara and death-hued alien predators; and the rage, a special rage—beguiling and repugnant, shameful and joyous—took hold of his being. He pulled the alien towards him, at the same time going in hard with the sword, and it was only a startled cry from Steenameert which returned him to sanity.

You hurt me! The alien’s silent words were shaded with astonishment and the beginnings of fearful comprehension. You could have done it! You were prepared to kill me!

“That’s what I have been telling you, greyface,” Toller ground out.

My name is Divivvidiv.

“You resemble a corpse to begin with, greyface,” Toller went on, “and it would occasion me not the slightest qualm of conscience were I forced to reconcile appearance with reality. I repeat, if you do not tell me—”

He broke off, disconcerted, as the alien’s face rippled with muscular convulsions, and the frail shoulder gripped in his left hand began to vibrate in tune with internal tremors. The black-rimmed mouth underwent asymmetrical changes, flowing in one direction and then another like a sea anemone pulled by conflicting currents, sending threads of discharged saliva snaking weightlessly through the air. Blurred mental echoes picked up by Toller told him that his captive had never been directly threatened with death before. At first it had been impossible for Divivvidiv even to believe that his life was in danger, and now he was undergoing an extremely violent emotional reaction.

Toiler, receiving his first insight into a culture totally dissimilar to his own, responded by renewing the pressure of his sword point. “The women, greyface … the women! Where are they?”

They have been transported to my home world. Divivvidiv was regaining some physical control, but his words reeked with fear, revulsion and barely contained hysteria. They are in a secure place — millions of miles from here — in the capital city of the most advanced civilization in this galaxy. I can assure you that it is far beyond the abilities of a Primitive like you to alter those circumstances in any way, therefore the logical thing for you to do is—

“Your logic is not my logic,” Toller cut in, hardening his voice in the hope of concealing the dismay which was washing through him. “If the women are not brought back unharmed, I will send you to another world—one from which no man has ever returned. I trust my meaning is clear…”

The room was large and almost bare, its principal item of furniture being a blue oblong which looked like a bed except that it lacked restraint nets. Ranged around the walls were rectangular and circular panels which continuously changed color, slowly in some cases, rapidly in others. The floor was of a grey-green seamless material closely perforated with small holes. Toller noticed that his feet tended to stick to the floor, obviating the need for zero-gravity lines, and he guessed the holes formed part of a vacuum system.