George Effinger - A Fire in the Sun

Courane set fresh drinks down for all of us. Shaknahyi dragged a wicker chair near enough to watch the computer-modelled images of the illusions Chiri and I would create. I fed five kiam into the Transpex machine. “You can go first, if you want,” I said.

“Yeah,” said Chiri. “It’s gonna be fun, making you sweat.” She took one of the Transpex’s moddy links and socketed it on her corymbic plug, then touched Player One on the console. I took the second link, murmured “Bismillah,” and chipped in Player Two.

At first there was only a kind of warm, flickering fog, veined with iridescence like shimmery mother of pearl. Audran was lost in a cloud, but he didn’t feel anxious about it. It was absolutely silent and still, not even a whisper of breeze. He was aware of a mild scent surrounding him, the fragrance of fresh sea air. Then things began to change.

Now he was floating in the cloud, no longer sitting or standing, but somehow drifting through space easily and peacefully. Audran still wasn’t concerned; it was a perfectly comfortable sensation. Only gradually did the fog begin to dissipate. With a shock Audran realized that he wasn’t floating, but swimming in a warm, sun-dappled sea.

Below him waved long tendrils of algae that clung to hillocks of brightly colored coral. Anemones of many hues and many shapes reached their grasping tentacles toward him, but he cut smartly through the water well out of their reach.

Audran’s eyesight was poor, but his other senses let him know what was happening around him. The smell of the salt air had been replaced by many subtle aromas that he couldn’t name but were all achingly familiar. Sounds came to him, sibilant, rushing noises that echoed in hollow tones.

He was a fish. He felt free and strong, and he was hungry. Audran dived down close to the rolling sea bottom, near the stinging anemones where tiny fishes schooled for protection. He flashed among them, gobbling down mouthfuls of the scarlet and yellow creatures. His hunger was appeased, at least for now. The scent of others of his species wafted by him on the current, and he turned toward its source.

He swam for a long while until he realized that he’d lost the trace. Audran couldn’t tell how much time had passed. It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered here in the sparkling, sunny seas. He browsed over a gorgeous reef, worrying the delicate feather dusters, sending the scarlet-banded shrimps and the porcelain crabs scuttling.

Above him, the ocean darkened. A shadow passed over him, and Audran felt a ripple of alarm. He could not look up, but compression waves told him that something huge was circling nearby. Audran remembered that he was not alone in this ocean: It was now his turn to flee. He darted down over the reef and cut a zigzag path only a few inches above the sandy floor.

The ravenous shadow trailed close behind. Audran looked for somewhere to hide, but there was nothing, no sunken wrecks or rocks or hidden caves. He made a sharp evasive turn and raced back the way he’d come. The thing that stalked him followed lazily, easily.

Suddenly it dived on him, a voracious, mad engine of murder, all dead black eyes and gleaming chrome-steel teeth. Flushed from the sea bottom, Audran knifed up through the green water toward the surface, though he knew there was no shelter there. The great beast raged close behind him. In a froth of boiling seafoam, Audran broke through the waves, into the fearfully thin air, and — flew. He glided over the white-capped water until, at last, he fell back into the welcoming element, exhausted.

And the nightmare creature was there, its ghastly mouth yawning wide to rend him. The daggered jaws closed slowly, victoriously, until for Audran there was only blackness and the knowledge of the agony to come.

“Jeez,” I murmured, when the Transpex returned my consciousness.

“Some game,” said Shaknahyi.

“How’d I do?” asked Chiri. She sounded exhilarated.

“Pretty good,” said Courane. “Six hundred twenty-three. It was a promising scenario, but you never got him to panic.”

“I sure as hell tried,” she said. “I want another drink.” She gave me a quirky grin.

I took out my pillcase and swallowed eight Paxium with a mouthful of gin. Maybe as a fish I hadn’t been paralyzed with fear, but I was feeling a strong nervous reaction now. “I want another drink too,” I said. “I’ll stand a round for everybody.”

“Bigshot,” said Shaknahyi.

Both Chiri and I waited until our heartbeats slowed down to normal. Courane brought a tray with the fresh drinks, and I watched Chiri throw hers down in two long gulps. She was fortifying herself for whatever evil things I was going to do to her mind. She was going to need it.

Chiri touched Player Two on the game’s console, and I saw her eyes slowly close. She looked like she was napping placidly. That was going to end in a hell of a hurry. On the holoscreen was the same opalescent haze I’d wandered through until Chiri’d decided it was the ocean. I reached out and touched the Player One panel.

Audran gazed down upon the ball of mist, like Allah in the highest of the heavens. He concentrated on building a richly detailed illusion, and he was pleased with his progress. Instead of letting it take on form and reality gradually, Audran loosed an explosion of sensory information. The woman far below was stunned by the purity of color in this world, the clarity of sound, the intensity of the tastes and textures and smells. She cried out and her voice pealed in the cool, clean air like a carillon. She fell to her knees, her eyes shut tightly and her hands over her ears.

Audran was patient. He wanted the woman to explore his creation. He wasn’t going to hide behind a tree, jump out and frighten her. There was time enough for terror later.

After a while the woman lowered her hands and stood up. She looked around uncertainly. “Marid?” she called. Once again the sound of her own voice rang with unnatural sharpness. She glanced behind her, toward the misty purple mountains in the west. Then she turned back to the east, toward the shore of a marshy lake that reflected the impossible azure of the sky. Audran didn’t care which direction she chose; it would all be the same in the end.

The woman decided to follow the swampy shoreline to the southeast. She walked for hours, listening to the liquid trilling of songbirds and inhaling the poignant perfume of unknown blossoms. After a while the sun rested on the shoulders of the purple hills behind her, and then slipped away, leaving Audran’s illusion in darkness. He provided a full moon, huge and gleaming silver like a serving platter. The woman grew weary, and at last she decided to lie down in the sweet-smelling grass and sleep.

Audran woke her in the morning with a gentle rain shower. “Marid?” she cried again. He would not answer her. “How long you gonna leave me here?” She shivered.

The golden sun mounted higher, and while it warmed the morning, the heat never became stifling. Just after noon, when the woman had walked almost halfway around the lake, she came upon a pavilion made all of crimson and sapphire-blue silk. “What the hell is all this, Marid?” the woman shouted. “Just get it over with, all right?”

The woman approached the pavilion anxiously. “Hello?” she called.

A moment later a young woman in a white gown came out of the pavilion. Her feet were bare and her pale blond hair was thrown carelessly over one shoulder. She was smiling and carrying a wooden tray. “Hungry?” she asked in a friendly voice.

“Yes,” said the woman.

“My name is Maryam. I’ve been waiting for you. I’m sorry, all I’ve got is bread and fresh milk.” She poured from a silver pitcher into a silver goblet.