Watchstar Page 4

  “Through the implant,” he said. “I could not do it by myself. If you had an implant, I could speak to your mind, too.”

  Daiya laughed. Reiho clutched his flat rectangle, looking startled. “You are primitive,” she said. “My people don't need such things to mindspeak.”

  “Please, speak more slowly,” he said, raising a hand.

  “My people do not need such things to mindspeak,” she said carefully.

  The boy was still for a moment. His eyes narrowed. “You can read my mind?” he asked softly.

  “It is too hard with you,” she answered. “You have no training, it is hard to read what you think, and you cannot touch my thoughts, so we must use speech.” She paused. “That does not mean I cannot grasp your intentions or feelings,” she added, just to be safe. She was about to explain that he was a solitary, without mental powers, but she decided against it. She would have to tell him that infant solitaries were always killed, and that might provoke him. She realized that if Reiho could not get back to his home, he would have to die. But if he did go back, he might return with others like himself.

  She swallowed. The longer she sat here with him, the greater the distance from her village seemed to be. Yet she could not bring herself to leave. She was too curious; she would damn herself with her curiosity. “This Homesmind,” she said, thinking it was a peculiar name for anyone to have, “does he know you spoke to me?”

  “It asked. I did not say, I said only that I wanted to learn the old language, your language.” The light from the rectangle's surface made his face seem sallow and drawn; his shadowed eyes were dark pools. “I am not supposed to be here. I said only that I was all right and I shall return when I repair my craft. I told It that I ... that I ... I do not have the words in this speech. I told Homesmind I wanted to learn this language to pass time. It is strange you still speak it.”

  “Why should speech change, when the world does not? It is mindspeech that is important, we need words only for children.” Questions threatened to flood her mind as she spoke. How could a being from the sky know Earth's language? She suppressed the question. “You're not supposed to be here,” she went on, “so you told no one.”

  He nodded. “That is true. We thought there was no one here, that you were all dead many ages ago.”

  Daiya coughed, trying to choke back her laughter. “Dead! You come from the sky where no human being can live, to Earth, the home of all men and women, and you thought we were dead. You are very foolish, and your people must be ignorant.” She paused, thinking that he might find this rude, then saw that he had not understood the rapidly spoken words. “I've told no one about you either, at least not yet,” she continued. “I can't imagine what they would think of you.” She pointed at the rectangle. “This thing, this book, what is it?”

  “It is words, writing.” He tilted it toward her. Just beneath the surface, she could see scratches and marks which seemed to form patterns. “I always keep a small library ... a small number of books ... with me. They are very small, tinier than the pebbles here, but when I put them in here"—he pointed at the rectangle as he spoke—"I can read them. If I wish to have other books, Homesmind can transmit them to me.”

  She could not understand a few of his words, and wondered if it was because her speech was still new to him. “You look at these patterns?” She squinted at them. “What for? Is it an art?”

  The boy stared at her. “You have no writing?”

  “I've never heard of such a thing.”

  “I shall try to say what it is,” he said very slowly. “These symbols, they are words, like the ones we speak or say. Each one of these stands for a word or part of a word. When I look at these signs, it is ... it is as if the person who put them down is speaking to me. I do not need the book, I could speak directly to Homesmind to learn what is here, but I find enjoyment in the words and their patterns. In a way, it is an art now, though long ago it helped people preserve learning.”

  “People put down these symbols?”

  He nodded.

  “Why? Why doesn't this person tell you his thoughts? Did a friend of yours do this?” She stopped, trying to remember not to speak so quickly.

  “This person was not my friend. She is dead for a long time, I do not know her. But her work is part of Homesmind, and with this book, I can read what she thought.” He pressed the edge of the rectangle; the light went out. He was now a black, alien form, lit from the back by the light inside the vehicle. She could not see his face. “This book is about history,” he went on.

  “What is that?”

  “About the past. It is about a long time ago. But it says little about Earth.”

  Daiya peered at him. “You are very strange,” she said. “You look at patterns to tell you about the past. I don't understand you. What is there to know?”

  “Do you know about the past?”

  “Everyone does. There were those like us and those not like us and they fought long ago. Then there were only those like us.” She suddenly realized that Reiho's presence contradicted that statement. “And some have said that the ones not like us live in another place, but many consider that a heresy. I didn't believe that before.”

  “What about after that?” Reiho asked.

  “What do you mean?”

  “What happened to your people after that?”

  “We are as we are. The passing of time is an illusion, a warp in eternity. What else is there to say?”

  “What about your history?”

  Exasperated, Daiya stood up. “I don't know what you mean. You look at signs and patterns on a surface and you ask what only a child would ask. We are as we are. We always were like this, we shall always be like this.” She was afraid to show the boy that she too had questions about her world, afraid he might see it as weakness.

  “It does not change at all?”

  “Why should it change? People die and children are born. The older ones tell us things and teach us, and we shall do the same.”

  “But change is part of life.”

  “We have always lived as we do. Your life is very distant from truth if you look for change.” She shook her head. “I must go, I have many things to do.”

  He took her hand. Startled, she jumped back, pulling her hand away. His skin felt dry and smooth; his hand, oddly enough, had no callouses. “Do not go,” he said.

  “I must.”

  “I shall leave you alone. I am frightened, I will say it. I have not ever been in a place like this.”

  She touched his mind and felt both his fear and his pride. He had struggled with his pride to make his admission. Earth's night covered him; the darkness hid unknown threats. A wild creature hovered near him and he did not know whether it would strike. That was how he saw her. She withdrew, annoyed but sorry for him as well.

  “Very well,” she said softly. She turned and pointed to a spot several paces from the craft. “I shall build my fire there, and sleep there, but you are not to disturb me.”

  “You may sleep in here, there is space. I will put down one of the seats for you.”

  “No. I'll sleep outside.”

  “I will not do anything, I will not even touch you.”

  Daiya leaned closer to him. She sensed he did not really want her in the craft. Why had he asked? Perhaps he was trying to trap her. She searched his surface thoughts, but could sense no hostility.

  “I must sleep outside, that is all,” she said. “I would not be comfortable in there. And you must leave me alone, or I'll go. Then you will be alone.”

  His body stiffened and his mind became a coil. “Very well.”

  She left him and went for wood to build her fire.

  Something was near her.

  Daiya swam into consciousness, releasing part of her mind from behind her wall. She touched another mind—it was Reiho's. Angry, she sat up quickly, blinking her eyes.

  The boy was retreating, hurrying back to his vehicle. She looked down at herself. He had covered her wi
th a piece of shiny cloth. She got up, pushing it from her, and ran up behind him.

  He spun around, apparently startled. “I thought you would be cold, so I...”

  She didn't wait for him to finish. She seized him with her mind, lifted him from the ground, and sent him sailing toward the craft, releasing him near the side. He fell against a large rock and rolled over, then climbed to his feet.

  “Do you understand?” she shouted. “You must do nothing. Leave me alone.” She waited. He began to crawl back inside the vehicle.

  “You are cruel,” his voice said in the darkness.

  “I warned you.”

  “You do not seem to understand a kindness.”

  “Be careful of what you say.” She waited, ready to strike at him again.

  “This world must have done this to you. Do not threaten me, you cannot hurt me.”

  She realized she had roused his anger and his pride.

  “Don't tempt me,” she said. “I can do more to you than you think.” She waited, for a moment hoping he would give her an excuse to destroy him.

  The door of the craft slid shut.

  Daiya turned away. She clenched her fists. Suddenly, she felt ashamed. Taking out her anger on the boy was as bad as taking it out on an animal—maybe worse. It would be kinder to kill him than to torment him like this. He might be an inferior being, but he had feelings like hers, and a mind that could reason, powerless as it was.

  She thought: I am a bad person, keeping secrets from the village, getting angry, asking questions. The boy's presence and his questions had disturbed her more than she had realized. She would die during her ordeal, she knew it now, it was beyond doubt. Her skin felt wet and cold; her stomach was tight. She would die. Maybe it was the only thing that could save her now, dying; after her suffering, the Merged One would rejoin her to Itself. If It existed. She thought: if I still doubt, at the moment of death, will I be condemned to eternal isolation? Of course, if there was no God, she would be condemned anyway.

  She walked slowly to the craft and peered inside. Reiho stared out at her suspiciously through the transparent dome, his face lit by the waning moon and the comet's bright light. She put her hand on the clear surface; Reiho shrank back. He probably thought he was safe inside the vehicle, but he was not. If she used all her strength, she could lift the craft and dash it against the hillside, or spin it so rapidly the boy would grow faint. She was beginning to understand why those without powers had to die.

  She said, “I am sorry.”

  The boy blinked his eyes and was silent.

  “I am sorry,” she said, as loudly as she could. “Please open the door.”

  At last the door slid open. Reiho, still seated on one of the reclining seats, peered out cautiously. He held one hand in front of his face, as if guarding himself.

  “I'm sorry,” she repeated. “I should not have lost my temper. You were not trying to harm me.”

  He put his hand down and frowned. Daiya carefully explored his surface thoughts. He was a frightened boy, far from his home, puzzled by her. He too was keeping a secret, telling no one about his encounter. His thoughts brushed against her. He was gripped by a loneliness so intense she could not bear it. Then another feeling rippled from him, capturing her; she struggled to recognize it. The feeling was curiosity. It was a cold blue light inside Reiho, dispelling his fears. It shone brightly, seeking out the dark places inside her.

  She withdrew from him. She had never touched anyone whose curiosity was this strong. The boy had to be a great sinner. She shuddered.

  “Why are you sleeping out there without a covering?” he asked. “I thought you would get cold.”

  “I'm training,” she replied. “I am preparing myself for an ordeal I must endure, and to live through it, I must be able to control my mind and body.”

  “I do not know one of those words.”

  “An ordeal? Is that the word?”

  He nodded.

  “It is a passage.” He still seemed confused. “It is something all people my age must endure,” she went on, “before we are accepted as adults. I must go with others into the desert and face something so terrible that no one will say what it is. Many die during an ordeal. My own brother Rin did not live through his.”

  Reiho's eyes widened a bit.

  “Don't you have such a thing?” she asked.

  He shook his head.

  “Don't you have to pass an ordeal before you become an adult? Perhaps yours is different. I have heard that in other villages, the young ones go high into mountains taller than those here, mountains that touch the sky, while in other places they are sent out in boats on the salty lake which surrounds the world.” She spoke slowly, so that he could grasp all her words. “I have even heard that in the north, young people travel across a cold white moisture which covers the ground like a blanket to places so cold that water stands still and solid. But the custom is the same everywhere. You must have your own ordeal, or how would you know when you are grown?”

  He said, “That is barbaric and cruel.”

  “Who are you to pass judgement?”

  “I must say what I think. I would refuse to go.”

  “You would have to go, or you would be cast out.”

  He stretched out a hand toward her. She kept her arms at her sides. He withdrew his hand.

  “What is your ordeal like?” she asked.

  “We do not have that kind of thing, not something that might kill us,” he said. “We have other things. We must study and learn, we must master many fields of study and then decide which one we wish to specialize in, and what will be our work.”

  “What are fields of study?”

  He shrugged. “Cybernetics, anthropology, astrophysics, different types of engineering, genetics, history, those sorts of things.”

  It sounded like gibberish to her, a chant, words running together in a stream; she could not tell whether he had said one thing or many. She thought of a field of study and saw the boy on a plain, roaming over it as he learned about its plants, animals, and weather.

  “I think I see,” she said. “You learn some things, then you learn one thing more than others. Is that it?”

  “It is something like that. When we decide on what we want to do most, we are adults. There are some things so difficult or demanding only a few can do them.”

  Daiya puzzled over his statements, wondering why one would want to know only a few things. Those in the village who lived long enough could know everything there was to know. “What thing is the hardest?” she asked.

  “I do not know. Perhaps raising our children.”

  Daiya began to laugh. She tried to restrain herself, then noticed that Reiho was smiling a little. “That is very strange,” she said between giggles. “You have men and women, don't you? Surely their feelings tell them how to make love.”

  “I said raising children. We all have them, we all contribute our genetic material to the wombs, but only a few are skilled enough to raise them properly, though the rest of us can spend time with them when we wish to do so.”

  She shook her head; he used strange words to describe lovemaking. “I am sorry for laughing. We all raise our own children, those who pass the ordeal are considered fit to have them. We must have many, because many die.”

  The boy wrinkled his brows. “It sounds like a very hard life.”

  She shrugged. She had never thought of it as hard, knowing, at least until now, that it was the same everywhere. “It's no harder than living in the sky,” she said, waving her hand.

  “Why must you go through this ordeal?” he asked.

  “I have already said why. We must become adults.”

  “Why must you go through it to become adults?”

  She folded her legs and sat on her heels. “Here it is,” she said. “As children, our thoughts are weak and confused. Whatever trouble they may cause can be controlled. I have a sister, Silla, she is very young, and I must often speak to her with my voice, as I am doi
ng now with you, and listen to hers, for she has not yet mastered the ability to project her thoughts clearly.” She gazed into Reiho's eyes and saw that he understood her so far. “As we grow, our minds grow stronger, and we must learn something even harder, how to control our minds. It's difficult sometimes. I threw you into your craft here, I should not have done it, I might have hurt you. You see that a village could not survive if it had many who would do these things.”

  The boy nodded.

  “That is why we must go through a passage in the desert,” she continued. “I won't know exactly what happens there until I go through it myself, but I know one thing. Those who are able to control themselves and fit into our community return, and others do not.” As she spoke, she once again felt doubts about her own ability to survive.

  “But why must you sleep outside with no covering to train for that?”

  “Body and mind are one thing. It does no good to have mental control if the body fails. I have heard one can die returning from the ordeal. We must go with nothing, we must return with nothing.”

  Reiho slouched, resting his arms on his thighs. “It is very puzzling,” he said. “I do not know very much, but I do not understand how you can have these mental powers at all.”

  Daiya smiled. “And I don't understand why you do not,” she replied. “God gave us these powers so that we would no longer be separated from one another and the world, that is what we are told.”

  “But the power, the energy needed for such things must come from somewhere,” Reiho said. “Your bodies cannot provide it. Something else must generate it.”

  “God provides us with powers,” she said quickly, not knowing what the boy was talking about and afraid to ask. She stood up slowly, feeling weak and knowing she needed to sleep. Her stomach, which had been rumbling with hunger hours before, now sat inside her like a hollow space. “You tell me you live in the sky,” she went on, “and yet you ask me questions. What do you do, build villages on clouds?”