Kéthani

Interlude

I met Stuart Kingsley a couple of years after my resurrection. A lecturer in medieval French at Leeds University, he moved into the village that summer and began drinking at the Fleece, where he soon gravitated into the orbit of the Tuesday night crowd. He was a quiet, thoughtful man who got on well with everyone. Stuart had his serious side—he was a highly respected academic with a string of weighty tomes to his name—but I like to think that our friendship brought out the fun-loving side of his personality. When drunk, he liked nothing more than telling long, convoluted, and hilarious stories about his experiences in life.

On one particular Tuesday night in the main bar, talk turned to the resurrection process, and what actually went on in the domes of the Kéthani home planet. It was a topic of conversation that we never exhausted.

As I was the only returnee in the group, it was natural that Stuart should elicit my opinion. “What happened, Khal?” he asked in his soft Devon burr.

I shrugged and gave a vague description of what I recalled of the resurrection dome.

I found it hard to speak of my time on Kéthan, as if the desire to do so had been edited from my mind. Some people cite the fact that returnees find it hard to talk about the experience as further evidence of Kéthani duplicity: why not allow us to speak openly about what happens within the domes?

I said as much now. “But I have a theory.”

Jeff Morrow smiled. “Let’s hear it then, Khalid.”

“I think that we’re not allowed a true memory of what happens there because the resurrection process, and the tuition that follows, is too… too alien for our minds to grasp. I don’t mean that it’s too horrific, merely that it is totally alien and ungraspable to the human mind.” I paused, then went on, “In place of the truth, the Kéthani fill us with a version of what happens. We recall human instructors, pacific and Zen-like, and views from the domes of Edenlike tranquillity.”

“But,” Stuart said, “the reality is unknowable to the human mind.”

I shrugged. “Something like that,” I said.

“But whatever happens,” Elisabeth said, “returnees are changed on some fundamental level. I mean, look at Khalid here.” She gripped my hand. “Sorry, Khal.”

I smiled. “I readily admit that I’m a changed man,” I said and left it at that.

Elisabeth turned to Dan Chester. “What about Lucy? Have you noticed a change in her since she returned?”

Dan regarded his pint, considering the question. Lucy was a teenager now, living with Dan in the village. I saw her from time to time, a slim, dark thirteen year-old who always had time for a chat. On these occasions I had always thought her more mature than her contemporaries.

Dan smiled. “It’s hard to say… but I think perhaps she was a little more… thoughtful, reflective, after her return.”

The conversation switched to other topics.

It was a couple of weeks later when I noticed that Stuart was taking a lot of interest in the barmaid, Sam. She was in her mid-twenties, at a guess, blonde and exhibitionist and a little loud, but friendly and always ready with a smile. Not to sound too patronising about it, she was the type of person I thought perfectly suited to a vocation pulling pints.

That Stuart Kingsley should find her attractive was, frankly, bizarre; that he should not only find her attractive but, a month later—after a whirlwind affair—should propose marriage, we found not only odd but alarming.

Richard Lincoln didn’t lose an opportunity to rib Stuart mercilessly about his choice of partner, and behind Stuart’s back he gave the marriage six months, at most. The truth to tell, we agreed with him.

A year later, our doubts were dispelled. Stuart and Sam were living proof that opposites not only attract, but complement each other. Sam became a vital part of the group and brought even more humour and vitality from the university lecturer.

One week before Stuart’s death, we were in the Fleece and talk again turned to the resurrection domes. I cannot recall that much about the conversation—it was late, and I was five pints the worse—but I do remember that Sam was almost… well, frightened at the prospect of life after death.

And I recall her saying she feared that, if either she or Stuart died, the Kéthani would drive them apart.