Null–A Three

CHAPTER 19

Gosseyn opened his eyes in pitch darkness.

Remembering what had happened—the whirling sensation—he lay still. And it actually took at least a dozen seconds before the thought came that… Could it be, was it possible?—

His sudden startled realization was that this was exactly the way the Gosseyn Three body had awakened after the space capsule had been taken aboard the Dzan battleship.

… I’m lying here naked (that was the feeling), covered by a thin sheet—

He moved his hands and arms slightly. And there was no question: it was a sheet, and it was cloth-like and not heavy; and, except for it, he seemed not to be wearing any clothes. His fingers touched warm skin.

Slowly; carefully, he pulled at the sheet; drew it down, and away from, the upper part of his body. Then, equally slowly, he raised his hands upward, probing.

He touched a flat surface. Less than a dozen inches above his chest, he estimated. And when he braced himself, and pushed against it, it turned out to be a smooth, solid substance with no give in it.

… Exactly as when he had come to in the capsule… only a couple of days ago in terms of how long he had been conscious since then.

He sank back to a relaxed position, and wondered:

… are my actions being observed here, also?—

… Or am I cut off from the outside?—

With that sudden feeling of uncertainty, it was definitely time for a test.

“Alter!—” It was a directed mental call—“do you have any idea what happened to me? Was that—he hesitated, shaken by the possibility—“another death in our group?”

There was a pause. A sense of emptiness… out there. And then, abruptly, contact, almost as if a door had been opened. “All these seconds,” came the thought of Gosseyn Two, “I’ve been only vaguely aware of you. Even your thought just now was dim. So it could be that someone is letting this communication happen. Everything is suddenly clearer.”

It did not seem to be the moment for analyzing who that someone might be. And in his next “words the alter ego seemed to have had the same thought; it was an answer to Three’s question:

“I don’t think—” said that faraway mental voice—“that you, Gosseyn Three, were killed. So this is not another Gosseyn body awakening.”

The statement had its relieving aspect, but there was also a chilling quality. Because what had happened and was happening implied that the someone who was performing these remarkable technological miracles knew about the earlier awakening.

Because it was a similar type of capsule he was in. Which triggered a sudden additional thought: That first time—all those connectors?

He could feel none of the physical sensations of rubber tubing or penetrating needles, of which he had so swiftly become aware on his first awakening. And, as he now probed cautiously with his fingers and hands, and with arms reaching all the way down to his lower extremities, there was only the bare skin.

He called out mentally to Gosseyn Two: “It looks as if you got it right. This is not Gosseyn Four coming to consciousness. As you, apparently correctly, analyzed, it has the look of a captured Gosseyn Three.”

For some reason, he felt relieved. And many moments went by, then, before the realization came that proof that here was, in fact, a captured Gosseyn body, was not exactly a reason for he who was the captured one, feeling better.

Suddenly unhappy again, he resumed his thought communication with the safe Gosseyn… out there: “It would seem these aliens were able to reach across tens of thousands of light-years, grab me, and take me somewhere.”

“Wel-l-l-ll!” There was reluctance in the reply from the faraway alter ego, with overtones of unhappiness rather than rejection—“remember, they got some sort of hold on you, electronically before you left the Dzan ship. And evidently they finally worked out the problem of distance control, and took action.”

Lying there in the darkness, Gosseyn Three agreed that it was very evident indeed.

“After all,” Gosseyn Two concluded, “we have to remember that the Gosseyn extra-brain has proved that at some level of reality, distance has no meaning.”

It was true. But it was not a happy thing to realize that somebody else had now used a similar method to capture a Gosseyn body. Since the alien-controlled ship had not hesitated to attack the Dzan battlecraft, the question was: why hadn’t they simply killed Gosseyn Three?

Gosseyn Two’s answering thought came through at that point in an odd, matter-of-fact fashion:

“I think we can finally analyze the situation. They’re probably studying you. They’d like to reconstruct what happened to them. Here they are in another galaxy; and they have now got the villain responsible for causing the disaster. So any minute be prepared to go on trial for the crime of illegal alien transportation.”

It was, somehow, not a reassuring comment.

The recollection came to Gosseyn Three that, while I still on earth, he had actually expressed the wish that he go aboard the alien-manned ship, and confront the semi-humans.

Presumably, such a confrontation would now take place under circumstances somewhat less favorable: then I knew where he was, but he didn’t know for certain where either they, or he, was.

What bothered him—he realized as he continued to lie there—was that, perhaps, he should be on his way And never mind waiting here in the hope of finding out what anyone else might want to do with him.

… The private thought, with its implied purpose, must again have transmitted to Gosseyn Two; for the alter ego mind was suddenly manifesting relevant thoughts:

“—Whatever you do should be very carefully considered. As I said, your captors may be studying you, and that means studying the Gosseyn extra-brain potentialities. And since, as you just recalled, you were trying to figure out how you could get aboard, don’t dismiss the potentialities of that too rapidly.”

“You’re presuming that I am aboard the alien ship.”

“It’s not the only possibility, but, considering what has happened so far, the most likely one.”

“True,” Gosseyn Three acknowledged from his darkness. “So what is your recommendation?”

“Wait!”

… The waiting grew long.

His feeling finally was: perhaps, those who were observing him were wondering what he would do next. It occurred to him that one of those nexts should be the Dzan battleship.

Going there would place him again within the frame of the big ship’s protective screens. So it would be important to determine if his captors were prepared to let him escape to a location where they could no longer control him.

As he reached that point in his analysis, he realized that the other Gosseyn was mentally shaking his head.

“It’s okay to come here,” telepathed Gosseyn Two, “provided you first transfer Enin back to his mother’s and his apartment. The lady thinks the boy is with you; and so, you’d better not come here by yourself.”

“Okay. That tells me where I should go first.”

It could have been the moment of decision. Gosseyn could feel himself bracing; his extra-brain doing that special focussing necessary for the 20-decimal similarity transmission to work, when—

At that moment, a voice said: “Get him out, and the… (meaningless word) will talk to him!”

A pause; then, from the faraway Gosseyn Two came an admonishment: “Watch it, Three! They obviously let you hear that intentionally. And so, although the whole notion of a talk would normally be reassuring, after their instant attack when they arrived, as a reminder that they’re not friendly, I advise you to be ready to jump if that’s merely a ploy.”

Under his body he suddenly felt a movement. As on that first occasion two long days ago, the movement I was in the direction towards which his head pointed. Gosseyn sighed inwardly. But, after moments only, he noticed it was not a feeling of relief that he had so automatically—thalamically—expressed. It was tension. Which intensified as that steady motion brought him closer to—what?

Flickering memories came of how—last time—he had actually been brought out of the capsule into the virtually total darkness of the Dzan laboratory.

Maybe the Troogs would make a similar attempt to conceal themselves from him while, by way of their instruments, they looked him over.

Should he let them? After a rueful moment, he realized that the real question was: could he stop them?

He recalled that… back there on the Dzan ship…” he had felt a sudden freshness because, then, what was apparently either a greater amount of air, or a slight different temperature in the laboratory, had affected the nerve ends of his naked body.

Shall I? Shall I not?—

He actually thought of where he should try to go first, and he actually, did what was necessary to “set up” his extra-brain for the 20-decimal similarity jump to that location.

But the indecision, he realized, had a basic, underlying, unresolved uncertainty that was relevant only to the Gosseyn condition.

Things were happening, and would continue to happen, to the Gilbert Gosseyn duo that was currently alive. And on one level—the level where the two of them operated as a team, whereby it didn’t matter if one body was killed so long as there was another one to carry on, with duplicate memories and abilities… or. that level, it might be a good idea to confront these people before he had any real understanding of what they could, or could not do.

… On the other hand, if this body is killed—that really me, gone forever.

Guilt came… Here we are, we Gosseyn bodies, was this great similarity thing in our heads, whereby memory equals identity, and similar bodies go on and on—That group of eighteen-year-olds were still waiting out there somewhere…

In spite of that reality, I am the one—maybe the First one—who’s beginning to think like a separate person.

In terms of General Semantics, of course, he was a separate being: an intricate complex of particles and energy flows arranged in the shape of a human being, different from all the other similar shapes in the universe, including Gosseyns One and Two.

Something of the implications of that rapid reasoning in this stress situation must have reached out to the faraway alter ego. Because, suddenly, the thought came: “Hey, Three, wait a minute! Let’s talk!”

Presumably, with that other Gosseyn mind reaching out to him, and at that very instant a door opening, and light glaring in on him from a room, where—instantly—he could see several twisted looking, two-legged beings standing, staring at him with round, lidless, black eyes… presumably it was a moment of confusion.

Enough to trigger a reaction.