Out of Phaze

7. Citizen

The flyer carried them northeast across the wasteland at high velocity: the direction opposite to the one they wanted. The prospect of rendezvous became increasingly remote.

Bane shook his head. "If only we had wrecked the vehicle not!" he muttered.

"My fault," Agape said. "I asked you to show me-"

He put his fingers against her lips, silencing her. "It was something I wanted to do. Still want to do." He put his arms around her, and she rested her head against his shoulder. She was out of the suit now, naked in the serf manner.

"Perhaps if we explain to your family, they will help you," she said. "Are they not good people?"

"Surely they be so," he said. "They must be very similar to mine own parents. Probably I should have done that first."

"Then you would have been back in your own frame by now, and I would not have met you, Bane."

"And I would not have met thee," he agreed, and hugged her closer. She was what she called an amoeba, a completely flexible creature, yet this did not differ much in his view from the way of any of the werefolk. She could be quite at home in Phaze. Of course he would probably not have been attracted to her, had he encountered her in Phaze. Fleta was as pretty in her human form as any true human woman, and as nice a person, but he had never been romantically interested in her. In Phaze, human beings could be friends with animals, and could play some rather intimate games with them, but they did not love them or marry them. His father's friendship with Neysa, Fleta's dam, had raised eyebrows in the old days, Bane understood. But Stile had married the Lady Blue, of course, and Neysa had returned to her Herd to be bred by the Herd Stallion. Thus Bane himself had come to be, and Fleta, and their lifelong association and friendship.

He faulted none of this-but he would have perceived Agape as a form of animal, and that would have made a critical difference. She was not, of course; she was an intelligent and talented creature from another world. Because he had been introduced to her as that, or as a human being at first, his fundamental perception of her had differed. Then, when she had helped him so loyally, when he needed help most-but he couldn't say all this. Not now, with the serfs of the flying machine listening. He just held her close and wished that she could join him in Phaze. For the truth was that though he had always understood he was to marry a human girl, he had found none he liked well enough for that. The village girls tended to be wary of Adepts, with reason, and avoided him whenever they could do so without giving offense. He had needed a relationship with a girl of some other Adept family-and the only ones of his age were in the families of the Adverse Adepts. Thus certain of the animal folk had been better company for him, though he had known this to be a dead-end association.

In due course the craft landed. They passed from its lock directly into a dome, where serfs guided them to cleaning stalls and then to a residential suite. "Eat, sleep," the foreman serf said. "Tomorrow Citizen White will have an audience."

"Citizen White?" Bane asked. "I thought we were being taken to Citizen Blue."

The serf shrugged. "Perhaps the Citizen will explain. Meanwhile, rest."

That seemed to be it. Bane understood that in Proton, Citizens governed, and no serf could question the actions or motives of a Citizen. He chafed against the delay in his search for his other self, but knew he could do nothing. They might as well have been prisoners.

But he remained with Agape, and that was a considerable compensation. Now, without further guilt or distraction, he could complete his understanding with her.

They went to the food dispenser in the suite, and Agape got a nutro-bev. Bane found that he wasn't hungry, not because of any tension or fatigue, but because his robot body did not require food. So he simply watched her eat. That turned out to be a remarkable experience in itself.

Then they adjourned to the bedroom. "I can show thee now," he said, though somewhat shaken by the recent spectacle of her meal. Still, she had warned him. "There be room enough here."

"Oh, Bane, I do want to know," she said. "But I have been up and active for so long-it is past midnight now-I do not think I can hold my form much longer. I fear I would melt in the middle of it."

That could be awkward, Bane had to agree. "Rest, then; we can do it in the morning." He was privately relieved. He was, as he had told her, used to observing shape-changing in others, but this had been not exactly that.

"You might not like to see me sleep," she said. "I return to my natural state."

"Thy natural state should not bother me," he said, hoping he spoke accurately. "But what will I do, while thou dost sleep? This body be not tired at all."

"Use the computer access to gain entertainment or education," she suggested. "Here, I will show you how."

Soon Bane was seated before a screen, watching three-dimensional moving pictures within it. He found this fascinating, so very much like magic that it seemed pointless not to call it that. He could cause the pictures to change merely by telling them to.

He directed the screen to fill him in on the history of Proton. He wanted to know what had happened here after the frames had separated. He knew from what his father had said that once there was fairly free travel between the frames; each permanent resident of one frame seemed to have an other self in their other frame, who resembled him exactly. But only when one self died could the other cross what was called the curtain to the other frame. Stile had crossed when the Blue Adept died, and Stile had taken Blue's place in the Blue Demesnes. But Blue had not been quite wholly dead; he had taken Stile's body in Proton and taken up residence there. Stile himself had animated a golem body, which performed just like the original one. Such magnificent magic had been possible in those days. Then the fundamental stuff of magic, the rock Phazite, had been diminished; half of it had been transferred to Proton for the sake of some complex but apparently necessary balancing of the frames, and magic had forever lost much of its potency. The frames had been fully separated, so that no one could cross over anymore.

All this Bane had known all along. What he didn't know was how Proton had fared in the interim. Since he had to remain here a while longer anyway, this did indeed seem to be the ideal occasion to learn about this. He knew that his father would be most interested in the information.

But acquiring the information turned out to be more complicated than he had supposed. There was so much of it! When he asked for the "History of Proton," the screen went back to the planet's discovery more than four hundred years before by an explorer-ship from the Empire of Earth: a beautiful world much resembling Phaze today. But there were creatures already on it, Earthlike creatures, including a few human beings. This indicated that there had been contact before. Since there had been a number of private expeditions to space, and not all of these made proper reports, it was concluded that one of these had colonized the planet, and the descendants of the colony had then forgotten its origin. This could have happened hundreds of years before.

Then it seemed that the planet was somehow double. There was reference to magic, which was of course impossible-

"Impossible!" Bane snorted. "You idiot!"

The narration froze in place. "New directive?" the screen inquired.

"Just skip it up to the past twenty years," Bane said, deciding not to wrestle with this aspect.

Even so, it was more than he could grasp. History turned out to be not a single and straightforward process, but a complex tapestry of events. Citizens lost their positions, and new ones came into being; the mining of Protonite, the key resource of the planet, suffered a severe readjustment as cutbacks ordered by Citizen Blue took effect.

Citizen Blue! "Follow him!" Bane exclaimed.

So Mach's father appeared. It seemed that he had more money or power than any other Citizen, so could make his will felt most effectively. He married Sheen, the humanoid robot female; this caused a furor. He required that the self-willed humanoid robots be granted serf status. Later he did the same for the most advanced humanoid androids, and for the humanoid cyborgs. Each such step was fought resolutely by the Contrary Citizens. Most recently he had done it for the aliens: those sapient creatures who could assume human form and mix with human beings on an equal intellectual and social basis.

"Agape," he murmured, understanding her position in this at last.

The screen heard him. "Agape," it said, showing a picture. "Sapient creature of Planet Moeba, first representative of this species participating in the Experimental Culture Project."

"I didn't mean to show her; I was just commenting," Bane said. The screen returned to its prior business, describing the things that Citizen Blue had initiated in the past twenty years in Proton. It was an impressive listing; more changes had occurred in this period than in the prior two hundred years. The Experimental Culture Project was intended to enable the diverse types of sapient creatures to integrate their society without adverse pressures. Ordinary serfs were required to become the employees of individual Citizens at maturity, and were thereafter subject to the arbitrary will of those employers. The Experimentals had no such requirement; they were considered to be the employees of Proton itself, with no requirements. They were free to do what they wished, within their own section. When they went beyond it, they had to observe the normal forms, deferring in all things to Citizens, and not interfering with the activities of ordinary serfs.

"But what is the point?" Bane asked. He knew that idlers would not survive long in Phaze, and doubted they would be tolerated long in Proton.

"The point is to ascertain whether the diverse species can successfully integrate," the screen replied. "If this is affirmative, the entire society will be similarly integrated. There will be no distinctions between species or types, only between serf-status and Citizen status. Machines and aliens will have equal access to the benefits of Proton society."

Bane nodded. This made sense to him. He would not have known how well unicorns and human beings could get along together, after centuries of noninvolvement with each other, if he had not known Neysa and Fleta.

Now he was learning how pleasant it could be to know an alien creature.

He glanced at the bed where Agape lay-and paused, astonished. She was there, but her form was not. She had become a mound of dark jelly that spread across the bed like so much spilled pudding. Only its cohesion and continuing quiver distinguished it from inanimate substance. She really was an amoeba: a blob of protoplasm.

Should he be revolted? He decided not to be. He had seen Fleta change to her natural unicorn form many times, and to her other hummingbird form, and back to girl form. That was interesting, not revolting; why should this be different? Agape had not concealed her nature from him, she had only tried to spare his feelings, because it seemed that other human beings had been upset by her true form. But he had come to know her mind and her personality, and he liked these. She was quite different from himself, physically; what did it matter?

He had had enough of education for now. He asked the screen for entertainment, and was rewarded by a "light-show" of phenomenal color and complexity. The lights brightened and dimmed, radiated out and in, changed shape and color, and assumed odd and fleeting shapes. Sometimes Bane, the viewer, seemed to be flying into a rapidly expanding bank of clouds; sometimes he seemed to be swimming in strange water. The configurations never repeated; he kept being surprised by what happened next.

Finally he told the screen to turn itself off. He walked about the room, thinking, trying to assimilate all that he had learned. One impression came through strongly: he liked this frame of Proton, despite its appalling degradation of the wilderness outside the domes. It had more than enough scientific magic inside the domes to make up. True, it had serious problems-but those represented not so much a liability as a challenge. Citizen Blue, who had been reared in Phaze, seemed to be Bane's own kind of man. It would have been nice to work with him to complete the necessary changes in the society. In time, perhaps, even the pollution could be cured, and Proton could become green again outside. Of course he had to return to his own frame, but he would always be glad to have had this experience in this one.

Many hours had passed, but Agape still slept and he did not wish to disturb her. He experimented with his body, discovering that though in the rush of events he had not been aware of many differences between his own body and this one, those differences were significant. It was not just a matter of not getting tired and of not needing sleep; his involuntary physical reactions had become voluntary. He could elevate his reactions at will, becoming keyed up or relaxed simply by so directing his body. He could make himself sexually excited instantly, and turn it off as readily. It was helpful to know, since it could have been embarrassing with Agape if he depended on natural reactions.

At last he turned himself down to standby state, and this was very like sleep. He could, after all, have slept, had he realized how to do it! He just had to turn his body close to off for a period.

An alarm jolted Bane out of his simulated sleep. "The Citizen will see you in ten minutes," the voice of a serf came from the screen.

"Uh, right," Bane said. He turned to the bed.

Agape was stirring; evidently the alarm had awakened her too. Already her protoplasm was changing its shape. Legs and arms grew out at the ends, and her head. None were well formed; they most resembled the appendages a child might tack on a homemade doll. But once the size was right, the specific features developed. In just a few minutes she was herself-or rather, that artificially human form he had come to know.

She sat up, gazing at him. "Now you have seen me as I truly am," she said.

"I think thou hast marvelous magic," he said. "I could not change my form as thou dost."

"You're not an amoeba."

"I am an Adept-or will be one," he said. "I can change the forms of others, but not my own."

"You really are not disturbed?"

"I really am not," he said. And now it was true; the screen had provided him with the proper perspective, so that he understood the rationale of her nature and her presence, and approved of it. She was a nice person who was trying to accommodate herself to what was for her an alien situation. She needed support, not objection.

She stood, then stepped up to him and kissed him. "I fear I will not encounter your like again," she said sadly.

"Nor I thine."

"Two minutes," the screen announced. "Present yourselves at the exit to your chamber."

"We must not delay," Agape said. "I have not been on Proton long, but I know from my briefing that serfs must always address Citizens as Sir and obey them implicitly. Perhaps I should talk, if it can be arranged."

"Aye." They presented themselves at the exit. The wall opened.

The serf conducted them quickly to a smaller chamber. They stepped in, but the serf did not. The door slid closed.

Suddenly the four walls vanished. They were in an enormous room. They stood on a beach whose sand spread endlessly to either side. Not far behind were palm trees, their fronds shimmering in the breeze. Ahead crashed the restless breakers of the fringe of a mighty ocean.

They stood staring, both awed by the scene. Then Agape put out her hand. "It is holo," she murmured. "The walls still enclose us."

"Holo?"

"Pictures, like those on the screen you watched last night. Very realistic."

Bane touched the wall, verifying its presence. It seemed as if they were in an invisible box set on the beach, but he understood what she meant; the box was real, the beach illusory. "If this be not magic, what need have Citizens for it?" he asked.

On the ocean appeared a sail, and the sail expanded. It showed up as a sailboat, blown quickly by the wind toward them. On the boat, operating it, was a ruddy, heavyset man. He guided it to the beach, then quickly furled the sail and dragged the small craft right up before the place where Bane and Agape stood. He lifted out a chest and set it on the sand. He brought out a key, put it to the big old-style lock, and unlocked it. He lifted the lid of the chest.

From the chest rose a head. It kept rising, until a complete woman stood in the chest. There could not have been room for her within it. She seemed quite young, possibly fifteen, and her hair was as white as snow, set with a silver tiara. She wore a white gown set with bright gems.

The woman glanced at the boatsman, who was now standing at attention. "Sir," he said, "these are the refugees."

This was the Citizen! Bane realized. He had expected an old man, not a young woman, but obviously Citizenship knew no age or sex.

"Your identities?" Citizen White inquired.

"Agape of Moeba," Agape said immediately. "And this is Mach, the son of Citizen Blue. Sir."

The woman frowned. "I think not," she said. She stared at Bane. "Tell me your identity in your own words."

Somehow she knew about the exchange! "I be Bane, son of the Blue Adept, also called Stile."

"And how came thee here?" she inquired.

For a moment Bane was too startled to speak. "Thou-thou knowest?"

She smiled. "How long since thou hast been to the White Demesnes?"

"The White Adept!" he exclaimed. "But-"

"But she be old and ugly?" the woman inquired with a smile. She made a gesture, and abruptly she was old and fat. Then she reappeared in her young edition. "Since when be the son of an Adept deceived by appearances?"

"But there be no connection to Phaze!" Bane cried. "I be the first in a score of years to come to Proton, and that only in a body not mine own!"

"Really," the woman said, smiling condescendingly. She turned to the serf beside her. "Set me adrift again, Grizzle, and open the window to Phaze for these two serfs."

"Sir!" the man agreed.

The Citizen lost height. She sank back into the chest. When her head disappeared, the serf closed the lid, locked the lock, and lifted the chest back into the sailboat. He turned back to Bane and Agape. "The floors-man will take you there," he said. Then he dragged the boat back to the water, stepped into it, unfurled the sail, and commenced tacking into the wind.

The scene vanished. They were back in the box. The door opened, and they stepped back into the hall.

"This way," the serf said.

They followed him down the hall to another door. "You'll need clothes," he said, bringing out a white shirt and trousers of the Phaze variety for Bane and a white dress for Agape. "We don't usually send others through, so white's all we've got. You can change them when you get where you're going."

"But I am a serf!" Agape protested. "I can't don clothing here!"

"We do wear it in Phaze," Bane told her. "Thou wouldst be as out of place there naked as here in clothing."

"I suppose," she agreed uncertainly. She got somewhat awkwardly into the dress and slippers provided. The serf helped her get her outfit adjusted, and in a moment she looked, by Phaze standards, quite nice.

Bane completed his dressing, bending to fit the shoes to his feet. They fit well enough.

"This way," the serf said, showing them on down the hall to still another door.

They entered another cubicle. This one closed on them, then abruptly ascended, startling them. Its walls were transparent; they could see the dimly illuminated walls of the region through which it passed.

It came up into a forest. It halted at ground level, and the panel on one side opened. They stepped out onto the forest floor. The cubicle closed itself up and descended back into the ground; a lid closed, making the ground complete.

"This is Phaze?" Agape asked.

"It seems like it," Bane said. "It be hard to believe that return could be so simple!"

"But I-I am not magical!"she said. "How can I be here?"

"The same way I be here," he said. "I exchanged bodies not; I be still in the robot body. We made a physical crossing!"

"All the time the Citizens knew this route!" Agape said. "It was not your imagination!"

He glanced at her. She was very fetching in her dress; it fitted her beautifully. "Thou didst doubt?"

She spread her hands. "I know that robots can be programmed and reprogrammed. They must believe what they are programmed to believe; they cannot do otherwise. I was sure that you believed, but not sure that you really came from Phaze. I apologize, Bane."

"Accepted, Agape!" he said. "I could prove my origin not as readily as thou didst."

"If this really is your frame, where should we go? I really don't belong here."

"I think thou dost belong with me," he said. "Thou didst help me wend my way through Proton; now it be my turn to help thee in Phaze." He brought her in to him and kissed her. "And how glad I be that this be not our separation, Agape!"

She clung to him. "Oh, Bane, I told you I wanted to learn how your species indulges in sex, and I do, but I think that was only part of it. What I really want is to be close to you. I felt so alone, so-so alien when I came to Proton, and you have made me feel like a person."

"Thou hast made me feel wanted," he said. And that, he realized, was the essence. He preferred to be genuinely wanted and needed by an alien creature, than to be routinely accepted by the most human of women.

They walked through the forest. "This must be near the White Demesnes," he said. "That would be northeast of the Blue Demesnes, and some distance away. I recognize this particular region not, but if we go southeast we'll get home."

"Home to you, perhaps," she said.

"Thou dost not want it?" he asked.

"Oh, Bane, I am not your kind! I have a task to accomplish-"

"But after thou dost accomplish it, and make thy report-what then?"

"Oh, Bane, I just don't know! This is all so sudden, so strange!"

"Meanwhile, come and meet my family," he said. He looked at her appraisingly. "And let's see how thou wouldst be in blue." He paused, considering, then sang: "Turn me blue, and her too."

There was a flash, and abruptly both of their outfits were blue instead of white.

Agape looked at him, and at herself, astonished. "Magic! You did it!"

"I be an apprentice Adept," he said. But privately he was bothered by a detail; there had never before been a flash when he performed magic. Was he losing his touch?

They walked on. Suddenly there was a commotion to the side. Gnarly little men appeared, about half the size of Bane.

"Goblins!" he said. "They be usually trouble!"

"Are they human beings?" Agape asked. "They seem so small!"

"They may be descended from human stock, but they be hardly human anymore. Mostly they interfere not with our kind, but they can be ugly on occasion. I want not to waste magic; I'll see if I can bluff them off."

The goblins charged up. "Fresh meat!" they exclaimed, licking their twisted lips.

"Back off, goblins!" Bane cried. "Else I transform you all to worms for the birds!"

"And who dost thou think thou art?" one of them challenged him.

"I think I be the son of Blue," Bane said.

"Blue be far from here," the goblin retorted. "We'll roast thee and thy buxom wench for dinner!"

"Goblins be worms," Bane sang. "As birds want-"

"We're going!" the goblin cried, and all of them scurried back the way they had come.

Agape was impressed. "Could you really have turned them to worms?"

"Methinks so; I have tried to transform that many not simultaneously before," Bane said. "My father could readily do it, of course. But we prefer to employ magic only as a last resort."

"Oh, why is that?"

"Because a given spell only works well once. I have to figure out a new one each time. So if I use magic when I don't need to, I be cutting down my options for the future. That could make me pretty much impotent, later in life."

"Ah, now I understand!" she exclaimed. "So life is not entirely easy, even with magic!"

"Not necessarily easy at all," he agreed. "Because there be also hostile magic." He paused. "Speaking of which-the White Adept really has never been very friendly with the Blue Adept, not since the separation of frames. Why would she do us this big favor now?"

"Perhaps she is a nicer person than you thought."

He laughed. "Adepts aren't nice folk! They are concerned only with their own powers." Then he reconsidered. "No, some are all right. The Red Adept owes his position to my father, so he's always friendly, and the Brown Adept's all right too. She helped Fleta and the weres a lot. She's the one who makes the golems."

"The golems?"

"They be like robots," he said with a smile. "They look and act like men, but they be dead sticks. Generally."

They went on. "Mayhap I should conjure us directly there," Bane said. "So thou dost not have to walk so far."

"Save your magic," Agape said with a smile. "I don't mind walking with you."

They came to a mountain. There was a large cave visible at its base. "The vampires!" Bane exclaimed.

"Vampires! The kind that suck blood?"

"They do, but not indiscriminately. It be part of special rituals they have for coming-of-age and such. We have nothing to fear from them." He walked toward the cave-entrance. Agape followed, not at all at ease.

A man in a gray cape stood guarding the cave, though bats wheeled in the sky nearby. He came alert as the two approached. "Who be ye?" he challenged.

"I be the son of Blue," Bane said. "This be my friend, a shape-changer. I come to see my friends."

"Who be thy friends?" the man asked.

"Vanneflay," Bane said.

"Sorry, he be away these three days."

"Vidselud, then," Bane said.

"Him, too."

Bane considered. "Then Suchevane."

The man shrugged. "That be a coincidence! He, too."

"All away?" Bane asked, surprised.

"But thou'rt welcome to join us in a meal," the guard said. "Any son of Blue be welcome here."

"Uh, Bane-" Agape whispered uncomfortably.

Bane smiled. "My friend be nervous about vampire viands. Thank thee, but we shall move on."

The guard made a negligent wave of his hand.

They returned to the forest and walked on toward the west until they were well clear of the vampire's mountain. Bane was deep in thought.

"I'm glad we didn't stay there!" Agape said. "The thought of eating blood-"

"That bothers thee? Is blood not easier to imbibe than solid food?"

"We don't consume flesh," she said.

"Actually, the vampires wouldn't have offered us blood. It's too valuable, and they always take it fresh. That isn't what bothers me."

"What bothers you, Bane?"

"This be not Phaze."

She halted in place. "What?"

"When I changed the color of our clothing, there was a flash. My magic ne'er did that. Be there a way science could have done it?"

"Changed the color? Oh, yes; some material is sensitive to certain types of radiation, so that when it flashes-"

"Methought so. And true goblins bluff not so readily; must always destroy a few ere they give over. But mainly, the vampires. They were not."

"But the fact that we did not see them change form does not mean-"

"Oh, they might have changed form, by some device. But the friends I named-" He shook his head.

"But they really could be away," she said.

"The first, yes. But the second, Vidselud-he be the son of Vodlevile, for whom my father did a favor. Vidselud be six or seven years my senior, but we be friends because with me he can safely travel."

"He can't with his own kind?"

"Nay. He has a problem with the assimilation of blood that crops up every so often. They keep a potion in the cave that cures it, and they never let that potion go out, because it cannot be replaced. So he flies ne'er beyond walking distance of the cave, unless with me, because I can conjure him home if need be."

"But then he should be home!" she said.

"He should be home. Yet the guard said he was not."

"Still, that's not proof-"

"And the third one, Suchevane."

"He could also be-"

"She," Bane said succinctly.

"Female? But the guard said 'he'-"

"Precisely."

"Maybe the guard forgot."

Bane smiled. "No male forgets Suchevane!"

Agape looked sharply at him. "She is-?"

"Almost as lovely as thee, in girl form. And still unmarried, when I left Phaze. If there be any male head doth not turn when she goes by, that head be blind. Even the werewolves howl for her."

"But how, then-"

"No way," Bane said with finality. "This cannot be the vampire mountain I know, and since there be only one like this, these be other than vampires, and this be other than Phaze."

"But why would-"

A bat flew down from the sky. As it neared the ground, it changed abruptly into a beautiful woman. "Lovelier than I?" she demanded.

Bane gazed at her. "Nay." Then, after a pause, "Sir."

The woman changed appearance, becoming the young-seeming Citizen White, then a woman about twenty years older, still garbed in white. "So you cannot be fooled, young man," she said.

"No, sir."

"It is true; this is all a setting. I was able to make it authentic because when I was a child, I did visit Phaze, and knew the vampire colony. But in twenty years the personnel have evidently changed, and without contact, we cannot change with them."

"True, sir," Bane agreed.

"So this is pretense, agreed." She gazed hard at him. "But you are not. You really are from Phaze; you have demonstrated that."

"But sir, why?" Agape asked, disturbed. "Why bother

to play such a cruel game with two serfs who intended you no harm?"

"That you are about to discover," the Citizen said. She snapped her fingers, and the entire setting disappeared, leaving a large empty chamber. She smiled, and it was not a pretty smile.

"I think we be in trouble," Bane murmured.

"Not necessarily," Citizen White said. But the cruel lines that manifested about her mouth gave her words the lie.