Quest for the Well of Souls

The Other Side of the Bridge

Renard had tried the system after the door slammed shut, and Wooley had fired a shot, but it was too late, meaningless.

It took the Agitar only a few steps to discover that the bridge was indeed still energized.

“Renard! Come on back!” Wooley called. “Maybe he was lying about those guns, maybe not. But you’ll never get that door open on your own! Why take the risk? The bastard’s double-crossed us and we have to retrench!”

Reluctantly the Agitar agreed with her, turned, and walked back. The voltage pulses struck him repeatedly until he reached the center of the bridge, but to no effect—except that he was fully charged for the first time in many years. It was a heady feeling to carry over eight thousand volts; it made an Agitar male light-headed and gave him the feeling he could do anything. Still, he made his way back to the far end of the bridge.

“Don’t touch me!” he warned them. “I’ll have to discharge some of this, or I’ll kill somebody!”

He finally found a section of metal rail that didn’t seem to be connected by a conductive material to anything nearby, tried a short jolt, then discharged about two thousand volts.

“So, now what?” he asked.

The Ghiskind merged with the Bozog. “I will see if I can get in,” it said. “The electricity and guns won’t hurt me even if I am detected, and if I can get inside I can take his body, I am certain.”

They agreed to let the Yugash try. It floated over the bridge and was soon invisible to them. They waited for several minutes, then watched it return.

“No good,” it told them, again through the Bozog. “The place is solid. No cracks. That door has insulated seals. It’s an entirely self-contained atmosphere in there. And if that computer’s a fraction of what he claims, he can live in there almost forever, even wait us out.”

“This is a hell of a mess, isn’t it?” Vistaru said. “So, now what do we do?”

“I’d say go Topside again until we think of something else,” the Agitar suggested. “For one thing, Belden’s dead. So we haven’t that threat. Second, that’s where all the food and water is. And third, I have to go to the bathroom pretty damned bad.”

There was little else to do. Underside, they were in Yulin’s element. Defeated, they slowly made their way back along the corridor.

To guard against Yulin and any tricks he might pull, and because they were still not certain that Topside held no dangers, they slept in the open in shifts.

Mavra slept solidly, and awoke feeling much better. Her head seemed clearer, her body did not ache so much.

One last commission, she thought determinedly, one I have to handle myself. Nobody else this time. Just me, at least in the brain department. If I blow this one…

But, no, failure was unthinkable. Frankly, she didn’t care what Yulin did with Obie or planned to do, but she cared about this last opportunity, the chance to prove to herself and to the others that Mavra Chang was as good as she’d always believed herself to be.

To succeed here would be to put the final stamp on her life, the proof that Mavra Chang existed as a unique individual, better than them all. With that she could be content to die. Without it, she was already dead. For she knew the moment she’d set foot on New Pompeii that she would never leave it She would not return to the Well World, to be transformed at random into something absurd, a Krommian dancing flower, say, or a Makiem frog—perhaps worse. And if she succeeded, and they all still lived—return? As what? A horse? That would go over big in the Com.

No. Triumph or disaster, it would end here.

The architectural plans of New Pompeii kept flashing through her head. Something must be there, some key, some way to foul things up. She was sure of it.

Apparently unimportant facts kept occurring to her, and she tried to organize them like a great jigsaw puzzle. But she had far too many irrelevant pieces. Her mind raced—the mind the Ghiskind had called the strongest it had ever encountered.

Obie. Obie was the key. Something about Obie. Think, Mavra, think! No, straining’s not the way. Slow down. Relax. Let it come.

And she had it—part of it, anyway.

“Renard!” she said sharply. He’d been dozing and his head came up slowly, sleepily.

“Huh?”

“Remember long ago, when we escaped from this hole? Remember, we stole the ship and started toward the Well World?”

He was still half-asleep. “Yeah, I guess so,” he mumbled.

“Obie talked to us over the ship’s radio. Remember?”

He was suddenly awake. “Yeah, he did, didn’t he?” he responded, understanding.

“Let’s get to the ship,” she suggested.

It was frustrating not to be able to handle the controls. At least there was a central pickup transceiver, not the headsets in the ship they’d used. Quickly she instructed him on the procedures, the radio tuning, power check and the like. Finally, she was satisfied.

“Mavra Chang calling Obie,” she said. “Obie, can you hear me?”

“I was wondering when you’d think of this,” the warm, human voice of the computer responded immediately.

“Never mind the quibbles. We’re not computers,” she responded. “Obie, what’s the situation in there now?”

“Bad,” the computer told her. “Ben has complete control. Oh, sure, I can do this sort of thing, but except on his command, I cannot act on anything that means anything—and I can’t stop him. Worse, Nikki Zinder and her daughter did not move when I told them and they were still here when Ben got into the room. He has captured them.”

“What?” they shouted at once. Both Renard and Mavra tumbled through sentences, and Obie let them run down.

Finally, when they had calmed, Obie explained.

“I spent most of my time trying to probe the Well,” he told them. “I discovered early that if I asked a specific and very limited question, the Well computer would answer it. By that time Trelig, Yulin, and Dr. Zinder—who I was really after—had already passed through. I sensed them, trying to get data on Dr. Zinder, but I was too late. All I could do was suggest that he be placed in a high-tech hex. It was a simple enough idea; I could handle it. So, when Renard and Nikki came through several days later, I was ready. Renard I made an Agitar, mostly because I knew Trelig was a Makiem and the two were situated next to each other. I thought you would act as a check on him, Renard.”

The Agitar nodded. That explained a lot, and eliminated the wild coincidence he’d had to accept.

“Nikki wasn’t ready, though,” Obie continued. “On her own she would be lost almost anywhere on the Well World, and I had no way of making her an Oolakash, like her father. The Well follows rather complex rules, and she just didn’t fit the Oolakash requirements. So, I decided there was only one thing to do. I seized her, practically in transit, so to speak. She went from the Well Gate to a mathematical limbo; then I brought her to me through the big dish Underside and produced her in the control center through the little dish. I cured her of sponge and most of the excess weight. She’s really rather cute. About the only thing that surprised me was that she was pregnant.”

Again there was a chorus of “What?”

“Your child, Renard,” Obie answered. “In Teliagin, when the two of you were sinking from sponge and thought you were going to die. Remember?”

Renard had totally forgotten it. Even with Obie’s prompting he could barely remember it now.

“I needed hands, and I needed people,” Obie told them. “So I allowed her to have the child. A girl, which she named Mavra, after you, Mavra Chang. You made quite an impression on her.”

Mavra felt slightly pleased. “She’s been living in there for twenty-two years with you?” she asked, unbelieving. “And the daughter is almost that?”

“Oh, no,” Obie replied. “Not exactly. Several years, yes. The child is about fifteen, and very attractive—I did remake her slightly,” the computer boasted. “Nikki is about twenty-five. There was no purpose to their living a strictly linear existence in there. I could provide the growth-match and some of the upbringing in the same way I put plans in your head, Mavra. They’ve lived off and on inside me.”

“I thought you were the god machine,” Renard pointed out, a little upset at all this. “Why’d you need people?”

“I could make extensions of myself, yes,” Obie admitted, “but not new life. The mathematics isn’t right for that. Even the Markovians had to become their own new creatures. And, of course, there was the matter of loneliness. I needed companionship. They have provided it. And they’ve been even more helpful ever since Dr. Zinder managed to build his transmitter and contact me many years ago.”

The surprised “What”s were getting monotonous.

“It’s been almost like old times,” the computer admitted. “Dr. Zinder was safe and well and happy—and could work with me. We coordinated with Ortega so that we’d know as much as possible what was going on with you all down there. It’s worked out nicely, and we’ve been able to help Ortega and several others with problems. The major task was the study of the Well, which is an endless project, and quite beyond me—and, of course, how to free myself of the Well’s hold. That proved to be relatively simple.”

“You mean you’re independent of it?” Mavra asked.

“Oh, no. I mean I know how to do it. The trouble is that only half of me is controlled by voluntary circuits—much like the human brain. The way to free the other half is to get into the shaft and short out a series of circuits. Harmless, but without them the Well and I cannot conduct proper communication.”

“Then why haven’t you?” Renard asked. “Involuntary circuit?”

“In a way,” Obie replied. “You see, they had me in ‘defense’ mode and that’s involuntary. In that regime, which I am still in, by the way, I can not open the door. I could make Nikki and Mavra into what I needed and give them the skills, or I could create a robot analog and do it myself—but I can’t get out there to do it.”

Mavra’s brain was racing, questions shooting through her mind with blinding speed.

“Obie?” she asked. “Why did you pick me to give those plans to?”

“I didn’t. I told the same thing to everybody I felt capable of doing the job,” the computer responded. “You were just the one who made it.”

That wasn’t the answer she wanted to hear, and it clouded her thinking for a moment. She recovered with difficulty.

“Obie—Ben Yulin’s going to find this out sooner or later,” Renard pointed out. “And when he does, he’ll free you of the Well’s hold but still be in control. What happens then?”

“As soon as contact is broken, he can reverse the field,” the computer replied. “New Pompeii would be back in normal, familiar space again—and the big dish would be operational. With my knowledge of the Well, and the big dish, he’d have the power to transform an entire planet into anything he wanted.”

“And how long do you think that will take?” Mavra asked.

“Not long,” Obie answered apprehensively. “He has Nikki and Mavra Zinder, and he has learned from them that Gil Zinder can be contacted by radio. Dr. Zinder built me into New Pompeii because of Trelig’s threats to harm Nikki Zinder. Do you think he’ll do less to save his daughter and grand-daughter? You know better. In a matter of hours Yulin will know it all. He’ll break contact with the Well not long after—and he’s very cautious and extraordinarily tricky. I calculate that Yulin will discover that I’m talking to you over the ship’s radio within that period, too, and put a halt to it.”

Plans and schematics continued to flash through Mavra’s head. Something, the key to it all, was there, she knew. But what? I’ve got too much data, she thought in frustration. Can’t get a handle.

“Then time’s running out on all of us,” Renard breathed helplessly.

“Except for Ben Yulin,” agreed Obie.