Solaris

9 THE LIQUID OXYGEN

I have no idea how long I had been lying in the dark, staring at the luminous dial of my wristwatch. Hearing myself breathing. I felt a vague surprise, but my underlying feeling was one of profound indifference both to this ring of phosphorescent figures and to my own surprise. I told myself that the feeling was caused by fatigue. When I turned over, the bed seemed wider than usual. I held my breath; no sound broke the silence. Rheya’s breathing should have been audible. I reached out, but felt nothing. I was alone.

I was about to call her name, when I heard the tread of heavy footsteps coming towards me. A numb calm descended:

“Gibarian?”

“Yes, it’s me. Don’t switch the light on.”

“No?”

“There’s no need, and it’s better for us to stay in the dark.”

“But you are dead…”

“Don’t let that worry you. You recognize my voice, don’t you?”

“Yes. Why did you kill yourself?”

“I had no choice. You arrived four days late. If you had come earlier, I would not have been forced to kill myself. Don’t worry about it, though, I don’t regret anything.”

“You really are there? I’m not asleep?”

“Oh, you think you’re dreaming about me? As you did with Rheya?”

“Where is she?”

“How should I know?”

“I have a feeling that you do.”

“Keep your feelings for yourself. Let’s say I’m deputizing for her.”

“I want her here too!”

“Not possible.”

“Why not? You know very well that it isn’t the real you, just my…”

“No, I am the real Gibarian — just a new incarnation. But let’s not waste time on useless chatter.”

“You’ll be leaving again?”

“Yes.”

“And then she’ll come back?”

“Why should you care about that?”

“She belongs to me.”

“You are afraid of her.”

“No.”

“She disgusts you.”

“What do you want with me?”

“Save your pity for yourself — you have a right to it — but not for her. She will always be twenty years old. You must know that.”

I felt suddenly at ease again, for no apparent reason, and ready to hear him out. He seemed to have come closer, though I could not see him in the dark.

“What do you want?”

“Sartorius has convinced Snow that you have been deceiving him. Right now they are trying to give you the same treatment. Building the X-ray beamer is a cover for constructing a magnetic field disruptor.”

“Where is she?”

“Didn’t you hear me? I came to warn you.”

“Where is she?”

“I don’t know. Be careful. You must find some kind of weapon. You can’t trust anyone.”

“I can trust Rheya.”

He stifled a laugh: “Of course, you can trust Rheya — to some extent. And you can always follow my example, if all else fails.”

“You are not Gibarian.”

“No? Then who am I? A dream?”

“No, you are only a puppet. But you don’t realize that you are.”

“And how do you know what you are?”

I tried to stand up, but could not stir. Although Gibarian was still speaking, I could not understand his words; there was only the drone of his voice. I struggled to regain control of my body, felt a sudden wrench and… I woke up, and drew down great gulps of air. It was dark, and I had been having a nightmare. And now I heard a distant, monotonous voice: “… a dilemma that we are not equipped to solve. We are the cause of our own sufferings. The Polytheres behave strictly as a kind of amplifier of our own thoughts. Any attempt to understand the motivation of these occurrences is blocked by our own anthropomorphism. Where there are no men, there cannot be motives accessible to men. Before we can proceed with our research, either our own thoughts or their materialized forms must be destroyed. It is not within our power to destroy our thoughts. As for destroying their material forms, that could be like committing murder.”

I had recognized Gibarian’s voice at once. When I stretched out my arm, I found myself alone. I had fallen asleep again. This was another dream. I called Gibarian’s name, and the voice stopped in mid-sentence. There was the sound of a faint gasp, then a gust of air.

“Well, Gibarian,” I yawned, “You seem to be following me out of one dream and into the next…”

There was a rustling sound from somewhere close, and I called his name again. The bed-springs creaked, and a voice whispered in my ear:

“Kris… it’s me…”

“Rheya? Is it you? What about Gibarian?”

“But… you said he was dead, Kris.”

“He can be alive in a dream,” I told her dejectedly, although I was not completely sure that it had been a dream. “He spoke to me… He was here…”

My head sank back onto the pillow. Rheya said something, but I was already drifting into sleep.

In the red light of morning, the events of the previous night returned. I had dreamt that I was talking to Gibarian, But afterwards, I could swear that I had heard his voice, although I had no clear recall of what he had said, and it had not been a conversation — more like a speech.

Rheya was splashing about in the bathroom. I looked under the bed, where I had hidden the tape-recorder a few days earlier. It was no longer there.

“Rheya!” She put her face round the door. “Did you see a tape-recorder under the bed, a little pocket one?”

“There was a pile of stuff under the bed. I put it all over there.” She pointed to a shelf by the medicine cabinet, and disappeared back into the bathroom.

There was no tape-recorder on the shelf, and when Rheya emerged from the bathroom I asked her to think again. She sat combing her hair, and did not answer. It was not until now that I noticed how pale she was, and how closely she was watching me in the mirror. I returned to the attack:

“The tape-recorder is missing, Rheya.”

“Is that all you have to tell me?”

“I’m sorry. You’re right, it’s silly to get so worked up about a tape-recorder.”

Anything to avoid a quarrel.

Later, over breakfast, the change in Rheya’s behavior was obvious, yet I could not define it. She did not meet my eyes, and was frequently so lost in thought that she did not hear me. Once, when she looked up, her cheeks were damp.

“Is anything the matter? You’re crying.”

“Leave me alone,” Rheya blurted. “They aren’t real tears.”

Perhaps I ought not to have let her answer so, but ‘straight talking’ was the last thing I wanted. In any case, I had other problems on my mind; I had dreamt that Snow and — Sartorius were plotting against me, and although I was certain that it had been nothing more than a dream, I was wondering if there was anything on the Station that I might be able to use to defend myself. My thinking had not progressed to the point of deciding what to do with a weapon once I had it. I told Rheya that I had to make an inspection of the store-rooms, and she trailed behind me silently.

I ransacked packing-cases and capsules, and when we reached the lower deck I was unable to resist looking into the cold store. Not wanting Rheya to go in, I put my head inside the door and looked around. The recumbent figure was still covered by its dark shroud, but from my position in the doorway I could not make out whether the black woman was still sleeping by Gibarian’s body. I had the impression that she was no longer there.

I wandered from one store-room to another, unable to locate anything that might serve as a weapon, and with a rising feeling of depression. All at once I noticed that Rheya was not with me. Then she reappeared; she had been hanging back in the corridor. In spite of the pain she suffered when she could not see me, she had been trying to keep away. I should have been astonished: instead, I went on acting as if I had been offended — but then, who had offended me? — and sulking like a child.

My head was throbbing, and I rifled the entire contents of the medicine cabinet without finding so much as an aspirin. I did not want to go back to the sick bay. I did not want to do anything. I had never been in a blacker temper. Rheya tiptoed about the cabin like a shadow. Now and then she went off somewhere. I don’t know where, I was paying her no attention; then she would creep back inside.

That afternoon, in the kitchen (we had just eaten, but in fact Rheya had not touched her food, and I had not attempted to persuade her), Rheya got up and came to sit next to me. I felt her hand on my sleeve, and grunted: “What’s the matter?”

I had been meaning to go up to the deck above, as the pipes were carrying the sharp crackling sound of high-voltage apparatus in use, but Rheya would have had to come with me. It had been hard enough to justify her presence in the library; among the machinery, there was a chance that Snow might drop some clumsy remark. I gave up the idea of going to investigate.

“Kris,” she whispered, “what’s happening to us?”

I gave an involuntary sigh of frustration with everything that had been happening since the previous night: “Everything is fine. Why?”

“I want to talk.”

“All right, I’m listening.”

“Not like this.”

“What? You know I have a head-ache, and that’s not the least of my worries…”

“You’re not being fair.”

I forced myself to smile; it must have been a poor imitation: “Go ahead and talk, darling, please.”

“Will you tell me the truth?”

“Why should I lie?” This was an ominous beginning.

“You might have your reasons… it might be necessary… But if you want… Look, I am going to tell you something, and then it will be your turn — only no half-truths. Promise!” I could not meet her gaze. “I’ve already told you that I don’t know how I came to be here. Perhaps you do. Wait! — perhaps you don’t. But if you do know, and you can’t tell me now, will you tell me one day, later on? I couldn’t be any the worse for it, and you would at least be giving me a chance.”

“What are you talking about, child,” I stammered. “What chance?”

“Kris, whatever I may be, I’m certainly not a child. You promised me an answer.”

Whatever I may be… my throat tightened, and I stared at Rheya shaking my head like an imbecile, as if forbidding myself to hear any more.

“I’m not asking for explanations. You only need to tell me that, you are not allowed to say.”

“I’m not hiding anything,” I croaked.

“All right.”

She stood up. I wanted to say something. We could not leave it at that. But no words would come. “Rheya…”

She was standing at the window, with her back turned. The blue-black ocean stretched out under a cloudless sky.

“Rheya, if you believe… You know very well I love you…”

“Me?”

I went to put my arms round her, but she pulled away.

“You’re too kind,” she said. “You say you love me? I’d rather you beat me.”

“Rheya, darling!”

“No, no, don’t say any more.”

She went back to the table and began to clear away the plates. I gazed out at the ocean. The sun was setting, and the Station cast a lengthening shadow that danced on the waves. Rheya dropped a plate on the floor. Water splashed in the sink. A tarnished golden halo ringed the horizon. If I only knew what to do…if only… Suddenly there was silence. Rheya was standing behind me.

“No, don’t turn round,” she murmured. “It isn’t your fault, I know. Don’t torment yourself.”

I reached out, but she slipped away to the far side of the room and picked up a stack of plates: “It’s a shame they’re unbreakable. I’d like to smash them, all of them.”

I thought for a moment that she really was going to dash them to the floor, but she looked across at me and smiled: “Don’t worry, I’m not going to make scenes.”

In the middle of the night, I was suddenly wide awake. The room was in darkness and the door was ajar, with a faint light shining from the corridor. There was a shrill hissing noise, interspersed with heavy, muffled thudding, as if some heavy object was pounding against a wall. A meteor had pierced the shell of the Station! No, not a meteor, a shuttle, for I could hear a dreadful labored whining….

I shook myself. It was not a meteor, nor was it a shuttle. The sound was coming from somebody at the end of the corridor. I ran down to where light was pouring from the door of the little work-room, and rushed inside. A freezing vapor filled the room, my breath fell like snow, and white flakes swirled over a body covered by a dressing-gown, stirring feebly then striking the floor again. I could hardly see through the freezing mist. I snatched her up and folded her in my arms, and the dressing-gown burnt my skin.

Rheya kept on making the same harsh gasping sound as I stumbled along the corridor, no longer feeling the cold, only her breath on my neck, burning like fire.

I lowered Rheya onto the operating table and pulled the dressing-gown open. Her face was contorted with pain, the lips covered by a thick, black layer of frozen blood, the tongue a mass of sparkling ice crystals.

Liquid oxygen… The Dewar bottles in the work-room contained liquid oxygen. Splinters of glass had crunched underfoot as I carried Rheya out. How much of it had she swallowed? It didn’t matter. Her trachea, throat and lungs must be burnt away — liquid oxygen corrodes flesh more effectively than strong acids. Her breathing was more and more labored, with a dry sound like tearing paper. Her eyes were closed. She was dying.

I looked across at the big, glass-fronted cabinets, crammed with instruments and drugs. Tracheotomy? Intubation? She had no lungs! I stared at shelves full of colored bottles and cartons. She went on, gasping hoarsely, and a wisp of vapor drifted out of her open mouth.

Thermophores…

I started looking for them, then changed my mind, ran to another cupboard and turned out boxes of ampoules. Now a hypodermic — where are they? — here — needs sterilizing. I fumbled with the lid of the sterilizer, but my numb fingers had lost all sensation and would not bend.

The harsh rattle grew louder, and Rheya’s eyes were open when I reached the table. I opened my mouth to say her name but my voice had gone and my lips would not obey me. My face did not belong to me; it was a plaster mask.

Rheya’s ribs were heaving under the white skin. The ice-crystals had melted and her wet hair was entangled in the headrest. And she was looking at me.

“Rheya!” It was all I could say. I stood paralyzed, my hands dangling uselessly, until a burning sensation mounted from my legs and attacked my lips and eyelids.

A drop of blood melted and slanted down her cheek. Her tongue quivered and receded. The labored panting went on.

I could feel no pulse in her wrist, and put my ear against her frozen breast. Faintly, behind the raging blizzard, her heart was beating so fast that I could not count the beats, and I remained crouched over her, with my eyes closed. Something brushed my head — Rheya’s hand in my hair. I stood up.

“Kris!” A harsh gasp.

I took her hand, and the answering pressure made my bones creak. Then her face screwed up with agony, and she lost consciousness again. Her eyes turned up, a guttural rattle tore at her throat, and her body arched with convulsions. It was all I could do to keep her on the operating table; she broke free and her head cracked against a porcelain basin. I dragged her back, and struggled to hold her down, but violent spasms kept jerking her out of my grasp. I was pouring with sweat, and my legs were like jelly. When the convulsions abated, I tried to make her lie flat, but her chest thrust out to gulp at the air. Suddenly her eyes were staring out at me from behind the frightful blood-stained mask of her face. “Kris… how long… how long?” She choked. Pink foam appeared at her mouth, and the convulsions racked her again. With my last reserves of strength I bore down on her shoulders, and she fell back. Her teeth chattered loudly.

“No, no, no,” she whimpered suddenly, and I thought that death was near.

But the spasms resumed, and again I had to hold her down. Now and then she swallowed drily, and her ribs heaved. Then the eyelids half closed over the unseeing eyes, and she stiffened. This must be the end. I did not even try to wipe the foam from her mouth. A distant ringing throbbed in my head. I was waiting for her final breath before my strength failed and I collapsed to the ground.

She went on breathing, and the rasp was now only a light sigh. Her chest, which had stopped heaving, moved again to the rapid rhythm of her heartbeat. Color was returning to her cheeks. Still I did not realize what was happening. My hands were clammy, and I heard as if through layers of cotton wool, yet the ringing sound continued. Rheya’s eyelids moved, and our eyes met.

I could not speak her name from behind the mask of my face. All I could do was look at her.

She turned her head and looked round the room. Somewhere behind me, in another world, a tap dripped. Rheya levered herself up on her elbow. I recoiled, and again our eyes met.

“It… it didn’t work,” she stammered. “Why are you looking at me like that?” Then she screamed out loud: “Why are you looking at me like that?”

Still I could say nothing. She examined her hands, moved her fingers…

“Is this me?”

My lips formed her name, and she repeated it as a question — “Rheya?”

She let herself slide off the operating table, staggered, regained her balance and took a few steps. She was moving in a daze, and looking at me without appearing to see me.

“Rheya? But… I am not Rheya. Who am I then? And you, what about you?” Her eyes widened and sparkled, and an astonished smile lit up her face. “And you, Kris. Perhaps you too…”

I had backed away until I came up against the wall. The smile vanished.

“No. You are afraid. I can’t take any more of this, I can’t… I didn’t know, I still don’t understand. It’s not possible.” Her clenched fists struck her chest. “What else could I think, except that I was Rheya! Maybe you believe this is all an act? It isn’t, I swear it isn’t.”

Something snapped in my mind, and I went to put my arms round her, but she fought free:

“Don’t touch me! Leave me alone! I disgust you, I know I do. Keep away! I’m not Rheya…”

We screamed at each other and Rheya tried to keep me at arms’ length. I would not let her go, and at last she let her head fall to my shoulder. We were on our knees, breathless and exhausted.

“Kris… what do I have to do to put a stop to this?”

“Be quiet!”

“You don’t know!” She lifted her head and stared at me. “It can’t be done, can it?”

“Please….”

“I really tried… No, go away. I disgust you — and myself, I disgust myself. If I only knew how…”

“You would kill yourself.”

“Yes.”

“But I want you to stay alive. I want you here, more than anything.”

“You’re lying.”

“Tell me what I have to do to convince you. You are here. You exist. I can’t see any further than that.”

“It can’t possibly be true, because I am not Rheya.”

“Then who are you?”

There was a long silence. Then she bowed her head and murmured:

“Rheya… But I know that I am not the woman you once loved.”

“Yes. But that was a long time ago. That past does not exist, but you do, here and now. Don’t you see?”

She shook her head:

“I know that it was kindness that made you behave as you did, but there is nothing to be done. That first morning when I found myself waiting by your bed for you to wake up, I knew nothing. I can hardly believe it was only three days ago. I behaved like a lunatic. Everything was misty. I didn’t remember anything, wasn’t surprised by anything. It was like recovering from a drugged sleep, or a long illness. It even occurred to me that I might have been ill and you didn’t want to tell me. Then a few things happened to set me thinking — you know what I mean. So after you met that man in the library and you refused to tell me anything, I made up my mind to listen to that tape. That was the only time I have lied to you, Kris. When you were looking for the tape-recorder, I knew where it was. I’d hidden it. The man who recorded the tape — what was his name?”

“Gibarian.”

“Yes, Gibarian — he explained everything. Although I still don’t understand. The only thing missing was that I can’t… that there is no end. He didn’t mention that, or if he did it was after you woke up and I had to switch off. But I heard enough to realize that I am not a human being, only an instrument.”

“What are you talking about?”

“That’s what I am. To study your reactions — something of that sort. Each one of you has a… an instrument like me. We emerge from your memory or your imagination, I can’t say exactly — anyway you know better than I. He talks about such terrible things… so far fetched… if it did not fit in with everything else I would certainly have refused to believe him.”

“The rest?”

“Oh, things like not needing sleep, and being compelled to go wherever you go. When I think that only yesterday I was miserable because I thought you detested me. How stupid! But how could I have imagined the truth? He — Gibarian — didn’t hate that woman, the one who came to him, but he refers to her in such a dreadful way. It wasn’t until then that I realized that I was helpless whatever I did, and that I couldn’t avoid torturing you. More than that though, an instrument of torture is passive, like the stone that falls on somebody and kills them. But an instrument of torture which loves you and wishes you nothing but good — it was too much for me. I wanted to tell you the little that I had understood. I told myself that it might be useful to you. I even tried to make notes….”

“That time when you had the light switched on?”

“Yes. But I couldn’t write anything. I searched myself for… you know, some sign of ‘influence’… I was going mad. I felt as if there was no body underneath my skin and there was something else instead: as if I was just an illusion meant to mislead you. You see?”

“I see.”

“When you can’t sleep at night and your mind keeps spinning for hours on end, it can take you far away; you find yourself moving in strange directions…”

“I know what you mean.”

“But I could feel my heart beating. And then I remembered that you had made an analysis of my blood. What did you find? You can tell me the truth now.”

“Your blood is like my own.”

“Truly?”

“I give you my word.”

“What does that indicate? I had been telling myself that the… unknown force might be concealed somewhere inside me, and that it might not occupy very much space. But I did not know whereabouts it was. I think now that I was evading the real issue because I didn’t have the nerve to make a decision. I was afraid, and I looked for a way out. But Kris, if my blood is like yours… if I really… no, it’s impossible. I would already be dead, wouldn’t I? That means there really is something different — but where? In the mind? Yet it seems to me that I think as any human being does… and I know nothing! If that alien thing was thinking in my head, I would know everything. And I would not love you. I would be pretending, and aware that I was pretending. Kris, you’ve got to tell me everything you know. Perhaps we could work out a solution between us.”

“What kind of solution?” She fell silent. “Is it death you want?”

“Yes, I think it is.”

Again silence. Rheya sat on the floor, her knees drawn up under her chin. I looked around at the white-enamelled fittings and gleaming instruments, perhaps looking for some unsuspected clue to suddenly materialize.

“Rheya, I have something to say, too.” She waited quietly. “It is true that we are not exactly alike. But there is nothing wrong with that. In any case, whatever else we might think about it, that… difference… saved your life.”

A painful smile flickered over her face: “Does that mean that I am… immortal?”

“I don’t know. At any rate, you’re far less vulnerable than I am.”

“It’s horrible….”

“Perhaps not as horrible as you think.”

“But you don’t envy me.”

“Rheya, I don’t know what your fate will be. It cannot be predicted, any more than my own or any other member’s of the Station’s personnel. The experiment will go on, and anything can happen…”

“Or nothing.”

“Or nothing. And I have to confess that nothing is what I would prefer. Not because I’m frightened — though fear is undeniably an element of this business — but because there can’t be any final outcome. I’m quite sure of that.”

“Outcome? You mean the ocean?”

“Yes, contact with the ocean. As I see it, the problem is basically very simple. Contact means the exchange of specific knowledge, ideas, or at least of findings, definite facts. But what if no exchange is possible? If an elephant is not a giant microbe, the ocean is not a giant brain. Obviously there can be various approaches, and the consequence of one of them is that you are here, now, with me. And I am trying my hardest to make you realize that I love you. Just your being here cancels out the twelve years of my life that went into the study of Solaris, and I want to keep you.

“You may have been sent to torment me, or to make my life happier, or as an instrument ignorant of its function, used like a microscope with me on the slide. Possibly you are here as a token of friendship, or a subtle punishment, or even as a joke. It could be all of those at once, or — which is more probable — something else completely. If you say that our future depends on the ocean’s intentions, I can’t deny it. I can’t tell the future any more than you can. I can’t even swear that I shall always love you. After what has happened already, we can expect anything. Suppose tomorrow it turns me into a green jellyfish! It’s out of our hands. But the decision we make today is in our hands. Let’s decide to stay together. What do you say?”

“Listen Kris, there’s something else I must ask you… Am I… do I look very like her?”

“You did at first. Now I don’t know.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Now all I see is you.”

“You’re sure?”

“Yes. If you really were her, I might not be able to love you.”

“Why?”

“Because of what I did.”

“Did you treat her badly?”

“Yes, when we…”

“Don’t say any more.”

“Why not?”

“So that you won’t forget that I am the one who is here not her.”