Planet of the Damned Page 3

  III

  This time there was no way to hold the door. Ihjel didn't try. Hestepped aside and two men stumbled into the room. He walked outbehind their backs without saying a word.

  "What happened? What did he do?" the doctor asked, rushing inthrough the ruined door. He swept a glance over the continuousrecording dials at the foot of Brion's bed. Respiration,temperature, heart, blood pressure--all were normal. The patient layquietly and didn't answer him.

  For the rest of that day, Brion had much to think about. It wasdifficult. The fatigue, mixed with the tranquilizers and otherdrugs, had softened his contact with reality. His thoughts keptechoing back and forth in his mind, unable to escape. What had Ihjelmeant? What was that nonsense about Anvhar? Anvhar was that waybecause--well, it just was. It had come about naturally. Or had it?

  The planet had a very simple history. From the very beginning therehad never been anything of real commercial interest on Anvhar. Welloff the interstellar trade routes, there were no minerals worthdigging and transporting the immense distances to the nearestinhabited worlds. Hunting the winter beasts for their pelts was aprofitable but very minor enterprise, never sufficient for massmarkets. Therefore no organized attempt had ever been made tocolonize the planet. In the end it had been settled completely bychance. A number of offplanet scientific groups had establishedobservation and research stations, finding unlimited data to observeand record during Anvhar's unusual yearly cycle. The long-durationobservations encouraged the scientific workers to bring theirfamilies and, slowly but steadily, small settlements grew up. Manyof the fur hunters settled there as well, adding to the smallpopulation. This had been the beginning.

  Few records existed of those early days, and the first six centuriesof Anvharian history were more speculation than fact. The Breakdownoccurred about that time, and in the galaxy-wide disruption Anvharhad to fight its own internal battle. When the Earth Empirecollapsed it was the end of more than an era. Many of theobservation stations found themselves representing institutions thatno longer existed. The professional hunters no longer had marketsfor their furs, since Anvhar possessed no interstellar ships of itsown. There had been no real physical hardship involved in theBreakdown as it affected Anvhar, since the planet was completelyself-sufficient. Once they had made the mental adjustment to thefact that they were now a sovereign world, not a collection ofcasual visitors with various loyalties, life continued unchanged.Not easy--living on Anvhar is never easy--but at least withoutdifference on the surface.

  The thoughts and attitudes of the people were, however, goingthrough a great transformation. Many attempts were made to developsome form of stable society and social relationship. Again, littlerecord exists of these early trials, other than the fact of theirculmination in the Twenties.

  To understand the Twenties, you have to understand the unusual orbitthat Anvhar tracks around its sun, 70 Ophiuchi. There are otherplanets in this system, all of them more or less conforming to theplane of the ecliptic. Anvhar is obviously a rogue, perhaps acaptured planet of another sun. For the greatest part of its 780-dayyear it arcs far out from its primary, in a high-angled sweepingcometary orbit. When it returns there is a brief, hot summer ofapproximately eighty days before the long winter sets in once more.This severe difference in seasonal change has caused profoundadaptations in the native life forms. During the winter most of theanimals hibernate, the vegetable life lying dormant as spores orseeds. Some of the warm-blooded herbivores stay active in thesnow-covered tropics, preyed upon by fur-insulated carnivores.Though unbelievably cold, the winter is a season of peace incomparison to the summer.

  For summer is a time of mad growth. Plants burst into life witha strength that cracks rocks, growing fast enough for the motionto be seen. The snowfields melt into mud and within days a junglestretches high into the air. Everything grows, swells, proliferates.Plants climb on top of plants, fighting for the life-energy of thesun. Everything is eat and be eaten, grow and thrive in that shortseason. Because when the first snow of winter falls again, ninetyper cent of the year must pass until the next coming of warmth.

  Mankind has had to adapt to the Anvharian cycle in order to stayalive. Food must be gathered and stored, enough to last out the longwinter. Generation after generation had adapted until they look onthe mad seasonal imbalance as something quite ordinary. The firstthaw of the almost nonexistent spring triggers a wide-reachingmetabolic change in the humans. Layers of subcutaneous fat vanishand half-dormant sweat glands come to life. Other changes are moresubtle than the temperature adjustment, but equally important. Thesleep center of the brain is depressed. Short naps or a night's restevery third or fourth day becomes enough. Life takes on a hectic andhysterical quality that is perfectly suited to the environment. Bythe time of the first frost, rapid-growing crops have been raisedand harvested, sides of meat either preserved or frozen in mammothlockers. With this supreme talent of adaptability mankind has becomepart of the ecology and guaranteed his own survival during the longwinter.

  Physical survival has been guaranteed. But what about mentalsurvival? Primitive Earth Eskimos can fall into a long doze ofhalf-conscious hibernation. Civilized men might be able to do this,but only for the few cold months of terrestrial midwinter. It wouldbe impossible to do during a winter that is longer than an Earthyear. With all the physical needs taken care of, boredom became theenemy of any Anvharian who was not a hunter. And even the hunterscould not stay out on solitary trek all winter. Drink was oneanswer, and violence another. Alcoholism and murder were the twinterrors of the cold season, after the Breakdown.

  It was the Twenties that ended all that. When they became apart of normal life the summer was considered just an interludebetween games. The Twenties were more than just a contest--theybecame a way of life that satisfied all the physical, competitiveand intellectual needs of this unusual planet. They were adecathlon--rather a double decathlon--raised to its highest power,where contests in chess and poetry composition held equal placewith those in ski-jumping and archery. Each year there were twoplanet-wide contests held, one for men and one for women. This wasnot an attempt at sexual discrimination, but a logical facing offacts. Inherent differences prevented fair contests--for example, itis impossible for a woman to win a large chess tournament--and thisfact was recognized. Anyone could enter for any number of years.There were no scoring handicaps.

  When the best man won he was really the best man. A complicatedseries of playoffs and eliminations kept contestants and observersbusy for half the winter. They were only preliminary to the finalencounter that lasted a month, and picked a single winner. That wasthe title he was awarded. Winner. The man--and woman--who had bestedevery other contestant on the entire planet and who would remainunchallenged until the following year.

  Winner. It was a title to take pride in. Brion stirred weakly on hisbed and managed to turn so he could look out of the window. Winnerof Anvhar. His name was already slated for the history books, one ofthe handful of planetary heroes. School children would be studying_him_ now, just as he had read of the Winners of the past. Weavingdaydreams and imaginary adventures around Brion's victories, hopingand fighting to equal them someday. To be a Winner was the greatesthonor in the universe.

  Outside, the afternoon sun shimmered weakly in a dark sky. Theendless icefields soaked up the dim light, reflecting it back as acolder and harsher illumination. A single figure on skis cut a lineacross the empty plain; nothing else moved. The depression of theultimate fatigue fell on Brion and everything changed, as if helooked in a mirror at a previously hidden side.

  He saw suddenly--with terrible clarity--that to be a Winner was tobe absolutely nothing. Like being the best flea, among all the fleason a single dog.

  What was Anvhar after all? An ice-locked planet, inhabited by a fewmillion human fleas, unknown and unconsidered by the rest of thegalaxy. There was nothing here worth fighting for; the wars afterthe Breakdown had left them untouched. The Anvharians had alwaystaken pride in this--as if being so unimportant that no
one elseeven wanted to come near you could possibly be a source of pride.All the other worlds of man grew, fought, won, lost, changed. Onlyon Anvhar did life repeat its sameness endlessly, like a loop oftape in a player....

  Brion's eyes were moist; he blinked. _Tears!_ Realization of thisincredible fact wiped the maudlin pity from his mind and replaced itwith fear. Had his mind snapped in the strain of the last match?These thoughts weren't his. Self-pity hadn't made him a Winner--whywas he feeling it now? Anvhar was his universe--how could he evenimagine it as a tag-end planet at the outer limb of creation? Whathad come over him and induced this inverse thinking?

  As he thought the question, the answer appeared at the same instant.Winner Ihjel. The fat man with the strange pronouncements andprobing questions. Had he cast a spell like some sorcerer--or thedevil in _Faust_? No, that was pure nonsense. But he had donesomething. Perhaps planted a suggestion when Brion's resistance waslow. Or used subliminal vocalization like the villain in _CerebrusChained_. Brion could find no adequate reason on which to base hissuspicions. But he knew, with sure positiveness, that Ihjel wasresponsible.

  He whistled at the sound-switch next to his pillow and the repairedcommunicator came to life. The duty nurse appeared in the small screen.

  "The man who was here today," Brion said, "Winner Ihjel. Do you knowwhere he is? I must contact him."

  For some reason this flustered her professional calm. The nursestarted to answer, excused herself, and blanked the screen. Whenit lit again a man in guard's uniform had taken her place.

  "You made an inquiry," the guard said, "about Winner Ihjel. We areholding him here in the hospital, following the disgraceful way inwhich he broke into your room."

  "I have no charges to make. Will you ask him to come and see me atonce?"

  The guard controlled his shock. "I'm sorry, Winner--I don't see howwe can. Dr. Caulry left specific orders that you were not to be--"

  "The doctor has no control over my personal life." Brioninterrupted. "I'm not infectious, nor ill with anything more thanextreme fatigue. I want to see that man. At once."

  The guard took a deep breath, and made a quick decision. "He is onthe way up now," he said, and rung off.

  "What did you do to me?" Brion asked as soon as Ihjel had enteredand they were alone. "You won't deny that you have put alienthoughts in my head?"

  "No, I won't deny it. Because the whole point of my being here isto get those 'alien' thoughts across to you."

  "Tell me how you did it," Brion insisted. "I must know."

  "I'll tell you--but there are many things you should understandfirst, before you decide to leave Anvhar. You must not only hearthem, you will have to believe them. The primary thing, the clueto the rest, is the true nature of your life here. How do you thinkthe Twenties originated?"

  Before he answered, Brion carefully took a double dose of the mildstimulant he was allowed. "I don't think," he said; "I know. It'sa matter of historical record. The founder of the games was Giroldi,the first contest was held in 378 A.B. The Twenties have been heldevery year since then. They were strictly local affairs in thebeginning, but were soon well established on a planet-wide scale."

  "True enough," Ihjel said. "But you're describing _what_ happened.I asked you _how_ the Twenties originated. How could any single mantake a barbarian planet, lightly inhabited by half-mad hunters andalcoholic farmers, and turn it into a smooth-running social machinebuilt around the artificial structure of the Twenties? It justcouldn't be done."

  "But it _was_ done!" Brion insisted. "You can't deny that. And thereis nothing artificial about the Twenties. They are a logical way tolive a life on a planet like this."

  Ihjel laughed, a short ironic bark. "Very logical," he said; "buthow often does logic have anything to do with the organization ofsocial groups and governments? You're not thinking. Put yourself infounder Giroldi's place. Imagine that you have glimpsed the greatidea of the Twenties and you want to convince others. So you walk upto the nearest louse-ridden, brawling, superstitious, booze-embalmedhunter and explain clearly. How a program of his favoritesports--things like poetry, archery and chess--can make his lifethat much more interesting and virtuous. You do that. But keep youreyes open at the same time, and be ready for a fast draw."

  Even Brion had to smile at the absurdity of the suggestion. Ofcourse it couldn't happen that way. Yet, since it had happened,there must be a simple explanation.

  "We can beat this back and forth all day," Ihjel told him, "and youwon't get the right idea unless--" He broke off suddenly, staring atthe communicator. The operation light had come on, though the screenstayed dark. Ihjel reached down a meaty hand and pulled loosethe recently connected wires. "That doctor of yours is verycurious--and he's going to stay that way. The truth behind theTwenties is none of his business. But it's going to be yours. Youmust come to realize that the life you lead here is a complete andartificial construction, developed by Societics experts and put intoapplication by skilled field workers."

  "Nonsense!" Brion broke in. "Systems of society can't be dreamed upand forced on people like that. Not without bloodshed and violence."

  "Nonsense, yourself," Ihjel told him. "That may have been true inthe dawn of history, but not any more. You have been reading toomany of the old Earth classics; you imagine that we still live inthe Ages of Superstition. Just because fascism and communism wereonce forced on reluctant populations, you think this holds true forall time. Go back to your books. In exactly the same era democracyand self-government were adapted by former colonial states, likeIndia and the Union of North Africa, and the only violence wasbetween local religious groups. Change is the lifeblood of mankind.Everything we today accept as normal was at one time an innovation.And one of the most recent innovations is the attempt to guide thesocieties of mankind into something more consistent with thepersonal happiness of individuals."

  "The God complex," Brion said; "forcing human lives into a moldwhether they want to be fitted into it or not."

  "Societies can be that," Ihjel agreed. "It was in the beginning, andthere were some disastrous results of attempts to force populationsinto a political climate where they didn't belong. They weren't allfailures--Anvhar here is a striking example of how good thetechnique can be when correctly applied. It's not done this way anymore, though. As with all of the other sciences, we have found outthat the more we know, the more there is to know. We no longerattempt to guide cultures towards what we consider a beneficialgoal. There are too many goals, and from our limited vantage pointit is hard to tell the good ones from the bad ones. All we do nowis try to protect the growing cultures, give a little jolt to thestagnating ones--and bury the dead ones. When the work was firstdone here on Anvhar the theory hadn't progressed that far. Theunderstandably complex equations that determine just where in thescale from a Type I to a Type V a culture is, had not yet beencompleted. The technique then was to work out an artificial culturethat would be most beneficial for a planet, then bend it into themold."

  "How can that be done?" Brion asked. "How was it done here?"

  "We've made some progress--you're finally asking 'how.' Thetechnique here took a good number of agents, and a great deal ofmoney. Personal honor was emphasized in order to encourage dueling,and this led to a heightened interest in the technique of personalcombat. When this was well intrenched Giroldi was brought in, andhe showed how organized competitions could be more interesting thanhaphazard encounters. Tying the intellectual aspects onto theframework of competitive sports was a little more difficult, butnot overwhelmingly so. The details aren't important; all we areconsidering now is the end product. Which is you. You're neededvery much."

  "Why me?" Brion asked. "Why am I special? Because I won theTwenties? I can't believe that. Taken objectively, there isn't thatmuch difference between myself and the ten runner-ups. Why don't youask one of them? They could do your job as well as I."

  "No, they couldn't. I'll tell you later why you are the only manI can use. Our time is running out and I must convince yo
u of someother things first." Ihjel glanced at his watch. "We have less thanthree hours to dead-deadline. Before that time I must explain enoughof our work to you to enable you to decide voluntarily to join us."

  "A very tall order," Brion said. "You might begin by telling me justwho this mysterious 'we' is that you keep referring to."

  "The Cultural Relationships Foundation. A non-governmental body,privately endowed, existing to promote peace and ensure thesovereign welfare of independent planets, so that all will prosperfrom the good will and commerce thereby engendered."

  "Sounds as if you're quoting," Brion told him. "No one couldpossibly make up something that sounds like that on the spur ofthe moment."

  "I _was_ quoting, from our charter of organization. Which is allvery fine in a general sense, but I'm talking specifically now.About you. You are the product of a tightly knit and very advancedsociety. Your individuality has been encouraged by your growing upin a society so small in population that a mild form of governmentcontrol is necessary. The normal Anvharian education is an excellentone, and participation in the Twenties has given you a general andadvanced education second to none in the galaxy. It would be acomplete waste of your entire life if you now took all this trainingand wasted it on some rustic farm."

  "You give me very little credit. I plan to teach--"

  "Forget Anvhar!" Ihjel cut him off with a chop of his hand. "Thisworld will roll on quite successfully whether you are here or not.You must forget it, think of its relative unimportance on a galacticscale, and consider instead the existing, suffering hordes ofmankind. You must think what you can do to help them."

  "But what can I do--as an individual? The day is long past whena single man, like Caesar or Alexander, could bring aboutworld-shaking changes."

  "True--but not true," Ihjel said. "There are key men in everyconflict of forces, men who act like catalysts applied at the rightinstant to start a chemical reaction. You might be one of these men,but I must be honest and say that I can't prove it yet. So in orderto save time and endless discussion, I think I will have to sparkyour personal sense of obligation."

  "Obligation to whom?"

  "To mankind, of course, to the countless billions of dead who keptthe whole machine rolling along that allows you the full, long andhappy life you enjoy today. What they gave to you, you must pass onto others. This is the keystone of humanistic morals."

  "Agreed. And a very good argument in the long run. But not one thatis going to tempt me out of this bed within the next three hours."

  "A point of success," Ihjel said. "You agree with the generalargument. Now I apply it specifically to you. Here is the statementI intend to prove. There exists a planet with a population of sevenmillion people. Unless I can prevent it, this planet will becompletely destroyed. It is my job to stop that destruction, so thatis where I am going now. I won't be able to do the job alone. Inaddition to others, I need you. Not anyone like you--but you, andyou alone."

  "You have precious little time left to convince me of all that,"Brion told him, "so let me make the job easier for you. The work youdo, this planet, the imminent danger of the people there--these areall facts that you can undoubtedly supply. I'll take a chance thatthis whole thing is not a colossal bluff, and admit that given time,you could verify them all. This brings the argument back to meagain. How can you possibly prove that I am the only person in thegalaxy who can help you?"

  "I can prove it by your singular ability, the thing I came here tofind."

  "Ability? I am different in no way from the other men on my planet."

  "You're wrong," Ihjel said. "You are the embodied proof ofevolution. Rare individuals with specific talents occur constantlyin any species, man included. It has been two generations since anempathetic was last born on Anvhar, and I have been watchingcarefully most of that time."

  "What in blazes is an empathetic--and how do you recognize it whenyou have found it?" Brion chuckled, this talk was gettingpreposterous.

  "I can recognize one because I'm one myself--there is no other way.As to how projective empathy works, you had a demonstration of thata little earlier, when you felt those strange thoughts about Anvhar.It will be a long time before you can master that, but receptiveempathy is your natural trait. This is mentally entering into thefeeling, or what could be called the spirit of another person.Empathy is not thought perception; it might better be describedas the sensing of someone else's emotional makeup, feelings andattitudes. You can't lie to a trained empathetic, because he cansense the real attitude behind the verbal lies. Even yourundeveloped talent has proved immensely useful in the Twenties.You can outguess your opponent because you know his movementseven as his body tenses to make them. You accept this withoutever questioning it."

  "How do you know?" This was Brion's understood, but never voiced secret.

  Ihjel smiled. "Just guessing. But I won the Twenties too, remember,also without knowing a thing about empathy at the time. On top ofour normal training, it's a wonderful trait to have. Which brings meto the proof we mentioned a minute ago. When you said you would beconvinced if I could prove you were the only person who could helpme. I _believe_ you are--and that is one thing I cannot lie about.It's possible to lie about a belief verbally, to have a falselybased belief, or to change a belief. But you can't lie about it toyourself.

  "Equally important--you can't lie about a belief to an empathetic.Would you like to see how I feel about this? 'See' is a badword--there is no vocabulary yet for this kind of thing. Better,would you join me in my feelings? Sense my attitudes, memories andemotions just as I do?"

  Brion tried to protest, but he was too late. The doors of his senseswere pushed wide and he was overwhelmed.

  "Dis ..." Ihjel said aloud. "Seven million people ... hydrogen bombs... Brion Brandd." These were just key words, landmarks ofassociation. With each one Brion felt the rushing wave of the otherman's emotions.

  There could be no lies here--Ihjel was right in that. This was theraw stuff that feelings are made of, the basic reactions to thethings and symbols of memory.

  DIS ... DIS ... DIS ... it was a word it was a planet and the wordthundered like a drum a drum the sound of its thunder surrounded and was a wasteland a planet of death a planet where living was dying and dying was very better than living

  crude barbaric DIS hot burning scorching backward miserable wasteland of sands dirty beneath and sands and sands and consideration sands that burned had planet burned will burn forever the people of this planet so crude dirty miserable barbaric sub-human in-human less-than-human but they were going to be DEAD

  and DEAD they would be seven million blackened corpses that would blacken your dreams all dreams dreams forever because those H Y D R O G E N B O M B S were waiting to kill them unless .. unless .. unless .. you Ihjel stopped it you Ihjel (DEATH) you (DEATH) you (DEATH) alone couldn't do it you (DEATH) must have BRION BRANDD wet-behind-the-ears-raw-untrained- Brion-Brandd-to-help-you he was the only one in the galaxy who could finish the job..................................

  As the flow of sensation died away, Brion realized he was sprawledback weakly on his pillows, soaked with sweat, washed with thememory of the raw emotion. Across from him Ihjel sat with his facebowed in his hands. When he lifted his head Brion saw within hiseyes a shadow of the blackness he had just experienced.

  "Death," Brion said. "T
hat terrible feeling of death. It wasn't justthe people of Dis who would die. It was something more personal."

  "Myself," Ihjel said, and behind this simple word were the repeatedechoes of night that Brion had been made aware of with his newlyrecognized ability. "My own death, not too far away. This is thewonderfully terrible price you must pay for your talent. _Angst_ isan inescapable part of empathy. It is a part of the whole unknownfield of psi phenomena that seems to be independent of time. Deathis so traumatic and final that it reverberates back along the timeline. The closer I get, the more aware of it I am. There is no exactfeeling of date, just a rough location in time. That is the horrorof it. I _know_ I will die soon after I get to Dis--and long beforethe work there is finished. I know the job to be done there, and Iknow the men who have already failed at it. I also know you are theonly person who can possibly complete the work I have started. Doyou agree now? Will you come with me?"

  "Yes, of course," Brion said. "I'll go with you."