The Emperor of Everything

Chapter 9

Eventually they reached a great hall. At the bottom of a broad ramp was a circular stage, occupied by a half-dozen strikingly handsome men and women, who waited in high-backed levichairs. Concentric semicircles of seats marched up into a darkness behind the stage. Only the first row was occupied — by the other travelers from the barges.

Ruiz and his group were the last to arrive. When they were seated, the woman who today was called Hemerthe rose to speak.

“Welcome, seekers,” she said with a smile and a look that seemed to focus on each of them for a moment. “Today we’ll discover how you may serve Deepheart. We must exercise discrimination; eternity is infinite in time, but not space. Some of you will be chosen to join us in eternity. Others will surrender their freedom to defray our expenses. In either case, you will contribute to the grandest experiment in the history of desire.”

Cold comfort for those not chosen, thought Ruiz.

“So, without further delay, let us begin.” She gestured, and a mech guided an autogurn down the ramp. On it squatted a Gench — perhaps the most moribund one Ruiz had ever seen. Its sensory tufts were dry and crumbling, its eyespots were frozen in a random jumble. Its shapeless wrinkled body resembled a paper bag of moldy trash. Wires and tubes connected it to the autogurn, and on the gurn’s lower tray, machinery clicked and bubbled. Trailing the autogurn were two security mechs, equipped with padded manipulators and catch-nooses.

“What is it, the creature?” whispered Nisa, voice full of disgust.

“Remember the Gencha I told you about? That is one, although it’s certainly not a very healthy one.”

“Do they plan to take our minds, then?” asked Dolmaero.

“I think not,” replied Ruiz. “It seems too decrepit to survive a single such effort.”

The three vagabonds from the next barge were seated to Flomel’s left. The large young man glared at Ruiz. “Shut up,” he said. “There should be no gabbling at this important moment.”

Ruiz eyed him calmly. “You’re right, no doubt,” he said politely. “My apologies.”

The young man thrust out his chin, looking pleased.

The Gench paused before the first of the white-robed seekers, and a thin tendril reached out from the Gench and touched the seeker’s forehead. The man jerked, became rigid.

On the platform, the judges gathered around a podium dataslate. They murmured together, pointing at the slate and shaking their heads. A minute passed, then Hemerthe spoke. “I’m sorry,” she said. “Your body is flawless, but your mind is superficial, inflexible, disengaged from your passions. You are ambitious, but not committed.” She motioned, and the security mechs took the man by the arms and led him away.

The evaluations continued. Of the six in white, only two were accepted. The others were taken away in silence; apparently they adhered to a stoic code.

The Gench reached the plump young woman in the ragged finery. She turned up her face for the Gench’s touch with a clear-eyed innocence that Ruiz found unsettling.

This time the judges took a long time to reach their decision. Finally Hemerthe stepped forward. “We’re sorry, truly — this was a hard decision,” she said. “Your body is imperfect, but bodies may be enhanced without difficulty. The trouble lies in your mind. You are passionate, you are intelligent, you have enthusiasm and the urge to excel. Your deficit is this: You have never been beautiful, you have not learned the lessons of adoration.”

She lowered her head and waited for the mechs to take her. But Hemerthe wasn’t finished. “Still, you’re such promising material that we cannot simply sell you in the slave market. This we will do instead: We will make you beautiful and return you to your home. When you think you have learned what you must learn, come to us again, if you wish.”

When the mechs came to lead her away, she clutched at the fox-faced old man’s hand for a moment, then went, teary-eyed and smiling.

The old man was next. The judges’ conference was short and Hemerthe’s pronouncement definite. “You are one of ours,” she said.

The large young man was judged in similar swift fashion, but not positively. “You’re a joyless lout,” said Hemerthe. “I wonder at your temerity, to present yourself to us.”

He sat in shock for a moment. But when the mechs seized him in their padded clamps, he struggled and shouted out. “But you took the old man — that dried-out relic, who hasn’t been stiff in more years than he can remember.”

Contempt glowed in Hemerthe’s elegant face. “Do you imagine that one’s capacity to love depends on the health of one’s glands? His body can be made new; your mind will never rise above its present brutish level.”

The mechs dragged him away, cursing and flailing.

The judges disposed of the beautiful young couple quickly, but more gently. Hemerthe told them that they were too young, and had led lives of excessive comfort. “Still, should you someday escape or receive manumission, return to us. You may need nothing more than the experiences you will have as slaves to make you fit to join us.”

They took it bravely, Ruiz thought — and they appeared to take Hemerthe’s advice seriously. They were young.

The Gench touched Flomel, who jerked away and then fell limp as the Gench seized his nervous system.

The judges seemed to recoil in revulsion, faces stiff with suppressed reaction. “No,” said Hemerthe, without explaining. “But we will wait a bit before we send you to the block — the circumstances of your group are unusual — you did not volunteer for eternity.”

Flomel shuddered and gasped when the Gench released him.

It moved on to Molnekh.

“No,” said Hemerthe again — but this time she spoke in good humor. “Your passions are different from ours. If instead of Deepheart this were Deepstomach, you would be our king.”

To Ruiz’s surprise, the judges conferred at length over Dolmaero. But finally Hemerthe, shaking her head unhappily, pronounced him unfit.

“You were a beautiful young man, and could be so again, and you have the mind and spirit to dwell among us, but your loyalty is already given… and you cannot take it back.”

Nisa clutched at Ruiz’s arm as the Gench moved toward her, eyes wide with fear. Ruiz patted her hand. “Don’t be afraid,” he said. “It’s painless and soon over.”

The tendril sank into her forehead and she froze.

The judges crowded close to the readout slate, smiling and whispering among themselves.

“There’s no doubt with this one,” said Hemerthe, after lingering over the data. “She’s very well suited to eternity. She has always been beautiful, a creature of sensuality. Her cultural matrix is fascinatingly alien. And she has the depth of one who has died a death. Delicious. We must have her.”

Ruiz felt a bleak mixture of relief and loss. Surely, her existence in Deepheart would be better than the other possibilities that she faced — far better than her original fate, which was to play the phoenix for Flomel’s conjuring troupe until she had died too many times. Better than dying with Ruiz in some SeaStack dungeon. Better than standing on the block in the slave market, to be auctioned off to some downlevel harlotry.

But she would no longer be his. And he was certain she was capable of a wider life, that Nisa possessed more important talents than her enthusiasm in bed. Would it not be a form of bondage, to spend the eons rutting in Deepheart? No matter how much pleasure it brought, might there not come an emptiness, finally?

The Gench withdrew its tendril from Nisa and came toward Ruiz. He felt the cold sting as it penetrated his skull, and then nothing.

When he awoke, it was a slow painful process. He struggled toward consciousness, as though he swam up through some dark viscous substance.

He opened his eyes and saw that he had been returned to his apartment/holding cell. Hemerthe sat beside him, a look of grave concern on her elegant features.

“You didn’t tell us you were League,” she said.

He coughed and cleared his throat. “I’m freelance. Contracted.” The weakness of his voice frightened him.

“In any case, we almost killed you. The old Gench disturbed the mission-imperative, and it claims it triggered the death net. For some reason it stabilized before it went critical. You’re lucky to be alive — and I have no explanation for your survival.”

Ruiz coughed again. “I’m wearing it down,” he said.

Incomprehension masked her. “Whatever. At any rate, we want you. You and the woman.”

“Why would you want me?”

Hemerthe looked at him oddly. “You don’t know? You have no introspection? You have a strange and rich mind, Ruiz Aw. We have nothing in Deepheart like you. You’re a sensualist and a stoic, a libertine and a Spartan. You make love and deal death with equal facility. You are that most intriguing of candidates, a genuine mystery.

“Some of us fear you; these would have destroyed you while you recovered. They say you will loose a cancer of nihilism among us that will eat away our collective soul. But most of us are eager to learn from you. Come to us and you will never be alone again.”

“No,” said Ruiz.

“No? The alternative is slavery.”

“I’ve been a slave. It’s a temporary condition, for me.”

Hemerthe became agitated. “We cannot force you to join us — then you would be a cancer indeed. Can we bargain with you?”

“I have things I must do.”

“The mission-imperative? We can deal with that. The Gench is too feeble to remove the net, it claims, but it can clean away the mission-imperative — and then the net will gradually break down.”

“It’s not just that,” Ruiz said. He felt a sudden flood of terror, which he strove to conceal. To stay down here in Deepheart forever, with nothing but the endlessly repeated pleasures of impersonal sex… it suddenly seemed to him a horror. What must it be like, to be buried alive in a grave of eager flesh? “I have other responsibilities.”

“What are they? I tell you now, the woman must stay. She may protest initially, but our reading of her character assures us that she will soon adjust — and be one of us. You might be able to resist our persuasions; you’re much older and harder than she is. But she won’t.”

“I’m not so sure.”

“No matter,” said Hemerthe. “She must stay. But it’s you we most desire. Tell me why you object so much. Many risk slavery to come to us, but you reject us without hesitation. Why?”

Ruiz sat up, feeling a little stronger. “Perhaps I cannot submit myself to only one pleasure. The prospect seems tedious — to do the same thing always.”

“Oh, you misunderstand us. Do you think we spend all our time in bed? No; we humans are not so vital; we would soon grow ill. We have other interests, like anyone else. We have the standard entertainments: vid, emotigogue, psych-skew drugs. Hobbies are popular. I myself breed flamefish; also I make traditional porcelains — though I must admit, my bodies vary in aptitude and dexterity, so that the quality of my work varies and sometimes I’m frustrated. Still, one day we all will learn to make porcelain, as my spirit circulates through all our bodies.”

“That’s very nice,” Ruiz said, “but I fear I would feel diminished….”

“No, no. It’s obvious you do not understand us at all. Please listen; you cannot know what it’s like,” she said. Her face lit, and her gaze had an inward quality. “I know, you imagine that what we seek is the small hardwired thrill that comes of copulation with a stranger. I know what they call us, above. The Fuckheads; correct? No, it’s so much more than that. You must trust me; the sensation builds, through body after body — you penetrate and are penetrated, you tangle your flesh with his, then hers, and then another, and another, until you begin to feel what we prize above all, a consuming identity with all the other great souls, a sense that you have loved the universe, or as much of it as is possible for a human being to encompass. You cannot know what it is like.” She glowed, and against his will Ruiz was moved by the intensity of her emotion.

“Yes,” he said. “But…”

Abruptly her mood shifted. She seemed angry; she bared her perfect teeth and spoke in a harsh voice. “We can make you wish you had joined us. We could sell you to a downlevel bloodstadium. There you might live forever, too, but you will kill and be killed every day. Wouldn’t you rather love and be loved?”

Ruiz said nothing.

“Or,” she continued, “we can hurt the ones you care about. We can sell your friends into hard lives. But if you come to us, we’ll set them free.”

Ruiz shrugged. “Free? Alone and naive in SeaStack? Not much of a bribe; how long would they last?”

She drew a deep breath and regained control. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I spoke in anger, foolishly. We would do nothing so vengeful, if you did not join us. We’re civilized people. Still, the SeaStack slave market is an open one, and the bloodstadia would bid heavily on you; so I would guess.”

Ruiz could think of nothing to say. He considered his prospects. If he did not stay, if he somehow escaped and thrust himself out into the brutal world of SeaStack and attempted to fight his way home, would he survive? Unlikely. Even so, the prospect of immuring himself in Deepheart’s eternal sexual frenzy was a dreadful one.

Above all, he thought, in Deepheart he would lose forever that special connection he had found with Nisa. Once in a thousand years he might lie with her, if they both dwelled in Deepheart, but it was unlikely they would ever again be together in the flesh they wore now.

He tried to explain. “Have you ever noticed that there are great differences between people who have lived everywhere, who have walked the soil of a dozen worlds and the pavements of a hundred cities, and the folk who were born in the house their grandparents were born in, who spend all their lives in one place?

“The city folk,” he said, “they’re clever and versatile and adaptable, and often the stay-at-homes envy them their breadth of experience. But there are advantages to staying in one place forever, too. The setting takes on an importance, a depth, that it never has for the travelers… and in that stability, people can come to know themselves more deeply. Sometimes they can think larger thoughts. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

She smiled. “An interesting analogy, to be sure. I think I know what you’re saying, and why you might feel that way — but it’s hard to keep them down on the farm. You are no bucolic, after all; how many strange worlds have you walked? Though I’ll admit it; few human beings are as intimately connected to their bodies as you are to yours — that’s one reason we want you so badly. We can learn much from you. But at least, I’m pleased to see that your objections are based on more than just blind fear.”

An idea came to him. A chilly revulsion resided in it, but he forced himself to consider it anyway.

“Perhaps we can make a deal,” he said.

She smiled and hugged him. “I hope so. What do you propose?”

He drew back slightly from her embrace, but she didn’t appear to notice. “I’d have to discuss it with Nisa first, before I can formulate my offer. Will you arrange it?”

She looked at him with suddenly cautious eyes. “There will be no opportunity for escape, Ruiz. We know your capabilities; we’ve taken stringent precautions.”

He shook his head. “You mistake me.”

“And we must watch you constantly. There will be no privacy.”

“I understand,” he said.

The mech let her into his apartment and closed the door, leaving them alone.

Nisa threw herself into his arms. “I thought you had died,” she whispered, arms tight around him. “When the monster touched you, you threw yourself back, and your face was someone else’s. The monster fell off its cart and shrieked. When they took you away, you didn’t seem to be breathing.”

He pressed her to him, oblivious to the spycells that surely watched. “I’m all right. Are you?”

“I’m fine. They’ve treated me well. My rooms aren’t as nice as the ones Corean kept me in, but I won’t complain.” She giggled.

He led her to the couch. “Sit with me. I must ask your opinion of a plan.”

She looked surprised, as if she’d never expected to be asked for counsel. “Heroes never ask the princesses what to do.”

“This is no goblin tale, Nisa,” he said, smiling. “But first, tell me. Have they explained what life would be like here?”

“Yes,” she said, looking down. “They have.”

“And how do you feel about staying?” Ruiz asked this with a sudden trembling uncertainty, though he strove to keep his voice calm. Suppose she wanted to stay?

She tilted her head and looked up at him. “I must explain something to you, Ruiz. On Pharaoh, I lived for the pleasures of the flesh; I kept slaves whose sole purpose was to bed me expertly, on the nights when I couldn’t find anyone more exciting.”

His heart grew heavy and he looked away.

“But,” she continued, “things are different now. Had the Sharers come to me then, I’d have gone gladly to them. Now, no. I have you.” She laid her hand against his cheek. “I do, don’t I?”

“Yes,” he said gratefully.

“They explained to me, Ruiz. I would never be with you again in the way we are now. Our bodies would go to other minds, and our minds to other bodies. I would lose you, wouldn’t I?”

“In a way. But you would be safe here — Corean would never find you.”

She drew back from him slightly. “You want me to consider this seriously?”

He nodded.

Nisa sighed and stood up. She walked to the autochef and operated it expertly. When she came back, she carried two beakers of a pale yellow wine. “Here,” she said, offering one to Ruiz.

She sat and sipped her wine for five minutes, staring at the wall, ignoring Ruiz.

Finally she turned to him and spoke in a careful voice. “Let me ask you: If we escape Sook, will you take me with you to your home? Will you let me be your companion, for as long as we both are satisfied with each other’s company?”

Her face seemed utterly composed.

“Yes,” he answered. He felt a sudden uncomplicated joy.

“Then I do not wish to stay here.” A lovely intimate smile curved her mouth.

“You understand that there are many dangers yet? That we may be captured by Corean, or by other enemies?”

“Of course,” she said, a little scornful. “Do you think me so unobservant? I have noticed that you attract difficulties. Still… you’ve so far survived them, which must mean something.”

“Perhaps. Well then, here is the proposal I will make to the Sharers.”

He told her his idea. First she was puzzled. When he explained it so that she grasped its essence, she shivered. “It’s so strange, Ruiz. So strange. Can you trust them to act honorably?”

“I hope so. I’ve already done so, in fact; they’re listening to us right now.”

“Oh.”

They sat together in comfortable silence for a few minutes. “I’ve noticed something,” she said. “You haven’t called them Fuckheads in a while.”

Hemerthe stood before them. “You realize, of course, that we had already considered this possibility. In a way, you offer us nothing that we could not take without your permission.”

“That’s not entirely true,” said Ruiz. “Your Gench will have told you that my mind is heavily self-circuited. Many areas of memory are locked down; if you simply take a copy of my mind and clone a body to hold it, you’ll be faced with the same difficulty you now have. You wish my willing participation, or so you claim.”

Hemerthe drew a deep breath. “Then let me see if I have this right. You two will permit us to take an impression of your total personality matrices, and will freely donate clonable cells. You, Ruiz will undertake to unlock the inaccessible areas of your mind, so that your replicant will be completely open to us.”

“I make no guarantees that my replicant will be any happier about staying,” said Ruiz.

“I understand. We’re not worried. It’s the self-protective aspects of your mind that we were most concerned about — otherwise you’re perfect. But what do you demand in exchange?”

“When the procedure is complete, you’ll release us: Nisa, Dolmaero, Molnekh, and me. You will provide us a boat in good operating condition and personal weapons. You will remove the mission-imperative from my mind. You will buy the slave Flomel from me at a fair market price — and he’s valuable, a conjuror from Pharaoh. Finally, you’ll give my friends a datasoak, so that they can learn the pangalac trade language. They speak only Pharaohan now, which would sabotage any chance they might have to survive in SeaStack, if something happens to me.”

Hemerthe laughed. “It seems you value yourself highly, Ruiz Aw. But apparently you trust us to keep our bargains.”

Ruiz shrugged, feeling a sickly helplessness. “I can find no alternative to trust. I’m afraid I’ve grown unresourceful in my old age.”

Hemerthe patted his shoulder. “No. Your instincts are still sound. We will agree to your terms; they are small things to us.”

Gradually, Ruiz began to feel a bit better. After a long while, he asked, from a rare urge to make polite conversation: “How long before the new Ruiz and the new Nisa will walk in Deepheart?”

Hemerthe grew animated and prideful. “Oh, we have the best tech this side of Dilvermoon. We grow the cells in dispersion, and then use nanomanipulators to construct the body, cell by cell. None of that primitive embryo-acceleration for us. How long? A week, ten days at the most. A few days more to embed the personality.”

This information gave Ruiz an odd chill. “Then I must leave immediately.”

The four of them stood on the landing, in the steamy SeaStack sunlight. Tied fore and aft to the mooring rings was a low sleek boat, powered by a silent magnetic propulsor. Its cockpit was covered by an armorglass bubble, now raised.

Dolmaero studied the boat with puzzled eyes. “I confess, Ruiz, I find this latest development even more astonishing than your capture of Corean’s airboat. How in the world did you win our freedom?”

Ruiz shrugged uncomfortably. “I sold a bit of myself. And a bit of Nisa. And all of Flomel.” In the safety pocket of his new unisuit was a cylinder of Dilvermoon currency, fourteen hundred paper-thin indium wafers. An energy tube was strapped to his forearm under the sleeve, operated by implanted muscle sensors. He wore a splinter gun at his belt, carried a tiny pepperbox graser tucked into each of his high boots. Here and there about his clothing he had hidden other weapons: knives, a stun rod, a monoline garrote.

“Which part of you and Nisa did you sell,” asked Dolmaero.

“A part that doesn’t show,” Ruiz answered shortly. Nisa squeezed his hand.

“Ah.” Dolmaero drew back slightly, as if in apprehension. “Well, the new language you bought for us is a remarkable thing. I find myself thinking thoughts that had never occurred to me before.”

“Me too,” said Molnekh. “It’s not a comfortable feeling, Ruiz Aw — but I suppose you had a good reason?”

Ruiz turned to Molnekh. “If somehow I should be unable to interpret for you, how would you manage?”

Molnekh rubbed his chin. “I hate to even consider the notion. We yokels, here on this weird world without Ruiz Aw’s protection? No, I can’t imagine such a disaster.”

“Nor I,” said Dolmaero.

Ruiz smiled. “Well, time to go,” he said. He stepped down to the speedboat’s deck. The boat rocked, sending ripples across the still black waters of the moorage. “Come,” he said, raising his hand to help Nisa aboard. “Let’s get moving, before the Sharers change their minds.”

When Dolmaero and Molnekh were seated in the aft bench, and Nisa was secured beside Ruiz, he pressed the toggle that lowered the bubble. The control slate lit, and a faint hum came from the propulsor. He touched another switch, and the mooring lines retracted.

He took the yoke and the boat powered away from the landing, leaving a frothing silver wake.

When they were outside, heading into the twisting channels, Nisa shivered, looking back at the carved gateposts. “It’s such an odd feeling, Ruiz. To think that our second selves will live forever in Deepheart, doing things that I cannot quite imagine…. It’s upsetting and yet… we two will live forever, in a way.”

Ruiz nodded, already preoccupied by his plans. He had tried to put away the speculations that now disturbed Nisa. His mind still felt raw, and somehow less well connected to the world, as if some crucial disintegration had occurred when he had released the locked-down areas. He felt a little out of control, as though his thoughts were no longer entirely his servants, as though they no longer obeyed the boundaries he had always placed around them. His mind seemed, as it had not in so many years, to be unknown territory. Perhaps, he thought, it was partly because the weight of the mission-imperative was gone, leaving him a little light-headed and unfocused.

Whenever his attention strayed, and he began to imagine the clones slowly developing in their gestation tanks, he shifted his thoughts to other matters.

Nisa spoke again. “It’s strange, Ruiz. I wonder if what I feel now is anything like the way that peasants feel, when they must sell their children to the slavetaker or let them starve.”

There was such a forlorn tone in her voice that he put his arm around her and pulled her close. “We made a hard choice, but it’s done. Who knows; their lives may be far sweeter than ours.”