Virtual Mode

CHAPTER 9—DDWNG

THERE were more realities than Colene had dreamed of. Some were inhabited by what were probably human beings or the equivalent; most were not. They passed quickly through the inhabited ones, which tended to cluster, and lingered in the wilderness ones. Wild creatures, as a general class, were not as dangerous as civilized ones. Seqiro was able to stun any creature who threatened, or simply to change its mind. In fact, she discovered, he could generate a mental field around them that discouraged insects, so that mosquitoes and biting flies did not come close. The first time she had slapped at a mosquito he had inquired, and then sent out the no-insect thought. Just like that, no problem. He had been satisfied to use his tail to flick away pests, until then.

She had liked him from the start. Each new thing she learned about him enhanced the feeling.

They walked for another day and slept another night. She kept no count of the number of realities they crossed, but judged that such a day’s travel should represent about five thousand of them. The calculation was simple enough: ten feet per reality, if they crossed it at right angles as they usually did. Ten miles in the day, because they walked maybe ten hours at maybe three miles an hour, taking time for eating and rest. The tens canceled out, and the number of feet in a mile—about five thousand—was the number of realities. But it didn’t matter. What counted was that they were making progress toward Darius. She knew they were; she felt the strengthening rightness of the route.

Most realities were overgrown with vegetation, but they did encounter a series of them with rocky sections, and she was able to ride her bicycle through these. Otherwise she would have been dead tired, because this was a whole lot more walking than she had done in a long time. She was lucky that her camping experience had prepared her somewhat; she knew how to conserve her strength and not push her limits.

Seqiro, in contrast, seemed indefatigable. He had evidently made it a point to maintain his health and stamina, and it showed.

I could carry you, he thought. It would not represent a burden to me, as you weigh little.

“I just don’t think of you as a riding horse,” she said. “You’re my companion.”

Granted. But a companion may walk or be carried.

She smiled briefly. “If it comes to the point where we really need to get somewhere, and I’m really holding us back, then you carry me. Until then, I feel more equal afoot.”

Because in your home reality horses are beasts of burden.

“Never to me!” she protested.

But your mind indicates that the association is there. You are concerned with what others will think, though none are here to see.

“Never argue cases with a mind reader!” she said ruefully. “Or with someone smarter than you.”

I am quite stupid compared to you.

“No way! Everything I tell you, you understand right away, better than I do. So you’re smarter or older or both, or just plain have more experience.”

None of these. I am your age in years: fourteen. That is mature for my kind but my experience of my reality is less than yours of yours. I depend on your mind.

“Do you, Seqiro? Maybe you needed me to fetch your supplies and load them on you, and to open your gate. But once you got out of your reality, I became superfluous. You have just remained with me out of sympathy.”

By no means. I remain with you because I need you, and because we are compatible.

“A girl needs a horse,” she argued. “But does a horse need a girl? Wouldn’t you be happier out grazing, if the grass would stay with you?”

I would be satisfied grazing, he agreed. But I am also satisfied to be traveling with you. Since I can not safely graze, and can comfortably travel with you, this is the preferable course.

“But you could travel just as well without me! I’m really holding you back.”

Not so. I would be unable to travel without you. This is the major reason I did not break out of my confinement and enter the Virtual Mode alone.

“I don’t believe that!” She was feeling that self-destructive urge, trying to persuade him to do without her. She didn’t want to be alone; in retrospect she found her prior travel frightening. But to be a drag on this beautiful horse—that just wasn’t right. “Give me one gold reason why you can’t travel without me.”

My intelligence would revert to its normal level, and I would be unable to fix on a specific distant destination. I would soon be captured by any creatures who saw me as a beast of burden.

“But you’re smart! I couldn’t be talking with you like this if you weren’t!”

I draw on your intelligence, which is excellent. In your absence I would retain only the memory of you, not the power of your mind. If other creatures captured me, and none shared minds with me, I would remain dull. I was dull until I made contact with your mind afar; then I became more intelligent than any of my kind.

Colene was amazed. “You mean—it’s all me? I’m really talking to myself?”

You are talking to me, and I am as intelligent as you—because you share your mind with me. If you withheld your mind, I would indeed be just a stupid horse.

“But your kind controls my kind, in your reality! I saw it, I felt it. Your minds make hash of our minds.”

Our leaders retain intelligent humans who provide them with good power of the mind, much as your leaders retain strong horses who provide them with rapid transportation. In your reality your riders control your horses despite the inferior strength of the humans. In mine, the horses control the humans despite the inferior intelligence of the horses. It is a matter of who is in charge, and how power is wielded.

She was coming to accept it, reluctantly. “So you needed a smart companion, so you would understand where you were going and how to get there. And I’m that companion.”

Yes.

“And if I’d turned out to be a bad human man, you’d still have had to go with me, because it would have been either that or stay under stall arrest.”

Yes.

“But I turned out to be a sweet human girl, and you like that better.”

Yes.

She turned to him. “I was joking, Seqiro.”

No.

“I mean, about being sweet. I’m not sweet, I’m suicidal.”

Yes, you were suicidal once, and sweet. Now you are only sweet.

“You believe that?” she demanded.

Yes. So do you. This is why I believe it.

She stepped into him and hugged his neck as well as she could. “I love you, Seqiro.”

Yes. I also love you.

“But would you love me if you weren’t picking it up from my mind?”

No. That is not an emotion I would understand alone. But it is pleasant now.

“I think I like you even better this way. You are my ideal companion.”

Yes.

“Yes,” she echoed. “We are ideal for each other. Seqiro, we must stay together!”

Yes.

“You keep agreeing with me, and I love it!” she exclaimed.

Yes.

“Yet how is it you know so much, when I don’t know it?”

A horse has good memory. I have learned much in my life, and when I am with you I am able to apply it relevantly.

She walked on with restored attitude. Seqiro did need her, perhaps more than she needed him, and this was an enormous comfort. She had made it possible for him to escape his fate, and he would remain with her until he found what he was looking for—which he could best find only while he was with her, sharing her mind. That might be forever. That was long enough.

THEY stepped across a boundary, and suddenly there was barrenness. As far as they could see, the forested slopes had been abruptly denuded. The air was cold and dry.

They retreated, and the friendly trees reappeared. “What happened?” Colene asked, baffled.

Nothing in my reality explains this. But you have thoughts of nuclear war in yours.

“I don’t think it’s that,” she said with a shiver. “No slag. No green glass. No deadly radiation—I hope.” She glanced at him. “I don’t suppose you can detect radiation with your mind?”

Focus on it, and I will try.

She concentrated on deadly rays, uncertain of their names or how they would feel, but sure that they would cut up the tender cells of her body and mess up her genetics. Invisible shafts of destruction, like X-rays, only worse. Would this be enough for him to fathom? She doubted it, yet she hoped, because otherwise they were at an impasse. How could they risk that barren waste, without being sure it wouldn’t kill them just because they were there? They couldn’t go around it, because it was evident that it extended everywhere on that planet. There had not even been any clouds. It was just so utter and final!

I can detect such radiation, Seqiro thought. My telepathic mind is very sensitive to intrusion, and such rays would intrude. There are none.

“Are you sure?” she asked eagerly, but knew it was a foolish question. Seqiro knew what he knew.

Yes, I am sure. But this may be immaterial. If that waste extends across many realities, we shall not be able to cross it.

“It can’t extend forever!” she exclaimed. “My sense says that where I’m going is somewhere beyond it. Darius didn’t say anything about a desert.” But she realized that Darius hadn’t said anything about the intervening realities, because the first time he had simply cut through directly. Only with the Virtual Mode did every reality between them become significant.

Then we must cross.

“But suppose it does cross many?” she asked, nipping across to the other case, as was her fashion when in doubt. “Do we have supplies to make it? I don’t want to be stuck in Death Valley without water!”

I see the bones of horses in your vision of that valley.

“Yes! It’s awful! I’ve never been there, but I’ve seen it in movies. Oh, Seqiro, what shall we do?”

You love my company, but you would not be satisfied with it indefinitely. You must rejoin your human man. Therefore we must cross, because the alternative is not suitable.

“Yes, we must cross,” she agreed. She wished she could say it with more confidence. Where was the heroistic, die-for-her-beliefs girl she longed to be? Not here, unfortunately.

They camped for the night, so as to be able to start early in the day. They agreed that the desert might get hot in the day, and cold at night. They might do best to cross it rapidly and get back into comfortable realities. But if it turned out to be more than a one-day trek, they would be better off to maintain a measured pace, resting in the heat of noon and in the cold of night, preserving their strength. They could make a three-day crossing, but not if they exhausted themselves on the first day.

Colene fetched dry sticks of wood, and bunches of dry grass, and used one of her precious matches to light a fire. Seqiro had checked and ascertained that there were no high-powered minds in this reality, so that the fire would be safe. She was very pleased to have it, for psychological as well as physical reasons.

While she stared into the blaze, she reviewed plans with Seqiro. He would quest ahead for minds. He could tune in to both animals and plants, but the distance depended on circumstances. A strong telepathic mind similar to his own could be contacted across a continent, while dialogue with a non-telepathic mind was limited to about half that. The Virtual Mode was similar, making the different realities seem like one; without it he would be confined to one reality. The less similar a mind was to his own, the more limited the range. Thus plants had to be fairly close for him to receive. “Plants have minds?” Colene asked, startled. Indeed they do. But not similar to yours. We find the best grazing by tuning in to the healthiest grass.

“But doesn’t the grass hurt when you bite it off? Why would it tell you where it is?”

It does not suffer in the way you would. It is philosophical about being eaten. It accepts what is. Since grazing promotes the growth of more grass at the expense of weeds, there is a certain compatibility between us.

Colene shook her head. “I hope so! I’d hate to have my head chewed off every week or so!”

A plant would hate to eat through its head, or to pull its roots from the ground and walk about.

She considered. “I see your point, maybe.”

Everything was normal, for a single reality. But Colene was unable to relax, let alone sleep, for a time. The barrenness ahead of them worried her.

“Can we talk, Seqiro?” she asked after a bit as the darkness closed in.

We may talk, he agreed.

“Say, I just realized: you never argue with me. Not really. You point out things, you clarify what I don’t know, but you always go along with what I’m thinking about.”

It is true. I reflect your interests, as mine are not of great moment.

“How can you think that? You’re the most wonderful person I’ve met, next to Darius!”

True. But I am not wonderful without you. “You’re a horse! A horse is wonderful by definition.”

As is a girl.

“Let me tell you what a horse is to me. I’m going to introduce you to Maresy Doats.” She summoned her mental picture of her imaginary friend.

She is a winsome mare.

“Well, I never thought of her as having sex appeal!”

I would have to smell her to determine that.

She laughed. “So you’re just like any man!”

No. Human males are always interested in reproduction. Horses are interested only when the mare is ready. We do not waste energy. We regard this as more sensible.

“Well, Maresy is sensible. She always knows what to do. The trouble is, others aren’t always sensible, and they don’t listen. It’s all recorded in my book. For Whom Was That Neigh? It’s based on a picture I have of Maresy Doats. Do you want an example?”

Yes.

“Now, why did I know you would say that? Okay, here it is. Maresy and another mare were grazing in this pasture. It was the only pasture they had, and there was no other source of food. Just the grass. A tough variety that hung on through the winter. Now, Maresy is smarter than the average horse, and she did some figuring, and realized that at the rate they were grazing, they would run out of grass before spring, and then starve in the winter. But if they slowed down their grazing, and ate less grass, they could stretch it out so that it would last until spring, when it would start growing again, and they would survive. They might be lean, but okay. So it made sense to do that.

“So she told the other mare. But the other mare just went right on grazing, paying no attention. She wasn’t smart like Maresy, and didn’t understand anything except eating until she was full. She ate like a horse.

“So what was Maresy to do? If she stopped grazing, then there would be enough for the other mare, but Maresy would starve now. If she didn’t stop, they would both starve later. So should she give up her life so that at least one of them would survive, even though it was the undeserving one? Or should she prolong her own life for a while by continuing to graze?”

She should kill the other mare, and have enough for herself.

“But Maresy wouldn’t do that!” Colene protested. “She believes in life, not death!”

But if there is life only for one—

“Yes. So she’s in trouble. I call it the pacifist’s dilemma.”

How does the story end?

“I don’t know. We’ll just have to wait and see.”

How long?

“I don’t know.”

I do not see the point of this story.

“It has no solution, but it does have a point. You see, Maresy stands for me, and for people like me, who are smart enough to see that the world—I mean, in my reality—can’t go on this way. It is using up all its resources, and when they are gone, it will be impossible to feed everyone, and most or all of us will die. It doesn’t have to be that way, but everyone else, like the other mare, refuses to see the problem, and just goes on grazing at top speed. So we will all suffer, when we don’t have to, because of the shortsightedly selfish ones. We won’t know exactly what happens until it happens, and then it will be too late. I think that’s part of what makes me suicidal. I mean, what’s the point in hanging on to life, when it’s all going to end anyway, too soon?”

But you are free of that now, with the Virtual Mode.

“Yes. So I’m not suicidal now, maybe. But I feel guilty for bugging out on my world.”

With the situation as you present it, that is your only choice. You are freeing your world of your presence, so that someone else can survive.

“Say, yes! That’s a good way to look at it.” Somewhat cheered, she relaxed, and soon was asleep.

THEY did start early, as soon as they could see their way. Immediately, the barrens, as Colene thought of this region, were all around them, before and behind. It was as if life had never existed anywhere.

At first the land was reasonably level, but this changed with realities, and it became so ragged as to be an unkind challenge. Bare stone rose up in twisted contours, and sank into rubble. Tors gave way to pits, forcing them to wind around their edges, slowing progress. Meanwhile the sun rose in the bleak sky and the bright light beat down on them. Colene fashioned a hat from cloth to protect her face and arms, and covered Seqiro’s head and neck similarly, fearing damage from the intensity of the rays. They were a strange-looking pair, swathed in coverings fashioned of loose clothing, but there was no one to see.

Then the land descended. It was a great cavity, so large that it featured its own mountains and pits and convolutions, as if it were a continent in reverse. It extended ahead until the rim of the horizon cut it off.

Colene gazed at it with dismay. Then she had a revelation. “It’s a sea!” she exclaimed. “An ocean! We’ve come to the end of a continent! A sea without water!”

All water is gone from these realities, Seqiro agreed. There was nothing to do except descend into it, because her sense told her that Darius was somewhere across this region. “I hope we don’t have to cross the whole Atlantic or Pacific!” Because that would be doom; they could not walk that far.

That brought another concern. “How will we know if it’s too far? I mean, if it is, we should turn back, so at least we don’t die of hunger or exposure. But if we turn back, when we could have made it across—”

If we reach what we deem to be half our ability to travel without new supplies, and I still can not detect life ahead, then we should turn back.

“You can detect life behind us?” she asked. “I mean, you’re not just thinking that to reassure me?”

It is fading, but I can feel that life behind.

“Okay. If you get so you can’t feel it behind, and you still can’t feel it ahead, we’d better turn back. That’s not the same as giving up; it just means we’ll have to find a better way.”

Agreed.

Yet privately she wondered what better way there could be. They would not be able to go around the barrens the way she had around the hostile bear, because these were entire realities, each one a universe in itself. If there were a million of them, they just had to be crossed, because there didn’t seem to be any way to skip over parts of the Virtual Mode.

Well, if they had to retreat, maybe Darius would be able to find a way from the other side. She was sure that he was looking for her too; he wouldn’t have set up the Virtual Mode and then just twiddled his thumbs. They could meet in the middle. So maybe he was coming to the other side of this now, and was thinking about how to cross, and all she had to do was go back and wait.

But she was more independent than that. She wanted to make it on her own. So she hoped they made it across.

I echo your sentiment.

“Oh, was I thinking too close to the surface? I didn’t mean to bother you with this!”

I am becoming increasingly attuned to your mind, so can read more deeply with less effort. I did not mean to intrude. “Oh, no, that’s all right, Seqiro! You understand me, the way Maresy did. I don’t mind you in my mind. I just didn’t want to burden you with my worries.”

You are concerned about survival now, rather than death.

She laughed, somewhat self-consciously. “For sure, I’m not being suicidal, now that I’m up against possible death! I’m reacting in a disgustingly normal way. I guess that’s an improvement.”

You have reason to live now.

“Yes. Because of Darius—and you, Seqiro.”

But if you lacked these folk, your self-destructiveness would return.

“I guess it would. I’m no bargain, emotionally.”

If you had not had those bad experiences, you would not have become self-destructive.

“Well, I don’t know about that. Those experiences weren’t necessarily bad, just different or shocking. I hadn’t known how the people lived in Panama; plenty of other people do know, and they aren’t suicidal. I did a lot of good at that hospital, and the doctors and nurses aren’t suicidal. The rape scene—that I could have done without. But I didn’t get beaten up or anything, and I was so drunk I may even have thought it was fun at the time. It sure taught me to be wary of liquor and of men! That camp episode really worked out okay, and word never got back to my folks what had really happened. It taught me not to trust anyone, not with my true secrets, and that was a good lesson.” But you trust me.

“Now, why did I know you were going to come up with that? I guess I am breaking my rule. But I also guess I meant not to trust anyone human. I trusted Maresy, because she’s a horse, and horses can be trusted. You’re a horse. Trust just sort of comes with your territory.”

I like Maresy. But there are many horses in my reality who can not be trusted. You are as foolish to trust an animal blindly as to trust a human being blindly.

Colene sighed. “I guess I am. Okay, I won’t trust any other animals either. But is it okay to trust you, Seqiro?”

Me alone, he agreed. Yet do you not also trust Darius, who is human?

That set her back. “I don’t think I do trust him, exactly. I love him, but that’s another matter. When he told me of his wonderful magic land, I didn’t believe it. I wish I had! So I guess there is danger in not trusting people too. I hope he forgives me!”

He must have forgiven you, because he set up the Virtual Mode, so that he could rejoin you.

“Yes, he did that.” Then she paused in her descent of a slope. “Seqiro! Is it possible that it wasn’t Darius who set it up? But someone else? I mean, how would I know, for sure?”

If it was Darius, you will know when you meet him.

“Unless it’s someone just pretending to be him, because he wanted an innocent girl or something. Lots of men want young sex-slaves. I really don’t know Darius that well.”

I will be with you. I will know his mind.

“Yes! You will know his mind, Seqiro! You must let me know whether it’s really him, and how he truly feels about me. I’m not going to marry him, I know that, but I’m willing to be his mistress and helper if I just know he loves me.”

I will inform you of his feeling for you, if you don’t object to my intrusion into your private matters. Understand that I will be partial to his sexual sentiment as well as his emotion.

“I understand! I want him to want me, every which way from Sunday! Just so long as he loves me!”

It shall be known.

They continued into the waterless ocean, which seemed even more barren than the continent, because of what should have been there. A continent could be a natural desert, but an ocean could only be an unnatural desert.

That brought another horrible realization. “Seqiro! Suppose we reach the next living reality—and we’re at the bottom of the sea? We could drown!”

She felt a wash of panic, and knew that her thought had struck through to his natural mind. It was a horse’s nature to spook and run from danger. So it seems. But your intellect suggests that we might simply retreat through the boundary between realities and be dry again.

“Well, at least we wouldn’t be thirsty!” she exclaimed too cheerily. The notion of being suddenly under a mile or so of water terrified her. She realized increasingly that though she had been suicidal, she was quite choosy about the way she might die. Water would be too suffocating, and she didn’t like that.

It would also be crushing. Suppose they were crushed to death before they could retreat? “I think we had better be pretty careful how we cross boundaries,” she said, shaken. I will detect the ocean life, which will give us warning. “Not if it’s a sterile sea!” For now she realized that the presence of water was no guarantee of life.

I will flick my tail across them, Seqiro suggested. “But you would have to travel backwards! No, let me take something of ours—here, this kerchief of mine will do—and I’ll flick it ahead of me, and when it gets wet, we’ll know.”

Agreed.

They moved on, with Colene ahead, constantly flicking her kerchief as she approached each boundary. It became automatic: one, two, three steps, flick, step, flick and step across, and start over. It was about five of her steps between boundaries, about two feet per step, but she wanted no accident. It would have looked strange to an outsider, but it was a sensible precaution.

Now she was not sure whether she did or did not want to encounter such an ocean. If they found no water, they might have to walk thousands of miles through this dread desert, and would die of dehydration; already their water supply was diminishing at an alarming rate. But if they did find it, how would they get through?

Suddenly there was something. Colene clapped her hand to her mouth to stifle a possible scream. A light was blinking to the south!

I see it, Seqiro thought, responding to her thought. A beacon. It seems that we are not alone.

“But can you detect life?”

No. But life must have placed it there.

“Then maybe it’s safe to check it,” she said. “Unless it’s got killer machines or something.”

What would be the point of that?

“I don’t know. But whatever sterilized all these realities may intend to keep them that way. If that beacon picks up a sign of life, it may trigger another sterilization treatment.”

I suspect it can spot us as readily as we have spotted it. I am aware of no harmful radiation associated with it. Is it possible that it simply marks a path through the barrens?

“Maybe so!” she agreed, encouraged. “There has to be a way through, so maybe someone left markers. If we have to gamble, let’s gamble on the positive interpretation.”

Nevertheless, they were diffident as they approached the beacon. It disappeared when they crossed realities; it existed only in one. But it was easy to approach, because of its constant flashing.

It turned out to be a simple machine: a blinking ball mounted on a thin metal pole stuck into a porous section of the sea floor. At its base was an arrow painted in bright red, pointing east.

“A direction marker!” Colene exclaimed. “Pointing the way!”

Could it be your friend Darius?

“You mean, to show where he’s been? Or to find his way back?” She focused seriously on that for a moment. “No, I don’t think so. He’s from the reality of magic, and this is plainly science. Super-science, I think; that ball’s opaque, yet it flashes. It must be someone else. Maybe there’s a regular caravan through here, with markers to steer it straight.”

I doubt it. This Virtual Mode has existed only a week in your terms.

She nodded. “Well, one person, maybe, but not Darius. But it will do for us, certainly; this should be much faster, because now we know where we’re going, sort of.”

I agree.

Heartened, they resumed travel.

Meanwhile the contours of the bottom of the ocean were a revelation to her. Instead of being flat and sandy, as she had somehow fancied, they were phenomenally more varied than those of the continental land. There were mountains and valleys and rifts and lattices of twisted stone. There were holes so deep they filled her with dread, and slopes so sharp that they resembled walls. One section was like a monstrous banyan tree, with thousands of pillars reaching down to lower platforms, from which more pillars extended on down. Another was like an upside-down mountain with mounds supporting its edges. Elsewhere there were what seemed to be worm holes in myriads, ranging from pinhead to handspan diameter, disappearing into darkness. And the opposite: pencil-thin towers of packed sand, their sedimentary origins showing in streaks crossing the formation. There had surely been water here once; what had happened to it?

In fact, how could this region have been rendered so dry without disturbing these natural formations? She was able to knock over the pencil towers with her hands; they were not made for sidewise pressure. Any heat great enough to vaporize all the water should have generated savage storms. If some cosmic drain had opened in the bottom and let it all flow out, there should have been some pools remaining and some gouging as the drainage rivers formed. Instead it was as if the water had simply vanished, without even making any currents.

Then her bandanna snagged on something. She jerked it back, startled, for to her eye she was merely flicking it in air before a sea of air. She checked it.

The tip was dry, but looked as if it had recently been wet. Because the water couldn’t cross the boundary.

“Oopsy, Seqiro! We’ve struck water!”

The horse stepped up and turned broadside. He flicked his tail. It struck something.

I felt the liquid, he agreed.

Colene put up her hands carefully, and felt the air before her. The boundary was icy cold and slick. “Like ice,” she announced. “I guess we didn’t have to worry about drowning; it’s under such pressure we can’t get into it anyway.”

I sense no life.

So it was lifeless water. Some realities had been dried, some frozen, or at least sterilized. The two of them could not continue crossing boundaries.

This was not exactly a relief. “What do we do, Seqiro? Do we turn back? We can make it from here, at least.”

But if we find a way to enter the next reality, we will have water, greatly extending our range.

“I don’t think so. We can’t take it with us.”

We can if we drink it carefully, saving our own water for emergency use.

“But it must be salt water! We can’t drink that!”

It is my understanding that we can. In my reality we have a technique for filtering impure water through sand to make it pure. We can do that.

“Or we can evaporate some, and condense the vapor!” she agreed, turning more positive. “But we still have to get up to the top of it, and then what will we do—sail across it?”

Seqiro sorted through the picture in her mind, of a girl and horse standing precariously on a raft. I prefer not.

She laughed, humorlessly. “I guess not! So unless there’s a big change coming beyond the water-reality, we’re sunk anyway, no pun.”

I fear that is the case. But we should try to explore it if we can. If we can find land, and cross more realities, I can quest farther for life.

“I guess you’re right. This is about midday now; let’s see if there is any rise to the level of the surface north or south.” She meant to the left or right, because their progress was generally eastward. “Maybe an island, at least. But which direction do we go? It would be a shame if there is a perfect island north, and we go south and fail to find it and have to give up and go back.” She tried to make it sound cheery, but knew that her dark forebodings were coming through clearly to the horse.

Perhaps we could explore both directions, one going north, the other south, and double our chances. We may discover another beacon.

“Seqiro, you’re a genius!” she exclaimed. “And we can stay in mental contact, so the other will have the news first thing.”

They did it. Colene went north. She tried to suppress her belief that they were wasting time and energy, because even if they found an island and were able to cross the boundary, they would still have virtually impassable water to cross. These barren realities were an awful barrier!

She came to a rise, but it was followed by a depression. She saw a mountain in the distance, which should be an island, but it was to the northeast, in the territory of another reality, impossible to reach from here.

“How about you?” she asked, thinking at Seqiro.

I may have found an island. But I can not find an ascent.

“Keep looking!” she exclaimed. “I have nothing here; I’ll come join you.”

She hurried south, now trying to suppress unreasonable hope. “Have you found a path up yet, Seqiro?”

No. I fear I am lost. I am caught in an endless trench.

“I’ll watch out for it!” Suddenly she thought how much worse it would be if her companion got trapped, and she had to choose between staying with him or saving herself. Even if she had no choice, if something happened to him, how could she go on alone? His marvelous mind had become her main emotional support.

Thank you. But away from you I am just a horse.

“You’re so much more than a horse!” she protested. “But a horse is good enough.”

In due course she reached the mountain. It did seem to rise high enough to be an island, depending on how high the surface of the water in the other reality was. But between her and it was a deep channel, as if the mountain had sunk down in the semi-molten floor eons ago, making a depression. This must be Seqiro’s endless trench.

She found a place where she could safely drop down into it, the drop not so far that she couldn’t scramble back. “I’m in the channel, Seqiro. Where are you?”

Not far from you. I shall wait.

Soon she caught up with him. He was standing, breathing hard, the sweat rolling off his hide. “Why, Seqiro! What happened to you? You’re steaming hot!”

I’m afraid I panicked. I galloped, but found no end to the channel. I recognized landmarks I had passed before, and realized that I was trapped.

“You ran all the way around the mountain!” she exclaimed. “Oh, Seqiro, you wasted valuable energy and are losing water in your sweat. Didn’t you know better?”

I did not.

“But you’re so smart!”

No. Away from you I am not. I maintained contact with you, but only your thoughts came through, not your underlying power of mind.

She realized that he had meant it literally when he warned her about that before. So, alone, he had reverted to his underlying nature, and spooked when unable to figure out how to escape the channel.

Then she realized something else. “You couldn’t have run around the mountain! Half of it’s in the other reality, under the water!”

True. I realize that now. The loop evidently is completed on this side.

“Well, let’s get you out of this and climb that mountain,” she said. “Now that you’re smart again, did you see a good way for you to do that?”

Yes. There is a navigable slope to a dead-end path.

They walked back to it. Sure enough, it was possible for a horse to climb up on the mountainside, but then the path ended as it seemed about to cross over the top of the channel, which was deep and narrow here. It was as if there had once been a bridge here.

And there, in an adjacent reality beyond the trench, was another stick-ball beacon. This was certainly the right place!

But I will do better with your help.

“Sure! What do you need from me?”

Tell me when my front feet are about to land just before the bridge. I am unable to see them when my head is up.

“Okay.”

Seqiro got up speed and galloped toward the brink. “Now!” she cried as his front feet came down. He brought his hind feet up close to them, then heaved up his forefeet and leaped over the gap. He recovered his balance and slowed to a stop. He was out.

“I guess maybe we should stay together after this,” she said. “I really didn’t like being apart from you anyway, Seqiro. I worried—”

I understand. And of course he did, for he could read the complex of her emotions as she spoke.

They explored the mountain from outside the channel, and found a likely ascent. But it was a narrow ledge in places. “Um, will you be able to turn around there? I mean, if—?”

Perhaps you should explore ahead, and I will rejoin you when you come across a turning place.

“Okay. But let’s just not separate any farther than we absolutely have to, okay?”

Agreed.

So she ran and hurdled the trench and mounted the twisty steep path, catching handholds on the carved stone abutments to help haul herself up. She found a kind of landing, and thought its description to Seqiro, who then followed her up. They continued similarly, by stages, their progress complicated by the wall of cold water. When the best path crossed that boundary, they had to back off and find an alternate path. Thus it was evening by the time they reached the top, and they were tired. They had seen no other beacons or signs of life.

“You know, if this doesn’t give us some way to move on rapidly, we’re sunk,” she said. “It will be all we can do to get down the mountain and back to the last habitable reality.”

I shall be disappointed for you in that event. But perhaps Darius will find a way to cross from the other side, and you will still be unified.

“Gee, I hope so! It’s not that I’m not satisfied with your company, Seqiro, but—”

You need a human male like Darius, just as I need a mare like Maresy, to complete your life.

“Yeah.” She led the way along the leveling summit, looking for a good place to camp for the night. But the only good one was on the east side of the mountain, beyond the boundary. She knew exactly where that boundary was now, after bumping into it so many times on the way up.

Then she did a mental doubletake: this was the top. They should be able to cross that boundary now—if they ever could. So she stepped gingerly into it—and passed through.

It was indeed an island. Ahead it sloped to a rocky shore just a few feet below the level on which she stood. The waves washed against the barren stone, making froth.

“Seqiro! We’re across!”

I saw it with you. The horse appeared behind her as she looked back, seeming to materialize from nothing. But I fear that this too is impassable.

“Yeah.” Her elation of the moment faded quickly. The surface of the ocean extended to the horizon, featureless. Then she had another thought. “But the beacons pointed this way, so there must be something.”

At least we can wash.

She forced her mind away from the disappointment. She really hadn’t expected any more than this. “Yes, we can both take a good dip, and I can wash my clothes.”

This time Seqiro let her remove his load and harness, and she stripped. Nakedness didn’t matter with an animal, and if it did, it wouldn’t have mattered with this one. He could see her naked mind.

They stepped cautiously toward the limited shore, passing through another boundary just at the verge of the water—and stopped short.

There was a pontoon wharf projecting into the sea. It cut off abruptly about ten feet out, and seemed of recent vintage, with bright paint and gleaming metal chains connecting the floats.

But what was the point of a wharf here? Was it waiting for a ship?

It is a bridge. We can see only what is in this reality.

Suddenly it made sense. The path hadn’t ended; it continued on across the water. But only part of it was in this reality, because it was on the Virtual Mode. “So the beacons did know what they were doing,” she breathed. “Well, let’s wash, and—maybe we had better spend the night here, and eat and rest, before we start across. We don’t know exactly what we may encounter out there.”

True.

They washed up, finding the water chill but refreshing. Colene felt a special freedom, being naked in the open. Somehow it seemed that if she could be naked all the time, she would never be suicidal.

She walked out along the bridge, crossing the next boundary. The pontoons continued unbroken. But the appearance was of a ten-foot segment ending before and behind her. It looked far more precarious than it was. There was no doubt now: the bridge was part of the Virtual Mode. Someone from an anchor reality must have set it up. But who?

We shall discover that when we follow it to its source.

“But how do we know that source is friendly?” she asked as she toweled herself off, using a dry shirt. She would have preferred to let herself dry naturally, but she was shivering and had to get clothed before she did herself harm.

I will be able to tell, if I am let into the mind of the anchor person.

“You can’t just peek?”

I can enter only a willing mind. Once I do, I can communicate freely, regardless of the language of the person, and can control that mind, and therefore the body. But I can not penetrate a hostile mind, or even an indifferent one.

“But you controlled the minds of those human servants in your reality, so we could escape.”

Not exactly. Our humans have been tamed, in the manner of your horses and other animals, so are receptive. Wild humans would not be receptive, any more than wild horses in your reality allow themselves to be ridden. They had discussed the differences between their two societies as they walked; Seqiro now understood her framework well enough. Even so, particular humans associate with particular horses, and do not allow unfamiliar horses to govern them if their own horses forbid it. In the stress of the moment I was able to strike through, but that was a limited opportunity. “But you and I made immediate connection!”

Because you are highly receptive.

“Well, I’m not tame!” she said indignantly.

But you desired compatible company. You were extremely lonely and nervous. That enabled me not only to join you, but to reach you from a distance, and across realities.

She nodded, now chewing on cold bread from his supplies, because there was nothing here from which she could make a fire. He was eating a ration of mixed grains. “I was that, for sure! I still am. I need you, Seqiro, I really do! Back when I started getting depressed I did some research, and decided I fit the profile of BPD: borderline personality disorder. I mean, alienation from my parents, sexual betrayal by a date, inability to cope with what I was learning about the evils of the world, and I was son of on a roller-coaster of mood swings with nowhere to go. I really didn’t know who I was, yet I hurt something awful with rejection even when maybe it wasn’t real. I would get so damn depressed, even when there didn’t seem to be any good reason. I didn’t dare trust anyone, especially not after that business with Mitzi, even though that worked out okay, in a way. But I couldn’t stand being alone either. Even when I was in the middle of people who seemed like friends, I knew it wasn’t true, and I just kept cutting my wrists and hiding them. I kept sort of wanting to tempt men, make them get hot, make them really want my body, but I didn’t want sex with them. I knew that was crazy but I couldn’t stop. Little Miss Self-destructive, that was me—until I loved Darius. Then I lost him. Then came the Virtual Mode—and you.”

I understand you and need you as you do me, but I have no sexual desire for you.

“Yeah. I can parade around naked with you, and it doesn’t matter. I thought I just wanted to tease men, but now I think it’s something else. I just want my freedom, freedom from what’s bugging me, and throwing away my clothes in public makes it seem as if I’m doing that, but it doesn’t mean anything with other girls, that happens in the showers anyway, so it has to be men, and when they get hot it sort of proves I’m getting there, I mean I want to be attractive, but it’s sort of dangerous too. Like—you know, once I was eating cereal, and it wasn’t sweet enough, so I put sugar on it, and it still wasn’t sweet enough, so I put more, but no matter how much I put, it wasn’t there. Then someone said, ‘Try salt’, so I put a little salt on it, and suddenly that stuff was so sickly awful sweet I couldn’t stand it. I’d been putting on the wrong stuff, not knowing, because it hadn’t tasted sweet enough. So with the nakedness and me—I’m looking for salt, but sugar is all I have, so I keep trying but it keeps not quite working. Does that make sense?”

Yes.

“And then when I found the salt—Darius—everything sort of came together. But I didn’t quite believe him, and—”

Suddenly she was sobbing. She leaned her forehead against his warm side and the tears flowed down.

You were afraid of intimacy, both physical and emotional.

“I guess so,” she said into his hide. “Did I ever blow that one!”

Yet you did what any practical person would have. Magic is not believable in your reality.

“If I had loved him enough, I would have believed him!”

Love is not precisely what horses experience, but we have learned something of it from our association with humans. In our judgment, the best love is based on practical considerations. Trust should not follow love; love should follow trust.

You condemn yourself because you were unable to do it backwards. You should not.

She lifted her head. “I never thought of that!”

Because you had no compatible and objective mind to explore it with. You do need me—and with me, you are whole. “With you I am whole,” she echoed. “But Seqiro, are you whole with me?”

Yes. My need for you is primarily physical and mental, for I have neither hands nor intelligence alone, but I had those things in my normal existence. You provide also the emotional factor I need, the quest for new things and new meanings. In this you are my completion, as I am yours.

“Yes,” she breathed. “Yes! We are whole!”

Then they settled down for sleep, Colene curled against his warm side with a blanket over them both.

Naturally her own thoughts interrupted it. “Seqiro! If you have to be let into a mind, if it’s a wild mind, how come you could handle those mosquitoes?”

Their minds are comparatively simple. The complex human minds are another matter. Mosquitoes could bar my penetration, had they the wit. But they don’t realize that, and I would not advise them of it.

“So it does make sense, after all.”

Yes. He seemed amused. She snuggled against him and drifted off.

IN the morning they set out on the pontoon bridge. It was solid enough to support Seqiro’s weight, though it did sink somewhat where he stood. Now it was Colene’s turn to shore up his confidence. “These things are strong. See, the platform part of it consists of long metallic planks, so even if the pontoon you’re over sinks, the others take up the slack, and you’d have to weigh a lot more than you do to make them all sink. In my reality they drive trucks across these things. So it may feel insecure, and look insecure because all we can see is one little segment at a time, but believe me, you’re safe.”

Now I have confidence. For he had seen her mental picture of the heavy trucks driving safely across such bridges, and her trust had become his.

However, she led the way, with a hand lightly touching his nose. This was so that her light body would encounter any possible weakening in the bridge first, and to guide him, because his eyes were not well placed to see the bridge. Her mind and hand became his guidance. Only the lack of a halter on his head would have showed an outsider that this was not a girl leading her horse. It was a girl leading her horse, but the relation between them was different.

The surface of the sea continued, but the color of the water shifted as they crossed realities. Life! Seqiro thought. I sense faint life ahead—perhaps very primitive, in the depths of the ocean.

“Then we’re getting somewhere!”

The signs became stronger. It was as if they were stepping through a paleontological exhibit, tracing the world from its sterile inception through the first suggestions of life and to the first multi-celled organisms. Things started showing in the water, living froth, then tiny jellylike creatures, then swimming crustaceans, and then actual fish.

And another island. This one had shrubbery on it, or primitive trees. The bridge went right to it, each short segment appearing as they proceeded until one touched the island, and for the first time in hours they set foot on land.

It was a relief to have the shade of fernlike trees, but they decided not to linger, because the pontoon bridge seemed endlessly long on the Virtual Mode despite its shortness in any one reality, and they were limited to the supplies they carried. They could more readily rest after they got safely past this region.

So with regret they moved out on the bridge again, trusting it to extend itself on through the Virtual Mode, and soon found themselves back in the middle of the placid sea.

Until Colene stepped through a boundary and found herself in a wind-screaming storm. Big waves rocked the bridge so hard it seemed about to be torn away.

She ducked back, and the storm cut off abruptly. Her hair was matted across her face and her blouse and jeans were wrinkled. “We’ve got a problem.”

So I saw. Seqiro had not yet crossed, but his mind had been with her. If it is confined to one reality, we can cross quickly.

“Maybe so. But suppose it isn’t?”

We can wait for it to subside.

“We don’t know how long these storms last. Maybe it’s always stormy in that reality.”

They discussed it, and decided to let Colene cross to the following reality, tied with a rope to Seqiro. The rope was part of his supplies, so would remain firm across the boundaries. If she got washed off the bridge, he would back away and haul her to this calm section. If she found that the following reality was calm, he would move across and rejoin her. They would remain in constant mental touch.

She knotted the rope firmly around her middle, and passed a loop down between her legs and up around her shoulders, so that there was no way for her to slip out of it. She was afraid of that terrible storm, but knew this was the best way to tackle it.

She ventured across the boundary again, wishing there were handholds. But there was only the level planking, which she now realized was vibrating with the force of the storm beyond. That had not been evident while Seqiro was walking, but now he was still and they both saw that part of the motion was not from his hoofs.

The storm caught her again. This time a wave was washing over the bridge, making the pontoons tip at what seemed like a precarious angle. She lost her balance and fell, and the water carried her into the sea. She inhaled to scream, involuntarily, and took in a mouthful and some of a lungful of froth.

Then she was in the calm water, having been carried across the boundary by the wave. Seqiro was backing away, hauling her in. She managed to catch hold of the edge of a pontoon and cling there, choking.

Calm. Cough. Calm. Inhale. Cough.

It was Seqiro, assuming control of her breathing, getting her to clear her lungs without panicking. She let him do it; it was much easier to ride along with his procedure.

Sooner than otherwise, she was back on the bridge and on her feet. “Thanks, Seqiro,” she gasped. “I needed that.”

Then she gathered her strength and charged back through the boundary.

This time a wave had just passed. She forged through the knee-deep water, able to keep her footing, and by the time the next wave loomed, she plunged across.

Into bright sunlight. The storm was only one reality wide! “Come on, Seqiro!” Then, immediately, she reconsidered. “Wait—let me spy the waves. It’s much easier to cross between them.”

She sat at the edge of the boundary, clung to a pontoon, and cautiously poked her head across. She got a faceful of salt water. She drew back, blinking the salt out of her eyes. Then she tried it again, and found a lull. “Now!”

The bridge vibrated with extra force. Suddenly the horse appeared, almost galloping along the bridge. The water splashed up from his legs.

Colene threw herself to the side, into the water, lest she be inadvertently trampled. How big Seqiro looked from this vantage! He was a massive horse, and splendid in his motion. She had forgotten that, in her constant communion with his mind.

He entered her current reality, and she had to scramble up before he overshot her position too far and yanked her along by the rope. They were across, but she hoped they did not have to do that again soon.

THE nature of the ocean changed faster than any individual reality suggested, and land came into view by jumps with each crossed boundary. Adjacent realities tended to be similar, but sometimes differed by significant stages within that similarity. Now they seemed to be headed for a reality whose far shoreline was considerably west of the one they had started with. Perhaps this world was turning slightly faster, so that it had gained on the others. No, it would be the other way: if it turned more slowly, a given spot on the globe would be west of the others. It hardly mattered; what counted was that they were getting across the ocean much faster than they might have.

By nightfall they set foot on what in her reality might have been Europe. Now she remembered how quickly they had reached what seemed to be the Atlantic Ocean; she had not walked any twelve hundred miles to the coast! So this effect must have existed all along; she just hadn’t paused to realize its significance. Now she was glad they weren’t traveling in the other direction!

Life had continued to progress, and now there were modern fish and animals and birds, though she did not recognize the individual species.

The pontoon bridge stopped at the shore, but here there was a well-marked path leading east. Someone certainly had set this up—but who traveled it? They had encountered no one, and seen no footprints or other signs of use. It had to have been done recently—within the past week—because before then this Virtual Mode hadn’t been in place. What did it mean?

We are approaching superior minds, Seqiro thought. Not many realities away. They are closed to me; I can fathom only their power.

“Not Darius’ reality? Magic?”

No. I suspect science, like yours, because if they set up the bridge—

“High-tech,” she agreed.

They seem to be human. They may be friendly. However—

“Um, Seqiro,” she murmured, really not speaking at all, more or less subvocalizing so as to focus her thoughts. “We don’t know what we’re headed into, but I think maybe they’re expecting us. Maybe we should, you know, not let them know too much about us. Until we know more about them.”

This was my thought.

They considered, then decided to do something neither of them really liked. Colene made a loop of rope and tied it about Seqiro’s nose, and held the other end like a rein. She climbed up on his back with the supplies and rode. Now it seemed that he was a plain unintelligent horse—she could not bring herself to think “stupid”—under the control of a human. It seemed to be a necessary charade—just in case.

They advanced through more realities, the path broadening as if to signal that they were close to their destination. Other paths intersected it at acute angles to their route, evidently going the same way. Were there paths reaching as far out as theirs, in other directions? All constructed in the past week? What an effort that must have been! And why? Colene still didn’t trust this..

“You know,” she subvocalized, “if this turns out as suspicious as it seems so far, and you have to keep on acting like a dumb animal, you’ll be put in a stall and I won’t be able to be with you without giving you away.”

True. But a stall is no discomfort for me, and we can remain in mind contact throughout. I believe I can now reach you across a continent, so we will not truly be separated.

“I hope not! But I have an ill feeling about this. Someone has gone to an awful lot of trouble to show us in.”

We must continue as we have, until we are able to proceed through this reality and resume our journey. Obviously they know someone will be coming on the Virtual Mode, but not who or from what direction, or they would not have fashioned so many paths.

“That’s what bothers me. This is obviously another anchor. Why didn’t the anchor person just come on out to meet us? If he wants to escape his reality, why take all this trouble to bring us in to it?”

I think we shall find out. I doubt we can avoid the encounter which threatens, so it is better to proceed into it as if innocent.

“We are innocent,” she muttered bleakly.

They crossed several more realities—and were abruptly in a huge building. This was evidently the anchor place.

A man stood before them. He was in a uniform: a princely robe of what looked like silk or fine artificial material. A metallic band circled his head at forehead level. His hair was reddish and receding, and his eyes were black and piercing. He looked to be in his fifties, running to density rather than fat.

Seqiro stopped immediately. Colene, uncertain what to do, decided to remain mounted. That way she could go with Seqiro if he bolted. “Hello,” she said tentatively, her throat feeling somewhat constrained.

“Hello,” a ball hanging near them said, mimicking her voice and intonation precisely.

I can not get into his mind, Seqiro thought. But I think that device is trying to communicate.

A translator! That made sense. She faced the ball. “Hello. I am Colene, and this is my horse, Seqiro. We are from a far reality, and only passing through this one. We would like to stay the night and go on in the morning.”

“Hello. I am—” the ball said.

Colene tapped her collarbone with a thumb. “I am Colene.” She glanced down. “This is my horse, Seqiro.” She indicated him. “Who are you?” She pointed to the ball, and then to the man.

“Hello. I am—” the ball said. Then the man lifted one hand and tapped himself. “Ddwng.” The ball spoke again. “You are Colene. This is my horse, Seqiro.”

She smiled. “My horse, not your horse. This is your palace.” She gestured around the chamber.

“Seqiro is your horse. This is my palace. You are from a far reality.”

That machine was fast! “A far reality,” Colene agreed. “On the Virtual Mode.” She gestured back the way they had come. Then she oriented on the man. “You are Deed-wing.”

“Ddwng,” he corrected her. There seemed to be a stutter at the beginning and no vowels in the middle.

“D-dwng,” she said, almost getting it. “Who are your people?”

The translator ball took some dialogue to get that straight, but in due course answered: “My people are the—”

“DoOon,” Ddwng finished.

“Do-Oh!-on,” she repeated, noting the three different “o” sounds. “Ddwng of the DoOon. I am Colene of the Americans.”

The introductions completed, Ddwng stepped forward. He smiled, offering his arm for Colene to brace against so she could dismount without tumbling. She put both hands on it, finding it very strong, and jumped down.

Other people appeared. Except that they weren’t exactly people. Colene tried not to stare, sure that it would be bad form. They had the heads of sheep!

“These are nulls of the Ovine persuasion,” Ddwng said through the ball, noting her surprise. The actual words were less precise, but that was the essence. “Palace servants. They are of human intelligence and perception.”

“Oh. Thank you.”

First the Ovines saw to her horse. Colene made clear that she wanted her mount well treated, and Ddwng led them to a chamber that would do for a stall. They were now in the anchor reality, and things did not shift every ten feet. She arranged with Ram, the male Ovine, to get good hay and grain and water for the horse, for Seqiro could eat the food of an anchor reality and retain it. Plus a block of salt! Then, with regret, she left him, for it would not do to show too great an attachment to a mere beast of burden. Seqiro advised her in this mentally, while playing the part of animal perfectly. They still did not know whether they could trust the folk of this reality. At least the DoOon seemed to have no notion of telepathy; their sophisticated ball indicated that they depended on computerized data banks for translation.

Then they saw to Colene. Ewe, the female sheep, approached bearing silken robes. Colene realized that she must look pretty ratty, after the day’s hike and the soaking down in the storm. Her clothing had dried on her and must look that way. She nodded affirmatively.

The sheep-woman led her to an elegant private chamber. Ddwng did not follow; it seemed he honored basic human protocol with regard to males and females. But she still didn’t trust him. She remembered how her date had behaved well enough, until he got her alone with his friends and their liquor. This could be a fancier version of something similar.

There was another hanging ball here, and it continued to respond to all her remarks. Maybe it was all part of a network, and they wanted to get as much of her language as possible, quickly. That was fine with her. She gave it all the words that came up, and instructed it in basic syntax, correcting it when it made an incorrect assumption. This was the easy way to establish communication!

Meanwhile she suffered herself to be undressed, bathed, and redressed by the quiet female. She was very good at her profession, evidently born to be a servant to nobility. For Colene was being treated like a princess, and garbed like one. Whenever she spoke to Ewe, that creature nodded her head forward in a set motion, both bow and acknowledgment, and did her best as quietly and efficiently as possible.

Soon enough Colene was not only clean and clothed, her hair was flowing and lustrous, and she wore a diadem that scintillated iridescently. Her fingernails matched the diadem, and her toenails too, in comfortable yet elegant sandal-slippers. The fatigue of the day was fading; the sheer luxury of her apparel was banishing it.

She looked at herself in a mirror. She was stunning! As lovely as she had ever imagined herself to be in her most foolish flights of fancy. She showed no private flesh, yet somehow the gown made her look utterly feminine.

Then they guided her to another ornate chamber. This seemed to be a dining room, and suddenly she realized how hungry she was. She and Seqiro had been so busy following the pontoon bridge that they hadn’t stopped to eat since breakfast.

Seqiro: the horse was doing fine. His thoughts told her of his best meal in days, and the attention of servants who had the heads of horses, who scrubbed off his hide and brushed out tangles in his mane. He could not read their minds, but their attitude indicated that they had not seen a genuine horse before, but understood hoofed animals, so had a general notion how to treat him.

Ddwng was waiting for her. He showed her to a seat at a table for two, and sat opposite her. “You are comfortable?” the ball of this room inquired.

“Yes, thank you,” Colene replied. Indeed she was, physically. But what was this leading up to? She tried not to show her continuing tension.

“You are beautiful,” the ball said.

“Thank you.” Then, aware that it spoke at the direction of Ddwng, she made the servant nod-bow to him.

Pleased, he returned the nod. If he had had doubt about whether she was civilized, it was being resolved.

Ovines brought in platters. Each had an array of odd but interesting-smelling substances. But she hesitated to choose, not wanting to make some gauche error. “Please—you choose,” she said to Ddwng.

He nodded again. In a moment she had a plate of things, similar to his own. She watched him lift a utensil resembling a single chopstick. When he touched it to a morsel, a bite-sized segment of that morsel adhered to it. Good enough.

They ate in silence. The food, strange as it was, was excellent; she could get used to this in a hurry. There was a beverage too, tasting like a cross between beer and chocolate milk; she hoped it wasn’t alcoholic, and it didn’t seem to be. Ddwng wasn’t trying to get her drunk. Why should he bother? She was in his power. That was the fly in this lovely ointment: soon enough Ddwng would get down to business.

They completed the meal, and the servants brought mouthwash that left her mouth feeling absolutely clean after one rinse. That was certainly easier than brushing her teeth!

Then they adjourned to a chamber containing a fountain whose fluid changed colors as it moved. Around it were exotic plants—perhaps ordinary here, but alien to her.

“Now we shall formulate our understanding,” the ball said.

“Of course,” Colene agreed, hoping that her suddenly renewed tension did not show. “What is your interest in me?”

“You are traveling the Virtual Mode with your animal. I have an interest in the Virtual Mode. I would like to know where its device of origin is located.”

“I don’t really know about that,” she admitted honestly enough. “It must have been set up by Darius. I am traveling along it to reach his home reality, or to meet him along the way, I hope.”

“Darius is your promised man?” The ball was doing the talking, but the expressions were on the face of Ddwng, and soon it was as if he were talking. He evidently had some kind of ongoing translation, so that he understood what she said.

“Yes. I love him.” She wanted no misunderstandings: she was taken.

“He is a fortunate man.”

She tried to suppress her girlish delight in being flattered. “I would like to get moving again tomorrow, with my horse. We had to cross quite a number of realities that were, well, empty. Do you know whether the ones in the other direction are okay?”

“We have not had occasion to explore far, but they seem to be similar to those through which you passed.”

“You went to a lot of effort, setting up those paths. Why did you bother?”

“When the Virtual Mode was established, we could not know its origin or mission,” the ball said. “We knew that those on it would have difficulty with this region, and perhaps suffer harm. So we constructed paths as far as feasible, and set markers beyond them. This seems to have been effective, as you arrived on one of these paths.”

“Well, I’m sorry I can’t help you. Why do you want the Chip?”

“A Virtual Mode is normally a temporary thing. With the Chip, we could establish Virtual Modes at our discretion. This would be an excellent thing for our society.”

“The Chip can do that? Can set up a Virtual Mode from anywhere, anytime?”

Ddwng smiled. “Indeed it can, Colene,” the ball said. “So you can see that a Chip is one of the most valuable things in all the realities.”

“I sure do now! I thought it was just some routine thing they could do in Darius’ reality.”

“That may be the case. But I gather it is not routine in your reality, as it is not in mine.”

“In my reality, we don’t even know that there’s more than one reality!”

“How did you discover that?”

He seemed interested, and nice, so she told him. In fact, she was acting just a bit more naïve than she was, because deep down she definitely did not trust him. Stupidity and ignorance could be significant assets for a girl, when they weren’t actual. “Darius was looking for a wife, and he didn’t like the ones where he was, so he made a spot trip to my reality. Somehow he knew that I wanted out of my situation and might go with him. But I didn’t quite trust it, and didn’t go. Then he set up the Virtual Mode, and now I’m trying to get back to him. But it’s one hell of a trip!”

“Surely so. But have you considered that if you are traveling toward his reality, and he is traveling toward yours, you may pass each other without meeting?”

“Se—” she started, then caught herself. She didn’t want him to know that the horse could pick up Darius’ mind when he came within several realities. “Seems I didn’t think of that! Gee, I hope I haven’t already missed him!”

Ddwng smiled again, satisfied about her naïveté. The ball spoke again. “I am sure you have not, because he has not passed through this reality, which seems to be between his and yours.”

“But maybe he went through a corner of it and you didn’t see him.”

“That is unlikely. The void realities are extensive, and difficult to pass. He should have intercepted one of our paths and followed it here, as you did.”

That did make sense. She now saw where Ddwng was leading, so she set it up for him. “But how will I know which path he’s coming in on? I mean, if I go out tomorrow—”

“Readily solved. You will simply wait here for him, and be reunited here. This will surely be best in any event, because we have excellent facilities, and he may be tired from the struggle with the void realities.”

“Gee, that’s nice of you!” she exclaimed happily. But inside she was not at all sanguine. This person had gone to an extraordinary amount of trouble to make long paths, and she doubted that he was doing it from sheer niceness. He wanted the Chip, as he said, and that meant he needed Darius to lead him to the reality where the Chip was.

But that Chip was the potential source of almost unimaginable power. What would Ddwng do once he had it?

She wished she could think of a way to see that Ddwng didn’t get it. But if she made any suspicious move, she was now afraid that she would proceed from the status of Guest to that of Prisoner.

She would have to wait until Darius came, and then warn him not to tell where his reality was. Maybe they could head back to hers, until they got free of Ddwng, then cross this region somewhere else. Or start toward his reality, and turn aside. There were surely ways and ways, if she could just warn him without alerting Ddwng.

“It sure is lucky that you’re here, with a good reality in the middle of the bad ones,” she said brightly. “I’m afraid we would have been in real trouble otherwise.”

“It is fortunate,” the ball agreed.

It was a disaster, she feared.