The Gods Themselves Part 8

Odeen often scolded Dua himself for her queer ways but was always unwilling to let Tritt do so. "You lack tact, Tritt," he would say. Tritt didn't know what tact was exactly.

And now- It had been so long since the first melting and still the baby-Emotional was not born. How much longer? It was already much too long. And Dua, if anything, stayed by herself more and more as time went on.

Tritt said. "She doesn't eat enough."

"When it's time-" began Odeen.

"You always talk about it's being time or it's not being time. You never found it time to get Dua in the first place. Now you never find it time to have a baby-Emotional. Dua should-"

But Odeen turned away. He said, "She's out there, Tritt. If you want to go out and get her, as though you were her Parental instead of her right-ling, do so. But I say, leave her alone."

Tritt backed away. He had a great deal to say, but he didn't know how to say it.

2a Dua was aware of the left-right agitation concerning her in a dim and faraway manner and her rebelliousness grew.

If one or the other, or both, came to get her, it would end in a melting and she raged against the thought. It was all Tritt knew, except for the children; all Tritt wanted, except for the third and last child; and it was all involved with the children and the still missing child. And when Tritt wanted a melting, he got it.

Tritt dominated the triad when he grew stubborn. He would hold on to some simple idea and never let go and in the end Odeen and Dua would have to give in. Yet now she wouldn't give in; she wouldn't wouldn't - - She didn't feel disloyal at the thought, either. She never expected to feel for either Odeen or Tritt the sheer intensity of longing they felt for each other. She could melt alone; they could melt only through her mediation (so why didn't that make her the more regarded). She felt intense pleasure at the three-way melting; of course she did, it would be stupid to deny it; but it was a pleasure akin to that which she felt when she pa.s.sed through a rock wall, as she sometimes secretly did. To Tritt and Odeen, the pleasure was like nothing else they had ever experienced or could ever experience.

No, wait. Odeen had the pleasure of learning, of what he called intellectual development. Dua felt some of that at times, enough to know what it might mean; and though it was different from melting, it might serve as a subst.i.tute, at least to the point where Odeen could do without melting sometimes.

But not so, Tritt. For him there was only melting and the children. Only. And when his small mind bent entirely upon that, Odeen would give in, and then Dua would have to.

Once she had rebelled. "But what happens when we melt? It's hours, days sometimes, before we come out of it. What happens all that time?"

Tritt had looked outraged at that. "It's always that way. It's got got to be." to be."

"I don't like anything that's got got to be. I want to know why." to be. I want to know why."

Odeen had looked embarra.s.sed. He spent half his life being embarra.s.sed. He said, "Now, Dua, it does have to be. On account of-children," He seemed to pulse, as he said the word.

"Well, don't pulse," said Dua, sharply. "We're grown now and we've melted I don't know how many times and we all know it's so we can have children. You might as well say so. Why does it take so long, that's all?"

"Because it's a complicated process," said Odeen, still pulsing. "Because it takes energy. Dua, it takes a long time to get a child started and even when we take a long time, it doesn't always get started. And it's getting worse.,.. Not just with us," he added hastily.

"Worse?" said Tritt anxiously, but Odeen would say no more.

They had a child eventually, a baby-Rational, a left-let, that flitted and thinned so that all three were in raptures and even Odeen would hold it and let it change shape in his hands for as long as Tritt would allow him to. For it was Tritt, of course, who had actually incubated it through the long pre-forming; Tritt who had separated from it when it a.s.sumed independent existence; and Tritt who cared for it at all times.

After that, Tritt was often not with them and Dua was oddly pleased. Tritt's obsession annoyed her, but Odeen's -oddly-pleased her. She became increasingly aware of his-importance. There was something to being a Rational that made it possible to answer questions, and somehow Dua had questions for him constantly. He was readier to answer when Tritt was not present.

"Why does it take so long, Odeen? I don't like to melt and then not know what's happening for days at a time."

"We're perfectly safe, Dua," said Odeen, earnestly. "Come, nothing has ever happened to us, has it? You've never heard of anything ever happening to any other triad, have you? Besides, you shouldn't ask questions."

"Because I'm an Emotional? Because other Emotionals don't ask questions?-I can't stand other Emotionals, if you want to know, and I do do want to ask questions." want to ask questions."

She was perfectly aware that Odeen was looking at her as though he had never seen anyone as attractive and that if Tritt had been present, melting would have taken place at once. She even let herself thin out; not much, but perceptibly, in deliberate coquettishness.

Odeen said, "But you might not understand the implications, Dua. It takes a great deal of energy to initiate a new spark of life."

"You've often mentioned energy. What is it? Exactly."

"Why, what we eat."

"Well, then, why don't you say food."

"Because food and energy aren't quite the same thing. Our food comes from the Sun and that's a kind of energy, but there are other kinds of energy that are not food. When we eat, we've got to spread out and absorb the light. It's hardest for Emotionals because they're much more transparent; that is, the light tends to pa.s.s through instead of being absorbed-"

It was wonderful to have it explained, Dua thought. What she was told, she really knew; but she didn't know the proper words;, the long science-words that Odeen knew. And it made sharper and more meaningful everything that happened.

Occasionally now, in adult life, when she no longer feared that childish teasing; when she shared in the prestige of being part of the Odeen-triad; she tried to swarm with other Emotionals and to withstand the chatter and the crowding. After all, she did occasionally feel like a more substantial meal than she usually got and it did make for better melting. There was a joy-sometimes she almost caught the pleasure the others got out of it-in slithering and maneuvering for exposure to Sunlight; in the luxurious contraction and condensation to absorb the warmth through greater thickness with greater efficiency.

Yet for Dua a little of that went quite a way and the others never seemed to have enough. There was a kind of gluttonous wiggle about them that Dua could not duplicate and that, at length, she could not endure.

That was why Rationals and Parentals were so rarely on the surface. Their thickness made it possible for them to eat quickly and leave. Emotionals writhed in the Sun for hours, for though they ate more slowly, they actually needed more energy than the others-at least for melting.

The Emotional supplied the energy, Odeen had explained (pulsing so that his signals were barely understood), the Rational the seed, the Parental the incubator.

Once Dua understood that, a certain amus.e.m.e.nt began to blend with her disapproval when she watched the other Emotionals virtually slurp up the ruddy Sunlight. Since they never asked questions, she was sure they didn't know why they did it and couldn't understand that there was an obscene side to their quivering condensations, or to the way in which they went t.i.ttering down below eventually-on their way to a good melt, of course, with lots of energy to spare.

She could also stand Tritt's annoyance when she would come down without that swirling opacity that meant a good gorging. Yet why should they complain? The thinness she retained meant a defter melting. Not as sloppy and glutinous as the other triads managed, perhaps, but it was the ethereality that counted, she felt sure. And the little-left and little-right came eventually, didn't they?

Of course, it was the baby-Emotional, the little-mid, that was the crux. That took more energy than the other two and Dua never had enough.

Even Odeen was beginning to mention it. "You're not getting enough Sunlight, Dua."

"Yes I am," said Dua, hastily.

"Genia's triad," said Odeen, "has just initiated an Emotional."

Dua didn't like Genia. She never had. She was empty-headed even by Emotional standards. Dua said, loftily, "I suppose she's boasting about it. She has no delicacy. I suppose she's saying, 'I shouldn't mention it, my dear, but you'll never guess what my left-ling and right-ling have gone and went and done-' " She imitated Genia's tremulous signaling with deadly accuracy and Odeen was amused.

But then he said, "Genia may be a dunder, but she has has initiated an Emotional, and Tritt is upset about it. We've been at it for much longer than they have-" initiated an Emotional, and Tritt is upset about it. We've been at it for much longer than they have-"

Dua turned away. "I get all the Sun I can stand. I do it till I'm too full to move. I don't know what you want of me."

Odeen said, "Don't be angry. I promised Tritt I would talk to you. He thinks you listen to me-"

"Oh, Tritt just thinks it's odd that you explain science to me. He doesn't understand- Do you want a mid-ling like the others?"

"No," said Odeen, seriously. "You're not like the others, and I'm glad of it. And if you're interested in Rational-talk, then let me explain something. The Sun doesn't supply the food it used to in ancient times. The light-energy is less; and it takes longer exposures. The birth rate has been dropping for ages and the world's population is only a fraction of what it once was."

"I can't help it," said Dua, rebelliously.

"The Hard Ones may be able to. Their numbers have been decreasing, too-"

"Do they pa.s.s on?" Dua was suddenly interested. She always thought they were immortal somehow; that they weren't born; that they didn't die. Who had ever seen a baby Hard One, for instance? They didn't have babies. They didn't melt. They didn't eat.

Odeen said, thoughtfully, "I imagine they pa.s.s on. They never talk about themselves to me. I'm not even sure how they eat, but of course they must. And be born. There's a new one, for instance; I haven't seen him yet- But never mind that. The point is that they've been developing an artificial food-"

"I know," said Dua. "I've tasted it."

"You have? I didn't know that!"

"A bunch of the Emotionals talked about it They said a Hard One was asking for volunteers to taste it and the sillies were all afraid. They said it would probably turn them permanently hard and they would never be able to melt again."

"That's foolish," said Odeen, vehemently.

"I know. So I volunteered. That shut them up. They are so so hard to endure, Odeen." hard to endure, Odeen."

"How was it?"

"Horrible," said Dua, vehemently. "Harsh and bitter. Of course I didn't tell the other Emotionals that."

Odeen said, "I tasted it. It wasn't that that bad." bad."

"Rationals and Parentals don't care what food tastes like."

But Odeen said, "It's still only experimental. They're working hard on improvements, the Hard Ones are. Especially Estwald-that's the one I mentioned before, the new one I haven't seen-he's working on it. Losten speaks of him now and then as though he's something special; a very great scientist."

"How is it you've never seen him?"

"I'm just a Soft One. You don't suppose they show me and tell me everything, do you? Someday I'll see him, I suppose. He's developed a new energy-source which may save us all yet-"

"I don't want artificial food," said Dua, and she had left Odeen abruptly.

That had been not so long ago, and Odeen had not mentioned this Estwald again, but she knew he would, and she brooded about it up here in the Sunset.

She had seen that artificial food that once; a glowing sphere of light, like a tiny Sun, in a special cavern set up by the Hard Ones. She could taste its bitterness yet.

Would they improve it? Would they make it taste better? Even delicious? And would she have to eat it then and fill herself with it till the full sensation gave her an almost uncontrollable desire to melt?

She feared that self-generating desire. It was different when the desire came through the hectic combined stimulation of left-ling and right-ling. It was the self-generation that meant she would be ripe to bring about the initiation of a little-mid. And-and she didn't want to!

It was a long time before she would admit the truth to herself. She didn't ^want to initiate an Emotional! It was after the three children were all born that the time would inevitably come to pa.s.s on, and she didn't want to. She remembered the day her Parental had left her forever, and it was never going to be like that for her. Of that she was fiercely determined The other Emotionals didn't care because they were too empty to think about it, but she was different. She was queer Dua, the Left-Em; that was what they had called her; and she would would be different. As long as she didn't have that third child, she would not pa.s.s on; she would continue to live, be different. As long as she didn't have that third child, she would not pa.s.s on; she would continue to live, So she wasn't going to have that third child. Never. Never! Never!

But how was she going to stave it off? And how would she keep Odeen from finding out? What if Odeen found out?

2b Odeen waited for Tritt to do something. He was reasonably sure that Tritt would not actually go up to the surface after Dua. It would mean leaving the children and that was always hard for Tritt to do. Tritt waited, without speaking for a while, and when he left, it was in the direction of the children's alcove.

Odeen was almost glad when Tritt left. Not quite, of course, for Tritt had been angry and withdrawn so that interpersonal contact had weakened and the barrier of displeasure had arisen. Odeen could not help but be melancholy at that. It was like the slowing of the life-pulse. He sometimes wondered if Tritt felt it, too.... No, that was unfair. Tritt had the special relations.h.i.+p with the children.

And as for Dua, who could tell what Dua felt? Who could tell what any Emotional felt? They were so different they made left and right seem alike in everything but mind. But even allowing for the erratic way of Emotionals, who could tell what Dua-especially Dua-felt?

That was why Odeen managed to be almost glad when Tritt left, for Dua was the question. The delay in initiating the third child was indeed becoming too long and Dua was growing less amenable to persuasion, not more. There was a growing restlessness in Odeen himself, that he could not quite identify, and it was something he would have to discuss with Losten.

He made his way down to the Hard-caverns, hastening his movements into a continuous flow that was not nearly as undignified as the oddly exciting mixture of wavering and rus.h.i.+ng that marked the Emotional curve-along, or as amusing as the stolid weight-s.h.i.+ft of the Parental- (He had the keen thought-image of Tritt clumping in pursuit of the baby-Rational, who, of course, was almost as slippery, at his age, as an Emotional, and of Dua having to block the baby and bring him back, and of Tritt cluckingly undecided whether to shake the small life-object or enfold him with his substance. From the start, Tritt could thin himself more effectively for the babies than for Odeen and when Odeen rallied him about that, Tritt answered gravely, for of course he had no humor about such things, "Ah,-but the children need it more.") Odeen was selfishly pleased with his own flow and thought it graceful and impressive. He had mentioned that once to Losten, to whom as his Hard-teacher, he confessed everything, and Losten had said, "But don't you think an Emotional or a Parental feels the same about his own flow-pattern? If each of you think differently and act differently, ought you not to be pleased differently? A triad doesn't preclude individuality, you know."

Odeen wasn't sure he understood about individuality. Did that mean being alone? A Hard One was alone, of course. There were no triads among them. How did they stand it?

Odeen had still been quite young when the matter had come up. His relations.h.i.+p with the Hard Ones had only been beginning, and it suddenly struck him that he wasn't sure that there were no triads among them. That fact was common legend among the Soft Ones, but how correct was the legend? Odeen thought about that and decided one must ask and not accept matters on faith.

Odeen had said, "Are you a left or a right, sir?" (In later times, Odeen pulsed at the memory of that question. How incredibly naive to have asked it, and it was very little comfort that every Rational asked the question of a Hard One in some fas.h.i.+on, sooner or later-usually sooner.) Losten answered quite calmly, "Neither, little-left. There are no lefts or rights among the Hard Ones,"

"Or mid-1- Emotionals?"

"Or mid-lings?" And the Hard One changed the shape of his permanent sensory region in a fas.h.i.+on that Odeen eventually a.s.sociated with amus.e.m.e.nt or pleasure. "No. No mid-lings either. Just Hard Ones of one kind."

Odeen had to ask. It came out involuntarily, quite against his desire. "But how do you stand it?"

"It is different with us, little-left. We are used to it."

Could Odeen be used to such a thing? There was the Parental triad that had filled his life so far and the sure knowledge that he would at some not-too-distant time form a triad of his own. What was life without that? He thought about it hard now and then. He though about everything hard, as it came up. Sometimes he managed to catch a glimpse of what it might mean. That Hard Ones had only themselves; neither left-brother, nor right-brother, nor mid-sister, nor melting, nor children, nor Parentals. They had only the mind, only the inquiry into the Universe.

Perhaps that was enough for them. As Odeen grew older, he caught bits of understanding as to the joys of inquiry. They were almost enough-almost enough-and then he would think of Tritt and of Dua and decide that even all the Universe beside was not quite enough.

Unless- It was odd, but every once in a while it seemed that there might come a time, a situation, a condition, when- Then he would lose the momentary glimpse, or, rather, glimpse of a glimpse, and miss it all. Yet in time it would return and lately he thought it grew stronger and would remain almost long enough to be caught.

But none of that was what should involve him now. He had to see about Dua. He made his way along the well-known route, along which he had first been taken by his Parental (as Tritt would soon take their own young Rational, their own baby-left.) And, of course, he was instantly lost in memory again.

It had been frightening, then. There had been other young Rationals, all pulsing and s.h.i.+mmering and changing shape, despite the Parental signals on every side to stay firm and smooth and not disgrace the triad. One small left, a playmate of Odeen, had, in fact, flattened thin, baby-fas.h.i.+on, and would not unflatten, despite all the efforts of his horribly embarra.s.sed Parental. (He had since become a perfectly normal student. . .. Though no Odeen, as Odeen himself could not help realizing with considerable complacency.) They met a number of Hard Ones on that first day of school. They stopped at each, in order that the young-Rational vibration pattern might be recorded in several specialized ways and for a decision to be reached as to whether to accept them for instruction then, or to wait another interval; and if then, for what kind of instruction.

Odeen, in a desperate effort, had drawn himself smooth as a Hard One approached, and held himself unwavering.

The Hard One said (and the first sound of the odd tones of his voice almost undid Odeen's determination to be grown-up), "This is quite a firm-held Rational. How do you represent yourself, left?"

It was the first time Odeen had ever been called "left" instead of in the form of some diminutive, and he felt firmer than ever as he managed to say, "Odeen, Hard-sir,"using the polite address his Parental had carefully taught him.

Dimly, Odeen remembered being taken through the Hard-caverns, with their equipment, their machinery, their libraries, their meaningless, crowding sights and sounds. More than- the actual sense perceptions, he remembered his inner feeling of despair. What would they do with him? His Parental had told him that he would learn, but he didn't know what was really meant by "learn" and when he asked his Parental, it turned out that the older one didn't know either.

It took him a while to find out and the experience was pleasurable, so pleasurable, and yet net without its worrisome aspects.

The Hard One who had first called him "left" was his first teacher. The Hard One taught him to interpret the wave recordings so that after a while what seemed an incomprehensible code became words; words just as clear as those he could form with his own vibrations.

But then that first one didn't appear any more and an-, other Hard One took over. It was a time before Odeen noticed. It was difficult in those early days to tell one Hard One from another, to differentiate among their voices. But then he grew certain. Little by little, he grew certain and he trembled at the change. He didn't understand its significance.

He gathered courage and finally asked, "Where is my teacher, Hard-sir?"

"Gamaldan? ... He will no longer be with you, left." Odeen was speechless for a moment. Then he said, "But Hard Ones don't pa.s.s on-" He did not quite finish the phrase. It choked off.

The new Hard One was pa.s.sive, said nothing, volunteered nothing.

It was always to be like that, Odeen found out. They never talked about themselves. On every other subject they discoursed freely. Concerning themselves-nothing.

From dozens of pieces of evidence, Odeen could not help but decide that Hard Ones pa.s.sed on; that they were not immortal (something so many Soft Ones took for granted). Yet no Hard One ever said as much. Odeen and the other student-Rationals sometimes discussed it, hesitantly, uneasily. Each brought in some small item that pointed inexorably to mortality of the Hard Ones and wondered and did not like to conclude the obvious, so they let it go.

The Hard Ones did not seem to mind that hints of mortality existed. They did nothing to mask it. But they never mentioned it, either. And if the question was asked directly (sometimes it was, inevitably) they never answered; neither denying nor affirming.