You and I are the same. We share the pleasure of inflicting pain, of destroying beauty.

Aton fitted the wrench extension of the maniple around the first bolt securing the missile to the ship. A servo motor whined; the bolt spun free. “I don’t know' who or what you are, Bedeker. But you’re wrong.”

 

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I am Plasm. I am Chthon.

Aton edged further along. His foot slipped and for a sickening moment he felt his legs swing out and dangle into emptiness. He scrabbled for a handhold and slowly managed to haul himself back to safety, wedging his body in the small gap between the ceiling of rock and the upper surface of the ship. He attached his wrench to the second bolt, and spun it free.

If you kill me. the Minionette dies also.

Pain bloomed again in Aton’s skull, and he saw' Malice spasming in her chair, her mouth clogged with yellow mucus, her eyes staring up at him imploringly.

He banished the vision, grabbed the missile’s mount, and swiveled it on its third and last remaining bolt. He knew it was armed, but there was no way to check the setting of its proximity fuse. A cable ran from underneath the mounting plate, into a grommet in the shell of the ship. Aton switched to a cutting blade. There was a chance he could trigger the system by shorting it. He stabbed the tip of the blade into the cable.

She is dying now.

Rage consumed him, more than ever before. He wrenched the blade in the cable as if he w ere stabbing the entity that was Bedeker. A spark flashed; the missile fired.

The blast from its rocket motor hit Aton in the chest and smashed him backward, tearing him free from the refuge where he had lodged himself between the rock and the ship. He was momentarily blinded by fire and smoke.

Gravity dragged him down, and he tumbled helplessly. Below him, the missile was a diminishing dot of flame, arcing toward the swirling, glowing gas. It disappeared, and he saw himself following it into oblivion.

Then came a momentary flash as the missile’s warhead exploded. It seemed tiny compared to the huge mass of vapor, yet it had an immediate effect. The steady pulsing of the gas became erratic. Electrical discharges spasmed through the mass from one side to another. As Aton fell toward it, he watched it tear itself apart.

Tendrils of gas spiraled free from the core. A shrill, painful screaming invaded Aton’s consciousness; then a babble of incoherent sound. The core of the gas blossomed into a fireball, and flashed blinding white.

Aton was seized by the blast like a leaf in a firestorm. Alarms sounded inside his helmet, and status indicators flashed red. He saw the outside of the suit catch fire, and he heard the cooling system overload. He was engulfed in flame; the roiling, burning gas surged up around him, and consumed him.

 

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CHRPT?R 18

Nightmare images formed and flickered like heat mirages. Lizard creatures clawing through rock, hissing with rage; men and women dressed in rags, stripping flesh from one another with their teeth and fingernails; a woman brandishing a knife, falling into fire; a man’s body bursting open, gushing black blood.

But cool waves were lapping at his body, caressing his skin. Gradually the fever dreams were washed away, until, finally, he opened his eyes.

“Don't try to move.”

He recognized the voice. He saw her face looking down at him, young yet intently serious. “Samantha,” he murmured.

She smiled faintly as if she liked hearing him speak her name. “You’re in a burn tank," she told him. “By the time we got to you, your suit’s cooling system was shot. You were just about fried.”

“Bedeker—”

“You took care of it. Don’t worry. You’ll be out in a few hours, with a new skin. It’s half grown already.”

Her words fell into his mind with a steady rhythm, like rain. He started to drift again—then remembered. “Malice,” he said. His eyes opened wide.

Samantha’s smile wavered. “We saved her too." She straightened up, and her face moved out of focus. “You’d better sleep, now.”

Aton felt something touch his arm, and he lost consciousness. This time, there were no dreams.

“One is pleased by your wholeness,” said Srndhi.

Aton flexed his muscles. The clothes felt almost painfully rough against his soft, new skin. He looked down at his hands. The flesh was unlined, baby- pink. The entire accelerated healing process, using catalyzed cells, had taken less than a day.

“One was referring not to your body, but to your mental condition,” the alien corrected him. “A catharsis has occurred.”

“Really?” He was finding it hard to concentrate, feeling restless, impatient to see Malice.

The door opened. Aton looked up quickly, and she was there.

This time, she showed no hesitation or reserve. She stepped toward him, her eyes watching him intently. As she came closer, she smiled; and then, w hen she was just a couple of feet away, she burst into laughter.

Aton was momentarily confused. “What’s the joke?”

She clapped her hands. “There’s no joke. I’m just happy.” She sat opposite him, still staring intently at his face. “I was sure you had been killed. Then when Samantha said they’d found you drifting in the chamber in the center of the planet, and you were still alive, I thought you’d be maimed for life. But you’re not, you’re—reborn." She kissed him suddenly on the mouth.

 

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“But I thought you were dead,” Aton told her. “The Bedeker consciousness—if that’s what it was— said it was killing you.”

“A deception,” said Srndhi. “One was monitoring events on the telepathic band. Unfortunately, because of interference, one was unable to send reassuring information by radio. While you were readying the missile. Aton, the consciousness was directing all its energies on yourself. You were the only threat; thus it ignored Malice.”

“I guess 1 should have figured that. It really was Bedeker, was it?”

“Yes. But please come to the control room, for further information.”

Together, Aton and the Minionette followed Srndhi out of the cabin.

The control room of the Earth ship was as Aton remembered it: black consoles, brushed aluminum, white ceramics. The face of Chthon still loomed outside the viewports.

“Well, well. Back from the dead.” Samantha greeted him. She examined his new skin with professional interest. There was no trace, now, of the mixed emotions he had seen in her face when he had first regained consciousness.

“Somehow' I didn’t expect—still to be so close to Chthon." Aton gestured at the disk of the planet.

“I’m still gathering data,” she told him. “It’s a habit I just can’t seem to shake.” She went over to the starcube. “Want to see a replay?”

They gathered around the display. It showed Chthon much as it looked outside the viewports now,

a blue-green sphere streaked with white, turning slowly against a background of stars.

“You braked out of your polar orbit and the weapons ship followed you down,” she said. Simultaneously, two points of light appeared in the cube, arcing toward the planet’s surface.

“You tunneled in, and we lost contact. Then Srndhi's equipment picked up a powerful TP transmission. The Chthon/Bedeker consciousness—-call it plasm; that’s w hat it called itself—had detected your presence. It was appealing for help from the extraga- lactic entities, whose exact nature we still don’t understand.”

“I remember, you tried to warn us,” said Aton. “We picked up fragments of your radio message.”

“Yeah. Well, by this time I was feeling kind of sick, sitting on my hands out in space, while you guys were doing all the work." She sounded embarrassed. “So, I came down after you.”

“A deed of courage and friendship," Srndhi said.

She turned on him. “Will you cut it out?” She paused, recovering her cool. “Anyhow’, we moved in.”

The picture in the cube shifted and grew larger, focusing on the hole in the planet’s crust.

“By this time, the surveillance systems in the weapons ship that followed you down had all gone dead,” Samantha continued. “And our monitors were picking up nothing from your ship either. The plasm entity had hit you with a chain of pulses powerful enough to override your shield and knock out most of your electric systems. Although it waited till you’d

 

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put the eater back in its containment vessel; it knew that thing would be a liability if it ran wild inside Chthon.

“So I was in low orbit, figuring I’d follow you down the hole you’d dug, when this happened.” The display showed a jet of white-hot gas streaming out of the cavity. “Your missile destabilized the plasm, and it blew up." The picture pulled back, showing the gas streaming into space, dispersing into a formless cloud, drifting away toward the stars.

“After that," Samantha finished, “we went in and pulled you both out."

“But what was this—plasm?" Malice asked.

“1Ъе planet Chthon has an extremely powerful magnetic field," Srndhi said. “It also has much volcanic activity. An evolution occurred, of a mineral intelligence. Possibly at first it was in liquid form; if so, it gradually evolved and changed its state. We found it as a plasma: ionized gas at high temperature, contained in the hollow core of the planet. By ‘plasm’ it referred to itself as a plasma life form.

“It maintained control over all biological life in Chthon. Decades ago, one of the convicts—a man named Charles Bedeker—strayed deeper than anyone else had ever ventured. Plasm took over his mind and body, seeing in him an opportunity to spread its malign influence to other worlds.

“It directed him to large natural deposits of mineral wealth, then enabled his escape. The genetic laboratories on Luna were financially vulnerable, and free from any governmental controls. Bedeker worked there for thirty years, as an extension of the plasm consciousness, which controlled him like a dumb terminal.

“Subsequently, it made contact with extragalactic mineral entities, which offered the potential power to exterminate biological life entirely.” The Xest paused. “One’s own race is now in communication with these extragalactic entities. The plasm had been their sole source of information—there is no biological life in their galaxy—and they had not realized it is possible for carbon-based life to acquire intelligence. They regret having tampered. In due course, we hope for a mutually beneficial understanding."

“Samantha.” a voice interrupted.

She looked up. “What is it, Tomas?”

The tall, blond, handsome Sim nodded politely to Aton and to Malice. “Excuse me for interrupting. Samantha, the analysis is complete. The data is in. Central wants to head back to Luna. With all our firepower here, the home base is unprotected. That conflicts with fundamental priorities.”

She stood up. “I guess it would. Well, you both know the score now, right?”

“Yes." Aton nodded thoughtfully. “I suppose there’s no way this—plasm—could reconstitute itself?”

“It existed in precarious equilibrium within its magnetic field,” said Srndhi, “which is why the small warhead that you fired was sufficient to disrupt it. Now that it has dispersed into the vacuum of space, one cannot see how it might become anything other than an inert cloud of gas.”

“So are you people coming back to Luna with us, or what?” Samantha asked. She was waiting with her hands on her hips, in the same impatient pose as when Aton had first seen her, outside the jail cell on the moon.

 

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"One has much to report to one’s people,” the Xest said. "One’s own ship is still nearby, under control of the smaller self. With regret, it is time to depart."

"Well, I figured as much," said Samantha. “Too bad; I enjoyed arguing with you, Srndhi.” She turned to Aton and the Minionette. “What about you two?"

Malice looked at Aton. "I know you have no wish to return to Minion,” she said softly.

"I was thinking,” he said, “that we should go to Hvee. My father was never able to confide in me, about our—family history. When 1 left, he was in poor health.” He looked steadily at Malice, carefully controlling his emotions. “I would like, before he dies, to tell him that I know now what happened, between him and you.”

She inclined her head. “As you wish,"

Samantha was watching them with frank curiosity. "Interesting,” she said. "But I guess it’s none of my business, right?” She turned without waiting for them to answer. “Srndhi, can they hitch a ride with you?"

The Xest walked to the starcube and tapped out a series of coordinates with one of its legs. The face of Chthon disappeared, and an image of the galaxy took its place. Colored arcs sprang into existence between the stars. "It would be a simple matter to take you to Hvee,” Srndhi concluded, "on the way to the Xest home world, provided the smallness of one’s space vehicle will not cause too much discomfort.”

"Good enough,” said Samantha.

“But what about you?" Malice asked her. "You seemed troubled before we reached Chthon. Does it bother you to return to Luna?”

Samantha gave her a guarded look. "I’m fine," she said shortly. She folded her arms across her slim body, as if placing a barrier between herself and the Minionette. “I got a lot of work to do back there, anyway. Maybe some changes to suggest to Central." She paused, choosing her words carefully. "The way Srndhi says it, if people don’t have the intellectual or physical capacity to take advantage of their freedoms, they’re not really free. I hate to have to admit it, but that is a valid point."

"We’re almost ready, Samantha,” Tomas called to her from one of the consoles. "The last of the convicts have been found.”

"Convicts?” Aton asked. He walked over to the screen in front of Tomas and looked down at the picture it was displaying.

“Slightly more than fifty convicts escaped," Tomas explained. “The hole that you excavated with the mass eater connected with some of the tunnels in their underground prison. They managed to climb to the surface."

The screen showed men and women being herded by robots toward a small tracked vehicle. The convicts were shouting futile abuse and throwing rocks at the machines. One of them tried to make a break; the police robot snared him with a net, and hauled him back.

“You should release them,” said Aton. Without knowing why, he saw himself down there on the surface of the planet, sharing their anger and helplessness.

"They’re sociopaths," Samantha reminded him.

 

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“Murderers, most of them. In many other systems, they'd be put to death.'*

“But they’re still people,” Aton said. “Why not leave them outside on the surface of the planet? Let that be their prison. Turn Idyllia over to them.” Samantha laughed. “Neat idea, but—”

“Idyllia is privately owned,” Tomas pointed out. “Pay for it by selling off the remainder of Bedeker’s equipment in the gene labs,” Aton replied.

Samantha gave Aton a wry, condescending look. “The universe doesn’t work this way. You don’t get something for nothing. If you commit crimes, if you kill people, you have to pay.”

“There’s been enough punishment,” he told her. “And you seem to be forgetting an old-fashioned idea. Redemption.”

“Aton is right,” said Srndhi. “Ethically speaking—” “Okay, okay!” Samantha held up her hands. “We’ll let Central deal with it. Tomas, check it out.”

The Sim stood silently for a moment, communicating with the centralized artificial intelligence via his radio data link. Then he shrugged. “There would be no conflict with the basic precepts, provided the convicts remain exiled from other Federation worlds.” “Hm.” Samantha drummed her fingers on the control panel. “But I still don’t like it.”

“I liberated the planet from the plasm," Aton reminded her. “Perhaps you could see this as payment to me.”

She looked at him with her eyes narrowed, and something indefinable passed between him and her. “All right,” she said slowly. “Yes; that’s exactly how I’ll think of it. Tomas, go ahead."

“One moment.” He paused. “There.” He gestured to the screen.

The robot cops were turning away from their prisoners, showing no further interest in them. The ragged men and women were standing and staring, unable to believe what was happening to them. One of them backed off a few paces, then turned and started to run. Hesitantly at first, the others began to follow.

The ragged human figures dispersed across the hillside, heading for a forest in the distance. Faintly, over the audio link, came the sound of shouts and cheering.

“Satisfied?” Samantha asked Aton.

He took her hand. Before, it had felt strong; this time, it seemed fragile. “Thank you,” he told her.

Her face showed mixed emotions, as if she was disconcerted by his touch. Abruptly, she pulled free. “Tomas will show you the way out," she said. She stepped back a couple of paces. “I’ve never been big on saying good-bye.”

The last Aton saw of her, she was mating the end of a cable to her neck implant, preparing to download more data.

 

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CHAPTER 19

The Xest ship set down on an open, grassy hillside. It was dawn on Hvee; the air was cool and the sky was gray-blue with early light.

Srndhi and the smaller Xest followed Aton and Malice to the ship’s exit. “One regrets this parting/’ the alien said. “Although, of course, the cells remember.”

“Maybe you should stay here on Hvee for a couple of days,” Aton suggested.

Srndhi peered out of the hatch. “A most agreeable world,” it commented. “But one has a duty to one’s race. Still, one senses our timelines will cross again.”

Aton and Malice descended the ramp to the ground. The grass was beaded with dew, and Aton smelled Hvee flowers growing in a nearby field.

He turned with Malice and waved to Srndhi. The small Xest had climbed on top of the larger one, as if to get a better view. Solemnly, each of the aliens raised a leg in farewell.

Then the ramp retracted and the hatch closed. As Aton and Malice stood and watched, the ship lifted

silently into the morning sky and drifted up, disappearing from view.

Aton looked around at the landscape. “It’s four years or more, since I was here,” he said.

“You recognize where you are?” She had a teasing, playful expression, as if she was holding a secret.

“I’m not sure. We seem to be some distance from my house. Why did you tell Srndhi to set us down here?"

She took his hand. “Come. I’ll show you.”

He followed her across the soft grass toward some woodland nearby. As the dawn light brightened, the air became filled with birdsong.

“This isn’t the way to my home,” he complained.

“I know.”

“But I want us to see Aurelius. That was the point in coming here.”

“Your father won’t even be awake yet,” she pointed out. “We have at least an hour to ourselves. Arc you sure you don’t recognize where you are?”

He was following her between tall trees, across a springy carpet of ferns and moss. The smell of vegetation was rich and strong. “Yes; I used to walk through these woods when I was a child.”

She paused, looking around as if to check her bearings, then led him along a tiny path that was almost completely overgrown with bushes.

They emerged in a glade; and now he remembered. Tall grass and wild Hvee flowers grew here, and there was the faint sound of a small stream running close by. The trees cut off all sight of

 

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the outside world, making this a special, secret place.

She went quickly to a tree stump near the center of the clearing, sat down, and searched in the grass at her feet. “Here,” she said, plucking a Hvee flower and holding it out to him.

Aton stepped forward, struck dumb bv the flood of memories. He felt as if he were walking to her in slow time. The glade had seemed much larger when he had been seven years old, and he had been lost and unsure of himself, then. But the Minionette had not changed; she was as radiant and compelling as ever.

He took the flower from her hand.

“It lives,” she told him. “Proving mv love.”

“Put it in my hair,” he told her, “as you did before.”

She stood up, moving lightly on her feet. Her eyes were alive with anticipation. “You are so much taller now,” she said, smiling, reaching up to tuck the blossom above his ear. “There.”

He looked down at her. Conflicting emotions surged in him and he felt dizzy. Still with a sense of moving in slow motion, he reached for her. “You told me I would never again meet anyone as beautiful as you. You told me no one would ever kiss me again as you did then.”

She parted her lips, breathing deeply. “Was it true?”

“Of course, it was true!” His tension broke and he shook her by her shoulders. “You gave me no choice!

You knew exactly how to manipulate my emotions.” 11c drew a deep breath. “Even now, you still do. You knew how' it would affect me, to bring me back to this place.” His grip tightened. “Isn’t that so?”

“Yes.” She was watching him intently, savoring his inner conflict. “It’s true. I did it deliberately. Are you angry with me?”

“Temptress.” He shook her violently. “You corrupted me.”

She gave a little gasp.

He slapped her face, and the skin turned pink, showing the outline of his hand. She fell against him and pressed her body close, trembling with excitement.

He seized her by her hair and tilted her head back, then kissed her angrily. At last, the ghost of his past was exorcised; he was no longer haunted by the image of himself as a young boy; helpless and afraid.

“Now pledge yourself to me,” he told her.

She sank down on her knees in front of him. "I am yours,” she said simply. “Your anger is my passion; your hate is my love.”

He stared at her, remembering when such a statement would have made him despise himself for the perverse, obscene fantasies it roused. He remembered, too, how he had punished others for his own sense of shame.

Now, however, he felt no guilt—only a fierce satisfaction at having confronted and vanquished the specters that had haunted him for so long. He would always carry the stigma of his genes, as a disorder that could never be erased; vet he was redeemed.

The caves of Chthon seemed far away, remote in

 

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space and time, as he pushed the Minionette down onto the soft grass of the forest glade. This was a singular moment, isolated not only from the past but from the future. Despite her pledge, he sensed there could be no guarantees, and the dark side of his soul might yet return to tempt him toward self-destruction. For now, however, the moment was enough.

 

 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Charles Platt's science fiction includes Twilight of the City, a study of urban decay at the turn of the century, and Less Than Human (under the pseudonym Robert Clarke), which applies a humorous treatment to traditional SF themes. His nonfiction includes computer books and the highly praised Dream Makers series, profiling fifty-seven of the best known science fiction authors in the field.

Platt is the onetime editor of New Worlds, a radical British magazine of the late 1960s. He now lives in New York City, where in addition to writing novels, he is science fiction editor for the publisher Franklin Watts.