Cluster (23 page)

Yet even this was not the whole problem. Every time he scraped to the bottom of his apprehension, he found a deeper level. Was Tsopi a well-meaning innocent—or was she in fact an active anticoalition agent, either native or possessed by alien transfer? She did not have a potent Kirlian aura, but he could not assume that the Polarian body perceptions could pick this up, or that it was impossible to conceal such an aura. If she were possessed, could she really be
C
le of A[
^th
], or Llyana the Undulant of Spica—the persona that had animated them? Even the least-threatening situation could have its complications. Perhaps it was his slightly paranoid suspicions that had enabled him to survive while others perished. If Tsopi were actually a transferee, she was extremely dangerous. Of course the chance of her being possessed by that malignant yet intriguing alien-Sphere entity who had tried to kill him before seemed remote, as he had anchored that female to the host-body for some time to come. But much could have happened, such as the accidental death of the infant, freeing the mother. Or a similar entity could have taken over. They knew how to locate him; the question was, how badly did they want him?

Yet Tsopi had been here before him. Unless the spies had access to Sphere Sol information, that virtually eliminated possession. They could not trace his transfer before he transferred! Nevertheless it was a risk, for no one had told him he would be expected in Sphere Polaris. Of course it could be an administrative foul-up; they happened often enough. It would be just like Earth's Council of Minister to have forgotten to inform him, the most critical party, of their plans for him. Or maybe the Polarians had such a good intelligence network that they had tapped in on Sol's secret and acted on it. If it turned out Tsopi were innocent, he would apologize to her most handsomely. After the Bug Wheel had the technology of transfer.

Meanwhile, he was lost and alone, as usual. It didn't bother him. He could proceed on his own.

Exactly where would the Big Wheel be? Since Tsopi would undoubtedly raise the hue and cry for him, or whatever rolling equivalent Polarians had, he had to act fast. Somewhere in his host-memories would be the information he needed, but he had already expended too much time exploring his own motives and could not take time to sift tediously through the host-library now. What he really needed was time; his prior missions had taught him to avoid acting precipitously. At the same time he had to complete his mission immediately. A paradox.

He crossed a scent-trail that offered a safe temporary haven for troubled entities. It was a priestly taste, consciously laid down, perhaps a Polarian monk. Since Flint dared act neither slowly nor ignorantly, perhaps this would help. He wheeled to follow the trail.

With this guidance, it took only moments to thread the network of ramps and locate the sanctuary.

At its portal he paused, for suddenly the taste gave warning. It was the flavor of a foolish young creature, ambitious and intelligent but about to roll off a precipice. Associated with it were the burning of fire, the fluidity of water, the rarefaction of air, and the solidarity of ground. The overall suggestion of the taste was not merely haven, but knowledge. More than the average intellect might crave.

But no danger per se. Flint did not fear knowledge; on the contrary, he craved it. He rolled across the threshold.

And the ramp collapsed. He dropped sickeningly into darkness—Polarians being every bit as vulnerable to a fall as Solarians—and flung out his trunk to catch any available support. But there was none.

Then his wheel touched something. It was a wall, or a steeply inclined plane. Too steep to travel on. But to prevent himself from scraping, he spun his wheel against it, letting it guide him down. This might not make much sense if he were about to crash, but it was a largely automatic reflex. Polarians preferred to die with their wheels turning.

The slant changed. The wall was angling into a surface he could almost grip. It was tasteless; no one could have passed this way recently. Now it was a steep channel, actually enabling him to slow his fall somewhat.

Gradually the channel leveled, though it remained uncomfortably barren of taste. He came to a smooth stop at the base. He had fallen a considerable distance, but was after all unharmed. Good enough; the threshold warning had been accurate. No one else was likely to follow precipitously, unless there were an alternate entrance.

No. His host memory, keyed by the dramatic fall, indicated that visitors always used this aperture. They left by another, equally single-directional, completing the circuit forcefully. It was common knowledge, available to him had he but known where in his mind to look. Which was why he did not want to act before exploring that mind. The next pitfall might not be as safe.

Sometime he'd have to find a way around that initial informational block. It was like learning all the rules of a complex new game at once, or trying to chew too big a nut so that his mouth wouldn't close or gain purchase. Though he now had no mouth. If there was a shorthand, an instant keying system—but
if
there were, Llyana the undulant surely would have used it to avoid the romantic trap he had sprung on her. Maybe this problem had helped him more than it hindered him.

Now he had arrived—somewhere. His host-memory could not help him, for the host had never actually been inside a Tarotist temple. Not that it was any great secret; it was just one of those experiences, like dropping into a deep hole, or sleeping in a haunted cave, that hadn't seemed necessary.

Tarotism—there, inadvertently delivered, was the name. It was the cult, a system of beliefs he had heard mentioned in passing back on Earth. Its prime tenet was supposed to be that all concepts of divinity were legitimate. The concept translated into taste, unmistakable because of the symbol at the entrance. The first key of the pack, the Fool. He should have made the connection before, for that had been a human memory. What use to delve into the confused recesses of his host's brain, when he was neglecting his own?

And what in the galaxy was Tarotism doing here? A human religion among the Polarians? There had hardly been that much contact, not between the Sphere centers. Humans and Polarians merged amicably on Etamin's planet Outworld, Flint's home at the fringe of each of their Spheres. But Tarotism had not yet reached Outworld. So how–?

A dark Polarian stood before him. Flint had not been aware of the entity's approach. More likely he had been there from the start, and only now showed himself in the brightening light. That was a thing Flint missed: the acute, direct binocular vision of the human eyes, eyes difficult to fool. The Polarian's light awareness was serviceable in most instances, but useless for fine definition in a crisis. The body was taste oriented; sight, touch, and hearing were secondary.

“I am the Hierophant,” the entity said. “What is your Significator?”

Flint applied his ball to his own skin. His host-memory was blank; no help there. “I do not understand.”

“This is the Temple of Comprehension,” the Hierophant replied. “Do you wish your nuclear identity to be open or hidden?”

“Hidden,” Flint said. He was not about to betray his origin and mission to this priest.

“Then we shall ask the Arcana to select your Significator—the symbol of yourself. Actually it is you who make the selection, random though it seems; your Kirlian aura will not be comfortable with any but the appropriate representation.”

Kirlian aura! How much did the Hierophant know?

“I know little; the sacred books know much,” the Hierophant answered. “Do not be alarmed; we mean you no ill, and shall not detain or importune you. We seek only to provide the aid you came for.”

“I came for solitude, a chance to explore my mind,” Flint said. That much was safe enough to say.

“Precisely. Now if you will shuffle the Tarot symbols...”

How did a no-handed creature shuffle anything? But now Flint's host-memory provided the answer, for this related to an everyday problem of the mechanical shuffler in a pedestal beside him. This was no random effort; by expert twitches of his ball he made the printed cards in the lighted chamber riff through each other again and again, until they were hopelessly mixed. Then he picked one randomly by touching another surface. He card flipped out of the pack to present itself for identification.

He ran his ball over it. It portrayed a lone Polarian whose trunk reached out to hold a lamp, whose source of light was a bright star. A simple figure, on the surface, yet as a parallel symbol there was a single swimming sperm cell.

Flint's mission was to bring secret information to foreign Spheres. News that would transform them, enabling them to expand their influence enormously, and to merge into a single galactic coalition. He was a tiny sperm cell coming to the huge egg of each Sphere to fertilize it in unique fashion. His knowledge was the illumination of a star, faint in the distance, yet of tremendous significance. How well the Tarot had chosen!

“You are the Hermit, the ninth key,” the Hierophant said. “Alone, concealed, not what you seem, bringer of light. You say 'Where I am, you may also be.' Though you walk in seeming isolation, your light shows the way for the multitude.”

How much did this bastard know? (Though there was no concept of bastardy in the Polarian intellect; that was a purely human derogation.)

“Please do not insult the Temple by your suspicion,” the Hierophant said. “We respect your privacy, and we are politically and socially neutral. The Temple of Tarot transcends matters of mundane import. If the key seems apt, it is because you have chosen it, not we.”

“Sorry,” Flint said. “It
is
apt.”

“Hermit, we shall now accede to your will,” the Hierophant continued. “You may have a private cell for meditation, or a reading of the Arcana to facilitate your thought.”

A private cell was what he had come for, but now Flint changed his mind. This Tarotism was strange, and it had some connection to Sphere Sol. It was possible that it could be of aid to him, if he could learn more about it. “I choose the reading.”

“I deal the keys as you have arranged them,” the Hierophant said. “Stand at the animation plate, and do not be afraid. No harm will come to you; it is only your own mind made manifest. No news of what the Tarot reveals will pass beyond these premises except as you make it known yourself.”

“Thank you.” Flint rolled to the circle that illuminated itself in a chamber before him. As he touched it, he became the Hermit, in a long gray robe, standing in the darkness atop a mountain, holding his stellar lamp aloft in his right hand, supporting himself by a staff in the left. Yellow light shone where he looked, cutting through the literal chill of the still air. He was no Fool; he contemplated his next step as well as the far reaches. His feet were cold on the snow.

And Flint leaped out of the chamber.
It had been a human representation—not a Polarian one!
Hands, not a trunk; feet, not a wheel. Direct vision, not peripheral. Eyes.
 

“I perceived it,” the Hierophant said. “You are of Sphere Sol, surely a transferee, though we were not aware your kind possessed that marvelous secret. Your animation was the most intense I have experienced, and it suggests a truly remarkable Kirlian aura. Are you the Founder, come to correct us?” And his skin glowed apprehensively as his body sank into a globular mass. When a Polarian was worried, his shape-control suffered.

“I am of Sphere Sol, but I am not your Founder,” Flint said. “I come on a mission unrelated to Tarotism; my presence here is coincidental.” Yet it was amazing that his intense aura should relate so directly to animation; certainly there was some kind of connection. Was animation a nonmechanical, nonsentient way to identify the Kirlian aura? If so, he had been guided by fate into a highly significant insight.

The Hierophant regained his composure. “It is not that we have anything to fear from such a visitation; we have followed the principles of the Arcana faithfully. But the very presence of the Founder after these centuries would suggest some serious development.”

“I understand,” Flint said, considerably reassured himself. “I respect your privacy as you respect mine; no news of this shall leave these premises. Let me proceed to the reading.” He rolled back into the chamber. When he returned to Sphere Sol, he would do some research on Tarotism and its Founder.

The Hermit manifested again, this time as a Polarian. The card dictated the symbol, but his mind animated it. Or rather his Kirlian aura did. He could control the image to some extent. In dealing, he must have controlled the order of the cards, but if the supernatural had some hand in it, that was as valid. Flint trusted to superscience, but at his core he accepted magic also. He was still a Paleolithic man, and he had seen the effect of spells, and learned civilized behavior from the Shaman, the tribe's magic man, still the wisest person Flint had ever known. Was there really any difference between superscience and magic?

“This covers you,” the Hierophant said, touching the machine to make it deal the first card. “This defines the influence upon you, the atmosphere in which you relate.” And Flint found himself standing naked and sexually neuter within a circular wreath. Around him stood four figures: a flying animal, a Polarian, Old Snort the dinosaur, and a wheeled carnivorous beast. These in their diverse, devious fashions symbolized the four conditions of existence: gaseous, liquid, solid, and energy. More specifically, air, water, ground, and fire. As at the Temple entrance, the four elements.

“This is the Cosmos key,” the Hierophant explained. “The Crown of the Magi. It signifies that your mission relates to the whole of our galaxy, affecting all creatures. It is also the key of great promise; what you do is good, reaching for perfection.”

Flint didn't comment. He agreed with the card, but who wouldn't? It signified nothing but flattery. If this were the practical nature of a Tarot reading, it was a waste of his time.