The Return of Santiago: A Myth of the Far Future (36 page)

      
"Somehow it never is," interjected Dante dryly.

      
"There is a alien race, almost extinct now, that can usually find what you're looking for. Not always, but usually. Rumor has it that they were imported to Nandi III centuries ago to help build it. These are their descendants. No one knows what world they originally came from."

      
"Can they find their way back out?" asked the Bandit.

      
"Frequently."

      
"How do we make contact with one?"

      
"We'll just enter the Maze," answered the alien. "They'll start contacting us."

      
"What do they look like?"

      
"They're humanoid," said Blue Peter. "Perhaps four feet tall. Covered with fur. Their colors differ markedly from one to the next."

      
"Has the race got a name?"

      
"Probably," said Blue Peter. "I mean, all races have names, don't they? Inside the Maze, though, we call them Lab Rats, since they're the only ones who can find their way around with any degree of accuracy."

      
"Lab Rats?" said Dante with a smile.

      
"Your face just lit up," said Blue Peter. "You're going to use them in your poem, aren't you?"

      
"How could I not write about a race known as the Lab Rats?" responded Dante.

      
The Bandit stared at the entrance, which was a broad archway.

      
"We just walk in, right?" he asked.

      
"That's right."

      
"Okay, let's get on with it."

      
He strode forward, and Dante and the alien fell into step behind him. Ten feet into the Maze he stopped and looked behind him.

      
"The entrance is still there," he noted.

      
"Yes, it is," agreed Blue Peter.

      
"Maybe you were exaggerating a little bit?"

      
"I wasn't," said the alien adamantly.

      
They followed the street for fifty yards, until it dead-ended against a large modular triangular building built of imported alien alloys.

      
"Let's try the left," said the Bandit, walking off in a new direction.

      
They followed him. The street narrowed until the buildings were so close together that he couldn't fit through the opening.

      
"So much for that," he muttered. "All right, let's go in the other direction."

      
He turned and backtracked, but when they came to the triangular building, everything seemed different.

      
"Something's wrong," he muttered, looking around.

      
"What is it?" asked Dante, who was bringing up the rear.

      
"That alley," said the Bandit, pointing. "It wasn't there before." On a hunch, he turned to his right, toward the entrance. It was gone. "Okay, so you weren't exaggerating."

      
Suddenly a creature the size of a child emerged from the shadows and approached them. It was covered by dull gray fur, and its face was long and angular, with wideset green eyes and a broad purple nose.

      
"Need a guide?" it hissed in a sibilant whisper. "Need a girly-girly house? Need a trip to Dreamland? Like to make a bet? I take you anywhere you want for 20-credits-20."

      
The Bandit tossed a coin to the Lab Rat. "Tell him," he ordered Blue Peter.

      
"I'm looking for a friend," began the alien.

      
"No blue girly-girly houses in the Maze."

      
Blue Peter shook his head. "This is a human friend. He's been locked up. His name is Virgil Soaring Hawk. I want to find him."

      
"I must search," said the Lab Rat. "I tell you soon."

      
"Should we wait here?" asked the Bandit.

      
"Go wherever," said the Lab Rat. "When I am ready, I find you."

      
He shambled off and scuttled around a corner.

      
"No sense following him," said Blue Peter. "When you get to the corner and look for him, he won't be there."

      
"Then let's walk around and see what the Maze is like, as long as he says he can find us," said Dante.

      
The Bandit agreed, and the three of them set off. The farther into the Maze they got, the stranger it became. Streets ended inside buildings, or curved and twisted back onto themselves. Buildings were all shapes; some seemed to blink in and out of the men's dimension, though when they approached them they seemed solid enough. There were doorless, windowless buildings from which peals of human laughter emanated, and stores that sold objects that were totally unfamiliar to Dante. There were brothels showcasing males and females of a dozen different races, and gambling dens with long, winding, seemingly endless tunnels leading to individual games. They followed a corridor, found a room with aliens playing
jabob
, retraced their steps, and found themselves inside an alien shrine that featured an altar stone still wet with blood. They walked out the exit, and found themselves blocks from the gambling den, on a four-level avenue covered by a building that rose from the ground on both sides of the street, leaned toward the middle, and joined about ten feet above the top level, forming a huge triangular arch.

      
"This gets weirder and weirder," said Dante.

      
"This is the ordinary part," said Blue Peter. "It gets really weird about three blocks from here."

      
Another Lab Rat, this one light tan with large black spots on its fur, approached them.
"Psst!"
it hissed.

      
"Go away," said Blue Peter. "We've already got a guide."

      
"Psst!"
it repeated. "Your guide has deserted you. I will never do that. I offer the unusual, the exotic, the bizarre. All for only 20 credits."

      
"Not interested," said the Bandit.

      
"For you, 15 credits," said the Lab Rat. It pulled its thin lips back in a distorted smile. "Eat at Joe's."

      
"If we want a restaurant, we'll find one without your help," said Blue Peter irritably.

      
"Not like Joe's," said the Lab Rat. "Your meal is lightly basted and still alive. You can listen to it scream as it slides down your gullet."

      
"Forget it."

      
"It is forgotten," said the Lab Rat.
"Psst!
Girly-girly house of cyborgs, only 12 credits."

      
Their own guide suddenly appeared. He stared at the other Lab Rat and growled deep in his throat. The new Lab Rat hissed at him. A moment later they were roaring and screeching, jumping up and down and making threatening gestures. Finally, as the noise reached a crescendo, they both stopped at the same instant, and the new Lab Rat raced away.

      
"Do not let my brother disturb you," said their guide. "I will kill him later."

      
"He's your brother?" asked Dante.

      
"Probably," was the answer.

      
"Did you find Virgil Soaring Hawk?" asked the Bandit.

      
"Ah, the unfortunate Virgil," said the Lab Rat. "Yes."

      
"Why 'unfortunate'?" asked Dante.

      
"He is guilty of sins for which they have not yet created any names," replied the Lab Rat. He turned to Blue Peter. "You helped."

      
"Take us there," said the Bandit.

      
"They will not release him."

      
"That is not your concern," said the Bandit, tossing him another coin. "Just take us there and then leave."

      
"If I leave, you will never find your way out."

      
"That is
our
concern," said the Bandit.

      
"You will die of old age here, all but the blue one," warned the Lab Rat.

      
"Why not me?" asked Blue Peter.

      
"The Maze finds your presence offensive. It will throw you out."

      
"How do you know?"

      
"The same way I know how to find Virgil Soaring Hawk," replied the Lab Rat, as if that answered everything.

      
"But—" began Blue Peter.

      
"Shut up," said the Bandit. He turned to their guide. "No more talk. Take us to Virgil."

      
The Lab Rat stared at him, gave a shrug that rippled down its entire body, and headed off down a dank, twisting alley. The Bandit and his companions fell into step behind the furry creature, following as it turned one way and then another, seeming to follow no rational course—but they noticed that while they were constantly backtracking, they never passed the same street or building twice.

      
Finally the Lab Rat ascended two levels, walked a block, climbed back down to the pavement, and waited for his party to assemble.

      
"Here we are," he said.

      
"
Where
are we?" said the Bandit.

      
"You wanted to find Virgil Soaring Hawk, didn't you?"

      
"Yes."

      
The Lab Rat pointed to an unmarked door. "Just walk through there."

      
"There are 50 identical doors on this block," said the Bandit. "How do you know it's this one?"

      
"Because."

      
"All right. Open it."

      
"I am done. You are not paying me to stay."

      
"I paid you to find Virgil Soaring Hawk. You're not done until I know he's inside."

      
The Lab Rat turned to him. "Have I ever lied to you?"

      
"You haven't said five sentences to me."

      
"There. You see?"

      
"Open the door."

      
"I weep at your distrust."

      
"You'll do more than weep if he's not in there."

      
The Lab Rat stared at him for a long moment. "This door," it said, walking to a door next to the one it had originally indicated.

      
"I thought it was the other door."

      
"I changed my mind."

      
The Bandit opened the door and turned to Dante. "Keep an eye on him until I make sure that Virgil's here." He entered the building.

      
"What's behind the first door?" asked Dante.

      
"Open it," said the Lab Rat.

      
"Just tell me."

      
The Lab Rat forced his lips into another smile. "That would spoil the surprise."

      
"I notice your Terran has become a lot more fluent since our first meeting," noted Dante.

      
"That's because it is noon in the Maze."

      
"It gets better or worse depending on the time of day?"

      
"And the weather."

      
Dante was about to reply when the door opened and the Bandit reappeared.

      
"Okay, let him go and follow me."

      
Dante turned to tell the Lab Rat to leave, but it was already gone. He walked forward and entered the building, followed by Blue Peter. They walked down a narrow arched corridor that curved to the left, and after a moment came to a lighted room. There was a strange multi-leveled desk with a small, olive-skinned man seated behind it.

      
"This gentleman," said the Bandit, indicating the man, "seems to be in charge of the place."

      
"I
am
in charge."

      
"It's not a jail and it's not a stockade, right?"

      
"That is correct."

      
"And yet you freely admit that you have incarcerated Virgil Soaring Hawk here."

      
"The Maze is used to aberrant behavior," said the man. "It is used to perversions that I hope you cannot begin to imagine. And yet your friend has performed acts that offend not only the inhabitants of the Maze but the Maze itself."

      
"And the Maze told you that, did it?" asked Dante.

      
"Not in so many words, but if you live here long enough, you know how to interpret its moods."

      
"I am sorry our friend has offended you," said the Bandit. "Tell me how much we owe you for damages, I'll pay his tab, and we'll be on our way."

      
"The same perversions, performed on another world, will be no less offensive," said the man.

      
"But since you won't know about them, they won't offend
you
," the Bandit pointed out.

      
"The Maze says he must stay. He will not be harmed, he will be well treated—but he will be confined alone for the rest of his life."

      
"He belongs to me," said the Bandit. "I'm taking him away with me."

      
"Do
you
indulge in similar sins?" demanded the man.

      
"What I do is no one's business but my own."

      
"And I suppose you're going to tell me that what Virgil Soaring Hawk does is no one else's business?"