Dennis Schmidt - Wayfarer 4 - The Wanderer.pdf - Dennis Schmidt - margozap

WANDERER

Dennis Schmidt

This book is dedicated to my children

An Ace Science Fiction Book/published by arrangement with

the author

PRINTING HISTORY

Ace Science Fiction edition/November 1985

Cover art by Carl Lundgren

This book may not be reproduced in whole or in part, by mimeograph or any other means, without permission.

For information address: The Berkley Publishing Group,

200 Madison Avenue, New York, New York 10016.

ISBN: 0-441-87160-7

Ace Science Fiction Books are published by

The Berkley Publishing Group,

200 Madison Avenue, New York, New York 10016.

PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

Prologue

The mountains rose on every side, dark and lonely in the night. A steady wind blew from the west,

shredding the few clouds that clung to the sky and flinging them east-ward. Aside from the numbing light

of the stars, the night sky was empty.

They sat in a circle, in the center of a plain, in the middle of the mountains. They were nine in number,

clad in black, their long gray hair whipping in the wind. Full robes draped and obscured their figures, and

deep cowls hid their faces from sight. They sat cross-legged, the skirts of their robes fanning out to cover

the ground. There was nothing to indicate who or what manner of creature they might be.

For many minutes, the only thing that could be heard was the moaning of the wind as it swept across

the plain and swirled around their circle. Then, as though born of the wind itself, a slightly different sound

began to separate itself from the background. It started as the merest whisper. Gradually it grew in

intensity, one moment sinking back into the wind, the next rising triumphantly above it. As it rose higher

and higher, a light grew on the horizon to the east. Slowly, a moon pushed up between two peaks.

Almost immediately it was followed by two more in quick succession. After a short pause, a fourth joined

the other three and together they began their march across the sky.

Now the sound was louder and more intense than the wind. Its cadence was wild and irregular, yet

seemed to hint at an internal logic that transcended any ordinary concept of order. When softer, it had

seemed to come from the very ground itself. Now, as it grew in strength, it could clearly be traced to the

circle of figures.

The light of all four moons was surprisingly bright, and revealed something new about the figures.

Deep within the cowls were human faces. They were of various forms, but all had the same severe frown

of concentration, and the same hard, bright eyes that stared out at things that were not visible. The lips

moved slightly, forming the words of the chant that rose to intertwine with the moaning of the wind and

swirl off toward the moons slowly climbing in the eastern sky.

The words of the chant were almost recognizable, yet somehow they resisted understanding, twisting

from the mind's grasp at the last moment. Higher and higher rose the droning sound until it dominated the

night, pulling the wind with it, forcing the clouds to flee, pushing the moons up, up, ever up. The plain, the

mountains, and eventually the world began to move around their circle as though around an axis. They

were the center.

As the first of the four moons reached the highest point in the heavens, the wordless, flowing chant

stopped suddenly and the world was silent in surprise and anticipation. One of the dark figures spoke in a

husky whisper that rang out against the mountain peaks. "See! See! It lies there in space, so serene, so

beautiful. What shall we call it? What shall its name be?"

"Death," another answered in a dry, rasping voice. "Life," suggested a second.

"Beginning," came a third answer.

"End," was the fourth.

"Kensho," said a fifth, firmly, commandingly.

Nine heads nodded in agreement. "Yes, Yes. Kensho. For it shall be Death and Life. It shall be

Beginning and End. It shall be Kensho. And it shall be Satori."

From the depths of one of the hoods came a cry of pain and horror. "Ahhhhhh! Madness! See how

they kill each other!"

"Yesss," came the group's reply. "The Mushin strike, the mind killers, the leeches, the eaters of

emotions."

"I am annoyed," one said, a whining complaint in the night.

"Mushin make annoyance into anger," came the muttered answer.

"I am angry," another continued, his voice hard and brittle.

"Mushin make anger into fury," the response hissed. "I am furious," shouted a third, the very air

quivering. "Mushin make fury into rage."

"I rage, I rage!" shrieked a fourth, his cry splitting the night and causing tiny creatures to huddle in

terror in their burrows.

"Now Mushin strike," the chant calmly continued. "Now the killers push the tottering mind over the

brink to fall in endless insanity. And now they feed!"

A hideous silence followed, one heavy with dread and death. It was finally broken by a lonely wail.

"Dead! Dead, all dead! Bodies everywhere! Twisted, bloody, eyes gouged out, throats torn out. Dead."

"Some live. A few. Those who control the emotions. Those who can still the mind. Nakamura

knows. He will save them."

Now a chant rose, soft at first, slowly gaining force until it filled the world with its power. "Moons,

moons, shining down on waters, waters moving slowly, moons moving slowly, yet being still. Still the

waters, still the moons. Movement, strife, all longing is but a reflection, passing to stillness when the mind

is calmed."

The chant ran out into the night, Roning along, smoothing the world. A calm settled over and around

the circle. The nine figures were still.

As the second moon reached the height of the sky one of them spoke. "A man comes. And then

another. They bring a way."

"Not a weapon, but a Way," the others answered. "Jerome, to save us from the Mushin."

"Edwyr, to save us from ourselves."

"Way-Farer. He who treads the Way that all may walk it."

"There is Judgment. Those who change survive. The race changes. The race survives."

"Kensho is true to its name. Mushin become Mind Brothers. The ends almost meet, the circle is

almost full."

Now the third moon rose to its apex in the night sky. In one mighty cry the circle shouted, "They

come! They come!"

The chant ran around the circle again. "With might beyond compare, they come."

"With space-spanning ships, they come."

"With mind twisting machines, they come."

"One comes to Kensho, one goes from Kensho."

"The balance is kept."

"The one who comes, stays, un-whole."

"The one who goes, returns, whole."

"The balance is kept."

"They go." The final words were whispered in tense unison.

For the fourth time, a watchful silence fell over the circle of forms. Though none looked up into the

sky, all were watching and waiting for the fourth moon to reach the point already reached by the three

others. When it climbed to that place, a great sigh went up from the nine. The sigh changed into a moan

that the wind took up and whipped against the mountains until the very air vibrated with it and the ground

of the plain trembled and shook.

"Again they come. Many more."

"Yes, yes, they come again."

"Who will stay and who will go?"

"Who will keep the balance?"

"Who will close the circle?"

Eight hooded heads turned to the form at the eastern point of the circle. The cowl dipped slightly and

a voice issued forth from its depths. "The past is easily traveled. One road leads back from here. The rest

have withered through lack of use. What was is determined by what is. What is contains what must be.

This way of seeing can tell no more."

The heads turned then to the figure at the western point. The cowl bowed in acknowledgment and

sorrow. "The future is not as open and clear as the past. It is infinite and multitudinous. From this instant

the paths of possibility flare off in all directions.

"Once we looked and paid a heavy price. We saw many ends. And some beginnings. Now that

which is most probable will be shared. And that which is hoped for as well. Open and receive, for the

fourth moon is high and soon will be setting."

The circle breathed deep and drew gently into a stillness that seemed to stop the very flow of time

and being. Nothing moved. The wind halted and hung suspended in the frozen moons light.

Then it was over. The stars went once more on their way, the fourth moon began to set, the wind

scurried on eastward in its journey as if to make up for lost time. One of the figures sighed and

murmured, "I have seen an end."

"Yes," came the reply, "an end."

"And yet, it was a beginning."

"Yes, a beginning."

"That which has been is always becoming that which will be."

"Through the narrow instant of now the infinite future becomes the singular past. All ends are

beginnings, all beginnings ends."

"The moons are setting as soon as they rise."

"The fate of Kensho has risen."

"Now it is setting."

"To rise again?"

"To close the circle?"

A pause followed, one filled almost to bursting with conjecture and wondering. Then with one voice,

the nine cried out, "They come, they come, they come!"

Hours later, when the last of the four moons had set, the plain was empty except for the hiss and

swirl of the wind. The mountains looked down on darkness. Nothing looked back.

Chapter I

The two men seated across the table from each other were a study in contrasts. One was dark of

skin, hair, and eye. The other was fair, blond, with eyes of a blue so pale they almost appeared white.

The dark one wore a midnight-hued robe, its folds hiding his shape in shadow. His garb was a sign of the

high office he held within the Power. It bore no badge or insignia, yet all knew it declared him a Cardinal

and one of the Adepts in the faith.

The pale man was dressed in the uniform of a Fleet Admiral of the Home Guard, a simple affair of

light blue cut to conform to the figure. The color was in honor of Earth, the incredible water planet that

even now looked blue and lovely as it hung in space.

Admiral Knecht watched the man in black with neutral but careful eyes. Cardinal Unduri, he thought,

was just possibly the most intelligent, most devious, most dangerous man ever to serve the Power.

Everyone knew his story, and he himself relished reminding them of it. Unlike most of those in the

Hierarchy, Unduri had not been born into the upper classes on Earth. Instead, he had come from the

lowest of slums, the vast, sprawling shantytown that lined both sides of the turgid, foul Congo River.

Abandoned by his own parents at an early age, he had fought his way out of the slums and into a minor

post in a local chapel of the Power. From that moment on, his rise had been swift, brutal, and nothing

short of incredible. His appointment as representative of the Power on this mission was a clear indication

of the importance attached to it by the Hierarchy.

As my appointment as military head shows how important we think it is, he reminded himself. The

whole thing was incredible. He had viewed the tapes himself, many times, and still they made no sense.

He had even gained illicit access to the full report of the mind probe the Hierarchy had conducted of

Bishop Thwait. The full report, not merely the "official" summary the Power had submitted to the

Investigating Commission. He shuddered inwardly. They had put one of their own on their damn

machines and torn his mind into tiny pieces, searching, searching for the key to what had taken place

aboard that scout ship. The results were astounding mainly because they literally made no sense. The

whole thing was inexplicable.

No sense, no sense. The phrase echoed in his mind. The ship's tapes made no sense. The memories

in Thwait's mind made no sense.

And yet it had happened. The condition of the scout, the crew, and the Bishop all gave grim evidence

to that fact. The interior of the ship was blasted and half destroyed. It had barely managed to limp home

on its auxiliary systems. But, astonishingly enough, there was no indication of any external damage!

Whatever had taken place had not been the result of an attack from the outside followed by a boarding.

Which brought up the condition of the crew. More than half had been killed or wounded during the

fratricidal conflict that had raged between Admiral Thomas Yamada's men and those who served the

Power. Or so it seemed. But such a thing had never happened in the history of the Power or of the Fleet.

What in the name of Kuvaz could have caused such a thing? It just didn't make sense. Falling on each

other in the face of the enemy? Not one of those questioned could give a satisfactory answer as to what

had happened or why they had acted as they did. Several had died under the interrogation, so there was

no question of their having held back information.

And then there was the condition of the Bishop himself. The drooling, moaning, crying, terrified shell

of Andrew Thwait. What could have plunged a man as tough as Thwait into raving insanity? What kind of

enemy had that scout ship faced?

Which brought him to the strangest part of all. From what he'd seen on the ship's tapes, the enemy

was totally unarmed; the planet was inhabited by a culture which was at best a Class Three.

A planet with no weapons, and a girl. The girl Thwait and Yamada had kidnapped to help with the

preparation of the spy and for the purpose of "questioning" under the Bishop's machines.

The "spy" had been one Dunn Jameson, an Acolyte Third, Drive Engineer, who had been wiped for

heresy against the Power. There had been no details as to the nature of his heresy or about the man

himself. These had been erased from the computer's memory when the man's mind had been wiped.

After being put on the Power's machines, a person simply ceased existing for all intents and purposes.

The Power generally reprogrammed the wiped individual to serve some limited and expendable purpose.

In this case he had been turned into a spy. The girl's memories had been used to help program the spy, to

give him background on the planet. His mission had been simple: Gather information on the state of

military preparedness, and find and kill a person known as the Way-Farer, who was apparently the

planet's leader. As interesting as the situation was, Knecht could see no way in which it could have

caused the mission's failure. From what the files indicated, the spy had done his job and then had been

detonated as usual. No, he thought, Dunn Jameson was an irrelevant factor.

But the girl, the one lone girl. He had watched the tapes of her, the few they had, several times. He

had viewed her as she was brought aboard the scout, unconscious and totally vulnerable. He had seen

her under the machines. Watched while she had killed four men with her bare hands. Gazed in

amazement as she ran through the battling ship, laser rifle spitting death everywhere she went, until finally

she reached the communications room and blasted it into molten metal. And then, as an incredible finale,

he had seen her disappear into thin air!

What in the name of Kuvaz were they getting them-selves into? He looked across the table at the

Cardinal. Would he be as much an enemy as the planet toward which they were heading? Would the

same thing that had happened to Thwait and Yamada, whatever that was, happen between him and

Unduri?

The Admiral cleared his throat slightly and spoke, his voice unusually soft and gentle for a military

man. "I, uh, suppose you've familiarized yourself with all the data on the previous mission, your

Worship?"

The dark man nodded. "Of course, Admiral, of course." For a few moments, the Cardinal let his gaze

rest on the face of the man on the other side of the table. Then he smiled slightly, his eyes glittering coldly

in the bluish light that bathed the small room. "I rather imagine we are thinking quite similar thoughts,

Admiral. Yes, quite similar." His voice was deep and smooth, soft and totally devoid of emotion.

"Thoughts about Thwait and Yamada, about what happened to them above this planet that the girl called

Kensho.

"I wonder, Admiral, do you know what that name means, that Kensho? I found it curious that it was

nowhere in the report. Apparently, no one found it interesting enough to ask. And that in itself is

interesting, no?

"Well, Admiral, my own curiosity compelled me to find out whether it does, indeed, mean anything.

And not surprisingly, it does. Most of these Pilgrimage planets are named after the leader of the mission,

or perhaps after the group that composed the mission. Quarnon, for example, was so named after the

Admiral of the flagship that escorted the Pilgrimage and helped get it established. He died in the process,

the victim of a particularly nasty life form the colonists found themselves confronted with. Asaheim, on the

other hand, was named after the rather bizarre group that founded it, a group which claimed direct

descent from the ancient Norse gods. Strange conceit for a group of mixed northern African stock,

wouldn't you say?

"But Kensho? What, in the world, kind of name is that? A true mystery, until I remembered that

Nakamura, their leader, was of Japanese descent and a High Master of the Universal Way of Zen, a

minor sect of some fifteen million or so people that regrettably had to be wiped out during the

Readjustment.

"Japanese, then, was the clue. Kensho, it seems, was one of the stages of what these primitives called

Enlightenment or Satori. It appears—"

"Let's stop the sparring, Unduri," the Admiral interrupted, his voice flat and hard. "Yes, we're both

thinking the same thoughts. One of the most disturbing is that I don't think I can trust you and you feel the

same about me."

"Ah, Admiral, I admire the directness of your approach. Yes, indeed I do. So military, so forceful.

And what you say is true, so true. For, you see, I am aware that you are a member of, as you people put

it, the Committee."

The pale man tried hard not to show his surprise. So the bastard knows! But that means the

Hierarchy knows! He checked his mind before it went any further in such speculation. There would be

time for that later. Right now he had to deal with the man across the table from him.

Before he could reply, however, Unduri lifted his hand to halt him. "Please, Admiral, do not utter a

word, either of denial or admission. It is unnecessary, really, and matters not a bit under current

circumstances. Let it just stand as concrete evidence of the fact that I fully realize there can be no real

trust between the two of us.

Dennis Schmidt - Wayfarer 4 - The Wanderer.pdf

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