RAINBOW RUN (10 page)

"You make him sound like a monster."

"Isn’t he? From what I know, Errox is one of those people who has never known love, never recognized the meaning of any life but his own. He uses people, takes rights for himself that he denies to others. He can murder, torture and mutilate because he has never felt empathy. He regards other people as animate objects for manipulation."

"He may have been manipulating me, but he did save my life. Then, he helped me obtain food and shelter. I don't have either now."

She looked up and down the slidestrip. "Come on. There's nothing for us here. Let's get on the slidestrip and go."

"Go where? Transit time has robbed me of any place to go."

"We'll go to my dwell. I promised I'd get you something to eat. You can stay with me for the time being."

It was the best offer I'd had today; it wasn't likely that I'd get a better one. As far as I knew, I'd never had a better offer in my life. But maybe I was still in custody. Clandine knew that she could trust me. I'd told her so and my words had been verified by the vericator. I wished I knew how far I could trust Clandine. I know that she had originally wanted to use me as a spy. Maybe she still did? Had I given her more power over me by telling her about my Simulike experience? I hadn't told her about the sexual content of my initiation because I wasn't sure whether or not she would use sex to try to control me.

I said, "Lead the way." I was tired of my own thoughts but not so tired that I neglected to add the route to Clandine's dwell to my mental map.

Clandine’s dwell was in an urbode not far from the Simulike Palace. I added its location to my mental map as a permanent landmark since Clandine, as a white wristlock wearer, did not have to change residences on Transit Day. Her dwell was cleaned on a separate schedule, saving her from the reorientation that most people went through every thirty cycles.
This world would be far more pleasant
, I thought,
if all the urbodes could be cleaned on a schedule that didn't require the tenants to find new lodgings
. My mental musing stopped when Clandine spoke.

"Sit down, Rathe. We’ll have a late first meal."

The food was the same as I'd had in the other urbodes and in the VIS center, but it seemed better here because there were only two of us and we were in a comfortable setting.

"I'm sorry that we couldn't find Miral or Errox," I said. "I didn’t know that it was Transit Day nor did I have any idea how disruptive it would be. I can understand the need for cleaning urbodes and that the people need to be out during the process but why do all the people, except the rainbows and some of the whites, have to change dwells?"

With a serious look on her oval face, Clandine said, "Transit Day forces the players of the Game to take a break and keeps some of them from burning out. It gives the white wristlock wearers that have to move—like Listeners and Clerics—a renewal and all new clients until the next Transit Day. It also makes it more difficult for grays to form permanent groupings. It's like True Faith Forever, another device for controlling grays."

"Some of the grays in my last urbode tried to interest me in meeting with a Cleric," I said. "The idea of devoting this life to spiritual exercises in order to have a better next incarnation requires more faith than I have."

"Me too," Clandine said. "I don’t want to waste this life on speculation. I’m trying to improve things so that when I emerge from the House of Rebirth for my next life I'll find the world a better place, even if I don't remember what it was like before."

"Is it true that only rainbows retain their memories when they reincarnate?" I asked.

"Rainbows don’t pass through the House of Rebirth. When they want their life renewed they go to the Fane of Change and come out rejuvenated with memory intact. Immortality! All you have to do is play the Game."

There was a note of dissatisfaction or disbelief in Clandine’s voice that I hadn't heard before. I asked, "Why don’t you play the Game?"

"I wanted to do something better with my life. I wear the white wristlock of the VIS because it gives me the power to help root out the misguided and criminal elements in our society. I want to stop the Freedom Crusaders. They're tied into the distribution of Cainenol, the drug that’s becoming a plague on our society. The Crusaders use it to control the minds of recruits, convincing them that if they die in the cause of freedom they will be reborn in a paradise called Freeland. Some of the recruits die from overdoses and some have berserker reactions. I want to stop the flow of Cainenol."

"Do you think Errox is involved in supplying the drug?"

"I don't know but I think he could find out about it. He might be willing to do that to get his slate wiped clean instead of being brainwiped."

From the way she talked, I realized that Clandine would have no compunctions about brainwiping anyone who didn't cooperate with her. Knowing that, made me uneasy. I hoped I had the skills to appear useful to Clandine until I could find a way to get out of her custody. I wasn't wearing the control collar, but I was still under her watch. I needed to know more about Transit Day if I wanted to survive until the next one. But,first, I needed to find a new dwell.

"I can see the kind of problems you're dealing with, Clandine, but doesn't Transit Day complicate things for you, even though you don't have to move?"

"Yes, but that's never going to be easy to change since Transit Day promotes the Game. As long as most of the best people concentrate on the game, the rainbows will continue to run things and whites perform the necessary services that can't be automated. Friends and acquaintances may lose track of each other every transit, but the Game goes on forever."

"Why is the Game so crucial? I played it once for a few minutes and I found it interesting because I was good at it. It didn't seem to be important enough to be the center of my life."

"The Game allows everyone a chance for upward mobility. People who are good at symbol manipulation and pattern detection advance to higher levels of the Game where the solutions of abstractions provide the skills the rainbows need to govern and control this world."

All at once, I understood what Clandine was trying to tell me. The Game served two purposes: it kept the best and brightest involved in producing data that preserved the system, while keeping those who didn't play the game in a position of powerlessness.

"The permanent grays get food, shelter, and clothing," I said, "but they have no hope for anything better, no chance to advance unless they play the Game and win—and they can't or won't. So the main job of the VIS is to make sure the permanent grays don't get organized and try to change things. Is that correct?"

"It's true that most VIS personnel are working to resist change. I'm not against change as a matter of policy, but I only want changes that improve society. That makes me one of the few who realize that controlled change can benefit our world, but unthinking resistance to all change can promote stagnation, decay, and destruction."

"You said you are one of the few. Does that mean that there are others who share your perceptions, and possibly your goals?"

"Rathe, you told me I could trust you and the vericator verified that statement as truth. But there is another reason why I think you're trustworthy—you were a blanc a short time ago; you haven't had time to become part of the conspiracy."

"What conspiracy?"

"I believe that some of the rainbows have banded together to control or manipulate the Game to increase and maintain their power."

"Rainbows already have all the real power in this society, don't they?"

"True, but some of the rainbows are doing things that indicate that they want more power than they have now. The rainbows who oversee VIS operations appear to have put obstacles in the way of the VIS personnel who are trying to control the flow of Cainenol. I suspect those rainbows are either involved in the drug trade, have friends who promote the drug or want to use the disruption the drug causes as an excuse to take greater control over VIS policies and personnel. I need your help in investigating this situation."

"My help? I can’t even help myself. I don't have a dwell and the wristlock I'm wearing belongs to a suspected criminal."

Clandine looked deep intomy eyes, "Rathe, I need someone who isn't part of VIS, someone to obtain information that you might be able to get. My VIS wristlock makes people suspicious when I ask them questions."

"Where and how would I get any useful information?" I had already been burned while acting as Errox’s cat’s-paw, so I wasn’t anxious to follow the same path with Clandine.

"I have some suspects in mind that you can approach."

"Clandine, I’m not sure I know enough to convince anyone to give me information that would help you."

"One of my suspects is a Listener. Do you know what a Listener does?"

"Listen, I guess."

"Right," Clandine said, rewarding me with a smile. "A Listener provides that service. Anyone can go to a Listener and talk about problems. The Listener may give advice, give the person some things to think about, or merely assure the person that the Listener has heard and understood. Mostly Listeners deal with grays who don't play the Game or others who want to know if they can become Listeners. I want you to tell your story to my Listener suspect and tell me whatever she tells you. Her name is Lyonella."

I tried my best to keep the shock I felt off my face. Did Clandine know that I had met Lyonella and that
she
believed we had a past?

"One of my associates will check to see where her dwell is when Transit Day is over. Once we locate her, I'll tell you how to get to her dwell, and then you can get her to listen to your story."

"My story?" I was surprised to learn that Lyonella was a Listener. My previous experience with her had made me aware that she was a confused person, someone whose grip on reality wasn't very strong. If she didn’t know already, I didn't want to let Clandine know that I had encountered Lyonella before.

"Yes, your story. You tell her about waking up as a nu-blanc in the Rainbow Room, solving the equation, and escaping. You tell her about being befriended by a gray who made sure you had a dwell and a wristlock. Tell her about your Simulike experience,then being arrested by the VIS and being placed in my custody—"

"You want me to tell her about you?" I asked. "Won't that make her suspicious of me?"

"I don't think so, Rathe. I don't think she knows that anyone suspects her of being part of the conspiracy. Besides, it's her duty as a Listener to hear you out. You can tell her that you're not sure you can trust me; although I've promised you a wristlock of your own and a dwell. Let her know that you're staying with me and you're still wearing the wristlock of a suspected criminal. Whatever she tells you will give me more information to work with."

I was willing to give Clandine's plan a try. Telling my story to a Listener might have a certain therapeutic effect;although, Lyonella would have been my last choice as a personal Listener—had I a choice in the matter… Thinking about Lyonella aroused mixed feelings. In our previous encounter her sexuality had almost overwhelmed me. Would that happen again? She could make me want her sexually, but I didn't want to enter into a relationship unless I could be sure we shared a little more than unbridled lust.

On the other hand, would Lyonella still insist that I was someone she'd known as Vargan? If so, maybe she could tell me about myself and my previous life and identity? Or was she just mentally disturbed, as she’d appeared? It was possible she had confused me with someone else or invented our past relationship? I needed to find out. I knew I could tell my story and make it sound real—especially the part about not being sure I could trust Clandine.

I found Clandine's great conspiracy theory possible but not necessarily probable. I knew that she, like Errox, intended to use me for her own ends. Her commitment was to her theory, not to me. Regardless, I was going to do it because I wanted to do something about my situation and this was the only path of action open to me where I would have some support. I told Clandine, "I'll give it my best effort."

"Good. I'll rehearse you in the part you'll play. Because I'll want you to tell almost the same story to one of my rainbow suspects, whichever one you can find at home on All Hues Day."

"Almost the same story? And what is All Hues Day?"

"You'll tell the rainbow that you overheard two grays in an urbode say that he or she was one of the few rainbows who was reputed to be concerned about the gray population. Then you'll explain your situation briefly and ask for help or advice. Whatever you learn, you can pass back to me."

"How will I get access to a rainbow?" I asked.

"They usually stay in their dwells on holidays because holidays are designed to keep the rest of the population in line. The next holiday is All Hues Day, a day off from the Game. The Game controls are turned off. All the public buildings—like the Simulike Palace and the Color Wheel—are turned into celebration sites where the clergy and other volunteers serve holiday food and jarva punch. All levels of every urbode are open to everyone. The clergy emphasize the spiritual aspects of the holiday, a chance for volunteers to understand the spirituality of service.

"The Game players are forced to take a day off; many of them relieve their tensions with jarva and casual sex in a carnival atmosphere. Some of the rainbows participate in the pleasures of the senses. During All Hues Day you should be able to make contact with one of my rainbow suspects—just one, because they might compare experiences and get suspicious of you, if you told your story to more than one of them."

"I guess I can do that convincingly."

"Sure you can,” she said reassuringly. "You can get an early start on All Hues Day, report back to me, and still have time to enjoy the holiday yourself. It's not a holiday that I celebrate, so I'll be here at my dwell whenever you can get back with a report."

I believed I was beginning to learn more about Clandine. Her power in the VIS made me suspect that she was a dedicated high-achiever and her conspiracy theory might be the result of paranoid tendencies. Her lack of interest in the sensual aspects of All Hues Day was an indication that she wasn’t interested in casual sex and sensuality. That probably meant she wouldn't initiate a sexual relationship with me as a control ploy. That was all right with me. I didn’t want the relationship to get any more complex than it already was.