The End of the Matter (10 page)

These details were interesting, but they were only incidental to what had caused both man and minidrag to tense. Each man had displayed a curled form on a shoulder, one on the left, the other on the right. Even from a distance there was no mistaking that blue-and-pinkish-red pattern of interlocking diamond shapes.

Minidrags!

Tame ones, probably as domesticated as Pip. His pet was the only miniature dragon Flinx had ever seen. While he had known that Pip came from here, he had had no idea that the practice of domesticating the venomous creatures was popular. Certainly it wasn’t widespread, because he had wandered through much of the town without seeing any tame flying snakes. Until now.

He increased his speed and found himself facing the entrance. If nothing else, he would learn something of his pet on this trip. The two men inside, living as they did on the snakes’ native planet, likely knew more about minidrags than Flinx had been able to learn on his own. Seeing the two men together, he suspected that the bond achieved between man and reptile led to one between men capable of taming such a dangerous animal. It was a suspicion compounded of equal parts naiveté and reason. If he was right, they would greet him as a friend.

Despite his anxiety, the entrance to the structure still gave him pause—the two men had entered a simiespin. Flinx was familiar with the notorious, barely tolerated simie booths. Places of unrefined amusement often advertised such booths for use.

In a simie booth, an individual’s thoughts were read, amplified, and displayed three-dimensionally in the booth user’s mind. The dreamlike simulacrum was complete with all relevant sensory accompaniment: sight, smell, touch, everything. All it took was the modest fee.

Naturally, a simie booth was private. Intrusion into a private booth, during which the intruder could also partake of some private dream, was one of the most universally decried offenses in the Commonwealth. This because the most unassuming individual could rid him or herself of the most depraved, obnoxious fantasies no matter how hellish they might be, without harming anyone.

Since booth owners didn’t care what fantasies their patrons conjured up, simies were once considered obscene and had been banned. The resultant great legal battle had finally been decided in favor of the simie manufacturers. Freedom of thought, one of the pillar principles of the Commonwealth, was brought to bear on the argument, and it was that which had finally defeated the censors. That, and the solemn testimony of a Church medical team. The team had deplored the uses to which the booths were sometimes put while simultaneously ruling that the booths had therapeutic value.

What Flinx was confronting was something at once less disreputable and more unsettling. In effect, a simiespin was a greatly enlarged simie booth which surrounded an entire establishment—a restaurant, a bar, sometimes even a travel agency. Preprogrammed, the simiespin machinery projected mass three-dimensional illusion. It provided an always-changing environment, keyed by the random thoughts of its patrons but preprogrammed with nondestructive simulacra. The thrill was in never knowing where a visitor might find himself next.

Simiespins vied with one another in the detail of their programming and the intensity of their simulations. Unwary visitors had been known to suffer from spells of madness, unable to cope with the rapid-fire change of environments, but these cases were insufficiently common to close the simiespins down. Ample warnings were posted outside to keep the unwary and uncertain from entering.

There was additional protection, as Flinx discovered after paying the fee and entering. He found himself in a long hallway, dark and lined with fluorescent murals depicting scenes from different worlds. It was more than a mere entranceway. He could feel a tickling at his mind.

Behind those decorative murals lay expensive, sensitive equipment, which the law had determined necessary. If any of them felt that Flinx’s mind or that of any other prospective patron was ill equipped to handle the fluctuating environment of the spin, alarms would sound and human or mechanical attendants would appear. They would announce with regret that those so analyzed would have to search elsewhere for amusement.

It was interesting that although a simiespin could serve food and drink that by themselves produced mental effects, there was no age restriction. What was required was a firm grasp on reality. Children were notoriously weak in that area, and so in general were barred from entering. But those children whom the machines passed were welcome within, whereas certain adults were rejected. It could and did lead to occasional embarrassment for overconfident parents, when they were denied entrance and their offspring were passed on.

Flinx found himself wondering how many politicians would be refused admittance to a simiespin. He was not surprised when the machinery also passed Ab. His alien tag-along had
no
grip on reality, and so was freely granted admittance to the lesser madness ahead.

Before him the door pulsed with an internal ruby glow, a promise of pleasure beyond. A sensuous mechanical voice murmured softly, “You have paid for and have been granted permission to sample our palette of a thousand worlds. Your pet”—an apparent reference to Ab—“may enter with you but must be kept under control at all times. You will be charged . . .” and the voice quoted various figures; the rate went down as the length of time increased. “On your way out or in, partake of the invigorating refreshments we offer,” the voice concluded. Flinx nodded. It was a bar, as he had suspected.

Smoothly the pulsing red door slid into the floor. Flinx braced himself mentally and walked forward. His initial reaction was one of letdown. The simiespin chamber was huge, a good three stories high inside. Though it didn’t look like an ordinary gathering chamber at present. Instead of benches and booths and a bar, he found himself looking at a sloping beach studded with boulders. It was evening. A sun much pinker and hotter than either Moth’s or Alaspin’s was turning the drifting stratus clouds above the color of wine. The sky matched the ocean, whose purple-lavender waves lapped sonorously at the yellow sands. A few strange plants swung lazily in the hot breeze off the water, almost in time to the humming sound of unknown source.

Nearby a man and a woman lay entwined in each other’s arms. Their filthy prospectors’ clothing was grotesquely out of place in the idyllic scene, but neither appeared to mind. They were elsewhere anyway, no doubt partly as a result of whatever they were sucking from a nearby boulder through a pair of long, sturdy plastic siphons.

“Where are we?” Flinx asked, his curiosity at the vision around him overcoming his unease at invading the couple’s privacy.

The man didn’t object. Pulling the tip of the siphon from his lips, he eyed Flinx and muttered dreamily, “Quofum, I think. Quofum.”

That was a world Flinx had heard of once. It supposedly lay far from the Commonwealth’s boundaries, somewhere along the inner edge of the Arm. Only a few humans and thranx had ever succeeded in visiting it. Something was wrong with space in that region, something which caused Quofum to appear only occasionally at the coordinates recorded.

Fabled Quofum, where the sky was as clear as a virgin’s conscience and the wine-colored seas tasted of everything from ouzo to Liebfraumilch. For the oceans of Quofum were varied, though the sea-stuff normally ran about nine percent alcohol. In the endless oceans of Quofum, so the tale ran, swam fish who were never unhappy.

Stepping off the wooden landing, he found his feet sinking slightly into warm sand. Then he was by the edge of the sea, which stretched endlessly to the horizon. Sunset outdid itself as he kneeled at the edge of the water. Purple comfort ran over his knees and extended hands. Pip stirred uneasily on Flinx’s shoulder, shook him with a start back to reality. It was the most perfect illusion Flinx had ever experienced.

Cupping his hands, Flinx dipped them into the sea, brought them up, and sipped a double palmful of ocean. The flavor of the seawater was rich, fruity, and strong, with a powerful bouquet and a gentle perfume caused by the warming effect of his hands.

Rising, he noticed the stains on his jumpsuit and frowned.

Someone chuckled.

Looking behind, he saw the two minidrag tamers he had followed in, leaning up against a wave-worn rock. The one with the aquiline nose called to him. His accent was unplaceable.

“Join us, young dragon lord, and sit with your fellow reptiles.”

Flinx started up the beach, brushing fitfully at his pants.

“Don’t worry,” the swarthy man assured him, “the stains will disappear the moment you leave. They’re as unreal as the sand and the drunken oceans.”

Even so, Flinx could still taste the smooth wine in his mouth, feel the wetness where it had swirled around his wrists and knees. The sand remained hot underfoot. Yet despite the heat, he realized, he was comfortable. No wonder only those of stable mind were permitted entry into such places! One with a less solid grasp of reality could go quite mad here.

As if to test his thoughts, the sky above suddenly blurred, as did the landscape around him. When the brief moment of disorientation had passed, he saw storm clouds overhead. Rain was falling steadily, and lightning crashed around him as electrons warred in the heavens.

Flinx blinked away drops that he
knew
weren’t real, that were only the products of machinery so sophisticated and sensitive that few humanx really understood how they operated. But he had to blink, the water dimmed his vision.

Jungle and high ferns closed tightly around him, the startling climax vegetation of a cold-weather rain forest. He felt stifled, and looked around frantically for the simiespin entrance. Naturally, he could see nothing so out of keeping with the forest simulacrum. Rain continued to pelt his head and shoulders, sending Pip deep into the folds of Flinx’s jumpsuit material. Ab singsonged behind them, oblivious to the cold downpour.

Except . . . Flinx wasn’t cold.

“We’re over here,” a laughing voice called to him.

He hunted but saw nothing. “Where?”

“Behind the big tree, straight ahead. We haven’t moved.”

Flinx walked around a meter-thick bole which looked like a cross between a Terran redwood and a bundle of black lizards tied together. As he walked past, he tapped the trunk. It responded with a stentorian bark that made him jump.

His response prompted another laugh, nearer now. Behind the tree, the two minidrag tamers stood as before, only now they were leaning up against a rotting stump. Rainbow-hued fungi formed a riot of color on the dead wood.

“First time in a simiespin, compadre?” the small man asked with a grin.

“Yes. I had some idea of what to expect but”—he took in a deep breath—“it’s still awfully disconcerting. Especially the suddenness of the changes.”

“That’s one of the attractions,” the other man countered. “As it is with everything in life.”

“Don’t pay any attention to Habib,” the short one advised. “One drink and he turns morbidly philosophical.” He extended an open hand. “My name’s Pocomchi.” A nod toward Pip, peeking out from beneath Flinx’s shirt top. “You’re the youngest I’ve ever seen with a tame drag.”

They were already on a first-name basis—good. As Flinx shook the proffered palm, Pocomchi extended the other. It held a large, fat mushroom. At least, that’s what it looked like. Flinx reached for it. As he did so, the large triangular head cradled next to the short man’s neck lifted. A slight sneeze from that head and Flinx would be dead. But at a word from its master, it relaxed.

The mushroom turned out to be full of a brown liquid. It looked like gravy, but it held the kick of the whole bull. After a stunned taste, Flinx handed it back.

Meanwhile, Pip’s head was weaving back and forth, up and down in jerky, dancing motions. His excitement was understandable. Since Flinx had found him, this was the first time he’d ever set slitted eyes on another of his own kind. The two minidrags opposite were apparently more used to others like themselves. They regarded Pip with only mild interest.

“I’m Flinx,” he replied when he had his breath back. As they sat down across from him, Flinx made a seat on the stump of another dead bush; the spongy mold crushed to cushion his backside against the hard wood.

“Tell me, is this a chair I’m sitting on, or . . . ?”

“You guess as well as we,” the one called Habib told him languidly. “All life’s an illusion.”

“There he goes again,” grumbled Pocomchi good-naturedly. He pointed behind Flinx. “Since that’s remained constant, I assume it’s not an illusion.” Flinx saw that the man was gesturing at Ab.

“He’s a ward of mine. Crazy as a drive lubricator from too many fumes, but completely harmless.”

“Funny-looking creature,” Pocomchi decided. He swigged his mushroom.

Flinx studied his seat. It looked exactly like a dead stump. As he regarded it, it turned into an eight-legged, blue-furred spider-shape which rolled bug-eyes and hearing organs at him. It didn’t move, however, and seemed content to support him. Somehow Flinx managed not to jump.

But his new friends noticed the irrepressible twitch. “First time in a simiespin for sure,” Pocomchi chuckled, as the sky turned pale puce above them. Then his expression turned curious, although the friendliness remained in his voice. “And maybe the first time on Alaspin as well? But that makes no sense. Dragon lords are few, Flinx. I don’t recall seeing you before.”

“I’m from offworld, all right,” he admitted. For some reason, he didn’t hesitate to reveal information to these men. Anyone who could tame one of the empathic telepaths called minidrags could employ them only for defense, never to attack or bully or cajole others. The snakes wouldn’t do it. They would never associate with such a being in the first place.

If these men were not informative, they might at least be potential allies.

“Not only is it my first time here,” he continued, “but it’s Pip’s as well. He was abandoned on my home planet when we were both much younger. In a way, I suppose,” he concluded, fondly rubbing the minidrag under one pleated wing, “it’s more of a homecoming for him than it is anything for me.”