The Garments of Caean Read online

  Grashnik had stopped breathing by the time Peder beckoned to Mast to follow him, and they set forth on the lifer’s slow, persistent project: a route to the surface.

  It took them nearly three hours of crawling, dodging and ducking, of fiddling with Grashnik’s sometimes faulty pass keys, before they came to the hatchway he had built into the outer perimeter wall. Nearby, in an improvised locker, they found the breathing set.

  ‘One of us will have to go first, and return for the other,’ Mast said.

  Peder paused. He filled his lungs, breathing deeply as if experimenting with his respiratory system. ‘It may not be necessary,’ he murmured. ‘Ledlide’s atmosphere contains some oxygen. Not enough to sustain one normally … but I may be able to manage. You don’t mind if I lean on you to save my energy? Occasionally I may ask for a lungful of air from your mouthpiece. If I should collapse, carry me the rest of the way to the ship …’

  ‘But you can’t live out there,’ Mast objected.

  ‘Do as I say.’

  ‘How long will it take us to get to this ship?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  Thinking him mad, Mast donned the breathing set. The Frachonard suit slowed down Peder’s metabolism to a minimum as they went through the tiny airlock Grashnick had built. Ledlide’s young atmosphere was thick and cloying, filled with unpleasant gases. By the light of a torch, also supplied by courtesy of Grashnik, they found a low-roofed tunnel, and then the fissure, made scalable by metal ladders hammered into the rock.

  Steadily, foot by foot, they began to climb.

  11

  Casting off one’s body and assuming larval form was, after all, something the human mind could not be expected to take without strain. Amara admitted this as she peered anxiously through the window of Alexei Verednyev’s chamber. Alexei, sans suit, filled to the eyeballs with de-sensitizing drugs, was tottering about his prison in a daze.

  The surgical revamping given him by the Callan’s medical section had left him seriously ill. His limbs were new, grown in a gene tank since his original ones had been too atrophied to be of use. Some of the torso and neck muscles had also been replaced, while others had been coaxed to work against the pull of normal gravity by an extensive course of massage and protein injection. His present digestive system would probably never be able to absorb normal food, and therefore there was talk of replacing that also with a new alimentary canal.

  But the physical problems were nothing to the psychological ones. Alexei’s rebirth would not have been endurable at all had he not been subjected to a process known as ‘neutralized effect’. This technique, accomplished by a combination of hypnosis and a whole battery of psyche-controlling drugs, robbed all experience of emotive content, so that anything, however bizarre or traumatic, was viewed with the same complacent equanimity. The drug dosages were supposed to be decreased by stages as Alexei grew accustomed to his condition, but in practice the withdrawal simply could not be carried out at the planned rate without his quickly regressing into what Estru flippantly termed ‘the horror syndrome’.

  In deciding to undertake the experiment Amara had acted from mixed motives, not all of which could be subsumed under the heading of scientific curiosity. When speaking to her team she had reasoned that it would be a useful exercise in researching ‘the mentality of encasement’. Possibly it would give them a line on how to decondition the Caeanic aberration. But she was also prompted by a genuine compassion for the hulking metalloid, who was cut off for ever from his own kind and could not even negotiate the ship without help, – or so she had told herself; she had also conceived an aggravation with him, an exasperated feeling that he would not really co-operate until he had been cut down to size.

  In one corner of the chamber stood a mock-up of the suit Verednyev had once possessed, into which he was permitted to retreat in moments of stress. With old-man weariness he leaned briefly against a wall, then made for this refuge. Amara spoke to him quickly, using the outside microphone.

  ‘You’re looking well today, Alexei. How are you feeling?’

  As she had intended, he halted his retreat to the mock-up. ‘As well as could be expected, Amara,’ he said dully, keeping his face averted. Even his own voice, vibrating directly on the air without the mediation of radio transducers, sounded alien to him.

  ‘Good,’ she responded briskly. ‘I’d like to come in so we can talk face to face. How about it?’

  ‘Not yet, Amara. I don’t think I’m ready for it. I still wouldn’t be able to bear it.’

  ‘All right,’ she said, making no attempt to hide her displeasure. ‘But just try to understand that you’ve got to make an effort. Before long we’ll be cutting down your medications to absolutely nothing. Then you’ll have to learn to face us. You’re got to live as we do.’

  Maybe I’ll take his mock-up away altogether, she thought as she left. It’s time he did without a funk-hole.

  Back in her section, she faced up brazenly to Estru’s scepticism. ‘He’ll adjust in the end,’ she assured him. ‘Learning to walk in only three months is pretty good going, if you think about it.’

  ‘But you said he’d be strolling through the ship by now and chatting to the crew,’ Estru reminded her.

  ‘He will. The important thing is that he’s realized there’s no other way out for him. He’s co-operating.’

  ‘Oh, I’ve no doubt he’ll make some sort of adjustment in the end. Then when we stop filling him with drugs he’ll be able to perceive his situation clearly for a change. A week later he’ll commit suicide. I doubt if lifelong conditioning can ever be permanently set aside.’

  ‘Then we won’t stop giving him drugs,’ Amara countered. ‘We’ll find a balance, whatever keeps him sane.’

  She cut off any further talk on the subject. There were more important things to do than to argue over the Verednyev experiment. The latest field research report to be delivered by the ‘planetary probes’ (as she called her spies) lay on her desk. She leafed through it attentively before speaking on the vidcom to the head of her staff in the adjoining room.

  ‘Has this report been taped yet?’

  ‘All ready to roll, Amara.’

  ‘Right, run it through to me.’

  She and Estru turned to their official terminal and watched a flow of symbols and diagrams (the specialized jargon of their trade) dance across the screen. ‘Leave it keyed in,’ Amara told her staffman. ‘I’ll integrate the results myself.’

  Her hands moved over the keys, instructing the sociological computer (the department’s main piece of hardware) to integrate the report’s findings into all the rest of the data they had gathered so far. Then they both sat back and studied the emerging updated pattern.

  ‘Well, it’s shaping up as I had expected,’ Amara congratulated herself. She stopped at the summation diagram, a graph displaying various curves and coded figures. ‘See, the habit-cohesiveness index is down – less rigidity. The Ries-Hammond factor is down, too. The implication is quite clear – the “Sovyan effect” is beginning to abate.’

  ‘But the sartorial index is increasing,’ Estru commented. ‘Apparel is richer in variety and content.’

  Amara nodded. ‘Of course it is. As the more restrictive consequences of the Sovyan experience fall away, the basic Sovyan mode manifests itself in a compensatory blossoming of sartorial techniques. Somewhere farther along the Tzist Arm – mid-way along it, perhaps – I think we shall see a culmination of Caeanic culture; clothes-consciousness will reach its peak. Then that, too, will decline as we proceed towards the farther end of the Arm. We can predict that the people at the extremity – those farthest from the seminal Sovyan event – will be almost normal. That’s what we can extrapolate from these figures, anyway.’

  Estru grunted. ‘The Directorate will be interested to hear that.’

  ‘They will indeed,’ Amara nodded emphatically. ‘If the planets at the farther end of the Arm turn out to be closer to us in outlook than to more typical Caeanics
– as I think they will – they will provide us with a lever for subversion.’

  She sighed with satisfaction, feeling the excitement of expanding knowledge. Sovya had given her an anchor-point from which to forecast a whole range of Caeanic characteristics right along the Tzist Arm. It thrilled her to see her predictions being borne out by observation.

  Privately Estru was more cautious. For the past few months, under heavy baffle to avoid detection, they had been scouting along the inner curve of the Tzist Arm, taking ‘cultural sounding samples’ from the more accessible inhabited planets. This they did by stealthily dropping trained observers, Caeanic-speaking and wearing Caean-made garments, who were supposed to index certain ‘cultural variables’ identified according to parameters chosen by Amara herself. Surprisingly, all the agents had so far returned safely. Amara swore that the method was reliable and objective, and Estru did not dare to contradict her, but sometimes he amused himself by imagining what sort of picture a similar operation carried out on Ziode would produce.

  ‘What’s the itinerary now?’ he said as Amara cancelled the summation diagram from the terminal. For an answer she keyed a map of the Tzist Arm on to the screen. Wandering along part of the inner curve ran a jagged line, each kink and angle marked by a symbol and denoting a planet they had surveyed.

  ‘Logically we should head for Verrage, the nearest regional capital, but that will bring us into the commercial space routes where we might be detected.’ She bit her lip, then zoomed in on the approaching stretch of the Arm.

  ‘We ought to try to get as close to Verrage as possible,’ he commented.

  ‘True enough.’ Stars and star groupings were sliding past in glowing colours on the screen as she tried to pick a tortuous path that would avoid the main space-faring lanes. ‘There’s a lot of information to be gained from this region.’

  ‘Perhaps we should ask Captain Wilce to pick a route,’ Estru suggested. ‘Safety is his responsibility, after all.’

  ‘I don’t want to give Verrage too wide a berth. But I dare say you’re right.’

  She turned to the vidcom asked for Captain Wilce.

  12

  The Diask: a garment unique to Caean, composed of independent panels of stiffish, chunky cloth cut into various shapes. Lacking stitching, seams or fastening, the panels maintain position solely by reason of the cloth’s natural tendency to adhere to itself, a quality which is heightened by friction. The garment thus clings during motion and relaxes somewhat when still. Wearing the diask brings a sensation of security and containment.

  The Bliaut: a garment of ancient origin but much developed and variegated in Caean. Consisting basically of a corset-like bodice with wide, sweeping sleeves, elaborately decorated, low, curved waistline and heavily folioled skirt or breeches.

  The Cyclas: a loose garment cut from a single piece of cloth with a single hole for the head. In the same class as the chiton (a long loose tunic with overfold fastening on the shoulder) and the kalasiris (a long-sleeved or sleeveless robe) but unlike them an essentially simple garment. To cut a new cyclas is regarded as one of the tests of a true sartorialist, since originality can only be achieved by means of tensions and warps in the weave. The cyclas, like its cousins the chiton and the kalasiris, imparts a sense of airy freedom.

  The Houppelande: a gown made in a bell shape and of rich cloth, sometimes reaching only to the thighs, but more often falling in increasing fullness to the ankles. Gracefulness of the heavy folds, both in skirt and sleeves, is an important feature. The houppelande gives a feeling of graciousnesss, richness and slow dignity.

  The Arras: a broad hanging garment consisting of flat, tasselled front and back curtain-panels depending from wide shoulder-rails, usually worn with a matching rail-like headdress and veil. The arras gives an impression of screened secrecy and withdrawal. Faintly reminiscent of a mandilion or some kinds of herald’s tabard.

  The Leviathan: a set of clothes covered in moving human images, so that the wearer seems to be clad in a living multitude. Variations on the leviathan use fewer, perhaps only one, image – a face set in the chest, perhaps, furnished with a voice and a certain degree of computer-backed personality able to respond to the wearer’s social environment. The leviathan can express sociability and extreme extroversion, but also multiple personality, instability of mind, and extreme distraction from one’s surroundings.

  The Remontant: a garment in which the human frame is utilized as the supporting stem for a flower theme. There is an infinite variety of remontants, most of which express a springlike quality denoting delight in new life, blossoming energy and artistic talent.

  These are but a few examples of the garments commonly worn in Tzist. It would be impossible to give any really adequate idea of the vast diversity of Caeanic apparel, which perhaps is best indicated by the fact that nearly one third of the Caeanic vocabulary is concerned with clothing. Oddly, the concept of fashion does not exist in Caean; the country is subject to no sweeping changes of mood or mass imitation. An important feature of the national structure is supplied, however, by sub-cults which could be described as ‘fashion societies’, but which are known in Caean as ‘sodalities’. There are innumerable of these, some small and local, some nationwide, each with its own historical, philosophical or cultural theme or goal which is pursued by means of suitable costume.

  All the above, and most other distinct categories of garment, could be regarded as having specialized applications. If a dress of universal potential exists then it is the form of attire most commonly worn in Caean and Ziode alike, and known simply as: The Suit: consisting essentially of trousers, a jacket, and more often than not a waistcoat. In this form the suit can be traced as far back as pre-expansionist Earth, reaching a peak of inventiveness in the twenty-first century of that era. In all known succeeding cultures it has survived as the predominant mode of dress among males and sometimes even among females, by reason of its convenience and flexibility of expression. In the hands of the Caeanic sartorialists it has radiated into a whole universe of styles, often losing its original character and merging into other, more specialist, classifications. Many established modes are known by apt names: the Scythe (making a man incisive, speedy), the Skyscraper (bringing a feeling of tallness, uprightness and commanding power), the Zipflash, the Suit of Light, the Airplane, and so on.

  The Caeanic ideal is a suit of clothes that encompasses the whole man and not merely some aspect or potentiality of him. Only the near-legendary Frachonard is believed to have accomplished such perfection, and then only in a limited number of his creations.

  Arth Matt-Helver, Travels in the Tzist Arm

  Sinuating through the velvety curves of superphotic space, the Caeanic battle cruiser had been shadowing the Callan for days. Captain Wilce, preparing to make a fly-by of the star group containing Verrage, had continued to entertain the faint hope that it was merely flying on a course coincidentally parallel to their own. But he had not been so impetuous as to veer away in order to put that hope to the test. Sudden changes of course attenuated the effectiveness of their baffles.

  On the fifth day, however, he was forced to acknowledge the failure of their mission. His face grave, he made a call to Amara.

  ‘We have just received a transmission from the commander of the Caeanic ship,’ he told her. ‘He tells me we are to be escorted to Verrage. He also instructs us to pipe aboard a party of his officers.’

  Amara went white. ‘Is there no chance of getting away?’

  ‘None at all, from a fully armed cruiser. They’ve clearly broken our bafflement.’

  ‘But we must get our research findings back to Ziode,’ she insisted.

  ‘We could try launching a message boat. It probably won’t get far.’

  ‘Do it anyway. We’ll have the tapes ready in five minutes. After that I want time enough to destroy our records.’

  ‘I should be able to delay things that long. I’m sorry about all this, Amara, but we really don’t have any choice but t
o comply.’

  ‘I know.’ Amara shut off the vidcom and turned to Estru. Even in defeat her look of stubbornness remained.

  ‘Damn,’ she said. ‘Damn.’

  Then she issued the orders which kept the department frantically busy for the next quarter of an hour. Two complete copies of all their findings were made. One went to the launching bay. The other they hid where the Caeanics would be unlikely to find it unless they took the Callan apart rivet by rivet – in which case the record would burn up before it came to light.

  Then all records, reports and dissertations contained in the sociological computer were erased.

  At last Amara sat back with a sigh, satisfied that the Caeanics would not discover the highly strategic secret of the existence of Sovya. Then she sat suddenly upright, her mouth set.

  ‘We shall have to destroy Verednyev too.’

  ‘No! I mean, not yet anyway.’ Estru was disturbed. ‘His background isn’t immediately evident. They won’t learn it unless they interrogate him – in Russian.’

  She clenched and unclenched her fist indecisively. ‘They’ll interrogate everybody. It’s too much of a risk.’

  ‘It wouldn’t be a very nice thing to do,’ he protested, ‘unless we absolutely have to.’

  Grudgingly she conceded. ‘We’ll leave it for the moment. I don’t like having to kill him any more than you do. But I want his guards armed and informed of their duty, should it become necessary.’

  As the Caeanic officers came aboard the message boat was launched. It was equipped with self-destruct, but this precaution proved superfluous. Before it could even slip into overdrive a pin-point ray shot out from the Caeanic cruiser and vaporized it.