The University of Dreams and Knowledgeby Harry Lang |
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| part 3 |
The park was empty but the old lady was in her tiny yard along with seven or eight other women. Virtually indistinguishable from each other, they milled around the property swinging brooms back and forth, chattering to themselves. It was a truly bizarre sight but Grimble wasn’t there to analyze the behavior of the locals.
“Good afternoon, ladies.” He glared at the old woman who had sent him to the mine, his hands squeezed into fists. “Good afternoon, miss...?”
The women scattered like chickens, leaving their neighbor standing alone.
“Mrs.,” she responded coolly as the others formed a ring around the two of them, each one gripping a stout, hickory handled broom. “Mrs. Glorn. I believe you knew my husband, Dr. Glorn.”
“I... that is...”
Whack! A broom handle caught him across the back of the knees; another flew toward his face. Down he went.
Before he could squirm or crawl away the end of each broom handle was on him, poised to jab deep into the most painful places.
“It’s in his pocket!” screeched Mrs. Glorn. “No, the other one! That’s where people with hands keep things like that!”
One of the neighbors reached into his pocket and pulled out a heavy metallic object with a barrel attached to a cylinder and a curved handle.
“Is this it, Mrs. Glorn?”
“Yes, dearie. Hold it tight by that curved part and don’t drop it. See if there’s anything else in that pocket.”
“Oh, what is it, Mrs. Glorn, what is it?”
“It’s called a gun. It’s for killing people!”
All the woman gasped as one. “You came here to kill our handsome young Chebma?” Down came the brooms.
“Why?” demanded one woman as she poked him in the ribs. “Why do you want to kill my son? Why, why, why?”
“Because he is destroying the world!” cried Grimble. “He is a heretic and he is making heretics all over the country! Students demand answers that we can’t give and this is chaos! They believe the Green Earth scenario; he makes them believe it! They believe the sun in the middle and the earth going round and empty space with no ether! They believe that tiny creatures in the body cause sickness. They believe in the ‘atom’ and the One Almighty myth, the Whole People and many races! The order of things is in danger; order will soon crumble and the chaos will return! It will be the Thousand Years Horror again!”
With the exception of Mrs. Glorn the women comprehended none of this.
Mrs. Lorink gave him another jab. “You don’t make sense! Chebma doesn’t make anybody believe anything; he just writes those stupid stories! And now he doesn’t even do that anymore, not since Dr. Kledge fixed him!”
“That’s right,” confirmed another woman. “The doctor retuned his interface so he gets terrible headaches if he tells those stories. Now he can work at the mine.”
“So you can just go and kill somebody else!” said Mrs. Lorink with a final jab.
“Mrs. Glorn!” cried the woman who was rooting through Grimble’s pockets. “What is this?” She held up a medallion stamped with the letters U.D.A.K. and inscribed with Grimble’s name. In the center of the medallion was an image of a book pierced by a knife.
“That’s his identity tag,” explained Mrs. Glorn.
“Ooh, is that blood dripping from that knife?”
“It’s falsehood!” barked Grimble. A few more jabs shut him up.
“Yes, dearie. You see, U.D.A.K. — University of Delusion and Konfusion or Defamation and Kalumny...”
Grimble opened his mouth to correct her but thought better of it.
“The knife in the book means the department of orthodoxy and the blood means he is an assassin!”
“Assassin? Assassin?!” The women were beside themselves.
“How do you know all this, Mrs. Glorn? How do you know?”
“I know all about the university,” she grinned. “I’m the schoolteacher here, aren’t I? I’ve been sending students to UDAK for years. But my best student stayed right here in Eastmine.”
The professor groaned. He should’ve seen it coming.
“You mean Chebma!” burst Mrs. Lorink.
“Yes, Mrs. Lorink, I mean Chebma. But now there’s something else I know.”
The scene grew quiet as Mrs. Glorn looked down at Grimble with an expression that made him truly afraid. He could hear the mechanical whine of her prosthetic hand as she reached into the wide, loose pouch of her apron and pulled out an identity tag hanging from a broken chain.
“Mrs. Glorn! It’s the book and the blood! Are you an assassin too?”
“No, no Mrs. Snett! I found this in Dr. Glorn’s hand the day he went to Snaketown to buy salt and meet Mr. Glarchy and his friends. The day he was killed. He fought with the man who was killing him and pulled this off his neck.”
“Does it say a name?”
Mrs. Glorn didn’t answer but passed the medallion to Mrs. Lorink, never taking her eyes from the trembling Grimble.
“‘Strike the shepherd and the sheep will scatter’, eh Professor?”
“The name it says...” Mrs. Lorink turned the medallion this way and that. “The name it says is Majis Grimble!”
Down came a broom handle. And another. And another...
* * *
“Hello! Hello! Are you all right?”
Grimble lifted his head slowly. He dimly recalled dragging himself to Mrs. Glorn’s iron fence with its crosses and angels, pulling himself up and staggering toward the edge of town.
Where was he? The shadows were long and the sun was low. He was surrounded by piles of rusty objects and crazy buildings.
“Are you all right?” A young man was kneeling beside him on the pale grass. “What happened?”
“I’m not sure,” answered Grimble, wincing as he sat up. Everything hurt and his vision was blurry but nothing seemed to be broken. Maybe a couple of ribs; it hurt when he breathed.
“Here, have some water. It’s okay. I didn’t drink from it.”
Grimble gave him a puzzled look as he took the bottle.
“No germs,” explained the young man. “It won’t make you sick.” He then extended his natural left hand; the right was prosthetic. “Chebma Lorink, at your service.”
“Majis Grimble,” replied the professor as he shook the hand.
“Well, Mr. Grimble, how did you end up among the Failures?”
“I beg your pardon?”
“The Failures,” repeated Lorink. “This is where the dreamers dump all their mistakes. Some see it as a museum of error and folly but I find it to be a great encouragement.”
“I was waylaid.”
“Really? That’s odd. The last of the bandits were cleared out ages ago. If they’re back we’d better alert the constable. Are you from Snaketown?”
“Just visiting.” There was something disturbing about the young man’s appearance. “I’m a professor of old literature at UDAK.”
“Oh? Well then, you must meet Mrs. Glorn. She’s the schoolteacher in Eastmine. She’s sent quite a few students your way.”
“We’ve met,” said Grimble getting to his feet. His vision was clearing and he felt stronger. “Now, if you could please direct me...”
“What is it?”
“I’ve seen you before. Yes, this morning on the path to Eastmine,” said Grimble, recalling the vacuous specimen who hadn’t acknowledged his greeting.
“Quite possible. But I don’t remember you. Or anybody else. I wasn’t myself this morning.”
Suddenly Grimble realized what was so disturbing about Lorink’s appearance.
“Gods! Where’s your brain interface?”
Chebma didn’t answer but reached into a pouch in his overalls and took out a bag. It made a jingly sound when he shook it.
“What have you done?” cried Grimble in horror. It was like talking to a man with no head. “You can’t live without that!”
“I beg to differ. I can’t live with it. Before long you’ll realize you can’t either.”
“But the damage... the brain functions...”
“Professor, are you familiar with the work of Drs. Glorn and Glarchy?”
Grimble said nothing.
“I thought so. Look, I know where the academics stand, so there’s no need to pretend. In fact I’m pretty sure they had Dr. Glorn assassinated, but that’s another discussion. The point is Dr. Glorn’s research showed that humanity has had full brain function for at least a hundred years. The interfaces are no longer necessary, if they ever were.”
“If? What are you talking about? This is ludicrous! You must get to a mind center at once!”
“Let’s think this through, shall we? Sixteen hundred years ago monsters from who knows where destroyed the world. We fought them, but our own weapons damaged us. Nobody knows what gamma barrages or nuclear detonations are, but we understand they bring about horrible changes in human physiology...”
“Preposterous! Your scenario supposes that people were once naturally whole when in reality we’ve always carried the marks of the Forces. Sixteen hundred years ago the demons came from the plain of the devils in the outer sphere. They crossed the ether and cast spells called ‘gamma barrages’. We countered with our own spells, but the Forces had decided against us because we tried to examine them too closely with the scientific method. Now we are under curses which we are powerless to lift but we can improve our lot...”
“If that’s true then how can I be alive? How can you be physically whole? We are the proof!”
“Proof?” Grimble’s head was starting to hurt. “Proof of what?” He sat down on the grass and rubbed his throbbing temples.
“Deep breaths,” directed Chebma. “Concentrate on something formless. The wind works for me.”
“I know what to do! This isn’t the first time.”
They sat calmly in the growing shadows, waiting for the spell to pass.
“Listen,” said Grimble quietly, taking care not to stray from a narrow path of thought. “Nobody cares if you create myths. Mythology is the foundation of what I teach... taught... and I actually enjoy your work. But people are starting to take it seriously. They are resorting to the Green Earth scenario and the One Almighty myth as the basis for important decisions. They’ve made the leap to the scientific method and give it greater weight than the word of academic authorities. Don’t you see that we all have to pull in the same direction? Your myths fight with ours. They are tearing down everything we’ve built and the only possible outcome is ruin and chaos.”
“So you value order over truth? Is that what you learn from old literature?”
“Truth is a luxury, young man,” sighed Grimble. “What do you take us for? Do you think you’re the only one with any imagination? Do you think we understand nothing about the scraps of the past we’ve been able to collect? Sacrifices are being made. Individual desires are being put aside for the greater good. Without order there is no science, no literature, no pursuit of luxurious truth. There is only chaos and hunger and death.”
“Professor, I appreciate your candor. I really do. I’ve never talked to an academic of any standing, and I must confess to some preconceptions. But let me ask you something. Do you remember your father?”
“My father?”
“Yes, your father. The man who brought you into the world and taught by example. The man who made you what you are.”
Grimble knew he was in trouble. He had no arguments prepared for “fathers.”
“Of course I do.”
“Well...” Chebma paused as a wave of emotion swept over him. “Today is the third anniversary of my father’s death. That’s why I’m out here. I went to visit him in Deadfield after I had the interface removed.”
“I’m sorry.”
“The report from the company’s safety group called it an accident, but we know better. You see, my father was the one who first told me about the One Almighty and the Green Earth. If you’ve met any miners you know how limited their mental capacity is, yet here was my father, descended from a long line of miners but capable of grasping the alternatives to orthodoxy. Why? How was it possible and why would he even care?
“As a kid I remember he had a lot of headaches. He fought with my mother just about every day and then all of a sudden it stopped. Things got peaceful. That’s about the time he started explaining things to me. I think that’s also when the Glorns moved next door and Pop became friends with Dr. Glorn.”
“You said his death wasn’t an accident?”
Copyright © 2011 by Harry Lang
