The Garments of Caean

Then he crumpled. The sociologists stepped forward, helping him back to his chair and draping the blanket around him.

Amara took Estru on one side. ‘Well, what do you think?’ she asked him. ‘Could this lunatic’s story have anything to it?’

Estru nodded slowly. ‘I think we should treat it with the utmost seriousness.’

‘But this – monster. Could there be such a thing?’

Estru screwed up his face in thought. ‘Remember Bourdon’s Imaginary Numbers of the Mind? He pointed out that every act of perception, every mental intention, resembles a positive vector in physical space. By applying the square root of minus one as an operator he produced theoretical descriptions of negative mental vectors. He claimed that the negative dimension was implicit in mentality as a whole, that the positive component couldn’t exist unless it had its own mirror image. It’s an idea that’s close to the notion of passive sentience.’

‘Could Forbarth have read Bourdon?’

‘No. He’d have to be both a mathematician and a trained psychologist. But I don’t think he could have invented what he’s told us either.’

‘His mind might be warped enough to accept some kind of mythical interpretation, or analogy, as the literal truth,’ she suggested dubiously.

‘And the suits?’

‘A new Caeanic enterprise – tailoring by genetic manipulation, perhaps?’

‘But there are four dead bodies out there.’

Amara’s staff chief, having sidled close, joined in the discussion. ‘I agree we should act on the assumption that Forbarth is telling the truth,’ he said. There’s something very logical about his story. It explains a great deal about what we’ve seen in this neck of Caean.’

He broke off as Peder started rambling, speaking to nobody in particular. ‘It will be irresistible. An alien culture on the move, clothes-robots in Frachonard suits, sweeping across the Gulf in their millions …’

‘What’s he talking about?’ Amara demanded.

‘He’s talking about the invasion of Ziode,’ Estru answered in a flat, dry voice. ‘We’ve all been fooled – the Caeanics themselves have been fooled. An invasion is afoot, or shortly will be – an invasion which will appear to be the work of the Caeanics, whereas in fact they’ll only be proxies. You heard what Forbarth said. The Prossim intelligence plans to clothe the whole of mankind.’

‘I knew we should never have trusted foreigners,’ Amara grunted in disgust.

‘There’s an awful kind of grandeur about it in a way,’ Estru said meditatively. ‘We are familiar with the idea of physical invasion, or of invasion by disease in the form of epidemics. But this is a psychological invasion. The total remaking of mankind.’

‘I like my mind as it is, thank you.’

He smiled with ironic humour. ‘Be objective about it, Amara. Cross-fertilizing is usually a good thing. This is mental crosss-breeding between lifeforms literally poles apart. Something quite unbelievable ought to come out of that. Perhaps the Caeanics know what they’re about.’

Amara cast him a look of withering scorn before turning her gaze to the vidscreen. ‘You’re being flippant. Luckily we are in a position to nip this horror in the bud. We can hardly destroy the entire Prossim species, of course, since it grows all over the planet, but if I understand Forbarth aright the scheme depends on those suits it’s growing. This is the only patch of them so far. Destroy it and Ziode is safe – for the time being, anyway.’

‘We don’t have any external armament to speak of.’

‘It can be done manually. We have portable atomic flamethrowers.’

Overhearing them from where he sat, Peder Forbarth began to laugh weakly. ‘But you won’t be able to! You won’t be able to!’

*

They found out what Forbarth meant almost as soon as Captain Wilce sent out a pair of his crewmen to burn up the Prossim growth.

The two went out on a disc-shaped grav platform that skimmed over the surface of the plain. One steered the platform, while the other handled the flamethrower, a telescope-like affair he held under one arm, supporting its weight with a harness that went over his shoulders. Both wore protective suits of a silvery heat-resistant light metal, complete with visors.

The sociological team, watching while they glided some distance away from the Callan, waited to see the flamethrower come into action. Nothing of the kind occurred, however. After a puzzling delay the grav disc settled on the plain. The two men divested themselves of their protective clothing until they stood naked on the green Prossim.

‘What in space are they doing?’ Amara squeaked in alarm. ‘Have they gone mad?’