Read The Disestablishment of Paradise Online
Authors: Phillip Mann
The Disestablishment of Paradise (27 page)
‘Did you ever work one of them?’ Mack nodded in the direction of the shuttle.
Dickinson stood up and wandered over to the control room window and squinted through. ‘Yep. These big crystal mothers were state of the art when I was training. I helped install one at the
shuttle over at Gerard’s Barn. You ever seen that place?’ Mack shook his head. ‘The shuttles are all shaped like hearts and they’re done out with black leather and crimson
velvet. They’ve got little golden cupids spraying perfume from their cocks. It’s supposed to be erotic but it smells like a monkey’s armpit. When a shuttle’s docking they
have this big knob-shaped lever that comes up and . . .’ He stopped and looked at Mack, and then came and sat down. ‘Listen, boss,’ he said slowly, ‘you wouldn’t be
thinking of doing what I’m thinking you’re thinking of doing, would you?’
‘You know your trouble, Dickinson?’ said Mack, standing up and draining his glass. ‘You think too much.’
Ordeal in the Labyrinth
People who have survived torture sometimes recall that, at the moment of greatest torment, they became distanced from their broken bodies. In this state they heard the voices
of loved ones or sometimes saw luminous images of a deity. Such encounters enabled them to survive. At the summit of anguish our state of being may change and we become both the sufferer and the
observer of our own suffering. Such I believe was Hera’s case.
In her words:
Hera
My first thought was,
This is not happening to me
. But the pain was real enough, and the sight of my blood. I remember being surprised. But my
situation was changing quickly. I could feel the tightness of the branches and a terrible dark awareness grew that they were settling into me, that they would never move and I would be there
for eternity.
Olivia
Did you ever doubt?
Hera
Doubt?
Olivia
The wisdom of what you were doing, the wisdom of actually being there, down on Paradise?
Hera
I was a bit too preoccupied for doubt, Olivia. Doubt is a luxury when you are pinned in a tree with spines growing through you.
Olivia
Sorry. Go on.
Hera
And still there was my name being sounded. It just went on and on – an echo that never faded. And the name seemed to flow in my blood. That
doesn’t make sense, does it? What I mean is that the name was in me like my blood, and I was so very aware of the blood. You see, being tilted the way I was, the blood from the cuts
inside the meshlite flowed out through my collar and even into my mouth. I know I was very confused and I think I must have blacked out several times. One of the spines of the was pressing into
the place just under the patella in my knee. Another was in my thigh and a third in my back. Others were in my arms. I still have the scars.
Olivia
You don’t need—
Hera
The pain of these, flower or no flower, perfume or no perfume, threatened to overwhelm me. They were like fire and ice. I had no idea how deep the cuts
were. Severe pain induces vomiting. Did you know that, Olivia?
Olivia
Yes.
Hera
Well, It surprised me. My body took over and I must have convulsed uncontrollably. What a sight I must have made. Being twisted the way I was, the vomit
fell to the ground – I saw it . . . I’m not boring you, am I?
Olivia
No, I . . . Sorry, I’m a bit squeamish. Go on.
Hera
Well, a kind of heat came back at me and immediately a growling. It was my name again, but spoken by a lion. I thought,
This is it
, and hoped it
would be over soon. You see my convulsions had driven the spikes deeper. That was when I floated away. The pain was great, but I was elsewhere, on the other side of it. I think I had accepted
death.
Olivia
And yet you lived on. Your spirit was not broken?
Hera
There was a moment of darkness, as though the sun had flickered, and I thought,
No more. Please. Let me pass on. Let me go
. And then, in front of
my eyes, one of the lovely blue flowers suddenly closed. Then opened again and closed again. Another higher up did likewise. Others followed. It was as though they were controlled by strings,
snapping open and shut. And then they all closed and the tree started to shake.
Olivia
Good God. And that hurt too
Hera
I was past caring. But I realized that the pressure on me had lessened. For one thing, I could feel that the weight on the one leg that touched the ground
was heavier. That brought its own problems, but I pushed against the thin branch locked round my arm, and the branch eased off. The crucial thing is that it was not like a spring. It did not
leap back, or worse, tighten even more. Well . . .
Olivia
Go on.
Hera
You are not going to like this at all, Olivia. I got this strong urge to push and to move. Suddenly I had an image of a Dendron, like the one that young
Malik talks about. You know, when she sees it churning up the water at the bottom of the rapids.
2
I was urged to . . . It urged me to have the strength
of the Dendron. That was the thought, and a surge of strength did come to me. And – mark this, because it is important – the same surge must have come to the weed too, for almost
immediately another of its branches pulled back. The spines – I saw them, red-tipped and wet – lifted from me slowly. I turned my body with them. I didn’t want to be cut as
they withdrew. How is that for clear thinking, Olivia? They came out cleanly, except for one, and the blood followed them.
Olivia
Good God.
Hera
And now we come to the silly part. I still only had one foot on the ground, because my other leg was still trapped. There I was escaping, but if the weed
moved any more, it would lift me up off the ground by one leg. But then that branch loosened its grip too. For a moment I tottered and thought I might fall towards the small plant in the
centre. At that one same moment the giant weed froze and all its flowers flashed open. If I had ever been close to sudden death, that was it. But I did keep my balance – don’t ask
me how, but when I was a girl I was a bit of an athlete, being small, you know – so that must have helped. It seemed like an eternity. Both of us still. And then I saw the flowers slowly
close, one by one, and it let me drop.
When I looked up at the weed, it had one branch raised higher than all the others, and I was reminded of a samurai warrior standing over me with his great sword raised. I kept
very still. But then that branch . . . it too just wilted and dropped. Something had killed it.
Hera lay on the ground for some time. She was aware of many things. Of pain and of relief, certainly. Aware too that the presence that had given her the strength of the Dendron
had also, perhaps inadvertently, given her knowledge. That would need long pondering.
She squirmed round and looked at the small plant, the young Michelangelo. It had closed up completely. It had lifted its leaves and wrapped them around its black and red heart so tightly that it
now resembled a slim green vase of the kind that can only hold a single flower. ‘What are you?’ breathed Hera.
Hera had seen a truth about Paradise. The small creature at the centre of the clearing
was
a child. A powerful child. It had played with her and it might have killed her with the same
wanton unconcern as a child plucks the legs off a daddy-long-legs or the wings off a cicada – without a trace of malice. Likewise, the clumsy weed had thorns, not to attack but because they
helped the branches to climb and grip. It was neither vengeful nor cruel.
Hera
Paradise is very simple on one level – or it was at that time. The biggest danger I ever experienced down there was when I let myself think of the
bio-forms in human terms or credited them with human emotions, and of course intellectually I knew that. But you know, Olivia, it is almost impossible not to. Our emotions are the greatest
dynamo within us. Can you prevent love? Can you resist it? Is it not the greatest generative force of which we can conceive? And does not the great imaginative act of empathy begin within us
too? (
LONG PAUSE
) At the same time, we do have to hold back sometimes in order to reach further. Poor Shapiro couldn’t, and look what happened to him. Of course
there is some overlap between us human beings and whatever the creatures are that live on Paradise – the very fact that we are all subject to time ensures that. But as Shapiro said on
many occasions, ‘We are children of the same universe, but it is a universe full of contradictions.’ As long as you realize the bio-forms did not act with malice and had no concept
of death in the way that we have, or any fear of death, you can start to understand the nature of Paradise – as it was. In fact, I did not know it then of course, but I was about to be
useful to them.
Olivia
Did they think of you as useful?
Hera
You are so wonderfully pragmatic, Olivia. I think they saw me as just what is . . . what was there. To hand. Rice in a begging bowl. You know I sometimes
think what we call wisdom is nothing more than the ability to foresee the consequences of our actions, and to hold back before they become our fate.
Olivia
Can I quote you?
Hera
I’d rather you didn’t.
Olivia
I have one question.
Hera
I have a hundred, but go on.
Olivia
Was the weed that grabbed you protecting the small Michelangelo? Because, if so, that shows intention or motive in a way that we can understand.
Hera
Mm. If I were a herbalist, and knowing what I know now, I think I would rename the weed the mother-of-all-kindness flower or some such old-fashioned name
because it seems to have always had an urge to protect. So, in grabbing me, you
might
say it was protecting the Michelangelo, or you
might
say that it was protecting me
– and remember that the s are very clumsy – for I reckon the naughty little Michelangelo had designs on me, don’t you? But the truly important thing is that the voice of a
Dendron – an extinct creature, as I then believed – crying out in pain, was heard by the only creature that could help it. Little me, Hera. Put that in your rationalist pipe and
smoke it.
Olivia
I will.
To return to Hera lying on the ground.
The adrenalin that flooded her system had a limited life. She needed to move before she stiffened and before too much blood was lost. The SAS could not reach her here, and so the first thing was
to retrace her steps through the labyrinth. She crawled back under the giant weed, stood up and began to limp along the widening avenue between the s. She has little memory of this journey beyond
an impression that it got easier as she moved along. So we must imagine the small limping warrior battling on, her path becoming brighter with every dragging step.
Hera does remember clearly the moment when she finally waded across the stream, but she was not where she had entered; she was much further down the hillside at a place that was more like a
meadow.
Hera was too far gone to ask questions and under no illusions. She was on borrowed time. She tapped the emergency code into her control pad and instantly the cool, unruffled voice of Alan spoke
in her ear. ‘Tracking your signal, Hera. ETA thirty seconds and counting.’ Even as he spoke, Hera heard the engine roar and saw the SAS lift above the labyrinth far up the ravine.
Having no human crew to consider, it bent in the air at a sharp angle and within a few seconds was hammering over her. What a wonderful sound! The wind from the rotor blades flattened the nearby
Tattersalls and pressed Hera to the ground. The door opened in the side of the SAS and a small ladder snaked down and stiffened.
Hera dragged herself upright and sat on the bottom rung. There she undid the top of her meshlite overall and gingerly eased herself out of it. In some places the blood had dried and the meshlite
was stuck to her. But she was able to loosen it and the fresh air on her skin felt good. Finally she undid the hip tags and pushed down. This was the hardest part, for to stand was painful, and yet
if she sat down that hurt too. But she managed. She stepped out of the uniform.
A casual inspection told her that the cuts where the spines had entered were not as bad as they might have been. They looked like little mouths. No bones were broken. Though she had lost blood,
that could soon be made up. She would heal. But her knee worried her. It had swollen and was very painful to touch. She feared that a tip of a spine might have broken off and be lodged inside.
Hera left the suit where it was, on the ground. I am glad to record that she had not lost her sense of humour. ‘I must stop stripping off and leaving my clothes everywhere, or I’ll
have nothing left to wear when I leave Paradise,’ she said as she gingerly stepped onto the ladder and held on. How prophetic!
‘You are hurt, Hera?’
‘A few scratches. And before you ask, the answer is no.’
‘You don’t want me to make a cup of tea?’
‘That’s not what you were . . . Oh, bugger it. Yes, make me a cup of tea. Just do it. Then head for home. I need to clean myself up.’
Back at Monkey Tree Terrace she made her way to the shilo, walking stiffy. She’d had some bright notion that she would shower and dress her wounds and then find clean clothes and . . . But
as she lowered herself onto the bed, the room turned around her and she passed out.
She slipped to the floor and lay still.