‘I can’t go on.’
‘The superior man faces his fear and in facing it overcomes his weakness.’
The Minstrel Boy fell on his side. He rolled over and pulled his knees up to his chest.
‘I … can’t … do … it!’
Jeb Stuart Ho knelt down beside the Minstrel Boy.
‘If you don’t strive to overcome it, it could kill you.’
‘I don’t care!’
The Minstrel Boy lay still with his eyes tightly closed and his face contorted. Jeb Stuart Ho stood up, and began walking up the side of the cone by himself. Each step became an inhuman effort. The fear had become a physical force. His legs were leaden. It was like wading in sand. He stumbled frequently. As he neared the top, it became almost more than he could bear. The sky glowed an evil, menacing red. The rock appeared to reflect it, and danced with flame. The force battered at him like a hurricane. Black hallucinations, flapping like murderous bats, swooped at the edge of his vision.
He reached the top. The force became absolute torture. It was pushing at him so hard that it seemed to be tearing the flesh from his bones. It screamed around him like monsters from some awful hell. In front of him, in the very summit of the cone, was a circular depression. Lying in it, on a bed of soft sand, were nine gold eggs. Each one was about half the height of a man. Jeb Stuart Ho knew immediately that they were the source of the power. His instinct was to destroy them. His hand went to his gun. It was like moving in slow motion. Inch by inch his fingers moved towards his belt. All the force seemed to be concentrated on his right arm. It was filled with a burning cold that gnawed at the bone and muscle. His fingers curled round the butt. That too was deathly cold. His fingers froze to it. As he slowly drew the gun from the holster, it felt as if the flesh of his hand was being ripped apart. He slowly raised the gun. Its weight seemed unbearable. The muscles in his arm felt like they were going to snap. Gradually the gun came in line with the clutch of eggs. He eased back the trigger. The scream around him rose in pitch. It felt as though his ears had started bleeding, maybe his very brain. The eggs seemed far away. His vision tunnelled. He desperately hauled on the trigger. It would hardly move. He began to black out, then, through it all, he heard the Minstrel Boy screaming.
‘Don’t! Don’t! For god’s sake don’t do it! They’re only trying to protect themselves.’
It suddenly all fell into place. Jeb Stuart Ho touched the half formed entities inside the gold shells. He felt the power of the scarcely developed minds. He felt their fear and their vulnerability. He was awed by what they might become. For an instant everything hung poised. The gun fell from his fingers. He sank, crosslegged, to the ground. He forced his mind to be calm. The beings’ fear still washed over him, but it was no longer aimed directly at him. He gathered all his strength and slowly directed peace and gentleness. He meant them no harm. He projected that as hard as he could. Veins pumped in his forehead as he tried to thrust his way through the fear.
He reached them. His thoughts penetrated through to the beings in the eggs. They seized on his projections as something new and strange. They dragged it out of him with a greedy hunger. They were insatiable. He hung on to stop his mind being dragged from him. He begged them to stop, but their infant greed demanded more and more. Jeb Stuart Ho reached his final limit. His consciousness was drained away.
The world went black. His body toppled, and rolled down the side of the cone like a discarded puppet whose strings had been cut.
He woke up to find the Minstrel Boy wiping his face with a damp cloth. He grinned at Ho.
‘Shit, Killer. I really thought you were dead for sure, this time.’
Jeb Stuart Ho raised his head.
‘How long have I been here?’
The Minstrel Boy shrugged.
‘Maybe a couple of hours.’
‘What happened?’
‘Don’t ask me. You were up there, you did it. One minute all hell was breaking loose, then suddenly it was beautiful, like the dawn coming up.’
Jeb Stuart Ho sat up. The landscape had completely changed. The ground was still grey rock, but it was broken up by clumps of green vegetation growing out of cracks in its surface. Tiny streams trickled into crystal clear pools. The sky was a deep even blue. It was as if the beings had taken apart his mind, and reshaped their environment according to what they found there. A little distance away, the lizards grazed happily on the vegetation.
Jeb Stuart Ho carefully stood up. He had expected his body to show some signs of strain after the ordeal. He was surprised to find there were none. He felt as though he had just woken from a comfortable sleep. He looked at the cone. It radiated a glow of benign contentment. His gun was still lying at the foot of the slope, where it had come to rest after he had dropped it. He walked over and picked it up. As he touched the weapon, the sky seemed to darken. The lizards looked up in alarm. He quickly dropped it into its holster and things resumed their previous calm. The lizards returned to their chewing.
The Minstrel Boy walked over to where Jeb Stuart Ho was standing at the foot of the cone. He was grinning happily. His friendliness was almost unnatural. He put his arm round Ho’s shoulders.
‘Looks like it turned out okay.’
Jeb Stuart Ho nodded.
‘It would seem so.’
The Minstrel Boy looked up at the cone.
‘I’m almost sorry to leave.’
‘We have to leave.’
‘I knew you’d say that.’
‘We should start.’
The Minstrel Boy stared at the ground. He seemed reluctant to start back into the nothings.
‘It’s like I’m thinking we ought to leave some kind of mark on this place.’
Jeb Stuart Ho looked at him in surprise.
‘Why?’
‘I dunno, just so we know we’ve been here.’
‘Surely we know that without leaving our mark here?’
‘Maybe we should give it a name or something?’
Jeb Stuart Ho gestured towards the top of the cone.
‘They must have a name for this place.’
The Minstrel Boy shrugged.
‘Yeah, maybe. I dunno.’
He put two fingers in his mouth and gave a high-pitched whistle. The lizards looked up, and began lumbering slowly towards where the two men were standing. Ho and the Minstrel Boy each caught the reins of his own mount, and climbed into the saddle. They turned the lizards and rode slowly past the cone. Jeb Stuart Ho paused for a moment and stared hard at it, then he took a deep breath and started after the Minstrel Boy.
***
A little grey-haired man in a quilted dressing gown tugged open the lift gate and padded across the frayed carpet of the Leader Hotel lobby, and up to the reception desk. He waited until the desk clerk looked up from his comic book and deigned to notice him.
‘Yeah?’
The little man cleared his throat, and tugged the faded robe closer round his bony shoulders.
‘Did my letter come?’
The desk clerk didn’t even bother to look at the pigeonholes behind him.
‘Nothing came.’
The little man remained where he was.
‘Are you sure? Couldn’t you check?’
The desk clerk put down his comic book and looked at the little man with cold patience.
‘Nothing came, Arthur. Just like yesterday, and the day before that, and the day before that and every day you’ve been here. Nothing ever comes for you, Arthur. Okay?’
Arthur cleared his throat again.
‘I’ll try tomorrow.’
The desk clerk turned over the page of his comic book.