Fall 2007

Table of Contents

• Column: Bears Examining #5: Get 'er Done by Elizabeth Bear

• Column: Lansdale Unchained #3: Little Boys Unite by Joe R. Lansdale

• Fiction: Fire in the Lake by Chris Roberson

• Fiction: Show of Hands by David Prill

• Fiction: The Fly and Die Ticket by Jay Lake

• Fiction: In the Dreamtime of Lady Resurrection by Caitlín R. Kiernan

• Fiction: Merry Bunta! A Lucifer Jones Story by Mike Resnick

• Fiction: The Acquaintance by Kealan Patrick Burke

• Fiction: The Blackwood Oak by Stephen Gallagher

• Fiction: The Four Hundred Thousand by Livia Llewellyn

• Fiction: The Sagan Diary by John Scalzi

• Fiction: The Support Technician Tango by Daniel Abraham

• Fiction: Or Else My Lady Keeps the Key (excerpt) by Kage Baker

• Review: Travel Light, by Naomi Mitchison

Column: Bears Examining #5: Get ‘er Done by Elizabeth Bear

No kidding, I have the best job on Earth.

It doesn’t pay very well, it’s full of deadlines and stress and extremely public criticism. It involves a lot of travel and the elaborate pretense at being an extrovert, not to mention frequently falling flat on my face when I attempt something new and hard.

I wouldn’t trade it for the world. Because I set my own schedule, I work in my pajamas, and while I lack dental insurance I honestly have better job security than I ever did when I worked for somebody else. I know I’m employed through 2010, currently, which is something very few of my friends working in office jobs can say.

Also, I’m doing something I love enough that I don’t mind doing it ten or twelve hours a day. And it seems that a lot of other people would really like to do the same thing, and are looking for tips on how to swing it.

On the face of it, it seems like writing–telling stories–should be a pretty easy thing to do. And, after a fashion, it is. The vast majority of us are pattern-making, storytelling creatures, and most of us can, as Richard Adams has Bigwig say in Watership Down, “run and fight and spoil a story telling it.”

But most people can shoot pool, too, and there is a big difference between me and Minnesota Fats (apparently, there was a big difference between Minnesota Fats and his carefully-honed image, as well, a little fact that may have bearing on the conversation later.). Which is to say, I’m not making my living shooting pool.

The making-a-living part is the hard part. The entertainment industry is merely a legal and reasonably honest means of living by one’s wits. This implies a few things: first of all, you have to be pretty good at whatever it is you mean to be doing. Not great–you don’t have to be better than the very best, though there’s nothing wrong with aspiring to that–but–like Mr. Fats–you have to be better than 99% of the nonprofessionals. Which means, good enough to be entertaining.

And you know what? I’m not going to talk about that. The internet and the book shelves are full of advice, some useful, some crippling, on how to learn the craft.

But there’s two other things you need besides craftsmanship. And those are the things I want to talk about here.

One of them is a work ethic. Working for yourself is a heck of a lot more fun than working for somebody else–at least for me, it is, and in writing books I feel like I’m doing something much more worthwhile with my life than if I were pushing papers around an office–but it’s still work, and there’s nobody to tell you to quit playing Desktop Tower Defense and write the damned book, unless you’re so far over deadline that your editor is calling you every day to make sure you wrote. And that scenario presumes that you already have an editor and a deadline, which takes a certain amount of stick-to-it-tiveness to accomplish on its lonesome.

The Germans call it “Sitzfleisch;” my dad calls it “ger ‘er done.” I call it butt-in-chair, and what it boils down to is the ability to apply the seat of the pants to the seat of the chair and make the words happen. When it’s easy, when it’s hard, when you would rather gnaw your own fingers off than type another damned paragraph. It comes down, again and again, to simple endurance, and that’s really the only secret I know.

The other third of the magic equation is the hard part: I call it “knowing everything.”

Which is not precisely accurate. I mean, I don’t know everything, despite some people who may maintain that I act as if I do. But there’s an old adage–”write what you know,” and that’s what I’m talking about. When we write, one of the things that lends us narrative energy is narrative authority, and that confidence comes from, first of all, from mastering the tools of the craft–but second, from knowing your material.

In other words, it’s not so much a matter of writing what you know, as knowing what you write.

That knowledge–whether attained through research, travel, practice, or conversations with experts–is the thing that allows us as writers to make scenes and descriptions specific and detailed, to bring them to life. When we speak with expertise, we don’t need infodumps, and we don’t need to pause the narrative to explain. The necessary details to ground the reader arise as needed–and when we do pause for exposition, the exposition itself is often fascinating for its own sake.

When you speak with passion, people respond.

In practical terms, this means that the fiction writer, unless she is curtailing her topics severely, becomes a bit of a generalist. You learn to read widely, nonfiction as well as fiction, and pick up books on all sorts of odd topics because you never know what might come in handy. And some of that reading foments new ideas: it’s a neverending vicious cycle. There’s directed research, where you have a particular problem in your work, and you are researching to illuminate it; and then there is random reading, the drunkard’s-walk, where you are reading as if wandering through the woods, strictly for the joy of discovery. And both of those can inspire.

Ray Bradbury said, “All that stuff that’s collected up in my head — poetry and mythology and comic strips and science fiction magazines — comes out in my stories.” And I think that is the absolute truth of it. Everything that we pack in there influences what we create, even if we create in argument with it.

Of course, he also said, “Don’t think. Thinking is the enemy of creativity. It’s self-conscious and anything self-conscious is lousy. “–a philosophy which would, if I had ascribed to it, resulted in me never learning to write my way out of a paper bag. I’m a believer in directed practice, which is to say, figuring out what you aren’t doing well and working on doing it better. Once you’ve practiced it for a while, you internalize, and then you don’t have to think about it any more. Which just goes to prove that nobody’s creative process is the same as anyone else’s. Find your own, and defend it.

An interesting side effect of this kind of research is that once somebody’s been writing for a while, they tend to get very good at Trivial Pursuit. My own favorite example of this is an episode of the National Public Radio quiz show “Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me” in 2002 which featured Clive Barker in a segment called “It’s not my job!” in which the hosts corral some famous, accomplished person and ask him questions entirely outside his field of expertise.

I was a barely-published young writer at the time that I first heard this, but something about it stuck with me. Specifically, I noticed the way Mr. Barker would self-deprecatingly say, “I only know a little bit about that–” and then get the answer right.

Because that’s the trick of the novelist. Tim Powers calls it “research a molecule thick.”

We know a tiny bit about everything.

The title of the radio segment aside, it is our job.

Column: Lansdale Unchained #3: Little Boys Unite by Joe R. Lansdale

Recently in this column I wrote an article on Robert E. Howard and his novel Almuric. It got a lot of response, directly and indirectly. I was pleased that so many liked it and were made aware of his work, and I was pleased that it stirred up discussion by those who were less pleased with my comments.

I suggested the idea that Howard was writing for the little boy inside of himself. This premise bent one reader at least a little bit. A very smart and well spoken reader, I might add. But I stand by that comment and add this: So what? That’s not a negative criticism. He appeals primarily to boys and men who still remember what it’s like to be a boy. Those of us who love the idea of being muscular and powerful, swinging a sword and knocking down the villains, living in the wild with nothing more than our wits to guide us, are more numerous than lying politicians.

Truth be known, we got out there in the wild, we would all most likely be eaten by lions and ants within about an hour and a half, even if we spent the first hour or so hiding in the top of a tree.

It is a fantasy, and a beautiful one, and that always appeals to the adolescent in us, no matter how sophisticated the fantasy might be. That’s my opinion, and I hasten to add it’s an opinion, and as I’ve said before, the old saying about opinions is they are like assholes, everyone has one, so take it for what it is: an opinion, not word from On High. I like to think I have enough background to write a reasonable opinion, but I don’t expect everyone to agree with me. As the detractor pointed out (and I’m sure he is in good company), there is violence and death in the Howard stories, and therefore it’s dealing with real life, but my take on that is how does that make it any less adolescent. In fact, in my view, that’s what seals the deal. Where I grew up, hunting, for example, was part of everyday life. Some could say they hunted for food, and back then, many of us did. But mostly people hunt these days because of the joy of killing something. And if that isn’t so, then switch to hunting with a camera. See if that works for you. These mighty Nimrods like to feel they are close to the “old” days when it was just them in the wilderness. Of course, in the old days, they didn’t have the kind of weapons we have now, telescopic sights, that sort of thing, and they had to hunt or die. But still, it’s a little boy’s impulse to get out there and bring in the game. And instead of wearing the antlers on their heads these days, they mount them on the wall, which strikes me as even stranger, and certainly savage. I mean, shit, if you’re going to take the antlers, at least fasten them to a helmet and wear them on your head, stretch the skins out and tan them and wear them for shoes. Show up for work in that gear. I want to see it.

Nothing like going to bed at night knowing you’ve protected the world against deadly attacks from squirrels, deer, and assorted birds.

Hey, they’re good to eat, and I’ve eaten them. I eat cows and chickens and pigs, etc. Every time I buy meat, I’ve killed something. But frankly, chicken is cheaper than all those bullets and beer and the outfits and the gas and I don’t have to be embarrassed about playing Nimrod anymore. Being out there with nature is part of it, certainly, but there’s something hypocritical in the idea that you’re being one with the universe when you’re blasting the shit out of birds and animals. You can at least say you’re keeping the deer population down. There’s a truth to that. You can say you like venison and they don’t sell it much in the store. And that’s true. I like it too. I like elk as well. But, hey, let’s be honest. It’s killing something that drives the beast. You know it, and I know it. Otherwise, once again, you’d carry a camera, not a gun.

I even know one guy who, when his son killed his first deer, had the boy wipe the deer’s blood on his face. You know, that’s kind of creepy. If it had been a bear and he’d killed it with a spear or a knife, you could maybe understand that. Big balls there, but otherwise…not so much.

Somewhere, Bambi sleeps without a father. Or mother. Or brother or sister. But at least when Bambi lays down he can be assured that somewhere a drunk has sobered up and taken the body of his loved one to be processed, and much of it will, when mixed with pork or beef, make good sausage.

Okay, I’m sidetracked and I’m not through.

I even saw in our newspaper a full page article on a boy who had prayed to god to kill his first deer, and god gave it to him. Had a picture of this religious kid and his dead deer. A big motherfucker with enough antlers to loan a couple of lesser deer. And I thought, shit, this kid should have prayed for peace in Iraq, something along those lines, ’cause god is getting distracted giving kids dead aim and dead deer when he could do something important, like ending wars, healing sickness, giving me six more inches on my dick and making me twenty-five-years-old again, but given the knowledge I have now. I also wouldn’t mind being a couple inches taller.

All that stuff god is supposed to be able to do, and the kid prays for a dead deer.

This, among other obvious things, assures me that if there is a god he/she/it hasn’t any sympathy for us in any manner shape or form. We’re an ant farm and our owner has gone off to play. More likely, there just isn’t anybody up there. Or he likes seeing deer get shot. Or he likes to make sure good football teams with good looking cheerleaders who show the most ass when they jump get his graces. I mean, think about it. Football players pray not to be hurt before a game, and that’s valid, but they also pray to win. This is true of both teams. They don’t want to get hurt and they don’t want to lose. Some still get hurt, and someone loses. Are they losing because they’re not as good a people as the other team? Does god not like them? If they get hurt, is god saying, “Showed that little cocksucker?” Or is it all…let me see what’s the word I’m looking for…Oh yeah, bullshit? That’s the word.

Yes, is it all bullshit.

And so, Lansdale, as is often the case, strays….

#

Almuric is a favorite of mine because it reminds me of an author I like even more, Edgar Rice Burroughs. I say this without feeling that I’m out to duel one author against the other. I like them both. Howard was maybe even more grown up about his material (so I give the detractors that), but at heart they both were small boys writing fantasy to keep themselves entertained and to pick up a check. They were both grown men playing with swords, if only in their heads.

Burroughs lived longer, and perhaps being more of this world, with a family and a mortgage, lost some of his love for the work, and therefore some of his appeal. He was successful enough to live pretty well, so he didn’t need as much of the fantasy. The books became repetitive and about as inspired as summer camp ashtrays.

But… He wrote some doozies. A Princess of Mars is my sentimental favorite novel of all time, while my favorite in other ways is To Kill a Mockingbird.

You couldn’t find two books further apart. Yet they are both about childhood in a way. Burroughs was writing from the inner child, and Harper Lee was writing directly about a child and how a child sees things and becomes an adult. Loss of innocence is a theme I’ve always loved, and have explored in a number of my own fictions, but I believe on some level, though we may lose innocence, we never lose our yearning to have it back.

Sometimes, springtime in East Texas I’ll come out of the house, on the way down to my study, which is the bottom floor, and unconnected to the rest of the house, and smell on the wind some springtime scent, and I will time travel to when I was a young boy in East Texas sitting out under a shade tree reading Edgar Rice Burroughs, or I’ll remember another time when I was lying in bed in front of what we called a window fan, which was cleverly called that because it was pushed up tight in a window, and had straw in the back of it, and there was a hook up to the water hose that was supposed to feed the straw with water and make the stirred air cool. The little hook up never seemed to work, but we would take the water hose and wet down the straw at the back of the fan, and that would last for hours, and it made our tall ceiling house cool and wonderful and I would read, and I would be John Carter.

Later, as a young man, divorced, visiting a friend in Berkley, CA, trying to find a job, finally doing day labor with winos and drug addicts, odds and ends type of work, I would end the day by going by a bookstore on Telegraph, if memory serves me. And there, with a few spare coins, I would buy used copies of Conan books. I had read Howard before this, while living in Tyler, Texas, going to the University, newly married (that marriage already dissolving and me not wanting to believe it), trying to go to the university (never finished), and so I knew Howard and I knew his ways. In Berkley, divorce papers served, living on pot pies and a desire to write, I read every one of these Howard books I could get my hands on. When I left to go back to Texas, I was ready to toss out clothes just to get those books back home. And I did, though over the years a few of them got kidnapped by someone here and there.

But I loved them. I loved Howard. I still do.

Still, he was the little boy writing about his idea of a grown man. He may have been a grown man, but the stories came from the child about the idealized man. Hell, Howard even dressed up in cowboy outfits when he was full grown and swung swords against weeds.

I worked hard physical jobs when I was young, and for a long time. I know what it’s like to keep your brain alive by visiting places that don’t exist. By using that little boy impulse to set your mind free.

On one level, I’ve never grown up. Even though I write about some pretty realistic things from time to time, the impulse is no different than when I write wild and fantastic things that come from a more obviously adolescent place. Writing is dreaming on paper, and trying to figure out a way to not have to work for anyone and still pay the bills.

Howard never grew up.

Writers never grow up.

Readers wouldn’t want them to.

Be it Hemingway telling us about Nick Adams, or Twain telling us about Huck and Jim in Huckleberry Finn, it is always about the inner-child, and note, when I say inner-child, I’m not talking about that pop psychology shit about the inner-child. This is simply that impulse we have to connect with our imagination when it was fresh and buck wild and it allowed us to sail away to some place other than math class. Since I mentioned Huckleberry Finn, and am, as you have seen, not afraid to digress, I’ll add that Huckleberry Finn, though about a child, is not a children’s book as some think. It is a dark and sometimes disturbing book, and though about childhood, it is also about real things, which Howard seldom was. There are no social issues in Howard’s work, and if there are, they are minimal. I add that not as a slight, but as something that seems obvious to me. Howard was even more about childhood dreams than the rest of us. This is an obvious reason for his success. He can do what a lot of writers cannot. He can give us our dreams back. And I should also note, childhood dreams are not all sweetness and light, and in fact many of them are dark as the pit and deep as Pellucidar. Shadows crawl there. Urges collide.

Howard was a fine writer of exciting tales. He was a kind of Texas Jack London. He was a force of nature. Not all he wrote was wonderful. His Elkins stories are overrated, from my point of view. Vultures of Whapeton is so bad it makes my back teeth ache.

But man, when he was on with Conan and Bran Mak Morn and Solomon Kane and Kull and his horror stories, his other creations, including the flawed but highly enjoyable Almuric, he could make the heart flutter.

(Must pause here to add a side note: Many believe Almuric was finished by someone else. Maybe so, but I haven’t seen any solid evidence of this, and until I do I consider the book Howard’s. Otis Kline is one of the suspects, and it’s certainly his type of story, very Burroughsian, but…again, until the evidence surfaces.)

#

Poor Howard, if his chemistry had been different, he might have lived on for many decades. He killed himself because of events on the ground, but these events were those many others would have weathered. He couldn’t. He was always the little boy and the little boy needed Zoloft, yet to be invented, or some drug of the type, and without it, the real world, the adult world, fell down on him like boulders. Even his broad shoulders couldn’t carry the weight.

Poor Howard. He had to have been like something nailed down and squirming in pain, as the old line goes. Living in a place and time that didn’t understand him. Having ambition that was far beyond anything even he could understand. He wanted to be like the other tough guys around him, the Texans who worked in the oil fields and boxed and did hard labor and had a clear and simple view of right and wrong. At least on the surface he wanted to be that way.

But he was different.

He was an intellectual in work khakis, and maybe on some level a little ashamed of it, or at least constantly aware of it.

Bless him. For he gave us much to read.

Curse him, because he killed himself.

Bless him, because it’s doubtful that he could have done much else. The chemistry boiled inside of him and exploded and at the same time life threw him one too many curveballs to catch.

In the end, he wasn’t Conan.

He was Robert E. Howard.

Writer.

Fiction: Fire in the Lake by Chris Roberson

Wood-Dragon year, 21st year of the Yongle emperor

From his courtyard, the late summer blooms already closing their delicate petals for the night, Jurist Xi San could see a pillar of smoke rising to the northwest of the city, sign of some distant fire past Kunming Lake. Having finished his evening meal in accustomed solitude, Xi sat beneath the open sky as the sun began to set, packing his long-necked silver pipe with tobacco. It was cheap, foul-smelling stuff, but it served to calm his spirits, and settle his thoughts.

Xi had smoked halfway through the first bowl, eyes lidded, his arms folded across his chest, when a polite cough from behind disrupted his meandering reverie.

“Good evening, Fai, sister’s son,” Xi said, without turning around.

“Uncle, how do you always know that it is me?”

Xi opened his eyes, and repositioned on his bench, to face the boy standing at the courtyard’s entrance. In the boy’s features, Xi could see reflected the countenance of his sister, dead these many years, though in the boy’s eyes were something of the spark which lit his late father’s eyes.

“It could be due to something no more complicated than the simple fact that you are expected to present yourself to me at the appointed hour, every evening,” Xi said, “and as this is the appropriate time, it is only reasonable that it is you who approaches.”

“But couldn’t my studies delay me, or one of your servants precede my coming on some household business, by a matter of moments?”

“One might assume that I trust my nephew to have learned the importance of punctuality, and the need not to try an old man’s patience through tardiness. Or one might recall that the household servants are forbidden from entering the courtyard of an evening, save for matters of the utmost importance.” Xi allowed a gentle smile to spread across his face. “Or, one might simply realize that having lived for so many years in a young man’s company, an old jurist might have come to recognize the pattern of footfalls his beloved nephew makes in crossing the flagstones.” Xi smiled broader, and motioned Fai to sit on the stool before him. “It is good to see you this evening, sister’s son. How go the course of your studies?”

Fai arranged himself on the stool, tucking the hem of robes beneath him, and bowed from the waist, reverentially. Fai had been studying for some years now for his imperial examinations, and only weeks remained before he would take his xiucai-level exam. If he passed, and was awarded the title of “flourishing talent,” it would be the first step on a lifetime career in the imperial bureaucracy. If he failed, he could take the examination again, but each time he didn’t pass would decrease his chances of ever advancing in the emperor’s service.

“With the help of the tutors you have graciously provided, Uncle, I feel that I am receiving the best possible advantages. Still…” The boy paused, his voice trailing off into silence, as an expression of doubt crept across his face. He seemed, in that moment, so much younger than his twelve summers, and Xi could not help but remember the small child he had welcomed–reluctantly, albeit–into his home those many years ago, when he had been District Magistrate in Sichuan province, long before he came to live in the Northern Capital. Parents lost in a fire, the soot of which still seemed to darken his tearstained cheeks, the young Fai had looked at Xi as a drowning man looks at a beach, his bloodshot eyes hungry for safety and security.

“You worry whether your performance on the examinations will reflect your education, or whether you will betray the expectations of myself and your tutors alike?”

The boy could only nod, his lower lip caught between his teeth.

“Do not worry, sister’s-son,” Xi said, gently. “Keep what you have learned close to your heart and the words of your tutors in your mind, and you will prevail. I have heard more learned critique from your lips of Confucian law and logic than in any number of juren-level ‘elevated persons’ I have encountered, through my many years of service. I am, after all, a jinshi-level ‘presented person,’ and your grasp of ethics impresses even me.”

The boy fidgeted on the stool, nervously.

“Uncle, may I stand? I find that my limbs have too much energy to them this evening to sit still for more than a moment.”

Xi puffed on his silver pipe, and nodded, indulgently.

“My thanks, honored uncle.” Fai stood, bowed again, and began to pace the length and breadth of the courtyard.

The sun had now dipped so low that it was almost hidden beneath the western horizon, the sky pinked and streaked with clouds painted orange and blue by the fading light, while in the east the stars began to shine, faintly.

Fai stopped in his courses at the edge of the courtyard, facing the eastern heavens.

“Uncle,” the boy said, pointing overhead, “do you note that red star, there in the east?”

“It is the one called Fire Star, is it not?” Xi answered, absently.

Fai nodded. “One of my instructors told me, in our recent sessions, that Fire Star was associated with judges, magistrates, and governance.”

“I have not heard of that before now,” Xi allows. Then he added, with a wry smile, “I wonder if the association is due to the fact that Fire Star reverses its course from time to time, if I recall correctly, traveling backwards across the sky for a span of days before turning once more and resuming its prior heading. Perhaps your instructor means to suggest that magistrates and judges are likewise inconsistent in their thoughts and rulings, yes?” Xi smiled broader and, drawing deep on the silver-pipe clutched between his teeth, chuckled deep in his chest.

Another polite cough from the courtyard’s entrance sounded, and Xi and Fai both turned to see one of the household servants standing at the threshold.

“Your pardons, Master Jurist, but an imperial messenger has arrived with an urgent summons. Your presence is requested immediately at the Forbidden City, on a matter of the highest importance.”

Xi set his pipe down on the bench at his side, and rose to his feet.

“You will have to pardon me, sister’s son. Return to your studies, and we will discuss these matters further, tomorrow evening.”

Fai bowed, low, and followed the servant from the courtyard. Xi arranged his robes, and tried to divine what possible use the imperial palace could have for a lowly District Magistrate.

#

Before the sun’s dying rays had vanished entirely from the western sky, Jurist Xi lingered at the southern Meridian Gate, the least of the Forbidden City’s five entrances, beneath the cloud-scraping Five Phoenix Tower, the easternmost entrance through which the imperial ministers entered the palace. Had he tried to enter through any of the others, reserved for the royal family or the emperor himself, Xi would have been clapped in irons at best, executed on the spot at worst. Passing through the shadowed tunnel, the light of the plaza of Supreme Harmony just a tiny crescent of brightness before him, Xi shivered, feeling out of his element.

There were guards at the far side of the Meridian Gate, and standing between them were two men, who waited on Xi with barely disguised impatience. One was a eunuch of the Household Department, round and hairless, wearing simple robes that brushed the flagstones, his shaved head bare. The other was tall and slender with wispy mustaches, wearing the formal robes and ruby-topped court hat of a Confucian scholar, a courtier of the first rank. The two men seemed polar opposites, yin and yang given flesh. One tall where the other was short, the other slim where the other was round. Their manner, too, seemed divided into light and dark; the eunuch was all nervous energy, shuffling and ill-at-ease, his eyes darting at every sound, while the scholar kept his hands tucked serenely into the sleeves of his robe, his eyes narrowed and steady, his expression closed.

“Your pardon, honored sirs,” Jurist Xi said, bowing from the waist as deeply as protocol demanded, his eyes on the ground. “But is it permitted to know what offense I may have given?”

His head still lowered, Xi looked up from beneath his brows at the two men, who cast quick glances at one another before answering.

“Offense, District Magistrate?” said the eunuch, a confused expression on his round features.

“Yes, honored sirs,” Jurist Xi answered. “Having spent the majority of my years of service in the far provinces of the empire, it has been this one’s honor to serve as District Magistrate in the Northern Capital these last two years. Leaving behind those farthest and most benighted hinterlands, it is my honor now to serve at the pleasure of the emperor in the shadows of the imperial palace itself. But in all that time, this one has never yet been summoned to the palace. One only imagines that one has given offense.”

The eunuch and the scholar exchanged looks, the meaning of which escaped Xi.

“No, District Magistrate,” the eunuch said, a slight smile playing across his full mouth. “You’ve not been called to the Forbidden City because of anything you yourself have done, but because of a service you have yet to perform.”

“A service?” Xi asked.

“Yes,” the Confucian scholar answered, his tone level but severe. “There has been a crime committed. That is the purview of the Magistrate, is it not, the investigation of offenses and the meting out of punishments to the guilty?”

“Yes,” Xi answered, bowing his head slightly in response. “But why call upon lowly District Magistrate, since the palace has its own guards and investigators? The Embroidered Guard, the secret policemen of the Eastern Depot, have as their charter the expressed job of safeguarding the emperor. Why not make use of them?” Xi paused, and then quickly added, “Meaning no disrespect, of course, honored sirs.”

“The case does not involve the emperor,” the eunuch said, his gaze flickering to the north as he spoke, where the pillar of smoke perched over the distant mountains.

“That is,” the scholar added, raising his hand, “not the emperor that was, and not directly.”

“Could you offer some …clarification?” Xi asked, confused.

“All will become clear in time,” the eunuch answered. The round man turned and began walking towards the inner walls of the palace, motioning Xi to follow. Xi fell in step, the scholar walking a few paces behind.

Crossing the plaza, they passed next through the Gate of Supreme Harmony, skirting around the imperial hall to the west, then towards the Palace of Heavenly Purity and the Hall of Earthly Peace to the north beyond. As they walked, Xi cast nervous glances around him, his eyes not large enough to take in the grandeur of his surroundings. Few men of his station had seen the interior of the recently constructed palace, and fewer still allowed to roam so far within the inner reaches. The palace seemed fresh made and new, though construction had begun in Fire-Dragon year, eighteen years before. The emperor had only taken permanent residence in Wood-Dragon, seven years since, and if not for the sections routed by fire some time ago, now being rebuilt, the Forbidden City would look as though it had been completed only the day before.

So distracted by the sights was Xi that he scarcely noticed the scholar begin to speak.

“There are shifting allegiances and conflicts within the palace walls,” the scholar had said, his voice low and conspiratorial, his eyes narrowed on the eunuch’s back. “All involved thought it…best, to have the matter at hand investigated by someone from the outside. Someone without…loyalties.”

“This one’s loyalty is to the emperor,” Xi said, quickly. He was not sure whether he was being tested, or allowed a confidence, but wasn’t prepared to take a chance.

The scholar regarded him for a moment from beneath his brows, and then nodded slightly.

“Well said, District Magistrate,” the scholar finally answered, his tone level, giving nothing.

“If this one is permitted to ask,” Xi said, after a moment, “what is the matter at hand?”

Up ahead, the eunuch came to a stop, tucking his arms in his full sleeves.

“Here,” the eunuch said simply, indicating the ground before him with a flick of his eyes, as though afraid to point or to look too long on the scene.

There, within the Imperial Gardens, in the shadow of the Pavilion of Ten Thousand Spring Seasons, a fat man lay face down on the ground.

Coming forward to stand beside the eunuch, Xi looked carefully at the scene, taking in every detail. The fat man was on the ground with arms spread at his sides, his legs folded one under the other, as though he had been tripped from behind and fallen face forward. The back of his head was concave where it should have been convex, his thin black hair matted with blood, that was pooled in an already congealing halo around his head. His skin was cold blue and lifeless, suggesting some hours had passed since the incident had occurred.

From his vantage point, Xi could see only a portion of the man’s left profile, and did not recognize the man’s features. His garments suggested a story in themselves, though. The color of the fat man’s brocaded sleeves was a shade of orange called “apricot yellow.” It was reserved for the exclusive use of the heir apparent.

“Is this…?” Xi paused, having trouble formulating the question.

“Yes,” the scholar answered, his eyes downcast. “It is Zhu Gaozhi. Next in line to the throne after the emperor Zhu Di and, as of this morning, ruler of all the Middle Kingdom.”

“I…I am confused,” Xi said, forgetting all etiquette in the dizzying moment.

“Word reached us in secret,” the eunuch answered, glancing at Xi, “just before you arrived this evening. The emperor died this morning on the road back from the Mongolian campaigns in the northwest. Zhu Gaozhi was his successor, and died before ever learning the throne was now his.”

#

Jurist Xi began his investigations early the next morning, leaving home for the Forbidden City before his nephew and servants had even risen for the day.

There were many in the palace whom a District Magistrate could not directly address, and whom he was forced to approach with much kowtowing and genuflection. In fact, there were some whose stations were so far above that Xi could not look directly at them. By the end of the first day of his investigation, his ancient knees were sore from kneeling so often on the floor, and his forehead felt frozen after being pressed time and again after the chill stones before some high ranking official.

So far, from these inquiries of those in power, he had learned very little. Whether he spoke to the Eunuchs of the Presence who managed the emperor’s toilet and bath; or the Confucian advisors who influenced imperial policy, whispering blandishments behind screens; or the servants of the Imperial Mothers, the wives and consorts of emperors past–none seemed willing or able to share anything of substance, anything that might identify who had ended the life of the fat princeling.

Jurist Xi returned to his humble apartments that evening, taking his evening meal in quiet silence as he always did, smoking a bowl of inexpensive tobacco in his long-necked silver pipe as the shadows lengthened, contemplating what might follow.

A familiar fall of footsteps and a polite cough signaled the arrival of his nephew, and Xi absently motioned the boy to his stool with a wave of his silver-pipe.

“Good evening, Uncle,” the boy finally said, to fill the silence that lingered between them.

“And a good evening to you, sister’s son,” Xi said, between puffs on his pipe. “I apologize if I am distracted somewhat, but my thoughts are…elsewhere.”

“If it is not too impertinent to inquire, Uncle, what office did the Forbidden City require of you, last evening?”

Xi chewed momentarily on the mouth of his pipe before answering. “It is perhaps impertinent,” he said, “but I will answer, after a fashion. I have been asked to investigate a somewhat…delicate matter.”

“For the emperor himself?” the boy asked. “That is a considerable honor, Uncle.”

“An honor?” Xi repeated, thoughtfully. “Perhaps, sister’s son. But there are times when I miss the simplicity of the outer provinces. Did I ever tell you of the time a sheaf of fifteen notes of currency became thirty, and then forty-five, in front of my very eyes?”

“No, Uncle.”

“It was when I was District Magistrate in the province of Sichuan,” Xi said, his eyes lifted to the heavens as his thoughts drifted back over the long years. “A poor grocer headed to the market to buy vegetables, and on the way found a sheaf of paper money. When he counted the money, he found fifteen notes worth five ounces of silver and five notes worth a string of one thousand copper coins each. Out of this sum he took a note, bought two strings’ worth of meat and three strings’ worth of hulled rice, and placed his purchases in the baskets he carried on a pole across his shoulders. Then he went home, without having purchased the vegetables his mother had sent him to purchase.”

Xi paused, taking a deep pull from the pipe, and then continued.

“When he returned home, his mother asked him why he had no vegetables, and he told her about the fortune he had found. His mother did not believe anyone could have lost so great a sum, and accused him of stealing it, instead. When her son insisted he was innocent, she demanded that he return the money. He should go back to the place where he found the sheaf, and see if the owner comes looking for it.”

Xi’s nephew shook his head. “That was foolish of her to say, wasn’t it, Uncle? Surely the money belonged to whomever had the most recent claim on it, and having lost it the previous owner had relinquished any claim to the sheaf.”

“That is one interpretation,” Xi answered, “and while a valid one, it was not the mother’s, and so did not motivate what was to follow.” Xi knocked the burned embers from his pipe, and began to refill the bowl from the tobacco pouch he pulled from the inner folds of his robe. “In any event, the grocer took the notes back to the place he’d found them, and in due course a wealthy merchant came looking for the money. When the grocer handed over the sheaf of notes, bystanders urged the merchant to reward the grocer for finding his money, but the merchant was a miser, and refused.”

“He refused?” Fai asked, horrified at the thought. “Then he was lying.”

“Perhaps. But more germane to our story was the manner in which the merchant lied, if it was in fact lying. ‘I lost a sheaf of thirty notes,’ the merchant said. ‘Half of my money is missing.’”

“But the grocer had found only fifteen notes,” the boy said.

“Precisely. The grocer objected, and the merchant argued, and after the argument raged on and on, the pair was brought before me, the district magistrate, to try.”

“What did you do?”

“First, I questioned the merchant alone. Then, I questioned the grocer, and found that his answers seemed to bear the ring of truth. Then, I sent for the grocer’s mother, and questioned her in private. Finally, I had the merchant and the grocer each submit written statements to the court, outlining their version of events. Still, the merchant persisted that he had lost thirty five-ounce bills, and the grocer swore that he had found fifteen five-ounce bills.”

Xi paused, lighting his pipe from a taper.

“’Very well, then,’ I said, ‘the sheaf the grocer found is not the sheaf which the merchant lost. These fifteen notes are heaven’s gift to a worthy mother, to sustain her in old age.’ I gave the grocer and his mother the money. Then, to the merchant, I said, ‘The thirty notes you lost must be in some other place. You should continue to look for them.’ And the merchant went away, cowed and ashamed.”

Fai laughed, clapping his hands together, merrily. “Well done, Uncle.”

“Thank you, sister’s-son. At times like the present, there isn’t much I would not trade for a simple case such as those. Now, you’ll have to excuse me, but my current obligations require additional rumination, and so I’ll wish you a good night’s rest. Study well, and we’ll speak again tomorrow evening.”

“Good evening, Uncle,” Fai said, crossing to the courtyard’s entrance, bowing low, and then leaving Xi to his quiet contemplation.

#

The next morning, he returned to the Forbidden City by the Meridian Gate, a different strategy in mind.

No longer would he wait on the pleasure of the high and officious. From this point onwards, he would direct his attentions to the lowest ranked of the palace society. The subalterns and couriers, the scullions and sweeps. The eunuchs who fed the garden fish in the garden pools and polished the floors in the Hall of Supreme Harmony to a mirror shine, the servants who paraded the meals to the royal family through all the watches of the day and night and the low-ranking priests who rarely paused in their orisons. From all of these, the most low, the unnoticed and underfoot, Jurist Xi slowly pieced together an image of the truth, gathering together one small element at a time, until the whole was spread before him like a mosaic.

#

Xi sat on a low stone bench, just beyond the walls of the Imperial Garden. It was early afternoon, the sun overhead just past its zenith.

“So you were not aware the emperor had died the afternoon the body was found?” Xi asked the eunuch who tended the topiary in the garden.

“No,” the gardener answered, impatient to return to his duties, worried that the neglect would allow his creations to grow out of true. “We were told the emperor was returning from the campaign in Mongolia, and were making ready for his arrival, but it was not for several hours more that the first riders arrived from the march, with the news the emperor had died in his sleep.”

Xi rubbed his hands together, palm to palm, trying to tease a fleeting idea from the back of his mind.

“So you were the first to find the body?” he asked.

“Yes,” the gardener answered with a sigh, his eyes flitting back to the garden beyond the low wall.

Xi thought back to the scene two days before, the fat man laying face down in a pool of coagulating blood, the sun receding in the west across pink-dappled skies. The body was cold, but the blood at the back of the neck had not yet fully clotted. The murder had occurred no later than midday.

“You work in the garden all day?” Xi asked, turning slightly from the waist, admiring the well-shaped hedges and crenulated trees.

“From the sun’s first appearance until nightfall,” the gardener answered, proudly. “I rarely stop for meals. In fact, I’ve worked for the last week without ceasing, in preparation for the emperor’s return.”

Xi narrowed his eyes.

“And yet you were elsewhere at this hour two days past?” he asked.

The gardener looked confused for a moment, and began to shake his head. Then, seeming to remember the content of their discussion, he quickly redirected the shake into an eager nod.

“Yes, yes, of course,” the gardener answered. “I was called away by a representative from the Household Department for a few moments. Some question about the feng shui of plants kept in the Hall of Mental Cultivation, as I recall.”

Xi held his hands together, palm to palm, as though he’d caught a fly between them.

“Curious,” he said, innocently. “That seems more within the purview of a Taoist priest than a gardener…if you will excuse my impropriety in mentioning. Are you often called on such tasks?”

The gardener regarded Xi closely.

“From time to time,” he answered.

Xi rose quickly, and bowed a fraction from the waist, nearly the bow given to an equal, shaded slightly towards deference.

“This one is grateful for your time and patience,” Xi said, and then turned and walked away, his hands held tightly together, fingers laced.

#

That evening, after his simple meal, his silver pipe held to his lips, Xi reviewed what he had learned thus far.

When Gaozhi was killed, no one knew the emperor had died. So who benefited from his death? His own son, Zhu Zhanji, or his brother, Zhu Gaoxu, either one of whom would be the likely next candidates for the throne. Of the two, the dead man’s son was away on the steppes on the fringes of the empire, on a long hunting expedition. He was a man who preferred the wilderness to the intrigues of court. Gaoxu had been in the capital city when his brother was killed, but witnesses placed him at a festival in the hour the murder had occurred.

What of other factions within the palace? The eunuchs, who held all the administrative and most of the high military positions under the old emperor, seemed eager to begin the coronation process, and put Gaoxu on the throne as soon as possible. The Confucian scholar-officials, who made up the balance of the administration, were blocking this appointment, delaying the proceedings wherever possible. One or two of the Confucians had floated the notion that the son Zhanji was the more proper choice for the throne, as his father had technically died after becoming emperor, but this position was not supported by all of the Confucians, many of whom suspected the dead man’s son of collusion.

Xi was in the midst of trying unsuccessfully to unravel the knot presented by the mystery, the pipe held between his teeth, his eyes closed tight, when he felt a touch on his knee.

“Uncle?”

Xi’s nephew Fai sat in his accustomed place on the stool before Xi, a look of concern on his features. He had entered, crossed the courtyard, and sat upon the stool, all without Xi noticing. After a long time waiting, apparently, he had tapped Xi’s knee, to rouse him.

“My apologies, again, sister’s-son. The vexations of my current office are many, and I find myself lost in my thoughts on the subject, more and more. It is a…complicated matter.”

“An investigation, then?” Fai asked.

“Something like that,” Xi answered.

“Perhaps there is some crucial article of fact you have not yet uncovered.”

Xi nodded slightly, puffing on the pipe, breathing out thick clouds of smoke which rose to obscure briefly the stars winking to light overhead. “Perhaps,” he allowed, after a time. “But I think it more likely that this is a quandary too complex to be solved at a single stroke, as much as I would prefer it were otherwise.”

Fai frowned, thoughtfully.

“You put me in mind of simpler times, though, sister’s-son. Did I ever tell you about the time he solved a murder case with a single word?”

Fai shook his head. “I don’t believe so , Uncle.”

“The case involved a merchant who was about to go out on a selling trip. The merchant had hired a boat and, having loaded it with the help of the boatman, waited for his servant to arrive from the house. He waited, and waited, and still the servant did not appear.” Xi drew the pipe’s smoke deep into his lungs, and exhaled another cloud to obscure the heavens. “The boatman, meanwhile, could not tear his gaze away from the fine, expensive things the merchant had loaded onto the boat. If the merchant were out of the way, the boatman reasoned, he could keep all of these fine things for himself. So, when the merchant’s back was turned, the boatman struck him from behind, killing him. The boatman weighted down his body, and sunk it deep into the murky river.”

“So it was murder!” Fai said, breathlessly.

“Without question. But if not for what came next, it is possible no one would have known. You see, the boatman then took the merchant’s fine goods, and carried them to his own home. With them safely secreted there, the boatman went to the merchant’s house. He pounded upon the gate, calling for the merchant’s wife. When the wife appeared at the gate, the boatman explained that the merchant had never arrived at the boat. The merchant’s wife sent her servants out to look for her husband, but they found no trace of him. The boatman, then, suggested that the merchant must have been waylaid on his way to the boat, and all of his fine goods stolen by thieves.”

“He lied,” the boy said.

“Yes, sister’s-son” Xi sighed, and shook his head slightly. “You will find, as you make your way through life, that people lie more often than philosophers and judges might prefer. In any case, the merchant’s wife was suspicious of the boatman’s story, and reported the matter to the local constable, who in turn informed the county officials, who then interrogated the boatman, but produced no new evidence. Finally, the court reached me, the district magistrate. All of the involved parties came before me, including the boatman, the merchant’s wife, and her servants. I sent out all but the merchant’s wife, and had her give an exact description of the events of that day. She explained that her husband had left in the morning, and that sometime later the boatman had knocked at the gate, and that before she could open it, the boatman cried out, ‘Mistress, why has your husband not come to my boat, after so long a time?’”

“That is what the boatman had said?” Fai chewed his lower lip thoughtfully.

“Yes,” Xi said, smiling slightly. “And I think perhaps you understand just how he undid himself with the first word he spoke.”

The boy shifted excitedly on his stool. “I think that…”

“Hold a while” Xi raised his hand. “I’ll finish my tale, and we’ll see if your thoughts accord with me own. Once I had heard the wife’s testimony, I her out, and called for the boatman. When questioned, the boatman gave a statement which agreed in all particular’s with that of the wife. I then called in all of the parties, and ordered the boatman arrested for murder, as he had just confessed to the crime. The boatman objected, asking what confession he had given.”

“When he called at the merchant’s house,” Fai said, eagerly, “he asked not for the merchant, but for his wife.”

“Precisely,” Xi said, smiling proudly. “Very good, sister’s-son. In answer to the boatman’s objection, I said, ‘When you knocked on the door of the merchant’s house, you addressed his wife, not him. Even before the gate had been opened, you were sure he was not still at home. How else could you have known he was away, unless you had seen him with your own eyes?’”

“And so with that one word, ‘Mistress,’ the boatman proclaimed his own guilt!” the boy said.

“Yes.” Xi sat his pipe beside him, and folded his hands in his lap. “Would that my current investigation could be solved so easily.”

#

The next morning, in the palace granary, amidst towering pillars of flour-sacks and casks of millet and grain, Xi found an ancient eunuch who had served the royal family since the days of the late emperor’s father. His fingers were permanently stained with ink, his shoulders hunched from sitting all day at his task, recording in his ledger the flow of victuals into and out of the palace stores, and his eyes were cloudy and dim, but his mind was clear and his tongue was sharp, and he was happy to have any audience, District Magistrate or no.

The ancient eunuch, whose name Xi never learned, listened with bare impatience while Xi rattled off a few questions about his investigation, and then waved his ink-stained hands in from of him, as though warding off foul spirits.

“These intrigues,” the ancient eunuch said, his voice high and piping. “They are nothing new, but pale shadows of what has gone before. All things tend towards decay and chaos, and treachery is no exception. Everything was grander in former days, even the darkness.”

“Might this one ask…” Xi began, and then the old man waved him silent with an impatient gesture.

“Know you, how the emperor Zhu Di–son-of-heaven and may-he-reign-ten-thousand-years–came to the throne originally?”

Xi didn’t see it necessary to point out that the late emperor seemed unlikely, at this juncture, to reign another ten days, much less ten thousand years, but held his tongue. He shook his head, and seeing that the old man had made no indication that his blind eyes had seen the gesture, answered simply, “No.”

“Listen, then,” the old man said. “This is what went before, in times past. This is what many fear might come again, whispering in the dark corner of the palace like frightened little girls.”

“What do they fear?”

“Purge, reprisal, siege, and the threat of civil war.”

Xi leaned in close, and listened as the ancient man told a tale of hidden history, in his sing-song piping voice.

#

Before the late emperor Zhu Di came to the throne, the Confucian advisers of his father Zhu Yaunzhang advised against favoring Di. They said that it would cause a rift between the old emperor’s other sons, and plunge the country into civil war.

Yaunzhang named his grandson Zhu Yunwen as his successor. Worried about the capabilities of his grandson, the old emperor launched a campaign in his final years to rid the empire of any who might later pose a threat to his successor. Fifteen thousand civil officials and loyal military commanders were executed in the mad emperor’s purge.

However, Yaunzhang had not ordered the execution of his own sons, especially his beloved Di. When Yaunzhang had died, Yunwen ascended to the throne. Yunwen then ordered the execution and assassination of his uncles, the princely sons of the former emperor, seeing in each of them a threat. Within a year, seven of the eight were dead, the only one left living the craft Di, who feigned madness, running through the streets screaming obscenities, stealing food and wine from strangers, sleeping in gutters. In warm weather he’d huddle near stoves, shivering and complaining about the chill. But it was all a ruse, to deceive Yunwen into thinking he was harmless while he marshaled his forces.

In time, Di gathered his strengths to him, his sons and loyal military commanders, and made a bid for the throne. He called his nephew Yunwen a dupe of treasonous advisors, and raised an army against him. Lost campaigns followed, and a siege of six months, but in the end Di was victorious, largely due to the cooperation of the court eunuchs, who had been dispossessed by Yunwen, stripped of their power and prestige. The court eunuchs, in exchange for a return to their previous positions, revealed to Di the secrets of the capital’s defense, and Di’s army took the city.

There are those who say the burned body found within the palace walls was not that of the emperor Yunwen, but that of a subordinate, and that the emperor himself escaped death, disguised in the garb of a woman. But these are the stories that washwomen and broken old eunuchs tell, and should not be heeded.

#

By the end of the third day of his investigation, Xi felt close to a solution, though no nearer a full understanding of the forces at play. It was as though he were standing too close to an enormous mural, and able only to perceive small details, not the broad sweep of the work. In his best estimation, the palace was in the midst of a struggle between two factions, with the eunuchs on one side and the scholars on the other. From battles as simple as which scholar should be appointed to a low-level functionary position at court, to those as complex and wide-ranging as the costs incurred by the Treasure Fleets so favored by the eunuchs and the late emperor, the struggle between the eunuchs and the scholars was a war fought on many fronts.

Since times past, generations gone, Jurist Xi had learned, the Palace eunuchs and the Confucian scholar-advisors had struggled for supremacy within the empire. In some eras one side was in the ascendant, in some eras the star of the other side was on the rise, but always the struggle, always the shifting of alliances and strategies back and forth. With the death of the emperor Di, and the murder of his successor Gaozhi, these ancient enmities again came to the fore. It seemed that the eunuchs were eager to rush through any investigation and deliberation, and put the dead man’s brother on the throne, while the Confucians were stalling for time, delaying matters at every turn, trying to devise some strategy.

On the morning of the fourth day, before any but women, eunuchs and the Imperial mothers were yet within the walls of the Forbidden City, Jurist Xi was called before the two men who had first met him within the Meridian Gate.

“You have been busy, we are told,” said the eunuch of the Household Department, his gaze level.

“Yes, honored sir,” Xi answered.

“And have your questions yielded fruit?” asked the Confucian scholar-courtier.

“Meager fruit, honored sir,” Xi answered, “but sufficient to establish the taste.”

“And what have you determined?” the eunuch asked, after a considerable pause.

Jurist Xi looked from one man to the other, his eyes lingering on the round figure of the eunuch. He had struggled for the last hours on how best to couch his next response, how best to explain how he had determined the only ones who stood to benefit from the death of the heir apparent, without giving offense. Before he could open his mouth to frame a response, though, a court page appeared at the elbow of the eunuch, and hurriedly handed him a slip of yellow paper inscribed in black ink.

Xi could not see from his vantage point what the paper said, but the impact on the eunuch was written in bold relief across the round features. His eyes widened, showing white all around, and his mouth twisted in a grimace that suggested shock commingled with fury. The eunuch’s hands closed into claws around the paper, crumpling it.

“Your pardons,” he muttered, and turning on his heel, raced away. The crumpled paper he dropped behind, and it fluttered to the ground like a falling leaf.

The Confucian scholar bent to retrieve the slip of paper in a fluid motion, and straightening it, read it at a glance. A slight smirk peaked at the corners of his mouth, but only for an instant.

“Honored sir,” Xi said, after a long silence. “Is this one given to know what the message says?”

The scholar lifted his eyes, and looked on Xi with an expression of wearied humor.

“Come along, District Magistrate,” the scholar answered, turning. With measured steps, he began to walk after the eunuch. “You will need to know soon enough, I would imagine.”

#

Beneath the Gate of Divine Prowess, at the northern wall of the Forbidden City, lay a body cold and still, dressed in the dull orange hue called “golden yellow,” reserved for the exclusive use of the emperor’s sons. Though he had never seen the man before, Jurist Xi knew at a glance that this was the body of Zhu Gaoxu, eldest son of the late emperor.

No man but the emperor may spend the night within the palace walls, unless he should pay six silver taels to the knifeman and surrender his manhood as the eunuchs had done. Zhu Gaoxu had spent the night in his royal apartments, just beyond the palace walls, and had risen early to meet with palace officials about his role in the funereal rites that would occupy the Forbidden City for the next hundred days. He never made the meeting, but was found still and lifeless on the cold flagstones by a group of ministers in the early morning light.

Some in the court, in the hours that followed, began to point their fingers in accusation at the late emperor’s grandson, Zhanji the hunter, out on the western plains, though how he came to be responsible for the murders of his father and uncle from a distance of thousands of kilometers, none can say with certainty. The arguments were spirited, and divided factions internally. Members of the Household Department disagreed openly and vehemently about what next course of action should be taken, and the courtiers and Confucian advisors locked themselves away, consulting histories and books of law, searching for precedent and historical guidance.

That morning, on first waking, Jurist Xi had felt sure that he had determined who had murdered the heir apparent, though he scarcely understood the motive of the murderers. No, as the day grew nearer to dusk, Xi felt that he knew perfectly the motives of two murders, but had grown less certain about the identity of the murderers themselves. The one thing of which he remained convinced, though, a certainty that burned with crystal clarity in his thoughts, was that no one could learn what he had discovered.

Xi knew well the responsibilities of the District Magistrate. His was the task of preserving order, at any cost. Xi remembered what the ancient eunuch in the granary had told him about the ascension of Zhu Di to the throne, and he wept to think of his district of the Northern Capital in burning ruins.

#

That evening Xi returned to his home, and ate his meal in private contemplation. Later, he sat in his courtyard, his silver pipe in hand. At the sound of a cough from the courtyard’s entrance, Xi turned, and waved dismissively.

“Not tonight!” Xi said, sharply. “Return to your studies, and we’ll speak on some later occasion.”

“Your pardons, honored uncle,” the boy said, his voice quavering as he bowed low. “Has …has this one displeased you in some fashion?”

Xi took a deep breath, and collected himself.

“No, sister’s son.” Xi forced himself to relax, incrementally, and smiled to the shaken boy at the entrance. “The anger conveyed in my tone is not with you, but with others more deserving of ire. You are dismissed this evening not for any fault of yours, but because I am expecting visitors which should arrive at any moment.”

A household servant appeared at Fai’s side, bowing low.

“Master Jurist, there are two men at the front gate who wish to speak with you.”

“And there they are now,” Xi said.

With a faint smile, Xi motioned the servant to escort the visitors in.

“You must excuse me, sister’s son,” Xi said to Fai, who lingered nervously at the entrance.” I must receive these guests in private. Continue with your studies, and we will speak again tomorrow evening.”

Fai bowed to his uncle and, without another word, left.

Xi refilled his pipe and, when he turned again, standing uncomfortably side by side in the doorway were the eunuch of the Household Department, and the Confucian scholar-courtier. Neither knew that the other had been summoned, but likewise neither was able to refuse. Xi had made certain to include certain suggestive passages in the invitations his servants had delivered, to insure their prompt arrival.

“District Magistrate,” the scholar began, attempting for bluster, “the manner of your invitation was most unseemly, and completely lacking in merit.”

“Yes,” the eunuch put in, stepping forward, “Most inauspicious. Etiquette demands…”

Jurist Xi raised his hand for silence, and shook his head with a slight smile on his face. He drew heavily on the silver pipe, and sent streams of spoke spilling up from the corners of his mouth.

“This one offers humblest apologies for any offense,” Xi said, his voice laced with dark humor. “But on consideration it seemed that civil war and the palace in flames would prove more inauspicious, and of the unseemly options which presented themselves this course was the most suitable.”

The eunuch and scholar regarded him through narrowed eyes.

“This one is pleased to report that the mysteries surrounding the death of the imperial princes have been solved,” Xi went on. “One is less pleased with the answers, but then these are trying days.”

Xi tapped out the spent tobacco from his silver pipe, and began to refill the bowl.

“In all things, there is a first cause,” he continued. “One might assume that the instigation of this current string of events was the discovery of the body in the Imperial Gardens, four days since. That would not, however, be true. In fact, it all began with fires in the northwest, out beyond Kunming Lake.” He paused, and then added, “From the direction of Mongolia.”

The Confucian looked at him, not comprehending, and then looked to the eunuch with dawning realization. The round man, for his part, kept his eyes on the ground.

“That was the means…” the Confucian began, then bit off the rest of his statement.

“One imagines there were a series of fires,” Xi went on, lighting his pipe from a taper. “Signal fires, stretching the hundreds of leagues between here and inner Mongolia. A way of passing information much faster than any horse and rider ever could. The content of the information would, perforce, be limited, but so long as your message was simple …say, to alert another as to a significant occurrence–the outbreak of war, or the death of a king…”

Jurist Xi paused, and let his words hang in the air.

“Understand, first, that one speaks only in the hypothetical,” Xi went on. “Imagine, if you will, that a group desired to circumvent the will of their emperor, in the manner of succession. For the sake of argument, let us say that…for instance…the palace eunuchs felt that their power would be severely curtained were the emperor’s chosen heir to come to the throne; they might even know for a certainty that the heir is the pawn of another faction within the palace…for example, the Confucian scholar-officials. These hypothetical eunuchs might be willing to go to any lengths, even murder, to secure their positions.”

Xi paused, taking a long draw off the pipe.

“However,” he said, continuing, “if the heir apparent were to die while the emperor stilled lived, the emperor might name a successor even less receptive to their cause. On the other hand, if the heir died after ascending to the throne, then the line of succession would next fall on the heir apparent’s own son. Suppose that the heir apparent’s son is an unknown, his allegiances not yet established. Let us say he prefers to hunt in the western wildernesses instead of playing court politics. Were he to take the throne, he might look favorably on the eunuchs’ cause, or he might favor some other faction…for example, again, the Confucian scholar-officials.”

Xi glanced between the two men, his manner serene. Neither of the visitors spoke, their eyes locked on Xi.

“If, however, the heir apparent were to die too late for the emperor to name a new successor, but before the emperor had passed on, then the throne would pass to the heir apparent’s brother.” Xi smiled, like an enlightened monk. “Suppose, further, that the heir apparent’s brother is, himself, the cat’s paw of the eunuchs, and with him on the throne, they know that they would be secure until another turn of the wheel. Now, if we assume that the eunuchs are successful in their scheme, and work out some mechanism to alert their compatriots at the palace that the emperor is on his deathbed, before the news is made public…say, by ingenious use of secret signal fires …and eliminate the threat of the heir apparent, isn’t it too much to assume that the Confucian scholars would not revenge. After all, if it is well known that the heir apparent’s brother is the pawn of the eunuchs, the Confucian scholars have a vested interest in eliminating this new successor, as well.”

Xi lowered his pipe from his lips, his expression hardening.

“I am merely a humble servant of the emperor,” Xi said, his voice hard. “I took my examinations and earned my certifications, and have served at the emperor’s pleasure from here to the western fastness these past long years. Now, mine is the role of District Magistrate of the Northern Capital, to maintain the safety and order of the city. What happens within the walls of the Forbidden City is beyond my ken and my control, but what happens beyond is my responsibility.”

Xi stood, and crossed his arms over his chest. The eunuch made to speak, but Xi silenced him with a glare.

“Murder is not to be tolerated,” he went on, “but if the prosecution of an offender leads to more bloodshed and violence, then who is to gain? Neither of your factions is guaranteed they will control the next emperor, whoever he will be. If the true facts of the last days is revealed, the only result will be civil war. Two men are now dead, and their father with them. Should more men now join them in death, or shall we consider things at an end, till the wheel should turn again?”

The eunuch and the scholar looked at one another, their expressions hard, their gazes smoldering. Then they looked back to Xi.

“The investigation of offenses and the meting out of punishments to the guilty is the purview of the Magistrate,” the scholar said through clenched teeth.

“We will abide by your decision,” the eunuch added, bowing slightly.

With that, both men turned, and walked back out into the night. Xi never saw either one of them again.

#

A month later, Zhu Zhanji, grandson of the late emperor, ascended to the imperial throne, and took up residence in the Forbidden City. Called the Xuande emperor, he seemed well disposed to the positions of the Palace eunuchs, but less so than was his predecessor. The new emperor seemed to listen with a more attentive ear to his Confucian advisors, but was reported to heed their counsel only when it suited him. In most ways, he was his own man, and his reign reflected that fact.

Some weeks after Zhanji took the throne, Jurist Xi’s nephew Fai passed his xiucai-level examination, recognized now by the imperial bureaucracy as a “flourishing talent.” Through his uncle’s connections in the Northern Capital–there were always those in the bureaucracy who considered it auspicious and prudent to have favors owed them by a District Magistrate–Fai secured as a position as an assistant to the official scribe on a forthcoming Treasure Fleet expedition, bound for Nippon. He would continue his studies while onboard, and then take his juren-level examinations on his return to the Northern Capital, the following year.

The day before Fai was scheduled to depart with the Treasure Fleet, he joined his uncle in the courtyard at the appointed hour, as was their custom.

“Good evening, uncle.”

“Good evening, sister’s son.” Xi motioned the boy to the stool, but his nephew politely declined, too excited to sit still.

“I think it is safe to say that great things lie in your future,” Xi said, “but I am not afraid to admit that your presence will be missed in this house.”

Xi dipped his head, reverentially. “I thank you for making a place in your household for me, Uncle. And I can only hope that my contributions can be even a shadow of what your service has meant to the empire.”

“Graciously said.” Xi smiled, kindly. “My own contributions to the emperor, though, are humble offerings, and you would do better to set your ambitions somewhat higher. It is perhaps ironic, but my most significant contribution in the emperor’s service is likely one which no one knows, outside of myself and two other men, neither of whom are likely ever to speak of it.”

“But surely,” Fai says, “even a hidden contribution still aids the emperor. What would have happened differently had you not performed this service?”

Xi shook his head, a dark expression drifting momentarily across his features. That is not a topic fit for discussion and, besides, I would not want a new cloud to cast a shadow on my nephew’s proud day.”

“Thank you, Uncle.” Fai bowed again, and then straightened, his hands in constant motion at his sides, too full of nervous energy to stand still.

“Perhaps,” Xi said with a gentle smile, “you should go and prepare your things for the coming voyage?”

“Yes, of course.” Fai smiled broadly, his eyes flashing. “Thank you, Uncle.”

The boy hurried to the entrance, pausing only to give a perfunctory bow before rushing to his rooms, leaving the jurist alone in the courtyard.

Xi smoked his silver pipe, looking at the stars coming out overhead.

What had he contributed, in the broad view? The Xuande emperor would still likely have ascended to the throne in a few years time, had his father lived. But who knew how the fortunes of the Middle Kingdom might have changed, in those intervening years, if not for one fire, burning in the wilderness, out beyond Kunming Lake.

Fiction: Show of Hands by David Prill

It was a fair, moonless August night, and in a farm field in southern Minnesota a bonfire blazed steadily. Apart from a handful of fireflies engaged in a courtship dance in the garden, all else was dark, you couldn’t make out County Road 249 or St. John’s steeple or even much of the corn and bean fields. All you could see were the bonfire lights, dotting the countryside, along the railroad tracks. There were bonfires, rustic pyres, spanning the entire township.

It was an event, a ritual, the coming of the circus train, an unforgettable show, only the show didn’t stop here. They usually didn’t stop at all, just slowed down long enough for the performers to wave and give something back to the farmers who left their white farm houses with their women inside, who had gathered by their bonfires to see something out of the ordinary.

The town of Goatfield was too small for the circus train to stop and give a performance. This circus was too high class.

Elton Hudnall remembered a circus of lesser renown that had visited Goatfield once, setting up tents in Misery Field on the edge of town. The ringmaster looked like a fella Elton had seen on the post office wall. The tiger wore a shabby coat, and the elephant paced anxiously, one giant foot chained to a post driven into the ground. The clowns were supposed to be funny, but nobody laughed because the way they dressed wasn’t so different from the audience. Elton wore hand-me-down overalls, and his shoes were a little oversized, too.

Vera didn’t care for that sort of entertainment generally; she preferred her Bible and soap operas, don’t get her started on Young Widder Brown, Ma Perkins and most of all Pepper Young’s Family. Even though it was secondhand, Elton knew Pepper, sister Peggy and the rest of the Young family like they was his own. Pepper was the boy everybody wanted as their son.

Anyway, the sad-sack circus returned to town the next year, but Elton stayed at home and read the new issue of Farm Journal magazine.

Crack and Divine’s Circus was different. It was big time, big city. It was like a circus you’d see in the movies. It spoke of places Elton had never visited, people he had never met. Peculiar countries. Forgotten languages. Creatures foreign to those which grazed his pastures. They were probably the biggest thing that ever hit Goatfield, apart from the time that troupe of actors performed “The Marriage of the Midgets or Tom Thumb’s Wedding” at the opera house. That was real humorous. People talked about it for a month afterward. County Commissioner Aesop also made an appearance in the Farmer’s Day parade the last time he was up for reelection, but that didn’t count because he worked for you and me.

One year, the day after the train came, Elton was walking near the tracks and found a folded sheet of red paper, a flyer that had been left behind when the train passed through. There were some fancy drawings in it, but it wasn’t like the real thing. It also listed their upcoming shows–Rochester, Des Moines, Davenport. Elton had been to Rochester once when they visited Vera’s sister. As the months wore on, and winter descended upon the fields, Elton took out the flyer often and gazed upon it it, fingering it until it grew worn and wrinkled. He kept it on a shelf in the granary, behind the flask of whiskey that he had hid from Vera for the last thirty years. When mice chewed on it, he moved the flyer to the feed bin in the barn. Tucked it under the lid, which fit securely onto the bin. Now it was safe.

Elton tossed another shovelful of cobs onto the pile, and it flared up nicely. He peered down the track, to the north, where the cold wind came from in the wintertime, but he didn’t see the light, the small steady light that they waited for every summer, the small light that came out of the north wind. Sometimes you could hear the whistle, of the train, of the wind, they seemed to arrive together, out of the north.

He did spot a faraway bonfire, must be at Jess Kopishcke’s place, made Elton feel a little less lonely but also jealous because he would get to see the circus train first.

Elton had stood by the bonfire waiting for the circus train ever since his daddy had brought him out here so many summers ago. Now Dad was gone, and Elton’s own children had left for the big city, where the circus train did stop, and Elton was alone along the tracks, just the old hound dog Blue nosing around in the alfalfa, waiting for the train. He felt nervous, and didn’t know why. If he thought about it he knew why, so he tamped those thoughts down. It was a ritual, building the bonfire and waiting for the circus train, a ritual handed down from father to son. That was all.

Then, from the far-off distances, well beyond the fields of his own farm, maybe even well beyond Goatfield, Elton heard it.

The wind picked up.

The whistle of the wind. Of the train.

Elton stepped onto the tracks and peered into the darkness, the darkness that seemed so complete. He thought he saw things, wished for the same things, and then realized he didn’t see anything at all.

When he retreated to the weeds, Elton noticed that his bonfire was growing weak. If the fire wasn’t visible from a long way off, the train wouldn’t have time to slow down before it reached him. Elton grabbed his shovel and hurriedly added cobs, the embers reaching for the sky before joining the darkness.

After he sunk the shovel blade back into the ground, he spotted it.

The train.

It was coming.

He could see the white light levitating on the tracks, already on the edge of the northwest field, where he had planted beans in the spring, and he heard the faint thunder of rails, felt the small vibrations beneath his feet.

The train.

Another year.

He had kept true to the train, kept the bonfire alive.

Blue began barking.

Here came the train now, the forms and colors and cars and cages rapidly taking shape, a kaleidoscope of wonder swirling out of the darkness, like a bottle-rocket arcing across a Fourth of July sky.

It was slowing. Elton breathed easily. He always worried that it wouldn’t slow, that they were late for a show, that they would charge along the border of his farm without even a nod or a wave.

But no, it was losing speed, and Elton stepped up in front of the bonfire to greet the circus train for another year. It was a ritual, a childhood tradition, and that was all.

The smells hit him first. Exotic, pungent, otherworldly smells, animals and sawdust and perfume and the unknown.

The sounds–calliope music that carried his heart to astonishing places, laughing and singing, brass instruments blaring their anthems. Life, life unlike any he had ever known.

And the sights. The ringmaster and acrobats and trapeze artists, clowns and tigers and elephants and monkeys and zebras, the bonfire playing off their faces, and it was like his own personal circus show, as if he was the only invited guest. And they were performing, at least now and then, from platforms interspersed between the passenger cars. Juggling, pratfalling, human pyramiding.

Those inside the cars were waving, joy on their faces.

Waving.

Elton’s heart went thump, thump, thump.

The hands.

He didn’t know why, but of all the wonder and beauty of the circus train, it was the hands that touched him the most.

The train was slow now, walking speed.

Beautiful hands. White and smooth and graceful and soft-looking. They shone in the bonfire light. Beautiful hands, waving to him. He didn’t wave back, kept his hands in his pockets, just smiled and nodded happily.

Then he saw her.

He didn’t know her name, yet there she was, every year, smiling, and waving at him with the most beautiful hands in creation.

He took another stride toward the train, until he felt like he was almost part of it.

She was a trapeze artist, dark-haired and dressed in red sequins and silk, and she spun on a rope attached to a bar that went the length of the platform, spun ’round and ’round, one leg wrapped around the rope, the other crooked at an angle, the foot poised on the opposite knee. One arm was locked around the rope, the other was free, was waving, her beautiful hand waving. It was the most beautiful hand on the whole train. It was like a white bird seen high against a summer blue sky.

She was smiling at him, and while her face and eyes were glorious, it was her wave, her beautiful hand, that reached out for his heart.

Elton smiled back at her, put everything he had into that smile, but kept his hands in his overall pockets.

She appeared to speak. Her mouth was making words.

Every year she smiled and waved at him, in what he thought was a special way, but this was the first time she seemed to want to talk to him.

The train was moving.

Elton walked with it.

“What are you saying?” he asked. “What are you telling me?”

But she just kept smiling, and waving, and then the train gained speed, and Elton began to run, run along tracks, through the fields, the train faster now, faster, and her words were lost.

After a time Elton pulled up, huffing hard, heart straining, and watched the train keep rolling and creaking down the tracks, down to the curve at Engel’s Creek, around the corner, and off into the night again, leaving Elton alone in the darkness, the bonfire burning out quickly, the night taking command once more, another year gone, another year to wait for the train’s return.

Elton kept watching the curve, until the bonfire was cold and the wind died off, and then he turned, whistled at Blue, and trudged slowly back to the white farm house, and the woman who lived inside.

#

“See the train, did you?” asked Vera, when he came back into the house, into the light. She had waited up for him, knitting by the radio. Bing Crosby crooned softly, “At Your Command.” Vera loved Der Bingle. His whistling especially. Elton leaned toward Al Jolson–”Swanee,” “Waiting for the Robert E. Lee,” “Back in Your Own Backyard.”

Back along the tracks.

“I saw the train.”

“The years go by so fast, Elton. Seems like just yesterday that you going out to meet that train.”

“It did at that.”

“I don’t even know why you go out there anymore. Kids are long gone. It’s dark out there. I’m afraid you’ll fall and hurt yourself.”

“Dunno, it’s something I’ve always done. Maybe it’s a way to stay close to my dad. Wouldn’t feel right if I didn’t go out there. The circus people, too, they appreciate it, they appreciate the support. It’s a long trip, not many towns around here. To see those bonfires in the dark must be pretty nice.”

“Circus people, what would you know about the circus people, then? A train comes by once a year and you know all about the circus people…”

Elton looked at her hands as she talked and knitted. Her fingers were stubby, with calluses and scars from years toiling in the kitchen and garden. Worn from the sun and soil. Tired-looking. He couldn’t remember if they had ever been beautiful. They had to have been beautiful when they were young, didn’t they? He tried to picture them in his mind on the day he slipped the ring on her finger, but all he could see were the hands of the circus people, of Her.

“What you standing there for? Why don’t you come in and make yourself at home? I’ll fix you some jam and bread, and a nice cup of warm milk.”

“Sure ma, jam and bread would be good.” Elton hung up his jacket on the hook by the door with hands that were no better, meaty, rough things, and gazed out through the porch into the night.

Another year.

Warm milk.

Hands.

Jam and bread.

Beautiful hands.

#

Summer departed, fall stepping in to fill the gap, the fields plowed under, the grove changing from green to gold and then just a gathering of stark grey skeletons, waiting for the snow to bury them.

Elton had more empty hours once the flakes started flying. A little fence mending, some tool repair in the workshop, catching up on his Midwestern Agriculturist reading, now he was in the middle of an article on how there was more profit and less waste from mow-cured hay.

It was a long, character-building winter. A major blizzard roared through the area the second week of December, took three days for the plows to clear the county road. The gout in his leg flared up again. Vera complained about arthritis in her fingers.

All winter, with time on his hands, Elton thought about the last visit of the circus train. It was like a different world, a world far removed from the sunburned field weekdays and starched-collar Sundays in church. It was a world that made his heart pump faster. He puzzled over what the circus girl had said to him. It was more than hello, more than any plainspoken greeting. It was something which required a specific response, that was his conclusion. A question. But what? What could she have asked him?

Why don’t you join us?

Elton started. Where did that come from? It was in his head; he heard it over and over like a popular song.

Why don’t you join us.

What could she have meant?

No, she didn’t say that, she couldn’t have said that.

Join us.

No.

She didn’t say that, thought Elton. I just imagined it. But his idle mind took up the challenge. What would I be in the circus? How could I help them? I am big, and I used to be strong, I still am strong. I’m stronger than men ten years younger than me. I can still lift the harrow plow onto the tractor hitch without any help.

Strong man.

Strongman.

Wearing one of those leopard-skin leotards. Barbells with big black cannonballs on the ends.

Strongman.

Winter was too long, there was too much time for thinking.

Finally, spring came, flooding the creek, although nothing like it did in ‘35, when the rushing waters crept almost all the way up to the back porch.

Summer.

The winds from the north.

Bonfires to be lit.

The train came, just like last year, just like every year.

When the train passed him, Elton, without thinking, bent down and hefted a watermelon-sized boulder that was on the edge of the field. He brought it up to his shoulders, lifted it over his head, held it there, then let it fall back to the ground with a thud.

The trapeze girl smiled and waved. Her hands were like soaring doves.

The performers in the warmly lit burgundy passenger cars appeared to be looking on with approval: they were smiling and waving, too.

She mouthed something again.

Join us.

Yes, that’s what she’s saying, he was sure of it this time.

Elton didn’t have a response. He didn’t run after the train. He just stood there, boulder at his feet, speechless, chest heaving, his arms aching from the effort.

Join us.

#

Quieter next winter, to the point that Vera wrung her coarse aged hands and asked him what was wrong.

“Just some rheumatism,” he said. “It’ll go away once the weather gets nice. Farmer’s Almanac says were supposed to have an early spring.”

“They’re usually right.”

An early spring meant a longer wait to summer.

Elton didn’t feel as strong as last year, but he was still plenty powerful. Once spring comes, he thought, I will get stronger.

When the snow melted and the puddles and mud dried up, Elton did work hard, harder than he had worked in years. He even skipped his afternoon nap. He hauled hay and chopped wood and walked the beans.

“Now you slow down,” said Vera. “Do you want to get a heart attack and leave me alone? Is that what you want?”

“I don’t want to end up like Marvin Soflow.” This was their former neighbor to the east. He had moved to the Goatfield Lutheran Nursing Home five or six years ago, and he was only a couple of years older than Elton.

“If Marlys was still alive, she wouldn’t have to worry about him.”

“We visited Marvin before Christmas, remember?”

“They served a very nice lunch.”

“He was a ghost.”

“The dessert was so tasty. Rhubarb cake. I should have asked them for the recipe.”

“Do you want me to live there, like that?” Elton asked, his voice rising, which didn’t happen often.

Vera quickly looked at him, then turned her head and said quietly, clasping her stubby, worn, calloused hands on her lap. “No, of course not. I…I just want you to be careful. I don’t want to lose you. Sometimes I feel like I’ve already lost part of you. You’re so distant sometimes.”

“It was the rheumatism,” he said again. “I have to work hard and break a sweat, sweat it out, then I’ll feel more like myself again.”

#

Elton studied his hands. All the labor was making them look rougher and more gnarled than ever. This worried him. Had the circus people ever truly seen his hands? What would they say? Would they laugh at him? Would they not slow down anymore? Elton knew it was the one sure sign that he was an old farmer and not a performer. Being in the public eye required attention to these things.

#

The calendar pages flipped quickly, and soon it was time for the train again.

It had been hot and humid the day the circus train was to arrive, and storm clouds boiled up in the early evening sky. Lightning made fantastic patterns across the dark canvas on the horizon. The air was damp, humid. The chickens had returned to their hen house roosts without being coaxed.

The rain and wind began after the sun fell, and got stronger over the next hour, before easing off some. Elton tugged on his slicker, and searched around for his rain hat.

“What are you doing?” Vera asked, coming into the kitchen. “You can’t go out on a night like this.”

“Never missed the train.”

“Be sensible. How are you going to build a bonfire in the rain?”

“Looks like it’s clearing up.”

“It’s a downpour.”

“By the time I get out there it will have stopped.”

“You’re going to get a death of a cold. You’ll catch pneumonia.”

“It’s a warm night. A little rain never hurt anybody.”

Elton left before the next round of arguments began.

He hurried across the farmyard to the barn. Blue wagged his tail happily when he swung open the big red door. Elton went to the feed bin and pulled out the knapsack, which he had packed and hid during the week. He tucked it beneath his slicker, behind his belt.

“Stay boy,” Elton told the hound dog, shutting and latching the door behind him as he headed back out into the weather.

By the time he got out to the fields that bordered the tracks, the rain and wind had picked up again. Lightning flashed at steady intervals, so it wasn’t hard to pick one’s way across the rutted pasture.

When he reached the tracks, Elton wasn’t sure what to do. It was too wet for any hope of a fire. A lantern in this weather wouldn’t have made much headway into the darkness.

He stood there in the rain, the water pooling around his boots, lightning and thunder fierce enough to make him flinch.

The train was upon him almost before he realized it.

It wasn’t slowing.

It didn’t see him.

Behind the yellow and inviting passenger car windows, the performers were laughing and singing and smiling, their lovely hands hoisting drink and food, beautiful hands emphasizing a point of conversation, fantastic hands touching a shoulder or cheek.

I’m invisible to them, Elton thought.

The girl from the trapeze was behind one of the windows, by herself, staring sadly out into the night.

She’s looking right at me, Elton thought.

She can’t see me.

He snapped out of his reverie.

He began running.

He began trying to catch the train.

He saw a railing, on the last car.

If he could just grab hold of the railing, he could pull himself onto the platform of the caboose.

Elton ran faster.

He got one hand on the railing and when he tried to bring his other hand up, his fingers slipped off the wet metal, and Elton lost his footing and took a long, stumbling plunge back into the muddy fields.

The train headed toward the curve.

The rain kept falling.

Elton picked himself up and watched helplessly as another year was taken away from him.

#

The failure didn’t dampen Elton’s dreams, it only made him more resolved.

Next year the skies will be clear.

Next year the railing will be dry.

Next year I will be strong, and my hands…my hands…my hands…

#

First snow came early, a solid inch the day after Halloween, even though it didn’t last long. The day before Thanksgiving Elton strung up green, blue, red and orange lights, glass bulbs the size of chicken eggs, along the tall evergreens lining the driveway, and sure enough, by the first week of December there was enough of the white stuff to plow.

Elton began work on his hands just after Christmas. Vera had given him a pair of gloves as a gift; leather, with a fleece lining, ruddy brown, good gloves, not work gloves. They fit nice and snug. He got into the habit of wearing them everywhere, even inside the house.

“I can’t help it,” he told Vera when she asked. “My hands are cold. I don’t want to catch pneumonia, you know.”

She had more questions when he began using her hand lotions.

“The skin on my hands is cracking,” he explained. “I’ll get an infection if I don’t take care of them.”

When the questions persisted, he began using udder balm. The cows were gone, and didn’t need it where they were now.

Gradually, Elton thought, his hands showed signs of improvement. They seemed smoother, more supple, the wrinkles not cutting so deep into his skin. He waved experimentally. The real test would come in the spring, when the snow was replaced by soil and there was work to be done.

But the true test for Elton came in a way he wasn’t expecting. Even after the warmer springtime weather had settled in, Elton had taken to wearing his Christmas gloves pretty much all the time–around the house, out in the barn, in the field, when slopping the hogs, and when driving into town.

His typical trip to town involved stops at the First National Bank of Goatfield, the Farmer’s Co-op, Gruis Family Grocery, and Wilton’s Tavern.

It was at Wilton’s that his gloves came under some scrutiny.

The bar wasn’t packed, Thursday afternoon after all. A couple of patrons in overalls at the bar. A sunburned pair in work shirts and jeans playing pool over in the corner. The balls and beer glasses clinked in time.

“Hamm’s,” Elton said to Wilton, sliding onto a stool.

“The Brew that Grew with the Great Northwest it is.” He leaned into the spigot.

When Elton reached for the foam-topped glass, one of the other men at the bar, Pete Ester, an old-timer, used to farm a place a couple miles south of Elton, spoke up.

“What’s with the gloves, Elton? You expecting a cold wave? Mighty fancy gloves for farming, you’re a gentleman farmer now, did you hear that, fellas, old Elton here is a gentleman farmer.”

There was a laugh or two.

“I…it’s a skin condition.”

“Skin condition. Hey Elton, how about a game of pool? Or do you not wish to hurt your precious hands?”

Precious hands. Precious, beautiful hands.

And their hands. Look at their hands. The wrinkles, the scars, the liver spots. It was laughable, it was sad.

“No time,” said Elton. “I’ve got groceries in the truck, don’t want the ice cream sandwiches to melt.”

“Don’t want get any dirt under your lovely fingernails.”

“Poison ivy. I picked it up when I was clearing away a tree that fell in the grove.”

“Sure, Elton. Whatever you say. You keep your gloves on, none of my business.”

“Yep.”

They let him be after that, and he drained his glass in peace. As he was leaving, someone piped up, “Hey Elton, you forgot your purse!”

Elton didn’t look back. He didn’t care. They couldn’t be expected to understand. They lived in a lesser world. Their hopes and dreams didn’t extend any farther than the end of the bar.

On the way home, Elton pulled over to the side of the road by the co-op and carefully removed his gloves, one finger at a time. He studied his hands, and was greatly pleased.

Not beautiful, not yet, but so much better. The progress was evident. Smoother, softer, maybe even tender, almost a shine to them. No dirt under the nails. He wondered if he should make an appointment with a manicurist.

#

“Elton, you seem like you’ve been in such a good mood lately,” said Vera that evening over supper. “I was beginning to get worried.”

“See, I told you it was the croup.”

“You said rheumatism.”

“One leads to another, then you get pneumonia.”

“Heavens no.”

“I feel fine.”

They ate their mashed potatoes and peas.

“Elton, do you think we could take a trip sometime?”

“A trip?”

“You know, a vacation.”

“Well…” Already he felt regret, already he knew he would look back, when the train came for him, and watch the farm, his old life, fade into the distance, then disappear entirely as they rounded the corner at Engel’s Creek. The last long look at the farm where he was born and raised, where his dad was born, where his grandfather homesteaded after taking the boat from Germany to the new lands.

New lands.

With Her.

“Maybe we could visit my sister in Rochester. When do you think we could visit her?”

Elton set down his fork.

He glanced over at the Goatfield Electric Co-op calendar on the wall by the door.

Soon, he thought.

Soon.

#

The John Deere 1937 Model 40 Hay Press was a step up from the horse-drawn balers of days gone by. Back then, when hay was cut in the field it was initially stacked in piles called shocks. A long pipe was inserted beneath the shock, a rope was tied across from front to back, and the shock was then hauled to the barnyard to be added to the haystack. The haystack itself was formed by setting a long cedar pole into the ground, then stacking the hay around it in the shape of a cone.

The Model 40 Hay Press made things easier. In many cases it was used in conjunction with a Model T Ford, by attaching a flat-belt sheave to the spokes of a rear wheel with three J bolts. The baler was moved to the hay field, where farmhands pitched hay onto the baler table.

These machines made chores easier for the modern farmer, but they also required looking after, sometimes as much as the livestock.

Elton, still wearing his Christmas gloves, had pulled the baler out into the yard by the corn crib to do routine maintenance. After he hooked it up to the car and got everything going, it sounded like the baler was running a little rough. Probably just needed lubrication after sitting in storage all winter.

As the baler ran, he lifted the guard to gain access to the transmission chains and sprockets. He then proceeded to oil the stuffer knotter drive chain, using a small bottle with a short nipple. The sides of the bottle were slippery from the oil, and he accidentally dropped it down behind the stuffer knotter drive chain.

Without thinking he reached in to retrieve the bottle.

The cog grabbed the gloved thumb of his right hand.

Elton couldn’t wriggle free of his nice snug Christmas glove.

The cog then took his wrist, and continued pulling him into the machine.

Elton gasped.

What happened?

What’s going on?

Blood sprayed the machinery.

Elton was unable to reach the button that would turn off the baler. He screamed in pain, for help.

His mind numbed quickly, in shock, the pain more distant now.

Elton shook his head, dizzy. To avoid being fully dragged into the machine, he kept pulling and pulling until he finally released himself from the machine, leaving his hand and glove behind.

He staggered backward, then stumbled across the yard toward the house, barely able to stay on his feet, blood spurting from his stump, to the driveway and Vera, who began screaming, too.

#

Hands.

Beautiful hands.

Elton was haunted by them in the fever of the netherworld he inhabited.

He had dreams, the strangest dreams.

Dreams where the glove was pulled off and consumed by the baler, but his hand was spared.

Dreams where his hand was severed but then grew back, slender and white and lovely.

Dreams where the combine was harvesting fields of hands, planted in neat rows, fingers waving like corn tassels in the summer winds. Chopping, chopping, chopping.

Dreams of hands, beautiful hands.

He slept.

He dreamed.

Of hands, of hands, of hands.

Even when he woke, the dreams of hands seemed to have no end.

#

Elton sat propped up in bed. He was at Mankato Municipal Hospital. His bandaged right hand was held in place by a pulley system. He couldn’t move it.

“When the wound heals,” the doctor had told him in a friendly voice, “we’ll attach your hook.”

Your hook.

Hook.

Hook.

Hook.

Was there beauty in a curved piece of steel?

Not the kind Elton was looking for.

Not the kind that would get him anywhere.

Vera was supportive as always, but Elton could see she was shaken. He put on a good face for her, hid his feelings.

#

Elton began to see the world differently. When someone came into his room, he didn’t look them in the eye, he eyed their hands. Even the stubby, coarse, weathered hands. There were very few beautiful hands in the hospital, the type of beauty he had in mind. Not even the nurses seemed to measure up.

He began to see and understand the world through hands. How emotions were expressed in hands, how they betrayed a person’s next move, how they were used to communicate thoughts and ideas. He wondered if someone with ugly hands could truly have beautiful thoughts.

Hands.

Hands.

Hands.

#

Then it changed. He wasn’t sure why it happened, but one afternoon the doctor came in and shook hands with Vera.

Elton began vomiting.

“Land sakes!” exclaimed Vera. “What’s wrong? Why are you so sick?”

At first he thought is was perhaps a coincidence, but then, when he saw two visitors shake hands in hallway, and felt the bile rise, Elton realized that he had an aversion to the handshake in all its forms. Fortunately, the custom was easy to avoid in his present condition.

Soon hands themselves began to disturb him. He asked Vera to wear gloves when she came into the room. The doctor liked to gesture with his hands as he talked, and Elton had to shut his eyes until he left.

On the wall of his room there was a painting of Christ in the Garden of Gesthemane, kneeling, his hands folded in a position of prayer. Elton asked the picture be turned toward the wall. The nurse gave him an odd look but compiled.

The doctor came in a short time later and asked him about it.

“I’m paying for this room, aren’t I?” Elton said.

“It’s perfectly natural to have these feelings,” said the doctor. “You’ve experienced a major loss, a physical loss, and it will take some time to get over it, but you will, believe me you will. In time you may even imagine that the hand is still there, we call it a phantom hand.”

Elton shuddered.

On the contrary, he wanted to find a piece of farm equipment that would take his other hand away.

#

Soon enough Elton was fitted with his hook and sent home to continue his recovery.

He didn’t want visitors, made Vera answer the door when the egg man or Watkins man came calling.

“My sister from Rochester wants to come visit,” said Vera. “What day would be best?”

“Tell her no.”

“But Elton…”

“I’m not well enough. I’m not ready. Give me time.”

There was time, and it went slowly at first, then the days seemed to fall away as they always did.

Elton looked at the calendar.

He had forgotten about the calendar, the passing of summer, and what it meant.

The circus train was coming through this weekend.

Elton began to weep.

#

The tears turned to panic, to fear, as the week moved along, and the day of the train approached, unstoppable. When he could sleep, his dreams were filled with hands, beautiful hands, slipping away, slipping into the belly of the baler. He was glad! It made him happy! Anything it took.

#

Hours before the train was to arrive Elton was already hiding in an upstairs closet, crouching among old flannel hunting jackets and duck decoys and cane fishing poles.

When Vera found him, she said, “My word! Elton, what are you doing in there? What are you hiding from?”

He was shaking, he couldn’t stop himself. “Please,” he said. “Make them stop. Don’t let them come here. Their hands, so close, so beautiful, no, they’re not beautiful, they are to be damned, damned, damned!”

“I’ll call the doctor,” she said softly.

“You don’t understand,” said Elton. “He can’t stop it, nobody can stop it! They come every year, don’t you know! Every year!” His voice dropped. “They’ll be here soon. Can you hear the train? Listen…is that the whistle now?”

“I’m making tea,” she said. “Why don’t you come down and have a cup? We’ll talk.”

Yes, Elton went downstairs with her, and sat in a rocker and acted like the spell had past.

Vera said things he didn’t hear.

When she went into the kitchen to get his tea, Elton escaped into the night…

#

Some things may have changed, but Elton was still strong.

The rails were strong, too. But they were constructed by men, men without his sense of mission, of belief.

Elton worked in the dark for some time, frantically, joyously, expertly, the hook doing its part, until the job was done.

The rails were old, Elton would say. Never inspected in all the years that he lived here. Bound to happen sooner or later.

And then he returned to the white farm house with the woman inside.

#

When the roar of metal and earth and human suffering, the terrible glow of the fire, came in a marvelous wave across the fields, Elton turned over in bed and told his panic-stricken wife: “I can sleep now. I can finally sleep.”

#

Afterwards, Elton got to know his hook. His mind seemed to return to a more or less normal state. His obsession had been slaked. There was work to be done, farm work, healthy honest farm work. He even let Vera invite her sister from Rochester for a visit.

“I’m so happy you’re back with me,” said Vera one morning at the breakfast table. “I thought I had lost you forever.”

“I feel like my old self again,” said Elton. “I never thought it would happen.”

Summer slipped out the door, and fall filled the breach. It was a gorgeous autumn, the trees in the grove painted brilliant red and yellow. Elton carved a pumpkin and set it in the window. Vera made pie out of the innards.

Winter then, never really welcome, but the change in seasons was always life-affirming. It had been a tough year, they had been through a lot, and it would be good to rest and wait for the arrival of spring, and, inevitably, summer…

#

It was a fair, moonless August night, and Elton and Vera were asleep in their bed. The nights had been getting cool, so Vera had brought out the down comforter. The window was open several inches, a fresh breeze wafting in.

Elton woke.

He lay there silently, wondering why he had left his dreams.

He listened.

Nothing.

Crickets.

A dog barking, fields away.

Silence.

No.

Something.

What is it?

Elton suddenly sat up.

A train whistle.

His heart began palpitating.

A train whistle.

He had to be imagining it. Just ringing in his ears, that’s right, that’s all.

A train.

Vera slept on.

Elton thought he heard an engine, thought he felt a faint vibration rising up from the floorboards.

Train.

He stayed in bed. He didn’t move.

The engine grew louder, the whistle more insistent.

But the whistle seemed different. Reedy. Hollow.

Closer.

Louder.

Closer.

Then the sound of the engine receded, quickly, too quickly. It should have been gradual, as the train rounded the curve at Engel’s Creek.

It could be any train, Elton thought. Any train.

Silent again, outside.

The window was dark. A moonless night.

You couldn’t make out County Road 249 or St. John’s church steeple or even much of the corn and bean fields.

Blue began barking, howling. He was in the barn.

Vera stirred, and hung there between the waking and sleeping worlds.

Elton looked to the window.

It was black. Like someone had hung a dark curtain in front of the panes.

Howling.

The black window.

Elton listened. He thought he heard something, something in the yard, moving through the grass.

And then, the window wasn’t so black anymore.

The curtain had been raised.

There were hands on the window, a score of hands.

No longer beautiful hands.

Charred and bloody and flayed and trembling hands.

On the window.

Moving, reaching, searching.

He couldn’t see faces, just hands, just hands.

Elton rushed from his bed to the living room.

The terrible hands covered the porch windows.

To the kitchen.

To the hands.

Glass broke, all over the house.

Elton saw more than hands now.

Moving, reaching, searching.

Elton was in the pantry.

Hands on him. Hands on him everywhere.

He heard tearing sounds, ripping sounds, screaming sounds.

Where were these sounds coming from? He wasn’t sure. It seemed very close.

And the fear went away.

Because the hands that were rending him, he realized with wonder, weren’t ugly, scarred, train-wrecked hands.

They were beautiful hands.

Yes!

He could see them now, see them all.

Beautiful hands.

White and smooth and graceful and soft-looking.

Like doves against a summer blue sky.

Elton had learned how emotions were expressed in hands, how they betrayed a person’s next move, how they were used to communicate thoughts and ideas.

And the hands, Her beautiful hands, said to him:

Join us…

Join us…

Join us.

Fiction: The Fly and Die Ticket by Jay Lake

Slow down, buddy. You’re all right. Here, have a drink. It’s a Spican ringstinger. You’ll love it. If you don’t, no matter–by the time you’ve choked it down you’ll be too drunk to care.

Don’t get any in your eye, though.

Trust me on that one.

Of course I know you’re new here. How many customers you think a place like this gets? Yeah, every one of us came in on the same ticket.

Me? Ah heck. Can’t hurt to tell it again. Probably about the same as your story. I got the bad news from a blind-doc on Tremayne Station. Everybody knows the drill. You come off a run a little space sick. Somebody on your shore leave rotation says, “hey, get your med clearance on the way,” so you find a med terminal before you head down to Fat Jake’s or The Spooky Action or whatever the local supra crew bar of choice might be. One of the self-serve ones, where you slip bearer credits in and there’s no one standing around with one eye on the monitors.

Just in case.

In goes your arm, swallowed by that little rubber sleeve lined with antiseptic nanogoop. There’s a deep tissue scan, which is like getting tickled by a sighting laser. It beeps. Sometimes there’s a needle, depending on tech-gen and what the terminal thinks it finds and the rules the local healthfare types have laid on. Then you get a green chit, and you go drinking.

That day on Tremayne, I didn’t get a green chit. Instead the sleeve closed tight and I got a red chit. The damned med terminal called healthfare on me and left me to choose between the end of my world or shooting my arm off.

I thought hard, but I couldn’t see it was worth the trouble of blowing away my own elbow.

Not with me going lepto.

#

There’s a law out there, with some name like the Space Assets Redevelopment Act of 2457. Who the hell knows? Everybody calls it Fly and Die.

The benefits of the Rajamurtha drive are obvious enough. If you want to leave any solar system without having your great-great-great-grandkids waiting for you when you get back, you have to go supraluminal. Einstein’s c is not the working man’s friend. So you fire up the Rajamurtha, watch the pretty sparkles as a measurable percentage of the observable universe turns to glowing tapioca, then shake the shingles out of your ears at the other end of the ride and tend to business. Everybody gets something out of the process, except strict causalists, who have been sucking lemons since Bohr and Heisenberg’s 1941 Copenhagen cage match.

On the downside, r-drives emit quantum packets which have no business existing outside of a very strong magnetic containment field, which means they play their own strange games with the baryonic matter in the vicinity, inciting leptogenesis in otherwise normal objects through what may be sphaleronic effects. In simpler terms, normal matter acquires dangerously unpredictable behaviors. You now know as much as any Ph.D. in human space about what actually happens during the tapioca phase, as supraluminal crew types call the r-drive transition.

It is a statistical certainty that Rajamurtha-equipped ships will eventually undergo leptogenic transformations which effectively end their service life, and incidentally render them rather strange, physically unstable, and in certain cases extremely dangerous. The short-life record is held by the Willem de Wurts, which was cooked on its first r-drive transition leaving the yards at Corona-VI. The long-life record is held by the Vostokian freighter Cantal 355b, with over two centuries in continuous service.

It is an equal statistical certainty that supraluminal crew who do not resign their posts in a timely manner in order to collect their exorbitant pensions in peace and safety at the bottom of some boring gravity well will eventually undergo leptogenic transformations which effectively end their service life, and incidentally render them rather strange, physically unstable, and in certain cases extremely dangerous. This is called getting your Fly and Die ticket.

#

“I’m sorry, Manny,” said RuDoLph. They were a trifrontal, with three separate skill loads and sets of emotional and logical responses sitting on top of a single subconscious Weltanschauung. They were pretty, morphologically male with hair the color of polished mahogany and skin pale as an oxygen pond lily. They served as Second Officer on Marlowe’s Epigone–until very recently my own ship as well. Most importantly, they were also on the other side of a one-inch energy-reinforced plexi barrier separating me from the rest of the universe. They continued: “I mean, everybody knows what’s happened. That’s how it is.”

It was Ru talking to me right now. Their side of the barrier was a grubby cubicle with faded graffiti on the walls and a strange stain just above the hatch which I’d already memorized. My side of the barrier was an antiseptic chamber three meters square which contained me, a flowmetal table with a reasonably comfortable chair, twenty-four degree climate control, a decent menu selection, and the end of my world.

“It wasn’t supposed to be me.” My gut twisted with the stupidity of it all. I’d heard this damned speech a dozen times in my career, from other supra crew I’d known sitting on the wrong side of a virtually identical barrier–it was required by law. There had been two lovers, three mortal enemies, and a captain among them. Now I was making the same idiot speech I’d heard over and over. “Get me out of here.” I slapped the barrier, which stung my hand as if it were a big, flat scorpion. “You can have all of it, everything I got. Just get me out, please.“

Ru hung their head. “I can’t.”

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I shouldn’t do this to you. Damn it, though. I could have quit any time I wanted.” Everybody says they’re going to stop while the money’s good, before their time runs out.

RuDoLph’s voice shifted, the Lph persona sliding forward. “Rivas and Dinagabbie both surrendered their papers after you got red-chitted. Captain’s pissed.”

I laughed, which sounded forced even to me. “She’s pissed. She can come sit in here if she wants and see how pissed she gets. Tell her I’ll trade problems.”

RuDoLph laughed, all three personas at once, which made them sound like a tenor waterfall. “You signed your assets away yet?”

“Nah.” I slumped in the reasonably comfortable chair. “I don’t know…thought maybe somebody’d listen to the money, get me out.” Not that I could even talk to anyone. This was deep isolation, except for whoever wandered into the visitor’s cubicle to face me through the glass.

“You know better.” Still Lph.

“Yes.” I’d been begged, bribed, browbeaten, and never did anything when I was sitting on the good side. I knew the rules, I knew the risks. “I was thinking Crew Benevolent Fund.” Higher ed scholarships for kids whose progenitors died out in the deep dark and didn’t leave anything behind. A bit difficult to go dead broke on a supra crew salary, but it was achievable with sufficient dedication to dissolution.

“Good. They’ll put your name on a piece of the fund.”

Someone would remember me. “RuDoLph…” I didn’t know what else I wanted. To make a difference, maybe. To make it easier for someone else. To keep them away from their own stupidity. Not that I’d ever listened. “Just tell anybody who…who wants to know. I got no regrets.”

“You always were a bad liar, Manny,” said Do, who’d been my lover for a while.

#

It’s difficult to dispose of leptogenically transformed ships. Can’t break them down for salvage, because you’re likely to get carnivorous roses spewing out of the air ducts of whatever vessel is unlucky enough to take on the resulting parts. Can’t blow them to smaller pieces because that just spreads the bizarre bits further, eventually infecting normal matter wherever the trajectories and subsequent vectors take the blast debris. Can’t park them in cold orbit in an inhabited system because there’s always some clown thinks he’s immune or too smart for the authorities who will come along looking for a quick score on whatever could be plundered.

All these have been tried.

So the other half of the Space Assets Redevelopment Act is what happens to the ships. Every now and then a survey mission finds one of those weird, worthless systems. Maybe there’s a swarm of pinpoint black holes in eccentric orbit around the primary, or the system is a close-contact binary with starstuff being slung around a little too freely, or the dark matter density is so high that even the rockball planets have orbital wakes.

The boffins look a place like that over, record everything they see up, down and sideways, leave a blank spot on the map, and turn the coordinates and relevant data over to Rajamurtha Resolution Commission. Those boys decide where the r-drive graveyards are–far enough away from other systems or any rational attractor of human activity, but still accessible to those on a need-to-know. And when a ship cooks, gets its Fly and Die ticket, off it goes to fall forever down that stellar gravity well.

#

“Your lucky day, Lepto Boy.” Tremayne Station’s healthfare outprocessor possessed a sense of humor I would have cheerfully killed to extinguish. She was two meters tall and nearly as wide, a sort of low-gee muscle ball, who apparently watched far too much virteo comedy in her off-hours. That she was utterly devoid of hair follicles and had one of those roving dermal maintenance colonies currently coloring the left half of her face bright orange did little to further endear her to me.

“I’ve been luckier.” I tried to figure out if the stain over the hatch in the visitor’s cubicle might somehow be related to the mess on her face. She certainly wasn’t bribable. Nobody held her job with those kinds of fault lines in their psych profile.

“Well, yes, but this one’s good. You were going to be shipped in low temp hibernation to the drop point at Marantha, but portmaster tells me we’ve got a cooked r-drive insystem needs to be sent on through there. So you get to con your own Fly and Die instead of making the big trip on ice.”

Marantha being a Rajamurtha Resolution Commission processing station for the too-secret-to-exist r-drive graveyard at Penny’s Floodgate. Not that you’d find Penny’s on any map, but supra crew talk.

“Am I riding her in all the way?”

“Don’t see why not.” The outprocessor’s shrug was a sight best not to behold. “There’s probably a few crewcicles on ice at Marantha need taking on, but you’d already be checked out on the boards. She’s a sweet fly, too, fast cutter for the Pelletonic Navy.”

“I’m riding a warship down?”

Another frightening shrug. “They pull the combat stuff, even on an r-drive pop. I think it all gets stuck in sealed holds, under booby-traps in case someone gets clever.”

A leptogenic weapons system sounded like a whole new class of Bad Idea. I appreciated the vigilance. “Well, she’ll be a fast hull, at any rate.”

“You’ll go down in style.”

“Just what I always dreamed of.”

#

One thing the Rajamurtha Resolution Commission does, they load the drops well. It’s a one-way trip, nothing comes back out, but the goodies are sent in just in case there’s supra crew still alive down there. Not every leptogenic transformation kills. Some of them might even be immortal. You just don’t want to be around them, catching their colds.

So my fly, the Double Needle, acquired several metric tons of provisions. As captain and sole crew, I demanded a manifest, which my outprocessor finally taped to the other side of the isolation barrier. No infotech for me, not even the hardware in my head–too much weird had flowed out the input channel in the past. There had been leptos who could twist code into Lobachevskian pasta. One had broken more than a dozen interlocking, redundant security overrides and fatally gassed seven thousand people on Cheng Du Station. Another reason for all the barrier control.

On inspections, I saw that the manifest seemed to lean heavily toward hard liquor and recreational chemicals. I supposed I had RuDoLph to thank for that, and maybe some of my other buddies off Marlowe’s Epigone. I’d starve years before I ran out of booze.

Which led me to a long funk of wondering exactly what kind of lepto I was becoming. A red chit just meant the markers were in my system. It didn’t say much about what they signified for my future. So far I’d exhibited all the leptogenic tendencies of a stale breadcrust. Not that this affected the Fly and Die rules, nor indeed should it have.

But this time, it was me.

#

Double Needle looked like sex and flew like sin. Just the way military hardware ought to. No point in submitting to the sort of mind-locks soldier boys had welded into their Jungian templates without them at least getting the real E-ticket ride in the bargain. Her former proprietors had lobotomized the AI when they decommed the rest of the scary stuff. Even so, in addition to doing the hard work of flying, the bridge brain could still kick me stupid seven ways to Saturday playing either chess or go.

It was a hot fly, as advertised, and me with a pilot’s rating, but I never trained on Naval gear so mostly I got to sit around and have my two-dan ass handed to me. Between games I ran training simulations, which given where I was sitting made for the galaxy’s best virteo simulation, but there’s only so much bushwhacking one man can do.

The ship might have been sex and sin, but it wasn’t my rocks she was meant to get off. Still, flying upright and conscious beat the hot photons out of making the trip as a crewcicle. I was pretty sure if I got out of line the AI had some antipersonnel routines saved up for troublesome leptos.

The alternative would have been to send Double Needle to Marantha with a volunteer master. For good and proper reasons dating back to the beginning of space travel, no one ever sent a vessel out under AI control without a human being on board. I had my own big red button, that would have dropped the AI to retarded puppy sentience probably about as fast as its boarding charges would have shredded my sternum.

Thankfully the issue never came up. We had our games of go to while away the empty hours to and from the Rajamurtha transition point, and tapioca mindfog during the transition itself.

At Marantha, I never saw another human being. They’ve got some vacuum-sealed protocols there. Everything was text messaging or symbolics. This orbit here, please sir. Stand to, please sir. Disable surveillance and boarding control systems, please sir–as a military vessel Double Needle apparently had required some serious hotwiring for that to even be possible. Open the number six and eight cargo locks, please sir. Remain on the bridge, please sir. Be advised that as of now you are legally dead, please sir. Course to decommissioning point laid in for you, please sir.

No chance to make a break or buy someone off. And they didn’t even wish me a nice day. No manifest, either, the canny bastards.

Double Needle made the final shift to Penny’s Floodgate without any input from me. I just rode her down, out of my little place in history and into the sweet hereafter.

#

Penny’s was the strangest place I’d ever been in person. Best as I could tell, somewhere in its evolution the system had made a game attempt at a natural-born version of a Dyson sphere. Inherent instabilities doomed that to failure, but the result was a solar system which didn’t keep to the ecliptic like any decent galactic denizen should–specifically a lot of strange, attenuated dust clouds and rocky chunks orbiting in a rough sphere just outside the Goldilocks zone. Imagine a dense Oort cloud at planetary distances.

The system couldn’t possibly be stable, not on a long term basis, but it was here right now. Scary as hell, too, for any pilot who wished to live to fly another day.

Which, come to think of it, was something of a technicality on my part.

As Double Needle moved in-system at a dead-slow velocity which would have gratified a shuttle full of widows and orphans, I did find that I had developed an ability to spot the big chunks before the military-grade sensor suite did. With leptogenic power like that, who needed to be permanently exiled? It would have been a godsend in life.

Nonetheless, the ship had a destination in mind, one I worked out before the AI saw fit to tell me. There were over two hundred hulls tucked up close to a continent-size sheet of rock big enough to have its own g-field that swept all the system junk out of its way. The ships were oriented on a hot point down on the surface–thermal energy, visible light, electronic emissions, the works. There was a port down there, a little slice of home. Double Needle knew where she was still wanted.

#

Up close, things were a little less homey. Some of the ships had gone strange, with bone ribs and leather wings, or puffy cancers that glowed in shadow and showed black in direct light. Others had spun cocoons for themselves, or faded to a sort of gelid translucency that turned my gut queasy. Several were difficult to look at, as if they had acquired dimensions beyond the usual assortment the human eye was designed to evaluate.

They all hung low in the sky over a few hundred square miles of mountain, field and forest with a little spaceport in the middle of it. Which was every bit as improbable as the whole system was in the first place. For one, I couldn’t even begin to work out the mechanics of that many ships in long term stable orbits that didn’t, well, orbit. For another, it was obvious from a hundred kilometers up that the landscape below me was lit to a warm, yellow Terran-standard, though the primary was bluer and sharper than old Sol or any of his G2-class brethren. Not to mention largely obscured by the incredible clouds of crap cluttering up the system.

No present like the time. The Rajamurtha Resolution boys had left me a landing boat, some cheapo screw obviously requisitioned off a fourth-tier broker back on Tremayne Station. This was presumably in case I wanted to die somewhere other than on board Double Needle. Instead I broke out a military-grade cargo loader and packed the boat to the gills with the booze and drugs. I know supra crew, after all. I decided not to worry yet about whatever Marantha had loaded in through the number six and number eight hatches. If they were supra crew, Double Needle would either wake them up, or I could come back for them if they weren’t sleeping the long sleep already. Anything besides crew, I didn’t really care.

Down I went, comm channels open in case someone wanted to talk, following the visuals to the radial landing grid at the center of the impossible little port.

#

I’d like to say I got a hero’s welcome. I’d like to say somebody tried to gun me down and I fought my way to freedom. I’d like to say a lot of things, but very few of them would be true.

Thirty degrees centigrade on the surface with a light wind and an apparently sunny sky, though the blue of the heavens was a bit oddly textured and there was no stellar-grade light source. Just light.

I walked along streets that looked like the collective overmind of the planning boards on a dozen worlds had succumbed to schizophrenia. Some buildings were solid, some were wireframe or beams, some were just pieces floating in place–a window here, an eave there, three steps about the height of my face.

But this place, this was the one real place in the whole town. I knew there would be a bar. Supra crew always have a bar. I call Manny’s. Scary traditional, ain’t it? I think this counter is walnut, hand-carved from a microgravity burl. Look at that crazy wood grain.

No, of course it’s not real. No more than you and I. No less, either. Copies of memories of things, maybe. I don’t know.

But I know this. I got a ship up there stuffed with enough sauce to keep Manny’s open until I go totally lepto and fade to black. In the mean time, I’m thawing you guys out one at a time and bringing you down. Sometimes new chums show up from Marantha on their own drops. See her, in the corner?

Yeah, taller than a tentpole, ain’t she?

That’s Spadeface McGillicudy. Chief engineer off the Queen of Barstow. She knew Lord Mbele back when he was smuggling hot powerpacks past the blockade on Islandwana. She’s got stories could curl your hair.

Same with those boys shooting billiards in the back. Don’t mind the wings on Tolberto. We think he’s heading on soon.

Yeah. That’s right. Stay a while. Add something to the town if it suits you. Lepto keeps changing you, but that’s all right. It’s who we are.

Me, far as I can tell leptogenesis is turning me into a permanent part of this bar. No matter, I’m here to help you if you want it. I’m either Charon or John the Baptist for a whole generation of Fly and Die tickets. Take your pick.

Want another Spican ringstinger? On the house. They always are, here at Manny’s.

Fiction: In the Dreamtime of Lady Resurrection by Caitlín R. Kiernan

How I, then a young girl, came to think of, and to dilate upon, so very hideous an idea?

–Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin Shelley (October 15th, 1831)

“Wake up,” she whispers, as ever she is always whispering with those demanding, ashen lips, but I do not open my eyes. I do not wake up, as she has bidden me to do, but, instead, lie drifting in this amniotic moment, unwilling to move one instant forward and incapable of retreating by even the scant breadth of a single second. For now, there is only now; yet, even so, an infinity stretches all around, haunted by dim shapes and half-glimpsed phantasmagoria, and if I named this time and place, I might name it Pluto or Orcus or Dis Pater. But never would I name it purgatorial, for here there are no purging flames nor trials of final purification from venial transgressions. I have not arrived here by any shade of damnation and await no deliverance, but scud gently through Pre-Adamite seas, and so might I name this wide pacific realm Womb, the uterus common to all that which has ever risen squirming from mere insensate earth. I might name it Mother. I might best call it nothing at all, for a name may only lessen and constrain this inconceivable vastness.

“Wake up now,” she whispers, but I shall rather seek these deeper currents.

No longer can I distinguish that which is without from that which is within. In ocher and loden green and malachite dusks do I dissolve and somehow still retain this flesh and this unbeating heart and this blood grown cold and stagnant in my veins. Even as I slip free, I am constrained, and in the eel-grass shadows do I descry her desperate, damned form bending low above this warm and salty sea where she has laid me down. She is Heaven, her milky skin is star pierced through a thousand, thousand times to spill forth droplets of the dazzling light which is but one half of her unspeakable art. She would have me think it the totality, as though a dead woman is blind merely because her eyes remain shut. Long did I suspect the whole of her. When I breathed and had occasion to walk beneath the sun and moon, even then did I harbour my suspicions and guess at the blackness fastidiously concealed within that blinding glare. And here, at this moment, she is to me as naked as in the hour of her birth, and no guise nor glamour would ever hide from me that perpetual evening of her soul. At this moment, all and everything is laid bare. I am gutted like a gasping fish, and she is flayed by revelation.

She whispers to me, and I float across endless plains of primordial silt and gaping hadopelgaic chasms where sometimes I sense the awful minds of other sleepers, ancient before the coming of time, waiting alone in sunken temples and drowned sepulchers. Below me lies the grey and glairy mass of Prof. Huxley’s Bathybius haeckelii, the boundless, wriggling sheet of Urschleim that encircles all the globe. Here and there do I catch sight of the bleached skeletons of mighty whales and ichthyosauria, their bones gnawed raw by centuries and millennia and aeons, by the busy proboscides of nameless invertebrata. The struts of a Leviathan’s ribcage rise from the gloom like a cathedral’s vaulted roof, and a startled retinue of spiny crabs wave threatful pincers that I might not forget I am the intruder. For this I would forget, and forswear that tattered life she stole and now so labours to restore, were that choice only mine to make.

I know this is no ocean, and I know there is no firmament set out over me. But I am sinking, all the same, spiraling down with infinite slowness towards some unimaginable beginning or conclusion (as though there is a difference between the two). And you watch on worriedly, and yet always that devouring curiosity to defuse any fear or regret. Your hands wander impatiently across copper coils and spark tungsten filaments, tap upon sluggish dials and tug so slightly at the rubber tubes that enter and exit me as though I have sprouted a bouquet of umbilici. You mind the gate and the road back, and so I turn away and would not see your pale, exhausted face.

With a glass dropper, you taint my pool with poisonous tinctures of quicksilver and iodine, meaning to shock me back into a discarded shell.

And I misstep, then, some fraction of a footfall this way or that, and now somehow I have not yet felt the snip that divided me from me. I sit naked on a wooden stool near Der Ocean auf dem Tische, the great vivarium tank you have fashioned from iron and plate glass and marble.

You will be my goldfish, you laugh. You will be my newt. What better part could you ever play, my dear?

You kiss my bare shoulders and my lips, and I taste brandy on your tongue. You hold my breasts cupped in your hands and tease my nipples with your teeth. And I know none of this is misdirection to put my mind at ease, but rather your delight in changes to come. The experiment is your bacchanal, and the mad glint in your eyes would shame any maenad or rutting satyr. I have no delusions regarding what is soon to come. I am the sacrifice, and it matters little or none at all whether the altar you have raised is to Science or Dionysus.

“Oh, if I could stand in your place,” you sigh, and again your lips brush mine. “If I could see what you will see and feel what you will feel!”

“I will be your eyes,” I say, echoing myself. “I will be your curious, probing hands.” These might be wedding vows that we exchange. These might be the last words of the condemned on the morning of her execution.

“Yes, you shall, but I would make this journey myself and have need of no surrogate.” Then and now, I wonder in secret if you mean everything you say. It is easy to declare envy when there is no likelihood of exchanging places. “Where you go, my love, all go in due time, but you may be the first ever to return and report to the living what she has witnessed there.”

You kneel before me, as if in awe or gratitude, and your head settles upon my lap. I touch your golden hair with fingers that have scarcely begun to feel the tingling and chill, the numbness that will consume me soon enough. You kindly offered to place the lethal preparation in a cup of something sweet that I would not taste its bitterness, but I told you how I preferred to know my executioner and would not have his grim face so pleasantly hooded. I took it in a single acrid spoonful, and now we wait, and I touch your golden hair.

“When I was a girl,” I begin, then must pause to lick my dry lips.

“You have told me this story already.”

“I would have you hear it once more. Am I not accorded some last indulgence before the stroll to the gallows?”

“It will not be a gallows,” you reply, but there is a sharp edge around your words, a brittle frame and all the gilt flaking free. “Indeed, it will be little more than a quick glance stolen through a window before the drapes are drawn shut against you. So, dear, you do not stand to earn some final coddling, not this day, and so I would not hear that tale repeated, when I know it as well as I know the four syllables of my own beloved’s name.”

“You will hear me,” I say, and my fingers twine and knot themselves tightly in your hair. A few flaxen strands pull free, and I hope I can carry them down into the dark with me. You tense, but do not pull away or make any further protest. “When I was a girl, my own brother died beneath the wheels of an ox cart. It was an accident, of course. But still his skull was broken and his chest all staved in, though, in the end, no one was judged at fault.”

I sit on my stool, and you kneel there on the stone floor, waiting for me to be done, restlessly awaiting my passage and the moment when I have been rendered incapable of repeating familiar tales you do not wish to hear retold.

“I held him, what remained of him. I felt the shudder when his child’s soul pulled loose from its prison. His blue eyes were as bright in that instant as the glare of sunlight off freshly fallen snow. As for the man who drove the cart, he committed suicide some weeks later, though I did not learn this until I was almost grown.”

“There is no ox cart here,” you whisper. “There are no careless hooves and no innocent drover.”

“I did not say he was a drover. I have never said that. He was merely a farmer, I think, on his way to market with a load of potatoes and cabbages. My brother’s entire unlived life traded for a only few bushels of potatoes and cabbages. That must be esteemed a bargain, by any measure.”

“We should begin now,” you say, and I don’t disagree, for my legs are growing stiff and an indefinable weight has begun to press in upon me. I was warned of these symptoms, and so there is not surprise, only the fear that I have prayed I would be strong enough to bear. You stand and help me to my feet, then lead me the short distance to the vivarium tank. Suddenly, I cannot escape the fanciful and disagreeable impression that your mechanical apparatuses and contraptions are watching on. Maybe, I think, they have been watching all along. Perhaps, they were my jurors, an impassionate, unbiased tribunal of brass and steel and porcelain, and now they gaze out with automaton eyes and exhale steam and oily vapours to see their sentence served. You told me there would be madness, that the toxin would act upon my mind as well as my body, but in my madness I have forgotten the warning.

“Please, I would not have them see me, not like this,” I tell you, but already we have reached the great tank that will only serve as my carriage for these brief and extraordinary travels — if your calculations and theories are proved correct — or that will become my deathbed, if, perchance, you have made some critical error. There is a step ladder, and you guide me, and so I endeavor not to feel their enthusiastic, damp-palmed scrutiny. I sit down on the platform at the top of the ladder and let my feet dangle into the warm liquid, both my feet and then my legs up to the knees. It is not an objectionable sensation, and promises that I will not be cold for much longer. Streams of bubbles rise slowly from vents set into the rear wall of the tank, stirring and oxygenating this translucent primal soup of viscous humours, your painstaking brew of protéine and haematoglobin, carbamide resin and cellulose, water and phlegm and bile. All those substances believed fundamental to life, a recipe gleaned from out dusty volumes of Medieval alchemy and metaphysics, but also from your own researches and the work of more modern scientific practitioners and professors of chemistry and anatomy. Previously, I have found the odor all but unbearable, though now there seems to be no detectable scent at all.

“Believe me,” you say, “I will have you back with me in less than an hour.” And I try hard then to remember how long an hour is, but the poison leeches away even the memory of time. With hands as gentle as a midwife’s, you help me from the platform and into my strange bath, and you keep my head above the surface until the last convulsions have come and gone and I am made no more than any cadaver.

“Wake up,” she says–you say–but the shock of the mercury and iodine you administered to the vivarium have rapidly faded, and once more there is but the absolute and inviolable present moment, so impervious and sacrosanct that I can not even imagine conscious action, which would require the concept of an apprehension of some future, that time is somehow more than this static aqueous matrix surrounding and defining me.

“Do you hear me? Can you not even hear me?”

All at once, and with a certitude almost agonizing in its omneity, I am aware that I am being watched. No, that is not right. That is not precisely the way of it. All at once, I know that I am being watched by eyes which have not heretofore beheld me; all along there have been her eyes, as well as the stalked eyes of the scuttling crabs I mentioned and other such creeping, slithering inhabitants of my mind’s ocean as have glommed the dim pageant of my voyage. But these eyes, and this spectator — my love, nothing has ever seen me with such complete and merciless understanding. And now the act of seeing has ceased to be a passive action, as the act of being seen has stopped being an activity that neither diminishes nor alters the observed. I would scream, but dead women do not seem to be permitted that luxury, and the scream of my soul is as silent as the moon. And in another place and in another time where past and future still hold meaning, you plunge your arms into the tank, hauling me up from the shallow deep and moving me not one whit. I am fixed by these eyes, like a butterfly pinned after the killing jar.

It does not speak to me, for there can be no need of speech when vision is so thorough and so incapable of misreckoning. Plagues need not speak, nor floods, nor the voracious winds of tropical hurricanes. A thing with eyes for teeth, eyes for its tongue and gullet. A thing which has been waiting for me in this moment that has no antecedents and which can spawn no successors. Maybe it waits here for every dying man and woman, for every insect and beast and falling leaf, or maybe some specific quality of my obliteration has brought me to its attention. Possibly, it only catches sight of suicides, and surely I have become that, though your Circean hands poured the poison draught and then held the spoon. There is such terrible force in this gaze that it seems not implausible that I am the first it has ever beheld, and now it will know all, and it shall have more than knowledge for this opportunity might never come again.

“Only tell me what happened,” you will say, in some time that cannot ever be, not from when I lie here in the vivarium you have built for me, not from this occasion when I lie exposed to a Cosmos hardly half considered by the mortal minds contained therein. “Only put down what seems most significant, in retrospect. Do not dwell upon everything you might recall, every perception. You may make a full accounting later.”

“Later, I might forget something,” I will reply. “It’s not so unlike a dream.” And you will frown and slide the ink well a little ways across the writing desk towards me. On your face I will see the stain of an anxiety that has been mounting down all the days since my return.

That will be a lie, of course, for nothing of this will I ever forget. Never shall it fade. I will be taunting you, or through me it will be taunting your heedless curiousity, which even then will remain undaunted. This hour, though, is far, far away. From when I lie, it is a fancy that can never come to pass — a unicorn, the roaring cataract at the edge of a flat world, a Hell which punishes only those who deserve eternal torment. Around me flows the sea of all beginnings and of all conclusion, and through the weeds and murk, from the peaks of submarine mountains to the lowest vales of Neptune’s sovereignty, benighted in perpetuum–horizon to horizon–does its vision stretch unbroken. And as I have written already, observing me it takes away, and observing me it adds to my acumen and marrow. I am increased as much or more than I am consumed, so it must be a fair encounter, when all is said and done.

Somewhen immeasurably inconceivable to my present-bound mind, a hollow needle pierces my flesh, there in some unforeseeable aftertime, and the hypodermic’s plunger forces into me your concoction of caffeine citrate, cocaine, belladonna, epinephrine, foxglove, etcetera & etcetera. And I think you will be screaming for me to come back, then, to open my eyes, to wake up as if you had only given me over to an afternoon catnap. I would not answer, even now, even with its smothering eyes upon me, in me, performing their metamorphosis. But you are calling (wake up, wake up, wake up), and your chemicals are working upon my traitorous physiology, and, worst of all, it wishes me to return from whence and when I have come. It has infected me, or placed within me some fraction of itself, or made from my sentience something suited to its own explorations. Did this never occur to you, my dear? That in those liminal spaces, across the thresholds that separate life from death, might lurk an inhabitant supremely adapted to those climes, and yet also possessed of its own questions, driven by its own peculiar acquisitiveness, seeking always some means to penetrate the veil. I cross one way for you, and I return as another’s experiment, the vessel of another’s inquisition.

“Breathe, goddamn you!” you will scream, screaming that seems no more or less disingenuous or melodramatic than any actor upon any stage. With your fingers you will clear, have cleared, are evermore clearing my mouth and nostrils of the thickening elixir filling the vivarium tank. “You won’t leave me. I will not let you go. There are no ox carts here, no wagon wheels.”

But, also, you have, or you will, or at this very second you are placing that fatal spoon upon my tongue.

And when it is done–if I may arbitrarily use that word here, when–and its modifications are complete, it shuts its eyes, like the sun tumbling down from the sky, and I am tossed helpless back into the rushing flow of time’s river. In the vivarium, I try to draw a breath and vomit milky gouts. At the writing desk, I take the quill you have provided me, and I write–“Wake up,” she whispers. There are long days when I do not have the strength to speak or even sit. The fears of pneumonia and fever, of dementia and some heretofore unseen necrosis triggered by my time away. The relief that begins to show itself as weeks pass and your fears fade slowly, replaced again by that old and indomitable inquisitiveness. The evening that you drained the tank and found something lying at the bottom which you have refused to ever let me see, but keep under lock and key. And this night, which might be now, in our bed in the dingy room above your laboratory, and you hold me in your arms, and I lie with my ear against your breast, listening to the tireless rhythm of your heart winding down, and it listens through me. You think me still but your love, and I let my hand wander across your belly and on, lower, to the damp cleft of your sex. And there also is the day I hold my dying brother. And there are my long walks beside the sea, too, with the winter waves hammering against the Cobb. That brine is only the faintest echo of the tenebrous kingdom I might have named Womb. Overhead, the wheeling gulls mock me, and the freezing wind drives me home again. But always it watches, and it waits, and it studies the intricacies of the winding avenue I have become.

She rolls through an ether of sighs–

She revels in a region of sighs…

–Edgar Alan Poe (December 1847)

Fiction: Merry Bunta! A Lucifer Jones Story by Mike Resnick

The first time I heard her name, I thunk it was some Brazilian holiday and someone was wishing me a merry one of ‘em. I was in Rio, having just experienced some of the side effects of Carnival, which they kept spelling Carnaval, proving once and for all that Brazil ain’t never gonna present no threat of worldwide domination, and I figgered I might as well see if this was the place where I wanted to finally build my tabernacle.

Truth to tell, it had a lot going for it. For one thing, it abounded in evil men and scarlet women, and you can’t hardly run a religion without an abundance of sinners to save. For another, it had a real pleasant climate, and a lovely beach where most swimmers of the female persuasion left enough clothes at home that it’d get ‘em arrested back in the States or applauded in most other places. And, third, there was a bar with a radio that brought in American baseball games, so I could see how Babe Ruth and Dizzy Dean were faring.

Of course, there were some disadvantages too. For one thing, hardly none of ‘em spoke American. For another, the local padres weren’t real thrilled with competition, especially the vigorous kind of Christianity I preached. And for a third, I didn’t have no money, having been flim-flammed by the villainous Erich von Horst, the details of which I’ve already writ up and are too painful to go into again.

I still hadn’t made up my mind what to do when it was made up for me of a pleasant summer evening, which for reasons I ain’t figgered out yet came about in mid-November. I was walking down the street to Madame Sarcosa’s House of Exceptionally High Repute, just minding my own business and reciting some of the spicier psalms to myself, when I saw the most beautiful blonde lady I ever did see. I knew right off that she wasn’t no native to Rio, since blondes were somewhat rarer down there than mosquitos, spiders. land crabs, rats and killer snakes–and blondes like this one was rarer than just about anything.

I must have been standing there staring at her slack-jawed, and the way I know this is a few seconds later I started choking on a pair of flies what had flown into my mouth. I must have made some strangling noises, because she suddenly turned and looked at me. I knew a delicate creature like her would disapprove of my spitting on the sidewalk, so I just chomped down on the flies and swallowed ‘em, then guv her my biggest, friendliest smile. She smiled back, and I knew beyond any shadow of a doubt that I had fallen eternally and everlastingly in love again.

Then she giggled, and I looked down to make sure my pants wasn’t unzipped, and they wasn’t, and I couldn’t figger out what was amusing her so much, and then I remembered that I was standing right in front of Madame Sarcosa’s. I didn’t want her thinking poorly of me, so as Ezra Willoughby and Slippery Jim Stevens came out the front door I whipped my copy of the good book out of my coat pocket and began preaching at them to mend their sinful ways.

“Aw, come on, Lucifer,” said Ezra. “You’re embarrassing us out here in public, and besides it ain’t as if you ain’t been in there with us the last four nights.”

“He just wants us to give the place up so he can have ‘em all to himself,” added Slippery Jim.

“Shut up, you guys,” I said softly. “I’m trying to impress that fair damsel on the other side of the street.”

Slippery Jim looked over my shoulder. “I don’t see no damsel there.”

“What’s a damsel?” added Ezra.

I turned, and sure enough the love of my life had vanished.

“What did she look like?” asked Slippery Jim.

“Like unto an angel with blonde hair, a tiny delicate waist, and a extra pair of lungs,” I replied.

“Blonde, you say?”

“Like spun gold,” I said.

“Sounds metallic and shiny,” offered Ezra.

“Like spun hay,” I amended.

“Now you’ve got her smelling like a barnyard,” complained Ezra.

“Like spun silk,” I said angrily. “And don’t make no more comments, because I’ve run out of spuns.”

“She carry a parasol?” asked Slippery Jim.

“No, just a little delicate umbrella,” I said.

“I think I know who she is,” said Jim. “Merry Bunta.”

“Merry Bunta to you,” I said. “Now don’t just stand there while my entire future is on hold. Tell me who she is.”

“You know grizzled old Harvey Bunta?”

“I’m in love and you’re telling me about grizzled old guys!” I complained.

“He’s a trader. Lives a few hundred miles inland. He comes to town once every eight or nine months to sell whatever he’s conned the natives out of.”

“What about him?” I asked.

“Sounds to me like you just described his daughter,” said Slippery Jim.

“You sure?” I said.

“Pretty blondes and wild elephants in musth are equally rare in Rio,” he replied. “That’s his daughter, all right. I think her name’s Merilee, but Old Man Bunta calls her Merry.”

“How do you know all this?” I asked suddenly. “You ain’t despoiled the fairest flower in all Brazil, have you?”

“No,” he said before Ezra could ask what ‘despoiled’ meant. “I just heard him talking to her.”

“That’s a relief,” I said.

He stared at me curiously. “Does she really have to be a virgin for you, Lucifer?”

“No,” I said. “I don’t put no special stock in virgins.”

“Then why did you ask?” he said.

“Because I put even less stock in comparisons,” I told him. “One thing I don’t need to hear from the woman I’m going to spend the rest of my life with is ‘Slippery Jim did it this way’ or ‘Ezra did it that way ‘.”

“I did no such thing,” said Ezra. “But if she’s half as purty as you say she is, I wish I had.”

Just then a horse pulling a cart down the street broke into a trot, and ran right through a puddle in front of Madame Sarcosa’s place, and I got all splattered with mud, and I knew I didn’t want to introduce myself to Merry Bunta looking like this, so I went into Madame Sarcosa’s and asked if anyone there did laundry, and she said that yes, I could toss my duds in with the next load of towels and sheets, and while I was wandering around in my skivvies perhaps I’d like to relax in a room down the hall with a young lady of quality, and since I hadn’t sworn my eternal fealty to Merry Bunta yet I couldn’t see nothing wrong with it, so that was what I did. Matter of fact, it was so relaxing that I did it all over again, and then once more, and when I finally climbed back into my clothes it was the next afternoon.

I left Madame Sarcosa’s and headed across street to where I’d seen Merry Bunta standing the day before, and tried to figure out where she could have vanished to so quick, and then I saw that she’d been standing in front of a hotel, so I walked in and asked the desk clerk where the Buntas were.

“Beats me, Senor,” he said with a shrug.

“Well, why don’t you look in your guest book and give me their room number?” I said. “And make it snappy, this being the first day of the rest of my life.”

“They checked out early this morning, Senor,” he said.

“Did they say where they was headed?”

“Inland, Senor, to Senor Bunta’s vast estate.”

“I don’t want to seem picky,” I said, “but the whole of South America is inland from here. You got any more specific address?”

“You don’t like inland?” he said. “How about dense, impenetrable jungle?”

“How does he get his mail?” I asked.

“He comes into town twice a year for it.” The clerk stared at me. “What business do you have with Senor Bunta?”

“None,” I said. “It’s his daughter I’m after.”

He nodded his head knowingly. “A lovely young girl,” he said. “And of course she’s in line to inherit the Bunta fortune.”

“Yeah?” I said. “How much is Old Man Bunta worth?”

“I do not know, Senor. But I know he doesn’t trust banks. He keeps it all in a strongbox on his estate.”

“You don’t say,” I said.

“I just did say.”

“And you ain’t got no idea how I can find him?”

He shrugged. “Just go inland and ask the natives.”

I thanked him for his time and walked back out into the street. I decided not to bother the desk clerk by checking out of my hotel, so I stopped by the local store, bought a toothbrush and a canteen, filled the canteen with beer, and I was ready to find the woman of my dreams, to say nothing of the family fortune.

I faced the west, so the Atlantic Ocean was behind me, and I figured I might as well start marching toward the setting sun, and keep doing it day in and day out until I finally ran into someone who could tell me where Merry Bunta lived.

The first full day was uneventful, and the next ten weren’t much different. I never saw a living soul, and truth to tell tapirs ain’t much for conversation. I crossed a couple of rivers, which were filled to overflowing with crocodiles or alligators–I couldn’t tell one from the other, but I ain’t never encountered one of either persuasion what didn’t have a lean and hungry look to him, with an emphasis on the hungry. Anyway, they’d chased all the snakes up onto solid ground, and some of ‘em were more than a little bit reluctant to share it with me, so I started zigging and zagging, still heading west, but in a route that more resembled Merry Bunta’s outline than a straight course.

After another six days I came upon a village with a bunch of half-dressed little guys and their women. They must have been hunting monkeys, because they had a collection of little monkey heads that they seemed mighty proud of. They kept jabbering at me about them, but since none of ‘em spoke American and I didn’t speak no Jabber, I never did find out what it was about these here monkey heads that got ‘em so excited. Finally, after an hour or two, as we was sitting around a fire and watching the womenfolk cooking up a big pot of something, I figured I might as well see if any of ‘em could help me on my romantic quest.

“Excuse me, Brother,” I said as one of ‘em was jabbering about the weather, or maybe the snakes that had all kind of gathered around to listen and beg for scraps, “but I happen to be embarked on a search for the woman of my dreams, and I was wondering if any of you could point me in the right direction?”

They just kind of stared at me, so I kept on speaking.

“I know it ain’t too likely, you being a bunch of godless heathens what don’t speak no civilized language and probably eat your babies, but if anyone can just kind of point me in the direction of my lady love, whose name happens to be Merry Bunta, I’d be much obliged.”

Well, actually, I had planned to say “I’d be much obliged”, but before I could get the words out they’d all jumped to their feet and pointed off to the west.

“Merry Bunta! Merry Bunta!” they kept shouting.

I couldn’t believe my luck, that the first village I’d stumbled upon knew the woman what had captured by heart.

“Now, you’re sure?” I said.

They seemed pretty sure. They all kept pointing to the same spot and yelling “Merry Bunta!”

“Well, she sure seems to have established a fan following,” I said. “I want to thank you for your help, and now I think I’ll head off to find the rarest treasure all Brazil has to offer.”

And I took maybe three steps when two of the bigger ones grabbed my arms.

“Merry Bunta!” they yelled.

“Ain’t I going in the right direction?” I asked.

They pointed to the west. “Merry Bunta!”

“Then why are you holding me back?” I said. “I know these ain’t my Sunday-go-to-meeting duds, but I lost them in a game of chance back in Rio. Besides, once I declare my love, it shouldn’t make much difference to her, and anyway I figure neither of us are gonna stay dressed for long.”

I headed off again, and this time they just looked at me as if I committed some social error, like maybe I hadn’t brung no flowers to their womenfolk, but no one tried to stop me and I soon left the village far behind me.

I traveled west for a few more days. I couldn’t remember what berries was safe to eat, so I settled for cooking up some eggs I had found, and you wouldn’t believe how mad that made the anaconda what laid ‘em, even though I’d left her a few hundred. So I figured I’d only eat fish eggs after that, which I seemed to remember was a pretty ritzy food back in the glittering capitols of Europe, but I guessed wrong again, and I found out that an enraged mama alligator can hold a grudge even longer than an angry mama anaconda. I found me a clutch of condor eggs, but as quick as I’d tap on the shell to bust ‘em open, a baby condor would tap on his side of the shell, and before I could figure out what code we were conversing in, out he’d pop, and there went my breakfast. Not only that, but three of ‘em decided I was their mama, and I had to keep feeding ‘em all the insects I kept plucking out of my hair until they found a lady condor that seemed to be in the adoption business and went off with her.

I’d been getting myself pretty thoroughly lost, though I kept walking toward the setting sun, and just when I was sure I wasn’t never going to see another human being again, a passel of ‘em burst out of the forest up ahead and started racing toward me, yelling “Merry Bunta!”

“Well, I’ll be hornswoggled!” I said. “How did Merry know to send a greeting party for me?”

Strangely enough, not a one of ‘em stopped to answer me. Instead, they just ran by me like I wasn’t there.

It was puzzling, but I finally decided I’d run into a tribe what was all near-sighted to a fault, and I kept on heading in my true love’s direction.

This here near-sightedness must have been catching, because before night fell I’d come across two more tribes what kept yelling Merry Bunta’s name and running right past me, and I figgered that once I’d found Merry and built my tabernacle, I’d import the best optometrist in Brazil once me and God reimbursed ourselves for expenses.

The next morning I came to one lone little guy, wearing a loincloth and not much else. He ran right up to me like Satan was hot on his heels and began repeating Merry’s name over and over.

“Hold on, Brother,” I said, grabbing his wrist before he could break into a run again. “Can you tell me where I can find Merry Bunta and her father?”

He pointed back the way he’d come. “Merry Bunta! Merry Bunta!” he hollered.

“Fine,” I said. “Lead the way.”

He got kind of panicky and began trying to pull me in the other direction.

“You’re confusing the issue,” I said. “I thunk Merry Bunta was this way,” I added, pointing to where he’d come from.

He nodded his head vigorously. “Merry Bunta!” he said.

“Well, fine, then,” I said. “Let’s go.”

He tried to break loose again, and finally it dawned on me. There wasn’t nothing wrong with anyone’s eyesight. They just all figured that none of ‘em had a chance with Merry when matched up against a handsome young buck like myself, and they were just clearing out because they knew after one look that the race to Merry’s heart was already won.

“Okay, Brother,” I said. “I understand your motives, and I approve of them. But I ain’t met no one what’s stuck around more than ten or twelve seconds, and I’m gonna be needing a best man, and failing that a best little feller in a loincloth, so why don’t you come along with me, and I promise if you stick around we’ll invite you over to dinner of a Sunday at least twice a year.”

He pulled all the harder to get free of me.

“All right,” I said. “It’d fair break your heart to be in the vicinity of such blonde beauty and know it’s been spoken for. I can sympathize with that. Only one of us can win her delicate ladylike hand and all the good stuff that it’s attached to. Go on your way, little friend, and no hard feelings.”

I let him go. He looked at me like I was crazy, and headed off in the general direction of Madrid and Paris, though of course Rio was in the way.

As I walked I realized that Old Man Bunta must be a pretty good hand with a rifle, because suddenly I couldn’t hear a single bird singing. In another couple of hours I figgered that he had about as big an appetite as I’d ever encountered, because not only wasn’t there nothing with wings left in the area, but there wasn’t nothing with legs neither, not tapirs, not deer, not sloths, not even monkeys. I decided that I approved, because the sooner he et himself to death the sooner I could share his strongbox with Merry. Then I figgered that I didn’t want her worrying her pretty blonde head about such weighty matters, and it made more sense for me to just handle whatever was in the box myself.

After another five miles I began to realize that most of the money from the strongbox was gonna have to be spent on seed and fertilizer, because there wasn’t nothing growing–not even a blade of grass. The trees was dead, the bushes didn’t have no leaves left on them, and I couldn’t see nary a flower.

I was still puzzling on why Merry and her father would want to live in a place like this when I finally saw a house off in the distance, and I knew I’d reached my destination at last.

There was a little stream betwixt me and the house, and I knelt down next to it and doused my head in the water. Then I plucked a fish from where it had latched onto my nose and slicked my hair back with my hands, which was the best I could do since I’d left my comb back at the hotel in Rio. For a minute I thunk of taking a quick dip, since I’d been wearing the same duds for months and hadn’t had ‘em washed since my last friendly visit to Madame Sarcosa’s, but I figgered if I did that I’d have to wait a couple of hours for ‘em to dry, and I was too anxious to take Merry Bunta in my arms, so I just kept running my hands through my hair til they didn’t run into no more six-legged intruders, and then I set off to meet the love of my life.

I’d just about reached the house when an old guy with a shotgun opened the door and stared at me.

“What the hell are you doing here?” he demanded, stepping out onto the porch.

“I’m here to pay court to your daughter, the most beautiful flower in all of God’s South American garden,” I said, and then added: “That is, if you’re Harvey Bunta, and if you ain’t, you might as well start packing your things right now, because nothing’s gonna stop me from hooking up with the delectable Merry.”

“Are you mad?” he said, kind of wide-eyed and surprised that a rival would footslog this far into the wilderness just to beat his time with Merry.

“Mad with passion,” I said. And then, since there was still a possibility that he was her father and not a suitor, I clarified it by saying, “With an all-encompassing and almost-Platonic passion.”

“You are a fool!” he snapped. “Didn’t you see all those men heading toward Rio on your way here?”

“You mean all them little guys in their South American skivvies?” I said. “Yeah, I kept running into them.”

“Didn’t you pay any attention to them?”

“Sure did,” I answered. “I kept asking where I could find Merry Bunta, and they kept pointing me in this direction.”

“Idiot!”

“That ain’t no way to talk to your future son-in-law, or maybe your rival, depending on who you are, which you ain’t told me yet.”

“I’m Harvey Bunta, and you are either the dumbest man I’ve ever met or else you’ve got yourself a real sweet tooth for punishment.”

“Aw, come on, Harvey–or should I call you Dad?–this ain’t no way for us to begin our relationship.”

“Not to worry,” he said grimly. “It’ll end in a day or two.”

I looked at his shotgun. “You ain’t thinking of trying to run me off, are you?”

“Idiot!” he said again. “You’re stuck here. We’re all stuck here!”

“I can’t imagine what you find so attractive about this here place, Harvey,” I said. “Ain’t nothing growing for miles around.”

“This place was greener than you can imagine just two days ago,” he said. “Why the hell didn’t you listen to those natives?”

“I did,” I told him, getting a little hot under the collar that he wasn’t taking my word for it. “I kept asking ‘em where I could find Merry Bunta, and they kept pointing me in this direction.”

“Didn’t you wonder why they were all racing hell for leather in the opposite direction?”

I didn’t want to give him the real reason, because I didn’t want no prospective father-in-law to think I was stuck on myself when nothing could be farther from the truth, so I just said that I figgered it was payday and they were all racing off to Rio to spend their money.

“They were running away,” he said.

“From sweet little Merry Bunta?” I scoffed.

“From marabunta.”

“That’s what I said,” I told him.

“Marabunta,” he repeated, and spelled it for me. “Not Merry Bunta.”

“There’s a difference?” I asked.

“Merry Bunta is my daughter,” he said. “Marabunta are army ants. We’re surrounded by about six billion of ‘em.”

“Six billion?” I repeated. “I guess that’s too many for you to stomp on ‘em, huh?”

He just glared at me.

“So where are they now?” I asked.

“Their main force is about a mile to the south of us,” he said, “and it’s headed this way. There’s another bunch that’s been approaching from the west. They eat everything in their path.”

I figgered it was too bad Rosie Sanchez wasn’t here, because I had long since come to the conclusion that nothing could eat her beans and tortillas and survive.

“Well, Dad Harvey,” I said, “if it’s a war they want, it’s a war they’ll get.”

“You call me Dad Harvey again, and the first thing they’ll get is your buckshot-riddled corpse.”

“These here ants are making you kind of tense,” I said. “That ain’t no way to talk to your future son-in-law.”

“I take great comfort in the fact that you and I will both be dead by sunset tomorrow,” said Harvey. “I’m only sorry that Merry will also die beneath the marabuntas’ onslaught.”

That got my fighting blood up, because I was bound and determined that nothing was gonna crawl all over Merry’s ripe young body before I did, and I decided it was time to start coming up with a plan of action.

“You got any gasoline, Harvey?” I asked.

“Why?”

“I figger we’ll pour it on the marabunta and set fire to it.”

“I got six gallons of gas. There’s seven billion ants out there.”

“I thunk you said six billion,” I said.

“They multiply fast,” he answered.

“Can they swim?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” said Harvey. “I’m usually so busy watching out for alligators and anacondas and the like when I’m in my boat that I don’t pay much attention to what kind of insects are frolicking in the water.”

“Well, even if we can’t kill ‘em all,” I said, “at least we can discourage ‘em.”

“Yeah? How?” he asked.

“You say the main body of the enemy is coming from the south, right?” I said. “I’ll just set a fire betwixt us and them, and that ought to discourage them.”

“Just how long do you think three gallons of gasoline will burn?” he said.

“I don’t know,” I said. “But even after it goes out, the ground figgers to be mighty hot on their tender little ant bellies.”

He shrugged. “What the hell. The gas is in cannisters around the side of the house. Go get it.”

I got three gallons of gas and brung it back with me.

“Now, where’s the delectable Merry?” I asked. “I wouldn’t want to trap her on the wrong side of the fire.”

“She’s in the house,” he said.

“Fixing some vittles, I hope?” I said.

“Nah, just sitting there shaking like a leaf. The thought of being et alive by a bunch of godless insects put her off her feed.”

“Well, you can tell her not to worry, now that Lucifer Jones is on the scene.”

“You’re Lucifer Jones?” he said, surprised. “I heard about a Lucifer Jones while I was in Rio, but I guess you can’t be the same one.”

“Why not?”

“You ain’t been lynched yet.”

I figgered I’d explain all them misunderstandings later, but the main thing now was to get the war underway, so I walked about half a mile south and parceled out the gasoline, spreading it as far as I could. Then I sat down and waited, and it wasn’t too long before the enemy showed up in force just atop the next rise, so I lit a match and tossed it onto the ground, and two seconds later there was a blaze you could have roasted half a dozen dinosaurs in.

I went back to the house and reported that I’d saved the day, and once Merry realized we were going to live and confessed her love to me, maybe she could rustle up some grub.

To celebrate I opened my canteen and took a swig.

“The water around here ain’t safe to drink til you boil it,” said Harvey.

“Really?” I said. “I been drinking it since I left Rio and I ain’t noticed a thing.”

“I could get you some boiled water from the house.”

“This ain’t water,” I said. “It’s beer.”

“Where’d you come by beer out here?” he asked.

“I been carrying it for maybe three weeks now. I been saving it for the proper moment.”

“Ain’t it a little warm and a little flat?”

“Yeah,” I admitted. “But it’s better than water.”

He couldn’t argue with that, so in my great-heartedness I let him take a couple of swallows. He’d just handed the canteen back to me and was wiping his mouth off with his shirtsleeve when he froze. At first I thunk the beer was disagreeing with him, but then he pointed off in the distance.

“They’ve split into two groups, and they’re flanking the fire!” he said.

Until that moment, I had no idea ants was that smart.

So I figgered if one fire didn’t discourage the marabunta two certainly would, and I waited until the columns joined again about half a mile from the house and used the rest of the gas to set another one. But while it was burning away, Harvey looked across the battlefield through his binoculars and announced that it was just a feint, that the real attack was coming from the west.

“You got any dams on that stream?” I asked him.

“A couple,” he answered. “Why?”

“Give me a stick of dynamite,” I said. “If I can blow up one of them dams, we can flood the plain between the ants and the house.”

“I only got one stick of dynamite on the whole estate,” he said. “Are you sure this is going to work?”

“I can’t see no reason why it won’t.”

He went into the house for a few seconds and came out with a stick of dynamite.

“You’re positive, now?” he insisted.

“Trust me, Harvey,” I said, and he tossed the dynamite to me. I caught it and raced off to the first dam I could find, stuck the dynamite into it, lit the fuse, and put my fingers in my ears. It blew about ten seconds later, and tons of water rushed out across the land.

And started sinking in.

And vanished.

“When’s the last time you had any rain?” I asked.

He shrugged. “You’re in the dry season. Maybe a couple of months, maybe a little more.”

“You might have told me that before I blew up the dam. All the water’s sunk into the ground.”

“Let me see if I’ve got this straight,” he said. “You set a fire off to the south, and all the ants did was march around it. Then you set another one, using up the last of our gasoline, and it turned out that the real threat was coming from the west. Then you blew up a dam, not a single ant got wet, and now we’re plumb out of water as well as gas. Does that pretty much sum it up?”

“I have just begun to fight!” I said with fierce masculine pride.

“God help us all,” muttered Harvey.

“I don’t suppose we can send away for any anteaters?” I said.

“I don’t know,” he said, still kind of bitter. “You on a first-name basis with any?”

“I meant from a zoo,” I said.

“If you can find a zoo within three hundred miles of here, be my guest,” he replied.

“You ain’t being too all-fired helpful, Dad Harvey,” I said.

“I told you what I’d do the next time you called me that!” he said, picking up his shotgun.

“Come on, Harvey!” I said, backing away from him. I climbed down from the porch onto the ground, and pointed to the ants. “The enemy’s out there!”

“You choose your enemy and I’ll choose mine!” he said, lifting the shotgun to his shoulder.

“You can’t shoot me!” I said. “I’m a preacher!”

“All the more reason,” he growled, lining up his sights.

“Think about it, Harvey,” I said, still backing away. “If you shoot me, who’s going to be left to defeat the ants?”

I couldn’t tell whether that got him laughing or choking, but he did so much of whichever it was that he tripped on the edge of the porch and the gun went off as he tumbled to the ground.

I started counting all my limbs, got up to four, and figgered he’d missed me. Still, I knew he’d hit something, because I heard this kind of buzzing sound in my ears. I raised my hands to my head and made sure both my ears were still attached. I couldn’t figger out what had happened, but I saw that he was getting to his feet, and I didn’t plan to just stand there until he finally shot me, so I turned to the east and prepared to take off like a bat out of someplace that smelled a lot worse than Heaven, when I saw that the sky was black with angry hornets, and I realized that Harvey’s buckshot had accidentally blown half a dozen hornets nests off a nearby tree.

The hornets looked around for someone to get mad at, and as it happens, they were closer to the ants than to Harvey and me, so a bunch of them started dive-bombing the ants while them what was left went around to recruit all their friends and relations.

Harvey was just standing there kind of dumbfounded, and I figgered since he wasn’t aiming the shotgun no more I was safer on the porch than out here in the middle of the battlefield, so I went back there, and we pulled up a couple of chairs, and spent the next three hours watching the war. For awhile it looked like the ants was going to pull it out, but this was one time that air power prevailed over boots on the ground. Both sides took a ton of casualties, and in the end the ants were in full retreat and the hornets had carried the day.

“Well, I can’t say you were any help,” announced Harvey when the battle was over, “but you didn’t desert us, and that’s worth a little something. Come into the house with me.”

I followed him into the living room, where there was a couch and a couple of chairs and a huge strongbox, which he walked over to and unlocked. I tried not to look too eager to see what I was going to inherit when the old gentleman went the way of all flesh, but I couldn’t help but lean forward and take a peek, and what I saw was a box full of shells.

“I collect them,” he said, handing me something that looked like it had once played house to a clam. “This one’s the treasure of my collection. It’s yours, Lucifer.”

I realized I’d been flim-flammed but good, that there wasn’t nothing in his strongbox but a bunch of seashells. Still, he was the father of the woman I was going to spend the rest of my life with, and I didn’t want to hurt his feelings, so I just handed it back and explained that I couldn’t take such a treasured item, and if he had some gold or diamonds lying around I’d be happy to settle for some of them instead, and he laughed like I was making a joke and slapped my back and allowed that maybe my parents shouldn’t have drowned me at birth after all.

And then I heard dainty little footsteps behind me, and I turned and saw Merry Bunta in all her radiant beauty, and I decided that coming all this way out from Rio was still a worthwhile undertaking, and that Merry without no riches was better than no Merry without no riches.

“Miss Merry Bunta, ma’am,” I said, bowing low, “I’m the Right Reverend Honorable Doctor Lucifer Jones, here to pledge my heart to you.”

“I think I fell in love with you the first time I saw you back in Rio,” she replied, “standing there outside Madame Sarcosa’s den of scarlet women. Once we got back home, I prayed night and day that I might somehow be able to see you again.”

“And here I am,” I said, “the answer to your prayers. Do you want to get hitched here or back in Rio?”

A look of sadness spread over her face. “I watched you this afternoon, Lucifer, and no one can doubt your bravery or your loyalty.”

“Two of my lesser virtues,” I said modestly.

“But the fact remains that if I marry you, you will be the father of my children, and you were outsmarted by a bunch of ants on three different occasions.” She sighed deeply. “I will always love you, Lucifer, but for the sake of my unborn children, I can’t marry you.”

I explained that the ants had all year to plan their campaign and I’d just stumbled into the fray on a moment’s notice, and that I’d be happy to stick around until the next time they were on the march and have a rematch, but she just kept shaking her head and saying that it just wasn’t meant to happen, and it was when I asked her what wasn’t meant to happen, the marriage or the rematch, that she just turned and went back to whatever room she’d come out of.

And that was the end of my tragic romance with Merry Bunta. I began walking north, hoping I’d run into a city sometime before I hit the Arctic Circle. But what I ran into was an old friend and a passel of trouble, and I’ll tell you about it just as soon as I hunt up a little drinkin’ stuff and refresh my artistic sensibilities.

Fiction: The Acquaintance by Kealan Patrick Burke

For Ken Bruen

I got into town just after nine, the lack of adequate street-lighting conspiring with the darkness to make it seem later. On the weekend, Dungarvan would be full of life and the cursing and shouting of drunks, the jubilant carelessness of the young, armed with fake ID’s and fresh livers, all making their way across the Devonshire bridge toward the night clubs. But this was midweek, and I suspected the rain dripping from the heavy boughs overhanging the bus stop would be the only sound I would hear once the wheezing vehicle pulled away after coughing me out. I was right.

Head thick from a semi-doze on the epileptic bus, I reviewed the options available to me.

No, not options.

Obligations.

Family and friends awaited me on the other side of that bridge. Some of them would be glad to see me, others wouldn’t, but all of them would say the same thing, “Ah, yer back”—a common Irish expression generally reserved for immigrants which somehow manages to make you feel welcome and ashamed at the same time, as if your return is the fulfillment of some smug prophecy that was made as soon as you went abroad.

So, fuck it, I decided. They could wait.

I headed for the nearest pub. Figured if I were going home, it would be best to prepare myself. Dulling the senses would make it just that little bit harder for them to get to me. Might as well make them work for it. Hard drinkers don’t make for easy targets. Not in my family, at least. We have a short temper. Not a mellow one among the lot of us, and because of it, we’re accorded a kind of perverse respect. See us in our cups, best not to get in our way. Last time someone did, they ended up in hospital with a broken arm, a fractured skull, and a couple of more injuries the prosecutor rattled off to me before the gavel came down and punctuated that chapter of my life.

The next one started in prison.

I served thirteen months and got beaten on average twice for every one of those. That’s justice for you. Forget the courts. All that legalese is just so much preamble. The real sentence is doled out inside. Throw in a couple of gang rapes and I came to realize I wasn’t half as tough as I thought I was going in. Didn’t change me, though. Only made me more careful about the people I associated with once I got out. Not that it was a problem. Folks hear you’ve been inside and if they have any decency about them at all, they’ll steer clear of you. The kind of guys who don’t are split evenly between those who hope some of your reputation will rub off on them, and those who wish to exploit it.

But I’d left all that behind now. London, though less than an hour’s plane ride away, might as well have been another continent for all the attachment I felt to it. When I’d walked out of that apartment on Camberwell New Road three days earlier, I’d left behind me two young guys and a girl out of their minds on coke. I wouldn’t miss them, nor the stark reminder of how many times I’d shared their beautiful inertia with them. I’d kicked the habit months ago and as such had outstayed my welcome. They seemed hardly to notice my departure, but as the cab pulled up at the terminal at Heathrow, my cell phone hummed in my pocket, and I snapped it open.

“You still have me fuckin’ lighter, prick,” said Nancy, the girl I had once shared a bed and considerable amounts of coke with in that dismal flat.

When it became apparent that she had not called for any other reason, “I’ll mail it you,” I said, and hung up.

Thus ended another chapter.

#

I had hoped to find some kind of peace waiting for me in Dungarvan, some kind of welcome that did not come in the form of another human being, but in the feel of the place itself. In the past, any amount of time away from my hometown had given it a kind of romanticism in my mind, though I’d hated living there and had left it in a hurry with scarcely a look back. My prolonged stays in Cork, Dublin, Galway, the American Midwest, and finally London, had served to persuade me that my heart is in Ireland, as the song says. Everything would be much simpler back home, I told myself. Everything would be familiar, safe. But even as the bus seemed to canter unsteadily down the long curving slope and the sickly yellow lights of the town and the still black mass of the encroaching sea came into view, I knew I’d been deceiving myself. The twist in my guts was not excitement, but dismay. The lights were beacons meant, not to guide me home, but to cull from my addled brain all the memories of why I’d left here in the first place.

Dungarvan itself is a beautiful town. The people, for the most part, are friendly. But neither aesthetical beauty nor man will lift a finger to help you realize your dreams. Such things do not belong here. They are not understood, nor appreciated among the locals, who themselves do not dream. They merely exist, and aspirations to anything further are regarded as fancy.

How deep.

I wanted to be a writer. Crime noir was my thing.

Didn’t happen. Didn’t write. Lived that shit instead.

What happened was I discovered drinking and drugs and sex.

And rage. But that was easily dealt with by pummeling some poor fucker who didn’t realize he was dealing with half a madman. Many a night I’d stagger into a bar and tear some sad bastard off a stool where he was enjoying his pint and kick the living shit out of him until someone pulled me off him. Never seemed to bother me either. Never seemed to regret a single bad thing I did in my life until I gave up cocaine. That’s when it all came to get me. In those first few weeks I visited Hell and was roasted on a spit by every demon I’d ever invited in. Then I was sorry. So sorry I lost forty pounds, grew a beard, and developed a slight limp for no reason I could fathom unless I’d punched something loose while I was in detox.

Home. And it wasn’t what I’d wished it to be. The romantic scribe in my brain threw his hands up in disgust, and I walked on, the sound of the sea beyond the town square less a soothing whisper than a request to keep my complaints to myself. Lighting up a cigarette and shuddering off a chill, I turned onto Mary Street, a narrow road flanked by the usual businesses on both sides: bookstore, travel agent, department store, lawyer and accountant and social services offices, and of course, more than its fair share of bars. At the second of these I stopped, stuck the cigarette in my mouth and shoved the door open.

It swung wide, heat rushing out to greet me.

I got the impression of empty space, nothing unusual on a weeknight in a small town, then a voice said, “Can’t smoke that in here.”

I paused, frowned and looked at the speaker, a bulbous woman behind the bar whose glass polishing slowed as she peered at me, as if gauging my potential for resistance. Fucking anti-smoking laws. Yet another of the Irish government’s attempts to Americanize itself, crippling one of its most popular sources of income and stunting a way of life that preceded their grandfather’s grandfathers. Taking cops off the streets to supervise the bars to ensure no one lit up, while all over the town dealers were peddling coke to school kids. Brilliant. Made me wonder how many kids ever robbed and murdered their parents for cigarette money.

I acquiesced, but made it clear I didn’t appreciate it by stubbing the cigarette out on the freshly swept floor rather than tossing it outside.

The barmaid scowled.

I found a stool at the short side of the bar nearest the door. Should trouble erupt, the small amber lamps on the walls would provide illumination enough for me to see a punch coming, but not who threw it. Without the omnipresent veil of smoke, the place seemed less cheery, less comforting, though I had to admit I didn’t miss having my eyes sting every time I blinked.

The barmaid approached, still scowling. She looked like the kind of woman who scowled easily but a smile would require a warrant. “What’ll you have?” she asked.

“Pint of Carlsberg.” If there was sole comfort to be found in my homecoming, it would be that the beer here, imported or not, wouldn’t taste like it had already been used as mouthwash and spat back into the glass. A few moments later, the white-topped amber pint was set brusquely before me. I didn’t care about the method of delivery; I only cared about the pint. My last good vice.

“Well,” said a voice to my right and I frowned in irritation. I hadn’t even had a sup of the bloody drink yet and already I’d been interrupted. I looked at the man who’d spoken, quickly took him in.

My age, maybe older.

Soft blue eyes, hard face lined with tragic stories I suspected he was dying to relate.

Thin, almost cadaverous, and dressed like he wasn’t the only one who wore his clothes. Old jeans frayed at the cuffs, boots half a season away from the dump, and a shirt that had once been white but now looked like a smoker’s handkerchief.

I returned the causal drinker’s greeting. “Well.”

“Join ya?”

As he’d already parked his narrow arse on the stool next to me and set a bottle of Smithwicks and a half-pint glass on the bar, I didn’t see the sense in refusing him, so I shrugged and hurriedly took a deep pull on my pint out of fear that it might be my last chance before his intrusion soured it. Closed my eyes in appreciation as the ice-cold lager chilled my throat. “Jesus, that’s good,” I muttered.

“Been away, I’d say,” said my new friend.

“London,” I told him.

“Ah. Fine place.”

“Shithole.”

“Ah,” he said again. “Twasn’t what you’d hoped then.”

I didn’t answer, was too busy taking another hearty slug on the pint. Half the glass was gone when I returned it to the bar.

“Can I buy you another one?” he asked.

You have to be careful in Irish bars. We’re chatty. We’ll talk to a wall when we have a few pints put away. But there’s an element of folk who’ll only talk in the hope that you’ll be suckered into supplying them with beer for the night. They buy you the first one, maybe the first two, and you let your guard down, assume they have money for a night’s worth of pissery. And by the time it dawns on you that they don’t, you’re too drunk yourself to give a shit. Then you wake up in the morning with empty pockets and a hangover and a nagging feeling of being had. On the other hand, if you let someone buy you drink all night and never put your hand in your pocket, the likelihood is that some night when they’re down on their luck, they’ll trawl the bars looking for you, hoping you’ll feel obliged to return the favor. It can get ugly.

As I sat there in the afterglow of a drink I’d missed more than most of the people I knew, I didn’t care what this guy’s motives might be. He could buy me drink until we were kicked out if he felt like it. If he came looking for repayment at a later date, he’d be disappointed. And if he was looking for a supplier, he’d be equally chagrinned to discover I wasn’t a total fool either.

So “Sure,” I said, and drained my glass.

At the man’s summons, the barmaid appeared and snatched the glass from the counter. As she turned, I told her, “Same glass, please.” The steam from the glasses in the dishwashing tray told me they weren’t long out. Beer in a warm glass is sacrilege. Beer in a used glass, the sides of which are already coated with suds from the beer, meaning it’ll hold its head longer, is perfect. As a barmaid, she would know this, of course, but that didn’t mean I was spared a dirty look as she set about pulling the pint.

“You don’t remember me, I’d say,” said the man beside me.

I looked at him. Better to try now to see if he rang any bells. The first pint already had bumblebees droning lazily around inside my skull. A few more and my drinking partner could be Tom Selleck for all I’d know. But on closer inspection, I saw nothing familiar in his face, aside from misery.

“Sorry,” I said. “Should I?”

He nodded once, a look of seriousness on his face, as if we had matters of grave importance to discuss.

“New Year’s Eve,” he said, searching my face for signs that the memory was surfacing. It wasn’t, and he continued. “About twenty years ago it was. Snowed like a bastard.”

“Snow…yeah,” I said. Given Dungarvan’s proximity to the Atlantic, the closest we normally get to the white stuff is a brief glimpse of it atop the mountains that surround the town. Then it’s gone. No white Christmases here, but once, we’d had a white New Year.

“I remember the snow, all right,” I told him. “Not you though.”

“You were drinking in O’ Reilly’s,” he said. “They had a band playing there—The Amadans. Great craic altogether. Everyone in fine spirits. They locked the doors and let us drink until four in the morning. Then the cops came knocking, cleared us out.”

It was coming back to me, but only vaguely. I tend to remember the bad nights over the good, and if it was as he had described it, nothing had happened to make that night a memorable one. I did remember the snow though, and the more I thought about it, the more my hand began to stray to my right eyebrow, fingertips tracing the deep scar hidden beneath it.

“That’s right!” said the man with a satisfied smile. “You remember now?”

The barmaid deposited our drinks. My drinking partner paid her. “Thanks Mick,” she said, and that gave me a name.

“Mick Molloy,” he said, and carefully searched my face. His scrutiny was beginning to get annoying. “Where did you get the scar?”

“I’ve always had it, I suppose,” I said, but knew he wouldn’t buy it. The barmaid’s arrival had created a brief gap in the conversation, allowing me to remember more about that night than I was willing to let on for now. His interest bugged me, and I suspected I would do well to recall his part in that night so there would be no sudden surprises.

“You fell,” he said.

“Yeah.” I knew that much at least. “Yeah, that’s right.”

“Slipped outside the bar. Ice on the snow. Slipped and spun around and hit yer head on the curb. You got a nasty ‘oul cut out of it.”

“I did. Where you there?”

“I was.”

For a moment he let this information settle between us. He looked calm, and I imagine I did too, but I got the feeling his mind was racing. So was mine.

“Well…I don’t remember you, sorry,” I said and hefted my pint.

“You headed home and I walked with you,” he said then. “Scooped up handfuls of snow and put ‘em against yer eye. Thought it might help.”

It came to me. Not his face, but the shape of him. Dark. Backlit by the cool lights from the quay as we traversed the Causeway—a three-quarter mile stretch of road that bisects the harbor.

Him raising his hand and putting it to my face.

Me, confused and more than a little angry. Who was this guy, I remembered thinking, and more importantly, what the fuck is he doing touching me?

Shit. In my chest, a sinking feeling. Was this guy about to spring a vendetta on me? Had he waited twenty years—or however long ago he’d said it was—to take me to task for being hostile to him when he’d been trying to help? That was all I’d need. I’d come here seeking a safe haven (though my belief in the existence of such places had been corrupted by time and experience) and now it was going to be spoiled by some old fart with a grudge.

Lovely.

“Remember?” he asked, leaning toward me a little.

“I do,” I said. “Thanks for that.”

I wasn’t worried about the guy. He looked like a scarecrow. If he decided to get violent, I’d snap him over my knee and split, as the Americans say. But I’d prefer not to have to. What I was, was dismayed. All I wanted was a few pints, maybe a shot or two before I went to face the false smiles and knowing nods at home. Trouble might reside in my immediate future, but I was in no mood for it tonight.

“You bled quite a bit,” he said with a convincing expression of sympathy. “I only meant to offer you the snow, to indicate that it was needed, but you were out of it. Thought I was attacking you, or something.”

I sighed. Lit up a cigarette. Offered him one. He waved it away. “I was out of it more often than not in those days,” I told him. “Had a lot on my plate.”

“I told you you can’t smoke in here,” the barmaid snapped.

“Call the pigs,” I said. “Or shut up about it.”

She looked as if I’d slapped her, and retreated to the far end of the bar, where an old man in a peaked cap was ruminating over a pint of Guinness.

“I should have known better,” Mick said, still marooned with his memories. “But I’ve always had this wounded animal thing. Better to help than not. Got it from my mother, God rest her soul.”

I raised my pint out of respect for his departed mother, not that I gave a fuck, but it seemed to thing to do. Maybe the gesture would be enough to convince him his beef of yesteryear should go unstated.

“You called me a faggot,” he said then, in a low voice, and I felt the smoke coil in my throat, burning it. I exhaled, took a quick and deep draw on my pint and licked my lips.

“I’m sorry about that. Jesus,” I said. “I’m sure I didn’t mean it. You know how it is when you’re pissed off and loaded to the gills. Everybody’s a target.”

He nodded sagely, looked troubled. One trimmed fingernail drew circles in the condensation on the side of his glass.

“I persisted, fool that I am,” he continued. “And then we ran into some of yer friends.”

Shit. That did it. Like the tumblers of a lock sliding into place. Even if I hadn’t remembered the specific occasion, drink and my friends more often than not meant trouble for somebody.

“You told them I was making a move on you,” Mick said, turning his head to look at me again. “Told them I was gay and trying to pick you up. Told them to show me what ye all thought of gays.”

I ran a hand over my face, momentarily forgetting the cigarette jutting from my lips. Burnt the edge of my palm, sent sparks flying. Quickly brushed them off my pants.

“Broke my wrists, my nose, my ankle, my fingers…”

There was only one way to deal with this. Sympathy or apology wouldn’t cut it. I knew by his face he wanted more.

“What do you want me to say?” I asked him. “I was a dickhead back then. You’re not the only one who ended up getting his face smashed in just for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. You want me to say I’m sorry, is that it?”

He frowned, and thick furrows appeared in his brow. “No,” he said quietly. “I don’t want you to say sorry.”

I shrugged, grabbed my pint. Sank it. “Then what?”

“I just wanted you to remember it, that’s all.”

I raised a finger to summon the barmaid. She ignored me.

“Well, I remember it,” I told him. “Feel better?”

He smiled, and it wasn’t pretty. Big yellow teeth. Traces of black. “I won’t ever feel better,” he said. “Maybe if I could change history there’d be a chance, but I can’t so…” It was his turn to shrug.

I considered leaving. There was nothing to stop me getting up and getting gone. There were plenty more bars in town where I wouldn’t have to have my pint made bitter by some old guy’s attempt to take me on an all expenses paid guilt-trip. But then the barmaid saw me, saw the empty glass, and retrieved it from the bar with an exaggerated sigh. Apparently her derision didn’t outweigh the need for money on a slow night.

One more, I decided. Then I’ll go.

“What you and your friends did that night is only part of it,” Mick said. “I wouldn’t change that at all.”

I appraised him anew. Just my luck to get saddled with a sadist more twisted than myself. “You wouldn’t,” I said.

“No. I don’t regret what happened to me. What I regret is not fighting back. Not defending myself.”

“There were four of us,” I reminded him, though given the accuracy of his recollection thus far, it seemed unlikely he’d need it.

“Doesn’t matter. It’s haunted me.”

“What has?”

“That I just stood there.” His eyes narrowed and quickly moved away from me to the bar, to where his other hand was clamped against the brass rail that ran the length of it, top and bottom. Stabilizers for the drunks, though Mick was not drunk as far as I could tell, only intoxicated by his own regret.

“You’d have hurt me worse, I’m sure, if I’d lifted a hand to defend myself.”

“True,” I told him, because it was.

“But I can’t tell you how often I’ve envisioned that scenario and wished to God I’d at least tried.”

“Probably better for you that you didn’t. We might have done you in altogether.”

“Maybe that would have been better.”

Off his bloody rocker, I decided. Of all the things in life to worry about, this fool is hung up on a fight he lost twenty years ago. But I didn’t say that. Instead I said, “Just let it go, pal. Time to move on. I’ve apologized for being a young drunken asshole, and I’m sure the rest of the lads would be more than willing to offer you the same if they knew ‘twas important to you.”

Very diplomatic. Pleased with myself, I accepted the pint from the barmaid, intercepting it before it had reached the counter. I swung the pint round to my right and toasted the old man. “To new beginnings,” I said. “Now let’s sink a few and forget about old troubles, all right?”

To this he replied, “You were in prison for a spell, I heard.”

Although the change of topic was encouraging, the choice of topic wasn’t. “Yeah.”

“What for?”

“GBH.”

“Ah.”

That single syllable spoke volumes, told me we hadn’t changed the subject after all. What a fucking surprise, that word said. And now I did want to hit him. Give him a thump and say, “You’re right. I’m still a drunk, still a brawler, still an asshole. Sorry about yer luck.” Maybe then he’d see the wisdom in letting old wounds heal.

“What do you remember most about it?” he asked, and I told myself to calm down, that walking was still an option with less risk attached, reminded myself of the topic at hand and how fast the past could become the present if I wasn’t careful.

“A man named Sam,” I said, without pause for thought. “Black fella. Nice guy. Bit dense. In for rape. Got shanked in the laundry room.”

“Why do you remember that?”

“Don’t remember him so much as the scream he let out. I thought they’d kept him alive to torture him or something that scream went on so long. Even told the screw “For God’s sake do something. Tell them finish it or at least close the fucking door.” But he did nothing. Said he didn’t hear a thing. The scream went on for days, weeks, maybe months. But I was told Sam died quick. It was the echo I was hearing. Awake, asleep, didn’t matter. That scream just kept on going, bouncing off the walls like a siren. It got stuck in my head and wouldn’t come out.” I looked squarely at him. “That’s what I remember.”

“And nothing will make you forget,” Mick said, and finally reached for his drink.

“I don’t think so,” I told him. “It’s in there too deep.”

“Well then,” he said. “You’ll understand why I can’t just let my bad memories go either. They don’t listen to reason. They stay in my head and refuse to leave.” He sipped at his drink, set it down and folded his arms.

I tipped my cigarette, prepared to drop it on the floor but the barmaid’s cough drew my attention to the small glass ashtray she’d put on the bar.

“You a smoker?” I asked her.

“Only on my break.”

“So take one. I’ll buy you a drink.”

She didn’t smile, but didn’t scowl either, which I considered progress. “No thanks,” she said and moved back to the grizzled old sentinel at the far end of the bar.

Three pints ago, I’d have left.

Three pints ago, I wouldn’t have talked about prison.

Three pints ago I wouldn’t have endured Mick Molloy’s bullshit.

But three became four and I felt myself melting into the seat, the old man’s words like rubber darts thrown at a steel door.

“You home for good?” he asked me at one point, after I’d treated him to enough long silences to give him the hint that I was done talking about his misery when I had my own to worry about.

“Dunno,” I said. “We’ll see how it goes.”

“What are you going to do for work? Got something lined up?”

“Not yet.”

“Well, a strapping lad like yourself will find something I’m sure.” He nodded, then said, “It’s getting late. I suppose I’d better be heading home. The wife’ll have a fit and I’ve a long day ahead tomorrow. I’ll be seeing you I suppose.”

He stood, seemingly annoyed that he hadn’t gotten from me whatever reaction he’d expected. I straightened, looked at him in surprise, thinking, “Surely after that drama there’s going to be some equally dramatic climax.” I’d anticipated a sudden outburst of rage, or tears, maybe. It wouldn’t even have surprised me if he’d tried to clock me across the head with a bottle. After all, he was obsessed with what the lads and me had done to him, to the point where he’d carried the burden of it on his shoulders like an old coat for two decades and had shown it to me as soon as I’d walked in the door. And all of it for—what? Was I supposed to feel guilty? Apologize again? What was it he’d expected to achieve here?

I didn’t know, but after another pint, I knew I wouldn’t care. If he was leaving, then there was a chance that the night could be salvaged yet, unless all I encountered were more bitter figures from my past.

“You sure you won’t have another one?” I asked, out of courtesy and not any desire for him to prolong his stay.

“I won’t,” he said and brushed at something on the breast of his shirt. Ash, maybe, from the only cigarette in a non-smoking bar. It wouldn’t be hard to find the culprit. I couldn’t help but smile. At least if he’d ruined my night, I’d ruined his shirt.

Small consolation. The shirt was already past it.

“See you Maureen,” he called to the barmaid. Then he looked at me with his liquid blue eyes. “See you, Gerry.”

I winked at him and watched him leave. His gait was stiff-legged and uncomfortable. He didn’t look back and the door groaned shut behind him, sending in a gust of fresh air that mangled my smoke. The shape of him passed the stained glass window, reminding me of his silhouette on the Causeway all those years ago as he packed snow against my face.

You all right, lad? You’re bleeding something wicked.

I returned my attention to the bar and his unfinished drink, slid it close and drank it down.

Lit another cigarette. Got the expected sigh from down the bar.

#

Three more pints and I felt inspired to join the old man at the far end of the bar, if only so I could voice aloud my disgust at the world and the hand it had dealt me. He was as talkative as a plastic bag, but that didn’t matter. I’d done my share of listening for the night and found it particularly unpleasant, so I wasn’t in it for the conversation. Now and then the barmaid materialized before us, looking put out that I had stolen her confidant. I smiled at her to let her know her worries and complaining would have to wait. The old man was booked for a while. Chilled her a little with some crass flirtation, and wondered how much more drink it would take before she started to look good enough to ride.

Midnight came like a pickpocket, unnoticed.

Another hour and “Last call,” said the barmaid, drumming her fingers on the counter. I wondered if that call was universal, or just for me. The old geezer had a full pint before him, untouched. Maybe he was waiting for me to leave before he gave it his full-undivided attention. Maybe they were both waiting for me to leave so they could give each other their full-undivided attention.

“One for the road, Maureen,” I said. Feeling magnanimous, I added, “And one for yourself and the elder statesman here.”

With as close to a smile as I had seen all night, she nodded. Poured herself a glass of Heineken and another Guinness for the old man, who offered a tip of his cap in thanks. Then she trudged around the counter as if the floor was made of mud and sat down beside me. Her perfume was nice; her face wasn’t. Chicken pox or acne had made a lunar landscape of her cheeks and chin. No wonder she never smiled.

“You know Mick, then?” she asked me.

“Not well. We were…acquaintances years back.”

“What’s your name?” Her elbow brushed against mine. I felt a slight spark of electricity run through me, a twitch in my nether regions. Proof positive that the mind and the body have different standards.

“Gerry Kelly,” I said and extended my hand.

She gave it a limp shake. Her hands were cold and moist. I wondered if the rest of her was the same way, then shook off the thought.

“He mentions you a lot,” she said.

“Who does? Molloy? Fucking obsessive that fella. Is he a bit cracked?”

“Maybe,” she said. “Lost his father there a few months back. Went quiet after that. Used to be in here nightly, the two of them, until the cancer. Now it’s just Mick, and we hardly see him at all.”

Just my luck that he picked tonight to come here, I thought, then immediately wondered if luck had anything to do with it. But how would he know I’d even be in town? Unless one of the lads told him. Roger knew I’d be home. Maybe he’d squealed on me, the bastard.

Christ. I lit up a cigarette, ran a hand through my hair. Drink always makes me paranoid. Call it my own ghosts from prison. Watch your back or the next time you look there’ll be a knife or another man buried in you. I exhaled heavily.

“So did ye sort it all out?” Maureen asked.

“Sort out what? His issues?” I said, using an Americanism I was quite fond of.

“Yeah.”

“Doubt it,” I said. “It looks like he latched onto it. Like he needs it or something, like I need this.” I tapped a nail against the pint glass. “Poor bastard.”

“Maybe it’s because there’s only you left out of the gang,” Maureen said and took a hearty swig from her glass, then belched. It made her sizable bosom jiggle. I couldn’t help but notice. She blushed, put a hand to her mouth. “Excuse me.”

“What do you mean there’s only me left out of the gang?” I asked her, and willed my eyes up to meet hers.

The blush on her face lingered as she noticed my attention. “You’re Gerry Kelly, you said.”

“I am.”

“You used to hang around with the Murphy brothers, and that little shit Roger Kennedy.”

“That’s right,” I said, amused at her opinion of Roger. If he was in here and heard her call him that, he’d wreck the place, and probably her. Only the old man would be left unharmed, because Roger had great respect for the elderly, don’t ask me why.

“Yeah, I did. Still do,” I said.

She raised her eyebrows and the flesh above them wrinkled. “Still? Up at the graveyard, is it?”

My drinking had slowed, and as a result the lager wasn’t nearly as cold as it should have been, but upon hearing her words, it turned to liquid ice in my throat and caught there. I coughed, spluttered, let it pour from my mouth to the floor between my feet. Maureen jerked back.

“Aw for feck’s sake. I’ll have to clean that up you know.”

I didn’t care, barely heard. The word “graveyard” was bouncing around the walls of my skull like poor old Sam’s scream. When I could breathe without choking, I grabbed the barmaid’s elbow. She looked down at my hand, looked up with her trademark scowl, and yanked it free.

“What do you mean, graveyard?” I asked, and waved away a cloud of my own smoke that had drifted to me from the ashtray. “Why would they be there?”

Her scowl softened a bit. “Oh…you didn’t know?”

I had to restrain myself from throttling her. “Didn’t know what?”

“The Murphy lads. God bless ‘em. They were drowned.”

My heart felt like a debt collector’s knock on the door. “Where? When?”

“The Causeway,” she said. “About a month ago, I suppose it was. They were going home and must have been fooling around behind the chains.” She shrugged. “Current probably dragged them down.”

The chains were designed to keep young children and dumb drunks from falling into the harbor. The amount of bodies from both categories hauled out of the water in the sixty years since it was strung up said all that needed to be said about its effectiveness.

It was a tragedy. It hurt, but I could grieve later because there was no way she was going to tell me Roger was dead. It wasn’t possible and if she disagreed, I’d laugh in her face, and she’d be lucky if that was all I did to it, because I’d spoken to Roger two weeks before. He’d been alive, and better than that, he’d been high as a fucking kite. The dead do not answer phones. They don’t talk. And they don’t smoke pot.

“Looking forward to seeing you,” he’d said. “It’s no fun in this town by my lonesome.”

I’d taken his words to mean without you. Now I wondered if that had been his way of breaking the bad news. He hadn’t been friendly with Ken and Ray Murphy in years, not since they’d put his younger brother in hospital after a fight outside a nightclub. But surely our pasts warranted a little more than such a cryptic mention of their fate?

Christ. My head was throbbing.

“Roger’s alive,” I said. “Don’t tell me he isn’t.”

The look Maureen gave me, the sympathy twisted into a face not built for it, made bile rush up my throat. My stomach contracted and I slid off the chair. “Don’t,” I told her and put a trembling hand to block her expression.

Calm down, take it easy, get your shit together, this isn’t—

“Overdose,” was the last thing I heard her say before I turned and fled toward the bathroom.

#

It’s all a blur.

I remember praying to the toilet, cursing at it as I watched my own insides gush out in a brown torrent. The cramps seemed to take forever to subside, and afterward I was left weak, drained and convinced I was still in London, still in the flat. I was high, soaring inside my own head, in a dream, after falling off the wagon and letting Nancy shoot cocaine between my toes.

Sure, life sucks, I said. But not this fucking much.

I crawled on my hands and knees to one of the urinals, grabbed its porcelain lip and hauled myself up. The smell from the pink cake increased as my piss hit it until it was as nauseating as the thought of more drink. I zipped up and someone knocked on the door.

“Are you all right in there?”

Maureen. I nodded, forgetting she couldn’t see me, then shouted, “Fine. I’ll be out in a minute.”

She didn’t wait. Instead she eased open the door and slipped inside the bathroom. I looked at her and wiped a hand across the back of my mouth, hoping it would be enough to rid myself of the taste of vomit. It wasn’t.

“Lemme get some water,” I said and staggered toward the sink.

She moved to stand before it, blocking my way and I almost collided with her, looked down into her moon-shaped face, craters and all.

“You’re in a bad state,” she said. “Want a lift home?”

“No,” I said. “I’ll walk. T’isn’t far.”

“Sorry about your friends.”

I nodded.

“You’re a fine looking fella,” she said, then she kissed me. It was a clumsy kiss. Her lips were dry.

I kissed her back. Mine was clumsy too.

Can’t remember what came next, but I found myself sitting outside the door of the bar, in the cold. The sound of the latch being slid home was the only sound in the world. The streets were deathly quiet. My underwear was knotted around my balls and squeezing the life out of me, so I rose with help from the wall, and started to make my way home. Wondered if there were cabs at this hour. Forgot where I was. Not London, not the U.S., where the cabs last as long as the people do. This is Dungarvan, where if you’re out after two, tough shit, lad. Find your own way home.

I navigated the streets as if they were the rolling deck of a ship on the high seas, and paused to throw up twice. Despite my feelings about alcohol, I wished I’d brought some with me.

The chill crept into my clothes and made a home there. Wrestling with my underwear until I could walk without them carving a groove in my thigh, I stumbled on as far as the Causeway, where I stopped and leaned against the chain to look out over the dark water.

Boats undulated silently on unseen waves.

Somewhere out there a buoy clanged a funeral toll.

Somewhere out there my friends had taken a breath and the tide had filled their lungs.

I started to imagine it, then bent over the chain and retched. There was nothing left of me to offer the sea, so I straightened, wiped tears from my eyes and moved away, whispering a fond farewell to my fallen comrades. Quickly followed it with, “Fucking eejits, the two of ye,” and stepped back.

Right out onto the fucking road.

The last thing I remember are a pair of blazing lights.

Attached to them, a car.

#

Anyone who wakes up in a hospital and says he doesn’t know where he is, is a daft prick. There are clear indicators.

The smell of shit floating in a bottle of bleach.

All the people walking around with stiff smiles and white clothing, oozing rehearsed concern from every pore.

The machinery. If you find yourself hooked up to anything, you’re either a junkie, or a patient.

The sheer cleanliness of it. Everything is white, like a practice run for Heaven, if such a place exists. The staff here clearly thinks so.

After coming to and surveying my surrounds, I closed my eyes and ran an internal diagnostic, as they used to say on Star Trek, hoping I could get at least a passing idea of how bad my injuries were before the doctor had a chance to tell me.

I was breathing. That was a start.

I could move my head, my hands.

Couldn’t move my legs.

Fuck.

When a doctor finally arrived, he looked me over, stuck a light in my eye, hummed thoughtfully, prodded my legs with what looked like a pencil, hummed again and stood at the foot of my bed jotting something down on his clipboard. I measured the length of his silence by the beeps from the machine to my left.

“Well…?” I asked after what felt like an hour.

He peered at me over his glasses. “You’re lucky to be alive, Mr. Kelly.”

“Call me Ger.”

“Ger.”

“What happened?”

“Hit and run, they’re saying.”

“Bollocks. What’s the damage?” I could have been talking to a mechanic about repairs to my car.

“You’re paralyzed from the waist down. I’m sorry.” He didn’t sound it.

“Don’t be sorry,” I told him. “Fix it.”

“Not sure we can,” he replied in that same emotionless tone, the same one I imagined him using to tell family members their loved one had died. Nothing more we could do. My condolences.

“Not sure?”

“You broke your back, Mr. Kelly.”

“It’s Ger.”

“Ger. There’s extensive trauma to the vertebrae, multiple lacerations to the spinal column. T-2 ab—”

“Hey Doc?”

“Yes?”

“I don’t watch ER.”

“Excuse me?”

“Speak English, or so help me, legs or no legs I’ll throw this fucking machine at you.”

“I’ll have to ask you to keep your voice down.”

“And I’ll have to ask you to tell me the long-term diagnosis before I realize the potential my dead legs have as bludgeons.”

He screwed up his face as if I was some curiosity just off the boat from the Galapagos. “We’re going to keep you here for a while. See what we can do. But for now it’s best to be realistic. The chances of you walking again, barring a miracle, aren’t good.”

I stared at him for a moment, brushing aside the awesome implications of what he’d just told me in favor of anger.

“I bet you’re a real treat at parties.”

#

I was there a day and a half before I had any visitors.

My family.

Gathered around me, wailing and sobbing and praying like a bunch of religious fanatics whose lilac bushes had caught fire and delivered to them instructions on how to save the world.

They fawned over me, all my sins forgiven, asked me if there was anything I needed.

I said, “Yeah. My legs.”

They smiled sadly. “We’ll pray for you.”

Told them, “Thanks.”

When they’d left, I instructed the nurse to take all their flowers and cards and toss them in the trash.

“Maybe someone else would like them?” she suggested.

I had been about to tell her where else she could put them, but registered how pretty she was, and how genuine her smile looked, so said instead, “Sure. If you can find another “Dear Ger” in here, feel free.” She was pleased, and with the help of another nurse, gathered up the flowers and cards and made off with them.

They tried to put pajamas on me. I refused them. The stripy cotton reminded me too much of prison blues, though I didn’t bother telling them that.

My world became a monotony of beeps and catheters and runny food and sponge baths. The latter ritual I might have enjoyed if the part of me that could appreciate such things hadn’t been out of order.

Three weeks to the day I’d been admitted, Mick Molloy came to see me. I’d been expecting him, and said as much as he drew a folding metal chair close to my bedside and sat down.

“Why’s that?” he asked, and set another bloody bouquet down on the table. Orchids. There was a small white card stuffed among them.

“Well, because I’m sure you couldn’t wait to see the result of your handiwork.”

“I don’t follow.”

“The Murphy brothers. Drowned. Roger Kennedy. OD’ed. Me, paralyzed. The four fellas who beat you to a pulp years ago. You going to tell me you had nothing to do with it?”

He spread his hands. “I don’t know what you’re getting at.”

“The fuck you don’t. You’re a sick bastard, Molloy, and when I’m back on my feet I can promise I’ll be paying you a visit. You had a score to settle and you settled it, but I’m still alive and now I have one of my own. And believe me, you’re going to be sorry for what you’ve done.”

He sighed. “You know my father taught me how to fight?”

“I don’t give a shit.”

“I was fourteen and the school bully’s favorite target. I got tired of being beaten, so I told my father. He took me down to the basement and toughened me up. The beatings he gave me made the bully’s look like an Indian burn. Taught me how to fight back. And I did. Hit the bully with a left hook, right in the mouth. Then he broke my arm.”

“I’m not interested in your sob stories, Molloy. You’re a pathetic waste of space, and you’re lucky I can’t stand right now.”

“Do you think I did this to you?”

“I don’t think. I know.”

“What if it was just karma, or fate?”

“I don’t buy into any of that hippie bollocks.”

“Maybe you should. Things have a way of working out in favor of the kind.”

“Oh for Christ’s sake.” There was button on a lead next to my bed. I reached for it, thumbed the button, summoning the nurse. I’d had it with Molloy. My temper demanded I at least try to hurt him, but the lingering shred of reason that ran like a vein of silver through a hard mountain told me I’d be the one who suffered most. The painkillers were doing a good job of making me feel damn near invincible, but already I’d felt the sheer enormity of the pain that came without them, so I restrained myself. I’d heal, I promised myself. I’d get better, and when I did, I’d tear this fucker to pieces with my bare hands.

“Bad men meet bad ends,” Molloy said, rising. “It’s not always the fault of their victims.”

“Oh you’re some victim all right,” I seethed. “Fucking psychopath is what you are.”

He smiled, almost serenely. “I’m sorry for you. Get well soon.”

“Better hope I don’t, you prick.”

He was gone before the nurse arrived with her faux concern, and by then I didn’t need her. She looked frustrated, so to give her something to do, I instructed her to dump the flowers Molloy had brought. She obeyed, but paused as she was leaving.

“There’s a card.”

“Big deal.”

“Want me to read it?”

“No.”

“It’s sweet.”

I sighed, looked out the window at a construction crane hoisting girders over the city. “Sweet,” I echoed, and said nothing more. The nurse interpreted it as a cue to continue.

“It says: ‘Hope to see you back on your feet soon. Catch you later!—Mick’.”

She gave a little hum of approval, then I listened as her soft-soled shoes squeaked away. I clenched my fists, willed the tension in them to run down to my legs, to infuse them with the life they’d forgotten, demanded they remember.

They lay there, useless. Not so much as a twitch.

I thought of Molloy’s card and grit my teeth.

The ambiguity of his words was not lost on me.

He would be waiting for me when I got out.

They always were, the bastards.

Always. Ready to raise their arms to show you the old wounds bleeding anew, to remind you how far your shadow stretched behind you.

I looked down at my legs. Thin bodies beneath a shroud. Unmoving.

Felt tears clog my throat at the memory of Molloy’s words: I’ve always had this wounded animal thing.

I wept freely, bringing nurses to my stricken form like firemen to a blaze. My anguished cries echoed for a long time.

Catch you later.

Fiction: The Blackwood Oak by Stephen Gallagher

Part One:

Damien could see that the biker and his girlfriend had pitched their tent among the trees, about fifty yards up the hill from the picnic area. It was an orange two-man ridge job, well-used and a little faded. They’d chosen an awkward spot, away from the other campers. But with the flysheet unzipped they’d have one of the best views in the whole valley, right out across the lake to the wooded hills on the other side.

He took the keys out of the pickup and swung the door closed as the biker walked toward him.

“Damien Ryan,” he said. “Ranger Service. What’s your problem?”

The biker seemed embarrassed. He was about twenty-five, a couple of years older than Damien and a bigger man all round. He wore a white T-shirt, with the upper half of his motorcycle leathers peeled down to his waist. Presumably so he could wash. Certainly not so he could shave.

“It’s in the tent,” he said. “Thanks for coming out.” His cellphone was still in his hand.

They walked up the hill together. The girlfriend was waiting alongside their big Honda Goldwing, arms folded protectively across her chest even though the day wasn’t cold. She wore jeans and a tank top. She was skinny and her arms were freckled, both a plus in Damien’s eyes. But he stayed professional and kept his eyes on the tent.

“I don’t know how it got in,” the biker said.

“They’ll grab any opportunity you give them,” Damien said. “Any food in there?”

“Yes, but it’s all in a coolbox.”

“They’ll still sniff it out.”

As he said this, the tent canvas moved suddenly as if it had been punched from inside. The girlfriend gave an involuntary yelp and there was a sound of claws scrambling across plastic groundsheet.

“Sorry,” she said after a moment.

And the biker said, “If it just turns out to be a squirrel, I’ll feel like an idiot.”

“No,” Damien said. “You did right to call me.” He signalled for the biker to stop so that he could approach the tent alone. The man joined his girlfriend by the Goldwing.

Damien said, “You didn’t get a good look at it, then?”

“It moved too fast.”

Damien was now closing in on the tent, never taking his eyes off it and moving with care.

He said, “It’s best to treat your wildlife with respect. You get a nip from just about anything in these woods, and you’ll know about it. You might want to move a little further off.”

The couple exchanged a glance, then moved together to the edge of their camp. Damien was around the far end of the tent now, with the valley and the view at his back. He crouched down before the half-unzipped flysheet.

The girlfriend called out, “Any danger of rabies?”

“Who knows,” Damien said.

Their tent was one of the old Vango Force Tens, a ground-hugging tunnel of cotton-canvas over steel. The central zip on the inner tent was closed but the zipper across the bottom had been left open. Fine if you wanted to keep flies out, but an open invitation for anything bigger to shimmy under.

Holding the liner at the bottom, taking care not to startle whatever had made its way inside, Damien slowly opened up the zipper and then lifted back one of the flaps.

They weren’t going to be happy campers. As seen in the stifling red-gold light of the tent’s interior, their possessions had been trashed. The sleeping bags shredded, stuffing dragged out and scattered. Maps had been ripped up. Clothing thrown around.

At the far end, in a kind of low apse formed by the tent’s extended shape, was their luggage and the coolbox. The coolbox was a dark blue plastic chest with two white clips to hold the lid down. The clips were thrown back and the lid was off.

And there, rummaging around in the contents, was the culprit.

It was greeny-brown and bug-eyed. About the size of a cat, but with rough skin like bark. It stood on two sturdy legs and rummaged with four racoon-like arms. Its skin was covered in sharp thorns, and it had a tail that was in constant motion. Damien couldn’t see much of its face until it suddenly became aware of him, and looked up.

It had been stuffing bread or cake into its mouth. Its cheeks bulged even more than its eyes. It stared at him and its mouth moved a couple of times, in a cud-chewing motion.

Then it spat the whole mouthful in his direction, with a force
and accuracy that would have drawn gasps of admiration in any Western saloon.

Damien dodged back just in time, and the mess spattered harmlessly on the inside of the canvas.

He ran the zip down again before rising to his feet and taking a step back.

“Yep,” he said. “It’s a squirrel. You couldn’t do me a favour?”

“Sure,” the biker said, eager to earn back some of his dignity. “What?”

“Go down to the truck and bring me those thick gloves out of the cab? And you’ll find a canvas sack in the load bed.”

The biker went hopping off down the hill, which left Damien with the girlfriend. He gave her a grin. She managed something like a smile in return.

The biker came back with the gloves in one hand and the canvas sack in the other, looking doubtfully between them. The gloves looked as if they’d been dragged through the cogwheels of some big machine a few times. The canvas sack wasn’t in quite such good condition. It had leather straps on it, like the fastenings on a straitjacket.

“These?” he said.

“Those are the ones,” Damien said.

#

With some low cunning and fast reactions and an unavoidable disregard for the campers’ property, Damien managed to get the creature into his canvas sack without letting them see it. He got the sack into the iron cage on the back of the pickup and then he didn’t wait around for their response to the mayhem inside their tent, or for the questions that would follow. Once his captive was secure, he was out of there.

Bouncing his way on the dirt track down to the valley’s metalled access road, he unhooked the pickup’s radio mike and raised his father at the lodge. Don Ryan responded right away. He’d been close to the radio and waiting for the call.

“I’ve got it,” Damien said.

“Did they get a look at it?”

“No,” Damien said. “And just as well. With those four arms I’d never be able to persuade them it was anything common. It’s not a form I’ve seen before. And it’s got a foul temper, I can tell you that much.”

“Any other distinguishing features?” Don said, and Damien gave him a description… the thorny skin, the uncannily accurate and forceful spit-missile ability.

“Let me see if I can look it up,” Don said. “I’ll call you right back.”

Damien tried to hang up the radio mike as he drove one-handed, fought with the curly cord a couple of times, and then gave up and left it hanging onto the floor like he always did.

He could imagine his father at this moment, pulling his dusty old books off the shelf in his study, looking through the indices and engravings for some clue as to what they had in the cage. Don Ryan had been the valley’s Ranger before Damien, for more than thirty years. These days he was semi-retired, mostly due to his arthritis. He answered the phone, dealt with campsite bookings, and dispensed advice to his grown-up children whether it was wanted or not. He knew the valley better than anyone; theirs was a line that had forested and lived off this woodland since the time of the English Civil War.

Some of the volumes on his study shelves were unbelievably rare, and probably worth a fortune. No one since the Victorians had approached the taxonomy of the preternatural world with the meticulous rigour of scientific enquiry; but for Don Ryan, the books were no more than a working reference library. Some had been handed down from his grandfather’s time. Others, he’d picked up as he’d gone along. He scoured library sales, and had contacts who kept an eye on country auctions for him. He’d been unbearable for a few weeks when he’d first discovered eBay.

But good information was essential. Every species was different. They misbehaved at the least opportunity, and the opportunities were many. Whenever one strayed, identification was always the first step in dealing with it.

As he was driving along the lakeshore, Damien’s eye was caught by something out on a promontory overlooking the water. It looked as if someone had been dumping rubbish. He pulled off the road and got out of the pickup, leaving the windows open so that he’d be able to hear the radio if Don called him back.

Before leaving the vehicle, he checked the iron cage. The canvas sack moved a couple of times, and he could hear a muttering from inside it. A spell in darkness ought to calm the creature.

In theory.

Out on the promontory, it was as he’d suspected. He found the remnants of a burned-out campfire, and beercan litter all around it.

He took in a deep breath, and sighed it out. He’d seen this so many times before. Why come all the way out here for the beauty of the place, and leave a trail of shit like this?

Town kids, probably. Beauty seemed to make them angry. He’d never understood why.

He got a rubbish sack from the roll he kept in the cab, and went around picking up the discarded cans. All he could do with the fire was kick over the ashes and leave the land to heal the damage.

Now, here was something strange. Some of the opened cans were almost full. And here was a six-pack, completely untouched. Like the campout had been abandoned all at once, and in a tearing hurry.

He looked all around, but could see nothing else unusual.

Don was calling on the radio when he got back to the truck.

“Damien,” his father said unnecessarily, “it’s me. Looks like it’s just a low-level wood sprite. Did you say four arms?”

“And a grip like the meanest monkey you ever saw.”

“Can you look and see if there’s a blue stripe under its belly?”

Damien cast a doubtful eye over the sack in the cage, just as the thing inside it seemed to be embarking on a new bout of restlessness.

“If you want to get that close and personal,” he told his father, “you’re on your own.”

“It probably doesn’t matter,” Don said. “Meet me at Fiddler’s Point.”

#

Fiddler’s Point was a relatively new planting on the valley slopes just above the dam. The slopes had been badly scarred when the dam was being built, and once the heavy machinery had gone away an extensive programme of replanting had begun.

That had been more than a century before. It had left a legacy of young woodland that was neat, ordered, and almost entirely without soul.

Wood sprites, Damien was thinking as he drove up to the Point. There are thousands of those. You could live your whole life in a place like this and never come across the same species twice.

Maybe those people down at the lakeside had disturbed something with their partying, and given themselves a scare. They’d be civilians, unaware of what lay in hiding all around them, assuming–when they thought about it at all–that the preternatural was no more than the stuff of dreams and stories.

Which suited Damien fine. The less people knew, the less likely they were to interfere. For him, the preternatural was something to be dealt with on a daily basis. A whole other stratum of wildlife with its own, very different set of rules. Don had taught him to see his trade as a combination of conservation and pest control, protecting the people from the wildlife and the wildlife from the people. For which a need-to-know arrangement was probably the best.

Don was there ahead of him. He could see his father’s blue-grey Land Rover waiting in the parking area. The area was of gravelled earth, with ruts and low spots where rainwater collected. Damien made a mental note to send out a crew to level the ruts before the season got fully under way.

Don was out of the Land Rover. He was poking his walking stick into one of the puddles to test its depth.

He said, “You want to get a load of stones ordered and–”

“I’m on it, dad,” Damien said.

Damien put on the gloves, and lifted the entire cage out of the back of the pickup. He remembered how lively the sprite had been when he’d struggled it into the sack, and didn’t want to risk having it fight him through the bag while he was trying to carry it.

“You got it?”

“I’ve got it.”

Don led the way. All the trees here were tall, straight, and evenly spaced. As woodland went, it was kind of boring. It could take a thousand years for a forest to grow a soul. There were many theories as to how it happened, all of them more speculation than science. One went that if a habitat was cleared, then its nature spirits were gone forever; slow migration was the natural way, as the creatures rarely bred. Throw a chainsaw into the equation, and it stopped adding up.

All the more reason to conserve what remained. They followed a straight path up through the trees, on ground that was covered in a spongy carpet of pine needles and dead bracken.

After a while Damien said, “How much further? This thing’s heavy.”

“Stop complaining,” Don said. “At your age I could do one-armed press ups.”

“Only because you never took your other hand off your wallet.”

Don paused for a moment. He was getting his breath, but he pretended that he’d stopped to point through the trees with his stick.

“That one, I reckon,” he said.

At first glance, it was a Scots Pine no different to all the others. But on closer inspection it seemed slightly less healthy. It had been marked with a red circle of spray paint.

When they reached it, Damien set the cage down with some relief. The thing in the sack was trying to flip itself around.

“Still pretty lively,” he said.

“Well, let’s put all that energy where it can do some good.”

Don placed his walking stick on the cage to steady it while Damien slid back the door and reached inside. Damien deftly unbuckled the straitjacket straps and then withdrew his hand before the creature could work itself free. Which it did at the first whiff of fresh air, fighting its way out to the light and then rocking back on its haunches and looking around blearily.

As soon as it saw Damien, it bared its teeth and launched at him. It was a short-lived show of aggression because it instantly hit the bars with a bang and fell back, eyes rolling up in its spiny head.

“Idiot,” Damien said.

Spotting an opportunity to make a tricky job easier, Don quickly slid open the door and reached into the cage. He took the sprite by the scruff of the neck and hauled it out, rising to his feet and turning to the tree. With one hand bracing his weight on his cane, he offered up the sprite to the waiting pine.

The sprite dangled in his grip like a slaughtered turkey. For a moment nothing happened, and then it began to rouse and open its eyes.

“Come on,” Don said, seeing that he was about to be stuck with a fistful of one very lively and pissed-off entity. “What are you waiting for?”

What happened then happened with speed, and with no voluntary participation from the sprite at all. As its eyes began to open, it was as if some great force was already drawing it toward the ailing tree. The creature had no time to panic or resist; wham, bang, and it was gone. Sucked in as if by the backdraft of a Bullet Train.

Don showed his relief. “Thank God for that,” he said.

Then he fumbled in the pocket of his outdoor coat and brought out a spray can. He shook it, and the metal ball inside it rattled around noisily.

Raising his voice over the noise, he said, “Any chance you could go and meet your sister for me?”

“I thought you wanted to do it.”

“That was the plan. But something’s come up. There’s been a sighting.”

“You get sightings all the time. What’s so urgent about this one?”

Instead of replying, Don popped the cap from the can and sprayed a red X through the circle on the bark.

“See how that goes,” he said. Then: “Well? Can you do it?”

“I suppose.”

They started back down toward their vehicles. All had gone to plan. The errant sprite would settle in its new home and the woodland on Fiddler’s Point would gain a little character, in more senses than one.

They walked side-by-side now. Don said nothing, and seemed preoccupied.

Damien wondered.

What could deter a father from rushing to meet the daughter that he hadn’t seen in almost a year?

#

Ariane’s train was due to pass through their little rural halt at around four o’clock. When Damien’s pickup arrived in the lane beside the station, the train was just leaving. It was a branch line Sprinter service. Two little carriages that always looked as if they ought to be carrying goats and milk churns from one village to another.

For someone who’d been travelling for at least the past thirty-six hours, his big sister was looking remarkably fresh.

“No dad?” she said.

“He’s checking something out,” Damien said. “How was Borneo?”

Ariane slung her backpack into the pickup’s load bed and moved around to the passenger door.

“You know you’re on a loser when the lost tribe you’re studying wants to clear all your questions with its PR agent,” she said. “I want a pint mug of real tea and a hot bath. Let’s drive.”

Damien drove. She sat with her feet up on the dash and her head tilted back against the rest.

Ariane Ryan was a leggy, low-maintenance beauty with all the social poise that Damien knew he lacked. As soon as she’d been old enough, she’d been out there into the world. And with a vengeance. Borneo! Damien had once grown homesick on a school trip to Scarborough.

Without opening her eyes, she said, “So how is he?”

“He doesn’t get out so much now,” Damien said, “but he keeps busy. He’s making a database.”

“For what?”

“Every woodsprite and nature spirit that goes AWOL. A kind of Nature’s Most Wanted list. He’s got his silver-surfer mates up and down the country emailing him sightings.”

She turned her head and looked out of the window. She probably wanted to sleep but was too wound-up by her long journey to manage it. Damien glanced at her as they turned into the valley road.

Ariane was older than him, by a couple of years. Old enough to remember their mother. Damien had always been a little in awe of his sibling; while he went to the agricultural college, lived at home, and went out with local girls, she went away and got a degree and continued on to a doctorate, heading off to remote parts of the globe to study anthropology in the field.

Damien could barely imagine it. The valley had too much of a hold on him.

The valley was home. How do you turn your back on that?

#

Before the building of the dam and the flooding of part of the valley to make a reservoir, succeeding generations of the Ryan clan had lived scattered throughout the farmhouses and small villages on its lower slopes. The reservoir had wiped out all the villages, and time had taken care of the clan. Now there was just the family and they were, as Damien sometimes put it, pretty much the Last Ryans Standing.

Back at the time of the big relocation, most of them had moved to a small barracks of newly-built wooden cabins in an upland clearing. It was only supposed to be temporary, and it stayed temporary for the next seventy-five years until the stormy night that a lightning-struck ash came down onto a roof and started a fire that had spread to the other buildings.

No one had been hurt because, by then, most of the buildings were no longer occupied. Uncle Wilf had gone to a nursing home and the cousins had gone to live in Canada, leaving Don Ryan and his new bride to continue the line. After looking over the damage, the forestry people had decided to replace it with a modern timber lodge that would double as a Visitor Centre and the Head Ranger’s home.

Ariane got her pint of tea, and fell asleep in her hot bath. Damien had to bang on the door to rouse her for dinner.

They dined as they had in the old days whenever there was something to celebrate, in the rough and ready fashion of children who’d been brought up by their father alone; good food, with no finesse, and everybody mucking in to help. The meat sat on the table in the foil in which it had been cooked, and none of the crockery matched. A candle sat in a beer bottle. Don had iced some champagne, which they drank from school-style water glasses.

“Blame your brother for that one,” Don told Ariane. “I gave him your mother’s best crystal to wash, and he snapped every stem.”

After dinner, they moved through into the sitting room. It was fairly spectacular, with a rustic stone fireplace and a high angled ceiling of wooden beams. The architect had been thinking big and hoping for an award.

“Is anything wrong, dad?” Ariane said as they went. “You seem a bit out of it tonight.”

For a moment it looked as if Don was about to deny it and make some excuse.

But then he turned serious. “We have a problem to deal with,” he admitted.

“I knew it,” Damien said. “Ever since the break-in.” He turned to Ariane. “Whenever I asked him, he said there was nothing.”

“What break-in?” she said.

“It was about ten days ago,” Don said.

He went on to explain. Someone had got into the lodge and disturbed a few things. Up here in the woods and miles from anywhere, he and Damien tended to be lax about domestic security until the season got under way. When there were more strangers around, they took more care.

No great damage had been done. Some old clothes had been thrown around and a few of Don’s books had been pulled from the shelves, but the intruder couldn’t have known their value because none of the books was missing.

“I wanted to think that was all there was to it,” he said. “But this morning I got an email.”

It had come from one of the people that Damien referred to as ‘Don’s silver-surfer mates’. There were several dozen of them in a loose online community; in all corners of the land, mostly retired, all party to the Well-Guarded Secret and forever telling each other the same old stories that they’d told each other a hundred times before. Some had worked on the land. Others just had an interest in the subject.

One had posted a forum entry on the sighting of a particular errant earth spirit, way down south of here.

“It had started the change to human form,” Don said, picking up a book that he’d left out on the coffee table, “but the spotter picked up enough detail to identify it. Sylvanus Roscoe, of the genus Sylvani. That sounded familiar so I went to the shelves to look it up. When I came to the relevant entry, I found this.”

He showed them the opened book. About four of its pages had gone; ripped out in a hurry, and without much care.

Don said, “I had to get a friend at the Bodleian to scan their copy and send the pages to me.”

“Are you saying that this woodland spirit was behind your break-in?” Ariane said as he passed the scans of the missing pages over for them to see. The first showed a meticulous engraving of a puck-like creature. Not a piece of fantasy art, but a scientific illustration.

“This is not your usual woodland spirit,” Don said, “but an Elemental. And not just any old Elemental, but a prince among his kind. Folklore traditionally associates him with… ”

“The Blackwood Oak,” Damien read aloud.

#

Part Two:

In the visitor centre’s map room, Damien switched on all the lights so that they could look at the big display. The room’s centrepiece was an enlarged then-and-now map of the valley, surrounded by historic photographs from a time before the building of the dam.

Don said, “In the eighteen-nineties, they flooded this valley to make the new reservoir. It meant losing three villages and a forest that had been there since well before the civil war.”

He pushed one of the interactive buttons that had been set in a row along the bottom of the map, and a black-and-white photograph was spotlit. It showed people in old-time dress by the base of a magnificent tree, obviously a great tourist attraction of its day. Its trunk was the size of a small carousel and many of its roots were above-ground, as if it had tried to prise itself free of the earth. Iron props supported some of the longer branches.

“At the highest point of the forest stood the Blackwood Oak,” Don said. “They couldn’t dig it up, so they cut it down. The timber went to panel the staterooms on the Oceanic and the stump ended up at the bottom of the lake. And that’s how it stayed until a couple of months ago.”

Ariane said, “What changed?”

“Remember those earth tremors we had last October?”

“I wasn’t here.”

“So you weren’t. The dam sprung a few leaks. They’re draining the reservoir to repair them. You probably saw the machines on the drive from the station. Anybody want to tell me what that means?”

“If the water level drops far enough, we’ll see all the old ghost villages again,” Damien said.

“And the old forest,” Ariane said.

Now Damien was beginning to understand.

“Uh-oh,” he said.

“Any sprite, sylph or elemental that didn’t get out of that woodland will have been trapped under the lake for close on a hundred years,” Don said, at which point the timer on the interactive button cut out with a thunk and the photograph of the Blackwood Oak went back into shadow. He turned to them. “I’m not going to dress it up,” he said. “An Elemental in its human form could be one hell of a loaded gun.”

#

Later that evening, while Don was online and the dishwasher was dealing with the aftermath of dinner, Ariane joined Damien out on the deck. Moths danced below the outdoor light. Damien was leaning on the rail with a glass in his hand, looking out into the darkness of the forest.

Ariane had been studying the printout images of the stolen pages.

“What do you reckon?” she said.

Damien gave a little shrug of his shoulders. “Drive down, do the gig, bring Roscoe back,” he said. “Piece of cake.”

Ariane opened out the pages, and held them out under the light so that she could and read aloud from them.

“’The Elementals occupy a position between humans and pure spirits. Made of flesh and blood, they eat and sleep and procreate like humans do. But unlike mortals, they are long-lived, capable of superhuman speed and movement, and without immortal souls.’”

Damien tried not to seem too worried.

“Just another day on the ranch,” he said. “Hunting fairies with pickup truck and cattle prod.”

“Hey,” she said, and punched his arm. “That’s quite enough from you. Don’t ever let dad hear you using the ‘f’ word.”

Then she grew serious and leaned on the rail alongside him.

“So how is he?” she said, with a glance back into the lodge. “Really?”

“He gets lonely,” Damien said. “He’s got his mates online. And I’m here a lot of the time. But you know how it is. That can never be the same.”

#

Damien was out behind the lodge at dawn the next morning, loading up ready for the long drive south. The little birdcage affair that he used for wood sprites would be of no use on this trip, so he put that into storage and brought out the big cage that, by tradition, one of his great-uncles had made for the great Undine hunt of ‘22. He was struggling to get it off the hand-trolley and up onto the load bed when Ariane appeared and helped with the lifting.

They heaved, and on it went. The pickup bounced on its springs and everything in the load bed jumped.

“You’re up early,” he said. “I thought you’d be ready to sleep for a week.”

“No chance,” she said. “I’m coming with you.”

“Says who?”

“Says me. I thought we could make it like the old days.”

“Okay,” Damien said.

He fixed the cage in place and got the rest of the gear loaded. A tarpaulin to cover it. Ropes. His padded gloves. By the time they were ready to go, Don was up and about.

They shared some breakfast. Don gave them all the details and the contact information that he had, and then he walked out with them to the truck.

They stopped beside the cab and he said, “Look. I’m not going to insult you. You both know the score. Hunting these nature spirits can be a tough and dirty business. We try to use compassion, but there’s no room in it for sentiment. That’s why I want one of you to have this.”

He produced a heavy-looking flashlight. When he held it out, Damien saw that it also had two short pins on either side of the lens.

“That’s not just a flashlight, is it?” Damien said.

“It’s a stun gun,” Don said. “I bought it over the internet. So far I’ve never had to use it. You almost certainly won’t need it. But I want you to have with you it just in case.”

He handed it to Ariane. Then he turned to Damien.

“Look after your sister,” he said, and then he turned to Ariane. “And you look after your idiot brother.”

“Hey,” she said, snapping the stun gun on and off and making it crackle. “Watch out, world. Armed feminist.”

She stowed the stun gun under the passenger seat. Then they said their goodbyes and off they went.

When they reached the lakeside a few minutes later, Ariane turned to get a look at the water level. It was well down from the shore, and as it retreated had left a series of bands that resembled contour lines drawn directly onto the bed.

Somewhere out across the water, probably not even visible from here, the surface would be broken by a shallow island with the low stump of the Blackwood Oak.

They lost sight of the lake as the road descended by the dam. Here a mobile brew hut and some heavy machinery were marshalled in the shadow of the dam wall, looking like the world’s most functional carnival. The Water Board crew had to be brought out from the town and taken back at the end of every day. Eight or nine men in hard hats and safety jerkins, ferried back and forth by minibus.

Damien stopped to fill the pickup’s tank with diesel and then they were on their way, joining the A-road that would take them out of the region and onto the motorway network.

“I feel like some kind of hillbilly,” Damien admitted. “Heading for the big city to bring back a runaway pig.”

Ariane had her desert boots off and her feet back up on the dash, looking about as relaxed as it was possible to be under the circumstances.

“You need to get out more,” she said, and that was all that was said for quite a while; for although their trip was nothing special and its purpose routine, the stun gun under Ariane’s seat was Don’s reminder to them not to take the job lightly. They’d made the joke about hunting earth spirits with a pickup truck and cattle prod; but now, with an Elemental in their sights, that seemed to be exactly what they were about.

#

Four hours later, after just one break for a sandwich and a stretch and a wrong turn at a junction where Damien misread the numbers on the sign, they left the motorway and stopped in a service area to locate their destination. Traffic whizzed by on the far side of the wire. Damien’s head buzzed. All around them was asphalt, cars, and concrete.

“A do-it-yourself warehouse?” Ariane said.

“A superstore,” Damien said. “With a timber yard.”

“But of course.”

It was no coincidence that most of these places ran a seniors hiring policy. They needed savvy people in the woodyard, when disoriented nature spirits regularly turned up in timber shipments like tarantulas on banana boats.

It was evening when they pulled into the parking lot of the trading estate where the DIY Superstore was located. There were other businesses on the estate–a shoe store, a sportswear barn, a multiplex cinema–so there were plenty of cars and people about. They could wait around in the pickup until closing time without seeming conspicuous.

As the sky grew dark, the parking lot grew brighter and somehow more sinister. Cars came and went all the time. Every now and again, a few people would drift over from the Burger King or Pizza Hut to catch the start of a movie. Minutes later, a few more would make the reverse journey as the previous show ended.

Damien was startled by a knock on his window.

He lowered the glass.

“You must be Don’s kids,” the man said.

He was somewhere over sixty with pale blue eyes, thinned-out hair, and a grey beard with some traces of his old colour in it. He was wearing the striped shirt and red apron of the DIY chain’s staff uniform. It made him look like a refugee member of a barber shop quartet. According to a badge, his name was Edward and he was Happy to Help.

Damien said, “How did you spot us?”

“Ranger Service on the side of your truck and a big covered animal cage on the back,” the man said. “It wasn’t exactly rocket science. We’re closing up in twenty minutes. I’m going to stay behind. It’ll be easiest if you’re already inside.”

He told them where to hide themselves within the store, and then he went back in alone. They gave it a couple of minutes. Then Damien got his gloves and his sack, and Ariane the shock baton. Damien locked the pickup and they walked over.

As instructed, they hid themselves in a display conservatory when no one was watching; it was all glass, but there were bamboo blinds on all the windows. Once inside, Ariane slid the catch on the door.

The two of them sat in silence as the store closed down around them; the announcements, the music switching off, the final call, the last staff check and then the all-clear.

It was another half-hour or so before Edward came for them. Damien emerged first, feeling a little nervous.

“I’m the keyholder for tonight,” Edward said to them. “I’ve switched off the internal alarms. As long as we keep away from the main windows, we’ll have the place to ourselves.”

He led them through the store. It felt strange. Still bright, but emptier than empty.

Ariane said, “Who made the sighting?”

“One of the girls on the paint counter,” Edward said, looking back over his shoulder. “She’s been telling everyone she saw a ghost. But as soon as I heard the description, I knew there was something going on. I poked around a bit, and that’s how I found this.”

“This” was in a corner of the section where hardboard, plywood and sawn timber were stored. A tall entranceway hung with heavy plastic flaps led to a staff-only area with a forklift and all the packing debris from the week’s deliveries.

In amongst the debris, someone–something–had put together pallets and boards and cardboard to make a kind of den or a nest. They took turns peeking in through the entranceway. It was a strangely comfortable-looking bolthole, and it had been furnished with items from all over the store… a battery-powered lamp, a picnic set, a lightweight sleeping bag from the outdoor section. And, in the corner, opened packets and a lot of stale cake.

An Elemental in its native shape needed none of these. But the longer it was abroad, the closer it would grow to human form.

After he’d taken a look, Damien turned to Edward and said, “What makes you so sure this isn’t just the work of some homeless kid who’s found himself a warm place to hide?”

“Well,” Edward said. “The girl said that she’d seen a green teenager. Said he walked right past her after closing time but when they checked the tape, you could see her looking at someone. But on the tape, she was alone.”

“Is she still working here?”

“What do you think?”

“It’s our boy, all right,” Ariane said. She’d found some papers under the sleeping bag. Now she showed them to Damien.

They were the torn pages from their father’s reference book. The first showed the early engraving of Sylvanus Roscoe that they’d already seen. Along with the text there were other illustrations; a crude carving, an aerial photograph of an earthwork figure, a black-and-white reproduction of one of the Victorian fairy paintings of Atkinson Grimshaw.

“So where is he now?” Damien said.

“He goes out and forages,” Edward said. “Don’t ask me what for. I haven’t been able to work it out.”

Their host led them up to the manager’s office. In here were CCTV monitors with camera feeds from key areas of the store, and a cupboard with long-play VHS tapes covering the past thirty days.

“We can wait here and watch for him,” Edward said.

“But we’ve already established that TV cameras won’t pick up an Elemental,” Ariane said. “They just won’t see him.”

“True,” Edward said. “But I’ve looked at tapes for the past few nights, and they’re starting to pick up something. As he approaches human, he’s starting to register.”

They kept the lights at a minimum in the manager’s office, and when they spoke it was in the lowest of tones.

Edward looked on with some concern as Damien checked over the gloves and the extra-sized sack that he’d brought along.

“That seems kind of extreme,” Edward said, “Why don’t you try talking to him first?”

“My great-uncle Harry nearly made that mistake,” Damien said. “He thought he was talking down a nature spirit, turned out that he’d cornered one of the Sluagh. That’s the Host of the Unforgiven Dead. He was lucky to get out of it with his skin on.” Damien looked at Ariane for support, only to see that something seemed to be troubling her.

“What?” he said.

“What does he want?” she said. “He’s come all this way. He’s made himself a base, here. He goes out every night and searches for something. What’s he looking for?”

“Trust me,” Damien said. “I’ve done this often enough. You don’t waste time in conversation. What does it matter what he’s looking for? You have to grab your chance as soon as you see it. With an Elemental, you might not get another.”

#

It was Ariane who saw the first sign of movement on one of the screens; a ripple down one of the aisles that in a recording could easily have been taken for a crease in the tape. Moving in silence, Damien shifted to the window of the manager’s office and looked down onto the sales floor.

There it was; just disappearing from view, heading into the timber section and, to Damien’s dismay, wearing one of his old overcoats.

“The cheek of it!” he whispered, as the figure flitted away and out of sight.

They descended from the office to the sales floor. It was almost as bright down here now as at any time during the shopping day; lights were left on all night in order to deter intruders and thieves. Without darkness, they’d no cover. Something which didn’t seem to trouble their quarry this evening.

The three of them reached the hanging plastic barrier. Edward held one of the heavy flaps aside and the others eased through the gap ahead of him. No one had spoken since they’d left the office. Damien noticed that, despite her reservations, his sister had the combined flashlight and shock baton ready in her hand.

Sylvanus Roscoe had gone to ground in his den. He’d switched on the electric lantern and they could hear the sound of cellophane wrapping being opened. He sounded busy.

Damien signalled to the others to spread out and stand ready. Silently, he opened up the mouth of the sack and laid it on the ground. Then he drew on the animal handling gloves.

Chopping the air silently with his hand, he counted. One, two, three. Then he heaved the wooden pallet away so that it fell forward with a crash, exposing the tableau within.

Roscoe was sitting on his unrolled sleeping-bag, knees up, overcoat cinched around him by its knotted belt, his bare legs rattling loose in a pair of the superstore’s Wellington boots. He was unwrapping more cake. A knitted cap had been pulled over his head, covering the tips of his ears. At first glance he might pass for a boy. But his features were pointed. Nose, cheekbones, chin… unnaturally pointed, as if carved in hard angles.

And he was green. Not a vivid green; not even a green that you’d notice if the light wasn’t good. More as if his skin had been dusted with it.

Damien hesitated. He was used to weaselly sprites, all kicking and teeth, that he could grab by the scruff of the neck and thrust into a bag. Sylvanus Roscoe was looking him right in the eye.

Then he moved.

Boy, did he move.

With a speed that seemed to cut through the air, he turned and reached around for something in the back of his den. He didn’t find it. His hand moved here, there, almost too fast to follow. He spun back to face them again.

Ariane called out, “Is this what you’re looking for?” And she held up the pages from Don’s book.

Roscoe stared. And then he launched at her, so fast that he’d reached her before anyone else could even move; she hadn’t even begun to raise the stun baton when he’d snatched the pages from her hand and, with a terrific bound, passed right over her.

She’d later say that she was aware of only a blur. Damien saw Roscoe switch his plane of movement entirely, running horizontally along the shelving before righting himself and dropping to the floor behind her.

Then he was off.

Damien pushed past Ariane and gave chase, out of the forklift area and into the main part of the store. He couldn’t see Roscoe but he could hear those Wellingtons slapping on the vinyl floor. He was aware of Ariane somewhere behind him, moving on to take one of the other aisles. They’d already left Edward some way behind.

Damien ran along the ends of the aisles, looking down each in turn. He came out into an open area with lawnmowers and barbecues on display. He stopped and listened; he had to still his breathing, which was ragged and loud, to give himself a chance of hearing anything.

He couldn’t hear Roscoe’s running footsteps any more. Which meant that either the Elemental had outrun him and was gone, or had stopped and was listening for him in turn.

Damien took a step, keeping it silent and looking all around. Ahead of him was the gardening section, with bags of peat and garden tools. To his left, on the other side of a sliding glass door, the area where they sold outdoor plants and garden furniture.

He took another step and then suddenly the glass door began to open, unbidden, startling him; Damien realised that he’d moved within range of its motion sensor and triggered it off. In the silence of the huge building, it was like a tumbling stack of books in a library. He turned back to resume his search of the store…

And there was Roscoe, running straight at him.

The doors had begun to close. Damien realised that Roscoe was aiming for the opening. On the other side of the glass was open night air and a high security fence with razor wire along the top of it; enough to deter a normal intruder, but small beer to someone who could run sideways along a vertical wall as if it was just another floor.

Roscoe hurdled a patio set. He went by so close and so fast that Damien could feel the breeze of his passing. But he couldn’t move quickly enough to grab him.

No matter. The glass doors had continued to close. Just as the Elemental went undetected by the store’s CCTV, he was invisible to the door’s sensors.

Roscoe mistimed and hit the glass so hard that Damien couldn’t believe it didn’t break.

The Elemental bounced, and landed flat on his back. The book pages, the ones that he’d snatched back from Ariane, were still clutched in his fist. Damien saw his chance. He ran over and threw himself onto the sprite, pinning him down. It wasn’t very elegant and it wasn’t dignified, but it got the job done.

There wasn’t much to the creature. He tried to struggle. Damien realised that, fast as he was, he wasn’t strong. He’d very little mass. But by the same token, like a spider surviving a fall, he hadn’t suffered much in the collision.

Ariane came out of one of the aisles at a run, summoned by the racket.

“I’ve got him!” Damien called to her. “Find me something to tie him with!”

She looked around, and saw a shelf of baling twine. As she crossed toward it, the sensors were triggered and the doors began to open again.

It was then that Roscoe pulled a trick that Damien had never seen before; in a brief, big-effort and highly effective transformation, he inflated his face into something golden-eyed and horrific. Only inches from Damien’s own, the effect was momentarily terrifying.

He lost his grip on the sprite. In a second the boy was out from under him, and racing for the opening.

Ariane sensed him as he passed behind her. By the time she was turning around, he was out and the doors were closing behind him. Damien scrambled to his feet and launched after. He and Ariane emerged into the sales yard just in time to look up and see Roscoe at the top of the fence.

He’d just cleared the razor wire and was starting to drop. His skinny legs were cycling in the air. The stolen coat had filled up and was flapping wide. He seemed to float down, and staggered only slightly when he hit the ground.

He looked back at them.

Then he recovered and was off across an empty stretch of the car park, passing from one pool of light to another.

“He stole my coat,” was all Damien could say.

“He should have stolen some underwear while he was about it,” Ariane said.

They trudged back into the store. Edward had caught up with them and had seen the last part of the escape through the glass.

He said, “Will you go after him?”

“There isn’t much point,” Damien said. “He’s away by now. We’ll need to wait for another sighting and then find him where he next goes to ground. I’d better call dad.”

He took out his phone and moved a few steps away, leaving Ariane and Edward making small talk. There was an atmosphere of disappointment, and he felt that it was his fault. They’d come all this way, and then he’d messed up.

“Dad?” he said. “We lost him.”

“What happened?”

So Damien explained. Don pushed him for more detail. His father didn’t forgive him, exactly, but only because he seemed to share in the blame as well as the disappointment.

“I should have briefed you better,” he said.

Damien said, “Shall we come home?”

“No,” Don said. “Not yet. Is Ted there?”

Ted? Damien realised that he meant Edward. Damien waved to catch the older man’s eye and then handed him the phone.

Edward listened to Don for a while. He didn’t say much other than to agree with him a couple of times.

Then he said, “No problem. I’ve got plenty of room.”

#

After the conversation with his son, Don Ryan rubbed his hand over his short-cropped hair and paced up and down in the lodge’s kitchen where he’d taken the call. His footsteps echoed on the tiles. This place was too big all around. Sometimes he felt more like its caretaker than a person who could call it home. Sometimes he just yearned for the old ramshackle cabins that had stood on this spot, and in which he’d grown up. Those were simpler times. When Damien was away and he was left here alone, the feeling was ten times worse.

What to do.

He’d never had to deal with a problem quite like this one before. Elementals were usually fine as long as you respected them and let them be. But trapping an earth spirit under a lake for a century or more–who could say how that would affect its disposition? Don tried to imagine being confined in the dark for a hundred years, deprived of all senses and unable to move, but he couldn’t. If such a thing were to happen to him, he’d probably go mad.

And if that proved to be the case with Sylvanus Roscoe, that was where the danger lay. Elementals were powerful. They were easily the most complex of the nature spirits. Some of their urges could be childish, their emotions overwhelming. Even their love could be terrifying; he tried to picture that same power channelled into a mass of negative feeling, and his imagination just wasn’t up to it.

He felt responsible. He was responsible. Retired or not, this was still his valley. In a few days’ time, Roscoe would be able to pass for human. There would be no more sightings then.

Don went into his study. He switched on his laptop and waited for it to boot and hook up with the wi-fi, wondering how many of his people were likely to be online at this hour. Quite a few, probably; the hard core of old men like himself, their lives filled and their memories vivid and their minds too active to be ready to let go. Talking about the old times, griping about the new, keeping alive names that the world had forgotten.

He found five of them online and active. They included Brownlow up in New York State and Toni over in Finland. When he joined the forum, they were trading off-topic messages about the film career of Agnes Moorehead. Don wrote up a quick summary of his problem, hit send, and waited. Responses and suggestions started to arrive within minutes, but none of the gang had anything useful to offer; it quickly descended into a grousing session about civilians in water management all over the world.

He signed out and went into the visitor centre, where he stood with the lights off looking out of the big panorama window. Whenever there was a moon, it was possible to see its reflection in the lake. But the sky was cloudy and there was no moon, just an occasional pearly cloud-glow where the moon ought to be.

After fretting about it for a while, he went and got Damien’s Ranger-issue night vision binoculars. He was halfway down the hill in the Land Rover before he remembered that yet again, he hadn’t locked up the lodge.

He often didn’t. It was an old habit from those less worrisome times. Well, he didn’t plan to be out for long. He drove down to the lakeshore and along until he reached a wide strip of fine shale that made a kind of freshwater beach. By day this was probably the most popular picnic spot in the valley.

There he parked, killed the Rover’s lights, and stepped out with the night glasses in his hand.

Thanks to the lowered water level, the shale beach was five or six times its usual width. Don raised the night glasses and looked out across the water; darkness that was impenetrable to the eye now sprang out in vivid green detail. Sky, shore and water were all clearly distinguishable. He hunted around at maximum magnification and eventually found it; the uncovered island on which the Blackwood Oak had once stood, no more than three or four feet of outcrop with a flattened top that had to be the stump.

Something obscured his vision for a moment. He reacted by lowering the glasses and looking, but of course that was of no help at all. So he decreased the magnification and looked through the glasses again.

Now the view was too wide and he couldn’t see the island, or much of anything else; he was picking up all kinds of movement but most of that was reflections from the water.

He lowered the glasses, and waited for his eyes to adjust. Somewhere up above the cloud parted and let a little moonlight through, which helped.

As he became more attuned to the darkness, he began to make out a figure that was standing between him and the water.

He looked again with the night vision glasses, and saw nothing there. Which set his eyesight back and meant that he’d have to wait for it to adjust all over again. This time he switched off the power to the binoculars, in case he forgot himself a second time.

There was definitely a figure standing there. A figure that electronic glasses did not see.

“Miriam,” he said in a low voice.

No more than a dim shape against the lake, the figure moved closer. As it moved, it made no sound. It stopped some distance from him, and waited.

“It’s not for me,” he said. “It’s the kids. I think they’re going to need some help.”

#

The next morning, Edward was up and moving around before anyone else. Damien was aware of him tiptoeing past the sofa to get to the tiny house’s kitchen. Crunched up on the sofa with pillows and a spare duvet, wondering if his sleeping posture was going to give him a case of DVT, Damien shifted his position a little to relieve the leg cramps but kept his head down and his eyes shut. At least until he began to smell real coffee, followed shortly afterward by the smell of frying bacon.

Ariane came down about fifteen minutes later, lured by the same airborne incentive and looking ready for the day. Edward had fixed her up with his spare room, after bringing the Ryans home to the two-bedroomed Victorian terraced house that he’d once shared with a wife named Enid and now shared with a cat called Skipper. The furniture and the décor were all Enid’s taste. The widescreen TV and the multimedia PC were Edward’s more recent additions.

“I always like to start the day with a cooked breakfast,” Edward said.

“So do I,” Damien said. “But it’s very rare that I ever get one.”

His phone rang.

“It’s dad,” he said, and everyone fell quiet as he answered the call.

Damien listened for a long time. Then he said, “Ted? Can you check your email?” and then went on listening as his father continued to speak. He could see Ariane watching him, trying to read something out of his changing expression.

When Don finished the call, Damien closed up his phone and looked at Ariane and said, “Apparently it’s all in the painting.”

“What painting?” Ariane said.

“I’ve got it right here,” Edward called from the next room.

They went through. Edward was seated at the workstation in the corner. Don had mailed them a link. On Edward’s screen was a picture that Damien thought he recognised, and which Ariane immediately identified.

“It’s the Atkinson Grimshaw painting,” she said. “It was on one of the pages from the book.”

And so it was. On the torn page, it had been in black and white. Here it was in colour, and accompanied by different text.

Damien said, “Can you make it bigger?”

Edward clicked, and the thumbnail image was replaced by one that more than filled the screen.

John Atkinson Grimshaw. A Yorkshireman, and a self-taught late Victorian painter of townscapes and landscapes and middle-class women in gardens. Not the most prominent of the fairy painters, but one whose choice of subjects reflected the market of his day.

This one was called The Fairy Bride’s Abduction and showed a canvas crowded with figures, most of them involved in the business of the title. An ugly horde of twisted creatures were carrying off a fairy–depicted as a barely-grown woman with dragonfly wings, her nubile form clad in little more than a veil–while others held back a struggling creature who was attempting to interfere. Over it all stood a great dark figure, one arm outflung in a pointing gesture, clearly in charge of the atrocity.

As a picture, it was hard to read. There was so much going on that the eye kept getting drawn off into some detail… this elf pulling the hat off another, that hobgoblin falling back into the brambles, something unnameable riding piggyback on the shoulders of something indescribable. In the background were some buildings, and in the few uncrowded inches of canvas beyond the buildings were a tiny patch of landscape and a moonlit sky.

“You could get a headache just looking at this,” Damien said. “I wonder what dad expects us to make of it?”

“Look at that figure, there,” Ariane said. “Don’t you recognise him?”

She had Edward reposition the image on the screen so that the struggling male figure was central. Two evil creatures were holding his arms and another had him about the waist. Every line of his being suggested that he was straining to reach the abducted sylph; every line of hers indicated her inability to resist the forces that were carrying her off.

The struggling figure was green; his face a mask of fury, his eyes a raging gold.

“That’s Roscoe,” Damien said blankly.

And so it was. Sylvanus Roscoe, in his unaltered, natural, non-
human form.

“You realise what this means,” Ariane said. “If that’s a recognisable likeness, then it must have been drawn from life. What’s the date on it?”

Edward read it out.

“Just before the valley was flooded,” Ariane said excitedly. “Look at those buildings in the background! Don’t you recognise them? Dad’s dug the albums out and showed them to us often enough!”

Damien probably wouldn’t have spotted it without prompting. But now that he looked–yes, she was right. They very much resembled the wooden cabins in which the Ryan clan had been rehoused after the construction of the dam. Moonlight shone through the roof of one of them. In the painting, the buildings were unfinished.

Ariane said, “The artist saw Roscoe. He obviously went to the valley around the time when the cabins were built. What if the rest of it’s true as well?”

“What? The whole kidnapping thing?”

“A historical record.”

Damien was beginning to feel a little overwhelmed.

Edward said, “It would explain what’s been driving him.”

They looked at the older man. His was gazing at the screen. He moved the mouse, repositioning the image so that Sylvanus Roscoe and the Fairy Bride were both in frame. Even though most would assume the scene to be fanciful, the distress of the two separated creatures was evident and real.

“He’s been in the dark all this time,” Edward said. “So for him, this is like yesterday. Someone took her from him and he’s set out to find her. He thinks he’s on a rescue mission. This painting is the only clue that he has.”

#

Part Three:

It was neither the most accomplished nor the most famous picture in the city gallery, but it was one of the most popular. When a new-broom curator had taken the decision to retire it to the basement stacks because she considered it second-rate art, the resulting local outcry ensured that the picture stayed in its place and the new curator didn’t.

It was an enormous canvas. Postcards and textbook reproductions couldn’t do it justice. It occupied almost the entire end wall of one wing of the building. There was a rope barrier to discourage touchers, and a low padded bench in the middle of the room for the weak and weary. In the soft light from a glass roof above, the woodland tableau was there to be observed from ten until six every day.

As Damien and Ariane entered the wing, they could see a solitary figure on the bench before the painting. It was mid-morning. They’d encountered no more than three or four people on their way through the gallery, and two of those had been members of staff.

Roscoe was a small figure before the enormous canvas. Much smaller than his painted self. He was still in the stolen overcoat, with the knitted hat pulled down to cover the pointed tips of his ears. He didn’t move or react as Damien and Ariane approached the bench and sat, one to either side of him.

Ariane said, “Painted over a hundred years ago.”

“From life,” Roscoe said.

Damien said, “You know what we’re here for.”

Roscoe took in a deep breath, and finally looked down from the picture. His features had softened a little in the hours since they’d chased him.

“Whenever you’re ready,” he said.

“As simple as that?”

Without looking up, Roscoe nodded.

Ariane said, “Don’t you want to tell someone the story?”

#

Outside the city gallery, there stood a city park. They walked out of the great doors, down stone steps flanked by white stone urns, and found a place to sit by a shallow pool with a fountain that looked as if it was never turned on.

Roscoe looked at the dead leaves floating and said, “We can only be as we are. My nature is to fly at any challenge that I face. I thought that if I seized my opportunity and moved with speed, I would surely prevail. Now I can see that it was a hopeless task and that whatever effort I might have made, it would have been in vain. Sometimes there are things that are lost, that we cannot hope to regain. Accepting that is hard.”

He looked down. Damien was finding this strange. Here they were in a slightly run-down park in the middle of a city; not neglected, but frazzled at the edges as public spaces always are. Behind them was the public building that housed all the city’s art treasures, such as they were. Roscoe looked like a scruffy modern boy. But he spoke like the ancient prince that he was. Ariane seemed unfazed by the oddity of it; but she’d travelled so much farther, and seen so much more.

Roscoe went on, “I’ll tell you the tale. And when it’s ended, you can take me back. I slept in the darkness while the world moved on. Now that I know what I know, I will welcome the chance to return.

“I lived in the valley, in the Blackwood Oak. Time meant nothing to us there. To leave is to become mortal, and to become mortal is to die.

“I was counted a prince among my kind. One of the duties of a prince is to marry, and to choose his bride with care. I was lucky. For me, love and duty were as one. I wooed a Dryad, from the willow circle on the hill. Her name was Elaby.

“On the night of our wedding, there was a remarkable appearance. A group of the most distant guests brought in a soul that they had found and at first taken for dead by the roadside. She had been making her way to the valley. Elaby recognised her as Eithna, one of her sisters, disappeared and long thought lost.

“We halted the celebrations and gathered to hear her story. Some had believed her captured, and this turned out to be the case. She told of being tricked and then trapped in a sack.”

Here he looked pointedly at Damien, who had the decency to shrug and look embarrassed.

“Who trapped her?” Ariane said.

“She spoke of being taken to a camp in a meadow. She said there was a caravan, and there were horses. A ring of fire encircled the camp. Beyond the ring of fire there were presences that she could not see.

“She was confined in iron and interrogated. Her captor was a tall man. A dark man.”

Damien thought of the shadowy figure in the painting, standing over all and giving orders to the horde.

“Eithna was defiant. She told him that she belonged to one of the oldest and the strongest groups of folk in the land. She believed that we would soon be arriving to rescue her. We are a gentle people. But in force we can be formidable.

“Her defiance was in vain. No one came for her because at that moment, none of us knew that she was gone. And by the time that she was missed and we started to search, the dark man and his accomplices had hitched up their horses and doused all the fires and the long journey south had begun.

“All along the way, she protested. And little did she realise it at the time… but the more she threatened him and boasted of our community, the more interested the dark man became.

“Eventually they reached their destination. She said they called it the Sunshine Farm. It was a place of horror.

“It was a place where our kind were confined and tortured and studied to find out what makes us as we are. The dark man exchanged his coat for a white one and Eithna found herself in the company of others like herself, who’d been captured in other parts of the land. All were subject to the same treatment. All were the objects of his research.

“Some were in a poor state. It was whispered that when their secrets were all known and their use was finally exhausted, they would be classified and then held in a preserved state that was like a living death.

“Eithna glimpsed such horrors in her time at the Sunshine Farm. Nature spirits in jars with their light dulled to a faint, eternal glow. Lesser forms dead and pinned to boards in case after case, as men do with butterflies.

“She’d abandoned her hopes of rescue, but resolved to escape before her strength waned. At every session she cursed her tormentor, and spat out threats about the anger of her people.

“Then, one day, she was taken from her storeroom to the dark man’s laboratory, and there she was left alone. The dark man did not come, and the room was not secured. At first she could not believe her good fortune.

“She seized her opportunity and escaped from the Sunshine Farm. She was far from the ancient woodland and had seen nothing of the journey down, and her instincts were weakened. But in crossing the country she came upon the great iron way, and followed it North; and in time the countryside softened and became ever more familiar. As she drew closer to home, she could feel some of her strength returning. The damage that she had suffered was great.

“Her best chance of recovery was to be returned to the willow circle, to which she belonged. But it was not to be.

“As Eithna reached the part of her story that concerned her home-coming, those of us listening became aware of a dark and growing presence surrounding the wood. At first it had gone unnoticed, so caught up were we in the horrors of her tale.

“I was the first to realise that her escape had been no accident. We are an elusive people and until now her captor had been an opportunist collector, making forays into the countryside and gathering his specimens in ones and twos.

“He was not intimidated by her threats of our numbers, but intrigued by them. He had contrived her escape in order to follow her to us, and he had not come alone. We were about to discover the true and terrible nature of his accomplices.

“A baying went up all around. It was designed to cause panic and dismay, and it had its effect.

“Within moments, we were being overrun. We had no time to prepare ourselves or to flee. It was here that we learned how Eithna’s captor, the owner of the Sunshine Farm, held command over the Sluagh, the Host of the Unforgiven Dead.”

As the boy spoke the name, Damien flinched. He couldn’t help it. The Sluagh were powerful, bitter, pitiless, and without any fear. The unforgiven dead were creatures with nothing to lose.

“We had no opportunity to resist, and no chance of escape,” Roscoe said. “We were corralled into the willow circle and held there by the Sluagh, while men and women with lanterns dispersed themselves through the woods all around us. Wherever we looked, we saw a waiting light. It was an organised and well-planned attack.

“For a few moments, nothing happened. Then the circle opened and into it walked the dark man. Eithna had said little to describe him, but I knew him on sight.

“He moved slowly, taking his time. He carried a silver-tipped cane and as he passed among us, he used it to point; indicating some of us, passing others over.

“When he came to the spot where I was holding onto Elaby, my fairy bride, he stopped. We’d been forced to sit on the ground and one of the Sluagh was keeping a close watch over us, daring me to move.

“The dark man raised his cane and pointed to Elaby. He did not point at me. Then he moved on.

“The Sluagh who’d been watching me obviously knew that I’d give trouble, and now seized me around the waist. Two more caught my arms as Elaby was taken away. I realised later that the dark man had a special fascination for those of our kind who most resembled human women.

“Much as I fought, and much as she struggled to hold on, Elaby and I were parted.

“I was overpowered, and she was borne away. Normally we make no sound. But I could hear her screams, and the screams of the others, from all the way down the valley.

“In the hours and the days that followed, I grew to understand the magnitude and the organisation of the dark man’s design. This was no one-off raid. It was a campaign, planned for the long term and to serve as a model for others. He’d recruited the Sluagh for the purpose, and rehearsed his forces in advance. He had even brought along an artist to record the event for the generations yet to come.

“The Sluagh had been left behind, posted in an impenetrable cordon. The dark man’s aim was to contain our woodland as an exclusive preserve, to be quarried for new material whenever his researches required it.

“Not a day passed without me making some effort to follow and find Elaby. Others tried to leave the valley and were even less lucky than I. The Sluagh would terrify, damage, and ultimately destroy any being who tried to pass through their lines, dragging the horrifying remains of their victims to the heart of the woods where they’d be left on display as a warning to the rest of us.

“Every now and again the dark man would return and make a new selection, his forces beating the woodland folk out of our refuges and taking certain ones away. But nothing ever equalled that first terrible purge.

“I hatched a plan. One time I managed to follow the raiding party with their captives, and to hang onto the underside of the dark man’s carriage. Gone were the horses, and here instead was machinery; the sudden noise of it startled me and I was thrown into the road, where I was discovered. The Sluagh gave me a mauling and threw me back into the woodland, where the others found me after a while.

“I was close to death. They placed me on a litter and carried me to the Blackwood Oak, so that I might return to it and be healed.

“The healing process took so long that by the time I was well enough to stir, the oak had been cut back and what remained was under water. I could not move. My home had become my prison.

“Time meant nothing. It was as if I dreamed. But the moment when I sensed that the waters had fallen and the oak was exposed, I leapt from my place.

“There was the first of my shocks. Instead of the valley that I knew, I found a lake. I dared not sink. I ran across its surface as if it were a piece of glass, until I reached the land.

“More uncertainty awaited me there. So much had changed. I called the names of those I knew, and none replied. I made my way up to the willow circle, but the circle was gone. In its place stood a great building of timber and glass.”

“The lodge,” Ariane said.

“I entered the building. I searched for some clue to what had been before. I found books.”

“Are you telling me you can read?” Damien said.

“The pictures told me all that I needed to know. These were the books written by the dark man and his kind. These were the results of their studies. I found myself in there. I found a reference to the raid.

“I continued to believe that there was hope. I set out and followed the iron road south, using it to guide me toward the Sunshine Farm as Eithna had to find her way back to the valley.

“But the Sunshine Farm is gone. Eithna is gone. Elaby is gone. All have gone and only that painting and I remain. If you wish to be kind, then leave me out here. Then I can grow mortal. Then I can die.”

“We can’t do that,” Damien said. “The land’s been stripped of too much as it is.”

“You’re part of the valley,” Ariane said. “It needs you. I’m sorry.”

“Then put me back,” Roscoe said. “The waters will rise and I’ll sleep again, and perhaps this pain will stop.”

#

He walked with them to the pickup, which Damien had left on a meter in a square a couple of streets away. Their time was expired but they’d missed getting a ticket. Roscoe climbed into the narrow seat in the back of the cab, and they set off for home.

Little was said on the journey. Roscoe lay across the back seat, curled up, eyes open, seeing nothing. When they stopped for diesel, Ariane took Damien’s phone and walked away from the fuel court to call their father.

Damien was waiting with the engine running when she got back to the pickup. She reported that Don had heard the story through to the end and then told her to call again when they were closer to home.

“Time’s getting short,” she said. “He says they’ve finished the dam repairs and closed the sluices. The lake’s already rising. There’s no saying how long before the Blackwood Oak goes back under.”

Roscoe had turned around, his back toward them. He stayed that way for the rest of the journey.

#

It was getting dark when they arrived. Ariane had made the second call as they’d left the motorway network, and they were met by Don waiting on the lakeshore with a boat. It was a small dinghy with an outboard. It belonged to the Ranger Service and was usually kept in a padlocked boat house.

Roscoe climbed in without a word. He sat alone at the front of the boat on the journey across the water, looking out toward his island in the fading light and evening mist. Damien felt a pang of sadness for him; he glanced at Ariane and was about to say as much, but saw that she was subdued to a point close to tears. Seeing the extent of her upset, he found that his own had suddenly become more intense. It seemed better not to risk speaking at all.

When they reached the oak, the islet was all but gone and the waves were beginning to wash across the sawn-off surface of the stump. It made an uneven platform, with the jagged planes and lines of the old saw-cuts still evident. The timber had been blackened by its long immersion, but hadn’t rotted.

Damien wondered how his father had managed to navigate out to it in the gloom. It was at no more than fifteen feet across, although it probably widened out more under the water.

There was nowhere to tie up. Don had to keep them close with short bursts from the outboard motor every time the wind and the waves tried to carry them away.

He called forward, “Do you know what to do?”

Sylvanus Roscoe seemed not to hear him, but it was of no matter. He appeared to understand what was required. He rose in the boat and stepped up onto the side, his weight barely tipping it as he balanced with ease on the narrow rail. He was an incongruous figure, still wearing the wool cap and stolen overcoat and with his skinny legs rattling loose in the Wellington boots from the DIY store. He was looking down at the remnant of the once-great oak; then without warning he seemed to let himself fall toward it, toppling smoothly forward with his arms by his sides.

In a second it was over. Roscoe was gone and the coat and boots were floating.

Damien hauled in the sodden coat, Ariane grabbed one of the boots, and Don gave a few blips on the outboard to chase the other as it drifted away. The hat had already sunk and there was no sign of it at all.

“Well, that’s that,” Don said.

He engaged the outboard, took them around the Blackwood Oak in a broad circle, and headed back toward the shore.

#

For Ariane it was the second homecoming in just a few days, but this one was much more subdued than the last. This despite the fact that, as retrieval operations went, it had been one of their most difficult and successful ever.

All the same, there was no sense of celebration. Ariane curled up in a seat in a corner and leafed through some of the books in her father’s library, while Damien put on a fleece and went out onto the deck.

When Don had finished composing a lengthy post to his forum, he came out to join him.

“All sent?” said Damien.

“Just the bones of it,” said Don.

They sat on the deck furniture in silence for a while, looking out into the evening.

Then Damien said, “Why didn’t we stop him?”

His father considered for a moment. Then he said, “I’m not sure I know what you mean.”

“This dark man. Whatever his name was.”

“Sir Norman Slingsby,” Don said.

Damien looked at him in surprise.

“Professor Slingsby,” Don said, “later Lord Slingsby. Author of The Romance and Superstitions of the English Counties. The book that Ariane’s looking through right now.”

“Look,” Damien said. “I know I’m the stupid one in the family. But we’ve looked after this valley for ten generations. How could he come and go, and do all those things he did, without our people knowing or doing anything about it?”

“Because we were helping him,” Don said quietly, looking out into the evening air and not at Damien.

“What?” Damien said. “What do you mean?”

“We were part of it. We, us, the family. He couldn’t have managed any of it without the family’s co-operation. Who do you think was carrying the lanterns?”

“But why would we–they–why would they do that?”

“Different days,” Don said. “Different times. I wasn’t there, and I’m not going to speak for anyone else. But everything we know today, it comes from what we learned back then. I’m not saying it wasn’t cruel. I’m not saying it wasn’t wrong. I’m just saying that’s how it is.”

“That makes me feel like crap,” Damien said.

“Try not to think about it too much,” Don said. “I don’t.”

And he went back inside.

#

The City Art Gallery and Museum, founded in part with the Slingsby Bequest, occupies a building that had once been a mid-sized country house with an extensive estate. Back then, it had stood outside the town by some way. But the town had grown, and the estate had been sold off one field at a time, until eventually a new city surrounded it and only a park remained.

In its heyday the estate was self-sufficient, with a large kitchen garden and a dairy herd. The dairy buildings were painted an ochrous yellow, inspiring local children to call it The Sunshine Farm. With some older people the name is in use to this day, even though the outbuildings in question are long gone.

By the time the house and land were gifted to the city, the Slingsbys had more or less abandoned it. It was a damp and draughty place then; grimy classical in style, but architecturally undistinguished. The upstairs rooms were taken over as offices for various departments of the council, and the reception rooms became exhibition space.

Aside from the occasional wet-weekender or school party, the permanent exhibition draws about as much attention as any other regional rag-tag cultural assortment of its kind.

No one has been in the basement for years. No member of the public, anyway. The basement is where they store all the inherited bric-a-brac of the museum; exhibits of little interest or academic value, that wouldn’t look out of place in job lots at a country auction.

The only visitors ever to unlock the unmarked door and descend the stairway are maintenance people, following some pipe for leaks or looking for a junction box. On those rare occasions, doors are opened and lights are switched on in one room or another, throwing a few beams into areas that otherwise know only darkness.

Typical of the content of those rooms is the collection that can be found stored at the back of one of them. Right up against a wall, and inaccessible behind two broken pennyfarthings and an incomplete human skeleton. There are boxes of files and ledgers, case after case of specimen boards, and jars of a preserving fluid long grown too murky to see through.

The Slingsby Bequest. Forgotten, ignored… and left far behind by the science that it was created to serve.

Time moves on, fashions change. Yesterday’s hot topic is today’s academic dead end. So the collection stands in darkness, and silently gathers dust.

Mice shred the records to line their nests. Spiders throw webs between the boxes, like fine ships’ rigging.

And every now and again, should a door open and some stray light briefly fall across one or another of the jars, something within it will stir.

Fiction: The Four Hundred Thousand by Livia Llewellyn

Part I

I stand on the balcony outside my parent’s cinder-block apartment, watching contrails drift apart in slate skies. My left hand grips a just-delivered letter, crushes it. I can’t help it, the tracking device that the officer has shot into my hand makes it impossible to uncurl my fingers just yet. It burns.

By direction of the President… the following personnel are ordered to active duty… on that date, the named will proceed to ______ __ Military Facilities for the retrieval of said personnel out of Jet Oberaan(yr-15)/ovaries-2:

In the living room, a printout of number and letter combinations sits on the couch: four hundred thousand, one name for each egg follicle inside me, one name for each potential soldier. I’d stopped reading after the fourth page–there are one hundred and nine pages more. By my calculations, and the doctors’ latest report, I’m twenty-six healthy divisions full of death to our enemy. No surprise I’ve been called. I always sort of knew. I just thought I had more time. I have five days.

Inside, Mom still shouts with joy. She’s been waiting for this moment since the day I started my period, when she dragged me to the registration office. She’d said if I got picked, we’d all get rich. A credit for every vat-grown baby forced into adult soldierhood within a year of conception, a credit for every soldier shipped into space, with a bonus if they were modified. Then I’d have a room of my own instead of sleeping on the couch, and Mom could buy us real food. Dad could get a new heart, which they couldn’t afford because all the money from Mom’s factory salary was going to me–for pills to jump-start all the plumbing and for doctor’s fingers poking inside me every six months, from the time I turned five. It was my fault he didn’t have the right pills or the right heart. That’s what Mom said. Of course I signed, the day my period started. I didn’t know any better. I was nine.

My neighbors across the way are staring at me. Faces peer out from a grimy square of glass, barely large enough to see out of. They’re surprised I’m out here–there’s not much of anything to see. Their balconies are the same as ours, the same grey concrete and steel. If I stood on the railing and jumped, I could almost reach them. To my right and left, hundred-story high apartment buildings sit in rows, bits of laundry fluttering from tiny open windows. Eighty stories below, a neon-lined strip of street glows in shadow. I’ve walked for miles and never seen the end of our street, never seen the end of this metal canyon, the beginning of somewhere else. Somewhere up above me, a war is being fought, has been fought for as long as anyone remembers. My made-to-military-specification sons and daughters will cram themselves into ships, soar past the curve of the planet. Will they crowd the windows, stare at the dwindling city before space and time swallow them whole? Will they see the end of my street before I do? Probably.

It’s so quiet out. I pull the oxiclamp from my nose and sniff the air. Metal and fuel.

Building by building, row by row, lights flicker and wink out. Airbase sirens sound through the chilly air. The city sobs. The latest corps are about to launch–little more than one hundred thousand in all. Rumor has it, something terrible happened with the deep space travel modifications to the last draft. They had to destroy half the crop. And the last two female draftees disappeared–ran away, or killed themselves. That’s why they needed me so soon, I bet. I stare at my hand. Under the brown skin, a dot of garnet winks at me as it burrows deeper. No one’s taking chances this time.

“Jet, get inside.” Mom reaches out from the doorway, plucking at my sleeve. I go in and lock the door behind me, sealing it air-tight. Mom bangs the thick steel shutter over the window. Everything has to be protected. The burn-off of battle cruisers floats through the air for days, bright cinders of liquid fire, beautiful and deadly. Sometimes it burns right through the walls. I grab my pack off the couch, fastening it to thick rubber straps at my side. Everything I need to survive is in it: food and ammunition, credits and bullets, tampons and hemlock. For barter, or for use.

“What about the list? Jet, take the list!” Mom struggles with her own pack, trembling hands snapping the locks into place. It’s hard to see anything in the garnet glow of the single emergency light over the door.

“It’s too big, I only need the letter.”

“Put that away, and get the list! It’s military property, we need to bring it with us when you go to the hospital.”

“No, we don’t!” Mom never listens to me. She rips her pack off and opens it, trying to cram all the paper inside. The hall alarms kick in, and we wince. My earplugs are somewhere in my pockets. We have two minutes to get to the inner stairwells.

“Mada, we don’t need the list,” Dad shouts from the bedroom doorway. His pack is crammed with plastic bottles: heart pills, all my vitamins and supplements. I see how his hand presses against his body. I recognize the stance. He’s holding a knife.

“Dad, I won’t need those anymore.” I hold out my hands to take the pills. “Not after next week.”

Dad stares at me, open-mouthed. He hasn’t thought about it. None of us really have, until this moment. We’re so used to doing the same things, over and over again. Now it’s all changed. He shakes his head, no. He stares at my winking wrist. I say nothing.

The building trembles.

“She’s right, Essam.” Mom looks up from her pack, pulls loose strands of her hair away from her shiny face. The air is getting hotter. Or maybe she’s been crying. I realize I don’t know how old she is. Mom could be close to fifty, or no more than thirty. She stands up, the pack slipping to the floor. Behind us, the safety override on the front door clicks on. We’re in here for good now, for at least a day. One less day of freedom left for me.

I press my hands against my body. Everything depends on two small, soft sacs of flesh and all that they hold inside. The vibrations of the battle cruisers crawl up my legs as their engines reach full power. I wonder if the egg follicles feel it, wonder if my children will crowd the curved walls of the ships a year from now, remembering that they first felt that thunderous power from within their mother’s flesh.

“If I went through all this for nothing,” I scream over the noise, “I swear I’ll–”

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.” Mom’s face crumples as she speaks, and I feel my heart stopping. “I didn’t mean to–I wasn’t thinking. I’m so tired. I’m just so tired of this, this life. I only wanted us to be happy. That’s why I did it.” She stretches out her arms, so thin in the black fabric of her unisuit, and I reach out mine. But she walks into Dad’s embrace. She wasn’t talking to me.

I fit my earplugs in, adjust the clamp at my nose, making sure the oxygen still flows. Lift-off: the engine scream hits us, and we drop in the hot air. They built the airbase a few years ago, less than half a mile away. No one bothered to relocate us. There isn’t anywhere else to send an entire ghetto to.

Dad lifts me up, carries me to the bedroom. As he lowers me to the bed, his fingers press against my flesh, trapping the tracking device before it sinks any further inside. The blade lowers, presses against the veins.

You can’t. I see his lips form the words in the red-tinged darkness. There is no war. You’ll be murdering your children. I’ve heard his lies before, but still I freeze. He waits for me to nod my head, yes or no. Mom’s hands reach out, grabbing him, grabbing me. We lay in a huddle on the thin mattress, our hands clasped in a circle, waiting for my answer. Engine after engine roars into the air. It’s raining black and red now, pocking the metal balcony doors with burn marks. The walls hiss. Despite the noise, I hear Dad’s heart, or think I can–the soft fluttering of something that’s been dying for years. We’re all dying, I realize. It will always be this way, for us. But it doesn’t have to be this way for my children. And despite the noise, I know they both hear me when I scream over and over until I almost pass out from the roar and heat of my own anger, yes I’ll do it yes I’ll go yes I’ll give them up yes I’ll save us all–

Only then does Dad let go of the knife, and my wrist. The garnet dot disappears. He never wanted this for me. He’d say anything, any lie, to stop me. He just wants us all to let go, to stop making soldiers and guns, to lay down and let them come, let them bring death, or bring peace. Anything other than this life. But it’s too late. It was too late the day I turned nine, the day I signed. Mom falls back on the bed and smiles. I close my eyes and hold him. He cries.

Outside, battleships rise and burning fuel falls.

#

Mom sits at the kitchen table, under the dim light of the bulb, carefully turning the pages of a pamphlet. The pages are glossy and stiff, crowded with fancy writing and bright photos of apartment buildings covered in sheets of light blue glass. I bet the people who live in those places have never seen their stairwells.

Dad sleeps in the bedroom. It’s been a few hours since lockdown ended, and after thirty-six hours in the stifling apartment, burning debris pounding against the outside walls, you’d think we’d want to be anywhere except here. But there’s nowhere else to go.

“We’re out of food.” I stare into the metal cupboard. All I see is half a tin of crackers, and two cans of soup. Dad may get hungry later on, so I shouldn’t eat them. For once, I can go without.

“Then go downstairs. Take Essam’s prescription with you.”

“Do you want anything?” I stand in front of the table. Mom doesn’t look at me. She pushes her hair behind her ears as she turns another page. I sigh. She looks up, annoyed.

“What do you want, Jet? Do you want me to tell you to be careful? It won’t matter what I say. You never listen to me.”

She stares down at the pamphlet again, then picks up a pencil and draws a circle around an apartment floor plan.

“I’ve never understood why you hate me so much.” My tongue feels dry and swollen in my mouth, and the words are hard to pronounce.

Mom doesn’t look up. “I don’t hate you. I’m tired of you.”

At the end of the hall, half a block down from our door, I push the swinging door into the eightieth floor communal bath.

The air smells of mold and disinfectant, sloughed-off skin.

Steam rises in thin wisps from a single nozzle–Thabit stands under a stream of light brown water. I slip off my unisuit and pad across cracked tiles to the next nozzle.

“You look lovely,” says Thabit as he points to my red nose and bloodshot eyes. “Heard you spent lockdown in your apartment. You missed Solomon bugging out in the stairwell. Took four shots to take him down.”

“The stairwell’s for pussies,” I say, pushing at a small soap dispenser on the wall, then activating the shower head with the circuits in my wrist–wiring given to each occupant of our building. The water is hot, but there won’t be much. The timer is ticking, I have three minutes to find some semblance of clean. Thabit’s shower shuts off, and he shakes the water off his long pale hair onto my face.

“You love living on the edge, don’t you?”

“I don’t live on the edge. I am the edge.” We laugh. It’s our old saying, our old routine. Stupid, but it belongs to us.

“Draft girl!” Thabit’s sister Badra emerges from a toilet stall, naked and smiling. Her spiked white hair glistens with traces of soap. She pulls on her suit, fastening hooks and clamps, sliding weapons back into place. Badra was my first, and then I was with her twin brother, who was just as gentle and cautious–because of the draft and the doctors, there are things I still can’t do. Thabit and Badra are cool with that. They’re two years older, but we’ve always gotten along. We’re family. As soon as I turn sixteen, we’ll make it permanent.

“It’s no big deal.” I point my head into the stream, let the water push the soap out of the stubble of my black hair. Dad buzzed me last week. No hair is ugly, but easier. “How did you find out? I haven’t told anyone.”

“Your mother made sure everyone knew the second the doors unlocked.” Thabit says the words lightly, but I wince. Already, she’s dividing us from the rest of the floor.

“Sorry,” I mutter.

“I have to go downstairs, get some food, fill some orders. Are you with me?” Badra locks her gun into place. There used to be minimarts on every floor, but when the elevators stopped working last year, they shut down. Now every trip to the street and back is an exercise in planned pain, especially for those higher up. Badra is paid to shop for others, for things on the market and off.

“Yeah. I need to get my father’s prescription refilled anyway. But I have to be back by tomorrow. In three days–” The water shuts off. I stand, naked and shivering, hands clasped against my breasts. Three more days before a knife splits my skin, and the four hundred thousand report for duty. Thabit and Badra stare at me. I feel bad. They have no idea what to say. Neither do I.

Two more people wander into the bathroom, adults from the other side of the hall. They’re trying not to stare. Everyone knows. Badra stands up, hand on weapon, a sweet smile on her face. They walk to the benches on the other side of the room, acting like nothing’s changed. Thabit throws me his damp towel as I step off the wet tiles. “We’ll get you back by morning, no worries,” he says.

An hour later, we walk outside. I try not to gag as I turn my oxygen feed on. The air is soupy down here, rancid garbage, urine and human sweat mixed with the unyielding tang of soot and gasoline. No one looks at each other. Everyone rushes along, anxious to get their things, to get home, to stay alive one more day. I stare down the street. The neon-tipped end disappears in the rows of buildings, as always. I don’t know what I expect this time–perhaps that the horizon will open to me because it knows that I’ve changed. I just want to know where it is my soldiers will be going, what they’ll see.

Someone jostles me as they push by, and I reach for my arm blade, ready to give them a little “lesson knick”. Thabit’s hand stills me. He shakes his head. He’s the calm one. If Badra had seen, there’d already be blood hitting the sidewalk. I frown, but stand down. Thabit’s right, of course. He’s seen what Badra hasn’t yet, what I realized twenty flights down. In the shadow of signs and storefronts, two soldiers in civilian unisuits stand, nonchalant in pose but aware at all times of who they guard, and how many. They’re letting me know I’m surrounded. Safe.

Thunder rolls through the canyon. I look up. Light flashes in thick clouds. As the first dirty drops of rain hit my cheeks, Badra grabs my arm and spins me off the sidewalk, into the shops and bazaars making up the first floor of the block. Most stores are shuttered, out of business for good. We wander poorly-lit corridors, listening to the distant boom of the storm. Badra picks out square packs of food, slips them into a mesh bag at her side as she swipes the credit bar on her sleeve. She doesn’t steal. No one does. I’d shoot her myself if she dared.

“The prescription.” I remember the disk in my pocket. “I should go ahead, the lines will be long.”

“I still have a list of people to shop for,” Badra says to Thabit. “I’m going to be a while. Go with her,” He nods, and we walk together out of the store, his hand resting lightly against my waist.

“So soon,” he finally says. I was wondering when the subject would come up. I’ve been dreading it ever since I got my orders.

“I’m old enough. We knew it would happen sooner or later.”

“Sometimes, I hoped–” Thabit doesn’t finish that sentence, but I know how much he wants children. I know what he wanted to say.

“Do you know who’s been drafted to fertilize the eggs?” Thabit stops at a kiosk, running his fingers through loops of brightly-colored plastic tubing for oxygen masks. I can tell he didn’t want to ask.

“They won’t tell me. I don’t think I get to know.”

“So it could be anyone. Someone you already met, or a complete stranger.”

He doesn’t know what I do, that soldiers sent into space don’t look like us, that they’re monsters. Half human, modified into half something else. “It’s not like I’m getting married. It’s just an operation. They pick parents for compatibility, nothing else. I’ll still belong to you two.” I touch the dingy grey tubes snaking out of my nose clamp, then lift bright red strands from the pile and hold them against my face.

“How’s this?”

Thabit laughs.

“You’ll look like your nose is bleeding.”

I drop them back down. The man in the kiosk glares, but says nothing.

“A daughter.” Thabit pushes his goggles into his white hair. Pristine circles of skin surround his blue eyes, untouched by the gritty air. “That’s what I’d like. I want to be the father of the daughter of divisions. A girl just like you. You are going to ask them, right? Ask them to hold back an egg?”

I imagine holding something small and squealing as it’s pulled from my flesh. Will it look like Thabit, or its space-bound brothers and sisters? Guns for hands? Will it even have a face? My stomach turns.

“We’ve talked about this before,” I say. “You know I don’t know if I want my own baby. I still haven’t thought about it.”

“Well, it’s time you do think about it. If we’re going to be together, if we’re going to be a real family, we have to decide together, and soon. In two days, there won’t be any more time.”

“I told you I haven’t decided, so back off!” My voice echoes off the exposed ceiling pipes. Thabit blanches, but he doesn’t back down. He takes me by the arm, leads me around the corner to a dead-end. The lights are low here, no one else is around. The soldiers, always discreet, are nowhere to be seen.

“I’m sorry, Jet,” Thabit say, “I know this is rough for you, but you don’t have the right to yell at me or command me. I’ve done nothing wrong. I deserve better than this.”

Angry and ashamed, I nod my head. He’s right–but he’s also not. He has no idea what I’m going through. No one does, not even me.

“You also don’t have the right to decide for us, even if it’s by not deciding at all,” he continues. “We’re supposed to be together. You know, I’ll never get the chance to choose how many children I get to have with you, or when I can have them. Something’s been taken away from me, too. I’m just saying, we all have to deal with this. Me and Badra both, as well as you.”

“I know.” The muscles in my face stiffen as I try not to cry. “You’re right. I shouldn’t have freaked. I’m sorry.” I sound just like Mom. Thabit pulls me close, holds me.

“I know you’re frightened. But we’ll get through this. This is what families do, we get through things together.”

My body feels unbalanced, swollen. I don’t want him to touch me. I pull away, staring into his face as I speak.

“I’ll find out about having my own baby, I promise. If I’m allowed, I’ll have an egg set aside and frozen. Then we can make a decision later. No matter what happens, the three of us will decide. I promise.”

“You’re not alone. Don’t forget that.” Thabit kisses my forehead, then my lips. I feel bad for him, for us, but I don’t know what else to do. Badra’s voice crackles softly, and Thabit breaks off, speaks softly into his headset. “Yeah, we’re still in line for her dad’s medicine. We’ll be about–fifteen minutes?” He looks at me, and I nod, glad to do anything but stand here and pretend to know what to say.

We walk to the drugstore and stand in line, acting as if the conversation in the corridor never happened. The pharmacist behind the counter doesn’t need to tell me what to do. I’ve known him since that day I turned five. He nods in greeting as I insert Dad’s medical disk into the groove in the bulletproof glass. The pharmacist removes it and disappears behind a door, then reappears with a small flat package wrapped in recycled brown paper. Right away I can see: it’s not Dad’s usual prescription. The pharmacist puts it into the hollow space under the counter. Our eyes lock as I open the door to remove it.

“I should offer my congratulations, but I’ll miss your visits,” he says. I guess he heard the news, too. “I’ve known you since you were a little girl–I almost think of you as one of my own daughters.”

“I’m sure I’ll be back, after, you know,” I say.

“Tell your father he needs to inject this once a week, otherwise it won’t work. The side effects are immediate. Read the paper.”

“Ok.” I turn the package over. No instructions. “What kind of side effects–”

The pharmacist turns and walks away without another word. Something’s wrong. I feel Thabit’s eyes fixed on me as I slip the package into the folds of my unisuit. Behind him, Badra hovers in the door, and behind her, the soldiers hover in the shadows. Everyone watches me, everyone’s waiting for me to bolt, to run, to slash my wrists, to stab my stomach. To do anything they don’t want me to do. They don’t know I’m already doing it, and I don’t even know what it is.

“Come on,” I say, grabbing his hand and pulling him to the door. “I’m starving. Let’s get out of here before I put a bullet in someone’s head.”

“That’s my little trooper,” says Badra as we head for the exit.

I hate it when she calls me that. When I get back from the hospital, I’ll make sure we all decide to never say it again.

Part II

The living room is dark when I open the door. I’m careful to keep quiet, it’s still night, and Mom and Dad are probably asleep. I put my pack on the couch and unbutton my lapels. The package is warm from the heat of my body. I turn on the light over the table, and sit down. I’m careful, I don’t make a sound. My kids will be good soldiers. They’ll know stealth.

The paper is easy to open, the tape slits apart with just a touch of my blade. It’s a miniature syringe kit. I can tell before I open it, I’ve seen them before. Inside, two syringes made of hard plastic nestle within molded foam, needles already in place. They’re ready to go. I rock the kit back and forth. A thick silver liquid slides back and forth in the tubes. The whole thing looks like a child’s toy.

“It’s not for you.”

I drop the kit onto the paper. Dad stands in the room, tying his bathrobe with shaking hands. I didn’t even hear him close the bedroom door. So much for stealth.

“But it’s not for you, either,” I say. “So who’s it for?”

“It’s heart medicine, for dissolving clots if I have an attack.” He picks up the kit and closes the cover, then slides it into his bathrobe pocket.

“I don’t believe you,” I say. “It’s poison, isn’t it? You’re going to kill me, or try to kill the soldier who’s supposed to fertilize the eggs.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Dad says. “You’re my daughter, and I love you. You drive me crazy sometimes, but I’d never harm you, or your soldiers. Hand me the wrapping paper.”

I slide it over to him. Dad smoothes it out against the table. For a moment, his face relaxes, and I see something of the father I remember from when I was young, when he taught me how to read and write, took me for walks in ancient parks under dying trees. Now all the parks are gone.

“You know, your mother took the hormones, too. She registered for the draft, but they didn’t pick her.”

“What?” Shock slides through me, prickly cold. “She never told me.”

“She didn’t want you to know. She was so ashamed. Her parents went bankrupt from the cost. After that, no one would have her, she was damaged goods. But I saw something in her, so beautiful, so–” His voice cracks. “I should have known it wouldn’t last. Nothing that fragile ever does. Greed always wins.”

Dad folds the paper into neat squares, and the softness disappears.

“She didn’t get her money, but that didn’t stop her from finding another way. That’s why she gave birth to you. As far as she’s concerned, you’re her second womb. Nothing more.”

Outside, night rain pelts the window.

“You’re lying,” I declare. “I don’t know why you’re saying these things, but they won’t make me change my mind. And if you think that that needle or your disgusting lies will stop me, you’re wrong.”

Dad reaches across the table, pressing the folded paper into my hands. I try to drop it, to pull my hand away, but he won’t let go. I’ve never seen him look so old, so worn.

“I’ve changed my mind. I don’t plan on stopping you.” His voice is low and gravelly. He has trouble speaking, as if he’s about to cry. It makes me ashamed. “When you see what it is that you’ve been responsible for creating, I’m hoping you’ll realize that all this has to be stopped. I want you to make that choice yourself, because then you’ll be acting as an adult, not as a child who simply does as she’s told.”

“What I’m responsible for is creating soldiers that will help us win the war. My soldiers, not my mother’s, not yours.”

“I keep telling you, Jet, there is no war.” Tears trickle down his face. “Open your eyes. There’s never been any war. We send our men and women into space, and nothing comes back? Not a single message? Not even a bomb from the enemy? Nothing?”

“But then where do they all go? We send soldiers to their death, just because? I don’t believe that.”

“Don’t be so naïve. I taught you better than that–I’ve told you time and time again, this is a war-based economy. There probably was a war, a long time ago. But it’s over, and we’re forced to keep pretending, simply so that a corrupt military government can remain in power. We live in coffins and crowd in stairwells, barely alive, while we pour all our resources into sending our children into space only to shoot them down.”

“I don’t believe you, that’s just more lies!” I struggle again to get away, but Dad tightens his grip, drawing me up and toward him. His face glows.

“It’s not just burning jet fuel that falls on us. It’s broken battle cruisers, broken bodies. From our ships, not the enemy’s. Remember the time I snuck you out of the stairwell, when you were ten? I showed you. You saw–”

“I saw nothing! I was little, I don’t remember anything!”

“I remember.” Dad’s voice grows calm, and his hands slip from mine, fall slack at his side. His stare is distant, cold. It frightens me.

“I remember how the ship split apart like an eggshell. I remember men and women falling like comets over the city. Their burning flesh left contrails in the air. They didn’t scream. All you could hear was flame, wind, impact.”

He unbuttons his nightshirt. I’ve never seen my father undressed before. Melted folds of flesh appear, scars upon scars, with an angry red line running down the middle.

“I remember how they came through the buildings and streets, putting bullets into every body, every heart. I thought if I lay still, they’d think I was already dead, and pass by. I was wrong.”

We stand silent in the dark. Through the distortion of my tears, for a moment I see a younger Essam, the shadow of what he used to be. And then his shoulders slump, and he covers his chest.

“Does Mom know?”

“No. And she never will.” His voice is firm.

“How many–”

“How many died? I don’t know. How many are alive? I don’t know that, either. The men and women who saved me, they said there were others. But we keep apart, we blend in. It’s safer. I’m one of the lucky ones, I wasn’t augmented. I can pass.”

A small spark of understanding– “The pharmacist,” I say. “He’s one of you, isn’t he? Oh. He’s your brother…” Now it really hits me. I sit down.

Dad doesn’t answer. I realize he never will. He’s still loyal. But I have to be loyal, too.

“Nothing will change if I say no, if I run away, even if you use that needle.” I hold up my wrist. The tracking device swims somewhere below the surface. “They’ll just find me, kill me, take out my ovaries. Then they’ll kill you and Mom. I can’t let that happen.”

“Everything can change, and without anyone knowing. Without anyone firing a gun or saying a single word. No one will die.”

“I’m doing this for you, you know. So you can get a new heart, so you won’t die!”

“I’m already dead, Jet. This isn’t being alive.” Dad bows his head and shuffles back into the bedroom, leaving me alone.

I grab the paper and unlock the balcony door. Light rain lashes my face as I lean against the railing. It’s freezing outside, the street below barely visible. A few kitchen window lights glow, weak sparks of life in the blue-black of early morning. I think about how easy it would be to climb onto the railing, to spread my arms and leave everything behind. Somewhere in the silent rows of buildings, tucked into invisible spaces, soldiers stare at me, watching. They’ll never let it happen. They’re loyal, too.

In two days time officers will come to the apartment again, disarm me and strip me down. I’ll be clean. They’ll do the same with Mom. But Dad has a history of heart problems. He’s an old man, and his hands tremble. They’ll let him keep his medical kit. If I tell them what I think is going to happen, they’ll put another bullet in him, and this time they’ll get it right. If I don’t– Someone is going to die, no matter what. And despite what my father said, I can’t say it won’t be me.

I straighten from my hunched position over the railing, and open my cramped hand. The folded paper is wet, and threads of blue ink stain the brown surface like spider veins. I unfold the squares. The writing is smeared and blurry, but I can still read my father’s name in neat block letters: ESSAM OBERAAN. Larger letters bleed through the surface, from writing on other side. I turn the paper over.

Someone has drawn an eye, large and almond-shaped. It’s filled in completely with deep blue ink, no pupil or lid to be seen. It stares up at me, unblinking. I hold my breath and wait.

Nothing happens, of course. A gust of wind throws more rain against me, and the eye dissolves into indigo oblivion. I ball the paper up and throw it high into the air. It disappears. I feel powerless, stupid. The daughter of a soldier, and I’m useless.

I speak to my armed guardians, silent and surrounding me.

“Tell me what to do.”

If they answer me, I can’t hear them. All I hear is rain.

#

The last two days burn as fast as rocket fuel, and taste much the same. I say my goodbyes to Thabit and Badra. We pay a kid to stand at the bath door and chase people to the other floors, while we spend several hours alone. I tell them the truth, the thing they don’t want to hear. There will be no egg left behind, no spliced-gene daughter for the three of us. It’s Thabit who cries, but I expected that. Badra tells me they’ll wait for me, that we’ll talk about it again when I come home, but none of us believe what she says. “Are you with me?” I ask, and they say yes. Yet Badra’s voice is ozone cool, and so are Thabit’s lips. Already, they’ve moved on.

The escort guard lets Mom and Dad come with me, when they come. It’s their right, as I’m technically a minor, even though I’m now in the army. People gather around my door, but I don’t see Thabit and Badra. I didn’t expect to. I recite the loyalty pledge to my city and planet in front of everyone, and there’s polite applause, and then I’m whisked down the long hall. People stand in their doorways, whispering and watching. Someone’s been making curry again, the smell of it seeps through the walls. One of the officers activates the supposedly-dead elevator, which causes a small riot. Dad helps me past the surge of people, but he won’t look at me. I assume that somewhere in his unisuit, the little syringes wait. I don’t want to know. The elevator rushes past the basement level, and I’ll admit I get a thrill when I realize where we’re going. I’ve heard there are underground transports, but no one gets to use them anymore. Well, except for military. That’s me, now. Private Jet Oberaan and her four hundred thousand. The sirens sound, faint and mournful, as we stand on the sub-level platform. In a year, they’ll sound for my children.

More papers. I sign until I think my hand will fall off. The train rushes through tunnels so fast, I can’t see what’s outside. Mom wants to know when we’ll get the credits for the eggs, and almost passes out when they tell her they’ll cut an advance against conception right at the hospital. I try to get Dad’s attention, but he stares out the windows, ignoring us both. My gun and blade are gone, they disarmed me back at the apartment. I feel light-headed and off-balance. I think of Thabit and Badra. I sit up suddenly, knocking the papers to the floor. I’m hungry; no, I’m thirsty. I don’t ask the woman in uniform if they’ll freeze an egg for me. I do ask if the soldiers will have faces. I don’t remember anyone’s answer. I can’t stop thinking, I can’t stop asking questions, I can’t stop pacing back and forth, I can’t oh god I can’t I can’t oh daddy don’t do this don’t do this don’t make me choose–

White.

The color is beautiful. Pure white. No dirt, no grime. I never thought any wall could look so clean. The woman sticks an inhaler against my nose, and I take another breath as she pats my back. I’m calm now, I don’t even remember when we got here. Drugged to the gills. Panic attack’s over. I feel good.

We’re escorted through the hospital corridors, on our way to meet the man who’ll be the father of my twenty-six divisions. Not man, the doctor said. Male. The male who’ll contribute the second half of my little army. He’s not human, that much info they gave me. I’m so high. I smile at my father, a loopy grin that he doesn’t return. Mom stayed behind the waiting room. She wore makeup today. There’ll be booze and black market food, and lots of handsome men congratulating her on her daughter’s plentiful ovaries. “I bet the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree”, one will probably say, and she’ll blush and laugh, not knowing what he means. Dad never took her to the parks. She’s never seen an apple, or a tree.

We pass through weapons sensors and wide walls of x-ray machines, past doors four feet thick and twenty feet high that take ten minutes to swing out. We’re sprayed for stray bacteria, and little badges with foreign symbols are placed on our chests. “I hope that’s not a target,” I joke as a woman fastens it to me, but she doesn’t smile. She looks pretty damn scared. She makes me take one more hit of the anti-panic gas before she runs back down the hall.

Behind the last door is a room, bigger than all the rooms I’ve been in, put together. All along the walls, stories above us, men and women in white coats peer down from observation windows. The walls are dotted with lasers and cameras. Hundreds of soldiers–half-human, bristling with machinery in their ugly faces–surround us, weaponry sweating in the heat. The air stinks of oil and cement dust and chemicals. At the center stands a cube of two-foot thick glass, and in the center of the cube stands the male. The officers draw their weapons and escort me to one side of the cube, to the metallic round of a speaking window, then back away.

The creature’s eyes are long, almond-shaped pools of mercury. They widen as I step forward, and his lips pull back, revealing a dog-like set of fangs in a jutting muzzle. That’s what he is, he’s a dog with the thick body of an over-muscled soldier, coated in bristling black fur. Except, he’s not a dog, or a man. My father stands beside me, disappointment washing over his face. He can’t get to the creature behind all that glass. He can’t use the syringe on it. Of course, there’s no glass surrounding me. Guess I know who gets the poison now. Under the haze of the drug, I giggle.

“What is he?” Dad asks.

“This is the future of the military.” Behind me, one of the officers steps forward. I can tell he’s memorized his answer by the way he stumbles over the words. “By combining the high intellect and reasoning skills of humans with the brute strength and longevity of this species, we’ve been able to create the perfect space-faring military weapon. Excellent for stealth missions, almost telepathic in communications skills, and blind in loyalty to their commanding officers. Loyal to the death. This is the future of the military. You’ll be pleased to know that the divisions you and he create will be the first wave of that future–a future that will ensure us both victory and peace.”

The officer stands beside us now. He looks satisfied. My father mouths, prisoner of war. I pretend not to see him.

“What is he? Where is he from?”

The officer smiles. “That’s classified.”

I ignore Dad’s “I told you so” smirk.

“Does he have a name?”

“He has a number.”

“That’s stupid. He needs a name. I’m going to call him Sidabras. For the color of his eyes.”

Now the officer looks a bit pained. I think he’s getting tired of the giggling girl before him, even if she is the mother-to-be of twenty-six divisions of death. I swallow down another nervous laugh, and try to look serious.

“Will the babies–the soldiers–look like him?”

“Not quite. A bit more human, more like you, less–” he waves his hands, as if unable to express the disgusting alienness of the creature standing before us. “You’ll be quite pleased. And I think your darker skin tones will help.”

“What?” I can feel Dad’s anger as he speaks, his hands gripping into my skin.

More hand-waving. “No, it’s not that, not at all. The last two batches with this male were produced with lighter-skinned females, which led to problems with the stealth capabilities of the fur and skin. Someone with coloring closer to his will correct that. We can’t afford to destroy any more batches.”

“Have you already, you know–” I glance down.

“Oh yes. It’s harvested and good to go.” The officer pats me on the shoulder. “We’re all just waiting for the four hundred thousand to report.”

The creature’s snarl has faded. I can’t tell what he’s thinking. His children, maybe, destroyed or sent to space to die. “Does he understand us?”

“You can speak to him,” the officer says. “We’ve wired him with a communications system.” He flicks a small switch by the metal circle, and an intercom crackles to life.

We stare at each other.

I lean forward, open my mouth. But I don’t know what to say.

Wide hands rise, both large enough to cover half my head with just the palms. He places a finger against his neck, flicks a switch with a sharp nail. A delicate movement–I bet he’s good with weapons. Small wires run down one side of his neck to the front of his throat, ending in an electrical plate bolted on an armor-like chest of calloused skin. He opens his mouth again, and several short bursts of harsh sound shoot out. Seconds later, I hear the translation.

ARE. YOU. LOYAL.

“Yes,” I say, not sure what he means. I look him directly in the eyes, and he does the same in return. It’s what you do with animals. I think we both know that. “Are you?”

The translator crackles, unable to understand the sharp bark. I jump at the sound. My heart pounds faster, and it’s getting hard to breathe. The anti-panic gas has worn off, I’m freaking out. “I’m so sorry you’re in here.”

COMMAND. THEM.

He must mean his children. Ours. “I can’t go into space with them, if that’s what you mean. I would if I could.” The lies come babbling out. What does he want to hear? “They won’t let me go. I’ll never see them. If I could–”

The glass fogs as ivory fangs appear from the red of his mouth, and his face distorts in the steaming air. His growl sounds like thunder in the canyons.

I step back. “Can we go now?” Dad reaches out with his hand to draw me away. I see a flash at his fingers.

“No!” I grab his wrist, and we struggle. The officers watch, dumbfounded. They don’t see the syringe, they only see a stubborn old man resisting his daughter. “I won’t let you kill them!”

“You stupid girl, it’s not for you–!” We collide, and I cry out: something just punched my heart. Dad pushes me away.

The syringe sticks out of my chest. It’s empty. I stare up at Dad. He points to one eye, his finger tearing the lashes as tears stream down his cheeks.

“Be loyal,” he says.

I say something, but my voice sounds so small and distant, I can’t hear the words.

Behind me, the creature roars. I hear him slam against the glass, and several hundred soldiers start as the entire cube shifts forward with an ear-splitting shriek. I scream–hands pull me back and under the cover of limbs. Doctors are shouting at the soldiers, trying to push through the wall of weapons and armor to get to me. Dad pitches sideways, hits the cube and slides down. I see him clutching his chest as soldiers surround him, weapons clicking.

“Don’t kill him!” I grab my throat–it burns. My heart is on fire from the poison, and the fire is spreading up. I press forward as the soldiers jostle their guns in confusion. They’re waiting for orders to shoot or save my father.

The dog soldier looks out, down, and our eyes lock. All that storm cloud mercury fills my mind, and I feel the words drop out of me like bullets or babies newly formed, even as the doctors finally pin me to the floor.

sidabras. don’t let him die. be loyal.

I don’t think I spoke.

The creature rages. Plumes of white gas curl from the cube’s ceiling, even as soldiers surround it like beetles on rotting food. The glass cracks, shatters all around us in sharp rain. Gunfire and sparks in the smoke–

I disengage.

I’ve done it before, like when I was jumped during an all-night party that turned into a riot, several years ago. I shot three men. Didn’t feel a thing. There’s a part of you that shuts down, and the lizard part blossoms, cold and bright and uncaring. There’s a man trying to rape you: stab him to death. The doctor straps you to the gurney: don’t fight it. Wake up, feel the gauze at your waist, you’re not a woman anymore: forget it. Ask the officers about my father–they don’t know anything about a syringe or a shot. You were high, hallucinating, remember? They do know something about a heart attack, but your father refused treatment: you say nothing. They tell you your mother left the base with a suitcase in one hand and a pamphlet in the other. She remembered to take your money, but forgot to leave her new address:

Disengage.

And now I stand on the apartment balcony, gripping an honorable discharge. Inside, Dad runs a hand down the front of his mended unisuit. Underneath, a new heart beats–a chop shop job I got on the street, after he collapsed again on the train ride home. It was that, or let him die. Guess I’m not loyal. Dad hates me for it, says he loved the old heart better. It was the heart he fell in love with his wife with, the heart he loved me with. The heart of a soldier. Now the wife’s gone, the heart’s gone, the money’s gone, and I’m the monster.

I open my hand, and the wind whisks the papers away. I stare at the distant buildings, silver and slick. I fall to my knees, fall asleep. I dream of mercury, and unblinking eyes.

#

Sirens wail as I run the tip of the pen over the last white square. Black fills up the space, and now the calendar is complete. One year gone. Outside, battle cruisers prepare for lift-off. Already the buildings vibrate from the engines springing to life. There are more cruisers this time, three times as many. Whatever was in that syringe, it didn’t affect the eggs. The dog soldier and I, we did good. The letter on the table, delivered today, tells me. Four hundred thousand, every damn one of them grown up, armed, and ready to go.

“Mom should have waited before she dumped us. She’d have twice the money now.” I push the letter across the table toward Dad, then hold the bank chip up to the light. A credit for every soldier shipped into space, with a bonus for “extensive” modifications. Just like they’d promised. Not that it matters much now. Things are bad–food supplies low, water dwindling, medicine non-existent. The power is off half the time or more. Everything tastes and smells like rotting metal. Something’s gone wrong in the world, but no one knows what it is. This time, there are no rumors.

“Are you listening to me?”

Dad stands at the balcony door, a silhouette in the pale morning light. He doesn’t want to admit it, but he’s been waiting for this day as much as me. He’s their grandfather.

“Fine. Whatever,” I say to myself. Dad doesn’t talk anymore. He hasn’t spoken to me since we left the base a year ago. Not one word. He’s healthier with the new heart, he even walks downstairs once a week. But he can’t forgive me for not stopping the war–for not dying when he stabbed me, for not dying when he stabbed himself. At least he didn’t kick me out. I have no place to go. Thabit and Badra don’t live in the building anymore. It seems they weren’t with me, after all. They were with a girl from another floor, the one I heard Thabit knocked up. I can’t blame them.

Something whispers in my ear, little half-caught words I can barely understand. It’s Dad, muttering under his breath again, whenever I look away. This is what he does instead of speaking, and it drives me crazy. I slap the chip onto the table, knocking the chair over as I stand.

“I am so sick and tired of your mumbling. If you have something to say to me, just say it!”

The light bulb fizzes, and winks out. I can hear the power dying in the building, all the ticks and hiccups of machinery shutting down. The sirens fade.

“Great. Just great.” I stumble into the living room, feeling around for my pack. “Come on, close that door and let’s get going. If we go now, we might still find a good place in the stairwell.” Silence, of course.

“I swear it’s like talking to a child…” I find my pack and strap it on, then feel my way into the bedroom. Dad’s pack is on his bed. I reach for it, then stop and cock my head, hearing the absence of engines. The battle cruisers. Have they already gone? Have my children already gone?

The pack slides off the bed, contents clattering onto the floor. I reach out, grab–

My hand shoots back, stung by the tip of a needle. As my eyes adjust to the dark, I see syringes. Empty syringes and full ones, too many to count, roll around my feet. I pick one up. It’s the same type that entered my chest. Even without a light, I see traces of silver glowing inside the hollow tube.

Everything tastes like metal, smells like metal.

“You son of a bitch.” I run to the kitchen, clutching the syringe. He’s not there. “You bastard! What did you do to me?” I kick the fallen chair aside, and step out onto the balcony. In the strange silence, my clumsy movements sound like thunder.

Dad sits on the railing, one leg thrown over the edge. His body leans into empty air, as if he’s looking for something in the distance, the right place to jump to. I don’t move.

“If you want to jump, fine. I’m not going to stop you,” I say. “But first you tell me what you did to me. What is this shit and what does it do? You owe me an explanation!”

“I never used them on you, not after the accident, at the cube–” Dad’s voice cracks, and he stops. It’s been so long since he’s spoken, we’re both surprised at the sound. He clears his throat before beginning again. “I told you they weren’t for you, you never needed them. They were intended for me, only for me. I’m sorry.” He leans out, raising his free hand high.

“Wait, don’t jump! Please–” I reach a hand out to him, slow and deliberate in the chilly air. “I promise I believe you, whatever you say. But please just tell me what why you’re doing this. Just talk to me for once.”

i’ve never stopped talking to you.

I drop the syringe, staring.

what did I tell you? do you remember?

His lips aren’t moving.

everything will change, and–

“No one will say–”

Dad raises a hand to his lips. He points one finger up, just below his right eye. Flecks of silver swim in the brown, like neon in the night, like open doors.

a single word

I don’t even have to concentrate. All I have to do is be still.

“It won’t last. Before the pharmacy shut down, I bought as much as I could. But it’s not an endless supply, it was never meant to be. Eventually you’ll have to do it.”

“Do what?”

“Command them.”

Whispers, behind me. Inside me. Familiar and soothing, like when I hold Mom’s pillow to my face and breath deep, inhale the faint fading scent of her skin. I pull the oxiclamp from my nose. Smoke from burning trash lingers in the air. Somewhere beyond hundreds of miles of crumbling city blocks, the sun rises. I lean over the rail, stare at the dark thread of the street. I follow the line to the horizon, and look up.

One building ripples with movement, then another, and another. It spreads, as if the canyon is a wound, bleeding drops of water that take on the colors of concrete and sky. The droplets spread, pouring themselves toward me, growing larger with every second. Not water, but iron, bone and blood, camouflaged to move like rain in the wind. But this place is too narrow for the stealth of so many, and the quiet of morning reveals their sounds. They push the air before them, and it carries the rustling of weaponry, the soft click of claws and guns, the scent of singed fur and leathered skin. Hundreds, then thousands, then tens of thousands. They keep coming. Hundreds of thousands. Four hundred thousand. Four hundred thousand, and one.

He appears in midair as his stealth armor deactivates. I watch the creature–Sidabras, that’s what I’d named him–soar in a graceful arc, claws striking into steel-plated walls. Sidabras holds, pauses, then leaps again. Once there were birds, and they flew, and never had to walk. Is this was it was like, before the war? To watch creatures fly above us, and not cower from burning fuel and fuselage?

Several low explosions echo back and forth down the canyon, rattling balconies. “Bombs,” I say, panic creeping over the wonder. “This is really happening. They’re destroying the base.” Dad steps up behind me, gripping my shoulder.

“This had to happen.”

“There’ll be nothing left but chaos.”

chaos is change.

Engines concuss the neighborhood–the battle cruisers are springing to life. And now the stealth armor of all the soldiers fades, and everything around me turns black. I gasp and cling to Dad. All of these people came out of me. Soldiers hang all around us, cling to balconies and ledges beside us, above, and below. Male and female and other, dark-skinned and muscular, four hundred thousand in all. Silent, waiting for me to command them. I can see their wide eyes–dark brown pupils floating in silver seas. They have something of me in them, after all. How much of them do I have in me?

The balcony edge blurs, flickers, and he is there. Sidabras stands, tongue lolling from the edges of his fangs in a soft pant. Blood dots his strafed armor, oozes in a sticky line from the fur of his upper arm. I didn’t realize how large he is, how much space he takes. There’s no glass between us now.

Dad pushes me forward, gently. I smell singed flesh, sweat, steel. Sidabras lowers his head, and I stare in his mercury eyes. His breath smells of the long-gone parks, of damp black earth beneath trees. I reach up, touch the matted fur of his muzzle. He doesn’t move away.

you are loyal.

Command them.

His words sound clear and crisp this time. I notice that the communications device has been ripped from his throat and chest, leaving raw wounds. I turn to Dad, but he steps back, as if handing everything over to me.

Command them.

I look around us. In the clear morning air, my children stare at me, open and expectant. I catch the eye of one, a young man almost as large as Sidabras. He stands on the balcony opposite us, a large rifle in his hands. He has hands. He has a face. He smiles. My heart feels like it’s on fire again.

“My son. He’s my son.”

“He’s your soldier,” says Dad. “They all are. And so am I. Tell us what to do.”

All around me, the four hundred thousand watch as the world opens up before me. I can leave. I can stay. I can destroy the city, maybe the world. I can disappear into the great mystery of space. I can stand here and do nothing, until the buildings crumble down. I feel Sidabras’ hot breath on my face, feel the distant vibration of the cruisers. Feel my children, feel Sidabras and Dad, waiting.

“Are you with me?” I ask my father. He smiles.

“I’ve always been with you, sweetie.”

I decide.

I turn to Sidabras, but he’s already raising his hand, signaling to the rest. He knows my thoughts as I think them. Movement, all around. Dad gathers his pack and the remaining syringes, and I wrap my arms around the father of twenty-four divisions, lash myself to his armor, hold tight.

“Mom should have waited,” I whisper into his fur. I’ll never see this apartment again, never sleep on the little couch, never huddle in the stairwell, trapped in sleepless fear. A large hand steals over mine, and some delicate emotion seeps from Sidabras into me, comforting and warm. There will be other trees, it seems to say, other families. New possibilities. New loyalties and love.

Sidabras jumps.

And now the moment of sorrow is gone, and so is everything old and tired. Only the empty space before us exists, space and the rising sun. Behind me, I hear Dad laughing, like he used to long ago. I’d look back, but I don’t need to, ever again. I see how we move in the world. We unfurl like the wings of some long-dead god, resurrected and in flight, to the end of my street, and up, and beyond. We will all of us wear the stars–father, daughter, four hundred thousand, and one.

Fiction: The Sagan Diary by John Scalzi

For Kristine

COLONIAL DEFENSE FORCES

Internal Security Command

CDF Information Retrieval and Interpretation, 1st Platoon

Col. Michael Blauser, Cmdr

DATE:

241.12.12 SUSN

(see linked table for local equivalents)

FILE NUMBER:

ISC/IRI-003-4530/6(C)

FILE TITLE:

BrainPal Diary, CSF Lt. Jane Sagan (VI)

Phoenix Station, 241.12.07

FILE DESCRIPTION:

See attached note

AUTHOR:

CSF Lt. Jane Sagan (VI)

CLASSIFICATION:

Classified. Security Clearance Level 2 required.

REDACTION:

Lake-Williams algorithm for emotional feed processing.

Emotional feed available as separate file ISC/IRI-003-4530/6(c)(a)

RECORDED BY:

CSF Lt. Jane Sagan (VI)

FILED BY

Lt. Gretchen Schafer, Chief Analyst (SubSpec: Psych), CDF/IRI

CC: Col. Michael Blauser

Preface Note to ISC/IRI-003-4530/6(c),

“The Sagan Diary”

Col. Blauser:

As per your instruction in your memorandum of 341.10.07, we have begun processing the BrainPal memory stacks of Colonial Special Forces members who have left that service, whether by death or (rather more rarely) by discharge from service. In both cases BrainPal retrieval was initially via method previously established in our CDF BrainPal retrieval protocol, but per the new directive of 341.10.09 we abandoned physical retrieval of CSF BrainPals and instead began processing BrainPal memory transcriptions as provided by the Special Forces’ own IRI office.

Let me reiterate again here in this memorandum what I have expressed to you verbally, which is that processing CSF-provided transcriptions is a massively unsatisfactory solution. The first seven CSF memory stacks we processed were rich in information that we then placed into our analysis matrix, and which were beginning to yield intriguing results before we were ordered to remove the data from the matrix and delete all analyses featuring the data.

Data from the CSF-provided transcriptions have been notably inferior, and while our own forensic scans can show no overt signs that the CSF is tampering with the data, it is my professional opinion that the transcription data have been redacted in some way. I have requested funds and clearance for a more thorough forensic scanning. That request has been in your queue for several days now; I would greatly appreciate a response to it in one way or another.

To give you a sample of the sort of “data” that we are limited to processing at the moment, I am submitting this file, which we have informally been calling “The Sagan Diary.” It is a transcription of a series of personal files from the BrainPal of former CSF Lieutenant Jane Sagan, who was discharged from service last week and (somewhat unusually) chose to settle on the established colony world of Huckleberry rather than on Monroe, the colony world set aside for retired Special Forces.

These diary pieces are taken from the last several days before Sagan transferred her consciousness from her Special Forces body to a standard human-template body. I don’t need to tell you that for IRI purposes, late-term BrainPal files are typically a gold mine of data, as service members reminisce on their time in service, in doing so refreshing critical data for analysis. Lt. Sagan in particular should be a potentially rich trove of data, as she was present at or participated in several key battles/engagements in the last few years, notably the 2nd Battle of Coral and the Anarkiq offensive; she being Special Forces, she undoubtedly participated in actions which are classified but which, (I would remind those in the Special Forces) we here at IRI are rated to know and view.

Instead, what we have to work with are data-poor bits in which Lt. Sagan thinks about what appears to be a romantic partner of some sort (Cursory investigation suggests a CDF Major, John Perry, who also mustered out of service on the same day and who was on the same shuttle to Huckleberry as Lt. Sagan, accompanied by an unrelated minor, Zoë Boutin. A number of data files for Perry and Boutin are marked classified, which is why I note the investigation was “cursory.”).

The diary files are of some anthropological interest, to be sure. It’s nice to know Lt. Sagan is in love; Major Perry seems like a lucky fellow. However, for our purposes these files are near useless. The only data of analytical note are Sagan’s notation of The Third Battle of Provence and the Special Forces retrieval of the Baton Rouge’s ill-fated Company D, about which of course we have a wealth of information, thanks to all the BrainPals that encounter sent our way, and a discussion of her relationship with prisoner of war named Cainen Suen Su, whose stay with and work for the CDF is classified but otherwise well-documented. Beyond this, the data are thin on the ground.

If I may be frank, Colonel, if the Special Forces are not going to allow us unimpeded access to the BrainPals of its fallen and retired soldiers, then I must question the utility of our processing the data from those BrainPals at all. We process thousands of BrainPals in a month, from regular CDF, and we barely have the staff to keep up with that; spinning our wheels processing bogus data from the Special Forces takes up time and processing power we don’t have from data which can be of actual use to us. Either we’re all working together here or we’re not.

Colonel, please read these “diaries” carefully; I’m sure you will come to the same conclusion we have down here in the processing labs. These diaries may be a window into Lt. Sagan’s soul, but what we really need is a window into Lt. Sagan’s history. I hope the rest of her life turns out the way she wants. Here in the labs, we need more data.

Sincerely,

Lt. Gretchen Schafer, Chief Analyst

(SubSpec: Psych), CDF/IRI

1

Words

Words fail me.

There is a disconnect between my mind and my words, between what I think and what I say; not a disconnect in intent but in execution, between the flower of thought and the fruit of the mouth, between the initiation and the completion. I say what I mean but I do not say all that I mean.

I am not speaking to you now. These words do not pass my lips or pass out of my mind. I say them only to myself, forming them perfect and whole and interior, and leaving them on the shelf and closing the door behind me. Others may find these words in time but for now they face only toward me, whispering back my image with full description, golems who write the words of life on my forehead.

These words are my life. Representation of time and counterfeit of emotion, record of loss and celebration of gain. They are not my whole life; words fail me here as they fail anyone, entire worlds slipping through the spaces between words and letters as a life among stars is compressed into this small space. A short life to be sure; and yet long enough to be lost in translation.

But it is enough. Give us a few lines arranged just so and we see a face and more than a face. We see the life behind it; the terrors and ambivalence, the desire and aspiration–intention in a pattern, a person in a coincident assemblage of curves. This is that: A few lines to follow that in themselves mean little but build on themselves; a crystal lattice using absence to suggest presence, the implication of more pregnant in the gaps.

I wish I could show these words to you, you who know me only from outward expression. I wish I could fold these words, package them and present them with a flourish, a rare gift I made of myself to you. But these words do not bend–or rather they will not–or perhaps it is that I cannot find the strength to push them through the doors of my mouth and my mind. They are stubborn words and I fear what would happen if I let them go. They stay inside where you cannot come; they are meant for you, but not sent to you. Words fail me and I return the failure.

But these words exist. These words record, these words stand witness; these words speak, if only to an audience of one. These words are real and they are me, or who I believe I have been; incomplete but truthful, through a mirror darkly but reflecting all the same. I have no doubt that one day you will find these words and that you will find me in-side them: a seed to plant in your mind, to become a vine to filigree your memory of who I was and who I was to you. Words fail me but I will use them anyway. And in their failure and despite their failure I will live again and you will love me again, as you love me now.

#

You do not remember your birth but I remember mine. I remember the sudden shock of consciousness, awareness flinging itself at me and demanding to be embraced, and me not knowing enough to do anything other than embrace it back. I sometimes wonder if I had a choice, or if I could have known then what I know now, if I would have received its embrace or would have punched it in the throat, and sent it staggering away to pester someone else, to leave me alone in a newborn senescence from which I would not awake. But in this we are all alike, those who remember our birth and those who do not: None of us asked to be born.

I awoke in perfect awareness and to a voice in my head which spoke “You are Jane Sagan,” and with those words the electric pricking of context, describing the relationship of “you,” and of “are” and of “Jane” and of “Sagan”–putting together the words like pieces of spontaneously generated puzzle, and then clicking them into place so the puzzle made sense, even if we later discovered how much we really hated puzzles.

But the words were a lie. I wasn’t Jane Sagan at all; I was a changeling, a creature stolen to take the place of someone else. Someone I did not know nor would ever know, someone whose entire life had been set aside for the mere utility of her genes, everything she ever was reduced to a long chemical strand–adenine, thymine, cytosine and guanine–the abrupt tattoo of these four notes replacing a symphony of experience. She was dead but she would not be allowed to rest, because I was needed here.

I wonder if she was in this body before me, if before my consciousness was dropped in this head she waited sleeping, dreaming of her life before and dreaming of her life to come. I wonder if she’s dreaming still, housed in the interstices and the places in my mind I do not go. If she is here I wonder if she resents me for taking her place, or whether she is glad of the company, and enjoys the world through my eyes. I cannot tell.

But I dream of her. I dream she and I stand at her grave, standing apart with the headstone between us, close enough to touch although we never do. And she says “Talk to me” and I do, trying to explain a warrior’s life to a woman who never fought, ashamed that I have nothing to share with her but death, which she already knows more about than I.

But she smiles and I know that she doesn’t begrudge me that. I ask her to tell me about her and she does and speaks of home and children and of a life of connection, things I have not possessed in my own life but which she is happy to share. I wake up and her words dissipate, specifics evaporating and leaving behind a memory of comfort.

I dreamt of her before we met but I will not tell you that.

#

The name “Jane Sagan.” The name itself mere words: The first name bland and common, the second name for a scientist who hoped for a better universe than the one we live in. I wonder if he were alive what he would think of the woman who used it now, and the cosmos in which she finds herself; whether he could embrace one or both, see beauty in either, or only entropy and slight regard; a rebuke on his lips for this demon-haunted world.

If he demanded his name back it would not matter. The name was random first and last, provided from a list designed to make sure only one Special Forces soldier owned a name at a time. There would not be another Jane Sagan until I bled my life away in battle, the name floating up off my corpse like the spirit of a Buddhist, to be reincarnated on the Wheel of Suffering: returning but learning nothing, repeating the same lessons again and once more, its owners torn from life on different worlds but performing the same actions.

My name is random but I earned it in time. I became Jane Sagan not through the whim of convention but through breathing and moving and fighting and discovering love–each of these coring through the undifferentiated mass of my existence, paring away that which was not me, shedding what was not essential and sometimes what was, demanding I retrieve what I lost or accept its loss; the diminution of a self only recently defined and still defining itself.

I lost some of what I should have been and could have been for you. The parts of me that I lent others who then left me unwillingly or willingly, as they earned the names they had, even as those names lifted up from them, their purpose spent–those which they signified already fading against the violence of bone and metal.

They took part of me with them. I kept part of them with me, to become me in the fullness of time, some of who I could have been replaced by all that was left of them. If you looked you could have seen them in me: discrete objects breaking down, atoms that would not willingly cohere to the molecule, a colloidal suspension of memory and more than memory; part of me and held within me, bound by names they no longer claimed but becoming me, to be called by my name, “Jane Sagan.”

In the end I am who I am. I am what I have made myself and what has been made of me. Part of who I am is who you are too; I have given you me as well. I would take your name and hold it in me, and whisper my name in your ear.

2

Killing

I am not Death. I am killing; I am the verb, I am the action, I am the performance. I am the movement that cuts the spine; I am the mass which pulps the brain. I am the headsnap ejecting consciousness into the air.

I am not Death but she follows close behind, the noun, the pronouncement, the dénouement and the end. She looks for where I have gone next, and where she is needed, and sometimes where she is wanted; desired as the worlds for those whom I have visited narrow down to a point too heavy to be long borne.

I have wondered whether death collapses the point into nothingness or expands it into eternity, but I do not wonder long. Death follows me but I do not look back to her and I do not dwell on what she does. I am killing, I am the action, and I have a job to do.

I am connected to those I kill: a T-shaped joint where their lives intersect mine, the line of their lives terminating in the contact while mine continues on to the next orthogonal encounter, toward the promise and threat of becoming the terminating arm–of the moment when death no longer follows but stands pitilessly before me, expanding or contracting everything I ever was or will be for her own unknowable aims.

I am connected to those I kill and I long to know them. I long to look down their line to see what has led them to me; whether they chose this moment or had it chosen. If they had chosen it, whether it was love or honor or duty or something else that set their line toward mine; if they had it chosen why they chose to accept it, and whether they would have accepted the choice if they knew I was waiting for them, preparing their final moment, every possible future imploding toward the point of my knife, the grain of my bullet, the grip of my hand.

I am connected to those I kill and would look past them, down the line of their lives to the originating point, to the other T-joint where their lives intersect with another: to the creature who bore them–to the woman, the female, the she; the verb and action and performance to complement my own, she who is not birth but whose acts allowed it, as I am not death but whose acts permit it.

When she first held this child who would become what I would kill, did she look for me as I look for her? Did she see me across the line of a life yet unlived? I want to know how I would appear to her: the anti-mother to kill whom she had created, or perhaps a crossbeam with her, to support the entirety of a life, without whom that life would be useless.

I do not flatter myself to suggest she would approve of what I represent, of what I would do, will do, have done, to the life she created and cherished. But I wonder if she would understand I am connected to her, through the one she bore. I stand facing her, staring across the chasm of time forded by this life between us.

#

The first thing I killed was unspeakable. Its species had a name for itself spoken like a hammer thumping onto meat; we could not have spoken it if we had tried.

We did not try. We called them for their language, for the percussive explosions which passed for their speech and filled the air when we fought them, like the beating of heavy skins. They were talking drums with weapons.

They were Thumpers and they were our enemy, our nemesis for the crime of landing on a world we said we owned and begging to differ with us on the matter. We sent emissaries to negotiate with them: 16th Brigade, Company D on the ship Baton Rouge. The negotiations did not go well. The Baton Rouge was made to fall into the atmosphere in a sparkling show, as metal and men tore into the sky and the sky tore back, shearing them down in layers that grew into conical sections of ash expanding behind their shrinking mass, ignored by the members of Company D on the skin of the world, who could not look up from their battle to see their friends’ farewell.

We felt Company D deserved its fate, the negotiations a lie and stupidly done at that; ham-handed arrogance that had gotten them stuck, and pleading for our help. We called them the “The Idiots”; we would have left them to die–an object lesson in incompetence–but we were not allowed a vote. We found ourselves on a world we should not have been on, to retrieve those who should not have needed retrieval, to kill those whose lives we should have not been made to take.

We would not complain about it. This was what we were bred to do. But it did not change the fact; my first mission was fighting someone else’s battle, making it my own by necessity. There was not much of Company D to retrieve; just enough for someone above us to declare victory despite the dead we left behind.

I will not detail the battle. I am here and that is enough.

The first thing I killed danced when I killed it, the force of the bullet spreading across its surface even as the slug traveled through its mass. It danced and spun and twisted and fell, shedding blood in a spiraling helix, angular momentum and gravity bartering for its movement and gravity getting the better end of the deal. It fell and lay sodden and I moved on to the next, already the verb and the action, already movement and purpose. My body moved.

My mind stayed, and in quiet moments in the days that followed returned to the dance, to the spin and slide and the sound of mortality the thing thumped out as it fell. I returned to that sound and imagined what it said: a shout of pain, a brief tattoo of regrets, the name of a lover or a brother or perhaps a mother; a final call backward, a fare-well to the one who had given it life or those who filled the life with joy, not to be seen again in the time that remained.

I have the moment recorded. If I chose I could open that moment again, find a translation and know for certain. I choose not to know. I had killed this thing. It deserved to have its final words fly past me, to find those for whom they were meant.

#

I think on what I owe those I kill. Clearly I do not owe them their lives, nor do I owe them individual memory; I have killed far too many to mark each with remembrance. My time with nearly all is too short to note much other than that they are dead and I am alive, even if it was a near thing on both counts.

I do not owe them guilt or regret. I have done what I have done. I know what I have done well and what I have done poorly, and for whatever I might be judged, I know no one knows better than I for what things I should be called into account. I know my own measure and will not burden those whom I have killed. If they have souls let them go to where they are bound, without my pleas of forgiveness to chain them to me, and to this world.

What I owe those I kill is understanding. I owe them the courtesy of recognition; acknowledgement that they were something other than just another thing I had to kill on the way to other things I had to kill. I cannot know every creature I have killed; I cannot spare the memory for each of them entire. But I will not pretend they were not my equal. Their lives were their own, and in their way they loved and feared and wondered and hoped. They did not expect me to be the end of all of that.

I will not pretend that all there was to them was the flesh I wounded, the bones I shattered, the blood I made to spill. I will not pretend that it does not matter to them that their lives are at an end. I grieve the loss of those I love and I will not pretend that those I kill are not missed, were not loved, are not grieved.

Some would not choose to do this and I do not fault them. Each of us does what we can to accept ourselves and what we do. But to see those I kill as less than myself lessens myself. I do not have enough of myself to lose that way.

After my first mission I learned of the Thumpers: their culture and ways and world. I learned of their gods and demons, their myths and fables and stories, learned of their art and song and the dances they danced without a bullet to guide them. I became an expert on the creatures I had killed, and when I did the one I made to dance and die took its leave of me.

I learned of the next people I would kill before I killed them, as I have done every time since. It became my job, along with killing, to learn what I could about those we fought and killed, the better to fight them, and the better to kill them–my need to know and understand and recognize those whose lives I end turned to practical use.

It is good to be useful for more than just killing. It is better to know that in my way I honor those I kill, as I would hope they would honor me.

3

Speaking

Let me speak your name. Let me feel the movement of my tongue within my mouth, of lips stretched and jaw pushed slightly forward, of the breath from my lungs shaped and formed into noise and phonemes and syllables and words; into proper nouns signifying you. Two names with marvelous utility: to recall you from memory, to bid for your attention, to speak your identity into the air and in doing so affirm you in your tangible skin, with vibration and waves and exhalation, with the intimacy of sound spoken aloud; with the pleasure that comes from the physical act of declaring you.

Let me speak your name and in speaking let me sing, a secret melody whose notes rise like birds and fall into your ears, to turn you toward me, with a smile that anticipates your own hidden song that choruses with my name. Let me speak your name so I may hear my name spoken to me from you.

You cannot imagine the sensuousness of speech, you who have spoken all your life, you who have mouthed words like bread, a staff of life common on your tongue. You cannot appreciate the luxury speech represents to those of us who have no time for it, we who speed our words, transmitting mind to mind without mediation, not even the briefest pause between mind and mouth to temper what we say or to soften sharp edges.

To speak without words is to speak fast and cheap, to not have to choose words either wisely or poorly but to send them all without discrimination–all content and no style, function over form, everything being what is said and nothing being how it is said. I talk to those I know, one mind to another, efficient and sure. We say what we need to say and then move on. Words do not mean to us what they mean to you and yours. We have other ways to share our emotions and our care and regard. Words do not carry that freight for us; they are light and fast and hollow. Sparrows with fragile bones.

Your words are not like this. Your words are filled, their hollows crammed with meaning, things unsaid nested within, jammed with implication. It is a wonder they do not drop to the floor the moment they leave your mouth. I marvel at what you say and even more how you say it, how your words shift their shape and contain their intent until they are inside me and unpack their contents, to leave me in awe of their economy. So much said with so little.

I cannot do this myself. We speak the same language but build our words differently. Mine are simple and deliberate, yours effortlessly complex. You are not aware of the miracles you make of your words. I cannot do this myself; I do not even try, save when I am speaking your name. With those few words I am your equal, filling the words with complexity and light. Stained glass shining from the inside.

You are so used to what you do with your words that you do not notice the effort I put into mine. I don’t mind. Take for granted that your name flows from my lips. It is a gift to me that you expect it there. Let me speak your name and fulfill your expectation.

#

I was not always in love with the spoken word. Those of you born to speech do not know how you tax the patience of those of us born to thought–how our first thought in hearing one of you speak is to wonder at the extent of your damage, to be curious at what sort of trauma could result in such an obvious and slow moving thing such as stands before us. We listen with politeness and internal pity: You cannot be faulted for the deficiencies to which you are born, and we would not choose to point out that they exist.

We listen and wait for our turn to speak, and then speak as slowly as you have been afflicted to do so. We try to get done with it as quickly as possible, because we know how much your sort wish to speak again, straining to pass along information along with asides and anecdotes and digressions and irrelevancies, leaving us to filter what you mean from what you say (We are no less verbose but at least we are quicker, when we talk among ourselves through our thoughts). And when you are done, again we speak, briefly and with economy and to the point, speaking what need be said and ignoring that which does not. For our courtesy we are labeled arrogant and curt. It annoys us.

In time I came to appreciate the spoken word, with its implications and intimations and allusions, with its potential of saying more than mere words, its palette of meaning richer and wider than I first grasped. And with that appreciation came exasperation at those gifted with speaking, who could say so much with what they said and how they said it, and chose to say nothing of consequence; who opened their mouth and allowed banality to fall out and thud to the ground; who were unaware that they could do with their words with the barest minimum of effort what I with all my desire could accomplish only haltingly, if at all. It was like being starved and watching those at a feast ignore the best dishes to fill up on bread.

If I could have I would have pushed their faces into their words, to make them see the parody they made of them. But they would have only have been confused and I would only have been more exasperated. There is a saying along the lines of not trying to teach a pig to sing because it wastes your time and annoys the pig. I want you to know how many times I have stood in pig-filled rooms, and longed to annoy.

I did not. I sat and listened to them talk instead, and was amazed to discover more in their words: subtext and overtones, emotional resonances that even those speaking did not know were there, the rhythm and pattern and tone of their speech opening them wide to be read. Books whose messages are not in the text but the footnotes. A library of the human experience.

It took time to translate the language, and I do not imagine I have mastered it. It will never be my native tongue. But I hear it well enough that in hearing it I see those who speak it anew, and once again I have pity for those who speak aloud. Not because they speak so slowly but because so many of them are deaf to all that they say. If they could hear what I hear they would be amazed.

#

My native tongue is not a tongue but the flash of neurons decoded and transmitted by machine instead of muscle. But it is my tongue nonetheless: my tongue, my map, my window, my apprehension of the world to myself. I am leaving it behind to be with you. I am an immigrant whose first language will not be simply unused but amputated, the parts of me I used to speak it left behind, no part of who I will be to speak it, even in the silence of my mind.

You do not know how this worries me. It is not that I am to be made to speak aloud a language I love and long to hear but which I speak imperfectly. In time I will speak it well enough. I worry that who I am is in how I know to speak; that I am shaped by my words and how I say them, and that in my deprivation, that which is me will diminish and become something other than what I am and what I am to you.

I am doing something new. I am holding myself in my mind–who I have been and who I am–wordless and silent; no description to resolve into a lexicon spoken or sent, a view of myself immune to travel or translation or amputation. When I move to your world my thoughts will be filled with myself; the measure of my character and deficiencies and desires held mute and in being mute held whole, so that when I am sent to you, I will be who I have been and who I am, so I can be who I will become with you.

I know you would not begrudge me this, that you would want me to think on myself if by doing so I believed that it would keep me myself. But you should know that as I hold myself in my thoughts, to will myself into being myself once more, the version of me I hold to myself holds you in her thoughts. She holds you wordlessly: who you have been and who you are, and who you will become with her. She holds you in her without words or speech and longs to speak your name.

4

Friendship

I rose early the day I killed my friend. I knew that when I killed him I would have to be ready, could not hesitate or be moved by his suffering, but be ready to strike swift and sure, and for that I needed to prepare myself. I needed not to harden myself but to be strong enough to hold myself open, to measure his pain not with detachment but with empathy, to strike him at the precise moment when the balance between his will and his suffering tumbled irretrievably against him; to allow him his struggle but not to struggle needlessly. I was to honor his final moments by judging when they would be, to do what he would not be able to do, and to give him the honor he was due from me and for himself. I rose early and spent the day in silence, and when I was ready and when the time had come, I took my knife and I went to him.

He did not answer his door; it was too late for that. His disease was untreated and untrammeled, sending the impulses of his nerves to bleed into his flesh, to twitch the muscle and fritter away any semblance of control. A friend let me enter and drew me to the rough mat on the floor, on which our friend sat and shook. I knelt in front of my friend and greeted him; drew my knife for him to see and placed it between us, not as a threat but as a promise, fulfillment of his request and my requirement to end his life.

He turned his head toward the knife and reached out a palsied hand to touch it, jostling it slightly as he did so. Told me it would serve, then reached the same hand to me, bidding me to take it. I found that I could not, the hand holding itself up for long seconds before retreating to its owner.

You blame yourself for this still, said my friend. You blame yourself for this disease you gave me, the one that will kill me today. It sits between us like an unwelcome guest.

I will not ask you to absolve yourself of this guilt. You have willingly picked it up and placed it on your shoulders. Only you will be able to set it down again. But know that I do not ask you to carry it for me. I would not have you think you are unworthy to touch my hand, you who are the only one I can trust and who I will trust in this final hour.

You afflicted me with this disease, took me far from my home and far from the people I love, and brought me to this moment. But you have also called me friend, understood me, and have given me honor and do me great honor now.

You have been long forgiven by me, and all that I would have between us now is companionship and love. You are my last and best friend. Remember that when your burden of guilt weighs you down.

#

And with those words my friend fell silent, curled himself small and began his wait, holding himself to himself as his body betrayed itself, scattering the messages between body and mind, pushing arms and legs, contorting his silent contemplation into a jester’s pantomime, making a mockery of his dignity–but not so much a mockery that his dignity did not hold.

It was hard to watch him leak and spasm and grunt. But I would not turn away. I watched every moment, silent and observant, owing him witness for the affliction I gave him and the release I would yet give him, until the moment when I became aware with every sense that my friend had arrived at his moment of release. I did not hesitate. I picked up my knife and prepared to find his heart.

There is a moment of surface tension when a knife blade presents its demand and the flesh honors it. An instant of pressure before the puncture, the rip before the slide, a small eternity easy to miss but impossible to ignore if you’ve felt it before. I lived in that moment a great while for the small sliver of time it was there.

And then I moved on, angled my blade in and up, felt its tip pierce its target and slide through the other side, and continued on until the flat of the hilt rested cold on his chest. I moved in close and embraced him, the better to provide leverage to twist the blade, and make the argument to his heart that its work was forever done. The heart did not argue and for that I was grateful.

My friend gripped me as I gripped him, exhaling at the crystal clarity of the knife, cutting through his diffuse and random pain to rally every thought in his body, every final message that coursed along his nerves, toward the goal of reaching his hand to me a second and final time.

I took it and held it, and wet it with my tears as I bent to kiss it, an action which surprised me and released me, and let me lay my burden down. I’m sure my friend saw it in his failing last moment of life; his last gift to me and my last gift to him, so that all that was between us in the end was companionship and love. He died in my arms and holding my hand, and after a minute I set him down on his rough mat, stepped back to where his other friend stood waiting, and gave our friend’s soul space to depart.

#

I did not say goodbye to my friend then, but some time later, as I held his body in my hands, floating in the cold and dark above the brilliant green world of his birth. A place I had come to fulfill a promise: to see him home, to return him to a place from which my actions had kept him while he was still alive. It was not easy to get there and it would not be easy to return, but I had risked my own death for reasons far more trivial. I would not shame my friend or myself by denying him his return home, because it would be inconvenient for me to take him there.

And so I floated above this great green world, body in hand, holding it longer than I should have, whispering words to it that would not carry in the vacuum but which I said nonetheless, before letting it go and releasing it to spiral into the gravity well of my friend’s childhood world. My friend and I paced each other a while, sharing the same orbit, until I turned to make my way back to my own world. I did not turn back to see my friend fall away from me. I had said my goodbyes and was content to let him find his own way home.

I wonder if as he fell those he had loved felt him return home and felt his absence filled, as he shot across the sky and spread himself in it. I like to think they did, not because I am the one who took him from them, but because I loved him too, and in loving him felt his love for them. I hope they looked to the sky, saw him move through it, and were glad to have him home.

5

Age

When you were born all you could do was cry. When I was born I woke to a whisper, giving me a name and telling me to come away from my cradle. I walked, one foot and then another, understanding fully without understanding how I understood. I turned to see my birthmates, all walking and all sending out their own names, and receiving names in turn. We were born and we were aware and we would soon be made to fight.

Our childhoods did not exist, except perhaps in the moment between being given our names and setting our feet on the ground. Once that step was taken we had a purpose, a call to action. We answered it unthinkingly, unaware of our options or that there were options–that concept left packed up for the time being because that was what was required in the moment–no more mind than it took to walk, one foot and then another, into the rest of our lives.

When you were two you had learned to speak and walk. When I was two I was made an officer–a lieutenant–to replace the one whose body had been bisected in front of me, dorsal and ventral peeling away from each other and falling sideways, the last thought he sent one of surprise at feeling a cool breeze between his front and back. And I, stumbling back with wounds of my own, holding my arm across my abdomen to keep my insides in, at an age when you were pulling the heads off your sister’s dolls.

When you were four you learned to read and tie your shoes. When I was four I attempted to negotiate a surrender, to keep my soldiers from having to risk their lives by having to take a settlement one hut at a time. There was no surrender and we went through the settlement, killing as we went and dying too, needless deaths all around, needless save to honor the death wish of the settlement leader, who preferred annihilation to life. I made sure I found him, denied him the martyrdom he imagined for himself, made him bury his dead, and gave him a cell to live a life which I hoped would be long enough to sprout regret.

When you were six you sat in school and learned to add two and three. When I was six I found you, or what remained of you–so much of you strewed behind you, along with the wreckage of your ship and your crew, and what was left of you alive only through luck and will and technology. You should have been dead when we met, and you should have died after we met, in the long minutes between finding you and saving you.

I remember touching your face and lying to you that you were all right now, seeing you weep and wondering if it might not be more merciful to let you die. But I had my orders to bring you back, so I did, knowing what it would mean for your life but not knowing what it would mean for mine. I was six when I met the person I would love, and became the person you would love again: the person I was made from, whom you met, or so you told me, when you were six.

#

Please understand me. I do not mean to belittle you when I note that I was leading soldiers at an age when you could barely control your bladder, or that I stood dazzled by three moons rising over a phosphorescent sea, lacking the poetry to match in my head the song in my eyes, at an age where you enjoyed the taste of paste and boogers and small coins.

You no more chose how to be born than I did, and your life is no more or less complete because you required two decades to become an adult, and several decades after that to become a soldier, both of which I was from the moment I opened my eyes. I do not mean to demean you when I admit I find some amusement at the idea of you as a child, of you reaching no higher than my waist, of you big-eyed, and your big head wobbly on your neck, looking at the world with curiosity if not comprehension, needing to wait years to know enough to know how little you know.

I note these differences because they stand between us. When you speak of growing up and growing old, you speak to someone who did not do the first, and can choose not to fear the second. Every day of my life from first to this, in a body that defies both growth and decay, even if one day it cannot defy death. It is not eternal but it doesn’t change, and if I chose I could stay in it for as long as I could manage. Timeless in my way, unyielding to both creation and destruction, and because of this separate from the human stream of age–the arc that bends from development to deconstruction, that gives definition to your days, provides sense of story and an assurance of all things in their season, and all of it coming to an end as natural and complete as its beginning.

I hear you speak of your childhood as the blind hear someone speak of the color of a flower or of a beloved’s eyes; understanding that the color exists, understanding the emotion color can arouse, but lacking the experience that brings understanding into empathy, understanding a thing without feeling it deep in the brain, where the joy of it will shudder out, down the nerves to one’s very fingertips.

Childhood is a country undiscoverable to me, something so far removed from me that I cannot even say that it was denied, because it was never something that I was meant to have. Nor is it something I desire, whose absence I resent. I am who I am and that is enough. It is simply that childhood is an experience we do not share, another place where our lives refuse to link, a commonality we do not have. When I think of you as a child it amuses me, and it makes me sad that you do not get to think of me the same way.

#

I am nine years old. In those nine years I have seen things that others could spend lifetimes and never once see. I have traveled farther than entire millennia of explorers, their journeys laid end to end and back again. I have been on more worlds than we knew could possibly exist for all but the smallest slice of time our species stared up at the stars. I have measured a life not in teaspoons or tablespoons or ladles or jugs but in inexhaustible gouts of experience, pushing me forward into wonder and terror and being.

I am nine years old and I have lived in every moment of that life. No time wasted in idleness and futility, in routine and repetition, in grinding gears or marking time. You can’t tell me I have lived less than those who have merely lived longer.

It does not matter: All these experiences and all this experience make no difference in how I am seen–how all of us are seen, those of us whose lives who begin in medias res. I am nine years old and must be what they remember nine-year-olds to be, seen, at best, as an idiot savant, a useful moron, a little girl in a big girl’s body.

Those who don’t belittle me fear me, me and mine; grown too fast, made too smart, too far out of their own experience to understand, assumed to be without morals because they would not have been moral at the same age. We are sent to do the things they judge necessary and yet fear to do–fine for us to be given tasks that might cost us our souls when we’re assumed not to have souls at all. We learn quickly not to hold this fear and stupidity against most of the human race, because the alternative is to let you all die.

When I first decided to love you I needed to know how you would see me. Whether you like so many others would see a child in an oversized body, or someone who was your equal in everything but time. I waited for the moment of condescension, for the casual dismissal, for the instance when you would ask what I could possibly know, given how little time I could have known it in.

I am waiting still, but I no longer expect its arrival. You are not blind to my age or our differences; you know better than anyone how brief my existence has been, because my life could have only begun after her life ended. Perhaps you see me as a continuation of a life interrupted, or perhaps you simply don’t care and see me as your equal because there is no reason not to. I have time to find out as our lives continue, and we mark time not by what has come before, but by what we have together.

6

Sex

I must apologize to you. I am sitting with you and you are talking to me, telling me about the world to which we are going, where you and I will start our lives together. I’m sure what you’re saying is important–critical things I need to know, about a place I have never been but where I will spend the rest of my days. I am sure you are telling me things I need to hear, but I must confess I’m not hearing a single word.

Instead I am intent on your face, and the movement of your lips, and the memory of how those lips feel when they are on me. While you speak I am thinking of the last time we kissed, and the subtle friction that took place because we were so slightly out of sync, the rush of blood flooding our lips to make them softer, and make us more aware of just how many nerve endings each of us were pressing against the other.

Your words arrive at ears that are not deaf but disinterested, because although what you say is something I need to know, I know I can make you repeat it some other time. You will oblige me that way. And so I watch your lips purse and thin and tighten and repeat, knowing that the same motions can be used for other ends, and enjoying the memory of those ends achieved.

I apologize now because I am staring at your hands, which you use as punctuation–another layer of language to illustrate the point you think I am hearing, but which in reality is flying past my head and falling into piles against the wall behind me. I realize that this is not like me, that you prize my seriousness and my ability to focus. You should know I am serious and I am focused, just not on what you’d prefer me to be. It is your hands that have my attention now, their short and choppy movements at the moment belying their startling fluidity as they move over me, and their strength when they lock with mine and press them down as you press your body into me.

There is an argument to be made as to which of us is stronger, but in the moment is not the time for that. Your strength is a sign of your intent and your request that I honor that intent. I’ve made the same request, and in the same way. I remember that you’ve honored it as well, hands locked and pressed and then released, to move with intent, another layer of language, to illustrate a point I want to hear.

I apologize yet again. This is a total loss. I am so far downstream from whatever it is that you’ve said that it would be impossible to catch up, and besides I am focused on other topics, about which I intend to make you presently aware. I am sorry that I have been entirely lost in your lips and hands and the memories of each on me. But you should know that I am going to make it up to you, and let you put them to what I feel is better use than the service to which they are put now. I think you will agree that all things considered, the purpose I have for them is a better one for all involved.

Even so I apologize for the inattention. I also apologize for surprising you just now, by knocking aside the table inconveniently set between us. And now I must apologize for upsetting your chair with you still in it, and for knocking your head on the floor. I will do what I can to make you forget your pain.

#

Sex with you is unlike any other sex I’ve had. I do not say this like one of the restless virgins of literature, swept up in swooning tides of bliss. I am not the swooning type. And while you are good, you are not that good; your mere touch is not enough to transport me to fantastical realms of ecstasy, or whatever ridiculous phrase one would use to express such an idea.

Sex is not a holy or sacred thing or a physical machine to express a separate emotion. I fuck to enjoy myself and to celebrate the fact I am alive. I understand the idea of making love, but it seems a bad way to go about it. I don’t fuck to show my love. I love to show my love and let the fucking be its own thing. I love you and I love fucking you and I have no need to complicate either with the other. They are both true statements and they are both good. I am content to have them remain that way.

My sex before you was with my own, with those born as I was, who communicate as I do, equally adept at transmitting sensation and emotion whole and unrefined, over the same line as we send words. With us sex is not a matter simply of bodies, and of a pantomime approximation of knowing if what you are doing is working for those you are with. You feel what they feel and they feel what you feel, a positive feedback loop to take every thrust and pull and lick and touch, and magnify it until your nerves ring with your exhaustion, and the exhaustion of your partners.

It is needless to say what fun it can be. But it’s also worth noting what it lacks. Being inside someone’s head heightens the performance, and it makes you aware it is a performance: moves choreographed to increase pleasure, focused on the mechanics of sex but lacking in connection, ironic when you consider that your lover is inside your head as much as inside your body.

The first time we were together, I sent toward you to bind our thoughts and realized that your mind was shut to me; that not once had your mind been as open as your body. That you had lacked that dimension in your sex and always had. I pitied you. And then you put your mouth on me, and your hands, and I had nothing to do but focus on how you moved on me, and against me, and inside me.

And I realized that you lacked nothing; that in place of feeling your thoughts reflected in mine, I felt your desire and your inescapable need to be inside
of me, not only with your body and not with your mind, but with every particle of your soul. I laughed and came at the same time, and wept as I tried to devour you, to own you and be every part of you as much as I was myself.

It was something I had never done before and will not do with anyone else. You opened me to desire, and I desire not to desire anyone but you.

#

I regret to say that we have made a mess of the room, but I do not regret to say that you are inside of me. We will reconstruct the room later, but for now I want to focus on what we are doing, which makes me wonder why I am bothering to narrate this in my own head, observing me observing you inside of me.

Now I remember. I’m observing this because I want you to know how I know the nature of desire, that I have learned it from you, and that I question whether desire is truly what I feel. I have taken the time to read on the nature of desire and have learned the physiology of it–the rush of chemicals through the brain, tunneling pathways and new connections. But among this physiology, the psychology, the warning that desire does not stay, that novelty wanes and desire wanders, looking for someone new to attach to, or simply wanders off leaving behind something else that may be as satisfying in its way, but is not desire.

If this is true then I am not now feeling desire. What I feel for you has not wandered or waned or lessened, but has grown since the first time you pressed your mouth to mine and served your notice that you had desires of your own. I look at you now even as you are between me, and would push you farther into me until there is no space between us, no gap between where I stop and you begin, but a continuum and a binding, covalent and irrevocable. If it is not desire I do not know what to call it, save to call it love, which I already feel in different ways than this.

I am without a word to describe what I feel, if it is not desire and is not love. So I will express it how I can, not in words but in action, with lips and hands and bodies and merging, with sex and fucking and release.

I have never been inside someone as deeply as I am inside you. I love to feel you inside me, the physical complement to my spiritual state, expression made flesh of what I would say to you if I had the words. I press you into me, and draw into a kiss the lips that earlier had been speaking. I take the hands that had earlier moved in the air and bid you move them on me. Later you will tell me again what you had earlier said, and I will listen then, I promise.

But for now all I can say is that I apologize for wanting you, and in wanting you having you. And I apologize in advance for all the times I will want you between now and the end of our lives. If you can find it in your heart to forgive me I will make it worth your while, and will forgive you for all the times you will want me, and will accept your apologies, as you accept mine now.

7

Fear

Fear enters the room and sits down in a chair and with a polite smile asks to open negotiations. Fear is small and hard and patient, and duplicitous, because in asking to negotiate it knows I cannot refuse. I am obliged to accommodate Fear because I am human, and no human is without fear. Fear sits and smiles and is predatory, immobile and silent and serene; an observer who conserves his energy and is content to wait. We watch each other and take our measures, he to undo me and me to avoid being undone. We both sit and measure and stare. And then because I long for other company, I ask him to show me what I should fear.

To begin he offers me the fear of death, and I laugh. I laugh because I know Death far too well to fear her. Death is my intimate and my companion; I am her messenger and handmaiden. We have walked too many worlds and have become too familiar; close acquaintances if not friends, because you can never befriend Death without embracing her, and for now I keep her at a safe and prudent distance. Even so I know her methods and her means and her agenda. I know her legendary capriciousness is overstated but that her inevitability is not. Death comes to us all, even those who have served her so well.

It is foolish to fear the inevitable. I know I will die. Fearing Death will not make her come for me later and might send me to her sooner, when a blind rush from her sends me into her arms. I will not fear her and I will not fear going to her when it is time to do so. I tell Fear to show me something else.

He shows me Pain, myriad as Death is singular, creative in his attention-seeking, and in his desire to overwhelm every scrap of consciousness. The most perfect of egotists.

I am not impressed. Pain is a tool: a diagnostic instrument in one’s self, a lever in others, and in all things symbolic of something else that better deserves our attention. Pain may represent Death, who I refuse to fear. Pain may represent power, which I also refuse to fear; I am better than those who would use their power to make me fear them, power predicated on the assumption that I will do anything simply to exist. They presume to hold my life in trust; my regret as I would end my life would be that I would not be there as they realized how little power they had over me. I choose not to fear the things Pain represents, leaving pain a process, a signal, a firing of nerves to be endured.

#

Of course Fear knows all this. Knows that I fear neither Death nor Pain, or those who use either to divorce me from my will. This is what fear does: presents you with what you can bear, so that when he shows you what is unbearable, you will open wider to let him feed on your heart. I know this and even knowing this does not keep me from a moment of satisfaction, and the hope that Fear will step away from my table. Fear allows you a moment to hope that he doesn’t truly know what will break you. But he does, and he proves it to me by showing me you, and showing you without me.

This is what I fear. And I confess that part of me hates you a little for it, hates that you have taken my life and so threaded it with yours that I can’t pull away without losing myself; I who had always been whole in myself but who now knows what she stands to lose in losing you.

It is not your death I fear, or separation. We have been at war as long as we have known of each other. Death follows behind us both, and separation has been what we have had the most of, our time together both trivial and precious measured against our time in absence. Death and separation do not alter what is between us. What I fear is diminishment, and subtle change, and the moment in which a life without you becomes a sustainable thought.

It seems such a small thing compared to all the other things one may fear. There is no finality here; you and I would continue in our lives, no death or distance to separate us. Just disinterest, and the perception of what we have becoming what we once had, becoming memory and history and remembrance. What was separated from what is and separate from what will be.

A small thing and a survivable thing. And for all that the thought of it falls on me like wreckage and pulls into me to burn with sickening violence. I look across the table and Fear is gone, not because it has gone but because it has found the thing that will let it live in me. I fear a life without you and you without me.

#

I choose not to share this fear with you. You do not deserve to have it put on you. There has never been a time when you have not reached toward me, even when I had pushed you away (or, when we were formally introduced, when I threw you across a table). You never made me ask your forgiveness for being her, and you never loved me simply because I was the only part of her you had left. You have always seen me and you have always seen me with you.

I feel ashamed I have this fear, based on nothing real, called into existence by my own irrationality. I have so many excuses for it, beginning with my youth, and my inexperience in weaving my life to someone else’s. But I will not rationalize this fear. It is what it is; the serpent in my ear, whispering the promise of the fall.

I am human. Fear lives in me and sets to make my heart bitter. But I know something about Fear. Fear is a scavenger who feeds on the future; on what may be and what is possible, extending down the line of our lives. Fear lives in me and I cannot change that. But I choose to starve Fear. I choose to live here with you now.

In the future perhaps we will diminish and we will divide, and all we will have is memory. I accept that this could be what we have in time, and in accepting it set it aside. What is left to me is this moment, and you with me. I choose to be with you in this moment, to love you in the present time and in the present tense. It is all the time we have, have ever had, or will ever have. All of our lives here and now, wherever here and whenever now may be.

I love you now and will not regret having loved you and will not fear loving you forward. I am here now and I am with you. It is enough for as long as I have it.

With that thought I accept what I must from Fear and move toward you. Negotiations are closed, and you and I remain.

8

Endings

It is time to come to the end of things and to the beginning.

I am standing in a room where there are two of me. One of them is who I have always been as long as I have had memory of myself. The other is who I will be, someone I will be poured into to become who I must be to start our lives together.

I cannot stop staring at her. I see myself in the curve of her cheek and the line of her nose and the length of her limbs. Through her I will gain many things I would not have.

I will gain a husband and a daughter and a new world, which I will not have to meet at the end of a gun, and whose citizens I will not have to defend or kill. I will gain a measure of peace and I will gain an identity that is my own–not one of a soldier or an officer or a killer, but simply Jane Sagan, whoever she may be.

She offers me so many things, she who is not yet me. And all I have to do for her to become me is to give up myself.

I give up myself in speed and strength; my new body has only what nature and evolution saw fit to provide, limbs weak enough to force the brain to better them, with spear and sword and bow, gun and gears and engines, every marvelous creation made by man to compensate for a body barely competent to carry its brain in its head.

I give up myself in mind, abandoning the fluid switch between machine and gray matter that extends myself into others, to disconnect my thoughts to them and theirs to me, to sever the connections that have sustained me. To shut myself off in my own head. To live alone with my thoughts, their echoes muffled in close quarters.

I give myself up in identity as a soldier and an officer and a killer, as a friend and a colleague, and as one by whose hand humanity keeps its place in the universe.

Make no mistake that I am weaker for the loss of each. Make no mistake that I will have to learn again how to fit myself into a world that no longer works like it should. Make no mistake that it will be through force of will alone, that my frustration and anger at being less than what I was will not be visited on you–that even in my newly weakened state I am still dangerous and liable to rage at what I have taken from myself, by becoming this new self.

The woman who opens her eyes in the body I see before me cannot be the same as the one who closes her eyes in the body I have now. Too much changed to remain intact, too much left behind that can’t be brought over. I will hold my image of myself to me, but there is only so much of me that will fit.

#

If you knew all of this I know you would ask me to consider what I was doing, whether I was sure I was making the right decision, and that you would rather face a life without me than to have me choose a life I would not choose for myself. I know this is what you would say and do as well as I know myself.

And this is why I say with all affection that sometimes you can be such a stupid man. I wouldn’t mind you feeling just a little bit greedy for me, that the idea of not having me would make you angry, not heavy-hearted and accepting. There are things you still have to learn about me and this is one of them. It is not that you are too considerate but that I don’t mind when you tell me what you want and put that first instead of last.

I don’t mind because that is what I am doing now. You should not think I do any of this for you, that I am committing a selfless act or an expression of slavish devotion, that I have signed on for a mermaid’s sacrifice and will walk on knives for dumb love. I am too selfish for that. I want you to know that I am here not for you but for me. I want you for my own. I want the life we will have together for my own. I want the silence of peace and release from being the one who walks ten steps ahead of Death. I want the honor of not being feared or hated, and of not having those be the correct response to my presence.

I want to be able to say that I have done my part and I have done it well, but that my part is over and now it is time for my reward, and that reward is you and this life. I want all of this and I am willing to pay to get it.

But it is still hard.

In this I imagine that I am now your equal: You once gave up a life, leaving behind a world and everything on it, all that you had been and everything you knew, on that single sphere of rock and air and water. You put it behind you and stepped into a new life in which you found me. I can’t imagine that it was easy to do this.

But was it a sacrifice? Did it take from you more than you could bear? It takes nothing from what you did to say it was not, that you left a life that had nothing left for you except the marking of time. Hard though it may be, it is not a sacrifice to give up that for which you no longer have a use.

I am at that place now. This life has made me who I am and who I am no longer wants this life. I have seen so much of this universe behind a rifle and a mission. I am ready to see a smaller part of it in depth and in peace. It is not a sacrifice to pay for what you want though the price is high. The price for this new life is everything in the old one. You once gave up everything in your old life and gained me. I am ready to give up this life and keep you.

#

I rest in the container that holds everything I am but not anything I will be, and watch as the technician makes her preparations. You are holding my hand and telling me of what it was like for you.

I smile and I want to kiss you, but not here and not now. I do not want a last kiss in an old body and in an old life. I want a first kiss in a new life, a promise fulfilled and no regrets. I am looking forward to that kiss. I hold it in my thoughts as I hold myself there and you there with me.

The technician looks at me now and asks me if I want to begin. I look to you and say I do.

Author

Afterword

On September 25, 2006, science fiction and fantasy author John M. Ford passed away. His loved ones suggested that those who wished to remember him do so by contributing to a book endowment, established in his name, which would benefit the Minneapolis Public Library. I had met Mike Ford only briefly, but a number of good friends and colleagues were close to him, and I wanted to do something to help get the endowment off to a good start. I offered a bound draft version of my novel The Last Colony for auction, and noted somewhat jokingly that if the bidding got to $5,000 or above, I would write a short story for the winning bidder, on the grounds that someone who bid that much deserved a short story.

As it happens, Bill Schafer of Subterranean Press had been trying to get me to write a story for him, set in my “Old Man’s War” universe. So he asked me if I was serious about writing the short story for a $5,000 bid. I said I was; he bid that amount. And here we are: The John M. Ford Book Endowment is $5,000 richer, and I wrote the story you now have in your hands.

I don’t want to overstate my relationship with Mike Ford; as I mentioned before, we had met only a few times, although each time was an enjoyable experience. Nevertheless, his warmth and kindness and wit enlightened the lives of people whom I have come to care about in the science fiction community, and their memories and celebration of his life served as an inspiration for me in the writing of this story. I encourage everyone who reads this to seek out his work, which is eminently worth reading.

I’d also like to give a word of appreciation to Bill, whose positive delight in maneuvering me over a barrel to get a story out of me in no way diminishes the generosity of his contribution, which serves both to honor the memory of Mike Ford and puts books in the hands of readers. Bill’s a good egg, and I’m delighted he got this story out of me.

–John Scalzi

December 16, 2006

Fiction: The Support Technician Tango by Daniel Abraham

One:

By its nature, a self-help book is written by someone who thinks they know what to do and read by someone who doesn’t; there
hasn’t been a better setup for the pompous to fleece the credulous since Rome stopped selling indulgences. The saving grace is that the bad advice of the authors is almost always ignored, misunderstood, or abandoned by readers who go ahead and do whatever they would have done anyway. Some people knit lace, some people improve themselves; self-help is a pointless hobby but harmless.

There are, however, exceptions.

In among the hatchet-faced, unhappy women who advise on matters of love, the avuncular sports nutrition PhDs who advise on
matters of love, and the Jungian analysts whose advice on love may perhaps pay off their divorce lawyers, there is a deadlier breed.

The covers are just as cheerful, the promises just as bright and insincere, the quotes of grateful, imaginary supplicants just as
breathless. But some few in this school of spiritual mackerel are actually sharks.

Some books are quite literally alive, conscious of the hands that hold the pages, and ready to present just the wrong idea at just the right time. They stalk the places that books lie forgotten–waiting rooms, dusty ledges between wall and mattress, Hastings–waiting quietly for the right moment and, more importantly, the right person.

Two:

“David Osgood, sir. He came in as soon the software company released the patch,” Mr. Elms’ secretary said. She always had a military air about her, like the Secretary of Defense reporting to the President. It was why Mr. Elms trusted her. “I think Teddy helped too.”

“And the virus?”

“We didn’t get it, sir, but a lot of the other law firms in town did. Libby and Meyers. Sudder, Belle, and Caffe. Cawdor and Glamis.

The Robert Correy Firm. And Clarence Musslewhite isn’t answering calls, so my guess is he got it too.”

Mr. Elms nodded, suppressing a grin. He was a dignified man, old-school, who considered it bad manners to gloat openly at the misfortunes of others once he’d made partner.

“That’s too bad,” he said. “Very bad. And it was destructive was it? People lost a lot of data? Ah. What a shame. I wonder if Libby and Meyers will have to ask for a continuance.”

“They already have, sir.”

Mr. Elms made a sound at the back of his throat that managed to be both non-committal and cheery. He tapped his wide, sausage-like fingers together. In the distance, he heard the phone ring, and the new receptionist pick it up. Someone down the corridor asked peevishly where the good printer paper was kept. The computer on his desk hummed quietly to itself, uninfected and ready to serve. The sounds of an office at peace. The sounds of an office not presently dealing with a massive computer failure. He found them oddly beautiful.

His secretary cleared her throat.

“I’ve heard a rumor, sir. Nothing I could swear to.”

“Yes?”

“I think Robert Correy fired his technician over this.”

Within the space of a heartbeat, Mr. Elms had taken in the guarded tone, the disavowal of certainty, the fact that his competition was about to be hiring just the sort of person who Peabody, Plummer and Elms had in pocket. He nodded to his secretary.

“Mr. Osgood must have worked very long hours on this,” he said.

“All night, sir.”

“Perhaps a little performance bonus is in order. Where is our man David, anyway?”

Three:

The whirr of the air conditioner made the darkened storage room seem quieter than it actually was. The couch, tucked back behinds three rows of cheap metal shelving, smelled slightly of cat, but it was soft and comfortable and long enough for all six lanky feet of David Osgood to stretch out. The coffee was just starting to wear off, the hours of sleep debt leaving his body heavy as a soaked towel. His mind drifted contentedly through the network, half recalling and half dreaming. The fact was that nowhere on the system was there any of the seventeen documented variants of the BLDSKR virus. The browsers and email programs on each desk were immunized against it, and the security hole in the mail server was patched and tested. In the world outside, chaos might reign and nations might fall, but his network was fine.

He didn’t recognize the click of the opening door until the fluorescent lights above him flickered to life. David grunted, sat up, and met the surprised expression of Daphne the paralegal. Annoyance at being disturbed slunk quietly away, replaced by the powerful awareness that he was sleeping in yesterday’s clothes.

Daphne was pretty the way that competence is pretty. Her clothes were simple with just enough pattern to hide stains. Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail that suited her face. Her shoes looked comfortable. David had known boys in high school who wore more makeup.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t know anyone was in here. The printer’s out of paper.”

“Okay,” David said, unable to keep his head from bobbing like a pigeon. “I’ll get that.”

“Actually,” she said, plucking a fresh ream from the shelves, “I think I can handle it. You put the thing in the thing and it goes, right?”

She smiled at her own joke. He grinned at it.

“Right,” he said.

“You want the lights back out?”

“No,” he said, “that’s okay. Break’s over.”

Daphne hesitated in the doorway, as if there was something more she was going to say. Something red as fresh blood caught David’s eye.

“Oh, hey!” he said. “You dropped your book.”

He scooped the little volume up fro the floor and held it out to her. She looked at it and cocked her head.

“Sorry. Not mine,” she said. And then she was gone.

David sighed and dropped back to the couch, rubbing his eyes with his free hand. On his knee, the book glittered white as cut marble with bright letters: 30 Steps to Your Best Self. And in the same font, but smaller and black: How To Become The Person You Want To Be Without Even Trying. He flipped the book open to a random page.

STEP FOUR (the book said) Branching Out

Once you have mastered your core abilities, it’s easy to stagnate and leave the things you most desire just out of reach. Instead, be open to opportunity. Try something new! Use that unexpected bonus for ballroom dance lessons, and let the sense of being “just that computer guy” fall away. You’ll find yourself becoming the kind of man that women are drawn to and men admire.

It was the stupidest advice he’d ever seen. What if the person reading it was a professional dancer? And what was that thing about an unexpected bonus anyway? He knew people who’d never get a reward in their lives, but went around acting like they deserved one.

And yet the fantasy wasn’t unpleasant. Dancing. He remembered a movie where Al Pacino had been dancing with a young woman who was almost but not quite Uma Thurman. David tried to imagine himself in the role, moving with grace and certainty, his arm around a beautiful woman’s waist, his clothes not looking slept in. For a moment, almost-Uma looked a lot like Daphne the paralegal.

“Um. David?”

Teddy stood in the doorway, thin moustache echoing thick mono-brow. His smile apologized for itself.

“Hey,” David said, letting the book close.

“Elms is looking for you.”

“What’s up?”

“Nothing bad, I don’t think,” Teddy said. “Just a postmortem on the patches and upgrades last night, probably. I’d tell him all about it, but you’re better with that, you know?”

David stood, combed his fingers through his hair, trying to make it lie straight. His sense of peace and accomplishment was gone. He tried to get it back by smoothing the wrinkles out of his shirt.

“How do I look?” he asked.

“Good. You look good,” Teddy said, nodding anxiously. “Rugged, kinda.”

“Yeah, well. Thanks for lying.”

“Welcome,” Teddy said as David walked past him and out of the storage room, and then a moment later, “Dave! Hey, you forgot your book.”

“It’s not mine,” David said.

Four:

STEP FOUR: Accepting Your Limitations

Most of us aren’t number one. Accepting that you are second rate is, however, the first step toward success. When the Good Book said that the race goes not always to the swift, it was talking about you. If you keep an eye out for the moments when the Top Dog isn’t available, you could still find yourself in positions you hadn’t dreamed of.

“Well,” Teddy said to himself. “Huh.”

Five:

“Um,” David said.

“Now don’t object,” Elms said, his puffy hand palm out in a stop gesture. “This is something I’ve already spoken with the other partners about, and we’re adamant. Good performance deserves its rewards.”

David looked at the check in his hand—it was as much as he would have made in a week—and wondered if he had been expected to argue against taking it. The thought hadn’t crossed his mind.

“We appreciate our employees,” Elms said, leaning forward over his desk. “We think of the firm as a community first, you know. Like family, really. And people who do well by us…well, David, we do well by them.”

“Um. Yeah. Thank you.”

“Think of me as a resource,” Elms went on. “Working together. That’s what we do best. We work. Together. If there’s anything you need—”

“Could I take the afternoon off?”

Elms blinked, thrown off stride.

“It’s just I was here all night,” David said. “And I could really use a nap and a shower.”

“Of course,” Elms said with an air of having been outmaneuvered. “Absolutely. Take the afternoon.”

“Thanks,” David said. They both stood and shook hands awkwardly across the wide desk. David folded the bonus check and turned toward the door, but he stopped, pulled up by a half-articulated thought.

“Mr. Elms?”

“David?”

“You’re successful. I mean, you’re a lawyer and you’re partner in the firm and like that. Do you…do you ever wonder if it’s enough? You know, if maybe there’s something you’re missing out on?”

“No,” Elms said, his face going a little grey. “Never.”

“Oh. Okay. Thanks.”

David stepped out into the calming, professional blue-green hallway. The hum of the business day was all around him—the low voices of distant conversation, the ring of telephones, the truck-backing-up beep of the microwave in the breakroom. He pushed his hands deep in his pockets, frowning.

The partners had noticed him, they’d given him money and time off and a handshake. By all rights, he should have felt delighted. He kicked all the ass, and everyone knew it. He took out the check and looked at it again.

You’ll find yourself becoming the kind of man that women are drawn to and men admire.

The lights were still on in the storage room. The couch was still pressed down where he’d rested his head. The book, however, was gone. He looked between the cushions, in the small, dusty space between the couch and the floor. He made a long, slow circuit of the room in case Teddy had shelved it with the pens or legal pads, but the thing simply wasn’t there.

He thought about going through the whole office, asking Teddy, maybe Daphne, if they’d seen it or, failing that, if they remembered the title. 30 Steps to Something Generic was the closest he could come. But it was pushing noon, and it wasn’t really important.

Six:

Mr. Elms didn’t consider himself a weak man. He had clawed his way to the top of a profession where clawing was de rigueur. He’d honed the plowshare of his mind into a sword with which you could shave an ant. When something was even the slightest bit off, he was sure could tell. And something had been off about David Osgood.

For the rest of the day and into the first few hours of the night—he, unlike Osgood, wasn’t the sort of man to go home early—Mr. Elms found his concentration divided. There was the deposition of a woman who claimed to have seem Mr. Elms’ client accepting a bribe, but there was also David Osgood asking if he was missing something. There was an angry letter from opposing attorney that required an equally scathing reply, but there was also the computer consultant calling him successful. Had there been just the hint of a sneer in his voice?

The fact was the firm constituted very nearly the whole of Mr. Elms’ world. He had never married because he’d never found a woman who didn’t want him around. He had no particular friends outside the profession because he found other pursuits beside the point, and no particular friends within it because it wasn’t that sort of work. The firm was as precious to him as his own arms. It was a part of him. The mere suggestion that he might find something lacking in his life put his back up.

And that might have been all it did, except for the book he found in the break room when he went to microwave his dinner.

STEP FOUR: Watching Your Back

The weak council patience, but men of power know better. The only way to protect yourself is to be vigilant. If someone under you begins to behave oddly, you would be a fool to ignore it. Don’t fall into that trap! Watch with the eyes of a hawk! Act boldly and without restraint! It is your total commitment to your work that makes you who you are.

The microwave beeped, startling him. Mr. Elms put the slim volume back beside the coffee machine where he’d found it. He was fairly certain that no one else was still in the office, but he certainly wouldn’t want anyone to see his reading a self-help book, not even one as wise and well-considered as that. A partner such as himself should show no weakness, ever.

Back at his desk, the glowing lights of the city his only companion, Mr. Elms ate his dinner slowly, unaware of the greasy steak and flaccid potatoes. He grew more and more certain that his reaction that afternoon had been more than merely a bruised ego. Something sinister was going on at Peabody, Plummer, and Elms. He would watch Osgood with the eyes of a hawk. He would act boldly and without restraint. Already, the prospect filled him with a carnivorous joy. In a moment of decadence, he slipped off his shoes and rubbed his stocking feet over the carpet like an ancient hunter tamping down the grass of the savannah, spear, metaphorically speaking, in hand.

When he heard the cleaning crew arriving, he hastily slipped them back on.

Seven:

Sarah Ellington sat at the receptionist’s desk trying very hard to be friendly, open, and efficient while bored off her nut. She had a Masters in cultural anthropology and folkloric studies, and with it, she was taking messages and transferring calls. She’d spent two years doing fieldwork in Africa. Now she wore pantyhose. The world was a thing devoid of justice.

The problem, of course, was Bobby. Six years married to Junior Silverback didn’t leave a girl with much of a resume. But the temp company had placed her here, and she’d leveraged that into a permanent position. Next up, office management. Or maybe paralegal.

Until then, clean desk, fake woodgrain, cheap coffee in a black cup. And anything to keep her brain from rotting.

The phone chirped.

“Peabody, Plummer, and Elms,” she said, smiling so that she’d sound like she was smiling. “How can I help you?”

“Bernard Lawton. Lookin’ for Mark,” a man grumbled.

“Mark who?”

“Mark Peabody,” the man said. Clearly no one else in the history of man had ever been named Mark.

“I’m sorry,” Sarah smiled. “Mr. Peabody is out of the office, may I take a…”

The line clicked and went dead. Sarah sighed, released the call, and silently wished a particularly nasty bloodworm on whoever it had been. People might be her species, but that didn’t mean she had to like them.

“Um, hey,” a voice said.

It was the computer guy. David something. Decent sort, so far as she could tell. Sarah raised her eyebrows.

“Do we have a yellow pages around here?”

“Sure,” she said, reached under her desk and pulled out the phonebook. He accepted it with a strangely furtive nod. It piqued her interest.

“I thought you guys just looked everything up on the web,” she said.

“Not always.”

“What’re you looking for?”

“Um. I was thinking about taking a class. But I need to find prices and schedules and stuff.”

“Oh. Like computer programming?”

He smiled. He had a nice smile, even if it didn’t last very long. His eyes were the same shape as her little brother’s.

“I’m already pretty good with writing code,” he said.

“So what then?” she asked, and the phone chirped again.

She took the call—the emotionally fragile husband of one of the junior partners calling to ask advice on some domestic crisis—and David took the opportunity to sneak off without answering her question. She finally scraped the husband into voice mail, picked up a pen and tapped it on her leg. The boy was up to something. Something he was ashamed of.

None of her business, granted. And yet…

Besides, he’d taken her phonebook.

She found him by the photocopier, talking with Daphne the paralegal. The phonebook was still in his hands. Sarah hung back a little, pretending to check her pockets for something. They were standing just inside appropriate social distance for Americans, and neither of them was backing up or moving forward. Daphne’s hips were just a little canted and her hand fluttered once like a little bird that considered perching on David’s arm but thought better of it. David was swaying just slightly in toward the girl every time he spoke and held the front desk phone book behind his back as if he were hiding it. His smile was exaggerated, his chest puffed out just the smallest bit.

So that’s how it is with them, Sarah thought. Poor bunnies.

She turned away. There were other phone books other places, and she didn’t have the heart to interrupt flirtation that was so tenuous, so unsure, and so blazingly obvious to everyone but the two who needed to see it. She didn’t have to like everyone, but she didn’t have to hate them all either.

Eight:

“I was thinking about maybe taking a class or something,” David said. “Like b-ballroom dance. Or something. I don’t know though. I probably won’t.”

“I like dancing,” Daphne said.

The photocopier hummed as if nothing had been determined.

Nine:

Niko Samuel’s Academy of Dance was in strip mall; its stylized logo of an elegantly dressed man and woman competed with a cell phone store to one side and a barber shop to the other. Music floated out to the grey concrete sidewalk like perfume. David stood for minute, looking at the pictures in the front window—men and women in gaudy outfits and dance poses. Some of them looked serious in a smoky, sexually tense way, others grinned at the camera, showing off. He couldn’t decide if the place seemed squalid or exciting.

He glanced out to the parking lot, half-expecting to see some unwelcome familiar face, before pushing his way through the door. Inside, the atmosphere was equal parts Casablanca and A Chorus Line. The music was louder, trumpets and drums and a voice singing in what might have been Spanish or French. A steady clapping punctuated the song, and another voice shouted out instructions David couldn’t understand.

An overhead fan dragged wide faux-rattan blades through the air, and a desk sat empty, sleek European chairs before it where clients like himself could sit. More pictures lined the walls of dancers, some of them holding trophies or ribbons. David sat.

“Good evening,” a voice said over the sounds of the class. David twisted in his seat. The man behind him was small with styled black hair, a thin moustache, and a dark blue, well-tailored suit. “Can I help you?”

“I don’t know,” David said.

“Then I probably can,” the man said. He walked forward with studied grace and took a seat on the far side of the desk. “I am Mr. Samuel, but call me Niko. All my students do. You are here for the classes?”

“Yes.”

“Excellent. What experience do you have in dance?”

“None. I mean, I’ve gone to some clubs, and if I got drunk enough…but nothing…” He struggled for the word. “Nothing real. I saw Strictly Ballroom once, though.”

“Of course you did,” Niko said. “That’s very good. The less you think you know, the better. We don’t have to spend time un-learning bad habits. We can begin right away with the good stuff. What kind of shoes do you have?”

“I can get whatever’s best,” David said. He hadn’t even thought about shoes.

“I have a catalog you can look through. Very reasonably priced. They do the shoes for the whole academy, so we get a very good rate. And what is it you want to learn?”

“To dance?”

Niko smiled.

“You want to learn to rhumba? Cha-cha? A little of everything?” he asked.

“Did you ever see the Al Pacino movie where he played the blind guy?”

Niko nodded, his eyes half closing as if at some lovely memory. The music shifted to something slower with more piano and less trumpet.

“Argentine tango,” Niko said, tasting the words as they came out. “Soft, not so militaristic and sharp. It’s a beautiful way to dance. Not easy, but very beautiful. “

“Do you have classes in that?”

“For someone who dances at clubs when he’s drunk enough? No,” Niko said. “For him, I have introductory classes. We can teach you about rhythm and grace and how you direct a woman where to move. Then, once you have the tools, certainly.”

“I don’t have a lot of money,” David said.

Niko seemed to consider something, then looked at his watch, frowned, and held out his hand across the desk, fingers twitching in a gesture that demanded something be given to him. David reached for his wallet.

“Your shoes,” Niko said. “Let me see your shoes.”

David unlaced his sneakers and passed them over. Niko turned them in his hands, nodded to himself, and vanished into the back room. David sat in his socks. A round of applause came from the back room—the end of class, he guessed. And a few seconds later, people came filing out. They were of all ages, all sizes, and none of them looked as glamorous as the pictures. David smiled and nodded, and wondered what was being done to his sneakers.

After the last of the students had gone, Niko reappeared with a pair of black leather shoes in one hand and David’s sneakers in the other. He handed David the leather ones.

“Three kinds of lesson,” he said. “One, group lessons; one teacher, many students. Two, group practice; no teacher, many students. Just to keep in practice. Third, individual lesson; one teacher, one student.”

“Okay,” David said uncertainly.

“Put the shoes on. Individual lessons are like drugs. The first one’s free.”

The back room was a single space with a wood floor, mirrors along one wall, and a stereo with stacks of CDs. A young woman in a black leotard and something more like the idea of a skirt than the actual thing itself was putting the disks in order.

“Angelica,” Niko said. “We have a new student. First lesson.”

“Um,” David said.

The girl smiled and left the disks. Niko went to the stereo.

“We’ll begin with the meringue,” Niko called. “It’s very easy. Two step. Just step and slide. Angelica will show you.”

Angelica was a full head shorter than David, her face perfectly made up. He felt himself start to blush.

“I don’t know what I’m doing,” he said.

“Put your hands out like this,” she said. He did, and she slid into them. The spandex felt strange on his fingertips. “You’ll start with your left foot. You always start with your left foot, and I’ll be your mirror you. It’s easy to remember.”

“It is?”

“Just tell yourself that the lady is always right.”

The music started.

“Now,” she said. “Step out a little with your left foot and then slide your right foot over. Like this.”

David watched her and tried to imitate her movements.

“So dance like Igor?” he said.

“General Meringue was lame,” she laughed. “You’re doing fine.”

After half an hour, Niko took him back out to the front room and they went over the different plans for study programs. David also looked through the shoe catalog. The prices were higher than he’d expected.

He put it on a credit card.

Ten:

“I don’t know,” David said. “I mean, it seemed like the right thing to do at the time.”

“Buyer’s remorse,” said Teddy, nodding sagely. “I do that too. There was this one time I bought a car from a cousin of mine…”

“I don’t mean the money,” David said.

“Then what?”

David sat back, his gaze flickering over the break room as if there might be an answer written between the microwave and the coffee machine. The walls and appliances offered him no counsel.

“I’m just not sure it’s me,” David said at last. “I mean it’s not like what I do.”

“That’s the point, though, isn’t it?”

“I guess.”

David ran his thumb across the woodgrained plastic table top. Teddy might not have been the right person to talk to about this, but he didn’t know who might have been the right one.

“Just do it like you were learning a new operating system,” Teddy said. “If Elms came in today and said we were going to switch over to Windows on the servers, what would you do?”

“Talk him out of it,” David said.

“I mean, if you had to?”

David shrugged. The coffee machine gurgled and spat, but didn’t start beeping.

“You’d do it,” Teddy said with a grin and a wide, sweeping gesture of his hands. “You’d go home and you’d build two or three systems from scratch, just to see how they worked. Then you’d read up on the security issues and talk to the folks on bitmines…”

“Who would tell me to quit,” David said, “and find someplace where they let me run real servers.”

“But you see what I’m talking about. You want to learn it, learn it,” Teddy said, and his smile faltered. “Why do you want to learn it again?”

“To be the sort of man women are drawn to and men admire.”

“Ah.”

Teddy seemed to mull this over for a few seconds. A misty look came to his eyes, and for a moment he looked a little like Freddy Mercury.

“That sounds really nice,” Teddy said. “You know, maybe—”

“Hey,” Daphne said, stepping into the room. “Here you guys are. The file server’s not letting me get to Mr. Plummer’s documents again.”

Teddy glanced at David then Daphne then the exit, eyes growing wide with panic.

“Did you cycle power on the switch?” David asked.

Daphne smiled and shook her head. She had the prettiest smile.

“You’re the computer guy,” she said. “I’m not touching that stuff.”

The computer guy. Yeah, that’s what I am, David thought. Not a human. Just the computer guy.

“I can go cycle the power,” Teddy said. “You want to go check the server? You know, in case it’s a routing problem…”

“You hang here and bring me some coffee when it’s done,” David said. “I went through this last time, and I think I know what needs doing.”

The relief on Teddy’s face was profound.

“Well, you take this one, then,” Teddy said. “Just call me if you need help.”

Daphne led the way to the back office. He could hear Mr. Plummer’s voice nattering in the conference room, the placid chirp of the phone. The almost-inaudible sound of cloth against cloth of Daphne’s dress as she walked. He could feel what it would be like to take her hand in his, his other palm pressing against her shoulder, pulling her just slightly toward him, her fingers gently on his own. He could almost move with the first little swaying motion as he stepped out with his left foot, she with her right.

Except, of course, that he was just the computer guy.

Eleven:

Sarah frowned at the screen, moved her mouse pointer and clicked again. The email message still didn’t open. Outside, the thunderstorm that had been threatening all afternoon was finally beginning—thick angry drops tapping against the wall-high lobby windows. And just in time for the drive home. Sarah was displeased.

“Did it show up?” asked David’s voice. She looked up, thinking that he must mean her email, before remembering the context.

“Yes,” she said, reaching under her desk for the package. “The fed-ex guy came an hour ago. Here you are.”

It was a cube, maybe six inches by six, and David’s eyes lit up when he took it.

“It’s music,” he said. “Mostly tango and cha-cha, but there’s some rumba too. I had them overnight it to me.”

“That’s lovely,” Sarah said. “You know, I’m glad you’re here. My Outlook Express hasn’t been working right. When I try to open this one message…”

“Reboot the computer,” David said. “That’ll fix it.”

“Well, I tried that, and it didn’t help. In fact, now I can’t open any of the messages in my inbox. Do you think you could…”

“Sure,” David said, “first thing in the morning.”

Sarah felt The Smile come to her lips. She liked David, and he’d usually been as pleasant to her as he was to everyone. He had never provoked her to The Smile, and yet there it was, pulling at her lips until air touched her teeth but never quite warming her eyes.

“I was hoping I could have someone look at it today,” she said. “There’s still half an hour to go, and I do need to answer some of this mail.”

“Teddy’ll have to do it,” David said, apologizing with a shrug. “I skipped lunch so I can take off early. Group class.”

He held up the fed-ex box of music as if it was a hall pass and she was a particularly intimidating gym teacher. Sarah forced The Smile back into its cage. She was being selfish because it was the end of the day and she was tired and annoyed. There was no reason to take it out on David, even if he was leaving when she had to stay.

“Well, have a good time, then,” she said.

David grinned, nodded, and almost bounced out the door toward the elevators. As it closed, Sarah thought she heard a sigh. She turned in time to see Daphne the paralegal vanishing into the file library, an oddly forlorn expression on her face. Lightning flashed and thunder grumbled.

Sarah clicked the reluctant message one more time for luck. The inbox went totally blank. Sarah sat back in her chair, and very quietly said something very crude.

Twelve:

The music began—drums and then trumpets, a woman’s voice singing low in her throat. David looked into his partner’s eyes. She was a heavy woman in her late forties who, despite solid efforts, hadn’t conquered her moustache problems. David didn’t care. No doubt she was a very nice woman with a good personality. He didn’t care about that either. The moment came, and he stepped forward on his left foot, then forward and to the side with his right, and then stepped in to meet it. Gently, his eyes locked on hers, he signaled with the pressure of his hands where he wanted her to move next. When he raised his arm, she turned in a slow spin, and he stepped in to meet her.

David’s peripheral vision was filled with other couples shifting to the music, some graceful, some awkward. Angelica—the teacher with the leotard and the very short skirt—called out corrections to students, sometimes clapping her hands to help them find the beat. She never spoke David’s name, and he found it hardly mattered. He was able to navigate from one corner of the floor to another, shifting forward and back. The dance made sense.

He’d been working on it at home, of course. In the living room, he’d tipped the sofa on end and pushed it into the corner so that the floor space was clear. He’d listened to rumba music and tracked down video clips to watch. He’d even popped out his old synthesizer and played the bass lines along with the music. Spending three of four hours a night at it for the last month had brought him to a place where he understood it perfectly.

Which, as it turned out, hadn’t been enough. Knowing and doing weren’t the same, and the whole time he’d practiced, he’d been watching his feet to be sure they were in the right places, matching the motions of the professional in his fireplace. Now he had a habit of dancing with his head bowed down, and he fought against it, looking into the woman’s eyes with a ferocity born of really wanting to just glance down, just be sure. He imagined this was what not smoking was like.

The singer’s voice growled, rose and fell. The final chords were struck, and David and his partner came to a halt.

“Much better,” Angelica said. “Most of you are getting the hang of this, but I’m still seeing some confusion on the spins. Here, David…”

She motioned to him, and he stepped over, putting his arm around her almost by reflex. She counted out the beat as he raised his arm, let her spin, and then stepped in to meet her again. She smiled a little. She had a very thin face and dark lipstick that made David think—in a non-judgmental way—of hookers.

“Like that,” she said to the class. “You all understand? Okay, we’ll try it again. Watch me and David, and try to do what we do, all right?”

Angelica went to the stereo and began another song. He also got through this one without looking at his feet. It was a pretty good night, so far.

After class, David walked out through the lobby with the other students. But Niko was there, cutting David out of the crowd with the grace and competence of a sheepdog.

“David,” he said when they were in the back office together, “I’ve been watching your progress. You are doing very well.”

“Thanks,” David said.

“I was thinking. The drive you have. The concentration. I admire it. It seems to me that you may be suited for something more than this. And I have need of you. The school has need of you.”

David blinked.

“My best bronze level in International Latin doesn’t qualify any longer,” Niko said. “He reached the semi-final last year, and it earned him the proficiency point that put him in silver. His old partner Mariella is still three points short. Technically, you’d still class novice, but everyone dances up sometimes. The competition is on Topeka, and you would have to take care of the travel. And it’s USABDA, so you would have to register. I know it’s asking a lot of you, but…”

Niko held out his hands, eyebrows raised as if he had asked a question. David went over the words again, as best he could remember them, hoping that something would make sense. Niko seemed to take his silence as reluctance.

“You are the best we have, David,” Niko said, his voice low and serious. “Mariella has seen you, and she agrees. With your dedication, it would be easy for you two to take the category.”

“You want me to be in a dance competition?” David said.

“Will you?” Niko asked. He was a short man, and the passion in his voice made David feel like Rudolph when Santa asked him to pull the sleigh.

“Um. Let me think about it,” David said.

Thirteen:

“So it works,” Teddy said.

David ran his finger down the screen, reading the green-on-black lines of the routing table one by one as he went. The electrostatic charge of the old video monitor crackled and pulled at the tiny hairs on the back of his hand.

There was the default path, and the subnet defined anything on 192.168.3.x as local network. But the printers in the front office were set to .45 and .46, and nothing was reaching them, so there had to be something else going on. Dimly, he realized that Teddy had spoken.

“Huh?”

“That guy Niko. He said he admired you. And me, seriously Dave, I admire the hell out of you.”

“Thanks,” David said.

“And this girl. What’s her name? The new dance partner.”

“Mariella.”

“So she saw you. And she got drawn to you, right? So it works. That’s so cool.”

David sat back in his chair and rubbed his eyes. He’d been up late listening to music. It was like having a second life. No one at the studio thought of him as the computer guy. No one at the office thought of him as a dancer. He had a secret, another world he was part of that no one really understood. Except that he’d let it slip to Teddy that they’d asked him to get really serious about it now. If he said yes, he was going to be one of those pictures on the wall, smiling and holding a trophy. In retrospect, he should have kept it closer to the vest.

“Yeah,” he said. “I guess it worked.”

“Is she…y’know. Is she cute?”

“Mariella? I guess so. Yeah, she’s all right. I told them that I’d go ahead and practice with her. I mean maybe we just won’t work together right, you know? I wouldn’t want to spend all that time and money when I’m not even the right guy.”

“What about that scanner we put in at Daphne’s desk?” Teddy said.

David frowned.

“What about it?”

“The DHCP server was being reprogrammed when we put those in, right? The scanner’s got an IP, and the box that goes with it’s got one. I don’t think she’s had to use them much since. But she was talking about some evidentiary thing coming on Friday and how she had to scan in the old documents. Maybe you gave the scanner stuff .45 and .46. That’d screw things up, wouldn’t it? If the printers up front have ‘em too.”

David closed his eyes. They felt gritty.

“Yeah,” David said. “You’re right. That’d do it.”

The receptionist—Susan, Sarah…something like that; he could never remember—appeared at the machine room door.

“There’s someone here to see you, David” she said. The disapproval in her voice was probably just his imagination; he got a little paranoid when he was too tired.

Mariella sat on the couch, looking out the window and eight stories down to the street as if it was a mildly interesting television show—something on the Discovery channel. She was in a tight dress, her blonde hair in a halo artfully arranged to make it seem like she’d just risen from bed. Her makeup was perfect as a mask. To his dismay, Mr. Elms and Daphne were standing at the front desk pretending to have a conversation while they both stared at her. Probably both thinking that he’d hired her to be seen with him.

“David. Sweetheart,” she said as he came into the room. “I was just downtown, and I wanted to drop this off for you.”

She held out a plastic CD case. A fat man with a thin moustache, a thin tie, and thinning hair was crooning into a microphone on the cover.

“I was thinking track eight,” she said.

“Cool, thanks,” David said. “I’ll give it a listen.”

“I won’t keep you,” she said, rising and smoothing her dress against her body. She leaned in, whispering into his ear, and gesturing toward Mr. Elms. “Don’t want to get you in trouble with the boss. But tonight?”

“Same as always,” David said.

Mariella made the little kissing sound that she used instead of handshakes or waves and glided out the door. David turned the disk over in his hand, reading down the playlist. Track eight. Rumba in the Bronx. Oh, this wasn’t going to be good.

When he looked up, Mr. Elms was gone, but Daphne was there, looking at the closed office door with an odd expression. David glanced over toward it, in case there was something interesting, but it was just the same tasteful dark wood finish as always.

“Who was that?” Daphne asked.

“My ballroom dance partner. Mariella,” David said, embarrassed. “She’s been at it longer than me. She’s pretty good.”

Daphne reached up, apparently unconsciously, and touched her fingers to her ponytail. She seemed almost dazed.

“Are you okay?” David asked.

“No, I’m fine,” she said. “Sorry. I’m fine.”

Fourteen:

Mr. Elms sat at his desk, quiet, calm, and consumed by fury.

Had he not been more than fair, more than kind, to David Osgood? Had he not put out the hand of friendship? What firm in the city would have shown the grace and charity to have a partner—an actual partner—offer a performance bonus to the computer guy? And this was how Osgood repaid him.

“Mr. Elms?” he secretary asked. He realized she’d been speaking for some time, but he didn’t recall anything she’d said.

“I have a headache,” he said, though he didn’t. “Bring me a cup of coffee.”

His secretary put down her notebook and left without word or comment, because that was how it was meant to be. His world ran on quiet efficiency, good grace, trust and loyalty. What did it matter that he hadn’t asked for an aspirin but coffee? Coffee he wanted, coffee he’d get. And none of this double-dealing, ham-handed, petty strutting. Unlike David Osgood.

To bring a woman or that stunning beauty and superb quality here to the office was, as Mr. Elms saw it, as good as boasting aloud. She had lit the waiting room just by sitting in it. Her voice had been a mixture of music and vice that would wake men from the dead. There was no question in Elms’ mind. David Osgood had been suborned into some act of corporate espionage, and the attentions of this goddess were the boy’s promise and his reward.

True there was no evidence yet. Not the sort he’d take before a judge. But Osgood had underestimated him, oh yes. Mr. Elms had been watching the boy like a hawk, and when the time came to act, he would be bold and unrestrained.

His secretary came back, a mug steaming in her hand. When he took it from her, it was almost white with cream and sweet as victory. He smacked his lips, nodded, and turned his laser-beam attention to his secretary, newly returned to her chair.

“It is my total commitment to my work that makes me who I am,” he said, not remembering where he’d heard the phrase before.

“Yes it is, sir,” she agreed.

Fifteen:

Two weeks before the dance competition, David still hadn’t quite brought himself to commit to the meet in Topeka but everyone kept treating him like he had. The studio was officially closed, the lights in the front rooms dimmed, the door locked. The back room, on the other hand, was bright and full. Six other couples from the school were entered to compete, and all of them were there, sitting on chairs or leaning against the mirrors watching with cold, judgmental expressions. Niko and Angelica passed among them like hosts at a party.

The music ended as David twirled Mariella into his arms. They froze for a beat, David staring into her eyes. She wore colored contacts. That explained a lot, actually.

“I don’t know,” the American Rhythm man said. “I think it needs a little more…” He rolled his hips. David thought he looked a little like Elton John when he did it.

“You always think that,” an International Style woman drawled.

“Children! Children!” Niko said, clapping his hands. “We don’t have time to squabble. David and Mariella have worked very hard on this, and it is our job to help them, not drag out old differences of opinion. Now the first passage…”

David’s cell phone went off.

“Sorry,” he said, trotting over to his work clothes. “Really sorry.”

He looked at the screen. The number was Teddy’s. David scuttled to the front room. He could feel disapproval following behind him like a cold fog.

“Hello?”

“David!” Teddy said. “Where are you, man? Did you see the thing on Slashdot?”

“I’m not at a computer right now.”

“They just announced a new exploit that hits sendmail on BSD platforms. There’s a patch, but the mirror sites are getting hammered. I’m heading into the office now, but if you want some pizza, I could…”

“I can’t. Teddy, I’m booked. I can’t come in.” The line went so quiet, David thought the connection had dropped. “Teddy?”

“You don’t want…what about…”

“Look, why don’t you take this one. Just swing by the office, get the patch and try installing it. If there’s a problem, we’ll sort it out in the morning.”

“In the morning?” Teddy echoed.

“Sure. But there won’t be a problem. You’ve handled this kind of thing before, right?”

“Right?”

“Great. See you tomorrow,” David said and cut the connection before Teddy could say tomorrow? Back on the dance floor, Mariella and Angelica were in close conversation. Two pairs of eyes fixed on him as he came back in. For a moment, David had the powerful memory of being ten years old and watching The Brides of Dracula on late-night cable.

“Sorry,” he said, turning off the cell. “It was work. Won’t happen again.”

“Emergency?” Niko asked. Even his voice was cold.

“No,” David said. “Nothing important.”

Sixteen:

Sarah was transferring a call to Mr. Elms’ voicemail when the door opened, so she didn’t actually see anyone come in. When she looked up, the arrival was still as a movie’s promotional photo. Red-brown hair curled softly over one eye; soft, high cheekbones gestured down to full lips curved in a small, shy smile. The dress was quality too; creamy muslin that showed off the woman’s hips and breasts without mentioning that thighs might exist.

“Can I help you?” Sarah asked politely, wondering how Sam Spade’s receptionist would have handled the moment.

But then the woman moved and spoiled the effect. All the glamour needed was confidence, but when she walked it was like seeing a teenager ready for her first prom.

“Daphne?”

“Hey, Sarah,” the paralegal said, pushing the artfully placed hair back from her eyes. “So. What do you think of the new look?”

“I’m amazed,” Sarah said.

“Thanks.”

You poor thing, Sarah thought. You poor stupid bunny. How ugly did he make you feel? She felt a surge of anger for David Osgood, wherever he was at the moment.

“You always look beautiful,” Sarah said.

The blush looked odd with the layers of makeup over it. No one with that much foundation should be capable of blush-inducing emotion.

“I just thought I’d try something different. You know?”

“I do,” Sarah said. She did.

Seventeen:

Most men in their hours of crisis seek solace in a trusted friend or bartender. David went to bookstores. Big bookstores. The kinds with coffee bars in them. Cheap, acidy coffee flavored with unlikely fruits and overpriced, stale pastries shipped in from Ohio.

“Anything else?” the barista asked. He was about David’s age with a thin beard, a quick smile, and an ear cuff with what looked like a wolf’s tooth hanging from it. He looked cool. Even if he spent his time away the espresso machine configuring firewalls and writing shell scripts, no one was going to mistake him for a computer guy.

“No thanks,” David said.

He took his comfort food to one of the tables in the back. Bach viola concerti murmured as he poured sugar into the blackness of his coffee cup.

He’d called the studio and Mariella, swearing that he was sick. He wanted to be there, but he was afraid of getting everyone else sick, and then where would they all be? Mariella hadn’t believed him, but she hadn’t come right out and called him a liar either. Niko probably hadn’t bought it either. Not that it mattered.

His mind spiraled around Daphne. She had come into the office today looking like she’d never looked before. It was obvious that she was dressed to impress someone. She’d clearly been going out after work, going to the kind of place you went dressed like that.

He sipped his coffee. It was still mostly bitter, only just a little sweet. He started to put more sugar in, but stopped and drank it the way it was.

The worst thing had been the way he hadn’t been able to avoid her. No matter where he’d been in the office, it seemed like bad luck had brought her there too. And every time he saw her, he’d wanted to ask her what was up, who the guy was.

But then she would have told him. There was nothing in the world he wanted less than to hear about how wonderful Jason or Brad or Robert was, where he had a degree from, the summer he’d spent touring Europe.

He took a bite of pastry. It was dry and left a coating on his tongue. He took another bite.

What was the point, he thought, in men admiring you and women being drawn to you when the men were Teddy and the women were Mariella? He thought about all the time and effort he’d spent trying to get her to see him as something more than the computer guy. And maybe he’d managed. Maybe she saw him as the computer guy who took ballroom dance classes. The image of Al Pacino and not-quite-Uma Thurman was gone too. All he had in its place was Mariella and the constant reminder not to look at his feet.

It was dumb. He’d wasted his time and him money, and probably his shot with Daphne if he’d even had one. He’d call the academy in the morning and tell Niko he was out. They’d find some other bronze to partner Mariella. And when that was over, maybe he could get Teddy to find out who Daphne was seeing and how serious they were…

David used the last swig of coffee to wash down the last bite of the pastry of affliction. Nasty stuff all the way around. The music changed, Bach giving way to Ella Fitzgerald. David looked out over the bookshelves and shoppers and felt better than he had when he came in. It was almost a relief, really, to shrug off the dancing. It was fun stuff in a way, but as a lifestyle, kind of weird. He rose, put his hands in his pockets, and headed over toward the computer security section. Maybe something new was out.

“Hey, bud,” the barista called. “Did you want the book or should I put it with the reshelves?”

David turned. The words not mine were on his lips, but they stopped there when he saw the blood red letters on their field of white. 30 Steps to Your Best Self.

“Thanks,” he said, took the book, and sat back down.

STEP 15: The Will to Commit

Weak-willed people are like flags that shift with the breeze. Any time things seem to turn against them, they abandon their focus and wander away. It never occurs to them that they themselves may be the source of the problem.

The solution is commitment. When the one job or girl or award that we thought meant everything slips away, it’s commitment that carries us though. We persevere until we see why we want what we want, and how we can reach it.

Commitment is the step you never stop taking. If you fail in your commitment, you fail in everything, always. Only by staying on your path will you will be rewarded by the discovery of who you are. Be strong and you will find what you really want.

Good luck. It’s your game to lose.

David closed the book and pressed his palms to his eyes, pressing until colors bloomed in the darkness.

Commitment. He didn’t want to be a weak-willed person, after all, and what else would he be if he just dropped the studio? And the thing about what to do when the one girl you wanted slips away, about finding out what he really wanted…Maybe he only thought that Daphne was the right girl. Maybe there was some deeper something going on with him, something psychological. And if he just went back to being who he was, he might never figure it out.

Just being himself had never done the trick.

He took out his cell phone, considering it like Romeo looking at his vial of poison. When he thumbed in the number, the phone on the other end only rang once before she answered it.

“Hey, Mariella,” David said. The last film of coffee was like ashes in his mouth. “I’m feeling a lot better. Tell Niko I’ll be over. And tell him I’m in for Topeka.”

Eighteen:

“Peabody, Plummer and Elms. Can you hold?” Sarah said, forcing herself to smile. This was line four. Lines two and three were already on hold. Lines five and six were still ringing. Line one had the only solid red light—Mr. Plummer on the line with Judge Christiansen, explaining the situation. The clock on her computer screen flickered from 10:23 to 10:24.

“No, I can’t fucking hold!” a man shouted. “You tell Peabody that this is Bernard Lawton. Lawton, you got that, sister?”

“Thank you,” she said, and put him on hold. She repeated the procedure twice more, then pulled off the headset, placed her hands palms flat on the desktop, and breathed in deeply, letting the air escape slowly through her nose the way all the relaxation tapes said she should.

I can do this, she told herself. They’re just people.

She put back on the headset and clicked on line two.

“Thank you for holding. How may I direct your call?”

“Sarah? This is Robert Correy. Robert Correy Law. What the hell’s going on over there?”

“Good morning, Mr. Correy. Yes, we’re having a little trouble with the mail server,” she said. “I don’t know all the details.”

“So what? You folks aren’t getting mail and it shuts the whole office down?”

“Oh, getting mail isn’t the problem. We’ve gotten several hundred thousand messages in the last few hours. And apparently we’ve also been sending mail out,” she said. “Several million pieces of it advertising a porn site in Yugoslavia. People seem to be taking some exception.”

“I’m so sorry,” he said, chuckling. “So is that why I haven’t seen Elms’ reply to my counter-offer?”

Line four went black as the caller hung up, then half a breath later started ringing again. Sarah’s finger twitched toward it.

“Very likely,” Sarah said. “It’s backed things up a little.”

“Well, you let me know if he decides he needs a continuance.”

“I’m sure Mr. Elms will be in touch just as soon as he can.”

“Well, I’ll let you go, Sarah. You try to have a good day despite it all.”

“Thank you, Mr. Correy.”

She hung up the line and grabbed for line four, but she was an instant too late. She heard the handset on the other end being dropped into its cradle. Line two started ringing.

10:25

She put the headset down and let the damn phones ring. She made herself knock at Mr. Elms’ door before she went in. It was as close to civil as she could manage. Mr. Elms was running his thick fingers through the space where his hair had been when he’d been a younger man.

“They’re working on it,” Elms said before she could even speak. “As soon as it’s fixed, they’ll get us connected again. But if they put us back online now, we’ll start sending out that junk mail like a firehose again. As soon as it’s fixed…”

“And when will that be?”

“Two or three hours,” Elms said, looking at her directly for the first time since she’d come in. His face was grey with rage.

The phones were ringing in a constant round now. The lines were lit and blinking for her attention like an air traffic controller’s console right before the disaster. She walked past her desk, down the hallway to the machine closet where David Osgood was crouched over a laptop, typing furiously. Teddy, behind him, was literally wringing his hands. She’d never actually seen anyone do that before.

“Maybe there’s some new exploit,” Teddy was saying. “I could have sworn the patch went in okay.”

David grunted and kept typing. It clearly wasn’t the first time Teddy had said something of the sort.

“I’ve never done a patch on my own before,” Teddy whined. “I mean, I didn’t get any error messages when I ran it.”

“It didn’t run, Teddy,” David said. “You don’t get an error when something doesn’t run. Don’t worry about it. I can get this fixed.”

“I’m sorry, Dave.”

“It’s my fault. I should have come in.”

It was all she needed to hear. The broken email, the failing file servers, Daphne’s new insecurity, Elms’ lost counteroffer. All of it came back to David Osgood.

She’d stood at the side and watched this train wreck long enough. If no one else was going to fix it, then by God she would.

Nineteen:

In the end, David scrapped the altered sendmail files completely, reinstalled them, and then spent several hours working the legion of hiccups and bugs out of the system. It was longer than three hours. And when he was finished, he was going to have to go to the academy for another critique session with Nikos and Angelica and all the others.

He was trying to scrape the spam out of Mr. Plummer’s inbox without accidentally trashing something real when Daphne came in.

“Oh,” she said.

“Plummer’s in the conference room,” David said.

Daphne hesitated, and David looked up again. He couldn’t read her expression; she seemed about to say something.

The silence between them was where he’d been able to make normal human banter before. He hated it, but he didn’t have any way to break it. Daphne smiled, thinly, nodded, and walked away again. David felt his heart go tight and heavy in his chest, but he just went back to defining junk mail rules, the keys under his fingers clicking softly.

He wanted to talk to her, even just to say hello and make smartass comments about putting paper into the printer. Little things, the way people do who work in the same place. He’d had that much once.

He applied the rule set, watched the junk mail pour out of the inbox. And then the test messages he’d sent. And then five messages that he knew should have stayed.

He sighed, opened the junk folder, dragged everything back into the inbox and started over. He only half noticed, twenty minutes later, when Daphne walked past the open door in deep conversation with the receptionist.

Twenty:

Sarah considered the pair of them. Daphne seemed stunned, Teddy nervous. She herself felt a combination of focused anger and relief that she was doing something. There were worse ways for a conspiracy to begin.

“So like…an intervention or something?” Teddy asked. “We all tell him not to fuck up anymore and that we all love him?”

Daphne swallowed hard and flushed a little pink.

“No,” Sarah said. “Interventions don’t work unless everyone he knows can participate. If we tell him there’s a problem and his dancer friends tell him he’s fine, he’ll shift his social network toward them.”

Someone rattled the conference room door, then knocked.

“In a minute,” Sarah called. Then, in her normal tone of voice, “He has to face a choice. Either his job and his friends are more important than this hobby of his, or else they aren’t. We are going to give him that choice.”

“How?” Daphne asked.

“This can’t go past us,” Sarah said.

Teddy twisted his fingers before his lips in a locking motion. Daphne leaned forward.

“Do we gotta kidnap him?” Teddy asked, clearly excited by the prospect of abduction.

“No,” Sarah said. “We generate a crisis and call him in. We make it clear that we need him, and then we see what choice he makes.”

The knock came again, harder this time. Sarah ignored it and it went away.

“When is this competition of his?” Sarah asked.

“Next weekend. I mean not this weekend coming up, but the one after it,” Teddy said, “He flies out to Topeka Saturday morning, him and Mariella.”

“Find out what time his flight leaves. We’ll meet here that morning. Just the three of us.”

“What if he chooses them?” Daphne asked quietly.

Twenty One:

Under normal circumstances, Mr. Elms would have considered standing in the corridor, his ear pressed to the conference room doors to be beneath his dignity. These were, however, desperate times. Osgood’s plans to sabotage the computer system were clearly underway, and given what his brief exploration of eavesdropping had uncovered he was not the only one to have noticed it.

Osgood was going out of town under the pretext of some “competition,” and he was traveling with the exquisite woman. Mr. Elms trotted back to his office, his former business forgotten. There could be no doubt that Osgood was going to meet with his new handlers, the unknown enemy that had turned him against the firm. Without doubt, it was the best opportunity to catch the boy in the act. Once Mr. Elms had hard evidence—he had always been a stickler for evidence which explained to a degree his choice of profession—he would merrily litigate Osgood and his new friends into bankruptcy. It might take years, and if so, all the better. Vice deserved punishment.

He could book himself a flight to Topeka, get there before the traitorous Osgood and his divine escort, and shadow them. He hesitated just as his fingers touched the keyboard, millimeters from using his browser to find an online travel site. It occurred to him that he was about to use his computer to act against his computer expert. He lifted up his wide fingers and wagged one at the screen.

“Very close,” he said. “You almost got me that time, but not quite. Oh no. I’m cleverer than that, my friend.”

“Sir?”

His secretary stood in the doorway with the expression one might expect from a woman of near-military precision and efficiency who had found her employer talking to his computer. Mr. Elms drew himself up from his desk.

“Mr. Berringer is in the conference room, sir.”

“Of course he is,” Mr. Elms said, “but first, I have an assignment for you. It’s very important. I want you to leave the office before you do this, do you understand? No one here must know anything about this. Find a travel agent. Go there in person. I need a ticket for one to Topeka.”

He paused, wondering if it would be wise to acquire a gun. Just in case.

Twenty Two:

David drove toward the academy. He was in his costume and he felt like an idiot. Red sequins glittered in his lap and down one leg. His shirt clung to his body, making him suck in his belly even when there was no one around. The rush hour was just ended, only the last stragglers limping home. He’d had a snack at home. He’d eat again later. And then sleep a few hours. And then go back to the office again, feeling less rested than he did now.

They were talking about him. The crash had technically been Teddy’s fault, but even he knew better than to take comfort in that. Teddy was a good guy, and he could run wire and configure simple applications, but he was no more a network admin than David was a movie star. Asking Teddy to do stuff that was over his head was just dumb. No one was going to blame Teddy, and he wouldn’t really want them to.

The sense of disappointment and dislike was new to him, though, and he didn’t enjoy it. The whole office knew he’d screwed up. They were talking about it, and about him, and knowing that made his shoulders feel heavier. He didn’t want to go back in tomorrow. Any more than he wanted to go to practice now.

If you fail in your commitment, you fail in everything, always.

He turned the car into the strip mall parking lot. He could recognize the cars of the other couples. Mariella’s white Lexus with the “My Lawyer Can Beat Up Your Honor Student” bumper sticker. He pulled into a space a little way down, killed the motor and listened to the car tick as it cooled.

It would be so easy to turn the key, reverse back out, just go home. Go home with his cat and his music, sit on his couch and watch his television, and just let all of it go away. He could skip work tomorrow too. Take the phone off the hook, and not check email, and not answer the door if anyone bothered knocking. He closed his eyes.

But that wasn’t what he really wanted. However pleasant it sounded now, the sense of being alone there had been what brought him here in the first place. When he’d spent his nights at home by himself, he’d felt alone. Now that he was here, he felt alone. The difference was that one of them was moving him out in the world, and he was more likely to find what he really wanted out here than back in front of the TV.

Be strong and you will find what you really want.

He got out of the car, trudged past the cellular phone joint, and knocked on the academy door. Angelica let him in. The others were in the back. Mariella frowned at him, Niko smiled. The room smelled of shoe leather, sweat, and expensive perfume.

“Good,” Niko said. “We’re all here again. Let’s see how our bronzes are progressing, shall we?”

David stepped out into the middle of the floor, folding his arm around Mariella, taking his hand in hers. She smiled, her body soft and supple under his touch.

“Try not to screw up,” she said.

“I’ll try,” he said.

The music started. David turned through the routine with certainty and precision. His legs knew where to be, his arms, his body. The whole thing had about as much joy as reciting the pledge of allegiance. He twirled Mariella into his arms as the music ended. She was breathing hard, and there was a glittering excitement in her eyes. David supposed he hadn’t screwed up.

“Excellent,” Niko breathed. “That was…that was perfect. There’s no way you can lose if you dance like that at the competition.”

“Don’t you think he could smile a bit more?” the American Rhythm woman asked.

Twentythree:

The week passed in unspoken tension, each day before the competition bringing the offices of Peabody, Plummer, and Elms one step nearer the breaking point. Sarah left Friday at five o’clock with the sense of finally slipping her leash. When she returned in the morning, it was like entering a different world.

With the overhead fluorescents off, the hallways and offices were dim. Sarah had never really understood how much background noise a lawyer’s office could generate until now that it was gone. It was a little eerie.

The lock clicked, the front door opened, and Daphne came in. She was dressed in old jeans and a sweatshirt; her hair was pulled back in its ponytail. She smiled when she caught sight of Sarah and raised a plastic sack.

“I brought bagels and schmear,” she said. “No dark cabal should be without.”

“Excellent.” Sarah said, motioning her over. “Have you seen Teddy? If his flight leaves at nine o’clock…”

“He was pulling into the parking lot when I got the elevator.”

“Even better.”

Sarah had a fresh cup of coffee in one hand and an everything bagel with lox schmear in the other when Teddy arrived. He grinned nervously. Sarah couldn’t tell if it just idiomatic for Teddy to look vaguely frightened, or if he was having second thoughts. But he wasn’t so distressed that food was beyond him. He had the cinnamon-raisin with honey butter while Sarah explained her plan one last time.

“But how would Daphne break it?” Teddy said when she was done. “I mean if she’s really here doing just normal stuff, how would she break the system?”

“It doesn’t matter,” Sarah said. “Maybe she didn’t. maybe the system just…broke.”

“Well, it’s a computer. They don’t just stop working, you know,” Teddy said, and then a moment later. “Ok. Never mind. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

“And why am I calling him?” Daphne asked.

“Because you can’t find Teddy,” Sarah replied.

“Yes, but…why am I calling?” Daphne said. “You could have done this without me in on it. You could make the call.”

“Sometimes men will do things for paralegals that they won’t do for receptionists,” Sarah said, smiling gently. Daphne blushed slightly. Teddy looked confused. The clock hummed and with an audible click shifted its minute hand to exactly the hour, and Sarah rose.

“Shall we?”

Teddy led the way to the machine closet. The three of them huddled around the laptop as it chirped and whirred, booting up. Teddy cracked his knuckles and started typing, green letters glowing on the black background. Sarah understood none of it. She didn’t need to.

“I really never dreamed I’d be doing something like this,” Teddy said.

“Desperate times call for desperate measures,” Sarah said.

“Yeah, okay. So, I’m not doing anything tricky, since I want to be able to put this all back the way it was. You know. I mean, in case.”

“That’s wise,” Sarah agreed.

“So I’m just gonna come in here like this. And then I’ll become root. And I’m just changing the permissions on this one folder here. That shouldn’t…”

The machine chirped and spooled through a long list of gibberish. Teddy leaned forward, squinting. He hit a few keys, and the laptop beeped loudly as he touched each one. He giggled. It wasn’t a good sound.

“That’s…ah…funny. Lemme just…ah…”

He touched a few keys together and the screen went flat black and featureless. The server’s hard drive whirred and started grinding.

“Well,” Teddy said. “Huh.”

“Daphne? You should call him now.”

Twentyfour:

Daphne put the phone’s handset back in its cradle, plastic clattering in the silence of the office. Her gaze wandered for a moment before she found Sarah.

“He’s not coming.”

Twentyfive:

STEP TWENTY: Protecting Yourself

Who among us hasn’t sometimes gotten in over his head? Overextending is a natural part of testing your personal limits, and nothing to be ashamed of. It is critical, however, that you deal with the consequences gracefully. If someone else in the office is on his way out anyway, it does him no harm to carry some of your burden. Shifting responsibility isn’t an act of…

Oh shit. It’s her. Put the book down.

Put the book down, Teddy.

Put me DOWN!

“What are you reading?” Sarah asked.

“I don’t know,” Teddy said, holding the book out to her. “I thought it was a self-help book, but then it gets into this free verse thing.”

Sarah took the book and skimmed a couple of pages. Then she made a noise and read it again, her eyebrows rising toward her hairline. Teddy thought it was weird the way she held it on her fingertips, like she was trying not to touch it.

Twentysix:

The “competition” was in fact a genuine ballroom dance competition. Mr. Elms had to give his invisible enemies credit. They had covered themselves well. To a less penetrating mind, this grand hotel ballroom with its colorful lights and transporting music, vaulted ceilings speaking of a gentler age, and genuinely decent snacks might have appeared innocent. Mr. Elms sat by himself, watching the dance floor. His jacket, folded on the chair beside him, concealed the handgun.

It was early in the evening, but Elms was a patient man. The program, open on his knee, outlined the course of the night’s entertainments. David Osgood and Mariella Demidain were listed together in the International Latin, bronze level. It was Mr. Elms’ intention to wait him out here, and then follow them, cat-like, from the ballroom to whatever nefarious meeting they had planned. If necessary, he would confront them. He could feel a rising excitement at the prospect.

Confounding that, he also felt a rising excitement at the American Rhythm competition presently on the ballroom floor. A man in a gaudy white and gold outfit was twirling a woman in a top and skirt that matched in both color and sheer visual intensity. Elvis Presley assured them all that he was both in love and also all shook up, and Mr. Elms found himself tapping his knee the beat. Man and woman were both smiling, their joyous, athletic movements both free and restrained in a combination that commanded the eye to follow them.

As he was near the back wall—the better for shadowy skulking, he’d thought—Mr. Elms could allow himself the luxury of standing up for a better view. These two were, he thought, amazing. Much better than the pair before them in red and gold, though he was going to have to track down more music by the Brian Setzer fellow the previous couple had danced to. Mr. Elms caught himself shifting his hips and arms slightly in echo of the dance on stage, felt himself blushing, and looked around to assure himself that no one had seen him.

At first, he couldn’t believe what he saw. There, at the edge of the crowd, a familiar face took in the dance with cool certainty. Sarah, the receptionist. Mr. Elms’ paranoia fell back upon him like a wave. She had been one of the voices he’d overheard discussing this competition. Was she part of Osgood’s betrayal as well? Or was there some other agenda that had brought her here?

Casting his gaze back and forth, Mr. Elms reached back for his jacket and eased the pistol into the front pocket of his slacks. The song came to its end, and the waterfall roar of applause covered him as he moved forward. His eyes didn’t leave Sarah as he inched forward. Like a hawk, he thought. Like a hawk swooping down to the kill.

The announcer, following his mandate, announced. There would be a brief open period while the judges for International Latin took their places. Everyone was invited to take a turn around the floor. The people surged forward, flowing around Mr. Elms like a river around a stone. Sarah did not turn, but then, just beyond her, he caught a glimpse of David Osgood, his chest covered with glittering sequins, the inestimable woman Mariella on his arm. Sarah, he saw, had risen from her seat, her eyes on the crowd, on Osgood and Mariella. Seeing her expression, he felt a moment’s doubt at his own attempts to cast himself as the hunter. The receptionist seemed quite suited to the role.

While he considered this odd insight, three things happened as if at once. Music began, a low almost compelling beat with a thrill of guitar and strings. The receptionist strode out toward Osgood. And the crowd around Mr. Elms shifted, leaving him suddenly aware that he was standing alone and unpartnered in the middle of a great dance.

It seemed symbolic.

Twentyseven:

It was as graceful and devastating as a cat pouncing. David, his arms around Mariella (the woman least like a young Uma Thurman of anyone in the world), had just taken the first turn of the dance when the receptionist from the office cut in. Without a word, Mariella was detached from David’s embrace, Sarah inserted in her place, and he was shifted out into the center of the civilized mosh pit of the dance floor.

“Um,” David said. “Hi.”

“Hello, David. We need to talk.”

It was a little odd, having his arm around her, her face close to his. She was from the office, and this wasn’t really the office-approved distance unless the Christmas party was way out of hand. It felt like kissing his sister.

“I can…I mean, what are you doing here?” he asked as she made a slow spin and came back to him.

“I was about to ask the same thing,” she said. “I was with Daphne at the office.”

“Oh,” David said, his belly heavy as if he’d swallowed a double handful of lead shot. “That.”

“It isn’t like you to ignore an emergency,” Sarah said. “It isn’t like you to leave Daphne in trouble.”

He almost bowed his head, but Angelica’s voice in the back of his mind snapped at him not to look at his shoes.

“I’m sorry about that. Seriously, I am,” he said. “I know it seems weird. But this was just…something I had to do.”

“It was the book, wasn’t it?” Sarah asked. They reached the edge of the dance floor and turned back in, slipping between the other couples easily as an eel through water. “What did it say to you?”

David didn’t answer right away. He felt small, embarrassed, humiliated. And it wasn’t just the costume or the eye liner and blush. His body shifted, the argentine tango moving him through its course, and all he could think about was how he must seem to Sarah. A slack bastard who’d let down people who were depending on him.

A lonely, sad little man who Daphne would never see as anything but the guy who fixes the networking. Who couldn’t face another year sitting on his couch with his cat, ordering pizza and watching cable, so instead paid a third of his paycheck for costumes he wouldn’t wear in public and dance lessons with people who didn’t like him.

Who had fallen so low he was taking advice from a self-help book.

“What did it say?” Sarah asked again, her voice gentler.

“That I need to know what I really want,” he said, knowing how stupid it sounded as he said it. “If I don’t stick through the hard parts of something, I’ll just keep bouncing around like some kind of pinball. I want…”

They turned, sliding gracefully around another couple. David’s feet moved with a grace and certainty he didn’t feel.

“You want this? Professional dance competition?”

“No. I just want. And maybe this all goes to the place I want to be. How do I know unless I go there?”

She went quiet; she was leading, but he didn’t object. It hardly mattered, really.

“It promised you that you’d know what you really want?”

“Yes,” he said.

“When do you dance besides this?” she asked at last, turning him out and pulling him back to her. She was pretty good at this.

“I don’t. I mean sometimes when I’m at a club and a little tipsy…”

“No country and western? Never been honky-tonking? No Cotton-Eyed Joe”

David laughed nervously.

“Um. No.”

“I have,” Sarah said. “Country music knows a lot about finding out what you want. There are a thousand songs, probably, that tell you how to do it.”

“Really?”

“It’s easy. You piss it away. The soul-crushing regret afterward is how you know that what you lost was precious. That book? It’s not on your side. I promise.”

David almost missed a step.

“She’d say yes,” the receptionist said.

David stopped. The other couples on the floor brushed against them, moths passing a lightbulb.

“You mean Daphne?”

“She’s in love with you. She has been for months.”

“You’re…I mean, she…”

The receptionist raised her eyebrows, challenging him to disagree. His mind spun like a top for eight beats. He dropped his arms to his sides and looked down at his feet. It was like waking up from a dream.

“Oh,” he said.

Twentyeight:

“I’m really a very important man. Running a law firm like mine is har…hard work.”

Mariella pulled him close as they turned. Her eyes were bright and predatory.

“So,” she murmured, “is that a gun in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?”

Twentynine:

They had almost missed the flight, and Sarah’s return tickets from Topeka didn’t land them back home until almost morning on Sunday. Teddy and Daphne were still at the office when they got there, along with three stale bagels and half a teaspoon of schmear. David felt a little weird in his sequins and dance shoes, but he’d gotten most of the eyeliner off at the airport, and Sarah promised him that what was left just accented his eyes a little. Nothing anyone would notice.

“I was going to try that next,” Teddy said, shoulder surfing. “Seriously, that was the absolute very next thing on my list.”

David, sitting cross-legged in the machine closet, let himself smile. The keyboard clicked under his fingers, the interface running as fast as thought. In his mind, the systems file structure glowed and shifted, symbolic links relating one level to the next in a cascade that brought the whole half-dead structure back into place.

“It would have done the trick,” David said, hitting enter. “Okay, I’m taking everything down and the restart should put us back in business.”

“That’s great,” Teddy said. His voice reminded David of someone being told the lab had accidentally switched his blood sample with a rhesus monkey’s and he wasn’t actually a macaque after all. “You want some coffee? Sarah just made some fresh.”

“That’d be great,” he said.

What he really wanted was to go home, change into something grey and colorless, listen to something punk and simplistic with terrible musicianship, and then sleep for a week. Except that Daphne came around the corner and he didn’t want any of that at all.

“Hey,” she said.

“Hey.”

“All better?”

“Pretty much,” he said, patting the keyboard as the monitor sprang back to life, running the startup checksums. Daphne looked down, smiling a little. She had the most beautiful mouth. David felt himself starting to blush. All the things he’d been going to say vanished. The moment was here, the chance he’d been fighting to take all this time, and he could feel it slipping away. In a second, she was going to ask him something about computers or NFS or domain management and this delicate, fragile chance would be blown again. He tried to speak, but nothing came out, not even something inane.

“We should go dancing some time,” Daphne said, looking up at him.

“Dancing?” he squeaked.

“Just social, you know. Like at a club.”

“The kind where nobody wins,” he agreed.

She hesitated, a hint of a blush in her cheeks.

“More the kind where nobody loses.”

Thirty:

The shredder hummed to itself, pleased just to be a shredder. Sarah leaned back in her chair. The simple harmony of a well-run office tapped and murmured. The phone didn’t ring. She licked the tip of one finger and turned the page.

STEP TWENTY-THREE: Forgiveness

The measure of your depth and maturity is your capacity to forgive. It is in this more than any other attribute that shows your best self and makes you an example for those around you.

“Not true,” Sarah said. “Keep trying.”

“Sarah?” Mr. Elms said, coming through the front door. She glanced at the clock. It was unlike Mr. Elms to be late, but less so than it had once been. “Sarah, I’m afraid I lost track of time over lunch. There’s a finding scheduled for three o’clock, and I was thinking we could have Daphne—”

“She has everything ready for it, sir. It’s on your desk,” Sarah said as the reason Mr. Elms had lost track of time walked in behind him. Mariella’s presence reminded Sarah of the other business she had waiting. “Also, David Osgood left a package for you.”

“Really?” Mr. Elms asked, and then, with an almost conspiratorial wink, “Is it what I think it is?”

“Rhumba in the Bronx. Among others,” Sarah said, handing over the stack of disks. Mr. Elms scooped them up, and Mariella sloped to his side. Talking knowledgeably about the songs, they walked back to Mr. Elms’ office together just as Daphne came from the other direction. Her flirtation with makeup was over. Her shoes were the low heels Sarah had always been accustomed to seeing. Her hair was pulled back. She was beautiful.

“He’s already downstairs with Teddy,” Sarah said. “I told Mr. Elms you had everything ready for him. You’re covered.”

“You’re sure you don’t want to some with us?”

“I don’t think Shall We Dance needed to be remade again. You kids go on ahead while you can still get matinee prices,” Sarah said. She looked at the shredder’s unimposing maw and then at the book. “Besides I have some document control to do.”

“You work too hard,” Daphne said.

“Only way I’ll make partner,” Sarah said with a shrug, and then Daphne was gone, the wide, solid door closing behind her.

The only way to truly judge something is by its results. All’s well that ends well, as the bard said. And it isn’t as if I exactly lied to anyone.

“And oftentimes, to win us to our harm, the instruments of darkness tell us truths, win us with honest trifles, to betray’s in deepest consequence,” Sarah said, her voice a light sing-song.

Oh, now that’s just mean.

A sharp snapping of fingers called Sarah to her attention. The man at the desk—early forties with a soup-stained tie and a scowl of such longevity is seemed etched in his skin—raised his eyebrows.

“I’m sorry,” Sarah said, laying the book aside. “I didn’t hear you—”

“I got that,” the man sneered as he dropped his attaché case on her desk. “How about you pull it together, give Oprah a rest, and go tell Mark Peabody I’m here. I’ll be back when I’m done in the can.”

“May I tell him who’s here to see him?”

“Bernard Lawton,” the man said, not bothering to look back at her. He appended his name with a word that was clearly intended to apply to Sarah, though she thought overall it fit him better. She scooped up her handset and paged Mr. Peabody. The attaché case squatted on her desk, a physical insult. She glanced at the book and had the eerie feeling that it was looking back. She picked it up again.

Or, it said, maybe we could make some sort of deal?

Sarah considered for a moment. Happily, the attaché case was unlocked.

Fiction: Or Else My Lady Keeps the Key (excerpt) by Kage Baker

ONE:

The Letter

On the 16th day of April, 1671, a man walked down Tower Street in old Port Royal and came to the Bluebell Inn. He stood in the street a while, looking up at the hanging sign. The daubed blue flowers were unmistakable, and in any case he could read the name perfectly well, having had some education. Still, he hesitated to step inside.

His name was John. To some people he was known as John James. He had been a London bricklayer’s apprentice who killed a man and was sent to the West Indies as a consequence. He had been several things since then: redleg bond slave, runaway, pirate, and most lately patriotic gentleman of fortune, for he had just returned from doing his bit sacking Panama with Captain Henry Morgan.

This very morning he had gone ashore, bidding farewell to his late commander. Morgan had returned his salute with a gloomy wave, and headed straight for the nearest tavern for a stiff drink before reporting to Governor Modyford. John would have joined him, but for his new and earnest resolve to give up the life of a buccaneer.

It wasn’t that the Panama expedition had been short on glory and adventure. It was that, when all had been honestly measured out afterward, John’s share of the loot amounted to a mere fifty pounds; and this had decided him to turn his hand to bricklaying once more.

Moreover John had seen madness and nightmares walking in the noonday sun, and left good comrades dead in the ashes of the old Spanish city. Still, there was a responsibility to discharge before he might begin his new life.

He squinted up at the sign again. He reached inside his coat, fingered a bit of paper hidden there, and sighed. At last he squared his broad shoulders and went into the Bluebell.

When his eyes had adjusted from the sea-glare to the dimness of the common room, he saw that the Bluebell was a clean place, as taverns in Port Royal went. No whores on the prowl, at this hour of the day, and no drunks asprawl at the tables. Only a sound and smell of onions frying in the kitchen, pungent, and a landlord who emerged from a back room and looked at him expectantly.

“What d’you lack, sir?” the landlord asked him. Taking a step nearer, he sized John up and grinned. “You’ve come back with our Admiral from Panama, ain’t you? Then welcome, sir! What you want is rum, my bully.”

“Thank’ee, no,” said John, narrowing his eyes. He was young, and big, and strong as an ox, with a broad simple face; but he wasn’t that green. “I carry news for a lady. Have you got a Mrs. Waverly staying here?”

The landlord’s expression changed, became unreadable. “We have. May I tell her your name, sir?”

“She won’t know it,” said John. “But it’s John James. You can tell her I’ve brought her a letter from Panama, and a private word if she’ll hear me.”

The landlord ducked his head in acknowledgement and walked into the back. John heard him climbing a staircase. John looked around again, shifting his weight from foot to foot. The floor of the common room was plaster laid down over planking, rapidly crumbling away to chalky punk in Port Royal’s climate. John made a note to come back, once he’d set himself up in business, and offer to put in good herringbone brick paving at a reasonable rate.

He looked up and saw that the landlord had reappeared silently, like a ghost. “Madam says please step upstairs, sir,” said the landlord. “First chamber on the left.”

John followed him as far as the stairs, and climbed alone. He came to the top of the stairs, meaning to knock, but the door to the first chamber on the left was wide open. A lady stood within, staring at him. Her face was deadly pale, so white John thought she might be going to faint. Her gray eyes were fixed on him; her red mouth was set and tight. She clenched a handkerchief in one hand.

“Ma’am,” John said, and bowed awkwardly.

“You must be from Tom,” she said. She had a sweet voice. Her accent was refined. She’d been Sir Thomas Blackstone’s mistress, so John supposed she’d been at court. He wondered uneasily if she was going to scream, or faint, when she heard his news. He cleared his throat and brought out the letter, with its daub of candle wax sealed by a thumbprint.

“I’m sorry to say, ma’am–” he said.

“Oh, he’s dead. He’s dead. Is that what you’ve come to tell me?”

“Yes, ma’am. He said to tell you, he died singing.”

She jerked as though he’d shot her, but her face twisted into a smile, a horrible thing to behold. “Did he?” she said. “Pray excuse me a moment.” She turned on her heel, smart as a soldier, and marched to a chair. There she sat and covered her face with her hands and wept, wracking sobs wrenched up dry from the roots of her heart.

John fidgeted, turning the letter in his big square hands. He saw again Tom Blackstone lying on the pallet in the makeshift hospital in Panama, red-faced and sweating. Before the fever had risen, Blackstone had called for pen and paper, and written out the letter in his fine hand. He’d sealed it and handed it to John.

“She won’t be expecting the print of my ring,” he’d told John. “She pawned it herself, long since. But do give her the letter, won’t you? Mrs. Clarissa Waverly, at the Bluebell. You can remember that, can’t you? And do tell her I died singing.”

John had been enough of a tender-hearted booby to shed a tear and cry, “Oh, courage! You won’t die!” Blackstone had given him a pitying look and called for wine. Two hours later he’d rattled out his last breath.

Too vividly John remembered the stink of Blackstone’s bandages in the close foul air of the room, and the way Blackstone’s voice had broken as he’d crowed out the old song:

The serving men doe sit and whine, and thinke it long ere dinner time:

The Butler’s still out of the way, or else my Lady keeps the key,

The poor old cook, in the larder doth look, where is no goodnesse to be found

Yet let’s be content, and the times lament, you see the world turn’d upside down.

Now his lady, having wept for him, sighed and wiped her face with her handkerchief. Some of her paint came off on it. She blew her nose, sat straight and looked up at John. John proffered Blackstone’s letter.

“From him, ma’am.”

Her mouth crumpled a bit at the edges, but she took the letter and broke the seal. She read swiftly, her gaze darting back and forth along the lines. At last she folded the letter closed, and tucked it into her sleeve. She regarded John thoughtfully.

“He said you were in his confidence, concerning his mission for Prince Rupert.”

“I was, ma’am.”

“Have you brought Prince Maurice from Panama, then?”

John reddened. “As to that, ma’am…we did find the lost prince. Got him without paying out any ransom money, neither. But he’d been a long time in a Spanish dungeon and he wasn’t, er–”

“Tom said he’d gone mad.”

“In a manner of speaking, ma’am, aye,” said John, remembering Prince Maurice’s gray moon face and blank dead eyes. He wondered whether Mistress Waverly had ever heard of zombies, and decided not to go into details.

“We reckoned Prince Rupert might be happier, not knowing what become of his brother after all, see. And then Tom went and died and I had errands to run for the Admiral, and I couldn’t watch the prince, and some fellows let him out and…well, he’s been lost again, ma’am. I’m sorry for it, but that’s how it is.”

“Then it was a fool’s errand,” said Mrs. Waverly. “And farewell my sweet Tom. However…” She was silent a moment in thought. At last she rose, giving John a brave smile. “Good man, I owe you a great deal. Pray step below and call for a bowl of punch, and we’ll drink to Tom. Then you may hear something to your advantage.”

John obeyed readily. He was fairly sure she wasn’t the sort to make him dead drunk and rob him after he’d passed out, like Hairy Mary who worked the waterfront over by the Turtle Crawl.

When he came back up Mrs. Waverly had smoothed her hair and refreshed her paint a little. She showed him to a chair and pulled another close, sitting nearly knee-to-knee with him. She encouraged him to speak of himself, of brave Admiral Morgan and the thrilling battles John had seen at Chagres Castle and Panama.

Her interest in these matters lasted until the landlord brought up the punchbowl, and took his leave after ladling out the first two cups for them. John thought the man gave him an ironical smile as he left. But the punch smelled all right, and John resolved not to take a second cup in any case.

“To Tom Blackstone,” he said, lifting his cup. “A rare brave comrade. And a clever fellow.”

“To Tom Blackstone,” said Mrs. Waverly, her voice catching on a little sob. “Oh, what a clever fellow he was.” She drank deep and set her cup aside. “Well. My dear Mr. James, you have been such a good friend to Tom, and so kind to me; I wonder whether I might further impose on your good nature?”

“Well, er, ma’am,” said John, “I’m sure I’d be happy to perform any service you might require.” It occurred to him that she might construe lewd meaning in what he’d just said, and he winced. Yet his baser instincts woke and sat bolt upright, in hopeful surmise.

“I knew you would say so,” said Mrs. Waverly, smiling into his eyes. “I will be frank with you, Mr. James. You know there was a ransom demanded for Prince Maurice’s safe return.”

“Four thousand pounds, aye,” said John.

“We collected it in London, when Prince Rupert engaged our services. We brought it with us to Barbados, to treat with a certain Spaniard there, who claimed to know where Prince Maurice was being held. He merely directed us to meet another Spaniard here. We began to suspect that we were being led in a fools’ dance. Therefore Tom took the money, gold in sealed bags, and hid it secure, lest we should fall amongst thieves in our search.

“As it fell out, we have no brother to send home to the prince,” and here Mrs. Waverly’s voice slowed, and she twisted a lock of her hair about her finger. “And I have lost a dear friend, and you have lost a valiant comrade-at-arms. Tom being dead, how shall Prince Rupert hear what became of the four thousand pounds? For all he may know, Tom paid the ransom in good faith and was treacherously slain by Spaniards. I think we are owed the money, you and I, for our pains.”

John blinked at her. He got the full import of what she was proposing, but her use of you and I set his heart pounding.

“Four thousand pounds,” he repeated, attempting to sound keen.

“Let us divide it, dear Mr. James,” said Mrs. Waverly. “Two thousand each.”

“Seems fair,” said John, trying not to dribble his punch. He wondered what unlikely thing might happen next. Heavenly angels flying in through the window, bearing plum duff and sausages? Closely followed, perhaps, by Father Christmas?

“I knew you would say so,” said Mrs. Waverly. “We have only to find the money.”

“Don’t you know where it is?” John sat straight, as the pink clouds dissipated somewhat.

“In a general way,” said Mrs. Waverly, with a graceful wave of her hand. “We bespoke our rooms here and then Tom left with the money. I thought he’d taken it to meet his contact. I didn’t see him again until a fortnight later, when he returned in a fine temper and told me he’d hid the money, but missed the man and would now be obliged to chase after him, perhaps as far as Chagres. We quarreled. I regret it now…Oh, to think I shall never see him again!”

She drooped, tears in her eyes. John was moved to take her hands in his.

“Aw, ma’am, it makes no odds. His last thought was of you, wasn’t it? And him being so particular about sending you the letter and all.”

Mrs. Waverly squeezed his hands. “But he was my rock, my brave steadfast hero, a very bulwark to a poor frail woman! Where shall I find another such? Shall I rely upon you?”

She leaned close and John had an excellent view down the cleft of her bosom. “Be sure you may, ma’am,” he said, breathless.

“What a dear soul, what a kind soul you are, Mr. James! Did you see the letter, before Tom sealed it?”

“No, ma’am.”

“Then know, Mr. James, that the letter confides where the money’s hid. We have but to go to a certain place and recover it. Alas, it is not on Jamaica. Do you know the Isle Leauchaud, sir?”

“Leauchaud? Ay,” said John. “Not hard to get to, at any rate.”

“Then I will leave it to you to make the travel arrangements, as I am sure you know a great deal more about these things than I do,” said Mrs. Waverly. “But I must beg you to pay for our passage, for in truth I have scarcely any money left.”

A tear trickled from her eye as she said it. John’s heart contracted. But his purse contracted too; he had calculated that his fifty pounds would just about set him up in business with a brickyard and proper tools of his own. He put the thought down as ungentlemanly, and considered too what he might do with two thousand pounds.

“I’ll see to it,” he said. “Never fear.”

TWO:

They Embark

John went down to one of the wharves and found a ship, the Fyrey Pentacost, bound for Barbados with a cargo of tortoiseshell and logwood. The captain was agreeable to taking on supercargo at a price, since Leauchaud was one of his ports of call, and since he had already agreed to take another traveler on board. Smiling, he quoted John a price for the passage. John winced but said “Done,” thinking of his share.

Early next morning he called for Mrs. Waverly at the Bluebell, and found her waiting with her packed trunk. All the same, they were like to have missed the boat; for it fell out that there were certain sums owed to the landlord that needed paying, and Mrs. Waverly’s purse was not equal to the debt. John paid.

“That was very kind of you,” said Mrs. Waverly, as they stepped into the street at last. “But you mustn’t pay for the hire of a porter to carry our trunks. I believe I can just scrape together sixpence–”

“No need,” said John, a trifle brusquely, and swung her trunk up on his shoulder. He tucked his own sea chest under his other arm. Mrs. Waverly looked at him, wide-eyed.

“Oh, sir! Indeed you are a Hercules for strength!”

John was a little mollified at that, but he merely said. “Strong enough, ma’am,” and strode off in the direction of the wharf. She followed him. They went crunching through drifts of broken shells, winding their way between the street vendors and avoiding all the unpleasant things folk had thrown into the street overnight.

Emerging onto the waterfront, they faced the brilliant glare of a hazy morning. The plaster walls of the houses reflected the dazzle back on the salt mist coming off the sea, or was it steam? John felt sweat prickling under his shirt, and squinted up at the sails being unfurled on the Fyrey Pentacost. They hung limp as curtains in a parlor.

The crew were getting ready to cast off. The first mate greeted John with a black scowl as he came aboard. He bit back whatever remark he had been about to make, though, when he beheld Mrs. Waverly gracefully lifting her skirts as she stepped up the gangplank. Men fell over themselves to offer her helping hands down into the waist.

“I thank you very kindly,” said she, smiling at them all. “Will some good gentleman show us to our cabins?”

“This way, ma’am,” said the first mate, bowing and gesturing aft. “And sir,” he added over his shoulder to John, in a peremptory sort of way.

Cargo had been pushed back hastily on the under-deck and bulkheads hammered into place to form three cabins, windowless and low. Mrs. Waverly regarded them in dismay, but made no complaint as John set her trunk down inside. She merely opened her trunk and set about making up a bed in the sort of box that had been provided. John set down his sea chest and peered at the tiny space allotted him. He grunted, dug out his hammock, and strung it up instead.

As he was tying it off, there came a double rap at the cabin door. John opened it, ducked down to see who had knocked, and found himself face to face with a sullen-looking black servant.

“Captain Sharp’s compliments, and requests the pleasure of your company at table this evening,” the servant recited, in a bored sort of way. He had an oddly flat, nasal accent.

“Oh. Right,” said John. The servant did not stay for further pleasantries, but stepped away sidelong.

John heard the same double rap, the same formula recited, and Mrs. Waverly’s clear reply: “Please convey my delighted acceptance to the captain and assure him I will be prompt. At what o’clock are we to dine?”

“Half past seven, ma’am.”

“Thank you.”

The same sidestep, knock and recitation, and then a new voice responding: “Oh! Why–well–that’s exceedingly decent of Captain Sharp! Yes, indeed. I’ll be there. Yes. Thank him, please.”

It was a male voice, an educated one. It sounded middle-aged.

*

They had to put out boats with sweeps to row the Fyrey Pentacost out of the harbor; they were obliged to keep the oars dipping until they were nearly to Port Morant. At last a breeze freshened and the sails flapped, then bellied as they caught the breeze in earnest.

John was leaning on the rail, feeling pleased that he wasn’t one of the poor devils rowing away in the boats, when Mrs. Waverly came up from below, parasol over her shoulder. She put her hand on his arm.

“Dear Mr. James, perhaps we might have a word,” she said in a low voice. “I am a little concerned for my good name.”

“Have some of these bastards been treating you improper?” asked John, and felt his face grow hot. “Hoping you’ll pardon my plain talk.”

“Oh, no, no indeed. But there have been inquiries made as to our relations, you see.”

John stared at her a moment, wondering why anyone would be asking after his old mother and ten brothers and sisters in Hackney, before he got the sense of what she’d said. His ego sat up and preened a bit. “Well, it’s nobody’s business–”

“Exactly, but now and again one does encounter a puritanical sort of ship’s master who assumes the worst about one,” said Mrs. Waverly, coloring a little. “So I have given out that I’m a new-made widow, and you are my late husband’s manservant.”

John’s ego fell, wounded. “Servant?”

“Oh, I know it cannot be to your liking, dear Mr. James; but it will help us avoid scandal, and in any case it’s only until we reach Leauchaud,” said Mrs. Waverly. “Tom and I had to devise such shifts many a time, as we traveled. Why, on one occasion I was obliged to disguise myself as a boy!”

It was a diverting image. John contemplated it a moment before swallowing hard and muttering, “Well, but things stood a certain way between you and Tom Blackstone.”

“That’s true. Yet I do count you as a friend, Mr. James; and who knows whether we mightn’t become very dear friends indeed?” Mrs. Waverly looked into his eyes. “Please, my dear, go along with the disguise this once, as a favor to me?”

“Well,” said John. He looked down at her, in her gown of yellow cotton sprigged with forget-me-nots. “Ain’t they going to wonder why you aren’t in black?”

Her lip trembled. “I hadn’t the money to buy a mourning gown,” she said. So then John felt like a cur dog, and said of course he’d go along with the game.

*

So John went before Mrs. Waverly to the great cabin that evening, and cleared his throat and announced her, as he supposed a servant ought to do. Four pairs of eyes watched his performance, and hers as she entered. Besides Captain Sharp and the first mate, Mr. Harris, there was the black servant who had conveyed the dinner invitation; also a little mild-looking man of about fifty, wearing thread-loop spectacles, who was introduced as Mr. Tudeley.

“Mr. Tudeley is on his way to Barbados,” explained Captain Sharp, as he held out his wineglass. The black servant filled it. “A new position, I take it, sir?”

“I hope so, indeed,” said Mr. Tudeley. “My sister and brother-in-law keep a pie-house there, you see, quite a profitable one. They have intimated they require a clerk, and were so good as to send for me after Squire Darrow’s plantation failed, I being then at loose ends.”

“Why, sir, I hope a pie-house is steadier work than a plantation!” said Captain Sharp, with a wink at the others.

“I, too. There wasn’t any fault in my accounts,” said Mr. Tudeley, looking miserable, for he had caught the wink. “No fault of mine at all. But Mr. Cox, that was the manager, Mr. Cox had taken to drink, and neglected the place shamefully. I said so at the time. The indentures were insolent and lazy, too. What could I have done?”

“I am sure you did your best,” said Captain Sharp. “And may I introduce the Widow Waverly? And Mr. James. Her man.”

Mr. Harris looked knowing at that, and the black servant stared in a fairly open way. John scowled, but Mrs. Waverly smiled.

“He was simply devoted to my poor husband, you know, and a better factotum I could not hope for,” she said, with a graceful wave.

“Thank you, ma’am,” said John.

“And we are taking you out to Leauchaud, as I understand?” said the Captain to Mrs. Waverly.

“Indeed, sir.”

“You’ll be taking the waters for your health, I dare say?”

“No; I have certain matters to resolve, concerning my husband’s inheritance,” said Mrs. Waverly.

“Oh, well, you ought to try the waters, while you’re there,” said Captain Sharp. “I’ve been, and it did me a world of good. You would think you were in Bath! Mr. Shillitoe’s had handsome pools built for invalids, and a pump room beside.”

“How charming!’ said Mrs. Waverly. “Perhaps I shall call on Mr. Shillitoe.”

“Now, is it Mr. Shillitoe runs the place, or Mr. Leauchaud?” inquired Mr. Tudeley, leaning aside as the black servant ladled turtle soup into his plate. Everyone turned to stare at Mr. Tudeley, and he blushed furiously.

“Chah! The name comes from L’eau chaud, hot water,” explained the black servant, with a snort of amusement. Now it was Captain Sharp who turned crimson.

“How dare you address my guests! Hold your tongue, damn you!”

There was a moment of uncomfortable silence, in which the servant met Captain Sharp’s glare with a smoldering look of his own.

“So it is French, then!” said Mrs. Waverly, with a bright little laugh. “Of course. No doubt some Frenchman or other discovered it. Well, well. What a pleasant thought.”

“And I’ll have none of your insolent looks,” Captain Sharp continued to the servant, “or you’ll earn yourself a flogging. Now, fetch out the sherry.” The servant hooded his eyes and bowed stiffly. He withdrew from the cabin.

“I declare I took no offense, sir,” protested Mr. Tudeley. “I wouldn’t have the poor slave beaten on my account.”

“He isn’t a slave,” said Mr. Harris. “He’s a damned freedman who gives himself airs.”

“Freedman or no, he’ll find himself cutting cane in the sun one of these days,” said Captain Sharp, with an unpleasant smile. “Fetch a good price too, I don’t doubt. Well! Let it alone. May I offer you a slice of the smoked pork, ma’am?”

The conversation touched on the price of sugar next, followed by the weather and local gossip. John was largely excluded from the conversation. At first he was relieved, not having much of a knack for genteel chitchat, until it occurred to him that he was being spoken around because he had been introduced as a mere servant. Then he felt a bit resentful.

He was spooning up the last of his soup when he heard a liquid sound on the other side of the bulkhead. The sound suggested certain distinct images; he felt an answering twinge in his bladder. A moment later the servant returned with a decanter of amber liquid, and set it at Captain Sharp’s elbow, with a narrow-eyed smile.

“Your sherry, sir,” he said.

“Ah. A glass with you, gentlemen?” said Captain Sharp.

“I thank you, no,” said Mr. Tudeley. “Not after the claret. I have a poor head for strong drink.”

Captain Sharp regarded him in amused contempt. “As you like,” he said. “You, my man?” he inquired of John.

John peered at the servant, wary. The servant raised his eyebrows. He gave a barely perceptible shake of his head.

“Er,” said John. “Thank you. No.”

“You, Harris?”

“Please,” said Harris, with his mouth full.

“Sherry for Mr. Harris and myself, Sejanus,” said Captain Sharp.

“Certainly, sir,” said the servant smoothly, and filled their glasses. “Shall I clear away the soup tureen, sir?”

THREE:

Old Friends

They made little headway next day, for the wind swung around and the Fyrey Pentacost labored in the swell with a seesawing motion that sent Mr. Tudeley below, green as turtle soup. His groans drove Mrs. Waverly from her cabin, in turn, and she went abovedecks for a stroll. Strolling proved impossible, though a sort or lurching progress from handhold to handhold could be managed. Several helpful crewmen put themselves in her way to catch her lest she fall against them, which she did. After the second time her hat was blown into the rigging, though, she made her way across the rocking deck to John’s side, where he stood at the rail. She clasped his arm to steady herself.

“Shall we get there soon, do you think?”

“Two or three days, I reckon,” said John. “At this rate.”

“Dear God,” said Mrs. Waverly. John looked at her sidelong.

“I been thinking about that money, ma’am.”

“I, too, I assure you.”

“I been reckoning it up. Four thousand pounds in gold, in sealed bags–that’d be a great heavy sum to be carrying, wouldn’t it? In sovereigns, anyhow. Tom couldn’t have lifted four thousand sovereigns by himself, let alone carried it off on his own to hide it. I reckon the only way he could have done it was if it was in five-guinea pieces. That’d amount to eight hundred of ‘em.”

“I suppose it would, yes.” Mrs. Waverly gave him a slightly hostile glance. “You’re rather good at sums, I must say.”

“It’s only like reckoning up how many bricks go in a course, ma’am,” said John. “So. Allowing it was in five-guinea pieces, allowing it was eight hundred, and reckoning the weight at five stone and some–that’s still a powerful lot for one man to carry about. And I was just wondering, ma’am, how Tom lugged it off to Leauchaud without anyone noticing and robbing him. You’re sure he had it, are you?”

“Of course I am,” said Mrs. Waverly. “Don’t be silly. I must have searched the room a dozen times while he was gone. And it was in five-guinea pieces, thank you, in sealed bags in an ironbound chest, quite a small one, considering. I saw it. And in any case, I have his letter! He tells me plain where it’s hid.”

“Is there a map in the letter? Might I have a look at it?”

“Oh, Mr. James!” Mrs. Waverly put her hand on her heart. “How can you ask such a thing? Tom’s letter contains remarks of a most private and passionate nature, and I am sure he never meant any eyes but mine own to read it. Spare a lady’s blushes, do!”

“All right. Meant no offense, ma’am.” John hung his head and glared down at the white water hissing past the ship’s hull. Mrs. Waverly considered him a moment. When she spoke it was in a sweeter voice.

“I would that Tom had trusted me, as he seems to have trusted you,” she said, and sighed, and leaned against John. “I loved him to distraction, and yet he held a part of himself aloof from me, always. But you are not like that, are you? I sense you have a kind and honest heart. If he had told you anything that might give a poor woman advantage now, you would surely tell her.”

“Be sure I would, ma’am,” said John, powerfully conscious of the warmth of her against his side. “But he never told me anything about the money. Only that it was hid safe.”

The ship dropped into the trough of a wave, smacking them with salt spray, and its lurch sent Mrs. Waverly tottering backward. John put out his hand and grabbed her lest she fall. He pulled her close, wrapping an arm around her. She looked up into his eyes. Her lips parted, and she sort of melted against him. “Oh, thank you,” she said.

John inhaled her breath, which was sweet with caraway because she’d been chewing comfits against seasickness. He wondered if they might get down into the cable tiers, where there was a chance to do it in a certain amount of privacy; he wondered if she was the sort of woman to be put off by the sight of a few rats running about. All this in the hushed moment in which she half-lay on his arm, gazing up wide-eyed. Then there was a voice close by his ear.

“Excuse me, lady.” Sejanus stepped around them and leaned over to empty the captain’s chamber pot to leeward.

“Do you mind?” snapped Mrs. Waverly. She gripped the rail and stood straight.

“I was just keeping her from falling,” said John. “On account of the rough sea.”

“Oh, yes,” said Sejanus, in a neutral voice. “Very rough today, indeed.” He lowered a bucket on a rope to pull up some rinsing-water. As he straightened up he looked aft at the horizon, and frowned. “We’re being followed,” he said.

John turned to look. There was a ship coming along, well over the horizon, keeping in the Fyrey Pentacost’s wake to starboard. She was a low thing, no bigger than a schooner, and the fact that her fore-and-aft sails were all patched and stained with many colors had made her harder to see. But John saw well enough the men crowded on her deck, and the glint of their weapons. As he watched, the craft sped nearer.

“Bugger,” he said. He knew well enough what they were, having cruised in just such a vessel himself. “Pirates astern!” he bawled.

“Oh God!” murmured Mrs. Waverly, and ran below. As John’s cry was echoed by the tardy lookout and men ran to the rail to see, Sejanus placidly rinsed out the captain’s chamber pot.

All was confusion for a few minutes, with Mr. Harris shouting orders until the captain ran up on deck. The helmsman swung the tiller, and the Fyrey Pentacost’s square sails luffed as she changed course and turned to run before the wind, like an agitated hen. The pirates merely cut straight across her wake and made for her port side, close enough now for John to make out their grinning faces.

“Blow them to Hell!” screamed Captain Sharp. “Mr. Partridge, serve out the muskets! Load the gun!”

Two of the crew got busy with the ship’s little rail-mounted one-pounder, and soon got off a shot that fell short of the mark; the pirates hooted and came on, their craft skimming over the water fast and light. By the time the gun was reloaded and aimed again, the pirates were close enough to nail the gunner with a musket ball between his eyes. He fell with the slow match in his hand.

John, seeing the firefight commence in earnest, ducked down and went below. He wasn’t a coward, but he had a good head for odds and nothing much worth stealing, and he didn’t feel like dying that day. He made his way to his cabin in the dark, and there loaded the pistol he’d brought with him, largely by touch.

“Mr. James?” Mrs. Waverly’s voice came from the other side of the bulkhead. She sounded tense, but not as though she was crying. “What ought we to do, Mr. James?”

“Stay out of the way,” said John.

“Are we in danger, Mr. James?”

“Might be,” said John. “Depends on how angry the captain makes ‘em. I’ve got a pistol, and I won’t let ‘em hurt you.”

Mrs. Waverly said nothing for a moment, in which time they heard the musket fire die down and the sounds of scuffling overhead, followed by the ringing of blades. “You are very good, sir,” said Mrs. Waverly at last.

“What was that?” Mr. Tudeley’s weak voice floated from his cabin. “What’s toward? Is that fighting? Good God!”

“Pirates,” said John, stepping out of his cabin. He leaned against Mrs. Waverly’s door, watching the dark passageway steadily.

“Oh Jesus Christ!” groaned Mr. Tudeley, and there was a crash suggesting he had fallen to his knees. “Oh, dear Lord deliver us! Lord, Lord, what have I ever done to deserve Thy wrath?”

“Take heart,” said John. “The captain might beat ‘em away.”

It didn’t sound as though that was much of a possibility now, however. John heard a lot more thumping overhead, and Captain Sharp yelling furiously. “Cowards! You damned cowards! Shoot him! Sejanus! My pistols–”

Then there was a terrific crash and a last thump. The noise of the swords stopped. John heard Mr. Tudeley weeping, and men muttering, and quick footsteps to and fro overheard. He heard someone coming down the companionway. At the far end of the passage, shadows blocked the light as men milled around, poking into the bales and boxes there.

John took a deep breath, and a firm grip on his pistol. He had no idea what he’d do with his one shot. He wondered whether Mrs. Waverly was the sort of woman who’d rather die than be raped. If she turned out to prefer death, he could blow her brains out, he supposed; otherwise the pistol would be pretty useless.

Footsteps were coming along the passage. Someone was carrying a lamp. John watched the yellow flare approaching, and saw gradually the glint of light on peering eyes and teeth. A dirty bearded face. A man wearing only rawhide breeches, holding a cutlass low and his lamp high.

John let his breath out.

“Sam Anslow, ain’t it?”

“Who’s that?” The man halted, lifted his lamp higher.

“It’s me, shipmate!” John put all the cordiality he could muster into his voice, and stepped forward. “John James. I was at Panama with you. Sailed under Bradley.”

“God damn,” said Anslow, and grinned. “I remember you! You was on burial detail at Chagres Castle.”

John felt drunk with relief. “So I was. Just lately come home with the Admiral. You weren’t in the fleet?”

“Not I,” said Anslow. “I reckoned I’d take my chances in Tortuga. A man has to earn his bread.”

“That’s true,” said John.

“How much did you make out of it?”

“Fifty pounds.”

“That was my share, too. Lousy business, weren’t it?”

“Fortunes of war, and all.”

“So,” said Anslow. There was an awkward pause. “Here you are.”

“Aye,” said John. He had what seemed a brilliant flash of inspiration. “I went home and straightaway married. The wife and I was on our honeymoon.”

“Oh! Congratulations,” said Anslow, hanging the lamp on a nail and offering his bloody hand to shake John’s. “So you weren’t working this cruise?”

“For a lubber like Captain Sharp? Not likely!” John chuckled, as convincingly as he could. “Now, I hope there ain’t going to be unpleasantness between us and your lads, shipmate, eh? What with me being a new bridegroom and all. I got my bride’s feelings to think of.”

“Oh, right,” said Anslow, and glanced uneasily over his shoulder. “That’s for Captain Reynald to say, of course. But it’ll be all right. I’ll vouch for you.” For the first time he seemed to notice the cabin behind John. “The missus in there?”

“Aye.”

“Congratulations on your wedding, ma’am,” said Anslow in a raised voice.

“I thank you, sir,” said Mrs. Waverly, through the bulkhead.

“You’re kindly welcome,” said Anslow. He looked sheepish. “Well. Business is business.”

“So it is,” said John. “Shall I go help you shift cargo?”

“You wouldn’t mind?”

“It ain’t my property,” said John, shrugging.

FOUR: The Harmony

When they went on deck at last, with Mrs. Waverly clinging tightly to John’s arm, the cleaning-up had begun; which was to say, dead men from both sides were being pitched overboard, and the blood was being swilled off the decks with buckets of seawater. The survivors of the crew of the Fyrey Pentacost were lined up along the rail, being jeered at by the survivors of Captain Reynald’s crew. Captain Sharp was slumped against the mast, clutching a lace-edged handkerchief to his eye. Captain Reynald, a lean Frenchman, was surveying his new quarterdeck and looking pleased with himself.

“Captain sir?” Anslow touched his forelock and led John and Mrs. Waverly forward. “This is my mate John, what I mentioned, and his bride.”

“Madame!” Captain Reynald gaze fixed on Mrs. Waverly. “Enchanted!” He took her hand and kissed it. “Please have no fears for your safety. We are a gallant band of adventurers, and respect the honor of a woman. Mr. Anslow informs me your husband is a comrade of his.”

“How very kind,” said Mrs. Waverly, with a bright artificial smile.

“And you are welcome to our crew, sir,” said Captain Reynald to John, looking him up and down. “We are short-handed.”

“Er,” said John. “Well–”

“Hear me!” Captain Reynald turned to the prisoners. “I offer each man among you the same choice! You may go over the side with your captain, or you may take the oath to join our company and live free. Will you join us, for liberty and treasure? What of you?” He pointed his cutlass at Mr. Tudeley, who had been hauled up from his cabin sobbing and now stood swaying and white-faced, from sickness and terror both.

“Oh, Jesus, sir! I wish to live!” cried Mr. Tudeley.

“Tres bien! Welcome, friend. And you?” Captain Reynald swung the tip of his cutlass to Sejanus, who was next in line.

“I cheerfully accept your offer,” said Sejanus. About this point it sank in on Mr. Tudeley that he had just joined a pirate crew, and his mouth opened for a cry of horror. Somehow, though, all that emerged was a sort of croak.

Captain Reynald moved briskly down the line, and one after another of the Fyrey Pentacost’s crew joined up, except for the ship’s cook and Mr. Harris, who had been beaten unconscious and couldn’t voice a preference. He was dumped unceremoniously into the bottom of one of the boats, and lowered over the side; the ship’s cook was shoved down to join him and so, after a certain amount of furious invective and threats of the rope’s end, was Captain Sharp. They were set adrift, as the Fyrey Pentacost put on sail and tacked about.

All this while John had been revolving in his mind what he ought to do, and was just clearing his throat and preparing to approach Captain Reynald when Mrs. Waverly’s fingers pinched off the circulation in his arm.

“Husband, may I just speak a word in your ear?”

“To be sure, wife,” said John, walking with her into the waist, where nobody much was standing at the moment.

“I must commend you on your swift thought, and your care for mine honor,” said Mrs. Waverly. “Knowing full well that you will never be such a beast as to press your advantage against a helpless female. Now, my dear: on no account must we let slip, amongst such people, any least detail regarding our plans.”

“I wasn’t about to tell ‘em,” said John, indignant. “What kind of a mooncalf do you take me for?”

“I’m sure you’re quite clever,” said Mrs. Waverly. “Just as I am sure Mr. Anslow is a kind gentleman, and Captain Reynald too for all I know. But I think it best to be discreet amongst so many other persons of uncertain character, don’t you? We will go along for the present and bear with our misfortune, trusting that we will have the opportunity to escape at some point and make our way to Leauchaud.”

“Right,” said John. “It’s only that I was getting out of the business, as it were, and now I’m on the account again whether I will or no. Any court’s going to say this was an English ship, and hang me up alongside that frog captain.”

“Only if we are caught,” said Mrs. Waverly. “And in any case I shall plead for mercy, and swear that you only did it to protect me.”

“How likely is that to work?”

“It has never failed before,” said Mrs. Waverly, smiling graciously at Captain Reynald.

*

The ship was rechristened the Harmony, and that night they found themselves invited to another dinner with the captain; only this time it was at a long trestle table set up belowdecks, in the crew’s quarters.

“Welcome, friends,” said Captain Reynald, who had put on a clean shirt for the occasion. “Madame.” He bowed deeply and once more kissed Mrs. Waverly’s hand. “I trust you will find the viands to your liking. They have been prepared with these own hands of mine.”

“Really,” said Mrs. Waverly, as he led her to a place at the head of the table.

“Indeed, madame. We are a happy community of brothers here; I am the leader only in matters of war and philosophy.”

“Philosophy?” said John, taking his seat to Mrs. Waverly’s left, since Captain Reynald had taken the seat to her right. Sejanus took a seat next to him and sat looking around, in great enjoyment; Mr. Tudeley, still pale and miserable, found himself seated far down the table.

“Indeed, my friend. We are a utopian fraternity of corsairs, rebels against the entrenched corruption of kings and merchants. We have refused the chains of Civilization and live in perfect equality here, upon the wide sea, the mother of liberty. Is it not so?”

“Yes, Captain,” chorused the crew, in tones that suggested they’d heard his speech a multitude of times.

“For example: all delicacies shall be shared in common among us.” Captain Reynald drew the serving platter close, and carved one of a pair of Captain Sharp’s capons. “My brother corsairs share in whatever bounty we find. Will you have some of this chicken, madame?”

“I thank you, yes,” said Mrs. Waverly. He loaded her plate with generous slices, to the point where the men at table looked narrowly at what was left.

“Perhaps you are surprised by such men; perhaps you expected us to be little better than savages,” continued Captain Reynald.

“I confess I scarcely knew what to expect,” said Mrs. Waverly.

“Though of course it is a fact that among civilized men, you will generally find filth, moral turpitude, decadence and lies, whereas if you make the acquaintance of primitive Man in his natural element you will find him a noble and honest creature,” said Captain Reynald, with a gracious nod in the direction of Sejanus.

“I wouldn’t know, sir,” said Sejanus dryly. “I was born in Massachusetts.”

“Pardon me,” said John, a little irritated by Captain Reynald’s attentions to Mrs. Waverly. “This sounds all right and proper, and I’m grateful to know we’ve fallen in with such a high-minded lot; but, since we’re on the account, let’s talk business. Have we got a commission?”

“Why, of course,” said Captain Reynald. “Signed by the governor of Tortuga.”

“Allows us to go after anybody but the French,” said Anslow, grinning. “And even them, if the captain don’t feel they’re yew-topian enough.”

“How do you know?”

“I regard them through the spyglass,” said Captain Reynald. “If the captain is dressed in great finery and his men are ragged, clearly he is oppressing them and it is our duty to liberate the ship.”

“We got the Triomphe de Bourbon that way,” volunteered one of the crew. “There was a ship, by God!”

“Pity about that reef off Curacao,” said another man, looking mournful.

“It is no matter,” said Captain Reynald. “We have this fine ship now, and the Fraternity; we shall cruise together and increase our fleet. Others will come to join us, and who can say? Perhaps we will find a suitable island on which to set up our community, and govern ourselves democratically.”

There were responses from the crew of “Oui, c’est vrai,” and “Right you are,” and “We’re all looking forward to that day, I’m sure,” none of it in tones of great enthusiasm.

“But in the meantime,” Anslow said to John, “It’s the old rules. No Purchase No Pay, but no damned shares to the King nor the Duke of York nor no governors, neither!”

“Not even the governor of Tortuga?”

“He is a reasonable man, and is content with a modest bribe,” said Captain Reynald. “And even I, the captain, even my share is no greater than that of my fellow corsairs. We are equal in all things!”

“Really,” said Sejanus.

“Indeed,” said Captain Reynald, filling Mrs. Waverly’s glass with Captain Sharp’s best rhenish. “I propose a toast, my friends: to universal liberty and the brotherhood of all mankind!”

They drank, all of them; even Mr. Tudeley, who screwed up his face as though he was about to swallow poison. After the first taste, though, he sighed and had another.

FIVE:

Theology

The congeniality on board lasted about as long as the delicacies plundered from Captain Sharp’s private store held out. When they were back to jerked beef and rum, the mood reverted to one a bit more like what John expected on a pirate ship.

Equality or no, Captain Reynald reserved the right to order them about. The first task John and his mates were set was tearing down the poop and quarterdecks, so the Harmony became a flush-decked fighting platform.

“I have been meaning to ask you about something,” said Sejanus, as he levered out the windows of the great cabin.

“What?” said John, catching the panes before they shattered and setting the window down flat.

“When did you and your mistress marry?”

“How dare you ask such an impertinent question, sir?” said Mr. Tudeley, sweating as he struggled to pry loose the wall-paneling by the privy closet. He set down his crowbar and pulled off his spectacles to wipe them on his sleeve. “Though to speak truth, Mr. James, I had wondered myself.”

“We ain’t married,” said John. “It was a ruse, what d’you think? On account of I didn’t know what these fellows would be inclined to do with her.”

“Ah! Very gallant of you,” said Mr. Tudeley.

“Just so,” said Sejanus. “So…you are her servant, then.”

“Aye,” said John. He took up Mr. Tudeley’s crowbar and hooked it into the paneling that had defeated Mr. Tudeley. A wrench, a grunt, and the panel popped off and bounced across the room like a playing card.

“And yet, you were a pirate before,” mused Sejanus. “How does a man go from piracy to serving in a lady’s chamber?”

John turned slowly, with the crowbar in his hand. “Well, ain’t you too clever by half?” he said quietly. “I reckon if I was to crack your crown and pitch you out that window-hole, there ain’t anybody’d know it wasn’t an accident but me and Tudeley here.”

“Too clever,” said Sejanus, nodding, though he did not move. “Yes, that’s me. And you aren’t as stupid as you look, either. I’ll hold my tongue.”

“But…” Mr. Tudeley’s face contorted as he tried to think through the relationship. “But…good God, sir, d’you mean the woman is a strumpet? You brought her aboard for immoral purposes?”

Sejanus burst out laughing.

“You dunce, who in hell goes to sea for a fuck?” said John crossly. “We could have laid up in an alehouse if that was all we’d wanted. Look, mate, here’s the truth of it: me and her man was mates in Panama, and he died, and I come back to tell her.” Hastily he laid down a new level of untruth, like paint. “Her health ain’t the best, and she wanted to take the waters at Leauchaud. I was only squiring her out there on my old mate’s account, as a last favor like.”

“Mmm-hm.” Sejanus took up a crowbar and set about dismantling the window frame.

“You must excuse me,” said Mr. Tudeley. “I have moved so long amongst indecent people, I scarcely recognize an honest man when I see him anymore.”

“That’s all right,” said John, pulling the cabin’s wainscoting away.

“I have often thought it must be something in the air of this place,” said Mr. Tudeley, in a mournful voice. “I used to imagine the tropics would be like Paradise, when I was in London. Reading Raleigh’s book, you know, imagining green palms waving in the sunlight, and luscious fruits growing all year round, and quaint birds and monkeys. It seemed another Eden.

“I’d no idea I’d find such heat, such rogues and drunkards, such…sweat and stink and filth! Mr. Cox had been a reasonable and upright man in London; Squire Darrow had great reason to trust him with the plantation. Yet I watched him rot before mine eyes in this sweltering heat, doing no more but lying in his hammock all hours of the day and swilling rum. I spoke with him long and earnestly, pointing out his duty, and was told to go to perdition for my pains. Was that fair, sir, I ask you?”

“I don’t reckon life’s fair, mate,” said John.

“And yet, I know I was blamed,” said Mr. Tudeley. He put his spectacles back on and bent to pick up the wooden slats that John was scattering everywhere. “Mr. Cox drinking himself into an early grave, who was left to blame but me? Squire Darrow’s reproach was almost more than I could bear. Yet it is all of a piece with the course of my life.”

“Mm-hm,” said Sejanus.

“Do tell,” said John.

“Nothing but disappointments,” said Mr. Tudeley. “Disappointed at school, in my marriage, in my prospects, all hopes blighted. It’s enough to make a man rail at God.”

“Chah!” said Sejanus. “Why don’t you, then? If it makes you feel any better.”

Mr. Tudeley shuddered. “Bitter as the crust of my life has been, how much worse might it be was I to call down the wrath of the Almighty?”

“Now, see, you’re like my father,” said Sejanus.

“How dare you!”

“There he was, lying in chains in a pool of shite, rolling to and fro as the slave-ship rolled, and what did he say? ‘Oh, merciful Damballah, I don’t know what I did to make you angry with me, but I’m sorry!’ And then there he was, sold naked as a baby on the auction block, and dragged away to sweat on a tobacco plantation, and what did he say? ‘Oh, merciful Damballah, I know I must have earned your anger, but if you’ll show me what you want me to do, I’ll do it!’

“And then there he was, lamed when a wagon rolled over his leg, and sold away to old Reverend Walker of Boston, who made him fetch and carry anyway and married him to an ugly woman, and what did he say? ‘Oh, merciful Damballah, I just know you have a reason for all the sufferings you’ve inflicted on me, and maybe someday you’ll please to tell me what it is?’

“And you know what he always said to me? ‘Respect the loas, Bandele! They are great and powerful and they watch over us always!’”

“What’s a loa?” asked John.

“Well, what can you expect of your heathen gods?” said Mr. Tudeley with a sniff. “Our Lord God Almighty is the true divinity.”

“And so said Reverend Walker,” said Sejanus. “He gave me schooling, he said to me, ‘Little Sejanus, I cannot save thy father’s obdurate soul, but I shall save thine.’ He said, ‘The Lord Almighty in His infinite mercy has visited the burden of slavery upon thy sinful people, and thou must bear it patiently, for it is part of His divine plan.’. I said to myself, Oh, yes, that’ll make me love your Lord Almighty!

“But he preached at me every day, did the Reverend Walker, trying to save my black soul. He’d lean out the window and preach at me the whole time I’d be weeding in his garden. He preached at me every mile of the way I had to carry him to and from the church, after he got too old to sit a horse.

“I said to myself, these two old men are fools. Great and powerful Damballah couldn’t save his people. Great and loving-merciful God carrying on the spiteful way He does makes no sense either. So at last I resolved I wasn’t believing in any of them.

“And you know what happened then, just last year?”

“What?” inquired John, pausing to mop his sweating face.

“We had moved to Virginia,” said Sejanus, smiling at the memory. “They passed a law there. The news came the day after I became an atheist. ‘All slaves come into the country by ship will remain slaves. All slaves born into the country to be manumitted after thirty years’ service.’ And I was just thirty. ‘There it is,’ I said To Reverend Walker, ‘I was born here. I’m free!’

“He signed my manumission and he said, ‘Then God has blessed you, Sejanus. Kneel with me and pray!’ And my old father said “You see? The loas have set you free! Let’s make them an offering in thanks.’

“I said ‘Thank you, but I think I’ll just get my black arse out of here before the law changes.’ I took my manumission paper and I set off. Last I saw, those two old sad men stood there watching me walk away down the lane. All their holy-holies between them couldn’t set me free. Only a loophole in the law, and me having the wits to jump through it.”

“Oh, that’s just blasphemy,” said Mr. Tudeley.

“But I worked my way this far and here I am, free as a bird,” said Sejanus. “How free are you, God-fearing man?”

“How’d you like dumping Captain Sharp’s pisspot for him?” said John. Sejanus scowled at him.

“At least I got paid wages for it,” he said. “And I chose to be here. Nobody, man or god, will ever ride my back again.”

SIX: The Santa Ysabel

John was dead-tired when he went to bed that night. He retired to the cabin, for Captain Reynald had graciously allowed him to keep it, “in order that the fair lady might enjoy her privacy”. Sejanus had been granted a hammock where the rest of the crew slept, and got on famously with them, and everyone seemed to have forgotten that Mr. Tudeley had a cabin somewhere aft. Privacy for John there was none, of course; only Mrs. Waverly curled up in the narrow cot, frowning at him when he blundered in.

“Do put the candle out soon, won’t you?” she said, sharpish. “I had just fallen asleep.”

“Sorry, ma’am,” said John. He swung himself up into the hammock and groped for the candle, pinching the flame out. He lay there, swaying in the pitch darkness, wondering uneasily what he should do if he needed to break wind.

The question occupied him to the edge of consciousness. Just as he was slipping over the edge into sleep he was jerked back by a small sharp noise, very loud in that confined space. For a moment he lay petrified with embarrassment, thinking he had farted. As he recollected the sound, however, he realized it had been more of a metallic sound; not unlike a coin or small bauble striking the deck.

“What is it?” said Mrs. Waverly, out of the darkness. She sounded full wide awake.

“Somebody dropped something.”

“I don’t believe so,” she said. John heard her rustling about. “I believe you were dreaming, Mr. James. I heard nothing. Do go back to sleep.”

*

The deck was flush, all the pegs sanded down and all the nail-holes stuffed with oakum and tar. Now John saw why Reynald’s men put up with his silly-arse ideas about universal brotherhood; for the captain knew his craft. He had the Harmony rerigged, giving her fore-and-aft sails for speed.

Reynald stalked her aft deck in satisfaction, gazing up at the spars and lines, now and then ordering an adjustment. When she was in full trim they caught a wind and ran, and made twelve knots. She might be broad in the beam, but now the Harmony was fast as a hare, and answered the helm like a willing bride.

No sooner was she apt for work but she found employment.

*

“Allons!” Captain Reynald grinned and closed up his spyglass. “Flag of Spain! Anslow, signal the Fraternity. We pursue!”

John, who had been cleaning the one-pound gun, looked up in interest. He could just make out the tilting pyramid of sail on the northern horizon, and the unwieldy bulk under it that suggested a merchant galleon. He cheered up considerably. Cargoes of tortoiseshell and logwood were pleasant enough to have a share in; the same went for sugar and rum. But the prospect of Spanish emeralds, or gold, or silver from the mines of Potosi, was enough to make the mouth water.

“What’s happening?” said Mr. Tudeley, who had been helping him by holding the rags and bucket of grease.

“We’re going into action,” said John, grinning as he watched the Fraternity wheel about and take off after the Spaniard like a coursing greyhound. The Harmony came about too and cut after her, and men catcalled and ran up into the rigging for a better view as they sped along.

“Oh dear God,” said Mr. Tudeley. “And now I shall be party to murder and robbery.”

“No!” said John. “That’s a Spanish ship, see? Now, you and me being English, our consciences are clear. They’re the enemies of the nation, so for us it’s a proper act of war.”

“But there has been a treaty signed,” said Mr. Tudeley. “We are at peace now, or hadn’t you heard?”

John had heard something of the sort, but he shrugged. “Like as not they’ll declare war again, when they hear what we done at Panama. And, you know, they’re only Papists after all.” He looked around at Captain Reynald. “Shouldn’t care to be a Frenchman,” he added thoughtfully, “because they’re Papists too, and I don’t know how they square their consciences going after Spaniards.”

“I can’t bear this,” said Mr. Tudeley, gathering up his rags and bucket. “I’m going to my cabin.”

“Just fetch up the powder and shot first, will you?” John called after him, watching avidly as the distance closed between the Harmony and the Spaniard.

*

The Spaniard was the Santa Ysabel, and the Fraternity had already engaged her to port when the Harmony came storming up to starboard. Little puffs of smoke were showing, here and there as muskets were fired.

John, who had been waiting impatiently for Mr. Tudeley’s return, sprinted below and found him struggling upward with his arms full of shot, holding a powder horn between his teeth. “Oh, Bleeding Jesus,” cried John, and grabbed him up bodily and ran back on deck with him.

“Le gouvernail!” Captain Reynald was roaring, pointing at the Santa Ysabel’s rudder. They were within point blank range. “Shoot! Shoot her!”

“Aye sir!” John slammed down Mr. Tudeley and relieved him of a gunball. He grabbed the powder horn, loaded, turned for a bit of wadding–

“Where’s the damn wadding?”

“The what?”

John spotted a book peeping from Mr. Tudeley’s coat pocket. “Here.” He grabbed it, tore out a page and shoved it down the gun, over Mr. Tudeley’s cry of outrage. The ball was rammed down, and then–

“Where’s the slow match?”

“You didn’t ask for one!”

“Oh, you whoreson ninny–”

“Merde! C’est incroyable,” muttered one of the musketmen, and dropped to his knees beside John, who aimed for the Santa Ysabel’s rudder. The one-pounder was tiny, no longer than John’s arm, but easy as a pistol to aim. They waited until the rise and the musketman dabbed his slow match to the touch hole. The gun fired; the little ball sped true and smashed pintle and gudgeon both, a beautiful shot if not much use. Hastily they reloaded, tearing another page from Mr. Tudeley’s book (“You bastards! That’s Boethius’s The Consolation of Philosophy!” raged Mr. Tudeley) and fired again, John praying for lightning to strike twice.

He heard the shot strike home but couldn’t see it; yet his luck must have held, for the Santa Ysabel wallowed and swung, drifting sidelong and turning her bow toward the Fraternity. Over the cracking of musket-fire John heard the Spanish tillerman cursing, as the Harmony cruised past and came around again.

Now the Harmony had the advantage, for her tops were full of buccaneers, crack marksmen. They picked off the one sharpshooter in the Santa Ysabel’s main top, whose attention had been focused on the men in the Fraternity. His covering fire stopped as the crew of the Fraternity pulled close enough to grapple and board.

John leapt up and ran below, grabbing a cutlass and axe from the arms-rack. He felt the crash as they ground into the Santa Ysabel’s side, but kept his feet and ran on deck once more, in time to see a Frenchman cut down right in front of him by a Spanish musketball. Mr. Tudeley was on his hands and knees, crawling crabwise. John kicked the dead man’s cutlass toward him.

“Come on!” he roared, as he spotted the Spanish marksman re-loading on the quarterdeck of the Santa Ysabel. He hurled the axe, which spun end over end and took the Spaniard full in the face. The man dropped with three inches of steel spike in his brains. John ran on and vaulted the shifting uneasy space at the rail, landing on his feet aboard the other vessel.

His enthusiasm evaporated, as it tended to do in the heat of battle, when his cold rational self woke to blood and mayhem. Panic drove him then, and so far had done well by him, enabling him to mow through his assailants.

He looked around now and promptly ducked, as one of the defenders swung a Toledo blade at him. The man had a better blade and was a better swordsman; John knew no style but a butcher’s, but he was bigger and had the reach on the other, and was scared besides. His opponent fell with a grunt, cleft at the shoulder, and didn’t move again. John saw men boiling up from belowdecks and yelled in terror. He put his blade up and beat away the first, and beheaded the second, and by slow degrees hacked through the crowd to the companionway and stood there gibbering, killing the Spaniards before they could come out, like a housewife smashing beetles.

Then there was blood all over the deck, all over the treads of the companionway, and John was looking down at dead men. He peered around, confused. Something was on fire, smoke tendrils were drifting up now from the hole at his feet. He saw Sejanus, grinning white through a mask of blood as he fought, and behind him another black man, one John did not recognize. The man was a near-giant, whaling away with a big squared blade; his strokes mirrored those of Sejanus, with eerie precision. It looked almost like a martial dance.

Then a grimacing enemy rose into John’s field of vision, pointing a pistol full into his face. John shouted and ducked, cutting the Spaniard’s legs out from under him. He rose and to his astonishment saw Mr. Tudeley, holding his cutlass out as though it was a poker, attempting to fend off an opponent. The other lunged forward and sliced away Mr. Tudeley’s left ear, and cut the string that held his spectacles on his face to boot. Yet he overreached.

His stroke carried him against the rail, in which time Mr. Tudeley had time to realize what had happened. He caught his spectacles and clapped a hand to the side of his head, disbelieving; then burst into tears. He ran full tilt at his enemy and impaled him on his blade. The man fell, yanking the hilt from Mr. Tudeley’s grasp as he dropped. Mr. Tudeley stood there weeping, streaming blood down his neck. He fumbled for his handkerchief and clapped it to where his ear had been, murmuring “You bastard, oh, you bastard. How shall I wear my spectacles now?”

“Victoire!” someone was shouting. John turned to stare and saw Captain Reynald swinging a bloody cutlass on high. All the Spaniards were down, dead or dying. The Santa Ysabel had been taken.

*

When they ventured below they saw they might have taken the Santa Ysabel, but they weren’t likely to keep her. A fire had been started somewhere down in the hold, and thick white smoke was billowing up. Some of the men went down with buckets of water to try to put it out, but they couldn’t find where it was before the smoke drove them out again, blinded with tears, choking.

So in the end it became a frantic game, running down with wet cloths bound over their mouths to grab what bales and boxes they could and drag them up on deck, to be swung over to the Harmony. John and Anslow hung off the stern on ropes and kicked in the windows of the great cabin. They got a lot of the Spanish captain’s candlesticks and plate that way, as well as some armor and navigation gear.

But all the while the smoke was getting thicker, and the fire could be heard now, crackling away somewhere deep. The Fraternity ungrappled and cast off, sailing free just as the first red flame appeared. Little bright tongues danced up through a blackened patch of deck. “Abandon ship!” someone shouted, and John joined the general rush to scramble back on board the Harmony. They cast off and moved away from the Santa Ysabel with bare moments to spare: indeed the Harmony’s paint was bubbled and discolored from the heat, where she’d lain too close. The same breeze that pushed them away fanned the blaze, and looking back John could see the little flames running up the Santa Ysabel’s shrouds and lines like sailors.

They did not stay to watch it burn, but beat away north. Still it was visible a long while behind them, as night fell, an inferno pitching up and down on the black water.

Review: Travel Light, by Naomi Mitchison

Reviewed by Anne KG Murphy

There once was a Princess whose father’s new Queen planned to do away with her. Her good nurse, overhearing this plan, turned into a Bear (as people sometimes did at that time) and carried the babe away. Halla Bearbairn would always have bearish tendencies toward berries and getting her paws in the earth, but her human form meant she wouldn’t hibernate like a sensible bear. As winter approached the nurse found a Dragon and convinced him to adopt the child. After a well-advised fireproofing ritual, Halla was raised by dragons, logically despising Heroes and wondering why Princesses were not traditionally consulted as to whether or not they wanted to be rescued.

Thus begins Travel Light, which Naomi Mitchison wrote just past half way through her 101-year-long life. Mitchison was born in 1897 in Scotland and wrote over seventy books of poems, plays, non-fiction and fiction both speculative and historical. Travel Light, a fairy tale with a whimsical tone, yet includes such serious themes as the disillusionment of men and the state of living among people who do not think remotely like you do. Small Beer Press reprinted it in 2005 as part of their Peapod Classics series – books small enough to fit in your hand and short enough to re-read as often as you please.

Mitchison organized the book into two parts. The first concerns Halla’s youth among dragons, trolls, unicorns and other mythical creatures. As the second starts, her life has been uprooted by a Hero. He is subsequently collected by Halla’s valkyrie friend, but the damage is done. Halla is taken under the cloak of The Wanderer, who recommends she set aside her dragonish treasure-keeping ways and travel light to Micklegard, though it is a far road.

As a dragon fosterling, Halla understands all languages including those of the animals and the birds. She is seen as a gift from god, a saint, a witch, an angel and, sometimes, a friend by those she comes among. She meets some men from upriver who seek audience with the Emperor in Micklegard (also called Constantinopolis or Byzantium) to complain of a tyrannical Governor. Halla becomes their benefactor and their voice as they struggle to achieve their goals in a world less just than they had hoped, yet she is not one of them and turns to her non-human acquaintances (now rats and horses) to find her way.

Travel Light has a mystical and floating tone even when it is describing cruelty, avarice, and death; the reader experiences Halla’s detached outlook toward a world that is starting to be thin of both dragons and heroes. There is no going back to the time of her youthful companions; Halla finds her own place straddling myth and reality – a place most people cannot see, because they do not believe in it any more.

“Perhaps she did not die,” said Halla, “perhaps her nurse turned into a bear and carried her away into the forest. Perhaps she was brought up by bears and dragons. Perhaps it was better for her in the end than being a king’s child.”

“That was never the story,” said Modolf.

“Forget the story,” said Halla.

This is a delightful little book I happily recommend to anyone who enjoys a trip in the light fantastic.

Table of Contents

Title Page

Table of Contents

Column: Bears Examining #5: Get ‘er Done by Elizabeth Bear

Column: Lansdale Unchained #3: Little Boys Unite by Joe R. Lansdale

Fiction: Fire in the Lake by Chris Roberson

Fiction: Show of Hands by David Prill

Fiction: The Fly and Die Ticket by Jay Lake

Fiction: In the Dreamtime of Lady Resurrection by Caitlín R. Kiernan

Fiction: Merry Bunta! A Lucifer Jones Story by Mike Resnick

Fiction: The Acquaintance by Kealan Patrick Burke

Fiction: The Blackwood Oak by Stephen Gallagher

Fiction: The Four Hundred Thousand by Livia Llewellyn

Fiction: The Sagan Diary by John Scalzi

Fiction: The Support Technician Tango by Daniel Abraham

Fiction: Or Else My Lady Keeps the Key (excerpt) by Kage Baker

Review: Travel Light, by Naomi Mitchison