WASTER MERCY

Sara Genge

Sara Genge’s latest story is part of her Children of the Waste series that began with “Godtouched” in Strange Horizons, and continued with “Shoes-to-Run” (Asimov’s, July 2009) and “Malick Pan” (Asimov’s, April/May 2010). She tells us, “These tales are loosely set in a wild expanse outside Paris that is scarred by ecological disaster and social decline. The stories occur in different areas of the Waste, each with its own ecosystem and social structure, and in different periods in time. Survival is a strong connecting thread as well as the idea that sometimes it’s the society that’s sick and not the individual—and child psychopaths appeal to me for some reason.”

* * * *

The zum-barrier closed behind Brother Beussy, casting a silver glow on the darkened road. The headlights came alive with two blinks and a flicker, but the shivering lights were barely enough to see. When the city magnetics failed, the skid bucked and landed on its wheels. Brother Beussy struggled for control, wondering if he’d ever get used to the bumpy feel of a vehicle in actual physical contact with the road. The old hybrid had cost a fortune, but it was the only means of transportation in the Waste where nano was too scarce to coat the roads and maintain a decent magnetic polarity.

Eastwards, pinkish light swept in under the Rim and spread shadows under the mengue bushes and tamarisk trees. The Rim looked solid enough, but it was only the visual effect created by the edge of the nanobot haze that coated Paris. Out here, the haze was too thin to keep out most of the sun’s radiation. Beussy could protect himself against the light, but the gamma rays must be, as of now, pummeling his DNA. It was a sacrifice, and one worth making. His absolution lay hidden among the trash, red dust, and glare of the Waste.

“Warning: sunrise. Warning: sunrise.” The skid console announced. At dawn and dusk, the sun shone directly under the dome, blinding and burning. Beussy swore like a Waster, hit the emergency stop, and skidded to a halt. Side flaps of woven polymer rose to cover his legs. Beussy yanked the hood out of the rear compartment and threw it over himself.

He waited, cocooned in his green bubble. He had been warned not to look, but slivers of light seeped in between the cape and the side flaps. Cracks. He damned himself for missing them and pulled the pieces of fabric together as best he could, hoping the gaps weren’t critical.

Beussy dug his head into his arm and prayed for his eyesight. An hour later, the skid declared it was safe, and he emerged from cover.

Brother Beussy had never seen so much light.

He had always thought of blindness as life in the dark, but now he saw that life in the light could be more intimidating. When his eyes finally adjusted, he laughed with relief.

He kept going. It was too dangerous to linger this close to the city after sunrise. The Wasters would soon be out and there’d be patrols on the lookout for new penitents to rob of their gear.

Brother Beussy accepted that there was a high probability of dying in the Waste. Lead poisoning, cholera, radiation—these were common threats. There was no shame in dying such a death, having his body disintegrate among the dust and trash, his grave unmarked save for the fluorescent chits that the wind blew into the base of burial mounds. If he could live as a Waster and die one of them, his life would have meaning and his soul would go to his Maker in peace.

But a violent death brought on by his foreignness was tantamount to martyrdom. Acclimatizing was his goal, and it carried powerful religious connotations. The Order shunned cultural colonialism, and Brother Beussy had spent years studying the biological urges that underlined the impulse to convert others to one’s culture, or else. He’d been trained to recognize the signals, the way his mind would try to trick him into confusing his private morality with universal good; what was right, with righteousness.

In this trip, Brother Beussy sought neither to preach nor to teach, although he was willing to do both. His job was simple but immense; he had only his soul to care for, but the breadth of that endeavor brought him to his knees. He could fail by refusing change, but that would be a private failure and he could always try again. Martyrdom was the only permanent failure the Waste offered, and Brother Beussy would do anything to avoid it.

The terrain north of Paris was hilly. The skid creaked and jittered over the tufts of grass and pebbled cement. The land was crackled like an old man’s arm, dry and jaundiced from the sun, with oil stains like black-and-blue marks and liver spots of rotting Kikuyu grass.

By mid-afternoon he’d covered only twenty kilometers.

He saw the nails on the road, too late. The wheels hissed and deflated. The hub clanged and the handlebars yanked out of the priest’s hands. It was a low speed crash, but Brother Beussy was impotent to stop it. The skid swerved off the road and hit a petrified trunk. For a second, Beussy thought that the worst was over. But the skid tilted and fell with the certainty of a quarter-ton machine and Brother Beussy went down with it.

He heard bone crack. Pain squeezed the air out of his lungs.

He prodded the machine, but the pain in his calf kept him from attempting anything drastic. Back in the city, it had taken three grown men to lift the skid up from its side. He had no hope of lifting it now. He knew he was trapped.

His mind raced through the options. As far as he could tell, there were none. He had prepared for this moment, he told himself. He had trained. There was no help coming, not from the city. He would die here, today if a predator found him, tomorrow if he bled out slowly and ran out of water.

Four deep breaths helped him focus. He was in the Waste. The thought cleared his mind. There was no shame in dying from the elements. This wasn’t murder; it wasn’t martyrdom. He hadn’t expected the end to come this soon, but he’d known all along that he was not going back. Only weak missionaries admitted defeat and returned to the city. Not he. He’d find his Creator in this desert of the soul or not at all.

The pain cut into his mind like a laser, separating his faith from its trappings, truth from political consensus. Beussy had never been so lucid. His life was laid out before him, freed from lies, conceits, and theological double-talk. He saw his naked sins spread out on the table, numbered, classified.

He had thought he understood confession. He had repented often enough. Now, he saw that he’d been lying even as he intoned Mea Culpas. His sin was pride—but he’d always known, hadn’t he? His pride cracked like a nut and revealed a pale soul, blinking its eyes in the light.

In awe, he realized that shame hadn’t replaced pride. He forgave himself as he had struggled all his life to forgive those who had offended him. His sins were a part of him, rough diamonds, proof of his utter humanity. They could not touch him now.

Brother Beussy hadn’t realized that his eyes were closed. When he opened them, he saw the sky between the branches of a mengue bush. The sun beat on each leaf, insisting it toughen up or die.

His eyes had seen; his ears had heard. He was a witness and he couldn’t imagine a greater honor, a greater blessing. The light of creation was blinding and Brother Beussy cried from the joy of it.

The child angel approached the skid cautiously. Brother Beussy held his breath, not wanting to scare it away. Its skin was a leaden gray and it weaved its way through Beussy’s vision like a ghost, entering and exiting on its own terms. It limped, or rather, loped at amazing speed, using the wooden cane more as a jumping pole than as a crutch. The cherub shook his head wearily and sighed. Brother Beussy chuckled at the adult gesture and the child jumped back.

“I won’t hurt you,” the priest said.

The child kicked the console away from Beussy’s hands.

“I know,” he said, and started patting Beussy down. The search produced a cheap metal compass, a snack, some currency and a couple of chits, which the child pocketed.

This was no angel.

“How do you prefer I kill you?” the boy asked. “I can leave you alive until Chief and his men come to take the skid, but I’d think you’d rather die now than later. That must hurt,” he said, pointing at the leg trapped under the skid.

He put it so clearly that Beussy almost forgot to beg for his life.

“Please,” he whispered.

The boy sighed and shook his head, knelt next to Beussy and caressed his hair. “If it were up to me, I’d keep you, but last time, mother got real angry. Besides, we don’t have food for a slave. And none of Chief’s men are going to want you. The leg.” It was self-explanatory.

“Not martyrdom! No, I won’t die that way. God, not that way!” Beussy moaned and struggled. The skid creaked but didn’t budge and he swooned from the pain. He shook himself awake and tried to dig his leg free, but the ground was hard-packed. The quartz dust bit the flesh under his fingernails until it bled.

In the background, he was dimly aware of the boy circling the skid, searching for unprotected pockets.

The pain was too much. The fear was too much. Brother Beussy stopped and covered his face with his hands. Blood trickled down his cheeks.

“Where’s the key to the container in the back?” The boy asked.

“Don’t kill me.”

“I’ll do it fast. Chief’s men won’t be so kind.”

“Let me die on my own! What is it to you?”

The boy considered this for a few seconds and then shook his head. “It’ll take you forever. Another scout might find you and then Chief won’t give me my part.” He motioned towards his paralyzed leg. “I have to move twice as fast, search twice as hard, and be twice as smart as any other scout just to stay in the militia. Can’t do.” The boy took out a multi-blade knife and went for the priest’s left wrist. The kid was fast and kept coming back, but Beussy fought back. His fist glanced off the boy’s temple.

The boy yapped and jumped back. “I was doing you a favor!” He started collecting stones. “You’ll die, dammit.”

“You’ll never find the keys,” Brother Beussy said. “If you do find them, you won’t recognize them and you won’t know how to use them. The skid will be useless to you and you’ll never manage to open the back container. It’s made from a woven metal polymer.”

The first rock landed on Beussy’s forehead, regardless. “The skid will be good for parts and I’m guessing a blowtorch will open the container . . .” the boy said. The second rock cracked Beussy’s eyebrow.

“Wait! For God’s sake, won’t you listen?” Brother Beussy blinked away the blood in his eye. “This Chief of yours—he’ll take most of my gear, right? He’ll give you the dregs. If you can open the back container you can take some of the stuff in there. There’s a couple consoles, some raw nano.” The boy’s eyes widened. “Yes, very valuable. If you don’t get too greedy, Chief won’t even suspect most of it was there.”

The boy looked pensive, passing a stone from hand to hand.

“Tell me how to open the back and I’ll give you until tomorrow. The hyenas will find you,” he said.

Brother Beussy rummaged through his hidden inner pockets for a translucent chit one centimeter across. Thank God the boy had missed it. “Insert it into the slot, flick the switch on the right, and tell me when you’ve finished. It’s voice activated.”

The boy did as he was told.

“Rabindranath Tagore,” said the priest. His voice was weary. The container clicked open and the musky smell of bionano wafted out.

At sunset, Brother Beussy heard the hyenas gathering. He pulled the cape out of the skid and wrapped himself in it. He didn’t know why he bothered. Blindness might be a blessing when the hyenas got him.

The hyenas didn’t bark during sunset. Beussy suspected they had curled up to protect their eyes in layers of fur and flesh. Why was it that all vile creatures could withstand the sun? When the end of the world arrived, Beussy suspected only the hyenas and cockroaches would survive.

He knew immediately when the sun had set. The air around him cooled fast. He consoled himself thinking it would soon be over and that he wouldn’t have to endure the cold desert night.

A growl behind him. A howl answered to his left. Beussy muttered a quick Mater Ferissima and prepared himself for death.

Stones flew over his head. The hyenas yelped and limped away. The boy emerged from behind a carbonized conifer and sat by the priest’s side.

“Wretched boy! You promised to let me die!”

“I didn’t. I promised not to kill you until tomorrow. I want the skid and I’m sure it only opens with your words, like the container. You can’t die until you give it to me.”

Brother Beussy knew he was being petty, not giving the skid to the boy. But he felt cheated, and not only by the boy. He had given his life to God; he had done everything in his power to excise the instinct to convert from his soul. He had even had an epiphany, for Godsake! Further suffering was unnecessary. The Universe had a wretched sense of humor.

But if he gave the boy the skid, what then? Would the boy break his promise a second time and kill him because of misguided compassion?

No. Brother Beussy recognized the fallacy as soon as it entered his mind. The boy hadn’t broken his promise; he’d simply interpreted it as a Waster and Beussy had no right to judge him for it. Neither could he judge Waster mercy as misguided. That was cultural supremacy at its worst.

“I must not die a martyr,” he said. Expressing his needs in a clear simple way, Waster-like. Beussy berated himself for not thinking about it earlier.

“Explain.”

Brother Beussy did.

The boy seemed confused. “Wouldn’t you rather die quickly? Your god would understand.”

“I would rather not die at all,” Brother Beussy confessed. “But if I must die, I would die from the natural elements of the Waste, not martyred by its inhabitants.”

“I see,” said the boy.

Brother Beussy doubted he did.

“If I take the skid and leave you here to die you won’t follow me?” The boy’s voice was strident, laced with disbelief.

“No.”

“Wow. Cool. Why?”

Brother Beussy struggled to explain about colonialism but although the boy nodded sagely a couple of times, the priest doubted that he understood. The missionary kept on regardless. Each minute he talked brought him closer to dying on his own terms.

“Listen, ah, what’s your name anyway?”

“Patrice.”

“I’m Beussy. Listen, Patrice. My order—that’s the group of people I told you about—they have a great burden of guilt from the past. Actually, we come from several different orders—Jesuits, Dominicans—but why am I telling you this? It isn’t important. Anyway, centuries ago, those religious orders used to go to new countries and preach. They did some good, but they also weakened the original cultures so that they could not withstand the soldiers who came after. History has shunned this—but you don’t know what history is, do you? Well, let’s see how I can explain it . . . Let’s just say that people have since decided that converting people was wrong and an order was created to redeem us from that collective sin.” The priest was giddy, high on faith and adrenalin. The boy seemed riveted, but his reactions were unpredictable. He laughed randomly, shouted in disbelief at the strangest moments and remained quiet and confused when he should have been angry. None of it mattered. Brother Beussy had his audience and he preached with zeal.

Patrice took a soda can that was hanging from his empty holster, removed the mud plug and offered the missionary a drink. Despite his better judgment, Beussy accepted. This would be the last time he preached and he had to make the most of it.

“Why do you carry that thing around?” Beussy asked, pointing at the useless holster.

The boy was offended. “I got it myself! Chief took the gun, but as long as I wear it, everyone knows I killed a man.”

“It is very pretty,” Beussy said. He hoped he didn’t sound placating.

“Isn’t it?” Patrice preened. “I hang it against my left side. That way people don’t notice that my left leg is so skinny.” His voice dropped; this was a secret. Brother Beussy felt a dull pride at being the repository of this tidbit. He didn’t have the heart to tell the boy that his deformity was evident, holster or no. The ground beneath him was beginning to redden. Beussy threw a worried glance at the East.

“Shouldn’t you be going? The sun’s about to rise.”

“You think I’m stupid!” The boy stood up and kicked him. “You cannot trick me, city-scum. I’m smarter than you. I’ll stay here until you die and then I’ll take your skid and your clothes and your nano. Even the little bits on your hair!” Patrice stomped and puffed his chest, shouting and threatening. Beussy cowered before the rage of the Waste, but a part of his mind kept whispering that the scene was simply too funny. Beussy’s lips twitched.

“I didn’t mean it! Whatever it was,” the priest shouted. The boy smiled, remembered himself, and frowned again. Beussy cowered some more, apologized for everything and nothing. Patrice kept huffing but both of them knew that this had turned into a game.

“I meant for you to protect your eyes. Sunrise is coming in a few minutes,” Beussy said. “Here, move under the cover of the skid with me. I promise I won’t hurt you—” Beussy realized his mistake, the boy thought of himself as fearsome—”I mean, I won’t try to escape!”

Patrice laughed. “There are mountains all around us, fool. By the time the sun rises above them, there’s already a bit of dome to protect the eyes. You only have to cover your eyes down in the plains and even then it’s enough to cover them with your palms. Only fools peek. Tell me a thing, foreigner. How is it that you city people survive to copulate and have children? You all seem too stupid to breathe.”

Brother Beussy sunk back into the nettles. Of course, the mountains. Indeed, he felt like an idiot. But wasn’t this what the Waste was about? Learning lessons? Then he remembered his situation and the enormity of it sandblasted through his mind. He glanced at Patrice. Sooner or later, this must come to an end.

The boy picked up on Beussy’s mood and his smile dissolved. He offered the priest water and they watched the sun rise, each concentrated on his own thoughts.

It took all of Beussy’s courage to keep his eyes open when the sun rose over the mountains. He had never watched a sunrise before. The dome over the city muted the light and all he had seen from inside was the blurry disk of the sun when it was at its zenith, dull like a lesser moon. Nothing in his training had prepared him for this spectacle. He shivered with the leaves in the morning breeze. As the crescent of the sun rose over the mountains, he broke into a jumble of Mater Ferissimas, Credos, and Mea Culpas.

Patrice started singing his own ditties, songs of battle and women. Brother Beussy feared the boy understood the explicit details. They both wound up laughing.

The light was bright, but not searing. Nobody went blind.

“Why did you leave your city?” Patrice asked.

“I told you. My order was founded to atone for the sins of Jesuits—”

“Those men are all dead.”

“There are other sins,” the priest whispered. “More recent.”

“You did not lock us out of the city; your ancestors did,” Patrice said.

Beussy stared back in surprise.

“What? You think Wasters don’t remember!” Patrice shook his head. “You poor man. You’re going to die for something your great-great-granddaddy did.” His voice dropped. “I don’t even know who my father was . . .”

“Ah, but I’ve profited from my ancestors’ crime. I’ve lived in comfort and safety every day of my life. Until today, I’d never missed a meal.” Spoken here, it was an obscenity, but Patrice didn’t bat an eyelash.

“You are a fool, foreigner, but I believe you. I believe you wouldn’t try to take the skid back, even if you could,” Patrice said.

Not that it mattered, but Beussy was glad to hear it.

“I believe you,” he repeated. “I hope I’m not wrong.”

The boy scampered off. The land came alive with stashes of hidden ropes and clasps, cleverly concealed under nettles and dry turds. Patrice wove around, lashing, knotting. He used his cane as an arm, a lever, a weight balance. Beussy had never seen such grace. The boy used his handicap, letting his limitations guide him to inventive solutions. He prodded the World, teasing Nature to see if she would allow a bit more strength, more bounce, more agility on a single leg.

Brother Beussy watched in awe, not understanding what the boy was doing.

“Now, I need to dig you out. The skid should be suspended.”

“But the ropes are so thin!”

“Idiot! There are many of them.” Patrice shook his head at Beussy but he smiled as he chopped the earth around the leg with the multi-blade knife. It was hard work. Patrice paused, thought for a second, broke off a blade and handed it to Beussy. The priest started digging.

A couple of hours later they had vacated enough dirt that the priest’s leg had sunk below the surface. The skid moved down a fraction of a centimeter. The ropes tensed and the branches creaked but didn’t give. The priest mopped his brow and started to inch his leg out, groaning and cursing from the pain.

Patrice looked on with the inscrutable air of a judge.

“Now what?” His foot was free. The pain had led him to believe that his whole leg was crushed to bits, but now he saw that it was only his ankle that was broken. He saw bone.

“I take the skid and the nano.”

The priest nodded. “The hyenas will get me, then?”

Patrice lifted both palms up to his face. “No, no, no! Have you no will, man?” He cut a few branches, skinned the twigs off, and placed them besides the priest’s leg.

“Don’t look.” Patrice grabbed the heel of Beussy’s boot and pulled. The bones settled in place with a crunch. Beussy managed not to scream, but blood flowed from his tongue. He swallowed fast before the boy could notice.

“Paris is that way,” Patrice said after he’d fastened the splint. He sounded weary. Brother Beussy realized that dealing with city folk must be trying. “A normal man should be able to reach the city, but you? I don’t know.”

“So we part now,” Beussy said. He sat up, still in a daze.

“Of course we part . . . As soon as you activate the skid, that is.” The boy smiled.

Beussy chided himself for expecting a teary goodbye.

“Aquinas,” Beussy said, and showed the boy how to reset the password. Chief would have a hard time stealing the skid after it was coded to Patrice’s voice.

“Here, have some water,” Patrice ran up to him and handed him a can. Beussy thanked him but the boy didn’t leave. Instead he looked the priest up and down, hesitating. He ran a hand through the priest’s hair, retrieved the stray nano and pocketed it. Then he cut off the priest’s clothes and handed him his own shirt instead. “There, that’s better. They won’t bother you if you look like a Waster.”

Brother Beussy put on the shirt, trying not to think about the flesh that it left uncovered or about the light engulfing his body. Now wasn’t the time to fuss about the radiation. His leg throbbed, but he felt playful, alive.

“I should go now,” Beussy said, but he stayed to watch Patrice pulley the skid upright. Child’s play for a boy that had survived despite all odds.

“You were going,” Patrice said. He threw Beussy his cane. “Take it. I’ll get another.”

The priest turned away, but not before he saw Patrice retrieve a couple of nails from the road. Beussy laughed, realizing what had caused his accident. He didn’t blame Patrice. The boy did what he had to do to survive.

He limped south, careful to avoid the roads where he might encounter Wasters. He kept his eyes open, but as far as he could tell, nobody was following.