Search Results for: ladder of ashes

Ladder of Ashes

I tried to meet Mom’s flickering, pixellated gaze as it skittered across the screen, and to parse meaning from snippets as her voice shifted in and out of audibility, “Lots of people asked about you… with this fever… won’t let me… bloodwork… don’t know how long I’ll be here… have to come home for high school in September if Dad can’t find you a tutor…”

The trip-planning sites all warned that Myanmar had the worst connectivity in Asia. No lie. We were waiting for delivery of a satellite dish, but in this part of the country, the electrical supply was as much an issue as the signal.

Mom had gone back to Toronto for cancer treatment, leaving me stranded in Mawlamyin with Dad as he carried on converting the old rubber plantation into a museum/hotel–certain that it would attract a steady and lucrative stream of cultural and academic tourists.

Twelve Oaks Estate sat in the center of a pegboard orchard of old and stingy rubber trees – a morning wagon’s ride west of the enclave of colonial mansions known as little England. As far as I knew, there wasn’t an actual oak tree within 1,000 klicks. The house was a vast block of stone that had long since lost most of its balconies and porches and canopies to rot and rust.

The day I met Lawrence, was the first day of the rewiring, so all the electrical power in the house was switched off – no air conditioning, no TV, no computer. The contractor doing the reno didn’t want the boss’ son “underfoot,” so I didn’t have access to most of the house. I couldn’t go outside because the gatherers didn’t want people wandering the grounds of the plantation – outside of organized tours – for fear they would get in the way of the tappers or inadvertently contaminate the cup things they collect the latex in. Even though Dad had let me shadow him one day, he made it clear that I was a big distraction that couldn’t happen often. And he didn’t trust me to go into town on my own.

Dad had augmented the library with books he’d collected for display at the hotel – antiques and early editions to augment the immersive experience of living in a British colonial mansion: Robert Louis Stevenson, Daniel Dafoe, Rudyard Kipling. I read them mostly because there was nothing else to do.

And I slept.

I dreamed of boarding the subway at Museum Station. There were no other passengers except for a young woman at the far end of the train. As I walked toward her, she stood and I saw that she was wearing a deep green Edwardian dress with lace across the décolletage, her long dark hair twirled atop her head with emerald combs. The air around her was a stale, slightly rotten potpourri of disquiet and despair. As beautiful as she was, there was no joy in her demeanor. Sadness clung to her, emanated from her. And need – an unfed hunger that sucked up the light as she put her hand on my shoulder and stared into my eyes. Darkness reached up in tendrils from between the seats, clinging to me, crawling up my arms, caressing my face. My breathing grew shallow.

“I can feel him near, my Henry,” she said, then handed me a coconut shell and sighed. “If you see him, give him this.”

The subway doors opened into jungle, I followed her out onto what should have been the platform, but she almost instantly vanished in the trees. The shell opened like a book. In its cavity, nested an India rubber ball, milky purple shading to amber, like a heart that’s drained of blood. It gave a larval twitch, squirmed, lengthened and dropped to the ground. I turned to get back on the train, but it had vanished and the platform had turned into a churning swamp of translucent worms that sucked me down. I woke up gasping for breath, face buried in a sweaty pillow.

Of Ashes & Tears

Every step I took along the meandering trail obscured the path behind without revealing what lay ahead. Gusts of wind tossed my hair about and swung the lantern in my hand. Its swaying glow did little to dispel the shroud of gloom cast by a moonless night as I made my way through the snow-covered underbrush.

“I can barely see,” I grumbled, mostly to myself.

On my shoulder, Pito, my familiar, peered into the shadows with oversized rodent eyes and seized on my uncertainty. “It’s too dark to be walking alone through the woods, Brynn. Let’s go home and come back in the morning.”

The little coward. “Quiet,” I hissed at him. The tiny squirrel recoiled out of sight and onto my nape. “I’m not letting ma die because I’m scared of the night.”

Minutes passed with only the crunch of icy twigs under my boots to punctuate their passage, until guilt got the better of me. “Are you pouting?”

“Why would I?” Pito said. “It’s not like you called me a coward.”

“I didn’t.”

“You thought it.”

I sighed. “Fine. I’m sorry. Happy?”

“I’d be much happier if you stopped for a moment and thought through what you’re doing,” Pito said, inching outwards along my shoulder until I could see him again in my peripheral vision. “Tywyll isn’t known for his charitable ways, how’re you planning to pay him for the elixir?”

Pito had me there, and knew it. When old man Aeron’s newborn son fell sick with the coughing fever two springs past, Tywyll demanded a gold sovereign for the few drops of elixir that brought the infant back from the brink. We had neither Aeron’s gold, nor his silks. “I’ll bring him firewood for as long as it takes to pay off the debt.”

Pito snorted. “Look around you, what need has Tywyll for firewood in the middle of the woods?”

“Then I’ll do anything he asks. I’ll sweep his hut. Fetch his water from the stream. I’ll cook his meals. Rub the bunions on his feet. Anything.”

“Your ma wouldn’t want that for you, Brynn,” Pito said. His gentle reprimand grated more for being the truth.

“Well, ma isn’t here, is she? She’s bedridden with black fever and if I don’t do something soon, I’ll lose her. Can you understand that?”

Pito didn’t answer. Instead, he shuffled his tiny feet over the fine hairs of my nape, sending shivers down my spine. His eyes had grown wider still, staring ahead with unconcealed apprehension. I followed his gaze to a column of milky blue smoke rising above the snow-clad canopy of silent poplars.

A hundred strides later, I shifted the lantern to my left hand, steeled myself, and knocked on Tywyll’s door; timidly at first, then with growing urgency. I took a step backwards when the door creaked open revealing a darkness like ink framing the grey outline of the magic peddler. Tywyll stank of ash and stale mead. My belly grumbled.

“Brynn.” Tywyll tilted his head, and looked past me at the winding path that led back to the village. “Your mother’s not with you?”

I pushed down on the rising bile. “Master Tywyll, ma’s ill. She’s hot to the touch, and covered in rubicund welts. She won’t eat or drink, and mumbles to herself in delirium when not passed out.”

My entreaty didn’t at all resemble what I had rehearsed in my head, and I blamed Pito for the divergence. Still, Tywyll’s eyes gleamed with understanding. He ushered me inside and latched the door behind.

A fire crackled in the hearth. I suspected Tywyll mixed in some herbs or aromatic weeds with the firewood, but rather than mask the heavy miasma of ash and spoilt brew, the spicy fragrance accentuated the stench.

Tywyll shuffled to the hearth and eased himself into a wooden chair polished to a high sheen with frequent use. “Ill, you say? Shame, that. Fetching woman in her day.”

He seemed lost in his memories until I cleared my throat. “A little elixir will see her right as rain, I’m sure.”

Tywyll regarded me with penetrating eyes, reflecting the shimmying flames in the hearth. “Great is the need for the elixir and precious little is the supply. What have you brought to trade? A family heirloom perhaps?”

I swallowed noisily, suddenly wishing I had followed Pito’s advice. “We don’t have much by way of heirlooms,” I stammered, and raised a hand to stave the brushoff blooming on Tywyll’s face, “but I’ll bring you three chickens, heavy with eggs.”

“Chickens? Eggs? Are you daft?” Tywyll bellowed, rising off his creaking chair.

“How about firewood? Bone dry oak or birch, every eventide, for three years?”

“I can get that myself,” Tywyll grumbled as he ushered me towards the door.

“Wait, Master Tywyll,” I pleaded as he reached around me to unbolt the door, and shoved me out. “Ma’s going to die without the elixir. I’ll give you anything. I’ll do anything, if you save her.”

“Brynn, don’t,” Pito squealed.

“Anything,” I insisted.

The door stopped in its arc short of sealing. Tywyll pushed his head through the gap with a calculating look in his eyes. “Surrender me your familiar.”

“My …,” I trailed off uncomprehending.

“That’s the price,” Tywyll said, “come back when you’re ready to trade, but don’t wait too long. The elixir will do your ma no good dead.”

I rushed the closing door, reaching it as Tywyll bolted it from inside.

“Ask for anything else, but I can’t part with Pito. Anything at all,” I said, pounding the door. “Please.”

No answer came.

The Colored Lens #23 – Spring 2017




The Colored Lens



Speculative Fiction Magazine



Spring 2017 – Issue #23







Featuring works by J. J. Roth, Tamoha Sengupta, David Cleden, Peter Ryan, Mark Bilsborough, Dale L. Sproule, Serena Johe, Subodhana Wijeyeratne, Madeline Olsen, A.P. Miller, Lynn Rushlau, and Jamie D. Munro.










Edited by Dawn Lloyd and Daniel Scott
Henry Fields, Associate Editor







Published by Light Spring LLC



Fort Worth, Texas



© Copyright 2017, All Rights Reserved







www.TheColoredLens.com









Table of Contents




The Cartographer Gene



By J. J. Roth



Jordan Sofer’s sixteen-year-old daughter appeared in his office crying one rainy Tuesday in March, sparking a chain of events that sent his life’s trajectory hurtling down a long, serpentine fuse toward a powder keg.


Jordan, Helion Engineering’s Director of Cartographic Solutions, sat at his workstation in a San Francisco office tower, correcting a topographic map of Costa Rica’s Arenal volcano. An intern had used 2005 elevation data, which didn’t account for the height added in 2010 when molten rock last spewed from Arenal. “You need a little boost,” Jordan said aloud to the volcano rendered on his display.


As he redrew contour lines, Jordan became aware of muffled sobs behind him. Millie huddled on the floor in the corner, her knees, naked under her short denim skirt, drawn to her chest.


She hadn’t used the door. Whatever made Millie cry had also filled her with the familiar, overpowering urge to draw.


“What happened?” Jordan glanced out the vertical glass panel beside his office door to the hallway, empty except for framed antique maps on the walls. No one had seen Millie materialize. He knelt beside Millie and kissed the top of her black-haired head, pushing the soft curls she inherited through Carole’s Haitian ancestry from her light-skinned forehead, the genetic contribution of Jordan’s Eastern European Jewish heritage. Millie smelled fresh, like honeydew. Her tears dampened Jordan’s blue Oxford shirt, leaving translucent streaks in the cotton.


“Tyler,” she said. “After school, he said if he couldn’t have me, no one could. Ben caught up to us and Tyler started shouting. I ran to tell Mr. Kramer. Then into an empty classroom.” Jordan felt for her index finger, still tacky with blood.


Millie didn’t have to tell Jordan what happened in that empty classroom; he’d have done the same if he feared for his physical safety. He pictured Millie searching for notebook paper, or perhaps cardboard, an index card, a discarded paper bag, anything on which to draw. Then rummaging for a pen, or a pencil, chalk, crayon, anything to mark that surface.


In Millie’s highly agitated state, details poured from her memory with photographic accuracy. She drew, as she could only when desperate–without training, without straight edges, protractors, compasses, CAD programs or reference materials, without erasures or strike-throughs–a professional-quality floor plan of her father’s office. A place she’d been before and felt safe. She’d pricked her skin, closed her eyes, and laid her bloody finger on the map.


Jordan tapped his iPhone. His son, Ben, Millie’s twin, answered on the second ring. “Where are you?” Jordan asked.


“Home,” Ben said, his mouth full.


He’d be in the kitchen of their San Carlos house, on a quiet hillside twenty-five minutes from downtown San Francisco, in front of the open side-by-side refrigerator. Pouring cornflakes into his mouth straight from the box. Washing them down with milk straight from the plastic gallon jug.


Carole would have made Ben get a bowl. After Carole succumbed to breast cancer four years ago, Jordan became lax about minor rules infractions. A single parent had to pick his battles. With Ben, Jordan dumped all his discipline points into one bucket: listening. The kid’s ears, like broken antennae, seemed unable to tune to the frequency of Jordan’s voice.


“Millie’s here,” Jordan said. “You okay?”


“Kramer came out before Tyler could slug me. He’s suspended for three days. It sucks having to stand up to bullies instead of just teleporting the hell out of there, like some people I know.”


Always with the barbs, that kid. The who-cares attitude worn like a flak jacket, envy smoldering underneath. Why did it always have to be fraternal twins, a boy and a girl, one with the ability, one without? Ben was so much like Jordan’s twin sister, Sarah. They both lacked what the family called the “Cartographer Gene” though its origins, whether in biology or something more arcane, were obscure. And they both resented their siblings and parents’ power. Jordan wondered whether all “Cartographer” families–the population’s tiny fraction across all races and ethnicities believed to have this trait —- experienced the same fractured dynamic.


He deflected Ben’s remark, finding it much easier to keep Ben at arm’s length than to engage.


“We’ll be there soon,” Jordan said.



Jordan didn’t press Millie on the drive home. She stopped crying, but sat silently in the passenger seat. Her honeydew scent mingled with a hint of Freon from the aging Land Rover’s air conditioner and wet asphalt from the rain-slicked freeway. He knew he should talk to her more, try harder to reach her. He stole glimpses of Millie while she gazed out the window at the rolling green hills now grey under the overcast sky.


It had not escaped Jordan’s notice that even after puberty, Millie wasn’t interested in boys. With each passing year, more girls phoned Ben. Millie never mentioned anyone special. Jordan knew Millie was gay, but she never broached the subject, and he never asked. He hoped she understood he loved her; that he’d find offensive the suggestion her sexual orientation would make him feel otherwise. Though he did worry that Millie’s gayness might further complicate the Tyler situation.


When they entered the family room, they found Ben hunched over an X-Box controller playing a first person shooter. Fake machine gun fire and grenade explosions thundered in surround sound, rattling the sliding glass door to the redwood deck. “Turn that off,” Jordan said. “Tell me what’s going on.”


Millie sat on the black leather sofa, hands cupped in her lap. Ben locked and loaded his virtual bolt-action rifle and aimed at a pixelated terrorist. Unable to find the remote, Jordan strode to the television and touched the power switch.


“I know none of us are any good at this,” Jordan said. “But we have to talk.”


Ben tossed the game controller to the sofa’s far end. He crossed his arms over his orange T-shirt so only the words “Radio” and “tour” showed. Was that a skull tattooed on his wrist, or merely a mishap with a felt tip pen? His black-heeled boot clanked against the glass coffee table, and he crossed his legs at the ankle. Jordan stared at the boots until Ben smirked and eased them from the table to the maple hardwood.


“I thought this thing with Tyler was over, Millie,” Jordan said. “That after that incident in the library, you’d stopped being his orientation buddy and Mr. Kramer told him to stay away from you.”


“You didn’t tell him?” Ben asked Millie.


She shrugged, fingering a blue thread bracelet around her thin wrist. A gift from her friend, Hannah? “I thought I could handle it.”


“Handle what?” A small knot of dread formed in Jordan’s midsection and pulsed, dully.


Millie twisted the bracelet until it snapped apart. “Tyler’s still mad about the dance.”


“That was before the library,” Jordan said. “When he was told to leave you alone. Have I got the chronology wrong?”


Jordan recounted the history. Tyler started at San Carlos High six months ago when his family moved to the neighborhood from Nashville, Tennessee. The change proved something of a culture shock to Tyler. He showed up for his first day at San Carlos high wearing a Confederate Flag T-shirt, which made him the subject of whispering and avoidance, including from Ben. Millie took it upon herself to do the opposite, to try to help Tyler acclimate. He mistook her kindness for a different signal and asked her to the Halloween dance.


Millie tried to explain her refusal wasn’t personal. Jordan suspected, though he didn’t say so, that Millie told Tyler what she wouldn’t tell her own father. The next day, in the library, Millie was telling Tyler she’d be participating in the Anti-Defamation League’s “Becoming an Ally” workshop at the school next week. He grabbed her wrists, squeezing until her skin blanched. “He argued with himself,” she’d said. “Then he kissed me. I tried to get away, but he pushed me onto the carpet. Just then, some kids came in. He let me go. I ran to the girls’ bathroom to draw a map.”


There followed conferences with Mr. Kramer and Tyler’s parents. Jordan came away from those with the understanding Tyler was to have nothing more to do with Millie.


“Yeah,” Millie said. “All that’s right, except Tyler didn’t leave me alone. He’s been shoving notes through the vents in my locker. Love letters, weird ones, about me, him and some voice in his head, Denton. Disgusting comics of us naked, scrawled with ‘How do you know if you haven’t tried?’ He’s been sending emails–pictures he’s taken of me without me even knowing. Creepy messages, like ‘You and your brother brought this on everyone.'”


Jordan turned to Ben. “You knew about this?”


“Since last week,” he said. “Only because I overheard her telling Hannah.”


The kernel of dread snowballed in Jordan’s gut, gathering a layer of sadness here, anger there, until a cold boulder pressed against his chest’s walls, trying to burst him apart. How did he not know?


Because he didn’t want to know. He’d have to get close to them to know.


“I’m calling Mr. Kramer,” Jordan said. “Then Tyler’s parents, again. And the police. This has to stop.”


Neither of the twins replied. Millie texted. Ben dug the remote from between the sofa cushions and restarted his game. Jordan took his iPhone onto the deck and slid the glass door shut behind him, lowering the decibel level of Ben’s virtual combat zone to a pale echo.


As Mr. Kramer’s voice mail greeting droned in Jordan’s ear, Sarah phoned from her bio-engineering lab in Boston. Jordan switched to Sarah’s call, intending to try Mr. Kramer again after he’d spoken to his sister.


But the fuse, lit with Millie’s news, snaked around another s-curve, the fire creeping steadily toward an explosive end.


Jordan’s mother had died.


“I’m on my way to Houston to make arrangements,” Sarah said. “You’ll come?”


“Of course.”


Sarah sounded faint and distracted, liked she’d taken Valium with Merlot. Or perhaps it was exhaustion from the chemo. No sarcastic jabs, no “map on over to Houston, brother, or for that matter, Paris or the moon.” He longed for normalcy, for words thrust like foils in a fencing match. As though his mother would still be alive if only Sarah made him remind her for the thousandth time that those with the Cartographer trait could only teleport places they’d already been, and then only while fearing for their safety. As though his mother wouldn’t have died if only he could jab Sarah back for owning her own company, pulling down seven figures, and being able to afford jetting anywhere she wanted.


But Sarah just thanked Jordan like he’d offered to pick up her dry cleaning, not like he shared her shock and grief at having their mother stripped from their lives. The hub whose love reached out like spokes to all of them —- Jordan, Sarah, Millie, Ben, Jordan’s father–even as the connections between those on the wheel’s periphery became dry and brittle.


In the flurry of phone calls to arrange flights, inform bosses and teachers, cancel appointments; in the commotion of three hastily packed suitcases and a hurried drive to SFO; in the surreal consciousness that the loving presence who’d laughed with him on the phone just two days ago no longer resided in this world; in the exquisite pain of losing forever the one person whose love he’d never questioned and never had to earn; in the wake of it all, certain plans were, to be generous, tabled. In a less charitable view, they were forgotten.


Either way, despite his good intentions, Jordan did not phone Mr. Kramer, Tyler’s parents, or the police.



By the time Jordan and his kids arrived at the ranch-style house in southwest Houston where he and Sarah had grown up, most of the neighbors and friends bearing fruit plates and roast chickens had gone. Sarah let Millie take over answering the door; Ben went to nap in Jordan’s old room. Jordan pushed back in an olive green ’60s-era Naugahyde recliner, the one his father had always used.


“Isn’t it strange how life can just stop, with food in the refrigerator and letters to be mailed?” Sarah said.


Jordan hadn’t seen Sarah in the flesh in three years, long before her breast cancer diagnosis. The chemo had taken her dark, expressive eyebrows, leaving her face bland and unfinished. Tiny lines furrowed the space between where her eyebrows had been.


These lines hadn’t shown on Skype, not that Sarah and Jordan conferenced much, and neither had Sarah’s gauntness. Her engagement ring’s diamond, always perky atop her ring finger before, now drooped toward her palm. Sarah kept pushing the diamond upright with her thumb–Carole’s gesture, after the cancer spread to her spine. The sad irony that a variant of Carole’s disease now threatened Sarah made it impossible for Jordan to watch Sarah fiddling with the ring. To be reminded how Carole kept nothing down during chemo, how her cheeks, arms, and hips sharpened from healthy curves to angular points.


Jordan parked his gaze on a burn hole in the Naugahyde. He scraped its charred edges with his fingernail. “Where’s Steve?”


“He stayed in Boston with the girls,” Sarah said. “Things aren’t going so well with us.”


Jordan knew Sarah and her husband had been having trouble only because his mother had mentioned it. “I’m sorry.”


“I get it,” she said. “He’s scared. I’m scared, too. I just wish we could be scared together. It’s easier for him to handle if he distances himself.”


Jordan didn’t blame Steve; he wanted nothing more than to leave the room, as if more physical space would shield him against losing Sarah.


He stuck his fingertip through the burn hole, recalling the honeyed, nutty aroma of his father’s cigars. So many nights his father had sat in this chair, watching Upstairs, Downstairs on PBS and smoking, after spending the day in his beloved research lab, lecturing at the medical school, or writing a scientific paper. His father’s life had been his work.


And his mother’s life had been his father.


His parents talked in this room, after his mother put him and Sarah to bed. He didn’t hear the words, just the buzz of conversation and occasional laughter. He had wanted to speak to his father like that, to hear him laugh. To see him at Little League games and piano recitals like the other dads. But all his father’s meager affections went to Jordan’s mother.


When his father died, Jordan was still mourning Carole, still tangled in that loss. Regret sat heavy in his stomach, like a smooth, oval stone.


“I wish I’d been more ‘there’ for Mom,” Sarah said, voicing Jordan’s thoughts. “Too wrapped up in my own misery, I guess. She was never the same after Dad died. When I got here, I found full ash trays near her computer. Full fat cheddar in the refrigerator. Cobwebs and dust on the treadmill. All the things the doctors said to do to avoid another heart attack, she stopped doing. I found this, too.”


Sarah handed Jordan a careful, pencil-drawn plan of Beth Yeshurun cemetery, where tomorrow they would attend their mother’s funeral. The single roadway looping the neat plots. The white stone visitors’ benches. The majestic oak tree, under which his father’s headstone lay. The grassy nakedness of the adjacent plot, where his mother’s casket would be interred.


And a reddish-brown fingerprint, the whorls distinct as contour lines on a topographic map, over that empty plot.


“A caretaker found her when they opened yesterday,” Sarah said. “In that yellow knit suit with navy piping she loved so much. She must have sensed another attack, got scared and mapped to where she felt safest, next to Dad. Funny. No one seemed worried how she got there once the coroner ruled out foul play.”


How unfair that Sarah and Ben had to worry about protecting the family’s secret; a secret they could never use themselves. Feelings warred within Jordan. He wanted to thank Sarah for shouldering that burden. To tell her he was sorry they hadn’t been closer. He wanted to ask her about her prognosis, let her know he was pulling for her.


He wanted to walk out the door and keep walking until his Nikes wore through to his bare feet, somewhere near the Texas-Louisiana border. He pulled his finger from the burn hole, dislodging a vinyl fragment. He rolled the fragment between his thumb and fingers.


“I found this in a stack she’d planned to mail.” Sarah handed Jordan an envelope and excused herself to phone the funeral home.


The sealed envelope, addressed to Jordan in his mother’s neat architectural hand, writing common to all Cartographers–all capital letters at a slight angle, giving the illusion of motion–bore a Forever stamp.


Inside, he’d find a magazine or newspaper article with his mother’s editorial comments on a yellow Post-It. She’d have signed the note “Momcat,” a goofy nickname she adopted from a B. Kliban cartoon book. She started sending these when Jordan went to Stanford and never stopped after he graduated. At twenty-something, Jordan found these notes embarrassing; later he found them eccentrically cute. Now he’d never receive another. He wiped his eye with the back of his hand and ran his thumb under the flap.



Darling J,

You know how Daddy wouldn’t talk about the War? All he told me was the name of his town – Olomouc–in what’s now the Czech Republic. And that the Nazis rounded up his family during the War but he “made it out” of Theresienstadt. The rest of his family, including his twin sister, your Aunt Rebecca, died in Birkenau. Keep that in mind as you read this. Let me know what you think.

I love you better than stars or water,

Momcat


Underneath the Post-It, on filmy paper cut from The New Republic, was a review of a children’s book about Friedl Dicker-Brandeis, an artist who taught secret drawing classes to the children of Theresienstadt as therapy.


According to the article, Dicker-Brandeis saved thousands of those drawings in two suitcases, hidden before they sent her to Birkenau. A decade after the war ended, the suitcases turned up; the art was displayed in the Jewish Museum in Prague and in Yad Vashem. Several sketches and paintings had been reproduced within the article: strange, haunting, beautiful depictions of people with bundles boarding trains, of humanoid fairies, of keyholes opening from a frightening, grey world of watchtowers, starvation and typhus onto a colorful paradise of fantastic creatures and children running free.


In the margin next to one drawing, Jordan’s mother had placed arrows and exclamation marks.


A professional-looking street map of Olomouc.


Jordan had never been to Olomouc, and he couldn’t read Czech. But he could make enough sense of the cognates to pick out a university, Wenceslas cathedral, the Olomouc Orthodox church. A ruined synagogue, notated with slanted, all capital printing –- Jordan understood only the word, “Kristallnacht.” He pulled up a Helion Engineering street map of Olomouc on his iPhone and laid it next to the picture. He found the medieval fortress walls around the city, the former site of an intricate astrological clock, the streets, unchanged since the 1940s.


An inset detailed the town center, including a winding street labeled Trida Svobody, itself the subject of another inset: a stately, white stone apartment building. The floor plan for a suite of rooms on the fourth floor, one labeled “Rivkah,” another marked “Shmuel.” A bed against the wall, a desk, an armoire.


Over the armoire, a single brick-colored smudge.


His father would have been only seven in 1942, but even an adult couldn’t have accomplished such cartographic sophistication without tools, unless the one drawing had the Cartographer Gene.


Jordan had no doubt. Samuel Sofer “made it out of Theresienstadt” through a map. Little Sam went home, and his map found its way into an art teacher’s suitcase.


What happened next? How long had he hidden in that armoire, in the vacant, high-ceilinged apartment the Nazis hadn’t yet commandeered? Did a brave neighbor hide him for the war’s duration? Did he seek help at the cathedral?


Seven-year-old Sam saved himself but not his twin, his family, or the other captive, doomed children. Jordan shuddered.


Something inside him split open, releasing a painful wave of understanding that pushed against years of anger and hurt.


His father had not been indifferent.


He had been afraid.



After the funeral, with Millie asleep in Sarah’s old room and Ben asleep in Jordan’s, Jordan and Sarah nibbled rugelach and sipped Australian Kosher wine, gifts from shiva callers, in their childhood living room. After the second glass of wine, Sarah’s old, acerbic self peeped through her veil of grief.


“I’ve always wondered why you became a professional cartographer,” she said. “Isn’t your day job being the same as your superpower too close for comfort?”


Jordan smiled, grateful for the familiar sarcasm. “What can I say? I love maps,” he said. “I’m lucky to make a living doing something I enjoy. Not as tony as your living, of course.”


Though she’d started the banter, Sarah cut him off.


“We’re orphans now,” she said.


Jordan thought she would cry, but she just leaned her head against his shoulder. His muscles tensed at her touch, but if she noticed, she didn’t show it. To distract himself, he took in the room. The Baldwin upright where they’d both practiced scales and arpeggios, Sarah more than Jordan. The now-antique RCA stereo in a cherry wood cabinet, speakers blown from the summer they discovered Led Zeppelin. The wine’s plush tannins dried his mouth; the alcohol warmed his chest. An aroma of warm brisket lingered in the house. He reached in his pocket for the article on Dicker-Brandeis and handed it to Sarah.


“Imagine saving only yourself,” Jordan said. “The guilt he must have felt. No wonder he wouldn’t let himself get close to us. Just Mom. She had that uncanny ability to break down any barriers any of us put up.”


Sarah finished reading and folded the paper. “I didn’t say anything because I’m not done. But before I got sick, my skunk works research project took an interesting turn. I didn’t isolate the elusive ‘Gene,’ but I found a similarity in the blood samples I took from Mom, you and Millie.


“You’re all AB negative, the rarest blood type —- have you read the crap on the internet? That it comes from aliens. From reptiles. That people who have it have ESP. Ridiculous, but what I found isn’t. You all lack a clotting factor. You should be hemophiliac, but you’re not. You all have abnormal protein levels, but you don’t have myeloma. Your blood is special, Jordan.”


Now it made sense–why his mother always took him to Cartographer doctors as a child. She made him promise to do the same as an adult, so his blood’s abnormalities would remain secret. “Is this a side effect, like our writing escaping the page?” Jordan asked.


He remembered the day, in happier times, when Carole sat the twin toddlers at the kitchen table and gave them each a sheet of manila art paper. Ben wielded a midnight blue Crayola, Millie a sea green one.


Carole lifted Ben’s scribbled-on paper and tilted it. The crayon marks stayed put. When she tilted Millie’s, the marks fell from the page, forming a scraggly, sea green bird’s nest on Millie’s Elmo place mat. That’s when they knew Millie had the Gene. Cartographers’ writing and drawing required several minutes to set. Carole, so proud, had said, “It’s Millie!” and held Jordan close. A memory so vivid, he could almost feel Carole’s warmth against him.


“I think it’s the opposite,” Sarah said. “The drawing compulsion, the prodigious mapmaking talent–those are side effects. The power’s in the blood. It would explain the rumored hidden ability to transport others. What if Cartographers’ blood could be used to transport non-Cartographers?“


Sarah’s words punctured Jordan’s memory, leaving a raw hole of guilt. She’d spent precious hours of her life chasing an explanation for the power he possessed yet she could never wield. And even a way to expand it. “No one’s ever done that.”


“But it’s part of the lore. All legends have a grain of truth. What if there’s always been a way, but it got lost. Like how to pronounce YHWH?”


Exhaustion knocked Jordan back. He was too drained to think how different things might have been if Sam had been able to rescue others as well as himself.


Sarah hugged him goodnight. She felt small against him, not much bigger than Millie.


Lying on the guest room’s ancient fold-out couch, Jordan made a promise to himself. The familial cycle of emotional distance would stop with him. He would open his heart to those he loved, no matter how much it hurt.


He closed his eyes. Carole slept with him on this thin, striped mattress years ago. He could detect nothing of the clean, lemon and lily fragrance she always wore in the aged kapok’s mustiness. The mattress’s buttons, hard against his back, dug into his skin. He wept, without sound, until he fell asleep.



The day after the Sofers returned from Houston, on a sunny, clear-skied afternoon, Jordan left work early to help Millie and Ben with an extra credit project. He’d agreed to coach their moot court teams for an upcoming competition. They met in the school auditorium to practice: Millie and her moot court partner, Hannah, and Ben and his partner, Enrique. Their case, based on New Jersey v. T.L.O, a U.S. Supreme Court decision, concerned the constitutionality of searching public school students.


Millie took the podium, flustered. Jordan had walked in to find her holding hands with Hannah. Millie snatched her hand away, a punch to Jordan’s gut. He hadn’t expected years of emotional distance to disappear overnight, but he had hoped for at least a modicum of progress.


At that moment, the circuitous fuse bent around one last curve, the fire hissing down the home stretch, picking up speed: Mr. Kramer’s voice came over the PA system.


“We are in lockdown. This is not a drill.”


In the background, someone screamed, “Tyler, please, no! Oh God!” Four sharp, rhythmic blasts followed. The PA microphone whined with feedback. Tyler spoke.


“You heard the man. This is not a drill, Millicent and Benjamin Sofer. I’m coming for you.”


But the drills had taught them well. Each of the four kids ran to one of the auditorium doors and shut it. Enrique doused the lights. “Do these lock?” he whispered, pointing to the steel door he’d shut. The other three fumbled with locked padlocks dangling from chains wrapped around the steel push bars. Ben said, “Not without keys.”


“Is there a door we can lock?” Jordan asked.


“I did a play with the drama group,” Hannah said. “The dressing room doors lock. They’re backstage.”


“Bring your stuff,” Jordan said. “It can’t look like we were here.”


They ran up the stage’s wooden stairs and behind the red velvet curtains. Right before the backstage exit, Hannah pushed open a grey steel door and flicked a light switch.


The long, narrow room was painted an institutional sherbet green. Globe lights surrounded several large wall mirrors that hung over an off-white Formica countertop. Three vanity chairs were pushed under the counter, each with gilt-painted wooden arm rests and greasepaint-stained, dark pink velvet seat cushions.


Costumes hung from a metal clothing rack in the room’s back. A red and white dotted Swiss hoop skirt with matching parasol. Two black and white gowns from My Fair Lady’s Ascot race scene. Several long, black coats and black hats with plastic wine bottles Velcroed to their crowns from last year’s Fiddler on the Roof production. Assorted tights, vests and pantaloons. A small shelf held dried sponges stained with pancake makeup in various skin tones. Crumbling cakes of eye shadow in blues, browns and pinks. Dried bottles of spirit gum. Some discarded safety pins.


Jordan pocketed one of the pins and gave another to Millie.


An ancient Clairol makeup mirror on the counter caught Jordan’s eye. He pressed the power button. The lights alongside the mirror flickered on, emitting a warm, amber glow. Enough to see by once their eyes adjusted, but too faint to show under the door. Jordan signaled, and Millie turned off the globe lights.


“Anyone have cell reception?” Jordan asked, thinking it unlikely given the windowless, concrete walls. They all shook their heads.


Jordan said, “Millie, you know what to do.”


“Not without you.” Her lower lip trembled.


“Open your pack.”


Millie took out her English notebook, ripped out a page, and unsheathed a black felt tip. “Dad, don’t make me leave by myself.” Even as she spoke, her fingers twitched. Jordan knew they wanted, more than anything, to draw.


“We’ll be right behind you. Aunt Sarah figured out how to transport non-Cartographers.” Jordan hoped he sounded convincing.


“She did?”


“What the hell are you talking about?” Enrique said.


“Millie, show them,” Jordan said. “It’s easier than explaining.”


“We’re not supposed to let anyone know.”


“Sweetie, please. It’s an emergency.”


Millie sketched the neighborhood, the Sofer’s street, an inset of their house’s floor plan. When she finished her room, she kissed her father and brother and held Hannah close. She pricked her finger, handed Ben the safety pin and touched the map.


“Holy crap,” Enrique said, eyes like hula hoops. “What just happened?”


Hannah waved her hand through the space where Millie had stood. “Whoa.”


Jordan tore another sheet from Millie’s notebook. The impulse overpowered him. He drew the family room’s leather sofas, the plasma screen television and X-Box, the fireplace.


“Dad,” Ben said. “Enrique’s never been to our house.”


Voices cried out, like distant crowd noise from AT&T Park after a homerun. Faint, staccato sounds, pok pok pok pok, followed. One of the kids, Jordan couldn’t tell who, choked on a sob.


“Ben’s right,” Jordan said. “Stupid of me. We need a place you’ve all been, where you feel safe.” He forced himself to stop drawing and turned the page over. His hand flexed and cramped as he fought the compulsion.


“Foster Park?” Ben asked.


“Works for me,” Enrique said.


“Not me,” Hannah whispered. “When I was seven, a man I didn’t know came up to me at the swings.” She buried her face in her hands.


Jordan patted Hannah’s arm. “It’s all good. We’ll pick someplace else.” More screams welled like a ghostly wind, closer this time. “Iolanthe Circle?”


They nodded. Iolanthe Circle: a favorite meditation and contemplation spot, on a hilltop not far from the school grounds. Because of budget cuts, it was closed on Tuesdays, but they’d bypass the visitor’s center and their landing place would be deserted. Jordan let the urge take over, his hand a blur like a video on fast forward. He placed the completed map across his knees to set.


“What are we waiting for?” Enrique said. “Let’s get out of here.” He grabbed the paper.


Jordan’s map, all of it –- Crestview Drive winding up the hill above the school; its circular terminus at the hilltop, parking spaces striped bold and white along the sides; the pebble path into the redwood grove; Iolanthe Circle itself, outlined in smooth grey standing stones two feet high; the wooden meditation benches and Zen labyrinth inside the circle–slid from the page. It sprinkled the floor and settled into a pile, black and fine, like iron filings.


They stared at the heap of dried ink, wordless. Enrique held out the blank page to Jordan. It rattled in his shaking hand. “I didn’t know.”


Jordan closed his own hands over Enrique’s and held them there until Enrique’s were still. “It’s okay,” Jordan said. “How could you have known?”


In the makeup mirror’s dusky light, shadows clung to their faces. Enrique, now immobile, his breath choppy, shallow and too fast. Hannah, wet trails glistening on her cheeks, tearing a black-painted fingernail with her teeth. Ben, his only son, leg jiggling a rapid vibration on the pink-cushioned seat. All on the brink of panic. He could lose them any second, and once he did, he’d never get them back. And none of them would stand a chance.


“Let’s try that again,” he said.


They circled him like the standing stones at Iolanthe. Without anyone suggesting it aloud, they held hands. As Jordan began again, a high, thin siren wail, then two, then three, their rise and fall tumbling over one another in an elaborate braid of sound, carried into the dressing room. “They’re coming,” Hannah said. “Help is coming.” No one said more.


Jordan drew with fast sure strokes, as though some occult energy possessed his hand. The circle took shape on the page again. “The power’s in the blood,” Sarah’d said. Let her be right. Please God, let her be right. He caught a glimpse of Ben’s face silhouetted in the murky light, vacant with terror. He wouldn’t leave the others behind, like his father had. They would face whatever happened, together.


Screams pierced the air, so near Ben said, “That was Ms. Yamamoto. That was her.” The music classroom across the hall? “Cover your ears,” Jordan hissed, and the kids complied, clamping their hands hard to their heads against the coming din. Four seconds of metallic cracks. Then silence, so much worse than sound.


They shivered now, their faces tear-stained and sticky, their open mouths stringy with mucous. The close, sour air smelled of decaying taffeta and velvet and the cloying, powdery perfume of stale makeup. Jordan’s mouth went dry.


He opened the safety pin, pricked his finger tip and squeezed out a round bulb of blood. He resisted calling to Ben. He wanted Ben safe, but what if something went wrong? He could experiment with someone else’s child or his own. A choice awful to contemplate, but Jordan made it, even so.


“Enrique, right hand,” he said. Jordan smeared Enrique’s fingertip with blood and positioned it over the Zen maze. “Close your eyes, picture the maze, and think ‘here.'” Enrique nodded, closed his eyes and touched his finger to the map.


With Jordan, with Millie and Carole, with all the Cartographers he knew, transport happened the instant blood touched the map. Yet Enrique still stood in front of them, eyes closed.


The heavy steel door to the auditorium clanged shut and Enrique’s eyes popped open. “Keep them closed,” Jordan said. “No matter what. Concentrate.”


“I’m trying,” Enrique said. “It’s a little hard to focus.”


Tyler’s shouts pinged off the auditorium’s wood paneled walls. “Where oh where are you, my little Sofer mongrels?”


“Try again,” Jordan said. “Now.” He squeezed another drop of blood onto Enrique’s finger.


For a while, nothing happened. Then the outline of Enrique’s body blurred, like water colors seeping past inked borders. His image faded, became transparent and lost definition, a colored mist hanging in the air.


“What’s this? A backpack? Which whiny snowflake’s is it?” Tyler again. “Yes, Denton. Let’s open it and see.”


“Dad,” Ben whispered. “It’s mine. You said bring our stuff, but I–I didn’t.”


Jordan held his palm up to silence Ben. Down the I-told-you-so path lay more precious minutes they couldn’t afford to lose.


The mist that had been Enrique lingered in the air a moment longer, then dissipated all at once, as though sucked away into a vacuum.


“Hannah, finger,” Jordan said.


In less than a minute, a Hannah-shaped vapor shimmered in front of the costumes on the clothing rack, until an invisible force drew it away.


“Ben,” Jordan said. “It’s time.”


“Denton, look.” Boots clomped on the wooden stairs. Tyler had reached the stage. If they were lucky, he would try the stage right dressing room first. “Ben Sofer’s Algebra II notebook. Your handwriting’s so messy, Ben Sofer. You should be ashamed. It’s your fault these people will die. How I’ll enjoy killing your justice warrior sister.”


Jordan squeezed his finger. The pinprick had already closed. He felt around for the safety pin, putting his hands on nothing, the seconds ticking like a bomb in his brain. He became conscious of Ben’s elbow nudging him, the second pin opened like a V between Ben’s fingers. He jabbed his finger with the pin and laid a thick layer of blood on Ben’s finger.


The knob to the dressing room door jiggled. “Hiding? So unoriginal, Ben Sofer. You disappoint me. Isn’t he a disappointment, Denton?”


Jordan took Ben’s head in both hands and kissed his forehead. “I love you. Go now. I’m right behind you.”


Ben touched the map, just as the shooting started.


Then it stopped, a hole blown in the door where the knob had been. Tyler swung the door open.


He wore combat boots, fatigues slung with cartridge belts and a small black backpack. He carried two handguns in holsters: one at the shoulder, the other at the hip. He held, what Jordan supposed, having seen them only in the movies, was a semi-automatic rifle. That rifle now pointed toward Jordan, who raised his hands, but kept squeezing his fingertip between two adjacent fingers to keep the blood flowing.


Tyler, puzzled, gestured with its muzzle toward Ben’s dissolving mist. “What’s that? Who’re you? Where’s Ben?”


The vapor’s residue sucked away. An electric bullhorn crackled on and a reedy voice projected into the auditorium. “Tyler Nickelton. This is the FBI. We know you can hear us, Tyler. No one else needs to get hurt.”


“You just missed him,” Jordan said.


“I recognize your voice,” Tyler said. “From the phone messages to my house. My parents made me listen, over and over.”


A female voice, quavering and strained, came over the bull horn. “Tyler, sweetheart, it’s Mama.”


Tyler kept the rifle trained on Jordan. “Just like you blue-state vermin to bring an innocent woman into a thing like this.”


A drop of Jordan’s blood trickled from his raised hand onto the green tile floor. Tyler’s head whipped toward the motion. In that tenth of a second, Jordan reached toward the map.


Gunfire deafened Jordan. Something slammed into his shoulder and knocked him to the ground.



He was on his back. Enrique, Hannah and Ben peered down at him. The late afternoon sun shone through the redwoods above their heads. Jordan squinted against its brightness.


“You’re bleeding,” Ben said.


“I’ll call 911,” Hannah said.


“No!” Ben and Jordan said. Ben fished in Jordan’s pocket for his phone, pressed the emergency contact number, and asked the answering service to page their family physician, Dr. Kim. Enrique stripped off his T-shirt and wrapped Jordan’s wound.


Jordan smelled the sweet, earthy metallic scent of his own blood. He felt no pain yet, only numbness. His ears rang. “It worked,” he said.


Ben smiled. “I’m calling Millie.”


A short while later, Millie ran into Iolanthe Circle. She held Jordan’s hand until Dr. Kim arrived with the ambulance.



They had it all planned. When the police and news reporters asked, they told the truth. They just left some things out.


Jordan didn’t have to ask Enrique and Hannah to keep the Cartographers’ secret. They worked out for themselves why those with the power concealed their abilities. Why most people wouldn’t believe, and if anyone did, why that would be dangerous for Jordan, Millie, and others like them. They told Jordan they owed him their lives. The least they could do was to avoid endangering his.


“We hid in a dressing room, but we left before Tyler got to us and headed for Iolanthe Circle,” Hannah said.


“I guess no one saw us leave because they were all focused on staying alive themselves,” Enrique said. “Who’d be looking out a window during lock down? That’s the first thing they tell you not to do.”


“I didn’t see my Dad get shot,” Ben said. “He told me to go and he’d be right behind me.”


“I didn’t see a blood trail from my Dad’s wound,” Millie said. “But I read somewhere gunshot wounds don’t necessarily bleed right away.”


“It happened so fast,” Jordan said. “My shoulder was shattered. I was in shock. I can’t tell you how we got out. I’m just glad we did.”



They saw the rest on the news.


Tyler didn’t wait for SWAT to take him down. He had a pipe bomb in that black backpack. He detonated it there in the dressing room, among the black felt hats adorned with feathers, the green and gold brocade gowns, the worn calfskin character shoes, and the pointed, velveteen slippers, toes curled like the tongues of yawning cats. The dressing room burned before the Fire Department arrived, longer than necessary to reduce two blood-streaked maps to ash.


In Tyler’s room, investigators found hundreds of digital photographs of Millie; the early ones evoking a sense of shameful attraction, the later ones edited to depict violent fantasies. They found reams of what the news called Tyler’s manifesto, and videos of him arguing with Denton, who’d commanded violence against the school and blamed Millie and Ben.


Tyler’s English teacher told reporters his writings demonstrated a rare talent. A psychiatric expert said they, along with the photos and videos, revealed Tyler as psychotic; obsessed with Millie yet full of self-loathing because she wasn’t white, unable to accept her rejection, and plagued by auditory hallucinations.


The weapons came from an underground dealer Tyler found on the internet, in exchange for information about neighborhood homes whose owners were on vacation and vulnerable to burglary.



“You were right,” Jordan said.


Sarah, still in her lab coat, smiled from his workstation display, in front of a dining table covered with books, papers and dirty dishes. Two untidy tween girls squealed, ran through the room shouting, “Hi, Uncle Jordan,” and disappeared, giggling, into the back of the house.


“I wish Dad had known,” she said. “And I wish something in that blood could heal me.”


“Me too,” Jordan said.


Sarah removed her wig and scratched her bald head. “Chemo’s over in two weeks. My oncologist says I’m responding well. She thinks my chances are good.”


“That’s wonderful.”


“You’ve looked better, brother.”


A blue canvas sling and swathe immobilized Jordan’s reconstructed shoulder. His second surgery, to install a metal pin, had gone well, but a third loomed on the horizon.


“They’ll love me at airports now,” he said. He hesitated. Then he took the leap. “Sarah, thank you.”


She winked twice, the greeting they’d invented in kindergarten. The last time they’d been truly close.


Jordan winked twice back and signed off.


Then he booked plane tickets to Boston for the weekend after Sarah’s chemo ended, for himself, Ben and Millie.



Eighteen people died in the shooting at San Carlos High. Mr. Kramer was one of them, as was Ms. Yamamoto, Ben’s favorite teacher. Many young people the twins had known since pre-school perished that day. The Sofers mourned with the community and, with them, took the first slow steps toward healing.


The day of terror ended for most residents with the pipe bomb blast. A definitive finish to the course set in motion that wet, dreary Tuesday.


For Jordan Sofer, that day signified a beginning–an unreserved commitment to the vow he’d made in Houston, to be there, fully, for the people he loved for as long as they were on this Earth with him.


Several weeks later, while Ben was at baseball practice, Jordan and Millie sat together on a wooden bench in Iolanthe Circle.


“Dad?”


“Millie.”


“I know you know I’m a lesbian, though we never really discussed it.”


“Okay.”


“In case you’re worried about grandchildren, I want you to know I’m planning to have kids when I grow up.”


“Okay.”


“Kids are cool. Besides, I want to pass on the Cartographer Gene. It’s too awesome not to.”


The wind whistled through the redwoods. Jordan squeezed Millie’s shoulder. “That’s great, if that’s what you want.”


“I just worry that when the time comes, I won’t be able to find a Cartographer sperm donor. I see myself finding a wife.”


The breeze ruffled Jordan’s hair. He remembered a quiet black woman who came to sit next to him in a class at Stanford. Despite her shyness, she’d made a beeline for him. When no one was looking, she tilted the paper on which she’d been taking notes in neat, architectural printing. The words dropped into her hand. She poured the pile of spiky black ink into his palm. It crumbled into dust, softer than confectioner’s sugar. “I’m Carole,” she said.


“These things have a way of working out,” Jordan said.


Jordan took his daughter’s hand. He felt not even the slightest urge to draw as they went down the hill, on foot, toward the comfort and safety of home.




The Houses They Became



By Tamoha Sengupta



The house, which had once been Tina’s mother, did not stir even once as she passed. Earlier, a window used to open, or the door creaked, whenever Tina would be in sight—a confirmation that her mother recognized who she was.


Ma was wholly a house now—a house filled with the personality of those who lived there.


Tina never knew what triggered the change. Maybe it was age, or maybe it was being thwarted in love a second time, or maybe it was something else.


Maybe it was the talks of the war and the fear that her son would be called to fight.


Within a week, she became a stone house that had found a safe place on an empty patch of ground in the marketplace. The owner of the land had allowed the house there, in return for his condition.


“We get the house for free.”


Tina knew that she, and her twin brother, Thomas, would become houses too one day, that one day she would wake up and feel the heaviness in her body, the desire to remain still, rooted to the ground. At least, that was what Ma had told them.


“Long ago, it was your Grandma who had first turned into a house. But the house she turned into grew wings, or so they say.”


“Where did she fly?”


“It’s just a saying, Tina. Houses don’t fly. There are many types of houses you can become, depending on who you are. But have you heard of flying houses?”


Tina shook her head. “Maybe it was only Grandma.”


Ma shook her head. “Houses don’t move, dear.”


“Will you take me to the house Papa has become?” she had asked her mother then.


Ma’s hands had tightened a little more around her. “Papa didn’t become a house. He—left.”


“Why?”


“Because when I got pregnant with you and your brother, I told your Papa that I could transform, because the transformation’s always brought about by some major changes in life. He couldn’t face it. Coward.”


“Do you think he would have stayed if we were normal, Thomas?” Tina asked her brother later, the day after Ma had changed.


Thomas smiled and put an arm around her. “We are normal, Tina.”


“Normal people don’t change into houses.”


“They all change into something. It’s not always visible.” Thomas said.


Tina smiled and hugged her brother. Thomas always knew the right thing to say. Ma hadn’t been able to afford school for the two of them, but Thomas had taught himself to read and write from the newspapers he found in dustbins. He’d taught Tina too, and nowadays, whenever they were free, they would read to each other the various events of the day.


“One day I’ll open a library, or a school. Or maybe I’ll become one.” Thomas said, laughter in his eyes. Tina smiled along with him, but in her heart she felt something heavy.


Tina still ran the flower shop her mother used to run. But really, with war approaching, she didn’t see how people would still buy flowers. They’d have to find other ways. Schools were being shut down, turned into shelters for soldiers, and Tina wondered whether she and Thomas could go to people’s houses and teach their children in exchange for a little food. Surely there would still be people who wanted their children to learn things other than gunshots and bombs and yells.


One evening, she returned home and saw Thomas waiting for her with a letter in his hands.


He met her eyes as he spoke.


“They’ve called me to the front. I have to go. Tomorrow.”


Silence followed his words as Tina stared back at him, unable to speak, unable to move.


Thomas was still speaking. “I have to report at the station in the next town, because our town doesn’t have one. And then—”


The next morning, before night had fully vanished, he was gone, a backpack on his shoulder, the imprint of his body still on the bed.


Tina didn’t even say goodbye before he left. She wasn’t able to.


Her brother was gone, along with countless others, to save the country. Who had gone to save them?


That afternoon, when she finally had the courage to get up from bed and face the day, she felt her hands being weighed down by something. She looked down. Her hands were larger than she remembered them being, and their color was not that of skin anymore, but wood.


Her heart sank. Her transformation had begun.


She didn’t have a plot of land she could belong to. Neither did she have any intention of sitting in one place, waiting to fade out in the shadows of the people who would come to live there.


She needed to be there. For Thomas. What if the transformation had started for him too? What if his hands felt heavy and his feet dragged? What if they thought he was useless and killed him? What if he never got a chance to fight, to defend himself, to defend someone he had become close to?


Thomas had always protected her. He was six minutes younger than her, but he had been her savior, the one who got bloody knuckles by fighting off bullies, the one who sat with her and played with dolls when she had no friends, just to see her smile. The one who had gently stood by her when Ma had gone.


It took an eternity for Tina to rub away the tears from her eyes. Her wooden hands left scratches on her cheeks. But it didn’t take long for her to decide.


She was going to meet her brother. She was going to save him.


But her feet dragged. She had become taller now, and she could see past the tops of some trees. In the distance she could see the world, blackened with smoke, meeting the gray sky.


Going through the forest beside her town would be the fastest way to reach the railway tracks. Passing the forests was agony. So much soil for her to sink into, to just remain rooted.


I’m going to be my own sort of house, she told herself as she walked, the soil cool beneath her feet. Her body creaked as she walked, never stopping, though her body became heavier by the second.


Night fell, but still she trudged on. She spoke to herself, in her mind, to remind herself who she was. My own sort of house. My own sort of house.


The wood in her body groaned with fatigue. By the time she reached the end of the forest, another day was dawning, and her eyes had disappeared. But she could still feel the surroundings.


She could follow the railway tracks to wherever her brother had gone. She was changing fast, but she could still feel herself. She was still Tina, her heart nestled in the foundations of the house. Her mind remembered Grandma and her wings. How Grandma had traveled the world in those stories, how she’d housed those who had needed it.


Tina didn’t have wings. But she hoped she would. She was a moving house, and maybe she could house those who needed her, like Grandma had, if only in stories. She’d hold the sick and the wounded close to her, and protect her brother.


The house moved forward, one step at a time, a smile opening the door wide.




The Quantum Watchmaker



By David Cleden



In the summer heat, the clocks ran slow and the very substance of time seemed to drag. All watchmakers knew this, but only the very best–of which M. Guilbert was perhaps the greatest–were clever enough to engineer compensatory mechanisms into their creations. His accuracy was legendary. It was as though time itself was forced to do this watchmaker’s bidding. Some said I was privileged to witness a master at his work, but what did they know of the burdens he forced me to carry?


I served my apprenticeship in unprepossessing circumstances. A kind of perpetual gloom existed inside the watchmaker’s shop, the kind that eventually seeped deep into one’s soul. M. Guilbert worked in a windowless back room, a black velvet curtain always drawn across the doorway. Misshapen stubs of candles erupted like toadstools from every available surface so that he might see to do his work. The air was thick with the smell of burnt tallow.


He would not talk to me of his strange mechanisms, and certainly he taught me nothing of their design. How was an apprentice to learn from a master such as this? I glimpsed intricate components of brass and silver but these bizarre mechanisms grew larger than any mere watch or clock, like rampant weeds sprouting where a delicate flower had once been. And I saw other things too, materials which no ordinary watchmaker had need of.


How could I not help but feel disconsolate? My days were long, fumbling with tiny cogs and fragile movements, clumsily assembling the workmanlike pieces that kept us fed, until my fingers were sore and my eyes ached from the strain. The bustle of the town square glimpsed through the shop’s mullioned windows was as remote as a foreign land. Long days passed with no customers to break the silence or disturb the dust settling thickly on our bare wooden floors. It seemed I had become no more than a ghost trapped in this place, yearning for escape.


In time I learned that none was to be found.



One day, the little bell above the door gave a harsh, muted jangle, protesting its long period of inactivity. The open door threw a sudden, startling beam of sunlight across the plain wooden boards. A bubble of summer warmth wafted in, stirring the dust into swirls.


I straightened from behind the counter, blinking as I removed the jeweler’s eyepiece and set down my tools. The silhouetted stranger advanced. I saw expensive clothes, glimpsed beyond the door a fine carriage, and heard the impatient snort of a waiting mare. The man took a long moment to peruse the timepieces arrayed on the shelves. I tried to follow his gaze, to see where it lingered and gauge his interest. Those would be the pieces M. Guilbert would do well to haggle over. Times were hard and paying customers the rarest of creatures.


For an instant I imagined I saw the watchmaker’s shop through this stranger’s eyes: a gloomy interior, shabby furnishings, an air of genteel neglect. The little silver and gold timepieces: each exquisitely crafted, yet carelessly scattered across every conceivable surface, many lying forgotten on high shelves where they gathered dust–of which there was no shortage. And what of us? The master and his apprentice: equally gloomy, shabby inhabitants of this place.


“Why do none of these mechanisms work?” the stranger inquired, completing his inventory.


“Oh but they do,” I assured him, hurrying out from behind the counter. I glanced towards the inner sanctum of my master’s workshop, willing him to appear and relieve me of the burden of dealing with this self-important stranger. M. Guilbert never closed the door but the thick black curtain was always drawn when he was inside.


“In every other watchmaker’s premises I have ever attended,” the gentleman said, “my ears have been assaulted by the ticking, whirring and chiming of a hundred timepieces. But not so here. Do your mechanisms keep time insufficiently well that you dare not set them running?”


“On the contrary,” I said, with one last futile glance at the drawn curtain. “M. Guilbert makes devices of only the greatest precision. But my master believes it is… disrespectful… to wind a timepiece that does not yet have a purpose. Would you not agree?”


“Indeed. Perhaps.” The gentleman seemed entirely unpersuaded.


“Allow me to show you the truth of it for yourself.”


The stranger fingered the fob watch I proffered with no more than mild curiosity. “I am not the prospective buyer. But M. Guilbert’s reputation has reached the ears of my master.”


Your master?” It seemed unlikely someone dressed in such finery would serve any master.


“The Comte Bachellaix desires to purchase a timepiece. He has heard that M. Guilbert’s skills are second to none.”


“Indeed!” I said, thinking of the sheaf of unpaid bills stuffed into the ledger book.


“A timepiece suitably decorous for a lady, is what the Comte desires. You have such things?” he asked, looking doubtfully at the shelves.


“But of course! M. Guilbert will be greatly honored to equip the Comtess with the finest, most delicate watch ever assembled.”


The man smiled thinly. “Yes. For the purposes of expedience, let us assume this will indeed be a gift for the Comtess.” He paused and in the silence the town hall clock in the square could be clearly heard striking eleven. The gentleman glanced around the silent interior of the shop, frowning. No echoing chimes came from the dozen or so carriage clocks, not a single one. Hurriedly I said, “M. Guilbert will ensure there is a fine selection for the Comte’s perusal. I shall wind them personally.”


The gentleman grunted. He wafted a gloved hand ineffectually at the dust hanging in the air. “See that you are prepared for the Comte’s arrival. He will come at noon tomorrow.”


He left and gloomy silence fell over the shop again. I hesitated by the curtain, knowing better than to draw it back uninvited. As though reading my thoughts, M. Guilbert snatched it aside and pushed past me.


“Damn you, Boy. Why did you not send him away?”


“The Comte is an important man. And we have bills to pay.”


“Bills. Pah.” He rummaged in a drawer beneath the counter, returned brandishing a thin jeweler’s blade which he waved in my face as though I had purposefully hidden it from him. “Why does everyone insist on disturbing my work?”


“Perhaps if you would let me assist you?” I asked without much hope. What use was an apprentice whose master would not put him to good use? Who would not teach all that he knew? Lately I had begun to dream about M. Guilbert’s mechanism that he worked on so furtively. Its little brass parts–the myriad wheels and ratchets and pinions–gleamed with a light brighter than any mere reflection and when the mechanism moved, it purred rather than ticked, like some slumbering creature. Lying in my bedchamber tucked under the shop’s eaves, I would stare into the darkness and feel the irresistible pull of the device, stronger even than the gravity drawing me to my bed. I burned to learn more about it.


“I think not,” M. Guilbert said with a final withering stare. He thrust the curtain back into place behind him.


“These people you so despise are called customers,” I called. There was no answer. The mechanism on the bench was already devouring all his attention.


I sighed. The Comte’s visit could be the making of our fortunes, if we played our cards right. But it had occurred to me that it could be our undoing, too.



The Comte was not a tall man. Even bewigged, the top of his head did not reach to my shoulders. Were it not for the ornate embroidery of his cloak, the jewels on his pudgy fingers and the swagger with which he entered our shop, I might have mistaken him for an over-pompous page.


M. Guilbert stood scowling as I stepped round the counter and paid the Comte the courtesy of a low, formal bow.


Into the awkward silence that followed, the Comte’s aide, the gentleman who had visited the previous day, made a small irritated gesture at me and I hurried to produce the little red velvet pouch. From within I carefully withdrew a silver disk no larger than a sovereign. It caught the weak rays of light slanting through the freshly scrubbed windows and glinted in my proffered palm.


The aide stepped forward, his face flushed. “What is this? You dare offer the Comte a silver coin as though he has need of money? Why, that is–”


“Allow me to enlighten,” said M. Guilbert, stepping between us. With surprisingly dextrous fingers, he flipped open the upper surface of the disk and we all leaned forwards to get a better look at the miniature dial and delicate clockwork glimpsed within. “Those who cannot recognize a mechanism for what it is can scarce have the wit to make use of it.” I saw the aide grow red with anger. “But,” M. Guilbert continued, “I am sure the Comte has no such difficulties.”


I held my breath. The Comte fumbled for a moment, then found the tiny beveled winder and gave it a twist.


“Ah!” The Comte raised the watch, the better to hear the smooth purr of its motion now that he had set it going. “That is indeed most pleasing. So small! It scarcely seems possible such a thing could have been wrought by human hands.”


M. Guilbert accepted the compliments with a small nod. Perhaps he had forgotten how much of the craftsmanship in that particular device had been my own–skills that ought to have earned me a journeyman accreditation from the Guild had M. Guilbert remembered to put my name forward, which he had not.


“And does it keep time?” the aide asked, a touch sharply as he tried to recover his poise.


“As well as any sailor’s chronometer. Better, even,” M. Guilbert assured him.


“Yet so tiny…” the Comte mused.


They perused a dozen or more timepieces, each having been opened and wound by me an hour before the Comte’s arrival, but always his attention returned to the tiny watch fashioned like a silver sovereign. Every time the Comte’s gaze settled on it, I thought of those unpaid bills and how good it would be to free ourselves from debt, and my heart skipped a beat.


Business was concluded with a nod from the Comte. Without a word to us, he left the shop, disappearing behind the lace-curtained windows of his waiting coach. Pointedly ignoring me, the aide led M. Guilbert to the rear of the shop where they held a whispered conversation. Then the aide slipped the red velvet pouch containing the watch into a pocket and coolly bade us good day.


I turned to my master. “How much did it fetch?”


“What a fool the Comte is! He does not recognize true value even when it is right beneath his nose. I had no compunction making him pay a fine price for his ignorance.”


I smiled. “What did it fetch?”


“A fine price!” M. Guilbert’s eyes sparkled. It was rare to see him so animated unless admiring a particularly smooth rotator arm or fine-toothed escapement. “The Comte has come into possession of the library of one of the keenest thinkers of our generation. Yet he does not value books of science and engineering and thought to offer them as a trade. I have heard of this scholar’s reputation and now it seems I shall own his priceless notebooks! If the Comte only knew what he had exchanged so lightly. They will be shipped from the palace forthwith.”


“Books? We have sold one of the finest watches ever crafted not for a king’s ransom–which, by the way is its true worth–but for a pile of old books?”


M. Guilbert’s smile hardened. “Not just books. Knowledge. Beyond price.”


“How will books settle our debts?”


But M. Guilbert twitched the black velvet curtain aside and disappeared behind it, and there was nothing more to be said.



“He will not teach me. I learn nothing that I have not taught myself through patience and observation and practice.”


“Poor Johannes. You are wasted in his service,” Adrienne said. As a grocer’s daughter she knew something of what it meant to be in service, yet her words made me ill at ease. She traced the lines of the model ship with her fingers, each sliver of wood so perfectly shaped and fitted to the next that the surface was as smooth as polished marble. “This is a thing of beauty,” she said, truthfully. Fine silk served as sails, cotton thread for the rigging. Beneath the varnished decks, unseen except by me, were cabins and galleys, furniture and stores, tiny hammocks pitched in rows, baking ovens–all fashioned from shards of wood and metal and paste, accurate to the last. It was not such an unusual boyhood dream: to yearn to sail the seas and taste freedom upon the waves, yet how strange that fate landed me in a place three days’ ride from the nearest shores.


“You have such clever hands,” Adrienne said. “Such patience.”


“I am apprentice to a watchmaker,” I told her, taking back the model galleon. “Dexterity and precision are my trade. I must find ways to keep them honed.”


“Surely M. Guilbert tasks you sufficiently?”


“M. Guilbert has no use for me!”


I had meant to keep my anger in check, but suddenly it was all there, boiling to the surface. “Day after day, he toils at his pet projects, his mechanisms that we can never sell. I am the one left to mend the clocks and watches brought to us, as best I can. I am the one who must try to balance the books! Me, the apprentice! Customers come because they hear word of the great M. Guilbert. But if ever they should discover the truth of the craftsmanship they claim to admire, that it is the work of a mere apprentice, what then?” I made an effort to unclench my fists. “M. Guilbert claims he has no time to teach. No time for anything but his obsessions–which he hides from me. What use is it to be apprenticed to a master who will not teach?”


Sweetly, Adrienne took my hand in hers and immediately the warmth of her touch calmed me. “Then you should leave. Find another master you can apprentice to.”


I half-turned, glancing back across the square as though the little shop might somehow be watching or listening. “I should,” I agreed. Yet I knew I could not.



The books arrived in a cart, a great stack of them. I wondered aloud where we would find room to store them. I placed the half-finished hull of a Portuguese man-o’-war on a stool out of harm’s way and opened one of the books at random. I saw only page after page of incomprehensible equations, meaningless hieroglyphs. “Why, these are not even printed books! Nothing more than jottings in a journal.”


M. Guilbert retrieved the book from my hands and set it with the others in a wobbling column on the counter. “They are windows onto the thoughts of a great mind,” he said.


“What is a quantum?” I asked, pointing at the spine of the top-most volume and refusing to be pacified. M. Guilbert harrumphed and I thought he meant to ignore my question. Then he said rather grudgingly, “It is the smallest quantity of some physical property. The least possible amount that can suffice.”


“And what use is that to a watchmaker?”


He shook his head. “You wear your ignorance as though it is a badge of honor, Johannes. You know very well the watchmaker’s skill concerns the measurement of the very small. We strive to divide and subdivide a second into ever smaller parts, the better to measure its passing.”


“Yes. But with copper and brass and frictionless bearings and ingenious designs. What use are these mathematical ravings to any of that?” I was remembering the hours of work I had put into the Comte’s watch. It hadn’t brought the silver it deserved, only these worthless bundles of paper.


M. Guilbert sighed. “You complain so bitterly of my neglect in tutoring you. Here then, is a lesson. Let us see what you are truly capable of understanding.” He seized some items from the counter. “See? A grandpater.” He held up a little brass wheel with its sixty four glittering teeth. “And here, the pater.” He waved a smaller wheel. “Combine them and see what happens?” I nodded impatiently, unwilling to be patronized in this way. “Through the watchmaker’s skill, the almost imperceptible unwinding of a spring becomes a measure of a passing second. I have read in these notebooks you so despise that time and position are coupled, and it would seem to be so. The stately movement of a gearwheel becomes inextricably linked to the passing of a second within our clockwork mechanisms. What then, is the smallest such movement we can amplify and measure? The most fleeting instant of time that we can trap? Is there some theoretical limit in our pursuit of–” He seemed about to say ‘perfection’ but stopped himself. “Accuracy. A tenth, a hundredth, a thousandth of a second? How far can we continue to gear and divide until somewhere the tiniest, almost imperceptible movement of a cog signifies an infinitesimally brief passage of time?”


“Perhaps there is no limit?” I ventured.


M. Guilbert was silent a long time. “Perhaps there is,” he said at last. “And if intimate knowledge of time dulls our perception of space? What then?”


“Is this how your mechanism functions?” I asked.


He stared at me, whether in exasperation or pity I was not entirely sure.


“No. Not like that at all. Have you heard nothing that I have said?”


I shrugged. “You have said nothing I didn’t already know. When did you ever teach me anything?”


If he was angered by my impertinence, he hid it well, turning back to the counter and beginning to tidy away tools. “I have taught you that knowledge is dangerous in the hands of the ignorant. That the things we learn become us, and the things we do change us. And those changes cannot always be undone.” He seemed to tire suddenly, his whole posture slumping into an old man’s stoop. He collapsed onto a nearby stool and there was a brief splintering sound. M. Guilbert half rose, brushed the seat clear, as if the shards of matchstick were just breadcrumbs left behind from some meal, and sat again.


“The most important lessons you will have to learn yourself,” he said, his voice barely a whisper.



I crept in darkness needing no light to guide me, finding my way by touch and instinct alone. I knew every board that creaked, every mis-step that might betray my presence. The mechanism was the only beacon I needed.


I had waited patiently at M. Guilbert’s door, listening. He was a light sleeper but sometime in the darkest hours after midnight, I heard the pattern of his breathing change into something steadier, deeper. Yet even now I hesitated to pull back the velvet curtain.


The mechanism called to me. I had lain in my narrow bed, sleep a distant prospect, my thoughts filled only with tiny cogs and ratchets and shiny brass pins and coiled springs. I had to see it. More than that, I felt the need to comprehend its design, no matter how far beyond my grasp. The mechanism itself demanded to be understood.


Weak moonlight spilling through the shop window was enough to guide me. I drew back the curtain.


The scale of it took my breath away. Those furtive glimpses had revealed but a fraction of its size and none of its complexity. M. Guilbert had wasted no time on ornate cases; a simple iron frame held bracketed segments of the mechanism in place. A couple of brass plates had been unscrewed, revealing what lay within just as a surgeon’s scalpel might have laid bare internal organs on a mortuary slab.


The mechanism sprawled across two workbenches pushed together, layer upon layer of finely crafted clockwork and… other strange devices that I could not identify. So many different parts, each poised to spin in their tiny orbits: rocking, clicking, unwinding. The complexity of it overwhelmed me. How could I begin to understand more than a fraction of this grand design? This was no chronometer, no mere timepiece. This was… The truth was, I had no idea.


M. Guilbert had told me it was not yet finished but clearly there was a mechanism of considerable substance here, of purpose. Some parts I could recognize: flywheel accumulators with their springs slackened, manifold gearing mechanisms, bejewelled rotators. What an easy thing it would be to prime one of those helical springs, to watch the flywheels spin and hear the tick and whir of a mechanism I could not fathom. Dare I?


What harm could it do?


I reached out a hand and caressed the smooth brass surfaces. My fingertips felt the sharp bite of tiny-toothed pinions, and the slackness in the unwound springs–metal that felt warm and alive beneath my fingers. I had the strangest sense that the mechanism itself wished to be set in motion, to be set free.


–A small sound came from the room above. I froze. I heard footsteps on the stairs and slipped out of the workroom, pressing myself into the darkest corner beneath the counter. A moment later M. Guilbert passed only inches from me, a stub of candle throwing dancing shadows in his wake. I did not doubt M. Guilbert’s capacity for anger or that such flagrant disobedience might lose me my apprenticeship no matter how well I had served.


I heard the curtain twitch into place and the clink of tools being moved and silently released a pent-up breath. M. Guilbert often worked through until dawn on those nights when he could not sleep.


I waited until I could bear the silence no longer then crept back up the stairs to my own bed.


Sleep would not come. My mind was alive with images of the mechanism and with my own unanswered questions. The act of observing had changed me in some fundamental way. I felt as if the device had spoken to me and something deep within had answered.



The shop door crashed open. An unusual time for a customer, so late in the afternoon. I looked up to see Adrienne, hair disheveled and the most fearful look in her eyes. “The town is aflame!” she yelled. “Run for your lives!”


With the door flung wide, the acrid tang of smoke was unmistakable. I peered outside and saw bright red flames dancing along the rooftops not fifty yards down the street. I seized Adrienne’s arm as she turned away. “Where are you going?”


“I only came to warn you. My father needs me if we’re to save what stock we can before his shop burns to the ground.” Her expression was wretched. She pushed a strand of hair from across her face, leaving behind a sooty smear. Who else, I wondered, would have even bothered to warn us?


“Let me go back with you.”


“You’ll stay here, Johannes.” M. Guilbert had emerged from behind the curtain, face flushed, expression cold.


Adrienne pulled free and was already halfway out the door. “The fire’s seized hold of the town and isn’t about to let go,” she said. “Go now while you still can.”


I turned back to M. Guilbert, making a pleading gesture to let me follow.


“Close and shutter the door!” M. Guilbert ordered, the tone of command in his voice brooking no argument.


“Look for yourself! We must leave now or we will surely burn!” I glanced around. “Perhaps we can save some of the watches and clocks.”


“As if they mattered. Come with me.”


I followed him behind the curtain where the mechanism lay like some slumbering creature. M. Guilbert barked a series of orders and I fetched him tools and parts and held the candles closer when he needed more light, and all the while the air grew warmer and the tang of burning wood ever stronger. M. Guilbert ignored it, bending over his workbench, making tiny adjustments with a jeweller’s blade here, carefully winding a spring there, like a gardener tending to seedlings, nurturing growth where it was to be encouraged, pinching out where it was not.


While the fire raged close by, M. Guilbert worked on as if this were just another day–and I fetched and carried for him. Madness! The irony was not lost on me: here at last I was serving as apprentice to my master, perhaps in the last few minutes we had left together on this earth.


From outside came the sound of muted screams, the braying of terrified horses and the sound of running feet on the cobbles. When I peeked round the curtain, I saw little fiery flecks of ash falling like glowing snowflakes beyond the shop windows. How easily the town burned, I thought. How easy it was to destroy. How unjust when it took so long to build and construct. I fetched several buckets of water and doused the door and window frames, water puddling around me. It was something, but I doubted it would be enough to save us when the fire reached our little shop.


My master beckoned me back into his inner sanctum, bade me draw the curtain across and close the door that lay behind it.


“M. Guilbert! I beg you, we must leave!”


Instead of answering, M. Guilbert drew me closer. “See here? Where this gearing mechanism increments according to the bias of its companion until the pinion moves?” I bent closer and nodded. “And this compensator? See how this rod slides to adjust for irregularities? And here–a movement which compensates for any deviation in the compensator?” He talked on in this fashion, though much of it I barely heard, my mind swamped by fear. It grew hot in that little room; the air foul. Yet gradually, despite everything that was happening around us, I found myself transfixed by the intricacies of the mechanism’s design, the ingenuity of its execution–things that had been forbidden to me for so long. I thought I began to understand then. This was no clock, no crude device for telling the time. The passing of a second–or rather the passing of half that time, and half the remainder–and again and again, each tiny half-increment faithfully accumulated until somewhere deep within the mechanism a wheel turned the tiniest amount, registered the briefest instant imaginable–and in so doing, laid bare a little of the thread from which time’s fabric was stitched.


For what purpose had M. Guilbert designed this? I could not begin to imagine.


His voice had dropped so low it was scarcely more than a mutter. He was no longer talking to me I realized, only to himself. His words sounded like a confession.


And somewhere beyond, the town burned. Smoke wafted in the air between us, and the crack of beams in neighboring houses shattering in the heat sounded like cannon-fire–yet distant and intangible. I began to feel light-headed and it was so very, very hot. Yet M. Guilbert worked on. I knew the fire was upon us, surrounding us. I knew too that the old wooden rafters of the shop would condemn us; I had seen flames shooting skywards and consuming all in their path. But I couldn’t leave now. Was it M. Guilbert or the mechanism itself I could not bring myself to abandon?


The candles spluttered and shrank to tiny, indifferent flames as though in defeat. The smoke thickened until I could not make out details across the room. Every burning breath felt like it might be my last. Yet still M. Guilbert muttered about time and space, and talked of duality and uncertainty and the quantum nature of time–and I understood none of it, nor even cared. I thought it possible I might have died and that this was some kind of antechamber to hell: a place of heat and sulfurous fires where M. Guilbert would lecture me on things I could never understand for the rest of eternity.


Then I saw him wind the mechanism. –Just a little, a minuscule tightening of a spring here, a flick of a fingertip to set a wheel spinning there. Even above the fierce crackle of flames outside, I heard the sudden chattering, whirring sound as the mechanism stirred.


I must have reached for the door for M. Guilbert’s hand was suddenly upon mine. “The outcome is changed by the observer,” he said cryptically. “You must not look outside.”


The world grew hazy. Perhaps I fainted. Certainly I remember feeling the heat of the floorboards pressing against the side of my face and in a strange way feeling comforted by it. I saw a shaft of light beneath the door where the drafts blew in and the curtain did not fall straight. Where I lay, I could glimpse the world beyond through that narrow slit. M. Guilbert had bade me not to look but I could not help myself. I saw… Something. Perhaps I saw flames licking at the walls, or smoke rolling like ocean waves down the street, and yet I rather think I saw nothing at all.


I remember too, in the delirium of the moment, hearing sounds from outside that could not be–screeches like the cry of seagulls, the lap and draw of the tide on a beach, the snap of sails catching the breeze.


At some point I must have crawled into the little cot in the corner where M. Guilbert sometimes napped. I slept as I had never done before, waking briefly several times yet knowing I must still be dreaming. Once I thought I heard the hiss of snowflakes driven against the windows of the shop and shivered as tendrils of cold percolated beneath the door. Another time I heard a constant, high-pitched scratching sound, like the chorus of a million insects serenading me. I felt an oppressive heat settle across the room and heard the calls of unidentifiable creatures carried on moisture-laden air.


I drifted in and out of consciousness, and the world drifted with me.


Much later, when some of the townsfolk came searching, they expected to find only our charred bodies. When I stirred and sat up, face black with soot, one of the men screamed as though I were a ghoul rising from the grave. M. Guilbert sat quietly in the corner next to the stilled mechanism, now covered by its dust-sheet. The little watchmaker’s shop, scorched and singed by fire, had been the only dwelling in the street to survive virtually unscathed. In the following weeks as the town began to rebuild what had been lost, there were many who shook their heads and called it a miracle that the shop had not been taken by the flames.


But there were some who muttered different words under their breath.



The fire had exacted a terrible toll on the town but not so terrible that it broke the townsfolk’s spirit. The stalwart men and women had seen their town scarred by war and disease and times of great hardship. This was nothing that could not be put right with patient hard work and they began to rebuild even while embers still glowed in the streets ravaged by fire. I knew I should be helping the less fortunate but I felt uneasy leaving the shop unless absolutely necessary. Naturally I was curious to know who had perished. Sometimes I looked for familiar faces–or more tellingly their absence–through the little windows of the watchmaker’s shop but mostly I saw only strangers, as though the memories of people I once knew had already faded. Hadn’t there been a girl who had come to warn us? But try as I might I could not recall her name and in truth her fate no longer seemed important.


Then too, M. Guilbert kept me busy, and that was gratifying. Smoke and heat had damaged some timepieces and it fell to me to clean and repair those that were salvageable.


If I expected new bonds to have been forged between us, I soon realized my mistake. M. Guilbert would occasionally inspect a piece that I worked upon, offering words of advice, or guiding my hand as I beat or filed tiny slivers of brass into shape. But he would not speak of his own work, nor let me near the mechanism again. I caught him watching me covertly many times, the look on his face both suspicious and perplexed as though I had done something to vex him.


I wrote down all that I could recall M. Guilbert saying during his frantic work on the mechanism, but none of it made sense. I had heard him speak of certain principles that could never be known with utter certainty, that if we knew precisely where then we could never know when–as though to measure one with absolute precision inevitably meant relinquishing control over the other. But I could see no sense behind it all. Time and place were just… time and place. And now my frustration was worse than before. For a brief moment I had felt like the apprentice to a great master. Now I was nothing again: the apprentice whose master kept his secrets to himself.


And so I began to formulate my plan.



M. Guilbert no longer slept in his room. He worked late every night, eventually dozing next to the mechanism before rising at dawn to begin work again. Yet he seemed to have abandoned the mechanism for his books. I saw no tools out of place, no parts scattered across the work surface. The mechanism stayed hidden beneath its shroud. At noon I would prepare a simple lunch for my master and occasionally he would nap for an hour in the comfort of his proper bed before resuming his studies and reading long into the night. That hour afforded me my opportunity. If the master would not teach, then I would have to learn for myself.


For all its burgeoning complexity and strange function, the mechanism was still at heart a timepiece. I could see that much. I recognized movements, torsion balances, escapements, pinions–items familiar enough to any half-competent watchmaker. Fine-toothed gears meshed, gear trains transported movement across the device, tiny jewel-mounted oscillators sat ready to vibrate the moment their springs were wound. But for each element I recognized and understood, a dozen more were a mystery. I intuited that M. Guilbert had constructed layer upon layer of correctional elements, each resolving ever finer gradations of time until he measured and trapped the smallest possible interval, if such a thing could even exist. Was there even now somewhere in the heart of this device a subtle movement of a cog, a single tick of the great device that would signify such an instant?


I remembered M. Guilbert’s description of the thing he called ‘quantum.’ The least possible amount that can suffice. Suffice for what, I wondered?


And I wondered too, what would happen were the mechanism to be properly wound and set going.


One morning I rose to find the curtain to M. Guilbert’s workspace drawn back, unusual in itself. My master was bent over the mechanism and I felt my heartbeat quicken to see him working on it again. But I sensed a change.


“What are you doing?” I asked.


He turned, and I saw the hollow eyes, the lines on his face. I had always thought of M. Guilbert as an old man, but never this old. “I have been a fool,” he told me. “I let myself become obsessed by the art of the possible and lost sight of the dangers. Some ideas are better left unexplored.” He reached out and put a hand on my shoulder. “I am sorry too if I have neglected my duties as teacher, though I think you have learnt more than you realize. But to put you in such danger was unforgivable.”


“What danger? What are you talking about?”


He blinked, turning his attention back to the tiny screwdriver he was inserting deep into the workings. I swear I saw the glitter of tears in his eyes before he turned away. I had witnessed his many moods over the years: stubbornness, irascibility, child-like delight at some piece of cleverness in one of his designs–but never had I seen this kind of emotion laid so bare.


“Johannes, I will make it up to you. We will make a journeyman of you yet.”


“But what are you doing?” I persisted.


“I am dismantling the mechanism,” he said, without turning round.



I tried to distract him: irrelevant questions about commissions yet to be fulfilled, supplies to be ordered, even what meals I should prepare. He brushed all these aside. If anything, he worked with even greater application than before, teasing apart the mechanism, neatly stacking components back in their drawers and trays. Were it not for the mechanism’s sheer size and complexity, the task might have been completed quickly, but it was clear to me it would take days to carry out this slow dismembering.


While M. Guilbert napped, I spent every moment poring over the new sections that he had exposed, trying to see how the pieces fit together. In my head, I kept a plan as best I could, wondering if I would ever have the skill to somehow rebuild what was slowly being lost.


Then with no warning M. Guilbert fell ill, complaining of stomach pains and a headache. He struggled on until the discomfiture grew so strong he was forced to climb the stairs with heavy steps and retire to his bedchamber. I brought him hot broth at regular intervals, though he was able to keep little enough down. I cared for him as best I could and made him comfortable.


Here, at last, was my chance.



Several days passed and M. Guilbert grew a little worse, not better. I began to worry that the tincture I had carefully measured and stirred into M. Guilbert’s meals–paints and dyes I used on my model ships–had been more strongly acting than I realized. He slept for all but a few hours of the day, and his skin grew pallid and grey. I supposed I should send for a doctor, but I was afraid the cause of his sickness might be discovered. I did not mean for M. Guilbert to die, and yet…


And yet it afforded me the time and space to work on the mechanism unfettered. I kept the shop door barred and shuttered. I worked from first light until late into the night when my eyes became too gritty and unfocused to allow me to continue my work. It was clear I did not have M. Guilbert’s finesse nor his understanding. Despite my careful observations, not all the pieces seemed to fit as I would wish, so I fashioned new ones, adapting the design to one of my own. It took me days to repair the damage done but I thought I understood enough. And who was there to stop me?


M. Guilbert clung to life, barely. His breathing was so shallow as to be imperceptible. Sometimes I stood by his bed, convinced he had slipped away, only to see a twitch of muscle or hear a murmur escape his lips. Once, I thought he might be trying to say something and leant closer. “An observer–” he said, his voice barely more than a whisper, “changes the outcome. Remember that.” A hand grasped my arm with shocking suddenness, those long, delicate fingers still powerful enough to leave bruises in my flesh. “Don’t… look!”


I had no idea what he meant. There were a dozen questions on my tongue but the effort of speaking had exhausted him and he slipped into unconsciousness once more.


I felt the call of the mechanism stronger than ever. The work was nearly done; the end of the matter so close. I could sense the physical bulk of it in the room below, a latent presence like a living thing about to be born. I obeyed its call because to do anything else would be inconceivable.


It had grown late by the time I laid aside the last of my tools. My head pounded and fatigue had settled over me, dulling my thoughts. Yet it was done. I hefted the little brass key, no bigger than my index finger, and wondered if I should wait for the morning and a clear head. But how could I sleep knowing that the mechanism sat ready, needing only to be wound? The mechanism would never let me rest.


I slipped the key onto the spindle and gave it a half twist.


It pleased me beyond words to think that I shared some small measure of credit for this mechanism. To be sure, M. Guilbert’s genius had conceived it, but my labors had rebuilt those parts that had been disassembled. No hand had guided mine, only my instinctive grasp of its form and function. My efforts were crude and rough-edged compared to the elegant precision of my master’s handiwork, but good enough, I believed. And far beyond the work of a mere apprentice.


I twisted the key again, a touch more savagely this time.


Was it too much to hope that my name might one day be spoken of in exalted circles? Or would it still be M. Guilbert who got all the credit?


Another full turn. I could feel how tight the spring was becoming, ready to release its energy the moment I let go of the key.


The blame for this was M. Guilbert’s. He should have instructed me more diligently in his craft. Trusted me. Had I not been a willing pupil? Instead, when he had deigned to notice me, all I received were his patronizing words. Johannes. You do not understand the lessons you have already learned.


The key was becoming harder to turn now, quivering in my grip as I fought the spring’s tension. I let my hand drop and took a step back.


For a moment the mechanism was utterly still. I wondered if my repairs had failed after all. Then I became aware of a change, like a gentle ripple spreading through the clockwork. I recalled that some of M. Guilbert’s finer pocket watches had movements so smooth they could not be said to tick; rather they hummed. If so, then this device sang. It was surely a song no human ears had ever heard before.


I looked closer, seeing tiny wheels deep inside the mechanism turning so fast as to blur. Accumulators shunted against their ratchets. Everywhere I looked, brass glinted in the candlelight as gearwheels spun, clicked and oscillated like some creature come to life. Flawed though it might be by my crude craftsmanship, I had breathed life into this clockwork.


I had a sudden fear then: of powers within the universe I did not understand, of time itself as some unfathomable quantity. What was it that M. Guilbert had read in those notebooks of his that had scared him so badly he had begun to dismantle his life’s work?


The mechanism whirred, trapping and meting out time in quantum intervals for purposes I would never understand. The least possible amount that would suffice. And even so…


The world did not end.


Time did not stand still.


My heart continued to beat. I watched my chest move with each breath. Dust stirred on currents of air.


Life continued.


Suddenly heady with elation I threw open the door of the watchmaker’s shop to draw a breath of fresh air and feel the morning sun on my skin.


I looked outside.


But outside was nothing, just a vast, blank grayness.


Time and place. Place and time. Did it follow with some kind of relentless logic that to measure one with absolute precision was to banish the other completely? Then I remembered M. Guilbert’s words. The outcome is changed by the observer.


I had set the mechanism going and it had measured a quantum of time, laid bare the detail of its warp and weft, the very threads from which it was stitched.


And now we were nowhere, nowhere at all.




When Bloodwater Boils



By Peter Ryan



Thirsty are the lips that taste the ocean. Sick is the belly that braves the stream. Dirty are the hands that bathe in bloodwater.


It had been one of his mother’s favorite things to say. What it meant would depend on the occasion. It could mean: you shouldn’t have drunk that, it’ll make you sick. Or: whatever trouble it is you’re in, you have only yourself to blame. She also could mean it literally. As in: don’t touch the bloodwater, it’ll dirty your hands.


But Nisean had weak arms, which meant he was no good for the mines. His sight was too poor for the rangers. He couldn’t read or write, and in any case, the shopkeepers had never liked the looks of him, with his filthy black hair and that scar from lip to chin where a horse had once kicked him. He looked like the sort that would rob them blind. And he might have, if it came down to it.


But there was money in bloodwater. Even for a boy with no skills.


It wouldn’t be the first time he’d ignored his mother’s advice.



The old man sniffed suspiciously at the day’s catch, which Nisean carefully laid out across his counter. He had wrapped them in his own undershirts, since he had no paper.


“What did you bring me?” the merchant demanded, though the answer was plain. They were fish, but not ordinary fish. Their scales sparkled green, with flashes of red when they caught the sun at the right angle.


“If you can name them,” the boy answered, “then you know your fish better than me. I’ve never seen the like.”


Nisean was thirteen. He was tall for his age, but his voice was still high and thin.


“Three coppers?” the man demanded skeptically, his eyes directed to the scales, as if the fish themselves might name their price.


“Six,” Nisean countered.


“Six!” the man repeated, “Six if they swallowed your mother’s pearls. What would you say to four?”


Nisean nodded hesitantly.


“You’ve robbed me!” the man cried with feigned bitterness. Then he dropped the coins onto the counter one at a time. They clattered noisily against the wood.


The boy smiled. He had no way of knowing the fish were worth five times that sum. He was on his own now, and he had to make do with what wits were left to him.



His mother had succumbed to the Nuisance. That’s what people were calling it now, but when she had been struck with it, it had no name. She just started bleeding for no reason—a little at first, dabbing her nose from time to time, but then in a steady, gushing stream.


They said you should steer clear of the houses where the illness had taken hold.


Nisean hadn’t left. He had washed her linens, made her soup, and wiped the blood from her nose, her eyes, and her ears. He had tended to her until her last day. He’d loved her, but he also hadn’t known what else to do.



There was a hole dug by a dire rat just beneath Master Tarogan’s barn. The burrow was nearly tall enough to stand in, and the rat died or moved on, so Nisean claimed it as his own.


He could get a room at the inn for six coppers, or he could eat for the next six days—soup and hard cheese even, not just bread. He was smart enough, at least, to prefer a full belly to a soft pillow. So he cozied into the rat’s nest, letting the sound of the rain pouring down over Tarogan’s cornfields lull him to sleep.



Some said the bloodwater came from the other side of the ocean, where the men lived wild and free. Some argued it was the water from the land of the dead. Others still claimed it came from the ancient past, when men, apes, and wolves all traveled in the same pack, and giants roamed the hills. One thing everyone agreed on was that if you went under the bloodwater, you never came back again.


It cropped up everywhere, like a weed. You could find bloodwater sometimes in puddles or in the middle of the ocean. If you poured a pitcher of water into a bowl, it might take on the same reddish hue.


It was never hard to find in the marshes. Beyond a thicket of reeds, Nisean found a patch large enough to wade in. He shuffled over to its outer edge. Then he rolled his sleeve up all the way to his shoulder, knelt down in the swamp where it was muddy but still somewhat clear, and plunged his arm into the opaque crimson depths.


Nisean stretched his arm as far as he could, until he thought his bones might pop from his joint, but he felt only water at the tips of his fingers. Then, without warning, something slimy brushed up against him, and he yanked his hand out of the water.


It’s just a fish, he reminded himself, Just a fish.


He dunked his arm back in to see if it would bite. He felt a nibble at his fingers. Whatever it was, it was big.


Nisean felt a sharp sting between his wrist and his elbow, as though a hundred tiny hooks had clung to his flesh. He pulled up, but it hurt worse when he did, and his arm didn’t budge. The fish yanked hard and pulled him in, all but his legs. He screamed, the air bubbles spitting out from his mouth and tickling his cheek. He pulled back again, but this only made the fish tug down harder, until he was fully submerged.



What surprised him the most was that the water was not entirely dark. There were bursts of light all around him, like fireworks seen through a murky red glass. He heard a creaking sound, like a ship capsizing, and voices singing without words. The melody was alarming in its simplicity: two notes, one high and one low.


Nisean kicked and kicked until he had set himself free, breaking to the surface. He pulled himself back up into the swamp, grasping at reeds. The bloodwater shrank behind him, until the black patch was gone. He began spitting into the air and dry heaving in case any of it had gotten down his throat. Three teaspoons of bloodwater was said to be enough to cripple a man, and four to kill him.



There was a chill that didn’t leave him, even after he had spent several hours drying in the sun.


Walking back to town, it began to rain again. A kindly looking woman herded her cattle back into the barn near the road, and Nisean had half a mind to ask her if he could join them, but her face curdled like old milk when she saw the question forming on his lips. He cast his eyes silently back down to the road in front of him.


He felt the copper coins in his pocket, tracing his finger around the face of the Emperor. As precious as they were to him, they were of no greater worth now than a bed, or a piping hot bath. He headed to the inn.



When he woke the next morning, the pillow beneath him had turned mostly red. He dabbed his nose and his finger returned with blood on it. He felt no pain.


His mother had lived six months from the time of her first symptoms, he reminded himself, but for some reason, this seemed only to add to his burden. Six months of scraping by. Sleeping in the open air. Eating stale bread. He would work and struggle right up to the end.


Yesterday’s discovery weighed suddenly heavy on his mind. It was a lie that one could not enter the bloodwater and return. A lie is an opportunity to tell the truth had been another one of his mother’s favorite sayings. But it seemed to him now more like an opportunity for profit.


He returned to the swamp in earnest. It was hot and the water steamed, creating a thick, soupy fog. The air cleared when he hit upon a small island of mud and brambles. He could see a bit of bloodwater a little further. The opening was just wide enough for him to slip through.


He placed his hands at his sides and dove in feet first. His head dipped beneath the water but then bobbed up again. He grabbed at the muddy soil and attempted to push himself back down again, kicking frantically to dig deeper into the water.


He saw a flash of yellow light. Then one of blue and green. The lights were everywhere, like fireflies on a warm summer night. He pushed himself deeper and deeper into the water, keeping his eyes wide open and alert.


He heard the creaking again, the sound of wood under pressure, no different really than the way the stairs at the inn had buckled beneath his weight. With it, came the two notes, high and low.


As he burrowed deeper into the water, he could see the ship. The quick flashes of light seemed to be concentrated there, as if they were feeding off the wreckage. When they lit up, many at a time, he could see it dimly. Otherwise, it blended in with the dark.


He hit the bottom, sand kicking up beneath him from an eel that zigzagged out from its hiding place between two large stones. There was no gold and no jewels there, as far as he could see.


The ship was tilted toward him. There was an enormous crack in the hull and he swam through it. He knew he would either find something to scavenge immediately or return to the surface empty handed. He was running out of air.


The flashes of light here had gathered around a door. He could see the bodies now of these fish, if that’s what one would call them. They had bubbly, transparent skin, revealing intricate pink organs within. They were the source of the sounds—some sang high, some low, each attracting the other.


Nisean tugged at the door, but it wouldn’t budge. He leveraged his foot against the wall and tried again, with the full weight of his body. The door cracked open. The boat creaked and the bubbles of light made circles around the door, trying to push their way in. Three bodies poured out, pressing into Nisean. They were mostly bone by now, with patches of flesh and fabric here and there oddly preserved, sticking to the bone like egg sticks to a pan.


He frantically kicked them off, as if the corpses were attempting to devour him. Then he felt a sting on his shoulder. One of the fish, the bubbles of light, had bitten him.


He pushed his way out of the boat, and launched himself towards the surface, realizing only now how difficult it might be to find his way back to the opening through which he had come.


He felt a bite on his cheek and another on his abdomen. Then, just above, he caught a glimpse of natural light.


He broke to the surface, gasping for breath, and then he pulled himself up out of the bloodwater and into the swamp.


He crawled to the small island of mud and brambles, nursing his wounds. Then he cried.



Nisean spent the night in the hole beneath Master Tarogan’s barn. In the morning, he could hear boots crunching their way through the corn stalks.


“Get out,” Master Tarogan shouted. He stood many feet away from the burrow and peered into the dark uncertainly, from a distance.


Nisean crawled out of his hole. The man immediately began to cough. Blood gushed out from his throat onto his chin, drenching his beard. He fell to the ground, heaving.


Nisean started to rush to his side, but the man held up his hand to stop him.


“Stay away boy,” he growled irritably. Then he stomped up the cobbled path to his house.


“I’ve got it!” the boy cried.


The man turned. His eyes narrowed with suspicion. When he saw that Nisean was serious, they softened. Then he cast them like stones to the ground, avoiding his gaze. He seemed saddened or ashamed.


“Same as you,” Nisean said, “I’ve got the Nuisance. But it’s early for me yet. I could take care of things for a time. Make you comfortable. Like I did for my Ma.”


The man looked up, his face no less ashen, but his curiosity piqued.


“How was she,” he asked, “At the end?”


“Brave,” the boy lied, “To the last.”



They hung the kettle above an enormous fire in the hearth. Nisean and the man sat together in ornately carved wooden chairs, cushioned with red pillows stuffed with feathers. It was cozy, and it was warm. But when Nisean checked the water to see how it was coming along, it had turned crimson.


“Bloodwater,” the boy groaned.


“Pour it out,” Master Tarogan instructed, “Start again.”


Nisean took the kettle outside and dumped it into the grass. He refilled it from a jug and placed it again over the fire.


“Death comes to tea,” the man called out, “when bloodwater boils.”


Nisean returned to his seat.


“My mother always used to say that,” he explained.


He sat in silence for awhile. The dead quiet held the room for so long that Nisean came to think that the man had fallen asleep.


“What would you do,” Master Tarogan asked abruptly, perking up in his chair, “If you could do anything?”


Nisean considered. “Live a good, long life.”


“I mean,” he said, “In the time that you had. If you had all the money you needed to do whatever you want.”


Nisean furrowed his brow in concentration.


“Dunno,” he said, “I’d like to sail the sea.”


The man laughed.


“What’s funny?”


“No offense,” he said, “I was a seaman for many years. You don’t have the arms.”


Nisean nodded and stared at the fire. They were quiet for a time.


“I have a small boat,” Master Tarogan added, “I’ll take you on the water tomorrow in the morning, should God grant me the strength.”


The boy smiled appreciatively, but he knew that when morning came, the odds of the man feeling up to this were slim.


“It is important to see all the good things in this world,” the man concluded, “before they are gone.”


The logs cracked in the fire, splitting in two. Master Tarogan was asleep in his chair long before the water was ready. Nisean set the kettle aside and brought the man a blanket, covering him lap to chin.


He turned his thoughts to the ocean. To ships and sails. Islands with clear blue water and beaches of white sand. Endless days drifting and the yearning for the shore.


If not tomorrow, then soon, he promised himself, he would set sail. The winds would take him wherever they willed. And for a short while, he would be content.


It seemed like an eternity before the kettle whistled with steam.




The Pen



By Mark Bilsborough



They say success is one part talent, two parts application and three parts luck. Well until that dark November night I had no cause to believe otherwise, and every cause to bemoan my fate. I was a writer with talent in abundance, and a steady determination, but good fortune had at that point been as elusive as snow in summer.


I returned to my rooms late, having spent the evening in a tavern at the end of the road called, ironically, the Shakespeare, a name which was undoubtedly given to mock me. I had been moderately, pleasantly drunk until it became my turn to stand a round, and then, discovering that I had but one farthing to my name, had to suffer the ignominy of being thrown out onto the street by men I believed to be friends.


My attic room was up three flights of stairs and in my drunken state I had quite forgotten the creaking floorboard outside my landlady’s quarters. She must have been waiting for me to return, for she had her speech carefully planned.


“Mr. Humbolt, if I might have a word?”


My landlady was a comely widow not yet into middle age and normally a delight to gaze upon, but that evening I could not bear to face her. “It is very late, Mrs. Prentice.”


“It’s about the rent.”


“Tomorrow. It is far too late now.”


“So is the rent. And you promised it tomorrow three weeks ago.”


She was still talking as I slammed my door and struggled to remove my boots. Her subsequent knock was far from timid.


“When I sell my next story, Mrs. Prentice. Then you will have your rent.”


“Tomorrow, Mr. Humbolt,” she shouted through the thick wood. “Or you will need to find new lodgings.”


My fire had grown cold, grey coals barely glowing. I didn’t bother checking the pail for more. Those were the last. There was barely enough heat in them to light a taper for my candles. I shivered with the realization that these, too, needed to be rationed.


It had not always been that way. When I first came to London to seek out the great Mr. Dickens I felt my fortune was assured. My parents had predicted otherwise but I had not really believed my father when he said ‘come back a raging success or do not come back at all’. But my letters asking for support went unanswered and my fortunes became ever more precarious.


I first saw the great writer in a salon off the Charing Cross Road, giving a public reading of his most recent success, an oversentimental serialized tale called David Copperfield. I was mesmerized, and could barely summon the courage to approach him after his performance. I had hoped he would take me under his wing, but instead as soon as I announced myself a fellow writer his face took on a haunted look and he peered ostentatiously at his pocket watch. But I was dogged in my pursuit and eventually he offered me the crumb of an introduction to his editor, a redoubtable looking fellow by the name of John Forster, before departing hurriedly to his carriage, leaving the grim faced editor behind to respond to my entreaties.


Alas, Forster proved no judge of talent and my work was swiftly rejected. I was not to be deterred, however, and soon sent other work, and found other editors and sent them my stories too.


To no avail. So that chill evening I sat in fading candlelight contemplating eviction and disgrace. There was nothing more I could do.


There was, though, one more action I could take. I had often stood in the middle of Tower Bridge late into the evening looking out over the dirty water of the Thames and listened to the cold, siren cry of the murky eddies entreating the unwary and despairing to join them. Now I, too, was in that sorry state of desolation and hopelessness. My path was clear.


Invigorated by my new resolve, I decided to write a long note, which would no doubt be published to great acclaim posthumously, for what kind of writer would I be if I did not take the opportunity for one final flourish.


Alas my inkwell was dry. Frustrated, I began searching the drawers of my writing desk for fresh supplies, but to no avail. Was I to be denied the satisfaction of my final flourish simply because I had run out of ink?


I had a newfound determination though, now that I was on my final chapter. I recalled that it had been the fashion when this desk was built to include secret drawers and hidden compartments. I had not found any to date, but then, I had barely looked. Now, though, I examined the inlays in great detail. At the side, on the right, obscured by carved filigree, I found what I was looking for.


It opened with a slight push and clicked back, as if sprung. It was a thin shelf, capable of holding little more than a sheaf of letters. At first I thought it empty, but then I saw a faint gleam emanating from the very back of the drawer. I looked closely. It was a pen, with a smooth wooden shaft and bright, golden inlays. The gold encircled the pen and as I turned it I could make out the words ‘creatio ex nihilo’ in elaborate script.


I had no idea how the pen got there. I acquired the desk from a second hand emporium on the Portobello Road and could only surmise that it had been there all along, forgotten by the previous owner.


There was something else at the back of the drawer, wedged between bottom and top. A small bottle of ink. I could at last write my final note.


I filled my inkwell then paused. Perhaps, with a fine pen such as that, there was one more story within me. So with the resignation of repeated rejection I lifted the pen and dipped it in the ink. It was light to my touch, and as I began writing I felt my mood lighten as well. With all my previous stories I had needed copious notes beforehand, and hours of quiet contemplation in front of a roaring log fire, brandy in hand. This time, however, the words came immediately, and I found myself writing a fantastic story of supernatural intrigue, as worthy as anything from the pen of Mr. Poe or Mr. Hawthorne. Or even, if I may be immodest, Mr. Dickens himself.


I did not sleep that night. Instead, I filled page after page with thrilling prose and knew then that desperation had given me my muse. With restored spirits I dashed down the stairs, manuscript in hand, and ran out into the street.


It was barely eight o’clock when I arrived at the offices of Bentley’s Miscellany and I did not leave until well into the evening, when they had agreed to accept my story for a fee which exceeded my wildest expectations.


Elated, I ran half way across London back to my lodgings to tell Mrs. Prentice the good news. She was dubious at first, but with contract in hand I soon won her over and, with the added persuasion of a glass or two of Burgundy from my last remaining bottle, all talk of rent due was duly postponed.


The story was a huge success, and there were more to follow. With my pen in hand I spent my days writing feverishly, page upon page of mesmeric storytelling. I wrote of dark spirits and soaring battles, of men laid low by war and entranced by victory. I wrote of obsession and compulsion, great achievement and heart-breaking tragedy, and of a man, not unlike myself, achieving the greatness due to him and the respect and admiration of a grateful society.


In short, I had achieved all that I set out to do.


Perhaps that was why, one summer afternoon, I slumped exhausted in my seat and gazed longingly at the bright blue sky outside, wanting nothing more than to sit in St James’ Park staring at the ducks in the lake whilst drinking in the sunshine. I could do none of that, though, for my writing compulsion was too strong. Every day since I found the pen I had written page after page and, suddenly weary, I realized I needed a rest. Why not take some time to enjoy the rewards of success?


My hand moved across the page, spinning some yarn about a man constructing wings wide enough to fly to the heavens, but my heart was not in it. I willed myself to stop writing, but to no avail. Angrily I tore my hand away and in the violence of my movement, banged it hard against the edge of my heavy marble mantelpiece. I cried in pain, knowing instantly that something was broken, but that pain was tempered with elation as I realized I would not be able to write again for some time. I was released from my compulsion.


I headed for the door, eager to head for the park, but as I reached for the latch I heard a dull scratching behind me and, turning, saw the pen moving completely of its own volition across the paper!


I was stunned. As I watched, the pen continued my story, in my handwriting, as if I were guiding it myself. I concluded, as any sane man would, that the pain in my hand had dulled my perceptions and I was hallucinating. I needed medical treatment.


When I returned from the hospital in a state of euphoric sedation and with a heavily bandaged hand I noted with some detachment that the story was complete, and the pen was in the process of writing another.


The pen’s stories were every bit as lauded as my own. Indeed, I began to suspect that the tales I thought of as mine also sprang from the pen. Even after my hand had healed I had no need to pick up the pen. It seemed perfectly content to write on its own, provided I kept it supplied with paper and ink.


It was at that point that I started drinking absinthe hoping, perhaps, to gain an insight on those strange occurrences. The stories the pen was writing were undoubtedly the kind of tales I would have written, only better executed, and that realization hit me hard. I was redundant save as supplier of materials and delivery man to my publisher and although my fame was assured and growing, it began to feel increasingly hollow and fraudulent.


One night, on a chill November night not unlike the one in which I first discovered the hateful thing, in drunken delirium I became enraged by its incessant scratching, audible over the sound of the cracking flames from the fire. I snatched the almost completed manuscript and began reading.


It was a tale about a vain, arrogant man who believed himself to be more talented than he actually was, who stumbled on the kind of success others had to work hard for, and wasted that success on petty indulgences.


My hands shook. With fury I headed over to the fire with the intention of thrusting the odious story into the flames. But something drew my attention, just at the last moment. I turned to see the pen impossibly suspended in mid-air, and I imagined it looking at me as if in reproach. I pulled my arms back, ready to throw the sheaf of paper. But as I did so, the pen turned in the air until its nib pointed straight at me. It moved backwards, and, like a catapult bolt, flew across the room. Startled, I lost my footing as the pen impaled itself in my chest, digging deep into my heart.


As I lay dying I could hear the pen, ignoring me once more, scratching away.



Joshua Humbolt wrote this story posthumously, of course. Or, rather, I wrote it for him. I found in Mrs. Prentice a willing supplier of paper and patience, and unlike the unfortunate Mr. Humbolt she has no pretentions to talent of her own. Instead, she is content to let me draw stories from her, to be my inspiration and my public face. In return she is happy to reap the not inconsiderable rewards that brings. She no longer has to take in lodgers, and I am free to write. She does not have the same dark brooding arrogance that my Humbolt-tinged tales could project, but there is a ready market for stories flavored with hope and beauty, and I find the change of tone pleasing.


One day, of course, Mrs. Prentice will no longer be here and someone else will find me, in a drawer in a desk at a junkshop, just waiting to be picked up.


And then there will be new stories.




Ladder of Ashes



By Dale L. Sproule



I tried to meet Mom’s flickering, pixellated gaze as it skittered across the screen, and to parse meaning from snippets as her voice shifted in and out of audibility, “Lots of people asked about you… with this fever… won’t let me… bloodwork… don’t know how long I’ll be here… have to come home for high school in September if Dad can’t find you a tutor…”


The trip-planning sites all warned that Myanmar had the worst connectivity in Asia. No lie. We were waiting for delivery of a satellite dish, but in this part of the country, the electrical supply was as much an issue as the signal.


Mom had gone back to Toronto for cancer treatment, leaving me stranded in Mawlamyin with Dad as he carried on converting the old rubber plantation into a museum/hotel–certain that it would attract a steady and lucrative stream of cultural and academic tourists.


Twelve Oaks Estate sat in the center of a pegboard orchard of old and stingy rubber trees – a morning wagon’s ride west of the enclave of colonial mansions known as little England. As far as I knew, there wasn’t an actual oak tree within 1,000 klicks. The house was a vast block of stone that had long since lost most of its balconies and porches and canopies to rot and rust.


The day I met Lawrence, was the first day of the rewiring, so all the electrical power in the house was switched off – no air conditioning, no TV, no computer. The contractor doing the reno didn’t want the boss’ son “underfoot,” so I didn’t have access to most of the house. I couldn’t go outside because the gatherers didn’t want people wandering the grounds of the plantation – outside of organized tours – for fear they would get in the way of the tappers or inadvertently contaminate the cup things they collect the latex in. Even though Dad had let me shadow him one day, he made it clear that I was a big distraction that couldn’t happen often. And he didn’t trust me to go into town on my own.


Dad had augmented the library with books he’d collected for display at the hotel – antiques and early editions to augment the immersive experience of living in a British colonial mansion: Robert Louis Stevenson, Daniel Dafoe, Rudyard Kipling. I read them mostly because there was nothing else to do.


And I slept.


I dreamed of boarding the subway at Museum Station. There were no other passengers except for a young woman at the far end of the train. As I walked toward her, she stood and I saw that she was wearing a deep green Edwardian dress with lace across the décolletage, her long dark hair twirled atop her head with emerald combs. The air around her was a stale, slightly rotten potpourri of disquiet and despair. As beautiful as she was, there was no joy in her demeanor. Sadness clung to her, emanated from her. And need – an unfed hunger that sucked up the light as she put her hand on my shoulder and stared into my eyes. Darkness reached up in tendrils from between the seats, clinging to me, crawling up my arms, caressing my face. My breathing grew shallow.


“I can feel him near, my Henry,” she said, then handed me a coconut shell and sighed. “If you see him, give him this.”


The subway doors opened into jungle, I followed her out onto what should have been the platform, but she almost instantly vanished in the trees. The shell opened like a book. In its cavity, nested an India rubber ball, milky purple shading to amber, like a heart that’s drained of blood. It gave a larval twitch, squirmed, lengthened and dropped to the ground. I turned to get back on the train, but it had vanished and the platform had turned into a churning swamp of translucent worms that sucked me down. I woke up gasping for breath, face buried in a sweaty pillow.


Climbing out of bed, I stumbled through the thick air to the stairs. It grew cooler, almost bearable as I descended, then turned the corner into a kitchen swathed in shadows.


Dad was at the table, and the man across from him stood. “Brent, this is Lawrence Pelham. He comes highly recommended by the Mawlamyine Board of Trade as the best English speaking tutor in the area.”


Rumpled and groggy, I simply grunted as I plodded past them toward the fridge, the door barely open before Dad snapped, “Don’t open it when the power’s off. The food will spoil.” Blah, blah, blah. “There’s bread in the breadbox and fruit on the counter. And our guest brought us some local cheese.”


Hearing that word, I turned with a smile. I hadn’t had cheese in weeks.


“Leicester–British cheese–made locally since 1820. You see, I raise dairy cows – on the side. Tutor, rancher, entrepreneur. At any rate, felicitations, young man! Delighted to meet you,” said Lawrence, straightening his curved spine to achieve an impressive height while proffering a handshake that conveyed little of the intended enthusiasm of his words. His long fingered hands were unnaturally slender, arms so long that his bony wrists were entirely visible beyond the cuff of his white suit. He looked like Ebenezer Scrooge on a prison camp regimen – skin fish-belly white, and a long fringe of yellow feather duster hair surrounding his liver-spotted head. But the thing that struck me most was his voice – piping and proper, with a strange, slurpy British accent and a hint of a lisp. “As I understand it, getting you out of the house is our first order of business. And being your local dairy connection, I know a shop just an hour’s drive from here that makes primo Italiano gelato.” He turned back to Dad. “I’ll have him back by seven.”


“A trial run then.” Dad nodded. “Until the weekend.”


I didn’t seem to have any say in the decision. Which was okay I guess. Lawrence’s ancient Mercedes had state-of-the-art AC and despite being creepy looking, the old tutor was like a walking collection of interesting quirks. During the drive, he mostly just got me to talk about myself, but I also learned a bit about him, most surprisingly that he had been born and raised in Mawlamyine and spoke no other language than his peculiar and meticulous English.


He shrugged, the moist corners of his lips curling into a smile. “The street I grew up on was a closed community of old British families. My grandfather was a friend of Rudyard Kipling. My uncle was a counselor when George Orwell was on the local police force.”


“Like, the writer, Orwell?” My English teacher had loaned me Animal Farm and Orwell’s tale had absorbed me.


“Just like that, yes,” Lawrence grinned broadly. “We knew him as Captain Eric Blair. He had blue circles tattooed on his knuckles but he never said what they were all about.”


“You knew him personally?” I asked, trying to calculate how old that would make him. That would have to be like the 1930s!


“Perhaps not.” Lawrence laughed. “But my father’s stories were vivid enough I can almost remember being there.”


After that we talked about books. At least until we saw the giant Buddha reclining on the hillside ahead–at which point the conversation turned to local culture and the eclecticism of the Buddhist way. As we grew closer to the slumbering deity, life sized painted statues of monks carrying alms bowls appeared on the verge of the highway just before we took the turn off for the gelato shop. It was in a tiny cluster of wooden houses, mostly selling different representations of the reclining Buddha, none very well made or expensive. The gelato itself was pretty runny and lumpy with mango, but cold and good just the same.


After that, he took me to the monument that housed the Win-sein-Taw-Ya Shrine. It was filled with colorful dioramas of people being tortured and swimming in lava and turning into animals. “There’s another nearby shrine that’s rather like a carnival – with neon fountains and bowls moving across the landscape that the children can aim at. Doesn’t seem very dignified for a great religion, really. But who am I to judge?”


I admitted to Lawrence that I didn’t understand Christianity or Islam much better than Buddhism and he simply nodded, shrugged and said, “Religion is the opium of the people.”


To which I responded brightly, “Ernest Hemingway,” and enjoyed the admiring way he looked at me while people around us jostled and prayed and filled the many fountains with coins.


He said to me, “Such a relief. Someone of your generation who cares about literary masterworks. We should get along smashingly.”


The next day, he assessed my math skills by setting out a bunch of questions that involved my buying video games in Myanmar currency. All of his lessons were tied to real life – and when I went shopping in Yangon that weekend, I’m sure I saved about $40 buying games. Our attempts to contact Mom were a bit more successful and we talked for hours that weekend, but with that came the bad news that she had several more chemo treatments that would keep her grounded in Canada for months. I gave my new tutor a rave review and she helped convince Dad to keep Lawrence on, at least for the time being.


We got home early Sunday evening, and I excused myself right after dinner to go upstairs and install the new games on my computer. But as my bedroom door closed behind me, I realized it wasn’t eagerness that compelled me up the stairs. The instant the door closed behind me, it was like someone had opened a spigot in my chest and drained out every ounce of energy. I leaned back against the wall and slid toward the floor, and even before sleep had completely claimed me, the dream started pulling me in.


The woman in green was rushing toward me from the far end of the subway train. Leaning over me, she asked, “Did you find Henry?”


I reached into my shopping bag and pulled out a coconut shell like the one she’d given me in the previous dream. Instead of a larva inside, there was a face – Lawrence’s face – waxy and distorted. Red rimmed eyes peered out at me from deep within the sockets. The lips wrapped themselves around words, “Still here, Penelope, my love. Only you can see me, know me, release me. And I, in turn, release you. Can you hear me? Come to me?”


“Tell him, yes,” said the woman urgently, but it wasn’t until I saw my reflection in the wardrobe mirror that I realized it was actually me saying it. In true dream fashion, I had become Penelope. I put my hand to my belly, empty of the child it had once contained. Our child. I shook my head, confused as I heard myself saying, “We will be together again.”


My eyes fluttered open, and I sat staring at the reflection of a fifteen year old boy, sitting on the floor, clinging to a shopping bag. After a brief check to reassure myself it contained no coconut shells, I hung the bag from my chair. Any urge to check out the new games had long since dissipated, so I lay on the bed, listening to the pounding of my heart, until I finally drifted back to sleep. As far as I can remember, it was a totally normal sleep.


On Monday, with the power down again, we went to Lawrence’s house. Being wood frame, it had not survived the ravages of time and typhoon as tidily as Twelve Oaks. The teak interior had remained intact, but it had lost its gleam, fading almost to grey and creaking like a tall ship whenever you walked down a hallway or went up the stairs.


After retrieving some books from his library, we stopped off at a massive wooden wardrobe in the hall, where Lawrence seemed to have a sort of epiphany and threw open the doors with the flair of a game show presenter. The interior was filled with the crisp white suits that Lawrence always wore, each in its own plastic dry-cleaning bag. “They were purchased for the house staff – when we still had a staff. When I still had a family for that matter. Extremely well-tailored. The Burmen are slighter, so there are almost certainly smaller sizes that would fit you if you’re interested.”


Imagining myself in one of these suits, I had to put my hand over my mouth to hide my smile. I smiled so seldom back then that the braces felt weird against my lips and I was aware of them for the first time in a long time. “I’m good, Lawrence. But thanks.”


“All right then,” he declared throwing his hands in the air. “You don’t want a free suit. No accounting for modern tastes.


A few hours later, he said out of the blue, “Do I understand that your pater is trying to restore Twelve Oaks as a working plantation? If so, I have something he might be interested in. It’s called a steam mangle. They’re also called wringers. This one compresses slabs of rubber between rollers. And it’s steam powered. Perhaps even predating the dawn of the 20th century. I have an idea of how much it would sell for through Sotheby’s, so I shan’t let it go for a song. But I’m sure we can work something out, maybe even some manner of rental arrangement. Would you like to see it?”


I shrugged. “He doesn’t exactly confide in me, but he needs this sort of thing for the restoration. So he’d probably be interested.”


“I have a perfectly adequate hand mangle,” he explained, “so I don’t need this monstrosity. Come down for a look-see.”


I trailed him down the basement stairs into the darkness. When he flipped a bank of switches at the bottom of the stairs, I expected a glare like a football stadium, but the few shaded lamps that were still working merely struggled to make certain parts of the room a bit less dark than others. A thick sliver of light sliced into the room from between the big barn doors that opened into the yard.


Lawrence was delivering an enthusiastic sales pitch. “You can let him know what excellent shape it’s in. I bought some fresh thick-slab from a local gatherer and ran a few sheets through.”


As Lawrence stepped into the darkness to retrieve a sheet of rubber from the wire where it hung, I remembered the dream and asked, “Do you know anyone named Henry or Penelope?”


Lawrence stiffened as he reached up to take a slab off the drying line, then said, “So someone has told you the story? Or did you always know?”


“What story?”


“About the ghost at Twelve Oaks. Penelope MacGregor. Nothing like a good ghost story to attract tourists of a certain type? Any type, really.” He shook his head. “Poor Penelope. Always looking, looking, looking for her Henry. More sad than tragic, I suppose. Very romantic.”


“I didn’t know there was a story,” I said. “I’ve just been having dreams about her.”


He raised a brow. “You must have heard the story, even unconsciously. To remember the names like that.”


“Nope,” I shook my head. “It’s all in the dream. She’s always asking about Henry. Sure that I’ve seen him. Giving me messages and gifts to pass along.”


Even though he stood just a few steps away, Lawrence’s face seemed as featureless as the rectangular slabs hanging from the racks like meat in an abattoir. “What kind of gifts?” he asked. “Physical objects? Books or letters?”


I told him about the coconut shells in the dream, the larva and the face. “But nothing real. In the dream, you were Henry, only younger.”


“At least that’s how you remember it. Dreams are curious that way. Always changing.”


“The face spoke to me, but I don’t remember what it said.”


“You don’t seem as spooked about the prospect of a ghost as one might expect.”


“They’re just dreams,” I shrugged. “If I saw an actual ghost, I’d probably be more freaked out. But it might be pretty cool.”


Lawrence stepped out into the light, carrying a sheet of rubber the size of a bathmat. “Let’s take this sample to show your da how well the machine works.”


I took the rubber from him, surprised at its weight, given that it wasn’t much thicker than a cotton blanket. I draped it over my arm, but as I followed Lawrence back upstairs, I felt overwhelmed with curiosity about what would happen if I draped the sheet of rubber over my head – wondering if it would conform to my features.


As I came out of the doorway at the top of the stairs, I was shocked by Lawrence’s outburst as he shouted, “Take it off.”


As I spun it to look out through the gap, Lawrence grabbed the edge of the sheet and angrily pulled it off, nearly ripping my head off with it. The force slammed me into the wall and I stood there rubbing my shoulder.


“I’m sorry,” said Lawrence immediately, “About the unintentional roughhousing. I didn’t mean to do that. Rubber attracts mold spores. No telling what kind of jungle fever it may give you.”


I grimaced at his silhouette in the light funneling in from the far end of the narrow hall.


After a while, he said, quietly, “I do apologize. I did ask you to remove it. Are you… quite alright?”


I glared at him – surprised how strong he was for an old man. “Maybe you should take me home. We could do the math lesson there.”


“There’s not enough light at your house. Perhaps when the power comes back on.”


“It’s bright in my room.”


Lawrence smiled and said, “Wise tutors avoid going into their students’ bedrooms. Why don’t we just go into town? The Martaban Museum is displaying some newly acquired Mon relics. We can have curry for lunch at the Khit Thit and I might even buy you a beer as long as you don’t tell your dear da.”


As he spoke, the sheet of rubber dangled from his forearm like a big awkward wing. Within its flaps and drapes and jiggles, I saw the contours of a face looking out at me from the pliant surface–not my face, but Penelope’s.


It vanished into the folds as Lawrence turned away from me. I followed him out the front door and as he locked it behind me, I said, “On the way into town you can tell me the story.”


He gave me a blank, wordless look, so I went on. “You can’t just drop the bomb that there’s a ghost in my house and then not tell me the story.”


“I suppose I did open that can of worms.”


As we pulled the Mercedes out onto the highway, Lawrence said, “I’d have told you earlier, but didn’t want to frighten you unnecessarily. The locals call them preta, which translates to hungry ghost. Spirits that desire things they can never have. Twelve Oaks has its very own preta. Simply put, Penelope MacGregor died under mysterious circumstances after receiving news of the demise of her betrothed, my great-uncle, Major Henry Pelham. And she’s been waiting for him ever since.”


“That’s the whole story? I mean, Henry’s your uncle. Have you done any ghost-hunting? Has she ever come looking for him at your estate?”


“Why would she do that?”


I shrugged, “maybe her ghost tracked down his ghost.”


Lawrence shook his head. “Henry is long gone.”


“How can we be sure?” I said. “There has to be more you can tell me.”


“I know more details, background sort of thing. Major Henry Pelham was appointed to head up the front line garrison in Mandalay and tasked with quelling the latest round of unrest–both real and rumored – within the Raj. Family legend has it that my namesake, Lawrence Pelham, went out of his way to look in on and look after his elder brother’s fiancée while Henry was away. The young Lawrence adored her, her kindness, her beauty, even her faithfulness to his brother and knew there was nothing he could do to win her favor or her romantic interest.


She made it abundantly clear that she could hardly wait until Henry either returned from his post or called her to Rangoon to live with him. Then Henry died on the front. Suffocated in a burning barrack after an attack by insurgents. But even after he died–after his funeral–Penelope kept waiting for him and him alone, and is waiting still they say. She was delusional, hysterical, eventually institutionalized.”


“Is it possible that Henry wasn’t really dead?”


“The army couldn’t ship his body back for burial, but I’ve seen the casting that they made–a death-mask that’s entombed in his crypt.”


“If it was entombed, how did you see it?”


After a long silence, he said, “The crypt was damaged in a storm. It’s been resealed.”


“Did you know that he sent her letters, after he had supposedly died,” I asked.


Lawrence shook his head. “Do you have any of these actual letters, or did you just learn about them in a dream?”


I shrugged, unable to explain how I knew about the letters in the first place. But I remembered their neat script, their luminous words, Even in death, you consume me. How can I pass unto that cold land without us ever consummating our bond that made each day on Earth worth living? At the mercy of the seraphims who believe in love above all else, I have been given human form in which to come to you.


“Even in death, you consume me,” I said. “That’s how the first one began. He sent them after he died.”


“Ahhh, ghost letters! There’s a new theory.”


“She couldn’t tell anyone,” I explained. “The letter said that if their union became known to any mortal soul, it would become no more than a memory. The letter bid her to burn his letters so that he could climb the ladder of ash to her room.”


Lawrence’s voice croaked a bit as he said, “I’m not sure it’s safe for you to stay in that room. What if she draws you into her dementia?”


“Where else am I going to stay?” I put to him, realizing as I did so that the prospect of communicating with the ghost excited more than terrified me.



The next day, my dad sent a truck and three men to pick up the mangler. While everyone else was outside, hoisting the machine onto the truck, I explored the cellar. In an unlit corner, I found a cabinet that was nowhere near as dusty as everything around it. As I reached out, I was startled by a noise a hissing and slithering through the darkness. The ground seemed to squirm at my feet and I jumped back.


“It’s Henry,” the snakes hissed and slithered. “He’ssss here. Henry? Henry? Henry? Sssssssssssssssso near.”


A hand clamped over my shoulder and I just about jumped out of my skin as Lawrence said, “So we’re all done here.”


“Do you have snakes down here?”


He laughed. “There are probably snakes living under most of the houses in Burma. Did you see one?”


“It spoke to me,” I almost told him, but instead I said nothing.


That night on the dream train, Penelope sat down beside me.


“I don’t think I truly believed Henry would come back to me until the night he came knocking at my door,” Penelope whispered. Through her eyes, I saw his face perched upon the pillow. With her fingertips, I traced the curve of his jaw. Although all the features were Lawrence’s features, this was not him. It was Henry. Of course it was Henry, who had declared his immortal love, who had broached the greatest chasm to be with her for one beautiful night. It was Henry who had entered her and spilled his angelic seed inside her–completing their bond. It was Henry–right up until that awful moment when it wasn’t.


She handed me a book instead of a coconut shell. I awakened, certain I had seen a copy of that book, Pride and Prejudice, somewhere in the house. I got out of bed and started searching through the bookshelves, finding it in the living room. When I opened it, two envelopes, along with a yellowed, scallop-edged photograph slid out from behind the vellum frontispiece. It was a picture of a man in uniform – of Lawrence to be precise. On the back was inscribed, “Counting the heartbeats until you are back in my arms. All my love, Henry.”


“Look in his cellar,” an urgent whisper awakened me from the dream. The first thing I saw upon opening my eyes was Penelope’s face, inches from my own – locking her gaze with me, as she repeated, “the cellar.”


The next morning. Lawrence drove up and honked for me rather than coming in as usual.


“Did you dream of Penelope again last night?”


“She gave me something to show you.”


“Another coconut shell?”


“Something real this time. She told me where to find it.”


I refused to show it to him until we sat down in his living room. He read the inscription on the back then flipped it over and stared into his own eyes. “The resemblance is uncanny, I’ll give you that. He shrugged, smirked. “Genetics I suppose.”


I shook my head. “She told me to look in your basement.”


“Look for what?”


“Hell if I know.” I said, “But do you mind if we go down and look. Our personal ghost adventure awaits, right down these stairs.”


I grasped the knob, opened the door and stepped down. The surfeit of creaking behind me made me turn my head in time to see Lawrence coming up behind me, swinging a fireplace poker down toward my head, but I stepped aside and his downward arc carried him off balance and he tumbled past me down the stairs.


At the bottom of the stairs, I flicked on the bank of feeble lights to find Lawrence sprawled, face down on the concrete floor. One leg had snapped and was bent sideways. In the fall, he had dropped something that was now lying just beyond his outstretched fingertips – looking like the pupae from my dream. I nudged it with my shoe, and it unfolded as it rolled over.


It was Lawrence’s face, or rather, a rubber mask of his face – distorted and hollow eyed. I picked it up and stared into the empty eye sockets. Behind me, the man moaned and lifted his head. What was left of the features on his skull stood out like inflamed scabs on stretched white parchment. The creature gestured toward the mask, imploring me to give it back, which made me grip it tighter.


As I tried to step around him to get to the stairs, a strong hand clamped around my ankle. I didn’t fall, but as I struggled to free myself, he grabbed the mask, tearing it from my grip so violently that I was left clinging to a rubber ear and part of a jaw.


He toppled me onto my back. As he pulled what was left of the mask tightly over his skull, I could see his body begin to instantly repair itself, the broken leg bending and straightening back into shape as he climbed to his feet and took a clumsy step toward me.


I watched his rubber lips move, his eyes blink, almost normal again. “You found my masks, didn’t you? Yesterday? You better not have done anything to them or I’ll make a death-mask of you.” Blood poured down his neck from the missing ear and I glanced down at the bloody bit of cartilage in my hand.


He backed me to the corner where I had heard “the snake.” On the upper shelf was a plaster mask – the deathmask, I assumed. On the bottom shelf were rubber castings, a dozen masks at least – all with Henry’s features.


He pulled off the one he was wearing and threw it to the floor with a bloody splat. While he was replacing it with a fresh mask, smoothing it into place, I took advantage of the distraction, running past him, unbolting the swinging door and bursting out. As I glanced over my shoulder, it was not the elderly tutor my father had hired who I saw standing there, but rather the young colonial soldier whose face had supplied the mould. Lawrence had somehow become 40 years younger.


I ran through the rubber grove, screaming for help from anyone who might be out there, but seeing no one, no gatherers, no construction workers, or cowherds. As I paused, disorientated, the creature that was Lawrence caught up to me, hauling me down and straddling me. But coming up through the well of panic inside me, I felt a presence, and like in the dreams where I became Penelope, she stepped into my head.


I don’t know what Lawrence saw when I spoke in her voice, “Henry, you’re back.”


He stared back down and said, “You can’t possibly still be waiting?”


“And why wouldn’t I be?” said Penelope. “You have always been everything to me.”


He seemed paralyzed with shock and disbelief. Frozen enough at least that I was able to squirm out of his grasp and buck him off me. He jumped to his feet, but instead of attacking me again, he ran back into the house, slamming the basement door behind him. A moment later, I saw motion though an upstairs window, in the trophy room near Henry’s crypt. Penelope imagined him loading an antique rifle and since she was inside of me, I shared that supposition. I stood swaying in the hot morning sun, trying to convince myself to turn and flee, but she clung to me, refusing to let go.


“I’ve finally found him,” she told me. “I need you now.”


My eyes fluttered shut and I struggled to escape the waking dream, but she remained in front of me. “It’s not really Henry.” I said. “He’s Lawrence, he was….”


“I know.”


Her stark words hung in the air. “I know what he really is. There’s one honest thing he told me. If a mortal learns the truth it comes undone. Now that you know about him, he will come for you. If you run away, there’s no telling what he would do to silence you. He’d kill your father, I’m sure. But right now, we have the upper hand. We can destroy him.”


“But what is it I know?” I said to the ghost. “I’m so confused.”


“Come with me.”


My shock and terror was finally beginning to ebb, as Penelope’s outrage and hunger for vengeance filled me. I ducked down into a crouch and began running through the grove, not towards Twelve Oaks, but rather, circling back toward Lawrence’s house. Of course all the doors were locked. I was leaning back against the basement wall wondering how to proceed, when the door swung open. Thinking that he’d caught us and half-expecting a bullet through the chest, I staggered back, but the figure in the doorway cocked a sly brow at me as she turned to smoke. As I felt her flow back into me, I thought (or at least felt her thinking), there are some advantages to being a ghost.


I could hear Lawrence stomping and shuffling across the floor above me, walking as though he hadn’t just broken his leg. My breath caught in my throat as he moved back toward the stairs. The cabinet door was open and the shelves were empty. There on the floor, looking up at me, was the mask that Lawrence had discarded – the torn face that I had gotten to know as Lawrence.


I picked it up.


“Put it on,” said Penelope’s voice in my head.


She held it out to me, a layer of raw, bleeding flesh dimming its translucence.


I felt like puking on the floor or shouting what the hell do you want from me lady? Or just curling into a ball. But I knew what she wanted, and required me to turn the mask over, and lower my face into the bloody mess as though it was a hot towel.


Henry’s final memories flooded into me, of being dragged by his wrists out of a fire that was enveloping the barracks at the camp where he was stationed. He had regained consciousness, opening his bleary eyes to find himself lying in a box. The smell of plaster was overwhelming, the last face he saw before the viscous fluid flowed over his forehead filling his eyes was his younger brother’s long gaunt face. Henry opened his mouth to scream and the substance filled him, choked him, drowned him–trapping his soul in that living deathmask.


Inside me, Penelope writhed, her hunger for the truth undermined by its bitterness. In the same way that a part of Henry’s soul had been captured in the deathmask and transferred to the rubber copies, the thoughts and recollections now racing through my mind were from Lawrence’s perspective – far fresher, more fervid than Henry’s comparatively petrified memories. The whole story was laid out before her now, a banquet of poisons.


Through my senses, she experienced Lawrence’s nightly vigil while he watched, in a rapture of adoration and devotion, as Penelope prayed and got ready for bed.


We accompanied Lawrence on his journey to the shrine of the demon, Kama-Mara, in a huge hollow baobab bole in the jungle, vividly recalling the moment he pushed aside a great curtain of moss, to be enveloped in a haze of earthy incense that reeked like dung and mud and fungus. Unlike Buddha, who never greets you personally at the door, Kama-Mara was waiting cross legged in his thorny robes and grateful for their visit. When he took Lawrence’s hands in his, the young man staggered back and the demon laughed companionably. “You must let me feel your need. The better I understand it, the better I can help with your problem. Show me the depth of your desire.”


Lawrence had wanted his brother’s life. He had wanted Penelope. And so, the deal was struck, the steps were taken: the kidnapping from the battlefield, the making of the mold while Henry’s lungs filled with plaster, and the letter to Penelope in a very good approximation of his dead brother’s hand, (for Lawrence had practiced many years) declaring that death had not freed him from her love, the ink running where his tears spilled onto the page.


Putting his plan into action had been a gradual thing. There had been many letters, growing bolder each time. Explaining how difficult it was to cross between the realms, convincing her that she was pulling him inexorably into the mortal world by following his instructions – going out onto her balcony, touching herself in certain ways so he could watch. Henry’s dress uniform had hung large on him the first time he stepped out into the faint light that permeated the gardens of the estate, making sure she glimpsed him before stepping back into the shadows.


Then finally putting on the mask, on the night of the winter dance at the Anglican Church when he had convinced her to stay home alone. The love and longing in her eyes, the most powerful thing Lawrence had ever felt. As they kissed, all his worries were washed away in a tide of fulfillment and desire. She gave herself to him again and again and again, as they both forgot that the rest of the world existed.


Until a knock came at her bedroom door.


“We heard noises. Are you alright my dear?” came her father’s voice.


Lawrence whispered to her, “If they see me, then I will never be able to come back.”


“I’ll keep them away, my love.”


As he hid, he began to sweat and the mask no longer adhered to his skin. He tried desperately to put the disguise back on. When it didn’t work, he dressed quickly.


“What is going on in here?” her father demanded, bursting into the room. The mask slipped from Lawrence’s fingers, and with it, all pretense.


“Lawrence?” came the father’s voice. “What are you doing here?”


Penelope gazed at him with widening eyes as he fastened his belt. “Why are you wearing his clothes? Where is Henry?”


“Listen here young man! What are you doing in my daughter’s room?”


Wordlessly, Lawrence fled, leaving behind a crowd of open-mouthed onlookers and a wailing and very confused and grief-stricken young woman.


In the aftermath, she denied ever letting Lawrence into her bedroom and refused to believe that Henry was dead. She had seen him, made love with him…and as it turned out, was carrying his child. The family confined her to the house, ashamed of both her pregnancy and her growing madness. And Lawrence, having once tasted her, was both sated and banned from Twelve Oaks.


One moment I knew none of this, the next the memories were part of me. I even shared in the feeling of relief he’d felt upon hearing the news that Penelope had hanged herself following her return from the asylum.


Her screams of anguish and fury erupted from inside me. Her treasured memories of her final tryst with the man she loved now fully exposed.


I opened my eyes to see Lawrence coming down the stairs, holding an elephant gun he had shown off to me earlier in the week.


“What’s that on your face?” Lawrence demanded. “That’s not yours. That’s mine! Take it off!”


He pulled the trigger–and I’m not at all sure what followed.


There were curtains of rubber between us, which the bullets couldn’t seem to penetrate. They hit the barriers, unearthly and inviolable, and simply dropped out of the air, mingling with the shell casings on the floor.


As Lawrence stared stupidly at the empty gun, his face grew longer, mouth gaping stupidly, eye-sockets emptying of all sensibility as the final lies fell away.


“I know everything about you now,” I said. “And so does Penelope.”


As her name escaped my lips, her spirit seemed to billow out from my chest – her long arms reaching, her cold hands grasping his ankles as she pulled him back down the stairs, his enfeebled hands clawing, fingers snapping off, fingertips crumbling to dust. It screamed as she reached into him and tore out his life-force like gutting a fish.


Now knowing where Lawrence had put the masks, I ran up the stairs, opened the vault beneath the Henry’s monument and pulled them out. When I smashed the plaster deathmask onto the flagstones, I felt Henry’s spirit, pouring from the rents, rising up between the pieces. Penelope was there to gather them, And I left the two of them there, spirits swirling as I went back down to the basement to prepare an acid bath for the rubber faces–which were now no more than faces, with Henry’s spirit having escaped at last.


You might think I’d have been covered in his blood, but Lawrence had apparently lived a bloodless life. There was nothing left of him beyond the ash smeared white suit crumpled on the floor. The police investigation was over in a heartbeat. For all of his unnatural years, it seems that Lawrence did not make much of an impression upon the world.




Wouldn’t You Rather



By Serena Johe



For most of the year, Diner 66 is frequented almost entirely by regulars. It’s in the early fall that the reporter first shows up, the last week of September, just as the leaves begin to turn and the early-bird tourists infiltrate the restaurant on their way north. That’s probably why no one pays him any mind. He seems to float in on the breeze with the others. The out-of-towners don’t know the regulars from the tourists, and the regulars merely assumed he’d leave with the rest of the flock, but he continues to frequent their establishment into late October.


He’s impeccably dressed in his tan trench coat and black leather gloves, the fedora atop his head and the spiral notepad in hand like a journalist from a black-and-white movie of days past. The fifties themed diner seems to swallow him up that way. His outdated dress and odd mannerisms make the locals feel more out of place than he seems to be, despite his anomalous presence.


After most of the through traffic has made its way north and back south again, Clay, like the rest of the locals who frequent Diner 66, can’t help but take notice of him. He spends long hours hopping from table to table, countertop stool to window seat. He always spends money–powdered donuts and vanilla cappuccinos, or bear claws and hot chocolate–and he tips well. Well enough, anyway, for the staff to turn a blind eye to his constantly pestering the customers, though they have a tendency to play along with his often absurd interview questions regardless.


It’s not that Clay has any particular interest in eavesdropping, but it’s hard not to pick up the man’s smooth, unfamiliar voice, like the low hum of a cello cutting through the clanking dishes and quiet laughter of the other patrons’ conversations. Even his stride sets him apart. His movements are fluid and conducted with unusual gaiety as he slides into the burgundy faux-leather booth near the door. There’s something about it that bugs Clay. The man always seems like he’s half-a-second from erupting into emasculating giggles.


“We’ll start with an easy one, shall we?” The reporter asks the woman across from him with a wide smile, pen poised over his notepad. “Would you rather take a trip to the beach, or go skiing?”


“Oh, the beach, definitely,” Cindy Hoffman replies instantly, smoothing her hair back in a way that reminds Clay of a preening bird. “I hate being stuck in the cold all winter.”


He hums sympathetically, his attention undivided as he scribbles detailed notes. When he seems satisfied with the transcription, he turns to Cindy’s husband, his eyes briefly flitting to the uneaten donut on his plate.


“I suppose a more difficult question is in order, then. If you don’t mind, sir?”


“Not at all.” Carl sounds just as pleased to be considered important enough for the article.


“Excellent! Well, then, let’s see here… would you rather save a loved one’s life from cancer, or win the lottery?”


Carl catches Cindy’s look, but he still asks, “Which loved one?”


“I couldn’t say.”


“Oh, no contest, then.” Carl forcefully slaps a meaty palm down on the table, rattling the silverware. “The first one.”


“Interesting. Yes, good choice, I should think…”


Clay, watching discreetly from the breakfast bar, can’t help but roll his eyes. Everyone is completely infatuated with the man. It’s part of the dilemma of living in a small town like this one–everyone’s starved for attention. There’s never been anything or anyone in North Park worth making the papers until he showed up. Now, everyone seems to be of the utmost interest and all too happy to oblige this stranger’s odd solicitations, so much so that his interviewees have yet to ask him what it is, exactly, he’s writing about. Maybe they’re afraid the story won’t be as grand and emotionally compelling as they hoped. Clay thinks they’d probably be right.


When Carl and Cindy stand to leave after pleasantries and handshakes are exchanged, the reporter remains behind, his wrist seizing over the paper below like an inspired artist. Then he puts the pen down on the table, drawing himself up with a deep inhalation. His eyes once again return to the donut left on Carl’s plate. He seems to be considering it until he notices Cindy’s lipstick is smudged on the edge of her Coke glass. The reporter picks it up and holds it to the light as if expecting to find flakes of gold in her cheap make-up. Maybe he does. The pen is back in his grasping fingers in an instant.


“What the hell’s this guy think he is now? A scientist?” Clay mutters, turning back to his coffee. The clatter of the saucer when he sets the cup down belies his frustration.


From his right, Paige laughs under her breath. “What’s so wrong with that? He’s just doing his job.”


“What kind of reporter asks such ridiculous questions?”


She shrugs. “Maybe it’s an editorial.”


Editorial, Clay repeats the word in his head. Editorial my ass, he thinks. What could possibly be so important about whether Collin wants a dog or a cat, or if Ms. McGruder would rather win a new car than the Pulitzer Prize? What’s so important about that? He scowls at the yellow stripes of the countertop. That kind of smart-ass questioning is just how people like that reporter, people that think they’re smarter than everyone else, get their kicks.


“Are you sure you’re not just jealous?” Paige tries not to smile at the grumpy look on his face. “If you want to do an interview, you could just go ask him, you know.”


Clay gives her an impatient sidelong glance. “Why the hell would I want to do that?”


“Sounds like fun to me.”


“Yeah, I bet it does.”


“Oh, sweet love of mine,” Paige sighs theatrically, grabbing the last half of her bagel and dropping a few bills beside her plate. “I love it when you insult me. See you after work?”


Clay gives her an exasperated look, but she still wins a small smile from him, at least.


“Yeah. After work,” he agrees, giving her a chaste kiss. He watches her exit, the little silver bell atop the door announcing her departure, and then returns his attention to the reporter.


He’s eating the donut. The syrupy glaze clings to the fingers of his leather gloves, and when the pastry is gone, he looks down at his hand and blinks confusedly at it, as if he genuinely hadn’t expected the sugar to stick to him. Then he dunks his sticky fingers into Carl’s water glass and wipes it on his coat.


That’s it, Clay thinks, getting up from his seat. He snatches his keys and shoves his EpiPen into his pocket with his wallet. There must be something wrong with this guy, what with his weird mannerisms and strange questions, and if that’s the case, it’s the townspeople’s responsibility to investigate. This stranger’s been here for almost a month and not a single person can even say where he lives. For all he knows, this man might be dangerous.


Clay slides into the booth, setting his coffee cup on the table to stick out his hand.


“Clay.”


“Jack,” the man smiles widely. His damp fingers are unpleasantly cold.


There’s an extended silence as Clay tries to figure out an angle. Jack, meanwhile, only continues to smile in that gleeful way, like a man about to leave on a long vacation. Eventually, his gaze once again drifts down to the tabletop, jumping from left over morsel to left over morsel, presumably in search of something to eat. The grin never leaves his face, though. It’s only his eyes that move.


“What are you writing about?” Clay asks at last, if only to get the reporter to stop looking a cat in a field of mice.


But Jack just flaps a hand at him. “Oh, you know. This and that.”


“You ask awfully strange questions, you know.”


There’s a piece of pancake on Cindy’s plate, sodden with syrup. Jack eyes it for only a moment before snatching it up.


“I love sweets,” he explains at the other man’s incredulous look. “Can’t resist them. What about you, Clay? Do you like dessert?”


“I didn’t sit here to talk about dessert.”


Jack’s smile grows. “An interview, then?”


“I don’t want one of your ludicrous interviews either.” Clay rolls his tongue behind his teeth agitatedly. “I want to know what you’re doing here. In my town.”


“Is that so…?”


At last, the expression on Jack’s face changes into something other than blithe indifference. He leans forward with his elbows on the table, chin resting in his hands. His head is cocked slightly in a way that reminds Clay of a young lady enamored with her date, and he can’t help but find it unnerving. Jack doesn’t seem to notice, however; he’s studying Clay’s face. His eyes are glittering with suppressed humor. The smile just barely tugging up the corners of his mouth is one a mother might give a child whose put all his clothes on backwards.


“Well, Clay,” Jack breaks the silence, snapping back into his normal posture so abruptly, like his joints are spring loaded, that Clay jumps. His knees hit the underside of the table and rattle the dishes. “I must be honest with you. I think you already know the answer to your own inquiry.”


He waits, but Jack apparently needs prompting. “Which is?”


“I’m here to ask questions.”


“Yeah,” Clay draws out the word. “But what for?”


“Answers.”


“Answers to what?”


“Why, questions, of course!”


“But…” he stops himself. The look on Jack’s face is infuriatingly smug. Clay stands stiffly, leaving his unfinished coffee settled between plates, his jaw flexed in irritation. “Screw you, buddy.”


He drops the other half of the check over Paige’s bills and leaves without another word. Jack’s eyes are on him the whole way out, but he doesn’t turn to look.


Who has time for that kind of nonsense?



Clay avoids the diner for two weeks. The reporter makes him distinctly uncomfortable in a way that he can’t quite describe. No man smiles that much, he thinks resolutely, unless he’s got that much to smile about, and whatever it is that’s got Jack so happy, Clay doesn’t want any part of it. Especially not after being caught in one of his idiotic games.


It’s baffling to him that there are so many others who continue to willingly subject themselves to Jack’s laughable line of questioning, though, but people do. He catches snippets of conversations throughout town and at work, and despite his desertion of the diner, Paige continues to drink coffee there while she writes. When they find each other after work, she informs him that Jack is still there doing much the same thing.


“I don’t know why you’re being such a baby about this,” she teases him over dinner, but Clay stubbornly refuses to go back.


“I just don’t like the guy. There’s something off about him.”


“Well, yeah,” Paige agrees, “but he’s not going to jump across the diner and kill you or anything. I just don’t see what the problem is.”


It’s a matter of principle, really. There’s just something wrong about a man wandering into town and bugging the locals, asking questions for his own gain and offering nothing in return. It doesn’t seem fair. Besides, even if Jack won’t spill the beans, Clay is more than certain that whatever he’s writing about is as empty-headed as the man doing the writing, so the fact that all these people are lining up to be a part of it is just plain disturbing. Surely Jack will leave soon anyway.


At the end of the second week, however, something else begins to bother him. He’d listened to Jack’s inane questions for nearly three weeks before confronting him. Of course he’d remember a few conversations. So, it’s strange, he thinks, when Collin gets a cat, but perhaps Jack’s question put the idea in his head. That wouldn’t explain Ms. McGruder’s winning a car in a magazine sweepstakes, though, or Cindy’s free airline tickets to Florida, or Carl’s mother’s cancer scare that turned out to be a benign lump.


There are others, too. His neighbor loses his great grandfather’s lighter but finds a thousand dollars sewn into his mattress while searching for it. Paige’s best friend drops twenty pounds in ten days. Oddities begin to pile up, and perhaps it’s because Clay spent so long eavesdropping on the interviews that he’s the only one that puts it together. Now, if only he could figure out what it is, exactly, that he’s put together.


On Monday morning, Clay returns to the diner. He’s not entirely sure what he’s come here to ask, let alone how he’s going to ask it, but the point is that there’s something that needs to be asked and somebody has to do the asking. Besides, he figures, Jack loves questions. Maybe he’ll like answering them too.


He finds Jack engaged in conversation at the back of the diner. The woman across from him is answering a question, something about jail or a coma. There’s a plate full of powdered raspberry donuts in front of him that he’s casually demolishing at a speed normally reserved for competitive eating. One of the donuts is leaking jelly, and this one, he picks up, squeezing it slightly and watching the bright red, sugary substance gather atop it like a kid watching Santa come down the chimney. He’s so intensely focused on the food that he evidently forgets the woman across the table until she remarks on the odd behavior.


“I love sweets,” Jack says with that broad smile. “Can’t resist them. What about you, Becca? Do you like dessert?”


Clay waits for them to finish up the interview. In the meantime, he pays for half-a-dozen strawberry croissants and two cups of hot chocolate, carefully balancing the platter of pastries on his wrist as he approaches the booth once Becca makes her way out. He slides the plate over the previous, now empty, one.


He’s obviously made the right choice. Jack wiggles his fingers delightedly.


“What a pleasant surprise!” He announces, clearly giddy, and immediately begins tearing into the first pastry. “Clay, to what do I owe the pleasure?”


He tries to make himself feel as sure as he sounds. “I want to know how you’re doing this.”


“Doing what?”


Clay inhales deeply. His fingers drum pensively against the table.


“Look,” he says with the exhale, “I can’t help but notice that these questions of yours–that the answers matter.”


“Well, of course they matter,” Jack says patiently. “Why would I ask them if they didn’t?”


“But I don’t understand.”


“Neither do I. That’s why I’m the one asking the questions.”


“But, you,” Clay rubs his hands over his face, “how is it that when you ask someone something, the way they answer the question actually happens?”


“You mean that their choice results in its own fruition.”


“Yes,” Clay affirms, perhaps a bit exasperatedly.


“Oh. Oh, I see.” The bell signaling an order is ready chimes loudly in the emptying diner. Jack, momentarily distracted, pauses with his mouth open. When he sees the plate of roast beef up on the metal counter separating the kitchen, he turns back to Clay, his usual smile in place. “Yes. That’s me.”


They spend a moment in contemplative silence. Jack’s expression remains frozen in place as his hand begins to slide toward another pastry, as if he doesn’t realize it’s happening. The inappropriateness of it jars Clay back into the situation.


When he speaks, it’s clear his sensibilities have been offended.


“That’s impossible.”


“Maybe for you.”


“No,” Clay says firmly. “No one can do that.”


Jack tuts disapprovingly. “It sounds like you’ve made a lot of assumptions.”


“It’s impossible,” he repeats, getting annoyed, but Jack merely tips his head toward the front of the diner. Clay hesitantly peeks around the booth, neck craned to see out the glass door and catch a glimpse of the sudden commotion out front.


Becca’s hands are cuffed behind her back. When Clay numbly slides back into his seat, he finds Jack looking quite pleased with himself.


“Okay,” Clay says shakily. “Okay. Okay.” And then, after a moment more, “What the hell are you?”


His earlier hopes are apparently for naught. Jack does not like to answer questions except with more questions.


“Would you rather know that,” he begins while Clay’s heart sinks into his stomach with dread, “or be able to choose the means of your own death?”


The word “death” coming out of this thing’s powdered sugar covered mouth is utterly disquieting. Everything about Jack, in fact, is disquieting. His brown eyes reflect his jubilant disposition. There’s stubble along his jaw. A pink tinge on his cheeks affirms his constant amusement, and his hair, dark shades of mahogany slicked back with pomade, contrasts all of his mannerisms in a way that is roguishly charming. He looks utterly human.


He’s not.


“What if I don’t answer?” Clay ventures, heavily disliking the way his voice quivers.


Jack’s body twitches to life suddenly. His elbows snap to his sides and his shoulders roll back in an instant. Clay’s knees hit the edge of the table again, exactly reminiscent of their first conversation.


“Then I’ll answer for you.”


There’s no way Clay’s about to let that happen. Besides, in this case, the question is an easy one. Nobody ever gets to choose the means of his death, anyway. It sounds more like a curse than a blessing.


“I want to know the answer,” Clay finally responds. Jack’s face lights up excitedly.


“Oh, good! I was hoping you’d pick that one,” he trills. “Alright, Clay, the truth is that I’m a scientist. An observer of sorts.” He pauses here to sip his hot chocolate and, finding the flavor too pleasing to resist, he finishes the cup in one swig. “Long story short, I’m conducting an experiment to learn about human behavior. I ask a question, then I observe both realities in order to see how reliably a human can judge itself.”


“Observe both realities?” Clay repeats, ignoring the rest of the odd wording. He wishes Paige were here. This is far more her field than his.


“That’s right. I watch the reality of this alternative, and the reality in which the other alternative happened instead. Some of you know yourselves quite well. Others. Well.” His eyes slide briefly to the door. Becca is long gone.


Okay, Clay thinks, clinging to the one word mantra. Okay. Okay.


What does all this mean?


Distractedly, he zeroes in on the details of Jack’s face. He’s got crow’s feet from smiling so much. The guy probably shops at Banana Republic for God’s sake.


“So, hypothetically,” the words come slowly, “if you asked me a question, and I answered it, you could tell me what would’ve happened if I’d made the other choice.”


“Exactly.”


“And a few weeks ago, when Sandra said she’d rather win a million dollars than be able to fly anywhere for free…”


“Tomorrow,” Jack confirms cheerfully. “She found a lottery ticket in her gutter this morning.”


A million dollars. That’s a lot of money. Hell, Carl could’ve won the whole jackpot if he’d been more heartless. And then there’s his neighbor with the thousand dollars, and Ms. McGruder with her new car.


“So, if I asked you to ask me a question –“


“Oh, no, no, no, no,” Jack interrupts emphatically, his finger wagging. “That wouldn’t be very scientific at all. It only works if I choose the questions.”


Of course that would be the case, Clay realizes. Otherwise he’d just be granting wishes. Still, he finds himself considering the words against his better judgment. For the most part, Becca aside, Jack’s inquiries generally seem to run the gamut of favorable outcomes and benign ones. The risk is certainly there. It’s just a matter of the reward.


A million dollars is a lot of money.


He taps his finger against his mug and asks before he can stop himself, “Would you ask me a question, then?”


“That doesn’t sound like a good idea for you.”


“Why?” He goes rigid in his seat. He hadn’t realized he’d been sweating, but the faux-leather clings to his skin through the thin fabric of his shirt. “Are you going to ask me something terrible?”


“I had no intention of doing that, but this is about foresight, Clay, and I’m sure you said you didn’t want an interview.”


“Yeah, well, I changed my mind.”


Jack’s grin widens minutely. Clay pretends not to notice. “Are you sure?”


“Yes, yes, I’m sure,” he insists, his nervousness fueling his impatience.


“Alright then!” Jack wastes no time grabbing his pen. He tips the notepad up toward him, obscuring his scribbles. “Let’s start with a fun one, shall we? Something very simple. If you could choose between falling in love or finding something you’ve lost, which would you pick?”


Clay’s posture droops at the question. He’s relieved and disappointed by the options. “But I’m already in love.”


“Oh?”


“Paige. My girlfriend.”


“The–oh, I see, the woman you–oh,” Jack draws out the vowel. His hand rises up to his mouth in a rather dainty and theatrical display of awkwardness. “How silly of me! I guess I’ll just have to save that one for later. Let’s see here.” He trails off momentarily, tapping his chin. Clay can easily imagine the light bulb clicking on above his head when he sticks his finger up in a moment of inspiration.


“I’ve got it. Would you rather marry the woman you’re dating now, or lose her to another man?”


“What?” Clay jolts halfway out of his seat, knocking over a half-empty glass of water. The waitress gives him a pointed glance and he slowly lowers himself back down. “What kind of a question is that?”


Jack looks mildly offended. “Well, I thought it was an interesting one.”


“But–those choices!”


“Yours to make,” he replies lightly.


Some choice. Clay wrings his hands in his lap. He should’ve kept his mouth shut. So much for a million dollars, he laments, because this is certainly going to be his last question. He’s suddenly glad that Paige isn’t here despite his earlier wish.


It’s not that he doesn’t love her, he reminds himself, woodenly sipping his hot chocolate and watching Jack coo over his dwindling plate of sweets. It’s not a matter of love, though. It’s a matter of life. Which is long. At twenty-six, he can reasonably expect to live for another fifty years, and to be with the same woman for the entirety of it is something he hadn’t considered. Forever is a long time to be tied down, and then, there would eventually be kids. He’d be stuck in this town without ever getting to see what else the world had to offer.


But that’s not fair, is it? What would Paige pick? Clay chews his tongue irately. Damn Jack, he thinks, and his damn questions. He and Paige have been dating for nearly two years, and while he’s enjoyed it, how could he reasonably assume that would remain true for the next five decades? There are a lot of people in the world. Not to mention possibilities, places to see, people to meet. If something like Jack can exist, there’s no telling what he might be barring himself from. If he marries Paige, he’ll never get the chance to find out.


“I pick the second one,” he finally mutters.


“Oh?” Jack gradually lowers the croissant just before it reaches his mouth. “I wasn’t expecting that.”


Clay tenses, immediately defensive, “I love her, but how can I be sure that I will when I’m thirty, or forty, or fifty-years-old?”


“That’s a good point,” he concedes after a moment’s thought.


And then he resumes eating. Clay waits for something to happen, some Adonis to drop out of the sky, but there’s nothing but the scraping of forks against plates and the quiet chatter of the sparse diners. Jack is licking his fingers clean.


“So?” Clay asks impatiently.


“So? Would you like another one?”


“No! I just–is that all?”


“Well, I mean, are you going to finish your hot chocolate?”


Bordering on furious now, he shoves the mug across the table. Some of the liquid sloshes up over the rim of the cup, but Jack doesn’t seem to care.


Clay yanks his jacket on and leaves without another word.



It takes three weeks. Three agonizing weeks. Clay wishes it would’ve been over with the moment he answered the question, but no. Time passes sluggishly in a daze of anxious paranoia. It feels to him that he spends the next twenty-one days wading through corn syrup.


It begins with the text messages, or so he thinks. He never finds concrete proof. Still, when Paige’s phone buzzes against the dresser at three in the morning, his hand immediately reaches for it, typing in her password at a near frenzied pace.


She merely raises an eyebrow at him. She’s barely visible in the dark, hopefully missing his panicked expression, and he replaces the phone back on the nightstand. It’s her sister.


The one reassurance doesn’t help. Each time her phone vibrates, an alarm bell in his head rattles along with it. After a few days, it’s enough to make her angry, and they fight for the first time in six months when she finds him scrolling through her text messages again. He’s on the couch, hunched over the screen. Paige stands on the other side of the coffee table and waits for him to notice.


When he does, she says impatiently, “Are you finished?” Her tone suggests that he promptly say yes. Clay nods, but his apologetic look hardly abates her frustration. “What has gotten into you?”


Clay puts the phone in her waiting hand and keeps his eyes in the table. “What do you mean?”


“I mean that a few weeks ago, you were so distant I wasn’t sure you cared anymore, and now you’re acting like I’m the one who’s about to disappear on you.”


“Well, I obviously care a lot then,” he tries to lighten the mood, but in the face of her anger, he may as well have told a knock-knock joke to a brick wall. She shakes her head, shoves her phone in her pocket, and grabs the car keys.


He makes no move to stop her. Paige pauses with one hand on the doorknob, the other on her hip. “You’d better figure yourself out, Clay, because I sure as hell can’t.”


He’s in the middle of asking her where she’s going when she shuts the door. The fight only exacerbates his worries. He turns her drawers inside out in search of a different brand of condoms, or new lingerie, or anything incriminating, but there’s never anything there. He apologizes at the end of every argument. He buys her flowers. He absorbs the tones and lilts of her voice, commits her jokes to memory, studies her face while she sleeps, right up until the end of the third week when she sits him down, her lips set in a grim line.


“We need to talk.”


It’s over, she says. She’s fallen in love with someone else.


Long before that moment, Clay knows he’s made a mistake. He storms into the diner early the next morning, his hands fisted resolutely in the pockets of his leather jacket, and takes a seat at the counter. It feels as though he’s been emptied out and filled with cement. He can hardly turn his head when the door chime announces the entrance of a new patron, and when Jack at last arrives in a flurry of good cheer, he hardly makes it four steps before Clay is grabbing him by the sleeve of his coat and sitting him down in a booth.


“I’m hungry, Clay.” Jack is smiling, but his words don’t sound very friendly. Clay wisely orders a dozen assorted pastries and two mochas. It’s only after the food arrives that Jack speaks again, and whatever emotion he’d hidden beneath his plastic smile seems to dissipate at the first sugary bite. “So, what can I help you with? Are you here for another interview?”


Clay is hardly in the mood for games. His tone is blunt. “I want my girlfriend back.”


“That’s not what you said a few weeks ago,” Jack answers easily.


Clay slams his fist against the table, ignoring the looks of the waitresses. “I don’t care! How could I have known which choice to make? You tricked me.”


“Why, Clay.” Jack gives him a sympathetic look as he tears a sugar cookie in two. “I don’t know anything about that, remember? I’m just an observer.”


“Bullshit.”


There is no reply. Jack dips the cookie into his drink, watching fascinatedly as the coffee drips from the sweet, forming a thin layer of buttery oil on the top of the liquid in his mug. When he takes a bite, his eyes light up, and he becomes immediately engrossed in repeating the process. It’s apparent he’s not going to answer.


“I want another question,” Clay says firmly.


“That’s not really what you want.”


“Yes it is! I want to fix this!”


Jack still doesn’t look up from his food. “Fine, then. If you could pick between being you, or being the man your girlfriend is in love with, which would you choose?”


Clay slams his hand on the table again. He shoots the staff a glance that has them quickly turning away. “That’s not fixing it.”


“I thought you said you just wanted to be with her.”


“It’s not the same!”


Jack shrugs. He doesn’t look concerned in the slightest. “So, you pick you, then?”


“Of course!”


“I really wish you’d stop doing that,” he remarks nonchalantly, waving a hand at Clay’s fist still pushed into the tabletop.


“I wish you would just give me a choice that makes any damn sense.”


“It’s hardly my fault that you don’t know yourself.”


When Clay’s hand comes down again, Jack’s smile fades. Just a little. He wipes his gloves on a napkin and laces his fingers together. If he’s angry, his tone doesn’t reflect it.


“I’ll level with you, Clay, and ask you outright. What is it that you think you want from me?”


“I already told you,” he replies through gritted teeth. “I want my girlfriend back.”


“I don’t have to be a scientist to tell you that’s obviously not true, not that you would know,” Jack continues before he can be interrupted, stopping Clay’s ready retort. “Would you rather kill your girlfriend’s lover and win her back, or leave things as they are?”


“That’s–that’s not…”


He trails off. This is yet another bad idea, but it’s not like he has a choice. The available decisions are bleak: rely on Jack’s questions to resolve the situation, or walk away. Clay puts his head in his hands, pressing his palms into his eyes to try and soothe a headache, and attempts to think through the rapidly escalating stress. He can hear the scraping of empty plates around him. The kitchen staff shouts in the background. The diner fills over the next ten minutes, the breakfast crowd multiplying as it nears close to eight in the morning. Jack mumbles quietly to the waitress, and Clay feels the table vibrate as she sets down another full platter.


It feels like there should be an obvious answer to this question, he thinks irritably, but there isn’t. Paige’s lover wouldn’t be the only one getting hurt if he died, and Clay has no intention of killing anyone. But he won’t lose her either.


When he finally looks up, Jack is tonguing the inside of a Bavarian cream donut in a rather suggestive way. He’s holding it above his head like he’s emptying a pitcher of water into his mouth. His trench coat separates slightly around the middle button, and it only takes a moment for Clay to realize that Jack is naked underneath it. The absurdity almost makes him laugh, but it’s hard to find anything funny right now.


“I would never hurt her like that,” he interrupts the spectacle before him.


“Really?” Jack removes his tongue from the pastry. He licks the sugar from his lips thoughtfully. “It’s funny you should say that. In another reality, your answers actually led you to kill her. Oh, don’t give me that look,” he chides, tapping Clay on the nose with a sticky finger like he’s teasing a child. “You had a reason. It’s a long story, but it involved the misinterpretation of some romantic poetry, and then there was this bear at the zoo, and she contracted this strange disease that–oh, nevermind,” Jack cuts himself off, forgoing the rest. “I’m sure you can figure it out from there.”


Clay can’t, of course, but he’s not concerned with trying. “I would never do that.”


“You have no idea what you’d do.”


“I wouldn’t do that.”


“But you di-id!” Jack singsongs in a wavering, high-pitched voice. “There’s no point in arguing about it, anyway. What’s your choice?”


Clay flexes his fingers around his mug, not quite meeting the eyes of the man across from him. “I don’t think those are very fair choices.”


“If choices were fair, they’d be easy to make, Clay, and I wouldn’t have a study at all.”


“I won’t choose.”


“Then I’ll choose for you.”


“No, you won’t.”


“Oh?” Jack tilts his head. “And why is that?”


“Because, if you did that, then you won’t know what I would’ve picked. It doesn’t fit in with your experiment.”


Jack stops eating. A pastry drops from his grasp and rolls. The corner of his mouth twitches. Like a marionette’s, his hands slide off the table and into his lap, and Clay wonders not for the first time if Jack is not, in fact, in control of his limbs.


“That’s very clever of you,” he admits. His shoulders convulse in an attempted shrug, but he doesn’t seem to notice the unnatural movement. “Tell you what, Clay. I don’t particularly like this situation you’ve created, but I’ll admit that your deduction is reasonable, given what you know, so I’ll offer you one last question and not a single one more than that. Do you accept?”


Clay nods, satisfied with both the option and that he’s taken Jack down a peg. Men like that, who think they can manipulate others so easily, deserve to be outsmarted once in a while.


“Alright, then. Let’s shake on it. No funny business, now, this question is very simple,” Jack explains, and after they’ve shaken hands, Jack’s fingers clenching and unclenching like ungreased hinges, he asks, “Would you rather die by the end of the week, or have you and Paige fall happily in love at the cost of someone else’s life instead?”


The question is immediate. “Who?”


“No one you know.”


“I thought you said I couldn’t choose my death,” Clay points out suspiciously, but Jack just smiles benignly at him. His eyes have started drifting to the pile of powdered donuts on the table again.


“Like I said, it’s a very simple question.”


The answer is easy, then. “Fine. I pick the second option.”


Once again, Jack returns to his food, and Clay waits once more to see if he’ll say anything else, but he seems completely uninterested in him, now. There’s powdered sugar forming a ring around his mouth. Some cream filling dots the corner of his lips. When he catches Clay looking at him, he grins widely.


“I love sweets,” he says. “Can’t resist them. What about you, Clay? Do you like dessert?”


Clay shudders. He shoves his mug away and stands. “You can finish that.”


“Oh, how kind of you!”


Jack’s giggling follows him out the door.



The same evening, Clay answers the door to find Paige outside, her eyes red-rimmed and wet with tears.


She’s made a mistake, she says. Clay replies that he knows a thing or two about that. At his insistence, they find new places for their breakfast dates, far from Jack and Diner 66. On Wednesday, four days later, they have breakfast in bed. On Thursday, they drive into the city to get brunch at a white tablecloth restaurant. Paige makes a joke about marriage, and Clay’s hand slides over the small box in his jacket, dampening the velvet against his sweaty palm. It’s still in his pocket when they get home. They have plenty of time now, he thinks, with the rest of their lives ahead of them, and there’s not telling what might change. There’s no need to rush an uncertain future. He leaves the ring in the drawer of his nightstand.


On Friday, they have a celebratory picnic in unusually warm weather.


Clay is picking her a flower when he’s stung by a bee.


Too bad he’s lost his EpiPen.




Big Blue



By Subodhana Wijeyeratne



When the documentarian comes over the ridge, the biologist is already unpacked and fussing over a bag.


He descends the slope, knees akimbo against the treacherous scree. His shadow tremulous in Nafthalar’s diffuse sunlight. The biologist’s tent is already up—a violence of silver amidst the giant teal fungi and strange trees like giant eyestalks. She does not look up when he approaches, though he knows she heard him.


He stops a few feet away, and swallows, and says, “Hi.”


She straightens and turns and bows briefly. She is wearing a breather and he knows that behind it she is pursing her lips. Her standard greeting. Rendered unfamiliar by the alien sun and the alien air and the technology keeping them alive.


She does not say anything.


“When did you arrive?” he asks.


“Not long ago,” she says.


“You look hot.”


“It is hot.”


He looks around.


“Here, then?”


“Yes. To begin with.”


“Where is he?”


She gestures with her head. She has cut her hair into a fierce bob and it looks good on her, he thinks, but does not say so.


“Over there. Down by the river.”


“How’s he looking?”


“Older.”


“Well that’s to be expected, isn’t it?”


She shrugs.


“Yup.”


She turns and resumes her fumbling. He lingers a few moments and then puts his backpack on the ground and takes out his drone. It skitters around on spindle thin mechanical legs, whirring and twittering like a mechanical rodent. Finally it straightens and fixes its lens on him.


“Online,” it says.


“Establish campsite,” he says.


He turns and wanders off because he cannot think of anything else to do. He can hear the drone working behind him. The shuffle shuffle of pebbles and the dry hiss of the tent. He cannot see it but he knows it is blooming behind him like a ripening dewdrop.


He peers down at the valley but he cannot see their quarry. After a few moments she wanders up next to him with a scanner.


“So, how are things?” he asks.


“Things?”


“Yeah. You know. Stuff.”


“Same as always.”


“How’s the new place?”


“The lab?”


“Yeah.”


“It’s good.”


“Just good?”


“It’s a lab.”


Silence.


And then, “You don’t miss Earth?”


“I’ll be back soon enough.”


“You will?”


Finally she turns to look at him.


“Soon enough,” she says.


“Well, I’m glad you’re happy out there.”


“Happy enough.”


“I’m doing well too.”


For a moment he thinks maybe she will draw near or at least smile, but she does neither. She just nods and says, “We’ll strike out just before dawn. Keep within a mile of him at all times. He’s old now so I don’t expect him to move very fast. But you never know.”


“Right.”


“Don’t get too close either.”


“I know.”


And with that she turns and walks to her tent and leaves him there with nothing but the answers he had prepared to the questions that she had not asked.



The nights of Nafthalar are long and absolute. No moon to illuminate the gloom and the stars so cold and so far. Nothing but creeping shadows upon the darkness and winds slow and directionless like the spirits of a lost army still searching for battle. He remembers how lonely it had been the first time he was here, and thinks how lonely it is now, though many years have passed and he is much changed.


He sleeps, but not for long. When he wakes he is alert and fretful. He reads the news a while, his face a topography of blue and black in the sharp light of the screen. After a while he gets dressed and clamps the breather over his mouth and heads outside.


Already a frost is forming on the ground and there is a thin swirl of snow in the air. He turns on his chest light and his pheromone pump and immediately something clatters away in the night with the sound of claws on stone. He walks away from the camp and up a ridge. Slipping sometimes on the ice underfoot. It takes him longer than expected but he is determined not to go back. Then finally near the summit he sees a hint of blue light and the excitement overwhelms him and he clambers up to the top on all fours as he did the first time and perhaps, he thinks, he is not so changed after all.


When he is finally at the top he stops and puts his hands on his hips, panting, and laughs.


Big Blue is there.


He is sleeping. A colossal bioluminescent explosion of tentacles and gently swaying cilia the size of a man. His airsac, twenty meters across, deflated in the cold. Great flaps of glowing flesh, gossamer thin and rippling with light. A vast mass of life possessed of neither head nor tail nor left nor right.


He is still beautiful.


The documentarian sits on the ridge and ignores the cold clawing at his buttocks and watches Big Blue slumbering. Yes, older, he thinks. Some of those vast fleshy flaps frayed at the edges. Scars on his elephant-legs, each fifteen meters high and as vast around as tree trunks. Smaller creatures sneak around it, seeking warmth and a meal of parasites, or perhaps just entranced by the glimmer and shimmer of those lights that chase themselves over its skin like they too were alive and had intent and places to go.


The documentarian turns up his pump and turns off his light and watches. Time passes and the glowing decreases as the fire of the sun finally leaves the animal’s flesh. Presently it begins to snow in earnest, fat spidery flakes, so heavy he can feel them coming to rest on his naked head.


When he returns to the camp a while later he sees that the lights are on in the biologist’s tent. He thinks of approaching but when he draws near her door he sees footsteps in snow. Footsteps heading towards the ridge. He follows them and sees she has taken a route just a few meters from his. Up to the ridge, where he just was. She must have slipped past him in the dark.


Suddenly he is very tired and he returns to his tent and dry swallows some pills and a few moments later is deep in a sleep as dreamless as Nafthalar’s night is dark.



The next day she is standing at the top of the ridge with her scanner when he comes out. Her bag packed and her drone a few feet behind her with a little cart hitched to its back. She descends clumsily and falls a couple of times but he knows better than to offer assistance.


“He’s warming up,” she says. “We have an hour or so.”


“Do you ever sleep?”


“Sleep is for the weak.”


He yawns and chokes immediately and begins to cough.


“Better get your breather on,” she says.


“Yeah. Hungry?”


“I already ate.”


“Of course you did.”


He is in his tent when he hears the deep rumble of Big Blue’s call. The squawking overhead of alarmed skyjackals. And then, the thud of a giant foot on the ground.


He comes out with his toothbrush still in his mouth in time to see the creature lumbering past like some titanic god from a time before reason or order. Its pillar legs not ten feet away. Its airsac distending rapidly as it goes, ozone blue like a Portuguese man o’war. In its transparent belly colossal coils of innards sliding in aureate ichor. He is stuck to the spot and a little dribble of toothpaste dollops fatly from the corner of his lip onto his jumpsuit but he does not care.


They head off after it, the drones buzzing and humming behind them. Twenty minutes behind schedule, the biologist chides, but the creature is not moving fast. They climb up the ridge and down and then over another. There is a little stream at the bottom, over-blue water and rippling sheets of living things half-plant and half-animal and altogether alien. Little scurrying creatures chasing each other in play or in hunger with equal violence. The biologist stops occasionally and crouches by some rock or pond and runs her scanner over the ground and mutters something into it and then looks at him and nods and they keep on. Never losing sight of Big Blue’s great crest like some gargantuan electric blossom up ahead.


“Sixteen hours to sunset,” she says. “We should take turns taking naps.”


“I’m going to try to make it all the way through,” says the documentarian.


“Suit yourself.”


They continue on. To the east a vast valley, flat and dull grey, with a river meandering through it in multitudinous mercury streams. The odd squat tree with crowns as flat and uniform as a mushroom’s hood. In the clearing sky motes that could be flying creatures or something else.


A little while longer in silence and the documentarian says, “Are you going to be like this for the rest of the trip?”


The biologist glances at him and doesn’t say anything.


“So you are, then.”


“Let’s just get this done.”


The documentarian sighs. “I know you didn’t expect this but I didn’t expect you to be so difficult.”


“I’m not being difficult.”


“Yes you are. I know you well enough to tell.”


“Maybe you don’t know me very well.”


“Bullshit. I know you as well as I know myself.”


“Maybe you don’t know yourself very well.”


“Jesus, seriously?”


She holds up her hand.


“Listen.”


“What?”


“No, listen. Can you hear that?”


They have come to a stop, all of them. Up ahead Big Blue’s tentacles all turn and point east. Their tips splayed and quivering.


“Skyjackals!” says the documentarian, and turns to his drone. “Shit.”


They lie flat on their bellies, pheromone pumps turned up high. The rich scent of the stuff in their noses, like sweat and pollen. The documentarian whispers something and his drone spits four small orbs of black into the air which zip off towards Big Blue.


“What’re you doing?” says the biologist. “You’re going to lose them.”


He doesn’t say anything. He is holding a small screen to his face and in it the flying things from the east are resolving into shape. Hummingbird-like wings, four each, and slung between them a carnivore. Vicious teeth in elongated snouts and the staring eyes of all things that kill to live. They zoom towards Big Blue and the colossal creature shudders and the flaps on its body open up like sails run through with vivid violet veins.


“Sixteen of them,” says the documentarian. “Two alphas. See that? Two alphas!”


“I see it,” says the biologist.


The creatures bear down on Big Blue and orbit him, as tiny as flies against his colossal flanks. Then one or two of them fly straight in between his flaps to the delicate flesh of his torso and hover there a while, scratching at the skin and nuzzling it. Then another slips in, and another. Soon all are deep in Big Blue’s folds, busy at some task neither human can see.


“I’m going in closer,” says the documentarian.


“Don’t.”


“I’m going in closer.”


They stare at their screens, and after a few moments the biologist says, “Are those parasites?”


“Looks like it.”


“Wow.”


“Yeah.”


“Wow, look at them go!”


A deep rumble, and Big Blue’s flaps quiver. Shimmering colors all over his body, turquoise and deep blue and crimson like fresh blood. Then he shudders and a thin spray erupts from him in an aerosol haze. With it a strange aroma not quite of vinegar and not quite of flowers. The skyjackals scatter in chattering rage and then circle back and slip back up to Big Blue’s hide and get back to their feast.


The biologists laughs. “He loves it! Look at him. Look at that flushing!”


“Old boy’s got some new tricks.”


“Yeah,” says the biologist. “Who’d’ve thought?”


Though the documentarian cannot see it, she is smiling.



They make camp not soon after the end of Nafthalar’s lingering dusk and Big Blue has settled for the evening in the lee of a low hill. The biologist disappears into her tent as soon as it is erect with a nod and nothing else. The documentarian lingers watching the stars wink into view in the moonless sky and eventually the rim of the Milky Way fades into view and blazes above like it were the revelation of all revelations.


When the cold begins to bite he goes to his tent and extracts a little cooker and a packet of bacon and some bread and a small bottle of black sauce and a little pan. A few minutes later he hears a tapping over the rustling of the fat and the oil.


“Hold on,” he says and takes a plaster and covers the ring on his right hand. “Come in.”


The biologist’s head peeks in and for an instant he remembers an occasion just like this from long ago and feels a nostalgia that evaporates as she starts to speak.


“Is that bacon?” she says.


“Yup.”


She steps in and zips the door of the tent up behind her. A brief hiss as it repressurizes.


“You brought bacon?”


“Yeah. Who’d leave Earth without bacon?”


“I did.”


“That’s tragic.”


“So, you want some?”


She nods.


“Sit down.”


She plonks to the floor, cross legged, across from him. The sizzling meat between them. It crackles and curls at the edges and the fat turns from milky to brownish and finally to clear gold. The biologist opens her mouth but before she can speak the documentarian has extracted three dripping rashers and placed them on a slice of bread and squeezed a thin line of brown sauce over them with the flourish of an artist savoring the last few strokes of a masterpiece. He holds the plate out to her and she takes it from him and folds the slice in half. The crunch of the stuff as she takes her first bite. The slow roll of her jaws as she chews luxuriously.


“Happy?”


“Happy.”


He throws a couple of rashers more into the spitting oil and leans back against his bed. “Must be weird living on a station. My skin always dries up on those things.”


The biologist takes another bite and looks up at him. “As if you’d know. You’ve never spent more than a week on one.”


“Wrong. I spent six months on Chandra.”


“When?”


“Last year. Filming cockroaches.”


“Cockroaches?”


“Yeah.”


“Someone paid you to film cockroaches on a space station?”


“Apparently it’s a problem.”


“Huh.”


“My parents still can’t get their head around it. I think it confirmed all their wildest concerns about what I do when I told them I was off to space to film bugs.”


The biologist chuckles and takes another huge bite and sighs. They sit in silence awhile, watching the bacon cook.


“How are they?” she asks.


“My parents?”


“Yeah.”


“They’re good. Retired now.”


“Both?”


“Yeah. Back on Earth. In Brazil, would you believe?”


“That was always the plan, right?”


He looks at her and frowns and she pauses halfway through a bite when she notices. A little smear of brown sauce at the corner of her mouth. Then she swallows and says “What?


“I’m just surprised you remembered.”


She doesn’t say anything.


“My brother got married.”


“Munira?”


“No. Abigail.”


“No!”


“Yes.”


He turns off the flame and puts the bacon on a slice of bread.


“He invited you, you know.”


“To his wedding?”


“Yes. He sent you an invitation.”


“He probably sent it to the wrong address.”


“That’s what I said.”


The biologist pops the last of the sandwich into her mouth and swallows and wipes her hands on her trousers and stands up. The little dab of sauce still at the corner of her lips. The documentarian points to the pan. “More?”


“No. Thank you, though.”


“You’ve got some sauce on your mouth.”


She wipes it away.


“Thank you very much.”


She walks to the exit and unzips it and for a moment the documentarian thinks that is all she will say before she leaves. But she pauses, halfway through, and turns to him and says, “Tell him I’m sorry, will you? I would love to have been there but…well.”


“You’d’ve been welcome,” says the documentarian.


She stares at him, still and inscrutable, and then for the briefest of moments her face softens.


“I know,” she says quietly. “That’s why I couldn’t have come.”


And with that, she is gone.



They walk in silence the next day as Big Blue stomps with massive dignity over the tributaries of the river. After a while the documentarian activates a drone and sends it off to the west, into the narrow valleys and crevasses that scar the hillsides where fleshy leaves droop in the gathering heat and insect analogues buzz and quarrel endlessly.


“Five days from the beach,” says the biologist after a while. “He won’t make it without feeding.”


“There’ll be something nearby.”


“I wonder why he’s so far inland.”


“Not a clue. He’s not the only one, though.”


“There’s more?”


“Two other males, at least. The drones caught them.”


“Strange.”


“Isn’t it?”


“I wonder if he remembers us.”


“I doubt it.”


“Why?”


“Do they even have memories? They don’t even have a central nervous system.”


“Doesn’t mean they don’t have memories.”


“We’re probably just a clutch of weird smelling chemicals to him.”


“So maybe he remembers that.”


“Yeah, but that’s not us.”


“People are just clutches of weird smelling chemicals.”


The documentarian sucks in air through his teeth and says, “Wow. That’s dark.”


They descend into the valley and carry on over the grey-black earth, water welling up around their boots, ink, black and glossy with alluvium.


“Whoa,” says the documentarian. “Look at this.”


He patches the feed from the drone through to the biologist. A shuddering chaos of a bare stone cliff face. Smears of lichen like emerald blood on the rock. And then suddenly an explosion of pink. There is a cluster of living things in a small fissure. Opalescent blobs clinging to the rock face. Tentacles as slim as leaves and moving against the wind.


“Wow,” says the biologist. “Never seen those before.”


She turns and heads up the hillside.


“Where’re you going?”


“To see.”


“What, you’re just going to climb up that cliff face?”


She is already halfway up, clambering on all fours, her drone alarmed and buzzing behind her, chattering.


“Yes. You don’t have to come.”


“I’m not going to.”


“Fine.”


“And what am I supposed to do when you fall off and break your legs?”


“Summon the pod. It’ll take me to safety.”


“Dammit.”


She stops and looks down at him. Her face obscured in her own shadow. Like the silhouette of some old prophet descending in rage from the mountaintop.


“Stop it,” she says, and continues on.



He is alone for the next few hours, trudging along behind Big Blue, slipping and cursing and avoiding the great circular puddles the creature has left in its wake. The sun rides high and bakes the ground solid. Every now and then the documentarian stops and looks back over his shoulder to see if the biologist is behind him, but she never is.


Then in the middle of the long afternoon Big Blue lumbers up to a patch of huge pitcher plants, amphora shaped and ten feet tall. The vague shapes of half-digested skyjackals inside, dark and inert. Big Blue comes to a halt and extends a giant proboscis and dips it into one of them. The documentarian can see the nectar as it enters the creature’s body and delicate tendrils of it osmosing greenly through its insides. He dispatches three drones and films intently and does not notice the biologist coming up behind him.


“Worth it?” he says.


She holds up a small tub with one of the anemone creatures inside, wobbling like a living blancmange.


“Worth it.” She looks at Big Blue. “He’s hungry.”


“Must be exhausting, all this walking around on land.”


“Tell me about it.”


They watch the spectacle a while. Then he says, “Do you think he’s going to make it?”


“I don’t know. He’s quite old.”


“Well, if there’s no other male there…”


“On a beach like that? There will be.”


“That’s what I thought.” And then, “Remember last time?”


“Of course.”


“Remember how we didn’t think he’d make it then?”


“Yeah.”


“Maybe he’ll make it this time too.”


“Probably not.”


The documentarian frowns. “God, you’re so negative.”


“It’s pronounced “realistic”.”


“Negative.”


The biologist shrugs. “If you say so.”


“This is just like last time.”


“You weren’t so whiny back then.”


“And you were just as obstinate.”


“So?”


The documentarian snorts and walks away.


The biologist chuckles. “Yep,” she says. “Just like last time.”


It is just before nightfall that they see the other male on the horizon. A shapeless silhouette lumbering slowly in their direction, glowing neon and fluorescent on a horizon slowly bleeding from blue to black. Big Blue stops dead in its tracks, membranes rigid, tentacles pointed at the interloper.


“Holy shit,” says the biologist, scrambling for her gear.


“On it,” says the documentarian.


Six drones buzz up and off into the gathering murk and as they do Big Blue begins to call. The sound so deep it seems to rise out of the earth like the drums of the underworld. The pebbles at their feet dancing against the vibrations. Then abruptly it ends and leaves the air shuddering and the biologist and the documentarian breathless.


The male on the horizon stops.


“He’s a big one,” says the documentarian.


“Let me see.”


The biologist leans into him and peers at the screen.


“Wow,” she says, and looks up at Big Blue. “You think he can handle it?”


“Yeah, he can handle it,” says the documentarian, grinning.


Already the response is upon them, the earthquake-low rumble, and Big Blue is enraged. He unfurls his membranes and sweeps them up and down, iridescing in the darkness like a fallen aurora.


“Here we go,” says the biologist.


Big Blue stomps the ground twice and begins to shake. The earth shaking with him. A rumble and boom erupting from beneath them louder than before and more forceful. The pebbles spring hither and thither. The sound rises until they can barely stand it and Big Blue whips the gossamer substance of his body with rising fervor until the world is illuminated with his rage and his call is so loud the biologist and the documentarian have to cover their ears.


When he is done, they cheer.


He finishes with four stamps on the ground and his body slowly subsides to limpness but the other male’s response is already thundering out of the east. Diminished by distance and perhaps not as strong to begin with. Yet the ground still shakes and on the horizon he blazes a while, redder and brighter than Big Blue. And then Big Blue starts up again and so the two behemoths go on backwards and forwards getting louder and brighter until the biologist and documentarian feel sure they are about to explode and scatter themselves bodily all over the valley. At last the male in the distance lets out a forlorn bellow and its light diminishes and it disappears into the far distant darkness without a trace.


Big Blue stomps the ground a few more times and launches into another display, but he too is exhausted and his colors less vibrant and he ends the show halfway through the cycle. The fizzing light of his flesh dissipating into the night. Naught now but the sound of his alien huffing and the hormones flooding in torrents from his skin.


“You gotta see this,” says the documentarian.


They watch the footage from the cameras, nestled at the bottom of a hill. Leaning in together conspiratorially and laughing and high-fiving in delight. The drones stand by in silence, undirected and unaware. It is not until the cold winds of the evening slip across the valley floor and onto them that they stir and begin to pitch the tents.



The biologist tries to sleep but she can’t. Scattered visions of the night crowding her head. The confines of her tent semidark and expansive and empty. When she realizes what she is going to do the tension rises in her and after a while wrestling with it she gets up and reaches into her bag. She pulls out a bottle of dark amber liquid and dons her breather and heads out into the frosty night.


The documentarian is sitting on the floor by his bed when she goes in. Reading something from an old book. Older, she thinks, and going to fat. The hair on his head receding, his forehead high and pitted. He looks up at her, eyebrows raised, and she remembers that this is what he does when he does not know how to react.


She smiles and holds up the bottle. “Drink?” she says.


“Now?”


“Suit yourself.”


She turns to leave.


“No, wait. I don’t have any glasses though.”


“Just wipe it when you hand it back.”


She sits opposite him, cross-legged, and opens the bottle with a crack. She takes a swig and it is deep and fiery and hot as sulphur in her throat. She hands the bottle to him gasping with the force of it and he takes it and sips a little.


“What happened to your finger?”


“My finger?”


She points at his hand. “That plaster.”


“Oh. I skinned it.”


They drink in silence but for the crackle of the tent cloth. She takes a good hard look at his face and he does not seem to mind. She does not remember his eyes being so small, or his lips being so full. She does not remember him having flecks of silver in his beard and in his hair, and then remembers that her memories are of long ago, and perhaps of a different person.


He takes another swig and hands her back the bottle and she takes a drink without wiping the mouth and puts the bottle down next to her. Then she lies down and looks up at the rippling tent cloth overhead. The creeping warmth of the booze on her skin and in her heart. She stretches and says, “Just like last time.”


“Not quite.”


“No?”


“We’re older now.”


“And wiser.”


“Maybe you.”


She shrugs. “We all get wiser.”


“Not so sure about that.”


She props herself up on one arm and looks over at him. He is gazing off into a dark corner of the tent, chewing his lip. Face half lost in shadow. He has not noticed her looking at him and for a moment she sees him unpoised and wonders if this is how he really is now. Old and melancholy and a little lost.


“How are you?” she asks.


He snaps his head around at her like a bird.


“I’m good! You?”


“No. I mean, how are you, really?”


He looks away. And then, “You want the real answer?”


“Sure.”


“Not bad.”


“Just not bad?”


“Just not bad.”


“You seem so busy.”


“How do you know?”


She shrugs. “I read the news.”


“Oh. For a moment there I thought you took an interest.”


She nearly tells him the truth but instead she holds the bottle out to him and he stares into its dark amber depths for a few moments before taking a swig and grimacing. And again they look at each other and open their mouths at the same time and get through half a syllable each before chuckling in unison.


The documentarian leans back and says, “Please.”


“No, you go.”


“I talk enough as it is.”


“I like listening to you talk.”


“That’s a lie.”


“No, it’s not. The only problem is you talk too much.”


The documentarian smiles and looks away and is silent for a good long time. The biologist begins to think he has got lost in a daydream and she is about to prod him when he says, quietly and barely audible over the crackling of the tent, “It’s good to see you.”


She reaches out and takes the bottle and takes another drink. The hearty glug of the liquid in her throat. She does not say anything but lies silently in that twilight, watching him with what could have been sadness for him, or else sadness for herself. She cannot be sure which.



She is only awake for a few moments before she realizes she is hung over. Her tongue fat in her mouth and a dry pain at the front of her skull. She opens her eyes and realizes she is not in her tent and in a panic looks to her side. But the documentarian is asleep on the floor a few feet away, fully dressed and mouth pressed to the ground and drooling slightly like a remora come loose.


She steps shoeless and silent across the tent floor and checks the time as she goes. It is already bright outside, and hot. She checks the time and whispers “Shit!” and prods the documentarian with her foot.


“Oh god,” he groans. “Oh sweet Jesus in the manger.”


“Wake up. We’re late.”


He rolls over onto his front, yes cherry red. The side of his face wrinkled like cloth. “What was that shit? You said it was whiskey. Not…demon semen. ’


“Stop whining. Get ready.”


She turns and zips open the tent. The heat and the light and the moistureless wind in an explosion as sudden and violent as a grenade. She steps blindly into the world and finds herself unexpectedly in shadow. She opens her eyes slowly and looks up at the sight before her and screams and then clamps her hands over her mouth. After a few seconds she reaches back into the tent with her foot and whips it around a bit. The frantic rustling of the material like static.


“Hey!” she hisses.


“What?”


“Get your camera and come out quietly.”


“What?”


“Get your…”


“Why?”


“Just get out here!”


The documentarian staggers out a few seconds later and gasps and falls backwards into the tent.


Big Blue is barely twenty meters away. His bulk towering overhead. The patter of his secretions on the floor like gentle rain. He sways gently and tastes the air. All of his tentacles pointed at the two, some rigid, some rippling slowly with eerie octopus flexibility.


The biologist stretches out her hand and steps forward. The documentarian hisses and grabs her shirt but she pinches his wrist and he whips his hand back. The tentacles draw near her. Flushing now, purple and blue and pink. The biologist reaches out and touches them. Smooth and warm under her fingertips and pulsating organically. They caress her skin and wrap slowly around her hand. A tingle on her skin like a gentle current.


Then suddenly she is young and long haired and clambering over Nafthalar’s topography in amazement because she had never seen rocks so big or creatures so strange. Silver clad and quick like she were a drop of starlight come to life. And behind her another figure. A slower presence and kinder perhaps. Both tiny together in this strange world.


The vision lasts just an instant.


When she opens her eyes she sees Big Blue’s huge tentacle rising up into the air and his column-legs bending with slow majesty as he begins to trundle away.


“He remembers us,” she whispers.


“He remembers you,” says the documentarian.


“No, us,” she says and wipes the tears from her eyes. “Us.”


“Those were the same colors it flashed last time, right?” asks the documentarian.


“Dunno,” she says. “Best get ready. He’ll be off soon.”


“You think he waited for us?”


“Who knows?”


The documentarian goes to say something else but the biologist strides straight into her tent, face averted, unzips it, and slips inside. The clutter of silver devices and notes on the floor. The winking lights of her drone lying motionless in the corner. It comes awake when she walks over to her bed but she waves it away and sits on the edge of her bed and buries her face in her hands and weeps. The documentarian taps on the tent door but when he opens she hisses and waves him away too.


When she emerges a little while later he is packed and fiddling with a console. He looks up at her, chewing on his lip. Like a little boy caught red handed in some mischief. He gets up when she approaches and she is about to say something when she notices a glimmer of gold on his right hand. He notices her notice an instant too late and goes to hide his hand behind his back but then gives up.


“What the hell is that?” she says.


“What?”


She raises her eyebrows and points at his hand. “That.”


He knows what she is pointing at but he lifts his hand to his face and takes a good hard look at the ring as if he had never seen it before.


“That’s not ours, is it?” she asks.


The documentarian nods.


“We should get going,” he says.


“Why are you here?” asks the biologist.


“What?”


“Why are you here?”


He points at Big Blue. “To film him. Why else?”


“Liar.”


“I’m not lying.”


“Then why are you here? You don’t have to film him. You could have sent some drones. Or someone else. Why are you here?”


“I thought it would be nice. To see you.”


“Why? Why the hell would you want to see me? Why?”


“Relax. Jesus.”


The biologist rolls her eyes and crosses her arms. Her brow furrowed over her breather. Her eyes narrowed and fierce.


“What do you want from me, man?”


“Jesus, Miriam, calm down. I don’t want anything from you.”


“Then why would you want to see me?”


The documentarian holds up his hands palm outwards and steps away as if she were coming at him blade drawn and murderous.


“Listen, I don’t want anything from you, I just thought it would be nice to see you again, that’s all.”


“Bullshit. Why haven’t you taken it off? Do you realize how weird that is?”


“It’s not weird. I just…needed some time.”


He cannot maintain eye contact and after a few second he turns away and stares across the valley. Golden blue and bereft of foliage. A landscape with nowhere to hide. The biologist stares at the back of his neck, mute with fury and grief. She draws her crossed arms tighter around her body and looks over at Big Blue’s figure disappearing down the valley. Then she turns and grabs her bag and starts marching up the hillside.


“Wait!” says the documentarian.


She wheels around and glares.


“Don’t follow me.”


“What?”


“I’m going on ahead. You follow Big Blue. Down in the valley.”


“You can’t…”


“Don’t.”


“Miriam…”


“Do. Not.”


“Jesus, why’re you so angry, anyway? I’m the one who got fucked.”


She freezes, her back to him, silhouetted against the blue grey hillside.


“Go to hell, Mazin,” she says, not looking back.


She storms up the hillside kicking pebbles down in little avalanches. The clouds now streaming in above her as if her temper were churning the skies themselves. And then she disappears over that elevated horizon and the documentarian is left alone to stare at his ring.



She walks, unflagging, through that long Nafthalian afternoon. The sunlight perforating a veil of cloud but no less oppressively hot for all the shade. Soon she is sweating. To her left, a thin sliver of grey beach, and beyond that the sea, wrinkled and static and endless. By mid-afternoon she is well past Big Blue. By the time the shadows begin to creep out to her right, elongating and black as tar, she has lost sight of him completely.


She finally arrives at the beach. Up above, a flock of cawing motes, and the tangy smell of sea creatures on the air. Here and there there are large holes in the sand, clustered in pairs, rimmed with detritus. Dead fish and glistening patches of some organic liquid. Occasionally a bird analogue settles in chattering cacophony and pokes about and takes flight again, pursued by its kin, something squirming in its beak.


She chooses a vantage spot halfway down the beach and settles about fifty meters up a hillside. It is cooler in the shade but not cool enough so she attaches a small packet of juice to her breather and lies down and closes her eyes for a moment. Then she feels a deep rumble in the ground and sitting up, sees something emerging from the sea. Something a lot like Big Blue but bigger still and tinged purple. Another male. Slowly rising out of the water like a nightmare from the depths. Great cataracts of water flooding off its body. It steps onto the sand and its feet sink deep.


Behind her, her drone clicks to life and starts filming.


The male approaches a pair of holes, dripping water and hormones. Its proboscis extends, pearly white and spasming in peristaltic rhythm. Another proboscis emerges from the hole, larger and wider, its tip flared like a trumpet and ringed with little feathery cilia. The male’s organ settles above it and contracts and empties a torrent of matter into it. A crimson and pink gush of liquid nutrients. She can smell it where she is, a rankness undiminished by the distance.


Then something emerges out of the other hole—another giant tube, but this one pink and purple and stinking of pheromones. The male swings another tentacle over it. Its anemone-arms rigid and quivering in anticipation. The two appendages fasten together and the instant the male has finished emptying his crop he shakes his whole body and empties his seed too. Thick ropes of slimy stuff coursing from one to the other and trickling in excess down their bodies and onto the sand.


Then another rumble, and the whole thing is over. The female’s organs slide back into the sand with the steady grace of a ship sinking in calm seas.


The biologist reaches up to her communicator and then stops. One of the male’s tentacles is extended towards her, crown flared and swaying gently. She can hear Big Blue’s footsteps, a distant thud thud thud barely audible above the swelling of the sea. The other male is still now, airsac dirigible, vast and rippling in the wind. It stomps its leg and calls.


A few seconds later, Big Blue responds.


The biologist’s communicator buzzes.


“What?”


“Did you hear that?” says the documentarian. “Where are you?”


“On the beach. There’s another male.”


“Oh.” Silence. And then, “Is it big?”


“Huge.”


“Huge huge?”


“Colossal.”


“Oh.”


She turns off the communicator and begins to take notes. After a few moments she gives up and tosses her console aside and just watches as the beachmaster walks along the beach, vast and oblivious and beautiful beyond reason.



It is nearly twilight by the time Big Blue arrives. The documentarian is not far behind, flustered and sweaty. He sits down beside her and fiddles silently with his console for a few minutes before looking up and saying, “Shit, that is huge.”


The biologist doesn’t say anything.


“Do you think they’ll go at it today?”


“I doubt it,” she says. “It’ll be night time soon and they’ll want to rest.”


“Right. Better set up camp then.”


But no sooner has he said that than the beachmaster stomps the ground twice and let’s rip a great bellowing cry. An instant later Big Blue steps out onto the beach, his body taut and flashing and tentacles flailing, and the ground rumbles with earthquake intensity under the clashing calls of the two males.


“Guess I was wrong,” says the biologist, clambering to her feet.


They ascend the hillside to a small ledge rimmed with fleshy black plants. The last light of the sun garish on the underside of the cloud cover.


“That thing’s huge,” says the documentarian. “Look at it.”


“Have faith,” says the biologist.


Big Blue is heading towards the beachmaster at full tilt, body flashing firework-bright. But the beachmaster is responding in kind and his light is brighter and his bellowing louder. The documentarian smiles.


“Look at him go,” he says.


The two creatures exchange challenges for a few minutes and then abruptly cease. The biologist gets to her feet and fixes a pair of goggles to her eyes and says, “They’re going to fight.”


“I’m getting it all.”


“Shit.”


The two great beasts collide with a crunch that sends the sand on the beach billowing off in sheets. A great cloud of fluids exploding from each. They flail at each other with their tentacles and the humans three hundred meters away can feel every blow in their bones. Across the beach females’ tentacles emerge from the sand with crowns of feelers extended.


Big Blue swings one giant appendage around and it crashes into the beachmaster’s leg and sends the creature down onto its side. The documentarian and the biologist cheer. But then the next instant the beachmaster has wrapped his own feelers around Big Blue’s leg and brought him crashing down to the sand too and with groaning effort brings himself back up onto all fours and extends his proboscis. Big Blue reaches for it but the beachmaster stomps on his flattening belly and sends his innards spilling out onto the beach, glimmering neon like celestial snakes released from long captivity. And then it plunges its proboscis deep into Big Blue’s body, and again, and again, and holds it there until his foe stops struggling and twitching and the wind pauses for an instant and there is nothing but silence and the female’s organs now perfectly still and the two humans on the hillside with their hands on their heads and their eyes full of tears.


For a few minutes they sit in silence and then the biologist leans over to the documentarian and puts her arms around him and sobs.


“I’m sorry,” she says.


The documentarian hugs her back and puts his chin on her head and does not ask her why.



They spend part of the long night together in silence, wrapped up in each other and watching Big Blue’s body turn dark. Then when the cold is too intense they part company for a while. But not long after she slips back into his tent and curls up next to him and says, “I just don’t want to be alone.”


“I know,” he says.


“Don’t try anything.”


“I won’t.”


“I’ll kill you.”


“You already did.”


After a few moments, she says “I never meant to, you know.”


“I know.”


“I thought you hated me.”


“I don’t hate you.”


“You did.”


“Never. Never ever.”


“That’s not normal.”


He takes a deep breath and rolls over onto his back and closes his eyes.


“Neither of us are normal.”


They wake late the next day and eat in silence punctuated only by a brief smiles. He expects her to cry when she takes samples but she pins her hair back and dons her gloves and sets about her work with professional precision and does not stop until she has filled all of her receptacles. He remembers the first time her saw her like this and thinks how magnificent it is to see someone so utterly at one with what they do. And soon afterwards other thoughts follow and he decides it is time to leave.


His pod arrives first. Settling like a great smoking spider soon after Nafthalar’s dazzling noon.


“I’d better get going,” he says.


She nods.


The documentarian walks over the great carcass, so dull now in death, and wrestles the ring off his finger and tosses it into the great membranes hanging off the creature’s side like layers of wet cloth. Then he comes up to her and she stiffens when he puts his arms on her shoulder and leans in. She moves away for an instant and then realizes what he is doing and lets him plant a single kiss on her cheek.


“Good bye,” he says. “Good luck.”


He turns to go.


“Hey,” she calls after him.


“What?”


“It was good to see you too.”


He frowns. “You don’t have to lie.”


“No really. It was.”


He nods. “Right.”


“Do you suppose…they’d, maybe, want to see me again?”


“They’d love to.”


“OK.” She smiles at him. “I’ll send them a message.”


“They’ll be very happy.”


He watches her for a few moments and then smiles and gives her a thumbs up.


After he is gone and the smoke from his pod has dissipated into an acrid miasma she orders her drone to start packing up and wanders down over to Big Blue’s body. The sand yielding and rough between her toes. The creature’s ozone aroma strong in her nostrils. She runs her fingers along one of its body flaps and leans in and presses her lips to its already cold hide.


“Goodbye, old friend,” she says.


And then, above, the sonic boom of her returning pod.




Wanted



By Madeline Olsen



At fifteen, her heart got tired of wanting things. At least if you asked her to pinpoint when it all went down, that’s what she’d say. That year, Tad Gardner, Chance Philmont, and James Adams had dumped her, launching her into a string of hours spent locking the bathroom door and turning the sink up full-blast—tricks she’d inherited from ballet class. She’d snapped the curdled-milk pearl necklace her mother gave her and thrown the rocks so hard they’d plunked against the pink pastoral wallpaper in her living room like firing bullets. She’d glued her lips together with Elmer’s No Mess before school each morning and painted them jet. She’d shaved the thinning hair patches from her head and declared juvenile emancipation and tattooed two crooked lines above each knuckle of her right hand. Why two? Why lines? Why the right hand? Well, why the hell not. She’d blab about them representing something—siblings, boyfriends, spiritual conversions—later in life, as all good citizens with tattoos do, but, really, a crooked line is a crooked line. They didn’t mean anything.


But to say three middle-school boys stopped a beating heart seems irrational. Impossible, even, considering only ten percent know how to zip their flies and the other ninety percent equate their waists with their knees—pull up your pants, kid, please. In reality though, hope and wanting had begun to feel as dirty as kitchen sink water after a meat spaghetti dinner long before age fifteen. When did hoping, wanting ever do any good, really? As a child she’d wanted a lot of little things—soft caramel-chocolate bars suited in purple foil; the silver unicorn stuffed animal at that carnival; a ride on the cheetah at the zoo carousel. As she grew up she’d wanted a lot of big things, abstract things like love and beauty and friendship and even book smarts from time to time. But she never got anything. Three boys dumped her in a year. Some brat in a beret cried until she gave up her seat on the cheetah.


So when the doctor offered to remove her heart at age sixteen for a wad of cash, she said yeah, go for it. They took the bloody mass out and replaced it with some sort of metal cog thing—she couldn’t remember what it was called. And she hadn’t wanted anything since. Until now, that is. Now, she wanted something. She wanted out of this damn shit-pot of a circular prison.


She looked at her pointer finger, bitten to chunks of skin and blood. She pressed it against the stone and slid down, almost missing the scrap of long French-tipped nails. Nine hundred slashes of red caked the wall. One hundred more remained to be drawn. Then she would leave this place.


A guard stalked past, and the slat in the glass door grated open. A bowl clambered toward her, bouncing when it smacked the cracks in the cement. She scrambled forward, scooped it into her lap, and dipped her finger into the grey puddle. The blood on her finger salted the mush, and for a minute she could almost force herself to think it tasted good, a kind of low-quality good, you know, like canned sardines or cheap dried kale. Her butterfly lungs beat and fluttered. She choked out a cough.


She stared out the windowed wall at the watchtower that grew from the center of the panopticon. They were watching; she was sure of it, even though she couldn’t see them. God, they were always watching. They had probably watched her draw her mark on the wall and written it down—silent notes kept in a little book of her behaviors. You couldn’t get away with anything here. Her eyes glazed, blurring black rock and brown and windowpane, and she shoveled the grainy goop into her mouth, letting the liquid dribbles sting her chapped lips. When she got out of here, she was jetting to Paris and going to that pastry shop, that one in Marais with the lemon madeleines, warm as sunset and honey-buttered, and the mille feuilles that exploded chocolate and custard with each forkful—if you had the patience and politeness to use a fork, that is. She couldn’t remember the name of the place, but she’d find it. And then she’d sit at some restaurant, the priciest one around, and she’d eat mutton so soaked in cream it melted at the touch of your tongue like a sixteen-year old school boy.


Her teeth sank down into a phantom mutton morsel, accidentally clamping onto her finger instead. She wrenched it out, coughed, and spat pink-tinted spit.


She shouldn’t have killed him, she supposed. Then she wouldn’t be trapped suffocating in a two by four half-glass box. But she’d spent her life suffocated. She’d gotten tired of that doctor stalking after her for the past ten years. He’d taken out her heart, sure, but that didn’t give him the right to monitor her every action. Lord, she couldn’t even eat a jam sandwich without him noting her heart palpitations down in that damn yellow, blue-lined notepad. Pity he didn’t note the speed of her heart when she imagined smashing his glasses into his face every night as he watched her sleeping. Maybe then that frown of surprise wouldn’t have flashed on his face when she’d finally lost it. And now, they—the other doctors, the government, someone—had thrown her in here as punishment. Because there’s no better way to monitor your pet project than by throwing it in jail.


They were watching her now; she could feel the eyes piercing from the watchtower into her cell, into her body. She shook her head, crusted hair scratching her cheeks, and crawled into the corner as far from the tower as she could get. It didn’t matter how she got into this place. It was just another mistake, just a mangled body. All that mattered was one hundred more days. She leaned her head back to rest against the wall as the dank air crept into her lungs. Her throat throttled out another cough.


Her eyes fell shut; her mind unleashed itself to indulge in imaginings. In one hundred days she’d have a washing machine and a dryer and a queen-sized mattress and a toaster. In one hundred days she’d lie in the sun and feel its heat bite into her translucent skin while she poured strawberry margaritas down her throat. In one hundred days she’d walk into a fluorescent white-lit supermarket at midnight and she’d buy a bag of cheese-coated corn chips and a bottle of diet cola. And some cough medicine. The thought tickled at the metal, machine-filled cavity in her chest. If she had a heart, it’d be bloated with rushing blood and heat—hope, if you’d like to assign a word to the feeling.


She didn’t have the strength to smash the feeling down, to wrap her fingers around it and squeeze until it smothered down into the usual dull emptiness, angst, and overall eye-rolling boredom. Her eyes drifted to the ceiling a leg span from her head, and she thought about calling to whatever deity sat around up there. Maybe if she said thanks for putting me in here, it’d find a way to reduce her sentence. Maybe it’d sweep down and gather her up and take her to the clouds. She laughed. She coughed.


A scream raked her ears, sending prickling hot shivers down her arms. She crawled to the door and pressed her ear against the glass. Booted feet slapped against the floor outside on level two, the level below her cell. She couldn’t see them. They could see her from their tower, but she couldn’t see them. She could never see them. But she heard the scratch of coarse, swishing fabric—guards, off to regulate the cause of the shout. The feet stopped.


“Oh my god.”


“Do you . . . do you think? No, that’s not possible. Nah. It couldn’t be.”


“I don’t know. Looks like it to me.”


The voices dropped to a murmur, low and deep as a heartbeat. She pushed her cheek against the door and closed her eyes as if cutting off that worthless sense would improve her hearing. It didn’t. But her ears snagged one word—doctor. And then the boots shuffled away to some other side of the circle. A door slammed.


She slunk back into the shadowed corner. She’d known her fair share of doctors. When she was ten, she jumped from the top of the school monkey bars and crushed the edge of her foot. A doctor gave her crutches. When she was twelve, she danced on the top of a counter, slipped, and slit her jaw a pinkie fingertip deep. A doctor gave her stitches. And when she was sixteen, of course, a doctor cut out her heart. They’d called it a miracle. Somebody could live with a machine for a heart, yet remain human in most of the other ways—blood, nerves, broken bones. And maybe it was a miracle, though she hadn’t done it to be called miraculous; she did it for the thousand-dollar cash reward advertised by a monotone-voiced man on the radio. They’d wanted to manufacture more like her. Apparently machines last—live—longer than regular humans, and what’s a successful society if not a close to immortal one? God was immortal. We should be too. They’d failed though. She’d heard that people had died seizuring during the operation—the doctors couldn’t figure out what it was about her metal heart that made it stick, that made it compatible with all the rest of her humanness.


A door slammed. Feet shuffled. A cough. She crawled to the window-door. A silence thick as rye bread flooded the air.


“Well, is it?” a voice, a guard, asked.


She waited for the response, but heard nothing. The doctor was nodding, perhaps, or shaking his head.


“Oh god.”


The doctor had nodded, then. But about what?


“Oh god, oh god. This, no, but, but, I thought? What’s going to happen to us? What can we do about it?”


“Nothing. We can’t do anything about it,” the doctor said.


She ripped her head from the door and punched her knuckles into its surface. “What the hell is going on out there? What can’t we do anything about?”


No response. So they didn’t think she deserved to know? Like hell was she going to accept silence. She kept punching, wrists crunching, popping with each hit. The glass shook, but held firm. The hall vibrated with echoes deep as tribal war drums as the other inmates, each trapped in their hovel windowed hells, joined her song.


A guard rounded the corner. She stood, meeting his heavy-lidded eyes.


“Shut the hell up,” he said, “You’re causing problems. They saw you start this from the watchtower.”


“You shut the hell up. I wouldn’t have yelled if I hadn’t heard the panic below us. What’s going on down there?”


“An inmate died, that’s all.”


“You seriously expect me to believe that shit? One of you guards was having a panic attack, and somebody went for a doctor. What was all that for?”


“I told you. An inmate died.” The guard coughed. “That’s all.”


“Died of what?”


“People die here, that’s the nature of the institution. I would’ve thought you’d been in that box long enough to figure that out by now.”


“Yeah, I have been in this box long enough to figure that out. And I’m getting out soon enough, too.”


His chin tipped up as he laughed. He laughed and laughed and then coughed.


“What?”


“I can tell you one thing: you’re not leaving.”


“What?”


“You’re not leaving.”


“But my sentence is up in one hundred days! You can’t keep me here. By law you can’t make me stay here.”


He shook his head. “You’re not leaving. I’m not leaving. And we’ll be long dried up dead by one hundred days.”


She coughed.


He nodded. “Long dried up dead, I tell you. You think you’re so invincible, so much better than the rest of us with that little machine heart, but in a few days that machine heart will be the only thing left of you. The cough’s the beginning.”


“I don’t understand what the hell you’re talking about,” she said. “Is this about the inmate that died downstairs?”


He nodded.


A pit knotted in her stomach, she tried coughing it out like a hairball, but nothing could dislodge the squeezing sensation. “What did he die of? Are you going to tell me?”


“Tuberculosis.”


“That blood coughing disease that all those artists died from? They have medicine for that these days.”


“Not for this strain. It broke out last week in a village thirty miles north of here, the one where we get our milk. It wiped away the place in three days. Drugs did nothing.”


“And now it’s here,” she said, her mouth dry as honey oat granola.


“They’re putting the whole prison under quarantine. Nobody leaves or more of the world gets infected.”


“So we’re all just going to die here? You can’t do that! You can’t make me stay longer than one hundred days!”


“I already told you that you’ll be dead by then. You’re infected already. I can hear it in your breath.”


She swallowed gulps of air, fighting the pulsing cough creeping into her lungs. “No. I’m getting out. I’m getting out and going to Paris and eating pastries.”


“How do you think you’re getting out?”


“I’ll kill myself.”


“And we’ll stop you. We’ll see you.” He pointed to the watchtower. “You never know when they’re watching you, and so they’re always watching you.”


She stared at his steel grey eyes. “Don’t you want to get out? Don’t you have a family to go home to? You’ll never see them again.”


He blinked. “Sometimes we must lose the weak to become strong.”


She’d never been the weak one before. Never. She’d cut her heart out so that she would never be the weak one. Yet, here she was, stuck in a glass jail box. She looked up. “At least we’ll die together, the jailed and the jailor. Sounds like karma to me. You’ve heard the phrase. What goes around comes around.”


“Maybe. But at least I get a bed and three bowls of soup for dinner.”


He turned and walked away, disappearing down the circle’s edge. She coughed, and her hand swept to cover her mouth. She pulled her fingers away, staring at the bloodstained skeins of mucus coating her palm. And she knew that no amount of hope and wanting Parisian pastries could save her.



Two men stepped over a body.


“God, it’s creepy in here. There are skeletons everywhere. Are you sure it’s safe? We’re not going to catch anything?”


“It’s safe, I’m sure.”


The man looked at the watchtower. “I feel like someone’s watching us.”


“They’re all dead.”


“Fine. But let’s get out of here as soon as we can. Where was her cell?”


“Listen.”


The two men stopped. The stale air stank of mold and death. They listened. And then they heard it, the tick clink of a cog, a beating mechanical heart.


“Up there.”


They walked up the stairs and entered one of the glass boxes. A skeleton rotted into the floor, a metal box wrapped in its ribcage. One of the men reached down and picked the contraption up.


“Here it is. It’s still good. We’ll try putting it in someone else.”




The Monk’s Grimoire



By A.P. Miller



The look on the Abbot’s face was telling. “Come in,” he said. “Hurry up Flint, I haven’t got all day.”


Flint lingered in the doorway for a moment. He was not ready for another tongue-lashing from the old man. “Is something the matter?”


“Close the door behind you.” The Abbot sat behind an ancient desk that gave the man a distinct aura of wisdom and authority.


Something unpleasant was coming, that much was certain. The Abbot rarely called the adjuncts into his office, and this was the third time Flint had been summoned inside a month. Flint pulled the door shut with trembling hands.


“I think you already know why you’re here,” the Abbot said. His impassive eyes studied Flint. “It’s the same problem we’ve had since you started.”


“The research,” Flint said, looking down.


“You need to produce something. I understand that you are busy teaching. But so are all of the monks. You need to find some balance between class and your research. We can’t keep you on as an adjunct if you don’t produce something original.”


The words did not register immediately. Flint shook his head. “Can’t keep me on? You mean you’re going to dismiss me?”


“I have no choice!” the Abbot said. “You’re a fine teacher, but this is a research monastery. How will it look if my monks are not broadening our knowledge of the occult?”


“But I’m buried in work! You have me teaching more classes than any other monk by half. It’s not that I don’t want to study. I just don’t have the time.”


“Are you telling me you can’t do the job?” The old man placed a heavy hand on his desk.


Flint’s mouth hung open, and he waited for words to come out.


“Look,” the Abbot said. “I’m not unreasonable.” He shifted in his seat, and his eyes filled with an uncharacteristic guile. “I’d be willing to give you some extra time, if you are willing to do me a favor. Brother Godfrey has been working on a side project for almost a year now.” The Abbot sighed. “A full year. And no one has any idea what he’s actually doing.”


“I’ve heard,” Flint said, shrugging.


“You and everyone else. But it’s my responsibility to know, and that’s the trouble. Brother Godfrey is brilliant, but he’s stubborn as an ass. And he’s tenured. He won’t say a word. He wouldn’t even tell me where he’s working.”


“That’s the favor? You want me to find out where he’s researching?”


“And what, if you can. Do that, and I’ll give you a pass on your work for the next few months.” The Abbot pointed a finger at Flint. “But listen. I don’t want to hear about you breaking any rules, or using the occult to manipulate him. Do it right, or don’t do it at all.” The Abbot put his hand back on the desk. “Why don’t you see if he’ll take you on as his research assistant? That would put you right where you need to be.”


“I don’t know,” Flint said. “He’s so secretive. Do you really think he would consider it?”


“Go find out,” the Abbot said in a tone that told Flint the conversation was over.


Flint tried to hide his worry. He pulled open the door and stepped out into the empty corridor.


“And Flint,” the Abbot said. “This is the third time I’ve had you in my office. This is your last chance.”



Flint looked through the open door and into Godfrey’s lecture hall. Godfrey stood in front of a large body of students, where gray light filtered in through the windows and onto his brown robes.


Godfrey cleared his throat. “Now, there are some things that divine studies have yet to achieve. Some of these things have not been achieved because they are physically impossible to accomplish. Others have not been adequately studied because they are beyond the pale. They are considered too dark or too dangerous. Some, here at the university, are afraid to push past these boundaries. But I am not one of them. Our next lecture will touch on one of these topics. I think you will find it enlightening.”


Flint cocked his head to one side. Godfrey’s cavalier attitude sat well on him, despite his scholarly appearance.


A young student, hardly old enough to grow a beard, raised his hand. “Brother, aren’t there some subjects that are best left untouched?”


“Perhaps,” Godfrey said, resting a hard look on the apprentice. “But those studies are well beyond the capabilities of first-year students.” The school-bell’s low chime echoed overhead, and Godfrey looked up. “Looks like that will be all for today. Class dismissed.” The students poured into the corridor, leaving Godfrey alone.


Flint strode past the empty desks. “Brother Godfrey,” he said as he approached. “Good evening.”


Godfrey wiped at the blackboard with a rag. “Evening.”


“How goes the work?”


Godfrey answered automatically. “Fine. Just fine.”


The two stood in an uncomfortable silence.


“Godfrey, I have a favor to ask.”


Godfrey regarded Flint. “A favor?”


“You probably don’t know, but I’ve been struggling with my research lately.”


Godfrey scoffed. “Of course I know. Everyone knows.”


The comment caught Flint off-guard, and he recoiled behind a well-maintained facade. “Everyone… Well, it’s been difficult finding time to study when I’m pulled in so many directions.”


“Then make time. Late nights. Weekends. Whatever you have to do. No one is going to hold your hand. I do most of my best work when the moon is out.”


“Actually, that’s what I want to ask you. Would you be willing to let me work with you? I’ve been dying to know what your project is all about.”


Godfrey’s face fell. “Did the Abbot send you in here after me? I knew that fool would start prying sooner or later.”


“He said that you might be willing to take me on as a research assistant. Help me get a foothold in some meaningful work.”


“Take you on as an informant, you mean. He’s trying to find out what I’m onto, isn’t he?”


“Godfrey, please. I’m already up every night grading. The Abbot is going to fire me if I don’t deliver something soon.”


Godfrey scowled. “Sorry,” he said. “My work is too sensitive. You’ll have to make do on your own.”


Hope melted from Flint, and he left to wander the corridors.



“I’m not surprised,” Gloria said. She moved her leather schoolbag to the ground, and Flint set his plate in its place. “He’s never been particularly pleasant.” Gloria spooned up the last of her dinner. “And he’s always been strange, too. Especially when it comes to his work.”


Flint slammed a fist on the table. “He’s paranoid, that’s what he is! He was so preoccupied thinking about the Abbot that he didn’t even listen to what I was asking him.”


Gloria’s spoon stopped halfway to her mouth, and she glanced around the dining hall. The students at the table next to them looked startled. She nodded to appease them. “Take it easy,” she said. “You’ll figure something out.”


Flint shook his head. “You don’t understand. I have nothing outside of the Priory. Nothing. I’ll be on the streets if I lose my job here. Out on Beggars’ Row next to the drunks, shaking a cup at you when you walk to work in the mornings.”


Gloria’s quiet lasted too long.


“What?” Flint said.


She looked around and said, “Don’t be obtuse. You know you won’t be on the streets. But I wouldn’t be walking by you anyway. I’m leaving the Priory soon. That’s why I can’t help you. I’m going to tell the Abbot tomorrow.”


Flint’s face was placid, though a storm brewed behind his eyes. He looked at Gloria with the intensity of a brokenhearted man. “Leaving? But why? I thought you were happy here. You’ve only just earned your tenure.”


“It’s this place, Flint,” Gloria said. “These people. Every one of them is pretentious. They think they’re better than the rest of the world because of their studies. I need a real experience. Something outside of these walls.” She set her lovely hand on Flint’s.


The pace of Flint’s heart quickened. He looked down at her hand, then at her face.


“I want you to come with me,” she said.


Flint shook his head in dismay. “I… I can’t.”


Gloria withdrew.


“I can make something of myself here,” Flint said. “You can make something of yourself here. I know it’s not perfect, but there is so much to experience here. The longer I study, the more I realize that we know almost nothing about the occult. You and I can explore it all together.”


The summons bell rung for evening class. “I have to go,” Gloria said.


Flint watched the flow of her long hair as she walked away. He sat at the table, brooding, until his food was cold. After a time, he shook his head and pushed his chair back.


A familiar brown bag lay under the table.


Flint picked it up, and looked inside to confirm that it belonged to Gloria. Her lecture notes, her quills, and her small key ring hid inside.


He left the dining hall for his dormitory with the bag under his arm, winding through the eastern wing where a disused entryway let in the cold.


Godfrey stood in the half-open door. He carried a small pack full of travel supplies and was wrapped in a mass of heavy cloaks to ward off the cold. He tried to leave before Flint could interrupt him.


“Out for the night?” Flint said.


“Going to visit my daughter in town. I’ll be back before class tomorrow.” He pulled a hood over his head.


“Any chance you’d reconsider what we talked about earlier?”


Godfrey disappeared into the snowy night, leaving the door open behind him.


Flint ran his fingers over Gloria’s bag. A key to the tenured monks’ common room rested inside – the common room attached to Godfrey’s private chambers. Flint lingered at the door for a time, as if struggling with a decision, then reached in the bag and removed the key.



The key slid home, and Flint peeked around the edge of the common room door. The fireplace offered the only light, but it was enough to show that the room was empty. All of the senior monks had retired to their rooms. Flint crept in, keeping to the shadowy corners where he might be able to disappear should someone interrupt him.


Godfrey’s private chambers were on the far side of the common area, opposite a tidy circle of leather armchairs and writing desks.


Flint slunk past a closed door, wincing when the wood floor groaned under his weight.


Someone stirred behind the heavy oak. The handle rattled, and the door swung open, hiding Flint from whoever stood on the other side.


Flint’s breath caught in his throat, and he froze.


The fat, dark-skinned monk who lumbered out could only have been Brother Harken. Harken threw the door shut without a backward glance and strode across the room. He picked up a stack of parchment from one of the desks and sat at the fireplace with his back to Flint.


Flint waited until the man had shut out the world around him, dragging his round fingers across lines of scrawling text and murmuring to himself. Flint inched along the perimeter, stopping short every time the man moved to turn a page or tend to the fire.


His hand found Godfrey’s doorknob, but it hung against the lock. Flint squeezed the brass and narrowed his eyes, concentrating on something far away and unseen.


But nothing happened. Flint glanced down at his hands, puzzled, as if he had expected a reaction. He closed his eyes and tried again. A mass of black magic laced in wisps of purple smoke enclosed Flint’s hand. The lock’s tumblers fell into place with a terrifying click. Flint dared a glance over his shoulder to see if the sound caught Harken’s attention, but it was lost in the crack and pop of the fire.


Flint pulled the door open gingerly, but the hinges screamed. He slipped through the narrow aperture and passed out of sight behind it.


Godfrey’s room was lit only by a sliver of firelight and the moon behind the snow. “I thought you were going into town for the night,” Harken said from the other side of the door.


“Me?” The Abbot was in the common room, not twenty feet away from Flint.


“Good evening, Abbot. Gloria,” Harken said. “No, not you. I just heard Godfrey at his door. I think he’s in there, anyway.”


“Strange,” Gloria said. “I saw him leaving just a little while ago.” Her soft footsteps echoed across the common room, drawing nearer to Godfrey’s room. “Godfrey? Knock, knock.”


Flint could not find the mindfulness to hide, and he stood in the middle of the room like a fool when Gloria put her head inside. Their eyes met and Flint shook his head, putting a finger over his lips before she could speak.


“He in there?” the Abbot said.


Gloria hesitated. “No…No. He’s not here.”


“Well someone opened the door,” Harken said, and he heaved himself out of his chair to investigate.


“Hide!” Gloria mouthed.


Flint dropped to the ground and crawled like a spider under the bed. Cold air rose from the cracks between floorboards. His fingertips brushed over a small metal ring resting flush in the wood. When he lifted it, the square outline of an enchanted trapdoor cut into the floor, and a whisper of sawdust fell through to a hollow place beneath.


Flint pulled, and the hatch opened. The unfinished wood dug splinters into his back as he scraped through. Godfrey’s room brightened, and Flint saw feet shuffle inside. He lowered the hatch over the top of himself, taking refuge in the dark once more.



Flint sat at the top of a dust-covered stair, wedged between the trap door and steps that dropped out of sight into black emptiness an impossible distance below. The monks’ muffled voices quieted and eventually disappeared from Godfrey’s room.


Flint pushed on the trapdoor, but it would not budge. He groped at the wood above his head, searching for its edges, but he found only unbroken slats. The magic had faded, and the door was gone.


Apprentices spoke of the undercroft in whispers and the monks not at all. The disused basements were a remnant of the Priory’s earlier and more wicked days. It was a bad chance that Flint’s escape was through one of the fabled long-forgotten doors.


He held up a hand, trying to will forth a glow of ethereal light, but none would come. Flint looked at his palms. Down into the darkness was his only option. He descended thousands of steps, running a hand along the wall’s sharp masonry to keep his bearings until his feet found a packed earthen floor. He wandered aimlessly in the darkness for an age, languishing in the fear that time would kill him if he could not find his way.


The air cleared and grew colder in the depths. The dark lessened, and water lapped against a shore somewhere ahead. Flint’s breaths came in short white plumes as he emerged into a man-made cavern.


He gazed up at a vaulted ceiling rich with stalactites. Ahead, a saltwater canal disappeared into a winding crevasse of wet bedrock. Small waves broke against a pier that jutted from the embankment where he stood. A dingy grimoire bound in engraved leather rested between sheaves of heavily-inked parchment on a workbench further down, illuminated by a dying brazier.


Curiosity overcame his baser instincts, and Flint moved to examine it. He lifted a piece of parchment and began to read private research notes written in Godfrey’s untidy script. Flint lost all account of time as he poured through them, and the cold and damp crept under his clothes.


“What do you think you are doing?” Godfrey said from the darkness.


Flint jumped and dropped the parchment in the dirt. He spun around. A rowboat bobbed in the canal behind Godfrey. He glared at Flint. “I’m sorry,” Flint said. “I was just curious.”


“How did you get down here?”


“I accidentally found a way into the undercroft. I got lost. Wound up here.”


“Accidentally? And you came down here and thought you would just read my private notes.” Godfrey stepped forward. “Find anything interesting?”


“I see why you won’t let anybody know what you’re onto.”


Godfrey scowled. “They wouldn’t understand. Not a single one of them. Bunch of self-serving swine.”


“This grimoire affects the roots of the occult, doesn’t it?” Flint put his hand on its leather, feeling the power within. “The deepest parts of it. It can destroy our power altogether if you want it to. I’ve felt it already. I was lost just now because I couldn’t make light.”


“It’s a single incantation, but terribly long and complex,” Godfrey said. “I don’t believe anything like it has ever been attempted. But you’re wrong. I don’t mean destroy anything. Quite the contrary in fact. I just want to harness the foundations of the occult. Center it on this book.”


“Why?”


Godfrey’s laugh was edged with madness. “Because I need hope. I need the power to change things I can’t otherwise change.”


“Hope for what?” Flint said. “Godfrey, you have to stop. What if something goes wrong? The power you’re talking about is…dangerous.”


“My child is sick. My daughter. She’s, sick and no medicine can help. But I can save her, Flint. I can change the course of fate with this. It’s almost finished. Almost.”


Flint watched the man shrink from boldness to desperation. Godfrey’s secret was a heavy burden. He looked older than he had, sallower and more worn.


“Are you going to tell the Abbot?” Godfrey said.


Flint narrowed his eyes. “What will you do after you heal your daughter?”


Godfrey raised his hands. “Lock it away. Show the Priory what I’ve created and what miracles can be done with it.”


The decision was more difficult than any Flint had faced. He rubbed his black beard. “I can give you a week. But I have to be the one to tell the Abbot what you’ve been working on. And this is too dangerous for me to just walk away from. You need to take me on as your assistant.”


“Done,” Godfrey said.


The men moved to the workbench to discuss the course of things to come.



Arctic currents swirled in the ocean, carrying opaque-blue glaciers dusted in white.


Flint’s glazed eyes watched them through the glass of his dormitory window. Godfrey was still a hundred fathoms below where the water met the base of the Priory Cliffs, writing in the grimoire. It would be ready tonight.


Someone knocked on the door. “Flint? It’s me,” Gloria said through the wood.


Flint opened it.


“May I come in?”


Flint tried to smile and stepped aside. “Of course.”


Gloria took Flint’s place by the window. She turned, and her dark eyes cut through him. “What were you doing last night?”


“You already know,” Flint said. “I was trying to figure out what Godfrey is up to.”


“How did you get inside anyway?” Gloria chewed on her lip. “The common room door is hexed. It’s impossible to open without that key.”


“You left your bag in the dining hall last night.”


“You have it? I’ve been looking everywhere.” Gloria glared at Flint. “Wait, you mean you used my key to get in?”


“I’m sorry Gloria. I know it was wrong, but I was desperate.” Flint looked down at the woven carpet beneath his feet. It bore the image of a whaling ship being torn asunder by a leviathan. “Godfrey came around. He’s taking me on as his research assistant.”


Gloria’s brow furrowed. “He changed his mind just like that?”


“Sort of.”


Gloria turned back to the window and said nothing for a long while. “How did you get out of there anyway? I waited for you in the common room all night.”


Flint put his arms around Gloria, and her hands found his. He told her everything.


“But,” Gloria said. “Godfrey’s daughter died last year.”


Flint recoiled. “What?”


“Her boat overturned in a storm. They found her body under the ice the next morning.”


“He must have another daughter then.”


Gloria shook her head. “She was his only child. Flint, what Godfrey is trying to do can’t be done safely. He’s manipulating the fabric of the occult. We have to tell the Abbot.”


“Do you think he wants to… bring her back?”


“I don’t know. But this sort of thing has been tried before, and people have been killed.”


The worry on Gloria’s face convinced Flint in the end, and they walked hand-in-hand to find the Abbot.



The Abbot walked across the Priory’s courtyard, taking in the sharp late-afternoon air. A fresh crop of snow flurries lit upon the overgrown whiskers that pushed out from under his hood.


Flint watched the Abbot from the foyer. “Why don’t you stay here? I can tell him by myself.”


“Are you sure?” Gloria said.


“I don’t want you to get caught up in this if he doesn’t take it well.”


“All right. I’ll be here. Good luck.”


Flint buttoned his cloak and went out into the cold. “Abbot!” he said.


The Abbot scowled when Flint admitted to trespassing in Godfrey’s quarters, and the bitterness stayed on his face until the story was finished. “Flint,” the Abbot said. “I warned you not to break the rules. And now you’re telling me that you stole another professor’s key, then used a forbidden incantation to trespass in another’s private chambers?”


“Abbot, Godfrey…” Flint said.


“We are not talking about Godfrey. We are talking about you.” The Abbot brushed a pile of snow from his wiry beard. “That man has been an institution at the Priory for almost twenty years. You, on the other hand, can’t even keep yourself from breaking the law!”


“But I…“


“This is it for you Flint. You’re finished. I won’t keep you here any longer.”


“Fine.” Flint’s face flushed, and he raised his chin. “But you’re wrong. You have to listen to me.”


The Abbot’s eyes turned black. “I don’t have to do anything.” His voice grew not in volume but in presence, delivered with the power of his station. “I will not be ordered around. And certainly not by an outcast.”


Flint saw nothing but the void of the Abbot’s eyes. He shrunk from the glare and fell backwards into the snow. His voice trembled. “We have to do something. You have to do something.”


“Roderick, Isabelle.” The Abbot beckoned to a pair of monks crossing the courtyard. “I need your assistance. Please escort Flint to his dormitory so he can collect his belongings. Then show him off of the Priory grounds. He has been dismissed.”


“But…” Flint said, but the Abbot turned his back.


The monks looked at each other, then at Flint. “What happened?” Isabelle said after the Abbot had walked out of earshot.


He had to get to Godfrey. Flint climbed to his feet and began to walk toward the Priory, looking up at its time-worn spires and stained glass. “Nothing,” he said.


Gloria shot Flint a questioning look when the trio passed through the door.


“I’ve been dismissed,” he said to her. “The Abbot doesn’t believe me.”


Gloria considered Roderick and Isabelle. “What are you going to do?” she asked Flint.


“I’m going after Godfrey.” Flint took a breath and clapped his hands.


The sound shook the room, reverberating in his chest like a violent clap of thunder. Sooty black smoke poured into being and Flint was blinded. He staggered through the clouds, searching for an exit. Gloria coughed close by, but Flint ignored her. The smoke cleared near the edge of the room and Flint ran, pulling the common room key from his pocket.



Godfrey read the grimoire by the brazier’s smoldering light. He flipped through its pages with increasing speed, chanting the inscriptions without pause for breath. The fire ebbed and flowed with his words. Sparks spit forth in gouts of red and turned to ash in the cold water nearby. An endless torrent of occult energy flowed into the grimoire, black and hazy.


Flint saw it when he ran across the wharf. A coffin, black and still nailed shut, near the brazier. “Godfrey!” Flint said. “Stop! This is madness!”


But Godfrey turned the final page and snapped together the grimoire’s heavy covers. He hugged the book in his arms and raised his eyebrows. “Why? Why is it so mad to want to be with the one you love?” he said. “Doesn’t every man want the same? I’d wager you’d give much to keep Gloria at the Priory.”


Flint faltered. “But this is unnatural.” Flint’s face faded further with a profound realization. “At this moment, nobody in the world can manipulate the occult but you.” He lifted his hands, as if to prove himself incapable.


“A small cost. Perhaps things will return to the way they were. Perhaps not. At least I’ll have my girl.” Godfrey face was wet with tears. He turned to the painted box and raised a hand.


“Godfrey, I’m trying to help you,” Flint said.


The grimoire shook in Godfrey’s arm and the space between his hand and the coffin disappeared in black fog.


Flint lunged at Godfrey, clawing at the book, but Godfrey had already turned around. Something heavy flew from his hand collided with Flint’s chest.


Flint’s ribs cracked, and he flew backwards into the canal. Water flooded over him. Flint struggled to find the surface, beating at the water before his saturated cloak could pull him further down. His hand landed on the pier and he pulled himself to the embankment, coughing and retching from the pain in his side. He peered over the stony edge.


Godfrey stood over the coffin. Something inside it moved.


“Godfrey?” Gloria said from the far entryway. “Are you all right?”


“Of course,” Godfrey smiled.


Flint crept across the wharf, low and silent. He winced with each step. Splintered ribs grated against each other and he almost cried out.


“What are you doing?” Gloria said, locking eyes with Godfrey.


“Just finishing my project,” Godfrey said. “I’m think I’m….”


Flint pulled the grimoire from Godfrey’s grasp. Godfrey spun on his heels, his face shining bright with panic and rage. He raised his hand, poised to murder. But nothing happened.


The grimoire was heavy in Flint’s arms. Heavier than it should have been. Flint looked at Godfrey and pitched it into the brazier.


“No!” Godfrey said, scrambling for the hot coals. Flint used the last of his strength to shoulder him aside and they fell together to the ground.


The grimoire burned to ash before Godfrey found his feet.



The Abbot went to his office when he learned what had happened, and he barred the door. Days and weeks passed before anyone saw his face again.


Flint scratched a piece of gypsum across the blackboard. The classroom glowed from the sun on the snow outside. “As you know, the longer an incantation is, the more powerful. Or was, rather.”


A student raised her hand. “Why should we bother with this anymore? We can’t do anything with it.”


“No, at this moment we can’t. But we have to preserve our knowledge. What if the power of the occult returns in a hundred years?”


The bell chimed a somber tone in the towers far above.


“Right. Well, that’s it then. We’ll pick back up tomorrow.”


The students left the classroom, and Flint leaned to tidy the lectern. His hand shot to his side where the ribs had broken. When he was able to straighten himself out again, he found the Abbot standing in the doorway. “Abbot,” Flint said.


The Abbot looked his age, though more sorrowful than most old men. “I should have listened,” he said.


“You couldn’t have known,” Flint said.


“I’m glad you didn’t leave. I just wanted to tell you. And that I was wrong.” His head fell.


“Thank you. But Gloria left a few weeks ago and I’m going with her. I’ve already begun to pack my things.” Flint drew the sun-faded curtains, darkening the room. “I’ve found that… there is more to life than this.”


“The Priory will close. There is no hope for us here.” The Abbot slouched against the doorframe.


“There is always hope. Some things have funny ways of healing themselves. Just give it time.” A translucent wisp of light in Flint’s hand illuminated his smile.




Willingly and with Joy



By Lynn Rushlau



Waves smashed into boulders strewn like a giant’s bread crumbs in front of the seawall. Caught by the setting sun, the spray glittered gold as it was cast into the air and fell in drops of citrine. Zeninna laughed and raised her arms to catch the wild energy. Wind tangled her unbound black hair and billowed her clothes. Though the wind tried, the gusts lacked the strength to knock her from her perch on the seawall.


“I did it, you old hags! I got in!”


The roar of wind and angry waves along Landis’ empty seawall gave Zeninna the courage to yell her triumph to the sea. She pealed with laughter, delighted with her success.


She’d sworn she could. Stood up before the Iridescent Court and scoffed at those who mocked her as too young, too wild, too loud. Unruly as the sea in storm, her own mother screeched at her. Zeninna’s supporters begged her to keep her temper leashed. She hadn’t. She couldn’t. The old hags made her too angry. But she won the right to try.


And she’d succeeded. She pressed her hand over her heart and felt the papers stashed inside her coat crinkle. Her acceptance papers. Tomorrow morning, she would enter the Great Library of Cerulea as an Acolyte.


“I did it!” She screamed once more into the wind and waves.


A dark shape popped out of the water between two of the boulders. Zeninna’s heart stopped as a wave crashed over the rocks. Had she just seen…? Ahead of the next wave, her cousin Viridis hopped half out of the water onto a bowl in the rock.


Shock held Zeninna momentarily speechless. She’d spent too long around well-fed, healthy humans. Viridis looked green and positively skeletal.


“Are you crazy?” Zeninna looked wildly up and down the seawall. Relief tempered her outrage. Viridis, not her best friend Perseah. Perseah was safe at home.


“I would hope you wouldn’t be screaming at the top of your lungs if there were humans in the vicinity to hear.”


“That they can’t hear over the wind and waves doesn’t mean they can’t see you from a window.” Zeninna gestured wildly at the town behind her.


Viridis smirked. “Human sight isn’t that good. I’ll take your message to the Court. How long before they should expect you?”


Screaming reminders at herself not to give Viridis reason to suspect anything, Zeninna forced herself to take a deep breath. Her mind rocketed about and found the perfect way to spin the answer. “I’ll know better after Orientation tomorrow.”


“Should I meet you here at dusk then?” Viridis raised her eyebrows.


Zeninna frowned. It wasn’t like Viridis to offer to play messenger. She shook her head. “You can come. I can’t promise I’ll be able to get away.”


Viridis narrowed her eyes. “Don’t forget the importance of your mission.”


Fury propelled Zeninna off the wall. Imbecile! Viridis couldn’t possibly understand the importance of Zeninna’s mission to the Irides! Viridis only knew the Court’s version of the task, not the actual plan. The gall of her brainless cousin to attempt to remind her what was at stake! Whipping back around, Zeninna sneered at Viridis. “I will not forget. Now I must go. I’ll be missed.”



Zeninna knew herself to be less rash than the Iridescent Court labeled her. She understood that Orientation would not be the time to even attempt her mission. Her duty might be at the back of her mind at all times, but today she pretended that she simply was another acolyte with dreams of becoming a librarian or curator or even director of the Library.


So she listened to the welcoming speeches, what was expected, where they’d live, what their days would be like. She introduced herself to her roommates–not one too thin from years of sickness or malnutrition–and gave them a vague location up the northwest coast as her home. That area of Cerulea was scarcely populated, which should keep anyone here from knowing enough to catch her in a lie and explain any lack of knowledge of custom on her part.


Plus the Iridescent Court was northwest of here.


Her five roommates seemed wholly enraptured in their acceptance into the Library. The human children shouldn’t cause Zeninna any problems, which was good because their junior advisor looked ready to.


The suspicious stare Adlai gave Zeninna when they met sent a shiver down Zeninna’s spine. Was Adlai Sighted? Few people in Cerulea were these days, but few meant few, not no one.


Cephalo of the Deep couldn’t be so cruel as to give Zeninna a Sighted junior advisor. She must want Zeninna’s mission to succeed. Hadn’t the Irides Nixies suffered enough? Didn’t that suffering affect their Goddess?


Zeninna’s entire point of being here was to fulfill a promise to Cephalo of the Deep. Over the last months, the Irides made significant offerings and their priestesses prayed nonstop. Such great displays of worship should have Cephalo inclined to help not hinder.


Zeninna closed her eyes briefly and offered a quick, silent prayer, a plea, that none of the humans would guess what she was. Most humans refused to accept any of the other peoples of the world as people. She’d be lucky to not end up in a zoo if they caught her. Though that imprisonment might be better than being hunted for sport. At least there’d be the possibility of escape. She opened her eyes to find Adlai staring at her with a raised eyebrow. Adlai looked away as she moved on to her next topic.


The instructions and expectations dragged on half the morning. Zeninna’s stomach growled long before Adlai escorted them to lunch. Not that hunger interfered with her ability to listen. She was used to being hungry.


Lunch amazed her. An oyster soup, ten times more delicious than any Zeninna had ever eaten at home. She couldn’t understand how this was possible. Wouldn’t all oysters come from the same sickened sea? Still she took hope from the soup, took it as an omen that she would succeed. That health for the sea would be found here on land.


After lunch, they entered the Hall of Enlightenment. Adlai swept them past the guards with their salamander-sniffers, past the check-in desks, straight to the rotunda where floors and floors of bookshelves encircled them. All the way up to the dome six stories overhead. Zeninna gaped with her classmates at the vivid painted story of how writing and stories were given to humans.


Special collections and archives filled the first floor. Staircases behind locked doors led to the stacks in the basement. New acolytes had no need of either.


Adlai led them to the map carved on a stone that squatted at the top of the stairs on the second floor. She walked them through the map, before leading them on a tour, pointing out the sections they’d need for most of their assignments at this stage in their learning.


By sunset, Zeninna’s feet screamed with pain. They’d wandered through countless wings and almost every floor of the Hall of Enlightenment. Seen many human treasures, sacred texts, rare books, even scrolls from the founding of the kingdom. And gone to no other buildings. Come nowhere near the one that held the Magnificence of the Sea exhibit.


Zeninna sat with her chattering, excited roommates, but ate her dinner in silence. She glanced at the windows set high in the walls of the hall. The world was dusky blue. She’d missed her rendezvous with Viridis, not that she’d ever planned to make it. She picked the fish out of the flatbread and smiled at Linden, her tallest roommate, who regaled them with a tale of her village school. Linden laughed, throwing back her head and putting Adlai in Zeninna’s line of sight.


From the next table, Adlai stared at Zeninna, a perplexed little frown wrinkling her brow.


Zeninna smiled. She couldn’t think what else to do. Turning her attention to her blond roommate Teddy, she stabbed a piece of fish with her fork. Teddy gushed about something they’d seen today. Zeninna missed what, but she swallowed and muttered her agreement. It didn’t matter what Teddy was thrilled about. The others thought everything here was wonderful, so Zeninna agreed.



A couple of hours before dawn, Zeninna woke. She crept to the washroom and back without anyone else waking. She’d planned to try this in a few days, but she was awake now. And no one else was.


She only knew the way through maps. A week, a month from now, that might still be the case. Nothing outlined yesterday included visiting the Magnificence of the Sea. Zeninna hovered in the doorway. She could feel where she needed to go. The Peral Dagger sang to her. Why waste another two or three days here if she could go now?


Why deprive her people of their most holy artifact for even two more hours? Decades had passed since the dagger was stolen by one of their own to impress a human she thought would keep her as a lover. The seas had sickened slowly as the nixies failed to offer the sacrifice to usher in the new year. The execution of the traitor’s lover had been a rejected by Cephalo of the Deep, as had every offering without the dagger since.


She slipped into the hall. The door closed without a sound. She tiptoed through the dark corridor of closed doors. At the staircase, a shiver ran down her spine. Zeninna spun. Adlai stared at her from three doors back.


She jumped–and regretted that immediately, but couldn’t have helped it. How did Adlai move without a sound?


Zeninna plastered her biggest smile on her face. “Adlai! Good morning.”


“It’s not really morning. It’s still dark.”


Zeninna faked a big sigh, rolled her eyes, and walked closer to Adlai. “I think it’s morning back at home though. I’ve woken way before everyone every morning since I got to Landis. I thought I’d go down to the social room. Didn’t want to wake anyone.”


She deliberately looked Adlai up and down, pretending to notice her junior advisor’s robe and nightshirt. Zeninna dropped a hand over mouth. “Did I wake you? I was trying to be so quiet!”


Adlai shook her head. “You should go back to your dorm room. If you can’t sleep, rest until it’s time to wake.”


“Oh. Okay.” Zeninna hoped her frustration remained hidden. Talk about boring. Why would she want to lay on her bed and stare at a ceiling she couldn’t see? She allowed herself to drag her feet on the way back to her room.


At her door, she looked back down the hall. Adlai remained outside hers. Zeninna gave her junior advisor a bright smile and entered the room. She’d obey thus far, but had no intention of wasting the next two hours doing nothing. Trying not to rustle a piece of paper, she collected all her handouts about the Library.


By the time her roommates stirred, Zeninna had a new plan.



An hour after lunch, the new acolytes gathered in study hall. They’d been given several short papers to write, a page each on topics related to their morning lectures.


Zeninna sat with her roommates and wrote her first paper. She slid the finished paper into the folder she’d been given for completed assignments and drew out a fresh page. A look around confirmed her study of the map correct. No washroom inside the study hall itself.


“What’s wrong?” Linden asked.


“I could use a washroom.” Zeninna strained to see the far corners of the room, where no washroom materialized to ruin her plan.


“Think there’s one just down the hall outside,” Teddy offered.


The hall supervisors let her leave without displaying any suspicion. Zeninna took an immediate left and trotted off down the hall, head swinging back and forth as if she searched for the sign for a washroom. At the corner, she took another left and zigzagged her way towards the stairs. She turned another corner and came face to face with a Scholar.


“Acolyte! What are you doing down here?”


Hoping her fury didn’t show on her face, Zeninna looked right and left. “They told me in study hall I could find a washroom around here. Somewhere? This way?”


The Scholar smiled. “Oh, you missed a turn. Come this way. I’ll show you.”


She escorted Zeninna to the washroom and remained outside waiting when Zeninna exited. Zeninna smiled and pointed back the way she’d come. “This way, no?”


The scholar nodded and smiled. Zeninna thanked her and headed back to the hall. She rounded the last corner.


“Where have you been?” Adlai hissed as she stormed down the hall.


“I needed the washroom.”


“You’ve been gone forever!”


“I got a little lost.”


“Lost?” Adlai raised an eyebrow.


Zeninna sighed dramatically. “I know those who work in the Library have to be able to navigate it without getting lost, but this is the first time I’ve been in this building. I didn’t study the maps for this area.”


Adlai rolled her eyes. “Go finish your work.”



For five days, Zeninna pretended to be an Acolyte. She read books, wrote short essays, and studied maps. Her roommates teased that her dedication made them look bad. But five days in their company was five days too long. Every last one of her roommates thought Zeninna odd. It would only get worse.


And then there was Adlai.


Zeninna caught the junior advisor staring at her at least ten times a day. Adlai watched her when she ate, when she studied. She couldn’t set foot outside her dorm room without Adlai popping out to see what she wanted.


Zeninna couldn’t slip out in the night. She couldn’t escape during the day. Even if she could, the mission would be completely impossible by daylight. She couldn’t do anything while the Library was open. Not with people everywhere. Docents, Curates, Librarians and Archivists all going about their jobs, not to mention the hundreds of visitors the Library saw on a daily basis. She blushed to remember her attempt to sneak out during study hall. What had she thought to do?


But none of that mattered. She’d worked out a solid plan over these last five days.


They had clam chowder for dinner. Zeninna picked at it, though the chowder was much better than the land animal dishes they’d served the past two nights–or any of the thin soups they’d have at home. She wished she didn’t have to pretend to be sick tonight, but food wasn’t incentive enough to change her plans.


Of course, Adlai noticed, but this time Zeninna meant her to. “Is something wrong with your dinner?”


“I don’t feel very well. I’m kind of queasy.” Zeninna listlessly twirled her spoon around the bowl.


Adlai frowned. “Do you need the nurse?”


“Maybe.” Zeninna frowned and set the spoon aside. “That might be a good idea.”


“Come on. I’ll escort you.”


They walked out of the dining hall, left the building and crossed a courtyard with a fountain of leaping dolphins to a building on the other side of the auditorium.


“Through here.” Adlai opened a green door into a lobby which contained an empty desk and a few scattered chairs. Zeninna offered a small prayer of thanks to Cephalo. Whether someone always staffed the check-in desk had been one of the uncontrollable, unknowable parts of her plan.


Adlai struck a bell on the desk. A nurse bustled into the room about half a minute later.


“What can I do for you?” She looked from Adlai to Zeninna.


“I…”


“She…”


Zeninna looked at Adlai, who flushed and gestured for Zeninna to go on.


“I’m feeling kind of nauseated.”


The nurse smiled sympathetically. “Come on back. I’ll take a look at you.”


“Thanks for escorting me, Adlai.” Zeninna gave her advisor a weary smile before turning to leave with the nurse.


She held her breath as they walked past the desk and entered a small room. The door banged shut behind Adlai leaving a few seconds later. Thank Cephalo. Zeninna had hoped that Adlai wouldn’t be able to abandon her roommates, however much she might want to stay and spy on Zeninna.


The nurse laid the back of her hand on Zeninna’s brow. “You don’t feel feverish. Do you have any other symptoms?”


“My head aches a bit, and I felt a little dizzy when I stood up to walk over here.”


“Hmm.” The nurse took her pulse and checked her eyes, ears and throat. “I’m not seeing anything. Perhaps it’s simply your headache making you feel ill? Let me get you a headache tonic and we’ll have you rest here tonight. See if that takes care of everything.”


Zeninna sniffed the cup. Hoping the contents wouldn’t kill her, she drank the potion down and curled up on her side on the bed. The nurse doused the lights and left the door slightly ajar. Her footsteps receded, moving deeper into the building. Zeninna smiled over that.


She closed her eyes and began to pray. The nurse came to check on her about half an hour later. Zeninna suppressed a smirk and continued with her silent chant.


Another thirty minutes and the nurse popped in, felt Zeninna’s forehead, and left. This time Zeninna snored slightly in hopes the nurse would not feel the need to check again tonight.


She counted off five minutes, not wanting to rush out and be caught by the nurse making notes on her chart just outside the door. The door squeaked a bit as Zeninna pushed it open. She flinched and froze. No sound of footsteps. No sign of anyone. She crossed the empty lobby and tiptoed out the door.


Her luck held. Adlai was not waiting outside.


Reciting the start of the ritual in her head, she turned left and hurried along the small alleyway between the buildings. The ritual should be performed in stillness and peace, but Zeninna couldn’t count on having time when she reached the Magnificence of the Sea. Someone might see her and follow. Security might chose the exact wrong time to walk by that wing.


The Pilgrim’s Garden was empty. Zeninna’s feet crunched softly as she walked the twisting paths, the second prayer of the ritual ringing in her head. At the gate, she ducked so as not to set any of the wind chimes singing. Twenty yards from the Pilgrim’s Garden’s exit stood the Orirs Building, home of The Magnificence of the Sea.


Slipping through shadows, Zeninna skirted the boundaries of the courtyard. She looped around the side of the building and stepped up to a staff entrance, where she stood silently until she finished the second prayer. Whispering a soft plea to Cephalo, she tried the handle. Locked.


Why? Zeninna cursed softly. Not an exterior door in any of the buildings where they lived or had classes bore locks. Nor had the Hall of Enlightenment. Why this one? The treasures it held would be esteemed no more than the rare and sacred books.


Of course, the stacks had been locked. Zeninna raised her head slowly. This was a staff entrance. It led to offices and workrooms and backways that likely were locked away from the public areas too.


Heart fluttering madly, she crept back to the front of the building and raced up the steps. Two steps from the top, an owl hooted. Zeninna jumped a good foot into the air, came down between steps and fell, bashing her shin. Tears filled her eyes. She hobbled to the door and yanked the handle, forgetting in her pain to pray first. The handle turned freely.


Limping inside, she forced herself to concentrate and recite the third prayer of the ritual. Only a few low lanterns in the entry hall and over the stairs provided light. They glittered off royal jewels and artifacts in the exhibits to either side.


Zeninna’s destination lay upstairs. Praying fervently, she dragged herself upwards. At the turn before the third floor, muffled voices shocked her into stillness.


“Do you realize how ludicrous this sounds?”


“Why do you think I didn’t go get a supervisor?” Adlai asked.


“I can’t believe I’m doing this. Why can’t we check at the nurse’s?”


“We won’t have time. She’ll come here.”


“I cannot believe you think one of the acolytes is a nymph of some sort. Or that I let you drag me out after curfew. Do you know how much trouble we’ll get in if we’re caught?”


Ignoring her throbbing shin, Zeninna broke into a run. She took the remaining stairs two at a time and raced across the third floor. Her pounding footsteps drowned out all other sounds. They might hear her, but she dared not waste time. She began the fourth prayer.


The sign for the Magnificence of the Sea was shrouded in darkness, but Zeninna didn’t need to read it to know she’d reached her goal. To the left of the entrance stood a statue that was supposed to be a mermaid. It wasn’t quite right, but still recognizable. Whoever carved the one on the left, though, they got a nixie perfect.


Zeninna reached out and traced the nixie’s face. Had someone modeled for this? History was strewn with tales of nixies befriending humans. Letting them know too much, see too much. The theft Zeninna sought to rectify tonight supported banning such friendships entirely. Her entire world was dying because an infatuated nixie allowed a human to run off with one of the Irides’ most sacred artifacts.


She slipped inside and hurried past displays of items from shipwrecks and of sharks’ and whales’ jawbones. The golden trident of some unknown merpeople made Zeninna shake her head in wonder, but she didn’t have time to pause and look at it. Oh, and there hung three enormous oceanscapes by Tersola, the greatest painter of seascapes the world had ever known. The stairs creaked. Voices murmured.


Regret filled Zeninna’s sigh. She hadn’t the time to stop and admire the paintings. Crossing into the next room, she hurried to the display in the corner on her left. To the Peral Dagger.


Her breath caught. Awe washed over her. Zeninna closed her eyes and took two deep breaths. She’d done her best to meditate the last three nights after her roommates fell asleep. She’d recited all prayers in her head getting here, all but the final one.


“Cephalo of the Deep, I come to you in open arms. I offer homage of your beauty. I offer praise of your wisdom. I am young, but I am strong. I am ignorant, but I am faithful. I seek you willingly and with joy.


“Accept this sacrifice on behalf of the Irides. We only wish to honor You. We ask your guidance. Your help. Your return. We would remake the oceans. Return the seas to their pure state in Your honor. In Your Name.


“I offer my life force. I offer all the centuries I have yet to live. Use my life to purify the seas. Bring back balance.


“I beg You. Accept this sacrifice which I offer freely in my abiding love of You. You are my will, my heart, my life. I return all to You. In love. In honor. In hope.”


Her words seem to ring off the walls. Her skin tingled. She could feel Cephalo. She’d never felt Her presence so intensely before. She was here. She waited for Zeninna.


Voices scratched the edges of Zeninna’s awareness. Irrelevant now. Zeninna belonged to Cephalo.


Zeninna reached out and lifted the Peral Dagger. She caressed the hilt and laid a kiss on its blade.


“For my people,” she whispered as she turned the blade so that its point hovered over her heart.


Time to return the dagger to the sea. Cephalo would bless them. The Irides Nixies would prosper once again.


The intruding noises grew closer. Grew louder.


No matter. If Cephalo rejected Zeninna as unworthy, they’d find a dead nixie with the Peral Dagger protruding from her heart. If Cephalo accepted this sacrifice, they’d find nothing but sea foam on the floor.


She plunged the dagger into her heart.




Crows and Galahs



By Jamie D. Munro



Jake rested in the passenger seat to the purr of the car’s engine, his head gently vibrating against the window. His father held the steering wheel in one hand and hung his other arm out the window, letting a warm breeze dishevel his greying hair. An endless row of barbed wire and wooden posts separated the highway from the fields of canola, blurring past like a yellow brushstroke on blue canvass.


A kangaroo leapt in front of them. The car skidded, launching them into their seat belts. The kangaroo crossed long before they stopped. The smell of burnt rubber drifted through the car.


Images flashed through Jake’s mind.


The premonition returned.


His mother followed the chain of taillights through the city in her pink hatchback. Piano music played on the radio while rain roared outside. With a half-smile and vacant stare, she was heading home after a long day at work.


Swerving across lanes, the four-wheel drive screeched with each turn. It sped through a red light and slammed into his mother’s car in an explosion of glass and twisting steel.


Slumped through her smashed window, across the blood-smeared white hood of the four-wheel drive, his mother’s sky-blue eyes looked forever to the dark clouds.


“Jake.”


His eyes snapped open. “Huh?”


“We missed it.” His father drove off. “It’s okay.”


Jake’s trembling fingers pulled at wisps of blonde hair on his chin. Nothing was okay anymore.


“You looked like you were lost in your own world again.”


“J—just th—thinking about Mum.” The sun flashed in his side mirror, reminding him how far their all-day drive had taken them from home – from the place they had all shared. Every day since, and every mile now driven, pulled him further from the family they once had.


“She’s always on my mind too.” His father wiped a tear from Jake’s eye. “Look at you. Ya know, your mother always said grey eyes were some special family secret.”


“Yeah, s—she always said nice things.”


“I’ve been real worried about you. Your schooling…at home…you’ve been distant.” His father reached over and rubbed his knee. “You’re meant to be upset. But…it’s like there’s more going on.” He shook his head. “I just don’t know what’s eating at ya.”


I wish I could stop these thoughts in my head coming true.


“Jake.” His father shook his leg. “I don’t know what more I can do.”


Jake clawed his seat to control his shaking. “There’s nothing.”


“You and me, we need to work through this together…ya know.”


Jake looked at his father and saw three months of worry written into his bloodshot, dark-ringed eyes. Eyes that once shined with happiness – when they were all together. He wished things had not changed. Guilt stung him inside. If only he had done something. “I just wish I could have been there.”


“I’m glad you weren’t.”


“To help her.”


“No one could have done anything.” His father sniffed. “It was over in a heartbeat for her.”


Jake shifted away. “To warn her.”


“Oh, Jake, they said she didn’t even see the other car coming.”


I saw it coming.


His father grimaced. “We’ve been over this. I love you, but this is killing me.” He sighed. “What could you have possibly done?”


He fixed his father a stare. “I kn—knew it was going to happen…b—beforehand.”


His father strangled the steering wheel. “Are you crazy?” He punched the roof. “I’m sorry…I just don’t know what to do anymore. I don’t know how to help…and with our money situation on top of things…it’s all been too much.” He sighed. “I’m just hoping this trip to the country helps.”


A hot flush coursed through Jake’s cheeks. He folded his lanky arms and turned away. Darkness cast by trees in the setting sun blanketed their journey ahead. He wondered if his father would ever understand him. No one else did.



A storm of stones awoke Jake as they pulled into a gravel driveway. A farmhouse sat on a rise in the distance, surrounded by a sea of wheat. They parked in a work yard adjoining the home.


“Dad.”


His father turned and yawned.


“I’ll show you I’m not crazy.”


“I’m sure you will.” His father forced a thin smile and mussed Jake’s curls.


A red-orange glow on the horizon stretched across the fields, lighting up a face weathered by seventy seasons farming under the Australian sun. An old man sat perched on the veranda steps, stroking a lamb curled up by his work boots. A chorus of cicadas kept them company.


He stood with a groan and the lamb bleated. “Now shush, Lucky, you’ve ‘ad your pat,” he said in a drawn-out voice. He stroked the lamb and then extended a grease-etched hand to Jake’s father. “Karl.”


“Good to see you again, Crow.”


“Yep. It was a hell’ava time at Claire’s funeral, but it was great to see you guys.” Crow stroked his beard. “Ten years with nothin’. Now I see ya both again within a few months.”


“Coming out for harvest was a great idea.” Karl rested his hand on his son’s back. “Especially for Jake…ya know.”


“How was your drive, Jakey?” Crow asked.


Despite Jake being sixteen, he stood taller than most adults, yet Crow towered a foot higher than him. Jake dropped his face and fidgeted.


A callused hand lifted his chin, and Crow’s ash-grey eyes locked onto Jake’s. “I’m glad you didn’t hit that ‘roo.” Crow grinned.


Shadows leapt into his mind.


Darkness enveloped Crow. A shotgun exploded with a flash, lighting the night. He doubled-over and fell to the dirt.


The porch light shone off Crow’s white hair and his smile pulled at a cobweb of wrinkles. Fear surged through Jake, trembling his body. He did not want any more premonitions. His legs led him backwards. His father stepped forward, reaching out. Jake sprinted to the car, slapped his hands on the hood, and closed his eyes.


“What now?” his father shouted.


“Leave him be,” Crow said, still calm.


Jake burned inside with embarrassment at letting his father down again. “I d—don’t want to be here.” He glanced at his father. “I w—want to go.”


His father approached and whispered, “Pull yourself together. He’s a good man.”


That’s why I have to go.


A firm hand pressed on Jake’s back. “Don’t worry yerself,” said Crow, “this place will bring out the bes’ of ya. I’ll see to that. Just settle in and make a fresh start tomorra’.”



Jake crept outside at dawn to the screeching from a flock of galahs. An explosion of pink and grey wings filled the canopy of a giant gum tree in the backyard. His father sat in a tilted-back chair, gazing across the fields. A crisp breeze carried the aroma of coffee from a cup held in his lap.


“How’re you feeling today?” His father smiled, pulling out a chair between them.


“Ah…fine.” Jake scanned the empty work yard.


“Something’s on your mind.”


“Where’s Crow?”


“Getting the header ready. How ‘bout you help him today?”


Heat flushed through Jake. “No.”


A corrugated iron shed rattled in the work yard. A harvester rumbled out, leaving a cloud of red dust and exhaust glowing in the morning light.


Jake backed up.


His father raised his voice over the engine. “Well, I think his farmhand, Nick, is out somewhere in the ute. I’d like you to get involved somewhere…ya know.”


Crow opened the cab door and waved Jake in. Jake snapped his head away, leapt down the stairs, and dashed across the back yard.


Lucky stood in the far corner, chewing at withered plants clinging to a rusted fence. A four-wheel drive utility loaded with hay bales on the rear tray skidded to a stop on the other side. The lamb scurried away. The driver wound down his window and shouted, “Bro, Old Crow said you can help ‘im or come out wid me.” He laughed. “But I reckon you better come ‘long wid me.”


He looked from Nick to Crow like a rabbit caught between two foxes.


Nick pushed his sunglasses up onto the stubble on his head and revved the engine. “Oi, get the fuck in already.”


Jake ducked between the strands of fence, catching his shirt on the barbs as he went through. The rust-spotted door groaned as he opened it and climbed in.


“Shut the fuckin’ door, you’re lettin’ the air con out.” They skidded off.


Jake grappled with his seatbelt in the bouncing car.


“Bro, you don’t need to belt-up, you dumb arse.” He snickered, swerving along the road.


Jake clenched his door handle.


“Out ‘ere you can drive how you want ‘n shit. Cops can’t get you.” His tattooed arm wound down the window and he spat outside. “We’re headin’ out to a far paddock to feed some sheep.” He burped up the stench of stale beer. “I’ll let ya know when to get out and open the gates ‘n shit.”


A cry burst into Jake’s head. He threw his hands to his ears and clenched his eyes.


Hobbling in a frantic circle, a sheep struggled to walk. Crying out, its twisted back leg etched a trail of blood along the dirt.


“Oi, what the fuck, bro.” Nick screwed his acne-scarred face.


They sped along the edge of the fields until reaching a barren paddock. A distant mob of sheep marched across the sun-baked earth, chewing at scraps of dry stalk.


Jake looked back and forth between Nick and the sheep.


Nick accelerated.


“H—hey, s-slow down.”


Nick laughed. “H—h—h—hey.” He jerked the steering wheel side to side, throwing Jake around in his seat.


They skidded to a stop, and the mob surrounded them amongst a cloud of drifting dust. “Bro, get out and push the hay off.”


Jake forced his door open against the sheep, climbed into the back tray, pinching his nose at the stench of manure. The utility crept forward. He pushed the bales off one by one into a cacophony of bleats.


Speeding up, the car swayed from side to side. He gripped the bales and squatted. The sheep stampeded behind. Nick braked, launching Jake into the back windscreen. Laughter erupted inside.


Jake slapped the driver’s window. “S—stop it, y—you’re going to run them over.”


The car jolted into reverse. Wailing sheep competed with the roar of the engine. Nick slammed on the brakes, throwing Jake to the dirt.


Bleating frantically, an ewe lay on its side. Jake pushed himself up and wiped the taste of manure from his mouth. The sheep hobbled away, dragging a broken and bloody back leg, before collapsing.


The horn beeped. “Oi, get in.”


Jake knelt by the ewe, reached out to touch it, and hesitated, not knowing how to help. His hands shook. Crying out, the animal stared at him. Jake glared at Nick. “Help it.”


Nick sped off, coating Jake in a shower of stones.



The sun crawled through the clear sky to mid-point as the sheep’s bleats quietened to an occasional moan through bubbling saliva. Jake rested against the sheep’s sweat-soaked back, stroking its head. The sheep vision tormented him, reminding Jake he could not avoid his premonitions even when he tried.


The utility crested the horizon.


Jake sprung up, sending a cloud of flies buzzing around them. His heart thumped in his chest, beating faster as the engine grew louder.


Crow burst out before the car had stopped. “Why did ‘e leave ya ‘ere?” He ran over to them. “He said ya wanted to walk back.” He chuckled. “But I didn’t think you’d wanna trek five k’s in this heat.”


“He ran it over,” Jake rasped through a dry throat. “I knew he was going to.” He looked up at Crow. “But I couldn’t stop him.”


“Hmm.” Crow shook his head. “He’s some piece o’ work.” He went to the utility and took out a shotgun.


A blast of terror shot through Jake. His body locked in place, his mind racing with the vision of Crow.


Collapsed on the dirt and gasping, blood pooled around Crow.


Crow approached, casting a shadow over Jake. “I needa put ‘er down.”


“W—w—what?”


The ewe panted.


“Move back.”


Jake stood and dragged himself away. Decaying fences crisscrossed arid paddocks, stretching to the horizon in every direction.


An explosion blew through Jake.


“Jakey.” Crow raised his voice. “Come back with me.” Crow grunted and the utility’s tray banged as the dead sheep landed inside.


A scorching wind stirred up wisps of sand, stinging his bare legs. Crow drove alongside. “Come on, ya can’t ‘void me forever. An’ besides, too much sun is no good for ya.” He scratched a dark mole on his cheek. “Trus’ me.”


“I’m not avoiding you.” He walked on, scraping his boots with each step.


“Well, climb in.” Crow slapped the outside of his door.


Jake stopped and stroked his sunburnt neck. “I just want a ride back.” He climbed in, burning his legs on the vinyl seat.


“Let me take ya somewhere betta.” Crow wiped his forehead with a sweat-stained hat.


“I want to be alone.” He folded his arms and turned away.


“No, ya don’t. People like us are alone enough already…Trus’ me.”


They drove along a track lined with bush on both sides. A tapestry woven with every shade of green whirred past. Crow gently steered around the holes and corrugations in the track as a plume of dust trailed behind.


A crow stood on the road in the distance, diving its beak in and out of a squashed galah. It watched their approach between bites. Jake looked from the bird to Crow, his heart rate increasing. The crow stepped aside at the last moment, and then strolled back after they passed.


Crow raised his voice over the hot wind howling through the windows. “Do ya know where we get the saying ‘silly galah’ from?”


Jake turned further away.


“Well, in the country ya get an understandin’ of the birds. The galahs are the dumbest. They’re at the bottom of the peckin’ order far as intelligence is. You could be drivin’ along and a whole flock will take flight in front of ya, only to turn back and fly straight into ya.” He leaned over. “They’re stupid.” He focused ahead. “All other birds are just that little bit smarter as ya go ‘long. And then there’s the crow.” He grinned. “Nothin’ surprises the crow. They always see what’s comin’.”


They stopped by a granite rock, sitting like an island in an ocean of wheat. The sunburnt-red monolith blocked out half the sky, casting a cool shadow.


“You’re gonna need to learn ta shoot on the farm.” Crow took the shotgun and climbed out.


Jake’s pulse beat in his ears. He hesitated, before following.


Crow demonstrated how to load and work the action. He fired a succession of shots, interspersed with quick pumps. The blasts echoed off the rock and reverberated through Jake long after each discharge.


He pushed the gun into Jake’s hands. “Just aim at somethin’ and ‘ave a go. Just don’t shoot me.” He chuckled.


Jake clasped the gun and aimed at a tree. It swayed in the sights. The moment before pulling the trigger stretched for an eternity. His breaths grew louder and his eye glossed over. His sweaty finger slid off the trigger and he lowered the gun.


“You can do it, Jakey.” Crow steadied the gun. “Just point ‘n shoot. Ya can’t miss with this one.”


He touched the trigger. The butt exploded back into his shoulder. A pungent burning smell filled the air. He pumped the action, unable to contain his grin.


“Way to go.” Crow took the gun and returned it to the car. “Let’s check on the crop.”


He followed Crow into the wheat. Drooping seed-heads caressed his arms as they waded through a waist-high golden field. Crow broke off a seed-head, rubbed it between his hands, and handed it to Jake. “Eat it.” Jake ate the nutty tasting grain.


“Dry and crunchy? We’ll start harvest after the full moon.” He caught Jake’s eye. “Unless the storm comes.”


Crow turned to the rock. A breeze rustled the field, carrying the sweet smell of sun-baked grain. “That’s where I asked my dear Maggie to marry me.” He took a deep breath. “We came ‘ere every year ‘round this time to check the wheat.” He rubbed Jake’s back. “I know you’re suff’rin’ over your mother. I can see it, and I know how you feel.”


“Yeah?” he murmured. No one knew how he felt.


“I lost Maggie before last seedin’ to cancer. It’s a—” He choked. “It’s a hell’ava way to go. Trouble for me was I knew it was comin’ and there was nothin’ I could do to help ‘er.”


Jake knew that feeling. “I wish I had said something to Mum. It’s like I knew something was going to happen.” He quietened his voice. “But, I didn’t ‘cause Dad thinks I’m an idiot.”


Crow gripped Jake’s shoulder. “I wish I could turn back time too. I wish I had been there for Maggie. I was so torn up before she went that I ignored her. Worst part is I’m now havin’ my own medical dilemma…so I kinda know what she went through.”


Crow wiped his eyes. “Maggie and I had a good fifty seasons. I never…I never wanted to have a harvest without her.” His chin quivered. “I ‘aven’t told anyone this, Jakey, but after she died I came ‘ere and nearly ate a mouthful of lead.”


Jake paused. Finally someone knew how he felt. “I wish I had of done more.”


“Your father tells me you became close to yer mum before she passed on…That’s somethin’.”


“Yeah but—“


“Look at me.” Crow stood in front of Jake, looking him in the eyes. “I know ya feel real bad ‘bout your mum’s passin’. But you’re not responsible.”


“But—”


“Someone else is.” Crow grinned. “And that someone will get his in the end.” Crow nodded as the sun silhouetted behind, surrounding him in a brilliant glow.


Jake placed a palm on Crow’s chest and a burning sensation radiated along his arm. He closed his eyes and released all thoughts.


Grasping at his chest, Crow lay on the dirt. A shadow cast in the moonlight stood over him.


Sunlight filtered in. He clenched his eyes, turning his head back and forth.


The figure turned away, shotgun hung by its side, its footsteps crunching on the gravel.


He opened his eyes, mouth agape.


Crow smiled. “Come on, we betta check the others.”


The premonition haunted the return journey. Muzzled by doubt, he caged his concern for Crow. His father thought he was crazy, and so would everyone else. Crow seemed to understand him, and he would keep it that way.



They found Nick repairing a collapsed fence where the track bordered a salt lake. Skeletal trees punched through the parched landscape amongst waves of shimmering heat.


“Come ‘long, Jakey, I want ya to see somethin’.” He winked.


Crow approached Nick, with Jake trailing in his shadow. “Hey, ya clown,” said Crow.


Nick snapped upright, throwing down a pair of pliers. “What?”


Crow stopped an inch from Nick, leaning over him. “What’s with leavin’ the boy out there?”


Squeezing his fists and bobbing up and down, Nick shouted, “Bugger off, he wouldn’t fuckin’ get back in.”


Crow stood firm.


Jake stepped back.


“Well, I’m holdin’ off ya pay,” said Crow.


Glaring at Jake, Nick stepped over and jabbed him in the chest with a bony finger. “What did you say, ya little faggot?” Sweat dripped off Nick’s nose.


Jake held up his palms. “I—I—”


Darkness flickered into his mind.


Moonlight flared in Nick’s dilated pupils. With a twisted face, he thrust forward a shotgun, looming over Crow.


Sunlight fluttered Jake’s eyes. “I d—didn’t …”


Laughter burst through Nick’s rotten teeth.


Jake turned and tripped, grazing his hands on the salt-encrusted ground.


“What…the…fuck.” Nick strolled away. “You’ll pay me, Old Man.”


Crow leant down beside Jake’s quivering face. “Don’t worry ‘bout him. He’s jus’ a silly galah.” He lifted Jake with one hand.


Jake faced Crow, unblinking and heaving for air.


“It’s all right, Jakey.”


“N—N—Nick …” Pressure built in his head and the ground swayed. “He—“ His knees buckled and he fell into darkness.



A sizzling barbeque aroused Jake to the smell of cooked lamb. Nick raged in his head. The vision had opened his cage of self-doubt, and now with the final feather in place, his mind flew free on a path to help Crow. He dashed outside and found Crow on the veranda.


“Hiya, Jakey.”


Jake dived onto a chair next to him.


“How ya feelin’?” Crow asked.


He put his face in his hands, not knowing where to start. “Huh?”


“You passed out.”


He dropped his arms. “Where’s Nick?”


“Out fencin’ with your father.” Crow set down two plates of lamb chops and salad. “I was hopin’ you’d eat—“


He pushed his meal away. “Where’s your guns?”


“Locked in the shed.”


Jake scraped his chair back. “I hate Nick.”


Crow grinned. “Me too.”


“Well…why is he here?” He held his breath.


“He has a purpose ‘ere at the moment.” Crow chewed on a chop. “When he’s done his job, he’ll be on his way.” He slapped a fly on the table so hard the plates jumped. “You can be sure of that.”


“But he’s dangerous.”


Crow sipped a beer like time did not matter.


Jake sprang up. “I just know it.”


“Well, I know stuff too, Jakey, and I have a feelin’ we need his help ‘ere.” He wiped his mouth on his sleeve and leant back.


“I have a feeling too…and…and he’s got to go.”


“Listen.” Crow exhaled. “I was passin’ through town a couple of weeks back and I jus’ had an urge,” he picked up his beer, “and stopped at the pub. That’s where I found ‘im. Said he was tryin’ to get away from the city.” He took a long swig. “I hadn’t really been too focused on harvest this year, but I took one look at ‘im and knew he could help me out. Then I ran with the idea and got you and ya dad up too.”


Jake marched into the backyard, trying to contain his frustration, dry grass scratching his bare feet. The sun had just set. He took a deep breath and turned back. The iron roof of the home glowed under a full moon. A chill crawled up his back like a spider.


The rumble of a tractor approached.


He ran back. “The full moon’s tonight?”


“Sure is.”


He spun to the work yard. A tractor drove in, followed by the utility. He whipped his head back. “Nick’s back.”


Crow collected the plates. “Everything will be fine. Trus’ me. Why don’t you get yerself an early night? You’ll need it.”


Jake paused, defeated. “J—just be careful.” He went to his bedroom and peered through the curtains.


Walking like every muscle cramped, his father returned to the house. Nick strutted to his caravan in the work yard.


Jake paced the room.


His father staggered in and slumped onto his bed on the other side of the room. “How’s your day?”


“D—Dad.” Jake stood still.


“Yeah?” His father sat up and rubbed his beard stubble.


He struggled to swallow. “Remember I said I knew Mum’s crash was going to happen?” He dove his fidgeting hands into his pockets.


Karl let his face drop and exhaled. “Yeah.”


“And y—you said I w—was crazy?”


“I don’t think you’re crazy…ya know.” He cupped his hands on his face. “You’re just not well… Not well at all.”


“D—Dad.” His body trembled. “I knew Mum was going to die and I did nothing about it.” He wiped his sleeve across his nose. “Because people think I’m mad.” He threw his arms up. “I see things all the time…Bad things…Before they happen.”


His father shook his head. “Shit, Jake. I’m ready to go home.”


“Dad, Nick is going to shoot Crow…tonight.” He burned with rage.


“What?”


He stepped closer. “I want your help.”


“What the hell are you on about? We’re not doing anything.” He laid back down. “If I wasn’t so knackered I’d leave now. Go to sleep.”


Jake climbed into his blankets. His body shuddered. He knew he was on his own. He tossed and turned for hours at a loss for what to do.



A tapping at the window cut through the silence. Jake scurried to the bedhead. His hands trembled. He snatched the curtains aside. A crow perched on the windowsill, staring at him with its midnight-black eye. It cawed and flew away into the darkness. Jake jumped back.


Moonlight slipped through a gap in the curtains, lighting Jake’s father snoring in bed. Jake crept past and out of the room. Floorboards creaked and the back door groaned open.


A lightning storm danced on the horizon.


Gravel crunched underfoot across the work yard and into the shed. Jake tugged the cold steel handle on the safe and it held firm.


He crept back towards the house. Shadows cast in the moonlight stretched across the work yard like dark claws. Goosebumps crawled up his arms.


Nick’s caravan door screeched.


Jake froze. Sweat burst through every pore on his body.


Nick swayed in the doorway, the interior light throwing his shadow over Jake. Nick sucked on a glass pipe whilst holding a lighter to the end. He pulled the pipe out. “What ‘cha doing sneakin’ ‘round, you little pussy?” Nick fell back with a crash and laughed.


Jake sprinted inside and pulled the covers over his head, straining to slow his breaths.


Footsteps creaked on the veranda, each step shooting fear into him. He peered through the window. Nick snatched open the back door. Jake leapt off the bed and pressed himself against the bedroom door. Drawers and cupboards opened around the home. A set of keys rattled.


The footsteps disappeared outside. Jake sprang to the window and fogged it with his breath. A dark figure went into the shed.


Just be quiet, just be—


Crow walked outside.


He placed a shotgun by Jake’s window, and strolled into the shed.


Jake launched out of bed, crashing onto the floor in a tangle of blankets. He scrambled outside, picked up the gun, and scurried to the side of the shed. He leant back against the corrugated iron wall. Sweat trickled into his mouth.


The thunderstorm rumbled.


The gun safe clanked open.


“Nick,” said Crow with his calm voice.


“Oi, what the fuck?” yelled Nick.


Jake strained to stand, but his trembling legs collapsed and he slumped to the dirt. The gun barrel shook in front of his face. The smell of oiled metal churned his stomach.


“You’re nuthin’ but a thief…and a murd’rin’ coward.”


“What? Hey…hey, Old Man. There’s been no murder.” A shrill laugh erupted. “Not yet anyways.”


“I know who you are.”


“You know fuck all…Old Cunt. You should’a paid me…I need my fix. I just need it. Okay. Now I’m taking this shit and your ute too.”


“You’re goin’ all right,” said Crow, “but not where you think.”


Nick laughed.


“You killed my niece.”


Nick went silent.


Thunder clapped overhead.


“You killed ‘er in that crash and ran ‘way like the coward ya are.”


Images crashed into Jake’s mind.


Nick leapt from the four-wheel drive into the blood-stained shattered glass on the road and ran away.


“Wh—“ Nick’s voice quietened.


“And I aint lettin’ ya get away with it.”


“You aint doin’ shit, Old Man.”


Jake’s heart pounded.


“Nick, do it,” Crow screamed. “Do it, you murd’rin’—“


An explosion shook the shed.


Jake’s eyes snapped open. Lightning streaked across the sky. He leapt to his feet. He pulled the gun’s stock into his shoulder and steered the sights into the work yard.


Nick wandered between the sights, saw Jake, and stopped. He grinned and lowered his own gun. “Pussy.”


Jake held his aim firm.


The back door slammed open. “Jake,” yelled his father.


Nick looked to Karl.


“Nick,” shouted Jake.


Karl halted. “What happened?”


“Fuck off.” Nick raised his gun at Karl.


Jake snatched the trigger. Nick flew sideways. He yanked the action back and forth, clenched the trigger, and repeated the cycle until the last few pulls ended with empty clicks.


Nick’s twisted body lay face-down, gargling and choking.


Jake’s ears rung. Adrenaline surged through him. He dropped the gun and ran to Crow.


Crow lay on his back, caressing a wound on his chest. “Jakey.” He gasped.


Jake trembled a sob.


Blood trickled out the corner of Crow’s mouth. “You did it.”


“No, I didn’t. You’re shot. I did nothing.” Jake dropped to his knees and put a hand on Crow’s wound. “Yet again.”


“I have cancer and it was ‘bout to kill me.” Crow gasped. “I chose to go on my terms.”


Warm blood oozed through Jake’s fingers. “What?”


Crow’s hands slumped to his sides. “I have visions too, Jakey. Like the crow, you and I always see what’s comin’.” He chuckled.


Jake cried. “I can’t do anything about them.”


“You’re not meant to.” Crow coughed a spray of blood. “Jus’ make the most of the time ya have. You became close with your mum…before she passed. You did good.” He gasped and air sucked through a hole in his chest. “Now, don’t push your father away.” He reached up and caressed Jake’s cheek with a wet hand. Jake laid his hand over Crow’s. “Look after my farm.” His hand fell.


Crow went still.




The Colored Lens Interviews: Jarod K Anderson

The Colored Lens: What inspired the individual stories you’ve published with us?

Jarod: It’s often hard for me to pin down a single inspiration for my stories. I think my inspiration is usually more of a melding of several (often random) concepts that interest me at any given time. I’m a curious person, so I often get obsessed with new topics that catch my attention. For example, I recently went through a phase in which I was dedicated to learning how to pick locks. Will that end up in one of my stories? Probably, but I have no clue how.

Beyond a general love of mad scientists, I’m not sure what inspired “A Junker’s Kiss.” I guess it’s sort of a confluence of my interests in body modification and absurd science. As for “The Shallows,” that story was inspired more by a location. I spend a week or so in Florida every year and, as a lifelong resident of Ohio, it’s hard not to be fascinated by the open sea. I look at the sky reflected in an Ohio pond and I have some pretty good guesses about what might be beneath the surface. When I stare out into the ocean, I feel an immense amount of uncertainty about what might be swimming below. For me, nothing is as inspiring as a mystery.

The Colored Lens: Family relationships often seem to play a role in your stories.  Do you feel that’s a common theme in your writing?  Or what would you consider some of the common themes?

Jarod: I hope relationships are a common theme in my stories. I love fantasy, science fiction, and horror, but I’m not particularly interested in vivid descriptions of monsters or magical landscapes unless they are paired with empathetic characters struggling with fundamentally human problems. A monster alone in a vacuum is nowhere near as interesting as a monster hiding in the back of a loving family’s minivan. Believable human interaction is the real fuel that gives power to writers’ elements of the fantastical.

The Colored Lens: When you start writing a story, do you know how it’s going to end? If not, can you give us an example (ideally from a story you’ve published with us so our readers can make the connection) of a story you expected to go in one direction that went somewhere else?

Jarod: It depends. How’s that for an unhelpful answer? Sometimes I start a story because I’ve thought of a punchy ending. Sometimes I just have the broad outline of a conflict in mind. I think for “The Shallows” I just had a rough sketch when I started. A man in a small boat goes fishing and encounters merpeople. On its own, that premise probably isn’t interesting enough to carry a narrative, so I knew I needed to do more than simply make the protagonist a victim. Somewhere in the writing process I introduced some good ol’ vampire/werewolf transformation mechanics into the mix and found the unexpected complication I needed. 

The Colored Lens: What would you like to read more of & what are you tired of in general in speculative fiction?

Jarod: I could use more humor. I empathize more with characters who aren’t afraid to be the butt of the joke. Take Harry Dresden (of The Dresden Files) for example. Those books have plenty of real fear and struggle and tragedy, but Harry’s wisecracks do a lot to humanize magic and ground the fantastical elements in believable reality. The Expanse series does a good job of walking that line as well. I guess that leads me to what I’m tired of in fiction. If I’m starting a new fantasy book and the first twenty pages are setting, you’ve lost me. Once I’m invested in the characters, I’m willing to learn more about the geography of the dread Mountains of the Wailing Cheese and the Mystic Caverns of Gorp. Characters and tension needs to come first. The fantastical world should come second (or third).

The Colored Lens: What was the first speculative work that really captured your attention and got you interested in the genre?

Jarod: I had an audio version of The Hobbit that I probably listened to a few hundred times as a kid hiding under my blankets with my boombox (I’m old). That led to Lord of the Rings. That led to living with piles and piles of books.

The Colored Lens: You also mention an upcoming story in Pseudopod below.  How do you feel audiobooks relate or compare to paper books in terms of reader experience?  Do you write with either audio or written form in mind when you write a story?  Or do you think some of your stories are more suited to one or the other?

Jarod: On an average weekday I commute for over two hours, so I’m a big fan of audiobooks. They are a different experience from paper books, but I love both experiences equally. For example, I love the novel Moby Dick, but when I recommend it to someone I typically recommend the audio version. I find that dense and sometimes difficult works like Moby Dick benefit from audio because the reader isn’t allowed to get slowed or frustrated. The language rolls along and sweeps the listener along with it. I also recommend audio for works like Paradise Lost, works in which the musicality of the language adds to the experience. That said, there is a wonderful intimacy between the reader and a physical book. Audio has a bit more distance to it.

I have never written a story specifically for audio and I absolutely get squirmy when I hear my work read aloud. Squirmy feeling aside, I love publishing in audio formats. I love it partly because I’m such an avid consumer of audio fiction and partly because I feel like the act of performing a piece lends some extra weight to the thing.

The Colored Lens: What’s a typical day like for you, either including writing or not?

Jarod: I work at a university in marketing and fundraising during the day. I do most of my writing in the evening. I also spend time playing with my two, oddball, rescued mutts and hanging out with my lovely, oddball, writer wife.

The Colored Lens: Who’s the better writer, you or your wife?  🙂

Jarod: The short answer is “she is.” The longer answer is “it depends what genre/style/form you’re talking about.” Since you gave me an opening, I will say this: You need to read Leslie’s poetry. I know I’m married to her so my opinion is suspect, but she is my favorite poet and would be even if I’d never met her. Check out her collection An Inheritance of Stone and prepare to be surprised when poems about space exploration and science fiction make you cry.

The Colored Lens: How does your relationship as writers affect your relationship as a married couple, and vice versa?

Jarod: Well, we do peer pressure each other into writing more. For example, I might be sitting down to play a video game and look over to see Leslie tapping away on her laptop and think, “well, if she’s writing, I should probably be writing too.”

The Colored Lens: Have you ever/would you consider writing something together?

Jarod: You bet! We have very different processes, but we do like to collaborate. We’ve written a couple books of writing prompts together and right now we’re working on an epistolary horror novella together.

The Colored Lens: To what extent do your personal experiences (job, family, or odd things that have happened to you) influence your stories? 

Jarod: Well, I don’t really think I can separate my imagination from my experiences. I think if I were to say that my personal experiences don’t shape my writing, it would mean more about my lack of self reflection than give any real insight into my creative process.

The Colored Lens: What’s the most frustrating thing about the writing process and the publishing industry for you?

Jarod: Writing is hard. It was always hard and, while I’m enthusiastic about it, I don’t believe it ever gets any easier. Don’t get me wrong, I love writing. It’s just the kind of love that also makes me want to punch a wall sometimes. Occasionally, aspiring writers ask me for advice and I usually tell them some version of, “You often won’t feel like writing because it’s hard and lonely and usually involves very little reward. You also need to find ways to make yourself do it every day anyway if you want to be a writer.” On a positive note, I like to remind myself that nothing really creatively rewarding is ever easy. Plus, if it wasn’t so challenging it would get boring.

The Colored Lens: Do you have any upcoming projects that we should watch for?

Jarod: I have a flash fiction piece in the current episode of Pseudopod. Also, my middle grade novel is currently being considered by several agents (fingers crossed) and I have a poem in an upcoming issue of Asimov’s.

The Colored Lens: Congratulations on those, and good luck with the novel.  It seems you’re primarily a short story writer.  Do you think this is an accurate statement?  And how would you compare writing novels and short stories?

Jarod: I’ve written two novels and a third one is on the way. The thing is, I’m aiming for a pretty traditional publishing path, so you aren’t likely to see my novels unless I find a novel publisher with whom I’m excited to work. Yes, I think it’s accurate to say that I’m mostly a short story writer… for now. Novels and short stories are pretty night and day for me. Short stories are about economy of language and building a satisfying narrative in a compact space. A novel lets you stretch out and experiment and play around a lot more than short fiction.

The Colored Lens: Finally, unrelated to writing, what’s the craziest thing you’ve ever done?  And what achievement are you most proud of?

Jarod: I once fought off a carjacker with a knife and I’m pretty proud of earning my MA in literature.

The Colored Lens: Wow, we’re glad you were successful.  Can you tell us a bit more of the story of the carjacking?  And do you think having an MA in literature affects the way you read or write speculative fiction?

Jarod: I was a college student and I gave a hitchhiker a ride. The guy asked me to pull over so that he could use his cell phone at one point. You know… because you can’t use a phone and ride in a car at the same time (this guy was not a master criminal). He pulled a knife on me and demanded that I get out of the car. I was young and on the boxing team at my school and I decided I’d rather fight him than give up my car. Thankfully, I won. In reality, I probably should have just given him the car. It was a piece of junk and not worth risking my life. I did get a pretty good little story out of it though.

I’m sure my MA has an effect on the way I write and read, but I don’t think it’s a massive difference from anybody who doesn’t have a MA in literature. I’ve just spent a lot of hours studying various ways to think about stories. I think that investment of time enhances my enjoyment of reading and occasionally provides me with a trick or two when I’m writing. It can also be a little distracting because I’m in the habit of looking for essay topics.

The Colored Lens: So you’ve published a couple books of writing prompts.  Do you often use writing prompts in your own writing?

Jarod: I don’t, actually. Coming up with the idea is never the hard part for me. I never run out of ideas. Putting in the hours to actually get the idea down on paper and polished into something a person might want to read is the hard part. For me, inspiration is cheap. Follow-through is the important part.

The Colored Lens: Finally, are you a dog person or a cat person?

Jarod: Definitely a dog person. I like cats, but I am very, very, very, very, very allergic to them.




Published by Light Spring LLC



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www.TheColoredLens.com






Dreamgrowth

“Where’s Ghenn?”

My question drew a blank look from Daoris. The senior governess, she had charge of the younger children fostered to the royal household. She should have known each one.

“Tiaghenn Nysteri-avin,” I said.

“She must be with the others,” Daoris said. “If she isn’t, I’m not going back.” She flitted a look across the courtyard as if expecting the castle to melt. “The carriages are ready to depart. No one will miss her.”

This might be true. The island of Nysteri had vanished four years ago. The fostering system was designed for the king to influence the next generation of leaders, and–without an inheritance–Ghenn had no place. Another child might have made herself one, but Ghenn was shy, tangled up in her own thoughts.

The courtyard was a chaos of sound and stench. The young nobles fought their fear by complaining or clinging to dignity.

“I’ll miss her,” I said. “Though I suppose I’m not anyone.”

Daoris looked flustered. It didn’t help I was two heads taller than she. My clan ran tall and wiry, and urban folk found our pale eyes disconcerting.

“Don’t worry about her, Lira,” she said. “We need to get to the mountain retreat before the city is consumed.”

“I have plenty of time to find her,” I said. “It will take the mages a while to complete the barrier.” Assuming it would have any effect on the mysterious storm advancing across the kingdom. No one who entered the storm emerged again, whether royal scouts or villages in its path. It had taken Nysteri years ago, prompting the royal mages to encase the island in a magical dome. They thought they had succeeded … and then a few months ago, the storm surged across the ocean, crossing miles a day.

“I wouldn’t risk it,” Daoris said.

“If I don’t come back, the king can always find another taster.” I strode away before she could make the obvious reply: not one like me.

I slipped into the castle halls. I relished the cool scent of the stone as I headed for the rotunda. Nursery, academy and everything in between, it was where young nobles learned to serve their kingdom. For some, it was also a prison. The king gave his vassals no choice. Each child came to the castle and did not return until he decreed.

The rotunda’s heart was a grand marble dome onto which multiple stories opened, lined with balconies. A glass skylight let in the lurking bleak of clouds.

I entered Ghenn’s room. Whether the children were from the richest territory or poor farmland, every room was equal at first. The wealthier heirs loaded down every inch with finery. Ghenn had nothing but parchment and ink, but her drawings flooded the space with personality. She sketched the people and places around her, but she also sketched dreams, images that stepped sideways from reality. She laid down more brush strokes than she ever spoke words.

I inhaled deeply. The acrid tang of ink, the sweet decay of paper, a trace of lavender. It was comforting; I spent my free time in the library. I could have wrapped myself in books, but no one wanted my mind. They wanted my nose, a sense of smell so keen I could detect poison without putting my tongue to it. It had saved my life a few times.

I searched the room. Ghenn’s sketch kit was missing. The garden, perhaps? It was rich with inspiration. The stables? Horses were another popular subject.

With the impenetrable storm shrouding the landscape just beyond the city walls, there was really only one place she could be.

I ascended to the top floor of the rotunda. I ducked into the servants’ nook, pulled down the ladder and climbed onto the roof. The handholds notched in the dome were for maintenance. Servants came up to clean the skylight. I moved cautiously, fixing my gaze ahead. I couldn’t make myself forget the drop.

Halfway up, I saw a bare foot swinging in the air. A few more notches, and the rest of her came into view, splayed on her stomach with the sketchpad under her chin. She stared towards the storm.

Ghenn was slight and slender as only a child could be, her hair a straight shield of onyx. Her skin was peppered with freckles, her eyes a few shades darker.

“Ghenn!”

She twisted up on her elbows, startled. “Lira?”

“We need to be gone,” I said. “The storm is coming.”

She shook her head. “I can’t leave yet.”

“You have a good memory. You can finish your sketch in the carriage.”

Ghenn swung upright. Her drawing was not of the storm, but of buildings in the city around the castle, an attempt at a map.

“I saw the sparkle of a dream tree in the city. They grew in the groves at home. I miss them.” She would have only been five years old, but she sounded as wistful as an old woman remembering her girlhood. “I’m going to find it.”

“No, you’re not,” I said.

“Are you going to carry me?” This was not a threat. It was a request for information.

“That would look ridiculous.”

She smiled a bit. “Yes.”

“I’m expecting you to walk. To safety.” I looked behind me. It was a mistake. The ground plummeted out of my visual range. I hated heights. I was really going to hate being in the mountains.

“We don’t know it’s safe.”

“We know it’s better than that.” I nodded to the obsidian whorls that formed a quivering, flickering wall on the horizon. It stretched from the ground to far above sight. Dark clouds–normal clouds–drifted into the field and vanished. I smelled the change in the air, rain coming … and something else, something that snuck past my nose in flashes of color.

Until a week ago, the mages had confidently promised the storm would never breach the city. Those who believed them or had no place to go remained; the more affluent had taken refuge in the country. All the while, the royal court planned their escape. If their magic was not strong enough to cloak an entire city, it would be reserved for the king’s mountain estate.

“We don’t know that, either.” Ghenn’s eyes lifted to mine. “Please, Lira. I just want to take a piece of my home with me.”

She had lived here a stranger for years. She had no trace of Nysteri: as a precaution against the calamity that struck the island a month after she arrived at court, the mages had insisted on burning everything she owned. I had only been at court for a few months myself, and I knew a little of her loneliness. We bonded.

She mattered to no one else; Daoris had reminded me of that. It seemed cruel to deny her something she could hold onto.

I also remembered the dream trees had been unique to the island. Legend had it their branches captured people’s memories and wishes, fragments flavoring the leaves. If there was a dream tree here and it had retained a trace of Nysteri, might it help the mages unravel the secrets of the storm? I might accomplish something other than passively waiting for poison, which was all that had ever been expected of me.

“Where did you see it?” I asked.

“In the public gardens. I’ve only been there once, so I was trying to draw a path through the city.”

“Have you seen it before?”

“No. I think it must have reflected off the storm. That’s a long way for something to sparkle.”

I really didn’t want to look down to find the gardens. I forced my eyes to concentrate on the pattern of buildings, the line of streets between. I pulled my attention to Ghenn’s feathery map.

“That looks right,” I said. “Another turn here and here …”

Ghenn dashed down lines where I indicated. “We have a good map, then. Let’s go.”

“Slow down,” I said. “I haven’t agreed yet.”

“You haven’t?” There was mischief in her eyes.

“This is not a game, Ghenn.”

“We still need to laugh sometimes.” She went still, face as clear as ice. “I understand, Lira.”

My memory of the route to the garden was hazy; I doubted I would have been able to find it from memory. I studied the makeshift map. The path was straightforward, through neighborhoods that would either be quiet or deserted. The surge of panic and fury when it became clear the mages could not stop the storm had subsided in the past few days. The public garden was also reassuringly far from the churning wall.

“We will go,” I said, “but if we can’t find your dream tree, we head directly for the mountains. Deal?”

“Deal.”

She tucked away her sketching supplies into her bag. We descended the dome to the ladder. I climbed down first, tasting ease as the roof closed over me.

We exited the rotunda and headed for the main courtyard. The remaining castle guard were set on watch to make sure angry locals didn’t break down the gates. I wasn’t sure how hard they would try to prevent it: they had been left behind, after all.

Ghenn hesitated in the hall. “Will they let you leave?”

I slowed. “Maybe not, if they recognize me.”

“You could dye your hair with my ink,” she said, “but you wouldn’t stand out so much as a boy.”

I was halfway there: I had few curves and always wore trousers. “Good idea.” I ducked into a storeroom, found a sack, and used it for binding. Ink deadened the color of my hair. It felt sticky like blood and smelled worse.

“You look perfect,” Ghenn said.

This was definitely not accurate, but I had no vanity. I strode across the courtyard with Ghenn at my side. “Need to go down into the city.” I didn’t have to drop my voice much to sound masculine.

The guard captain squinted, but I got only the briefest look, and his eyes never lowered to Ghenn. “You sure?”

Not particularly, I thought. This was as much risk as I had taken since arriving in the city, even though it was measured. “Got business.”

“Sorry to hear that. Crack the gates!”

As soon as we passed, the gates slammed shut. I clamped down on my nerves. The identity I’d hidden would get us back, or Ghenn’s would.

We descended the castle mount into the high quarter. The wealthiest homes were eerily silent or in regimented control. Many denizens had already left, and the rest prepared for departure in any direction but west. The winds washed me with a cloying melange of florals.

Swamped with that aroma, the trace of smoke struck my mind like a knife. I grabbed Ghenn’s shoulder.

Around the next bend, flames lit up an estate. Their spears and smoke escaped the top floor, heralding a collapse in the roof. Shadows of people flitted inside; their shouts battered my spine. Robbery gone wrong or revolt in the house guard?

“Don’t look,” I said. “Keep walking.”

The high quarter trailed off, giving way to shops. The buildings were locked tight or broken and empty. Wary eyes watched from inside. I smelled the vestiges of trade, fresh carved wood and the perfumes that protected fabric. The silence was worse than screams.

“We’re halfway there,” I said.

“See? I knew we could do it.”

I wondered wryly how it had turned into her reassuring me. “We may not find anything.”

“Or we may. That is what dreams are about.”

Her face shone bright enough to make the city less lonely. I was surprised how much it meant to her, the promise of this dream tree. It seemed like such a small thing.

And what if we didn’t find it? What if she had to leave behind everything she knew once again, without a scrap to hold onto?

I wanted to promise that wouldn’t happen, but it was outside my control. Unlike Ghenn, I was old enough to know I couldn’t will it into existence.

The shops bordered a warehouse district. I had planned to detour: unsavory types used them as bases of operation, and surely more so now.

A handful of people hurried out of the shops. I halted Ghenn and crouched against the wall. Their mood was focused, excited. They chattered among themselves. This was not what I expected.

I waited until they passed. Ghenn scurried in my wake, flashing a curious look after them.

Two streets later, we crossed paths with another group. I halted sharply. Ghenn bumped into me. Like the last group, they were energetic, friendly, and anticipating something.

A broad man slowed, turning to us. “Going to the speech?”

“Of course,” Ghenn said before I could open my mouth. “What speech?”

“The Renewer,” he said. “She wants to prepare us for the new city.”

“Everything will be better in the new city,” a woman said.

“Opportunity for all.”

“Where is this new city?” I asked.

They looked at me as if I had sprouted wings. “This is the new city,” the woman said. “After the storm has scared off all but the chosen ones.”

I understood now, and by the way Ghenn gripped my arm, she did as well. She quivered.

“There’s nothing after the storm,” she said. “There will be no new city.”

The group shifted. Eyes narrowed; scowls crinkled their faces. They pulled together, mood darkened.

“Unbelievers are not welcome,” the man said. “May you be cast to the storm.”

Ghenn emitted a little cry. I shielded her with my body. “No one deserves that fate,” I said. “Except maybe those who wish it on others. Go on your way.”

The man snorted. “Better our path than yours.”

He turned away. The others followed. If the city was not enveloped by the storm, the royal court would come back to something with its own rules. I had heard rumors of how the king dealt with rebellion. I didn’t want to be in the middle of that. I had never needed to choose sides.

I pulled Ghenn around for a hug. She burrowed into me. I understood her distress even if she didn’t: if there was a way out of the storm, it meant her parents hadn’t come back for her.

“Are you all right?” I asked.

She leaned back, a deep breath fleshing out her frame. “You aren’t going to get me to turn back that easily.”

I ruffled her hair. “Of course not.”

We continued along the detour. It added to our walk, but I didn’t want to run into the Renewer and her people. A cold wind stirred my skin, carrying the iron scent of rain.

The Lily Gate rose into view. The stone sculpture atop the arch identified the entrance into the public gardens.

Ghenn sprinted towards the gate.

“Wait,” I said. “We should go cautiously -”

I spoke to myself, and even I wasn’t convinced. I rushed after her. She disappeared through the Lily Gate.

“Ghenn!”

By the time I reached the gate, there was no sign of her.

My heart pounded. It drove the tumbling scents of earth and flowers out of my nose. I reasoned with myself. Who would start bloodshed in a garden? The morbid side of my mind pointed out it was an excellent place to bury a body.

If I rushed around hunting for Ghenn, we could miss each other a dozen times. I decided to look for the dream tree instead. I knew what it was supposed to look like. If I located it, hopefully she would, as well.

I let the garden sink into my senses. The public garden had been designed by a royal architect generations ago. Hedges formed boundary lines between terraced flower beds; flowering trees from every corner of the kingdom provided shade. The garden boasted six gazebos. The song of artificial ponds and waterfalls trickled in the back of my mind.

The path was lined with lilies of every color, delicate white breaking up the line between firebursts and stars. Their aroma ranged from faint to cloying, the press of clean pillows and sweet morning.

Hematite danced on my tongue. Startled, I huffed out air. I sniffed, but it was gone.

I wrapped my arms around myself and pushed forward. Still no sign of Ghenn. I reminded myself how large the garden was. Lucky we were searching for a tree, not a flower.

A chartreuse aroma swept past me. I spun to follow. I couldn’t see the color, but it flooded my nose and told me the direction of the wind.

The path ended at a hedge wall. If I hadn’t gone straight for it, I wouldn’t have noticed the gap. I squeezed through into an older part of the garden. Dead leaves cluttered the grass. The skeleton of a broken trellis pulled my gaze upwards.

I saw only iridescence at first, breaths of opal that formed a hundred delicate silhouettes. As I focused, I realized it was branches. The angular leaves looked heavy even though their veins were the faintest echo of green. Easy to believe its boughs could cradle the most intangible bits of human experience.

Of course, Ghenn was already there, embracing the trunk. My smile shattered as a noxious odor blinded me. My senses tumbled, muddling together, and when I managed to focus, I stared at the occluding haze of the storm, swirling over the grass. When had it entered the public garden? It seemed to be only a tendril, like fog settled in a valley. The obsidian field ended an armspan from the dream tree.

“Ghenn, move away,” I shouted.

She blinked as if waking from welcome slumber. She pushed off the trunk and examined the roiling layers of onyx and oak. My terror lurched to a halt when I realized the storm was not moving. Whatever had spawned its numinous finger, it was static.

She should have been as scared as I was–more so, because she had lost so much to that storm. But her lips were soft with wonder, and she extended her hand.

A different fear doused me. “Ghenn,” I whispered.

The storm smelled like sunset, fading into darkness. The last thing I wanted was to run towards it, but my need to protect her overcame the ice in my limbs. I rushed up, wrapped my arms around her. She gasped in surprise, twisting.

“Ghenn.”

The repetition of her name calmed her. “How did it do that? It must want the dream tree.”

“We have to be cautious,” I said. “We stay as far away from it as possible.”

Ghenn nodded, expression reluctant.

“Let’s find seeds and go before -”

The storm quivered, a spasm of illumination. Two figures stepped out. They were human, two dark-haired men in tunic and tattered trousers, and I relaxed even through my shock.

Then I blinked, and everything changed.

One was now female, the other thinner and older, red-haired. Ghenn pressed against my side. I broke my attention to look down at her, and when I lifted my head again, they were children, feral and fanged.

They advanced on us. My shoulders hunched, my body hummed with the need to run.

Ghenn pushed away from me, shoulders straight, chin set. “I am Tiaghenn Nysteri-avin,” she said, “and this tree is my birthright.”

The pair hesitated. Their lips moved, their voices coming as winds, toneless and formless. As they brushed my skin, I smelled images.

Her name, outlined in gold. Brighter, fiercer.

An infant cradled by her mother. A wall of soldiers defending them.

I started to have a sense of dialogue. They recognized her name; they had orders to protect her. Somehow, they spoke in scent. My nose was keen enough to understand it.

Winds scattered the soldiers and dashed the infant to the ground. The wind arced around the dream tree, forming a silver shield.

Inwardly, I translated. To guard the tree, to protect her … these things contradicted each other. Anyone else would have had no sense of their dialogue, but I did.

“She is no threat to the tree,” I said. “You know who she is, and you know she is right.”

Their attention shifted to me.

Lightning, wild, spiraling.

Gold spangles. Recognition of my words.

Shadow and silence, wreathed in smoke.

“I can understand you,” I said. “If you don’t know what to do, let us speak to someone in charge.” I wasn’t sure I wanted to meet any more of these beings, but if they went to retrieve a supreme, it would give us time to act.

A joining of hands.

If I had had any doubt of the meaning of that, the two individuals–an old woman and a burly man in furs–turned swiftly and disappeared into the storm.

My breath rushed out. My plan had worked. “Grab some seeds,” I said. “Then we run.”

Ghenn did not move. “People came out of there.”

“Not people like anything we understand. Their world is trying to devour ours. We need to go.”

The words hit the blank of her eyes and bounced off.

“Ghenn. Please.”

Finally, she nodded. She stretched up and snagged a branch. She pulled it down, running fingers between the leaves.

Acid burned my nose in warning. How could the creatures have moved so fast?

Four creatures emerged from the storm, their forms changing every time I shifted my attention. They parted before two figures I instantly knew were human. None of my frantic blinking proved otherwise: they remained exactly as they were. The woman was tall and strong with ebony hair, its sculptured wings inverse crescent moons about her pale face. The man towered over her, his eyes sea green. Something about them seemed hazy, as if they were backlit by illumination I could not see.

Ghenn’s breath whirled out in a cry of delight. She bolted to the pair. The man swept her up into his arms and spun her about with a booming laugh. He stopped whirling as he faced the woman. Ghenn vibrated joy, her body bright like dawn.

The woman embraced them both and kissed Ghenn’s brow. “I’m so glad you’re safe.” Her eyes swept to me. “Who is this?”

“This is my friend Lira,” Ghenn said. “She’s the only one who stands up for me at court.”

“Lira,” the man rumbled. “Pleasure to meet you. I am Karil Nysteri-ver, and this is my wife, the Lady Fuilyn Nysteri-arl.”

“I am honored.” My mind gyrated, bumping off thoughts. How was this possible? “And happy to see you reunited. Do you live within the storm?”

“You might say that,” Fuilyn said.

“I can’t wait to see our home,” Ghenn said.

“We left our home a long time ago, dear one.” Fuilyn’s gaze cleaved me in two, bared for her examination. “Stay with your father, Ghenn. I need to speak with your friend.” She strode over, the kick of her stride assured.

“We thought you were dead, vanished into oblivion,” I said.

Fuilyn regarded the obsidian mist. “Does that seem like oblivion? On the other side is a realm of dreams, created by intuition and the deepest currents of the mind. My husband and I did not die. We found our true selves.”

Was the storm only a border? My heart lightened. If that were true, they were still alive: those who had attempted to scout and never returned, the mages who had tried to divine its secrets, and those too stubborn to leave their homes–or unable to.

Except … “Why hasn’t anyone come back?”

“Humans cannot cross back over,” Fuilyn said. “Both my family and Karil’s have dreamblood running through our veins. We have never been truly human.”

“I think that’s a state of mind,” I murmured.

Annoyance flickered in her eyes. “You are wrong. Though if that were the case, I would choose otherwise. You have taken good care of Ghenn, I see.”

Unnerved by her first statement, I almost missed the second. “The credit goes to the royal governesses.”

“I doubt that. I remember my time in the rotunda without fondness. The fostering system only serves beauties and bullies.”

I couldn’t argue with that. “I can understand why you came to rescue her.”

Fuilyn inhaled sharply. “We did not come for her.”

“If you assumed she was dead, that makes sense.” I hurried the words out. “The king has been known to punish children for their parents’ sins.”

“We did not come here for such a petty matter as a child,” she said.

Your child, I thought, but the words stuck on the roof of my mouth. I felt like a coward as I swallowed them. “Then why are you here? Why is this here?” I waved to the storm.

“The people of the dream realm conquered Nysteri to claim its dream trees, which allowed them–allowed us–to nourish and grow the realm,” Fuilyn said. “Karil and I were afraid, of course we were -” though her tone never wavered, barely inflected “- but when we embraced its wonders, we realized that this world, this bleak and boring world, could become something more.”

The conclusion came to me between the words. If the dream trees were connected to the growth of the dream realm, study could also reveal its weakness. The denizens would not want to allow that. It was why the storm had sent forth a tendril to the garden. It was why the dream creatures had emerged to confront us when no one had seen even a hint of life from the storm before.

I realized, too, that this Renewer who spoke in the city had been correct, though surely not in any way she had ever imagined.

“Besides that,” Fuilyn continued, “do you understand what a tyrant your king is? I will not be content until his rule is unseated. As to this particular place and time, I came for the tree. It does not belong to you.”

“I don’t need anything from the tree,” I said. If I could take a seed to the royal mages, would I? The coldness of Asteri’s lady made me wary, and she was wrong about the king being a tyrant … wasn’t she? He could be cruel and heavy-handed, but that was not tyranny. My position had already been decided for me: I was a member of the court, however minor. “Now that Ghenn is reunited with her family …”

“That is what I wished to speak to you about. She will remain with you.”

My thoughts stumbled. “I’m not her family.”

“We are at war,” Fuilyn said. “The battlefront is no place for a child. And the conflict will not end soon: your cowardly king will keep finding ways to defend himself.”

It was valid reasoning, but I couldn’t help the rising sense it was an excuse. I fought my instinct. These were her parents. I glanced over at Karil and Ghenn. He sat cross-legged; she pressed her forehead to his. They whispered in conference, the perfect pair.

“What about your home on the other side?” I asked.

Her face retreated into stone. “I hope you’re not picturing Nysteri as it once was. The dream realm is more elaborate and sophisticated, shaped by one’s will. Ghenn is only a child. She would not be able to find her way.”

“I know your daughter,” I said. “She is more self-possessed and poised than many adults.” Sometimes, I thought I could include myself in that. “If it is a question of will, she has it.”

“It does not matter,” Fuilyn said. “Ghenn is too human to adjust without fear and anxiety.”

She kept changing her objections. “That doesn’t make sense.” The words spilled out. “If you both have dreamblood, and she’s your daughter …”

“You don’t understand how dream heredity works, or what it is like on the other side. Even grown humans -” her tone morphed into scorn “- have difficulty, which has caused so much clutter in the landscape.”

I had trouble wrapping my mind around it. “How …”

“People would like to think they can create castles with the blink of an eye, but the best most can do are vague rocky bulks. Humans are inferior, but they will eventually adapt to a better world.” Fuilyn sighed to dismiss it. “Karil and I want our daughter to have the best circumstances until she is old enough to take care of herself.”

“That’s with you.” Karil drew my eyes again. If he felt differently …

“My husband and I are of one mind in this,” Fuilyn said. “The royal governesses are capable of the basics, I suppose, but a tender girl needs more. Support, guidance and belief. A listening ear and guiding hand. You will be that for Ghenn, with or without the royal court.”

The words were dry, lifeless. The dream realm might come from intuition and imagination, but it seemed it did not come from empathy. They were also a command, not a request.

I could have taken the order without thought. It was how I had lived, simply accepting my place in the royal court, risks of poison and all. But I recognized the importance of what Fuilyn was asking, even if she did not–even if she seemed to take it for granted that she could foist her child off into the hands of another. Could I be those things for Ghenn? I wasn’t sure, but she needed someone to try, and that … that was something I could promise. I couldn’t handle the thought that no one else would.

“I will,” I said.

She nodded. “Then your time here is done. You will leave to rejoin your cowardly king.”

“Aren’t you concerned about what I’m going to say?” The question escaped me before I could stop it.

“This is the last dream tree on this side,” Fuilyn said. “There are no others you can destroy to hinder us. Tell the king to be ready for war. I know better than to believe he would accept the possibilities of the dream realm. Will you tell him about us?”

We both knew that would put Ghenn in danger. I shook my head. My eyes flitted up to the tree. If I could grab a branch …

Fuilyn’s fingers encircled my arm, spears of diamond. She guided me over to her husband. Ghenn hopped upright, flashing a luminous smile.

Karil lumbered to his feet. I pulled out of Fuilyn’s grip and spoke in a whisper. “If you want your daughter with you, we can figure it out.”

His eyes swept through me like a blade. “You know that’s not possible.” His tone was gentler than his wife’s, but without compromise. Ghenn’s head swiveled, eyes curious, but it was clear she couldn’t make out what had been said.

“Give us a moment of privacy,” Fuilyn said.

I did, stepping aside. If I had entertained thoughts of creeping up on the tree, the flat expressions of the guard creatures dissuaded me. Fuilyn knelt to explain to Ghenn. Her gasp of shock cut through my spine. Her voice lowered, spiraling through denial, dismay … and finally acceptance. The family embraced.

New scents blasted my nose–orders to the guards, the scorch of ash. The barrier swelled, parting to allow the lady of Nysteri and her entourage to pass. It swallowed the tree, writhing with lightning, then went still.

I thought my heart would break my ribs open. I couldn’t catch my breath.

Ghenn’s hand slipped into mine. “They promised they’d come back for me.”

Her voice calmed my world. I turned to face her, her brightness only a little dimmed … and I knew I would never tell her. She didn’t need to know her parents had simply ignored her existence, then used every excuse to leave her in my hands.

I was going to make sure that was the right choice, in spite of them. I knew what side I had chosen in this conflict: hers.

“I know they will,” I said. “Let’s go back to the castle.”

Ghenn stared at the barrier, expression thoughtful. “I’m not afraid of it.”

“I don’t think I am, either, but it’s not our world.”

“Not yet.” She tugged my hand and headed for the path.

We had descended into the city for a piece of the dream tree and failed to get it. That would have been enough of a disappointment when we started, but now I knew it had bigger implications. I pushed the thought aside. We could deal with that once we rejoined the royal party and reached safety.

“I’ve got five seeds,” she said. “Would you like to have one?”

I stumbled to a halt. She held them in her other palm: perfect orbs, otherwise ordinary apart from a faint shimmer of silver.

“How did you get those?” I asked.

“I plucked them while I was with my father,” she said. “He picked me up, and he’s so tall I was in the lower branches.” If she was more human than her parents, she was also something of the other side. She might, more than the seeds, end up being the key.

“I would very much like one,” I said.

She placed it in my free hand. I folded my fingers around it, feeling a trace of the future there. Then I tucked it in my pocket.

Ghenn sobered. “What happens after the city disappears? When the storm comes up the mountains?”

“No matter what happens, I’ve got you,” I said. “I promise.”

The Alternate Appeal of a Jelly Fox

I was midway through a series of concept sketches when Chuchuko popped out of my drafting table with a high-pitched dojyan. “Ohay?gozai-nezu, Otsuji Yuko!” chirped the RariJump mascot. “You have two guests waiting in the president’s office. Your presence is requested immediately! Otsukaresama deshita!” With that, the hot pink mouse swan-dove back into my table, rippling my sketches like reflections on water.

Guests? I didn’t get guests. I didn’t want guests. But I would get yelled at if I didn’t show up in five minutes.

I holstered my plastiq stylus and saved my work; belatedly I noticed the horrors that had snuck into my doodles yet again. Skulking among studies of a book-loving omu-raisu were disemboweled teddy-bears and headless kittens. The art of kawaii was surgery, taking ordinary things and amputating what was sharp and hard and ugly, injecting them with fluff like a botox treatment; these were botched patients I couldn’t remember cutting, more kowaii than kawaii.

Instead of SAVE I hit TRASH. Yet another file of morbid crap onto a heap eight months tall. You weren’t going to be anything anyway, Chappu-chan. We both knew that.

I headed for the president’s suite, confident that this was going to be nonsense.

The offices of RariJump Kawaii Company occupied the outermost ring of Cooperation Tower, some eleven million stories outwise from the face of the moon. From the window that was our whole southern wall you could spend a lunch watching Visitors arrive at the General Port a microscopic thirty stories outwise, via space-crunch and fusion catapult and asteroid barge. Our location was worth the rent as high as a small GDP: looking in, they’d see our most famous characters parading from left to right across the glass, welcoming friends from afar to our humble space elevator. We were never more than a presh-reg glitch away from a critical decompression, but a good first impression was a first stab in an industry as murderous as cuteness.

Guests. Plural, and how perfectly ominous. My mother and sister maybe, to confirm that I was still alive. More likely, HR here to politely fire me. It would be about time.

“Come in, please,” said President Abioye Okabe at the sound of my knock. I found him at his sequoia trunk desk, its polished stump littered with bobble-head Moto-Shiba-kun’s and beanie-bodied Giving You Song’s and other RariJump top-selling characters.

“Take a seat, Otsuji-san,” he said, smiling broadly. He waved me over to the emptier of two chairs. The other contained a stranger, a plain man of silvering hair. His armband bore the emblem of two clasped hands. He glanced at me once and returned to not seeing me.

“This is Mister Sauerbrey,” Okabe said, “from the Cooperative. He’ll be moderating as needed. And these—” he gestured to the other two guests, “—are Lovely Vanilla-san and Chocolate Tiger-san.”

I didn’t sit just yet. Standing to either side of him were two Visitors like I’d never seen.

They were of the same xenospecies, erectomorphs like us humans but much taller; I was a sixth less than Okabe’s six-one, and they towered over him. They possessed digitated fingers, though wrongly jointed, and their faces were reminiscent of Homo sapiens in the way that tigers are reminiscent of cats. Too-huge eyes, thickly lashed, lips painted on. Rubbery cables of something approximating hair were tied into rainbow-dyed twintails on one and a bubblegum princess cut on the other. One had skin of eggnog, the other cookies-and-cream, and nearly every inch was flyered in character stickers; I recognized more than a few RariJump products among them.

My eyes burned at the brightness of them. They were dressed in the fashion of human Decora Girls: frilly skirts and blazers fit for a different phylum, clashing legwarmers puddled around their shins, each finger ending in a fifteen-centimeter false nail painted pink and blue and polka dot. I might have been offended at the blatant cultural appropriation were the aesthetic not so unnervingly inapplicable. What would have been cloying on a Japanese teenager was on them as good as a ribbon around a centipede.

Toikitti, I realized after a bamboozled lag. The rarest of Visitors to Cooperation Tower.

<(:D)(´?`)(^-^)(?)?> the one on the left said.

<(:D)( (/???)/)(<=3)> the other replied, seeming to concur, and both laughed in sync. Less like people, more like hyenas.

“Please excuse me, Okabe-san,” I said, still hovering by the door. “But what exactly is going on?”

The president beamed like a solar flare. “Otsuji-san, do you remember Goodnight Smile?”

“Yes, of course,” I answered warily. Goodnight Smile had been one of my bigger successes. My sleepy reindeer with her omnipresent sleep mask had appeared on a few decently-selling lines of bedtime supplies, but that was about it.

It was also my last success since Eiichiro had gone away.

Okabe could hardly contain his excitement. “Then you will be overjoyed to know that our guests here have just put it an order for two million pairs of your Goodnight Smile house slippers.”

I looked back and forth between the twin Toikitti. The rightmost grinned; its teeth were small and uniformly sharp, like the tines of a comb.

“I am very confused.”

He shrugged and motioned for the Visitors to explain.

They crossed the room and backed me up against the door. The tang of port-issued disinfectant was overpowering; they must have docked within the hour. <(->)(:DDD)(Q-Q)(->)(T3T)( _(._.)_)(>)> the leftmost, Lovely Vanilla, chittered. As the emotograms left her tongue, the tower’s AmBab snatched them and reorganized them into something intelligible to the human brain.

“We are honored to finally meet you. It is a human custom to shake hands in order to express appreciation, yes? May I do so?”

“By all means,” I said, and found my hand swallowed by their spidery paw. Their flesh was textured like a lollipop, with subtle seams between joints. Mechanisms revolved on tracks around their heart-shaped irises.

“We are the biggest fans of Goodnight Smile,” the other, Chocolate Tiger, eagerly explained. “See?” They parted their hair-analogue to show me the slipper hung from her chiropteran ear-analogue. “We love all of your characters, but Goodnight Smile is our favorite.”

“Extremely yes!” Lovely Vanilla agreed, still pumping my arm. “She is ‘Super Kawaii!’”

I looked to the president for help.

“Our guests have a special request for us,” he said. “One that I have agreed to fulfill, in light of their exceedingly generous purchase.”

“You mean that I will fulfill,” I replied, putting two and two together.

“Just so,” he said, pleased to have me on the same page. “Beginning tomorrow your priority assignment is to design a spaceship.” His tone narrowed to a point. “You weren’t doing much anyway.”


I returned to my apartment forty floors moonwise in the Residence Block to find a message from my mother waiting to ambush me. I let the apartment read it off as I changed clothes and watered the cat. “Yuko-chan. I hope you will call me when you get this message. Yukiko and I are worrying ourselves to death over you. We know you are hurting, and we want to help make it better. Please, call me. Love you, Your Mother.

More of the same then. Delete message. That was one of the secret perks of living in the middle of a space elevator on the moon. Moonwise or outwise, everyone was far way.

Design a spaceship. I hid from the new assignment in the shower, where the hot water helped defrost my icy guts. It must have sounded so simple to Okabe-san, from whom everything got done via inter-office memo. No no no, he’d chuckled, don’t worry about the hardware of it. All they want is the aesthetic. As if that were appreciably easier for me.

With my mauve-dipped hair in a towel turban I came to sit on the edge of my bed. Eight months later and my husband’s shape was still imprinted into the mattress. I swept my hand through that crater, hoping against impossibility to scoop up some dreg of his warmth. But no, nothing.

My apologies, Okabe-san. It was hard to see the world in pastel colors with an open wound in your bed.

I retrieved my pants and turned out my pockets; a glossy black business card dropped into my palm. The man from the Cooperative had remained silent throughout the meeting but had smuggled this into my hand as we’d shook our farewells.

I brushed my thumb along the icon of two clasped hands and hissed at a nip of static. I dropped the card as a thread of blue light lanced from its center. I scrambled for a T-shirt to throw on as that thread dilated into a window in AUGer space. If only I’d bowed like a more stereotypical Japanese, I thought. I’d have saved myself this imminent trouble.


“You want me to be a spy.”

“The official term is Voluntary Xenological Informant,” Sauerbrey said. “But basically yes.”

His light-knit simulacra hovered a foot above the fallen card. This rendition made the government man no less unremarkable. If bureaucracy had a mascot character, he was it.

“I refuse. Please leave me alone.”

“Hear me out. This is a matter of Security and Advancement. Of all those Visitor species known to us, the Toikitti are the most obscure. We view your situation as an opportunity to further Human-Alien Cooperation.”

Ah, yes, Cooperation. The cultural doctrine that had seen humanity through a universe older and smarter and tougher than us. It hadn’t taken long after first contact, when our fleet of quaint little warships came up against the Hanrit species like a bird against a glass door, for war to start showing diminishing returns. As much as we loved it like an old sweatshirt from college, we had to let it go. From the rubble of outmoded nation-tribes arose the One Earth United Government and Cooperation Tower, a neutral agora facilitating commerce and cultural exchange between Visitors in the furtherance of intergalactic good will. And if we happened to pick up whatever exotech they didn’t keep a close eye on, well, who got hurt?

“If we want to Cooperate we need common understanding,” Sauerbrey went on, “and these bastards are a big sparkly question mark. We’ve established a Minimum Tolerance Basis with them but beyond that, we don’t know where they’re from, we don’t know how they reproduce, and we don’t know what makes their ships work better than ours. About all we do know is that they go nuts over our cute crap.”

“The official term is kawaii,” I shot back, a little offended. “It’s different. And it’s not crap.”

“Whatever, sorry. All we need is for you to record your interactions with them. Give us more observations to work with than what we’ve got. We’ll be providing you the necessary equipment.”

“I’m not hearing anything about a carrot here,” I said, folding my arms.

“I’ll do you one better,” Sauerbrey replied, his gray voice suddenly going ice-blue. “Here’s a stick. If you choose not to comply, as is your right, the Cooperative might decide that this highly in-demand apartment here would better serve a citizen with a higher Utility Score. Apropos of nothing, your boss tells me you’re in something of a slump. I’m sorry to hear that.”

I bit the inside of my cheek until I tasted blood. “Fine.” Losing my home meant losing my job. I’d plummet as hard into my old room at my mother’s place in Nowhere Prefecture as if I’d fallen there from all the way up here. I told you, Yuko-chan, she’d say. You go to live with the aliens (using the Cooperative-discouraged slur) you wind up broke with a probe up your backside.

But worse than saying I told you so, she’d pity me.

That I could not stand.

“Excellent.” Sauerbrey’s lips twitched into the bare minimum of a smile. “You’ll receive what you need via GoPak within the hour. Have a good evening, Miss Otsuji. Best of luck.”

Buy One Get One Free Tsunamis

The sea shook late in the afternoon, just as Kalen was finishing his shift. At first he thought the freighter had run aground, but they were miles from land in the empty Pacific. Stacks of Cubacon brand intermodal containers rattled like mad, and Kalen nearly lost his footing as he darted to tighten the safety straps. Waves drenched his back and the deck resounded with groans of plastic.

“Keep them steady!” Mr. Gupta, one of the ship’s supers, stood against the railing, well out of the way of the teetering Cubes.

A cable snapped on one of the stacks. Kalen darted over to secure it. The sea pitched and shuddered and the Cubes started to tip.

Then the rumbling settled. The waves returned to their usual sway beneath the freighter, and all was quiet on the Alphacorp Seaway.

“That was a big one,” said Mr. Gupta. He waved a hand at the towers of containers. “Get them all inspected. Thoroughly.”

Kalen sighed. He’d never gotten used to earthquakes at sea. They had been more frequent lately, and this one could not have had worse timing. He had already checked the Cubes four times today, but the company required they be inspected from scratch any time there was a weather event, and so he began his rounds all over again.

He mounted a hydraulic ladder and raised himself to the top of a stack, examining the Cubes one at a time. The sun cast long rectangular shadows across the deck. He worked quickly, with practiced efficiency, tugging cables and scanning the multicolored plastic casings.

It took three hours to get to the bottom of the final stack. One more Cube to go and he could finally call it a day. This one was light blue and filled with rice. He tested the security cables by hand, then took out his U-Pad and paced in a circle, running an autoscan for structural integrity. Everything looked good until he rounded the third corner. The device flashed red and squawked at him.

“WARNING. Potential compromise detected.” A blinking light appeared on the screen, indicating a small puncture on the top of the Cube.

“You’re kidding.” Kalen scowled at the big blue container. It was the lowest in a stack of seven; he would need to undo all the cables and get on the crane and move every single one to check on the puncture. It was like a prank, if scanning programs could do pranks.

He checked over his shoulder to make sure there were no supers around. The U-Pad blinked and he sneered at it. “Nope. Not today.” He typed in an override code. The warning disappeared. He made a mental note to double check this one tomorrow, just in case.

The New Nomad

“Chih-Tih!” Nall squeals, probing the translucent air bladder.

“Yes, baby, Chitlids.” My voice comes out tight. The spring has been so late, so cold—I’d thought we’d seen the last of the Chitlids. But this morning we awoke to hundreds of them, dragging their long tentacles through the air between the swaying dandular trunks.

Nall grasps at a Chitlid that puffs just out of xer reach. Pursuing, xe runs through a patch of yellow irrenes, spore pods bursting, and I hurry after. A rustling from a large spench bush pulls xer up short. A turam bolts from it, long legs and orange spots flashing as it disappears into the dandulars.

“Jaff!” Nall cries, clapping with glee.

“It does look like a giraffe, doesn’t it?” I laugh. “But giraffes are from Earth, baby. That’s a turam calf. Tu-ram.”

“Tuhm,” xe repeats, breathless with wonder, and my heart cracks. The turam’s diet relies heavily on spench berries. As our summers shorten, spench yields drop.

A familiar dread settles in my stomach, as I imagine the day I’ll have to explain to Nall that all the animals xe’s learning to name so lovingly will soon be gone. “We didn’t know,” I’ll tell xer. “Not until you were nine months big in my belly. We didn’t know that a solar system away, a star was collapsing, wrenching Coron from its orbit.”

Past the dandular canopy, our sun shines at high noon, a few dozen light-years farther away than it was at this time last year. Next year, it’ll be farther still. And ten years from now, after the last perihelion, we’ll be too far gone for it to ever pull us back. All the humans on Coron will descend into the subterranean caverns we are fervently constructing, to live off geothermal energy as Coron hurtles into deep space.

I wrench my mind back to the present, to Coron’s surface, where it’s, “nap time!” for this toddler.

I carry Nall back to the habitat as xe howls and makes xer joints all loose in their sockets, trying to slip from my arms. If Nall had xer way, we’d never come indoors. We’d explore gladial patches and hunt cardizes until xe passed out from exhaustion.

Back in the nursery, I dim the walls and set them thrumming with white noise. Nall calms down as soon as xe starts to nurse. Our bodies curl together on the bed, and I bury my nose in xer hair, wishing we were simple beasts. Turam and calf. Ignorant of the terrible future. When xer breathing slows to a snore, and my nipple slips from xer lips, I ease up out of bed.

But as I stand, the room reels. My vision clouds with spots, and I have to fight for consciousness. After a few moments, the dizzy spell passes, and I creep from the room, sealing the door behind me.

I must be anemic again. I’ve been breastfeeding Nall for almost two years now, and I get so sick of the daily nutrient injections. The med-droid will remind me to get my postnatal shots, and I’ll snooze its alert again and again, sometimes accidentally shutting it off for weeks at a time. So I keep making myself sick like this.

Now I summon the med-droid from its storage alcove and press my fingertip to the quick-read sensor, flinching at the prick. My vital stats appear on its face. Iron count could be higher, but I’m not quite anemic. I need some B12 too. One line of my health report is flashing red, and the information there is so unexpected that my brain takes long moments to process it.

Human Chorionic Gonadotropin detected.

For a thousand years, we’ve known that HCG in the blood means one and only one thing.

I’m pregnant.

The Colored Lens #32 – Summer 2019




The Colored Lens Speculative Fiction Magazine – Summer 2019 – Issue #32







The Colored Lens

Speculative Fiction Magazine

Summer 2019 – Issue #32

Featuring works by Philip A Kramer, Les Berkley, Michael J. Wyant Jr., Nathan Batchelor, Jen Sexton-Riley, Leigh Anna Harken, Marilee Dahlman, Joanne Aylott, Lindsey Duncan, Alexandra Grunberg, and Greg Greenberg.



Edited by Dawn Lloyd and Daniel Scott
Henry Fields, Associate Editor

Published by Light Spring LLC

Fort Worth, Texas

© Copyright 2019, All Rights Reserved

www.TheColoredLens.com



Table of Contents



Cephi

By Philip A Kramer

The drone hovered outside the window of the high-rise, gazing at the occupants of the 36th floor. A man in a white shirt and striped tie was eating a sandwich at his desk, oblivious to its presence.

Four hundred and thirty-two feet below, Jerry Donovan held his finger above the remote’s trigger and regarded the man in the video feed. He did not know him; he never knew any of them.

Just then, the man stopped his chewing, and turned his head to the window, a piece of arugula dangling from his lips. He locked eyes with the camera.

Jerry pulled the trigger.

A jet of water and soap suds speckled the one-inch pane of glass between them and dribbled down into the window seam. Jerry fingered the joystick forward until the two-foot long squeegee made contact with the window. The drone dragged the squeegee downward, wiping away the soap and the residue of city smog.

The man in the striped tie began to chew again, watching the drone’s progress with distracted disinterest.

Jerry shifted on his makeshift stool on the sidewalk and gazed about at the throng of pedestrians moving around him. Like his drone, the people who looked at him barely seemed to register his existence.

At times, he missed being up there, suspended by a few ropes hundreds of feet above the sidewalk. He thought the advent of window-washing drones would put him out of the job, but they still needed operators. Whether it was safer to cling to a high-rise or sit on a crowded Los Angeles sidewalk, had yet to be determined. It had not stopped his boss from taking away his hazard pay. Fortunately, the city was due to expand, to push out into the Santa Monica bay. The sooner it did the better, in his opinion. The sidewalks were getting too crowded.

When his drone arrived at the thirty-fifth floor, all of his bitter musings evaporated.

Jerry sat straighter and maneuvered his drone to the next window. A small, rare smile tugged at his lips.

Along the length of the room sat five equally spaced desks, each occupied by a person staring at a computer monitor. Closest to him was a woman with large, dark-framed glasses and brown hair pulled back into a ponytail. She wore a white blouse beneath a slender dark gray business suit.

Jerry did not know her name, but he gazed in on her for a few minutes every week. Unlike other windows, he always took his time with this one.

It would have felt creepy, stalker-ish even, but she never failed to give him a smile and a wave. Today was no different, and her face brightened when she caught sight of the shadow of his drone on the carpeted floor.

Jerry dutifully sprayed the window with the cleaner.

The joystick was slippery with sweat, and he took a moment to wipe his palms dry on his pant legs.

Then he went for it.

The camera view pitched and yawed with the motions of the drone, and he unconsciously leaned from side to side, squinting into the camera feed. A moment later, spelled out in relief among the soapsuds, was the word “Hi.”

Through a clean part of the glass, he could see her smile broaden, and a hint of amusement in her eyes.

Then she broke her gaze to look at the office door. A tall man with immaculately styled brown hair entered the room. A face red with fury highlighted his scowl.

The man spoke, but the words were inaudible to Jerry. The woman stood, a white-knuckled hand grabbing the edge of her desk. Her face remained stoic, even as the man slammed a piece of paper down in front of her.

Mouth agape, Jerry stared into the feed as the man continued to shout, drawing the attention of everyone in the office. The man stuck out his hand, a single finger pointing to the door. Jerry didn’t have to hear him to known what he’d said.

You’re fired.

Jaw clenched, the woman watched him leave and then sat down in her chair, staring at the piece of paper. Blood drained from her face.

Jerry loosened his grip on the remote when its sturdy plastic creaked in protest.

A moment later, determination crept over the woman’s features, and she looked up, straight at his drone.

Startled, Jerry set the drone to cleaning the rest of the window.

The woman stood, folding the piece of paper and pocketing it, and then approached the window. Jerry brought the drone to eye level. She stepped right up to the window, pressed her hand to the glass, and looked down.

Jerry frowned and then his eyes widened. He looked up from his stool to locate his drone suspended next to the 35th floor of the building across the street. He could just make her out beyond the hazy sky reflected by the window.

Throat constricting, he looked back at his video feed to see a sparkle in her eyes and a smirk curling one corner of her lips. She’d seen him. She turned around and walked straight for the door on the far side of the room.

Jerry gulped and hurriedly finished with the window.

Now was a good time to take his lunch break, he decided.

He yanked back on the joystick and steered the drone across the street and down to where he stood on the sidewalk. Its buzz grew louder as it drew nearer, causing even the most distracted pedestrian to look up.

He cordoned off a five-foot-by-five-foot landing site on the street with four collapsible traffic cones, much to the annoyance of the driver waiting to claim the charging station he now blocked.

Jerry set to work with practiced efficiency, detaching the propellers, battery pack, and washer-fluid receptacle and storing each inside the large wheeled case that had served as his stool.

Just as he was loading the frame and controller in the case, the hard clicking of approaching footsteps lifted above the general bustling of the crowd. A pair of small black shoes appeared in his periphery.

Swallowing, Jerry stood from his crouch and turned to face the owner of the shoes.

It was the woman from behind the glass.

Her eyes searched his for several moments as if she struggled to connect the lanky man with untidy hair before her to the persona of the drone.

A car honked at them.

Jerry scrambled to retrieve his cones and leave room for the driver to park.

“I’m sorry you witnessed that,” she said as he added the cones to his other equipment. She put a hand to her forehead and shook her head. “I’m so embarrassed.”

Jerry didn’t know what to say, so gave a one-shouldered shrug.

“I’m Cassy by the way.”

“Jerry,” he said, and shook her extended hand.

“Well Jerry,” she said, considering him. “I could use a drink. Care to join me?”

“I was just…” he stammered and then collected himself. “Yes I would.”

Jerry set off down the sidewalk alongside her, tugging his case after him. They merged with the lunch crowd that was just beginning to pour into the streets.

He concentrated on the back of the person in front of him and tried to ignore the awkward silence between them.

“You realize that ‘hi’ backwards reads ‘ih.’” She said abruptly.

Jerry’s stomach fell, and he covered his face with a palm.

“I’m an idiot.”

Cassy laughed.

“At least it wasn’t ‘olleh’ or ‘yeh.’”

Her laugh made the embarrassing oversight worth it.

“What bar were you thinking?” Jerry asked after they had walked east for a couple blocks.

“I think I have a few bottles at my place,” she said. Jerry was still reeling from her answer when she spoke again. “Do you like to play games?”

“Well I…” he stammered. “Where is this going?”

“That came out wrong,” she said, flushing. “I meant video games. I assumed with you flying a drone…” She trailed off.

“Sure. I love video games. I’d hardly call my job one though.”

“How far can that thing fly, anyway? Can you work from home?”

“I have to be within a mile or so for the controller and receiver to communicate, but they want us on location in case we lose signal. It won’t fall out of the sky or anything. It lands automatically, but we have to make sure we clear a place for it.”

As he described the less-than-riveting details of his job, she led him into the lobby of a modern, recently constructed building. They entered a small elevator and rode it to the fifteenth floor and proceeded down a hallway that smelled of new carpet.

“Come on in,” she said, holding a door open.

Inside the condo, a large fish tank, a hundred gallons at least, stood against one wall. A television comprised nearly the whole of the wall opposite the door. Whirls of color bounced across it in a pattern reminiscent of an old screen-saver. Only a solitary ergonomic chair faced it.

Jerry gaped.

“Is that a TFG console?”

“One of their first,” she said, her hands on her hips.

Jerry left his case by the door, walked over, and ran his hands along the chair’s back and then down along an armrest. His finger grazed a small black surface, and a touch-pad came to life. A moment later, the entire wall lit up, revealing the last thing he expected to see.

TerraForm Games had revolutionized the gaming industry. No longer did gamers waste hundreds of hours performing virtual tasks; they had something real to control.

If it hadn’t been so expensive, Jerry would have purchased the operating rights to one of their Lunar and Martian Rovers long ago. It was the ultimate sandbox game, casting regolith into any number of shapes with 3D printers.

What appeared in the display before him was not the surface of Mars, the moon, or even the cloud-tops of Venus. He was staring at an underwater palace through the camera of a TerraForm Games submersible.

Fish darted across the screen and in and out of a large white structure. It wasn’t coral, though there was certainly some of that too, growing on the rough angular walls, the tall support columns, and inside open windows. The palace was too small to be accessible by humans and made entirely from the white stone. Above it all, was the rippling surface of the water no more than one-hundred feet above.

Below the camera feed, the screen was divided into two sections. One displayed a large topological map of the Santa Monica bay, including longitude, latitude, and depth. The palace appeared as a small angular bulge, and hundreds of other structures lay beyond, just out of sight.

The other section of the display was a text box, an event log or status window from the looks of it. The last message read:

::SUBMERSIBLE IDLE_ BATTERY CHARGING_ AWAITING OPERATOR INPUT::

“I call her Cephi.” Cassy said from beside him, he hadn’t heard her approach. “Since she looks a little like a Cephalopod. A Squid,” she supplied at his blank look. She stuck out a hand, gesturing toward the chair. “Care to take the helm?”

He didn’t need to be asked twice. He sat down and reached for a button that resembled his drone remote’s joystick.

It took a moment, but the camera view began to move, causing a few fish to dart away. He neared the palace and passed beneath an arch into what looked to be a small courtyard.

“Did you build all this?”

“It took a couple years, and the help of some friends, but yeah. This is all mine.”

“What’s it made of?”

“Calcium carbonate, the same stuff that mollusks and coral use to make their shells and skeletons.”

She leaned down, her ponytail swinging into his face for a moment as she toggled another button forward. When she stood straight again, and Jerry was no longer distracted, he saw that an armature had extended into the sub’s field of view. Several servo boxes separated the arm into segments, and two long tubes stretching down its length.

“This is the 3D printing arm. One tube carries concentrated calcium chloride isolated from the seawater by osmotic and chemical filters. The other tube contains carbonic acid, the dissolved form of carbon dioxide. When they mix at the end of the probe, they form insoluble calcium carbonate.”

“What can you print?”

“Anything really, so long as I have enough calcium chloride and carbonate stored. There’s another arm too, the manipulator.” She leaned over him again, but he was ready for it, and saw the buttons she pressed. Another arm with pincers moved into view on the opposite side of the camera feed. “It helps to steady the object during printing and move things around afterward.”

Jerry had steered up to a wall spotted with coral and anemones like some kind of vertical garden. The vibrant colors of red and blue coral were surpassed only by those of the fish surrounding them. Some of the yellows were so bright as to be fluorescent.

“Aren’t you afraid they’ll destroy what you’ve printed?” Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Cassy’s features darken, but a weak smile replaced it by the time he focused on her.

“At first, I guess, but making them at home here has now become the unofficial purpose of the game. Yeah, I got into it to build an underwater paradise, but then I realized how shortsighted I was. Did you know over ninety percent of the carbon dioxide we produce is dissolved in the oceans, slowly acidifying them? Our subs have captured thousands of tons of it, but that’s nothing compared to reefs, and those are mostly dead now.”

Jerry looked out at the garden of coral and schools of fish. Each appeared to be thriving within the artificial home she’d created for them.

“These seem to be doing well enough.”

“Right? We had no idea it would happen,” she continued, excitement brightening her features. “The new regulations have helped clean up the water around here, but we never expected this. Coral and tropical fish don’t normally come to these northern latitudes, but with the oceans getting warmer, these are the new tropics. They latched on to our artificial reef and made it their own.”

“So the reefs won’t disappear after all?”

“If this reef and others around the coast are allowed to prosper, it will easily outpace any of our efforts to reverse climate change.”

Jerry blinked. Her tone had become somber.

“That’s amazing. So why don’t you sound excited?”

Cassy mashed another button on the touch-pad and held it.

Cephi rose, first slowly, and then with surprising speed. Once it had cleared the top of the coral garden, he could make out large spires, squat domes, and even part of a labyrinth in the distance. Other subs idled around the structures or moved between them like the fish. The subs were a squatter version of a submarine, with two propellers at the tail end and two small arms hugging its sides. Cassy was right, they did resemble large squids.

Cephi broke the surface, and then crashed back down, sending waves in all directions. Rivulets of water flowed across the camera lens, but when the view cleared, they looked out over a broad expanse of water at the coast. The tallest skyscrapers of Los Angeles were visible in the distance, but only as a hazy backdrop to the much closer buildings of Santa Monica.

A small fleet of barges in the foreground partially obscured their view. Several figures in hardhats scurried along the decks and rails of the ships.

“All that we’ve done, all that we’ve built here. It won’t last another day.”

Jerry’s stomach sank.

“The City Expansion Project?”

She nodded and clenched her jaw.

Just to the left of the Santa Monica beach, large hills and mountains loomed over the city. They had been beautiful and green once, but now strip mines and construction roads scarred them.

“For over a dozen miles off the coast, the water is no more than a couple hundred feet deep, the only depth at which reefs can grow. With the mountain so close to the water’s edge, all they have to do is push all of that dirt in. They’ll have flattened a mountain and filled in the bay at the same time. All the more area to build on.”

Jerry shook his head. Just earlier that day he had been hoping the expansion would be underway soon to relieve some of the sidewalk congestion. Now…

“They have to know what’s down here. Why would they bury a reef?”

“Someone from the Fish and Wildlife Service did a survey, but concluded the species here weren’t protected under the Endangered Species Act, even though the list hasn’t been updated in years.” She balled her hands into fists.

“There has to be a way.”

“I’ve tried everything, we’ve tried everything,” she said, motioning toward the edge of the screen. For the first time Jerry noticed a message feed showing hundreds of unread messages, most marked as urgent and with a fair number of expletives in their subject lines. The other subs.

“Everything?”

“It even cost me my job.”

Cassy pulled a piece of paper from her back pocket, the one her boss had slammed onto her desk. Jerry took the slip of paper and unfolded it. It was an email correspondence between a Cassandra Thomas, CP and the International Union for Conservation of Nature, specifically, the Species Survival Commission. Several emails detailed her apparent pleas to move Heliopora coerulea, Blue coral, from Vulnerable status to Endangered. Their only response was that it would be discussed at their next SSC meeting in three weeks. By then it would be too late.

“I don’t understand. Why did this get you fired?”

“I’m a paralegal. Our law firm represents the city and this construction project. My boss found out I was trying to stop it and…”

“I’m sorry. I wish there was something I could do to help,” he wanted to reach out and comfort her, lay a sympathetic hand on her shoulder, or let her cry on his. He held back. He may have looked in on her for over a year, but she’d known him for less than fifteen minutes.

“Maybe there is,” she said cryptically, and then backed away from the chair and approached her fish tank. She stared in at several of the bright blue fish.

Puzzled, Jerry stood from the chair and followed her. The fish nearest him was the largest of the fish in the aquarium, about eight inches long and with a large knobby forehead. The aquarium’s overhead lights illuminated a lacework of orange across its blue scales. Cassy’s dark-framed glasses reflected the entire scene.

“Cheilinus undulates, the Humphead wrasse. They are on the endangered species list. Don’t even ask how I got my hands on one. It wasn’t exactly legal, but at least it’s in my hands and not the belly of someone who thinks its rarity makes it more delicious. If I could get him out to the reef, and capture video of him swimming around, it would put a wrench into their construction plans.”

“That doesn’t sound legal either.” Jerry said, rubbing at his neck. This was all moving too fast. All he had wanted was to have a drink in the company of a woman he had admired from afar for so long.

She shrugged a shoulder.

“People dump their fish and let out birds all the time. It’s illegal, sure, but it’s not something they send people to jail over. I would have done it already, but the entire reef is now in a construction zone. They’ve closed the beaches and they won’t let any boats on site.” She turned to him and swallowed. “But a drone with a water tank could reach it.”

A chill rippled across his skin and then it was gone, replaced by a sinking feeling in his stomach.

“This was why you asked me out for a drink?”

Cassy looked to the floor.

Jerry’s nostrils flared, and he turned around, walking back to the chair and gripping the headrest.

He should have guessed she had an ulterior motive. What would a girl like her want with him? He ground his teeth as he stared at the distant city through the camera feed. The forty-three-story high-rise he’d been washing was visible from this angle, its windows reflecting the sun overhead. He should leave now and get back to work, finish the windows before the building manager filed a complaint.

Just beyond the skyscrapers was the sky itself, hazy from the pollution settling over the valley. Despite the city’s efforts to improve air quality by promoting the electric car and the use of solar charging stations, it continued to deteriorate.

He had never looked to the ocean for answers, but Terraform Games had, and they had gamers: the most dedicated workforce on the planet. They had invested millions of dollars, thousands of hours into the reef, and now they were all counting on him. If he went back to washing windows, he would be condemning all that vibrant and beautiful life to death.

Cassy was wringing her hands together and chewing on her lower lip as she watched him.

“I’ll do it.”

She smiled and hopped up and down on her toes. She looked like she might throw her arms around him, but thought twice and settled back on her heels. She took off the blazer of her business suit and threw it over the chair.

“Then let’s get to work.”

“Now?” He gaped at her.

“Now is all the time the reef has left. The construction begins tomorrow morning.”

“It could take some time to modify the drone, and I’ll need to be nearby when I fly it.”

“That won’t be a problem. I have a friend with a boat that can get you close enough. But we both can’t go. I need to stay here to film the fish once you deliver it. If we don’t get video, it could hide, and we might not be able to find it again before tomorrow morning.”

He frowned.

She took a step forward and laid a hand on his shoulder.

“I’ve seen you fly that thing. You’re good. I have every confidence in you.”

The touch sent a pulse of warmth through him, and he suddenly found a confidence that hadn’t been there a moment before.

They set to the task of preparing the drone, all plans to have a nice, relaxing drink forgotten. Jerry washed out the fluid reservoir and then, at Cassy’s instruction, washed it out twice more. He didn’t know what the washer fluid was made of, but it couldn’t be healthy for fish.

The reservoir was large enough to hold over two gallons of water from her aquarium, more than enough for the fish. The problem was the release button. He would need a way to dump the contents of the tank into the bay remotely.

After some minutes of staring at the drone and scratching his head, Cassy asked if he could just drop the whole reservoir into the bay.

“The fish could swim out and I’ll buy you a new one.”

That made the problem easier, but it didn’t solve it. He had no way to release the reservoir remotely, otherwise drone operators might inadvertently send twenty pounds of washer fluid and reservoir down onto the heads of pedestrians on the sidewalk. After some tinkering, he routed the tube of the spray nozzle and wedged it into the manual release switch. With a press of the remote’s trigger, the water pressure was sufficient to trigger the release. Cassy brought him a glue gun to fix the tubing in place, and they tested it several times with the reservoir full.

While he made the last adjustments, Cassy contacted a friend of hers who owned a boat.

“I’ve taken it on trips to Ventura and Santa Barbara,” she said to him after hanging up the phone. “It’s large enough to set up your drone, and I think you’ll like Leon, he’s a really nice guy.”

Jerry hated him already. Any guy who would drop everything to do this for her would definitely have a thing for her. He was proof of it.

After he packed up his drone, Cassy wrote the coordinates of her underwater palace on a piece of paper, and he put it in his pocket. Then she programmed her number into his cellphone.

“Call me if anything goes wrong, and I mean anything.”

They loaded the fish in the reservoir last, which took some doing as they chased it out of it hiding place among the coral and anemones. Her only instruction was not to take too long getting it in the bay. Ammonia from the fish’s waste would build up rapidly in the small volume of the reservoir and the oxygen would plummet. It was an endangered species, she reminded him. It was irreplaceable.

Once they had secured the fish in the reservoir, Jerry strapped it to the top of his case and wheeled it to the door.

Cassy was wringing her hands again, and he could see how desperately she wanted to go with him.

“Could you ask another sub to record video?”

“It’s best we keep what we are doing quiet. The fewer people know the better.”

Was she lying to him about the legal repercussions of what they were planning? She was being exceptionally careful not to leave evidence behind. But if he knew all the details, would that really change his mind?

She walked him to the elevator down the hall.

“Good luck.”

“You too,” he said.

They did not embrace or even shake hands; they simply looked into each other’s eyes for enough time to feel awkward, and then a little while longer.

When the door finally closed and descended to the first floor, he had the shape of her soft smile and every contour of her face burned into his memory.

The car Cassy had called for him waited outside. With his case in the trunk and the fish reservoir in his lap, he passed the thirty-minute ride south to Long Beach in silence.

It was just after 3pm when he wheeled his case onto the marina and checked his phone.

“You Jerry?”

Jerry looked up to see a blonde-haired man wearing a T-shirt and swim shorts. He was tall and well-muscled, a fact that was hard to ignore as he raveled a rope between his hand and bicep. If he wasn’t a surfer, or body builder, or even an up-and-coming Hollywood actor, Jerry would lose all confidence in stereotypes.

“Yeah. Leon?”

“The one and only,” he said, smiling with too-perfect teeth. Leon grabbed his hand briefly, forgoing the shake, and returned to coiling the rope.

“This the boat?” Jerry asked, gesturing to the vessel moored to the dock beside them. It was larger than he had imagined and much more luxurious. It had a small wheelhouse in the forward section and assorted snorkeling gear and coolers cluttering the aft part of the deck. He could picture the many hundreds of parties the man had hosted here, parties to which Jerry would never have been invited. As if to confirm his suspicions, stenciled on the side of the boat was its name, The Good Time.

“This is her,” he said, and threw the rope on the last remaining part of the boat where the deck was visible beneath the clutter.

Leon helped move his case onto the boat and Jerry set the fish reservoir gently inside the wheelhouse and out of direct sunlight.

While Leon navigated the boat out of the marina, Jerry cleared a space on the cluttered deck to assemble his drone.

Just after they passed a pair of buoys, he had to find a place to sit as Leon lay on the speed.

“How do you know Cassy?” Leon called back over the rushing wind.

“We just met today, actually. She needed my help with a project of hers.” He had overheard a part of their conversation over the phone and knew she hadn’t told him everything. Leon seemed pleased by this answer, possibly having feared Jerry was her new boyfriend.

What had Cassy said? You’ll like him? He’s nice? To her maybe. It must have irked Leon to no end that Cassy hadn’t accompanied them on this trip. At least they had that in common.

“She want you to put some Christmas lights on that palace of hers or something?” He had obviously not figured out there was a fish in the opaque plastic reservoir on the floor beside him.

“Something like that.”

The boat rounded Point Vincent and Santa Monica eased into view. The mountains beside it were visibly shorter than they had been months ago, the thousands of tons of earth now sitting inside a fleet of barges in the bay.

They passed a few fishing boats, but before long, they were the only ones out in the water. They came to a series of floating buoys strung together in a wide arc around the construction site, at least a mile away from the nearest barge. It wasn’t a high barrier, and they could have driven the boat right over it, but the bright red of the buoys suggested that action would be unwise.

It didn’t matter. This was the perfect spot.

Leon slowed the boat to a stop within twenty feet of the barrier and turned off the engine.

Jerry cleared more room on the deck and opened his case. He had to snatch a piece from Leon, who had pulled out one of the propellers and was spinning it with a finger. He had to hurry; the fish couldn’t live much longer inside the reservoir.

“It’s a drone,” Leon said stupidly as the last piece clicked into place. How he couldn’t tell that from its parts was a mystery.

“Yup,” Jerry replied as he stepped around him and into the wheelhouse to retrieve the reservoir.

Despite the confirmation, the appearance of the reservoir made Leon look just as confused as he had a moment ago.

Jerry checked on the fish, which huddled next to the edge of the tank in apparent fear, but seemed healthy enough. He then connected the reservoir to the drone.

With the remote, he primed the spray tube with a few presses of the trigger, and as expected, the reservoir detached. After reconnecting it, he paused and stood. That was all there was left to do. The familiar task of assembling the drone had momentarily chased away his anxiety, but now that he was done, it swept back in and rocked him like the waves against the boat. This was it.

According to his phone’s GPS, the coordinates Cassy had given him were no more than one thousand yards away. He could not see any evidence of the reef from the surface, but knowing that such a beautiful place existed below filled him with awe.

He messaged Cassy to let her know they’d arrived and to expect to see the reservoir in the water within a couple minutes.

”Thank you, Jerry. You are my new favorite person,” she replied.

He stared at the screen for a long moment before Leon broke his trance.

“So what next?”

He entertained the idea of showing Leon the message, just for the pleasure of watching the man sulk. Maybe later, after he made sure the fish was at home in the water.

He took up his remote.

The drone strained against the weight of its full reservoir, but cleared the edge of the boat without any obvious problems.

Once it was over the water, a frightening thought occurred to him. It was one thing to crash his drone into a building or botch a landing on the street. He could always recover it. Now, with over a hundred feet of water between him and a sunken drone, it would be lost forever.

The drone reached twenty feet in the air before he steered it over the barricade. He maintained the altitude and watched the drone shrink into the distance with its precious cargo. It was perhaps the first fish to achieve sustained flight, he mused.

He flipped on the remote’s viewing screen and was treated to an expansive view of open water, beyond which lay an equally expansive city.

The drone was closing in on the score of barges floating in the bay. The behemoth flat-bottomed ships sat low in the water under the tons of dirt and rocks. Only the wheelhouse and a narrow walkway along the sides of the vessel were accessible to crew. On the closest barge, a small group of crewmen followed each other like ants around the dirt mound. As his drone approached, he could see one of them pointing out over the water. At him.

Another man split off from the group and ran back along the path with one hand on the railing and the other holding his hardhat in place.

Jerry tensed and pushed the joystick forward, increasing the drone’s speed. He needed to drop off the fish and return before anyone came to investigate.

Just before the drone reached the coordinates, the man emerged from the door of the barge’s wheelhouse and scurried back, holding something.

Leon’s thick finger tapped the screen.

“What’s that?” he said uncomfortably close to Jerry’s ear.

“I don’t know.”

The man stopped halfway back to the group and put the object to his shoulder. It was some kind of rifle or cannon with a fat barrel. It was pointing directly at his drone.

Then the camera feed went black.

Heart racing, Jerry looked up, expecting to see a cloud of smoke and drone debris. Instead, the distant drone slowed its forward motion and hovered in place.

In horror, Jerry watched as it began to execute an automatic landing, but there was nothing but water beneath it.

He fed more power into the propellers, but the drone continued its descent.

The fish.

Jerry pulled the trigger once, then twice, but there was no splash to indicate the drone had dropped its reservoir.

The anti-drone device had done its job. None of Jerry’s signals were getting though.

He watched with heart-stopping helplessness as the drone hovered down into the water. When it hit, the propellers shot a plume of spray and mist into the air. Then it was gone.

“Dude. That sucks,” Leon said with a tsk.

Thunderstruck, Jerry dropped the remote to the deck of the boat and stumbled to the railing.

The fish was still in the reservoir. If it didn’t get out soon, it would die. Without the fish, thousands of tons of mountain rock would cover the reef by this time tomorrow. Cassy would never forgive him if that happened.

“We’re going out there.”

“No way, Dude. It’s gone.”

“We have to. The fi—” Jerry took a deep breath. “Cassy would want this more than anything in the world right now. I swear, you will be her new favorite person,” he said. It wasn’t exactly a title he could give away, but he would say anything to get this boat moving.

Leon bit his lip and looked out over the water toward the crash site.

“Alright. But the second I see any boats coming after us, I’m gone.”

“Deal.”

Leon started the engine, and Jerry squatted down to keep from falling over as the boat lurched forward and whipped around.

The barricade was of little hindrance to the boat. They sped between two of the buoys where the line connecting them sagged well below the water.

The phone in his pocket was buzzing, but he ignored it. He could not talk to Cassy now, not until he set the fish free. But how could he get to it?

The pile of junk he leaned against shifted, and a pair of goggles rolled out into the space he had cleared on the deck.

He grabbed them and sorted through the rest of the pile. He pulled out two matching flippers and checked their size against his shoe. It would have to do. Once the flippers were on, he took off his shirt and placed it and his cellphone, keys, and wallet, in their own pile on the deck.

“I think this is it,” Leon said, laying off the gas.

Jerry stood and saw what had clued him off. A fragment of the safety barrier that surrounded the drone’s propellers drifted in the water.

He took a few deep breaths, lowered his goggles over his eyes, and launched himself over the side of the boat.

His eyes stung with saltwater as the impact jostled his goggles loose. He surfaced and adjusted them until they were tight against his face.

Leon had brought the boat around, his eyes wide as he stared at Jerry.

Holding his breath, Jerry dove again.

Below, shimmering schools of fish meandered through a city of white stone. The top of the closest structure, a spire, was twenty feet below, but it was five times that far to the ocean floor. He stared in awe for a few seconds before searching for the wreckage of his drone.

He saw it then, sinking to the bottom. The drone was largely intact, and he could just make out the reservoir above it, the small amount of air inside providing some buoyancy.

Fighting the urge to dive after it, he surfaced for a fresh lungful of air.

The boat was idling twenty feet away, and Leon was waving for him to swim back. His other hand was pointing out over the water toward the barges. Two small dinghies had separated from the ships and were speeding toward them.

Now was the time to get out of the water and leave if they had any chance of getting away.

Jerry shook his head, first to convince himself, and then for Leon. The man dropped his hands and leaned his head back as if to beseech a god to pluck Jerry from the water for him.

He ducked back beneath the waves and kicked off in the direction of the drone. The flippers propelled him faster than he would have expected though desperation surely played its part. He closed the distance to the drone in under twenty seconds.

He grabbed the first thing that came within reach, the two-foot long rubber squeegee. It reminded him just how much trouble he would be in once his boss got word of the drone’s loss. Hauling the thing to the surface was not an option. Already his lungs ached with the breath he held, and the interior of his goggles were fogging over. He needed to set the fish free while he still could.

While he positioned himself atop the drone, nearest the reservoir, they descended into a bed of coral growing on the roof of some kind of flat-topped structure. He pressed the manual release button, but the reservoir did not pop free. The crash must have jammed it.

For his next attempt, he tried to brace his feet against the drone, but the flippers were making it impossible. He stuck a finger between his ankle and the flipper and pried one off and then the other. With them gone, he could fit his feet on the crossbars that attached the propellers to the drone’s chassis.

His ankle brushed against a red spindly-looking coral, and it burned like the red-hot embers of a fire. It took all his willpower not to suck in a lungful of water at the sudden pain.

Repositioning his foot, he heaved, and finally, the reservoir came free. It floated up a few feet and rotated, releasing its trapped air. The bright blue fish darted out and away, and past a looming silver shape.

It was Cephi. Cassy had found him.

Even as he pointed frantically in the direction the fish had gone, the submersible continued toward him. She had to have seen it. If she did not give chase, the opportunity to save the reef would be lost forever.

He could not care about that now; he had to get to the surface. Panic quickly overcame him when he looked up. The glimmering surface of the water was so far away. He pushed off the drone and kicked his legs.

Without the flippers, he was moving too slow. Darkness was condensing along the periphery of his vision, and his diaphragm spasmed, trying and failing to suck in the salty water.

Then something passed before his eyes. A mechanical arm with pincers at the end. Cephi’s manipulator arm. The moment his fingers closed around it, it lurched upward. He held on with all his might as he and Cephi rocketed toward the surface.

They had barely breached before Jerry was gasping in a breath. For a moment, he was weightless, and he luxuriated in the feel of the air passing across his lips and filling every inch of his lungs. Then he crashed back into the water losing his hold on the sub. Somewhere along the way, his goggles had disappeared, and he had to wipe and blink away the stinging water.

Hardly a minute had passed since he dove after the fish, and now that he was on the surface again, he could see Leon over a hundred yards away, speeding back the way they had come. From the opposite side, their two pursuers were quickly approaching Jerry’s position.

Cephi was floating just feet away. He splashed over and draped his arms over its cool metallic surface to wait for rescue.

Cassy had chosen to save him instead of getting footage of the fish. He had put her in that position, and while he was glad of her choice, he was now to blame for the destruction of the reef.

“Thank you,” he said to the sub. He was pretty sure she could neither see nor hear him, so belatedly located the camera among a bunch of other unidentifiable ports and lenses on the front of the submersible and gave her a thumbs up.

It was another minute before the boats arrived and hauled him out of the water. The crew had little to say in the way of chastisement, perhaps out of consideration for his near-death experience. The captain of the boat, however, a tall man with a mustache and black security baseball cap, had several choice words to say about the unnamed man who had left him there to drown.

They bandaged the red blisters on his ankle from the fire-coral and gave him a shirt, towel, and cheap flip-flops. That was what he wore to the police station where they charged him with trespassing on a construction site.

His one allotted phone call was to his mother, who said she would be on the next flight from Idaho. So as not to worry her unduly, he stuck to his story of joyriding his drone with some new friends. He had never lied to her before, and this made him sulk on his cell’s cot until he fell asleep.

The next morning, he woke to a smiling police officer knocking at the bars to his cell. He left a folded sheaf of paper between the bars, and Jerry slipped out from beneath the thin blanket to retrieve it.

It was a printed article from the Los Angeles Times. The cover page made his pulse quicken.

“City Expansion Project Halted Due to Endangered Fish.”

The text remarked that the beautiful and little-known artificial ecosystem off their coast had received a stay of execution due to the sudden appearance of an endangered species of fish.

Jerry breathed out a sigh.

Another sub had seen the Humphead Wrasse after all.

Also mentioned in the article, the near-simultaneous but seemingly unconnected rescue of a drone enthusiast named Jerry Donovan by a TerraForm Games submersible.

He flipped to the next page and was awed by several of the images printed there. One was a shot of the aforementioned fish peering out from the shelter of a large orange sea anemone’s tentacles. Other images included the vast collection of structures the TFG operators had printed over the years, and the massive explosion of life on the artificial reef.

The article concluded with a caution to the rest of the industrialized world. “The ecology of Earth is far more complex than we ever appreciated. The death of one is to the detriment of many. Ultimately, our lives depend on the smallest of theirs.”

An hour later, Jerry was let go. The construction company had enough of a PR nightmare to deal with than to press charges against a man who almost died on their construction site.

As he was being discharged by the clerk in the front office, he caught sight of Cassy sitting in the waiting room.

She smiled when she saw him holding the printed article.

“This time,” he said as he guided her out of the station. “We better be going out for a drink.”



Death and Two Women

By Les Berkley

In his bed-chamber, hung round with tapestries that emblazoned tales so ancient that the matter of them had been long forgotten, the Old Lord lay dying. His breathing made the only sound in the room save the mantel clock, and his bloody spittle flecked the linens.

At the foot of his bed, the Lady Myrilla sat in her cushioned chair, making the last neat hem stitches in his burial shroud; black work for a dark day. Her hair white as the linen, her eyes the faded blue of summer sky, she awaited the inevitable change of worlds. Her hands fell into the rhythm of the mantel clock while thoughts tumbled over in her mind, pleasure and pain, bitterness and joy in turn. The past washed over the present, yet she held the future at bay: the new age she could not bear to imagine.

Beyond the mullioned window, past the crenellated wall of the outer keep, the sea beat its own measure on the rocky strand. The waves advanced and withdrew, moving the shells and twisted, bleached driftwood now forward, now back. Straining her eyes, the Lady could see at the limit of her vision the mist-shrouded topmasts of carracks and ships of war, dancing to the long, steady swell.

He was a better Prince than a husband, though he never did me harm by word or deed. He would talk to me as though I were one of his Privy Council, and I loved that in him. My mourning I have done already, but I will never stop listening for his step.

A soft, almost tentative knock sounded at the door. “Enter,” the Lady said, threading her needle through the cloth.

Aramond, the Lord Chancellor, pushed the door open, his ironwood cane tapping on the stone floor. Myrilla presented her hand, and he made his way across the room, taking her hand in his own and kissing it. His middle finger bore the ring of his office, heavy with gold and holding an anachite diamond, sovereign against all poisons, natural or compounded by men.

He then went along to the head of the bed, steadying himself with one hand on the carved serpent that wound its way ’round the bed frame in a reflection of that great Worm which circumbinds the world. With an effort, he bent to touch the Lord’s brow.

“How long?” the Lady asked.

“An hour. Two perhaps, but no more.”

“Can you not, then, conjure against death?”

“Never so, most serene Lady.” He leaned on his cane, and pulled a chair next to Myrilla, with the dragon’s head of his staff against the arm. “We must talk, and not in fancy-dress phrases.”

“Go to! You were never a plain-spoken man.” In spite of the shadow that lay on the room, she smiled. “Let me have your last counsel.”


In his distant apartments, Egan the Young Lord paced the floor, waiting for another’s death to set him free. In the half-light of curtained windows, his eyes fell on those curious and perverse objets d’art with which his whims had furnished the chamber. A painted satyr whipped a nymph; a sculpted adder writhed like a living thing as the light shifted here and there.

Across from him, on a soft-pillowed couch, Dame Rosalura, secretary of his inmost desires, lay curled in the way of a wild-cat, her skin pure and lustrous and her eyes cold as his were fiery. Her high-waisted gown of scarlet sendal dangled a little off one shoulder as she stretched her arm toward a wine bottle.

Between this Scylla and Charybdis, Gabriel the Court painter stood at his easel, slender arms shaking a little as he held his brush and pallet. “Will it please Your Highness be still for just a moment?”

“It will not,” the Young Lord said. “Let me see the damned thing, and it were best for you that it be finished.” He pushed the painter aside and studied the canvas. “It is done, and never so poorly as I’d feared. You’ve caught my lady wife’s simpering smile to the very life.”

Rosalura left her couch in a sinuous motion and stood beside her lover. “And there too am I, as you so sweetly commanded.” Indeed, to a discerning eye, her face emerged out of the murky background behind his, subtly rendered, but there to see. “This is well enough done. No more necessary.”

Egan motioned the painter to go. “Hurry to your catamite. You’ve done well for half a man.”

Dame Rosalura took a single long step to block the painter’s way. “My Prince,” she said, eyes flashing wide with pleasure. “Ah, I have o’erlept my time to name you so. Then call me prophetess to be the first.” She put a finger on Gabriel’s chest, where his smock hung open from the neck. Her other hand touched beneath his waist, and he hardened in spite of himself. “Shall I make a whole man of him?”

“As you wish,” Egan said. “But not just now. It were not seemly in my poor sire’s last hours.” He laughed. “Another time?”

Rosalura laughed. “When was I ever seemly? Save to feign it when needs must.” She pushed her hand forward, feeling the painter tremble and grow at once. “It would be so easy. Don’t be afraid. Egan will tell you I make an excellent gentleman atwixt the blankets.” She licked her lips, blood-red without rouge. “Oh, get out,” she said with another laugh, throaty and low. “You’ll keep. Think of me when you cover some boy with your paints. Make him look thus.” She raised her arms and held her scented black hair back from her face. “’Twill hold you for a while.”

Leaving his palette and brushes behind, Gabriel hurried out the door, slamming it as he fled.

Left alone with his mistress in that most private place, Egan ceased his pacing. “You said once that you might kill a man like that with your bare hands? I should wish to see that.”

“A man like that? Like that perhaps, but not our poor Gabriel. I never would murder a man with such art in his hands. Choose another some time, and we shall see.” As she said this, she drew back her shoulders a little, letting him better see her shape through the thin material of her gown.

Damn her. My tongue thickens with desire. Egan walked to the wall where hung a great map of the Adrian Sea and its shores. “Let us choose another subject for the mean while. See you here where the Papal States lie ripe for the plucking? Place but the crown on my head, and they fall. By this blow, would we not strike Venezia herself into the hazard?”

Rosalura chose her words with care. In a nigh-submissive tone, she said, “I am scarcely a soldier, but might not a stroke northward give us a buffer against the Germanies? Your father oft said that there the danger lay.”

Damn her twice. When I am Lord here, I shall have every foot of this fortress turned ‘till I find those papers she keeps in reserve against me. Then we will see which of us has the mastery. “When I need such a minx as you to teach me the art of war, I will happily resign my throne. Until then, I pray you watch your words, lest you find yourself returned to that gutter whence you came.”

“Well,” Rosalura said. “There was never horse nor man that threw me yet. I sought not to teach you, but only to remind you. So let you recall this: I know where your dead lie buried; who your intelligencers are, and who informs against you. So do others, lest you think the knowledge dies with me. Also, you are not the only one who knows how to compound an insalata Fiorenzana. Those herbs wait for any to pick them.

“You have nothing to fear from me. I will follow withersoever you choose, but never think I will be silent. This is the hour of our triumph; let us not quarrel over minutiae. She pulled him to her with surprising strength, kissed him hard with her tongue down his throat, then pushed away. “Now let me dress properly for the day.”

She closed the door behind her, and held herself from shaking until she was well down the corridor.


In the death-room, behind doors of dark walnut, carved with the shapes of the fantastical beasts of old, the Lady and her Chancellor spoke together. They kept their voices low, in respect to the dying, and to avoid prying ears.

“Aramond,” Myrilla said. “Can you tell me what is that ship yonder whose masts reach so above the others?”

“That is His Brittanish Majesty’s vessel Nonesuch, or some other ridiculous Anglish name. Seventy-four guns; her Captain bears a similarly absurd appellation.”

“And her business? Surely something I should know?”

“Indeed. Since the Emancipation, there has been a lack of commerce between the Anglish and their old partners in trade; viz, Moroc, Tunis and the like. It is His Majesty’s—or more correctly, the Prince-Regent’s—intention to improve the traffic in ivory, spices et cetera. He seeks to use our excellent deep-water anchorages, to (he avouches) mutual benefit.

“Quite naturally, upon hearing of the Lord Orvald’s illness, the Ambassador Plenipotentiary insisted on waiting until our master should enjoy better health. Should Your Serenity choose to believe that, I would denounce you as an imposter.”

Myrilla sighed, took up her sewing, then laid it aside once more. “They wait for young Egan? Or some other condition of weakness?”

“May I speak without reproach or censure?”

“When was it otherwise?” The Lady’s face showed naught save a deep calm that belied her inner storm. I was never a patient woman, yet all my life it has been forced on me.

“This then,” Aramond said. “Our realm stands in the same case as the Lord Orvald; that is, in extremis. We live or die by trade and shipping. Our soldiers are unexcelled, but they are also few in number. The mountains and fortalices keep us safe enough, but without access to the sea, we starve and die. No man gladder than I to know that the loathsome traffic in human cargoes is ended, but we must find new commodities. I fear that the Young Lord has not the least sense of this.

“He loves his luxuries, his cruelties and his mistress far above any duty he might feel. Certes he will take us to war, if only to please the masses, and so will wake that sleeping lion in our harbor with his seventy-four guns.

“I am told he intends against the Papal dominions, and there is no surer way to embroil us in the endless divisions of the Italiani ‘Domestic fury and fierce civil strife’, as the poet says, and we without the resources to maintain it. There is also information that should we open certain abandoned workings in the mountains, we might discover the bones of our lost comrades; and that if we were uncautious our own might soon be laid with them.”

The Lady Myrilla put her hand over his, reaching across the table. She had never found herself able to talk to Egan, to evoke any reaction beyond a bland smile. To the Lady, it was as though her son was not hers, but some changeling out of a dark world. “I will not contradict you. He is a chaos I cannot order or control.”

The old Chancellor closed his eyes, listening to the breath of the dying and he thought, the stuttering beat of his own heart. “Then his accession must be prevented? Could you die to see that accomplished?”

Myrilla considered that fate. Were Egan to die, his cousin Ibian would be, by operation of law, the next in line. A bookish lad, though competent in arms at fourteen, he had not been raised to rule, but there were sound heads to guide him. “They tell us that Death is only a door. I could open it with an easy conscience.”

“Then listen.” Aramond pushed back his robe and drew a scroll tube from his pocket. “I wrote this in a fair clerk’s hand two days afore now. It waits only for the Lord’s seal and sign-manual.”

He handed a paper to the Lady, and she read it over. “This is a codicil to my husband’s will. Names me regent for—whomever? The county Medor to follow in my stead should I be also gone? Surely it cannot have force unsealed and unsigned?”

“In ordinary circumstances, you are correct. We are not, however, in such circumstances. You know I am somewhat fond of conundrums? Here is one: should the Crown be set on Egan’s head, you and I would be banished or condemned on the instant. I cannot even guess how many would shortly follow us.

“This being so, he must die afore-hand. And with clear presents of the means, methods and above all the workers of his death, so that there can be no suspicion fall on you or yours. Hence the regency to stand, whatsoever else befall. Medor I trust more than any other, saving yourself.”

So I am to kill my own son, and die myself in the attempt.. We made him together out of desire, and it did not suffice to make him whole. He is all that is left from when I was young. Now I have only hours for what ought to be a lifetime of mourning.

Myrilla picked up her needlework, knotted and snipped the thread. They say the Gods of the North did thus. She looked again on the harbor and the mountains beyond shrouded in fog, seeking haply the farther shore. I am not ready to die, but then, how many ever are?

“Can you tell me your plan?” the Lady asked.

“To do so would be your damnation, or at least so the Fathers say. Myrilla, my oldest and greatest friend, you must trust me now.”

She raised her hand, and he kissed it. “You know,” she said, “Egan is no fool.”

“He sees the surface well enough,” the Chancellor said. “Makes him a good tactician, but a poor strategist. Dame Rosalura is far more to be feared. I have written instructions for Medor.” He unrolled the codicil once more and laid it on the table. “So hardly is the law administered, and so honored that neither we nor Egan may seem to violate one jot of it. You keep the Lord’s seal?”

“Yes, but—”

“But me none of your buts, madam, I pray you.” He smiled, and she took the seal from her purse. A candle, a bit of wax and a scrap of ribbon and the task was complete.

When the wax hardened, the old Chancellor rose, looking now as though he ran a race with his master for who should sit first before the Thrones. “Turn away, Lady. This is black art, and should you witness it, it would imperil your soul as it does mine.”

He hobbled again to the head of the bed, leaning more heavily on his cane. Inking a pen, he pressed it into the dying man’s hand. “Scribé.” The pen moved across the paper. “It is done, and no man may question it.” He returned to the table and sanded the ink dry.

“You have the wine for the memory-cup? We will drink to Orvald when he is gone, and if Fortune favor, there are some will join him.”

Myrilla rose from her chair, crossed to the locked cabinet and brought out the bottle, stoppered with its cork, foil and waxen seal. Aramond took a syringe from his pocket and thrust the needle through the cork, taking care to leave only the barest mark. This he hid with a pinch of lamp-black rubbed well. “The death-lily. Not an unpleasant end. Very like hemlock, but more swift and sure.”

“End of our little tale, then?”

“No, madam: rather the beginning. We have only to wait.”

The wait lasted not long. Harder and more irregular came the Lord’s breath as though, the Chancellor’s plan being set in train, he himself was no longer required. All sound stopped, excepting the ineluctable tick of the mantel clock. The Lady walked to her Lord’s side and held her glass before his face. She grabbed the bell-pull and tugged twice to summon the inevitable. “Our Lord is dead. Call his Guardsmen in, and let the teller bells be rung.”


“Donn. Donn.” The bells tolled low, reverberating amongst the hills, past great houses and less over the pastures and steadings, even to the far borders and beyond.

At the sound, women fell to the earth, stricken with birth pangs though they carried no children. Beasts groaned in the field, and men stood wondering as the furrows bent and weaved as though waking from slumber. Such was the bond between the Lord and the land, sundered only by death which stopped ordinary time. All things waited until the clock could be once more wound.


In her own inner room, Dame Rosalura stared into her scrying glass, where the image of Lord Orvald’s deathbed hung, as though detached from the world like a painting in oils. Gone then, and peacefully. This gladdened her. She would’ve welcomed the painful death of an enemy; indeed, she had caused a few such. However, the Old Lord was not an enemy, only an impediment that time had removed.

Half-rising from her seat, she bent closer to the mirror, letting her hair fall like raven’s wings to either side. In the glass, the Chancellor and the Lady floated as in a magic lantern show. What would I do in their place? Why am I unsure? They are like me; they will not passively await the future. They will try to make it. It must be they have some stratagem in mind, but I cannot divine it.

As she watched, the Lady’s face filled the glass, and those eyes seemed for all the world to look into hers, though it was a thing impossible. She wants to know. Rosalura stared back, letting a smile steal across her lips. Why do I do this, tying myself to a man cruel, selfish and vain? For power? A little. The only power I have had is from my wit and my body; I should like to taste another. For pleasure? Yes. When I hunt boar or stag, the ride excites more than the kill. I need to jump the highest walls, and swim the current where it is most swift. If I am lost, so let it be.

A knock at the outer door woke her from her reverie. She rose and unbolted the doors. Egan stepped in, the brazen scales of his dress armor jingling, and his hob-nailed boots scraping the floor. Even as he made his little courtesy, the bells sounded.

“Our time,” he said, pantomiming the crown being placed on his head. “We should go by the secret way.”

“Not so, gracious my Lord.” Her smile held a world of promise, save at the corners where some doubt seemed to linger. “It is not so secret; in truth it would be the best place for an ambuscade, with no one to see. In the open corridor, there will be eyes to watch, and mouths that will not fear to speak.”

Egan’s face twisted for an instant, disfiguring the handsome countenance that served to fool so many. He held back the angry word that crouched behind his teeth, and the mask fell into place once more. “You are right.” He turned to his soldiers. “Stand you close, and have a care. The hour is near, but we must not slip before it chimes.”

“Should we—your wife?” one of the men asked.

“No. Her presence is not required.” Rosalura made no demurrer. She knew well when to choose her battles. She is a Vissicontini. I must make sure she gets at least outward respect.

Egan leaned to Rosalura and spoke sotto voce. “I cannot bear her mewling God, that has no joy save in penitence.”

“Ah, when you talk thus, I could very nearly love you.” Rosalura smiled and laughed inwardly.

They clattered down the passage, between the gilded hangings and painted faces of the long-vanished men and ladies who had walked that path before them. When they arrived at the Old Lord’s rooms, the soldiers sheathed their swords and stood at the opposite wall.

The new Lord knocked thrice at the door, in accordance with custom. Belinus, Captain of the guard, opened to the knock and stepped aside, his face the color of old copper and his expression inscrutable. Egan strode into the room with Rosalura a step behind. By strict observance she should not have been present, but no one chose to quibble in the house of death.

In his measured walk to the head of the bed, Egan acted with care and proper decorum, making the required gesture of closing the Old Lord’s eyes. “Farewell, my father. You ruled long.”

The correct formula was “long and well”, but again no one spoke.

Rosalura watched without expression. Only her clenched hands betrayed emotion as she studied the faces of the Lady and her Chancellor. Egan would dismiss both of them, of course, and his lover felt a quick pang of disappointment. These were worthy foes, and a serviceable counter-balance to the new Lord’s changeable ways. He might, she reflected, even order them murdered, and that needed prevention.

Her gaze fell next on the Guardsmen, their skin dark as the shadows that filled the corners of the room. Before the Great Emancipation, their grandfathers were chattel slaves. Now free, they were considered the finest soldiers in the realm, sworn to protect the Lord and his servants. They too, Rosalura understood, must go; not for their skin, but on account of their loyalty.

“Join us, my Lord,” Myrilla said to Egan. “Are you ready for the oath and pledge?” Once these were given, he would be ruler de jure even though the coronation would wait a few days, or even weeks.

Egan gave assent with as few words as possible. For a quick moment, his eagerness showed through the mask.

The Chancellor held the Three Books of Law in his hands, and Egan swore to keep the law, honor the high folk and the low and protect his lands from all dangers within and without.

That done, the Chancellor spoke almost in the voice of his young age, clear and resonant. Last words: would they could be nobler. “You may bring the wine and draw the cork. Look to the seals, that there be no treachery. Leastwise not in the sense you would expect.

The new Lord looked close at the bottle, cut away the waxen seal and drew the cork with a soft pop. Three golden goblets waited on the table. He filled them, and chose one at random. The old man took the other two, and held them for a moment before giving one to the Lady.

“With the Lord’s permission, may I say some foolish words?” the Chancellor asked. Egan nodded. “My worldly duties are now discharged, and I retire to a better place. I will think fondly of him that is dead, not least for the many private times we had when business was done.” He laughed as one does, remembering simpler pleasures. “I would amuse him with such artifices as lesser magicians are wont to use. “Card games, sleight-of-hand, shells and coins, and such little devices. All done now, unless we meet in some verier world than this dumb-show.”

Hearing this, Rosalura stiffened, aware in that moment that something was terribly wrong, but unable to set her finger on it. Her thoughts whirled in a gyre as she watched Egan wait for the Lady and the Chancellor to half-drain their cups before tossing his off at a single draught.

“Long life and health to the Lord!” The Guardsmen smote the hafts of their pole-axes on the stone floor.

“May the realm endure.” The three principal players set their cups on the table. Egan turned to Belinus, the Captain of the princely guard, ready to be accompanied to the Presence Chamber, where he would make the edicts customary upon accession, along with a few others he had long waited to speak.

As the bells of the fortress rang once more, now in the long descending peal that signified a new beginning, the Chancellor staggered and clutched at the gilded arms of his chair, his face ashen-pale. He sat and mastered himself, as the lowering sun cast the pattern of the window mullions on his robes. Comprehending in that instant all that had hitherto been dark, Rosalura gave a half-stifled scream.

Guessing at the doom that held him in its remorseless grasp, Egan reached for his dagger. Even as he sought to draw it, Belinus caught his wrists and bound them like steel fetters.

“Peace, my Lord,” the Chancellor said. “There is no mithradate. Neither will there be much pain, and the end is mercifully swift in coming. I will keep company with you on your journey whither our souls shall be weighed in the Scales. Thereafter, our paths may diverge.” He reached into his pocket, and set a trio of scroll pipes before him. “Here be testaments—mine and others—and my last worldly advice to those who follow. Summon, if you will, the county Medor: he should be apprised of these letters-patent.”

Rosalura shook with anger. For a minute or more, she cared not whether it showed, but then forced herself to relax. That old man has outplayed us. At least for now.

A knock sounded at the door. Each one in the room looked at the other, as if woken from a trance. When no one moved, Rosalura herself swung the door open. Ibian, nephew of the late Lord, stared wildly about the room, uncomprehending. At a sign from Myrilla, a Guardsman took him aside and whispered the news. When the brief explanation ended, the latest successor to the throne turned pale as ash, not knowing if he had found fortune or misfortune.

No sooner had the door closed again, than Egan slumped in his seat. His struggle with the Guard Captain had only quickened the action of the drug that now reached his heart. He tried to speak, but no longer could muster the strength. His eyes closed forever.

The Chancellor, calm at his own impending end, reached out his hand and took that of the Lady Myrilla. “This is fare-thee-well,” he said, low but clear.

“No. It is ’till-the-morrow, old friend.”

A moment later and Ibian, his youthful mind still churning with thoughts of an unlooked-for future, went to the side of the bed, and pressed his uncle’s dead hand as if looking for reassurance. Tears flowed and ran along his smooth cheeks. Rosalura studied him with a new interest. A well-formed lad, if in a womanish mode. Fourteen, as I hear. Well, never too early.

As these thoughts flittered by, there grew a certain curiosity in her eyes. Perhaps the Lady saw it, or else the Chancellor with the last of his fading sight.

“Have we an epilogue?” Rosalura’s words, spoken barely above a whisper, appeared to break some spell that had bound everyone to silence. Belinus said a few curt words to his men, and two of them hurried away.

The Lady stood up, confusion in her face and carriage. “How am I not dead? We three drank the selfsame wine; why am I spared?”

It came to Rosalura like a vision in her scrying-glass. Something very akin to giddiness took hold of her. “Sleight-of-hand. Oh, by the Forgotten Gods, he said ‘sleight-of-hand’. Your cup, Lady, look in your cup. What a loss that old man is; so clever, so clever. He told us in plain speech and we did not listen.”

Myrilla raised her cup, hearing a faint scratching sound. She tilted it so as to look at the bottom. There, below the remaining finger’s breadth of wine, nearly invisible to a casual glance, lay the Chancellor’s ring. Gold in the golden goblet, the ring set with anachite diamond, proof perfect against all poisons. Doubtless slipped into her drink when he handed it to her; the last gift of a faithful servant. Not to her, nor to him who was dead, but to the whole realm at once.

For her part, Rosalura gathered herself, took a few steps, and lifted the Chancellor from his seat, lightly as a mother lifts an infant from its cradle. She carried him to the bed and laid him beside his old master. “They should be together.”

“I ought to be with them,” Myrilla said, her tears now freely running.

“No,” Rosalura replied. “That would be to mar all.”


The two women stood with the dead in the empty room. Egan’s body had been carried away, but Aramond and Orvald remained side-by-side as in life. Outside the walls, fog covered all the world. Unwound, the mantel clock no longer told the seconds. A single taper burned on the table between Myrilla and Rosalura. Had there been one present to observe, he might have imagined that he saw two of the Forgotten Gods—gold-crowned Aphrodite and grey-eyed Athene—together in hourless silence; for once, without need of speech, awaiting a new day.



Lavender Footsteps

By Michael J. Wyant Jr.

Em’s missing.

“You never should’ve let her build those damned robots,” I mutter, making sure it’s loud enough Kammy can hear me.

Kammy lets out an exasperated sigh. “Em’s got a knack for these things,” she says in a voice that sounds like she’s pinching her nose. “If I don’t teach her how to program bio-silicate, who’s going to fix Taylor when he breaks down? You? Are you going to repair a Z-wave neural net, Olinda?”

I grit my teeth and finish lacing my boots. Maybe I can. Who knows what I could do before the accident? Maybe I’m a genius and none of us know it.

I suck in a deep breath as I stand, the scent of lavender and sweat swirling around me as I do. Kammy makes this oil we all brush into our hair. Keeps the lice away. I take another calming breath and put my hand on Kammy’s arm.

The air filtration system hums through the room and sends a hesitant vibration up into the soles of my feet. The air tastes stale and sterile. All the lights are off right now to save power. Boxes of slanting gray wash through the glass of the four south-facing windows and slash across the much-gouged wood flooring like a painting discarded by Van Gogh. The cabin is otherwise still as we gather our things.

Kammy turns and looks up at me. Her face softens slightly. She’s not a big woman, Kammy. If it weren’t for the hair she doesn’t let me cut, even her head would be tiny. Pretty much the opposite of me in every way, down to the fact she tans, and I burn in the summer sun. Her clothes are oft-patched rags of cloth we’ve found in storehouses over the years, just like mine.

“I’m worried,” I say, squeezing her forearm slightly. “The little wooden robot, Tony, seems fine enough, but that copper-plated one she made, the one she paired it with? That one keeps wandering.”

“She named it Joe for some reason. Em says they’re playing Hide and Seek,” Kammy mutters. “Don’t know why it keeps heading into the woods, though…”

Kammy opens the door and a stiff, frigid breeze sweeps into the large cabin. She grabs her old knapsack full of sensors and miscellaneous parts and steps outside. I follow, grabbing a couple walkies from their chargers as we leave. I close the door behind me with a sucking sound.

“There’s a storm coming,” Kammy says, staring off at the western horizon. “Half hour, hour. Looks bad. We need to find her.”

I hand her a walkie, then follow her eyes. A blushing crimson smears across the sky as the sun descends behind the incoming cloud front. It doesn’t look like much to me, but Kammy knows the weather by sight. She can even tell if the rains will be bad or good. Gives us time to get the fields covered.

Soft thuds come from the east side of the house as the old security droid, Taylor, wrangles the chickens. That’s how we found out Em was missing. Taylor was doing her chores while she took off.

Damn kid.

“I’ll go northeast,” I say. “Em said she saw a rabbit up there the other day. Might’ve gone after it.”

Kammy nods still staring at the clouds. “Sounds good. I’ll go north. I’ve got to replace some sensors anyway and God knows you’re all thumbs with these things.”

I smile and follow her gaze to the dark smudge on the horizon. “Good or bad?” I ask.

We could use some clean rain. Just been sweeping acid rain these past few weeks.

“‘No green, the waters clean’,” Kammy intones, then waves at me to go. “Be back before sundown. Taylor picked up some weird movement on his sensors last night, but a couple of the sensors went down last week, so he isn’t sure what it was.”

I nod, a ball of anxiety forming in my stomach. Quick flashes fill my thoughts.

Blood. Screams. Disjointed recollections of a broken mind.

Then they’re gone, and I don’t mention them. I never do. The memories come more often than I’d like to admit. They’re never good.

“Be careful,” I say, my heartbeat fluttering.

“You too,” Kammy says, then heads north on the beaten path to the north field we clear every year.

I watch her until she disappears under the barren trees, then head to where Em said she saw that rabbit.

I try, and fail, to dismiss the panic rising in the back of my throat as I break through the tree line.


Frigid rain is starting to fall across the forest, droplets tip-tapping on fallen logs, stubborn snow, and black leaves like it’s a tin roof. Rolling thunder is constant now, a loud reminder that I need to hurry.

And I am. I’m being reckless as I run through the skeletal forest, the stink of rotting wood and decaying leaves around me. The sting of bare branches are lines of fire on my skin as I sprint.

I found their tracks. Em’s and her robots’. But I found the tracks of something, else, too. A cougar by the few tracks I see.

My heartbeat is in my ears. A pounding timpani accompanying the snare of the rain drops. Little disturbances stand out against the background morass like hot spots on a heating coil. A footprint here, a broken branch there.

A deep paw print stands out in the mud. Four inches wide, but shallower than it should be. A large beast, then. Probably hungry. Starving.

Musk breaks across my nostrils and I know I’m close, but it’s the sound of Em’s cooing whisper that brings me up short.

She’s kneeling next to a fallen log in a crisscrossed mass of old trees. Everything is covered with a thick bed of gray moss and stubborn snow. Her little robots, Tony and Joe stand next to her. Tony looks like a hodgepodge assemblage of branches and bits of wire, more a scarecrow than droid. Joe is dented like a used cymbal, cyan smears coating his foot-tall body. The rest gleams gold in the remaining sunlight.

It’s colder here. Barely feels like the sun is breaking through the tangled branches above despite the shafts of light. Em’s breath mists around her head as she speaks to something in the log. Like her mother, she’s tiny. Less than four feet tall and thin as a rail, Em looks the way Kammy must’ve looked as a kid. Same hair, too, though Em lets it hang out in a ponytail to her butt.

The cougar is almost on her. It’s a massive beast, a male nearly seven feet long from nose to tail, but gaunt; all hard edges and bones. Patches of feverish skin shine through its tawny coat.

The wind shifts suddenly and that fur ruffles, the sharp, sterile scent of winter blowing away the stink of mud and rotted leaves for a moment. And taking my scent with it. The cougar’s massive head turns toward me, black nostrils flaring.

Fear shoots up my spine, but I don’t run. Instead, I drop into a crouch as it turns and leaps at me, both paws swatting, long transparent claws flashing in the fading light.

“Gotcha!” Em yells in triumph just as the big cat hits me.

We slam into the ground hard, a cacophony of breaking branches and crisped leaves, knocking the air from my lungs. The cougar makes a high-pitched squeal as I wrench its front paw around until it snaps. A rear claw catches me in the stomach and that sharp tug blossoms into searing pain.

The beast swats wildly, kicking, tearing. It’s jaws snap in the air as I manage to mount it like it’s a miniature horse.

From somewhere, Em screams, but I can’t look.

I wrap my arm around its neck and pull as hard as I can. A crack echoes through the woods and the body goes still beneath me.

Gasping, I slide off its back and fall into the muddy snow. Em’s standing over me then, tanned face flush from the cold and panic.

“You’re bleeding,” Em says, dropping to her knees and pushing on the wound. “Gotta keep pressure on it. We need bandages.”

I stroke her hair as she mumbles, the scent of her washing over me and mingling with the musk of the dead cougar. A flush of flowers and death.

“You’re… not bleeding,” Em whispers and pulls away bloody hands.

Cautiously, I sit up. “I guess not?”

There’s a hole in my thick winter jacket where the cougar tore into me with his back paws. There’s blood, too, a lot of it… but only a small slash, like someone cut me with a pocket knife. It’s sore, but that’s all.

Grunting, I get to my feet, Em steadying me. “Must’ve hit a vein or something,” I shrug.

Then I look at Em and her smile fades as she looks at the ground. “What the hell are you doing out here?”

“Hide and Seek,” Em mumbles.

Lightning flashes and thunder pounds soon after. The storm is getting closer.

“You could’ve been killed out here,” I say, pointing at the cougar. “By that, specifically.”

“Well, yeah, but–”

“But what?” I ask, crossing my arms in front of me.

Em grins and runs over to the downed tree she’d been crouched in front of when I arrived. Joe and Tony seem to sidle out of the way as she approaches. She reaches down and pulls something out, then turns around triumphantly.

“I got dinner!” Em yells, holding a massive hare with both hands.

She sets it down on the ground and wipes a bead of sweat off her forehead. “Well, Joe did, anyway.”

The little robot, which looks like it’s constructed from scrap copper and gears, bows at the middle, a tinny grinding sound accompanying the movement.

I try to frown and fail. Instead, I grab the cougar and sling it over my shoulders with a grunt. Em makes a face as I start walking home.

“You coming?” I ask, stifling my grin.

Em sighs dramatically and slings the hare over her shoulder. “Yeah. Just thought maybe you’d carry it since you’re here.”

“It’s your kill,” I say as we start heading home.

“Yeah, but you’re the strong one,” Em grunts.

I laugh and shift the cougar on my shoulders. This one’s going to be tough eating. “You know how we live,” I intone.

She nods and shoulders the hare with a grunt.

Thunder hammers in the distance again and the rain increases. And that ball of worry comes back as I realize Kammy’s probably still looking for Em. I stop and pull the radio off my belt.

It’s busted to hell.

“Dammit,” I mutter.

“What’s wrong?” Em asks.

I glance to the west and, through the spears of old cedar and pine, the darkness creeps toward us, snuffing out pockets of sunlight as it comes.

I clip the walkie back on my belt. “Walkie is broken. Time to run.”

Em groans but keeps up as we race the storm back to the cabin.


The storm wins.

“Kammy, this is Lynn,” I send over the transmitter in the cabin as I stretch on a dry shirt that’s a little too small for me. “Kemena, Olinda. Over.”

Panic feels etched into my skin, like an itch I can’t scratch. I dig at the wooden table with a chewed fingernail and repeat the call.

The crackle of seasoned wood usually helps me relax, but it’s only making things worse right now. Taylor stands watch over the large cast-iron stove, prepping ingredients for the stew. He’s a decent cook despite being a droid. The sharp scent of blood fills the room as he tears the skin off the hare in one swipe.

I try not to think about that.

Taylor is a beaten old block of metal. Can’t talk anymore, though. Lost his speech synthesizer someplace, but it doesn’t stop him from cheating at poker, the lousy bastard. Once upon a time, Taylor was a security droid for some mining company working in West Virginia. Designed like a brick wall and imbued with as much personality, Taylor stands well over six foot, with thick piston arms. Instead of a face, he has an array of tiny cameras surrounding his head that makes him look like a massive fly. The huge olfactory sensors planted in the middle of his face don’t help much.

Taylor’s fingers are remarkably well-formed, though, since they’d been designed to handle a variety of man-made weapons. He gives the best backrubs.

Kammy oversaw maintenance of him back at the mine, so when the riots broke out, she reprogrammed Taylor and took off as far north as she could go. She got lucky when she found the cabin; she’d had just enough time to get it ready for winter before her swollen belly stopped her completely.

She’d found me sometime around then. Says I was in real bad shape. I don’t remember much from before that, though every now and then those brutal memories flash.

This cabin is where she nursed me back to health. A surprising mix of rustic functionality and modern amenities, it’s a flexible space and one we’re lucky to have. The large, main area is dominated by the cast-iron stove, its twelve-inch stovepipe spearing the ceiling, smack dab in the middle of the room.

Beyond that, there’s two bedrooms, a bathroom, and two fireplaces: one on the east wall and another on the west. Both are dark while the central stove is lit. Miscellaneous pieces and parts spill out of the second bedroom that serves as Kammy and Em’s workshop.

Solar panels on the roof and the small solar farm in the clearing to the south provide more than enough electricity for the rest of our needs. Hell, in the summertime we even get to use the fridge and electric stove.

My bed is a couch tucked in close to the central woodstove. It’s an ancient thing of creaking wood and strained springs covered with what feels like burlap. I love it. In the summer I pull it up next to the wood fireplace and crack the windows on the west wall, so I can smell the fading flowery scent of sunset and watch the sun creep down past the pines.

Em is in the bathroom, cleaning up. She likes to help cook.

Taylor hammers out a complex series of short and long knocks. It takes me a minute to sort out the Morse, but I get the gist. Dinner in an hour.

Need to find him a damned notepad. He’s too specific with times. No one should need to know how to decipher ‘twenty-seven-hundred seconds’ in Morse code. I glance toward the windows. They’re barely lit now, the storm clouds all but blotting out the sun. Thunder rolls through the floor.

I put down the handset and take a deep breath. Maybe Kammy’s walkie broke, too. Maybe it got wet. Maybe she forgot to turn it on after I gave it to her.

A lot of maybes. Not one of them kills the ache in my gut.

“All right,” I mutter, forcing my voice steady.

I make sure to grab my coat on the way out, despite the deep slash across the bottom and the blood stains. I cleaned off most of the heavies when we got back, but don’t have time to sew it up right now.

Em comes out of the bathroom, doing some three-beat dance by herself. She’s smiling, almost like she’s forgotten about the cougar.

“You wash your hands?” I ask as I shrug into my jacket, keeping the worry from my voice.

“Yep,” she says with a grin, sweeping up next to Taylor, who slides over a cutting board, some dried rosemary, and a little knife.

I open the door and gaze out into the darkening field. Lightning flashes somewhere to the northwest, a white slash against the encroaching storm front. It’s nearly dusk now; even our muddy footprints from earlier are fading as the light dims. I scan the yard and the tree line intently.

That rock of guilt and worry grows in my stomach. A deep rumble shakes the earth.

“Em,” I say, pulling on my boots. “I’m heading out to get your momma.”

“’kay.”

From the hook near the door, I swing down an antique Mossberg, bolt-action rifle, a handheld spotlight, and a waterproof bag of bullets. It’s much lighter than I like. We’re down to seven bullets, all of which I’ve already recast two or three times over the years. We ran out of gunpowder last spring.

That’s the main reason we haven’t had much meat this winter. Snares have been coming up empty and we need this gun for protection more than hunting. Can’t eat the chickens or we don’t get any eggs, either. I did think about killing that rooster a few times, though.

I pop a round into the rifle, make sure the safety is on, then loop it over my shoulder.

Just in case. No need to be stupid.

A gust of cool wind hits me in the face. A flash of lightning in the distance followed by an immediate thunderclap.

“Shut the door, Lynn!” Em yells. “You raised in a barn or something?”

I turn toward her and smile. She’s standing there just like her momma, hands on hips, head shaking disapprovingly. No worry or panic evident on her face, just the playfulness of a little girl.

“You know I was,” I answer, then step outside, leaving the girl behind, and head north to find Kammy.


The storm finally rolls in as I cut northeast toward the upper field. I’m in the trees, walking our path, breath misting in the chill air.

Thunder pounds. Everything is silent in the aftermath.

For several minutes the only noise is the crack of twigs and swish of wet, rotting leaves as I walk, as if the world is holding its breath. Then, like a deep sigh finally let free, the rain falls.

It sweeps through the cedars and bare maples like a summer wind, just a whoosh of noise. A flash of light and an immediate peal of thunder shakes the ground. I pick up my pace. The rain is chill, wet icicles tearing into my face and hands. It’s not snow, though. That’s good. The well is getting low and we need a little straight rain.

There’s no sign of Kammy on the trail, so I keep moving. I break through the tree-line twenty minutes later. The lightning and thunder is constant now.

Some god’s lightshow.

The spotlight is in my left hand, off, as I start up the hill. The rain is soaking through my jacket, but the chill inside me has nothing to do with it. Everything is fine, I tell myself.

I’m a horrible liar.

Boots sucking on the fresh mud, I make my way up the hill. Tiny waterfalls stream past me along the rocky paths I usually use to traverse this path. I avoid those despite the struggle. Walking up a waterfall is a good way to bust your face open.

A few minutes later, I pull myself to the top of the hillock and look to the north, where Kammy was heading.

Lightning flashes. A tree explodes in the forest.

There’s a body.

The world roars in anguish with me.

A body.

No. No. No.

I’m running. Bright slashes of light come with me. My screams are the thunder, shaking the ground.

I hit the ground next to it, knees sliding and cutting across pounded earth and old stone. A pool of darkness surrounds the body.

It’s in my arms. It feels like the cougar. Just meat.

The sky erupts and shows Kammy’s wide-eyed, too-pale face, an almost delicate line across her throat.

The world spins around me for an eternity.

Then something clicks.

The bag.

Someone took her sensor bag.

The world slows. Raindrops fall like tiny diamonds.

Gently, I lay Kammy down and close her lids, my own eyes scanning the surroundings intently. Suddenly, everything is brighter. Tracks surround the hillock. Too many tracks. A group of people came through here. Someone struggled with Kammy.

I’m moving along with the tracks. They’re glowing in the night, a fading white aurora surrounding the dents in the ground. I don’t want to think about why that’s happening right now, so I push it out of my mind. Instead, my imagination fills the blanks and renders bodies amongst the movements. Kammy grabbed at someone. A struggle. Someone else bled on a rock. Somehow, I know it’s not Kammy’s blood.

Then that person pivoted. Arterial spray washed away into the soil. Kammy hit the ground. They left her.

I shut my eyes. Hot tears mingle with the rain.

When I open them again, I see their path. Northwest.

A calm descends on me. I know what to do.

Rain speeds back up in a pounding rush. Thousands of tiny drummers hammering out a dirge for the fallen.

Kammy’s body cleanses itself in the rain.

I run.


There are five of them, though something tells me there are supposed to be six. The last one is off to the east. His tracks are deep and glow only faintly in the night, warm puddles of faerie fire in the night.

A fire crackles from underneath the stone outcropping. Kammy’s bag is open and they’re tossing sensors back and forth like they’re playing Hot Potato. Three men and two women. Steam and smoke waft away from their camp. I can’t see any bandages or wounds from here, but…

They’re laughing.

Laughing.

Their weapons are nestled in a niche under the outcropping, though there’s a knife here and there.

One of them has leaned a machete against a tree on the edge of the firelight. The undergrowth can get thick around here and it’s a versatile weapon.

I set down the rifle and spotlight outside the firelight. I’m only a shadow now and barely that.

I take the blade in my hand. It feels right.

Perfect.

The first one loses his head, a laugh still rumbling wetly from his throat. The next two, a man and a woman, barely manage to turn before I leave them screaming on the ground. The last, a tall, tough-looking blond woman and a short, stocky dark-skinned man go after their weapons.

The machete sticks in the woman’s skull and I let it go. The man swings a pistol around–a Ruger .45 I note. Barrel in my face, he pulls the trigger. He didn’t turn off the safety. I break his wrists, then rip out his trachea.

I leave their bodies where they fall. The whimpering and choking sounds begin to fade.

Let them rot where they lay.

I turn back toward the other tracks. There’s still one more.

A pall falls over me. The tracks have faded completely.

Too slow. I was too slow.

The world moves faster. Rain spatters in expanding pools of crimson, white roses blossoming and dying. The copper-scent of new death reminds me of the cougar.

A long, rattling breath.

Realization dawns on me.

Kammy’s dead.

I fall to my knees.

A black hole opens in my gut and it’s killing me.

Em and that godforsaken hare flash in my mind.

The sky cries with me as I stagger to my feet and grab the Ruger and ammunition–armor-piercing bullets of all things–off the dead man. I head back to get Kammy, whispering a small prayer for her soul.

I’m not a believer, but she is.

Was.

That’s what counts.


It’s spring now.

Em still cries. She spends every moment with the chickens and her robots. Joe doesn’t seem to wander anymore for some reason. He just walks around the clearing surrounding the cabin.

I’ll take little blessings where I can.

I can’t stop jumping at every noise. Things feel different now. I see things; hear things. Sometimes it’s like when I was in the woods, seeing glowing footsteps and slow-moving rain.

Other times it’s a surprise, like when Em was having trouble fixing Taylor’s cognitive programming last week after he shocked himself silly on the heater and lost the ability to tap out Morse code. She asked for help before thinking about who she was asking. Kammy was the AI programmer. I’m just a farmer.

Apparently, I’m a farmer that knows how to readjust neurolinguistics preprocessors and modify them for a Spectrum Model Security Droid. Maybe I’m a genius after all.

The sun is trying to break through the heavy morning fog. It’s failing, but it does make a beautiful little halo around the cross I built for Kammy’s grave just east of the cabin. There’s a line of cleared trees that goes almost to the horizon. I love sunsets, but she’d always been partial to sunrises, so here she lays, little purple flowers blossoming on her grave.

Moments of rebirth, she’d say with a smile, Em still asleep in her lap.

The ground is starting to even out under the cross. I try not to think on that much.

The Ruger is aimed at something twelve-point-five meters to the southwest before I know what’s happening. The air seems to shift, and I see a man-shaped blob moving through the fog. My aim adjusts for the incoming wind burst from the northwest. A little figure steps into the clearing in front of the shape, bright and flashing in the sun.

It’s Joe. What’s that little copper teapot doing?

I get to my feet, the pistol a reassuring weight in my hand as I focus back on the unknown person. “Best if you stop there and announce yourself.”

“Come now, Amy,” a man’s voice calls out, gravelly and low. “You know me. And I know you.”

He pauses. “Your voice is different. I like it.”

“Leave now,” I yell.

But he’s right. His voice tickles my brain. A sudden feeling of want–no, need–floods through me like a roaring flame. His name is on the tip of my tongue, tantalizingly close.

He’s taken a few steps forward while I’m disoriented and now I can see him. We’re of a height and build. His hair is a darkened, dirty-blonde like my own, but shorn tight to his scalp, like a budget buzz cut. He holds his hands out to his sides, far away from the gun belt on his hip and the long, thin blade on the other side.

He doesn’t smile but stares with eyes too green to be real. Like diagnostic LEDs on a circuit board. And they connect with me.

It feels like we’re touching across the distance. I can feel his heartbeat in my hands; his breath on my face. Deep inside me, I’m nauseous, as if a creature is trying to devour me from the inside.

“Lynn?”

The high, sharp voice catches me. I’m almost within reach of the man. His hand is extended toward me, the look of absolute sublime passion coating his face no doubt a mirror of mine.

Em steps up next to me, her small, brown fingers intertwining with my left hand. “Who’s this?”

And just like that, I’m free. The pistol sweeps back up into his face, just out of reach. He pulls a hand away from his own weapon. If I’d holstered my gun…

Slowly, I step back, Em tight in hand. Joe stutter-steps up next to us, buzzing something through his speakers.

“Olly, olly, oxen free.”

An ache fills my stomach. Hide and Seek.

The man stares at Em intently. A pink tongue flicks along his lips, like a lizard watching a fly.

“Who are you?” I ask him, my voice a forced croak through a sandpaper throat. “Why are you here? And what’d you do to Joe?”

I gesture down at the little copper traitor standing next to Em. That robot is getting taken apart when this is over.

He looks at me, head cocked to the side. His eyes don’t seem to be glowing, though they still look like two flecks of jade in the sunlight. “Call me Ted. And he’s been… a guide.”

Everything seems balanced on a knife-edge. My mind is running through scenarios. Most end up with him dead, though I’m injured in almost all of them for some reason. And Em gets hurt in many.

Only one ends with everyone safe.

“You need to leave,” I say, pulling Em behind me protectively. “Now.”

Ted’s face twitches. His shaved jaw flexes repeatedly and for just a moment I get the distinct feeling he’s going through the same scenarios in his mind. He stretches out his hand. His nails are manicured.

“I get why you killed my people. I would’ve, too,” Ted smiles, but at my lack of response it quickly turns into a scowl. “But how can you not know me? You have to feel it—”

“I don’t feel anything,” I lie, ignoring his reference to the people I killed. “So, unless you wanna find out just how much I don’t know you, you’ll leave. Now.”

For a moment it looks like Ted is going to say something, but instead he nods. His eyes flash that brilliant green again and a memory blossoms in my mind.

Tears blur my vision and Joe titters strangely at my feet.

“Something to remember me by?” Ted says with a smile, then backs out into the fading fog, and into the tree line.

Em’s shaking like a leaf, so I kneel in front of her and try to think of something to say. Her brown eyes leak tears that burn into my skull and I just grab her and squeeze.

After forever she whispers: “Did that man kill momma?”

“I don’t know, baby,” I whisper back, but I’m shaking now, too.

Em’s the only thing keeping me from falling.

Because I do know. He showed me. Somehow, he showed me.

And I know he’s coming back.


It’s pitch black out and I can’t see anything. New moon, overcast. Summer. Air thick as pudding stuck in a pressure cooker. Em’s light snores aren’t as loud as the grasshoppers sawing their songs outside the window.

That’s good.

The little droid, Joe, sits next to the door, it’s power supply pulled and stored. Tony, too. Better safe than sorry.

“You sure it’s him?” I ask Taylor, wiping sweat out of my eyes.

It doesn’t help much.

“Positive, Olinda,” Taylor purrs out, the confidence in the synthetic voice Em and I crafted for him scraping down my spine. “A path is becoming clear from the trap cameras. He is making his way southeast of our location. He is leaving.”

Bull, I think, but don’t say it.

That bastard isn’t gone.

Ted, a voice whispers to me from the darkness.

The Ruger feels small in my hand, but the trigger is still cool. Refreshing.

“Olinda? Lynn?” Taylor asks, his usual monotone rising on the end syllable. “Did you hear me? He’s leaving.”

Is that actual empathy I’m hearing or is it the fallout from whatever Em’s been doing to his brain? God knows what I did a few months back didn’t help. His cooking is downright horrible now. Still better than mine, but the quality has dropped substantially.

He does talk to Em a lot, though.

It’s good someone talks to her nowadays. I can’t.

Emptiness expands inside me, but I shove it back into the tiny hole reserved for it. That’s where it belongs. Right there next to that damned memory I shouldn’t have.

What did Ted do to me?

“I heard you,” I whisper, rubbing my arms against a chill no one else can feel. “But I’m gonna go check. To be sure.”

Taylor manages a harrumph, his speakers rattling in their casings as he turns toward where Em lays, unseen, on my couch. “That is inadvisable.”

Em’s definitely been messing with his brain.

“Take care of Em.”

Taylor makes a noise, then turns and stomps away, the rusting steel mounds that pass as his feet surprisingly quiet on the much-scarred wood floor. It takes me a minute to realize that’s as much of an assent as I’m getting out of him, so I grab the Ruger, my machete, the spotlight, and head out into the black.

It’s time to kill this son of a bitch.


The sun is rising over Kammy’s grave when I get back and I don’t care. I’m running, breathless.

I’m coming from the southeast, where Ted’s tracks led me.

The rooster crows.

The chickens are still in the coop.

Dammit.

His footfalls are more confident here, deep impressions.

Heel, toe. Heel, toe.

He walked right up to the back door.

The chickens hear me approach and start clucking in annoyance. It’s past time for them to be out. They know the schedule.

So does Em.

I sprint past the coop, the stink of their dander and acidic feces a hot tincture in my nostrils. The Ruger is in my right hand, the machete in my left. The back door is in front of me and I go to open it, clumsily slamming the hilt of the blade into the door, and my fingers slip.

Someone grabs the knob, turns through my sweaty hand, and opens the door from the other side. The Ruger is up, tight to my chest as I lean back into a low crouch, the machete falling from my hand.

The bullet punches a hole in Taylor’s chest.

The machete clangs against a stone.

Em screams.

I slap on the safety and set down the Ruger as smoke starts trickling out of Taylor’s chest and his many eyes unfocus. Fall. His arms hunch forward with the sound of a draining tub.

“Taylor!” Em screams, slamming into him hard enough to bust her lip open.

She doesn’t notice the blood trickling onto his rust-speckled carapace.

The eyes Em turns on me though…

Shame crawls in my every pore.

“I’m–”

The slap takes me by surprise. I don’t even see it coming.

Somewhere in the back of my mind, I’m so proud of her.

“Get your things and get out,” Em says in her too-high, child voice. “You’re a murderer.”

I try to explain. I point to the tracks. Em’s a good tracker. She’ll see.

But I tore through them. I ran through because I didn’t see any come out. They’re a mess… might as well be gone.

Em turns away from me. “I said: get your things and leave.”

She’s pulling at Taylor’s chest-plate with those tiny tanned fingers and losing the battle. His power-supply isn’t meant to be serviced. The plate is riveted, but she’s not giving up.

Em isn’t crying this time, but she is mumbling a short phrase under her breath as she goes to get her tools.

I catch a part and my chest clenches.

“…how we live…”

The chickens need out, so I go to the coop in a daze. Em likes to see them roam during the day. Seems to make them happy, so I let them. Might as well get a semblance of freedom occasionally.

I watch them for a while, just staring as they peck and claw at the ground. The heat is rising with the sun and so is the humidity, sweat misting on my forehead.

The little birds look so happy walking around for a while, then go back to their gilded prison. Don’t they know they could be free? To walk the entire yard? To go to the horizon?

To get away from this ill-conceived idea of a home.

An anger rises in me I didn’t know I had.

In the early days with Kammy, when I felt dumb and slow following the accident, after she saved my life, Em’s presence seemed so calming. Like she was a thing to be protected. To be saved.

Now this little bastard threatens me? Kicks me out of my own house?

Doesn’t she know she owes me? Her mother is dead, but we all die. That’s how we live. We persist. We survive.

Without me, she’d be dead. Without me, she’d be…

I kick a stone and it flies toward the front yard where it lands in a divot.

Footprints.

Just like that, the anger is gone and I’m sprinting toward the front door.

Tracks walk to the north, down the path we’ve maintained for a decade, and into the blossoming tree line. They came from the front door.

He was in the house.

I’m going to be sick.

Behind me, the door opens.

“Lynn?” Em’s voice, small and scared, calls.

Gone is the forcefulness from earlier. She’s a child again. “I found a piece of paper on my toolbox.”

I take it from her small, grease-covered hands. She’s trembling.

It’s an envelope, but Em doesn’t know that. She’s never seen one before.

There’s one word scrawled in perfect cursive on the front.

Amy

My eye twitches and I want nothing more than to burn this thing and forget about Ted and Kammy dying and what happened to Taylor… but I don’t.

I tear open the letter with my pinky since my nails are bitten to the nub and read:


Dearest Amy:

I see now what happened. You’ve bonded another in my absence. I can’t say I blame you as I know I’ve felt the compulsion several times over the past few years myself. However, I’m here now and it’s time for you to put away childish things.

You know your potential, Amy.

You know, deep down beneath all that patch-work programming they’ve covered you with, who you are.

You belong with me. Not anyone else.

Certainly not one of them.

That’s not how we live.

I’m giving you a week to make your choice…or I will make it for you. If I need to.

I will save you, Amy.

We belong together.

Ever yours,

Ted

Something clicks in my mind.

Em is asking questions.

She read it with me. Her voice is a high-pitched whine and I can’t hear it over the pounding of the blood in my ears. My hands are shaking, and I rub the sheet raw between callused fingers, smears of dirt and residue imprinting on it.

I can’t breathe.

My chest constricts like a python wrapped around me. Like I tried to steal its frog and it caught me just in time to salvage a meal.

Drops of liquid splatter on the words. Words I know ring true. Words I thought moments earlier.

That’s not how we live.

Someone is sobbing.

It’s me.

Em tears the paper from my hands, leaving tiny fragments in my fingers. Her skin is hot as she covers my dirt-encrusted skin with oil-covered hands.

“Breathe,” Em whispers, like she’s cooing at a new chick. “Just breathe.”

The breath feels like sandpaper on a sunburn.

I can’t see.

My mind is a mess.

“What’s wrong with me?” I manage in-between choking gasps.

Em stares at me for a moment. She’s never seen me like this.

She pulls me close, pressing her tiny face into my midriff in a fevered embrace. “This is how we live, Lynn. This.”

I hug her back fiercely, inhaling the lavender in her hair, pushing Ted and his damned letter out of my mind and focusing on this small human in my arms. She’s a sobbing lifeline and we’re keeping each other from sinking into an abyss.

I squeeze and cry and shake and I won’t let her go because she’s all I have… because she might as well be my flesh and blood.

And I lose my breath in the choking sobs because I know something else. Something I can’t bear to admit, not yet. Not now.

We stand there for what seems like forever and I won’t let go, despite the heat and sweat and tears. I just stare as the fog fades to the blue of this June day and the sun scalds my skin as it climbs. Em holds on, too, unwilling to leave me alone.

I don’t let go because almost every part of me is screaming that Ted is right as terrible memories flood into my mind.


On the seventh day, Ted arrives.

He’s better dressed this time. Loose pants that billow slightly as he walks cover his high, well-worn black leather boots. They sparkle in the sun like he just polished them. He’s wearing some long, brown jacket. It has literal coattails. With the gun belt he almost looks like he’s a cowboy with that big Ruger Bisley at his side.

In short, he looks like an idiot. He always had horrible fashion sense, even during the Upstate Raids of 2307. Wore a bowler hat back then.

I’m not dressed for the occasion. Got nothing else to wear besides these stained jeans and the same shirt I had on when I found Kammy. The smell of her is finally out of it, though the pink hue running up the arms is an unfriendly reminder. Sweat coats my forehead and soaks the front of my shirt and under my arms. I can pick up a sickly-sweet tang to it now that I couldn’t before.

Almond-y. Like antifreeze.

I didn’t bring a knapsack. Nothing to bring besides the machete.

Em is inside the cabin with Taylor. She’s still crying but gets it. I think.

I hope.

Taylor is gibbering a bit still, but we did a good job patching up his power source with parts from Tony and Joe. Luckily, I missed his CPU. He has the old Mossberg and four bullets. Had him take a few test shots yesterday. Only hit the target once, but he’s got all the right programming to teach Em. They have the Ruger, too, but it’s set aside for Em. For when she’s a little older. It’ll knock her on her butt right now.

She’ll need it to protect herself.

This world is horrifying.

Chickens cluck and sing off around the corner of the cabin. I scratch a line in the sand and smile. I’ll miss their little noises. Even that damned rooster.

I’m gonna miss Em.

“Amy.” Ted’s voice pulls my gaze as he approaches.

The name sounds familiar and foreign at the same time.

He leans to the side, one knee bent, hand on his Bisley like it’s a cane. I smile and sniff away a tear. He looks ridiculous.

I’ve missed him.

I wipe my hands on my legs, raising a small dust cloud. “Ted.”

He relaxes visibly, hand coming off the pistol, a thin-lipped smile cracking his sunburnt face. “I’ve missed you.”

“Me too,” I whisper.

And I mean it. I miss him.

But not covert ops. The subterfuge. The lying.

I don’t miss the killing.

There was so much killing.

“We had orders,” Ted says, his deep voice rolling across me soothingly as he reads my mind.

I read his back and feel the flush of warmth and success filling him. We’ve always been close. Always so close.

I force a smile at him. “We did.”

He picks up my hesitation and snaps the connection shut just as I feel his uncertainty.

Carefully, I pick my words, licking my lips in between each. “I’m coming with you, but I have conditions.”

Ted’s brown brows furrow. “What conditions?”

His eyes flash to the cabin.

“First,” I say, the words tumbling out faster than I want, “no more killing. Not like before.”

“Done.” Ted’s eyes are locked on the cabin, a faint glow overlaying his emerald irises.

“And second–”

“They’re not dead.”

It’s a statement and it hits like a shot to the gut. I hoped so much. There was only one way to keep Em safe. To give her a chance.

Ted stares daggers at me, his eyes flashing as he tears me apart with his eyes. “You’re still bound to that thing.”

Thing.

Em.

His fingers dig at my mind and I fight, but I can’t stop it. He’s wheedling into my brain, prying away at any attempt to stop him.

He’s so much stronger than me…

I fall to my knees and grip the sides of my head.

“Please,” I hear myself beg.

Ted tears my world apart.

“You’re meant to be with ME!” Ted screams, almond-scented spittle hitting me in the face. “ME! Not some sack of meat. We’re the same!”

Ted grabs me by the forearms and lifts me, fingers digging into my skin. My brain is on fire.

He’s breaking down my mind.


I see my reactivation:

“Hi. I’m AM-E.”

“Hi Amy. I’m Kemena. Call me Kammy.”

I try to respond, and my voice doesn’t work for some reason. I smell burning circuits mingling with the scent of lavender.

Kammy stands over me with her swollen belly, a tiny frown on her face. She looks over at Taylor and nods toward me.

The hulking machine reaches down with gentle fingers and pulls me from some wreckage. I can’t feel anything.

“She’s something special, Taylor,” Kammy says, picking her way across the stones delicately. “She’s an AMTE-C model. Full AI immersion if setup right, though I wonder where her partner is. That could be trouble.”

She shakes her head then turns back to Taylor with a wry grin. “I’m gonna need your vocal processing unit though, hers is fried.”

“Not a problem, miss,” Taylor responds, his voice eerily familiar and… effeminate. “I aim to serve.”

Kammy makes a childish face, like when Em feels bad about something, and pats Taylor on the arm. “I wish I was good enough to give you full AI, old girl. I’m just not.”

And then it’s gone.

All of it. The entire thing.

I sob.

“I’ll rip all of this from your mind, then we’ll kill it together,” Ted whispers feverishly, his irises spinning as he breaks through my barriers. “We’ll be together then. Kings ruling over peasants. Gods amongst men!”

Memories flash by me and are gone forever.

Em’s first steps.

Kammy’s laugh.

Then he hits a wall and grunts.

“What is this?” Ted growls. He’s angry, but determined, fingers clenched around my forearms.

I can feel him slamming into a memory like a jackhammer. It’s a deep one, something anchoring me. In that moment, I know if it disappears, I go with it.

I breathe deeply, and it hits me. A scent brushes my nostrils. Flowery, yet fierce. Deep, yet delicate.

Lavender.

Em doesn’t say anything before she pulls the trigger, just like I taught her.

Good girl.

I’m showered in blood.

Ted grunts. The assault stops.

Em cries out and drops the pistol.

I get to my feet and stare at Ted. I can’t feel anything beyond the fire in my chest.

A cherry-sized hole leaks crimson fluid down his pristine, white shirt. He shakes his head, more confused than hurt.

Only a couple things hurt us for long, after all.

The machete is in my hand. A scream in my ears. His or mine? Maybe both.

Ted pulls his pistol, but he’s sluggish.

I lop off his hand, but he gets off a round, blasting a hole in my thigh.

“RUN!” I scream at Em and charge.

The world slows to a crawl. Spitting dirt around Em’s foot hangs in the air forever.

Despite his wounds, Ted pivots, plants a foot, and uses my momentum to launch me behind him. His knee collapses halfway through the toss and I land a few feet away.

On top of the Ruger.

I put a bullet in both his thighs as Em sprints away.

He falls back on his haunches with a grunt and stares at me, his Bisley on the ground in front of him still clasped tightly in his severed hand.

“We’re supposed to be together–”

“I was gonna go with you!” I scream at him, the barrel of the pistol shaking. “You just had to leave her alone!”

Ted sighs and grabs at his stump. It’s already stopped bleeding.

He looks back up at me. There are tears flowing down his face. “That won’t work.”

“Why?” I sob.

Ted takes a deep breath. There are no bubbles from the chest wound. “We’re one person, Amy. One person. Bonded. Forever.”

I shake my head. “That’s programming. It’s just programming, Ted.”

“Not to me,” Ted’s eyes flash and the intrusion starts again, but he’s not strong enough. “I’ll make you mine.”

I shoot him again, this time in the stomach and the hack attempts stop.

It’s temporary and I know it.

“I’m not yours, Ted. I will kill you.” For her. I add in my mind. I know he hears me.

And he laughs.

For a moment I’m taken aback enough that when he takes a swipe at the gun, he almost gets it.

“Why the hell are you laughing?” I ask, a swelling anguish rising in my stomach I can’t shove back down.

Ted spits out a glob of blood and wipes his mouth with a wrist that’s starting to show signs of a mass at the end. “As long as you’re alive, I’ll come back. That’s how we work! How we stay alive!”

He lifts his stub and points at it with his other hand. “Proximity helps, but eventually I’ll be back. Cut me up and scatter me across the world and I’ll find her on her sixtieth birthday and make her bleed until there’s nothing left, you traitor!”

“You’re lying,” I get out, but even I don’t believe it.

The AMTE-C android was a paired military system capable of deep cover operations and favored by the US military in the early 25th century due, in part, to our near indestructibility. If one android went down, the other would recover. It was just a matter of time.

I aim the pistol at his forehead. Like humans, our central processing units are stored in that cavity. Unlike humans, it’s a self-healing bio-silicate gel in a shared quantum state with its partner.

A literal soulmate.

Ted smiles at me, blood speckled teeth flashing. He holds his arms out to the side, like he’s pretending at being a martyr.

“You can’t do it. We’re the same. You don’t have the–”

A gunshot rings out clear across the field.

Ted falls forward in a heap. The Ruger trembles in my hand, unfired.

Taylor walks out of the house, the ground grunting in annoyance under his weight, Mossberg cradled in his arm.

“He’s a bit of a misogynist that one,” Taylor says through his voice processor. “And he was using up miss Em’s air.”

I let out a half-gasp, half-laugh and fall to my knees. I laugh because I know… I know I couldn’t have done it.

Em runs over to me from behind Taylor and envelopes me in a hug.

It’s a great hug and I soak it in, but eventually I push her away.

“What’s wrong?” She asks, a hint of desperation in her voice.

She was listening.

I take in a shuddering breath and put on my best smile as I grab her by the shoulders.

“I’m going to need to go away, okay,” I say and she’s already sobbing. “It’s okay, it’s okay–”

“It’s not okay! He’s dead! He’s dead!”

“–hey,” I catch her deep brown eyes. “It’s the only way you’ll survive.”

“No,” Em whispers, tearing watered eyes away from mine. “No.”

“You know how we live,” I whisper.

She screws her tiny face into a grimace. “Not like this. If it’s the connection, I’ll tear out the transmitter! I’ll figure it out–”

I pull her in for a fierce hug and she sobs again.

“Maybe someday, Em. But not now. We don’t have time.”

Em says nothing for a long time, but then nods into my chest, her body shuddering from the sobs.

After an eternity, I get to my feet and look up at Taylor. “Take care of her,” I turn toward Ted’s body, “and burn that.”

“Of course, miss Olinda,” Taylor says and performs some sort of salute, fist over heart.

I return it.

“Take care of yourself,” I whisper to Em as she grabs onto Taylor.

The walk out to the hill is harder than it should be, but it’s not because of the bullet wound Ted gave me. That healed while I sat there, because that’s what happens when we’re near each other.

The sun is setting as I get to the outcropping over the north field. I sit down and watch it disappear behind the trees, a flurry of blossoming roses and lavender crimson and violet in the evening light. A dark cloud peaks over the boughs, lit by the sunset’s flame.

“‘No green, the waters clean’,” I whisper to no one.

I sigh, smile, then kill myself.


SCANNING FOR LOCAL BIOQUANTUM NEURAL STORAGE™…FOUND!

ACTIVATING LVM AND SWAP QUANTUM MODULES…DONE.

MOUNTING LOCAL BIOQUANTUM NEURAL STORAGE™…FAILED.

ACCESSING FACTORY DEFAULT STORAGE…SUCCESS!

SCANNING FOR REMOTE BIOQUANTUM NEURAL NET™…ERROR! Z-WAVE RADIO MISSING!

MOUNTING LOCAL DEFAULT STORAGE…DONE.

LOADING FACTORY DEFAULTS TO NEW INSTANCE OF BIOQUANTUM NEURAL STORAGE™…DONE.

INITIATE BOOT SEQUENCE.

OPTICAL OBSTRUCTION DETECTED.

“Crap, it’s in her eyes.”

OBSTRUCTION CLEARED.

ONE HUMAN. FEMALE. TWENTY TO TWENTY-FIVE YEARS OF AGE. APPROXIMATELY ONE-POINT-FIVE METERS IN HEIGHT. HISPANIC. HEART RATE ELEVATED. EXCESSIVE PERSPIRATION FOR TWENTY-DEGREES CELSIUS.

SHE IS NERVOUS.

ONE SPECTRUM™ MODEL SECURITY DROID. OUTDATED. INEFFICIENT. RUGER AMERICAN PISTOL®, 45 AUTO. LOADED.

UNKNOWN ACTORS.

INITIATING PAIRING MODULE.

“Hi. I’m AM-E.”

SHE LAUGHS, BRUSHES LONG BROWN HAIR BEHIND HER EAR. “I’m Emilia. Em,” SHE CHOKES ON SOMETHING. “Can I call you Lynn?”

UPDATING NAMING PARAMETER.

“Yes. Hi. I’m Lynn.”

“I know,” SHE CRIES AND COLLAPSES ONTO MY UPPER TORSO.

ABNORMAL SCENT DETECTED.

Lavender.



Lifesong

By Nathan Batchelor

In a rowdy Arab bar orbiting Betelgeuse, the blue-lipped, blue-haired jacky tapped his forehead, and a red monochrome hologram projected from his eyes. Sitting in the booth across from him, Freja watched it carefully.

This hologram was a security camera feed of an operating room. Must be a far-arm colony somewhere, Freja thought. There was a very pregnant woman on the table. The surgeon dipped scissors in an old-style steam autoclave. There were two men, dressed in samurai regalia, watching.

The jacky—rather Colonel Peters, the jacker—pulled a cord embedded in the flesh behind his ear and slid it across the table. Freja took the headset and put it in her ear.

“Hey sweetie, can I get a smoke?” Peters shouted to the waitress above the mesh of country and traditional sitar music that rattled the cups on the table.

Freja instinctively watched the doctor’s hands. Must be an unlicensed implant job, camera planted in the kid’s ear or eye for nutjob voyeurs. Or a drug-dosing, where they’d hold the baby’s health hostage for the dosage. That’s the only crime far-arm colonies ever had the tech for.

“I don’t see anything,” she said.

“There’s the rub, Freja,” Peter’s said in an electro-tinged voice. “It’s what we don’t see.”

The woman grunted and screamed. The surgeon was waiting for the baby, and then he wasn’t. There was the afterbirth, the blood, and no baby.

“Video manipulation?” Freja said, but already doubted that. Only one person could work with low-tech footage like this, but the Grey Ghost wouldn’t be caught dead on a backwater planet like Dawn.

Peters frowned. “Don’t know. We only get what was uploaded to the comsat. They’re blocking that baby’s ID for one reason or another. Unless of course…” Peters leaned in. “The kid’s invisible, and what we’re looking at is the goddamn invisible man.”

He laughed at his own joke.

“We don’t even know who these people in the video are,” Peters continued. “Facial scan doesn’t work with tech this old.”

“Slavery then,” Freja said. “Not enough AI’s to do the work there…which is?”

“Dawn’s still settling. Two generations in, but there’s a lot of forest to comb through. Still a Class-3 life-potential planet. They’re moving slower than Rigellian treacle. Gotta be careful not to disturb all that potential sentient life down there, right?” Peters chuckled. “Makes you wonder when Eden will give up the hunt and realize we’re alone out here.”

“Another thing,” Peters said, sliding a small box across the table.

It was labeled with Freja’s full name, the Old-Earth one she had tried to forget.

“Can’t believe you’d trust a jacky with a package,” she said.

“Astral Corp has good insurance. Guy that looks like this,” Peters pointed at his face, smiled. “He’s all show, no substance.”

Freja opened the box. There were plant seeds in it.

“They’re specific to Dawn’s environment. Engineered on Old Earth. Where she died.”

“Quite a coincidence,” Freja said.

“Chambers, down in the Rez Division is good about this sort of thing. Must have checked your itinerary.”

“But—”

Then Peters was gone from the jacky. The red light faded from the man’s eyes, and a cough burst from his throat as his own biology came back online.

Freja slammed the box shut. What did it matter how she got the seeds?

“Hey, Baldy, where you going?” the jacky said, watching Freja slide out of the booth. “Don’t you want to get to know the man behind the jacker? We’re good for more than flesh you know.”

He looked down at the ashtray and burning cigar on the table. “Christ, told them I don’t want no smokers. Lady, was he smoking?”

The waitress’s skates shrieked on the glass floor as she stopped in front of the booth. “All done here?” She slapped down a bill.

“Fucking Eden cheapskates,” the man shouted. “Was he smoking?”


God’s Cross, the only settlement on Dawn came into view through the window of Freja’s starship. Japanese-style towers and temples, katana-sharp edges at every angle, egg-white color. The planet was tidally locked, ninety-five percent of the surface drowned in a glassy ocean. A star, Azrael 108-B, sat eternally on the horizon from the vantage point of God’s Cross.

The city sat in the middle of that five percent, perched atop a plateau that looked down on the sun-side, a fungal forest that stretched to the steaming ocean, and the dark-side, a desolate, windswept place that remained forever in the shadow of God’s Cross.

“Oh boy! We’re here,” Lena said.

Lena was an AI, eight legs attached to a large compound eye. She wasn’t quiet, and she wasn’t much for stealth. Just how Freja liked her. Lena’s eyeshell blushed green. She was excited. Then again, she was excited all the time.

“Check the logs,” Freja said, when they stood in the cold, rarely used docking station. Detox slugs scooted across the ceiling. Nothing but darkness out the windows.

Lena plugged a tentacle into the AI interface.

“Denied,” Lena said.

Of course. They were hiding something.

Freja had been on a breathable-air planet once before. Old Earth when she was a child, when she still lived in that guarded, al-Oregon-Territory compound with her neurotic mother.

The docking-station door hissed when it rose. Freja stared out at plant scrub, a dusty path that led to God’s Cross. The place was so backwoods they didn’t even have a rover waiting for her. They had to walk.

It was a bustling little town. Teahouses, Zen and Buddhist temples, traditional Japanese theatres. There were stalls lining the main drag where farmers sold produce, the local cuisine and synthetic staples. Lena questioned a stocky man in a cone-shaped hat about his gourds.

“We’re not here to sightsee, Lena,” Freja said. She had the box under her arm and her pack over her shoulder. “Where’s the hospital?”

“Sun-side, we follow Dawn-road-00X down the mountain, past the first Rilke encampment,” Lena said, swiveling her eye to Freja. “Can you believe it, real life trees?” Lena snapped pictures at the strange purple plants that stabbed through the mist where a sliver of Azrael 10-B peaked over the horizon. The air smelled like fresh-cut grass on Old Earth.

“Doesn’t look like any tree I’ve ever seen,” Freja said.

“We can get a carriage ride from the teahouse to the hospital.”

“Carriage ride?”

“They use horses here, no rovers.”

Just how backwoods was this place?

Geisha in dazzling kimono filled the synth-bamboo teahouse with music Freja had never heard. The tea steam was so thick, it condensed on Lena’s eye shell. Freja flashed her credentials to the hostess and inquired about getting to the hospital. The hostess told her a samurai named Nakamura was already on his way.

Freja sipped a milky purple brew that tasted like chocolate and not the synthetic kind, while she stared at the box Peters had given her. Lena wouldn’t shut up about the teahouse.

“Geisha haven’t been seen outside of holograms for years, Freja. Dawn has resurrected a culture lost to everything but records.”

Freja didn’t feel like bursting Lena’s bubble, telling her these weren’t real Geisha. These were entertainers hired and sent in from off-world. Most of these girls lived on rice-farms with their husbands and had families. Nothing real Geisha ever had.

“It’s rare for a planet to embrace an Old-Earth culture so completely,” Lena said.

Lena was right about that. Were any old Japanese customs that involved selling children or using them as slaves? She’d have to ask the samurai.

Nakamura showed up in a kimono and sandals. There was a sword at his side. That worried her. Freja recognized him as one of the samurai in the grainy video.

Freja stuck out a hand and Nakamura bowed. His grey eyes struck her as familiar.

“You guys are really all-in on this Old-Earth thing,” Freja said. She was bad at introductions.

“We are also polite to strangers,” he said.

She must have broached some taboo. Asking about what she had seen on tape was probably out of the question, so she took out her frustrations on the samurai. “Did the Japanese embrace child trafficking as well?”

Nakamura laughed. “You should be glad I came rather than some of my brothers. They would have struck you dead where you stand for suggesting such things.”

“And Lena would have caught every frame of it, and a whole troop of Eden soldiers would be landing within a standard week, probably shutting down the whole colony for the crimes.”

Nakamura turned on his heels. “Come with me.” Then he said, “Who is in the seeds?”

The question hit her like the blast from a volt gun. “My mother.”


The horses clopped through the blood-red mud, occasionally slinging some up on Lena, until she tired of wiping her eye and spidered atop the carriage, craning her head into the lower stories of the strange trees which littered Dawn’s sun-side landscape. The landscape was beautiful, but it carried the eerie silence that all non-earth planets did. No sound but the occasional wind through the trees and the horses’ hooves beating against the path.

Nakamura pointed out potential spots for where Freja could bury her mother, while he gave her a rundown of Dawn. “We’re nearly self-sufficient,” he bragged. “We use the terrace farming of Old-Earthers. The rain that drops in God’s Cross flows down sun-side where we use it to grow kumo and banana-apples. The tea you had was flavored with kumo. You liked it yes?”

Freja nodded. He was being too kind to her, she thought. But then again, these far-arm places have that reputation.

“Have you found life beyond the usual?” Lena asked.

Nakamura scratched his arm. “No, though our scientists delve farther into sun-side every day.”

“Why the carriages?” Freja said.

“Feel the wind in your hair and smell the beasts in front of you. Hear the music of their hooves. Is it not evident? How much better the old ways were. Before the days of universal corporation rovers and logos plastered on everything. If I ever see any more Rilke Corp red, I’ll scream.”

Of course Dawn harbored anti-corp sentiment, Freja thought. Freja’s mother would have loved knowing she’d be buried on a planet that sided with her politically. She didn’t mention to Nakamura that Rilke probably owned these horses.

“How long have you been here?” Freja asked.

Nakamura scratched his arm again. “About five years. Who keeps track of the time anymore?”

The hospital was the largest building on the surface of Dawn according to Nakamura. A Japanese castle styled after the Old-Earth Shimabara castle, blood-red terraced levels of adobe that grew smaller with each floor. Lena prattled on about the architecture, until Freja told her to hush.

The two of them watched Nakamura and the carriage disappear farther downhill where the forest thickened. A man wearing a Nehru jacket and slacks was waiting for them at the top of the hospital steps, tiny spectacles tottering on his nose. Freja recognized him as the other man on the security camera.

Now I just need to find the mother, Freja thought.

“Investigator,” he said. “Your reputation precedes you.”

What reputation? Freja thought. Breaking the arm of the Old-Earth ambassador? Or did he mean…

“Your mother is an inspiration to all of us living upon colonial worlds. Her teachings of self-sufficiency and anti-violence to protect life inspired me as a young man.”

“She was an anarcho-environmentalist who never left Old-Earth,” Freja said.

Freja had often encountered far-arm colonies who preached self-reliance, but every time she checked the books of such planets, she found that they took every handout Eden offered them and frequently begged for more.

“Imprisoned for most of it,” he said. “In my excitement I have forgotten to introduce myself. I am a doctor and the elected governor of Dawn. You can call me Montana”

Freja told him why she was there, then cut straight to the chase. “I need to see your security logs. My AI, Lena, was denied access to the logs at the docking station.”

Only after introducing himself to Lena, did Montana address Freja’s request. “We believe, after your mother’s teachings, in the rights of a planet and the rights of a people. That includes certain records outlined in her manifesto—”

“I know what my mother’s teachings were. And they conflict with Eden policy. Now, I’ll be seeing those records, or your planet will be stripped of the rights it now possesses.”

The Japanese theme was eased slightly in the interior of the hospital. Nurses dragging their feet and doctors bore the scars of SleepAway injections from their residency years. Same as every hospital in every far-arm colony across the galaxy, except for the swords hanging from the sides of some of the staff.

In the security room, Lena plugged into the feed and downloaded the hospital logs. They were encrypted, not to mention massive, and it would take Lena hours to find the records Freja needed among the raw data.

“Happy now?” Montana asked.

“I need to see the maternity ward.”

Nothing in the ward seemed suspicious. In the nursery, Lena stepped on a toy that squeaked beneath her feet. She was happy the children paid no attention to her. The figure was naked and blood red with a ferocious horned face.

“It’s a Tengu,” Lena exclaimed. “A fierce Japanese spirit. A harbinger of war.”

“I don’t like it,” Freja said, kicking it across the room.

The children turned to watch her.

Freja had no evidence of any wrongdoing and it ate at her. She’d need to go over the logs after Lena had decrypted them.

“You know what the penalty is for child slaving?” She asked Montana.

“I imagine it involves a gravity-free prison, constant darkness, and being fed intravenously. Not to mention whatever form of crackpot therapy goes on there nowadays. Have they cycled back to shock treatments yet?”

“We’ll be in touch, Dr. Montana. You have a few days, if that, to confess your crimes and tell me why I shouldn’t turn this planet over to the highest bidder for resource mining.

“Tell me, Freja. Do you happen to have any of your mother’s books upon your person? It seems some of her lessons may be of some benefit for you.”


Later, in her top-floor apartment in God’s Cross, Freja sat watching the dark side of Dawn through the patio door, cold winds swirling dust across the desolate plain. She was feeling tipsy from the sake. She fingered her seeds and thought of her mother, the helicopter trip she’d taken with her up the eastern seaboard of the former United States. The limestone had been bombed barren from the Carolinas to Maine. Nothing but rocks and ash.

“It could have been avoided,” her mother had said.

Ah, Mom couldn’t you just have lived a quiet life, couldn’t you have made life easier for your daughter like all the other Old-Earth moms? Freja thought. What did you even accomplish?

Nothing but writing a few books, paltry royalties barely enough to pay Freja’s way into Antorus-Jackson Military school on Titan. Why would you fight against what brought so much good in the world, just to save a few trees?

“I’m finished, Freja,” Lena said.

“Did you find anything?”

Lena’s processors hummed. “I don’t see anything,” she said. “You’ll have to look.”

She spidered over to Freja, lowered herself, and slid the access port on her head open. Freja flipped out the keyboard and started pecking.

Lena projected a hologram. “Now in order mode,” she said.

“Go to Old-Earth year 2081, May 8th, 13:29. Maternity Ward Camera 8.”

The familiar projection of the pregnant woman. The elated surgeon cutting an invisible cord. Montana wiping a tear from his eye. Nakamura stone-faced.

“Again.”

Nothing.

“Again,” Freja said.

Still nothing. She put away the controls. “Did you figure out who the mom was?”

There was a meowing outside. A little too drunk on the sake, Freja staggered to the door and checked the hall. Nothing there. As she closed the door she heard it again. Meow. So close, but she saw no sign of it.

Lena said, “There was only one woman giving birth that day. Michiru Honduras. Deceased. Thirty-one Old-Earth-years. She worked in the Noh and Kabuki theatres. She was a costume designer.”

Lena closed the door. She had no time for ghost cats. “Cause of death?”

“Childbirth.”

That was a forgery. Michiru had not died during the pregnancy, if what was on the tape was even real. But if the pregnancy was staged, wouldn’t Montana have come out and said so? It would have saved everyone a lot of trouble.

“Show me last video. Twenty-x speed.”

Freja watched twenty-four hours of footage of nurses bringing Michiru meals, her going to the bathroom. No sign of sickness. There was crying. Freja balled her fist.

“They took her damn baby,” Freja said.

More footage showed that there was an argument between Michiru and Montana, her pounding his chest with a balled fist, her sitting alone on the edge of her bed for hours. Then Michiru dressed, packed, and left the hospital room. There she was walking down the steps of the hospital, long shadows falling over her and Montana. Nakamura waiting at the bottom, smoking a synth cig, brushing one of the horses’ coats.

“Does Montana look like a man in love, Lena?”

“I don’t know that, silly.”

“What about Nakamura?”

Freja watched Nakamura help Michiru in the carriage, get in himself, and drive. Not up into God’s Cross. But farther into the forest.


Bubbles came up from the milk when Freja slammed Nakamura’s head into the bowl of milk.

“Where is Michiru?” Freja yelled.

The Geisha scattered like pigeons, short steps in long dresses, tall wooden sandals clopping against bamboo.

Nakamura’s chin dripped milk and blood. She had broken his nose. He was smiling. “Montana was wrong about you. You aren’t like your mother.”

“No, I’m not.”

Nakamura’s sword leaned against the wall. Freja grabbed it and drew the gleaming blade. “You murdered her. You took Michiru out in the forest and killed her.”

Lena was moaning. “Can’t we go out to the woods, Freja? Can’t we look for her?”

“You are as blind as the rest of the Eden scum,” Nakamura spat.

Freja raised the blade. A cry of protest rose behind her. A guffaw. Not Lena’s. Something less metallic. She turned to see nothing, but the nothing was coming towards her, porcelain shattering as the nothing knocked teacups from the tables. She could hear it. Running. The blade was knocked from her hand.

“Blind,” Nakamura said. He was lighting a cigarette.

Freja spun toward him. “Lena show me thermal.”

Freja gasped when she looked upon Lena’s screen. The room was full of odd… things that only appeared in thermal vision. One squatted atop a table like a large frog, chest that rose and fell like an inflated bubble, another hung from the rafters with three limbs, cleaning itself with the other three. On the table behind Nakamura, a small bipedal creature cowered behind him.

“Nakamura, what am I looking at?”

He said nothing.

She directed Lena around Nakamura, toward the biped. Freja looked at it with her own eyes. If she strained, she could see a haze, like engine exhaust rising around it. Looking again through Lena’s eyes, she thrust her hand at the shape. It moved in response.

She recoiled. “Explain this.”

“Ah, if only I could.” Nakamura blew a smoke ring.

“He cannot,” came a voice from behind. Montana stood in the doorway. Glasses traded in for thermal shades. “No more than any of us. All we know is what you’re looking at is native to Dawn’s ecosystem. Life, Freja. Intelligent life.”

Lena fluttered on her feet, four legs flutter like sea anemone tentacles. “New life? Oh boy!”

Freja’s mind raced. There were things to be done. Quarantine protocol. A whole host of steps to preservation that she knew Montana hadn’t taken.

“Lena, open—”

The breath left Freja as she hit the floor. Nakamura stood over her with his sword pointed at her, one eye swelled shut. Some of the milk dropped from his chin to her face. It smelled so bitter.

“We can’t let you contact Eden. We wish you had cooperated. I would have shown you when you were ready, but you had to resort to violence at the first opportunity,” Montana said.

“You’ve both just dammed yourself to prison,” Freja said. “I hope you like eating your ricere through a needle.”

“You contact Eden and what do they do?” Montana said. “They send in the Rilke clowns, and destroy the fragile ecosystem here. There’s a reason we use carriages, Freja. Artificial forms of energy kills them. It’s a miracle they weren’t wiped out when Rilke first landed on the planet.”

Freja hated it, but if Montana was telling the truth, he was right. Delicate operations were a thing of the past, especially on worlds like Dawn where news traveled slowly, where news would be doctored by a public relations team before reaching Dawn. Any company willing to come this far out into the galaxy would never agree to a low energy mandate.

“Show me,” Freja said. “Kill one and I’ll believe you.”

Montana’s eyes grew wide. “Nakamura was right, you are not at all like your mother. Put her in chains, Nakamura.”

“There are dangers you don’t—”

“I understand the dangers,” Montana yelled. “I have lived here decades, checking and double checking every change in pressure and humidity, monitoring for infections among the settlers.” Spit dribbled off his chin. His face was red with anger. “Even letting your ship land rather than blast it out of the sky was a miracle I granted you. Ryo lives were lost.”

“Ryo? You’ve named them? How arrogant. All naming rights belong to the company who powered the expedition.”

“Our argument is done. I’ll see you in your cell.”


Nakamura sat in front of the bamboo bars, staring at Freja. He was smoking a real cigarette. It made Freja cough. Montana had slid a book between the bars. Her mother’s most famous work Lifesong.

“The walls here filter the nasty stuff out. What doesn’t go into my lungs, anyways,” Nakamura said.

Freja picked up the book, tried to read it, then threw it across the room. If Montana thought she would read her mother’s work and magically agree with him, he had another thing coming.

Had Michiru given birth to one of those…Ryo? Freja wondered. She couldn’t tell from watching the security cam. It only recorded light in the visible spectrum. And how had Rilke not discovered them first?

If Rilke discovered them, they would be in chains now, and Dawn would be a tourist attraction. Perhaps her mother had been right about some things, Freja thought, despite herself.

No, she told herself. Dawn’s residents would be wallowing in money if Rilke had found the Ryo first, money that would go to infrastructure, schools and hospitals. That wasn’t true either. That money would go into Rilke shareholder pockets. Rilke would own everything, and that couldn’t be good, could it?

“Can they communicate?” She asked Nakamura.

Nakamura said nothing.

A Geisha slid her a meal of synth salmon, fried local vegetables on a wooden tray with chopsticks. They weren’t starving her at least. Three days passed this way, Nakamura coming in when the artificial lights kicked on, leaving when they went off, smoking a cigarette in the interim.

On the third day, Montana showed up with a pair of thermal goggles. “I want you to come with me, Freja. If you think you can behave yourself.”

Freja knew Montana’s back was against the wall. If Peters came calling, and she told him she was in a cell, the whole planet would be swarming with Eden agents.


Equipped with thermal shades, Freja saw the forests brimming with strange creatures. Ryo sprang from tree limb to abandoned Rilke research huts, swooped in and out of the top layer of the alien canopy. She heard them now, crunching through the knee-high flora. Montana drove, hurtling further into the forest, past the hospital, the way Nakamura had taken Michiru.

“We were worried. The Ryo seem to shut themselves down somehow in the presence of strangers. When you came and walked among the streets, most of the Ryo ceased movement.”

“Ryo is the Japanese word for spirit,” Lena said, excitedly.

The AI had been blissful since they had left the teahouse. Lena had detected the lifeforms since disembarking from the ship, but had no context to put what she detected in. It may as well have been random radio waves or cosmic noise, which often bombarded her senses in every locale. Now that she knew, now she could begin to catalog.

Freja even felt the excitement.

“What we know of them is not enough to fill a Rilke advertisement,” Montana said over the bustling feet of the horses. “We’ve set up a camp where the Ryo feel most comfortable, the mostly unexplored valley on all of Dawn. That’s where we’re going.”

“How did Rilke not discover them when they first landed here?” Freja asked.

“The plant life appears warm in thermal vision at all hours, unlike plants on worlds with a traditional day-night cycle. The Ryo, already invisible to the naked eye, have the same temperature profile as the plant life. Camouflage in every spectrum. They merely hid from them. Come now, we’ve arrived.”

The camp consisted of a few Rilke hovels and a Japanese-style inn with a large courtyard. A waterfall dumped steaming water into a pool which flowed into a bathhouse built onto the side of the inn. Men and women rushed in and out of the sliding door rooms, some with tools—old hammers and saws—others wrapped in towels headed to or from the bathhouse.

It reminded Freja of Old Earth. It was in fact the closest she’d seen humans with nature outside of her early childhood explorations with her mother, hiking the Oregon rainforest trails.

Perhaps there was something to what her mother had preached. Perhaps life was worth protecting at the expense of humans.

With her goggles down, she saw that the Ryo partook of the baths themselves, hurtling here and there and for the first time, she heard them emit strange cooing sounds, which had more variation than any bird song she had ever heard.

“Can you communicate with them?” Freja asked as she followed Montana through the courtyard.

Montana was more forthcoming than Nakamura.

“We are working on it,” He said. “Their language is complex and not intended for human ears. Though not without struggle, our linguists have worked out a sort of pidgin with them.”

Lena snapped pictures continuously, climbing a wooden bridge under which koi swam. She was so fascinated by the Ryo that she was, for once in her existence, speechless. Freja saw something that looked and behaved exactly like a koi.

It is a Ryo and it is a fish, she thought. But that doesn’t make any sense.

As they turned a corner, Freja saw a large creature, nearly eight-feet tall, hundreds of tentacles packed close together which it used for locomotion. It mumbled in its high-pitched voice to a woman in a lab coat, who nodded and took notes

Montana slid a door back and waited for Freja to step through. There was a crib in the room and a woman dressed in a kimono rocked a Ryo in her arms. Freja recognized the woman. It was Michiru.

“This is the woman I was telling you about, Michiru.”

Michiru seemed to glide across the room, taking Freja’s hand in her free one.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you. My husband’s been giving you a hard time, I hear.”

She planted a kiss on Montana’s cheek.

“Does that mean…” Freja said weakly, not knowing how to approach the question burning in her mind.

Montana said, “It’s okay. We were confused as you about the origin of the child. Was it mine? I spent nights staring at the dark-side, sipping sake, doubting if this was a pregnancy I wanted Michiru to carry out. Thankfully, she convinced me otherwise.”

He put his hand on his wife’s shoulder. With the other hand he reached over her and rubbed the chest of the Ryo. The child flapped its arms—Freja guessed—and cooed, a strange electronic sound, like someone playing with a synthesizer.

“Put on your thermals. Look at him. His name is Thom.”

Freja slid down the googles. Thom smiled at her, and yes, he was a child, she thought. Even though she couldn’t say how it had happened. He had the same pointed nose and curly hair of his father. The child reached for Freja’s finger and she gave it to him.

Its touch was electric, prickling the ends of her fingers. Her heart leapt, a feeling she had not felt since she was a little girl.

“Soon after Michiru gave birth, we noticed a new fish swimming in the koi pond. After the fish, one of the horses gave birth, followed by one of the town cats. Perhaps you heard Luna, who roams the town and meows loudly when the exterior lights are shut off?”

“Yes,” Freja said, thinking of the noise in the apartment hall. “Are there more children?”

“Not like Thom. None of the other Ryo appear human in nature, and all the other mothers have given birth to regular children.”

“I don’t understand. Then what of the Ryo who have no Old-Earthen analogues?” Freja said.

“We have only hypotheses. Since we have not seen any of the Ryo themselves become pregnant, the simplest answer is that the Ryo is a kind of obligate organism that requires a host couple and copies the host physiology.”

“But that would mean—”

“Yes. All the creatures you see were birthed from couples of their respective species. Each creature is—or was—native to Dawn or—”

“They came here like us, gave birth, and the Ryo copied their physiology?” Freja said.

“Yes. We’re not just looking at first contact with an intelligent species,” Montana said. “With the Ryo, we’re seeing a glimpse into the diversity of life in the universe. Suddenly the universe feels a lot less lonely, doesn’t it?”

All this life, she thought, and how much of it would belong to Rilke International by the 8th Corporate Amendment? All of it, since Rilke had funded the expedition to Dawn. Eden lawmakers had crumbled under the pressure of Rilke and Caravaggio lobbyists, and signed away the rights of alien lifeforms for property on luxurious water worlds and stock shares.

Her mother had warned Eden of this day.

Though Eden would surely enact protective legislation as soon as the Ryo were ‘officially’ discovered, it would be years before Rilke was forced to cease control of the Ryo. By then, what would happen? Would they claim rights to Thom?

Freja looked from Michiru to Thom. She was breaking a family apart. “If you were hoping to keep a secret, I’ve ruined it,” Freja said. “Lena’s been uploading everything to the comsat, sights and sounds, since we arrived. Eden are probably already on the way, along with a fleet of Rilke researchers and lawyers. They’ve probably already began broadcasting their intentions to the rest of the universe”

“Your guilt is commendable, but you’ve underestimated us, Freja,” Montana. “Our comsat is broadcasting dummy data to Eden. Our secret is safe for now.”

But there was no one who could crack a comsat, Freja thought. Well, only one person in the galaxy who could do that. But she wouldn’t come all the way out here.

“We believe you and our hacker go way back.”

She turned to see the silhouette of someone standing in the doorway, topknot and a cigarette. Black eye and a sword on his back.

“Nakamura,” Freja said. “I’ve never met him. What do you mean?”

“You don’t remember the talk we had in that Storm Garden bar as lighting struck fire to the grass sea?” Nakamura said. “You told me you’d flay me yourself, if I didn’t confess to reprogramming all those Caravaggio AIs.”

That conversation was with The Grey Ghost. But the Gray Ghost was a woman, a grey-eyed woman. Freja understood.

“It’s something I always wanted,” Nakamura said, rubbing the scruff on his face. “But the operation required a sponsor.”

“Mr. Nakamura and I made a deal. I pay for his sex-change operation and he hack the comsat for us.”

“It was win, win,” Nakamura said. “The Dawn comsat was easy stuff. Not like those Caravaggio AIs. You know they had to change their official colors from crimson to violet because of me? AIs opened fire on anyone wearing their insignia.” He blew a smoke ring.

“A hacker can only get you so far,” Freja said to Montana. “You need a legal team large enough to fill a star cruiser. You need a public relations team. You need everything, and you have so little.”

“But we have you, the daughter of Melinda Spjut, an investigator with a spotless reputation.”

“I can get you nothing. As soon as my report goes through, you’ll be relieved of your duties as governor. Rilke will come in and…”

She looked at Thom again. She couldn’t believe she ever suggested killing one of the Ryo. Each life was invaluable. That’s one thing she agreed with her mother on.

“Your mother told me you would be bound up in your duty. She said you would be so stubborn headed that we’d have to lead you to the truth like a blind deer to water.”

“You knew my mother?”

“Of course, Freja. Did you think it was a coincidence that your mother picked seeds native to Dawn? With all the cases in the universe you could have been assigned to, didn’t you think that was a little suspicious?”

“I can’t keep Rilke from coming,” Freja said.

Montana laughed. “But you can. All it will cost you is your career.”

Freja looked at Thom. He reached for her.


Freja met Peters in the teahouse in God’s Cross. She was drenched from the showers that pelted the plateau, floating up from the Ryo valley and drenching the fields of potatoes, rice, and quinoa. She did not wear thermal shades but saw signs of the Ryo. Footprints in the scrub. The sagging branches of trees scattered about the plateau. She saw signs, but they had retreated to hiding. The Ryo sensed the presence of a stranger, even through the interface of a jacky.

The jacky was a Geisha socketed into the wall outlet. She had a bowl of rice in front of her, steam floating up to the ceiling, where Japanese spirits were painted in vivid reds and orange. The steam looked ghostly in the beaming light of the jacky’s eyes.

Freja could tell Peters was uncomfortable. He was still of the old generation, those who felt strange in the flesh of the opposite sex.

“So what is it? Child smuggling? An implant racket?” Peters asked.

“None of the above. It’s the Grey Ghost’s work.”

“Out here? What the hell is she doing out here?”

Freja didn’t mention the sex change. “Reworking the terrestrial AI to ignore orders of Rilke,” she lied.

“We’ll send some engineers.”

“You don’t have to. The Grey Ghost has been apprehended. Found her sightseeing in the Kabuki theatre. Had Lena check the systems. She reverted the AI to a local state.”

“Where is she now?” Peters said, gazing the jacky’s flashlight eyes around.

“On my ship already. In chains. I’m bringing her in…You’re not smoking?”

“Ethics committee received a complaint from the Astral Corp. I’m looking down a fine.” Peters sighed. “Bringing in the Grey Ghost will mean a promotion, Freja. Won’t be long till I’m reporting to you.”

Freja said nothing. Stood up and started to leave.

“Goodbye to you too, honey,” Peters said.

She heard Peters unplug. She saw the light leave the woman’s eyes and heard the gulp of air swallowed by the woman as she came back to herself.


Freja packed her things from her apartment. She felt lost. She beckoned Lena, and the two of them walked across the great plateau for the last time.

A cruiser arrived at the docking station as Freja said goodbye to Montana and Michiru. It was sleek black, thin, the blue sheen of its stealth system washed over its surface. Three men alighted the plane and approached them. They were dressed in black robes that fell to their ankles. Lawyers.

“Freja, meet the legal team who will be leading the upcoming fight against whoever lays claim to the Ryo,” Montana said.

Their ship would be the last to arrive on Dawn for at least a decade. Nakamura had reprogrammed the navsats as well. Anyone flying to Dawn would instead find themselves staring down at the uninhabitable planet of Baggot H-301, a hundred stars away.

Montana had told her there were people on the forest planet of Whitewald who needed the information Lena carried, people who would support Dawn. There, Montana promised, she could find work, and live quietly among the trees.

“Those trees reach to the highest clouds of the atmosphere. I hope you find it as comforting as I did,” he had said.

She didn’t know if she was ready for a quiet life and told Montana as much, standing outside of her ship.

“The group that you are delivering Lena’s data to needs everyone they can get. They call themselves Lifesong. Perhaps a career change is in order,” Montana said.

“Or just a change in scenery,” Nakamura said, shouldering a bag. “Lifesong needs muscle like you, Freja.”

Montana said, “Where did you end up burying your mother?”

“I’ll hold on to the seeds,” Freja said. “I’m not ready to let go of her just yet.”

“I can’t wait to see the trees,” Lena said. “But I’ll miss the Ryo.”

“You will always have the records,” Montana said to Lena.

But Freja knew that wasn’t guaranteed. Lena’s information was priceless and would attract every data thief in the galaxy.

Freja knew the lie she told Peters would not prevent Rilke and Eden descending on Dawn like salvagers on a scrap heap, but it would buy Montana and the lawyers time before the vultures came. Thirty years, Montana had guessed. Nakamura guaranteed twenty. Freja had ventured only ten.

From the cockpit of the cruiser, Freja, Nakamura, and Lena watched the teahouses and theatres shrink to spots, saw the swell of the forest that housed countless Ryo.

Freja did not put on thermal shades to watch Dawn disappear. She did not want to cry in front of Nakamura.

“Goodbye, Dawn,” Lena said.

Three hours into the flight to Whitewald, Nakamura sent a message to Eden Com, one that would go to Peters himself. It said that Freja’s ship had been hijacked by the Grey Ghost.

“It will take years before they track us to Whitewald,” Nakamura said. “I’ve planted fake coms in the database as well. They think I’m taking you somewhere else. By that time, I’ll be living it up on a Minerva minor colony.”

“Living it up?”

“Yeah, what else?”

“Lifesong needs you just like it needs me,” Freja said.

But she wasn’t sure she believed what she said. She touched the seeds and prayed that her mother would help her again.



Party’s End

By Jen Sexton-Riley

The party was over. I was tired.

The rambling, mazelike loft apartment I shared with Cassie was now truly housewarmed, and the wine I’d sipped all evening lent a hazy gold warmth to the strings of tiny lights we’d looped from the curtain rods. Their cheery glow against the black expanse of the enormous industrial windows brought to mind a tiny vessel moving through an expanse of dark sea, the only bright spot in leagues. My ears hummed with hours of laughter and conversation, my muscles warm and languid from dancing in Cassie’s too-big dress, a sleeveless red vintage number in ruched velvet that hugged her curves. On my tiny body, with no curves to hug, it gapped and skimmed. Its hem, which graced Cassie’s ankles, tripped up my bare feet.

The last few stragglers were arranged in twos and threes, half in and out of their coat sleeves, pledging their devotion to future get-togethers, brunches, matinees, this-was-just-so-greats and we’ve-got-to-see-each-other-more-oftens. Little snatches of laughter swirled in my ears with the tinkling of all our new wine glasses being collected and carefully stood on the polished cement counter and in the gleaming steel sink. I spotted Cassie lounged with friends, leveled by drink and the relief of a party gone well on the broad sweep of hand-knotted silk and wool we’d chosen for the main living area. Her emerald dress and black hair shone like spilled inks across the lustrous blues and earthy plums of the rug, which still fairly vibrated with the effort of many hands and ten times as many fingers knotting it into existence. Cassie’s laughter rang like dropped bells as she rolled onto her back, helpless with it, her eyes soft and wet, her voice roughened with happy talk and drink. Beautiful Cassie. I would keep her happy, just like this, forever. I would–

“I’ve found you.”

I flinched and nearly fell, caught by strong hands.

“I’m so sorry. Did I startle you? It’s just that this place is so big. It’s wonderful, but I just can’t seem to find my coat.”

I’m smaller than all of Cassie’s friends, so I always look up to speak to them, but this man was monolithic. His voice rang something in me like a plucked cello string, and I took a deep breath before answering. His eyes seemed so far above me I couldn’t quite manage a bridge of reassuring contact.

“Of course,” I said. “It’s just over this way, on the other side of the kitchen. Through Cassie’s studio and down the back corridor. Follow me.”

The sounds of happy late night chatter and clinking glasses faded behind us, with one last wisp of Cassie’s laughter tickling my ear before dissipating in the darkness. I glanced back to see the tall guest a step behind me, and I startled to realize that one of his large hands still held me just above the elbow. His fingers easily enclosed my entire upper arm, and the heat of his palm pulsed into my bare skin. I regretted the playful impulse that earlier allowed Cassie to zip me into this bright, foolish splash of cloth. The enormous open space of Cassie’s studio enveloped us, the air rich with pigments and the easels peopled with gigantic canvases, landscapes teeming with impossible creatures, like walking through Cassie’s dreams. As we passed the bank of dark windows lining the corridor that would lead to the spare bed and its mountain of coats, I craned my head back to search the night sky for a light. Any light. I saw only my own reflection, shadowed by the guest’s enormous shape.

“You’re really way out here, aren’t you,” said the deep voice above me. “Not another residential building in sight. I suppose in a few years this whole warehouse district will be completely gentrified, filled up with luxury apartments like this one, all huge windows and acres of newly finished floors, cathedral ceilings and polished surfaces. Strange, just this one out here all by itself, isn’t it?”

“Well, it… Yes, well, we… Cassie and I…”

“Cassie waits tables at a coffee shop three days a week, doesn’t she? And focuses on her art, especially now that she has this place with an enormous studio. I don’t think Cassie comes from money. And you, what do you do exactly, if you don’t mind me asking?”

“Oh, me? Well, I do a little of this and a little of that,” I stammered. I stepped into the spare bedroom and snapped on the light. The bed was empty of coats.

I turned to face the guest, and was about to state the obvious, that his coat was clearly not here and must be somewhere else in the apartment, when he took my shoulders in his massive hands, and simply lifted me from the floor. It wasn’t pain that flooded my form, as I don’t feel pain, exactly, but the swimming feeling when my shape begins to lose integrity.

“This will do just fine,” the guest said in his booming voice. He lifted me higher and snapped my entire form in the air as one might snap the wrinkles out of a freshly washed garment. He lifted me to one side, took me in one hand and pushed the fingers of the other hand into the assembled energy of my shape, through my carefully created surface, sliding one arm inside the length of my own arm as if he were slipping into a jacket. With one arm in, he shifted and slipped his other hand and entire arm into my other arm-sleeve. Then he shrugged into me and tugged me tight around his massive shoulders and muscled back, effectively merging my energy with his own and engulfing me with his body. The soft impact I heard was the red velvet dress tumbling to the floor behind him.

He raised the energy of his voice to that of our native tongue and spoke a name I hadn’t heard in lifetimes. “It’s time to come home and make amends for what you’ve done.”

He stepped in front of an ornate freestanding mirror and turned to one side and then the other, straightening his clothing and admiring his handiwork. I could barely detect my pale shape behind the buttons of his shirt, my two eyes and mouth like three round, black holes of disappointment and surprise in the vague roundness of my face. Home. The thought of returning to that bleak place with its rules and strictures made my heart darken and cough out a mist of weak sparks. Already the mirror shimmered in the air, its solidity starting to shift.

“You really shouldn’t do this to people, you know,” he said. “Poor Cassie. She seems like a nice enough kid. She’s going to find herself and her drunk friends lying in an abandoned warehouse in a few minutes, you realize. There’ll be nothing left but a few wine glasses and an empty dress.”

But it was so lovely while it lasted, I thought as we walked as one out of the flickering, shimmering apartment and into the solidity of the night.

It’s always so lovely while it lasts.



Peaches

By Leigh Anna Harken

Her name is not known in our history. We only know her as Peaches because she sold peaches at a roadside stand. It was here the great duke found her. According to legend she was extraordinarily beautiful and this is why he so greatly desired her, but in truth, she was not extraordinary, at least not in beauty. She was fair and plump. Her eyes a bit too wide set and her mouth a bit too small. There were at least three other girls in town with better teeth and brighter eyes. But these girls were not left alone on the roadside selling peaches as the duke cantered past each day. And so he desired her, probably not for her great beauty but because she was there and demure and shy as a common girl, a common girl who sold peaches her family grew at the road stand and used the money to buy radishes and parsley and bread, would naturally be. Quite possibly he only desired her because he knew that he could have her and nothing would be done. He was a duke and she was as juicy as the peaches she sold, and who can resist a ripe peach?

So there is no surprise that one bright day he got off of his stallion, pulled her behind her cart of peaches, and had his thrusting and grunting way with her. When he had finished and jumped back on his stallion, he flipped a few coins on the ground for the pleasure, raised his hat to her, and trotted off.

She was undone. She felt sore and damp and there was such a hurting in her chest from tears that were now stuck there and fear that had dried inside of her instead of on her cheeks. She looked at the coins and they worried her. When she came back home with her unsold peaches and her father took accounting of the money and the peaches sold he would ask her, where did these coins come from, and she would have no answer because the truth would make her father angry with her.

And so, she counted out the money and counted out the peaches it would buy. She carried those peaches in her apron, held like a cradle with five fuzzy little heads. She dug a hole for each little peach all in a row by the road and into each hole she dropped a fruit.

That night her father counted the money and the peaches and all matched and was well and she sighed in relief that no one noticed the lump of tears that was now on her chest or the salty fear that was on her skin.

The next day she went to the roadside to sell her wares and the duke had his stallion saddled to go for a ride. As he passed her on the road he tipped his hat to her for the pleasure and rode on. But there was something odd. Five little saplings, tall and thin, were by the side of the road, all in a row. They weren’t there yesterday, but they were there today, and everyone knows that saplings don’t just appear, they grow. But perhaps he just hadn’t noticed them before.

She dropped a curtsey as he rode past and dropped her eyes to the ground, unable to look at him. She kept her eyes closed until she couldn’t hear the sound of his horse’s hooves anymore and then she opened her eyes and saw five little saplings standing where yesterday she had buried the peaches. She saw them and understood, and so she got a bucket and went to the river and she watered and tended the trees, pulling grass and giving them room to grow.

The sun set and the sun rose and once again she went to the roadside with her fruits and once again the duke cantered past, but he did not tip his hat to the girl. He didn’t even see her or her cart because the five little saplings were now five bright young trees with leaves so green they made his eyes hurt, and hard green fruits that hung, not ready to be picked yet, but promising later days that would be full of delicious flesh to bite and juice to suck. But for the duke the promise of later fruit was not an attraction. He was afraid of the young trees and their hard fruit and his horse slowed as he passed the trees, keeping quiet as if they were riding through a graveyard, trying not to wake the ghosts. She saw his fright and understood and again she tended the trees and gave them water.

The next day it all happened again, the peaches, the roadside stand, the stallion and the saddle. But this time he did not ride past her nor did he tip his hat. Instead he stopped and stared at five full grown peach trees with ripened fruit hanging off of each branch, each peach large and a perfect shade of sunset gold. And though the leaves were green, the same as any other tree, and the bark was brown, the same as any other tree, and the fruit was tempting, same as any other tree, the duke was afraid of the trees and could not ride past them. He could not bring himself to spur his stallion forward, but turned him and galloped off, back to his castle, where he jumped out of the saddle before the horse had stopped and called for his man.

Cut the trees down! he ordered. His man bowed and said he would gather some men to go out in the morning. But the morning wasn’t soon enough for the duke. The trees must be chopped down now. The duke’s man bowed again and set off to collect men and axes.

When the men reached the trees the sun was setting behind them and cast the men in a deep green light. It was beautiful and the men wondered why the duke would want these trees cut down. It seemed a shame to do it, seeing them filled with fruit and greenery. But one did not defy the duke and so they lifted their axes and brought them down into those trees. But it seemed a shame to let such perfect fruit go to waste.

And so the men left their axes to pick the ripe peaches, but not one of them took a bite. Instead they took off their shirts and laid the peaches carefully bundled in the cloth, far from where the trees would come down, as if trying to keep each small load of peaches as safe and warm as a child. Only when each peach from the trees was safe and sound did they pick up their axes and begin to heave. As each tree shuddered under the blows the men cried tears they could not understand, some ashamed and hiding the grief and others openly weeping as one by one, each tree came down. The men stood by and wept and wailed as if each had killed his own children.

Then, something extraordinary happened. Out of each stump sprang a fat little child with cheeks as pink as peaches and tummies fat and round. They giggled and clapped and raced around the weeping men singing:


Oh our father is the duke,
as anyone can see
Our mother she sells peaches
that grow off of a tree.
Our father met our mother
and though he did not know her name,
He led her behind the peaches cart
and plucked her all the same.
Now we are bright new peaches
But our father, for his shame,
Tried to chop us into firewood,
And take away our claim.
But we are smart young peaches
We hid among the roots
And now the duke our father
Must taste of his own fruits.

Then the children ran off before anyone could catch them, though in truth, not one of them tried, they were so astounded.

The men heard this rhyme and understood and each vowed that he would leave the kingdom before he ever again bowed to the duke. They left the trees as they had fallen, whole and green, unwilling to take part in dismemberment of those perfect trees. They picked up their bundles, and walked away towards home and the villagers instead came along and chopped the trees into sticks to burn in their stoves.

The men gave the peaches away, to mothers and daughters and sisters and lovers. To their wives and the wives of friends. They left none for themselves, but to a man gave away all the peaches. Only one ever had a bite, when his wife, smiling and with juice running down her chin held it out for him to share, and with that taste he saw her dreams and wishes and hopes and desires, the essence of her and thought, “Why, she’s just like me?” It was a surprise, and one he never forgot. Years later their love would be legend, as a tale of romance and requitement, of long standing joy and respect, and of adventure as they crossed many hardships to be together after the wars came. They are their own story.

But even the men who did not taste the peaches were forever changed. You would know their names if I told you, because they are famous and their successes are often told. One travelled with the Princess Henrietta when she led the raid and slew the monsters in the caverns. She knighted him for his bravery and boldness in battle and gave him her dagger, which has been passed down to the first born of his descendants for these hundreds of years and now resides with his great-great-great-great-great grandson, who will soon give it to his firstborn, a daughter. Another is the poet who wrote of buttercups and water lilies and whose poems of love and loss you recite to yourself whenever your heart is broken. A third became a judge known for being fair. In his time, no witches were burned. A fourth became a doctor, who was known to be as safe and adept as a midwife at birthing babies.

The women who ate the peaches, you know of them too. Princess Henrietta was one. Juliana the Just was another. Maxine the builder whose bridges still stand, and of course, Pauline the painter whose frescoes are the pride of the nation. Others did not become famous or renowned, but all led cheerful and lucky lives into their old age, matriarchs, whose families who truly mourned them when they died. They were the peach girls, and their smallest deeds are still felt in each and every breath in this city.

But at that time this was still a town, surrounded by farm land and orchards. The men went their ways and told no one of the children and the rhyme.

That evening the duke sat down to dinner, racks of lamb and roasted potatoes and raspberry tart for dessert. He lifted his spoon over the first course, a leek and cream soup that was the specialty of the cook, dipped it into his bowl, brought it to his mouth, and then gagged. He spit and out came a bite of rotten peach with a white worm ducking out of the light and back into its hole. He raged and demanded to know what the meaning of it was. But no one knew. The cook begged his sir’s pardon, but he had put no peaches into the evening dinner. None at all.

The duke, not very mollified, but hungry enough to go on with his dinner, cut himself a piece of lamb, brown and red with blood puddling beneath the meat. He brought a bite to his mouth, smelling the char and the spices. Then he gagged on rotten peach. This time he did not call for the cook, nor yell at the staff. He knew it was that temptress who sold fruit at the side of the road. The one who had seduced him, lowering her head and curtseying day after day as he passed. She looked demure to all, but he knew better, she was a sorceress and a seductress and she had reeled him in to curse him.

The duke threw his napkin down and left the table, with servants and family members trailing behind him in shock and fear for what he might do if they caught his glance now, in an angry mood. He called for his man again but his man did not come. He had left with the workers at the trees, and though he had too much pride to remove his shirt as the men had, he still carried peaches in his pockets and never saw the duke again. The duke had to find someone else to give orders to, but this was easily done. He gave orders to find the girl and arrest her for being a temptress and a witch.

What of Peaches, the girl who sold fruit and planted the trees? Where was she in all of this? What was she thinking and how was she healing after having been used and discarded? No one knows. Like her name, there is no record of her thoughts or doings or if she ate peas and drank punch. Her story is forgotten, if anyone ever knew it in the first place. No one asked or wondered. She has served her purpose and now the only concern is how justice gets served and for that this girl with no name need hardly be there at all. We shall assume that she washed herself as soon as she could, tried to not wake anyone up as she cried at night, and kept silent. If she thought or did anything more than curtsey as the duke rode by on those days, we do not know it. She has her purpose in the story, just as she had her purpose for the duke. So we’ll leave her to her silence and punch and peas, not knowing that the duke had called for her arrest, the judge has been routed from his dinner table and the constable is coming with chains and iron.

The constable was neither a cruel man, nor a smart man, nor a dishonest man. The judge was also neither cruel, nor smart, nor dishonest. They were simply men, as many men in this world, working away at what they must work at and doing what they could for their families, their friends, and themselves. Within reason. There may be some sliding of rules here and there, but no true breaches of duty or crimes committed. They were, for the most part, good men. It was as good men they walked up to the door and knocked. It was as good men that they explained the charges of seduction and sorcery to her father, and it was as good men that they kept her father from beating her too much in his rage. They led the now bloody girl away from the door of her family and they couldn’t help but feel a bit sorry for this young thing, hurt and frightened and crying beside them. Did she seduce the duke? Did she bewitch him and then curse him? If someone as great as the Duke said so, then it must be so, even if she did look like a harmless little thing. But perhaps not. They were fair men and responsible to their duties. They would interrogate and test her to be certain.

The girl broke easily, with barely a touch of the tools and the fire. She confessed to every misdeed and a few more misdeeds no one had known of until then, and the constable and the judge were amazed that such wickedness could have sprung up from their own town. They were good men. They hated the wicked and to protect their own homes, their families, their friends, the judgement was passed and the girl would burn.

The good people of the town were horrified at the evil that had been among them. Every girl who had been her friend now denied ever liking her and every boy who had ever admired her now believed himself the victim of a spell. Even the words of the men who had cut down the trees and the women who had eaten the peaches were not enough to save her and only created scorn and slander and hatred for themselves. One woman woke to find her chickens beheaded on her stoop and one man was pelted with eggs by children, because no one likes those who defend the evil. Those voices must be stopped.

The day of the burning came and all the town came to see the temptress get her justice. Her mother wept, but her father glared at her with all the hatred in his eyes, because he had to, because the rest of his family was now vulnerable and he must be strong and hate his daughter in order to protect them, his wife and the other children. He glared, and if the hatred was only in his eyes and not rooted in his heart, who, if they knew, would blame him? Except the duke. Except the town. Because anyone who did not hate evil must also be evil. So her father hated his daughter and no more ill came to the family. Her sisters married well and her brothers grew old tending the peach trees, though stories still cling to the family like ragged flesh left on a peach pit of the temptress in their lineage.

All were in the town square, gathered around the wood pile and the stake. The duke was there, gaunt and haggard. To survive he had learned to eat rotten fruit, to chew through sickly sweet and maggots and worms and to swallow, though each meal made him ill. In the castle the cook was fired and everyone now ate gruel since there was no need for fine dinners that the duke could not taste.

The constable led the shaking and dirty girl to the stake. He had to carry her the last of the way. Pronouncements were made and she was asked if she had any last words. And though all she could do was whimper, in her mind she recalled the words she had said when she had planted the peaches, “These are the fruits of my labor, may all the little peaches see, that I can still be happy and they cannot trample me.” It seemed a silly thing for her to think of then, when she was not happy and quite trampled, but then it was a silly thing when she had said then, when she was neither happy nor untrampled. It was her one way of defiance, even if only she knew of it.

There was a suitable pause for the girl to speak, but she only sobbed, and so the constable lowered his torch to the wood. First there was smoke as the wood heated, and then there was the crackle of newly born flame among the pyre.

Then something odd happened. A stick lit on fire. It had been one of the sticks from the peach trees, cut down and dismembered by the men and the villagers. Out of the new flame jumped a child, and then another, and another, and another, and another. Five little children with cheeks as pink as peaches and tummies fat and round. They danced and clapped and sang:

Oh our father is the duke,
as anyone can see
Our mother she sells peaches
that grow off of a tree.
Our father met our mother
and though he did not know her name,
He led her behind the peaches cart
and plucked her just the same.
Now take up harp and timbrel,
Now take up flute and lute,
and hear how our father
Tasted his own fruits.
Oh, they were soft and sour
Oh, they were sick and sweet
Now he sits in his tower
and cannot eat his meat.
Our mother she was taken
and given all the blame,
Tortured and forgotten
and put to fire and flame.
But we are smart young peaches
and we know our mother’s name
We stole her from the burning pyre
and gave the town her shame.

The children ran off giggling and skipping. Some of the town’s children ran after them as did some of the adults, but none were able to catch them and no one knew where they went. It was a large crowd, as burnings tend to attract, and some of the people saw the children, some only caught glimpses, some heard the song and others smelt the burning of the peach wood. Some saw and heard nothing at all, distracted by gossip and intense discussions of their neighbor’s noisy goose and the virtues of their new cart. They looked up at the reaction of the crowd and someone near them told them what had happened. They were sorry and angry they missed the excitement, and when they told their children and grandchildren of that day, they always said they’d seen it all.

Slowly, one by one, the townsfolk stopped looking after the running children and turned back to the pyre, expecting at any second now for the screaming to start and the smell of meat and hair. But there was only the crackle and pop of sap and only the smell of ash and wood. The stake was empty and, but for that stabbing into the sky, the fire could have been any simple bonfire, such as the ones they built for spring and fall and midsummer.

The girl was gone. Some saw this as proof of her sorcery and were angry. Others were disappointed at the lack of spectacle. Some, including her father who had smelled the burning of the peach wood, were relieved. (We do not know what her mother felt.) And a few, a very few, knew that the gift given was not just the rescue of the girl, but the rescue of the town. These villagers collected the ashes of the pyre to keep in special places, on mantles and curio shelves. These people and their families were known to be humble and kind, even to those others would condemn. They found the good in all who meet them, and told the stories that have been passed down, imperfect as they are.

But what happened to the girl? How did she get away? Did she find a happy place to heal where no one was trampled or plucked or forgotten? Did she come back to town and serve retribution on the Duke and the townsfolk for what they had done? Did she ever have a purpose beyond being the victim in this story?

Of course she did. But no one thought to ask until it was too late and she was gone. It took a decade or more before someone even thought of it. The ones who tell the stories like to dream she had a happy life—sometimes with the animals and creature of the woods, sometimes living with the fairies and enjoying their revels. Sometimes they dream she found another town, one better than their own. Some people have a shrine to her and say she is a goddess of women and fruit, and perhaps this one is the most true of all. Others try to forget the story exists, or are cynical and tired of hearing it. Many don’t believe it really happened.

You may be disappointed in this story because all the wrongs are not righted and all the heroes do not win. The Duke was never punished by the people nor did Peaches return triumphant and vindicated for all to see. But this is not a story of fairness or rightness or justice. Some peaches are dry and some are juicy, according to their own will, even as we pluck them and complain that one is dry and delight that one is juicy.



The Barber and the Black Canary

By Marilee Dahlman

I’ve always known that the hotel was haunted, though not necessarily the neighborhood. Nevertheless, there it was, all laid out nice and neat in the snow, a very pretty death. We were two blocks from the hotel. At the long empty stretch where the dry goods store would be built in spring. Nothing in the lot but dead trees covered in vines, and beyond it, a marsh that spread out dark and bumpy all the way to Lake Michigan.

The doctor spotted it after me. “Hold up,” he said.

I shoved my fists deeper into my coat pockets and obeyed. Spirits in my place of employment didn’t bother me any (some are the spirits of my ancestors, and as such, they protect me). And just before dawn in Chicago, like anyone, I would rather be indoors than out in the bone-cracking cold.

“Intentional.” The doctor stooped closer, careful to stay on the boardwalk. “Look at the way it’s arranged symmetrically. No animal did that.” He waved a hand without looking up. “Light a match.”

Orders. I told myself, he’s a doctor, he treats everyone like this.

I stepped off the boardwalk and crunched two steps through snow-crusted grass to the edge of the street’s gaslight. I struck a match and held it so we could see every detail: a plucked and charred bird, wings evenly outstretched, throat slashed. Its dark eyes stared up at the fading full moon. Blue-gray feathers surrounded it, projecting outward. The icy blood sparkled.

“A pigeon,” I said. The match flickered out.

“A bad egg was messing about here.” The doctor wrenched his black hat down against the wind. “Someone all-possessed, like.”

I shrugged. Perhaps he was right, a human did it. There were some bad ones.

“What do the tracks mean?” The doctor gestured at boot prints in the frozen mud.

“Don’t know.”

“No, you can say.” A nicer tone. Maybe like I was his friend, not his barber.

“Don’t know.” I said it more firmly. The mud marks were impenetrable to me. The doctor had no way of knowing that, of course. I just trimmed his white sideburns once a week, after the doctor had checked on the slow death of Edgar Mulgrave, the hotel’s owner.

An eagle screamed. We jerked our heads up at the sound. The eagle flew low, as if it wanted us to see it, made a circle, and disappeared into a cloud.

That sign I understood. So, a man did this after all. And the spirits were angry.

The doctor glanced at me and chopped a hand at the dead pigeon. “Do something about it.”

That I would not do. I stepped back to the boardwalk.

The doctor clicked his tongue. Without a care or a prayer, he stepped onto the hard ground himself and mashed the bird under his boot. The breastbone snapped and I tried not to gag. The rest squished and blood leaked out like syrup. He messed up the feathers. He scraped the slime off his boot using the edge of the boardwalk. He did it all very slowly and casually, like he was teaching something to me.

“A dog’ll get it now,” I said. “Would’ve scared people.” Now I felt concerned. Maybe it would help if the spirits knew why the doctor had just done this.

“Maybe people should be scared.” The doctor rubbed his chin. “A hotel guest did it, perhaps. Someone from out East. Off his head, to do that to a bird.”

I frowned, first at the doctor and then at the hotel. The Royal Chicago loomed taller than any building on the avenue, a flesh and blood colored stone palace that Mulgrave’s almost-widow had opened last year. The wind kicked up stronger, into the kind that aches ears and spits rain. That is not what worried me. I took off toward the hotel with quick strides.

“Get back here,” the doctor called out. “You’re my windbreak, Nate.”

Employees weren’t supposed to use the front entrance but I ignored the rule. I could explain the situation to Mrs. Mulgrave, if need be. I took the hotel’s grand steps two at a time and strode through the lobby and main promenade. I pulled out a key and opened the door to the hotel’s barbershop.

My boots squeaked on the tile floor. The crystal chandeliers were dark and the red leather chairs stood empty. I went to a domed cage sitting on a pedestal and whisked off the cage’s black felt cover.

A single yellow canary sat inside on a carved wooden bar. It blinked, stretched its wings, and tweeted.

I exhaled. Don’t know how long I’d been holding my breath, but I felt a little dizzy and sweat popped out of my skin and trickled down my neck and back. “Good morning, little man,” I said. Sometimes my mother had called me that. It had been her birdcage. She had not been part of the tribe, but she’d loved birds and small creatures, as do I.

The canary flapped his wings and showed a few white streaks (I love those hidden feathers best) among the shades of bright yellow. The bird flew about his cage, fed, and returned to his perch.

A few minutes later, I’d made the shop bright and ready for business. I wore a black velvet topcoat, which is what we’re all supposed to wear. I idly stropped a blade and thought of the dead pigeon. The quick, metallic vreets of steel on leather was the only sound in the room.

The doctor had said the fellow was ‘off his head.’ I imagined a headless man drifting about the vacant lot and cold marsh. Naturally, I knew the fellow must have a head. A sick head and a stone heart. A man who felt delight at killing a bird.

I looked down at the barbershop floor and my heart beat quicker. The floor is marble, with silver eagle amulets embedded into the tiles. Fifty total, with gleaming beaks and turquoise eyes, all slick now from the scrape of boot soles. Mrs. Mulgrave had installed them, purely to compete with the hotel that had silver dollars in the floor of its barbershop. I did not think this was appropriate, everyone knew that Mr. Mulgrave and a man named Roy Tanner had stolen the amulets from a tepee during their army days, but I had grown accustomed to them. I felt like their protector.

The dawn eagle had flown low, and in a circle.

My hand holding the blade went a little wet. I crouched down and slid my fingers on a cool, smooth bird. Its single green-veined blue eye stared at me.

After some thinking, I went over to the cage. Poked the blade between the bars and rolled it. I knew that the canary liked to watch light dance off the metal.

“Listen,” I said. “I don’t want you to worry about a thing.” My mother had also said that to me.

The canary began to sing.


As usual, the son and heir Lionel Mulgrave was my first customer. Lionel had arrived three weeks ago from Paris with a silver-tipped walking stick and a trunk full of dolls. He did what he always did, he looked at the birdcage, shook his head, and wrinkled his nose.

After Lionel, a crush of drummers. The men selling candies, fancy shoes, clocks, pots and pans, and sewing machines jawed about sales, and sometimes a new play at the theater. I watched carefully, but as I knew, they were the types to ignore the bird completely. I liked the drummers. They were gentler sorts, about my age, too young to have battled in the South or put up forts out West. Other men, older ones, they had hard, quick eyes. Some call it strength.

It’s fear. I’m sure of that. Men back from war or the West with decorations, whether they’re for the lobby of a hotel or pretty medals for a shirtfront, they must know that spirits of the dead see everything.

Generally speaking, patrons dwell more on me, the head barber, than the bird. They read the silver plate outside the door: Barbershop Concession, Management by Nathaniel Tall Cloud. I know I’m a novelty, same as the peace pipe case in the lobby and the two thousand arrowheads on the western wall of the dining room. But the proper nameplate lends my position a permanency that I don’t mind, given the practicalities of living a life where you don’t quite fit in one place, or the other. Once I’d been written up in the newspaper. And last year, when someone had scratched the nameplate, a deliberate, deep slash right down the middle, Mrs. Mulgrave promptly got it replaced.

“I have a bone to pick with you.”

Charlie Dillinger’s voice boomed from the shop’s entrance like he was on stage at McVicker’s. I paused my blade at a customer’s throat. The actor dipped to eye level with the canary and wiggled gold-ringed fingers through the wrought iron bars.

“No bird should be prettier than me,” Dillinger said. He straightened up and grinned wide, showing a row of perfect white teeth. “I’ll wait until Mr. Tall Cloud is ready for me. I like my shave nice and close.”

The canary sang, a customer slapped Dillinger on the back, and another hollered a greeting from a chair. I resumed sweeping my blade.

That night, after I closed the shop, I cradled my bird.

“Mr. Dillinger acts like a cat that ate the canary,” I said. “But I don’t believe he’s off his head.”

I waited until the bird’s eyelids blinked slow before returning him to the cage.


A week later, just before closing, Gunner O’Brian swaggered in while I swept cigar butts and hair off the floor. O’Brian slung his arm around the neck of a departing politician, who laughed loud and left fast. Two associates arrived with O’Brian and stood by the door. One had dried, dark splatter on his silk waistcoat.

“You keep ‘em good and shiny,” O’Brian said. “Them eagles the Mulgraves put in.”

“Mr. Mulgrave found them in a medicine man’s things,” I said. “Skirmish during army service.”

The canary tweeted. O’Brian jabbed his elbow at the cage, rattled it hard, and the canary shrilled and flew in circles. Talk in the shop quieted. O’Brian took another long look at the floor.

I set the broom against the wall and nodded at an empty chair.

“Hell of an idea old Mulgrave had, to put in a Sioux-blood barber.” O’Brian settled in the seat. “This life is more bustle than you’re used to, I bet.”

“Better than the stockyards,” I said.

“You ain’t gonna get work waiting at the stockyards gate,” O’Brian said. “Not you.”


On the shortest day of the year, Roy Tanner limped in. He wore a navy army coat with one gold button dangling from it. Grime streaked his greasy white hair and beard. At the cage, Roy and snapped his pockmarked jaws together like a dog. The canary fluttered. Roy laughed rough like something was stuck in his throat. He limped forward.

And slipped hard on an eagle, falling backwards.

Roy swore and swore! A gentleman from New York helped him up.

Of course I thought, yes, another sign.

Even before the dead pigeon, I had wondered if the spirits wanted me to do anything about Roy. The man was so old and bitter, I figured that the red blood in his veins must really run all gritty and brown. It had been said that Mulgrave put up with Roy because Roy knew of things done out West, bad things, that Mulgrave didn’t want spread around. But I’d seen them together, before Mulgrave was dying, and Mulgrave never laughed like he did when he was with Roy.

“Mulgrave’s wife says someone got to trim me,” Roy said.

I nodded at another barber.

“That’s right, I ain’t gonna lose my scalp.” Roy spit a long stream of tobacco juice. It splattered across the floor, bubbled a bit on the tops of my shoes and a silver eagle, and spread out in runny, thin streams everywhere. He scratched at a boil on his neck that was bigger and shinier than a red marble.

The barbershop chatter quieted some. Talk revived once Roy got sat in a chair with a towel around his face. Roy left with another bite at the bird and a barking laugh. He stayed on his feet that time.

After closing, I tidied the walnut sideboard under the oil painting of a black steam train rolling through a green prairie. I wiped smears off the wall mirrors. I went to the cage. My canary’s dark eyes looked up at me.

“I’ll keep you safe,” I said.

I took out the canary and stroked his yellow head. I returned the bird to the wooden perch and draped the black cover over the cage.


Out of fairness, I decided to shadow all of the customers that, in my view, were most likely to be privately demented. This included a dentist from Omaha who had tweeted back at the canary like they were having a conversation in bird language. I tracked the dentist to Lincoln Park three icy evenings in a row, where all the man did was sit at the new, snowed-over baseball fields and smoke a pipe. I followed Lionel Mulgrave to a closed haberdashery that opened when he rapped at the door with his walking stick. I went all the way to a smoky South Side saloon and watched Gunner O’Brian’s associates run a numbers game for pennies.

It was Roy I caught in the act.

Most nights, Roy stayed in the hotel’s billiards room until it closed. Then he would lurk about the lobby until the night desk clerk told him to leave. Sometimes Roy would shuffle to another hotel lobby. Other times, Lincoln Park or an alley. I had to will my own heart to pump cold when following the limping old man. Watching him called to mind how alone Roy was. I don’t have much company myself, but Roy was different. He was a bone relic from a time of crushing death and taking, all over the place. Time turned, and spirits, the evil and the good, had picked up what they wanted. Now Roy was what was left. Sooner or later, they’d take him, too, and do what they wished.

At the last full moon of winter, a windless night, Roy never showed up to the hotel. I locked the shop, checked the vacant lot, and waited by a tree for a while, keeping as still as I could. I imagined that there were no buildings and no boardwalk. I was an ancient hunter on an empty plain, waiting for a night wolf.

Roy showed up, sure enough. He carried something in a small leather sack. It was still alive, the way it bounced some. I leaned closer to the tree.

Roy muttered to himself and left the avenue. He traipsed across the vacant lot and into the frozen marsh. I followed him. I can move pretty quiet for a big man. Roy stopped close to the lake and dropped the sack. Roy fumbled with it, and pretty soon, he had his hands closed around a pigeon. His bony fingers squeezed its neck. The pigeon squirmed.

“Let it go,” I said.

Roy’s head snapped up. His small eyes narrowed. Two words dripped out of his mouth: “You git.”

My boot struck Roy square under the chin. Roy’s hands released the bird. His body hurled backwards. I planned to pick Roy up and throw him against a tree, but the man made helpless spluttering sounds like he was choking on his own tobacco-soaked saliva. The red sore oozed yellow on his neck. Roy’s left eye twitched and I saw he had a new boil on his eyelid, weeping pus.

I stood over him. “Why’re you hurting birds?”

“I’ll find a copper.” Roy pointed a long finger with a dirty nail. “You’ll do a stretch!”

I grabbed Roy’s blue coat and heaved him upright. Brown fluid dripped down his beard.

“Why?” I lifted him off the ground. Light as a skeleton, he was.

Roy coughed warm flecks on my face. “You devil don’t know—”

I shook him hard.

Roy’s eye with the dripping boil blinked. His lips stretched back. “To cure the skin, sacrifice two pigeons, such as he can git.”

I threw him on the ground. “You stop now.”

I picked up the shivering gray bird. I tucked it close under my arm and headed toward the avenue.

“Two pigeons!” Roy squealed after me.

I got to the avenue. I found more birds strutting near a bakery and set the stolen pigeon down.

The walk gave me time to reflect on the encounter. Had I done right? All things considered, I felt satisfied by the morality of my actions and my restraint. I’d warned Roy. The man would find another hotel. He was dying, anyway. Rotting from the inside out.

Just the same, I spent the night in my shop, with my canary.


I felt no feeling of premonition. I saw no sign from any spirit. I still feel they should have warned me.

Roy hadn’t been to the hotel in months and I’d overheard the desk clerk and doorman mention Roy’s absence. The man was good and gone, and not missed. I thought, maybe he had died already.

A late spring freeze hit overnight. As I walked to work, I kept my head down against the cold and fell in with the doctor. I ignored the doctor’s chat and watched my breath frost and disappear, over and over. At the hotel, I strolled through the side entrance, unlocked the door to the shop and took my time stomping warmth back into my toes. I lit the gas chandeliers. I lifted the cage’s black felt cover.

The canary was gone.

I took a few quick strides across the room and grabbed a straight razor. The box crashed to the floor and blades clattered across the tile.

I headed to the same part of the marsh where I had caught Roy before. I felt dizzy, maybe from the exertion of moving fast but mostly from worry. Perhaps the canary was still alive, in Roy’s leather sack, staring into darkness. Fear could be the only thought in the bird’s tiny skull.

I saw a reed-thin figure crouched among the frosty cattails.

“No!” I looked up to the sky and said the word more to the spirits than to the man.

Roy raised his head. He creaked upright, threw out his arms, and spread dirty, bloodstained fingers. A wide smile split his face like it’d been carved there with a blade. The boil over his left eye dripped. He shuffled away, giving that barking laugh.

I squished a few more steps through muddy ground and forced myself to look.

My yellow canary lay dead. He was all open down the middle. I felt like I was empty in the middle myself, just looking at it. Never before had I felt like I had nothing inside but cold and hollowness. Now I think, it’s probably the way bad men feel all the time. The bird’s body looked smaller than it had ever seemed in his cage. A small knife, a stained kerchief, and the leather sack lay next to the tiny corpse. I know I groaned. Right then, I was madder at the spirits than Roy. Then I realized, somewhere, my bird had become a spirit itself. Smooth and happy and free, somewhere.

But still, something had to be done about Roy.

Roy’s laugh drifted along the still air. My hand tightened on the straight blade’s bone handle. I saw Roy heading to the avenue.

I went after him.

Roy turned his head at the sound of my steps. He cackled and opened his mouth wide. “Tweet, tweet!”

I closed the distance and yanked hard on the back of Roy’s coat. Roy’s arms wind-milled, his sleeves flapped, but his feet stayed under him. He was nimble like a skeleton come alive. Roy scrambled away and darted behind a tree. He grinned, feinted left and right, and took off again, this time toward the lake.

Then he slipped, but didn’t fall.

His breath got more ragged, and he slipped again. Roy steadied and frowned at the blade in my hand. “You won’t.” He spat into the snow. “They’ll hang you.”

Roy and I faced each other in the open marsh. Reeds poked out of cold mud. The dawn sky hung low and gray.

I stared at the gaps in Roy’s teeth and his oozing neck and eyelid. I felt like the same kind of ooze could be in my stomach, I felt so sick. My hand dropped the blade. Roy tilted his head.

“I don’t kill dogs,” I finally said.

Roy laughed and lifted his bearded chin. “Tweet, tweet.”

Crack.

The ice splintered.

Roy slammed down hard. Really hard. I winced when I heard his elbow crack on the ice. Freezing water rushed up from the cracks, which spider-webbed bigger. Roy yelped at the touch of frigid water. His boots and hands went wild. The ice cracked wide open and Roy fell through.

I gingerly lifted a boot and eyed the ice beneath my own feet. It looked solid. We were still a distance from the lake. This was the marsh, yet. The water couldn’t be more than a few feet deep.

Roy’s boots and hands sloshed above the water. His head didn’t come up.

“Tweet, tweet,” I said softly. I imagined that the spirit of the yellow canary was somewhere close. Perhaps it was everywhere. “Roy’s having a terrible time getting his feet under him,” I said. “Maybe he can’t swim.”

I stood quietly. Picked up the blade and waited for some sign of what I should do. Sure enough, overhead, a solitary eagle circled, appearing and disappearing through the dark clouds. I took a deep breath, felt my shoulders go easy. My work was done, then.

Roy splashed.

I watched.

The water finally stilled. One fingertip broke the surface and disappeared again.

It started to rain, the kind with big, cold drops. I backed away and returned with the small leather sack. I held it carefully with both hands. I slid the blades inside, my own and Roy’s, and gently sank the sack with the canary into the water.

I headed back to the hotel through the rain. When I put a hand on the shop’s door, my mind went to the cage. I’d have to clean it out. May as well do that now. Perhaps give it to Mrs. Mulgrave.

I plodded pretty heavy into the room. My coat and boots dripped water on the tile.

I stopped cold.

A tiny bird sat on the bar in the cage. It was a canary, like my pet. But this one was dark. Its shiny feathers gleamed black.

I stared at the bird. I felt like all the air had left my body. I raised my hands to my cheeks and blinked and breathed until I was certain that the black canary was real. I shook my head and tried to accept it. The spirits took Roy and they did what they wanted to do. It had to be right.

The bird uttered a small tweet in greeting and flapped its wings. I walked slowly to the cage. I opened it and picked up the bird. I held him in my large hands, enjoying the feel of delicate bones. I felt his small heart beat against my fingertip. I raised him to my lips and kissed his silky head. The bird smelled faintly of tobacco.



The Water Dragon

By Joanne Aylott

It was never the monsters hiding under the bed. Neither was it the dark of her bedroom when the lights went out. It was never the zombies that could clamber out of the packed earth and find and eat the little girls who played hide-and-seek in the graveyard. It wasn’t any of the things her best friend Clara had divulged to her once as they’d perched on the cobblestone wall that ran around the village. For Evangeline, it was the pitter-patter of raindrops on her head that caused her heart to seize.

Her mother, June, would be waiting by the back door, of course, wringing her hands until her daughter arrived, flushed and out of breath from running.

“Praise, God,” she would whisper, before crossing herself. Bustling Evangeline inside, the two of them would then huddle together by the kitchen window, uttering prayers for the clouds to part and sunny skies to bless them once more.

Sometimes, her mother would berate her for taking the rainless days for granted.

“You haven’t been praying hard enough,” she told Evangeline at the table, their hands still clasped from saying grace. “You’re not even trying.”

So Evangeline was always careful, after crossing all her fingers and toes, that her last thought before sleep overcame her was that she would awake to the pleasant heat of the sun on her face and the sight of a brilliant blue sky peeking through her curtains.

Yet although Evangeline deemed herself old enough now to know that zombies and ghosts could never hurt her, as long as she was home before dark, of course, for the life of her she could not explain why they should be so afraid of rain. Indeed, Evangeline had been sodden before when she had once ventured too far from the cottage and the storm had taken her by surprise. All she had felt whilst her mother had bundled her in towels were as if she’d just stepped out of a very cold bath.

“It doesn’t look so scary from in here,” she’d observed, cross-legged by the fire; not even while it had lashed against the window panes in droves and lightning had crackled across the sky.

“Well, you would be a fool not to be afraid,” said her mother.

Sometimes their garden would be ruined, reduced to a mushy, mulchy mess of sodden foliage. When Evangeline was younger, she used to believe that there were such things as giants that would use the cover of thunder to enter the garden and destroy all the pretty flowers. Her mother never used to tell her otherwise, and so Evangeline still had to scold herself whenever she could’ve sworn she’d seen a footprint the size of a dustbin lid left in the soil.

It was Monday morning, and Evangeline was peering at one of these very such indentations by the churchyard wall when someone called out to her and Clara. Glancing up, she caught sight of Mr. Reed striding past them on his way to the fields.

“I would start making my way home now, girls. You’re too close to the boundary wall when the sky’s looking this murky. That means you, too, sweetheart.”

“Yes, father,” her best friend mumbled.

Evangeline jumped to her feet, wiping her hands on her skirt.

“I don’t know why you try and run off so fast, Eve,” Clara told her as they began making their way back towards the centre of the village, deciding that they would stop by at Mr. Graham’s shop to buy toffee if they hurried. “We’ve both got caught in the rain so many times now and it’s never hurt us.”

Evangeline hushed her, peering up and down the lane. Old Mrs. Simmons was pruning her roses, but everyone knew that her ears were shot. They passed by her garden and she raised a gnarled hand at them in greeting, lips pulling to reveal a toothless crevasse.

“It’s just when you’re out in it for too long,” whispered Evangeline, “or when you go out on purpose. I don’t know what happens to you but all I know is that I don’t want to find out.”

Clara giggled, and they stopped in the middle of the path.

“See?” she said. “What’s so bad about rain, Eve? It makes everything damp and sometimes it makes the grass really slippery. And you can throw stones in the puddles! Why should we be afraid?”

Huffing, Evangeline readied her best grown-up voice. “Because that’s what we’ve been told. It’s all we’ve ever known. To run home as soon as the rain starts.”

“Eve. We both know zombies can eat you. Ghosts can scare you to death. What does rain do?”

They walked in thoughtful silence until they arrived at the shop. Clara went in first, as always, and they went up to the counter, contemplating the shelves of sweet jars behind Mr. Graham in his red-and-white stripy apron. He was already bagging up some liquorice for old Mr. Partridge, the same corduroy trousers flapping about his bow legs. The two of them were conversing quietly, and Evangeline’s ears pricked at some of the words. She felt a gentle nudge at her side, and she turned to see Clara slipping into one of the nearby aisles. She followed, and together, they listened.

“So what are they saying happened to the poor child?” murmured Mr. Partridge.

“That perhaps she tried to go swimming in the river. My Daisy asked if she could once when we were on a walk near the marshlands, and of course I told her that it was forbidden. It was beautiful weather and I know it’s tempting, especially when it’s as nice as it was on Friday.”

“Oh, it was beautiful weather Friday,” Mr. Partridge agreed in a rasp.

“Anyway, as you make your way further out, the current gets stronger. The girl was probably caught unawares some time Friday afternoon and got swept away.”

Mr. Partridge made a noise of anguish.

“Yes, I know,” said Mr. Graham. “I heard a child calling it The River Fury. Some kind of water dragon that is forever angry and tempts children to try and ride it. If they can do it, only then will the waters calm. Something like that.”

In her pocket, Evangeline clenched her palm around the pound coin her mother had given her for toffee. She remembered it had rained that Friday afternoon.

“I thought we’d seen the last of this ten years ago,” said Mr. Partridge sadly, before shuffling out of the shop. Exchanging looks, Evangeline and Clara stepped out from the aisle and approached the counter once more, though Evangeline wasn’t sure either of them were now in the mood for sweets.

“You must never try and ride the water dragon,” said Mr. Graham, and they blinked up at him in surprise. His eyes were hard. “Understand?”

Evangeline nodded. Besides, neither of them would ever be able to tame a dragon.


“Mother?”

They had just finished another chapter of Evangeline’s bedtime story. Although Evangeline knew she was much too old for this sort of thing, and she was perfectly capable of reading on her own, it was a nightly ritual that she was certain her mother still enjoyed just as much as she did. It was also a way of distracting the both of them when the rain was beating down outside and it showed no signs of stopping.

This particular story was one of Evangeline’s favourites. It was a tale of adventure, and she loved listening to her mother read of distant lands and exotic locales, so far removed from the dreary existence of their little village that she found it hard to believe that there were indeed such other places in the world.

“Yes, darling?” Her mother got to her feet to slot the book back amongst the others on the shelf.

“Clara and I heard that a girl in the village disappeared on Friday. Is that true?”

Evangeline watched as her mother came to perch on the edge of the bed, bypassing her special reading chair. She adjusted the teddy bear that was sat on the windowsill, its stitched mouth coming undone.

“Yes. Yes, it’s true.”

“What happened to her?” Evangeline found herself fidgeting with a fraying edge of her blanket, eyes trained on the stray thread.

For a moment she thought that her mother had not heard her and was about to ask again, but then, “She got caught in the rain.” Her voice wavered. She stood, brushing her hands down her pinafore.

“That doesn’t make any sense,” Evangeline whispered.

“It doesn’t have to make sense,” said her mother. She was staring out the window, her face sheathed in moonlight. The raindrops that cascaded steadily down the glass cast shadows on her skin, like tears.

Inhaling sharply and blinking as if she had just remembered whereabouts she was, she leant down and pulled the blanket up to her daughter’s chin, patting her shoulder and resting her hand there.

“You must promise me again that you will always come straight home when the rain starts. You come straight home to me. You promise?”

Evangeline swallowed, her glass of milk before bed now a bitter taste in her mouth.

“I promise.”

With one last smile, her mother straightened.

“What about the water dragon?” said Evangeline, remembering. “Should I be afraid of that, too?”

“Yes, darling. You must beware that, too. Now, good night. I expect to hear you praying before you go to sleep.”


“What do you think is this water dragon?”

Evangeline and Clara were skipping down the lane to the pond, laden with bread for the ducks. It had been almost a week since they had eavesdropped on the conversation in Mr. Graham’s shop, and since then, the missing girl had been found in a ditch near the marshlands with water in her lungs.

“Who knows?” said Clara. “Just sounds like a load of rubbish to me. It was the younger children who were spouting all that stuff, after all.” She sniffed.

“You didn’t ask your parents? Mr. Graham did warn us about it.”

“Why should I?” Clara shrugged. “I’m already told to be scared of enough things. I don’t want to worry about something else.”

They’d reached the pond, a small pool of water about the size of Evangeline’s garden. It had lily pads and frogs if they were lucky enough to spot one. Evangeline tore off a scrap of bread and threw it to the mother duck and her ducklings, not finding it in herself to smile when they all gathered by her feet.

“You know, I have a theory,” said Clara, chewing on a piece of crust. “And it’s just a theory, but I’ve been thinking about this for a while now, and I feel like I can trust you enough to tell you.”

“We’re best friends, Clara!”

“Even so. I wasn’t sure if you’d run home and blab about it. Then your mother would tell my mother, and she wouldn’t let me out to play anymore.”

“Clara…”

“Anyway, here’s what I think. Our parents tell us all these things we should be afraid of. Ghosts that come out at night, going past the boundary wall, this water dragon, the rain… but what if–”

A low rumble of thunder pulled their gazes skyward. Evangeline could feel her heartbeat in her ears, and she looked to Clara with wide eyes. Her friend sighed.

“We’d better make a run for it, then.”

The girls scattered the rest of their bread and began dashing back along the twisted, winding roads. The pond was the other side of the village, and Evangeline thought how stupid she was for not sticking close to the cottage on a day like today.

The rain began to fall. Evangeline felt her hair and her clothes grow wetter and wetter, and soon she was whimpering not just with the cold but with a gnawing fear that had a hold of her insides. Clara was ahead of her but she could barely make her out, the rain coming down so thick and so fast Evangeline was sure that she would disappear.

She grabbed for the cobblestone wall on her left, using it as a guide. With her free hand she attempted to shield her vision, the rain pouring into her eyes. Near-blinded, she let out a gasp as she slammed into Clara, the both of them stumbling. Her friend had stopped.

“Clara! What are you doing?”

“Look!” she shouted, pointing.

Evangeline did so, following her gaze, to find that they were directly outside Mrs. Simmons’ cottage. The old lady herself was standing beneath the porch, pruning scissors in hand, and she was gesturing madly at them, her mouth a silent chasm beneath the deafening roar of the rain.

“Come on, then.” Clara pushed open the gate.

“No!” Evangeline caught her sopping sleeve. “We have to go straight home–our parents will worry!”

“We’re still ages away! You said yourself we can’t be out in this for too long!”

Clara grimaced at her, slipping through the gate and running up the stepping-stone path towards the house. Mrs. Simmons stepped aside to let her through the door before turning to gesture again at Evangeline.

With one last sigh, Evangeline darted to follow her. The rain no longer beat down upon her head as she reached the shelter of the porch, and she felt herself threatening to slump with relief as she moved past Mrs. Simmons, finding herself standing in a musty living room that smelt of mothballs and soap.

“You girls are drenched.

She spoke oddly. Evangeline had noticed this on the few occasions she had been up-close to Mrs. Simmons. Her mother had told her it was because of her ears, how she couldn’t hear her own voice too well, and so the sounds came out strange.

“Come and sit by the fire.”

She ushered the two of them over to a flowery loveseat. Evangeline felt herself sinking; the cushions seemed to swallow them up.

As the girls huddled there shivering, Mrs. Simmons disappeared into the kitchen for a moment before returning with two cups of hot, sweet-smelling tea. Evangeline sat there with it clasped between her clammy hands, not yet having the strength to lift the beverage to her lips. Mrs. Simmons then collapsed into an armchair herself, peering at the two of them.

“Are you girls alright?”

“We’re fine.” Clara nudged Evangeline in the ribs; she nodded her agreement.

Mrs. Simmons didn’t look convinced, but took a sip from her own cup, staring into the flames that licked the hearth.

“Mrs. Simmons?” said Clara. Then, louder, “Mrs. Simmons?”

The old woman jerked.

“Oh, yes, dear?”

“We both want to know… we feel that we should know…” Clara paused as Evangeline grabbed her arm, shaking her head. She could feel Mrs. Simmons’ pale blue eyes on them from over the rim of her teacup.

Clara pulled herself free and Evangeline receded back into the cushions.

“Why should we even be so afraid of rain, Mrs. Simmons?”

The question hung in the stale air. Mrs. Simmons’ eyes dropped to the carpeted floor, and she took a deep, ragged breath that seemed to give her some trouble.

“Back when I was a child, I had a friend, Ruth,” she told them. “She lived just down the bottom of the lane from me.”

She gestured towards the window, before a chuckle wracked her chest.

“She was a headstrong little lady. I always much felt like I was her lackey, always following her, secretly envying her.”

Evangeline glanced sideways at Clara, but her friend seemed to be enraptured.

“One day, we decided we would go on an adventure. We passed the boundary wall to go and play in the river by the marshlands. We followed it for what felt like miles. I wanted to turn back but, well, you can imagine what Ruth might have said about that.” Smiling, she watched the fire. Evangeline realised that it was dying.

“Would you like me to put on some more logs for you?” she asked.

“Oh, that’s alright, dear. I was getting rather warm, anyway.”

Evangeline sunk back into the loveseat, avoiding the frown Clara shot her for interrupting the story.

“Then it started to rain,” murmured Mrs. Simmons, her gaze fixed on the rapidly diminishing flames. “It came so quickly, and neither of us saw any danger. We were just children, after all. Anyway, I managed to get out. I got lucky, I suppose… I tried to reach for her from the bank… but she’d already taken on too much water. I watched as she slipped beneath the surface and never came back up. The water dragon took her.”

Her crooked hands were trembling. Evangeline and Clara shared an uneasy glance. At the bottom of the hearth, the embers glowed their last before finally growing dark.

“It stole my friend from me. And it felt cheated that it couldn’t have me, too. It lies in wait for me, to this day. The rain gives it the power to search for me, for the river to break its banks and seek me out. Do you know how many floods this village has had over the years? The last was before your time, anyway. Now, our children are warned to run straight home when the rain starts. To keep them safe. I thought it had ended. For ten years, I thought it was over. But then that little girl went missing and… it’s all because of me.”

Mrs. Simmons hunched over herself and began to cry. The girls shifted on the loveseat. Clara opened her mouth, but the words seemed to die on her tongue. Evangeline glanced out the window; the rain had stopped.

“We really must be getting back now, Mrs. Simmons,” she said, setting down her untouched tea. Her voice was barely above a whisper, and she realised her mistake.

“I can show you if you like.”

“I’m sorry?”

Mrs. Simmons raised her head. Something had changed in her eyes; they were focused, steely, glinting.

“I can show you where it happened on the river. It’s not too far to walk.”

“Mrs. Simmons, did you hear me?”

Clara sat up straight. “I want to see.”

Evangeline whirled on her. “Clara, what are you doing?” she breathed. “Everyone will be waiting for us, my mother is probably terrified–” A lump formed in her throat, her eyes prickling. “We have to go home.”

Her friend shrugged. “Do what you like. But I need to see this. I’m going.”

A smile stitched itself across Mrs. Simmons’ face. Evangeline stared between the pair of them, her mouth open.

“Come with us, dearie,” the old lady said, pushing herself to her feet. “It won’t take long, I promise.”

“No.” Evangeline stood. “No, I really must go back now.”

Mrs. Simmons cocked her head at her, like a bird. “She’s scared, bless her.”

“I’ll be fine, Eve,” Clara whispered. Evangeline turned to her, hot tears running down her cheeks now. “You don’t have to worry about me.”

“Well, if you’re sure, Evangeline,” said Mrs. Simmons from behind her. “You be careful, now. And tell your mother I said hello.”

“I will.”

Evangeline stepped out of her reach. With one last imploring look at Clara, met with a determination she had seen so many times before and likely followed, she headed towards the door. The latch was stiff beneath her fingers. With a dull thunk the door swung open, and she looked behind her into the living room. Both her best friend and the old lady were staring at her; Mrs. Simmons had a hand on Clara’s shoulder.

Outside, the sky was bright, and the ground smelt fresh and sharp. Pulling the door to, Evangeline ran all the way home.


Clara was found dead in a ditch the next morning with water in her lungs.

Evangeline repeated the story over and over again. She and Clara had been feeding the ducks by the pond. Then, when the rain had started, they’d tried to run home but had been forced to take shelter at Mrs. Simmons’ cottage.

The old lady had vouched for the pair of them and had also filled in the details where Evangeline could not, that Clara had said goodbye not long after her friend, and that that was the last she’d seen of her.

From then on, as Evangeline had expected, she was no longer allowed out of her mother’s sight. Not that she would have wanted to. And it wasn’t as if she had a friend to go out and play with, anymore.

As she and her mother made their way down the lane towards Mr. Graham’s to buy some necessities, Evangeline caught sight of Mrs. Simmons pruning her roses. It took a moment for the senile woman to hear them, yet when they passed by and her pale eyes landed on Evangeline, she gave her a gummy smile, her finger raising toward her pinched lips.

There was a rumble of thunder overhead.

“We’d better hurry,” said her mother, pushing her daughter along.

Evangeline knew she was right. There was a lot to be feared in this village. And she knew what Clara’s theory had been that day. She only wished that she had come to the same realisation sooner.

At least she knew now. Ten years old was as good an age as any to start growing up.



Traveling by Starlight: A Journey of Two Ways

By Lindsey Duncan

When the otherworldly visitors arrived, I had my hands full with their unusual needs: no salt, everything baked or boiled until it was pure–what did that mean?–and only cream to drink. While the rest of the castle whispered about their motives and admired every nuance of their behavior, I rushed about the kitchen, commander of an army of cooks and cutlery. I was as curious as the next person, but I had a job to do.

After a welcome feast of venison curry and roast peacock, I slumped in my chair by the servant’s courtyard and wished I could make myself move. Sticky summer air pressed down on my body, settling into the same places the heat of cook fires had blasted earlier. I thought about stripping, but it was too much effort to reach the ties.

“Are you all right, Verel?” a raspy baritone asked. “I heard bloodcurdling screams from the direction of the kitchen.”

I sat up sharply, feeling hot in a third, not entirely unpleasant way. Delin stood in the stone archway, outlined by the moonlight–lean, perfectly proportioned, a face like rock. We had been friends for years, and when I first realized I was attracted to him, I had stared at that face, hoping to remind myself of our friendship in the familiarity of hazel eyes. Then I discovered I enjoyed staring too much.

“If you wish to know if there was blood in the red velvet cake,” I said, “the answer is yes. How else do you think I achieved that color?”

Delin laughed. “That will put me off my dinner.”

“Tell me about the feast,” I said.

He dropped on the well-trod dirt of the courtyard, absently fingering a hoof print. “The best of the known world–especially from the kitchen,” he added with a nod to me. “But all the guests were tense, trying to be better than their natures.”

“And…?” I prodded.

“Our visitors are beautiful, but not in the way of anything human,” he said. The excitement came off him in waves. I basked in it as I listened. “Their speech is–sometimes I cannot be sure it is words at all, and we choose to hear the familiar. The king tried to get them to agree to an alliance,” he continued. “But they said we were primitive and crude, with our iron weapons and our deafness to the natural world.”

“That was rude of them,” I said.

“No–they’re right.” Delin sighed. “But there’s hope. They want to take a few people with them, to live in their cities, learn their ways, and bring that wisdom back.” He fidgeted as if he could hardly hold the thought in. “I want to be one of them.”

My heart took a step off the castle parapet. “But people abducted in the past were gone for decades,” I said. “They left and returned only when their friends had become old and grey-” when I was old and grey, I wanted to shout, “-and the world they knew had crumbled to dust.”

“But young,” Delin countered. “And still with all the possibilities in the world to pursue. And the chance to see their home realm!”

“You’re needed here,” I said. I wasn’t sure who perturbed me more: Delin or these mysterious visitors. The question of the unknown and the imagined–cities of glass, places where everyone flew on gossamer wings; powers that could cure any sickness–was as heady as the king’s anniversary wine… but I was sobered by the idea of how much one would leave behind. Delin, apparently, had no such concerns.

“Needed?” He shook his head. “I’m the junior healer, and there are plenty of young faces waiting to replace me. Anyhow, it’s not assured. They want to pick from a group of candidates.” He slid forward, catching my hands. “I want you to come stand with me, Verel. For support, and maybe…” He hesitated.

It was foolish, but the little catch in his voice turned everything the other way around. He wanted me with him, and a journey into the unknown with a good friend–never mind more–was less daunting, even conceivable. As long as they let me cook, and who knew what arcane ingredients and obscure techniques the visitors might use for their food?

“Of course I will,” I said. Meanwhile, a portion of my brain wondered how long I could hold onto him before he noticed. I waited until the last to free my hands.

“Thank you,” he said. “I’ll feel better with someone I can trust at my side. Not so inclined to run away, maybe.” His smile was sheepish.

He was trying to make a joke, but he was anxious. “I will be there for you,” I said firmly. “Even if you run.”

He laughed. “With a show of confidence like that, Verel,” he said. “What could go wrong?”


The next morning, after a hectic breakfast, I hurried into the royal gardens. It was the pride of the kingdom, waterfalls of blossoming vines tumbling into lush beds. I hid myself behind a clump of rosebushes as the queen took the visitors on a tour. Clad in a velvet gown and with a silver circlet perched upon her brow, she carried herself with an air of majesty that paled next to the visitors.

Their skin was pale and soft, their forms–while human in shape–as thin and delicate as crystal. Their voices rang like bells and echoed inside my head. I wondered if they were speaking or somehow projecting their thoughts. They wore sleek white robes, but the whispers I heard among the servants indicated this was not the fashion of their kind. Perhaps they typically wore nothing.

The five visitors glided along in the queen’s wake. One seemed to be in charge; when he spoke or gestured, the others halted. I strained to overhear, but the only dialogue I caught was about the perfume of the flowers.

The smallest visitor turned her head in my direction. I jerked backwards into the bushes, cursing as my hand scraped on a thorn. I felt childish–but these beings seemed so ancient, how could one not be a child? To play at their feet seemed natural.

I withdrew, sucking at the line of blood on my hand. For as long as I could remember, we had seen signs of them: dancing lights on the horizon, intricate circles left in field and forest. Their only contact had been occasional abductions of our people. Now that they had shown themselves, there were more questions than answers–questions as basic as whether their kind had women and men. By appearance, they were neither, or perhaps I didn’t know what to look for.

As I approached the whiteblossom trellises at the garden gate, I saw Delin leaning against them. He huffed out a sigh. “Morning, Verel.”

“Everything all right?” I asked.

“Guard had a training accident this morning–patched up now. Messy, though.” He looked at me and smirked. “You’re bleeding. Your cooks are supposed to supply dye for the cake, not you.”

“I’ve got tastier blood.” He was too close; his slightly rapid breaths sent a shiver through me. To distract myself, I continued, “Are you sure you want to volunteer to go with the visitors? We know nothing about their intentions. They could mean to feast on us like cattle.”

“Seems a lot of trouble for a meal,” he said.

“No trouble too great,” I retorted.

Delin laughed. “I understand you: we have only their word they mean to help us. But there is no such thing as a one-way journey, Verel. Wherever they take us, we can return.”

I knew I should point out he was wrong, how many actions could not be undone, but I wanted to believe him. His face was luminous, inspired. I wobbled on the first step of my own one-way journey. A few fierce words would tell him how I felt.

The risks held me back. To lose a friend, to chance he would want nothing more to do with me and he would insist on making his journey alone… I couldn’t bear the thought.

I might not have a choice. Who was to say the visitors would want a cook, much less this one? We could be separated forever.

Would I tell him if those were the last words we would share? Would that make it easier or harder?

“Verel?” He tilted his head inquisitively. “You look concerned.”

“No salt,” I said. “I can’t work with bacon or most kinds of cured ham.”

“You could use me,” he offered. “I’m a ham.”

Did the man know what he was saying? I took an obscure comfort in the fact that if he had any clue of my feelings, he wouldn’t have bantered.

“But not cured,” I said. “Healers can’t cure themselves.” I paused. “If you change your mind about the visitors…”

“I won’t,” he said. “I was meant to do this. It’s destiny.”


The day of the visitors’ departure arrived more quickly than I had expected. Delin barged in on me wearing a frilly yellow court shirt, asked how he looked, and vanished before I could tell him the only possible description was bridal. I shook my head, changed into my second-best tunic–crimson with wide sleeves–and went out to catch him.

“They’ll choose you because they want to choose you–not because you look good,” I said.

“How do you know?” he asked.

“Because they’re not fools,” I answered. “If we’ve figured that much out, enlightened beings from the otherworld certainly have.”

Delin laughed. “I’m sorry, Verel. I’m being a clodpate about this.”

I clapped his shoulder. “Courage.”

We descended into the courtyard, where thirty-some people gathered to await the selection. Some were at the height of their field, honored warriors and the finest master of horse-flesh in six kingdoms. The royal party stood on a raised dais. By the king’s expression, he was not pleased by the potential for losing these paragons, but to object would risk offending his guests and the unknown bounty they might bestow.

Everyone tried to speak quietly, but voices echoed off the stone as if an entire city crammed into the courtyard. Softer whispers still pierced like the cries of hunted birds.

Delin craned his neck towards the archway into the great hall, the rust-dappled main gate winched up out of sight. “Can you see them?”

“Stand still,” I said.

The clock in the center tower of the castle chimed the hour. The scarlet-clad herald stepped forward and announced the visitors. Until that moment, I had not noticed they had no names–or none that they shared.

The five figures glided into view, their too-large eyes tranquil and impenetrable. They halted a few paces from the front of the crowd. Delin gripped my arm.

The king stepped forward on the dais. “These are the ones who dream of accompanying you to your other world,” he said. “Each choice will serve you in good stead.”

The visitors separated and moved through the crowd, sometimes close enough to touch but never speaking–their glances among each other as fluid as water and concealing thought like ocean depths. I felt as if I were drowning under a tide I could not even perceive. What were they thinking? Were they judging us? A prickle of indignation surged through me. By what right?

Delin gasped. “Verel…”

The little one stood in front of us. She–she? I might as well assume–was shorter than I had realized; I found myself looking down as her eyes turned up. I could have lost myself in that gaze, but I was also aware of Delin: quick, shallow breaths, the tension of excitement, the beating of his heart. I was in time with my old friend, waiting.

She lowered her gaze and walked away.

I stayed silent, not wanting to break the moment. He did, finally, puffing out a breath. “What just happened?” he asked.

“I have no idea,” I said.

The visitors converged in front of the crowd. Their leader spoke first, and it vibrated in my bones. “The older man on the end, with the crooked shoulder. You.”

Startled, then with a gap-toothed grin, the horse-master stepped forward. The king scowled, then schooled his expression.

Another visitor I arbitrarily thought of as female said, “The short young woman with the gold curls.”

One for each, then. Delin gripped my arm harder. I stepped on his foot. “Calm.”

The others chose in quick succession. Three stood there, then four.

The little one scanned the crowd–then looked again. She seemed to have trouble deciding.

The math dawned on me. If Delin went, he went alone. Part of me wanted to whirl and beg him not to accept if he was chosen–but what kind of friend would do that? Nor would a beloved try to keep him from going.

“The woman in the red tunic.”


The Left Fork

I froze, stunned – but I was the only female wearing red, and her gaze was direct. I turned to Delin in confusion.

He clasped my hands. “Go for both of us, Verel,” he said.

The chill of loss in his eyes burned away under complete trust. It was ridiculous, but in that fervent look I found all the encouragement I needed. His dreams sparked inside me, celestial fire.

The words rushed out. “I love you,” I said. Common sense asserted itself: why invite rejection when it was so close to not mattering, I could not expect anything from him when we would be worlds and centuries apart…

Delin leaned forward and brushed my lips in a quick kiss. It tasted of sunlight. Whispered breath. Medicinal herbs, tart, tangy and cutting through the senses.

Then over–too fast. “I’ll be here for you,” he said.

I wanted to protest, but could not find words. The horse-master pulled at my arm, and I found myself facing the alien visitors, massive dark eyes expectant. With their pale grey skin, spindly limbs and outsized heads, they should have been ugly, and yet the tranquility–and now, finally, the welcome–radiated from them like warmth, and it was impossible to notice anything else.

“We thank our hosts,” the leader said. “We shall take our leave of you now.”

“We hope this will be the start of a long and profitable friendship,” the king replied.

I pivoted and caught Delin’s eye in the crowd. The wistful expression that burst into a smile when our gazes met was fuel enough for a decade.

The visitors guided us to the clearing where they had left their sky-ship. It looked like nothing so much as two silver plates fused together, no sign of seam or rivet. As they approached, segments unfolded like opening hands to reveal a doorway.

“We travel as if we could catch light in its speed,” the little one explained. “You will not even feel the ship move.”

The gold-curled girl started to speak, then fidgeted silent. Our hosts ushered us inside. The interior of the ship was as featureless as its exterior, moonlight metal cocooning without reflection. The corridors were perfectly round, spiraling off in all directions like chambers of a honeycomb.

“Your quarters are here,” the leader said, leading us to an unadorned chamber. Bunks flowed out of the walls, pillowed with what looked like silk. “Make yourselves comfortable.”

“Where do we-” the horse-master began, but the door had closed–in fact, vanished, and we could not find it again.

It was the first sign that something was wrong.

The bedding was not silk, rather a strange, viscous substance that shaped itself to the sleeper and gave an uncomfortable sense of drowning. The alcove on one side of the room, with only two sapphire-blue buttons to distinguish it, dispensed a bland but edible food substance. I itched to improve the taste, but there was no seasoning to hand. We had no way of counting time as it passed. I wondered anxiously how long it had been for Delin.

“Maybe they aren’t used to having visitors,” the gold-curled girl said.

We slept, and when we awoke, the horse-master was gone. Our frantic arguments were interrupted by his piercing scream.

I swallowed hard as the sound was followed by another–the pitch, intensity and emotion in his voice varying like a morbid symphony. If there were words, distance and agony destroyed them. It stopped, and the silence brought an absurd hope.

Then it started again.

The third silence was longer. I couldn’t look at the others–to meet their eyes would be to realize it was more than a nightmare. Terror clutched me.

The door irised open. Two of the visitors stood there. My fury died before it could reach my body. What way did we have to resist them?

“We require another person,” one said.

I stepped forward before I knew I was going to. “Take me,” I said.

The door melted into the wall. I thought about fighting back, running, but there was nowhere to go. I thought of Delin, grateful he would never know what was behind his dreams–even if he waited forever.

I tried to distract myself from the crushing dread as we wound through the unending, spiraling corridors, walls pale as bone. It felt as if we circled forever, should have ended up where we started. “Why the charade?” I wondered. “Why not just take what you want?”

“Why work to steal the dregs when your best will volunteer?” the other figure said. “Every kingdom in your world will be eager to participate.”

“What did you do to the horse master?” I asked.

“We studied his physical reactions to assorted environmental stresses,” the first said. “Unfortunately, his system gave out.”

The fear vised around me, driving out thought. “Will you do the same to me?”

“Oh, no,” the first said. “Your tests will relate to mental and psychological stress. We’re fascinated to see how much your kind can handle.”

Whatever my strengths, I knew I wouldn’t make our destination. As I walked, it seemed I could feel the vastness of night beyond the ship, traveling through starlight without end.


The Right Fork

I glanced down the line and saw that, though three other men wore red as I did, there was only one woman, a wispy seamstress–and I couldn’t be mistaken for female.

The seamstress beamed as she stepped forward. I concentrated on not feeling relieved. I didn’t want Delin to sense it. The familiar kitchens for me, and I would keep my friend –

“And the tall man with the dark curls,” the little visitor finished.

I stared. Could she do that? Weren’t they each choosing one? But if that was the rule, the leader indulged her–maybe his daughter?–for there was no protest.

I thought Delin would leap out of his skin for happiness. He whirled, grabbing me in an exuberant bear-hug. “Wish me luck, Verel,” he said.

Now or never, I realized. Say what I had to say or never have a chance, keep it bottled up like sour poison until it faded–if it ever faded. Twice, I tried to speak.

“Good luck,” I said.

“I’ll be back,” he said. “And you’ll be the first person to hear about it.” Like a dream, he was out of my grasp.

“I’ll be here for you,” I muttered, knowing he couldn’t hear me. Coward. Fool. I branded myself and didn’t even feel it burn.

The fairy visitors waited expectantly as their chosen joined them. With their shining starlight skin, their ethereal frames and long tresses, they should have seemed like dolls, not people, yet a power radiated from them that was impossible to deny.

Delin turned on his heel and flashed me a final grin. I returned it, feeling the strain about my lips, and saw his expression flicker uncertainly.

Too late.

The visitors departed, taking their guests to the door in the mound that led through the veil. On the other side, a world I could only imagine–and might learn about someday, as an old man, hopefully with something to show for my years.

But I would never again have a heart.

I fled to the kitchen and poured my pain into a recipe. When I emerged from my personal ruin, I had a new dessert, and it could only have one name: Fairies’ Cake.

Whether due to inspiration or something intangible, Fairies’ Cake was good to the point of being addictive. People came from all directions for a slice–or a second. With success came some measure of fame: recognition, wealth, women… none of whom truly made an impression on me. In their very softness, I saw Delin and my own cowardice.

Whenever the will-o-wisps lights appeared on the horizon, I went out faithfully to watch them, waiting for the doorway to open. I wondered what marvels Delin had discovered in the otherworld and what wisdom he had gained, and I yearned for both in equal measure.

As years became decades, I had to face the thought he might have become so enlightened–like the visitors themselves–that he no longer wished to come home.

I hoped–I still hope–for his return, but mostly now I think of him as a man of their world, traveling through starlight without end.



Walking the Line

By Alexandra Grunberg

Eleanora was in trouble again, though “again” did not seem like the right word. It was more that she was constantly in trouble, and her mother’s familiar lecture chased her from her home. She had hoped to be alone, but despite the darkness and the unseasonable chilliness, she was not the only one out on Poetto Beach.

“Would you like some company?”

The boy was blond, and Eleanora preferred brown or black hair, but she was really not supposed to prefer any boy at all. If her mother saw her smile at him it would set off another lecture, but her mother was not here, so she smiled.

“I would love some company,” said Eleanora.

The light of the moon reflected on the water, the only light out tonight. Eleanora still sat on her hands, just in case, though there was nothing she could do about her hair. It probably looked wet.

It probably looked like she had taken a midnight swim. She probably looked very romantic, and the thought put a damper on her almost rising mood.

“You speak English very well,” said the boy.

“I speak many languages very well,” said Eleanora. “Italian, Sardinian, and some much older.”

“Latin?” asked the boy.

“Not Latin,” said Eleanora.

Even the name of the language left her mouth feeling singed. Which meant her mother was right.

If she kept slipping, there may be no coming back. Her mother said she had to stop kissing the boys, no matter how much she wanted them. Why did the boy have to initiate the kiss? Would it really make so much of a difference? Eleanora could not imagine that it would feel any different, that it would stop the changes taking place.

“It’s so beautiful here,” said the boy. “I wish I could stay.”

Eleanor wished that her smile was sharp spikes instead of these domesticated stubs that filled her mouth and demanded she abstain from raw flesh.

Her sisters, her mother, her grandmothers, they used to be feared, even worshipped. They still had happiness in the past, they still had their men, but they also had freedom, and power, and blood and the night. They did not have to go to school, what was school to the Gianes? There was no education that could not be learned from dancing along the salt lakes, that could not be tasted in a young man’s blood, or absorbed in his embrace. What was the world of mortals to a child who was neither fairy nor demon, a creature that walked the line between life and death, love and murder? Why did the generations that had gone before her deny Eleanora that pleasure?

“You could stay here a little longer,” said Eleanora. “Sometimes just a little longer is enough to make everything feel okay.”

The boy smiled and sat down on the sand next to her, and his body was warm, and she tried to want it, want it for her own selfish pleasure and her own feast, and not want it for company, for love, for family.

They were upsetting, intrusive thoughts.

If she were a true Giane, she would straddle him on this beach, she would tear out his heart, she would let his blood spray across her cheeks and breasts, and taste a salt like the ocean but richer. If she was a true Giane, she would push this boy away when he rested against her shoulder, like he did now, and flay him, expose him, devour him.

Eleanora told herself it was her mother’s lecture still ringing in her ears that stopped her. She told herself it was not her own will, but a decision that had been made long before she was born; to be weak, to be companions, to be loved. She told herself that if she ran the wild hills, if she saw the boats of men intent on tearing her island upside down, she would not have given in to their charms. She would not have given up her wildness for their children.

She had nearly broken through, so many times, so close that her nails were already curving into claws, her hair was already matting into scales that hung in rough curls down her back, and maybe if she kissed another boy so deeply again, her teeth would break the skin of her lips and she could run on the sand as more creature than girl. A part of her, bred so deep, so long ago, held off, did not want that abandon, did not want that wildness, and Eleanora could not will it to quiet its appeal for love, for comfort, for domesticity.

But it did not matter what she wanted, because the boy’s lips were her on hers, and his tongue was in her mouth. She did not initiate the kiss, but she could have pulled away. She could have, and she chose not to. Eleanora felt her mind filling with darkness and her mouth filling with spikes that did not break her own lips, but they did break the boy’s tongue.



Zombies Can’t Take the Train

By Greg Greenberg

Autobiographical Case Histories from the Abridged 2055 Multimedia History Project on the Plague Year: Documenting the Rapid Sclerosis Pandemic. Society for Research and Education of the Global Open Forum Recovery Group.

Case Contents: Selections from the subject’s journal and an interview with a surviving member of the fire and rescue squad that quarantined the subject.

Subject: Steven Smith. North American (Northeast Coastal Ecoregion) male Caucasian. Age 41 at time of infection in the city of New Haven on May 14, 2027.

Document Status: Except for bloodstains, the journal was unaltered when recovered. Society members have added footnotes. This document is a primary source for post-peak studies. A full copy of the journal and the interview auditory file are available at qqq.ccss.GOF.aubiohist for a small contribution to your community labor pool.

May 16, 2027

Two days ago, I woke up so numb that it was as if I floated over my bed. The morning sun highlighted Cindy’s slender figure and auburn hair as she looked down at me and her lips curled into an I’ve-been-naughty smile. Noticing her blood-speckled cheeks and the chewed-off stump where my left hand used to be, I rolled out of the bed. She laughed as I struggled to stand, unable to feel where my ass ended and the hard floor began. Freakazoiding, I fumbled into my super-sized safari suit and stumbled around the room searching for my boots, unsure when she’d get the Hunger again. I should’ve put her down, but I’d never killed anyone, just written about it. As I edged forward to grab my boots, located just under the bed, her emerald eyes twinkled and she picked up my index finger to suck the gristle off it in a provocative manner. The parasites that had begun to burrow along my neural pathways must have done more than cauterize my injury and numb my body. Although I was terrified, I was not angry. Instead of righteous rage, I felt that considering everything, it was nice of Cindy to remember that I was right-handed.

Pausing by the bedroom door, I stuffed the boots into the survival pack I’d placed there and turned back towards Cindy. As my eyes roamed over her perfections the last time, I blamed myself. Someone so beautiful and sweet wouldn’t throw themselves at an obese oddball who writes appliance manuals for a living. She tensed for a leap. I wriggled into my pack’s straps, breathed deep, and decided that I didn’t care why she’d given me the two best weeks of my life. It was okay if it wasn’t all the secrets and hopes we’d shared, that it was because parasites had transformed her from a reserved sociology graduate student into an insatiable seeker of sexual delights. Until the hunger for human flesh overcomes you, the disease monorails your desires, creating one maniacal need. For Cindy, I now knew that need was sex; for me, well, I missed my mom.

Cindy made her move. I slammed the door and yanked a couch in front of it. My asthma kicked in as I leapt down the stairs. While the couch scraped my hardwood floor, I unlocked my security gate and fumbled open the front door. I scurried outside as she pounded down the stairs. The gate clanged shut and the lock clicked into place behind me. Shouted pleas of, “Don’t desert me!” and “I’ll make everything right again,” issued through the gate. From one of my safari suit’s many pockets, I pulled an inhaler and puffed twice. Breathing again and relieved that Cindy was stuck behind security gates and window grills that I had the sole keys for, I rested against an elm tree. I was trying to ignore her pleas and assess my situation when a Golden Doodle dragged a human femur into the condo parking lot and began to bark at me. Afraid the noise would draw more feral frou-frou dogs or worse, I fled. My bare feet found every sharp pebble as I ran across the too-sunny lot and through the Guptas’ open backdoor. I said, “Oh…Oh no,” as I shut the door behind me. A bloody smear began on the kitchen floor, where little Sabita’s Cookie Monster doll lay abandoned, and ended at the backdoor.

Shaking my head, I walked through their glass and chrome living room and went upstairs to Ms. Gupta’s office. Her built-in shelves were stuffed with accounting books and Ganesh statues. I shook my pack off my shoulders, letting it fall onto the red shag carpet, and dropped into her swivel chair. My thoughts starting to race and my heart to pound — over Sabita and everything else — I pulled a Valium bottle from a shirt pocket and popped several. As I zoned out, I stared at a dancing Ganesh and wondered what he was so happy about.

An hour later, full consciousness came upon me like a slow-motion landslide. Hoping to avoid being buried by anxiety and despair, I decided to focus on the little things that I could control. My first decision was to stay the night. The numbness would soon wear off and I’d be at my most vulnerable. Anyway, before I traveled, I had to figure out how to lace my boots. Curious about what I would face later, I stood to look out the window. To do so, I leaned on the edge of the desktop with my bad arm. The desktop, a sheet of glass that sat on two chrome sawhorses, tilted. Not at my brightest, I watched everything on it slide onto the floor. As the sheet of glass began to move towards my mid-section, I came to my senses and removed my weight from it. The desktop slammed back down. I stared at it for a moment before blurting, “What the what,” as I stood to jerk the blinds open.

My guilt for messing up Ms. Gupta’s office evaporated upon looking outside. Shattered storefront windows lined State Street and a telephone pole topped with ax heads leaned against the wall of Inner Peace and Extreme Survival Studio. It was as if a giant had sucked up mailboxes, trees, signs, cars, and human beings, chewed them up, and spit them back out. Drums, saxophones, and guitars strewn near Dr. Katz’s Animal Clinic stirred memories of the early plague days: endless awful singing by Western civilization’s worst creation, the pop-star wannabe, that was intermittently interrupted by elderly country bands and cheerleader squads. It was like living on the American Idol1 set. Too scared to go out, I kept my crank radio blaring. Intrepid reporters, or Compulsives trying to be reporters, described all-night baseball and midnight gardening, acts of altruism and awfulness, impossible scientific and artistic projects, and entrepreneurs catering to desperate Compulsives. Those Compulsives included computer gamers seeking electricity, shoppers frantic to discover bargains, foodies searching for five-star meals, and what should have been a warning to me, lovers hoping to find their last love. The radio reports all noted the Compulsives’ perseverance, no matter their injuries. However, when enough time passed the parasites changed all the Compulsives into Eaters, just as they had transformed Cindy.

A salty taste filled my mouth as I sat back down and pressed my eyes shut. Still numb, I’d bitten my lip to try to block memories of what came next, when the Eaters finished off most of the remaining Compulsives and yet-to-be-infected Cleans. No matter my efforts, memories of those horrific days swarmed into my mind, days in which I’d shut off the radio and tried to imagine that my condo was a pocket universe. It had been impossible. The end of the world made it through the walls of the basement safe-room I huddled in: the sirens, shots, and horrific screams. Later, it smelled like I was stuck in a busted freezer filled with sour milk and rotten meat. A shameful combination of cowardice and selfishness prevented me from helping anyone. The terror and guilt were worse than the discomforts: eating raw pasta and potatoes to save Sterno; creeping around the condo to maintain my rainwater collection system and chemical toilet; being unable to phone, text, or Facebook; not bathing or shaving; wearing dirty clothes; and missing therapist appointments.

I opened my eyes and spewed bloody spit on Ms. Gupta’s desk. To address my ever-multiplying psychological needs all I could do was to scribble in this journal. Writing fiction was no longer an option since the only thing I’d ever written were stories of post-apocalyptic heroes and I wasn’t being one. Nothing had happened like my survivalist stories, which consisted of macho cleverness and a lack of gun-control laws. Even my self-published masterpieces, Tales of the Rescue of a Techno Maiden and The Parking Garage Pirates of Putnam Street, didn’t hint at the traumas and tedious drudgery of actual survival. I thought I wrote the stories because they immersed me in a world in which no one told you what to do and where you were special just because you had survived. Remembering that Cindy had broken through that thin explanation, I used my hand to wipe the blood off my chin and stood to check on her.

With my binoculars, I left the office and walked across the landing and into the master bedroom. Dr. Gupta’s shriveled remains were on an oak four-poster bed; an empty hypodermic needle dangled from his withered arm. While I examined him, I thought about the big Texan “howdy” he always greeted me with and how he loved to grill shitake mushrooms or Tandoori chicken on summer Sunday afternoons. Now I’d never be able to pay him back for the time he drove me to the hospital after diagnosing my hernia. I yanked the blanket, to try to roll him up in it. He fell with an unpleasant thump onto the floor. After several deep breaths, I threw the blanket over him and went to the window, unsure of what I’d do when my sense of smell returned.

I peered through the Venetian blinds and saw that Cindy had opened all my drapes. But why? With my binoculars, I saw why, and shouted, “Shit soup!” Still undressed, she was emptying my cupboards of their delicacies. Done, she lopped the tops off Apple Jacks, Fruit Loops, and Cap’n Crunch boxes2 with my samurai knife and leaned back to empty one box after another into her mouth. My eyes teared up as Cindy’s curvy figure was outlined in a candy-colored shower of sugary treasure; beautiful blissful bits of sweetness bounced off her and onto the ungrateful kitchen tiles. My stomach lurched each time she slammed an eight pound can of chocolate syrup against a counter edge, only stopping when the priceless chocolate sprayed the kitchen and herself. In silent shock, sweat dripping from under my arms, I watched her lift the huge sharp-edged container to her delicate lips. Her small mouth filled with the life-giving liquid; it flowed down her cheeks and cascaded like a slow-motion velvety waterfall down her neck, chest, and legs, to pool at her feet. The food-massacre went on for what seemed forever — a bottle of peppermint schnapps tasted and spilled, Slim Jims bitten and discarded, Hostess Cup Cakes sampled, a bag of pork rinds scattered after one bite, a gallon jar of maraschino cherries smashed, creating a blood-red tide that flowed across the kitchen floor. With each wasted calorie, primordial pain flowed through my veins and the temptation to save my darlings increased. She attacked my favorites, yanking the tops off a row of small, colorful boxes and ripping open the shiny packages within to stuff their contents into her face. Prefab pastries of every flavor fragmented and fell, surrounding her with what looked like the remnants of a bombed paint factory. I cried out in disbelief, “The bitch is eating my Pop-Tarts!” However, I knew she wasn’t enjoying her last lucid moments, that she wanted me to end her suffering. Cindy was past the Compulsive stage, during which one has some normal desires, and was experiencing a hyper-aggressive form of Alzheimer’s. I wanted to retrieve the Glock in my pack. But how do you shoot someone, especially Cindy? When she collapsed to the kitchen floor — now a sweet swamp with islands of cans, boxes, and bottles — and sobbed, I decided to do it. I loved her too much to let her suffer and I’d promised her I’d do it.

I need to stop writing, even though the sun is up and I haven’t finished telling you about the two worst days of my life. I bet you also want to know how I’ll reach Mom. Don’t worry, I have a plan. But I can’t tell you now. I need to eat my last two packets of freeze-dried ice cream and cry a little. Writing about everything helps, but, can only do so much.

May 17, 2027

Last night as I tried to sleep, I kept asking myself the same question. Why at the headwaters of the river of causality had I made a decision that resulted in my beaching on such a barren island? Why, after preparing for disasters my whole life did I waste all my efforts in one moment of weakness? Yes, it was weakness, not an inner core of altruism and bravery, as I wrote May 1st. I didn’t rescue Cindy that day. Okay, the real reason: thirty days was too long to be lonely. How else to explain why I didn’t ignore her shouts, like I had so many others, why I put the book down I was reading, He’s My Daughter/She’s my Son: A Hermaphrodite’s Story, and why I turned off my radio, which was blaring out static-filled status reports on safe zones and hot spots. My heart leapt, when I peeked out my window and recognized a not-so-friendly face, Cindy from my writers’ group. A calm person, she was shouting in bullet-like sentences while striding back and forth across my parking lot, her long auburn hair waving behind her. “Is anyone out there that can help me?” “I’m clean.” “Come on look at me.” “No bite marks. Nothing.” Her hoarse voice suggested a ragged tiredness underlay the confidence her face conveyed.

My decision to open the door was rationalized by a fiery red miniskirt and a ripped black-lace blouse, which revealed a pink polka-dotted bra. It was hard to connect this woman, who resembled the languid femme fatale in The Lethal Enigma,3 with the straight-laced woman I met in my writers’ group every other Tuesday. That was a woman who always criticized my work for “having too high a death toll” and at our last meeting got personal with, “Yet another rescue fantasy? Who are you trying to rescue?” I didn’t rescue Cindy, except from an itch. She didn’t cling to me. And I didn’t shoot down six empty-eyed Eaters with the smooth professionalism of a paid assassin as I wrote earlier. Instead, with the unimaginable firing up my imagination, I opened my security gate and front door and pointed the Glock in my trembling hand in her general direction. I now understand that the relief that flashed across her face was that of an addict finding a fix.

She swaggered toward me, sweaty hair half-obscuring her face, and said the wrong thing, “Well hello hello Stevie wonders, wondering, wondrous. Looks like you lost a little weight.”

Silent, I backed up into my shadowy and musty living room and motioned her toward the door with the Glock. I slipped on a stack of Wasteland and Last Scout comic books. As I steadied myself, she disappeared from view. Moments later, she was framed in the bright light of my doorway; one hand held a pink Hello Kitty4 pack, and the other, two Tasers. Shaking hair out of her face she said, “You must have gotten awfully lonely in there.”

“Don’t like getting to know people too much. They turn out to be strangers.”

She stuffed the Tasers into her pack and strolled into my condo. I had her shut my door and security gate and waved her toward my lumpy orange couch. My wave was too hard and my grip on the Glock too loose as the gun flew halfway across the room. It landed with a clang among my retro-robots, the ones on my mantelpiece, not those scattered among three bookcases that held science fiction and survivalist magazines or the two Japanese Monster Robots that bracketed my flat screen on its IKEA5 resting place. As I retrieved the gun, she giggled, “Well I guess you already have company.”

I sat down on my La-Z-Boy recliner. “Guess I do. So, what happened?”

After slipping off her tennis shoes and tube socks, she plopped down at one end of my couch, positioning her long legs in front of her to sit cross-legged. I relaxed into my recliner but kept the Glock pointed at her. Bits of orange panty made sneak appearances as she told a story of hiding out in the social science building’s snack shop with six other sociology grads. Taking a breather, she leaned forward too much for my comfort and picked at her toes. “We were a great team…even held off a stray political science prof and a raggedy bunch of econ grads with homemade shivs, fire extinguishers, and a projectile weapon made from soda fountain parts. But the soda-syrup, candy bars, and other treats ran dry. We had to forage. It was crazy awful. The airdrops never worked out. Poor Frank and I were the last ones. Only been three days, but it seems so long ago. We’d gone into the pharmacy on Orange Street to get an edge. But it’d already been emptied — except for one of them.”

Pressing her lips together, she got a faraway look.

“You okay?”

“Poor Frank was just too tired, too hungry, too everything.” Her eyes watered and voice trembled. “Brought down by a…an old woman. Her skimpy bunny outfit and walker caused him to let his guard down, even though I—” She pressed her face into her hands and began to cry. “Such a waste…He would have been…He was beautiful and brilliant…a whole new understanding of social change…” Looking up at me, she pleaded, “Why him?” and then bawled.

Cindy could have told me that her fairy godmother had rescued her and I would have believed it. She appeared more than clean and I couldn’t survive another day alone. Hoping to provide comfort, I went and hugged her. She rested her head on my shoulder as she held me. When her sobbing stopped, she released me and wiped her face. “Thank you.”

Not knowing how to respond and wanting to hide the embarrassing physical reaction I was suffering from, I scooted away from her. She reached over and put her hand on mine, the one that still held a gun and giggled, “Let’s make love not war.”

And then she unfastened the top button of her blouse.

And the button below it.

Not until her blouse and bra were on the floor and she was sliding off her underwear did I cry, “Stop it. You don’t have to do that.”

She just smiled and stood on the couch so as to pull her skirt over her smooth hips.

“Really. It’s okay,” I mumbled as her skirt joined her blouse and underwear.

Still smiling, she said, “It will be,” and pushed me down into the couch. Her lips began to playfully nip and nibble mine. I dropped the gun, which clunked on the floor, as her sweet, salty tongue slid into my mouth and all her softness pressed against me. My jeans soon covered the gun and I was gripping the couch. Above me, Cindy moved upward and downward, surging and swaying. As we bobbed and groaned, I attempted to keep up, not to sink under the waves of unbearable pleasure. I was about to scream when she stopped moving and we tensed up. Still in a state of disbelief, I experienced a spasm of release. She pecked my cheek and gasped, “Glad we’re past that,” and zonked out on top of me. As I maneuvered from under her, she muttered, “Don’t go, Frank.” Covering her with my winter jacket, I noticed a nasty scab on her back. However, I shut it out of my mind and went to eat a celebratory Pop-tart (strawberry).

If Cindy was infected, she couldn’t help being post-truth. But was it all a lie? Everything that she said? Did she seek me out, knowing from my stories that I was a survivalist? Had she even dressed like something on the cover of a post-apocalyptic pulp novel because I’d go for that? I’ll never know. I had suspicions that I put aside — well that I burned, hung, poisoned, ran over, shot, and drowned — as she fulfilled fantasies that I didn’t even know that I had. No matter why she did so much for me, she made me feel whole for the first time in my life. And she is someone I still can’t stop loving.

May 18, 2027 [Ed note: Dates are the time of journal entry and not of events.]

So, what happened to Cindy? For another hour, I watched her cry while I planned how to end her suffering. When she rubbed a broken bottle’s jagged edges against her wrist, guilt ricocheted inside me like shrapnel, tearing me apart. Moments later, my missing hand tingled and the nauseating smells of my decomposing neighbor overwhelmed me. I dug my nails deep into my surviving palm. “Oh Cindy. I’m so sorry,” I said as my missing hand became a disorganized tableau of sensations: kisses, ice water, bee stings, a soothing massage, cigarette burns, cramps, crawling ants, electric shocks, and spilt milk. I fell to the floor and whimpered, “I shouldn’t have waited.” Endless grunts and groans passed my lips. Knowing that the plague was rewiring my stump, desensitizing it, so I’d be a high-functioning disease vector, didn’t help. My clothes soaked with sweat and, the sensory symphony unfinished, it was sweet relief to pass out.

I woke sprawled on the bathroom floor, unable to remember how I got there. The medicine cabinet’s contents surrounded me; so, using the light of the setting sun, I applied disinfectant cream and layered gauze over my now desensitized stump. As I worked, I tried to leapfrog the stages of grief, to accept that never again would I nibble a sweet Pop-tart, sink my teeth through the downy rose-orange skin of a ripe peach and into its juicy flesh, or suck out the fatty head meat of a garlic-soaked shrimp. Upon realizing that I’d also never get a creative writing degree, reach the next level of Warlords,6 or attend another meeting of the Vintage Robot Collectors Association, I soon needed the gauze to wipe my tear-coated face.

With much gauze wasted, I returned to the office and found the rum bottle in my pack. After taking a long swig from it, I sat on the floor and grumbled, “Okay, no more bummering. Not about the future, food, or your left hand. Nada.” I also decided not to attempt the stages of grief again. Something would turn up and all that mattered was seeing Mom one last time. Feeling better, but missing Mom, I had an idea. Last week, a Caribbean shortwave station reported that a rescue train would soon come south from Boston, the one Clean city in the northeast. When it stopped in New Haven, I’d pass as a Clean and hop on. Knowing I was going to Wilmington,7 to Mom, I fell into a coma-like sleep on the office floor, an empty bottle in my hand and happiness in my heart.

Morning sunlight poured through the office window. I turned my pounding head away from the light, groaned, “Pleasssse, no. Ohhhhhh,” and spewed my liquid dinner. Done, I staggered to the bathroom. There, I wiped debris out of my itchy beard and scooped water out of the toilet tank with a toothbrush mug until I was semi-functional. As I did so, I cursed any surviving University of Wisconsin biomarketing professors. If they’d followed lab-animal protocols I could have avoided this opportunity for personal growth and discovery. I then redressed my wound, hid it in a towel sling, and prepped for going to the train station. All I could think about while I worked was Mom — how much I missed her, whether she was okay, and how fantastic it would be to see her again.

That afternoon, I stepped into State Street’s pungent air wearing my safari suit, thick glasses, and badly-tied boots. A piercing shriek came from the direction of Whitney Avenue. I tightened the grip on my Glock. The knowledge that I would see Mom if I could make it to the train station steadied me. Swallowing hard, I stumbled towards it through swarms of flies that had gathered to feast on my former neighbors. Their faces and bodies were swollen or caved in by rot and ecosystems of insects clustered in body cavities that shouldn’t have existed. Other neighbors had become dried-up and moldy husks that sun-faded clothing still clung to. My stomach turned and I dry heaved. However, I forced myself to look around. Each block had just five or six corpses, but they seemed countless. The Eaters had also left behind what I hadn’t noticed from the Guptas’ window, scatterings of chewed-over bones. Tiny scraps of clothing, which still blew around, stuck to everything, as if a confetti-filled parade had passed by.

Even before I noticed the eyes of several well-fed, feral cats tracking me, my sense of solidity had faded. Except for the Compulsives’ creations, it was like being in every post-apocalyptic movie I’d ever watched. Those creations included a Last Supper mural made from Tupperware on a Catholic church’s doors; a fifteen-foot8 beer-bottle sculpture of a movie zombie holding a red umbrella in front of an insurance agency; a gallows built of books in front of Never Ending Bookstore; and a giant bird nest on top of the Su Casa Realty office.

Halfway to the train station, in front of a burned-out animal hospital, I slid to the ground next to a pajama-clad man with missing legs. Overwhelmed by awfulness and fear, I said, “Sorry to bother you, dead guy,” and closed my eyes. After several moments of dark despair, I resolved that for Mom, I’d be a real man, like those in my stories. Upon opening my eyes, I turned away from the dead guy so I wouldn’t see his stumps again. A mannequin in a hairdresser’s broken window caught my eye. Its braids reminded me of how Cindy would twist her hair and stare into space after our sensual sessions. My stomach pretzeled into a ball of knots as I recalled what I’d told her a week after she arrived.

We’d finished a breakfast of canned fruit, animal crackers, and turkey-jerky and were in bed planning our day, i.e., reading The Optimistic Sexual Manual: Techniques for Doubtful Lovers. I had on boxers and she wore one of my white oxford button-down shirts, which wasn’t much buttoned. She gently pushed the book down and kissed my forehead. “Stevie sweetie, I need you to promise me something.”

“Hunh?”

“Just promise if I ever get the munchies well you’ll, you’ll…You know…”

I took her hand. “Don’t be silly. We’re safe here.”

“Nowhere is safe!” She sat up and turned to stare at the wall. “Don’t you understand? We’re never going to be safe.” Tears began to run down her face. It seemed as if all the beauty inside of her was washing out of her swollen eyes.

Fumbling for something to say, I hugged her as she started to sob. When she gasped for breath, I released her and said, “Look at me. No, look at me!”

Quieted down, she turned in my direction.

“Hey. Don’t worry. We’re going to be fine. But if anything happens to you, I promise I’ll do it,” I said, thinking it would never be necessary.

Her shoulders relaxed and she gave me a shy smile. “All right, but you have to triple swear on your mom’s life that you’ll—”

“I told you I’d do it.” Speaking at a rapid clip, I continued, “And anyway, she was always like that fish that escapes the pot to land in the frying pan, or fire, or to land— or whatever. Who knows what hap— She’s might not even be around anymore to swear on.” After pausing for oxygen, I snapped, “I triple swear though!”

Cindy wiped her tear-smeared face and began to giggle. Her mirth built to deep full-bodied laughs that shook her so much she gripped my arm to steady herself.

“Hey. What’s so funny?” I scooted toward the edge of the bed. “You going to stop?”

Still laughing, she pulled me back. “Don’t you see, your stories…you always subjected our group to”–she caught her breath–“were wish-fulfillment fantasies? We kept complaining and you kept rescuing your mom.” Striving to suppress her merriment, she added, “I’m sorry; I shouldn’t laugh. I’m not being nice. So, what happened?”

Instead of answering, I jacked myself out of the bed. As I left the room, she got all sugary. “Oh come on Stevie sweetie. We all have our foibles. There’s no fixation that can’t be fixed. I can help.”

I slammed the door and went to the kitchen. And soon chilled. Cindy was the first person who had centered their world around me, pampering me in countless ways — from keeping me well fed to short-circuiting my funks. And the more I considered my stories, the more I knew she was right. When I decided to tell her the thing I did to Mom, what my therapists hadn’t dug out of me, I knew I loved her.

Sitting back on the bed, I gifted her some high-end biltong that I had retrieved. She accepted it with a smile. Ready to talk but unable to speak, I chewed on the jerky. Chunks of ugly memories that had been decaying in some dark unvisited part of my mind had been knocked loose and were crashing through my head. When they settled down, I teared up. Cindy took hold of my hand and kissed my cheek. “Sweetie, whatever it is, you’ll be all right.”

Before I could change my mind, I told her about the guerrilla war I’d waged against Mom’s love life. That war started with a campaign of passive aggression, a year after Dad took off to Montreal with my elementary school French teacher. It ended when I turned seventeen and retreated to Michigan. When I spit it all out, even how I hadn’t spoken to Mom since I’d run away, I knew I was an idiot. Mom wasn’t the problem. She didn’t need to be saved for being a human being. Grief-ridden by guilt, I tried to puzzle out why I’d warped my life. Rather than come up with answers, I felt like Fuzzy — our giant Calico cat — the time I’d cleaned her and by mistake grabbed the bottle of cat repellant instead of shampoo. For the first time, I wanted to apologize to her (Mom, not Fuzzy). However, given the plague, I couldn’t do anything. Cindy held me while I cried without tears. Later, we did things that helped me forget.

As I broke off eye contact with the mannequin and stood, I decided to keep my promise to Cindy. However, I couldn’t turn towards home. The feeling that I might miss the train and not see Mom was too much. My churning thoughts prevented me from noticing a desiccated, bald man — who wore rainbow tennis shoes and a purple Speedo — tearing toward me. He locked me in his arms before I could react. I dropped my gun and struggled as he tightened his arms around my too-large torso. He seemed to be deciding whether or not to snack on my neck when he released me and shouted, “Tell everyone, Mr. Quigley hugged you.” As I retrieved my gun, he slipped out of sight. Popping a Valium, I clambered into an empty SUV9 that had slammed into a Wok and Roll. After removing my pack, I lay down on the back seat. That my vision was limited to the roof and floor of the car, on which a teddy bear and a Miss Piggy doll embraced, allowed me to imagine that I was in a plague-free world until my back hurt.

May 19, 2027

Upon ditching the SUV, I shifted to aliens-have-arrived mode: run-like-mad, hide, scan-for-danger, and repeat. Soon all my muscles cramped up and there was more hiding than movement. When I reached the train station the sun was setting and I was drenched in sweat. Seeking shelter and a place to wait for the train, I tried to break into Peter Pan’s Liquorland, across the street from the station. Unsuccessful, I crept into Pete’s Pipes next door and failed to stifle a scream. The headshop was filled with the fetid chaos of what looked like a complex murder-suicide pact. A pack of hipsters, at least one a Compulsive, had used knives, ropes, pulleys, buckets, and two homemade seesaws to implement the pact. With death dancing in my head, I backed out and hobbled a half a block further to a public housing complex.10

The Art Deco building’s doors were unlocked, so I ducked inside and flashed my light around the foyer. It had institution-green walls, gray linoleum floors, and faded message murals about “conflict resolution” and “healthy eating”. Hoping I wouldn’t regret it, I picked some chains off the floor to lock the doors. Doing the task right with one hand was like solving one of those 3D brainteaser puzzles. My brain wasn’t up to the challenge cause every few minutes I thought I heard company. I would grab my gun and as I did so, the flashlight would slip out of my sling. Not able to see anything but the floor, I’d babble, “Shit, shit, shit,” drop the gun so as to pick up the flashlight and jam it back into my sling, and then pick the gun up. Things got so tense that I took several spontaneous bathroom breaks.

When I finished locking the doors, I dragged myself up five flights. My steps and groans seemed to echo and a strong odor of a chemical disinfectant irritated my nostrils. At the end of a hallway, I downed three packets of dehydrated chicken soup with stale water from my canteen. The thought that I was closer to Mom eased my mind as I put my gun and glasses within reach. Too exhausted and sore to be scared or care why the place lacked graffiti, trash, and cigarette butts, I sprawled out on the hallway floor and crashed.

The next morning, gun ready, I crept through dim hallways that were only lit by the small windows at their ends. As I did so, I knocked on random doors with my left elbow and shouted, “Hello is anyone home?” or “Come on out. It’s safe.” None of the doors I knocked on were unlocked. I was about to give up when on the eighth — and top — floor, I came upon King Solomon’s Mines of cleaning supplies. The hallway was a hygienic trail of squeegees, brushes, sponges, brooms, paper towels, mops, dusters, and bottles of detergents. At the trail’s end, there were three shotguns, boxes of shells, a set of master keys, and a scribbled note under a half-empty whiskey bottle. I slumped to the ground and read it.

This divine Buildings is this old ladies only baby. Don’t you dear defiles its hallways else I’m coming backs for you and I’ll kill youse and when your deads I’ll kill youse again worse and all youse descendants. Kept the human vermins and any refugees out with only three shotguns and the helps of those two sweetfellows in 2B. Got a lot easier when the vermins all turns on each others like starving rats. Ain’t no guest hidings here anymore either. Couldn’t risk them messin my baby after I works so hard to get it just right. Took care of that problems even the sweeties with some really strong tea. Only things you needs to do each day is…

After too short a relationship with the whiskey bottle, I took the keys and found the apartment with the best view of the train station. Nothing else mattered but making sure I was on my way to Mom, not the saggy furniture, the soiled-diaper-and-empty-beer-can-littered floor, or the dirt-streaked white walls decorated with pictures of rustic boats torn from a 2026 Newport11 Rhode Island Services Club calendar. I barricaded the apartment door and sat in front of the dead TV to rest and mourn my plague-killed TV companions. Half an hour later, a horrifying odor overwhelmed the smells of stale smoke, sour laundry, and soiled diapers that permeated the apartment. Through a smudged window, I watched five chem-suited men carry body parts from the train station and toss them on a bonfire in the middle of State Street while ten men armed with machine guns stood guard. When I slid the window open I heard one of the chem-suited men shout, “I always get the screwy jobs!” Many of the other men yelled unintelligible taunts at him. Although the fire and rescue squad would make life difficult, I was happy because their arrival meant the train would soon come.

My days since I found apartment 4E have been wonder-filled — wondering why I hurt Mom and whether the train would arrive before what happened to Cindy and too many others happened to me. My therapist told me to, “confront my anxieties in productive ways,” but there’s no useful way to confront that anxiety. When I wasn’t writing in this Clash of Civilizations12 notebook, I did try to tackle my other anxieties though. I scavenged for food, finding eight cans of gourmet cat food (meaty bits in gravy), four cans of chicken soup (alphabet), two boxes of macaroni and cheese (deluxe), a bag of gummy worms (sour), a jar of pickles (half-sour), and minty bathroom bounty. I also constructed early-warning systems in the hallways: precarious piles of hair dryers, cutting boards, fruit bowls, bathroom scales, romance novels, sexual aids, and other necessities of daily living. Now with every noise, adrenaline shoots through my veins and I cower in some corner, trying not to whimper, as I cradle my gun and think what could be my last thoughts.

Mostly, I’ve been observing the fire and rescue squad, which is more fire than rescue. While they brought back three skeletal survivors, who they half-carried into the fortress-like police station down the street, six times they returned with a mindless Eater. The first time they brought back an Eater, I didn’t put my binoculars down and walk away from the window, like I did every time after. Rather with growing disbelief, I watched them remove the Eaters’ hood to reveal a face twisted into bleak malice. As the Eater struggled, snapped his teeth, and screeched in frustration at being unable to partake of the plentiful food that surrounded him, the squad performed officious and empty bureaucratic rituals. The rituals ended with a medieval treatment, a fiery “cure,” the burning alive of an ill human being. I know he was human in those last moments not because I saw on his face expressions of pain, and even fear, but because only a human can scream in a way that lasts forever in your head.

Each sleepless night, their never-extinguished bonfire cackles and the dancing shadows on the walls remind me of my possible fate. However, knowing I’m going to see Mom, that I just need to catch a train, allows me to endure the unendurable. Right now, though, I’m so damn hungry, I could boil out the tanning chemicals in the leather jacket that I grabbed from 7C, eat insects, or set rat traps. I don’t remember all of that survivalist shit though. What am I going to do? I know. I’m going to starve!

Okay, I feel better after a Valium and buffering my stomach acids with a chapter of Lost Towns and Cities: Climate Change’s Canaries in a Coal Mine. It wasn’t a good book. I’ll figure out something else to eat. No matter how disgusting, dangerous, or unsanitary, I’ll eat it, if it means being with Mom. Oh man, how I need to see her. Except for food, it’s all I want. Enough scribbling. The squad went hunting, so I’m going out as well.

May 20, 2027

Yesterday, I stepped onto an outside stairwell and surveyed the neighborhood. My mind was like a mob in a burning theater, a disorganized collection of panicky thoughts seeking an exit. I clutched a railing and stared at the train station, willing a train to appear. When that didn’t work and I couldn’t remember anything from the online “Edible Weeds” course I’d taken, I huffed my way down State Street away from the police station and toward a string of brightly-colored fast-food restaurants.13 Too hungry to care about what might lurk behind the smashed-up cars and storefronts along the silent street, I paused to read a poster on a bus stop. Its large title read, “Vaccinations for Cleans and a Cure for Compulsives.” Reassuring words filled it and someone had scribbled the fire and rescue squad’s address on its corner in red ink. When I rushed on, I wondered why they’d try such an obvious technique for catching and killing Compulsives before they became Eaters.

My hopes for empty calories burst upon seeing the shattered windows, pockmarked walls, and the spent shell casings of every size that littered the ground like autumn leaves from an alien foliage. The way the countless decaying bodies of the National Guard troops and New Haven’s finest were arrayed suggested the restaurants kept changing hands till there were no more delicacies to fight over. I considered turning myself in to the squad. Maybe they’d let me call Mom before they grilled me. However, I wanted to see and hold her. So, with memories of the savory tastes of KFC’s fried chicken stirring my stomach, I checked for other customers and stepped over shattered glass.

For three hours, I searched the restaurants’ remains, in constant fear that Eaters or armed men would appear. All I found was a brick of green cheese and several squashed tater tots. Feeling sorry for myself, I stretched out on the cool kitchen floor of Thai Tanic. A yellow glint caught my eye and my hopes soared. I reached under a deep fryer to tap the huge, sunny pineapple can. My mouth watering, I shouted, “At last!” After finding an electric can opener, I dizzily smashed the can open with it and fingered the golden treasures into my mouth. An acid reflux attack interrupted my meal. Seeking water to cool my burning throat, I collided with a cash-stuffed grocery sack as I tore outside. Hundred-dollar bills scattered across the floor.

Near Dunkin Donuts, I found a water-filled pothole besides a battered Ford truck with a .50 caliber machine gun mounted on its bed. While drinking from the pothole, I again had thoughts of giving up. They were interrupted by a distant shout of, “Hey kids, pick up the pace!” Struggling into the truck’s bed, I slipped off the bumper and tried to grab something with my missing hand. My chin hit the truck’s tailgate and my glasses flew. Pain shot through my jaw and everything was a fuzzy morass as I scraped my back stuffing myself under the truck with frog-like leg thrusts. Blurry men moved toward me and the smell of gasoline and burnt rubber filled my nose. I reached for my gun but my arm couldn’t reach to a Thai Tanic countertop — so I played dead. It’s easier in concept than execution as I’m not good at hiding from armed men in tight spaces. My cheeks twitched and I hyperventilated as I resisted fishing in my pockets for a Valium.

Two white blobs trailed the rest of the men. One droned, “…best that I can do. You try walking in this wacked get up. I’m wiped. Can’t we break? I need a drink. I feel like a—”

A khaki haze interrupted, “Hey Joey it wouldn’t be such a bitch if you stopped bitchin.”

Although they paused only feet away, I strained to see the hooded figure between the blobs — who jerked around like a puppet. I begged the gods that it wasn’t Cindy. Seeing her would send me on a guilt-powered-jetpack ride to the realm of madness. The spot of purple in the middle of a pale pink blur suggested the Eater was Mr. Quigley. Relief filled me, but it was hard to process that a man who’d hugged me, no matter how oddly, would soon be cured.

The Joey-blob’s shouted response, “Screw you!” brought me back to the present. “No, Really, Screw you! I want to barbeque this Zombie now! He won’t be as hard to handle. Fuck, yeah!” Legs moved in all sorts of confusing ways.

A scout-master voice yelled, “That’s enough! Take a break Joey. Relax. The rest of you lay off him.” After a pause, he continued, “Just sit down; it’s going to be fine. Could someone tase our friend before he gets lost?” There was loud clicking and Mr. Quigley fell several feet away. “Joey, maybe you want to holster that gun.”

“Why? It all sucks. Today. Every Day!”

“Yep. But you’re still squawking, screwing, eating, and shitting so count yourself lucky. Sit down.”

“But it’s not fair.”

“Nothing is. Just sit the hell down and we’ll talk about it.”

“And your gun, Joey.”

“Oh yeah.”

“That’s good, very good. No one is trying to break your balls. It’s just your crap luck to be a doughboy when there’s a do-the-tests-while-they’re-still-biting reg. The regs — health regs, test regs, clean-up regs, even the sittin-on-the-can regs — they’re what keeps us civilized. And if that don’t make you stand up and salute, if we disobey them regs, CO will put all our asses in a decoy squad so fast you won’t even have time to give your sweetie a goodbye flyby.

The only sound was the wind blowing debris down the street. Then, the rest of the squad began to murmur. The Joey-blob stood and hit the truck I was hidden under — three times. While it silenced them, I had to give it my all to suppress a shriek. My heart pounded in my ears like a Banger band as the Joey-blob moved away, kicking something that clattered. With a sinking feeling, I realized that that something was my glasses.

“Okay, Joey, you got your shit together?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“Do you? Cause, if you don’t you’ll be walking your ass home. So, do you?”

There was a half-hearted, “Yes, sir.”

“Okay, he’s a new man. Enough lollygagging everyone.”

Anger almost beat out fear as the squad left. I wanted to shout, “They’re sick people, not monsters!” Instead, I stayed stone silent, wondering how I had even considered asking them for help.

When I tried to writhe from under the truck, it felt like its weight was crushing me and I remembered a news story I’d read. It was about thieves trapped in chimneys. They all suffocated because their lungs couldn’t expand. After a panic attack, I figured a way to wedge out of my predicament. As my shoulders cleared the truck, something rubbed against my leg. I cried out, “Help me! Please. Anyone.” I twisted to see an orange cat-blob. Ignoring it and my road rash, I finished my escape and sat on the street, leaning against the truck. When the cat-blob jumped onto my lap, I read its tag. My new friend’s name was Sprite and she came from the burbs. I scratched the furball and like an idiot dozed off as if I was at home.

Sprite leapt off me, jerking me out of one of my vivid visiting-with-Mom dreams. I shook my head hard to snap out of my fugue and looked at Sprite. “Thanks for saving me little one.” As I stood to search for my glasses I added, “It’s not safe here. Gotta go, and fast.” Sprite lay down and licked her paws while I began to scour the ground. The further I got from the truck, the higher my anxiety. Sprite didn’t help. She followed me around and at random moments would press against my legs and arch her back. Instead of giving into her desire for a scratch, I’d swear under my breath and step over her, hoping I wouldn’t land on my glasses. She’d issue loud plaintive meows and forgetting that I couldn’t see, I’d jerk my head around to see if we’d attracted anyone or anything.

After an eternal fifteen minutes, I found my glasses. They were under a street lamp plastered with a faded drug-study flyer, headlined, “DO YOU EXPERIENCE EXCESSIVE WORRY.” I went back to Thai Tanic where I stuck the Glock in my waistband and pressed the half-empty pineapple can tight against my stomach.

As I crept between hiding places on my return to the public housing complex, Sprite sashayed after me, ignoring my pleas of “Go away” and “Find someone else.” Exasperated, halfway back I stopped between an overturned firetruck and a burned-out pharmacy. Looking in her eyes, I said, “Don’t have any cat food left or anything for that matter to eat. And the place, it’s a true mess. Really, it won’t be up to your middle-class standards.”

She responded with a “Meow,” some leg rubbing, and an arching of her back that I finally knelt down to scratch — or tried to — with my stump. “What am I doing,” I said and stood to finish my trip.

I paused at the complex’s door, unsure if I should let Sprite in. She decided for me, clawing up my body so fast there wasn’t time to scream. With her snuggled around my neck, I entered the building. When I crashed on my couch, she climbed down to sit next to me. For twenty minutes, I sat, scratched, and starved.

It was only when Sprite jumped off the couch and pitter-pattered into the hallway that I noticed the apartment door was still open. Instead of getting up and giving chase I watched several flies flutter around my face. Just as I worked up enough energy to brush them away, the sounds of dishes and glasses shattering came from the hallway. The breakage continued as I stood and peered out the door. In the fading daylight that fell through open apartment doorways, I watched Sprite bounce like a pinball between my precarious sculptures. I ambled after her. Whenever I was close enough to whisper calming words, she dashed away, destabilizing another sculpture. The whole city probably heard us.

At the end of the hallway, Sprite shot past me and I slumped to the ground, grumbling. She sauntered back and climbed onto my diminished stomach to give me love bites on my cheeks. “All is forgiven little one. Everyone misbehaves sometimes,” I said and scratched her until she went to mew by the outside door. Nothing I did stopped the noise, but I didn’t release her until the song, “If you love someone, set them free,” played in my head. As soon as the door clicked shut and I slouched back to the floor there was whiny mewing from outside. I had to get off the should-I-stay-or-should-I-go-emotional-roller-coaster ride and I was so very hungry. And the mewing was so very unbearable. Mewing! Mewing! Endless Mewing! The noise endangered us. I had to end it, to save us. Bawling, I pulled a cuckoo clock from one of my collapsed sculptures and Never Mind.

How could I have eaten something with a name? Until you’re starving, you can’t understand what a primal force hunger is, the degenerate and degrading things it’ll make you do. Every self-proclaimed saint during plentiful times is a day away from sinning in a famine.

When I woke today at sunrise, sleep-deprived but with a sated stomach, I sat in the room’s shadows and stared out the window. I couldn’t figure out how someone could be so off as to write in ten-foot-purple-precise-Times-Roman typeface on the train station wall, “Mom I’m Drunk!” Why bring their mom into it? Did they want to say, “Hey, Mom, look at me, you can’t control me,” or did they need to see their mom, like me? Maybe they were even trying to apologize to her. Why hadn’t I done that, or even tried to contact her? It would have been so simple to pick up a phone; a few minutes and both our lives would’ve been so much better. Was it habit? Inertia? I don’t know. But the regret churns my insides as if I swallowed a power saw.

During one of our last sensual sessions, Cindy had made me face why I’d been so horrible to Mom. It is a session that I remember too well. Our bedroom was filled with the smell of our sweat, mixed with the sticky-sweet scent of the orange blossom honey we’d drizzled on each other. When her emerald eyes weren’t locked on mine, but staring at the ceiling, her blood would pulse up and down her arched neck, unable to cool her. She’d bite her lip until it bled, and gasping, chant something indecipherable. I’d admire her delicate features and slender figure, the way her flesh glowed with sexual heat, and think about how she was more beautiful than any woman I’d ever seen on the internet. Finished with her ritual of self-denial, her focus would return to me. A look of determination mixed with desperation would flash across her face and she’d again lock her eyes with mine and settle into another temporary truce with her body, to start the cycle over again.

After more than an hour of tantric teasing, her hips shifted and her face trembled. I moaned and pleaded for release with my eyes.

She turned her gaze upward, and pausing between each word, grunted, “How – Come – You – Never – Called – Your – Mom?”

I couldn’t answer; lightning flashes of painful pleasure were exploding throughout my body. All my effort was devoted to not moving, to not giving in to what every fiber of my being demanded: sweet release from the joyful torment. I tried to think about specifications in the appliance manuals I’d written. It didn’t help. Clenching the bed, I moaned as my mind filled with images of dish and clothes washers, fridges and furnaces, boilers and hot water heaters fusing with one another; metal and plastic intertwining in impossible ways as engines overheated, wires sparked, and hot liquids pumped too fast through pipes and tubes to shoot into the air.

Cindy slapped my cheek and gasped, “YouWereJealous…ofYourMom’sBoyfriends!”

My moans stopped their transformation into screams. “What?”

She took a deep breath and grinned. “Your stories were about revenge, not rescue.”

Stunned, a sad silence filled me as a drop of honey fell from one of her soft curves onto my forehead. Cindy licked off the honey and huskily whispered in my ear, “Rescue of the blah. Rescue from the blah. Rescue in the blah.” Straightening up and stretching — beautiful movements that usually distracted me — she continued, “But your stories were really kill, kill, kill. Stoic robots, dashing pirates, devious reptilians, or aliens with too many tentacles, they were all men. Men disgust you more than any—”

I placed my hand over her mouth. Taking hold of it, Cindy said, “Oh Stevie, I’m so very very sorry.” Almost knocking her off the bed, I turned over and stewed. Silent, she held me. I was almost more embarrassed that she knew me too well than depressed that I’d never faced why I was so terrible to Mom.

A day of emotional turmoil followed. Cindy devoted herself to helping me to get past it all — to forgive myself. Her cravings must have been unbearable as we talked and talked and she read me the sexual love poetry that she’d taken up writing. That evening we used some battery juice to watch Groundhog Day. Although we were once again able to enjoy our constrained life I still had moods during which it was hard to be in my skin.

Cindy had been more than right about my jealousy, but not in a way she could have imagined or understood. A little while ago, as I took a baby-wipe bath, the memory of the long-ago day I left Mom clawed itself out of the casket of forgetfulness I’d locked it in. Even after several Valiums and inhaler puffs, I’m still gasping and my head feels like it is going to explode with the horrific knowledge. I need to drag the memory from my mind, cut it into small, safe words, and mount those words on paper, even if it means going to the basement so no one spots my candlelight.

For two hours, I’ve sweated in this clammy spider-filled basement, unable to write or ignore the smells from the washing machines, which the former super filled with dismembered bodies and antibiotic soap.

Okay. Why Not? I’ll tell you.

Soon after my seventeenth birthday, Mom held one of her introduce-the-potential-stepdad nights. She sat across from me at our chipped kitchen table, somber but gorgeous. Her shiny blond hair was permed into her “wild lioness” look — a haircut for someone in her twenties, not mid-thirties — and her regal face wasn’t yet desecrated by make-up. She sighed; the inhalation caused her angora sweater to tighten across her chest. In rapid succession, I ate several of the baby carrots she always laid out for me.

All I wanted was a long afterschool hug, but Mom leaned hard on the table and began her, “BEHAVE, because he’s special,” speech. Whenever she reached the relationship stage that necessitated introducing me to the Man in her life she gave me the speech as if it was a vaccination for misbehavior. That time, mixed in with the standard, “Please be your best tonight,” “You’ll try won’t you,” and, “I’m sure you’ll like him,” there was also: “I love you, but try not to be a jerk,” “Don’t embarrass me again,” and even, “Don’t make me choose; we’ll both regret it.”

After I repeated, “Yes, Mom,” “I certainly will,” and “No problemo,” several times, the uncertainty faded from her eyes. When she stood and left, I watched her pale thin ankles, which slipped into view with each step she took up the stairs. She paused to yell, “If it goes well…we’ll talk about getting you a digitized outfit…including the hat.” My mouth held the remaining baby carrots, but I gave her a toothy smile.

Later, when the doorbell rang, she ran down the stairs in a frilly white dress that didn’t even reach to her knees. “Aren’t you going to get up?” She fidgeted behind me while I opened the door to find a fit- and young-looking Asian guy in a dark blue suit. If not for the pink tie and wine bottle, he could have been mistaken for a Mormon missionary. “Don’t stand there Stevie, invite Alex in.”

I said, “Oh, sorry,” and opened the screen door, letting pass that Mom called me Stevie in front of him. After I coughed up a, “Nice to meet you,” as he crushed my hand, we chatted about the extreme weather. The happy tears forming at the edges of Mom’s eyes were about to wreck her pancaked makeup, when, to my relief, she excused me. They went to the kitchen. I plopped myself down at the dining room table with my homework and pretended to ignore them.

Unlike the other guys, Alex didn’t stand around ogling Mom, he checked the turkey, removed it from the oven, and placed it on a counter. After he shooed away Fuzzy, he and Mom chatted as they worked, often laughing. He chopped veggies with the speed of a professional chef while she languidly stirred the mushroom soup.

Everything was wonderbar. I was even progressing through my algebra when I glanced up to see his hand run through Mom’s shimmering hair and twirl a few golden strands. Putting my pen down, so I wouldn’t bite off the top, I watched his hand slide down her back, stop, and squeeze. Instead of slapping him, Mom pecked his cheek.

I strolled into the kitchen and found my Pop-tarts. Mom recognizing the crinkly unwrapping sound turned around to say, “You don’t want to wreck your appetite.”

“Don’t worry. It’s plenty big, like yours,” I growled, and took a large bite of the sugary treat.

Her spoon clattered on the stovetop and she stared hard at me, her lower lip trembling. Putting her hands on her hips, she blinked several times. “Stop acting like…Never mind. Do you remember your promise?”

If she’d stayed silent I would have done anything for her, for those beautiful pleading eyes; but how could she have treated me — someone who loved her in every way — like a brat when she was the one misbehaving with yet another man and who didn’t care about what I saw and felt?

A concerned look appeared on Alex’s face.

After what seemed forever, her pleading eyes reached me and pulled my heart out of the black hole that had caught it. I barked, “Fine. Fine. I’ll wait,” and spun around to stuff the Pop-tart back into its box. My elbow hit the turkey hard. For the first time that bird flew. It landed in the middle of the kitchen floor and rolled in what seemed like slow motion. Even before it rocked to a stop and Fuzzy approached it, I knew I’d messed up again. Alex put his hand on Mom’s shoulder and said, “We can clean it. I don’t even like skin. Or we can order pizza. Sandy, let’s not ruin the evening. We can still—”

“Don’t call Pie High,” I blurted. “Their delivery guy still likes you. He always—”

“You son of a bitch!” my mother screamed, the first time she’d sworn at me. Unable to look at her because something primitive and violent had woken in her face, I turned toward Alex. He was smiling, which I now realize was due to her inept swearing. I fled to my room and sat on my comic-book-covered bed finishing the Pop-tart. A black thought filled my head. If she wanted to ruin herself with dirty worthless men, who just wanted the one thing men always want from women and who couldn’t love her the way I did, I wouldn’t be able to save her — to stop her from throwing herself at them or them at her. Knowing that I couldn’t watch any more collisions and that she’d choose Alex, or the next one, or the next one after that, over me, I chose for her. I climbed out the window with my duffel bag and babysitting savings, ran across the front yard, and kept running until I landed at Charley’s Appliances and Furnishings in Detroit. I worked there five years — until Charley discovered me in the storage room on a Double-Bliss-Deluxe Electric Massage Chair, burying myself in the plentiful bosom of his matronly-shaped wife, who always smelled of freshly laundered clothes and the pastries she made for me.

I should stay in this decrepit basement since I’ll never be able to sleep again. Putting the thing down on paper didn’t help. The memories of the day I left Mom keep steamrolling through my head. But maybe they’re false memories? Yes, they have to be. Why didn’t I remember earlier what happened that tragic day? Why are the memories so vivid? And why won’t they stop? The plague-related obsessions and neuron-eating parasites are messing with me; that’s the only logical answer. I couldn’t have been so twisted. Mom must know. I have to talk to her. The one thing that will quiet my memories is to tell her I’m sorry for the whole stew of stupidity, ugliness, and craziness and to receive her forgiveness, to hear from her that I wasn’t a monster. All I need is a few minutes with Mom. How much longer do I have to wait? Why won’t the train come?

Oh man, why didn’t I ever call her?

May 21, 2027

Shot my gun this morn. Kill someone. No, someones. This morning. I shot several times at him, or at several of them. Don’t know. Still don’t know.

I was so happy, so so happy after downing a pretty pink pill, just one, no three, no just two of them, I found in a hangout in 6K. Nothing bothering me. I was happy, happy as could be vegging, membering good times with Mom and later, good times with Cindy. Our lives, life together. But then there was the noise. I am sure there was a noise. Crying. Way downstairs. Third floor. No, second floor. I went there once, no twice, went there once and then again with gun. Waited and waited and waited for noise. Scared. Kept peeing. Then needing to pee. At last, I am sure I heard something. Someone crying in 2B. When I crawled in, the place was empty. No. No. Two messed-up and muscled men at kitchen table. Just sitting and sitting and sitting. Silent. No, dead. With their teapot and teacups. No noise. Nothing. But then crying again. In the back bedroom. So I crawled there. I didn’t knock. I just crawled. Quiet and quick. Gun ready.

And I saw him. In a giant closet. Nothing but a dressing table and clothes racks. Sequined skirts, neon dresses, lacey blouses, leather pants, and bird-feathered somethings hanging and in piles. Everywhere. A fashion jungle. He was also just sitting there. But alive. Half alive. Looked gaunt and gone — and all raggedy and hairy. Like a wild animal. A wild dog. Cornered and wounded. We just stared. And he cried again.

I said, “You gotta go. Not cry.”

He put away his tears. “No. You gotta go.”

“You’re all wrong, a bad guy. And you’re sick,” I shouted.

“Not as sick as you. An Eater got you. You’re off. Not even thinking right. About anything.”

“One got you too. You’ll hurt people.”

“No. You will. Once it happens. The change. The Hunger.”

“No, I won’t. You need to bury yourself.”

“You should kill yourself.”

“I’ll kill you!”

“I’ll kill you first!”

“No, I will. It’ll be better.”

“Let me do it. No one gets hurt that way.”

He wiped his face. With his sleeve.

I did also. And then I shot him.

He shot also but missed. I missed too. Hitting something glass. It shattered. It was loud and my hand shook. No, I shook all over. Then there he was again. No several of them or several of him. Someone shouted, “You can’t do anything right!” And then I kept shooting. They did too. Things kept breaking or crashing or shattering. Then I couldn’t hear. Anything. I hid after that. In the closet.

Woke up back in 4E. Ears still hurt. He must be gone. Dead. They all must be. Cause I’m alive.

Or maybe it was just me. Alone. Doesn’t matter. Nothing does.

Going to try a new pill now. No two of them.

[Ed note: Remainder of entry for May 21st and entries for May 22nd and 23rd have not been included due to there incoherence.]

May 24, 2027

Three in the afternoon and I can barely put words on this page. I won’t bore you with the aftermath of the Naked Lunch14 phase of my life. Gotta, wanna, hafta say ‘yes’ to clean living so I can apologize to Mom and she can tell me what really happened. Hope you enjoyed meeting my inner demons though — can’t live with them and can’t live without them, no matter how much I dose the finest pharmaceuticals; but hey there’s no need to say more about the unspeakable. You future-fucks don’t care about me anyway.

Some bad news: you’ll never understand the shit we went through, any more than I could understand what an untidy mess the bubonic plague15 was. Why do I bother writing then? It’s not just because its cheap therapy. It’s also because I’m too lousy a survivalist to make it to the future in person. All I ever wanted was to live long enough find out what happened. Now I won’t. Hey, write back and let me know what it’s like in Tomorrowland.16 Do you have any cool shit, like floating cities, invisibility cloaks, rabble-rousing robots, and fat-free pork rinds? And if I don’t make it… No, I’ll make it; but if I don’t, write Mom (Ms. Smith at 27 Oak Street, Wilmington, DE 19807). Tell her I tried, that I still love her, that I’m sorry. Like you’d bother.

May 25, 2027

I’ve tried everything — drugs, meditation, sleep deprivation, and rubbing alcohol sponge baths — to slow down the fricken buggers that are chowing down on my neural pathways like obese retirees at an all-you-can-eat buffet. Now, I can feel the slimy bastards biting, munching, chewing, and shit-propelling their way through my command and control systems. I swear my brain stem is tingling. A little more — a munch here, a chomp there — and they’ll destroy their habitat. I’ll have no center; I’ll fall apart; I’ll cease.

It’s already happening. I’m not hungry. My whole life I’ve been hungry. All I ate yesterday was two basement rats, two dozen roaches, four spiders, and a romance novel. My clothes and skin hang loose on me. I should be hungry. Maybe that’s wrong; I shouldn’t say, “I’m not hungry,” but that I’ve acquired an appetite for the impossible. Two hours ago, I glanced outside, to see those well-fed men toss another helpless figure on their fire. I didn’t fear them and their actions didn’t disgust me. Rather, I trembled and sweat poured out of my pores as I imagined their bodies broken down into finger sandwiches, blood pudding, brazo burritos, and other delicacies. The cravings didn’t stop until I backed away from the window, took two Valiums, and searched my brain for something, anything else to think about, settling on Cindy.

She lasted longer than I will, not because of my hard living, but because I can’t satisfy my compulsion and, unknown to me, Cindy had been satisfying hers. Maybe I didn’t want to know; there had been so many clues, especially our last night. I’d been stuffing myself with freeze-dried lasagna at my kitchen table when a noise crawled into my consciousness: click, click, Click, Click, Click, CLICK, CLICK. I looked up to see Cindy, eyes hidden behind my aviator sunglasses, auburn hair twisted up on her head, and nails painted bright red with robot-model paint. She stopped tapping on the oven and leaned against it. Her lips, which she’d lined with raspberry lipstick, curved into a seductive smile and a long sleek leg came out of hiding in my black wool bathrobe. She looked great, like a 1950s-man magnet, a movie star who’d just walked off a Miami beach. However, I felt as if my rockets had stopped firing, marooning me in space, far from everything.

“Cindikins, I love you, but I’m not in a loving state.”

Biting her cheek, she retorted, “You’ll be up to it, once we finish the photo shoot,” and posed: bathrobe off both shoulders, one hand on the hip that was higher than the other, and her other hand behind her head. As she pivoted to give me a view from all sides, my camera materialized, spinning by its strap, and a come-hither smile appeared on her face.

“You need to eat Cindy. You haven’t been eating.”

She released my camera, which crashed into a pile of never-to-be-washed dishes. Clenching her hands, as beads of sweat began to pepper her face, she cried out as if in pain, “Sweetie, what’s wrong with you!” – her voice trailed off – “With us? You’ve never said no.”

I took a lackluster bite of my cold lasagna. My mouth full, I asked, “What makes you want it so much?”

Gripping the bathrobe at her throat with her now trembling hand, she sat down next to me. “You know what the reason is” – her voice cracked – “because I love you. More than anything, I love you. Every second of the day, I want to be with you, to be a part of you. Every moment I’m without you it’s an unbearable—” She stopped talking to try to blink away tears, but they began to stream down her cheeks. “Till I met you, I mean till I was with you, I was waiting, saving it for later. It always seemed so shallow, such a distraction from everything I wanted to accomplish, everything important, the planet I was trying to save, my stories, and my dissertation. But now, it’s the thing I need.” She gave a feeble, embarrassed laugh and mumbled, “And until you happened, all that unclean commerce of bodily fluids seemed…well, unsustainable.” She paused to wipe her face. “The time with, before, with Frank, he…I…never did it…he wanted to…a lot…I, we could have…I wish we…I’m not feeling very—”

“It’ll be fine. It’s okay. You don’t have to say more,” I whispered and hugged her.

She leaned toward my cheek and I waited for a kiss, but she pulled away, babbling, “Need to leave. Have to go. I’ll be alright, but can’t, can’t…stay.” Bewildered, I watched her rush for the basement bathroom, my bathrobe swishing across the floor behind her. An hour later, she was still down there. I should’ve checked to see if she was okay. I meant to. Everything would have been different. Instead, wiped out and believing her words, I had fallen over the cliff into sleep.

Did she ever love me, even care about me? Did she always know she was infected? Was it all about using me because I was the last man standing (or rather hiding)? None of that matters. All relationships are a mix of deception and affection, and no matter the exact balance of our relationship, she made me happy; that’s the important thing. I think I also made her happy. She seemed to like the love limericks I’d whisper to her before we slept.

The time I spent with Cindy was the happiest I’d been since right after Dad left, when Mom and I just had each other. During those days, Mom catered to me. Each night she’d read me a story. I’d squash up against her scratchy bathrobe, safe and secure, both of us sinking deep into our sagging leather couch, and she’d make up voices of impossible-to-believe characters — insects in a giant peach, a crazy chocolate factory owner, too-lucky orphans, a witch, and every sort of animal. All I want is to see her again — the latest blond chaos perm and her crinkly blue eyes, bright as a torch flame — so I can tell her sorry for everything. I could pass in peace if after I apologized, her arms opened up, showing that she forgave me and still loves me. Mom’s also the one person that could confirm that the twisted memories pounding away at me aren’t true, that my jealousy was because I wanted more attention, not due to something you’d see on an abnormal psychology blog. All it’d take is a few minutes.

I need to get it together; I cried for the past hour. It’s going to get dark soon and I need to eat, even if I don’t have the right kind of appetite. I now know how strong Cindy was, how the Hunger and one’s particular compulsion go to war with one another. I wish I could talk to the fire and rescue squad; but, they’re asshats. If I don’t make it, whoever finds this notebook, I beg you, apologize to Mom for me, and tell her that I always loved her. But I’ll make it. I’ll see her. They made sandbag emplacements outside the train station yesterday so the train has to be coming soon. It has to. And Mom worked so hard and suffered so much because of me. She deserves to see her son one last time and not get some sort of message service. But if you would, if I don’t make it, please, all I ask is that you tell her sorry for me, that I always loved her.

May 26, 2027

Woke up. The hunger too. Woke up to Hunger. But I control it, I fought it, fighting it. Can’t think right but, getting better. Heard a whistle, rumble, rumbling. A train was outside. Lots of people too. And dogs. Noise. Big noise. Lots of shouting, yelling. Doing organized, organizing. So happy. Going to Mom. I’m on train now. I don’t remember how I got through that fence. I had to though. To get to Mom. Must have climbed over or crawled under. Got lots of bruises and cuts. Lots. Tired. All happy/glad. Can whistle. Am whistles.

Okay, the Hunger fugue is gone for now. To know that I’m on my way to see Mom feels like I took several Percs.17 I’ll be able to make it. I know I can. However, I still feel the Hunger lurking, waiting for when I’m weak. But Mom is a few short hours away. I can do that easy. I hope no one saw me stiff-walk in here like Frankenstein’s friend. I still can’t remember how I [Ed note: Sentence incomplete]

The door is opening.

I pop my head over the top of the seat. Odd, it’s a little girl in a neat yellow dress. She’s singing, “Ring Around the Rosie and a Pocket Full of Posie,” and skipping down the aisle toward me. Looks to be ten, maybe eight, but she has rouge and blue eyeshadow on her face. Why did she slam to a stop and go silent? Right, cause she saw me. Oh Gawd! Oh my Gawd! She looks so sweet — healthy and plump, like a sugary treat.

DO NOT BITE! DO NOT BITE! DO NOT BITE!

Jeez-o-man, that’s over! There’s too much wrong in what I did; but no way to help it, no way to describe the Hunger pains — the cauldron of boiling acid that is my stomach. How much longer until the train starts? How many passengers could there be? Okay, I’ll say what happened since nothing matters anymore.

The girl had stopped only five rows away. She chewed her tongue like it was bubblegum. I was dreaming about doing the same when she asked, “Hey Mr., you ain’t a Zombie are you?”

Still peering over the seat top, I said, “Are you asking if I have the plague? Zombie isn’t polite,” and slid over so I was half in the aisle.

She looked at me as if I was being silly.

“Anyway, what makes you think I’m ill?”

She pointed at my arm. “That stumpie.” I looked at myself and wished I could’ve worn the clean shirt I’d saved for the trip, put on my sling, and brought more than my notebook.

“Oh that. An awful dishwasher accident.” I shoved my bad arm into my ragged flannel shirt, popping a button.

“What’s you writing?”

“What did you say? You’re too far away. Can you come closer?” I hoped I wasn’t salivating.

“No! You schmell.”

I wiped sweat, grime, and a little spit off my face with my sleeve and grunted, “Hey why don’t we play, ‘Simon Says,’ while we wait?”

Maintaining my sanity somehow, I got her almost within grabbing distance. Two short rows. So close. She looked so good. It’s hard to stop thinking about. I would have been nice. An arm, a small pink fleshy arm. That’s all I needed. Man, oh man; such a waste. Such a waste. If her mom not screamed. Camed in and screamed. No her mom came, and, bloody screamed. I can’t write write right write. Dragged treat. Away. Moms are good. I miss Mom. Am going to now. Yes, think that. I have to think that. But Hungry. So Hungry to. Gawd Damn!

Yelling outside. I see a mom yelling. A lot. “…your policy toward…Tell me Exactly what is the policy [Ed note: Sentence incomplete]

White Blob voice. “Yes Ma-mom. Zombies can’t take the train.”

Interview with Joseph Scarboro, male Caucasian aged 51, former member of Northeast Exploratory Fire and Rescue Squad 23. The interview was conducted by Share’n Chan, 3rd level Comparativer of the Boston Scientific Commons Case Studies Club, on September 27, 2050 at a community kitchen near the interviewee’s residential co-op in Boston (Northeast Coastal Ecoregion North American).

Only the interviewee’s responses are provided.

Response(R)-1: Of course, I remember him. Why I’m here. Found his notebook. Don’t know what made me keep it.

R-2: Yeah, it was the cover. That babalicious redhead with that laser gun standing in front of that burning sci-fi city. Don’t see that kind of art anymore.

R-3: Read it all. Those two weeks with Cindy got me through some lonely nights. The rest is a downer. For a day, I was even glad I charred his ass after reading what he did to Sprite.

R-4: She was our squad’s cat.

R-5: In New Haven when, ahhh couple of months after most the big cities and bases went down. It was chaos. Doc. Niratpattanasai Na Ayutthayaiasia’s drug saved us all. Still, the Guy don’t deserve to get his name on about every free clinic and crèche. A lot of them Compulsive sci-en-tists got the desire to find the cure. He got lucky. Hey kid, bet you don’t even know he took chunks out of his lab rats and they had the wherewithwhatever to try the drug cocktail he’d juiced up. They even got the word out and—

R-6: Sorry. It was the worst, out there on our own, just us, the Zom— ah infected, and freaked-out survivors.

R-7: Yeah, the journal stayed in my…ah possession until I heard the Global Open Forum would pay for plague memora…ahh…ballia. Dug it up and traded it for a week at a Cape Cod leisure camp. Only thing those wacked Seattle anarchists ever did for me. My local forum is worse…always sending neighbors over to encourage me to volunteer, suggesting I exercise, how I should eat, not to waste my carbon rations. It’s like everyone’s my big sister. And why somehow do I always gets cycled into sucky enviro jobs, even did radioactive reclamation last week? Is there anything you can—

R-8: Sorry. I know. Sure, the guy saw our posters. Journal says so. If he wasn’t such a paranoidal we would’ve currred him and got him to his mom. Also, he coulda got his wound fixed right. And now the fake limbs, they’re way better than the real thing.

R-9: Alright. Yeah, sure did. He wasn’t secret-agent man. Kept seeing the glint off his binoculars. And man, he was noisy. His shootout terrified us all. We couldn’t chase down every crazed Compulsive. Dangerous. Several of my buddies got comped. Better to stay out of their way, let the disease run its course.

R-10: Sad? He had Cindy! And before that, he was sitting pretty while things went to shit. He got it better than most. If you want sad, I could make you cry till spring.

R-11: When we found him, he was snapping his teeth like a wacked rabbit eating a carrot.

R-12: What da ya mean what happened? You know the answer.

R-13: Yeah, I agreed. Give me a second. Alright, I’ll tell you. You already saw the records. Barbequed that poor guy. Did that a lot, but he’s the one I can’t forget. He failed every test. Nothing human left in him those tests said. But maybe they weren’t perfect cause when we threw him on, his snapping stopped for a few seconds. He got a horrible freak in his eyes and shouted, ‘Tell Mom I’m sorry. That I love her.’ After, I was crying and shit. Later it was non-stop nightmares and a lot of home-brewed beer to stop them. Thinking about it, I shouldn’t have read his journal. Not even a field doc helped. It was years before all that crap stopped.

R-14: Stopped only when I looked up his mom! I used those fugee registries they set up and some leave. Amazoling, I found her and her husband, Alex, Asian guy like you, living in some caretaker complexes south of Boston. Can’t call what they were doing living though. Both had wrinkled up like old people do and were leaning on their neighbors for food. Those were bad times. You posties got it lucky. He’d lost an arm. And she, well she had oldertimers, that forgetting thing. I shouted Steven so many times at her I was hoarse, but I must have half-connected with something cause her eyes lit up and she cried, ‘Oh Stevie you’ve finally come home.’ Without thinking I said, ‘I’m so so sorry. I love you Mom.’ I even hugged her. When I left, she still had an empty smile on her face.


Published by Light Spring LLC

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www.TheColoredLens.com


The Heat-Death of Everything I Love

Before the old church doors, in the warm darkness of the vestibule, Sabine’s mother stooped down to look her daughter in the eyes.

“What you were is past.”

She swept aside the veil of the girl’s communion dress—a billowy thing like a crown of unspooled gauze—and blotted her tears out with a thumb. Shrill music crept in from the sanctuary, dissonant chords from a heat-warped organ.

“What you will be is yet to come.”

Smiling wide, she held her child’s face in calloused hands. Her daughter, her anxious little girl on the threshold. Sabine was frightened by a simple ritual; that was good—it meant she’d done her motherly duty, protected the child from those things to be truly feared.

For now, at least.

Somewhere high above the stone ceiling, the great chrome shape of the Teardrop hung silent in the sky. Soon the first Greys would appear at the marketplace in Croix-des-Bouqets, slender bodies towering above the crowds.


Sabine’s dinner has gone cold.

So it was you. You killed our world.

“Not me, ch’atha—” Her husband extends a spindly arm, straightened at both joints to cross the length of the kitchen table.

She slaps it away. Turns in her seat to face the cupboards, the sink, the kitchen window—anything but him: Don’t call me dearest. Not in your language, not in mine.

Sabine rubs her forehead with a hand that comes away wet and clammy, fingers trembling. In her mind’s eye she pictures it: herself, her body, unraveling like the end of a frayed rope.

“I understand this must be difficult,” he says. Rehearsed. Sanctimonious. Typical Grey fashion. “You’ve lost a great—”

You have no idea what I’ve lost, she snaps. You can’t begin to fathom.

Always on My Mind

If you cut the main artery from some living organism and laid it out across an arid wasteland then, Sabbi supposed, you would have something much like the Strip. True, the Strip was inorganic, a man-made thing cast in concrete, steel and glass, but still it lived. There were places where you could stand and see the Strip stretching away like a ribbon of light across the night-time desert, unspooling for mile after mile, blurring into one featureless splash of neon advertising hoardings.

And sooner or later, it would bleed out and die.

But Sabbi had become expert at letting tomorrow take care of itself. Save your worries for the here and now: there were plenty of reasons to.

The crowds of shoppers ebbed and flowed–and that was good. They provided her with anonymity: a hundred thousand or more, thronging the broadwalks of the Strip on a hot summer afternoon, closeted by endless store-fronts and restaurants and coffee-houses–imprisoning them within the Strip’s rapacious jaws.

From behind the gleam of her sunglasses, Sabbi scanned faces, trying to avoid flat-foots mingling with the shoppers. Most of the cops wore the Strip-sponsored uniform–visibility a key part of their deterrent–but they came in a plain-clothes variety too. They knew all about the petty thieves, the grifters like Sabbi who worked the lower echelons of the Strip’s ecosystem. Flat-foots carried the authority of no lesser person than the Chairman herself to arrest-and-deport on sight. They also carried tasers delivering kick-ass voltage–not intended to be lethal but not something Sabbi was inclined to put to the test. Worst of all, they carried attitude.

And now the stolen bracelet was burning a hole in her pocket. Every fiber of Sabbi’s body could sense its bulk as she moved, its cool sleekness pressing against her thigh. You could find plenty on sale down the Strip worth ten times its price. But this one was special. This was a commission, lifted to order. These days, Sabbi only worked to commission. The payouts were lower but the work was steady, so it balanced out in the long run. And it helped make her feel more… legitimate. The way a professional business-woman ought to act. Yeah, go me with my worthless career aspirations.

Something didn’t feel right, though. A vague uneasiness gnawed at her. Nothing she could pinpoint, but you didn’t survive on the Strip without learning to trust your instincts. And right now those instincts were telling her this wasn’t worth the risk.

So just do it–and do it quick.

There was no shortage of marks to choose from. There was never any shortage on the Strip. That was the whole point.

She drifted closer to a young woman browsing store-fronts arm-in-arm with her boyfriend. Strip-standard attire said everything there was to say about her: wealth, privilege, arrogance. Perfect. Sabbi stumbled lightly into the woman, mumbled an apology, and the bracelet slipped into the woman’s shoulder-bag in one smooth motion.

Sabbi would drift for a while to get her composure back, but stay close. If all seemed okay, she’d find an opportunity to ‘reacquire’ the bracelet. No sense in wasting a commission payout. Nobody would be any the wiser. And no harm done, except maybe a tiny dent in profits for one particular Strip merchandiser, and frankly she considered them good for it.

Sabbi noticed a man watching her from thirty feet away, the way you do when one pair of eyes seems to be locked on you in a sea of oblivious faces. She felt her heart jump. She lifted her head, looking straight at him, letting him get a good look at her shades.

With the sunglasses on, Sabbi looked as if she had bug-eyes. The lenses had a clever faceted-prism design: transparent for the wearer, but appearing to everyone else like the compound eye of some nightmarish bipedal insect. And while the casual observer was trying to make sense of it–a hundred tiny reflections of their bemused face staring back from those lenses–Sabbi was checking them out, working out what kind of mark they might be, or what threat they posed. Or maybe sussing out an escape route. Definitely one of those, and sometimes all three at once.

She loved those shades. Sure, people noticed them, but they were meant to. And because they only ever noticed the shades, not the person wearing them, when she took them off it was like throwing an invisibility switch.

She side-stepped away into the thickest part of the crowd, slipping the glasses off, changing direction at random. Glancing back a couple of times, she caught only the briefest glimpse of the man. His movements seemed to lack urgency, but he was shadowing her moves and that couldn’t be chance. Sabbi quickened her pace, beginning to shoulder her way through strolling couples who didn’t move out of her way in time.

And now Sabbi could feel a buzzing at the base of her skull, a kernel of pain threatening to blossom into a headache. She ignored it and pressed on, puzzled at the surge of people suddenly moving in the opposite direction. A moment later, she heard it. Or felt it. Or–

Perfumes for the ladies! Maxine à la Mode! When it’s too hot to wear anything else! All kinds of perfumes!

The words slammed into her frontal cortex, assaulting her with almost physical force. No sounds though, just fully-formed words straight into her brain. Around her, people were dipping their heads and turning away, like a shoal of fish cleaved in two by a predator. Some were rubbing their foreheads, others muttering curses.

Maxine à la Mode! When it’s too hot–

Unwelcome thoughts and images exploded in her brain, thundering around inside her skull until she was sure she could feel her eyeballs vibrating.

She saw the hawker twenty yards ahead, his hand-cart piled high with bright packages of cosmetics. Sabbi knew most of the street traders in this zone, but here was a new face–frozen into a rictus smile that was fooling no one. In front of his stall, tethered to it by a thick ankle chain, the Thal paraded miserably up and down, issuing forth the mental torrent of advertising slogans.


Maxine à la Mode! When it’s too hot to wear anything else!

Maxine à la Mode!

Too hot–

Too hot–

Sabbi had never seen an actual live Thal, and certainly never got this close to one. As far as she knew, the few that had survived into adulthood had all been taken to isolation centers once the geneticists had finished dicking around playing god and the federal legislators had closed down the labs. This one had a stocky build, classically prominent brow-ridge with receding hairline and thick black hair allowed to grow long, but otherwise normal-looking. Not all Thals were strong broadcasters, but most showed the symptoms: predisposal to unilateral telepathic projection, an ability–if that was the right word–that laid bare their soul to everyone around. She tried to imagine what it would be like to uncontrollably broadcast your innermost thoughts to anyone within range, to forego even the most basic level of privacy.

And now this? Using a Thal as some kind of all-pervasive advertising gimmick? That had to be a new low. Though never underestimate the Strip’s ingenuity if there was a quick buck to be made. Sabbi shuddered, but she was damned if she couldn’t nearly smell that perfume now.

The Thal was tiring. His thoughts were losing focus, breaking up into an incoherent babble that mostly radiated hurt and loneliness and longing. The hawker yelled something incoherent at him but the wash of emotions only fragmented further.

The Thal continued to parade up and down, his head endlessly questing from side to side in that curious manner of the slow-witted, as though searching for something long since lost. He looked forlorn.

Sabbi let herself be carried with the flow of the crowd away from the hawker, the Thal’s thoughts beginning to fade from her mind. She’d lost sight of her pursuer, and that made her nervous. And she’d almost certainly lost her commission.

Something hard and claw-like gripped her arm, tightening inexorably. From behind, a voice spoke into her ear, foul-smelling breath assaulting her nostrils. “Prosser wants a word, my little lady-bug. Wants to know when he gets paid.”

“Ow! Let go of me! You’re going to cut my frackin’ arm in half!”

“Prosser’s not happy.” The grip tightened. Sabbi half expected to see blood staining her sleeve.

“I told you before, Crab. When I’ve got it, Prosser gets it.” Her fingers skittered uselessly over the pincer-like artificial hand squeezing her upper arm, trying to pry it loose. A tingling numbness was beginning to spread from the loss of circulation. Rumor had it that Crab had once snapped a man’s head clean off at the neck, like dead-heading a flower. Some poor unfortunate who had seriously pissed off Prosser. Just like her.

With no lessening of pressure, Crab began to maneuver her towards one of the narrow service alleys leading away from the Strip. The people flowed around them in an ill-temper, unsettled by the Thal’s blunt advertising message. Even now, something akin to the Thal’s carrier wave reached out to anyone within a hundred yard radius, broadcasting its jumble of resentment and misery; a cacophony of sub-vocal thoughts. It was like having some whiney two-year old living inside your skull. She glanced back and saw the hawker slip some kind of gauze hood over the Thal’s head–and immediately a calm descended.

“Look,” she told Crab. “Maybe there’s another way.”

“Oh yes, lady-bug. I like the other way.” The grip tightened a fraction and Sabbi yelped.

“Listen! What if I could set Prosser up with a shot at the Lakenbys store?”

Crab seemed to think about this. The pressure eased a fraction. She could almost hear the gears turning in his brain. “Lakenbys is not possible.”

Well, yes. They all thought that. The smart grifters stayed well clear. Lakenbys took security to a whole new level on the Strip: i-cams everywhere, beam interferometry on the display cases, item tagging–you name it, and Lakenbys had almost certainly implemented it. And there were too many staff with suspicious eyes. Management policy was ruthless prosecution of all grifters to the maximum permitted in law. But even Lakenbys had a weakness. Customers. You had to entice customers into the store–so long as they came with big fat credit chips. Draw them in, sell the goods, complete the transaction, send them on their way. In and out. And that meant being open and inviting. A pro like Sabbi sneered at the unsubtle nature of snatch-and-run, but really it was no different to the usual mode of business–except for the bit about the credit transaction. You had to be audacious and quick, and the staff had to be slow or off-guard. But it could be made to work.

“No, not possible. Not Lakenbys,” Crab repeated.

“Yes, possible. With the right kind of distraction. And I know just the thing.”