by David Klass
I look back at her. Feel a tear welling in my eye. Before I know what I’m doing I take her in my arms.
The feel of her! The smoothness of her skin as I stroke her cheek. The sweet smell of her hair.
He likes this? The voice is P.J.’s but the inquiry, phrased in the third person, is unmistakably Flora.
I don’t answer. Try to ignore the question. Don’t want to break the spell. But I can’t do this. I can’t fake it this way. It feels cheap and somehow wrong.
P.J. hates this future world. Much as I enjoy imagining that she’s here, with me, she doesn’t fit in a hutch full of Gorms and it makes me feel guilty to pretend.
He doesn’t like Flora this way?
It’s not your fault. I’m sorry.
Want to try again? Is there anyone else?
I hate to admit it, but there is. And she is very much of this world. She would probably fit right in here—I bet she’s drunk shuffle and boogied to this techno music. I close my eyes and imagine Eko, as she revealed herself to me on the Outer Banks. There was a moment when she abandoned her fighting guise, and transformed into her true self. Now, in my mind’s eye, I picture her as the exotic beauty I flirted with in that beach house . . .
I lower my screens, and let Flora have a look, and I can almost feel her mind recoil. She lets out an earsplitting scream—the first sound I have ever heard a Gorm make with vocal cords—and staggers away from me.
The music shuts off. The lights stop pulsing. The shuffleaddled Gorms stop gyrating. They’re all staring at us, alarmed. I guess that to be a Gorm is to be in a perpetual state of high alert. What is it, Flora?
He accessed a Priestess of Dann! she announces. He knows her! He’s been intimate with her! Flora could tell.
There are frightened gasps as they surround me.
Intimate is too strong a word, I mumble back telepathically. We’re just pals and occasional traveling companions. Really, there’s nothing to be concerned about. Why doesn’t someone turn the music back on . . .
Flora, what else did you see?
She’s trembling, shuddering. I saw blue ocean in the background, out a window. And clean skies. And a few minutes ago he was asking me about Queen Mira . . .
Louder gasps. Who is he? He can’t be of this time. What does he want here? Morgan, where did you find him?
Morgan steps forward and puts a protective hand on my shoulder. There’s no cause for worry. He was on the crust, lying unconscious. Morgan was looking for egesta and dug him up. He’s not from the past or he would have told Morgan, because he’s Morgan’s friend. Right?
I look back at him. Hesitate. Yes, I am your friend, Morgan, I say. And you’re right, there’s no cause for alarm. I admit I did come here from far away, and maybe I should have shared the exact circumstances with you, but the trip wasn’t my choice. I’ll leave now if you want.
My words don’t pacify the mob of frightened muppets. If anything, they get even more agitated. He wants to leave so he can betray us! He’ll reveal our coordinates! We’ll all die! Stop him! Five Gorms grab me roughly.
I twist and squirm, but they’re a lot stronger than they look. I start to feel panic-stricken myself. Who knows what a room full of drunk and paranoid Gorms will do to remove a perceived threat? Look, calm down, I urge them. I don’t want to betray anybody. Just let me go.
More hands grab me. My legs. My wrists. My hair.
Sarajane, who is he? Wasn’t there a prophecy about such as he?
A strange-looking Gorm—and that’s saying a lot—steps forward. She looks like a hippie Medusa, with a long mane of unkempt gray hair and burning red eyes. She stands in front of me and the twin coal-pits of her pupils grow brighter till I feel the heat from them. A cherry-colored flame radiates from her sockets and dances over me. “Take off his shoes,” she croaks in a low voice.
They pull off my track shoes and strip off my socks and see my missing pinky toe—the one the Dark Lord gnawed off in his Amazon compound.
The Gorms draw back, as if they can sense his evil, lingering presence in the scarred stump of my missing toe.
I try to make a run for it, but there’s no place to go. I dodge and kick and somersault off a wall, but they grab me again.
The flame-eyed Medusa tilts back her head and emits a ululation. Then her fearsome face snaps forward and she intones telepathically: He is the one of prophecy! For Esaki has written, a Prince of Dann shall come from the distant past, yea, nine fingers shall he have, and nine toes, and he shall bring doom to all who come near him!
Terrified Gorm shrieks ring out.
Sarajane’s red eyes bore in on me and she continues: Death shall sit on his shoulders, and more death shall ride in the hollows of his ears. His true name is Jair, he will call himself Jack, but he might as well be called death, because rivers of blood will swallow up any fools who don’t flee at the first sight of him!
I guess a prophecy like that would put a damper on almost any social event, but it has a truly remarkable effect on a room crowded with paranoid Gorms.
There are half a dozen well-concealed secret exits to Morgan’s hutch, and hysterical figures pry them open and crawl over each other to dive through narrow holes and clamber up chimneylike crevices.
One of them hurls something at my feet as he flees, and dark smoke billows. I breathe some of it in, and immediately start to pass out.
As I crumple to the floor, my last sight is of Morgan standing alone watching me in an empty hutch with holographic party streamers and an overturned bowl of shuffle.
9
He didn’t trust Morgan.
I blink awake. I’m lying on the floor. His long Gorm fingers are rubbing something under my nose.
He’s a mighty Prince of Dann, who hobnobs with wizards and Dark Lords, but he was just using poor little Morgan.
Yes, I admit. I apologize. You deserved the truth. It was wrong of me. I ask your forgiveness.
Eating Morgan’s wurfle egesta, drinking Morgan’s tea with lemon, and lying through his clean white teeth.
They’re not that clean. Look, I said I was sorry. You, better than anyone, should understand why I did it. The first rule of a Gorm is to survive at all costs. The second is don’t trust anyone.
Now he’s throwing the rules of being a Gorm back in Morgan’s honest face! What about Morgan? Hello! Isn’t Morgan here in this hutch, also? Did he ever stop to think that by coming here and accepting Morgan’s hospitality, he was endangering Morgan? The Dark Army is hunting him. Now they’re hunting Morgan, too! They will pop down into this hutch at any second, and it will be the neural flay!
Calm down. No one knows we’re here.
A whole party of Gorms just found out.
But they’re your friends, right?
Don’t trust anyone. The Dark Army would pay well to find him. That’s why we need to go now.
I focus on Morgan. He’s exchanged his party jester outfit for a protective costume. Dark jacket. Goggles. Boots. There’s a black rucksack next to him.
Got to get far away before they come.
I sit up. You really think your friends would sell you out to the Dark Army?
Morgan doesn’t have any friends.
I take it you still haven’t forgiven me?
His lips twitch. No. But Morgan appreciates that his position is not an easy one. A Prince of Dann! The Dark Army will hunt him down. There’s only one thing to do.
What’s that?
The Gorm leans toward me, as if feeling a need to whisper, even though we’re communicating telepathically: Just a Gorm in his hutch, but Morgan hears things.
What kind of things?
The softest of telepathic whispers: Not over yet.
What? The war? I clamber slowly to my feet.
Morgan’s not saying more. Dangerous to talk.
So my mother’s still alive?
Not dead.
Then she’s alive! Do you know where she is?
Morgan spreads out a map. This is no
t some futuristic high-tech holograph. It’s an old-fashioned chart that could have been made before I was born. It probably wasn’t, though, because geography was always one of my strong points, and there are many places I don’t recognize.
There are also familiar names. Cairo. Jerusalem. This is the Middle East! Or at least what was the Middle East a thousand years ago.
I glance excitedly at the Gorm. Where are we?
His finger moves over the yellowing map and touches down. It looks to me like we’re in what used to be Turkey.
And where do you think my mother is?
His finger moves again. I see Damascus. The Tigris and Euphrates rivers. The Al-Hawizeh marsh. I recall a news story I once saw on TV. Hey, wasn’t that supposed to be where the Garden of Eden was located?
Just a legend.
And that’s where mankind is making its final stand? Kind of ironic, huh?
The Dannites are hiding there for strategic reasons. It’s become the most dangerous, inhospitable part of the whole planet. Even the Dark Army hesitates to go there.
But we’re heading that way?
As soon as he puts on his gear. He gestures to a chair where some equipment has been laid out for me.
A few seconds later I’m all suited up. This stuff must be Morgan’s spare kit—the sleeves of the jacket would be too long for your average orangutan. I lower the goggles over my eyes and suddenly Morgan’s hutch is a dull green color. I bet these babies will protect me from the solar glare. How do I look?
If he wants to survive more than five minutes on the crust, he will do exactly what Morgan says.
You’re the boss. Lead on. How long will our journey be?
Seven hundred miles through the most deadly terrain imaginable. We’ll never make it. Foolish to even try. We’re walking to our own certain and agonizing slaughter.
10
My pessimistic guide pushes a button and a sliding door retracts, and we start climbing steep steps dug into a shaft. Even through my protective suit, I can feel it growing hotter as we near the surface.
Are we gonna walk? I ask him.
Much too far.
Then we’re gonna fly? I ask, remembering the antigravity suits that Eko taught me to use on the Outer Banks.
Seconds after he lifted off, a wurfle would swoop down and scromp him up.
What does that leave?
Chigga chigga.
What’s that?
Best way to travel across the crust at night. Of course, a wurfle will still probably eat him.
If it happens it happens, I mutter, trying to match his glum mood. Eat me, digest me, and egest me.
We reach a rooflike barrier. I don’t see any buttons or levers, but Morgan’s hands move across it and it slowly swings open.
Heat comes flowing down the shaft like a dragon’s searing breath.
We pull ourselves up and out, onto the brittle baking crust. It’s night and we’re wearing protective gear, but it still feels like we’re walking across hot coals. Where are the chigga chiggas? I ask Morgan nervously.
Sleeping or procreating. You can never trust them.
Great, I say. What do we do till they show up?
Keep still. Try not to get eaten.
Sitting is out of the question, because the sandy ground is scorching. So we stand there and kick our boots when the thick soles get too hot.
Even though it’s dark night and I’m wearing a jacket and goggles, I can feel the heat and sense the glare radiating up from the barren, microwaved earth.
The moon is out—the same beautiful moon I grew up watching in Hadley-by-Hudson a thousand years ago. The stars of the Milky Way are shining just as brightly as I remember them. Space is the same. The galaxy is lovely and unchanged. But our earth is a parched and empty kill zone.
Why are you out here with me? I finally ask Morgan. You say it’s suicide and we’ll both probably die. Why leave your hutch and come on this journey?
Had to leave. No choice. Dark Army is on the way.
But you don’t have to take me on a seven-hundred-mile suicidal trek across deadly terrain. Why are you risking your life? It seems very un-Gorm-like. If you’re acting out of friendship, I appreciate it, but I don’t want your blood on my conscience.
He looks back at me. Raises his goggles. I raise my own. The night glare seeps up from the dark sand and makes us both blink. I see his big eyes looking back at me. Tired of living like crud.
I beg your pardon.
Hiding in a hutch. Eating wurfle egesta. Crud.
I admit it’s a hard life. But you’re surviving. Why roll the dice?
His eyes glint. The Prince of Dann! If Morgan can bring him back, big reward. Delicious food. Clean water. Soft bed. Good night, Morgan. Thank you for bringing our Prince home. The Queen would like to sing you to sleep with a lullaby. Would you like another cupcake before bed?
Nice fantasy, I tell him. But here’s the reality. A lot of good folks have died on my account. The two people who raised me. A yellow dinghy that became a comrade. The governor of the free and wild state of the Amazon. Shot, tortured, blown to bits. If I were you, I’d point me toward the lost Eden and find a new hutch.
Morgan looks back at me a second more, blinks rapidly, and lowers his goggles. When Morgan decides, he decides. And here come our rides.
Not noble Arabian steeds.
Nor even a pair of mangy camels.
I follow Morgan’s gaze and spot twin stains running parallel through the moonlight, as if two torpedoes are heading toward us just beneath the surface of hot dust. The smudges appear to be about ten feet long, and they are moving fast.
Are they sand snakes? I ask Morgan.
Giant unsegmented nematodes.
Worms?
Not parasitic.
I guess that’s good news.
You have no idea. Parasitic nematodes were a blight for centuries, but they vanished in the great die-off three hundred years ago, when their hosts died. Dependency leads to extinction. These are the last worms left on earth. They’re marvelous creatures in their way.
What way is that? I ask doubtfully, as the smudges draw near us. I see that they actually travel on top of the sand, but their color so perfectly matches the crust that they appear to be moving beneath its surface.
They’re perfectly adapted to survive.
Survive what?
Almost anything. They’re hermaphroditic. They can reproduce by themselves. They’re cannibalistic. If hungry, they’ll eat their own young. In fact, they can eat virtually anything—animal, vegetable, and even many minerals. And they have no vital organs. If a wurfle eats half of one, and the other half escapes, it can grow whole again in less than a week.
The two long brown bedroom slippers park themselves next to us and lie stationary, with only their vacuum-nozzlelike mouths moving.
How come they don’t eat us?
We’re too big. Morgan will feed them what they love best—wurfle egesta—and they’ll take us for a nice ride. He fishes some of the noxious pellets out of his jacket pocket and holds them out in either hand, as if offering sugar cubes to horses. The two loathsome worms shuffle forward and suction the food from his palms.
Okay, I say. You’ve fed them. What do we do now?
Climb on. Attach your suction gloves to their outer cuticle.
In a few seconds, I’m mounted on a giant nematode.
Is he ready to roll?
Ready as I’ll ever be.
Hold on tight. If he falls off into a mud suck, he’ll drown in hot slime.
Thanks for the warning. If I manage to stay on, is there anything I need to worry about?
If he hears a whistle and sees a big shadow behind him, it’s a wurfle swooping down.
What do I do?
Let it eat him headfirst so he doesn’t suffer. Hold on tight, Prince of Dann! Here we go!
The giant worm starts to slither. My fingers inch deeper in the suction gloves. At first, as the nematode coils and unspools
across the crust, I’m in constant danger of falling off. But then I start to anticipate the odd rhythm of its motion. Also, like a horse that breaks from a trot into a gallop, the nematode gains momentum till it hits cruising speed and the ride becomes a bit smoother.
It makes a distinctive sound, a bit like a train going choo-choo. Or, I suppose, chigga chigga.
11
We travel fast and far. There are no red lights or stop signs to slow us down. There is only an endless expanse of dark and barren crust stretching away from us in all directions in the moonlight, like a becalmed ocean.
Dawn comes, and the temperature rises with the sun.
The nematodes stop and let us off, and then start to burrow down into the parched earth with a corkscrew motion. I can hear them digging, sawing through the hard-baked crust till they disappear from sight.
Morgan gets on all fours and we crawl down after them, snaking our way into the freshly dug shaft. We spend the next fourteen hours in a pitch-black wormhole, occasionally swallowing egestas, taking tiny sips of water from Morgan’s thermos, and hiding from the deadly sun.
What makes you think my mother is still alive? I ask Morgan telepathically. Who did you hear it from? And do you know anything at all about my father?
Not safe to communicate during daylight, the Gorm warns me. Wurfles hunt when the sun is up. They can sense thoughts. Morgan’s hutch was shielded. Now we’re exposed. Also, don’t move around. Dark Army drones can spot movement beneath the crust. Quiet, quiet. Still, still.
So I lie back against the rough hide of the nearest nematode and try to rest and block out the sense that I’m slowly baking in a subterranean brick oven.
The fourteen hours drag by, and finally we crawl out of our hole and resume our journey through the dark wasteland. No wurfles swoop down on us, but after about five hours of speed-slithering, the nematodes suddenly stop and remain very still. If unsegmented worms can look frightened, they do so.