Ronin

by Tony Bertauski

  “Where is he?” Ryder blurted. “Where’s Ronin?”

  “He’s safe, child.”

  She twittered her fingers and urged them to come closer. Nog stepped aside, his wide feet stamping the snow like snowshoes, making space between Merry and him.

  “What about William?” A look of concern wedged between Cherry’s eyebrows. The old man was struggling. The wind shoved him down. “We can’t let him freeze,” she said.

  “That won’t happen,” Merry said.

  “He will find what he needs.” Nog lifted a defiant finger. “The true Christmas spirit.”

  After all he’d done, it was still hard to watch the old man like that. He was cold and suffering. Most of all, he was lost.

  Merry and Nog held up their hands, both with wiggling fingers and merry smiles, their cheeks rosy and eyes sparkling in deep folds. Ryder and Cherry took their hands. With their backs to William, they faced another watery wall. They were standing in the space between two incognito domes, Nog explained.

  “Don’t you think we should show them first?”

  “You do.”

  “We should.”

  Merry was warm and soft and full of wrinkles. Nog was a step ahead of them. When he got back in line, she nodded. Their hands tightened as if the roller coaster were climbing over the first drop.

  “Children,” she said, “the real North Pole.”

  The air shimmered like a vertical pond of water was suddenly disturbed by a pebble. The distant horizon wavered and the dunes of snow quaked. And then like turning a knob, a correct frequency was found and the window was clear. A roar of celebration surprised them.

  Elven were everywhere.

  They sang and shouted, cheered and laughed. The volume was deafening and so full of joy that it felt like a bonfire had been ignited with gasoline.

  They wore long coats and short coats, some with caps and others without. Beards that touched their toes and faces smooth and round, a concert of partygoers mingling in controlled chaos. There were fast avenues where the ice was exposed and the elven slid on bare feet. There were congregations crowded together and barely moving.

  Snowballs were launched like beach balls, and snow fell like confetti. Elven popped out of the ice, and others leaped into open leads of water. And they were singing.

  They were all singing.

  Presents brightly wrapped floated amongst the crowd, passed along like pails of water, each making their way toward a giant red sleigh, where elven kept count and directed traffic. Enormous snow creatures were at the end of the lines, taking the gifts with thick arms and placing them in a big sack, their heads turning like turrets. They were abominable things made of snow.

  Ryder felt the ice begin to tilt.

  He and Cherry staggered. Merry and Nog held them upright. His balance was suddenly elusive. He didn’t get dizzy in dreams.

  “It’s real,” Cherry murmured.

  “My dear, you flew on a reindeer,” Nog said. “Of course it’s real.”

  “It’s just so, so... magical.”

  “Not magic. Science. Magic is phenomena not yet understood—”

  “Nog.”

  He cleared his throat. “Not magic.”

  “That feeling you have right now,” Merry said, “is why we remain secret. You’re not ready to see. William took our knowledge for the wrong reasons. There are others like him.”

  Ryder didn’t know if he’d ever get his legs back. In the game room he knew it was an illusion, that he could leave and go back to the way things were supposed to be. And in a dream he woke up. Reality was always waiting.

  But this is reality.

  A hoarse call rose up. A herd of reindeer was gathered in a circle. They were facing in with bushy white tails flickering out. Their antlers clattered as they crowded together. Somewhere in the middle a greater set of antlers rose up.

  Ryder took a tentative step.

  His legs were stiff and numb. Merry tried to hold him back, but he stumbled ahead, dragging them through the barrier with him. It felt thick and wet, raising every hair follicle on his body as he passed through it. He emerged on the other side still dry.

  All at once, everyone stopped.

  Presents held stiffly, snowballs cocked and ready, no one moved. They were caught in the act, holding as still as Arctic hares. Even the snow creatures were motionless, as if they were natural features conjured up by a storm.

  “Everyone!” Merry called. “I’d like to introduce—”

  The stampede drowned her out. Sliding and marching, rolling and jumping, cheering and singing as they rushed toward them. Ryder and Cherry drew closer as short arms and little hands mobbed them.

  Merry and Nog tried to control traffic, but it was futile. The fat little bodies crushed together, pulling at their coats and grabbing at their hands. Touching them and cheering. Gray-haired elven seemed just as thrilled as the bouncy younger ones.

  The abominable snowmen got control.

  They parted the crowd and stomped their way toward them. Gently, they moved the swarming elven a safe distance away, allowing a few at a time to reach them.

  “Christmas, everyone!” Merry’s amplified voice magically rose above the din. “Remember it’s Christmas. We need to continue our work. Please, everyone.”

  A collective groan rippled through the crowd. Little by little, they peeled away and picked up the presents. Three younger elven slipped between the snow creatures and tossed a gleaming cube in the air. As it hovered above them, they wagged their tongues and threw up fingers.

  “Enough selfies.” Merry ushered them away. “You have work.”

  The reindeer hadn’t moved.

  The tips of great antlers were barely visible. The snow creatures cleared a path. Ryder and Cherry walked down the icy red carpet with straggling young elven on both sides of the abominable barricade.

  The reindeer snorted.

  Two elven were feeding them and adjusting harnesses on their bellies. They seemed immune to the hysteria, focused on the reindeer instead. Ryder held out his hand. Wet nostrils walked up his arm and sampled his neck and hair. A coarse tongue raked his cheek before the next one in line did the same, purring with approval.

  “They remember you,” one of the handlers said.

  She gave them green cubes. Little by little, the center of the gathering was revealed. Ronin lay on folded legs. He lifted his head slowly, like his antlers were cast iron. Eyelids lazily revealed watery eyes. Ryder fell on his knees.

  The reindeer closed around them.

  “You’re special,” the handler said. “You have the kiss.”

  Ryder touched his cheek where the birthmark was. “I... remember...”

  “He never forgot.”

  A musky scent of wet fur and grassy breath smothered them. Ryder leaned against Ronin’s neck, the fur warm and tickling. Cherry did the same on the other side. They ran their fingers over his long snout. A deep satisfied groan rattled deep inside Ronin. The adrenaline that had fueled Ryder tapped out and a deep restfulness fell over him.

  Reindeer breath sprinkled down like magic.

  “You share a connection.” The handler’s voice was comforting. “One that will always be there. One that might feel...”

  Ryder could feel her lean closer to whisper.

  There was an explanation for all of this—like how a reindeer flies, or the way he saw through Ronin’s eyes, or that elven really do exist—but he didn’t want to call it science. Not just yet. They shared a connection, one that seemed to connect their thoughts and senses. There was only one word for that.

  “Magical,” the herder whispered.

  The sky was dark and still. Colorful ribbons dashed against an endless backdrop. From outside the ring of reindeer and imposing snow creatures, a song rose up. Surrounded by the impossible, Ryder rested in the best place in the world—the strong neck of a reindeer.

  The greatest of them all.

  ***

  Bells.

  Me
lodious bells gently carried Ryder to wakefulness. The ground jolted.

  “Not this year.” Tinsel, the elven herder, stroked Ronin’s muzzle. “You’ve done enough for one night.”

  That didn’t slow him. Ryder and Cherry fell back as he made it onto his front legs. The antlers swung around as he stretched his neck and let out a long mournful wail.

  “They’ll be fine,” Tinsel said. “They know the way.”

  Reluctantly, he dropped back down, a growl rumbling in his throat. There was nothing he could do about it. He didn’t have the energy to stand. Tinsel soothed him until he laid his head down. Snow puffed out in long streams. His eyelids dropped once again.

  “Come,” Merry called.

  Nog helped Cherry stand. Merry waited patiently for Ryder to take her hand. Ronin’s eyes were already wandering beneath his eyelids, watching dreamy green cubes dance like sugar plums.

  “Thank you,” Ryder whispered into the fluffy ear.

  He stopped from hugging the big snout resting peacefully. This was the presence he’d felt all of his life. No matter how lonely he felt, there was someone out there watching over him. Ryder told him that he didn’t need him anymore.

  Secretly, he didn’t want to let go.

  The elven were no longer scattered across the ice but grouped tightly around the sleigh. None were waiting for Ryder and Cherry as the snow creatures escorted them. Occasionally, the younger ones snuck a selfie. Everyone else was focused on the most important night of the year.

  Cherry and Ryder laced their fingers.

  The sleigh was larger than it appeared from a distance. The eight reindeer were tethered to the front, mouths buried in feed bags, stamping the snow impatiently, bells ringing on the harnesses. The sack was bulky and tied shut. The strangeness of all of this threatened his balance again, telling him to wake up. There weren’t sleighs on the North Pole or sacks filled with toys.

  And reindeer don’t fly.

  The bench was padded and a control panel looked like something from a spaceship. A mug of cocoa steamed from a cup holder, little white marshmallows bobbing in foam. Cherry pinched his arm and he winced.

  “Just wanted to make sure you’re real.”

  “Why wouldn’t he be?” The voice was deep and resonant, as if a bassoon could talk.

  His beard was as white as snow and thick as a blizzard. His red coat was worn and thick, white specks of snow stuck to the fuzzy surface. A strong fragrance of nutmeg surrounded him.

  This was not the cartoon from movies or coloring books or holiday calendars but a real man with scuffed mittens and a ruddy nose, eyes as deep and blue as Arctic ice.

  He’s real.

  Ryder didn’t say it. He’d said that enough already. Even though they’d flown on a reindeer and waded through an ancient race of jolly elven, seeing the fat man was the most dizzying thing of all.

  “Santa.”

  A low rumble of laughter tumbled from his thick beard, an abrupt but distinctive one. His eyes twinkled like stars were born from them. An elderly woman was next to him, sprigs of gray hair escaping her winter cap. She took his arm and they smiled upon them gently.

  “It’s been a troubled road,” he said. “But those hardships have made you who you are.”

  He shed his glove and touched the tips of their noses. A faint smell of cinnamon tickled their nostrils.

  An elven approached with an electronic tablet and reminded Santa what time it was. He acknowledged him with a nod and turned to the waiting crowd, lifting a hand above his head.

  “Merry Christmas!”

  They cheered and leaped. The ice shuddered. Snowballs were launched. Elven hugged and danced, and Santa’s laughter was buried beneath the celebration. They took the feed bags from the reindeer.

  More elven joined the one with the tablet and ushered Santa to the sleigh, muttering updates about weather and routes. He slid onto the seat and listened intently, having a sip of cocoa.

  “Are you coming?”

  He turned a twinkling eye to Ryder and Cherry. They had turned solid with wonder, had become observers watching reality dress up like a dream. Santa patted the bench.

  “Life in the ice isn’t for you,” Merry said. “He’ll take you home.”

  “We don’t have a home.”

  Cherry beat him to it. They couldn’t go back to Kringletown. The ice was as good as any other place they’d been.

  “You do now.”

  Mrs. Claus adjusted Ryder’s cap and tightened Cherry’s scarf before guiding them around the sleigh. Elven held their hands to keep them steady, boosting them onto the front seat and then handing Mrs. Claus two steaming cups of cocoa. She put them in cup holders and winked.

  She fussed with Santa’s coat, pecking him on the cheek with a smiling kiss and silly laughter. The elven cheered like children and cleared a path in front of the sleigh. Santa waved with a thick mitten.

  “Would you like to do the honors?” he said.

  Ryder and Cherry didn’t know what he meant. Santa gestured to the reindeer, their heads turned and waiting, clouds streaming from their nostrils.

  “Now Dasher, now Dancer...” he started.

  The two reindeer in front faced forward; muscles rippled over their hindquarters, white tails flickering. Ryder looked at Cherry and swallowed. He couldn’t remember the rest.

  “Now Prancer and Vixen,” Cherry said.

  Santa threw his head back and put his hand on his belly. “Ho-ho-ho!”

  They finished the names together. Ryder managed to squeak out the last one but then, unexpectedly, heard Santa add one that wasn’t in the popular refrain that everyone back in the real world knew and loved.

  “And Ronin to lead them all!”

  The sleigh jerked forward. The reindeer dug into the snow and sped through a storm of celebratory snowballs and cheers. They jostled in the seat until Dasher and Dancer lifted off the ice. Two by two, the rest of them followed. Their antlers glowed and warped the atmosphere, surrounding the sleigh with a protective bubble where the wind couldn’t reach them.

  They soared on a smooth trackless path, circling above the mass of elven. Santa waved back and wished them all a good night. Ronin was a dark figure on the ice. A sorrowful moan reached them. Ryder waved with a lump in his throat. All was blurry when he heard the last reindeer call to them.

  And then they were gone.

  They had exited the incognito dome that kept them hidden from the world. Alone on the North Pole where they lived in the ice, their stealthy technology keeping them secret. How long would it last? And what would happen when they were finally discovered? After all, William found them.

  It can’t be much longer.

  “He’s been watching you.” Santa flipped a switch and leaned back with his cocoa, tossing a sideways smile at Ryder. “Ever since he found you.”

  “He doesn’t have to anymore.”

  This time, Ryder meant it. This was where the last reindeer belonged. Maybe it was time for someone to protect him.

  Santa reached for a button. When he pressed it, a high-pitched whine sounded from the rear of the sleigh. The stars blurred and the earth too. They had entered a time-warping field that would allow them to travel the world in a blink of an eye. Santa began laughing.

  “Just try to stop him.”

  24

  Visibility was getting worse.

  William had tested the phone in these conditions. All of his technology was built for this day, the day a reindeer would lead him to a hidden society of elven and a fat man in the sleigh.

  This was a mistake.

  He’d given in to desperation, the final pieces falling apart when Ronin escaped. When Billy questioned me. He hadn’t expected him to be so resistant, to be so remorseful. Billy was his clone. He had the same DNA. William had implanted him with his own memories, had guided his thoughts. Yet he had changed so quickly.

  How?

  Gallivanter wiped him clean, hid his thoughts, implanted new compulsions, or so
mething. What’s my name? William didn’t know if Billy was rejecting his name or really couldn’t remember it. He doesn’t have a name.

  How long had Gallivanter been lying in wait, planning his emergence from cold storage, lurking in the network until the time was right? William had taken precautions, set up redundant firewalls, scanned for intelligence anomalies, cloned the elven over and over, and interviewed them extensively to build a predictive model of what he might do to attempt to escape. All of those Gallivanter clones with his memories and experiences and, still, he’d pulled it off.

  No matter how many clones he cranked out, William would be alone. They were merely bricks he’d used to pave a broken path to the Pole. Now he was truly alone.

  “Hey!”

  He shouted at the reindeer clone. It didn’t have a name. He hadn’t named any of the elven clones, just gave them numbers to keep track of them. The reindeer clone was no different. A tool didn’t have a name. A hammer was a hammer.

  A clone was a clone.

  “Hey!”

  Could he leap back to Kringletown? Did he have the energy? He had Ronin’s stamina because he was a perfect duplicate of the last reindeer. Of course he can. He wasn’t quite sure if he had Ronin’s memories; there hadn’t been time to scan him. It shouldn’t matter if he did. He would listen, he would obey, whether the phone was working or not.

  Billy stopped listening because Gallivanter changed him. And the phone still worked on him.

  William assumed that was why Billy had stopped obeying. What if something else had happened, some sort of identity crisis that crashed the protocol? That was the mistake he’d made in the very beginning, confusing memories for consciousness. William had expected to wake up in a new body when he cloned himself. Instead, Billy woke up and William went into cold storage.

  Ryder reminded him of that.

  “Come here!”

  Distracted by the Northern Lights, the reindeer clone stretched his neck and looked up. Perhaps he couldn’t hear him.

  Why won’t the phone work?