Lumber was gold on Sherwood Minor.
For the most part, the drones from Castor 5 made the adjustment to their new lives easily and quickly. Sherwood’s government welcomed the new workforce with open arms. The previous drones had jobs for pay, not just slave labor in sweatshops.
The friends were still together for the most part. Daniel was now known as Danielle and still searching for her children. So she would leave and return only to leave again when a new clue came her way. Morris was still working as a poor man’s physician. Sprocket fixed machines when they broke. She had an amazing talent with mechanics of every sort. Warren worked in the entertainment business as a mentalist. The friends knew the truth behind his talent but said nothing because everyone needed work to survive.
Edgar, Warren and Morris had taken to living in a spare apartment off a local, rather swanky, theatre. The Nightingale Opera House had patrons with deep pockets and welcomed them with open arms.
Edgar was the only one who hadn’t found a profession or a job yet. She split her time between poring over the few books she had managed to save and a tavern down the street called the Red Robin.
She was brooding over a mug of cider one day when Two paid her a visit. It nodded its white mask at her and sat down across from her. “All the inhabitants of Castor 5 seem to have adjusted well to their new lives,” Two said, and Edgar nodded. “All but you.” Here it turned its beak to the mug she clutched and then back to her face.
Edgar took the hint.
She shrugged it off like it was nothing. “I just took some time off to think. That’s all. It’s been a long time since I had a vacation.”
The white mask regarded her. “And what are you thinking about?”
Edgar was silent a long moment as she quaffed her cider.
“The future that never happened,” she finally said, giving Two a meaningful stare.
The bird mask cocked its head to the side in curiosity.
“If the Mendors hadn’t interfered in Warren’s timeline… what would have become of him?” she asked pointedly.
“Ah!” breathed Two in sudden understanding. The creature seemed to give a long, sad sigh. “The government would have captured him and killed you and your mate.”
Edgar nodded once. “And?”
Again the mask tilted to the other side.
“And what would have become of him?” she asked, insistently.
Two seemed confused. “You are more concerned about the boy’s timeline than your own?”
“Of course! He’s my son!” she emphatically said. “So I turn out to be a ‘dead woman walking’. So what? Tell me what they do… would have done… to him!”
Two sighed again and shrugged. “He would have become king. Sort of.”
Edgar frowned and slammed her tankard down.
“Sort of?” she repeated in growing irritation. “Quit talking in circles! Explain the ‘sort of’ part.”
Two shook its head and then leaned forward, lowering its voice. “I’m not supposed to tell you this part.”
Edgar made a wry face. “And I’m not supposed to be drinking, but oh well! Now out with it!”
Two hung its head between its shoulders and shook its mask from side to side. “Very well. As you wish. But I did try to warn you.”
Two waved its sleeve at the bar maid. She came over and it whistled at her like a rude drunk. She raised her eyebrows at the creature and, without saying a word, she left. She returned presently with a long bamboo tube with a metal straw sticking out the end. Two waved its sleeve and five gold crowns appeared on her tray along with three sparkling white diamonds. The bar maid smiled and with a wink, told Two, “Whistle at me anytime, babe.” Then she reconsidered what she had just said and chose to follow it with, “Just whistle! You’re not exactly my type.” She left, smiling broadly as she pocketed the payment.
Two just shrugged and did not seem to be offended in the slightest. It positioned the straw so it could drink under its mask.
“Now. Where were we?” Two said.
“My son,” Edgar insisted. “What would have happened to him?”
Two nodded and took a long draught on the metal straw.
“In that other future Warren is taken by the government,” Two began. “They wipe his mind and erase all his memories. Then they put what they want in there and he becomes a sort of a… straw king. The Queen Empress Victoria is still in charge of Her Majesty’s Imperial Galaxy. But Warren becomes her sword… with other people pulling the strings, of course. He’s pretty much just a human shell, doing everything his bosses tell him to do. He’s fed on a strict diet of Mulligan Stew and never raises his hand against his bosses or says no to them in any way whatsoever. Because his powers of clairvoyance are so strong, they use him to spy on many people. They have to terraform more planets as penal colonies again because of your son. He fills all the prisons with people who had bad thoughts or people they believe to be a threat because they don’t follow the status quo.”
“Non-conformists like myself and my friends,” Edgar said.
The white mask nodded. “Quite. Such people are weeded out early, pretty much as infants, and terminated, no questions asked. No one is allowed to go against the government.”
Edgar considered his words for a moment. “And Her Imperial Majesty approves of this?”
The mask cocked its head to the side. “Have you ever met the Queen Empress personally?”
Edgar almost laughed but stopped, sensing there was more to his question.
“No,” she replied.
The robed shoulders shrugged and the mask took another long draught on its metal straw.
“Then you would probably be surprised to learn your government is not run by the ‘queen empress’ at all. That is just a code name for the supercomputer at the center of the building. A corrupt conglomerate translates everything the supercomputer says and devises human means of carrying out its orders. They call themselves the Empire’s Pride and are the ones who end up pulling all the strings on your boy.”
Two gave Edgar a moment to digest his information.
“So you see, we have saved all of your lives. I am sure Warren is much happier doing what he’s doing now than being a mere puppet of the Pride. You are safe now. And that is how it should be.”
Two took one more pull on the straw that noisily drained the bamboo tube of its contents. Then the creature stood to leave.
“And… having completely changed the future of millions of people for all time… we’re all good now?” she asked.
Two shrugged. “Of course!” it emphatically assured.
She was somehow uncomfortable with completely believing him.
“I suppose thanks is in order, then,” Edgar muttered distantly.
Two shrugged.
“Gratitude is not a thing my people value,” it told her. “We had to save you in order to save ourselves. We would like to continue living. I do have offspring who I care about a great deal, you realize. I want to see them thrive. Good day to you, Miss.”
And with that, it fluffed its robes and left her at the table by herself.
* * *
Edgar made her way back to the theatre alone. She was lost in thought, silently mulling over the words Two had just spoken.
She entered the Nightingale through the back door. There was a small, indoor tunnel bustling with activity and colorful people all getting ready for their moment on stage, or having just finished and quickly rushing to change before the next scene. All of the actors and actresses knew her. They smiled and hailed her as they sped past. She only smiled and nodded, happy they were too busy to chat. She wanted to get home to her silent room. She still had so much to ponder.
Edgar was on the spiral stairway to the apartment she shared with Morris when the stage manager hailed her.
“Hey, Professor!” he called.
She turned, and bending over the railing, looked down.
“A package came for you today,” he cried up to
her. “I took the liberty of delivering it to your apartment myself. I hope you don’t mind. I locked up after I left.”
She nodded, smiled and waved him on. The stage manager was always insanely busy. She was surprised he had remembered to tell her in the middle of everything else.
As she climbed the last few steps to her apartment, the strains from one of the songs from Phantom of the Opera wafted up to her ears. She smiled and hummed the tune a little. She had always loved that production and hoped to see a show later before it closed for the season. But not now, not tonight. Tonight she just wanted to be alone with her thoughts.
She unlocked the apartment door and stepped inside. Closing and leaning back against it, she sighed in relief and closed her eyes a moment.
Home and alone at last!
Edgar took off her jacket and hung it up. She put away the keys and made her way to the kitchen to start water for a pot of tea.
The apartment used to be the costume room of the theatre and some of the props were still there, notably a banged up suit of armor from Don Quixote and a wide assortment of masks of all colors and types from pretty and fanciful to horrific and scary. The masks bothered some people, but Edgar liked them. They weren’t really hers to keep though. They were theatre property and sometimes still needed. But Edgar liked them for decorative purposes. And as long as she didn’t have to wear a mask on a daily basis anymore, she enjoyed looking at them.
There was some sort of large thing set on her kitchen countertop and covered with a worn piece of burlap sack. She stirred the tea in her cup as she considered whether to open it now or later. She hadn’t been expecting any sort of package. Maybe more of her books had been salvaged.
She frowned, sipped her tea and decided not to wait for anyone.
Edgar swept off the tattered, brown burlap from the mysterious package.
She froze, her eyes going wide. The warm cup tumbled out of her shocked fingers and shattered. Painstakingly brewed tea splashed into a starburst on the wooden floor. She cried out in horror with the feeling of someone walking over her grave.
It was a large fish bowl filled with salt water. Within the bowl was a familiar looking, lethal, blue spot octopus.
There was a hiss and a pop of an antique microphone.
“I can no longer keep her,” said a well-known yet dreaded voice, breaking the silence of the room. “Calypso said she wanted to be with you. So I brought her with me.”
An ominous looking mask separated itself from a shadowed corner of the room where all of the scary masks were assembled. The Chamberlin stepped forward into the dim light of the kitchen area.
Edgar stepped back and slipped on the shards of porcelain and the puddle of tea on the floor. She staggered and threw out an arm in a wild arc to brace herself. Clutching at the countertop she managed to stop herself from falling. Her feet paddled frantically on the slick floor before she found purchase.
“What…” she gasped, flailing for words. “What are you doing here?”
Her mind fumbled for some sort of defense. She was all by herself. Morris wouldn’t be back for hours. Sprocket was nowhere near.
Warren! He could hear her thoughts. Mentally she screamed for his help. She knew he would hear… if he hadn’t turned off the dial. He had been doing that a lot lately, except when he was performing.
Edgar steadied her legs and started to pull herself along the counter in the direction of the kitchen knives.
But the Chamberlin seemed to anticipate her thoughts. His long, segmented tail whipped out and suddenly slapped the counter, halting her progress to the nearest defense.
“Please don’t,” the Chamberlin’s crackly voice advised. “That would be terribly rude since I just came here to talk. Nothing more than that.”
Edgar shook her head. “We have nothing to talk about.”
Again she mentally screamed for Warren. She wished his talent worked both ways. She had no idea if he had heard her.
“Oh, but I really believe you are wrong there,” it told her.
It stepped forward, closer to her. Edgar cringed back close to the counter, her heart pounding against the cage of her ribs.
The tail suddenly snaked back. Edgar glanced without moving her head to where the kitchen knives were stored in a block on the counter just out of reach.
And then the Chamberlin’s tail whipped back again, this time with a stool gripped tightly. It placed the stool beside her.
“Please sit,” the Chamberlin forcefully implored. “We might as well be comfortable.”
The tail moved another stool in front of itself and then took up a watchful position between Edgar and the knives. The Chamberlin stepped forward and hopped onto the stool across from her, perching upon it like a bird on a tree branch.
“Please, my dear, try and relax,” it cajoled. “If I had wanted you dead you’d be dead already. And I certainly wouldn’t entrust you with the care of my favorite pet. I mean to leave you as alive as when I first entered your home.”
Edgar saw she had no other choice. She took the offered stool.
“May I offer you some tea?” it said trying to be polite. “I have observed that when humans are stressed, they make tea.”
But Edgar could only cross her arms in front of her and shake her head in denial.
The Chamberlin seemed to mimic shrugging.
“Why are you here?” Edgar managed to choke out.
“My children have all hatched and are settled,” it explained. “They don’t need me anymore. I am retired, so to say, and can do whatever I want. I chose to spend the last months of my life traveling.”
Something about the way he said this made Edgar prick up her ears.
“You’re… dying?” she asked.
It nodded. “I have fulfilled my goal in life, to guard the next generation until they are hatched and no longer have any need of me. Now that this has been done, I will soon die.”
It paused.
“I suppose that may come as a relief to you,” it said.
It did. It gave Edgar such a relief that she was able to think logically.
“Then… where is the fuel coming from to power the Empire?” she asked.
The Chamberlin rustled within its robes and two of its many limbs came out and folded their long fingers in front of itself. Edgar realized it had observed this behavior from other humans and was mimicking them to set her at ease.
It did not have the desired effect.
“I negotiated a deal with your government,” it told her. “My children will refine the fuel for your machines. They’re really much better suited for that sort of work than humans.”
Edgar frowned. “In exchange for…”
The Chamberlin seemed to laugh. “You did not tell me your race occupied so many planets. And each of these planets has a class system. And some of the poorest classes have no collateral to properly dispose of their dead.”
Edgar felt sick to her stomach. “So anyone who is too poor to afford a funeral… homeless, or a John or Jane Doe that dies… they go to feed your children?”
The Chamberlin nodded.
“You’re grave robbers!” Edgar spat. “And you’re still monsters!”
The Chamberlin shook its head. “You say it like it’s such a bad thing. Throughout your history, people have died with no recourse for their bodies to be disposed of. Such a wasteful situation! This way, at least, they will be recycled. Is that not better? Humans like recycling, don’t they?”
“Humans don’t recycle themselves! It’s barbaric!” she fumed.
The Chamberlin shook his head in denial. “We have already decided that since my kind are not human, the same rules do not apply here. You have a problem of what to do with all the unwanted bodies. We supply a solution. That is all. Where is the harm in that?”
Edgar shook her head in disgust. “Is this what you do then?” she asked. “Wait until another race has settled your planet then hatch and… consume them?”
The Chamberli
n’s body language actually seemed to convey surprise.
“No!” it exclaimed. “Is that what you think of us?” It shook its masked head in denial. “It was not a contrived convenience that my children came along.” It attempted to convince her. “The next generation would have hatched at that time anyway, whether humans came along or not.”
This gave Edgar pause as her thoughts spun.
“Then… what does your kind feed on when there are no humans about?” she asked. “There is no other life on Castor 5 that we know of…”
The Chamberlin shook its head and waggled a scolding finger at her. She frowned. She was quickly getting tired of his attempts to copy human mannerisms.
“It might interest you to know that my kind also has a class system,” he told her. “Some are made to eat… and some are made to be eaten.”
Edgar’s jaw dropped in true horror at this revelation.
“You… cannibalize… your own people?” she gasped in utter revulsion.
The Chamberlin shrugged and waved it off like it was nothing. “It is not a bad thing in my culture,” it said. “It is actually believed to be a noble, patriotic act. We survive off of their sacrifice.”
Edgar made a face. “Well, humans think of such things as repulsive.”
“Then it is a very good thing that I am not human, wouldn’t you agree?” it replied.
They regarded each other in silence for a moment.
“So is that all you came here for? To deliver a poisonous pet and tell me stories of your people’s customs that would repulse me?” she asked.
The Chamberlin seemed to laugh. “Oh no, not at all!” it chuckled. “I came here to warn you.”
Edgar’s heart began to beat a bit faster. “Warn me of what?”
If the Chamberlin could have emitted an evil smile, now was the time.
“I recommended for you to start a revolution,” it told her. “You did not.”
Edgar sniffed and raised her chin defiantly. “A recommendation is not an order. I was free to refuse. Besides, everyone could see the explosion coming. Conversely an implosion is always unexpected.”
A Slice of Unkindness Page 14