by Jared Ravens
He woke up early in order to get to the gate before anyone else. The crowd was much lighter and there was a new guard. He gave Bern a little gruff but allowed him in to wait. The gates opening the greenery of the yard expanded before him. He walked its gravel path through the gardens, the house and its magnificent turrets growing with each step. The house became longer and taller as he came closer. Distant scaffolding hinted at its continued expansion. Story after story of white marble was being built on top of each other. Then it would be torn down and rebuilding slightly different colors. The building was a block of gleaming white and gold majesty highlighted in blue trim and framed by a bright green lawn, all stretching out endlessly towards the point where the mountain turned into sky.
He came to the front stairs, the white stone shining so bright that they nearly blinded him in the morning light. There was already a line of people pouring down them. He waited as a female guard processed them one by one. Once checked, they would disappear into an enormous set of gold doors that entered into the fortress. The guard looked at him through the slits in her burgundy helmet and asked for his name.
She made him wait with many others on the stairs. He ate nuts forma vender and wiled way half the morning walking among the gardens. An army of Choholi tended to them. They were a short breed of humans with darker skin who came from an island somewhere from in the south and east.
“They hire them last,” said a man after Bern asked about them. He wore a hat and a worn out suit in what was probably his most formal outfit. “Celia don’t like them cause they don’t give a damn about her. They won’t take any gruff off her, and they talk back. But not in the same language.”
Bern had worked with them before; they were hardy people indeed, but if they didn’t want to do something they would simply leave. Few could speak the Choholi language and fewer still could control them. They would wash up on a beach in a rickety boat and, once they tired of living here, leave on another to go back to their own island. It did not appear that Celia had anything to do with their creation. She had never said anything officially about them. Bern had noticed this about Celia, and the titans in general. If they couldn’t explain it, they would ignore it.
“They must be hard pressed for workers if they hired them,” Bern replied.
"I doubt Celia had anything to do with them. Genesee knows how to manage things. He doesn’t care who they are.”
Bern thought about Celia, how she would have to look out her window and see these short brown creatures talking in clicks and wandering around her garden. I mentioned this to the man.
"Look above you,” he grinned. "She doesn’t have any rooms on this side. I bet she has the prettiest people on the other side of the building. But the gardens must look like shit!”
Bern was let in soon after that. He went through the imposing doors and down a cavernous hallway with a roof high enough that birds could comfortably fly through. In fact, majestic holes in the roof allowed them entrance and trees planted on each side the hallway provided suitable homes for many species. There was constant movement of staff as they ran from door to door holding file, some screaming, some with panicked looks, some with shovels or brooms. Only the sheer size of the place muffled their activity.
He went to an office with tope colored walls where a group of officials in dark uniforms stood behind a massive desk and dealt with a mob of commoners. Papers were flying left and right; People shouted to be heard. Bern reached the front of the line and an agitated man asked what his business was. The man gave a series of formal and unhelpful responses. He asked for Bern’s birth mother’s address at one point, to which Bern replied that she was dead. The man handed him a set of papers and shoed him away from the desk.
He filled out the paperwork in the hallway, scribbling as he held it against the wall. While waiting in a another line to file the papers he caught a glimpse of something move. A giant walked across the far end of the hallway, its head nearly touching the enormous ceilings. The sight, one so common here that none of the bureaucrats took any notice, moved Bern so much that he forgot where he was for a moment. He tried to recall which one he had just seen. Maybe Curson? It was gone before he could examine it.
That line led to another wait, and then an appointment with an officer, a pleasant lady who wrote down everything Bern said and then had him sign it before she filed it in a massive drum filled with paperwork.
"I really need to speak to a representative of Celia’s,” Bern said.
"Celia won’t see you,” the woman said matter of factly.
"I know, I just need to ask one or two questions through a representative. This is really life or death for some people.”
She seemed concerned by this and sought to aid my distress.
"No one really dies; they are recycled by Waring,” she told me, pointing to a painting on the wall of Waring, the Minister of the Underworld. He seemed particularly tired in the painting, with huge dark circles under his eyes and a forced half smile. Bern looked at the other official portraits on the wall. None were flattering, not even Celia’s, which stood prominently behind the clerk.
Bern thanked her, dismayed at the waste of a day. He had known this was going to be drudgery, but thinking about it and experiencing it were two different things. He slouched out of the office, counting the money he would need for another night at the inn. He sat on the steps, watching the light slowly disappear behind a patch of trees on the lawn. He had enough for two nights there but then he would have nothing for the trip back. He thought about sleeping on the lawn, if they would let me. The gates were closing. The last of the crowd was being dispersed at the front. He sighed and stood up, his suit still feeling fresh even if his mind was not. He saw the man and his son from the inn walking forlornly across the garden. He knew how they felt.
"Is your first name Bern or your last name Bern?”
Bern looked behind him when the tonal voice spoke. He froze at the sight in front of him.
Genesee was looking at a piece of paper, the last light bouncing off the top of his bald head, and he adjusted his unneeded round glasses as if he might have read the name on the paper incorrectly.
“First,” Bern replied nervously.
"You filled out the form wrong,” Genesee siad, handing it to Bern and then reaching back to a man in formal dress. The man handed him another piece of paper. Bern looked at the paper Genesee had given him. He didn’t recall seeing it before. He had filled so many applications today.
“I can change it,” Bern said anxiously.
"Please, but later." Genesee stepped forward, walking down the steps. Bern followed him and the man in formal dress followed in back. Bern noticed that, though he was taller than Genesee, the shorter man had a way of speaking and walking that made him feel like any of the giants. He had his hands behind his back and he lifted his chin up in the air, his words floating back to Bern.
"Are you the one behind this book that been causing so much trouble?”
"Well, I’m a representative of...”
"So, yes,” he interrupted, lifting his fingers above his shoulder. The man behind Bern wrote something down. "Who fact checks your books, Bern?”
"We have fact checkers in office...”
"We do, too. Bern, we fact check books.”
Genesee stopped. And turned Bern expected him to stare him down but he looked at his helper and the man nodded, then walked back along to the compound. They were now on the side of the building, standing on the lawn. Along the pathways torches were being lit. Genesee’s face was now illuminated in flickering red and yellow, the cropped grey and brown hair on the sides of his head shining in the torchlight. Though he seemed to have every reason to be furious at Bern he seemed entirely complacent.
"We thought the book was from Celia,” Bern said. "We prefaced it as best as we could.”
"Did you ask her if she wrote it?”
"That’s not really possible, judging from my experience today. I was hoping you could ask her for
me.”
He scratched his cheek.
"She knows you’re here.”
"Then I can see her?”
"She wouldn’t admit she did it even if she did write it.”
"Did you ask her?”
"She said she didn’t, then she said to send you away.”
"I’m sorry...” Bern said, deflated. “We only did it because the thought she would demand it. It was meant as a scholarly work...”
"She probably did write it,” He replied, plainly. "You shouldn’t publish anything that she tells you to. It’ll only get you into trouble.”
They continued walking, this time side by side. Bern found himself warming to Genesee. His cold manner was simply his personality, not a judgement.
"Damned if I do, damned if I don’t,” Bern said.
"Its better to be in my good graces than hers. Do you think she’s interested in protecting you?”
"I thought there was balance between you two.”
"Yes, except I have to keep jumping on the scale to keep it that way. The official story is the official story because that’s what everyone agrees on. It doesn’t matter if it’s true or not. And I can tell you, whatever she says certainly isn’t true.”
"If I don’t do what she says, she’ll just keep sending people to me with more of the same.”
I pulled out a copy of the current story and told him about the woman soaked in blood on my doorstep. He stopped and fingered through the pages.
"She’s talking about Staley?” He said after reading them. “My, she’s insane. If he feels embarrassed he’ll unleash a hurricane on her doorstep.”
"Is it true?” Bern asked.
Genesee glanced up at Bern.
"What difference does it make? Do you want people to know what she’s actually like?”
"I think they already have the opinion that she’s unstable. They live with her every day.”
He took some time to look through the pages.
"I just don’t know...”
"You don’t know if she wrote it or not?”
He looked up at Bern.
"She’s making herself look like a basket case if she did write this and deliver it to you. Why would she do that?”
They continued walking. We were approaching the scaffolding now. Bern realized something was very wrong; this was not a simple remodeling. The wall was destroyed, exposing many levels of rooms and their ruined furniture. There was a clear view into one of the enormous hallways where torches were being lit. A cool breeze flickered torches. Even the ceiling had been torn down in numerous places. Through the hole Bern saw the great hall, where Celia held court. It was empty now, pillars demolished with parts of the roof caved in. The huge Table of Eternity was at the far end of the room, the top of it seemingly twice the height of Bern.
"Its a disaster,” Genesee breathed.
"Is this Fairfax, sir?” Bern asked.
Genesee turned to Bern slowly.
"Is this to be in another book of yours?"
"No, sir, no,” I stuttered. His face was unreadable. Bern didn’t know if he was capable of joking. "Do you think,” Bern asked, “that she is trying to rally public opinion on her side?”
"Because of Fairfax?”
"People talk about him all the time. Even if they don’t like him, they talk about him. They like seeing her take it on the chin. And I don’t know how your recruiting is going...”
Genesee’s eyes suddenly lit up.
"You know what people are saying?” Genesee said.
"Well, I know what I hear.”
He put his hand on Bern’s shoulder awkwardly. They walked past the scaffolding towards a large pile of dirt in the distance.
"You’re right that we have some difficulty in public relations. The fighting doesn’t help. I was thinking that you could help me in some ways, and it would look favorable in light of your recent violations.”
"Yes, sir, of course.”
"You could report what people are saying. As a person in the public ear, you know more than we know. We managers could disguise ourselves and go down and talk to people but it’s never really the same.”
"Well, of course I could.”
"You would have a direct line to me.”
"Yes, sir, of course.”
"And I was thinking, to cover up for your mistake of putting this book into print you could do a large run of the official history. With statements from all of us affirming its validity. It would be a masterwork for you.”
Bern smelled the rot of losses in every word he said. No one wanted to read that dry piece of shit, and it wouldn’t help at all. Bern breathed in, his throat dry. They were getting closer to the dirt pile and he saw in the darkness there was an enormous hole.
"Sir, if you want my opinion that would be a huge waste of time.”
They stopped just short of the hole. It was a a tremendous blackness in the ground. Something hadn’t dug this hole. It came from an explosion.
"Why is that?” he asked.
"No one believes it.”
He turned to Bern slowly.
"You want to know what people say...” Bern said quickly. "They know whatever comes from The Hill is garbage. And this Fairfax thing... It's extremely dangerous. I don't’ think you understand. She’s buttering the public up. She’s getting them ready. She’s giving the warts and all truth because people will believe it. It will feel more true than what they read from you. And then, when she has the chance, she’s going to throw you down and crush you.”
"She’s always doing that,” he whispered. "Every time she has a chance.”
"She makes you look like a fool in the books. She’s promising utopia, and you and Goetz are standing in the way.”
"That’s how she sees it.”
"Then tell me how you see it. Put it out there. It can be along the official line, but told by you."
He looked to the hole. Bern couldn’t tell what he was thinking, nor why he had taking me to this giant hole. It felt like he was waiting for someone to appear and throw Bern into its endless depths.
"She’s going to blame Fairfax on me,” Genesee said, nodding. "I know it. That’s where her stories are leading.”
“Can I ask, what does Goetz know about all this.”
"It knows of it. Of course it knows about Fairfax. It wants us to get him and bring him back. He doesn’t want Celia to have him.”
"You’ll need a bigger army.”
He glanced up at Bern.
"You people are difficult to control.”
That sounded exactly like what Celia might say. But Celia would not have said it so softly.
"Let me think about it,” Genesee sighed.
"Can I ask you something?”
He didn’t reply, but the didn’t walk away.
“Did you send people out to burn down Johnathan’s home in Far West?”
“Yes,” he said, bluntly. “They followed you.”
“They killed Jonathan….”
“Did you know, there is no death? You are all recycled. He’s much better now.”
“But you would have killed me if I hadn’t escaped.”
“But they didn’t. And if they had we wouldn’t be dealing with this problem.
He held up the papers in his hand before stuffing them in his jacket. His face was so plain and calm that it was impossible to read.
“Now that it’s out in the open I guess we have to find another solution,” he continued. “Don’t you think?”
Waring
Adapted From Celia’s Testament of an Alternate History of Creation
As Received by Anonymous
Goetz was and is an absentee landlord. It demands obedience and yet does not tend to the needs of its own offspring. The problems with this sort of management are obvious, and in the early days I had my hands full just keeping the system from bursting at the seams. There was no one to handle agriculture, so I sent Spaulding made trips to teach farmers what he knew about tending the fields. Week
s of famine followed. Although he knew about the ground he knew nothing of growing, and result was empty fields and piles of bodies.
Goetz was not present for this, and it was adamant that its own resources were stretched by our demands. So we had to take matters into our own hands. I needed to create something with an eye towards farming but my abilities were at this point limited to only humans and animals. We had worked to create Staley, and his conception was the mold we I had to follow, for better or worse.
My sister, Martel, and Harper were spending more time together than I wished, and their romantic entailments did not please me. I let it happen but I took note of it. I knew they were sneaking behind my back and copulating in hidden corners of the The Hill. With this in mind I hatched a plan for creation.
I had a barn built, large but with few windows. As it was being constructed I went down into the woods and experimented with animals. I made many cattle of various sizes and intellect. I experimented with focusing specific traits into a being, as Goetz had done with Staley. This was challenging and took a great deal of concentration but I finally made a female that pleased me, a beautiful cow of light brown and white. It was an amazing beast, handsome and quiet, and I could see in her eyes a thought process that one does not equate with animals. It must seem quite odd to think of a cow as intelligent, but when I tested its basic skills it was able to do math and even read. It could not speak its thoughts but it did have them.
I had the cow dressed by my handmaidens, explaining to them that it would be paraded down the streets of Sigma as a present to its people. I then hid in shadows, following my sister to see where she would meet Harper. They met on an unfinished balcony that night, and I was pleased that their intimate transgressions did not cross into copulation. As soon as they walked away from each other I ran silently back to Harper's cottage to lay a note on his bed.