We Can Save Us All
Page 35
You who seemed winged, even as a lad,
With that swift look of those who know the sky,
It was no blundering fate that stooped and bade
You break your wings, and fall to earth and die,
I think some day you may have flown too high,
So that immortals saw you and were glad,
Watching the beauty of your spirits flame,
Until they loved and called you, and you came.
Cap’n Cunt considered sports and business and war—these things that men believed themselves called to—and saw that they were all the same. Or at least poured from the same wellspring of toxic male bloodlust. We’d grown more civilized since the days of gladiator death matches as a form of entertainment, or even dueling with swords or pistols, and had tempered this need into swooshing on ice skates, tickling a puck with a stick, only occasionally smashing or punching each other in the face. Sports were a release valve, she got that, even if she didn’t totally get the emotion they were meant to release. Even war was more civil these days. Computer hackers attacking power grids were marginally better than barbarians impaling each other with metal spears.
Right?
She spots Business-Man over there. He’s been gone for hours, it seems, and now here he is directing the deployment of rowboats. Before they left the Calypso, David had pitched them about ancient Rome, where Julius Caesar staged naval reenactments. Naumachia, they were called. Caesar dug mile-wide basins in the earth and filled them with water and brought in ships for battle. It was a spectator sport, crazy expensive. A crew of POWs manned each boat, prisoners whose death was a foregone conclusion in these gladiator games. David envisioned something like this as a final USV spectacle—but with effigies, with symbolism. Filling the stadium with water was a way of neutralizing the fear of the rising tides. Another release valve substituting for violent battle.
But now there are women on the battlefield, Cap’n Cunt reminds herself. This was the difference. She answers only to herself. To the Egg inside. She has no need to “Make Hobey Proud.”
It’s true that she microdosed with Ultraviolet, just one more time—her last trip ever, she promised herself. It was over a month ago, at the tail end of the first trimester, when a part of her—a part that scared her—whispered dark possibilities of losing the baby, of being rid of this anxiety, once the wrenching grief was over. But no, the trip only made clear the gift of this baby. It only solidified her love into something simultaneously unbreakable and horribly fragile.
She’d seen Ultraviolet’s vision, and he’d confirmed it afterward. So she knows what must happen. David’s plan is decidedly different from Mathias’s. She knows, finally, there’s only one way out. It’s the end of the game, and humans are losing, and you have to do something big and bold to win. A Hail Mary, they call it. She believes she’s ready. She will be when the time comes.
Until then, she will keep her mask on.
Her mystery is her power.
“It still smells fresh,” Cap’n Cunt says, sidling up next to Business-Man. “What happens if it gets contaminated?”
“We have filtration and purification systems at the ready. Charcoal, sand, iodine. Lots of water is better than none, and we’ll just do our best to keep it clean and use the gray water for—”
“No, we’re building a lake within our bounds,” she says. “As the end comes, we’ll all pay the ferryman and sail together across the great river dividing living from dead.” She blows him a kiss.
“Well, that’s a less practical-sounding plan, but sure!” he says. “If it gets really bad, we’ll climb into the rowboats and hold on tight.”
“And if the water reaches the ceiling?” she says. “Do we smash that glass skylight, pour out the top through the Null Point window, overflowing like champagne bubbles, and emerge evolved?”
“Or we just wait till the weather’s better, pull the plugs, and walk down the ramp, back into the world outside,” he says, finding a smile for her.
“I got you something,” she says. “A little end-of-the-world gift.” And she hands him a pink iPhone with a cracked screen, plus a set of earbuds tucked in their white charging cube. She tells him she’d found a hard drive when cleaning out Fu’s room, before the fire: an archive of sorts with hours’ worth of original compositions, solo experiments, live recordings of Human DJ sessions from The Egg. A sonic diary of Echo’s last year of life. “Some of it is batshit crazy,” she says, “but a lot is rawther genius. I loaded everything on to this phone for you. If you keep the antenna off, you’ve probably got a good ten hours of charge. Thought it might keep you centered.”
He feels bad and he’s touched. He didn’t realize they were exchanging gifts. Business-Man thanks her, kisses her, tells her he loves her forever. She says, “You’re my bitch.”
Business-Man takes a breath. He feels clear, cool, collected. In a state of preparing. He feels a cosmic pull with every human body in this great space, like a murder of crows. As if silently summoned, he looks up and finds Ultraviolet at the top of section 124. With a quick head nod Ultraviolet motions David up to the upper deck announcer’s booth they’ve reserved for the League of Seven. Business-Man heads that way. Cap’n Cunt joins him, belly growing bigger by the second.
“How do you feel?” David asks, pointing at her midsection.
“Distended, tight, incredibly pressure-filled,” she says. “Like it’s pulling my back forward where I can’t correct it and the bottom is pulling up tight, and the sides are tight when I breathe, but above all”—she squeezes his hand and he squeezes back—“I feel ready.”
Then her face perks up, like she’s just remembered the answer to a nagging question. She takes his palm and places it on the side of her belly.
Tonggg!
The sound booms through the Superdome, which means they’ve succeeded in powering and patching into the arena’s PA usually reserved for announcers’ voices and jock jams. It echoes.
They hold still, that’s the rule. But then, good god, David feels it moving, the only thing still moving in this whole huge place, just a tiny flutter, barely perceptible, but he imagines a small knee, maybe, or elbow, or hand waving hi, or maybe a butt rolling to find a more comfortable position, but whatever it is, something’s magically alive in there. He wants to see it, to see through her belly skin with X-ray vision and know exactly what body part of the baby he’s touching right now, what it looks like, what shape is its nose, is it a boy or girl. Feeling it writhe, he imagines it looks like a little alien, this thing roiling beneath her skin, but why does it automatically conjure alien when it’s the most human thing of all?
David once read that when people get closer to something awful—death, for instance—they become better able to look away and pretend it’s not there. The closer to disaster, the easier to deny. But not for David. He feels the baby moving and silently promises it that he’ll stare straight ahead and let the brightness blind him and pray the oncoming train is really a light at the end of a tunnel.
— Ø —
They step out into the narrow concessions concourse. Above them is the underside of the stadium seats, an Escher-like upside-down staircase. Blink. Business-Man remembers the first time he saw the stairwell open wide in The Egg, those unnatural ridges beneath. Here, hanging low from the steel girders, are some of the USV’s provisions—mostly smoked and dried meats dangling down like some massive Chinatown butcher shop—venison and duck and ham hocks and clusters of dried sausages bunched thick like the bristles of a giant broom. With the power off, the hanging light fixtures are useless, but some enterprising soul has dangled mason jars from each one and filled these with candles, lending a soft Renaissance light to the hundreds of humans below.
Business-Man can’t be sure whether this infrastructure extends around the entire circumference of the stadium, but this section 121–125 stretch right here has been transformed into a kind of shopping mall of USV merchants and service providers. The concessions have be
en largely gutted of electric appliances, but the ventilation hoods still work well enough, so small fire pits in metal trash cans serve as cooktops, and an extensive team of chefs and servers are working hard to rough out the night’s dinner. The concourse concrete has become the USV’s Shakedown Street, the kind of pop-up parking-lot-style commerce he remembers from music festivals. It’s lined on both sides with purple craftspeople—woodworkers, metallurgists, glassblowers—all plying their wares from makeshift workshops behind makeshift storefronts, plus musicians and massage therapists, commodities traders and preachers, scavengers and superheroes, pitching their unique skill sets via cardboard signs, the last sort of CV these Ivy Leaguers ever expected to present to the world.
There are buyers, too. Heroes with signs scrawled ISO: DEPACON/ANY MIGRAINE RX and the like. Dr. Ugs is holed up in the arena’s Lost & Found with his cadre of chemists, doing his best to help the many kids who are off their meds. Beyond the recreational stuff and performance enhancers and world-openers, some of their heroes need daily synthetic thyroid medication, insulin, and asthma inhalers and will be in serious danger soon. They’ve stockpiled and scavenged from pharmacies, but that won’t help if they’re stuck in this place indefinitely.
Beside a first aid station, Business-Man notices a tent marked D-DAY DOULAS. A team of hippieish midwives in white sarongs holds court for a dozen or so girls sitting cross-legged before them. The girls don’t appear overly pregnant, but each caresses her midsection, practicing some kind of slow, circular motion, so perhaps they’re just not yet showing. Business-Man realizes Cap’n Cunt is merely the furthest along of the USV’s many expectant mothers.
A throng of underlings has formed a tighter corridor for the League of Seven to walk through. There’s Ultraviolet up front, Cap’n Cunt now right behind him, Sergeant Drill marching with purpose, while It Girl gets derailed every few steps to give hugs. Business-Man pulls up the rear with Peacemaker and his newly expanded task force of enforcers, all of them strutting like a tight and important entourage. Which is, after all, exactly what they are.
Business-Man feels like an NBA all-star, dropping low fives along a gauntlet of teammates.
“Business-Man!”
“How are you?” David says, shaking hands. “What a pleasure to see you, Mayline Ranger.”
“The water level is at the top of the hockey boards, starting to run over the Plexi.”
“Keep it coming until it fills the lobby, then seal off the west entrance. Only the west. Go.”
“Business-Man,” says Johnny Pockets, a human Swiss army knife. “Where do you want—?”
“Firewood in the boiler room,” he says. “Cans in concessions. And send Savage Horrorshow and DJ Jigglepuss to siphon more gas from the cars in the parking lot before they all float away. Go.”
It’s been like this for days. Everyone’s so intimidated and awed by Ultraviolet, and Business-Man has de facto and by definition become the guy who gets it done. He suddenly realizes he’s very good at his job. He sees Ultraviolet’s theoretical vision but is the one who can communicate it in practical fashion. He understands the nuance of numerous choices but makes executive decisions quickly, projecting confidence and certainty. He is scared but is excellent at pretending otherwise.
He’s like a dad, maybe.
The Schirminator says, “Business-Man, which cape do you like from these three?”
“The one on the left.” He couldn’t give a shit, but it’s better to be decisive.
Yes-Man says, “Business-Man, I brought you a Diet Sierra Mist. Maybe the last one ever!”
“Delightful,” Business-Man says, accepting the offering, shaking his hand. “Excuse me.”
When he’s out of range, Business-Man leaves the can on the concrete. He’s got things to do. He cares much more about water, pure hydration, or maybe it’s better to abstain from all public displays of ingestion and appear ascetic at a time like this.
Cosmik Debris says, “Business-Man, I was awake all night, saw the sun and all of space-time. I understand now. Can you get me ten minutes with Ultraviolet so I can explain? He’ll understand.”
“Minutes don’t exist, my hero.” David pivots, bobs, weaves.
He tries to get stealthy, but immediately a new trio of heroes, two girls and a guy, accost him, looping arms around his neck. It’s hard to keep the faces straight, especially now that most of the costumes have been replaced with paint, but David does his best to remember. He never was great with names, but he’s found himself to be pretty solid with personas. One of them, buff and gender neutral, is Androgenius, and David remembers the girl—she calls herself Serious Miss Givings—because she’s blown him twice, and the other girl he’s never seen before but she can barely keep her eyes open because of drugs.
“We’re having a thing tonight, section 110,” Androgenius says. “Anything goes.”
“I appreciate the offer,” Business-Man says.
“David!” says another voice. And this time Business-Man does a double take.
“It’s Esteban. From Forbes,” the guy says. “I mean, I’m Steel Wool now, uh, my thesis—”
“Yes, I realize. I know who you are. But your name is terrible. That’s a name for a punk rocker or someone with a good Jew ’fro. C’mon, Esteban. You have like two days to figure out who you are before you are no more. So who are you? Why are you?”
Esteban nods. Business-Man can see he’s scared. “I was going to be a lawyer.” His voice quivers when he says it. “I don’t know what I am or how to help anymore.”
“It’s okay,” Business-Man says, putting a hand on his shoulder. “The good news is that you’re strong. Physically and mentally, my friend. You have arms and legs and can help us haul. You have goodness in you, a sense of right and wrong. It’s what drew you to law, right, and it’s what makes you a valued hero in the Satya Yuga, after we pass through the dark neck of time. We have no idea how long we’ll be buried in this human time capsule before we emerge evolved. I’ll guarantee we will need law and order inside this sacred space. Find Sergeant Drill, up there. She knows our laws and you can learn them the way you’ve studied the ones of this dying world. We need your help, Esteban. And incidentally, as long as you’re offering to help, I’d kill for a Diet Sierra Mist.”
Esteban wipes his eyes, gives him a hug, and runs off to make himself useful. Business-Man watches him run, scans the gathered crowd. He can see it all. He did this. He knows what he is here to do next. He will gather the masses, guide them through, and save them all.
— Ø —
The announcer’s booth is windowed along one side looking down on the arena below.
Peacemaker is continuing to tweak Ultraviolet’s ham radio setup with the arena’s PA system, trying to get the timbre of their Seventh-Minute Stop’s tonggg just right, removing the static. This tech stuff would’ve been Fu’s job. But Peacemaker has his solar panels and Electrocycles, while H-Bomb and TarHero brought their biodiesel-powered generator, too, for later. On the audio front, he’s really stepped up since Fu died. David is so proud of him. That broken boy from last semester—the roommate who’d screamed and cried and smashed trash cans and fallen apart after Soccer Bob’s rightful expulsion—has picked himself up off the Forbes shower floor and learned to fly.
Ultraviolet sits at the head of a long wooden table, the remainder of the core USV scattered around him. Security stands guard along the walls and windows of this press box, trying to stay out of the way while looking generally imposing. The League is gathered to give and get final instructions. Business-Man paces a slow circle around the table, arms crossed. He feels powerful, yet maybe a little self-conscious in his skintight suit. He glances down at his package to see how it looks in these boxer briefs. Just okay.
“Get some food, take your moments alone, whatever you need to do, do it now,” David says. “Intelligence says we’ve got about an hour of power left.”
He’s making this stuff up, but he must project confidence.
Business-Man continues: “My guess is they’ve set up a perimeter around us.”
“Or what if they haven’t?” asks Haley, breaking character. David hates it when she challenges him like this. He ignores her, tries his best to command the room. But nobody’s listening.
“Seriously,” says Ultraviolet, directing his voice at It Girl this time. “Something is disappearing me like Marty McFly. The End is under way. We’re stretching upward. I mean, just feel these things.”
“Feel this,” Cap’n Cunt says, bringing Ultraviolet’s hand to her belly. David suddenly wants to disappear Mathias himself. He stares at his stupid purple hand lovingly stroking her.
“It’s a boy,” Ultraviolet says. “I can see it.”
“I think I’m ready,” Cap’n Cunt suddenly announces, more to Ultraviolet than to the room.
Business-Man continues: “They’ve probably sent state police plus SWAT, and maybe—”
“We’re on our own, David, now shush!” Ultraviolet snaps at him, swiping his hand to sever his speech. Everyone gets quiet. “What does that mean?” he says to Cap’n Cunt. “Either you know or else you’re not ready.”
“I’m ready,” she says immediately. “I see the clock ticking.”
Ultraviolet nods. He motions to the security detail by the door and they gingerly move to escort her from the room. She rises, slowly, with the extra weight of a child and something even more than a child that David doesn’t yet understand. She stops beside Business-Man and kisses him on the cheek. He can’t tell whether she’s mad or horny, or maybe this is some kind of new emotion that has no particular name except in German. She smiles, and before he can ask where she’s going, the rest of the League lines up along the windows, standing at attention.