by Logan Jacobs
“That’s what he has those skull-faced goons for,” Tempest said.
“We have to expose him,” Nova said. “It’s the right thing to do.”
“Sugar, who are we going to tell?” Aurora asked. “Someone lower in the hierarchy of the games than Tyche? The police? The news? We don’t have anything to show them.”
“Captain Har’Gitay saw the whole thing,” I argued. “She knows about Dolos.”
“We can’t let him know that we know,” PoLarr said, “otherwise it’ll definitely be over. We’ll just have to lie low and dodge his bullshit until we can find out more.”
“PoLarr is right,” Grizz said. “Sometimes discretion truly is the better part of valor. Our enemy is powerful and widespread, and we do not know how to fight him best just yet. The best strategy now is to shore up our defenses and let him reveal himself.”
And so we all trooped home.
Artemis got a sly smile on her face as we approached the door to the apartment.
“What’s up, babe?” I asked.
“I just think you’re going to be pretty relieved when you open the door,” she said.
“What, did you re-replicate my DVD collection or something?” I asked.
“Oh, no, I honestly left the place a total mess,” Artemis said. “You’ll see.”
When I opened the door to the apartment, the lights were on. The DVD shards, bits of sparking disemboweled robot, and other debris from the bio-droids’ freak-out were all gone, even though the furniture and the wall were still slashed and full of holes.
There was one presence in the apartment that hadn’t been there when we’d left. For a second, my brain couldn’t register the sight, and then all the thoughts of conspiracy and secrecy that had been whirling through my mind on the way home were gone. I ran to the man on the couch.
“Dad!” I cried. My first instinct was to give him a huge flying hug, but my combat medic mod reminded me that he’d been shot just a few hours ago, and that I needed to take it easy on the sudden tackles of affection for the moment. I still embraced him, but it was a lot less of a tackle and a lot more of an arm-around-the-shoulders kind of thing.
“Hey, son,” Thomas said with a grin. There was a hover-chair next to the couch, but I was happy to see that he didn’t look pale or drawn.
“We’ll take a rain check on the movie, sugar,” Aurora called. She blew a kiss to me and headed to her bedroom.
Artemis pressed a kiss to my cheek. “He called from outside the apartment not too long ago,” she said. “I just called Hanquisarqual and told him to let your father in. I hope you have a good talk.”
PoLarr snapped off a smart salute as she passed through the living room to the hall, and Nova and Tempest followed suit. Thomas returned the salutes and held them until the girls had gone into the hallway.
“Amazing women,” he murmured. “So they all live with you, huh?”
I sat down on one of the recliners. “We fight together as a team, we train together as a team, and we live together as a team,” I said. “And I love them, and they love me. It’s a pretty sweet set-up.”
Thomas nodded slowly. “You’ve got a good team. That’s important in life. Knowing that you’ve got people who have your back, no matter what, on the battlefield or at home.”
“Yeah,” I agreed. There were so many things I’d wanted to say to my absent dad all of my life. Sometimes I’d wanted to tell him how well I was doing without him and how proud he’d be of me if he’d just been there. Sometimes I’d wanted to scream at him and blame him for not being there, for letting me down and letting down my mom when she was sick. Now that he was alive and in front of me, and we finally had time to talk, I wasn’t even sure where to start. “Uh, can I get you a beer or something?” A little alcohol sounded like a good way to begin a conversation and grabbing him a beer would give me a chance to figure out what I wanted to say first.
“A beer sounds good right about now,” Thomas said. “Nothing too strong, if you don’t mind. I can’t drink much on these painkillers.”
Woodhouse rolled into the living room with two tall glasses in hand before I could even get up. “Two beers, sir,” he said in his plummy British accent. “Please let me know if you need anything else. I make an excellent Indofleesian Pheasant soup for the ailing.”
“Thanks,” Thomas said as he accepted the beer, “but I’m recovering from a bullet wound, not a cold.”
“As sir wishes,” Woodhouse said as he rolled back into the kitchen.
I tasted the beer and goddamn was it good after the adventure we had just gone through. Woodhouse had given me a glass of my favorite rich, dark Guinness. The beer in Thomas’s glass looked paler, and I guessed that Woodhouse had either given him Shiner Bock, the lowest alcohol beer that Woodhouse knew I liked, or some medicinal alien ale.
“You’re healing up pretty well already,” I said. “I thought…” I felt a hot tear start to well up in the corner of my eye. I put down my glass on the side table and wiped it away. “Thought you were dead. Thought I’d lost you right when I found you, you know?”
Thomas leaned forward and put his hand on my shoulder. His grip was warm, firm, and comforting. “Marc, I thought I was dead too. Everything was going dark, that little blue lozenge didn’t seem to be making any difference--”
“Little blue lozenge?” I asked. “What did you take?”
Thomas leaned back on the couch and took a breath before he answered. “Oh, they’ve been giving us these new experimental candies we’re supposed to take if we get sick or injured out in the field,” Thomas said. “Guys are calling them Blue Bonnies or something.”
“Blue Betty!” I said. “I’m familiar with the lady in question.”
“Yeah, that’s it,” Thomas said. “I thought they were some kind of new amphetamine at first, didn’t want to try ‘em, but I’d found one in the pocket of that armor jumpsuit, and I thought, shit, I’m already dying, it doesn’t matter if I feel a little jittery or not.”
My combat medic mod reminded me that taking amphetamines when you were already dying of blood loss was a bad idea, since the chemical would just speed up your heart and get the blood out faster. I reminded it that we weren’t in combat right now and that it needed to shush.
“Everything was going dark,” Thomas continued. “I’d managed to get that candy out of the pocket and get it into my mouth, but then I couldn’t move my legs or arms. I couldn’t even taste the Blue Betty anymore. I could hear you fighting, and I was terrified.”
I nodded. “Yeah,” I said. “I understand that.”
“I didn’t care if I was about to die, Marc.” Thomas said. “Not really. It’s been a long time since I’ve had the luxury of fearing death. I was terrified that I’d left you without backup. I didn’t want to hear you die right in front of me when I couldn’t come to help you.”
“I was scared of the same thing,” I said. “I should have been watching your back. You don’t have all the mods I do.”
“I may not have your mods, but I have decades of training under my belt,” Thomas said. “You did the right thing protecting the President’s daughter. That was what we were there to do.” He put his hand on mine. “You did a good job, Marc. I was proud. I am proud. I know I can’t take any credit for the man you’ve become, but I’m still proud of that man.”
I felt the hot trickle of tears on my cheeks. Of everything Thomas had said, of everything I’d been through today, why did my dad telling me that he was proud of me have to be the thing that finally broke the dam of tears?
Woodhouse silently handed me a tissue. He handed one to Thomas as well. Thomas took it and nodded at Woodhouse, then continued his story.
“I was blacking out, Marc, and the only thing I wanted in the world was to stay and help you fight,” Thomas said. “Everything I could hear died away, and I thought, ‘Shit, I’m going under, this is it.’ Then I saw the light, and I figured, well, I’m either on an operating table or I’m about to see all of
my dead relatives, probably even the ones I don’t like very much, so I’d better get ready for that.”
I laughed a little. “Sorry, it just sounded like the kind of thing I’d think right at the gates of Heaven or whatever.”
“Well, it wasn’t Heaven,” he said. “It was the moon, shining down on this huge, wooden cabin in the middle of the woods. And there was an old man standing there. One eye, big old floppy hat, couple of crows on his shoulder. I knew exactly who it was.”
“You saw Odin in your near-death experience?” I asked. “Damn, that is the most metal thing I’ve ever heard.”
Thomas’s grin got even wider. “And you know your Norse mythology,” he remarked. “Yeah, you’re definitely my kid.”
“I’ve had some weird dreams after drinking Blue Betty, but never anything like that,” I said. “Closest thing I got was a dream where Tom Hiddleston asked me directions to the Battle of Agincourt and then tried to bite my neck. So you met Odin in the woods outside of a mead hall…”
“He asked me if I wanted to take my place in Valhalla,” Thomas said. “I asked him what the alternative was, since he was kind enough to give me the choice. He told me I could go back to Midgard and risk dying of old age in my bed.” Thomas laughed. “I told him I was fine with that. I wanted to stick around to make sure my son outlived me.”
I crumpled the tissue in my hand. “You might not get to see that. I mean... I’m glad that’s what got you to come back. I didn’t want to lose you.”
“But?” Thomas asked.
“But being a Champion isn’t your average job,” I said. “I’m really unlikely to live to old age.”
“There are plenty of professions with a high death rate,” Thomas said. “Firefighters, construction workers, those deep-sea divers who do construction work under oil rigs...hell, even truck driving is pretty dangerous, and plenty of people who work those jobs live to retirement age more often than not.”
“Death matches aren’t part of the job when you drive trucks, though,” I said. “At least, they weren’t on any of my routes. This isn’t just a job with a high death rate. Champions don’t die in their beds of old age.” I twisted the tissue in my hands. “I’m not trying to tell you this to bum you out or anything. You just need to know this. You came back from the dead because you wanted to see me stick around, but there’s a very real possibility that I won’t. You’re not going to get grandkids or any of the usual family stuff.”
Thomas took a long drink of his beer. He wiped his mouth and set his glass down on the metallic side table before he spoke again. “Then I want to be able to see you win as many times as possible before you lose. I wanted to contact your mother so many times over the years. I tried to write letters, I tore ‘em up. I rehearsed these conversations in my head that we’d have over the telephone. I told myself that when I finally got back Stateside, I’d find her, show up at her house with gifts, take her out to dinner. Propose, maybe, if she didn’t have anyone in her life.”
He wiped away a tear. “God, I don’t know what I would have done. Every time I had some fantasy about coming back to sweep her off her feet, I would imagine her slamming the door in my face. Every time I thought about us being a family, I’d realize that I had no idea how to be a father. Hours of D&D and years of Special Forces made me a good strategist and a pretty decent fighter, but it wasn’t going to prepare me to raise a child.”
I nodded. Now that I’d burned off a little of that stored-up resentment and gotten to meet the man, I understood a little more about him. If I’d gotten my girlfriend pregnant when I was barely old enough to drink, I would have been pretty freaked out too.
“And every time I took on another mission or liquidated another target,” Thomas continued, “I’d realize that I was slipping just a little farther away from ever being able to come back and try to make some kind of normal suburban life out of the time I had left. I lost my nerve, every time, and then I lost my chances.”
In some of my worst moments I’d thought about how I would tell him that Mom had died. I’d imagined saying it as bluntly as I could, choosing my words so they would hurt, describing her pain. I’d torn into him in my imagination, lambasting him for not being there for her. I’d wanted to see the hurt on his face, to let him feel even a fraction of what I’d felt when I’d lost her. Now, I didn’t know how to tell him, or even if this was the right time. If I could handle reliving even a little of her illness tonight.
“She got sick,” I finally said. “I don’t know if you ever found out.”
“Not until I read your file,” Thomas said, his voice heavy. “Mother: Deceased. That was all it said. I’m sorry, Marc.” He reached for my hand again, and this time he took it and squeezed. “It must have been hard on you.”
“Really hard,” I said. “I don’t want to talk about it now.”
“I understand,” Thomas said. “Point is, I never thought I’d get any of that family stuff in the first place. I definitely don’t expect grandkids or anything. I mean, unless you’re already planning to have kids someday,” he added. “I know it’s not for everyone.”
“Not really an option for me,” I said. I’d never really thought much about having kids back on Earth, and now I didn’t like the idea of leaving behind a child without its father any more than I had liked being left behind. Having a bunch of little Marclets running around town without ever really being able to know them sounded even worse somehow.
“I get it,” Thomas said. “Point is, you don’t owe me any of that. Not grandkids, not Thanksgiving dinner, not visitation every other weekend. I was proud to fight alongside you and your team just once, and if I’d died knowing you were going to live that day, I would have been content with that.” He squeezed my hand again. “But you’re my son, and you’re a fighter. You’re a survivor. The only thing you owe me is to live up to that.”
“You can’t win every fight,” I said. “And I can’t promise you that I will any more than I can promise that to Artemis.” I squeezed his hand back. “But I can promise you that I’ll try.”
“Good,” Thomas said. “Because I can’t promise anything normal either. I don’t know how to be a father, and I know I can never make up that time we both lost. I wouldn’t know how to start to try. But you’re my son, and you’re a good man, and…” He wiped a tear from his eye. “I’m proud to meet you. I want to get to know you. I want to be there, if you’ll let me.”
“Yeah,” I said softly. “I’d really like that. Even if, y’know, you can’t make it every other weekend.”
Thomas’s face lit up. “I’ll come to see you when I can,” he said. “I don’t know what my schedule will be like when I recover. You don’t get many regular hours when you’re in the Special Forces. But we’ll talk. Hell, we’ve finally got real videophones now. I’ll be able to see your face.”
My dad and I talked over beers for what seemed like hours. It was a relief not to have to keep track of time or beat the clock for what seemed like the first time that day. The conversation went everywhere, from comparing childhood memories to swapping funny D&D stories to swapping Special Forces and Crucible battle stories, some of which had only gotten funny with time and a certain amount of gallows humor.
Eventually, my dad’s eyelids started to droop. “I think the evening might be over for me, son,” he said, and he finished off the last few inches of beer in his glass. “I’m usually up a little later than this, but...well, y’know. I’m not exactly at my best right now.”
“Do you want to stay the night?” I asked. “I mean, unless you got a hotel in town or you really need to go back to the hospital or something. The trip back to Earth is kind of long. Plus, we never have a match two days in a row. I could show you around town in the morning. We could make a day of it.”
Thomas laughed. “I don’t think I’ll be up to much tourism, but I’d love to stay over,” he said. “They discharged me with orders to rest up for at least seven days. If I wasn’t here, I’d probably be sittin
g alone in some on-base apartment I rented watching kung fu movies all day.”
“Hey, we can put on all the kung fu movies you want,” I said. “And Woodhouse can make you some of that Indofleesian Pheasant soup.”
“I’ll give it a shot,” Thomas said.
“Say, Woodhouse,” I called, “do we have a guest room?”
“Not at this time, but one may now be procured instantaneously, sir,” Woodhouse replied.
“Then let’s guest room it up,” I said.
I made sure my dad was situated in the brand new guest room that had suddenly appeared in the hallway and then headed to my own room. It had been a really long day. I wasn’t even sure if it was technically the same day any more--we’d been shifting through so many places with so many orbital patterns that I’d lost track. The Blue Betty and adrenaline had been carrying me through everything, but now I was ready to drop.
When I approached the door to my room, a thin bar of light shone from under the bottom of the door. I stopped with my hand halfway to the doorknob and stared at it. I forgot to turn the lights off when I left the room sometimes, but most of the lights in the apartment went off automatically if they didn’t detect someone in the room, unless you told them specifically to stay on. I knew I hadn’t done that. Sometimes one of the girls would decide to wait in my room to surprise me before bedtime, but that was usually when we were all planning to turn in around the same time.
I hadn’t exactly planned how long I was going to stay up talking with my father, and I didn’t think any of the girls would have wanted to wait an unknown number of hours just to surprise me in bed, since we were all super tired. Then again, if someone who wanted to kill me had been able to get into my bedroom without the security systems noticing, they wouldn’t be likely to blow the whole thing by putting on the lights so they didn’t have to wait for me in the dark. A really smart assassin would break the lights and use the dark as cover for an ambush. “Better safe than sorry,” I told myself finally.