Deeper

by Jeff Long

  Done properly, it takes just eight pounds of pressure to push a knee out of joint. Ike performed the technique properly.

  His teacher had been explicit. The People’s time was past. Kill them all.

  His daughter’s life depended on this. Daughter? It still astonished him. Ike tried to put the thought away. It was a monkey thought. A distraction. And yet it helped give shape to the rage that was shaping him. He had no idea what she looked like, or how her voice would sound. But it was as if her face were there in front of him.

  He passed between the spires of blue stone and climbed the sheer staircases and heard the sweet trickling in the aqueducts grown over with stone. The city was a dream at best, a pretty conceit. Civilizations rise and fall. Races come and go. He was terminating a phantom, no more.

  Alerted to a trespasser, hadals came hurtling down the stairs or crawling on the walls, one even snaking from the aqueducts, only to find emptiness. Then Ike would step from the doorways or climb from beneath his earlier victims, and they would freeze at the sight of his sacred armor. It was a fatal pause. More than shock accounted for their dying, though.

  The tomb had changed Ike’s perception of time. It was not that he moved any faster now, rather that every movement he saw was linked to its next movement, and every link offered an opening. He was like the butcher in the Zen koan whose knife only gets sharper as he carves.

  The hollow spires began to whistle in the breeze. In his mind, Ike was that breeze as he chased through the spires and hives. He did not hear himself howling or smell the coppery scent of blood. His passage was pure.

  He worked his way higher into the city. They pursued him, following his aftermath, connecting the dots, bewildered and furious. And frightened. This was their dark turf and they outnumbered him. He should have been easy prey. But he was dressed in the armor of God. Either he had killed God, which was impossible, or God had turned against them once again.

  Mostly they met him in ones and twos. Their weapons skipped off his jade plates, but found the meat of his arms and legs. The wounds burned. At least in his mind, they were not wounds, but tongues of fire. Enveloped in flames, he lit the city with his carnage.

  The breeze quickened. The city purred with wind song and the screams of the dying.

  Ike broke the back of a fighter striped from head to foot like a candy cane. He gutted a dandy with feathers tied to his horns, and another with little pink periwinkles for earrings, and a faraway part of him was sorry. These were the fiends of hell, these lovers of beauty. One sat down in a pile of his own organs and started singing the most elegant psalm.

  Even as he exterminated them, Ike read their markings and ornaments and pinpointed which clan and tunnel nets they came from and where their long journeys had taken them. Some he had known when he was a slave. Several of the older ones remembered him by name. As they fought him, they greeted their former chattel with gladness.

  A number of them died naked except for their paint. Some wore rusting scraps of hand-me-down chain mail, or sported bits and pieces of uniform or field gear taken from dead soldiers. Many were in bad shape, mauled by their battle, hardly fit to walk much less fight. As he slaughtered them, Ike felt no more pity for them than for himself.

  To fight a knife, you must become its shadow, moving where it moves. Then the knife becomes your shadow. Then you stop the shadow and break its arm and get the knife. Like that, Ike obtained one knife, then two.

  The ribs form a cage that both shields the organs and traps the invading blade. Best to skip a stab at the heart. Go for the guts. Open the throat. There is a sweet spot just behind the collarbone. Down through that entrance lie the tender tops of the lungs. His knives plunged in.

  Not a thought or calculation guided him. His enemy volunteered a dozen ways of dying. He simply provided the means.

  The wind increased. Shaped by the giant walls, dervishes sprang into being. They darted about, scouring the hollow-mouthed city.

  Ike had no idea where he was going. He let his enemy guide him into its heart. Wherever they were coming from, there he went. A torrent of boulders came thundering down a certain staircase, which led him up the stairs. At the top he made for a scarred and windswept fortification. From there he found a stone bridge slicing across an everglade of reeds and foul water. When two hadals broke the surface and cast their lives at him, he knew this was the way. Over there he would put an end to this unfortunate species, and find the children who would buy him his daughter.

  As he started across, a rifle opened up on full automatic. The muzzle flash winked from a slot in that exhausted fortress, and bullets nipped at the water, not even close, par for hadal marksmanship. It was extraordinary that one of them had even thought to pick up the rifle in the first place. The clip ran dry. Ike galloped on.

  The wind gained strength. Gusts sheared at him. Waterspouts danced back and forth across the bridge. The reeds rattled like spears.

  In single file, three came sprinting out to meet him. One slipped and the wind blew him into the water, where he began screaming. Ike killed the other two in passing. He was Death’s horse this day. Wherever he went, none survived.

  They yielded the island’s shore to him, which could only mean they were laying a trap—or many traps—among the pyramids. It was not too late to leave. They would gladly let him return to the depths. It would become part of their mythology, how God had broken down their walls and taken them to the brink of extinction, and at the last instant held back his sword. Like every chosen people, they would make sacrifices and give thanks and regenerate.

  But the angel had declared their sentence: death. That paled next to the ransom of Ike’s daughter. He needed the children, and would never stop. The pyramids shrieked.

  Alabaster rubble ricocheted down the sides, loosened from the crests. A pale warrior launched himself from some high precipice. Ike leaped to meet him and rode him into the rocks.

  One after another, their ambushes failed. By this time there was little they could do to stop him. Even though his legs grew heavy and his knives slowed, Ike had the velocity of fate.

  A handful of the creatures clung to the heights like apes, peppering him with rocks. That was as close as they dared get. Little touched him. Ike was in a sacred state. Hair and beard flying with Mosaic fury, greasy with blood, his rage became serene. The world was flying apart all around him, and yet everywhere he turned it fell calm and opened for his passage.

  He might have gone on like that, stalking among the rubble and slaying the demons of ignorance and darkness. But his rage was lifting. Bullied by the wind, Ike quit his lope and slowed to a walk. The flames on his limbs flickered out. Now he saw his wounds for what they were. Sliced and beaten, his forearms had taken the brunt of the fighting. One wrist was probably broken. He could see, but not feel, the knife in his numb hand. A small childlike arrow hung from his shoulder, possibly poisoned. Doubts wormed in.

  The monkey thoughts began chattering. How many of the enemy were left? How badly was he wounded? Did he have a snowball’s chance of lasting long enough to see his daughter? Ike wheeled in place. Where was he? Where were the children? Pyramids and snapped columns and masses of debris spun around him.

  Then he smelled the girls, or some of them. Blowing on the wind, their ripe scent was as unmistakable as the local intent. You didn’t hold captives on a whim in this starving land. Every prisoner served a purpose, or entered the stream. In this case, the girls were breeders, plain and simple. The only question was, whose breeders were they, the angel’s or this rebel band’s? Ike had come to answer that with draconian finality, but suddenly he didn’t feel like much of an answer.

  He was easy pickings now, theirs for the taking. Strangely, no one came after him. There were no more hails of arrows, no more bravos scampering in to try for a celebrity kill, no more ape-men hooting and throwing rocks. It was just him alone among the pyramids, him and that smell of human females.

  Ike sat down, tired and disoriented. A knife
in each hand, he rested on his knees. He hunched his back against the wind that promptly attacked him from the front and sides. The wind was the problem. Turned by the chamber walls, it spun in circles, small dervish ones inside the larger one. The scent could be coming from anywhere.

  The wind pummeled him. Time passed. Ike watched his blood dry. Then the scent grew stronger. He lifted his head.

  A figure—nude—was approaching across the rubble. It was a young woman, or a girl becoming one. Dark hair. Buds of breasts. Long legs.

  Hoops of gold circled her neck. From her forehead to her soles, the girl was a canvas painted with patterns, numerals, and words. Concentric circles rippled out from her nipples. Painted lines aimed the eye at her loins. Her pubis was marked with an inverted triangle of bright ochre.

  The girl represented a surrender of sorts. An offering. He could use her however he wanted for a while. And then he was meant to follow her in.

  “Where are the rest of you?” he said.

  She pointed at the lopped-off top of the largest of the pyramids.

  “Who sent you?” His tongue felt thick in his mouth.

  She shook her head dumbly.

  “Was it a man named Clemens?”

  “I don’t know his name,” she said. “We just do what he says.”

  Ike saw the dark hollows under her eyes, and the whip stripes on her legs. Her cheeks were chapped raw by the wind. She was brand-new to captivity.

  “You’re a brave girl.” His words slurred. Everything hurt.

  “Whose side are you on?” she said.

  What a strange question, he thought. But then he realized he didn’t know anymore. “My daughter,” he said. It was the truth, in a roundabout way.

  The wind shook her. She whispered something. He saw, but couldn’t hear, the word on her lips. “Help.”

  The rubble seemed to shift under his feet. She had no idea what she was asking. Help her? He had come to use her. She and all her sister captives were going to buy him his child.

  Delete, thought Ike. Reboot. Somehow he would help her, yes. He would save them all somehow, but in pieces, his daughter first, then somehow the others over the coming years. Those who survived long enough to be saved.

  Lambs, flowers, damned. He put it out of his mind, or tried to. But in every way this girl was more real than his own, whom he had never seen. Until the angel filled him with rage and set him on this path, Ike had not even dared to think of his daughter.

  “Please,” she said. “Take me away. Save me.”

  She was a temptress. He could do anything with her. He could even kill her. Then she wouldn’t be a temptation.

  Ike dropped the big knives with a clatter. He climbed to his feet. “I want to see my daughter,” he said.

  She bent her head. Her fingernails, chewed to the quick, still showed a few flakes of bubblegum polish. Her shoulders hiccupped.

  “Don’t cry.” Ike searched for something she could hang on to in the coming months and years until he might come down again and rescue her. “None of this is real,” he said. “It’s all just a dream. You’ll see.”

  She raised her head and he expected a look of revelation or at least of stoic thanks. But her eyes were bloodshot, and she was horror-struck, not inspired. He had never felt so wrong in all of his life.

  ARTIFACTS

  CNN.COM

  February 14

  Sub Crew to Be Swapped for American Spy Plane Crew

  In a dramatic turn of events, the White House today issued a statement saying that the crew of the Chinese submarine grounded in California will be sent home on Monday. One minute later, Chinese president Jiaming announced that the crew of the American spy plane will also be returned to their home. He also declared China’s willingness to resume treaty discussion to resolve the land claims in the Interior.

  Reaction to the news was swift.

  “Both sides looked into the abyss, both sides blinked, both sides stepped back from the brink,” said Senator John Cheney, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Armed Forces Committee. “This was a sensible compromise that will lead to productive relations in the future.”

  Representative Carey Grant, the Republican chair of the House Appropriations Committee, sounded a more ominous note. “This only has the appearance of compromise. Is anyone paying attention? There was a one-minute gap between our announcement and theirs, an eternity in diplomatic time. In other words, we caved in to China, and then China gave us a reward. I want to know what kind of deal was cut. I am going to see to it that there is an investigation into that missing minute. If necessary, we will assign a special prosecutor to look into it.

  “Make no mistake, I am delighted our patriots will be home in time for the Super Bowl. But remember this, the Chinese beached an attack sub armed with nuclear missiles on our shores, and then they played bumper cars with an unarmed American plane in international air space and nearly killed its crew. And now we have to make the first gesture. Where’s the apology from China? Where’s our downed plane? Where’s this administration’s spine? Once again the dragon speaks, and we roll over. This has got to stop.”

  In an extraordinary moment, one of the top generals in the People’s Liberation Army, Wang Yi Chap, contradicted President Jiaming. “China has suffered a national humiliation. We should not return their invaders until America apologizes. The barbarian is at the gate, and must never be appeased except to lull him.”

  43

  From the top of his pyramid, the hunter watched that man in green armor limping through the ruins. At least he was pretty sure this was a man, not a hadal. The footprints he’d been following from the river looked human, as did the ragged curtains of beard and long hair. But what kind of man ran amok like this? Clearly this was a wild animal that had to be put down.

  He watched the man follow the painted girl. Like ants, they threaded their way through the moonscape of rubble. Their behavior mystified him. What did the man want? Where did he come from? Was he a messenger or just another killer?

  All the while that he was wondering about the man, the hunter went on trying to reckon how to dissect a wind that turned in circles inside circles.

  Ike and the girl passed a rack of odd-shaped sails bulging with wind. Strung between rods to cure, they were human rawhide. Several had military tattoos, which would be prized by whoever wore the skins next. Around the corner Ike found the men who had worn them last.

  The long row of men had been peeled alive and left on stakes. Ike had traveled too far and wide in the depths to be shocked. Now their souls were free to roam, enlightened—one would hope—by their suffering. Gravity had done most of them in. The tips of the stakes showed under several chins. The need for a few hams had taken care of others: dead or alive at the time, they had lost one or both legs to the cooks.

  But as Ike approached, one man lifted his head, so far gone there was nothing left but pain. “Enough,” said Ike, and stopped the flayed man’s heart with one hand.

  “Assholes,” said the girl. She was looking at the soldiers.

  “But they came to save you,” Ike said.

  “They couldn’t even save themselves.”

  The row of corpses faced a Minotaur statue. The wind had polished its face away. Its ox horns were stubs. You could read the man-bull two ways. Either the wilderness had gotten civilized, or civilization had gone wild.

  He followed the girl up the pyramid’s sheer steps. There were hundreds. While he rested at the midpoint, Ike scanned the murky valleys between the pyramids. The place was empty. Even his kills were gone, dragged away by comrades to be recycled. The quick and the dead, he thought. All had fled. The volcano was about to blow.

  They climbed slowly. The wind seemed bent on blasting these man-made mountains to sand. Grit peppered his face. He didn’t have much left in the reserve tank.

  “Look,” said the girl. A tornado had spawned in the great plaza below. Its tail switched here and there, groping for any movable thing. In a single gulp it sucked a
way the soldiers’ carcasses on the stakes. It started up the pyramid, then changed its mind, slid back down, and disintegrated.

  “This way,” said the girl.

  They reached the plateau at the top. A small forest of statues surrounded a partially collapsed domelike structure. The dome reminded Ike of a Buddhist stupa, right down to the giant, almost feminine eyes staring into infinity and the question mark for a nose. Its mouth was the entry. The girl went in.

  Ike hung back, suspicious. She was the bait. This was the trap. Maybe it had already been sprung.

  The plateau had all the trappings of human sacrifice. There was an altar with blood gutters. Chains and fetters ran the length of one wall, empty of prisoners, the wind shrilling through the bolts. In one corner, curled like an infant, lay a human spine fringed with bits of nerves and meat.

  Behind him the stairs plunged. In the distance, he saw the lesser pyramids ringed haphazardly around this one, and realized they were actually islands that had been faced with blocks. This was an archipelago waiting for another flood.

  The ox symbol cut into his hand stood in stone above the doorway. A second symbol bound him here as well, the same one he wore on his back, that curious N. Body and soul, he was written into this place. He had no choice but to enter the mountain inside the pyramid.

  He approached warily. His feet weighed a ton. The wind kept salting his wounds. He skirted the statues of half-animal gods and goddesses, some tipped over by quakes or time, most still standing as they’d been placed. There was a Medusa, a harpy with breasts and wings, and a serpent with arms and ears.

  The reptile man came alive on his pedestal.

  Ike glimpsed a flicker of motion behind him. Then a heavy blow dropped him to the ground. Blood streaming into his eyes, he glimpsed a slave thing maimed for keeping, and recognized it. “Clemens,” he said.

  Long ago, Ike had worked as a rigger for an action movie. Every few days a big blank section entitled FIGHT SCENE would interrupt the script and they would have to make up some violence. Now it seemed he had one more FIGHT SCENE to go.