Monsters of Men

by Patrick Ness

  Or here, too, here I am, looking down from a hilltop as a huge ship, bigger than a whole town, flies overhead and comes in for a landing–

  And at the same time I’m having a memory of being next to a creek bed and there’s a baby Spackle playing and there are men coming outta the woods and they’re dragging the mother off and the baby is crying and the men come back and pick him up and load him on a cart with other babies and I know this is a memory that ain’t mine and that the baby is, the baby Spackle is–

  And sometimes it’s just dark–

  –sometimes there’s nothing but voices I can’t quite hear, voices just beyond reach and I’m alone in the darkness and it feels like I’ve been here for a long, long time and I–

  I can’t remember my name sometimes–

  Are you there?

  Viola?

  And I don’t remember who Viola is–

  Only that I need to find her–

  That she’s the only one who’ll save me–

  She’s the only one who can–

  Viola?

  Viola?

  “. . . my son, my beautiful son . . .”

  And there!

  Like that!

  Sometimes there it is in the middle of the darkness, in the middle of the memories, in the middle of wherever I am, doing whatever I’m doing, sometimes even in the middle of the million voices that create the ground I walk on–

  Sometimes I hear–

  “. . . I wish yer pa were here to see you, Todd . . .”

  Todd–

  Todd–

  That’s me–

  (I think–)

  (Yes–)

  And that voice, that voice saying those words–

  “. . . say ‘ain’t’ all you like, Todd, I promise not to correct you . . .”

  Is that Viola’s voice?

  Is it?

  (Is it you?)

  Because I’m hearing it more often lately, more often as the days pass, as I’m flying thru these memories and spaces and darknesses–

  I’m hearing it more often among all the other millions–

  “. . . Yer calling for me, and I will answer . . .”

  I will answer–

  Todd will answer–

  Viola?

  Are you calling for me?

  Keep calling for me–

  Keep doing it, keep coming to save me–

  Cuz every day yer closer–

  I can almost hear you–

  I can almost–

  Is that you?

  Is that us?

  Is that what we did?

  Viola?

  Keep calling for me–

  And I’ll keep searching for you–

  And I’ll find you–

  You bet yer life on it–

  I’ll find you–

  Keep calling for me, Viola–

  Cuz here I come.

  PATRICK NESS is the author of the Chaos Walking trilogy, which includes The Knife of Never Letting Go, winner of the Guardian Children’s Fiction Prize; The Ask and the Answer, winner of the Costa Children’s Book Award; and Monsters of Men. He has written two books for adults and is a literary critic for the Guardian. He says, “Even in a society where we’re constantly being told to ‘be ourselves,’ the pressure to conform is terrible, especially for the young. If the Chaos Walking trilogy is about anything, it’s about identity, finding out who you are. How do you stay an individual when the pressure to conform, to change who you are, is actually life-threatening?” Born in Virginia, Patrick Ness lives in London.