A. Warren Merkey

by Far Freedom

  “I see them. Will I see you again?”

  “It’s doubtful.” How does one read the body language of an alien and know what it means? I imagined this person felt disappointed by my negative reply. I imagined all manner of human characteristics for him, despite his nonhuman appearance. It didn’t occur to me to question his motives. I was simply flattered to have him show an interest in me. “Unless you come with us,” I thought to add. I really wanted more time to get to know this friendly alien. “We have an engagement to sing at a festival.”

  “Sing? A festival?”

  “We sing. We look for someone. If we sing, perhaps he’ll notice us.”

  “The festival is today?”

  “Yes. Near an art museum.”

  “Don’t go!”

  “Why not?”

  “Too many people. Bad things can happen.”

  This was potentially important information. I wanted the others to talk to White Bridge. They were staying away from us, as the alien noted. We wanted to minimize exposure of Jessie and Zakiya to anyone who might detect their identities. They wore robes, as did Alex and I, and they kept hoods over their heads. It was ostensibly a part of our singing act. “Will you meet my friends?”

  “With pleasure. They dress strangely.”

  I tried not to stare at White Bridge. He had arms and legs like we humans but his spine was apparently on the front of his torso. This caused his neck to connect head to body with an awkward-looking plumbing arrangement. His face overhung his flat front side and had no nose between his dark eyes and thinlipped mouth. He had breathing holes on either side of his neck not far below his ears. The ears - shaped like little trumpets - twisted to catch sounds - or emit them - in almost any direction. What skin could be seen had interesting patterns of pigmentation, sort of like abstract tattoos. He wore work clothes that emitted the odor of his occupation. Of course, Alex and I worked in a related job whose aromas were just as bad. We processed dead bodies and other organic material for composting. I speak of White Bridge as a male in the human sense but this was not obvious.

  I introduced White Bridge to Zakiya and Alex. Khalanov had stayed with the ship, hidden in what we hoped was a safe place. When I introduced Jessie, we

  all discovered how a Fesn displays astonishment. The pigmentation moves, the eyes grow large, the eyelids opaque.

  “Don’t be afraid,” I said. “She isn’t what you think.”

  “What I think is what I know!” White Bridge hissed, trying to retrieve his hand from Jessie’s. Too much of Jessie’s arm was exposed from the sleeve of her robe when she reached to take the alien’s hand. She released it quickly. White Bridge dropped to his knees before her. He performed this act of submission rapidly yet with a difficulty possibly due to age. Jessie leaned over and urged him to resume standing. He struggled back to his feet.

  “Did Golden Ones hurt you?” Jessie asked with concern. “Did they hurt others of your kind?”

  “Not me. They were interested in us for awhile. Some of us disappeared.”

  “I can’t explain their behavior but I will never hurt you!”

  “I’m happy to hear that! I thought I was endangered by my curiosity. I don’t know what made me approach Samuel Lee. If I have disturbed you, I apologize.”

  “You are a wonder to us!” Zakiya said. “News of your race has not reached into the Union. I find it remarkable that you survive here among the barbarians of our species. How long have you lived here?”

  “More than a century, Zakiya.”

  “Please forgive my turn from social courtesy to business matters,” Zakiya said, “but you must know this world well.”

  “I’ve worked in most parts of it,” White Bridge replied.

  “Would you be our guide?”

  “That might create a problem with my overseer but I am tempted.”

  “What kind of problem?”

  “I’m not sure. He isn’t a very good overseer. I think he depends on me too much. He may feel the need to search for me or report me missing.”

  We eventually learned from White Bridge that he - not the human overseer - managed his department at the waste treatment plant. Without his help, the overseer would eventually be visited by a member of the Black Fleet. This could be a lethal visit. It was less certain what might happen to White Bridge. They would have to find him first, and we promised to make him disappear from the Big Ball as soon as possible.

  “You can take me away from this place?”

  “We have the means,” Zakiya replied. “But it will be dangerous.”

  “I will accept the danger.”

  “There will be danger at this festival we planned to attend?”

  “You hear the music. It isn’t festival music. It should be. The festival started two hours ago.”

  “We’ll go there.”

  “There will be many children,” the alien said. We didn’t understand his implication. He should have better warned us.

  We saw signs of the early exodus as we approached the scene from several sections away. Numerous stragglers, many holding to each other in a distressed manner, passed by us on the outbound walkways above us. Zakiya reacted to something she saw up ahead and questioned White Bridge about it. “Yes, the great museum is no longer. The Black Fleet destroyed it. The park across the concourse is the festival site. They tried to move it to another place, because of the destruction of the museum, but foolishly went ahead when no other place 498 Far Freedom was found.”

  “This was the museum Rafael and I visited,” Zakiya explained.

  We moved to the edge of the walkway, slowing down, approaching the green grass, but our attention was on the vast ruins of the museum on the opposite side. It was a maze of debris floating in dusty light, clumped into nets to control drifting. I saw Zakiya’s ocular recordings of the structure and knew it was a major work of art itself, its loss a cultural tragedy. It was from this sight that we turned to see the park. There were lights in the trees, ribbons on the lampposts, all the decorations of festivity. I won’t describe what lay on the ground. At my first glimpse I reached for Jessie to turn her away from it. I was too late.

  Jessie saw the horror. She vomited. She screamed. You and I have never heard such a scream. I hope I never will again.

  Alex loped toward a nearby group of people. He asked them questions. He shouted at them. I could hear him clearly but the words didn’t penetrate my broiling thoughts and emotions.

  I could hear Zakiya breathing hard. White Bridge stood behind me, holding onto a pinch of my clothing, making a strange sound. I held Jessie, and the pressure of my arms couldn’t subdue her shaking.

  Alex came back to Zakiya and urged her to leave. Black uniforms appeared behind us. Before we could gather our courage to navigate the field of slaughter away from them, they were upon us. Three barbarians surrounded us.

  I was startled to hear Alex and Zakiya talking inside my head.

  {We can take them.}: Alex.

  {No. See what they want.}: Zakiya.

  “Who are you?” one of them demanded.

  “Singers,” Alex spoke for us. “We came to perform. We’re leaving.”

  “You don’t look like singers to me,” a second officer challenged.

  ” Some of us are new to the profession. This was to be our first performance as a group. I don’t think we can sing now.” Perhaps Alex could not completely mask his feelings. I was told he was once a master at deceiving barbarians, but under the current circumstances that could be impossible for him. The three members of the Black Fleet reacted to him with suspicion but with obvious ignorance of how close they were to death.

  “I think you can,” the last barbarian said.

  {No. Never.}: Alex.

  {Yes. We must.}: Zakiya.

  {Not for them.}: Alex.

  {For the dead. For the survivors.}: Zakiya.

  “Will we be broadcast?” Zakiya inquired.

  “Of course, sweetheart,” said One. He tried to peek into her ho
od and she managed to deflect the attempt as though unaware of his intent. She moved aside, as though distracted, just as his hand touched her hood.

  “Get up to the stage,” said Two. We were already moving.

  “You’d better be good,” said Three.

  For all his exotic appearance, White Bridge managed to remain invisible to the barbarians. I could still feel him holding to my robe, right behind me.

  I almost had to carry Jessie. I could feel her tension, almost as though she would explode. I knew what that might mean and it worried me.

  Bodies. Parts of bodies. Large bodies and small. Pools of blood. We had to watch where we stepped, and we didn’t want to watch where we stepped. I kicked things, stumbled over things, not looking at things. Just things. No

  longer people. No longer in pain. No longer.

  {These three didn’t kill, or else I wouldn’t spare them.}: Alex.

  {Cold weapons. Clean knives. Clean uniforms.}: Zakiya.

  {They were late to the party, that’s all.}: Alex.

  {What can we sing? How can we sing? }: me.

  We made it to the stage. Jessie had calmed somewhat. I peered into her hood and made her look at me. She didn’t seem to know me. I felt a great fear for what I may have lost.

  “I must sing,” she said with a terrible ache in her voice. “I sing for the dead.”

  Dear Sunny. Sunny, Sunny, Sunny! All things seem possible, but evil seems probable. Nothing can ever set right something as horrible as what happened here, but your mother’s voice fully explained how any good person should feel about such slaughter. Listen and understand. I’m sorry such a lesson must be learned by gentle people.

  Jessie sang.

  I thought I was prepared for it. I was wrong.

  I knew the words Jessie sang because I could speak her language. The words added little to the impact of the pure sound, the pure sadness. The others who listened were stunned, I perhaps only slightly less so. Jessie didn’t sing long, just to the point where my heart was being torn from my chest. Every little sadness, real or imagined, that I’d ever experienced rose to the surface of my awareness, crowned by the loss of Sunny. I cried like a baby.

  Jessie collapsed into my arms when she finished.

  The three Black Fleet boys - struck down by the power of Jessie’s voice - got up off their knees. One of them wiped his face on his uniform sleeve. Zakiya waved goodbye to them and they departed meekly. It was curious and troubling they could be affected so strongly. People never quite fit into the neat boundaries we try to place around them.

  I didn’t think it was possible but we stayed and sang as a group. None were songs we rehearsed. Zakiya led us by giving cues in our ocular data terminals. I had to close my eyes to concentrate on the words and harmony. When I opened my eyes I saw we had an audience. Many of the people who arrived to clean up the carnage had gathered before the stage to listen.

  It was encouraging to me that Jessie was singing with us. The shock of seeing the carnage may not have damaged her too badly.

  How could we sing? How could the people in our audience listen to us? How could they pick up bloody fragments of persons and put them in bags? How could we survive this magnificent hell and remain unchanged?

  Jessie was already changed. Perhaps leaving Sunny started the process. This abattoir of a park pushed her beyond what her present personality could tolerate. She would become someone new - or someone old. Perhaps I would still know her. Perhaps she would still love me. Or not.

  “Why?” I asked.

  “It is not unusual,’” White Bridge replied in his quiet but resonant voice.

  “It was all for no reason?”

  “Reason is alien to it. Everyone knows large gatherings are dangerous. The Fleet will always come, will always be bad. Females will be raped. Foolish angry sups will be killed. I think some Fleet were killed here today, or so many sups would not have died, and not so horribly. This is the worst I can remember.”

  “Why did they destroy the art museum?” Zakiya asked after a moment of

  500 Far Freedom silence.

  “It became symbolic. The Great Artist often appeared there. One of the Cruel Ones found a painting of a woman he recognized and became enraged. The two facts made it certain the museum would be damaged.”

  “Was the ‘Great Artist’ Rafael?” Zakiya asked.

  “Yes, that was his name.”

  “I didn’t realize so many innocent people would be harmed. You didn’t see the picture, White Bridge?”

  “No. One hears there are many copies, but they’ll remain hidden for a long time.”

  “We shouldn’t have come,” Alex said.

  “We must find our son,” Zakiya said.

  ” You and I can continue to look for him. I feel very apprehensive about the safety of Jessie and Sam. We should have left them with Iggy.”

  “Do you want to turn back, Sam?” Zakiya asked me. “Jessie seems rather unsettled.”

  “I’ll leave that decision to her, but she may not be able to make the decision very soon. I believe she was forced to repartition her mind.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “When a certain amount of time has passed, or when some shock damages her psyche, Jessie must open a new space in her mind in which to be a different person. She can try to salvage memories from any previous partitions, but something will always be lost, including at least one entire partition. She was once a Singer for the Dead and some of that partition is now in her current partition.”

  “Will she still know us?”

  “Yes. We may not see much change in her, but she will be changed. I suppose the result is not much different psychologically from being rejuvenated by a Mnro Clinic.” I felt Jessie move in my arms and I thought she would say something but she didn’t. “Jessie?” She answered me by hugging me. “Do you want to go back to the ship?”

  She leaned away from me far enough to shake her hooded head as a negative response. We had a discussion before leaving Khalanov with the jumpship. Jessie and I had argued for going with Alex and Zakiya. We wanted to help. We wanted to see the place. Zakiya didn’t want to put us in greater danger. We compromised. Alex and Zakiya scouted the parts of Oz near where we hid our ship and determined the four of us could be inserted into the social setting long enough to assess the risk and choose the next step.

  Alex found jobs for me and him in a recycling plant. It was disgusting work and often horrific and heartbreaking, especially when a child’s body would appear in the incoming material. Jessie and Zakiya had stayed out of sight in a vacant residence we claimed like squatters. We learned how to procure food and clothing with our work vouchers. Alex became acquainted with the local punks who immediately agreed to leave us alone. He started making me learn selfdefense methods.

  There were good people and there were bad people. There were crimes of passion and crimes of hunger. There was no professional law enforcement. The strong survived, the weak died. There were appointed managers and enforcers. If they didn’t manage and enforce effectively, the Black Fleet liquidated them. It was a rough and boring way of life for the average slave, yet not a very dangerous one - if you worked hard, paid protection to the local punks, and stayed away from large public gatherings.

  In the evening hours in public places similar to parks and commons we had followed the examples of street musicians and had put on short performances of our style of harmony. Only days into our stay the festival singing engagement was offered to us.

  Now we sat on benches near the walkway concourse of a deserted neighborhood two levels above the basement of Oz. It was evening, but only by the clock - light always filled the air and illuminated the bright colors of this cheerful hell. We had retreated from the area of the destroyed art museum. Our temporary home in Oz was only a few minutes away. We were waiting for time to ease the pain of our experience in the park. But it never would.

  “If we stay together,” Zakiya said, letting us know she was leaning towa
rd staying a quartet, “where should we go from here? White Bridge, do you have any advice?”

  “There is a colony of people who are mostly artists and performers,” the alien replied. “They have guilds. They might accept you as members.”

  “How difficult would that be?”

  “You’re very talented, I think, but there may be social or political obstacles. How would this help you search for the person you seek?”

  “It may give us more mobility and a wider source of information.”

  “You have no idea of his location?”

  “We know he was sent to the games to die.”

  “Then there is no hope!”

  “Is there any way we can get into the games?” Alex asked.

  “Not as a spectator. But they are televised.”

  “I heard a fellow sup bragging that he was going to fight in the games,” Alex said.

  “Anyone who would join the Black Fleet must qualify by surviving in the games,” White Bridge said.

  “Just survive?”

  “And kill three opponents with bare hands.”

  Zakiya frowned at the thoughtful look on Alex’s face.

  Zakiya reluctantly decided to visit the artists’ colony. We arrived late, yet people were still out and about. We were tired, hungry, and emotionally bruised. With two hooded figures and a Fesn guide, we attracted attention.

  The neighborhood featured porches and balconies on multistory buildings arranged in circular clusters. The structural material appeared organic, perhaps varieties of wood and bamboo, and very lightweight in mass. Artificial gravity being the rule in Oz, provided more architectural freedom of design and construction, especially in the vertical direction. Canvas awnings spanned the circular courtyards from the roof eaves, cutting the omnipresent illumination to a dusky level. The awning panels could be opened and closed to approximate night and day.

  Despite the late hour, when we arrived in the innermost courtyard there was live music coming from musicians on balconies. With a little imagination I could almost see the old New Orleans French Quarter and I could almost hear it in the music. Our arrival caused the music to die. In the sudden hush a gypsylike woman approached us from a first-floor porch. Tiny bells on anklets tinkled in the silence as she walked on bare feet across the parqueted yard. This was a Carmen, I thought, watching her glide toward us as though prepared to give a performance.