by M. Suddain
‘Life is very strange.’
He could see the narrow walkway with the platform at the end. It looked like the long silver spoon his mother had used to feed him soup when he was ill. At one end of the platform he saw the last and largest priest fly off into space as the boy, shrouded in blue, called after him. He saw the girl still in the middle of the platform, a shadow in her own blue cloud. He saw the two bubbles float along the platform and become one. Pplopf! The two children now floated inside a single sphere of light as the palace crumbled around them. How strange it was. Like a little play so far away, so silent and dreadful. He wasn’t quite sure what to do now. His ship, like much of the debris from the battle, had become caught in one of the armpits of the Sweety and it made him sad to be there. But there he sat. What was to be done? What was this all about? And what was the point of it all? And what had happened to his older self?
And before he could fashion any kind of answers, and just as the command station collapsed silently under its own weight, he saw something new to be surprised at. He saw the brightly glowing blue sphere shoot off from the station’s spindly platform like a shot from a cannon, leaving an arcing cobalt trail in space.
Then, in a blink, it stopped.
‘Well, that looks like something you don’t see every day,’ said Fabrigas the younger.
*
Lenore and Roberto, racing towards the black hole at many, many thousands of miles per second, were astonished to find their path intercepted by the slender, curling frond of sticky blubber. They were stuck fast to the end of a tentacle whose owner was lost in the smoulder. But they were no longer shooting through space towards the black hole at many, many thousands of miles per second, and this was good.
‘What is happening, Roberto?’
The boy said nothing. He could hear the beating of a heart as loud as steel moons colliding. They felt themselves float gently up until they bobbed within their silky bubble before a great unblinking eye.
‘Well, hello, Mister Squids, and how are you today?’
The creature blinked, twice; the shock wave from its unfurling eyelids made the tiny bubble quiver.
‘Thank you very much for stopping us. And from our hearts we are grateful. You seem sad to be here, though. Are you sad?’
They felt the heavens and the creature groan around them.
‘It is painful to be sad. And it is sad to be painful. We are all alone today as well. We come from far away and are orphans too. We have lost all and there is no one to look out for us now and it seems that everybody alive in any place would like us dead. We have none within the universe except each other.’
The creature sighed again and disturbed eternity with his sadness.
‘But to have each other is not so bad. Would you like to be our friend and go on an adventure with us? It is time for the next part of our journey and we could use some strong arms to protect us.’
The creature blinked again. The bubble sang.
‘But you must promise us to stop smashing things. It is sad that you have lost your lady friend. But there is no reason to go bashing and breaking your way across the universe. Do you promise now?’
The creature’s sigh was a crashing wave of hope and grateful promise. Even the smoking broken chunks of steel seemed to laugh.
‘Hallelujah, then!’ said the girl in a voice that seemed suddenly as large and dreadful as the beast. ‘Let me explain the how, where, why. The how is that we will fall very fast and vanish. Don’t be afraid. There is really no such thing as death. The where is a mystery. It can be no other way. Just close all your eyes and make sure to hold on to us very tightly, and when you open them again we will all of us be somewhere magical. After that we might be able to find out about the why.’
There was a sound in their bubble like the gears of heaven moving. Then the creature closed his eyes, and the children closed theirs, and as they fell towards the black abyss the arms of the universe opened wide to receive them.
4675881: THE ONE IN WHICH ALL LIFE IS BUT A FLEETING DREAM
There is a butterfly garden near the zoo dedicated to a woman whose real name is forgotten. In the mornings the butterflies can be seen alighting on a damp statue loosely based upon the only photo of her. She never returned to the city, though it is hard to imagine how she could have escaped the doomed laundry palace as it collapsed around her, how she could have overcome the effects of the poison. And yet, knowing her, it is hard to imagine how she did not. There is also a stone laid at a small church for a man named Jacob. The body of the Emperor was never recovered by his people. His vanishing became a great mystery. The Forbidden Zone was never found or rebuilt.
When Commander Descharge returned to the city he was furious to discover that the people he’d battled so hard to return to had been lost in the mayhem. And yet he wasn’t so willing as others to believe that they were lost for ever. ‘It is amusing that you all believe those criminals are dead. Ha! Well, I for one will not believe Lambestyo is dead until I see his body for myself. Only then will I rest.’ And then he turned quickly away, as if gripped by some strong emotion, perhaps anger, or perhaps something else. He sat alone in a garden near a ruined temple for the rest of the day, staring up towards the suns and moon still dim within the pall of smoke, and in that golden light looked infinitely sad.
‘Really,’ said Kimmy, ‘that man has major issues.’
Panduke and Kimmy were married, they took the throne together, they were happy for a long, long time, though if there’s a thing to learn from this strange story, perhaps, it’s that there is no such thing as ever. The years passed, and the ages. Eventually the city fell to a powerful tribe of psychic bears called the Vandykes. The royal family fled, the great monuments and towers of Diemendääs, rebuilt so carefully by its people, were allowed to fall into ruin. The stone statue of the woman crumbled well before the butterflies stopped coming. The earth swallowed up the stone laid for a man called Jacob. The local suns expanded and extinguished all life upon the planet, the hungry plants on the nearby moon were burned away for ever. Soon the suns themselves winked out. It did not take long, in the grand scheme, for every ounce of energy in that universe to be spent, for the seemingly inexhaustible well of light and power to run dry, and for everything once more to fall into the nothing which lies beyond darkness, which lies before beginning.
MIND, HOW YOU GO
Fabrigas the elder survived his time in space, thanks to the advanced electrothermal fibres of his cloak, as well as his ability to dramatically slow his metabolism. He’d been blown far away by his servant’s last breath. He’d floated in space and watched as the girl in her beautiful blue bubble, and the boy in his, finally came together. Soon he saw the platform break off from the ship, he saw the pair tumble gently from it, afloat inside their pod and set against the brilliant white light that sloshed around the edge of the black hole, he saw them tumble over and over, their arms stretched out in the shape of a plane. And from there he could not watch.
Eventually, a ship slid silently down beside him. It was a very old funeral ship, the kind that hadn’t been made for a long, long time. A hatch opened and he floated in. He found himself in the carpeted room where the coffins are stacked before they’re pushed into space. Soft funeral music played. No, I do not know the name of the tune. His rescuer appeared in the darkness, remained in shadow. Her voice was soft and calm. She said only that she worked on behalf of an organisation called Dark Hand.
‘We have been working with our friends, the Immortals. They want you to know that they are very proud of you.’
‘Proud?’ The old man couldn’t raise his head.
‘Would you care for some soup? You haven’t eaten in days, and we understand you are very fond of soup.’ She stepped from the shadows with a small silver flask which she offered to him. Fabrigas did not see the flask – his eyes were wide open. ‘Have you never seen a Xo before? We are rather unusual-looking. Here, take the soup.’ He took the hot metal flask and drank, an
d it was heaven.
‘You are to be returned to your universe and placed in exile. No one must be able to speak with you. In time, you might be called upon to serve again. But this is unlikely. You have the box containing the universe containing the zone containing your pilot. Give it to us.’
The old man wiped his lips on his sleeve. ‘It is not for you. It’s for … I said I would deliver it to her.’
She took the empty flask from him. ‘We must have that box. We will make sure it goes to the right place. Trust us.’
Fabrigas took the box from his robe and passed it into the shadows. The figure took the box, placed it in a small airlock. Fabrigas cried out as he saw the box fly out into space towards the black hole.
‘Don’t be angry,’ said his rescuer. ‘It’s for the best.’
‘He was my friend!’
‘Fabrigas.’ Her voice was calm. ‘You are not alone. There are infinite “You”s in different dimensions, all struggling to solve the same problems, all working to make some sense of their lives and this universe, some falling into misery, some rising up in triumph. You met one today, did you not?’
Fabrigas gaped.
‘Now you know the great truth. You are an army. You do not have a soul, but you do not need one. You are part of something greater than the soul. You are one with a sea that never ends, and never begins. You are legion. Remember what Provius taught you. What is a sea that is empty?’
Fabrigas, looking now more like a boy than perhaps he ever had, leaned his left ear towards his left shoulder and said, ‘It … is life.’
‘It is life. The Immortals have asked me to give you these in return for the box.’ She lifted a small vapour lamp from a table and let it play over a giant stack of books. ‘These thousand and one volumes contain a code. If you break the code you’ll have the key to enter the ectoplasmic dimensions and perhaps rescue your servant. Now your greatest wish will be granted. We will take you home.’
‘Home.’ He could hardly even breathe the word.
‘Home. Is that not what you wanted from the very start? To go to the moon where your auntie and uncle once lived, and where your father and your nanny fled?’
The old man did not answer. He did not answer because he did not know.
And so, M. Francisco Fabrigas, scientist, explorer, became the first person to circumnavigate reality, to leave his own universe and return alive. Not that anyone in his own universe could know about it. In his absence he was branded a traitor. He was sentenced to death. It is a miracle that his real story has survived for me to tell it. He was taken in that funeral ship to an orphan moon, far in the depths of space, to a crumbling mansion whose stairs he had run down as a boy, beside a sea where he had once built magnificent castles out of sand. Upstairs he found two skeletons. He stayed alone in that mansion until I found him, and I found him looking out across the sea to where the serpents play.
END
… END
‘This is a disaster of unimaginable proportions.’
‘It is.’
‘We know.’
‘Do not tell us what we know.’
‘In fact, sisters, it is difficult for me to imagine how it could possibly have become more of a disaster. Our allies crushed, the girl we wanted dead escaped, the wizard too. And now we learn about this file. Our most precious secrets at large in the universe, our entire Master Plan in jeopardy.’ The speaker, still dressed as a monk, but now much more in charge of his body than he was when the Man in the Shadows first collected him from the Hotel Empyrean, spoke quietly. ‘This has meant we will have to delay our plans for UWX. It will allow the rebel forces to organise. He has sent me here to seek answers. And to exact penance.’
‘We understand, Lord Bosch,’ said the Man in the Shadows. ‘We too are mystified as to how things could have gone so “udders up”.’
‘Did you bring the material I asked for?’
‘Yes, Lord Bosch, I did. It was extremely hard to locate, but I –’
‘Present it.’
The Man in the Shadows placed a wooden box on the low table before them. The box at first seemed empty, black. The sisters squirmed. Then a small, silver flask rose slowly, shyly, from within. The three sisters watched with wide, tearful eyes as Bosch took the flask and set it carefully down upon the table.
‘Sir. Please, don’t ask this from us.’
‘Please.’
‘Sir.’
Three voices like a rain of arrows upon a burning bush of thorns.
‘You don’t think you deserve this punishment? Did you not defy our master’s wishes? Did you not sign the order to send the Pope to the next universe?’
‘We wanted only to serve him.’
‘And now you will. Remove the stopper.’
When the Man in the Shadows removed the stopper, a plume of silky steam rose up like the head of a snake and the three sisters began to wail softly.
‘Do you want us to beg, sir?’
‘No, I don’t want you to beg. I want you to die, sisters, and there is no option. You might as well take your medicine cheerfully. He is our master, our creator. His mercy is great; this is the least painful of all possible ends. Quickly now, before I forget my mercy.’
The first sister picked up the flask with trembling fingers; her jewels clattered against it as she sipped.
The second sister grasped the talisman around her neck as she took the flask.
The third sister drank quickly, and by the time she did the first was beginning to writhe and spasm. The poison worked fast. In a minute they were still as rabbits.
‘It was for the best,’ said Lord Bosch.
‘I know it,’ said the Man in the Shadows.
‘Justice must be swift if we’re to triumph. There is no room for sentiment.’
‘It is so. Please let your master know that his next human accomplices will not be so fallible.’
‘I hope for your sake. Fallibility seems to be a very human trait. And you insist again that you had no knowledge of the missing file, and that you were not part of the plan to send the Pope to the next universe?’
‘I confess, I knew nothing of the sisters’ plot. My group sees much, but not all.’
‘I will take you at your word. But if I ever find out that you had anything to do with the Pope’s crusade, your punishment will be far worse than the sisters’.’
The sisters were rigid. Their hands still grasped their hems and jewels, and smoke curled dreamily from their nostrils and their gaping mouths.
‘Your Queen, on the other hand, has played an outstanding match. She has, through wit or dumb luck, managed to eliminate her treacherous sisters.’
‘It is a stroke of great luck. Her only friend is her fool, Barrio. She is alone. She is so isolated now that not even Dark Hand could reach her.’
‘Are you sure about that?’
‘I am.’
MISFORTUNE’S QUEEN
She was Misfortune’s Queen. Misfortune for so many reasons: for her looks; for her lack of intelligence; for the age she lived in; for the enemies who surrounded her, whose jealousy and cruelty seemed as limitless as the spheres she commanded.
Queen Gargoylas X was in her bathing chamber; she sobbed in her tub, and her sobs, far from making her seem more ugly, almost made her seem human. Her sisters were gone. Yes, they were treacherous, but they were her only family. Now she was utterly alone. Almost.
‘Don’t be sad, my love,’ said a voice beside the bath. ‘You have played the part exactly as I told you. They think you are weak, but they could not be more wrong. You have held off your attackers against all odds. You have turned a hopeless game to your advantage. You eliminated your sisters by having them sign that order. You had to. And it is a more than adequate revenge for your beloved Albert. You even destroyed that idiot Pope. You are a great Queen, my love. And if you keep listening to me, my love, you will be the greatest Queen of all.’
‘Oh, Barrio, I am so alone, so sad. If I did not have you I
don’t know what I’d do.’
‘Let’s not think about that.’ A hand reached up to touch her foamy cheek, the grimy hand of a fool. ‘Let’s think about where we’re going, and all that we’ll accomplish together. It is us two against the world. To have each other is much better than having no one at all.’
And in that instant Misfortune’s Queen was happy. Just for the briefest flutter of a butterfly’s wing. They heard footsteps approaching. Barrio withdrew his hand, and in an instant was a drooling gimp again. An aide appeared at her doorway.
‘Your sisters have drunk a poison and are dead.’
‘Thank you. That will be all.’
The aide left.
‘A poison? So their master chose to show them mercy. Surprising.’
She smiled as she heard the aide’s footsteps caress the marble floor. Now her own plan could be put into action. She would rule all and none would stop her.
It was good to be the Queen.
EPILOGUE
Captain Lambestyo stood beneath the black hulk set upon the shore. The silver beach stretched into the distance, a narrow jungle shore beneath a sky that was almost a solid mass of stars. The hulk was a skeleton of an ancient ship, a wooden ship, probably a merchant ship. Its timber was rotten and eaten through by worms, its sails and heraldry were the gently wafting webs of spiders. Around the hulk hung the skeletons of long-forgotten sailors, watching for ever the eternal motions of the stars. Around the hulk were the bones of a giant sea creature. It had its many tentacles wrapped around the hull, and you could see where the wooden decks had splintered in its grip. The vessel and its monster must have died together, thought the captain. The ship was called the Nemesis.
Captain Lambestyo was surprised to be where he was. Minutes ago he had been sitting in his capsule. He had not moved for days. He no longer slept. The boredom had turned his thoughts to lazy tickles at the back of his skull. He had taken the gift that Lenore had forced into his hand as he was led away and held it lightly in one hand. It was strange that in all the time he’d been there he hadn’t thought to look at it. Now that he did he was struck by what an unusual charm it was: a starfish. He noticed that the creature wasn’t a fossil. It was just an ordinary starfish, but the more he looked into it the more he saw: the way it sparkled faintly, as if covered in fine sand. The way it seemed to change colour in the moonlight, and even in time with the rhythm of the sound of the waves. The waves?