On My Way to Paradise

by David Farland

  Chapter 14

  After battle practice I felt dirty with sweat, and I headed down to level four for the showers. The shower room was hot and steamy, and one could smell it from the ladder. The line in front of the narrow door had only 40 people. The men in line were subdued. They discussed the latest happenings in South America, but there was no joy in their voices. It was as if it were old news from many years ago.

  As I waited a small, wiry man with many tattoos of spiders and skulls on his arms came out of the showers. His eyes were glazed with weariness, and as he passed a big Brazi in the doorway he gave the Brazi a shove. It was a shove meant only to push the Brazi aside, but the Brazi swung, flattening the tattooed man. His head cracked on the floor, leaving a smear of blood. He got up and staggered away and no one helped him.

  It was a small incident, but struck me as strange: Both men attacked, but the violence was mechanical, passionless. There was no posturing before the skirmish, with each man making threats. No one screamed or cursed. And the witnesses didn’t try to calm the aggressors or help the injured, as if we simply didn’t care.

  I showered and couldn’t help thinking about what had happened. Perhaps I’d been shocked into inaction, I wondered, but twice in my life I’d witnessed fights, and both times I’d rushed to aid the victims. I had always believed in serving society, yet I’d let an injured man crawl away without a thought. Even a dog would have done more than I had done. In the past few weeks, we had each suffered so much pain, that the pain of others became meaningless. Where was my compassion? I could not believe that I had sunk so low. I had always sought to serve society—but one can only serve society by serving one individual at a time. Even if I felt nothing for the man, even if I could not rouse myself to feel sympathy for him, I reasoned, I must serve him.

  I got out of the shower and followed the blood trail left by the injured man. He seemed to walk the halls at random, without a destination. I lost his trail on level seven. I checked with a nurse at the infirmary and verified that the man had never sought treatment. When I’d done all I could, I headed back up the ladder to my room. As I reached the top, the door to the airlock above me slid open and a man in white coveralls climbed down from module B. I’d believed there was no way to move through the airlocks.

  I was so astonished I blurted, "How did you do that?"

  "Ti?" he said in Greek and shrugged. He spoke no Spanish and I spoke no Greek. He fingered a small transmitter in his pocket, then the airlock closed and he descended to the lower levels, and I now saw that if the need ever became great I could find a way to reach Tamara, and the Alliance assassin could find his way to reach me.

  In the afternoon I accompanied Zavala and García to the library. As we walked Zavala said, "Huy, such a fine way to waste a morning!" as if preferring not to be bothered, yet he nearly skipped with joy. The "library" turned out to be the size of a broom closet and contained only one small viewing console and a few tapes about Baker. The cost of stocking and carrying tapes must have seemed superfluous to Motoki Corporation. We could learn all we needed about how to wage war through the simulators.

  I inserted a tape entitled "The Delicate Natural Balance of Baker," hoping to learn of the creatures I’d seen in simulations. The narrator showed how Motoki struggled valiantly to introduce Earth organisms on Baker to hurry the complete terraforming of the planet. Yet at every turn the Yabajin harried the dedicated terraformers, bringing their efforts to naught. Honey bees died from parasitic mites introduced by the Yabajin, jeopardizing plants that reproduced through pollination. Fish counts in Baker’s oceans remained low because the water was too warm—the Yabajin had thwarted the terraforming of the great central deserts, and these deserts introduced large amounts of dust into the atmosphere, creating a greenhouse effect that warmed the oceans. I learned nothing about the biology of Baker. But I learned much about the naiveté of Baker’s native propagandists. The information presented in the films was obviously slanted. Like most repressive government officials, Motoki’s social engineers had been suppressing information for so long in their effort to stamp out the remnants of Western civilization they seemed incapable of looking at an issue from two sides.

  Zavala grinned like an idiot. "Well, I saw no children training for battle in that tape, did you?" he asked. I shook my head and he said, "What? I didn’t hear you."

  "No," I said.

  The second tape, called "The Great Catastrophe," was more helpful. It recounted an "unprovoked" attack by the Yabajin some forty years earlier. The Yabajin had flown over Motoki’s coastal cities and released a viral plague that killed two million. The inhabitants of Tsumetai Oka and Kimai no Ji were so weakened by the plague they were unable to bury their dead. Instead they threw the ravaged corpses into a river. The bodies floated downstream, but when the high tides came the bodies floated back upstream and were deposited on the beaches. For days the bodies washed in and out with the tides. When the survivors recovered, they built a cemetery. In the cemetery they erected a cement pillar the size of a small fence post for each fatality. The name of the plague victim and the victim’s lineage was inscribed on each pillar and white tassels were tied to the top.

  Once each year the 40,000 residents of Kimai no Ji visited the vast cemetery and clustered at one end so they could visualize just how many had died. Then they put candles on two million paper lanterns and set the lanterns adrift on the river so it became a river of fire. Everyone from the oldest grandmother to the youngest child swore undying hatred for the Yabajin. Once again, the tape taught me little.

  But the vision of Baker as a desolate planet with buildings blasted to the foundations disappeared. There were no cement buildings on Baker. Instead the cities were small hamlets filled with dark wooden frame houses with cream-colored paper walls. The city was neat and well-kept—ornate, sculpted stone lanterns in front of each house, immaculate gardens along the roadside—with no sign that a battle had ever been fought.

  I began to suspect that this war was an accident, that a virus had mutated and killed the inhabitants of Motoki’s settlements and initiated a war, but the next tape, "Growing-up Motoki," persuaded me otherwise. The tape showed how for thirty years the Yabajin had engaged in infanticide—systematically destroying Motoki’s children.

  In the early days it had been done in the birthing vats. A Yabajin assassin successfully poisoned amniotic fluids in the birthing vats for three years in a row. Corporate officials caught and beheaded the man, but not before representatives from the Alliance completely outlawed birthing vats on Baker for "the duration of the war."

  I found the term "duration of the war" interesting, for nowhere in the films did Motoki officials describe retaliation for the Yabajin attacks. The film went on to show how after the initial attack against the birthing centers, young children soon became targets: Sixteen children were blown apart by tiny bombs that looked like toy butterflies—when one pinched the wings together, the butterfly exploded. Cyanide-laced rice balls strewn about park benches killed five toddlers. A blooming chrysanthemum became bait over a spiked pit, spearing a small girl.

  The attacks were grisly and well-documented. Fearful parents hid children indoors, and attacks moved into the homes. The tape showed a young man standing over the corpse of a black-robed man, describing how the assassin—the Japanese used the slang "Farmer"—had entered the boy’s house at night. The young man slept with his family’s ancient sword and slashed the assassin’s belly open. I was surprised to recognize the young man as Kaigo, the samurai master who trained us.

  The film switched to an old man teaching a child self-defense. The training consisted of teaching the child not to look at flowers, not to eat food given by strangers, not to play with other children in groups.

  "Ah, here is your defensive training!" Zavala said. "But it appears your samurai forgot to train the children how to fire a rifle!"

  So much for our theory that children fought beside adults. Children were merely victims here. Being raised in
doors, they would perhaps be socially inept, shy, and even afraid of strangers. Yet at the same time, they’d be survivors. They didn’t touch candy left on the ground, they didn’t smell chrysanthemums, and they slept with their weapons. They had to be cautious. Perhaps overly cautious—afraid to act in a new way.

  But that seemed ridiculous. If anything, the samurai adapted quickly to any new curve we threw them. I was walking up a dead-end street, learning nothing, and I knew it.

  "I do not think these tapes will be of any help," García admitted. "The propagandists have gone over them too carefully. I’ll bet these are the tapes Motoki showed the Alliance delegates on Earth when they sought permission for a full-scale war. We will find nothing."

  The last three tapes provided more of the same information. One map showed the demographics of Baker. Motoki settlement was separated from the Yabajin by six thousand kilometers of desert and canyons. Motoki estimated the Yabajin population at 95,000—a scant 18,000 more than Motoki. Populations should have been higher, much higher. Motoki had obviously launched attacks of its own. Knowing my luck, I was fighting for the wrong side—if there was a right and wrong side.

  Nothing in the tapes indicated why the samurai always beat us. I’d expected evidence of a protracted, bloody war—permanently scarred bodies, cyborged citizens, strong defensive perimeters, war machines—things that would explain the samurai’s facility with weapons. But even after reviewing the background in the tapes, the only war machine was a bulky black cybertank putting through an orchard, a minor part of the Alliance-approved defense.

  I sighed and turned off the monitor.

  García had watched over my shoulder. He leaned back against the wall. With a total lack of conviction he said, "Then the samurai must be cheating in the simulators. We will have to attack one of them, test his abilities."

  I drummed my fingers on the control panel of the monitor. It had seemed like a fun idea when we were drunk. Now it only sounded stupid. "That may be risky. Even if we lose the battle, the samurai may consider it an act of rebellion. What might they do to us?"

  Zavala spoke up. "You idiots! You’ll get us in trouble. You know the samurai don’t cheat. Why don’t you just admit the samurai beat us by the power of their spirit!"

  García and I looked at each other. García smiled grimly; his eyes held no defeat. And I smiled in return. We’d somehow pushed the right button on Zavala; he was terrified of the samurai. Though our proposed action sounded stupid, the plan was worth discussing if only to see Zavala squirm.

  "We won’t give up, because you’re wrong," García said, looking for a place to put his hands. He finally just hooked his thumbs under the belt of his kimono. "Give up, Zavala! Just pay me my million pesos and we won’t have to fight the samurai." García licked his lips and watched Zavala, enjoying his game.

  Zavala began shaking like a cornered rabbit.

  "Ah, so what if they kill us?" I said as if to discount the threat.

  Zavala raised his cymeched hand, palm outward. "Wait! Wait!" he said. "I cheated you. I know something you don’t!"

  The thought crossed my mind that Zavala had stolen some tapes from the library—tapes showing children practicing with the hovercrafts and laser rifles. He stood there a moment.

  "Well?" García demanded.

  Zavala stood up straight. "I know ..." he said, as if to bear his innermost soul, "I know—that the world is magical, that there are spirits!" We must have appeared incredulous. "I have proof!" he said.

  "Let us see this proof," I asked.

  Zavala said, "I know it’s hard to believe, but I was once like you—always seeking answers to questions that have no answers, seeking to comprehend the incomprehensible universe." He waved his hand as if to display the universe in one simple gesture.

  "This was before the socialists attacked Colombia, back when I was sixteen. I wanted to marry a girl from Tres Rios, and I wanted to make some money so we could buy some land. I went to Buenaventura and got a job on a ship, a Chinese plankton harvester.

  "We were supposed to sail the coasts of Antarctica to harvest the plankton, but the ship’s intake swallowed everything in its path—logs, jellyfish, kelp, trash. My job was to separate these things, put the trash on a conveyer belt and send it back to sea, rake the small fish onto another belt, and gaff a large fish if we got one and throw it into the processor.

  "We had not travelled for three days, and we were just south of Chimbote, when I found it ...” Zavala stopped.

  "And ...” García said. "You are not going to tell me you found a spirit?"

  "You would not believe me if I told you," Zavala answered.

  "You have not lied to us before, why should we not believe you now?" I asked.

  Zavala considered my words. "Because we ran over a bed of red kelp. And among the long strands of red kelp I found something. At first I thought it was a large porpoise, and I was excited, for no one has found a wild porpoise for many years. It was long and gray, with a gray tail. But when I uncovered it, I found that it had the chest and head of a woman! It was a siren. She had light blue skin, and white hair, and long thin arms with webbed fingers on her hands. And right here," he drew a finger in a line under his throat, "were her gills—white gills that fanned out like those of a salamander!

  "She had been dead for several days, and her eyes had been eaten out by the fishes. In spite of this, she was ... beautiful. Marvelous. Perfect." Zavala looked back and forth between the two of us, as if to convince us by his expression. "I know what I saw!"

  García smiled a smile of embarrassment for Zavala. "So, you found a siren. That may be," he said condescendingly, "but how does that prove we have spirits?" He obviously didn’t believe Zavala. Yet Zavala’s sincerity convinced me he was telling the truth.

  Zavala became quite agitated. He swung his arms wildly as he spoke. "Don’t you see? This proves the Earth is magical. For if this magical being has really existed all these thousands of years without us knowing about it, how can we doubt that greater things exist? Magic is everywhere! But our minds are too puny to comprehend it, so we make up lies so we can pretend we understand! All you must do is feel inside you; then how can you doubt that you have a spirit?"

  I said quite calmly, "There is of course a logical explanation for what you saw."

  "What?" He set his jaw.

  "What you saw may have been a chimera—after all, you were near Chilean waters."

  "No," Zavala shook his head vigorously. "It was not a chimera! Nobody could have made something that beautiful!"

  "I saw how the engineers designed Abriara. Believe me, with enough time those men could have made anything—even a siren. You have seen chimeras who are not quite human, haven’t you?" I asked. "Did you not hear tales of those little men that looked like giant bats? And near the genetic engineering compound at Tocopilla were large aquariums leading directly to sea. Could not the engineers have created a siren or two?"

  Zavala laughed to scorn. "I should have told you nothing. I should have known better. The great doctor! As soon as I tell you something, you try to explain it away. You fucking intellectuals are all alike. If you don’t believe me, go ahead and attack the samurai! But when they kill you, I’ll rob your corpses and get my money! You know nothing!"

  He stormed out of the room. I felt bad, but didn’t know what to do.

  García sighed. "Then, I guess we’ll have to have our chimeras fight some samurai tonight. Is there anyone special we should attack?"

  I waved my hand. "They’re all alike to me."

  "Me too. They live up in the state rooms on your level. I suggest we just ambush one in the hall. What do you think?"

  "It sounds like a good plan."

  "Then it is settled," García said. "We’ll do it tonight."

  Chapter 15

  That evening Perfecto came in the room and said quite matter-of-factly, "There is a dead man in the hall." He said it as he crossed the room to sit on his trunk, and used the tone one might use i
f he were to say, "It is raining outside."

  No one bothered to look up at Perfecto, to ask who the man was or how he’d died.

  Mavro rolled off his bunk and said, "I’m getting tired of this shit." He could have been speaking about our losses in the simulator, or the steady drag of the heavy gravity, or the depressing news of a dead man in the hall. Perhaps it was a little of all these.

  We shuffled from our room, down the corridor. Near the ladder we found the body. Without my prosthetic eyes it would have looked as if the man was simply injured, since his face was not discolored. But his body was cooling, and his platinum glow was soft and diffuse—none of bright spots of heat in the neck or face where warm blood pumps near the surface. He had thick black hair, dark brown skin, and a small build. He was lying on his left side, but his face was twisted up so he stared at the ceiling, and his right leg was raised at an angle the way a dog would lift its leg to pee. His lips were contorted into a snarl. Someone had broken his neck. Though he was small, his body filled the narrow hall, almost as if it had been wedged in, so it was impossible to walk around him. Hot platinum air from a ventilator shaft near the floor blew into the man’s hair, stirring it, as if his hair were being brushed by shafts of light.

  Mavro looked at the little man and said, "Ah, Marcos, I see Tomas finally caught you with his woman. Tough luck!" He climbed over the corpse without stopping. He grunted angrily and swore. At such a heavy gravity the small man seemed a major obstacle. I stopped and looked at the body and decided I didn’t have enough energy to try to move it. Marcos had probably weighed 65 kilos on Earth. In ship’s gravity he’d have weighed 100 kilos—well over my Earth weight. Besides, how could I get him down the ladder to the infirmary where he could be properly disposed? I didn’t know him. He was beyond help. It was up to his compadres to dispose of the body.

  I climbed over the corpse and headed down the ladder to level three.