The Dreams of the Black Butterfly

by Mark James Barrett

  “Guess what? I’m just going to believe you. The police will be here in about half an hour because I’ve closed my home down. What can you do?”

  “It’s already done. I adulterated your DNA today and wiped your consciousness file.”

  “You did?”

  “Yes, Mr Schema.”

  Daniel scanned the man’s variegated face. He was a Coppertint but it hadn’t taken very well. “How did you manage to do that, then?”

  “I work as a low-tech engineer at the hospital. I know where they store the DNA strands and the consciousness files.”

  Daniel laughed. “That’s all very well, but the security is unbreakable.”

  “I’ve spent a year drifting it.”

  Daniel had heard of drifting of course: a rare skill that was thought to be caused by the effects of modern networking upon the brain. It was said that a drifter could send his psyche through solids for sometimes up to an hour if undisturbed.

  “I thought drifting was an urban myth.”

  “They’d like you to believe that.” Mr Link glanced at the fitful glow in the walls of the house. “We have fifteen minutes now before the squads arrive. I must leave here in five.”

  Daniel made a decision. “You want credit I presume?”

  “I believe you have level two?”

  “Yes and I’m willing it to you now.” Daniel had received a steady drip of concerned messages, offers of advice and legal threats since he turned his home off and all but disconnected from the web. Now he attempted to think in his code against the tide.

  Mr Link spent the next minute pacing up and down in agitation. “Come on! Come on!”

  “They’re performing security checks. How did you get into the hospital archives anyway? Drifting is one thing, but you still have to physically get in there.”

  Mr Link stopped pacing and gave a shaky grin. “I told you, I work there, and through drifting I pinpointed certain moments of slackness in security. It is seconds we are talking about, but if you know which seconds …” He wandered over to the giraffe and ran his hands down its neck and then back up against the nap of the animal’s fur. He twisted the giraffe’s face and kissed it. “This is a very nice animal. Do you want to come with me, baby?”

  The giraffe sat down heavily and shook its head. Mr Link turned away. “I’d make you if I had more time. Is it done yet?”

  “It’s done.” Daniel felt like he should say something more profound but nothing came to mind.

  Mr Link pulled a gun from his jacket and placed it against Daniel’s forehead. It was warm and hard. Daniel realised that the dull throb in his throat must be fear. He closed his eyes and waited for the silence.

  The squads arrived eight minutes late due to a violent electrical storm which stalled their cars. The house was dark and quiet. They found Daniel Schema on the floor of his living space with half of his head missing. A small giraffe was attempting to undo his trousers with its teeth. The attending officer drew his weapon and pointed it at the beast.

  “Tell us everything you know,” he ordered.

  “Good morning, it is Mr Schema. Just confirm by opening your new eyes on your new first day.”

  Daniel sat up slowly. “How?” he asked in a whisper.

  Nobody answered. There was just the babbling room trying to mollify him, while its sterility, its stark light, scratched his new eyes like nano-thin razorblades. He curled up on the bed with his head pressed against his knees and rocked back and forth slowly.

  Breakfast came: green algae on toast, mango juice and a sweet green tea. As Amber placed it on the table, Daniel leapt to his feet and the girl just made it to the door. Her yelp of fear encouraged him. He threw the tray and they brought him down with an infrasonic pulse. When he woke, there was a new tray on the table and a new breakfast.

  “Good morning, Mr Daniel …”

  He took the tray and dashed it across the wall. They knocked him out six times before he calmed down.

  “What have you done, you bitch?”

  Dr Gene-Mart smiled. “What we are asked to do under provision of your insurance policy.”

  “But–”

  “Your parents added something else. I guess you never bothered to listen to the whisperprint.”

  He shook his head in disbelief. His hands went up to his face and began to explore it. They probed nostrils that were wider than expected, pulled at a fuller lip, a higher cheekbone. He noticed a gleam of pleasure in Dr Gene-Mart’s eyes. Finally, his hand went to the mirror. He looked in silence upon his new face.

  “Mr Link kept his side of your little deal. Your DNA was not backed up I’m afraid, but your consciousness was. It’s kept separately in a secure vault. So here you are in a new body.”

  He watched her lips in fascination, stunned by the words that were now spilling from them.

  “You may develop some disparities in personality traits, but rest assured it is a healthy donor clone. There will always be some impact between the clone body’s cells and your consciousness. Cells have memories, too, and you may find you acquire a liking for things you never did before. Naturally, the donor’s history will be made available to you. That’s the best we can do under the circumstances, Daniel. We are not Gods.” She allowed herself a smile.

  Daniel realised he had smashed the mirror. “You caught him?”

  “Yes, Daniel. He had been under surveillance for some time. You’re going to hurt yourself with that–”

  “When?”

  “A few hours after he shot you I believe. He’ll be in the body of a walrus by now. You know what they do to murderers, Daniel.”

  He was on her in an instant and the broken shard of mirror rose and fell in a rapid blur, tossing strings of bright red baubles high above him. He marvelled at their sparkle and warm patter as they fell back upon the doctor’s bronze skin.

  “Die, die, die!” he commanded and then fell onto the dead woman as the room’s control mechanism fired a lethal sonic wave through him.

  The elegant, high-ceilinged room rang with the tinkle of polite laughter. The walls were a deep, lush green. From them grew a proliferation of orchids. Their heavy petals hung in cream, damson and fiery orange, like ranks of flamboyant spectators to the party in the centre of the room. It was very warm.

  A tall, platinum-tinted woman of indeterminable age was holding court to a group of eight women and four men.

  “I can’t thank you enough of course, Miss Gene-Mart-Schema. That has a nice ring to it, does it not?”

  The tiny, Silvertinted young woman beside her nodded coyly. “You have been very generous with your patronage. I’m glad I could help. It must have been a testing time for your family.”

  “Indeed, but your sacrifice has helped us and Daniel greatly. I see our tinting division did an excellent job. Silver suits you.”

  “I’m very happy with it.”

  “Good. There’s nothing that dents the confidence quite like a poorly applied tint.”

  The older woman closed her eyes for a moment. Her naked body, which was translucent due to the very latest skin fashion, began to quiver a little. The profusion of green buds that grew on her head in place of hair began to flower. In a matter of seconds, there were tiny, gold blooms covering her scalp.

  “Oh, bravo, dear! Bravo!” Her husband, dressed in nothing but rolling, ten-minute skin adverts for Schema International, stepped forward to congratulate his wife. The rest of the party clapped enthusiastically as the woman beamed her delight.

  “Are they gold? Are they gold?”

  “Yes, Mrs Schema; a wonderful show.”

  One of the other women gestured at the gurgling fluids just visible inside Mrs Schema’s belly. “I see you’re pregnant again Mrs Schema. Congratulations.”

  She blushed intentionally. “The
termination is in September. I like to have one every fall. It’s the season for loss, don’t you think?”

  “Yes, indeed.”

  “Okay, let’s see if he will grace us then.”

  She moved to the far side of the room with her husband as the guests took their drinks and sat at the horseshoe-shaped seating system, which faced the door. She pleaded for almost five minutes and her smile never faltered.

  “Be a good boy, now. All these people are here to see you on your birthday. Occasionally, she adjusted her teller to see if that would work. “Cum in heah dis minnit!” she demanded and then softening again, “I membahs de time wen you wah jus a chile, you neva dis bad. C’mon honey, fer ya mammy.”

  One of the seated parties called through. “Is that Slave?”

  The woman re-adjusted her teller and turned her head.

  “Yes, do you like it? Farnwood thinks it’s too gauche.”

  Finally, the lion stretched lazily into a standing position and padded out of the den past the man and woman. In the living room there were a number of people the creature recognised. They all looked at him expectantly. He had been taught to sing a birthday song at this moment but he didn’t want to. He moved into the centre of the room, opened his enormous mouth and yawned. The seated people shuffled a little and sipped their drinks. The young Silvertinted woman stood up shakily. “Hi, how are you doing today?”

  The lion studied her with pale, yellow eyes. His lolling sandpaper tongue probed the empty gums in his mouth. His thick paws attempted to unsheathe claws long since removed.

  The naked man flashed a brilliant white smile at him. “Come on, son. Friends and family are all here and we have a birthday surprise. Here she is, in person.”

  At his words, there came the sound of a guitar being strummed and out of a side door, Natalie Gallo appeared, swinging her guitar as she sang, “I once knew a man brought back to life …”

  She wore loose cargo pants, a blue T-shirt with a golden dragon writhing on it and over that, a blue, unzipped hoodie. Her hair was cut short, but the fringe was long, whipping across her face as she moved.

  “You might be that man I adored. But you don’t seem to remember, how we met and what your heart ached for.”

  The lion pawed at the floor and roared. The eight seated people jumped to their feet and backed away. There was some whimpering. Miss Gallo stopped singing abruptly and looked at Mrs Schema in terror.

  The woman waved impatiently. “Continue, continue! He can’t harm you – no cock or claws.”

  The guitar started up again tentatively. “I’m … I’m all out of faith and I’m waiting in heaven … now it’s empty without you …” Natalie Gallo’s nostrils flared with emotion as she opened her voice for the climax of the song and her haunted eyes never left the lion’s face. After the applause, there was an awkward silence. Miss Gallo turned to the Schemas.

  “Was it okay, then?”

  Mr Schema smiled. “Well, son, what did you think of that?”

  The lion squatted over the grass carpet and its face contorted with effort. The smell of lavender filled the room.

  * * *

  … Moises looked around at Dollie and the man jumped a little, surprised by the boy’s movement.

  “Why have you quit?”

  “Water,” Moises croaked.

  Isaacs handed him a bottle, which he downed in two long draughts.

  Dollie leaned forward. “Did you feel me shaking you earlier?”

  “No.”

  “Appears you can’t be reached when you’re in the thick of it.”

  Moises yawned long and hard. He was feeling lightheaded and hungry. The stories were getting harder for him to take. That last one … well, the sickness of it hung on him.

  The Texan also seemed to be struggling with something; his mouth moved silently as he looked at some notes he had made. “You tired, boy?” he asked, looking up from his pad.

  It was hard to concentrate on Dollie’s words. “Yes, very tired now.”

  Dollie sighed. “Well, we got a ways to go yet. What do you think of these stories, Moises?”

  “They seem … true.”

  Dollie looked him with a kind of awe.

  “I think you’re right … Hell, I know you are somehow.”

  Moises shrugged. “Me perecen íntimos.”

  “They are.” The flat voice came from the shadows across the room. Moises turned and peered at them, trying to pick out the speaker. It was a voice he did not recognise. There was a strangeness to it, an accent of some sort.

  “What do you mean, Wendell?” Dollie asked, and the man stepped out from the shadows. He was slightly overweight, short-haired, pale and plain-looking; the jeans, sneakers and light jacket, wholly inappropriate for the situation, marked him out as a foreigner, newly arrived in Peru.

  “From what we know about Hawthorne, this boy’s obsession with the pop star, and some of the other elements in the stories” – The man pointed at Moises – “a percentage of this is coming from him. I am not sure why though … or how much.”

  “Holy Mary and Joseph!” Dollie whispered. “I make you right.”

  Moises stared at the man and Dollie answered the unspoken question. “Wendell here is a bit of an expert on esoterica. I brought him in from Germany a bit back.”

  For a few moments, Dollie and Wendell moved away and discussed something in whispers. Dollie turned back to Moises.

  “Just get back to it, now.”

  Moises shook his head. “I want to sleep for a bit.”

  Dollie’s shadow fell over him. “You want to join your family right now, is that it?”

  Moises shook his head wearily, but a growing part of him longed for what the Texan was threatening. He wanted to be away from this place so badly, far away, with his brother Mayta perhaps, drinking ice cold beers not in Iquitos, but in that English pub Hawthorne often talked about … that Moat House. And yet, Mayta was even further away than England wasn’t he? In a country of the dead that Moises could not imagine. Still, it was a nice dream to have and he could see it as clearly as the room around him, more clearly even.

  “What are you grinning at?” Asked Dollie.

  Moises ignored him and turned back to the table. He looked down the microscope, cleared his throat and felt his eyes drawn to an unfurling story once again …

  This Side of the Other Side

  I sit outside for a while, nervously dipping my fingers in lager, and tracing around the tropical fish on the cover of the album I always bring along. It’s a still, hot day and the manager comes out in a lilac shirt to raise the parasols. I nod at him, squinting at the sun bouncing back off the white washed walls of the old building.

  “You’re early today Chris, got a day off?”

  “Yes ... it’s Sean’s birthday.”

  He smiles sympathetically. “Is it? How are your mum and dad keeping?”

  “Not bad thanks.”

  Steve picks an empty crisp packet off the bench and scrunches it in his fist. “Didn’t they fancy coming down?”

  “No, it upsets them too much nowadays ... you know?”

  Steve nods. “Hope it goes well.” He slaps me on the shoulder and moves along. I turn away from the blinding walls. From where I am sitting I can watch people coming into the pub. There is a shallow moat around the building, and a small stone bridge out front is the only way across from the car park. A young couple cross the bridge and sit at the bench opposite me. The man parks the baby carriage so it is under the parasol, then sets the brakes on the wheels and goes into the pub. The woman tears open a packet of crackers. She passes one to the tiny outstretched hand in front of her and licks her fingers. She is very attractive. I take a gulp of lager and try not to watch her cooing at her baby. I fail.

  A family pull u
p in a people carrier and walk slowly across the bridge. They pause to look into the moat, pointing animatedly at any fish they see. The water is flat and dusty in the midday heat. I watch it now, to see if I can spot what is exciting them. After a few moments the thick, pale lips of a large carp break the surface. There is a prolonged slurp, and the water curls as the fish turns away. The pretty woman makes a little gasp and looks embarrassed at having done so. “Wow, what was that?” she asks, thinking out loud.

  “A carp,” I say, mesmerised by how clear and blue her eyes are.

  She opens them wider. “Big fish aren’t they?

  “Yes,” I confirm, they are. She goes back to cooing at her child.

  I want to tell her that my brother and I caught those fish fourteen years ago, from a lake almost thirty miles from here. I want to describe how Sean used to fill a holdall up with water, and how he would sit in the back of the car with the carp, bream, or whatever it happened to be that day, stroking the fish to comfort them as they were transported to a new home. Every fish in that moat was brought here lovingly, illegally, by my brother Sean. Nobody knows that. Why should they? It isn’t important to them.

  I don’t tell her anything of course. Her husband comes back with a pint and a half and gives me a quick look that might be a warning.

  One of the barmaids appears with a ticket in her hand.

  “Chris Dallán?”

  “Yes.”

  “Your contact is available now.”

  I grab my album and follow the girl inside. I hear a familiar voice and see a grin appear out of the gloom. It’s Turtle. “Alright Chris, you look lost?”

  “Bloody sun, I’ve gone blind walking in here.”

  Turtle was one of my brother’s old friends. Ribs, Donn and Jimmy are sitting with him. We exchange a bit of forced banter, but it’s still nice to see them. Ribs stands up - there isn’t a great deal of change in his height - and pushes his hand through his black wavy hair. I’ve always thought he looks like Johnny Cash in heavier gravity.