The Magister (Earthkeep)

by Sally Miller Gearhart

  II. Shifting Kanshou

  It was a fully appreciated irony that the century's most heinous explosions of violence took place during the next two weeks, just before the official dissolution of the most effective peacekeeping force in history. Prior to those two weeks, the responses to the Heart's decision had been within the expected boundaries of public dissent. In every satrapy, small pockets had exploded with thievery, fraud and physical abuse had exploded, as if to herald the lawlessness that would prevail without the Kanshou. And in every satrapy, self-appointed individuals or groups had stood ready to defend themselves and the commonweal against such affronts: Renegade groups of paladin protectors had sprung up along the Yukon, anointing themselves the fearless armed guardians of endangered innocents; Bedouin tribeswomen near Damascus had engaged Femmedarmes in a conflict of heavy weapons, hurling loud condemnations at the "cowardly, irresponsible Kanshou, the puppets of treason"; a brigade of Amahs in Seoul had resigned their posts and established themselves as "the New Amahrery, the true sentinels of public safety."

  Zude and her colleagues had observed such discord and nodded with understanding at the protests and rallies, the marches and picket lines and confrontations. They had reminded themselves that they could not expect far-reaching acceptance of their decision overnight, that the world, after all, was fast being robbed of its children, its most precious possession. They had dutifully acknowledged to each other that all of Little Blue's people were not only wrenched and frightened by personal loss but also threatened to their core by the knowledge that their determination to preserve their species might well come to naught.

  Again and again, Zude and her colleagues had turned their eyes to the concomitant river of hope that had leapt its banks and seemed now to be flooding Little Blue. That flood included a deep bonding of the members of the Heart of All Kanshou, even in the face of Bushona Talabele's assassination, and their daily reaffirmation of trust in the appropriateness of their decision. It included the increasingly compelling reports of changes that daily were transforming the individual lives of Little Blue's citizens. And most heartwarming of all, it included the overwhelmingly supportive response of some 90 percent of active Kanshou to the leadership of their Magisters and their Heart.

  But during the two weeks prior to the first ceremony of the Kanshoubu's dismantlement, negative rejoinders to the Heart's decision, at least in some parts of the world, increased almost exponentially, requiring the presence of Kanshou themselves in exceptional numbers. There were riots in eleven major cities; in Zanzibar, rebels proclaimed the joint states of Tanzania and Kenya to be sovereign entities independent of any satrapy, tri-satrapy or global jurisdiction; in Novosibirsk, a demesne governor challenged Zude to a public duel.

  Most devastating to Kanshoubu officialdom were two incidents that occurred over a two-day period just a week before the initial dismantlement ceremony of the Kanshoubu. First, a 24-hour rash of mass suicides in the southeastern sector of North America stunned the world. Atlanta, Birmingham and Jackson were hardest hit, but almost every part of the Old South was affected. The dead totaled over 4,500 persons, all but three of them adults, and one of them, it was later reported, a Vigilante Lieutenant. Second, in Prague, two distraught parents murdered their three children in their sleep.

  With the news of these incidents, Little Blue's three Magisters stopped in their tracks and spent sixty-odd hours in holo-conferences with Heart Members and other Kanshou all over the planet. All Kanshou, both mighty and modest, painfully re-examined the Heart's decision and their own participation, their own motives. They argued with and despaired of each other, they ate little, and they slept not at all.

  It was the Congress of Active Kanshou who officially stepped into the morass of agonized self-examination and helped the Magisters and their colleagues to come again to a clear and common decision. The message read:

  To our Magisters, Vice-Magisters, and our Heart.

  We speak as 180 Kanshou and we speak for, at our best estimate, 556,000 of the 600,000 Kanshou whom we represent. We urge you to stand by your decision to abolish the Kanshoubu, and to leave the victims of recent unfortunate events with only your deepfelt compassion. By your leadership and your trust you have empowered us to assess extreme situations and intentions. Our assessment of the present dissent on Little Blue is that it is only the dying gasp of violence itself. We look forward to joining you in a world where being a Kanshou is simply an internal state, expressed by every appropriate action that we take each day in the living of our lives. You have decided wisely.

  The leaders of the Kanshoubu heaved a grateful sigh and turned with new resolve to the carrying out of their decision. By the time the first disbanding rites were held, there were globally only occasional protests of the decision; by the time the third and last ceremony took place, the planet's dedicated and diligent Full Spectrum Opinion Services experienced difficulty in finding citizens willing to criticize the Kanshoubu's abolition.

  The Vigilancia, last of the Shrievalties to be founded, was the first to be disbanded. In their final duty as Shrieves, the Vigilantes sailed, low-rocketed, gerted, cush-carred or marched from the furthermost reaches of Nueva Tierra to Los Angeles in Aztlán, where they were to spend two days in rituals that would close the doors forever on their careers as peacekeeping officers.

  They began arriving days before the exercises, claiming a need for parade-ground practice, or for flight tests for air shows, or for briefing on sea-vessel and flex-car maneuvers. They joined immediately in the complex organization of work assignments that would assure the smooth execution of the closing rites. They sang and danced and drank long into the nights in the bars and gather-rooms and aboard the Sea-Shrieve vessels anchored in or beyond the harbor. They established communication networks that would keep them forever bonded to one another. They sat on hillsides and watched the lights of a civilian metropolis, speculating about what their lives would be like when they returned to whatever satrapy they called home. They relived the old times and made plans for the times to come. They shared personal agonies about giving up their careers, and they described with wonder the magic that seemed to have touched their lives since the moment of their letting go of being Kanshou.

  When the first day of the formalities arrived, so did

  Lin-ci Win and Flossie Yotoma Lutu, each with her three Vice- Magisters. They joined Zude and the Vigilancia's top-ranked officers on hot review stands, officiating at full-dress parade exercises, Sea-Shrieve maneuvers and Sky-Shrieve routines.

  To the delight of every Vigilante and the hundreds of thousands of civilians who crowded the basin's spectator fields, Nueva Tierra's Magister herself, in gert with an old lover, Sky Captain Claudia Anzaldúa by name, led the Vigilancia's Flying Daggers in a dramatic air show that climaxed with an entire wing's quarter-mile perpendicular dive toward the choppy waves of Santa Monica Bay. Zude-Gert-Claudia (and the wing) finally pulled out of the dive just short of the water's surface. Breathtaking, concluded the proud civilians and Kanshou of Nueva Tierra.

  Zude stopped trying to count the Vigilante marching bands, the visiting Amah and Femmedarme drum-and-bugle units, the honor brigades, the regiments of Vigilante cadets, the drill teams and the light-weapon demonstrations that filled the afternoon. She stood, she saluted, she smiled, she nodded, she applauded and cheered with the appreciative crowds. And she felt no weariness whatsoever, only a light-headed pride and a priceless gratitude.

  When at sunset the spectator fields were transformed into a highly organized small city complete with street markets and art fairs, the Magisters, Vice-Magisters and top Vigilante officers visited the open-air banquets and fiestas of representative Vigilante corps or divisions. They put in an appearance at major carnival areas, cheered the splendid pyrotechnics display, and took in whatever street performances they encountered on their sojourn into the regiments of Vigilante officers and cadets.

  It was past midnight when Magisters Lutu and Win sought their quarters for rest
before the next day's final proceedings. Zella Terremoto Adverb, still fresh as a daisy, returned to her Vigilantes, talking and laughing with them far into the morning hours when, often quite literally, she tucked them into their camp beds. Like generals from time immemorial who spent the night before a great battle walking softly among the silent tents of their troops, Magister Adverb covered miles under that cool starry sky, stepping carefully past battalions of dreaming figures in regulation bags or bedrolls.

  On the deck of the flagship Nora Astorga of the Nueva Tierra Central Vigilante Coastal Fleet, Zude smoked a rare cigarillo with Sea Commander Nancy Chevarría of Matagalpa and watched in the dawn for the gulls that the Commander insisted would swoop over the bow to greet early risers. Zude heard their squawks and felt the breath of their wings, but only Chevarría actually beheld the gulls, her eyes bright with appreciation and wonder. What Zude did see in the gray waters of the bay was the triple leap of a shipfish. On each high arc of its thick body it imparted a word to her: Yes! Praise! Soon!

  By 9:00 the next morning, the spectator fields were cleared of any remnant of the previous day's celebration. They hosted instead the spit and polish of 180,000 Vigilantes at parade rest and the masses of citizens who encircled them on temporary but sturdy scaffoldings of feathersteel. Media dirigibles dotted the sky, transmitting to aerially mounted audio-view-screens the close-up activity of carefully specified companies or battalions; most friends and families seated themselves according to the mikcam location of their favorite Kanshou. It would be a day to remember.

  The complex exercises were conducted with appropriate pomp. Each Vigilante or Vigilante cadet was recognized, called by name and congratulated for her service by her Magister, Vice-Magister, Brigadier, Admiral, Captain or Commander. Each individual Kanshou or Kanshou cadet received from a superior her collar pips, a merit scarf or token of any special honor she had earned, and her warrant of service. Each Vigilante was privileged to take her uniforms and her subvention belt with her into her future. Most important of all, the cape and cowl of that mysterious and versatile material, tekla, were permanently bestowed upon each Vigilante by the Kanshoubu, especially precious gifts to her and her designated heirs forevermore.

  At noon, Zude and her Co-Magisters gave stirring speeches. They formally discharged with honor all of Little Blue's Vigilantes, including those high-ranking officers who stood with them on the round platform at the center of the spectator fields. They politely requested the participation of ex-Vigilante Vice Magisters as well as certain ex-Vigilante bands and honor brigades at the upcoming ceremonies for the disbanding of the Amahrery and the Femmedarmery. At the end of the formalities the Vigilante anthem, Patrullar, Navegar, Volar, filled the air.

  It was 4:00 in the afternoon when ex-Vigilantes and their guests retreated to designated areas of the spectator fields for food, celebrations, visits, rest, exercise or meditation. At dusk they reassembled before two flags: One was that of the Vigilancia, which was put to bed nightly; the other, that of the Kanshoubu, which was never formally lowered, night or day. As the crowd stood silently by, the flag of the Vigilancia was lowered for the last time. For the first time since the Kanshoubu was founded, a bugler played taps.

  Three weeks later in Hong Kong, the two-day rites were repeated, with appropriate variations, for the dismissal of the Asia-China-Insula Tri-Satrapy's 230,000 Amahs. Only one irregularity marred those proceedings. A hydraulic apparatus critical to the raising of the review stand was held up on a bridge from the mainland by the eruption of a religious demonstration. A firmamentarian sect, convinced that without the Kanshou the legions of Satan would storm Heaven's gate, blocked traffic for half an hour while its members exhorted God to give them some sign that Armageddon was not at hand. Amahs relocated the demonstrators but could not make up for the delay in the starting of the first day's activities. Interestingly, the demonstrators were later reported to be covered with small but still very itchy mosquito bites — an answer from God to their request, many concluded.

  Three weeks later in Tripoli, in the cheering presence of some half-million civilians of the Africa-Europe-Mideast Tri-Satrapy, 190,000 Femmedarmes were mustered out of the Kanshoubu. Many of the exercises took place against a background of date, olive and orange groves, or under frequent pockets of greenery provided by the desert reclamation project. Again, the planning was smooth, the presentations impressive, and the speeches brief.

  After the discharge of the Femmedarmes, and the final singing of the Femmedarme anthem, each of the Magisters formally held up an earthen jar filled with sand and painted the color of the Femmedarmery, the Vigilancia or the Amahrery. One by one, each turned her vessel upside down and stood silent while the sand drained completely from it.

  Yotoma held up her green jar. "Form, empty of members," she intoned, "Femmedarmery, you are no more." She raised a regulation Kanshou baton and smashed the jar to bits.

  "Amahrery, you are no more." Lin-ci smashed the red jar.

  "Vigilancia, you are no more," said Zude, and smashed the blue jar.

  Yotoma held up a fourth jar of red, blue and green. "Form, empty of members," she said again, "Kanshoubu, you are no more." Simultaneously, Lin-ci and Zude struck and shattered the jar.

  "Steward Lin-ci Win," said Yotoma, flipping the edges of Lin-ci's Magister cloak to off-duty position, "you are Magister no more."

  "Steward Zella Terremoto Adverb," said Lin-ci, turning Zude's cloak in the same manner, "you are Magister no more."

  "Steward Flossie Yotoma Lutu," said Zude, folding back Flossie's cloak, "you are Magister no more."

  The Kanshou anthem filled the air.

  That evening, after the flag of the Femmedarmery was lowered, the flag of the Kanshoubu followed it down. The bugler played taps for the last time.

  Present at each of the three disbanding ceremonies was an odd couple: two women, whose flying spoon landed at dawn on the first day and departed after dusk on the second. One of the women was tall and middle-aged, with shoulder-length brown hair and a unicorn earring; she was dressed in soft pants and a lightweight shirt. The other was equally as tall, of undetermined age, and possessed of only two upper and cuspid teeth; she wore her long gray hair in ringlets, which bobbed boisterously beneath the wide-brimmed sun hat that was tied in a large bow under her chin; she was clad in white organdy, an ante-bellum gown with hoops and a bodice that revealed scrawny shoulders but no cleavage whatsoever.

  The younger woman clearly appreciated every aspect of the ceremonies. The older one seemed to listen more carefully, smile more readily, sing more lustily, cry harder and dance with more abandon than any other attendee.

  They had come because they liked to think that, after all, they might have played some small part in the drama unfolding before them.

  III. Shifting Citizens

  Of all the changes, even the violent ones, that began at once to take place on Little Blue after the Heart's decision, the one most keenly and universally felt was the sense of speed with which life seemed suddenly to be happening. Daily chores and interactions became almost breathless, and even traditionally molasses-bound bureaucracies began to move with purpose and dispatch.

  Little Blue's governmental and social agencies endured their expected struggles, but on the whole they found themselves taking unusual risks and challenging orthodoxy at every turn. For example, all nine Sifters at the Kitchen Table and all fifteen Websters in the Central Web immediately ratified the Heart's Desire; moreover, in the spirit of the Kanshoubu's example, each of those bodies entertained a proposal to abolish itself, thus setting in motion the processes that would leave Little Blue's global infrastructures not only without law enforcement or interpretation of the law, but without law itself. The Global Energy Commission formed the Task Force On Personal Desire And Thought Focus. In some demesnes, optimism about the future restoration of both children and animals swelled to new heights: Home transmogrifiers were called upon to produce toys and children's clothing again, and amidst a
flurry of controversy and speculation some food processing plants began creating a limited line of vegetarian meals for cats, bird and small fish.

  The global interconnections of commerce, transportation and communication sustained Little Blue as an integrated world, but in truth, daily life became increasingly local and autonomous. Small villages of fewer than 500 inhabitants became the norm; dwellers in large cities tended to coalesce into distinct neighborhoods of about that same size.

  As the occurrence of extraordinary events increased worldwide, miraculous became a useless word. Any randomly chosen day was rich with new experiences. For example, on July 18, 2088, Manuela Osias discovered that she could carry out her plant-wide duty as materials regulator for a zinc alloy company in Manila by commanding her computer with neither voice nor touch but entirely with her mind. On that same day, near Idfu on the Nile, the colossal stones of a newly discovered pyramid were faultlessly dismantled and reassembled on safer ground by a sister-brother team of telekinetic engineers. Four women flew alone for the first time without the companionship of a spooning partner. A man and a woman flew in spoon together from Sicily to the Balkans, and two men accomplished that same feat from Timor to Australia's Melville Island. Inch-wide striations of pure gold appeared in the granite of a Quaker Meeting House in Manchester, England. When an angry Lua Phra Meo of Thon Buri picked up a fist-sized rock to throw at Pa Nong Samut, Samut disappeared. And, still on that same day, a companion section to Egypt's Rosetta Stone was washed up on an Amazon levee; along with its original hieroglyphics and its demotic and Greek characters, this basalt stone included a new undecipherable language that remotely resembled electronic computer code; its final line included a single pictograph that could only be described as an opened cage.