Lana vomited, sick to her stomach at being tricked yet again.
“I wrote ‘Fossil Lake’ on the side of your house before I ever even started on your window. Bart had a lot of blood left in his neck. I can’t believe you didn’t see it. But you bitches never see it coming do you?”
She gagged.
“And just in case somehow you do see freedom again, here’s your lesson: Frogs, men, princes, we’re never who we say we are. And you bitches, well, it’s all your fault.”
Lana looked all around her. At Lucky, at the lake, at her vomit on the ground, at Bart’s severed head. Just beyond Bart, she saw a pile of wet, mildewy, flesh-picked skulls. No doubt Lucky put them all there before he’d come to knock on her window.
For a second, she wondered just how bad Bart had been. How bad had any of them really been? Maybe they weren’t such utter shits? Maybe they didn’t deserve to get destroyed? Maybe she’d read the whole thing wrong, read them all wrong? Lana still didn’t think so, but there was always … maybe.
The blue and red lights flashed across Fossil Lake. Lana heard the sirens and the screeching of tires. She heard a car door open. She heard footsteps on stones and knew that there was no way out.
A spotlight lit her up from behind.
“Thanks for the sandwich and the kiss, bitch,” Lucky said hopping toward the lake. “Oh and thanks for letting me come in your hand. That was awesome. So soft. Do you use lotion? Never had a bitch let me do that before. Anyway, hope you learned something.”
Lana looked at the rings that rippled from Lucky’s splash and she hated him. Hated herself. Felt sick.
“Ma’am,” came a voice from a bullhorn behind the open door of the police car.
She turned, shuffling awkwardly around on her knees, and looked into the light. She blinked as it blinded her. She started to raise her hands.
“On the ground, ma’am. Face down, hands behind your head. We know who you are and we suspect you of murder. Our orders are to proceed with extreme caution.”
Lana stared, empty hands raised.
“On the ground, ma’am.” Sterner now.
As she began to comply, she heard a fat, croaky voice chortling from the middle of the lake.
“You think this is bad, bitch? Wait until they see that pile of heads.”
GOTHICISM ON TRIAL
G. Preacher
“But not even the capture of The Eternal City could persuade Honorius to grant him legitimacy. Undeterred, Alaric marched south, intending to sail to North Africa, at that time the breadbasket of the entire Italian Peninsula. By controlling those grain reserves, he could starve not only Rome but the entire West. If that wouldn’t get Honorius to proclaim him Magister Militum, nothing would.”
Professor Maximillian Hastings risked a glance up from his notes. Some blank looks gazed back, from those of his students not distracted by something else. Half the classroom seemed to be focused on laptops, no doubt playing games or chatting with friends rather than taking notes. Others stared intently at the clock, as if that would somehow make the time go by faster.
His heart sank. A familiar anger kindled in his belly. Marketing, he’d been told. It was all about marketing, about selling history to the kids these days, making it exciting.
If this was what marketing got him, he’d rather lecture to an empty room.
There was a preponderance among them of pale faces, black lips and eyeliner, and attire to match. They wanted Goths, and that was what they were getting. But look at them. Just look at them.
And look at that other one, sitting in the back in the closest seat to the door. Him with his unwashed hair and torn black leather jacket over a rancid death-metal T-shirt. Him with his entitled, fuck-you attitude forever pasted on his sneering mouth. Why was he here? He wasn’t in this class. He wasn’t even enrolled.
“His plans were thwarted by a vicious storm that destroyed his fleet,” the professor continued. “Alaric himself survived, only to die a short while later, near the end of the year 410, probably from disease. His successor, his brother-in-law, Ataulf or Ataulphus, took over leadership of the Gothic Confederacy, and led them north, into Gaul, where Honorius eventually granted them land and allowed them to settle as feoderati.”
Nothing. He’d just thrown out feoderati for the first time and not a one of them batted an eye. They weren’t listening. They weren’t caring.
He raised his voice in an attempt to pull them back, to force them to listen. “The Roman response to being beaten by the Visigoths was immediate and long-lasting, and it is what we’ll be examining in Monday’s lecture. Which, if you’ve been paying attention to the syllabus, will be on St. Augustine’s Concerning The City of God Against the Pagans, De Civitate Dei Contra Paganos, one of the ten most influential books in western civilization.”
Still nothing. The dirty intruder at the back of the room smirked.
“The abridged version, assigned on the first day of class, is, of course, required reading. If you haven’t started yet, you’ve got a long weekend ahead of you. Monday’s class will start with a quiz on the text. Failure on the quiz equals failure of this class.”
Now some of them looked worried through their masks of makeup and piercings. Others looked overconfident and smug, as if he’d just issued them a challenge.
Had any of them done the reading?
Why did he even bother to wonder?
Idiots. He always got stuck with the idiots. Screw the teacher-student contract. Screw them all.
“Are there any questions?” Hastings asked as the clock ticked closer to the hour.
There were none, only a general rustling of eagerness to leave. He dismissed them, then made his own quick retreat from the lecture hall.
Gothic Culture and Its Relevance Today. God, what an awful title.
“Marketing, my foot,” he muttered. See what it had gotten him?
He detoured by way of the restroom and the faculty lounge, hoping – probably against hope – that if any of his students tried to seek him out at his office, they would give up and go away when he didn’t arrive immediately.
Questions during class? No, never. A parade of excuses, whining pleas for extensions, and sob-stories about how unfairly overworked they were? Always.
His hopes proved only partially validated. He found two people waiting in the hall outside his door. One was a pale, slightly overweight girl of that indiscriminate college-age anywhere between seventeen and twenty-two. Her dyed-black hair was cropped in an unappealing, boyish cut. Her clothes were also black – gauzy skirt, leggings, a stretch-velvet top – except for an ill-fitting burgundy-colored corset.
The other was … him.
As Hastings approached, he heard the girl say, “–your father? Really?” His heart, already low, sank further.
“Yeah,” said the other. “I’m the successful one of the family. Author, editor, publisher. That’s me. Not some butt-licking burger-flipper. I do it all myself.”
“Wow! So what do you write?”
“It’s probably too dark for you.” His eyes widened and his speech quickened. “It’s too dark, transgressive and in-your-face for most people. April Derleth called me Lovecraft’s heir. And Brian Keene, that hack, he just wishes –”
“Sorry to have kept you waiting,” Hastings said, interrupting before he had to hear Niccolò recite his self-aggrandized resume yet again.
The girl turned toward him. “Oh, no worries, Professor. I was just talking to Nick, here. You must be so proud to have such a creative son!”
“You have no idea,” he said, hiding the irony he couldn’t mask by opening the office door. “What can I do for you ... Jasmine, wasn’t it?”
“Yes, sir.” Now she went a bit sheepish. “I, um, see, I’m going away for the weekend . . .”
Here it was.
He raised a hand to cut her off as she launched into something about a Wiccan retreat in the mountains and how she therefore wouldn’t have any time to read and couldn’t sh
e please –
“You’ve had the assignment for the last three weeks,” he said. “Perhaps you shouldn’t have left it until the last minute.”
“Just an extra couple of days?” Jasmine looked tearful.
“The quiz is on Monday. For everyone.”
“This is the only retreat all semester!”
“Then you have a decision to make. The spiritual advice of St. Augustine, or the Wiccans.”
“But that’s not fair!”
Hastings folded his hands tight atop his desk to keep them from curling into fists. Had she honestly just said that? That it wasn’t fair? Not fair that the work was clearly outlined in the syllabus? Not fair that he’d stated on numerous occasions there would be no exceptions given? How was any of that unfair?
What was unfair was that he had to sit here being whined at, as if her problems were his fault. What was unfair was that he was stuck here, unable to secure his grant money, instead of in Italy! Where the river, the river, was at its lowest level in decades!
“Fuck, Dad,” Niccolò said from the doorway. “Don’t be such a shit-slinging prick about it. It’s just a stupid history book.”
What was also unfair was being stuck with this insane excuse for a child, who sounded like a twelve-year-old reprobate when he swore.
Doing his best to ignore that for now, he bit back his bile and frustration to concentrate on trying to help Jasmine find a solution to her ‘unfair’ situation. Once she’d agreed that she should be able to find at least some time for reading in and around her ridiculous weekend plans, she slunk timidly from the office.
Hastings, exhausted, desperately wanted a nap. But there stood his son, glaring at him with greasy petulance.
“Nice fucking work, Dad! She was into me! I was about to score, but then you had to walk up treating her like some pus-filled blister you have to lance off your ass. How the fuck am I supposed to get a girlfriend with you sabotaging me?”
“Nicco –”
“Don’t fucking call me Nicco! Nobody calls me fucking Nicco, all my friends know not to call me out of name!”
“It is your name. I was there. I named you. Niccolò, after Machia –”
“My name is Nicolaus! Or Nick! Not Niccolò, that’s a fag’s name, do you want me to be some sort of butt-probed fag?”
Max sighed. “What do you want? Or are you just here to try and pick up girls from my class?”
“Thanks a fucking lot; I came to tell you my great news and you don’t have to go and take a ripe shit on it.”
“What news is that?” He did not dare to let himself dream it might be a real job, for once.
“I got a reading! For my new book, Fossil Lake. Those fuckstains won’t know what hit them. They’ll see. You’ll see, too. I told you how you should give me a fucking chance to have my career.”
Hastings began explaining, with as much diplomacy as he could muster, that he would be busy all weekend with analyzing and deciphering the latest images that would be transmitted during the satellite flyover of the site in –
He needn’t have bothered with diplomacy.
“Fine! Don’t come. Why would I want an old fuck like you there anyway? Be the asshole that I always knew you were ... that Mom always says you are!”
With that, the storm that was Niccolò Hastings blew off as quickly as it had blown in.
Nicco’s departure, however, did not signal the end of the day’s troubles. Hastings was beset with ever more annoyances and inconveniences, from scheduling mix-ups to the department chair wanting to throw his weight around. It culminated with being called a selfish, domineering bastard by his own grad student.
That last stung most. He and Rob had always gotten on so well!
It wasn’t as if they hadn’t discussed the plan, gone over it in exacting detail more than once. Rob knew he’d need to get everything configured before the uplink. He knew about the time zone differences that had to be taken into account.
He also knew how much Hastings depended on him. Rob was the one who understood the programs, the software, the technical aspects of this stage of the project. Rob knew how important this was.
Why, therefore, was Hastings to blame for expecting Rob to put duty before pleasure? So he had a hot date, good for him, but a chance to ‘get lucky’ hardly meant ducking out on his other responsibilities.
Just as he’d told Jasmine she needed to choose between Augustine and the Wiccans, he presented a similar choice to Rob. His girl, or his thesis. He could get lucky any time, after all. An opportunity like this, like they were about to undertake, was not to be missed.
Finally, the disgruntled Rob nonetheless saw the light. Hastings was able to go home for an unsatisfying dinner of overcooked take-out and perhaps too much wine, and fall into a fitful sleep.
* * *
Gaius Maximius Herenus stood on the hill overlooking the works. The riverbed, dry now except for patches of mud and mire, spread out before his ever-watchful eye. The tomb itself lay in an excavated depression.
Hundreds of slaves scurried about, carrying the bricks and mortar needed to build the north and west walls of the structure. The carpenters worked in a large camp to the north, above the river bed, crafting the traditional grave offerings as well as a spectacular four-wheeled chariot that would be used to transport the body.
Or something like that, Maximius wasn’t entirely sure. Upstream, his second-engineer kept the dam that diverted the Buscento under constant supervision and frequent repair. The last thing anyone needed was for the dam to break and drown everything, and everyone. That would surely mean Maximius’ head. Ataulphus was not an understanding king.
“Maximius!” The call came from his scribe, Lucius.
He raised his hand in greeting.
“The king has called for you. He has bid me tell you that he wants to know when the tomb will be complete, and for you to know that he is prepared to give you great honors if you can finish in three more days.”
“It can be done my friend, just barely I think. Take me to him then, and we shall see what he says.”
* * *
His cell phone gradually woke him, the strains of O Fortuna rousing him from his slumber.
Fragments of the dream flashed through his waking mind and he grasped at them, desperately trying to remember as many details as he could.
In his youth, similar dreams had come to him often. Nightly, sometimes. The dreams had inspired him, given him direction for his studies, kept him going during difficult times. They’d led him to the area where he believed the remains of the tomb must be found, despite those who’d been unconvinced by his theories.
It was the wrong place, they’d said. The tomb must have been near Cosenza, not further upstream, away from the coast.
Hastings knew better, knew with every ounce of his being. He had been there. In person, yes … walking the valley of the Buscento all those years ago … the best times of his life … his young exuberance, his wonder at the world and its history, his passion, the best days of his life … he’d been there in the flesh as well as in his dreams. His recurrent dreams of being Gaius Maximius Herenus, engineer of Alaric’s tomb.
Dreams that had made him who he was today.
But it had been years since the last one, and this time … this time was different.
Never before had there been a summons from Ataulphus!
Hastings yearned to go back to sleep, to pursue further revelations, but the phone rang again. He reached for the annoying object.
Soon, he would have his proof. It wouldn’t be as good as being there, standing on that dry river bed, but the live satellite images and the new computer enhancement software would find traces of the tomb.
He’d be vindicated. His life’s work complete. His dreams realized in every sense of the word.
Expecting it to be Rob, calling from the computer lab with an update, he answered the phone. At this ungodly hour, it had better be one hell of a good –
“Dad! Ab
out fucking time you picked up!”
The hour was even ungodlier by the time he had finished dealing with the bail bondsman and the police, and climbed back behind the wheel with Niccolò sulking in the passenger seat.
“The shriveled old cunt deserved it,” he said. “Sassing me at my reading? Hah! She asked for what she got!”
“It was an open-mic night, not a ‘reading’,” Hastings said.
“She said I had a dirty mouth, and when I told her I’d make her mouth dirty, she called me no kind of Christian! Can you believe that? Who does she think she is, calling me –”
“She was a nun. A seventy-year-old nun in a wheelchair, and you slapped her.”
“Fucking bitch.”
Hastings sat for a moment, trying to compose his thoughts. Here he was, pissed off and tired, on what was supposed to be the eve of his greatest triumph. And his son was a fucking idiot. A fucking nun-slapping idiot.
Now he was faced with either driving Niccolò all the way across town to his tacky basement studio apartment, or take him home to the condo, which he did not want to do.
O Fortuna sounded again. On the other end of the line was a grouchy campus security guard, wanting to know if Hastings really needed to keep the computer lab open and empty all damn night.
“Empty?” he cried, panic surging through him. “What do you mean, empty? Rob’s not there?”
“Nobody’s been here,” said the guard. “I could have gone home by now otherwise.”
Rob and his hot date! Rob and his hormone-befuddled priorities! All their work, down the drain? Hastings’ mind whirled like Hero’s aeolipile.
“Don’t close the lab,” he told the guard. “I’ll be there as soon as I can!”
The guard did not seem thrilled by this, but Hastings was beyond caring. He snapped shut the phone and roared out of the precinct parking lot faster than was advisable.
“The fuck crawled up your sour ass?” Niccolò asked as they sped toward the university.
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