The Shoreless Sea

by J. Scott Coatsworth

  “It’s coming!” Se looked terrified. Poor kid.

  “I know. That’s why we’re here.”

  They disentangled themselves and got up.

  “‘We?’”

  “Destiny, meet Zaimann.”

  Destiny looked up at the two-meter-tall fox woman, and ser mouth dropped open.

  “Nice to meet you.” Zaimann gave Destiny her best canine grin. “Gordy, I think we have company.”

  He turned to see the mist billowing behind them. Lilith’s face appeared, lovely as ever. She stopped and took in the scene.

  Gordy and Zaimann closed in protectively in front of Destiny.

  “You can’t have this one.” Zaimann voice was a half growl.

  “You shouldn’t cross me.” Lilith’s watery gaze shifted to Gordy. “I know you. The little minnow who slipped away. Down the river to the deep blue sea, deep deep into the churning sea….”

  “No less crazy than I remember.” Gordy suddenly saw her for what she was. A pathetic, broken creature, one who had amassed far too much power. But weak even so. She bullied to hide her weakness. It was a story as old as humankind.

  “What is this? An invasion?” Lilith’s voice slid back toward sanity, sounding squishy and wet. “You’re too late. You should have destroyed us while you could.”

  Zaimann glanced at him.

  Gordy shook his head. “No idea.”

  “We’ll discuss this later.” Zaimann lifted her hands and the curved sword appeared once again. “Here, take this!” Zaimann’s hand extended toward him, and another sword manifested in midair. Then she leapt forward, following Lilith as the creature scurried back into the mist.

  Gordy managed to snag it with his good hand, without cutting off any fingers, and shot Destiny a “what the hell am I gonna do with this?” look.

  Se shrugged.

  He sighed and took Zaimann’s cue to leap into the fray.

  Between the two of them, Gordy and Zaimann managed to drive Lilith back.

  Zaimann was an expert swordsman, while Gordy supplemented her skills with well-timed pokes at the beast’s face.

  Lilith hissed and pulled away, then reshaped herself and pushed forward again.

  Her body contorted, her eyes sliding backward and to the sides, something that really creeped the hell out of Gordy.

  One of her tentacles snaked around his arm, and his skin steamed.

  He howled, pain rushing up his virtual nerves until Zaimann lopped off the tentacle.

  Lilith screamed in pain as the part holding Gordy’s arm vanished in a puff of smoke.

  She struck out again, but he managed to parry the blow, chopping off another tentacle.

  Three more grew in its place.

  Behind him, Destiny shouted, “Leave my friends alone!”

  Before he could stop ser, se jumped past him, an armful of gray in ser hand, and thrust it at the foul creature.

  The ball of mist enveloped Lilith, spreading across her sickly skin and sinking in like water into dry ground.

  Lilith screamed again and started scraping at her own skin with her clawed tentacles, trying to pull off the clinging fog and ripping her skin off in long red shreds.

  Her howling and frantic tearing increased, and soon she had reduced herself to a whimpering pile of blood, flesh, and guts.

  Zaimann stepped forward and thrust her sword into the heart of the pile, and what had been Lilith’s form on this plane vanished in a brilliant flash, leaving only an acrid trail of smoke.

  “What the hell?” Gordy stared at the spot where Lilith had been.

  Zaimann sniffed the air. “She’s gone for now.” She turned to Destiny. “What did you throw at her?”

  “A memory. Of the day she was born.”

  “That shouldn’t have been too traumatic….”

  “The day she was born as this. When she lost her humanity.”

  “Ouch.”

  Se nodded. “I know. It was… harsh. But it worked.” Se threw ser arms around Zaimann’s waist, eliciting a priceless look of shock from the bandmaster. “Thank you for showing up when you did.”

  “You should be proud of yourself.” Zaimann patted Destiny on the shoulder uncertainly.

  “Hey, I helped too.” Gordy crossed his arms.

  Destiny laughed and hugged him.

  “And your swordsmanship shall become the stuff of legend, blah blah blah.” Zaimann fake-clapped for his triumphant victory.

  “Asshole.”

  Zaimann bowed. “Thank you. Now we have to go. We need to strike at Lilith while she’s weak.” She looked at Destiny. “You coming?”

  “I have to stay here. I’m the link and the way back.”

  Zaimann cocked her head. “That’s a lot of pressure for a child your age. You must be powerful.”

  “I—”

  “Don’t get any ideas. Se’s not staying in this world.”

  Zaimann’s eyebrow arched, a very attractive gesture on her vulpine face. She laughed. “Very well.”

  Destiny could feel Belynn, Kiryn, and Dax through their links to ser. “Are you sure you don’t want to wait? The others should be here soon.”

  “Others?” Zaimann squinted at ser.

  “The other inthnauts. The ones from my world. With their own Jacksons.”

  She shook her head. “Lilith is weak. We have to strike now. Send the others when they arrive. They can help us clean up the mess.”

  Gordy shrugged. “Whatever the lady says.”

  Zaimann growled, sounding pleased. “Right answer. Come on—the final battle awaits us.” She slashed the air again, and they stepped back through to New York.

  THE TAXI swept past the multicolored superscrapers of downtown Fargo, zipping between them like a gull, twisting and turning this way and that and narrowly missing other vehicles that buzzed around the city center.

  It was barely bigger than the two of them, a bright green shape that resembled nothing so much as some of the insects from Old Earth that Belynn had studied with her parents.

  It had no visible means of propulsion, but it moved quickly, avoiding other objects adeptly, and although its lurching progress should have made her want to vomit, she felt no unpleasantness at all.

  Old Earth tech or inthworld magic? She supposed she would never know.

  “Your friend Jackson lives north of the city. Older neighborhood. Some families settled out there to have a quieter place to raise their kids.” He shook his head. “People have strange ideas.”

  “Yeah. Strange.” Belynn didn’t mention that growing up that way was the norm on Forever.

  She hadn’t yet figured out how she would convince Jackson to help her. She had vastly underestimated the complexity of this world—the sheer overwhelming reality of it when you were immersed in its demesne. Each and every person here seemed to be a fully realized being, albeit missing some key life memories.

  Jackson would be no different. If anything, he would be even more complex, as he was the originator of these worlds and had presumably put a lot of himself into them.

  They left the city behind and flew lower to the ground, zipping past a wide park along the banks of the river. People ran and rode two-wheeled machines and even floated along the path that ran along the riverfront.

  “What’s the river called?”

  “The Red River.”

  “But it’s green.” It snaked back and forth below in wide and narrow oxbows like a strip of ribbon carelessly laid on the ground by a giant.

  “It’s red in the rainy season. Lots of silt.”

  “Ah.”

  Soon they were zeroing in on a small patch of houses, each with sparkling black rooftops and wide front yards and backyards that backed up onto the stream. The houses were surrounded by large trees that obscured most of their rooflines.

  “Why aren’t they glowing?”

  “What?”

  “The plants. None of the plants here glow.”

  Cast laughed. “They’re not supposed to. Do they
glow where you’re from?”

  She nodded. She’d known that. Somewhere, at some time, she’d been told that. Probably by Mamma. But still… seeing it was a whole different thing.

  The open sky still made her queasy too.

  The little craft shook.

  “What’s happening?” This time she could feel the motion in her gut.

  “Not sure.” Cast tapped his temple and mumbled something, closing his eyes.

  The taxi jerked back and forth, as if it were being shaken by a giant hand.

  Cast’s eyes opened. “Someone has taken over navigation.”

  “She who shall not be named.”

  He snorted. “I would guess so.”

  “Can we do anything about it?”

  “Two steps ahead of you.” He palmed the smooth console in front of them. “Request manual override.”

  “Name and identification?”

  “Drake, Castillian. 89661478612.”

  “Access granted.” The surface shimmered, and a shape extruded upward to form a hand grip.

  The taxi lurched to the right.

  Belynn grabbed the door handle to steady herself, and the whole world shifted again. Color bled away, and then surfaces, turning the whole world into a frightening clash of mesh and web.

  “Got it.” The vibration stopped.

  Belynn stared at Cast. He looked like a wire frame version of himself, pulsing and glowing as he steered the craft.

  She let go of the handle, and the world snapped back to normal. “What the hell?” Her double vision seemed to have returned.

  “I think I have control again. Hold on, just in case. We’re almost there.”

  The houses they’d seen from a distance were below them now.

  He landed the taxi on a round pad in the middle of the little neighborhood. It was a rough landing, throwing Belynn against her restraining belt, but then they were down.

  The windshield shimmered.

  “Come on. She’s here!” Belynn grabbed the door handle again, expecting the world to change, but nothing happened.

  She pushed it open and ran from the taxi, with Cast hot on her heels.

  Belynn looked back to see the taxi transform, sprouting hideous sucker-covered tentacles. The bright green faded, becoming yellowed and then pale with age.

  A face emerged, or a horrid parody of one, and then more writhing tentacles grew out of its sides. No longer sleek and beautiful, it lurched forward, its eyes locked on them.

  Belynn froze.

  Cast yelled in her ear, “Come on! We have to get away from her!” He pulled her arm, and she closed her eyes and turned away from the approaching terror. “Where is Jackson?”

  Cast dragged her along after him. “This way!”

  They ran off the landing pad and through a row of bushes, sending leaves flying behind them. He pulled her across a street and onto a wide path shaded by tall trees.

  Belynn glanced back again. Lilith lurched after them, shredding the poor hedge into pieces. “It’s not real. It’s not real. It’s not real.”

  Cast side-eyed Belynn as they ran, but said nothing.

  “It’s not real.” There was something there, teasing her brain. “It’s not real. She’s not real! Of course.” Stupid, stupid, stupid.

  Belynn had conjured up a sword in Cast’s apartment. Why hadn’t she seen it before?

  She stopped and turned to face Lilith, standing her ground.

  “What are you doing? She’ll kill you!” Cast was a few paces farther down the path, staring at her with his mouth wide open.

  “No. She won’t.” This wasn’t Forever. She didn’t have her normal abilities here. But it was a biomind, and she knew how to access it now.

  Belynn knelt, put her hand on the ground, reached, and the world changed.

  Once again the color drained out of the trees and sky and pathway around her as the world was stripped to its essence, becoming a shadow of itself.

  But now, as she concentrated on the bones of the world, she could see little bits of info zipping back and forth within the mind’s neural network. She could see the connections between things. Between her and Lilith.

  The shape that was Lilith’s form in this part of the world slowed.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Watch.” Belynn found the thread she wanted and pulled, hard.

  Lilith let out an agonizing scream. The wire thing in front of her writhed and unraveled.

  She let go of the ground and stood.

  Lilith was literally falling to pieces. It was as if she’d been doused with acid.

  Her dark eyes caught Belynn’s, and they were filled with an unrelenting hatred.

  Something surged back through their connection and knocked Belynn on her back, her head slamming into the hard pathway and knocking her out.

  She was suspended in the halfway space between waking and sleeping for a long time. She could vaguely hear voices around her, but nothing made sense.

  She was set down on something soft.

  Belynn blinked and moaned. She opened her eyes to find Cast staring down at her. “You okay?”

  “I think so.” She reached up to feel the back of her head. There was a big bump there. “Is she gone?”

  He nodded. “Melted into slush. Did you kill her?” He seemed nervous.

  She supposed she would be too, if she’d seen someone do what she had just done.

  It would be hard enough to discover that your whole world existed basically on a mote of dust. But to see how easily someone could just unravel you? “No. I just undid her presence here in Fargo. Still, I’d guess it hurt.”

  Someone else came into view. “Hey there… you feeling better? Your friend brought you here, babbling something about a huge spider?”

  He was tall, red-haired, clean-shaven. Younger than she’d imagined. “You’re Jackson.”

  He furrowed his brow. “Yes. I’m Jackson Hammond. Have we met?”

  “Not exactly.” She held out her hand. “I’m Belynn. Belynn Hammond-Clarke.”

  Chapter Twelve: Lilith

  ONE OF Aine’s canine defenders launched itself at Andy, gnashing its teeth with a guttural, feral growl.

  She scrambled out of the way, and it slammed into the stone wall behind her, hard. It fell to the ground, shaking its head and looking dazed.

  Hellhounds. They reminded her of hellhounds.

  Andy dropped to the ground and laid her palm out flat, reaching for Aine, praying she would respond. We’re here! Call off the hounds! She felt something—a deep stirring.

  “Andy!”

  She turned to see the other hound backing Shandra and Colin up against the cavern wall, its furry brown tail twitching back and forth in an agitated fashion. “Working on it!”

  As the first hound got up off the ground, shaking its head woozily, Andy felt the world mind’s presence at last. Andy?

  Aine, thank Saint Ana. We’re here. Call off your defenders!

  At once the animals backed off into a corner, growling but obeying their mistress. They sank down on their haunches in the back of the cavern, watching the visitors warily.

  Andy looked at them appreciatively. They were quite beautiful—predators personified.

  The room shimmered, and instead of a dark cavern in the ground, it became a woodland, golden light filtering down from the sky through the myriad branches of the tree that took up the center of the forest glade.

  The bark of one of the trees split, and Aine stepped out sheepishly. “I’m sorry I left you hung out to dry. I couldn’t let Lilith get to me. The implications—”

  “Would be catastrophic.” Andy shrugged. “We’re okay. Tell me more about this suicide mission you sent my children on. Kiryn told me a little, but….”

  “Sorry. It had to be done.”

  “You couldn’t just destroy the aberrant mind?”

  Aine stared at her. “You know I couldn’t. Except as a last resort. And you know why.”

  Andy sighed. “Ye
s. I do.” It was an old argument between them, as old as the intifadas. “We brought company.”

  Aine glanced over her shoulder and hissed.

  Andy turned to look at Shandra and Colin.

  Colin’s face had a glowing mask. Why hadn’t she seen that before?

  His eyes narrowed, and he put his arm around Shandra’s waist, pulling his knife out with the other and putting it up to her neck. He glanced nervously over at the hounds, which were back on their feet and growling menacingly. “Keep them back or Shandra dies.”

  Andy stared at Colin. It made perfect sense now.

  That nagging sensation that there was something not quite right about him. How he could have reached them so quickly if he’d left when the intifada had begun. This was all planned.

  “You’re one of them.” Andy stared at him in horror. “You’re one of the ints, aren’t you?”

  Colin frowned, and his mask did too. “What the hell is an int?”

  “From Lilith’s world.”

  He nodded, flashing her a proud grin. “I’m Ollie. One of Lilith’s boys. She’s been preparing for this moment for a long time.”

  Andy stuttered. “You… you were after this all along.” She signed to Shandra. Get ready.

  He nodded, suddenly looking not at all like her sweet, dear Colin, though his features were the same. “Best way to get you here, with me.”

  Andy wondered why she could see his mask here, when she’d never been able to before. Only Belynn had seen them.

  Maybe because she was halfway into vee.

  Behind Colin, from the darkness of the tunnel entrance, something small slithered out into the light.

  She had to keep him talking. “Are you from New York? Or Fargo?”

  “New York. You don’t know what it’s like there. Locked into the same life and death, over and over—”

  “That’s why you came here?”

  He nodded, looking from Shandra to Andy as if seeking reassurance that he’d made the right choice.

  Andy smiled, she hoped reassuringly. “It must be terrible to be trapped like that.”

  The hounds growled, pulling Colin’s attention away from her for an instant. Andy slid her hand down her side to the knife hilt in her belt.

  “It was.” He took a deep breath. “This world… it’s so new and beautiful and wonderful. I was lucky to be one of the chosen ones.”