Rejoice, a Knife to the Heart

by Steven Erikson

  “Fuck!” he said. “Fuck fuck fuck—you broke my hand!” He glared up at her, no doubt expecting to see her face splashed with blood, a welt fast rising.

  But she stood as before, motionless, outwardly unaffected although her heart hammered in her chest.

  “What the—?” He came back up, straight for her, his other hand reaching out to grip her round the throat.

  Instead, the fingers all snapped back and Annie heard popping sounds.

  “Goddammit!” Jeff staggered back a step, staring down at his left hand and its array of dislocated fingers.

  Annie turned to Sally. “Go to your room, sweetie.”

  The girl bolted.

  Jeff was now down on one knee, breath coming in harsh gasps, eyes wild in their red sockets.

  Annie collected up the frying pan again. She stepped forward and sent the bacon fat slinging toward her husband. The oil splashed up against something she couldn’t see, not a drop reaching Jeff. The horror on his face, mottled by the intervening slick of dripping fat, then shifted to confusion.

  “Fuck, woman, I’m going to kill you.”

  Suddenly exhausted, even as a strange elation burgeoned within her, Annie set the frying pan back down. The bacon fat was now pooling on the floor. Not a drop remained to slick the invisible barrier between her and her husband. She moved to collect a roll of paper towels. They went through a lot of those paper towels, and the roll was the only soft thing she knew to clutch for comfort after one of Jeff’s beatings. Now, she paused, staring down at the roll in her hands. Then she looked up and met her husband’s vicious gaze, and shook her head. “I don’t think so, Jeff. I think it’s over. At last, it’s over.” A wave of pity ran through her as she studied her husband. “You poor angry man,” she said, “what are you going to do now?”

  Gaza Strip, Israel, May 25th, 2:13 PM

  Private Ruth Moyen of the IDF stood at the checkpoint, the bulky M-16 cradled in her arms, belt heavy on her hips, and watched as rocks and bricks sailed toward her and then bounced off nothing, some thrown with enough force to create little puffs of dust in the air. Behind her, the APC’s crew had tumbled out and was arguing over the vehicle’s crumpled front end. The last order, to advance into the crowd beyond the checkpoint, seemed to have crumbled in the face of its apparent irrelevance.

  No one was getting anywhere. Not the screaming mob opposite, not the advance team on the ground. Overhead, drones circled, and somewhere to the north was the sound of jets, still high, still far away. She had a feeling they weren’t having much luck either.

  Earlier that day, six missiles had left the banked roadside a few hundred meters ahead, arcing up and racing toward Israeli settlements. All six had exploded in mid-air, at the high-point of their arc. Radar and drone triangulation had fixed their point of origin and a counterstrike had been immediately initiated, but that missile had suffered the same fate, detonating harmlessly high in the air.

  She listened to the excited, frightened chatter in her ear-bud as teams called in, argued and begged what to do now. She watched, unmoving, unafraid for perhaps the first time in her young life, as the Palestinians gave up throwing rocks and bricks, as they tried to advance en masse only to run face-first into one of those force-fields, the foremost line then pressing up against it as the crowd behind it tried surging forward. She watched as the effort finally broke up, as people limped away or wiped blood from broken noses and split lips.

  There had been shots fired sometime earlier, about a block away. A group of locals colliding with a scout team, sudden close-quarters, plenty of shouting, weapons sighted, the radio chatter terse and then fierce, and then frantic. Bullets flying, bullets hitting nothing.

  She turned slightly at the arrival of Captain David Benholm, his face sunburned as usual, the golden hairs of his sparse beard glinting in the sunlight. “Can’t even throw a punch,” he said, fingers combing through his beard. “Can’t force into a home, can’t make arrests, can’t evict.” He looked at her. “It’s stalled, Ruth. Everything … stalled.”

  “What now?” she asked him.

  His weapon was slung over a shoulder. He stood like a man who’d put away his vigilance. It made him seem so much younger than the warrior she was used to seeing, the one who gave orders, the one who never hesitated to pull the trigger. It made him beautiful. He pulled out a pack of Marlies, offered her one. “What now? I don’t know. No one does.”

  He paused for a moment, and then, “I guess … we talk.”

  From the mob across the street, a young boy waved and made smoking motions with one hand. Then, tentatively, he approached. They let him come, watched him pass through the place where the forcefield had been. It was all down to intent, and whatever eye was fixed upon this and every other scene, it never blinked.

  The kid was too young to smoke, but then they all were—that was a bitter joke among them all, on both sides. Too young to smoke, but not too young for killing and dying. David tossed the pack to the boy, who took one out and stepped closer.

  David’s lighter flicked to life between them.

  Cigarettes lit, the three of them stood at the checkpoint, smoking, witnesses to the end of an eternal war.

  North Sudan, May 25th, 2:17 PM

  Casper Brunt worked for a lot of people. This time, he worked for the Chinese. He stood to one side, sunglasses cutting the harsh glare, while the three buyers popped the crate’s lid and flung padding and bubble wrap aside to get at the guns. The plastic stuffing flew away, skidding across the dirt track to flatten out against the barbed wire fence beyond which stretched desert scrub.

  These days, the Chinese were making cheaper AK-47s than the Russians. The steel wasn’t as good but there was no point in mentioning that. There were plenty of international agreements and prohibitions against selling arms to known terrorists, warlords, and death-squads. But the truth was, everyone mostly looked the other way. War was good business, after all, and good business kept the world machine well-lubricated. The gears needed turning in that machine, and blood worked as well as oil.

  One of the men slid a full clip into his brand-new weapon. He gestured to his fellow Jihadists waiting by the Land Cruisers, and a few moments later two more appeared, dragging a man between them. His face was battered, one eye swollen shut. He moved his legs as if he was having trouble with his equilibrium.

  Casper Brunt looked away, stared off into the west. People liked killing each other. They liked the power of life and death, right there in their hands, and they never hesitated paying for the privilege.

  Once this deal was done, he was heading by bush-plane south and then west, to another hotspot with its resident insurgents who used whatever ideology they needed to justify a way of life they had come to love. A way of life that was nothing more than bullying, and hallelujah, bullies loved to bully.

  Casper had been at this for a long time. He had plenty of competition, but no one took it hard if a rival got in first. There was a never-ending demand, a never-ending supply. Capitalism in its purest, rawest form.

  Shots ripped the air behind him, and then angry shouting. Casper turned round.

  The kneeling victim was still kneeling, his one working eye blinking rapidly in the glare.

  The leader of the Jihadists stalked toward Casper. “Joke? Blanks?”

  “Blanks? What? No, of course not.”

  The Jihadist lifted the gun and fired point-black into Casper’s chest.

  He stumbled backward, his mirror sunglasses dislodged by his flinch. But there was no pain. Looking down, he saw his silk shirt unmarred. No holes, no bloom of blood. Ears ringing, he took off his sunglasses and looked across to the man who had just tried to kill him.

  “What the hell?”

  Abruptly, the Jihadist drew out a pistol and fired again at Casper.

  He saw the muzzle flash, saw the weapon recoil.

  The Jihadist stared in disbelief at his weapon, and then threw it at Casper. It struck something invisible between them and fel
l to the dusty ground with a heavy thud.

  Behind him the prisoner had pushed to his feet. Two men closed to restrain him, and were rebuffed before they could lay hands on him.

  Casper watched as the battered victim staggered back a few steps, and then wheeled and began a shuffling run up the track.

  A dozen weapons let loose behind him, to no effect. Another jihadist ran in from one side, a knife in his hand. He too was flung away, the blade never touching the prisoner, who simply continued his wavering, drunken run.

  “Oh,” muttered Casper. “It’s those forcefields, isn’t it?” It had to be. He’d studied those damned things online, seeing all the sudden barriers to his trade, wondering which eco-terrorist group was responsible. Which government. Wondering who he’d need to contact to find the inevitable work-around. He’d seen the vids showing people shooting into the damned things.

  But this new forcefield wasn’t some kind of green nut-job’s wet-dream, protecting threatened areas, national preserves and parks and whatnot.

  Sweat now soaking his shirt, beading on his face and unaccountably chilling him despite the sun’s intense glare, Casper put his sunglasses back on and looked skyward, seeking signs of a drone. The intervention here was too personal, too specific. Someone was watching, fiddling with dials.

  But he saw nothing up there, and the more he thought about it, the more he realized how ridiculous it was to think that someone had tracked him all the way out here. Nobody cared, nobody ever cared.

  His buyer was shouting at his men now. The crates of weapons were left lying on the ground as the troop started climbing back into their trucks. From the small huddle of buildings that marked this mostly abandoned hamlet on the east side of the road, an old woman had appeared, all wrapped up, face hidden. As the trucks roared to life and backed into three-point turns, the woman lifted a hand and pointed a thick finger at the Jihadists. Whatever she then shouted to them was lost amidst skidding tires and spitting gravel, as the trucks pulled out onto the road and roared off into the north.

  Casper glanced back at Jamel, his driver, and saw the man leaning casually on the shaded side of the Land Rover. He headed over. “Let’s go,” he said.

  Straightening, Jamel nodded toward the crates.

  “Leave them,” Casper said, walking round to the passenger side. “They’re useless now.”

  Moments later they sat side by side in the Land Rover.

  “Where to?” Jamel asked.

  “Airstrip,” Casper replied.

  “What’s happened?”

  “Eye in the sky, Jamel.”

  “Whose eye?”

  Casper shrugged. “God’s. The Archangel Michael’s. The fucking Martians’—does it matter? I need to find a new line of work.”

  Jamel started the engine, slid on his own sunglasses. “Good.”

  “Not good.”

  “Yes, good,” said Jamel, who then looked across at Casper. “You a professional piece of shit. Too bad they didn’t kill you, those bullets.” He put the truck in gear and they lurched forward. “Go back to Australia. Don’t come back.”

  “Lacking fear, he said what was in his mind,” said Casper, leaning back in the seat. “It’s a brave new world, Jamel.”

  “Professional piece of shit,” said Jamel again, nodding.

  “I see an end to respect,” Casper said, sighing. “The question is, what will take its place?” He glanced at his driver. “Like you. All that hate. All that anger. What’re you going to do with it, Jamel?”

  The road was bumpy. Jamel was driving too fast, but there was no other traffic in sight.

  “Me?” Jamel asked. He shrugged.

  “You could have made me walk,” Casper said. “I couldn’t have stopped you.”

  “That’s true.”

  “But you didn’t. I sold nothing. No cash. Nothing in my pockets. I guess you realized that. Realized that I could only pay you the second half of your fee once we got back to base.”

  “I know how it works,” Jamel agreed.

  “You were happy enough to take this piece of shit’s money. Still are, it seems.”

  “This last time, yes. Then you go and you don’t come back.”

  “Then what, for you?”

  Jamel suddenly smiled. “Then, asshole, I party.”

  Los Angeles, May 25th, 11:02 AM

  It wasn’t easy living a life where nothing went right. The first rule about being pissed off was to stay pissed off. At everything. At the old man who took off when Anthony was seven, who came back when he was seventeen only to take off again a year later and where the fuck was he now? Nowhere. Shacked up with some woman and starting up yet another trail of kids who’d grow up without a dad, because the bastard had leaving in his eyes and that was a look that never went away and the women who fell for him were just dumb-fucks.

  School had been another mess. Enough said about that. It didn’t matter. All he needed to learn was on the streets anyway.

  It wasn’t his plan and he wasn’t the leader, but he knew his job and it was a simple one. First in through the doors, the big old .357 out from under his heavy coat and pointing straight at Stubbs, the bank’s lone guard. Jim Sticks in right behind him, heading for the tellers and yelling at everybody to get down on the floor. Paulo next, right over to Stubbs to take the guy’s gun away.

  They were wearing masks, bulky coats. Their car was around the corner, the closest place they could find a parking spot.

  Everything went wrong from the start. Anthony rushed in, couldn’t find Stubbs anywhere, so he pointed the gun at everyone, and then, even as Sticks then came in screaming—and none of his words could be understood because the mask didn’t have a mouth-hole, only nostril holes—out came old Stubbs from the staff bath-room, pulling at his gun—

  Paulo’s 9 mil barked right behind Anthony, deafening him. And Stubbs skidded to a halt, looked down and then back up again. Then he had his gun out and suddenly everyone was shooting. The recoil of the .357 made Anthony fumble his grip after his first shot. He’d been less than ten feet away from Stubbs but somehow he’d missed the man. Sticks was firing at everyone, hitting no one. The front window shattered.

  Through the ringing in his ears, Anthony heard sirens. “Fuck it!” he shouted. “Let’s go! It’s fucked up! Let’s go!”

  They retreated to the doors.

  Stubbs stood watching. He’d emptied his clip and missed with every shot, which wasn’t like Stubbs—the guy was a fuckin’ Vietnam vet. “Aw shit,” he said even as Anthony reached the doors, with Sticks and Paulo crowding right behind him. “You guys? You idiots—Sticks, Paulo, Anthony—you all live a block away!”

  “Shut the fuck up!” Sticks shrieked, pushing at Anthony.

  Moments later they were outside in the bright California sunshine. And cop cars had already blocked both escape routes. Heavy weapons were out, trained on the three boys.

  Suddenly, Paulo yelped a laugh. “Watch me!” he yelled, rushing forward, gun blazing. The roar of fire that answered him came in a wave. And still Paulo ran, laughing as he did so. He darted between two patrol cars. Cops closed on him. Hands reached out, and just like that, Paulo was caught.

  Anthony had seen enough. He dropped the .357 and then held his hands up. Swearing, Sticks spun and ran back into the bank.

  Anthony heard him arguing with Stubbs, and then there was a scuffle and Sticks yelped. The doors opened again and out came Stubbs with Sticks in an arm-lock.

  It wasn’t easy living a life where nothing went right, but Anthony was used to it by now. It made it easy to stay pissed off. As cops closed in on him and forced him to the hot pavement, he railed in his mind at everything and everyone. And then, feeling the gritty heat of the pavement on his left cheek as the cuffs were put on, something broke inside. He suddenly relaxed.

  He could see to the corner, and watched, without any feeling at all, a tow-truck turn onto the street just beyond the barricade, dragging his car behind it.

  A moment la
ter, he began laughing.

  CHAPTER SIX

  “To see the universe and all reality from a solely intellectual, materialistic perspective, is akin to blinding yourself in one eye. You can still see the surface, but you’ve lost all sense of depth.”

  SAMANTHA AUGUST

  Victoria, British Columbia, May 24th, 11:36 AM

  “Ronnie! It’s your phone!”

  Ronald Carpenter continued staring at the newsfeed. He’d been watching one impossible thing after another. The newscasters were frantic, stumbling over everything they tried to say, which wasn’t too surprising, as what they had to say made no sense.

  Though, in a way, it did.

  “Ronnie!”

  “Right,” he said, straightening from his forward perch in his recliner. He walked over to where he’d left his cell on the dining room table, took a glance into the kitchen where Emily was doing dishes.

  The ringtone wasn’t immediately familiar though he’d heard it before, but even as he collected up the phone and looked at the caller ID on the screen, he recalled who’d insisted on that ringtone. In disbelief and growing joy, he answered the call. “Sam? Is that—”

  “No, sorry,” came a man’s voice. “It’s me, Hamish … Sam’s husband.”

  “Oh, yes, of course. I just saw the ID and—”

  “One of my wife’s other cells,” Hamish explained. “Listen, I don’t—rather, is there any chance you could come by? Do you remember where we live?”

  “Of course.” Ronald glanced back the television. “But things are kind of crazy right now.”

  “I know.”

  “Is this about Sam?” Ronald asked. “Some word—”

  “Well … yes. And no. But I need to talk, and I maybe need some answers.”