Paragaea

by Chris Roberson

  The jaguar man tossed the helmet to the ground by the fire, and proffered the orange nylon oversuit to Leena.

  “It is warm,” the large figure said in his baritone grumble, his English laced with an indefinable accent. “Wear this instead; it will be cooler.”

  Warily, Leena reached out and accepted the oversuit.

  “Spasibo,” she said, thanking him. The jaguar man nodded, solemnly, and then padded back to the far side of the fire.

  All modesty forgotten, she stripped out of the pressure liner, naked for the briefest moment, shivering even in the humid air, and then put back on the orange nylon oversuit and the heavy leather boots. When she had done, she sat back cross-legged on the ground, and opened up the case of her survival kit.

  As she inventoried the contents, working out what was useful, what was damaged and what wasn't, the English-speaking man on the far side of the fire kept watching her, that strange half-smile peaking the corner of his mouth. He wore a loose-fitting white shirt, a pair of dark trousers, and high boots that came almost to his knees. Across his lap lay his scabbarded sword, while at his side rested a satchel.

  And still he didn't speak.

  Finally, Leena could stand it no longer.

  “Kto…?” she began, then stopped herself, dredging up the necessary vocabulary. “Who are, and…how you here come?”

  “I already told you,” the man said with a smile, his teeth flashing white in the firelight. “My name is Hieronymus Bonaventure.”

  “Hyr-ronn-eye-mush,” Leena repeated, taking each syllable in turn, with some difficulty.

  “Call him Hero,” growled the jaguar man. “Trust me, it's just easier.”

  “Hero,” Leena said, trying out the sound. Much better. “But why? Come you here how, to what place is this?”

  The man called Hieronymus tilted his head to one side, trying to work out the meat of her question. Then he nodded, and crossed his arms over his chest, his eyes on the middle distance.

  “I was an officer in His Britannic Majesty's Navy during the recent troubles, the war against the French and later against their Emperor Napoleon, and through misadventure I was thrown overboard in a squall on the South Pacific Seas. I thought myself dead for certain, my sins caught up with me at last, but in the midst of a surging wave I found myself falling through a mirrored hole. It was a hole in the midst of the air itself, and through it I fell into other waters. I found myself in the Inner Sea of Paragaea, and was taken onboard one of the cities of Drift.” He paused, and smiled wistfully. “I was lucky to be taken in as a member of their community, as among the people of Drift, everything found floating on the waves is either Food, Fuel, Furniture, or Family. Nothing escapes categorization into one of those four classes.”

  Leena looked at him, her eyes narrowed. She'd been able to absorb only parts of the man's narrative, but those small parts had made little sense.

  “Chto? The year, it is 1964,” Leena said sharply. “You are madman, think you battle Napoleon, buried last century?”

  The man shook his head.

  “No, I am not mad, or if I am, it is on other grounds entirely. Time moves differently between the two worlds, Earth and Paragaea, and not all doors open onto the same era.”

  Leena kept her gaze steady, considering what he'd said.

  “And he?” she said, pointing to the jaguar man. “How is such thing possible? Such man?”

  “What? Balam?” the man answered. “He's a native to this land, one of the nation of the Sinaa, the jaguar people of the Western Jungle. Once coregent of the nation, he was cruelly…” The man stopped, and looked to his companion apologetically. “I'm sorry, Balam, perhaps you'd prefer to tell your own tale?”

  The jaguar man shrugged.

  “No, you go ahead,” he said, through a saber-toothed smile. “I'm not the one in love with the sound of my own voice.”

  The man seemed not to notice the jibe, but continued on, unabated.

  “Balam, as I said, was once one of the rulers of the jaguar nation of the Western Jungle. His sisters, his former coregents over the nation of the Sinaa, ousted Balam and replaced him with his cousin, Gerjis, who had poisoned their minds against their brother with his twisted religiosity. The coregents of the Sinaa now argue for an alliance of some kind with the wizard-kings of the Black Sun Empire. Balam's cousin is a follower of Per, the leader of the Black Sun Genesis, a religion among the metamen that preaches that the wizard-kings in their Diamond Citadel of Atla, with their science and ancient machines, are not just mortal men, but are in fact the creators and gods of metamankind.”

  Leena's English was growing stronger with each passing moment, like a long-dormant muscle coming back into use, but she still understood little of what the man said, and what little she comprehended she refused to believe.

  “You say…I think you say, this some Sargasso Sea,” she said, hotly, “into which fall men and ships, to return never. Some Fairyland, with animal men and wizards and kings? Bessmyslica!” She spat in the dust at her feet. “Nonsense!”

  “Fair enough,” the man said with an infuriating smile. “I leave it to you, then, to explain him.”

  The man pointed at his animalistic companion, whose feline face split in an alarmingly toothy grin.

  The next morning, they dined on a meager meal of wild berries and some sort of rodent roasted on a spit over the embers of the campfire. When she had finished, Leena tied her pressure liner into a makeshift pack, and loaded it with the remains of her survival kit. All except the Makarov, which still glinted in the belt of the man sitting a few meters off.

  “Hero,” Leena called out, grateful for the diminutive. “Pistolet moj?”

  The man glanced over, confused.

  “Come again?” he said.

  “Pistol mine,” Leena translated, and pointed at the man's waist. “My pistol.” She pointed again, and then at herself. “I want.”

  “Oh,” the man said, glancing down at the Makarov as though he'd forgotten it was there. “Well, if you promise not to go pointing it in friendly faces anymore, I don't suppose it would hurt.”

  The man tugged the gun from his belt, and glanced at the jaguar man, who looked on warily with amber eyes. With a shrug, the man tossed the pistol to Leena, sending it arcing end over end through the air, glinting silvery in the morning light.

  Leena caught it neatly by the handgrip, and checked the chamber and the action carefully before tucking it into a zipper pocket on her right thigh.

  The man and his jaguar companion left off eating, and began to gather their things. In bare moments, they had fully packed, and began to head away from the clearing.

  “Where you go?” Leena said, snatching up her makeshift pack and jumping to her feet.

  “We are heading to relative safety in the north, away from the country of the Sinaa,” the man answered, pausing and glancing over his shoulder. “We have business in the city of Laxaria, and had we not encountered you and your furry fellows along the way, we'd be some hours nearer our destination.” He paused, and then added, “You are welcome to accompany us. However, remember that you are not our prisoner, nor are we yours, and if you want to strike out on your own, we won't stop you.”

  Leena was silent for a moment, considering her options. Her first duty was to return home, to report to her superiors her discovery of this strange otherworld. The successful launch of the Vostok 7 would pale in comparison to newfound worlds for the Soviet to explore and improve. There was no question now she'd be invited into the Party and given a rank, though now she had visions of a major's insignia on her lapels, not merely those of a lowly lieutenant.

  “Who knows way?” she asked at length. “Between worlds? Who knows way to travel between?”

  The man and his jaguar companion glanced at each other, and turned to smile at her patiently.

  “That is a large question,” the jaguar man said, his black lips curled back in a full grin.

  “Most in Paragaea don't even accept the exis
tence of Earth,” Hieronymus explained apologetically. “How many in your country still believe in Fairyland as adults? It is no different here.”

  Leena shook her head, determined.

  “Net,” she said fiercely. “No. Someone in authority, I think, there must be. Someone knows this thing.” Leena was a firm believer in the power of authority, and in the wisdom of those in high places. A lifetime serving the greater good of the Soviet could lead her to no other opinion. “There must be place of study,” she went on, “a university, a school, where men and women of learning, they gather together?”

  The man and his jaguar companion looked to each other, and consulted in a strange tongue, sounding a little like that of her jaguar men captors. They spoke for a few moments, smiling and nodding, occasionally casting quick glances Leena's way. Finally, the man turned, and addressed her, his tone apologetic.

  “Well, my colleague and I agree that the nearest place that meets that description would be the Scholarium in Laxaria, which city is luckily our destination. But I warn you now: you won't like the answers they'll give you.”

  Leena shouldered her makeshift pack, and headed towards the track leading to the north, the way the two had started.

  “For me to decide, I think, that is,” Leena said, passing them and heading back into the jungle.

  The trio passed the rest of the day moving through the jungle, heading ever northwards, making tracks as best they could in that trackless wilderness. Hieronymus and Balam kept silent, the one taking the lead and the other bringing up the rear, ever vigilant, watching all sides, above and below, for any sign of danger. Whether they feared that the jaguar men would trace their steps and attempt some reprisal, or worried that some other jungle denizen lurked in the shadows, waiting to pounce, Leena could not tell.

  As they walked, Leena busied herself in the attempt to reacquaint herself with English. She'd scarcely used the language at all since she was transferred from the East Berlin listening post to the flight training program of the Air Defense Forces. And even then she'd been primarily a passive receptor, listening to the language for endless hours, clammy headphones to her ears, pencil and paper in hand, but she'd rarely had occasion to speak the language. Not since the linguistic courses she'd taken at the Red Army facility outside of Moscow had she been forced to generate words and phrases in the convoluted English tongue. Now, seeing the vital urgency of complex communication with this Hieronymus and his jaguar man companion, she dredged up her every memory of the language as best she could. She recited old poems to herself, dimly recalled from copy-book pages. She conjugated verbs: He kills, he killed, he will kill. She strained her memory to recall the nouns and names for every creature and object that came into view. “Tree.” “Man.” “Stream.” “Monster.” “Mystery.”

  And still on they walked.

  As the sun set, they stopped for the night. Hieronymus set about starting a fire, gathering branches and dried bracken to use as tinder, setting them ablaze with a flint-and-steel from his pack. Balam slipped into the darkening woods for a few short minutes, soundlessly, and then returned with a bloodied coney in either hand. The rabbits were feral, and somewhat lean, but when Hieronymus objected that they'd present a poor repast, Balam insisted that with proper seasoning they'd be more than filling. Hieronymus, as though it had been his intention all along, dusted off his hands and stepped away from the cook-fire, wagering Balam that he couldn't make the coneys palatable. The jaguar man, it seemed, could not resist a challenge, and so fell to preparing their rustic evening meal with abandon.

  Hieronymus came to sit beside Leena, where she warmed her hands in the heat of the flickering fire. He kept a respectful distance between them, but when Leena glanced over favored her with a companionable smile.

  “You look confused,” Hieronymus said pleasantly. “It's hardly surprising. I could scarcely credit the evidence of my senses when first I arrived on Paragaea.”

  Leena scowled, tilted her head to one side thoughtfully, and then nodded in reply, almost as an afterthought.

  “This world,” she said, carefully arranging her words and meanings. “What you called it?”

  “Paragaea.”

  “Pair-ah-gee-uh.” Leena repeated each syllable slowly, shaping the word in her thoughts. “Paragaea.”

  “That's it.” Hieronymus nodded, like a headmaster pleased with the progress of a student.

  “What is this Paragaea? How it comes to be?”

  Hieronymus took a deep breath through his nose, and then sighed contemplatively. “Would that I could tell you, little sister,” he said. “All I know is that, in some regards, it seems that Paragaea is a more ancient twin to the Earth you and I once called home. Where civilization's recorded history on our world dates back only a few thousand years at best, going no further than the earliest days of the pyramid builders and the flowering of the Euphrates, Paragaean history goes back many hundreds of times further. There are beings in these lands”—he indicated the jaguar man with a jerk of his head—“who can measure their family's lineage back many thousands of years, and whose cultural records and writings go back countless millennia further.”

  Hieronymus glanced from Leena to Balam, and then to the stars just beginning to wink in the darkening skies overhead. When he spoke again, it was as though a hint of fear and wonder had crept into his voice. “And there are still older races, who linger at the edges of the known world, stranger and more ancient still.”

  Leena mulled over what he had said.

  “But twin?” she asked, and then paused, restructuring the sentence in her thought. “Why you say twin?”

  Hieronymus reached into his shirt, and pulled out a necklace of solid metal links, from which depended a small round pendant. The pendant was spherical, a little over two centimeters in diameter, and covered in dyed-blue sharkskin. Around the circumference of the sphere ran a line of brass, like an equator, with a sickle-shaped latch on one side and brass hinges on the antipodes.

  “Observe,” he said. With a practiced maneuver, he unlatched and opened the sphere, revealing within an ivory ball, covered in engraved and stained representations of familiar continents. Tipping the open hemisphere carefully to one side, he caught the ivory globe in his outstretched hand, and proffered it for Leena's inspection. “Recognize this?”

  Leena took the tiny globe, and turned it over in her hands. The craftsmanship was evident, the lines and curves of the continents remarkably accurate, given the small size. Its only principal errors were the lack of some detail in the western shore of South America, and the complete absence of the Antarctican continent. Leena glanced from the miniature globe to Hieronymus. If he was truly from the early nineteenth century, as he claimed, his conception of the world's geography would not include Antarctica, not discovered until long decades later. His madness, if madness it was, could be said to be self-consistent, at the very least.

  “Earth,” Leena said. “It is Earth.”

  Hieronymus nodded, a wistful expression passing fleetingly across his features. “It was a gift from my mother. A long…very long time ago. My grandfather had been a cartographer, employed by Dutch traders to chart the passages to Japan, and my mother grew up in his household as something of an amateur cartographer herself. Before she died, while I was still a student at Oxford, she commissioned the London firm of James Newton to produce this diminutive globe, that I might be able to carry it with me always.” Hieronymus's voice trailed off as he stared into the middle distance.

  Leena smiled uneasily, not sure how to respond.

  “In any event,” he went on, reaching into his pack and pulling out a metal tube capped with some sort of rubberized plug on either end, “finding myself here, in this strange land, I eventually felt called to pursue this ancestral avocation of mine, and set about measuring the limits of my newfound world.”

  Unstopping one end of the tube, he slid out a curled sheaf of papers, and laid them before Leena, careful to position them out of the range of
sparks popping from the cook-fire.

  “This,” he said, not without a hint of pride at his workmanship, “is Paragaea.”

  Leena looked over the map in the flickering firelight. It was an unusual projection, all of the landmass of the planet enclosed inside one ellipse, the lines of longitude curved rather than straight. An equal-area projection, of the Mollweide or Sinusoidal varieties, instead of the more typical Mercator projection.

  “Chert voz’mi,” Leena muttered under her breath. Damn it.

  She shook her head. Back at TsPK in Star City, when they'd studied maps and cartography as part of the regular cosmonaut training regime, Leena had often found herself more involved in the mathematics that created the map than with the territory it described. Now, here she was looking at a map of an alien world, and her thoughts raced over which projection the strange man at her side had used in calculating its dimensions.

  “Note the shape of the continent,” Hieronymus said, pointing at the large landmass dominating the map's center.

  There was but a single continent on the Paragaean map, ringed on the north, east, and west by tiny islands and archipelagos. In the middle of the continent was a body of water labeled “Inner Sea,” and bordering the landmass on all four sides a vast body labeled “Outer Ocean.”

  “At first blush,” Hieronymus went on, “this world bears no especial resemblance to the Earth you and I know.” He reached over, plucked the globe from Leena's hands, and held it just above the map's surface. “But regard how the western coast of the continent resembles in gross detail the western extremity of the North American continent on Earth. And how the jutting peninsula of Parousia shares a remarkable similarity to the shape of India on terrestrial seas. A few short years before I myself was translated here to Paragaea, I chanced to reach a monograph by a German naturalist named Alexander von Humboldt, who noted a congruence between the bulging shape of South America's eastern shore and the bight of Africa, and conjectured that the lands had once been joined. But now, if the continents of the Earth are mobile upon the planet's surface, and can move about like ice floes in a melting lake, then so too might they continue to migrate, moving out of their familiar arrangements into ever stranger configurations. And if they did, mightn't the resulting globe resemble in large part the shape of this Paragaean continent?”