Glassing the Orgachine

by David Marusek

  “Amen,” he concurred.

  She frowned but said nothing.

  “You know,” Jace confided, “I’m surprised you even wanted to see me again after . . . you know.”

  “After you helped my little brother jump into a volcano?”

  “Yeah, that.”

  “You’re right. I hate you for that, and I never wanted to see you again.”

  “Then why are we talking?”

  “Things have changed.”

  “What things?”

  She began to say everything but changed her mind. Then, “I don’t blame you for that anymore. It was Father God’s will, and Uzzie was doing His holy work. You had a role to play too; you were the driver, and driving is a very important job because otherwise Uzzie would have missed his helicopter ride, and you did your part just fine.”

  “Um, thanks, I guess.”

  “Being the driver is no small thing,” she went on. “I mean, if the three wise men had a decent driver, they wouldn’t have needed the star of Bethlehem.” She liked her smart analogy until she remembered who she was talking to.

  “I guess not,” Jace said, unsure what else to say. “But I still feel terrible about the whole thing, and I’m very sorry about your loss, and about your whole family’s loss. Is that why you left home? Did they make you leave?”

  Jace was never one for small talk, it would appear.

  “No, I left on my own.”

  “Why?”

  “I’m on a mission.”

  “You mean like on a missionary mission?”

  “Yes.”

  “Where are you going? Costa Rica? Africa?”

  “I don’t know yet. I’m waiting to find out.”

  “Like when your church decides?”

  It was hard to talk to him without knowing if he allowed Jesus into his heart at all, even a tiny bit. The blindfold she saw in Heaven probably meant that even if some little ember burned in his soul, he wouldn’t be aware of it. Maybe she had been a little too judgmental about his wanting to say grace; maybe his “amen” was genuine and not meant to mock her as she had instantly felt.

  “Jesus gave me a mission, and I’m waiting for further instructions.”

  “I see. Jesus, the big guy himself. Did Jesus actually talk to you in person?”

  “Yes, He actually did.”

  Jace considered this, nodding his head. “Was Jesus the one who told you to ask me about the planets?”

  “No, that was His Archangel Gabriel.”

  “Okay, Archangel Gabriel. So you talk to all of them.”

  Now he was mocking her.

  “Sorry,” he said, reading the sudden fury in her expression. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like you’re hearing voices or something.”

  “What if I do hear voices? Sometimes people are given the gift of hearing voices; it doesn’t mean they’re crazy, does it?”

  The conversation paused as they listened to an airplane taking off like an angry hornet down at the airstrip. Sometimes you don’t hear them arrive, but you always hear them leave.

  “Sorry to sound so confrontational, Deuteronomy. There’s some serious, uh, stuff going on in the world right now that I thought we should talk about, especially since we played a part in it. That’s why I asked about Uzzie.”

  “I get it,” Deut said. “It’s hard to talk to you when I know you think I’m an idiot for my beliefs.”

  “But I don’t!” he said with less than full candor.

  “Tell me this, ranger, how do you explain how my brother got so strong at the volcano? I mean, he was just a little kid but he tossed those boulders around like throw pillows. And how could he breathe poisonous air that made us pass out? How do you explain that away?”

  “Uh,” Jace said, not so bold as he seemed a moment ago. “Uh, your brother was . . . different . . . even before the volcano.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “The day before we went to the volcano, I, uh, met Uzzie on your airstrip. He said you told him to —”

  “Wait a minute. You were there before?”

  “Yeah, the day before.”

  “So do you make it a habit to trespass on our property, ranger?”

  Jace sighed and looked away. “Like I tried telling you on the airstrip. I thought you friended me under a pseudonym.” She drew a complete blank, so he rephrased, “Asked to be my friend on Facebook. It’s a social site where people hang out online.” Still blank. “Anyway, someone named Crissy Lou contacted me and asked me to meet her on the airstrip. I thought it was you asking me.”

  “And like I told you, Crissy Lou is a dog!”

  “I know that — now. But back then I thought it was you.”

  She just stared at him.

  “And anyway, give dogs credit for being intelligent creatures” he said. “They’re observant, sensitive, loyal, trusting, and expressive. They know more about us than we can imagine. Just because they can’t talk to us in our own language doesn’t mean they don’t think or can’t communicate their thoughts. I don’t know Crissy Lou that well. I only met her that one time near your rabbit hutch.” He paused; it was the first time they had ever spoken to each other.

  “So anyway,” he went on, “the day before our volcano trip, ‘Crissy Lou’ messaged me to meet her on your airstrip. I thought it was you asking but instead your brother Uzzie showed up. Middle of the night, no hat or gloves. I tried loaning him mine, but he wouldn’t wear them. He told me you wanted him to show me the angel. He led me up the side of your mountain to an old air shaft. He was the one who broke trail up the mountainside. I could hardly keep up with him in the deep snow. You know, like on the volcano. He was already super strong. I didn’t understand it, but I followed him to a ledge where a mine shaft was. I tried to stop him, but he climbed down the shaft like a little monkey, and I had to scramble to stay with him. But then I got blocked partway down. So he said he’d bring the angel to me, and I waited in the shaft. I didn’t know you guys had moved into the mine, but I could smell woodsmoke and cooking. And in a little while something climbed up to where I was, and I shined a light and saw . . . well, what I saw sure didn’t look like an angel.”

  “What did it look like?”

  “A non-terrestrial.” She seemed confused, so he added, “An alien from outer space.”

  All at once her face lit up, and she said, “You mean like the blue man in the movies?” She remembered the little blue Avatar action figure toy that had set her poppy off in a rant that time in Wallis.

  It took a moment for the reference to click. “Yes,” Jace said, “like Avatar, but it wasn’t blue. It was more like a muddy greenish brown. With a big, uh, pickle head and squat little body. Anyway, it begged me to help it ‘phone home.’ That’s a catch phrase from another movie. It means contacting its mothership to come pick it up.”

  They heard a snowmobile approaching up Main Street, and they both looked out the window to see if her brothers had returned. But it was the Bunyan boy, Chas, heading toward the river.

  Deut dropped her gaze to the tabletop. She sighed and shook her head. Then she sat up straight and said, “I am utterly astonished by the hypocrisy of some people, Mr. Ranger. They accuse us Christians of being simpletons because we believe in miracles, and then what do they do? They go off and preach about alien spacemen.

  “Here’s a news flash, Mr. Ranger, there’s no such thing as aliens! They don’t exist. They can’t exist because Jesus is the second Adam, not the second blue man. Aliens are not real!” It was the same argument, Romans 8:22, that her poppy had used with Ginger’s father.

  “And if that’s not bad enough, some of these unbelievers are perfectly comfortable believing that cats can beget bunnies and dogs can talk. No, it gets better; dogs can type on computers. I gotta say, ranger, I’m beginning to wonder about you.”

  Now Jace hung his head, but he wasn’t ready to fold. “All right, fair enough. But then how do
you explain it? Who was I talking to in the ventilation shaft if it wasn’t an angel and couldn’t be a space alien because space aliens don’t exist? I know for a fact it wasn’t human. What was it?”

  “I don’t know for sure what you were talking to, but we did have a false angel in the keep for a time, but we cast it out and got rid of it. He was a hideous, hideous devil called Beezus, but Poppy sanctified the keep to lock him out. We anointed every doorway and gate, but I guess we must’ve missed the ventilation shaft openings, if that’s where you saw him.” She made a mental note to warn her family as soon as she could about the breech in their defenses.

  “So there was an angel,” Jace said.

  “A false angel. A brother of Lucifer.”

  “Even worse, a full-fledged devil. So you’re saying a devil summoned me.”

  “Must be.”

  Even then, some guardian wingman urged Jace to shut his mouth, but instead he said, “I want to get this straight, so please excuse me if this sounds mean. Okay, a hideous, hideous devil named Beezus — Beezus, right? — is hanging out in a ventilation shaft and wants to talk to me, so he sends your brother Uzzie to escort me. Then, later, Beezus wants to deliver a tiny sphere, like a BB, to a helicopter. Did Uzzie show it to you? He showed it to me. So Beezus gives the BB to Uzzie and asks me to drive Uzzie to the glacier. That’s what you’re saying?”

  Deut didn’t respond one way or another.

  “Doesn’t that mean Uzzie was in cahoots with Beezus?”

  Was he ever going to let it go?

  “And so to answer your own question about how he got so strong, apparently he got his strength and the power to breathe poisonous gasses from the devil.”

  Deut stood up from the table. “That’s a lie!”

  “Prove me wrong.”

  “My brother is a saint! He sacrificed himself doing Father God’s work.” She was fierce and unwavering.

  “And how do you know that?”

  “Because the Holy Spirit gave me the gift of knowledge. I had a vision of the Throne Room of Heaven, and Uzzie was there. Uzzie’s in Heaven right now! He’s a brand new saint with baby wings. Jesus cherishes him, and he’s so, so happy!”

  “Wait a minute. Wait a minute. You saw Heaven? In a vision? And Uzzie was there, all safe and sound?”

  Hands on hips, she challenged him to contradict her. “Isn’t that what I just told you?”

  “It is, and that doesn’t strike you as a little too convenient?”

  “I don’t know what you mean by that. You can’t fake Heaven, and I saw Heaven, whether you choose to believe me or not! And Gabriel is a real angel, not an imposter like Beezus, not a blue man, not a dog.”

  “And he’s the one who told you to ask me about how many planets there are?”

  “Yes, he is. So tell me, Mr. Ranger, was he right? Is there a new planet out there?”

  “I don’t know yet. It’s something big, whatever it is.”

  “Your spaceman doesn’t know? Well, my angel does. We’re not as clueless as you think we are.”

  The front door opened. Barbara Jean was back. She saw Deut standing with her arms crossed and cheeks burning. “Hello again,” she said. “I hope you two had a good brunch.”

  They both looked at her in surprise.

  “Yes, thank you,” Jace said. “Excellent rolls, by the way.”

  “Thank you. I’m glad you enjoyed them, but the compliment goes to Deut. She’s the one who made them.

  “Oh, and by the way, Deut, your people have a long-haired German Shepherd, don’t you? Female, friendly, bushy tail?”

  “Yes, that sounds like Crissy Lou. Why?”

  “Because there’s a stray that’s showed up in town begging for scraps at people’s doors. Charlie Moses took her in. I thought that maybe Crissy Lou followed you to town?”

  Deut looked at Jace and laughed out loud. She sat back down at the table laughing.

  Barbara Jean looked at her and then at Jace. “Did I say something funny?”

  “No,” Deut said, “except maybe Crissy Lou didn’t follow me; maybe she came into town to see her old computer buddy here. They go way back.”

  BD5 1.0

  WALKING HOME, JACE said, “Read me the news headlines.”

  Browsing news sites: Obama Reveals Sweeping Gun Control Plans, and NRA Vows “Fight of the Century;” Army Judge Rules in Alleged Whistleblower Bradley Manning Case; French Troops Launch Ground Operations in Mali; Climate Scientists Urge Obama to Reject Keystone XL Pipeline; Boeing 787s Grounded over Safety Concerns.

  “Any stories about strange space anomalies?”

  No.

  Jace reached his house at the end of the block. “Okay, call Missing One for me.”

  Don’t you mean Found One?

  “Yes, yes, you know who I mean.”

  The alien appeared in Jace’s living room as he entered, and Jace said without preamble, “Well? Planet or no planet?”

  “Yes, a planet.”

  “So, it’s visible now?”

  “Not entirely. This one is sending a live feed to your communicator.” The alien blinked its large eyes and tilted its bratwurst head to gaze up at the ceiling. Jace looked up too to watch the living room being wiped away and replaced with a view of cold, unblinking stars in inky-black space. Suddenly, a giant ball of light flickered into existence right in front of him. He jumped back in surprise. Just as suddenly, the ball vanished.

  “That’s the longest period that this one is currently able to lock it. This one is still remembering how to disable stealth effects, but based on early observations, the object is an Earth-sized, class M planet with continents and oceans but not much of an atmosphere. It may have once had an atmosphere but lost it during its transfer to your space.”

  “Transfer from where?”

  “Unknown. From your same arm of the Milky Way perhaps, from across the hub or from another galaxy altogether. Machine can mine its missiles from wherever it finds suitable warp conditions.”

  “Missiles like whole planets?”

  “Yes. This one is moving at an extraordinary speed and will smack the Earth head on in 53 days. Both planets will be demolished. No living thing on Earth will survive.”

  Jace collapsed on the couch. This wasn’t happening.

  “Has anyone else seen it yet?”

  “No claims have surfaced anywhere, not even on encrypted networks. This one will endeavor to defeat the cloaking effect, but even when it’s visible, it may take astronomers hours or days to discover it. Unless this one leaks its location.”

  “Like you leaked it to Deut before you even told me? Like that?”

  The holographic starscape dissolved and vanished. “Yes, this one has informed Deuteronomy Prophecy about the planet. Was that an error?”

  “I’m not saying it was or it wasn’t. That’s between you and her. None of my business, except why are you impersonating an angel?”

  The alien scratched its head. Was it mimicking human gestures now, or was head scratching a universal thing? “What business is it of yours how this one chooses to engage other humans?”

  “None, no business whatsoever, except that you’re reinforcing all that religious bullshit she’s been steeped in her entire life and making it twice as hard for anyone, meaning me, to reason with her.”

  Found One nodded its head. “This one is beginning to understand; you harbor tender feelings for Deuteronomy, or at least for some ideal version of a Deuteronomy you imagine to exist. But take a moment to consider this one’s perspective. Deut has put herself and her relationship with her family at grave risk in order to assist in this one’s survival. She has done so even more than you, to be honest about it, and without any expectation of reward. She seems to act out of a sense of charity that springs from these ‘bullshit’ beliefs of hers that you see as limiting. Therefore, this one claims the right and responsibility to engage with her for her own well-being, despite how you feel.

  “Also, considering the limiting
effect that deeply held biases have on human perception, Deut is capable of knowing this one either as a deity or a demon. There is no room in her state of reality for non-terrestrials. So, the real question here is whether you’d rather that Gabriel chat her up or Satan.”

  But Jace wasn’t buying. “Why do either of them have to ‘chat her up’ at all? Leave her alone. There’s no excuse for telling her about the planet. Now she thinks she has proof that angels are real and Jesus sent her on a mysterious mission.”

  “She was never in need of proof about angels, and the mission you reference is actually this one’s attempt to redress its wrongs and make amends. As you are aware, this one has robbed Deut’s family of one of its beloved children. This one feels great remorse over this and seeks to make reparations, just as it has offered you a boon for your efforts. Deut’s mission will be this one’s attempt to lessen the burden on her family and increase its chances for survival in the mine. That is, if Earth itself survives the crisis.”

  “Oh,” Jace said, his outrage somewhat mollified.

  It was chilly in his house; he’d shut off the oil stove as he left for his trip abroad. Now he struck a match and lit the pilot light.

  “Okay,” he said. “I guess that makes sense.”

  “Which leads this one back to the rogue planet. This one is still actively remembering the intricacies of cosmic field mechanics. There is much yet to recall, but this one has thus far delineated two viable options to defeat Machine’s attack, what this one calls the ‘Little Nudge’ and the ‘Big Bump.’ The Little Nudge uses the force of gravity and what your scientists call dark energy to slightly alter Earth’s period of revolution around the Sun, increasing it by several hours, just enough time to throw off the rogue planet’s aim. The transition may cause some minor seismic activity worldwide, some hydro dams to fail, some volcanos to erupt, and for the moon’s orbit to wobble. But for the most part, people will hardly notice it. It would feel like a heavy truck driving by on the street outside.

  “Long term, Earth’s disruption (combined with the gravitational effects of the sudden appearance of the rogue planet in the solar system) will slightly perturb the orbits of all of your neighboring planets, and even the Sun, though to a minuscule degree. It will take centuries for equilibrium to be reestablished. The moon’s orbit will take even longer to stabilize, causing several centuries of unpredictable tides.”