The concierge's eyes are sad now. She gives Gerda a package printed with a clown's face and colored balloons. Gerda holds the gift out from her upside-down and scowls at it.
The concierge has packages for all the children, to keep them quiet in line. The giftpacks match age and gender. Rith always says his gender is Geek, as a joke, but he does somehow get a Geek pack. They can analyze his clothes and brand names. I muse on how strange it is that Rith's dad gave him the same name as mine, so that he is Rith and I am Channarith. He never calls me father. Agnete calls me Channa, infrequently.
The beautiful concierge takes our papers, and says that she will do all the needful. Our trolley says good-bye and whizzes after her, to check in our bags. I'm glad it's gone. I hate its hushed and cheerful voice. I hate its Bugs Bunny baby face.
We wait.
Other concierges move up and down the velvet-roped queues with little trolleys offering water, green tea, dragon fruit, or chardonnay. However much we paid, when all is said and done, we are fodder to be processed. I know in my sinking heart that getting here is why Agnete married me. She needed the fare.
No one lied to us, not even ourselves. This is bigger than a lie; this is like an animal migration, this is all of us caught up in something about ourselves we do not understand, never knew.
Suddenly my heart says, firmly, There are no aliens.
Aliens are just the excuse. This is something we want to do, like building those skyscrapers. This is all a new kind of dream, a new kind of grief turned inward, but it's not my dream, nor do I think that it's Gerda's. She is squeezing my hand too hard and I know she knows this thing that is beyond words.
"Agnete,” I say. “You and the boys go. I cannot. I don't want this."
Her face is sudden fury. “I knew you'd do this. Men always do this."
"I didn't use to be a man."
"That makes no difference!” She snatches Gerda away from me, who starts to cry again. Gerda has been taken too many places, too suddenly, too firmly. “I knew there was something weird going on.” She glares at me as if she doesn't know me, or is only seeing me for the first time. Gently she coaxes Gerda toward her, away from me. “The children are coming with me. All of the children. If you want to be blown up by aliens—"
"There are no aliens."
Maybe she doesn't hear me. “I have all the papers.” She means the papers that identify us, let us in our own front door, give us access to our bank accounts. All she holds is the hologrammed, eye-printed ticket. She makes a jagged, flinty correction: “They have all the papers. Gerda is my daughter, and they will favor me.” She's already thinking custody battle, and she's right, of course.
"There are no aliens.” I say it a third time. “There is no reason to do this."
This time I get heard. There is a sound of breathing-out from all the people around me. A fat Tamil, sated maybe with blowing up other people, says, “What, you think all those governments lie? You're just getting cold feet."
Agnete focuses on me. “Go on. Get going if that's what you want.” Her face has no love or tolerance in it.
"People need there to be aliens and so they all believe there are. But I don't."
Gerda is weeping in complete silence, though her face looks calm. I have never seen so much water come out of someone's eyes; it pours out as thick as bird's nest soup. Agnete keeps her hands folded across Gerda's chest and kisses the top of her head. What, does she think I'm going to steal Gerda?
Suddenly our concierge is kneeling down, cooing. She has a pink metal teddy bear in one hand, and it hisses as she uses it to inject Gerda.
"There! All happy now!” The concierge looks up at me with hatred. She gives Agnete our check-in notification, now perfumed and glowing. But not our ID papers. Those they keep, to keep us there, safe.
"Thank you,” says Agnete. Her jaw thrusts out at me.
The Tamil is smiling with rage. “You see that idiot? He got the little girl all afraid."
"Fool can't face the truth,” says a Cluster of networked Malay, all in unison.
I want to go back to the trees, like Tarzan, but that is a different drive, a different dream.
"Why are you stopping the rest of us trying to go, just because you don't want to?” says a multigen, with a wide glassy grin. How on Earth does s/he think I could stop them doing anything? I can see s/he is making up for a lifetime of being disrespected. This intervention, though late and cowardly and stupid, gets the murmur of approval for which s/he yearns.
It is like cutting my heart at the root, but I know I cannot leave Gerda. I cannot leave her alone Down There. She must not be deserted a second time. They have doped her, drugged her, the world swims around her, her eyes are dim and crossed, but I fancy she is looking for me. And at the level of the singing blood in our veins, we understand each other.
I hang my head.
"So you're staying,” says Agnete, her face pulled in several opposing directions, satisfaction, disappointment, anger, triumph, scorn.
"For Gerda, yes."
Agnete's face resolves itself into stone. She wanted maybe a declaration of love, after that scene? Gerda is limp and heavy and dangling down onto the floor.
"Maybe she's lucky,” I say. “Maybe that injection killed her."
The crowd has been listening for something to outrage them. “Did you hear what that man said?"
"What an idiot!"
"Jerk."
"Hey, lady, you want a nicer guy for a husband, try me."
"Did he say the little girl should be dead? Did you hear him say that?"
"Yeah, he said that the little baby should be dead!"
"Hey you, Pol Pot. Get out of line. We're doing this to escape genocide, not take it with us."
I feel distanced, calm. “I don't think we have any idea what we are doing."
Agnete grips the tickets and certificates of passage. She holds onto Gerda, and tries to hug the two younger boys. There is a bubble of spit coming out of Gerda's mouth. The lift doors swivel open, all along the wall. Agnete starts forward. She has to drag Gerda with her.
"Let me carry her at least,” I say. Agnete ignores me. I trail after her. Someone pushes me sideways as I shuffle. I ignore him.
And so I Go Down.
They take your ID and keep it. It is a safety measure to hold as many of humankind safely below as possible. I realize I will never see the sun again. No sunset cumulonimbus, no shushing of the sea, no schools of sardines swimming like veils of silver in clear water, no unreliable songbirds that may fail to appear, no more brown grass, no more dusty wild flowers unregarded by the roadside. No thunder to strike the neak ta, no chants at midnight, no smells of fish frying, no rice on the floor of the temple.
I am a son of Kambu. Kampuchea.
I slope into the elevator.
"Hey, Boss,” says a voice. The sound of it makes me unhappy before I recognize who it is. Ah yes, with his lucky mustache. It is someone who used to work in my hotel. My Embezzler. He looks delighted, pleased to see me. “Isn't this great? Wait till you see it!"
"Yeah, great,” I murmur.
"Listen,” says an intervener to my little thief. “Nothing you can say will make this guy happy."
"He's a nice guy,” says the Embezzler. “I used to work for him. Didn't I, Boss?"
This is my legacy thug, inherited from my boss. He embezzled his fare from me and disappeared, oh, two years ago. These people may think he's a friend, but I bet he still has his stolen guns, in case there is trouble.
"Good to see you,” I lie. I know when I am outnumbered.
For some reason that makes him chuckle, and I can see his silver-outlined teeth. I am ashamed that this unpunished thief is now my only friend.
Agnete knows the story, sniffs and looks away. “I should have married a genetic man,” she murmurs.
Never, ever tread on someone else's dream.
The lift is mirrored, and there are holograms of light as if we stood inside an infinite diamond,
glistering all the way up to a blinding heaven. And dancing in the fire, brand names.
Gucci.
Armani.
Sony.
Yamomoto.
Hugo Boss.
And above us, clear to the end and the beginning, the stars. The lift goes down.
Those stars have cost us dearly. All around me, the faces look up in unison.
Whole nations were bankrupted trying to get there, to dwarf stars and planets of methane ice. Arizona disappeared in an annihilation as matter and antimatter finally met, trying to build an engine. Massive junk still orbits half-assembled, and will one day fall. The saps who are left behind on Ground Zero will probably think it's the comet.
But trying to build those self-contained starships taught us how to do this instead.
Earthside, you walk out of your door, you see birds fly. Just after the sun sets and the bushes bloom with bugs, you will see bats flitter, silhouetted as they neep. In hot afternoons the bees waver, heavy with pollen, and I swear even fishes fly. But nothing flies between the stars except energy. You wanna be converted into energy, like Arizona?
So we Go Down.
Instead of up.
"The first thing you will see is the main hall. That should cheer up you claustrophobics,” says my Embezzler. “It is the biggest open space we have in the Singapore facility. And as you will see, that's damn big!” The travelers chuckle in appreciation. I wonder if they don't pipe in some of that cheerful sound.
And poor Gerda, she will wake up for a second time in another new world. I fear it will be too much for her.
The lift walls turn like stiles, reflecting yet more light in shards, and we step out.
* * * *
Ten stories of brand names go down in circles—polished marble floors, air-conditioning, little murmuring carts, robot pets that don't poop, kids in the latest balloon shoes.
"What do you think of that!” the Malay Network demands of me. All its heads turn, including the women wearing modest headscarves.
"I think it looks like Kuala Lumpur on a rainy afternoon."
The corridors of the emporia go off into infinity as well, as if you could shop all the way to Alpha Centauri. An illusion of course, like standing in a hall of mirrors.
It's darn good, this technology, it fools the eye for all of thirty seconds. To be fooled longer than that, you have to want to be fooled. At the end of the corridor, reaching out for somewhere beyond, distant and pure, there is only light.
We have remade the world.
Agnete looks worn. “I need a drink, where's a bar?"
I need to be away too, away from these people who know that I have a wife for whom my only value has now been spent.
Our little trolley finds us, calls our name enthusiastically, and advises us. In Ramlee Mall, level ten, Central Tower we have the choice of Bar Infinity, the Malacca Club (share the Maugham experience), British India, the Kuala Lumpur Tower View....
Agnete chooses the Seaside Pier; I cannot tell if out of kindness or irony.
I step inside the bar with its high ceiling and for just a moment my heart leaps with hope. There is the sea, the islands, the bridges, the sails, the gulls, and the sunlight dancing. Wafts of sugar vapor inside the bar imitate sea mist, and the breathable sugar makes you high. At the other end of the bar is what looks like a giant orange orb (half of one, the other half is just reflected). People lounge on the brand-name sand (guaranteed to brush away and evaporate.) Fifty meters overhead, there is a virtual mirror that doubles distance so you can look up and see yourself from what appears to be a hundred meters up, as if you are flying. A Network on its collective back is busy spelling the word HOME with their bodies.
We sip martinis. Gerda still sleeps and I now fear she always will.
"So,” says Agnete, her voice suddenly catching up with her butt, and plonking down to Earth and relative calm. “Sorry about that back there. It was a tense moment for both of us. I have doubts too. About coming here, I mean."
She puts her hand on mine.
"I will always be so grateful to you,” she says and really means it. I play with one of her fingers. I seem to have purchased loyalty.
"Thank you,” I say, and I realize that she has lost mine.
She tries to bring love back by squeezing my hand. “I know you didn't want to come. I know you came because of us."
Even the boys know there is something radically wrong. Sampul and Tharum stare in silence, wide brown eyes. Did something similar happen with Dad number one?
Rith the eldest chortles with scorn. He needs to hate us so that he can fly the nest.
My heart is so sore I cannot speak.
"What will you do?” she asks. That sounds forlorn, so she then tries to sound perky. “Any ideas?"
"Open a casino,” I say, feeling deadly.
"Oh! Channa! What a wonderful idea, it's just perfect!"
"Isn't it? All those people with nothing to do.” Someplace they can bring their powder. I look out at the sea.
Rith rolls his eyes. Where is there for Rith to go from here? I wonder. I see that he too will have to destroy his inheritance. What will he do, drill the rock? Dive down into the lava? Or maybe out of pure rebellion ascend to Earth again?
The drug wears off and Gerda awakes, but her eyes are calm and she takes an interest in the table and the food. She walks outside onto the mall floor, and suddenly squeals with laughter and runs to the railing to look out. She points at the glowing yellow sign with black ears and says “Disney.” She says all the brand names aloud, as if they are all old friends.
I was wrong. Gerda is at home here.
I can see myself wandering the whispering marble halls like a ghost, listening for something that is dead.
We go to our suite. It's just like the damn casino, but there are no boats outside to push slivers of wood into your hands, no sand too hot for your feet. Cambodia has ceased to exist, for us.
Agnete is beside herself with delight. “What window do you want?"
I ask for downtown Phnom Penh. A forest of gray, streaked skyscrapers to the horizon. “In the rain,” I ask.
"Can't we have something a bit more cheerful?"
"Sure. How about Tuol Sleng prison?"
I know she doesn't want me. I know how to hurt her. I go for a walk.
Overhead in the dome is the Horsehead Nebula. Radiant, wonderful, deadly, thirty years to cross at the speed of light.
I go to the pharmacy. The pharmacist looks like a phony doctor in an ad. I ask, “Is ... is there some way out?"
"You can go Earthside with no ID. People do. They end up living in huts on Sentosa. But that's not what you mean, is it?"
I just shake my head. It's like we've been edited to ensure that nothing disturbing actually gets said. He gives me a tiny white bag with blue lettering on it.
Instant, painless, like all my flopping guests at the casino.
"Not here,” he warns me. “You take it and go somewhere else, like the public toilets."
Terrifyingly, the pack isn't sealed properly. I've picked it up, I could have the dust of it on my hands; I don't want to wipe them anywhere. What if one of the children licks it?
I know then I don't want to die. I just want to go home, and always will. I am a son of Kambu, Kampuchea.
"Ah,” he says and looks pleased. “You know, the Buddha says that we must accept."
"So why didn't we accept the Earth?” I ask him.
The pharmacist in his white lab coat shrugs. “We always want something different."
We always must move on and if we can't leave home, it drives us mad. Blocked and driven mad, we do something new.
* * * *
There was one final phase to becoming a man. I remember my uncle. The moment his children and his brother's children were all somewhat grown, he left us to become a monk. That was how a man was completed, in the old days.
I stand with a merit bowl in front of the wat. I wear orange robes with a few others. Cu
riously enough, Rith has joined me. He thinks he has rebelled. People from Sri Lanka, Laos, Burma, and my own land give us food for their dead. We bless it and chant in Pali.
All component things are indeed transient.
They are of the nature of arising and decaying.
Having come into being, they cease to be.
The cessation of this process is bliss.
Uninvited he has come hither
He has departed hence without approval
Even as he came, just so he went
What lamentation then could there be?
* * * *
We got what we wanted. We always do, don't we, as a species? One way or another.
[Back to Table of Contents]
Department: PLUMAGE FROM PEGASUS: SUGAR AND SPICE, AND EVERYTHING LICENSABLE by Paul Di Filippo
"After scoring as hits on the page and on screen, Neil Gaiman's creepy children's story Coraline is now heading for the stage. New York's MCC Theater will present a musical adaptation of the tale—about a little girl named Coraline who stumbles onto a parallel world—this spring, according to press reports from New York.”
—CBC News, “Gaiman's Coraline Slated for Stage Musical Adaptation"
* * * *
The very elderly writer rested contentedly in his deathbed, medicated against pain and unease. All around him, machines softly chuntered and chuffed as they vainly struggled to keep him alive beyond his natural span. (But his body was wiser than the machines, and was shutting inevitably down, his soul preparing its final flight.) Many people came and went in the large, luxurious room, some stern and serious, others weeping, yet others officious.
But as the object of all this sundry attention, the very elderly writer took no notice of either the machines or the people.
Behind his shuttered rheumy eyes, his mind was too busy, all his attention directed inward, as he reviewed his long, exciting, privileged life, and all he had accomplished: such a vast deal, in fact.
And so much of it was owed to a little girl named Celadine. A little girl who had never really existed, in any empirical sense, and yet who had become more real than many pallid creatures of flesh and blood.
How vividly, all these decades later, he recalled his initial artistic inspiration for Celadine and her adventures. The heady excitement of solitary composition, the sheer rightness of the tale. Once finished, he had collapsed in a postpartum exhaustion. But soon thereafter came the excitement of publication, the surge of glowing reviews, the wearisome ecstasy of the publicity tour, the accolades of fans. Then arrived the multiple awards, and the knowledge that the fable of his devising had earned a secure place in the literary canon of the fantastical.
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