Worry for Anne was never far from his heart. Leaving her behind was the best thing I could do for her. Fearful that BES might track him via his jack-in, he let the battery die. It’s better she not know where I am so the bessies can’t pull it out of her. He tried not to think of the moment when the forest fire’s hot wind sucked the air out of his lungs as he hid in the animal den. At that instant, a tanker soared overhead and dropped water and retardant on top of the den, snuffing the fire, and giving Bill a second chance. His luck astounded him, and he raced to the west, leaving the useless fire blanket behind. He force-marched himself overnight, stopping in the morning at a stream where he washed off the retardant. He slept under a rock outcrop, then hiked down an ancient, overgrown logging road to the coastal highway. He hitched into Port Simpson, looking like another vagabond victim of the Warming and the Spike.
Two decades after Bill’s last visit, the sidewalks of Yesler City had more cracks, the streets more potholes, and the walls of the decrepit brick and sandstone buildings tilted further outward over the whole scene. Though he recognized landmarks and street names, he couldn’t shake a fuzz of disorientation that resulted in a collision with a tattered, hunched-over wreck of a man, triggering a psychotic outburst.
“Help, oh god, help me,” the derelict screamed. “The bessies are taking me again. Again!” An aura of mold enveloped the creature.
“No, no, I’m sorry. I’m not BES.” Bill’s eyes darted. He feared a local cop or security bot might hear. “It was an accident.”
“I’m dying,” the man sniveled. “I need my oil. My oil. Oil to keep me warm.” The grizzled derelict bawled, tears streaming down his tanned cheeks. “I’m freezing to death. Can’t you see?” He grabbed Bill’s coat like a madman. “You know where it is, don’t you? You know who has my oil?”
Bill tugged at the man’s arms, desperate to get away. “No, I don’t.”
“That freak, that animal. The Tiger. He’ll kill you for your oil. He’ll rip you neck out. He’ll snap your spine, like a pencil.”
Bill feared the old man’s grip would break his arm. He had no idea what the crazed man was talking about.
The derelict yanked Bill’s face close and whispered, his breath polluted with cheap mist. “Do you know what fuels the fires of hell? Do you?”
Bill shook his head, the pain in his biceps tearing through his frame.
“Captain Gore’s farts.” The old man cackled. He released Bill, and Bill left him sobbing and mumbling his incomprehensible laments in a doorway. Rubbing the incipient bruises from his upper arms, Bill stopped at a tiny cobblestone square and counted the last of his euros, keeping the bills close to his body. He bit his lip. With his com dead, he couldn’t withdraw any cash from a bank. The bessies would trace me. At least Anne has enough to get her through the next few weeks.
He found a flophouse just off the main drag that ran along the shoreline. The lobby floors of the Henderson Hotel were clean and the duct-taped furniture dusted. Once inside, Bill smelled bathroom cleanser and wet wool. The audio of a television and the accented English of a Chinese game show host echoed down a hall. Bill stood at the desk, nervous that no one was on duty. “Is anyone there?”
A chair scraped the floor, and a short, dark woman waddled out of an office. Her uniform was faded by dozens of washes.
“Yes?” She scratched the inside of her ear. Her name tag said “Lin.”
“A room, please.”
“Tramps stay at the shelter.” She pointed to the door. “It’s a block over.”
I must look like hell. “I’ve been in the mountains. I have money.”
The woman reassessed her prospective guest. “How many nights?”
“I’m not sure. I’m looking for work. Could be a day, could be a week.”
“One-fifty a night.” The woman’s voice was crusty. “Checkout at eleven.”
Bill pulled out his thin wad, counted out the bills one-by-one, and handed them to her. She counted them also, but with her eyes.
The online register displayed in the glass counter. “Sign in.”
Because his com battery was dead, the register wouldn’t get a signal and couldn’t access his ID. He wasn’t even sure he wanted to sign in. BES computers watched net traffic for traces of wanted criminals.
“Sorry, I left my charger back home.” Bill shrugged. My lies better be convincing. “Been on the road and haven’t time to buy another one.”
“I’ve got a spare I could loan...”
“No, ma’am.” Bill smiled. “I mean, thanks. My com, um, my com is a new model. Different battery type. Not many out there.”
The woman was skeptical. “Law says I gotta have your digital sig in case someone comes around asking questions.”
Bill breathed out, trying to stay calm. Maybe something extra would help. He reached into his grimy pants pocket and placed a 10-euro coin on the counter over the electronic register. “I’m happy to register in the old-fashioned way.”
The clerk studied the coin for a second or two, and she reached under the counter. Bill tensed, wondering if she was somehow alerting the local police or even BES. Instead, she showed a yellowed registration card. She took a pencil from her hip pocket.
“Put a name and address on this.” The coin disappeared into her apron pocket. “It’ll do ‘til you’re back online.”
Bill wrote a fictitious name and the address of a bar in Churchill. He sighed, feeling the weight on his shoulders growing heavier. How many lies will I have to tell before this is over? He hoped the clerk wouldn’t ask for more details.
She handed Bill an object that reminded him of a playing card. “You’ll need this since you’re com is dead.”
“What is it?”
“Wave it in front of the lock.”
“Okay.”
“Second floor, hang a left.”
Bill found the room, and after a few passes with the card, the lock clicked. He peeked around the door, half-expecting an occupant. The room had the usual furnishings. A stink of decaying vegetables and grease drifted through the open window. The towels on the shelf were clean, if threadbare. Bill shared a bathroom with the other ten rooms on his floor. His tight shoulders relaxed. He emptied his pockets, which contained nothing more than a few bills, coins, and his favorite holo-pic of Anne. She was angelic in her first communion dress. Bill’s family was Catholic, and he felt the need to at least introduce her to the traditions, even if he was not a religious man.
He undressed, wrapping himself in one of the towels.
On his way to the bath, a banged-up cleaning robot announced itself at the door of another room, and a gruff female voice demanded that it go to hell. Bill almost tripped over the robot as it reversed to turn toward the next room.
Bill couldn’t buy the bar soap and shampoo in the hotel’s vending machines because of his dead com. However, a kind person had left a used bar and half-filled shampoo bottle in the two-person shower stall. He punched in his room code, programmed the shower temperature, and luxuriated in the soap and water, careful to rinse before the stream stopped flowing. He used up his room’s five-minute daily allotted time, or perhaps the ten gallons allowed by the government. He wasn’t sure. Either way, the shower gave him a jolt of new energy.
All Bill’s clothes burned in the ranch fire, and what he wore reeked. A card on the dresser said the flophouse had a laundry room. He wrapped his damp towel around his waist and draped a second towel over his shoulders. Carrying his wallet, sheathed rigging knife, com recharger, and dirty clothes under his arm, he took the elevator to the basement. Modesty was his habit, strengthened by the presence of his daughter, and he was glad the elevator made no stops.
When the elevator halted, Bill hesitated at the open door. Where would I run wearing a pair of towels? No one was in the laundry, which had two washers and dryers, newer models than his at home. Mine are scrap now. Bill cursed when he saw the readout on the washer. Like the bathroom vending machines, the washers and dryers
only took electronic payments, but there was a scratched-up machine that changed paper and coin euros, American dollars, and renminbi. He fumbled with the coin feed. I haven’t done this since my last time on the beach. Bill punched in the code for the first washing machine, along with a soap purchase. Water and detergent poured into the washer, showing that he hadn’t used up his water allocation, and Bill stuffed in his clothing. He bought twenty minutes of dryer time as well.
With his body clean, his clothes fresh, but his stomach empty, he counted his remaining cash. Three small bills and some change. He left the hotel, checking up and down the street for anything that might signal police or BES. Kilel could be on top of me in five minutes, or five days. His palms sweat, in spite of the chill. Nearer the water, the air temperature was lower than inland, and he pulled a wool cap tighter over his short haircut. Thick clouds moved in overhead, and Bill smelled rain, though none fell on this street. Chandlers, brokers, branch offices for shipping lines, union halls, bars, and the occasional tourist trap lined the avenues and narrow lanes first laid out in the 1850s.
Bill headed for a sailors’ hangout, the Brass and Canvas, on a narrow side street. Water from a previous rain shower glistened on the broken asphalt, which revealed older bricks underneath. A neon sign glowed over the bar’s entrance.
The place hadn’t changed. Its generic intimacy was comforting and strange at the same time. The bar was dark and narrow, squeezed between two ancient brick buildings like an afterthought. Faded color photos of old oil-burning cargo vessels gathered dust on the walls. He thought of his first job as a cook’s helper. He was fifteen, but passed for eighteen, a few years after the first carbon laws. The shipping companies were desperate for labor to man the sail training ships and big sailing yachts pressed into cargo service. A young man with experience around boats could get a berth easily.
Bill took a seat in a booth. A woman with hanging jowls and no eyebrows came up to him. “Afternoon,” she said. “What can I get you?”
Bill now assessed each person he met as a possible threat, and it didn’t help that he couldn’t be pinged by servers for payment types he preferred or stored preferences for food and drink. His lack of electronic availability was a red flag, but the waitress didn’t say or do anything that signaled a problem. She sees off-the-net shellbacks every day. They’re like stray dogs.
“I’m kind of hungry.” Bill watched the waitress’s face. “Anything special on the menu?”
“We’ve got a veg burger, fries and a Pepsi.”
“Can I substitute a Hanoi Dark?”
“Sure, for a couple of extra bucks.”
Bill added up the cost in his head. It would clean him out, but he needed some cheer. If he was desperate, bread was free at the shelter the desk clerk talked about. He dismissed the thought, feeling sure that he could get a job in no time. I’ll take anything. I’m doing it for Anne.
“Alright then.”
The waitress touched the order into her notepad. She returned with the beer. Bill took a thoughtful sip and hoped to see a familiar face. Would I recognize anybody after twenty years? He wanted to work his old channels, keeping away from the mainstream, meaning the unions and the shipping companies themselves. It was easier to stay in the shadows that way.
Bill spied someone through the window. Micah? He left the table and ran out the door. “Micah Panang?”
She patted a salt-and-pepper dog tied up at the entrance and looked over to Bill. She wore a vest over a t-shirt, a clue about her attitude toward the weather. Her woven, graying ponytail looped twice at the nape of her neck. Her face brightened. “Bill!”
The two embraced, but Bill was shocked at the change in her. The skin of her face and arms was still the same sun-cooked, leathery brown it had when he first met her in Honolulu, when she was bosun on the Artful. The lines and colors of her tattoos were blurred by age, and a frostbite scar marred her left cheek. When she smiled, her perfect white teeth punctuated the air like the Cheshire cat’s, though without the feline’s guile. I learned everything I know about tall ship sailing from her. “You’re looking pretty fit, I have to say.” Bill admired her powerful shoulders. He would lose a wrestling match if he challenged her.
“You’re looking the same. Ugly as ever.” She punched his shoulder.
Bill laughed. God bless Micah, an old friend. “How are you, really?”
“Been working a lot. Just got in after two months at sea. Won’t be here long. How long have you been here?”
“Just got in myself.”
“Wow. Seaman’s luck.”
“Come inside.” Bill beckoned her into the bar. I need some luck. Maybe Micah’s it. “I’m getting a burger.”
The waitress delivered Bill’s food. Micah rested her bare arms on the table, and Bill noticed faint bands of dark and light pigment on her skin. A new kind of body art? Micah always liked that craft.
“Anything for you, ma’am?” the waitress said.
“A Hanoi would be good.”
Bill gestured at his plate. “Have a couple of fries, Micah.”
“Christ, it’s been forever, Bill.” Micah munched on one of the fat fried potatoes. “I never imagined we’d run into each other.”
“This place is swabbie central.”
“What are you doing here? God, it’s like the years have disappeared. Didn’t you quit the sea, right after you got married? Got a farm or something for you and your kid, um—”
“Anne.”
“Yeah. What about Molly? What happened to her?”
Bill put down his burger and sipped his Hanoi. He weighed whether or not to lie to one of his best friends from his youth. He once depended on her for life and limb. They were both much younger then with no ties and fewer cares. He realized, as he noted the sadder, wiser cast to Micah’s obsidian eyes, that she had changed in ways he couldn’t know. Can I trust her?
“Last I remember, you and Molly had some trouble and you split up.”
Bill was surprised at how much pain Micah’s remark caused. It was an innocent statement; she was trying to catch up. I shouldn’t keep things from Micah. She was my mentor, my best shipmate. That was twenty years ago. Anne was all that mattered now to Bill. “Some things don’t work out.”
“Sorry to hear that, Bill. You were head over heels.”
Micah’s comment brought everything back about Molly, his only serious love, starting with the moment Bill saw her on the Chelsea, a hulking 35-meter brig. Molly was an experienced mariner who didn’t think much of Bill at first, but he tried to be nice to her, help her with chores, do an extra watch so he could speak with her. One night, he was coming off watch at midnight, and on the way to the crew mess, Molly found him, led him to a storage locker, and... Bill smiled inwardly at the memory. She was the most beautiful woman on the planet. Chelsea arrived at Singapore and the chief engineer declared the mainmast cracked. It would take two or three days to repair. “Molly and I found a room and we didn’t leave it until the blue peter went up. I asked her to marry me that day.”
“How did you know it wasn’t just a fo’c’sle romance? Did you really love her?”
“I did. I think so.” After two decades, Bill wasn’t certain. “She married me, didn’t she?”
Bill sipped his beer as he told Micah more of the story. A few days after the couple arrived at Port Simpson, Molly discovered she was pregnant. She was troubled by the news. She had planned to go back to school to finish a master’s in computer science. She was only a few credits from getting a degree, but she had to go back to maritime work to earn the money to pay for the schooling. Bill had no plans. His parents had died, leaving him enough for a down payment on a house. Molly could finish her degree with online courses, and they agreed to buy the ranch in Brier Valley. They married at the courthouse, and Anne was born about seven months later.
“Things were fine until she finished her degree,” Bill said. He took care of Anne while Molly earned high praise for her work on artificial intelligence,
and her thesis was published as an article in a scientific journal. Then she got a call from Algid. It was Martin Scribb himself.”
Micah gasped. “You mean the Martin Scribb?”
Bill nodded. “Algid offered her a job doing advanced AI work.” Damn Scribb to hell.
The family would have to move to Seattle, but Bill wasn’t up for it. “I don’t feel comfortable with over-educated types and their grand ideas.” In the end, Molly would go to Seattle, see how the job went, and if she didn’t like it, she’d come home. They’d use her earnings to pay off debts for farm robots and BES fines they’d run up getting started.
Six months dragged on to a year, and two years. Molly came home whenever she could, and Anne and Bill went up to Seattle a couple of times, and they talked on the com almost every night, at least in the beginning. Anne was too young to understand that her mother was far away. I was her only parent, as far as she was concerned.
“One day, Molly didn’t come home.” Bill lowered his voice. “I don’t know where she is now, or what she’s doing.”
Why is truth so painful? After they met, no one else existed in the world for Bill than Molly, at least until little Anne came along. If I had understood what Molly wanted for herself, to be more than a shellback, to make a bigger mark on life, I might not have asked her to marry me, and she might not have said Yes. She did, regretted it, and moved on. I’ve never regretted it. I wouldn’t have my daughter if Molly had said No. Maybe that’s why the whole mess still hurts after 20 years.
“I’m sorry.” Micah said. “How do you feel about Molly now?”
Bill raised the glass to his lips, but stopped short, considering an answer. Embers of anger still glowed, but so much time had passed. “I don’t dwell on it.”
“What would you do if you saw her?”
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