Could it still be true? Hadn’t Wiggler talked about machines creating more complex machines? Might he have been rescued from the dead by a biomechanoid who in turn had been designed by another such creature-thing?
Clearfather eased back the robe to see if he could do anything with the wound—but there was nothing to be done.
“I’m sorry,” he said, tears filling his eyes. “I didn’t want to hurt you. I just wanted to get away.”
“I don’t . . . blame you.”
“It was a mistake.”
“That’s what we make. Children . . . and monsters. Messiahs and mistakes. But if this Stinky Wiggler was a biomech, where’s the real one?”
“Maybe Sitturd’s hidden himself in a labyrinth of him—or herselves. What’s going to happen now?”
There was a sudden earth tremor and another rockslide.
“I don’t know,” the miniature Wiggler rasped. “The Transubstantiation wasn’t completed. You have to get away. I think everything will go. You’ve got to get away if you can—but wait—come close—there’s something I must say . . .”
“Can’t I help you . . . ?”
“It’s too late . . . but listen . . . you must listen . . .”
Clearfather knelt down close to the whispering hologram.
“You have . . . a son.”
“No, he died. That woman!”
“No!” Wiggler’s voice cried. “You have a son . . . about your age. Dingler. Julian . . . Dingler.”
“The new head of Vitessa?” Clearfather gasped.
“I don’t—know how—or what it means. Some other force at . . . work.”
“But . . . what will happen . . . to me now?”
“Come . . . close . . .”
Clearfather cradled the fallen body in his arms and saw an aura peel back across the skin. Every inch of flesh was covered—carved. The designs were too numerous, too intricate and interconnected to be examined in detail. Letters, runes, ciphers, foreign alphabets, chemical symbols, models of complex molecules and mathematical formulae.
Clearfather laid the head down. A tornado of luminous faces rose from the corpse. Some were animalian and hideous, some stretched with grief or suffering, others smiling and kind. They whirled up together to the height of a person and for a moment it looked as if the funnel might take human shape—then the speed of the spiral increased and the faces expanded out of focus and were gone.
The air grew still and Clearfather was no longer aware of Blind Lemon’s mournful guitar. Maggie had stopped weeping and lay nestled against the remains of her friend, who’d proved himself to be every bit the hero he’d dreamed of.
Then the ground shook terribly. A ledge of Neanderthals gave way. Walt Whitman and the saber-toothed tigers yoked to the rickshaw fled in terror. The Harijans began to wobble and spark.
“C’mon!” Clearfather cried, rushing over to grab hold of Blind Lemon. “This whole place is coming apart!”
“Whair wee gonna go?”
“There’s only one way out that I know of. Let’s go!” he called, leading the old black man whose face was soaked in tears.
As fast as they could move, Clearfather led them to the livery stable—into the blue-and-silver bus he’d seen before. It was still there, with the big steel letters on the side. SPIRITCRUISER
“Wee can’t jest drive outta heer!” Maggie hollered.
The church bell was chiming frantically now, indricotheres and other giant mammals stampeding—drones and Neanderthals colliding in the dust as moss-covered crags crashed down and the buildings seemed to liquefy.
“Yes, we can!” Clearfather replied, remembering the words of the little Chinese men—To find a door, first look for a wall. The wall where Calamity Jane had been playing. It was a way into the Vortex—a way out of the Canyon.
He stuffed Lemon into one of the seats and buckled him in. Then Maggie. A rockfall collapsed a portion of the roof as he fired up the ignition. The street was filled with coffins and musical instruments—centaurs trampling Wiggler’s damaged stepchildren.
Clearfather couldn’t remember driving—and certainly not a bus—but it came easily given the situation, especially since he plowed through the flimsy walls. Smoke filled the air. The laboratories, the experimental animals, and the mysterious machines were all going to disappear. A series of explosions throbbed, raising a fallout of roller-coaster sparkle. Diamonds and glowworms and golden death masks rained down as Wiggler’s subterranean bemusement kingdom crumbled into the deeper Dakota darkness.
Clearfather brought the bus in a straight line for a run at the section of wall he thought Calamity Jane frequented. Through the dust and flames he saw the sloth—petrified by the turmoil—but he had no intention of stopping. He didn’t know how the doorway worked, and if it didn’t, he wanted to be up to speed. Better a head-on with the cliff than the panicking creatures and malfunctioning machines. He pressed the accelerator to the floor—his desperation counteracting the grief. There was a deafening screech of static.
CHAPTER 7
In the Wind
Into the chaos of vortices bristling like nerves straight into a wall of light . . .
The SPIRITCRUISER roared through the cliff. Maggie screamed at the point of imagined impact and then screamed again when the cloud of red dust and white powder billowed up around them as the bus ground to a halt. The moment the dust had settled and the barrenness was revealed—she screamed again—thinking she’d had a miscarriage. It was only diarrhea. She waddled off to the restroom.
“Holy moly!” cried Blind Lemon. “I think I can see!”
“You don’t have eyes,” Clearfather pointed out, pleased that the old man was all right. The wall had looked so solid. Right up to the second of impact he’d feared they were going to be smashed into an accordion. Then he remembered the funny sound Calamity Jane had made mingling with the rock—a giggle almost—and he gave himself over. He knew it was a door—and the stone dissolved into a mist like fine particles of aluminum chloride. There was a sound of ripping silk and then the bus was inside a vast cave system of green lichen, which became a wind tunnel—speeding forward and falling at the same time, becoming particles and molecules, then patterns of vibrations like music made of light—re-forming into texture and a white star of ice exploding into Texas redsoil.
“How many fingers am I holding up?”
“Three,” the old bluesman answered.
Clearfather was relieved. He hadn’t moved his hand. While suddenly being able to see might sound good, it also might also herald molecular dissolution.
Maggie returned embarrassed, horrified about the Marshal, and stricken with terror. Clearfather found an old jumpsuit for her. Miserably she took it and went to wash up and change. He left Lemon strumming his guitar and went outside to check things out. No one was around. Not a stick of building remained, but he had no doubt of where they were. The burned yellowgrass and red dust had been carpeted with a caustic-smelling white powder like bleach. Not a bird or insect could be seen—and the monument to Sitturd’s sister had been destroyed. He’d been right about Vitessa returning after he and Kokomo had escaped. They’d done a microgrid search for evidence and then launched a scorched-earth assault. Pits and craters showed where the tunnels and shelters had been bombed. If anyone or -thing had survived the tornado battle, it hadn’t survived this.
“Soa whair tha fuck are wee?” he heard Maggie call from the door. She looked pale and sick—but still rather fetching in the jumpsuit.
“We’re in Texas,” he answered.
“Say whot?”
“About eight hundred miles south of where we were.”
“Yeah right! Howa wee travil eight hunnerd miles in a minnit?”
“The answer’s technical.”
“Doan yoo start with that bullshit! I had enuff. Tell mee the damn truth!”
“I know it’s hard to believe, but we really are eight hundred miles away from South Dakota.”
“Oh sheet!” Maggie
cried and started bawling her eyes out.
“It’s not that bad,” Clearfather called, noticing that Blind Lemon had inched his way to the driver’s seat, strumming his guitar—a mournful but reassuring song called “The Downhearted Blues.”
“Doan yoo see! This means hee ’as right! Wee aren’t real—wee jest in his hedd!”
Blind Lemon bent a note like a baby crying. “I can see her point.”
Terrific, thought Clearfather. Two members of the party think they’re illusions.
“But . . . ,” said the bluesman. “If we really ain’t real—why dint we just go poof back in the Canyon—’long with everythin’ else?”
“Doan ask me,” Maggie choked. “I’m jest some kine a-kairacter. Hey, Wiggler!” she yelled at the sky. “Whot tha fuck wee doo now!”
The sky was Krishna blue and empty, as if all the clouds had fallen in the fields. Maggie’s voice sounded both loud and small. Then they heard another sound.
“You hear that?” Clearfather asked.
“Iss comin’ from over there.” Lemon pointed, his arm poking out like a weather vane.
“I can’t wait to seee whot kine a-monstur hee’s gonna send at us now.”
Clearfather’s ears pricked at her remark and then he smiled—for the sound came clearly now. It was the barking of a dog—and on the bleak horizon there appeared the skeletal shape of the greyhound he’d encountered earlier. He let out a piercing whistle, and the starving creature sauntered faster through the tortured landscape.
“Yoo knoah that dog?” Maggie sniffled.
“What dog?” Clearfather teased. “We’re inside Wiggler’s mind.”
“Welll, mebbe hee’s thinkin’ of a dog right now!”
“Or maybe it’s a real dog. I bet the dog believes he’s real—and real hungry. We’ve got to believe we’re real, too.”
Blind Lemon farted.
“’Scuse me. Ate my grits too quick this mwaning! Figure a bluesman should like grits. But I don’t frankly. Really I don’t.”
“Shut up, yoo ol’ booty grabber!” Maggie fussed. “Wee got moor to worry ’bout than grits. Wee in somebody’s brain! An’ the Marshal’s dedd!”
“Don’t you see that if we really were in Wiggler’s brain, we wouldn’t have anything to worry about?” Clearfather asked. “And the Marshal couldn’t be dead—because he’d never have really been alive!”
“Then how’d wee get heer . . . so kwik?”
“Canyon was full-a back doors and trapdoors,” Lemon said.
“That’s what I think, too,” said Clearfather. “Somehow the Vortex lies behind this reality and connects different points and perhaps moments like passageways in a house.”
“All right, smarty-pants. If yoor right . . . how cum hee dint jest git yoo when yoo bin heer beefor? This is whair yoo cum threw, right?”
Blind Lemon stroked his guitar again. “I can see her point.”
“There’s a simple answer,” Clearfather replied. “He’d forgotten about the door. That’s what happens when you have too many secret passages. Besides, he had a mental block about Dustdevil. He was murdered here, too, in a way. His dream died. Anyway, we’re here now—and however we got here we’ve got to go on.”
Maggie snuffled. “Whot was that last bit all about? Whenn yoo held him?”
“He asked for forgiveness.”
“An’ yoo gave it to ’im?”
“Yes,” said Clearfather as the spoke-thin dog snuffled up to him.
“Butt hee’s a loony! Hee started wars an’ things!”
“He did good things, too. Great things. Who can say what the final judgment of history will be on him? But it was my forgiveness he wanted. I gave it to him.”
“Butt . . . hee wuddn’t even real. Not hyuman.”
“Now she starts in on the human shit,” Blind Lemon grumped. “Why you so proud of bein’ human . . . when you worried you not real?”
“I can see his point,” said Clearfather, stroking the dog’s ears.
“Oh, shut up. I ain’t lissenin’ to yoo!”
“If creatures and machines that you think aren’t real can ask for forgiveness, then maybe being real isn’t what you thought it was,” Clearfather said. “But in a way you’re right. He wasn’t the real Wiggler. He was a decoy. A backup.”
“I been with him long as I can remember,” Lemon countered.
“Doesn’t change his relationship to us. He thought he was the real Wiggler. As far as we’re concerned, he was. I think that’s what makes a good decoy.”
“You mean we’ll meet him again?” Lemon asked.
“I don’t know if we’ll meet him. A part of him’s inside us . . . and will be with us wherever we go. But there’s another part of him that’s outside. In the wind.”
“I cain’t beeleeve the Marshal ain’t heer!” Maggie gasped.
“I . . . know,” Clearfather said. “But he died a real hero . . . and as much as I miss him, I figure it was for the best. We’ll need some of his courage now. Let’s not let him down.”
“I’m goin’ name ma baby affer him. Marshal . . . Kane . . .”
“He’d like that,” Clearfather said. “And I’ll . . . stick by you, Maggie. We’ll be all right.”
Blind Lemon struck a glittering harmonic that hung in the air.
“Whatchyoo mean . . . stick by mee?”
“I’ll help you raise the baby.”
“Wait a minnit! Yoo sayin’ boyfriend . . . husband stuff?”
“Yes.”
“All yoo got’s a stump.”
“It’s a big stump. Plus I got spizzerinctum—and friends and family in high places. They’ll help us.”
“Why they doo that?”
“Because I helped them. That’s what people do. I know you’re scared and confused. So am I. But it’s going to be okay. We’ve got to stick together.”
“So . . . whair wee gonna go?”
“We’re going to head to Pittsburgh—via a place called the Garden of Eden in Lucas, Kansas. A friend told me about it. I want you to come, too, Lemon. I got this idea you could be a star and help Professor Chicken. How would you like to play before real audiences?”
“No shit?”
“No shit.”
“Can you drive . . . all that way?”
“Yeah . . . ,” said Clearfather, thinking it out. “I can.”
Getting out on the road would be the best way to leave the sadness and confusion behind. He was certain that Wilton and even the Man of Steel would be glad to see him—even if he did bring problems with him. From there he’d work out how to make contact with Julian Dingler.
The greyhound gave another bark. The brittle old dog had found something—where the orchard of windmills had once stood. Clearfather went over to have a look. In the whitened redsoil was a folio-sized book bound in an unknown material. The cover was tornado green, and written on it in faded gold letters were the words . . .
THE VORTEXTS
MEMOIRS & MUTATIONS
BEING THE SECRETS, DREAMS, INVENTIONS, AND INDISCRETIONS
OF
LLOYD MEADHORN SITTURD
Clearfather’s heart jumped when he read the title—but he was taken aback to open the heavy book and find that the pages were all empty.
“Whot up with that?” Maggie asked, looking over his shoulder.
“So this is what she stole . . . ,” Clearfather breathed.
“Hoo?”
“Calamity Jane. She took this book from Wiggler’s library and passed it through the wall. She’d done it before with other things.”
“The sloth put this book heer?”
Lemon doddered over to have a look.
“The people who lived here before—they saved the things she slipped through. They thought they were gifts from God.”
“Boy, did they have it wrong!”
“I don’t know,” Clearfather sighed. “Of all the books she could’ve given—I can’t think of any one I would’ve wanted more.”
/> “Why? Damn thing’s empty. Every page is blank!”
“Maybe. Or maybe there’s a secret.”
Blind Lemon held out a hand for the page. “Shit! This page ain’t blank. Tons a words . . . and symbols and shit. No way this be blank.”
Clearfather closed the book. “Come on,” he said. “We’ve got a long way to go. We’ll take the dog with us.”
“Hee got a name?” Maggie asked.
“I don’t remember. Why don’t you give him a new name?”
“Shit, I doan knoa.”
“Then let’s call him Lucky. All right?”
“Tha’s one-a the first normal things I hear yoo say.”
Clearfather led them back to the bus, where he rounded up a Lamb ’n’ A Can® meal for Lucky and then went to rummage up a change of clothes. When he took off his robe Maggie gave a low squeal.
“What is it?” he asked.
“Iss yoor back! Tha words—tha marks—thair gone!”
He rushed into the bathroom and saw that she was right. The evil writing had faded away. There was just a hint of a scar on the third F—like where the weather vane had stabbed him. No more burning. No more weight.
He stared out over the dry waste of dust and chemical poison. If you’d gone searching for the most desolate, hopeless, barren bit of desert, you’d have to say this looked remarkably like it now. Suddenly he knew what he was going to do with the little globe of ivory that he’d been carrying. He went outside and found the spot where he thought the monument to Lodema Sitturd had been. He knelt down.
“This is for all of you,” he said, digging in with his hands. “All of you who have helped me on my journey. We plant this seed to heal the past. We plant this seed in hope for the future. To both remember and forget.”
He nestled the dull white ball in the dead red earth, patted the dust over it, and said a silent prayer for Kokomo. His heart ached for a moment—but by the time he was back behind the wheel, he felt a rushing sense of energy. They had no money. He might have a brain hemorrhage at any moment. Maggie’s baby might have birth defects. And worst of all, he’d found out that not only was he a kind of flesh-and-muck robot—the man who had made him was also one. He was a technological and theological experiment gone wrong. But he couldn’t help himself. He was glad to be alive. Whatever that meant.
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