by Anthology
Outside, Hedron was talking to the chickens. The volcano smouldering on his head made Chancery nauseous, itchy, and restless. She shivered.
"I belong here," she whispered.
"Don't you get it, Chance? Do you know how selfish you're being?"
Skook ambled over. She rubbed his ears and he licked her arm.
"You've been out here for five years and you haven't Walked. You're the only one. You could help people come back."
Chancery put her arms around Skook's neck and pressed her face against him, her chest tight and painful. There was a long silence.
"Do you understand me?"
"Yes." Skook's fur grew damp under her cheek.
An engine rumbled into the yard and brakes squealed painfully.
"I have to go to work. I'll leave you to think about it. Please. All those people need you. I need you."
Kay jammed her feet into her boots, right there at the table, and left.
***
There were a lot more of Hedron's people around that day than usual, wandering like ghosts in the Haar. Mindful of Hedron's caution, Chancery didn't stray far from the house. Even so, she nearly ran into one, coming close enough for her to see the oozing cracks in his blackened lips and smell his off-sweet, cheese and pear-drops scent. He reached for her, eyes glistening in a face scalloped by emaciation and scaly with flaking skin, his hands shiny and dried to red, worse than her own. His song filled her head with his aching desire to hold and be held, but he didn't touch her. She wondered if he'd been told not to.
She wondered if he'd ever not been people.
At lunchtime, the temperature dropped and the sky darkened. She went out, opened the door to the barn, and put out leftover rabbit, venison, cheese, and bread.
"It's going to snow," Hedron said. She could barely see him in the gloom.
"I know." She pulled her jacket tighter, shaking. Her bones itched, hot and cold at the same time.
"This looks good."
"There are a lot of them about today."
"You're safe enough. I'm not far. You should go inside, though. You're cold."
"I'm going. I don't feel too good. What about you?"
"I've got things to do. But Chancery?" He waited until she was looking right at him. "Don't worry. Okay? No matter what happens. I'll be close."
"Okay."
She headed back to the house. When she reached the tiny road between the house and the farm she looked back and stuffed her knuckles in her mouth at the sight of him. His head was hidden beneath a seething, roiling mass of grey like stormclouds made of corpse skin. Her marrow fizzed and her skin prickled and stung. Her eyes smarted as if she were chopping onions.
"Go inside," he called, and his voice was sterner than she had ever heard it. It frightened and reassured her, both at the same time.
***
The snow came, fat flakes drifting until the wind picked up and sent wild flurries careening through the sky. Chancery settled down by the range, listing her supplies and flicking through recipe books. She wanted to be overflowing with so many ideas she didn't know what to try first. The ideas were there, spinning and whirling like the snow, but she couldn't tame them because Kay's scalding anger and betrayal kept forcing their way to the front of her thoughts.
Kay didn't believe in Hedron; hadn't asked why Chancery was so thin when she cooked so much. How could Chancery convince her? Hedron looks after me. He loves me. He looks after you, too, when you visit, because I asked him to.
That would just make Kay angry again. She should have asked Hedron what to say.
When did Kay start turning into people?
She was still worrying at it when an engine coughed, popping in her chest. Flustered, she tried to focus on making some dinner because it was that or run away and hide. She'd got as far as jointing the pheasant when Skook began barking out in the yard. She went to the door. He was bouncing around in the headlights, saliva flying from his teeth.
"Come!"
With a shake of his head, he ran over and pushed her back inside. She closed the door. He stood on his hind paws at the sink to stare out the window.
"Chance? It's freezing!"
"Skook, sit." He lowered his hindquarters until they barely touched the floor, growling. "Okay."
Kay came in, stamping to get the snow off. "My god, that weather. Did you know there are Walkers out there?"
"Where else would they be?"
"This many, though?"
Chancery shrugged.
"Hi, Skook." Kay reached to pet him and he snapped at her, teeth missing her hand by a careful inch. "If he's aggressive like that back home, they'll have him destroyed."
Chancery's fingers tightened around his scruff.
"I'm sure he'll be all right," Kay said, then, "We have to leave tonight."
Chancery shook her head. She had no idea what to say other than, "I can't."
"Chance, Rob Walked. You have to come."
Hedron hadn't said anything about that.
"I can't." It was hopelessly inadequate.
Kay was silent for a moment. There were no lines or curves on her face. "Fine. It's okay. Really. I just need to get something from the jeep."
An icy gust barrelled into the kitchen when Kay went out. Chancery rubbed Skook's ears, tense.
The door opened again, snow shredding the air. Skook barked, deep and angry, and there was a tremendous crack. In the confines of the kitchen, the gunshot was deafening, stunning, a sledgehammer to the head. Chancery's ears sang against silencing numbness as she stared at Skook lying on the floor with metallic crimson matting his fur.
Someone grabbed her. She heard hollow burbling, water gurgling in distant pipes.
She was hoisted into the air. She screamed. She kicked. She pummelled with her fists and when someone tried to pin her she scratched and bit. She was released and tried to run but was grabbed again and bundled to the floor. Sharp pain lanced through her leg and she cried out. Someone knelt on her shins and someone else held her hands way above her head, making her shoulders hurt. The sound of sticky tearing preceded constriction around her wrists and ankles. Fire licked her bones.
Something like a wasp sting jabbed into her arm, then she was drowning in liquid dark, Hedron's name tangled around her tongue.
***
Chancery was sick. It wasn't helped by the sinuous rise and fall of the boat underneath her. She assumed it was a boat—it smelled like one.
"I'm sorry."
Chancery turned towards the wall, not wanting to see her.
"The world needs you. It's selfish to stay where you were."
Chancery's bones were baking. It wouldn't be long now. There had been no sign of Hedron since she woke up.
"I'm sorry about Skook, I really am."
She didn't sound sorry, but Chancery didn't know what sorry sounded like. Never had.
"We'll reach Zeebrugge in a couple of days. There's a team waiting to examine you. They're not going to hurt you. They just want to take a few samples, keep you in for a few days."
"They'll kill me," Chancery said.
"Don't be silly. They just want you to help them find a way to fight the disease, that's all." She paused, then said, "Try and get some rest. Shall I bring you something to eat?" She must have realised the offer was insulting. "No. All right then."
Chancery pulled the thin blanket to her chest and squeezed it between her fingers so tightly the tendons ached. Nerves fired randomly in her legs, making her knees jerk and twitch.
Not long now.
"I did this for my daughter. Sara. She's very ill. The medical bills—” A broken, halting sob. "A cure for the Walk is worth a lot of money. I took the job for the life insurance, the Walk policy, but after I met you I couldn't…I hope one day you'll understand."
The door shut. Chancery tried to go back to sleep, knowing this wasn't a nightmare, hoping it was. A minute passed, two, and then a sound that had been familiar until five years ago: the heavy, regular, fast
thump of a helicopter.
She scrambled out of bed, fell on the floor. Her right leg wouldn't support her weight. She hobbled to the door. It was locked. There was no window.
"Hedron," she whispered. "Where are you? You said it'd be okay."
She sat in the corner, on the floor, waiting, fidgeting, rocking, burning up inside. The hands of the clock, high on the wall, swung from nine-twenty to almost ten, then voices murmured on the other side of the door. The lock clunked and a figure entered the room. It was covered in blue material, and had a square of clear plastic over its face. Another two figures, similarly clad, remained outside in the corridor.
Chancery stared. She couldn't breathe.
"Don't be afraid." His voice, thickly accented, was muffled. "My name is Doctor Marcello Martino. I need to take a blood sample, just to be sure everything is A-OK, yes? Miss Korsten tells me you survived five years without Walking. You are a very special young lady, and we will take very good care of you."
He carried a kidney dish. A blood collection kit, five tubes and a needle, rolled around in it.
She squealed.
Then she saw Hedron. He winked at her. "Don't worry," he said. "List all the things you can do with apples."
People wearing crew uniforms grabbed the two figures in the corridor. They ripped the hoods off the suits as the men inside screamed. Martino turned to see what the commotion was and someone ripped his suit, too.
Hedron bared his teeth and his eyes spat lightning. He removed his hat. It was a dark, irregular ball made of dust, cobwebs, lint, stray hair, soil, dirt, skin flakes, fish scales, leaf litter, and fly shit. It oozed hunger. His hair sprang up in a thick, woolly mass of green and white, rippling like an anemone covered in cobwebs.
He clapped his hands against his hat.
Dust exploded.
Chancery's eyes streamed, nausea making her stiff. Vertigo gnawed at her temples. Her marrow was on fire, her heart pounding so hard her ribcage shook. The doctor and his men doubled over, pink-tinged vomit splattering on the floor and filling the room with a sharp, bilious stench. Hedron grasped his hat in both hands and squeezed, wringing it like a dishcloth.
“Hedron—”
"It's okay. Stay there. Close your eyes."
"I don't feel well."
"I know. Don't worry. Do as I say."
She could not disobey that voice. She wrapped her arms over her head, quaking with fever. Minutes stretched the shivers into spasms. Screams echoed from the corridor, punctuated by dull slaps, wet meaty thuds, and occasional gunshots.
When everything fell silent, Hedron came and sat beside her. His hat was back on his head and it was spotless.
"It's okay," he said.
"I'm sick." Her teeth chattered.
"I know."
"Am I going to walk?"
He curled down to kiss her head. His voice surged inside her, a song without melody. "Ssh. Don't worry. I'm here. You're safe. Tell me all the recipes you know for liver."
***
Hours later, Hedron helped her limp onto the deck of the platform supply vessel, his hat sooty. The sky was darkening, snow drifting like ash. The control house sat five floors above the bow, bristling with antennae and radar arrays. The helicopter perched at the stern of the long, flat cargo deck, where the crew meandered in Brownian motion. They were a mile offshore. Black smoke from the harbour curled upwards against flat, grey clouds. The sea rolled in a smooth, glassy swell the colour of an approaching storm.
"What happened to Kay?" she asked.
Hedron pointed to one of the people on the deck. Chancery supposed she ought to feel sad.
But then, Kay had spoiled things. Just like Hedron said she would.
"Do you know how to drive a boat?"
He indicated the crew. "They do."
Chancery nodded. "I'm going to be okay amn't I, Hedron?"
"Of course," he said. "You've got me. I'd do anything to keep you safe." He gazed towards the horizon, beyond the foggy swirls of Haar, and showed his teeth. "Anything."
Annalee Flower Horne
http://flowerhorne.com
Seven Things Cadet Blanchard Learned From The Trade Summit Incident(Short story)
by Annalee Flower Horne
“Seven Things Cadet Blanchard Learned From The Trade Summit Incident” originally appeared in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction, Jul/Aug 2014.
To: Command Staff, Associated Planets Ship Stinson
by: Cadet-Captain DeShawna Blanchard
Re: Disciplinary Action Plan—Essay Component
SEVEN THINGS I LEARNED
FROM THE TRADE SUMMIT INCIDENT
I knew I was in trouble when the air vents in the ship’s gymnasium started farting.
Cadet-Captains Padma Rajan, Kiyan Sherazi, and I were on the pull-up bars, just after 1930 hours.
“Seven…Eight…Jesus, Blanchard, what’d you do?” Rajan said.
I caught the look on her face and sniffed the air. It smelled like a wet fart. That’s when I noticed the light puff of smoke coming from the nearest air vent.
“It wasn’t me,” I said.
Sherazi finished his set. “Someone probably programmed the MECUs to print stink bombs,” he said. “It happened a few times on my last ship. Cheap prank. You’ve pulled off way better.”
Lesson #1: The Stinson’s safety systems can tell the difference between a hazardous gas and a stink bomb, and won’t activate for the latter.
Rajan dropped to the deck. “Command’s going to come looking for you, Blanchard.”
I finished my last rep and dropped down beside her. Cadets on the track were starting to moan and pull their shirts up around their noses. “It wasn’t me,” I said again. “I mean, stink bombs? What am I, eleven?”
“I didn’t say you did it. I said they were going to come looking for you.” She glanced up at the vents, which were now emitting a steady fog of brownish smoke. “I’m guessing in about three—two—”
The gymnasium’s main hatch swished open.
Commander Sherazi entered.
The cadet nearest to her on the track skidded to a stop. “Ten-hut!”
“As you were,” she called, before we could finish coming to attention.
“Oh, that’s not a good face,” Cadet Sherazi said, under his breath. “Trust me, Blanchard, you don’t want to back-talk my mother when she has that face.”
“Cadet Blanchard,” the commander called. “Hallway. Now.” She turned around and walked out.
“—one,” Rajan said.
“Thanks, pal.” I smoothed my hair and followed the commander out.
Commander Sherazi was waiting for me in the hall.
“Cadet-Captain Blanchard, reporting as ordered, Command—”
Commander Sherazi gestured to the nearest air vent. “Do you think this is funny, Blanchard?”
Lesson 2: Stink bombs are not funny.
I resisted the urge to point out that the unparalleled record of inspired, class-one pranks I have allegedly orchestrated aboard the Stinson should put me well above suspicion for something as budget as stink bombs. However, I reserve my right to submit a formal protest at a later time. “No, sir.”
“You had better not, Cadet, because your little prank has just disrupted the trade summit.”
“Sir, I didn’t—”
“I do not want to hear it, Cadet. You think we didn’t have enough trouble with Earth’s agricorps rep dragging his heels on samples? Now we’ve had to suspend the summit entirely until we can scrub the air. I cannot believe I actually have to tell a cadet of the Associated Planets this, but you are not permitted to modify the Matter-Energy Conversion Unit code for any reason, ever. Am I understood, Cadet?”
I wanted to tell her again that I wasn’t involved. And I’d like to point out that if I had been allowed to defend myself at the time, I would not have needed to undertake the actions for which I’ve incurred this Disciplinary Action Plan. But because I am a model soldier who shows excell
ent restraint in the face of patently unfair accusations, I said instead, “Yes, sir.”
“I didn’t hear you, Cadet.”
I squared my shoulders, lifted my chin, and repeated, “Yes, sir.”
“Good,” she said. “I understand you think yourself something of a wit, Cadet, but the captain is not happy about this. You’re going to be explaining yourself to him tomorrow morning. Now change your clothes, report to the mess hall, and fix the MECU code.”
I blinked. “Fix the MECU code, sir?”
“Did I stutter, Cadet?”
“No, sir, but you did just order me not to modify the MECU code for any reason, ever.”
Lesson 3: No one likes a smartass.
Lesson 4: Ordering a cadet to use a terminal at stink bomb ground zero is not a violation of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, the Titan Conventions on the Treatment of Prisoners of War, or the United Nations Conventions on the Rights of the Child. I am not entitled to a tribunal to redress this heinous injustice.
Even though I could have fixed the code from any other terminal on the ship.
The mess hall itself didn’t smell so much like a wet fart as it did like an uncleaned lavatory in a norovirus-infested sick bay.
The commander hadn’t been on the Stinson long enough to internalize the slanderous gossip about my reputation for alleged involvement in works of staggering comic genius. But once I logged in, I could see why she had come gunning straight for me.
The malicious code had been checked into the MECU repository from my account.
I looked up the terminal ID from which I had supposedly vandalized the MECUs. It was assigned to the personal terminal in Commander Sherazi’s quarters.
My thoughts immediately went to Cadet Sherazi, talking about this happening on his last ship. I reverted the code to the previous commit, then copied the blame log onto my tablet and headed back to the gymnasium.
Cadets Rajan and Sherazi had reached the aft end of the track when I finally caught up with them. I grabbed Cadet Sherazi by the collar and yanked him behind a stack of tumbling mats.