Sunshaker's War

by Tom Deitz

  “Uh…no,” he managed. “Lilith, maybe?”

  “Thought she was Adam’s first bride.”

  He shrugged, feeling chagrined at his ignorance of his own mythology. Now if she’d asked him about Cuchulain…

  “Maybe,” Liz said, backing the car into the muddy road and turning east.

  *

  “Well,” Big Billy announced to the world at large, “that sure is a fine mess.”

  David, who, with Liz, had joined him on the gravelly shoulder of the main highway, nodded—a gesture precisely mimicked by Little Billy. “That’s a fact,” he replied.

  He stared at the scene before him: steep, raw bank on the left crested by a file of trees where the terminus of a series of steep ridges had been sliced away to make way for the highway, the far slope pitching steeply down to the Coker Hollow road—next up the highway from Sullivan Cove. The creek flowed out of there, too, and the highway had forded it until last night. To the right was the narrow end of his pa’s bottomland, bounded to the east by the rest of the creek, and beyond by Enotah National Forest, all beneath a heavy loom of clouds that now and then let through shafts of fitful sunlight. And straight ahead was the highway, mostly invisible beneath the gleaming bulks of slow-moving vehicles.

  The road was cut all right: a ten-foot slice taken out straight across, with the thick, hard stratum of pavement visible above a base of clay and granite gravel. The vast corrugated cylinder of the displaced culvert lay crumpled and abandoned at the absolute apex of their field. As for the creek that had caused the present havoc, it was back to normal, no more than the usual foot or so deep, and David wondered once more at the amount it had taken to wash something like that out of the ground. On either side of the break, the blue-and-gray bulks of the Georgia State Patrol’s Crown Victorias (and one pursuit Mustang) blocked traffic, blue-suited patrolmen equipped with bullhorns and whistles maneuvering traffic in each direction while a dump truck emptied its second load of gravel, preparatory to inserting a fresh culvert. Liz was probably right: they’d doubtless have at least one lane open by that afternoon. He’d have to be careful, though, next time he came barreling over the hill up ahead.

  “Gosh!” Little Billy gasped. “Did that li’l creek do all that?”

  “Sho’ did,” Big Billy replied. “I tried to tell ’em when they put that there thing in that it ’uz too little, but they wouldn’t listen. I been here a long time, seen how much it can rain.”

  “Yeah,” David said, finding himself for once in agreement with his pa.

  “Good thing it didn’t happen ’fore commencement, though,” Big Billy added philosophically. “Otherwise you’d’ve been givin’ your speech to the cows and gettin’ your diploma by mail.”

  “Maybe so,” David chuckled, struck by the image of himself addressing his impassioned paean for independence to the unflappable Madame Bovary, while her new calf, Voltaire, looked on. “Or maybe they could have worked up some kinda satellite link, or something. Video cameras here feedin’ into the high school. Diplomas comin’ in by fax machine.”

  “We don’t have a facts machine,” Little Billy observed.

  “No, but we have a fact machine,” David told him. “One ’bout three feet tall and blond-headed!”

  “That’s a fact,” Big Billy put in, and David started, surprised at his pa’s joke. Odd, he thought, how the weather made everybody else irritable and left Big Billy alone. Or maybe they’d just all sunk to his level of grumpiness and he felt less outclassed now.

  “Gonna be a bitch come Monday, though,” Big Billy went on. “They don’t have that thing fixed by then we’ll have to go to Helen to pick up groceries.”

  “I’ll go if you like,” David volunteered quickly. “If I can’t get to MacTyrie I won’t have anything else to do.” And besides, he added to himself, it’d keep him out of the house and out from underfoot. The first day of summer vacation stuck on Sullivan Cove with his rascal brother, his moody ma, and his sweat-of-the-brow-raised pa, was not a notion he relished.

  “Maybe so,” Big Billy grunted. “Reckon we oughta get on home. Reckon I might even apologize to the old lady.”

  “Might be a good idea,” David acknowledged, exchanging expressions of relief with Liz, who took his hand and started back to the car she had parked at the end of the road.

  They had almost reached it when he became aware of a subtle variance in the steady drone of traffic that had been turning around behind him: something beyond the idle of engines and the crunch of tires and the occasional squeal of an overstressed power steering pump. He frowned, then recognized it as the sound of a motorcycle—a big one, thumping expertly through the maze. He stopped in place, searching, and found it: a Bimmer R 80 G/S, shiny and black, headlight on, as was the law in Georgia. Not new, but still impressive. He stared at it appreciatively, and turned to go, sparing the merest glance toward the rider: a muscular fellow in black helmet, black leather jacket, jeans, and Frye boots. But as Liz tugged his hand gently onward, he heard the cycle’s engine gunned, and turned again—just as it ground to a halt behind him. Already wired (he was always that way now) David tensed, ready to assault the cyclist with some scathing remark.

  And caught himself just in time. There was something familiar about that grin, about the blaze of perfect white teeth and full lips above a square-cut chin. And then he figured it out: that skin was ruddier than it ought to be, and the cheekbones a tad wider.

  He squinted through the visor, then caught the glint of a beaded necklace above the jacket collar and the gold stooping falcon pins that decorated either lapel.

  “Calvin!” he cried, dropping Liz’s hand and rushing forward. “Hey, folks, it’s Calvin!”

  They stopped in place, turned and began to approach: Liz calmly, Big Billy at his usual saunter, Little Billy at a full-tilt run.

  “Long time no see, Kemo Sabe,” was all Calvin could get out before Little Billy was tugging on his leg. “Hey, Thunder-kitten,” the Indian added, removing his helmet. He reached over to rub the small boy’s hair. It was a reference to Little Billy’s favorite TV show of the previous summer.

  “Awww, that’s old stuff,” Little Billy piped. “It’s Ninja Turtles now!”

  “Oh yeah,” Calvin said quickly. “Those are the guys with the Italian names, right? Hope they don’t have one named Caravaggio. “

  “Huh?” wondered the Brothers Sullivan as one.

  “He liked little boys,” Calvin mouthed to David over Little Billy’s head.

  “Oh,” David mouthed back, then; “Hey squirt, why don’t you take off and let me and Mr. Fargo catch up and all, we’ll be along, don’t worry—that is,” he said, “if you’re up for lunch at the old home place.”

  “Always!” Calvin cried.

  David aimed a kick at his brother’s backside. “Now scat, kid.”

  “Awwww, Davy!”

  “I said scat!”

  Calvin raised an eyebrow, and then neither of them could hold back any longer. A quick high-five ensued, followed by a hearty, brotherly hug made awkward by the fact that Calvin was still astride the cycle. “So how’s it goin’, man?” he asked, shaking out his mane of black hair—longer now than when David had last seen it. There was an ear stud too: another falcon.

  “Let me guess, you need a bed, a bath…”

  “All of the above,” Calvin chuckled. “But more to the point I need to talk to you.”

  “Any particular reason?”

  “Good things and bad things.”

  “Give me the good first.”

  “No, he has to give me a hug first,” Liz inserted, joining them.

  “Glad to oblige.” Calvin grinned. “And I’ll give you a better one once we get to Dave’s house.”

  “You said something about good and bad things…”David supplied. He loved Calvin like a brother, but he didn’t quite trust him around Liz yet, even though he supposedly had a girlfriend, the never-seen Sandy.

  “Oh, yeah, right,” Calvin laughed, rele
asing Liz. “Good things first, I guess: I need some ideas about a wedding present for G-Man.”

  “You came over here to ask me that?”

  “I came over here ’cause I got some real disturbing news last night—or this morning, or sometime. Stuff that I need to bust tail on.”

  “Sounds serious.”

  “It is,” Calvin affirmed. “But not so serious I can’t spare sometime for lunch,” he added, eyes twinkling. “We can rap till then.”

  “Well that settles one thing,” Liz said. “I’m certainly gonna hang around a while longer now!”

  “I hope so,” Calvin replied, once more grinning at her.

  “Your bike?” David asked, to change the subject. Calvin shook his head sadly. “Sandy’s. But let’s not stand here blockin’ traffic. Hop on and I’ll give you a ride.”

  David hesitated, glanced at Liz.

  She shrugged. “Go ahead. I think I know the way on my own. And I know how much you like wheels.”

  “I think you can make it part way up the drive now,” David said. “Just park where you can.”

  “I’ve got a brain, David! And eyes!”

  David rolled his eyes at Calvin and climbed on behind him, while Liz returned to her car and began turning around.

  “So,” David wondered as Calvin trundled off, “where’d you come from all of a sudden?” He paused, wrinkled his nose; then chuckled. “No, let me guess: from Our Lady of the Smokies?”

  Calvin’s stubby nose wrinkled as he sniffed. “Damn! Thought she scrubbed all that off me ’fore I left. God knows she like to have scrubbed nearly everything else off—what she didn’t wear off other ways!”

  David giggled and wondered when he’d get to meet Calvin’s squeeze. Thus far all he’d seen was a fuzzy wallet photo of a pretty, though rather hippie-looking lady.

  And then he had no more time to wonder, for Calvin was wheelstanding down the Sullivan Cove road.

  *

  “Well,” David announced a few minutes later, when he, Calvin, and Liz were ensconced in his bedroom, “welcome to Georgia!”

  He was reclining on his elbow on one of the flanking twin beds while Liz sat on the floor beside him and Calvin eased his feet out of the boots and white socks. The Indian wiggled his toes blissfully. “New shoes,” he offered by way of explanation. “Birthday present from…”

  “I bet I know,” David laughed. “But what about this trouble?”

  “Well,” Calvin began, “I guess you know I’ve been kinda out of touch lately, ’specially since Christmas, but the fact is, it’s not really my fault. I’ve been spendin’ time in Galunlati. You remember Uki said I could visit, so I’ve been goin’ every chance I get.” He fished in his pocket and brought out an uktena scale. “I burn one of these to get there, and he gives me a new one every time I come back. It hurts like hell to transit, though; and I don’t much like to do it unless I have to, or can stay a long time. In the meanwhile, I’ve been livin’ with the woman I told you about.”

  “Sandy,” Liz supplied.

  “Yeah,” Calvin went on. “I’ve told her about all this stuff we’re involved in, the Worlds, and all. And she, being a physics teacher, has been tryin’ to figure it all out rationally. But anyway, I’ve been kinda keepin’ tabs on what’s goin’ on over here too, I…”

  “You’ve heard about the shitty weather then?” David interrupted.

  Calvin nodded grimly. “That’s why I’m here, partly.”

  And with that he told them about his most recent visit to Galunlati.

  “Whew,” David said when he had finished. “So what’s the worst-case scenario?”

  Calvin shrugged. “Well, Uki seems to be afraid Galunlati’ll be destroyed, and that would affect things here. But I think maybe the worst thing is that the sun itself could get unbalanced someway.”

  “Like go nova, maybe? You’ve gotta be kidding?”

  “No, but it’s apparently tied up with the Tracks somehow. Sandy thinks they’re some kind of inter-dimensional manifestation of gravity. But apparently something’s been drawin’ on the power of the Tracks, and that’s been causin’ all kinds of trouble over there. I needn’t tell you how precarious the specs are that keep this place habitable.”

  “Good point.”

  “Yeah. I mean in Galunlati, which was apparently made in some way, they moved the world nine times before they got it right—course the folks there thought it was the sun was moved, but you get my drift. It’s no big deal here—yet; Faerie and Galunlati are both fragment worlds and more or less depend on ours to keep together. But they’re also more susceptible to disturbances at a cosmic level. It’s like gravity: it doesn’t take as much to perturb the orbit of a small object as it does a big ’un.”

  “And Galunlati’s a small object, relative to us, right?” David wondered, trying very hard to grasp the complex concepts.

  “Right. But still if anything happened to it—or Faerie…”

  “It might upset the balance here.”

  Calvin nodded emphatically. “Right!”

  David shook his head. “Where’d you learn all this, anyway?”

  “Books, Uki, Sandy, common sense, you name it.” He paused. “I don’t reckon you have any ideas?”

  David shifted position. “As a matter of fact I do.”

  He briefed Calvin then, about his dreams, the war, his theories about it.

  “God!” Calvin said, standing up and pacing the space between the beds. “Yeah, it all makes sense now. And it really is critical that we find out what’s goin’ on over there.”

  “I’d thought about tryin’ to stop it, if I can,” David said slowly. “Had the idea anyway, though I’m damned if I’ve got any notion how. I mean, how do you stop a war, man?”

  “Like I told you, David,” Liz inserted. “One man at a time, and one side.”

  “Easy to say, hard to do.”

  “But at least we agree on the first step.”

  “Right,” Calvin said. “Soon as lunch’s over we bop over to see Mr. McLean.”

  “There’s one minor problem with that,” David noted.

  “Oh?”

  “Road’s out twixt here and there.”

  “Is that all?” Calvin laughed. “No problem, long as I got the bike.” His gaze fell on Liz. “Only holds two, though.”

  Liz grimaced resignedly. “I guess I’ll just have to trust you guys then, and it’s probably just as well. At least maybe I can get some studying done this way.”

  David’s eyes narrowed. “I thought you left your books in Gainesville.”

  “I did,” Liz replied. “But not my notebooks.”

  “You’re not leavin’, then?” David inquired hopefully.

  “Not yet, foolish boy! Do you think I’d run off with something like this going on? But I really do need to study, and somebody probably ought to tell your folks what’s going on. Uncle Dale too.”

  “You got it.”

  “What I’ve got,” David said, “is a case of the hungries! Let’s go see if ma’s got lunch ready, then boogie. I’ll give old Alec a call and tell him I’m comin’ over, just not why, or with whom.”

  Calvin looked briefly worried. “He is okay, isn’t he?”

  “More or less. Still pining for Eva some. I think he’s finally decided he likes you, though—if that’s what you were worried about.”

  “Well that’s a relief,” Calvin said, and then JoAnne called them to lunch.

  Chapter X: Eavesdropping

  (near MacTyrie, Georgia—Saturday, June 14—2:30 P.M.)

  Lord, get me outta this with my head on frontwards and my skin intact, David was praying with surprising fervor for an adolescent agnostic as Calvin laid the Bimmer far over to negotiate the last sharp turn on the MacTyrie mountain at what David knew with absolute certainty was preposterously more than legal speed. He tightened his grip on the Indian’s leather jacket and closed his eyes, as his body tilted in sync with his friend’s. Use the Force, Luke, he thought, as gravel
brushed his left cuff. He had, he decided ruefully, a certain amount more sympathy for Alec, whom he had terrorized with his own brand of motorized mayhem since he was a highly illegal fourteen.

  The bike straightened abruptly, and he heaved a sigh of relief and opened his eyes once more, certain he’d heard Calvin chuckle. At least they were almost to their destination.

  And at least it was not—for the moment—raining, though David suspected that he might arrive pretty damp anyway, either from perspiration, or maybe from peeing in his pants from sheer terror.

  A wayward June bug found its way around Calvin’s head and thwacked David smartly on the upper lip; its mate smeared itself across his face plate. He flinched, swore softly, and blinked back tears. When he could see again, they were on a straight, and Calvin was really winding the cycle out.

  Moses, save me. David gritted his teeth and hung on.

  Over the MacTyrie bridge (eyes closed again), around a final series of blessedly more gradual curves, and MacTyrie loomed before them. Just inside the city limits they turned left onto Alec’s street, then right into his drive. Calvin cut the engine and walked the cycle the last few yards out of courtesy to Dr. McLean’s usual afternoon nap. David climbed off shakily and checked his watch as casually as he could. At least his britches were still dry.

  The watch read 2:35 P.M., which meant they had made the journey in eighteen minutes and thirty-six seconds—a new record. And they could probably have made it even faster had not the main road been out. Instead of turning down the Sullivan Cove road and then onto the main drag—and into the trickling traffic—Calvin had turned left at the bottom of the driveway, then cut through the church environs. From there it had been a short jog overland, following the trail into Coker Hollow, where they’d jumped the creek and cut into the main highway above the break. Traffic had been heavy at first, but Calvin had proven expert at weaving in and out of it, using the shoulder when necessary, but with absolutely no regard for David’s nerves, which were as shot as they’d ever been.

  As if sensing David’s distress Calvin turned and grinned at him. “You okay, man? You look a little pale even for a paleface. Or is that maybe a touch of green?” The grin widened wickedly.