The Cloud Atlas

by David Mitchell

  At first, he tried to summarize the briefing he'd received, but I interrupted him with so many questions that he finally gave up and handed his top secret briefing packet to me. He put a finger to his lips, as if to say “shh,” and then raised his thumb. He didn't have to draw it across my throat, or his. I began reading.

  Evidence of Japan 's germ weapons program was arriving from an increasing number of credible sources, the report said, even as the information relayed was becoming increasingly incredible. A highly specialized and extremely secretive Japanese army medical corps named Unit 731 had set up shop-factories, really-in Manchuria, where they were conducting horrifying experiments on local peasants, as well as whomever else they might come upon-White Russians, Koreans, Gypsies, missionaries. Men's chests were split open and their organs removed while they were still alive. Limbs of men, women, even infants were frozen, then beaten or thawed and refrozen to examine the process of frostbite.

  The authors of Gurley's report, however, were not worried about frostbite.

  There had been reports from a Chinese informer that Unit 731 was experimenting with germ warfare. Typhoid, cholera, plague, syphilis, and anthrax were injected into patients and the results examined: depending on the disease, body parts might turn black, hands fall off. The informer swore he had seen this. And more: prisoners had been taken to a remote area and staked to the ground in a great circle. A specially modified tank had driven to the middle of the circle and begun… spraying.

  There was also an active breeding program of rats and fleas; the fleas were infected with disease, the rats infested with the fleas. It was thought that these fleas, or possibly gnats and even mosquitoes, were candidates for balloon travel, to be sent aloft in special porcelain canisters that-

  “Did you get to the part about the fleas?” Gurley shouted at me. I nodded. “Fleas!” he repeated.

  “Rats,” I said, for lack of a better response.

  “Yes, well, rats” Gurley said. “Now, there's a troublesome threat,” he added. He grabbed the papers back from me. “It's bad enough I get saddled with balloons, while other men are off battling warships or rockets or desert armies. But now I find I am enlisted to fight fleas.”

  “This unit-sir-dissecting men alive? Babies?” I stared at the papers in his lap.

  “If they airdrop lunatic doctors,” Gurley said, “then yes, we will have something to fear. Even more than we would have to fear from our own medical staff-”

  “Sir, I-” I was surprised to find myself interrupting; I usually let Gurley babble on. But I really was afraid now, a different kind of fear than I had ever felt in bomb disposal school or ever since. I'd always seen my death as a bright, sudden event-an explosion-but what Gurley's briefing papers promised was something much more slow and gruesome.

  “Yes?” Gurley asked, less annoyed than I thought he might be.

  But I didn't really have anything to say. I had just wanted him to shut up; I had wanted him to let me sit and think through everything I'd just read; I had wanted him to ask me where I'd been the night before, so I could tell him With Lily, before you, even if it was just for dinner and talk of ghosts. I wondered now: Had Lily told him, too, that she was leaving?

  I didn't answer Gurley. I stared down at my hands, rubbed my palms together, imagined first the one and then the other swelling, rotting, turning black and falling away.

  Gurley watched me for a moment before he spoke. “You have a question.” I must have looked surprised, because he added, “I know- it's this gift I have. I'm a mind reader. Otherwise, I don't know how I'd figure out what lay behind that impenetrable countenance of yours.”

  “Sir,” I began again, having missed most of what Gurley had just said. His using words over two syllables was usually a clear cue to tune out. But the term mind reader had stuck. And Gurley saw it. I don't know how much he saw, whether he saw Lily and I, last night's meeting or the nights before, saw us almost holding hands, saw her smiling only for me (I was sure), but he saw Lily inside me clearly enough. I panicked, and stayed panicked, even when he started smiling.

  “Ah,” Gurley said. “How soon I forget. We have a mind reader in common, do we not?” He feigned being interrupted by a private and quite enjoyable memory, or perhaps actually had one. Then he focused on me again. “Is this our boy-becomes-a-man talk? I should have known. A lad goes off to war, and-did your father sit you down before you left, young Sergeant?”

  “Sir, I-”

  “Oh, yes, yes-no father, no mother, a bastard raised by nuns. Delightful. Though they couldn't be counted on to-well, now, could they? Mmm… there's a thought.” He must have seen my impenetrable face opening to anger, because he stopped. “So,” he said. “Lily: What's your question?”

  I waited, too long, before I spoke. “That's not my question,” I said, and it hadn't been, though now I wasn't sure. I tried pushing Lily out of my head. She wouldn't go, but I pressed on. “I wanted to know why we're flying all the way to Wyoming. Why not some guys out of Denver? Or San Francisco?”

  “Or perhaps Paris -or Cairo,” Gurley said. “Why not just sit back and let the other boys do our job? Steal our medals. Win our war.” He drew himself up as best he could in the seat restraints. “Because, Belk. That's why. Because, one, as I told you, volunteers were few and far between at the meeting yesterday. While they fret over what to do, we've got the chance to leap ahead and seize the initiative in what may turn out to be the most important campaign of the war. I make fun of their fleas, but make no mistake, if that report is even ten percent right, it won't matter who wins in the Pacific-all those GIs will return home to stinking corpses strewn across the prairie.” I turned away, and he elbowed me so I'd turn back. “Because, two, there's already been a story published, so the potential for further fuckups is pretty high. With bacteria-encrusted bombs on the way, there's no question now of disposing with the ban. This must be kept secret.” Now he sank back. “And because, three, any chance to leave our fucking frozen Xanadu for warmer locales, even late winter Wyoming, is a chance we take.” He closed his eyes. “Really, Belk.”

  I sat back, too, and thought about making a mistake when I handled our next bomb. Our next normal one. It wasn't the first time I'd thought this, but the reason for the mistake was changing. Early on in Alaska, I'd spent some long, lonely days daydreaming about-well, blowing myself up. Maybe doing it in such a way that I'd only be injured-lose a foot maybe, a finger or two. But you couldn't count on that. It was a safer bet to try to kill yourself outright.

  But lately, I'd begun to think about Gurley.

  “About the mind reader, though,” Gurley said after a few minutes, eyes still closed, and then added, “Lily is a lovely girl.” He waited. “Mmm?” I nodded, realized he couldn't see me nodding, and then grunted in agreement. I wasn't sure what would come out if I opened my mouth. “But you do realize,” he said, opening his eyes to catch mine, and then closing them again, “that she's a-that she's a busy woman. A businesswoman, in point of fact.”

  “Yes,” I said. I wiped my palms on my knees.

  “I'm just saying, don't grow too attached. Not that you have. It may seem like they're only six girls in all Anchorage, but there's more coming, all the time.”

  Now I closed my eyes and leaned back. Not to go to sleep, but just to escape, somehow: the conversation, the plane, the mission, Gurley. I opened them when Gurley tapped me on the chest. I found him leaning as close to me as he could. “I guess what I'm saying is, just between you and me, I have a unique fondness for our mutual friend. And I'm thinking of-how shall I put it?-taking her off the market. For the duration, at least. Not sure I can see her back East, let alone Princeton, but then, I'm not sure I can see myself there anymore, either.”

  “You're going to get… married?” I asked.

  He looked at me. “In a gold carriage pulled by four white horses. You'll be a ringbearer, or flower girl.” He rubbed his forehead. “Jesus, Belk. If you were about ten years older and a hundred years more m
ature, we could manage a conversation on this topic. As it is, I don't know what's going to happen. And I don't want this to get around- but, yes, I have a soft spot for the girl. I care for her, and would like to take care of her.” He looked up toward the cockpit. “Which is why I want to take care of this mess, as quickly as possible.”

  “Have you told her this?” I asked, probably sounding a bit too desperate. Why hadn't she told me this? Or was this why she was leaving Anchorage? To escape Gurley? Or elope with him?

  “Yes,” he said, and thought for a moment. “Yes, I have. Which is the war's biggest surprise so far, Belk, if you're keeping track-bigger than Pearl Harbor, bigger than balloons and bigger than fleas. If you'd have told me before I enlisted that I'd return from the war with an Eskimo bride, tall enough to look me in the eye and-have you ever noticed, Belk? She has the most remarkable eyes. Jet black, almost. You look in those eyes, you're liable to forget your name, the date. And legs like- well, suffice to say, she's not the type you meet over punch at the Vassar mixer.” He pulled himself up. “Of course, I understand your meetings don't give you the opportunity to learn such details. She tells me you just consult her for palm readings.” He delivered this as both statement and question.

  But I was thunderstruck that Lily had told him about me. She and I were the only ones with secrets. “She told you?”

  “Don't be embarrassed, Belk,” Gurley said. “Or do be-I'm sure the nuns back home would be horrified. I, for one, find your interest in astrology or whatever it is… affecting. A trifle immature, but harmless.” I heard in that harmless a word of warning, and one look at his face told me I'd heard right. Then he broke into an almost giddy smile and dove into his satchel of papers again. I tensed for what terror would emerge this time: perhaps blue foxes gone rabid. Maybe Lily herself.

  “All right, all right,” he said, needlessly looking around to see if anyone was watching, and then handed a torn piece of newsprint to me. “Now, I'd always fancied myself the kind of suitor who'd stride down Fifth Avenue to Tiffany's for the robin's-egg-blue box, but-” He stopped. “You have no idea what I'm talking about.” I didn't, but I wasn't listening, either: he'd handed me an ad for an engagement ring. “I went by, you know. You'd think it's just a little small-town glitter shop, but the man's an old pro. Gets his gold from right here in Alaska, diamonds from wholesalers back East. Once he realized I wasn't the same sort of army rube he's used to getting, he took me in back-you know, the pieces reserved for special customers.” The ad showed a gaudy diamond ring on a hand with long, delicate fingers that looked nothing like Lily's.

  “Will she-” marry you? is, what I wanted to ask, but only the first two words come out.

  Gurley took the clipping back. “Wear it? I know what you're thinking. Not that type of girl. Not for her, china and lace. But here's a secret, Belk: they all like pretty things. Hell, the Indians sold Manhattan for a bag of beads. And the rings I'm considering. Well.” He returned the ad to his satchel, paused a moment, and then drew out a single sheet of paper. “That's not the problem. But Alaska – Alaska is. I'm not sure she'd leave. I have the loveliest spot picked out, too. Some land, north of San Francisco. Hillside, overlooking the ocean. Found it when I did a brief tour at the Presidio. But Alaska has this hold on her.” He looked absently at the sheet he'd pulled out. I couldn't read what was on it. “And I don't know-I don't know if I could make it here. After the war.” He tapped his leg. “They've civilized Anchorage, Juneau, Fairbanks, a few other spots, but she's no city girl. She'd want to be out-in the bush, on the tundra. I don't know, Belk.” He finally handed the paper to me, but I didn't look at it immediately-I was fascinated with his face. Gurley, who ruled all, was betraying an honest sense of longing. Even regret.

  I was sure I knew why. It wasn't Lily he'd miss. No, he'd stay in Alaska, in the bush, but forever be isolated from his old world. His Princeton classmates. Their clubs. A night at the theater. The opera. Museums. He was displaying a prissy softness, and I looked down, embarrassed for him. The sheet he'd handed me was titled “Germ Warfare Balloon Protocol.” But I was so surprised by what he said next that I looked back up at him.

  “It's not safe, Belk. When the war's over and the shooting stops, the world, most of it, will be safe. Safer. That's what we're fighting for, right? Al of us? But Alaska, after the war? It will be as dangerous as it always was. And if you lived here, you'd be fighting along, alone, you versus the weather, wildlife, the wild. Fights you can't win. Not with one leg. Not with two hands trained for banking or books.” He rubbed his face and then stared straight ahead, an old man of twenty-five. “It's just so easy to die up there.”

  GERM WARFARE BALLOON PROTOCOL

  Fourth Air Force

  The Presidio

  San Francisco

  To summarize, intelligence reports received now indicate the likelihood if not certainty that future Japanese Army balloon bombs will carry bacteriological warfare payloads. Until the first such payload is identified and more is learned, these procedures must be followed:

  1. The media blackout must remain total. The mere suggestion of alien germs breaching the nation's borders could cause panic, causing civilians to overwhelm civil and medical authorities.

  2. Emergency mass quarantine plans should be reviewed and updated, and should include protocols for the use of deadly force, particularly in areas of military significance. Significant transportation throughpoints, such as highways, bridges, and train stations, should be evaluated for purposes of securing them, or, as a last, but not implausible resort, their destruction.

  3. State and county agricultural agents should monitor livestock and crops for trends and vulnerabilities. A separate, detailed bulletin is being prepared for veterinary authorities.

  4.

  * * *

  WHAT REMAINED OF the Kirby balloon was heaped in a corner of a truck bed.

  It was dirty and gray with stiff folds, and had all the appearance- to me, as I think of it now-of a roadside heap of late winter snow. Along with the balloon was a pie-sized piece of metal that I recognized as the balloon's gas relief valve. Also present was the control frame, seemingly intact. The incendiary and antipersonnel bombs were gone (over the Pacific, one hoped, and not in some farmer's field-or the cab of the truck), and the demolition block was nowhere to be seen. But these all seemed like ancient and simpleminded fears now. So a bomb explodes. So someone loses a limb or dies. Show me the canister where the rats live. Show me the fleas that have carried the plague thousands of miles, across the ocean from Japan and across the centuries from the Middle Ages.

  We'd landed on an empty road leading into town and had taxied into a field adjoining a small farmhouse. Within minutes, everyone was there: the widow from the farmhouse, the man whose truck now held the balloon-Will McDermott, the apparent sheriff-and lastly, via bicycle, the AP stringer, Samuel Leavit. Gurley dismissed the widow, scowled at Leavit, and finally settled on McDermott.

  McDermott had raised his right hand in greeting, but it was his left arm that had caught my eye. A gentle breeze had picked up his empty left sleeve, causing it to flap momentarily back to life. I had seen Gurley take note and relax. A man he could do business with.

  “That's an entrance,” McDermott said, nodding to the plane.

  “Wasn't my choice of landing spots,” Gurley said. “But you know- pilots.”

  The man's face darkened a bit. “I do. I am one. Was one.”

  “I'm sorry,” I blurted out.

  Gurley winced and then turned to McDermott. “You're the sheriff?”

  “Sheriff's somewhere in the Pacific,” McDermott said. “I'm the man with the sheriff's truck. But I've got what you need.”

  This is the point when he'd led us around to the back of the truck. Gurley and I had exchanged a quick glance. We'd left the germ warfare gear in the plane, assuming that we'd be led to the balloon after meeting with the local authorities. Instead, we'd had it delivered. We watched the sheriff and stringer wander back a
round. There was nothing we could do but follow. Gurley went first, and I watched the back of his head as he walked. The officer defuses the bomb.

  “Now this,” McDermott said, reaching for the control frame, “this I don't get at all.”

  “Don't!” I shouted. Gurley looked at me, furious one moment and anxious the next.

  McDermott toppled back like he'd been shot, and then relaxed, straightened up. “Easy on me, Sergeant,” he said. “I don't take too well to sudden noises nowadays, not that I ever did.”

  He looked carefully at both of us, and read too much in our faces. “This isn't a weather balloon.”

  “Yeah,” said Leavit. “Why's the Army need to know the weather in Wyoming?”

  “Back off, AP,” Gurley growled.

  “What's going on?” Leavit asked. “This is big.”

  It was, especially for me. My first performance in front of Gurley. And civilians. And germs. Now that I make my living as a priest, it would be nice to look back on moments such as this and remember how a sudden burst of prayer powered me through. But it didn't happen that way. Nothing happened. I simply took a deep breath, and then held it, suddenly worried I'd already breathed in some deadly germ. I twitched the tiniest bit when Lily's face flashed in my mind, but then it was gone, and I swung up into the truck bed. I could take care of this. Somehow.

  “Careful, Sergeant,” Gurley said, and with that, I knew he was willing to play along. Probably because the primary risk so far was me blowing some part of my body off.

  “Should I get the-” I looked at Gurley and nodded toward the plane. Gurley looked back at me, struggling to keep a perfectly blank look on his face, but still making his response perfectly clear: we'll not be hauling out a giant crate marked with a skull and crossbones, and then donning gas masks and suits in front of a reporter.