In Constant Fear

by Peter Liney

I thought she might’ve been blind, but I didn’t bother to look too closely on account of the fact that I’d also realized something else—that was far more important: she was a non-imp.

  “Kill her,” the Boss ordered, watching me closely, as if I was being subjected to some kinda test.

  “How?” I asked, still ignoring the woman’s screams, how upset she was getting, the way she kept pleading with me.

  The Boss looked around, her eyes falling on this large rock. “Can you lift that?”

  “’Course I can,” I replied, though, actually, I wasn’t sure I could.

  “Crush her with it.”

  I wasn’t gonna let the Boss down, not at any price. All non-imps had to die, everyone knew that, and if I could impress her at the same time, all the better. The really convenient thing was that the woman couldn’t move, she was just lying on the ground already bloodied and beaten; the less convenient thing was that for some reason she still wouldn’t shut up, over and over screaming to me to save her.

  I locked my arms around the boulder, well, as best I could. It was huge and heavy, probably bigger than anything I’d lifted in my life, but I gave this almighty heave and managed to get it a few inches off the ground—however, as soon as I did, I had so much pain in one of my legs I promptly dropped it.

  I tried again, giving it my all, determined to obey and impress the Boss, but once again, as soon as I lifted it, this stab of pain shot down my leg and I had to let go.

  For sure the non-imp wasn’t helping with all her screaming; she kept begging me to remember who she was, calling out this name over and over. “Thomas!” she kept repeating, like it was s’posed to mean something to me, “Remember Thomas!”

  Having said that, something about the situation was unsettling me—probably that I was failing the Boss and she was obviously starting to get angry with me. “Do it!” she demanded. “Do it!”

  Again I tried, but it was no use, my leg simply couldn’t take the weight, and finally the Boss shoved me aside, glaring at me as if I was nothing—worse than nothing—determined to show me how it should be done.

  I’ll tell ya, that woman was really something else. She grabbed that boulder and raised it up to chest-level in one clean, smooth movement, standing there looking at me with this expression of triumph, as if we’d just completed a very long contest that she’d finally and overwhelmingly won. I mean, it was impressive—God knew how much that thing weighed. The non-imp was wailing even louder, knowing death was only seconds away, still saying all kindsa weird stuff.

  “I love you, Clancy! I love you!” she kept crying out, as if it would make a difference to me in some way.

  The Boss raised the boulder right over her head, standing there like some magnificent goddess basking in her glory, beginning to shake a little but still looking supremely confident, obviously enjoying showing me just how strong she was, greedily relishing what she was about to do.

  “I love you, Clancy!” the non-imp shrieked.

  And with that, as if it was the motivation she’d been waiting for—as if she utterly despised what the non-imp had just said, the Boss went to smash the boulder down on the weeping blind woman.

  EPILOGUE

  Like I told ya at the beginning, we never know what life has in store for us, and never more so when it comes to death.

  I don’t imagine for one moment that it occurred to Nora Jagger how close she was to hers. And what an even bigger shock it would’ve been for her to know exactly who was responsible—after all, both perpetrators were already dead.

  The first one was little Arturo, and I can’t begin to tell you how glad I was that the Mickey Mouse Kid finally got his full glass of revenge. It was an obscenity, not just that someone like him had been slain at such a young age, but the way it’d happened, picked off by hunters on the street, his body stolen for spare parts. Then again, as it turned out, he wasn’t down to live that long anyway: it was true that Arturo had an unnaturally large heart, but it wasn’t a healthy one. He had this condition called cardiomegaly, and I reckon our second perpetrator, Doctor Simon, had known all along. He must’ve been managing it for Nora Jagger without letting on, aware that if he ever disappeared, if she decided to take him out for any reason, she’d lose her medication and be liable to heart failure. Like when she was putting too much strain on that immensely strong—immensely heavy—hybrid body of hers. For example, pounding through the forest, running up hills, fighting everyone she came across, then finally, lifting insane weights just to prove she was the strongest of all.

  The amazing thing was, the moment she died—that very second she crumpled to the ground with that huge boulder falling on top of her, crushing her head the way she had so many others—I was free. Jimmy was right when he said we shoulda known. No way was she gonna leave the “turning of the key” to a third party. The Shadow-Maker was just her instrument, the actual key was the Bitch herself: those four hi-tech prosthetics, the extra implant she had inside her (one of several, apparently), together they created a kinda techno field. It was that she used to key people, and why, in an emergency, she was able to manually key me.

  No wonder she only removed those limbs in controlled conditions, like when she could store them in those special vats at Infinity. No wonder she got so furious with me that day I took one. It was her very own personal configuration, that she trusted to no one, and when she died, the field was broken. My implant stopped functioning along with everyone else’s, and I thank every god of the Universe and Time that I hadn’t gone through with what she’d ordered me to do, that I hadn’t killed the woman I love.

  It’s funny, in most of the books I’ve read, certainly in the movies I used to watch years ago back in the City, stories always had a definite ending, and usually a happy one. Well, I guess this is a happy ending, though I wouldn’t describe it as altogether definite. If this was Hollywood, maybe the beating the Bitch gave Lena would’ve resulted in her getting her sight back, waking up and seeing my wrinkled old face before her—but that didn’t happen. Lena’s finally convinced me that she’s fine the way she is. Sure, she might go to the City one day and try to change it, but with what we’ve got—the farm, our friends, that boisterous little one-year-old, and most of all, each other—she’s more than happy the way things are. And, of course, I’ve come to realize she’s right—like I told you before, she usually is.

  Sheila and the rest of the Commune talked it over with Jimmy and in the end decided not to do anything about the punishment satellite. They didn’t want any more Judgments from On High, or even to dictate what it should punish for. As far as they’re concerned it can stay up there till the day gravity finally sucks it back down. From now on they’ll work things out amongst themselves, let their notions on morality and law and order develop naturally.

  They did ask us if we wanted to stay at the Commune, but we were keen to get back to the farm. We might’ve only lived here for a short while, and for sure it’s got its limitations, but as far as we’re concerned, this smallholding is our own little plot in paradise. Nick was the only one who decided to stay at the Commune. I’m not sure why. Maybe the valley reminds him too much of Miriam. Anyways, for sure we’ll be seeing them all often enough.

  I guess it might sound odd, but we haven’t been back to the City yet. Maybe for the same reason Nick couldn’t return here? There are just too many memories. I’m sure things are better now that the Bitch is dead and her implant program over—but after everything that happened, we simply can’t bear to put it to the test. Out here our victory is complete; in the City, with all those different factions, it might end up being only partial. But still, as someone once said, “You can’t have sunshine without a few shadows.”

  Oh, there’s one other thing I gotta tell ya, that maybe reassured us a little about the City, that life there would get back to normal, something the Doc would’ve been truly delighted by.

  I know I’ve come a long way in all of this. Mostly thanks to Lena, I feel so much more confi
dent in myself, who I am, but there are still times when I can be the dumb old big guy. Though in this case, maybe the truth was, I really didn’t wanna know? I mean, those kids, Gordie and Hanna—what the hell did I think they were up to, sloping off all the time, going missing, taking long walks. They’re in love! ’Course they are, and well, lovers—irrespective of age—get up to all kindsa stuff.

  Anyways, we don’t have to worry about whether anyone else but Lena can give birth to a child anymore. It was one helluva shock, believe me. When they first told me, I gotta admit, I got really angry with them. They’re barely seventeen, for chrissake! But Lena never questioned it for a moment, a little like the way she never questioned the difference in our ages, as if all that mattered was that amongst all the terrible things that’d been going on, Love had found a way.

  How we’re gonna take care of another baby, I dunno, but I guess we’ll manage. I mean, ya do, don’t you? You have to. That’s what I mean about endings rarely being definite—there’s always that bit more. The only prediction you can confidently make about this life is that as soon as you get it all neat and tidy, someone’s gonna come along and mess it all up again.

  THE END