Wandering Soul

by Steven Anderson

  “Who did this to me?”

  “Don’t know his name, or much else about him. We found what was left of him up on one of the rooftops. A pack of dogs had gotten to him and ripped him up quite a bit. I guess the critters didn’t like the sound of gunfire. Or maybe they’re on your side now too.” He smiled at me again, like it was absurd.

  “They are,” I assured him. “Those dogs have to keep me safe. I haven’t had my babies yet.”

  “Oh, is that what it was?” He nodded, the gentle smile making the dragon look less fierce.

  “Yep, that’s exactly what it was.” I closed my eyes and slept a little bit more.

  Cuza was still there when I forced them open again. “What day is it?”

  “The sun will be rising on a beautiful Saturday morning in an hour or so. Why? You got somewhere to be?”

  “It was Thursday. Sam leaves… tomorrow. I lost a day with him. Is he still here? Still in the Mission?”

  “Where else would he be?”

  “I want to see him. And Winona, where’s my Winona?” My heart was pounding hard in my ears.

  He tapped something on the screen behind me and I was suddenly sleepy again, dizziness starting to overtake me.

  “Cuza! Really?”

  “Sammy was up past midnight sitting here with you. Let him rest. Winona and your folks are in Eindhoven with the Clan leadership. Big meeting later this morning, so I’m told.”

  I rolled my head over and looked at the thing on my shoulder that was knitting me back together. “Want to get up now. Eat waffles.”

  “I know you do. Sleep a bit more first.”

  “Oh, fine.” I closed my eyes and went looking for Sam. I found him, not too far away, dreaming about being lost in a big house full of dark corridors and stairs that descended into blackness where there was only fear. I took his hand and together we changed the dream, opening windows and letting in the sun.

  I woke to the feeling of fingers gently moving the hair away from my forehead. I smiled and waited for the kiss that I knew would follow. Nothing. I opened my eyes a slit. No Sam, only Cuza and an older woman with her gray hair tired back, nose to nose with me.

  “Ah, there she is. Feeling better without that cuff on I suspect.”

  I looked at my left shoulder. There was a pink area two or three centimeters across near my armpit, but no hole, no blood. I turned back to Cuza, feeling sudden panic. “What day is today?”

  “Saturday. Almost 1300.”

  “Is it the same Saturday as the Saturday it was last time that it was Saturday?”

  “Cuza, what were you thinking dialing her up so high? It’s a wonder I was able to wake her up today at all. Now listen to her.”

  Cuza looked embarrassed. “But, Doc, she needed a good long sleep. It’s hard the first time you get shot, scary even, not knowin’ that you’ll be OK.”

  I was looking back and forth between them, feeling empty and panicky. I couldn’t feel Sam or Winona, or my parents.

  “You let him leave! I was asleep for a week and you just let him leave without me having a chance to say goodbye.” Tears started and I wasn’t sure if they’d ever stop.

  Understanding came into Cuza’s eyes. “Same Saturday, Little Soul. Peace. It’s only been a few hours. Sammy’s in Eindhoven with your parents. Hannah called and asked for him, so of course he had to go.” Cuza smiled at the doctor. “Young lovers.”

  She gave him a sideways grin before turning back to me. “How did you know he was gone?”

  I was awake enough now to just shrug. “If he was still in the Mission, he’d be here with me.” In the back of my mind, I was furious with him. Hannah had called, so of course he went to her, leaving me to die in the infirmary.

  She patted my arm. “You should get up and dressed now. Get something to eat, you’ll feel better. I have some exercises for you to do that will help you get the strength back in that joint.” She poked at the pink spot, squinting at it. “I’ll send them to you. You do have a display pad, right?”

  I nodded while Cuza shook his head. I raised my eyebrows at him, then, “Oh! It was in the pocket of that big coat I was wearing! The one I threw into the crowd.” My left hand came up to my forehead, and I winced at how sore my shoulder felt. “Dad’s going to kill me.”

  “We should have a donated one you can borrow.”

  I sighed. “Thank you.”

  It took me a while to get dressed. All of me was sore and every time I moved my left arm it hurt, sending little tingles racing down my fingers. I carried my tray through the line in the nearly empty dining hall, feeling wobbly, settling for a small bowl of soup and a couple of rolls.

  Father Ryczek was sitting at a table by himself and he waved me over. I sat with him, not sure what to expect. He let me eat in silence for a while, but I could feel him watching me.

  “Alice, your mother, sent me dozens of letters asking to come here.” He took a folded piece of paper from his pocket and handed it to me. “This is the one that convinced me to allow her to come. I printed a copy years ago and I look at it from time to time when God sends difficult people to my door. This is the one where she tells me the truth. You see? She was running away; running from Dulcinea, from the memories of her first husband who she felt had abandoned her by dying, running from her father, and mostly running from herself and who she had become. She wanted to come here to be reborn.

  “Funny thing, though. By the time she got here, she didn’t need to come any more. Ted had already saved her, or was in the process of saving her. Everything in life is a process, a journey. She stayed because Ted was on a journey too, trying to find out what kind of man he was going to become.”

  “He’s a good man.”

  Father Ryczek nodded. “He tries to be, and that’s all anyone can do. And now there’s Mala Dusa, who came here to find her mother. Have you found her yet?”

  “And to serve God,” I reminded him.

  “Yes. Have you found her?”

  “I’m in the process of finding her. It’s complicated.” I bit into one of my rolls, letting the crumbs fall into the soup. “Hannah’s my mom, isn’t she? More than Alice ever can be.” The thought of that made me sad. I touched the paper, tracing the words Alice had crafted into sentences, begging for redemption in the Warrens. My mom. I had made her sick in the mornings and made her waddle around with me in Bodens Gate’s high gravity. I knew she had loved me, but all I had of her were other people’s memories.

  “There’s no right answer. Do you love Hannah?”

  “More than I knew. Being here with her, seeing what she can do, how strong she is, and how vulnerable…” I shook my head and finished the last of my soup. “She’s Mom, and more than Mom. And less. It’s strange.”

  I found him staring at me when I looked up, holding my eyes with his. “Ah. You no longer see her as you did when you were just a little girl.”

  He smiled softly at the way I was frowning.

  “It’s OK, Little Soul. There’s more to be gained in growing up than is lost, if you do it right.”

  I looked back at my plate. “Then I don’t think I’m doing it right. I’m selfish and cruel, even when I try not to be. I’m probably not living up to either of their expectations. I do terrible things when I don’t have my friends around to make me better.”

  “Pray to God every day that he keeps those kind of friends close to you.” He touched my chin and lifted it so I had to look at him. “You’ll be fine, there’s a lot of Alice in you. Alice raised by Hannah.” He started chuckling. “God help us all.”

  He stood, taking my dirty dishes and stacking the trays. I walked with him to the recycler.

  “Now, then, about those new solar arrays that we’re still waiting for you to install and integrate into our power grid.”

  “Nobody’s touched them yet? They’re still waiting up on
the roof?”

  He nodded, a bit of a smile crinkling his eyes.

  “What’s the weather today?”

  “Snowing right now, but tomorrow’s supposed to be sunny. You’ll have the walls around the roof to keep the wind off you.”

  I was chewing on my lip, wanting to get started prepping the grid and updating the control software right away. I could get that done while the weather was bad. “I need to talk to Mom. I don’t know what her plans are.”

  Father Ryczek sighed. “I’m to keep you hidden here while you heal and until she’s ‘ready for you’. Whatever she means by that.”

  “I used to think she always had a plan. Now I’m not so sure. I think she improvises a lot and depends on her own brilliance to keep her out of trouble. And Dad. He keeps her out of trouble a lot of the time too.”

  “He’s rescued her more often and in more ways than they’ll probably ever tell you.”

  That was a troubling thought, and it reminded me of something important. “Sam.” I whispered his name out loud, touching my pockets, looking for my display pad. Empty.

  “Cuza said you might have a display pad I could borrow. I need to talk to Sam and then Mom and then I’ll start the install process for getting the panels integrated.” I rolled my shoulder around, listening to the clicks and pops. “And I’ve got to do some kind of exercises this afternoon that the doctor was supposed to send me.”

  Father Ryczek held his finger up in front of my nose. “One thing at a time, thorn. Focus. Serve God, then other people, then yourself. Got it?”

  I nodded, knowing that what he was saying was probably profound, but I wasn’t really listening. All I could think about was contacting Sam.

  “And don’t neglect your shoulder. I can’t have you wandering around here complaining about how your body hurts all the time the way Cuza does.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  I followed him back to his office where he opened a cabinet and gave me a box.

  “This looks brand new.”

  “It may well be. Sometimes we get donations of things that have never even been unwrapped. People get things, then decide they want something better. The wealthy are not understandable, not by me anyway.”

  I unrolled it in my hands, looking at the screen coming to life. “It’s even got a charge. I promise not to lose this one, and I’ll get it back to you before I leave.”

  “How many have you lost?” He looked mystified.

  “Lost or destroyed?”

  He closed his eyes and held up his hand. “Never mind. Do your best.”

  “I always do. Mostly.”

  “Go. And remember what I told you.”

  I left, wondering what it was he had told me. Something about focus.

  It only took a few minutes to sync to the Union net and enter my credentials. I punched Sam and waited. Nothing, so I punched him again. And again.

  Finally, text came back. Meeting going on, your mom presenting, can’t talk now.

  I stared at it. No ‘how’s your shoulder, MD?’ No ‘I miss you.’ No ‘I’m sorry I left you in the infirmary to die.’

  I closed the session without replying and wandered around the Mission for half an hour before I could trust myself to start coding the power grid. The pad chimed a few times while I was working and each time I’d say out loud to myself, “Sorry, busy writing code, can’t talk now.”

  I was feeling better as I worked, and I finished all the updates by late afternoon. All I’d need to do on Sunday was the physical setup on the roof and connecting the power link.

  Father Ryczek came into the control room just as I was finishing the last simulated load.

  “All done,” I told him, feeling like I’d accomplished something good. My anger had dissipated.

  “Did I give you a display pad this afternoon?”

  I bit my lower lip. “Yes, Father.”

  “And you’ve been ignoring it, God alone knows why.” He unfolded his pad and held it up to me so I could see Mom’s unhappy face.

  “How was the meeting?” I tried for innocence, but I could hear the defiance in my voice.

  “I want you here for dinner, if you’re not too busy. We’ll be joined by representatives from the Council of Clans, the CG, RuComm and the Trade Guild. Wear something nice, something professional, something that leaves your left shoulder bare, do you understand?”

  Father Ryczek’s chin came up a little at that last part, and a disapproving glint came into his eyes.

  “Sure, I understand. I could print a new shirt for myself with an arrow pointing at my shoulder and letters that say, ‘Look at me! I got shot fighting for the Warrens!’ if you think that would be better.”

  She said something that the display pad edited out and I found myself looking at Winona. She kept glancing off screen and finally told me, “She says to tell you to wear something appropriate and to be at the hotel by 1900. Would you like to talk to Sam?”

  “Oh, does he have time for me now?”

  “Duse, you don’t know what it’s like here.” She tapped her forehead and stared at me. “We need your support, remember?”

  A miserable looking Sam leaned into view. He opened his mouth to say something, then closed it again and settled for just looking at me. I could feel him. Over ten kilometers away, and I could feel every bit of his pain and longing. I wanted to be mad at him and say something cruel, but couldn’t.

  I sighed. “I love you so much, Samuel. I’ll be there as quickly as I can.”

  He nodded and I started to reach for him. Father Ryczek slammed the pad shut.

  “Are you going to wear the kind of ridiculous outfit Hannah suggested?”

  “No, sir.” I blinked a couple of times, trying to clear Sam out of my thoughts for a moment. I could still feel him. “I’ll need your help. I don’t have anything of my own to wear, and I don’t think I’ve ever owned anything that would be appropriate. Maybe one, but I don’t have it anymore.”

  “My help? With clothes?” He looked down at his coveralls. “Let’s see if Leticia is about.”

  Father Ryczek took me to a part of the Mission where his staff had small apartments. He tapped on a door and a woman about the same age as my mom answered.

  “Little Soul.” Leticia patted my check fondly. “You were just a big bump between Alice’s hips when I saw you last. Now look at you.”

  I smiled at her. Another link to my mom’s past, more memories that I could share, but never own.

  Father Ryczek told her, “She needs a dress for tonight. Something nice, but that the Citizens from Eindhoven will recognize as being from the Warrens. And something that the Clans will find respectful, maybe even elegant.”

  I grinned shyly. “Is that possible? And I need to leave in about an hour.”

  She tipped her head, looking at me from different angles. “How’s your shoulder? Does it hurt?”

  “It hurts,” I admitted. “But my friends will help me and I’m going to be OK.”

  “Spoken like a child of the Warrens. Let’s see what we can find for you.”

  She chose a dress made of light overlapping layers of soft cloth, subtle, subdued colors and leather boots that covered my ankles. The boots were a little loose on my small feet, but they stayed on when I walked slowly enough. The lines of the dress accentuated my thinness rather than trying to conceal it. I swallowed hard looking at myself in her mirror.

  “Will that work for you?” She asked when we were done. “It was my daughter’s a couple of years back till she outgrew it. Her first grown-up dress. She’s fifteen now.”

  I shook my head at myself. “It’s much prettier than I deserve. I can never thank you as I should.”

  She hugged me close and whispered. “Keep fighting for us. That’s all the thanks I need.” She let go, touched my hair, and looked me up and down one last
time, not seeing me anymore, lost in a memory. “And don’t get shot any more, promise?”

  “I’ll do my best.”

  Cuza drove me to the edge of the Warrens, saw me safely into an autocab and kissed me gently on the cheek.

  “You comin’ back tonight?”

  “I don’t know. Mom has plans for me.”

  “Let me know if you do. I’ll come fetch you.”

  I kissed him softly on the lips the way I’d seem Mom kiss him. I put my hand on the pay screen and the door slid shut. “Central Hilton,” I told it.

  There were Guardians of the Peace waiting outside the hotel with slung rifles and wearing full body armor. I was suddenly afraid that I’d stumbled into a trap and that Boden himself would be there smirking, waiting to grab me. I could almost hear his voice, so real was my fear. I got out of the autocab ready to run as fast as I could in my too big boots. Maybe the dark and the snow would hide me.

  “Why so afraid?” Dad wrapped my hand around his arm, supporting me.

  I glanced around at all the guards. They looked more bored than threatening now. “I don’t know. There are just so many of them.”

  He grinned at me while we walked into the lobby. “Welcome to Bodens Gate. Yesterday’s enemies are today’s protectors.”

  I was still afraid, but having him next to me was keeping me from shaking or sprinting down the street. “What will they be tomorrow?”

  “Well, that’s what we’re working on tonight. How’s your shoulder?”

  “Better. Still hurts when I use it.”

  “Doing your exercises?”

  “No, not yet. But I got everything ready for the new solar array. Do you know how many patches I had to apply first? It’s a wonder the Mission had power at all.”

  “What was the last rev date?”

  “Like five years ago.”

  He chuckled. “At least it wasn’t from when I was last here. But that’s Father Ryczek, always assuming that if it’s working today then it’ll be fine for another year.” He glanced down at me. “Nice dress, by the way.”

  “Thanks. I’m not sure what Mom will say.”