Munib marched into the middle of the chamber, flush with victory, and tore off his space helmet. He took in a deep breath of recycled air and fervently began searching the gathered faces. I hadn't yet seen him look quite like that. The calm, calculated demeanor had been abandoned, if in fact it ever truly existed. His short cropped hair looked wild and tousled. His eyes shown brightly. This was a man who seemed very much alive.
We were standing in the deck that led out onto one of the Observatory's spaceports. These were reserved for the exclusive use of the military. The spaceships themselves docked underneath in huge caves blasted out of the rock of the mountain, but they loaded and unloaded their cargo there. I caught a glimpse once on the way out for some exploring. It was a large, uninteresting but highly defended, paved surface cut into the rock of the promontory and wedged up against the outer doors of the air locks. There were three of them on this side of the Observatory. Each air lock could accommodate about ten persons at a time. It was impossible to see from here as there were no windows, but the ships must still have been queued up, waiting to disgorge their crews. It was a process that would take hours.
“Acilia!” Munib called out when he found her. Even when he was excited, the force of his voice was modest. Cupping the space helmet under one arm, he marched over to where she stood. His steps were wobbly and awkward, impeded by the thick material of the space suit. On his way he passed near me. Those bright, darting eyes locked onto mine. I was amazed to find color in them. The irises were a chocolate brown. “Mr. Gyges!” he hailed even though I was standing only a meter away. “I'm glad you're here. I need a rest, of course. I'll send for you later.”
The Shadow of God on Earth forgot then that I existed and moved on to more important matters. Relaxed and jovial in their familiar surroundings, his bodyguard melted away. At the same time, Colonel Acilia stepped forward out of the crowd and saluted. Coming to a stop before her, Munib crisply returned it.
“We start loading up the captured booty as soon as the soldiers are inside,” Acilia told him stiffly. “The data you sent ahead indicate it's enough to support us for several months.” At that, a great cheer went up from the crowd.
“Have you sent out the clean-up crews?” Munib queried.
“We started organizing them once we had word of your return.” Acilia was one of the women I had seen conversing with him the first time I was taken to Munib's tower. Her hair was red and lavish and fell lightly to the nape of her neck, framing a broad, freckled face. She had a tiny nose and flashing, green eyes. I thought she was pretty. “They are being deployed from the aft spaceport even as we speak.”
“Excellent!” Munib took in another deep breath and looked around at the crowd. It was pressing eagerly in around him. Waving an arm, he admonished them firmly. “Soldiers, clear out! The crews are tired and they need rest. Give them room to move around in!” As if on cue, there was a harsh hiss of air and the three inner doors of the air locks slid upwards into the ceiling, revealing thirty exhausted soldiers standing at attention.
Obediently, the crowd began to disperse. I wanted to stay, but Maya pulled me after her. “C'mon,” she said, “let's go back out to the surface. Maybe we can get our hands on a quibble and fly out to where the action was.”
The devastation on the ground was shocking even from so far away. The shattered and scarred husks of what once had been the advance outposts of the Chinese armed forces lay torn open and dismembered on the ground some hundreds of meters below. They would have been unrecognizable if we hadn't already known what they were. Bodies, still suited up, lay strewn about on the highlands among the debris. A few healthy looking spacecraft were parked not far away and the tiny forms of our soldiers, members of the clean-up crews, were scavaging for scraps of metal and intelligence, anything useful that had survived the bombardment. Even the bodies would be recycled for their organs, I realized grimly, the ones that hadn't been too badly damaged anyway.
“See how differently they build than we do?” Maya asked as she guided the centaur a bit lower. Just ahead, awash in the light of our heavy spotlights, an open shell of scorched metal ensconced in the regolith and hard stone of the lunar highlands gaped at us hideously. It's many unidentifiable contents lay strewn about here and there among the stony crags and ridges. A few familiar looking quibbles and centaurs were parked nearby. The tiny, moving forms on the ground were turned, heads lifted towards the sky, arms cast over their helmets, cursing us angrily.
“Let up on the spotlights, will you?” I suggested.
“Oh yeah,” Maya breathed and pressed a button on the console in front of us. A few burning lights winked out among many. “I guess I got carried away.”
Instead of the large, domed colonies which we preferred, the Chinese appeared to favor compact, rectangular structures which they arranged in neat little rows, extending far into the horizon on either side. It must have taken quite some time and effort to destroy them all.
I pointed at the visuals. “Look.”
“I see it.” There was a large crater up ahead, many kilometers in diameter. Something large and hulking rose up out of the top. Maya pointed the ship's nose high in the sky and took us in for a closer look.
On the way, I looked out the viewport to my right and reviewed the destruction. The earth hung in a sky embedded with brilliant pearls. A sliver of darkness had been cut out of it. “How can this happen?” I breathed into the hard plastic.
Maya overheard me. “How?” She seemed puzzled for a moment. “Don't you pay attention to the intercasts? Standard procedure is a two-pronged attack. You shoot down the satellites and at the same time activate malbots to eat away and destroy their link points. After that they're blind. They can't see what's coming.” Looking out the fore viewport at the quickly approaching crater, Maya began to blandly hum to herself.
The crater loomed large in front of us. Below on the surface I could make out ejecta from the explosion, massive, fractured boulders perched in little craters of their own and brightly colored trenches like scars etched into the surface, radiating outwards in perfectly straight lines. We could hardly see across to the other side in the dim earthlight. The sheer, crumbling walls of the lip, thrown up by the impact, rose hundreds of meters above the crags and gullies of the rocky ground below. We had already gained a great deal in altitude, but as we passed over the edge I had the uncomfortable feeling that we weren't going to clear the top. On the other side we were greeted by darkness. Maya flipped on the spotlights.
The mining installation was massive. A huge platform which we were now flying over had been erected on the inside of the crater's lip not far below. A number of cargo ships and cranes was parked there. Attached and running along the inside wall of the lip itself were a series of smaller structures, undoubtedly the living quarters and offices of those who worked the mine. Elevators similar to the ones that connected Laplace Observatory to the mare floor descended into the depths of the crater. No doubt at the bottom were the mine shafts, huge holes dug into the regolith to get at the rocks and ores concealed beneath. Easily accessible craters in the highlands were one of the most sought after mining sites on the lunar surface because they provided access to the richest prizes concealed in the moon's crust.
The mine, its landing platform, and the adjacent buildings were all intact. The installation was extremely valuable and there was no sense in destroying it. No doubt it would be operating again within days, but this time the metals uncovered here would not stream into the heart of the larger, more densely populated Chinese territory a little further east in the Mare Serenitatis, but rather westward, a hundred kilometers past lonely, unoccupied stretches to our own spaceports. As we passed over, we could see more of our soldiers busily swarming over the platform. Below us in the darkness of the crater were the slowly crawling lights of ships not unlike our own, moving to and from the installation. One of the elevators was already in operation.
As we passed back over the lip of the crater, a curious activity caught my eye. A number of our soldiers were standing in a line just at the bottom of the crater's lip, pointing their laser tubes menacingly at a group of Chinese, recognizable by their red colored spacesuits.
“Look,” I said, pointing. “I thought Munib wasn't taking prisoners.”
“He's not,” Maya replied as she turned the centaur back towards home.
“What're they then?” I asked, craning my neck to keep them in view.
“Survivors. Looks like they're being expelled from the base.”
I frowned. “You mean turned loose on the lunar surface? They'll die!”
“They've all got tracking devices,” Maya responded blithely. “Someone will find them.” After a short pause, she added, “Unless they've been taken away.”
“Why would anyone take them away?” I exclaimed.
Maya clicked her tongue in frustration. “I don't know, Marcellus. I'm just speculating.”
The rest of the flight back to the Observatory we passed in silence.
That night, Marcellus dreamed. He dreamt that it had been sunny for some time. The weather was beautiful and he and his friends were often out in it. They went swimming in the sea and they went dining on terraces and they even went skiing in the mountains. When they were at home in their vast apartment complex and he looked out the window the sky was always clear and blue and the landscape inviting. In the dream, Marcellus had lots of friends, and they all lived in this huge, luxurious apartment building.
After some time, though, the weather began to change. It got cloudy. The sun was covered by a film of grey which quickly began to thicken. As he and his friends looked on with ever deepening consternation, the sky turned darker. Soon, even though it was daytime, outside it had become black as night. It was a night without stars, and the world was concealed in a veil of darkness that could not be penetrated by any light, artificial or real.
Eventually, of course, the skies cleared and the sun returned. But everything was different. The world was not what it had been.
Civilization had ended. Something had happened – something unspecified in the way of dreams – during that deep and unnatural night. There was no more electricity. There was no more running water. The vidphones didn’t work and the buses wouldn’t come. There were no more hospitals. There was no government, either. No police. All the artefacts of civilization were still there, but they had been rendered useless. Eventually, even they would decay and perish and only the wild would remain.
The people needed protection. For it was only a matter of time before the bandits and hooligans would come, stealing and raping and murdering at will.
They needed to leave the apartment building. It had become a target. His neighbors were streaming by the open door to his apartment. They were all going someplace where together they would be safe. Marcellus wanted to go, too, but he asked his friends to wait. He needed to find his cigarettes. Because if there was no civilization anymore, then certainly they had stopped making cigarettes. Eventually – sooner rather than later – he would have to quit. But for now, he knew he still had some, and he intended on bringing them with him.
His friends, though, were impatient. They felt there wasn’t much time. Marcellus wasn’t sure why they were making such a fuss. They started out down the hallway while he fervently searched.
By the time he found them his friends were gone, but he ran down the hallway just the same. When he got outside, he knew there would be no one. Just this huge abandoned apartment building and all the other abandoned buildings in the area. The journey would be too dangerous on his own, he knew.
Running down the endless hallway, he knew he would never see them again.
He would never see anyone again.
Munib poured some hot tea into Marcellus' cup. “You seem ill at ease, Mr. Gyges.”
Marcellus had been fidgeting. Embarrassed, he moved his hands under the top of the large, metal table the general used for a desk. “I want a cigarette,” he mumbled.
“Ah,” Munib breathed and leaned back with his brightly decorated, terracotta cup in one hand. “Air is expensive here. We cannot allow smoking. It's a dirty, disgusting habit, as I'm sure you know.”
“You sound like Icarus.”
“Drink some tea. You'll feel better.” As if to demonstrate, he took a long sip. His coal black eyes studied Marcellus over the top of the cup.
Behind them, someone was wiping down the inside surface of the dome. Marcellus recognized him. Whenever he came to see Munib in his office, the young man was there performing some kind of menial labor. In fact, he had noticed a whole army of such people scampering slowly and silently about the Observatory. There was always something to be wiped down or disinfected. The threat of mold and mildew, mere inconveniences on earth, was life-threatening on the moon.
Eventually, Marcellus tired of the silence. “Why is Eddie here?” he complained. “I thought you were going to protect me from Judas.”
Munib's eyes narrowed ever so slightly. “Do not trouble yourself with Epstein's serpent. He is being carefully watched. He will do you no harm. But why are you concerned? Just tell him to leave you alone.”
“I will never use the ring again!” Marcellus told him darkly and looked away at the earth far beyond the transparent dome behind Munib's head. Half of its glowing surface had been extinguished. In the week since he had arrived, it had moved only slightly towards the horizon. A few of the most distant mountain peaks punctured its serene face.
“Never?” Munib set his terracotta cup on the table. “How interesting.”
Marcellus pulled the ring from his finger and put it in his pocket. In his mind, he resolved never to put it on again. “I thought you said you were going to cut off contact with the earth. Until this civil war is over. But I still see transports take off and arrive every day.”
Munib held his hands before him, fingers spread apart, tips pressed against each other. “What would you have me do?”
Marcellus frowned. “Are you really going to listen?”
“Yes.”
Marcellus thought for a few moments. “I want you to break off contact with earth. Today. Starve Judas of his metals and his water.”
“Who will rule precious luna in his stead?”
“You will, of course,” Marcellus replied, jutting his chin in the general's direction.
Munib shook his head slowly. “I am fighting a war on two fronts. Someone else will have to attend to the daily affairs of the lunar territory.”
“Oh.”
Marcellus didn't seem inclined to say anything else. Munib smiled wanly at his perplexity. “Have you been in the sim?”
“What?”
“You heard me. Have you surfed at all since you arrived, Mr. Gyges?”
“Don't you already know?”
Munib shook his head. “I do not bother keeping tabs on people here. There is no time for it, but also – I find the practice distasteful.”
Marcellus shifted uncomfortably in his stiff, metal seat. “I've been in once or twice, yeah.”
“Your friends?”
“Not Maya.”
“Yes, she is often in your company. Are you in a relationship with her?”
Marcellus couldn't help but laugh. “With Maya? No. I think she likes women.”
The general's tone grew more serious. “Beware of the sim, Mr. Gyges. Especially here on luna, it poses a certain risk. It can be hard to fill the hours.” Munib gestured towards the man cleaning the dome. “Luna is full of burn-outs like this scullion here. What do you call them in popular culture?”
“Zombies you mean?”
“Yes, zombies,” he repeated in his heavy, Eastern accent. “If used too often, the sim causes irreversible damage to the neocortex.” He gestured towards his forehead. “These zombies are able to perform such menial tasks as you see here, but not much else.”
“Oh,” Marcellus mumbled, throwing the cleaning man a quick glance over his shoulder. “I thought he was a mod or something.”
The general bristled at the suggestion. “There are no mods here on luna! As long as I'm sitting in this chair, there never will be.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Marcellus thought he saw the cleaning man stop what he was doing and nod his head in solemn agreement.
Munib leaned forward and calmly poured himself more tea. “You are very fortunate, Mr. Gyges. Do you realize that?”
“Fortunate?” Marcellus frowned. “How?”
Munib gestured towards the dome all around them. “You have arrived in the lunar night. It is when she is most pleasing. The soft glow of the earth drenches all, and the blanket of stars in which she is perched stares lovingly down. During the lunar day, this dome is shuttered. There is no view. The rays of the sun are too potent.”
Marcellus wasn't sure what Munib was getting at. He said as much.
“You will see. In a few days time the glowering will start in the east. Dawn lasts nearly a day here. After that, you will experience the inferno.”
Marcellus pursed and then bit his lip. “I need to know,” he finally declared. “You said you don't want the ring. I need to know why.”
Munib's steely eyes flashed. “I have already told you. I don't need it.” He took a forced sip of tea.
“The real reason, Munib. Tell me or I won't be able to trust you.”
The Shadow of God on Earth chewed on that thought for a few seconds. Finally, he set his terracotta cup on the metal table with a hollow clang and stiffly pressed his fingertips against each other in front of him. “I have already told you,” he repeated coldly. “I am a cruel man. My occupation provides me with an adequate outlet. Presidents cannot act in the same way, or they are slain.” He shrugged. “It is as simple as that.”
Intrigued, Marcellus cocked his head to one side and kicked up his legs. “Why?”
“What do you mean, why?” Munib snapped, a dour, surly look flashing across his face. “You are tiresome company.”
“Tell me why you love destruction so much.”
“Do you like tomatoes?” Munib returned.
“Sure.”
“Why?”
Slowly, Marcellus shook his head. “It's not the same thing.”
“But isn't it?” Munib seemed to have regained his composure. He poured himself more tea. “Would you like to learn the arts of war, Mr. Gyges?”
“War? Why do I need to know anything about that?”
“You don't, of course.” Munib smiled at him wanly.
Marcellus took a few moments to consider. “Well,” he finally said, “I've got nothing else to do.”
“You don't sound very committed,” Munib observed.
“Listen, after all that's happened, I don't have the feeling I'm really in control of my life.” Marcellus shrugged. “I guess I'll just go with the flow. If you think I should learn how to run battles and all that, it's fine by me. When do we start?”
Munib cocked his head to one side and peered intently at the young man across the table from him. “You create your own world, Mr. Gyges. If you don't feel in control of it, perhaps you should choose otherwise.”
Marcellus was taken aback.
“I'm sorry,” Munib breathed into the heavy silence that followed. “Did I offend you?”
“It's just – it's not the first time somebody's said that to me.” What he tactfully didn't mention is that he was as surprised by the mouth the words had come from as the words themselves.
“Said what?”
“He also told me we create reality merely by interacting with it.”
“Ah. Then whoever it was is a very wise person indeed.”
“That's just it. It wasn't a person.”
“No?”
“It was a dream.”
Munib smiled wanly. “What interesting dreams you have, Mr. Gyges. We should all be so fortunate as you.”
Xiling stood impatiently by as his acolyte sputtered and writhed and pitifully held his head. The robed figure was convulsing at his feet and wasn't showing any sign of stopping soon. Very soon the Chief Justice had had enough. “What did you see?” he hissed, leaning close.
“Oh, master!” came the words, distraught and beseeching. “I need more time!”
“Time is what I do not have,” came the cold reponse. “Tell me now.”
“It's there,” said the Chief Acolyte, a paltry heap of flesh and bones lying dejectedly on the floor. “I saw it.”
The Chief Justice wiped clean the sweat from his forehead with a damp handkerchief and leaned ever closer. “Tell me!”
“An office building,” rasped the Chief Acolyte. “In New Jersey.” He had seen it. He knew exactly where.
“I can hardly hear you, boy! Speak up!”
“You are a cruel master,” lamented the frail figure on the ground.
“And you are a snake,” replied the Chief Justice as he pushed his handkerchief into the breast pocket of his favorite purple suit and stood up. “I should like to go and see for myself, but these generals of mine cannot be trusted. So I must save my strength and trust to your witless musings.”
The Chief Acolyte coughed violently and wiped the phlegm from his lip with the heavy sleeve of his robe. Propping himself up on his elbow, he rasped, “There are other ways to ensure the generals' loyalty. You waste yourself needlessly.”
The Chief Justice's eyes flashed. “Foolish boy!” he snapped. “It's a wonder I've kept you so long!”
They had taken New York City that very morning. Millions of people had died. Xiling, though, seemed only to care about recovering his penthouse. Which he did, of course, although he was sorely disappointed when he got there. The fact that it was his favorite residence had not been lost on Epstein. The beautiful glass wall in the rear overlooking his balcony had been smashed long ago, exposing the interior to the abuse of the elements. Huge chunks had been knocked out of what had once been elegant, marble columns, now redecorated with crude slogans and poorly drawn pictures. To make matters worse, the place appeared to have served as a public toilet. The whole place stank of rot and urine and, during the three months since their conflict had broken out, had become an abode to rats. The only persons who could come safely inside were the Chief Justices themselves, their acolytes, and their drone escorts, human beings genetically modified to such an extent that their features were best hidden from the sight of normal human eyes behind layers of thick, black, rubbery material and tubing.
The Chief Acolyte was lying on a freshly dried, human skin splayed out on the floor. He and the other acolytes had been allowed to choose victims from among the prisoners. It wasn't a real panche, and yet it was a powerful symbol that soon they would soon be initiated into the darker rights of their Order. He was using it to protect himself from the filth covering the floor. Still, the throes of the drug which helps induce a Vision are violent, and he was gashed and bleeding in several places on his hands, face, and legs, presumably from shards of glass that had bit through the leathery mantle.
“So it's true.” Xiling had withdrawn and was floating a few centimeters above the floor, hands clasped tightly behind his back, staring thoughtfully out the gaping window looking over his balcony, now packed with refuse. He had spoken softly. Every once in a while, he flexed his fingers. Outside, past the obstructions of the trees and the taller buildings of Manhattan in the direction he was gazing was the Hudson river. At the moment, it was the only thing that separated Epstein's forces from his own. On the other side of that river lay New Jersey. And inside New Jersey, not very far at all, there was –
“Word must quickly be spreading,” the Chief Justice murmured. He turned his head slightly in the Chief Acolyte's direction. The deep, raw cleft that had been ripped into the side of his face as if by some terrible claw came into view. “Has Epstein managed to secure the place?”
The Chief Acolyte sat up on his human skin and clasped his knees. “No. The place was abandoned. Bombed out, I think.”
“You think,” Xiling sneered and bared his teeth. He turned his attention back to the river. “Maybe he doesn't yet know it's arrived. Maybe a detachment of his soldiers is on its way right now. Either way, we have to stop him. Whoever gets to that building first will prevail.”
“Are you really worried about winning the war, master?” the Chief Acolyte asked warily. “In virtually every engagement you've had the best of the President. I've heard you say many times yourself that it's only a matter of time – ”
“Before it's over?” the Chief Justice interrupted dreamily. “Yes, I believe I've said that.” He was gently fingering the long ridge of his wound.
The Chief Acolyte observed for a few moments before he remarked maliciously, “It's been several months now and it doesn't seem to be healing.” A moment later, he was groaning in pain and clutching his hand. A sliver of glass had somehow wormed it's way deep under one of his fingernails.
Xiling smiled lustfully. “Do not mock me, boy,” he hissed. “You know as well as I, it will only vanish once vengeance has been satisfied.” Gingerly, he touched the raw, infected flesh.
Epstein had had the worst of it since hostilities broke out. Most of the generals and colonels in the army, navy, and space forces had rebelled. The national guard, CIA, and FBI remained loyal to Epstein, but they were no match for the vast firepower of the armies arrayed against them. Within weeks huge swaths of the country had been cut out by the rebel armies. And their success had come at a terrible cost. The first real prize had been Los Angeles. San Francisco followed and then the entire West Coast fell in a single air battle. When Xiling pushed eastward he entered a vast patchwork of restricted zones that no one without special access had seen in a decade. He was keen enough to publish what he found on the link, for this was also the heart of the nation's system of freemocracy camps. In a great and public display of mercy, he had all the inmates released. The stunt worked brilliantly in his favor. Chicago and Kansas City opened their doors to him. Cheering crowds welcomed him and threw rose petals as he and a contingent of armored tanks entered the city.
But Xiling was merciless to his enemies. He had neither the will nor the resources to pursue a protracted conflict. Cities that resisted were destroyed along with their inhabitants. Especially the small towns and cities of Iowa and Indiana felt his wrath. Prisoners were dispensed with summarily. Eventually, the refugees that poured into what was left of Epstein's domain erased the paternal image that Xiling had managed to create for himself. Many of them were former inmates of the freemocracy camps. Most of them had preferred their incarceration to their liberation. It was not long before people added another name to the many he already possessed. Xiling the Terrible, they called him, and he was proud of it.
Xiling's advance had been so rapid and his attention so singularly focused on capturing Epstein that he had neglected to consolidate his gains. Stoked by sleeper agents left behind by the FBI and CIA, pockets of revolt began to appear in his rear. His adversaries employed guerilla tactics and sabotage. They released carefully designed, self-morphing malbots that targeted even the most secure of the link points in his production chain. They hit his supply convoys and knocked his satellites out of orbit with specially designed lasers that operated from the ground. Important officials keeled over and died during state banquets. At first the cost seemed negligible, but over time the drain on his resources had the cumulative effect of slowing and then halting his lightening advance. Now when he caught any of these saboteurs he had them thrown from a high place. Let that be a lesson to the others, he thought.
They had taken New York City that morning, it is true, but the contest had lasted almost a week. Rhode Island and Omaha were in open revolt, the Appalachians refused to yield, and Epstein still controlled the rest of the East Coast down to Florida, most of the South, and Texas. Steiner, one of the two generals who had remained loyal to Epstein, was transporting his army north and regrouping in Texas, and the latest information indicated that Sokolawski, the other one, was only a few days from landing his army in Washington.
Xiling knew that any successful resolution to the contest had to also be a quick one. It was a familiar precept. The other Justices knew it, too, and they pestered him about it constantly, especially Tizoc and Murasaki. For this reason he sent them behind the lines along with Ramuel and Rhea to deal with the various seditions. They were capable warriors and enjoyed the inherent cruelty of their task. Kaela and Michael, his most trusted lieutenants, were off commanding armies of their own. Talisman and Frey (even after all these years she remained a mystery to him) were with him in New York, setting up their headquarters downtown in one of the skyscrapers that their illicit commercial enterprise – otherwise known as The Company – had once used.
For this reason Epstein remained holed up in his compound in Washington. His hopes were pinned on a war of attrition. The fool, Xiling thought to himself. There were far safer places for him to ride out the war. Washington was in range of his satellites. Lasers from above wreaked daily havoc upon the city. They weren't as accurate as he would have liked, but portions of the White House itself now lay in ruins. And still Epstein stayed.
Human beings, Xiling reflected to himself, like all creatures are creatures of habit. In a sudden pang of intuition, he began to ponder. What about myself? He had always been careful to identify and break through his own conditioning. It was a critical task precisely because he had lived so long. But was it possible that his own analysis was itself the product of conditioning? He'd have to meditate on the matter when he had more time...
There was another general who had not joined forces with him. This was perhaps the most important general of all, worth more than the rest of them put together. But he hadn't joined forces with Epstein either.
Glancing upwards, the Chief Justice studied a crescent moon hanging low in the clear, daylight sky. “What is Munib up to?” he wondered aloud.
The Chief Acolyte hovered slightly behind him, hands folded neatly in front and buried inside the heavy folds of his robe. “Gyges is up there. He has the ring. Both are beyond our reach.”
Xiling stirred. “Your words betray your ignorance,” he murmured. “Surely you must know space presents no limits to our movements.”
“But it is so far!” As if to add weight to the words, he gestured towards the sky.
“Only in your mind.” The Chief Justice shook his head. “You distract me.”
“Forgive me, master.”
“Munib's motives are not yet clear. He has stopped all shipments from the moon, and all approaching ships are shot at. But he can't last forever up there without a steady supply of food and oxygen.” Xiling bit his lip testily.
“Perhaps he's hedging,” suggested the Chief Acolyte. “He's waiting to see who will gain the upper hand.”
“Perhaps,” the Chief Justice breathed. “Of course, whoever he eventually joins will know he withheld his abilities when they were needed most. One does not earn gratitude and esteem in such a way. Munib knows this.”
The Chief Acolyte frowned. “What do you mean?”
Xiling let out a weary breath of air. “Munib is old, boy. He served under Murroughs.”
“But that would make him ninety at least!”
“Ninety-three.”
“I thought he was in his sixties. He looks like he is in his sixties.”
“Indeed,” Xiling agreed. “Remarkable, isn't it? He does not work magic as we do, and yet he is granted the health and long life that accompany it.”
“Why should he know the value of gratitude and esteem, master?”
“Because, when Murroughs the Elder died and her son started his term, Munib did not declare for him until after Murroughs had put the other contenders to death. After that he fell into disfavor and was banished.”
“Banished?”
“Yes, to a small island off Scotland. Didn't you know? Even Murroughs the Younger wasn't mad enough to have him executed, although there's no telling what would have happened had he lived long enough. By decree of the Senate, Munib was stripped of his honors and estate and was shipped off to a poor house with a well and some mangy livestock. For decades he lived like this, alone save the few visitors who managed to escape notice, raising his own food and nursing his own illnesses. I imagine the years of solitude and dreary weather contributed to his rather detached nature, don't you think?”
“Yes, master, if you say so.”
“If I say so,” repeated Xiling. “Oh, you really are a snake!” He reached out and patted his acolyte affectionately on the side of the head.
“What happened then?”
“He had hopes, of course, that Sindhra and Jimenez would recall him. I understand there were even clandestine contacts, but in the end they left him there to rot. They did this even though his services could have proved useful to them. Sindhra strove long and at great cost with the Mediterranean Union for the rest of Turkey and Syria. Jimenez had to contend with the Mexican Uprising and lost the bid for Saudi Arabia.”
“Master, why would they do such a thing?”
The Chief Justice shrugged. “Because they knew the limits of their own abilities and judged them sufficient.”
“I don't understand.”
Xiling turned and fixed him with steely eyes. “Don't you?”
After a brief moment, the Chief Acolyte lowered his head. The hood fell over his eyes.
“Of course, everything changed during the upheaval that followed Jimenez' death. The one they call the Dutchman went of his own accord to the island where Munib lived and brought him back to Washington. For that, Epstein has been ever grateful. But as for Munib?” He shrugged again and looked back up at the moon. “I am beginning to wonder if Epstein hasn't lived long enough to regret it.”
Xiling turned suddenly and laid both hands on his acolyte's shoulders. “No one must recover it save we,” he said intently, peering into his eyes.
“That is clear, master.”
“It is in Epstein's territory. Even according to the most optimistic scenario, we would never lay claim to that office building before he does.”
“Of course, master.”
“We must secure that building by exceptional means.”
“What are you getting at, master?” the Chief Acolyte asked, suddenly uncertain.
The Chief Justice lifted his head slightly and looked off over his acolyte's shoulder. The eyes lost some of their focus. The breathing slowed. After a moment, though, the eyes sharpened and the breathing picked up again. “Tizoc and Murasaki are in Providence,” he announced. “You must go to them with a message.”
“But they are engaged in combat!” the Chief Acolyte protested.
Xiling nodded soberly. “Yes, and Murasaki is wounded. Does that displease you?”
“Yes!”
“Why?”
“I am yet weak! I need more time to rest, especially if I must fight!”
The Chief Justice smiled cruelly. “Consider this a test,” he murmured. First he touched a fingertip to his acolyte's head and then he gave him a slight push.
“Master!” The word, though, was flung back at him.
As he fell, the world seemed to crumble. The pieces gathered at his feet, seeped through the cracks of time and space and were gone. There was blackness. The pieces of a new world sprang up out of the darkness and started to assemble themselves around him. A slight roar quickly deepened into an unbearable cacophony. The new world solidified.
An incendiary device of some kind erupted to his right. A flash of light and sound. Shards of metal penetrated his leg, sending spikes of pain seething through his brain.
Shit, he thought as he landed hard on his bottom.
It was daylight. He was sitting on a patch of smashed up cement. Smoke hung in the air. A body of calm water of some sort was off to his left. On the other side he could see a row of cheap, bulky apartment complexes, each one an exact replica of the other. To his right loomed the broken facade of a factory made of red brick. The shattered windows glared at him like lifeless eyes. High above suspended on pillars was a major traffic artery.
Shots from a laser tube struck the ground nearby. The cement bubbled and hissed where they struck.
Scattered about the cement loading dock where he seemed to have landed were large containers of the type that were carried on ships. These were not stacked neatly, however, but lying as if a great pile of them had been knocked violently over. The Chief Acolyte's senses told him that a few hundred soldiers had taken cover behind these containers both in front and behind him and were shooting at each other.
The containers were not the only flotsam flung across the loading dock. A large, brightly painted replica of a cockroach, some fifteen meters in length and three high, was lying on its side near the water. It was split in two. Realizing that hidden behind the head he would be out of sight to both groups of adversaries, he blinked out of sight and reappeared there. In the welcome shade and protection, he breathed a sigh of relief while the soldiers continued firing at each other.
You bastard. The Chief Acolyte bitterly sent the words tumbling off into the world and leaned his head wearily against the hard surface of one of the cockroach's shattered antennae.
A few moments later came the reply. Stop complaining and get on with it!
The Chief Acolyte could sense Tizoc and Murasaki inside the factory. It was like viewing the clear, bright flames of two candles in a room of fleeting shadows. It was the shadows that concerned him. It looked as if a squad of enemy troops had managed to sneak inside the factory and were closing in on the Justices' position. Scanning their aura, he knew they were preoccupied and weren't aware of the intrusion. He had to act.
The air was dusty inside and tasted of pulverized brick and mortar. Standing at the top of the rickety stairs looking down, the Chief Acolyte winced. Shards of pain laced through his legs. Staring back up at him, mouths hanging slightly open, were several masked men and women, laser tubes in hand. They had been making their way slowly up the stairs, taking great pains not to upset the joints which would whine shrilly if they put their feet down too hard.
The Chief Acolyte did not realize his mistake until it was too late. A heavy arm came from behind and grabbed him ferociously by the throat. In an instant his neck would be broken and he'd be dead. The others on the stairwell surged forward. A flurry of noise arose all about them.
The metal of the stairway, though, was growing soft. In fact, his assailants' booted feet began to sink into it. The Chief Acolyte remained safely a few centimeters above the quickly melting metal, coldly listening to the horrible cries of agony. The woman who had grabbed him was now lying motionless in a little depression her body had made when her legs gave way. The black nylon suit she had been wearing was boiling away. The smell of charred flesh saturated the air.
When the last of the attackers was dead and most of the top of the stairway had dripped away onto the floor below, the Chief Acolyte noticed that he was being watched. Standing in the opening where a corridor once joined the stairwell was a familiar figure. “You were making a great deal of noise,” it said coolly.
The Chief Acolyte smiled cruelly. “I didn't expect a welcoming party. You should be more careful.”
Farula peered out from under the heavy hood of her robe at the twisted, charred bodies lying scattered below. “Creative,” she told him. “I thought you were a goner.”
“You were watching?” the Chief Acolyte demanded in astonishment as he floated over to her. Farula was Murasaki's acolyte. He and she had once been lovers, but when their masters discovered it their relationship was put to an end.
“Of course,” she murmurred. “If you should perish, someone else must be named Chief Acolyte, no?”
“Well it wouldn't be a woman, would it?” the Chief Acolyte sneered as he came to stand next to her. “You know the rules.”
Farula shrugged. “I see you are injured.”
“Yes.” The Chief Acolyte winced. “It hurts very much.”
Spinning on her heels, Farula gestured curtly for him to follow. “Don't expect much sympathy. You're not the only one, you know.”
“It's not the ring that makes you a monster,” Nameless told me.
“Oh,” I said, lowering my head in shame. “So it's me. I'm the monster.”
Nameless frowned. He seemed puzzled. “No, no,” he replied slowly after a moment. “I think you are feeling badly about yourself. It's not what I meant.”
“What did you mean then?”
“Very few people would be able to avoid using the ring for their own purposes.”
“How else would anyone use it?”
“The power of the ring is irresistible. When you don't use it and you want to, you feel like you are being beneficent. You feel others should be thankful. And when they are not, their actions evoke emotions of anger and jealousy. The only barrier between themselves and slavery is your ability to control yourself. With enough time, if you continue down that road, you'll have a moment when you won't see any more reason to control yourself, and then woe unto the world.”
Again I lowered my head.
Again Nameless frowned and seemed puzzled. “Don't be so hard on yourself, Marcellus. It would be the same with virtually anyone.”
We were in an ancient, crumbling amphitheater of some kind. It was night but there were no stars, only a full moon. The air was warm. Nameless and I were sitting on hard, stone seats about halfway up. There was no one else in the audience but ourselves. On the gravelly surface below, hemmed in by a high wall, there was an orchestra. Its members were dressed in black tuxedos. They were playing music, probably classical or jazz, but it was hard to tell because their instruments didn't make any sound. Judas, standing on a dias behind a little podium embroidered with the Presidential Seal, was conducting energetically. The musicians, too, were familiar. There was Tina, Secretary of the Justice and Interior, playing the oboe. Sonya – studs, piercings, black eyeliner and all – was banging happily away at the drums. Harvey Cash was blowing silently into a shiny alto saxophone. The twins were first and second flutes. Vassily was perched behind a grand piano. He looked like a viper would if it were able to walk and put on a tuxedo. Even Betty, armed with a susaphone, and Davey, standing lackadaisically near the back with a triangle, were present. The Justices of the Supreme Court had their own little block to the side playing string instruments.
Sitting on my hands like a small child, I kicked up my feet and finished Nameless' thought. “But not everyone.”
“No, Marcellus, not everyone.”
At that moment, a meteor came careening down from the black sky above, tearing the air apart and landing in a plume of dust and smoke and light not far away from the orchestra. No one seemed to notice, though, except myself.
“How else is there to act, Nameless? If not out of personal motives?”
“So you admit that it's possible to act without being you!”
Sometimes it sounded like Nameless was speaking nonsense, and he always did so matter-of-factly. I used to just throw up my hands and tell him I didn't understand, but over time I learned I would get more useful responses if I replied with a question of my own. “Is it possible to stop being me?”
“Exactly, Marcellus. You can not be you. If you choose to.”
“If I let go.”
“Yes, very good. All you have to do is stop identifying with yourself. Have you ever meditated?”
Another meteor landed in a great shower of sparks on the floor below.
“No. Munib does, though.”
“I'm not asking about Munib. You should try. Perhaps you'd better understand what I mean.”
“When people meditate, they are still. They've got their eyes closed and they're sitting in a funny position and they've got candles lit.”
“If it suits you. But you can also act in such a state and not even be aware that you are acting. It's at such time that we say God is acting through you.”
“Consciousness.”
“Yes, Marcellus. Consciousness.”
I glanced casually down at the orchestra. Judas was driving them furiously onward. The sweat was dripping from their tired faces. Another meteor landed, this time in between the core of strings and Vassily the Viper at the piano. I glanced at the Justices' box. The faces seemed vaguely familiar. I must have seen them on the link. Eventually, my eyes came to rest on the only person below who was not wearing a tuxedo. It was a clean-shaven man with slightly oily hair neatly parted in the middle. He had Oriental features and was wearing a purple suit with a yellow handkerchief tucked into a breast pocket. His left cheek was marred by an ugly gash.
“That's a terrible looking wound,” I remarked as I squinted to get a better look.
“Yes,” Nameless agreed. “It's his punishment.”
“Punishment? What for?”
“He pitted his demon against me. Don't you remember?”
“You did that to him?”
“Of course not. His demon did.”
It was at that moment that his eyes made contact with mine. A feeling of fear stirred within me.
Xiling's eyes widened momentarily. He threw down his viola and stood up, knocking over his fold-up chair and glaring furiously back at me. More meteors landed in a thunderous shower all around, some of them even striking the concentric rings of stone seats. “We finally meet, Marcellus Gyges,” came the words in my mind although his mouth never moved. Xiling's tiny hands balled into eager fists.
“Sssssssss,” hissed Vassily angrily in Xiling's direction, a forked tongue flickering from his scaled lips.
The Chief Justice's eyes strayed to Nameless. A moment of surprise mingled with hesitation flitted across his smooth features. “You!” he breathed.
“Do you have any peanuts?” the man sitting next to me asked.
“Peanuts?” I exclaimed and looked over. An overweight, elderly man whose mouth hung slightly open and probably never closed was sitting next to me. He aimed a weathered, unhealthy face at me, a face topped by watery, bloodshot eyes far too large for it. This was one of those people who seemed to be surprised by anything that happened in the world around them, even as simple as an unfamiliar passer-by.
When I turned back to the orchestra, I found that the rows between myself and the orchestra were packed with a fuller audience. They were all staring at me.
Xiling laughed and lunged forward.
He leaped up from the bottom of the amphitheater onto the lowest stone ring, violently pushing the occupants aside where he landed. They fell limply into the space below and were gone.
“Sssssssss!” hissed Vassily, greenish eyes flashing angrily.
I fell out of my own head. Not quite sure what else to do, I turned to Nameless beside me, but he only gazed languidly back. I would find no answers there.
Xiling was already half-way up the rows of seats. I could hear him growling. His terrible eyes were trained on me. People like useless debris were shoved aside and tumbled down into the pit below. The orchestra played silently on.
A light went on inside my head. When it seemed that Xiling was so close his outstretched fingers would wrap around my throat, I remembered. This was the real Xiling, there was no doubt. I could feel it. It was his spirit anyway. But the body, the form, that was dreamstuff. It was the fabric of my very thoughts that allowed him to manifest here, and being my own, I was in control of it. After all, I had summoned him.
I waved my hand. A shocked expression crossed Xiling's face. His body wavered, broke, and dissolved into nothing.
I decided I had had enough with orchestras and falling meteors. I sent them away, too.
“I remember now,” I announced suddenly. Turning to Nameless, I asked, “I'm dreaming, aren't I?”
“Yes, Marcellus. You finally noticed.”
“Did I now?” A concerned look filled my face. “I'm worried about Munib.”
“Worried?”
“Yes. About his soul. What will come of him? Does he have a demon like Xiling? Or an angel like you?”
Nameless stood a moment in the nothingness I had left us in. “I cannot say, Marcellus. He is not in my charge. But my feeling is that, like many others, that particular struggle has not yet been decided for Munib.”
“I hope he makes it.”
“So do I, Marcellus.”
For some reason I felt sad. “I'm still allowed to feel for him, aren't I?”
“Of course.”
I glanced quickly at Nameless' expressionless face. “You don't remember what it's like to feel, do you?”
“Do you remember when I told you why we have to die?”
I scrambled to think. “Yes. To be rid of the conditioning. So we can start afresh.”
“To be rid of the physical conditioning.” He pointed to the base of my head. “All the learned behavior stored in your cerebellum. You leave it behind when you die and it rots away. Remember, you have other bodies – vital, mental, theme – and these have their own conditioning that carry over into the next manifestation.”
“What about creativity? Where do new things come from?”
At once, a familiar landscape began to crystallize around me. Even before it had become clear, I knew what it was. I was standing at the sharp edge of a cliff. My toes hung precariously over it, but this time I was not afraid. Below was a deep, dark, endless chasm. The far side was obscured if it existed at all. In the air hung a heavy mist. Behind me, there was a maze of paths leading off among a dismal terrain of high grass and boulders. The paths extended forever in every direction, and yet this cliff face was just footfalls away from any point on those paths, if only you looked for it.
Nameless stood beside me. “I'm not having those terrible nightmares anymore,” I said to him. “I'm doing better now. It's because of you, isn't it?”
“No, Marcellus, it's because of you.”
I leaped into the chasm.
This site and all its contents are the result of the tumultuous workings of the mind of one Adam Wasserman.