Bastion Science Fiction Magazine - Issue 7, October 2014 Read online

  Tears of embarrassment and regret streamed down her face, clouding her vision. Her agitated breath fogged up her mask.

  “Calm down,” the pilot advised. “Your vitals just spiked and—”

  Sumelyu swept her feet under the pilot’s legs, toppling her. As the pilot careened to the ground, her words muffled by the fall, Sumelyu grabbed her med-pack and ran towards the outcroppings of rock she’d used to reach the summit. As she descended, she kept looking up at the summit for signs of the pilot, but a bank of clouds rolled in and obliterated her view.

  By the time the pilot had traced her footsteps in the snow to the ledge, she had vanished.

  About an hour later the Ariadne climbed through the sky and resumed its mission.

  #

  “There will be no more Blessings.”

  Drosian, lost in a reverie, was pulled back into the here-and-now by the sound of his daughter’s voice.

  “I know.”

  Sumelyu knelt down and kissed him on the cheek. The old man’s skin was still burning up. “But the Guilds will endure,” she said, and pulled out the equipment she had snatched from the pilot. “With this tool, we should be able to direct the sicknesses we carry in our bodies to defeat one another. Perhaps not everyone will survive, but…”

  “We should use it on the youngest members of our Guilds first,” Drosian said. “They have the best chances of making a full recovery.”

  Sumelyu sat down beside his reclining figure.

  “We won’t live forever,” she said.

  Her father looked at her for a long time, ineffable sadness mixed with transcendent joy. “Then let’s make the most of every moment we have.”

  Sumelyu nodded. Suddenly the events of the last week seemed to catch up with her body all at once. Chills passed through her with the same vigor that the Blessings had once exerted. Exhaustion tugged at every cell in her body. This is no paradise, she thought, looking at the frozen cavern walls. But it’s home.

  ###

  Alvaro Zinos-Amaro is co-author, with Robert Silverberg, of When the Blue Shift Comes, which received a starred review from Library Journal. Alvaro’s short fiction has appeared in Analog, Nature, Galaxy’s Edge, BuzzyMag, and other venues. His poetry has been nominated for a Rhysling award. Alvaro's reviews and essays have been published in the Los Angeles Review of Books, The New York Review of Science Fiction, Strange Horizons, and elsewhere. Alvaro currently edits the blog for Locus. His website is Waiting for My Aineko (myaineko.blogspot.com).

  Shudder

  Manfred Gabriel

  So, we’re guarding this warehouse. One of those domes on the periphery. No idea what’s in it. Lot of the time they’re empty. Bait for the goons. Still, orders are orders.

  I’m up top with a Geiger and a three-sixty. Nothing but burnt out adobes for blocks. My murder is evenly spaced around the base of the dome, each killer just close enough to put eyes on one another in case the buzzers jam. Another two at the doors. A convoy’s due after dark along with our relief, but out there, night falls slowly.

  Spinners swarm out of the north, we don’t see them because the setting sun is in our eyes. Glare guards might work here, but not there, where the sun would burn your retinas in seconds if you did so much as blink in its general direction.

  The spinners are silent. Not like the old kind that hummed like so many flies. They strike Vil, pierce his well coat, a thousand stings to the chest.

  Then the goons start popping out of the ruins of the adobes, gear shots in their gangly hands, eyes like they were slit open with knives. They keep the two killers nearest Vil pinned down so they can’t get to him. He goes down. He’ll be dead in less than a minute.

  I leap and hit the side of the dome nearest him, slide down so I’m only a few steps away. Meantime, goons have spotted me, gear shots plug the ground, the dome, but they miss me as I move to Vil. His eyes were wide, his breath slow and labored. If I took time to feel his heart, no doubt it would be racing. With one hand I’m firing away with my Geiger, green shots hurtling into the already bombed out buildings. Explosions send pieces of goons flying into the air. In my other hand I’ve got a patch, slap it on Vil double-quick. He was still unconscious, but at least he was breathing normal again.

  The goons regroup behind the wall of an adobe that was once a manse. They start firing again. I blow the wall to pieces with my Geiger. I fling Vil over my shoulder. No small feat. He’s a big man, even bigger than me. Start scrambling up the wall, my boots gripping onto its smooth façade. I make it back up top. Look around. Half my murder is gone. The goons are making their way to the dome door.

  I call for support. I’ve got Vil lying at my feet, and I’ve emptied my Geiger. Some of my murder has joined me up top. A hopper rolls overhead, like some black thundercloud. It booms. Jumpers fall from its portals to engage the enemy. A tentacle wafts down to me. I grab hold of Vil and it sucks us up into the hopper.

  Did he make it?

  Who?

  Vil.

  Oh yeah, he made it okay. Coats in the hopper saw to that.

  And how did you feel?

  Pissed off. That was my murder, my assignment, and we got our asses kicked. Good killers, all gone.

  You weren’t afraid? I mean, with all that happening around you.

  I didn’t have time to think about it.

  Even afterwards, sitting in that hopper?

  Don’t you get it, Coat? I’m never afraid. Never been afraid in my entire life. That’s why I’m here.

  #

  How are they treating you?

  Aren’t you a ‘they’?

  I’m sort of a volunteer. I take cases that interest me. I’m not associated with the clinic.

  We call it the twisted house.

  I prefer clinic.

  It’s okay, I guess. You hear all sorts of stories on the outside, you know. Like they throw you into pits with a bunch of other loonies, and everyone’s trying to claw their way up and out, and screaming or sobbing so that you can’t ever get any peace. Or they drug you into a coma and strap you to your bed for good measure. Stuff like that. But I’ve got a soft bed and they let me read all I want. My room’s got an odd shape, and funny little windows like raindrops high towards the ceiling that let in the stars. The corridors beyond go this way and that, turn and curve and hairpin. So in case you escape your room, you won’t be able to find your way out. The food’s crap, but I’m used to that from the periphery. At least it’s regular. Sometimes, food drops wouldn’t come for days. Support our troops—bullshit.

  Still, could be worse. Did I tell you I was once captured by the goons? They don’t normally take prisoners. No word in that gut spewing language of theirs for it. Caught me unawares once when I got lost in the canals. Dozen or so on me, not much I could do. They bound me with what seemed like their own flesh, all oozing. Think they were just holding me while they figured out the messiest way to kill me.

  Spent ten turns under that white-hot sun. No food, little water. They stripped me naked. One of them always watching me. Finally, they left me alone for a few minutes. A mistake, I guess. Anyway, one thing about those cords they bound me with, they were slippery. Slid out of them and stole away. Could hear them hunting me for several miles before I finally came upon one of our recon units. Almost shot me. Thin as I was, no clothes, thought I was one of them.

  Did you think you were going to die?

  Notice you didn’t use the word ‘afraid.’

  I know that you weren’t. At least, you think you weren’t.

  Saying I think I’ve never felt fear is like saying I think I have ten fingers. I don’t think. I know.

  Smoke?

  If they’re pure, sure. None of that untine crap. I like my addictions.

  So tell me more about never having been afraid.

  Must have been maybe five or six when I first realized I was different. Before that, you know, you’re a boy, climbing, jumping. Maybe my parents
were scared for me, but I was fearless.

  Anyway, I used to share a room with my older brother when we were kids. He was only a year older than me. One night, he wakes up screaming. Our mom comes rushing in, scoops him up, holds him, rocks him, sings a lullaby:

  Night falls

  A soft blanket

  The moon

  A kiss on the cheek

  Child, it’s time to close your eyes

  Child, it’s time to sleep

  You have a nice singing voice.

  Thanks. Parents made me take lessons. Even then, I was into the military stuff. Thought it might soften me. Anyway, my mother, she’s singing that song. We had a nightlight, and I can see my brother, shaking and sweating. Hear him sobbing softly. Next day, I ask my mother what happened. She said, ‘Oh nothing, just a nightmare.’ That’s when I asked her what a nightmare was. That’s when I first knew I was different somehow.

  You had never had a nightmare?

  Oh, I dreamt of monsters and being chased or being lost and alone. I guess you’d call those nightmares. But I was never scared, even while I was dreaming. Even before I woke up and realized none of it was real. Later, I read this fairy tale about this guy who wanted to be able to shudder with fear, but he wasn’t afraid of anything, no matter what. He eventually marries a queen, and, one night, tired of his complaining, she dumps a barrel of water on him filled with little, squirming fish while he’s sleeping. He wakes up, shuddering. A joke, get it? I figure I’m like him. Except nothing’s funny about it.

  #

  I met someone yesterday.

  Tell me about it.

  You don’t seem surprised.

  Nothing surprises me about you anymore.

  I’m lying in my bed. It’s lights out, but I can’t fall asleep. No reason. Nothing in my head. Just not tired. Then the voice, you know the one, that tells you it’s time to wake up, time to eat, that I’ve got an appointment with you. The one that comes through a speaker hidden in the wall somewhere, it starts talking. Only it’s not the older woman’s voice with the perfect diction, it’s the voice of someone who sounds like she’s not a girl exactly, but not mature yet, either. And she’s talking right to me.

  She’s a patient, she says. Has been since she was a little girl, since she wouldn’t stop cutting herself and refused to eat. I ask her if she’s been here so long, why isn’t she better yet? She is better, she tells me. Just not good enough. Anyway, she says, where would she go, what would she do? Family stopped visiting years ago. This is the only home she knows.

  They let her work in the office. They trust her that much. At night, the watcher likes to nap. Leaves her to monitor the eyes. That’s why she has access.

  And of all the patients, she talks to you?

  I know what you’re thinking. She’s some figment of my imagination. Hell, you might even think I’m making the stuff about being scared. But it’s real. She’s real. Said she can see me. Like I didn’t know there were eyes in my room. She says that she liked how I looked. Most guys here, they’re old, or they don’t care about their appearance. Me, I look like I take care of myself. I tell her I exercise in my room. Pushups, sit ups, running in place. She says she knows. I wonder what else she’s seen.

  Sounds like she has a crush on you.

  Yeah, probably. Don’t know if she’s ever been with a man. Don’t know what she looks like. Imagine she’s a waif of a thing, gaunt. Too young. Not my type. Some of my murder, we’d go on leave, and first place they’d head to was a comfort house. Find the youngest one in the bunch. Not me. Nice to get the attention though, remind me that I’m still alive.

  #

  No, I didn’t want to die.

  But you were standing in the airlock, your hand on the button, ready to open it up into space.

  I told you, I’ve never been scared. I thought facing my own mortality might scare me.

  But in the military, you did that all the time.

  I was working.

  And did you? Think about death, I mean. While you were in the air lock.

  Course. Can’t help it. I tried to imagine myself being blown into the vacuum, floating for a couple of minutes, unable to breath, then exploding. Then nothing.

  And that didn’t frighten you?

  You can’t be scared of nothing. Long ago stopped believing in heaven. All a fantasy. Wishful thinking.

  By those who are afraid?

  I guess.

  Want some coffee?

  Sure.

  Tastes lousy, but it’s all they have in here. So, you thought about it? Hitting the button, I mean.

  Who wouldn’t, especially if you’re like me?

  You’ve never told me what’s so bad about not being scared. Most people spend their life being scared. They wouldn’t mind being free of fear.

  How would you like it if you could never be happy, or sad, or angry, or in love? Good or bad, they’re all emotions. Part of being human. I feel like, without fear, I’m missing something important.

  But you didn’t open the airlock.

  No, a couple of tars grabbed me before I could.

  So you would have? You did want to die.

  Yeah, suppose so.

  #

  Cecilia, that’s her name. Talk to her every night, after the lights are out. We speak real quiet. I can almost feel her breath. It’s like she’s in the room, not a disembodied voice.

  What do you talk about?

  Last night, I told her why I’m here. I’ve told some others on the outside about it, kills in my murder, a couple of girls I’d been with. None of them believed me. Or if they did, they thought I belonged in here. Cecilia was different though. Curious. Had lots of questions.

  Then she told me about her mother. Scared of everything. Worried constantly. Wouldn’t let her go out and play by herself when she was a little girl. Had her chipped so that she would know where she was every minute of the day. Picked her up from school, even when she was old enough to walk by herself. Made Cecilia frightened, too. She couldn’t talk to strangers, froze in a crowd. Asked her if she thought her mom caused her problems. She was quiet for a long time after that.

  You like, her, don’t you?

  I feel bad for her. Being in here.

  You’re in here.

  Yes, but I can leave whenever I want.

  Not without my say so.

  Try me.

  Then why don’t you go?

  I’m still hoping you can help me.

  #

  You don’t believe that I can’t feel fear.

  I believe you believe it.

  Cecelia believes me. She’s the only one who’s ever believed me. She’s been here so long, she knows crazy when she sees it. She could be something if she ever got out of this place. Could be a coat, if she wanted. Smart, has these insights, this way of getting me to talk. Know what she told me? She said I’m as healthy as anyone else. I just have this illness. Like a diabetic not producing insulin, I don’t produce fear.

  We cured diabetes years ago.

  I don’t think she knows that. Have you come up for a cure for me, with all that blood you took?

  I wouldn’t be here if we had. Tell me more about Cecelia. You’re fond of her?

  Sure.

  You’re in love with her.

  Never been in love. Loved, yeah. But not in love. Have to think about that.

  #

  You really should let me go. The guards will be here any moment.

  They won’t. I know you had the eyes turned off. To keep what we talk about secret. ‘Sides, all I have to do is give my wrist a twist, and I’ll break your neck.

  If you can kill me so easily, why don’t you let me go? You can always reach out and snap my neck later if you want.

  No matter. I wasn’t going to kill you anyway. Had enough killing in my life. Just wanted to let you know I could.

  Why?

  Cecilia had a meltdown last night.
She was crying, saying she was losing it, she couldn’t do this anymore. I didn’t know what that meant, but I knew she needed help, so I went to her.

  You escaped your room?

  I told you, I can leave whenever I want. You forget where I’ve been, how I’ve been trained. So I head down the corridors, twisting this way and that. Turns out, Cecelia still has that chip her mom planted in her, and I still have my tracking hardware. Can’t take that out of you without turning your brain to mush. All the while, I hear Cecilia cry. I don’t understand though, because my room is far away. I think maybe she started filtering it through the buzzers in the hallways, luring me. Like a siren.

  Still, you went. Out of love.

  The locks to the offices are biometric. Old style, easy enough to clear. I get to the room where Cecilia is. She’s there in the corner. A lot like I imagined her. A lot like she described herself one night when I asked. She couldn’t lie. Maybe that’s why she was having so much trouble now.

  I don’t understand.

  Maybe I should kill you. Lying to me still. Even after I know the truth. I took her and held her tight.

  You had sex with her?

  You know I didn’t. You were watching the whole time. You or someone like you. I found the eyes. No, I held her, rocked her, like a child in my arms. I told her it would be okay, that I understood. It wasn’t her fault. That’s when I realized what was going on. Who you are. Not a coat at all, not the kind you pretend to be, at least. You don’t care about helping me. You just want to use me, and you were using Cecelia to help you. You want to know what makes me tick, why I don’t feel fear. You want to take it, bottle it, feed it to all the other soldiers out there. Make it into a weapon. Imagine, an army without fear, charging into battle without a care for their own skins. Every general’s dream.

  It doesn’t matter anymore. We have what we need. We thought it might be in your psyche. That’s why the talks. But it’s in your blood. We can reproduce it in other soldiers, create that dream you seem to dread. Finally bring the war to an end… Why are you laughing?