Paul started to ask how, but he never got the chance. The Boy began to turn in a slow circle, as if addressing everyone and no one all at the same time.
“You can hear me,” he said. “I know you can…all of you. You are adults, and I freely admit that in the past I have had little use for you. But I need you now for you to set things right, so the villains do not triumph. Just as you need us to survive so that there remains a spirit of youth, joy, and laughter for you to cling to, as you would savor a long-forgotten taste upon your tongue.
“If you have hands to clap, clap them now. If you have lips to speak, move them now. Believe, as I do, that matters can—should—must come out aright. I need you to have faith with every fiber of your being—with your minds that others believe cannot think, with the faintest whisper of a mouth that others believe cannot speak—believe that we should be delivered, hale and whole, from this place.”
And Paul, hearkening back to his own experience with clapping his belief, realized what The Boy was doing. He joined in, speaking to that which he could not see, but with no less emphasis. “You cannot follow us, but you can send us on to be your proxies. Our triumph will be your triumph, and in the depths of your despair will be a single glimmering ray of light for you to bask in and take with you to your ultimate destination, whenever and wherever that may be.
“Believe in us. Believe in a happy ending. Believe…believe…”
Their words echoed throughout the entirety of the Noplace and resonated into the rest of mankind.
It was an extremely cruel time.
We cannot fault Paul and The Boy, really. They were simply trying to salvage their situation, to give themselves a way out. They could not know the harsh result. They cared merely about the ends, and gave no thought to the means through which it was acquired.
Throughout the world, for a very brief time, people lying in comas, or with multiple tubes invading their bodies—people who were incredibly aged, sitting in a haze of uncertainty as to whether they were alive or dead, their own memories suspect and their own children strangers to them—for a very brief time, those peoples’ families were surprised and stunned to hear them speak or whisper with a clarity and certainty of purpose that they had all assumed to be long gone.
“I believe,” whispered the elderly and infirm.
“I believe,” whispered people lying in hospitals.
“I believe,” whispered coma patients who had been declared to have lost the ability to string words together.
Individually, not a one of them would have been able to embark on anything approaching a heroic quest or a world-saving mission. But together, collectively, they joined their will and determination and recollection of what it was like to be young and carefree and triumphant, rather than laid low by the curse of relentless age and cruel nature.
Their nurses jumped and their family members started, and throughout the world hope swelled that a miracle had been handed them from on high. A million tiny miracles presented in one brief, glorious instant, like a star exploding in the mind of humanity.
And then it faded.
The aged slipped back into their twilight worlds, the comatose back into their comas. They left behind them a vast array of momentarily stoked hopes that would convince their families and caretakers that there was a possibility—however slight—that their loved ones would return to them. It would sustain them for a terribly cruel period of time until, one by one, they were doomed to disappointment.
’Twas a fleeting moment…but, as the Bard once said, “’tis enough, ’twill serve.”
A door that neither The Boy nor Paul knew was closed opened wide, and they were pulled through. A happy resolution had been determined, not by me, certainly. I am but the recorder of events; and honestly, I had no idea how matters would turn out until just now, and to speak truly, I am of mixed feelings on it. I do not believe that heroic quests should end in failure if it can be helped, but I despise the notion that innocent bystanders are made to suffer without even comprehending why things transpired the way they did. But no one asked for my opinion, which is probably just as well, since it was a vacillating one at that and not of much use to any. Best, then, that I simply relate what happened next rather than dwell upon yet another example of life’s cruelties.
Chapter 20
The Strange Fate of Mary Slash
Anyone who has ever had a dream—which is, in fact, anyone—can tell you that the speed with which time passes in one place is not remotely relevant to the speed with which it passes elsewhere. Many has been the time, I’m sure, when you’ve fallen asleep at the witching hour and had enough dreams to fill an entire night’s sleep—only to awaken and discover that mere minutes have passed.
So, too, was it with the transition from the Anyplace to the Noplace and back again. Mary Slash had just sent The Boy tumbling into the shadow of her brother with a vicious thrust of her sword, and she was now holding the bloody implement over her head and laughing her triumph.
It is difficult to say whether she would have lived long to celebrate it. Upon seeing what had transpired, Princess Picca let out a savage howl, leveling her spear and preparing to charge right at the pirate queen. For her part, Captain Slash was brimming with confidence over her latest victory, and confidence can go a long way in a battle to the death. All other fighting had ceased aboard the pirate ship, with all eyes now upon the princess and the pirate. There was a sense that the winner of this impending and no-doubt fearsome battle would determine who was the victor in the war that had consumed the two vessels.
But before any move could be made, there was a loud sound like a sudden rushing of air, as if a small tornado had leaped into existence right there on the deck of the ship. All of them watched in astonishment as the shade of Captain Hack trembled, flinched, and suddenly seemed to be pulled right into itself, like a shirt being turned inside out. Then, from out of the space that had been occupied by the piratical shadow, two forms leaped, although really they were as much propelled as they were jumping on their own.
The Boy and Paul landed on their feet, and Gwenny, who was looking on, waited for them to collapse and die. Instead, they stood tall and straight, looking first at themselves and then at each other.
Then The Boy looked down.
His shadow was secure at his heels, as if it had always been there and was slightly puzzled over the notion that it should be anywhere else. Of the outline of Captain Hack there was not the slightest trace.
“That’s as it should be,” said The Boy, and “I should say so,” agreed Paul, and then the two of them grinned in that insouciant way that only triumphant boys can. Gwenny let out a squeal of delight, and Princess Picca a war whoop of triumph; and Fiddlefix turned lightning-fast circles, chiming out in her pixie language so rapidly that not even Paul or The Boy could comprehend what she was saying, but the general thought was that it was approval. The clouds parted, the rain ceased, and the sun shone down.
At which point, Mary Slash went berserk.
“Foul boy!” she said. Her body was trembling and her face was purpling; and the sword upon her wrist was vibrating with such force that it was making high-pitched, irritating sounds. “Vile boy! Contemptible boy! Where is my brother? What have you done with him?”
“He is not ‘done with’ so much as simply done,” said The Boy. “He is gone, woman. Face it.”
“I don’t believe you!” said Mary Slash. Her anger was towering and seemed to have a force all its own, as if it were coming from somewhere else and she was merely the channel for its ferocity. “He cannot be gone! You cannot have triumphed! It’s impossible!”
“And yet here we are,” Paul told her, feeling a touch smug about the ordeal. “Your beastly brother now resides in the belly of the beast, in this world and the next.”
She attacked Paul in a blind fury: She was so angry that she couldn’t see him, her world having been reduced to a sheer blanket of red. “You lie, wretched thing! I hate you! I despise you!” He
r sword went wide of him, and he easily sidestepped it. She stumbled forward, banged against a mast, turned, and charged once more yelling, “You can’t have won! You can’t! You’re just a couple of pathetic boys!”
“Wrong,” said Paul defiantly. “He is The Boy—”
“And he,” said The Boy, “is Tigerheart.”
Again Mary Slash missed in her thrust, as reliable in her aim as any drunkard. Her sword bit down into the prow and she yanked it free, sending splinters of wood flying.
“And to think I was once afraid of you,” Paul said, his tiger’s heart pounding proudly in his chest.
Captain Slash tried to go for him once more, but this time her wrath was so all-consuming that she wasn’t able to stay upon her feet. She took two steps and stumbled forward, landing heavily, and she started pounding her fist impotently on the deck. For good measure, she started kicking her feet as well; and for a moment Paul thought she was going to explode, so irate was she. “I don’t believe it! I refuse! It’s not true! I hate you! I despise you! You cannot have won! I won! Me! Mary Slash, the most dreaded pirate captain in the seven seas!”
As you might imagine, this wasn’t going over particularly well with the rest of the pirates. Pirates stake a good measure of their pride and self-esteem to their commander, and Mary Slash’s meltdown was taking their confidence and loyalty—what there was of it, considering they were pirates—along with it. Even worse, the Indians and The Boy’s followers were doing the unthinkable: They were pointing and laughing at Mary Slash’s tantrum. Let me say that again: pointing and laughing. Small wonder, then, that the pirates and the Bully Boys exchanged silent looks and began to sidle away, all unobserved by the amused onlookers. By the time Mary Slash’s strange fate overtook her, her crew was long gone, having taken the closest small boats and longboats and gotten away as quickly as they could.
Mary Slash, meantime, was still venting loudly. One could almost feel a measure of pity for her. After all, she had thought that she had triumph within her grasp, and now she had nothing, while that damnable Boy looked on in amusement. She flipped over onto her back, continuing to pound the deck with her hand and booted feet, like an irate tortoise. All thoughts of her mother’s fate were gone, so furious was she.
“Oh, come now, Captain,” The Boy said, “act your age!”
It is impossible to say whether she heard him or not, but she very well might have, considering the results. She howled for her crew to cut down these smirking invaders where they stood, but her crew was already well under way. “I want my brother! I want my crew! I WANT MY TRIUMPH! I WANT MY DAY OF VICTORY! I WANT MY SHIP! MINE! MINE! ALL MINE! GIVE IT TO ME GIVE IT TO ME I WANT IT I WANT IT I WANT IT—”
Gwenny was the first to notice what all the others were laughing too hard to realize: As she purpled in rage, as her cheeks seemed to balloon, as her eyes scrunched up, Mary Slash’s voice was getting higher pitched. The words were running one into the other into near incomprehensibility.
And then Princess Picca’s eyes narrowed, and she saw something else, and she pointed and said, “Is pirate captain…shrinking?”
Paul tried to wipe the tears of laughter from his eyes, and then he saw what Picca was talking about, and so then did The Boy. They stopped laughing, consumed by the wonderment of it all.
Mary Slash didn’t realize they had stopped laughing. She was far too involved with herself, and it was not just that she was shrinking. She was growing backward very rapidly. Within seconds she was a teen, then a young girl, and the tantrum continued. Her hair grew shorter, her face rounder, her arms and legs chubbier. She was no longer speaking anything approximating words, but instead had been reduced to one long, ululating cry.
She disappeared within her clothes; and in very short order, there was only a moving lump beneath her shirt. It was thrashing, still crying, but it was more of a reed-thin wail; and then even that tapered off and there was nothing.
They all exchanged looks, and then slowly Paul moved forward toward the pile of clothing. He pushed the garments aside and then realized that the crying had not ceased entirely. There was still a faint snuffling, like the sound of an infant that had exhausted itself but was trying to work up its energy once more.
He pulled the clothing back, and, lying there, with a scrunched-up face and discontent expression, was a round-faced, pucker-lipped infant girl. The sword was lying nearby, having fallen off her wrist since the cuff was now far too large, although the stump still remained from where she had severed her hand. She had a small tuft of hair atop her head. She looked as if she was about to start crying again.
“Hunh,” said The Boy. “I guess she really did decide to act her age.”
“Swaddle her,” Gwenny said quickly. “Infants like to be swaddled.”
Paul quickly ripped up the pirate shirt, fashioned a diaper out of it for her, and then drew her pirate coat around her like a swaddling blanket. If the infant had been intending to cry once more, she changed her mind. Instead she nestled her head against Paul’s chest, her eyes rolled up in her head, and she drifted to sleep as if she had just had the longest day ever.
“Never seen anything like this,” Princess Picca said.
“Oh, I have,” Gwenny said confidently. “It’s called a ‘second childhood.’ It happens all the time to adults. Granted, not usually this dramatically or reflective of the true nature of the attitude, but things do tend to turn out rather literally around here.”
“So—so what do we do with her?” said Porthos, looking a bit disconcerted over the entire business.
“It’s obvious,” said Irregular, and he pointed at Paul. “He said he wanted a new baby sister to replace the other. Here she is.”
“What? Her? This?” Paul looked with uncertainty into her sleeping face. “You want me to bring a pirate home for my mother to raise?”
“She’s not a pirate now,” Gwenny pointed out reasonably. “She’s a blank slate. You can write whatever destiny you wish upon her.”
“But what if you’re wrong, and she does grow up into a pirate?”
“Then she’ll doubtless be the most successful member of your family,” said Irregular, “becoming a captain of industry and making more money than any of you know what to do with.”
“Oh,” said Paul, giving it some thought. “Well…that would be okay, then.”
It was at that point that they realized the pirates were gone. For a moment Paul was concerned that The Boy was going to want to go right after them, but instead The Boy simply shrugged and said, “It wouldn’t be fun. They need time to regroup, choose a new leader, and become a threat again. Far more sporting to wait so I can kill them later.” So The Boy and his shipmates set to separating the vast vessels. This took them a bit of time, but they managed it. Even though both ships were somewhat damaged, neither was holed below the waterline, and so they were able to sail them both back to the Anyplace while The Boy bounded from one to the other and kept declaring himself to be commodore.
The Indians, knowing that Paul would soon be on his way, held a farewell celebration in his honor. The Boy, as was typical for him, joined aggressively in the festivities, dancing about almost exclusively with Princess Picca. This left not only Gwenny disgruntled but also Fiddlefix, who alighted on Gwenny’s shoulder and complained at length and in very colorful language—of which Gwenny only understood every third word, but it was enough—about the Indian way. It was the first time that the two females, albeit of different species, found themselves in agreement on something.
Paul did not participate in this celebration all that much, but not—as was the case the previous time—because of grief. Instead he spent the entire time off to the side, cradling baby Mary in his arms and watching her with wonderment. After a time she awoke, and the Indians were able to provide her with a drinking skin filled with milk, which she delicately sucked from. Paul held it carefully, making sure not to let her drink too much at once, and stopping every so often to wipe dribbling liquid from her chin.
The infant finally stared him straight in the eyes, and there was such unadulterated love and peace in that look that Paul felt the last vestiges of his concern melting away.
“Was she worth it?”
He looked up to see that The Boy was regarding the infant with faint suspicion. “You gave up your tiger for her, and everything he represents. You’ll never be what you were before. Was she worth it?”
“If she makes my mother smile, she’s worth all that and more.”
“And if she doesn’t?”
There was a challenge in his voice that Paul couldn’t help but notice. “What do you mean, what if she doesn’t?”
The Boy squatted near him. “Your mother is a mother, no different from any of the breed. She probably has not even noticed you have left; and if she has, then she will probably not care when you come back…and wonder what the point of the infant is to boot.”
“You’re wrong.”
“If I am right,” said The Boy mischievously, “then come back here to the Anyplace with me. We could have grand adventures together.”
Paul thought of all the things his mother had said to him, and the way she really seemed to greet him with nothing but anger. There was just enough truth, or so he thought, in the words he was hearing to make him think that maybe, just maybe, The Boy had a point. But then he rallied his confidence and said, “And if I am right, you have to stay with us. Let my family adopt you. Leave behind childish games and make your mark as a man.”
The Boy spit in the palm of his hand, said “Agreed,” and held it out for Paul to do likewise. Paul spit into his own palm, joined hands with The Boy, and shook firmly, as Mary dozed peacefully in the arms of her new big brother.