“Shit,” Battle said. “They’re just ghosts.” There was an ugly metallic ratcheting as he brought up his weapon again. Behind him, the others had followed suit.
Teddy slammed the end of the staff against the earth, pulling at the dregs of power in Bloat. There was less than he expected. The mermen dissolved into nothingness as he brought the power to bear on the intruders. “Go back!” he husked out through clenched jaws. “I order it! Drop your weapons!”
He held them in the bonds of his mind, but that was all. Their wills struggled against his. Cameo turned first, then Danny. Sweat was breaking out on the Outcast’s forehead, dripping into his eyes. Teddy blinked, shaking his head and concentrating, letting the power run from dreamtime to Bloat to him.
Battle took a step backward, the muzzle of his weapon dropping. For a second Teddy thought he’d won. He ached. The Outcast’s body was shaking as if from tremendous physical effort, but they had all turned now except Billy Ray. Teddy pushed at him, grunting.
Like any such exertion, Teddy could only push for so long. Everything gave way suddenly. In that moment he lost his connection with Bloat and his hold on Ray and the others. Gasping, Teddy knew he was going to die, knew it even as Ray’s finger curled around the trigger.
The penguin leapt between them as the weapon chattered death. Downy feathers exploded like a bursting pillow. The bird’s carcass slammed into Teddy and nearly knocked him over. Billy Ray was staring, as startled by the suicidal move as Teddy was. For a moment the tableau held as Teddy knelt down to the penguin.
“This is twice now,” the penguin gasped. Blood was drooling from the corners of its beak, the black-and-white fur was spotted with red, the skates torn from its flippers by the violence of the slugs, the abdomen a ragged moist cavity. “Fat boy, how many more times will someone have to do this before you get the idea?” It giggled, a sound very much like Bloat, and then gurgled wetly in its throat.
It died.
Teddy stared at the penguin, aghast. He couldn’t move, couldn’t do anything. The hold he had on the intruders fell apart. He heard Battle’s order before the man spoke.
Kill him, you idiots! What are you waiting for?
Teddy had no power left at all to stop them. He let the Outcast dissolve as he fell into dreamtime. Automatic weapons fire gouged the wall behind where he’d been standing.
The Outcast swayed as though he were about to fall. Wyungare put an arm around the man’s shoulders, steadying him. There was pain in his eyes, pain in his face. His body radiated anguish and exhaustion. "Up there,” said the Outcast, attempting to point. “It’s all like that out there now.” He looked like he wanted to cry, but couldn’t quite spare the energy for tears. “We’re all dying up there.”
The gentle southern skies looked like they were shot through with blood and pus and smoke. In the middle distance, Wyungare and the Outcast could hear a sound like the wind blowing hard enough to bend adult trees to the ground.
“I’ve got to tell you something before it’s too late,” said the Outcast. “I think probably I fucked up and it may be too late to fix things.”
Wyungare squinted. He’d thought there was something different about the hero’s face. The Outcast looked much the same as he always had, except that the smooth, distended, baby-fat surface was gone. The Outcast no longer looked quite so much like a hyperannuated boy. His features were more like a man’s features. Not just any man’s — someone who had embarked on a journey through hell. There were new lines deepening around mouth and eyes.
“Wyungare?”
Wyungare blinked. “Go ahead, my friend.”
“I’m scared shitless. All those people trusted me, and they’re going down like the action figure soldiers I used to trash when I was a” — the Outcast swallowed on a dry-throat cough — “when I was a kid.” He looked like he almost smiled. “A younger kid.” His eyes were bleak and pained. “Thing is, it’s not a game. Not like computers or video. Joker heads get taken off by shrapnel, their brains stay smeared over the wall.”
“It’s a hard lesson,” said Wyungare. “There are many who will never deal with it. They will simply run, whether inside their head or in the world.”
“There’s no reason you have to do this. After the New
Jersey’s shells destroyed your cell, you could have split. No one would have wondered.”
The wind roared closer. It sounded out of control, a primal force that would know no restraints.
“I am trying to help a brother,” said Wyungare.
“I’ll remember that.”
The Aborigine set his hand lightly on the Outcast’s shoulder. “Then here is something else to remember.” He looked into the man’s aging eyes. “Someone needs help.”
“I need help,” said the Outcast.
Wyungare smiled.
They stood outside the cabin in which they had watched the boy Jack being raped. The house was even more ramshackle than before, as though it had started to decay and no one living there had the heart to attempt repair. A boy walked slowly out the front door and looked around. He did not appear to see either Wyungare or the Outcast. Or if he did, he didn’t react. It was Jack. He held a faded, worn, soft-sided suitcase that looked like it was finished in some hideous carpet design. His hand grasped a handle made from several loops of cotton clothesline.
Then, as though the suitcase were too heavy to hold, as though it were an anvil grasped in his hand, Jack set it down. He fell to his knees beside it and stared into … nothingness. There was no focus in his eyes.
He made a keening sound like an animal crying.
The Outcast and Wyungare exchanged looks.
“What…” the Outcast started to say. He swallowed.
“What can I do?” His voice trembled.
Wyungare turned back to Jack. “You know the weight he bears. You saw.”
The Outcast hesitated, as though still waiting for direction. Wyungare gazed back at him. He very nearly could, the Aborigine thought, hear the neurons popping and sizzling in the man/boy’s brain.
Then the Outcast crossed the clearing to where the boy still crouched beside the faded carpetbag. At first hesitant, then surer, he strode until he reached Jack.
For just a moment he looked back beseechingly at Wyungare. Then the Outcast sank to his own knees beside the boy. He put his arm around the boy’s shoulders and began to speak.
Wyungare could overhear it.
“Listen… friend, I, I’ve sort of been through some of this too, you know?” At first the words stumbled. But Jack looked back at his older companion and his eyes widened as though a less tangible, more articulate message was coming through. You are not alone, said the Outcast. I understand something of what you feel. Talk to me. Maybe I can help. “I know,” said the Outcast. “I’ll help you if I can. I want to.”
The boy slowly tilted his face to meet the Outcast’s eyes.
You are not alone. That was the communication that crossed each direction.
This is courage, thought Wyungare, and then he glanced up at the tops of the trees, past them toward the onrushing storm.
“I care,” said the Outcast. At first tentative, then sure; the two men, one very young, the other barely older, embraced. Strength, reassurance, healing power, all flowed first in a trickle, then a rushing river.
Now you are a hero. The Outcast could never articulate that for himself. But the Aborigine shaman could do it for him.
Wyungare felt as though he were an observer at an exorcism. Ghosts of smoke and shadows swirled up. And dust. Then all fled.
It took a few seconds to shake off the memory of the dreamtime.
The Outcast blinked, disoriented and exhausted. As always, he quickly scanned the minds of the Rox, checking the familiar minds as a sailor might check the stars. Kafka, Croyd (still sleeping), Travnicek, bodysnatcher, Molly
“Governor?” Kafka asked. “Glad you’re back. I —”
“Shhh…” Teddy said.
…?
??Twas brillig and the slithy toves did gyre and gimble in the wabe…
The passage was an anomaly in the matrix of the Rox. Patchwork was throwing up words like a fog, clouding the interior thoughts.
…All mimsy were the borogoves, and the momes raths outgrabe…
Behind the screening words, Teddy could sense anger and determination. And a name.
“Travnicek,” he said.
“Governor?”
“Gotta go, Kafka. Hold down the fort.”
The Outcast called on his power and moved. It was much, much harder than it should have been.
“Interesting,” Travnicek said. “I could feel it, just a second before you showed up. A shifting in the energy fields, a blurring.…” Travnicek, his neck lei erect and quivering. Teddy’s surroundings were coming into focus now. He was in Travnicek’s tower, in the room buried under tons of reinforced concrete and battle armor. It seemed a very dim and uninviting place. Travnicek was observing him like a bug under a microscope. All the flowers of the growth around his head were facing his direction.
In the middle of Travnicek’s speech, there had been a faint plonk from the opening to the air shaft. Travnicek hadn’t noticed it. Behind the art-deco grillwork, Teddy could see an eye empty of its socket, like a hardboiled egg with a brown yolk.
“Something very unusual happens when you do things, slug,” Travnicek was saying. “I think that if I could figure it out” A second, much louder noise came from the shaft. This time Travnicek turned. They both saw the hand, clutching a large grenade. The pin had been pulled; the fingers held the triggering lever in place, but only barely.
Shit! The governor’s there.
Travnicek screeched and leapt backward several feet, putting himself behind the Outcast. “Get rid of it, slug! Put battle armor over the vent, smash it, I don’t care!”
“I’m listening to her. She’s not going to let go. Not yet.”
…can’t kill Bloat shit shit shit…
The Outcast grimaced and gathered the shreds of power around him. He concentrated. Harsh purple light flared in the amethyst of his staff. He blinked. When he opened his eyes again, Patchwork — minus eye and hand — was standing before him. Teddy almost staggered from the effort of bringing her here. He had almost nothing left.
“Beware the Jabberwock,” he said, and giggled despite his weariness. “Patchwork has been a very bad girl.”
“He won’t let Modular Man go,” Patchwork said. She talked hurriedly, rushing the words as if she could make them more convincing with speed. “You weren’t supposed to be here, damn it. I was going to —”
“— kill Travnicek,” Teddy finished for her.
“—talk to him,” she answered. “Really. I just want him to say the right words. I want him to tell Modular Man that he doesn’t have to obey anymore, that he can follow his own mind. And if he won’t say them, I’ll make him.”
“Or kill him. With your vorpal grenade.”
“Or kill him,” she conceded. “Yes. I figured it would come to that.”
“The tin heap’s mine,” Travnicek spat. “By the way, Governor Slug, how is it that you missed this little assassination attempt?” Travnicek moved to the opposite side of the room, keeping the Outcast between himself and the grenade.
“I’ve been busy,” Teddy said. “I can’t listen to everyone all the time. I’m only human.” That seemed funny too, but no one but him looked amused.
“Governor,” Patchwork pleaded. “Modular Man is a person, as much as you or me. He thinks, he feels. He hates what Travnicek’s doing to him.” She turned to the man. “He’s told you that. He loathes you. He’d kill you himself if he could.” Back to Teddy. “He’s made Modular Man into a slave, forced him to do things he doesn’t want to do. All I want is for him to let Modular Man go. Set him free.”
“Hallelujah!” Travnicek mocked. “So I’m Simon Legree. Well, Little Nell, Uncle Tom’s a machine. I bet you don’t let your car decide which way it wants to go. You don’t let your stereo play what it wants, do you. And he can’t kill me. He can’t even think that. He’s a fucking tin can. Tin cans don’t have feelings. I didn’t give him feelings.”
“Maybe he’s learned them on his own,” Patchwork answered. “Maybe you built him better than you thought. He’s more than you know or want to believe. I — I —” …love… Teddy heard the thought. “— care for him. He’s a friend and he’s done a lot for me. I owe him this.”
“You might as well have feelings for a vibrator,” Travnicek scoffed. He kept the Outcast between him and the grenade. “Because that’s all he is. A big, shiny vibrator. You just like it because you can talk to him afterward.”
“I’m not talking about sex,” Patchwork said. “If you were even halfway smart, you’d know the difference. Governor, please… How can you let him do this? I thought the Rox was all about freedom, about being able to make our own decisions. How can you call the Rox a homeland when you allow this kind of thing to continue? Isn’t this exactly what you’re fighting against? Isn’t it? Damn it, Governor —” Patchwork stopped, breathless. “I’m so lousy with words. I can’t tell you how I feel or what I know. If you hadn’t been here…”
“I’ll make it easy for you,” Travnicek said. “This is now Toaster Liberation Day. He doesn’t interest me anymore. I’d rather watch the slug here, and I’m safe where I am. You want the toaster, you got him. How’s that for easy? Now, Governor Slug, why don’t you take Grenade Lady here and pop her someplace safe.”
“You’ll do it?” Patchwork breathed. Her fingers tightened around the grenade’s lever. “You’ll really do it?”
“Yes, I’ll really, really do it,” Travnicek answered in a mocking, high voice. “Now take your little play-toy and go.”
“Then tell Modular Man now, while I’m here.”
“I can’t. The slug here sent him on a mission.”
“Then how can I trust you? How do I know you’ll do it?”
Travnicek gestured at Teddy. “The governor can read my mind. He can tell you exactly what I’m thinking. Since you don’t seem to want to blow him into little slug-pieces, I assume you trust him.”
Both Patchwork and Travnicek turned toward Teddy. “Governor?” Patchwork asked desperately.
The Outcast blinked, his mouth open.
The truth, slug? The truth is that the toaster’s programming is hardwired and I couldn’t change that even if I wanted to — and I don’t want to. The truth is that frankly Grenade Lady here is too dangerous to live and I’m going to enjoy telling the tin heap to take care of her just as soon as he gets back. That’s the truth. And! don’t mind telling you. You know why? Because you can’t let the toaster go. Do that and you’ve lost the one weapon that’s worked for you in this fight. Let the toaster go and who knows whose side he’ll come down on. He knows everything about this place now. You want him bringing back a tactical nuke? You want him taking you out with a well-placed laser burst? I control him, and I’ve given him to you. I didn’t hear you complain about using him. You’re a putz, a wimp, the Great White Weenie. I heard what you did with Detroit Steel and Snotman. That was stupid and now you’re going to do something smart. You’re going to lie. You’re going to talk nicely to Grenade Lady and get rid of her until the toaster’s back. Go on, slug, tell her that nice Dr. Travnicek will let the poor old toaster have its freedom.
“Go, on,” Travnicek said aloud. “Tell her, Governor Slug.”
“Patchwork —” Teddy began. Stopped. He was looking at Patchwork, at the defeated sorrow in her face. He listened to her dejected thoughts and rummaged through the images of Modular Man she held. His head whirled with other images and thoughts; Jack in his bayou swamp: his cousin Rob and Uncle Alan; the penguin flinging itself in front of him not once but twice.
“Fat boy, how many more times will someone have to do this before you get the idea?”
“You’d really do it?” Teddy asked, and read the answer in her mind even as he spoke the questio
n. “It isn’t just a bluff. You’d really sacrifice yourself to give Modular Man his freedom.”
“Hey, slug” Travnicek said.
Jack, in the dreamtime. Rob, crying under the covers.
There’s nothin’ you can do, Teddy. Nothin’. Just leave me alone.
“He lied,” Teddy told Patchwork. Travnicek’s alien face looked in horror at the Outcast. “He can’t and won’t let Modular Man go. I’m sorry.”
“So am I,” Patchwork said. She nodded and tried to keep her next thought from him. Teddy heard it anyway. He tried to send Patchwork one place and her hand another. The amethyst gleamed and faded, but she was still there.
The lever of the grenade hit the floor with a distinct chime.
“Go!” Patchwork shouted at Teddy.
He went. The echo of a twinned scream followed him.
SATURDAY NIGHT
September 22, 1990
On the heels of a strong north wind, through a storm of fire, carrying his new weapon wrapped in a tarpaulin, Modular Man returned to the Rox. Forgetting about shoot-and-scoot tactics, Zappa had finally unleashed a continuous barrage from his full arsenal, and though a lot was inaccurate, enough was hitting the target to continually outline the Rox in a glow of fire. Broken turrets yawned to the murky sky alongside shattered domes. Weapons lay abandoned on the ramparts. Smoke rose from the burning.
The last hour of the Rox had come.
The android timed the falling shells, waited for a lull, and dropped into Travnicek’s tower. As he flew over the inner bailey he saw that craters of various sizes had shattered the symmetry of the stone flags. The smell of high explosive hung in a noxious cloud. There were dead people, and parts of people, scattered in the rubble.
Modular Man dropped down the long tube of the tower. At the bottom he found Travnicek’s door still sealed. He knocked, received no response.