The Lord of Opium

  “I love you, too,” said Matt. How could he have thought her angry and unforgiving? María was made for forgiveness. She was the one still point in a world full of lies and shifting loyalties. “I’m sorry I was cruel to you. I didn’t mean it. I would never mean it.”

  “I know,” she said simply. “I lost my temper too. I know you wouldn’t betray me.”

  “Never,” he swore. “Mirasol . . .,” he began, not knowing how to explain.

  “Mirasol doesn’t exist,” said María firmly.

  “She doesn’t exist,” he repeated. He didn’t believe this. Somewhere Mirasol did exist where he couldn’t find her, but he wasn’t going to risk an argument. “I wish we were together.”

  “Mother won’t let me come,” said María, “but I will. I don’t know how, but I’ll find a way.”

  “I could come there,” Matt said.

  “It’s too dangerous. I hate to say this—I know it’s wicked and God tells us to honor our parents—but I don’t trust Mother. She’s become so powerful. Presidents and generals listen to what she says, and she’s so single-minded. I don’t think you’d be safe here.” María unpinned the altar cloth from the wall. She put it into one of the cylinders Esperanza used to send messages through the holoport. “Remember me,” she said, and tossed the cylinder into the portal.

  Mist billowed around the missile as it made its slow journey through the wormhole and fell to the floor with a metallic chime. The image of the Convent of Santa Clara filled with snowflakes, and a finger of icy air touched Matt’s face. After a moment the image resolved, but by that time María was gone.

  * * *

  Matt wandered through the gardens in a dream. At last he’d seen María, and although they couldn’t touch each other, they were as close as if they were in the same room. Esperanza hadn’t been able to change her. Matt smiled. María’s mother might have the power to order generals and presidents around, but she couldn’t control her daughter.

  Matt had the altar cloth folded inside his shirt next to his skin. When he drew the fine silk from the cylinder, it was as though María had reached through the portal and touched his hand. He was transfixed, unable to move for several minutes. He would keep the cloth always. He would never be without it.

  Birds crowded the garden, feasting at various feeders that were refilled each morning. Goldfinches clung to bags of thistle, jays squabbled over sunflower seeds, woodpeckers complained loudly when he walked by. Hummingbirds hovered in front of his face, daring him to steal their sugar water. The air was full of their colors—yellow, blue, iridescent ruby, and green—and of the whirring of their wings.

  María said that when Saint Francis went into the fields, throngs of birds filled the trees. “My little sisters,” the saint told them, “God has granted you the freedom to fly anywhere. He has given you pretty clothing and taught you beautiful songs. He has created the rivers and springs to drink from, the rocks and crags for refuge, and the trees for your nests. The Creator loves you very much. Therefore, my little sister birds, you must praise Him.” And the birds rose into the air, singing marvelously and circling ever higher.

  I shouldn’t have made fun of Saint Francis, Matt thought. Even if he didn’t quite believe the stories, she did. He would try to be respectful.

  He had no idea how much time had passed. The sun had moved toward the mountains, and the shadows had lengthened. He arrived at last at the playroom, vaguely aware that he had to fetch Listen and Mirasol and enter the real world again.

  Mbongeni was asleep in his crib, with Listen curled up beside him. She was sucking her thumb and looked at Matt with wide, scared eyes. Matt immediately looked around and saw the line of eejits next to the kitchen. If they had moved in the time he had gone, there was no evidence of it. Mirasol . . .

  Mirasol was standing next to a bed, and around her lay a drift of pictures pulled off the walls—dinosaurs, reptiles, and insects. The thumbtacks had been removed, and now Matt saw where they had gone.

  El Bicho was standing next to her and very carefully pressing the tacks into her skin. Her whole right arm glittered with metal as though she were in armor. Mirasol herself showed not a trace of emotion. Her eyes stared straight ahead, unseeing.

  Matt hurled himself across the room. “You little crot!” he yelled. He struck the Bug, sending the boy flying across the bed. The Bug screamed and scrambled over the other side. Matt flung himself on the bed, but he was stopped by Listen, who had jumped out of the crib.

  “Please, Mr. Patrón. Please help Mirasol,” she cried, grabbing Matt’s ankle. “I tried to stop him, really I did. He wanted to hurt me, but she came between us. Every time he tried to get me, she put herself in the way.”

  The red mist that had descended on Matt’s brain cleared. He’d been about to kill El Bicho. He knew it. He panted as though he’d been running a race. He sat down on the bed, his heart pumping.

  “We’ve got to take Mirasol to the hospital,” said Listen. “She didn’t even move when he put those tacks in. She didn’t cry or anything, but it’s got to hurt.”

  Matt blinked at her. The Bug was still under the bed, screaming.

  “Mr. Patrón? Are you awake?”

  “Yes,” Matt said dully.

  “You can order the eejits to carry Mirasol to the hospital. I can’t,” said the little girl. “I tried.”

  At last Matt responded. “Did Dr. Rivas come here?” he asked.

  “He dropped the Bug off and left.”

  The Bug is the wrong one to kill, thought Matt. Dr. Rivas is the one who knew what would happen. But he couldn’t unleash Cienfuegos on the doctor. He needed him to train the new physicians and nurses. It was another compromise in the battle to save the eejits, like shooting down an aircraft to avert a war. As Dr. Rivas said, you could get used to being evil. Matt got up and gave the orders to the eejits.

  23

  THE RUINS OF TUCSON

  The new hovercraft was large enough to carry cages of owls as well as Matt, Mirasol, and Listen. Listen planted herself sulkily next to the owls, who watched her with round yellow eyes. She had thrown an unholy fit when informed she was to go to Ajo, and it had taken two eejits to subdue her. Only Dr. Rivas’s command to obey the patrón had made any impression on her. And Matt’s promise to send her back later.

  Matt had said nothing to Dr. Rivas about Mirasol. What was the point? The girl hadn’t minded the tacks, and her injuries had been slight. A disinfectant spray, an injection of vitamins, and a few crème caramel custards had put everything right.

  Cienfuegos climbed into the pilot’s seat. “You didn’t see much on your way here, mi patrón. Now you can get a better idea of your country.”

  They flew down the valley and over the huge observatory. Sunlight glinted off the two telescopes, and soon they were traveling north to go around the mountains. “I could fly over them, but there are dangerous downdrafts in the canyons,” said the jefe.

  Matt looked out the window, entranced. The other times he’d been in hovercrafts, he’d been either sick or scared. Now he watched the landscape unroll beneath him. Here and there were the ruins of abandoned houses or the sketchy marks of agriculture gone back to the wild. After a while he saw a large town that had been deserted. “That’s Willcox,” said Cienfuegos.

  “Where did the people go?” Matt wondered.

  “When the Dope Confederacy was established, people were moved either to the United States or Aztlán,” the jefe explained. “It wasn’t a peaceful transition. Thousands died in the conflict.”

  “¡Por Dios!” exclaimed Matt. “Why did the governments allow that?”

  “The governments had no control. Drug lords battled homeowners; homeowners fought back. The armies of Aztlán and the United States moved inhabitants who cooperated, but the system broke down in many places. It was a bloody time.”

  “Was it worth it?”

  “For the drug lords, very much so,” said Cienfuegos. “As for Aztlán and the United States, they experienc
ed a few drug-free years. In the long run, who can say whether it was worth it? Allowing Opium to return to the wild preserved the ecosystem. Throughout history there have been disasters that have had beneficial results. Bubonic plague killed a third of the people in Europe, but it destroyed the old governments and allowed their citizens to gain freedom. The result was a burst of creativity and prosperity never seen before.”

  “Dr. Rivas has a supply of plague germs frozen in his fridge,” Listen revealed, having gotten over her tantrum. “He’s got smallpox and cholera, too. He spanked me hard when I opened the door.”

  “Now I know he’s one of the villains. Show me which fridge the next time we go to Paradise and I’ll blowtorch it,” said Cienfuegos. She stuck her tongue out at him.

  They flew over another deserted town called Benson. It was crossed by a meandering stream that sparkled in the light. “That’s the San Pedro River,” said the jefe. “Not long ago it was dry, but with the people gone, the water isn’t being sucked away.” Cottonwoods filled the river valley, and the ground was covered in tall grass. Suddenly, a large catlike creature emerged from the grass and bent down to drink from the stream. It was followed by four adults and four cubs.

  “That’s a lion!” cried Matt.

  “Well, what do you know? They’ve spread from Tucson,” Cienfuegos said, pleased.

  “Lions don’t live here!”

  Listen got up and peered out the window. “Looks like they do,” she observed.

  “They broke out of the zoo during the fighting,” said the jefe, “along with a lot of other animals. The elephants didn’t do well, and the hippos died from lack of water, but there’s still quite a wildlife population around Tucson. In winter they stay close to the nuclear power plant, where it’s warm. Some of the lions have adapted to the cold and moved away.”

  Matt saw a herd of antelopes grazing along an old road. “We can collect some of these for Esperanza,” he said. “She won’t believe what we’ve got here.”

  “Let’s keep it our little secret, in case we need to negotiate with her,” advised Cienfuegos.

  As they went on, Matt saw more greenery and more animals. There were large stretches of desert covered with saguaro, paloverde, and ocotillo, but between them were green valleys where water ran. Clusters of deserted adobe buildings appeared, and rusting metal dwellings that Cienfuegos said were called trailers. The dead city of Tucson loomed ahead with skyscrapers like the ones Matt had seen in Aztlán, only these stood against a bright-blue desert sky, not the polluted air to the south.

  To the north were two gigantic power plants, one nuclear and the other a cold-fusion energy producer. By the nuclear plant was a large lake surrounded by reeds and waterbirds.

  “Are the power plants deserted too?” Matt asked.

  “Oh, no,” said the jefe. “El Patrón had them built. This is where Opium gets its power. Most of it goes to protect the border. We’ll land here to recharge our antigravity pods.” They floated down to a large hovercraft port and clamped onto one of the magnetic strips.

  Immediately, men swarmed out of a nearby building. “I’ve alerted them to our arrival,” said Cienfuegos.

  He stepped out, and the men snapped to attention. “At ease, amigos. I bring you our new patrón. Try to look fierce,” he said in a lower tone to Matt.

  As Matt stepped out, a cheer went up from the men. “¡Viva! ¡Viva El Patrón!”

  “I’m not El Patrón,” Matt whispered.

  “Oh, but you are,” said the jefe. “You’re the old man reborn. I’ve watched you develop these past weeks. You were nervous at first, but the power grows in you. You’ll make a fine drug lord.”

  “I’m not—”

  “Walk past them into the building,” said Cienfuegos. “Don’t wave. They don’t expect it. There’s a lunch waiting for us inside.” Matt, feeling uneasy, did his best to look tall and fierce as he went past the cheering men. Mirasol walked obediently at his side, and Listen followed with her head held high, as though she were already a drug queen. Inside was a table covered with a white tablecloth and bowls of food. Three places were set.

  “What about Mirasol?” asked Matt.

  “She will serve you,” said the jefe. “You can’t be seen treating an eejit as an equal.”

  “Oh boy! Apple pie!” said Listen as her eyes lit on the dessert.

  “Wait until you’re served,” Cienfuegos ordered. First Matt, then the jefe, and then Listen were given potato salad, fried chicken, and candied yams by Mirasol. She filled their plates until told to stop. When she cut pieces of pie, Listen demanded three slices, but Cienfuegos stopped her at two.

  “I want ice cream and lots of it,” said Listen.

  After the meal, various men came up and offered their greetings to Matt. They were all Farm Patrolmen in charge of supervising the technicians operating the plants.

  “Mirasol needs to eat,” Matt said after the introductions were over.

  “I’ll order a packed lunch. She can have it while she waits for us in the hovercraft,” said Cienfuegos. “Now we get the grand tour.” A technician guided them through the plants, explaining what each section was for. The man seemed very intelligent, but there was a deadness in his eyes that spoke of some form of control. Most of the workers were robots, but a few human technicians moved among them. They must have been performing jobs that required great skill, yet their faces were just as expressionless as the robots. They didn’t look up as Matt and his companions passed.

  “They’re all men,” said Listen.

  Matt stopped and looked around. She was right. “Why aren’t there any women?” he asked Cienfuegos.

  “El Patrón didn’t think women were smart enough for this kind of work,” said the jefe.

  “I could do it,” Listen boasted. “Show me how and I could run the whole damn plant.”

  “You can’t even reach the on button,” said Cienfuegos. The technician who was guiding them went back to work, and the jefe led them outside to the lake. Here it was hot and humid, and strange trees formed a dense forest not far away. They were covered with vines, and dark shapes moved restlessly behind shaking leaves. Close by, a bird erupted from the reeds and flew toward them, honking angrily. The jefe caught it before it managed to attack and tossed it back into the lake.

  “That’s an Egyptian goose. She must have a nest nearby. Let’s go before she recovers.”

  There were many kinds of birds Matt had never seen before living in the marsh. Some had built nests like baskets attached to the reeds. Cienfuegos said they were weaverbirds and came from Africa. “I come from Africa too,” Listen said proudly. In the water itself were catfish with long whiskers, and Matt saw a pair of yellow eyes gazing up at him from green depths.

  Cienfuegos hastily pulled him and Listen away from the edge. “I forgot. There are Nile crocodiles in the lake. We lost a technician last year,” he said.

  Nile crocodiles? thought Matt. This place was getting more amazing by the minute. When they got to the forest, he saw monkeys slipping through the leaves. Large-billed toucans flapped heavily to keep their balance on the branches, and something howled in the trees beyond. Listen cowered behind Cienfuegos.

  “It’s a gibbon,” the jefe said. “Harmless, but noisy. Some of the things here aren’t harmless, though. There are Malayan tigers, African river otters that can take a chunk out of your leg, and Tasmanian devils that will attack anything. I think we should turn back. I’d hate to have to kill anything.”

  Matt vowed to return when they didn’t have a little girl to protect. He was enchanted with the lush greenness, the teeming life, the odor of flowers hanging from the trees. “It’s a real jungle,” he exulted. “Did El Patrón know about this?”

  “Of course, but he lost interest in it after a while,” said Cienfuegos. “He liked to start things and then move on to something else. Neglect is probably what preserved this place.”

  “Did all these animals come from the zoo?” Matt asked.

&n
bsp; “Yes, but even more interesting is where the plants came from. We’ll go there next,” said the jefe. They retraced their steps and cut through the nuclear power plant to reach the hovercraft port. On the way they passed a shrine to Jesús Malverde, and Matt saw Farm Patrolmen arranging flowers in front of the statue.

  “That looks like you,” said Listen, pointing.

  Matt sighed. “It’s a portrait of El Patrón as a young man.”

  “There’s a big chapel in the woods near Paradise,” the little girl said. “The nurses were always going out there to worship. Dr. Rivas says that only idiots pray to a chunk of plaster.”

  “Dr. Rivas doesn’t know anything about religion,” said Cienfuegos.

  “Oh, yes he does. He’s a scientist, and they know everything. Religion is crap,” declared Listen.

  “You’re the most obnoxious little brat I’ve ever met.”

  “Both of you be quiet,” said Matt, who wanted to savor the memory of the green jungle.

  They returned in silence as Cienfuegos and Listen simmered with resentment. From all the crumbs inside the hovercraft, it was clear that Mirasol had fed lavishly. She looked up and—was it possible?—smiled at Matt. The smile was gone as swiftly as it had appeared, and he wasn’t quite sure it had existed.

  He sat next to her and let Listen sit in the front. For days at a time he forgot about Mirasol. He was so used to her that she seemed more like a familiar piece of furniture than a person. He took her hand, hoping for a reaction. She let it hang limply in his grasp. Remembering how risky it was to awaken her, he let it fall again.

  24

  THE BIOSPHERE

  They floated over a series of low hills. The canyons were full of streams and a wild profusion of plant life. The dry hilltops were covered with cactuses and paloverde trees. Ahead was a shimmering, transparent curtain that distorted the land beyond.

  “That’s the northern border of Opium,” said Cienfuegos.