Thunder Run

by Daniel José Older

  He locked eyes with her, and Magdalys felt nauseous herself, like some piece of all that heavy history had slipped loose from Lafarge and embedded itself in her gut. “Even today, even after everything that happened next, I still feel a sick sense of triumph when I remember that moment, that power.” He flinched, disgusted.

  “What did happen next?” she asked, when it seemed like he might have finished talking for the night.

  “Come.” He tipped his head toward the far end of the alley, and Magdalys fell into stride beside him as they made their way between the serene crowd of dinos. “You see?” They stepped out into Jackson Square — this city would probably always feel like some kind of fantastic labyrinth, no matter how many times Magdalys walked its streets. The sun had set not long ago and duckbill riders now loped around the edges of the plaza, illuminating the gas lanterns as the daylight faded into a velvety darkness around them. “We won the battle.”

  He pointed out to the center of the park area in front of them, where Andrew Jackson stared endlessly off into nowhere from his iguanodon steed. And beside him …

  “That’s you!” Magdalys gasped. “The boy in the statue.” She walked quickly toward it, vaguely aware of the mass of dinos stomping languidly out of the alleyway behind them.

  The boy’s brow was creased, his mouth a tight frown, fists clenched. She’d thought it was just anger, defiance, when she’d first seen it, but now she realized he was concentrating. “You’re the hero of the Battle of New Orleans.”

  Lafarge made a harrumphing noise behind her. “Some say that. The history books don’t, because Jackson had to be known as the true hero. Presidential campaigns and legacies demanded it, you know. And fragile political egos. But this city loves a hometown hero, even if the rest of the country prefers to suffer from ritually enforced amnesia. Of course …”

  He walked up beside her, gazing at the statue of the boy he once was.

  “Something else,” Magdalys said. “Something happened.”

  Lafarge nodded, his face a cemetery. “I had no idea what I was doing. The dinos had never felt a power like mine. No one knew it was possible. They ran …” He shook his head, frown so severe it seemed like it might fall off his face. “They ran wild. Stampeded through the countryside and bayous.”

  Magdalys waited.

  “Two dozen were killed. Trampled to death, mostly. My … my family. The only family I had left after what the British did. Michel. Jean Louis. Celestine. Mama. Only little Bienvenue survived, and only because she’d been sent to Lafayette before the war. The rest? Murdered by the havoc I created.”

  She reached out, unsure if touching him would help or make everything fall apart. Her hand hung there in the air, trembling. “You didn’t turn away from dinos entirely after that.”

  “Oh, I tried.” He coughed a curt, joyless chuckle. “Believe me, I tried. But … somehow, I couldn’t. They were, against all odds, the only thing that brought me joy. I can’t explain it. Who can make sense of these things? The healing power of the very thing that caused our downfall. It is as infinitely confounding as God.” He seemed to dismiss the whole matter with a shrug. “But fighting, I gave up forever. That was my one vow that day. I couldn’t forsake dinos, because they were a part of me, and there is nothing more dangerous than denying the most powerful part of yourself. But I would — will — never use them to fight again.”

  Magdalys nodded sadly. She’d made a similar vow not long ago, but it hadn’t taken long to break it. No vow changed the fact that this world didn’t care about her life or her loved ones.

  “But this I know,” Lafarge said after a few deep breaths. “Your anger won’t save you.”

  Magdalys tensed.

  “It may have gotten you this far. It may have done so once or twice, yes. But in the end it will only consume you and everything you love. It is combustible, Magdalys. It will catch fire and explode. Especially when you’re dealing with a herd of rampaging tyrannosauruses.”

  “You don’t know anything about my rage,” Magdalys said. “You don’t know anything about my life. What I’ve been through. What I’ve seen. What I’ve done. You think because you’re old and have had horrible things happen, you know everything. But you don’t. You’ve forgotten what it means to care about something enough to fight for it. You’ve made yourself forget.”

  “I —”

  “Don’t compare your pain to mine, Monsieur Lafarge. You’ll never understand it. So unless you have a better suggestion than ‘don’t get angry when people are trying to kill you,’ get out of my way.”

  Magdalys let the competing waves of anger and sadness wash over her as she and Lafarge stared at each other. She had no idea what Lafarge would say to all that, but it didn’t matter much at that moment. All she knew was that she was tired of people telling her how she was supposed to feel, how to live her impossible life.

  His fists were clenched, his face squeezed tight. He looked like he might sob or take a swing at her. Or both. “What do you want me to do?”

  “Teach me,” Magdalys said. “Teach me the Gathering.”

  “I cannot.”

  “Why?”

  The old man just shook his head and walked away.

  Magdalys stood there for a long, long time as the dinos slunk slowly back into the night, until all that remained was the squad of tupus chattering on the iron fence around Jackson Square.

  DAY BEGAN BREAKING in warm grays and soft purples over the Mississippi as Magdalys walked up to the docks. She’d spent the night trying to figure out the Gathering, failing miserably, and had barely slept.

  “Ahoy!” Mapper yelled from farther up the boardwalk. “We got your minidactyl message. How was practice?” Montez, Tom, and Wolfgang stood with him, going through their equipment. A few feet away, Briggs, Toussaint, and Bijoux looked out on the river alongside Lieutenant Colonel Parker and a few of his men. Everyone wore civilian getups: brown slacks and white shirts with jackets. No emblems or medals, no extra cartridge cases or utility belts, just regular everyday clothes. Magdalys almost didn’t recognize them.

  She shook her head. “I don’t know if …” She shook her head. “I don’t know what we’re gonna do.”

  “Mags, I’ve seen you in action,” Mapper said. “You can do anything.”

  She sniffled and rubbed her face. That was exactly what she was afraid of. What if she did get all the T. rexes moving to her will and then they burst out of control? What if they trampled all her friends and Montez and then she ended up an old bitter mess like Lafarge? “I don’t know…. We need a backup plan, something.”

  “Mags … It’s me, Mapper. When have you seen me go anywhere without a backup plan?”

  “I mean —”

  “Don’t answer that! And anyway, we have the whole voyage across the Gulf to figure something out. It’ll be great.”

  Montez squeezed her shoulder. “And if you can’t figure out the dino angle, we’ll just sort out Drek the old-fashioned way like I’ve been saying all along.”

  “Quite a motivational speech there, big bro.”

  “The barge is due any minute,” Parker called. “Gear up and get ready to move.”

  Magdalys and the others joined him on the dock. Mist hung over the water like a sleepy ghost. Magdalys shivered.

  “You ready for this, Roca?” Parker said.

  She shook her head. “I don’t know, sir.”

  “I wish I could say there was room for mistakes, but … that’s not the case. I’m not even sure if Banks is planning to launch the campaign we’ve directed him to. He hasn’t shown much sign of it so far. For what it’s worth, I believe in you, and so does the general.”

  Magdalys took a deep breath. A dark shape appeared in the mist, moving quickly toward them.

  “We couldn’t use any regular US Navy vessels to get you folks across,” Parker said. “So we had to rely on some less … er … conventional partners.”

  “LAND HO, MATEYS!!” a voice called out of the mist.
It sounded … familiar, somehow.

  Magdalys perked up.

  The first thing she realized was that the vessel was even bigger than she’d thought. A wide solemn sauropod face emerged first, its long neck reaching up from dark river water. An elaborate ironclad ship’s hull rose from the creature’s enormous torso. Cannons poked from windows all around. Steam-powered paddle wheels splished along on either side and both masts and smokestacks stretched into the cloudy sky from its midsection. A figure had been carved into the wood at the frontmost part of the sauropod mount — a boy with a cutlass and wily smile. It looked exactly like —

  “Redd?” Magdalys gasped.

  Someone waved wildly from the crow’s nest at the very top of the highest mast. “Yoo-hoo! Up here!”

  “Redd!” Magdalys and Mapper yelled at the same time.

  “You know him?” Parker and Montez both gaped at the same time.

  “Hop on, friends!” Redd called. “We have quite a journey ahead!”

  MAGDALYS WATCHED THE two sharp sail fins of ichthyosaurs cut the swirl of ocean water. She could feel them, their shrill calls back and forth, their shock at encountering a being who could understand them, who could persuade them. Their curiosity felt like a warm breeze; their nervousness tingled and shuddered through Magdalys.

  Out, she thought, and the two fins swung in opposite directions away from the hull. She nodded, waited a beat, then thought, Now back. The ichthys kept going. Back! And then they slipped smoothly beneath the waves and were gone.

  Magdalys put her head against the sauropod’s smooth tree-trunk neck and growled. The ocean stretched out of sight all around them. It went down and down and down forever, and held the churn and swoosh of countless gigantic creatures in its berth. It seemed so much huger here, from the middle of it, than it ever had from the shore. Huge and impossible and overwhelming, just like the task that awaited Magdalys when they landed. She bonked her forehead against the sauropod neck and groaned.

  “Hey,” Redd said, walking up beside her. “What did Phoebe ever do to you?”

  “Urg,” Magdalys said.

  “More importantly, what did your forehead ever do to you? Phoebe probably doesn’t even realize you’re there.”

  “Urga burga.”

  Redd perched on the edge of the deck, legs dangling off, and gazed out at the swirling sea. “I don’t speak urga burga, but if you want to talk about anything, Mags, you know I’m here for you.”

  Seeing Redd again had been such an unexpected blast of sheer joy, Magdalys had managed to forget about what lay ahead and throw herself fully into the excitement of heading off to sea with her brother and some good friends, new and old. They’d played dominoes, and had a delicious fish sandwich lunch, and laughed as Reconnaissance Briggs tried to introduce himself as a master spy.

  Then they’d traded stories about all that had gone down over the past few months. Redd had fallen in with David and Louis and the others at the Bochinche (he assured them everyone was okay), hanging out late into the night and then roaming the Brooklyn streets on his raptor, Reba, looking for trouble. They’d inspired him to dedicate himself even more to the cause of freedom. It sounded to Magdalys like Redd had gone through a similar wrestling match with his own conscience as she had — he didn’t really support a lot of things the US had done, but he wanted to do whatever he could to crush slavery. Finally, he’d decided to offer his services as a buccaneer but not join up fully.

  The government had sent him on several covert missions, mostly interfering with Confederate vessels trying to break the Union blockade of southern ports, and he’d worked his way gradually south and then west along the riverways before General Grant sent a message that someone was needed to secretly transport an undercover unit to Mexico.

  “The last time we had a heart-to-heart,” Magdalys said, putting her head on Redd’s shoulder, “we were about to storm a prison and I was terrified, and you changed my whole life with a few words just by getting me to be confident in who I am and my powers.”

  “Bah!” Redd said, waving her off. He put his head down on top of hers. “It wasn’t all that deep.”

  “Was too,” Magdalys said. “Anyway, now we’re about to head back into yet another battle, and I’m terrified again and uncertain of myself again, but I don’t want to keep dumping on you every time I see you.”

  “Well, that’s the great thing about saying the right thing the first time! I don’t have to repeat myself, since you already know you have to be proud of who you are and all you can do.”

  Magdalys let out a chuckle. “You make it sound so simple.”

  “Oh, no, trust me, I know it ain’t.”

  A few moments of just whispering wind and crashing waves passed. “Tell me something good about you, Redd.”

  “Oh, ha … I fell in love, I think.”

  “Oh?”

  “Twice actually. With the same person. Ugh. It’s a long story. She’s a hundred miles away and who knows when anyone will see anyone again in these stormy days … years …”

  “What’s her name?”

  “Matilde.” He said it like a poem. “She has fiery eyes and amazing aim and rides a minitrike named Poseidon.” He shook his head, then rubbed his face. “Had to head back to France though. She’s the daughter of Haitian diplomats and they were in some heavy-duty negotiations in New York and live in Paris, so we had three weeks of adventures and fun and then she was just gone….” He sighed. “And it’s not like I’m easy to find these days. She only has my address in Brooklyn, so there might be a whole stack of letters waiting for me when I get back, if I ever do.”

  “Oh, man …”

  “Then again, there might be nothing.”

  “Redd …” Magdalys put her hand on Redd’s shoulder. “I’m sure she wrote.”

  “Yeah, well … maybe. She was pretty upset when I told her I was going to run missions for the army. Said if I got killed without her she’d have to go hunt down all the people who’d killed me and it would really be a nuisance.”

  Magdalys snickered. “I like her already.”

  “Heh, you think she was kidding? Now tell me what’s wrong with you. Seriously.”

  Magdalys affected Lafarge’s battered old voice and Cajun accent. “Everything you know is trash.”

  “Oh wow,” Redd said. “You found a grumpy teacher.”

  “Did I ever. Told me anything I’ve managed to do with dinos while in battle or afraid for my life doesn’t count.”

  “Well, I mean, that can’t be —”

  “No, he’s right. I mean, I can still connect to them, and I’m starting to get the hang of a few at a time, but … basically I’m back to knowing nothing.”

  “Not nothing, Magdalys. Everything you’ve done leading up to this still matters. You still draw on it to get to where you’re going.”

  “Yeah.” She scowled. “Seems like wherever I’m going, it’s just to die.” She turned back to the water, closed her eyes.

  Redd put his hand on her shoulder, whispered, “I believe in you, even if you don’t.” She waited for the sound of his boots to clomp away.

  Magdalys reached out. The sea was mighty, full of life. It churned, like a living thing itself. She could feel the rasps and moans, the eerie high-pitched howls echoing back and forth beneath the waves and through her core.

  Come, Magdalys thought. Gather to me.

  The moans and howls rose and fell within her. She felt no click of connection, but maybe it wasn’t about that. Maybe it was something else entirely.

  Forget everything you know, Lafarge had insisted. But he hadn’t really told her what to do next. And then he’d just closed up shop and walked away.

  Papeena, a tiny hoot sounded above the rest.

  Magdalys blinked her eyes open. A single tupu sat on the ship rail in front of her.

  “Hyacinth,” Magdalys sighed, slumping forward, almost entirely alone. “Hyacinth.”

  MAGDALYS AWOKE IN darkness to the sound of shuffling fee
t and skittering dinos above. What was happening? She’d gone to bed a little after sunset, worn out from a frustrating night of dinowrangling with Lafarge and then a full day at sea. She had no idea how long she’d slept; a circular window showed only night sky and crashing black waves. She was alone in the cramped sleeping quarters. Each long, raspy breath of the huge sauropod they were on seemed to rumble through the whole rickety hull, sending gusts of air and creaks of wood whispering back and forth.

  She sat up.

  That meant that Redd had cut the engine off. It was the first time since they’d left New Orleans that those huge paddle wheels on either side weren’t swooshing amidst the churn and chug of steam. The sauropod drifted along on her own, swishing those gigantic fins through the water occasionally. Magdalys reached out to her and got an almost eerily serene kind of mooing as the reply. The sauropod, at least, was content.

  Magdalys slid off her bunk and pulled on her boots. She stumbled up the steep stairwell onto the deck, where a brittle ocean wind swept over her. No one was around. That couldn’t be right. She’d just heard them. Magdalys turned and exhaled. Everyone stood at the front end, their backs to her. There was Montez, beside Mapper. Colonel Wolfgang Hands stood with his arms akimbo, Tom Summers and Bijoux on one side, Briggs and Toussaint on the other. Milo sat on Bijoux’s shoulder. Dizz, Beans, and Grappler were perched on the railing, and Redd sat astride Reba.

  If Redd was already mounted up, Magdalys realized, walking toward her friends, that must mean … “Land ho!” he called.

  “Well, there it is, lads,” Wolfgang said.

  “Don’t look like much, do it?” Toussaint said.

  “It’s still two hours before daybreak,” Mapper said. “And the rendezvous point is out in the middle of nowhere for a reason.”