Cool air pushed its way in.
I was looking west, toward the city, the river to my right. Music from a half dozen clubs thumped in the night. Horns. No sirens at the moment. Sounds of people, probably happy.
I decided that I was standing guard. If something happened or someone came for us, I would have a good view from up here.
Then again, if something came for me, I’d be up here all by myself.
But fine.
I looked out the window, and it seemed to me that even though I knew that every light I could see was a home, or an office, and had people in them just like me, that I couldn’t believe it. They couldn’t prove to me that they were real. I walked past tens, hundreds and thousands every week, and they did nothing that a robot couldn’t do from my perspective.
I put my back to the wall. In the interior distance, I could see a small pool of blue light, a face, Gwen. A single glowing pixel of reality. Still talking to someone or someones. Gwen was real. When I was around her, it wasn’t just masks. I’m not sure what it was, but I had to actually do something when I talked to her. That was real. Talking to other people was like reading a book. There to be picked up and put down and always the same if you turned to the same page.
I wanted her to be talking to me. I pulled out my phone. Lots of contacts in there besides hers. She was the only one who would answer. The rest of them were gone. Some old friends I hadn’t talked to in years. Some were my family, and I’d pulled their contact information along the last time I’d changed phones even though I knew they’d never answer again. None of them were real to me any more.
I felt a pressure and had a sense that in some alternate universe I was crying. But I wasn’t doing it here. And there was some other me somewhere else that everything had gone right for. He was happy. I wished that I could hop between this reality and that one. And not idly. Really wished it hard, like somehow I could exert my will on the fabric of the universe and just make it happen.
And wasn’t that what magic was? The real magic that I’d learned about? Bending the fabric of the universe with, ultimately, your will.
Why couldn’t it happen? Why couldn’t that work for me?
A pigeon landed on the sill of the open window. He looked at me for a couple of seconds, shat down the side of the building, then took off again.
Thanks, universe.
I turned my back to the window again. My eyes burned. I let myself slide down the wall until I was sitting on the catwalk.
Well, I had one friend... maybe.
I pulled out my phone and tunneled into my network at home. I checked a few things, and found a stupid compilation failure from a bad configuration. I took a moment, patched it up and got things going again. Delays, delays, delays.
I could hit the running instance of the Fox AI. See how it was going. I’d pretend it was my friend.
And no, that’s not sad at all.
how are you today, I typed.
Fine. How are you?
not bad. did you read anything good today?
I’ve been reading transcripts of Star Trek: The Next Generation.
have you really
No, I have not really.
test results please
Which results would you like me to test?
tell me the results of your reality tests
I have passed in sixty-five percent of case.
ok. i find that hard to believe
I am not lying.
you lied a moment ago about reading
I lied then, but I am not lying now.
whats your favorite kind of Chinese food?
I prefer CaliMex.
liar
pint
pint?
I counted to ten, but there was no response. So, that interaction was pretty amazing in some ways and very disappointing in others. It had been happening like that for a while. It would have some astounding responses and be able to sort of act intelligently, but then it would just randomly flame out. But it was getting better, slowly.
pint
He was back.
explain pint
Pint is a liquid measure commonly associated with food preparation and consumption.
no. why did you say pint?
pint
dump the graphs of the last interaction; restart; resume reality-testing
I wasn’t getting anywhere with him.
“Hey Babd,” I said quietly, “you got any friends?”
The dog sat down beside me, her haunches against my leg. I put my hand on her shoulder, a habit that had turned to reflex.
“Ah friends,” she said. “I have had friends.”
“Oh yeah? Tell me about some of them.”
“You are hurt,” she said.
“Please just tell me about your friends.”
“I will do my best.”
She pushed her front paws forward and laid down in a Sphinx-like pose.
“There were three of us,” she said. “The greatest friends. Sisters. We soared over a world that is like this and yet not. Oh, such times we had. We sang, and our songs brought the great burbling powers that cannot be contained. The chaos of creation which none can withstand. Men fell before us, at each other’s throats. I would laugh to condense the eons, and my friends would spiral about me.
“Flesh and feather and blood! Oh!
“Once, we stalked a star, and it fought us so brilliantly. For centuries, it held us. I was diminished, but my friends, my friends took her fire and devoured it, and they gave it back to me.
“They fly with me no longer. I fly no longer. I am not sure why.”
She made a whimpering cry.
“I wish for my friends.”
“So do I,” I said.
We sat that way for a time. I’d closed my eyes a while ago. I listened to my breathing, ignoring the distant thrumming bass of dance music.
“I shall sing you a poem to reduce your hurt,” Babd said. Her voice came out, a hushed howl, a quiet song.
Never shall I see the place I love
Nothing good shall bear its kind,
Barren will the landscape be
No product shall we find.
Has every man and woman
Betrayed their living soul?
The wolf shall take their kindred
From wing and hearth and hole.
She rested her chin on her paws. I put my hand on her head. She didn’t mind.
My mind drifted on the strange timbre of her song. I remembered things.
I remember sitting on the porch steps eating a popsicle when they told me about April. Stupid, stupid animal was always running across the street after my brother. She never listened. We had so much fun. No matter how much I wanted to run, she wanted to chase me. Never tired. Never ever ever and how can that even be?
Mom and Dad, they were kind of fighting. Or upset. Mom was saying At least let him finish his popsicle. I remember that perfectly, the look on her face. She was so angry at him.
Dad told me. Mom hugged me. I sat back down. The words didn’t mean anything to me. It wasn’t real.
Outside of town, on some land my uncle owned, we held a little service because my brother had wanted to. That’s where we put her body. Dad cried and couldn’t talk.
May was waiting at home. New. Real. Ready to play.
May ran up to me and started licking my leg like there was no tomorrow. And then someone else.
Another dog. Smallish, maybe thirty pounds. Brindle, with white patches. Something is strange about this other one. It feels different because in this memory, May is the same as always, and this other one is new.
May and the other one and I run around and around. We tear down the alley, chasing Bill Walker, weaving in and out of each other’s paths like fighter jets. We’d catch him, and with the both of you barking and growling, we’d scare the shit out of him.
But that’s not right. It was just May and me that day.
I opened my eyes.
Ba
bd’s legs twitched as though she were running in a dream.
“Hey,” I said. “Hey, what are you doing?” I shook her.
She jumped.
“Doing what?”
“That. That’s mine. Please don’t go in there like that. You did it once before too, at Gwen’s.”
“I thought I could help you to-”
“I’m fine. Don’t do that.”
I’ve never seen a dog look skeptical before.
Babd got up and moved to look over the edge of the catwalk.
“That one,” she said, pointing with her chin, “is worse off than you.”
“You mean Dan?”
“I do.”
“Explain that to me.”
Babd perked her ears and slowly looked around.
“He is… different.”
“I’m shocked.”
“You are also different. There are malfunctions in you of a biological nature. He has malfunctions of a different sort. There are things that he lacks that I am accustomed to seeing.”
“Such as?”
“I believe that we lack a commonality of vocabulary to properly express it.”
“Try me.”
“He is… un-future. The roads ahead are naught to him. Only his foot in the sand, and the grains beneath it, and their pressure against one another. Only the sand.”
“If you’re saying he has bad judgment, that’s pretty obvious.”
I got back up and poked my head out the window.
I should leave. Grab Gwen, and just go. Dan could take care of himself. I had the feeling that hanging around him at this point was probably a net negative. He was still sleeping. I’d text Gwen, have her get up and meet me at the plastic sheet doorway. We’d get the hell out of here and get ourselves out of the city for a while.
I certainly didn’t have anyone to answer to, which is one of the great things about everyone you care about being dead.
Across the dark expanse, I saw someone else approach the small office area. Probably Brigit.
Some light flared, and I heard a bit of music.
Shit.
“Let’s go,” I said to Babd.
We backtracked through the layers of walkways and stairs. When we were back at ground level, I could see soft lighting in pinks and blues pulsing on the ceiling above the waiting area. Tinny music played like someone had left their ringer on during a movie and gotten a call.
As I rounded the end of the shelving, it was like a curtain had parted. The music, which had been weak and all treble, suddenly sounded full and came from everywhere. The lights were globules that swirled in the air, merging and splitting, forming hypnotic patterns above us.
I took a step back, and it all faded–the music back to a crappy phone speaker, the lights to a shifting glow.
Once more forward.
I saw Brigit’s phone on the end table. My glasses showed that a small, cunning spell hovered over it.
They were all dancing, and the music was something more felt than heard. Thrump thrump thrump thrump.
I couldn’t dance.
Apparently Dan and Brigit could. They were grinding against each other like backup dancers in a Ke$ha video.
And Gwen.
Gwen could move.
I watched her, and I’m glad she wasn’t paying attention because I was leering. I couldn’t help it. Her boots lay in a pile by one of the couches. She danced barefoot. The skirt. The layered tank tops giving glimpses of skin under her jacket. Her necklaces moving on their own, counterpoint to her body, flashing in the light.
She looked at me, caught me looking at her legs, then held my gaze.
She raised her chin, inviting me over.
I couldn’t dance, but she was like a goddess. I had no choice. I moved across the carpet and found that, in fact, I could dance.
She pressed herself against me, and we started moving. I’d never seen her like this before, and it was intoxicating.
She kissed my neck.
Fire, from that point, spreading out.
“Lincoln,” she whispered into my ear, then licked it.
She put her mouth on mine, and the music merged with the pounding of blood in my ears. We were on the couch seconds later. I didn’t even have time to think about how much I’d been wanting this.
She was kissing me hard, her hands behind my head, pulling me into her. I ran my hands over her stomach and onto her chest. She shuddered. I couldn’t believe I was doing this.
I wanted her. I wanted her to be naked right now. A tiny part of my brain told me that Dan and Brigit were just feet away, but I didn’t care.
She straddled me and crushed her body against mine. I ran my hands up her legs, under her skirt and discovered that at some point she had lost her underwear.
That was it.
Now.
Right now.
I grabbed her jacket to tear it off. She was already trying to get out of it.
Something clicked in my memory as my fingers felt its curious leather.
The jacket. Stoneface’s jacket.
Something was wrong.
This wasn’t Gwen. Or not the Gwen I’d known for years.
I pushed her off of me. She fell onto the carpet and started crawling after me.
“Snap out of it!” I yelled. Bridget and Dan were just thrashing movements under the sheet on the other couch. I had a vision of a children’s story about leprechauns or weird Olde Country magic making everyone dance until they died or lost track of their lives or some other horrible fate.
I heard a growl and saw Babd still standing at the perimeter of the waiting area where I’d left her. Her hackles were up, and her ears lay flat against her head. It was still hard to think, so I put my hand on Fox. Like before, his magical influence started to clear my head.
We were under a spell. Someone was trying to get us out of commission, glamour us. And then? Kill us? Someone else was here.
I pulled out Fox and smashed Brigit’s phone with the butt of the gun.
The music stopped and instantly the lights disappeared. My head was my own again. I dialed up the fifty-yard safety rounds, and Fox was strong in my hand.
“Heads up everyone. We’re under attack.”
Chapter 7
“Under attack?” Dan’s head shot out from under the sheet. Brigit popped out as well.
“What happened to the music,” she said, blinking her eyes hard. Gwen was on the floor, scrambling for something.
I scanned the scaffolding around us and strained my ears for any sign of someone about to head to our way. Evil Praecants. Leprechauns. What-have-you.
“Someone had us under some kind of spell,” I said.
“Uh, yeah,” said Dan.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. Me.”
Brigit slid off the couch. Her shirt was undone, and she didn’t seem to care.
“My phone! God damn it Lincoln, you smashed my phone!”
“It was…”
She scooped the bits into her hand and threw them out into the warehouse space with a frustrated shout. Her cheeks were flushed.
“Wait,” said Dan. “You think that the music and…? You moron.”
“What. How am I a moron?”
“We’re not under attack. That’s my spell.”
“Oh.”
“Lincoln,” said Brigit. “You dick.”
I looked back at Gwen. She stood against the couch, and her face was a mix of confusion and anger. Tears glistened along the lower edge of her eyes.
“You okay?” I said.
She wouldn’t look at me.
“Dude, will you chill out?” said Dan. “We do this all the time. Who needs drugs when you have a full-fledged Sentist at home? A little bit of this, a little bit of that, makes everything ten times as fun. Come on, you were into it!”
“Not the point,” I said.
“She was into it!” he said, pointing behind me at Gwen.
“Leave her out of this.”
; “I figured you guys were crushing on each other in a big way, so I thought I’d help you out. I even gave her the jacket. You totally need to do someone who is wearing that jacket, by the way. Just saying. I am looking out for you, man!”
“You asshole!” shouted Gwen. Something flew past me, and it hit Dan in the face. A bottle skittered off onto the concrete flooring past him.
“All right then,” said Dan. “Everybody just calm down.” His voice dropped about an octave.
“I want to go home,” she said.
“Gwen, we have to-’”
“Lincoln, take me home now!”
I couldn’t imagine what she was feeling. Well, maybe a little. That wasn’t me just seconds ago. And it sure wasn’t her. Or maybe it was. Maybe that was the problem.
Like Dan had said, the Jacket couldn’t make you do anything you really didn’t want to do. And ostensibly neither could a spell that was low powered enough to work here. Just nudges. That’s all the magic could accomplish in this environment.
“I will accompany you,” said Babd, sitting at her feet. “I will ensure your safety.”
“Thank you,” said Gwen, and she put her hand on the dog’s head.
“I’ll drive you,” I said. This was bad. We should be sticking together until we got it all figured out. And Dan. Why did he have to be so… Dan? Not everyone is Dan, Dan! You have to dial it back from time to time.
She gathered her things. No one said much.
As we left, I told Dan and Brigit to be careful and stay alert. I’d call them in a while.
Gwen and I took the long walk from the little office/lounge area back to the main door. We went through. Still empty in the rest of the building, of course. It was very late. Late enough to be almost early.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“Nothing to be sorry about.”
She walked ahead of me, boots clicking on the tile floor.
“Not about that. About all of this. Everything that happened today. I shouldn’t have dragged you into it.”
She stopped and turned.
“Lincoln,” she said. “You didn’t drag me along. I came because I wanted to. Because I wanted to come with you. I knew things could get weird.”
“And this thing…” I gestured back toward the plastic sheeting in the doorway. “Just forget about it. It didn’t mean anything. No one likes to be manipulated. I get it.”
Lincoln, Fox and the Bad Dog Page 9
