Tourmaline

by James Brogden

  ‘Someone brought you here?’

  ‘No.’ She looked at him frankly, but without defiance. Believe this or don’t, that look said. It makes no difference. ‘I’m still there. Still in St Justine’s Hospice, being fed through a tube and visited occasionally by my grieving family who can’t even have the consolation of turning me off because the machines say I still have some brain function.’

  ‘Bullshit!’ he laughed reflexively, then reddened. ‘Sorry, but…’

  ‘Seb?’ she continued. ‘The last thing he remembers is just before going out with some friends to a nightclub in Toulouse and taking some pills he bought from a guy he didn’t know because his usual dealer was in jail. Silly boy.’

  ‘This is insane.’

  ‘The Lachlans refuse to say anything about who and where they were or what they remember before Stray, so it’s impossible to say how they got here – they’re certainly not married in the conventional sense – and Joe is simply too young.’

  ‘I thought he was born here.’

  ‘Are you kidding? That pair of old farts? Please. He was found floating, just like the rest of us – just like you – so they adopted him “for his own good” and refuse to tolerate any discussion. The only reason me and Seb don’t say anything is because it would upset the kid.’

  ‘Sorry, wait, back up a bit. Are you seriously trying to tell me that we are all, that each one of us is lying in a bed somewhere in a coma? And that our minds are all here in this place?’

  ‘I’m telling you what I know to be true. Whether you believe it or not is up to you.’ She sipped her kaff and watched him closely.

  ‘And this is all, what?’ He gestured around. ‘The Matrix?’

  ‘Okay, good, well at least we’ve got that one out of the way nice and quick,’ she said to herself. ‘No,’ she told him firmly. ‘You are not plugged into a machine as a slave to a race of robotic overlords, and you are not Keanu Reeves. You’re not that cute, for a start.’

  ‘Thanks for that.’

  ‘This isn’t a hologram or a collective delusion or anything like that. This is a real place, and those are real people, and this is real coffee which we’re going to have to pay real money for, or we’re going to get in real trouble with the owner’s really big son. Get it? I don’t know how we got here, but I know that here we are all the same.’

  ‘I’m sorry, it’s just – it’s a little hard to swallow.’

  ‘Then riddle me this, Batman: how much weird shit has happened to you in the last three weeks that you cannot explain in any other way?’

  Bobby tried to deny that she had a point but couldn’t quite bring himself to do so. His blood, crimson pearls in the sea. The sea itself, seething with billions of fish that first night. The Three Fishketeers, gobbling his blood and coming up to stare at him hungrily for more. Around and around in a circle, and in the middle of it: Sophie, chained to something underwater, touching his hand and saying You’re all here. All of you.

  ‘Tell me something, Bobby. You got that book of yours? The one you’re always reading?’

  He brought out A Tender Death from the pocket where he carried it. ‘Yes, why?’

  ‘Let’s have a look.’ She flipped through it. ‘Nineteen forty-eight,’ she read from the copyright page. ‘Seems very new-looking for something printed over sixty years ago.’ She tossed it back. ‘And for someone who claims to be a minor diplomatic flunky from post-war Blighty, how do you know anything about the Matrix?’ He couldn’t answer that one either. ‘You are not who you think you are, Robert Andrew Michael Jenkins. Not by a long shot.’

  ‘So what about these people?’ he asked, gesturing around at the crowd in the market square. ‘Are they all coma people too?’

  ‘No, they live here. This is their home, not ours. We have no connection to this place. If we were to leave Stray and try to settle on one of the Islands, we wouldn’t be able to grow any crops or raise any livestock, and we’d soon starve to death. That’s why Marjorie can’t grow anything in her flower boxes. The Flats are flat because it’s where we live – we made them that way just by being there. Something about not being fully in this world has, I don’t know, a dampening effect on it.’

  ‘Like we’re sucking the life out of this world to stay alive in ours?’

  ‘Jesus, I hope not. Bad enough that we’re somehow responsible for the Tourmaline Archipelago’s very own version of the Bermuda Triangle without that little theory getting a hold, so keep it to yourself, yeah? The last thing we need is their equivalent of Ghostbusters turning up to zap us all awake. Incidentally, it’s also the reason why you can’t get me pregnant.’

  ‘So, silver lining, then.’

  ‘You have no idea.’

  ‘But if all of this is just a big dream, then what does it matter?’

  ‘It matters because how can you say whether or not this place is real when you don’t even know if you’re real yourself?’

  Bobby’s brain felt like it was trying to rub its stomach and pat its head at the same time; the only thing he could think clearly were the words Crash and burn, which made no sense whatsoever. ‘I think I need to go for a little walk,’ he decided.

  ‘Fine. I’ll head back to Tatters and get her ready. Don’t take too long, okay? And don’t go doing anything stupid like picking a fight with someone because you think this is all a big dream. That shit I do not need.’

  ‘No, Mother.’

  She snorted. ‘We can work on your Oedipal hangups on the way home. You are coming back with me, aren’t you? Did we agree on that or not?’

  ‘I’m not saying that I believe any of this, you understand? But I’m fairly sure that I’m not going to get any clearer an idea of what’s going on by sulking around here. So yes, I’m coming back with you.’

  ‘Such touching devotion.’

  2

  As she emerged onto Timini’s stone harbourfront, Allie didn’t notice the Spinner’s deckhands at first because it simply didn’t occur to her that anybody could ever be that interested in tiny, threadbare old Tatters and her boring cargo. She’d noticed the steamer itself, of course, as Tatters had arrived at Danae – the hulking steel-hulled trawler with its plume of smoke idling from its stack had been as out of place amongst the local boats as a barracuda in a tropical aquarium – but she’d dismissed it as probably belonging to some regional bigwig doing the rounds and told herself to keep an even lower profile than normal. It was true that the Strays were treated with distrust, but the most that had ever amounted to in the past had been a bit of shouting and pushing. Nobody had so much as pulled a knife on her. The other reason was that Berylin had ordered the crew to dress down in jerkins and tattered crazy-pants like regular fishermen, so as to blend with the local populace, and by the time Allie had spotted their cutlasses and the determined way they were approaching her, it was too late: she was out in the open and committed.

  So she did the only thing she could do, which was to brazen it up to them with a big grin and say ‘Afternoon, fellas. Nice day for it.’

  There were four of them, and they moved quickly to surround her.

  ‘Okay,’ she sighed and reached for her purse. ‘How much…’

  ‘You are the Stray named Alison, are you not?’ said a female voice behind her. Allie turned and saw a young woman, a bit shorter than herself, dressed smartly in high boots, pants, and a man’s shirt with the sleeves rolled up. Beneath cropped dark hair, she had a severe beauty which put Allie instantly on her guard. Behind her stood a craggy man with the most outrageous-looking gun she had ever seen strapped to his belt.

  ‘Who wants to know?’

  ‘My name is Berylin Hooper. I’m very pleased to meet you at last.’ She put out her hand. Allie ignored it. She put it away again with a small, resigned smile. ‘Very well, then. I work for a branch of the Oraillean government tasked with investigating what you migh
t call unusual phenomena. I’d like to talk to you about the Flats.’

  She remembered her joke to Bobby barely a few minutes earlier about not wanting a visit from the local Ghostbusters. ‘You have got to be fucking kidding me,’ she groaned to herself, but she switched on her sweetest smile. ‘Have I done something wrong? Am I under arrest?’

  ‘Not at all. It’s nothing like that.’

  The Hooper woman was lying and not even trying particularly hard to hide it. It screamed at Allie from the stance of the man with the gun and the four goons who were still between her and escape. Even worse, people were stopping to stare. What scared her more than the fear of a physical confrontation was the danger that if by some miracle she got out of this, she’d still be persona non grata in Timini and forced to look further afield for supplies in the future. All she could think to do was get this situation out of public view and in the meantime pray that Bobby didn’t come back and try something stupidly heroic. At the same time she was kicking herself for not realising that it would come to this sooner or later, and not being prepared for it. She hated having to think on her feet.

  ‘The Flats?’ she asked ‘Sure, okay. I’ll tell you whatever you want to know. I know this great little taverna just around the corner. Why don’t we…’

  ‘No. We’ll do this aboard my ship.’

  Allie knew, with the certainty of a knife in her guts, that if she set foot on board that large steamship, she would never come off it again alive. ‘Now wait a second…’

  But the conversation seemed to be boring Hooper already. ‘Gentlemen,’ she waved the deckhands forward. They took hold of her then, and she began to scream.

  3

  Bobby had stopped on the way out of town to buy Allie a surprise present of a bracelet, which looked like it was made out of iridescent porcupine quills, and was starting up the steeply switchbacked road out of Timini when he heard her screaming for him. If he’d been exploring the market place or the smaller side-streets, he probably wouldn’t have heard anything, but the extra height allowed her cries to reach him clearly over the lower rooftops.

  For a moment he froze, thinking he’d misheard something – maybe a couple of the locals having an argument. Then it came again. His name.

  And he was off at full tilt back down the narrow cobbled street, shoving aside townsfolk and knocking over piles of crates and baskets because the street was so crowded and he was taking corners too fast to care what lay around them, until he skidded out onto the quayside and saw Allie being bundled along by a bunch of men.

  Two had her by the arms, with a third leading the way and one more bringing up the rear. Without thinking, he shoulder charged the one at the back, ploughing him straight over the quayside and into a fishing boat full of wicker creels. Consternation erupted; fishermen and traders ran yelling in all directions, clearing a sudden space around the combatants. The two thugs holding Allie kept their grip while the leader ran back, sweeping from his side an ugly but very sharp-looking sword. He raised it high, telegraphing the blow so obviously that Bobby was certain it was a feint and almost did nothing until it was too late. Turned out the guy was simply crap; Bobby stepped inside the sword’s downward arc and drove his fist into the man’s throat. The sword skittered away, and the thug dropped to his knees, choking.

  Odds evened somewhat, the other two looked uneasily at each other.

  In a sense, Bobby was conscious of none of this. Muscle memory had taken over, just like when he’d fallen off his first raft and discovered that he could swim – memories earned somewhere else, as someone else. Everything narrowed down to the bare essentials: hands, muscles, lungs, the stone under his feet, the positions of the men opposite him. Coma-raft-dream-world be bollocksed, this was something Caffrey knew inside out – a good, old-fashioned kicking.

  Who is Caffrey?

  But then the two men had let Allie go and were moving, and Bobby had no attention to spare. They tried to flank him, wary now that they had seen how easily he’d dealt with their mates, sword-tips circling. For all that their weapons were basic, unadorned lumps of metal, they gave his enemies a reach which he was going to have to get inside quickly unless he wanted to be skewered from both sides like a spit-roast.

  He feinted an attack on one, was rewarded with a panicked lunge, got inside it, grabbed the man’s sword-wrist with his wounded hand (fuck, that hurt!), and twisted outwards, pivoting the guy on his right hip and driving him arse-first into the stone quay. Bobby followed him down with a knee planted in the middle of his chest and heard something crack inside as the man’s skull smacked heavily at the same time, and he was unconscious before he had time to scream. Bobby felt rather than saw the last guy move. He threw himself sideways as the downcut which should have buried itself between his shoulders ended up in the unconscious thug’s face instead, splitting it vertically from brow to chin in a fan of blood and teeth, the blow so hard that the blade lodged in his jawbone and wouldn’t pull free. While the swordsman was staring in shock at what he’d done to his fallen mate, Bobby kicked his legs out from underneath him and was scrambling to his feet when Allie finished the man off rather elegantly by dumping a basket of fish over his head.

  ‘ENOUGH!’ yelled a female voice from behind. Bobby whirled, fists clenched, and found himself staring straight down the barrel of a large revolver. The woman holding it was white-faced with fury. The older man with the lunar-landscape face standing next to her was also pointing a weapon at him, but one which looked like a Flash Gordon ray-gun. It was attached by a thick cable to a belt-pack and humming with power. Between them, a small but business-like dog was growling deeply with all teeth on display. He’d been so focussed on taking out the four who had hands on Allie that he’d missed these two, and he kicked himself for the oversight.

  ‘Bobby,’ Allie whispered, her eyes huge. ‘What do we do?’

  ‘What you do,’ spat Berylin, ‘is you step away from my injured men and get yourselves aboard, or I swear that I will end you where you stand.’

  ‘Do what she says,’ said Bobby. ‘We’ll sort everything out, I promise.’ To Berylin, he said more loudly, ‘We’re co-operating, okay? There’s no need for anyone else to get hurt.’

  ‘Is that a threat?’ She sounded almost amused.

  ‘If it needs to be.’

  ‘It’s a bit late for that, my lad,’ growled Runce. Buster barked in agreement.

  But before Bobby and Allie had set foot on the Spinner’s gangplank, a commotion started in the crowd of gawkers which had formed at a safe distance, and a group of men pushed their way through, shouting. Judging by their long wooden staves and baggy cloth hats, they were members of the town constabulary. The largest man in the biggest hat was using his belly as much as his staff to clear a path to the ship, and he swaggered up to Berylin, red-faced and perspiring. He smelled like he’d come straight from a tavern.

  ‘What in goat-buggering God’s name is going on here?’ he demanded.

  ‘Nothing that you need concern yourself with, Sheriff,’ she replied. ‘This will be off your dock and out of your hands soon enough. His Majesty King Alexander’s Department of Counter Subornation thanks you for your forbearance.’

  ‘Does he now? Well that’s just fucking precious of him, isn’t it? In case it’s escaped your attention, Missy, you aren’t in your kingdom now, and you don’t tell me a fucking thing about what I concern myself with.’ He pointed at Bobby and Allie. ‘Jono. Dav. Get them two in irons.’ As his men moved to obey, Berylin protested.

  ‘Sheriff, I am empowered by…’

  He thrust the end of his staff in her face. ‘It’s Osk. Serjeant Osk. And you, Missy, are empowered to stick this up your clunge and swivel on it, you snooty bint.’

  ‘Mind your tongue,’ warned Runce, taking a step forward.

  ‘Or what, Oraillean?’ Osk shot back. ‘Picking on a couple of Strays is one thing. Taking on the A
mity constabulary will land you in an ocean of hurt. Literally.’ He cocked a bulging eye at Berylin. ‘Are we going to have a problem with your attack dog, Missy? Either of them?’

  With great effort she restrained herself. ‘No. We are not. Runce, please take the wounded men back aboard.’

  Runce blinked. ‘Beg pardon, ma’am?’

  ‘You heard her,’ Osk sneered. Runce stared at them both a moment longer, then shoved his way back to the ship, cursing.

  ‘Serjeant…’ began Bobby.

  ‘And you!’ Osk wheeled on him, ‘You might be pretty handy with those fists, but the muscles in your head need some work if you think I’m letting you say one buggering thing to me.’

  Before Bobby could protest, someone struck him savagely across the back of his head, and the world exploded into black stars.

  4

  Once the Strays had been manacled and dragged away, Osk turned back to the Oraillean woman. ‘I’ve had clatter messages from Drava about you lot,’ he continued and then laughed at her surprised expression. ‘Oh yes, we’re not so pissingly small and out of the way that we don’t hear about stuck-up foreigners swanning around, thinking they own the place. These Strays are scum, to be sure, but they’re our scum. If you don’t like it, the circuit magistrate will be around to us in a week or so; we’ll see what he has to say.’

  ‘Sir,’ Berylin answered through clenched teeth, ‘I have no intention of waiting a day, let alone a week.’ She turned on her heel and stalked up the gangplank.

  Truth to tell, neither did Osk, who knew well enough that Miss High and Mighty would get her own way just as quickly as it took her to send an enraged clatter to her superiors, who would then shout at his superiors, who would then tear him a new one. Let her sweat it. He’d give the Strays as long as he could, if only out of sheer bloody-mindedness. It was the closest thing he had to a virtue.

  Chapter 18

  Jail

  1

  Timini was a small town on a tiny island, with little to trouble it beyond some petty theft and the inevitable drunken scuffle, and so the constabulary had no call for an elaborate jailhouse. They occupied a decommissioned pump-house on the town’s upper slopes and used a defunct water cistern carved into the stony hillside as their one and only cell.