No one said anything. He cleared his throat. “Now zen, for ze first lesson ve vill demonstrate ze proper operation of zee human—toilet-machine! Ja! Ja! Das toilet-machine!”
There was open laughter now. “Vot?” shouted Dr. Ziegfield-Gruff. “Vot is so funny about das vord—‘human toilet-machine’?”
Again the class convulsed with laughter, more violently than before.
“I do not understand,” said the teacher. “Vy it is so funny venn I say zee vord—ven I say zee vord—”
There was a long, agonizing pause.
“‘Human toilet-machine’!”
Some of the monsters were laughing so hard now that they were falling out of their chairs and rolling on the floor. Dr. Ziegfield-Gruff stomped his cloven hoof. “Nein!” he bleated. “Bad! Ba-aaaa-aaad!”
Max, who was sitting next to Falcon, smiled happily. “Dude,” he said. “I just figured out what my favorite class is going to be.”
At the front of the room, Dr. Ziegfield-Gruff was still shouting. “Nein! Baaa—aaaa—aaa—aad!”
“You like this class?” said Falcon.
“Are you kidding?” said Max. “I’m gonna major in this.”
Miss Wordswaste-Phinney, who had requested that the students call her by her first name, Willow, had them all seated in a circle facing each other. She was a thin, seven-foot-tall woman with a long, pointed nose like a woodpecker’s.
“Welcome to Language and Fabrications,” she said, “a class in the art of literature. Here you will study stories and poems, and learn to write your own original work. As monsters, you all know what it is like to suffer. Yes, to suffer! But you cannot allow that suffering to remain trapped in your heart. You must get it out of your heart and onto the page, so that you may turn your darkness into light. Virtually all of the world’s great writers have been monsters. Shakespeare! Byron! Norman Mailer! Here we will teach you an important strategy for survival—by changing your blood to ink!”
“Rrrr,” said Sparkbolt.
“Yes, Timothy. Would you read the first stanza of the poem I’ve handed out? Please?”
“Poem bad,” said Sparkbolt.
“Bad, yes—okay, good. But now could you read the first stanza? In a nice clear voice so we all can hear.”
“RRRR,” said Sparkbolt. “Heart—aches! Drowsy! Numbness! PAIN! PAIN! HEMLOCK!!”
“Okay, good,” said the teacher. “Very nice. I want you all to note how much emotion Timothy is putting into his reading. And his reading is just as valid as anyone else’s! But now I’ll read the same lines, and see if it sounds the same.”
Willow closed her eyes.
“My heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains
My sense, as though of hemlock I had drunk,”
Sparkbolt murmured. The teacher read several more lines.
“’Tis not through envy of thy happy lot,”
“Envy,” muttered Sparkbolt.
“But being too happy in thine happiness,
That thou, light-wingèd Dryad of the trees,
In some melodious plot
Of beechen green and shadows numberless,”
“Shadows,” said Sparkbolt.
“Singest of summer in full-throated ease.”
She looked up at the class. “‘Ode to a Nightingale,’ by John Keats,” she said. “A classic of British Romantic poetry. What’s going on here, in this opening stanza? Anyone?”
The class was silent. Falcon, Pearl, Max, Jonny, and Megan were sitting near each other in the circle. Merideath and the vampires were seated directly opposite them.
“Sad,” said Sparkbolt.
“Timothy, excellent,” said Willow. She got up out of her chair and began to pace around the room. “Why is the speaker sad?”
Falcon sighed inwardly. It didn’t seem like anyone needed a special reason to be sad.
There was an extended silence again. Then Sparkbolt said, “Envy. Shadows!”
“He’s envious, good, Timothy. Who is he envious of?”
There was more silence. This was one of those silences in which it was not clear whether no one was speaking because no one knew the answer, or because everyone knew it and was embarrassed to speak the obvious.
“Well, who is the poem addressed to?”
“The nightingale,” said Merideath, and then added, “obviously.”
“Good, Merideath,” said the tall, slender woman. “But wait—I’m confused! Why would Mr. Keats be envious of a bird?”
The class fell silent again.
“Because the bird is really excellent?” said Max.
“Okay, tell me more about ‘excellent,’” said Willow. “What’s excellent about a bird?”
“It sings,” said Ankh-hoptet.
“Good,” said Willow. “What else?”
There was another extended silence.
“It can fly,” said Megan.
“It can fly, Megan, yes,” said Willow. She looked at her thoughtfully for a moment. “You’re the girl who lost her sisters, aren’t you?”
Megan’s eyes opened wide. “How did you—? That’s not what I—”
“It’s okay, Megan,” said Willow. “Everyone in this room has a sorrow like that. Someplace inside where they’re all broken.” Willow’s voice fell. “Even me.”
Incredibly, Willow’s eyes appeared to be filling with tears now as well. Yikes, Falcon thought. This is going to be some class. He wouldn’t be surprised if they came in here every day and wept their brains out.
“Raise your hand,” said Willow, “if you have ever wished that you could fly.”
A number of hands shot up immediately. After a few moments more students raised their hands. As Falcon sat there thinking about it, he remembered the moment Pearl had flown with him and Megan, out of the high window of the Tower of Aberrations and around the castle, on their first night at the Academy. He realized, with a shock, that while he was flying he’d felt something he’d never felt before. While he’d been soaring through the air with her, for the first time he’d found a place that felt like home.
Willow seemed to be reading his thoughts. She was staring at him now, nodding gently. He felt a pang in his heart, knowing that as the years went by, it’d be unlikely for him to feel that sense of wonder again.
“It seems like such a small thing,” said Willow, “the wish to fly. And then there are other wishes, of course. The dream of being understood. The dream of being loved.”
Sparkbolt murmured to himself.
“So what do we do when we cannot have the thing for which we dream?” said Willow. She ran her long, twiglike fingers through her very long, blond hair. “What becomes of us?”
“We bite people!” said Scout, snarling.
“We bite them again, and again!” said Ranger. He looked at Falcon menacingly.
“Biting, okay, good. Who else? Anyone? Anyone?”
“We STING them,” said Pearl. “With the big black stinger!”
“Stinging,” said Willow. “Good. Stinging and biting. Anyone else?”
“Destroy,” said Sparkbolt. “DESTROY!”
“Suck out their blood,” said Merideath. “Make them pay!”
“Make them like us,” said Mortia.
“Destroying, blood-sucking, good. Taking our revenge. But there is another form of revenge, isn’t there? There is the revenge of horror. And then there is the revenge of love.”
The students seemed unsure of this. Sparkbolt moaned.
“Sometimes, when you are filled with sadness and death, you can try to make other people suffer. But then there is the revenge of love, when you respond to the horrors of the world with a completely unexplainable, irrational kindness or compassion. And in this way, instead of bringing others down to the level of darkness, you raise yourself to the level of light. It is this paradox that I want you all to consider. That the wisest among us take our revenge on the world—through love. And the greatest form of love is this: the poem.”
“Then Sparkbol
t,” said a voice, “LOVE ALL THINGS! DESTROY! THROUGH LOVE! DEATH WITH INK!”
Willow smiled, her day’s work apparently complete. “Well, then,” she said. “For tomorrow, I’d like you all to try to write a poem of your own. Bring it in to class, and be ready to share.”
“What are we supposed to write about?” asked Megan.
“Your pain, of course,” said Willow matter-of-factly. “The horror.”
“Rrrr-rrrr-rrrr,” said Sparkbolt.
“And we’re supposed to—share these?” said Megan.
“Oh yes,” said Willow. “Be prepared to share.” She looked at her watch. “Okay, I see we’re just about out of time. By the way, I want to give everyone in the class two happiness stars for their good work today. And Timothy, I’m giving you three happiness stars. You have the soul of a poet!”
The bell rang and everyone stood up.
“Whoa, Sparkbolt,” said Mortia. “The soul of a poet! Who knew?”
Sparkbolt sighed. “Pain, good,” he said. “Poetry—bad.”
After lunch they broke into smaller groups for Shame, to begin to learn some of the practical steps for resisting their monster natures. Halfway to his classroom, however, Falcon thought he heard someone mention his name. There was a large group of teachers and staff having a heated discussion in one of the classrooms, and he paused for a moment to listen.
“They should not have been admitted,” said a voice that Falcon recognized as belonging to Algol, the hunchback. “Mistakes, the bowf of ’em, I say. They should be eaten, by wormzies, they should! They should be—”
“Mr. Algol, please,” said Dr. Medulla.
“Forgive me, master,” said Algol. “It’s me greatest fault, expressin’ me opinions so free ’n’ all. But all I ’av evah, evah done was to please you, me master!”
“Enough,” said a silvery voice. “It stops talking now.”
Falcon crept forward to see the speaker, then pulled back when he recognized the moth man. He remembered that Mr. Pupae had been introduced on the first night as the acting headmaster. He looked very serious, sitting there with his dusty wings and blank, sleepless eyes.
“Let us stick to the facts, please,” said Mrs. Redflint. “Just the facts. Dr. Medulla.”
“Quinn, Falcon. Undiagnosable,” said Dr. Medulla.
“By you,” grumped Mr. Shale.
“Let us say undiagnosable thus far,” said Mrs. Redflint. “But the facts, once more. So that all will be clear.”
There was the sound of files shuffling and papers being rattled. “Bifurcated aspects to the cerebrum,” said Dr. Medulla. “Eyes of different colors, and different nature. Necrotic tissue on the upper back. And the hearts, of course.”
“Hearts?” said Mr. Shale. “Hearts?”
“Yes,” said Dr. Medulla. “Falcon Quinn has two hearts.”
Falcon, listening from his post outside the classroom, fell back against the wall, as if he had been struck by a blow. Even as he fought the urge to shout, to burst in among the teachers and tell them that they had made a terrible mistake, he suddenly knew that it was true. He put one hand upon his chest. He could feel it there, against his fingertips—his pulse, and yes, beneath this, something else gently pulsing, something waiting to be known.
I have two hearts, Falcon thought. I have always had two hearts.
There was a great deal of talking and shouting all at once. Mrs. Redflint banged on the table. “Please. Let us focus. These hearts, Dr. Medulla—are they of equal size? And temperament?”
“They are not of equal size,” said Dr. Medulla. “The ventral heart is the larger and seems to be monstrous in nature. But the other, the dorsal heart: smaller in size, but growing. Growing rapidly.”
“What is this second heart?” said a voice Falcon recognized as Willow’s. “Is it—human?”
“Perhaps,” said Dr. Medulla. “It has some human qualities. But there are other aspects of it that seem to suggest”—his voice lowered—“one of them.”
Again there was a lot of shouting, and it was hard for Falcon to hear some of what was said. But it didn’t matter what they said. Now I’m beginning to understand, Falcon thought, why I’ve always felt torn between things. It’s because I’m neither one thing nor the other. Or maybe it’s that I’m all things at once. Both monster and human. Or both monster and—monster destroyer?
The shouting died out, and then there was a pause. “This is most unfortunate,” said Mrs. Redflint. “Dear, dear.”
“I wouldn’t want to stake my reputation on it,” said Dr. Medulla. “But some of the other symptoms conform to this diagnosis. The blue eye is particularly troubling.”
“It is,” said Mrs. Redflint. “I have seen that eye. The boy does not know what he is capable of.”
“Why would he have been brought here,” said Willow, “if he’s—”
“Mr. D.’s mandate,” said Mrs. Redflint, “is to pick up in his bus anyone who exhibits a monstrous nature. The first day of spring, in the thirteenth year. And Mr. Quinn certainly fits the criterion. As you know, we’ve been quite accurate over the years. We’ve only had one false admittance before.”
“Scratchy Weezums,” said Algol wistfully. “Wot a piece a business that was!”
“I suppose,” said Willow. “But from where I sit, it’s a surprise that situations like this don’t happen more frequently. You know how it is—once they hit thirteen, well, for heaven’s sakes, who doesn’t seem like a monster?”
“Its dual nature is not a complete surprise,” said the moth man, “given its history.”
“Still,” said Mrs. Redflint. “I had hoped—”
“Hope is not a diagnosis,” said Dr. Medulla.
“They are seeking him,” said the moth man. “The others. One of them came to the grandmother’s, to capture him.”
“Why? To destroy him?” asked Willow.
“Or get ’im to join ’em,” said Algol. “Become their fearless leader.”
“Well?” said Mrs. Redflint. “Which is it?”
“It is not clear,” whispered the moth man in his silvery voice.
“Why don’t we just destroy him?” said Mr. Hake. “That way everyone’s happy!”
“Turn him to stone!” said Algol. “Like we did wif’ Scratchy Weezums. Gargoylize him, and put him up on the column, next to Weezy! They’ll be a matchin’ pair!”
“But he might be a gift,” said Dr. Medulla. “The guardians may want him for this very reason. He might be a threat to them. A new mutation with gifts we do not yet comprehend.”
“Or a mutation with the power to destroy us all,” said Mr. Shale.
“It must be made to reveal itself,” said the moth man. “So that its nature can be known. That is the choice.”
“But how long can we wait,” said Mrs. Redflint, “if the child is really not one of us? We cannot simply wait for this other heart to emerge the stronger.”
Now there was a long silence. Falcon stood still, trying not to move a muscle, but his heart was pounding in his throat. His hearts.
“What about the Frankenstein, then?” said Mr. Shale. “This—Jonny.”
“Another mystery,” said Dr. Medulla. “On the surface he seems like a traditional reanimated mosaic, like so many of the others we get each year. And yet there’s something about him that makes the monstrastat short out. I’ve never seen anything like it before—the system crashed twice before I gave up.”
“Maybe it’s the machine,” said Mr. Hake. “Maybe its vacuum tubes were wearing their smiles upside down?”
“Perhaps,” said Dr. Medulla. “But my own impression is that the boy has been taken apart and resewn too many times, by an abundance of different masters. There are whole sections of him that seem to have been dead for years. By any measure, the boy seems to be an unstable assemblage.”
There was a pause as this sank in.
“Is he volatile?” asked Mrs. Redflint.
“There is a high likelihood of some decomposition
,” said Dr. Medulla. “As things stand now, I’d give him a fifty-fifty chance of degrading completely.”
“But that would put the other children at risk,” said Willow, “if the boy erupts. Or explodes.”
“It would,” said Dr. Medulla.
“Mr. Pupae,” said Mrs. Redflint, “has the headmaster been informed of the complications?”
There was silence at the mention of the headmaster. For a long moment the teachers and the medical staff sat in their seats, shifting uncomfortably.
“It spoke to me this morning,” said the moth man. “It is very—concerned about the situation. It said it might have to come down from its tower, and have a look firsthand.”
“Leave the tower?” said Mrs. Redflint. “He said that?”
“It did,” said Mr. Pupae.
“But he hasn’t left the tower since—”
“It is very concerned,” said Mr. Pupae.
“Very well, then,” said Mrs. Redflint. “Let’s observe as Mr. Quinn’s monstrosity emerges. If Mr. Quinn is one of us, well, there is the hope that the monster side of his nature will conquer—ahem—the other. If not…well.”
“And the Frankenstein? If it is a Frankenstein?” said Mr. Shale grumpily. “Are we just to wait and see whether it self-destructs?”
“Let us agree,” said Mrs. Redflint, “that their time is not unlimited. Both these students will have a short period to prove themselves. After that we must make our decisions.”
“Gargoyles,” said Algol. “We’ll make gargoyles out of ’em.”
“Wait,” said Willow. “You said the guardians came to the grandmother’s house?”
“A trailer, yes,” said the moth man.
“What did they do to her? When they found that Falcon was not there? Did they—?”
The moth man sighed. “When they found the child missing, they did what they always do. Gamma Quinn—was destroyed.”
12
CATCH AND RELEASE
Falcon lay on his back, staring up at the ceiling. There was a knock on his door, and Megan peeked in.
“Hey,” she said. “You okay?”
Falcon Quinn and the Black Mirror Page 12
