The Deserter

by Peadar O'Guilin

  ‘Just so you’ll know me, my name is Jagadamba. Yes, I’m Religious – can’t hide that, nor would I want to.’ She spat again so that it landed uncomfortably near Stopmouth’s bare toes. ‘And yes, I can take you to Indrani, because we have her. In a place they’ll never find her.’ She laughed. ‘Or so I’m told!’

  Jagadamba removed a small package from inside her clothing, which she shook out to reveal another set of robes. They were a dull orange like hers and would cover a whole body. ‘You need to wear these, savage. Come on now, no dawdling, you disgusting cannibal. They’ll be on their way already.’

  Stopmouth grabbed the robes and started trying to get into them. Then he paused. ‘But wait. Indrani hated the Religious and they hated her. She was a … a Secular.’

  ‘Good savage, good little monster,’ said Jagadamba. ‘But don’t stop putting those clothes on. You, skinny boy. You help him.’

  Hiresh remained frozen to the spot as though he’d seen a ghost. The old woman ignored this and hobbled over to Stopmouth, fussing with folds of cloth. ‘In civilization we have mastered the art of talking and dressing at the same time, yes we have. Good, you’re not quite right, but those Commission idiots’ll never notice the difference.’

  ‘I still don’t …’

  ‘What, savage? Oh, yes. You are correct. We don’t like your Indrani. The Witch, we call her. But we know we weren’t the ones who shot her down to the surface during the Rebellion. It was her own side that tried to kill her, and now they’re combing the whole Roof looking for her. Why do you think that is?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘And strange how they just let you go, isn’t it, monster? A cannibal set loose in the middle of the Roof!’

  ‘They let me go?’

  Jagadamba nodded and grinned at the look of horror that must have appeared on his face. ‘Stupid men, always thinking they’re the ones who get to do the rescuing. All you are, savage, is a tool to track Indrani down – that’s why you’re here. Now I’ll have to throw the Commission off your scent, gods curse you.’

  ‘I thought … I thought …’

  She wiped her mouth with claw-like hands. ‘We’d kill you if we didn’t think it would sour the Witch to us. But we need to know her secret.’

  Then the old lady seemed to notice Hiresh again.

  ‘What are you going to tell the unbelievers, skinny boy, when the Commission send their dogs?’

  ‘I – I’m just a fan … I don’t— I mean …’

  ‘You’ve probably recorded my face already.’ She reached into her robes. Hiresh flinched, but it was only another set of clothes. ‘Yes, you fan-boys always think you want adventure, don’t you? Well, you’re coming with us. Either you’ll answer their questions or they’ll lock you up somewhere until you do. Why, they might even send you to the surface you obviously love so much.’

  Jagadamba’s threat did not seem to frighten Hiresh. He donned the robes she had given him with no difficulty. When the sleeve of his uniform slipped back, Stopmouth thought he spotted some strange scarring on the boy’s arm. Maybe they meant something to Jagadamba, for she curled her lip and said, ‘You were born one of us. A Religious.’

  ‘Where I grew up is my own business,’ he snapped. ‘I’m free now – that’s all that matters.’

  She ignored this. ‘There’ll be no broadcasting, you hear me, hairy lip?’

  ‘My name is Hiresh.’

  ‘You broadcast my face, Hiresh, and when I’m caught I’ll tell them you were working for us all along.’

  He nodded, lips pursed.

  ‘Good.’ To Stopmouth she said: ‘Pretend I’m the murder leader, or hunt leader, or whatever you Deserters call it. Obey me without question. I know how they think as you never will.’ The door opened to a wave of her hand and she led them out into the corridor.

  ‘Come.’

  The first thing that struck Stopmouth was that this side corridor had suddenly become as full as the main one where he’d first experienced the crowds of the Roof. His stomach lurched as it had then. But these people weren’t just walking – they were churning, boiling like a nest of insects. This time, a good half of them were dressed in the same orange robes Jagadamba had made him wear, their faces hidden by veils, their eyes in shadow as they fretted and heaved.

  Jagadamba led Hiresh and Stopmouth down a series of corridors, all filled with scurrying robed figures, all identical and anonymous behind their veils. Stopmouth realized that nobody would be able to pick him out of this crowd. That didn’t stop the old woman from hurrying them onwards, although she herself walked with a pronounced limp.

  The images on the ceiling and the walls had disappeared by now, to be replaced with orders to disperse; threats of capture and punishment to anyone blocking public corridors. ‘Those who act like savages may have to live with them!’ declared one warning, and Stopmouth, in the stifling, horrific crowd, in the crippling robes, almost wished he could be caught and sent back home.

  Then the pressure of the crowd suddenly increased from behind. ‘The Wardens are coming!’ somebody shouted. ‘The Wardens!’

  ‘Ha!’ said Jagadamba. ‘The Commission caught on quicker than I’d hoped. They know they’ve lost track of their savage. We hurry now!’

  People were falling over; running as if for their lives. Stopmouth heard screaming, saw men and women hit the ground while others trampled them underfoot. Back the way they’d come, he spied a green glow and heard more screams.

  ‘Wardens! Wardens!’

  The crowd ahead became as thick as the one behind, but Jagadamba was always able to say things to get her little group through the press where others couldn’t pass. Soon they reached an open space where two corridors crossed. Here, Secular and Religious were jammed in together. Green lights glowed from at least two of the available directions.

  Jagadamba tapped three robe-wearers. ‘You, tall one. Do not speak any more until they capture you. You, old one: call your tall friend “Stopmouth” and this one “Hiresh”. Attempt to escape down the southern corridor and broadcast to the Religious along the way, asking for help. Their spies will pick it up. Try not to get caught for as long as you possibly can.’ All three nodded agreement and made off down one of the two corridors that was free of the green glow.

  ‘What will happen to them?’ asked Stopmouth.

  ‘Nothing that won’t happen to us if we’re caught,’ said Jagadamba. ‘Remember them. Remember what you owe us when we bring you back to your woman.’

  The crowd parted to let the three decoys through, and they were soon out of sight down one branch of the corridor. Stopmouth looked after them, wishing he’d taken the time to thank them or ask their real names.

  But Jagadamba was already pulling him down the other ‘safe’ corridor, spitting orders at people to get out of the way. They obeyed her every time, yet progress was terribly slow and the screaming began to catch up with them. Whenever Stopmouth turned his head, he saw the green glow getting closer. Eventually it resolved itself into points of fierce light, rising and falling, pushing panic before them.

  ‘The Wardens!’ people were shouting, Religious and Secular alike. However, the former turned back on Jagadamba’s instructions and created a buffer between Stopmouth and the approaching enemy. Even so, if their intention had been to slow the advancing hunters, they didn’t do so for long. Stopmouth could now see men and women in the tight-fitting clothing Indrani had been wearing when she’d fallen out of the sky. Black visors covered their faces and they wielded little sticks with glowing green tips. They poked their weapons into faces, backs, chests – anywhere they could. Victims screamed and collapsed.

  The movements of the Wardens seemed jerky and unbalanced to Stopmouth’s expert eye – until he realized they were walking over a carpet of bodies. Brave Religious could sometimes hold them back, or even knock them over. But the advance barely slowed.

  Just behind the first line of hunters, Stopmouth could see another consisting of men and wom
en without visors who seemed to be checking the faces of all the fallen Religious. There’d be no chance of playing dead here.

  Then the corridor in front of the fugitives widened unexpectedly and the pressure eased. Bright light streamed in from an open space ahead of them where the walls of the corridor seemed to disappear. Stopmouth felt giddy at the thought of open space. ‘Come on!’ he shouted. But when he started pushing forward, he found that Jagadamba had already fallen several steps behind him. ‘Oh.’ He had forgotten what it was like to deal with old people. Hiresh seemed fine, but the woman was limping and breathing hard after no more than a few dozen heartbeats. The air rasped in her throat so loudly that the young hunter feared it would be enough by itself to bring the Wardens down on them.

  The enemy were drawing nearer. Their excited cries could be heard above the screams of the fleeing crowds. Stopmouth knew he could escape by himself, but without Jagadamba he’d be no closer to Indrani. In fact, her allies might be too afraid to contact him again. There was only one thing for it.

  ‘Follow closely, Hiresh,’ he said.

  Without asking permission, he picked Jagadamba up and threw her over his shoulder.

  ‘You’re as light as a child!’ he exclaimed, and started running towards the light, stopping only once to hitch up his robes with one hand while Hiresh stumbled along behind on skinny legs.

  The hunter’s passenger yelled in outrage.

  ‘Put me down! Savage! Alien-eater! Down!’

  And then they were outside. There was no other word for it, although the brightly coloured ceiling – blue with white shapes drifting across it – was no higher than ten houses from the ground. He felt Hiresh bump into the back of him and heard Jagadamba cry, ‘Stop staring, fool! Forward! We go forward here!’ Ahead of him there seemed to be almost as many people as he had left behind in what Hiresh had called the residential areas. Families lay splayed out on bare earth that stretched far into the distance in front of him. A great dizzying open space. The only break was a small series of what had to be hills. Safety!

  ‘No, go left! Left, you fool! Cannibal! Left!’

  He ignored his passenger and ran for the higher ground, skipping between and around astonished spectators, with Hiresh whooping like a joyful hunter at his side. Stopmouth grinned and lengthened his stride, the old woman no heavier than a cloak of moss on his shoulder, the muscles of his legs feeling stronger than they had been even before a wall had collapsed on one of them.

  People covered the lower slopes. They shouted questions that the group, already out of breath, ignored. Jagadamba kept shouting too. Or trying to. ‘The least … you could do … you animal … is follow the path.’

  Sure enough, as the ground rose, a brown track began to emerge. The slope had grown steeper and rockier. People disappeared, having nowhere to sit. Stopmouth paused, astonished. In front of him, in a small crack in the bare rock, some plants were growing – the first he’d seen here that no human had stepped on or crushed. Slender green stems supported blooms of the most astonishing colours. But what stopped him was the scent. Rather than irritating his eyes and nostrils, they smelled deliciously sweet. Intoxicating, even. He had a terrible urge to shove his face into them even though he thought they might be poisonous.

  He jumped as he felt Hiresh’s touch on his arm. The boy was sweating and clearly in desperate need of a rest. But his smile was as strong as ever. ‘Paradise. I told you … It will be again … the whole Roof.’

  ‘Oh, for the love of the gods!’ said Jagadamba. ‘Put me down! Put me down at once!’

  Stopmouth found he was very glad to do so. All the running was beginning to catch up with him and he suddenly felt hungry, as if he could eat an entire Hairbeast by himself. He lowered Jagadamba to the ground and fell down beside her.

  The hunter felt something tapping against his upper thigh. It turned out to be Jagadamba giving him what she probably thought was a good kicking. When she’d finally exhausted herself and shared the latest build-up in her throat, she turned to look back the way they’d come. ‘Yes … the enemy are still tailing the other three … Good. Now get up, you sloths. We need to go and find the Witch. And we don’t want to be trapped on top of a hill when the Commission realizes its mistake.’

  7. EXPECTING FLESH

  HIRESH FELT SICK as he trudged behind Stopmouth and Jagadamba. He’d felt uneasy up on the hills, and at first he’d put it down to the absence of people in that high place. But then they had reached the top, with the whole of the park spread out below them: artificial lakes swarming with the swimming, laughing children of refugees; beautiful bridges arching over the river; athletics fields, barely discernible under the bodies of ten thousand Dreamers who had never run so much as a few metres in their lives.

  But the savage hadn’t been interested in that. Instead, his mouth hung open in childish joy as he ran the palms of his hands along the bio-metal of the ceiling. Hiresh had to jump to touch it, even at the highest part of the hill. It felt far colder than it should have. His fingers came away damp with condensation that ought to have been drunk up by the metal and recycled.

  Things had been breaking down his whole life: the mighty powers of the Roof Goddess were degrading, fading away. Even though a Cure for all these problems was on its way, it still made him uncomfortable whenever he had his face rubbed in them.

  ‘And the fluffy things!’ Stopmouth was saying. ‘Are they alive?’

  ‘Stupid cannibal!’ said Jagadamba. She grinned over at Hiresh. ‘They’re just holograms of clouds.’

  ‘Clouds …’ The savage smiled. He had great teeth, as strong and straight as those of any god from before the Crisis. But Hiresh couldn’t find it in himself to resent him. Seeing Stopmouth hunt and kill on the surface was one thing; having him here beside you, so gentle and supportive, so … so innocent – was quite another. How could that be possible?

  Hiresh had been called a traitor many times before, when he was growing up. But he’d never felt like that in his own heart until now. It was as if he’d become a sneak, and this puzzled him, because all his actions were born out of the best motives. He served the Commission as he’d always dreamed. More importantly, he was ensuring that Tarini would be safe.

  But why couldn’t somebody else have been chosen to betray the savage? That’s not me – I’m not like that! And yet he was the one with the new lump on his arm – a primitive transmitter just under the skin. Human built, because the Roof would never co-operate in the creation of a tracking device. It had been programmed long ago not to interfere in the affairs of its inhabitants.

  But I’m doing well, thought Hiresh. And he was. He hadn’t even asked to be taken along when the Wardens had pretended to be chasing the little group through the corridors. I’ll pay you back, Tarini, don’t you worry.

  They stopped for a rest before starting their descent. At that point Jagadamba took a phial from her robes. ‘Know what this is, hairy lip?’ she’d asked him. ‘It’s a Cosmetic.’ She grinned at the look of disbelief that appeared on his face. ‘Priceless, no? It could make even you beautiful. Maybe even me!’ She cackled. ‘You want it?’

  Hiresh felt his mouth go dry. Luckily, before he could make a fool of himself by reaching for it, she had snatched it away again. ‘Come here, savage! Get down from those clouds. I need you to drink something. Come here.’

  ‘Is it blood?’

  ‘Gods curse you, you make me sick! Of course it’s not blood! Just drink it and pray to your gods, your … ancestors. Pray to look like one of us. Drink!’

  Hiresh turned away to keep his jealousy from showing. A Cosmetic! Oh gods!

  But he couldn’t block out the old lady’s gloating. ‘His flesh-eating mother wouldn’t recognize him.’

  Hiresh doubted that. Stopmouth would always move like a carnivore, a killer. He would give off the smell, different from the hordes around them, of somebody who feasted on the lives of intelligent beings and exulted in the juices running down his chin. Sometimes Hiresh
would see the hunter looking at him and his whole body would shiver. But even in those moments he still felt bad about what he had agreed to do.

  ‘It doesn’t matter,’ he said to himself. His only task was to stay with them until they found Indrani. The transmitter in his arm would do the rest.

  The exit from the parkland – a wide, square gap in the walls disguised as the break in a mighty cliff – led them directly into the Boulevard of Birds. Hiresh himself had never seen this wonder before, with its wide sloping canyon and high ceiling. Thousands and thousands of empty niches spoke of the colourful flocks that had nested there in better times and would again just as soon as the Cure started working its magic and the Crisis ended. He craned his neck and was suddenly dizzy. Only the grip of the savage kept him from falling down. Or up maybe, up into the air.

  Jagadamba poked him in the side. ‘What sect were your parents?’ she asked.

  ‘It’s unimportant.’ Hiresh could feel his heart racing. What he’d had to go through before his escape! And Mother! ‘I am my own man now.’

  ‘Man!’ she hooted. He could see her exposed tooth pressing against the veil as she spoke.

  He looked away from her and his eyes met those of the savage for a moment. The hunter patted him on the arm. Already the Cosmetic was turning his pupils a darker colour. Where had the old hag got hold of something like that? Could she get one for him?

  ‘Tell me, man,’ continued Jagadamba, ‘why you abandoned your duty to your parents so easily.’