Outlier: Reign Of Madness

by Daryl Banner

  Tide squints. The fuck is up with this guy? “Where are they?”

  “Who?”

  “Who do you think, idiot? The ones who were chasing me.”

  “Oh. Gone. They went past.” The boy pushes the curtain to the side to get a glimpse out the window. “Yes. No sign of them.”

  Tide grunts, then moves for the side door again. After a second, he reconsiders, going for the front door perpendicular to the side one instead.

  “Leaving so soon?”

  Tide stops with his hand on the doorknob. “I have business to handle.”

  The boy lifts a bowl of apples off the table nearest him. “Do you want to eat? Before you take off running again? You look pale.”

  Tide sneers, annoyed, as if being called pale is an insult. Then he reconsiders precisely how he might appear at the moment. I just turned out my insides. I don’t have the energy to run. But he wouldn’t dare admit the shakiness in his legs, or the weakness in his arms, or how he feels like the shell of a nut that’s been smashed by a boot, its meaty insides shattered and splayed about him in chunks.

  Without a word, Tide moves to the bowl and palms an apple. He brings the thing to his mouth and rips out a bite as if the apple had done something to anger him. He crunches it with his eyes closed, chewing and melting into the sensation. Nourishment seems to flood through his veins in one instant. He feels a warm sense of giddiness followed by a ringing hopefulness that lightens his head.

  “Apple’s gritty,” he complains through his chewing as he opens his eyes onto the boy. A tiny fleck of the apple leaps from his mouth and lands on the boy’s cheek, who doesn’t flinch at all, his brown eyes locked onto Tide’s chest, still unable to lift them any higher.

  “I’m Dag,” he says.

  Tide stops chewing, lifting an eyebrow. “That’s your name?” He nods. “Dog? Like the animal?”

  “Dag. It’s … It’s Dag. But you can call me Dog if you want.”

  Tide’s eyes lighten, amused by the boy. He takes another huge bite of the apple, crunching loudly and smacking his food with his mouth open. “Dog? Think I should call you Dog, then?”

  The boy shrugs. “If … If you want. I mean, you know. O-Only if you really want.” He thrusts his hands into his pockets, watching as Tide consumes the apple bite after obnoxious bite.

  Tide knows he’s being obnoxious. He enjoys the power he’s got over this boy. Seventeen is he, like Tide? Or sixteen? Maybe the boy is even older, one of those nineteen-year-olds who never lifted a weight in his life, who’s never grown fully, who is as weak as a lazy breeze in the summer. With every boorish chomp of his teeth on this boy’s apple, he’s testing him, much in the same way he’d poke his friends in the chest repeatedly to see if they’d fight back.

  “Yeah,” Tide decides after swallowing. He bites into the apple again, the crunch of water spraying out, a drop or two landing on the boy’s forehead. “Yeah, that’s what I want to call you.”

  Dog—as Tide insists on calling him—lets on a tiny smile, almost shy, then gives a wave of his hand to the table. “I have water, too. It’s lukewarm, as I’d fetched it in the night, but you’re welcome to—”

  “Lukewarm?” Tide gives a huff through his bite of apple. “Who the fuck drinks lukewarm water? Might as well drink piss.”

  “Sorry. It’s, uh …” Dog gives a nervous glance at the small vase of water, neatly set next to two clay cups. “It’s all I have, really.”

  “You can’t fetch fresh water for your guest?” Tide spits back through his mouthful.

  Dog’s lips part, half a sputter coming out of his lips, and then he swallows. Tide gives the nervous boy a onceover, wondering if he’s enjoying this. He’s just like Wick, a boy of other boys. I can tell. He wants to see what I’ve got under this shirt and in these pants. He’s got a stiff one for me, I know it. Could Tide’s luck be any better?

  “Well?” Tide prods him. “You gonna fetch or what, Dog?”

  Dog nods quickly. “Of course, yeah. I’ll, um … I’ll get more.”

  “Nice couch,” Tide mutters as he walks over to the one at the end of the room just under the shaded window. He carries the bowl of apples with him, plopping down on the couch and putting his feet up, taking up the whole length of it. He shifts, getting comfortable. “I think I’ll stay here awhile.” He takes another merciless mouthful of the fruit, letting the crisp wetness dress his chin in careless flecks of juice. When he brings his gaze back to Dog, he finds the boy staring at Tide’s legs, bewildered. “The fuck you looking at?”

  Dog snaps his eyes up. “Nothing. I just … I’d just cleaned the couch, really. It was … I-I’m …” He stares at Tide’s feet.

  My boots have mud and dirt on them. I’m soiling his couch. “If I’m wrecking your pretty little house, then I can leave,” retorts Tide.

  “N-No. No, no, it’s okay.”

  “Say the word. I’m taking these apples if I go, but say the word and my ass is out.”

  “Don’t leave. It’s okay.” Dog nods quickly, tripping over himself as he backs away toward the side door. “Just … um, please don’t go to the windows. Or look out of them. Or answer the door. I’ll … I’ll keep you safe in here, from whatever you’re running from. I’ll get some fresher water. If you, um …” Dog swallows, his hand already on the doorknob. “If you want, when I get back, maybe you can tell me what you’re running from …?”

  Tide furrows his brow challengingly. “And if I never tell you?”

  “Well, that’s … that’s fine too. You can stay.”

  Tide nods. “Good Dog. Now go fetch.”

  The boy issues a weird sort of sound—something between a sigh and a moan—then slips out of the door. Tide tosses aside the apple core, letting it land on the floor somewhere, then fists the next one in the bowl. King Tide, Storm King. This isn’t much of a throne room, but it’ll have to do for now. He considers whether he ought to leave. A girl named Gin is somewhere out there, and until he brings her back to the Queen—alive—his life in the Abandon is forfeit.

  0186 Kid

  She sits by the water with her legs dangling off like two limp legs of a doll. She stares down at her rippling face in the water and wonders what the hell she just did.

  “We … are … fucking … stuck.”

  Kid looks up. She sees Link is still leaning against the wall with the weird Faery girl, and the pair of them are staring down at the dead body. No one seems to be able to say anything.

  “Stuck. We’re stuck.”

  Except for the Ames boy, who won’t shut up. He’s pacing back and forth down the sidewalk muttering like a crazy person.

  Link sighs. “Ames …”

  “We’re stuck. We can’t get home. We won’t get home.”

  “Ames, calm down. Please.”

  “Ten years, Link!” Ames’ voice has reached an impressive new level of squeakiness and desperation. “Ten fucking years! We know no one here! We’re alone! We have no way to get home!”

  “Wrong.” Link doesn’t look at Ames when he speaks, instead keeping his eyes on the floor. “We know ourselves ten years ago.”

  “I’m not making jokes!!”

  “Neither am I.” Link gives a short shrug. “We are somewhere in the tenth ward Waterways, ten years ago. There is a six-year-old version of me up there. There’s a four-year-old version of you.”

  Kid thinks about that notion. I wasn’t even born, she realizes. Unless I’m actually eleven. Or twelve. Or thirteen. It’s pretty frustrating sometimes, to not even know your own age. She wonders if there’s a younger version of her out there right now. A baby who …

  Kid’s eyes shoot wide open. A baby who still has a mommy and a daddy. “A baby of me.”

  She feels the attention of the others suddenly. Kid looks up. The eyes of her three companions stare down at her. There is fear in all their faces, and it’s only now that Kid feels a cool wash of worry run through her. They all think I’m a killer. Especially Ames, whose glare is twenty
times darker than the others’.

  “You’re the reason we’re stuck,” he says, low and cold.

  Link sighs. “Ames. Don’t. Just stop.”

  “It’s her fault. It’s all her fucking fault. She killed him and … and we could be next.”

  “We can’t die.” Link folds his arms, annoyed at his friend. “Do I have to remind you of that fact? And besides, she was protecting us. We ought to be thanking Kid.”

  “Baal moved his brother! Didn’t you hear him?? He moved his brother to some other time, Link! We don’t know where he took him and now we don’t know how long we have left! We could be alive for just another year! For just another month! We don’t know!”

  “We could be alive for twenty more years,” says Link. “Or even a hundred. Doesn’t matter. All our lives were cut short the day the Mad King took the throne. All the lives of everyone in Atlas.”

  Kid glances at Faery, who has been strangely quiet throughout the whole exchange. The girl returns her glance, her big eyes wide and fearful.

  Ames doesn’t seem satisfied with that answer. With a growl and a shriek of frustration, he stomps off like a child, rounding the corner and letting off another howl or two of anger. Link does not follow him, sliding down to the ground and hugging his knees instead.

  They sit there for a long while more, listening to the rushing of the waters and saying nothing at all. Whether the three of them are deep in their own thoughts, no one can say. Kid can’t seem to focus on anything but a pang of hunger that lives in her belly.

  Finally, Link speaks. “Are … Are you really a Goddess?”

  Faery drops her eyes to him. “Am I a what?” she returns softly.

  “That man right there,” says Link, nodding in his direction, “was under the impression that you’re … one of the Three Goddesses. He seems to think that you’re missing. That you got separated from your other Sisters or something.”

  Faery doesn’t respond, her eyes drifting to the water with worry quivering in them.

  “H-He was weird,” Link says at once, seeming to backpedal. “He was just as obsessed as his brother, it turns out. Don’t be scared. He thought I had some magic vision. They both did.” He laughs now. “I was just hallucinating while I was being drowned. It makes sense to me now. I just wish …” Link sighs and slaps a hand to his forehead. “I wish I’d realized all of this before.”

  Faery crouches down and starts picking at something on the pavement. “What are the Three Goddesses?”

  Link chuckles at first. When he meets her eyes and realizes that the question was genuine, his face straightens. “Oh. You don’t know what they are?” Faery shakes her head. “They, um …” Link glances at Kid, who turns away quickly, returning her gaze to her own reflection in the water. “They’re what some slummers believe in. A lot don’t believe in them anymore. We, um … we believe they’re the reason that we have Legacies. We believe they’ve been around for … hundreds and hundreds of years. Thousands, maybe. They are almighty beings of energy and, like, they’re immortal … and one of them dreams.” Link gives an apologetic shrug. “I really don’t know what they are.”

  “Who cares?” comes a soft voice from down the way.

  Ames has returned, strolling down the path toward them. His voice is lighter and sullen, as if he spent the last hour screaming out all of his energy several canals away and is now returning, deflated and spent of all his fury.

  “Faery asked what they are,” Link says tersely.

  “It doesn’t matter what they are, really.” Ames comes to a stop near the water. His shoulders are slumped and his eyes seem red with expended emotion. “We need to figure out how we’re planning to survive.”

  “Just like we did in the Brotherhood,” Link decides. “We make runs to the surface for food. We live here in the Waterways, hidden. We stick together, all four of us.”

  “I’m not sticking around with her here,” mumbles Ames, his eyes on Kid.

  Link rises and moves to his friend. “Perhaps you aren’t seeing the sheer beauty of having her with us. Kid’s Legacy can render her invisible. Thereby, she can render all of us invisible. She is our key to staying unseen, to keeping hidden. With her, we are protected.”

  Ames studies Kid guardedly, taking in what Link just said. Kid studies him back, feeling guilty for their whole situation all over again. Link’s kind words of defense don’t seem to touch her.

  “Yes,” Ames says suddenly, his eyes lighting up. “Yes, yes, yes. Oh. Link. Link! There is a sheer beauty in her being with us. Link!” He grabs Link by the shirt, his eyes wide with excitement. “We are in the past! We can save the world ourselves!”

  Link’s face transforms from wide and surprised to furrowed and concerned in one second. “Ames …”

  “The Banshee King in the sky! We can slip into the Lifted City, Link. Fuck that Mad King in our future. We should be the ones to end King Greymyn’s reign! We should be the ones to take the throne! We could rule Atlas, the four of us!”

  “Ames, stop it. We can’t—”

  “Kid will be the Marshal of Legacy. You’ll be the Marshal of Order. Your friend Faery here, she can be, well, the Marshal of Peace, I guess, because she’s so damned quiet. I’ll be King Ames. Ames the Undying. Ames the Immortal King.”

  Link shakes himself away from Ames’ hold. “We can’t do that.”

  His face turns sour instantly. “Why not? You want to be King? Is that it? King Link, the Colorful King?”

  “No. We can’t change the past,” Link says. “Didn’t you hear Baal before? Tiptoe, remember? Any little thing we do here can cause a tidal wave in our own time. A dangerous game we play, sitting here like stones in the past. We can’t change a damn thing.”

  “We can. And we should. It’s our responsibility. This is a gift we have been given, Link. Kid here, she can mask us. No one will see us! We’ll be saving the world unseen. That’s not breaking any rules, is it? Baal told us: ‘We cannot be seen.’ Didn’t he say that? He must’ve known that we’d find some means to stay invisible. That girl right there, that Kid, she is our key!”

  Link looks over at Kid, who can’t help but watch the exchange, her own heart quickening in her chest. “Well, Kid?”

  She lifts her eyebrows, surprised that he’s including her. For a while, she was much preferring to remain invisible, even if she didn’t literally turn so. “M-Me?”

  “You,” confirms Link with a mild look of patience on his soft, tired face. “Tell us, Kid. What do you think about all this?”

  Kid moves her gaze between each of them, curious. Link seems patient and interested, despite the dark look to his eyes that she has gotten used to. Faery always looks lost, almost like she doesn’t even understand the language they’re speaking half the time. Ames looks kinder than he did before, inspired and full of passion. Are the three of them really waiting on her opinion?

  “Do ya think he was lying?” she asks suddenly.

  The expression on the boys’ faces falters. It’s Ames who speaks first. “What do you mean? Baal?”

  “Him,” Kid says, dropping her eyes to the dead body between them. “Do ya think … Do you think he was lying? About moving his brother’s body? About saving the world? About … everything?”

  Link and Ames exchange a look. Perhaps the boys hadn’t truly considered it until just now. Ames gives a mild shrug, still looking at Link. “I guess, uh …” He bites his deformed lip, then looks down at Baal. “It’s a possibility that he … never meant to save the world.”

  “Maybe he was the one responsible for destroying it,” puts in Link. “Maybe he was going to use the Goddess to do it.”

  “And maybe … maybe in our killing him, we’ve … already saved the world.” Ames lifts his eyebrows after saying that, as if that very possibility has just occurred to him, putting together all the pieces.

  “Did he ever separate from you guys?” asks Link suddenly.

  Ames asks, “When?”

  “When I droppe
d into the water and swam away. When I went into the dark tunnel and found her,” Link elaborates with a nod at Faery, who is still picking at something on the ground and looking between the others with bewilderment in her big, far-apart eyes.

  “No,” answers Ames. “At least … At least I don’t think he did.”

  “If he didn’t separate from you, then that means he never left us during the time that we’ve been here in the past. So if he never left us,” Link goes on to say, piecing together his own narrative, “then that means he couldn’t have moved Baron someplace else. He must have been lying.”

  “Well, that means we definitely have only ten years left to live,” mutters Ames miserably. “I’m not sure I feel better about that.”

  “Or maybe it would only take him an instant,” Link considers, his eyes drifting to the ceiling as he mulls over the possibilities. “He could pop ten years into the future, do whatever it is he needs to do, and then pop ten years back, right into the exact second he left. We wouldn’t have noticed a thing.” Link’s eyes turn fearful as he glances at Kid, and then at Ames. “Do you think he’s that … perfect with his skill? It’s unlikely, isn’t it? Wouldn’t we have noticed?”

  Ames doesn’t seem able to answer, suddenly scared by the idea. He folds his red arms and lifts a hand to his mouth, pensive, worried.

  In the tense silence that swells between them, Kid decides to answer Link’s question from before. “Yes. I think we should do it.”

  Link turns to her, confused. “Do what?”

  “Things. Going places. Looking at … things.” She casts her eyes down at the dead body. She sees herself under a table when she was just six, hiding like her dad told her to do, invisible, and the masked men who invaded her home and killed him right in front of her. “Looking at things,” she repeats, looking at the thing, the memory, the dead body of Baal, the dead body of her dad.

  And then Link is in front of her. His sudden appearance startles her, but she remains there, looking up at him. “And what is it,” he asks, “that you want to go and see here, ten years ago?”