The Fissure King

by Rachel Pollack

  "I am honored," Jack said.

  "You have asked, and I shall answer." Asked? Jack thought, then realized he'd spoken aloud his question about what happened next and how to stop her. Did she hear everyone's questions, all over the world? She said, "And you must listen."

  Jack sat up straighter, as if she could see him. "I'm ready," he said.

  "You have two days, Jack Shade. There were three, but the first is gone." Jack sucked in a breath, thinking of all those hours stuck in his chair. The Queen said, "Two days before it truly begins. Then it will be too late. Haarlindam, 1132." Before Jack could say anything, she hung up.

  "Wait!" Jack said. "What about Carol Acker? Damn!" He hit the callback button. After a few rings a pleasant voice said, "Hi. This is the voicemail for Margaret Strand. I'm sorry I'm not—"

  It was only after he put down the phone that Jack saw Carolien's reaction to the Queen's message. She was sitting forward on her chair, her back a straight line, her mouth half open, her eyes fixed on the phone. Jack got up to squat before her and take her hands. She didn't seem to notice. "Carolien," he said softly, "what is it?"

  She looked at him, almost surprised, as if she'd forgotten where she was. Then she closed her eyes for a moment, and when she opened them, swore softly, "Godverdamme." Then louder, "Haarlindam!"

  "What?" Jack said. "What is Haarlindam?"

  "A very old Nederlandse city. Every Dutch Traveler knows of it."

  "I'm sorry, Carolien, I've never heard of it. And what does—"

  "Ah, but you won't have, dear Jack. This is something the Nederlands Reisen Associatie keeps very much to itself. In the year 1132—" She stopped and crossed herself, something Jack had never seen her do. "—the Travelers and the Powers joined together, and they—what is the word, oh yes, obliterated, they obliterated the city of Haarlindam, and everything and every person within it."

  "Jesus," Jack said, "Why? What the hell was going on there?"

  "No one knows. The Travelers of 1132 time-sealed it."

  "Shit," Jack said. A time-seal was a kind of bubble, a force-field to use the modern expression, that prevented any information from a place or an event from leaking out to the future, or even the past. "Does anyone have a clue?"

  "Only that something verschrikkelijk—terrible—had become free in Haarlindam, and no one could stop it. In this case, some small details, stories perhaps, escaped the seal. Preserved, maybe, by the sealers. Bodies, and body pieces, strung like decorations for Carnaval. Lines and line of black poles with human heads on top. Heads that could see, and hear, and smell. And of course, scream." She gripped Jack's arm now. It always surprised him how such soft hands could be so strong. She said, "Jack, if this thing you brought back to your client, your Carol Acker, is anything at all the same as what happened in Haarlindam, and we have only two days, we must stop it. Before. Before it completes its so-called warming-up."

  Jack took a breath. "I did it, I'll stop it."

  She shook her head. "No, no, no. Not alone. Even you will need help this time."

  "Where do we go? The Queen has obviously said all she's willing to say."

  Carolien smiled slightly, just for a moment, but it thrilled Jack to see she could do it. "Where else? We are Travelers, ja? Then we must go to NYTAS."

  "Oh, great," Jack said. "Arthur!"

  The New York Travelers' Aid Society had existed, under various names, from long before there was a New York, or a Nieuw Amsterdam, for that matter. Carolien had once traced it back to an alliance of the Mannahasset and Wampanoag Indians, but it went back much further than that. Under the current Chief, however, an erstwhile surgeon named Arthur Canton, it had become something of a showcase—for Canton himself. He'd moved the Chief's office to a former ceremonial chamber and made sure that all group actions, communications, and requests for the help of NYTAS's vast resources must go through him. He assisted those he liked, and blocked those he didn't. Canton liked Carolien, everyone did. Jack, on the other hand—Canton considered Jack arrogant, selfish, a loner who never helped the group and considered himself above everyone else. All true, of course, which made it that much harder for Jack to plead for help.

  They found the Chief at his great ebony desk inlaid with gold and silver to show the Planetary Palaces and diamond arrows to chart the pathways between them. Canton wore a charcoal suit with a black tie containing bits of light that represented some constellation or other. His chiseled features and lush hair always made Jack suspect he'd cast some George Clooney glamour over himself, and if they ever saw the real Arthur he'd have a sloping forehead, a rat nose, and a receding chin.

  Canton sat with the air of someone who expected a summons from the White House at any moment. The real White House, of course, not the showpiece in Washington. He said, "Carolien, it's lovely to see you as always. Your unruly pet, on the other hand—"

  "Enough," Carolien said. "We know you dislike Jack, of course you do. Everyone does." Jack struggled not to stare at her.

  Canton smiled. "Except you, apparently."

  "I vacillate," Carolien said, and then, before Canton could answer, "Arthur, believe me, please. We come with something so important we must set aside any personal matters." She looked at Jack. "Tell him."

  Jack described Carol Acker's "soul retrieval," condensing his struggles in the different worlds and going straight to what happened afterwards, especially the slaughter of the man who'd given Jack's card to his cousin Carol. Then he told Arthur about the telephone call from the Queen of Eyes, and let Carolien explain about Haarlindam. He could see it hurt her to do this, reveal a Dutch Travelers' secret to Arthur Canton, but she did it anyway,

  For what felt like a long time, Arthur stared at Jack through narrowed eyes, while the fingers of his left hand drummed slowly on the tabletop. "So," he said finally, "we seem to be driving down an old road. Mr. Lone Wolf Shade, who has no use for his colleagues until he needs something, has once again—how shall I say this—Oh right, fucked up. And now he expects NYTAS to save him. Ah, but this time he brings his mommy to plead for him."

  "Arthur, please," Carolien said, "this is not about Jack."

  "No? I got an interesting call just before you arrived. From Dean Margolis and Sam Harwin. They were not terribly pleased to discover they'd been used as Jack Shade's errand boys."

  "Jack did not do that," Carolien said, "it was me. We needed to know if Mr. Acker was safe."

  "Well good news, then. He's fine, apparently. But his wife did leave a message. Just in case someone showed up. A message for a certain Jack Shade. She wanted you to know that she's, quote, ‘just warming up.' And now the message has been delivered." He inclined his head and rotated his hand in mock servitude.

  "God damn it," Jack said, "can't you see that—"

  Canton waved a hand and Jack's mouth locked so he couldn't speak. The position of Chief carried certain powers, which probably was why Canton rarely left the building. To Carolien, he said, "I've made my decision, Carolien. You may go now. And take your dog with you before he soils the floor."

  Carolien looked about to try again, but Jack took her arm and led her out. When they had left the building, Carolien let loose a stream of Dutch that Jack figured would burn his ears if he knew what it meant.

  It didn't matter, Jack knew. He looked around at the street. NYTAS was on Madison Avenue and the passersby were mostly office workers and executives, well-off shoppers, people on their way to appointments with clients, lovers, or therapists. The sun had come out but the air had turned chilly, and some held their light jackets tightly against their bodies. Haarlindam, he thought. What if she chose New York this time? He looked at a man who'd just bought a hot dog from a cart and was happily taking his first bite. For an instant, Jack saw the man turned inside out, his body parts strewn across the Art Deco relief of an angel on the building behind him.

  Jack took out his phone and began to dia
l. Carolien asked whom he was calling, and he said "COLE."

  COLE stood for the Committee of Linear Explanation, and no Traveler liked to call them, though every Traveler knew their number. When an action spilled over to the outside world COLE stepped in to clean things up, to restore Non-Travelers' trust in their limited reality. Jack had only ever called them once, the night his daughter's poltergeist killed her mother and then his daughter had left the world entirely, pulled into the dead zone of the Forest of Souls.

  The phone rang once, and then a woman's voice said, "You have reached the offices of COLE. All our agents our occupied right now, but if you stay on the line—"

  "Fuck!" Jack said, and almost threw the phone at NYTAS's oak door. Instead, he just put it back in his pocket, and told Carolien, "I have to go do something and it has to be alone." She started to speak but he said, "There's no time. I need you to head back to your place and monitor the news, track any activity that might tell us what she's doing, where she is. The Queen said two days, but she's already started. Warming up. Will you do that for me?"

  She nodded. " Call me," she said.

  "When I can." Jack stepped into the street and raised his arm. Instantly, a taxi pulled to the curb and the cabbie ordered the confused couple in back to get out. When they tried to protest he yelled "Emergency! No charge, okay?" Jack took their place the moment they stepped out. The ability to command taxis was one of Jack's favorite perks of being a New York Traveler, but now all he cared about was getting where he needed to go. "The Public Library," he said. "And I'll pay their fare as well as mine."

  The scene on the Library steps might have been summer, with people sitting on the cold stone, or the small slat chairs on the sidewalk, some reading but most talking, eating street food, playing games or texting on their phones. Two young women in tight jeans and sweaters, and wearing clunky Ugg boots leaned against one of the stone lions, talking intensely about some boyfriend, while in front of the other lion a young white guy was doing card tricks to impress a couple of middle-aged marks.

  Okay, Jack thought, where to start? He gestured at the two women. Both of them gasped, then laughed with delight. "Mr. Kewpie!" one of them said, and patted the lion's mane, which had become soft and silky. "What are you doing here, little one? So far from home! Did you follow me? Who let you out?" She began to pull on the stone head, which didn't move but let out a low growl. "Come on, sweetie," she said. "When did you get so heavy?"

  Jack pointed at the card sharp. The eight of hearts flew out of his hand and began to loop around the heads of the older men. Soon other cards followed it. "What the fuck?" one of the marks said, and the two of them hurried down the steps, swatting at the cards, while the sharp stared after them and made strange noises.

  Come on, Jack thought, who do you have to screw to get some attention in this town? He went back to the two women, gestured again, and a deep voice boomed out of the lion. "Riddle me this. What creature walks on four legs in the morning, two legs in the—"

  That was as far as it got. Everything froze, the lion, the people, even the cards in the air. Jack closed his eyes. Finally, he thought.

  Behind him, a firm man's voice said, "John Shade!" He turned and there they were, a white man and woman in black suits and white shirts. An old Traveler joke went "Nothing is ever just black and white. Well, except for COLE, of course." Jack wasn't sure, but he thought they might be the same two who'd confronted him some months back, when he was fighting off his dream duplicate. Maybe he'd become their special assignment. Or maybe all COLE teams just looked alike. The man said, "John Shade, you have violated—" but the woman interrupted him.

  "Jesus, Jack," she said, "what the fuck are you doing?"

  "I needed help," Jack said, "and nobody was answering the phone at your headquarters.

  The man ordered "Move!" Jack had never heard so much fury in one syllable. It was just standard procedure, get the bad boy Traveler away from the scene before the weird memories could take hold in the witnesses' minds. As he began walking east, towards Grand Central Station, he saw that two more agents had arrived to glam the witnesses' minds. Jack thought how he'd often pitied Nons—non Travelers. They knew so little of reality, and were so easily put asleep. Now he envied them.

  They didn't talk until they stopped at the main entrance to the train station, under the statue of Mercury in flight above the doors. Before the agents could accuse him, Jack told them what had happened. "Look, I need help. I ony staged that scene so I could talk to you. I've got to find that, that thing, and stop it, and I have just two days. Maybe just today, maybe tomorrow will already be too late. And I don't think I can do it alone."

  The woman looked from Jack to her partner. "What do you think? Maybe the satellite system?"

  "No," the man said.

  Startled, the woman let some color show in her face. "But you heard what Nliana Hand said. Haarlindam was almost a thousand years ago. We were in that seminar together, Paul. Think how much bigger the targets could be today."

  "Stop," the man said. "This is not our responsibility. It will only become so if Mr. Shade reveals things to the outside world. And then our task will be to remove Mr. Shade."

  The woman stared at her partner. "Don't you think mass slaughter will reveal things?"

  His shoulders moved in the slightest of shrugs. "Not necessarily. The outer population will no doubt cast its own interpretation. Disease or terrorism, most likely." He waved a finger and a white Lexus illegally parked in front of the Grand Hyatt Hotel next door to Grand Central glided forward. As the man got in the car the woman said to Jack, "This isn't over. He's letting his dislike of you cloud—" And then, as if realizing she'd said too much, she ducked into the car.

  She would try, Jack thought, but her partner—whatever he thought about Jack—represented the agency's mission. Don't save the world, just keep it ignorant. He watched the Lexus get absorbed in traffic. So many people, he thought. In trains, on the street, in stores and offices. Tell Jack I'm just getting started, Carol Acker had said. Warming up. And two days, the Queen had said. And Jack Shade had no idea what to do.

  He stepped inside the train station to reduce the traffic noise, and called Carolien. "COLE's a wash-out," he said. "All they'll do is cover it up after it happens."

  She made some kind of Dutch noise, then said "Maybe I should speak to Arthur alone."

  "Don't bother," Jack said.

  "What are you going to do? You cannot act alone this time. You must understand that."

  "I know. There's another possibility."

  "Possibility?"

  "An ally. Someone who owes me."

  "What? Do you mean your Dream Hunter friends?"

  "No. I'm talking about someone with real fire power."

  "Who—Oh no. No, Jack, you cannot—La Societé?"

  "I told you, they owe me."

  "And what will you owe them if you do this? You know what they are! Jack, please."

  "I don't have a choice, Carolien."

  "Godverdamme, Jack. That's what you told yourself when you freed that—thing. You always have a choice."

  "Not this time."

  "Maybe we can petition the Powers."

  He made a noise. "Come on. Even an emergency request would take four or five days just to get a hearing."

  "Perhaps they could undo any damage done between the petition and their acceptance."

  "Maybe. But what if they can't? Or won't? And suppose they don't grant the petition? Without NYTAS behind me they could say I don't have standing. You know what they're like. Fucking divine bureaucrats."

  He could hear tears in her voice now. "Please, Jack, think of what you're doing. Think of who they are!"

  "I'm sorry, Carolien, I just can't worry about myself in all this."

  "I can't let you—"

  "I have to go, Carolien. I'm sorry." He ended the call,
then switched off the phone. It was time to move.

  He hailed a taxi and had the driver take him to 67th and Lexington. The building on the northwest corner housed a high end Islamic couturier on the ground floor with long silk dresses and hijabs so elegant that Carolien had once said she might convert for the fashions. Above the shop rose faceless offices, whose entry door, gray and anonymous, bore only one logo, the initials "S.I." in gold letters, and to the left of it a keypad of numbers. There was no bell to ring, no intercom. Either you knew the number code or you didn't. The code was simple but impossible to guess. It was the birthday of King Solomon, according to the ancient Hebrew calendar.

  Suleiman International, originally headquartered in Baghdad but for the past ninety-two years in Geneva, had diversified in recent times, like all wise conglomerates. And SI was nothing if not wise. If you knew of their existence, and had the money, you could hire them for cross-world quantum encryption, nano-possession of troublesome clients, Akashic data protection (guaranteed for up to one hundred past lives), or emergency exorcisms of politicians in danger of foreclosure by their operational hosts. But if you knew they existed, you also knew their original and primary function—controlling, and selling, the services of the Djinn.

  Jack tapped in the king's dates. The door silently opened, then closed behind him the moment he entered. There was only one elevator in the narrow lobby and Jack rode it to the third floor, where a young white woman in a pale blue dress sat at a crescent-shaped cedar desk. Judging by her uncovered long blonde hair she was not a believer. Nice to know, Jack thought, that S.I. didn't discriminate. Before Jack could say anything, the woman told him, "Welcome to S.I., Mr. Shade. How may we help you?"

  Jack had often noticed the proclivity of powerful organizations to flaunt their intelligence. He was not in the mood to play, however. "I need a flask," he said.