Strangers and Shadows

by John Kowalsky

  Contents

  About Strangers and Shadows

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Prologue

  Darkness And Light

  A Short Trip

  Dear Diary

  One Fare Day

  Questions And Shopping Sprees

  Seventh Heaven

  Chinese Take Out

  The Flip Side

  A Lot Bigger Than You Think

  The Overlaps

  @ The End

  The Kid's Day

  Start At Once

  Bar Fight

  Back In The Seventh

  Safe And Sound

  Weeks Later

  Chicago Hope

  Back From The Dead

  In The Belly Of The Beast

  Surprise...

  Mad Science

  In The Dungeons

  Back Among The Living

  How Bad Is It?

  Chapter and 3rd Verse

  Rings and Things

  Steady Now

  Gollum In The Gears

  Once Twice Trace

  Agent Saboteur

  Disorganized Resistance

  Test Results

  Babysitter Extraordinaire

  Working Vacation

  A Separate Piece

  Persistent Resistance

  And So It Begins

  Might As Well... Jump

  A Dash And A Twist

  After The End, Before The Beginning

  Acknowledgements

  About The Author

  Copyright

  In the MultiVerse of Strangers and Shadows, people are anything but ordinary. Whether born with telepathic abilities, or granted them by advanced technology, the agents of the Sixth and Seventh Verses find themselves locked in conflict over a young boy.

  On one side, a powerful father and daughter seek to discover the plans of a scheming and estranged mother.

  On the other side, the mother pursues her cause to unite both Verses and forge a new path for all of humanity.

  Meanwhile, two secret lovers from a backwater world are thrust into the middle of the muddy conflict along with a stranded time traveler. Unsure who is in the right and who can be trusted, they must all choose their allegiances in the struggle between Strangers and Shadows.

  Strangers

  and

  Shadows

  by

  John Kowalsky

  To my big sister, who never got to read the ending.

  Prologue

  The Stranger walked out of the dark alley. He was already late delivering the keys, having been held up in New York in the Fifth. He’d run into a few complications before making it to a clean jump spot.

  Given that they so often worked and traveled in foreign worlds, the agents of the Seventh referred to themselves as Strangers. Having been one for the last seventeen years, Mikhail knew better than most what would happen if he didn’t complete this mission. He didn’t fancy the idea of being permanently posted to some back water Verse far from the comforts of home.

  He pulled out a folded paper map, as his tech had no central database to connect to here. Old school, he thought, and checked the directions to the drop point again.

  He was presently in the Third, in Chicago. He’d been to Chicago before, but there was more than one, and Mikhail hadn’t had the time to acclimate to this one yet.

  It was cold, the sun had gone down, it was beginning to rain, and the wind was blowing like a madman.

  Good, he thought, checking the map, I’m only a few miles east of where I need to be.

  Banks, his handler, had told him nothing about the keys or who they were for, but that was procedure—though, there did seem to be a big fuss about this particular delivery. He had overheard the handler speaking with a few senators that had come to visit the office.

  He couldn’t make out all of the conversation, but he had managed to piece together a few facts—the keys were coded to a young man and woman, and they were very important to the prime minister. He found the entire situation supremely odd. The keys were out of date, relics from the Seventh’s past. No one used this tech anymore. It was ancient, bulky, and it caused erratic patterns in the grid, sometimes even affecting the weather.

  His thoughts were interrupted by a muffled thud coming from the rooftop on his right, then another on his left. The sound of Shadows.

  So they finally caught up to me. The Stranger ran.

  He had thought he’d given them the slip back in the Fifth, but now that they were here, his chances of completing his mission and surviving had dropped dramatically. Still, it would take them a few minutes to hone in on his exact position. He just might have enough time to make the drop and jump out before they found him.

  He took the next street to the left and dodged a series of cars that were driving down the avenue. In spite of the seriousness of his situation, he found the time to laugh at the reactions of some of the people watching him on the sidewalks.

  They must think I’m a crazy person, he thought as he ran. Dressed in a suit, overcoat, and hat that were manufactured in a parallel universe, maybe they were right.

  He changed streets a few more times and then jumped into a cab. He gave the driver the address, and paid him in advance, to which the driver muttered something under his breath.

  The Stranger hoped that they had given him the correct currency. It wouldn’t be the first time that someone had overlooked that little detail at the office.

  The driver seemed pleased enough with the money, and pulled out into traffic, nearly hitting another vehicle in the process.

  When the Stranger arrived at the address, he was surprised by the building’s appearance. It was run down and unimpressive. Well, no matter, he thought, the sooner I finish this and leave, the sooner I’ll get back to Jenni and the babies. He had just recently had twins. They were his first children from his second wife, and he was looking forward to seeing all of them again.

  He’d been on assignment for the last three weeks. First tracking down two working versions of the keys from the Fifth and then dropping them to another agent who took them back to the Seventh to be coded. From the Seventh the keys came back to Mikhail in the Fifth, and then he’d brought them here. The attempt at compartmentalization and secrecy seemed a little over the top to Mikhail, but, then again, that was the information game.

  He took the stairs, several flights up, to the roof. The location was supposed to be clean, checked by his people just hours before, but with the arrival of the Shadows, nothing was certain.

  He stepped through the door to the roof and removed the keys from their casings. When he reached the ledge, he activated the jump gate over the street below. He was about to drop the keys in when he felt the knife enter his back.

  Damn, he thought as he fell to his knees, I must be getting slow. He thought for sure he would have more time before they caught up to him.

  He tossed the keys as hard as he could in the direction of the drop point, but the poison was already setting in, his arm went limp, and only one of the keys managed to make it over the ledge. The other made a sick clank as it bounced backwards and began to roll.

  Mikhail had just enough motor control left to turn and see his attacker. Sort of.

  There were two of them, though it was hard to be sure. His vision had gone blurry and was starting to fade.

  The taller one picked up the key that hadn’t quite made it over the side and turned. “One of the keys made it through.” He tilted his head as he listened to the reply on the other end.

  “No, it was his key...”

  “Yes, it’s unfortunate, but we can—” He nodded. “It’ll look like it was them…”

  “Alright, we’re on our
way back now.” The taller one ended the conversation and turned to the shorter blurry figure. “Poor bastard…”

  The Stranger saw a flash of anti-light and then the curtain fell.

  Darkness And Light

  The mist is back today. The bells are sounding. This marks the start of the third week without sunlight.

  I haven’t slept well in days. Asher is continually bringing new problems to my attention that must be addressed immediately. We are running low on food. Medical supplies have to be re-used, boiled in hot water to clean them as best we can. The children have started falling asleep. They do not die, but neither do they wake. It’s as if the darkness is a disease that is slowly infecting us all. Some of the adults have grown sick as well. The old ones first, like a common cold.

  We ran out of firewood three days ago. We’ve had to start tearing down homes and businesses to keep the light of the fire alive. The light is all we have to keep us going. I pray that mother returns soon. She’s gone off to the south, searching for a cure to this ever-night. I don’t know how much longer we can hold out. Some of the guards have succumbed to madness and thrown themselves off of the wall and into the darkness. We can still hear their screams long after they’ve vanished from the torch light. They echo in our heads, calling out to us.

  I have asked the priestesses to hold services round the clock that it may lighten the people’s despair. I fear it will not be enough.

  Great Mother, where are you? If you can hear my prayers, send my mother, our queen, back to us with the answers we seek.

  — Entry from the Royal Journal of Princess Avialle, found in the Palace at New Britain.

  Asher began his day just as he had for the last three weeks—he opened his eyes expecting to see the sunlight pouring in through the windows. As on every other day for the last three weeks, nothing but darkness greeted him. Not a pitch black darkness, but still one dark enough that a torch or light of some kind was needed. He likened it to the kind of darkness found on a clear starry night, but there were no stars here. In fact, no heavenly body was in sight—no moon, no sun, and no stars.

  He reached out and found the lamp on the night stand next to his bed and lit it, careful not to waste the match.

  The newspaper had stayed in business, despite all the recent upheaval, and he went in search of the morning edition. Asher’s father always used to tell him that the best news was bad news, at least for selling papers, not necessarily for hearing.

  Asher’s father had been in charge of the treasury, overseeing the economy of the entire realm. He had taken over his father’s office, in addition to his other duties, after his death a little over a year ago. Sometimes he could still hear his father’s footsteps in the hall, spaced out in such a way and of such a weight, that they could only belong to him, but when he turned to look, no one was there—tricks of an afflicted mind.

  The economy had ground to a halt under the darkness that surrounded everything these days. The newspaper, in addition to the food markets and the hospitals, was one of the only businesses still up and running. Although without any sunlight, the crops would soon be all but ruined. The grocer’s had little more than bread, oats, eggs, and milk to offer these days, and their supplies would dwindle to nothing within the week.

  Panicked citizens robbed the food carts coming in from the countryside, but little could be done, as the princess thought that the city guard should stay within the city in order to protect its inhabitants. And if Asher had learned one thing in his twenty years, it was never hope to change a woman’s mind.

  As Asher approached the newstand, he was greeted by the paper’s owner and sole operator these days, Bill McGrath, a gruff old man with wire-rimmed glasses and a large mustache that he wore curled up at the ends.

  “How are you, young Asher?” Bill asked.

  “The same as yesterday, I suppose,” Asher said. “Anything good today?”

  “No, sir. Three more children slipped into the sleep, and two more guards took their final leave from the wall.”

  “Took their final leave, eh? That’s a mighty nice way of saying that they tried to end their own suffering, the coward’s way.” Asher shook his head. “I don’t understand it myself.”

  “Well, it’s not my place to say, of course, but I’m of the opinion that we need to keep as positive a view as possible of the events happening these days.” Bill brightened. “After all, what would happen if the people lost all hope of this darkness lifting? No, sir, I won’t be the one to blow out the final light of hope that these people have. It’s bad enough that all the news I have to report is bad news. The least I can do is try to lighten the terrible weight of it all with some mighty nice way of saying it.”

  “I see your point…” Asher grew more curious. “Tell me though, how is it that you have enough light to print the paper? As far as I know, the only people with lights these days are the members of the Queen’s court.”

  “Well, it takes quite a bit longer, and I can’t print as much, but I increased the print size to where I could feel the shape of the letters on the cast. Then I arrange them by feel. Sometimes though, I get it wrong, so if you’ve noticed more misprints than normal, I beg your forgiveness.”

  “Nonsense, Bill, I’m grateful for the service you provide, and I know for a fact that the princess feels the same way. And I’ll tell you what, I’ll see about getting you some light for you to work by. Like you said, it’s important to keep people’s spirits up in times like these.”

  Bill thanked him and Asher left to report to the princess for the day’s business, walking past groups of people huddled around a shared lamp, reading the morning paper.

  Asher was almost to the palace, though he wouldn’t have been able to tell, just from looking. In fact, he could hardly see five feet in front of him, even with his torch light. The morning mist combined with the darkness to swallow any light that was near it.

  Looking around, he couldn’t help but notice how depressing the darkness was.

  Ordinarily, the palace was a beautiful sight to behold. The work of hundreds of craftswomen. Queen Emille’s palace took seventeen years to build. It always made Asher think of the stories of past kings and their grand palaces. Solomon, Caesar, the czars of Russia... Asher wondered what it must have been like when people were ruled by men. Was it really so bad as the teachers say?

  Asher was one of the few men alive today who was allowed to do something besides manual labor, military service, or breeding duty. After The End War, the remaining survivors, mostly women, had decided it would be better to limit the male population and breed out male aggressiveness in order to prevent the mass genocide from ever occurring again.

  According to the histories that Asher had read, Gretchen Richards, a British psychiatrist, was responsible for re-uniting the surviving human race and implementing the new breeding policies.

  Her breeding program selected the healthiest male survivors and banished or killed the rest. The whole thing seemed a bit cruel to Asher, but his teachers assured him that it was absolutely necessary to the survival of the human race, and who was he to judge, he hadn’t been there.

  Asher remembered the fullness of his teacher’s lips and the curve of her hips as she explained the early days of the Program to him.

  The Program required all of the remaining males to undergo a series of deadly games and tests that would determine who would be kept in the rebuilding society for reproduction. The rules of the game were simple: if you survived, you won, and were allowed to pass on your genetic makeup.

  The men who won were then separated and sent to different breeding houses where they would live out the rest of their lives, never seeing what would become of the children they had with the handful of women that would visit them daily.

  If a man refused to play the game he was cast out of the society and never allowed access to a female for the rest of his life. Still, there were whispered rumors of male led tribes across the Atlantic where some of the outcasts had fled,
taking with them female captives. Asher, for one, didn’t believe it. The land across the Atlantic had sustained the worst of the damage from The End War. The teachers all said that the fallout would have rendered the remaining land unlivable for thousands of years.

  Asher was so caught up in his memories of school that he let his lamp blow out. Cursing his absent mindedness, he went up to the queen’s chambers in darkness, since he’d brought no matches with him. Surely, the princess would have a lamp burning.

  Asher stumbled only once before he reached the top of the stairs. He looked toward the door of the queen’s room, where Avialle was staying in her mother’s absence, and thought that he should have been able to see the princess’s light by now.

  Wondering if something had gone wrong, or maybe she was still sleeping, Asher decided to approach as quietly as possible. Before he could make it to the door, he heard the longest creak he’d ever heard in his life.

  He cursed himself for being so stupid. How could he have forgotten the creak that the queen had her servants put in?

  The queen didn’t like to be taken by surprise when her attendants came knocking on her door, and Asher had just discovered that the purposefully placed creak was quite effective.

  “Who’s there…? Is anyone there? My lights gone out and I can’t see a thing.” It was the princess’s voice.

  Asher paused for a moment, pondering how to proceed. He pushed the door open slowly, and looked into the darkness of the room, trying to decide where the princess might be. He heard the sound of her falling followed by an ear piercing scream.

  Asher could hear her scramble frantically, as he found the princess’s matchbox and lit his lamp.

  With the light, he could see Avialle’s panic stricken face staring at him from the floor, her legs draped over the fallen chair.

  She was relieved that it was only Asher, but angry and embarrassed at looking foolish.

  “Asher!” Ava yelled. “You could have called out...” she paused, an evil grin coming over her face, “now, you will have to be punished.”