The Shining Cities: An Anthology of Pagan Science Fiction

by Lauren Teffeau

  There’s something here by someone named “Pseudo-Apollodorus,” whatever that means, and it says that Odysseus’ wife Penelope had to leave Ithaca because of Antinous, and instead she went to someplace called Mantineia, where she had sex with Hermes and had Pan as a child. What is “Pan”? What does cookware have to do with anything?

  Is that Antinous the same one as the Antinous mentioned elsewhere connected to Mantineia? And where is Bithynia? I’ve heard of this Hadrian, but I thought he built a wall…I didn’t know he was a Roman emperor. But, maybe he isn’t? Maybe there’s more than one Hadrian, too?

  There’s not enough time to read all of this stuff, as it looks like there’s more than a thousand pages of documents here, and only a quick word-search is what I can manage in my present mental state.

  I’ve found this “phylactery” that McCool mentioned — it’s a small box, about two inches square, and it has images of this same guy who is so frequently pictured on the walls of McCool’s bunk. It seems to be hollow, and at some point I’m sure it could have been opened, but I can’t seem to open it now. I really don’t know what having it near me when I sleep will do — it doesn’t seem to be an electronic device giving off subtle pulses of energy, nor does it smell of anything other than the plastic that it is made from.

  But, if I don’t have it with me when the crew puts me under in my own bunk, they’ll all flip out, so I better save myself the trouble and an impassioned lecture on their superstitious nonsense. At least polytheists have the ability to explain why they do these silly things…this crew is just superstitious, and doesn’t understand any of this at all. Why they think I would, since I was the last one to speak to McCool and receive his instructions, is beyond me…

  They’ve given me a dose of the sedatives that should put me into a fairly deep sleep for about three hours. I’m in total darkness, in my own seven-by-three bunk, and this annoying soporific music and sound is playing to lull me to sleep quicker. This is ridiculous, and I don’t think it’s going to work.

  Boy, this music is awful. There was a time when I had wanted to be a musician. I was pretty good with electronic music when I was a teenager, and I even had a small band called the WingNuts for about three weeks, before I had a fight with Steve Manning, the guitar player, because he wanted to date my older sister, and she actually was interested in him. What a jerk. I still play that one song we did, though, “Fade to Blue,” at least a few times a week when I’m on earth. I can’t play it on our mission here, because it’s a play-it-loud, rock-out sort of song, and we’re not allowed to have music like that on these flights for fear it might interfere with the very sensitive instruments of the ship in these difficult supra-orbital conditions. Orbital missions are so much easier and more predictable. I haven’t been on one of them for years that hasn’t been as rote and boring as taking the tram to another city on earth ....

  I’m on the tram between Los Angeles and Sacramento. The Northern Republic of California and the Southern Republic have been pretty friendly towards one another for over a century, but there is currently talk of the Northern Republic merging with the Cascadian Republic, now that they’ve sorted out their water problems. Steve Manning is on the tram with my sister, sitting across from me.

  “Going my way?” he says.

  “No, you can go your own way.” He and my sister get up and leave the tram car.

  Two old men with horses walk through, followed by what looks like a mailman from some centuries back. He keeps saying “Speedy delivery,” but he doesn’t seem to be going very fast.

  A shirtless guy with very white hair and wearing a kilt sits down across from me.

  “Is that McCool?”

  “No, McCool’s dead.”

  “Oh, that’s a pity, now. I’m his ancestor, and I have a message for him. Well, no time to waste.”

  “Wait! Why don’t you tell it to me?”

  “What’s your name?”

  “Bill Carney.”

  “Irish, are you?”

  “Yes, but only on my father’s side.”

  “Then I can tell you only half the message.”

  “Why?”

  “You’re only half Irish.”

  “So, what’s the message?”

  The guy in the kilt puts his thumb in his mouth and begins speaking again.

  “You seek the Great Knowledge Which Illuminates,

  the arrow fired into the heart of the problem…”

  “And what else?”

  “That’s half of the message. Sorry, it is geis to me to reveal more if you’re only half Irish.”

  “But wait! That doesn’t tell me anything!”

  “Then ask him instead!”

  The man in the kilt points toward someone else coming down the aisle of the tram. He’s at least forty feet tall, but I could have sworn this tram was only large enough for someone up to seven feet tall. He’s walking in my direction, and I don’t like the looks of him. He’s kind of translucent, and he’s got a penis that is at least as tall as I am, if not taller.

  “Why have you summoned me?”

  “I haven’t summoned you.”

  “You are Fergus mac Cumhaill, the descendant of Finn mac Cumhaill and Fergus mac Roích, are you not?”

  “No, Fergus McCool is dead.”

  “Are you a fili?”

  “I don’t even know what that is.”

  “Then I will tell you only what any fool can know. I have seen the great Táin myself, for I was among the exiles of the Ulaid when it began, when Medb of Connacht coveted the Brown Bull of Cúailnge, the great dam dílenn called Donn .…”

  “Could you speak a bit more English, please?”

  “If I am not welcome by your fire to tell my stories in the way I wish to tell them, I shall depart from you with curses. May you die the death of puppies and be regarded as a hound of the shit-pile, you who are as worthless as the vomit of a badger and as useless as convincing a mare not to fart!”

  This giant see-through figure licks his fingers, slaps his ass-cheeks, and walks away from me. The tram is now a boat, and we’re floating somewhere with the sun overhead. The two egg-headed guys are here, and I think they’re twins. They’re naked and they’re sailing the ship, and I notice that I am now also naked. However, I don’ t really feel ashamed at this, and they don’t seem to be making a big deal out of it either.

  “Will you choose for Kastor?” one of them asks.

  “Or will you choose for Polydeukes?” the other asks.

  “Which one is which? What do you mean?”

  “In order to know, you must first choose.”

  “What’s the difference?”

  “I am Kastor, he is Polydeukes.”

  “Then I’ll choose Kastor.”

  The sky becomes black and the waves begin to get very rough.

  “You have chosen the way of Kastor, which is the way of death.”

  “Wait! What if I had chosen Poly … whatever?”

  “But you didn’t, so you’ll never know.”

  The two of them leap in what looks like lightning-style strokes up the mast of the ship and fade into the sky. I am alone on the ship and in very stormy seas. Suddenly, I see something ahead of me. There is a big wall in the middle of the sea. A middle-aged man with a beard is on a scaffolding with bricks, building the wall. The ship comes close to him, and though the seas are still very rough, he seems to be able to hear me fine through the wind and waves.

  “Who are you?”

  “I’m Hadrian, and this is my wall.”

  “Why are you building a wall?”

  “Why aren’t you building a bridge?”

  I suddenly realize that I’m no longer on the ship, but instead am on a dock-like structure that runs beneath the wall along the surface of the water. Though the seas are still storm-tossed, they don’t seem to be splashing up much on the dock.

  “You didn’t answer my question,” Hadrian says, pointing to a large pile of wood adjacent to me.

&nbs
p; “I don’t know anything about bridge-building; I’m an astrophysicist, not a carpenter!”

  “That never mattered to me. I was a musician, and a philosopher, and a poet, and an astrologer, and a soldier, and a politician, and an architect, and an Emperor.”

  “So, are you Hadrian the wall-builder, or Hadrian the emperor?”

  “I am both. Why are you here to kill my lover?”

  “I don’t know what you mean.”

  Just then, I hear the sound of sirens. A man who looks much like Hadrian approaches in a ship, tied to its mast, and around him are bird-like, fish-like, snake-like creatures with the heads and breasts of women, whose mouths open and the sound of police and fire sirens shrieks out. Hadrian throws bricks at the strange creatures, and then the man tied to the mast loosens his ropes and hands me a bow and arrow.

  “Use it to kill the lead suitor, mortal.”

  “He is not the suitor of Penelope, he is the son of Hermogenes and Mantinoë, the Osiris-Antinous the Justified, the New God Hermes, the New Iakkhos, the New Pythios, the Panantinous who leads ships at sea to safety!”

  Hadrian and the man from the boat come chest to chest, and start to wrestle with each other. They are about the same size, the same weight, and I’d estimate the same age, so I have no idea who will win. Just then, I notice someone else behind me: a young man with a bowl-shaped helmet with wings on it, also naked. He’s holding flowers, which he hands to me.

  “Happy Anniversary!”

  “What anniversary is this?”

  “The day that Set killed Apophis, of course!”

  The naked man with the winged helmet points to the other side of the dock, and I see a red knife, fork, spoon, and plate on a large rock. They seem to be speaking.

  “Yes, it was easy to kill him, for I do it every day.”

  “And you do it very well indeed!” says the winged-helmed guy.

  Now it looks like a red croquet set. “But this one is not fit for this duty, and he will surely fail, unless either Hadrian or Odysseus convinces him that theirs is the way forward.”

  “It’s a difficult decision, to be sure,” replies the winged-helmet guy.

  Now it looks like a red chess set. “You, Hermes, are the judge of the palaestra ground—can you determine who will win this bout of the pankration?”

  “It’s true,” the naked winged-helmet guy, who is apparently “Hermes,” replies again.

  “Will you be needing my help any longer?” the thing by the rock asks again, but now it is an old television.

  “I do not believe so,” Hermes replies.

  “Then you’re set!” the thing by the rock says before it flies away in the form of a red swing set. I think I see it fade into the sun, which for a second looks more like a sea-going ship with a hawk-headed person on its deck.

  As I turn back to this Hermes character, there is someone else present. He’s young, and he looks an awful lot like Hermes, and somewhat like Kastor and Poly-whatever as well. He’s first wearing a kind of toga, but then he takes it off, and I recognize him as the guy who was pictured so often on the wall in McCool’s bunk. He comes and puts his arm around Hermes, and they watch Hadrian and the other man, who is apparently Odysseus, wrestling with all their might but not making any headway for either of them. The young naked man notices me and jerks his head in such a way that I feel he’s asking me to come over to him. As I get a better look at him, he’s unbelievably attractive. I’ve never been much of a man’s man up to this point in my life, but if there were ever a male that I’d want to have sex with, I think this would be him.

  “You must choose, Bill,” the attractive young man says to me.

  “I don’t understand what I’m choosing.”

  “You hold the bow. You must choose whether it is used against Antinous, the lover of Hadrian, or Antinous, the suitor of Penelope.”

  “Who are you?”

  “I am Antinous, the lover of Hadrian.”

  “But you didn’t do anything! And you’re so beautiful! Why would I choose you?”

  “You must choose.”

  “Who is Antinous the suitor of Penelope?”

  “That man.”

  Antinous the lover of Hadrian points to someone else who is watching the wrestling match. He’s older, with a bit of a paunch, slightly bent in his posture. He’s balding in the front, and what remains of his hair is long, black, and greasy. I can almost smell how bad his breath must be from here. He’s horrible. And this is what Odysseus had to fight off from his wife?

  “That’s an easy choice, then: I choose to fire it against him.”

  “Why?”

  “Look at him! He’s as ugly as sin and is an adulterer to boot! Why would anyone keep him around when the other choice is to kill you?”

  “Think carefully about what you’ve chosen, Bill. Are you certain?”

  The two naked egg-head twins show up again. “He has chosen the way of Kastor, Antinous.”

  “What do you mean? Now or before?”

  “It is a difficult road, what he has chosen,” Hermes says.

  “Did I make the right choice?”

  “Did you?” one of the egg-head twins asks me. I don’t know which one it is, though.

  “What if I chose the other one?”

  “Which other one?” Hermes asks.

  “What if I didn’t choose the way of Kastor? What if I chose the way of Poly-dooky-whatever-his-name-is?”

  “Do you choose the way of Polydeukes?”

  “Yes! Yes! I’ve changed my mind! The way of Poly-dooky-whatever!”

  The one of the egg-head twins that I think might be Poly — well, the one I chose instead of Kastor — comes up to me and places his egg-shaped helmet on my head.

  “Whatever!” he says before he and his brother leap like lightning up into the sky again.

  “Look who is the egg-head now!” Hermes says with glee.

  “Then you know what this means,” Antinous the lover of Hadrian says.

  “No, what does it mean?”

  “It means you have chosen the way of Polydeukes, the way of immortality rather than mortality.”

  “And … that’s … good, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, it is very good indeed.”

  “But good for who?”

  “It is good for you, and good for your mission, and good for the earth that I know and love so much. It is also good for Fergus McCool.”

  Fergus McCool walks up, also naked, and he seems to have his husband with him.

  “It’s the right choice, Carney. You’ve done well!”

  “So, now do I get to shoot that ugly and awful Antinous on the other side?”

  “No, you get to shoot me.”

  “WHAT?!? Wait, I don’t understand!”

  “You have chosen the way of Polydeukes, the way of immortality. Antinous the suitor of Penelope is mortal; Antinous the lover of Hadrian is a god.”

  “But why would I want to kill him! He’s not done anything wrong!”

  “Sometimes, that’s just the way things go, Bill,” Hermes says.

  Just then, Hadrian flips Odysseus over onto his back, punches him very hard in the stomach and then the groin, and stands with his foot on the prone man’s chest.

  “Hadrian wins!” Hermes announces.

  “And that means that Antinous the suitor of Penelope dies!” Hadrian exclaims.

  “No, it means Antinous your lover is shot by the arrow,” Hermes explains.

  “NO! I will not have it! Shoot me instead! He has died on my behalf before, now it is my turn to repay the favor!”

  Hadrian stands, arms outstretched, before me as if he should be my target.

  “I will not shoot you, nor will I shoot the beautiful Antinous!”

  “Then I shall prevail!” the suitor of Penelope announces, bringing Odysseus to his feet and absconding with him.

  “You have made your choice, Bill, now carry it out!” Hermes says. The rock at the other end of the dock goes flying into space
, past the moon — it is now night and the shadows are closing in under the full moon’s brightness.

  “I am just not ready to do this!” I scream.

  “You may not be ready, but are you Set?” Hermes asks.

  And now, I am no longer in my body, but I am watching it from the outside. A voice which is mine but is not mine speaks through my mouth, in a strange distorted stereo effect. I also notice that though my body looks the same as it did, it is now entirely red.

  “I am Set,

  the slayer of Apophis,

  the one who dismembered drowned Osiris,

  the one who does what must be done!”

  The red version of myself draws the bow with an arrow — that looks strangely like one of the missiles on the anti-asteroid ship — and instead of firing it at Antinous, who stands serene and beautiful on the dock, nor at Hadrian who still has his arms outstretched as a willing surrogate target, but rather at the wall Hadrian was building. The arrow-missile flies through the air, and when it crashes into the wall, there is a huge explosion, and when the dust clears, what looks like a man with a beard but gigantic breasts of colossal size is behind the wall, with a flood of water going before him that rushes towards all of us. But of everyone on the dock, the only one who is in the path of the inundation is Antinous the lover of Hadrian, who is washed away into the sea.

  The red version of myself starts singing:

  “Can’t go on, can’t go back,

  the lights are out, the night is black,

  and since I’m here, and here with you,

  we may as well just fade to blue…”

  I’m standing on the deck of the anti-asteroid ship Odysseus, with the red version of myself nearby, naked, holding the bow. I am in my dress uniform, which I have not worn since graduation from the academy fifteen years ago. I ask the red version of myself “What have you done?”

  “More than anyone else has: what I could,” he replies. He disappears.

  I am now looking out the port window of our ship at the moon. It’s a scene I’ve witnessed from orbital ships on many occasions, but it has never looked like this. The moon is much larger than it has ever been in those previous occasions, and the space around it pulses in a deep navy blue color, full of starlight and what I can only describe as sentience, intelligence, like a constellation of millions of eyes watches me from the unfathomable darkness within its endless expanse. And in the moon itself, it is not the familiar features of the surface of it that I have seen so many times, but the face of Antinous, the beautiful lover of the Roman Emperor Hadrian, looking to the side. He speaks.