The Stories: Five Years of Original Fiction on Tor.com

by Various

  Kimball blinked. Ah. “Thayet, I’m not a hallucination.”

  “Yes you are. Kim is hundreds of miles from here.”

  He laughed. For some reason that made her open her eyes again. “If you can convince me you won’t drop it, I have water.”

  She shook herself, then slapped her cheek. She looked back across the arroyo to where her father and the crowd watched. Kimball hadn’t been looking at them. They were all standing, many of them with their hands raised as if they could reach out and snatch both of them to safety. Graham, the teamster boss, even had one hand raised to his mouth.

  “Kim?” She looked back at him.

  “Yes, Thayet.” Kimball shifted another shovelful of bugs and sand, made another pace forward. He stopped again, to let the bugs settle. “Here, catch.”

  He took the hat and threw it like a Frisbee. She clutched it weakly to her, eyes widening.

  “Does that feel like a hallucination?”

  She rubbed it between her fingers. “No.”

  “Put it on, silly.”

  She did, and sighed audibly when the rim shaded the sun from her face.

  “Ready for the water?”

  “Give me a moment. I’m numb from the waist down.”

  “Well, you better do something about that.” Kimball’s legs had gone to sleep before during meditation but he was afraid her experience was really more like the time he’d been locked in the stocks by the People of the Book.

  She had to use her arms to uncross her legs. She pushed them out, extended and leaned back.

  Kimball took another shovelful, another step.

  Thayet screamed as the sensation began returning to her legs. There was a sympathetic shout from the crowd across the arroyo. They probably thought a bug was boring through her, but Kimball saw Hahn talking, his hands raised, explaining about the legs.

  Thayet gritted her teeth together, then, methodically began massaging her legs. “Aaaagghhh.” After a few moments she said, “Water?”

  “Sip first, right? You drink too much you’ll throw it right up.” He swung the bag by its handle, underhand, and she caught it neatly.

  She was careful, rinsing her mouth before swallowing. She managed a half of a liter in small gulps before he got the rest of the way to her boulder.

  “Scoot over,” he said, sitting beside her. “Whew, I’m bushed.” It wasn’t the effort, but the tension.

  They sat there for another half-hour. Thayet tried some dried apple and a few walnuts and another half-liter of water and Kimball bandaged the bug score on her right thigh. Finally, he helped her stand and encouraged her to take a few steps side to side atop the rock.

  They went back the way he’d come, one shovelful at a time, with her hands on his waist and stepping into his vacated footsteps before the bugs filled them. The bugs crawled around their ankles and once one took a shortcut through the leather of Kimball’s moccasin and the skin of his ankle, leaving a bloody dribble across the sand.

  He cursed a blue streak but he kept his steps and the shovel steady.

  When they made it back to the edge of the bugs, where the cut dropped into the sand of the arroyo, they staggered up the road several yards. As they collapsed there was a ragged cheer from across the arroyo.

  Thayet bandaged his ankle, then drank more water. “You want some?”

  “No girl. That’s your water. Until you’re peeing frequently, copiously, and clearly.”

  “You’re gross.”

  “Yes, little dove.”

  * * *

  They found Joffrey’s errant horse, Stupid, near the road, its lead reins tangled in a patch of prickly pear, and Thayet refused to move another step until Kimball had gotten its halter and harness off. Its mouth was a mess after two days of chewing around the composite bit. Kimball settled both the horse and Thayet a good quarter mile up the road in the shade of a rock outcropping.

  Back at the lip of the arroyo, across from the teamster boss, he shouted, “You ready?”

  “Yeah,” the teamster yelled back. “We got them back over the hill. Your mule didn’t want to go. Josh was reaching for its bridle and she came that close to biting off his arm. You could hear the teeth come together clear down the hill. But Hahn, here, he bribed her with a bucket of oats and she followed him down.”

  “She’s a lot of trouble. Okay, give me five minutes.”

  What he had in mind wouldn’t take as long as the painstaking slog across the arroyo to get Thayet, but it was probably as dangerous.

  While one might be able to take the carts and saddle horses cross-country downstream to where the walls of the arroyo were less steep, the freight wagons would have to detour thirty miles to a crossing they could handle.

  Unless they could clear the crossing of bugs.

  The spot he chose was a half-mile downstream, where the walls of the arroyo had been undercut by the recent flooding, but a three-foot stratum of limestone kept the rim solid. There was more limestone below, with shallow pockets that had caught some of the iron-bearing sands. While the bugs were nowhere near as thick as at the crossing, there were some grazing for ferrous bits.

  He found the first thing he needed about fifty yards back, a depressed hollow between two rocks, perhaps two feet deep, two feet wide. He used the shovel and made it deeper, but he kept his eyes open as he dug, The last thing he wanted to do was uncover an old metal fence post.

  The second thing he needed he found closer to the arroyo, a big chunk of limestone about the size of a large watermelon. It was sunk in the dirt but he cleared an edge and levered it out with the shovel. It was flat-topped and flat-bottomed so it didn’t roll worth beans. He might have carried it a few yards but instead he just flopped it over and over, thud, thud, thud, all the way to the rim. Then he shifted it sideways a bit and tested his choice by dropping a very small pebble over the edge. Nope. Another pebble, a foot to the right, was dead on target so he shifted the boulder, took a deep breath, and shoved.

  He was running before it hit, but he still heard multiple ‘pops.’ One would’ve been sufficient. He could hear the bugs in the air, a harsh cicada buzzing with ultrasonic overtones. It was mostly from upstream but he still had to dodge a few that arose from the brush in front of him. He dropped into the hole and several buzzed overhead, more than he’d expected.

  Maybe there was some old barbwire in the neighborhood.

  After five minutes his heart had stopped pounding and his breathing slowed and he was back to boredom. He stuck to the plan, though. Bugs could keep coming for a while and it was better to be cautious.

  He’d intended to meditate but he fell asleep instead.

  The teamster boss’s voice woke him, yelling at the top of his lungs, yelling his name from about ten feet away, worry and fear in his voice.

  Kimball shuddered awake, his heart pounding, the sick sound of a bullwhip crack fading back into the dreamscape.

  What on earth has happened now?

  Kimball stood up and his head cleared the rocks. The teamster wasn’t looking his way and when Kimball spoke the teamster boss like to fell over.

  “Jesus, Mary, and Joseph! We thought you were dead!”

  Oops. “How long have I been asleep?”

  The man opened his mouth, shut it, opened it again, then just shook his head and marched back toward the crossing. “He’s all right!” he yelled back toward the road.

  They were all out there—the Joffreys, the teamsters, and the others—spread out across the desert, looking for Kimball. He picked up Joffrey’s shovel and waved it overhead. Kimball started back toward the edge of arroyo, to take a look at the impact site, but the bugs were thick on the ground before he reached the rim, their wings extended and held flat to the sun, so he veered away. He could only imagine what they were like in the arroyo below.

  Back at the crossing they’d already brought the stock and vehicles across and when Kimball glanced down the cut into the wash it was just sand, now, clear of bugs.

  Mrs. Pe
decaris snorted and walked to meet him. Mrs. Joffrey, with a large smile on her face, handed him a cold apple empanada. When Kimball thanked her for it, she lunged at him, and it was all he could do not to throw her in the dirt before he realized she just wanted to hug him. When she let go her eyes were wet. When Kimball gave Joffrey his shovel back, the man nodded gravely and said, “I’ll keep this handy. I see it still has plenty of use in it.”

  Thayet was lying in the shade under their handcart, a jug of water to hand. Kimball approved. “You pee yet?”

  She shook her head.

  “Drink more water.”

  Copyright © 2009 Steven Gould

  Books by Steven Gould

  THE JUMPER SERIES

  Jumper

  Reflex

  Jumper: Griffin’s Story

  Wildside

  Greenwar

  Helm

  Blind Waves

  7th Sigma

  The author and publisher have provided this e-book to you without Digital Rights Management software (DRM) applied so that you can enjoy reading it on your personal devices. This e-book is for your personal use only. You may not print or post this e-book, or make this e-book publicly available in any way. You may not copy, reproduce or upload this e-book, other than to read it on one of your personal devices.

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  When we contacted our steampunk compatriots and regular Tor.com bloggers to ask them if they wanted to contribute to October 2010’s Steampunk Fortnight, we got a lot of good ideas, but none quite as unexpected as one from the inimitable Eileen Gunn:

  I may be coloring a little bit outside the lines, but that’s what lines are for. I promised to write four pieces of flash fiction, tuckerizing four people who donated to Clarion West’s Write-a-thon this summer. I think it would be fun to write four short-shorts, each in the style of a different formative steampunk tale.

  Aha!, we thought. That idea is just crazy enough to work…and work it did, spectacularly. Consequently, on the last four weekdays of Steampunk Fortnight, we presented one of Ms. Gunn’s stories every morning, each one featuring a real benefactor of that glorious institution, Clarion West.

  - Liz Gorinsky

  (with apologies to Messrs. Gibson and Sterling)

  Nth Iteration: The Compass Rose Tattoo

  A phenakistoscope of Ada Lovelace and Carmen Machado, with Machado’s companion dog, the brown-and-white pit bull Oliver. They are apparently at a racetrack, although the tableau was no doubt staged at the maker’s studio. The two women, clearly on friendly terms, are attired in pale silk gowns and overdresses, billowing out over crinolines but still elegantly simple in effect. They are shown seated at first, on an ornate cast-iron bench in front of a painted scrim, watching the start of an invisible race. They move their gaze to follow the speeding steam gurneys. They stand, caught up in excitement. Carmen puts her hand on Ada’s arm, and removes it quickly. Then she surreptitiously dips her hand in Ada’s reticule bag, withdraws an Engine card, slips it into a hidden pocket in her own dress, and resumes watching the race. The two women jump about triumphantly, laughing and clapping their hands in an artificial manner. The race has been run and an imaginary purse no doubt won by at least one of them. At the end, Machado turns to hug Lovelace briefly. Her dress dips elegantly low at the back of her neck, and we get a brief glimpse of the famous tattoo between her shoulder blades: a large, elaborate compass rose. Then the two women sit down as they were at the beginning, a slight smile on Machado’s face.

  Carmen Machado, alone but for faithful Oliver, gazed into the slot of the phenakistoscope and turned the handle. The two women watched invisible gurneys, stood up, leaped around, and sat down again, over and over.

  She tapped a few more paragraphs into the document she was working on, weaving the scene on the disk into the text of the novel she was writing. When she was done, she pulled the Compile lever, sat back, and addressed the dog. “All done, Oliver. I think this is as good as it’s going to get. Thank heaven for the phenakistoscope. The dead past revived through the wonders of light and shadow, as the adverts say.” And so fortunate for herself, she thought, that she and Ada had spent so much time playacting. She need only view a few silly phenakistoscope disks, and she had the plot for the next installment of her fanciful thriller.

  When the Compile was done, she gathered up the huge stack of Engine cards, careful to keep them in order. She wrapped them securely in brown paper and tied the package with string. Then she reached for her shawl and Oliver’s leash. Oliver was getting old, but he wriggled a bit in anticipation of a walk. They went outside, and she closed the cottage door behind her, pushing a few vines aside. Must get those cut back, she thought—dreadful cliché, a vine-covered cottage.

  At the village postal office, the old clerk, Mr. Thackeray, took the package from her as she entered.

  “Ah, Miss Machado,” said the clerk. “Another installment of your wonderful entertainment about the Queen of Engines! I will send it right off: the wires are free.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Thackeray,” said the writer, watching as he fed the punched cards into the hopper. “I’m so glad you are enjoying the fruits of my misspent youth.”

  “My pleasure, Miss Machado,” said the clacker clerk. “I might have been a writer, you know, but for the attractions of technology and my responsibilities as the head of a household. An artist’s life, writing. A restful life of the mind.”

  “La, Mr. Thackeray!” said the writer. “Nowadays it’s scribble, scribble, scribble, and the more scandal and naughtiness the better. I doubt you would find it either artistic or restful.”

  “That may well be the case, Miss Machado, for a novelist like yourself,” said Thackeray. “A fine novelist,” he added quickly. He hesitated. “But I—in my youth—I had aspirations to be a kinetoscope writer. Greek tragedy, retold for the small screen.” The wire transmission was finished. He rewrapped the cards and tied them up tight.

  Carmen Machado nodded. “Quite right, Mr. Thackeray. Quite right. A far more elevated profession,” she said, taking the package from the clerk. “But the money is in the novel, sir. The money is in the novel.”

  Author’s note: Carmen Machado is a writer. She told me this about herself: “I have a large tattoo of a compass rose between my shoulder blades. I have a spotted pit bull named Oliver who kind of looks like a cow. I live in a tiny cottage covered in vines.”

  Copyright © 2010 by Elieen Gunn

  (with apologies to Howard Waldrop)

  Sheriff Lindley opened his mouth to accept a fig from the beautiful woman in a diaphanous gown who was kneeling on the floor next to his couch. She looked like the woman on those cigarette paper ads, but more alert. She was holding the fruit just out of his reach, and he lifted his head a bit from the pillow. She smiled and pulled it teasingly further away.

  Suddenly, there came a heavy pounding—thump, thump, thump—not very far from his head. The lovely courtesan ignored it, and dangled the fig from its stem, smiling flirtatiously. The sheriff leaned his head toward the fruit, but it evaded him.

  The pounding grew louder. The woman gave him a provocative look, and said, “Sheriff! Sheriff! Wake up!”

  She didn’t sound like a woman at all. He woke up.

  “Gol Dang!” said Sheriff Lindley. “Leo, that you?”

  “Yessir, Sheriff Lindley.”

  “Didn’t I tell you I need my sleep?” Too late for that. The sheriff pulled himself out of bed, dragged on his suit pants and shrugged into his vest. He opened the bedroom door. “This better be good. Sweets and Luke take care of the rest of them cooters, like I told them?”

  “I don’t think so, Sheriff.” Leo looked like the dog’s breakfast. He probably had less sleep even than me, thought the sheriff. Excitable fellow. “There’s someone here.”

  “Those folks from
that observatory out the Arizona Territory? No need to disturb my well-earned repose. Let them crawl around, if they wish.”

  “It’s not Professor Lowell. It’s someone else. He told them to stop blowing things up, and they stopped. I thought you ought to know.”

  Sheriff Lindley woke up again, for real. “They stopped?” He grabbed his suit coat and badge and strapped on his Colt Navy. “Bring the shotgun,” he said to Leo as he ran out the door.

  Out by the Atkinson place, on a borrowed horse, Sheriff Lindley looked down at a well haberdasheried man carrying a small, square leather case, accompanied by a fluffy white dog with an unusually alert demeanor.

  The sheriff flashed his badge. “Sheriff Lindley,” he said. “Mind telling me who you are and what you’re doing here, sir?”

  The fellow reached into his vest pocket and took out a pasteboard card. He carefully handed it to the sheriff. “Ellis McKenzie Creel of Hemingway, South Carolina, painter and creator of miniature dioramas, at your service, sir!” he said with a flourish.

  “Hemingway must be a very fine town, Mr. Creel,” said the sheriff, “if its painters dress so well.” He was a man who admired a well-cut suit, not that he saw many of them in Pachuco County. “And can you tell me what you’re doing giving orders to my men?”

  “I had no idea they were your men, sir,” said Creel. “I took them for vandals or thieves despoiling this historic site, which I am here to preserve for the United States Government.” He pulled out a glove-leather wallet and waved an official-looking piece of paper. The sheriff did not doubt for a moment that it was fake.

  “You can go back to your United States Government and tell them that I have everything under control.” He unholstered his Colt, but did not point it directly at the visitor.