by Denny Taylor
“The jeweler called from downstairs, ‘Do you have it?’
“‘No,’ I shouted, ‘Had to pee. Won’t be a minute.’
“X-it flushed the toilet.
“I took the key and unlocked the safe,” Word said, speaking rapidly as if being chased. “Inside was a smaller safe with a rotary combination lock. Of course I knew the numbers by heart. I pulled open the door and took out my backpack, adjusted the straps, and put it on. I ran into the bathroom and climbed up on the toilet seat. X-it gave me a boost and after a nerve-wracking moment when I got stuck because of the backpack I was through the window and slithering down the rope. We were only one floor up so it wasn’t much of a drop. X-it was right behind me. We heard gunshots as we negotiated our way past the trash cans from the surrounding buildings. Once out of sight and the line of fire X-it stuffed his sweatshirt into one of the cans. I took off the backpack, stuffed it in a black canvas bag, and then covered it with the red t-shirt I’d been wearing with a black one underneath. Then we walked out into the crowds of people crossing roads in so many directions – including to and from the subway which is located on two islands one each side of 72nd street where Broadway and Amsterdam meet.
“The gunfire sent people running in all directions and so the usual chaos had become total mayhem,” Word said. “It was almost a repeat performance of the Grand Concourse. We walked slowly. X-it asked me if I’d like a hot dog and we crossed 72nd street and went into Gray’s Papaya.
“While we were standing getting our hot dogs I said I had to go home to study for a test and we talked about school that day – making it up in case people working there were questioned. ‘Two kids were in here but they were on their way home from school – the girl was talking about the test she’d gotta take tomorrow. Seemed worried about it. Didn’t look very smart.’
“We could hear police and ambulance sirens and we got our hot dogs and left. We stopped and looked across the street with everyone else before slipping away unnoticed. Within minutes the entire area was cordoned off but by then we were on our way to Riverside Park and the path along the Hudson River.
“We realized later that the jeweler had called up to us with a gun pointed at his head,” Word said. “One of the Sick-Reapers had killed him when they ran upstairs and found out we’d escaped through the bathroom window. They were never caught –” Word shrugged, then without looking up she said bitterly, “but they caught me the night I jumped into the Hudson River.”
Twenty-Five
“Not much time left,” Et said. “How d’you want to proceed?”
“There’s no time to tell you all that’s happened to us,” Word said. “We lived small. Practiced being invisible. We always seemed to have a roof over our heads. We stayed in one basement apartment in a brownstone for almost a year while the owner was in Paris. But we were always ready to run, hide, and fight if necessary. Bits of the story are important, some not, but X-it needs to be here –”
“Agreed,” Et said. “But when X-it returns he might not be –” she hesitated “– the same, and we cannot risk –” again she hesitated “– our time together in this split second will run out soon.”
“Understood,” Word said.
“Wait,” Cat said.
“Enough!” Et said. “No more questions.”
“But she hasn’t told us what happened to all those pieces of parchment –” Cat said, not at all phased by Et’s sharp tone “– the bits of the old books Word picked up after the library at the compound was blown up.”
“I thought you’d have figured that out by now,” Et said.
“They’re tattooed on my body,” Word said pushing Cat off her lap and standing up. She lifted the front of her t-shirt and then turned around and lifted the back. “Each tattoo is an exact replica of all those pieces of parchment and vellum that I saved. I still have the originals but they’re very fragile and some are disintegrating. It’s very sad but as long as I’m alive the texts will survive. I’m vellum.”
It was a heavy moment. They all felt it. Word pulled her t-shirt down and sat back on the chair. Unable to cope with the tension Cat jumped up on Word’s lap and used her nose to get her head under Word’s t-shirt.
“They’re not all ancient texts,” Cat said with her nose almost in Word’s navel, sticking out her rough tongue and giving her a quick lick.
“That tickles!” Word said, laughing, “Don’t do that!” She extricated Cat and pulled her t-shirt down. “I’ve added quotes from other ancient texts, Lucretius of course – I used Montaigne’s edition of Lucretius – but also quotes from Marlow and Shakespeare, and Montaigne himself, and more recently Italo Calvino. They’re on my body because they are part of my ancestry as a Truth Keeper. There are also lines from writers who are deep in my heart – Langston Hughes, and James Baldwin. Similarly, there are not many women in the ancient texts, so I’ve added some lines from Jane Austen, Emily Dickenson, Toni Morrison, others too, Maya Angelou, Isabel Allende.”
“Why?” Cat asked. “I understand why you would have your body tattooed with the ancient texts that fell from the sky but why all the others? Just pick up a book and read.”
“By the time I was eighteen there were no books,” Word said. “From eleven till sixteen I could always find books to read, and once read they remained in my head.
“In the city I could go to libraries, universities, book stores, and scavenge for them the way we scavenged for food,” Word said. “There were always books in the trash – often bags of book were left out for recycle. Also, there were really great second hand books sold on tables on the sidewalk on Broadway near the 72nd subway.
“Friends gave you books – you gave books to friends – more friends gave you more books,” she said. “That’s how it was. We had a huge underground book exchange and books were always available.
“In 2016 that all changed. Books started disappearing and friends became reluctant to share them. There were book disposal centers where people could get 5 cents a book the way people used to get 5 cents for collecting plastic bottles and soda cans.
“X-it and I started hoarding books. We had an immense library that we kept in an old subway maintenance depot under Riverside Park just north of the 79th street entrance to the West Side Highway. There were great iron gates but X-it found a way in and we stored our books there in boxes covered with tarps.
“By 2017 the Ginger Tom, the Freaky Geek, and the Posh Boy were blatantly confiscating books. People were fearful and so were the political masters around the world. They knew what was going on but nobody was talking about it,” Word said. “Reading books became a crime against our political masters. It was regarded as seditious –”
Word stopped. She looked into the Fire that glowed as if sending warm thoughts to let her know that the embers cared for her.
“The closer we get to leaving the more I want to stay,” Word said.
The Four Corners sighed circling the room.
“Me too,” Et said.
“This split second is the longest time X-it and I have been apart since we were eight,” Word said, she paused, and picked up where she’d left off.
“Cat-astrophe,” Cat mewed, shakily. “I love Word and I love you, Et. I cannot imagine being without you.” She jumped off Word’s lap and coughed up a fur ball. “What if X-it is hacked and I don’t stop it?” Death was dissolving, no longer Cat, no longer Bat, Kiss for a moment, then Lady Gaga, followed by Bowie for several seconds before reappearing as a mangiest of mangy cats.
“It’s not good,” Cat said, her sores weeping. “When we leave the split second everything will take place in less time than it just took me to go from Cat to Bat and back again.” She coughed up another fur ball. “Et,” she said. “Forty five million centuries and all we’ll have left is a split second? If just one of us makes a mistake – me for instance or X-it – it will be like a giant asteroid hitting the planet. We’ll all be annihilated.”
“Instantaneously,” Et said, factual
ly. “But it’ll be so quick you won’t know anything about it.”
“Oh that makes me feel a whole lot better!” Cat hissed, the mew gone. “I’m going to stay in my feline form even though I’ve almost no fur left.” She jumped up on Et’s lap.
“I might get a whole lot bigger,” Cat said, turning and looking up at Et. Black panther? Saber-tooth tiger? Whadyathink?
Et stroked Cat and her fur came back.
“I’ll be with you,” Et said, still stroking Cat. “This is the first time in forty five million centuries that I’ve been stuck in a split second, so it’s new for me too.”
Et gave Cat a quizzical look.
“Better move on quickly to 2022 then X-it will come back,” Cat said, avoiding Et’s gaze.
“In 2018 there were book purges,” Word said, missing the significance of the quizzical look. “Organized militias, mutants with the Ginger Tom’s insignia, in full riot gear with balaclavas and face shields, went street-by-street, building-by-building, and apartment-by-apartment, confiscating books and hauling them off to landfills. If anyone protested they were taken away. Rumor had it some people were shot.
“‘The wrecking madness in the mind of man’,” Word said, “that’s what H.G. Wells called it.”
“I’m going to remember that,” Cat said.
“Great libraries of precious books were burned,” Word said, speaking quickly. “There were big bonfires in Central Park of the rare and irreplaceable books from the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It took almost a week to burn all the books in the New York Public Library at 42nd Street and Bryant Park. It took another week to burn the immense holdings of the Morgan Library, which ranged from Egyptian art to Renaissance paintings, illuminated, literary, and historical manuscripts, early printed books, and old master drawings and prints.”
“The Morgan also contained some of the earliest evidence of writing on the planet,” Et said. “Ancient seals, tablets, and papyrus fragments from Egypt and the Near East.”
“Like the ones tattooed on your body?” Cat asked.
“Yes,” Word said. “Some of the earliest evidence of writing still in existence was in the Morgan Library, but I think the very earliest evidence of a sign in the Universe is in the package my mother gave to me.”
“Is it safe?” Cat asked.
“Yes,” Word said. “It’s safe.”
“Where?” Cat asked. “What if someone has found it? And, if we only have a moment, how are we going to get it back?”
“Shhh!” Et said.
“People were hauled off if they kept books after the purge,” Word continued, not admitting she was also wondering how she was going to get the package when they left the split second. “The purge was not just the books it was really the stories books contained – the knowledge inside them. It was our collective memory, the fabulous human mind that was being exterminated – who we were, who we are, who we will be, everything we believe in. The dark side of men’s imagination was expunging it all.
“The Ginger Tom wanted people to be burned with their books because he’s a monster, while the Freaky Geek was a Truth Slayer. He wanted books eliminated because he’s obsessed with transcending biology by using neuro-technology to merge humans with the advanced computers he’s building.
“But then the unexpected happened,” Word said. “Young people stopped being spectators. Betrayed by their elders, who did nothing to stop the political masters and the Ginger Tom and the Freaky Geek, they began to organize, hold meetings, plan protests, and fight back. They used social media to spread the word – psychic contagion – literally at the speed of light.
“It was an extraordinary moment. Within twenty four hours young people covered nearly every building in New York City with graffiti – identical copies of the pages of book – words and illustrations.
“It was a well-organized effort,” Word said her eyes sparkling. “The entire works of Shakespeare were written on the apartment buildings along West End Avenue. There were almost two million young people in the five boroughs and I would say over a million of them participated in making New York City a giant pop-up book.”
“Where’d they get the books?” Cat asked.
“X-it and I gave them the books we’d been hoarding,” Word said. “The location made it possible. Just above 79th Street there are so many routes – paths, roads, and river walks – to, in, and through Riverside Park. It made it easy for young people to come and get books.
“Many of them knew us you see. Since the time we arrived on the Upper West Side we’d been supporting book clubs, reading novels, participating in poetry slams. We met with many young people who shared their own writing. It was the way they rebelled.
“The reaction of the Ginger Tom and the Freaky Geek was swift and deadly. They shut down all the substations and Manhattan was paralyzed without electricity. Supermarket shelves were empty within days. Supply chains were disrupted. But the biggest problem and what transformed the lives of young people – all the people in New York City – was the very deliberate shutting down of the Internet and social media – that’s a whole other story that would take many split seconds to tell you. The city had become a bleak and dangerous place for young people, for everyone, especially kids.
“What’s important here is that young people knew what it was like to have books taken away, because their books had been taken away in schools,” Word said. “When there were schools for them to go to they did test prep hooked up to galvanic devices that monitored their emotions as they sat at the Freaky Geek’s computers being programmed all day,” Word said. “That’s another whole other story there isn’t time to tell – and yet it’s such an important part of what happened to us.
“We could sit here for hours while I tell you about the young people who we met on the Upper West Side who had come from all over the city,” Word said. “The word got out – excuse the pun – that a new civilization with books at the center was being created by young people who were rejecting the brutality of the political masters, the Ginger Tom and the Freaky Geek. The confiscation and elimination of books was years in the making and young people knew that life was being forced out of them. It was as if we were using books to conjure a new world into being that was magical and, and kind and filled with love,” Word said. She looked at Et.
“You’d better tell us what happened next when X-it’s back,” Et said, “so he can fill in the gaps.”
“Wait!” Cat said, doing her jump-off act, landing on the floor from Et’s lap.
“No!” Et said, evaporating slightly. Then reappearing and turning puce knowing what question Cat was going to ask. “This is not the time.”
“Does he know?” Cat asked, ignoring Et.
“Know what?” Word responded.
“That you’re pregnant,” Cat said. “Is it his?”
Word slapped Cat. “Of course it’s his.”
“Now,” Cat said. “I’ll answer your question.”
“What question?”
“Do you think it’s possible for a memory to be created at the moment of conception?” Cat said. “The answer is yes.”
“How do you know?” Word asked, guessing the answer.
“I had a little mooch when I was under your shirt,” Cat said with the most lopsided of all Cheshire Cat grins.
“That’s a problem,” Et said, no longer angry at Cat.
“Why?” Cat asked. “I was very respectful.”
Word understood and Cat, instantly mangy, jumped off Word’s lap and went and curled up on the rug.
“Better we know now than when we leave the split second,” Et said. “I should have been paying more attention.”
“If Death can detect the consciousness of your baby without you knowing,” Et said, “then so can A-I hackers and Super Recognizers.”
“Sick-Reapers,” Cat said.
“What happens,” Word asked, “when we leave the split second?”
“Death will have to remain in her Cat persona so she can
mooch,” Et said. “We will be in constant communication.”
“Mooch?” Cat said, looking at Et, and her mange disappearing now Et was on it. “Be careful you’re being enculturated!”
“Indoctrinated!” Et said, in an attempt to joke.
“X-it doesn’t know,” Word said, but was drowned out by the mooch interchange between Cat and Et.
“X-it doesn’t know,” Word said again.
“You haven’t told him?” Cat asked.
“No,” Word said. “We thought A-I was hacking X-it’s consciousness before I was pregnant. Things happened and it was the only explanation. I knew I couldn’t talk with him about it because they would have known. The last months were harrowing. Totally. We were being hunted and I had to stop sharing everything with X-it and I couldn’t tell him why. Imagine how much worse it would’ve been if the Ginger Tom or the Freaky Geek knew I was not the last Truth Keeper.”
“We can’t tell him,” Cat said.
“If he knows there is a new living being in this potentially existential life ending scenario,” Et said, “he can help us take defensive action.” She hesitated, “But even if we fail, which we could – remember I can no longer see the future – X-it should know he’s going to be a father and that together you’ve made a child.”
“We have to tell him,” Et said, before she disappeared.
Twenty-Six
“What if the baby is hacked?” Cat asked, her voice sounding as if she was on a rotary phone with a bad connection. “Would the A-I hack a baby?”
“If Et was here she would tell you off for asking me that,” Word said. “If they detect the baby –”
“Okay, let’s not go there,” Cat said, her voice breaking up. “Let’s talk about death and dying. Whadyathink?”
“Let’s not,” Word said, annoyed with Cat. “You’re being incredibly irritating. Why are you talking like this?”
