by Ike Hamill
They’re just coming through when I get to the far end. I’m gaining some distance, at least. I certainly can’t outrun them, but I have the benefit of motivation. Regardless of how much they want to catch me, the kids are all too cool to exert themselves. My door begins to close behind me and I find myself at the back of an empty classroom. The desks are arranged on tiers, like an amphitheater. I wonder why the professor would want to stand below the students. They must feel like they’re at a disadvantage, looking up at all the seated pupils.
I rush across. The door on the other side is locked. There’s a door at the bottom of the classroom though, behind the professor’s desk.
I run for that.
Mercifully, it’s open.
There’s really nowhere to go in here. It’s part office and part supply-cabinet. Fortunately, the door has a lock on it. The door has one of those little windows that’s only a few inches wide and a couple of feet tall. I turn the lock on the handle and back up until I’m in the shadows.
I’m just standing there, with my dripping white bags of thawing blueberries. The first kids come through the classroom and I see a line of them filing in like ants. Their numbers have grown. They spread through the lecture hall as I back away from the door. Their eyes are sharper than mine. I have to account for that. I move around the little desk and crouch down, so just my eyes are above the edge. As soon as I’m hiding, I hear the doorknob rattle and see someone cup their eyes to the narrow glass to see inside.
I think I’ll be okay, as long as they don’t find a key, or shine a light through the window.
It’s like they can hear me. I see someone with a flashlight descending from the back of the classroom. In the darkness, I see that the desk doesn’t go all the way to the floor. Even if I crouch down, they’re going to spot my feet.
“Shit,” I whisper. I duck-walk back towards the wall.
“Pssst!”
The sound comes from behind me.
“Pssst!”
I locate the source. There’s a vent mounted on the wall, near the floor.
“Adam?”
The metal pops towards me and I see the dim outline of fingers moving it to the side.
“Come on,” he whispers.
He’s crazy. The opening is impossibly small. I’ll never fit in there. Suddenly, I have a much better view of it. Light streams through the little window and my head is casting a shadow on the wall right next to the vent. I turn and the light dazzles my eyes. I can hear hands working at the door, trying to bang it open. I don’t know how motivated those angry ants are, and I’m not eager to find out.
I push the bags of berries through the opening. At least I can get rid of the evidence. Then, just so I can say I tried, I stick my head through the hole in the wall. It opens up larger on the other side. I slip my shoulders through. Maybe my hips are comparable, but I’m pretty sure my shoulders are the widest part. I can’t see much in there, but it feels like there’s a decent amount of room.
“Put the grate back,” he whispers as I pull my legs through. I turn and reach to the side.
Back in the office, it sounds like the door is about to give way. I find the grate and maneuver it back into the hole.
“Watch your fingers,” he says. I pull back my hands. My eyes are focused on nothing but what’s happening in the office. I see their feet arrive as they somehow break through the door.
Something makes a loud “THUNK,” and the grate shakes a little. I back up as one of the students comes to the little vent and starts prying at it with his fingers. Adam must have done something to lock it into place, because the kid doesn’t have any luck getting it open. Still, I’m not going to stick around to see how long it takes them to break it.
I turn to ask Adam which way we’re headed. The duct is a box of metal, big enough to crawl through. It’s lit by a series of of tiny lights, down the center of the ceiling. I look back the other way. The dimensions are the same, but there are no lights. It’s almost like they’re guiding me along.
Adam’s not there.
I push my berries in front of me and get moving. I don’t know if I’m supposed to follow the lights or not, but I’m not going to head into the dark, that’s for sure. The duct turns. I see another vent that looks down from the back of a bigger lecture hall. I hope the duct can support my weight. It feels solid enough, but it’s still disconcerting to see how high up the duct is.
I glance back to see if I’m being pursued. I don’t see anything. The lights are extinguishing themselves as I crawl by. Perhaps they’re on a timer, or maybe Adam has some kind of motion control system. Whatever the mechanism, I’m glad for it. Even if the kids do gain access to the duct, they’ll be hard-pressed to follow me.
I crawl through twists and turns and look out through vents on a multitude of rooms. Most of the vents I see wouldn’t be big enough to fit through. I’m beginning to feel a little claustrophobic. It’s rude of Adam to have left me. When I stop and call for him, I get no answer.
Progress is slow, pushing the berries ahead of me. I’m starting to get desperate and I’m tempted to leave them behind.
The more I think about it, this duct makes no sense. Why would there be such a large duct in the walls? How much air-flow could they possible need to service these rooms, and why haven’t I come to a fan or something? It’s as if this duct is nothing more than a crawl-able highway between these rooms. Maybe Adam is responsible for it. Maybe this is how he spies on the students.
I take another turn.
I’m wondering if I’ll see my own TV room, through the iron grate. But that wouldn’t make sense. Adam always walks up to my grate.
The lights end up ahead. The shaft gets noticeably dimmer as I approach. The lights go out behind me, and soon I’m crawling beneath the last bit of illumination I have.
It goes dark.
Great.
I suppose I have to keep going forward. What other choice to I have? The last vent I saw was only the side of a shoebox lid, and it was a couple of turns back. The shaft is narrow enough that I’m not sure I could turn around.
I find the bags of blueberries in the dark and push them forward. They’re turning into mush as they thaw. I can’t imagine what I’ll be bringing back to the bear—ghetto blueberry jam?
The bags disappear. I hear them tumble away and then plop onto some lower level. Feeling ahead, the whole vent takes a downward turn. I can’t see a thing.
“Adam? Are you there? I need a little guidance here.”
I hear no response.
“Adam?”
I start to mutter to myself as I pull forward.
“This is fucking insane. I’m in the dark, God knows where, crawling through ductwork to escape a bunch of rowdy college students who only care about parfait.”
I try to get my leg forward, but it’s too tight. My hand finds the other side of the gap and I slide forward a little more. I’m not sure what I put my hand on, but it’s not solid. In an instant, I’m overbalanced. The world suddenly doesn’t make sense and I’m tipping over. All my limbs go rigid and out to the sides to try to grip anything, but none of the surfaces offer me enough friction. I’m falling.
I crash down on the metal floor, hitting it with my shoulder.
My wounds must have opened again, because I’m feeling cold guts on my shirt.
Cold?
It’s the blueberries. I find the remnants of one of the split bags.
I managed to roll onto my butt and I see a horizontal sliver of light ahead. I find the bags. One has dumped some of its contents on me, but the other two seem intact. I hold them and shuffle on my knees towards the light. As I get closer, I realize that I can stand. The of light sliver is coming from under a door. I can see another pinpoint coming through a keyhole. My hand finds the knob and I turn it. It opens towards me.
I blink as I step through into the light.
I raise one of the bags to shield my eyes from the brightness. A light applause breaks out. Confuse
d, I squint until my eyes adjust and I can see. The applause diminishes into murmurs. For a second, I think it’s the “hissing” communication that Adam was talking about. But these aren’t college students, and they’re talking to each other. Hissing is anonymous.
They’re dressed well for this neighborhood. The women wear black and red. The men have suit jackets over jeans. Everyone wears some type of boots. They’re holding Champagne flutes filled with bubbling nectar.
A woman approaches me. She leans in and tents her fingers just under her chin as she speaks.
“Well done, but you’re dripping.”
---- * ----
The fancy people part to let us through. I’m led through the gallery to a small kitchen. The paintings out in the main exhibit looked like they were vomited from a neon peacock. The one over the sink could be a Monet.
“Let me get you a bag for your…” she laughs. “Bags! So clever. I told Fred that your entrance would be grand, but I have to admit, you really surprised us. Is there more in store?”
From a cabinet, she produces a white garbage bag. She helps me load my blueberries into it and then seems surprised when I take the bag from her. I’m not sure what she intended to do with it.
“Oh, turn!” she says. When we do, a flash goes off.
“Let me see,” she says. She takes me by the arm out into the gallery. We step around a sculpture of a horse, made from baseball bats. There’s a big painting on the wall that I assume is just a black rectangle on canvas. I’m wondering who the artist is when it changes and becomes the photo just taken of me and this woman. In the photo, the kitchen behind us is gone. It’s just us against a black background.
I lean in to get better look at my shirt and then look down to see it in person.
The dried blood looks like an eye and the purple blueberry stain beneath it looks like a crude portrayal of Earth. The splotches are the oceans. The negative space is the land. The eye watches over it all.
“I just noodled it through,” the woman says. She has the biggest smile on her face. She turns back to the crowd. They’ve gone back to their conversations, but when she addresses them, everyone drops to silence immediately
“Everyone, listen! Look at his shirt again—the eye over the planet. The asteroid! It was our guest!”
The room is shocked.
The silence stretches out for at least five seconds and then they all act at once. I can’t help it—I cringe back and pull the trash bag to my chest. The applause bursts forth at least fifty times louder than before. People are clapping so hard that Champagne is flying every direction. One man puts two fingers in his mouth and whistles so loud that another man falls to his knees and clamps his hands over his ears. The applause dies down with cheers of, “Bravo!” and “Well done!”
The woman turns back to me and has to nearly shout to make herself heard.
“I don’t know how you pulled this off. Really. It’s going to be impossible to surpass.”
I’m trying to pull away from this woman, but she keeps sliding closer to me. I have no idea what to say to her. My salvation comes as a surprise to everyone.
On the wall to my left, there’s a set of six paintings. They’re big squares of muted color, arranged in a circle. The wall thumps and then bows. The center of the circle cracks and splits and pushes in towards us. A hand emerges. It forms into a fist. Still pushing, a forearm and then an elbow come through. Once we see the whole arm, the wall bursts apart and a fat, naked man spills into the room.
More shouts and more applause from the crowd give me some cover and I back away from the woman. Her attention is consumed, so I turn and try to find a door. I see a glowing EXIT sign, but it’s just an exhibit. Finally, I see a hall. At the end, I push through a big steel door and I’m on the street.
I’ve seen this door from the outside before. I never would have guessed it was an art gallery.
I waste no time. I sprint back to my house, ignoring all the pain reports coming back from my ravaged body. I don’t rest until I’m safe in my own apartment. With a deep breath, my heartbeat begins to slow. My eyes drift closed. The mission has exhausted me, but I’m now the proud owner of a half-thawed disgusting mess of blueberries in a trash bag. I shake my head and a smile begins to form on my lips when it flattens out again.
I hear a deep growl from the bedroom.
Chapter Fourteen
* Explanation *
I RUSH TO THE bathroom and get there just before the bear. He fills up the whole doorway. I have the bag that split open and I’m holding it above the toilet. His eyes are fixed on me, but his nose it twitching a thousand times a second. He knows exactly what I have.
“Come out of there,” he says.
“No,” I say. I adjust the bag and a clump of blueberries slips from the bag and drops into the toilet water. I reach over and flush.
The bear doesn’t say anything, but I see his shoulders tense a little. Honestly, I hoped that he would be tempted by the blueberries, but I had no idea that his reaction would be this strong.
“What are you doing? You got those for me. Just come out here and let me have them.”
I see a little drool escape the corner of his giant mouth.
“You’ll tell me what you know about the asteroid,” I say.
He rolls his eyes. “It’s such a long story. Give me the bag and I’ll tell you.”
I let another clump slip to the edge of the bag. When he doesn’t start speaking immediately, I shrug and let it fall. I flush again.
“Okay!” he says. “Be reasonable. What do you want to know?”
“Stop screwing with me, bear,” I say. I threaten him by crinkling the bag. “Where did the asteroid come from?”
He slowly lowers his hind end to the floor and keeps his eyes locked on the blueberries.
He begins to speak. “Some of this is going to be confusing to you… The first thing you have to understand is this: people only see about one percent of the electromagnetic spectrum. If you knew someone who only saw one particular shade of yellow, imagine how confusing the world would be to them. Everything else would just be black, and they would constantly be running into everything and wondering why the universe didn’t make sense. The only thing they would focus on would be egg yolks, and daffodils, and some varieties of roses. Having a conversation with them about a tree would be nearly impossible, because they would only understand the pollen and the leaves when they started to change color in the fall.”
“Are you getting to a point?” I ask.
He continues, unperturbed. “I, on the other hand, see everything. I can see the ripples of cold coming off that bag. I see the two other bags you have in that trash bag. I see the cramp forming in your arm. I see the key in your pocket. I see that your bladder is nearly full and you’re going to have to use that toilet pretty soon.”
“The asteroid.”
“We’ve known it was coming for about six months, when we first saw the gravity disturbance on the other side of the sun. It’s a big one. Not much on Earth is going to survive. We’ve seen some pretty big strikes in the past. I mean, not me personally, but in our collective consciousness. I’ve only been here for a thousand years, so I haven’t seen that much.”
My hand starts to fall a little. I don’t know why I trust this bear. I don’t have any reason to. He doesn’t seem like a particularly trustworthy animal, and I’ve been told that he’s a felon. Still, the idea that he has been walking around on this planet for a thousand years has some ring of truth to it. I can’t say why.
“We’re supposed to be neutral about the fate of worlds like this. They come and go. It’s senseless to get too invested in them because sometimes they just peter out. You have to be able to walk away without remorse, you know?”
“You’re not a bear?” I ask. I’ve broken my own rule—I’ve let him get off-topic.
“Of course I’m a bear,” he says, giving his head a little shake. “What kind of thing is that to say? I’m a hundred-pe
rcent bear.”
“But you talk, and you’re suggesting that you live for a thousand years and can move to other planets.”
“Yeah? What of it? Why does that make me anything but a bear?”
I shake my head. “Back to the asteroid.”
He shrugs a little. “Yeah. There’s an asteroid coming. If it makes you feel any better, this happens all the time. Your planet was formed by a bunch of asteroids coming together. It only stands to reason that there would be some still out there, careening through eccentric orbits, occasionally colliding with the planet. Just look at the moon. Have you seen all the craters there?”
“Nobody lives there.”
“Not comfortably,” he says. He makes a dismissive sound. “How about those berries?”
I ignore the question. “But why was there a vote about the asteroid?”
“There was a time, back when the asteroid was still much farther away, when its path could have easily been changed. As a body moves through space, it pushes a wave ahead of it. Have you ever seen how dolphins swim in front of ships?”
“Sure,” I say. I haven’t seen it personally, but I’ve seen it on TV I suppose.
“The ship pushes a bow wave. An asteroid does the same thing. If you interact with that bow wave, you can change the course of an object. It’s very weak when the object is far away, but that’s the time it’s easiest to alter.”
“I don’t get it.”
“If you turn a steering wheel a tiny bit when you’re a mile away, you’ll miss the target. But if you turn the wheel at the last second, you’re going to hit what you’re going to hit.”
“Hmmm,” I say. “But if it was so easy, why wouldn’t you guys have changed the asteroid? Why was it even a question about whether it should hit?”
He smirks—as much as a bear can smirk—and grunts. “You guys are not the most popular species around. There are plenty of bears who think that hitting the reset button on this planet is not such a bad idea. We clear out for a while, let everything fix itself, and then come back when it’s all clean and nice again.”
