Allie's War Season One (59 page)

Maygar hears me, and his amusement returns.

Not only for that, Bridge,
he says.

Pushing his mind aside, I remember Haldren, why I am here.

I concentrate on his face, on the clear, confident voice that rises above the crowd, the darkly burning eyes, his laugh. I remember other things, too. The things that no one else sees. Shuddering sobs in the middle of the night in the orphanage when no one comes, his crush on Kardek’s lab assistant, Massani, his fear of the other children, his need to control them, to make himself feel safe. I remember the details, the way he snorts when he laughs, cracks his knuckles when he’s nervous, recites equations under his breath to not be afraid...

Slowly, the Earth begins to rotate beneath my feet.

I do not notice at first, but it is rotating backwards, in the wrong direction.

The sun and planets revolve backwards as well, moving with oiled precision, west to east, instead of the reverse. I half-expect to hear beautiful music, like when my father and I viewed a miniature version of Earth’s constellations sliding in rich ovals on smooth brass rails. In my mind’s eye, my father laughs there still, delighted by the beauty of the kinetic sculpture.

“Music of the spheres, Allie!” he says, patting my back with his large hand. “Music of the spheres! Isn’t it wonderful!”

I hear his voice, and as time unwinds again, I smile.

A lightness coincides with the wires of the Pyramid growing less around that little blue and white world. The dark threads unwind even faster, like a ball of yarn teased by a cat, and I can breathe again, in a way I never can in that other place...

Abruptly, the motion stops.

Earth begins revolving forward once more, with effort at first, like gears grinding back into their natural motion. It is slow, like I say...yet fast, too. Regular time, which passes changing everything, so that we lose ourselves, so that we don’t recognize one another.

So that we must find one another, again and again.

Instead of the Pyramid, a gray cloud masses over Europe.

There,
I say to Maygar, pointing with my mind.

I feel him acknowledge me.

...Then he and I stand in that other version of our world. This time, I do not know the exact place; I have never been here before, either in the Barrier or the flesh. We perch on a grassy, leaf-strewn hill dotted with aspens shedding white bark.

Below us, a circle of black mud runs before a row of whitewashed buildings. The mud is thick, grooved with wheel ruts. In the distance I see more of those same buildings, what look like barracks, and below that, men in gray-green uniforms and cloth caps march in formation through the same dark mud and horse manure, carrying guns.

I recognize the uniforms in a vague kind of way, not well enough to—

SS,
Maygar sends my way. Contempt drips from his light.
Didn’t your husband teach you? They are Schutzstaffel, Frau Dehgoies.

I flinch at his words, but I don’t answer.

This is all very interesting,
Maygar adds.
But what is it?

I feel my light spark as I lose patience with his arrogance.
You’re the one who said this isn’t an exact science. So why don’t
you
tell me where we are, big infiltrator man?

Maygar sends with mock politeness,
Perhaps you miss your Nazi husband? You thought of him, and it brought you here?

I am about to answer back when I stop, staring through trees to three men standing on the same muddy hill. One I recognize at once as Terian. The second I know only because he has no face. Like when I saw him before, he is well-dressed in a formal, dark suit, and tall.

...Though not as tall as the third man, who is Revik.

I blink somewhere in my mind.

He is still there when I return.

I can’t take my eyes off him, even knowing Maygar is watching...even feeling his disgust when he notices my stare.

Revik wears what likely passed for casual in the time period—dark brown pants, a white shirt with sleeves rolled up to his elbows, suspenders, boots—but his clothes look well-made, and he is clean-shaven, still on the thin side but significantly healthier-looking than when I saw him last in this timeline, wasting away in a Berlin jail. The bruises have faded from his jaw and face, although I still see scars on his neck, one in the shape of a question mark, another on his hand that I recognize. He wears the silver ring on his smallest finger, just like he did when I met him in San Francisco, and my light hand moves reflexively to my light throat.

I wonder again if the ring is from his wife, Elise.

He combs fingers through his black hair, clearing his throat.

“What are we doing here?” he says in German.

The shock of seeing him alive paralyzes me.

“...I thought we were done with this,” Revik prompts again. “Why are we here?”

Terian laughs. He is pleased with his new friend. The pleasure sparks clearly in his light. “You see, sir?” he says. “He’s barely here a minute, and already we are wasting his time!”

“Manners, Terian.” The faceless man claps Revik on the shoulder. “I would like to challenge you, Rolf, to think about this war differently. Until now, you have approached your role in this conflict as a slave does. I would like to persuade you to change that vantage point.”

Revik folds his arms, shifting his weight in obvious irritation. “I adhere to the Seven’s doctrine of non-interference, if that’s what you mean by ‘slave.’ Humans as a species must be allowed to mature undisturbed. The rules are quite clear about—”

“Spoken like a true believer,” Terian mutters.

Revik turns, raising an eyebrow. “Are these schoolyard tactics meant to persuade me to abandon Code?” He glances at Galaith. “Because I find them a bit tired...sir.”

“We do not mean to insult you, Revik. Far from it.” Galaith gives Terian a thin smile. “But I do wonder when is the last time you really thought about those words you just recited?”

Revik frowns, looking between them.

“I have had plenty of time to think about it,” he says, his real emotion coming out that time. “...Believe me, I have. This is not the first war of theirs I’ve fought. I understand well the argument for interference, but it doesn’t make it any less wrong.”

I see that his pride is pricked, though, especially at the silence after his words.

“I curbed their excesses where I could...” he said.

“You did nothing,” Galaith says calmly.

Revik stiffens. “I disagree.”

“You were a
Nazi,
Rolf,” Terian laughs. “They were gassing your people and you watched disapprovingly from a distance, at best...cleared the way for them with your panzers at worst!”

“Don’t be offended, Revik,” Galaith says, raising a hand to silence Terian. “It is not you that is the problem. The Seven certainly mean well, but they are judging my race as if it were their own. But humans are not seers, Revik. Humans...the ordinary mob of humanity...do not need more freedom. They do not even want it. What they want, more than anything, is for the world to make sense. They want their lives to have some greater purpose...a meaning.”

The faceless man smiles wanly, looking out over the muddy exercise yard.

“They want someone to provide that for them, Rolf,” he says, quieter. “They want this in part because they do not trust themselves...much less their fellow man. Which means, more than anything, they want to be led by someone greater than themselves. They don’t want a committee of their peers. They don’t want the truth to shift with the sands of opinion, or time, or perspective. They want an absolute reality. One that makes sense to them year after year, no matter what occurs outside of them. Whether they control this or not is irrelevant to them. They wish the illusion of control...without any of the responsibility.”

I glance at Revik’s face, watch him thinking about this.

I can tell he doesn’t exactly disagree.

Hell, I’m not even sure I do.

Galaith watches Revik too. After a pause, he smiles wanly.

“Rolf, my dear friend...humans are, quite simply, made to be dominated. If not by seers, then by more powerful humans. In truth, they prefer it.” He gestures broadly over the whitewashed buildings, the rows of uniformed men. “This war is a case in point,” he says. “Is it the honest leader to whom the masses flock? The one who gives them greater freedoms? More responsibility for their lives?” He smiles, shaking his head. “No. It is the one who gives them purpose, Rolf. An enemy. A beautiful dream that tells them all of their problems can be solved. Do they care that this dream is borne of countless lies? No. They do not. No modern human leader has ever been loved as the Germans love Hitler, Rolf. Not Churchill, not Roosevelt. Not since the last of his kind...Napoleon, Caesar, the Emperors of old Asia.”

Revik stands there, blank-faced.

Then he laughs.

“You yourself are human!” he says.

“Yes.” Galaith smiles. “I am. But I am also one who sees this truth...and accepts it. Would you condemn me for this? Call me a race traitor to choose reality?”

Revik pauses, looking at him. “No,” he says.

Revik is in pain. I feel it on him. I feel it through him, even though it makes no sense that I should. It will be decades before I am even alive in his world. I realize the pain is for Elise and something crushes the small bones in my chest, making it hard to breathe, hard to remain where I am. The craziness behind this feeling doesn’t escape me.

I am jealous. I am beyond jealous, and of two dead people.

I follow his eyes to the muddy tracks below. Men in gray-green uniforms roll a tank of gas onto a wagon tied to a wooden yoke laced to a mule. The soldiers cluck at the mule, pulling at its bridle until the mule, the wagon, and the tank stand in the middle of the mud ruts in a circular drive. Two more tanks are loaded, pulled by another mule and a horse. The animals halt where men line up in formation, in the center of the circular drive.

Around them, I count over a hundred people.

“Why are we here?” Revik says again, but this time I hear uneasiness in his voice.

“I want to cure you, Rolf. Of obedience. Of being a slave.”

I feel my stomach roll over. I know suddenly, what I’m going to see.

I don’t want to see it. I turn to Maygar.

Let’s go. You were right. This is a dead end.

But Maygar is focused on Galaith.

He does not see what I see, or if he does, he does not care.

The separation pain worsens, mixes with a grief too thick to think through. The resonance is too strong; I can’t change my vibration enough to pull myself out. I am locked here, tied with steel cords to this past Revik and his grief for his dead wife.

That is him?
Maygar says of Galaith.
He is
human,
Bridge!

A silver channel opens up above the three of them, feeding directly into the cloud of the Rooks...
the Dreng,
I think, remembering Vash’s explanation. Terian’s light body shines with wire-like threads, but many fewer than existed when I glimpsed that side of him in San Francisco. The widest channel of all opens between the Dreng and the faceless man.

That same channel then opens to Revik.

Sharp, silver light ignites through his aleimi like molten sparks. The sickness I feel worsens as I watch his light change. The silver overtakes the softer gold-white, seems to strengthen it, but I see it as a covering over, a slow eclipse of something I realize I still love, that I can’t seem to stop loving, no matter how hard I try.

Seconds later, the auras around Terian and Revik gleam bright with metallic, silver light, emitting lightning-like flashes. An even brighter aura pulses off Galaith.

I hear Maygar mutter beside me.

...Impossible.

Terian winks at Revik. “You see, my cantankerous,
Heer
friend,” he says with a smirk. “Galaith, here, he is like a great, big mirror. Anything that lives in the network, lives also in him. Which means, if any of us has a present for the network, he is the first to unwrap it...”

Terian’s eyes turn slightly colder, and just for the barest instant, more predatory. I see the covetousness in him, even back then, but he turns it into a smile.