Life During Wartime (36 page)

Debora made a disparaging noise.

‘You believe me,’ said the computer. ‘But you don’t want to hear your beliefs spoken by the unbelievable something you think I am.’

The vines holding the chopper creaked, the light trembled, as if a mighty thought had troubled the innermost structures of the hollow.

It was approaching twilight when at last they headed back to the village. Birds were roosting, monkeys chattering, the beams of light withdrawing from the jungle floor. From the boulders ringing the hollow the trail wound downhill, narrowing into an archway of low-hanging branches, a leafy tunnel that curved west and opened onto a glade of palmettos and sapodillas. At any time of day the glade was lovely, but as they came out of the archway, they discovered that it had been made more lovely by the presence of millions of butterflies perched on every twig and frond. There was so much color and pattern that for a moment Mingolla failed to notice Nate standing on the opposite side of the
glade, himself flowered with butterflies; some were swirling around his head, forming into a cloud through which his cold unreadable face could now and again be glimpsed.

‘Nate!’ Debora’s voice was sharp with panic, and Mingolla, already deep into panic, probed at Nate, but to no effect. That peculiar pattern he had encountered on his first day in the village resisted his efforts, creating a fluctuating barrier he was unable to penetrate.

More butterflies eddied up, the cloud filling the glade, and Debora pulled at Mingolla, broke into a run back toward the hollow. He glanced behind him and saw that the archway was choked with a flurrying tide of butterflies, a tide of flowers flooding a green tube, making a whispery rustle that chilled him and weakened his legs. They reached the boulder that overlooked the chopper, and poised on the brink, butterflies streaming about her head, Debora shouted, ‘Jump!’ They jumped together, and Mingolla landed in a crouch, fell forward. Spotted Debora slipping off the side of the chopper, which was swaying violently. He caught her arm. Butterflies were batting at his mouth, his eyes, and he swatted them away. He dragged Debora toward the hole punched by the missile and followed her inside, slicing his hand on the ragged edge. He slid past the blinking telltales to the dark end of the computer deck and began prying at the cockpit hatch. Debora joined him, straining at the rusted metal, working her fingers into the crack of the seal. Butterflies everywhere. Light touches on his face and hands. He spat them off his lips. His heart was doing a fancy dribble against his chest wall. The hatch squealed open, and they wedged through, forcing it shut behind them. Several dozen butterflies had poured into the cockpit, and in a frenzy, Mingolla went about killing them, crushing them against the plastic bubble, stopping them, squeezing them into a glue of broken wings. Once he had killed them all, he leaned against the copilot’s chair, gazing at the skeleton, its ribcage protruding from the shreds of a flight jacket. The skull was parchment yellow, blotched with brown; dessicated tendon strings adhered to the corners of its mouth, lending the grin a grotesque silliness. Mingolla had the notion that the pilot was about to tell a joke; then a blue butterfly fluttered up in an empty eyesocket, and
the expression of the skull was altered toward the sinister. With a shriek, Mingolla backhanded the skull, knocked it off the neck to roll on the floor; white dust puffed from the splintered spinal column.

Breathing hard, he turned to Debora. She had sagged down against the hatch, her knees drawn up, resting her forehead. ‘We’re okay,’ he said. ‘We’re okay now.’

The light dimmed, dimmed with such suddenness that Min-golla wheeled around to learn the cause. Thousands of butterflies were massing on the crack-webbed plastic, obscuring the reddened light with a matte of wings and brittle bodies. Like looking at a puzzle of butterflies laid on a red table, with a few pieces missing. The missing pieces filled in rapidly, and the cockpit grew dark, only a faint effusion of reddish glow filtering through the overlapping wings. He could sense the enormous weight accumulating on the plastic, and moments later he began to hear scratchy sounds of strain, the bubble giving way.

‘C’mon!’ He groped for Debora, plucked at her shoulder ‘Find Nate! Stop him!’

He flung out his mind, made immediate contact with Nate, and focused his fear into a knife that pried at his defenses. But even when Debora added her strength to his, that resistive pattern disrupted their attempts to penetrate it. The creaking had intensified, sharp bits of plastic dusted Mingolla’s face, and he felt the tonnage above them as a pressure on his chest, a crushing weight that was forcing air out of him. Desperate, he tried merging with the defensive pattern, and – a triangular chunk of plastic fell from above, striking his cheek – he found that he could. Wings rustling, prickly legs stalking his forehead; he bit down on something that crunched, spat it out. The edge of his fear flowed in complicated loops and arcs, stitching along Nate’s pattern with the rapidity of a sewing machine, and he added all his strength to the flow, accelerating it. Debora’s mind joined his, and the signature knot of their involvement threaded itself into the pattern, overwhelming it, drawing it into a bizarre three-way connection of pain and sexuality. Then a scream from beyond the cockpit, and with the suddenness of a spell being broken, the connection was dissipated.

Butterflies lifted from the plastic; the dying light streamed in
between the mattes of crushed bodies and wings that remained, stippling the floor with shadow. Through a gap, Mingolla saw Nate’s blond head lying on the boulder above, and felt his mind roiling in the sluggish tumble of unconsciousness. Butterflies settled in Debora’s hair as she leaned on the pilot’s chair, shaking, and dozens more were eddying inside the cockpit, but Mingolla had no energy left to deal with them; he watched them batting around the headless skeleton, some fluttering out the new rent in the bubble, their colors flamed by the sunset, drifting higher and higher like glowing ash, until they became invisible against a lacework of black leaves and crimson sky.

They climbed up from the chopper to the boulder where Nate was lying. He was wearing a sidearm, and Mingolla removed the gun from its holster. Then they set about waking him. His mind had lapsed into a disarray similar to Amalia’s, but apparently their strength had grown over the last days, for they managed the job with ease. The patterns of Nate’s thoughts – again, like Amalia’s – kept unraveling, but Mingolla was able to restore them when they did. He saw that it would be no problem to reverse the process, to weaken and dissolve the patterns of a healthy mind, and he wondered if this was what had happened to Nate. Soon Nate sat up and looked around blearily; he smoothed down his hair.

‘I, uh …’ He pinched the bridge of his nose. ‘I’m not sure what went wrong.’

‘You tried to kill us,’ said Mingolla. ‘Remember?’

‘Of course, yes. But I was only supposed to watch, to assist you.’ He stared down at the chopper. Always so many mistakes.’

‘What do you mean “mistakes”?’ Debora asked.

‘Can I be of assistance?’ asked the computer.

It seemed to Mingolla there was urgency in the computer’s voice, and ignoring it, he repeated Debora’s question.

‘They are skillful, very skillful,’ said Nate. ‘It takes them a long time to control someone, but they’ve had centuries of practice. The thing is, though, they’re careless. They rely too much upon their power, and that makes them prone to sweeping tactics, the grandiose. They tend to neglect minor details … details that would be obvious to you and me.’

‘“The others,”’ said Mingolla. ‘That who you mean?’

Nate spotted the gun in Mingolla’s hand and reached for it. ‘Let me have it, please.’

‘You’re kidding!’

‘You must,’ Nate said. ‘He will find me, use me again.’

‘I really believe I can help him,’ said the computer.

‘Do you know what it’s like to be almost nothing?’ said Nate. ‘To see things that aren’t there, obey voices in your head.’ His eyes darted about, and he wrung his hands, growing more agitated by the second. It was not good to watch; it appeared he was winding himself up, his springs coiling tighter and tighter.

‘Who’s using you?’ Debora asked.

‘Izaguirre.’ Nate made a grab for the gun, but Mingolla knocked his hand away. ‘Please! It’s been years since I’ve felt this clear. I may not have another chance.’

‘Tell us about Izaguirre,’ said Debora. ‘Then we’ll help you.’

‘All right.’ Nate rested a hand on the boulder, laid it there with precise care as if he wanted to know it, to draw its coolness inside. ‘All right, I’ll trust you.’

Darkness fell, moonlight inlaid the black metal of the chopper with gleams, and Nate talked calmly, steadily, his head thrown back, eyes lidded, like an enraptured saint. He told them he’d suffered a breakdown during therapy, and afterward had spent a long confinement in a house with other damaged recruits. Somewhere in the States, he thought, but he wasn’t sure.

‘Izaguirre was in charge,’ he said. ‘In fact, he was the only one of the families in residence.’

‘The families?’ Mingolla said. ‘That stuff Amalia said … it’s true?’

‘Oh, yes. Izaguirre would tell us stories about the families, the feud. He’d shake his head as if it were weighing upon his soul, but he enjoyed the stories, and I think he relished their bloody past. It was in the way he embellished them. He made horror sound elegant.’ Nate cast an eye toward the gun. ‘Such a strange, moody place … that house. You must be careful. There were dangerous people there. Izaguirre’s toys, his weapons.’

It was all coming together for Mingolla. The clues, Nate and Amalia, and Pastorín’s stories. Izaguirre was behind
everything … if that was his name, and it probably wasn’t Sotomayor and Madradona. His arrogance would demand he use real names in the story. He must have subverted Pastorín. And maybe he was Pastorín. The author’s penchant for privacy was notorious, and now that Mingolla thought about it, he’d never seen a photograph of the man.

‘What did he have planned for us?’ he asked.

‘I’m not sure. I was supposed to watch you, protect you. But something went wrong.’

‘Did he say anything ’bout us getting stronger? Anything ’bout a mutuality of focus making us strong?’

‘Actually,’ said the computer. ‘I’d forgotten that.’

They all turned to the chopper.

‘I simply thought it would be amusing to send you after Debora,’ the computer went on. ‘I have a fondness for irony. And I’m glad I did send you. No one has ever been able to defeat Nate until now. His malfunction has made clear how valuable you two will be. We look forward to your arrival.’

‘Izaguirre,’ said Mingolla. ‘You motherfucker!’

The computer gave forth one of its easy chuckles. ‘Hello, David. Surprised to see me?’

‘Not really.’ Mingolla stood and looked down at the chopper, wishing Izaguirre were there in person. ‘Where are you?’

‘Don’t be annoyed, David. I have nothing but good wishes for you and Debora. As to where I am, you’ll see me in Panama.’

‘What makes you think we’ll go to Panama after all this?’

‘Where else can you go? You’re both deserters, so you can’t go home. And besides, you want to learn about Panama. You want to find out what’s there, don’t you?’

‘Why don’t you just fly us there now?’ Debora asked.

‘Ordinarily I might,’ said the computer. However, I think in your case it would be wise to gauge your strength. The trip will provide you with tests, and I for one will be most interested in seeing how you cope with them.’

‘You’re nuts!’ said Mingolla. ‘You’re playing games with us, with everyone.’

‘Not at all,’ said the computer. ‘I’m merely being cautious.’

‘What
is
going on in Panama?’

Silence, the black web of vines stretched taut by the enormous bulk of the chopper. Mingolla felt its size and power within him, felt that his body, too, was a web holding a black shape, a potential that Izaguirre in his arrogance might not suspect. If he could hide that potential, if Debora could hide hers, they just might have a surprise for Izaguirre.

‘Please,’ Nate said, gesturing at the gun.

‘If you leave Nate here,’ said the computer, ‘I’ll have someone look after him.’

‘No!’ Nate jumped to his feet. ‘I won’t go back.’

‘Calm down, Nate,’ said the computer. ‘It’s not as bad as all that.’

Debora held out her hand to Mingolla. ‘Give me the gun.’

Appalled, he said, ‘What’re you going to do?’

She said nothing, but continued to hold out her hand.

‘You don’t have to,’ said Mingolla. ‘Maybe …’

‘Give it to her!’ said Nate. ‘You have to!’ He had a sick, eager look; Debora’s expression was resigned.

‘If it has to be done, I’ll do it,’ Mingolla said.

‘There’s no need to
do it
at all,’ the computer said. ‘Nate is overstating the horrors of his service. He’ll be well cared for, I promise.’

‘Well cared for?’ Nate stepped to the edge of the boulder, his fists clenched. ‘Yes, I’ll be well cared for! I can sit in a room all day without a thought to trouble me. And when I’m waked … hah! When I’m waked I’ll be so grateful to have you twist me … to let you …’ He appeared to have lost the train of thought and stared at the chopper. Insects fizzed out in the dark scrub beyond the ring of boulders.