The Clock Winked (The Sagittan Chronicles Book 2) (26 page)

“Well in that case,” Butler said, turning back to the crowd.
“I’ll hurry it up. You’re probably wondering what this will achieve. I only
have one goal.
To cut each and every one of you off from your
home planet forever.
I have been planning this for hundreds of years.
Your dear Keeper is doing her job, but only because I made it possible. Why did
I make it possible? I didn’t. I only made it possible for her to fail.

“Yes, she is sitting at the top of the ladder, but she’ll
fail. ‘Why?’ you ask.” A wild grin cavorted across his face.
“Because
I corrupted the memory of the clock.
It had a chip, a computer chip, and
I corrupted it!” He began to wave his hands around widely and spin, staring up
at Bronwyn’s figure at the top of the ladder. “It will ruin everything and then
the gate back to your home will self-destruct. Five! Four! Three! Two...!” His
finger pulled the trigger of the gun he grasped tightly in his left hand with a
loud bang. Bronwyn’s body began to fall.

His audience let out a collective gasp as she tumbled from
the top of the ladder and then suddenly disappeared.

*****

In reality, Bronwyn jumped. After watching as the features
of the clock’s face grew shorter and shorter, she decided that there was no
real point in waiting around, especially since she had already seen the Clock
wink. So she jumped, and as she fell she could swear she saw Sauvignon Pincer
gazing up at her through the fog. And when she landed only two seconds later,
the weight of her surprise probably outweighed the moon.

*****

Salve heard everything Butler said, but he didn’t see the
smiles and the scowls, the wild hand motions or Samson’s figure kneeling at the
base of the clock. Salve’s eyes were fixed upwards—past the clock, past the
insane Butler, past the fog and the ladder—his eyes were fixed on the tiny
figure of Bronwyn sitting delicately on the highest rung. He could see the
silhouette of her face as she looked down, then up, and then straight out
towards the city. He saw her stand up and stretch out her arms, with the sun
rising behind her in the morning sky.

She looks like an angel, Salve thought.

Then he saw her begin to fall and everything seemed to slow
as she looked right into his eyes and disappeared.

*****

John was pedaling furiously.

“Why are you pedaling? Quin asked.

“I just feel like since there’s a bike here, I should work
on my stamina,” John answered. “I mean, what’s the point of a bike if not to
ride it?”

Simon walked in circles around the bike, aiming his laser
eyes at the metal, examining it down to its most basic elements. Jirin and
Teira sat against a wall, doing their best to patch up her arm. Rathead groaned
every few minutes, but remained largely unconscious.

“We need to go back
up and save Bronwyn,” Auvek said. He strode rapidly towards the elevator.

“Won’t work,” Quin said as Auvek reached the door.

Auvek reached out to touch the metal sliding door. It didn’t
move under his fingers, instead remaining quite solid and cold. He felt the
edges for buttons.

“Locked,” Quin stated.

“How do we get out?” Auvek’s expression had transformed from
tired into a mask of extreme concern. “Are we trapped forever?”

“Of course not!”
John grinned.
“There’s a perfectly viable form of transportation right here.”

Silence dropped on the room like a rock as everyone turned
to glare at him with bemusement. The pedals whirred.

“It’s bolted to the floor,” Auvek said, “and even bikes—I’m
sure you’re surprised—can’t drive through solid rock.”

“I think you might be surprised.”

The lasers in Simon’s eyes changed colour for a moment; then
they closed as he moved slowly around the bike.

“Master John,” he said. “You are, in fact, correct. It is
simply missing one key component.”

John stopped, frowning.

Simon pulled open a little flap on the back of the machine.
“A battery.”

“Darn it!” Auvek exclaimed, trying to make a joke. “For a
moment there, I thought we were saved.” No one laughed.

Simon’s and John’s heads swiveled towards Auvek and then
back towards each other. They burst out laughing. Simon’s laugh was tinny and
rough, like a Model-T Ford running out of gas.

“You can laugh?” Auvek asked, surprised.

Simon nodded.
“Of course, Master Auvek.”

He then pulled his tail around and removed a piece off the
tip. Carefully, he slid it into the battery slot. John began to pedal
furiously. A loud roaring, grinding noise permeated the room, coming from all
directions at once. Auvek exclaimed, “
leaping
blennies!” and sat down right where he stood. Teira and Jirin gasped and
cringed; but Quin stood still, watching as the ceiling of the chamber began to
iris open, starting with a pinpoint of light in the center and slowly widening.
When the hole was about the size of John and the bike, the floor lit up like a
thousand lanterns, shining one beam straight into the clouds. The ladder was
completely visible in the deluge of light.

“I don’t get it!” Auvek asked, yelling over the loud
grinding of the machinery. “Why did they use a bicycle?
Why
not a button?”

“It’s a metaphor!” John yelled back.
“About
futility, inanity, and the ridiculousness of this war!”

“Well, what about Bronwyn, then?” Auvek began to pace in
circles, like a large, trapped, wild, cat.

“As soon as it stops,” Quin answered him, “I’ll lift you
out.”

“Now, now!”
Auvek exclaimed jumping
pathetically towards the spinning ceiling.

“No. Your hands will be crushed by the blades that are
opening.” Quin frowned.

Above them, a figure danced backwards on the moving panels,
trying to escape the oncoming void. He scampered away from the hole in a more
and more agitated fashion until he abruptly disappeared from view.

“That was Butler!” John exclaimed, and began to pedal
harder.

*****

When Bronwyn fell, she found herself alone. She sat in the
darkness with only a pinprick of light visible in the distance. She
contemplated for a moment that she might be dead, but quickly ruled that out,
and standing carefully, began to slowly make her way towards the light. It
turned out to be a hole in a wall of some sort. She stuck her finger in it and
a loud creaking noise sliced through the darkness as the wall opened to reveal
a large room filled with empty seats. She seemed to be standing on a stage.

“Hello?” she called. Her voice echoed. A green sign blazed
“Exit” in the old language. She went that way, stepping through two large doors
into an enormous, glassed in lobby. A large musical instrument with strings
strung tightly across it sat in one corner, covered with dust. She slipped
through a glass door into the street.

The town bustled; people walked rapidly to and fro, kicking
up dust that glistened in the hot sun and threatened to choke the small
community. The sign above her head said “Theatre
Between
the Sea Restaurant and Tavern,” and across the street sat a large barrel-shaped
building labeled “Crabonion Fruit Brewery.” On the sidewalk next to the
theatre, an old man sat in a creaking rocking chair. He wore baggy brown pants
made from a loosely knit fabric and no shirt; a whitish head of hair crowned
his wrinkled face.

“Hello there, young lady.” His friendly smile revealed
several missing teeth. “I’ve been waiting for you.”

He stood, the way an old man stands—so slowly that a young
person is afraid the universe will freeze over before they make it upright, and
then they never do quite make it upright because their shoulders bear the
burden of an entire lifetime.

“Hello, sir.” Bronwyn stepped forward and offered her arm.

“Thank you. You are Bronwyn, I presume.” His voice had the
crepitating quality of wrapping paper being perpetually wrinkled and unwrinkled,
and then wrinkled again.

“Yes...” Bronwyn said quizzically as she held her arm
steady. He guided her across the street and into the alley that ran between the
giant barrel and the tavern. Tufts of grass sprouted from the dry dirt that
billowed each time Bronwyn stepped down.

“There is a room back here.” The old man gestured with the
hand that wasn’t clinging to Bronwyn’s arm.

“Can I ask...?” Bronwyn started.

“Ask anything, my dear.”

“I was sitting on the top of a ladder, fifty or sixty or
seventy feet in the air not five minutes ago. It was probably five in the
morning.” She took a breath. “Here it’s hot and dusty and, well, not four in
the morning.”

“You’re on a different planet, love.” He smiled a wrinkly
smile.
“Different planets, different seasons, different days,
different times.”

Bronwyn looked up the sky. Through the blazing light that
bounced off the lightly-coloured sand, she could see two glowing spots.

“Double sun,” the old man said. “And at night, you can see
our moons. There are three, and one has rings.”

Bronwyn stared at the sky, amazed. “I’m pretty sure I’m just
dreaming,” she said.

Chuckling, the old man turned to his left and opened a door.
“This way.”

The room was nothing special. A simple rug covered the
center of the floor, and a couple of chairs squatted against one wall.

“DWIGHT!” The old man’s crepitant voice ricocheted off the
walls and sank harshly into her ears.
“ADERYN!
She’s
here! Just like I said she would be!”

A slightly plump, middle-aged woman bustled into the room.
She wore a cotton dress under a dusty apron, and her frizzy hair sprang
insolently from underneath a red bandanna. Behind her, a similarly-aged
gentleman appeared, with a bit of extra gut and a bit of extra beard. A
brilliant smile radiated excitement as he ran in, picked Bronwyn up in a tight
hug and spun her around.

“Oh!” Aderyn exclaimed, wiping her eyes on her apron.
“You’re so beautiful!”

“And tall, just like me!”
Dwight
commented, grinning. “And she has no idea who we are. Ah well, that’s Aunt Llewellyn
for you. Ignoring our letters all these years and definitely not passing them
along.”

He reached out and took Bronwyn’s shoulders in his hands.
“Bronwyn, it’s us, your parents.”

Bronwyn nodded, and a sudden onslaught tears streamed down
her face as she was engulfed into the arms of the parents she had always longed
for.

*****

A basic tenet of mammalian biology is that unless coerced to
set foot on some sort of space vessel or winged transportation device, monkeys
don’t fly. So when Simon ripped himself away from the bike and launched himself
into the air, everyone thought he would come right back down. Instead, he
floated upwards through the now open face of the Clock and looked out over the
massive crowd that carefully shifted away from the Clock, slightly afraid of
it, but still wanting to be first one to see if something interesting were to
happen.

John gazed up at the floating robot and shook his head. “If
only Lake Oliphant hadn’t died so young. He would be the
great-great-great-grandfather of all modern technology. I think he’s my new
hero.”

But he was the only one who spoke. A roaring silence had
fallen. The crowd stood still, simply looking. Aunt Llewellyn gazed at him and
clutched Salve’s arm tightly until one tear began to trickle down her cheek.
Even Butler, as he balanced precariously on the edge of the Clock, stared
without making a sound.

Simon began to tell a story. His voice soared over the crowd
and sank down around them, spinning its yarn in a binding knot, sliding
slowly through their ears and into their minds and changing the things
they found there.

It wasn’t the story of Romis or Remilio, or the story of
Zebigular and Cerina. It wasn’t the story of Butler and Samson or of Rathead
and Stryker; it was the story of one life “…born and left to grow up without
parents and without friends to fulfill a destiny chosen for her by two groups
of mad rivals, who fought to the death time and time again with one goal in
mind: to keep fighting. It wasn’t to protect their families or to spread their
religion, it wasn’t to help the other side or even to acquire wealth and
prosperity for their own people—it was simply to fight. To fight for separation
of two communities which have forgotten their warriors who live here, forgotten
why they started fighting in the first place, and forgotten that they are
completely integrated and prospering beyond their wildest
dreams.
”

Simon’s black face looked eerie in the beam of light that
burned into the lightening sky.

Butler gazed at the strange apparition
which
floated above his head. Aunt Llewellyn sobbed.

“There is one thing that you should all know, told to me by
a man who is rapidly approaching death at this minute, laid up in his bed at
home in Southern Pomegranate City. This secret affects every single one of you.
Your lives, your purpose, your identity.”
A deep,
resounding hush fell over the already quiet crowd as everyone held their
breath.

“The Clock of Legend never worked.” A hundred and fifty
breaths exploded into the silence. “It was never set. It was never counting.
Indeed, Laertes’ bell would have never rung.”

*****

Salve now had the story of all stories. It was the
story of the death of a legend. The next day, after he had slept a bit, he
wrote a news article titled: “Pomegranate City Gangs Come to a Tentative
Peace.”

He took it to his old boss as a peace offering, but the
offering was rejected with the comment, “Don’t make up stories, boy! You have
to grow them, tend them, weed them, feed them—you can’t just stick a seed in
the ground and expect to have a potato!” Instead he received an assignment—the
missing girl.