Threshold Shift (12 page)

Roe
suddenly found herself laughing. “Paul, do you realise, you’ve
spent the last two days insulting me and threatening me, and this
never occurred to you? Why didn’t you just offer me a bribe in
the first place?”

The
Threshian swung himself smoothly into a sitting position. “So
you’ll let me go?”

Roe
continued to laugh. “No, but you have cheered me up.”

“Humans,”
Paul intoned. “I will kill you, Roe.”

Still
smiling, Roe stepped down from her stool. “Excuse me, Paul, I
just have to go and find that bucket.”

*

Jon
was sitting against the wall when Roe found him, his rifle aimed
lazily at the gap in the door. He smiled briefly when he saw her, but
it was a forced smile. Roe sat down beside him.

“You
should be downstairs,” he said without looking at her.

“I’ve
done my fair share, thank-you. It’s your turn.

“OK,”
he said, and began to struggle to his feet.

She
put her hand on his, stopping him. “Hey, I didn’t mean
it. What’s wrong? What did he do?”

“Well,”
Jon said. “He left, said he had some personal business to
attend to.”

Roe
frowned. “He just left?”

“Well,
first of all I told him that he wasn’t my father. I would never
consider him to be my father, and that my father was upstairs.”

“He
went upstairs?”

“Couldn’t
resist, I guess. I told him about the Jopo addiction. He didn’t
want to believe me.”

Roe
pursed her lips. “So now, he’s just gone? Did he even
take a communicator?”

“Do
we still have those?” Jon asked.

“Jon,”
she said. “He doesn’t have Espirnet.”

“Oh,
I think he’ll be back,” Jon said. “He just has to
work it out.”

“What
do you mean?”

Jon
turned to face her. “After my mother died, Dad was very angry.
Sometimes I thought he’d explode. Whenever that happened, he’d
head out, a man on a mission. The next day, the cells would have a
few extra lodgers.”

“You
think that’s happening now?”

Jon
nodded. “He may not be my father, but I know him.”

Roe
sighed, “as if we don’t have enough problems.” She
tried to stand, but found she was still holding his hand. She let go.

“You
want some food?” He asked, and gestured at the hole in the
door. “It’s dark outside, must be almost dinner time.”

“I
don’t feel hungry.”

“Me
neither,” he smiled. “Funny that.”

Roe
tried to reconcile the Jacob, Jon had described with the one she
knew, but drew a blank. “What was he like?” She asked.
“Before your mother...”

Jon’s
eyes became distant. “Like a child, he would play, he would
laugh. He was very fond of mounting tickle attacks.”

She
grinned, trying to imagine that Jacob Klein.

“Anyway,”
he said. “That man died a long time ago.”

She
watched Jon relax as he remembered, but the moment didn’t last
long. He sighed mournfully, and struggled to his feet.

“I’ve
decided to make us some dinner after all. Have you ever tasted my
spaghetti?”

She
shook her head. “Definitely not, is it a culinary masterpiece?”

“It
is,” he declared. “I’m the master of the
microwave.” He gripped her shoulder for a moment. “Keep
watch, Roe. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

She
peered up at him. “OK.”

He
nodded and then let go. She watched him disappear beyond the
staircase towards the kitchen, rifle slung over his shoulder. After
he was gone she found herself staring upward. Jacob was still there.
It was like she could feel him. The undertakers had been called and
very soon he would be taken away. Perhaps then, she could forget
about him. As for thee sim, he had been up there stood over the body.
She wondered how that had made him feel. What was going through his
head when he ran out the door?

Minutes
passed in silence. The danger beyond the doorway became remote,
unimportant. It was so quiet. An internal chime signalled a connect
request. Her father was trying to contact her. She accepted the
request.

A
grey bearded avatar appeared next to the hole in the door. He was
just as short as her, but considerably wider.

“Hi
Daddy,” she said.

“Roe,
you’re OK, I heard…”

“I’m
Fine, Daddy,” she smiled, knowing her own avatar would reflect
that expression to her father. “How are you?”

“Not
happy, my daughter continues to put herself in harm’s way.”

“It’s
my job.”

“Come
home, Roe, please.”

“You
have nothing to worry about, Daddy. In a few days Paul will be
collected by the Interplanetary agent and everything will get back to
normal.”

“Will
it, though? You don’t know Michael. You can barely remember the
uprising.”

“I
remember,” she said. There had been darkness, fear, a damp
cellar, Andy, water and some apples, buried alive.

“Look,
is the Marshal there?”

“No,
he’s not.”

“I
need to speak to him, I’ve noticed things.”

“Daddy,”
she said. “I’m the Senior Deputy, you can tell me.”

“Where
is he?” the avatar asked.

“Daddy,
Dad, tell me.”

The
avatar became pensive, turning from side to side as if he feared
being overheard, even on a secure Espirnet connection. “You
remember Corley’s farm?”

“He
was your old neighbour,” she said. “Michael bought that
farm when the old man passed away.”

“But
he never worked it,” Abe said. “I even use some of the
land on the eastern side. He’s never noticed.”

“So?”

“Threshians
have been arriving for the last few hours, literally pouring in,
fifty at least. I’ve seen them, Andy’s seen them.”

“He’s
going to work the farm then?”

The
avatar showed its teeth. “No, he doesn’t need that many
hands to work that land. Something is going on. The Marshal needs to
know.”

“I’ll
tell him,” she said, “as soon as I see him.”

“He
needs to be ready,” Abe declared. “I think things are
going to get bad. I’m going over there to take a look.”

“You’re
panicking, Daddy,” she said.

“You
don’t understand Threshians, Roe. Blood is blood, he won’t
let Paul go. You need to tell the Marshal what’s going on.”

“Don’t
do anything stupid, Dad.”

The
avatar smiled. “Just like your mother.” The connection
ended.

“Everything
all right?” Jon asked. He had appeared with a tray bearing two
steaming plates of spaghetti.

“My
father thinks the Threshians are massing at Corley’s farm.”

Jon
put the tray down beside her. “We need to contact the sim.”

“How?
He doesn’t have Espirnet. He doesn’t even have a
communicator,”

Jon
frowned, directing his gaze at the hole in the door. “It’s
happening all over again.”

Chapter
Eight

Jake
shivered as he walked slowly away from the Jailhouse down an almost
deserted Main Street. Night was beginning to fall and the thin grey
uniform he wore offered little protection against the cold. With a
glance back at the Jailhouse, he found himself entertaining the very
real intention of returning. It was the barred bedroom window on the
top floor that stopped him. The body contained in that room was one
of the reasons he had left the Jailhouse so abruptly. He would rather
not return until it was removed.

Jopo
H, he couldn’t believe it, how could Jacob Klein become
addicted to Jopo H? It was a killer drug that there was no coming
back from. How had his older self become so desperate? He felt
disgusted by the notion, and yet he was sure Jon had told the truth.
Even though the boy he remembered was gone, the man hadn’t
changed that much. Jacob had always been able to tell when Jon lied.
He had even let him get away with it sometimes, but not when it
mattered. The very thought of that pathetic man lying on the bed
enraged him. He didn’t want Jon to see him like this. He had
never wanted Jon to see him like this. He needed to walk it off,
maybe find some trouble to deal with, and stop being so damn cold.

A
lone Threshian stood in the doorway of a closed Butcher’s shop
dressed in a long black overcoat. It was the overcoat that caught
Jake’s attention. The Threshians disliked the cold even more
than he did.

“Evening,”
he said as he mounted the shop’s decking. “How are you,
tonight?”

The
Threshian regarded him grimly. Jake smiled in response, sensing there
were a few weapons hidden under that overcoat.

“I
am waiting for a friend,” the Threshian said, turning away.

Jake
leaned up against the wall beside him. “Me too.”

“I
would prefer to wait alone.”

“Me,
too,” Jake replied.

In an
instant the Threshian swivelled to face him, its long arm reaching
inside its jacket. Jake was faster, the gun he had collected from the
Jailhouse weapon’s cabinet was out of its holster and firing
before the alien had an opportunity to respond. Jake smiled as it
collapsed to the ground with a satisfying thud. He still had it.
Holstering his gun, he turned to face the Jailhouse. From the
butcher’s shop doorway he had a perfect view. Absently, he
kicked the body. So this had been the lookout. He searched it,
discovering a rifle and two pistols. He slung the Threshian’s
gun belt over his shoulder, and then had another thought. After all,
there wasn’t that much blood on the overcoat.

*

Considerably
warmer, Jake continued his march down Main Street. He had walked this
street so many times, it was easy enough to avoid line of sight from
all but the least obvious overhead sniper points. He almost dared
them to try, the bloodlust pumping strong. He was fast and he knew
it, faster and more accurate than any Threshian could hope to match.
Oh, how he could react. He felt energized, ready for anything, but as
he walked, no more Threshians came out to play.

He
found himself thinking about what he was, a sim, not a real man, just
a copy. He recalled being a copy before, being a copy countless
times. This time felt different. A sim didn’t have much
longevity. In a few months he would simply stop. He also felt that
something was missing, something innate, indescribable. He was Jacob
Klein, but not quite. The loss and not knowing what it was, made him
ache inside. He was only a couple of hours old, and he already knew
that whatever he was, it wasn’t enough.

As if
on cue, he was outside the undertakers, the familiar sign, ‘Kander
& Son’ still in blazing neon above the doorway. He walked
inside, and was pleasantly surprised to see old Christopher working
on a coffin. The skin on the old man’s face was more shrunken
than he remembered, the white mane reduced to a few wispy strands. He
had a funny feeling he knew whose coffin the old gentleman was
putting together.

“Hello
Christopher,” he greeted.

“Jacob!”
The old man said, dropping his tools into the casket. “But
you’re...”

“He
is,” Jake replied and motioned to the coffin. “Don’t
worry. You’re not wasting your time. I’m just the sim.”

Christopher
studied him with apprehension, walking around him, as if he could
spot the invisible joins.

“Don’t
get so worked up, Christopher,” Jake said.

The
old man returned to the casket. “I apologise, Marshal. With all
the trouble today we were waiting for a more surreptitious time to
collect the body.”

“Very
wise,” Jacob said. “But I haven’t come about that.”
He dropped the Threshian gun belt and rifle onto the table next to
the coffin. “I’ve created a little more work for you. The
Threshian who owns these items is waiting for you at Valentine’s
Butchers Shop.”

Christopher
tightened his collar involuntarily. “I’ll deal with it.”

“As
usual the Marshal’s office will pay…” Jake
stopped, “will pay, the going rate.”

Christopher
smiled, his teeth an unpleasant yellow.

Jake
motioned to the rifle and gun belt. “I’ll leave those
items with you,” He turned to leave. “Have a pleasant
evening, Christopher.”

"You
too, Marshal."

Jacob
felt like laughing. Even after ten years, Christopher was still
cleaning up his mess. Some things never changed.

*

Jake
walked towards the flashing green and red spaceship that hung over
The Colonial Captain. The music played loudly, the same old beat that
played every night, even after ten years. There were voices too,
slurred words, some shouting, all indistinct beneath the beat. He
ignored the Captain’s double doors, he didn’t feel like
drinking. In another time he would have gone in, searching for
arrests, ferreting out petty crimes. Drink always encouraged loose
talk. But the Jailhouse was a mess, the prisoner too important, the
situation too dangerous. He couldn’t afford it.

As he
passed by the doors, a bearded drunk was hurled through, head first,
into the street. By the old clothes the man wore, Jake guess he was a
miner, one who had already spent his entire month’s earnings.
It still seemed a little early for that sort of fun, but then again,
for some of the patrons, early was late. Only yesterday he and Lucas
would have rounded up the drunks and let them sleep it off in the
cells. But Lucas was gone; in fact, they had never really met at all.
The thought made his head swim. He tried to calm himself down. He was
still Jacob Klein.

The
Colonial Captain’s beat faded away behind him. Main Street
petered out, no more shops, no more homes, no more bars. He found
himself standing next to the white latticed three storey building
that comprised the recharge station and storage area, its many
docking bays filled with an array of electrocars and cycles. He
paused for a moment, noting the latest designs, the sleeker bodies,
contrasted by the older cars farmers had used for decades. Larson ore
had brought wealth to a few but not to all. Running his hand over one
of the electrocycles, he thought back to when such designs had been
all the rage on old Earth. Everything comes around again, he thought,
nothing is really new.