Harrison Squared (31 page)

Lub and Lydia, however, felt nothing. To them the scrimshaw were just engravings in tooth and baleen. Artifacts.

Then Lub handed Lydia a piece and she grunted as if she'd been punched.

“You found them,” I said.

She nodded. I leaned close and saw the gleam of tears in her eyes. The portrait was of a man and woman with Lydia's wide eyes and dark hair. They bore little resemblance to the graying, unmoving people lying in the living room of her uncle's house.

“They're alive,” I said. “I can feel them in there.”

“Don't say that,” she said. “I can't stand it if they're trapped in there.”

“At least they're somewhere, right?” Lub asked. “Some of these people don't have bodies to go back to.”

“And how do we do
that?
” Lydia asked. She turned on me. “You have any answers for that?”

“I don't,” I said. “For neither of us.”

She looked away, and then nodded. For a moment she'd forgotten that we were in the same situation now. Both of us were artificial orphans.

“So where do we store these?” Lub asked. “I've got room at the lighthouse.”

“We return them to the families,” Lydia said. “As best we can.”

That made sense. The portrait of my mother was hidden in my bedroom. I didn't want the police to seize it as evidence or something.

I squatted, balancing on one crutch, and picked up a portrait that I'd set aside. “I'll take care of this one.”

*   *   *

The door to the library was unlocked. The lights, hanging high above the shelves, were still on. Maybe they were always on. Inside, it was never day or night. It was always Library Time.

I stumped my way through the stacks, not bothering to call out the professor's name. I knew he was in here somewhere. Instead, I enjoyed the quiet, and the presence of these old tomes. Books were always waiting. Hoping, silently, that someone would take them from the shelf.

I turned a corner, and there was Professor Freytag. He was looking at a high shelf, frowning in concentration. I waited for him to notice me. When that didn't work, I quietly cleared my throat.

Even that sound made him jump. “Harrison!”

I was pleased he could remember my name. “How are you doing, Professor?”

“Terrible! And you?”

“I was just thinking, it's like the books are watching me, wanting me to pick them up, but they're too polite to ask.”

“Of course,” the professor said. “The best books are always reserved.”

I laughed. “Good one.”

He looked at me quizzically, then broke into a smile. “Oh! Yes! Ha ha!” He removed his glasses and wiped them with his handkerchief, clearing ethereal dust with ectoplasmic cloth. “You know, I used to love jokes. Made them all the time. At least I think so. And very recently I began to feel … lighter. More free.”

“The Scrimshander's dead,” I said.

“Oh, many men have thought so.”

“No. I saw him die.”

“Well then. Perhaps that's it. Still…”

“Still. You're looking.”

He gazed up at the shelves. “Oh, yes. I'm sure it's in here somewhere.”

“I was thinking. Maybe it's not a book.” He looked at me quizzically. I set my crutches against the shelf and took off my backpack. He watched as I unzipped the pack and took out a plate made of bone.

“I think this belongs to you,” I said.

He placed his glasses back on his nose and leaned over. “Oh,” he said. “Oh my.” It was a fine likeness. The Professor Freytag before me was exactly like his portrait. Unlike Lydia's parents, there was no living body to continue aging.

He turned away from me.

“Professor?”

“Just give me a moment.” He took off his glasses again and wiped at his eyes.

“I'm sorry if I upset you,” I said.

“Upset me?” He turned, and put on a smile. “My boy, you've delivered to me a pearl of great price.”

“Tell me what to do with it, Professor.”

“What do you mean?”

“How do I set you free? Do I smash it?”

“Oh, don't do that! There's no telling what the consequences could be!”

“Then what am I supposed to
do
?”

His expression softened. “Tell me what's happened,” he said.

“There are other portraits,” I said. “One's of my friend's parents. And there's one of my mother.”

“Ah. I see. Come, my boy. Sit down. Let's talk through the situation.”

I sat in the armchair I'd found him in on my second visit. He stood patiently as I talked, not even pacing. I told him everything that had happened out on the water, and everything I'd since remembered about my childhood.

“First of all, let me congratulate you,” he said. “Lesser men, upon seeing the things you have seen, might have gone mad. Oh, I've witnessed it myself. Two colleagues of mine glimpsed the mere
aspect
of a creature from another dimension and lost their heads. Both ended their lives in asylums. But you, my boy, seem to be remarkably sane.”

“I don't feel that way.”

“I understand. You've got one foot on the Other Side now.”

“I think I stepped across that line a long time ago,” I said. “I just didn't know it.”

“The Blood Pilot, yes. You were bitten as a child, and infected. But you survived. You've obviously developed a sensitivity to the Other Side.”

“Just tell me what to do,” I said. “How do I get my mother back?”

“I haven't the faintest idea.”

“I hate this!” I said. “
Magic
. The
supernatural
. Before Dunnsmouth, I thought the world was a rational place. I knew how things worked, and if I didn't know, I could figure them out with logic and a little research. I knew the difference between fact and fantasy. But since then I've made friends with an amphibian, fought an ancient serial killer, and faced down a god.”

“And talked to ghosts.”

“Exactly! None of this makes any sense! I want science back!”

Professor Freytag seemed amused. “When the supernatural turns out to be real, it's not
super
natural anymore—it's just nature. Yes, it may be strange, uncanny, or frightening. It's always scary to find out that the world is bigger and more complex than you thought. But that doesn't mean you
give up
. What if Galileo had given in to peer pressure? What if van Leeuwenhoek had thrown away his microscope when he discovered that there were tiny animals living in our bodies? And does anybody
really
understand quantum mechanics?

“But think of how much you've already learned about this ‘nonsensical' field. One: Consciousness can exist outside the body. I'm unliving proof!”

“Uh…”

“You see what I did there?”

“Comedy. Right.”

“Second: The Scrimshander has discovered a technology by which to transfer consciousness and store it in another medium.”

“Like a hard drive,” I said.

“I've never understood baseball metaphors,” he said.

“No, a hard drive is a—never mind. Go on.”

“Third: Technology can be
learned
. There must be a way to undo what has been done, and move the consciousness to its proper location. We only have to find the right instruction manual.” He nodded at his portrait, now lying on the floor. “In the meantime, let's find a place to hide that. On a low shelf, mind you, where I can see it. I'd forgotten how handsome I am.”

*   *   *

The day my mother was released from the hospital, Aunt Sel threw her a welcome home party. Amazingly, she did not have it catered from Uxton. “This is a Dunnsmouth affair,” she said. She cajoled Erik Hallgrimsson and his wife, Andrea, into providing fresh lobster, and Lydia made something called dagon chowder, which involved many ingredients I'd never heard of. Saleem made a dessert from an ancient recipe he'd learned as a child from his Persian mother: pineapple upside-down cake.

“Where are you from, again?” I asked.

“Minnesota.”

“Right.”

I was pretty sure Lub was lurking outside the house—we'd made plans to talk later that night—so I made a show of carrying the cake past the window.

We ate our meal in the living room, where Mom's high-tech hospital bed had been set up. Aunt Sel had thrown herself into the task of taking care of Mom, and Lydia had helped her create a daily calendar and care chart. After all, Lydia had the most experience of any of us in taking care of the victims of “the Dunnsmouth Disease.” Aunt Sel, though, promised the best care money could buy. A nurse was scheduled for every morning and night, a physical therapist would visit every other day, and a Reiki specialist would come every Thursday “to maintain energy flow.” We already had an appointment to drive Mom to see a high-powered neurologist in Boston. It was great to see Aunt Sel so focused on someone other than herself, but there was still something about the elaborate charts that made them a bit about Aunt Sel, too.

After supper, I started to clean up, but Aunt Sel told me my job was take care of the guest of honor. The others went to the kitchen. I hopped to my bedroom, retrieved my backpack, and sat next to Mom.

“I want to show you something,” I told her. I held up the scrimshaw. “See? Your body's all right. And
you're
all right. We just have to put you back together again.” I placed the scrimshaw on her chest, and placed her hand over it. Skin and bone were equally warm.

I'd have to come up with a story to explain the scrimshaw to Aunt Sel. And I'd have to somehow convince her that we absolutely had to stay in Dunnsmouth. Lydia would undoubtedly have some ideas. Maybe I could pit the women against each other.

“Don't worry,” I told Mom. “We're scientists. We can figure this out.”

EPILOGUE

The Toadmother lay upon her stone bed, breathing and thinking of food. She could tell by the stains on the floor that parts of her were still bleeding. When she moved, shards of wood and metal shifted painfully beneath her skin. The explosion of the
Albatross
had turned her into a pincushion. Her dress was
ruined
.

The swim back to the shore had been exhausting. To add insult to injury, when she'd reached her chambers, all the food buckets were empty, and her chambermaids were nowhere to be found. True, she'd told the girls to stay home until summoned, then had sealed the doors so that she could not be disturbed during the anticipated rituals—but that was before everything had gone wrong and her boys had abandoned her. She'd sent her eldest son to do a simple job—disable a boat, kill a few people, then swim back—and what had happened? He'd disappeared. Then, when she was almost killed herself, where had her youngest son gone? Davy Jones' Locker, probably. He'd died without even saying goodbye.

Oh, she was so hungry. She'd tried to remember the last time she'd gone this many days without a meal. The only way into her chambers that was still unsealed was the secret passage that led to the sea. She tried to remember if anyone except her sons knew about it. Probably not. That was the problem with secret passages.

If someone didn't find her soon, though, the consequences were dire. She'd have to get out of bed. She'd have to find food on her
own
. The thought exhausted her. How had everything gone so wrong? Hundreds of years of waiting, and now two failures within decades of each other, both brought on by the same family—the same
mixed-race
family! It defied explanation.

A scraping sound came from the direction of the secret tunnel. The chambermaids! The Toadmother pushed herself up to a sitting position.

“Where have you been!” she said. Her voice, now a dry croak, was still loud enough to set the air trembling.

A figure appeared at the tunnel entrance. The man was on all fours—though “all threes” might be more accurate, because one leg was bent at an odd angle and dragging behind.

It was her youngest son. The glossy black mass of the Blood Pilot rode upon his back. Its black tendrils roped around his lower jaw like reins and disappeared into his mouth.

Eston Montooth, principal of Dunnsmouth Secondary, had become the vessel.

“Come to my arms, my boy!” she cried.

Montooth crawled forward, then collapsed on his stomach, moaning. The Toadmother, with new energy, pulled herself from the bed to meet him at the center of the room.

“You brought it back!” she said. “Good job!”

He lifted his face. The Pilot had filled his mouth. It very well could have been breathing for him when he was in the water. It was the only explanation she could think of for his survival; until now Eston had never shown any talent for amphibiousness.

The black inside his mouth trembled. “THIS VESSEL IS NOT EMPTY.”

“Oh,” the Toadmother said. It had figured out how to speak. “We had someone else lined up for you, someone completely vacant.”

“IT FIGHTS ME.”

“My apologies,” she said. “Eston. Stop fighting the Blood Pilot.”

He moaned. His eyes were wide and pleading. Such a baby.

She reached past her son's head to touch the Pilot's oil-black skin. Her fingers sank in to the knuckles. She pulled back, and her fingers came free with a
bloop
.

“So,” she said. “When do we start building the gate?”

 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

D
ARYL
G
REGORY
was the 2009 winner of the IAFA William L. Crawford Fantasy Award for his first novel,
Pandemonium
. His second novel,
The Devil's Alphabet,
was nominated for the Philip K. Dick Award and was named one of the Best Books of 2009 by
Publishers Weekly
. His short fiction has appeared in
The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, Asimov's Science Fiction Magazine,
and
The Year's Best SF
. He also written comics for BOOM! Studios and IDW. You can sign up for email updates
here
.