Spanners - The Fountain of Youth (9 page)

“Go,” said Kalar.

“But we can’t—” said Porella.

“Go!” said Kalar. “I’ll find you later.”

Porella cried and then nodded.

“Your eyes are glowing again,” said Porella. “Bright orange.”

Porella kissed the glass, and then she and Dano disappeared into the night. Kalar felt sad, but soon smelled burning from behind her. She turned around and found that her bed sheets were smoldering! She ran over to get a blanket and then covered the bed. It took her a while to smother all the little embers, and when she did she heard the door behind her opening.

Kalar turned around to see Brother Bocephalus and Master Chergon’s second wife, a hag named Zorchina. Both of them were covered with pustules.

“We know it was you who burned the barn, Kalar,” said Brother Bocephalus. “You’re a witch. We’ve known this since the day you just
appeared here
, with no parents to speak of.”

“And we know you started this plague, child,” said Zorchina. “We wanted to kill you outright, but Master Chergon in his infinite wisdom has found another way out of this.”

Kalar’s jaw quivered; she didn’t know what to say.

“Master Chergon has been told by the Lord himself the way out of this plague,” said Brother Bocephalus. “The plague will be lifted if he marries you.”

“But—” said Kalar.

“This is the only way,” said Brother Bocephalus. “The Master is righteous and you are filth, and because of your filth he may not last another forty-eight hours. The only way he can cleanse both you and our land of this plague is if he marries
and
impregnates you tonight.”

/***/

Kalar stood by an altar hewn of native eucalyptus as they wheeled in Master Chergon. The old man was wearing an oxygen mask and seemed almost twice the size of Brother Bocephalus. He could no longer sit up, so they had bound two gurneys together and he laid there like a dying horse. Many of his boils had burst and new ones were growing to take their place; he smelled of rancid meat and Kalar couldn’t help but wince when he came in.

Master Chergon had a coughing fit and his oxygen mask steamed up. While his attendants rushed to him, Zorchina whispered into Kalar’s ear.

“Rest assured, love, we’ve given him some medication and he’ll be able to
perform
upon you,” said the old woman. “Do you catch my meaning?”

“No,” said Kalar.

“You’ll understand it tonight,” said Zorchina. “It’s your destiny.”

Brother Bocephalus got to the front of the room and snapped his fingers. The attendants wheeled Master Chergon around and assembled in formation to start the wedding. Kalar noticed that all the exits were closed, and many of the attendants had weapons.

“Brethren and sisters,” said Bocephalus. “We’re here to witness something miraculous this evening; the continuation of our Master’s legacy. In his magnanimity, he has agreed to bless one more of our daughters with his being, and through her our Master shall live again.”

Master Chergon coughed again, and this time his oxygen mask became speckled with blood. Zorchina nodded at Bocephalus
, and he put his hands on a gun by his hip before getting up to the pulpit again.

“We’ll make this short,” said Bocephalus. “Master Chergon, do you agree to take our daughter Kalar as one of your family, and
to lead her to holiness and the afterlife?”

Chergon turned his head to look at Kalar. He stared at her body for a moment and then smiled.

“Yes …” wheezed Chergon.

“And do you, Kalar, take Master Chergon as your one and only love for eternity?” asked Bocephalus.

Kalar froze; she didn’t know what to do. She couldn’t say yes, but she couldn’t say
no
either; she’d never disagreed with anyone in her life.
I wish to be far, far away from here; this is what I want
, thought Kalar,
and if I cannot leave, I wish to die.

The carpet around her began to smolder and some of the guests started to yell. Brother Bocephalus ran to a corner and got a fire extinguisher and then came back to put it out. Kalar looked around; many of the guards had their own fire extinguishers and approached the carpet, but Bocephalus bid them back and extinguished it himself. There were cries of
witch
, but Bocephalus calmed them down, coughed and then resumed his place at the pulpit.

“Our daughter Kalar has
strange and dark powers, but we have prepared for them,” said Bocephalus, still clutching his fire extinguisher. “And this is all the more reason she must be purified by our Master in perhaps his final act.”

Bocephalus nodded at a guard whose face was covered with burst pustules, now scabbed over. The guard took Kalar’s legs from under her, shoved her to the ground and held her arm behind her back. He then put a gun to her head.

“You have ten seconds to say ‘
I do
,’” said Bocephalus. “Otherwise we’ll cleanse you
our
way. Now, do you, Kalar, take Master Chergon as your one and only love for eternity?”

There’s no way out of this,
thought Kalar.
Perhaps I should just let the guard kill me. It will be better than—

Kalar heard a massive
BOOM!
and for a moment she thought the gun had gone off. Kalar wriggled out of the guard’s grip and then turned around to see that Master Chergon’s gurney had been tipped over. The old man was lying on the ground moaning, and it smelled like he had soiled himself. Kalar saw Bocephalus pointing his gun in horror, and then she looked around to see that he was facing a massive hole in the wall.

“Everybody calm!” said Bocephalus. “For though we’re being attacked, we have God’s prophet on our—”

There was a smaller
BOOM
, and a thin strip of air seemed to fold in upon itself for a moment. Bocephalus was pushed backwards into the altar behind him, knocking it over. Two men came through the door, both tall but one nearly two meters in height. The taller man was completely covered in dark blue clothing held together with heavy buttons. He wore thick, black gloves and had wrapped a set of wrought-iron shackles around his waist. He looked strange, but Kalar noticed that the strangest thing about him was his
mask
. It was like a welder’s mask, but it looked heavy, as if it contained machinery. The mask clicked and whirred, and it sounded to Kalar as if the mask’s inner gears were making the whirring, and he himself was making the clicking noises. The man made more strange clicking sounds, as if he were inspecting his surroundings, and a moment later another guard raised his weapon. In a flash, the masked man turned around and crossed his arms with great speed. There was another
BOOM,
and folded air emanated from his arms and traveled towards the guard, dislodged his weapon and blew him backwards into the wall.

The tall man’s comrade stood up. He wasn’t covered with a mask and would have been handsome save for the fact that it looked like he hadn’t slept or bathed in
weeks. His eyes were watery and had rims of blood at their edges, and his hair looked as if he had slicked it back using his own spit. His clothes were caked in dust, as if they had reached their utmost level of filth long ago, and his leather boots had more holes in them than actual leather. Kalar noticed that this grisly-looking man had a single pustule on his own neck, but seemed otherwise unaffected by the sickness.

“This island, this community, this entire place is an affront to humanity,” said the unbathed man. “And I have cleansed it. For those still healthy enough to walk, if you want to live,
depart this island and never come back. For the rest of you sinners, all we ask is that you give us this daughter and we’ll leave you alone to die in peace.”

There was a silence, and then a wheezing from Master Chergon. Brother Bocephalus knelt down and listened to Chergon’s words and then spoke.

“Did the Devil send you?” asked Bocephalus.

“No,” said the unbathed man. “The
Devil made me, but I’ve seen the error in my ways, and now I serve no one else but humanity.”

Master Chergon wheezed again and Brother Bocephalus spoke.

“He says that you shouldn’t be here,” said Bocephalus. “You’re interfering with our path to Heaven.”

The unbathed man knelt down in front of Chergon, poked one of Chergon’s pustules until it burst,
tasted the seepage and then nodded.

“I don’t know if the path to
Heaven exists,” said the man, “but if it does, it’s far, far away from this place.”

/***/

After a short boat ride, they got in a car that the unbathed man had procured. Kalar looked back and saw her island fade into the distance. It was the only world she had ever known, and now it was invisible. She started to frown, but the man stopped her.

“Don’t get all misty,” said the man. “You’re liable to start a fire.”

Kalar nodded and then smiled; she had prayed for a way out of her marriage to Chergon and someone, somewhere had answered.

“What name did they give you?” asked the man.

“Kalar,” she responded.

“That’s not your name,” he laughed. “I go by my spanner class name, so my name’s
Phage
. The tall, masked man in the back, his name’s Geryon. We’re brothers.”

Geryon made some small clicking sounds and then Phage breathed in deeply.

“We’re your brothers too,” he said, “but not like brothers on that island. Meaning same mom, same dad; we’re related.”

Kalar didn’t know what to say; how could this sick man and his mute friend be her brothers?

“Don’t get too overwhelmed,” said Phage. “We’ve got a long way to go, and some bad men are after us, men a lot smarter than Brother Bocephalus and company.”

Kalar couldn’t tell if these men were her actual brothers. Phage resembled her somewhat, but
he was smothered in dirt and could have looked like anyone on the island if she thought about it hard enough. She looked back and realized she might never figure out what Geryon looked like. The tall man sat in silence, shrouded in the darkness, his features and emotions completely obscured by his thick blue clothes and his opaque welder’s mask.

“Why did you rescue me?”

Phage smiled and then nodded at Geryon, who clicked in return.

“A favor to our other brother, and he’s your brother too,” said Phage. “A man named Adam Parr. A group led by Juan Ponce de León is after him, and you’re the one thing
that Adam cares about in this world. They won’t be able to get him, but they’ll find a way to get you and hold you hostage, that kind of thing. Adam helped me control my sickness a few years back, so I owe him a favor, and I’m bringing you to him.”

“Thank you,” said Kalar.

She paused a moment and then asked Phage a question.

“What’s my real name?” she asked.

Phage smiled at Geryon and then looked at her.

“Your name’s Phoe,” said Phage. “P-h-o-e
; rhymes with
tree.
”

A FATE WORSE THAN BURIAL

Adam slumped down in the chair of his living room an
d took a sip of his Louis XIII Cognac.
I’m not quite happy
, he thought with a slight smile,
but it does feel good to be home.

He took a shallow draft and let it sit on his tongue for a bit. He didn’t look at the bottle, but he remembered from the ta
ste where he had been when the cognac was made. He had been working this bottle’s vineyard and had probably plucked these grapes himself. It was a simple hundred-year-old bottle, nothing special, but Adam smiled again when he remembered that year,
that quiet year
. It wasn’t a great vintage for grapes; it had rained a bit too much, but it had been a good time for Adam, so he smiled. He had been chased out of Scotland Yard by some particularly nasty criminals, and like he always did when the heat got too high, he disappeared, and this time he had disappeared to the vineyards of France.

The work was taxing, but he enjoyed it. No one cared who he was or where he came from; they only cared that he brought in the grapes, and of that, they didn’t seem to care too deeply. All the vineyard required was that he be able to walk, lift and refrain from stealing anything.

Why did I ever leave those fields?
he wondered.
I could still be there today, anonymous and working amongst migrants.

Adam took another swig of the c
ognac and knew his regrets were mistaken; he couldn’t have stayed in the vineyards forever. He had too many enemies, both spanner and human, and he would have been hunted down sooner or later, dragged out of the quiet fields and buried in a ditch somewhere. Cities gave him the protection he needed, and though they moved too fast for him, they also gave him plenty of places to hide.

Adam poured himself a second glass
of cognac before noticing that his phone’s answering machine was blinking.

He went over to the phone and tried to figure out how to get the machine to play its message. He looked over it for a good
five minutes before working up the courage to push a button; he was paranoid about pressing the wrong thing and erasing the message.

Mayfly would always tease him about this.
“
Adam, I know you have a problem with new technology,”
Mayfly would say, “
but you’re the only one left who even HAS an answering machine, and it’s not that hard. You just press ‘play.’”

Adam pressed
play
with a shaking hand and heard Mayfly’s voice.

“Adam,” said Mayfly
on the answering machine. “I’m in prison, but I’ll get out soon, so don’t worry about me. I’m not going to join you on this quest; I just don’t have enough time, and I hope you’ll understand that.
But your gang is there for you, I’m sure of that, and as always, if you really get into a jam, I’ll find you. If I’m still alive, I’ll find you.”

Adam was disappointed that Mayfly wouldn’t help him, but there was nothing he could do. He’d have a team, but they weren’t as good as Mayfly.
I’ve never had a partner as good as him,
thought Adam,
not once in eight thousand years.

Adam checked his wall clock; it was midnight. He’d find Cattaga, Brogg and the Treys soon, but first he had to pay a visit to a spanner who probably knew a lot more about the current situation than anyone else did. He would know about Juan Ponce de León
’s motives, the Fountain and just about everything else. The spanner went by the nickname
Special Ed
, and he saw
everything
.

/***/

“This place you’re going is not safe, boss,” said the cab driver.

Adam guessed the cab driver was from Armenia, and judging by his accent and name probably from the city of Kapan, but Adam feigned ignorance in the interest of time.

“I know it’s not safe,” said Adam. “But a friend of mine works there.”

“He work
there
, this time?” asked the cab driver. “Guy like you no have friend in place like this, not working this time. Not safe, boss.”

“You’re right,” said Adam. “Just drop me close; I can pay you double fare, whatever. I just need you to take me there and then wait for us.”

“Then wait? Why?”

Because Ed’
s probably conning some guy out of his life savings and we’ll need a getaway car,
thought Adam
.

“My friend is handicapped and we’ll need a cab to get us out of there,” said Adam. “Drop me close; I’ll pay double fare.”

“I take you, drop you, wait and pick you up,” said the cab driver. “But I not need double pay. I need you not die, I need you not be killed.”

Maybe there’s hope for humanity after all,
thought Adam with a smile, making a mental note to pay the cab driver double anyway, perhaps triple.

/***/

They drove for a half hour and the neighborhoods got worse, and to soothe his nerves the cab driver turned on the AM radio.

“This radio bother you, boss?” asked the cab driver. “It’s
shock jock
. I like
shock jock
.”

“Leave it on,” said Adam. “I like it too.”

“
We got a caller from La Loche, a town way up in Northern Saskatchewan,
” said the DJ. “
And surprise, surprise, he says spanners are real.
”

“
They’re all around us,
” said the caller. “
A lot of them come up here, to Saskatchewan.
”

“
Why would beings with odd lifespans go to Saskatchewan, of all places?
”

“
I don’t know
,” said the caller. “
But some of ’em live up here like animals. They have strange powers, so they hunt moose with their bare hands.
”

The radio DJ laughed a bit, and then played a sound clip from an old movie where someone was saying “
You’re crazy!
” over and over again. The DJ settled down and then gained a serious tone.

“All right,
” said the DJ.
“Let’s ignore the fact that you just said spanners live in Saskatchewan and eat moose, because as we all know that’s ludicrous. I’ll ask you a question that I ask all the Bigfoot-hunters, ghost chasers and astral-energy looneys: If this truth is ‘all around us’ as you say, how come there hasn’t been one video, I mean ONE video of indisputable evidence of just ONE of these spanners doing something crazy, like getting shot and then surviving, shooting rainbows or doing whatever it is that they do?”

“
They hide
,” said the caller.

“
They hide
,” said the DJ, incredulous. “
But with all the video cameras now
,
you’d think one of them and their so-called powers would be documented.
”

“
They hide, and lately they’ve been disappearing
,” said the caller.

“
Disappearing?
” said the DJ. “
These spanners can disappear now?
”

“
No, disappearing, like being killed
,” said the caller. “
One of their own is taking them off the streets and killing them. He’s trying to take their powers in the hopes of taking over the world and—”

The cab driver turned the radio off with a click.

“Sorry for nonsense,” said the cab driver. “Lot of crazies out there.”

“Yeah,” said Adam. “There’s a lot of crazies out there.”

“Yes, yes,” said the cab driver. “We here. Now pick up your friend and I drive around. Be fast, hurry, or you be dead.”

/***/

Adam had to bribe the guard at the gate to get into the game, and after they patted him down, a man twice his size escorted him down to the main card room. The players turned around and scowled at Adam, but Ed vouched for him.

“He’s … a f-f-friend of m-
mine,” said Ed in a shaky voice.

The men snickered at Ed’s words, but Adam’s heart skipped a beat. He knew Ed was about to take all of their money; everyone underestimated
“Special” Ed, even other spanners.

Ed was a
slomo
-class spanner, so named because he lived his lifespan in extreme slow motion. His body couldn’t adjust to it, so to everyone else it looked and sounded like he had profound cerebral palsy. But in reality, Ed was
quick
. He noticed small differences in a person’s breathing and heard microchanges in their heartbeat. So he could tell when a person was lying, and he used his powers to make a killing in the underground poker circuit. Ed could even listen to differences in the sound of card swipes to deduce what card was going to be drawn next. Unfortunately for Ed, the main rooms caught on to the fact that he always won, and soon all they all barred him permanently. So now he played in the rough edges of town for smaller stakes.

And he’s still making a killing
, thought Adam as he looked at Ed’s chips,
but he’s playing with desperate men, men who will go hungry if they lose to him.

“Your call,” said the dealer. “Player three goes all in. What do you want?”

“I’m all i … in t-too,” said Ed.

Ed pushed his chips in.

“Flip ’em,” said the dealer.

The board had
ace, king, ace, and Ed’s opponent flipped over an ace-king hand. Ed flipped over a pair of threes, and the other man celebrated.

“Full house,
aces full of kings versus aces over threes,” said the dealer.

“Yeah! Yeaaaah!” said the guy playing Ed.

When the man jumped up, Adam noticed a bulge in the man’s pocket; he was carrying a switchblade.
This is about to take a turn for the worse,
thought Adam,
and we need an exit strategy.

The dealer burned a card and then turned over a three.

“Hell
no
, man,” said Ed’s opponent, half jokingly.

Adam put himself behind Ed’s opponent just slightly, and then looked for the door. There was a clear path, but Adam saw that one of the guards was young and eager to prove himself. Adam’s experience told him exactly what was going to happen. The player would pull a knife, tackle Ed, the guards would separate them, and the young guard would pull out his weapon and after a few moments, fire it. It wouldn’t hit Ed, but it would hit one of the other players, and then things would start to get messy.

The dealer burned another card, and then turned over another three.
Two threes in a row,
thought Adam,
less than a one-in-two-thousand chance, and Ed knows it.

“Four of a kind for Ed,” said the dealer, “beats
aces full of kings.”

The other players erupted in guffaws, catcalls and head shakes.

“Now
that’s
a bad beat,” said one, laughing.

But the guy who lost wasn’t laughing.

“You cheated,” said the loser.

“I … don’t cheat,” said Ed, pulling in his chips. “I see … everyth … th … thing.”

“No one goes all in hopin’ for two threes,” said the guy who lost. “Especially not some retarded motherfucker who can’t even keep his eyes uncrossed.”

There was a moment of silence, and then Ed resumed taking in his chips. The guy who lost pulled out his knife and lunged at Ed. Adam dove at the man, and then swung him around to protect himself against the guards who had all pulled out their guns. The young guard was particularly close to pulling his trigger, so Adam spoke up.

“Wait,” he said. “Please, don’t shoot. I’m talking especially to the kid in front of me, to my left.”

After a moment, one of the older guards nodded at the kid
, and the kid lowered his weapon.

“You got ten seconds to explain just what the fuck’s goin’ on, man,” said the main guard.

“Ed’s a good card player, and he’s incredibly good at reading people,” said Adam, not missing a beat. “I mean he’s really good. I’ve seen this before; he wins fair and square, and people get upset. I need him to help me with my own problem, something that has nothing to do with poker, and I want to buy him off of you. Let us go, and I’ll cover the losses completely, plus five hundred to the house.”

The guard wavered for a bit, and then looked at the guy who lost, who thought a moment and then nodded.

“Now, how much are you out?” asked Adam.

The guard counted the money.

“Three hundred and fifty dollars,” said the guard.

Ed used to play for a hundred times this much,
thought Adam as he pulled a wad of bills from his pocket and placed them on the table,
and one day he’s probably gonna get killed for less.