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Year's Best Body Horror 2017	C. P. Dunphey (ed)	[ "horror", "body horror", "short stories" ]	[]	Chapter 7	Something was definitely happening. It had been a week since the old woman had grabbed him and his penis had grown to four inches. Dylan laughed as he looked at the yellow tape measure. Had it been wishful thinking? Was he somehow measuring it wrong? Or had the old witch used some kind of magic to make it a normal size? He stood opposite his bathroom mirror and looked at his genitals. His flaccid, fleshy appendage hung over the testicles. Below the balls! It must have been over a thousand times that Dylan had stood opposite this mirror and something around the size of an acorn usually peered back at him, nestled on top of a wrinkly dark ball sack. But now what he saw was longer. It was definitely longer. The old woman had put a spell on him and his cock had grown. It was normal size. He was normal. Dylan stood to one side to view himself from a different angle. His dick still hung over his balls. His head lay back on his shoulders and he bellowed a loud, joyful laugh.
Year's Best Body Horror 2017	C. P. Dunphey (ed)	[ "horror", "body horror", "short stories" ]	[]	Chapter 8	The same night, Dylan lay naked on his bed, browsing the internet. He wanted to test his new-found confidence. Browsing the search engines, he came across listings for local escorts in the London area. He found a white woman. She was of large proportions and over fifty years old. She charged £40 per night for her "services." Dylan phoned the number and arranged to meet her in Tottenham at ten o'clock. He booked a local hotel, one of the budget ones where the workers look on with no judgement. "Sandra" was uglier in person than the pictures on her website suggested, but that was okay by Dylan. With his confidence fragile, he felt that he would start with someone who would be grateful of his company. He kept checking his penis every few minutes to make sure it hadn't shrunk back to its original tiny form, that the old woman's spell hadn't worn off. It hadn't. The sex with the prostitute was fast. Dylan was excited and didn't last long at all. But he left the hotel with a huge grin on his face. The woman must have seen thousands of penises in her working life and she had called Dylan a big boy. A big boy! Dylan couldn't believe it. He felt like a man for the first time in his life. He was no longer a virgin; a woman had seen his penis and not only thought it was acceptable but it was big. Of course, she might have said that to all the punters. And that was okay by Dylan, even if she did, the fact that she could say something to flatter him without it being sarcastic or ridiculous pleased him hugely. She had even bled slightly from his penetration. Dylan returned home and went to bed. He slept a dreamless sleep with a huge grin slapped on his face.
Year's Best Body Horror 2017	C. P. Dunphey (ed)	[ "horror", "body horror", "short stories" ]	[]	Chapter 9	The grin remained on his face when he woke. But that wasn't all. He looked down the bedsheets at his naked groin. His morning erection stared back at him. To Dylan it looked huge. He jumped out of his bed and went to the bathroom, grabbing the tape measure out of the cabinet drawer. When he measured his now flaccid penis, he gasped, putting his hand to his mouth. Six inches. It was still growing. Dylan punched the air and danced around his bathroom, his penis slapping against his thighs as he moved. He booked another prostitute, this time one slightly younger, in her late-thirties. She was pretty, blonde and slim with a pleasant face. The sex lasted longer this time and again the woman commented on his size. This time though, something happened to disturb him somewhat. The woman had bled again but appeared to suffer pain. "Sorry, it's too big and it felt like..." her words faded as she failed to complete her sentence. "Felt like what?" Dylan asked. "If felt like it jabbed me inside. Something sharp. Like a bite. It felt like something bit me."
Year's Best Body Horror 2017	C. P. Dunphey (ed)	[ "horror", "body horror", "short stories" ]	[]	Chapter 10	Dylan's penis continued to grow. Six inches became eight, eight became twelve and on the morning of 21 November, around three weeks after his encounter with the witch, it measured eighteen inches long. People at work had begun to notice the long bulge in his trousers. Dylan saw women giggle and wink as he walked past them in the work café. He was struggling keeping it tucked into his trousers. Its tip went well below the crotch of his trousers and he needed to constantly adjust its position, such was his discomfort. He had slept with two more prostitutes. Both had commented on his size and both had bled. The last one had cried out in pain and thrown him out angrily, telling him he was a monster, that he shouldn't be allowed near women. Dylan didn't care, if anything, the prostitute's words had boosted his ego. She was angry at him for the size of his penis. It was something he could not have imagined before. A woman sat opposite him as he ate his jacket potato. Dylan had seen her around. "Hi, I'm not sure we've met properly," she said. "I'm Debbie. I work in the Accounting Department." "Dylan. I work in Facilities. Nice to meet you." He smiled. Debbie was gorgeous. Long, blonde hair fell to her shoulders. Her smile was heavenly, displaying bright white teeth and sparkling blue eyes. "I was just wondering," Debbie said. "Would you like to go for a drink on Friday?" "Is there an office do, like? A work night out?" Debbie laughed. "No, don't be silly! Just me and you. I'm asking you out on a date, Dylan. Don't make me feel silly and have to ask you again." "Er. Yeah. Yeah of course. I'd love to."
Year's Best Body Horror 2017	C. P. Dunphey (ed)	[ "horror", "body horror", "short stories" ]	[]	Chapter 11	Dylan showered and dressed, spraying aftershave. His penis, now over twenty inches long, needed tucking into his jeans. He had been forced to buy baggier jeans to accommodate it. The growth had begun to worry him. What if Debbie wanted to have sex? He thought to himself. Will my cock keep growing? When will it stop? His confidence had grown in the past few weeks, at the same rate as the growth of his penis, but now for the first time he was beginning to feel fear. What would she say if she saw it? Would she be scared? He met her at the pub. Debbie was fantastic, full of fun. She was Oxford-educated and had a keen interest in Art. Dylan liked her immediately. After a few drinks he began to feel a stirring in his groin. Fear filled him again, worry that he would hurt her, anxiety that she would be shocked by what she saw. But all the feelings of worry were swept away by a desperate, burning desire from his groin. A feeling of utter emptiness that could be filled and satisfied by taking Debbie to bed. The stirring grew into an almost explosive excitement when Debbie looked at him with her bright blue eyes and said, "Shall we go back to yours?" They went to Dylan's flat and immediately began removing each other's clothes. Dylan ripped open Debbie's blouse, exposing her large, firm breasts. Debbie went straight for Dylan's trousers. He gulped as she pulled them down. Debbie gasped. "It's true. Oh, my God, it's true." She laughed and looked up at him. "What's true?" he asked. A large grin on Dylan's face betrayed his combined feelings of relief and delight. "They said they'd seen it... the bulge. Oh, my God, Dylan. It's absolutely huge. It's the biggest I've seen. How do you...?" Suddenly, Dylan's penis moved. It twitched upwards. "Oooh, it's a bit lively," she said, grinning as she took it in both of her hands. It moved again, snapping itself out of her hands like a whip. "Dylan what are you—" Her words were cut off as the long, fleshy penis thrust itself at her. Debbie held her hand to her face and then brought it away. Her face was full of blood. "What the fuck?" she yelled. But her words were soon cut off as Dylan's penis went forward again. It seemed to stretch into an even longer shape, elongating and bending. It wrapped around Debbie's neck. Dylan tried desperately to stop, pulling his hips away from Debbie's face and using his hands to pull it back. But it wouldn't move. It was thick, ropey and pulsating. Dylan had lost all feeling down there. It was as if his penis was completely independent from his body. He was powerless to stop it. Debbie gurgled as it tightened its grip around her throat. Her bright white eyes began to fill with blood. Blood also ran out of her nose, spurting out with each struggling, suffocated breath. Dylan began to cry. "Debbie, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." Debbie spluttered again and Dylan heard a popping sound. Her eyes were now bleeding and Debbie had defecated. The rancid smell filled the air. Debbie's lips turned blue, in contrast to her white, blotchy face. Dylan's penis loosened and Debbie's lifeless body fell to the floor. Dylan put his hand over his mouth and cried. Surely this was a nightmare from which he would wake any minute? He slapped himself hard in the face. This couldn't have happened. Surely it couldn't? He looked down at his flaccid penis, the end of which was resting on the cold wooden floor. He put his hand around it and picked it up, staring at the shiny end. "You bastard," he said. "You murdering bastard." Suddenly the end of his penis glimmered. The urethra opening was large, around the size of a coin. Dylan looked at the blackness contained within and felt like he was looking into death, the blackest soul from hell. Suddenly there was a flash of white. Were they teeth? He thought so. They flashed again. Tiny white, jagged triangles in two circular rows were contained within the hole at the tip of his penis. He put his hands around it and squeezed. Maybe he could kill it. Maybe he could strangle it just like it had strangled Debbie in front of his eyes. Suddenly his penis darted forward and he felt a sharp pain in his right hand. It had bitten him. A fast trickle of blood fell from the wound. His own penis had bitten him on the hand. But this wasn't his own penis. Not anymore.
Year's Best Body Horror 2017	C. P. Dunphey (ed)	[ "horror", "body horror", "short stories" ]	[]	Chapter 12	Dylan put Debbie's body in a large holdall that usually held his Christmas Tree and dragged it to the woods. At two in the morning, it was unlikely that anyone would see him, but he had a cover story sorted all the same. He was carrying an old Christmas tree ready to make way for a new one. He worked nightshift and only had the middle of the night to do so. To make the story stand up against any possible police checks, he put branches of the tree around Debbie's body, which was covered in bin liners. In the woods, he dug a shallow grave in the most remote area, right in the middle. It took him forty-five minutes to walk there and a further hour to dig. There was a creepy atmosphere in the dead of night, with the tree branches rustling in the breeze and several nocturnal animals scurrying, calling, crying, and squeaking. He pushed Debbie's body into the grave and re-covered it with loose dirt. He looked down to his dirty jeans and caught sight of the huge, long bulge down his right trouser leg. Has it got even bigger since Debbie's death? he thought to himself. What is happening to me? When will this end? He cursed his penis. He cursed his former self for making his penis the cause of all his problems. And he cursed the old witch for putting this terrible spell on him. Suddenly, Dylan had a thought. The witch was in these woods! He threw down his spade and ran farther into the dark woods. He ran without direction for an hour, tripped over old stumps and caught sharp branches across his body, the trees overlooking him like eerie, dark pillars, judging him and tracking him. Suddenly he came across a small white caravan, partly hidden under a dead, fallen tree. The caravan was dirty and old, muddy handprints were stamped all over its battered façade. Dylan ran to the caravan and hammered his fists on the door. "Come out! Come out, you old witch! What did you do, gypsy? What the fuck did you do to me?" Suddenly the door swung open. A woman came out. She was young and beautiful. Long dark hair seemed to move and twirl of its own accord around her shoulders. Her skin was milky white and she was dressed in a bright red ballgown. The dress was strapless, exposing her perfect shoulders. Her lips were full and luscious and her eyes sang of beauty. "You were looking for me?" she said. "No. I was looking for... the witch." "The witch! Ha! I take many forms, Dylan Turner." "It was you." She raised her delicate hand and moved her fingers lightly. Dylan looked down. He felt a stirring in his trousers. Suddenly his penis broke free and pushed its own way out of his jeans. He looked at the incredible sight in front of him. As the woman moved her hand, the penis was moving with it. She was controlling it. She snapped her fingers and the penis turned to Dylan, snapping at him with its awful ring of teeth. She clicked her fingers again and it fell back to his jeans limply. Still in terrible awe, Dylan tucked it back into his jeans. His mouth gaped open and he began to shake his head. "But... why?" "Why? No particular reason. I could see your pain, Dylan. Your stupid egotistical pain. It was running your entire life, heaping misery on you. I wanted to show you. To teach you a lesson. And it was fun. I enjoyed watching you. First the glee, then the ego, then the misery. Tell me, Dylan, what have you learned?" "You're fucking evil! You're a psycho! I want to take it back! I want to go back." The witch released a horrible cackle, the same one she had bellowed all those weeks ago. Suddenly her eyes brightened, the whites became larger and the pupils burned into a red fire. Her hair became grey and matted, with bald patches appearing all over her head. The gown fell from her body completely, revealing a bony, haggard torso, completely naked. Her breasts shrivelled and her skin sagged. The woman's nose grew into a hook and large warts appeared on her face. She raised a bony finger and pointed it towards Dylan. "Go! You Go! The shame will return! The shame. The shame!" She cackled again, a sound that echoed across the desolate woods, rattling through Dylan's head and reverberating across his entire body. Dylan fled.
Year's Best Body Horror 2017	C. P. Dunphey (ed)	[ "horror", "body horror", "short stories" ]	[]	Chapter 13	The following morning, Dylan was awakened by a knock at the door. It was the police. "I'm Detective Inspector Dewsbury. I'd like to ask you a few questions about Debbie Field. A colleague of yours. I understand you went for a drink with her last night?" "Yes," Dylan replied. "Unfortunately, Miss Field's body was found in the woods in the early hours of this morning." It didn't take Dylan long to confess. A witness had seen him dragging the bag across the woods. A dog walker had discovered the body when his German Shepherd had decided to dig the fresh earth, finding the large holdall buried below. Dylan had left the spade next to the grave. There was no escaping. He told the police everything. About the witch, the large penis, the growth. He even stood to undo his trousers to prove his story, which the Detective forcefully stopped him. Dylan was arrested without bail and placed in a cell while a thorough investigation was carried out. Alone in the middle of the night, he sat in his cell and cried, with his head in his hands. How could everything have taken such a bad turn? He felt a sudden stirring in his groin and his penis burst out of his jeans, ripping the material around his button fly in the process. The penis hovered at his eyeline and its two rows of circular teeth glowed in the dim light of the prison cell. He looked at it with dismal resignation. "You bastard. You've ruined my life." The penis looked back at him, the sharp teeth gleaming. Was it smiling at him? Mocking him? He put his hands up to grab it. He had nothing to lose. He was going to strangle the bastard, even if he took himself with it. The penis escaped his hands with ease, like a snake slithering out of its handler's grasp. It quickly wrapped itself around his neck. Dylan began to choke and splutter, his eyes filling up with blood. His bowels opened and his body slumped against the cell wall. He was dead.
Year's Best Body Horror 2017	C. P. Dunphey (ed)	[ "horror", "body horror", "short stories" ]	[]	Chapter 14	"Another one this morning," said Greg as he walked along the prison halls, talking to his colleague John. He swung his jailer keys around his fingers rhythmically. "Never get used to the suicides." "Yep. Goes with the territory I suppose," John replied. They stopped opposite Dylan's cell. His pale, lifeless body hung in front of them as other officers took photographs and surveyed the scene. Thin, tangled bedsheets were wrapped around Dylan's neck as he hung stiffly from the light fixture on the ceiling. "Funny one this one, though. You've got to laugh." "Really?' Greg asked. "What did he do?" "Strangled his girlfriend. Not an uncommon one, gotta admit. But it was what he said to deny it which was bizarre. He said that his dick killed her. Jumped right out his pants and wrapped itself round her neck. He said a witch's curse made it grow to a massive length and then it killed her." Greg laughed. "Aw that's a good one. I mean, I feel bad for laughing but that is a good one. First time I've heard that one. It wasn't me governor, it was my tallywhacker that done it!" They both laughed loudly. Gregg laughed until his face went red and he had to bend down and regain his breath. "But that wasn't even the funniest thing," John said. "Wait till you hear this. We gave him a medical when he came in. He stripped off, you know, the usual routine." Greg nodded. "But when we checked him, his dick... it was the smallest one I'd ever seen. About the size of a baby prawn. That dick couldn't wrap itself round an ant's neck never mind a woman's!" They roared with laughter. ⁂ [ NATURAL GROWTH by M. B. Vujačić ] "So, Mrs. Shane," Dr. Kramer said, leaning back in his chair, "I've been told you're interested in the Natural Growth Program." Sarah straightened in her chair. "Umm, yeah," she said, and gave a tiny grin, her eyes sweeping across his office. It was all wood and leather and earth tones, the walls adorned with dozens of framed awards, diplomas, and certificates. Kramer watched her from behind an ornate desk. He was a small, clean-shaven, fifty-but-looking-forty type, clad in a business suit and a hundred-dollar haircut. She licked her lips. "Sorry, ah, I'm kinda excited." The doctor smiled. Greg chuckled and gently squeezed her hand. "It's okay, honey." He looked at the doctor. "We found an article about it on the internet. It sounded great, so we decided to give it a shot." Kramer gave a slow nod. "A good choice. Natural Growth Program is not as swift as the traditional method, but I think you'll find the final result well worth the wait." He opened a drawer and took out the largest, thickest brochure Sarah had ever seen. He leafed through it until he found a page showing the side view of a woman's breast, with five pink Xs marked around the areolas. "The hormones are introduced directly into the fatty tissue and the mammary glands. The procedure is performed wholly via infusions," he tapped the Xs with a pen, "with no more discomfort than what would be experienced during, for instance, a blood donation. The procedure consists of five major infusions spread over three months. The patient is closely monitored during this period to ensure everything goes well. The risk of scarring, rupturing, or infection is minimal, and there's no need for additional interventions." Kramer turned the page. The next two pages displayed six photographs of a woman's naked torso. On the topmost photo, the one with Before written under it, the breasts were little more than nipples on a flat chest. The second picture showed the same nipples perched atop strong A cups. Week One was printed beneath it. The third, marked Week Four, displayed large Bs. "And the best thing? They are all yours." He spread his arms. "We implant no outside agents like silicone. We merely give your body a nudge and it takes care of the rest on its own." Sarah barely heard him. She stared at the sixth photo, the one with Week Twelve written under it. It showed the kind of gravity-defying Ds that not only didn't sag, but also looked completely natural. The only time she'd seen their like outside of TV was in high school. They belonged to one Mona Jackson, an unassuming girl whom everyone liked but nobody invited to parties because she commanded the attention of every guy in the room. "Honey? You with us?" Sarah blinked, looked at Greg. "Oh. Yeah. I was just, umm..." Kramer smiled, offering her the brochure. "Please, take a look. The available sizes are listed at the back." Sarah leafed through it. There were more photos of successful procedures, not all of them ending with Mona Jackson-size Ds. Some women had stopped at Bs or small Cs, while one had had her already-strong Cs grown into Fs so bulky they bordered on vulgar. Greg ran his hand over his mouth. "I gotta ask, doc, how is this so cheap? I mean, it costs less than implants at some clinics. I thought you guys would want to milk it while it's still new." "Actually, that is precisely why it's so affordable," Kramer said. "The public tends to mistrust new medical procedures. Since we do not yet have the funding necessary to hire a famous actress or a model for promotion, we feel it's crucial to keep our prices as reasonable as possible." "But it's all safe, right?" "As with every procedure, some small complications may arise, but I assure you we're equipped to deal with them. We don't have a single unsatisfied customer and we intend to keep it that way." He looked at Sarah. "So, Mrs. Shane, do you prefer any size in particular? You do not have to decide right away, of cour—" "D cups," she said, grinning so hard the corners of her mouth itched. "I want D cups." "So what do you think?" Sarah said. Greg smiled. "I still don't get why you wanted them so much. You were perfect just the way you were." He looked her up and down for the hundredth time in the last minute. "Not that I'm complaining." "But they're lovely, aren't they?" Sarah said. She stood in front of the bathroom mirror, naked above the waist, holding one of her breasts. It felt warm and heavy, and it could barely fit in her hand. She couldn't have kept the grin from her face if she tried. "They're awesome, baby." Sarah's grin widened. "How much longer is it going to take?" "Eight weeks," she said. Round white patches, no bigger than shirt buttons, were glued to her breasts, three under each nipple, covering the spots where the syringes had punctured the skin. "Two more infusions." "I read about those things they experimented on to make the hormones," Greg said, leaning against the washing machine. "Did you know they can lay, like, a million and a half eggs? Maybe you'll start laying eggs, too." "If that's how it went, we'd all have tails by now from all those rats they use in labs." Greg hugged her from behind and kissed her neck. "I just want you to know, I married you because I love you, and that's not gonna change. Not even if you grow a tail." She giggled. His hands slid up her belly and cupped her breasts. "They're so warm," he said. After a moment he made a puzzled face, then pressed his ear against her left breast. "Oh, weird." "What?" "It's like I can hear two heartbeats. One's faster than the other." He put his ear to the other breast. "Same here." "What does that mean?" "Nothing. There's probably a vein there and I'm hearing both its pulse and your heartbeat." "You sure?" Greg shrugged. "What else could it be?" That night, Sarah had the first of what she'd come to think of as her baby dreams. In it, she walked on a seabed, lost in an aquatic landscape. Everywhere she looked she saw corals sticking to underwater reefs, jellies swimming in great swarms, and roe clusters hidden within forests of algae, but none of that fascinated her nearly as much as the two babies in her arms. She couldn't tell if they were boys or girls, and didn't care. They stared at her with bright blue eyes, same as her own, their lips mouthing a single word repetitively—mama, mama, mama. They asked her to promise she'd do something for them and, seeing no harm in it, Sarah gave her word. By the time she finally woke up, her pillow was wet with perspiration and for a few moments afterward everything smelled of brine and rotten clams. Worst of all, her breasts itched. She tried scratching them, but the itch went too deep. It kept her up all night and didn't pass until noon. Sarah mentioned the itch to doctor Kramer during the weekly examination. He told her not to worry, it was likely just a side effect of her skin stretching to accommodate her growing breasts. She left without telling him about the twin heartbeats, as that was something the babies had asked her not to do. Sarah didn't understand why she felt the need to keep a promise she'd made to a pair of imaginary infants, but there it was. Oh well, she could always tell him next week. "Oh, honey," Greg muttered, "oh, baby." He lay on top of Sarah with his face buried between her breasts. His tie hung loose around his neck, his shirt unbuttoned, his lips purple from all the wine he'd drank. "I love you so much," he said into her flesh. "Ow, you pinched me." "I'm sorry, baby, I'm sorry," Greg said through a mouthful of nipple. "God, I love you." Sarah giggled and ran her fingers through his hair. They'd just returned from a party at the factoring firm Greg worked at. It was an annual charity thing, held every year so his boss could show off to the investors. Although just a financial analyst, Greg had to attend and drop a little something into the charity box, and boy, oh boy did he hold a strong opinion about that. But not this year. Sarah had read somewhere that the difference between a regular woman and a great one was that the great woman knew how to make her man feel powerful. She wore an unassuming black dress to the party, the kind you could wear to a funeral without being called disrespectful, but even so she made Greg feel very powerful indeed. He absolutely enjoyed how everyone—well, his boss, mainly—watched him with a mixture of envy and respect. He constantly smiled and laughed and cracked jokes, telling his bachelor colleagues a good wife was worth more than a thousand harems. Sarah thought about her mother and sisters, and how they never noticed the way everyone—not just men—ogled them when they weren't looking. But she did. Skinny little Sarah, the one daughter in the family who never shared her bras with her sisters because they were too small for them. She'd always wondered what it felt like to draw such attention. Well, now she knew, and it gave her an unconscious smirk that stuck to her face like a tick. "I love you, I love you, I love you," Greg said as he entered her. "God, how much I love you." The sex was short and sweet, and ended with Greg falling asleep with half his body still on top of a satisfied Sarah, his hand laid over one breast. She let him sleep like that for a while, feeling way too mellowed to get up just yet. Eventually, the heaviness in her eyelids became too much and she went to the bathroom to remove the remnants of her makeup. Sarah was standing in front of the mirror, wiping her face with a moist towel, when something moved inside her right breast. It was just a slight shift, but it produced a lance of pain so sharp it made her stagger and fall on the toilet seat with enough force to leave a bruise. Second one this week, Sarah thought after the pain abated, and it's only Friday. Doctor Kramer had warned her rapid movements might cause a nerve to be pulled or skin to be stretched, but it had been six weeks since she'd finished the Natural Growth procedure, and these spasms still happened. As for the babies, Sarah dreamed about them every night now. She'd fall asleep and find herself drifting in the murky depths, the twins side-by-side in her arms. She'd look at their blue eyes and hear them call her mama, and it'd disarm her so thoroughly she'd be unable to deny any of their requests. One of the things they made her promise she'd keep to herself was the odd heaviness in her new breasts. Not only did they seem to weigh ten pounds each, if you squeezed them hard enough you'd come upon bone-hard matter. As if she carried rocks inside, hidden under all the soft flesh. Also, something had begun to drip from her nipples. Sarah didn't notice it until five weeks after the therapy was over, when one morning she discovered brown smudges on the insides of her bras. At first she thought they were sweat stains. Then she washed them and realized they wouldn't come out no matter how hard she scrubbed. The babies begged her not to tell anyone about this and, though it worried her, Sarah just couldn't say no. Not long after, she woke up to find brown stains on the inside of her nightgown. By the end of the week, her breasts were oozing brown liquid every night. Just a trickle, but it frustrated her to no end, doubly so once she realized how much it reeked. You couldn't smell it unless it was right under your nose, but it was there—a stale, salty odor reminiscent of filthy seawater and rocks slimy with algae. It embarrassed her so much she decided she'd tell doctor Kramer about it during the next examination, and to hell with the dream babies. In the meantime, she washed her breasts as many as five or six times a day. Greg never noticed anything wrong. Sarah washed them again before returning to bed. She donned an old black t-shirt—that's what she slept in these days, to keep from ruining any more nightgowns—and snuggled next to Greg. He snored in big raspy wheezes, like he was coming down with the flu, so she gave him a nudge and he stopped. Sarah closed her eyes, yawning, and— —and opened them to find the room flooded. The bed, the lamp, the night table, it all floated in what had to be at least two feet of water. Moonlight shone in through the window, but instead of blue it painted everything green. The babies sat at the edge of the bed, staring at her, muttering: Mama, mama, mama. Sarah looked at them. "What is this? What are you—" Something bumped the underside of the bed, right beneath where she was lying. She looked over the edge and saw long insect legs squirming just under the water's surface. They were covered in a jagged carapace, like that of a lobster. "Oh God! Greg!" Sarah grabbed his shoulder and shook it, but there was no strength in her arms. "Jesus, Greg, wake up!" The bed rocked, and then one of the insect-legs burst from the water and clamped its pincer on Greg's arm. Sarah shrieked and tried to push it away, but another one splashed out and bit into Sarah's thigh and she started screaming screaming, SCREAMING and— —and then it was day and she was in her bed, facing the ceiling. Greg still lay there, asleep, his back turned to her. Her pillow was soaked, her hair sticking to her forehead, her breasts so sore the slightest touch made her wince. She shut her eyes and slowly pulled her shirt over her head. "No," Sarah shrieked. "No, no, no!" Black veins crisscrossed her breasts, branching out from her nipples and reaching all the way to her collarbone. They looked painfully swollen, as if the slightest bump might cause them to burst in a spray of black goo. "Greg," Sarah said, crying. "Greg! Greg, wake up! Help me!" He didn't move. She dug her nails into his shoulder and shook it. "Greg, please!" He still didn't move. Screaming, "Waaaake uuuupppp," Sarah grabbed him with both hands and yanked, rolling him over. His eyes were already open. They stared straight ahead, glazed and empty like the eyes of a mounted animal. His mouth brimmed with brownish-red foam. It spilled over his lip, sticking to one pale cheek. It reminded her of a dead slug. Sarah saw the light. It was a big white circle, with six little glowing circles inside it, like the wheel of a revolver. People, all of them dressed in surgical masks, medical caps, rubber gloves, and what appeared to be raincoats, all of it turquoise, stood around it, staring down at her. Machines, attached to her via a series of tubes, loomed within arm's reach of the bed, beeping and blinking. She was naked but for a turquoise medical cap and a pair of white panties the nurses had given her. A nurse placed an oxygen mask on Sarah's mouth, and told her to count down from ten. Sarah tried, but her thoughts kept returning to the day she'd found Greg dead in their bed. The first thing she'd done was call 911. Driving to doctor Kramer's clinic was the second. When the woman at the reception asked her if she had an appointment, Sarah simply raised her shirt. Ten minutes later, while Kramer was holding an ultrasound stick against Sarah's left breast, the attending nurse gasped and said: "Oh my God, are those legs?" Doctor Kramer gave the nurse a withering look, then gestured at Sarah with his free hand, waving it up and down as if to tell her to stay put. "Legs?" Sarah said. "What legs?" "Set Mrs. Shane up for an MRI," he told the nurse. He sounded as calm as ever, but his face had gone ashen and his Adam's apple kept twitching. "Full chest scan. The standard tests, as well." "What legs is she talking about." Kramer took a deep breath, exhaled slowly. "It, ah, it appears your mammary glands didn't react to the therapy as we intended. I... We need to do more tests to—" "Jesus Christ, what legs is she talking about?!" His mouth became a slit. He turned the ultrasound screen toward her and pointed at half a dozen segmented lines sprouting from and curving around a dark smudge. "That doesn't look like a leg." "I'm afraid it does." "No, it doesn't. Where's the knee? Or the foot?" "A moment." He took his cellphone, tapped its screen for a few seconds, then showed it to her. It displayed a photograph of an Asian man holding the largest bug Sarah had ever seen. Its armored body was bigger than the man's head, each of its six limbs five or six feet long. Its front limbs had pincers that looked vicious enough to shear an arm off. "This is a Japanese Spider Crab," Kramer said. "Look at its legs. Then look here." He indicated the ultrasound screen. "What do you... Oh... Oh my God." His forehead glistened with a thin film of perspiration. "I... I don't know how this could happen, but we will—" "Are they alive?" "No. Not truly. I can't tell for sure without additional tests, but I'd say they're equivalent to benign tumors." "Tumors? You gave me cancer?" "Uh, forgive me, poor choice of words. Parasites would be a better comparison. They live off your body's resources, but they're not a part of it. The excretions you experienced, the ones that poisoned your husband, they—" "Poisoned? They fucking killed him," Sarah said. "No, you killed him. Your goddamn therapy did. And now you're telling me I have fucking cancer?" Kramer swallowed. "I assure you, I understand your anger and I'm deeply shaken by all this. But we must act quickly if we're to prevent these parasites from doing more harm. Chances are, we'll have to operate." "With... Am I gonna be fine?" Even now, lying under the surgical lamps days after that ultrasound, Sarah still hated herself for asking that question. She couldn't shake the feeling Greg's death was her fault, that she had no right to worry about herself when he lay cold because of her. If she hadn't been so goddamn picky and just gotten silicone implants like everyone else, he'd still be alive. His birthday was supposed to be in two weeks, Sarah thought as the six lights merged into a yellow blur. I was going to buy him a gold tie clasp. For a while afterward, Sarah saw nothing but blackness. Then she heard a noise. It came and went, a soft whoosh, vaguely familiar. She eventually placed it. Waves breaking against a beach... Or against a ship. Sarah could hear other sounds now: the hiss of sand drifting up then slowly settling back on the seabed, the click-clack of a rock bouncing down an underwater reef, the gurgle of air exhaled from a lung, and far above, the waves crashing. She was naked, her hair algae, her belly huge and swollen and covered in black veins. Everything glowed with a trembling green light. The babies swam up to her. Their skin was brown and spiny, their blue eyes bigger than their mouths. They hugged her belly, showering it with kisses. One of them drifted away, crying and begging Sarah not to let it go. She heard screams in the darkness. They were close, but muffled, as if her ears were stuffed with cloth. Her vision twisted at the corners. The babies' faces grew distant and vague, and so did the crash of the waves and even the sight of her own warped body. Soon all was blackness again, but now the screams grew louder. They stabbed at her skull, filling the space behind her eyes with ground glass. She could see the lights now, all six of them. Only now there were scarlet stains on two of the lamps. The slow, rhythmical beeping of the machines had given way to what sounded almost like a klaxon. She tried to sit up and ask where all the doctors had gone, but her body ignored her commands. She could think, hear, even move her eyes, but aside from that she was paralyzed. Oh, please God, no, Sarah thought, don't let me die. God must've felt merciful that day. She sensed a coldness at her back and an uncomfortable tugging at her chest, but at least there was no pain. Something clattered on her left. Sarah turned her eyes, trying to see. The doors stood wide open and people were shouting for help in the hallway beyond. A table lay overturned, the saws and scalpels scattered on the floor. Kramer lay next to it, his head bent at a grotesque angle, the lower half of his face a red ruin. Sarah felt more tugging at her midriff. She rolled her eyes down as far as they'd go... And realized God hadn't been merciful after all. The thing on her belly was as big as a fist. Its pincers, caked with Kramer's blood, tore at her remaining breast, trying to free its sibling. Then, as if sensing her gaze, it backed up and turned to look at her, its chitinous legs dancing over her skin like skeletal fingers. It had a round face with a tiny pug nose and bright blue eyes, same as her own. It inclined its head, its mouth working, and uttered a single squeaky word: "Maaa-maaa." Despite the anesthesia, Sarah began to scream. Millions, Mrs. Shane. Tens of millions. That's what every lawyer who'd contacted Sarah during the nine months after the operation had told her. She could sue the clinic, hell, she could sue the entire medical system, for tens of millions of dollars, and that was just for the emotional damage. What she'd been through was awful, no question about it, but that was all the more reason to demand compensation. Sarah supposed it was, but she still never called them back. She spent most of her time in front of the bathroom mirror, naked but for her slippers. She couldn't help comparing herself to a waterlogged corpse, with her pallid complexion and her damp skin, the two ragged scars that had replaced her breasts standing on her chest like botched skin-grafts. Sarah returned to the living room and collapsed onto the couch. The apartment stank of brine and sweat, and the shadows seemed as deep as those in underwater caves. She didn't leave the house much anymore, nor did she talk to her family except on the phone. Not for some time now. The crab-thing had almost managed to free its brother or sister or whatever it was from her remaining breast by the time the security guards had arrived. It charged them the moment they entered the room. They opened fire and—although inaccurate enough to graze Sarah's arm and destroy a fortune in medical equipment—one of them managed to put a bullet in the thing's face. Its sibling lived only seconds longer. Tens of millions of dollars, Mrs. Shane. We could ask for that in a settlement, and they'd count themselves lucky. That's enough to ensure an extravagant life for yourself and your family, not to mention whatever children you may one day have. "Somehow, I doubt that," Sarah said to the empty room, and looked at her belly. It was so swollen she couldn't rest her arms on it without having them slide off. Its surface was rough and uneven and covered with thick black veins, the skin as craggy as if there were a thousand little knots just under its surface. Knots? she thought. Nah, not knots. Eggs. The doctors who had treated her after the surgery made her promise she'd notify them if something, anything, about her body felt or looked the slightest bit odd. Sarah wanted to be as good as her word. She really did. But she couldn't, because she had other promises to keep, promises made to the new blue-eyed babies in her dreams. Sarah didn't know how they'd ended up in her belly or why she loved them so, and didn't care. What she did know, however, was that they numbered in the hundreds, and they relied on their mama to keep them safe until they were ready to hatch. ⁂ [ UTTER NO EVIL by Joseph Watson ] I keep asking myself why I was so stupid. Maybe I could have gotten help, real help. If I'd done something sooner, but I didn't. It started at work. I snagged my arm on something when I was taking out the rubbish. They always leave loads of crap lying around the back of the shop. Most of it comes from the nearby factories, the guys there say it's not their fault, but shit, that's a big fat lie. The bosses' big pockets get them out of any serious trouble, so we have to make do with the back of our street looking like the world's just ended. I'd caught my arm pretty bad. It was a bloody mess, to be honest. At first, I panicked and thought it'd gone deep, but once I'd cleared away the blood and gunk it didn't look nearly as bad. I got patched up in the back and didn't think any more of it; it'd be healed up in a few days. When I got home it still itched like crazy. There wasn't any pain. In fact, I'd not noticed this until now, but there wasn't much pain when I'd caught my arm either. Just a strange itchy feeling, like nails were scratching under my skin. I jumped in the shower. That should have sorted it out. I scrubbed it raw and for the first time got a good look at the wound. It was just an ordinary cut once you wiped away the blood. Well, an ordinary cut that didn't seem to hurt in any way, like I'd been anaesthetised. It was jagged and messy. There was a valley of torn skin surrounding the gash. Still, nothing to get all that worried about though. It looked worse than it was. The itching, though, that was still there even after I'd put on some antiseptic. If it was still weird the next morning I'd made the decision; I'd go to the doctors. Maybe I'd have to get some antibiotics or something. The next morning, the itching had gotten worse and when I rolled up my sleeve there wasn't any cut left. It'd healed already, within less than twelve hours. Let me just phrase that again; a cut running half the length of my arm had healed, completely, in less than a day. The skin had healed funny too, it wasn't like a scab or scar was forming, instead the skin had sort of glued together over the cut. The texture looked like I'd kept my arm in water too long. It appeared to be healing, but in a strange way. The skin almost looked like it was pulling itself apart. I went to the doctors. The doctor who saw me was nice enough, young, just graduated maybe. She went through a lot of stuff, asked how I was eating, drinking, whether I was getting enough sleep. Eventually she prescribed me some new skin cream, said it's most likely an everyday infection. Trust those bastards that dumped all that shit out there to have made sure it was filthy too. I didn't tell her that my arm had healed like I was Wolverine. Don't ask me why I didn't say anything, just figured, if they thought it was a normal injury then it'd be a normal injury. I was an idiot. The cut still itched whilst I was at work. That feeling again, it was hard to describe, like fingers scratching. No, not fingers, that was the day before. Now it felt different. Like teeth, biting under my skin. When I got home the skin was still the same, perhaps even worse. It looked stretched, less like it was healing over and more like it had been pulled apart and was barely holding itself together. I slapped on some more of the antiseptic, making sure to cover the entire wound. That was the other thing I noticed. The actual wound had gotten bigger. The cut had been fairly big but it'd been narrow at least. Now, the infection covered a good chunk of my forearm. I bandaged it up and got ready for work. The first few hours were just about bearable, but then, I honestly thought I was going mad. I'd made an effort to simply not look at the bandage in an attempt to ignore it. Trying not to scratch an itch is almost impossible, and this was the worst I'd ever felt, it wasn't even as if I could get to the itch, it was like it was underneath the skin. It wasn't until I had about an hour left before finishing that one of the other shop assistants came up to me. She gave me this slightly nervous, sympathetic look and told me my arm was bleeding. Christ, I must have stood there for over half an hour at least, with blood flowing down my arm. I rushed into the back office and grabbed some paper towels from the bathroom. Unwrapping the bandages, I dabbed at the blood and wiped it out of the way. The wound had re-opened but was much messier than before. The skin had pulled back on both outer-edges of the wound, like it had been yanked open. Where the skin had given way, it looked as if it had dried up, peeling back to reveal a cavernous glistening hole buried in my arm. The gash continued to bleed for several minutes as I wiped away at it, before eventually stopping. As I reached for the bandage, I glanced down at it once again. It was a horrible wound, and as I wrapped my arm up again I swore the opening quivered. Why, for the love of god didn't I say anything? My manager let me leave early and I made a trip straight to the hospital; I wasn't taking any more chances. They patched it up, stitching the wound and cleaning it, which burned something wicked. The guy told me it was the infection that was the problem and said to keep the wound as clean as possible, changing the dressing every few hours. I told him about the fast healing, but, if I'm completely honest, I don't think he believed me. I came in looking like a wreck, probably thought I was out of it. That night I felt exhausted; by the time I got home I didn't have the energy to do anything. I collapsed in a heap on my bed and fell straight asleep. It was a hot night; I felt hot. My arm thrummed with a dull, aching heat. Some horrible sickness was coursing through my body and it was starting to affect my mind. My dreams were horrid, sharp, painful things. Not actual dreams but more like flashes of nightmares, singular images that were lighting up at the back of my eyelids. Christ, I felt bad. I awoke covered in sweat in the early morning. It was still dark outside and I glanced at my alarm clock. It was just past three in the morning, and I was due at work for eight. As I laid there staring up at the ceiling I heard a clicking sound from the side of my room. It was light and muffled, but I definitely wasn't hallucinating. It wasn't coming from the side of my room though, as I continued to look for the source of the noise, I realised it was coming from my arm, beneath the bandage. I unwrapped the bandage and didn't know whether to laugh or cry. The wound in my arm was even bigger, running along the entirety of my forearm like a crooked smile. And it was moving. It quivered even more as I poked at the flesh, with soft clicking sounds whenever the two ends of the wound closed together. I probed at it for a bit, watching my own body seem to consciously react to my inspection before taking a deeper look. I still didn't know what was causing the clicking, but I found my answer. I peeled back the edges of the cut, causing the wound to move more erratically, like some wild animal that was being pinned down. Beneath the edges I managed to get a glimpse at what was causing the noise. A row of small jagged teeth appeared to have erupted from my flesh; tiny crooked yellow daggers lined up in roughly symmetrical rows across the insides of my arm. I carefully pushed the flesh out of the way to look further in, only to see the bright red flesh and muscle, and, what looked curiously like a tongue. A sinuous slice of meat that seemed to move as I watched it. I let go in shock, and the teeth chattered once more. I paced around the house for hours, watching the sun gradually creep in through the windows. I'd wrapped my mess of an arm in a clean bandage, and had not looked at it since. The steady gnashing of the teeth could still be heard, despite my best efforts. I was losing my mind, this couldn't be real. Sleeping was impossible, not only did the wound constantly make noise; the steady chattering of teeth seemed to get louder. The pain had gotten worse too, covering the whole of my arm, not just the forearm where the cut had been, but all the way up to my shoulder. By the morning I had that same itching sensation all the way up to the top of my back. I jabbed the side of my shoulder tentatively with a finger and it felt tight, yet oddly spongy. A dull heat had settled under the skin. Whatever I had was spreading. Whatever I had wasn't in any medical book. I unwrapped my arm to take a look again. The teeth were still chattering, the wound occasionally twisting itself into some kind of grin if I looked hard enough. I was looking hard enough, diseases don't grin for crying out loud. Bacteria isn't evil, it's just nature. Yeah, try telling my arm that. I was sick, really sick. What'd happen if I went to the hospital again? "Oh, come on in, sir, we're just going to send you to quarantine and turn you into a lab rat, can't have you infecting people now." Work soon became impossible. The steady chattering too noisy to cover up. Returning to the hospital was also a no-go. I was a medical experiment now, some twisted miracle that'd be prodded and poked. No, I was alone. Alone with a body that was no longer mine. Soon, I had another mouth, similar to the first, which gibbered and clicked above my left shoulder. They continued with the same mumbling sounds. It'd be worse at night, locked in the silence of my room, trying to sleep, as the wounds would continue uttering nonsense. Which brings me back to where I started. It's impossible to leave the house now. Last time I checked there's nine mouths spread all across my body. Wicked, ragged wounds with the same gnashing teeth and horrid supple tongues. They've gotten louder and louder, so much so that I've given up leaving the house, or even trying to sleep. They are wearing me down, attacking both my body and my mind. They're winning the fight and they know it. They mutter things now. Maybe it's me going mad, but I swear that they talk in their own way. Murmuring in their own twisted language. And there's no way for me to escape it. I could have done something sooner, gotten help, but I didn't. I was so stupid. Last night, I tried to cut one out, the first one. I grabbed a knife out the kitchen draw and stuffed a towel in my mouth. It was agony, the thing began to croak and almost scream as I went at it with the knife. I couldn't keep it up though, I'm weak. It won out in the end, just leaving me in more pain than when I started. And then they started chanting again. I broke down. Snapped. I screamed until my throat gave out, anything to stop what is now a chorus of noise. I yelled at it, the thing, this disease, whatever it is, that's slowly taken hold of my body. "What do you want?" I screamed. And it... they, answered. "You." I collapsed, and the mouths laughed in unison. ⁂ [ DOWN WHERE HER NIGHTMARES DWELL by Sheldon Woodbury ] They say the greatest heartache a parent can feel is to witness their child in pain and feel helpless to stop it. That misery is even more wrenching when it echoes the same pain they felt as a child, because then they know the soul crushing agony being inflicted on the flesh they created. But what if that flesh is the cause of the pain? The childhood of Molly Stark was brutal in a way that no child should ever have to endure. She'd been born with a face that was plump and sullen, with gloomy eyes, and a misshapen body. This woeful condition created other frailties as well, a halting stutter, a nervous twitch, a shuffling walk. To make it even worse, she grew up in Los Angeles where beauty was worshipped above all else. The siren call of Hollywood lured striking faces from far and wide. Prom queens and heart-throbs strolled the streets in all their glory, as even more gorgeous faces shimmered on the giant billboards above. Her teenaged years were nothing less than a daily crucible of terror and fear. She found out in the most painful way possible that the cruelty of kids had no boundaries. She felt like a prisoner of war and the collective duty of her classmates was to torment her with slashing insults and cutting taunts. That's when something began to fester inside her, dark and secret. She didn't know what it was, only that it came from the place where her nightmares dwelled. It told her she had to change, no matter the extremes that needed to be taken. Her course of action was obvious at first. She began to exercise with an obsessive compulsion, huffing and puffing in the tiny sanctuary of her room. She also bought beauty magazines and studied them by flashlight deep into the night. The glossy pictures and self-help articles became her sacred text, pointing the way to the promised land of beauty. Some modest gains were made, but that was all, a different hairdo, more pleasing make-up, some fat sweated off. But even with that, the daily abuse didn't let up, because once the mean girls and bullies chose you as prey they couldn't be fooled by anything minor and modest. In that secret place, the festering thing told her more radical measures were needed, because the problem was way too severe for small accomplishments. And the pain had gotten even worse, like a throbbing ache that had no limits either. The next course of action presented itself when she was pushed down a flight of stairs at school by a football player and her plump face was horribly crushed by the tumbling fall. She was used to taunts and mocking sneers, but now it was obvious they wanted her dead. She was rushed to the hospital in an ambulance, and taken to surgery right away. And that's where her life was changed forever. Under the sizzling lights in the operating room, she met the gleaming metal god that had the power to change human flesh. Her face had been smashed to a bloody pulp, so bones were rearranged, sinew attached, and the battered skin was sewn back together. The operation was deemed a success, but her face was even more revolting, a swollen atrocity mashed together with stitches. The recovery process took months, another wrenching crucible of pain. When the healing was finally completed, the result was a surprise she didn't expect. It may have been the surgeon's miraculous skill, or just an unexpected accident, because her features weren't as dreary and dreadful as before. It wasn't a total transformation, but it was definitely better than what the exercise and make-up had been able to achieve. All because of the gleaming god of surgical steel. "This is your life..." she heard from that secret dark place. The taunts and bullying continued through her teenaged years, then finally slacked off in college, only because the torment was now to make her invisible, as if she didn't exist at all. The beautiful people decided this was even more cunning and mean, to pretend they couldn't even see her. By this time though, she was so focused on becoming a doctor the new torture was something she could finally ignore. But she didn't want to be just any doctor, she wanted to wield the metal god that could transform flesh. She learned the mysteries of the human body in medical school, then studied the magic of plastic surgery after that. Late at night, in that secret place where her nightmares dwelled, the misery of her younger years still howled with an unforgettable agony and pain. But now she knew the slab of flesh that covered her body was not a physical prison, but merely a mushy facade that could be easily changed. The years of study and building her practice were grueling, like climbing a mountain where her only desire was to get to the top. When money finally came, she quickly utilized the benefits of her chosen profession, sculpting her face and figure into a form that was unrecognizable from the pitiful creature she'd been before. She transformed her flesh into a captivating shape that wasn't that different from the glossy pictures in the beauty magazines from long ago. With her new allure, suitors arrived and she picked the one that seemed the most pleasant. She'd never been overly attracted to men because of the psychic cruelty that still lingered inside, but she wanted a child so she accepted marriage as a necessary part of the process. When her daughter was born, the flesh of her flesh, she felt a joy she'd never experienced before. Cradling the tiny bundle in her arms unleashed a part of her heart she never knew existed, the part where love was the most powerful feeling imaginable. But then another emotion suddenly appeared one night when she realized her child was indeed the flesh of her flesh, but before her sculpted transformation. Her eyes were becoming dark and gloomy, and her wiggling body was twisting into a misshapen form. They say the greatest heartache a parent can feel is to witness their child in pain and it echoes the same pain they felt as a child. Down where her nightmares dwelled, and the memory of her tortured years still howled with pain, a plan formed that she accepted as the only right course of action. No loving mother would ever allow cruelty to the flesh of her flesh, so if ugliness was going to be her daughter's inheritance, then changes had to be made. She divorced her husband, in case he didn't understand what needed to be done, then set up a make-shift operating room in the basement. She'd acquired skills that few people had, as a worshipper of surgical steel. It was a slow process that wouldn't be detected by others, but it was extreme and radical in its own way. She gradually transformed her daughter into a teenaged beauty, but it didn't stop at just that. She made her a bombshell beyond the limits of good taste, with a sexy figure, lusty lips, and cascading hair. She'd been attacked for being ugly, so she made the flesh of her flesh something totally new, seductive perfection in every way. And that's when it happened, the horror of horrors that no child should ever experience. Her daughter came home in tears after a date with the captain of the football team, and the evidence was easy to see. Her clothes were ripped and her body was bruised, but the assault had gone much deeper than that. Down where her nightmares dwelled, her rage erupted to monstrous proportions and she prayed to the metal god for an appropriate response. It came with a clarity that startled her with its stunning cruelty, but she accepted its depravity. She needed her daughter's help, which she offered with the same need for payback and punishment. With a soft and luscious voice, her daughter told the lumbering football player how much she wanted another date as soon as possible. This fed his brutish ego like a game winning touchdown run, so the trap was set. "My Mom is away this weekend," she whispered in his ear at school. "Why don't you come over and we can have more fun..." When he arrived lugging a bottle of cheap booze and flashing a horny grin, it was easy to knock him out with a super powerful tranquilizer slipped into his drink. It took both the mother and daughter to drag his bulky body down the thumping stairs to the make-shift operating room in the basement, then push him up on the table. He was missing for a couple of days, because the operation was extreme and radical, not an easy fix. He was one of the beautiful people, with sunny blonde hair, a square jaw, and blue-sky eyes. It was close to midnight when his parents heard a scraping at the front door and stumbled downstairs. When they opened the door, it took a few seconds to see the whimpering thing on the stoop was their son, but now the flesh of their flesh was something brand new. He looked more like a pig than a human, with four stubby legs, a limp tail, pointed ears, and a snout that came from between his legs. The horror in his eyes was a pain no parent should ever have to see, but down where her nightmares dwelled, she knew the operation was a success.
(Yokai 1) The Night Parade of One Hundred Demons	Matthew Meyer	[ "Japanese mythology", "pedia" ]	[]	Introduction - What Are Yōkai?	Put simply, yōkai are supernatural creatures of Japanese folklore. The word in Japanese is a combination of yō, meaning "bewitching," and kai, meaning "strange." Yōkai encompasses more than just monsters and demons. It also includes certain kinds of gods (kami), ghosts (bakemono) ], magical animals, transformed humans, urban legends, and other strange phenomena. Over the years, many different words have been used as translations—such as demon, monster, goblin, and spirit—but each of these words carries cultural baggage. None of them quite does the trick of capturing the essence of yōkai. It is a broad and vague term. Nothing exists in the English language that matches up exactly. Like samurai, geisha, ninja, and sushi, yōkai just works better left in Japanese [ Where Do Yōkai Come From? ] Japanese mythology is an amalgamation of a several traditions. The foundation comes from the folk religions of isolated tribes living across the Japanese islands. Later, these tribes merged and forged their beliefs into the Shinto religion. Contact with China and India brought Buddhism and Hindu cosmologies, which were incorporated seamlessly into the existing folklore. Japan's oldest recorded histories go back to the 8th century CE. These books contain the creation myths and legendary prehistory of Japan, including stories of emperors descended from the gods. Over the following centuries, other books and scrolls were written which catalogued the legends and folklore of Japan. These works contain the earliest records of Japan's gods, demons, and other supernatural creatures. From the 17th through the 19th centuries, Japan experienced an unprecedented flourishing of culture and art. Ghost stories exploded in popularity, along with tales of monsters and strange happenings from the various regions of the country. During this period, the first mythical bestiaries were assembled by folklorists and artists like Toriyama Sekien and Sawaki Sūshi. These entrepreneurs collected the oral traditions of rural Japan—adding a few monsters of their own and creating mass-market entertainment for commercial consumption by the growing urban population. Yōkai bestiaries begun as collections of painted scrolls, and later expanded into multi-volume illustrated encyclopedias of strange tales and supernatural stories. Toriyama's Illustrated Night Parade of One Hundred Demons set the stage for other famous artists. The yōkai tradition was born, and would eventually expand into every aspect of Japanese culture. After fading away during the WWII war years, yōkai reemerged during the 20th century and were popularized by manga artist Mizuki Shigeru. His comic series GeGeGe no Kitarō re-introduced yōkai to post-war Japan, and caused a second explosion of interest in supernatural monsters and ghosts. Mizuki's comics and illustrated encyclopedias brought yōkai out of the distant past and into modern Japan, where they have continued to be an important aspect of popular culture. The influence of yōkai can be felt in Japanese books, movies, animation, product design, video games, and more. Today, as Japanese culture becomes more and more global, yōkai are becoming known all over the globe. ---- Kappa (河童) Translation: river child Alternate names: kawatarō, kawako Habitat: rivers, lakes, ponds, waterways, cisterns, and wells; found throughout Japan Diet: omnivorous; prefers cucumbers and human entrails Appearance: Kappa are aquatic, reptilian humanoids who inhabit the rivers and streams flowing over Japan. Clumsy on land, they are at home in the water, and thrive during the warm months. Kappa are generally the size and shape of a human child, yet despite their small stature they are physically stronger than a grown man. Their scaly skin ranges from a deep, earthy green to bright reds and even blue. Kappa bodies are built for swimming; they have webbed, thumbless hands and feet, a turtle-like beak and shell, and an elastic, waterproof skin that reeks of fish and is said to be removable. Other inhuman traits include three anuses that allow them to pass three times as much gas as humans, and forearms attached to one another inside of their shells—pulling on one arm lengthens it while the other arm contracts. But their most distinguishing characteristic is a dish-like depression that lies on top of their skulls. This dish is the source of a kappa's power and must be kept filled with water at all times. Should the water be spilled and the dish dry up, the kappa will be unable to move. It may even die. While younger kappa are frequently found in family groups, adult kappa live solitary lives. However, it is common for kappa to befriend other yōkai and sometimes even people. Possessed of a keen intelligence, kappa are one of the few yōkai able to learn human languages. They are highly knowledgeable about medicine and the art of setting bones. According to legend, friendly kappa taught these skills to humans. For fun, they love causing mischief, practicing martial arts like sumo wrestling, and playing games of skill like shogi. Kappa are proud and stubborn, but also fiercely honorable; they never break a promise. Kappa will eat almost anything, but they are particularly fond of two foods: cucumbers and raw innards—particularly human anuses. Kappa are revered in Shinto as a kind of water god. It is not uncommon to see offerings of cucumbers made at riverbanks by devout humans. In return, kappa help people by irrigating fields, befriending lonely children, or competing with adults in sports and games. Kappa can also be crass and dangerous. Lakes and rivers where they live are often marked with warning signs. Kappa particularly despise cows and horses, and will attack the animals for no reason at all. Mischievous by nature, they loudly pass gas in public and love to peek up women's kimonos. Sometimes their mischief turns violent. Kappa have been known to kidnap or rape swimming women, and kill people. A kappa's preferred method of attack is to drown its victims, or bite them to death under water. Kappa also devour humans alive. Usually they go for the rear end to get at the shirikodama, a mythical ball of flesh located just inside the anus. In the water, there is no escape for anyone who crosses a kappa. On land, however, it is possible to outwit one; the honorable kappa will feel obliged to return a bow. If it can be tricked into bowing so low that the water in its dish spills out, it can be overcome. Once bested, kappa have been made to swear loyalty and friendship to their victor for the rest of their lives. ---- Garappa (ガラッパ) Translation: a regional corruption of kappa Alternate names: gawappa Habitat: rivers, lakes, ponds, streams; found only on Kyūshū Diet: omnivorous; same as the kappa Appearance: Garappa are river spirits found on the islands of Kyūshū in southern Japan. Close relatives of kappa, they resemble them in many ways. The two are often confused with each other, although there are a number of important differences. A garappa's limbs are much longer than those of a kappa. When garappa sit down their knees rise high above their heads, unlike the stubby kappa's knees. Because of these longer limbs, garappa are taller than kappa when standing upright. Garappa also have slightly longer and more streamlined faces. Garappa are shyer and more elusive than kappa. They tend to avoid populated areas and instead, wander back and forth between the rivers and mountains. Garappa live in smaller groups, or by themselves. Because of their shyness, garappa are more often heard than seen. They have two distinctive calls: "hyō hyō" and, "foon foon foon." While garappa encounters are much rarer than kappa, they share a similar relationship with humankind. Extremely fond of pranks and mischief, garappa love to surprise people on mountain paths, or trick travelers into losing their way. Like kappa, garappa are physically stronger than humans and are easily capable of overpowering grown men larger than themselves. They are extremely fond of sumo wrestling, at which they are highly skilled. Garappa are also sexually aggressive and are known to assault and rape women. Despite their reputation as tricksters, garappa are absolutely dedicated to keeping their word. When captured or bested in contest by humans, they can be forced by their victors to promise to stop drowning people, playing pranks, making noises in the woods, or similar concessions. Over the centuries, Shinto sects who revere garappa have worked to earn promises from them to cease doing evil. As a result garappa attacks have become less and less common over time. Garappa occasionally even serve humans by catching fish or planting rice fields, and they are credited with teaching the ancient people of Kyūshū the art of making poultices. [ Yōkai-Human Hybrids ] While humans and yōkai rarely intermingle in that way, there are a number of stories of rape by yōkai, and even voluntary pairing between humans and supernatural creatures. It is possible for humans and yōkai to have children together, and the children of these couplings sometimes have inhuman strength reflecting their supernatural nature. Sadly, many cases are also fatal. In one case of rape by garappa in Kagoshima, the impregnated woman was eaten from the inside out by the hungry offspring. Eventually the creature emerged from its mother's stomach in a gory mess. The horrified villagers tried to kill it with fire, but it vanished into thin air. ---- Hyōsube (兵主部) Translation: onomatopoeic; written with characters connoting warfare Alternate names: hyōsue, hyōsubo, hyōsunbo, hyōsunbe Habitat: rivers and streams; found primarily on Kyūshū and in West Japan Diet: omnivorous; prefers eggplants Appearance: Hyōsube are squat, hairy humanoids found mostly in the southern and western parts of Japan. Cousins of kappa and garappa, they are more savage and belligerent. Physically they are short, with bald scalps, sharp claws, and a mouth full of sharp teeth which are prominently visible due to the malicious smile they wear. Their skins are covered with a pelt of thick, greasy hair that gathers dust, oil, and dirt. This repulsive pelt constantly sheds wherever they go. Their name is said to come from the "hyo hyo" call that they make. However, written in kanji, the characters have a martial connotation. Hyōsube live near rivers, where they catch wild fish and generally keep away from humans. Their favorite food is eggplant—they are capable of devouring whole patches in the blink of an eye. Like kappa, hyōsube love mischief and hate horses. They are generally more violent and malicious than their cousins, but they retain a strong sense of honor. Hyōsube are capricious, insolent, and extremely dangerous. Simply looking at a hyōsube can cause a terrible and contagious fever, which can spread and turn into an epidemic. Hyōsube cackle with an evil laughter which is also contagious; an unlucky person who hears a hyōsube laugh, and who laughs himself, will be struck with fever and die within hours. A hyōsube's thick hair builds up with dirt and grime; they love nothing more than to sneak into houses at night and slip into the bathtub. When a hyōsube finds a bathtub it likes it often returns every night, leaving behind a thick scum of greasy body hair and a horrible stench. Once, the unlucky owner of such a house emptied the bathwater and threw out the hair and grease. This angered the hyōsube so much that it slaughtered the owner's horse the next night. When another unfortunate dumped his bathtub and some hyōsube hairs accidentally landed on a nearby horse, the animal promptly dropped dead. In yet another tale, a woman spied on a hyōsube ravaging her eggplant garden; the next morning her entire body had turned purple. She died soon after. Hyōsube are occasionally honored at local Shinto shrines, usually worshiped as gods of war for some military service performed for villagers in the past. Farmers living in areas inhabited by hyōsube often leave offerings of the first eggplants of the harvest in hopes that the hyōsube will spare their fields for the remainder of the year. Those who do not leave offerings can find their fields trampled. ---- Kirin (麒麟) Translation: none; based on the Chinese name for the same creature Habitat: areas ruled by a wise and benevolent leader Diet: purely vegetarian; never harms another creature Appearance: The kirin is one of the rarest, most awesome and powerful creatures ever known in East Asia. It is a regal animal, holy and highly revered. The kirin is often considered a god in its own right. Resembling a deer with scales like a dragon's covering its body, the kirin is a chimerical beast. It has a tail like an ox and a flowing mane. Its body and mane are covered in brilliant, holy fire and its face is the picture of utter serenity. A gentle animal, the kirin never eats the flesh of other beings, and takes great care never to tread on any living thing, even insects. When it walks, it does so without trampling a single blade of grass. Its beauty is only surpassed by its rarity; the unicorn-like kirin only appears during periods of world peace. They are seen only in lands owned by wise and benevolent people and during the reigns of noble and enlightened rulers, where they herald a golden age. Although kirin never harm good and pure souls, they are swift and fierce to attack if threatened, breathing holy fire from their mouths. Because kirin are beasts of purity and goodness, they have been used in carvings and paintings as symbols of these virtues since early times. They are also seen as symbols of justice and wisdom. Because of their holiness, images of kirin frequently adorn temples and shrines. Omens of great luck and fortune, the appearance of a kirin is believed to be a sign of the arrival of a great leader or a wise man. Kirin were introduced to Japan via Chinese myths and legends where they are known as qilin. Over time, the Chinese and Japanese version diverged into slightly different creatures. In Japan, the kirin is considered to be the most powerful and sacred beast of all, surpassing the hōō and tatsu. Giraffes are also called kirin in Japanese, named for the traits they share with the holy kirin. Their long legs, scale-like pattern, gentle nature, and the knobs on their heads must have reminded the first Japanese to see a giraffe of this most sacred of beasts. ---- Hōō (鳳凰) Translation: none; based on the Chinese name for the same creature Habitat: paulownia trees; only appear in lands blessed by peace and prosperity Diet: only bamboo seeds Appearance: Hōō are beautiful, peaceful, phoenix-like creatures honored across East Asia and worshiped as divine spirits. They are described as having the beak of a rooster, the jaw of a swallow, the head of a pheasant, the neck of a snake, the back of a tortoise, the legs of a crane, and the tail of a peacock. Brilliantly colored with the five colors of the Chinese elements—white, black, red, yellow, and blue—they have five distinctive tail feathers. Hōō are creatures of utter peace and never cause harm to other living things. They eat only bamboo seeds, and nest only in paulownia trees. When a hōō flies, it is said that the wind stops, dust settles, and birds and insects grow quiet. Because of their purity, they appear only in lands blessed with peace, prosperity, and happiness. They flee to the heavens during times of trouble. The appearance of a hōō is an extremely good omen, said to signify the beginning of a new era. The hōō is a popular motif in Japanese paintings, crafts, kimonos, and as designs on temples and shrines. As a symbol, it represents fire, the sun, and the imperial family. It also stands for the virtues of duty, propriety, faith, and mercy. Its five colors represent the five elements of wood, fire, earth, metal, and water. Hōō come from Chinese mythology, where they are known as fenghuang. Originally they were considered to be two distinct birds: the male hō (feng) and the female ō (huang) ], symbolizing yin and yang and the duality of the universe. Eventually the two creatures merged into one and their combined name was used. The combined creature is still considered to be female, and is often partnered with the tatsu, which is considered to be male. The hōō is one of the most revered and holiest animals in Japan. Second only to the kirin in terms of power, it is the most sacred bird in the Japanese pantheon. ---- Tatsu (龍) Translation: dragon Alternate names: ryū, ryō, wani; known by many specific individual names Habitat: rivers, waterfalls, mountains, lakes, seas, and palaces deep in the ocean Diet: capable of eating anything Appearance: Tatsu, Japanese dragons, are similar in appearance to the dragons of China and the rest of the world. They have long, scaled bodies, serpentine tails, sharp teeth and claws, and often have horns, antlers, spines, and beards. Some tatsu have multiple limbs or heads. Many disguise themselves as humans and are never seen in their natural forms. Tatsu are strongly connected to water—be it rain, rivers, seas, or oceans—and are considered to be water gods. They live in splendid palaces at the bottom of deep seas, or in other secluded places. They usually live far from human-inhabited areas, but occasionally make their homes near Buddhist temples. Like Western dragons, they hoard vast amounts of treasure and keep powerful magical artifacts in their homes. Many are great villains, tormenting mankind out of spite, while others are pure and kind, offering their wisdom and power to those seeking it. Some tatsu even allow worthy heroes to visit them, and lend their magical items to noble warriors. Tatsu rarely concern themselves with human affairs unless it affects them directly. They accept worship and sacrifices from humans; many temples maintain the holy grounds of local dragons, and countless Japanese make pilgrimages to holy mountains inhabited by tatsu. Tatsu receive prayers for rain or for protection from floods, and other water-related requests. Fireworks festivals, ritual dragon dances, and other local celebrations honor these dragon gods all over the Japanese islands. Tatsu are one of the oldest supernatural creatures known in Japan. The first recorded stories go back to the earliest written accounts of Japanese history and mythology, the Kojiki and the Nihongi. Over the centuries, tales of the Chinese long and Indian naga were incorporated into Japanese mythology. Today's Japanese dragons are an amalgamation of these imported myths merged with the indigenous water deities of prehistoric Japan. Legends: The Japanese imperial family, the oldest hereditary monarchy in the world, is supposedly descended from dragons (as well as other gods) ]. The monarchy is said to have been founded in 660 BCE by Emperor Jimmu, the legendary first ruler of Japan. His father was the son of Toyotama hime, who in turn was the daughter of Ryūjin, the dragon god of the sea. So by tradition the emperor of Japan is the direct descendant of a dragon ---- Baku (獏) Translation: none; based on the Chinese name for the same creature Habitat: deep in thick forests Diet: bad dreams Appearance: The baku is a strange, holy beast that has the body of a bear, the head of an elephant, the eyes of a rhinoceros, the tail of an ox, and the legs of a tiger. Despite their monstrous appearance, baku are revered as powerful forces of good and as one of the holy protectors of mankind. Baku watch over humans and act as guardian spirits. They feed on the dreams of humans—specifically bad dreams. Evil spirits and yōkai fear baku and flee from baku-inhabited areas. Because of this, health and good luck follow baku wherever they go. The baku's written name and image have been used as symbols of good luck in talismans and charms throughout Japanese history. In the old days, it was common to embroider the kanji for baku onto pillows in order to keep away bad dreams, sickness, and evil spirits. Fearsome baku images are commonly carved into the pillars above temple doors and on the columns supporting temple roofs. Baku are one of only a handful of holy creatures honored in this manner. Legend has it that when the world was new and the gods were making the animals, the baku was put together from the leftover bits and pieces at the end of creation. That explains its bizarre appearance, and why it is considered a favorite of the gods. Today, the Japanese word baku also refers to the tapir. The animal was named for its uncanny resemblance to this holy chimerical beast. ---- Koma inu (狛犬) Translation: Goryeo (an ancient Korean dynasty) dog Alternate names: shishi ("stone lion"); refers only to the open-mouthed koma inu Habitat: shrines, temples, and holy areas Diet: carnivorous Appearance: Koma inu are noble, holy animals, usually employed as guardians of sacred sites. They can range in size from a small dog to the size of a lion and—due to their resemblance to both creatures—are often called lion dogs in English. They have thick, curly manes and tails, powerful, muscular bodies, and sharp teeth and claws. Some koma inu have large horns like a unicorn on their heads. However, many are hornless. Koma inu are fierce and noble beasts. They act like watchdogs, guarding gates and doorways and preventing the wicked from entering. They live together in male-female pairs and are always found together. In their pairs, the female usually guards those living inside, while the male guards the structure itself. Koma inu are a ubiquitous symbol at holy sites in Japan. Stone koma inu statues are almost always found at the entrance to Shinto shrines, often with more inside the shrine guarding the important buildings. The pairs are usually carved in two poses: one with mouth open in a roaring position, and one with mouth closed. Symbolically, these creatures represent yin and yang, or death and life. The open-mouthed koma inu represents the sound "a," while the closed-mouthed koma inu represents the sound "un." These sounds are the Japanese transliteration of the Sanskrit "om," a mystical syllable which symbolizes the beginning, middle, and end of all things. A Western analogy would be alpha and omega. Koma inu were brought to Japan via Korea, which in turn received them from China, which in turn received them from India. China is where they first began to symbolize the Dharmic philosophies of Indian religions. In China these dogs are called shishi, which means "stone lion." This name is often used in Japan as well, though it only refers to the one with its mouth open. The other one, and the two of them collectively, are always referred to as koma inu. [ Pearls of Wisdom ] Koma inu, tatsu, and other holy beasts are often depicted carrying round pearls or decorative balls, either cradled in their mouths or in being grasped their claws. These balls are representations of the jewel or pearl of wisdom, a common theme in Buddhist art. It is a symbol of vitality, life, and the jewel-like perfection and purity of Buddhist wisdom. ---- Nozuchi (野槌) Translation: wild mallet (named for its mallet-like shape) Habitat: fields and grasslands; found all across Japan Diet: carnivorous; usually feeds on small animals like rats, mice, rabbits, and birds Appearance: Nozuchi are one of the earliest recorded yōkai in Japan. They are powerful and ancient snake-like spirits of the fields, known for their bizarre shape and habits. Short, fat creatures shaped like mallets, Nozuchi are about fifteen centimeters in diameter and just over one meter long. They have no eyes, nose, or any other facial features save for a large mouth located on the tops of their heads, pointing towards the sky. Their bodies are covered in a bristly fur, much like a hairy caterpillar. Nozuchi make their homes inside of large trees, particularly on the tops of hills. They are slow movers, and get about by rolling and tumbling down slopes, then slowly inching their way back up. Their usual diet is wildlife—mice, rabbits, squirrels, and other small animals—however, they are able to eat things much larger than themselves. In Nara, they are known to feed on deer. They can devour a deer in a single bite, pulling the whole animal into their small, stumpy frame. Nozuchi have been known to attack humans who come near their nests, rolling downhill and snapping at their feet. Their bites are dangerous, resulting in terrible, mangled wounds which quickly lead to a high fever and death. A person who is touched or even merely seen by a tumbling nozuchi can contract this fever and die. Fortunately, nozuchi attacks are easily avoided. Stick to higher ground where they cannot tumble, or climb a tree if no other high ground is available. Other forms: Nozuchi can transform into a humanoid shape, though they rarely are seen in this form. They take the shape of a human priest, but with no eyes, nose, hair, or ears. The only feature on the head is a large, gaping mouth pointing upwards towards the sky. Wicked monks who are banished from their temples to live in the wilds sometimes gradually turn into nozuchi. These nozuchi are more likely to maintain a humanoid form than a serpentine one. Care should be taken not to confuse a shape-changed nozuchi with a nopperabō, which has a similar appearance but poses a different threat. ---- Onibi (鬼火) Translation: demon fire Habitat: grasslands, forests, watersides, graveyards Diet: life energy Appearance: One of the more dangerous types of fireball yōkai, onibi are a beautiful, but deadly phenomenon. Their name means "demon fire," and they certainly earn that moniker. They look like small balls of flame, usually blue or blue-white (red and yellow onibi are less common), and appear in groups of twenty to thirty orbs. The orbs can range in size from three to thirty centimeters, and usually float around at eye-level. They appear in places surrounded by nature—most often during the spring and summer months, and particularly on rainy days. ] Onibi are found all over Japan. In some areas, they manifest the faces and even voices of the victims whose life force they have drained. In Okinawa, onibi are said to take the shape of a small bird. Onibi do not create much heat, but the orbs possess a different danger. Living creatures that draw too close are swarmed by dozens of orbs, which drain away the life force from their victims. Soon nothing is left but a dead husk on the ground. During the night, onibi are often mistaken for distant lanterns, and people have vanished into the forests chasing after these phantom lights. Travelers should take care not to be lead off their paths to their deaths by demon fire. Onibi are born out of the dead bodies of humans and animals. It is not known what causes onibi to develop; sometimes they appear and sometimes they do not. Intense grudges and malice are also able to create onibi. They are considered to be identical to the will-o'-the-wisps of English folklore. ---- Hi no tama (火の玉) There are many different yōkai which appear as glowing orbs of light. It is difficult to tell the difference between onibi, kodama, hitodama, kitsunebi, and the many other kinds. Though similar in appearance, they have different origins and attributes. Some are mindless while others are intelligent; some are harmless while others are deadly. Despite their differences, all of the fireball yōkai are lumped together into one group, called hi no tama, which literally means "balls of fire." ---- Hitodama (人魂) Translation: human soul Habitat: graveyards and near the recently deceased Diet: none Appearance: Hitodama are the visible souls of humans detached from their host bodies. They appear as red, orange, or blue-white orbs, and float about slowly not too far from the ground. On warm summer nights, these strange, glowing orbs can be seen floating around graveyards, funeral parlors, or the houses where people have recently died. Most often they are seen just before or after the moment of death, when the soul leaves the body to return to the ether. It is most common to see them at night, though they occasionally appear during the daytime. Rarely, hitodama materialize when a person loses consciousness, floating outside of the body, only to return when the person regains consciousness. Hitodama are harmless, and it is important not to confuse them with other, potentially deadly fireball yōkai. Hitodama can be distinguished from other hi no tama by the distinctive tails of light which trail behind them. ---- Kodama (木霊) Translation: tree spirit Habitat: deep in untouched forests, inside very old tress Diet: none; its life is connected to the life of its host tree Appearance: Deep in the mountainous forests of Japan, the souls of the trees are animated as spirits called kodama. These souls wander outside of their hosts, tending to their groves and maintaining the balance of nature. Kodama are rarely ever seen, but are often heard—particularly as echoes that take just a little longer to return than they should. When they do appear, they resemble faint orbs of light in the distance; or occasionally a tiny, funny shaped vaguely humanoid figure. A kodama's life force is directly tied to the tree it inhabits; if either the tree or the kodama dies, the other cannot live. Kodama are revered as gods of the trees and protectors of the forests. They bless the lands around their forest with vitality, and villagers who find a kodama-inhabited tree honor it by marking it with a sacred rope known as a shimenawa. Occasionally, very old trees will bleed when cut, and this is regarded as a sign that a kodama is living inside. Cutting down such an ancient tree is a grave sin, and can bring down a powerful curse, causing a prosperous community to fall into ruin. ---- Yamabiko (山彦) Translation: echo; written with characters meaning mountain boy Habitat: forested mountains and valleys, inside camphor tress Diet: unknown Appearance: The wilds of Japan are full of strange phenomena, like echoes that bounce back with more delay than they should, or that come back slightly different from the original sound. When the false echo comes from the forest, it is usually attributed to a kodama. When it comes from the mountains, it is due to something called a yamabiko. They are small, appearing like a cross between a dog and a wild monkey. Yamabiko are known almost exclusively by their voices. They are skilled at mimicking any sound, including natural sounds, human language, and trains and cars. They occasionally unleash terrible and mysterious screams deep in the forests that can carry for long distances. Behavior: Little is known about these yōkai due to their rarity and elusiveness. They live deep in the mountains and make their homes in camphor trees, in close proximity to (and sharing a common ancestry with) ] other tree and mountain spirits. For many centuries, their calls were speculated to be a kind of rare bird, or other kinds of yōkai, or even natural phenomena. It wasn't until the Edo period—when determined yōkai researchers like Sawaki Sūshi and Toriyama Sekien began making illustrated yokai bestiaries—that this creature's form was decided ---- Kijimunā (キジムナー) Translation: the name comes from an old Okinawan village, Kijimuka Alternate names: sēma, bunagaya Habitat: banyan trees on the islands of Okinawa Diet: seafood; prefers fish heads and eyes Appearance: The southern island chain of Okinawa is home to a number of unique yōkai that are not found anywhere else in Japan. One of these is the kijimunā: an elfin creature that makes it home in the banyan trees that grow all over the Ryukyu archipelago. Physically, kijimunā are about the same height as a child, with wild and thick bright red hair, and red tinted skin. They wear skirts made of grass, and move about by hopping rather than walking. Although kijimunā retain the appearance of child-like youthfulness into their adulthood, males are noted for their large and prominent testicles. The kijimunā lifestyle mimics humans in many ways. They fish along the shores, live in family units, get married, and raise children in much the same way as the native islanders. On rare occasions, they marry into human families. The kijimunā diet consists entirely of seafood. They are excellent fishers, and are particularly skilled at diving. Kijimunā use both these skills to catch their favorite dish: fish heads—specifically the head of the snapper species called the double-lined fusilier. They are especially fond of fish eyes, even preferring the left eye over the right. Okinawans attribute eyeless corpses of fish found on the beach to picky kijimunā. Kijimunā have a number of peculiar fears and prejudices. They loathe chickens and cooking pots. They are extremely put off by people passing gas. However, the thing they hate above all else is the octopus. They avoid octopuses at all costs, despising them and fearing them at the same time. Kijimunā often help fishermen catch fish, or aid humans in other ways in return for a cooked meal. When they form friendships with humans, it can last for a lifetime. Kijimunā will often return to their human friends many times, even spending holidays with their adopted family. Unprovoked kijimunā attacks on humans are rare. Cutting down the banyan tree in which they live is a sure way to earn their wrath. Kijimunā thus wronged have been known to murder livestock, sabotage boats so they sink while their owners are far out at sea, or magically trap people in hollow trees from which they cannot escape. Sometimes they press down on peoples' chests while they sleep, or snuff out lights during the night. Once earned, the enmity of a kijimunā can never be assuaged. ---- Nure onago (濡女子) Translation: wet girl Alternate names: nure hanayome ("wet bride") Habitat: watersides, wetlands, fishing villages; anywhere near water Diet: attention Appearance: Nure onago appear as disheveled-looking young girls with matted, wet hair. As the name implies, they are soaked with water from head to toe. Often, nure onago are covered with dead leaves and things stuck to their dripping bodies. They wander about dripping and sopping wet, and are encountered on roads near swamps, rivers, and coasts, or during nights of heavy rain. Travelers along the coasts and rivers of the islands of Shikoku and Kyūshū occasionally encounter young girls, lost and soaked to the bone. Most people who witness such a pathetic sight rush over to help the poor girls. When a human draws close to a nure onago, she looks up into their eyes and smiles. If the smile is returned, she will follow the helpful stranger human, sticking by him forever. This isn't as nice as it seems; nure onago continually drip water and stink of mildew and swamp water. Although she causes no particular harm, her constant presence is often enough to ruin the rest of a person's life. Ignoring a nure onago and refusing to return her smile is the only way to avoid this yōkai. Unfortunately, by the time her true nature is discovered it is often too late. Nure onago are born from the strong feelings of loss and sadness shared by widows of drowning victims—particular widows of sailors lost at sea. These feelings build up and materialize into a nure onago, whose desire for attention is the amplified desire of heartbroken widows to see their husbands again. Nure onago behave similarly to hari onago, although in a less violent form. The two are sometimes grouped together as waraionago, smiling girls. Both are also found on the island of Shikoku, suggesting a possible relation between them. They should not, however, be confused with the similarly named nure onna, a much larger and more dangerous yōkai. ---- Jorōgumo (絡新婦) Translation: entangling bride; alternatively whore spider Habitat: cities, towns, rural areas, forests, and caves Diet: young, virile men Appearance: In Japan, some spiders are known to possess amazing supernatural powers. One of these is the jorōgumo, known as the golden orb-weaver in English. The jorōgumo is the most well-known of the arachnid yōkai, and found all over the Japanese archipelago except for the northern island of Hokkaidō. Their body size averages between two to three centimeters long, but they can grow much larger; some are massive enough to catch and eat small birds. Renowned for their size, their vividly beautiful colors, and the large and strong webs they weave, the beautiful jorōgumo are also famous for the cruel destruction they wreak on young men. Written with modern kanji, their name means "entangling bride." However, these characters were added much later to cover up the original meaning of jorōgumo—"whore spider." Jorōgumo live solitary lives, both as spiders and as yōkai. When a golden orb-weaver reaches 400 years of age, it develops magical powers and begins to feed on human prey instead of insects. Jorōgumo make their nests in caves, forests, or empty houses in towns. Possessing a cunning intelligence and a cold heart, they see humans as nothing more than insects to feed on. They are skillful deceivers and powerful shape-shifters, usually appearing as young, sexy, and stunningly beautiful women. Jorōgumo's favorite prey are young, handsome men looking for love—or other favors. When a jorōgumo spots a man she desires, she lures him into her home with promises of affection. He is never seen again. Jorōgumo spin silk threads strong enough to ensnare a grown man so that he cannot escape. They also have powerful venom that can slowly weaken a man day by day, allowing the spider to savor her victim's long and painful death. Jorōgumo can control other, lesser spiders, even employing fire-breathing spiders to burn down the homes of any suspicious meddlers. They are such skillful predators that a jorōgumo can operate like this for years and years, even in the middle of a busy city, piling up hundreds of desiccated skeletons of foolish young men. ---- Tsuchigumo (土蜘蛛) Translation: ground spider Alternate names: yatsukahagi, ōgumo ("giant spider") Habitat: rural areas, mountains, forests, and caves Diet: humans, animals; anything that it can trap Appearance: Tsuchigumo, known as the purse web spider in English, are found all over the Japanese islands and throughout much of the world. Long-lived tsuchigumo can transform into yōkai. They grow to a monstrous size, able to catch much larger prey—particularly humans. Tsuchigumo live in the forests and mountains, making their homes in silk tubes from which they ambush passing prey. Like other spider yōkai, they rely on illusion and trickery to deceive people. While the jorōgumo use their sexuality to seduce young men, the tsuchigumo have a wider selection of deceptions—and often bigger ambitions. Legends: The accounts of the legendary warrior Minamoto no Yorimitsu contain numerous encounters with tsuchigumo. In one, a tsuchigumo changed itself into a servant boy to administer venom in the form of medicine to the famed warrior. When his wounds were not healing and the medicine didn't seem to be working, Yorimitsu suspected foul play. He slashed his sword at the boy, who then fled into the forest. The attack broke the powerful illusion which the spider had laid on Yorimitsu, and he found that he was covered in spider webs. Yorimitsu and his retainers followed the trail of spider's blood into the mountains, where they discovered a gigantic, monstrous arachnid—dead from the wound Yorimitsu had inflicted. In another legend, a tsuchigumo took the form of a beautiful warrior woman and lead an army of yōkai against Japan. Yorimitsu and his men met the yōkai army on the battlefield. With his experience in such matters Yorimitsu attacked the woman general first. The blow struck, her army vanished—it was merely an illusion. The warriors followed the woman to a cave in the mountains, where she morphed into a giant spider. With one swing of his sword, Yorimitsu sliced her abdomen open. Thousands of baby spiders the size of human infants swarmed out from her belly. Yorimitsu and his retainers slew every one of the spiders and returned home victorious. ---- Aosagibi (青鷺火) Translation: blue heron fire Alternate names: goi no hikari ("night heron light") Habitat: rivers, wetlands; wherever herons and other water birds can be found Appearance: When they reach an advanced age, many types of birds transform into magical yōkai with eerie powers. Aosagibi is the name for a bizarre phenomenon caused by transformed herons—particularly the black-crowned night heron. Found all along the islands and coasts, this heron prefers remote areas with heavy reeds and thick woods. Though aosagibi is most commonly attributed to this particular bird, other herons and wild birds such as ducks and pheasants are able to develop this manifestation. Aosagibi is most commonly seen at night, either in the trees where the herons roost, by the rivers where they hunt, or in the twilight sky as birds fly overhead. Long-lived herons develop shining scales on their breasts, which fuse together from their feathers. With each breath, they blow a yellow iridescent powder from their beaks that scatters into the wind. During the autumn nights, their bodies radiate a bluish-white glow. Their powdery breath ignites into bright blue fireballs, which they blow across the water or high in the trees. These fireballs possess no heat and do not ignite what they touch, but eventually evaporate in the wind. Like most wild birds, night herons are shy and flee from humans. Even after transforming into yōkai, they retain their shyness. While the sight of a colony of wild birds breathing blue flames and making strange calls on a cool autumn night can be rather disconcerting, aosagibi does not post any threat. However, because their fireball breath appears similar to other phenomena, caution should be taken to avoid confusing aosagibi with onibi or other supernatural lights. ---- Itachi (鼬) Translation: weasel Alternate names: often referred to as ten, the Japanese marten Habitat: found all across Japan, particularly in mountainous areas Diet: carnivorous; feeds on small wild animals Appearance: Like birds and spiders, many other animals develop into yōkai when they reach a certain age. Japanese weasels, known as itachi, are disconcerting animals. They bring ill omens, and people fear their particular brand of magic. Like most animals-turned-yōkai, they possess shape-shifting abilities in addition to a number of supernatural powers. Itachi are tricksters and pranksters, but generally shy away from interaction with humans. As a result, they are mistrusted and disliked. Itachi calls are also considered to be ill omens. After the yelping cries of a group of itachi are heard, misfortune and despair always follows. Though itachi can transform, they prefer to use other kinds of magic—usually with unfortunate results for their targets. When an itachi is seen standing on its hind legs it is said to be bewitching a human—perhaps hypnotizing them into leaving out food or performing some other task for the weasel's benefit. Itachi are dangerous in groups. They gather together at night, climb up onto each other's shoulders, and create huge columns of fire which erupt into whirlwinds. These are frequently blamed for starting conflagrations which can burn down entire towns. In the old days, weasels were believed to transform into ten (martens) or mujina (badgers or tanuki, depending on the region) ] after reaching an old age. Additionally, the names ten and itachi were often used interchangeably. As a result, there is confusion over which animal is being referred to in many stories Other forms: Itachi are often considered to be the most skilled shape-changing animals, possessing more forms than any other shape-changer. An old phrase about animal yōkai goes, "Kitsune nanabake, tanuki hachibake, ten kubake"—foxes seven forms, tanuki eight forms, martens (i.e. itachi) ] nine forms. When an itachi changes its shape, it usually adopts the form of a young priest boy dressed in clothes that are too big for him. This form is used chiefly to acquire alcohol, which the weasels cannot brew. Itachi also frequently adopt the forms of other yōkai in order to scare humans. One of their favorites is the ōnyūdō: a colossal, bald-headed giant who terrorizes villages, destroys houses, devours livestock and even eats people ---- Kama itachi (鎌鼬) Translation: sickle weasel Habitat: primarily the Japan Alps, but potentially anywhere that weasels are found Diet: carnivorous; feeds on small wild animals Appearance: The mountainous regions of Yamanashi, Nagano, and Niigata are known for a particularly meddlesome kind of itachi. In these areas, grandparents warn their grandchildren to beware of kama itachi, or "sickle weasels." These itachi have learned to ride the swirling whirlwinds of this cold region. They have claws as strong as steel and as sharp as razors. Their fur is spiny like a hedgehog, and they bark like a dog. They move so quickly that they are invisible to the naked eye. They come and go with the wind. Kama itachi travel and attack in threes, striking out at people from thin air. The first kama itachi slices at its victim's legs, knocking him to the ground. The second one uses its fore and hind legs to slice up the prone victim with thousands of dreadful cuts. The third one then applies a magical salve which heals up the majority of the wounds instantly, so that none of them proves fatal. It is said that the kama itachi strikes with such precision that it can carve out entire chunks of flesh from its victims without spilling even a drop of blood. The attack and the healing happen so fast that the victim cannot perceive them; from his perspective he merely trips and gets up with a bit of pain and a few scratches here and there. One theory about the kama itachi's origin is that it is only a joke: a play on words based on a sword fighting stance known as kamae tachi. However, legends of invisible beasts that ride the wind and attack humans in a similar manner are found in all regions of Japan, and the sickle weasel remains a popular explanation. ---- Basan (波山) Translation: onomatopoeic; the sound of its flapping wings Alternate names: basabasa, inu hōō ("dog phoenix") Habitat: mountainous forests; found only on Shikoku Diet: charred wood and embers Appearance: Basan are rare birds found only on the island of Shikoku, in the mountains of Ehime. They are roughly the size of a turkey, and shaped like a chicken. Basan are easily recognized by their bright red comb and brilliantly colored plumage which appears like tongues of flame. Their most notable feature is their breath, which flows visibly from their mouth like a dragon's fire. However, the flame gives off no heat, nor does it ignite combustible material. Basan are entirely nocturnal, and little is known about their behavior. They make their homes in remote bamboo groves, far from human activity. Charred wood and embers make up their diet, and they have been known to wander into remote villages at night to feast on the remains of bonfires or charcoal. When pleased or startled, basan beat their wings creating the distinctive rustling "basabasa" sound from which they get their name. People who have witnessed this report that the birds vanish into thin air when they realize they have been seen. ---- Yamawaro (山童) Translation: mountain child Alternate names: yamawarawa Habitat: mountains; commonly found throughout Kyūshū and West Japan Diet: omnivorous Appearance: Yamawaro are minor deities of the mountains, closely related to other nature spirits such as kappa, garappa, and hyōsube. Short creatures resembling boys of about 10 years of age, their heads are crowned in long brown hair and their bodies are covered in fine, light hair. They have a short torso and two long legs, on which they walk upright. A yamawaro's most distinguishing feature is the single eye in the middle of its head. They are skillful mimics, copying the sound of falling rocks, wind, dynamite, and tools. They can even learn to speak human languages and sing human songs. Like their cousins the kappa, yamawaro despise horses and cows, and attack them on sight. They love the sport of sumo, which they are better at than any human. Like hyōsube, they sneak into homes to nap and take baths, and leave behind a thick film of grease and hair when they are done. Yamawaro are frequently encountered in the mountains by woodcutters, and are known to help with work. If properly thanked and offered food for their services, a yamawaro is likely to return to help again. However, care must be taken when feeding a yamawaro. If the amount of food is less than what was promised, it will grow angry and never return. If offered before the work is performed, the yamawaro will simply take the food and run. One theory from Kumamoto Prefecture says that yamawaro and garappa are actually different forms of the same yōkai. During the cold months, these creatures live in the mountains as yamawaro (or yamawarawa, as they are known locally) ]. During the warm months, they live in lakes and rivers as garappa. Every year on the autumn equinox, all of the country's garappa transform into yamawaro and travel from the rivers to the mountains in a mass migration. They return on the spring equinox and transform back into garappa. Villagers who build their houses in the pathway of these massive yōkai migrations are prone to find holes, gashes, and other damage caused by yamawaro angry at having their path blocked. People who witness the springtime return of the yamawaro often catch deadly fevers This theory is supported by the fact that these creatures share so many traits in common with one another, and because it is extremely rare to see garappa in the winter. However, it is also possible that these aquatic yōkai go into hibernation during the colder months, and that the similarities between garappa and yamawaro are simply coincidence. ---- Azuki arai (小豆洗い) Translation: the bean washer Alternate names: azuki togi ("bean grinder") Habitat: remote forests; found throughout Japan Diet: unknown, but probably includes azuki beans Appearance: Azuki arai are mysterious yōkai encountered in mountainous regions all across Japan. They have many regional nicknames, a common one being azukitogi. These yōkai live deep in forests and mountains, spending their time near streams. Few actual sightings have been recorded, but they are said to be short and squat, with big, round eyes, and overall resembling Buddhist priests. They appear full of mirth with silly smiles and large hands with only three fingers. [ Behavior: Azuki arai are more often heard than seen. Their main activity seems to be washing red azuki beans by the riverside while singing a dreadful song interspersed with the "shoki shoki" sound of beans being washed in a basket: Azuki araou ka? Hito totte kuou ka? (shoki shoki) ] Shall I wash my red beans, or shall I catch a human to eat? (shoki shoki) ] Passersby who hear an azuki arai singing usually slip and fall into the river. The noise from the splash scares the yōkai away. Nearly all encounters with azuki arai are purely auditory; they are notoriously shy, and do all they can to avoid being seen. Their uncanny ability to mimic the sounds of nature and animals helps them to hide. Because of their elusiveness, spotting an azuki arai is supposed to bring good luck [ Azuki Yōkai ] A number of yōkai share a connection to azuki, a red bean found in many Japanese dishes. In addition to the name, these yōkai share number of common traits and habits with each other. Whether they are related to one another or simply coincidentally connected is unknown. Some are dangerous and some are benign, but they are all incredibly shy—often heard, but almost never seen. Due to their elusive nature, an accurate classification of this yōkai family is difficult to make. Stories of the azuki yōkai offer little clues to their true nature; some tales connect them with the ghosts of humans who drowned while washing beans at the riverbanks; others imply some connection with Shinto mountain gods and deities of good fortune; and still others attribute azuki yōkai to the magic of mischievous itachi or tanuki. With so few reliable observations, it is impossible to assign a proper taxonomy to these spirits. ---- Azuki hakari (小豆はかり) Translation: the bean counter Habitat: rural villages, homes, attics, and gardens Diet: unknown Appearance: A possible relative to azuki arai are the azuki hakari, or "the bean counters." A poltergeist found in some homes and temples, these yōkai are known only by the sounds they make. They are said to dwell in attics or gardens, and are most active at night. Azuki hakari have never been seen directly—only heard. Though similar in name and habit to their azuki-related cousins, azuki hakari have traits distinct enough to classify them as separate yōkai. Azuki hakari appear in homes late at night, after midnight. An encounter usually begins with the sound of heavy footsteps in the space between the attic and the roof. Shortly after, a rhythmic sound like dried azuki beans being scattered can be heard against the windows or sliding doors leading outside. The sound grows progressively louder, and gradually changes into the sound of splashing water, then finally to the sound of geta—Japanese wooden sandals—walking just outside the room. Opening the doors or windows causes the noise to stop, revealing no sign of any creature; nor any beans or puddles or markings Because of the difficulty of direct observation of all azuki spirits, it is likely that some of the stories about azuki arai may in fact be about encounters with azuki hakari, especially those which take place near homes or away from rivers. ---- Azuki babā (小豆婆) Translation: the bean hag Alternate names: azuki togi babā ("bean grinding hag") Habitat: forests and occasionally villages in Northeast Japan Diet: humans, and probably also azuki beans Appearance: The people of Miyagi Prefecture tell of a much more sinister member of the azuki family of yōkai. Rather than the benign and cute azuki arai known throughout the country, this northeastern variation takes the form of a fearsome old hag dressed all in white, singing in a husky, ugly voice. Azuki babā appear only at twilight—particularly on rainy or misty autumn nights. Their song is similar to the azuki arai's, except that azuki babā follow through on the threat to catch and eat humans. Witnesses of azuki babā describe an eerie, white glow visible through a thick, white mist. From the mist, they hear the husky voice of an old hag singing her ghastly song and counting beans as she washes them in the river with a strainer. Those who don't turn away at this point never make it back. Azuki babā are rarer than their harmless, bean-washing counterparts. Despite their ferociousness, they are mostly found only in stories used to scare children into behaving properly. Of all the variations of azuki-related yōkai, this one is the most likely to be a shape-shifted evil itachi, tanuki, or kitsune imitating the harmless azuki arai to attract a curious child to catch and eat. ---- Wa nyūdō (輪入道) Translation: wheel priest Habitat: hell; encountered on roads, mountain passes, and occasionally villages Diet: souls; occasionally snacks on babies Appearance: Wa nyūdō appear as giant, fearsome men's heads trapped within flaming ox-cart wheels. Their heads are shaved like monks' in penance for sins during life. Wa nyūdō are servants of hell, but spend most of their time on earth patrolling for the wicked. They are in constant suffering from the flames and the wheel, and take a sadistic pleasure in inflicting pain on others. When they capture a victim—ideally a wicked criminal or a corrupt priest, but often enough just an ordinary person—they drag their victim back to hell to be judged and damned. Then the wa nyūdō return to earth to continue their work, until the sins of their former lives have been redeemed. When a wa nyūdō is sighted, smart townspeople keep off the roads and stay away from all doors and windows to avoid any notice by this demon. The extra-cautious decorate their homes with prayer charms in hopes that the monster will be repulsed and stay away. Merely witnessing the wa nyūdō is enough to bring calamity upon a whole family. Their souls are torn from their bodies and brought to hell by the wheel. Legends: One famous story from Kyōto tells of a woman who peeked out her window at a wa nyūdō as he passed through town. The demon snarled at her, saying, "Instead of looking at me, have a look at your own child!" She looked back at her baby, who was screaming on the floor in a pool of blood—both of its legs had been completely torn from its body. When she looked back at the wa nyūdō, the child's legs were in its mouth, being eaten by the mad, grinning monster. ---- Katasharin (片車輪) In Buddhist cosmology, the souls of the damned are reborn in hell to be tortured until their sins have been atoned for. Sometimes, however, particularly wicked souls are enlisted as servants of hell. They are forced to work off their bad karma earned during their lives. One of these enlistments is reincarnation as a katasharin, or "single wheel," of which the males are known as wa nyūdō and the females as katawaguruma. Only the most cruel lords, ladies, generals, and kings are transformed into katasharin. These crippled wagon wheels fly through the air, patrolling the highways and roads between earth and hell, searching for souls to drag back to their infernal masters. ---- Katawaguruma (片輪車) Translation: crippled wheel Habitat: hell; encountered on roads and mountain passes, and occasionally villages Diet: souls Appearance: Instead of a giant monk's head stuck in a wheel, a katawaguruma appear as tormented, naked women riding single, flaming, ox-cart wheels. They suffer eternally, burning in pain. Katawaguruma look and act in much the same manner as wa nyūdō, rolling along the roads of Japan, occasionally stopping in towns to hunt for impure souls to drag back to their hellish masters. These demons bestow powerful curses on any who see them. This curse spreads rapidly through town, traveling on the news and gossip about the katawaguruma. Eventually, this brings calamity upon an entire village. Despite this, there is evidence that the katawaguruma has a capacity for mercy alien to its male counterpart. Legends: In a 17th century record, when a katawaguruma attacked a village in what is now Shiga, she abducted the child of a woman who dared to peek at her through a crack in her door, saying "Instead of watching me you should have been watching your child!" The distraught woman realized her own curiosity was responsible for the loss of her child. She composed a poem expressing her faults, and displayed it all around town, warning others to watch their children more carefully. The next night, the katawaguruma came again and saw that the woman was truly regretful. She returned the child unharmed. The katawaguruma was never seen in that village again. [ Why Wheels? ] The wheel is an important symbol in Buddhism. The hub of the wheel represents moral discipline, while the spokes represent wisdom to defeat ignorance. The rim of the wheel represents concentration, which holds the whole thing together. The revolving of the wheel represents the endless cycle of reincarnation. Punishing evil by trapping it in a wheel was a way to express the supremacy of Buddhism over any evil. The katasharin demons may seem like tyrants to humans, but they were mere slaves in the greater scheme of things. They are forced to submit to Buddhism in order to attain their salvation. In this manner, the wheel plays a role in Buddhist symbolism analogous to the crucifix in Christian symbolism. ---- Oni (鬼) Translation: ogre, demon Habitat: hell; remote mountains, caves, islands, abandoned fortresses Diet: omnivorous; especially livestock, humans, and alcohol Appearance: Oni are one the greatest icons of Japanese folklore. They are large and scary, standing taller than the tallest man, and sometimes taller than trees. They come in many varieties, but are most commonly depicted with red or blue skin, wild hair, two or more horns, and fang-like tusks. Other variations exist in different colors and with different numbers of horns, eyes, or fingers and toes. They wear loincloths made of the pelts of great beasts. All oni possess extreme strength and constitution, and many of them are accomplished sorcerers. They are ferocious demons, bringers of disaster, spreaders of disease, and punishers of the damned in hell. Oni are born when truly wicked humans die and end up in one of the many Buddhist hells. Transformed into oni, they become the ogreish and brutal servants of Great Lord Enma, ruler of hell. Wielding great iron clubs, they crush and destroy humans solely for enjoyment. An oni's job is to mete out horrible punishments such as peeling off skins, crushing bones, and rendering other torments too horrible to describe. All these tortures are for wicked sinners—but only those not quite wicked enough to be reborn as oni themselves. Hell is full of oni. They make up the armies of the great generals of the underworld. Occasionally, when a human is so utterly wicked that his soul is beyond any redemption, he transforms into an oni while still alive. He then remains on earth to terrorize the living. These transformed oni are the ones most legends tell about, and the ones who pose the most danger to humankind. Oni are the stuff of legends and fairy tales. Japanese mythology is full of countless stories of oni encounters with lords and ladies, warriors and rogues. No two stories about oni are exactly alike except for one thing—oni are always the villains of mankind. Originally, all spirits, ghosts, and monsters were known as oni. The root of their name is a word meaning "hidden" or "concealed," and it was written with the Chinese character for ghost. In the old days of Japan, before the spirits were well-cataloged, oni could refer to almost any supernatural creature—ghosts, obscure gods, large or scary yōkai, even particularly vicious and brutal humans. As the centuries shaped the Japanese language, the definitions we know for the various kinds of monsters gradually came into being. Female demons are not called oni, but are known by another name: kijo. ---- Kijo (鬼女) Translation: ogress, demoness Habitat: remote mountains, caves, islands, secluded huts Diet: omnivorous; anything and anybody, particularly travelers Appearance: Kijo are female demons. They resemble human women in most ways, although they are hideously ugly to behold. Some have red or yellow eyes, blue skin, sharp horns, long claws, or other supernatural features. They usually dress in rags and wear their hair long and unkempt. They live like savages far from civilization. Kijo refers chiefly to women who have been transformed from humans into horrible monsters—either out of intense jealousy, wicked crimes, or a terrible grudge that twists the soul into pure hatred. These transformed women retreat from common society into more secluded places where they continue to perpetrate their wicked deeds. They can be found living in remote mountain caves, abandoned houses, or along mountain roads where they receive a steady supply of victims. Kijo are stronger than most humans, though their strength pales in comparison to oni. These demonesses excel in magic; they accumulate powerful spells over their long lives. Kijo are capable of bestowing hexes and curses, brewing poisons and potions, and weaving complex illusions. A few kijo dedicate themselves to personal vengeance or some political goal. But most just keep to themselves and go unnoticed by humankind for centuries. Like oni, kijo are the stuff of Japanese legends. Innumerable fairy tales, bedtime stories, kabuki plays, films, and so featuring kijo on have been created to entertain, to caution, and to preach morality. Women who do bad things might turn into kijo, and men who go after unscrupulous women might be heading to their deaths. Kijo is a broad term that in its most general sense encompasses any female demon, just as the term oni can technically refer to any male demon. Indeed, the name kijo is formed simply by combining the two kanji for oni and woman. Though their name might suggest that kijo are the female counterparts to the male oni, there is nothing to support this. Tales show oni working either as tormentors of the damned or as menaces to human society in the living world, but kijo do not seem to have any connection to hell or the afterlife. They work solo, and have their own motives. Further, kijo and oni are not commonly seen together. Little to nothing is known about how either creature reproduces (or if they even do) ]. It is likely that kijo are entirely separate creatures from oni, other than the fact that both are born from corrupted human souls ---- Reiki (霊鬼) Translation: demon spirit, demon ghost Habitat: any; usually haunts the area near its body Diet: none Appearance: Some oni can be killed by manmade weapons, and others die of natural causes. But they do not always peacefully pass on to the next life. Some still have unfinished business or karma left to burn off, while others die such violent or passionate deaths that the soul becomes disjointed at the moment of death. They remain in the human world as a demon ghost. Reiki, written by combining the characters for spirit and demon, are the ghosts of oni unable to pass on to the afterlife. Reiki appear just as they did before death, but accompanied by an aura or an eerie glow. They are semi-transparent like ghosts, and often gain supernatural powers in addition to the magic they possessed in life. Reiki have only one motivation: revenge. They bring suffering to the person or people they feel are responsible for their death, or to those who stood against them in life. Reiki will either follow a target or attach themselves to a particular area—often their own grave site—and assault any who come near. They can haunt for centuries. Reiki persist until exorcised by a powerful Buddhist priest. Legends: There are fewer stories about reiki than about oni, but tales tell of powerful spirits even more fearsome than their living counterparts. One of the most well-known reiki legends takes place at Gangō-ji, a temple in Nara Prefecture. A mysterious force was haunting the temple's bell tower and murdering children every night. The force was so powerful that not even the most devout priests could identify it, let alone exorcise it. In a story reminiscent of the adventures of Hercules, only the son of a god was strong enough to track down and defeat the demon ghost, saving the children of the temple. ---- Jubokko (樹木子) Translation: tree child, shrub child Habitat: battlefields, places where mass deaths occurred Diet: blood Appearance: On the fields of war and sites of vicious massacres, where the blood of thousands of warriors has saturated the soil, a strange kind of tree can be found. From afar, jubokko appear to be ordinary trees, indistinguishable from the various species that dot the landscape. It takes an observant eye to notice the slightly more fearsome features of its branches, or the piles of human bones buried in the undergrowth beneath the tree. In fact, they were once normal trees; but the vast amounts of human blood absorbed through their roots transformed them into yōkai. Thereafter, the trees thirst only for human blood. Jubokko wait for unsuspecting humans to pass underneath their branches. When somebody gets close enough, they attack, snatching their prey with long, jagged, finger-like branches, and hoisting it into their boughs. These branches pierce the skin of their victims, sucking out all of the blood with special tube-like twigs. After the body is drained, the flesh and organs are consumed by birds, insects, and other animals. Only the dry bones fall back to earth. By the time most people are close enough to notice the heaps of bleached bones at the base of the trees, it is too late to escape. [ The Battle of Sekigahara ] October 21st, 1600. The Battle of Sekigahara is one of the most important battles in Japanese history. Considered the decisive battle of the warring states period, it marked the beginning of the unification of Japan under the Tokugawa shogunate. This bloody battle was the culmination of centuries of civil war, fought between various lords, armed peasant uprisings, and religious conflicts that took the lives of countless Japanese. The Battle of Sekigahara saw the deaths of roughly 40,000 soldiers in a single day—it is no exaggeration to say that the rivers and fields ran red with blood. Because of the impact this battle had on Japanese history, it has remained a popular subject for ghost stories and legends about the past. Today, visitors to Sekigahara talk of strange and unique local vegetation, born from the tainted soil soaked with the blood of tens of thousands of warriors. Ghosts and evil spirits still wander the fields. Could any jubokko have been born on the fields of Sekigahara after that great combat? Take care not to wander too close to any strange trees in the area. ---- Tsurube otoshi (釣瓶落とし) Translation: a dropping well bucket Habitat: heavily wooded areas; particularly coniferous trees Diet: carnivorous; large ones prefer humans, crushed or mashed Appearance: Tsurube otoshi are a gigantic disembodied heads of either a human, a tengu, or an oni. Sometimes they appear wreathed in flames like large fireballs with facial features. Spending most of their lives high in the trees (preferring pine, kaya, and other conifers for their height) , they live deep along paths in the forest, or just outside of town where travelers are likely to pass. Tsurube otoshi range in size from an ordinary human head to up to two meters in diameter. ] Behavior: Tsurube otoshi lurk in the treetops late at night and wait for unsuspecting creatures to pass underneath. When they need to feed, they drop quickly to the ground like a stone. This is the reason for its name, which means "falling well bucket." The goal is to trap and eat an animal, or a human if the head is large enough. Then they slip back into the trees, sometimes singing a monstrous taunt, challenging others to pass underneath. They enjoy this style of killing, letting out a horrible, guffawing laugh as they hunt and devour their prey. When they are not hungry, tsurube otoshi will sometimes drop down and crush people just for fun. They also drop large rocks or even well buckets (they have a sense of humor) ] on their victims from up high, laughing at the damage they inflict. Travelers passing under tall trees late at night would be wise to keep their heads up. They may be crushed by a falling tsurube otoshi Tsurube otoshi encountered in the Kansai region are most often solitary, gargantuan heads. In the Tohoku region, tsurube otoshi are usually encountered in larger groups of slightly smaller heads. ---- Gashadokuro (がしゃどくろ) Translation: onomatopoeic; rattling skull Alternate names: ōdokuro ("giant skeleton") Habitat: any; usually found near mass graves or battlegrounds Diet: none, but enjoys eating humans anyway Appearance: Gashadokuro are skeletal giants which wander around the countryside in the darkest hours of the night. Their teeth chatter and bones rattle with the "gachi gachi" sound of this yōkai's namesake. But they are not always noisy. If they should happen upon a human out late on the roads, the gashadokuro will silently creep up and catch their victims, crushing them in their hands or biting off their head. Soldiers whose bodies rot in the fields and victims of famine who die unknown in the wilderness rarely receive proper funerary rites. Unable to pass on, their souls are reborn as ghosts, longing eternally for that which they once had. These people die with anger and pain in their hearts. That energy remains long after their flesh has rotted from their bones. As their bodies decay, their anger ferments into a grudge against the living, which twists them into a supernatural force. When the bones of hundreds of victims gather together into one mass, they form the humongous, skeletal monster known as the gashadokuro. Too large and powerful to be killed, gashadokuro maintain their existence until the energy and malice stored up in their bodies has completely burnt out. However, because of the large amount of dead bodies required to form a single one, these abominations are rarer today than they were in the past, when wars and famine were a part of everyday life. Legends: The earliest record of a gashadokuro goes back over 1000 years to a bloody rebellion against the central government by a samurai named Taira no Masakado. His daughter Takiyasha hime was a famous sorceress. When Masako was eventually killed for his revolt, his daughter continued his cause. Using her black magic, she summoned a great skeleton from the bodies of dead soldiers to attack the city of Kyōto. Her monster is depicted in a famous print by Utagawa Kuniyoshi. [ Japanese Funerals ] Japanese funerary rites are complex. As with Western customs, the body is carefully prepared, a wake is held, and finally a funeral. The body is cremated, and the bones are removed from the ashes by the family and interred in a grave. After the funeral, a number of memorial services are held. These occur on the 7th, 49th, and 100th days after death, and during the Obon festival. Other services are repeated on the 3rd, 5th, 7th, and 13th anniversaries, and many more times for up to 50 years after the person's death. These ceremonies help ensure that the deceased pass on to the proper realm of afterlife and do not dwell among the living, or suffer in one of the many Buddhist hells. Services are performed and family graves are tended to by their progeny for as long as the family line exists. Those who are not given proper rites might not pass on, and are often said to turn into yōkai. Or worse… ---- Yamauba (山姥) Translation: mountain hag, mountain crone Alternate names: yamanba, onibaba Habitat: isolated huts or caves, deep in the mountains Diet: generally eats human food, but will cook anything available Appearance: Yamauba are the old hags and witches of the Japanese mountains and forests. They were once human but became corrupted and transformed into monsters. Some sport horns or fangs, but most often yamauba look just like ordinary kind old ladies with no sign of their evil nature—until they attack. Yamauba live alone in huts by the road, where they occasionally offer weary travelers shelter, food, and a place to sleep. Late at night when their guests are fast asleep, yamauba transform into their true shape—an ugly, old, demonic witch. Thus revealed, they try to catch and eat their guests, often using powerful magic. Stories of encounters with yamauba have been spread by those few travelers lucky enough to escape. These tales were then passed along for generations until they came to be told as bedtime stories to disobedient children: "Be good or yamauba will come to get you!" Sometimes yamauba are created when young women accused of crimes or wicked deeds flee into the wilderness and live in exile. The women transform gradually over many years into mountain witches. In some cases, their origin can be explained by an old custom from times of famine or economic hardship. When it became impossible to feed everyone, families had to make a hard choice: remove one member so that the rest can survive. Often the sacrifice chosen was the newly born or the elderly. Some families led their mothers deep into the woods and left them there to die. These abandoned old women, either out of rage or desperation, transformed into horrible monsters that fed on humans and practiced black magic. ---- Kotengu (小天狗) Translation: lesser tengu ("lesser divine dog") Alternate names: karasu tengu ("crow tengu") Habitat: mountains, cliffs, caves, forests, areas surrounded by nature Diet: carrion, livestock, wild animals, humans Appearance: Kotengu resemble large birds of prey with human-like characteristics. They often wear the robes of the ascetic and mystical hermits called yamabushi, and sometimes carry fine weapons or other items stolen from human homes or temples. Kotengu behave like savage monsters. They live solitary lives, but on rare occasions band together or with other yōkai to accomplish their goals. They accumulate hoards. Kotengu collect and trade trinkets and valuable magical items. When angered they throw tantrums and go on destructive rampages, taking out their anger on anything near them. Kotengu have little respect for humans. They feast on human flesh, and commit rape, torture, and murder for fun. Some of their favorite games are abducting people to drop them from great heights deep into the woods, or tying children to the tops of trees so all can hear their screams but none can reach them. Kotengu kidnap people and force them eat feces until they go mad. They especially revel in sacrilege. They torment monks and nuns, rob temples, and try to seduce clergy. Kotengu's greatest weakness is overconfidence. There are countless folk stories about kotengu being duped into trading powerful magical items or giving up valuable information in exchange for worthless trinkets. Foolish kotengu overestimate their own intelligence when trying to trick humans, and end up being tricked themselves. ---- Tengu (天狗) No yōkai is as ubiquitous in Japan as the mighty tengu. They hold a singular place in Japanese folklore—worshiped as gods, reviled as demons, and revered as reincarnations of great heroes and wise men. Tengu are noble warriors, honorless thieves, wise sages, wicked villains, prophets, protectors of nature, and harbingers of war. Tengu are feared and honored for their vast knowledge and mystical secrets. They know magical spells, and keep the secrets of heaven and earth. Fierce martial artists, tengu are skilled in multiple forms of combat. According to Buddhist lore, tengu are born when a person dies who is not wicked enough to go to hell, but is too angry, vain, proud, or heretical to go to heaven. The tengu is a personification of those excessive vices, magnified and empowered in a new, demonic form. Tengu are divided into two castes: daitengu and kotengu. Of these, the daitengu are more powerful and wiser—and more likely to be known by name and revered by humans. The kotengu are vicious, savage, and cruel. During the Edo period, scarier tengu stories were gradually supplanted by amusing folk tales, dampening the vicious images of earlier lore. By the 19th century, the warlike nature and martial demeanor of the tengu came to be seen as honorable traits unique to these powerful bird-like spirits. Their knowledge and skills were popularized in the arts like ukiyoe prints and noh and kabuki theater. From then on, tengu have remained one of the most well-known and beloved subjects of Japanese folklore. ---- Daitengu (大天狗) Translation: greater tengu ("greater divine dog") Alternate names: they usually go by their individual names Habitat: high, remote mountaintops Diet: many individuals have preferred foods or strict religious dietary regimens Appearance: Daitengu are much larger and more imposing than kotengu. They appear in a more human-like form; usually that of a man dressed in the robes of an ascetic monk, with a red face, an incredibly long and phallic nose (the longer the nose, the more powerful the tengu) . Large, feathered wings sprout from their backs. Only rarely do they appear in the more primitive avian form of the lesser tengu. ] Daitengu live solitary lives on remote mountaintops, far removed from humanity. Their lives are spent in thoughtful meditation, intent on perfecting themselves. Daitengu possess greater pride, wisdom, and power than their kotengu cousins, although they can also be just as savage and unpredictable. This savagery combined with intelligence makes daitengu more dangerous. In fact, natural disasters and other great catastrophes are sometimes attributed to the wrath of a powerful daitengu. However, daitengu also possess more self-restraint; there are stories of daitengu giving aid to worthy humans. While kotengu terrorize people whenever they could, over the centuries daitengu were viewed less as the enemy of mankind and more as a race of god-like sages living deep in the mountains. Daitengu became closely connected with the ascetic mountain religion of Shugendō. The mountain mystics grew close to the tengu, seeking their wisdom and worshiping them as divine beings. It is perhaps through this mystic religion that humankind was eventually able to earn the respect of the tengu. Brave men ventured into the unknown wilds in hopes of gaining some of the tengu's wisdom. Occasionally, tengu would teach secrets and impart magical knowledge to the worthiest of these men. One of Japan's most famous warriors, Minamoto no Yoshitsune, is said to have learned swordsmanship from the tengu king Sōjōbō. ---- Ōnyūdō (大入道) Translation: giant priest Alternate names: many variations and different kinds exist Habitat: any; usually found in mountainous regions Diet: varies; most commonly livestock or humans Appearance: Ōnyūdō is a catch-all term for a number of giants found throughout Japan. The name is used in a euphemistic way; while some ōnyūdō bear a strong resemblance to Buddhist priests and monks, most have no actual relation to the clergy. Size, appearance, and mannerisms vary from region to region and account to account. Some giants are only slightly larger than a human while others are as big as a mountain. Some are saviors of men, while others are man-eaters. Ōnyūdō can be separated into four general groups: those that harm humans; those that help humans; transformations of other yōkai; and other, truly unique ōnyūdō that do not fit into any of these categories. Ōnyūdō that harm humans are by far the broadest category. Among them are well-known yōkai, such as hitotsume nyūdō, mikoshi nyūdō, and the ocean going umi bōzu. These giants delight in terrorizing humans— sometimes hunting them to eat, sometimes pillaging and destroying villages out of rage, and other times terrifying lone travelers just for the fun of it. Ōnyūdō that help humans are much rarer. They have been known to perform good deeds such as turning stuck waterwheels, moving heavy objects, or doing other things that require incredible amounts of strength. Though helpful, they are not always friendly. Ōnyūdō can change from benevolent to violent with little warning. Helpful or harmful, true ōnyūdō are actually rare. Transformed yōkai—especially tanuki and itachi—make up a large percentage of the giant population. Shape-shifting yōkai take on giant form in order to scare people and cause mischief, though they rarely kill. There is no easy way to identify if a giant is a true ōnyūdō or just a shape-shifter. The two are functionally indistinguishable. And then there are the remainder of the ōnyūdō—enigmatic and mysterious. They are only evidenced by their footprints or discarded trash. Regardless of how good or evil at heart a particular ōnyūdō is, they are by nature extremely dangerous. It is generally wise to leave them be. Better to avoid all contact with them than risk enraging an ōnyūdō and bringing destruction upon nearby villages. Why Priests? Many yōkai have names ending with nyūdō, bō, bōzu, kozō, and other terms for priests, monks, and so on. These yōkai are also often depicted with priestly robes, shaved heads, and other iconic Buddhist traits. It could be assumed that old Japan did not have a very high opinion of the Buddhist clergy.... While a few of these yōkai do actually have connections to religion, the majority do not. In ancient Japan, these words were used as endearing nicknames, humorous euphemisms, or colloquialisms to refer to strangers. Just as the English "sir" and "madam" actually refer to nobility but are used as polite terms of address in daily life, these Japanese words for the clergy have broader meanings outside of their religious context. ---- Hitotsume nyūdō (一つ目入道) Translation: one-eyed priest Habitat: roads and highways Diet: omnivorous; occasionally humans Appearance: Hitotsume nyūdō could pass for really tall human priests if not for the large, single eye in the center of their faces. They dress in luxurious robes and travel in enormous, ornate palanquins carried by lesser yōkai or human slaves. Their palanquins are surrounded by a splendid precession fit for a corrupt abbot or a rich lord. The fantastic procession is enough to make most travelers stop and stare, speculating about what nobleman or lady might be riding inside. But when the palanquin stops and a hitotsume nyūdō comes strolling out, it means trouble for any curious gawkers. Hitotsume nyūdō are one of the most demonic types of ōnyūdō. They roam the roads and highways outside of the cities, assaulting lone travelers unfortunate enough to get in their way. Like many giants, they are able to increase and decrease their size at will. They can grow taller than the highest trees and trample forests to crush any who might be hiding within. With their long legs they are faster than any human. Running away is impossible. Like many ōnyūdō, hitotsume nyūdō attacks are blamed on mischievous kitsune or tanuki disguised by transformation magic; and occasionally this is true. Legends: A legend from Wakayama tells how a man, traveling along a wooded road, came across a splendid procession unlike any he had ever seen. Entranced, he climbed a tree to get a better look. As the procession approached, it stopped just as it reached his tree. There was a frighteningly large palanquin, and out from it stepped a giant, one-eyed monster. The creature went after the man, climbing the tree he was hiding in. In a panic the man swung his sword at the creature. At the moment he did so, the hitotsume nyūdō and the entire procession vanished. Another hitotsume nyūdō, frequently seen outside of Kyōto, was said to be the reincarnation of a particularly fierce abbot of Enryaku-ji. Renowned for his strict discipline, in life he was known for expelling lazy monks from his temple. He saw the world as growing increasingly secular and wicked, and he constantly lamented and criticized the corruption and sin of the monks of his day. After his death, it is said he was reincarnated into a yōkai. This allowed him to continue punishing the wicked and impious clergy. ---- Mikoshi nyūdō (見越入道) Translation: anticipating priest Alternate names: mikoshi, miage nyūdō, taka bōzu Habitat: bridges, roads, streets; especially at night Diet: omnivorous; prefers travelers Appearance: Mikoshi nyūdō are fearsome yōkai who appear late at night to lone travelers on empty streets, intersections, or bridges. They appear to be harmless traveling priests or monks, no taller than an ordinary person; but in an instant they grow abnormally tall, with long claws and hair like a wild beast. As soon as a person raises his eyes to look upon a mikoshi nyūdō, the giant grows to an immense height—as tall the observer is able to raise his eyes, and just as fast. This causes the person to look up so high and fast that they lose their balance and tumble backwards. That's when the mikoshi nyūdō lunges forward and bites their throat out with its teeth. Those unfortunate enough to meet this cruel yōkai usually do not live to tell the tale. Much depends on the person's reaction. If they try to ignore and walk past the mikoshi nyūdō, the angry giant will crush them or pierce them with bamboo spears and branches. The same fate is met by those who turn and try to run away. People who stare at the mikoshi nyūdō frozen in fear will drop dead on the spot, overcome by its presence. The only possible escape is to anticipate the mikoshi nyūdō (thus its name) ]. Meet it face-to-face, eye-to-eye, and show no fear. Then, look from its head down to its feet, rather than starting at the feet and looking up. If done properly, the giant's power to grow will be sapped. Telling the giant, "You lost! I anticipated your trick!" causes it to vanish in anger, leaving the traveler to pass safely along Other forms: Mikoshi nyūdō is a popular form of some shape-shifting animals. In particular, itachi and tanuki transform into these giants in order to hunt humans. Kitsune and mujina are known to occasionally take this form as well, though less often. When a mikoshi nyūdō is result of a transformation, it carries a bucket, a lantern, or some other tool. This tool is where the shape-shifter's true body is stored. If you can snatch the object away from the giant before it attacks, the spell is broken and the transformed yōkai will be at its captor's mercy. ---- Taka nyūdō (高入道) Translation: tall priest Alternate names: frequently confused with mikoshi nyūdō Habitat: alleys, roads, mountains; native to Shikoku and the Kinki region Diet: omnivorous Appearance: The taka nyūdō is a close relative of the mikoshi nyūdō. Because of the similarity in regional names and appearance, taka nyūdō and mikoshi nyūdō are often confused with one another. Taka nyūdō are usually encountered in alleyways, suddenly appearing before unsuspecting humans. Like the mikoshi nyūdō, they increase their height at the same speed as their victim's gaze. Taka nyūdō can be defeated in a similar manner as the mikoshi nyūdō—by demonstrating courage in the face of death, showing no fear, and refusing to raise your head and denying them the chance to grow. Some say they can also be outsmarted by carrying a ruler or other measuring utensils and attempting to calculate their height before it can react. The confused giant usually leaves in disgust and will not bother the same person again. Taka nyūdō are generally less violent than other giants. They are content with simply scaring its victims instead of ripping their throats out or crushing them with trees. Its true form is often a tanuki, kitsune, or kawauso. ---- Abura sumashi (油すまし) Translation: oil presser Habitat: mountain passes; native to Kumamoto Prefecture Diet: unknown Appearance: The abura sumashi is a rare yōkai native to Kumamoto Prefecture. It looks like a squat humanoid with a large, ugly head like a potato or a stone. It wears a straw-woven raincoat. Abura sumashi are extremely rare, only found deep in the mountains or along mountain passes in the southern parts of Japan—throughout the range where wild tea plants grow. Very little is known about the lifestyle and habits of this reclusive yōkai. The most well-known abura sumashi lives in the Kusazumigoe Pass in Kumamoto, but only ever appears briefly to travelers. Occasionally, an old grandmother walking the pass with her grandchildren will say, "You know, a long time ago, an abura sumashi used to live in these parts." A mysterious voice will call out in reply, "I still do!" On rare occasions the abura sumashi will appear to the travelers, materializing out of thin air. The name abura sumashi means "oil presser," and comes from the act of pressing oil out of the seeds of tea plants which grow in Kumamoto. Though its origins are a mystery, it is commonly believed that abura sumashi are the ghosts of oil thieves who escaped into the woods. Oil was a difficult and expensive commodity to make. It required time and hard work to extract it from tea seeds, so its theft was a serious crime. Oil thieves who went unpunished in life reincarnated as abura sumashi—a divine punishment for their sins. ---- Yuki onna (雪女) Translation: snow woman Habitat: mountain passes; anywhere there is snow Diet: life energy; can also eat ordinary food Appearance: Yuki onna prey on travelers lost in the heavy snowstorms that blanket the Japanese Alps in winter. They have an otherworldly beauty, with long black hair and dark, piercing eyes. Their skin is ageless and as white as snow, but their bodies are as cold as ice. A mere touch is enough to give a human a deep, unshakable chill. They feed on life force, sucking it from human's mouths with an icy breath that freezes their victims solid. Yuki onna spend their lives hunting humans in the snow. They stay near mountain roads and prey on the travelers coming and going, or break into homes and flash-freeze the inhabitants during the night. While they are killers, Yuki onna are not entirely cold blooded. Legends say they can fall in love with their intended prey and let them go free. Some go so far as to marry humans and live happily together. As supernatural spirits never age, however, their husbands inevitably discover their true identities. This revelation usually ends these happy marriages. Legends: In Niigata Prefecture, an elderly man operated an inn on a mountain trail with his wife. One snowy night, the inn was visited by a young lady traveling alone. She warmed herself by the fire and ate with the innkeeper and his wife. She was sweet and charming and extremely beautiful. So it was even more of a surprise when, in the middle of the night during a fierce blizzard, she stood up and made to leave the inn. The innkeeper begged her not to go outside, and took her hand to hold her back. It was as cold as ice. Merely touching it sucked all the warmth from the innkeeper's body. As he tried to keep the girl in the house, her entire body turned into a fine icy mist, and shot up the chimney and out into the night. A man from Yamagata Prefecture claimed that he had been married to a yuki onna. His wife was beautiful, with piercing eyes and skin as white as a marble statue. While he loved to take long hot baths every night, his wife always refused to bathe. This puzzled him greatly. One particularly cold and snowy night, he insisted that his wife take a bath. Otherwise she would freeze to death in the cold, he said. She protested, but there was no reasoning with the man. Finally she acquiesced. When he went in to check on her a few minutes later, all he found in the tub were half-melted icicles. ---- Shōjō (猩々) Translation: none; based on the Chinese name for the same creature Habitat: coasts, islands, and shallow waters; found throughout Japan Diet: omnivorous; extremely fond of sake Appearance: Along the mountainous coasts of Japan lives a race of intelligent sea spirits known as shōjō. They look like man-sized apes, with long, shaggy red hair. Their faces are also reddish and blushed as if drunk. Shōjō are bipedal like humans, and occasionally wear clothes or skirts made of seaweed. Shōjō spend their lives drinking large quantities of alcohol and playing in the sea and sand of secluded beaches. They revel in drunken silliness, singing, dancing, and enjoying life. Despite their silly appearance and demeanor, they are said to be wise. Extremely fond of sake and other types of alcohol, they are excellent brewers themselves and can distil a powerful brine wine from seawater. The taste of the wine varies depending on the imbiber. If he is a good person, the wine will be delicious. However, if he is a wicked person it will taste like a foul poison. The wine may even kill him if he does not change his evil ways. Shōjō can understand human languages and even parrot a number of words. They are curious and gentle towards friendly humans. Generally peaceful, shōjō keep to themselves, preferring to remain apart from the world of mankind. Occasionally there have been stories of groups of shōjō harassing sailors and ships which stray too close to their homes. These stories are rarely violent; usually the shōjō flee into the water after stealing a few barrels of sake. The name shōjō is the Japanese version of the Chinese name for these ape-like spirit, xīng xīng. The name connotes liveliness, a fitting match for the personality of this creature. Due to the orangutan's physical resemblance to this yōkai, the name shōjō is applied to that species of great ape in both Japan and China. Additionally, shōjō can be used to refer to a person who is a heavy drinker. The famous artist and yōkai painter Kawanabe Kyōsai jokingly referred to himself as a shōjō in this way. ---- Ushi oni (牛鬼) Translation: ox demon Alternate names: gyūki Habitat: usually along the coast or near bodies of water; found in West Japan Diet: varies from type to type, but always carnivorous Appearance: A terror from Western Japan, ushi oni is a class of monster that lives near water. The name literally means "ox demon," and it refers to a number of different monsters with bovine traits. Most Ushi oni resemble an ox from the head up and a demonic horror below. Many variations are known to exist; the body of an ox with a head like an oni's; the head of an ox on a body like a spider's or a cat's; or even an ox's head on the body of a kimono-clad human (a Japanese version of the minotaur) . ] Despite their unique and varying morphology, all ushi oni share a number of characteristics, pointing to a common origin. They are exceedingly cruel and savage. They breath toxic poison, and eat humans. Some ushi oni are lurkers, attacking people who draw too close to their lairs; others are hunters, roaming the coasts seeking prey. The cruelest ushi oni ravage the same towns over and over, inflicting terrible curses or bringing diseases. Although a few roam the mountains of the island of Shikoku, most ushi oni live along the rocky coasts and beaches of Western Japan. Ushi oni frequently work together in cooperation with other yōkai. The spider-like version from the coasts of the islands of northern Kyūshū and western Honshu frequently partners with nure onna and iso onna. These siren-like yōkai use their charms to lure unsuspecting men towards the water's edge. When they approach, the ushi oni pounces and bites the victims to death. The meal is then shared between the yōkai. ---- Nure onna (濡女) Translation: wet woman Alternate names: nure yomejo Habitat: coasts, rivers, and other bodies of water; native to Kyūshū Diet: blood Appearance: Nure onna are vampiric sea serpents who haunt shores and rivers looking for humans to eat. They are most commonly found on the shores of the island of Kyūshū, but there are stories of nure onna encounters as far north as Niigata Prefecture and as far east as Fukushima Prefecture. There are two variations of this yōkai: one without arms, which resembles an enormous sea serpent with a woman's head, and one with human-like arms. Aside from this difference, the two look and act in exactly the same manner. Their faces are hideous and betray serpent-like features such as a forked tongue. They have long black hair which sticks to their dripping bodies. Their name comes from the fact that they always appear soaking wet. While physically much stronger than a human, nure onna prefer not to rely on brute force and use trickery and guile to catch their prey. They most often appear near the water, on a coast or by a riverbank. Nure onna magically disguise themselves as a distressed woman carrying a bundled up baby. They cry out for help from fishers, sailors, or anybody passing by. When the prey approaches, a nure onna will plead with their victim to hold her baby for just a moment so that she can rest. If he agrees and takes the bundle, the "baby" becomes as heavy as a boulder. The victim is unable to move. The nure onna is then free to attack her helpless victim, feeding by draining his blood with her long, serpentine tongue. Nure onna frequently appear together and cooperate with ushi oni, as they inhabit the same environments and share the same diet. ---- Iso onna (磯女) Translation: coast woman Habitat: coasts, particularly rocky ones; native to Kyūshū Diet: blood Appearance: Iso onna are dangerous vampires from the Kyūshū islands and Western Japan. They hunt for fisherman and travelers to feed upon. Despite having no serpentine features, Iso onna are closely related to nure onna. Iso onna wander rocky beaches, hunting for prey. Individual accounts of iso onna vary when it comes to their appearance. In most cases, they appear as beautiful women who have just come out of the water, dripping wet. Their hair is long and matted, reaching almost all the way down to the sand. Their eyes are heavy with sultry, sexual energy, and their nearly transparent wet clothes stick to their skin. From the waist up, they appear like ordinary human women. But from the waist down, they are blurry and slightly transparent, betraying their otherworldly nature. In some regions they are said to be large enough to crush ships out at sea, like umi bōzu. They also have the ability to disguise themselves perfectly as large beach rocks when they don't want to be seen. When iso onna appear on sandy beaches, they look like beautiful women, staring far out to sea. When somebody approaches and tries speaking to them, they turn around and let out an ear-piercing shriek. This stuns their victim. Then they lash out with their long hair and drag their prey into the sea. Once in the water, they drain their victims' blood with their hair. On rocky coasts without sandy beaches, iso onna appear sitting on the cliffs and calling out to passersby in an eerie voice. Their victims are mesmerized, and walk straight towards them, ignoring the dangers posed by the rocky cliffs. They walk off the cliffs and fall to their deaths, leaving the iso onna free to feed on their bodies. Iso onna are occasionally encountered far out at sea. They act much the same as they do on land, capturing their human prey with their long hair and draining their blood. Iso onna are most commonly encountered during the holiday seasons of Obon and New Year's Eve, when the border between the realm of the living and the spirit world can be more easily crossed. They occasionally cooperate with ushi oni to catch their prey. ---- Funayūrei (船幽霊) Translation: ship ghosts Alternate names: ayakashi Habitat: seas, oceans, bays Diet: none Appearance: When the ghosts of people who have died at sea transform into vengeful spirits, they become a particular type of ghost called a funayūrei. These are the shades of drowned sailors which remain in this world, hunting for their former friends and comrades to take them down into the sea. Like many ghosts, funayūrei appear as dead bodies wearing white funerary robes. They can be seen at night, either when the moon is new or full, on particularly stormy or foggy nights, or during the festival of Obon. Funayūrei appear as an eerie, luminescent mist, which gets closer and closer until it forms into a ship with a ghostly crew. Funayūrei ghost ships attack in different ways. Sometimes they charge headlong towards the other ship, causing it to steer away so sharply that it capsizes. Other times they pull alongside the other ship and the ghostly crew tries to drag it down under the water. The ghosts themselves carry large ladles and buckets which they use to fill ships with seawater, sinking the ships and adding more souls to the funayūrei crew. Occasionally funayūrei strike not as a large crew of man-sized ghosts, but as one very large ghost who rises out of the water to capsize a ship immediately. This ghost often demands a barrel from the crew, which it uses to flood the deck and sink the ship. Giant funayūrei are often confused with umi bōzu, which appear and attack in a similar manner. It is said that a clever crew can outsmart the funayūrei by carrying buckets and ladles with holes in the bottom. Despite their efforts the ghosts will not be able to flood the human ship with such tools. Encounters with ghost ships can also be avoided by boldly sailing directly through the phantasm instead of turning to avoid a collision—though this runs the risk that the other ship may actually be real and not a phantasm. Some crews have also escaped the wrath of the funayūrei by throwing food and provisions overboard as offerings to the hungry ghosts, who chase after the food instead of the crew. ---- Ningyo (人魚) Translation: human fish; mermaid, merman Habitat: seas, oceans, and other large bodies of water Diet: omnivorous; fish, seaweed, and other aquatic foods Appearance: Mermaids are known as ningyo in Japanese, but they are very different from the mermaids of Western tradition. Unlike the mermaids of the Atlantic Ocean and Mediterranean Sea, ningyo from the Pacific Ocean and the Sea of Japan are hideous to behold. Instead of seductive sirens, they are otherworldly nightmares. Ningyo are more fish than human. They can have anything from ugly, deformed fish-like faces, to entire human torsos with long, bony fingers and sharp claws. Ningyo range in size from a human child to a large seal. These days, mermaids resembling the breeds known throughout the West—with an attractive human torso and a piscine lower body—are not unheard of in the Japanese islands. Since the end of the Edo period and the opening of Japan to the West, ningyo that resemble Western-style Atlantic mermaids have become popular in Japan. However, the traditional Japanese mermaid is more beast than beauty. Ningyo sightings go back to the earliest written histories of Japan. The first recorded mermaid sightings in Japan are found in the Nihon Shoki, which is one of the oldest books of classical Japanese history and dates back to 619 CE. The flesh of a ningyo is believed to grant eternal life and youth to those who eat it, and thus it is the subject of many folk tales. However, this meal carries a danger that most people unwilling to risk; ningyo can place a powerful curse on humans who try to wound or capture them. Some legends tell of entire towns that were swallowed by earthquakes or tidal waves after a foolish fisherman brought home a ningyo in one of his catches. While their grotesque appearance and supernatural powers make them an intriguing subject, ningyo are best avoided at all costs. ---- Isonade (磯撫で) Translation: beach stroker Alternate names: ōkuchi wani ("giant mouthed sea monster") Habitat: shallow seas and coastal waters of West Japan Diet: carnivorous Appearance: Isonade are mysterious, shark-like sea monsters which scour the rocky coastlines searching for boats to scuttle and fishermen to snatch. Their bodies are enormous, and their fins are covered with countless, tiny metallic barbs like a grater. They use these barbs to hook their prey, dragging them deep into the water to be eaten. Isonade are said to appear when the north winds blow and the sea currents change. Despite their size, isonade are incredibly elusive. They move through the water with unparalleled grace and can swim without creating so much as a splash. This makes them difficult to spot. By the time most sailors have noticed that the winds have changed and a strange color is upon the sea, it is too late—a huge tail is already rising out of the water, above their heads. When isonade strike, they do not thrash about violently like a hungry shark. Instead they hook their prey on their fins or tail with a gentle stroking motion, dragging them into the depths almost peacefully. They do this without a sound and without ever showing their bodies, making them all the more dangerous for their stealth. ---- Koromodako (衣蛸) Translation: cloth octopus Habitat: Sea of Japan; particularly near Kyōto and Fukui Prefectures Diet: carnivorous; feeds on both tiny plankton and large ships Appearance: Koromodako are strange and terrifying octopus-like yōkai. They live in the seas bordering Kyōto and Fukui Prefectures, particularly in the bays of Ine and Wakasa. Koromodako appear similar to ordinary small octopuses. Males only reach a size of a few centimeters long, while females can grow up to five times that length. Being so tiny, they are subject to the tides and waves, and float wherever the currents take them. Females live inside of a paper-thin shell, while males have no shell (similar to the family of octopuses called argonauts) . ] When koromodako are threatened, they become dangerous. They can instantly grow to many times their original size—large enough to engulf fish, fishermen, or any other creature that might try to eat them. Stretching their arms and body out wide, they resemble an enormous piece of cloth, which is how koromodako get their name. While in this form a koromodako can engulf nearly anything in the water, even entire ships. It wraps its arms and mantle around the ship, sailors and all, and drags it down into the deep, never to be seen again. After feeding, the koromodako shrinks down to its tiny size, impossible to trace. ---- Umi bōzu (海坊主) Translation: sea monk Alternate names: umi nyūdō, umi hōshi Habitat: seas, oceans, bays Diet: unknown Appearance: Perhaps no other aquatic yōkai is as mysterious as the giant umi bōzu. Their true form is unknown. Umi bōzu are only ever seen from the shoulders up, but they appear to be roughly humanoid in shape, with inky black skin and a pair of large, round eyes. Eye-witnesses report a great range in size, from slightly larger than a ship to a size so unimaginable that only the creature's bulbous face is visible above the water. Its head is smooth and round like a venerable monk's, and its body is nude and as black as shadow. Umi bōzu appear on calm nights, when there is no sign of anything out of the ordinary. All of a sudden, with no warning, the waves and the weather whip up into a furious condition. Out from the tumult rises a titanic creature. It moves to destroy the ship, either by smashing the hull in a single blow, or taking it down bit by bit, depending on the size of both the ship and the umi bōzu. Some rare reports make them out to be more serpentine, while others make them out to be more ghostly, like a gigantic kind of funayūrei. In the same way as the funayūrei, umi bōzu will demand a barrel from the crew. It uses this to pour huge amounts of water onto the deck, quickly sinking the boat and drowning the crew. If given a barrel with the bottom removed, the umi bōzu will scoop and scoop to no effect, and the sailors will be able to make a lucky escape. Some say that the umi bōzu are the spirits of drowned priests, cast into the sea by angry villagers (this may also be implied by their name) ]. These priests were then transformed into ghosts due to the horrible nature of their death, making them cousins of the similarly dreaded funayūrei. Others, however, say that umi bōzu are a sea monster which lives in the deeps of the Seto Inland Sea, and that they are the progenitors of a large variety of other aquatic yōkai. Because sightings are rare and almost always fatal, it is likely that the true nature and origin of this spirit will remain a mystery for a long time ---- Bakekujira (化鯨) Translation: ghost whale Alternate names: hone kujira ("bone whale") Habitat: Sea of Japan Diet: none Appearance: Bakekujira are animated whale skeletons which sail near the surface of the sea, rising as they did in life when they needed air to breathe. They are followed by a host of eerie birds and strange fish, and appear on rainy nights near coastal whaling villages. In olden days, when whales were still plentiful in the Sea of Japan, a whale sighting was a blessing for the residents of the poor fishing villages. A village could reap huge amounts of wealth from the meat and oil in a single whale. Such a bounty did not come without a price, however. Many fishermen claimed that the souls of these whales lived on as bakekujira, seeking revenge against the humans who took their lives. Those who witnessed a bakekujira were infected with its horrible curse, which they brought back to their villages when they returned home. The whale's curse brought famine, plague, fires, and other kinds of disasters. Legends: One rainy night long ago, some fishers living on the Shimane peninsula witnessed an enormous white shape off the coast in the Sea of Japan. Squinting their eyes, it appeared to them to be a whale swimming offshore. Excited for the catch, they rallied the townspeople, who grabbed their spears and harpoons and took to their boats to hunt down and catch their quarry. They soon reached the whale, but no matter how many times they hurled their weapons not one of them struck true. When they looked closer, through the dark, rain-spattered water's surface, they realized why; what they thought was a white whale was actually a humongous skeleton swimming in the sea. It lacked even a single bit of flesh on its body. At that moment, the sea became alive with a host of strange fish that nobody had ever seen before. The sky swarmed with eerie birds which nobody could recognize and the likes of which had never been seen before. The ghost whale then turned sharply out to sea, and swiftly vanished into the current, taking all the strange fish and birds with it, never to be seen again. The terrified villagers returned home, realizing that the skeletal whale must have been a bakekujira—a whale turned into a vengeful ghost. While the bakekujira was never seen again, other villages in Shimane felt the whale's curse. They were consumed by conflagrations and plagued by the infectious diseases that followed whale beachings. ---- Nurarihyon (滑瓢) Translation: slippery gourd Alternate names: nūrihyon Habitat: expensive villas, living rooms, brothels; possibly marine in origin Diet: picky; prefers expensive and luxurious food Appearance: Nurarihyon is a mysterious and powerful yōkai encountered all across Japan. It is said appearances can be deceiving, and nurarihyon is the perfect illustration of this. Overall, he is rather benign-looking; his head is elongated and gourd-shaped; his face is wizened and wrinkled, resembling a cross between and old man and a catfish; he wears elegant clothing—often a splendid silk kimono or the rich robes of a Buddhist abbot—and carries himself in the quiet manner of a sophisticated gentleman. The short, comical, elderly nurarihyon is actually the most powerful and elite of all the yōkai. He travels in an ornate palanquin carried by human or yōkai servants, often visiting red light districts but occasionally stopping at mountain villas as well. Nurarihyon is known as Kaibutsu no Oyadama—the Supreme Commander of All Monsters. Every yōkai listens to his words and pays him respect, treating him as the elder and leader in all yōkai meetings. Along with otoroshi and nozuchi, nurarihyon leads the procession known as the night parade of one hundred demons through the streets of Japan on dark, rainy nights. He fits the role of supreme commander every bit as much when he interacts with humans as well. Nurarihyon shows up on evenings when a household is extremely busy. He arrives at homes unexpectedly in his splendid palanquin and slips into the house, unnoticed by anyone. He acts in all respects as if he were the master of the house, helping himself to the family's luxuries such as fine teas and tobacco. His power is so great that even the real owners of the house can do nothing to stop him. In fact, even after they finally notice his presence, the owners believe the nurarihyon to actually be the rightful master of the house. Eventually he leaves just as he came, quietly and politely slipping out of the house and into his palanquin, as the owners of the house obsequiously bow and wave him farewell. Only after he has left does anyone become suspicious of the mysterious old man who just visited. As to nurarihyon's origins there is only speculation. The oldest records of his existence are mere sketches and paintings. His name comes from nurari ("to slip away") and hyon (an onomatopoeia describing floating upwards) written with the kanji for gourd (due to the shape of his head) ]. This connotes a slippery evasiveness—which he employs when posing as master of the house In Okayama Prefecture, some evidence links nurarihyon to umi bōzu. There, nurarihyon are globe-shaped sea creatures, about the size of a man's head, which float about in the Seto Inland Sea. When fisherman try to catch one, the sphere sinks down into the water just out of reach, and then bobs back up mockingly. It has been theorized that some of these slippery globes migrate to land, where they gradually gain influence and power, becoming the nurarihyon known throughout the rest of Japan. Whether this theory is the true origin of the Supreme Commander of All Monsters or just one more of his many mysteries has yet to be solved. ---- Ohaguro bettari (お歯黒べったり) Translation: nothing but blackened teeth Alternate names: often referred to as a kind of nopperabō Habitat: dark streets near shrines Diet: unknown Appearance: Late at night, a disturbing yōkai dressed in beautiful wedding clothes can be seen loitering near temples and shrines. She calls single young men over to her, and they are seldom able to resist her charms. Until of course, they get too close.... From behind, an ohaguro bettari looks like a beautiful woman wearing a kimono—often looking like a newlywed in her bridal gown. She appears at twilight outside of a temple, or inside a man's own house, disguised as his wife. At first, she conceals her head, or turns away from any viewers. Any man who comes closer to get a better look is surprised when she turns to reveal her face: an ugly, white, featureless dome slathered in thick makeup, containing nothing but a huge, gaping mouth full of blackened teeth. She follows up this initial shock with a horrible cackle, sending the man running away and screaming in terror. Ohaguro bettari are similar to a yōkai called nopperabō in appearance and demeanor. Like nopperabō they are often blamed on shape-shifting pranksters like kitsune, tanuki, or mujina looking to have a laugh at the expense of an unwitting human. It has also been suggested that they are the ghosts of ugly women who were unable to marry. Accurate eye-witness reports are hard to come by due to the embarrassment of the victims at having fallen for such an obvious gag. However as no deaths or injuries (other than to pride) ] have been attributed to ohaguro bettari, and because sightings are rare, a mischievous shape-shifting animal yōkai seems to be a plausible explanation [ Tooth Blackening ] For more than a thousand years, ohaguro—the custom of dyeing one's teeth black—was an aristocratic fashion. This was accomplished via a special "tea" made from vinegar and oxidized iron filings. This brew was swished around in the mouth to stain the teeth dark black. Ohaguro was begun at an early age, taking many years for the teeth to develop a deep, permanent black color. It was popular among upper-class married women and is frequently depicted in old woodblock prints. ---- Rokurokubi (轆轤首) Translation: potter's wheel neck Habitat: occurs in ordinary women; also frequently found in brothels Diet: regular food by day, lamp oil by night Appearance: By day, rokurokubi appear to be ordinary women. By night, however, their bodies sleep while their necks stretch to incredible lengths and roam around freely. Sometimes their heads attack small animals; sometime they lick up lamp oil with their long tongues; and sometimes they just cause mischief by scaring nearby people. Unlike most yōkai which are born as monsters, rokurokubi and their close relatives nukekubi are former humans—transformed by a curse resulting from some evil or misdeed. Perhaps they sinned against the gods or nature, or perhaps they were unfaithful to their husbands. In many cases, their husbands or fathers actually committed the sin. By some cruel twist of fate the men escape punishment and the women receive the curse instead. In any case, the rokurokubi curse only affects women. Legends: A lord noticed that the oil in his lamps was vanishing at an alarming rate, and suspected one of his servant girls might be a rokurokubi. He decided to spy upon the girl. After she had fallen asleep, he crept into her room and watched over her. Soon he noticed vapors and ectoplasm forming around her chest and neck. A little while later, the servant girl rolled over in her sleep, however only her body moved! The head stayed in its place, and the neck lay stretched out between the two. The next day he fired her. She was fired from every place at which she subsequently worked. The poor girl never understood why she had such back luck with her employment. She never found out that she was a rokurokubi. An old tale from Tōtōmi Province (Shizuoka Prefecture) ] tells of a monk who eloped with a young lady named Oyotsu. While traveling, Oyotsu became sick. Treating her would have used up all of their travel money, so the monk murdered Oyotsu and stole the remaining money. On his travels, he stayed at an inn owned by a man with a beautiful daughter. The wicked monk shared a bed with the innkeeper's daughter, and during the night her neck stretched and her face changed into that of Oyotsu. She angrily accused him of murdering her. The next morning the monk, regretting his evil deeds, confessed the murder of Oyotsu to the innkeeper. The monk also told the innkeeper what he had seen the night before. The innkeeper confessed that he, too, had murdered his wife for her money. He used the money to build his inn, and as a punishment his own daughter was transformed into a rokurokubi. Afterwards, the monk rejoined his temple, built a grave for Oyotsu, and prayed for her soul every day. What happened to the innkeeper's daughter is never mentioned ---- Nukekubi (抜け首) Translation: removable neck; detached head Alternate names: frequently referred to as rokurokubi Habitat: occurs in ordinary women Diet: regular food by day, blood by night Appearance: Nukekubi are a variant type of rokurokubi. They are similar in most respects, except that a nukekubi's head detaches itself completely from its body rather than elongating like a rokurokubi's neck. Because their heads detach, they can travel further distances than the rokurokubi. Nukekubi possess a thirst for blood, and are more violent than rokurokubi. Their flying head sucks the blood of victims like a vampire. Nukekubi also brutally bite humans and animals to death. Like the rokurokubi, being a nukekubi is considered a curse. Edo period scientists believed that nukekubi suffered from an infliction similar to somnambulism; only instead of walking about at night the patient's entire soul and head depart from the body. Uncured, this curse has the potential to tear a family apart, particularly due to its violent nature. Treatments for the curse of the rokurokubi and nukekubi have been long sought after—particularly because these women can often pass their curse on to their daughters who shows signs as they mature. Afflicted girls were sold off to live in brothels or human circuses, or forced to commit suicide in order to preserve their families' honor. Legends: A famous account from Echizen Province (Fukui Prefecture) ] tells of a young woman afflicted with the curse of the nukekubi. Her head flew about the capital city at night, chasing young men through the streets all the way back to their houses. Locked out, the head would scratch and bite their doors and gates during the night and leave deep gashes in the wood. When the young girl eventually discovered her curse, she was so ashamed that she asked her husband for a divorce. She ritually cut off all of her hair in repentance and committed suicide. She believed it was better to die than to live the rest of her life as a monster According to lore from Hitachi, a man married to a nukekubi heard from a peddler that the liver of a white-haired dog could remove the curse. He had such a dog, and killed it and fed its liver to his wife. Sure enough she was cured of the affliction. However, her curse was still passed on to her daughter, whose flying head took to biting white dogs to death. Other accounts claim that by removing the sleeping body to a safe place during the night, the head will not be able return, and will eventually die—however this is not a cure that most families are willing to try. ---- Futakuchi onna (二口女) Translation: two-mouthed woman Habitat: usually occurs in married women Diet: as a normal person, only twice as much Appearance: Families who notice that their food stocks are shrinking at an alarming rate, while the women in their houses hardly eat a bite, may be the victims of a futakuchi onna. Futakuchi onna appear as regular women until their terrible secret is revealed: in the back of their skulls—buried beneath long, thick hair—is a second mouth, full of teeth and with large, fat lips. This second mouth is ravenous, and uses long strands of its hair-like tentacles to gorge itself on any food it can find. In the folk tales of Japan's eastern regions, futakuchi onna are most often thought to be shape-changed yama uba posing as young women. In the western regions they are frequently shape-changed kumo, or magical spiders. In the other tales they are the result of curses brought about by wicked deeds, similar to rokuro kubi. In each story, regardless of its true nature, this yōkai is used as a punishment upon a greedy man or woman for wickedness and extreme parsimony. Legends: One story tells of how in a small rural village in Fukushima there lived a stingy miser. Because he could not bear the thought of paying for food to support a family, the miser lived entirely by himself. One day he met a woman who did not eat anything at all, and he immediately took her for his wife. The miser was thrilled with her because she never ate a thing and was still a hard worker. However, his stores of rice steadily decreased, and he could not figure why, for he never saw his wife eat. One day, the miser pretended to leave for work. In truth he stayed behind to spy on his new wife. As the miser watched from a hidden location, his wife untied her hair, and revealed a second mouth on the back of her head, complete with ghastly lips and teeth. Her hair reached out with tentacle-like stalks and began to scoop rice balls into the second mouth, which cooed out with pleasure in a vulgar, raspy voice. The miser was horrified and resolved to divorce his wife as soon as possible. However, she learned of his plan before he could act on it, and trapped him in a bathtub and carried him off into the mountains. The miser managed to escape. He hid in a heavily scented lily marsh where the futakuchi onna could not find him. Another story tells of a wicked stepmother who always gave plenty of food to her own daughter, but never enough to her stepdaughter. Gradually the stepdaughter grew sicker and sicker, until she starved to death. Forty-nine days later, the wicked stepmother was afflicted with a terrible headache. The back of her head split open, and lips, teeth, and a tongue formed. This new mouth ached with debilitating pain until it was fed, and it shrieked in the voice of the dead stepdaughter. From then on the stepmother always had to feed both of her mouths, and always felt the hunger pangs of the stepdaughter she murdered. ---- Hari onago (針女子) Translation: hook girl Alternate names: hari onna ("hook woman") Habitat: streets and alleys; found on Shikoku Diet: young, virile men Appearance: The fearsome yōkai known as hari onago appears at night on the roads of the island of Shikoku. In the dark, they are indistinguishable from ordinary young women, unusual only for their loose, disheveled hair. Upon closer inspection, the tip of each hair is fitted with a needle-like, barbed hook—although if you are close enough to notice these hooks, it is probably already too late. Hari onago wander the streets searching for victims—usually young, single men walking alone. When a hari onago comes across a suitable man, she smiles coyly at him. If the smile is returned, she attacks: she releases her hair, and the barbed ends lash out with blinding speed and a will of their own, sinking deep into her victim's flesh. A hari onago's strength is so great that even the strongest man can be overpowered by her hooks. Once her victim is ensnared and rendered helpless, she rips him into pieces with her hooks and devours the remains. It is technically possible for a very fast runner to escape a hari onago, providing his home is close enough and has a sturdy door or gate. If he can get himself safely indoors before her hooks catch him, he may be able to survive until sunrise—when yōkai vanish. The scars and gouges she leaves in the wooden door frame remain as a testament to her viciousness, and as a cautionary tale to young men not to pick up strange girls. ---- Kuchisake onna (口裂け女) Translation: slit-mouthed woman Habitat: dimly lit streets and alleys Diet: none; though enjoys hard candy Appearance: The kuchisake onna is the ghost of a woman who was mutilated and has come back to wreak vengeance on the world. Her name comes from the deep, bloody gash which runs across her face, grinning from ear to ear. She appears at night to lone travelers on the road, covering her grizzly mouth with a cloth mask, a fan, or a handkerchief. Kuchisake onna sneaks up on her victims in the dark and asks them if they think she is beautiful: "Watashi, kirei?" If the victim answers yes, she pulls off her mask and reveals a red, blood-dripping, grotesque mouth. Then she asks in a grisly voice if they still think she is beautiful: "Kore demo?" If her victim answers no or screams in terror, she slashes him from ear to ear in an imitation of her own mutilation. If he lies and answers yes a second time, she walks away—only to follow her target home and slaughter him brutally that night. The spirits of the dead who were killed in particularly violent manners—abused wives, tortured captives, defeated enemies—often do not rest well. The kuchisake onna is thought to be one such woman. However, during the Edo period, a large number of kuchisake onna attacks were blamed on shape-changed kitsune playing pranks on young men. During the 20th century, the blame began to be placed on ghosts, serial killers, and simple mass hysteria. This resulted in an explosion of kuchisake onna sightings over Japan. Over the years, clever young people claim to have outsmarted kuchisake onna by delivering quick, confusing answers, or by throwing money or hard candy at them. This buys enough time to escape from the kuchisake onna's wrath and lose her in the darkness. ---- Hone onna (骨女) Translation: bone woman Habitat: dark streets, alleys, graveyards Diet: none; though has a large sexual appetite Appearance: Not all who die turn into vengeful beings of grudge and jealousy. Hone onna retain an undying love that persists long after their flesh has rotted away. This allows them to continue to be with the object of their affection despite having died. These ghosts appear as they did in life—young, beautiful women in their prime. Only those unclouded by love or with strong religious faith are able to penetrate their disguise and see their true form: a rotting, fetid, skeletal corpse returned from the grave. At night, a hone onna rises from the grave and wanders to the house of her former lover. Her appearance shocks those who believed her to be dead. This shock quickly turns into a joy that blinds the hone onna's lover to any clues that something might be wrong. Even the hone onna herself may not know of her condition. She is driven only by love. She exists as a ghost only to continue the love she had in life. The hone onna spends the night and leaves in the morning. This unholy coupling can continue for days, or even weeks, without being noticed. However, there is a price to be paid. Each night she drains some of her lover's life force, and he grows ever sicker and weaker. Without intervention, he will eventually die, joining his lover forever in death's embrace. In most cases, a friend or a servant of her lover will see through the hone onna's illusion and alert someone to her true identity. Though her human lover may be repulsed by her when the truth is revealed to him, the ghost may not realizes her condition and continue to visit every night. A home can be warded with prayers and magic charms against entry by ghosts, but they only work as long as the master of the house wills them to. As the hone onna's body decays further, her enchanting allure only increases. Eventually most men succumb and let her into their homes one last time, sacrificing their own lives to the ghost of the woman they loved. Legends: Perhaps the most famous hone onna is Otsuyu from Botan Dōrō, or The Tale of the Peony Lantern. Botan Dōrō was introduced to Japan in the 17th century from an old Chinese ghost story. Over the centuries, it has been adapted into puppet shows, kabuki plays, rakugo, and films, and remains an influential ghost story today. ---- Kerakera onna (倩兮女) Translation: cackling woman Habitat: alleys near red light districts Diet: none Appearance: Kerakera onna are gigantic, horrid yōkai found in red light districts. Their name comes from the cackling sound of their laughter. Kerakera onna appear as enormous, middle-aged women in colorful brothel kimonos, with thick make-up and slathered-on lipstick. They skulk around in alleyways and on empty roads, dancing, laughing, and mocking the profession that worked them to death. They are rarely seen outside of the pleasure district—the place responsible for their creation. When a man passes a lonely street or alley haunted by a kerakera onna, she unleashes a horrible, shrill cackle that can only be heard by him. A weak-hearted man faints right on the spot, but one who has the constitution to flee finds that no matter where he goes, or who he turns to, the cackle echoes in his ears; nobody else can hear it. Eventually these men are driven insane by the incessant laughing—repayment for the lifetime of abuse the kerakera onna went through. During the Edo period, the average lifespan of a prostitute was only 23 years. The demands and hardships of such a life were too much for most to bear. Work hours were long and difficult, pay was low, and abuse was commonplace, both from clients and employers. Very few women made it to middle age. Like most long-lived things in Japan, those who made it were said to become extremely powerful. When aged prostitutes died after serving in such a painful world for so long, their ghosts could not pass quickly and easily on to the next life. Instead, they became kerakera onna. ---- Taka onna (高女) Translation: tall woman Alternate names: takajo Habitat: red light districts Diet: as a normal person Appearance: Taka onna appear as ordinary, homely human women most of the time. But they have the power to elongate their bodies and grow to several meters in height. Like other brothel yōkai, they are rarely seen outside of the red light districts, but are fairly common yōkai nonetheless. Sightings of these yōkai peaked during the Edo period and continued up to the post-war period—the time when brothels and yūkaku ("pleasure districts") were at their height in Japan. ] Taka onna are frequently spotted peering into the second-story windows of brothels and homes where romantic liaisons are taking place. Their activities are generally limited to peeping into windows. Though they rarely attack humans physically, taka onna do enjoy scaring and harassing both men and women who frequent the pleasure districts, jealous of the physical pleasure they were never able to know in life. Taka onna were originally ordinary women who were too unattractive to marry (or to find work in the red light districts which they haunt) ]. Through jealousy, they became twisted and corrupted, and transformed into ugly, malicious monsters that prey on others' sexual energy Legends: Taka onna encounters were often the subject of bawdy anecdotes, as they generally revolve around trips to the pleasure districts. In one account, though, a woodcutter describes how he discovered that his own wife was a taka onna. His child mysteriously disappeared one day, and over a short period his servants also began to disappear one by one. Unable to figure out what was happening, the woodcutter began to suspect his wife. One night while pretending to sleep in bed, he witnessed his wife jump into a well. She then elongated her body and climbed back out. The woodcutter fled into the mountains, and never returned to his home. ---- Ame onna (雨女) Translation: rain woman [ Alternative Names: ame onba ] Habitat: dark streets and alleys; formerly clouds and holy mountains Diet: unknown; possibly rain, or children Appearance: Ame onna are a class of yōkai that appear on rainy days and nights. They summon rain wherever they go, and are blamed for kidnapping and spiriting away children. They appear as depraved, haggish women, soaked with rainwater. They lick the rain off of their hands and arms like wild animals. Ame onna are related to minor rain deities. Unlike the gods, however, ame onna are not benevolent. Though the rains they bring might save a village in drought or bring fortune to farmers, they have a more sinister purpose—under the cover of the rain, ame onna wander the villages looking for newborn girls. If they should find a child born that night, they snatch it and carry it off into the darkness, spiriting it away to another world. Mothers who have their babies snatched away sometimes transform into ame onna themselves, out of grief and despair. Having lost their minds, these transformed women roam the streets at night with large sacks hoping to replace what was stolen. They sneak into houses where crying children can be heard, and steal them away from their homes into the night. Ame onna go back to the ancient folk religions of Japan and China. The rains were said to be brought by benevolent gods and goddesses who lived as clouds by morning and as rain by night, forever traveling between heaven and earth. Legend has it that some of these rain-bringing goddesses became corrupted and devolved into evil yōkai. They abandoned their divinity to live among mortals and prey upon them. [ Rain Women and Men ] These days, it's not uncommon to hear somebody called ame onna or ame otoko (for men) ] in daily conversation. This term refers to unlucky people who seem to bring rain with them wherever they go, ruining outdoor events and generally spoiling good moods. But this colloquialism is not related to yōkai. The opposite terms, hare onna and hare otoko, refer to those people for whom the sun always seems to shine whenever they go to outdoor events ---- Betobetosan (べとべとさん) Translation: onomatopoeic; from the sound of footsteps Alternate names: bishagatsuku Habitat: alleys and narrow, sloped roads; only appears at night Diet: fear Appearance: Betobetosan are formless specters, and are recognizable only by their telltale sound—the "beto beto" clacking of wooden clogs. People who walk the streets alone at night might encounter these harmless, but nonetheless disturbing, yōkai. They synchronize their pace with walkers and follow them as long as they can, getting closer and closer with every step. For the victims, this can be traumatic. The haunting sound of footsteps follows them wherever they go, but when they turn around, there is nothing there. Though betobetosan can be disconcerting, they are not dangerous. Once you realize you are being followed by a betobetosan, simply step to the side of the road and say "After you, betobetosan." That is enough to escape from this yōkai. The footsteps will carry on ahead and soon vanish from earshot, allowing you to continue in peace. In northern Fukui Prefecture, a betobetosan which appears during cold winter sleet storms is known as bishagatsuku. Its name comes from the "bisha bisha" sound its phantom feet make in the slush-filled streets. ---- Dorotabō (泥田坊) Translation: muddy rice field monk Habitat: unused, overgrown fields Diet: none; survives on vengeance alone Appearance: Dorotabō are the transformed ghosts of old men who toiled hard on their rice fields, only to see them lie in waste by neglectful owners after their death. They appear as one-eyed, three-fingered humanoid figures rising out of the mud at night. It is said that the five fingers of the human hand represent three vices and two virtues: anger, greed, ignorance, wisdom, and compassion. The ghostly dorotabō appears with only the three fingers representing the vices. It is a spirit of vengeance and rage—angry at the ignorance and greed that now shame its life's work. Dorotabō roam the overgrown fields, calling out in a mournful voice, "Give me back my rice field!" They haunt their fields after nightfall, disturbing the new inhabitants of their lands and preventing their sleep. Dorotabō continue haunting until the wasteful owners changes their ways or give up and flee, selling the field to someone who will take proper care of it. Most of Japan's land is bound up in inhospitable mountain ranges where farming is impossible. The usable land is extremely valuable. Families can save for a lifetime just to buy a small plot of precious farmland, and hope to leave it to their offspring after they die. Of course, children do not always follow their parents' wishes—a prodigal son who forsakes his father's hard-earned fields in favor of vices like gambling and drinking will find a dorotabō waiting back home. ---- Aka shita (赤舌) Translation: red tongue Alternate names: aka kuchi ("red mouth") Habitat: rice fields and farming villages; commonly found in Tsugaru Diet: farmers Appearance: Aka shita is a mysterious spirit which takes the form of a dark cloud with sharp claws, and a hairy, bestial face. Its most prominent feature and namesake is the long, bright red tongue that lolls from its mouth. Only the shape of its hairy, monstrous face and long, bestial claws are known. The rest of its body is perpetually hidden inside of the dark, black clouds in which it lives. The aka shita appears during the summer months, when rain and water are at their highest demand to ensure a successful growing season. They are agents of retribution, primarily known as punishers in water disputes. Because plenty of water is essential for keeping rice paddies flooded, Japan's farmlands are interlaced with an intricate series of interconnected aqueducts and canals meant to deliver water to all of the farmers equally. In times of drought, however, a wicked farmer may open up the sluice gates and drain his neighbor's water into his own field. Such a serious crime can cost a family its livelihood, and water bandits face the violent wrath of their neighbors. Some clever water thieves are never caught, and may think they've gotten away with their crime. But then the aka shita appears, and drains the water from the water thieves' fields and snatches them up with its long, red tongue. ---- Otoroshi (おとろし) Translation: a regional corruption of osoroshii, meaning "scary" [ Alternative names: odoroshi, odoroodoro, keippai ] Habitat: shrines, temples, and homes; found above gates and doors Diet: small animals and wicked people Appearance: Otoroshi are known by many regional names, most of them being wordplays denoting this monster's fearsome appearance and wild, course mane that covers its body. Otoroshi appear as hairy, hunched, four-legged beasts with fierce claws and tusks. They have blue or orange skin. Though its existence has been known of for centuries, little is known about this rare and mysterious creature. Otoroshi are masters of disguise and are rarely seen except for when they want to be. They are most commonly spotted in high places like roofs. Other favorite places are the torii archways at shrines and the gates above temples that separate the physical world from the realm of the gods. Otoroshi act as a kind of guardian of these holy places. They eat the wild animals found in shrines and temples—particularly pigeons, sparrows, and other birds. Otoroshi attack humans only rarely: when they spot a wicked or imprudent person near a holy place—or when one tries to enter through the gateway they are guarding. Otoroshi attack by pouncing on their victims from above, tearing them to shreds, and devouring their remains. While its name implies ferocity and its appearance is quite grotesque, it is only known to be dangerous to the wicked. The name otoroshi, while not a word itself, appears to be derived from variations in regional dialects. It is generally accepted to be a corruption of osoroshii, meaning "scary." Nothing is known of its origins; it is speculated to be related to a similar yōkai, the waira, due to their common habits and environment. ---- Waira (わいら) Translation: a regional corruption of kowai, meaning "scary" Habitat: forests, mountains, shrines, and temples Diet: small animals and wicked people Appearance: The waira is a rare and reclusive yōkai, few of which have ever been encountered. It is an ugly beast with a large body similar to that of a cow but with a single, sharp claw on each of its four long limbs. According to the accounts that exist, male waira are mottled in earthy brown colors while females are colored red. Waira live deep in the mountains, near heavily wooded temples and shrines. They are found near otoroshi, and are believed to guard temples and shrines from wicked people. They also use their tough claws to dig up and catch the small animals that they feed upon, such as moles, mice, and rabbits. From the colorings and environments where they are found, it is believed that waira are transformed yōkai, born from the common toad after it reaches an advanced age. It is also speculated that the waira is somehow related to the otoroshi, as they share the same habitat and are often seen together. The waira's name, as with the otoroshi's, is a subject of some confusion. As these yōkai's names are not written using kanji, they contain few clues as to their origins. The most commonly accepted theory is that it is a corruption of a variant of the word kowai, meaning "scary." This further supports the speculation that the waira and the otoroshi may be somehow related. ---- Uwan (うわん) Translation: onomatopoeic; named for the sound it makes Habitat: empty temples, abandoned houses Diet: lives off of the fear it causes Appearance: Another monster about which little is known, the uwan is more often heard than seen. It is named for the distinctive sound it makes, crying out from the darkness: "Uwan!" No written record of its physical appearance exists; the creature was thought to be formless for centuries. It wasn't until the Edo period when artist Sawaki Sūshi gave the creature its shape that uwan were considered anything more than phantom sounds. Uwan are occasionally encountered outside of old buildings and temples. They assault lone passersby by leaping out of the shadows and shouting "Uwan!" The uwan depends entirely on the surprise attack—any weak-willed victims who faint at the site of the uwan never regain consciousness. The uwan steals their essence and flees into the darkness. However, if a brave individual shouts back "Uwan!" then this yōkai flees and never bothers that person again. Legends: A famous uwan encounter took place in Akita Prefecture during the Edo period. A young newlywed couple had bought an old mansion and moved in together. On their first night in their new house, they were awoken by a loud voice shouting "UWAN!" The shocked couple searched all over and around the house, but couldn't find the source of the voice. The shouting continued for some time, erupting sporadically all night, every night. The couple was not able to sleep at all. Some time later, the couple's neighbors began to ask why they were always so tired-looking, with blood-shot eyes and disheveled hair. The husband tried to explain about the mysterious voice, but none of his neighbors claimed to have heard the shouting. Of course, nobody in the neighborhood believed the couple. Instead, gossip quickly began to spread that the newlyweds weren't getting any sleep on account of nocturnal activity of a different kind. Embarrassed, the couple ceased asking about the strange sounds. ---- Hyakume (百目) Translation: one hundred eyes Habitat: abandoned homes, temples, caves, and other shady areas Diet: unknown Appearance: Like their name suggests, hyakume are covered from head to foot with countless blinking, yellow eyes. Underneath those eyes are fleshy, roughly man-sized bodies. With their eyes closed, they resemble pink lumps of flesh, and are nearly indistinguishable from nuppeppō (which live in a similar habitat) . ] Hyakume make their homes in old temples, guarding them from would-be thieves during the night. During the day, the sky is too bright for their many sensitive eyes. They only come out at night, spending the lighter hours in dark and shadowy buildings where few humans ever go. Hyakume are shy and try to avoid human contact. Should a human come within a few meters of a hyakume, one of its eyes will detach from its body and fly towards the person. The eye sticks to the person's body for as long as he or she is in the area, keeping an eye out for criminal activity. Eventually the eye will return to the yōkai when they perceive there is no danger. When hyakume feel threatened, they jump out of the darkness in a menacing manner. They are not particularly violent and rely on their size and fearsome appearance to scare humans away. ---- Nuppeppō (ぬっぺっぽう) Translation: a corruption of the slang for wearing too much makeup Alternate names: nuppefuhō Habitat: graveyards, old temples Diet: unknown Appearance: Nuppeppō are bizarre and creepy yōkai found in ruined temples, overgrown graveyards, and other dilapidated areas. These creatures are known for their revolting appearance and smell; they give off a strong odor of rotten meat. They look like large, flabby, roughly humanoid chunks of flesh about the size of child, with lumpy, undeveloped hands and feet, and vaguely indiscernible facial features. Nuppeppō appear usually only at night, and are not known to cause any particular harm or mischief—other than being disgusting. They seem to enjoy the nauseating effect their smell has on passersby. They frequently cause chaos and havoc by running around and disgusting people, and outrunning angry villagers who would try to chase them down and kill them. Nuppeppō are very rare yōkai. There are only a few recorded sightings, even though their grotesque form is well-known. Accounts usually describe lords sending hosts of warriors to chase the creature out of a castle or a temple, only to have it outrun the guards and escape, causing some of them to swoon and faint from its odor. Though they are passive and non-aggressive, they can move quickly and are notoriously hard to catch. According to the records of Edo period pharmacists, its flesh imparts incredible power on those who eat it (providing they are willing and able to keep it down) ], and it can also be made into a powerful medicine with excellent curative properties Nuppeppō's origins are mysterious. They are believed to be a distant relative of nopperabō. Some scholars suggest that nuppeppō may in fact be botched transformations of inexperienced shape-shifting yōkai, such as a mujina or tanuki. The origin of their name is equally mysterious. It is thought to be derived from slang for wearing too much makeup, painted so thickly that facial features become indiscernible—just as nuppeppō's features are barely discernible on their fleshy, fatty faces. ---- Hitotsume kozō (一つ目小僧) Translation: one-eyed priest boy Habitat: found all throughout Japan; often encounters on dark streets Diet: omnivorous Appearance: Child-like and mischievous, hitotsume kozō are little one-eyed goblins that are well-known in all parts of Japan. They wear shaved heads and robes, like tiny Buddhist monks. They have long red tongues and a single, enormous eye. Hitotsume kozō are relatively harmless as far as yōkai go. Their most alarming trait is appearing suddenly and surprising people on dark streets. They seem to enjoy startling people; hundreds of encounters have been reported over the years, most of them very similar to each other. Aside from their startling play, hitotsume kozō have one serious job. In East Japan, it is said that every year on the 8th of December, hitotsume kozō travel the land, recording in ledgers the families who have been bad that year. They use this information to decide each family's fortunes for the coming year. Hitotsume kozō take their reports to the god of pestilence and bad luck, who then brings appropriate misfortune on those deserving families. However, hitotsume kozō leave their ledgers with the guardian deity of travels for safekeeping until February 8th. In a mid-January ceremony, local villagers burn down and rebuild that deity's roadside shrines in hopes that the fires will also burn the hitotsume kozō's ledgers before they come to pick them up—thus escaping disaster that year. Though similar in name to other one-eyed monsters like hitotsume nyūdō, there is little evidence suggesting a relation between the two. Many believe that hitotsume kozō's origins are connected in some way with Enryaku-ji, the head temple of the Tendai sect of Buddhism. Others believe that they were once local mountain deities who over time devolved and changed into yōkai. Legends: A man visited a friend on business. While waiting in the reception room, a young boy of about 10 appeared and began to mischievously roll and unroll the hanging scroll in the room's alcove. When the man scolded the boy for being mischievous, the boy turned around and squawked, "Be quiet!" However, the boy's face had only one eye! The man screamed and fainted, and had to be carried back to his own home. He was bed-ridden for 20 days, but made a full recovery. In an account from Fukushima Prefecture, a young lady was walking the street at night. A little boy approached her from behind and asked "Ma'am, would you like some money." She laughed and sweetly replied yes, and turned to face the boy. He was a hitotsume kozō. Instead of bearing riches and he was grinning, staring so intensely at her with his single eye that she fainted in shock on the spot. A similar tale from Okayama Prefecture tells of a particular street where an eerie, pale blue glow was seen one night. A man went to investigate and witnessed a ghostly one-eyed boy playing around. The man collapsed, paralyzed with fear, and was unable to move. The apparition approached the helpless man and licked him from head to toe with his long, slobbery tongue. ---- Ubume (姑獲鳥) Translation: woman in late pregnancy; often written with different characters Alternate names: obo, unme, ugume, ubame tori, and many others Habitat: haunts the area where she gave birth Diet: none; only exists to deliver her baby into safe hands Appearance: When a woman dies just before, during, or shortly after childbirth, anxiety for her child may prevent her spirit from passing on. This troubled attachment manifests as a ghost known as an ubume. These women appear on dark, rainy nights. Ubume can appear in many forms: a woman carrying a baby; a pregnant woman; or a blood-soaked walking corpse carrying an underdeveloped fetus. Other times they just appear as horrific, bloody, pregnant women crying out desperately into the night for help. These variations are due to the burial traditions of different regions, as well as the circumstances of their death. In some areas, when a pregnant woman died she would be buried with the unborn fetus still inside of her. In other places, the fetus would be cut out of her and placed in her arms during burial. Women who died after delivering stillborn babies were also buried this way. These tragic spirits wander the areas near where they died, seeking aid from the living which they cannot provide themselves. If the mother died after childbirth but her baby survived, the newly formed ubume will try to care for the child in whatever way it can. She enters shops or homes to try to purchase food, clothes, or sweets for her still-living child. In place of money she pays with handfuls of dead leaves. These ghosts also try to lead humans to the place where their baby is hidden so that it can be taken to its living relatives, or adopted by another person. In cases where both mother and child died, an ubume can appear carrying the bundled corpse of her infant. When a human approaches, the ghost tries to deliver the bundle into the arms of the living. If the stranger accepts, the ghost vanishes, and the bundle grows heavier and heavier until the helpful stranger is crushed under its weight. Other forms: The name ubume is written with characters that imply a bird's name. The literal translation of these characters is "child-snatching bird" and some theories connect this spirit with another yōkai called the ubumetori. This yōkai is an evil bird which flies through the sky searching for clothing that has been left on the clothesline overnight. When it finds some, it smears its poisonous blood on the clothing. Shortly afterward, the owner of those clothes begins to develop shakes and convulsions; possibly leading to death. Ubumetori are also blamed for snatching babies and taking them away into the night sky. Whether this bird is another form of the ghostly mother or a separate spirit with a similar name is not known. ---- Yūrei (幽霊) Translation: faint spirit, ghost Alternate names: obake, shiryō, bōrei; other names exist for specific variations Habitat: any; commonly found in graveyards, houses, or near the place of death Diet: none Appearance: There are many different types of yūrei. In most cases, how they appear depends on the circumstances on their death. They retain the features and the clothing they wore when they died or were buried, which means they are dressed in white burial kimonos or the uniforms of fallen warriors. Occasionally, they have bloody wounds indicative of the way they died. Their hair is usually long and disheveled, often obstructing their face and adding to their disturbing appearance. Their hands hang limply from their wrists. Yūrei are translucent and only faintly visible. In most cases they are so faint that they appear to have no feet. Yūrei are capable of invoking powerful curses. They do not roam about, but haunt one particular place or person. In the case of a place it is often where they died or are buried. In the case of a person it is often their killer—or sometimes their loved ones. They remain stuck in this world until they can be put to rest. This might require bringing their killers to justice, or finding their lost body, or something as simple as passing on a message to a loved one. Some yūrei are reluctant to accept their own deaths and haunt their living family, bringing misfortune and unhappiness for the rest of their family members' lives. Each haunting is as unique as the person it originated from. Only when its purpose for existing is fulfilled—or it is exorcised by a priest—can a yūrei finally rest. But the possibility that salvation exists is a glimmer of hope for those who are affected by a haunting. According to traditional Japanese beliefs, when a person dies his soul lives on as a separate entity, passing on to a heavenly afterlife. This transition is accomplished through a number of funeral and post-funeral rites and prayers performed by their loved ones over many years. Through these rites, the soul is reunited with its ancestors and becomes a family guardian spirit. These ancestors are enshrined in the house and continue to be honored as members of the family, particularly during the summer holiday of Obon when they are said to return to the material world to be with their families. Those who do not receive the proper funeral rites cannot pass on. They remain stuck in a purgatory that is part physical world and part ethereal. Others who die suddenly, tragically, or violently—or with grudge and malice in their hearts—are sometimes unable to pass on even with the proper prayers and rites. These lost souls transform into yūrei. ---- Onryō (怨霊) Translation: grudge spirit, vengeful ghost Habitat: found all throughout Japan Diet: none; survives solely on its wrath Appearance: The most dreaded type of yūrei is the onryō. They are the ghosts of people who died with such strong passions—jealousy, rage, or hatred—that their soul is unable to pass on. Instead, they transform into powerful, wrathful spirits who seek vengeance on everything they encounter. Often they were victims of war, catastrophe, betrayal, murder, or suicide—and they display wounds or marks indicative of the way they died. Their motive is always the same—vengeance. Onryō are easily powerful enough to kill anyone. However, they prefer letting the object of their hatred live a long life of torment and suffering, watching loved ones die in their stead. Onryō inflict a terrible curse on the people or places that they haunt. This curse can be transmitted to others like a contagious disease, creating a circle of death and destruction far more devastating than any ordinary ghost. Onryō make no distinction in their targets; they just want to destroy. Moreover, an onryō's vengeance can never be satisfied. While most yūrei only haunt a person or place until they are exorcised or placated, an onryō's horrible grudge-curse continues to infect a location long after the ghost itself has been laid to rest. Occasionally, an onryō's curse is born not out of hatred and retribution, but from an intense, passionate love that perverts into jealousy. These onryō haunt their former lovers, exacting their wrath on new romances, second marriages, new children, and eventual end up destroying the lives of the ones they loved so much in life. Whatever the origin, an onryō's undiscriminating wrath makes it one of the most feared supernatural entities in all of Japan. Legends: Unquestionably the most well-known onryō, and one whose grudge-curse exists to this very day, is the ghost of Oiwa. A young woman who was brutally disfigured and then murdered by her wicked and greedy husband in an elaborate plot, her story is told in Yotsuya Kaidan, or The Ghost Story of Yotsuya. Yotsuya Kaidan has been retold many times, in books, ukiyoe, kabuki, and film. Like Shakespeare's Macbeth, legend has it that a curse accompanies her story, and that those who retell it suffer injuries and even death. To this day, producers, actors, and their crews continue to visit the grave of Oiwa in Tōkyō before productions or adaptations of Yotsuya Kaidan, praying for her soul and asking for her blessing to tell her story once again. ---- Kawauso (獺) Translation: river otter Habitat: rivers, wetlands, freshwater bodies Diet: carnivorous; feeds on fish and small animals, with a fondness for sake Appearance: River otters can be found in the wilds all over Japan. They are under a meter in length, cute and furry, and well-loved for their shy, playful nature. As with most wild animals in Japan, kawauso develop magical powers upon reaching old age. They are particularly skilled at shape-changing and accurately copying sounds. Kawauso love alcohol, and are usually only seen in human areas trying to acquire sake. They are playful yōkai, well known for their tricks and mischief, but rarely dangerous. Kawauso are fond of playing pranks on humans, especially by mimicking sounds and words. They enjoy calling out human names or random words at strangers walking in the street and watching their confused reactions. They are fond of magically snuffing out lanterns in the night and leaving travelers stranded in the dark. Kawauso sometimes even transform into beautiful young women and try to seduce young men—only to run away laughing when the men take the hook. Occasionally, kawauso commit more violent deeds. In a few instances near castles in Ishikawa, a kawauso dressed up as beautiful young woman and lured young men to the water's edge in order to catch and eat them, discarding the half-eaten bodies into the moat. But stories like this are rare. Other forms:A kawauso's favorite disguise is the form of a young beggar child wearing a big straw hat. They use this child form to sneak into towns and try to buy alcohol from shops. The ruse often falls apart when the disguised creature is asked who it is, or where it came from. Caught off guard, the kawauso simply repeats the last word spoken to it, or makes funny nonsensical noises. This ruins its disguise and gives away its supernatural nature. ---- Nopperabō (野箆坊) Translation: faceless monk Alternate names: often referred to as mujina Habitat: roads, inns, shops; blends into human society Diet: unknown, but has no mouth and thus can't eat Appearance: Nopperabō resemble ordinary human beings in almost every way, and blend in perfectly with human society. However, the illusion is quickly shattered when met face to face—nopperabō actually have no face at all. Their heads are blank orbs with no eyes, nose, mouth, or features of any kind. These mysterious yōkai are encountered on quiet, empty roads late at night when nobody else is around. Like many yōkai of this kind, their main activity seems to be scaring humans. This they do remarkably well. Nopperabō usually appear in the guise of a man or a woman with his or her back turned towards the observer. When approached, the yōkai turns around and reveals its terrifying true form. To maximize the effect, they often appear with a face at first, and then wipe their face off dramatically with their hand at the most opportune time. Nopperabō revel in the terror they inflict upon their unsuspecting victims. Nopperabō often work together in groups to scare one individual. As their victim runs away in a panic from the first nopperabō, he runs into another person who asks him what is wrong. When the victim explains what he saw, this person replies, "Oh, you mean like this?" and wipes his face away exactly like the first nopperabō. They are even known to impersonate close relatives of their victims, and sometimes a poor man will run all the way home, having run into multiple faceless monsters, only to tell his wife what he saw and have her too reply, "Oh, you mean like this?..." Other forms: The nopperabō is a favorite transformation of mischievous animal yōkai—kitsune, tanuki, and especially mujina. In fact, so frequently are encounters with this spirit blamed on shape-shifting badgers that the nopperabō are often mistakenly referred to as mujina. ---- Mujina (貉) Translation: badger Alternate names: anaguma; known as tanuki or mami in some regions Habitat: forests and mountains Diet: omnivorous; feeds on small wild animals Appearance: Mujina are badgers who have developed magical powers and become yōkai. While mujina was once a common word for badger, these days anaguma refers to ordinary badgers while the term mujina is reserved exclusively for their yōkai form. Mujina are frequently confused with tanuki because of their similar size, appearance, and magical prowess. To further complicate matters, in some regions tanuki are called mujina, while mujina are called tanuki. In other regions the term mami applies to both animals. Mujina are less famous as yōkai than other shape-changing animals. As they live in the mountains, generally far from human society, they are not encountered as frequently as other animal yōkai. They are shy, and do not like to be seen by or interact with humans. Unlike other, more careless magical animals, the few mujina who live amongst human society take great care not to betray their true nature in any way, When it is dark and quiet, and there are no humans around, it is said that mujina shift into a humanoid form—usually that of a young boy wearing a tiny kimono—and sing songs in the street. If approached by a stranger, they run away into the darkness and transform back into animal form. Other forms: The most well-known form mujina take is that of a nopperabō, a seemingly normal human form, but with no facial features whatsoever. They use this form to scare and panic humans who wander mountain or village roads at night time. Because of this, the two yōkai are often confused, and nopperabō are sometimes mistakenly referred to as mujina. However, other animal yōkai also imitate this same form, and there are non-animal nopperabō as well. Care should be taken to avoid misunderstanding. ---- Tanuki (狸) Translation: also called tanuki in English; sometimes referred to as a raccoon dog Alternate names: bakedanuki; referred to as mujina or mami in some areas Habitat: mountains and forests; found throughout Japan Diet: omnivorous; feeds on small wild animals, has a fondness for alcohol Appearance: The tanuki rivals the kitsune for the most well-known animal yōkai. Sometimes called a raccoon dog in English, the tanuki is in fact a unique species of East Asian canine that resembles a badger or a raccoon. These shy, nocturnal animals can be found on all of the Japanese isles. Tanuki statues are popular decorations in homes and shops. They are beloved not only for their cuteness, but also for the tales of mischief and trickery associated with them. Tanuki possesses powerful magical abilities. They are similar to kitsune in their superb ability to change shape. Tanuki have a jovial nature, and delight in playing tricks on humans. Aside from their powerful ability to change their shape, perhaps the most famous attribute that tanuki possess is their massive, malleable, magical testicles which they can adapt to any need. Their testicles can be used as weapons, drums, fans to keep cool, fishing nets—even umbrellas. Often, tanuki incorporate their testicles into their disguises: the tanuki becoming a shopkeeper and its testicles transforming into the shop; or perhaps a palanquin complete with servants to cart the tanuki from place to place. A famous nursery rhyme about tanuki testicles is learned by children everywhere: Tan tan tanuki no kintama wa Kaze mo nai no ni Bura bura Translation Tan-tan-tanuki's balls Even when there is no wind They swing, swing Interaction: In the ancient religions of the Japanese isles, tanuki were considered gods and rulers over all things in nature. With the introduction of Buddhism, they gradually lost their status. Like other magical animals, they took on the roles of messengers of the gods and guardians of local areas. While tanuki are not generally feared or considered malicious, they are not entirely harmless either. Like humans, each one is a unique individual. While many tanuki are jovial do-gooders who love the company of humans, some local tales tell of horrible tanuki who snatch humans to eat, or spirit them away to become servants of the gods. Other forms: The most intelligent and magically adept tanuki have been known to adopt human names and practices, such as gambling, drinking, even administration and religious activities. Many go through their whole lives living among humans without ever being detected. In human form, tanuki have proven to be as corruptible as the humans they emulate. Some tanuki have well-earned reputations as thieves, drunkards, liars, and cheats. Additionally, many use their shape-shifting powers to transform into stones, trees, statues, and even ordinary household items in order to play tricks on people. Some even transform into giants and horrible monsters—either to terrorize humans for pleasure, or to scare them away from places they shouldn't be. ---- Kitsune (狐) Translation: fox Alternate names: unique names exist in many individual instances Habitat: found throughout Japan Diet: omnivorous; fond of fried tofu Appearance: Foxes, or kitsune, are found all across Japan. They are identical to wild foxes found elsewhere in the world apart from their incredible magical powers. Their cute faces and small size make them particularly loved by most people. There are two major variations of kitsune. Holy foxes are servants of the Shinto deity Inari, and Inari's shrines are decorated with statues and images of these foxes. Legends tell of celestial foxes providing wisdom or service to good and pious humans. These holy foxes act as messengers of the gods and mediums between the celestial and human worlds. They often protect humans or places, provide good luck, and ward evil spirits away. More common are the wild foxes which delight in mischief, pranks, or evil. There are stories in which wild foxes trick or even possess humans, and cause them to behave strangely. Despite this wicked nature, even wild foxes keep their promises, remember friendships, and repay any favors done for them. Most tales of kitsune are about wild foxes punishing wicked priests, greedy merchants, and boastful drunkards. They vex their targets by creating phantom sounds and sights, stealing from them, or otherwise humiliating them publicly. Certain mental disorders have been attributed to possession by kitsune (known as kitsunetsuki). Mysterious illusory fires and strange lights in the sky are said to be caused by their magic, and are known as kitsunebi, or "fox fire." Other forms: Kitsune are extremely intelligent and powerful shape-shifters. They frequently harass humans by transforming into giants or other fearsome monsters. Sometimes they do this just for pranks, and sometimes for more nefarious purposes. They are skilled enough to even transform into exact likenesses of individual people, often appearing in the guise of beautiful human women in order to trick young men. On more than one occasion, this has resulted in a marriage with an unwitting human. Some kitsune even spend most of their lives in human form, adopting human names and customs, taking human jobs, and even raising families. When startled, or drunk, or careless, a patch of their magical disguise can fail—the kitsune's true nature may be revealed by a tail, a swatch of fur, fangs, or some other vulpine feature. [ Nine-tailed Foxes ] Kitsune are wise and long-lived creatures, and their magical knowledge is said to increase with age. In fact, a fox which reaches its 100th year is said to sprout a second tail; and another one every hundred years thereafter. The most powerful foxes have nine tails and brilliant white-gold fur. These nine-tailed kyūbi no kitsune have the power to see and hear anything happening in the world, and are said to hold infinite wisdom. ---- Kitsunebi (狐火) Translation: fox fire Habitat: originates from kitsune and only appears when they are nearby Appearance: Kitsunebi, or foxfire, is named for the magical kitsune who are said to create it. Kitsunebi appears as a mass of floating orbs of light, usually only a few centimeters in diameter and less than a meter above the ground. The orbs are as bright as lanterns and, in most cases, appear red or orange; although they are sometimes blue-green. Kitsunebi appear only at night. There can be a long chain of them hundreds or thousands of meters long, as if there were lanterns carried by invisible bearers. Often the kitsune responsible for the fireballs are standing right next to the flames, invisible. Kitsunebi are formed by foxes, which breath the ball of fire out from their mouths and use it to light their way at night. It is most often a sign that a large number of kitsune are nearby—often lighting yōkai events such as the night parade of one hundred demons, yōkai wedding ceremonies, and other processions or meetings. Kitsunebi are not directly dangerous to humans, however the wild foxes behind the strange lights might be harmful. Sometimes, kitsunebi are used to trick humans off of their paths at night as a malicious prank. Other times they are used to lure curious humans into the darkness towards a group of hungry yōkai. Following kitsunebi is never a good idea—they only lead people to places they should not be. ---- Bakeneko (化け猫) Translation: monster cat, ghost cat Habitat: towns and cities Diet: carnivorous; fish, birds, small animals, and occasionally humans Appearance: Cats, feral and domestic, are all over Japan. They are in houses as pets, on farms as exterminators, or in cities and towns as strays. Like many of Japan's animals, when cats live to an old age they develop supernatural powers and transform into yōkai. Bakeneko begin their supernatural life looking almost identical to an ordinary housecat. Soon they begin to walk about at on their hind legs. As they age and their powers increase, they can grow large indeed—up to the size of a full-grown human. Bakeneko possess great shape-shifting abilities and disguise themselves as smaller cats or humans—sometimes even taking the shape of their own masters. Many learn to speak human languages. While in disguise, they are known to dress up as humans with towels wrapped around their heads. In this form bakeneko dance around merrily. While this sounds frivolous and even cute, bakeneko are a menace to any house they live in or near. They can eat things that are much bigger than they are, and can even consume poisonous things without difficulty. It is possible for a bakeneko to eat its own master and then assume his form, living in his place. If they do not directly kill their owners, they can bring down great curses and misfortune. They can summon ghostly fireballs and are known to accidentally start house fires, their tails acting like torches igniting any flammable materials in the house. Bakeneko also have the disturbing ability to reanimate fresh corpses and use them like puppets for their own nefarious purposes. Bakeneko can come into being as a result of a number of things, but the most common reasons are by being long-lived (over 13 years old), growing to a certain size (over 3.75 kilograms) ], or by licking up large quantities of lamp oil. A telltale sign that a cat may be close to becoming a bakeneko is believed to be an exceptionally long tail. The older and wiser a cat gets, the longer its tail becomes. This superstition led to the custom of bobbing cats' tails at an early age to prevent them from transforming into yōkai ---- Nekomata (猫又) Translation: forked cat Habitat: towns and cities Diet: carnivorous; frequently humans Appearance: One particularly monstrous breed of bakeneko is the two-tailed variety known as nekomata. Nekomata are found in cities and villages and are born in the same way as other bakeneko. However, only the oldest, largest cats with the longest tails—and thus the most intelligence—become this powerful variety. When a nekomata transforms into a yōkai, its tail splits down the center into two identical tails. These monster cats are most likely seen walking around on their hind legs and speaking human languages. While not all bakeneko are malicious or violent towards their masters, all nekomata are; they look upon humans with contempt. Nekomata summon fireballs and start great conflagrations, killing many people. They control corpses like puppet-masters with their necromantic powers, and they use their powerful influence to blackmail or enslave humans. The most dangerous and powerful nekomata live deep in the mountains, where they prowl in the shape of wild cats like leopards and lions. They grow to incredible sizes, many meters long, and prey on other large animals such as wild boars, dogs, bears, and of course humans. ---- Shōkera (精螻蛄) Translation: mole cricket spirit Habitat: rooftops, temples; only appears every sixty nights Diet: wicked humans who try to outsmart the gods Appearance: The shōkera is a large, dark-skinned, three-toed demon which spends most of its time lurking about on rooftops. Not much is known about this fearsome beast aside from its hunting practices. The shōkera is believed to be some kind of demon with connections to Kōshin, an esoteric Japanese folk religion with origins in Taoism. Shōkera only appear on special nights in the Kōshin faith which occurs every sixty nights. A shōkera spies through windows, doorways, or skylights in houses, and hunts for impious behavior. Then it pounces down in a vicious attack. Because Kōshin is no longer a widespread religion—and because victims of shōkera attacks would only be implicating themselves as wicked by admitting to seeing one—little else is known about the shōkera. According to Kōshin, there are three spiritual worms or insects, called the sanshi, which live inside every human body. Every sixty nights, on a special night called kōshin machi, these worms leave the body while their host human sleeps. The sanshi travel to heaven to report on the good and bad deeds of their human. The emperor of heaven then uses this information to lengthen or shorten people's lives according to their deeds. While good people have nothing to fear from kōshin machi, the wicked might try to circumvent having their bad deeds reported by staying awake and reciting prayers all night long during these special nights so that the sanshi cannot leave the body. That's when the shōkera goes to work. It lurks about on rooftops during these nights, peers into windows, and hunts for anyone violating the laws of heaven. ---- Ao nyōbō (青女房) Translation: blue lady Alternate names: ao onna ("blue woman") Habitat: abandoned villas, mansions, and ruins Diet: spoiled and rotten leftover food; otherwise humans Appearance: In the empty, abandoned mansions of bygone eras, there is sometimes more than spider webs and cockroaches lurking in the shadows. Often, large and dangerous yōkai take up residence in these domiciles. One of these is the ao nyōbō, an ogreish spirit of poverty and misfortune. She takes the appearance of an ancient court noblewoman. Her body is draped in the elaborate, many layered kimonos of ancient eras. Once fabulous, her gowns are now tattered and moth-ridden. She wears the white face of ancient courtiers, with high painted eyebrows and blackened teeth. Aged and wrinkled from years of waiting in musty old ruins, her beauty has long left her. Ao nyōbō inhabit the empty, abandoned homes of ruined families and fallen nobles. They wait in the house, constantly applying their makeup, fixing their hair, and adjusting their image. They act as if they are in anticipation for the arrival of some guest—perhaps a lover who has lost interest, or a husband who has abandoned his wife. In any case, should a trespasser visit a home inhabited by an ao nyōbō, she devours them whole. And then goes back to waiting vainly for someone who will never show. Nyōbō were the court ladies of old Japan. The paragons of youth, beauty, education, and refinement, nyōbō served in the palaces of high ranking families, a position they held until they themselves were married to a worthy suitor. After marriage, they idled their days in their own private residences, patiently waiting for their husbands to come home each night, or for secret lovers to show up during the day. But not all nyōbō were so successful. The ao in the name ao nyōbō means the color blue. This does not refer to skin color, but implies immaturity or inexperience (just as green implies the same in English) ]. There were some low-ranking women of the old imperial court who—no matter how hard they worked—couldn't seem to attract a husband or elevate themselves. These "blue" nyōbō were destined to grow into bitter old maids, desperate to increase their social status but never able to escape from their subordinate positions. When they died, these unsuccessful courtiers turned into yōkai ---- Kage onna (影女) Translation: shadow woman Habitat: abandoned buildings, run-down homes, haunted houses Diet: none Appearance: Kage onna are the shadows of women projected onto windows and doors when there is no one around to cast them. They usually take the form of young ladies, though occasionally they appear as old crones with bells hanging from their necks. They appear late at night, when the moon is bright. The paper sliding doors and windows of traditional Japanese homes are particularly good at catching kage onna shadows in the moonlight. Kage onna make no sound, nor do they interact with the house or its inhabitants. Other than projecting an eerie atmosphere, they are not known to cause any harm. In any case, the image of a person who should not be there is enough to startle the bravest person. If the door or window is opened to see who or what created the shadow, there will be nothing waiting in the dark. However, tradition says that a house where a kage onna is seen is likely haunted—or will soon be haunted—by other yōkai as well. The moonlight frequently plays tricks on the eyes, causing people to see things in the darkness that aren't really there. The bright moon casts eerie shadows on the ground and walls that don't seem like they should fit. Most of the time, this can be attributed to an overactive mind piecing together ghost stories and wandering thoughts, or constructing some horrible figment of the imagination. Sometimes, however, a shadow is more than a shadow; sometimes it is a kage onna. ---- Nuribotoke (塗佛) Translation: coated buddha Habitat: poorly cared for family altars, run-down homes Diet: none Appearance: Nuribotoke is a grotesque zombie-like spirit which creeps out of a butsudan, or family altar, that has been accidentally left open at night. It is a soft, flabby, corpse-like spirit with oily black skin and a pungent smell. Trailing behind is a catfish-like tail connected to its spine. The most striking and disturbing feature is this spirit's eyeballs, which dangle wildly from its eye sockets. Nuribotoke do not do much other than fly about, flap their tails, and terrorize the families whose butsudan they crawled out from. They dance about impishly and revel in their ability to terrorize the living. Occasionally they try to trick foolish humans by giving false prophecies. They can be kept at bay by sprinkling salt on the floor, which they will avoid crossing. Nuribotoke must return to the butsudan before sunrise, and they vanish altogether during the day. Even though they are mostly harmless, it is best to prevent their appearance altogether by shutting the butsudan at night. In most Japanese homes there is a large, ornate, wooden shrine called a butsudan. Inside are religious icons, scrolls, mantras, statues, and other holy items. It serves as the center of household spirituality, and the ancestors of a family are all enshrined in it. During the day, the butsudan stays open. During holidays and special occasions, it is treated like a member of the family and treated to offerings of food and sake. The doors to a butsudan are always closed at sunset—the butsudan is a gateway to the spirit world. Superstition warns that if the butsudan is left open certain spirits can wander freely back and forth between the land of the living and the land of the dead. Nuribotoke is one of these spirits. [ Coating the Dead ] Nuribotoke's skin is black because of lacquering, which helps explain the meaning of its name—"coated Buddha." Japan is a wet country, and corpses did not last long in the old days. Before modern preservation techniques came to the country, corpses would putrefy during the hot and humid summers. Embalming a corpse in lacquer was one method of preservation. Lacquer embalming was particularly used with the corpses of important priests. The nuribotoke's lacquered skin reflects the high status it had during its lifetime. ---- Zashiki warashi (座敷童子) Translation: zashiki child Alternate names: many, depending in the region and variety of spirit Habitat: zashiki (a kind of sitting room covered in tatami mats) and other rooms Diet: none, but enjoys candies and treats left out for it Appearance: Zashiki warashi are house spirits. They are fond of mischief, loved by all, and believed to bring great fortune and riches to those whose houses they haunt. Direct sightings of these spirits are rare. It is often difficult to make out any details other than a vague, child-like shape. When they can be seen, zashiki warashi appear as ghostly children, five or six years old and with blushing red faces. The boys are dressed in child-sized warrior costumes and the girls in patterned kimonos and with hair that is either short and bobbed or long and tied back. In rare stories they appear as wild, hairy, brutish figures. It is said that only children and the house's owners are able to see these spirits. They are usually known only by their pranks. Zashiki warashi love mischief. Often the first signs that one's house may be inhabited is by a trail of children's footprints going through ashes or soap powder. Other mischief includes making phantom noises. These noises sound like children's games—tops spinning all night long, paper crinkling, children's voices, or kagura—Shinto holy music. Most hauntings involve a single zashiki warashi, while some involve multiple spirits. Zashiki warashi are considered guardian spirits of the house, and gods of luck. It is said that a house with a zashiki warashi will prosper and grow rich, and a house that drives away such a spirit will fall into decline and ruin. In one account, a family witnessed a zashiki warashi leaving their home, and soon they all succumbed to food poisoning and died. In another well-known legend from Iwate Prefecture, a wealthy man's son shot a zashiki warashi with a bow and arrow. Soon after the family's fortunes collapsed. In many homes, these spirits befriend the children of the house, teaching them songs, games, and nursery rhymes. They keep elderly or infertile couples company, and these couples often treat the zashiki warashi as if it were their own child. The desire to attract and keep these friendly yōkai has led to customs like setting out food in the zashiki for them, and even laying coins in the foundation when building a new house. The Japanese take great care to maintain their formal reception room so as not to drive out any guardian spirits dwelling there. Other forms: Their common name comes from the zashiki, the formal reception room for guests in a Japanese house where these spirits most often reside. Zashiki warashi are known by many different names in other areas, such as kura bokko or "warehouse child," and makura gaeshi, or "pillow turner." Countless variations of zashiki warashi exist across Japan, with minor differences in their appearance and behavior. ---- Chōpirako (チョウピラコ) Translation: none Alternate names: often simply referred to as zashiki warashi Habitat: inner parlors and living rooms Diet: none, but enjoys candies and treats left out for it Appearance: Chōpirako are similar to ordinary zashiki warashi, only they are much more beautiful. Their skin and clothing glows with pure, radiant white light. Their features are more beautiful than human children. Chōpirako are usually found in the homes of families that had an only child who died—but who was loved and lavished with gifts before they passed away. Like other zashiki warashi, chōpirako bring richness and prosperity to the houses they inhabit, and promote happiness and well-being among the inhabitants. They require more maintenance to keep them happy than zashiki warashi do; but in return they bring more wealth and good luck than other kinds of house spirits. Rich families who could afford it often presented lavish funerals for deceased children, with beautiful burial gowns. The deceased child's room is turned into a shrine, full of lavish toys, books, and games that the child would have loved in life. The chōpirako resides in the this room, rather than in the zashiki, and few people are allowed to enter in order to keep it in the pristine condition this spirit requires. A few inns in Japan advertise that they are inhabited by zashiki warashi or chōpirako in order to attract spirit hunting guests or people seeking good luck and fortune. ---- Usutsuki warashi (臼搗童子) Translation: mortar pounding child Alternate names: notabariko Habitat: warehouses, storage sheds, under floorboards Diet: none Appearance: One particularly unpleasant variation of the zashiki warashi is the usutsuki warashi, named for the eerie thumping noise that these low ranking house spirits make. Unlike their bright and cheerful cousins, usutsuki warashi crawl out from the dirt underneath the floorboards and roam about the house at night. They make creepy noises, creaking and thumping, and track dirty footprints throughout the house. Usutsuki warashi do not cause any actual harm, though they spread unease and discomfort in houses that they infect. Unlike other zashiki warashi, these troublemakers do not bring any good fortune to their homes. However, a house which drives these spirits away will still fall into ruin, just like a house that drives away the more pleasant zashiki warashi. This spirit's origin is similar to that of the yama uba. It comes from the old and terrible practice of kuchiberashi, or "reducing the mouths to feed" by thinning out families during times when food was scarce. Some houses with too many mouths to feed had no other choice but to sacrifice the newly born. The cost of a funeral also being too high, these children were buried underneath the house or in a storage shed. Instead of a tombstone, often an usu, a large mortar, was placed as a grave marker. ---- Akaname (垢嘗) Translation: filth licker Habitat: dirty baths, filthy toilets, abandoned homes Diet: slime, mold, scum, hair, human waste, etc. Appearance: Akaname are small, goblin-like yōkai which inhabit only the dirtiest homes and public baths. They are about the size of a child or a small adult, though they generally appears much smaller due to their hunching posture. Akaname have a mop of greasy, slimy hair on the tops of their heads. Their bodies are naked, and their skin is greasy like their hair. Akaname come in many colors and varieties, ranging from a dark, mottled green reminiscent of mold, to the ruddy pink of bedsores. They come in both one-eyed and two-eyed varieties, and can have anywhere from one to five fingers and toes. All akaname have an extremely long, sticky tongue. They use this to lap up the slime, grease, hair, and other filth found in bath houses and behind toilets. Like cockroaches, rats, lice, and other pests, akaname detest clean, well-kept homes. They only appear where the owners show a complete lack of sanitary discipline. Akaname are shy and stay clear of humans, scattering in the light like cockroaches. They spread disease, so it is a good idea to keep bathrooms and houses clean enough that akaname do not wish to settle down. ---- Keukegen (毛羽毛現) Translation: hairy, fluffy sight; alternatively, rare and dubious thing Habitat: damp homes, dirty gardens, moldy closets, under floorboards Diet: mold, dirt, and garbage Appearance: Keukegen are filthy monsters commonly found in populated areas. They are the size of a small dog and appear as a mass of long, dirty hair. Keukegen make their homes in cool, damp, dark places; they are particularly fond of living under floorboards and around run-down homes, where stuffiness, moisture, and lack of human activity create the perfect breeding place for sickness. Despite their apparent cuteness, Keukegen do not make good pets. They are actually a kind of minor spirit of bad luck, disease, and pestilence. They bring sickness and bad health to those whom they live near. Being shy by nature, they try to avoid human contact and are rarely seen. Those who claim to have seen them are often accused of overactive imaginations. However, their proximity is apparent when members of a household mysteriously fall sick or have a run of bad luck. Keukegen are easy to avoid, however. Just clean your house. Keukegen keep away from clean, kempt houses. Keukegen's name is a pun. It is commonly written with characters that mean "a hairy, fluffy sight." But it can also be written with different characters that mean "rare and dubious." ---- Kamikiri (髪切り) Translation: hair cutter Habitat: urban areas, dark alleys, toilets, bedrooms Diet: human hair Appearance: Kamikiri are a kind of magical arthropod, with a scissor-like beak and hands like razors. They are small, and capable of sneaking quietly through open windows and doors without alerting their victims. A kamikiri's modus operandi is simple: sneaking about at night and cutting a person's hair off—suddenly and unexpectedly. They hide under roof tiles and wait for unsuspecting prey to pass by. Kamikiri's are indiscriminate in their attacks. They go after anyone with hair—men and women, servants and aristocrats. Kamikiri strike in urban areas. They stalk alleys, bathrooms, or other out of the way places. In many cases, the strike goes completely unnoticed until later, when a mop of cut hair is found lying in the street or friends and family point out the victim's striking new hairstyle. Often, the victim is asleep in bed when the kamikiri attacks. In the days when long hair was the only fashion in Japan, the kamikiri was a terrifying apparition indeed—particularly in high class, urban areas. These days, with the wide variety of hair styles including short hair, kamikiri are no longer feared as they once were. Aside from random, malicious attacks, it is said that kamikiri strikes are sometimes a sign that the victim is about to unknowingly marry a yōkai. While these couplings are uncommon, there are a number of stories of kitsune and other shape-changers tricking unsuspecting men into marrying them. Because these improper marriages often end in catastrophe, helpful kamikiri interfere in hopes that the wedding will be called off. Legends: One account of a kamikiri attack was printed in a newspaper as follows: May 20th, 1874, about 9 p.m. in a neighborhood of Tōkyō. A servant girl named Gin left her master's mansion to use the outhouse. She suddenly felt a ghostly chill, and a moment later her hair fell disheveled about her face as her long ponytail was lopped off at the base. Gin panicked, and rushed to a neighbor's house where she promptly fainted. The neighbors investigated the outhouse, and discovered Gin's severed hair strewn about the floor. Afterwards, Gin became sick from stress and returned to live with her family in the countryside. Nobody ever used that outhouse again. ---- Seto taishō (瀬戸大将) Translation: General Seto, the crockery general Appearance: Seto taishō is a tiny little soldier pieced together out of chipped teacups, cracked dishes, and other miscellaneous utensils that have fallen out of household use. Its face is a sake bottle and its armor is made of porcelain-ware. Seto taishō runs about the kitchen on tiny spoons, wielding knives or chopsticks as swords or spears. Seto taishō is highly aggressive. It loves to chase the cooking staff around the kitchen, causing chaos with every attack. The tiny crockery general occasionally crashes into walls or cabinets, shattering to hundreds of pieces. But it then slowly puts itself back together, and resumes its miniature kitchen war. The word seto refers to the Seto Inland Sea, an area famous for earthenware. Just as we say "china" in English to refer to a specific kind of crockery, the Japanese use "seto mono" as a colloquialism for this tableware. ---- Shiro uneri (白溶裔) Translation: white undulation Appearance: Born out of a dish towel or kitchen rag which has seen too many years of usage, the shiro uneri looks like a ferocious, yet tiny cloth dragon. Shiro uneri flies through the air, chasing cleaning staff and servants. It attacks them by wrapping its slimy, mildewy body around their necks and heads, causing them to pass out from the stench. Though they seem more interested in mischief than murder, shiro uneri have occasionally killed servants by strangulation. Tsukumogami 付喪神 When household items, tools, clothing, and such reach an advanced age—traditionally one hundred years—it was believed they would develop a soul and transform into kami. Tsukumogami means "ninety-nine year gods"—just one year shy of one hundred. These objects were thrown out one year too soon. Instead of transforming into kami, they became degenerate, lowly spirits. Tsukumogami is written with characters that imply attachment and misery. Having worked hard for nintey-nine years before thanklessly being tossed out, these emotions cause tsukumogami to animate. There are as many kinds of tsukumogami as there are kinds of household items. Each one is as different from the next as the individual objects are. Often, tsukumogami enjoy playing pranks or terrorizing humans as revenge for their neglect or mistreatment. ---- Bakezōri (化け草履) Translation: ghost zōri (zōri are traditional straw sandals) Appearance: When the straw sandals known as zōri have been mistreated and forgotten by their owners, they can transform into sandal-yōkai called Bakezōri. These sandal-shaped yōkai sprout arms and legs from their bodies and a single, large eye in their centers. They run about the house at night, causing mischief and making noise. Bakezōri have a favorite chant, which they sing as they run about the house on their tiny feet: Kararin! Kororin! Kankororin! Managu mittsu ni ha ninmai! Kararin! Kororin! Kankororin! Eyes three and teeth two! "Eyes three" refers to the three holes where the sandal straps are attached and "teeth two" refers to the two wooden clogs on the underside of Japanese sandals. The other words are onomatopoeia representations of a zōri clacking along a hard surface. ---- Karakasa kozō (唐傘小僧) Translation: paper umbrella priest boy Alternate names: kasa obake, karakasa obake Appearance: These silly looking yōkai are transformations of Chinese-style oiled-paper umbrellas. They have a single large eye, a long, protruding tongue, and either one or two legs upon which they hop around wildly. Karakasa kozō are not particularly fearsome as far as yōkai go. Their favorite method of surprising humans is to sneak up on them and deliver a large, oily lick with their enormous tongues—which may be traumatic even though it isn't dangerous. Caution is advised, however. There are other umbrella tsukumogami which are dangerous to humans, and care should be taken not to confuse them with this more playful spirit. ---- Mokumokuren (目目連) Translation: eye eye (i.e. many eyed) muraji (a hereditary title used in ancient Japan) Appearance: If not properly taken care of, shōji—the paper sliding doors and windows found in Japanese houses—can be easily damaged and riddled with holes. When shōji have gone too long without repair, ghostly eyes begin to pop out of the holes, watching all that goes on inside of the house. Mokumokuren are harmless, but incredibly creepy. Their true danger lies in who their companions might be. Mokumokuren often work in concert with other tsukumogami, and are usually a sign of a greater infestation of yōkai. ---- Chōchin obake (提灯お化け) Translation: paper lantern ghost Appearance: When a paper lantern, or a chōchin, reaches an advanced age, it may transform into a chōchin obake. The paper of the lantern splits along one of its wooden ribs, forming a gaping mouth with a wild, lolling tongue. One or two eyes pop out from the upper half of the lantern. Arms or legs may even sprout from its body as well, although this is rare. Like karakasa kozō, chōchin obake rarely cause physical harm, preferring simply to surprise and scare humans. They cackle and roll their huge tongues and big eyes at guests in the home. But you shouldn't be too quick to laugh them off. Occasionally, powerful onryō disguise themselves as chōchin obake—a case of one of the most dangerous supernatural entities masquerading as one of the most harmless. ---- Kyōrinrin (経凛々) Translation: awe-inspiring sutra Appearance: Kyōrinrin is a spirit of knowledge formed from ancient scrolls, books, and scriptures which have been left unstudied by their owners and gathering dust. Kyōrinrin are often extravagant; they decorates themselves with the most ornate volumes and scrolls, wearing them like a kimono. A scroll with tassels becomes the headpiece, and they develop bird-like beaks and long, extendible arms. Compelled by the wisdom of the ages, the volumes that make up a kyōrinrin rise up as a dragon-like spirit. The kyōrinrin use their elongating arms to assault the ignorant owners who let such priceless treasures and knowledge fall into disuse. ---- Suzuri no tamashii (硯の魂) Translation: ink stone spirit Appearance: An ink stone which has been used to copy the same manuscript over and over again for many generations begins to take on aspects of the story itself. Suzuri no tamashii can manifest phantom sounds and illusory characters from the story, which arise from the ink and wreak havoc on the writing desk. One of the most bloody tales of old Japan deals with the civil war between the Taira and Minamoto clans, known as the Genpei War. In the final naval battle of the war, the entire Taira clan was brutally wiped out. Many of the slaughtered Taira soldiers transformed into onryō, and their grudge-curse infects the ink stones which have been used to repeatedly copy their story. Suzuri no tamashii echo the brutal slaughter from when the Taira clan was wiped out in the final battle of the Genpei War. When used, they produce sounds like the echo of the sea, the din of battle, and the screams of warriors. The ink inside begins to ripple and billow like the sea's waves, and tiny boats and soldiers materialize out of the ink. ---- Shami chōrō (三味長老) Translation: elder shamisen Appearance: A shami chōrō looks exactly like the shamisen it transformed from, a three-stringed guitar-like instrument. Musical instruments, because of their high value, are often kept around long enough to turn into tsukumogami. Instruments which were once played by masters are the most likely to develop into yōkai. These instruments no longer receive any use—either because their master died or because they started using other instruments—and transform into yōkai, longing to be played again. Shami chōrō's name is a play on words, written with characters meaning shamisen master. The name also invokes the old Japanese proverb, "Shami kara chōrō ni wa nararezu," meaning, "One cannot skip from novice to senior." In other words, only through many years of practice can one become a master. ---- Koto furunushi (琴古主) Translation: old koto master Appearance: The Koto furunushi looks like a koto—a long, harp-like instrument that is the national instrument of Japan—transformed into a wild beast. A koto which was once played frequently but later forgotten about and stored away can transform into the koto furunushi. These yōkai may look like wild beasts, but they remember every song that was ever played on them. Koto furunushi play when no one is around, causing everyone to wonder where the music is coming from. They prefer to play old, forgotten tunes that have fallen out of style and vanished from people's memory. ---- Biwa bokuboku (琵琶牧々) Translation: takes its name from a particular legendary biwa Appearance: A biwa is a kind of lute, frequently used to sing stories and poems. The biwa bokuboku is a biwa that has grown a human body and is dressed like a blind priest, wielding a cane, A biwa of extremely fine construction, upon reaching an advanced age, transforms into the self-playing biwa instrument known as a biwa bokuboku. This musical tsukumogami wanders playing music in the street for money. These tsukumogami get their name from a legendary biwa named Bokuba. This magnificent instrument was said to magically play on its own when nobody was looking. And not just any music—Bokuba played music beautiful enough to charm even an oni. ---- Ittan momen (一反木綿) Translation: one tan (about 28.8 cm by 10 m) of cotton Appearance: Ittan momen are long, narrow sheets of cloth normally used to make clothes, but reanimated as tsukumogami. They are native to Kagoshima, and can be seen flying through the sky at night. Ittan momen attack by wrapping their bodies around a person's face and neck, strangling or smothering them to death. As far as tsukumogami go, they are fairly malicious and even deadly. ---- Kosode no te (小袖の手) Translation: kosode (a short sleeved kimono) hands Appearance: Kosode no te appear in short sleeved kimonos formerly owned by prostitutes. This yōkai manifests as a pair of ghostly hands that emerge from the sleeves and assault welching clients—or whoever happens to be nearby. Kosode no te can occur for a number of reasons. One common origin is when a prostitute dies in vain, after working for many years to save up the money to buy her freedom. Upon death, such women usually had their clothes donated to a temple in exchange for a funeral and prayers. However, if the woman died still owed money from some of her clients, her spirit might reanimate her old clothing and head off in revenge. The newly formed kosode no te leaves the temple to find the prostitute's customers and scare them into to paying the money owed. Another origin is when a dead person's kimono is sold for cash instead of being donated to a temple, as is customary. If the deceased was unable to properly pass on to nirvana upon death, that person's spirit may come back and haunt their former kimono. ---- Jatai (蛇帯) Translation: snake obi (a kimono sash) Appearance: The jatai is an animated kimono sash that slithers around like a giant snake during the night. An old folk belief from Ehime Prefecture and other parts of Japan says that if you lay your obi out near your pillow while you sleep, you will dream of snakes. Because the word for a snake's body (jashin) ] is the same as the word for a wicked heart, it is said that the obi itself turns into a murderous tsukumogami called a jatai. The jatai hunts after men, strangling them in their sleep. ---- Ao andon (青行燈) Translation: blue lantern Alternate names: ao andō Habitat: parlors and living rooms; appears during ghost story telling parties Diet: fear Appearance: The ao andon is the incarnation of mass human terror, formed out of the built up fears of large groups of people. This fear takes the appearance of a demonic woman with long black hair, blue skin, blackened teeth, sharp claws, and horns. It wears a white or blue kimono, and glows with an eerie blue light. During the Edo period, a popular summertime activity among the aristocratic classes was to gather and swap ghost stories, hoping the chill of fear would stave off the intense midsummer heat. These parties were called hyakumonogatari kaidankai—a gathering of one hundred ghost stories. During a game of hyakumonogatari kaidankai, one hundred candles would be lit and placed inside of blue paper lanterns, called andon. The andon created an eerie atmosphere suitable for storytelling. Throughout the night, guests would take turns telling progressively scarier stories about yōkai, demons, ghosts, and other strange things. After each story, one candle would be snuffed out. The room grew gradually darker, until only the hundredth candle remained. Its dim blue light would struggle to fill the room, and cast long, creepy shadows. According to superstition, after the final candle was snuffed an actual spirit would appear out of the darkness to attack the participants. Summoned by the heightened emotional state and fears of guests, this spirit was called the ao andon. The ao andon would emerge from the smoke of the final candle and attacks the guests. What exactly this attack consists of is a mystery; whether the ao andon slaughters all of the participants in a brutal finale inspired by the preceding tales, or simply jumps out to give one last shock before the guests return home has never been recorded. The reason for this is that by the time the ninety-ninth ghost story had been told, the guests were too frightened to tell the final story. Hyakumonogatari kaidankai parties traditionally concluded before the final candle could be snuffed and the ao andon could appear. As the old proverb says (in both English and Japanese) ]: speak of the devil, and the devil appears. It was believed that merely talking about ghosts and spirits would cause them to materialize for real. ---- Hyakki yagyō (百鬼夜行) Translation: the night parade of one hundred demons Alternate names: hyakki yakō Habitat: travels throughout Japan, appearing on auspicious nights each month Appearance: The hyakki yagyō is the dreaded night parade of one hundred demons—an event when all of the yōkai, oni, ghosts, tsukumogami, and other supernatural creatures leave their homes and parade through the streets of Japan in one massive spectacle of utter pandemonium. In many ways, it resembles a traditional Japanese festival, filled with songs and chants, dancing, and merriment. The parade is said to be led by nurarihyon, nozuchi, and otoroshi. Humans foolish enough to go outside on these nights, or curious enough to peek out of their windows in hopes of catching a glimpse of the supernatural, are either killed or spirited away by the monsters. This is attributed sometimes to divine punishment for looking upon that which must not be seen, and sometimes to sheer shock from witnessing this horrible spectable. Legends: According to the Shūgaishō—a medieval Japanese encyclopedia—the only way to keep safe from the night parade should it come by your home is to stay inside on the specific nights associated with the Chinese zodiac on which the night parade is said to be held. Those who hear the pandemonium parade pass by their homes should chant this magic spell: KA-TA-SHI-HA-YA, E-KA-SE-NI-KU-RI-NI, TA-ME-RU-SA-KE, TE-E-HI, A-SHI-E-HI, WA-RE-SHI-KO-NI-KE-RI
(Yokai 2) The Hour of Meeting Evil Spirits	Matthew Meyer	[ "Japanese mythology", "pedia" ]	[]	What Are Evil Spirits?	In Japan, it is said that there are 8 million kami . These spirits encompass every kind of supernatural creature; from malign to monstrous, demonic to divine, and everything in between. Most of them seem strange and scary—even evil—from a human perspective. They are known by myriad names: bakemono, chimimōryō, mamono, mononoke, obake, oni, and yōkai. Yōkai is the most common catch-all term for the strange spirits of Japan. The word encompasses all of the supernatural creatures and phenomena which make up the spirit world. Within the realm of yōkai, there are a few significant categories. It is the nastiest of these spirits with which this book is concerned. Oni (demons) stand apart from other yōkai due to their cultural and literary significance going back more than one thousand years. They are powerful and thoroughly evil spirits. Their sole occupation is to hurt humans and human civilization as much as possible. Long ago, oni was a generic term for all evil spirits, but it has evolved into a specific subset containing only the worst and most hellish of monsters. Oni play a prominent role in Japanese theater such as noh and kabuki, as well as other art forms. The female version of an oni is called a kijo. Onryō (vengeful ghosts) hold a singular place in Japanese folklore and literature. These are ghosts of humans (and sometimes animals or yōkai) who return to haunt the world of the living. Though many kinds of ghosts exist, onryō are significant because of the sheer terror they inspired in the ancient aristocracy. Fear of their supernatural retribution—and efforts to appease these angry souls—has shaped the course of Japan's politics, history, and culture. Kaibutsu (monsters) make up the broadest category of yōkai by far. This includes a number of subdivisions such as magical animals, kaichō (strange birds), kaijū (strange beasts), tsukumogami (artifact spirits), and transformed humans. Many of these yōkai were invented by Edo period bookmakers, looking to feed the insatiable appetite for ghost stories. Some of these monsters were once local kami who were long ago worshipped as gods. They were forgotten and devolved over time into amusing or scary versions of their former selves. Kaii (strange phenomena) make up the final category. These includes kaika (strange fires) and hi no tama (fireballs), tsukimono (possession by spirits), enchantments, and other supernatural occurrences. Before modern medicine, mental illness was also included in this category. These phenomena can be caused by yōkai or black magic. Sometimes they occur for reasons unknown. [ Sorcery and the Manipulation of Spirits ] Due to the prevalence of belief in evil spirits in ancient Japan, a number of traditions developed that attempted to tap the spirit world for human benefit. Most of these were syncretic, mixing Shinto, Buddhism, Confucianism, and Taoism beliefs and practices with local superstitions. As society developed, these traditions transformed into complex belief systems. Chief among them was the religion of yin and yang: Onmyōdō (陰陽道 ). Onmyōdō is a Japanese occult philosophy and cult of magic that developed in the Heian period (794 to 1185 CE). Part natural science, part esoteric religion, Onmyōdō was a major political and social force for much of Japan's history. Onmyōdō dealt primarily with divination and fortune telling, but covered a broad range of practices including: astrology and astronomy; the calendar and timekeeping; magic and medicine; driving evil spirits out of people, places, and things; creating protective wards against the supernatural; and subduing monsters. Practitioners of Onmyōdō were called onmyōji. They wielded considerable power for centuries. Onmyōji were expected to use their occult knowledge on behalf of the state. They contacted the gods, buddhas, and kami to make official supplications. They prayed for the longevity of the emperor and protected officials against black magic and curses. Sometimes they used curses and magical spells against enemies. Reading the future and making predictions was another important part of an onmyōji's job. The nobility of the Heian period based their lives around the predictions of onmyōji. Unlucky directions and inauspicious dates were avoided. If your house was located in an unlucky direction, you might not return home until a luckier date or direction was foretold. So strong was this belief that people canceled important meetings, turned down invitations, or remained absent from the imperial court based on the advice of an onmyōji. The origins of Onmyōdō can be traced back to ancient China. Yin-yang philosophy and wuxing (the philosophy of five elements) were imported to Japan from the Tang Dynasty during the 6th century. They mixed together and combined with Japanese Shinto. Over the years, esoteric practices from Buddhism, Taosim, and Confucianism were added, along with the Chinese arts of astronomy, divination, fortune telling, calendar making, timekeeping, feng shui, and observational science. As its popularity among the nobility grew, more occult and esoteric elements were added. For a few hundred years, onmyōdō was developed independently by onmyōji all over Japan. During the 10th century, two families—the Kamo clan and Abe clan—dominated the practice. With the establishment of the Onmyōryō (the imperial Bureau of Yin and Yang), the already immensely popular art became a centralized force under the control of the government. But it did not last. Eventually, the political power of the onmyōji waned. The Onmyōryō was dismantled and shut down in 1869 after the Meiji Restoration. Onmyōdō came to be looked at as an ancient superstition, and lost its favor to new, forward-thinking, Western-inspired ideas. But the practices of onmyō magic did not vanish. They had been absorbed into other spiritual traditions and continued on under esoteric branches of Buddhism such as Shugendō and Kōshin. [ Meeting Evil Spirits ] The existence of magic and the supernatural has always been an everyday fact of life in Japan. Sorcerers and priests are found even in the remotest parts of Japan, presiding over ceremonies, reading fortunes, asking the gods for blessings, and protecting people from the influences of evil spirits. Despite this protection, evil spirits remain a concern among people of all social strata. Superstitions set strict boundaries that cannot, and should not, be breached. Inauspicious days—such as the days when the night parade of one hundred demons roams the world—are marked on calendars. Certain activities are forbidden during those times. Yōkai live in a world that parallels our own. Their lives resemble ours in many ways. They have societies and rivalries. They eat, sing, dance, play, fight, compete, and even wage war. Normally, we keep to our world and they keep to theirs. However, there are times and places where the boundaries between the worlds thin, and crossing over is possible: There are borderlands where civilization ends and wild mountains begin, where rivers cut through the land, where the sea meets the shore. These are places where you might accidentally happen upon a spirit. In old Japan, leaving the safety of your village to go into the mountains was a dangerous task. Those who worked in the wilderness, like traders and woodcutters, had the most to fear. Yōkai roamed the untamed wilds. The passage of time is also shrouded in occult mystery. The changing of the seasons is associated with the ebb and flow of yin and yang. Spirits appear more frequently during the solstices and equinoxes. During Obon, the summer festival honoring the dead, ancestral ghosts return from their world to spend time with the living. But the changing of the seasons and Obon are brief periods during each year—it is easy to take precautions during those times. The cycle of night and day is the most constant—and unavoidable—reminder that evil spirits lurk everywhere. Humans thrive during the day, but during the night the supernatural takes over. Villagers whose work kept them out past sunset lived in fear of being abducted by mysterious creatures. Ushi no koku —the "hour of the ox"—is the Japanese equivalent of the witching hour. During this time—the period of deepest, darkest night between 1:00 and 3:00 am—even grass and trees are said to be asleep. Evil spirits are at their greatest power. People whose work keeps them away from their homes at this time are likely to run into danger, or be abducted by mysterious creatures. There is only one time of day that is even more dangerous. The twilight hour—the border between daylight and darkness—is when the boundary between worlds is at its thinnest. Twilight is the easiest time for yōkai to cross into this world, or for humans to accidentally cross into theirs. Our world is still awake and active, but the world of the supernatural is beginning to stir. Superstition tells people to return to their villages and stay inside when the sun sets in order to avoid running into demons. This is why in Japanese the twilight hour is called ōmagatoki: "the hour of meeting evil spirits." ---- Ōmagatoki (逢魔時) Translation: the hour of meeting evil spirits Appearance: Ōmagatoki is the twilight hour between when the sun sets and the sky goes dark. It is not quite day, but not quite night. Shadows swallow everything. Your eyes start to play tricks on your mind. The border thins between sekai —the world we live in, belong to, and recognize—and ikai, the "other" world. Ikai is where the spirits live, a world about which we humans know next to nothing. During ōmagatoki, the evil spirits, the chimimōryō, wake up and move about freely. This is the hour when yōkai, yūrei, and other dark things cross over into our world. The appearance of yōkai during ōmagatoki is said to be accompanied by a few telltale signs: a cold wind blowing; a strange smell in the air, like that of fish or blood; a sudden onset of darkness; a sudden chill that causes one's hairs standing on end. Humans and spirits normally have separate existences in different worlds. When those worlds come together, things become chaotic—particularly for humans. In order to avoid meeting the things that prowl the night, people would head home as the sun set and stay inside until morning. Woodcutters sleeping in mountain huts something heard the cutting down of trees at night, but found no evidence of it in the morning. Phantom waterfalls could be heard where there was no waterfall for miles around. Strange laughter and voices of inhuman things echoed throughout the forests. Children who wandered away from the village and got lost in the mountains could be spirited away by otherworldly things and taken to another world. Sometimes they would return years later, changed in some way. The first tales of encounters between humans and spirits came from woodsmen, travelers, criminals, and people whose livelihoods forced them away from the safety of their homes and villages at night. These men would return to their villages in the morning with stories of eerie experiences after twilight. Over time, these stories developed into the earliest superstitions, helping shape Japanese folklore, religion, and society into what they are today. Ōmagatoki can be written two different ways: 逢魔時 literally means the hour of meeting evil spirits; 大禍時 literally means the hour of great calamity. Both of these readings illustrate the fear and apprehension that the ancient Japanese people felt towards the things that came at twilight. ---- Chimi (魑魅) Translation: mountain spirit Alternate names: sudama Habitat: mountains, forests, and other wilderness across Japan Diet: varies, includes humans Appearance: Chimi have human-like faces and bestial bodies. They feed on the bodies of the dead—particularly the innards—and bring disease and evil things with them wherever they go. Chimi is both a specific and a general term for monsters that live in mountains, forests, swamps, stones, and other parts of nature. Chimi tend to be nasty, or at least mischievous. They trick humans who wander in the mountains, and cause them to lose their way. Once their prey is isolated, chimi attack, often killing their victims. The name chimi is derived from the ancient Chinese history known as The Records of the Grand Historian . Chi is the name of a tiger-like mountain god, while Mi is a swamp god with the head of a boar and the body of a human. Over time, the names of these gods combined into a term for all kinds of monstrously shaped nature spirits. In Japan, chimi are considered to be a kind of mountain kami. ---- Mōryō (魍魎) Translation: mountains, trees, streams, and rocks spirits Alternate names: mizuha Habitat: streams, rivers, mountains, forests, graveyards, and wild areas all over Japan Diet: human corpses Appearance: Mōryō are said to look like children about three years old, with red or black skin, red eyes, long ears, and long, beautiful hair. Like chimi, mōryō is both a specific yōkai and a general term for a large number of nature spirits that live in the wilderness. In general, mōryō refers to evil spirits which rob graves and eat corpses. In particular, while chimi refers to mountain and swamp spirits, mōryō refers to water spirits. The most defining feature of mōryō is that they feed upon the bodies of dead humans. They rob graves, dig corpses up out of the ground, and feast upon the rotting innards. They also interrupt funerals, using magic to distract the attendees so they can steal the corpses from their coffins while nobody is looking. Because of these behaviors, they are especially detested. Special methods have been even invented to prevent disturbances to the deceased. Mōryō are afraid of oak trees and tigers. In ancient China it was common to plant oak trees in graveyards, and to adorn cemetery roads with stone tigers. Additionally, prior to interring a casket in the ground, a servant would enter the grave and prod around with a spear to make sure no mōryō were hiding in the ground. These practices did not catch on in Japan. Mōryō first appear in ancient Chinese records, where they were said to be minor nature spirits or demons. In Japan, they are considered to be water kami, and cooperate alongside chimi and other minor kami of the mountains. Many kinds of yōkai can be classified as mōryō, one of the most famous examples being the kappa. This leads to some confusion as to what this spirit's true nature is. In Mimibukuro —a collection of folktales collected during the Edo period—there is a story of a mōryō disguised as a human. Long ago there was a government official named Shibata. One evening, out of the blue, a servant informed Shibata that he would be leaving his service. When asked why, the servant replied that he was not actually a human, but a mōryō in disguise. His turn had come up to steal a corpse. The next day, he would have to travel to a nearby village and fulfill his duty as a mōryō. Sure enough, the servant vanished the following day. At the same time, dark clouds suddenly descended over a funeral service at the village the servant had mentioned. When the clouds cleared away, the corpse was missing from the coffin. ---- Chimimōryō (魑魅魍魎) Chimimōryō, combining the words chimi and mōryō, is a common term which refers to all evil spirits of the rivers and mountains. It's one of many catch-all terms for Japanese monsters, along with mononoke, bakemono, obake, minori, yōkai, and so on. Today, yōkai is the most common world used to refer to the vast menagerie of spirits in Japanese folklore. But in the past, each of these other terms has enjoyed varying levels of popularity. ---- Jami (邪魅) Translation: wicked mountain spirit Diet: varies Appearance: Jami is not a clearly defined creature, but in general refers to manifestations of the ill will of the mountains and forests, awoken in order to do harm to humans. They are a subset of chimi, or mountain spirit—though they are much nastier. Jami are truly wicked and harmful towards people. Because there are so many different wicked spirits that can be considered to be jami, there isn't one particular ascribed behavior or danger. However, a common trait is that they are capable of possessing and inhabiting human bodies, infecting sickness and disease upon their human hosts. Along with chimi and mōryō, jami first appear in ancient Chinese histories describing the nature spirits that roam the land. As Chinese culture began to influence Japanese culture, scholars discovered these ancient books and incorporated their teachings into their own works. When these creatures were included in Japanese bestiaries and records, they became associated with various Japanese evil spirits. In the ancient Chinese hagiography Biographies of Divine Transcendents, a wise sage named Ōyō was able to cure sick people by drawing an image of a prison on the ground. He would then call the evil spirits out of the body of his patients. When the spirits came out, they would become trapped in the prison and the patient would be instantly cured of his sickness. The evil spirits trapped this way were said to be jami. ---- Shīsā (シーサー) Translation: the Ryūkyūan pronunciation of shishi (lion-dogs) Habitat: shrines, castles, graveyards, villages; often seen on rooftops Diet: carnivorous Appearance: Shīsā are small, dog-like yōkai which are found throughout the Ryūkyū Islands. They are guardian deities which live in close proximity to humans. They are very similar to the lion-dogs found in other East Asian countries, but there are a few notable differences. Shīsā are native to the Ryūkyū archipelago, and are only found in Okinawa and the southern islands of Kyūshū. They are smaller and more dog-like than the lion-dogs found throughout the rest of Japan. In most of Japan, lion-dogs are found in pairs, yet the shīsā of Okinawa are often solitary. Shīsā are used as wards against evil spirits. They are most frequently found on the rooftops of houses and castles, or flanking village gates and gravesites. Shīsā are also commonly used as shrine and temple guardians. Male/female pairs represent the "a " and "un " syllables which make up the Sanskrit word om —the mystical sacred word found in Indian religions. This paired depiction of shīsā was most likely imported from Japan after the Ryūkyū Islands were conquered. In Okinawan depictions, the open-mouthed shīsā is the female, which beckons good luck and fortune. The close-mouthed shīsā is the male, which protects the village from natural disasters and evil spirits. Shīsā are very close relatives of Japanese koma inu, and share the same ancestor: China's imperial guardian lions. However, while koma inu arrived in mainland Japan via Korea, shīsā were imported to the Ryūkyū Islands directly from China, before they were a part of Japan. In fact, the name shīsā is actually the Ryūkyūan pronunciation of their Chinese name, shishi. [ The Origin of Lion-dogs ] Lion dogs are found in many East Asian countries. In China they are known as shishi, or stone lions. In Tibet they are known as ruishi, or snow lions. In Myanmar they are called chinthe. In Japan they are called koma inu, or Korean dogs. And in Ryūkyū they are called shīsā. Lions, however, are not found in any of these countries. The Asiatic lion is actually native to India. The lion-dogs of Japan and Ryūkyū come from cultural diffusion due to heavy trade with the Tang dynasty of China. However, the usage of guardian lion statues goes back much further than the Tang Dynasty. Lion imagery was first brought to China via trade along the Silk Road with Central Asian countries. In fact, the Chinese word for lion shares the same etymological root with the Persian word for lion. The usage of lions as symbols of protection and royalty in Central Asian art came via trade from India, where lion statues were frequently placed as guardians on both sides of statues of the Buddha. So the guardian lion-dogs we see throughout Japan actually have their origins in India. The use of lions as symbols of protection goes back much further than the birth of Buddhism in India. Guardian lion statues can also be found Ancient Mesopotamia and Egyptian art, which was introduced to India and Central Asia from Greece during Alexander the Great's conquests. Perhaps shīsā are distantly related to the sphinx or lamassu... ---- Hiyoribō (日和坊) Translation: weather priest Alternate names: teruteru bōzu Habitat: mountains (only appearing on sunny days) Diet: unknown Appearance: Hiyoribō is a yōkai from Hitachi Province who looks like a stone priest. It blends in with its surroundings and is not easy to spot in its natural habitat. Hiyoribō calls forth the sun and creates good weather. It lives deep in the mountains, and can only be seen on sunny days. During rain or in bad weather, this yōkai remains hidden. Hiyoribō strongly resembles another weather yōkai from China known as the hiderigami. It may be that hiyoribō is simply another form of the hiderigami. [ Teruteru bōzu ] Hiyoribō is the origin of the traditional dolls called teruteru bōzu . Made of paper or cloth, teruteru bōzu look exactly like tissue-paper ghosts from Western countries, although their origins are unrelated. They became popular during the Edo period, when children would make them and pray to them for good weather the next day. If good weather came, eyes would be drawn on the teruteru bōzu, holy sake would be poured over them, and they would be washed away in a river. ---- Hiderigami (魃) Translation: drought spirit Alternate names: batsu, kanbo ("drought mother"), shinchi Habitat: mountains Diet: atmospheric moisture Appearance: Hiderigami are grotesque, hairy humanoids which stand between two and three feet tall. They have a single eye on the top of their heads. They only have a single arm and a single leg, although they can run as fast as the wind. All hiderigami are female. Hiderigami are rarely encountered by humans. They live deep in the mountains and seldom travel out into human-inhabited lands. When they do, their presence can be felt over a wide area. A hiderigami's body exerts such an incredible heat that everywhere they go the ground dries up, clouds fail to form, and rain cannot fall. Not all water yields to the hiderigami's power—it is said that throwing a hiderigami into a toilet will kill it. Hiderigami originated in southern China, and come from a goddess. Their origin is recorded in some of the oldest Chinese records. When the legendary Yellow Emperor of China fought the warlord Chi You, he summoned a powerful goddess named Batsu to aid him in battle. Batsu contained a supernatural heat inside of her. When she released her power, the battle was quickly and decisively won in the emperor's favor. However, she had used so much of her power up that she was unable to return to heaven or contain her heat. While Batsu was nearby, waters dried up and rain would not fall. Her presence became a terrible problem for the emperor. Unable to kill her or to send her back to heaven, the emperor exiled the goddess to a far-away mountain and forbade her to return. Whether Batsu became the mother of the hiderigami or she became corrupted and transformed into this yōkai herself is unknown. ---- Ao bōzu (青坊主) Translation: blue monk Habitat: wheat and barley fields, uninhabited homes, lonely roads Diet: varies from region to region; commonly children Appearance: Ao bōzu are generally depicted as large, one-eyed, blue-skinned priests with a strong connection to magic. However, local accounts vary greatly in details such as size, number of eyes, and habitat. In Okayama (old Bitchū, Bizen, and Mimasaka Provinces), they are described as two-eyed giants who take up residence in abandoned or uninhabited homes. In other stories, they appear in wheat fields, or on dark, lonely roads. In Shizuoka (old Tōtōmi, Suruga, and Izu Provinces), ao bōzu are said to appear in spring at sunset in wheat and barley fields. The transition from night to day is a popular theme in the tradition of onmyōdō. Further, the blue-green leaves of young barley have powerful connections to onmyō magic. Children who run and play through the fields in the evening might be snatched up and taken away by an ao bōzu. Thus, good children must go straight home after school and not tramp through the fields! In Kagawa (old Sanuki Province), ao bōzu appear late at night to young women and ask them, "Would you like to hang by your neck?" If the woman says no, the ao bōzu disappears without a word. However, if she ignores him or says nothing, he attacks her with lightning speed. The ao bōzu knocks her out and hangs the poor woman by the neck. In Yamaguchi (old Suō and Nagato Provinces), ao bōzu are considered minor deities. They appear before humans on the road and challenge them to sumo matches. Because Yamaguchi's ao bōzu are only as big as children, many have foolishly accepted the challenge. They quickly find themselves flung to the ground with god-like strength and potentially lethal speed. Very little is known about ao bōzu. Toriyama Sekien was the first to record them, and his illustration came without a single word of description other than their name. From their name we can glean a little bit of information; the word ao means blue or green, and can denote immaturity and inexperience. (Another well-known yōkai—ao nyōbō—uses this color in a similar manner.) As the original illustration was black-and-white, it may even be that this yōkai was never intended to be colored blue or green, but rather just as a mockery of what Toriyama Sekien saw as a corrupt and hypocritical priesthood. Nonetheless, due to their name, they are usually depicted in a sickly shade of blue or green. The fact that ao bōzu have only one eye and are revered as minor gods in some places draws a strong parallel with another yōkai, the hitotsume kozō. Because of their similarity, there are theories suggesting a connection to the ancient spirit worship of old Japan. In this shamanistic proto-religion, one-eyed monsters were fallen mountain gods and bringers of evil, sent to do the bidding of larger deities. They could be kept at bay with woven baskets or other objects with many tiny holes. Monsters would view these as hundreds of eyes and flee, either out of fear or jealousy. Because there are so many different accounts and so many different kinds of nasty priest yōkai, it's impossible to tell which, if any, describe the real ao bōzu. ---- Furutsubaki no rei (古椿の霊) Translation: old tsubaki spirit Habitat: tsubaki trees Diet: sunlight, water, soil Appearance: In Japanese folklore, almost anything that lives long enough can develop a spirit and become a yōkai. When tsubaki trees (Camellia japonica, or the rose of winter) reach old age, their spirits gain the ability to separate from their host trees. They also manifest other strange and mysterious powers, which they use to bewitch and trick humans. The tsubaki is an evergreen tree with a peculiar trait. Instead of losing its flowers gradually, petal-by-petal, it drops them all at once to the ground. As a result, it has long been associated with death and strangeness in Japan. It is taboo to bring tsubaki flowers as gifts to hospitals or sick people. Long ago in Dewa Province, two merchants were walking along a mountain road when they passed a tsubaki tree. Suddenly, a beautiful young woman appeared on the road beside one of the merchants. She breathed on him, and he transformed into a bee. The young woman then disappeared into the tsubaki tree. The bee followed her and landed on a flower, however, the fragrance of the tree had turned into poison. As soon as the bee smelled it, the flower and the bee it dropped together to the ground. The remaining merchant picked up both the bee and the flower and rushed to a nearby temple. The priest recited prayers and read the sutras over the bee, but it sadly did not return to life or to its human form. Afterwards, the surviving merchant buried the bee and the flower together. In Dewa Province, long ago, a man heard a sad and lonely voice coming from a tsubaki tree one night. A few days later, disaster befell the temple. This happened again and again, and soon the priests at the temple realized that the tsubaki would cry a warning every time something bad was about to happen. The tree was dubbed Yonaki Tsubaki, or "night-crying tsubaki," and still stands today in the temple Kanman-ji, where it has stood for over 700 years. In Ōgaki, Gifu Prefecture (old Mino Province), there is an ancient burial mound. One year, historians excavated the burial mound and discovered some ancient artifacts, including a mirror and some bones. However, the man who discovered the artifacts died shortly after. The locals blamed it on a curse, and returned the artifacts to the mound. They planted a tsubaki on top of it. When the tsubaki grew old, it transformed into a yōkai tree. Since then, the glowing figure of a beautiful young woman has been seen by the roadside near the burial mound at night. ---- Ippondatara (一本踏鞴) Translation: one-legged bellows Habitat: mountains Diet: unknown, but kills humans one day per year Appearance: Ippondatara has one thick, trunk-like leg and a single saucer-like eye. It lives deep in the mountains of Japan. It is especially well-known in the mountains bordering Wakayama and Nara Prefectures (old Kii and Yamato Provinces), though sightings have been reported in other neighboring prefectures as well. Ippondatara is a shy yōkai, and tends to stay away from inhabited areas. It moves about by hopping around and doing somersaults. It avoids humans, though on winter days it is not uncommon to find the unique prints of this yōkai's large, single foot in the snow. While it is mostly harmless, once per year on December 20th, the ippondatara turns violent. Those entering the mountains on that day who run into the ippondatara are squashed flat under its powerful foot. Because of this, December 20th is considered an unlucky day in the areas where this yōkai lives. People stay out of the mountains then. The name ippondatara comes from tatara, the bellows that a blacksmith would use in the old days. This yōkai is said to resemble a master blacksmith who lost the use of one eye from years of starting at the intense flames, and lost the use of one leg from years of heavy work pumping the bellows. There are many theories about the origin of this yōkai. In some villages, it is considered to be a cousin of a certain breed of kappa called gōrai which—every winter—transform from river spirits into mountain spirits called kashambo until they return to the rivers in spring. Ippondatara is said to be a kind of kashambo. Other explanations describe the ippondatara as the ghost of a woodcutter who cut off one of his legs in penance for some crime. Or it may be the ghost of a famous one-legged, one-eyed robber named Hitotsudatara who lived in the mountains of Wakayama and had supernatural strength. It may even be the ghost of a giant boar who used to roam the mountains killing hunters. A high priest was able to bind the boar's spirit and keep it from harming people, but the conditions of the magic that binds this ghost allow it to roam free one day per year—on December 20th. It has also been suggested that it is a kind of mountain kami which was corrupted over the ages and became a yōkai. A single eye is a common feature among mountain spirits, and other one-eyed yōkai (such as hitotsume kozō) originated as mountain kami as well. ---- Ouni (苧うに) Translation: ramie peat (named for her resemblance to these plants) Alternate names: wauwau Habitat: deep in the mountains Diet: omnivorous Appearance: Ouni looks like an ugly old woman with an angry face and a body covered in long, black hair. Ouni live deep in the mountains, away from civilization, and only occasionally appear before humans. They are a variety of yama uba, or mountain hag. Unlike most yama uba, ouni are friendly towards humans who treat them kindly. They occasionally visit rural houses or mountain huts late at night. When this happens, the ouni asks the owners of the house to give her free lodging and a meal for the night. If they are kind and invite her in, she spins an enormous amount of thread during the night for the family, and then she vanishes without a trace. Ouni's name comes from the Japanese words for ramie (Boehmeria nivea )—a fibrous plant that is used to make thread—and peat—the rotten muck found in swamps that comes from rotting plant matter. The first part of her name comes from the thread which she spins at night, usually in the form of ramie, as well as the long, black hair which covers her body and resembles thick threads. The second part refers to her filthy, black, hairy body, which makes her look like she is covered in dead vegetation. ---- Buruburu (震々) Translation: onomatopoeic; the sound of shivering Alternate names: zozogami Habitat: human-inhabited areas Diet: cowardice Appearance: Buruburu are invisible, but are usually depicted as shivering ghosts wearing tattered rags. The only way to know a buruburu is near is by recognizing the telltale signs: goose bumps and shivers. Buruburu are born when humans perform acts of cowardice, such as running away from battle. They possess people by clinging to their shirt collars and touching the backs of their necks. This causes their hair to stand on end and sends shivers down their bodies. Buruburu follow their victims and cause them to shudder in fear. They are sometimes referred to as the spirit of cowardice. The words buruburu and zo are Japanese onomatopoeia for the sound of shivering and the chill of fear. This spirit's name comes from the sound of the shivers that it causes to run down people's spines. ---- Namahage (なまはげ) Translation: from a phrase meaning "peeled blisters" Alternate names: amahage, amamehagi, namomihagi, appossha Habitat: mountainous regions in northern Japan Diet: omnivorous Appearance: Namahage are a frightful demon-like yōkai which live in the mountains along the northern coast of the Sea of Japan. They look like oni, with bright red or blue skin, wild hair and eyes, large mouths full of sharp teeth, and often have horns sprouting from their forehead. They wear straw leggings and raincoats, and carry large blades. Once a year, during koshōgatsu —the first full moon of the New Year—the namahage descend from the mountains to scare villagers. They go from door to and brandish their knives, saying things like, "Any bad kids here?" They particularly enjoy scaring small children and new brides. Despite their ferocious appearance and behavior, they are actually well-meaning yōkai. They are sent down from the mountain as messengers of the gods to warn and chastise those who have been lazy or wicked. The name namahage comes from another taunt the namahage use: "Have your blisters peeled yet?" In the cold winter months, a lazy person who spent all of his or her time in front of the fireplace would get blisters from being too close to the heat for too long. Namomi is a regional name for these heat blisters, and hagu means to peel. The combination of those words became namahage. Today, the namahage play a major part in New Year's festivities in Akita Prefecture (old Dewa Province). Villagers dress up in straw raincoats and leggings, don oni masks, and wield large knives. They go from house to house and play the part of namahage. Residents visited by these namahage give presents such as mochi to their "guests," while the namahage chastise kids and warn them to be good. Newlywed couples are also harassed by these namahage. They are expected to give an account of all of the evil deeds they did during their first year together, as well as serve sake and food to the namahage before sending them off. While the name namahage is unique to Akita Prefecture, very similar yōkai are known by many different local names in neighboring regions: in Yamagata Prefecture they are known as amahage, in Ishikawa Prefecture they are known as amamehagi, and in Fukui Prefecture they are known as appossha. ---- Yamajijii (山爺) Translation: mountain geezer Alternate names: yamanjii, yamachichi ("mountain father") Habitat: deep in the mountains of Shikoku Diet: omnivorous Appearance: Yamajijii look like elderly men about 3-4 feet tall, with only one leg and one eye. In actuality, they have two eyes, but one of them is so huge and the other so tiny that they appear to have only one eye. Their bodies are covered in fine gray hair, and they can be found either wearing old clothes, tattered rags, or nothing at all. Their teeth are sharp and powerful—a yamajijii's bite is said to be strong enough to crush the bones of wild boars or monkeys. Yamajijii live in the mountains far from human settlements. They rarely appear before humans, but their tracks are easily recognizable. They leave deep, sunken footprints about 12 inches long every 6 to 7 feet (from hopping about on one leg). Because their bite is so strong, hunters would sometimes tame yamajijii and use them to drive away wolves. They also have the uncanny ability to read peoples' thoughts. They are most well-known, however, for their powerful voices. The cry of a yamajijii is so powerful it blows the leaves off of branches, splits trees and moves rocks, reverberates through the mountains, and shakes the heavens and the earth. They enjoy shouting contests, and will occasionally allow a human to challenge them. However, humans who are close to a yamajijii when it shouts sometimes have their eardrums burst, or even die. An old story tells of a brave hunter who challenged a yamajijii to a shouting contest. On the hunter's turn, he fired his rifle when he shouted, winning the contest. Later, the yamajijii realized he had been tricked. He shape-shifted into a spider and snuck into the hunter's bed to attack him in his sleep. In some versions of the tale, the clever hunter prepared for the shouting contest by praying to the gods of Ise and crafting a holy bullet inscribed with their names. This bullet had a special power: when fired it would never miss. Because of its magic, whenever the hunter carried it with him it would invariably attract the attention of yōkai. However, any time a yamajijii came near enough to threaten him, the hunter would display the bullet, and the yamajijii would flee in terror. A tale from Awa Province tells of a group of woodcutters warming themselves by a fire in a cabin when yamajijii suddenly appeared. The terrified woodcutters all had the same idea—kill the yōkai! The yamajijii read their minds one by one. Suddenly, one of the logs in the fire split with a loud snap! The yamajijii thought there must be a mind he could not read among the hunters. He fled the cabin in terror. A legend from Tosa Province tells of a kind yamajijii who gave a sorghum seed to a poor farmer as a gift. The farmer sowed the seed and that year was blessed with an incredible harvest. That winter, the yamajijii returned and asked for some mochi to eat. The grateful farmer gladly gave the yamajijii as much mochi as it could eat. The next year another great harvest followed, and again the yamajijii came back in the winter to ask for mochi. Each year, the yamajijii was able to eat more and more mochi, until it was able to eat three huge barrels-full. The farmer became afraid of losing his fortune, and they next time it came he gave the yamajijii a pile of burned stones, passing them off as yakimochi—baked rice cakes. The yamajijii ate them, but soon began to feel sick and hot. The farmer offered a cup of hot oil, passing it off as tea, but the yamajijii realized the farmer's trick. Surprised and hurt, it fled into the woods, but died before it could get back to its home. Afterwards, the farmer's family fell into ruin and was never rich again. ---- Sansei (山精) Translation: mountain sprite Alternate names: sanki ("mountain demon") Habitat: mountains Diet: crabs and frogs Appearance: Sansei are small humanoid spirits that live deep in the mountains. They range in size from about one foot tall to three or four feet tall. Their most noticeable trait is their single leg, which is turned around backwards. They are known as the leaders of all animals which live in the mountains. Their diet mainly consists of frogs and stone crabs, which they are particularly fond of broiling with salt. Sansei occasionally sneak into woodcutters' houses and mountain huts to steal salt, which they use to flavor the crabs. Though not very aggressive, they sometimes attack humans. When this happens, if one calls out, "Hiderigami!" the sansei will flee in terror. However, if one calls out, "Sansei!" instead, that person will meet some horrible fate, such as falling ill or having their house catch on fire. ---- Satori (覚) Translation: enlightenment Alternate names: kaku, yamako, kuronbō Habitat: deep in the mountains of central Japan Diet: carnivorous; occasionally humans Appearance: Satori are strange, intelligent ape-men found in the Japanese Alps. They are roughly man-sized, and appear similar to larger versions of the native monkeys found in the region. Satori appear to travelers on mountain roads, or to folks living in mountain huts far from civilization. If the opportunity presents itself, they gladly dine on anyone they can get their hands on. In cases where they encounter a lone human female, they often take her away into the mountains and rape her. Satori are most well known for their uncanny ability to read people's minds and then speak their thoughts faster than the individuals can get the words out themselves. This makes it difficult to hunt, trick, or escape from a hungry satori. The one thing they fear is the unexpected. Should something unforeseen happen, such as being hit by an unseen object, satori grow frightened and run away. One of the only ways to avoid being eaten by these yōkai is to completely empty your mind. With no mind to read, the satori grows bored and wanders away. The word satori literally means "enlightenment," in the Buddhist sense. The satori, with its uncanny ability to read thoughts, comes across as a kind of enlightened being to scared travelers, which is how it got its name. This also relates to the method of escaping a satori—true enlightenment comes from emptying one's mind of distracting, worldly thoughts, just as salvation from the hungry satori comes from an empty, zen-like mindset. The origin of the satori is not entirely clear. Edo-period encyclopedias relate satori with yamako, apes from western China that capture women to rape or eat. It has also been theorized that satori are cousins of the yamabiko, a small, monkey-like yōkai. The satori's ability to read people's minds and the yamabiko's ability to mimic their words are rooted in the same folklore. More recent folklorists have suggested that satori are fallen mountain gods of the ancient proto-Shinto religion which were corrupted into yōkai over the ages. ---- Imori (守宮) Translation: gecko Appearance: Imori are the ghosts of dead warriors transformed into geckos. They haunt the forgotten, overgrown ruins where they lost their lives, attacking and harassing trespassers. Origin: This yōkai's name is somewhat confusing—it is written with the kanji for gecko, which is normally pronounced yamori; yet in this case the name is pronounced imori, which means newt. When written it implies that this is a gecko yōkai, but when spoken it sounds like a newt yōkai—in actuality it refers to a gecko yōkai. Long ago in in Echizen Province there was a monk named Jingai Shuso. He lived as a hermit out in the mountains. He subsisted off of wild mountain plants and whatever charity the people from the local village would bring him. He spent almost all of his time in secluded meditation. One day Jingai was reading near the ruins of Yu no O castle, when suddenly a tiny man appeared and started talking to him. The man was only about 5 or 6 inches tall and wore a black hat and carried a cane. Being a good monk, Jingai did not let the stranger interrupt his studies. He continued reading. This angered the little man. He scolded Jingai, but Jingai still paid no attention. The tiny man became angry. He hopped up on to his cane and flew at Jingai. Jingai brushed him away with his fan, and the tiny man fell to the ground. He swore to get revenge on Jingai. Shortly afterwards, five women, about 5 or 6 inches tall, came up to Jingai and scolded him. Suddenly, there were 10,000 of these tiny people, with sleeves rolled up and armed with canes. They swarmed upon Jingai and began to beat him with their canes. In the distance, Jingai saw their general—a tiny warrior in red lacquered armor. The general called out, "Get out of here and never return, or else we will pop your eyes and slice off your ears and nose!" Some of the tiny men had climbed upon Jingai's shoulders and began to eat his ears and nose. Jingai knocked them off and ran away. Jingai ran to a ruined gatehouse. When he arrived, there were thousands of tiny men swarming over it. They knocked Jingai down, and another general said to him, "You were rude to our friends! We will cut off your hands and feet!" Thousands of tiny katanas were drawn from their tiny sheaths. Jingai was surrounded. Terrified, Jingai apologized for not considering their feelings. He begged them to spare him. The general told him that if Jingai was truly sorry, he could go. The general ordered his men to eject the monk from the gatehouse, and Jingai ran away. The next day, Jingai investigated castle ruins. He discovered a large hole in the ground that was swarming with geckos. Gathering some local villagers for help, he dug up the hole. It was over 3 meters deep, and filled with over 20,000 geckos! Deep inside, he discovered a 12 inch long gecko, which he realized must have been the general. The village elders explained that long ago an ally of Nitta Yoshisada built a castle near there, and it was destroyed in a battle. The souls of the dead warriors and the lord haunted the remains of the old castle well. Ever since, they had been causing all kinds of mischief in the area. Jingai began chanting sutras. By the time he finished chanting, the thousands of geckos were dead. Jingai took pity upon the poor beasts. He and the villagers collected the bodies, burnt them on a funeral pyre, and buried them. On top of the mountain of ashes they built a proper grave for the fallen warriors. ---- Tsurubebi (釣瓶火) Translation: well bucket fire Alternate names: tsurube otoshi, tsurube oroshi Habitat: coniferous trees deep in the forests of Shikoku and Kyūshū Diet: none Appearance: Tsurubebi are small tree spirits which appear at night, deep in coniferous forests. They take the form of bluish-white orbs of fire which bob up and down in the branches. Occasionally they drop to the forest floor and float back up into the trees. Their name comes from the way they bob about in the trees, which resembles a well bucket swinging back and forth. Sometimes the vague shape of a human or bestial face can be seen in the flames. Tsurubebi do very little other than bob up and down or drop from branches. Their flames produce no heat and do not burn the trees that they live in. Nor do these yōkai pose any other known threat. While tsurubebi are most often considered to be tree spirits, it has also been suggested that they are closely related to another yōkai named tsurube otoshi. These two yōkai share many similarities, including their names, coniferous habitat, and dropping-down behavior. However, while tsurube otoshi are malevolent and dangerous, tsurubebi appear to be entirely benign and uninterested in humans. ---- Furaribi (ふらり火) Translation: aimless fire Alternate names: buraribi, sayuribi Habitat: riverbanks Diet: none Appearance: Furaribi are small, flying creatures wreathed in flames. They have the bodies of birds, and their faces are somewhat dog-like. Furaribi appear late at night near riverbanks. They are a type of hi no tama, or fireball yōkai. They do very little except for float about aimlessly, which is how they got their name. Furaribi are created from the remains of souls which have not properly passed on to the next life. This is most often due to not receiving proper ceremonial services after dying. In Japan there are a number of important ceremonies performed at fixed intervals which occur for many years after someone's death—missing even one of these could cause a soul to become lost and unable to rest. Furaribi are one example of such lost souls. In the late 16th century, Etchū Province was ruled by a samurai named Sassa Narimasa. Narimasa kept a very beautiful concubine named Sayuri in his household. Sayuri was not well liked by the female servants or other women in Narimasa's household. They were jealous of her beauty and of Narimasa's love for her. One day, these women conspired against Sayuri and started a rumor that she had been unfaithful to Narimasa with one of his own men. Narimasa flew in a fit of jealous rage, murdered Sayuri, and took her body down to the Jinzū River. He hung her corpse from a tree and carved it into pieces with his sword. Next, he captured Sayuri's entire extended family—18 people in all—and executed them in the same manner. Afterwards, their tortured souls aimlessly wandered the riverbanks every night as furaribi. It is said if you go down to the riverside and call out, "Sayuri, Sayuri!" late at night, the floating, severed head of a woman will appear, pulling and tearing at her hair in a vengeful fury. As for Sassa Narimasa, he was later defeated by Toyotomi Hideyoshi. Some have attributed his defeat by Hideyoshi to the vengeful curse of Sayuri's ghost. ---- Ubagabi (姥ヶ火) Translation: old hag fire Habitat: riverbanks Appearance: Ubagabi are a kind of hi no tama, or fireball yōkai. They appear on rainy nights near riverbanks, and take the form of 1-foot diameter balls of flame with the faces of old women in them. They can also appear as chickens, but do not remain in this form for long. They are created out of the ghosts of old women who were caught stealing oil and died of shame. Ubagabi have the uncanny ability to fly long distances in the blink of an eye—up to 4 kilometers. Occasionally, they graze a person's shoulder and then continue off into the darkness. The unfortunate people whom they bounce off of invariably end up dying within three years. However, if they are quick enough and shout, "Abura sashi! " (oil thief) just as an ubagabi comes flying towards them, the yōkai will vanish. The shame at being called out as an oil thief is too much to bear even in death. Long ago in Kawachi Province there lived an old woman who was very poor. In order to make ends meet, she stole oil from the lamps at Hiraoka Shrine—a terrible crime in an age when oil was rare and precious. Eventually she was caught by the shrine's priests and her crime was exposed. From then on, the people of her village shunned her, and would shout out at her, calling her an oil thief. So great was the old woman's shame that she went to the pond behind the shrine and committed suicide. Such unclean deaths never turn out well. Instead of dying properly she turned into a yōkai. To this day, the pond behind Hiraoka Shrine is known by locals as Ubagabi Ike ("the pond of the ubagabi"). ---- Sagari (さがり) Translation: hanging Habitat: hackberry trees Diet: none Appearance: Sagari are strange apparitions from western Japan and Kyūshū, particularly Okayama and Kumamoto Prefectures (old Higo, Bitchū, Bizen, and Mimasaka Provinces). They take the form of grotesque horse heads, which drop down from hackberry trees to startle travelers on the road. Sagari don't do very much other than drop down right in front of your face and scream their unholy cry. However, those who hear a sagari's whinnying and screaming may be stricken with a terrible fever. Sagari come from the spirits of horses which die on the road and are discarded and left to rot where they fall. The horses' souls get caught in the trees as they rise from the bodies. The ones that stick in the trees cannot pass on to the next word and transform into these yōkai. ---- Yosuzume (夜雀) Translation: night sparrow Alternate names: tamoto suzume, okuri suzume Habitat: remote mountain passes and roads Diet: seeds and insects Appearance: The yosuzume is a rare bird yōkai found on the island of Shikoku and in neighboring areas. As their name suggests, they are nocturnal, appearing on remote mountain passes and forested roads late at night. Like ordinary sparrows, they are noisy birds usually found in large flocks. Yosuzume appear to travelers at night, swirling around them in a creepy, unnatural swarm. By themselves they don't do any particular harm other than startling people; however they are a sign of bad luck and bring terrible evil to those whom they surround. Because of this, locals have superstitious chants to say at night to keep yosuzume away. Roughly translated, one of them goes: "Chi, chi, chi calls the bird / maybe it wants a branch / if it does, hit it with one." Another one goes, "Chi, chi, chi calls the bird / please blow soon / divine wind of Ise." In some places, yosuzume are known as tamoto suzume, or "sleeve sparrows." Their appearance was a sign that wolves, wild dogs, or other yōkai were nearby. Their call is mysteriously only ever heard by a single individual, even when traveling in groups. It was considered bad luck if a tamoto suzume jumped into your sleeve while walking, and so travelers held their sleeves tightly shut when traveling in areas inhabited by these birds. In other areas, yosuzume are not seen as bad omens; they are instead warning signs that a more dangerous yōkai, the okuri inu, is nearby. For this reason, the yosuzume is also known as the okuri suzume, or "sending sparrow." Its call is said to be a reminder to travelers to watch their footing on the dangerous mountain paths. ---- Okuri inu (送り犬) Translation: sending-off dog Alternate names: okuri ōkami (sending-off wolf) Habitat: dark mountain passes, forested roads Diet: carnivorous; particularly fond of humans Appearance: Okuri inu are nocturnal dog-or wolf-like yōkai which haunt mountain passes, forested roads, and similar locations. They resemble ordinary dogs and wolves in all but their ferocity; they are much more dangerous than their mortal counterparts. Okuri inu follow lone travelers late on the road at night. They stalk their prey, keeping a safe distance, but following footstep for footstep. You are safe so long as you keep walking. If you should trip or stumble, the okuri inu will pounce and rip you to shreds. The "sending-off" part of its name comes from how it follows closely behind travelers, trailing behind them as if it were a friend sending them off on their way. Okuri inu are somewhat of a blessing and a curse. On the one hand, if you should trip and fall, it will pounce with supernatural speed and gobble you up. On the other hand, they are so ferocious that while they are following someone, no other dangerous yōkai or wild animals will come near. As long as you keep your footing, you are safe. But traveling in the dark over root-infested, rocky mountain footpaths does not make for easy footing—especially for merchants carrying large packs of whatever it is they are going to sell! The okuri inu has a special relationship with another yōkai, the yosuzume. This eerie bird's nocturnal song is often a warning that an okuri inu is following you. If you hear the yosuzume's "chi, chi, chi" song, it is a sign to take extra care to watch your footing so that the okuri inu doesn't have you for dinner that night. In the unfortunate case that you should stumble on the road, there is one chance for survival: if you fake it so it looks like you did it on purpose, the okuri inu will be tricked into thinking you were just taking a short rest, and it won't pursue. You do this by saying "Dokkoisho! " ("Heave-ho!") or "Shindoi wa! " ("This is exhausting!") and quickly fixing yourself into a sitting position. Sigh, sit for a bit, and then continue on your way. The okuri inu will wait patiently for you. If you should make it out of the mountains safely, turn around and call out, "Thanks for seeing me off!" Afterwards, that okuri inu will never follow you again. Further, when you get home, wash your feet and leave out a dish of something for the okuri inu. This shows your gratitude to the okuri inu for watching over you. Superstitions related to the okuri-inu are extremely old, and found in all parts of Japan. Wolves and wild dogs have existed on the Japanese isles for as long as humans have, and the legend of the okuri inu originated in the mists of pre-history. In modern Japanese, the word okuri ōkami also applies to predatory men who go after young women, pretending to be sweet and helpful but with ulterior motives. That word comes from this yōkai. In Izu and Saitama, there is a similar yōkai known as the okuri itachi. This is a weasel that works in roughly the same way as the okuri inu; only if you take off one of your shoes and throw it at it, the weasel will eat the shoe, run away, and leave you in peace. ---- Hihi (比々) Translation: none; based on the Chinese name for the same creature Habitat: deep in the mountains Diet: carnivorous Appearance: Hihi are large, monkey-like beasts which live deep in the mountains. They have long, black hair and wide mouths with long, flapping lips. Old legends say when a monkey reaches a very old age it will transform into a hihi. Hihi are fast runners and primarily feed on wild animals such as boars. They batter them down and snatch them up just as a bird of prey snatches up small animals. The hihi gets its name from the sound of its laugh. When it sees a human it can't help but burst into laughter, letting out a loud, "Hihihihi! " When it laughs, its long lips curl upwards and completely cover its eyes. While hihi feed primarily on wild beasts, they will also prey on humans given the opportunity. They are known to catch and run off with human women in particular. If a hihi grabs a human there is only one way to escape—by making it laugh. While it is laughing it is blinded by its own lips. It can be taken down by striking it in the middle of the forehead with a sharp spike. Hihi are sometimes confused with other mountain-dwelling, monkey-like yōkai, such as yamawaro and satori. The hihi are much bigger, more violent, and far more dangerous. Some stories say that, like satori, hihi have the ability to speak human words and read human hearts and thoughts. They are valued for their blood, which is a vivid, bright red. If used as a dye, the bright red color will never fade or run. If drunk, the imbiber gains the ability to see invisible demons and spirits. The origin of the hihi lies in ancient Chinese mythology, where they were believed to be supernatural monkeys that lived in the mountains. These legends were brought over to Japan by folklorists during the Middle Ages. In modern Japanese, hihi is the word for baboon, which takes its name from its resemblance to this yōkai. ---- Nobusuma (野衾) Translation: wild quilt Alternate names: tobikura (flying warehouse) Habitat: forests and mountains Diet: primarily blood; also fire, nuts, fruit and berries Appearance: Bats which live to a very old age develops magical powers and change into nobusuma. They look almost identical to musasabi, or Japanese giant flying squirrels—although nobusuma are much more dangerous. Nobusuma eat nuts, fruit, and berries like other animals, but they also feed on fire and by sucking blood from humans and small animals such as cats. They attack travelers walking the roads at night. Nobusuma swoop down from the trees onto the faces of their unsuspecting victims. They latch on and begin sucking blood. When they do not need to feed, they simply swoop down and blow out lanterns and torches. Then they fly back into the night sky with a creepy cry of "gaa gaa!" While nobusuma are born from long-lived bats, the transformation does not stop there. They have several evolutions. Once a nobusuma reaches old age, it transforms again, either into a yamachichi or a momonjii. This yōkai should not be confused with the nobusuma (野襖 ) from Tosa Province, whose name is pronounced the same but uses different kanji. That nobusuma is actually a variety of a different yōkai called nurikabe. ---- Yamachichi (山地乳) Translation: none; just the name for this monster Alternate names: yamajiji, satorikai Habitat: deep in secluded mountains Diet: life force (in the form of the breath of sleeping humans) Appearance: Yamachichi live in northeastern Japan and originally come from bats. A long-lived bat transforms into a nobusuma, which then transforms into a yamachichi after many more years. These yōkai resemble monkeys with pointed mouths and sucking lips. Yamachichi live deep in the mountains and pay visits to houses late at night. They steal the breath from sleeping human victims, sucking it out of their mouths with their pointed lips. After sucking away all of their victims' sleeping breath, yamachichi tap their victims on the chest, and then flee into the night. Humans who have had their breath stolen this way will die the next day. However, if a yamachichi should be caught in the act of stealing breath—either by the victim or by another witness—it will flee. Its victim will have their life span greatly increased instead. The name yamachichi only appears in the Ehon Hyakumonogatari, an Edo period yōkai bestiary. Thus, very little is known about them. The characters used to write the name literally mean "mountainous region" and "breast" or "milk." These are most likely ateji —characters assigned phonetically without regard to the original meaning of the word. The original meaning of the name is mysterious and the only explanation given is that they are called yamachichi because they live hidden away in the mountains. Because they are similar in shape to satori, yamachichi are often confused with that yōkai. Yamachichi have picked up the alternative name satorikai. ---- Momonjii (百々爺) Translation: hundred hundred (i.e. really old) geezer Habitat: dark roads and mountain passes Diet: omnivorous Appearance: Momonjii derive from long-lived nobusuma, which originally come from long-lived bats. They are mysterious yōkai that take the form of hairy, bestial old men who wander the wilds and assault passersby—particularly crying or misbehaving children. Momonjii appear late at night on the road, when the wind blows strongly. Those who are unfortunate enough to meet them suddenly fall sick. The name momonjii was created by a complicated combination of Japanese puns and wordplay. It is formed from the words momonga and gagoji. Momonga is the Japanese word for a small flying squirrel—but long ago the momonga and musasabi (the Japanese giant flying squirrel) were thought to be the same animal. Their names were used interchangeably. The yōkai nobusuma (from which momonjii evolve) closely resemble musasabi; so the name momonga was used interchangeably to refer to nobusuma. Gagoji is a regional word for a bogeyman-like monster who assaults children. The name is a regional variation of the famous demon Gagoze of Gangō-ji. Momonga and gagoji were combined to form momonjii—a scary, child-assaulting monster related to the nobusuma. During the Edo period, there was a strict prohibition on eating meat from certain animals such as deer and boar. These forbidden animals were collectively referred to as momonjii. To get around this prohibition, shops began selling animal meat as "medicine" instead of food. These "medicine" shops were called momonjiya, and the meat sold there was believed to ward off disease. The fact that this yōkai resembles a wild animal and also brings disease is an cynical reference to momonjii and momonjiya. The "medicine" sold at momonjiya was given nicknames in order to disguise its true contents. Deer meat was called momiji, or maple leaves, and boar meat was called botan, or peony. This secret imagery persists in things like hanafuda playing cards which show deer with maple leaves and boar with peonies. Toriyama Sekien was aware of the imagery in hanafuda cards; when he first illustrated the momonjii he drew it hiding in a pile of maple leaves and created yet another connected between this yōkai and the prohibition of wild animal meat. ---- Nodeppō (野鉄砲) Translation: wild gun Habitat: mountains and forests Diet: blood Appearance: Nodeppō are animal yōkai which live in northern Japan, deep in forested mountain valleys. Nodeppō resemble flying squirrels, but are actually born from animals called mami, which resemble badgers. When mami reach old age, they transform into nodeppō. Nodeppō closely resemble nobusuma in appearance and behavior. They swoop down from trees at night and extinguish flames. They latch on to humans' faces, smothering them and sucking out their blood. In fact, in some places nodeppō and nobusuma are thought to be the same creature. While both nodeppō and nobusuma smother people's faces and blind them with their webbed arms and legs, nodeppō can do something unique amongst yōkai: it shoots bats out of its mouth like bullets from a gun. The nodeppō is able to spit a stream of bats out of its mouth towards the faces of its victims, blinding them in a cloud of angry bats. This distinguishing feature also gives the nodeppō its name. Mujina and Mami and Tanuki, Oh My! Mami has been used to describe a number of creatures across Japan. In olden times, depending on where you lived, mami could refer to some or all of the following: tanuki (raccoon dogs), musasabi (Japanese giant flying squirrels), momonga (flying squirrels), mujina (badgers), or anaguma (another word for badgers). To further add to the confusion, in some regions the kanji for these animals might be switched. As you traveled from region to region, the meaning of written words would change too. Often times these animals were considered to be the same animal. They were seen as different stages in the life of one creature, in the same way a caterpillar becomes a butterfly or a tadpole becomes a frog. ---- Noderabō (野寺坊) Translation: wild temple priest Habitat: abandoned, ruined temples Diet: sadness Appearance: Noderabō appear as forlorn, grotesque priests dressed in tattered rags. They appear late at night in abandoned, overgrown, ruined temples, and haunt the temple grounds. They occasionally ring the large temple bells. Noderabō are the ghosts of priests who committed some kind of sin and died in dishonor. Most often they are those who fell to vices forbidden to the clergy, such as attachment to women or money. No longer welcome in towns and cities, they flee to abandoned temple ruins located out in depressed rural areas. Eventually, they transform into yōkai. In Saitama Prefecture there is a place called Nodera which gets its name from this yōkai. Long ago in Musashi Province, a prankster decided to steal the large bronze bell from the town's temple. However, he was spotted in the act by one of the local townspeople and fled. He dropped the bell into a pond, where it got stuck. It was too heavy and dangerous to remove, so the townspeople decided just to leave it in the pond. Eventually the pond became known as Kanegaike ("Bell Pond"). One day, a lazy priest boy was given a job by the high priest of the temple. Instead of doing what he was bid, the boy spent the day playing with other neighborhood children. When it came time for him to face the high priest, he was so ashamed that he became depressed and drowned himself in Kanegaike. After that, the villagers could hear the sound of crying every night echoing off of the great bronze bell, coming from deep within Kanegaike pond. The priest boy became known as the ghost of Nodera, or the noderabō. ---- Furuutsubo (古空穂) Translation: old quiver Appearance: Furuutsubo are the beloved quivers of slain archers who died particularly tragic deaths. These quivers—along with other arms and armor—develop life force due to the residual energies left behind by their owners. They begin to move around on their own. Legend: The most famous furuutsubo was the quiver which belonged to Miura Yoshiaki, a military commander who lived at the end of the Heian period. Yoshiaki was a brave warrior, skilled in sword and bow. For the Genpei War, he fought on the side of the Minamoto clan. As the enemy was bearing down during a terrible siege, Yoshiaki arranged for his household to escape from the castle. Then, as the last few survivors made it out safely, he remained alone. Yoshiaki stayed behind to defend the castle against the invading army. He sacrificed his life. After his heroic death, his favorite quiver was heartbroken at the loss of its master. It took on a life of its own and became this yōkai. ---- Abumiguchi (鐙口) Translation: stirrup mouth Appearance: Abumiguchi were once stirrups belonging to a warrior who fell in battle. The stirrups were left on the battlefield, forgotten. Upset at losing their purpose, a soldier's implements can transform into tsukumogami. Like faithful hounds, abumiguchi wait in the fields for their masters, who will sadly never return. ---- Kura yarō (鞍野郎) Translation: saddle rascal Appearance: Kura yarō are saddles whose masters have been slain. They take on lives of their own and act like warriors. The most famous kura yarō was once the saddle of Kamata Masakiyo, the first and foremost retainer to Minamoto no Yoshitomo, general and head of the Minamoto clan. After losing a battle during the Heiji Rebellion (1160 CE), he and his lord fled from Kyōto. But they were betrayed and murdered by an ally. Kamata Masakiyo's wrath at being betrayed remained after his death and became attached to his saddle, which transformed into a tsukumogami. Afterwards, his saddle would pick up sticks and prance about like a warrior, fighting everything it could. Even after his death, Masakiyo's weapons were a loyal to his cause. ---- Kosenjōbi (古戦場火) Translation: ancient battlefield fire Alternate names: kosenjō no hi Habitat: ancient battlefields Diet: none Appearance: Kosenjōbi are a type of onibi, or demon fire. They gather in places were bloody battles have been fought. Kosenjōbi appear as countless orbs of flame which float about aimlessly through the air. Kosenjōbi are formed from the blood of the countless warriors and animals which died in battle and never passed on to Nirvana. The blood soaks into the earth and rises up into the air at night. It creates fiery shapes. Kosenjōbi occasionally take on the form of wounded warriors and animals. These phantoms search for their missing body parts or just wander forlornly across the battlefield. Though eerie to look at, kosenjōbi do not harm the living. ---- Kawa akago (川赤子) Translation: river baby Alternate names: kawa akaji Habitat: rivers, streams, ponds, swamps Diet: omnivorous Appearance: Kawa akago are cousins of the kappa, and trickster yōkai. They look like small, red-skinned babies. Kawa akago appear on riverbanks and call out to passersby, perfectly mimicking the sound of crying human babies: "Waah! Waah!" (Japanese: "Ogyaa! Ogyaa! ") When someone wanders down to the river's edge, the kawa akago retreats further into the underbrush and calls out again. This continues with the yōkai leading its victim further and further into the river. Finally, it sneaks up under the unsuspecting human, pulls his legs out from under him, and sends him tumbling into the river. While this is only meant as a prank, some people drown in this manner. This makes kawa akago a fairly dangerous yōkai. Similar yōkai called yama akago (mountain baby) are found in Akita Prefecture (old Dewa Province). They hide in leaf piles in the mountains, and when people step on the leaves, they call out in a loud voice, "Ouch! That hurt!" Then they laugh and vanish into thin air. ---- Ikuchi (イクチ) Translation: none; just the name for this monster Alternate names: ayakashi, ikuji Habitat: open seas Diet: unknown; but it is big enough to eat anything it wants Appearance: Ikuchi are colossal sea monsters that roam the open seas off the coasts of Japan. They appear in numerous stories from the Edo period, where they are described as enormous fish or monstrous serpents of some kind. Their bodies are covered in a slippery oil, which sheds as they swim the ocean. When an ikuchi's path crosses a boat's, the sea monster envelopes the boat in its tentacle-like body. It slithers over the sides and across the deck, slowly sliding its whole body over the boat. Ikuchi are so long—many kilometers, by some accounts—that it can take hours for an entire one to slither over a boat. On a few occasions, boats have been tangled up in this monster for days. During this time, sailors must constantly bail the monster's oily slime off of the deck to avoid being capsized by the heavy goo. An ikuchi is depicted in Toriyama Sekien's bestiary Konjaku Hyakki Shūi, where it is called ayakashi. This yōkai is often referred to by that name. Ayakashi is more commonly used as a term for other strange creatures and supernatural phenomena and has nothing in particular to do with ikuchi. Toriyama Sekien may have just been listing the ikuchi as an example of an ayakashi. For whatever reason the name stuck. ---- Umi zatō (海座頭) Translation: blind man of the sea Habitat: the waters surrounding Japan Diet: prefers ships and sailors Appearance: Umi zatō are mysterious, gigantic yōkai that look like blind guildsmen, or zatō, who wander the seas at night. They tap the waves with their long canes. Very little is known about the mysterious umi zatō. They are considered to be harmless and leave people alone. However, according to some tales, umi zatō harass fishermen out at sea. They beckon ships towards them. When the ships draw close, they flip them over and capsize them. They occasionally swallow entire boats whole. They do have a congenial side, however. If the people on a ship reply to an umi zatō in a polite and docile manner, the umi zatō will vanish and leave them alone. Because there are so few legends about the umi zatō, almost all of what we know about them is speculation. They are sometimes considered to be cousins of the similar-looking umi bōzu, but it is likely that umi zatō is an invented yōkai thought up by Edo period artists solely for decorating picture scrolls. ---- Sazae oni (栄螺鬼) Translation: turban snail demon Habitat: oceans, seas, and coastal areas Diet: carnivorous Appearance: Sazae oni are monstrous turban snails (Turbo cornutus ) which haunt the seas. They appear on moonlit nights, dancing on the water's surface like exotic dancers or dragons. Sazae oni are monstrous and deadly creatures, fully deserving the "demon" moniker. They are powerful shape-changers, often taking the form of beautiful women in order to lure seamen into trouble. At sea, they pretend to be drowning victims and cry out to be rescued. Then they turn on their would-be saviors once brought aboard. When encountered on land, sazae oni travel disguised as lone, wandering women who stop at inns. They eat the innkeepers during the night. Sazae oni can be born a few different ways. According to ancient lore, when animals reach a certain age they gain the ability to transform. It was thought that when a turban snail reaches 30 years old it turns into a yōkai with all kinds of magical powers. Another way that sazae oni come to be is when a lustful young woman is thrown into the sea. Such a woman transforms into a sea snail. If she happens to live a very long time, she transforms into a sazae oni as well. On the Kii peninsula, legend tells of a band of pirates who spotted a woman drowning in the water. They rescued her, though not out of the goodness in their hearts—the pirates had more nefarious reasons for wanting a woman aboard their ship. That night every pirate on the ship had their way with her. Unfortunately for the pirates, the woman was actually a shape-changed sazae oni. During the night, she visited each pirate on the boat one by one and bit off their testicles. At the end of the night she had all of their testicles, and demanded treasure for their return. The desperate pirates traded away all of their ill-gotten gold to the sazae oni to buy back their kintama, or "golden balls," as testicles are called in Japanese. In other words, they traded their gold for their gold. ---- Shinkirō (蜃気楼) Translation: clam breath tower; mirage Habitat: open ocean Appearance: Shinkirō are not yōkai, but kaii—supernatural phenomenon. They take the appearance of distant, fantastic cities with tall towers and giant pagodas. Shinkirō appear out at sea on still nights, far off in the distance near the horizon. They only appear to sailors who are far from shore. Those who chase down these phantom cities never reach them. No matter how long they travel, the beautiful cities remain just as far away on the distant horizon. These mysterious illusions are caused by a legendary breed of giant clams, which breathe out fantastic images into the sky. These giant clams were known as shin, and were believed to be holy beasts related to dragons. Today, shinkirō remains a part of the Japanese lexicon as the word for mirage. While we understand the causes for this phenomenon today, its roots as a kaii are still preserved through the meaning of the kanji used to write the word: shin (clam), ki (breath), and rō (tower). According to legends, the mysterious cities that appears in these mirages are not just are illusory, but a vision of Ryūgū-jō, the mythical palace of Ryūjin—the dragon king who lives on the bottom of the sea. ---- Ryūjin 龍神 and Ryūgū-jō (龍宮城) While dragons are regarded as sacred beasts in Japanese lore, one dragon in particular is the grandest of all. Watatsumi, more commonly known as Ryūjin (meaning dragon god), is the god of all the oceans and seas and the king of the water spirits. He lives in a beautiful palace built from red and white corals called Ryūgū-jō, which sits at the bottom of the sea. From his palace, Ryūjin controls the oceans using the magical jewels kanju and manju, which cause the tides to ebb and flow. He is served by jellyfish, sea turtles, fish, and other marine life. In addition to water spirits and yōkai like kappa and suiko pay homage to Ryūjin. ---- Suiko (水虎) Translation: water tiger Alternate names: sometimes mistakenly referred to as kappa Habitat: rivers, lakes, ponds and waterways; found throughout Japan Diet: omnivorous; prefers human blood and souls Appearance: Suiko are found in both China and Japan and are often confused with kappa. However, suiko are far more dangerous, violent, and hot-tempered than their kappa cousins. Suiko have the body of a small child and are covered in tough scales like a pangolin's. They have sharp, hook-like growths on their kneecaps that resemble a tiger's claws. They live near riverbanks and large bodies of water. Suiko rank above kappa in the hierarchy of water goblins. They are sometimes placed in charge of kappa groups, with one suiko leading 48 kappa. They are sometimes called the oyabun, or yakuza bosses, of kappa. In turn, suiko report to Ryūjin, the dragon king, who lives in his palace Ryūgū-jō at the bottom of the sea. The main reason suiko attack humans is to look tougher than other suiko and increase their standing with the dragon king. Likewise, when kappa attack humans it makes them look tougher and increases their standing with their suiko bosses. Suiko live in inhabited areas and sneak out of the water at night to play pranks on humans. They knock on doors and run away, or possess people and make them do strange things. Like kappa and other water spirits, suiko use their superior strength to pull humans into water and drown them. Although unlike kappa, suiko have no concern for shirikodama. Instead, suiko drain their victims of blood like vampires. They then eat their souls (reikon ) and return the drained body to the surface. It is possible to keep suiko at bay by leaning a sickle against the side of your house and sprinkling flax seeds or black-eyed peas on the ground. Suiko are afraid of these and will keep away. There is one known method to kill a suiko. It involves the corpse of a person who has had their blood drained by a suiko. First, you build a small hut made of grass and straw in a field. Then lay the drained body on a wooden plank and place it inside the hut. The suiko who sucked that person's blood will be drawn to the hut. It will run around and around in circles. Suiko are usually invisible, so it is likely that they will only be heard rather than seen. Only its footprints will be visible. As the dead body gradually decays, so will the suiko. By the time the body has rotted completely, the suiko will have died, its magic ceased. The decayed corpse of the suiko will become visible on the ground near the body. ---- Shiranui (不知火) Translation: unknown fire Habitat: along the shores of Kyūshū Appearance: Shiranui are a specific type of kaii known as a kaika, or mysterious fire. They appear in bodies of water around Kyūshū on dark, calm nights—particularly at the end of the 7th month according to the old lunar calendar. They are most visible during the strongest ebb tide, around 3 am, and appear roughly 8 to 12 kilometers off shore. They can be seen from elevated parts of the coast, but not from sea level. Shiranui begin with one or two distant fireballs, called oyabi, floating just above the surface of the sea. The oyabi sway left and right, splitting apart and multiplying until finally there are hundreds or thousands of fireballs swaying in the distance. This line of fireballs can stretch out for many kilometers. Shiranui were thought to be manifestations of the lanterns created by Ryūjin, the dragon god of the sea. On days that shiranui appeared, local villages were forbidden to catch fish in the same area as the kaika. Boats that tried approaching shiranui reported that no matter how long they sailed, the fireballs remained far away on the horizon. ---- Ryūtō (龍燈) Translation: dragon lights Habitat: oceans, coasts, lakes, rivers, and other bodies of water Diet: none Appearance: Ryūtō are kaika which appear just above the surface of the water on calm, peaceful nights. They create no heat, nor do they burn anything. They are only found in bodies of water which are home to dragons. Ryūtō start out as single orbs of flame which hover a few meters above the surface of the water. They soon begin to multiply, until there are countless orbs. These fireballs float about aimlessly along the water, stretching and shrinking and morphing their shapes. Some of them sink back into the water. Others float up into the sky or nestle into the treetops. At dawn, they merge back together into one orb before vanishing back into the sea. Ryūtō are considered by the Japanese to be a manifestation of light caused by the dragons which inhabit bodies of water. Areas where ryūtō routinely appear often have shrines near them, and the lights themselves are considered sacred. On nights that ryūtō appear, people gather along the shore to watch these dancing and changing holy flames. The Itsukushima Shrine in Hiroshima Prefecture (old Bingo and Aki Provinces) is not only one of the most famous shrines in Japan, but also a popular sightseeing location for watching ryūtō. The lights appear on the tranquil surface of Hiroshima Bay for about a week starting on New Year's Day. They are believed to appear because the Itsukushima Shrine is dedicated to the gods of the sea and thus is connected with Ryūjin. ---- Tenome (手の目) Translation: eye hands Habitat: open fields and graveyards at night Diet: human bones, fresh from the body Appearance: Tenome take the appearance of elderly zato, a kind of blind guildsman. Their faces have no eyes at all; instead, they have eyes on the palms of their hands. Tenome wander through open fields or graveyards at night, hunting for tasty humans. They wait until their prey is close before attacking. By the time you are able to recognize that you are face-to-face with not a zato but a tenome, it is too late. Tenome can run quickly. While their vision is not particularly strong they have a powerful sense of smell which helps them follow their victims in the dark. The tenome's true nature is not known. Most likely they are the ghosts of blind men who were robbed and murdered by thugs. This explanation can be traced to a folk tale, in which a man was attacked at night by a monster with eyes on its palms but none on its face. The victim fled to a nearby inn for shelter. He told the innkeeper what he saw, and the innkeeper replied that a few days earlier, a blind man was attacked and robbed out in that field. As the man lay dying in the grass, he cried out with his last breath, "If only I could have had once glance at their faces! If I only had eyes that worked—even on the palms of my hands…!" The old blind man's resent-filled death caused him to be reborn as a yōkai—with eyes on the palms of its hands and a heart full of hate. In Shichijō, Kyōto, a young man entered the graveyard at night as a test of his courage. From out of the darkness, a blind old man approached the young man. When the elderly figure got close enough to be seen in detail, the young man saw that it had eyeballs on the palms of his hands—and it was coming after him! The young man ran as fast as he could to a nearby temple and begged the priest for sanctuary. The priest hid the man inside of a long chest and locked the lid. Shortly afterwards, the monster entered the temple, sniffing loudly as if it was hunting. The young man could hear the sniffing noise getting closer and closer, until it stopped right next to the chest he was hiding in. Then, there was a strange slurping sound, like the sound of a dog sucking on an animal's bones. A little while later, the eerie sounds vanished, and all was quiet. The priest opened up the chest to let the young man out, but all that was inside of the chest was the loose, empty skin of the young man. His bones had been completely sucked out of his body! ---- Dodomeki (百々目鬼) Translation: hundred hundred eye (i.e. many-eyed) demon Appearance: Dodomeki are cursed women with very long arms covered in tiny bird eyes. They were once human girls who developed a penchant for stealing money. Because of their wicked actions, they transform into monsters—hundreds of tiny bird eyeballs sprout out of their arms. When Toriyama Sekien first described this yōkai, he inserted a number of puns. The dodomeki is described as being a woman with long arms. Having "long arms" in Japanese is a figure of speech meaning kleptomania. The dodomeki has long arms both figuratively and literally. Copper coins, or dōsen, had holes in the middle of them. Because of this, they were colloquially known as a chōmoku, or "bird's eyes." This play on words is the reason dodomeki grow birds' eyes—a punishment for stealing copper coins. Money was also sometimes referred to as ashi, or "feet," because it comes and goes as if it had its own feet. The phrase ashi ga tsuku is a common idiom which means "to catch someone who has committed a crime." Clever readers would notice that if the word ashi is replaced with chōmoku, the idiom changes to mean "covered in bird eyes." Long ago, in Shimotsuke Province, a demon had been sighted at a horse graveyard near Utsunomiya. A hero named Fujiwara no Hidesato grabbed his bow and arrow and went to investigate. Hidesato waited until nightfall. When the hour of the ox came, an enormous demon appeared and ravenously devoured the horse carcasses. The demon stood over ten feet tall and had sharp, spiked hair. It was covered in glowing eyes all over its body. Hidesato carefully aimed an arrow at the brightest glowing eyeball and fired. The arrow hit its mark, and the demon roared in pain. It fled into the woods until it collapsed at the foot of Mount Myōjin. Although the demon was near-fatally wounded, it still had power left. From its body erupted a torrent of flames. Its mouth split open and poisonous fumes spewed forth. The toxic air and intense heat proved too much for Hidesato. He had to give up and return to his palace. When he returned the next day, the ground was blackened and burnt over a large area. There was no sign of the demon. 400 years later, a village had sprung up on the northern slope of Mount Myōjin. Strange things were happening there. The temple's head priest suffered mysterious injuries and unexplained fires broke out at the temple. A new head priest, the virtuous and holy Saint Chitoku, was called to discover what the cause of the strange problems was. Saint Chitoku noticed a young woman who stopped by the temple frequently whenever he preached his sermons. He recognized her as the dodomeki in disguise. The wounded demon had retreated into some caves nearby to heal. It transformed into a young woman, and had been visiting the site where it fell. The village temple had been built on top of the battle site, and the dodomeki caused the fires and attacked the priest to scare them away. It was gradually sucking up all of the noxious fumes that it had breathed out, and collecting all of the blood that it had lost in its battle with Fujiwara no Hidesato. Saint Chitoku confronted the disguised demon. It finally revealed its true form. The dodomeki did not attack him, however. While frequenting the temple, the dodomeki had overheard Chitoku's powerful sermons, and they had stuck with it. The dodomeki promised that it would never again commit any act of evil. Since then, the area around Mount Myōjin has come to be known as Dodomeki. ---- Tesso (鉄鼠) Translation: iron rat Diet: feeds off of vengeance; also eats scrolls, books, statues, and holy relics Long ago, during the reign of Emperor Shirakawa (1073-1087 CE), there lived a monk named Raigō. He was the abbot of Mii-dera, a monastery in Ōmi Province at the foot of Mount Hiei, and well known for his piety. The emperor, having no heir, was concerned about his line of succession. One day, he approached Raigō and asked him to pray to the gods and Buddha for an heir to the throne. Raigō prayed long and hard, and finally in 1074 Prince Taruhito was born. The grateful emperor promised to give the abbot anything he wished in return for his prayers. Raigō asked that a splendid new ordination building be constructed at Mii-dera so he could train new priests. The emperor gladly agreed. However, Mii-dera had a powerful rival—Enryaku-ji, on top of Mt. Hiei—which wielded influential political power as well as having a powerful army of warrior monks at its disposal. Enryaku-ji could not abide such a gift being granted to a rival temple, and pressured the emperor. Bowing to Enryaku-ji, the emperor reneged on his promise to Raigō. Raigō began a hunger strike in protest of the emperor's broken promise. But the emperor would not—or could not—go against Enryaku-ji. On the 100th day of his hunger strike, Raigō passed away. As he died, his heart was full of rage towards the unfaithful emperor and the rival monastery of Enryaku-ji. So great was the hatred in Raigō's heart that he transformed into an onryō, a ghost driven by pure vengeance. Shortly after Raigō's death, a ghostly vision of the abbot was seen hovering near young Prince Taruhito's bed. A few days later the young prince died, leaving the emperor heir-less once again. Raigō's vengeance did not end there. Raigō's twisted spirit transformed into a gigantic rat. Its body was as hard as stone and its teeth and claws as strong as iron. The monstrous spirit—Tesso as it came to be called—summoned an army of rats. They poured through Kyōto, up Mt. Hiei, and arrived at Enryaku-ji. There, the rats wreaked Raigō's vengeance. The army of rats poured through the monastery complex, chewing through the walls and doors, tearing up the roofs and floors, and attacking the monks. They devoured Enryaku-ji's precious sutras, scrolls, and books, eating and despoiling everything they found—they even ate the statues of the Buddha. Nothing could stop Tesso and the army of rats until a shrine was built at Mii-dera to appease Raigō's spirit. Raigō's shrine still stands at Mii-dera today. An interesting footnote to the story: while Buddhist buildings are typically built facing the east, Raigō's shrine is built facing the north. It points to the top of Mt. Hiei, directly at Enryaku-ji, the target of his rage. ---- Amanozako (天逆毎) Translation: she who opposes everything in heaven Alternate names: amanozako hime, onna tengu, metengu, tengu kami Habitat: heaven Appearance: Amanozako is a terrifying and powerful demon goddess. She is roughly human in appearance, but has a bestial face with a long, tengu-like nose, dangling ears, sharp teeth, and protruding tusks. Amanozako's hideous appearance is matched only by her foul, contrarian temper. She loves to go against the crowd, and does exactly the opposite of what is expected. She frequently possesses the hearts of humans, causing clever people to become overly proud and haughty, or foolish people to lose control over their tempers. Amanozako is extremely picky and particular. When things do not go exactly the way she wants them to, she flies into a horrible rage. When angered, she can hurl even the most powerful gods distances of over one thousand villages in a single throw. Her powerful teeth can tear apart even the strongest blades. Nobody can stop her wrath. Amanozako was born from the temperamental storm god Susanoo. He had let his ferocious spirit and bad feelings build up inside of him until they formed into a large ball, which he eventually vomited up. That ball of ill-feeling became this goddess. Stories about her are ancient, going back to long before recorded history. She is thought to be the ancestor deity of tengu, amanojaku, and other yōkai which share her penchant for disagreeability and short temper. Amanozako has one son, Amanosaku. In keeping with her obstinate nature, she spawned him all by herself without any partner. Her son proved to be just as obstinate as she, and was such trouble that all eight million gods in heaven could not put up with him. Amanosaku was so terrible and disobedient that he was eventually made ruler over all the disobedient and malevolent kami. ---- Amanojaku (天邪鬼) Translation: heavenly evil spirits Alternate names: amanjaku Appearance: Amanojaku are wicked monsters which have been known since before written history in Japan. They are described as evil kami, minor oni, or yōkai who cause mischief and perform evil deeds. In particular, they are known for provoking humans into acting upon the wicked, impious desires buried deep within their hearts. They spread spiritual pollution wherever they go. Although they predate Buddhism in Japan, amanojaku are frequently depicted in Buddhist imagery as symbols of wickedness being defeated by righteousness. In particular, the Four Heavenly Kings are depicted as standing on top of demons, squashing them—those squashed demons are said to be amanojaku. The god Bishamonten's armor is also decorated with demonic faces, which are said to be this evil spirit. Amanojaku originate in ancient mythology. Though their true origins are a mystery, they appear to have developed out of ancient myths of wicked Shinto deities. Amanozako, Amenosagume, and Amenowakahiko all share aspects of this spirit's undermining nature. It is widely believed that amanojaku originated from one or even all of them. The most well-known tale about amanojaku is the story of Uriko hime. In this story, a childless elderly couple discovered a baby girl inside of a melon. They took her home and raised her as their own, and named her Uriko hime. She grew into a beautiful young woman, and one day a request for her hand in marriage arrived. Delighted, her parents went off to town to purchase her dowry and prepare for her wedding. Before leaving, they warned her not to open the door for anybody, no matter what! Shortly afterwards, Uriko hime heard a knock at the door. "Uriko hime, please let me in!" She refused to open the door. The voice replied, "If you won't open the door, then at least open the window a crack…" Reluctantly, Uriko hime opened the window just a crack. As soon as she had done so, a long, clawed finger slipped into the crack and smashed the window open. It was an amanojaku! The amanojaku leaped at Uriko hime, tearing at her clothes. The young woman fought for her life, biting and kicking at the demon, but she was not strong enough. The amanojaku snapped her neck, and she died. The amanojaku didn't stop there, however. It flayed Uriko hime's skin and wore it like a suit, hiding itself in her clothes and disguising itself as the young girl. When the girl's parents came home, they were fooled into thinking their daughter was still alive. Finally the wedding day arrived. The elderly couple brought the amanojaku-in-disguise to its husband-to-be. However, a crow in a nearby tree called out, warning the couple that their daughter was not what she seemed. They grabbed the bride tight and held her down. They washed her body until the flayed skin sloughed off, and the amanojaku was revealed. The amanojaku ran for its life, but the elderly couple chased after it. More and more people joined them, until a whole host of villagers chased the demon through the village. Finally, the townspeople caught up to the amanojaku and hit it with sticks, stones, and tools. They beat the demon into a bloody mess, and it died. ---- Yamata no Orochi (八岐の大蛇) Translation: eight-branched serpent Diet: omnivorous Appearance: Yamata no Orochi is a gigantic serpent with eight heads and eight tails. It has bright red eyes and a red belly. The beast is so large that its body covers the distance of eight valleys and eight hills. Fir and cypress trees grow on its back, and its body is covered in moss. Yamata no Orochi appears in the earliest written Japanese documents, the Kojiki and the Nihongi . Without a doubt, the legend goes back even farther into pre-history. Ages ago, the storm god, Susanoo, was thrown out of heaven and descended to earth at Mount Torikama near the Hi River in Izumo Province. There, he came upon an elderly couple of gods named Ashinazuchi and Tenazuchi, who were weeping. When Susanoo asked why they were crying, they explained that they once had eight daughters, but every year the eight-headed-eight-tailed serpent Yamata no Orochi demanded one as a sacrifice. They were now down to their eighth and final daughter, Kushinada hime. Soon it would be time for Yamata no Orochi to demand a sacrifice. Susanoo explained that he was the elder brother of the sun goddess Amaterasu, and offered to slay the beast in return for Kushinada hime's hand in marriage. The elderly couple agreed, and Susanoo set in motion his plan to defeat the serpent. First, Susanoo transformed Kushinada hime into a comb, which he placed in his hair. Then, he had Ashinazuchi and Tenazuchi build a large fence with eight gates. On each gate they raised a platform and on each platform they placed a vat. They poured extremely strong sake into each vat. When this was finished, everyone waited for the serpent to arrive. When Yamata no Orochi appeared, the great serpent slithered into the fence and noticed the powerful sake. It dipped its eight heads into the vats and drank the alcohol. Soon, the monster fell into a deep, drunken sleep. Susanoo used this chance to make his attack. He sliced the enormous beast into tiny pieces with his sword. The carnage was so great that the Hi River flowed with blood. When Susanoo had cut the creature down to its fourth tail, his sword shattered into pieces. Examining the part of Yamata no Orochi's tail which broke his sword, Susanoo discovered another sword within the creature's flesh: the legendary katana Kusanagi no Tsurugi. Susanoo eventually offered Kusanagi as a gift to his sister, Amaterasu, and was allowed to return to heaven. The sword was passed down through the generations in the imperial line of Japan. It is one of the three pieces of imperial regalia, along with the mirror Yata no Kagami and the jewel Yasakani no Magatama. Today, the sword which came from Yamata no Orochi's tail is said to be safeguarded in the Atsuta Shrine in Nagoya. ---- Meido (冥途) Translation: dark way; the underworld Appearance: When someone dies, they either go to Tengoku (heaven) or Jigoku (hell). If they lived an exceptionally good or an exceptionally evil life, they may go straight to Tengoku or Jigoku. However, for most people—who have done both and good and evil in their lives—the soul travels to Meido. There they face a test by the judges of the dead, each of whose true form is that of a buddha or a god. They are then sent either to Tengoku or Jigoku. Meido is a terrible place—though nowhere near as terrible as Jigoku. It is dark, windy, and full of horrible sights, sounds, tests and trials. It is a long journey, with no place to rest or find comfort. To enter the underworld, the soul much first find and cross the Sanzu River, the River of Three Crossings, which marks the boundary between this world and the world of the dead. The Sanzu River is said to be located somewhere on Mount Osore, literally Mount Fear, a desolate volcano located in northern Japan. Despite its appearance—covered in blasted rocks, bubbling pits of dark liquid, and open vents spewing out toxic gas—Mount Osore is one of the three holiest places in Japan. Itako, blind shamanesses, communicate with the dead as they approach the mountain. The itako take hallucinogenic mushrooms known as skull mushrooms (ōdokurodake—big skull mushrooms; himedokurodake—princess skull mushrooms; and onidokurodake—demon skull mushrooms) which sprout only on the crags of this caldera. There are many variations on what exactly happens after this life ends. These are often depicted in graphic hell scrolls kept at temples. The depictions differ greatly from tradition to tradition and place to place. A typical explanation may go like this: Upon dying, souls are visited by three oni who escort them on a seven day journey to Meido. The journey is harsh and terrible. It is dark, and a strong, howling wind rages constantly. The corruption of the living world materializes into swords on this plane, which pierce the bodies of the travelers, turning the surrounding terrain into a sea of blood. A few days along the way, the souls are assaulted by horrible birds, which tear at their skin and pluck out their eyes. All the while the birds taunt them and scream at them to hurry up. "Why didn't you tell me sooner? I would have hurried from the start!" cry the souls of the dead. "What is this stupid soul saying!" cry the birds. "We were perched on his roof since three days before he died, warning him to start saying his prayers! That fool only said, 'The crows are being extra noisy today. The old woman next door must be dying. Go bring her some sugar.' Well the old woman is still alive, happily licking her sugar!" Next, the souls come to an enormous mountain which scrapes the clouds, covered in sharp thorns. The path up the mountain is steep and impossibly long. The souls cry out, "I was sick and weak in life, how can you expect me to climb such a mountain now?" To which the oni reply, "What is this stupid soul saying! This is the mountain of your greed! Every time you wanted something your neighbor owned, or desired some earthly possession, you added to this mountain! You built it, now you can climb it!" Anyone who lags behind gets hit with the oni's terrible iron club. Finally, after seven days, the souls arrive at the Sanzu River and face the first trial put forth by the first judge, King Shinkō (whose true form is that of Fudō Myōō; who is known as Acala in English). Shinkō judges the souls on how much killing they have committed, down to every bug that was squashed and every fish that was caught. Those whom Shinkō judges to be wicked go straight to Jigoku. Others may cross the river depending on how well they fared in the trial. To cross the Sanzu River, a toll of 6 mon (an old form of currency) is required. This is buried with the deceased during the funeral. Those whose funerals were not properly performed and did not receive the 6 mon cannot cross. This is the reason that the seventh day after death is an important day in Japanese funerary services. The services and prayers performed for the deceased aid them in this trial and allow them to cross the river. One part of the Sanzu River is crossed by a great bridge. Another part of the river is shallow and fordable. The rest of the river is wild and deep, and filled with poisonous snakes. The souls with the most good deeds are allowed to cross the bridge. Those with a mixture of both good and evil may ford the river in the shallow part. The worst of the souls may only cross by swimming through snake-filled rapids. The crossing of the Sanzu River takes seven days. After crossing the river, the souls encounter Datsueba and Keneō. These two oni take the heavy clothes from each soul, wet from the crossing of the river, and hang them on a tree. The amount the branch bends under the weight of the clothes serves as a measure of the weight of the sin on each soul, to be used as evidence in the trials to come. If a soul arrives with no clothes—perhaps having discarded them while swimming in the river—Datsueba flays his or her skin and hangs it from the tree instead. The second trial takes place fourteen days after death, and is overseen by King Shokō (whose true form is Shaka Nyōrai, or Siddhartha Gautama). Shokō judges the souls on how much they have stolen. As with the previous trial, he sends the most grievous offenders straight to hell, while allowing the good to pass on to the next trial. Again, the fourteenth day after death is an important day for family members to perform ceremonies in honor of the deceased, in order to help him or her pass this trial. Before the third trial, each soul must pass through a fortified gate which is guarded by a fierce oni. The oni wields large blades, which he uses to haphazardly chop off the arms and legs of the souls, saying, "That hand helped you to sin. I'll cut if off for you!" The souls must then cross an enormous bay, wider than the Sanzu River, and filled with boiling liquid. The river gives off foul smelling fumes in all directions for many miles. The third trial takes place 21 days after death, and is overseen by King Sōtei (whose true form is Manji Bosatsu, or Manjusri). Sōtei judges the souls on their sins of lust and sexuality, using a cat and a snake. The cat judges the souls of men; it bites at their penises, and the degree of the injury—from a slight scratch to completely severed—is used as a measure of one's sexual sin. The snake judges the souls of women; it is inserted into the woman, and the depth to which it can enter is used to determine the depth of her sin. As before, some will go on to hell, while others—with the aid of funerary services from their surviving family members—will pass on to the next trial. The fourth trial, 28 days after death, is overseen by King Gokan (whose true form is Fugen Bosatsu, or Samantabhadra). Gokan judges the dead on the number of lies they told in life. He weighs each soul against a large, heavy stone. The number of stones it takes the balance the scale determines the weight of one's sins. Excessive liars are damned—those who are not may continue on to be judged again. Once again, the family holds a funerary service to aid their beloved departed in this trial, hoping to sway the mercy of the judge. Next, the souls must cross a vast blasted, desolate landscape of unfathomable length. Balls of red-hot iron fall constantly like rain from the sky, burning the skin of the souls and causing their feet to blister as they walk the path to the next trial. The fifth trial, 35 days after death, is overseen by Great King Enma, the ruler of the underworld (whose true form is that of Jizō Bosatsu, or Ksitigarbha). Enma's judgment is the final chance to appeal one's fate through the prayers and memorial services performed by the living relatives. Enma shows each soul a large mirror, in which the individual's former life is reflected back at them, with all of their sins and transgressions clearly laid out. Enma's job is to decide, based on his and the previous trials, which of the six Buddhist realms each soul will be reborn into: the realm of heaven, the realm of humans, the realm of ashura, the realm of beasts, the realm of gaki (or hungry ghosts), or the realm of hell. After 42 days, the souls which have made it this far now face the judgment of King Henjō (whose true form is Miroku Bosatsu, or Maitreya). Henjō decides the location of each soul's rebirth based on the reports from Enma's mirror and Gokan's scale. Next, the souls must cross a dark land, full of strange animals whose cries pierce the darkness and fill the atmosphere with dread. Strange birds attack the souls, breathing flames at them and piercing them with their sharp beaks. On the 49th day after death, the souls reach the trial of King Taizan (whose true form is Yakushi Nyōrai, or Bhaisajyaguru). The 49th day memorial service is an important one, with many family members attending to pray for the deceased; Taizan's trial is the final chance to avoid going to hell. He uses the information from the previous judges to determine the remaining conditions of each soul's rebirth. Upon completion of this trial, each soul moves on to a road with six unmarked torii gates, each representing one of the Buddhist realms. There is no way to tell which gate leads to which realm, and each soul must decide for him or herself which gate to choose. Upon passing through the gate, the soul travels along an enormous frozen river, and leaves Meido for the next world, whichever one it may be. For many, the journey ends here. Those who have been judged worthy may find themselves in Tengoku. Others are reborn as humans, animals, or worse. For those deemed unworthy for even the lowest forms of rebirth, more trials await in the realm of Jigoku. The origins of Meido are strongly rooted in Chinese Buddhism. When Buddhism was brought from India to China it took on a structure of its own, merging many aspects with Chinese philosophy and Taoism. This mixture of Chinese Taoism and Indian Buddhism was imported to Japan, after which it began to develop its own uniquely Japanese features as well. ---- Jigoku (地獄) Translation: earth prison; hell Appearance: Souls who are deemed unworthy of rebirth in the five upper Buddhist realms find themselves in the worst afterlife of all—Jigoku, or Buddhist hell. Though it is described as one realm, Jigoku is not just one place. There are countless different hells, which are usually separated into eight hot hells and eight cold hells. These are further subdivided into many other smaller planes and demi-planes—more than 64,000 according to some counts—and each one has a uniquely specialized form of punishment and length of stay, tailor-made to the sins of its inhabitants. While there are many different levels of hell in Japanese Buddhism, the general term Jigoku usually refers to the eight hot hells, also known as the eight great hells. The eight great hells are as follows: Tōkatsu Jigoku, the reviving hell, is the plane of hell reserved for those who commit the sin of killing. Those who kill without remorse go to this hell. Even the killing of lesser creatures such as mosquitoes, flies, or ants—unless repented—will cause a soul to go to this hell. In addition, people who were particularly pugilistic in life, and those who died in mutiny or uprisings will also fall into this hell. Here, the ground is ever hot and burning. Denizens of this hell must fight each other with iron claws, tearing each other to pieces. Terrible oni roam the land, smashing, and pulverizing souls with their iron clubs. As soon as a soul dies, a cool breeze blows and it is instantly revived, and must fight to the death again. Souls here experience the pain of being killed countless times, for a life span in the reviving hell lasts 500 years. However, time in hell is measured differently than in the world of the living: one day in this hell is equivalent to 500 years in the realm of the Four Heavenly Kings, while one day there is equivalent to 50 years on earth. Therefore, a soul in Tōkatsu Jigoku must continue this punishment for over 1.6 trillion human years. Kokujō Jigoku, the hell of black threads, is reserved for those who have not only killed but also committed the sin of theft. Here, oni knock the souls onto the hot ground and mark lines on their body with black threads. Then, using axes and saws, the bodies are hacked to pieces along the markings made by the threads. Others are made to carry heavy piles of hot iron across a tightrope suspended over a giant frying pan. When the victims fall, they are boiled and hacked to pieces in the pan. One life span here lasts a thousand years; however, a day in this hell is equivalent to 1000 years in the realm of Tōriten, while one day in Tōriten is equivalent to 100 years in the human realm. This works out to about 13.3 trillion human years. Shugō Jigoku, the crushing hell, is reserved for sinners who have killed, stolen, and also committed the sin of lewdness. The suffering here is ten times greater than that of Kokujō Jigoku. Denizens here are crushed repeatedly between mountains of iron, being pulverized into a bloody jelly. When the mountains separate, life is restored and the process begins again. Trees with razor-like leaves dot the landscape, and beautiful men and women beckon to the souls from the tree tops. The lustful inhabitants climb the trees, slicing their bodies up in the process, and when they reach the treetops the beautiful men and women reappear at the bottoms of the trees, beckoning them back down. As blood and severed organs spout from the bodies, giant demons and beasts rush in to gobble of their entrails and pound the souls into a bloody mush. Fellators have their tongues stretched out and nailed to their ears. Pedophiles have molten copper pumped into their anuses until it pours out of their mouths. Homosexuals see their lovers covered in flames, and are forced to embrace them, only to be burned and torn into pieces themselves. Souls remain here for 2000 years; however, one day here lasts 2000 years in the realm of Yamaten, and one day in Yamaten lasts 200 human years. Thus, a lifetime here is equivalent to over 106 trillion human years. Kyōkan Jigoku, the screaming hell, is for murders, thieves, lechers, and alcoholics. The suffering here is ten times stronger than in the previous hell. Here, sinners are thrown into boiling pots or locked up in iron chambers and roasted by oni. Those who committed crimes while drunk have their mouths wrenched open and molten iron is poured into their bellies. The cries of anguish of the denizens only serve to anger the oni further, and they fire arrows at the souls or bash them with iron clubs to make them stop, at which point they only revive and resume their suffering. One lifetime here lasts 4000 years, of which one day is equal to 4000 years in Tosotsuten, of which one day is equal to 400 human years. Thus, a condemned soul will spend over 852 trillion years in Kyōkan Jigoku. Daikyōkan Jigoku, the hell of great screaming, contains murderers, thieves, debauchers, drunks, and liars. The suffering inflicted here is ten times worse than in the previous hell. Here, the tongues of the damned are pierced with iron nails and stretched and torn from their bodies, after which they grow back and are immediately pierced and torn again. This continues for 8000 years, one day of which equals 8000 years in Kerakuten, where one day is equivalent to 800 human years. The damned in Daikyōkan Jigoku suffer for an equivalent of roughly 6.8 quadrillion years. Jōnetsu Jigoku, the burning hell, contains killers, robbers, perverts, drunkards, liars, and those who have held thoughts or beliefs contrary to Buddhist teachings. Here, the tortured souls are beaten with red-hot iron clubs. They have hot skewers thrust through their mouths and out their anuses, and are broiled over a great sea of fire. A life span in this hell lasts 16,000 years, one day of which equals 16,000 years in Takejizaiten, where one day is equivalent to 1,600 years on earth. A damned soul here spends the equivalent of 54.5 quadrillion human years. Daijōnetsu Jigoku, the hell of great burning, is much the same as Jōnetsu Jigoku, only much hotter. The suffering here is equivalent to ten times more than all of the higher hells combined. This plane of hell is reserved for sinners who have committed all of the crimes listed previously in addition to physical crimes against Buddhist clergy—for example, raping a nun. The screams of the tortured souls here are so terrible that they can be heard up to 24,000 miles away. The power of this hell is so great that those who are to be sentenced here begin to feel their suffering up to three days before they actually die. The punishment on this level of hell lasts one half of an antarakalpa—a unit of time in Indian cosmology that is so unfathomably long that it defies mathematical description. Mugen Jigoku, the hell of uninterrupted suffering, is the eighth and deepest circle of hell. It is reserved for the worst of the worst—murders of their own parents; killers of saints; those who have betrayed every single Buddhist precept. The souls down here are so hungry and thirsty that they tear apart their own bodies and drink their own blood in a useless attempt to ease their suffering. Words literally cannot describe how awful this hell is; if Mugen Jigoku were ever accurately described, both the reader and the writer would die from the sheer horror of it. It is so deep that it takes 2000 years of falling, non-stop, at terminal velocity, for a soul to descend all the way into this hell. Some say that those who are sent here never come back, while others say that the term of punishment here lasts one full antarakalpa, after which the soul may reincarnate again; although, even after a soul is finally released from this hell, its punishment is said to continue on into its next lives. Because Jigoku is so terrible and the buddhas so merciful, the tortured souls in Jigoku are allowed a few more trials like the ones they received in Meido to see whether they can be released from hell early or not—or at least have their existence "upgraded" to a less torturous one. On specific days, Buddhist memorial services are held by the deceased's surviving relatives. While the specifics of what exactly happens in Jigoku vary between different Buddhist traditions, this is one explanation of the trials: 100 days after death marks the first trial in Jigoku. These trials are not so much judgments, as the soul is already being tortured in hell. They are more like appeals, where the soul (and his or her still-living family) get to appeal to the gods and the buddhas for one more chance at salvation. During the first of these trials, the soul is brought before King Byōdō (whose true form is Kannon Bosatsu, also known as Guanyin or Avalokitesvara in English). On the 1 year anniversary of the death, the soul is once again brought to trial. This time the judge is King Toshi (whose true form is Seishi Bosatsu, or Mahasthamaprapta). On the 2nd year anniversary of one's death (the beginning of the third year after death), the soul is granted another chance for salvation by trial. King Godō-tenrin (whose true form is Amida Nyōrai, or Amitabha) presides over this judgment. In Chinese Buddhism, this tenth trial is the last chance for salvation; however, in some forms of Japanese Buddhism the soul still gets three more chances for salvation from Jigoku. The next trial occurs 6 years after death, and is presided over by King Renge (whose true form is Ashuku Nyōrai, or Akshobhya). Another trial occurs 12 years after death, and is presided over by King Gion (whose true form is Dainichi Nyōrai, or Vairocana). The thirteenth and final trial occurs 32 years after death. This last trial is presided over by King Houkai (whose true form is Kokūzō Bosatsu, or Akasagarbha). Those who fail all three of these final tests, either through their own faults or from lack of prayers by their living relatives, are damned to remain in hell for a very, very long time before they can be reborn into one of the five other realms. Like Meido, the Japanese concept of Jigoku derives from Chinese Buddhism—specifically the concept of Diyu, which is in turn derived from the Indian Buddhist concept of Naraka. After being imported to Japan from China, it developed other uniquely Japanese features, although it never merged with the native Shinto concept of hell, Yomi. ---- Enma Daiō (閻魔大王) Translation: Great King Enma Habitat: Jigoku and Meido Appearance: Enma Daiō is the ruler of hell (both Jigoku and Meido) and the foremost of the 13 judges of the dead. He has dresses in the robes of an ancient government official from the Chinese Tang Dynasty, and wears a fearsome expression upon his face. He is served by two secretaries, Shiroku and Shimyō, as well as a number of other demonic servants—the chiefs of which are Gozu and Mezu. His name often is invoked by parents who scold their children, "If you tell a lie, Enma will rip out your tongue!" Enma's chief duty is to judge the souls of the newly dead and send them on to their next location. He keeps a great scroll in which he records all of the good and evil deeds of each and every person to use as evidence against them when their time of judgment comes. He oversees the torturing and suffering in hell, making sure that each soul gets enough punishment. Like many demonic figures in Japanese folklore, Great King Enma has a honji, or "true form," which is that of a Buddha or bodhisattva. Enma's true form is Jizō Bosatsu, the guardian of the underworld, god of travelers, and protector of children. Jizō is a warm and compassionate, beloved across Japan, deity who made a solemn vow not to become a full Buddha until all souls have been freed from suffering in hell. It is not uncommon to see small, red-bibbed, stone Jizō statues along roads and paths, and in graveyards all over Japan. While Enma may seem fearsome and terrifying, at heart, he is a kind and compassionate god, and he truly wishes to save each soul from damnation—this may be why the souls of the dead are given so many tests and trials to avoid going to hell. Enma's origins lie in India. In Vedic mythology he is known as Yama, the god of death. From the Vedas, the idea of Yama spread into Hinduism, Sikhism, and Buddhism. Buddhism traveled to China, bringing Yama with it, and mixed with local religions and superstitions before being brought to Japan during the Tang Dynasty. As Chinese Buddhism mixed with Japanese religions and superstitions, he gradually developed into the god known as Great King Enma. [ Holidays in Hell ] Enma's holy days fall on the 16th day of each month. The first and seventh month are particularly important to him, and on these days, he and his servants take off from work and return to their homes. On these days, temples and shrines dedicated to Enma display statues and flags in honor of Enma, and prayers and offerings made on these holidays are said to provide much more merit than those offered on ordinary days. Temples dedicated to him frequently serve konnyaku treats to guests on these days, as konnyaku is Enma's favorite food. In addition, the first day of the seventh month (by the old lunar calendar—this generally translates to mid-August by today's calendar) is a holiday for all of Jigoku, called Kamabuta Tsuitachi, "Kettle Lid First Day of the Month." On this day, the lids of all of the boiling cauldrons are opened up and the souls are allowed a brief reprieve from torture. This day also marks the beginning of the Obon season, when the dead return from the afterlife to be with their families. The tortured souls in hell crawl out from their boiling pots, cages, and so on, and make the long journey to the world of the living, returning to hell after Obon to resume their torture. ---- Datsueba (奪衣婆) Translation: clothes-stealing old woman Alternate names: sōzukaba, ubason ---- Keneō (懸衣翁) Translation: clothes-hanging old man Habitat: Meido, along the banks of the Sanzu River Appearance: Datsueba and Keneō are a terrifying pair of elderly oni. They guard the bridge and the banks of the Sanzu River. All souls must pass by them before moving on to Meido to be judged. During a Japanese funeral, 6 mon (and old form of currency) are placed in the coffin to be used as a toll to enter the underworld. Upon reaching the Sanzu River, the souls must cross either by bridge (if they were good in life), by wading in the shallows (if they were only somewhat good), or by swimming across the deepest part of the river (if they were wicked). After crossing the river, each soul encounters Datsueba, who accepts the toll and strips the souls of the clothes on their backs. Datsueba hands the clothing to her partner, Keneō, who hangs it from a tree by the riverside. The amount that the branch bends under the weight of the clothes serves as a measure of the weight of the sin each soul carries, and is used as evidence in the trials to come. Of course, the clothes of those who had to ford the river or swim across are heavy and wet, which only makes the branches of the tree sag lower. If a soul arrives with no clothes, Keneō flays his or her skin and hangs it from the tree instead. Datsueba and Keneō perform a little bit of torture themselves, breaking the fingers of those guilty of theft, and so on. They also roam the banks of the river, tormenting the souls of children who are too young to cross the river and must wait for salvation to come to them instead. According to some accounts, Datsueba is the wife of King Enma. In the Edo period, she became a popular object of folk worship, and temples dedicated to her began to spring up around Japan. Prayers and charms dedicated to Datsueba were used as wards against disease and coughs, in particular for children's coughs. [ Sai no Kawara ] The souls of children are not allowed to cross the Sanzu River. Instead, they are forced to sit on the riverbanks in a sort of limbo called Sai no Kawara. Their souls remain in Sai no Kawara until enough prayers have been said for them to earn enough merit to cross. Here they sit, building towers out of pebbles, adding one pebble each time someone says a prayer for them. When a tower is completed, the child can finally cross; however, Datsueba and Keneō roam the banks and constantly knock the pebble towers over, rendering the effort meaningless. The only way for children to leave Sai no Kawara is to be saved through intercession by Jizō Bosatsu, the guardian deity of children. This is why Jizō is such a popular god in Japan; prayers to him go towards saving the souls of lost children. ---- Gozu (牛頭) Translation: ox head Alternate names: gozuki (ox head demon) ---- Mezu (馬頭) Translation: horse head Alternate names: mezuki (horse head demon) Habitat: Meido and Jigoku Appearance: In Japanese Buddhism, Gozu and Mezu are the demon generals who guard the gates of hell. They appear as terrible oni with animal heads; an ox head for Gozu, and a horse head for Mezu. They are extremely powerful and have the strength to move mountains. They are servants of Great King Enma, the ruler of hell, and are among the chief torturers and punishers of the wicked. Gozu and Mezu are the first demons that one encounters upon entering hell. Should a person manage to escape from hell, Gozu and Mezu are sent out to bring them back. Though Gozu and Mezu are the most famous and most commonly depicted in story and art, they are not the only animal-headed demons in Great King Enma's employ. Deer, tiger, lion, and boar-headed demons are also said to serve among the upper ranks of the guardians of hell. They operate the great torture chambers of Jigoku and oversee the torment of countless souls. Gozu, Mezu, and other animal-headed demons originate in Indian mythology, which was imported along with Buddhism to Japan by way of China. ---- Ashura (阿修羅) Translation: asura; warrior demons from Buddhist cosmology Alternate names: asura Habitat: Shuradō, one of the celestial realms Diet: carnivorous; they thrive on violence and destruction Appearance: Ashura are fearsome demon gods with multiple faces and arms. They are roughly human-like in appearance, though their size, strength, and numerous appendages distinguish them from mere mortals. Ashura are warriors above all else, and live for battle. They love combat, war, and destroying things. They have enormous egos; ashura always desire to be better than others, have no patience for those weaker than they are, and prefer to solve any problem with violence. There are many different kinds of ashura. Some are considered to be gods and others demons. Ashura are strong, powerful, and magical. In many ways they are far superior to humans. They experience more pleasure than those in the human realm, and live much longer. However, they are controlled by such intense passions—wrath, pride, violence, and greed—that despite their pleasure-filled existence they are constantly fighting and never at peace. Ashura are also wracked with jealousy; to be reborn as an ashura means to be constantly reminded how much better life would have been if you had been reborn in a heavenly realm instead of Shuradō. In Japanese Buddhism, after someone dies, they are eventually reborn in one of the 6 Buddhist realms: Tendō, the realm of heaven; Ningendō, the realm of humans; Shuradō, the realm of ashura, Chikushōdō, the realm of animals; Gakidō, the realm of hungry ghosts; and Jigokudō, the realm of hell. Of these, only two realms are considered to be "happy" rebirths—the heavenly realm and the human realm. Of the remaining realms, the realm of Jigoku is the worst, followed by Gakidō. The realm of animals is not a good rebirth because animals are ruled by their desires and thus cannot obtain enlightenment. Shuradō, the realm of the ashura, is the least unpleasant of the "unhappy" rebirths. In some Buddhist traditions, the realm of ashura is considered to be the lowest level of heaven, and gets included among the "happy" rebirths. However, because ashura are so controlled by their emotions, it is almost impossible for them to achieve enlightenment, become buddhas, and escape the cycle of endless reincarnation. Souls who are reborn here are usually humans who lived good lives up to a point, but committed some wicked deed which prevents them from being reborn in the realm of heaven. ---- Gaki (餓鬼) Translation: hungry ghosts, preta; suffering spirits from Buddhist cosmology Habitat: Gakidō, a realm of suffering, starvation, and thirst Diet: gaki will try to eat anything, but are never able to find nourishment Appearance: Gaki are spirits which live in horrible torment and are afflicted with constant suffering. They look vaguely human, but they have distended, bulging bellies and tiny, inefficient mouths and throats. They inhabit a parallel realm called Gakidō. It is a barren place, full of deserts, wastelands, and other inhospitable terrain. Gaki are eternally hungry and thirsty. There are many kinds of gaki, each of which suffers in a different way related to the sins he or she committed in a past life. Some are unable to eat or drink anything at all. Whenever they try to eat, the food instantly bursts into flames and vanishes. These gaki are only able to eat food which has been specially blessed for them in Buddhist services. Some gaki are able to eat only unclean things, such as feces, vomit, corpses, and so on. Others have no trouble eating anything they please. However, no matter how much they wolf down, their hunger and thirst are never sated. In some Buddhist traditions, a special ceremony called segaki is performed during the Obon season, to help ease the suffering of the gaki. In this ceremony, offerings of rice and water are laid out on special altars, out of sight of any statues of the gods or Buddha. The gaki are called to come and eat, while prayers are said to ease some of their suffering. The realm of the gaki is considered one of the four "unhappy" rebirths. In the cosmology of birth and rebirth, the realm of the gaki is only one step above the realm of Jigoku—the main difference between the inhabitants of Jigoku and the gaki being that those in Jigoku are confined to their prison. Gaki may roam free as they suffer. Today, the word gaki is also a very nasty term for a child. This comes from the perception of children always wanting more food and never feeling satisfied with what they get. ---- Ono no Takamura (小野篁) Appearance: Ono no Takamura was a noble, scholar, poet, and government official who lived in the first half of the 9th century. He is famous for being clever, quick-witted, and somewhat insolent. But he is even more famous for his side job in hell as an attendant to Great King Enma. Near the temple Rokudōchinnō-ji in Kyōto, there is a spot where the boundary between the world of the dead and the world of the living can be crossed. There are many stories in that area of ghosts returning to this world and trying to buy candy from stores, or visiting lost relatives. Ono no Takamura knew of this, and discovered a way to travel freely between the world of the dead and the world of the living. He would enter the underworld every night by climbing down a well located in the garden of Rokudōchinnō-ji, and return every morning by climbing out of a well located in the temple Sagano Fukusei-ji. According to one legend, a nobleman named Fujiwara no Yoshimi fell very ill and died soon after. His soul crossed the Sanzu River, and traveled to Meido to be judged. When he reached the court of King Enma, a familiar voice spoke up from the darkness next to the judge and said, "I know this soul. In life, he served as an imperial minister, and was a noble and virtuous man. Please trust my judgment and return him to life." When Yoshimi raised his head, he saw that the voice belonged to Ono no Takamura—and he was serving as one of King Enma's councilors! King Enma replied, "Well, if you say so I suppose it can't be helped," and ordered his hell-guards to return Yoshimi to the world of the living. A few days later, Fujiwara no Yoshimi approached Ono no Takamura at the imperial court. When Yoshimi asked Takamura about what he saw in Meido, Takamura appeared troubled and replied, "My work there is actually a secret, so please don't tell anybody else about what you saw…" Afterwards, Yoshimi began to grow more and more fearful of Takamura's power and position. Rumors spread through the capital that Takamura was King Enma's right hand man. Many feared him. Rokudōchinnō-ji still stands in Kyōto today. In the Enma Hall, right next to the statue of Great King Enma is another statue—one of Ono no Takamura. The well which Takamura used to enter the world of the dead still remains on the temple garden; however Sagano Fukusei-ji no longer stands, and the place where Takamura's exit well once stood is now a bamboo forest. ---- Kowai (狐者異) Translation: strange fox person; origin of the word for "scary" Habitat: food stalls, garbage dumps Diet: any scrap of food it can get its hands on Appearance: Kowai are the ghosts of gluttonous people who carried their obsessions with food into death, transforming into this yōkai. They take the form of grotesque humans with blood-shot eyes, sharp teeth, fox-like features, and long, drooling tongues. They appear at night outside of food stands and restaurants. Kowai are concerned with only one thing—eating. They always suffer from hunger, and ravenously devour any bit of food they can get their claws on. They rifle through garbage pales, knock down food stalls, and attack food vendors late at night. They wolf down whatever scraps have been left behind. Kowai will even pick at carrion in the streets. No matter how spoiled or how disgusting, if it can be eaten, a kowai will go after it. Kowai first appear in the Ehon Hyakumonogatari, an encyclopedia of ghosts published in 1841. Their name is written with kanji meaning "fox," "person," and "strange," and can literally be translated as "weird fox person." According to that book, kowai are the origin of the word 怖い (kowai ), which means "scary" in Japanese. ---- Amefuri kozō (雨降小僧) Translation: rainfall priest boy Habitat: found throughout Japan; appears during rainy weather Diet: omnivorous Appearance: Amefuri kozō resemble young boys. They wear children's kimonos, wooden clogs, and wide-brimmed straw hats or umbrellas on their heads. They are not particularly cute, and have pudgy, upturned noses. Despite their childish appearance, amefuri kozō are charged with the very important task of causing rainfall. Wherever they go, they cause clouds to form and rain to come down. In ancient China, amefuri kozō were thought to be the servants of the god of rainfall, who is known as Ushi in Japanese. Amefuri kozō are shy and rarely interact directly with people. However, they enjoy stealing people's umbrellas and wearing them as hats. They then cause rain showers to fall upon their victims. Amefuri kozō became widely known thanks to the printing boom during the Edo period. They were common characters in the cheap, pocket-sized publications sold by street vendors known as kibyōshi, or yellow covers. Kibyōshi were satirical comics, heavy on illustrations, depicting urban life with easy-to-read prose. Amefuri kozō and other priest boy yōkai became popular in these adult-oriented comic books. People enjoyed their grotesque, silly, yet somewhat cute appearance. Rain that falls while the sun is out is known in Japan as kitsune no yomeiri —fox weddings. Kitsune (fox yōkai) hold their weddings during sun showers. Before getting married, kitsune will say a prayer to the amefuri kozō for rain on their wedding day. [ Priest Boy Yōkai ] There are many yōkai whose names end in kozō, a combination of 小 (ko; small) and 僧 (sō; priest or monk). This word literally means young Buddhist priests, but it can also be used as a general term for young boys. These kozō yōkai don't necessarily have any connection with religion, just like many bōzu and nyūdō yōkai aren't necessarily connected to Buddhism in any way. ---- Tōfu kozō (豆腐小僧) Translation: tofu priest boy Habitat: urban areas Diet: omnivorous; loves tofu Appearance: Tōfu kozō are small yōkai who resemble human children except for their large heads and clawed fingers and toes. They wear little boys' kimonos and wide-brimmed hats—the typical outfit of tōfu-selling boys of the Edo period. They are usually depicted with two eyes, but in some illustrations they appear as having only one eye. They are usually found in urban areas in close proximity to people. Tōfu kozō are timid and weak yōkai. They are not known to be aggressive towards humans. On rare occasions, tofu kozō may follow people home on a rainy night. However, for the most part, they shy away from any confrontation. Tōfu kozō are first and foremost servant yōkai. Even among other yōkai, they are bullied and teased for their lack of strength. They get no respect; at most, they act as menial servants to more powerful yōkai. Tōfu kozō's origin is a mystery. Prior to the Edo period, there are no known stories about them. Some say that they are just one of many forms taken by an itachi, the shape-shifting weasel yōkai. Others say that tofu kozō are the offspring of a mikoshi nyūdō and a rokurokubi. Another possibility is that they are an invention of a creative artist looking to sell illustrated storybooks. Stories of tofu kozō first appeared in the penny-novels and pulp fiction of Edo in the 1770s. They became popular among the Edo upper class. These silly stories helped spawn the explosion of yōkai-related fiction that appeared in the latter half of the 18th century. Tōfu kozō bears a strong resemblance to another yōkai called hitotsume kozō. The chief difference is that hitotsume kozō have only one eye and large tongues, while tofu kozō have two eyes and carry a plate of tofu. Both of these yōkai are weak, child-like creatures. They act as messengers to more powerful monsters. In some literature, the two yōkai are interchangeable. It has been suggested that tofu kozō may be closely related to, or may even have been copied from hitotsume kozō. However, there is not enough evidence either way to say for sure. ---- Katsura otoko (桂男) Translation: katsura (the tree Cercidiphyllum japonicum ) man Habitat: the moon Diet: human life force Appearance: Katsura otoko is an incomparably beautiful man who lives in the face of the moon. He appears on moonlit nights and gazes back down at those who gaze up at him. His beauty is said to be so enchanting that people find it difficult to turn away—even to their own peril. If you gaze long enough at katsura otoko, he will extend his hand and beckon, calling you towards him. With each shake of his beckoning hand, your life span shrinks. If you stare long enough at katsura otoko, you may drop dead right on the spot! Katsura otoko originates in Chinese mythology. It is said there is a man who lives in a great palace on the moon. He spends his time pruning and chopping away at a gigantic katsura tree which grows there. As he prunes the tree, the shape of the moon grows smaller and less round until there is almost nothing left. Then the tree slowly grows its branches back—a just-so story to explain the waxing and waning of the moon. ---- Shirime (尻目) Translation: butt eye Alternate names: nuppori bōzu Habitat: city streets, late at night Diet: none; it just enjoys scaring people Appearance: From a distance, shirime appear to be normal human beings. When close enough, however, it becomes apparent that they are yōkai. Shirime have no facial features, but located in their buttholes are large eyes which shine like lightning. Shirime approach travelers on the road late at night, looking like men wearing a kimonos. Once they have your attention, they ask if you have a moment to spare. Before you can answer, the shirime drops its kimono to the ground and bends over, spreading its butt cheeks and revealing the giant, shining eye located inside of its butthole. Other than this very startling behavior, shirime do not do anything harmful. They appear to thrive solely on the joy of scaring people. There are few documented encounters with shirime. Because of its alternate name (nuppori bōzu) and its shocking behavior, it is very likely that shirime are close relatives of the faceless nopperabō. In that case, a shirime's true form may simply be a shape-shifted animal playing a practical joke on humans. ---- Ōkaburo (大禿) Translation: big kamuro (an apprentice oiran) Alternate names: ōkamuro Habitat: brothels Diet: herbs and dew from chrysanthemums Appearance: Ōkaburo are cross-dressing yōkai found in brothels. They take the appearance of oversized kamuro, little girls employed as a servants in brothels. Only they are much larger than a typical girl of 5. The origins of this yōkai are vague. Ōkaburo are best known for their depiction by Toriyama Sekien. His ōkaburo is actually a male yōkai dressed up as a young kamuro, wearing a chrysanthemum-patterned kimono. His description makes an allusion to Peng Zu, a legendary Taoist wizard from China. Peng Zu lived past the age of 700 by having lots of sex with both women and men, and keeping a strict herbal diet which included licking the dew off of chrysanthemums. For this Peng Zu took the nickname Kiku-jidō, or chrysanthemum boy. Sekien likely intended his ōkaburo to be a pun referring to homosexual brothels in which young boys were dressed up as kamuro and offered to male patrons. Aside from the obvious connotations of having a young boy dressed up as a kamuro, the chrysanthemum was used as a secret symbol for homosexuality; the shape of the petals was supposed to represent an anus. The nickname chrysanthemum boy, the chrysanthemums on the kimono, and the image of licking the dew off of "chrysanthemums" leave little to the imagination as to what Sekien was alluding to with this yōkai. A story of an ōkamuro with very different origins comes from a pleasure house in Hiroshima, where a particularly short-tempered oiran was employed. One day, her ohaguro (a tea-like mixture of hot water and iron filings used to blacken the teeth of courtesans) had been improperly prepared. The color would not stick to her teeth. Enraged, she grabbed the nearest kamuro and poured the entire pot of boiling liquid down the little girl's throat. The girl, vomiting up her insides, smeared her bloody handprints along the wall as she died in anguish. Ever since, it was said that the voice of that young kamuro could be heard at night, calling out for vengeance against the oiran. [ Prostitution in Old Japan: Kamuro and Oiran ] The oldest profession has a long history in Japan, but the prostitution of the Edo period is perhaps the most widely romanticized and misunderstood. There is much confusion regarding the many types of entertainers found in old Japan, and the terms themselves have changed over the years. In the 16th century, walled "pleasure districts"—called yukaku —began to spring up in large cities. Eventually, these became the only areas in Japan where prostitution was legal; cities within cities specialized in the art of professional entertainment. The women employed in these neighborhoods were called yujo, or "pleasure girls." They were both prostitutes and entertainers. Yujo had many ranks, but the highest and most elite were called oiran . Not simply prostitutes, oiran were highly trained and skilled entertainers. They were knowledgeable about many subjects, and seen as the epitome of beauty. Many developed celebrity status. To become an oiran, a woman had to undergo years of training. Young girls were sold to brothels at age 5. The training was lengthy; they would spend many years as a kamuro, acting as servants, messengers, and attendants for experienced oiran. If skillful and beautiful a kamuro could move up in rank to become an oiran herself. ---- Kejōrō (毛倡妓) Translation: hairy prostitute Habitat: brothels, red light districts Diet: young, virile men Appearance: Kejōrō are prostitutes whose faces and bodies are hidden behind curtains of long, matted black hair. They appear in red-light districts and brothels. In most stories, only the hair on their heads is disturbingly thick and long, but in some stories, their whole bodies are covered in thick hair, like beasts. Despite their horrible appearance, kejōrō are said to be quite popular with other yōkai. In fact, male yōkai frequently fight each other over the kejōrō, competing for their affections. Kejōrō seem to return this devotion; in some stories, kejōrō cut off their hair and send it to their lovers—human or yōkai. Sometimes they tattoo their lover's name into their skin as a token of their undying love. Kejōrō's victims are young men who frequent brothels and red light districts. A man might think he sees a girl that he recognizes from behind, and run up to speak with her. When she turns around, her face and body are covered by a thick mat of hair that hides her features. The kejōrō shocks her victim in this way, which gives herself time to attack. She tangles him up in her hair and uses it to slice him up. The earliest records of kejōrō go back to Toriyama Sekien's One Hundred Demons of the Past and Present . There is some debate over his original description. Do kejōrō have a normal face under their mat of hair, or are they faceless monsters related to nopperabō and ohaguro bettari? Various yōkai researches weigh in on either side of the question. [ Maiko and Geisha ] While kamuro and oiran were popular in the early Edo period, by the 19th century they had all but vanished. They were replaced by a new type of entertainer: the geisha. Geisha first appeared in the mid-18th century. They developed from the tradition of odoriko, dancing girls who performed as performers for hire but did not perform sexual services. Like oiran, geisha were highly trained and educated entertainers. Geisha appealed to a much broader class of people than the diva-like oiran did. Eventually, geisha grew so popular that they replaced oiran entirely. As with oiran, young girls began training to become geisha at age 5. They started as servants and gradually moved up in rank. At age 13, they could become maiko, or apprentice geisha. At the age of majority they could become fully-fledged geisha. Despite the high class status of maiko and geisha in Japan, they are often mistakenly viewed as prostitutes overseas. Much of this misunderstanding comes from the occupation of Japan, when kimono-clad prostitutes dressed up as geisha appeared on the scene. These women primarily served American GIs, who did not know the difference between a "geisha girl" and real geisha. Eventually, "geisha girl" began to refer to any Japanese prostitute. This is why geisha have become so misunderstood in the West. ---- Iyaya (否哉) Translation: a slang expression meaning "No way!" Habitat: dark streets Diet: as a human Appearance: From the back, iyaya look like attractive young women wearing beautiful clothing. When somebody calls out to them to get their attention, they turn around and reveal ugly, wrinkly faces like those of old men! Iyaya can be found anywhere. They prefer towns and roads at night where they are more likely to surprise lone travelers. They don't do anything harmful. Like many yōkai, they live just to shock people. That done, they wander off to find new victims. ---- Ōkubi (大首) Translation: giant head Habitat: hiding in large barns, or flying around in the sky Diet: unknown Appearance: Ōkubi appear as enormous, severed heads, which fly through the sky. In most accounts they are female in appearance. Quite commonly they have blackened teeth. Ōkubi are little threat to humans. Their most common activity is to fly about harassing people: grinning at them, blowing away their umbrellas, or otherwise scaring them. According to some accounts, if an ōkubi breaths on any body part, that part will become inflamed. However, stories about serious injuries or deaths are rare to nonexistent. Eyewitness accounts of ōkubi were common during the Edo period. In a story from Inou Mononoke Roku, the protagonist Inou Heitarō opens the door to his storage house. He discovers that an enormous head of an old woman—the size of the entire storage house—has taken up residence inside. Curious, he pokes at the head with a long chopstick. Instead of bumping against the forehead of the ōkubi, the head is sticky and mushy and the chopstick slides right in. ---- Kasha (火車) Translation: fire cart Habitat: populated areas Diet: fresh human corpses Appearance: Kasha are a type of bakeneko, or monster cat. They are bipedal felines as large as or larger than a human. Kasha are often accompanied by hellish flames or lightning. They appear during rain or stormy weather, and most often during the night. Their name sometimes causes them to be confused with other yōkai; kasha translates as "fire cart," but they do not use vehicles of any kind. Kasha, being bakeneko, often live among humans disguised as ordinary house cats or strays. However, they reveal their true forms during funeral services, when they leap down from rooftops to snatch corpses out of their coffins. Their motivations vary. Kasha are occasionally employed as messengers or servants of hell, in which case they are tasked with collecting the corpses of wicked humans to spirit off to hell for punishment. Other times, they steal corpses for their own uses—either to animate as puppets, or to eat. It is nearly impossible to retrieve a person's remains after they have been snatched by a kasha. This makes passing on to the next life difficult. The best defense is to be prepared; temples in areas where kasha prowl have devised unique ways of defending against these monster cats. In Yamagata, clever priests hold two funeral ceremonies for the deceased. The first ceremony is a fake—the casket is filled only with rocks. If a kasha comes for the body it will end up with nothing. The real ceremony takes place afterwards, when the risk of a kasha encounter is lessened. In Ehime Prefecture (old Iyo Province), a head shaving razor may be placed on top of the coffin as a ward against kasha. In Miyazaki (old Hyūga Province), priests chant "kasha ni wa kuwasen (don't be eaten by a kasha)" two times in front of the funeral procession. In Okayama Prefecture (old Bitchū, Bizen and Mimasaka Provinces), priests play a myōhachi —a type of cymbal used in religious ceremonies—in order to keep kasha away. Kasha were once ordinary house cats. Like other animals in Japanese folklore, as cats age their tails grow longer, and they begin to develop magical powers. Some turn into bakeneko. More powerful cats turn into nekomata. Beyond that some turn into kasha. Fear of such demonic cats has long existed in Japan. Since ancient times, folk wisdom tells us, "Don't let cats near dead bodies," and, "If a cat jumps over the coffin, the corpse inside the coffin will rise." Fears such as these have given rise to superstitious traditions such as cutting a cat's tail short in order to prevent it from learning magic. [ Where's the Cart? ] Kasha have a quirky name: it means fire cart, but there is no cart! The original reading of this yōkai's kanji is hi no kuruma, and it does actually refer to a corpse-stealing demon pulling a flaming cart. The demon who pulls the hi no kuruma is a kind of mōryō that carries the dead off to hell to be tortured. When the name kasha was written down in kanji, the characters for hi no kuruma were used for their phonetic value and because of the kasha's corpse-stealing tendencies. The kanji for mōryō have also been used as an ateji (choosing kanji for meaning only, without regard to the reading) to write "kasha," as mōryō is also general term for corpse-stealing yōkai. ---- Hone karakasa (骨傘) Translation: skeletal umbrella Habitat: anywhere humans live Diet: none Appearance: Hone karakasa are tsukumogami born from tattered and torn up old Chinese-style paper umbrellas which have lost their covering. Only the "bones" remain. They dance through the sky like wild birds. Hone karakasa are closely related to other umbrella tsukumogami, such as the karakasa kozō. ---- Nurikabe (塗壁) Translation: painted wall Habitat: coastal areas; encountered on dark streets and alleys Diet: unknown Appearance: Because these yōkai are usually said to be invisible, little is known about the true form of nurikabe. During the Edo period, however, artists began to illustrate this creature. They gave it an appearance somewhere between a grotesque, fantastic beast and a flat, white wall. Modern representations of the nurikabe depict it as a plain, gray, bipedal wall with vague facial features. Nurikabe appear mysteriously on roads late at night. As you are walking, an enormous, invisible wall materializes right before your eyes and blocks your way. There is no way to slip around this yōkai; nurikabe extend as far as to the left and right as you might try to go. There is no way over them, nor can they be knocked down. However, it is said that if you tap a nurikabe near the ground with a stick, it will vanish and allow you to continue on your way. The true nature of the nurikabe is surrounded in mystery. Based on its name, it seems to be related to other household spirits known as tsukumogami. It has also been suggested that nurikabe are simply another manifestation of shape-shifting itachi (weasel) or tanuki. Mischievous tanuki are said to enlarge their magical scrotums into an invisible wall in order to play pranks on unsuspecting humans. ---- Sōgenbi (叢原火) Translation: Sōgen's fire Habitat: spotted at Mibu-dera in Kyōto Diet: none Appearance: Sōgenbi is a type of hi no tama, or fireball yōkai. It appears as the anguished head of an old monk, covered in flame, and flies about the sky. Long ago, at the temple of Mibu-dera in southern Kyōto there lived a monk named Sōgen. Sōgen was a wicked monk. He would steal money out of the temple's saisenbako, a large wooden box which holds offerings. He also made off with precious oil, which was to be used as an offering for the gods. Sōgen sold it in secret, keeping the money for himself. This went on for many years, until he eventually grew old and died. Because of his wickedness, Sōgen was reborn as a yōkai. Shortly after his death, it was said that the flaming head of old Sōgen could be seen floating about in the vicinity of Mibu-dera. ---- Haka no hi (墓の火) Translation: grave fire Habitat: tombs, graveyards, and burial grounds Diet: none Appearance: Haka no hi are mysterious, supernatural fires, or kaika. They spout forth from the base of graves. The cause of haka no hi is unknown. It is commonly believed to be a result of failure on the part of the grave's owner to reach enlightenment and pass on to Nirvana. The flames are thought to be residual energy from worldly attachments, or else feelings of grudge or resentment, coming from the remains interred in the grave. ---- Oitekebori (置行堀) Translation: "drop-it-and-get-out-of-here" canal Appearance: Oitekebori is a mysterious apparition that was seen in Honjo, part of Sumida ward in present-day Tōkyō. It takes the form of a human ghost, and haunts fishermen and others who stray too close to its home in the canals. The oitekebori name derives from a slang version of the phrase, "oite ike! " meaning, "drop it and get out of here!" Nobody really knows exactly what the oitekebori is. The most likely explanation is a kappa. Hungry and too lazy to fish on his own, it terrorized innocent fishermen and stole their catches. Other explanations blame a tricky tanuki. Still other explanations exist, covering everything from a yūrei, a kawauso, a mujina, or a suppon—a soft-shelled turtle-turned-yōkai. Long ago, Honjo was full of canals and waterways teaming with fish. It was common for people to make their livings catching and selling fish caught in the moat system. One night, two fishermen were fishing in a particular spot in Honjo at sunset. They noticed that they were catching more fish than usual. So they fished and fished, filling their baskets to the brim. After some time, when they could hold no more fish, they happily packed up their tackle and prepared to carry their large catches home. Just as they were about to leave, they heard an eerie, terrible voice come up from the canal. It shouted "oiteke!" What happens next depends on who is telling the story. Some say that both fishermen dropped their baskets and fled; when they returned to the canals later that night, both baskets were empty. Others say that they fled home with their baskets, but when they got home there wasn't a single fish in the baskets. But the most chilling version goes like this: Both fisherman turned and fled from the canal. One of them dropped his basket and the other took his basket with him. The fisherman who dropped his basket ran all the way back to his house and bolted the door shut. The other fisherman didn't get very far—a ghostly hand rose up out of the canal and dragged him down into the water, basket and all. He was never seen again. ---- Nue (鵺) Translation: none; the characters connote night and bird Habitat: unknown; only seen in the sky, accompanied by black clouds Diet: unknown Appearance: The nue is one of the oldest yōkai recorded, first appearing in the Kojiki (712 CE), an account of the early histories of Japan. It also appeared in the Heian-period encyclopedia Wamyo Ruijusho (938 CE), and again in the Heike Monogatari (1371 CE), a record of one of Japan's bloodiest civil wars and most tragic family clans. The nue has the head of a monkey, the body of a tanuki, the tail of a snake, and the limbs of a tiger. In ancient times, it was thought to be a kind of nocturnal bird—its call was supposed to sound like that of a White's thrush. Thus, its name is written with a kanji that contains the meanings "night" and "bird." Little is known about the nue's natural habitat and lifestyle. While sightings throughout history have been rare, nue are considered to be evil monsters. The few times that humans and nue have crossed paths, the results have been disastrous. One famous nue attack occurred in the summer of 1153 in Kyōto. Emperor Konoe had nightmares every night, and grew terribly ill. Neither medicine nor prayers had any effect, and the illness was attributed to some evil spirit visiting the palace early in the morning. These events climaxed days later in a storm, which appeared over the imperial palace around 2 AM. Lightning struck the roof, setting it on fire. The emperor summoned the legendary samurai Minamoto no Yorimasa. To deal with the evil spirit, Yorimasa brought his legendary bow which he received from Minamoto no Yorimitsu, and his trusted companion I no Hayata. During the night, a strange wind blew over them, followed by a black cloud. Yorimasa fired an arrow into the clouds above the palace. Out from the sky came a horrible scream as a nue dropped to the earth. I no Hayata leaped upon the body, dealing it the finishing blow. The emperor immediately recovered from his illness, and rewarded the heroes with the legendary katana Shishiō for their service. This event has been immortalized in numerous paintings and ukiyoe prints. After the nue was slain, the inhabitants of Kyōto were afraid of a retaliatory curse for killing the beast. They loaded its body in a ship and sent it down the Kamo River. The boat with the nue's corpse eventually washed up on the shore near the village of Ashiya, in Settsu Province. The good citizens of Ashiya removed the nue's body, built it a burial mound, and gave it a proper funeral. You can still visit the mound today, known as Nuezuka. ---- Itsumade (以津真天) Translation: "until when?" Alternate names: itsumaden Diet: the lamentation of the dead Appearance: Itsumade are kaichō, or strange birds. They have the face of a human with a pointed beak, and the body of a snake with wings, and terrible claws. Their wingspan is 4.8 meters. Itsumade appear in the night sky during times of trouble—such as plagues and disasters, or flying over battlegrounds where many have died. In particular, they fly over places where there is suffering or death, yet little has been done to alleviate the pain of the living or pacify the spirits of the dead. The strange birds fly about in circles all night long, crying out in a terrible voice. Itsumade make their first recorded appearance in the Taiheiki, a fictional history of Japan written in the 14th century. According to the Taiheiki, a terrible plague spread during the fall of 1334. The suffering of the plague victims is what summoned the itsumade. Itsumade's name is not written in the Taiheiki; it was added later by Toriyama Sekien. He named this yōkai for its horrible cry of "Itsumademo?" which means, "Until when?" The birds appear to be asking those below how long will this suffering go unnoticed. It is thought that the spirits of the dead and suffering form into onryō which take the shape of these birds. They demand recognition of their suffering and torment. One night during the fall of 1334, the itsumade suddenly appeared above the hall for state ceremonies, crying out, "Itsumademo? Itsumademo?" Panic erupted amongst the people of the capital. The same creature came back the next night, and every night thereafter. Finally, the imperial court decided that something had to be done. They recalled Minamoto no Yorimasa's triumph against the nue many years earlier, and decided to summon the warrior Oki no Jirouzaemon Hiroari. Hiroari was an expert archer. He used a signal arrow that let off a loud whistle as it flew, and shot the monster out of the sky. Afterwards, Hiroari was given the name Mayumi, meaning true bow. Mayumi Hiroari went on to become a famous warrior, and settled down in Chikugo Province in what is now Miyama City, Fukuoka Prefecture. His grave still stands there. The area was renamed in his honor after he died. ---- Onmoraki (陰摩羅鬼) Translation: shadowy unpious demon Habitat: temples and places where people have recently died Diet: impiety Appearance: Onmoraki are bird-like monsters with black feathers, bright eyes that shine like lanterns, and a ghastly human face. They are skilled mimics, and shake their feathers as they give off their shrill, terrifying call. Onmoraki appear near temples, particularly in the presence of neglectful priests. They sneak up on sleeping priests and surprise them, scolding them in a perfect imitation of their own voices. When the priest wakes up and flees in terror, the onmoraki vanishes into the shadows. Onmoraki come from the bodies of the recently deceased. When people die but do not receive enough memorial prayer, their life energy can transform into this grotesque, bird-like demon. The name onmoraki comes from a play on words emphasizing demonic interference with achieving Buddhist enlightenment. The first part of the name, on, comes from onmyō, the Japanese word for yin and yang. On represents yin, the shadow, the unseen, and hidden, secret things—in this case it refers to demons which live in the shadows and in the hidden parts of the world. The second part of the name, mora, refers to Mara, a Buddhist demon who personifies unskillfulness, impiety, and the death of the spirit—a reference to the poor quality of memorial services which cause this yōkai to come forth. The last part of the name, ki, simply means demon—emphasizing the fact that this monster truly is a demon. ---- Waniguchi (鰐口) Translation: alligator mouth; shrine bell Appearance: Waniguchi are tsukumogami which come from the circular, hollow bells found at shrine entrances. These bells are rung when praying to the shrine's gods. When one of these bells becomes a yōkai, it sprouts a reptilian body and tail. The bell becomes the creature's head, opening and closing like an alligator's mouth. The bells at shrines are called waniguchi due to the wide split along the bottom rim. This gives them the distinct look of an alligator's mouth. This yōkai first appeared in tsukumogami picture scrolls as a pun based off of the word for shrine bell. ---- Nyūnai suzume (入内雀) Translation: imperial palace-penetrating sparrow Alternate names: sanekata suzume (Sanekata sparrow) Habitat: the imperial palace of ancient Kyōto Diet: all of the emperor's breakfast Appearance: Nyūnai suzume has the appearance of an ordinary russet sparrow, but in reality it is the ghost of an imperial attendant named Fujiwara no Sanekata. During the reign of Emperor Ichijō (960-1011 CE) lived a nobleman named Fujiwara no Sanekata. One day, he got into a quarrel over some gossip started by Fujiwara no Yukinari. In a rage, Sanekata snatched Yukinari's hat and threw it away. For his bad temper, Sanekata was demoted and exiled to a solitary island in Mutsu Province in the northeast. Sanekata nursed his resentment towards those back in the court at Kyōto. Three years into his exile, he died, with thoughts of vengeance poisoning his heart. When the news of Sanekata's death reached Kyōto, a strange event began. Every morning, when the servants placed food out for the imperial court to eat at the Seiryōden palace, a phantom sparrow would swoop in, gobble up all of the food in an instant, and flew off. No matter how much food was laid out, the sparrow devoured every grain of rice. It left nothing for the palace inhabitants. It was not long before the court grew scared of this bird. Not content with just eating the court's feasts, it destroyed all of the crops in the fields. Nobody knew how to stop the sparrow's attacks. Rumors spread that the sparrow could only be the vengeful ghost—or onryō—of Fujiwara no Sanekata. At the same time, Saint Kanshi, the high priest of Kangaku-in, had a sparrow visit him in a dream. The sparrow identified itself as the spirit of Sanekata. He desperately longed to return to his beloved Kyōto, and asked the priest to chant and pray for him. The next morning, Kanshi discovered the body of a single sparrow lying dead at the base of a tree on the temple grounds. He recognized the sparrow as the transformed spirit of Fujiwara no Sanekata, and built a small grave. Kanshi mourned it and prayed for its soul. After the sparrow's grave was built, the attacks stopped. Years later, Kangaku-in's name changed to Kyōjaku-ji, or Sparrow Temple. While Kyōto has changed dramatically since that time, the little grave where the sparrow was buried still remains. Fujiwara no Sanekata's legacy lives in another way: the common Japanese name for the russet sparrow is nyūnai suzume. ---- Teratsutsuki (寺つつき) Translation: templepecker (as opposed to woodpecker) Habitat: Buddhist temples Diet: its own rage Appearance: Teratsutsuki is the onryō of Mononobe no Moriya, who lived in the 6th century CE. His onryō took the form of a ghostly woodpecker that tried to destroy Hōryū-ji and Shitennō-ji temples, until it was driven away by Prince Shōtoku. Long, long ago, when Japan was still called Yamato and the capital was located in Yamato Province, the nobility was divided into two kabane, or political groups: shinbetsu and kōbetsu. The shinbetsu clans claimed to be descended from the gods, and the kōbetsu clans claimed to be descended from the imperial family. The highest ranking titles in these groups were muraji, for the shinbetsu, and omi, for the kōbetsu. Their rivalry flamed in the 6th century CE, when Buddhism to was introduced to Yamato from China. Mononobe no Moriya was the leader of the Mononobe clan and a muraji. As a shinbetsu clan with ties to Japan's native gods, the Mononobe supported the old Shinto religion. Moriya's rival was Soga no Umako. As an omi, Umako supported the promotion of Buddhism throughout Yamato. Moriya and Umako both had considerable influence in the imperial court, although Moriya held the higher favor during the reign of Emperor Bidatsu (572-585). But when Emperor Yōmei, a Buddhist, took power in 585, Umako rose in power. Emperor Yōmei died two years later in 587. Both the Mononobe clan and Soga clan tried to influence the succession of the imperial title. They each supported a different prince, and fought bitterly for their clans' interests. Finally, war broke out. During the war, Mononobe no Moriya sought to purge the foreign religion from his homeland. He set fire to Buddhist temples and tossed statues of Buddha into canals—including the first such statues brought to Yamato. Moriya and Umako mustered their armies and met on the battlefield in Kawachi Province. There, at the Battle of Mount Shigi, Mononobe no Moriya was killed by Soga no Umako and Prince Shōtoku. The Mononobe clan was almost completely exterminated. Afterwards, the Soga clan rose to even higher prominence. Prince Shōtoku, a devout Buddhist, began the construction of many new Buddhist temples. The spirit of defeated Mononobe no Moriya did not rest. As he lay dying, he was filled with hatred and resentment, and transformed into an onryō. Moriya's ghost took the form of a ghostly woodpecker—the teratsutsuki—which would be seen at the temples built by Prince Shōtoku. The phantom bird pecked furiously at the wooden buildings, determined even in death to destroy the heretical new religion. Prince Shōtoku finally drove away the teratsutsuki by transforming into a hawk and attacking it. After that, the ghost of Mononobe no Moriya was never seen again. ---- Gagoze (元興寺) Translation: none; named for the temple which he haunted Alternate names: gangōji no oni, gagoji, guwagoze, gangō, gango Diet: children Appearance: Gagoze is a reiki, or demon ghost, who haunted the temple Gangōji many centuries ago. He appears as a hideous demon dressed in monks robes, crawling about on all fours. His legend is preserved at Gangōji, which was founded in 593 by Soga no Umako. Long ago in Owari Province, during the time of Emperor Bidatsu, a thunder god fell out of the sky in bolt of lightning. A peasant investigated the spot where the bolt struck, and discovered the thunder god in the form of a young boy. The peasant raised his cane with the intention to kill the creature, but the god pleaded to spare his life. The thunder god promised to give the peasant and his wife a young boy as strong as a god if the peasant would help him. The peasant agreed, and helped the thunder god to build a boat which allowed him to return to heaven. Shortly after, the peasant and his wife had a child. Just as promised the child was as strong as a thunder god. As the boy grew, he became renowned far and wide for his superhuman strength. By the time he turned 10, he had grown so powerful and boastful that he challenged a prince to a contest of strength and won. This attracted attention of the imperial court, and the boy was apprenticed to Gangōji. Shortly after he joined Gangōji, the temple's young apprentices began dying strange deaths one by one. Every morning, the fresh corpse of one of the boys would be found by the temple's bell tower. The monks decided that an evil spirit was infiltrating the temple at night and committing the murders. The peasant's son resolved to solve the mystery. He volunteered to catch whatever was killing the boys. That night, the boy placed covered lanterns in the four corners of the bell tower. He instructed an older monk to wait by the lanterns and uncover them once he grabbed the evil spirit. The boy waited by the bell tower. At midnight a hunched creature came crawling towards the tower. It saw the boy, however, and ran away. A few hours later, hunger got the better of the creature and it slinked back. The boy sprang and caught it by the hair, but the monk was too scared to uncover the lanterns. Summoning his superhuman strength, the boy dragged the creature to each corner of the tower and uncovered the lights. In the lamplight, he could see that the creature was a reiki—the ghost of an oni. The reiki pulled back so hard that it ripped off its own scalp. Once free, it scampered away into the darkness, leaving its hair in the boy's hand. When morning came, the priests followed the bloody trail left by the creature. They found the grave of a lazy, wicked servant formerly employed by the temple. The servant's spirit had transformed into the demon ghost that was responsible for the murders. After that, the reiki never returned to the temple again. The monster's scalp became one of the holy treasures of Gangōji. The boy became famous far and wide. He used his superhuman strength to irrigate the temple's fields, and eventually took the name Dōjō and became a splendid priest. After he died, he was enshrined as one of the gods of Gangōji. ---- Shuten dōji (酒呑童子) Translation: a nickname meaning "little drunkard" Appearance: Shuten dōji is an oni—a great, red-skinned, horned demon with superhuman strength and a wicked, corrupt heart. He is considered to be the king of the oni. Along with the ghost of Emperor Sutoku and the nine-tailed kitsune Tamamo no Mae, he is one of the Three Terrible Yōkai of Japan Shuten dōji was not born an oni. There are many stories about how he came to be, but most of them say that he was originally a human boy born over a thousand years ago, either in Ōmi or Etchū Province. His mother was a human woman and his father was the great dragon Yamata no Orochi. How he changed from boy to demon varies greatly from story to story, but the one popular version goes like this: There was a young boy who was supernaturally strong and abnormally intelligent for his age. Everyone around him constantly called him a demon child due to his incredible strength and wit. He gradually became anti-social and resentful of others. At age six even his own mother abandoned him. Orphaned, the boy became an apprentice priest at Mt. Hiei in Kyōto. Naturally, he was the strongest and smartest of the young acolytes. But he grew resentful of them as well. He slacked off on his studies and got into fights. He also fell into drinking, which was forbidden to monks. He could out-drink anyone and everyone who was willing to sit down and drink against him. Because of his fondness for alcohol, he became known as Shuten dōji, "the little drunkard." One night there was a festival at the temple, and Shuten dōji showed up very drunk. He put on an oni mask and went around playing pranks on his fellow priests, jumping out from the darkness to scare them and such. At the end of the night, he tried to take off his mask but found he couldn't—to his horror, it had fused to his body! Ashamed, scared, and scolded by his masters for being drunk, he fled into the mountains where he would no longer have to interact with other humans. He saw them as weak, foolish, and hypocritical. He lived there on the outskirts of Kyōto for many years, stealing food and alcohol from villagers, and drinking vast quantities of alcohol. His banditry eventually attracted groups of thieves and criminals, who stuck with him loyally and became the foundation for his gang. Living in exile, Shuten dōji grew in power and knowledge. He mastered strange, dark magic, and taught it to his thugs. He met another demon child like him, named Ibaraki dōji, who became his chief servant. Over time, the young man and his gang transformed into oni. Eventually, he had an entire clan of oni and yōkai thugs who prowled the highways, terrorizing the people of Kyōto. He and his gang eventually settled on Mount Ōe. In a dark castle, he plotted to conquer the capital and rule as emperor. Shuten dōji and his gang rampaged through Kyōto, capturing noble virgins, drinking their blood and eating their organs raw. Finally, a band of heroes led by the legendary warrior Minamoto no Yorimitsu assaulted Shuten dōji's palace. With the help of some magical poison, they were able to assault the oni band during a bout of heavy drinking. They cut off the drunken Shuten dōji's head, but even after cutting it off, the head continued to bite at Minamoto no Yorimitsu. Because the head belonged to an oni and was unholy, they buried it outside of the city limits, at a mountain pass called Oinosaka. The cup and bottle of poison that Minamoto no Yorimitsu used are said to be kept at the temple Nariai-ji in Kyōto. ---- Ibaraki dōji (茨木童子) Translation: a nickname meaning "thorn tree child" Appearance: Ibaraki dōji is one of the most famous and most feared demons to have wreaked havoc upon Japan. She was the chief deputy to Shuten dōji, the greatest oni of all. Not very much is known about Ibaraki dōji's life. It isn't really even known if Ibaraki dōji was male or female. Most stories and illustrations depict Ibaraki dōji as a kijo, or a female oni. Yet there are other stories which refer to Shuten dōji's deputy as a male. There is also a rumor that she and Shuten dōji were not only partners in crime, but also lovers. What is known is that Ibaraki dōji was a wholly terrible and fearsome monster. It was bent on doing as much damage in the human world as possible. Ibaraki dōji's most famous story takes place at Rashōmon, the southern gate of old Kyōto's city walls. Rashōmon was built in 789, but after the Heian period it fell into serious disrepair. It was overgrown and unkempt, an unsavory place. Thieves and bandits hung out near it. It even served as a dumping point for unwanted babies, and a spot to dispose of murder victims. But the scariest part of its haunted reputation was the legend of Rashōmon no oni—the demon of Rashōmon. After his celebrated victory over Shuten dōji, the hero Minamoto no Yorimitsu returned triumphant to Kyōto. He was celebrating at his home with his deputies—Sakata no Kintoki, Urabe no Suetake, Usui Sadamitsu, and Watanabe no Tsuna—when the noble Fujiwara no Yasumasa informed them that an oni was seen haunting Rashōmon gate. Watanabe no Tsuna, had just returned from a great battle with Shuten dōji's clan; he could not believe there were any oni left. Single-handedly, he went out to investigate. He mounted his horse and traveled south. When Tsuna arrived at the gate, a great howling wind broke out and his horse could travel no further. He dismounted and went on foot. Approaching the gate in the fierce gale, he noticed an enormous hand reach out of the dark to grab his helmet. Tsuna wasted no time, and swung his great katana around. He severed the arm of an enormous demon—it was Ibaraki dōji, coming to avenge the murder of Shuten dōji. The injured demon ran away, leaving her arm behind. Rashōmon was no longer haunted. Ibaraki dōji later returned to Rashōmon, looking for her arm. She disguised herself as Watanabe no Tsuna's wet-nurse, and was able to steal back her severed arm and flee. After that, her whereabouts were never known again. Though for many years after, in some town or another, villagers would claim that they had seen Ibaraki dōji coming or going. The monster always appeared in connection with some kind of mischief. ---- Hashihime (橋姫) Translation: princess of the bridge Habitat: very old, very long bridges Diet: rage and jealousy Appearance: Hashihime are spirits who inhabit bridges—in particular, very old and very long bridges. Hashihime often take different forms depending on the occasion. However, they are most commonly depicted wearing white robes, white face-paint, and crowned with an iron trivet lit with five candles. This is a ceremonial outfit used to perform curses. Hashihime ferociously guard the bridges they inhabit. As with most spirits connected to a location, they are competitive and jealous. If you praise or speak positively about another bridge while on top of a hashihime's bridge, or if you recite lines from certain noh plays that feature a woman's wrath as the main theme, something terrible is likely to happen. Despite their fearsome nature, hashihime are highly honored by the people who live nearby the bridges they inhabit. Shrines are established in their honor. In times of war, residents beseech their local hashihime to guard the bridge against invaders. In times of peace, hashihime are revered as goddesses of separation and severing. They are asked to aid people in things such as break-ups, divorce, and severing bad luck. So strong is their power of severing that it is considered taboo for lovers or wedding processions to pass in front of a hashihime shrine together. If newlyweds need to cross a bridge inhabited by a hashihime, they must instead pass underneath it on a boat or risk cursing their marriage. The most famous hashihime story comes from Tsurugi no Maki, in The Tale of the Heike and is retold in the noh play Kanawa . A woman visited the Kifune-jinja in Kyōto at the hour of the ox (roughly 2 am). She was filled with rage and jealousy towards her ex-husband who had thrown her away for another woman. Night after night she visited the shrine, praying to the gods enshrined there to turn her into a powerful demon. The woman wanted nothing else other than to see her ex-husband destroyed, even at the cost of her own life. After seven nights of pilgrimage, her prayers were answered—the gods told her that if she immersed herself in the Uji River for twenty-one nights, she would become a living demon. The woman did as she was bid. She donned a white robe and tied her hair up into five horns. She painted her face and covered her body in crimson dye. She placed an upturned trivet on her head and attached torches to each foot of the iron stand. She lit a torch on both ends and placed it in her mouth. She immersed herself in the Uji River, and for twenty-one days she kindled the hatred in her heart. Just as the gods told her, she transformed into a terrible kijo with supreme power. She had become the hashihime of Uji. That night, her ex-husband awoke from a horrible dream with a premonition of danger. He sought out the famous onmyōji, Abe no Seimei, who recognized the dream as a sign that the man's former wife would come and destroy the couple that very night. Seimei promised to save them. He went to their house, recited magical prayers, and crafted two katashiro—magical paper doll representations of the man and his new wife. These were meant to be used as substitutionary targets for the hashihime's rage. That night, as Seimei had predicted, the demon appeared. Seimei's magic worked; the hashihime attacked the two katashiro instead of the real couple. Her power was reflected back upon her and she was driven away. The demon, realizing that she could not overcome Abe no Seimei's magic, promised that she would return another time and vanished. ---- Hannya (般若) Translation: wisdom; specifically the Buddhist concept of Perfect Wisdom Appearance: Hannya refers to demons or oni; more specifically to female demons called kijo—even more specifically to those kijo which appear in noh theater. They were once human women who were consumed by jealousy and transformed into demonesses. The name hannya also refers to a specific type of demon mask used in noh theater. There are three grades of hannya: namanari, chūnari, and honnari. Namanari hannya are kijo that still resemble human women. They have small horns and use dark magic to perform their evil deeds, such as summoning ikiryō to attack their enemies. They are not completely evil; there remains a chance for these beginner demons to return to humanity. Chūnari hannya are mid-level demons. They have long, sharp horns, tusk-like fangs, and more powerful magic. However, they are still vulnerable to Buddhist prayers. Honnari hannya are true demons and the most powerful of the three. They have serpentine bodies and breathe fire. Honnari hannya have embraced their jealousy so deeply that there is no calming their fury. Hannya originate from the Sanskrit term for wisdom—specifically Prajñāpāramitā, the highest form of Buddhist wisdom which leads to enlightenment. The juxtaposition of the highest form of wisdom and creatures who represent direct opposition to that wisdom comes from the use of the hannya mask in noh. In the play Aoi no Ue, a shugenja (an ascetic mystic) exorcises the spirit of the hannya Lady Rokujō from Lady Aoi. As it is driven away, the evil spirit cries out, "Oh, how horrible! The voice of wisdom is like a demon!" Since then, demon masks and wisdom have been associated with each other. The three most famous hannya from Japanese literature are Lady Rokujō from Aoi no Ue, Kurozuka from Kurozuka, and Kiyo hime from Dōjō-ji. ---- Kurozuka (黒塚) Translation: Black Mounds; named for the area she haunted Alternate names: Adachigahara no Onibaba (The Demon Hag of Adachigahara) Appearance: Kurozuka is one of the most well-known kijo, or demon women, in Japanese folklore. She is a popular subject in the arts, starring in everything from paintings to ukiyoe prints to noh plays. She has gone by many names. The most famous is Kurozuka, or the Witch of the Black Mounds, but she is also known as the Demon Hag of Adachigahara, or even just simply Onibaba—the Demon Hag. Kurozuka's story has changed over the years and through various adaptations. A popular version of her story goes like this: Long ago, a wealthy noble couple had a daughter whom they loved very much. She was sickly, however, and by the age of five she had never spoken a word. The worried couple consulted with priests and doctors. Finally, one doctor told them that the only way to cure their daughter was to feed her a fresh liver from an unborn fetus. The couple summoned their daughter's nanny and gave her the task of obtaining the liver. Expecting that it would take some time to find someone willing to give up their baby's liver, the nanny prepared for a long journey. She gave the daughter a protection charm and promised not to return empty-handed. Then she left. The nanny traveled for days, months, and eventually years without finding any family willing to give up their baby's life. Eventually, her travels brought her to the moors of Adachigahara, in Fukushima. Despondent, she decided that if nobody would give her a liver, she would have to take one. She made camp in a cave off of the road and decided to wait for a pregnant woman to pass by. Many more years passed. Finally, a lone pregnant woman came walking by on the road. The nanny leaped out of the cave and slew the traveler with her knife. She carved the pregnant woman's belly open, killing the fetus, and harvested its fresh liver. Only after the deed was done did the nanny look down at her victim. She noticed the young woman was wearing an old but familiar protection charm—the same one that she had given the daughter so many years ago. The knowledge of what she had done weighed so heavily on her that the nanny went insane. She transformed into a hannya. The Demon Hag of Adachigahara, as she came to be known, developed fearsome magical powers. She lured travelers into her shelter and invited them to spend the night. After which she murdered them in their sleep. She remained on the moors of Adachigahara for many years, murdering any lone travelers who passed by her cave and eating their remains. In the noh version of her story, the demon woman is eventually visited by traveling Buddhist priests whom she plans to kill. While she is out gathering firewood, the priests find a room full of dead bodies and bones. They recognize her as the Demon of Adachigahara. She chases after them, but they are able to hold her back with their Buddhist prayers. They manage to drive the evil spirit from her and banish it forever. When the demon spirit is driven from her body, the nanny reverts to being an old woman and dies. The monks bury her remains and build a grave among the black mounds that she haunted. ---- Momiji (紅葉) Translation: literally "maple leaves;" used as a name Alternate names: Sarashina hime (Princess Sarashina) Appearance: Momiji is a famous kijo and an example of a hannya—a woman who has transformed into a powerful demon. Her tale is famous in Japanese theater. The noh play Momijigari ("Fall-Leaf Hunting" or "Hunting Momiji") first appeared hundreds of years ago during the Muromachi period. During the Meiji period it was remade as a kabuki play. Momijigari was made into a film in 1899, becoming one of the first Japanese films. It was designated an Important Cultural Property in 2009. Long ago, a powerful witch named Momiji lived in the mountains of Shinano Province. Her story takes place during the season of fall-leaf-viewing, when groups of people gathered in the mountains for festivals and parties under the falling red, orange, and gold leaves. During this time, a samurai named Taira no Koremochi was charged by a local Hachiman shrine with hunting oni. His hunt had taken him to Togakushi Mountain, where a particularly nasty kijo was said to live. Koremochi and his retainers climbed the beautiful mountain and came upon a small group of aristocrats having a leaf-viewing party. Koremochi sent one of his retainers ahead to investigate. The retainer approached to inquire about the party. He was told that a noble princess was hosting it; however, the ladies in waiting would not tell him the princess's name. Just as Koremochi and his retainers decided to continue on their mission, one of the ladies-in-waiting approached and told them that her mistress had heard of Koremochi before. She wanted to invite them to her party. Despite his mission, Koremochi could not turn down an offer from a princess. He and his companions agreed. At the party, the warriors were introduced to an extremely beautiful young woman named Princess Sarashina. They sat and enjoyed watching the leaves, drinking sake, and dancing. Koremochi asked the princess if she would dance for him, and she did. Soon the men became drunk and sleepy and dozed off under the beautiful trees. As he slept, Koremochi dreamed of Hachiman and his mission. The god told him that Princess Sarashina was actually the kijo Momiji in disguise, and that he must kill her with the holy katana, Kogarasumaru ("Little Crow"). When Koremochi woke up, the sword he dreamed of was in his hand—a gift from Hachiman. He knew that the dream had been real. He chased after the women, when suddenly a huge firestorm broke out. Flame and wind lit up the mountain. Suddenly, a ten foot tall hannya with horns made of burning trees appeared. An intense battle raged between the samurai and the demoness. In the end Koremochi slew the Witch of Togakushi Mountain thanks to his magical sword. ---- Rokujō no Miyasundokoro (六条御息所) Translation: Lady Rokujō; Miyasundokoro is her given name Alternate names: Rokujō Miyasudokoro Appearance: Lady Rokujō is a woman who appears in the noh play Aoi no Ue, which is based on the 11th century novel The Tale of Genji . The novel revolves around the life of Hikaru Genji, a noble living in the height of the Heian period. Lady Rokujō's transformation from noblewoman to demoness has made her one of the most well-known monsters in Japanese theater. Her name comes from Rokujō, the area of Kyōto in which she lived. Lady Rokujō was the daughter of a minister living in the capital during the Heian period. She was high ranking, extremely beautiful, elegant, sophisticated, and intelligent. She had been married to the crown prince and would have become empress upon his ascension. However, when her husband passed away Lady Rokujō lost much of her power and standing among the court, robbing her of her ambitions. She sent their daughter away to Ise to become a shrine princess, and became a courtesan of the imperial court. The widowed Lady Rokujō soon became one of the mistresses of an aspiring nobleman named Hikaru Genji. She fell deeply in love with him. But because of her age, rank, beauty, and refinement, Genji was reluctant to return her affections. Lady Rokujō also could not express her true feelings as she wished without breaking court decorum. Instead, she repressed her feelings of jealousy, which began to transform her into a demon. One night, while sightseeing during the Hollyhock Festival, Lady Rokujō's carriage collided with the carriage belonging to Genji's rightful wife Lady Aoi. After already losing her place to Genji's wife, Lady Rokujō discovered that Lady Aoi was pregnant with Genji's child. The insult was too much. Her repressed jealousy escaped from her body and transformed into an ikiryō, which haunted Lady Aoi every night. Eventually, the ikiryō was witnessed by Genji, who purchased herbal charms for his wife to protect her against evil spirits. Lady Aoi gave birth to Genji's son, but shortly afterwards became possessed by Lady Rokujō's vengeful spirit. (This possession is the subject of the noh play Aoi no Ue .) The ikiryō was finally exorcised by a shugenja, but the possession took its toll on Lady Aoi. She passed away. Lady Rokujō had hoped to become Genji's next wife, but she discovered that her own hair and clothes carried the odor of Genji's herbal charms. She realized that she had been responsible for the hauntings. Thinking that Genji could never love her after murdering his wife, Lady Rokujō left the capital and joined her daughter at the Ise Shrine. Six years later, Lady Rokujō returned to Kyōto with her daughter and became a nun. Shortly afterwards, she fell very ill. Genji came to visit her, and was stricken with her daughter. Lady Rokujō, still deeply in love with Genji, begged him not to take her daughter as a lover. Lady Rokujō passed away, and Genji adopted her daughter as his ward. They moved into her old villa at Rokujō. Even in death, Lady Rokujō's jealousy remained as a vengeful shiryō, which appeared at the Rokujō villa. It haunted Genji, attacking his new wife Lady Murasaki and the other ladies of the house. Upon hearing of the hauntings, Lady Rokujō's daughter became sad that her mother had still not found peace in death. She performed the necessary memorial services to finally put her ghost at ease. ---- Oboroguruma (朧車) Translation: hazy cart Habitat: city streets, late at night Diet: the lingering anger of ancient nobles Appearance: On misty, moonlit nights, residents of Kyōto occasionally hear the squeak of an oxcart in the street. Stepping outside to check and see, they discover a half-transparent, ghost-like oxcart with an enormous, grotesque face parked outside of their home. Carriage yōkai have existed in picture scrolls for hundreds of years. They may originally have been a kind of tsukumogami, or object-turned-yōkai. Most of these scrolls were created for their vivid imagery rather than for any particular story. Oboroguruma may have initially been created without any backstory. When Toriyama Sekien published his yōkai bestiaries, he included the oboroguruma and gave a description. He linked it to a famous scene in The Tale of Genji when Lady Rokujō and her rival Lady Aoi competed for a parking space and got into a carriage fight. Long ago, sightseeing in the capital was accomplished by means of oxcart taxis. When it got crowded—particularly during festival seasons—the taxi drivers got into carriage fights. They slammed their carriages against each other to grab the best spots for sightseeing. Just like parking can be a problem in cities today, parking in ancient Kyōto was a huge source of frustration. The resentment of nobles who didn't get the prime sightseeing spot they wanted was something to be feared. The negative feelings could build up and become a powerful force of their own, which is where these yōkai come from. Oboroguruma materialized out of the wrath of nobles who lost these carriage fights and were not able to reserve the sightseeing spots that they wanted. ---- Kiyo hime (清姫) Translation: unknown fire Habitat: along the shores of Kyūshū Appearance: Kiyo hime is one of the most famous antagonists in Japanese literature, and an example of a honnari hannya—a demon woman who has attained the maximum level of power. She appears in The Legend of Anchin and Kiyo Hime, an ancient tale from Kii Province. Versions of the story appear in a number of ancient books. Her tale is retold in the famous noh play Dōjō-ji. Long ago, during the reign of Emperor Daigo, the young priest named Anchin was traveling from Mutsu to Kumano on a pilgrimage. Every year he made the journey, and every year he would lodge at the manor of the Masago no Shōji family. He was an incredibly good looking young man, and he caught the eye of Kiyo hime, the manor lord's daughter. She was a troublesome young girl. Anchin joked to her that if she were a good girl and behaved herself, he would marry her and take her back to Mutsu. Every year Kiyo hime waited for Anchin to come again for his pilgrimage. When she came of age, she reminded him of his promise and asked him to marry her. Anchin, embarrassed that she had taken his word seriously, lied that he would come for her as soon as he finished his pilgrimage. On his return, he avoided the Masago no Shōji manor and headed straight for Mutsu. When Kiyo hime heard of Anchin's deception, she was overcome with grief. She ran after the young priest, barefoot, determined to marry him. Anchin fled as fast as he could, but Kiyo hime caught him on the road to the temple Dōjō-ji. There, instead of greeting her, Anchin lied again. He pretended not to know her and protested that he was late for a meeting somewhere else. Kiyo hime's sadness turned into furious rage. She attacked, moving to punish the lying priest. Anchin prayed to Kumano Gongen to save him. A divine light dazzled Kiyo hime's eyes and paralyzed her body, giving Anchin just enough time to escape. When Anchin reached the Hidaka River, he paid the boatman and begged him not to allow his pursuer to cross. Then, he ran to Dojō-ji for safety. Kiyo hime's rage exploded to its limits—the divine intervention had pushed her over the edge. She transformed into a giant, fire-breathing serpent. Ignoring the boatman entirely, Kiyo hime swam across the river after Anchin. Seeing the monstrous serpent, the priests of Dōjō-ji hid Anchin inside of the large, bronze temple bell. However, Kiyo hime could smell Anchin inside. Overcome with rage and despair, she wrapped herself around the bell and breathed fire until the bronze became white hot. She roasted Anchin alive inside the bell. With Anchin dead, the demon Kiyo hime threw herself into the river and drowned. ---- Amikiri (網切) Translation: net cutter Habitat: villages and towns, particularly fishing villages Diet: unknown Appearance: Amikiri are small, crustacean-like yōkai that resemble shrimp or lobsters. They have long bodies, red segmented shells, bird-like beaks, and two scissor-like claws on their forearms. They fly through the air as a fish swims in water. Amikiri are quite shy, rarely appearing before humans. Amikiri don't interact with humans very much, except for one particular activity—for some strange reason, amikiri love to cut nets. Whether it is a fishing net, a screen door or window, or a kaya—a hanging mosquito net—the amikiri want to cut it. That is the reason why they are called "net cutters." While they are not directly harmful, this mischief is not entirely benign. A fisherman whose nets have been shredded by an amikiri could find his livelihood ruined. It's unclear where amikiri come from. They bear a strong resemblance both in name and shape to an arthropod-like yōkai called kamikiri, which cuts women's hail. Stories about amikiri are rare, and their name and shape may actually be a pun. The word ami means net in Japanese, but it also is the name of a type of tiny shrimp. A story from Dewa Province tells of a fisherman who one day found that his fishing net had been shredded to the point of worthlessness. He suspected the work of an amikiri. The next day, he took special care to hide his nets at his home where they could not be found by any wandering yōkai. That night, however, the amikiri snuck into his room while he slept and cut up the kaya covering his bed. The man woke up with his entire body covered in painful, itchy mosquito bites. ---- Yama oroshi (山颪) Translation: mountain wind; sounds like mountain grater Habitat: kitchens and gardens Appearance: The yama oroshi is a metal grater which has been improperly cared for and has grown too dull to grate anything. It sprouts a body, and the dull slicers on the grater stick out like wild spines from its head. Yama oroshi's name contains a double pun. First, the Japanese word for grater is oroshi, which is found in this tsukumogami's name. Second, its name sounds like yamaarashi, the Japanese word for porcupine. This yōkai resembles a porcupine with its spines. ---- Hahakigami (箒神) Translation: broom spirit Alternate names: hōkigami Habitat: streets, yards, and dirty places Appearance: Hahakigami are tsukumogami which take up residence in brooms. They can sometimes be seen on cold, windy late autumn mornings, sweeping wildly at the blowing leaves. Long ago, brooms were not only household cleaning tools, but also holy instruments used in ritual purification ceremonies. They were used to sweep the air in a room in order to purify it and sweep out any evil spirits or negative energy that might be lingering. Like any tool used for many years, brooms which reach old age becomes a perfect home for spirits—perhaps even more so in the case of a hahakigami because of the ritual nature of their origin. Hahakigami are used also as magical charms for safe and quick childbirth. Because brooms are used to "sweep out" evil energy, hahakigami act as a sort of totem to "sweep out" the baby from its mother safely. They are also used as charms to keep guests from overstaying their visit. Anyone who has stayed beyond their welcome might also be "swept out" by the power of the hahakigami. ---- Shōgorō (鉦五郎) Translation: "Gong-goro," or ghost gong, depending on the reading Habitat: old, dilapidated temples Appearance: Shōgorō are a kind of tsukumogami, spirits which inhabit household items. In this case, they are an animated shōgo (鉦吾 )—small, bowl-shaped gongs that are struck with mallets and used in Buddhist services. Shōgo see a lot of use. They are struck multiple times every service. They are made of metal, and can last years without breaking. Worn out gongs sometimes cease to play their notes pleasantly. These get put into storage until forgotten. Or gongs might be the witness to some horrible crime. Either way, they are ideal candidates for awakening into yōkai. Like most tsukumogami, shōgorō are not dangerous. At their worst, they are startling. They wander around at night like some kind of metal turtle, striking their bodies and ringing their notes out into the night. It is enough of a racket to cause a sleepless night, but not much else. The name shōgorō is a pun. It is a combination of shōgo, the gong, and Gorō, a common boy's name. The word can also be read as a combination of shōgo and goryō, the ghost of a noble or an aristocrat from ages past. Goryō are a grade of ghost above yūrei, and play a large part in many Japanese ghost stories. In the early 18th century, there was a wealthy merchant family called Yodoya living in Osaka. For many generations, the Yodoya were the kings of the rice trade, raking in unbelievable amounts of cash. The 5th generation boss, Yodoya Tatsugorō, had so much money and lived a life of such extreme opulence that he attracted the attention of the bakufu, the regional shogunate officials that acted like military police. The bakufu decided that the Yodoya family had accumulated too much wealth. They were only a merchant family, and it was improper for a lower class to have such a vast fortune; their economic power was above their station in life. The bakufu stripped Yodoya Tatsugorō of everything he had—his rice, his business, his house, his every last possession. The Yodoya family fell into ruin, and Tatsugorō became destitute. Even his favorite possession, an unbelievably rich and indescribably splendid golden chicken called kogane no niwatori (金の鶏, literally "golden chicken"), was taken from him. The loss of his precious golden chicken caused Tatsugorō so much grief that he died. Because of the unhappy circumstances of his death, his ghost was unable to pass on. Normally, when a ghost lingers like this, it attaches itself to the object of its desire, be it a person, a place, or (in this case) a thing. Tatsugorō's soul meant to attach itself to his precious kogane no niwatori. In Japanese, the words for "gong" and "gold" can both be read kane . Poor Tatsugorō's ghost must have gotten confused and attached itself to a nearby shōgo instead of his chicken. The instrument turned into a tsukumogami. ---- Nyoijizai (如意自在) Translation: a pun meaning both "free staff" and "exactly as you please" Habitat: living rooms and bedrooms Appearance: Nyoijizai are nyoi —a kind of priest's staff—that turn into yōkai after existing for many years. They also bear a strong resemblance to magonote, which literally means "grandchild's hand," and refers to backscratchers. A nyoijizai's only power is its ability to scratch that itchy spot on your back which you just can't seem to reach, no matter how hard you try. Nyoijizai's name is a play on words. While nyoi is a term for a priest's staff, it can also mean "as you wish." Jizai means "freely" or "at will." While this name evokes an animated staff, it also literally means "exactly as you please." Thus, nyoijizai is an animated backscratching staff that allows you to freely scratch any place you wish, exactly as you please. ---- Eritategoromo (襟立衣) Translation: standing-collar clothes Habitat: temples Appearance: Eritategoromo are Buddhist high priest's kimonos that have transformed into yōkai. They still look mostly like the high-collared ceremonial robes of a priest. However the long, pointed collars have twisted into long, pointed noses, and they have sprouted eyes and beards. The most famous eritategoromo was once the kimono worn by Sōjōbō, King of the Tengu, who lives on Mount Kurama, north of Kyōto. Sōjōbō is a fearsome, powerful, wise, god-like monster, with the strength of 1000 ordinary tengu. He is a master swordsman, and was responsible for training a number of famous legendary heroes of Japan, such as Minamoto no Yoshitsune. Though he is an ascetic yamabushi and great teacher, like any tengu, Sōjōbō has an evil side too. He is said to feed on children who wander too deep into the mountains. Sōjōbō was not always a tengu. He was born a human, and became a well-respected high priest. He was also proud. He mistakenly believed that he had achieved satori, or enlightenment. Though he expected to become a Buddha when he died, he transformed instead into a demonic tengu. Even as a tengu, the proud Sōjōbō continued to live as a Buddhist priest. He trained daily, and wearing his ornate priestly vestments. Either due to Sōjōbō's extreme pride, or due to being worn by a magical tengu, a spirit became attached to his high-collared robes. They transformed into this yōkai. ---- Yanari (家鳴) Translation: house squeaker Habitat: wooden houses, especially new construction Diet: unknown Appearance: Yanari are miniature oni which appear in houses late at night. They live most often in wooden houses—especially those of cheap or new construction in which all of the parts have not had time to settle yet. Yanari often carry miniature weapons or tools, such as mallets or iron clubs. Yanari only do one thing, and they love doing it—making noise. They come out from the floors, ceilings, and the woodwork late at night when everyone is in bed. They run about the house performing mischief. Specifically, yanari bang the furniture, walls, floors, ceilings, and anything else they can find. Although they are usually non-destructive, occasionally they break things. Yanari delight in the work, and take it very seriously. Although tiny, they have a strong work ethic and do their best to perform their duty of making noise to the fullest. Long ago, in Tajima Province, a group of ronin decided to test their courage by spending a night in a haunted house. Late at night, when they were fast asleep, the entire house suddenly began to shake violently. The ronin, thinking it was an earthquake, dashed outside for safety. However, they soon realized that theirs was the only house shaking. The next day the ronin visited a wise man who lived nearby and told him of their experience at the haunted house. The wise man offered to stay with them that night to see for himself. Sure enough, late at night, the entire house shook violently. The wise man looked carefully at the floor. Locating the area where the most violent shaking was originating, he stabbed his dagger deep into the tatami mat. Suddenly, the house was quiet. The next morning, the ronin and the wise man examined the house. Under the floor where the wise man had stabbed his dagger they found a strange gravestone dedicated to the memory of a bear. Where the knife had penetrated the stone tablet, blood was trickling out. The wise man asked others in the neighborhood what the strange gravestone could mean. They explained that some time ago there was a bear in these parts who broke into peoples' houses at night. One night it broke into that particular house, and the man who lived in there killed it. In order to appease the spirit of the bear and protect himself from its vengeful ghost, the man had a gravestone placed in the house dedicated to the bear's memory. The ghost of the bear must have possessed that gravestone, which caused the yanari to appear every night and shake the house. ---- Sakabashira (逆柱) Translation: upside-down pillar Habitat: houses Diet: none; it lives off of its own resentment Appearance: Sakabashira are the angry spirits of tree leaves which manifest inside houses where one of the pillars has been placed upside-down—that is to say, in the opposite direction of the way the tree was pointing when it was living. These spirits manifest their grudge late at night, and bring misfortune upon those living in the house. Sakabashira are most well-known for making noises. They creak and moan, imitate the sounds of wooden beams cracking, and sometimes even speak in sentences like, "My neck hurts!" They can cause houses to shake, and the leaf-spirits residing in the tree can manifest as yanari. They act like poltergeists and break things around the house. Sakabashira can be so loud that families move out of a house. These yōkai cause not only strange noises, but also terrible luck. People who stay in a house haunted by sakabashira often lose their family fortunes, or even see all of their possessions consumed in great conflagrations which destroy the cursed house. It has long been a folk belief that a pillar erected in the upside-down position will bring misfortune. Sakabashira are usually the result of a careless mistake on the part of the construction crew. In order to prevent this yōkai from appearing, folk superstition tells us that a pillar must be erected in the same orientation as the tree had when it was alive. However, sometimes support pillars are actually installed upside-down way on purpose. This is due to another folk belief: "The moment a house is completed, it starts to fall apart." As a kind of ward against bad luck, Japanese buildings were sometimes only almost completed, with the final step being left out, or purposefully made into a mistake. The famous shrine Nikko Tōshō-gū is one example. It was built with just one pillar purposefully pointing in the opposite direction. This same superstition was followed when building the imperial palace—placing the final pillar in an upside-down position. During the Edo period, house builders commonly "forgot" to place the last three roof tiles for the same reason. ---- Tenjō kudari (天井下) Translation: ceiling hanger Alternate names: tenjō sagari, tenzurushi Habitat: attics and roof crawlspaces Diet: unknown; possibly humans Appearance: Tenjō kudari has the appearance of a naked, ugly, old woman with a long tongue, and long, disheveled hair. This yōkai was first documented by Toriyama Sekien. Aside from his illustration, little else is known about it. Tenjō kudari spends most of its time in hiding. It lives in the narrow crawl space between the ceiling and the roof. Every so often, in the middle of the night, it crawls out from the ceiling, upside-down, to scare people. In old Japan, the space above the ceiling was connected with superstitions and legends about dead bodies rolling about at night or women being confined like prisoners. Tenjō kudari seems to have been something Toriyama invented based on those myths. During his time, the phrase "to show someone the ceiling" was a colloquial expression for causing trouble—which tenjō kudari certainly does. A few possible connections to origins outside of Toriyama's imagination exist. One involves the story of a yōkai that moved into the roof crawl space of an inn in Yamanashi. During the night, it descended from the ceiling and snatched up travelers to eat. However, it isn't certain whether this myth inspired Toriyama Sekien, or rather was inspired by his work. ---- Makuragaeshi (枕返し) Translation: pillow flipper Alternate names: makura kozō Habitat: bedrooms Diet: none; as a ghost it does not eat Appearance: Makuragaeshi are a kind of zashiki warashi—child ghosts which haunt specific rooms of a house. Though details vary from region to region, they are found all over Japan. They take the form of a small child dressed as a Niō (Buddhist guardian deities), a monk, or a samurai, and appear in bedrooms late at night. Makuragaeshi are named for their primary activity—flipping pillows. People who sleep in a room haunted by makuragaeshi often wake up to find that their pillow has been flipped and is now at their feet. Makuragaeshi are also known for other minor pranks, such as running through ashes and leaving dirty footprints around the rooms they haunt. While most stories about makuragaeshi present them as harmless pranksters, there are a few stories that describe scarier powers. Some don't flip the pillow, but lift up and flip people instead. Others pick up entire tatami mats that people are sleeping on and bounce them around. Still others are said to sit on their victim's chest while he or she sleeps, pressing down hard and squeezing the wind out of the lung. They occasionally cause kanashibari, or sleep paralysis. The most extreme stories say that anyone who sees a makuragaeshi loses consciousness. After they pass out the makuragaeshi steals their souls, leaving them dead. There are as many theories as to where makuragaeshi come from as there are variants of zashiki warashi. Most often they linked to the ghosts of people—particularly children—who died in the room they come to haunt. As makuragaeshi are lower in rank than zashiki warashi, they are often the result of ghosts which died tragically, such as murder victims. However, some makuragaeshi have also been attributed to shape-shifting, prank-loving yōkai such as tanuki or saru (monkeys). Others still have attributed this spirit to the actions of monster cats such as kasha. ---- Abura akago (油赤子) Translation: oil baby Habitat: human-inhabited areas Diet: lamp oil Appearance: Abura akago are yōkai from Ōmi Province. They are a type of hi no tama, or fireball, but can also take on the shape of a baby. Abura akago first appear as mysterious orbs of fire which float aimlessly through the night sky. They drift from house to house and—upon entering one—transform into small babies. In this baby form, they lick the oil from oil lamps and paper lanterns, known as andon. They then turn back into orbs and fly away. Like many other oil-related yōkai, abura akago are said to originate from oil thieves. While the particular circumstances of these oil thieves are lost to time, they mirror so many other yōkai that we can infer that these thieves died and—instead of passing on to the next life—turned into yōkai as a penalty for their sins. ---- Hikeshi baba (火消婆) Translation: fire extinguishing old woman Habitat: human-inhabited areas Diet: unknown; probably omnivorous Appearance: Hikeshi baba takes the form of a white-haired, grotesque-looking, old woman. She wanders from house to house blowing out lanterns. Hikeshi baba is not a dangerous yōkai herself, although her actions can indirectly harm people. Her purpose is to make the world a gloomier place by extinguishing the cheerful, beautiful paper lanterns that decorate Japanese homes. Yōkai, by nature, are not accustomed to bright lights or cheery atmospheres. Her work is intended to make conditions more suitable for other yōkai to come out and do their own misdeeds. ---- Kanbari nyūdō (加牟波理入道) Translation: kanbari priest; the meaning is unknown Alternate names: ganbari nyūdō Habitat: bathrooms Diet: omnivorous Appearance: Kanbari nyūdō is a perverted ghost-like yōkai which lurks outside of bathrooms on New Year's Eve. It has a roughly priest-like appearance, with robes and a tonsured haircut. Its body is covered in thick hairs. Kanbari nyūdō blows a cuckoo out of its mouth. As it only comes out once per year, very little is known about this yōkai. There are many conflicting accounts about what kanbari nyūdō actually does. What is certain is that it lurks outside of bathrooms on New Year's Eve, and peeks into the window at people using the toilet. What happens next varies from place to place. In general, this yōkai brings bad luck in the coming year. In more recent stories, kanbari nyūdō tries to stroke or lick the person using the toilet. Sometimes, it inflicts constipation upon those who see it. Kanbari nyūdō's history and origins are confused and convoluted. According to Toriyama Sekien, this yōkai originally comes from the Chinese god of the toilet, Kakutō. Because the characters used to write Kakutō are similar to the characters used to write the Japanese word for cuckoo, this may have been intended as a pun on Sekien's part. However, Kakutō was not, in fact, a Chinese toilet god. He was actually a 15th century Ming general. The cuckoo connection does actually trace back to China. It was considered bad luck to hear a cuckoo's call in the toilet—if you hear a cuckoo while using the toilet, you have to bark like a dog to counter the curse. This yōkai's name is also a mystery. It can be written in many different ways using many different kanji, although none of them have a particular meaning. They appear to be ateji—kanji chosen solely for their phonetic readings. Jippensha Ikku, an Edo period author, wrote about ganbari nyūdō using kanji meaning "stretched eyes"—very appropriate considering this yōkai's propensity for peeping. However, as no earlier stories use those kanji for the name, it is certainly his own (very clever) fabrication. Ganbari may also be connected to the word ganbaru, which means to try hard and persevere—which may or may not be related to certain bathroom activities. But this is almost certainly a connection made after the fact, rather than being the origin of this yōkai's name. Stories about kanbari nyūdō differ wildly from region to region. According to some local legends, if you enter an outhouse on New Year's Eve at the hour of the ox, between 1 and 3 am, and peer down into the hole and chant "ganbari nyūdō " three times, a human head will appear in the hole. If you then take that head and insert it into your left kimono sleeve and then take it back out, it will turn into a koban —an oval-shaped gold coin. In other regions, the human head must instead be wrapped up inside of a silk cloth and taken back to one's room. When the cloth is unwrapped, it will be filled with gold. In most areas, kanbari nyūdō are thought to be bringers of bad luck. If one enters the toilet on New Year's Eve and chants the spell, "ganbari nyūdō, hototogisu! " ("ganbari priest, cuckoo!") this yōkai will not appear, and thus the following year will not be unlucky. On the other hand, in other areas, chanting the same phrase or even remembering those magic words is unlucky enough to guarantee an entire year of bad luck. ---- Kurote (黒手) Translation: black hand Habitat: toilets Diet: omnivorous Appearance: A kurote is a bizarre, hairy yōkai from the Noto peninsula in Ishikawa Prefecture. Long ago in Noto Province, there was a samurai named Kasamatsu Jingobei. He lived in a nice house, as was typical of samurai at the time. One day, his wife went to use the bathroom, and something strange happened. While using the toilet, she felt a hand reach up from the darkness and stroke her behind. She told her husband, who suspected the work of a mischievous tanuki or kitsune. Jingobei drew his katana and entered the bathroom. Sure enough, as he stood over the toilet, something moved—an arm, covered in thick, black hair, reached up out of the darkness and began making a stroking motion. With one swing of his sword, Jingobei sliced the hand clean off. He put it into a box. Several days later, three yōkai disguised as priests appeared at Jingobei's house. Not realizing their true form, Jingobei invited them in. The first priest said, "There is a strange presence in this house…" Jingobei brought out the box and showed them the hand. The second priest said, "This is the hand of a creature known as a kurote who lives in humans' toilets." The third priest examined the hand closely and snarled, "This is my hand which you cut from my arm!" He immediately transformed into a 9-foot tall, black-haired monster. He snatched the hand away, and then all three priests vanished. Sometime later, while Jingobei was walking home late at night, something like a quilt fell down from the sky on top of him. Wrapped up and unable to move, Jingobei was lifted up seven feet into the air and then violently slammed to the ground. When he came to, Jingobei noticed that the sword he was carrying on his belt—the one which he used to cut off the kurote's hand—was missing. ---- Ikiryō (生霊) Translation: living ghost Alternate names: shōryō, seirei, ikisudama Diet: none; lives off its creator's emotions Appearance: Ikiryō are the souls of still-living people that have temporarily left their bodies and move about on their own. They appear just as the living person from which they spawn. Sometimes they take on a ghostly, translucent form. Other times they are indistinguishable from a living person. There are a number of ways for ikiryō to appear—during a near-death-experience, fainting, intense passion or desire, intense hatred, or even as part of a curse. Ikiryō most commonly appear due to some intense emotion or trauma. The owner of the soul is almost always unaware of the ikiryō's existence. This can lead to some awkward situations and misunderstandings. Folk superstitions about ikiryō go back to before recorded history. According to ancient superstition, just before death the soul leaves the body and is able to walk around, making strange noises and doing other things outside of the body. This is especially common during wartime. The ikiryō of soldiers in far off lands are said to appear to their friends and loved ones moments before or after their deaths, in their war uniforms, to give one last goodbye. The souls of the soon-to-die and recently-deceased are also sometimes seen visiting nearby temples and praying for a few days after their deaths. During the Heian period, ikiryō were a popular subject of stories. They were attributed to intense feelings of love. When a person—usually a woman—felt intense passion and love, her spirit detached from her body and haunted the object of her affection. She might whisper sweet things into his ears. Depending on the strength of her feelings, the ikiryō could even physically move her lover around. This was not romantic, however—people haunted in this way were often tormented to the point of extreme sickness by these ghosts. The most common type ikiryō is born out of rage and jealousy. Just as the ghosts of the dead can go after those who wrong them in life, an ikiryō can manifest from one living person to curse another. These are also usually unconscious manifestations. However, a few famous examples of conscious manifestations of ikiryō curses exist. The shrine visit at the hour of the ox (ushi no koku mairi) and ichijama (from Okinawa) are ceremonial curses in which a person consciously sends their soul from their body to hurt or to kill their enemies. Of course, this sort of black magic often has dire consequences for the performer as well as the target. During the Edo period, ikiryō were considered a symptom of certain illnesses, such as the aptly-named rikonbyō, or "detached soul syndrome," and kage no yamai, or "shadow illness." These horrifyingly-named diseases were Edo period terms for sleepwalking and out-of-body experiences. For carriers of these illnesses, it was said that the soul could depart from the body at night, taking the person's consciousness along with it. This would cause them to experience things from the ikiryō's perspective as if they were actually doing it. A person might have false memories of things he didn't do, or be accused of things he didn't remember. Some people even experienced meeting their own selves, as if they had a doppelganger. Superstitions about ikiryō have persisted into modern times, particularly those dealing with people appearing to family members and friends on or around the times of their deaths. The idea of the soul leaving the body and experiencing things during out of body experiences persists as well, and remains an unexplained phenomenon. ---- Shiryō (死霊) Translation: dead ghost Alternate names: shirei Diet: none; thrives solely on its emotions Appearance: Shiryō are the ghosts of the dead. They contrast with ikiryō, the ghosts of the living. Shiryō is generally synonymous with yūrei ("faint spirit"), as they both refer to the classic Japanese ghost. However while yūrei can be creepy sometimes and beautifully mysterious at other times, shiryō is almost exclusively used to refer to unpleasant, malevolent spirits. The inclusion of the kanji for "death" in the name is the clue that this ghost is not to be romanticized. Shiryō act in similar ways to ikiryō, appearing to relatives or close friends of the deceased. While ikiryō usually appear in the moments just before death, a shiryō appears in the moments just after death. When one appears, it is most often to give one last goodbye to its loved ones before departing. However, shiryō do not always appear in order to say goodbye; sometimes they come to take their loved ones away with them into the world of the dead. Belief in shiryō goes back to before recorded history. They have long been a staple of Japanese folk superstition. One famous account is recorded in Tōno Monogatari, a 1910 collection of folk beliefs which gave birth to the field of academic folklore research in Japan. In this story, there was a young girl who lived together with her father. After her father died, his shiryō appeared before the young girl and tried to take her with him into the world of the dead. The girl narrowly escaped and fled from the house to ask for help. Every night, various friends and distant family members agreed to stay overnight in the house with her and watch over her. Every night without fail, her father's shiryō came looking for her, to try to take her away. Only after a whole month of sleepless, terrifying nights did the ghost stop appearing. Finally the girl was left in peace. ---- Goryō (御霊) Translation: honored ghost Alternate names: mitama Diet: none; exists solely for vengeance Appearance: Goryō are the ghosts of ancient warriors and nobles who died horrible, agonizing deaths and returned to haunt their enemies as dreadful ghosts of vengeance called onryō. These terrible ghosts bring calamity and destruction to those who wronged them in life. Their revenge is often in the form of fires, wars, plagues, droughts, floods, storms, the deaths of imperial family members, and other disasters which the ancient nobility viewed as curses. Because ghosts cannot be killed, the only way to end their wrath was to transform them into peaceful, benevolent spirits. This was done with the help of priests and onmyōji, through the religion known as goryō shinkō—the religion of ghosts. [ The Religion of Ghosts ] Onryō were one of the most terrifying things to Heian period nobles. This explains the great lengths gone to pacify them—often by the very people who caused their deaths. The Heian period was a volatile time, with frequent revolts, succession crises, political scheming, and wars. Many noble families saw their fortunes rise and fall at the expense of others. The belief that one's enemies could harm them even after death weighed heavy. Goryō shinkō refers to superstitious traditions which had been developing in Japan since prehistoric times. These traditions developed into a highly ritualized and important religion during the Heian period. It is the art of pacifying, and often deifying, the souls of the angered dead. Goryō—also called mitama—literally means "honored spirits." In regards to Goryō shinkō, it refers to the ghosts of aristocrats who were dishonored politically, killed in battle, or otherwise died in anguish. These unfortunates turned into vengeful onryō, came back for revenge against those who wronged them, and were pacified, enshrined, and transformed into deities. After the Heian period, goryō shinkō began to decline. As the power of the samurai caste grew, Buddhism gradually supplanted the older rituals and superstitions that were popular with the imperial nobility. But belief in the power of onryō remained. Ghost stories about vengeful onryō remained popular throughout Japan's history, and experienced a major revival during the Edo period. ---- Tatarigami (祟り神) Translation: curse god, curse spirit Diet: vengeance Appearance: Tatarigami are powerful spirits which bring death and destruction, fire and famine, plague, war, and all forms of calamity. They are some of the most powerful evil spirits that haunt Japan, and have done much to shape the culture and politics over the country's long history. Tatarigami can refer to powerful gods of destruction, or to the ghosts of powerful people. Famous tatarigami include gods such as Emperor Gozu, the bull-headed demon god, and Yamata no Orochi, the eight-headed eight-tailed dragon. Also included are the onryō of important historical figures such as Mononobe no Moriya, Emperor Sutoku, Sugawara no Michizane, and Taira no Masakado. In the case of historical figures, they are almost always ancient nobles who died in anguish and transformed into onryō. Tatarigami wreak havoc upon those who wronged them—usually other nobles. In order to appease their vengeful spirits, shrines honoring them have been built across Japan. Through proper appeasement, their curses can be lifted, or at least abated. The Gion Matsuri in Kyōto, one of the most famous festivals in Japan, is an example of a ceremony initially designed to appease a tatarigami. During the Heian period, Kyōto suffered a number of outbreaks which were thought to be caused by Susanoo and Gozu tennō—two powerful gods of disease and destruction. In order to appease their wrath, a festival was held in their honor at the Yasaka Shrine in Gion. To keep the city free from disease, the festival was repeated every year. Eventually the connection to Susanoo and Emperor Gozu was lost, but the festival traditions remain to this day. The appeasement of tatarigami remained an important part of religious life throughout the Heian period and beyond. The duty of pacifying these curse spirits fell to the onmyōji, and popular belief in this superstition helped onmyōdō rise in power. ---- Sanshi (三尸) Translation: the three corpses; the three spirits Appearance: The sanshi are three spiritual worms found inside of humans. Each is about 6 centimeters long. These worms live in their hosts from the moment they are born to the moment they die. They work hard to cause their hosts to do evil things. The names of the sanshi are Jōshi, Chūshi, and Geshi, meaning upper worm, middle worm, and lower worm. Jōshi lives in your head and looks like a Taoist wise man. He is responsible for making your eyes grow weak, creating wrinkles, and growing white hairs. Chūshi lives in your torso and looks like a wild beast. He is responsible for damaging internal organs, making you overeat and overdrink, and causing bad dreams. Geshi lives in the lower half of your body and looks like a human foot with a cow's head. He drains the will and shortens the life of his host. The number 60 is an important number in Chinese astrology, and every sixty days the sanshi leave the body to visit the King of Heaven while their host human sleeps. They report their host's wicked deeds for the year to king. Depending on this report, the King of Heaven shortens each human's life span by a certain amount. To escape the King of Heaven's sentence, Kōshin practitioners do not sleep every 60th night, so the sanshi are never able to leave the body and give their report. Additionally, spells and charms are chanted to prevent any harm done by the sanshi. The following spell is said to defeat the sanshi: HO-U-KO-U-SHI, HO-U-JO-U-SHI ME-I-KO-SHI / SHI-TSU-NYU-U-YO-U-ME-I-I-CHU-U KYO-RI-GA-SHI-N Finally, if you find yourself drowsy and unable to stay awake, the following spell must be chanted: SHI-YA-MU-SHI-HA, I-NE-YA-SA-RI-NE-YA WA-GA-TO-KO-WO / NE-TA-RE-ZO-NE-NU-ZO NE-NE-DO-NE-TA-RE-RU-ZO [ Kōshin ] The sanshi derive from Taoist beliefs, many of which were incorporated into Japanese folk religions. The most well-known of these is Kōshin, a religion with Taoist, Shinto, and Buddhist origins mixed with local folk traditions. The custom of staying up all night during Kōshin nights is called Kōshin machi and became popular among the aristocracy of the Heian period. They stayed up together in large groups to help pass the time and prevent sleepiness. Kōshin machi soon evolved into an all-night eating and drinking party. Belief in Kōshin enjoyed a resurgence in popularity during the Edo period, as members of all classes began to practice certain aspects of the religion. Today, Kōshin is less well-known. Most Kōshin temples have been absorbed into Buddhist temple complexes. However, many elements still remain hidden in plain sight. Perhaps the most well-known symbol of Kōshin is the statue of the three wise monkeys Mizaru, Kikazaru, and Iwazaru—the see-no-evil, hear-no-evil, say-no-evil monkeys. ---- Abe no Seimei (安倍晴明) Appearance: Abe no Seimei is perhaps the most famous onmyōji in Japanese history. A descendent of the famous poet Abe no Nakamaro, he lived from 921 to 1005 CE. Due to his success as an astrologer and diviner, he was widely believed to be a genius—and a wielder of magical powers and secret knowledge. Abe no Seimei's fame comes from the success he had as an onmyōji in the 10th century. He was a student of Kamo no Tadayuki and Kamo no Yasunori, and succeeded Yasunori as astrologer and diviner for the imperial court. Seimei's duties included foreseeing the gender of unborn babies, diving the location of objects, advising on matters of personal conduct, conducting exorcisms and crafting wards against dark magic and evil spirits, and analyzing and interpreting events such as celestial phenomena. He wrote numerous books on divination and fortune telling, including Senji Ryakketsu, containing six thousand forecast and thirty-six fortune telling techniques using shikigami, and a translation of Hoki Naiden, detailing secret divination techniques. Abe no Seimei was so renowned that the Abe family remained in control of the Bureau of Onmyō until it was shut down in 1869. After his death, stories about Seimei began to spread rapidly and continued to do so for hundreds of years. Eventually, the details of his life became so intertwined with countless legends that the truth was no longer distinguishable from myth. It was believed that Abe no Seimei's magical aptitude derived from a supernatural lineage. His mother was said to be a kitsune, making him half-yōkai. Seimei's father, Abe no Yasuna, saved a white fox which was being chased by hunters. The fox transformed into a beautiful human woman and said her name was Kuzunoha. Out of thanks for saving her life, Kuzunoha became Yasuna's wife and bore him a son, Seimei. By age five, Abe no Seimei's yōkai lineage was becoming apparent. He was able to command weak oni and force them to do his bidding. One day, he witnessed his mother in her fox form. Kuzunoha explained to Seimei that she was the white fox his father once saved. She then fled into the forest, never to return again. Kuzunoha entrusted her son to the onmyōji Kamo no Tadayuki in order to ensure that he would not grow up to be evil. Abe no Seimei had many rivals. One of them was a famous priest from Harima named Chitoku Hōshi. Chitoku was a skilled sorcerer, and wanted to test Seimei to see if he was truly as great as people said he was. Chitoku disguised himself as a traveler and visited Seimei's house, and asked Seimei to teach him magic. Seimei saw through the disguise instantly. Even more, he saw that the two servants Chitoku had brought with him were shikigami—summoned servant spirits—in disguise. Seimei decided to have a little bit of fun with Chitoku. He agreed to train him, but said that it was not a good day, and that he should come back tomorrow. Chitoku went back to his home, while unbeknownst to him, Seimei unsummoned both of the shikigami. The next day, Chitoku realized that his servants were gone, and he approached Seimei to ask him to return his shikigami. Seimei laughed at him, angrily scolding him for trying to trick him. Any other person, he said, would not be so kind to return shikigami that were employed against him! Chitoku realized that he was in way over his head; not only could Seimei see through his disguise, but he was able to manipulate all of his spells as well. He bowed low, begged for forgiveness, and offered to become Seimei's servant. Abe no Seimei's chief rival was a sorcerer from Harima named Ashiya Dōman. Dōman was much older than Seimei, and believed that there was no one in the land who was a better onmyōji than he was. Upon hearing of Seimei's genius, he challenged him to a magical duel. On the day of the competition, many officials and witnesses came to watch. The two sorcerers met in the imperial gardens for the contest. First, Dōman picked up a handful of sand, concentrated over it for a moment, and threw it into the air. The particles of sand turned into countless swallows which began to flit around the garden. Seimei waved his folding fan one time, and all of the swallows turned back into grits of sand. Next, Seimei recited a spell. A dragon appeared in the sky above. Rain began to fall all around them. Dōman recited his spell, however as hard as he tried, he could not cause the dragon to vanish. Instead, the rain grew fiercer and fiercer, filling the garden with water up to Dōman's waist. Finally, Seimei cast his spell again. The rain stopped, and the dragon vanished. The third and final contest was a divination challenge: the contestants had to guess the contents of a wooden box. Dōman, indignant at having lost the previous round, challenged Seimei: "Whoever loses this round will become the other's servant!" Dōman confidently declared that there were 15 oranges inside of the box. Seimei contradicted him, saying that there were 15 rats in the box. The emperor and his attendants who had prepared the test shook their heads, for they had put 15 oranges in the box. They announced that Seimei had lost. However, when they opened the box, 15 rats leaped out! Not only had Seimei divined the contents of the box, he had transformed the oranges into rats, tricking Dōman and the entire court. Victory went to Seimei. Ashiya Dōman continued to hold a grudge against Abe no Seimei, and continued to plot against him. He seduced Seimei's wife and convinced her to tell him Seimei's magical secrets. She showed him the stone box in which Seimei kept Hoki Naiden, his book of spells. Hoki Naiden was a book of secrets which had been passed down since time immemorial from India to Tang, China. It came into the possession of the Japanese envoy, Kibi no Makibi. When Kibi no Makibi returned to Japan from Tang, he presented the secret book to the relatives of his friend Abe no Nakamaro, who remained in China. From there it was passed down and eventually inherited by Abe no Seimei. One night when Seimei returned home, Dōman boasted that he had acquired Seimei's secret magic book. Seimei scolded him, saying that was impossible. So impossible, in fact, that if Dōman did have the book, he could cut Seimei's throat. Dōman triumphantly presented the book, and Seimei, realizing that he had been betrayed by his wife, offered his throat to Dōman. Dōman gladly cut it open. Seimei died. When Seimei was murdered, Saint Hokudō—the Chinese wizard who had given Hoki Naiden to Kibi no Makibi—sensed the loss of a great sorcerer. He traveled across the sea to Japan, collected Seimei's bones, and restored Abe no Seimei to life. The pair of them set out to get revenge on Dōman and Seimei's ex-wife, who was now married to Dōman. Saint Hokudō paid a visit to Seimei's home, where Dōman and his wife were now living. He asked if Abe no Seimei was home, to which Dōman replied that, unfortunately, Abe no Seimei had been murdered some time ago. Saint Hokudō said that was impossible, for he had just seen Seimei earlier that day. Dōman laughed at him, saying that was impossible. So impossible, in fact, that if Seimei was actually alive, he could cut Dōman's throat. Saint Hokudō called out to Abe no Seimei, who presented himself. He then promptly cut open the throats of Ashiya Dōman and his wife. Today, Abe no Seimei is worshipped as a god at many shrines throughout Japan. His main shrine is located in Kyōto, and sits on the site of his former house. ---- Taira no Masakado (平将門) Appearance: Taira no Masakado was a samurai of the Heian period, a powerful warrior, and a great leader. He was born either in the late 800s or early 900s CE and was killed in 940. After his death, his spirit is said to have returned as a vengeful ghost and brought destruction across the country. Along with Emperor Sutoku and Sugawara no Michizane, he is one of the Nihon San Dai Onryō —Three Great Onryō of Japan. Though Taira no Masakado's birth date is unknown, he is believed to have been born sometime around when Sugawara no Michizane died. A Meiji period biography of Taira no Masakado suggests that he may have been Sugawara no Michizane's reincarnation; his revolt against the emperor may actually have been a continuation of Michizane's curse. Taira no Masakado was born into the Kanmu Heishi, the clan of Taira descended from Emperor Kanmu. It was an elite family. Masakado had a privileged childhood in the capital, after which he settled down in Shimōsa Province in Eastern Japan, northeast of modern day Tōkyō. His troubles only began after his father died. Inheritance laws at this time were not firmly established, and his uncles tried to steal most of his father's land. They claimed their royal lineage gave them the right to do so. In 935 CE, the dispute with his family members broke into outright battle. Masakado was ambushed by one of his uncles and a number of Minamoto warriors. But Masakado was a powerful warrior. He quickly defeated them, and then took his revenge by burning their lands, ravaging the countryside, and slaughtering thousands. This brought him into conflict with other relatives by blood and by marriage, who brought their dispute to the emperor. Taira no Masakado was summoned to court to answer charges of the relatives of the dead Minamoto warriors. Masakado was not only brave, he was also smart. He had taken great pains to remain within the law and proved that he had good reason for his killings. After only a few months, he was fully pardoned when the court offered a general amnesty in commemoration of Emperor Suzaku's coming of age. Taira no Masakado returned to his home, but soon found himself under attack. This time, it was his father-in-law and his relatives. Again, Masakado quickly defeated them. To avoid stirring up more political trouble, Masakado received a warrant to apprehend his attackers. Now, with legal sanction for his military action, he stormed into their lands on a quest for revenge. In 938 CE, Taira no Masakado received another court summons for questioning about a quarrel with one of the cousins who had attacked him. This time, Masakado ignored the summons. He raised a large force and invaded Hitachi Province. He conquered eight provinces: Shimotsuke, Kōzuke, Musashi, Kazusa, Awa, Sagami, Izu, and Shimōsa. The whole time, he maintained his innocence, insisting that his campaign was legal under the terms of his warrant. The government was seen as ineffectual and the nobles as abusive by the peasants of the time. Taira no Masakado, on the other hand, treated the peasants of his conquered domains much better than their former masters did. His insurrection was seen as a salvation by many peasants. They welcomed him gladly. The court feared that Taira no Masakado was preparing to overthrow the government and declare himself the new emperor of Japan. He was condemned as a rebel and a traitor. A number of warriors—including Masakado's ally Fujiwara no Hidesato and some his own relatives—were commissioned by the government to take his head. They caught up with Masakado's army in Shimōsa Province on the fourteenth day of the second month of 940 CE. They attacked during a night ambush and quickly defeated the rebels. Masakado's men were outnumbered ten to one. Masakado was beheaded, betrayed by his friends and family. The head was brought back to Kyōto to be displayed in the east market as a message to would-be rebels. Strangely, Taira no Masakado's head did not decompose. Many months after it was first displayed in the east market, it still looked as fresh as the day it was severed. The eyes had grown fiercer, and the mouth twisted up into a hideous grimace. Night after night the head would call out, "Where is my murdered body!? Come here! Reattach my head and let me fight once again!" And then things got really strange. One night the head began to glow. It flew off into the sky, across the country, towards Shimōsa. The head eventually grew tired and landed to rest in a fishing village called Shibazaki (which would one day grow into the city of Edo). The villagers who found the head cleaned it and buried it. A shrine was erected over the grave and named Kubizuka —the mound of the head. Masakado was honored and worshipped by the peasants as a true warrior, a symbol of justice who stood in heroic defiance of a corrupt and lazy nobility. He was seen as an underdog who was repeatedly betrayed and eventually murdered by those he should have been able to trust. Despite his deification and popularity among the lower classes, his ghost was not appeased. A few years after his head was buried, the ghost of a samurai began to be seen in the neighborhood of his shrine. In the early 1300s, a great plague struck Edo. Many people died. The plague was attributed to Taira no Masakado's anger. In order to appease him, his spirit was moved from his small shrine to the larger and more prestigious Kanda Shrine. He was designated one of the main gods, and his spirit was placated—for a while. In 1874, Emperor Meiji visited the Kanda Shrine. It was viewed as inappropriate for an enemy of the imperial family like Masakado to be honored when the emperor was visiting, and so his deity status was revoked. His shrine was moved to a smaller building outside of the main shrine. Taira no Masakado's anger returned in 1928. After the Great Kanto Earthquake destroyed much of the city, the site of his Kubizuka was chosen as the temporary location for the Ministry of Finance. Shortly afterwards, the Minister of Finance became sick and died. Over a dozen other employees died, and even more became sick or were injured in falls and accidents in the building. Rumors about the curse ran began to spread. The Ministry of Finance building was demolished and a memorial service for Masakado was held at the Kanda Shrine. Throughout the 20th century, a number of other accidents, fires, sicknesses, and mysterious sightings were attributed to the curse of Taira no Masakado. Each time, purification rituals were performed. Finally, in 1984, in response to public pressure, his deity status was reinstated. Today, great pains are taken not to anger his ghost. For example, it is common practice for television stations to visit the grave of his head, still located in what is now Otemachi, Tōkyō. They pay their respects to him before his character appears on any show. The Kubizuka is maintained by an organization of local businesses and volunteers who have taken on the responsibility of upkeeping of his grave. Many statues of frogs decorate Taira no Masakado's gravesite. The Japanese word for frog, kaeru, is a homophone of the word meaning "return." Just as Masakado's severed head returned to his hometown, people pray to his spirit that their loved ones will kaeru —return—safely. It is also said that the frogs may symbolize the frog magic that the wizard Nikushisen taught to Masakado's daughter, Takiyasha hime. ---- Takiyasha hime (滝夜叉姫) Translation: Princess Takiyasha; literally "waterfall demon princess" Appearance: Takiyasha hime is the daughter of Taira no Masakado and a sorceress who raised an army of yōkai and attempted to conquer Japan. Her story became popular in the Edo period, and is depicted in novels, woodblock prints, and kabuki. The details of her story vary quite a bit from version to version. After Taira no Masakado was defeated and his rebellion quashed, the imperial court declared Masakado's entire family to be traitors and ordered their execution. Two of Masakado's children, Yoshikado and Satsuki hime, somehow managed to escape their execution. They remained in hiding at a temple at the base of Mount Tsukuba for years. Satsuki hime became a devoted nun, but her brother was not interested in religion. He spent his time exploring the mountain and playing at being a samurai. One day while exploring Mount Tsukuba, Yoshikado encountered a mysterious wizard named Nikushisen. Nikushisen informed Yoshikado that he was the heir of Taira no Masakado, and gave him a magic scroll containing the secrets of frog magic. Yoshikado returned to his sister, and told her everything Nikushisen had said. He gave her the scroll. She studied it and also became a master of frog magic, and took the name Takiyasha hime. The two of them decided to fulfill their father's dream of overthrowing the emperor and ushering in a new order. In a different version of the story, instead of Yoshikado meeting Nikushisen, Satsuki hime secretly began to perform the dreaded curse ushi no koku mairi—the shrine visit at the hour of the ox. Every night, she snuck into the Kifune Shrine and performed the ritual. After twenty-one nights, she awakened the aramitama—the violent, wicked spirit—of the Kifune Shrine. The aramitama spoke to her, granting her the knowledge of onmyōdō, and instructing her to take the name Takiyasha hime. Takiyasha hime and Yoshikado returned to their father's fortress of Sōma Castle in Shimōsa Province. They called on the surviving soldiers who remained loyal to their father's cause. Using her newly acquired black magic, Takiyasha hime raised an army of yōkai to continue her father's rebellion against the emperor. Ōya no Tarō Mitsukuni, a warrior who was knowledgeable about onmyōdō, had heard of Takiyasha hime's plans and set out to Sōma Castle to investigate if the rumors were true. When he arrived, Takiyasha hime disguised herself as a prostitute and tried to seduce Mitsukuni. However, Mitsukuni suspected a trap and told her about the brutal death of Taira no Masakado. She could not contain her emotion, and she fled from Mitsukuni. That night, Takiyasha hime ambushed Mitsukuni with an army of skeletons and yōkai. She unleashed a gashadokuro upon him—a gigantic skeleton as tall as a castle. Riding into battle on top of a giant toad, Takiyasha hime assaulted the brave warrior Mitsukuni. However, despite her magic, in the end she was defeated. Her short rebellion was snuffed out just as her father's was. ---- Osakabe hime (長壁姫) Translation: the lady of the walls Habitat: secret areas of Himeji Castle Appearance: Osakabe hime is a reclusive yōkai who lives high up in the keep of Himeji Castle. She takes the appearance of a majestic old woman wearing a 12-layered kimono. Osakabe hime is a powerful yōkai, capable of manipulating people like puppets. She is extremely knowledgeable about many things and controls a multitude of kenzokushin —animal-like spirits who act as messengers. She can read a person's heart and see their true desires. She can then manipulate them any way she pleases. It is rumored that anybody who sees her face will die instantly. Osakabe hime absolutely hates meeting people. She spends most of her time hidden away in secret areas of Himeji Castle. However, once a year, she comes out of hiding to meet with the castle lord and foretell the castle's fortune for the next year. Osakabe hime's true identity is a mystery. By popular account, she is actually an elderly nine-tailed kitsune who takes the form of this yōkai. According to other accounts, she may be a snake spirit, or the ghost of one of Emperor Fushimi's favorite courtesans. She may even be the sister of Kame hime, a similar yōkai who lived in Inawashiro Castle in Mutsu Province. Another common legend is that she was originally the kami of the mountain upon which Himeji Castle was built. When Himeji Castle was expanded by Hideyoshi in the 1580s, the shrine dedicated to the local goddess of Mount Hime, Osakabegami, was removed. The goddess was re-enshrined in Harima Sōja, a shrine dedicated to several gods. In the 1600s, when the lord of the castle, Ikeda Terumasa, fell mysteriously ill, rumors arose that his sickness was due to the goddess's anger at having been removed. In order to appease her, a small temple was built in the keep and Osakabegami was re-enshrined at the top of her mountain. Osakabegami may be the true identity of Osakabe hime. During the Edo period, a young page named Morita Zusho went on a dare to go see if a yōkai really lived in the upper floors of Himeji Castle. He waited until nightfall, and then—paper lantern in hand—he climbed to the top of the keep. As brave as he was, Zusho couldn't help imagining what would happen to him if there really was such a creature up there. Finally, when he reached the top floor, he saw a faint light coming from a door in the attic. He peeked in, but whoever was inside had heard him. A woman's voice called out, "Who's there!?" Zusho was paralyzed with fear. He heard the sound of a kimono rustling. The door opened up to reveal a beautiful, elegant woman in her thirties wearing a splendid 12-layered kimono. Zusho felt his strength return and politely introduced himself and explained his reason for coming. Amused, the yōkai replied, "A test of bravery, you say? You will need some proof that you actually saw me." She gave him a neck guard of a helmet— piece of his master's own family heirloom armor—to show his master as proof that he met Osakabe hime. The next day, Zusho told the story of what had happened to his master. Everyone had trouble believing him because they had always heard that the yōkai took the form of an old woman and not a young one. But when Zusho presented the neck guard, his master was shocked and had no choice but to believe the story. ---- Sugawara no Michizane (菅原道真) Appearance: Sugawara no Michizane was a scholar, poet, and politician who fell out of favor with the emperor and died in exile. He lived from 845 to 903 CE, and is considered one of the greatest scholars and poets in all of Japanese history. After his death, he returned from the grave as a wrathful onryō to wreak his vengeance upon those who had wronged him in life. This earned him a position among the Nihon San Dai Onryō —the Three Great Onryō of Japan. Sugawara no Michizane was born the eldest son of a high-ranking family of scholars. From a very early age, he showed his brilliance, composing elegant poems by the age of five. He was well-educated and lived a privileged life, gradually climbing the ranks of the bureaucracy and increasing his public standing. Sugawara no Michizane was an excellent student and scholar. Passing the highest level of government exams at age 26, he received the equivalent of a PhD at age 33. Michizane was selected to be governor of Sanuki Province in 886. During his time as governor he composed a great deal of poetry. In 888, during the Akō Incident, he supported Emperor Uda in his rivalry with Fujiwara no Mototsune. This action earned him a great deal of political clout. When the Emperor consolidated his power, he demoted officials from the Fujiwara clan and promoted officials from the Minamoto clan. Michizane was not a noble, but he too was rewarded. Hs rank rose even further, and he picked up many important court titles, including Ambassador to the Tang Dynasty. This caused unrest among the nobles—particularly the Fujiwaras. They felt indignant that a non-noble scholar should be elevated to such elite ranks. When Emperor Uda abdicated to Emperor Daigo, Sugawara no Michizane's fortunes declined rapidly. Both Michizane and Fujiwara no Tokihira—the son of Fujiwara no Mototsune, whom Michizane had censured years ago—were the emperor's primary advisors. Tokihira advised the emperor that he should pacify the indignant Fujiwara nobility by sending Michizane away. The emperor listened. Michizane lost his rank and titles, and was demoted from his high position to very minor regional government post at Dazaifu, Chikuzen Province. There, he experienced a thankless life of hard work under much stricter and more severe conditions than in Kyōto. Despite his humiliation and exile to Kyūshū, Sugawara no Michizane continued to work hard and earnestly for the sake of the country. All the while he prayed for the well-being of the imperial family and the safety of Japan. His hard work was never acknowledged, and he never regained his prestige. He regretted his demotion, and longed for his beloved Kyōto for the rest of his life. Late in the second month of 903, as the plums were blossoming, Michizane died. His heart was filled with loneliness and resentment. After Sugawara no Michizane's death, a series of disasters struck Kyōto. Plague and drought spread over the city. His rival Fujiwara no Tokihira died at the age of 39. The sons of Emperor Daigo became sick and died one after another. A lightning bolt struck the Seiryōden palace, causing a fire which killed a number of the officials who had participated in Michizane's demotion and exile. A few months later, Emperor Daigo himself became sick and died. Everyone in the capital had become convinced that Michizane's ghost had become a thunder god and was punishing those who had wronged him. Sugawara no Michizane's onryō continued to curse the capital with disaster upon disaster. Eventually, the emperor built a shrine to his spirit and posthumously restored his rank and office. He removed any mention of Michizane's exile from the official records. However, it did not appease his spirit, and the disasters kept coming. Finally, in 987, during the reign of Emperor Ichijō, Sugawara no Michizane was promoted and deified as the highest rank of state kami. A special shrine was built for him in northern Kyōto, and a festival was established in his honor. Michizane became known as Tenman Tenjin, the god of scholarship. The curse was finally appeased. Tenjin remains a popular god to this day. Paintings of him are hung in homes across the country, and students from all over Japan visit his shrines to pray for luck on their school examinations. Tenjin shrines commonly hold festivals in late February, when plum trees start to bloom, and when school examination results are posted. The plum tree is commonly associated with Tenjin, as it was his favorite tree. Shrines dedicated to him commonly have plum trees on their grounds. Legend has it that while in exile in Dazaifu, he longed so deeply for his favorite plum tree that one night it flew from Kyōto to Kyūshū to be with him. That tree still stands today at the Dazaifu Tenman-gu in Fukuoka. ---- Sutoku Tennō (崇徳天皇) Translation: Emperor Sutoku Appearance: Sutoku Tennō is one of the three most famous yōkai to ever haunt Japan. After he died, he transformed—some say into a terrible onryō, some say into a great tengu—and inflicted his wrath upon the imperial court at Kyōto. Along with Tamamo no Mae and Shuten dōji, Emperor Sutoku is one of the legendary Nihon San Dai Aku Yōkai —the Three Terrible Yōkai of Japan. Along with Sugawara no Michizane and Taira no Masakado, he is one of the legendary Nihon San Dai Onryō —the Three Great Onryō of Japan. Prince Akihito was born in 1119 CE, the first son of Emperor Toba. At least that was on the official registry. It was an open secret, known by everyone in the court, that Akihito was actually sired by the retired former Emperor Shirakawa. Akihito was not well liked by his "father," who constantly referred to him as a bastard. His true father Shirakawa may have been the former emperor, but he still wielded considerable power in his retirement. When Prince Akihito was 5 and Emperor Toba was 21, Shirakawa forced Toba into retirement. Akihito became Emperor Sutoku. After Shirakawa died in 1129, retired Emperor Toba began orchestrating his trap against Emperor Sutoku. He convinced him that the cloistered life of retired emperor was much better than being the actual emperor. He suggested that Sutoku adopt Toba's son Prince Narihito, and retire. In 1142, Sutoku finally did so. Toba oversaw the process, and made sure to record that the emperor was retiring and passing the throne on to Narihito instead of his own progeny. This ensured that Sutoku would wield no power over the young emperor, nor would any future son ever become emperor. The 3-year old Narihito became Emperor Konoe, and the retired Emperor Toba wielded all of the power behind the throne. Toba sent Sutoku's allies to distant provinces, and filled the capital with his own allies. There was nothing Sutoku could do. Emperor Konoe remained sickly and childless his whole life. He passed away without an heir in 1155 at the age of 17. By this time, Sutoku had his own son. He saw an opportunity to recover his standing. Sutoku and his allies claimed that the throne should pass on to Sutoku's son. Instead the imperial court declared that Toba's fourth son would become Emperor Go-Shirakawa. When Toba died the following year, this dispute escalated into a miniature civil war known as the Hōgen Rebellion. The war was decided in a single battle. The forces of Go-Shirakawa were victorious. After the Hōgen Rebellion, Go-Shirakawa's forces were merciless. Those who fought against the emperor were executed, along with their entire families. Former Emperor Sutoku was banished from Kyōto and forced to spend the rest of his days exiled to Sanuki Province. He shaved his head and became a monk, devoting himself copying holy manuscripts to send back to Kyōto. The court feared that the deposed Sutoku would attempt to curse them. It was rumored that he had bitten off his own tongue and wrote the manuscripts in his own blood, imbuing them with his hatred for the merciless imperial court. The court added insult to injury by refusing to accept any of his manuscripts. In 1164, Sutoku passed away, defeated, deposed, and humiliated—and most importantly full of rage for the imperial court. When news of his death reached Emperor Go-Shirakawa, the emperor ignored it. He ordered that nobody should go into mourning, and that no state funeral would be held for such a criminal. After his death, strange things began to happen. Sutoku's body was set aside while its caretakers awaited funeral instructions from the emperor. After 20 days, his body was still as fresh as it had been on the day he died. While his coffin was taken to be cremated, a terrible storm rolled in. The caretakers placed the casket on the ground to take shelter. After the storm passed, the stones around the casket were soaked with fresh blood. When his body was finally cremated, the ashes descended upon Kyōto in a dark cloud. Afterwards, for many years, disaster upon disaster struck the capital. Go-Shirakawa's successor, Emperor Nijo, died suddenly at age 23. Storms, plagues, fires, droughts, and earthquakes all pounded the capital. Imperial power weakened. Clan rivalries set into motion by the Hōgen Rebellion escalated. Many of Go-Shirakawa's allies were killed in battles, and the country stepped closer and closer to all-out civil war. In 1180, the Genpei War broke out. In 5 bloody years, the power of the imperial court had vanished, and the Kamakura shogunate took over Japan. All of this was attributed to Emperor Sutoku's vengeance. Sutoku finally returned to the capital during the Meiji era. In 1868, he was enshrined as a kami in the Shiramine Shrine in Kyōto. The Takaya Shrine in Kagawa also enshrines one of the stones onto which Sutoku's blood flowed during the rainstorm before his cremation. Despite this, there are still rumors that his curse might still linger. In 2012, when NHK broadcast the drama Taira no Kiyomori, an earthquake struck the Kanto region right at the moment when Emperor Sutoku transformed into an onryō. ---- Tamamo no Mae (玉藻前) Translation: a nickname literally meaning "Lady Duckweed" Appearance: Tamamo no Mae is one of the most famous kitsune in Japanese mythology. A nine-tailed magical fox, she is also one of the most powerful yōkai that has ever lived. Her magical abilities were matched only by her trickiness and lust for power. Tamamo no Mae lived during the Heian period, and though she may not have succeeded in her plan to kill the emperor and take his place, her actions destabilized the country and lead it towards one of the most important civil wars in Japanese history. For that reason, Tamamo no Mae is considered one of the Nihon San Dai Aku Yōkai —the Three Terrible Yōkai of Japan. Tamamo no Mae appears in numerous texts and has been a popular subject throughout Japanese history. Her story is portrayed in literature, noh, kabuki, bunraku, and other forms of art. There are several variations on her story. Tamamo no Mae was born some 3,500 years ago in what is now China. Her early life is a mystery, but she eventually became a powerful sorceress. After hundreds of more years she became a white faced, golden furred kyūbi no kitsune—a nine-tailed fox with supreme magical power. In addition, she was an expert at manipulation. She used her charms and wit to advance her standing and influence world affairs. During the Shang Dynasty Tamamo no Mae was known as Daji. She disguised herself as a beautiful woman and became the favorite concubine of King Zhou of Shang. Daji was a model of human depravity. She held orgies in the palace gardens. Her fondness for watching and inventing new forms of torture are legendary. Daji eventually brought about the fall of the entire Shang Dynasty. She managed to escape execution, and fled to the Magadha kingdom in India in 1046 BCE. In Magadha, she was known as Lady Kayō, and became a consort of King Kalmashapada, known in Japan as Hanzoku. She used her beauty and charms to dominate the king, causing him to devour children, murder priests, and commit other unspeakable horrors. Eventually—whether because she ran out children to eat or because Kalmashapada began to turn away from her and towards Buddhism—she fled back to China. During the Zhou Dynasty she called herself Bao Si, and was known as one of the most desirable women in all of China. In 779 BCE she became a concubine of King You. Not satisfied as just a mistress, she manipulated the king into deposing his wife Queen Shen and making Bao Si his new queen. Though she was beautiful, Bao Si rarely ever smiled. In order to please his beautiful new wife, King You committed acts of such evil and atrocity that eventually all of his nobles abandoned and betrayed him. Eventually, King You was killed and Bao Si captured and the Western Zhou Dynasty was brought to an end in 771 BCE. Somehow Bao Si managed to escape again; she went into hiding for many years. Little is known of her activities until the 700s, when she resurfaced disguised as a 16-year old girl named Wakamo. She tricked the leaders of the 10th Japanese envoy to the Tang Dynasty—Kibi no Makibi, Abe no Nakamaro, and Ganjin—as they were preparing to return home to Japan. Wakamo joined their crew and took the ship to Japan, where she hid herself away for over 300 years. In the 1090s, she resurfaced once again. This time she transformed herself into a human baby and hid by the side of the road. A married couple found the baby and rescued it, taking her in as their daughter and naming her Mizukume. She proved to be an exceedingly intelligent and talented young girl, and was so beautiful that she attracted to attention of everyone around her. When she was 7 years old, Mizukume recited poetry before the emperor. His imperial majesty immediately took a liking to her and employed her as a servant in his court. Mizukume excelled at court, absorbing knowledge like a sponge. There was no question she could not answer, whether it was about music, history, astronomy, religion, or Chinese classics. Her clothes were always clean and unwrinkled. She always smelled pleasant. Mizukume had the most beautiful face in all of Japan, and everyone who saw her loved her. During the summer of her 18th year, a poetry and instrument recital was held in Mizukume's honor. During the recital, an unexpected storm fell upon the palace. All of the candles in the recital room were snuffed, leaving the participants in the dark. Suddenly, a bright light emanated from Mizukume's body, illuminating the room. Everybody at court was so impressed by her genius and declared that she must have had an exceedingly good and holy previous life. She was given the name Tamamo no Mae. Emperor Toba, already exceedingly fond of her, made her his consort. Almost immediately after she became the emperor's consort, the emperor fell deathly ill. None of the court physicians could determine the cause, and so the onmyōji Abe no Yasunari was called in. Abe no Yasunari read the emperor's fortune and divined that he was marked by a bad omen. After that, the highest priests and monks were summoned to the palace to pray for the emperor's health. The best prayers of the highest priests had no effect, however. The emperor continued to grow worse. Abe no Yasunari was summoned again to read the emperor's fortune. This time, to his horror the onmyōji discovered that the emperor's beloved Tamamo no Mae was the cause of his illness. She was a kitsune in disguise, and was shortening the emperor's life span in order to take over as ruler of Japan. Emperor Toba was reluctant to believe the diviner's words, but agreed to test Tamamo no Mae just to be sure. To save the emperor's life, Abe no Yasunari prepared the Taizan Fukun no Sai, the most secret and most powerful spell known to onmyōdō. Tamamo no Mae was ordered to perform part of the ritual. They reasoned that an evil spirit would not be able to participate in such a holy ritual. Though she was reluctant to participate, the emperor's ministers persuaded her. They told her that it would increase her standing an admiration among the court. She had little choice but to accept. When the ritual was performed, Tamamo no Mae dressed even more beautifully than normal. She recited the holy worlds as expected and played her part extremely well. But just as she prepared to wave the ceremonial staff, she vanished. Abe no Yasunari's divination was confirmed. The court flew into an uproar. Soon after, word arrived that women and children were disappearing near Nasuno in Shimotsuke Province. The court sorcerers determined that Tamamo no Mae was the cause, and it was decided that she must be destroyed once and for all. The emperor summoned the best warriors in all of the land and then charged the most superb of them, Kazusanosuke and Miuranosuke, to find Tamamo no Mae. The warriors gladly accepted the honor. They purified themselves and set out with an army of 80,000 men to slay the nine-tailed kitsune. Upon reaching Nasuno the army quickly found the kitsune. The warriors chased her for days and days, but the fox used her magical powers and outsmarted them time and time again, easily escaping. The army grew weary, and frustration set in. It seemed that nothing they did was working. However, Kazusanosuke and Miuranosuke would not accept the shame of defeat and vowed to press on. They practiced harder, honing their tactics, and eventually picked up the kitsune's trail. One night, Miuranosuke had a prophetic dream. A beautiful young girl appeared before him, crying. She begged: "Tomorrow I will lose my life to you. Please save me." Miuranosuke adamantly refused, and upon waking the warriors set out again to find Tamamo no Mae. Sure enough, the next day they caught her. Miuranosuke fired two arrows, one through the fox's flank and one through its neck. Kazusanosuke swung his blade. It was over, just as the dream had said. However, Tamamo no Mae's evil did not end with her death. One year after she died, Emperor Konoe died, heirless. The following year, her lover and former Emperor Toba died as well. A succession crisis ignited between forces loyal to Emperor Go-Shirakawa and forces loyal to former Emperor Sutoku. This crisis started the Fujiwara-Minamoto rivalry that led to the Genpei War, the end of the Heian period, and the rise of the first shoguns. As if that were not enough, Tamamo no Mae's spirit haunted a massive boulder which killed every living thing that touched it. ---- Sesshō seki (殺生石) Translation: killing stone Appearance: Sesshō seki is a large boulder that stands in the plains of Nasuno, Shimotsuke (modern day Tochigi Prefecture). Around it is a desolate, lifeless field, filled with toxic gasses and the skeletons of animals who strayed too near. Sesshō seki was formed when the evil nine-tailed kitsune Tamamo no Mae was slain. Her hunters returned triumphantly, bearing her body to the capital. Her spirit, however, attached itself to a large boulder near where she fell. It continued to kill long after her death. Any living thing that wandered close enough to the stone died instantly. Sesshō seki remained a deadly landmark until 1385 CE, when Tamamo no Mae's spirit was put to rest once and for all. One day, a high priest named Gennō was traveling through Shimotsuke Province when he noticed a peculiar sight—the birds in the air fell to their deaths whenever they passed over a certain boulder in the plain of Nasuno. At the base of the stone was a pile of dead birds. Gennō wondered what could cause such a phenomenon. Not long afterwards, a local woman appeared near the priest, and he asked her about the stone. The woman explained that Sesshō seki was haunted by the spirit of Tamamo no Mae. She told him the story of the fox courtesan, and then vanished. Gennō realized that the woman had been the ghost of the infamous kitsune. He performed a Buddhist memorial service over the stone, and suddenly Tamamo no Mae's spirit reappeared and confessed all of her sins, going back thousands of years all the way to India and China. After hearing Gennō's pure words and Buddhist teachings, Tamamo no Mae repented all of her evils and swore never again to do wrong, and then disappeared. Her spirit, exorcised from the rock, never harmed anyone again. Gennō—whose name means hammer—hit the rock and it burst into many pieces. The pieces flew all across Japan, where many of them remain today. The base of the rock still stands in Nasu, Tochigi. Other chunks flew to Okayama, Niigata, Hiroshima, and Ōita where they were enshrined. Smaller fragments landed in present-day Fukui, Gifu, Nagano, Gunma, and parts of Shikoku, where they were picked up and used as magical amulets to perform charms or curses. ---- Shikigami (式神) Translation: ceremonial spirit Alternate names: shikijin, shiki no kami Diet: varies Shikigami are servant spirits used by onmyōji in rituals for various purposes. Some are used as charms for good fortune, some are used as amulets for protection, and some are used as curses. To call a shikigami means to call a god, a demon, a yōkai, or a ghost and to utilize its power for some deed or another. Shikigami can be powerful and dangerous. They come in many forms. The most common are enshrined in small objects, such as strips of paper or amulets. Others may come in the form of animal possessions, using the bodies of chickens, cows, or dogs as vessels. The most dreadful shikigami take the form of humans, ghosts, yōkai, or oni. While shikigami are powerful and terrifying, perhaps their most horrifying aspect is that they never act under their own will; they are slaves in the service of human magic users who tell them what to do. [ Controlling Spirits ] According to Shinto belief, humans and kami all have a soul known as mitama . A mitama is divided into four separate spirits, or tamashii, which oppose each other. These are controlled by another spirit, calling a naohi, which forms a connection between heaven and earth. The four tamashii are aramitama, nigimitama, sakimitama, and kushimitama . Aramitama is the spirit of courage, perseverance, and extroversion. Nigimitama is the spirit of peace, harmony, and cooperation. Sakimitama is the spirit of happiness, love, and affection. Kushimitama is the spirit of wisdom, observation, and analysis. Aramitama and nigimitama oppose each other, while sakimitama and kushimitama are considered to be aspects of the nigimitama. All four of these spirits are controlled by the naohi—the oversoul—and they work together to form one soul. When dealing with spirit summoning, it is important to know which tamashii you are dealing with. Nigimitama manifest as benevolent and helpful spirits. Aramitama manifest as raging, wild, dangerous spirits. These opposing tamashii differ so much—even within the same kami—that they can seem to be two separate beings. Much of Shinto is based on the concept of pacifying the aggressive aramitama and bringing forth the peaceful nigimitama. Helpful prayers and songs are normally directed to the nigimitama of the kami in order to bring out its benevolence. Dark summoning and spells meant to harm others invoke the much more dangerous aramitama. ---- Tanuki tsuki (狸憑き) Translation: tanuki (raccoon dog) possession Appearance: Spirit possession can be caused by humans and ghosts, but frequently it is the work of animals with supernatural powers. One of the most common animal possessions is called tanuki tsuki—possession by tanuki spirits. When tanuki possess human beings, their victims develop strange new personality traits. One of the most common changes is gluttony. Victims become intensely hungry and eat and eat, even going so far as to eat spoiled and ruined food. Although possessed humans grow vast waists from this gluttony, all of the nutrition goes to the tanuki spirits. Victims only grow weaker and weaker until finally they die from malnutrition. Other common symptoms of tanuki possession include unexplained illness, melancholy, becoming overly talkative, sudden outbursts of violence, or abnormally increased libido. Tanuki possess humans for various reasons, but common ones include revenge for destroying the tanuki's den, or simply just as a prank. In rare cases, some human families have harnessed the power of animal possession for their own use. Some legends tell of people offering food to old, wild tanuki, taming them, and then using their spirits to possess their enemies. Because tanuki are powerful yōkai, it is difficult to escape tanuki tsuki. Either the tanuki must leave of its own will, or it must be driven out by a powerful yamabushi, priest, or onmyōji. Another solution is to deify the tanuki. A tanuki elevated to the level of a kami will no longer possess humans. Many villages—particularly in Shikoku—have built shrines to worship particularly troublesome tanuki. [ Keeping it in the Family ] Animals and spirits that can possess humans are called tsukimono . Some families, called tsukimono suji, keep animal spirits as servants. They are able to use them as shikigami. These servant spirits are called upon to perform wicked deeds against the family's enemies. Often these families retain control over their tsukimono for generations, passing them on down the family line like precious heirlooms. The use of tsukimono black magic against others has been illegal since long ago. Those with the power carefully guard their secrets. Common animals used by tsukimono suji families are dogs, such as inugami, various types of foxes, snakes, weasels, and martens. Tanuki are less commonly used in this way, but the use of tanuki spirits by humans is not unheard of. Owning a tsukimono allowed a family to gain power and money. Many became nouveaux riche. They were envied for their wealth but feared for their taboo powers. People were strongly advised against marrying into tsukimono suji families. ---- Inugami (犬神) Translation: dog god, dog spirit Alternate names: ingame, irigami Appearance: Inugami are a kind of shikigami that was once popular in Kyūshū, Shikoku, and elsewhere in western Japan. In public, inugami look identical to ordinary dogs. This disguise lets them blend in with society. However, their true form is a desiccated, mummified dog's head, often dressed up in ceremonial trappings. This is used as a fetish to summon and control the spirit. This is kept safe and away from prying eyes, usually in a secret shrine in its owner's house. Inugami are used for all manner of nefarious deeds. They serve their masters loyally, performing tasks just like trained, faithful dogs. They are bound to one person or one family only, and unless seriously mistreated they remain loyal forever. They can even be inherited from generation to generation like heirlooms. Like other shikigami, inugami are powerful spirits. Their primary use is to possess and control other people. They are created from strong emotions, and thus are skilled at possessing emotionally unstable or weak people. Not only humans, but animals such as cows and horses, and even inanimate objects, can be possessed by inugami. Possessed animals become sick and unable to work. Possessed tools become dull, or are otherwise rendered completely unusable. People who find themselves possessed by an inugami are in for some serious misfortune. Inugami usually enter through the ears and settle in the internal organs. Signs of inugami possession include chest pain, pain in the hands, feet, or shoulders, feelings of deep jealousy, and suddenly barking like a dog. Some victims develop intense hunger and turn into gluttons. It is said that people who die while possessed by an inugami are found with markings all over their body resembling the teeth and claw marks of a dog. The only way to be cured of inugami tsuki is to hire an onmyōji to expel the spirit. This could take a very, very long time and involve a great deal of money. The technique for creating inugami is passed down along bloodlines. Such families are known as inugami mochi . These families keep their inugami hidden in the back rooms of their houses, under their beds, in dressers, or hidden among water jars. Inugami mochi families own as many inugami as there are members of the household. When a new person joins the family, they receive their own familiar. Inugami are treated like family members by inugami mochi households. Most of the time these dog spirits do their master's bidding without complaint. However, like living dogs, occasionally a resentful inugami might betray an owner that has grown too abusive or domineering. Inugami can turn on these brutal masters and savagely bite them to death. While inugami are used to bring wealth and prosperity to their families, occasionally they might cause a household to fall into ruin. Practicing this sort of black magic was illegal and frowned upon (although that didn't stop the aristocracy from dabbling in onmyōdō sorcery). If an inugami mochi family member was even suspected of cursing another family, the accused would be forced to apologize and leave their estates to live on the outskirts of town, secluded from family, friends, and the comfortable aristocratic life. Even if the victims were eventually cured of their possession, the accused and all of their offspring for generations to follow had to maintain a solitary lifestyle. They were outcast from the rest of society, and viewed by others as wicked and tainted. No one knows when or where the practice of creating inugami begun. There is evidence of an ancient tradition of inugami worship stretching from western Japan down to Okinawa. By the Heian period, some 1000 years ago, at the height of classical Japanese civilization, the use of animal spirits as tools of sorcery had been outlawed. [ How to Make an Inugami ] The process to make an inugami is particularly brutal. First, you starve a dog by chaining it up just out of reach of some food, or else burying it up to its neck. In time, the dog will go berserk out of hunger. At the moment of its greatest desperation, as it strains with all its might to reach the food, you chop the dog's head off. This traps the intense emotions in the skull. Then, you bury the severed head in a busy street—usually a crossroads where many people walk. The trampling of hundreds or thousands of people over the buried head adds stress and causes the trapped emotions to transform the dog's spirit into an onryō. (Occasionally these severed heads escape and fly about, chasing after food, animated by the power of the dog's hunger and rage. When this happens, either the head has to be captured or the process begun anew.) Eventually the head is dug up from the crossroads, baked or dried, and then enshrined in a bowl. It is now an inugami. The enshrined spirit will do whatever it is commanded for the rest of time. ---- Kanashibari (金縛り) Translation: bound up with iron Appearance: Kanashibari is the Japanese term for sleep paralysis, a phenomenon when REM sleep overlaps with waking consciousness. Victims' bodies are still paralyzed in sleep, but eyes are open and the mind is half-awake—the real and dream worlds mix together. Stories about kanashibari go back to ancient times. The phenomenon was attributed to supernatural forces acting on the body. There are many legends about kanashibari, and each one points to a different cause. The most common form of kanashibari comes from spirit possession. When a person is possessed by inugami, kitsune, tanuki, or other kinds of tsukimono, one of the possible symptoms they can develop is immobility or sleep paralysis. This could sometimes be overcome if a shugenja recited Buddhist sutras to drive out the possessing animal spirit. Once the spirit was driven out, the kanashibari would disappear, and all would be well again. Other kinds of yōkai can inflict kanashibari as well. House-haunting yōkai, such as makuragaeshi, are frequent culprits. Victims wake up in the middle of the night, feeling a crushing weight on their chest, and often see the ghost of a small child or some monster sitting on top of them. This can occur sporadically, or even every night, depending on the nature of the yōkai involved. Though not actually harmful, it is a terrifying experience for the victim. Kanashibari can even be caused by humans—usually by priests or onmyōji invoking the gods. The tale of Kiyo hime features one passage where the jealous princess is chasing after her lover, Anchin. Trying to escape her advances, the Anchin asks the gods of the Kumano Shrine for help. They are able to trap Kiyo hime in kanashibari, giving Anchin time to flee. Finally, kanashibari can be caused by ghosts—ikiryō or shiryō. There are many variations, but this famous account from a popular ghost story in Iwate Prefecture (old Mutsu Province) is fairly typical: during the middle of the night, a man woke up with an ominous, foreboding sense of dread. He realized that he couldn't move, even though he was wide awake. It felt as if powerful arms were gripping him tight, keeping him immobile. Suddenly, an invisible force tugged on his legs and dragged him out from under his futon and towards the door! After a desperate struggle, he finally snapped out of the sleep paralysis, and saw the ghost of a middle aged woman rise up into the ceiling. ---- Katashiro (形代) Translation: form substitution Appearance: Katashiro are human-shaped dolls. They are usually made of paper, but sometimes of wood, straw, or metal. There are different shapes and designs of katashiro to suit the many purposes they serve. Katashiro are a type of yorishiro —ceremonial objects used as a substitution for someone or something. Specifically they are used as a substitution for a person during a ritual. They are commonly used in purification rituals, where a person's sins are transferred into the katashiro. The karashiro is then discarded into a river or body of water, taking the sin away with it. Katashiro are also frequently used to ward off evil in a similar fashion. If you are suffering bad luck, a katashiro can be used to absorb the bad luck from you or prevent bad things from occurring. If you suspect that you are going to be targeted by a curse, a katashiro can be prepared as a substitute target for your person. The doll will receive all of the evil effects in place of the intended target. Katashiro can even be used in spells or curses as a substitution for a real human target. Usually this involves inscribing the name, birthdate, and other personal information on the paper doll. The spell is performed on the doll, after which the intended effects happen to the actual person. ---- Wara ningyō (藁人形) Translation: straw doll Alternate names: suge ningyō (sedge doll) Appearance: Wara ningyō are a popular kind of katashiro made of straw. Wara ningyō most commonly depict humans, but they are occasionally made in the shape of horses or other animals too. Wara ningyō are used extensively as wards against evil. During the Heian period, wara ningyō would be placed along the sides of the roads for protection against plague. It was hoped that the evil spirits which brought disease would nest in the straw bodies instead of living human bodies. Afterwards, the straw dolls would be discarded into a river, which would also purify the evil spirits. Wara ningyō are popular devices in a number of dark rituals. They are combined with something from the recipient of the curse, such as a piece of hair. This transforms the doll into a substitute for the intended target. Long nails are pushed through the wara ningyō, harming the subject as well as the doll. There are specific rules for creating different types of wara ningyō. These detail the materials to be used, the way the dolls are constructed, and the objects to be inserted into them. It can be difficult to find the materials needed to perform curses. The required items are not sold in most stores. However, some websites sell premade curse kits that contain all of the items you might need to perform a specific curse, including a wara ningyō, long nails, a mallet, pre-written curses with blanks for the recipient's name, and other accessories. Of course, performing such rituals is illegal. ---- Hitobashira (人柱) Translation: human pillar Habitat: found in bridges, castles, dams, and other large constructions Appearance: Hitobashira refers to the gruesome practice of burying a living human being in the foundations of important buildings—bridges, dams, tunnels, and particularly castles. It was a common practice during large construction projects from ancient times through the 16th century. However there is evidence that hitobashira were still being used in some construction projects during the 20th century. This form of sacrifice was used as a magical ward for the building being constructed. It was believed that the sacrifice of a human soul would appease the nature spirits in an area—particularly the river spirits in areas where flooding was common. They were also used to ward castles against assault, fire, and other disasters both man-made and natural. Although hitobashira literally means human pillar, the actual meaning is more complicated. Pillars and Shinto have a long relationship—kami can be enshrined in pillar-like sacred trees, the oldest shrines were built upon pillars, and hashira, in addition to meaning pillar, is also used as the josūshi —Japanese counter word—for kami. The bashira in hitobashira refers not to a literal pillar, but actually to this counter word. The human was enshrined in a manner similar to a kami of the building to which he or she was sacrificed, becoming both a literal pillar and a connection to the gods. Very often, small stone memorials were erected in honor of the hitobashira who were sacrificed to a building. Some still stand today. A few famous castles in Japan are connected to legends of hitobashira. Maruoka Castle in Fukui Prefecture (old Echizen Province), one of the oldest surviving castles in Japan, is said to contain a hitobashira in the central pillar of the keep. While Maruoka Castle was being constructed, its walls kept collapsing no matter how many times they were repaired. It was decided that a person should be sacrificed and made into a hitobashira in order to improve the stability of the castle. A poor, one-eyed woman named Oshizu was selected for the honor of becoming a hitobashira. As a reward for her sacrifice, she was promised that her son would be made a samurai. After she was sacrificed the castle was completed. However, before her son could be made a samurai, the castle's lord was transferred to another province, and the promise was left unkept. Every year thereafter, the castle's moat overflowed when the heavy spring rains came. The people of Maruoka blamed this on Oshizu's vengeance, and called this rain "tears of Oshizu's sorrow." Afterwards, a cenotaph was erected for Oshizu inside the castle grounds to calm her spirit. ---- Ichijama (生邪魔) Translation: living evil spirit Alternate names: ichimabui, ikimaburi Habitat: Okinawa and islands in southern Kyūshū Appearance: Ichijama is a curse from Okinawa. It is a type of ikiryō—a spirit of a still-living person which leaves the body to haunt its victim. The magic which summons this spirit, the person who casts the spell, and the family line of that person are all referred to as ichijama. Not only people, but cows, pigs, horses and other livestock, as well as crops can be cursed by an ichijama. An ichijama is summoned by praying to a special doll known as an ichijama butokii . The ichijama butokii is boiled in a pot while reciting the name of the body part which is to be cursed. After the ritual is performed, a spirit which looks exactly like the person casting the spell visits the home of the intended victim. It delivers a gift to its target—usually fruit or vegetables such as bananas, garlic, or wild onions. After receiving the gift, the target develops an unidentifiable sickness in whichever body part was chanted during the spell. If untreated, the victim will die. Omyōdō did not exist in Okinawa, so this curse could only be overcome with the help of Okinawan magic, by shamans known as yuta. This was accomplished by performing yet another curse. The yuta would bind the victim's thumbs together and hit them with a nail while chanting bad things about the curse victim. Performing this curse would drive out the ichijama from its victim. The ability to summon an ichijama is a hereditary secret passed down from mother to daughter. Families with such magical power are said to be very beautiful and have a sharp look in their eyes. The ability to use black magic carries a strong social stigma in Okinawa. Marrying into one of these families should be avoided at all costs. But it is difficult to tell; ichijama clans are often careful about hiding their family secret. ---- Ushi no koku mairi (丑の刻参り) Translation: shrine visit at the hour of the ox Alternate names: ushi no toki mairi Appearance: Ushi no koku mairi is one of the most famous and dreaded black magic spells. It takes place between 1:00 and 3:00 in the morning, during the hour of the ox. This is the period of darkest night, when the border between the world of the living and the world of the dead is weakest. During this hour, evil spirits are at their greatest power. There are a number of complicated steps required to perform this curse ritual, and they vary from account to account. In general, you must first construct a wara ningyō containing a small piece of the intended target's body—a piece of hair, blood, fingernails, or skin, for example. Alternatively, you may use an image of their target, or a piece of paper with the target's name written on it. Then, you put on the ceremonial dress—a white kimono and obi, with thick white face powder. An upturned trivet is placed on your head, and you attach tapers to its legs and light them. Tall, single-toothed geta are worn on your feet. A mirror is carried over your breast, a dagger is tucked behind the obi, and a comb is held between your teeth. Thus prepared, you must sneak into a shrine during the hour of the ox and approach the shrine's sacred tree. Then, you hammer a long iron nail through the wara ningyō into the tree—symbolically breaking the barrier between the world of the living and the spirit world. You call out to evil spirits, demons, and yōkai to come into the world. This ritual must be repeated every night for many nights, and it is very important that the person performing the curse not be seen. If there are any witnesses, they must be killed immediately. Otherwise the evil of this curse will rebound onto the caster. Once the ritual is completed, something—it is not clear what—terrible happens. According to some accounts, the curse victim dies an agonizing death upon completion of the ritual. In other accounts, the entire process is torture for the victim, causing days of suffering while the curse is being performed. In some stories, the curse summons yōkai which haunt the victim, and in other stories, the person performing the ritual transforms into a powerful oni or kijo. A few shrines are well-known for this sort of black magic. Kifune Shrine and Jishu Shrine in Kyōto, and Ikurei Shrine in Okayama Prefecture (old Bitchū Province) are the most famous ones. In the old days, these were popular locations for jealous lovers to perform this curse. Even today, every now and then, shrine officials find wara ningyō hammered into trees at these shrines. ---- Taizan Fukun no Sai (泰山府君祭) Translation: the Taizan Fukun (Lord Taizan) ceremony Appearance: Taizan Fukun no Sai is one of the most secret and powerful onmyōdō rituals. It is jealously guarded by the few who know it, and strongly coveted by those who don't. This spell was developed in ancient China by Taoist philosophers. It is named for Lord Taizan, the god of the mountain Taishan in Shandong, China and one of the kings of hell. He is one of the most important deities in Onmyōdō. In this ritual, the supplicant beseeches Lord Taizan, Great King Enma, and the other judges of Meido and Jigoku to lengthen a person's life span, save someone from death, or even restore life to the dead. Gold, silver, silk, saddled horses, and human life—usually substitutes in the form of katashiro, or paper dolls—are offered to the gods. No mantras or magical worlds are spoken; the gods are simply invited to sit down and participate. A formal letter of request is read to them, detailing the offerings and the virtues of the supplicants, and the precise divine intervention desired. The Abe clan was famous for their knowledge of this spell. It is one of the reasons they were able to maintain a monopoly on the imperial Bureau of Onmyōdō. Under their offices, this spell was routinely performed for the emperors in order to increase their life spans and protect the country. Abe no Seimei is particularly famous for his use of Taizan Fukun no Sai. He resurrected his father, who was murdered by Ashiya Dōman, and used it many other times in the service of the emperor and country. Once, a high ranking monk of Mii-dera known as Chikō fell gravely ill. It was determined that his illness was the result of karma, and thus could not be cured with medicine. Abe no Seimei was summoned. He divined Chikō's fortune, and discovered that death was imminent. However, Abe no Seimei said that if someone was willing to trade life spans with Chikō, he could perform the Taizan Fukun no Sai and save the priest's life. The priests all looked at each other uncomfortably. As much as they loved and admired Chikō, nobody was willing to sacrifice his own life in order to save him. Finally, a young man named Shōkū—an average pupil who had been studying for many years yet had never attracted the attention of Chikō or the other teachers—stepped forward and offered his own life. Abe no Seimei accepted the offer. He immediately performed the Taizan Fukun no Sai. Shōkū writhed in anguish, his life span shrinking away, while Chikō rapidly began to recover. Finally, Chikō was cured, and Shōkū lay on death's door. As the young pupil's last breath left his body, he prayed with all his heart to a nearby painting of Fudō Myōō. Just then, tears poured from the painted eyes of Fudō Myō-ō, and the god's voice was heard: "If you would take the place of your teacher, then let me take your place instead." Suddenly, Shōkū and Chikō sat up, both of then restored to life. ---- Hinode (日の出) Translation: sunrise Appearance: Hinode, the break of dawn, signals the end of the power of evil spirits over the waking world. The holy light of the sun banishes yōkai, ghosts, and demons back to the places from which they came. As the morning light fills the shadows, unknown things no longer lurk. As the sun's rays pierce the dark forests, strange shapes no longer hide among the trees. The time of meeting evil spirits is over. Once again the world is safe for humans. The sun has always been a central part of Japanese religion. Amaterasu, the sun goddess, is the most important deity in Shinto and is worshipped across Japan. The importance of the sun in Japanese culture can be seen in Japan's nickname—the land of the rising sun—on the Japanese flag, and in the native word for Japan itself: Nihon, "the origin of the sun." In Japanese artwork, the sun often appears as the final scene in picture scrolls depicting yōkai and the night parade of one hundred demons. Similarly, Toriyama Sekien's second illustrated yōkai encyclopedia, Konjaku Gazu Zoku Hyakki, opens with ōmagatoki and closes with hinode, depicting the monsters that rule the world from dusk until dawn.
(Yokai 3) The Book of the Hakutaku, A Bestiary of Japanese Monsters	Matthew Meyer	[ "Japanese mythology", "pedia" ]	[]	Collecting Yōkai	Yōkai have been collected and categorized for thousands of years. An ancient legend tells of an encyclopedia called The Book of the Hakutaku, which was given to the emperor by a magical beast. This book contained information about all the spirits, gods, and demons in the universe. It was lost long ago, but parts of it were copied down. People have been collecting information about the spirit world in supernatural encyclopedias ever since. Nowhere was this tradition of collecting yōkai more passionate and widespread than in Japan. While yōkai are antique, the majority of them were not invented until the 16th century and onwards. In ancient times, yōkai were imagined as invisible, malevolent forces lacking physical form. The most popular legends involved oni (demons) and onyrō (vengeful ghosts). This changed during the Muromachi Period with the arrival of a series of picture scrolls depicting the night parade of one hundred demons. In this long procession, grotesque and comical monsters cavort and dance from sunset to sunrise. The earliest picture scrolls did not include names or stories to accompany the creatures. Some of them were recognizable as ghosts from popular Heian Period classics. Others were household objects with comical human-like features—a type of yōkai known as tsukumogami. These depictions of hordes of strange monsters laid the foundation for a massive yōkai boom in the coming centuries. During the Edo Period, artists copied the picture scrolls, adding new yōkai to the parade. They gave names and invented stories for the creatures. The flourishing economy and new technologies allowed for the mass production of illustrated books. Demand for cheap reading material was high. Artists like Toriyama Sekien collected yōkai from around the country and bundled them into illustrated, multi-volume encyclopedias. As demand for yōkai grew, artists looked back into Japanese literature and history for inspiration. They copied monsters from ancient Chinese classics, reinterpreting them through a Japanese lens. They even invented new yōkai based on puns and reflecting contemporary societal issues. When the Edo Period ended, Japan began to modernize rapidly. Belief in yōkai quickly faded away as scientific discoveries began to explain away the mysteries of the past. However, the appeal of yōkai remained strong. Folklorists like Inoe Enryō and Yanagita Kunio collected folk tales and superstitions from around the country. The cartoonist Mizuki Shigeru further helped save yōkai from disappearing by bringing them to pop culture and reintroducing them to the post-war world. Like those before him, he collected his yōkai in illustrated encyclopedias, and tried to document as much of Japan's folklore as he could. Today, the appeal of yōkai remains strong. Universities preserve and present yōkai in vast searchable folklore databases—a sort of online Book of the Hakutaku. Thanks to the internet, yōkai have become accessible to people all over the world. And the ancient tradition of collecting them continues today in the form of collectible card games, video games, television, movies—and of course books like this one.
(Yokai 3) The Book of the Hakutaku, A Bestiary of Japanese Monsters	Matthew Meyer	[ "Japanese mythology", "pedia" ]	[]	Origins in Foreign Folklore	Yōkai are often understood as Japanese monsters. However, not all yōkai are necessarily Japanese. The word can refer to mysterious spirits and phenomena from anywhere in the world. Foreign monsters like Dracula and Frankenstein's creature are often included under the yōkai umbrella. Many yōkai which are traditionally viewed as Japanese actually originate in other cultures. Even some of the most quintessential and famous yōkai—like kitsune, kappa, and oni—have roots in earlier sources from China and India.
(Yokai 3) The Book of the Hakutaku, A Bestiary of Japanese Monsters	Matthew Meyer	[ "Japanese mythology", "pedia" ]	[]	Chapter 3	Bits and pieces of foreign cultures have gradually trickled into Japan and been absorbed into Japanese culture. This has been happening for thousands of years, through both direct and indirect exchange. Trade and diplomatic missions to China exposed Japan to the gods, traditions, and superstitions of the Asian continent. The ancient Japanese borrowed much from China, including folk religions and mysticism. Practices like onmyōdō (yin-yang magic), astrology, medicine, and methods for appeasing evil spirits were strongly influenced by Chinese philosophy. The introduction of Buddhism to Japan brought Indian cosmology and philosophy with it, filtered through a Chinese lens. Indian mythology had little trouble being accepted and disseminated throughout Japan. Local Shinto gods and spirits were interpreted as manifestations of the Buddhas and Hindu gods. Even without direct exchange of stories, it is possible for folklore to travel across the world. Trade between China and the Near East along the Silk Road have also had an indirect effect on Japanese folklore. As Indian ideas traveled through Central Asia on their way to China, they were influenced by the countries that they passed through, picking up influences from Western and Islamic cultures. For example, the wind bag carried by the Japanese god Fūjin is believed to have originated as the cloak of Boreas, the ancient Greek god of the north wind. Alexander the Great's conquests brought Greek culture and art styles to Central Asia. They fused with Buddhism, and eventually made their way to China, Korea, and then Japan. The effects of this exchange are quite visible in the art history of these countries, but they can also be found in the folklore. Many of the yōkai in this book have roots in foreign cultures. Centuries of exchange of stories and gods has had a profound effect on the development of Japanese folklore. Over time they evolved and were reinterpreted over and over again, taking on unique identities. They are both foreign-born and authentically Japanese.
(Yokai 3) The Book of the Hakutaku, A Bestiary of Japanese Monsters	Matthew Meyer	[ "Japanese mythology", "pedia" ]	[]	Chapter 4	Hakutaku (白澤) Translation: white marsh; based on the Chinese name for the same creature Alternate names: kutabe Habitat: remote, holy mountains Diet: unknown; likely herbivorous Appearance: Hakutaku are wise chimerical beasts that resemble white oxen. They have nine eyes—three on their head, and three on each of their broad sides. They have a pair of horns above each set of eyes. Hakutaku live in remote mountains. They speak human languages and are knowledgeable about all things. They are extremely rare, only manifesting during the reign of a wise and virtuous leader. A hakutaku's appearance is considered to be an extremely good omen. Because of the incredible knowledge that hakutaku possess, paintings of them were popular in Japan during the Edo period. Hakutaku images and icons were kept as good luck charms and as wards against evil spirits, disease, and other yōkai. Because hakutaku know all, it was believed they repelled evil things. The hakutaku, like many other holy beasts, originally comes from Chinese legends. In China, it is known as the bai ze. Long ago, a hakutaku taught the Chinese emperor Huangdi (c. 2698–2598 BCE) the names of the various kinds of yōkai and monsters in the world. The emperor was performing an imperial tour of all his lands. In the east near the sea, he climbed a mountain, and there he encountered a hakutaku. The two spoke about a great number of things. The hakutaku told the emperor that in all of creation there were 11,520 different kinds of yōkai. The emperor recorded everything the hakutaku had said, which was preserved in a volume known as the Hakutaku zu (The Book of the Hakutaku). This encyclopedia recorded the names of every kind of yōkai along with what kind of evils they perform, the disasters they bring, as well as how to deal with them. Unfortunately, the Hakutaku zu was lost long, long ago. No surviving copies exist. However, fragments of it were copied into other texts, so bits and pieces of the hakutaku's wisdom remain. While the hakutaku is most commonly associated with China, Japanese stories also exist. A legend from the end of the Edo Period describes a hakutaku encounter in Toyama Prefecture. It occurred on Tateyama, one of the tallest and holiest mountains in Japan. The hakutaku, called a kutabe in this legend, warned people that a deadly plague would soon sweep through the lands. The kutabe instructed them that anyone who painted its image and hung it in their home would be protected from sickness and harm. Since then, the hakutaku has been revered and even worshiped as a protective spirit of medicine. ---- Kudan (件) Translation: none; written with characters that mean "human" and "cow" Habitat: farms, particularly in Kyūshū and western Japan Diet: never survives long enough to feed on anything but its mother's milk Appearance: Kudan are prophetic creatures that take the form of cows with human faces. Very rarely, they also take the reverse appearance: a cow's face on a human body. They are born from cows and can speak human languages. The birth of a kudan is believed to be an omen of some significant historical event. Kudan are born with the ability to speak. Just after birth, a kudan will deliver one or more prophecies. The content of their prophecies varies. Sometimes kudan speak of great harvests or terrible famines. Sometimes they foretell plagues, droughts, or other disasters. Sometimes they predict terrible wars. Whatever it is, the prophecy of a kudan never fails to come true. Tragically, a kudan always dies soon after speaking its prophecy. Kudan are a relatively recent yōkai, having entered the public consciousness near the end of the Edo Period. This was an era of great social and political upheaval. The fall of the shōgunate and the restoration of imperial authority, combined with the rapid changes brought about by the opening of trade with the West caused widespread uncertainly and turmoil throughout Japan. During this time, stories of kudan being born were published in newspapers across the country. Among the events predicted by kudan are the Russo-Japanese War and the Pacific War. Because of their uncanny ability to see the future, the word of a kudan was viewed as absolute truth. During the Edo period, newspapers looking to add emphasis to a story would include the words kudan no gotoshi, or, "just as if a kudan had said it" to their articles. This phrase is still used today as a way of assuring readers of the veracity of a story. Because of their reputation for honesty, images of kudan were used as talismans for good luck, prosperity, and protection from sickness and disaster. Newspapers advised their readers to hang the printed images of kudan in their houses for protection and good fortune. Kudan were such popular yōkai that their taxidermized remains were often carted around in traveling sideshows. These objects were made of stillborn deformed calves, or of different animal parts stitched together to create a chimera-like stuffed animal. Audiences could pay a small fee to peek at these specimens and receive some of their good luck. A few of these preserved kudan survive in museums today. ---- Kotobuki (寿) Translation: congratulations, long life Alternate names: jū Habitat: unknown; supposedly lives in India Diet: unknown; likely herbivorous Appearance: The kotobuki is an auspicious chimerical beast whose body is made up of parts from the twelve animals of the Chinese zodiac. It has the head of a rat, the ears of a hare, the horns of an ox, the comb of a rooster, the beard of a sheep, the mane of a horse, the neck of a dragon, the back of a boar, the shoulders and belly of a tiger, the front legs of a monkey, the rear legs of a dog, and the tail of a snake. A number of alternate versions exist as well, swapping the body parts for different zodiacal animals. The kotobuki first appeared in the Edo Period. Woodblock prints of it were popular gifts. Little explanation about the creature was included in these prints, other than that it was said to come from India and could understand human speech. Merely possessing an image of the kotobuki was believed to protect a person from sickness and disease and bring good fortune to their home. Good luck charms featuring the various animals of the zodiac were popular in the Edo Period, especially during the New Year season. While it is traditional to give presents and display artwork with the new year's zodiac sign on it, an image with all twelve zodiac signs was even luckier. Even without any explanation, people recognized the twelve zodiac animals hidden in this beast. Furthermore, the word kotobuki connotes celebration and congratulations. This made the kotobuki instantly identifiable as a powerful and auspicious creature. Shō Chiku Bai While the twelve animals of the zodiac are instantly recognizable as lucky images, it isn't only animals which have that symbolism. Plants are used in the same way too. During the winter, the three most common auspicious plants are pine ( shō), bamboo ( chiku), and plum ( bai). They are known as saikan no sanyū (the three friends of midwinter) due to the fact that they remain healthy even in the cold of winter. This makes them perfect for New Year decorations. Botanical displays called kadomatsu which decorate the front doors of shops and houses are made of these three plants. The shō chiku bai motif has been used since the Heian Period in clothing, paintings, greeting cards, product packaging and just about every other form of art that exists. These plants, like the kotobuki, are recognizable as symbols of prosperity and congratulations. ---- Myōbu (命婦) Translation: noble lady; one of the titles for ladies of the imperial court Alternate names: byakko (white fox) Habitat: shrines and places sacred to Inari Diet: mainly carnivorous, but they also enjoy tofu, sekihan, and inarizushi Appearance: Myōbu are celestial kitsune (fox spirits) with white fur and full, fluffy tails reminiscent of ripe grain. They are holy creatures and bring happiness and blessings to those around them. Myōbu statues are most often found at Inari shrines, taking the place of the koma inu which adorn most other shrines. These foxes act as both guardians and symbols of good luck. People leave offerings of sake, sekihan (red rice and red beans), inarizushi, and fried tofu for the fox spirits at these shrines. These foods are all said to be favorites of kitsune. Foxes have been considered holy animals in Japan since before recorded history began. The farmers of ancient Japan revered foxes, which preyed on crop-destroying mice and rats. Foxes have long been associated with Inari, the god of the harvest. Inari is said to use foxes as servants and messengers. The foxes who serve Inari are the holy, white-furred myōbu—in contrast with red-furred kitsune, who are the wicked trickster foxes found in folklore. Myōbu statues often carry sacred objects in their mouths, such as the round jewel carried by koma inu in other shrines. In addition, myōbu frequently carry spiral-shaped keys, sheaves of grain, and scrolls. Each of these has special significance in Inari worship. The round jewel represents the soul of Inari and is a symbol of a grain storehouse. The spiral key is an archaic design for keys used with traditional farm warehouses. It represents the desire to unlock the storehouse; i.e. the soul of Inari. The sheaves of grain represent the five grains (wheat, rice, beans, awa millet, and kibi millet) which are important in East Asian traditions. Finally, the scroll represents knowledge and wisdom. ---- Nigawarai (苦笑) Translation: bitter smile Habitat: human-inhabited areas Diet: cynicism and ill-will Appearance: Nigawarai are large, ugly yōkai with horns and green-tinged, hairy bodies. They wear dirty rags. Their hairy mouths are twisted into what looks like a forced smile. Their hands end in sharp, poisonous claws which can paralyze small animals. Nigawarai are created out of the negative feelings of human beings—particularly ill-humor and forced, feigned amusement. As their name suggests, they are related to the uncomfortable smiles that people make when trying to hide feelings of discomfort. They cause ill-will, disgust, and encourage arguments among those around them. They both feed off and spread these negative feelings. The poison from a nigawarai's claws can be used in cooking, which makes food terribly bitter. However, it also has the ability to cure stomach pain. This makes nigawarai a useful yōkai for medicinal purposes. The earliest references to nigawarai go back to the Muromachi period where they appear in long picture scroll paintings depicting the night parade of one hundred demons. The monsters in these scrolls appeared with no descriptions, so the artist's original intentions for this yōkai are unknown. Over the centuries, nigawarai was copied over and over onto other yōkai scrolls. Later artists invented its name and came up with its description. Through the work of numerous artists over many years, nigawarai gradually evolved the traits that it is known for today. ---- Dōnotsura (胴面) Translation: torso face Alternate names: akahadaka Habitat: unknown Diet: as a human Appearance: Dōnotsura's body appears much like that of a human's, except that it is missing everything from the neck up. Its extremely large facial features are prominently displayed on its torso, as its name implies. Dōnotsura appears on yōkai picture scrolls, but only in name and image. Like many yōkai originating in picture scrolls, no stories or descriptions from folklore exist to explain what it does or where it comes from. However, its most likely origin is from a play on words. There is an expression in Japanese— dono tsura sagete—which is used to scold a person who is inappropriately unashamed when they should be too embarrassed to show their face. The figurative meaning of this idiom is to lower a mask over one's face (as in, "How dare you come here wearing that face!"). Dōnotsura seems to be a stricter interpretation of this idiom; its face has been literally lowered down to his torso. ---- Shumoku musume (撞木娘) Translation: hammer girl Habitat: mountain passes and lonely roads Diet: unknown Appearance: Shumoku musume looks like a human girl with one exception: she has a bald head with long eyestalks protruding from the sides of her head, causing her to resembling a hammerhead shark or a slug. Her eyestalks end in enormous, round eyeballs. She wears a furisode kimono—a style worn by young, unmarried women. Shumoku musume is not a major yōkai yet her image is fairly well known. This is because she was included in obake karuta, a yōkai-themed version of a popular children's card matching game. Although no story accompanies her in obake karuta, her card says that she jumps out to scare travelers in the Usui Pass separating Gunma and Nagano Prefectures. The word shumoku refers to the wooden hammers used to ring temple bells. It is the same word that gives hammerhead sharks their Japanese name: shumokuzame. It is possible that shumoku musume is actually the tsukumogami of a bell hammer, but it is not clear. Her name may be a reference to the shape of her head and nothing else. [ Spooky Card Games ] Karuta is a playing card game which was invented in the 16th century. It is a competitive game between two or more players, with one more person acting as a reader. The cards are laid out on the floor with their images facing up. The reader recites a proverb, while each player searches for the corresponding card and tries to take it before the other players can. Whoever collects the most cards wins. During the Edo period, a variation of karuta known as obake karuta became popular. Each obake karuta card has a picture of a yōkai and a single hiragana character on its front. Rather than proverbs, the reader gives clues which describe the yōkai and correspond to the hiragana character on the image. Obake karuta was especially popular among children because of its subject matter and as a tool for teaching reading. ---- Kanazuchibō (金槌坊) Translation: hammer monk Alternate names: daichi uchi (earth striker), ōari (giant ant), yari kechō Appearance: Kanazuchibō is an odd-looking yōkai which has been depicted in several different ways by different artists. It usually has long flowing hair, big buggy eyes, and a beak-like mouth. Sometimes it appears bird-like, while other times it is a grotesque, misshapen goblin-like creature. It holds a large mallet over its head, ready to strike another yōkai. A mallet-wielding yōkai appears in many of the earliest yōkai picture scrolls with no name or description. Various names like kanazuchibō and daichiuchi were invented during the Edo period. No description of kanazuchibō's behavior was ever recorded. Many yōkai scholars have made guesses at its true nature. It may be a spirit of cowardice. Its posture and its hammer evoke the proverbs "to strike a stone bridge before crossing" (i.e. to be excessively careful before doing anything) and "like a hammer in the water" (i.e. to stare at the ground and watch your steps; walking like a hammer in a river, with its heavier head sinking below the surface, and its lighter wooden handle floating above it). Perhaps this is a yōkai which haunts cowards. Or perhaps it turns people into cowards when it haunts them. Toriyama Sekien included a version of kanazuchibō in his book Hyakki tsurezure bukuro. He re-imagined it as a tsukumogami born from a keyari—a hairy spear used as decoration and in parades. He dubbed this yōkai it yari kechō, or "spear hair chief." ---- Okka (大化) Translation: a baby-talk corruption of obake (monster) Alternate names: akaheru, chikarakoko, gamanoke (frog spirit); countless others Appearance: Okka is a small, bulbous yōkai. It is a round, bright red creature with big eyes, two clawed feet, and a diminutive tail. There are many variations of this yōkai, separated by minor differences in color, number of appendages, facial features, and hair. Okka appears in many old yōkai picture scrolls. Since it was originally unnamed, countless names have been invented to describe this yōkai. The word okka is a baby-talk variation of obake, a generic term ghosts and monsters. There is an established pattern of monsters being named in baby-talk; waira, otoroshi, gagoze, and uwan are all thought to be baby-talk variations of local words for scary things. Based on its appearance, some scholars have suggested that okka may be a frog spirit. It has also been suggested that okka may be a tsukumogami, as it appears alongside other tsukumogami in paintings. Though it was never given a name or an explanation, okka remains a common sight in yōkai picture scrolls. It is frequently the target of kanazuchibō's hammer. However, this may be no more than a coincidence. Painters frequently copied yōkai straight from earlier scrolls, and without any description there is no way of knowing if the original painting of okka was placed with kanazuchibō for a specific reason or only because they looked amusing together. ---- Sunekosuri (脛擦り) Translation: shin rubber Alternate names: sunekkorogashi, sunekkorobashi, sunekajiri Habitat: human-inhabited areas Diet: omnivorous Appearance: Sunekosuri are small, mischievous spirits from Okayama Prefecture. They appear on rainy nights in streets and alleys where people travel. They are most often described as dog-like in appearance, though they are occasionally said to resemble cats. Sunekosuri run up behind people who are walking on dark, rainy nights. They rub against their shins, weave in and out of their legs, nuzzle against the knees, and otherwise make it difficult to walk. Although their nuzzling is often aggressive enough to make a person stumble or even fall, sunekosuri do not intentionally harm humans. A few local variations of this yōkai are slightly more dangerous. Sunekkorogashi and sunekkorobashi both mean "shin toppler." Sunekajiri means "shin biter." Although not malevolent like other kinds of yōkai, these spirits are blamed for the occasional tumble, and ensuing bruises or bloody noses. Sunekosuri is a relatively modern yōkai. It did not appear in writing until Satō Seimei's 1935 yōkai encyclopedia Genkō zenkoku yōkai jiten, although it is impossible to tell how far back oral traditions go. Despite its newness, it has appeared a number of times in manga and film. Due to its cute depictions and pet-like nature it has become a well-known and well-loved yōkai. ---- Kosamebō (小雨坊) Translation: light rain monk Habitat: mountain roads Diet: as a human; likely follows a monk's diet Appearance: Kosamebō are yōkai which look like Buddhist monks. They loiter about empty mountain roads at night. As their name implies, they only appear during nights when light rain is falling. Kosamebō accost travelers and beg for alms like spare change, spare food, or bits of millet to eat. Though frightening, disturbing, and perhaps a bit annoying, they do not pose any serious danger to humans. Kosamebō is described by Toriyama Sekien in his yōkai encyclopedia Konjaku hyakki shūi. Sekien describes them as appearing on the roads going through Mount Omine and Mount Katsuragi, two holy mountains in Nara Prefecture with popular pilgrimage trails. They are also part of the local folklore of the Tsugaru region of Aomori Prefecture. ---- Minobi (蓑火) Translation: raincoat fire Alternate names: minomushibi, minoboshi; varies widely from place to place Habitat: wet rural areas Appearance: Minobi are phenomena that appear on rainy days in rural areas, particularly during the rainy season. Often, they appear near bodies of water such as rivers or lakes like Lake Biwa in Shiga Prefecture. Minobi begin as a number of tiny fireballs which glow like fireflies. They float about in the air and gather in large numbers. Minobi get their name from a tendency to gather around people wearing mino (traditional straw raincoats). They stick to raincoats and begin to burn. When someone attempts to brush off or swat out the fire, instead of going out, the minobi multiplies. The fire grows larger and larger until eventually the person is forced to strip off the raincoat and leave it on the road. Minobi are found all over Japan, although often by different names and blamed on different culprits. Sometimes this phenomenon is thought to be caused by natural gas escaping from the ground (as it is with other mysterious fireballs like onibi and kitsunebi). Most often it is said to be the work of mischievous kitsune, itachi, or tanuki. Because they appear more frequently during the rainy season, sometimes minobi are believed to be fireflies or other insects such as the minomushi (bagworm moth). ---- Ushirogami (後神) Translation: the spirit behind you Habitat: haunts cowardly people Diet: thrives on its victims' fear Appearance: Ushirogami look like ghosts with long black hair, white kimono, and no feet. They have long, twisting bodies which allow them to leap high into the air. A large, single eyeball is located on the top of their heads. Ushirogami's favorite tactic is to scare people by leaping out and appearing right behind them. This is how they get their name. They tug on the hairs on the back of a person's neck and then vanish when that person turns around to see what touched them. Other pranks that ushirogami enjoy include placing icy cold hands or breathing hot breath onto the necks of their victims. Sometimes they call up strong gusts of wind to blow umbrellas away. Ushirogami particularly like going after cowardly young women walking alone at night. They sneak up behind the women and untie their hair, causing it to fall all over the place. Or they run their hands through the women's hair and mess it around, tangling it up. Ushirogami are thought to be a kind of okubyōgami—spirits that causes cowardice, or that specifically target cowardly people. Their name comes from the words ushiro (behind) and kami (spirit). However, there is a hidden pun in their name: kami can also mean hair, so ushirogami can also mean the hairs on the back of your neck. The phrase ushirogami wo hikikaeru ("to have the hairs on the back of your neck pulled") means to do something with painful reluctance. It describes a person who must do something that they really don't want to do. As they search for some way out of their task, they turn around and look behind them as if the hairs in the back of their head were being pulled on. The pun is that the ushirogami (spirit) is pulling on your ushirogami (hair), causing you to become cowardly and not want to do something. Thus, ushirogami could be described as both external entities which cause fear and as the internal personification of your own cowardice or reluctance. ---- Kazenbō (火前坊) Translation: monk before the fire Habitat: Toribeyama, a mountain in Kyōto Diet: none; it is fueled only by its attachment to this world Appearance: Kazenbō are ghostly apparitions which resemble burnt monks wreathed in flames. They appear on Toribeyama, a mountain in Kyoto which has been used as a burial site since the Heian Period. Kazenbō occasionally appear before travelers on Toribeyama. They don't do anything harmful and their fires are not hot, but their horrific appearance is disturbing. They materialize, suffer and writhe in flames which never completely consume them, and disappear. During the Heian Period, Toribeyama was an important burial ground and cremation site, especially for the city's nobility. In times of major epidemics, the bodies of those who died from disease were cremated there. The smoke rising from the mountain from all the bodies being burned was said to be unending. Towards the end of the 10th century, a number of monks decided to offer themselves up in ritual sacrifice by fire. They believed that in doing so, they would rid themselves of their worldly attachments along with their bodies, and thus achieve enlightenment. The ceremony was open to the public. A large number of people came to witness. The event proceeded as planned; the monks sacrificed their bodies in the fire. However, a number of these monks did not actually pass on to nirvana. Instead, their souls remained on earth, bound to where they died. They must not have been able to truly give up their attachments to the material world. Ever since, their doomed ghosts have haunted Toribeyama, appearing as ghostly beggar-monks wreathed in the fires of ignorance and sin. Buddhism and Yōkai In Buddhism, the root sin from which all others are born is attachment. Specifically, attachment to the impermanent, material world. This covers things like wealth and power, but also the perception that our bodies are not separate from our consciousness. Thus, attachment to our physical selves and even our lives is a kind of ignorance. Our attachments serve as an impediment to reaching enlightenment. A person who is able to completely detach his or herself from this ignorance would no longer be reincarnated after death but would achieve nirvana—a state of freedom from suffering and rebirth. A person who is unable to relieve his or herself from attachment is doomed to be reborn over and over again eternally. When that attachment is particularly strong, a person might be reincarnated not as a human, but as a ghost or a demon. A great deal of yōkai are born this way—former humans, now doomed to suffer as wretched monsters until their souls can be redeemed. ---- Yonaki babā (夜泣き婆) Translation: night-weeping hag Alternate names: nakibabā Habitat: human-inhabited areas; loiters outside of homes and temples Diet: feeds off of others' sadness Appearance: Yonaki babā look like old women with scraggly, unkempt hair and plain robes. They haunt families which have been recently struck by tragedy. Yonaki babā remain outside of the houses of the bereaved and weep loudly through the night. They are attracted by the sadness of those within. Although they appear to be sharing in the sadness, it is said that they in fact weep out of scorn, mocking those who truly grieve. A yonaki babā's weeping is contagious. Those who hear it cannot help but weep as well. Yonaki babā often return to the same house over and over for many nights. Families which are repeatedly visited by yonaki babā invariably fall to ruin. Because yonaki babā appearances are often precursors to the ruin of an entire family, it has been suggested that yonaki babā may belong to a class of spirits called yakubyōgami—kami of bad luck and misfortune. These spirits inflict sickness and suffering wherever they go. Before modern medicine, plagues and natural disasters were thought to be the works of yakubyōgami. Conversely, it has been suggested a yonaki babā's arrival may be a divine warning that disaster is near. Rather than bringing disease and ruin herself, a yonaki babā may be a kind of divine herald with the duty of warning humans that misfortune, sickness, and death are on the way. ---- Amazake babā (甘酒婆) Translation: amazake hag Alternate names: amazake banbā Habitat: dark, snowy streets; particularly in northern urban areas Diet: amazake and sake Appearance: Amazake babā are yōkai from northeastern Japan which appear like haggardly old women. They are practically indistinguishable from ordinary old women, which makes them difficult to recognize as yōkai—until it is too late. Amazake babā appear on snowy winter nights, traveling from house to house. They knock on doors and call out, "Might you have any amazake (a sweet, low alcohol content form of sake)?" Those who answer, whether yes or no, fall terribly ill. According to superstition, it is possible to keep amazake babā from your house by hanging a cedar branch over the door. A variation of amazake babā from Yamanashi prefecture is called amazake banbā. They travel from house to house trying to sell sake and amazake. The consequences of replying to one are the same as with an amazake babā, but the way to keep them at bay is slightly different. They will leave you alone and go on to the next house if you hang a sign at the front door that says, "We do not like sake or amazake." Long ago amazake babā was considered to be a spirit of disease—specifically smallpox. During smallpox outbreaks, there were large increases in amazake babā sightings in major urban centers across Japan, not just in the northeast. Rumors of old women roaming the streets at night selling sake and spreading sickness were rampant in large cities such as Edo, Kyōto, Ōsaka, and Nagoya. Fear of smallpox was a major concern in urban centers and contributed to the popularity of amazake babā rumors. Since the eradication of smallpox, amazake babā has been downgraded from a spirit of smallpox to a spirit of the common cold. Statues of amazake babā can be found in large cities. Parents visit these statues to leave offerings of sake and amazake in hopes that their children will not become sick. ---- Tsurara onna (氷柱女) Translation: icicle woman Alternate names: tsurara nyōbō, shigama nyōbō, suga nyōbō, kanekōri nyōbō Habitat: snowy areas; only seen during winter Diet: loneliness; can also eat ordinary food Appearance: Tsurara onna are born from the loneliness of single men during the winter. They appear as exceptionally beautiful human women. When the winter snows melt and icicles can no longer be seen hanging from roofs, tsurara onna disappear along with the cold weather. Despite their icy origins, tsurara onna are warm and loving spirits. They often fall in love with and even marry humans—however these marriages always end in tragedy. The beautiful bride vanishes when the spring comes, leaving her lover confused and heartbroken. Because they look and behave like human women, it is difficult to identify a tsurara onna. One telltale sign is an unwillingness to enter a bath. Stories tell of women who refuse to take a bath despite their husbands' constant pressuring. Eventually, they relent and enter the bath. After that, these wives are never seen again; all that remains are a few shards of ice floating in the tub. Long ago in Echigo Province, a young man gazed out his window on a snowy winter night. As he wistfully admired the scene, he wished that he could find a wife as beautiful as the icicles hanging from his roof. Suddenly, there was a knock at his door. A woman's voice called out, as beautiful and clear as ice: "Hello! I was traveling along this road, but the snow is too heavy, and I can journey no further. Might I stay for the night?" The woman's face was as beautiful as her voice. The young man welcomed her inside and worked hard to make sure her stay was as comfortable as possible. Several months later, the woman was still staying at the house. She had forgotten about her journey altogether. The woman and the young man fell deeply in love and got married. One morning the young bride went out shopping. She did not return. The young man waited for her night after night. He asked everyone he knew if they had seen his wife. Nobody had. He searched all around. There was no sign of her. Eventually the snows melted, the plum blossoms bloomed, and spring arrived. His heart was broken, but he forced himself to accept that his bride had left him. Later that year, he married a young woman from his village. The following winter, the young man found himself looking out the window at the long icicles hanging from his roof. Suddenly, there was a knock at the door. His beautiful bride from the previous winter was standing outside of his house. He was shocked. "I searched for you every day! Why did you vanish without a word?" he cried. The woman replied coldly, "We promised to love each other forever. You said that our bond was as long and as solid as the beautiful icicles hanging from your roof. Yet, you remarried so quickly!" She turned and left with a sad look on her face. The young man's new wife appeared, asking what was going on. "It's nothing. Go back inside," he told her. He started after the woman. Suddenly there was loud crash near the front of the house, followed by a shriek. The new wife ran to the door to see what had happened. There, lying in the front yard, was her husband. He was dead, pierced through the brain by an enormous icicle which had fallen from the roof. ---- Oshiroi babā (白粉婆) Translation: face powder hag Alternate names: oshiroi bāsan Habitat: dark streets at night, particularly near snowy mountains Diet: unknown Appearance: Oshiroi babā are ghastly old hags who appear near the end of the year in mountainous areas. They are accompanied by a telltale jara jara sound, as if someone were dragging a mirror while hobbling through the streets. Their backs are hideously twisted, bent like an old woman who has had a lifetime hard work. They carry a cane in one hand, a sake bottle in the other, and wear a broken straw hat. Their most defining feature is their wrinkly old face which is caked with thick, sloppy, white face powder. Oshiroi babā don't interact with humans often. For the most part, their looks alone are awful enough that anyone who sees them quickly runs away. They occasionally accost people, demanding makeup or trying to buy sake. In this way they resemble other old hag yōkai who wander the streets at night, such as amazake babā. However, unlike most other hags, oshiroi babā—while ugly and scary—are not dangerous. According to some local legends, oshiroi babā are a kind of yuki onna who descend from mountains into villages on snowy nights. Other legends say that they are more similar to yama uba, who occasionally demand makeup from travelers or appear at the bases of mountains to buy alcohol. According to Toriyama Sekien, oshiroi babā serve as the attendants of Shifun Senjō, the goddess of rouge and makeup. White Faces, Black Teeth The artwork of the Edo Period is well known for its depictions of women wearing distinctive makeup. The palette of this time consisted of three basic colors: white, red, and black. The whiten the face, a lead-based pigment called oshiroi was applied thickly with a brush. The whiter the better. The lips, cheeks, and fingernails were colored red using a pigment made from safflowers. Upon getting married, women would blacken their teeth by swishing in their mouths a concoction made from vinegar and iron filings—a style called ohaguro. Upon giving birth to her first child, a woman would shave off her eyebrows, and would sometimes paint a new set of fake eyebrows high up on her forehead. Yōkai are often depicted wearing excessive amounts of makeup. Picture scrolls show ogrish women applying thick white makeup and smiling with mouths full of black teeth. And there are yōkai—like oshiroi baba and ohaguro bettari—who are named for these makeup styles. It seems that even ghosts and spirits were not exempt from fashion trends. ---- Jakotsu babā (蛇骨婆) Translation: snake bones hag Habitat: Bukan, a mythical country far to the west Diet: as a human Appearance: Jakotsu babā is a scary old hag and a shaman with the power to control snakes. She is described as carrying a blue snake in her right hand and a red snake in her left. Very little is recorded about Jakotsu babā's history or life. Her behavior is the subject of speculation by storytellers. She supposedly lives near a place called "the snake mound." She scares those who wander too close to her home by attacking them with her snakes. It's not quite clear where this yōkai originally comes from. She was recorded in 1780 by Toriyama Sekien in his book Konjaku hyakki shūi. Because she carries two snakes, Sekien speculated that Jakotsu babā originally came from the mythical country of Bukan (also called Fukan; known as Wuxian in Chinese). The race of people who lived in Bukan were shamans, and they used snakes prominently in their divinations. Bukan is recorded in the Sengaikyō (Chinese: Shan hai jing), which Toriyama Sekien uses as his source for this record. It was supposedly located far to the west, past China on the Asian continent. According to Sekien, long ago there was an important man in Bukan named Jagoemon who lived in a place known as "the snake mound." His wife was known as Jagobā (i.e. "Jago's wife"). Over time, her name was corrupted into Jakotsu babā. Jagoemon is not a famous historical or mythical figure, so Sekien's reference may have been invented for fun. Prior to Konjaku hyakki shūi, the name jakotsu babā appears as a vulgar slang word for an old woman in various pulp fiction and kabuki plays of the 1760s and 1770s. Some scholars believe that Sekien may have taken a popular buzzword of his time, transformed it into a yōkai, and attached a simple backstory. ---- Uwabami (蟒蛇) Translation: giant snake, great serpent Alternate names: orochi, daija Habitat: wilderness Diet: carnivorous; gluttonous and very fond of alcohol Appearance: Uwabami are enormous serpents. Apart from their incredible size, they closely resemble ordinary snakes. They make their homes in the wilderness, far from civilization. Uwabami are capable of eating things that are much larger than their bodies, and in quantities that seem like more than they should be able to eat. They are also extremely fond of drinking and can consume huge quantities of sake. They can shapeshift into objects and creatures, including humans. Floods and rock slides are often blamed on evil uwabami. Snakes have been a part of folklore since prehistoric times. They are symbols of life, death, and eternal youth—the shedding and re-growing of their skin was viewed as a magical ability. Because they can slip into the tiniest cracks, penetrating deep, dark places inaccessible to humans, they were seen as tenacious and clever creatures. The word uwabami is slang for a heavy drinker. The comes from the uwabami's legendary fondness for sake and its ability to drink more than a creature as large as it should be able to. Long ago, an uwabami lived in Ōnuma Lake of Shinano Province. Every year he would transform into a handsome young man and visit the mountains to see the cherry blossoms. One spring, he saw a beautiful young woman alone under the blossoms. She was Kuro hime, daughter of the powerful lord Takanashi Masamori. Kuro hime also spied the handsome man who was watching her and found him irresistible. They became acquainted and soon fell in love. The uwabami traveled to Masamori's castle. He introduced himself as the great snake of Ōnuma Lake, guardian deity of the Shiga Highlands. He professed his love for Kuro hime and asked the lord for her hand in marriage. Masamori immediately refused. The uwabami did not give up and returned every day to ask for Kuro hime's hand. Finally, Masamori gave his conditions: "If you can keep up with me on horseback and complete seven laps around my castle, I will give you my daughter." The uwabami agreed. Masamori devised a plan to kill the creature. He had his servants plant swords in the grass all around the castle. When the race began, Masamori spurred his horse into action. The uwabami could not outride the lord, so he transformed into a snake to keep pace. The swords planted around the castle pierced and tore his body. Masamori was an expert rider and knew where the swords were hidden so he easily avoided the traps. When they had completed seven laps, the uwabami's body was ragged. Rivers of blood flowed from his wounds, and he collapsed. Masamori's trap had worked. When the uwabami awoke, he realized that he had been tricked. He returned to his lake and summoned a storm, the likes of which had never been seen. Ōnuma Lake swelled and overflowed, flooding everything around. Houses were knocked down, fields were flooded, villages were washed away. No humans or animals escaped annihilation. However, the mountains around Masamori's castle shielded it, and the castle stood firm. Kuro hime watched from the safety of the castle. She was heartbroken when she saw the destruction. She traveled to Ōnuma Lake, where she threw herself into the water and drowned. When the uwabami learned what had happened, he banished the storm clouds and commanded the flood to recede. The lake shrank back to its original borders. Kuro hime was never seen again. The uwabami is still worshiped today as the guardian deity of the Shiga Highlands. There is a small shrine called Daija Jinja located near Ōnuma Lake where the snake is enshrined. Every August, the villagers gather there to honor the uwabami and remember the story of Kuro hime. ---- Ōmukade (大百足) Translation: giant centipede Alternate names: mountains and caves; any dark and humid place big enough to hold it Habitat: large mountains and deep forests Diet: carnivorous Appearance: Ōmukade are monstrous mukade ( Scolopendra subspinipes)—centipedes with dark bodies and bright orange legs and heads. They are often depicted with dragon-like features. While ordinary mukade can grow up to 20 cm in length, the upper size limit on yōkai mukade is unknown. Like their smaller relatives, ōmukade are vicious and highly aggressive. The bite of a regular mukade is venomous and extremely painful, but rarely fatal. Ōmukade, on the other hand, are much more venomous and powerful. They have even been known to attack dragons. An ōmukade's exoskeleton is so tough that it can't be pierced by weapons. They have one weakness—human saliva is toxic to them. A weapon coated in saliva is able to pierce through its armor and wound it. Ōmukade encounters are extremely rare. However, when they happen they pose a threat to all in the area. Throughout history, the responsibility of exterminating these monsters has fallen on the shoulders of brave warriors. There is a famous bridge in Shiga Prefecture known as Seta no Karahashi. Long ago, a great serpent appeared on the bridge and would not move. The villagers were too afraid to approach the serpent, and so they could not cross. One day, the brave warrior Fujiwara no Hidesato came to the village and learned of the serpent on the bridge. He feared nothing so he crossed the bridge, trampling over the serpent's great body with his heavy feet. It slithered back into the lake. The bridge was clear again. That night, a beautiful woman visited Hidesato. She introduced herself as the daughter of the dragon king of Like Biwa. The dragon king had sent her to Hidesato to ask for his help. Her family was being tormented by an ōmukade who lived on Mount Mikami. She believed that Hidesato was a brave warrior who had trampled her so fearlessly. Hidesato agreed to help the dragon king. He took up his sword and his bow and headed to the mountains. Upon reaching Mount Mikami, Hidesato saw an enormous centipede coiled around its top. It was so long that its body wrapped around the mountain seven and a half times. He fired his arrows at it until only one arrow remained but he was unable to pierce the beast's armor. Hidesato coated the tip of the arrow in his saliva. He said a prayer to Hachiman, the god of warriors. This time his arrow struck true. He brought down the ōmukade. The dragon king's daughter was so grateful to Hidesato that she rewarded him with marvelous gifts: a bag of rice which never became empty no matter how much rice was taken from it; a roll of silk which never ran out no matter how much was cut from it; a cooking pot which always produced the most delicious food without the need for fire; and a large temple bell, which Hidesato donated to Mii-dera. The grateful dragon king also taught Hidesato the secret to defeating Taira no Masakado, a rebel whom Hidesato had been ordered to defeat by the emperor. ---- Daidarabotchi (大太郎法師) Translation: giant; literally "Big Tarō the priest" Alternate names: daidarabō, daidabō, daidara hōshi, daitarōbō, deidarabotchi, dairanbō, dendenbome, reirabotchi, ōki bochabocha; many others Habitat: mountains all over Japan Diet: omnivorous Appearance: Daidarabotchi are colossal humanoids which resemble bald-headed priests. They have big rolling eyes, long, lolling tongues, and pitch-black skin. They share similarities with other giants like ōnyūdō and umi bōzu, but they are by far the largest giants found in yōkai folklore. Daidarabotchi are so large that their movements shape the world. They build mountains by piling up rocks and dirt. They pick up and move mountains to other places. When they walk, they leave lakes and valleys in their footprints. Many places across Japan are reported to have been made by daidarabotchi. Some are even named after them. Some of the oldest folk stories in Japan are legends of giants. Because of this, daidarabotchi have countless regional name variations. Most of them are local variations of the same theme: a giant priest. However, priest is often used as slang and doesn't necessarily refer to members of the clergy. Similarly, the name Tarō is such a common Japanese name that it is often used as a placeholder name and does not refer to an actual person. So, while daidarabotchi can be translated as "Big Tarō the priest," it is more of a figurative name than a literal one. Mount Fuji is said to have been made by a daidarabotchi. The giant scooped and dug up all the dirt in Kai Province (Yamanashi Prefecture) to make the mountain, and that is why the area around Mount Fuji is a large basin. When he ran out of dirt, he gathered more by digging in Omi Province (Shiga Prefecture). The area he dug there became Lake Biwa. The towns of Daita in Setagaya, Tōkyō and Daitakubo in Saitama are named after daidarabotchi. Both places are said to have been formed by daidarabotchi long ago. Daizahōshi Pond in Nagano Prefecture is another form of daidarabotchi and is believed to have been created by one. Senba Lake in Ibaraki Prefecture is also said to fill the footprint of a particularly large daidarabotchi. The Takabocchi Plateau in Nagano's Yatsugatake quasi-national park is said to have been formed when a daidarabotchi lay down to rest his back for a bit. ---- Onikuma (鬼熊) Translation: demon bear Habitat: mountains and forests Diet: omnivorous Appearance: Onikuma are bears which have lived an extraordinarily long time and transformed into yōkai. Onikuma continue growing beyond even the largest ordinary bears. They walk on two legs and are big enough to pick up cows and horses. They can easily move boulders than ten men could not budge. They are so powerful that they can crush a monkey in the palm of their hand. Onikuma behavior is similar to ordinary bears. They live deep in the mountains, far away from humans. They are nocturnal. They hunt and scavenge and are able to eat just about anything. Onikuma rarely venture out of their habitats. However, like ordinary bears, onikuma will occasionally emerge from the forests and go into villages in search of food. Due to their reclusive nature, encounters between onikuma and humans are rare. When they do occur, they are often violent. Onikuma sometimes wander into human-inhabited areas in search of food, usually livestock. Onikuma are capable of grabbing livestock and carrying them back into the forest. When this happens, the villagers have no choice but to try to hunt and kill the onikuma. Special tactics are required to hunt onikuma. First, hunters use strong timber to build a sturdy wooden structure resembling a square well casing. This is covered with wisteria vines and used to plug up the entrance of the onikuma's den. Sticks and brush are pushed through the narrow openings around the den plug. The onikuma instinctively pulls these things into the den and piles them up in back, like a nest. As more and more sticks are inserted, the den fills up until there is no more space. The onikuma then pushes its way out through the vine-covered plug. As it emerges, it is stabbed with long spears and shot with rifles. One such onikuma hunt was recorded during the Kyōhō era (1716-1736). The hide taken from the beast was reported to be large enough to cover more than six tatami mats. ---- Hōkō (彭侯) Translation: based on the Chinese name for the same creature; literally "evergreen lord" Habitat: inside of trees Diet: unknown; probably herbivorous Appearance: Hōkō are nature spirits which inhabit thousand-year old trees. They resemble black dogs with human-like faces and no tails. Being tree spirits, hōkō are said to resemble kodama or yamabiko. However, Toriyama Sekien goes out of his way to mention that despite the similar appearance hōkō are a separate yōkai. Most hōkō encounters are accidental. They usually involve an old woodcutter chopping into a camphor tree with an axe, and blood spurting out from the tree from the hōkō living inside. Nevertheless, there are a number of records of hōkō appearing in Japanese and Chinese chronicles. Hōkō are recorded as being edible; the ancient Chinese records that mention them include accounts of hōkō being stewed and eaten. Apparently, they taste sweet and sour, and are similar to dog meat. Hōkō is the Japanese pronunciation of this spirit's Chinese name: penghou. According to legend, its name was recorded in the yōkai encyclopedia Hakutaku zu. The last surviving copy of this book was lost thousands of years ago, so the true meaning of the name is difficult to decipher. Because of gradual changes in the writing systems of China and Japan, the characters used to write hōkō do not translate perfectly into Japanese. Legends refer to the hōkō being found inside of camphor trees. However, the first characters in its name refers to a different kind of evergreen in Japanese: the sakaki ( Cleyera japonica). This is an important, sacred tree in Shinto. The second character in its name was used as a title for feudal lords. It's not clear that these were the intended meanings in the original Chinese though. ---- Sarugami (猿神) Translation: monkey god, monkey spirit Alternate names: enjin Habitat: mountain forests far from human civilization Appearance: Monkeys are viewed as pests by farmers. They dig up crops, steal food from gardens, and sometimes even attack pets and small children. Sarugami are bigger, more vicious, and smarter versions of the monkeys which inhabit Japan. They can speak, and they sometimes even wear human clothes. When sarugami interact with humans it almost always ends in violence. Most legends involve sarugami kidnaping young women from a village. Heroes are then called upon to venture into the wilderness and slay the beasts. Sarugami are an example of fallen gods—spirits once revered as deities but who have since been forgotten and degenerated into yōkai. Monkeys were once worshiped as gods in parts of Japan. Hiyoshi Taisha at the southern part of Lake Biwa was an important center of monkey worship. Monkeys were messengers and servants of the sun because they become most active at sunrise and sunset. Monkey worship was popular among ancient farmers, who also awoke and retired with the sun. As people advanced beyond subsistence farming, monkey worship faded away. Eventually the monkey gods were forgotten. Though the monkey cults vanished, sarugami worship somewhat continued throughout the middle ages in esoteric religions such as Kōshin. Monkeys were viewed as servants of mountain deities, acting as intermediaries between our world and the gods. The famous "see no evil, hear no evil, say no evil" monkeys ( mizaru, kikazaru, and iwazaru) come from Kōshin and are a remnant of ancient sarugami worship. Long ago a giant monkey lived in the mountains of Mimasaka Province. Every year it would demand a sacrifice of a young woman from the villages around the mountain. A hunter happened to be staying at the house of the young woman who was chosen to be that year's sacrifice. The hunter took pity on the young woman. He offered to take her place as a sacrifice. The hunter and his dog were loaded into a large chest and taken up into the mountains by priests to be presented to the sarugami. After some time, a giant monkey more than two meters tall emerged from the woods. It was accompanied by an entourage of over one hundred monkeys. The hunter and his dog leaped from the chest and attacked. Monkey after monkey was slain, until only the sarugami remained. The sarugami possessed one of the priests and spoke through him. It asked for forgiveness and promised never to demand another sacrifice if the hunter would spare its life. The hunter allowed to sarugami to run away. True to its word, the sarugami has never since asked for another sacrifice. In Ōmi Province there lived an elderly farmer and his young daughter. The farmer toiled in his fields every day, while his daughter waited to be married off. But there were no suitors. One day, the farmer mumbled to himself, "If only there was someone who would marry my daughter and come work in my field... Even a monkey would be ok!" Suddenly, a sarugami appeared nearby. It performed all the old man's farm work. Then it demanded the old man's daughter as payment. The old man refused. The sarugami grew angry at him for breaking his word. It kidnapped the man's daughter and ran deep into the mountains. It kept the daughter tied up in a sack in its den. ---- Obariyon (おばりよん) Translation: piggyback rider Alternate names: bariyon, onbu obake, ubariyon, obosaritei Habitat: human-inhabited areas, near roads Diet: unknown Appearance: Obariyon are child-sized monsters from Niigata prefecture which love riding on people's backs. Obariyon lurk in bushes and trees by the side of the road. When a traveler walks by an obariyon's hiding place, it leaps out onto their back and shouts, "obariyon!" If the traveler relents and carries the obariyon on his back, the monster becomes heavier and heavier with each footstep. In addition, this mischievous yōkai chews on the scalp of the person carrying it, further adding to their misery. To protect against an obariyon's head-chewing, some villages developed the custom of wearing metal bowls on their heads. According to some tales, as the obariyon becomes heavier and heavier, it eventually crushes its victim under its weight. However, more commonly, when a person has dutifully carried the obariyon the whole way home, it turns out that the strange burden was actually a sack of money. The helpful bearer becomes incredibly rich. The name obariyon comes from a phrase in a local Niigata dialect requesting a piggyback ride. Differences in local dialects are reflected in the many different names for this spirit. Though it varies from place to place, it is always some form of a childish request to be carried piggyback. Although the exact origins of this particular creature are unclear, folk tales about yōkai which demand to be carried or cared for are common across Japan. There is a recurring theme that those who persevere when dealing with children will prosper. Just as those who put up with the strange demands of the obariyon may find themselves blessed with a bag of gold, those who manage to deal with the demands of raising young children will eventually reap the rewards. In this way, obariyon may be a metaphor for child-rearing. While the demands of the obariyon seem selfish and burdensome, those who are willing to endure for the entire journey find that the hard work was worth it in the end. ---- Kenmun (水蝹) Translation: water spirit Alternate names: kenmon, kawatarō, yamawaro Habitat: the Amami islands Diet: primarily fish and shellfish Appearance: Kenmun are hairy water and tree spirits from the Amami islands in southern Japan. They look like a cross between a kappa and a monkey. Kenmun closely resemble their Okinawan cousins, kijimunā. Their bodies are covered in dark red or black hair, and they have long, thin legs and arms. They are slightly larger in size than a human child. Their mouths are pointed, and on top of their heads is a saucer-like depression which holds a small amount of oil or water. Their bodies smell like yams. Their drool is rank. Kenmun live in banyan trees and spend their days in family groups playing in the mountains or near the water. They particularly enjoy sumo wrestling, at which they are highly skilled. As the seasons change, they migrate back and forth from the mountains to the sea. Kenmun have a number of strange abilities. They are able to change shape and often disguise themselves as people, horses, or cows. They can change into plants and blend in with the surrounding vegetation, or even disappear entirely. Kenmun also create light. Their drool glows eerily, as do their fingertips. They can create fire from the tips of their fingers. Sometimes they use this fire to light the oil in their head-dishes. When phantom lights are seen in the mountains or on the shores of the Amami islands, locals attribute this to kenmun. Kenmun hunt at night. They light up their fingertips to search for food in the dark. They primarily feed on fish and small shellfish. They also enjoy slugs, and they pull snails out of their shells and roll them up like rice balls. (It is possible to identify a banyan tree inhabited by a kenmun by the snail shells piled up among its roots.) They hate octopus and giant clams and will have nothing to do with them. Kenmun avoid inhabited areas and flee when large groups of people are nearby. They occasionally aid lone woodcutters and people gathering firewood by carrying heavy loads for them. They remember those who treat them kindly or do them favors. A fisherman who saves a kenmun from being attacked by an octopus is sure to earn its eternal gratitude. Some elderly islanders who have befriended kenmun are able to call them down from the mountains to show their grandchildren. They love competition, especially sumō wrestling. When their head-dish is filled, they have supernatural strength and cannot be beaten. However, kenmun like to mimic people. If a challenger stands on their head or bows low, the kemun will do so too, spilling their head-dish and draining their strength. Kenmun enjoy pranks. They shapeshift into animals and try to scare humans. Or they offer false directions to make people helplessly lost. They have no shame about stealing food and utensils. Kenmun occasionally do wicked things. They are sensitive to insults, particularly about their body odors. If a person talks about bad smells or farts while in the mountains, any kenmun who overhears it will take it personally. Kenmun can steal the souls of living humans, turning them catatonic. They then pull them into rivers or force them to eat snails. Their victims are later found unconscious beneath banyan trees. Even children can have had their souls stolen. Afterwards, they will behave like kenmun, living in banyan trees and leaping from tree to tree when villagers try to catch them. If a kenmun's banyan tree is cut, the kenmun will place a curse on the woodcutter. The victim's eyes will swell up and go blind. Eventually they will die. Hanging a pig's foot bones or Pittosporum tobira branches from the eaves of rooves keeps kenmun away. Threatening to throw an octopus at one is enough to send them running. If an octopus is not available, they will run away from anything you throw as long as you pretend it's an octopus. ---- Bashō no sei (芭蕉精) Translation: banana tree spirit Habitat: the Ryūkyū archipelago Appearance: Bashō no sei are the spirits of the Japanese banana tree ( Musa basjoo). Banana trees are native to the islands of Okinawa but are common in ornamental gardens across Asia. Bashō no sei usually appear as human faces amongst the broad, flat banana leaves. Stories about banana tree spirits are numerous across Japanese, Chinese, and Ryūkyūan folklore. Bashō no sei are not usually hostile or threatening towards people. They generally limit themselves to startling humans by suddenly appearing next to them. For example, in one story a bashō no sei takes the form of a young woman, appears next to a meditating monk, and asks him if even inanimate plants can attain Buddhahood. Bashō no sei are not completely without danger. They sometimes assault and even impregnate humans. According to some superstitions, women should not to walk near banana trees past 6 pm. If they do, they will surely run into a yōkai among the broad leaves. Sometimes bashō no sei appear as monsters. Other times as handsome young men. Whatever the form, shortly after the woman will become pregnant. Her baby will be born with tusks or fangs like that of a demon. What's more, the following year and every year after that, the woman will give birth to more demon children. Whenever such creatures are born they must be killed by feeding them a poisonous drink made of powdered kumazasa (a type of bamboo grass). This is supposedly the reason why kumazasa is commonly found growing near houses in Okinawa. The Edo period herbalist Satō Chūryō recorded his observations about these spirits in an essay. According to him, Ryūkyū's banana orchards were so large that they contained rows of trees many miles long. If you walked past them at night, you were guaranteed to experience something strange. He observed that the spirits that come out of the banana trees did not cause direct harm to people other than spooking them. Nevertheless, they could be avoided if you carried a sword. Chūryō theorized that banana trees weren't necessarily unique in having spirits. However, because their leaves are so large, and they were planted in such large numbers, it is particularly easy for humans to see these trees' spirits. He believed that was the reason for the large number of superstitions about banana trees in comparison with other plants. In Nagano Prefecture, a priest was sitting outside and reciting sutras when a beautiful young woman appeared and attempted to seduce him. The priest grew angry. He stabbed the woman with his sword and she ran away. The next morning, the priest found a bloody trail left by the woman he had stabbed. The trail lead to the temple's gardens, where a bashō tree was lying on the ground, cut in two. The priest then realized that the woman had been the spirit of the tree. ---- Ninmenju (人面樹) Translation: human face tree Alternate names: jinmenju Habitat: mountain valleys Appearance: The ninmenju is a strange tree which bears flowers that look like human heads. These heads cannot speak, but they can smile and even laugh. In the autumn, they bear face-shaped fruit which tastes both sweet and sour. If a person laughs at the tree, the head-shaped flowers will laugh back at that person. If they laugh too strongly, the heads will wilt and fall off the trees. The ninmenju is an example of folklore that has traveled over great time and distance to become what it is. Ninmenju first appears in Japan in the Edo Period encyclopedia Wakan sansai zue. This book documented animals, plants, and yōkai from both inside and outside of Japan. The description is paraphrased from the Sansai zue (Chinese: Sancai tuhui), an encyclopedia published in 1609. This book describes a tree bearing human-faced fruit which originated in the foreign land of Daishi (大食). Daishi comes from the Ming Chinese name for the Islamic world, which in turn comes from the Persian word for Muslims– tāzī. This was derived from the Tayy, an Arabic tribe which flourished under the Abbasid Caliphate. There is a tree in Islamic folklore called the waq waq tree which is similar to the ninmenju. This tree was described as bearing fruit shaped like humans and animals. The fruit could speak, and even tell secrets about the future. Yet it would die a few days after being picked. These trees grew on the mythical island of Waq Waq in the land of Zanj, an area in Africa near present-day Zanzibar. Arab legends say that Alexander the Great spoke to a waq waq tree during his conquests, and it foretold his death. The waq waq tree may in fact be the same tree which comes from Daishi and is referred to in Wakan sansai zue. Through trade along the Silk Road between the Islamic world and Ming China, it is possible that this Arabic myth made its way across the Asian continent and eventually became the model for the ninmenju. ---- Akateko (赤手児) Translation: red child hand Habitat: Japanese honey locust ( Gleditsia japonica) trees Diet: none Appearance: The akateko appears as its name implies: as a red, disembodied hand belonging to a child. They can be found hanging in Japanese honey locust trees. An akateko drops down from its tree as people pass underneath it. Aside from giving its victims a nasty surprise and the general creepiness of a disembodied red child's hand, it is not known to cause harm. Some people claim to have seen the figure of a furisode-wearing beautiful girl of 17 or 18 years standing underneath an akateko's tree. Those who witness her are immediately struck with a powerful fever. It is not clear what relationship this girl has to the akateko—if she is part of the same apparition or another spirit entirely. The origin of akateko is said to be a certain tree in front of an elementary school in the city of Hachinohe, Aomori Prefecture. However, there are local versions of this phenomenon in Fukushima and Kagawa Prefectures as well. In these prefectures, akateko sometimes work together with another yōkai called aka ashi. They grab at the feet of pedestrians, causing them to stumble and fall. It has been suggested that akateko and aka ashi are two forms of the same yōkai. ---- Teke teke (テケテケ) Translation: onomatopoeic; the sound of her walking on her hands Alternate names: shaka shaka, pata pata, kata kata, koto koto, hijikake babā Habitat: urban areas, along roads Diet: none; survives solely on its grudge Appearance: Teke teke are ghosts who appear in a number of urban legends. They are almost always women, though in a few versions of this urban legend they are male. Teke teke appear as someone cut in half at the waste, running about on their hands. This creates the distinctive teke teke sound from which they get their name. Teke teke chase their victims down dark roads. Despite having no legs, a teke teke can run fast enough to catch victims escaping in speeding cars. It can supposedly crawl at speeds of up to 150 km per hour. When a teke teke catches its victims, something terrible happens— although the legends are not always clear what. In some versions of the story, the teke teke carries a sickle. It slices its victims in half at the waist and steals their legs. Some say that she is searching for her lost legs. Others say that she is angry at humanity for not helping her when she was alive—she is simply out to slaughter as many people as she can. Every town has its own version of the teke teke urban legend. In some stories the teke teke was the victim of a tragic accident. In others it was suicide. In some stories magic charms can protect you from its wrath. In others, nothing can protect you; death is certain. Sometimes the teke teke's victims even become teke teke themselves. There are so many versions of the legend that it is impossible to know what the original story was, or where it began. However, a number of common threads point towards a woman from Hokkaidō named Kashima Reiko. In the years after World War II, Kashima Reiko, an office worker in Muroran, Hokkaidō, was assaulted and raped by American military personnel. That night, she leaped off a bridge onto the railroad tracks and was hit by an oncoming train. The impact was so forceful that her body was torn in half at the waist. The severe cold of the Hokkaidō night caused her blood vessels to contract and prevented her from bleeding out. Instead, she writhed in pain for several minutes. She crawled along the tracks all the way to the station where she was seen by an attendant. Instead of trying to help her, the station attendant covered her with a plastic tarp. She died a slow, agonizing death. Shortly after hearing the legend, Kashima Reiko will appear and ask you a riddle. This will come either in a dream or in a mysterious phone call. The only way to escape death is to answer her questions exactly the right way. She will ask you: "Do you need your legs?" You must reply: "I need them right now." Then, she will ask you: "Who told you my story?" You must reply: "Kashima Reiko." (The kanji used for her name are specific: ka as in mask (仮面); shi as in death (死); ma as in demon (魔); rei as in ghost (霊); ko as in accident (事故). If you answer her riddles without mistakes, she may let you live. If you fail to answer her questions accurately, three days later you will see the ghost of a woman with no lower half. The teke teke will try to catch you. When she does, she will tear you in half and steal your lower body. ---- Hōsōshi (方相氏) Translation: minister of the four directions; the one who sees in all directions Appearance: A hōsōshi wears the mask of an oni and special robes (the particular outfit varies depending on which shrine the ritual is being performed at). It carries a spear in its right hand and a shield in its left. In ancient times, hōsōshi were official government ministers and priests in the imperial court. The name refers not only to the title, but to a demon god which priests would dress up as during yearly purification rituals. This god appears as a four-eyed oni who can see in all directions and punishes all evil. During the early Heian Period, the hōsōshi's duties included leading coffins during state funeral processions, officiating at burial ceremonies, and driving corpse-stealing yōkai away from burial mounds. By donning the mask and costume, the hōsōshi (priest) became the hōsōshi (god) and was able to scare away evil spirits. The hōsōshi's most famous duty was a purification ceremony called tsuina. Tsuina was performed annually on Ōmisoka—the last day of the year. The ritual was done at shrines and government buildings (such as the imperial palace). In this ritual, the hōsōshi and his servant would run around the shrine courtyard (covering "the four directions"), chanting and warding the area against oni and other evil spirits. Meanwhile, a number of attending officials would shoot arrows around the hōsōshi from the shrine or palace buildings, symbolically defending the area against evil spirits. Other observers would play small hand drums with ritualistic cleansing significance. Hōsō was a concept related to divination, the four directions, and the magical barriers between the human world and the spirit world. It dealt with creating and maintaining these boundaries and barriers. This included things like planting trees or placing stones in the four corners of an area or utilizing existing features like rivers and roads to serve as natural boundaries. By maintaining these natural boundaries, the spiritual boundaries between the worlds could also be maintained. The ultimate goal was keeping the imperial family and other government officials safe from supernatural harm. The concept originated in ancient Chinese folk religion, where it is called fangxiang. The fangxiangshi was an exorcist who wore a four eyed mask and a bear skin. Over time, Chinese folk religion mixed with Buddhism and Taoism, and then made its way to Japan. The Japanese hōsōshi's rituals and costume were derived from this syncretic folk belief. Eventually the Japanese version evolved away from its Chinese roots. The hōsōshi came to be seen not as a god which keeps oni away, but as an oni itself. Rather than exorcising evil spirits, the hōsōshi became an evil spirit. It was the imperial officials who chased away and exorcised the hōsōshi. This may have been due to changing perceptions during the Heian Period about the concept of ritual purity. The hōsōshi, associated with funerals and dead bodies, came to be viewed as unclean. It was inappropriate for such a creature to be on the same side as the imperial household, so it became the target of the ritual instead of the officiator. While the governmental position of hōsōshi no longer exists today, some shrines still perform annual tsuina rituals involving the hōsōshi. The celebration of Setsubun, in which beans are thrown at people wearing oni masks, is also derived from this ancient ritual. ---- Shōki (鍾馗) Translation: none; this is the Japanese pronunciation of his Chinese name Appearance: Shōki (known in Chinese as Zhong Kui) is a legendary hero and deity from ancient China. He is ugly, with a large hulking body, a long flowing beard, and fearsome piercing eyes. He is usually shown carrying a sword and wearing a court official's cap. Due to his ability to vanquish, exorcise, and even control oni and other spirits, Shōki is known as "the demon queller." He is so feared by oni that his image alone scares them away. The demons he defeats sometimes become his servants. It is said that he commands 80,000 demons. Shōki originated in ancient China during the 700s. His story reached Japan by the late Heian Period, and his popularity reached its height during the Edo Period. Paintings and statues of him are still used as good luck charms. Shōki's image appears on flags, folding screens, and hanging scrolls. Small statues of him can sometimes be seen on the roofs of older houses in Kyōto. Shōki is strongly associated with Boys' Day, a holiday in May. He is revered as a god of protection from demons and sickness (particularly smallpox, which was believed to be spread by evil spirits). He is also a god of scholarship. Shōki lived in Shanxi Province in China during the Tang dynasty. His life's goal was to become a physician in the court of Emperor Xuanzong. Shōki was a smart and diligent student. He trained hard and passed all the exams to become a physician. He placed first out of all the applicants and should have easily received the position. However, Shōki was tremendously ugly. When the emperor saw his face, he immediately rejected Shōki's application even though he was the most qualified for the job. Shōki was devastated. His dreams shattered, he committed suicide on the steps of the imperial palace. The emperor was moved by Shōki's dedication. He regretted denying the application of such a talented and brilliant man because of his looks. The emperor decreed that Shōki receive a state burial of the highest rank—an honor usually reserved for royalty. He then posthumously awarded Shōki the title "Doctor of Zhongnanshan." Years later, the emperor became gravely ill. Delirious with fever, he dreamed that he saw two oni. The larger one was wearing the clothing of a court official. It grabbed the smaller oni, killed it, and ate it. Then, it turned to the emperor and introduced itself as Shōki. He vowed to protect the emperor from evil. When the emperor woke up, his fever was gone. Xuanzong commissioned the court painter to make a painting of Shōki based on his dream. Shōki became a popular deity across China (and later, Japan). He was revered as a god of scholarship for his great devotion to his studies, and as a protector against disease and evil spirits. ---- Sōjōbō (僧正坊) Translation: high priest Alternate names: Kurama tengu, Kurama sōjōbō Habitat: Mount Kurama Appearance: Sōjōbō is the name of a great tengu who lives on Mount Kurama in the northern part of Kyōto. His home is in Sōjōgatani, a valley located deep within the interior of the mountain. Sōjōbō has long, white hair, an incredibly long nose, and possesses the strength of one thousand tengu. Sōjōbō is first in rank among tengu and is often referred to as their king. As the king of the tengu, Sōjōbō possesses a knowledge of magic, military tactics, and swordsmanship unsurpassed by any other. Sōjōbō is known through his connection to Kurama Temple, an isolated temple which practices a unique branch of esoteric Buddhism. Kurama Temple has long had a connection with both the ascetic mountain religions called yamabushi as well as the tengu which these religions revere. Because Sōjōbō resides there, Mount Kurama is also considered to be the mountain most important to tengu. According to Kurama Temple, Sōjōbō is either one rank below Maō-son— part of the holy trinity which is central to the Kurama faith—or is in fact an incarnation of Mao-son himself. Although his name is well known, not much is written about Sōjōbō. The most famous legend is that he trained a young boy named Ushiwakamaru. Ushiwakamaru wished to learn from him and traveled deep into Sōjōgatani to undergo a long and arduous training. This was a dangerous quest. Tengu are fierce and unpredictable, and Sōjōbō was rumored to eat children who wandered too deep into the forest. However, Sōjōbō was impressed with the young boy's bravery and agreed to train him. Ushiwakamaru grew up to become Minamoto Yoshitsune, who lived from 1159-1189 CE. As one of the main heroes in The Tale of the Heike, Yoshitsune is still revered as one of Japan's most celebrated warriors. His unmatched swordsmanship is credited to the training he received from Sōjōbō, the tengu of Mount Kurama. ---- Shokuin (燭陰) Translation: torch shadow Alternate names: Shokuryū (torch dragon) Habitat: Mount Shō, near the Arctic Ocean Diet: none; he does not need to eat, drink, or breathe Appearance: Shokuin is a mighty god with the face of a human and the body of a red dragon. His serpentine body is said to be 1000 ri long (a ri is an ancient unit of distance which varies quite a bit from age to age and place to place). This is an immeasurable distance, meaning that he is impossibly large. He lives at the foot of Mount Shō, near the northern sea. His eyes glow like beams from a lighthouse and his breath is so strong that it changes the seasons. When Shokuin opens his eyes, daylight falls upon the earth. When he closes them, it becomes night. When he inhales it becomes summer. When he exhales it becomes winter. Shokuin does not need to eat, drink, or breathe to survive. But when he chooses to breathe it causes huge gusts of wind. Shokuin originally comes from China. Shokuin is the Japanese pronunciation of the characters that make up his name. In China he is known as Zhuyin or Zhulong. Many yōkai were lifted straight from Chinese by Japanese authors—some of them more or less word for word, others undergoing considerable transformation and reinterpretation depending on how much liberty the authors decided to take. Toriyama Sekien's description of Shokuin doesn't undergo too much of a change from his source. He copied the Sengaikyō (Chinese: Shan hai jing), an encyclopedia of fantastical Chinese mythological creatures. However, Shokuin appears in a number of other Chinese books. Many stories contain contradictory statements about precisely where he lives and other details about him. It isn't clear exactly where his home of Mount Shō is located. Toriyama Sekien describes it as being near the Arctic Ocean. Due to his size and the effects that his blinking and breathing has on the day/night and seasonal cycles, Shokuin may have been an ancient Chinese fire or solar deity. He might even have been a personification of the sun. It has also been suggested that Shokuin may have been the aurora borealis. An ancient Chinese name for the northern lights was "red spirit," and the location of Shokuin far to the north further supports this theory. To the ancient Chinese, the aurora may have looked like a giant red dragon thousands of kilometers long writhing across the northern sky. ---- Seiryū (青竜) Translation: azure dragon; Qinlong Alternate names: Shōryū, Seiryō, Sōryū, Chinron Habitat: the eastern sky Appearance: Seiryū is a large blue-green dragon with a long tongue. Its home is in the eastern sky. It spans seven of the twenty-eight Chinese constellations, taking up one quarter of the night sky. The constellations which make up the horn and neck of the dragon are located in Virgo. The constellation which makes up the chest of the dragon is located in Libra. The constellations which make up its heart, belly, and tail are located in Scorpius. The final constellation makes up its dung and is located in Sagittarius. Seiryū is one of the shijin, or Four Symbols. These are important mythological figures in Taoism. Seiryū is the guardian of the east. The dragon is associated with the Chinese element of wood, the season of spring, the planet Jupiter, and the colors blue and green. It represents the virtue of benevolence and symbolizes creativity. Seiryū controls the rain. It is enshrined in Kyōto at Kiyomizu Temple, in the eastern part of the city. [ The Four Holy Beasts ] Seiryū, Suzaku, Byakko, and Genbu make up a grouping of gods known as the shijin: The Four Holy Beasts. They are known by a number of different names, such as the Four Benevolent Animals and The Four Symbols. They were brought to Japan from China in the 7th century CE. They are strongly associated with Taoism, feng shui, the seasons, astrology, the five-element theory, and other forms of Chinese mysticism. The ancient capitals of Fujiwara-kyō, Heijo-kyō, and Heian-kyō were built in correspondence to these beliefs, with each of the quadrants of the city dedicated to one of the Four Symbols. Excavations of ancient burial mounds in Nara have revealed paintings of the shijin decorating the four directions on tomb walls. After the Heian Period, the influence of astrology gradually waned. Worship of the Four Holy Beasts was supplanted by worship of the Four Heavenly Kings of Buddhism. However, their use as symbols continues. ---- Suzaku (朱雀) Translation: vermilion bird; Zhuque Alternate names: Sujaku, Shujaku, Chūchue Habitat: the southern sky Appearance: Suzaku is a large, scarlet, phoenix-like bird. Its home is in the southern sky. Suzaku spans seven of the twenty-eight Chinese constellations, taking up one quarter of the entire sky. The constellation which makes up the left wing of the bird is located in Gemini. The constellation which makes up his head feathers or comb is located in Cancer. The constellations which make up its head, beak, and body are located in Hydra. The constellation which makes up its right wing is located in Hydra and Crater. The constellation which makes up its tail feathers is located in Corvus. Suzaku is one of the shijin—the guardian of the south. It is associated with the Chinese element of fire, the season of summer, the planet Mars, and the color red. It represents the virtue of propriety. Suzaku controls heat and flame. The ancient capitals of Fujiwara-kyō, Heijo-kyō, and Heian-kyō were each guarded on the south by a large gate called Suzakumon. Beyond Suzakumon was a wide avenue called Suzaku Boulevard, which served as the main north-south road. In Kyōto, this road ran from the Imperial Palace to the gate at the southern limits of the city, Rashōmon. Today, though the gates are long gone, Suzaku Boulevard (now called Senbon Avenue) remains an important road in the city. Because they look similar, Suzaku is often confused with hōō, the Chinese phoenix. The attributes and symbolism of one are mixed or swapped with each other. Though it has been suggested that they may share a common origin—perhaps going back to the mythical bird Garuda in Indian mythology—there is no strong evidence linking these creatures. ---- Byakko (白虎) Translation: white tiger; Baihu Alternate names: Baifū Habitat: the western sky Appearance: Byakko is a celestial white tiger. Its home is in the western sky. It spans seven of the twenty-eight Chinese constellations, taking up one quarter of the entire sky. The constellation which makes up the rear of the tiger is located in Andromeda and Pisces. The constellations which make up the middle of the tiger are located in Ares and Taurus. The constellations which makes up its front legs and head are located in Orion. Byakko is one of the shijin—the guardian of the west. It is associated with the Chinese element of metal, the season of autumn, the planet Venus, and the color white. It represents the virtue of righteousness. Byakko controls the wind. [ The Fifth Element ] The Four Symbols are guardians of the four cardinal directions, as well as four of the five elements. However, there is a fifth holy beast who acts as the commander of the other four, as well as the symbol of the fifth Chinese element: earth. This creature is Ōryu (or Kōryu), the yellow dragon of the center. Ōryu is associated with the color yellow, the changing of the seasons, and the planet Saturn. It is located in the center of the cosmos. It represents the authority of the Emperor over all. It is known as Huanglong in Chinese and is viewed as an incarnation of the mythical emperor of China Huangdi. It is sometimes depicted not as a dragon, but as a kirin. While the yellow dragon is an important figure in China, it is far less so in Japan. ---- Genbu (玄武) Translation: dark warrior; Xuanwu Alternate names: Genten jōtei (dark emperor of the heavens), Showan'ū Habitat: the northern sky Appearance: Genbu is a large tortoise or turtle combined with a snake. Sometimes it is represented as two separate creatures: a snake wrapped around a tortoise. Sometimes it is represented as a single creature: a tortoise-snake chimera. Its home is in the northern sky. It spans seven of the twenty-eight Chinese constellations, taking up one quarter of the entire sky. The constellation which makes up the snake's neck is located in Sagittarius. The constellations which makes up the tortoise's shell are located in Capricornus, Aquarius, and Pegasus. The constellations which make up the snake's tail are located in Pegasus and Andromeda. Genbu is one of the shijin—the guardian of the north. It is associated with the Chinese element of water, the season of winter, the planet Mercury, and the color black. It represents the virtue of knowledge. It controls the cold. Genbu is enshrined in the Genbu Shrine, north of Kyōto's Imperial Palace. Genbu is named differently than the other shijin. Rather than directly describing a color and animal (i.e. Black Tortoise), its name is written as gen, meaning dark, occult, or mysterious, and bu, meaning warrior. The word tortoise is not used because it was a slur in China. The euphemistic name was used instead. Genbu's name comes from Chinese mythology, where it is synonymous with the Taoist god Xuanwu (the Chinese pronunciation of Genbu). Xuanwu was a prince who lived in prehistoric northern China. He resided in the mountains, far from civilization, where he studied Taoism as an ascetic. Xuanwu learned that to achieve full divinity he would have to purge both his mind and body of impurities. Though his mind had become enlightened, he still had to eat earthly food. Sin remained in his stomach and intestines. So, he cut them out and washed them in a river to purify them. When he did this, his stomach turned into a large demon tortoise and his intestines into a demon snake. The demons began to terrorize the countryside. Xuanwu subdued them, yet instead of destroying them he allowed them to atone for their sins by serving him as his generals. These two generals which became Xuanwu's—and Genbu's—symbol. Genbu is associated with yin—the energy of darkness and shadow. In ancient China, it was worshipped as a god of the moon in addition to being the god of the north. Because the shell of a tortoise is like a suit of armor, Genbu is also viewed as a warrior deity. The tortoise shell is a symbol of heaven and earth, with the flat part of the lower shell representing the world and the dome of the upper shell representing the heavens. Tortoise shells were a popular tool in divination. Genbu too was thought to have soothsaying powers, as well as the ability to travel between the lands of the living and the dead. The tortoise is a symbol of longevity and immortality, while the snake is a symbol of reproduction and multiplication. Long ago it was believed that all tortoises were female and had to mate with snakes to reproduce. The intertwining of the two was a symbol not only of long life and fertility, but also of the balance of yin and yang. ---- Gyokuto (玉兎) Translation: jade rabbit Alternate names: tsuki no usagi, getto (moon rabbit) Habitat: the moon Diet: herbivorous; presumably with a fondness for mochi Appearance: The dark spots visible on the full moon are said to resemble a rabbit who lives in the moon. In Japan, the rabbit in the moon holds a wooden mallet which it uses to pound mochi (rice cakes) in a mortar. The mallet and mortar as also visible as dark spots on the moon. In China, the rabbit is believed not to be creating mochi, but is instead mixing the medicine of eternal youth. The myth of the rabbit in the moon is ancient. The earliest written version comes from the Jātaka tales, a 4th century BCE collection of Buddhist legends written in Sanskrit. The legend was brought along with Buddhism from India to China, where it blended with local folklore. It came to Japan from China in the 7th century CE, where it was again adapted and adjusted to fit local folklore. The Japanese word for pounding mochi in a mortar like the rabbit is doing is mochitsuki (餅搗き). The word for the full moon is also mochitsuki (望月). The two are homophones. The Japanese version of the Sanskrit tale appears in Konjaku monogatarishū. A fox, a monkey, and a rabbit were traveling in the mountains when they came across a shabby-looking old man lying along the road. The old man had collapsed from exhaustion while trying to cross the mountains. The three animals felt compassion for the old man and tried to save him. The monkey gathered fruit and nuts from the trees, the fox gathered fish from the river, and they fed the old man. As hard as he tried, the rabbit, however, could not gather anything of value to give to the old man. Lamenting his uselessness, the rabbit asked the fox and monkey for help in building a fire. When the fire was built, the rabbit leaped into the flames so that his own body could be cooked and eaten by the old man. When the old man saw the rabbit's act of compassion, he revealed his true form as Taishakuten, one of the lords of Heaven. Taishakuten lifted up the rabbit and placed it the moon. In that way, all future generations could be inspired by the rabbit's compassionate act. The reason it is sometimes difficult to see the rabbit in the moon is because of the smoke which still billows from the rabbit's body, obscuring his form. ---- Yatagarasu (八咫烏) Translation: eight-span crow Alternate names: sansoku'u (three-legged crow), kin'u (golden crow) Habitat: the sun Diet: unknown, but probably omnivorous Appearance: Yatagarasu is a three-legged crow which inhabits the sun. It is found across East Asian folklore. A three-legged crow has been used as a symbol of the sun since Neolithic times in East Asia. It may have originated as a personification of sunspots by ancient astronomers. In Japan, the crow has also been a symbol of the sun since ancient times, appearing in Japan's earliest written works. It is a holy creature and a servant of the sun goddess, Amaterasu. Yatagarasu means "eight-span crow." One span was the length between the outstretched thumb and middle finger—roughly 18 centimeters—but this moniker is mainly a poetic way to say "very large." Originally Yatagarasu was depicted with two legs, but in the 930s CE, the Chinese myth of the three-legged crow blended with the story of Yatagarasu. Since then, Yatagarasu and the three-legged crow have been synonymous. The three-legged crow has long been used in religious and astrological symbolism across China and Japan, particularly among those involved with sun worship and onmyōdō. The three legs of the bird represent heaven, the earth, and humanity, while the crow itself represents the sun. This symbolizes that heaven, earth, and mankind all come from the same sun. They are like brothers to each other. They are also said to represent the three virtues of the gods: wisdom, benevolence, and valor. The three legs may represent the three powerful clans of ancient Kumano—Ui, Suzuki, and Enomoto. These clans use a three-legged crow as their crest. Yatagarasu is an important figure in the mythical history of Japanese. According to the Kojiki, Japan's oldest written history, Yatagarasu is an incarnation of the god Kamo Taketsunumi, a deity today enshrined in Kyoto's Shimogamo Shrine. As Yatagarasu, he led Jimmu, the first emperor of Japan, through the mountains of Kumano to establish his country. Jimmu's clan originated in Kyushu, in present-day Miyazaki Prefecture. He and his brothers led an eastward migration from along the Seto Insland Sea. They went in search of a better homeland, subduing the various tribes they encountered along the way. They suffered many hardships. When they reached Naniwa (present-day Osaka), Itsuse, Jimmu's older brother and leader of the expedition, was killed in battle. Jimmu realized that they had lost because they were fighting facing eastwards, against the sun. He led his troops around the Kii peninsula to Kumano (present-day Mie Prefecture). From there they began a westward push. His expedition became lost in the mountains of Kumano. Seeing this, Amaterasu, the sun goddess, and Takamimusubi, one of the creator gods, ordered Kamo Taketsunumi to act as a guide to Jimmu. Kamo Taketsunumi took the form of a giant crow and flew to Jimmu's side to show him the way. With Yatagarasu leading the way, Jimmu was able to navigate the mountains of Kumano and reach Yamato (in present-day Nara Prefecture). There he found his capital and become Japan's first emperor. According to legend, Jimmu's great-grandfather Ninigi was the grandson of Amaterasu. Thus, Jimmu and the entire Japanese imperial line are the direct descendants of the sun goddess. Yatagarasu, as a guide to Jimmu, played a small roll in an event with a big impact on the future of the Japanese identity. ---- Fūri (風狸) Translation: wind tanuki Alternate names: fūseijū, fūbo, heikō Habitat: mountains and cliffs Diet: omnivorous; feeds primarily on spiders and incense wood Appearance: Fūri are wild beasts from the mountains of China. They are about the size of a tanuki or a river otter with bodies resembling monkeys. They have red eyes, short tails, black fur with a leopard-like pattern, and blue-greenish manes which run from nose to tail. Fūri are nocturnal and spend the daylight hours sleeping. At night they leap from tree to tree, or cliff face to cliff face, with soaring jumps. They can move as quickly as the wind and resemble flying birds when they leap. They can clear the distance between two mountains in a single leap. A fūri's diet consists of spiders and the fragrant wood from incense trees. However, they have also been observed hunting. They use a special kind of grass (the species is unknown) and climb to the top of a tree. They hold the grass out in their hands to try to attract a bird. When a bird comes for the grass, the fūri is able to catch and eat the bird. Fūri are extremely fast, but Chinese records say that it possible to capture one with a well-placed net. A captured fūri will act embarrassed, lowering its head and looking up with big, pitiful eyes in an attempt to convince a person to release it. They are extremely fragile and die immediately if they are struck. However, if you try to slice them up with a sword or knife, the blade will not cut through their skin. If you try to roast them with fire, their bodies will not burn. They have the amazing ability to revive from death merely if wind blows into their open mouths. However, they cannot revive if their skull has been broken, or if their nose is stuffed with leaves of Japanese rush ( Acorus gramineus), a wetland shrub. Fūri appear in various Chinese atlases of herbology and medicine. These were referenced by Japanese authors during the Edo period, which is how fūri entered Japanese folklore. The original description of the fūri is most likely based on the colugo—a gliding mammal native to Southeast Asia. There are no colugo in Japan, which is likely why Japanese folklorists described them as a subspecies of tanuki. ---- Raijū (雷獣) Translation: thunder beast Habitat: thunderbolts Appearance: Raijū are the embodiment of lightning in an animal form. They have long, sharp claws and ferocious faces. They are thought to look like wolves, dogs, tanuki, or even weasels or cats. Far more fanciful forms exist. Some raijū look like dogs with four rear legs and two tails. Some look like insects or crustaceans. Others look like miniature dragons. There are even chimerical raijū composed of many different animal features. Raijū live in the sky—a world which was off limits to humans before the 20th century. Because of this, not much was written about their true nature or behavior. They ride bolts of lightning to earth when thunder claps and create mayhem wherever they land. For seemingly no reason at all they attack buildings, start fires, and cause mass destruction. Raijū were once seen as divine beasts, akin to the thunder gods ( raijin). Nothing was known about them except that they were fast and deadly. When lightning struck, people believed that a raijū had been sent by the gods to punish them for some reason or another. Small raijū like burrow into humans' belly buttons to hide from angry thunder gods. This is the origin of a Japanese superstition which says to cover your belly button when you hear thunder. Once, the raijū was one of the most well-known and feared supernatural creatures in Japanese folklore. Yet today it is relatively minor, practically unknown to the average person. This dramatic reversal is due to advances in science during the 19th and 20th centuries. Long ago, lightning was believed to be the work of the gods. Only gods had the power to shake the earth and send fire from the sky. Lightning strikes so quickly and so randomly that it is impossible to observe. But it has observable effects: the terrible booms that shake the ground; the odd burn patterns on the things it strikes; and the fires that it ignites. When buildings were all made of wood and packed closely together, a single lightning strike could cause mass destruction. The damage caused by lightning was indiscriminate—it destroyed everything from peasant hovels to imperial palaces. Lightning was rightly feared by all. During the Edo Period, "real" raijū were popular sideshow attractions. Mummified and taxidermized remains of cats, monkeys, and dogs were presented as raijū and displayed in traveling shows. Anyone could pay a small fee to get a safe, close up look at a dead raijū. During the Meiji Period, society was rapidly transformed due to the influx of foreign science and technology. Yōkai like raijū were one of the first victims of this modernization. People were actively discouraged from holding on to superstitions because they were perceived as an embarrassment to the country. New understandings about electricity and inventions like the airplane took away the raijū's most powerful mysteries. Its life in the unreachable sky and the god-like power of lightning were commonplace. Once those were gone, the raijū held no more power over peoples' imaginations. It was quickly forgotten. Raijū in literature are beasts meant to be slain by brave heroes. The most famous example is probably the nue, which attacked Kyōto and was slain by Minamoto no Yorimasa in 1153. Another legend involves the samurai Tachibana Dōsetsu. One night he was taking shelter from a storm under a tree when lightning struck. He drew his sword just in time to strike the bolt. When the smoke had cleared, there was a dead raijū on the ground next to him. Afterwards, he named his sword Raikiri, or "lightning cutter." ---- Tatarimokke (祟り蛙) Translation: curse child Alternate names: tatarimoke Habitat: lives inside of owls Diet: none Appearance: Tatarimokke are the spirits of dead babies which inhabit the bodies of owls. Visually they appear no different than ordinary owls. Tatarimokke (or rather, the owls who serve as hosts to tatarimokke) remain near the homes of their families. The hooting of these owls is said to be the crying of the dead children's spirits. Like zashiki warashi and other house ghosts, tatarimokke are treated with respect. Families which have lost children recently will take care of owls that appear near their homes and treat them as if they are the spirit of the lost child. In most cases, these spirits are beloved by the families they haunt. They cause no harm. In some cases, however, tatarimokke can be dangerous to people. The souls of babies whose bodies were carelessly discarded into rivers, babies who were killed by their parents to reduce the number of mouths to feed, and even the spirits of aborted fetuses could retain a grudge against the living. People passing through the places where these resentful spirits haunt might hear eerie sounds and feel unsettling sensations, see strange phenomena like floating fireballs, or may stumble on a rock and hurt themselves. In the most extreme cases, tatarimokke truly do bring terrible curses upon those who are perceived as having wronged them. Particularly in the case of people who were murdered in violent and gruesome fashion. In these cases, the tatarimokke is born not from the spirit of a newborn baby, but instead from the spirit of the murder victim. These tatarimokke lay a curse on their assailant so powerful that it not only brings ruin to the murderer, but to his entire family for generations to come. The name tatarimokke comes from tatari (curse) and moke, which means "infant" in some northern dialects. It is usually written phonetically but is sometimes also written with characters that mean "curse" and "frog." In this case, the character for frog is pronounced "moke" and refers to a newborn baby. In ancient Japan, babies were not considered fully human until sometime after they were born. Therefore, when a newborn died, it was not usually given a proper funeral and placed in a cemetery. Instead it was buried quietly in or around the house. The spirits of these children would float out and were believed to easily get "stuck" in owls, creating a tatarimokke. ---- Shiro ukari (白うかり) Translation: white floater Habitat: the sky Diet: unknown Appearance: Shiro ukari are ghost-like spirits with long tails. They are white, with large eyes that stare off into the distance as if lost in thought. They float about in the air, aimlessly wandering. Shiro ukari appear on a few Edo period scroll paintings and nowhere else. They were invented by an artist rather than recorded from folklore. Aside from the name, nothing is written about them. Everything about them, including their behavior and origins, is unknown and unexplained. However, their name may hold a clue to their identity. Shiro ukari literally means "white floater." Both of these words carry a number of nuances. Shiro not only refers to the color white, but to a state of total innocence or naivety. While ao (blue) is used in many yōkai names to refer to a novice or an apprentice, shiro can refer to a state of total, absolute naivete. It has a negative connotation, akin to "fool" or "country bumpkin" in English. The urban socialites of Edo looked down on the rural people who lived far outside of the capital as naive, uneducated, and unsophisticated. While not specifically stated, the vacant expression on this yōkai's face could be an allusion to this alternate meaning of shiro. Ukari comes from the word for floating, which has a number of different implications. The most literal meaning is to float about from place to place. This carries a nuance of absentmindedness or disconnect from others. Tourists who feel out of place in a strange city might be described as floating about in this way. It can also refer to merrymaking, particularly in a way that is in disconnect with the realities of the world. This has the same origins as the word ukiyo, which refers to the "floating world"—the urban, ephemeral pleasure-seeking lifestyle of old Edo. In a spiritual sense, it can also refer to ghosts which have not been able to pass on to the next world due to the weight of their ignorance and sin. They float about, but never ascend to heaven. They are doomed to haunt this world forever. Perhaps shiro ukari is a pun describing the uncouth, naive rural bumpkins who Edo urbanites thought had no business being in their city. Their experience in the capital might be something like a wide-eyed ghost floating from place to place. Or perhaps they are yōkai which seek out the impermanent pleasures of life as the humans of old Edo's pleasure districts did. Or perhaps they are the spirits of people who were unable to ascend into the next world, burdened by the weight of their ignorance to float about and wander aimlessly for the rest of time. ---- Tennyo (天女) Translation: heavenly woman, celestial woman Habitat: Tendō, the realm of heaven in Buddhist cosmology Diet: vegetarian (as required by Buddhism) Appearance: Tennyo are extraordinarily beautiful creatures who resemble human women. They have unparalleled grace and elegance, and supernaturally attractive faces and figures. They wear beautiful gowns called hagoromo ("feather cloth") which allow them to fly. Tennyo are servants and courtesans for the emperor of heaven, and companions of buddhas and bodhisattvas. They sing, dance, play music, recite poetry, and do much of the same things as the women in human imperial courts; though they have far more grace, refinement, and beauty. Tennyo are a female-only subgroup of tennin, one of many celestial races native to Tendō. They are based on the Indian apsaras, celestial nymphs from Indian mythology. They were brought to China with Buddhism, where they developed into the tennyo we know today, which was later brought over to Japan. Tennyo legends often involve love stories and marriage between tennyo and human men. A famous story is told in the Noh play Hagoromo. Long ago, a fisherman named Hakuryō was walking along the pine-covered beaches of the Miho Peninsula. It was a beautiful spring morning, and Hakuryō stopped for a moment to admire the beautiful white sand, the sparkling waves, the fluffy clouds, and the fishing ships on the bay. A pleasant fragrance filled the air, and it seemed that ethereal music was dancing on the winds. Something caught his eye; draped over a nearby pine branch was a robe of the most splendid fabric he had ever seen. It was made of a soft, feathery material, and was woven in fantastic colors. He decided to take it home and keep it as a family heirloom. Just as Hakuryō was preparing to leave, a young woman of breathtaking beauty appeared in the nude. She had flowers in her hair and smelled just as beautiful as she looked. She asked him to return her hagoromo robe. Hakuryō realized that this beautiful maiden was a tennyo. He refused to return to robe, saying it would bring good luck and fortune to his village. The woman grew sad and lamented that she would not be able to fly home to heaven without her robe. She dropped to her knees and cried, her tears falling like beautiful pearls into the sand. The flowers in her hair wilted. She looked up at the clouds above, and heard a flock of geese flying by, which only saddened her more as they reminded her of the celestial birds of heaven. Hakuryō was moved by the beautiful maiden's sadness. He told her that he would return her robe, but first she must perform a celestial dance for him. She agreed, but she needed her hagoromo to perform the dance. Hakuryō refused to return the robe, thinking she would fly off to heaven without performing for him. The tennyo replied to him that deception was a part of his world, not hers. She said that her kind do not lie. Hakuryō felt shame and returned the dress to her. The tennyo donned her hagoromo and performed the dance of the Palace of the Moon. She was accompanied by celestial music, flutes, koto, and the wind in the pines. The moon shown through the trees and sweet fragrances filled the air. The waves grew calm and peaceful. Her long sleeves played upon the wind, and she danced in sheer joy. As she danced, she slowly floated up into the sky. She flew over the beach, higher and higher, above the pines, through the clouds, and beyond the top of Mt. Fuji, then disappeared into the clouds. ---- Karyōbinga (迦陵頻伽) Translation: a phonetic rendition of its sanskrit name, kalaviṅka Alternate names: myōonchō (exquisite sounding bird) Habitat: Gokuraku jōdo, a realm of paradise Diet: vegetarian (as required by Buddhism) Appearance: Karyōbinga are celestial beings from Buddhist cosmology. They have the head and arms of a bodhisattva, the body of a bird, and long, flowing tail feathers similar to that of a hōō. They live in a realm of paradise called Gokuraku jōdo. Karyōbinga possess voices of incomparable beauty. They begin singing while still inside of their eggs. After they hatch, they dance and play heavenly musical instruments as well. They sing holy scriptures and the words of the buddhas. Karyōbinga come from Indian mythology. They originated in Buddhist scripture, which was brought to Japan from China. They differ little from their Indian counterparts. They are usually used in paintings and sculpture as symbols of paradise and the Buddha's words. They are a reminder that by living a holy life, one can be reborn into Gokuraku jōdo after death. Practitioners of Pure Land Buddhism make reaching this paradise their goal. Gokuraku jōdo is a pure land of utter bliss—a celestial kingdom created by Amida Buddha. Its inhabitants can practice Buddhism directly under Amida's tutelage, listen to the songs of karyōbinga, and achieve enlightenment themselves. [ A Pure Land ] One of the largest denominations of Buddhism in Japan is Pure Land Buddhism. Pure Land teaches that our earthly world will never be peaceful or perfect enough for its inhabitants to attain enlightenment. Thus, the goal of Pure Land practice is not to achieve Buddhahood, but to be reborn in the paradise of Amida Nyōrai, where enlightenment is possible. The pure land of Amida is known as Gokuraku jōdo in Japanese. It is a heaven-like world created by Amida, where conditions are perfect for attaining Buddhahood. Those who are reborn in Amida's Pure Land experience a life free from suffering and ignorance. They spend their days in bliss, listening to the sermons of Buddha and the songs of the karyōbinga, and focus on achieving Buddhahood free from the distractions of Earth. ---- Gumyōchō (共命鳥) Translation: interconnected lives bird Alternate names: kyōmeichō Habitat: Gokuraku jōdo, a realm of paradise Diet: vegetarian Appearance: Gumyōchō are beautiful two-headed birds that resembles pheasants. Occasionally they are depicted as having two human heads instead of two bird heads. Their home is Gokuraku jōdo, the realm of utter paradise created by Amida Buddha. The gumyōchō is one of six bird species which are said to inhabit nirvana—the others being white swans, peafowl, parrots, mynah birds, and karyōbinga. Like karyōbinga, gumyōchō are said to have exceedingly beautiful voices. They and the other heavenly birds sing the holy scriptures in nirvana. Those who listen to their songs achieve enlightenment. Gumyōchō originate in the cosmology of Pure Land Buddhism. They were brought to Japan in the 6th century along with Buddhism. They are often used as ornamentation on Buddhist temples. Their story is a parable for the interdependence of all humans on one another. Long ago, a gumyōchō lived in the snowy mountains of India. It had two heads and one body. One head was named Karuda, and the other head was named Upakaruda. The bird's two heads had different personalities and desires. When one head was sleepy, the other one wanted to play. When one head was hungry, the other one wanted to rest. Eventually, the two heads began to resent each other. One day while Upakaruda was sleeping, Karuda feasted on delicious fruits and flowers until he was stuffed and could eat no more. When Upakaruda woke up, he wanted to eat too, but he was already full because they shared one stomach. He could not enjoy any of the food. Upakaruda decided to punish Karuda. While Karuda slept, Upakaruda found a tree with poisonous fruit. Because they shared one stomach, Upakaruda ate the fruit in order to make Karuda sick. Sure enough, when Karuda woke up, the poison had already taken effect. Karuda writhed and suffered, and then died. Of course, because they shared one body, Upakaruda also became sick, collapsed in agony, and then died. Just before dying, Upakaruda realized how foolish he had been. When he resented his other head, he failed to recognize that his own life depended on it. Just the same, by harming his other head, he was also harming himself. When he realized this, he understood one of the core tenets of Buddhism: interconnectedness. The birds became enlightened and were reborn in nirvana. ---- Karura (迦楼羅) Translation: derived from the Hindu deity Garuda Alternate names: konjichō (golden winged bird) Habitat: Shumisen (aka Mount Meru, a holy mountain in Buddhism) Diet: mainly dragons Appearance: Karura are a race of enormous, fire-breathing demigods. They are humanoid in appearance, with the heads and wings of eagles. They have red skin, and red and gold feathers. Karura are fearsome. They breath fire from their beaks. The flapping of their wings sounds like thunder and creates gusts of wind which can dry up lakes, knock down houses, and cover entire cities in darkness. Their gigantic wingspans are 330 yojanas wide, and they can leap 3,360,000 ri in a single bound. (The lengths of one yojana and one ri vary greatly from country to country and era to era. A yojana can measure anywhere between 1.6 km to over 13 km long. One ri can measure anywhere between 400 m and 3.9 km.) Karura inhabit Tendō, the realm of heaven. They are found on Shumisen (known as Mount Meru in English), a sacred mountain with five peaks which exists at the center the universe. They make their homes in trees and live in cities rules by kings. They are the mortal enemies of the naga—a group of beings which includes dragons and serpents—and feed upon them as their main diet. Karura are worshiped in some branches of esoteric Buddhism. Because karura are the enemies of dragons and serpents, they are seen as a counter to things associated with these creatures. They are guardians who keep venomous snakes and dragons away. They protect against poison and disease. They are even helpful against excessive rains and typhoons. Because they are such fierce predators, they are also viewed as destroyers of sin, devouring the spiritual impurities of the faithful in the same way they devour dragons. Karura comes from the Hindu deity Garuda, a giant eagle who served as the mount of Vishnu. Garuda was incorporated into Buddhist folklore where he became an entire race of powerful eagle-like devas. They were then later brought along with Buddhism to China, and finally to Japan. The name karura comes from the Japanese pronunciation of Garuda. Karura are one of the hachi bushū—the Eight Legions. These are the eight classes of supernatural beings who were converted to Buddhism by Buddha. The eight races of the hachi bushū are ten ( deva in Sanskrit), tatsu ( naga), yasha ( yaksa), kendatsuba ( gandharva), ashura ( asura), karura ( garuda), kinnara ( kinnara), and magoraka ( mahoraga). All of these creatures are inhabitants of Tendō (the highest state of existence) except for the ashura, who live in Ashuradō (the third highest state of existence). ---- Yasha (夜叉) Translation: yaksha; demon gods from Buddhist cosmology Habitat: rivers, forests, and mountains Diet: omnivorous; occasionally man-eating Appearance: Yasha are a race of powerful, high ranking nature spirits which appear in Buddhist cosmology. They are a type of kijin (demon god) both worshiped for their benevolence and feared for their wrath. They are terrifying warriors and serve as guardians of the treasures of the earth. They have varied forms, but generally are humanoid in appearance. They have brightly colored skin, spiked hair, sharp teeth, and fierce eyes. They are usually depicted carrying weapons and wearing ornate armor. Yasha are one of the members of the Eight Legions—eight supernatural races who listened to the sermons of Shaka Nyōrai and converted to Buddhism. Along with the ten, tatsu, kendatsuba, ashura, karura, kinnara, and magoraka, they serve as guardians of the Buddhist teachings. Yasha serve Buddhism in a number of ways. Most importantly, the Twelve Heavenly Generals (the twelve most fearsome yasha), serve as the personal bodyguards of Yakushi Nyōrai, the buddha of medicine. They wage war on sickness and fight the enemies of Buddhism. They are also important in astrology. The twelve of them are associated with the twelve animals of the Chinese zodiac, the hours of the day, the months, and the directions. Their leader, General Kubira, is also an important kami in the Shinto faith. He is believed to be the Buddhist manifestation of Konpira, god of fishing, seafaring, and farming. He is enshrined as Ōmononushi in the Kotohira shrine of Kagawa Prefecture, alongside Sutoku Tennō. Yasha, along with another kind of demon called rasetsu, are used as soldiers in the armies of Bishamonten, one of the Four Heavenly Kings. Bishamonten is often depicted trampling a tiny, evil yasha (called a jaki or amanojaku) under his feet. His armor is also often decorated with scowling yasha faces. In this way yasha also serve as a symbol the triumph of virtue over wickedness. Yasha come from Hindu mythology. They were originally benevolent nature spirits and caretakers of the trees and earth. In Buddhism, they were interpreted as evil, ghost-like spirits who preyed upon travelers. They later gave up their wicked ways upon hearing the sermons of the Buddha. The Buddhist version of yasha is similar to another class of Hindu spirits: the ogrish, man-eating demons known as rasetsu. When Buddhism was brought into China, it mixed with Chinese folk religion and astrology. Yasha grew even further away from their Hindu origins. When Buddhism was brought to Japan from China, the Chinese interpretation of yasha was brought along with it. In Japan, yasha were often viewed as Buddhist manifestations of local evil spirits, like amanojaku and oni. Yasha took on some of the characteristics of these spirits, and sometimes even became synonymous with them. ---- Jinja hime (神社姫) Translation: shrine princess Habitat: deep lakes and oceans Diet: unknown; probably omnivorous Appearance: Jinja hime are serpentine creatures roughly six meters long. They have two horns on their heads, long tails, dorsal fins, and flippers. Their faces are those of human women. They resemble ningyo, the Japanese mermaid. Jinja hime spend most of their lives underwater, and as a result rarely interact with humans. They are the servants of Ryūgū, the palace of the sea dragon king. Jinja hime was first sighted in Hizen Province (present-day Saga and Nagasaki Prefectures) in 1819 by the Edo period scholar Katō Ebian. He recorded the encounter in his book Waga koromo. According to Katō, he encountered a fish-like creature on a beach in Hizen. The creature spoke to him: "I am a messenger from Ryūgū, called jinja hime. For the next seven years there will be a bumper crop. After that, there will be an epidemic of cholera. However, those who see my picture will be able to avoid hardship and instead will have long life." After delivering her prophecy, the jinja hime disappeared into the sea. Katō printed an illustration of the jinja hime in Waga koromo so that all could see it and be protected. The news of the jinja hime and her prognostication became so popular that it spawned numerous copycat stories across Japan. Not long after the sighting of jinja hime other stories about yōkai with foresight—such as kudan and amabie—began popping up all over Japan. Jinja hime is thought to be the basis for all of these stories. The jinja hime resembles a real-world animal called the giant oarfish. Its name in Japanese is ryūgū no tsukai, which means "servant of Ryūgū"—the same title this yōkai used for itself. ---- Gangi kozō (岸涯小僧) Translation: riverbank priest boy Habitat: rivers and riverbanks Diet: fish Appearance: Gangi kozō are hairy, monkey-like water spirits which inhabit rivers. They live along the riverbanks where they hunt fish. Their bodies are covered in hair. The hair on their head resembles the bobbed okappa hair style once popular among children in Japan. They have webbed hands and toes, and long teeth which are sharp and jagged like files. They are close relatives of the much more well-known kappa. Gangi kozō are not encountered outside of riverbanks. There may be a good reason for this; according to one theory, they are a transitional form of kappa. Kappa are said to transform from river spirits into hairy mountain spirits when the seasons change. Different regions of Japan have different names for these different forms of kappa. In Yamaguchi Prefecture, there is a hairy mountain spirit called a takiwaro which transforms into a water spirit called an enko (a variety of kappa). Some folklorists believe that the gangi kozō is a kind of takiwaro, and thus is a transitional form of a kappa. This explains why so little is known of their natural behavior. Gangi kozō normally stay away from people, but occasionally encounter fishermen along the rivers they inhabit. When fishing near a place where gangi kozō live, fishermen often leave their largest, cheapest fish on the riverside as an offering. Though there are stories of similar-looking yōkai, gangi kozō do not appear by name in any local legends. The first written record of them is in Toriyama Sekien's yōkai encyclopedias. It is therefore possible that gangi kozō was made up by Toriyama Sekien based on the numerous legends of transforming kappa. According to Mizuki Shigeru, the name gangi kozō can be written with another set of kanji: 雁木小僧. These characters can mean "stepped pier" or "gear tooth" depending on the context. This writing reflects both the riverside habitat of the gangi kozō as well as its mouth full of sharp teeth, which resemble toothed gears. ---- Tako nyūdō (蛸入道) Translation: octopus priest Alternate names: tako bōzu Habitat: the Sea of Japan; particularly near Shimane Prefecture Diet: carnivorous Appearance: Tako nyūdō is an octopus yōkai which takes on a humanoid form. It has a bulbous head and the face of a bearded, old priest. It has eight tentacles and wears human clothing. The Bakemono emaki depicts a tako nyūdō dangling a fish above the head of an unagi hime. It appears to be teasing or seducing her, however no description accompanies the painting. This yōkai's natural habitat is hidden from the human world, leaving its lifestyle a mystery. In Shimane Prefecture along the Sea of Japan, tako nyūdō are feared. They attack boats, grabbing fishermen and dragging them down beneath the waves. The phrase tako nyūdō is sometimes used to mockingly refer to bald-headed old men, as their smooth scalps resemble the heads of octopuses. Unagi hime 鰻姫 Translation: eel princess Alternate names: ōunagi (giant eel) Habitat: lakes and deep ponds, especially in Miyagi Prefecture Diet: carnivorous Appearance: Unagi hime are large, shapeshifting eels which take on the appearance of beautiful women. Unagi hime live at the bottom of lakes and ponds. They are said to weave clothing on looms at the bottom of their ponds. The loom's clacking sound can be heard near the banks of ponds where an unagi hime lives. Unagi hime rarely interact with humans due to the fact that they live deep underwater. When fishermen discover one, they usually leave the area where it was encountered and try not to disturb it. People who catch eels near ponds inhabited by unagi hime are scolded by their peers. In Miyagi Prefecture, eels were believed to be guardians of the ponds they inhabit. They battle with other pond guardian animals such as crabs and spiders. These eels usually take the form of beautiful women and request the help of humans. Sometimes they find a famous warrior or priest who is willing to aid them, but in many stories the eel loses the battle. A warrior named Genbē lived near a deep pond. One rainy summer night, he took a walk around the pond. An eel who lived there appeared before Genbē in the form of a beautiful woman. She told him that on the following night, a spider who owned a nearby pond would come to fight her. She begged the warrior to stay by the pond and protect her, for with his help she would surely win the battle. Genbē promised to help. However, on the following evening, he grew cowardly and stayed at home, shaking. The next morning, he returned to the pond and found the severed head of a giant eel. Its unblinking eyes stared at him with such hatred that he lost his mind. He threw himself into the pond and drowned. ---- Hanzaki (鯢魚) Translation: giant salamander ( Andrias japonicus) Alternate names: ōsanshōuo, hanzake, hazako Habitat: rivers and streams Diet: mainly insects, frogs, and fish Appearance: Hanzaki are monstrous versions of the Japanese giant salamander. These animals normally grow up to one and a half meters long. However, the yōkai versions can grow much larger. They have rough, mottled, brown and black skin, tiny eyes, and enormous mouths which span the entire width of their heads. They live in rivers and streams far from human-inhabited areas. Hanzaki and humans rarely come into contact with each other. When they do, it is usually because the hanzaki has grown large enough to start eating humans or livestock and is causing trouble for nearby villages. The name hanzaki is a colloquialism for the Japanese giant salamander. They are called hanzaki for their regenerative powers; it was believed that a salamander's body could be cut ( saku) in half ( han) and it would still survive. The call of the salamander was said to resemble that of a human baby. So, their name is written with kanji combining fish (魚) and child (兒). There was once a deep pond in which a gigantic hanzaki lived. The hanzaki would grab horses, cows, and even villagers, and drag them into the pond. It would then swallow them in a single gulp. For generations, the villagers lived in fear of the pond and stayed away from it. During the first year of Bunroku (1593 CE), the villagers called for help asking if there was anyone brave enough to slay the hanzaki. A young villager named Miura no Hikoshirō volunteered. Hikoshirō grabbed his sword and dove into the pond. He did not come back up; he had been swallowed by the hanzaki in a single gulp! Moments later, Hikoshirō sliced through the hanzaki and tore it in half from the inside out, killing it instantly. The slain creature's body was 10 meters long, and 5 meters in girth. The very day the hanzaki was slain, strange things began to happen at the Miura residence. Night after night, something would bang on the door. A screaming and crying voice could be heard just outside the door. However, when Hikoshirō opened the door to check, there was nothing there at all. Strange things began to occur all through the village as well. Not long after that, Hikoshirō and his entire family died suddenly. The villagers believed the angry ghost of the dead hanzaki had cursed them. They built a small shrine and enshrined the hanzaki's spirit as a god, dubbing it Hanzaki Daimyōjin. After that, the hanzaki's spirit was pacified. The curse was laid to rest. A gravestone dedicated to Miura no Hikoshirō still stands in Yubara, Okayama Prefecture. The villagers of Yubara still honor Hanzaki Daimyōjin by building giant salamander shrine floats and parading them through town during the annual Hanzaki Festival. ---- Kōjin (鮫人) Translation: shark person Alternate names: samebito Habitat: oceans; particularly the South China Sea Diet: carnivorous Appearance: Kōjin are aquatic humanoids that resemble mermaids. They have black, scaly shark-like bodies, and ugly, human-like faces and arms. Kōjin are well known for their weaving skills, and they spend much of their lives working on their looms. The sea silk that they weave is of the finest quality and doesn't get wet even in the water. Kōjin are emotional, and cry frequently. When they cry, pearls and gems fall from their eyes instead of tears. Long ago, a man named Tawaraya Tōtarō came across a strange looking creature crouching at the base of a bridge near Lake Biwa. It resembled a man, but its body was inky black, it had the face of a demon, the beard of a dragon, and its eyes were like green emeralds. It had served as an officer under the Eight Great Dragon Kings in the dragon palace of Ryūgū-jō but was banished from the palace and exiled from the sea due to a small mistake he had made. Since then, it had been wandering, unable to find food or shelter. It begged Tōtarō for help. Tōtarō took the kōjin back to his home where he had a small garden with a pond. He allowed the kōjin to live there for as long as it wanted. For six months they lived together. Every day Tōtarō brought the kōjin fresh food fit for a sea creature. During the seventh month, Tōtarō met a woman of extraordinary beauty and refinement. Her skin was white as snow, and her voice like a nightingale's. Her name was Tamana. Tōtarō fell in love with her at first sight. She was unwed and her family wanted her to marry a man of rank. They demanded as a betrothal gift a casket of ten thousand jewels from whomever wished to marry Tamana. Tōtarō fell into despair. Even if there were ten thousand jewels in all of Japan, he would never be able to procure them. It seemed impossible that he could ever make Tamana his wife. Yet he could not get her out of his mind. He refused to eat or sleep and became so ill that he could not even lift his head from his pillow. It seemed that he would die of a broken heart. The kōjin cared for Tōtarō in this time. Tōtarō apologized to the kōjin, for if he died, it would surely die as well. The kōjin was so touched by Tōtarō's concern that it began to cry. Great tears of blood spilled from its eyes, and when they hit the floor they hardened into splendid rubies. Tōtarō instantly found new strength and gathered up the jewels. Seeing Tōtarō recover, the kōjin stopped crying. The flow of jewels stopped. Tōtarō begged it to continue crying until he had ten thousand jewels, but seeing that Tōtarō's sickness was cured, the kōjin was filled with relief and could not cry anymore. He suggested that they visit the bridge where they had first met to reminisce, and perhaps it could cry again. The next day, they visited the bridge. They ate fish and drank wine and watched the sunset. The kōjin thought about its life in the sea and its happy days in the dragon palace. Overcome with homesickness, it began to weep profusely. A great shower of jewels covered the bridge. Tōtarō gathered them up. When he had collected ten thousand jewels he shouted for joy. Suddenly, a song was heard far away in the sea. A glorious palace made of coral the color of the setting sun rose like a cloud out of the water. The Eight Great Dragon Kings had granted the kōjin amnesty and were calling it back home. The kōjin leaped with joy. It bade farewell to Tōtarō, thanked him for his friendship, and then dove into the sea. Tōtarō never saw the kōjin again. He brought the casket of ten thousand jewels to Tamana's family and presented them as a betrothal gift. Shortly after, Tōtarō and Tamana were married. ---- Amabie (アマビエ) Translation: unknown; possibly a misspelling of "amabiko" Habitat: oceans Diet: unknown Appearance: Amabie are mermaid-like yōkai with a mixture of human and fish features. They have long hair and scaly bodies. They have beak-like mouths and three legs. Amabie glow with a bright light that can be seen from the shore. Amabie are auspicious yōkai—keeping a picture of an amabie can protect you from disease. Little is known of the amabie's characteristics. However, their story is similar to other prophetic yōkai such as jinja hime and kudan, which deliver a prognostication and then disappear. These yōkai first appeared during periods when epidemics like cholera were spreading around the world. Fear of disease was widespread, and images of protector yōkai that could be used as charms against sicknesses were in high demand. It is possible that amabie were a sort of copycat yōkai, following the trends of the time. The origin of the name amabie is a mystery. There is only one recording of an amabie sighting and it appears similar to another yōkai with a similar sounding name: amabiko. There are numerous recorded amabiko sightings. All of them are minor variations on the same theme: a three-legged creature that appears on the water to deliver a prophecy about abundant harvests and disease. Similarly, amabiko instructs people to spread its image around to protect them from the disease. "Amabie" may have been a simple typographical error, or else it may be a regional variation of the amabiko. The only recorded sighting of an amabie comes from Higo Province (present-day Kumamoto Prefecture) in April of 1846. For some nights in a row, a bright light could be seen in the waters off shore. One night, a government official went out to see to investigate the light. When he approached, a strange creature appeared before him. The creature introduced itself as an amabie. It told the government official that a six-year bumper crop was coming. It also said that should there be an outbreak of disease, he should immediately show the amabie's picture to people everywhere as it would protect them against harm. After that, the creature returned to the sea. Shortly after, the amabie's story along with an illustration of it was featured in the newspaper to be distributed to as many people as possible. ---- Akkoro kamui (アッコロカムイ) Translation: string-holding god Habitat: Uchiura Bay in Hokkaido Diet: omnivorous; it can swallow ships and whales whole Appearance: Akkoro kamui is a gigantic octopus god which resides in Hokkaido's Uchiura Bay. When it extends its legs, its body stretches over one hectare in area. It is so big that it can swallow boats and even whales in a single gulp. Its entire body is red. Akkoro kamui is so large that when it appears the sea and even the sky reflect its color, turning a deep red. Any ship foolish enough to sail too close to Akkoro kamui are swallowed whole. Therefore, for generations, locals have stayed away from the water when the sea and sky turn red. Fishermen and sailors who had no choice but to be on the waters would carry scythes with them for protection. Akkoro kamui comes from Ainu folklore, where it is known as Atkor kamuy. Its name can be translated as "string-holding kamuy." String-holding likely refers to the octopus's string-like tentacles, while kamuy is an Ainu term for a divine being—similar to the Japanese term kami. In Ainu folklore, Akkoro kamui is both revered and feared as a water deity, specifically as the lord of Uchiura Bay. Long ago, in the mountains near the village of Rebunge, there lived a gigantic spider named Yaushikep. Yaushikep was enormous. His great red body stretched over one hectare in area. One day, Yaushikep descended from the mountains and attacked the people of Rebunge. He shook the earth as he rampaged, destroying everything in his path. The villagers were terrified. They prayed to the gods to save them. The god of the sea, Repun kamuy, heard their prayers and pulled Yaushikep into the bay. When the great spider was taken into the water, he transformed into a giant octopus and took over charge of the bay as its god. Ever since then, he has been known as Atkor kamuy, or Akkoro kamui in Japanese pronunciation. ---- Atui kakura (アトゥイカクラ) Translation: ocean sea cucumber Alternate names: atsuui kakura Habitat: Uchiura bay in Hokkaido Diet: mainly a scavenger; occasionally eats ships Appearance: Atui kakura is an enormous sea cucumber which lives deep in Uchiura Bay in Hokkaido. Atui kakura is rarely seen due its underwater lifestyle. It spends most of its time deep in the water, occasionally attaching itself to chunks of driftwood and floating to other parts of the bay. Despite rarely being seen, Atui kakura can be dangerous to ships on the bay. When Atui kakura is startled, it thrashes about wildly, smashing or capsizing ships which happen to be near it. It also sometimes mistakes a wooden boat for a piece of driftwood, attaches its mouth to it, and drags the ship under the waves. Atui kakura is the Japanese transcription of its Ainu name, Atuy kakura. Atuy is the Ainu word for the sea, and kakura means sea cucumber. According to local legend, Atui kakura was formed when a mouru—the traditional undergarment of Ainu women—washed down a river and into the bay. The mouru settled at the bottom of Uchiura Bay and turned into a giant sea cucumber. ---- Amemasu (雨鱒) Translation: white-spotted char; literally "rain trout" Habitat: cold streams and lakes, occasionally seagoing Diet: carnivorous, ranging from small fish and plankton up to and including large boats Appearance: Amemasu is the Japanese name for the white-spotted char ( Salvelinus leucomaenis), a species of trout which is found in Northeast Asia. Amemasu spend most of their lives in the water away from humans. They are found mostly in rivers and streams, but seagoing varieties also exist. They are more common in Hokkaido, the northern parts of Honshu, and along the Sea of Japan. However, legends of amemasu occasionally take place in the southern parts of Japan. They feed on whatever they can eat, from plankton to insects, to fish and any other aquatic lifeforms they can fit into their mouths. Yōkai amemasu can grow to colossal sizes, sometimes spanning an entire lake from head to tail. These gigantic fish also occasionally thrash and sink ships, devouring any poor souls who happened to be on the ship. In Ainu folklore, the wild thrashing of giant amemasu is believed to be what causes earthquakes–much like giant catfish are thought to cause earthquakes in the rest of Japan. Ordinary amemasu are a popular target of game fishing and are also raised in fisheries. Amemasu that have become yōkai can transform into human shape and walk about on land. They usually take the form of young, beautiful women in order to seduce young men. Shape-changed amemasu can be identified by their skin, which feels cold and clammy like that of a fish. A number of lakes in Hokkaido are believed to be the home of giant amemasu. According to Ainu folklore, these amemasu are the guardian deities of their lakes. Lake Mashū is home to an amemasu the size of a whale. Lake Shikotsu contains an amemasu so large that its head touches one end of the lake and its tail touches the other. A legend from Minabe, Wakayama Prefecture tells of a mysterious whirlpool that appeared in a deep pond. A giant amemasu lived in the pond. Every spring, she would emerge from the pond in the form of a beautiful woman. For two or three days she would catch young men and take them away—where to nobody knows, but they were never seen again. The only way to know this woman was a fish and not a human was from her cold, clammy skin. One day, a cormorant dove into the pond to go hunting. The giant amemasu swallowed the bird in a single gulp. However, after a short time, the amemasu's body floated up to the surface of the pond, dead. The cormorant burst out of its stomach. Afterwards a shrine was built at that spot in honor of Konpira, the god of seafaring. It still stands there today. ---- Tomokazuki (トモカヅキ) Translation: diving together Alternate names: umiama Habitat: coastal areas where shellfish are found Diet: unknown Appearance: Tomokazuki are aquatic yōkai found underwater that appear to ama, the deep-diving women who gather oysters, urchins, and other sea creatures. They appear on cloudy days. They are a kind of diving doppelganger; they take on the appearance of the ama who see them. The only way to tell them apart from actual women is the length of the headbands they wear; tomokazuki have much longer headbands. Tomokazuki appear to divers deep underwater. They beckon the divers closer to them, offering shellfish and sea urchins as a way to lure them deeper. They continue to lure the divers deeper and farther away from safety. Eventually the divers are lured too deep or too far from the shore, and they drown. In order to protect themselves from tomokazuki, superstitious ama will carry magic charms with them while diving; usually in the form of the seiman and dōman symbols on their headbands. Since tomokazuki are only ever seen by ama deep under the water, belief in them is not widespread. Most of the time, tales of tomokazuki encounters are written off as hallucinations or delirium brought on by the stresses of deep diving–high pressure, lack of oxygen, physical exhaustion, and the fear of being swept away. One popular explanation among believers is that tomokazuki are the ghosts of drowned ama. In one story from Shizuoka Prefecture, an ama and her husband took a boat out to sea to dive for shellfish. While deep underwater, the ama saw a tomokazuki and quickly surfaced to tell her husband. He mocked her for believing in stupid things and told her to keep working. The ama dove back down as her husband commanded. She was never seen again. In Fukui Prefecture there is yōkai called an umiama, which is similar to a tomokazuki. When an ama dives down to the sea floor, the umiama surfaces. Then, when the ama surfaces, the umiama dives down to the sea floor. Because of this, it is difficult to spot this yōkai. However, those unlucky few who do manage to see it become gravely ill shortly afterwards. ---- Ōnamazu (大鯰) Translation: giant catfish Alternate names: jishin namazu (earthquake catfish) Habitat: rivers, seas, oceans, and subterranean caverns Diet: omnivorous Appearance: Ōnamazu are gigantic catfish which live in the muck and slime of the waterways around Japan. They also inhabit large caverns deep underground, working their way into the cracks in the earth. Ōnamazu behave much like ordinary catfish. They dig in the muck, and thrash about when disturbed or excited. Due to their titanic mass, the thrashing of ōnamazu is considerably more violent than that of ordinary catfish, to the point where they are dangerous. When these monstrous fish get excited, they shake the earth with their violent thrashing. Ōnamazu cause devastating earthquakes in the areas near where they live. Ōnamazu do not normally encounter people. However, during the Edo period they were frequently depicted in newspaper illustrations. Usually these pictures showed a huge, grotesque catfish being subdued by a large number of people, gods, or even other yōkai desperately trying to calm its thrashing. Long ago, common belief was that earthquakes were caused by large dragons which lived deep in the earth. During the Edo period, the idea of catfish causing earthquakes gradually began to displace dragons in popular lore as the origin of seismic activity. By the 1855 Great Ansei Earthquake, the ōnamazu had become the popular culprit to blame for earthquakes. This was due mostly to the hundreds of illustrations of thrashing catfish which accompanied newspapers reporting the news of that disaster. They were so popular they spawned an entire genre of woodblock print: namazue (catfish pictures). The reason catfish came to represent earthquakes was due to a large number of witnesses observing catfish behaving oddly just before tremors, thrashing about violently for seemingly no reason. Rumor quickly spread that that catfish had some kind of ability to foresee the coming disaster. Since then, the catfish has regularly appeared as a symbol for earthquakes—either as the cause or as a warning sign of the coming disaster. Studies have shown that catfish are in fact electrosensitive and do become significantly more active shortly before an earthquake. The Kashima Shrine in Ibaraki Prefecture has a famous story about ōnamazu. The deity of the shrine, a patron deity of martial arts named Takemikazuchi, is said to have subdued one. He wrestled and pinned it down underneath the shrine, piercing its head and tail with a sacred stone which still remains in the shrine today. The tip of the stone protrudes from the ground. Earthquakes that take place during the 10th month of the lunar calendar—known as "the godless month," when the gods all travel to Izumo—are said to be due to Takemikazuchi's absence from the shrine. During the 2011 Tōhoku disaster, the Kashima Shrine was badly damaged by an earthquake. The large stone gate was destroyed, stone lanterns were knocked down, and the water level in the reflecting pond changed. The gate was rebuilt in 2014. ---- Shachihoko (鯱) Translation: none; this is the creature's name (written with kanji that mean fish and tiger) Alternate names: shachi Habitat: cold oceans Diet: carnivorous Appearance: Shachihoko are fearsome sea monsters. They have the body of a large fish and the head of a tiger. Their broad fins and tails always point towards the heavens, and their dorsal fins have numerous sharp spikes. Shachihoko live in colder, norther oceans. They are able to swallow massive amounts of water with a single gulp and hold it in their bellies. They are also able to summon clouds and control the rain. Shachihoko are often found adorning the rooftops of Japanese castles, temples, gates, and samurai residences. They are placed facing each other on opposite ends of a roof. They serve as protector icons, similar to the oni roof tiles also commonly found on castles. It was believed that in the event of a fire, the shachihoko could protect the building by summoning rain clouds or by spitting out massive amounts of water which they had previously swallowed. Shachihoko as an element of architecture evolved from shibi–large, ornamental roof end tiles. Shibi originated in China during the Jin dynasty and were popularized in Japan during the Nara and Heian Periods. During the Sengoku Period, when castles rapidly began appearing all over Japan, shibi were reimagined as large fish, and the current image of the shachihoko was popularized. From them on, shachihoko have remained popular elements of Japanese roof construction. Shachihoko's origins may go even further back to India. In Hindu mythology, there is a large sea monster named Makara who is half-fish and half-beast (sometimes depicted as an elephant, a deer, a crocodile, or another animal). Makara was a powerful protector and servant of various deities. Images of Makara were commonly used in temple architecture, particularly over archways and doorways, or as rain spouts. Japanese versions of Makara tend to resemble the shachihoko more than they resemble the original Hindu creature. Today, the Japanese word for the orca is shachi because of its similarity to this mythical creature. ---- Shussebora (出世螺) Translation: eminent giant triton Habitat: migrates from mountains, to valleys, and finally to seas Diet: omnivorous Appearance: Like many animals, giant tritons ( Charonia tritonis)—a kind of sea snail similar to a conch—can turn into yōkai after living for an extraordinarily long time. When giant tritons reach an age of several thousand years old, they transform into draconic creatures called shussebora. Long ago, it was believed that giant tritons started their lives deep in the mountains. They spent many years buried under the earth, growing larger and larger. After three thousand years they exited the mountains and descended into the valleys in great landslides. Then they spent three thousand more years living near human villages, until they finally burrowed down into the sea. After three thousand more years underwater, they transformed into mizuchi—a kind of sea dragon. Because they spend their years buried in the earth or deep in the sea, shussebora very rarely ever encounter humans. However, the caves they leave behind during their migrations serve as a testament to their existence. All over Japan, after landslides people have discovered large caves in which shussebora were thought to have lived. These discoveries were even documented in newspapers during the Meiji period. The flesh of a shussebora was said to bring long life to anyone who ate it. However, the rareness of these creatures made confirmation of this rumor difficult. Nobody who has eaten a shussebora has come forth to tell their story. Because of the ambiguous nature of these creatures, the rumors about their life-giving meat, and the lack of any evidence other the caves they allegedly lived in, the phrase hora wo fuku ("to blow a conch shell," meaning to brag), is said to have originated from this yōkai. ---- Wani (和邇) Translation: none; this is the creature's name Habitat: oceans, seas, and lakes Diet: omnivorous Appearance: Wani are sea dragons that live in deep bodies of water. They have long serpentine bodies, fins, and can breathe both air and water. They are able to shapeshift into humans. There are even tales of wani and humans falling in love. Wani are the rulers of the oceans and gods of the sea. They live in splendid coral palaces on the ocean floor. Wani have a complex political hierarchy which mirrors that of the surface world. There are kings and queens, princes and princess, courtesans, servants, and so on. Ōwatatsumi, also known as Ryūjin, is the greatest of them all. He rules the sea from his palace Ryūgū-jō. He controls the ebb and flow of the tides using the magic jewels kanju and manju. Wani appear in the earliest written records of Japanese myths, the Kojiki and Nihon shoki. They almost certainly go back even further, into the mists of prehistory. Scholars disagree over whether the earliest legends of wani originated in Japan or were imported from other cultures, citing similarities between wani and the Chinese long or the Indian naga. Wani play an important role in Japanese mythology, including in the mythological founding of Japan. The word wani first appears written in man'yōgana, an ancient phonetic syllabary. Later it came to be written with the kanji 鰐. Wani came to refer to sharks and other sea monsters that sailors and fishermen might encounter out at sea. The sea was a dangerous and mysterious place. Sailors may have thought that sharks were the powerful monsters they had heard about legends. Over time, the meaning of the word expanded to include to crocodiles as well as sharks, and then later shifted exclusively to mean crocodiles. Today both the kanji and the word wani mean crocodile. They are rarely used to refer to sea dragons. One of the most famous wani legends is the story of Toyotama hime, the daughter of Ōwatatsumi. She married a surface dweller named Hoori. Hoori and his brother Hoderi were grandchildren of Amaterasu, the goddess of the sun. One day Hoori borrowed Hoderi's fish hook and then lost it. Hoderi demanded that Hoori return the lost hook. Hoori went into the ocean to look for it. He was unable to find it, but instead he discovered the palace where the dragon king of the sea lived. Hoori visited the palace and asked Ōwatatsumi for help finding the hook. With the dragon god's help, he found the hook. However, by the time it was found, he had fallen in love with Toyotama hime, the dragon god's daughter. Hoori and Toyotama hime were married, and they lived together at the bottom of the sea for three years. Eventually, Hoori became homesick and longed to see country again. Together, he and his wife returned to the surface world with Hoderi's lost hook. While on land, Toyotami hime gave birth to a son. When she went into labor, she asked Hoori not to look upon her because she had to change into her true form in order to bear her child. Hoori became curious and could not resist looking. He was shocked to see that, instead of his wife, a huge wani was cradling their newborn son. The wani was Toyotama hime's true form. She was ashamed and unable to forgive Hoori's betrayal. She fled back into the ocean and never saw Hoori or her son again. Although Toyotama hime abandoned her son, her sister Tamayori came to raise him in her absence. The boy, Ugayafukiaezu, grew up to marry Tamayori, and together they had a son. Their son was Jimmu, who became the first emperor of Japan. ---- Shiofuki (汐吹) Translation: tide sprayer Habitat: oceans and coastal areas Diet: unknown; probably fish Appearance: Shiofuki are elusive aquatic yōkai with elephantine ears and a trunk-like mouth. They have human-like arms, but their hands are webbed and resemble the fins of a fish. Their bodies are covered in fine hairs which the salt in the ocean sticks to. Shiofuki live in the oceans, far away from human civilization. They are only seen when they rise up from the waves to spray salty water into the air. Everything else about the lifestyle and habits of these creatures is a mystery. Shiofuki is not well known. In fact, the only reference to it anywhere is the Bakemono tsukushi emaki, a yōkai scroll painted in 1820 by an anonymous author which depicts unique yōkai found nowhere else in folklore. No text accompanies its illustration, so everything about this yōkai is purely speculative. ---- Namekujira (なめくじら) Translation: slug whale Habitat: homes and gardens Diet: herbivorous Appearance: A namekujira is a slug of monstrous proportions. Its body is reddish-brown in color. It has a long stripe which runs down its back, and from its head to its neck it is covered in black spots. Namekujira live in gardens and behave like ordinary slugs. It is their size that makes them so strange. They crawl across doors and fences, leaving behind enormous, silvery slime trails up to 100 hiro in length—almost 182 meters. The namekujira is described in the Kujirazashi shinagawa baori, a comical Edo-period book featuring different types of fantastic whales based on puns. The name namekujira is a portmanteau, combining the namekuji (slug) and kujira (whale). This yōkai's description contains an additional pun. There is a dish made from whale intestines called kujira no hyakuhiro. The name literally means "whale's 100 hiro," which comes from the great length of the whale's intestines. The joke is that while kujira no hyakuhiro refers to a delicious meal, namekujira no hyakuhiro is just a 182-meter-long slime trail. ---- Kyōkotsu (狂骨) Translation: crazy bones Habitat: wells Diet: none; it is powered solely by vengeance Appearance: A kyōkotsu is a ghostly, skeletal spirit which rises out of wells to scare people. It is wrapped in a ragged shroud, with only its bleached skull and tangled hair emerging from its tattered clothes. Kyōkotsu are formed from bones which were improperly disposed of by being discarded down a well. The bones may belong to a murder or a suicide victim, or someone who died after accidentally falling into a well. The lack of a proper burial combined with the egregious disrespect shown by discarding remains in this manner creates a powerful grudge in those bones. This transforms the deceased into a shiryō—a spirit of the dead. Like other ghosts, they inflict their grudge on to those they come in contact with. A kyōkotsu lies at the bottom of its well until it is disturbed. Then it rises up to curse anyone unfortunate enough to be using the well. The kyōkotsu was invented by Toriyama Sekien for his book Konjaku hyakki shūi. In his description, he writes that this yōkai's name is the origin of the word kyōkotsu, which means fury and violence. While there is a word in a local dialect of Kanagawa which does match this description, there is no evidence actually linking it to this yōkai. It is just as likely that Toriyama Sekien—who was fond of wordplay—actually created this yōkai based on words in local dialects and made up a false etymology to add authority to his tale. ---- Kosodate yūrei (子育て幽霊) Translation: child-rearing ghost Habitat: towns, cities; anywhere it can find people to haunt Diet: none; they exist only to see that their children are tended to Appearance: Kosodate yūrei are the ghosts of mothers who died in childbirth or shortly after childbirth. They return to the world of the living because of their strong attachment to their child and their lingering motherly duties. They look like faint versions of their former selves, wearing burial clothing or the clothes that they wore during life. They appear to shopkeepers or travelers on the road at night, and often return to the same place over and over again. Kosodate yūrei exist to fulfill one purpose: to see to the well-being of their child. They try to buy candy or toys for their children with whatever money they have–they even try to pay with dead leaves. When the mother died in childbirth, these ghosts seek out living people and try to lead them the baby. If the baby is discovered and taken care of, the kosodate yūrei can finally rest. Until then, though, she will appear every night to seek help for her child. One rainy night, a shopkeeper was closing up his shop when he heard a tapping sound at the window. A woman was standing in the rain, cold and drenched. When he asked what she needed, all she said was, "One candy please." Though the shop was closed, the shopkeeper felt sorry for the woman, so he sold her the candy. She paid him one mon–a low denomination coin– and vanished into the night. The next night she came at the very same time. Again, she asked the shopkeeper in a voice almost too faint to hear, "One candy please." The shopkeeper gave her the candy, and again she paid with one mon. She left as quietly as she had come. For six nights, the same scenario played out. On the seventh night, the woman had no money left. Instead, she presented a handful of leaves as payment. The shopkeeper would not accept the leaves, so she offered him her coat instead. He protested, but she insisted until he finally accepted the coat. The next day, a traveling merchant stopped by the shop. The shopkeeper told him of the strange woman who came visiting every night and showed him the coat that she gave him as payment. When the merchant saw the coat, he went pale. "That is the coat of my friend's wife! She died one week ago. She was buried in this coat!" The merchant and the shopkeeper went to the temple where she was buried. When the told the story to the priest, he scolded them for believing in such superstitions. Afterwards he took them to the woman's grave to show them that all was okay. When they reached the grave, however, the unmistakable screaming of a newborn baby could be heard under the earth! They dug up the grave and discovered the body of the woman who had been visiting the shop. Entwined in her arms, there was a living baby wrapped up in cloth. She had given birth posthumously in her coffin. Wrapped up with the baby were six mostly-eaten pieces of candy, which had kept it from starving during the week. Its mother had bought the candy with the six mon traditionally buried with a corpse to pay the guardians of the underworld. They took the baby from the grave and returned it to its family. When they reburied the woman's body, she had a serene expression on her face. The ghostly visitor to the candy store was never seen again. ---- Appossha (あっぽっしゃ) Translation: a phrase from a local dialect meaning "give me mochi" Habitat: underwater, in the Sea of Japan Diet: omnivorous; fond of mochi Appearance: Appossha are fearsome monsters which appear in the village of Koshino in Fukui Prefecture. They resemble red oni, with large heads and dark, kelp-like hair. They wear the clothing typical of workmen. Appossha live in the Sea of Japan. They appear on land once a year, on Koshōgatsu—a holiday celebrating the first full moon of the lunar new year. On this night, appossha crawl out of the sea and wander the village streets, banging iron tea kettles and chanting, "Appossha!" They travel from house to house, demanding food and threatening children. They ask each household if there are any ill-mannered children living there, and if there are they will take them back to the sea. Once a household's children have been thoroughly scared, the parents give a gift of mochi to the appossha and they leave. The appossha tradition comes from long ago, when a sailor from a foreign country was shipwrecked and swam ashore in Koshino. He traveled from door to door begging the villagers for food. The name appossha is thought to be based on the foreigner's words, a heavily accented attempt to ask for some mochi to eat: "Appo (mochi) hoshiya (want)." The appossha is part of a family of oni-like yōkai which are found all over Japan, but especially along the Sea of Japan coast in the Hokuriku region. The namahage of Akita Prefecture is the most famous example. In nearby Ishikawa and Niigata Prefectures, similar yōkai named amamehagi can be found. In Yamagata they are known as amahage. Although details and origins differ, a key part of each story is the same: these yōkai come from the wilderness on or around the new year, scare young children, and leave once offered a gift from the villagers. Visitors from the Other World Appossha are an example of a type of creature called a marebito. In Japanese folk religion, marebito are divine spirits—demons, gods, or otherwise—which come from the world of the dead to visit our world at times when the border between the worlds has become weak. Some marebito deliver prophecies or bring gifts. Others bring disaster. These strange foreign spirits are welcomed as honored guests. They are fed, sheltered, and treated kindly and respectfully by those they visit. Sometimes they are even revered as gods; their coming is welcomed in the form of festivals and rituals. Although the marebito-centered folk religion is no longer practiced today, aspects of it are still a visible part of Japanese culture. Yōkai like the appossha and namahage and festivals like Obon have preserved many of the elements of this ancient folk religion. ---- Jikininki (食人鬼) Translation: human-eating ghost Habitat: old temples and ruins Diet: human corpses Appearance: Jikininki appear as ordinary humans for the most part, except their features are ugly and monstrous. They have sharp, pointed teeth which they use to peel off and eat the flesh of the recently deceased. Jikininki usually live in abandoned temples and old ruins. They avoid contact with humans. However, they remain close to human settlements as corpses are their main source of food. They do not enjoy their existence. They do not find pleasure in eating the dead; it merely temporarily relieves some of the pain of their eternal hunger. Jikininki exist somewhere between the living and the dead. They and their dwellings are often invisible during the day. They appear only to unsuspecting travelers at the night. Jikininki usually hunt their prey at night, slipping into temples when the dead are placed there for funerals. Jikininki are closely related to gaki—hungry ghosts of Buddhist cosmology who are constantly starving but unable to eat anything. A jikininki is born when a person commits evil deeds, tainting their soul. Some jikiniki were corrupt priests who did not properly pass on after death. Others were humans who developed a taste for human flesh. As they continued to eat human meat, they gradually transformed into these monsters. Long ago, a monk named Musō Soseki was traveling on a pilgrimage when he became lost in the mountains. As day faded, he came across a dilapidated hermitage. An elderly monk there gave him directions to a nearby village. Soseki arrived in the village just as night fell. The son of the village chief welcomed the monk and invited him to stay in his house as a guest. "However," he said, "my father passed away earlier today. Our village has a custom: when one of us dies, we must spend the night away from the village. If we do not, we will be cursed. But you are tired and are not a member of this village. I see no reason why you must leave. Please, stay in my house tonight while the rest of us depart." Soseki was grateful. The villagers left town and Soseki was alone. That night, Soseki recited funerary prayers over the body of the village chief. Suddenly, he felt a presence nearby. His body froze in fear. A dark, hazy shape crept through the house and up to the body. The creature devoured the remains of the chief, then slipped away as quietly as it had come. The following morning the villagers returned. Soseki told them what he had seen during the night. He asked why the monk living in the nearby hermitage did not perform funerals for the village. The village chief 's son was confused. "There is no hermitage nearby. What's more, there haven't been any monks in this region for several generations..." Soseki traced his steps to the old hermitage. The monk welcomed him into the hovel and said, "I apologize for what you sight last night. The monster in the chief 's house was me. Long ago I was a priest. I lived in the village and performed funeral prayers for them. However, all I ever thought of was money. I disdained the souls of the deceased. Because of my lack of conviction, when I died I was reborn as a jikininki. Now, I am forced to feed off the bodies of the dead. Please, save my soul and release me from my torment!" In that instant, the elderly monk and the dilapidated old hermitage disappeared. Soseki was sitting on the dirt, surrounded by tall grass. The only feature nearby was an ancient, moss-covered gravestone. ---- Kokuri babā (古庫裏婆) Translation: hag of the old temple living quarters Habitat: old, dilapidated temples Diet: human flesh Appearance: Kokuri babā are old hags which haunt temples deep in the mountains. Kokuri babā hide themselves away in the backs of the temples they used to work in. They feed themselves by carving up the bodies of those dead placed in the temple for funeral services. When there are no fresh corpses available, they unearth previously buried corpses from the temple's graveyard, peeling off chunks of rotting flesh to gnaw on. Kokuri babā do not usually interact with people. They prefer to stay hidden away in the back rooms of their temples. However, when traveling monks pay a visit, they do not pass up the chance for some fresh meat. People who encounter a kokuri babā don't realize they are in danger until it is too late. Kokuri babā was once a priest's widow at a remote, rural temple. While her husband lived she was a dutiful wife. She helped run the temple and tended to the needs of the parishioners by cooking, cleaning, washing, and taking care of the temple grounds. However, after her husband's death, she retreated into the temple's living quarters. There she became a shut in. When her food stores ran out she began to steal the offerings left behind by people visiting the temple. Because of this grave sin, she was unable to die and pass on to the next life. Instead she transformed into a yōkai. From then, she developed a taste for human flesh. Kokuri babā was invented by Toriyama Sekien for his book Konjaku hyakki shūi. Although it is written with words that literally mean "hag of the old temple living quarters," Sekien was well known for using wordplay in his yōkai names. This yōkai is no exception. Kokuri is reminiscent of a popular folk phrase "mukuri kokuri," which is a metaphor for something scary. Indeed, Sekien points out in his description that kokuri babā is even more fearsome than Datsueba, the skin-flaying hag of the underworld. Parents would scold misbehaving children with "Mukuri kokuri, a demon will come (if you don't stop misbehaving)!" [ Mukuri Kokuri ] Mukuri kokuri has a long history, originating in the Mongol invasions of the 13th century. The Mongols under Kublai Khan conquered China and Korea. From there they set their sights on Japan. The invaders were viewed by most people as the living embodiment of demons due to their ferocity and advanced technology. Japan's victory against the them ended the expansion of the Mongol empire—thanks in no small part to two typhoons believed to be kamikaze, or "divine winds" sent from the gods. These typhoons eradicated two massive invasion fleets. The invasions had a profound impact on world history as well as the identity of the Japanese nation. Their memory remained strong for generations and became part of folklore. The fear of invading Mongols was the basis for the phrase "Mōko Kōkuri no oni ga kuru" ("The Mongolian-Korean demons are coming!"), which over the centuries was corrupted down to just mukuri kokuri. ---- Chirizuka kaiō (塵塚怪王) Translation: strange king of the dust heap Habitat: dirty, cluttered places Diet: unknown Appearance: Chirizuka kaiō is a red, hairy demon who resembles a small oni. His clothing is old and tattered. He has wild hair and wears a crown on his head. He is called the king of the dust heap but is often thought of as the king of the tsukumogami–the animated spirits of discarded objects. Chirizuka kaiō appears in picture scrolls of the night parade of one hundred demons. In these scrolls he is prying open a Chinese-style wooden chest and releasing a horde of tsukumogami–presumably objects that were stored in the chest and forgotten. Chirizuka kaiō's earliest appearance comes from the Muromachi Period (1336 to 1573 CE). In the earliest scrolls he is depicted without name or explanation. He was given his name in the Edo period, in Toriyama Sekien's tsukumogami encyclopedia Hyakki tsurezure bukuro. This book contains a number of yōkai based on puns. Chirizuka kaiō's name appears to be a pun based on essay seventy-two from Tsurezure gusa, a popular collection of essays from the 14th century. This essay discusses the folly of having too many things–too much furniture in your home, too many pens at your inkstone, too many Buddhas in a temple, too many rocks and trees in a garden, too many children in your home, and so on. However, there is no such thing as having too many books on your book stand, or too much dust upon your dust heap. (In other words, the pursuit of knowledge and cleanliness can never be overdone.) In his description of chirizuka kaiō, Sekien explains that there is nothing in creation which does not have a leader: the kirin is king of the beasts, the hōō is king of the birds, and so this chirizuka kaiō must be the king of the yama uba. The phrase is yet another pun and refers to a line from the noh play Yamanba. It explains that worldly attachments pile up like motes of dust, and if you let them build up into a dust heap then you may turn into a yama uba. Despite the phrasing, chirizuka kaiō has come to be interpreted as the king of tsukumogami rather than yama uba. This is probably because he appears in Hyakki tsurezure bukuro, which is full of tsukumogami. There is no other connection between chirizuka kaiō and yama uba, as chirizuka kaiō has only ever been depicted releasing yōkai from a chest. Perhaps Sekien was merely using the yama uba as an allusion to yōkai born out of worldly attachment and ignorance. Yama uba are born when one's improper attachments pile up like a dust heap. Tsukumogami are born out of forgotten household objects whose owners could not bring themselves to properly dispose of. The same kind of attachment forms both of these types of yōkai. ---- Fuguruma yōhi (文車妖妃) Translation: strange queen of the book cart Alternate names: bunshō no kai (essay spirit) Habitat: libraries, temples, and noble houses; anywhere with book collections Diet: none; she is fueled by the emotions contained in her letters Appearance: Fuguruma yōhi is a spirit which resembles an ogrish human woman in tattered clothing. She is a kind of tsukumogami–an artifact spirit–which manifests out of old-fashioned book carts called fuguruma. In this case, it is the emotions built up in piles of love letters which give birth to this yōkai. Fuguruma yōhi appears opposite of chirizuka kaiō in Toriyama Sekien's collection of tsukumogami Hyakki tsurezure bukuro. Like chirizuka kaiō, her name is a pun based on essay from the medieval essay collection Tsurezure gusa. Essay seventy-two discusses the folly of overabundance. Having too many possessions is a bad thing which distracts you from that which is important; however, there is no such thing as having too many books on your book cart. The fuguruma yōhi is what Toriyama Sekien imagined might appear if you actually did have too many books on your book cart. The emotions and attachments poured into a single love letter may not amount to much sin, but if there are enough letters, enough sin might pile up that a yōkai can be born from them. ---- Hasamidachi (鋏裁) Translation: scissors cutter Alternate names: hasami no bakemono, hasami Habitat: houses Appearance: Hasamidachi are small yōkai with wild hair, buggy eyes, and a pair of scissors sprouting from their heads. Hasamidachi appear in the earliest yōkai picture scrolls and have been copied many times from these early depictions. They appears over and over again in many different scrolls. Despite this, no name or description has ever been recorded. The name hasamidachi was given to them in recent years by yōkai researcher Aramata Hiroshi. They are also known by less descriptive names such as hasami no bakemono (scissors monster) or just hasami (scissors). ---- Furuōgi (古扇) Translation: old folding fan Habitat: houses Appearance: Furuōgi are squat, hairy yōkai with old, worn out folding fans sprouting from their backs. Furuōgi appear in some of the earliest Hyakki yagyō emaki, pictures scrolls of the night parade of one hundred demons, along with a number of other tsukumogami. Early yōkai scrolls did not give names or descriptions, so nothing about furuōgi is known other than their appearance. Even the name was added much later. Presumably, they are the spirits of old, ruined folding fans which have come to life to cause mischief. ---- Kaichigo (貝児) Translation: shell boy Habitat: decorative shell boxes Diet: none Appearance: Kaichigo are the spirits of shell boxes come to life. They take the form of small, doll-like boys in kimono. Kaichigo haunt the shell boxes used to store beautiful and expensive painted shells. They come out when nobody is around and play with the shells, flipping them over and moving them around into different positions. Kaichigo's origins lie in kaiawase (shell matching), a popular Heian Period game which uses painted seashells. Beautiful shells of the right size and color were collected and decorated, their insides lined with gold and painted with scenes from popular stories, such as The Tale of Genji. The two halves of the same shell would be painted with the same scene, and players of the game would try to match the two sides. Beautifully decorated shell boxes, or kaioke, were used to store the shells while not in use. Kaiawase gradually was replaced by other matching games, such as karuta, which use less expensive playing pieces. The kaioke and shells themselves came to be viewed as precious art objects instead of toys. Because each shell half will perfectly fit its matching half and no other, expensive kaiawase sets came to be used as wedding dowries–symbolizing a perfect and unique match between bride and groom. Some boxes have been passed down from mother to daughter over and over for centuries. Those kaioke which have been around for a very long time and are no longer used as games begin to resent their existence. They grow restless and want to be played with once again and develop a soul which manifests as a kaichigo. ---- Byōbu nozoki (屛風闚) Translation: folding screen peeper Habitat: wealthy homes Diet: thrives on others' lust Appearance: Byōbu nozoki are depraved spirits which emerge from the decorative folding screens known as byōbu. They are very tall, stretching well over two meters (tall enough to peer over any sized folding screen). Their bodies are long and lithe, and they wear white robes resembling those of ghosts. They have long black hair and blackened teeth. Despite the resemblance, byōbu nozoki are not yūrei, but are actually tsukumogami of folding screens. As its name suggests, a byōbu nozoki's chief activity is leering over folding screens at the people on the other side–particularly if the people are engaged in romantic activities. Byōbu nozoki were invented by Toriyama Sekien for his book Konjaku hyakki shūi. According to him, these spirits manifest from ancient folding screens which have witnessed many years of sexual activity. Sekien invented a fake history linking this spirit to ancient Chinese history. Sekien describes the byōbu nozoki as tall enough to peer over a folding screen seven shaku (a unit of length approximately 30 cm) high. This recalls a story about the Chinese emperor Qin Shi Huang, in which he leaped over a seven shaku tall byōbu to escape an assassination attempt. This legend would have been well known to his readers during the Edo period. With this reference, Sekien both invents a silly narrative and finds a way to connect this amusing yōkai with literature and history, seemingly legitimizing it as more than something he just made up. ---- Tenjōname (天井嘗) Translation: ceiling licker Habitat: cold, dark homes with tall ceilings Diet: dirt, dust, and ceiling grime Appearance: Tenjōname are tall yōkai with long tongues. Their bodies are covered with strips of paper which resemble a matoi—the paper flags carried by Edo period firemen. Tenjōname appear in houses with high ceilings, particularly in the cold months. The weak winter light cannot reach the ceilings, and weird shadows are cast upon the rafters. Tenjōname are named for their primary activity: licking ceilings. The older a house gets, the more dust and grime collects in hard-to-clean places such as the ceiling. This attracts tenjōname, who lick the dirty ceilings to feed on the filth. The telltale sign that a tenjōname has come calling is the appearance of dark stains and splotches on ceilings, walls, and support pillars. Although their appearance seems to be inspired by earlier yōkai scrolls, tenjōname first appear in Toriyama Sekien's Hyakki tsurezure bukuro. It is not specifically stated, but based on its appearance and the fact that most of the yōkai in that book are tsukumogami, it is likely that tenjōname is a transformed matoi. Like many of the entries in Hyakki tsurezure bukuro, tenjōname appears to be a pun based on one of the essays in Yoshida Kenkō's Tsurezure gusa. Essay number fifty-five gives advice on building a house. It states that too high a ceiling would make winters feel cold and lamplight dark. Toriyama Sekien references this essay in his description of tenjōname. Tenjōname were created in the 18th century so older folktales do not exist. However, since then a number of stories have been invented. One such story claims that a samurai from Tatebayashi Castle—the ruins of which are in present-day Gunma Prefecture—captured a tenjōname. He used it to clean all the spiderwebs and grime from the ceilings of the castle. More recently, it is thought that the stains left by tenjōname take the form of hideous human faces. Staring too long at these stains—particularly when they appear above your bed—can lead to madness and even death. ---- Haradashi (腹出し) Translation: belly exposer Habitat: old temples and homes Diet: unknown, but has a fondness for sake Appearance: Haradashi are goofy looking yōkai that can change into various forms. Occasionally, haradashi will appear as headless torsos with arms, legs, and comical facial features on their bellies. Others look like kind, elderly nuns. Still others look like female monsters with long black hair. Whatever form they take, the defining characteristic of haradashi are the large, silly-looking faces which appear on the creatures' enormous stomachs. Unlike most yōkai, haradashi do not do anything harmful. They are cheerful and agreeable. They enjoy amusing others and cheering sad people up. They frequently disguise themselves as ordinary humans and then suddenly reveal their belly faces to surprise people and make them laugh. Haradashi appear before sad and lonely individuals, particularly those who are at home drinking alone. Haradashi slip into these peoples' houses and join the lonely person. When offered a drink, a haradashi happily accepts. It then bares its belly and performs a ridiculous dance. Those who entertain a haradashi in their homes find that their troubles and worries vanish. They become filled with hopes and dreams. Haradashi don't only perform house calls. They make their homes in old temples and invite in those who need help. They call out to people who are lost or seeking shelter from the snow or rain and invite them to stay the night in their temple. A haradashi will present its guest with a warm room and a hearty meal. And of course, it will entertain its guest with its signature belly dance. ---- Aka manto (赤マント) Translation: red cloak, red vest Alternate names: aoi manto, akai kami, akai hanten, akai chanchanko, akai te Habitat: school toilets Diet: school children Appearance: Aka manto is an urban legend related to elementary school toilets. It usually takes place in a specific stall in a specific bathroom in the school—usually it is an older or disused bathroom. Often the fourth stall is the cursed one. This is because the number four is associated with death. Most stories follow the same pattern. While at school late in the evening, a student suddenly finds themself in desperate need of a toilet. The closest restroom is one that is normally avoided by the students. Older and less well-kept, separated from the rest of the school, the stall is rumored to be haunted. With no time to find another restroom, the student goes in. After they have finished, they realize that there is no toilet paper. Then a strange voice asks, "Do you want red paper or blue paper?" The student answers, "Red paper." A moment later, they are stabbed and sliced up violently. Blood sprays everywhere, soaking their body and making it look as if they were wearing a bright red cloak. Some time later, a different student finds him or herself in need of a toilet in a similar situation. They know the story of the kid who died in the restroom but they use the bathroom anyway. Sure enough, a voice asks them, "Red paper or blue paper?" Remembering the legend, they say, "Blue paper." Then all of the student's blood is sucked out of their body. They are left dead and blue-faced on the bathroom floor. Aka manto's identity varies from place to place. Sometimes it is a serial killer hiding in the adjacent stall. Other times it is the ghost of a tall man with a sickly, bluish-white face. Sometimes it is even blamed on a hairy yōkai called a kainade who lives in the toilet and likes to stroke people's rear ends with its hand. In this case, the result is markedly less violent; a hairy arm of the chosen color rises out of the toilet to stroke the student's behind. In some versions, choosing "blue paper" gets you strangled until your face turns blue. In some, answering "red paper" gets your skin flayed so that it hangs off of your back like a red cape. Other versions are less lethal, with the students' skin color changed permanently to whatever color they chose. Sometimes the consequences are worse than death. Students are dragged into the netherworld, never to be seen again. There is usually no escape from aka manto. Clever students who bring extra toilet paper with them discover that it vanishes before they are able to use it. They still find themselves having to answer the question. People who choose a different color other than those offered are met with an equally horrible death. (One version has a student say, "yellow paper." The result is that their face is pushed down into the dirty toilet water and held there until they drown.) In some instances, students have been able to escape by saying "I don't need any paper." This buys them just enough time to flee the bathroom. Those who survive and tell the story to others fall terribly ill and die shortly after. Aka manto has been a popular schoolyard rumor since as early as the 1930s. One explanation for its continued popularity is that it reflects the anxieties in a student's daily life. Aka manto asks a question with no good outcome. That feeling is not too different from having to answer a problem on a test that you don't know, or being singled out by a teacher in front of the whole classroom when you don't know the answer. ---- Maneki neko (招き猫) Translation: inviting cat, beckoning cat Habitat: towns and cities Diet: carnivorous; as an ordinary cat Appearance: The maneki neko is a cat which brings good luck and fortune. It is most commonly seen in the form of decorative statues in homes and stores. It is usually depicted with one or both paws in the air in a beckoning motion. Cats have long been connected with the supernatural in Japan. While some superstitions link cats with bad luck, curses, and strange fires, there is also a long tradition of cats being revered. Cats are particularly seen as beneficial in agricultural and sericulture, where they eat mice and other pests which destroy crops and silkworms. In these areas cats were lucky creatures. Images of cats were used as charms. Statues of maneki neko were popular items in the urban areas of Japan towards the end of the Edo Period. Cats with their right hand raised were said to bring economic fortune, while cats with their left hand raised were said to attract customers. The color of the cats' fur can be significant as well. Long ago, black cats were said to be lucky due to their ability to see in the dark. Black maneki neko were used as talismans against evil spirits. Red was believed to repel smallpox and measles, so red maneki neko were used as talismans against sickness. The origins of these statues lie in folkloric tales about strange cats who brought riches to their owners, or who saved their owners from disaster. In the Yoshiwara pleasure district of Edo, there lived a famous courtesan named Usugumo. Usugumo was a tayū (the highest rank of oiran) in the esteemed brothel of Miura Yashirōzaemon. Usugumo was a cat lover and was particularly fond of her tortoiseshell cat. She always carried her cat with her wherever she went. So great was her love for her cat that rumors began to spread that Usugumo had been possessed or bewitched. One day, as Usugumo went to use the restroom, her tortoiseshell cat began acting strangely. It refused to leave her side, clawing at her dress and meowing noisily. The brothel owner saw this and thought that the cat was attacking Usugumo. He drew his sword and slashed at the cat, slicing its head off. The cat's head flew across the room and sunk its teeth into a large venomous snake which was hiding out of sight near the toilet. Usugumo was overcome with grief for her cat. It had given its life to save hers. To ease her sadness, the brothel owner had a statue in the likeness of her cat made by the finest woodcarver out of the finest wood. The carving was so masterfully done and so lifelike that Usugumo was overjoyed. She found happiness once again. Everyone who saw the carving of the cat wanted one just like it. That year, copies of the figure were sold in the Asakusa markets. This is often told as the origin of maneki neko statues. ---- Shukaku (守鶴) Translation: none; this is his name Appearance: Shukaku was a tanuki who lived in disguise as a human priest. For many decades he worked at Morinji, a Buddhist temple in Gunma Prefecture. Shukaku is best known for his miraculous tea kettle, known as the bunbuku chagama, which he left to Morinji as a gift. Shukaku's story has been told at Morinji for centuries. However, different versions and variations have sprung up over the years. The story's popularity spread during the Edo Period. Thanks to a booming publishing industry it became well known across Japan. Although Shukaku is associated with Morinji, the structure of his story—a magical animal presenting a wonderful gift to humankind—is a recurring motif throughout Japanese folklore. Morinji was founded in 1426 by a priest named Dairin Shōtsū. While he was traveling through various countries on pilgrimage, he befriended a priest named Shukaku. They traveled together. After Morinji was built, Shukaku stayed on to act as a head priest there for many years. In 1570, an important religious gathering was held at Morinji. Priests from all over the country traveled to the temple. When it came time to serve tea, the priests realized that they did not have enough kettles to serve such a large gathering. Shukaku—still serving the temple 144 years after his arrival—brought his favorite tea kettle to help serve the priests. This tea kettle was a miraculous object. No matter how many times you dunked a ladle in it, it was always brimming with enough hot water to make tea. It also stayed hot for many days after heating it. The kettle was given the name bunbuku chagama— chagama being the word for tea kettle, and bunbuku meaning "to spread luck." The name was a pun as well: the sound of boiling water is bukubuku, which sounds much like bunbuku. Thanks to Shukaku's marvelous tea kettle, the gathering was a great success. The bunbuku chagama continued to be used by the temple for many years. Shukaku, as well, continued to work at Morinji for years after that. According to Morinji's records, On February 28, 1587, a monk walked in on Shukaku while he was taking a nap. During his sleep, the tanuki's disguise faltered just a bit, and the monk noticed that Shukaku had a tail! Shukaku's great secret was exposed: he was not a human priest, but a tanuki in disguise. He had been living among humans for thousands of years. Long ago he had traveled through India and China. Eventually he met Dairin Shōtsū, who befriended him and brought him to Morinji. There he used his magic to serve the temple as best as he could. After his secret was uncovered, Shukaku decided it was time to leave. To make up for the great shock he had caused, he gave them a parting gift: he used his magic to present the story of the Battle of Yashima, one of the final clashes of the Genpei War. To show their gratitude for all that he had done, the priests built a shrine to Shukaku. He is still worshipped as a local deity. And the bunbuku chagama, which Shukaku left behind, remains on display at Morinji. ---- Kuzunoha (葛の葉) Translation: kudzu leaf Alternate names: Shinodazuma (the wife from Shinoda) Appearance: Kuzunoha was a white-furred kitsune who is most famous for being the wife of Abe no Yasuna and the mother of Abe no Seimei. Her story is preserved in a number of kabuki and bunraku plays. The Inari shrine near where Abe no Yasuna first met Kuzunoha still stands today and is popularly known as the Kuzunoha Shrine. During the reign of Emperor Murakami (946–967 CE), the onmyōji Abe no Yasuna sought to rebuild his family house. The Abe family had been rich and powerful, but their lands and status were lost years before by Yasuna's father when he had been tricked by con men. While rebuilding his house, Yasuna regularly traveled to the Inari shrine in Shinoda, Izumi Province, to pray for the god's blessings. One day, while walking through the woods of Shinoda, a beautiful white fox jumped in front of Yasuna's path. It was being chased by a hunter. The fox asked Yasuna to save it. Yasuna knew that white foxes were holy to Inari. He helped the creature to escape. Shortly afterwards, the hunter came to where Yasuna was and the two got into a fight. Yasuna was wounded in the fight and fell to the ground. After the hunter left, a young woman came out of the forest to Yasuna's side. She told him her name was Kuzunoha. She took Yasuna back to his home and nursed him back to health. The woman continued to visit Yasuna, caring for him and checking up on his recovery. During the time she spent visiting him, Kuzunoha and Yasuna fell in love. When he finally recovered they decided to get married. Eventually Kuzunoha became pregnant. She bore Yasuna a son. They three of them lived happily for some time. However, when their son was five years old, he witnessed something strange. Some say it was when she looked in a mirror, others say it was while she was sleeping; but his mother accidentally let her true form appear for a brief second: she was a white-furred kitsune! Her secret discovered, Kuzunoha had no choice but to leave her beloved family. Holding a brush in her mouth, she wrote a farewell tanka on the paper door and vanished: If you love me, come and visit in the forest of Shinoda in Izumi. When Yasuna read her poem, he realized that his beloved wife was the fox whom he had saved years earlier. He and their son traveled to the forests of Shinoda where Kuzunoha had first entered the world of humankind. There, Kuzunoha appeared before them one last time. She presented them with a crystal ball and a golden box as parting gifts. Then she left her human family forever. Thanks to the magical gifts his mother had given him, her yōkai lineage, and his father's onmyōji training, Kuzunoha and Yasuna's son grew up to become a powerful sorcerer. He took the name Abe no Seimei and became the most powerful onmyōji in all of Japanese history. ---- Tōdaiki (燈台鬼) Translation: candlestick spirit, candlestick demon Diet: none; it is sustained by dark magic Appearance: A tōdaiki is a magical lamp created using black magic and a living human being. Stories about people visiting strange lands and being transformed or disappearing into another world and never returning are not uncommon in Japanese folklore. Fanciful stories like these might have originated in true, but unsolved, disappearances of loved ones. The most famous tōdaiki story involves a real historical figure. Hitsu no Saishō was the nickname of Fujiwara no Arikuni, a Heian Period noble who lived from 943-1011 CE. Long ago, during a period of great movement of culture and ideas between China and Japan, a government minister named Karu no Daijin was sent on a diplomatic mission to Tang China. He never returned. His family in Japan, including his young son Hitsu no Saishō, did not know whether Karu was alive or dead. Many years later, when he was an adult, Hitsu no Saishō traveled to China to search for news of his missing father's whereabouts. He traveled far and wide. In a particular location he came across something he had never seen before—a candlestick fashioned out of a living human being! The man had been installed like a piece of furniture onto a fancy platform. A large candle had been affixed to his head. Every inch of his body was covered in strange tattoos. By some combination of drugs and sorcery, the man's throat had been blocked up and his ability to speak removed. As Hitsu no Saishō looked in amazement at the strange object, the tōdaiki began to shed tears. Unable to speak, the man bit hard into his finger tip until it began to bleed. Then, using his finger, he wrote out a poem in his blood: Long ago I came to China from Japan. I have the same family name as you. The bond between father and son transcends Even the seas and mountains that have separated us. For years I have cried in this horrible place. Every day I think of my parents. I have been transformed into a candlestick in this faraway land. I just want to go home. Upon reading this, Hitsu no Saishō realized in horror that the tōdaiki was his own father, whom he had come to China to find. ---- Himamushi nyūdō (火間蟲入道) Translation: oven bug monk Habitat: under the floorboards Diet: mainly lamp oil Appearance: Himamushi nyūdō are grotesque yōkai which live under floorboards and crawl out at night. They vaguely resemble Buddhist monks, but have long necks, sharp claws, and bodies covered in thick, dark hair. They have long tongues which they use to lap up the oil from lamps. Himamushi nyūdō bother people who are working hard or studying late at night. They jump out of the darkness towards them. Although they don't directly injure people, their presence is disturbing enough. They blow out the lights suddenly, and lick up the precious lamp oil, making it difficult to continue working. According to Toriyama Sekien's description of this yōkai in Konjaku hyakki shūi, himamushi nyūdō are born from those who were lazy in life, carelessly wasting time from birth to death. The term "oven bug" in its name is probably a reference to cockroaches. The hima kanji in this yōkai's name can also be read kama—and likely refers to the kamado, a traditional Japanese oven. Cockroaches have quite a few nicknames in Japanese; among them himushi (fire bug) and hitorimushi (lamp bug), both of which sound similar to himamushi. Cockroaches and other pests would have fed on the fish oil used to power Edo Period lamps—just like this yōkai does. Cockroaches live in dark, warm spaces, such as underneath a kamado—just like this yōkai does. And they crawl out of the floorboards to scare those working late at night—again, just like this yōkai does. Himamushi nyūdō's name contains a number of puns. According to Toriyama Sekien, it was originally called himamushiyo nyūdō (monk who wastes time at night). Over the years, the pronunciation gradually morphed. It became associated with hemamusho nyūdō—a popular Edo Period word doodle in which a monk is drawn using the characters in its name: ヘマムショ入道. The association of this yōkai with the word doodle would have amused readers during Sekien's time. ---- Kuro bōzu (黒坊主) Translation: black monk Habitat: human-inhabited areas Diet: the breath of sleeping humans Appearance: Kuro bōzu are dark, shadowy yōkai which looks somewhat like dark, bald Buddhist monks. However, their exact appearance is vague and difficult to make out. Their bodies are entirely black. They wear black robes. Their faces have somewhat bestial features. Kuro bōzu have long tongues and reek of rotting fish. Their hands and feet are said to be indiscernible. They can change height rapidly, becoming towering monsters in an instant. They are extremely fast and can run as if they were flying. Kuro bōzu haunt areas inhabited by humans. They come out at night, sneaking into houses after everyone is asleep. They creep up to their victims—usually women—and suck the breath out of their mouths. They also slide their putrid tongues into the mouths, ears, and all over the faces of their victims. Those visited repeatedly by kuro bōzu fall deathly ill. Kuro bōzu didn't appear in folklore until the Meiji Period. They are relatively new by yōkai standards. Because of the wide variations in reports, it is hard to come up with a clear picture of this yōkai's identity. Due to their vague and indiscernible features, some experts believe they are a kind of nopperabō. Others compare them to yamachichi, who also sneak into houses to steal the breath of sleeping humans. Their size-changing abilities and monk-like appearance suggest that they may be a variety of taka nyūdō. Still others say that kuro bōzu are one of the forms taken by magical kawauso. The most well-known kuro bōzu report comes from the early Meiji period, from a newspaper article in the Hōchi Shinbun. The encounter took place at a certain carpenter's house in Kanda, Tokyo. At midnight, a black, shadowy figure shaped like a monk appeared in the house. The creature entered the bedroom where husband and wife were sleeping. It climbed over the carpenter's sleeping wife and stuck its tongue in her ears and mouth. Then it licked her all over. The creature smelled like foul garbage. The smell was so noxious that the family became ill. Again and again, for several nights, the kuro bōzu returned to assault the carpenter's wife. Finally, she could not put up with it anymore. She left her husband and went to stay with some relatives. According to the carpenter, after his wife left, the black monk stopped coming. ---- Kekkai (血塊) Translation: blood clot, blood clump Alternate names: kekke Habitat: under the floorboards of its birth house Diet: its own mother Appearance: Kekkai are a kind of sankai—childbirth monster—from Saitama, Kanagawa, and Nagano Prefectures. They are small and ugly, resembling a monkey. Their hair is said to grow in backwards. They have two tongues—one red and one white. They are sometimes born from pregnant mothers instead of human babies. When a kekkai emerges covered in blood and amniotic fluid, it quickly scampers away from its mother and tries to escape. This is most often accomplished through the irori, or earthen hearth, a common feature in old country houses. It either burrows down beneath the floorboards or climbs up the long pothook which hangs above the irori and flees. If the kekkai is able to escape, it will return later to kill its mother while she sleeps. It does this by burrowing up through the floorboards and into its sleeping mother, tearing her apart from the inside. A few traditional precautions exist to protect against kekkai. The most important is preparation. A large shamoji (spatula) is placed by the irori. When the kekkai tries to climb up the pothook, it must be swatted down and caught before it has a chance to escape. Another common precaution is to surround the floor around the mother with byōbu (folding screens) to prevent a kekkai from escaping. This practice is the source of a play on words surrounding this yōkai's name: the byōbu creates a spiritual barrier, or kekkai (結界), which prevents the kekkai (血塊) from escaping. Kekkai are almost certainly a way to explain the dangers surrounding childbirth and the existence of birth defects. Before modern medicine was invented, death from complications relating to childbirth was not uncommon. A grieving family might be easily convinced that a mother's death was caused by some evil spirit—spiritual punishment for the family's sins. Similarly, it is not hard to imagine how superstitious people might have seen premature, stillborn, or deformed babies as monsters. Referring to them as yōkai may have been an attempt to understand the unknown and explain the unexplainable. ---- Hinnagami (人形神) Translation: doll god, doll spirit Alternate names: kochobbo Habitat: homes Appearance: Hinnagami are powerful spirits from Toyama Prefecture. They reside in dolls and grant their owners' wishes. Hinnagami grant their owners any wish that they desire. Families who own hinnagami quickly become rich and powerful. People who become rich and famous too swiftly are suspected of owning hinnagami. Hinnagami come with a catch: if a new request is not made as soon as a wish is granted, the hinnagami will demand, "What is next?" As soon as that request is fulfilled, the hinnagami demands another task. And another. And another. This pattern never ends. Because their creation comes out of human greed and desire, hinnagami cling to their creators obsessively and never leave their sides. A hinnagami's attachment is so powerful, in fact, that even death cannot separate it from its master. When a hinnagami's creator dies, the hinnagami will follow them to hell and haunt them for all of eternity. Hinnagami are created through a long and complicated ritual. There are a few variations depending on who you hear the story from. In the most common ritual, the person who wishes to create a hinnagami must begin collecting grave earth that has been trampled on by people during the day. Grave earth must be collected in this way every night for three years. For an even stronger hinnagami, they should take earth from seven different graveyards in seven different villages. Once collected, the grave earth is mixed with human blood until it becomes clay-like. Then it is molded into a doll shape representing a god or a spirit that its creator worships. This doll is placed in a busy road and left there until it has been trampled upon by one thousand people. Then the creator retrieves the doll, which has become a hinnagami. An alternative method is to collect graveyard stones and carve them into one thousand small dolls, each about nine centimeters long. These dolls are boiled in a large pot until only one of them rises to the surface. The doll that rises is said to contain the combined souls of all one thousand dolls. This type of hinnagami is called a kochobbo. ---- Hangonkō (反魂香) Translation: spirit calling incense Appearance: Hangonkō is a special kind of incense from ancient Chinese legends which has the power to call forth the spirits of the dead. Those who burn the incense will see their loved ones' faces within the smoke of the incense. Hangonkō is made from the hangonjū, a magical tree with leaves and flowers that resemble those of a maple or Japanese oak. Its smell can be picked up from over 100 ri away. To make hangonkō, you steam the hangonjū's roots until the sap comes out. Then you knead the sap to make the incense. Even a small piece of this resin is strong enough to recall the spirits of those who died from sickness or disease. There is a catch, however. Hangonkō only returns the spirit for a short time and they only exist within the smoke of the burning incense. The incense was famously used by Emperor Wu of the Han dynasty in China. After his beloved concubine Li Furen passed away, the emperor fell into deep depression. A Taoist sorcerer, in an attempt to ease the emperor's grief, provided him with a bit of hangonkō that he might see Lady Li one more time. Hangonkō was a popular subject in Japanese literature as well. It appears in a number of Edo Period works, from ghost story books to theater, kabuki, rakugo, and bunraku. The Japanese versions star famous characters from Japanese history. For example, in one story a man is overcome with grief at the death of his beloved prostitute. A hōkan (a male geisha) recommends he try recalling her spirit using a secret incense handed down by the onmyōji Abe no Seimei. All the variations of the story have the same ending. After the person uses the incense to meet their lover's spirit, it only leaves them sadder and more grieved than before. Hangonkō doesn't alleviate their loneliness—it makes it worse. This story is a Buddhist allegory. Smoke can be a symbol of delusion, such as attachment to the material world, or the inability to let go of a loved one after death. In Buddhism, this delusion is the ultimate cause of all suffering. The smoke of this incense prevents people from properly letting go of their loved ones and moving on. They're stuck in the past, in a delusion, and will be forever miserable unless they learn to let go. ---- Oiwa (お岩) Translation: a girls' name meaning "rock" Appearance: Oiwa is the onryō from the ghost story Yotsuya kaidan. Her story is based on real-life events which took place in 17th century Edo. The real Oiwa died in 1636. It is rumored that her onryō still haunts the places she lived as well as those who perform her story. Mysterious disasters occurring around theater and film adaptations of her story have been blamed on her ghost. A small shrine and a temple dedicated were erected on the ruins of her family's house to appease her angry spirit. It is customary for actors and crews putting on a production of Yotsuya kaidan to visit Oiwa's grave and ask her permission. Oiwa was married to a samurai named Iyemon . He was a wasteful man and a thief. One day, Oiwa decided to leave her husband and return to her family. Iyemon followed her but was stopped by Oiwa's father, Yotsuya Samon. He knew of Iyemon's crimes. He demanded the bandit divorce Oiwa. Iyemon drew his sword and murdered Samon, then returned to Oiwa and told her that a stranger had killed her father on the road. He begged her to reconcile with him and promised to avenge her father's murder. Times were hard. They had little money. Oiwa bore Iyemon a son, but she became sickly after giving birth, and Iyemon grew resentful of her. A rich doctor named Itō Kihei lived next door. He had a beautiful granddaughter named Oume. She was attracted to Iyemon, and so Kihei conspired to help her marry him. Kihei prescribed an ointment for Oiwa to help her recover from her sickness. In reality, it was a poison. After she applied it, her face was horribly disfigured. Iyemon's resentment grew into disgust. Kihei suggested to Iyemon that he leave Oiwa and marry his granddaughter; if he were to wed Oume, all the wealth of the Itō family could be his to inherit. Iyemon so hated Oiwa's face that he agreed to the scheme. Iyemon pawned Oiwa's possessions, her clothing, and even their son's clothing to save money to marry Oume. He needed a legitimate reason to divorce Oiwa, so he paid his friend Takuetsu to rape her so that he could accuse her of infidelity. On a prearranged night when Iyemon was away, Takuetsu entered Oiwa's room. He was so shocked by her disfigurement that he abandoned the plan. He confessed everything to Oiwa. She had not known what the ointment had done to her face. Takuetsu showed her a mirror. When Oiwa saw her reflection, she cried. She tried to cover the disfigurement by brushing her hair over it, but it fell out in large, bloody clumps. She went mad. She grabbed a nearby sword and stabbed her own throat. As she bled to death, she cursed Iyemon's name until she could breathe no more. Oiwa's body was discovered by Iyemon's servant Kohei. When Kohei delivered the sad news, Iyemon was overjoyed. Kohei became suspicious, but before he could act, Iyemon murdered him. He nailed Kohei's and Oiwa's bodies to a door and threw them in a river. He claimed that Kohei and Oiwa had slept together, justifying their deaths and freeing him to marry Oume. On their wedding night, Iyemon had trouble sleeping. He rolled over in bed and next to him was the disfigured face of Oiwa! He slashed at the ghost with his sword, but Iyemon realized too late that it was not Oiwa, but Oume. His new bride lay dead on the floor. Iyemon ran next door to seek Kihei's help. However, when he got there, he was confronted by Kohei's ghost. Iyemon slashed at the ghost with his sword. As he did Itō Kihei's slain body fell to the floor. Iyemon fled into the night but Oiwa's onryō pursued him. Everywhere he went, she was there. Her ruined face haunted his dreams. Her terrible voice cried out for vengeance. She even appeared in the paper lanterns that lit his way. Iyemon ran into the mountains and hid in an isolated cabin. But Oiwa followed him there too. Haunted by Oiwa's ghost, no longer able to separate nightmare from reality, Iyemon descended into madness. ---- Okiku (お菊) Translation: a girls' name meaning "chrysanthemum" Appearance: Okiku was the name of a servant girl who lost a precious plate, died a terrible death, and returned as a vengeful ghost. Her story is called Banchō sarayashiki: "The Dish Manor at Banchō." It has been retold countless times in folk tales, puppet theater, kabuki, film, and manga. Though the general outline of her story remains the same, the names, locations, and surrounding details vary quite a bit from telling to telling. Long ago, a woman named Okiku worked as a dishwashing servant at Himeji Castle. Okiku was beautiful. It was not long before she caught the eye of one of her master's retainers, a samurai named Aoyama. Aoyama tried many times to woo Okiku, but each time she rejected his advances. Aoyama grew impatient with Okiku and decided to trick her into becoming his lover. In the castle there was a set of ten extremely expensive dishes. Aoyama stole one dish and then called for Okiku. He told her one of his master's fine dishes was missing. He demanded to know where it was. Okiku became frightened. Losing one of her lord's prized dishes was a crime punishable by death. She counted the dishes, "One… two… three… four… five… six… seven… eight… nine…" She recounted them. Again and again, each time she came up one dish short. Aoyama told Okiku that he would tell his master that it wasn't her who lost the dish—but only if she would become his mistress. She again refused. This time Aoyama became furious. He ordered his servants to beat Okiku with a wooden sword. Afterwards, he had her tied up and suspended over the castle well. He tortured her, repeatedly dunking her into the well, then pulling her back up and beating her. He demanded one last time that she become his mistress. Okiku refused. So, Aoyama struck her violently with his sword and dropped her body down into the well. Not long after, Okiku's ghost was seen wandering the castle grounds. Night after night, it would rise from the well and enter her master's house searching for the missing dish. It would count the plates: "One… two… three… four… five… six… seven… eight… nine…" After counting the ninth plate, the ghost would let out a blood curdling scream that could be heard throughout the castle. Okiku tormented Aoyama every night, robbing him of his rest. Those who overheard part of Okiku's counting became sick. Those who listened all the way to nine died. Finally, the lord of the castle demanded that something be done about Okiku's ghost. He asked a priest to pray for her soul. The priest waited in the garden all night, chanting sutras. One again, Okiku's ghost rose out of the well. It began to count the dishes: "One… two… three… four… five… six… seven… eight… nine…" As soon as the ghost had counted the ninth dish, the priest shouted out: "TEN!" The ghost suddenly looked relieved. Someone had found its missing dish! After that, Okiku was never seen again. ---- Okiku mushi (於菊虫) Translation: Okiku bug Habitat: wells around Himeji Castle Diet: herbivorous Appearance: Okiku mushi are caterpillar-like yōkai with the torso of a human woman. They are called Okiku mushi because it is believed they are born from the vengeance of Okiku's ghost. According to the story Banchō sarayashiki, the servant girl Okiku was murdered by her lover. Her body was tied up, she was tortured, and then her body was discarded into the well of Himeji Castle. After her death, a number of strange occurrences were blamed on Okiku's ghost. One of these was the sudden proliferation of a certain type of caterpillar—specifically the Chinese windmill ( Byasa alcinous). The chrysalis of this butterfly was thought to look like a woman's body tied up with ropes. The locals of Himeji immediately associated this with Okiku's story. It was believed that Okiku's spirit must have manifested as these bugs, spawned by whatever part of her grudge lingers in this world. While this insect is commonly known as the jakō ageha in Japan today, it is sill also known by the nickname Okiku mushi. This is in part due to the popularity of Okiku's story across Japan as well as to the clever marketing of the local shopkeepers around Himeji Castle. During the Edo period, Himeji's souvenir shops sold the chrysalises of these insects to tourists at shrines near the castle. [ The "Big Three" Ghosts ] Japan has a love for "top three" lists. The Big Three Japanese Gardens, the Big Three Views of Japan, and the Big Three Mountains are common tourist destinations among Japanese and foreigners alike. Of course, folklore is no exception. There are numerous "big three" lists which rank yōkai, oni, and onryō by various criteria. One of these lists is Nihon san dai kaidan–Japan's Big Three Ghost Stories. These are Yotsuya kaidan, Banchō sarayashiki, and Botan dōrō—the tales of Oiwa, Okiku, and Otsuyu. These stories are singled out because of the profound influence they have had on Japanese culture. A fourth tale is often included alongside these as one of the most famous Japanese ghost stories (replacing Botan dōrō, which originated in China). That is the story of Kasane, from Kasane ga fuchi. Kasane is held up alongside with Oiwa and Okiku as a paragon of the grudge-driven female ghosts of Japanese folklore. ---- Otsuyu (お露) Translation: a girls' name meaning "dew" Appearance: Otsuyu is the ghost from Botan dōrō (The Peony Lantern). Her story was originally a Chinese folk tale. It was adapted into Japanese in the 17th century. It has been adapted for rakugo and kabuki, with various changes, extra characters, and more details added to flesh out the story. Her story takes place during the Obon holiday, when the dead are believed to return to the land of the living. Unlike most Japanese ghost stories, Otsuyu's tale is one of love rather than of vengeance. Long ago lived a man named Ogiwara Shinnojō. He was recently widowed. On the first night of Obon, Ogiwara saw a beautiful woman and her servant walking down the street, carrying a lantern with a peony motif. Her name was Otsuyu. Ogiwara was instantly smitten by her beauty and invited her into his home. Otsuyu spent the night with him. Long after the moon had set and the lamplight had grown faint, she reluctantly bade him farewell and left before sunrise. To Ogiwara's delight, Otsuyu and her servant returned the following evening, carrying the same peony lantern. Ogiwara fell deeply in love with Otsuyu. He lost interest in seeing anybody but her. He no longer left his house and stopped taking care of himself. Night after night, Otsuyu visited Ogiwara's house. Each night she left just before dawn. Twenty days passed. The neighbors began to grow concerned for Ogiwara. An old man who lived next door heard laughing and singing coming from Ogiwara's house at night. He peeked through a hole in Ogiwara's wall. He saw Ogiwara ecstatically entwined in the boney arms of a skeleton. When Ogiwara spoke, the skeleton nodded its head and moved its arms and legs. When the skeleton's jaw opened, a haunting voice came from where its mouth should have been. The old man was frightened. The next day, the old man called upon Ogiwara. He warned him that his guest was a ghost, and that he should visit to a temple at once. Ogiwara heeded the old man's advice. At the temple, Ogiwara discovered Otsuyu's grave. An old and tattered peony lantern was draped across it. The priest warned Ogiwara that he must resist Otsuyu's calls or he would surely die. He gave him a magical charm to place on his house. Ogiwara rushed home and attached the charm to his door. The charm worked perfectly: Otsuyu stopped visiting Ogiwara. Although he was safe, Ogiwara was despondent. He missed Otsuyu dearly. Some days after her last visit, Ogiwara became drunk and left his house. He wandered to the temple where he had discovered Otsuyu's grave. At the temple gate, Otsuyu appeared and beckoned to him. She led him away, and they spent one more night together. Several days later, the neighbors noticed that Ogiwara had been missing for some time. Fearing the worst, the priest opened up Otsuyu's grave. Inside was the dead body of Ogiwara, wrapped up in the boney arms of Otsuyu's skeleton. ---- Kasane (累) Translation: to pile up, to overlap, to add on Appearance: Kasane is the ghost from Kasane ga fuchi (the pond of Kasane). Her tale is based on true events which happened in the 17th century. Long ago, a farmer named Yoemon and his wife Osugi lived in the village of Hanyū, Shimosa Province. Osugi had a child named Suke from a previous relationship. Suke's face was disfigured and his leg was malformed. Yoemon hated him. One day, while crossing a bridge over a deep pond, Yoemon pushed the child into the pond. Suke was unable to swim and drowned. The next year, Yoemon and Osugi had a baby girl. They named her Rui. Rui looked so much like Suke, including the disfigured face, that the villagers believed she was haunted by his spirit. Instead of calling her Rui they referred to her as Kasane—an alternate reading of her name implying that Suke's soul had been reborn in her. Years later, Yoemon and Osugi died. Kasane lived alone. One day she became sick. A man named Yagorō visited her and nursed her back to health. Out of gratitude, Kasane offered to marry Yagorō and make him the inheritor of her father's property. Yagorō found Kasane's face repulsive but he wanted her land and inheritance. He agreed. One day, Yagorō and Kasane went out to the fields to collect beans. Yagorō made Kasane carry all of the beans herself. The burden was so heavy she could barely walk. As they crossed the pond, Yagorō pushed Kasane into the water. He jumped in after her and stepped on her chest, pinning her to the riverbed. He crushed and squeezed the air out of her lungs. He shoved rocks and river sand into her mouth. He stabbed her eyes with his thumbs. Then he wrung her neck until she could struggle no longer. Some townspeople witnessed this, but nobody tried to help her. She was so disliked for her ugliness that there seemed to be an unspoken agreement to leave things be. Yagorō continued to live in Kasane's home and maintain her family's lands. He remarried quickly. However, his new wife died shortly after the wedding. He remarried again, and again his wife died. This happened over and over again. After Yagorō had remarried six times, his wife managed to survive long enough to bear him a daughter. They named her Kiku. Yagorō's sixth wife died when Kiku was thirteen. One day Kiku suddenly became extremely sick. She collapsed to the floor. Her mouth foamed. Tears streamed from her eyes. She cried that she couldn't bear the pain and begged Yagorō to help her. Suddenly, a different person's voice spoke forth from her body: "I am not Kiku! I am the wife you murdered! I curse your family! I killed your wives! Don't you remember me? I am Kasane!" Kiku lunged at Yagorō, but he escaped and ran to the village temple. Yagorō told everyone Kiku was lying. But the villagers, wanting to save poor Kiku, dragged Yagorō from the temple and confronted Kasane's ghost. Yagorō defiantly maintained his innocence even while Kasane's spirit cursed him. Kasane then cursed the villagers who witnessed her murder and did nothing to stop it. "All of your ancestors are here with me in Hell!" She named each of their ancestors and listed their sins. Then she listed the sins of the living villagers. The entire village's pride was shattered as their shame was made public. Yagorō and the others confessed what they had done. Though Yagorō committed the act, through inaction the whole village was guilty of her murder. The villagers who didn't witness 202 ---- the murder but never asked about Kasane's disappearance were partially responsible too. It was their fault poor Kiku was possessed by Kasane's (ghost.) Kasane demanded that the villagers hold a lavish funeral and erect a Buddha statue in her name to end her torment. The villagers balked at the cost to cover such a funeral. Kasane told them to sell her father's land to pay for it. The villagers told Kasane that her family's lands had already been sold away. Kasane's wrath exploded. Kiku's body twisted and floated high up into the air. The poor girl lost consciousness. Word of Kiku's possession spread far and wide. A traveling priest named Saint Yūten visited the Yoemon household to offer his prayers and try to save Kiku. But his chanting and praying had no effect. Kasane taunted Yūten. He then tried to have Kiku recite the prayers, but Kasane's spirit interfered and Kiku was unable to speak. Finally, Yūten grabbed Kiku's hair, forced her into a bow, and told her to pray. Kiku was able to recite the sutra, and the spirit of Kasane grew quiet. Kiku appeared safe. A few days later, however, Kiku's possession returned. Yūten returned to the Yoemon household, this time determined to subdue Kasane no matter what the cost. He grabbed Kiku's hair and with all of his strength forced her down onto the floor. As he held her down, demanding she pray, Kiku's voice could be heard faintly mumbling. Yūten bent down close to her mouth and listened. He asked Yagorō: "Does the name Suke mean anything to you?" Yagorō had never heard of Suke, nor had anybody else present. Saint Yūten asked the villagers. An elderly man came forward, saying, "Some sixty years ago the first Yoemon's wife had a son. He was murdered and thrown into the pond. I think his name was Suke." "Are you Suke?" Saint Yūten asked Kiku. Kiku's voice replied, "Yes. When you saved Rui, you left me behind. Now I possess her." Yūten blessed Suke and granted him a kaimyō—a posthumous Buddhist name. He wrote this name on the family altar. Suke's spirit left Kiku's body and entered the altar. Everyone present dropped to the floor and prayed. The spirits of Kasane and Suke were never heard from again. ---- Kitsune tsuki (狐憑き) Translation: fox possession Appearance: Until the advent of modern medicine, mental illness and insanity were thought to be caused by kitsune tsuki, possession by a fox spirit. Women were more susceptible to kitsune tsuki than men, as were the weak-minded. When a kitsune possessed an individual, it was often in retaliation—for something like killing one of its family members, for example. The kitsune caused its host to behave erratically and emotionally, making them prone to violent outbreaks and hysteria. They might run naked through the streets. They might foam at the mouth or yelp like a fox. Victims of kitsune tsuki were often able to speak and read languages that they previously had no knowledge of. Kitsune were able speak through their hosts mouths. They could control their hosts like puppets and cause them to do evil. Some fox spirits served families, making them rich and fertile. These families were called kitsune mochi (fox owners). In addition to bringing their owners prosperity, kitsune would bring ruin upon the family's enemies. They placed curses, inflicted sickness, or possessed rival families. Kitsune mochi families kept their fox spirits for generations, handing down the secrets from parent to child. They honored and cared for their foxes; for the spirits could just as easily bring the same ruin upon the kitsune mochi family if angered. Families suspected of being kitsune mochi were mistrusted and feared by their neighbors. Even today in some parts of Japan, people belonging to kitsune mochi lineages occasionally have trouble finding marriage partners. Few parents would knowingly allow their son or daughter to join such a family. Kitsune tsuki was also used in religious rituals. A willing person was used as a vessel to perform divinations. The kitsune entered the medium's body and spoke through their mouth, predicting the future or imparting secret knowledge. This was a dangerous practice. It relied on the willingness of the kitsune to leave the body after the possession was over. A person possessed by a kitsune often developed telltale foxlike physical features, such as sharper teeth or a streamlined, pointy face. Recognizing kitsune tsuki in a person could be difficult if the victim did not display any obvious physical signs. However, there were a few clues that aided diagnosis. Despite being invisible, kitsune have certain traits which betray their presence. They love fried tofu and azuki beans. A possessed person craved these foods, often eating them in large amounts without feeling full. A possessed person also developed a fear of dogs. Finally, a small lump could often be found hidden somewhere on the victim's body. This is the place where the fox spirit resided. If pushed or pricked, the lump slipped away and moved to another part of the body. It could be caught or removed by any physical means. Because of widespread belief in fox possession, several folk cures were invented over the centuries. Exorcism was usually performed at Inari shrines, as foxes are sacred to Inari. One fairly benign treatment included having the victim licked from head to toe by dogs. Foxes fear dogs, so this could drive the spirit away. A less benign treatment involved beating or burning the possessed in attempts to drive out the fox. Priests would also burn fresh pine leaves, suffocating the patient in thick, toxic smoke in an attempt to drive out the spirit. Unfortunately, this could kill the patient before driving out the kitsune. Even if a person was cured of their possession, they and their families—as well as anyone accused of being behind the possession—often suffered ostracism and social isolation for the rest of their lives. ---- Haimushi (肺虫) Translation: lung bug Appearance: Haimushi are tiny moth-like creatures with segmented bodies and four wings. They live in their host's lungs most of the time, but occasionally leave the body and fly through the air. They have red faces with triple-forked mouths, and white bodies like that of maggots. They have colorful, feathery wings. They feed mainly on cooked rice. Haimushi infect the lungs and cause various health problems. If a haimushi leaves its host and gets lost, the person will die. The haimushi will then turn into a fireball and burn up. A haimushi infection can be treated with byakujutsu, a traditional remedy made from the powdered root of the herb Atractylodes japonica. ---- Haishaku (肺積) Translation: lung shaku (a type of infection) Alternate names: sokuhon Appearance: Haishaku originate under the right armpit and gradually migrate into the lungs. They grow from smaller, larval forms into large, white, lumpy shapes that envelop the lungs and cause sickness. Their noses open directly into the lungs, so they are extremely sensitive to smells. People infected with haishaku develop smooth, white skin. They dislike strong smells, good or bad. Instead they prefer raw, fishy smells. They prefer spicy foods over bland ones. They also become pessimistic and depressed. Because haishaku are shaped like clouds, their hearts also become cloudy and subdued. When infected with haishaku, tears will flow like rain. Haishaku infections can be treated with gentle and shallow acupuncture. Anything stronger than that will be too painful for the victim. ---- Gyūkan (牛癇) Translation: cow kan (kind of infection) Alternate names: kiukan, hainoju, haikan (lung kan) Appearance: Gyūkan are a type of kan no mushi—creatures which causes distemper and irritability in children. Kan no mushi can take many shapes and infect many parts of the body. A gyūkan is a kan no mushi which takes the shape of a cow and infects the lungs. They have long tongues and sharp hooves. The lower part of their body is red. Gyūkan tend to act up when their hosts eat and drink. From their position in the lungs, they can sense when food enters the throat. They become excited and cause their hosts to faint. There are many of ways to treat them with acupuncture. However, as they grow older their horns become longer and sharper. Recovery becomes more difficult. ---- Hishaku (脾積) Translation: spleen shaku (a type of infection) Alternate names: hiki Appearance: Hishaku are microbes which live near the belly button and infect the spleen. They have fuzzy, yellowish, wolf-like bodies and long red tongues. They have no legs. A large red pentagon-like shape appears on a hishaku's side; this is a representation of the belly button. Hishaku mainly infect women. They cause an extreme fondness for sweets, as well as a yellow tinge to the face. Hishaku hosts tend to hum constantly. They can cause extremely heavy menstrual bleeding as well as irregular vaginal discharge. Women infected with hishaku suffer difficulty getting out of bed. Hishaku infections are most likely to occur during the changing of the seasons. This is because hishaku are related to the element of earth in Chinese element theory. Days when the seasons change are closely related to the element of earth. Hishaku can be treated with acupuncture in an area about one centimeter around the belly button. The techniques for this treatment are only passed down orally. Hinoshu 脾ノ聚 Translation: spleen shu (a type of infection) Appearance: Hinoshu are microbial yōkai with a lumpy, boulder-like appearance and extremely large mouths. They infect the spleen. Hinoshu attacks occur when the host is relaxing outside or when the host is among a crowd of people. They roll about inside the body, bruising every part and causing a lot of pain. The victim feels as if they have fallen from a height onto an enormous boulder. Viewing beautiful rocks, such as in a Zen garden, causes this infection to act up much more strongly, as the hinoshu becomes excited in the presence of beautiful rocks. When an infection takes this form, it becomes difficult to recover. Traditionally, acupuncture is used to treat it, however the treatment is too complicated to learn in a book. It must be learned orally, from someone who has treated a hinoshu infection before. ---- Hizō no mushi (脾臓の虫) Translation: spleen bug Appearance: Hizō no mushi live in the spleen and attack the liver and muscles. They have bright red bodies which are hot. Their limbs are tipped with sharp claws. They stagger throughout the body on their spindly legs. People infected with hizō no mushi take on some of their characteristics; most notably the staggering style of walking, with left and right arms spread wide. When hizō no mushi reach out from the spleen and grasp the liver in their talons, their victims develop hyperthermia. When hizō no mushi grasp the muscles in their talons, their victim's bodies become hot. They begin to feel dizzy as if hit on the head. A hizō no mushi infection can be cured by taking Chinese medicine made from mokkō (a species of thistle) and daiō (a kind of rheum). ---- Akuchū (悪虫) Translation: evil bug Appearance: Akuchū are dangerous bugs which infect the spleen. They can easily move throughout their hosts with their flexible segmented bodies and broad tails. They have six sharp claws with which they strongly grasp the spleen. Akuchū cling to the spleen and with their hooked bills and steal the food that their hosts eat. No matter how much food is ingested, their hosts will gain no weight and receive no nourishment while infected. Akuchū infections can be easily cured with mokkō (Chinese medicine made from a species of thistle). ---- Hizō no kasamushi (脾臓の笠虫) Translation: capped spleen bug Appearance: Hizō no kasamushi get their name from the bright red, cap-like feature on top of their heads. They have a long, worm-like body covered in short red hairs, which ends in a hairy forked tail. The hizō no kasamushi's cap interferes with the normal intake of food. People infected with this worm become pale and weak. They cause either rapid weight loss or extreme weight gain. This bug is difficult to remove, but its symptoms can be somewhat relieved by taking Chinese medicine made from agi (dried gum from the roots of ferula plants) and gajutsu (made from the stems and roots of turmeric plants). ---- Koshō (小姓) Translation: page, apprentice Alternate names: koseu Appearance: Koshō are parasitic yōkai with snakelike bodies and child-like faces. They have white, scruffy beards and umbrella-like protrusions on the top of their heads. They can speak, and constantly chatter like children. They love sweet sake. They live in between the heart and the diaphragm where neither medicine nor needles can reach. A koshō infection is a terminal illness. Not even the best doctors have ever come up with a way to treat it. The umbrella-like protrusion on their heads block medicine, and they hide too deep in the body for acupuncture to be effective. ---- Ōzake no mushi (大酒の虫) Translation: heavy drinking bug Appearance: Ōzake no mushi have bright red bodies with several worm-like appendages branching out. They are warm and become warmer when their hosts drink alcohol. They look like lumpy satchels tied up at the top. People infected with ōzake no mushi become heavy drinkers. If the satchel-like shell is broken, the ōzake no mushi erupts, spilling what looks like red sand throughout the body. In fact, these are countless other worms which live inside its red body. Even after its host dies, these parasites will survive inside of the abdomen. ---- Taibyō no kesshaku (大病の血積) Translation: terrible disease blood shaku (a type of infection) Alternate names: kesshaku, chishaku Appearance: This yōkai infects hosts after they have suffered from a terrible sickness. Their bodies are shaped like flexible bulbs. They have flippers and broad tails which help them swim about the stomach. Their heads are shaped like hammers, and they use them to smash through the stomach wall and enter the heart, where they feed off of their hosts' blood. A person infected with a taibyō no kesshaku becomes pale, with thin and emaciated cheeks. The victim's entire body becomes weak and worn out. This infection can be cured by vomiting up the taibyō no kesshaku and sprinkling it with shukusha (medicine made from black cardamom seed). When a taibyō no kesshaku is smashed, its body rips open and an enormous blood clot is released. ---- Kakuran no mushi (霍乱の虫) Translation: vomit and diarrhea bug Appearance: Kakuran no mushi are parasitic yōkai which live in the stomach. They have black heads and red bodies. Tiny legs are interspersed across their long bodies. Their facial expression resembles that of a person who is about to vomit: with open mouths and tiny pinpoints for eyes. People infected with kakuran no mushi suffer symptoms similar to food poisoning: frequent diarrhea and vomiting. This infection can be cured by taking goshuyu, a medicine made from a dried, unripe fruit ( Tetradium ruticarpum). In one record of a kakuran no mushi infection, this yōkai's head was briefly visible in its host's mouth during a particularly violent bout of vomiting. A friend of the victim grabbed the kakuran no mushi's head to try to pull it out, but the victim weakened and seemed as if he was about to lose consciousness. The friend let go of the head. The kakuran no mushi retreated into its host's body. Afterwards, the victim died. When an autopsy was performed, the doctor found the kakuran no mushi wrapped up around its host's liver so tightly that he couldn't remove it. The doctor ground up shazenshi ( Plantago asiatica) and mokkō ( Saussurea costus) and sprinkled it over the kakuran no mushi. The creature disappeared. ---- Kishaku (気積) Translation: mind/spirit/mood shaku (a type of infection) Appearance: Kishaku's most distinguishing feature are their mouths, which are split three ways. They have red, furry bodies with a white stripe and black tails. Kishaku love greasy, oily foods. They live in the stomach and feed off oily foods their hosts eat, such as fish and chicken. They completely ignore rice and other foods they don't like. People infected with kishaku experience an extreme increase in sexual desire. This sickness can be cured with medicine made from a tiger's intestines. ---- Sori no kanmushi (ソリの肝虫) Translation: back-bending liver bug Appearance: Sori no kanmushi are terrible parasitic bugs with wide bug eyes, blue backs, and white bellies. Their hands are like flippers and their tails are brush-like. They like spicy foods. They live in the liver, but the symptoms they cause affect the spine. Sori no kanmushi bite the backs of their hosts, causing great pain. Their victims develop a warped or curved spine, a condition which long ago was called sori (thus this creature's name). Mokkō ( Saussurea costus) and byakujutsu ( Atractylodes japonica) are effective medicines against this bug. ---- Umakan (馬癇) Translation: horse kan (kind of infection) Alternate names: shinnoju Appearance: Umakan are infectious parasites with the appearance of splendid, fast horses. Their heads, necks, and backs are deep red. Their tail, belly, and legs are white. They act up in bright sunlight, or in the light from large fires. Umakan victims suffer from weak heart and fainting spells. Upon awakening from a faint, they seem perfectly fine with no other problems. To treat this sickness, the victim must continuously build up strength in their heart. There are a number of effective ways to treat it with acupuncture as well. These are passed down orally from teacher to student. ---- Gyōchū (蟯虫) Translation: intestinal worm; pinworm Appearance: Gyōchū are infectious yōkai with six arms and long red tongues. They are extremely fond of chatting and gossiping. They live and reproduce in the sex organs, making them a sexually transmitted yōkai. Gyōchū reproduce in the sex organs on Kōshin night, a holy night which occurs every sixty days in the esoteric Kōshin religion. Gyōchū leave their hosts on these nights and visit Enma Daiō, the king of hell and judge of the damned. They tattle on their hosts, telling Enma about all their hosts' dreams, desires, and sins. Enma then inflicts his divine wrath on them accordingly. There is no treatment for a gyōchū infection. The only way to keep safe from this infection is to avoid any chance of contracting an infection by abstaining from sex on Kōshin night. Traditionally, Kōshin night is reserved for praying. Believers gather together and refrain from sleeping for the whole night, so faithful practitioners should have no problem avoiding contracting gyōchū. People who have sex on these holy nights are committing a grave sacrilege which the gyōchū will report to King Enma. During the feudal era, terrible diseases (leprosy, for example) were believed to be divine punishments for those who disrespect the gods. Today, the name gyōchū refers to the pinworm. ---- Kitai (鬼胎) Translation: demon uterus Appearance: Kitai are grotesque, infectious yōkai which begin as blood clots the size of a large sake cup. Their life cycle begins in the left abdomen, and as they grow they migrate to the uterus. Gradually, they develop faces that look like a frightful cow: bright red with black horns. They grow long bodies which coil around like snakes. Kitai have short tempers. They move extremely slow, like slugs. Because of this they tend to feel a lot of stress which they pass on to their hosts. Once a kitai takes on its adult form it is difficult to recover from. When a kitai slithers about inside of its host, it causes bouts of hysteria. They are difficult to treat with acupuncture, because the needles often cause the kitai to become stressed, which worsens the condition. There are secret ways of treating slow moving bugs like the kitai, but they are passed on orally from master to student. ---- Mimimushi (耳虫) Translation: ear bug Appearance: Mimimushi are infectious yōkai with long ears and spotted, snakelike bodies. They writhe and slither back and forth as they migrate between the ears and the heart, causing discomfort in their hosts. People infected with mimimushi crave cold foods and avoid hot food. Their stomachs appear swollen and bloated. Infections can be treated with remedies made from the herb byakujutsu ( Atractylodes japonica) and the mushroom bukuryō ( Poria cocos).
(Young Wizards 9) A Wizard of Mars	Diane Duane	[ "fantasy", "young adult" ]	[]	Chapter 1	Truth is always late, always last to arrive, limping along with Time. (The Art of Worldly Wisdom, Baltasar Gracián, §146) [Terra Cognita} <The problem,> Kit thought, scowling at the paper, <isn't the basic shape, so much. It's what to do with the legs...> He briefly glanced up from the pencil sketch he'd been doing in the margin of his notebook and looked wearily up at Mr. Machiavelli, his history teacher, as if he'd actually been paying attention to anything the Mack was saying. It was hard enough to care, this time of year. <One more week till school's out. One more week!>— and especially late on a Friday afternoon, when the air-conditioning was broken. <Again!> Kit thought. He was sweltering, along with everyone else in the place. Only little, balding Mr. Mack, strolling back and forth in front of the blackboard and holding forth on Asian politics of the 50s, seemed untouched by the heat and humidity. He paused to write the word "Pyongyang" on the board, pausing in the middle of the process to stare at the word as if not sure of the spelling. <Oh, come on, Mack, give us a break: who cares about this stuff right now?!> But the Mack, as the whole class knew too well by now, was unstoppable; the heat slowed him down no more than cold or rain or dark of night probably would have. People names and place names and endless dates just kept on rolling out of him, and now he turned to the blackboard and started writing again.... Kit let out a sigh and glanced at the air vents at the back of the room. Cold air should have been coming out of them, but right now they were emitting nothing but an occasional faint clunking noise as somewhere in the system a feeder vent kept trying and failing to open. The school system was having budget troubles, which meant that some equipment that needed to be completely replaced wasn't even getting maintenance. But knowing this didn't make the heat any easier to bear. People in the back of the room were fanning themselves with paperwork and notebooks. Kids sitting by the open windows were leaning toward them, courting any passing breath of air, and (when Mr. Machiavelli wasn't looking) panting obviously, as if it would help. Without stopping what he was saying, Mr. Mack had paused to flip open a book on his desk and peer down at it: he shoved a bookmark into it and turned back to the blackboard, starting to write something else. <How can this not be bothering him when he's got a whole suit on?> Kit thought. <Doesn't he have sweat glands??> The cooling system clunked several times more, to no effect. Kit made a face, glanced at the clock. It seemed hopelessly stuck at twenty past two, and the class wasn't going to let out until quarter of three...which from where Kit was sitting felt like at least a year away. <I can't stand it anymore. And anyway, none of them'll notice> — Very quietly Kit reached down into the book bag beside his desk and pulled out his wizard's manual. At the moment, the manual looked like his history textbook— which was perfectly normal, since earlier this year Kit had stuck a chameleon spell on the manual's exterior, causing it to imitate the proper textbook for whatever class he happened to be in. Kit turned idly through the manual's pages to the one that held the spell he'd first crafted to do repairs on the school's cooling system, back when it broke down during the hot spell in April. He'd had to use the spell several times since, and he'd had to rework it every time, because engineers from other schools kept coming over to work on the system— and every time they did, they disrupted whatever quick fix Kit had managed to implement the last time he'd done the fix-it spell. <Gotta get in here sometime during vacation and do a real fix on the whole system,> Kit thought. <Otherwise things'll get even worse when the cold weather comes around...> The words of the spell, in the long, curved strokes and curlicue hooks-and-crooks of the wizardly Speech, laid themselves out before him on the manual page. Hovering above them, faint and hardly to be seen, was the shadow of the camouflage page that any casual, nonwizardly observer would see if he or she looked at the book. There was of course no question of saying the spell out loud in a situation like this. <Gonna be kind of a strain doing it on the quiet,> Kit thought. <But this heat's just too much. And what's it like on the other side of the building, where the Sun's hitting? The kids over there must be dying. Let's just call this my good deed for the day...> He closed his eyes for a moment, working to make the requisite "quiet zone" inside his mind, and then opened his eyes again and started silently reading the words of the wizardry in the Speech. Slowly the wizardry started to work: a silence started to fall around Kit as the universe seemed to lean in around him, listening to the spell. In the growing silence, Kit watched the room around him seem to fade, while the normally invisible layout of the cooling system now started to become visible, glowing like a wireframe diagram that stretched out and away from the history classroom. Kit didn't need to go hunting through the system to find the source of the problem: he knew where it was, and anyway, the locator functions of the spell would have shown him the duct near the heart of the building, just this side of the heat pump in the school's engineering center. Kit peered at the duct in his mind, concentrating on the source of the problem— a vent shutter that looked something like a small, boxy Venetian blind. "Okay," he said silently in the Speech. "What is it this time?" <The guy came again,> said the vent shutter buried deep in the duct<, and he tightened those bolts up too much...> "Said" was of course not the best way to put it— inanimate objects don't communicate the way organic ones do— but to a wizard like Kit, who was good at communicating with such objects, the way the information passed was enough like talking and listening to think of it that way. The wizardry showed Kit the bolts that the vent shutter meant: a series of them, up and down each side of it, fixing its shutter hinges to the inside of the duct. "Got it," Kit said silently. "Okay, here we go —" He turned his attention to the bolts. "Come on, guys, lighten up. You don't need all that tension. Just let yourselves unwind..." Half of wizardry was persuading people, creatures, or objects to do what you wanted them to: the rest of it was knowing what words in the Speech would get the intention across... and by now, Kit knew the words entirely too well. Slowly, the wizardry showed him the bolts loosening up one by one. "Not too much," he said in his mind. "We don't want the shutter to fall out. Yeah, that's it... just like that." The last bolt rotated a quarter turn. "That's the ticket," Kit said in his mind. "That should do it. Thanks, guys..." With one finger Kit traced a series of curves on the desk, the "unknotting" routine to undo the Wizard's Knot that fastened most spells closed and started them working. The wizardry obediently unraveled: the glowing wireframe of the duct structure faded out as the classroom faded in around Kit again. And from far away in the building, echoing down the air vents that led into the room, Kit heard something go clunk, just once— the vent's shutters, locking into the correct position. After a few moments, a breath of cooler air started sighing out of the vent. Kit let out a breath of his own. It was tough to conceal the effects of doing a spell, even a minor one like this: he felt as if he'd just run up a few flights of stairs, and it was now taking some effort to keep his breathing regular. For the moment, all Kit could do was shut his manual and pick up his pencil, his hand shaking with a fine muscle tremor born of the brief exertion. But the air was cooling already. <Worth it,> Kit thought, <even for just twenty minutes...>He glanced again at the sketches in his notebook's margin, the topmost of which showed a single slender tower rising from a forest of smaller ones, all surrounded by a barren, otherwordly landscape. The tower in particular was fuzzy around the edges, with erasures and redrawing: rendering architecture wasn't Kit's strong suit. But the figures he'd drawn farther down the page were better, especially the— "Not too bad," said a voice over his shoulder. "Better put some more clothes on her, though, or you'll lose your PG-13 rating." Kit froze as the laughter of his classmates spread around the room. Mr. Mack's hand came down and picked up the notebook. "Actually, as regards the draftsmanship, not bad at all," his history teacher said. "I'd rate her babe quotient at, oh, an eight or so. Make it eight-point-five for her, uh, attributes." More snickering went around the class. Kit's face went hot. "But as for the content..." Mr. Mack gave Kit a disapproving glance. "Not sure what it has to do with the aftermath of the Korean War..." "Uh. Nothing," Kit said. "Nice to see that you realize that, Mr. Rodriguez," Mr. Mack said, wandering back up to his desk and dropping the notebook on it. "So maybe you'll exculpate yourself by filling us in on the continuing significance of the thirty-eighth parallel..." Kit swallowed hard. This kind of thing was so much easier to do on paper: the shufflings and mutterings and under-the-breath comments of his classmates routinely filled him with more dread than being locked in a closet with the Lone Power. "It's the border between North and South Korea," he said. "Both sides have it heavily fortified. It's also one of the few land borders you can see from space, because there's normal city light on the southern side of the line, and it's almost pitch-black on the north..." Slowly his throat got less dry. Kit went on for a minute or two more about famines and political tensions, trying to remember some of the really good stuff that would have been just a couple of pages back in the notebook right in front of him if he hadn't been drawing in it. Finally Mr. Mack held up a hand. "Enough," he said. "Ms. Simmons, maybe you'd pick up where the artistic Mr. Rodriguez left off. What effect is the UN's food-aid effort likely to have on the North in view of the present political situation?" "Uh —" Kit had little amusement to spare for poor Delinda Simmons's ensuing struggle to find an answer. Between doing the spell, trying to hide it, and then having to try to recall notes he'd taken two weeks before, he was now stressed to breathlessness. He concentrated on acting like he was paying attention, while being grateful Mr. Mack had let him off the hook so soon— he'd seen some of his classmates go through scenes of torment that had lasted a lot longer. At last Mr. Machiavelli held up a hand, with just a glance at the clock. Kit glanced at it, too: somehow it was still only two thirty. <Boy, you don't need wizardry to get time to run slow, sometimes...> "All right," Mr. Machiavelli said. "Were this an ordinary day, you'd all have to sit here and suffer through me doing a recap of what the work required for next Friday was going to be. But, lucky you, for you there is no next Friday! Where you'll all be by then, since classes end on Tuesday, I neither know nor care. Me, I'll be up on the North Fork, wearing a really beat-up straw hat and helping an old friend prune her grapevines— not that any of you will care. What you will care about, of course, are your final grades." A great stillness settled over the classroom, broken only by the sighing of cool air from the vent. Mr. Mack turned toward his desk, flipped his briefcase up onto it, and opened it. "These exams," he said, "as you know, are sixty percent of your final grade. As usual, there'll probably be questions and comments from some of your parents." Mr. Mack drew himself up as tall as was possible for him: maybe five feet two. "But you, and they, should know by now that there aren't going to be any changes. Whatever you've got, you've brought on yourselves. So, those of you who have recourse to inhalers, get them out now..." He brought out a pile of papers, stapled together in six-sheet bundles, and started to work his way up and down the aisles, starting from the leftmost row. Kit sat there with his palms sweating, grateful that at least Mr. Mack wasn't one of those sadists who called you up to the desk in front of everybody to get the bad news. In the first row, subdued mutters of "Yes!" or "Oh, no..." were already going up. A couple of seats behind Kit and to the left, his buddy Raoul Eschemeling got his paper and looked at the back page, where Mr. Mack usually wrote the grade. Then he raised his eyebrows at Kit, grinned at him, at the same time making an "OK, not bad...!" gesture with one hand. Kit swallowed as Mr. Mack came to his row, gave Gracie Mackintosh her paper, gave Tim Walenczak, in front of Kit, his... and then glanced down at Kit, shook his head slightly, and walked on by. "I'll see you after class," Mr. Mack said. The sweat all over Kit went cold in a flash. Some kids in the class broke out in either a low moan of "Uh-oh..." or some really nasty laughs that were badly smothered, on purpose. Kit went hot again at the laughter. There were some junior boys and a senior in here who resented being tracked into this class with the smart younger kids; these guys were constantly ragging Kit about his grades being too good. <As if something like that's possible where my folks are concerned!> Kit thought. But nonetheless, he could just hear them: <He's a geek, just a nerd, it comes naturally, he can't help it...> Or else: <teacher's pet, little brownnoser, who knows what he's doing to Mack to get grades like this...> They were just the normal jeers that Kit had long ago learned to expect, and it didn't take mind reading or any other kind of wizardry to hear them going through those kids' brains right now. Kit could do nothing now but sit there as students all around him got their papers while his own desk remained terrifyingly empty. <Oh, no. Oh, no. What's going on...? What have I done now...?> And the tragedy was that he had no idea. He racked his brain for anything that made any kind of sense, as the last papers in the right-hand row went out. Mr. Mack made his way back to his desk. "Not a brilliant result, all told," Mr. Mack said as he closed his briefcase and put it aside. "Workmanlike, in many cases. Dull, in a lot of others. You people need to get it through your heads that spitting a teacher's exact words back at him in an essay, or adding material that's plainly been plagiarized from encyclopedias and online sources, won't cut it... with me, or the much tougher teachers to follow. None of your result exactly shone, and none of your results were utter disasters... with a very few exceptions." The silence was nearly as profound as the one that had leaned in around Kit earlier, but this one was more unnerving. Kit felt eyes all around the room resting on him in scared or amused conjecture. He looked over his shoulder. Raoul hunched his tall, blond, gangly self down against his desk and rolled his eyes at the others' reaction. The look he threw Kit was sympathetic: Raoul, too, had had a grade slump earlier in the year, and his own dad and mom had taken turns tearing strips off him about it ever since, invoking not getting into college and "a ruined résumé" and other dire threats if he didn't shape up. Ever since, he and Kit had been studying together, and they'd both thought they had the course material down pat. <Well, one of us did, anyway...> Mr. Mack glanced at the clock. It suddenly said two forty-three, and now Kit found himself wishing desperately that time would slow down again. "Well," Mr. Mack said, "I'm sure you're all thinking we've all seen enough of each other for one year. For the moment, I'm inclined to agree with you. So all of you just get yourselves the heck out of here!" This invitation was immediately followed by a muted cheer and the concerted shriek of chairs being pushed back as the bell went. Everybody who hadn't already leapt to his feet did so now and plunged toward the door: the classroom emptied as if it had been turned upside down and shaken. Kit stood there and watched everyone go... then finished stuffing his manual and other books into his book bag and went up to Mr. Mack's desk. "Well," Mr. Mack said, glancing up from Kit's notebook. "Any thoughts?" This gambit was one of the Mack's favorite ways to get a student to say something dumb, allowing him scope to verbally torture the unfortunate victim for many minutes thereafter. Kit was determined not to let this happen. "Okay, I shouldn't have been drawing," he said. "I should have been paying attention." Mr. Mack put his eyebrows up as if resigned at so quick a surrender. Kit had seen this maneuver, too, and what came of it: he refused to rise to the bait. For a few moments there was silence as each of them concentrated on outwaiting the other. Then Mr. Mack glanced at the notebook. "It's a thoat, isn't it," he said. Kit followed his glance, surprised. "Uh, yeah." "Not a lot of people still read those books," Mr. Mack said. "Burroughs's style has to seem antiquated these days. But you can't fault his imagination." He looked down at Kit's sketch of what had to be a very large creature, to gauge by the scale of the humanoid being standing next to it. "What made him decide to put so many legs on these things, I can't imagine. I could never assemble a clear picture of a thoat in my head no matter how I tried." "If you sort of divide the legs into two sets— " Kit said. "Six and two, huh?" Mr. Mack said, studying the drawing. "With the six in the back grouped for better traction? You may have a point." Mr. Mack glanced up at him again. "But it's possibly still an effort that might better have been saved for your art class." "Uh, yeah..." He glanced across the page. "And that would be the calot, I guess. Another nice solution for the multiple legs. Nice tusks, too. You wouldn't want to get on the bad side of that thing. And as for her..." Mr. Mack said, glancing down at the sketch again with a critical eye. "Well, you've put more clothes on her than Burroughs did. This rendition owes more to Victoria's Secret than the descriptions in the original... so let's let the inappropriateness issue ride for the moment." Kit blushed fiercely. "Now about your test," Mr. Mack said. "You and Mr. Eschemeling have been working together. Pretty hard, I believe. So I was curious about... let's call it a discrepancy in your performance on the final." <What have I done to deserve this?> Kit thought in despair. <I worked so hard! I really studied for this, it should have been all right, I should at> least <have passed —> "Especially since there's nothing wrong with your ability to discuss the material, even in front of your admittedly unsympathetic classmates," Mr. Mack said. "That was a nice touch, by the way— that bit about being able to see the border from space. I saw that picture myself, some months back. It brings you up short." Kit didn't feel inclined to mention that he hadn't seen the image as a picture: the difference was clearly visible from the surface of the Moon when the weather on Earth was right. "The light on one side, and the darkness on the other..." Mr. Mack said. "A striking image. Too bad things aren't usually quite so simple, especially over there. Anyway, no question that your work's improved the last couple of months. You've been trying a whole lot harder than you were before." And this was true... which was why Kit couldn't understand why he was standing here alone without a test paper in his hand. <Mama's going to go so ballistic with me, we'll be able to use her to launch satellites! I can't> believe <I —> "The problem might lie in the way your concentration comes and goes without warning, kind of like it did just then," Mr. Mack said. "But we'll chalk that up to end-of-term antsies, huh?" Then he grinned— an expression that Kit had rarely seen on Mr. Mack's face before. Kit didn't know if this was cause for alarm, but he was alarmed enough already. "Now, then —" *Mr. Mack popped his briefcase open and pulled out one last test paper. Kit instantly recognized his own handwriting on it. "I thought I'd spare you the embarrassment of dealing with this in front of the class..." Mr. Mack said softly. "Don't think I haven't noticed that some of our older participants have issues." If Kit thought he'd been sweating before, he now found that his pores had been holding out on him. Mr. Mack looked at him with a thoughtful expression. "And so," he said, "I didn't really want to give them a chance to make your life uncomfortable all summer because of"— he held up the test paper— "this." Kit gulped and reached for the paper, shaking slightly. At the bottom of the front page, circled, was a number: <99%.> Kit's eyes went wide. "Ninety-nine?" he said. "Ninety-nine!" "Best mark in the class," Mr. Mack said. "Congratulations." Then it hit Kit. "Ninety-nine??" he said, flipping the pages to look at them one after another. "Why not a hundred!?" Mr. Mack looked at his watch. "Possibly one of the shortest bursts of gratitude on record," he said. "Kit, I had no choice. You misspelled 'Pyongyang.'" Kit was so torn between relief and completely unreasonable disappointment that all he could do was say "Oh." "One 'o,' one 'a,'" Mr. Mack said. "I checked. Sorry about that. But your essay was terrific. Best I've seen in a long while. You're showing at least a few of the warning signs of falling in love with history." Kit said nothing, partly from embarrassment at being praised, and partly because he suspected Mr. Mack was right, and he didn't know what to make of that. "So you can tell your mother, who I know was giving you grief," Mr. Mack said, "that whatever else you've done in your other subjects this spring, you've passed history with flying colors, and I'm really pleased with you. She should be, too. Tell her to get in touch if she wants any more details." "She will," Kit said. Mr. Mack smiled slightly. "So did mine," he said. "Mothers... Go on, get out of here. Enjoy your summer." Kit stuffed the paper hurriedly into his book bag and shouldered it. Mr. Mack closed his briefcase with the air of a man shutting a whole year into it, and good riddance. Then he glanced up. "Unless there was something else? Of course there was." Kit gave up any hope of ever being able to put anything over this particular teacher. "Yeah. Uh— <How do you not sweat like that?"> Mr. Mack looked briefly surprised, and then laughed out loud. "The phrasing's unusual," Mr. Mack said. "I take it you mean, how do I not sweat? And the answer is, I <don't> not sweat." Kit raised his eyebrows. "But I do waterproof the insides of my clothes," Mr. Mack said. Kit stared at him. Mr. Mack laughed again, then, the sound of a sneaky magician giving away the secret to a really good trick. "It's a Marine thing," Mr. Mack said. "We used to do it on parade. We spray our shirts with that anti-stain waterproofing stuff you use on upholstery. It's good for giving other people the impression that you're not quite human." His voice as he said this was so dry that Kit burst out laughing. But a moment later he stopped. "You were in the Marines?" Kit said, and found himself looking at Mr. Mack with entirely new eyes. This little guy, just barely taller than Kit's mama, with his bald head and his red tie with little blue galloping ponies on it, a different tie every day <—"Korea?"> Mr. Mack shook his head. "Oh, no," he said. "A lot of other places. But Korea was well before my time." Kit looked at him; this time it was his turn to look thoughtful. "The way you talked about it, though. The dark, the light—" Mr. Mack shook his head. "If a historian needs anything," he said, "it's an imagination. The dates, the place names, the battles... they're not what's most important. What matters is thinking yourself into those people's heads. Imagine how the world looked to them— their sky, their sea. Their tools. Their houses. Their troubles. That's how what they did starts to make sense. Along with what we do in the same situations..." He paused, looking surprised at himself. "Sorry. It's a passion," Mr. Mack said. "But I can recognize the signs in someone else. Watch out: it'll eat you alive. Other lives, other minds... there's no getting enough of them." He gave Kit a cockeyed look. "Why are you still here? Go away before I give you a quiz." Kit grinned and left with as much dignity as he could manage. The dignity broke down about three yards down the hall, as he caught sight of Raoul, trying to look like he was leaning casually against a locker, waiting for Kit. Kit didn't know whether to try to look cool or to scream out loud. Screaming won. He pulled the paper out again, waved it in Raoul's face. Raoul snatched it out of Kit's hand. "Do you believe this, Pirate?" Kit yelled. "Do you believe this?!" They started jumping up and down together like the acrobatically insane. "Ninety-nine! Ninety-nine!" Raoul promptly turned it into something like a sports chant. "Nine-ty-nine! Nine-ty-nine!" People wandering down the hall that crossed this one stared at them, vaguely interested by the actions of the certifiably mad— meaning anyone who would still willingly be in the building after the end of the last period. "But what did you get?" Kit said as they headed toward the doors at the end of the hall. "Eighty," Raoul said. Kit suddenly felt bizarrely disappointed. "How'd that happen?" "I messed up the essay," Raoul said. "But I did okay on everything else. It's not a bad grade. My mom'll get off my case now." "Mine, too," Kit said, "I hope. But wow... what a relief. I thought I was dead!" "I thought you were dead!" Raoul laughed that crazed laugh of his as they went down the hall to the paired doors that led to the parking lot. They each hit one door and burst out into the hot, humid summer air, laughing. "This day could not possibly get any better," Kit said. "Oh, come on," Raoul said, "stretch your brains. Anything could happen..." They saw Raoul's mom's slightly beat-up red station wagon come swinging in through the parking lot gates. "So listen," Raoul said, "my dad says we're having a big barbecue party next week, for his birthday. Next Thursday. You and your folks and your sister, you're all invited. Can you make it?" "I'll find out." "Okay," Raoul said, as his own mom pulled up. "Text me later!" Kit nodded, waving at Raoul's little blond mom as he got into the car. The first thing Raoul did was fish around in his pack and show his mom the test paper: she grinned, and Raoul flashed a grin of his own at Kit as his mom drove away. Kit let out a long breath as he glanced down at his own paper one more time, then put it away. His nerves were finally settling down, which was a good thing, as he was also still tired from doing that spell. He wasn't so tired, though, that he wasn't going to immediately call the wizard with whom he worked most closely and do a little gloating. He pulled his wizard's manual out of his backpack, flipping it open to the rearmost pages, the messaging area. Some pages were covered with stored messages, all seemingly printed in the graceful curvilinear characters of the wizardly Speech; but any one Kit touched with a finger would seem to rise up out of the page, the writing increasing in size for easier reading. He flipped through the back pages until he found one that was blank, ready to take a message— and then stopped. In the middle of a page that had been blank earlier in the afternoon was a single line of text, and it was glowing fiercely blue and pulsing alternately brighter and fainter— the sign of a message that had just come in and hadn't yet been read. Kit peered at it. There was nothing there but a time stamp— JD 2454274.123287— and these words: <We've found the bottle. Meeting this afternoon. M.> The breath went right out of Kit. <Holy cow... Raoul was right!!> "Yes!" Kit shouted. He slapped the manual shut, shoved it back in the book bag, and jumped up and punched the air some more. And then, because right in front of the school would have been a bad place to do a teleport, he ran off across the parking lot, grinning, to find a more private spot. <Gili Motang> Nita Callahan sat on the flat, warm stones at the edge of the koi pond, her eyes closed, looking for something. After a moment, she saw it. <Shadow,> she thought. <A shadow across the Sun. Just for a few seconds. But when?> She waited: and then she knew. "Now," she said, and opened her eyes. The water rippled at her in the summer breeze, the surface of it dazzling in the bright and uninterrupted sunlight. Nita winced. "Oh, come on," she said under her breath. "Come on!" She looked up at the sky overhead. It remained stubbornly clear. "That won't help," said a small voice from the water. She frowned and refused to answer. Above and beyond the trees that surrounded Tom Swale's yard, very slowly, a single little puffy cloud could be seen cruising toward the low, late-afternoon Sun. It seemed to be in no hurry. If clouds had feet, it would have been dragging them. Nita scowled harder. <Hurry up!> she thought in the Speech. <Come on, get a move on!> But merely thinking something in the Speech doesn't turn the idea into a spell... especially since wizardry is mostly about persuading creatures and things to do what you want, not ordering them around. The cloud actually seemed to slow up. Then, finally, almost reluctantly, it started to pass in front of the sun. Nita grinned. "Awright!" she said, looking down into the fishpond. "That's the best one yet! I only missed it by half a minute." One of the koi, the one with the silver-coin scales, looked up out of the pond at her. "Fifty seconds," Doitsu said. "Or about fifty-five seconds too long," said another voice, a human one, from behind her. "Doesn't count. Try it again." Nita let out an annoyed breath and turned. "You guys are just being mean!" "An oracular who predicts the future a minute late is possibly even less effective than one who gets it wrong all the time," Tom said, straightening up with a groan from the flower bed where he'd been working. "And will probably get a lot more frustrated." "Hey, thanks loads," Nita said, and slumped against the fishpond's rockwork. "You'd hardly expect me to start lying to you at this late date," Tom said, amused. Nita gave him an annoyed look. "Let's see you do any better!" "Me? Why should I?" Tom said, frowning down at the next flower bed. "This is your gift we're trying to sharpen up." "And, anyway, it's too hot!" "True," Tom said, "but nothing to do with the business at hand. Come on... give it another try." Nita wiped her forehead; she was sweating. "It's no use," she said. "I need a break." Another koi, a marmalade-colored one, put its head up out of the water. "You need to concentrate harder," said Akagane. "You can't be in that moment unless you're in this one." "Blank your mind out first," said Doitsu. A third head came up, splotched in red and black on silver-white. "Pay more attention to the news," said Showa. Nita rolled her eyes. "None of you are helping!" "It's not help you need," Tom Swale said. "It's practice. You think anybody learns to see futurity overnight?" "Forget the future," Nita said. "I can barely see the present!" She leaned back against the rocks behind the koi pond, rubbing her eyes: beams from the low sun piercing through the trees were glancing off the pond's surface, and the glitter of them made her eyes water. "The news'll help with that, too," Tom said. He was sweating; even in a T-shirt, the humidity that day was enough to make anybody miserable. "And it's not the future," said Showa, backfinning toward where the rocks overhanging the pond made a small waterfall. "A future." Nita sighed. "But how can you tell you've got the right one?" "You can't," said Akagane as she rose to the surface in Showa's wake. "At least, you can't tell for sure, or very clearly." "You can get a feeling," said Doitsu, just hanging there in the water and fanning his fins. "Or a hunch." "But what if you're wrong?" Doitsu made a kind of shrug with his fins. "You try again. Assuming you haven't blown up the world or something in the meantime..." And he submerged. The other two koi sank down into the water as well. Nita sighed and leaned back, watching Tom as he walked over to another of the plant beds, squatted down beside it, and then let out a long, annoyed breath. He reached down in among some of the plants, pushed broad green leaves aside, and sighed. "Guys," Tom said in the Speech, "how many times do we have to have this conversation?" He picked something up, looked at it. It was a slug. He shook his head and tossed it off to one side, into another leafy bed. "Those are our strawberries"— fling— "over there! These are my strawberries"— fling— "over here!" Nita gave him a crooked smile. "That can't be real good for them..." "Slugs are resilient," Tom said. Nita watched another one fly through the air. "Yeah. I see how they bounce..." "Do I hear a criticism coming?" Nita restrained herself, but wasn't quite ready to stop teasing Tom yet. "Isn't it weird that a Senior Wizard can talk the sky into hitting things with lightning but can't talk a bunch of slugs out of eating his strawberries?" Tom sighed. "Lightning's a lot easier to talk to than slugs," he said. "Not that you're so much talking to the slug as to its DNA... which has been the way it is for about a hundred million years. Strawberries are a relatively recent development, to a slug. But then, so are human beings..." He grinned then. "Anyway, I live in hope that they'll get it eventually. But enough of you being on my case. Or just you. Kit's running late. Where's he gotten to?" Nita rolled her eyes. "That'd be the question, the last couple weeks." Tom glanced up. "He's missing Ponch, huh?" Nita shrugged, not sure how to describe what was going on. Kit's dog had been getting increasingly strange for a long time, but last month he had gone way beyond strange, right out of life and into something far greater. Kit wasn't exactly sad about what had happened, but he was definitely sad at not having his dog around anymore. "It's complicated," Nita said. "I don't think it's just about Ponch. But he's been away from home a lot..." Tom straightened up again and gave Nita a look that was slightly concerned. "A lot of that going around right now..." Nita sighed. "Tell me about it. But his sister Helena's coming home from college in a couple of weeks. That has to be on his mind. And then there's Carmela. He's having trouble dealing with her lately." Tom pulled off his gardening gloves and tossed them up into the air: they vanished. "Yeah, well," he said. "First time off the planet, and what does she do but stride out into the universe like she owns the place and blow up the Lone Power. I could see where that might make Kit feel a little surplus." Tom strolled back to her, his hands in his pockets. "Does Carmela seem any different?" "No. Or yes," Nita said. "But that might just be because of her PSAT scores." Tom put his eyebrows up. "Worse than expected?" "Better," Nita said. "It's screwed up her college plans. She thought she was going to take it easy and go to the community college in Garden City. Now all of a sudden her pop and mama and her guidance counselor are giving her all this stuff about CalTech and Harvard..." Tom gave Nita a wry look. "Interesting problem. But otherwise it sounds like you're telling me that, though her PSATs might be an issue, shooting up a major interstellar transport center and being dragged halfway across the known Universe hasn't particularly cramped her style." "No. And that's what has me worried. Tom," Nita said, "tell me she's not turning into a wizard!" He laughed one big laugh. "Would it break your heart if she was?" "Mine? Not really. Kit's? That's another story." "Not that I could do anything one way or the other," Tom said, "if the Powers offered her the Oath and she accepted it. It'd be out of our hands. But wouldn't you think it's kind of late for her to become a wizard? You know how it goes. Onset in humans is usually between twelve and fourteen..." "Except for people like Dairine," Nita muttered. "Yes, well," Tom said, straightening up with a groan and massaging the small of his back, "your sister's the exception to most of the rules I know. How's she coping, by the way?" Nita shook her head. "I don't know. It's hard to work out what's going on with her sometimes. All she'll say is that she's looking for Roshaun." Tom nodded, heading for the French doors at the back of the house. Nita got up from the edge of the pond and followed him in. "What's your take on that?" Tom said. Nita shook her head as she stepped into the relative cool of the living room. <That he vanished in a cloud of moondust while he was doing a wizardry that had one end stuck in the core of the Sun, and he's probably dead, and my sister's in denial?> she thought, but refused to say out loud. On the kitchen table, Tom's version of the wizard's manual was stacked up several volumes high. "What's it say about him in there?" Nita said. Tom put up his eyebrows. "You haven't looked in your own manual?" he said. "Well..." "Scared to?" Nita gave him a look. She had of course been scared to. Finding out the truth would have forced her into a position where she would have had to start working out what to do about Dairine. Tom shook his head. "You know," he said, going over to the sink to wash his hands, "if I looked in there for an answer, and then told you what I was shown, it might not be data that from your point of view would necessarily be definitive. Or even useful. Has that occurred to you?" "No," Nita said. "Well," Tom said, "when you do get around to looking, tell me what you see." Nita rolled her eyes, as she'd been hoping to get Tom to do the scary thing for her: she'd had more than enough of being scared in the last month or so. <Great. Now I get to go back to being just too chicken to look...> "And by the way," Tom said, turning off the faucet and reaching for a dish towel hanging over the door of the cupboard under the sink, "you're blinking." "Huh?" Nita said, and then glanced to her right. "Oh, yeah—" There in midair beside her, a little pinpoint of blue light like a star was flashing on and off. "I really should hook up a sound to this," Nita said, reaching out to the little light and pulling it straight down in the air. "I did this wizardry the other morning real early, and I didn't want to wake anybody up while I was testing it..." A vertical slit of darkness opened in the air, exposing the inside of the otherspace pocket in which Nita kept her wizard's manual and various other useful objects while she was out and about. She reached into the darkness, felt around for a moment, and then came out with her manual. Nita started paging through it while Tom opened the fridge and rummaged around. "Message?" he said, coming out with a couple of cans of cola. "Yeah. Uh, got any fizzy water in there?" "Sure. Thought you were the big cola fan, though..." "I'm off the sugar for a while." "Don't tell me," Tom said, coming out with a bottle of mineral water, "that you're starting to worry about your weight! Completely inappropriate for you at your age—" "Huh? Oh, no, no, it's just that I keep getting these... Never mind." Nita trailed off, partly on purpose, as she flipped the manual open to the back pages where the messaging wizardries and messages were stored—no way she was going to get into acne-and body-image issues right now with a wizard of a completely different sex, seniority, and order of importance. On the rearmost page of the manual, one block of text was alternately glowing dark and fading. Nita peered at it. Then she snickered. "Kit's getting ready to go to Mars," she said, putting down the manual for a moment and opening the mineral water to take a swig. "What a surprise!" Tom chuckled as he popped open his can of cola. "Kind of the flavor of the month with him, isn't it...?" "More like the flavor of the year." Nita read down the message and tapped the reference link at the bottom of it: another message, the one that had caused Kit to send her the first, appeared in the first one's place. "He's got Mars posters up in his room, and little Mars crawlers on his desk, and half the Mars books in the school library aren't there: they're stacked up on his bed..." She grinned. "Hey, this is great. Mamvish got in just now! We've been talking to her a lot by manual this last year, but we've never seen her in person. Kit's gonna be buzzed to meet her finally." Nita shut her manual and put it away in the otherspace pocket again, "zipping up" the little blue light to close it again. She pinched the light; it went out. "Which is probably why he ran straight over to Gili Motang without waiting for me..." Tom smiled at Nita's annoyed expression. "Well, maybe it's understandable," he said. "Mamvish is heavily in demand all over this side of the galaxy: normally we don't get to see so senior a wizard out this way unless it's something to do with worldgates. If the Powers' own Species Archivist has come out to our neighborhood in person to check up on something, that's definitely a hot topic. So if Kit wants to go do the fanboy thing, well, so will half the other wizards on the planet." Tom paused. "And now that I think of it..." He got up and went back to the fridge. Puzzled, Nita watched Tom open it again and start rooting around. "I guess there really are no accidents," he said, coming out with a very large plastic bag full of tomatoes. Tom shut the fridge and handed the bag to Nita. She looked at the bag, and then at Tom again. Tom grinned at her. "When you catch up with Kit," he said, "make sure you take that with you. It's been so hot so early this year, the backyard's getting overrun with these." He sighed. "And in another week it'll be the zucchini. I've really got to check in with the global warming intervention group..." "Tomatoes??" Nita said. "What kind of spell uses tomatoes?" "And tell Mamvish we send our best," Tom said. "I'd love to go see her myself, but I have to get back to work. Carl and I and all the other Seniors are still hip-deep in the on-planet cleanup from last month's business." "I feel for you," Nita said, not entirely sincerely. "Tom, there are a ton of these! My arms are breaking!" Tom just laughed. "So levitate them." The spell to make them float would have cost as much energy as just carrying them, or more. Nita just gave Tom an annoyed look, boosted the overstuffed bag up from the bottom, and shifted it to her other arm. Tom picked up his cola again and went over to the table, gesturing at the stack of manuals. Several of them picked themselves up off one in the middle of the stack: Tom pulled it out, and the others settled back onto the stack once more. "Obviously our manuals will update with a précis of what you all decide to do about whatever she's here for," Tom said, sitting down. "Especially since Mamvish won't have come all this way just for fun. But do me a favor and drop me a note to fill in any details you think we should know about." "Okay," Nita said, and shifted the bag to the other arm again. Tom was already paging through his own manual, wearing a distracted look... which frankly didn't surprise Nita, considering what all the wizards on the planet had been through of late. <So why hang around and pester him? Let's go find out what the tomatoes are good for.> She hefted the bag again to resettle it over her hip, then wandered out of the house and over to the fishpond again, peering in. One of the koi came drifting up to the surface: it was Doitsu. "Hey," Nita said. "I forgot to ask you: "Wha'd you think of the mealworms? <Did they satisfy> <That deep-down desire for 'yum'?"> Doitsu gave her a look and just hung there in the water, fanning his fins and saying nothing. "Okay," Nita said. "See if I go out of my way to bring you stuff from the bait shop again." Doitsu eyed Nita from under the water. "The mealworms were lovely," he said. "But your scansion's execrable. 'Wha'd'?" Nita rolled her eyes. "I'm just getting the hang of this! Cut me some slack." "When you can construct a haiku without apostrophes, sure," Doitsu said. "And not a moment sooner. If you're going to be an oracular, you've got standards to maintain. So get out there and make me not want to spit in your eye." And he vanished down into the water again. Nita shifted the bag of tomatoes to the other arm. "I'm getting trash-talked by fish," she said under her breath. "Something's wrong with this picture." She sighed and took the flagstone path around the side of the house, heading for home. It wasn't too long a walk, which was a good thing: though she kept shifting the tomato bag from hand to hand, both her arms were still killing her by the time she got close to her house. As Nita came down the sidewalk in the early sunset light, she looked at her front yard— all covered with ground ivy, and with the single big maple tree standing up out of the middle of it, shading everything— and thought, <Why does it look so little these days? And the house, too.> It was a standard enough bungalow for this neighborhood— white-shingled, black-roofed, two stories, with the attic partly converted—but lately it had seemed much smaller than it had this time last year. As Nita walked up the driveway, the memory of the vast main concourse of the Crossings Intercontinual Worldgating Facility came back to her unbidden, illuminated with its strange sourceless night lighting, its tremendously high roof-sky seemingly absent and the whole concourse open to the huge, pulsating, many-colored stars of its home planet's neighborhood. <After you'd been there as much as I have this last month, anything'd look small,> Nita thought. <That place has got to be the size of New Jersey. Well, Rhode Island, anyway...> She went up the stairs to the back door, expecting to have to let herself in: but the inside door was open. Nita opened the screen door, braced it behind her so it wouldn't slam, and dumped the bagged tomatoes on the drainer by the sink as she went through the kitchen. "Daddy?" "He had to go back to the shop for something," came a voice from inside, and Nita grinned then, because it wasn't her sister's voice coming from the living room, but someone else's entirely. "He'll be back in an hour, he said." Nita went through the dining room into the living room. There Kit's older sister Carmela was sitting on the floor amid a heap of cushions and a scatter of TV remotes. Nita looked at the remotes in bemusement: she couldn't remember their TV as having quite that many. There was the VCR remote, sure, and the one for the TV, and the— "Ohaiyo gozaimas'!" the TV yelled at her as she entered. Nita stopped still. <Oh, no...> she thought. "Mela," she said, "you didn't—" "I brought our remote over," Carmela said, and stretched her fluffy-sweatered self out among the cushions, toying with her single long dark braid. "Dairine said it might be smart to train your TV to get the alien cable channels, the way Kit did with ours. This is bargain-shopping season, after all! And we don't want to freak out the visitors at home..." Nita perched briefly on the arm of her dad's easy chair behind Carmela and looked at the TV. It wasn't nearly as fancy or new a model as Kit's new entertainment-center TV was, but all the same it was showing a channel-listing page as sleek and modern as anything Kit's set could boast. And as Carmela punched the "scroll" button, the online guide shifted through page after page after page of channels that didn't exist anywhere on this planet. The entries on the scrolling pages were all in the curving, curling characters of the wizardly Speech, which many worlds used as a common language of discourse. "Wait a minute," Nita said. "What visitors?" "Ooh," Carmela said, "you mean you haven't heard? Guess who's coming home from college!" "No, I did hear," Nita said, easing herself down off the easy chair to flop down among the cushions, "but I thought that wasn't till July..." Carmela shook her head until her braid flopped around. She punched the remote, which immediately changed the TV Guide channel to one of the many thousands of alien shopping channels available to users of GalacTrans or whatever other unearthly "cable" provider Carmela had hooked them into. "Nope," she said, watching absently as some alien being apparently made entirely of wreathing chartreuse smoke did its best to demonstrate the virtues of what Nita thought was some kind of household appliance, maybe a food processor. It picked up one indecipherable "accessory" after another with tendrils of green smoke, waving them around. "That whole thing blew up," Carmela said, leaning back and briefly looking at Nita upside down. "Helena had a fight with her boyfriend, so no Paris for them! She's already cashed in the plane tickets. She's going to come back next week and stay here until her college choir's trip to Romania or wherever they're going..." "Slovenia, Kit said," Nita said. "Whatever. At least she'll have fun with the vampires!" Nita shook her head. "No vampires," she said. "Some undead, yeah, and some confused Goth wannabes. But there haven't been real turn-into-a-bat-and-flap-around vampires since 1652." "Really? What happened in 1652?" "Some other time, okay?" Nita said, increasingly distracted by the chartreuse-smoke creature, which was now pouring itself rapidly into what looked like the container of the food processor and pulling a lid down over it. A second later, a tentacle of green smoke came curling out of the container and punched one of the buttons on the processor's front. The tendril was abruptly sucked back into the main mass of the creature as many peculiar things started happening inside the container at that point, including small lights flashing like sparks inside an outraged microwave. "So when's Helena's trip?" "August the first," Carmela said, shaking her head. "Gonna be tough at home till then, Neets." She raised her eyebrows, looking at Nita out of the corner of her eye. "I know," Carmela said. "Let's do a road trip. Let's go over to Ireland and see your buddy Ronan!" Nita rolled her eyes. "He is not my buddy!" "Yeah, and isn't it wonderful," Carmela said. Her real intentions, Nita thought, couldn't possibly be as predatory as her smile made them appear. I hope! "But isn't it August when everything gets crazy in Ireland? It did last time..." "Believe me," Nita said, "what happened then is not a regularly scheduled event." She sat there for a moment more watching the TV, where the "blender" seemed to have stopped— at least the flashing and smoking going on inside it had. The mist creature came out, not yellow-green now, but pink, and waved its tendrils around: a long line of number-characters in the Speech, probably the "food processor's" details, started flashing on the screen. Nita shook her head. "I came in late," she said. "What's this about?" "It's a portable wanjaxer," Carmela said. "On sale, it looks like. Which is all right, except I don't know if I really want to get into wanjaxing. I mean, I'm as broad-minded and tolerant as the next girl, but there are all these hue issues..." Nita rolled her eyes. Carmela had been spending a lot of time lately studying alien lifestyles, and her attempts to explain some of the finer points could take hours. "Forget it," Nita said. "You see Kit before he left?" Carmela looked at Nita in shock. "You didn't? You mean he just ditched you and ran off halfway around the world?" Carmela paused. "Is it halfway?" Nita frowned, considering. "I'd have to look it up. How'd you know where he went?" "The remote told me," Carmela said. "It loves Kit, but it's no good at keeping a secret. Are you, cutie-bunny?" She reached down to the remote on the cushion beside her and tickled it under its infrared emitter. Nita was startled to see it arch its little "back" and emit a small electronic purr. She thought back to her conversation with Tom, and then put aside the thought that Kit's original specialty had been getting inanimate objects and mechanical things to do what he wanted. And now Carmela... <Naah, it's probably still just something to do with Ponch. Everything here got really strange because he was getting really strange. It'll take a while for things to calm down...> "Anyway," Carmela said, "he's kinda forgetting his manners, if you ask me." She leaned back among the cushions. "You two've been working on this Mars thing for months and months now." "Well," Nita said, "it's really been more him. Not that I'm not interested. But I have stuff of my own to take care of." She stretched her legs out. "Yeah," Carmela said, "I've noticed. And not your water-based project that you've been so sneaky about, either. Oh, yeah, I noticed... don't give me that look. All those magic conference calls all of a sudden with you and Miss Thunder-Fins the Humpback! But this is how many times now that you were 'too busy' to come shopping with me? Three? Four? And you looked cranky, not happy like when you've been working with S'reee." Nita looked briefly morose. "Dairine..." she said. "She's been out a lot lately, and my dad's been giving me grief about keeping tabs on her. Suddenly I'm supposed to be my sister's keeper." "You'll need a whip and a chair for that," Carmela said. Nita made a face, since this was true. "How much did Kit tell you about the Mars thing?" Carmela rolled her eyes most expressively. "Nothing, as usual. He's started acting like he owns all the wizardy stuff in the world, Neets! You'd think there wasn't enough to go around." Nita laughed, maybe just a little evilly. "Don't think that could have anything to do with you, could it?" "Me?" Carmela actually batted her eyelashes. "However could that be? He's just jealous because he never got a chance to blow up a worldgating facility. First Dairine, now me— he's just feeling like he's missed an opportunity." Nita grinned, for that thought had crossed her mind. "Come on," she said, getting up. "I need to change." She headed up the stairs: Carmela came after her. "But anyway," Nita said at the top of the stairs, turning down the hall toward her bedroom, "you know how he keeps going up there." "Kind of hard to ignore," Carmela said, following Nita into her bedroom and flopping down on her bed while Nita went to her dresser and started pulling open drawers. "He sheds all this red dust all over the place when he comes back. It's all staticky: it gets all over the CDs and the DVDs. They get scratched. And he's always wrecked the next day. He's started using it as an excuse not to do his chores." "Tell me about it," Nita said, rolling her eyes. She came out with a pair of very worn and faded floppy jeans, and then with a short-sleeved pink cropped top that she held up against her while looking in the mirror. "Dairine again...?" "Same problem, different story," Nita said, chucking the pink top back into the drawer: it was the wrong shade to work with what little was left of her spring tan. "Those big transport wizardries really take it out of you unless you can get somebody to help you pay off the energy debt. Anyway, Mars— Kit's not the only one who's had Mars on the brain for a long time." She picked up another top, a white one, and held it up against her. "Why? Are they going to invade us?" Then Carmela paused for a moment, getting a curious look. "Now that you mention it— who lives there?" "Nobody," Nita said, shaking her head and dumping the white top back in the drawer. "So isn't it funny that you think somebody there might invade you?" Carmela looked surprised. "Well, you know how it is. All the movies and old stories and stuff about invaders..." "'From Mars,'" Nita said, looking over her shoulder. "The words almost seem to go together for a lot of Earth people. Weird, huh?" "I guess," Carmela said. "You mean, it shouldn't be weird?" Nita shrugged, turning back to the drawer and rummaging through it. "Well, think about it. 'Invaders from Venus'? 'Invaders from Jupiter'? You don't take them seriously. The language itself is giving you some kind of hint." She came upon another top, a light green one, and held it up against her. "And it's not just because Mars is the most Earthlike planet in our solar system, either. There's just something about Mars. People have been interested in it for a long time, because of that. So wizards have been interested in it for a long time, too. There are all kinds of things about it that're weird." She picked another top out of the drawer, another pink one, and held it up against her, too. "For one thing, it doesn't have a kernel." Carmela blinked. "What?" "A kernel. Everything's supposed to have one. People, things, atoms, planets. It's like, if a body's or a thing's the hardware, the kernel's the software: the rules for how it runs." Carmela considered this. "So a kernel's kind of like a soul?" "No. But souls can get hooked up to them. Anyway, a planet's kernel usually just bops around inside the planet, doing its own thing and keeping the gravity and such working right. If there are wizards on the planet, one of the strongest ones gets told to keep an eye on the kernel and make sure it keeps working right." Nita dropped the pink top back in the drawer. "But there's no people there, you said. So no wizards—" "Not now," Nita said. She put the green top down on the dresser and shut the drawer. "But once upon a time..." "There were people?" "We don't know," Nita said. "But everybody feels like there should have been." "Whoa!" Carmela said, sounding both amused and skeptical. "Sounds kind of vague for you, Miss Neets. You're usually Hard Science Girl." "Yeah, well, everybody's vague about this," Nita said, sitting down on her desk chair and pulling off her shoes. "Mysterious stuff, and nothing in the manual to tell us what happened." Then she wrinkled her nose and got up again, opening a different dresser drawer to get at the socks. "But when a species feels the effect of a neighboring planet this strongly, it usually means they've got past history." "What? Like somebody there invaded us before?" Nita pulled off her old socks, put on a new pair. "Not necessarily. Maybe they could have... or they meant to. But it never happened." Then she grinned, looking up. "Or else it did happen... and we're all Martians." Carmela gave Nita a very wide-eyed look. "¿Que?" "There are lots of meteorites from Mars lying around on Earth," Nita said, getting up and feeling around under her dresser for her favorite beat-up sneakers. "Some people think that life here might have been started by some little bug on a shooting star that survived the ride in through the atmosphere. Splashed down into a nice warm sea... and then umpty million years later..." She grinned, gestured around her: her bedroom, her clothes, her teen magazines. "Us..." "And what do wizards say about that?" Carmela said. Nita shook her head. "Jury's out," she said. "The manual doesn't normally tell much about a species' origins until the species has already discovered a lot of the truth itself. Culture-shock issues..." "I wouldn't be shocked," Carmela said, sitting up and folding her legs under her. "As far as I'm concerned, half the people in school act like Martians already." Nita snickered, wandering over to the door of her room and chucking the used socks out at the laundry basket in the hall. They bounced off the wall and went in. "But lots of people would be bothered," Nita said. "Worldview stuff, religious stuff... Hey, look, even wizards are only human. We're not all perfect at having both the real and the true in our heads at the same time without them blowing each other up! Especially since both the real and the true keep changing all the time." She headed back to the dresser to pick up the jeans and the top she'd decided on. "But some people think that finding the truth for themselves is cooler than just sitting around with what people tell them is true. They think it's okay to find out where you really came from, even if at first it gets you upset." Carmela sat quiet for a moment. "You know," she said, "if people here found out there really were Martians..." Nita bent down for her sneakers. "They'd freak," Nita said, heading for the door. "And they'd do it big. Even if the little probes we've sent there don't find anything bigger than germs, some people will still freak, because they think we're—they're— the most important things in the universe, all the life there is." She snorted. "Yeah," Carmela said. "Sker'ret would laugh all his legs off at that one." Nita put her eyebrows up, leaning against the doorsill. "How is our favorite centipede?" "Busy," Carmela said. "The Rirhath B government's still cleaning up the Crossings, and Sker's having himself a party being King of the Alien Worldgates while his Esteemed Ancestor grows in his new legs and claws and brains and things." She grinned. "Sker'ret says he needs me to come help get their shopping mall cleaned up." "Cleaned out, you mean," Nita said. The planetary government of Rirhath B had settled a considerable reward on Carmela for "services rendered" in the liberation of the Crossings Worldgating Facility... and Carmela had chosen to take her reward as shopping vouchers. Nita guessed that a whole lot of the Crossings' shopkeepers were rubbing their hands, claws, or tentacles together at the prospect. "That trip I'm taking with you, no matter what Dairine does... But anyway, the freaking's gonna happen eventually, no matter what we do... because no matter who goes looking for life, sooner or later they'll find it. And as far as wizards here go, it looks like the Powers That Be have decided that if we're old enough to be asking serious questions about the fourth planet, we're old enough to be told. But only because we didn't just ask and then run away to play. We started going there and digging around." "How long has this been going on?" Carmela said. "Since the 1770s..." Carmela banged the side of her head with one hand a couple of times in a my-ears-are-malfunctioning gesture. "Sorry! I thought you said since the Revolutionary War..." "Melaaaaa...!" Nita said, laughing, and headed out of her bedroom, making for the bathroom just down the hall. "There were wizards here then!" She pushed the bathroom door shut enough to change clothes in privacy. "What, in New York? And they went to Mars?" Nita pulled off her school pants and pulled on the jeans. "There were wizards all over the world, just like now. And sure they went to Mars! Everybody here was all hot on Mars around then, not just wizards. William Herschel started it. It was in all the papers. There were drawings and everything." Nita snickered. "Though most of them were of completely made-up stuff that was never there..." "Okay," Carmela said with a sigh, as Nita sat down on the edge of the tub to put on her sneakers. "I am very weirded out now. Not that this is even slightly unusual, but no one has any pity on my mental health..." Nita grinned as she pulled off her old top, for Carmela's mental health was more robust than most people's. She put on the lighter top, bent down to retie one loose sneaker-lace, then straightened and glanced at herself in the mirror. And paused, startled, for there was another figure behind her, looking at her over her shoulder in the mirror: taller, as slender as she was, but extremely pretty, far more so than— Nita blinked. The other reflection was gone. <Now what the heck was that?> Nita thought. <And who has hair that color?> For the long, flowing, waving hair of the person she'd thought she'd seen had been the richest and most vivid sky-blue imaginable. Nita stared into the mirror for a second more. There was nothing to be seen but her and the black and white tiles of the wall on the far side of the bathtub. <I've been watching too much anime,> she thought. "You fall in, in there?" Carmela called. "No..." Nita said, and reached for the mouthwash, looking suspiciously at the mirror. This was one of the unfortunate aspects of changing wizardly specialties... assuming that she was actually changing one, not just adding something on. Everything got so unsettled: you saw things, heard things, sensed things that at first didn't make any sense. Later they did... but usually too late to help you sort out whatever the present problem was. Nita took a gulp of mouthwash, rinsed, spat, turned the faucet on to rinse the sink, and looked in that mirror again. Nothing but herself, and the memory, the shadow of a shape, fading already. Sapphire-blue hair, black eyes, profoundly deep. A fierce look: uncompromising, alien. And afraid... <File it away,> Nita thought. <Stick it in Nita's Big Book of Odd Oracular Imagery, and have a good long look at it later. Bobo?> <Got it,> said the voice she was only slowly getting used to hearing in the back of her head, and even then not every time she spoke to it. There were unnerving, ambivalent silences sometimes when Nita spoke to the peridexis, her own personal "online" version of the wizard's manual. It didn't always answer. Nita wondered if this was because it knew she wasn't entirely happy with it being inside her... though she'd been happy enough a month or so ago, when for a little while it was all the evidence of wizardry she'd had left. <And if I don't trust it completely... does it trust me? And if not, why not? This is all so bizarre...> "You did fall in!" Carmela said from the bedroom. "No!" Nita said, briefly annoyed, and put the cap back on the mouthwash. She smoothed her top down and went out of the bathroom, leaning against her bedroom's doorsill again. "Come on," Nita said. "I'll show you. Anyway, Kit's over there, and you know you want to go make him crazy..." "It's what I live for!" Carmela said. "Let's go." She stood up and stretched. "What's summer wear for Mars look like?" "A force field. But that's my problem. Anyway, we have another stop first." She eyed the sweater Carmela was still wearing, a leftover from an unusually cool morning. "Better dump the angora," Nita said, pulling open one more drawer, rummaging again, and coming up with a T-shirt that was too big for her, but about the right size for Carmela. She grinned and waved it like a flag. "You won't need it where we're going." Carmela gave her a look, got up off the bed, and grabbed the T-shirt out of her hand. She vanished into the bathroom: a few moments later she was back in Nita's room again, though she was still fussing with the T-shirt in a dissatisfied way. "So now what?" "Just come stand over here by the window." Nita snapped her fingers, and her otherspace pocket popped open in the air beside her. She reached into it and felt around. <Oh, you don't need that...> said the voice in her head. <Let's just say I like to check my figures,> Nita said silently to the peridexis, riffling through the manual. <Besides, I like to be extra certain, because it's Carmela I'm transiting as well as me. Kit would be cranky if I got his sister stuck in the Earth's core.> Then she snickered. <Then again, maybe he wouldn't...> "And what is so funny?" Carmela said. "Besides the way this tent fits?" "Everybody should have a few floppy shirts," Nita said. "Don't distract me." She flipped through a few pages and found what she was looking for, the manual's "persona" utility. "What's your birthday again?" "November sixth," Carmela said, knotting up the T-shirt into a more fashion-conscious configuration above the waist of her jeans. She peered over Nita's shoulder, watching the way the Speech-characters on the manual page shifted and changed as she spoke. "Look at them jump around! Is that analyzing my voice?" "And your brainwaves, and a lot of other things," Nita said. "It makes a shorthand version of your name in the Speech: that gets pasted into the spell. What was the last book you read?" "Gulliver's Travels," Carmela said, watching a new layer of characters appear and nest themselves in among the first group, shoving them around in various directions and changing the colors in which they appeared on the page. "The uncensored one. Hey, what do you mean 'shorthand'? Is it safe to put shorthand anything in a spell?" "Safe enough for this," Nita said, watching the Speech-characters knit themselves into a little thorny circlet on the page, bristling with attachment-spurs that would hook into the larger spell. "We're not going out of atmosphere, and less than fifty-eight thousand miles total. Not enough for significant error to build up." Then Nita wrinkled her nose. "Wasn't that kind of gross?" "What, the book? Come on. I don't know why that parents' group keeps trying to ban it. You'd think school kids had never heard that people pee." Carmela snickered. "Maybe the grownups are just trying to keep word from getting out." Nita smiled slightly as the diagnostic fitted another level of meaning into the long sentence-acronym it was assembling from the data that came with Carmela's physical presence. All kinds of information about her were being summed up and pulled into the construct: it'd be interesting to analyze it all in detail later on, though some of the information was already giving Nita second thoughts. "Your favorite color is this shade of yellow?" Nita said, putting her finger on one part of the Speech construct and pulling that set of characters off to one side, out into the air. She had to wince at the little bead of light that came to life at the tail end of the character chain. It was a particularly eye-watering shade of citrus yellow-green. "This week, yeah," Carmela said. "Next week, who knows?" Nita shrugged: at least the routine was picking up its data correctly. "Okay," she said, and let go of the character string: it snapped back into the circlet where it belonged. "Great— we're set. Two seconds..." Nita turned back to the center of the manual. "Gating circles, please?" she said in the Speech. The manual fell open at the place where she stored her transit circles. "Thank you..." She reached into the page and pulled one out, an on-Earth transit routine that had her own Speech-name and the transit's starting location, her bedroom, woven into it already. With a flick of her wrist she dropped it to the floor around the spot near the window where the two of them stood. Then Nita turned back to the page where she'd generated Carmela's shorthand name. Carefully she lifted the long string of glowing characters out of the page and dropped it near Carmela, where there was a receptor socket ready to take it in the larger transit circle. Carmela looked down at it all suspiciously. "Are you sure this is safe?" she said. Nita gave Carmela an amused look. "This from somebody who let a <TV remote> install a worldgate in her bedroom closet? Spare me. And you should really have Sker'ret check that... he's the expert." Nita shut the manual, looked at the spell that lay burning on the floor around them, and started to say the words of the Wizard's Knot that would fasten the spell closed and start it going. <You're forgetting something....> Nita's jaw dropped. "Oh, wow, you're right!" she said. "Mela, wait right here. Don't touch anything!" She jumped over the edge of the spell-circle and ran downstairs. Nita trotted through the kitchen, shut and locked the back door— something else she'd forgotten— and then picked up the plastic shopping bag of tomatoes from beside the sink. <You're welcome...> said the peridexis. Nita rolled her eyes. "Everybody gives me a hard time," she said, heading back upstairs. "Thanks, Bobo..." In Nita's bedroom, Carmela was standing there with her arms folded and an <I'm-waiting-patiently,- what-do-you->mean-<don't-touch-anything?> expression on her face. "Does your invisible friend possibly have a secret identity?" she said. "A cute one?" Nita gave Carmela a look. "You behave," she said, "or I'm going to let your mama and pop know just what they're trying to turn loose on the poor unsuspecting nerdboys of CalTech." "Please," Carmela said, sounding unusually fervent even for her. "Just do that, and I'll fall at your feet and kiss them forever." "Yet another image I didn't need," Nita said. She looked down at the transit spell and began, once more, to speak the words in the Speech. The world always seems to press in all around to hear a spell being spoken. As Nita said the words, and heard the merely audible sounds of the everyday world go quiet under the pressure of that larger regard, she started to become strangely aware of something else: the sense that the spell itself was reacting strangely to something in the circle with her. <The peridexis,> she thought. She'd noticed this before, recently, when heading out for offplanet work— Carmela's presence in the spell merely added an unusual edge to the effect, as the peridexis shifted its presence to adapt to her. As the spell pressed in with more force around them, Nita wondered for the umpteenth time how she was going to get used to having what seemed to be wizardry itself in her head with her. It wasn't all a bad thing: she'd kept a little of the increase in power which all Earth's younger wizards had experienced during the recent crisis, when others had lost theirs much sooner. But she couldn't get rid of the idea that there was something about all this she wasn't understanding yet, and she needed to get to grips with it pretty quick.... The silence leaned in around them, becoming total. Light started fading as well, leaving the two of them, for the long, strange stretch between one breath and the next, marooned in an odd daylight darkness. For that little time, Nita and Carmela were all that seemed to exist: and of the two of them, Carmela seemed much less concerned about it all, standing as casually there in the spell-circle as someone waiting for a bus. Nita turned slightly to read and say the last words of the spell, feeling the world resisting them. It always resisted a little at the end of a gating: no matter how sweetly you persuaded one place to let you stop being where you were while it stayed the same, the local physicality hung onto you and complained to the last. <What's funny,> Nita thought, <is that I never really noticed it until now. Was I always in too much of a rush? Am I just hypersensitive because of this change-of-specialty thing? Or is it the peridexis? Whatever—> She pushed through the resistance, said the spell's last word, and added the final syllables of the Wizard's Knot to make it all come real. Reality, finally becoming resigned to the wizardry, surrendered. Everything went black: then not quite black, but the deepest possible blue— <Heat:> that was the first thing that made an impression— heat that even at dawn still pressed in all around and briefly took your breath. Nita glanced around to make sure that Carmela was all right, for in the direction they'd been facing, the sky was still fairly dark. Then Nita groaned and put the tomato bag down on the indefinite-colored, sandy ground, massaging the arm that had been holding it for what now felt like about a century. They were standing on an elevated outcropping of land near the edge of an island in a sea that, in the growing dawn light, was already a surprisingly vivid deep blue. Ahead and to their right, the black basalt cliffs of the island's northern peninsula dropped sheer down into the water. In those cliffs' shadow lay a kind of patchy, glowing pallor— the bioluminescence associated with the offshore coral growth. Soon enough, Nita knew, that glow would fade as daylight grew and the native reds and violets of the corals asserted themselves. As she watched, a delta-winged shadow slid across the green-white glow— some passing giant manta, out hunting early. "Whooo," Carmela said, turning around very carefully, for they were a good way up from the stony beach below. "Hold still," Nita said. "I'll make a light." She held out a hand and said the sixteen words of a wizard-light spell. The light popped out of nothing in the air, burning small and hot and blue, and Nita got out her manual. "I need to check that everybody's where I think they are..." She glanced at the messaging page in the back of the manual, comparing the coordinates laid into one message to the terrain below. A map came swimming up out of the glowing text, showing the cliffside, the path leading down from it, and the beach on the island's northwest tip. There Nita saw a little cluster of blue-light pinpricks, one circled in red. "Yup," she said, and shut the manual, shoving it back in its otherspace pocket. "There he is. Let's go." Nita made a downward-pressing gesture with one hand, and the little sphere of light sank down to shin level, illuminating the path before them. "Down this way. Take your time: you wouldn't want to slip..." They made their way down the path, the light going before them and growing slightly paler as the dawn light all around grew stronger. North of the cliffs, the island's slope to the water grew gentler, creating a spot that more resembled a beach, though not the kind that would have been pleasant for sunbathers. It was strewn with boulders of every size, though they were smallest down by the water. Here and there some small scraggly tree, scrub tamarind or beechpine, pushed its crooked, wind-twisted way up between the boulders. "Okay," Carmela said as the path switched back again, and for a little while they walked more or less toward the swiftly brightening eastern sky. "So geography was never my big thing: I give. Where on Earth are we?" Nita snickered. "Half the clues are right in front of you," she said. "I should make you guess." "Juanita Louise," Carmela said, "you are a real pain in the gnaester sometimes..." "Carmela, what did I tell you about the 'L' word?" Nita said, as they turned another switchback curve in the hillside trail. Nita hated her middle name and was still trying to figure out how Carmela had discovered it, as Carmela wouldn't tell her. "It was Dairine, wasn't it?" she said. "That little—" "Not her, Miss Neets," Carmela said, looking smug. They turned another switchback curve, and Nita, paying too much attention to Carmela's expression, banged her left sneaker-toe against an unexpected rock. "Ow, ow, ow...!" she said, putting down the tomato bag hurriedly and hopping briefly on the other foot. "See that," Carmela said. "The world's punishing you for being cute with me. Ooooh... Nita stopped hopping, grinning at Carmela's reaction to something Nita had seen before when wizardly work had taken her and Kit close enough to the equator— the shortness of dawn and sunset twilight, and the bizarre way that sunrise and sunset just seemed to happen, <bang,> all at once. The Sun didn't quite leap up over the horizon, but it seemed a very short time between the moment the first burning splinter of the Sun's upper limb broke the water and the one when the whole blinding disc, veiled in furiously silver-burning clouds, rose over the eastern sea. The water of the bay beneath them came alive in a storm of glitter. "Welcome to Gili Motang," Nita said. "This is really cool," said Carmela. "Except for the temperature." "It'll get worse, but I don't think we're gonna have time to care." The last turn in the path had brought them around to look back the way they'd come, so that they were now gazing straight down into the hot, blue waters of the Molo Strait. From that direction the dry southwest wind was blowing hard, and big waves rolled up the southerly-facing beaches; the crash of the surf could be much more clearly heard when you were facing into it. "Pretty," Carmela said. "So where is Gili Motang exactly?" "Indonesia," Nita said as she put her stubbed foot down, wriggling her toes inside her sneaker. She picked up the bag of tomatoes again. "Our visitor has a project going here. Or not going, and she keeps coming in to work on it. Did Kit tell you who he was coming to see?" "Some important wizard," Carmela said. "Kit's really impressed with her; that's all I know. 'Manfish'?" "Mamvish," Nita said as they negotiated one last switchback on their way down the hillside. "She's really old... in our years, anyway. She's spent three thousand years or so saving species that're about to be destroyed: getting rid of what's threatening them, or else moving them to new homes. 'Rafting,' it's called. Some species she's even been able to save <after> they've been destroyed." "That must take some work!" "She's got the power to pull it off," Nita said. "Tons of it. What's fun is that even though she's such a big deal, she's still kind of a goof." They came down onto the stony, broken ground at the bottom of the hill. Carmela tsk-tsked at the rocky beach as they made their way along the base of the hillside. "Not much good for swimming..." "No," Nita said. "Especially not if you have trouble with sharks..." Carmela laughed. "Like you wouldn't!" "Not these days," Nita said, smiling. "No." She changed the tomato bag over to the other hand as they came around the pointy end of the hillside where it dropped to the water. Another small, half-circle rocky bay was revealed on the right as they made their way down among the fractured sandstone boulders that had rolled down the cliff. The strand of the bay was boulder-strewn too, and small dark shapes— human figures— sat on the biggest rocks near the water. Near the base of the cliff, not far away, stood a long green-golden shape that had to be fifty feet long. "What is that?" Carmela said. "Hey, it's a dinosaur!" And she started to head straight downslope toward it. "Uh, no," Nita said. Then she caught a motion out of the corner of her eye. "Mela, watch out!" She flung an arm out in front of Carmela. Carmela stopped so suddenly she nearly fell over forward onto the seven-foot-long Komodo dragon that was suddenly blocking their path. "Whoa!" Carmela said, and stumbled back. Nita grabbed Carmela's arm to steady her as that blunt, oblong head swung toward them. <Yum,> the Komodo dragon said. Its tongue went out and waved around in the air, tasting it for their scent. "You really wouldn't like eating us!" Nita said in the Speech. "Yeah," Carmela said, also in the Speech. "We're probably both full of additives." The dragon looked from Carmela to Nita and back again. Its tongue went in and out a few more times. <What's an additive?> the Komodo dragon said. <Is it nice?> Very carefully, Nita handed Carmela the bag of tomatoes, acutely conscious of how the dragon was following her every move. "No, they're really unhealthy..." The moment she had both hands free, Nita took hold of one of the charms on her bracelet, the one with her shield spell set up in it. Komodo dragons could move like lightning when they wanted to, and could rip an arm or a leg off you before you knew what was happening. <If this guy tries something cute, I'm gonna have to adjust this spell on the fly so it works for two of us—> "You should really go inland," Nita said. "There are all kinds of nice goats and things for you to eat up there, much nicer tasting than us." "Seriously," Carmela said. "Just go on back there in the forest and take a seat, and your server will be with you shortly!" The dragon looked peculiarly at Carmela, and its tongue went in and out several times more. Nita held her breath. Finally the Komodo dragon turned and lurched away, uphill, toward the scraggly forest above the beach. Nita let out a long breath and shot Carmela a look. "You've been spending too much time in those restaurants at the Crossings!" Carmela shrugged. "Being nice never hurts..." "You've got that right, anyway," Nita said. "Let's get down there before we have to have that conversation with one of Mister Dragon's buddies." The two of them headed downslope to where the track gave out. Shortly they were picking their way among the cracked yellow boulders toward the group on the beach. "Neets," Carmela said, "I hate to tell you this, but there's another dragon down there." "Where?" "Under the dinosaur." Nita peered ahead. "It's okay... I think it's too busy to notice us. Anyway, don't you see someone familiar?" She took back the bag of tomatoes. "Who?" Now it was Carmela's turn to peer. "Where do you— Ronan! Carmela took off toward where that tall, slim shape was lounging on top of a big boulder in black jeans and a black T-shirt, and doubtless paying the price for it in this weather; but he looked as casual as if he were sitting on a block of ice. Nita grinned as she negotiated the rocky stretch between herself and the wizards sitting on the rocks by the edge of the bay. Kit was there in T-shirt and baggies, perched on an even bigger boulder than the one where Ronan Nolan had stretched himself out. Nearby, on a lower, flatter stone, a smaller shape sat cross-legged— younger, much darker, wiry, in swim trunks and a floppy white tank top: Darryl McAllister, one of the newer wizards of Nita's acquaintance, a neighbor from over in Baldwin. The three of them were watching yet another Komodo dragon, bigger than the oneNita had spoken to, and also keeping an eye on the huge, shimmering, golden-green shape bending down over the dragon: one that, to Nita's way of thinking, seemed much worthier of the name. If someone had stood an African elephant next to that great shape, the elephant would have been taller, but the saurian, sheathed in a handsome, pebbly, gleaming hide, would have been much bigger. Though Mamvish's shoulders stood no more than twenty feet from the ground, they were nearly ten feet apart, and each leg was as thick as the trunk of the forty-year-old maple in front of Nita's house. Those legs bent twice, in a double elbow— one of them bending backward about eight feet from the ground, and the second one about four feet above it. Each leg ended in a six-toed paw, as broad compared to the leg as the foot of a cat, and each toe had a massive, metallically glinting claw retracted partly into it. The hind legs were like the front ones, though the hip joints were higher than the shoulders, and the tail that trailed away behind them lashed and coiled, gesturing more expressively than any Komodo dragon's tail could. At the other end, the saurian's long, oval head peered down at the smaller one of the Komodo dragon sitting between her huge forefeet. The massive jaws in that huger head opened, exhibiting teeth that gleamed like pale metal, and a broad, black tongue. Around the words that she spoke, like the breath behind them, came a low, moaning hiss like a house's central heating system complaining of too much pressure in the radiators. But the voice itself spoke the Speech in a surprisingly high register, like a flute's or clarinet's. As Nita got closer, she could see how subtly changing colors ran and shimmered underneath the gemmy bumps and pebbles of the hide, shifting slightly with the words and the volume at which they were spoken. "Let me put it again in a way you can understand," the voice said... while sounding as if its owner wasn't sure this could be done. "There's nowhere else for you to live in these seas! The two-leggers are encroaching on your territory. No matter how well the ones who come here right now are treating you, sooner or later some will come who don't mean you anything like as well. You'll have nowhere else to go! And there are much better places for you to be, with no two-leggers, with nothing but people like you—people who're interested in you and want you to live somewhere safe! If you'll just let me show you—" The Komodo dragon between Mamvish's feet looked up at her and opened its mouth, emitting a similar hiss, though a much smaller one. By way of the Speech, Nita heard it say, <I'm hungry.> Mamvish rolled her eyes in frustration. This was worth seeing, since it wasn't just the eyeballs that rolled; the entire socket containing each one went around in a large and wobbly circle. "You can eat any time," she said. "Please pay attention. We're talking about something <important> here—" <A juicy little deer would be nice right about now,> said the Komodo dragon... and it turned ponderously around and lurched away out of Mamvish's shadow and up the beach, toward the underbrush that sprang up under the eaves of the forest. Mamvish watched it go. "You stupid, <stupid> things," she hissed, "why do I keep wasting my time?" She stamped all her feet in annoyance. "It's your <lives> I'm trying to save here! Your whole <rijakh>'d <species'> lives!... And all you can ever think about is <food!> If you came home with me, you'd be superstars; your species would be comfortable and safe forever! And now I wonder why I'm bothering trying to take creatures home who're so <merthakte> dumb! Powers that Be in a <bucket,> have you ever seen the like of these people? Time after time you come umpteen thousand light-years to make them the offer of a lifetime, and every time they ignore you; they don't have the brains to come in out of the Sun; they—" The tirade went on. Somewhat distractedly— for Mamvish was using a completely new and interesting subset of words in the Speech— Nita made her way over to the boulder where Kit was perching. As she scrambled up beside him, Nita found herself wondering whether there was a separate "bad language" section of the wizard's manual, and why she'd never thought to go looking for it. <Am I really that much of a geek? Oh, god.> Kit was looking elsewhere, as if embarrassed. Darryl was listening with fascination: Ronan had leaned all the way back on his boulder with his hands under his head, his eyes closed. <Because of Mamvish, or Carmela?>— for Kit's sister was sitting there, trying to keep her attention evenly divided between Mamvish and Ronan. For the moment, Mamvish was winning. "What took you so long?" Kit said under his breath. "You missed <everybody.> Half the wizards we know have been here, and a lot we don't." "Want to understate some more? Half the wizards on the <planet> have been here!" Darryl said from the next boulder over. "A real mob scene. And some real heavy hitters. Check this out!" He scrambled over toward them, holding out the WizPod he used these days to carry his wizard's manual. "Jarrah Corowa was here, and she even gave me her autograph!" He pulled a glowing page sideways out of the WizPod and into the air, showing Nita the tracery of Speech characters there. "Wow!" Nita said, for a wizard's autograph, depending on how much of the wizard's personal information it contained, could be worth a lot more than just a keepsake of meeting someone who was famous for their way with a spell. "Nice going!" Kit rolled his eyes in a good-natured way at Darryl's excitement. "Fang was here, too," he said. Nita let out a breath, sorry to have missed an old friend in wizardry, the orca who'd sung the part of the Killer in the Song of the Twelve. "How is he? He came way out of his way to get here." "Not all that far. He and his family swim the Pacific this time of year: he's over here working on typhoon steering or something. He's fine, and he was asking about you. <And> her." Kit threw an annoyed glance in Carmela's direction. "On another subject, is it just barely possible that we can go anywhere on this planet these days, or any other, without her coming along?" "Funny," Nita said. "I was going to ask whether it was possible you might go anywhere that I could come along." Kit stared at her. "What?" "I was late because I was waiting for you! I hung around Tom and Carl's for half the afternoon!" Kit looked stricken, as if this had never occurred to him. "But you said you were going to talk to the fish." "I was!" Nita said. "But I didn't go there to talk to the fish! I went there to blow some time until you were going to turn up after school— which you never did! Oh, no, you just heard the word 'Mars' and forgot all about everything else, and ran straight off here!" "Come on, Neets, you know I—" <Would you two ever just take it to telepathy,> Ronan said silently, <or else save it for later? She's starting to run out of steam again.> At least the hissing was dying down. "Why?" Mamvish was saying to the sky and the Earth and whatever else might have been listening. "Why do I keep coming out to this dust speck of a not-particularly- interesting world out at the farthest possible edge of all that's bright and beautiful to talk to these idiotic creatures who make a pt!walnath look assertive and a Zabriskan fontema look smart? I ask you." Then she fell silent. Mamvish looked around her, a little guiltily. "I'm sorry," she said, "very sorry. They're just so—" "Clueless?" said Darryl. "Lackwitted? Like you called them the last time you lost it?" "Dim?" said Ronan. "Pitiful? Like you called them half an hour before that?" "All right, it's not kind to describe them so," Mamvish said, sounding contrite. "They're as the One made them. If they won't be saved, they won't. But I just keep hoping they'll change their minds... though I'm starting to wonder why I bother." "Because you're a wizard?" Nita said. "And it's what wizards do?" Mamvish swung her huge head in Nita's direction... and then froze. Both those eyes suddenly went forward and trained on Nita with tremendous directness: and Mamvish's nostrils flared. "Cousin," she said. "Are you carrying what I <think> you're carrying?" Nita held up the plastic bag. "You mean these?" Mamvish suddenly lurched toward Nita as singlemindedly as the Komodo dragon had. Nita hurriedly scrambled down off the boulder, headed for Mamvish, and started to carefully empty out the tomato bag onto the stones. "No, no, it's quite all right," Mamvish said. "I don't mind a little roughage..." Nita dropped the bag and the tomatoes as Mamvish lumbered forward. A second later, the tomatoes and the bag were gone. So were some of the stones— deafeningly crunched up, shattering and splintering. Everyone stared. Mamvish's eyes rotated in her head in opposite directions in what Nita very much hoped was delight, and the shimmer under her skin ran suddenly tomato-red. "You are my friend! Mamvish said, using the Speech-word <thelefeh,> which was a much closer and cozier usage than <hrasht,> or "cousin." Nita was charmed, and began to see some use in having carried that bag halfway across the planet. "And this is unquestionably one of the best worlds in this whole part of the galaxy," Mamvish said, straightening up after a moment. The place where her jaw jointed pulled back and back into what her species apparently used for a smile; Nita started wondering if Mamvish's head might actually come apart. "Thank you so much for bringing those: I didn't think I was going to have time to get any, this trip. Do forgive me; I missed your name—" "You didn't miss it," said a voice from behind her. "She was late." "Stow it, Ronan," Nita said. To Mamvish she said, "I'm Nita." "And of course I know you, thelef', Mamvish said, lowering her head so that one of her eyes could look into both of Nita's. "We've spoken often enough via manual. I'm sorry if I moved quickly, there... It's really hard for me to help myself around these things. It's something to do with the bioflavinoids..." "You should grow them at home!" Nita said. "They're not the same," Mamvish said, sounding sorrowful as she hunkered down on the rocky beach again. "There's something in the water here. Or the air. Or the spectrum of this particular sunlight. Tomatoes are just happiest on Earth..." She sighed. "But it doesn't matter. They're a tremendous compensation for other slight annoyances." One eye glanced back toward the Komodo dragon, which was disappearing into the brush up near the cliff. "And, after all, who knows if I'd ever have found out about Mars at all without the tomatoes?" "Tomatoes are all very well," Ronan said, sitting up and stretching himself in the sunshine, "but as for these folks, you should just move them. If they don't have the smarts to agree to leave on their own, then change their minds for them—" "Don't tempt me," Mamvish said, waving her tail in annoyance. "Unfortunately this issue goes right to the heart of the Wizard's Oath: 'I shall change no creature unless it, or the system of which it is a part, is threatened.'" She looked around her. "And they are. These are the only ones left of these creatures, except for the few hundred on the other island, and those few others scattered about the planet in zoos. But if I change their minds for them, will they still be the creatures they are?" A long, deep fluting sigh came out of her. "Never mind. They're a problem for another day... though one that has its resonances with what we're about to start." Nita opened her mouth, but Carmela, sitting up on that boulder, put up her hand and starting waving it around like some back-of-the-classroom kid desperate to be called on. "Excuse me," she said in the Speech, "but what are we about to start?" Nita threw a glance sidewise at Kit. He was covering his face and groaning softly. One of Mamvish's eyes was suddenly regarding Carmela; the other one was looking in what seemed mild confusion from Nita, to Kit, to Darryl, to Ronan. "Has this planet gone <astahfrith> without my noticing?" she said. "I have been busy..." Nita snickered, for this was probably an understatement. "No," she said. "We still have to hide our wizardry, mostly. But there are people who're in on the secret and aren't freaked by it. Mamvish, this is Kit's sister Carmela. Mela, this is Mamvish fsh Wimsih fsh Mentaff." "Hey," Carmela said in the Speech, "Life says, 'hi there.'" Mamvish's eye actually tried to lean farther out of her skull in Carmela's direction. "And It greets you by me as well. You're not a wizard, though..." "Don't need to be," Carmela said, sounding utterly certain. "Too much work. I'm just a tourist training to be a galactic personal shopper." This was all news to Nita, but she tried to keep her grin restrained and out of Kit's sight: his reaction to Carmela's ever-growing ability with the Speech had been becoming increasingly pained. Mamvish looked unfocused for a moment, or as much more unfocused as one could be expected to look when her eyes were already pointing in different directions. Then she said, "Oh! You're the one who shot up the Crossings during the intervention last month." "That would be me," Carmela said. "But Neets was there first. And our colleague with all the legs." "Sker'ret is a great talent," Mamvish said, "and an invaluable resource. His people have been instrumental in your world's development, you know that? At least as far as worldgates go. It's good to see that you're so well connected." One of Mamvish's rear legs came up to scratch behind where one of her ears might have been, had she had any on the outside. "Meanwhile, I don't see why you'd need to be excluded from this. Especially since you came with the bearer of the tomatoes." She beamed at Nita, then turned back to Carmela again. "From your own world's point of view, Mars is a 'situational location of interest.' Wizards here have been trying to find out why for some centuries now. And even the outer worlds feel echoes of something that happened... and have nothing further to say." She tilted her head, looking thoughtful. "So plainly there's something going on here that we need to know about before we move forward." "And what are we moving toward? Carmela said. <We.> Nita could just feel Kit start fuming quietly. "Waking up the Martians, dummy!" Kit said. "Well," Mamvish said, swinging one eye in his direction, "that's the question we'll be examining. Local catastrophes have killed too many species in the past— peoples we could ill afford to lose. My job's to prevent the loss of worlds that have something special to offer the universe, to keep species or planets that have made unusual contributions from being completely lost—and, occasionally, to get back lost worlds that aren't as lost as we think they are." "Like Mars..." Nita said. "Yes," Mamvish said. "And sometimes, as seems to have happened in this case, we get a little help from the species in question: they leave us data about what happened to them." "A message in a bottle," Ronan said. "Yes. In this case, the 'bottle' we've located seems to have been emplaced some five hundred sixty thousand years ago." Nita blinked at that. "Wow. There were just human ancestors around then. It was— what, the really early Stone Age?" "The Lower Paleolithic, as I understand your usage," Mamvish said. "Any knowledge or memory your most distant ancestors had of Mars is lost. But worlds have different kinds of memory than the beings that move on their surfaces. Whatever humans know about Mars, the outer worlds have different knowledge about it: troubled recollections. We have to go carefully at first." The eyes rotated again in the head. "But the risk may be worth it. Some of the most dangerous 'lost' species have brought us some of the greatest gifts once they've been revived." Carmela was looking dubious. "Am I completely misunderstanding you, or are you actually talking about bringing them back from the dead?" "Well, there's dead and there's <really> dead," Mamvish said. "Of course we couldn't do anything about the second kind. However, there are a hundred different kinds of stasis, soulfreeze, matter seizure, and wait-just-a-minute that species across the galaxy have invented to stave off entropy's Last Word. Many species have seen a catastrophe coming and found ways to archive or preserve not just the news about what happened to them but themselves as well. In Mars's case, the first steps have been toward finding out whether there were ever Martians—because your whole species seems to have some kind of unfinished business, or unstarted business, with Mars. If Martians did exist, the next step would then be to find out what happened to them. Once we know that, we can start working out how to re-evoke them—in a limited way, just to find out firsthand what happened to them. From there we can make the determination as to whether it's wise to revive them wholly. And then—" "We bring them back," Kit said softly. "Maybe," Mamvish said. "We've got a lot of steps to go through before that. And the first one will be to—" Nita suddenly felt as if something had kicked her in the chest. The breath went right out of her, for no reason she could understand, and she gasped in reaction. At the same moment, "I'm so sorry I'm late," said another voice, a female one, out of nothing. "What did I miss?" They all turned— Nita last: she was still having trouble finding her breath—and stared. Standing there among the rocks of the beach was what looked like a slender little housewife in her thirties, wearing a flowered housedress and flip-flops. She had boldly highlighted shaggy blond hair, a blinking, placid baby in a patchwork-patterned shoulder sling, and a yellow parakeet sitting on her shoulder. Mamvish hurriedly put down the scratching foot, stood up, and inclined her head to the woman. "Irina," she said, "this is more than a pleasure!" Nita and Kit stared at each other, and Darryl's eyes went wide, and even Ronan, for all his usual overlay of unconcerned coolness, sat up straight. <Is that who I> think <it is?> Nita said silently to Kit. <Look at the way Mamvish's acting. It> has <to be—!> "I'm just passing through," said the Planetary Wizard for Earth, and the baby chuckled and reached up to pull on her hair as she smiled around at them all, then at Mamvish again. "I heard you were going to be in the neighborhood, Archivist. I thought I'd wait until the excitement died down, and then drop by and pay my respects." "Planetary," said Mamvish, bowing her head more deeply, "don't be respecting me. I'm just migrant labor." Irina laughed; the parakeet fluttered its wings and scolded her, a little scratchy noise on the hot, sunny air. "And I'm just a housekeeper!" Irina said, reaching up a finger to the parakeet: it nibbled her nail. "Sure, the house is bigger than some. But it's the empty house next door that's really got me interested. I hear you've finally found what you were looking for—" "We were about to go up to the site to look at the find," Mamvish said. "Do you have time to accompany us?" "For a few minutes, surely." Mamvish put her head up and cocked one eye at the Sun. The other stayed trained on the ground, as if she was looking for something. Nita watched this with interest, suspecting that Mamvish was about to cast some kind of transit circle— Shadow fled outward from Mamvish and ran swift as a blast wave across the ground, past the rocks on which they were all sitting, out toward the sea and up the face of the cliff. In that shadow, Mamvish glowed. The green-gold shimmer under her hide was replaced by darkness in which burned a great complexity of characters and sentences in the Speech, writhing and coiling about one another, flowing out onto the darkened ground. The shadow beneath them now filled with those words and characters, and as Mamvish stretched her head upward into the air, the sound of the surf behind them was drowned out by what seemed a whole chorus of voices chanting in the Speech, like a great concord of wind instruments: Mamvish's voice, but seemingly multiplied many times over, as if she was somehow reciting all the different parts of the spell at the same time. Nita tried to breathe and found she couldn't. The spell held her in place, and she couldn't move a muscle, not even to look sideways to see how Kit was taking it. All around them, instead of the inward-leaning, listening silence that normally meant a wizardry was starting to work, Nita started to hear something astonishing— more voices, seeming to join in with Mamvish's fluting one, all speaking the Speech together with her from out of some great echoing depth, a great chorus of intention, elation, even excitement— <Then> the silence fell, abrupt, unexpected: and the sea was gone, and the sky was a dark hazy russet-golden color rather than blue. Nita let go the awed breath she'd been forced to hold, looking around her at a world that had gone a dusty ochre, shading to rusty charcoal at the edges. Nita slid down off the boulder, took another breath. Since her eyes weren't boiling out of her head in the hyperthin air, and she hadn't half frozen since they got there, it was plain that Mamvish had taken care of the group's atmosphere needs. But Nita still felt wobbly. That huge wash of Speech and wizardly power left her feeling like she'd been run over by a truck, and as if all the spells she'd ever cast by herself or just in company with Kit were weak little things by comparison. She leaned against the boulder, gulping, and tried to get her composure back. Kit, still up on the boulder, was gasping and trying to hide it: Ronan was shaking his head like someone who'd been punched. Carmela, sitting beside him, had unbraided her hair and was braiding it up again— a sign that Nita had learned to read as meaning that Mela was unnerved. Only Darryl was standing there casually looking around him, seemingly unaffected. Nita saw Mamvish, noting this, rotate one eye toward Irina, who was fanning herself with one hand like someone who'd broken out in a sweat. Irina said nothing, but Nita suspected that a few thoughts were passing between them concerning why so young and relatively inexperienced a wizard should be untroubled by what had just happened. <Good,> Nita thought. <Something we don't have to warn her about.> Nita had been concerned about the appropriateness of one of Earth's precious few <abdals> getting involved in offplanet wizardly work: but if Irina didn't do anything about it, then it definitely had to be all right. Nita let out a long breath and looked up at that strange butterscotch-colored daytime sky, which shaded down toward deeper tints of apricot and warm brick red at the horizon. Southward of where they stood, the dust was thick in the sky, softening a horizon that was usually much sharper, hiding the view of the distant foothills. Nita swallowed, smiled. It had always been wonder enough just to step out of a gating circle onto this ancient and alien soil, to stand gazing up into this unearthly sky and see that smaller, cooler, pinker sun. Nita had been here often enough, over the last year or so, to almost get used to that marvel. But today there was something new that sharpened this view, lent an edge to the feel of the place. The clue they'd been hunting had finally been found. Now every shadow, every rock, seemed to be hiding a secret. <Life...!> <Syrtis Major> "What time is it here?" Irina said. "About halfway through the sol," Mamvish said, glancing around. "Am I right— that's the name your people use for the Martian day? Excellent. Anyway, it's late autumn here: we're just north of the planet's equator." Looking around, Nita smiled wryly. The only way to tell that fall was here was by the angle of the Sun and the slight warmth remaining in the atmosphere— meaning that the outside temperature was only about thirty degrees below zero. Feeling less shaky now, she pushed away from the chilly boulder she'd been leaning against and peered south toward the highlands. This part of Mars's northern hemisphere was dominated by flat country, the crater-pitted remnant of old lava flows. Southward the highlands would start to pile up into far more spectacular and mountainous terrain, dotted with terrible crevasses and ancient volcanic peaks. But all that was well over the horizon. Here everything was relatively flat, darkened by the local green-brown sand and dust— except for the features lowering over the site to which Mamvish had brought them. On every side, immense charcoal-dark dunes of windblown basalt sand had piled up— stretched out serpentlike across the plain, half a mile or a mile long, as sharp-edged as any desert dune on Earth. But in the lower gravity, these dunes towered nearly five hundred feet high, casting long, cold shadows across the plain in the light of early morning. The others were getting down from where they'd been sitting. Nita threw a glance at Kit, saw that he was all right, and went over to where Carmela was standing, gazing around with her hair braided up again, a look of astonishment on her face. "Aren't we inside a force field or something?" Carmela said. "How come I can feel the wind?" "I told you," Nita said, "Mamvish has power to burn..." Whenever Nita and Kit had come here on their own, or to work with the other wizards involved in this effort, they'd both worn personal force fields that hugged them close, keeping the Martian atmosphere out and their own carefully calculated air supplies in. But Mamvish had built her wizardry very differently, so that it matched the temperature and oxygen content of Earth's air exactly but still transmitted the forces of the thin exterior atmosphere as if they were one and the same. It would have been an incredibly difficult wizardry to structure, and Nita could imagine the kind of power necessary to run it. <The same kind of power that can pick you up off one planet and drop you on another between one breath and the next without it even looking hard...> "Why's everything this khaki color?" Carmela said, as she and Ronan and Darryl came over to join Nita and Kit near where Mamvish and Irina were looking around. "I thought this was supposed to be the red planet." "Because we're in the middle of Syrtis Major," Kit said. "That big dark eastern-hemisphere blotch that everybody used to think was a sea, with canals running into it. There were a lot of volcanoes here, so the ground's full of this green stuff, olivine, that formed when the lava cooled." Kit looked around like someone who just needed to see a few landmarks to be sure where he was. "This isn't really a crater we're in: it's what's left of one of the calderas where the lava came out. It's called Nili Patera." He looked over at Mamvish. "And the bottle is—" "A few hundred meters south," Mamvish said. "Síle and Markus get the credit for finding it. They were working this site all this week..." "Who're Síle and Markus?" Carmela said, bouncing up and down in place to get the feel of the gravity, which was only about a third of the Earth's. Each bounce took her several times higher than she'd intended, and Nita kept having to reach up and grab her and pull her back down. "A couple of the other wizards on the project," Kit said. "Síle's from Ronan's part of the world— she's at college studying computer science in Paris. Markus is in the German army: he drives tanks." "They're not tanks," Ronan muttered. "They're armored personnel carriers, and if he hears you call them tanks one more time..." Kit gave Ronan a "whatever" shrug. "They were the ones who called me in," Mamvish said. "Markus's unit had to go on active service yesterday morning to help with the floods in the south of his country. Síle stayed here and kept running the spell routines that she and Markus had been working on, till something came up that required her to head home and go out on errantry yesterday evening. She called me in just before she went on active status." "It's a shame they can't be here," Kit said. "They've been working so hard on this for so long..." "As have about twenty other people from your planet for whom this is a special interest," Mamvish said. "But they don't grudge missing the action, as long as there is action." Her tail swished with excitement. "The rest of your team will get here when work and errantry leave them time. Meanwhile—" "Where is it?" Kit said. "What is it?" "It's where you said you thought it might be," Mamvish said. "Hidden under one of these dunes. But time passed, the wind blew, the dune moved... and now it's not hidden anymore. As for the what— now we'll find out. Over this way..." They all headed southward. Nita saw that Carmela seemed to have recovered her composure and had gravitated back toward Ronan, who was gliding along a foot or so above the surface, with only the occasional very practiced and casual bounce: he looked as unconcerned as if he were walking across some park back home. <Looks like he and Kit have been up here working in one-third g an awful lot. Maybe more than I thought...> But projects of her own had been keeping Nita busy lately, and what she told Carmela had been true: the Martian project had been far more Kit's passion than hers for some months. Not that she hadn't come up every now and then to see how things were going. But mostly they hadn't been. Until now, Kit and all the other wizards he'd been working with had found nothing at all.... He and Darryl and Ronan were now bouncing along together, talking hard as they came up beside Mamvish. Carmela had dropped back, succumbing to the fascination of where she was and looking intently at the sandy ground, the dusty rocks, the alien dune-vista between her and the horizon. Irina, too, had paused to pick up a rough dark-green stone and look closely at it. The baby hanging in front of her patted the rock with one hand and crowed as Nita came up next to the two of them. "Irina—" she said very quietly. "It's about Darryl, isn't it?" Nita went hot with embarrassment. "It's all right," Irina said softly, turning the rock over in her hands. "He can be away from Earth for short periods, and his function as a channel of the One's power into the world won't suffer. But I think you'll find that he won't care to be away much longer. For those of us who've become important at the planetary level, the Earth whispers in our ears when it's uneasy at our absence. And the whisper's impossible to ignore." Irina tossed the rock to the ground and gestured with her head toward the others. She and Nita started to bounce after them, and the baby shouted with delight as they went, while the yellow parakeet scolded them noisily, finally taking off and flying on ahead, quick as an arrow-shot in the low gravity. "Besides," Irina said, "while Mamvish is here, nothing's going to dare interfere with him, or you, or anything else that's going on." "Yeah," Nita said. "I couldn't believe that spell. And she did it so casually. What her power levels must be like—" "Well, yes, but it's not just that," Irina said, even more softly than she'd spoken about Darryl. "She's unusual even as wizards go. It wouldn't be in the manuals, but it might be useful for you to know: she's an Abstainee." Nita's eyes went wide. "She had her Ordeal and the Lone Power didn't show up? Irina nodded, smiled. "It even sent her a message saying It wasn't going to turn up. She told me once," Irina said, with a somewhat cockeyed look, "that It said It had a headache." Nita shook her head, not knowing what to make of this. "I bet that doesn't happen often." "Galaxy-wide? Eleven times in the last five centuries," Irina said. She looked ahead toward where the others had stopped in the shadow of one more black-sand dune, a very perfect crescent with the open side toward them. "And as usual, the question is: do her power levels come from being an Abstainee, or did the Lone One decide not to get involved because of her power levels...?" Irina shook her head. "It may not matter. But she's good to have around for backup... and no wizard alive knows more about this particular kind of work than she does. I'm glad she's here. Especially since this is such an odd place, some ways..." Irina gazed toward the northern horizon for a moment as they went. "I have to come up here two or three times a year to make sure the planet's operating correctly in the absence of a kernel, and afterwards I always go away wondering why the manual's so short of information about exactly what's happened here. Now, though, what the Mars team has found may mean the silence is finally about to break a little..." Shortly they caught up with the others, who were all standing around a little irregular outcropping or bump of dark olive-colored stone, just four feet or so high. It jutted up deep in the shadow of the crescent dune, and just a foot or two clear of where the steep, smooth sweep of dark, gritty sand on the dune's inner side came down to the ground. "It's under that?" Kit said as Nita and Irina caught up with the others. "Inside it," said Mamvish. "And you're sure whatever's in there isn't something contemporary?" Ronan said. "Like that alien tourist beacon Nita's sister found up on Olympus Mons when she passed through on her Ordeal? Not some practical joke?" Mamvish tilted her head one way and the other, the gesture her people apparently used for "no." "Many sites that wizards have investigated here over the last three centuries have had a scent of old wizardry about them, but never anything this concrete. And the survey spell identifies what's emplaced here as being at least five hundred forty thousand years old. Even Earth's earliest wizards didn't venture this far for many thousands of years after that... so I think we're safe enough from practical jokes. Anyway"—and she gestured with her tail at Kit—"Kit is probably the most Mars-crazed of the whole team, and he's the one who's always been after everybody to keep on looking here, even after previous searches came up blank." "Why, Kit?" Irina said. "What seemed so special about Syrtis?" Kit shook his head. "I don't know. It was just a hunch to start with." He looked around him. "But Syrtis Major was the first feature on Mars that anyone on Earth really noticed, the thing that's most obvious from space. It just seemed like a good place to start." "Hunch or no hunch, Kit seems to have a feel for this place," Mamvish said. "Why argue the point? No one knows why any wizard's good at any particular specialty. The Powers may know, but it's not information They seem interested in sharing." She shrugged her tail. "How come all the sensor spells the team was using before didn't turn this up until now?" Nita said. "Because it was built to hide its nature," Mamvish said. "An extremely elegant piece of wizardry, exactly mimicking the structure and composition of its surroundings. For a long time, before the dunes advanced into the crater, all the spell had to pretend to be was this chunk of rock... and it did that perfectly. But then the dunes came in, and the wizardry had to adapt itself to mimicking not only rock, but dust and sand of a different composition and structure. The adjustment took a while, since the spell had only limited running power available to it. And when the dune moved away again, the spell had to adjust again. A dust storm moved through here the other night: in the wind, the dune moved just far enough westward to reveal the outcropping, and the wizardry started to adapt again. But Síle was still here, up north by the canyon valley you call Huo Hsing Vallis, running the new survey spell she and Markus had designed... and she detected the chameleon spell and what it was protecting before the wizardry had time to reset and hide it all again." "Well done, that woman," Ronan said. "She always was the stubborn type." "Sometimes stubbornness pays better dividends than high power levels," Irina said. "Well, shouldn't we take a look at it?" "This is your job, I think," Mamvish said to Kit. Kit suddenly looked abashed and shy. Nita had to hide her smile. "Go on," Mamvish said. "You're the one who predicted the location. Pull it out of there and let's see what it is." Kit nodded, knelt down in front of the outcropping, put his hands up against it, and very slowly and carefully recited the fourteen syllables of the Mason's Word, which has power over stone and the mineral elements. Then he leaned inward. Slowly Kit's hands sank in through the surface of the brown stone, up to the wrists, then up to the elbows. He looked absently upward, like anyone feeling around for something he can't see, and then his eyes widened. "It's pretty big," he said. "Round, I think. Kind of beachball sized..." Very slowly he pulled his arms back. His face tensed. "It doesn't want to come," he said. "The spell would resist," Mamvish said. "That's its job. Keep pulling—" Nita watched as the sweat popped out on Kit's forehead. She could feel his nervousness, catch a flicker of stressed-out thought: <Please don't let me drop it, don't let anything bad happen to this thing, we've been looking for so long—> Then Kit sat back on his heels, hard, gazing down at what he held. For a few seconds the ancient chameleon spell refused to entirely let go, so that what Kit held looked like nothing but a rounded, gritty, green-brown boulder. Then, gradually, the seeming fell away. Revealed in his hands was a shining blue-green metallic object, strangely shaped: a sort of blunt-ended capsule or stretched sphere, about two feet long. "Wow..." Nita said, and then realized that her heart was pounding. All the others let out breaths of surprise and satisfaction as they peered over Kit's shoulder. Only Kit was completely silent, kneeling there with the thing braced on his knees and staring at it in wonder. And, way down in the pocket of her jeans, Nita's cell phone rang. Kit looked over his shoulder, his expression surprised and annoyed. Nita said a word that was not one she'd heard Mamvish using earlier and pulled her phone out, checking the ID on its display. It was her home number. <If it's Dairine, I swear when I catch her I'm gonna grab her and shove her head down the—>But the phone, having had its caller ID tweaked with wizardry, helpfully added: DAD CALLING. "Oh, no," Nita moaned, for she suspected she knew what he was calling about. "Oh, no. I'm sorry, I have to take this..." She flipped the phone open, acutely aware of everyone watching her, and flushed with embarrassment. "Hello?" "Nita," her dad said: and that was an immediate sign of trouble— both in terms of his tone of voice, which was annoyed, and the fact that he'd called her by her name rather than one of the usual nicknames or pet names he used. "Where are you?" "I'm on Mars, Dad. Please, can this wait a little while? Because I—" "No. I need you home right now." "Daddy, I—" "Five minutes." She knew that tone of voice, and there was no arguing with it, not if you wanted life to continue in anything like a normal way. "Okay," Nita said. Her dad simply hung up. <Oh, he sounds so steamed about something, what can have him so mad...? I bet I know.> She started to get mad herself as she folded up the phone and put it away. "This is so unfair!" she said. Mamvish gave her one of those amused Senior-like looks that suggested that the concept of "fairness" was something Nita should have gotten past by now. Nita sighed. "I have to go," she said to Carmela. "I'm really sorry—" "Don't be," Carmela said. "It's no problem. I'm sure Kit will drop me off as soon as he's done here. Won't you?" And Carmela turned on Kit one of those bright of-course-you-will looks that dared him to say anything different. Nita saw Kit's face work through annoyance, frustration, and an imposed calm that suggested he didn't want to look like an idiot by protesting too much. Behind him, Ronan was gazing innocently at nothing in particular, and Darryl was watching all this with acute interest. "Sure," Kit said. Nita reached for her charm bracelet, feeling for the single charm, like a thin ring or empty circle, that held the preset transit spell that would take her home in a hurry. She said the few words in the Speech that took the "safety" off the spell, and as she pulled the bright line of light that was the transit spell out of the charm, Kit threw her an apologetic look. "I'll log everything we do," he said. "Get back as soon as you can—" "Depend on it," Nita said, dropped the transit circle glowing on the dusty brown-green ground around her, and vanished. Kit let out another long breath as the others gathered around to look more closely at what he held. He looked up at Mamvish and Irina. "What is it?" he said. "Well, as far as the shape goes," Irina said, peering at the object, "it's a superellipsoid. A superegg, some people used to call it, or a Lamé solid: the three-dimensional object you get when you rotate a superellipse around its axis. Not as resistant to force as a sphere, but it's less likely to be mistaken for something natural." She reached out a hand, touched it. Bizarrely, Kit flinched, even though he'd touched the object already. But nothing happened. "It's weird," he said. "It looks like metal, but it's not cold. Even with Mamvish's environment field covering everything here now, it should still be cold..." Ronan and Darryl and Carmela all came to crouch down around Kit and carefully touch the superegg. Kit got a sudden image of cautious ape relatives reaching out to a tall black monolith, and had to smile. "Seems like it's in no hurry to crack open," Mamvish said. "But then some of these bottles have long-duration 'time locks' on them, or routines that analyze the finders as carefully as they'd like to analyze the find." Kit reached sideways into his otherspace pocket, hanging near him in the air as it always was, and pulled out his manual, putting it down on the ground beside him and flipping to one of the sensing-routine pages in the rear section. He was shaking and couldn't understand why. <It's not as if I've never seen anything alien before!> Kit thought. <But this is different. This is stranger. Isn't that weird? The closer to home an alien thing is, the harder it hits—> He looked at the manual. It showed him a diagram of the superegg, but very little data appeared beside the image, and no information about whatever might be inside it. "It is made of metal," Kit said. "But there's plastic in it, too. And wizardry..." Irina looked over Kit's shoulder at his manual. She reached down to touch it, and a few extra lines of information appeared in the Speech, but nothing more. She looked surprised. As Mamvish, too, gazed down at the manual, her huge tongue flicked out, wavering over the manual as if tasting the air around it. "This object's cloaked," Mamvish said. "Even against someone with our authorizations?" Irina said. "That would take some doing." "So it would," Mamvish said. "But we have little data on how powerful the wizards were who worked on this world." Her tail lashed. "At least I don't get any sense of this interference being something of the Lone Power's doing..." Irina frowned. "That's an impression that could be faked." "Yes," Mamvish said, "but as you say, against one of us? What are the odds?" Irina raised her eyebrows, shrugged. "Admittedly, low. But there's a first time for everything..." "I can feel something," Kit said, turning the superegg over in his hands. "Like there's just a little fragment of power in there— a splinter." Mamvish put her tongue down against the superegg, let the tip of it rest there for a moment. Symbols in the Speech once again whirled and glowed in her hide, but they were faint and vague. "Yes," she said. "I feel it, too. A fragment of a spell, or a collapsed and compacted sequence of a wizardry, no more. And it's not active." "Like it's on standby," Darryl said. Mamvish tilted her head sideways, a "maybe" gesture. "It could be. If there's a complete spell held inside, it may have been set to stay dormant for a while after this artifact was found." "In any case, I can confirm your surveyors' results," Irina said. "This object's very old indeed, and nothing like the kind of spell that Earth wizards were doing half a million years ago, even at what were then their highest levels of organization. Structurally, and in terms of the complexity of the outer shell alone, this is completely different. It feels alien to me." "Aren't you going to try to get it open?" Carmela said. "We'd have to have a clue as to how," Irina said. Once more she reached down to touch the superegg, running her hand slowly across its surface. "To use wizardry to operate on an object, you have to know what it is, what it's made of... and working that out may take us a while. Come on, Irina said in the Speech, and the sudden burst of power in the words her soft voice spoke shook Kit as if someone had struck him. But the power was all persuasiveness. "Tell us your secret. You've been alone so long already— isn't telling about yourself what you want to do, what you're all about? Who set you here? What are you for? We're here to listen...!" Nothing. Kit shook his head, wondering how anything inanimate or otherwise could be unmoved by such power directed at it. But the egg just sat there in his lap, mute. "Plainly this is going to take more analysis," Mamvish said with a sigh. "Well, it's the usual thing: nothing worth finding out about comes easy..." "What's that?" Ronan said suddenly. Everybody looked at him. "That sound," he said. Kit realized he, too, had been hearing something in the background, a low, hissing noise like static from a radio in the next room. But now it was sounding closer, or as if someone was turning that radio up. Everyone looked in all directions. "There," Mamvish said, both her eyes swiveling to look almost directly back the way they'd come. Kit's view was blocked by her bulk: he stood up to see. Then his eyes went wide. In the distance, maybe half a mile away, a tall, dark, twisting shape was wobbling across the landscape toward them, kicking up dust as it came. It was vague, soft-featured, amorphous— but it was getting less vague every moment as that hissing noise got louder. "Dust devil," Ronan said, peering past Mamvish. Beside him, Carmela watched its approach openmouthed, her attention distracted from Ronan at least for the moment. "Saw one of those on the TV news the other night," Darryl said. "It looked smaller..." "They can be a mile high," Kit said, for the moment almost oblivious to the superegg he was holding. "The winds inside are almost as fast as an Earth tornado's..." "Now there's a question," Darryl said. "If a tornado hits you here and picks you up, what happens then? Does Mars have an Oz?" "It's not very likely to hit us," Mamvish said... and then trailed off as the dust devil swerved and headed right toward them. To Kit's slight satisfaction, Carmela gulped. "Mamvish, your shield thingy'll keep that out, won't it?" "Wouldn't matter much if it didn't," Kit said. "You might get some dust in your hair. The air here's so thin, it could hit you square on and not hurt you." The dust devil was still running right at them, as unerringly as if it was on invisible tracks. Mamvish half turned, lifting her head, and her hide darkened: under it, symbols and phrases in the Speech began to twist and flow. Kit sucked in a breath and held it at the feel of the power building around her. <She's really something,> he thought, once more frozen in place as all the others were. <But no, not> all <the others—> Irina straightened up and came around Mamvish's side. The parakeet fluttered away to perch on top of the stone outcropping, and Irina's baby looked up into her face with a strange, silent composure, as Irina went up to stand by Mamvish's head. She hadn't said a word out loud in the Speech, but Kit could see the air around her hands trembling with some force that rippled the air like heat. The hissing grew louder; the dust devil wobbled only a little from side to side as it came at them, blocking half the horizon away with a whirling russet wall of dust. The Speech-symbols under Mamvish's hide blazed as she reinforced her shield-spell, but she didn't otherwise move. Then the whirlwind of dust blew right over them. For a moment they were caught right in the center of the vortex. The hiss became deafening. Kit, standing there with the superegg in his hands, tilted his head back and found himself looking up at a view that even few wizards would ever have seen—the dark golden radiance of the Martian noontime sky, but just a circle of it, completely walled around by the upward-widening, brick-colored cone of a dust devil's heart. The breath went out of him in wonder. But he was feeling something else as well, and couldn't understand where it was coming from. <I've seen this before! But that's crazy. Where could I ever have seen this?> The moment passed as the dust devil did. A second later it was behind them, wobbling away across the Martian landscape again. Mamvish's wizardry released them, and they all turned to watch it go. "What a mess," Carmela said. Kit had to admit that she had a point. The outcropping and the ground around it, which had been fairly clean after the dune had been blown back, were now almost entirely buried in the finest possible red dust. Much more of it was piled nearly ten feet up the face of the black dune. Darryl whistled softly. Irina, the air around her hands gone quiet again now, clucked softly to her parakeet, which had taken to the air. It flew back to her, sat on her head, and shook its feathers out, raising a small red dust cloud of its own. "Well," Mamvish said, looking after the dust devil as it wandered away toward the horizon, "that was unusual..." "You really think so?" Irina said. "You'll be telling me you believe in coincidences next." Mamvish tilted an eye back toward Irina. "Not as such," she said, "of course not. It's safe to say that we've been noticed. But by what?" "The planet?" Ronan said. Irina threw a thoughtful look at him. "If Mars had a Planetary, we could ask him, her, or it," she said, "but it doesn't." She sighed. "One more mystery." "Best we take them one at a time," Mamvish said. Kit hefted the superegg, which was getting heavy. "Let's start with this one," he said. "What do we do with it?" "Well, we'll have to keep trying to find a way to get it open," Mamvish said. "Bottles like these usually lead to more of the same: the more of them you can open, the more you can find out about the species that left them for you, and why they left them. Some of them are just memorials. Some are cries for help. And some species foresee their own demise and leave you information about how they tried to stop it. If you can make sense of those, you can start working on a way to bring them back." "Assuming," Irina said, giving Mamvish a wry look, "that bringing them back is a good idea." "Well, of course!" Mamvish said. "It's not a course of action anyone rushes into. You need a lot of information before you reconstitute a lost species. Some of them are lost for good reasons. And you have to think about the effects of a reconstitution on the nearby planets." She looked at Kit and the others. "Your world's now technologically of an age to notice what's happening here. If a new species suddenly turned up here, humans would be asking why." "They'd be doing a lot more than that!" Ronan said. "They'd be going completely spare." "Whether aliens would be reconstituted here is an entirely different question," Mamvish said, waving her tail. "We've got a big galaxy, and plenty of completely uninhabited systems with suitable planets. Relocation is always a possibility. But that's a question for later in the process." "Which you'll need to continue without me, unfortunately," Irina said, "as I need to get back to what I was doing at home. Let me know how you do with your analysis on that." She nodded at the superegg. "What'll you do with it?" "Re-emplace it for the time being," Mamvish said, looking at the outcropping. "If there seems to have been some kind of local reaction to its removal, better to minimize the effect for now." Irina nodded. "As for you folks," she said, glancing at Kit and Ronan and Darryl, "just a word. Our cousinMamvish is as busy as any Planetary would be, and her expertise is in demand. So you want to pay careful attention to whatever advice she gives you in this intervention. If there's the slightest chance that you don't understand or can't handle any problem that comes up, call her right away." She looked thoughtfully at Kit. "I've been watching this project for some time, from a distance. Tom and Carl have told me that you were to be trusted with it... that you were possibly even vital to it, if only for your commitment and all the time you've been spending on it: and this development suggests they're right." Kit tried to keep the grin of pride off his face. He was only partly successful. Irina smiled, too, but her look was still serious. "Naturally I trust my Seniors' judgment," she said. "But, regardless, since Mamvish seems to think you should be taking a leading role in what starts happening here now, I want you to be very, very careful what you do." Irina gave Kit a look that suddenly had a slight edge of frown on it. "When Tom and Carl briefed me on what you've been working on here, I naturally took a long look at your history as a wizard. All your histories," she said, glancing at Ronan and at Darryl. Then she turned her attention back to Kit. "So far in your career you've shown a certain talent for gambling successfully with your own skin in crisis situations. But this work won't be like that. This is likely to be one of those extended projects where when things go wrong, they start so small that you miss the early warning signs. Whatever happens here will inevitably affect Earth sooner or later... so I expect you'll behave accordingly." "Yes, ma'am," Kit said, sounding very subdued. "All right," Irina said. "And now that all that's said—" The sudden grin that flashed out was as excited as Kit's would have been. "You're on the cutting edge of something very unusual, very special. Enjoy it! And keep us posted." She turned away and strolled back over to Mamvish. "Don't forget, now," Irina said, "let me know right away if there's anything you need." "Cousin, I'll do that," Mamvish said, and bowed her head again. Kit put his eyebrows up, for the word wasn't quite the casually friendly relationship-word hrasht that one wizard used to another in the ordinary course of business. It still spoke of a close kinship, but it was more nuanced, and echoes of the overshadowing attention of the Powers That Be hung over it. Irina patted Mamvish on the flank, waved to the rest of them, and then she was gone. <A leading role...!> Kit thought. <A leading role!> "Yeah, well, you heard her reading you the pre-riot version of the Riot Act," Ronan said under his breath. "So don't get cocky." Kit threw Ronan a smug look that suggested the advice might already be a bit late. Ronan rolled his eyes. "Is she really the most senior wizard on Earth?" Carmela said. "She doesn't look old enough." Kit winced in embarrassment at someone as sketchily informed about wizardry as Carmela making such judgments... even though the thought had crossed his mind as well. Mamvish, though, cocked an indulgent eye at her. "Seniority," Mamvish said, "takes many forms. Irina is quite special. No one understands the Earth the way she does: and as a result, it listens to her." She waved her tail in a way that to Kit somehow communicated a strange level of concern. "If for some reason the Earth needed to be destroyed in a hurry... she'd be the one that the Powers would talk to." "She takes care of the Earth's kernel?" Darryl said, awed. "She may occasionally be the Earth's kernel," said Mamvish. "Certainly she's the planet's foremost geomancer: and when you possess and exercise power at so central a level, the difference between what you do and what you are does start to blur." She waved her tail again, turning as she did so. Another brief storm of Speech-characters broke out under Mamvish's hide, and the newly deposited red dust went sliding away sideways from the outcropping and the dune, blown there by a more concentrated and focused wind than the one that had dropped it there. "Let's tuck the egg back in where we found it," Mamvish said to Kit. "It'll be safe enough here. Your manuals, and my version of the Knowledge, have stored all the data we acquired from the egg today. The rest of the investigative team will now have the data, too. Our next task is to work out how to open the egg, or read its interior, so that we don't lose any potential clues to just what happened on this world." "You mean," Carmela said, "maybe the species that lived here destroyed themselves or something?" Mamvish waved her tail uncertainly. "It's too soon to say. When both the planets and the species in a given system have such ambivalences about another of the system's worlds, it could be an indicator that something catastrophic occurred. But with so little information in the manual to guide us, we have to be careful not to jump to conclusions." "Isn't it kind of weird that there isn't anything?" Darryl said. "Not at all. Sometimes the Powers That Be purposely conceal information for one reason or another— but in this case, They tell me They've done no such thing. Which leaves us with other possibilities. The Lone Power might have interfered, causing that information to be hidden. Or the species in question may itself have found a way to redact the data, for reasons of their own." Mamvish waved her tail again. "We'll take our time and find the truth. Meanwhile, I've got other business to take care of... so let's seal this up and call it a day." Kit nodded and went to kneel in front of the outcropping again. He put one hand on that cold brownish stone and said the Mason's Word, feeling the stone go soft under his skin. Then carefully he slipped the egg back into the heart of the outcropping. When it was completely concealed, he paused for just a moment more with his hands on the smooth alien metal, unwilling to take his hands away: he thought he felt the egg tingling slightly in his grip. <Am I imagining that?> But a moment later the sensation had faded. <Probably something to do with using the Mason's Word: you always get a little fizz, something to do with the gas atoms in the oxides or nitrates or whatever coming unbound...> Kit pulled his arms out of the stone, stood up, and dusted his hands on his pants. As usual, the gesture was fruitless: there always seemed to be more dust to get rid of. "Yeah," Carmela said, "and when you get home, make sure you stay away from the DVDs until you've washed up..." Kit silently gritted his teeth. <I can't wait to dump her,> he thought. <And then we have to find a way to keep her from tagging along everywhere we go, or this thing's gonna turn into a disaster...> "So," Mamvish said. "Keep doing what you're doing, cousins: and keep me informed. I'll leave the shield here to protect what we've found. Dai stihó!" And she was gone, without the slightest movement of the air inside the shield. "Now there goes a professional," Ronan said, shaking his head in admiration. "Irina's right: we're lucky to have her around." He stretched, glanced around. "Meanwhile, I've got to get back myself. Conference call tonight?" "Yeah," Kit said. "Put a note in my manual— we'll set a time. Big D?" He glanced at Darryl. "Any time after dinner's fine," Darryl said. He waved and vanished, making a careless pop in the air. Ronan rolled his eyes again. "Sloppy," he said. "See you later—" A second later Ronan, too, was gone, more silently. Kit looked at Carmela. "Well," he said, "let's get you back." He reached into his otherspace pocket and pulled out the ready-set transit spell he used to get back to his bedroom from Mars. Uncoiling the long sentence in the Speech, he ran the glowing line of light through his hands until he found the part he was looking for. "We need to put your personal info in this," he said. "Now, how much do you weigh this week?" His sister glared at him. "Could you start with a more tactless question?" "Sure. Your IQ?" Carmela glowered. Kit grinned as he dropped the spell to the ground, and it stretched into a circle around the two of them and joined one end to another like a snake biting its tail. His hands were still tingling slightly as he started reciting the first part of the transit spell and the world started to go silent around them. It was strange that even as the silence built and the universe leaned in to listen to what Kit wanted, he could still hear that hissing, the dust whirling by.... <Wellakh> Nita appeared as quietly as she could in the shade of the sassafras trees at the "wild" rear of her backyard. In between the bigger trees were tall thickets of smaller sassafras and wild mulberry scrub, screening the space from any possible view from the houses behind or to either side: but right now, the possibility of any neighbors noticing her was the least of her worries. Nita glanced up through the leaves at the late afternoon light, letting out a long, annoyed breath. <Since when do I appear out here like someone who's afraid to go in the house?> She slipped out from under the trees, heading up between the flower beds of the garden. Close to the house, not far from the chain-link fence and its gate, a tall, broad-crowned rowan tree stood in the middle of the yard, all covered with white flowers: an old rope swing hung from one branch. As she walked under the rowan, a long, leafy twig dropped down toward her: she put up a hand absent-mindedly and highfived it. "Liused..." she said in the Speech. <Sounding a little under the weather,> the tree said. "Ask me in an hour or so and I'll give you a more detailed weather report..." She opened the gate to the driveway. Her home life had once seemed so much more casual. <Where's your sister, dear? She's on one of Jupiter's moons, Mom.... Oh, well. I guess that's all right. Just as long as she's not creating life again.> After the shock of discovering that their daughters were wizards, Nita's mom and dad had eventually become almost relaxed about it all. But along with Nita's mother, those days were now gone. Her dad had become much more the heavy parent in the last six months. <You have to expect some changes,> her counselor, Mr. Millman, had said. <People handle their love and their loss in a hundred different ways. The results can be annoying until you understand what's going on.> Though Nita was starting to understand, the annoyance was a long way from abating. In Nita's dad's case, she suspected his new sternness about wizardly doings was because he knew the tendency toward wizardry had come down to his kids through his side of the family, and he was feeling as if this was somehow all his fault. <If only I could brainfix my dad and make him think that everything was just fine with Dairine.> Well, Nita could brainfix him, but it would be the wrong thing to do, would be in complete contravention of the Wizard's Oath, and would make her feel like a criminal. Nor was it any consolation that psychotropic spelling, the wizardries that could be used to change people's minds about things, were such a nuisance to work, had such a horrible backlash on the wizard who worked them, and worked for so short a time before everything went back to the way it had been before. The irony wasn't lost on Nita that a wizard could so easily change concrete physical matter, but practically had to sweat blood to change something as immaterial as someone else's thought. <Or if I could only clone my sister. Make an extra one who'd stay home and behave, so Dad wouldn't notice what was going on with the real one...> Then Nita groaned, not believing she was seriously having this idea. The last time there'd been a cloned Dairine around, during her sister's Ordeal, the complications had been nearly endless. <One of her's enough for any universe! Or the whole sheaf of them. Besides— a Dairine that hangs around behaving all the time? Instantly identifiable as a fake.> She paused on the back doorstep, trying to devise some kind of strategy for handling her dad. His stern moods could be hard to derail— "You could come in, you know," said a voice from the kitchen, through the screen door. "It's not you I'm going to ground." That sounded promising, but it didn't seem smart to relax just yet. Nita went in. Her dad was rooting around in a cupboard next to the stove; a full coffee cup stood on the counter. "Are we out of sugar?" "We just got a whole bag last week," Nita said, leaning against the counter. "Is sugar why I came all the way back from Mars? We were just getting to the good part!" "And you can go back," her dad said, coming down with a crumpled-up, near-empty bag of store-brand sugar, "as soon as you sort things out here at home." "What 'things'?" "Your sister," her father said, "was missing from school today." <Thought so.> Nita rolled her eyes. "Daddy, there's only two days of school left before summer. You know that she—" "I don't know that she," her dad said, sounding annoyed, letting the cupboard door fall shut and pulling a spoon out of the silverware drawer, which he hip-slammed shut. "And I really dislike getting these calls from school telling me she's nowhere to be found, after she promised she'd stop cutting classes to run all over the galaxy!" Nita went into the dining room and flopped down in a chair. <This is not my fault, why am I having to deal with this?> "So where is she?" her dad said. "Did she mention to you where she was headed?" "No. I have no idea." "It's not just that she wasn't at school," her dad said. "She also hasn't done her chores. The kitchen was a mess when I came in, and the garbage didn't go out this morning. And after I had a big thing with her last week about not leaving the planet before she's done her work at home! For a few days it looked like she was going with the program. But now..." Nita buried her head in her arms. <This is a disaster. I can see it coming now: here goes my whole summer...> In the kitchen, the spoon clinked in the cup for a few moments: then her dad followed Nita in and sat down beside her. He turned the mug around and around on the table between his hands. "Honey, your mom was always better than I was at knowing what was going on in Dairine's head... or at least having a clue." She could hear from his voice that it cost her father something to make this admission. "I don't have her to help me out now. So you're going to have to step into the gap and give me a hand." Nita wanted to laugh helplessly, but this didn't seem to be the moment. "I can check the manual to find out where she is, sure. But as for figuring out why she does what she does day by day, by reading her mind or something, it's not going to happen, Daddy! It's easy to keep someone out of your head if you know they're trying to listen. And even when you can hear somebody's thoughts, you can't always tell what the thoughts mean to them." Her dad looked frustrated. "Then what use is mind reading?" "Not a lot," Nita said. "Talking still works best. Which is what wizardry's about, to begin with." "Well, talking's not working real well with Dairine at the moment," Nita's dad said. "She keeps telling me she'll stay in touch, be back home for meals... and then it doesn't happen. This has to stop... and you're going to see that it does." "Me? How? I can't do anything about—" "Oh, yes, you can. To begin with, you can find her and get her back here. And then you can find a way to make sure she behaves." Nita's father frowned. "I don't want to play the bad guy here, but I can't spend every day of the summer wondering where she is and what trouble she's getting into! I have a right to some time off, too—an afternoon or an evening when I don't have to be worrying about her. This kind of behavior isn't fair to me!" He looked at Nita. She let out a breath. "No," she said, "I guess not." "Thank you. So I want to know from you every day where Dairine is, until I can start depending on her to let me know. And you go nowhere on any given day until you've satisfied me as to where she's going to be and whether she's okay." Nita heaved a heavy, exasperated sigh and stood up. "You want her back here right now?" "Yes." "And then I can get back to what I was doing?" "Yes." "Then I have to do something first," Nita said. "Do it. Then bring her home for dinner." Nita went slowly up the stairs, wearing a frown that she suspected looked much like her dad's. <I hate this. And it's not fair to me. But there's no way out. And he's kind of right—> At the top of the stairs, she paused, looking out the window that overlooked the next-door neighbor's front yard. <So treat it like a challenge from the Powers... because maybe it is. Figure out what to do, and maybe the rest of the summer won't turn into a horror story.> Nita let out a breath. <Think of Dairine as just another intervention, one more problem to be solved.> Then Nita swallowed—because whether she liked it or not, there was one step she had to take before she could start solving this particular problem. In her bedroom she sat down on the bed and pulled her manual out of her otherspace pocket. For a long moment Nita sat hunched over, holding the closed book in her hands, looking at the scuffed blue buckram cover, then flipped the book open and paged through to the directory that listed wizards and their status. She didn't have a bookmark for the page she wanted, but then she'd never had cause to look up information about the world of the wizard in question: he'd just turned up in her basement while she was off on exchange. "I need the pages for the star system containing the planet Wellakh..." The book in her hands riffled its own pages hastily from right to left, kicking up a little cool breeze. Nita smiled. "Can I get you to do this all the time when it's hot out?" The pages instantly laid themselves out extremely flat, open and still. "Okay, don't get all annoyed," Nita said under her breath, amused, and glanced at the open pages. Wellakh's golden-yellow star displayed in the first of a set of images on the left-hand page. The right-hand page filled with data about the system and its one inhabited planet: a précis of local system history, details about the species inhabiting the one inhabited world, and other general information. Nita read quickly through it, shaking her head; the planet's history had been difficult. <Not that anyone couldn't tell that from clear out in space,> she thought, looking at the image of the planet. Half of Wellakh was dappled with blue seas and lakes, much of its terrain red-golden with the planet's idiosyncratic vegetation. There were even snowy mountains here and there. But the other half of that world was flat and scorched-looking, a slagged-down desolation. <What would it have been like growing up there—knowing that anytime, your sun might get cranky and pull the same stunt again?> Nita touched the listing again. "Show me all wizards native to the planet for the last hundred Wellakhit years." The picture of the planet dissolved, replaced by a couple of columns' worth of listing. Nita glanced down it, turned the page to see two more columns there. But that was all. <Just a few hundred wizards. Not a lot for a world with a population of over a billion: mostly a pretty peaceful place. But the troubles they've got are big ones. And for the worst ones, they need a very special kind of wizard...> Nita started running down the list. <Ke Nelaid, ROSHAUN... 'See det Nuiiliat'? Oh, I get it, that's the clan name the whole family's listed under...> Under det Nuiiliat, a long list of wizards in that wizards in that family went right down the page. In fact, half the wizards on the planet were either in this family or related to it. Nita swallowed as she came to "Nelaid"... then realized this wasn't the wizard she was looking for, but his father. <Ke Seriv, NELAID. Residence—> The address initially displayed in the Wellakhit language, then re-rendered itself in the Speech. <Sunplace, the Borders, the Scorched Zone, Old Continent. Position: Sunlord-in-Abeyance. Power rating: 28.8 +/-.5.> Nita's eyebrows went up: that was a very high rating, certainly higher than Tom's or Carl's. <Physical status: Corporate. Mission status: Presently unassigned; political considerations.> But this wasn't the name Nita was looking for. <I missed it: on Wellakh they change their names depending on who their father was...> She glanced farther up the column, and a little shiver of pain went through her as she found the name she'd resisted looking up for so long. <Ke Nelaid, ROSHAUN. Former residence: Sunplace, the Borders, the Scorched Zone, Old Continent. Position: Son of the Sunlord, son of the Great King, descendant of the Inheritors of the Great Land, the Throne-Destined.> Nita grimaced at the huge weight of words, which Dairine had immediately reduced to "prince." Then Nita looked down at what she had been avoiding, the single line underneath the description. [Physical status:] And she stared at the blank space after the words. There was nothing else there. <But that doesn't make any sense—!> Nita scanned up the column again to other older names. The majority of their physical status listings showed the single long, curved-back streak of Speech charactery that meant one thing: <Recall.> Nita had seen it often enough in the listings of wizards from Earth, both those whose lives had been lost in the line of duty and those who had died in other circumstances. The implication seemed to be that once you were a wizard, maybe you never stopped being one unless you really wanted to— and even after you were dead, or what passed for dead in the Real World, the Powers That Be nonetheless considered you to still be on some kind of duty. It was, in a strange way, reassuring. <But this... this is just strange.> The listing did have some unusual descriptions of physical status. One, attributed to one of Roshaun's great-great-grandmothers, was Indeterminate. A couple of others said Exhaled. Nita blinked. <Whatever that means!> But the complete lack of a physical status for Roshaun left Nita bemused. She reached out to the listing and touched a different name, feeling the small sizzle of power that spoke of active wizardry indwelling in a self. All the names had it, dead or alive. But when she touched Roshaun's name— No sizzle: a feeling as if the manual page was nothing but ordinary paper. <It's as if not even the Powers That Be are sure what's happened to him. How can that be? I don't get it.> < And if even They don't get it—> Nita let the manual's pages fall forward on the finger that held her place. <Whatever it means... it also means that Roshaun's not dead! Or not dead yet. Or something. And whatever else I might think about what Dairine's up to, at least she's not nuts, or in denial. She's looking for somebody she's got at least a chance of finding. Maybe the smallest chance imaginable... but still a chance.> Nita spent the next few moments just getting hold of herself... for she'd been shaking, afraid of what she was about to find. <Which just goes to show that I should've done this a long time ago. Maybe I could have saved myself this grief with Dairine!> The shock of relief was almost as hard to bear as the shock she'd braced herself for, that final awful certainty from which there would have been no retreat. Finally she flipped the manual open again, riffling through to the section holding the directory for Earth. Nita had a quick-reference "bookmark" page installed at the front, showing names of wizards she knew well or had worked with either frequently or occasionally. The name she was looking for was almost at the top. <Callahan, DAIRINE R. Present location: Sunplace, Old Continent, Wellakh.> Nita raised her eyebrows. <Okay... but doing what?> she thought. <Arrival time: JD 2454274.10012. Power rating, 5.45 +/- .55...> Nita eyed her sister's power level: it was lower than she'd ever seen it. <Then again, what's this supposed to be?> She looked curiously at the listing beside it, one she couldn't remember having seen before. It said, <Under augmentation: augment level 3.2 +/- 2.2.> She frowned. <That's a new one. What's she up to?> She put her finger on the listing. "Coordinates, please?" They displayed on the page. At the same time, a voice said in the back of her head, <You know, if you'd just ask me, I'd do the gating and take you there.> "Bobo," Nita said, "I appreciate the offer. I just want to make sure I don't lose the hang of doing it the hard way." <You're just a glutton for punishment,> the peridexis said. "You and I are going to have to sit down—as much as you can sit, anyway—and have a long talk about—" <How we can be talking at all?> Bobo said. At least he didn't sound injured. <I guess I wonder myself. But go on, do your spell the hard way...> Nita jiggled the charm bracelet on her wrist until the gating charm came up. Out of it she pulled a long, blue-glowing thread of spell, a single word-character in the Speech. This she drew down until it touched Dairine's entry in the manual, hooking to its location parameters. Then Nita let go of the strand of light. When it snapped back into the charm, it pulled with it a whole new chain of characters, swallowed them up, and blazed, ready to go. Nita stood up and shoved the manual into the waiting otherspace pocket. Then she pulled on the charm again, and that long line of glowing blue light slid out: she dropped it on the floor, where it went a fierce molten gold and stretched into a circle of Speech-words, ready to knot itself up in the Wizard's Knot. Nita looked down at the glowing words and slowly began to speak them, turning as she spoke. The room went silent. Darkness pressed in. As she completed the spell and pronounced the syllables of the Wizard's Knot, everything went dark. Moments later she found herself standing on a terrace of some smooth, glittering dark-golden stone. Behind her, in a sheer stone wall, was a series of tall, glassy doors, like the entry to a school or the front of a theater, leading into some dim, hard-to-see interior. Maybe fifty yards in front of Nita, the terrace ended in a meter-high railing that followed the terrace's curve hundreds of feet along to either side and out of sight. Out past the rail she got a glimpse of wide gardens far below, fading off into a barer landscape. Glancing from side to side, Nita saw that the terrace itself was cantilevered well out from the surface of the huge, relatively smooth needle of stone behind her, in the base of which the doors were set. Nita tilted her head back, trying to see the top of the peak above. <A few hundred feet, maybe—> It was hard to tell. The blue-green sky was full of clouds: as she watched, one drifted straight into and around the top of that needle of stone, obscuring it. More terraces were visible above, staggered around the surface of the uprising spear of stone, up to the cloud and past it. Nita glanced around, wondering where to go from here. Her transport wizardry had built into it a typical so-called "decent interval" offset; you'd be deposited somewhere within, say, a hundred meters of the person you were seeking, but the wizardry wouldn't drop you right into that person's lap. <So let's see...> Down the right side of the curve, nothing was visible but featureless, shining stone. To the left, though, maybe fifty yards down, Nita spotted a single small door, all by itself. <But wait. Not a door. That's a gate. It's got bars—> Nita reached sideways and retrieved her manual from the otherspace pocket— for when a wizard was visiting a world where wizardry was practiced in the open, his manual was his passport— and walked toward that gate. Above her, that cloud moved away. On the stony spire's far side, the sun came out, throwing a long path of shadow down the wall, over the gate and Nita, and out to the terrace's edge. But as she got close to the gate, she saw a light as intense pouring out of it, streaming in a narrow bar-striped ribbon out across the terrace. Nita stared. <Oooookay,> she thought. <Unusual.> She walked slowly to the gate, tucking her manual under her armpit, and reached for her charm bracelet, pinching one small glassy lens-charm between finger and thumb and saying a few words in the Speech under her breath. A fragment of spell-shielding ran up and over her free hand and nearly to her elbow, like an oven mitt of thickened air. She wiggled her fingers to make sure that it felt right, and then stuck the shielded hand into that light. Nothing happened. <Just sunlight?> Nita thought. <Weird, unless there's a window on the far side of the mountain—>She shook the shield-spell back down her arm: it vanished. Then she peered around through the bars of the gate. Her mouth dropped open. <Sunlight,> she thought. Inside the gate was a huge, domed, circular room nearly as wide across as the entire width of the spire of stone. Inside it, floating maybe three feet above the floor, was a sun. Nita leaned against the gate, staring at the burning, dark-golden globe that hung there. It looked to be about fifty feet in diameter. Blobby black foot-long sunspots sailed slowly across its surface, the fiery red-gold plasma they pushed through getting all torn up by their magnetic fields. Plasma writhed and stretched away from the surface in bright filaments as the sunspots plowed stubbornly through it like inkblots with a mission. Elsewhere, sticking up off the surface like fuzz off a ball of yarn, spiky prominences licked into the upper reaches of the star's atmosphere, frayed at their ends, fell back again. If you held still, you could just see the star's rotation, as slow as watching sunrise. As Nita watched, movement off to the right caught her eye as someone walked around the side of the great globe and stood with her back to Nita, looking up at it. <What the heck is she wearing?> Nita thought. There was no mistaking Dairine, especially in that small sun's light: it made her red hair look even redder than usual. When Nita had seen her this morning, Dairine had been been wearing floppy jeans and a cropped T-shirt. She might still have them on, but it was hard to tell, as she also now wore some kind of silky floor-length tunic in a dark honey color. Dairine half turned, pushed up the sleeve of the tunic—<yeah, the jeans and the top are still there; what a strange look!>— and thrust her arm into the sun, almost up to the shoulder, where she stood feeling around under the "star's" surface like someone trying to find something hidden at the back of a dark cupboard. And as Dairine felt around inside the sun, her glance fell on Nita. Dairine's eyes went wide: she froze. <That's my cue,> Nita thought. <Is this open?> She pushed the gate experimentally. It swung open under her push. Nita walked in and started across that broad shining floor toward Dairine. Dairine took her arm out of the sun, shook it, folded her arms, and stood watching Nita come. This was a sure sign that Dairine was in a snotty mood and ready to be tough to deal with. <Now it's just a question of how to handle it.> Nita kept walking, letting her attention move to that huge, slowly turning ball of energy. The energy was real; as she got closer, the heat from the "sun" was increasing, though it was nothing like what a star would genuinely have emitted. <It's a simulator,> Nita thought. <Maybe even a real-time mirror of Wellakh's own star—> Another shape came out from behind the starglobe: a man. He was taller than all but the tallest human beings would be— slender, narrow-shouldered, wiry, with very long hair as red as Dairine's. He wore the same sort of long, light tunic Dairine was wearing, though his was several shades darker, with nothing under it but a sleeveless vest and long, loose trousers of a similar silky material, almost exactly the dark fiery amber color of that star. As Nita got closer she spotted something else unusual that Dairine was wearing besides the tunic. Around her neck was an oversize torc of red-gold metal, with a smooth, egg-shaped, egg-sized stone set in it—paler than the metal, slightly paler than the color of the star. In its depths, as Nita got close, she saw a glow that shifted and moved, echoing the stretch and snap of the prominences on the "star's" surface. Every now and then the glow dimmed as a miniature sunspot slipped by under the surface of the gem. Dairine, hostile-eyed, watched Nita coming as the man walked around the side of the "star" toward them. Nita paused and waited for him to approach. His walk was easy and graceful, but his expression suggested that the outer calm concealed a tremendous tension. Nita found herself being examined by very immediate green eyes, shadowed under heavy brows. The Wellakhit's face was a sharp one, high-cheekboned, eyes slanted, so that it was easy to get the impression of some cool and thoughtful predator looking at you. As he got closer, Nita picked up on something else: a sense of sheer power that transmitted itself right across the empty air. She concentrated on hanging on to her composure as he came, for she'd never felt anything quite like this before from a being who worked with wizardry and was also mortal. <Most immortals spend a lot of effort covering up their power,> she thought, <so we ephemerals won't get too freaked. And mortal wizards don't flaunt their power: it's rude.> But this wizard possibly had reasons for handling his aura differently. On Wellakh, where there were relatively few wizards, Nelaid ke Seriv was very senior indeed: if not actually the Planetary—for some worlds had none—then the next thing to it on Wellakh, a person of crucial importance to the planet's well-being and a power to be reckoned with. <Which is probably why it annoys him so much that some of his people keep trying to assassinate him. And why he walks around with his aura hanging out, so anybody in range gets reminded what they're in for if they cross him...> As he came, Nita's eyes went back to that flaming hair of his. It wasn't just almost the same shade as Dairine's: it was exactly the same shade. <That is beyond strange!> And at the back of Nita's mind, the thought stirred that, in a wizard's world, there were no coincidences. When something looked like a connection, it was smart for you to pay attention— <Later.> When she judged that Nelaid was close enough, Nita executed the half bow that she'd found worked well with most bipedal humanoid species. "Senior," Nita said, having considered which of ten or twenty terms of address would be most correct, "in the Powers' names, and on Their behalf, greetings from another jurisdiction." "Young cousin," he said, a response correct if not precisely comradely, "in Their names, and on Their business as always, welcome." "What are you doing here?" Dairine said. Nita didn't even spare Dairine a glance. Protocol dictated otherwise: you always greeted and briefed the most senior wizard first. This also left Nita with a perfect way to outflank Dairine's temper. "Sir, I'm sorry to interrupt whatever's going on, but we have a family situation that in my judgment overrides what my manual indicates is an elective exercise on my sister's part. With your permission—" Nelaid nodded, a gracious gesture of agreement, and turned away as if to examine the star-simulation. Nita went over to Dairine. Under her breath she said, "You look like a Jedi knight who lost the bathrobe's belt." Dairine rolled her eyes. "I live for your fashion bulletins." "Your continued life is just what we're talking about. At least your home life. Dad wants you back there right now." "You came all the way here to tell me that? You can just go back, thanks." The dismissive, cutting tone made Nita flush hot. As she opened her mouth, "Your pardon," Nelaid said, "but a matter has arisen that requires my intervention. If I may be excused—" Surprised by the very status-neutral language, Nita caught the oddest look from Nelaid, a slight narrowing of the eyes. Then he vanished without so much as a breath of wind, the effortless displacement of a wizard who had long since perfected the art of teleporting in or out without anyone being the wiser. <Especially whoever's trying to murder him this afternoon...> Nita turned back to Dairine. "What exactly are you doing?" "Practicing. Or I was until you butted in." Dairine turned away. "Practicing what?" Shrugging out of her overrobe, Dairine glared at Nita. "Messing with the energy management of a live star," she said. "What are you, obtuse?" <She's trying to get me mad,> Nita thought, <and that'll be her excuse to blow me off.> "Cruel question for someone you know hates geometry," Nita said. Her sister's mouth quirked as she folded up the robe. Nita kept her own face still. "Dair, you ditched school." "Like everybody else wasn't ditching it today," Dairine muttered, turning away. "Like it's such a big deal. Some schools are more important than others." "Won't argue," Nita said. "But you and Dad had an agreement. If you'd let him know what you were going to do first, you might have been in less trouble than you are now. Now you've got a mess to clean up. The least you can do," Nita said as Dairine opened her mouth to say something angry, "is let me help you get out of it so you can get on with business." Dairine paused. "What?" Nita laughed, thinking, <This is the way to go, keep her off balance...> "You think I enjoy watching you get in trouble? There's nothing in it for me. And it screws up my schedule. Let's keep this brief so we can both get back to what we were doing, okay?" Dairine stared, caught between bemusement and suspicion. "Are you all right?" she said. "Have you flunked something?" "No! This isn't about anything but me helping you cover your butt, because it looks like you need help with that right now." Dairine scowled, but now at least the scowl suggested that they might be on the same side of the argument. "All right, how?" "We're going to bug your manual," Nita said. Dairine's eyes went wide. "Oh, no, you're not!" she said. "Nobody but me messes with Spot!" "Of course somebody does!" Nita said. "All the time. Wizardry messes with Spot every second of the day." Dairine gave her a strange look. "All Dad wants is to know where you are, and that you're okay," Nita said. "There are two ways that can happen. He can make me run after you constantly and report in on everything you do. I mean everything. If he doesn't like something you're up to, I'll have to haul you out of it... which is probably going to make us kill each other by the end of the summer. You'll be sick and tired of me butting in on you every five minutes, yeah?" "Yeah—" "And I'll want you dead because having to keep tabs on you will ruin my schedule and drive me berserk. Since killing each other would get the Powers That Be cranky with us, let's try something different. Remember the translation spinoff we arranged with Tom last month, so Dad would have access to the manual info about Filif and Sker'ret and Roshaun when they came to visit?" Dairine nodded, but couldn't cover the wince of pain on hearing Roshaun's name. Nita pretended she hadn't noticed. "We'll do the same deal," Nita said, "but instead we'll hook the output from your daily manual precís into it. Dad can read it on the computer, or even his cell phone." "He won't understand half of it," Dairine said, scowling. "Not my problem," Nita said. "You get to explain stuff to him when you get home every day. He'll calm down even more when you're telling him about what you're doing." "It's gonna be a nuisance," Dairine said. "Not as much a nuisance as being grounded." Dairine grinned. "Like he could." "He couldn't. But Tom could." The amusement fell out of Dairine's expression. "You know he and Dad talk every few days! One word from Dad to Tom, and unless you're officially on errantry, your butt's going to be stuck on Earth till the two of them agree otherwise." Dairine opened her mouth. "And the Powers That Be wouldn't countermand Tom unless there was something big going on! Till we hit the local legal age, They're mostly on Dad's side." Dairine stared at the polished floor. "I don't know," she said at last, looking toward the simulation. "This has kind of a Big Brother sound to it..." "Or Big Sister?" Nita said. "Yeah, it does. But it's the best deal we're going to get from Dad right now. And since Bobo is wizardry, and the Powers That Be run him, he can't do anything bad to you or Spot." Nita glanced around. "Where is he, anyway?" Dairine gestured with her head toward the star simulator. To Nita's considerable surprise, a small shadow, like a rectangular sunspot, materialized near the bottom of the slowly rotating globe: and then a dark oblong shape extruded itself from the shadow and dropped toward the shining floor. The shape put out legs in midair and landed on them, bouncing slightly as it came down. Then it came spidering over to Dairine and Nita. "Wow," Nita said, "he's had another upgrade." When she'd seen Spot only that morning, he'd looked as he had for the last couple of months—a little silvery laptop about the size of a large paperback book. Now, though, he'd gone wider, leaner, and shining black. Set into the back of the closed lid, matte black against the sleek gloss of the rest of the carapace, was what could at first glance have been mistaken for the fruity logo of a large computer company: but this apple had no bite out of it. "Very slick, guy!" Nita said to him. "Nice look." <Thanks,> Spot said. As usual, he was no more verbally forthcoming with Nita than with anyone else but Dairine. But he did sound faintly pleased. Dairine let out a long breath. "I don't know about this," she said under her breath. "Bobo's kind of your tool." Nita burst out laughing. Dairine looked at her strangely. "What? What's so funny?" It took Nita a few moments to get the laughter under control. "My tool! Oh, please. Like I can order wizardry around and tell it what to do! Please let that happen." She got down on one knee. "Spot," she said, "have you been following this?" <Yes.> "Will this solution work for you? You're the one who'll be the source of the raw data. Bobo'll just be managing the spinoff for Dad: he'll feed the massaged data to the computer at home." <Maybe with text-message alerts when something new comes in,> Bobo said at the back of Nita's mind. <Copied to e-mail...> Nita rolled her eyes. <Not only do I have the spirit of wizardry living in my head, but it's a geek spirit.> She turned her attention back to Spot. He turned one eye up to look at Dairine. <Okay with you?> Dairine shrugged. "If we're going to stay on track with what we're doing here, sounds like it has to be." <Okay,> Spot said, and trundled off back under the simulator. There he levitated up into the body of the surrogate sun, vanishing in the glare of its chromosphere. Nita shook her head. "How hot does it get in there?" "Not too bad," Dairine said, and sighed. "A couple thousand degrees K. The temperature's scaled down, like the exterior, for practice. Wizards here usually scale themselves way up in apparent size to work with Thahit. Seems it perceives us better that way." Nita nodded. "Okay. Look... thanks for working with me on this. Why don't you go get changed and we'll head home and deal with Dad before he gets too crazy. The sooner we disarm him, the sooner life gets back to what passes for normal." Dairine nodded, moved away. Then suddenly she stopped and turned: and the strange, hard look on her face made Nita wonder if she was going to have to do this bout of persuasion all over again. "One thing," Dairine said. Nita tried to stay calm. "Yeah?" Dairine came back to Nita almost reluctantly. "When you came after me just now," Dairine said, "you checked your manual first, didn't you? To see what happened to Roshaun." Nita froze. Dairine's voice had gone expressionless and flat, and hearing it sound that way scared Nita: the last time she'd heard that tone from her sister had been just after their mom had died. <How do I handle this? What do I say?> "Yeah," Nita said. "I did." Dairine stared at her. Then she whispered, "What did it say?" <Oh, wow, I was afraid of this! Either she hasn't looked, or she has and doesn't believe what she saw. And if whatever I say is the wrong answer, now I get blamed for whatever I found.> "Uh... Something weird. Something really— vague." Dairine's face was simply frozen. Nita didn't dare move. <Oh, no, I'm dead now...> But suddenly her sister was hugging her hard, her face buried in Nita's vest. "Oh, wow," Dairine was saying, "oh, wow, I was so scared, I thought that he— and then I thought I was crazy; it didn't make any sense. But if you saw it, too, then it's true, he's not, not dead, he's not—" Nita was bemused, but for the moment the safest course seemed to be to just hang on to Dairine while her sister got herself under control. "It's okay," she said, "it's okay"— while very much hoping it actually was. After a moment Dairine pushed her away, turning her back to wipe her eyes. "Come on," Nita said, "let's get moving. Go change." Dairine nodded and vanished. Nita turned away from the slowly rotating star— then jumped. In complete silence, Nelaid had reappeared behind her and was standing with hands clasped behind his back, looking past Nita at the simulator. That ironic gaze shifted to her now. Nita popped out in a sweat. The effect was similar to being in the principal's office, except that in this case she hadn't been called: she'd walked in and told the principal to his face that whatever he was doing, he needed to stop it while she dealt with business. "I'm really, really sorry," Nita said. "If I could have, I'd have waited till she got home. But my dad—" Nelaid held up a hand, closed his eyes. It was a gesture Nita had seen other humanoid species use as the equivalent of a headshake. When Nelaid opened his eyes again, his expression was milder, if no less ironic. "She is, I take it, a trial to you." Nita rolled her eyes. "You have no idea." "I might," Nelaid said. "I had a younger brother once. He should have been Sunlord when our father left the body. But others had different plans for him. And my father, and me." In the précis on Wellakh, Nita had seen references to the political instability of the world: but the phrase "frequent assassinations" can sound merely remotely troubling until you find yourself discussing the reality of it with one of the targets. Not certain how to respond, Nita kept quiet. "She reminds me of him," Nelaid said, looking at the simulation of the Wellakhit homestar as it gently rotated. As they watched, a single loop of prominence arched up out of the leftward limb of the star, strained away from it, snapped in two; the ends frayed away and the separate jets fell back to the sun's surface in a splash of plasma. "Of your brother?" Nita said. Nelaid closed his eyes again. When they opened, Nita was sorry she'd said anything: the grief and pain in Nelaid's eyes flared as the prominence had, brief and fierce. Then the look was swallowed back into that look of carefully controlled irony, and might never have been there at all. "Is she in difficulty at home?" Nelaid said. "Some. It'll be okay when we get back. Our dad just needs to know what Dairine's doing." And then the idea hit her. "I wonder—" Nita said, and stopped. <Where do I go from here? There are too many ways this can go wrong—> Too late: Nelaid was waiting. "It might make our father happier," Nita said, "if he knew for sure that she had someone keeping an eye on her. Someone—" "Older?" Nelaid said. "More responsible?" He smiled. Again there was pain in the smile, but it was distant enough, Nita thought, that Nelaid could now also find it funny. "A father figure?" Nita said, taking the chance. After a long moment's stillness, Nelaid nodded. "Perhaps, when the present problem is settled, he and I might speak. At his convenience." Nita bowed to Nelaid, and not one of those all-purpose half-bows, either. In the middle of it, the air went bang!* behind her as Dairine reappeared. "You drop something?" her sister said. Nita straightened, catching a glint of humor in Nelaid's eyes, but this hid itself as quickly as the pain had. "No. Where's Spot?" Spot popped out of the air between the two of them. Nelaid looked over Nita's head and said to Dairine, "You did moderately well with the last exercise, but you have much work to do yet before it's perfect, and perfection is what's required. Let me know when you're at liberty to deal with the situation." Dairine bowed, too: a somewhat cursory gesture, but more than most entities would get from her, no matter how many planets they virtually ruled. Nita pulled the transit circle out of her charm bracelet, dropped it to the floor, nodded goodbye to Nelaid, and activated the spell. A few blinks later they were standing in their backyard. The long afternoon shadows were not too far along from where Nita had left them. "Go upstairs and sort yourself out," Nita said as they headed toward the house. "Be quiet about it. Then come down. Don't make him come up after you. Okay?" "Will you cut it out? It's not like I don't know how to handle him!" Nita caught her sister by the shoulder. "Handling's not what he needs right now. Just play it straight, so we can both get back to business. Please?" Dairine gave her a quick look of rebellion— but that was all, a moment's indulgence of habit— and vanished. Nita sighed and headed through the gate, up the driveway, and into the house. Her dad was still at the dining room table, working on another cup of coffee: he looked surprised to see Nita come in the door. "She'll be down in a minute," Nita said, and flopped into a chair. Her dad blinked. "Just like that?" Nita shrugged. Her dad stared down into his cup, looked up again. "You think I was a little abrupt with you before?" Nita said nothing, just gave him back one of his favorite expressions, a wide-eyed look with the eyebrows right up. Her dad laughed, a brief, embarrassed sound. "Sorry about that." "It's okay." He was looking at the table again, a little unfocused. "Roshaun," her father said, sounding reluctant. "Just what happened with him up there on the Moon?" Nita shook her head, wishing she had more clarity on the subject. "He vanished." "But wizards vanish all the time." "Not like this," Nita said. "It was a lot more... final." "But not final enough for Dairine." "No. Dad—" There was no way to say this that wasn't going to pain both of them, so she just said it. "Even for humans, there's dead, and then there's dead dead. Other species handle mortality other ways. They have to: their souls are different shapes from ours. But no matter what shape your soul is, when you're a wizard, weird things can happen to change the way things work..." She shook her head. "The only thing I'm sure of is that Roshaun's not dead the way we think about dead." "And so Dairine actually has some chance of finding him?" Nita nodded. "If anyone can, yeah. But he's still lost. And all this time she's been spending on his home planet… I think she feels like she owes a debt to his mom and dad. Like she got Roshaun involved with our planet... and then Nelaid and Miril lost their son because of what she did." Her dad sat silent for a moment. "It's honorable, what she's doing," he said at last. "But at the same time—Nita, she's eleven! And she needs a lot of watching." "So that's just what you'll be doing, whenever you want," Nita said. "And she's going to explain everything you see. It'll be the next best thing to standing over her shoulder, watching." And Nita grinned. "Might be more data than you want." "I wouldn't bet on that," her dad said. But as he leaned back in the chair, he looked more relaxed. Nita stood up. "So am I off the hook?" Her dad's look was meant to be stern, but Nita wasn't fooled. "For the moment. We'll see how this works out." Nita went over and hugged and kissed him, because he was really being very good. Then she headed for the back door before he changed his mind. "By the way—" In the kitchen doorway, hearing the stairs creak as Dairine came down them, Nita paused. "Yeah?" "I keep meaning to ask you. What is on Mars?" "Besides a rock with your cell phone number carved on it?" Nita grinned. "We're not sure. But we're gonna find out." "Well, all right. But don't get us invaded, now..." "Daddy!" He gave her a mischievous look. "Well, you can't blame me. It's kind of the first thing that comes to mind, isn't it?" "Yeah," Nita said. "I know." And she vanished. [ Nili Patera ] It was dark. Kit found himself staring at his bedroom ceiling, his eyes wide open. He was wide awake, but he couldn't think why. He lay there on his back under the covers for a few seconds, listening to the house. It was still, devoid of any of the little middle-of-the-night sounds that it made as the weather got warmer. And one other sound was missing, from the braided rug by the side of his bed: a small, faint whistling snore. Kit sighed. <Ponch,> he thought. But his dog's midnight snore was a sound he would not hear again. He turned his head on the pillow, peered at the digital clock on the front of the clock radio. <3:38.> < Which is what time on Mars?> He closed his eyes again for a moment, trying to do the math for the time at Nili Patera. But math was no match for the image of the green-brown sandy soil under his knees, and the strange shining blue-green superegg in his lap. He could just feel the faint sense of some quiet power running under the surface of it, mute, waiting. <That was it,> he thought, pushing himself up on his elbows. <It wasn't ready. It was waiting for something.> < And what if it's ready now?> Kit sat up in the quiet, gazing into the darkness, his heart pounding as if he'd been running somewhere. It was weird. Then, <No, it's not,> he thought. Kit had had a lot of trouble getting to sleep when he'd finally gotten home and turned in. He'd been as wired as if he was seven years old and the next day was going to be Christmas. <Well, what do I expect? I was on Mars. I actually touched an alien artifact that someone left there. I felt that it was alive—> <And waiting.> He looked again at the clock. <Mamvish said we should do some analysis first,> Kit thought. <Irina said, take your time...> Kit sat there for a few moments, listening to his heart pound. Then he threw the covers off, got up, and went to the desk by the window. The manual was there where he usually left it when he was home. <Analysis...> Kit thought. He flipped the manual's cover open and paged through to the Mars project section, then tapped the open pages so they'd glow in the dark. The only new things on the main project page were the manual-generated précis of what the group who went up to Mars yesterday had found, and beside it, a few "read, noted" symbols from research team members who'd flagged the entry to let other team members know they'd seen it. Kit shook his head, unbelieving. <Twenty-six other wizards working on this project and nobody has anything interesting to say?> Kit thought, frowning. <Even just 'Hey, wow'? Come on, people...!> He let out a frustrated breath and flipped on through to the part of the master directory he'd bookmarked. <I wonder, is Mamvish around—?> He found her name halfway down the page, as usual, with that astonishing power level noted next to it— a four-digit level, when even the most powerful wizards on Earth usually only went as high as three. Even Irina's level wasn't as high. Yet at the same time, the level of respect Mamvish had been showing Irina suggested that, at the more elevated levels of practice, sheer power wasn't everything. <Even if you could blow up a whole planet all by yourself—> It was a creepy thought. Wizardry was usually about keeping things alive, or at least in one piece. <And why would the Powers That Be want someone to blow a planet up?> Kit thought. <Especially their own?> A sudden image came to him of Irina, standing alone in some desert place, terrible power building around her, while her face held still and cold, and her eyes— Kit shivered. <Now, where'd that come from?> he thought. <Catching something from Neets, maybe—> He shook his head, glanced down at Mamvish's listing again. Next to the short version of her name flashed a small knotted symbol that was Speech-shorthand for <Occupied: on assignment.> Next to it was a long string of symbols indicating that Mamvish wasn't anywhere near this solar system, since the light-years-from your-location symbol had a tens-of-thousands augmentor suffix on it. <Halfway across the galaxy, it looks like. And busy. Dammit...> Kit leaned back in his chair, tipping it back on its back legs and rocking for a moment in thought: then sat forward and turned some more pages in the manual. <It's quarter of nine where Ronan is,> he thought. <He must be up by now!> But the "status" part of Ronan's listing, when he came to it, was grayed out, a sign that the person was unavailable for some routine reason, usually sleep. <I can't believe it. How can any sane person sleep late after what we were doing yesterday?> Kit folded his arms on top of his manual and put his head down sideways on them, frustrated. Again he found himself gazing at the oval braided rug where Ponch could always be found between bedtime and morning, lying on his back, snoring, waiting for Kit to get up and feed him. <I wish he was here,> Kit thought sadly. <I'd just say, 'Come on, Ponch, let's go to Mars!' And he'd jump up and spin around a few times and run out the door, ready to go...> Then Kit let out a long breath. He was a wizard, not a magician: and in a wizard's world, there was no use wasting your time wishing for things you couldn't have. You went on to the next option— by getting up off your butt and doing the necessary work. <Even if there's no one else to do it with . .> . Kit stood up, glancing down at the manual. <Neets...> But he could just imagine what she'd say if he woke her up at four in the morning after the afternoon and evening she'd had. Kit flipped over to the fast-messaging area in the back of the manual and had another look at the terse message she'd left him about the results of the phone call from her father, and her annoyance on coming back to Mars when everything was settled to find that everyone else had left. <Talk to you tomorrow AFTER LUNCH,> the note ended. He could practically see her scowling. <Well, she'll be over it after she's had some breakfast and some time to relax.> Kit straightened up, shivering: it was a while since the central heating had been on, and the room was chilly. <I'll jump up to my usual spot, then go check on the superegg from there. It'll take less energy than doing a whole new custom transit.> Very quietly he pulled clothes on— jeans, sweatshirt, down vest— and then the hiking boots his pop had given him for his last birthday, when the family had driven upstate for the weekend and walked the Appalachian Trail through Bear Mountain State Park. Those boots had been getting more than Earth dirt on them the last few weeks, and the abrasive sand and dust of the much-eroded Martian surface was in the process of wearing the leather down to a nice beat-up patina. He finished lacing up the right-hand boot, rubbing the leather thoughtfully: it was dry. Even though Kit always took enough air with him to Mars for a given visit, plus twenty percent in case of emergencies, that air tended to get very dried out while it was there. So did anything else inside the air bubble with him. <Better find the neat's-foot oil and leather wax for these things when I get back. Don't want them to start cracking.> Kit picked up the manual and paged through it again, then whispered the thirty-eight words of a spell macro he used when he wanted to get in and out of the house quietly: one small subroutine that put an inchthick layer of hardened air between him and the stairs, as a cushion for his footsteps, and another subroutine to ask the downstairs back door if it would please unlock itself in absolute silence. He made his way quietly downstairs, through the living room and into the kitchen. Just a faint line of light showed by the back door where it had eased itself open— a little crack showing Kit that the dimness outside was paling toward dawn. There, just behind the door, Kit paused for a moment, looking at something hanging on one of the coat hooks behind the door— a long, slim, faintly blue-glowing cord with a loop at each end, dangling down half-hidden behind one of Kit's winter jackets. It was a spell made of fishes' breath and other hard-to-source ingredients: Ponch's wizardly leash, the only leash that had been able to stay on his dog and keep whoever was walking him connected to him when he'd started walking between universes. <I really should roll that up and put it away...> But he hadn't been able to do that just yet: it would have been an admission of how completely his dog was gone. Kit sighed, touched the doorknob. <Thanks,> he said to the door and its locks. <No problem,> they said in chorus. <Know when you're coming back?> "Not just yet," Kit said in the Speech. "Go ahead, lock up again, but real quiet." He stepped out, pulled the door closed behind him; both locks snicked back into place. Kit went down the stairs into the carport and paused by his dad's pet project, the Edsel Pacer that he'd been restoring forever. Part of the problem was that parts for a car made in 1958 were getting hard to come by. But more to the point, Kit's pop was in the habit of taking a lot of overtime at work so that the family could afford things he thought they needed to have, like the new entertainment center, so mostly the Edsel sat here waiting patiently for him to summon up the energy to work on it. Every now and then his pop came out and waxed it, or oiled whatever metal was exposed so that it wouldn't suffer, or installed some long-sought part that had finally come in from somewhere around the country. The relationship was becoming a guilty one on Kit's pop's side, no matter how often Kit explained to his pop that the Edsel didn't really mind. "Hey, guy," Kit said, leaning against the right front fender and looking down into the headlight on that side. "You doing okay?" <I'm fine. Any news on the replacement taillights yet?> The car's resigned tone made Kit grin. "I hear they actually shipped," he said, walking around to the far side of the car and carefully opening the front door. He slipped in and sat down on the broad bench-style front seat, bracing the door so that it would fall closed quietly. "Should be here next week." <Great! Where you going today?> "The usual place," Kit said. He reached out and punched one of the radio buttons on the Edsel's dashboard. In immediate response, the transit spell he'd installed inside the car a couple of months back came alive around him, a glowing tracery of Speech-characters seemingly shining up from just underneath the surface of the seat's leather. The closed environment of the car did a good job of muffling the air-implosion noise that went with a teleport, and it was hard enough to see into the Edsel that Kit felt comfortable vanishing in there without adding the energy outlay of an invisibility spell on top of the transit. "We all clear?" He could feel the Edsel looking around it, though as with most inanimate objects, Kit wasn't sure what it was using to do the looking. <All clear. Be careful!> "All the time," Kit said. He reached down to the glowing lines of the transit spell, braced himself, and said the word to activate it. The next moment was never entirely comfortable. No one travels a hundred fifty million miles in a breath without his or her body complaining about the stresses and strains of bypassing lightspeed and numerous other natural laws. Kit felt, as usual, as if he was being squeezed unbearably tight on all sides, and the pressure got worse and worse— until all the pressure abruptly went away, and almost all the breath whooshed out of his lungs. That, too, was typical for a private transit to Mars: it took a fraction of a second for his life-support wizardry to analyze its new coordinates, recognize them, and kick in. Kit swallowed and opened his eyes, starting to gasp as the usual reaction to doing a biggish spell set in. He was right where he was supposed to be, sitting on his usual "landing rock," perched on the rim of the ancient caldera-crater of the extinct volcano Elysium Mons. Kit sat there waiting for the breathlessness to pass, and concentrated on blinking until his eyes worked right again. He had originally chosen this spot for its spectacular view. Though not as high or huge as its more famous cousin Olympus Mons, Elysium Mons stood up steep and splendidly isolated in the northern hemisphere lowland plains of Elysium Planitia. The cone of the old volcano alone was taller than Mount Everest. But underneath the mountain proper lay a great uplift plateau that ancient stresses had pushed some three kilometers up out of the crust; so the spot where Kit now sat towered at least forty thousand feet above the dark-sanded plain. Off to his left, twenty miles south and east at the edge of the pedestal, the little crater-topped mountain Albor Tholus rose up, its concave top whitened with dry-ice snow. Beyond it, the underlying uplift pedestal fell away in dark narrow rilles to the surrounding plain, charcoal-colored in the night. Away into the dark distance the plains stretched to a horizon just faintly hazed on their southwest edge with a thin line of silver light: the last remnant of sunset. Between Kit and that distant, shadowy edge of the world, craters dotted the ashy darkness, here and there shining pale at their bottoms with thin gleaming skins of starlit water ice or carbon dioxide frost. It was clear tonight—a frigid pre-winter midnight in Mars's northern hemisphere, through which stars unimpeded by the thin atmosphere burned fierce and still. Kit shivered. Even with an aggressive force field and in a hemisphere where it was summer, Mars wasn't somewhere you wanted to spend much time at night. And in the winter— <Has to be a hundred below,> Kit thought. <Maybe a hundred fifty.> He glanced down around the low boulder where he sat, then bent over and picked up a little stone about the size of a golf ball. Even though it had soaked up some considerable heat from the bubble of air his life-support spell was holding in place around him, the stone was still so cold it burned his hand. Kit had to juggle it to keep it from sticking to his skin. "How cold, fella?" he said in the Speech. The rock took a moment about answering. Things made of stone tended not to understand the idea that cold and heat might be different: it was all just temperature to them. <A hundred and twenty-three point five degrees below zero Fahrenheit.> Kit nodded and kept tossing the rock gently in his hand until it came up to a more bearable temperature. After a few moments he was able to hold on to it. He rubbed it gently between finger and thumb: charcoal-colored grit came off on his fingers as Kit looked south toward that acutely curved, silver-edged horizon. For a long time now, whenever he'd felt the need for a little quiet in his life, or a little mystery, he'd come here to sit and look out at this silent, uncommunicative terrain in perplexed wonder—for it was rare for a planet's landscape to have so little to say to a wizard. Wherever life had been for any length of time, the structure of the world tended to remember, and to be willing enough to "talk" about it. Here the ground seemed only to know its own strictly geological history. Yet there was also a strange sense of something being withheld: as if some dark tide of silence and secrecy had risen, submerging everything, and never receded.... "What about it?" Kit said to the rock. In this starlit midnight, it was dark matte-gray, with here and there a fleck of mica embedded in its gritty sandstone. "What do you know about the world? Who's been here?" < No one but you and her,> the rock said, <the other one. I know day, and night. Water snow and gas snow. That's about it.> Kit nodded and put the rock down where he'd found it. As he did, the landscape around him lightened ever so slightly, a change he'd never have noticed on Earth: but here, now that his eyes were used to the dark, it made a difference. He looked up and saw the little moon Deimos rising, a planet-bright moving spark against the stars, about as bright as the International Space Station could have been at home when it went over. Deimos, though, moved quicker, almost imperceptibly changing the dark charcoal of the surrounding sands to a lighter shade as it climbed the sky, shifting the angle of the dim shadows in the craters below. Kit stood up, dusted his pants off, and flipped his manual open to the Mars project précis. He ran one finger down the entry there, pinpointing the spot where he and Mamvish and the others had been earlier in the day, then tapped the page so the coordinates would load into the on-planet transit spell he already had bookmarked. Another flip of pages brought Kit to the transit spell, its characters glowing under the page and ready to go. He began to read. Even in this empty silence, you could hear the universe leaning in around you to listen: and for some reason, the listening seemed to Kit unusually acute. He finished reading: the breath went out of his lungs again as things went totally black— —then lightened again, but not much. Once again, starlight, a clear night, no dust in the upper atmosphere: two in the morning at Syrtis Major. Kit stood in the shadow of that towering black dune and shivered again, though not from the cold. The surroundings were noticing him, watching him... with what underlying reaction, Kit couldn't tell. All of a sudden Kit began to wish he hadn't come alone. The watchfulness of the surroundings was feeling increasingly creepy. He grimaced. <Come on, what's the matter with me? I've been here in the dark before. Nothing's going to happen!> Yet he thought of the dust devil earlier. That had taken even Mamvish and Irina by surprise. There'd just been something about the way that whirlwind came straight at them— He shrugged. <Just the planet noticing us, like Irina said. It does that all the time. In fact, it probably just noticed us harder because there was such a crowd there. Not to mention a Planetary...> Kit glanced around, determined to get down to business and shake the absurd feeling that he had stepped into an early scene of a monster movie. He went closer to the dune. <This hasn't moved. At least I don't think it has—>The dune's face looked as it had the afternoon before: but as Kit glanced around, he saw with some disquiet that all the investigative party's footprints had disappeared—even Mamvish's. <Did somebody clean up?> But it seemed unlikely. On Mars, where the wind blew a lot of the time, tidying up evidence of your presence on the surface wasn't as vital as it was on the Moon, where there was neither wind nor erosion and your sneaker's footprint would last forever. <The wind did it. Or another dust devil...> That moment at its heart had been astonishing. Yet now Kit found himself really unwilling to see another one of those bearing down on him. <Why do I keep letting myself get the creeps about it?> he thought. <Let's find that egg...> He flipped through the manual again to the detector routine that Síle and Markus had designed. It was a longish spell and hadn't been set to execute automatically, but reading the whole thing would still take Kit less time than digging around in the dune in the hopes that the stony outcropping concealing the superegg would be easily found. <This dune might have moved, after all. Let's see.> Kit read the spell through—four long sentences in the Speech—and stood gasping again with the exertion, waiting for the spell to take. Gradually a wireframe of glowing lines superimposed itself across one spot on the dune low down and to the right, describing the outcropping's humped-up appearance. Kit went over and checked the spell's glowing Speech-symbols to see how deeply the outcropping was buried. <Only a couple of feet. I was right; the dune hasn't moved—> Yet still the uneasiness wouldn't leave him. Kit shook his head and hunkered down in front of the slope of near-black sand, whispering the syllables of the Mason's Word as he'd done the afternoon before. Then he reached in through the surface of the dune, the surface of the stone, until he felt the odd smooth coolness under his hands again. He made sure of his hold on it, and pulled. This time there was less resistance. Seconds later the cold stars above Kit were gleaming on the superegg's dark surface, their reflections trembling in its mirrory sheen: and the tremor's source was Kit. He stood up with the superegg in his hands, shivering all over with the utter strangeness of where he was and what he held. <The age of this thing. Here it's been for five hundred thousand years... and not by accident. Who left you? Why won't you open up and let us find out what you're meant to tell us?> He tried to stop his hands from shaking, and couldn't. Then after a few seconds, Kit realized that it wasn't just his hands that were shivering. It was the egg. In the first shock of realization, he almost dropped it—but he stopped himself just in time. <Who knows what a hard bounce could do to it, even in this gravity? And if I break it, I'm going to be in so much trouble—> The memory of Mamvish's eye cocked at him flashed before Kit as he tried to steady the vibrating superegg: he thought of Irina's level gaze as she eyed him like someone wondering if he was really as trustworthy as she'd been told. <And I'm not. I shouldn't be doing this. Why did I do this when I knew that I— Whoa!> Kit braced the shaking superegg against his chest, trying to steady it, but to no effect. Now it was lurching from side to side in his grasp, more and more violently every moment, until the thing actually vibrated right out of his grip and into the air. Kit clutched at the egg and just managed to get hold of it again before it gave one shake more violent than anything that had preceded it— And split in three. Kit tried to keep hold of all the wedge-shaped pieces, but they struggled out of his hands like live things desperate to escape, bobbling up into the air in front of him. He made a grab at one, caught it, and pinned it under his arm while reaching for the second. But he couldn't get a good grip on that wedge because of the way hugging the first one between arm and body was limiting his movement. The second wedge wrenched itself out of his one-handed grip and into the air again. The third wedge hit the ground, bounced in a puff of dark dust, and rebounded into the second— And stuck to it. Kit stared as the two adhering wedges began, from the edges inward, to shred apart in midair, shattering into shining fragments that thinned to ribbons, then started tangling together like a nest of snakes. The third wedge tore itself away from Kit, leaped into the air, and shattered like its counterparts, then began stretching itself into ribbons and tangling itself up with the others. Seconds later they were melding together again, writhing and changing in a shimmer of consolidating metal— The shrinking shape was still amorphous, like a bubble of water floating and wobbling in weightlessness. Then it put out projections, hurriedly, one after another—and fell. When it came down on the surface in another cloud of dust, it stretched itself out, long and sinuous, went flat like a steamrollered snake— <Now what?!> Kit thought, panicked. The long, shining shape moved, twitched, and all at once sprouted from its sides what he initially mistook for long tufts of fur. The fur moved, though, waving, writhing—and the hair stood up all over Kit as the long, flat, blunt-ended shape stood up and slowly started moving toward him on entirely too many legs. Kit backed away a step. Though he'd long since conquered his childhood nightmares about being attacked by giant bugs under his bed, he still wasn't wild about them, especially when he met them all alone in the dark on other planets. <It's not really a bug,> he thought, taking another step backward as the shining thing kept moving toward him. <It's not alive. It's some kind of machine. A weird, alien machine, yeah, but machines are a lot of what I do. I really should be able to—> Kit lost the thought as little round, pebbly eyes suddenly bumped their way up out of the bug's blunt head. They were opaque, featureless... but they were all looking at him. And then the back end of the bug lengthened out, got long and sharp, and curved up over its back. <Oh, no. Not a bug.> It was a scorpion. <At least it doesn't have claws yet,> Kit thought, still backing up. And then the creature reared up, starlight sheening down it, and the many legs consolidated, getting thicker, sharper, more angular. Six legs, three and three, in the back: four legs, two and two, in the front, upraised, each of these splitting down the middle near the ends, the razory vee of newly created claws starting to scissor together. The clawed forelegs lifted, pointing at him as the claws worked against each other. Those eyes fixed on Kit more determinedly as the scorpion-thing came at him, faster now, on the point of breaking into a run— Kit tried to gulp, and failed, dry-mouthed. "I am on errantry, and I greet you!" he said, probably a lot more loudly than he needed to. Still backing up, he reached behind him to zip open his otherspace pocket. He'd taken to keeping a little surprise in there if he ran into a situation like this— Barely six feet away, the metal scorpion stopped short. The unsettling gaze of all those little eyes was still fixed on Kit, and it suddenly seemed as if the creature or machine was waiting for something specific from him, or not seeing something it expected. Kit, too, froze. <What does it want? What am I supposed to—?> It lifted its claws. <Too late!> Kit thought, pushing his hand into the otherspace pocket and gripping the small, fizzing wizardry that lay there, ready and waiting— The claws angled up and out, not at Kit, but in four different directions, and light burst up from them— not true beams of light, but curving arcs of a thin, pale blue-green radiance. They leaped into the air fluidly, like water from a fountain, curving in to twist together high above the motionless scorpion. There they knotted together, then separated and streaked toward the dark horizon, sending Kit's and the scorpion's shadows reeling and stretching across the dark sand. Kit spun around, trying to see where all the streaks of light were going. He had only enough time to make out general directions before the streaks faded and were gone. The scorpion lowered its claws, folding them across its front in a strange gesture, almost formal. The eyes dissolved back into the creature's blunt head. It rolled up, the long, curved spine of the tail vanishing, the legs slipping into the body; the whole shape collapsed into itself, smoothed, solidified— The superegg lay rocking gently on the sand, and finally came to rest on one end, perfectly still in the starlight. Kit went over to the egg, knelt down beside it, almost scared to touch it. Finally he swore at his own nervousness, reached out and put one hand on the superegg. Nothing happened. The sense of latent energy within it was completely gone. The sweat that had broken out on Kit was going cold: he hadn't been paying enough attention to his life-support spell, and his breath was smoking as the air around him chilled down. Kit more or less collapsed onto the dark sand and sat there trying to recover, staring at the egg. <Okay,> he thought, <I've broken it. And I'm now in the most trouble I've ever been in my life. But there's no point in freezing myself solid.> Kit picked up his manual, flipped through it to check some spell syntax, and then spoke to the life-support spell's parameters, telling them to pull some energy from under the planet's crust, where a little residual heat lay stored. Then Kit rubbed his face, flinching at the grit, which as usual was getting everyplace, and stared at the egg. <Those were signals. But to what, or who—?> He flipped pages in the manual, turning to the place where local changes in the environment would have been logged. "What were those signals about?" he said to the manual. "Where were they headed?" A long spill of characters in the Speech appeared all down the glowing page, filling it—the technical description of what the scorpion had done. Kit read down it, turned the page, and found it filling up with description, too—a bewildering amount of it. "Whoa, whoa! Save that. And just give me a graphic for now, okay?" The page dimmed the Speech-charactery down to near invisibility and drew him a simple outline map of the Martian surface in a cylindrical projection, a wide rectangle. Four glowing arcs drew themselves outward from Kit's location in Nili Patera, each a slightly different curve heading in a different direction: northeast, northwest, southeast, and much more deeply south. At each arc's end, the map labeled itself with the English-language names of the targeted features and their equivalents in the Speech. "All craters," Kit said under his breath, noting their names: Stokes, Cassini, de Vaucouleurs, and Hutton. "Any response from anything there?" The page blanked. Then a single character appeared, the Speech-symbol that could stand for either the number zero or a null response. Kit let out a breath: his manual wasn't normally so terse. "Okay," he said. "Alert me if anything comes up..." He closed the manual and put it aside, looking down at the superegg. "Might as well put you back..." Once more he hunkered down in front of the outcropping where it had been secreted. There was no point in leaving this out where one of the satellites orbiting Mars could see it. <What I'm really wishing,> Kit thought as he put a hand out to the egg again, <is that there was some way to cover what I just did. Or some really good excuse for it.> But this wasn't one of those situations where you could just tell the local authority figure the equivalent of "the dog ate my homework" and expect to get away with it. And as he thought that, a small pain struck Kit somewhere in his midsection. <It's not like I can claim my dog is eating much of anything anymore...> Kit made an unhappy face. His manual had been open and logging when this happened. Hiding anything of what had happened would be impossible. <I just wish I wasn't about to get yelled at for doing something wrong, and maybe get kicked off the whole project—> It then occurred to Kit that telling just one aspect of the truth might be enough to keep him out of trouble. All he'd have to say would be that something had made him do this: some urge he couldn't resist had come over him. <And that was true,> Kit thought. <Or at least it kind of feels like it was true— But wait. Am I just talking myself into this because I don't want to look stupid?> And no matter how thoroughly he talked himself into believing this irresistible urge thing, one of the other wizards associated with this— Mamvish, Irina— might be able to tell him that the urge hadn't been all that overwhelming: that he could've resisted if he'd really wanted to.... <Then I wind up looking twice as dumb as I am already. And besides—>The Speech, the most important part of wizardry, was about describing the universe as it really was. If you started taking liberties with that concept, you were doing the Lone Power's work for it. And when working with the Speech, trying to describe things the way they weren't could get very fatal. Kit picked up the superegg, muttered the necessary syllables of the Mason's Word, and shoved the egg back into the stone. <Never mind. I'm gonna call Mamvish, come clean, and get the yelling over with.> He stood up and flipped the manual open to the contacts section, put a finger on Mamvish's entry. He had to stop and try to swallow before he could speak: his mouth had gone dry again. "Page her," he said to his manual. "Ask if she's got a moment." Mamvish's name dimmed, then blazed again. Under it a one-line phrase traced itself out in the curving characters of the Speech: <Unavailable: on intervention. No availability estimate at this time. If the matter is urgent, please leave a message.> Kit stared at the words: somehow they were the last thing he'd expected<. Urgent. Is this urgent? How do I tell? And what if it's not, really?> "Uh," he said. "Mamvish, it's Kit. I'm on Mars. There's been a development. The egg went through, I don't know, some kind of metamorphosis, and it sent out signals. Nothing else has happened yet." He stopped, tried to think what else he should add that both he knew to be strictly true and wouldn't make him sound like an idiot. No, just quit while you're ahead...> "Uh, that's all. I'll call you back later. <Dai stihó. Mamvish's name flashed, confirmation that the message had been saved. A link to a copy of Kit's message, with a time stamp, appeared down the page. Kit sighed and slapped the manual shut. The sudden feeling of reprieve was tremendous. <...And dumb, since I haven't gotten out of anything yet! Still... she'll know I tried to call her. That has to count for something.> Kit became aware that his heart was pounding. He glanced around at the silent sands, the dark dune towering over him. Off to the northwest, Deimos was diving toward the horizon. <So now what?> He stood watching Deimos's downward arc while his pulse slowed. <Well, now that you've got some new data out of this crazy thing you did, do something useful with it. Find out why those signals were sent to those spots! And this time, don't do it alone.> Deimos twinkled through the atmosphere near the horizon while Kit wondered where that idea had come from. <Am I just trying to have someone around to share the blame with if something else goes wrong?> A depressing thought. <But company would be good for keeping me from screwing up again.> That thought was nearly as depressing. <I'm going to go home and get some breakfast. Maybe Neets— But she'll still be asleep. And she said to wait till after lunch to call her... Well, never mind! Who wants people getting the idea that you can't do anything without having her along? Or that you can't handle something unusual by yourself?> Kit glanced back at the outcropping. That strange feeling of the surroundings watching him was gone now. <It went away when the egg opened. But why wouldn't it do that before? Unless it was waiting for something.> And, outrageously, the idea came to him: <It was waiting for me.> ...After a moment Kit shook his head at the crazy idea. Mamvish had mentioned in the past that some of these "bottles" had timing wizardries attached, routines meant to give the wizardries time to see what conditions in the world around them were like before popping open. <Its timer probably just went off after it finished taking its readings. Then it started calling to its buddies. But why aren't they answering?> In forlorn hope Kit flipped his manual open to the page where those four craters were marked. But there was no sign of anything happening there: no movement, no heat, no unusual energy artifact. <Then again... it was how long before this egg hatched, after we took it out the first time? Eight hours? Maybe the other eggs, or whatever it was signaling to, have time delays set, too.> The thought of another eight hours of waiting for something to happen seemed almost unbearable. <But wait. If there's going to be a delay, that's okay: it gives us time to put extra monitoring wizardries in place nearby.> "Us." This time he felt better about the idea of someone else being there with him. <And a little weird, wasn't it, to be wanting to keep this all to myself? Where was that coming from?> Kit shrugged. Probably the suddenness of the egg's hatching had freaked him out. He reached sideways, unzipped the air, and started to stick the manual into his otherspace pocket— then paused. <Better deactivate my last-defense gadget first.> With care Kit reached into the pocket, felt for the single thread of characters in the Speech hanging out of the compact little wizardry— its tripwire— and pinched it. The wizardry went inactive like a stick of cartoon dynamite that had had its burning fuse pinched out. Kit tucked the manual into the pocket, zipped it closed, and glanced west, seeing Deimos's dimming spark vanish below the horizon: then looked the other way. Blue, bright, growing stronger and brighter by the moment, Earth rose in the east—Mars's northern hemisphere morning star, this time of year, the herald of the dawn. Kit's stomach growled. He grinned. <Home,> he thought, and vanished. The next two hours were torture for Kit. He forced himself to have breakfast, though his insides were roiling with excitement and anxiety. But every minute that his manual didn't start flashing with an annoyed message from Mamvish, or worse, Irina, felt like a small triumph. Eventually, as the Sun started coming in the dining room windows around seven, Kit began feeling as if maybe he wasn't in incredible trouble after all. His attention was presently divided evenly between two pages in the directory. He had a paper napkin stuck in each one, and he flipped back and forth between them about once every minute as the dining room filled with sunlight. What surprised him was on which one the gray print of unavailability first flashed dark. Kit pushed his third bowl of cornflakes aside and pounced on the page. "How soon can you be ready to go out?" There was a pause. "Am I allowed to eat first?" Darryl's voice said from the page. Kit grinned. "No." "You're cruel, man," Darryl said. "Gonna stunt my growth. Don't you think I have enough developmental issues without you messing with my metabolism, too?" Kit snickered. The only thing wrong with Darryl's metabolism was that it seemed bent on getting ahead of everyone else's. The way he ate and drank, Kit routinely expected to see Darryl turn up at a meeting three feet taller than at the last one. "I am going to sit right here for the next fifteen minutes and finish eating my chocolate-frosted sugar bombs," Darryl said. "Part of my nutritious breakfast, and no, I'm not gonna go hyper on you. Don't think I can't just hear you thinking, so don't start! And then I'm going to put some clothes on, if that's okay with you. Not gonna go running around Mars in my bathrobe!" "Okay, okay!" Kit said. "As soon as you can." "Fine. Thank you." There was a pause filled with noisy crunching. "And what're you doing up so early? Thought I was the only one who liked this hour of the day." Kit wondered how to start explaining. He might as well have saved the effort. "Uh-oh," Darryl said, "I know, you were up there messing, weren't you? What did you do, Kit-boy? You broke something, didn't you?" Kit rolled his eyes. Darryl could be annoyingly acute, and could hear more about what was going on with you in a moment's silence than some people could hear in a whole paragraph. "Man, you should be kept in a cage," Darryl said. "Never mind, I'm not gonna make you all bad and wrong for whatever you did. At least not till I help you clean it up." "Thanks a heap," Kit said. "Finish being nutritious and then get your butt over here." He glanced down at the directory and saw another name go dark. "Aha. Later." He touched Ronan's name; it glowed under his finger. "Hey," Kit said, "good morning." "Oh, listen, Rodriguez attempts to score on irony," Ronan's voice came back. He yawned. "But no! It bounces off the goalpost! What a shame..." "Why is it always sports with you?" Kit said. "Football, rugby, that thing with the weird sticks—" "Hurling." "Yeah, the only sport with a mandatory body count." Kit had seen the game played once and was glad he didn't go to school in Ireland: hurling came across like lacrosse on crack, but Ronan loved it and would blather about it for hours. "Forget the playing field for now, okay? We've got to go to Mars." "Oh, really. What have you blown up now?" Kit was tempted to bang his head on the table. "Nothing blew up!" "You don't fool me," Ronan said. "You went off to be with your friend the superegg in the middle of the night." He laughed. "The Martian night! You know, some day you may want to reproduce, but you're never gonna do it if you freeze off your—" "Ronan," Kit said. "I can either shoot you a précis from my manual, or you can force me to embarrass myself directly..." "Always much more fun," Ronan said, and yawned. "Go." Kit spent five minutes or so describing what had happened. Ronan stayed quiet during the explanation, then simply said, "Creepy." "Yeah," Kit said. "But that thing's given its friends a shout. I don't think we're gonna have to wait for long before something happens up there." "And when it does," Ronan said, "it makes sense for there to be wizards there. Okay, sit tight and I'll have a word with my ride." Kit's eyebrows went up. Irish wizards were restricted from casual long-distance transport due to the buildup of ancient spell residue on the island. Normally they had to go a considerable distance to get to a city-based rapid-transit worldgate, unless they were on active errantry and entitled to a personal transport dispensation. "What kind of ride?" "Five minutes." Ronan's listing in the manual faded down to gray again, while beside it an annotation came up: <In consultation; please wait.> Kit pushed his chair back and got up to take his bowl and spoon into the kitchen. While he was putting them in the dishwasher, he heard someone coming down the stairs. Moments later Carmela wandered in, wearing one of her super-long striped nightshirts. She made for the refrigerator, stuck her head in, and just stood there yawning. Kit shut the dishwasher and looked with mild interest at his sister, who was still contemplating the fridge's interior— morosely, he thought. "Looking for something?" Carmela yawned again and straightened up. "I'm just thinking that this is the last morning for the next two weeks when I can be sure that if I leave a strawberry smoothie in here when I go to bed, it'll still be there the next morning." Kit headed back for the dining room. "Why? I don't like your smoothies." "I know," Carmela said. "But Helena does." Kit stopped right where he was and stared at her. "Kit?" said Ronan's voice from the dining room table. "We're all set." Carmela's head snapped around. "Is that who I think it is?" She pushed past Kit into the dining room. "No, wait a minute! I mean, yeah—" Kit went after her. "Carmela, wait! What do you mean, 'Helena does'? She's not going to be here until next week!" Carmela was leaning over his wizard's manual. "Hiiiii, Ronaaaaaan!" There was a pause at the other end. "Uh. Carmela, hi. Kit?" "Yeah, give me a minute! What did your ride say? When can you get here?" "Whenever you want. I'm in Baldwin now." "What? Already?" "Yeah. Darryl fetched me over. How long do you need?" "Ten minutes." "Right. Cheers." "Byeeeeeee!!" Carmela shouted at the manual as Kit slapped it shut. "Hey, that was rude. I wasn't done!" "You can go all gooey over him when he gets here," Kit muttered, pushing past her to get his vest and jacket off one of the dining room chairs. "It was supposed to be Wednesday she was coming! When did everything get changed?" "Last night," Carmela said. "You were asleep. Helena e-mailed Pop: the airline screwed up her flights. She had to either fly today or wait another week. She'll be here this afternoon." Kit groaned as he zipped up his vest. "I do not need this right now..." Carmela leaned on the chair opposite. "Kit... give her a chance. You've talked to her on the phone lately. You've heard her... She's a lot mellower." "You mean she no longer comes right out and says she thinks I sold my soul to the devil?" Kit said. He laughed. "Forgive me if I'm not convinced." He put on his jacket. "If I'm lucky, she'll be too busy running around socializing with her old friends to want to spend much time thinking about her weird little brother." "Ooh, bitter..." Kit sighed and picked up the manual, eyeing Carmela's nightshirt. "You plan to be wearing that when Ronan shows up?" Her eyes went wide. "Ohmigosh," Carmela said, and fled upstairs. Kit leaned against the chair at the end of the table and sighed. When he'd realized he had to tell his mama and pop that he was a wizard, they hadn't had incredible trouble coping with the concept— at least after they got over the initial shock. Carmela had actually been delighted. But Helena had been horrified, and as upset by the rest of the family's relatively ready acceptance as by the idea that Kit could do wizardry in the first place. Though the whole family was churchgoing, Helena had always struck Kit as more religious than all the rest of them put together; and until she started getting used to the situation, Kit had been really annoyed by the scared or worried looks Helena gave him every time their paths crossed. When she finally went off to college and put some time and distance between herself and what her little brother had become, Helena had calmed down a little... or so Kit had thought. <Oh, please, don't let her get all freaked out all over again,> he said to the universe in general. <The stuff that's going on right now is so important. It'd be a nuisance to have to sneak around and hide what's happening so she won't drive everyone crazy—> Ronan appeared at the other end of the table in a muted bang! of displaced air that rattled the dining room's venetian blinds. <Like that kind of thing, for example,> Kit thought. <I was being discreet about wizardry when Helena was getting all nuts. What's she going to do when stuff like this happens out in the open?> Ronan was all in black, as usual: though this morning the black was heavy black jeans and hiking boots, and a black parka better suited to January than June. He glanced around, then pulled a chair out and flopped down on it. "Where's the Mouth that Roared? Thought she'd be right here." "She was. I told her to go put on some clothes." "Thanks for that," Ronan said. He sounded actively grateful: but he gave Kit a peculiar look. "You okay? You look pale." "I believe you." Kit laughed, rueful. "Just family stuff. My older sister's coming home for a few weeks. She's not so clear about who we work for." "Uh-oh. Going to lie low? Or try to talk sense to her?" "No idea. Depends on how she is." "And you're not eager to find out." Kit shook his head. "Don't get me wrong. As sisters go, she's okay. More than okay. But as soon as she found out about wizardry... "He shrugged a helpless shrug. "It's like... I don't know. Not just that she thought it was a bad thing: almost as if my being a wizard embarrassed her." "Best reason to keep it quiet," Ronan said. "I feel for you. Glad I don't have to deal with that stuff." "You never told your family?" Ronan shook his head. "Tried it once or twice," he said. "It never felt right. Might have been something to do with the classified stuff the Champion was up to when he was stuck in my head. But now that he's gone, I'm not sure I want to rock the boat..." Bang! Darryl appeared in the kitchen doorway, wearing khaki cargo pants and one of those many-pocketed vests favored by photographers. "Sorry I kept you waiting," he said. "I had to feed my turtle." Ronan eyed him with amusement. "Looks more like You were feeding the lions. What, are we going on safari? I should get you a pith helmet and an elephant gun." "Stop envying my style," Darryl said. "Envying?" Ronan snorted. "It is to laugh." "You're not fooling anybody." Darryl grinned at Kit, then looked around. "We all set? Where's Miss Neets?" Despite how eager he was to see her, this kind of question from the others was beginning to grate on Kit's nerves. "Sleeping in," he said. "She had a long day dealing with her dad. And she was muttering about something she was doing with Carmela, probably some girl thing..." Darryl's eyes went wide. "Oh, Kit, don't let her hear you say stuff like that! She'll pull your head right off and beat you over the shoulders with it." Ronan rolled his eyes in agreement. "Miss Tough-Mouth Neets doing girly stuff?" he said. "Not usually on her program." "Can we worry less about her program and more about ours?" Kit said. "Right away, O mighty one," Darryl said, wandering over to the bowl of fruit off to one side and picking up an apple. "Hey, these look nice—" He glanced at Kit. "Oh, go ahead. Why should a little errantry keep you from eating?" "I assume you've got a plan ready," Ronan said. Kit nodded. "Darryl, did he tell you about the signals to the other craters?" Already three bites into the apple, Darryl paused long enough to give Kit a look. "I read your précis between the second and third bowls of sugar bombs," he said. "You want to keep up with me, Your Kitness, 'cause I might have been autistic, but I've never been dyslexic. You have a preferred target we should investigate first, or should we just flip for it?" "If there's any flipping-for to be done," said a voice from the living room, "it's going to be by Ronan over me." All heads turned as Carmela walked in. She was wearing a short blue dress with a peach-colored tank top underneath it, leggings, and little high heels of the kind Kit had heard her call "kitten heels." The clothes were the same kind of thing you might see a lot of girls her age wearing somewhere casually, say to the mall. But there was nothing casual about the way Carmela wore any of her clothes anymore— not since last year, when she suddenly discovered she had a figure. The pigtails of ten minutes ago were gone. She had pulled her long hair off to one side, so that it flowed down in a raven sweep over one shoulder, and she carried herself with the gracious, queenly condescension of a supermodel who had descended for a time from her usual starry height to walk among the lowly paparazzi. What Kit found strange was that this lofty carriage didn't look preposterous on her. "Good morning, Darryl," Carmela said, smiling sweetly at him; then turned her head. "And Ronannnn..." Kit could only roll his eyes as Carmela stalked over to Ronan with that smile turned right up. <It's got to be an act,> was all he could think. <She's just messing with him because he thinks he's such a hunk—!> For Kit had seen her pull this stunt with egotistical alien royalty in the past. After he worked out what was being done to him, the prince in question had eventually recovered sufficiently to take nourishment and walk around. <For a while...> "Carmela," Ronan said in what Kit was beginning to think of as the Tone of Great Forbearance, "don't you think I'm a little— old for you?" His tone of voice suggested that Ronan expected no answer but "yes." Carmela, however, just looked at him brightly and said, "That's okay. In ten years you won't be." Ronan opened his mouth and closed it again. Kit didn't know whether to laugh or cry. But right now the laughter was threatening to win. "Ronan, don't we have places to be?" "Oh," Ronan said, "uh, yes." Carmela just smiled. "Nice save, Kit," she said, "but it's just temporary." She waved the fingers of one hand at them in a toodle-oo gesture as she wandered back into the living room. Kit watched her go with slight relief. <Then again, why am I relieved? She's got a worldgate in her closet. The sooner we're out of here, the better.> "Let's go out back," Kit said. "It's shielded there; the neighbors won't see us." They headed out the back door together. Under his breath, Ronan said, "Your sister—" He shook his head. "We have a word for her where I come from—" "Maybe I don't want to hear it," Kit said. "She is my sister." Not that Kit wasn't finding it peculiar to suddenly be concerned about how Carmela dressed or acted around other people. He wasn't used to thinking about how girls looked in their clothes— <except what about Janie Lowell in chemistry the other day?> said one eager and interested part of his brain from the background. <That skirt she was wearing, it hardly even covered her—> Kit made a face. Other girls were a different matter. But he wasn't sure he wanted to be seeing his sister that way, and he wasn't sure he wanted anybody else seeing her that way, either<. And just a few months ago, I wouldn't have cared one way or another. This is so weird...> Ronan was shaking his head as they headed into the backyard. "Leaving words about her out of it," Darryl said to Ronan, "they have any words where you come from for the expression on your face when she said that?" "Probably they do," Ronan said as they made their way down through the yard. "'Gobsmacked' would be one. Carmela"— Ronan shook his head— "is a whole bucket of gobsmack." Kit grinned. "Cousin, I hear you there!" "When's she going away to college?" said Darryl as they came to the weedy, tree-screened rear of Kit's backyard. "Not a second too soon for me," Kit said. "No— that's not true. I don't know..." He and Carmela had always gotten along better than he and Helena did. And it wasn't just that Carmela hadn't completely blown a gasket when she found out he was a wizard, or that later she'd started to pick up the Speech. <There's something else going on. Maybe we're just closer in age...> In among the trees, Kit had a spell circle laid into the ground under the carpet of leaf mold. "I need to make a couple of changes to this before we go," he said to the others. "I don't want her tracking us." "We don't need that," Darryl said. "I'll transit us the way I brought Ronan in from Dublin. And I doubt she can track my kind of transit: it's real atypical." "If you can go transatlantic on a personal transit without even breaking a sweat," Kit said, "I guess 'atypical' would be the word." "It's to do with that bilocation stunt I stumbled onto during my Ordeal," Darryl said. "Seems I don't need the usual spells to gate around in the neighborhood. I can go a long way without needing a spell, as long as I leave one of me on Earth and have coordinates to work with." He rolled his eyes. "Tom said he didn't understand it, and shoved me off on Carl. Carl gave me five different theories and then wound up saying he thinks I'm bypassing string-structure issues by selectively shredding the interstitial structure of local space-time." Darryl grinned. "Whatever that means! I don't think he understands it, either. Shredding—" He shrugged. "He wants to call it that, it's fine by me." "Okay, shred-guy," Kit said. "Does the ground suit?" It was the question you asked another wizard when he or she was going to be responsible for a spell. Darryl glanced around. "Yeah, it's fine. Where on Mars are we going, exactly?" Kit flipped opened his manual. "A little crater called Stokes." "Show me. Carl says I need to be careful about coordinates while I'm still getting the hang of this." Kit nodded, thinking that Tom and Carl were wisely covering all the angles with Darryl. While they wanted him to be cautious about what he was doing, they also didn't want him thinking too hard about whether his ability to do it might be unusual. <Making it sound like something normal is smart...> Kit found his marked map and tapped on it to bring it into higher definition, zooming in on the spot he wanted. "Right there—" Darryl studied the map. "Okay. And about—one second from now," he said. "They said I needed to specify temporal coordinates, too. Guess they're nervous I might overshoot." "Probably something to do with you just being hot off your Ordeal," Ronan said. "You young superpowered hotshots, you want keeping an eye on until you settle down into more realistic power levels..." Darryl nodded as he took a last look at the map. Kit shot Ronan a quick approving look over Darryl's head. Ronan raised an eyebrow in response, eyed the map in turn. "Not far from the north pole. We need to bring any extra heat with us?" "No, I factored plenty into the spell," Kit said. "Okay," Darryl said, "we're good to go. You guys ready? Life support's set? Don't make me come all the way back here for more air, now. It's fifty-four million miles to Mars..." "We've got air for three people for four hours," Kit said, "and a heavy-duty force-field bubble." Ronan suddenly got a wicked look on his face. "And since it's got to be dark there somewhere..." He pulled out a pair of black-lensed aviator sunglasses and put them on. Darryl snickered. "Some of us," he said, "have been watching too many old movies." "Old? That movie was young when I was!" "So were the dinosaurs. Ready to shred?" And Darryl reached up and put a hand each on Kit's and Ronan's shoulders. "Hit it," Ronan said. Between one blink and the next, Earth went away. [ Arsia Mons ] Nita was standing near the edge of a gigantic lake, looking out across the still water, waiting for someone. <Where is he?> she thought. <He's so late.> The strange, manylegged creature sitting off to one side on the gravelly red ground at her feet looked up at her. <You've always known he might be someday,> it said. Nita scowled. <Not> that way, she said in her mind. <Not funny...> She peered out across the lake, shading her eyes from the low sun and the pinkish glitter dancing on the water in the crater. <I don't like the way that looks,> she said as the speed of the ripples out on the water increased. <There has to be a lot more of that coming—> The creature sitting next to her shrugged. <He won't notice it where he is,> it said. <The water would have to rise a lot higher to bother him there.> <The usual place?> Nita said. The creature nodded. <Up on his mountain.> Nita turned and walked a few steps over to the transit circle she had left ready to go, blazing on the ground. <What about the other one you were supposed to be meeting here?> said the creature that still sat by the lake's edge, unmoving, gazing back at her with ironic golden eyes. <Can't wait,> Nita said. <Come on, let's go.> She stepped into the circle. It blazed up around her; the transit was instantaneous. Nita emerged barely a blink later from a flicker of darkness to a spot near the edge of the broad, dish-shaped depression on top of that ancient volcano. The view was amazing; she could understand why Kit loved this place so much. But she looked all around the crater and couldn't see him anywhere. There was no question of Kit being hidden behind anything. There were no big boulders, large objects, or outcroppings: just pebbles, sand, fist-sized stones, and cracks and crevasses caused by the contrast between the day's relative warmth and the night's ferocious cold. Nita transited across the crater a couple more times, effortlessly, the way she'd seen Darryl do, but found no trace of Kit. The transits, though, were enjoyable for their own sake. <Pity this is a dream,> she thought<. It'd be great to be able to do this without having to do a spell and pay the price...> The third time, she came out near the ridge at the crater's edge, where the dust and sand still held some trace of someone's sneaker prints. She dropped to one knee, touched one print, then reached over beside it to pick up a little stone that lay there. <What about it, guy?> she said. <Who's been up here recently?> <Nobody,> the stone said. <Just him, and her. The other one.> Nita blinked at that, confused. Well, rocks tended to think of time in the geological sense; they could get confused about shorter periods. <I haven't been up here, though. This is the first time.> <No,> the rock said. <But the last time you came, he had been thinking of her; and he didn't want to stay. He ran away. And so did you...> Nita shook her head, uncertain what to make of this. An odd feeling of dread was beginning to gather at the back of her mind. Uncertain, she dropped the stone gently to the sandy ground and climbed further up the ridge. There on the crater's edge, Nita paused, looking out across the dusty red afternoon toward where the low sun swung. At the edge of that sharply curved, foreshortened horizon, something moved and glittered. <You did say you didn't like the look of that...> said the creature crouching at her feet. <Oh, it can't possibly—> Nita said. But then she noticed that the silvery tremor out at the edge of things was getting brighter. It actually seemed to be humping up against the horizon— higher than the hills of the Southern Highlands, impossible though that was. Fear began to rise in Nita, growing more pronounced as a thin, distant sound began to reach her: the rush and roar of water. <There's no way I can hear that all this way up here,> she thought. Her pulse began racing. She stared all around her in growing panic. Where was Kit? He was supposed to be here. But he couldn't be here. If he was here, and he didn't get away soon, he'd get caught in this— All the southern horizon was awash now. Nita could see the foaming onrush of the initial waves, running northward toward her in a flood of ever-increasing speed, over the hills and down into the craters of the lowlands, splashing up around highland hills and making islands of them, rushing inexorably at the mountain where she stood. The new islands were swiftly drowned as the water raced toward Nita. She stood rooted in horror as the incoming wavefront, hundreds of feet higher in this gravity than an Earth-based tsunami could ever be, came plunging through the southern highlands and down over the edge of their plateau, pouring down into the vast cratery basin of the lowlands at her feet and rushing, uncheckable, toward the mountain where she stood. Within what seemed only moments, the water flowed around her on all sides, splashed up over the immense mesa on which the mountain stood, drowned it in a matter of a few breaths, began to climb the sides of the mountain— Nita gulped with fear. She had to get away, fast, before the onrushing water changed the nature of the land where she was standing and made it impossible for her to use her already prepared spell to escape. Nita raised her hands, the summoning gesture for the transit spell she was carrying. But no light erupted around her feet. The Speech-characters she was expecting didn't materialize. Nita began hurriedly speaking the words of an emergency transit spell— and then, shocked, stopped, realizing the words made no sense. <I don't understand! It has to work! It's a spell! A spell always works—> <I told you not to wait so long,> said the creature crouching at her feet. <That's a lot of help now!> Nita turned southward again, afraid of what she'd see. Between her and the pale, pinky sun, something rose up to filter and dim the sky. It was a wave, easily a hundred feet thick in this gravity, easily a mile high. Up and up it reared, now taller than the mountain, leaning over Nita, leaning farther out, the great sparkling arch of it stretching out over the top of the mountain-crater like a vast, downward-curving, smoked glass roof. The distant sun, caught in it, flickered and struggled to shine. It was no use. The thickness of the water was putting it out. And Nita couldn't transit. She was trapped, unless she found the right words to say, figured out what to do. But she was never going to figure it out. There wasn't going to be time. The wave arched, curved more deeply above her, then finally and immensely broke— Nita had what felt like a lifetime's leisure to watch the water fall slowly toward her in a massive, incompressible, high-curved slab. Gravity or no gravity, when that wave came down on her, its mass would crush her just as flat as if it was stone and not water. <Too much mass at this speed,> some dry and terrified part of her brain said in the background, didactic to the end. <After all, g equals G times the mass of Mars over the square of the radius, so that would be at least three hundred seventy-two centimeters per second squared, and that means—> The roaring and the blackness smashed down onto Nita. The world ended. Nita sat bolt upright in bed, gasping for breath. It took a moment for her to register, as she stared around her, that everything was all right, that she was in her bedroom and all the usual safe, sane, familiar things were there. The posters on the wall, the library books piled up on the desk, the magazines stacked on her dresser, the shopping voucher plaques for the Crossings that Carmela had given her, saying, "I've only got about sixty of them; let me know when you need more..." Nita worked on slowing her breathing down. After that, her first, somewhat panicked impulse was to try to completely forget what she'd just seen and try to go back to sleep. <What, and find myself back in that dream again? Not a chance!> She got up, pulled down her nightdress, and went over to the desk, where she flipped her manual open. "Bobo," she said, "boy, have I got one for the dream journal today!" The manual's pages riffled under her hands, laying themselves open to the section into which she dictated her dreams. <General theme?> said the voice in the back of her head. Nita shook her head, sighed. "Water again." <You've been getting a lot of that lately.> Nita shrugged. "Probably something to do with the project at hand." But an echo of an old memory said, <Fear death by water...> She shook her head. Picchu had just been quoting some poet at the time. And that had been such a long while ago. <Yet Peach's prophecies were always reliable. Who knows how long they might have been good for?> Unfortunately, prophecy rarely came stamped with a sell-by date. Nita took the manual back to the bed, sat down cross-legged on top of the covers, and hurriedly dictated everything she could remember about the dream. "...And the wave," she said at last. "I can't believe I was standing there working out the acceleration of a falling mass on Mars." She laughed. "And that all mixed up with the water... Kit's thing is starting to get to me." <Well, after yesterday, possibly that's understandable.> "Might be right," Nita said. She stretched and glanced at the clock. "Where is he?" <Where do you think?> Nita laughed. "Don't know why I even bother asking." She got up, tossing the manual to one side. "Did he leave me any messages?" <Just a routine notification of where he was going.> She let out a breath and pulled a dresser drawer open, pulling out a big sweatshirt and a pair of jeans. These Nita held up against her, looking down to check the length, then paused: the act brought back that strange image of the transit circle that wouldn't flame to life. She let out a perplexed breath. <Wizardry,> she thought, <not working...> <That's something that's happened recently,> the peridexis said. Nita pulled the pants on. "Yeah... But I've dreamed that before." She considered as she finished dressing. "Maybe it's the wizard's version of those horrible dreams people have where you forgot to study and there's a test. Then you wake up in a cold sweat and find there's nothing to it..." The peridexis offered no opinion. Nita shrugged and headed downstairs. Her dad was sitting at the dining room table, staring at the screen of his cell phone. "Morning," Nita said, heading into the kitchen to make some tea. "There's a fresh pot on the counter," her dad said. "Thank you..." Nita poured a cup, got a spoon and the sugar bowl from the counter, and put what were probably too many sugars in the tea, then left it there while she went rooting through one of the cupboards over the counter for cereal. "You playing around with your address book again?" "No," her dad said from the dining room, "it's Dairine's information coming through on the phone. The live feed of what she's doing today. What was it you called it? A spinoff?" "Secondary spin," Nita said, reaching into the fridge for milk. "At least, that's what it's called when we're just excerpting nonwizardly stuff that's also in the manual. We might need to invent another word for this." She brought in a bowl and a spoon and the cornflakes box, and sat down by her dad. "She's gone already?" "Yup," her father said. He looked more resigned than annoyed. "She did her chores first, though." "Good." Nita poured cereal into the bowl, reached for the milk, and then realized her tea was still in the kitchen. "Oops..." She went back for it. When she came back, her dad was fiddling with the little joystick under the phone's screen. "What are you getting?" Nita said. "Text, or—" She looked over his shoulder. "Oh, no, there she is! Hey, that's pretty good." The screen wasn't the best for this kind of work, but it showed clearly enough an image of the simulator hall in the palace at Wellakh, with Dairine standing in front of the slowly rotating Thahit-mirroring sunglobe. "Where are they, exactly?" her dad said. Nita squinted at the screen. "See that icon over there on the left? If you hit that, it'll bring up subtitles. There you go. It's Roshaun's home planet, Daddy. About twenty-three thousand light-years from here." Another figure moved into view on the phone's screen. "And that's— who? His dad?" Nita nodded as she sat down and poured milk on her cereal. "Nelaid ke Seriv." Her dad studied Nelaid for a moment. "Tall guy." "Yeah, Wellakhit usually are. Their gravity's a little less than ours, so their bones grow longer..." Nita ate some cereal, then paused. "Oh, yeah— he wants to talk to you. At your convenience, he said. About Dairine." Her dad glanced up. "She's not making some kind of trouble for him, is she?" "Oh, no! I think—" Nita munched for a moment more. "I think he considers her a challenge. His family are big on that kind of thing..." She wondered how much of the political situation it would be safe to get into with her dad, then decided to leave that to Nelaid. "I think he just wants to talk dad-to-dad stuff with you. To let you know he's keeping an eye on her." Her father looked concerned. "Is fatherhood on other planets really that much like fatherhood here?" "Some places, no. But in this case, yeah. Hominid species tend to have a lot in common, depending on how their biologies work. There are always cultural variations, but—" Nita held out her hand for the phone, took it, and played briefly with the joystick, then handed the phone back. "Go through that section, and you can get a species-to-species and culture-to-culture values comparison. Have it generate you a matching-features chart." "Like one of those compare-before-you-buy websites?" Nita grinned. "Close. But let me know when you're ready to talk to Nelaid, and I'll send him word." She went back to her cereal, eating faster so it wouldn't have a chance to go soggy. "He was real gracious about this. Which he doesn't have to be: he's a king. He's used to having people jump when he says, not the other way around." Her dad nodded, went back to watching Dairine and Nelaid while Nita finished her cereal. Shortly he said, "What exactly are they doing?" "It's complicated," Nita said. "Nelaid's family are responsible for keeping their planet's star from acting up. It's not the kind of wizardry it's easy to do from a distance. Sometimes you have to get in there under the hood and fix things..." "'Get in'?" her dad said. "Into a sun?" Nita nodded, eating the last of the cereal, then reaching for the mug of tea. "It's pretty specialized work. Roshaun did it for our Sun while he was here." "And she was there for that?" Nita nodded. "I think she had to be. I mean, it's our star. It wouldn't have mattered if Roshaun'd been a specialist at the galactic level: he still would've needed a local rep on hand to explain things to the star. A system's primary has a really deep connection with creatures born in its system. If an alien wizard tried to do anything significant to the Sun without an Earth-born wizard there, the star might think somebody was trying to tamper with it who didn't have permission." Nita shook her head. "Could've gotten real ugly." Her father gave Nita a slightly cockeyed look. "The star might think?" Nita sighed. "Daddy, I know how it sounds, but believe me, sometimes it's safer to treat inanimate things as if they were animate! Awareness levels in matter can be real situational. Anyway, I think Nelaid's teaching Dairine how to get into a relationship with stars besides her own. Seems like a good addition to her skill set. She always did like the high-powered stuff." <And the way her power levels have been dropping off, she may start needing finesse to keep doing that work. She's not going to have brute new-wizard strength to fall back on now...> Nita got up to put her bowl in the kitchen. "So you're going off, too, now?" her dad said. "Whereabouts? Mars?" "What, just because you think Kit's there?" "Well, that'd be the normal assumption, wouldn't it?" Nita had to laugh. Even her dad knew the score. "Yeah, I'd say..." She washed her bowl and put it in the dish drainer. "Well, guess what? Unlike just about every other wizard you know, I'm actually doing something close to home. Got to go to the beach and talk to S'reee. I had an idea last night before I went to sleep about something we've been talking about for a while." She came back into the dining room, bent down, and kissed her dad on the cheek. "You okay with this now?" She glanced at the phone. "Yeah, I think so." "Good. I'll be back later." "Before you go to Mars, or afterwards?" "Maybe before. It's not like he doesn't deserve his own private time up there." "'Boys are from Mars,' huh?" Nita snorted. "Believe me, I've been starting to wonder." "Okay. Keep me posted." Nita headed for the stairs again, smiling slightly. <This is working pretty well so far,> she thought. <If I'm real lucky, he won't get the bright idea that it'd be fun to watch me the same way he's watching Dairine.> <Well, you know,> the peridexis said in the back of her mind, <if it came to that, you could always tell him I refused to do it.> She snickered as she headed up the stairs. "Bobo," she said, "I know I can count on you. But let's not worry about it right now." "You say something, sweetie?" her dad said from down in the dining room. "Just talking to my invisible friend, Daddy..." There was a pause. "Why do I even bother asking anymore?" Nita laughed under her breath. She went into her room, threw some things into her backpack— a magazine or two, an extra sweater. Then she put out a hand and whistled for her wizard's manual. <You're really going to bring that with you? Such a crutch.> "We've had this discussion before, Bobo," Nita said, opening it and paging through to the messaging area to see what Kit might have left in response to her note of the previous day. "I kept my little blue baby-blankie for a real long time, too..." The peridexis fell silent, possibly confused. Nita grinned and looked at the messaging pages. The note she'd left Kit the previous day was grayed out: his response was underneath. <Headed out to check things out with Darryl and Ronan. Didn't want to bother you so early. Probably back around the middle of the afternoon. Take a look at my précis when you have a moment. K.> Nita raised her eyebrows as she closed the manual. <Kind of terse for him,> she thought. <Maybe he's realized how annoyed I was about him dumping me yesterday, and now he's feeling guilty? Good. But I'll take a look at the précis as soon as S'reee and I handle business, and then go see what he's up to. No point in making him suffer all day if he's learned his lesson.> She shoved the manual into her backpack, then slipped one strap over her shoulder and pulled a preset transit circle out of her charm bracelet. Nita dropped it to the floor, where it came alive in the proper blaze of fiery characters in the Speech. Nita looked at it with unnecessary relief. <Just a dream, before,> Nita thought. <Just a dream...> She stepped through the circle— The boulder-built breakwater jetty that sticks out into the water on the east side of Jones Inlet once had a U.S. Coast Guard station associated with it. The station was gone now, the old low building at the jetty's landward end demolished: no structure remained but the tower at the bayside end that still held the light and horn. The horn was silent, since the morning was bright and clear. The light blinked as usual, making a faint tink, tink, tink noise that could be heard by anyone within twenty feet of the tower, even over the wash and rush of water where it ran up against the stones of the jetty's base. Nita came out under eye level, from the landward point of view, on one of the big guano-streaked stones nearest to the end of the jetty. She had a low-energy visual shield-spell around her—a simple wizardly cloaking surface that redirected the images of objects behind her so that they appeared in front of her, making it seem as if she wasn't there. Nita held the slide-around cloaking spell in place while she glanced around to make sure no one in the area could see her. Fishing boats came in and out of the Inlet all the time, so this was something of an issue: but at this time of morning, the commercial boats were already out in the bay, and the small casual boats—charters that took parties of game fishermen out after sailfin and swordfish—were either well away or not yet ready to go to sea. No person or craft was anywhere near enough to see her even with binoculars. Nita killed the shield-spell, then sat down on the stone and stared down into the murky water, where long, silky green weed attached to the big gray-black rocks swayed and rippled rhythmically as the water washed and splashed against the jetty. The image from her dream, that impossibly high wave with the pale struggling sun caught in it, rose before her mind's eye again. <Water, water everywhere,> Nita thought. <Why does it keep turning up in my dreams?> But not even the koi had any answers to that question. Sometimes Nita thought it had to do with the part she'd played way back when in the Song of the Twelve: the expression of some old pain or discomfort still undischarged after what had admittedly been a very trying experience for a wizard relatively new to wizardry and not entirely prepared for the dangers of the Art as it was practiced in the Sea. <But the problem doesn't have to be the past,> she thought. <It could as easily be something in the future.> Her specialty as a wizard was changing, or rather expanding: the visionary gift had been making itself more obvious in her practice, which had meant that she'd had to start learning to handle it before—as Tom had said— it started handling her. <If that's not what it's doing already...> <The problem is, this predictive stuff— just isn't predictable!> And something about that bothered Nita, even as the phrasing made her laugh. She preferred her spells straightforward and structured: she liked to do a spell and then get a result she'd known she could expect. But the dreams and visions she was now trying to learn to manage were maddeningly fluid— and Nita had to laugh again at her phrasing: the liquid imagery kept sneaking in. <I've got water on the brain...> A hundred yards or so off the jetty, the water roiled, then sprayed upward in a noisy blast of spume that caught the Sun in rainbows. A few moments later a dark shape came looming up through the water into visibility, and the massive, gray-skinned, barnacle-spotted body of a humpback whale rose up to loll just under the surface. One eye broke surface to peer up at Nita, a lazy, interested look. "Dai stihó, O Honored Senior for the Waters of Earth," Nita said. S'reee rolled and blew spray at Nita, and Nita couldn't get any kind of force field up fast enough to ward it away: she got soaked. "No more of that, thank you very much!" S'reee said. "I've had it up to my dorsal with titles! And few I've been gladder to get rid of than that one, now that things have quieted down." that's all." Nita snickered. "It just sounds good on you, that's all." "I want nothing to do with it," the humpback muttered, slapping the water with her tail in annoyed emphasis. "All I want from the Powers is my own waters, my own name, with 'senior' added if anyone insists: that's more than enough honor for me." She blew again, resting the end of her long long chin on the breakwater's last stone, and looking up at Nita with one small bright eye. "What are you doing up so early in the day, hNii't? Isn't this supposed to be time off for you? Your learning-place work is almost done for this season, I thought: you were supposed to be relaxing—" "I am," Nita said. "This is relaxing..." S'reee backfinned and rolled over sideways in the water, the apparent smile of the long jaw reflected for the moment in the squeaks and clicks of her voice. "Oh, my, you've hit the bad phase of your wizardry already, where you can't stop working! Middle-aged so soon! I thought I was getting old before my time." Nita laughed, for S'reee was younger in humpback terms than Nita was in human ones. "Oh, sure. You're a real ancient." S'reee rolled right over on her back, partly in a gesture of agreement, partly to get a better view of the jetty. "And where's K!t today?" she said. <When are people going to stop asking me that? Especially when half the time they know the answer!> "Where do you think?" S'reee chuckled, a long string of squeaks and bub bling noises. "Don't give me that look! It's not my fault if he's predictable lately. And taking all this so seriously..." "Yeah," Nita said. "Well, I'll catch up with him after we talk. But something occurred to me last night. Wait a sec, I'll come down—" She clambered down off the rocks and carefully boosted herself down onto the surface of the water. There she stood fairly still until she got her balance, bobbing up and down while she reached around to one specific charm on her bracelet, shaped like a little glass bubble: the ready-made spell she used for underwater work when she wasn't up for a full shape-change. She pinched it between finger and thumb, whispering the last six words of the spell, the activating sequence. Around Nita and under her feet, the transparent sphere of air went solid at its outer boundary, then sank. Nita leaned against the front of the bubble, indicating which way she wanted it to go: it began to glide along under the surface, while S'reee finned along beside her. "So what's it about?" S'reee said. "Not what we've been working on. Something different." "Oh?" "The bombs." "Oh, yes," S'reee said. After the end of World War II, the local authorities dumped a considerable number of out-of-date depth charges into the Great South Bay, along the main approach to the New York and New Jersey harbors. For some time wizards had been arguing about what to do with these, as they were becoming increasingly unstable and dangerous with age. "I do wonder sometimes what possessed your people to just dump those there," S'reee said. "They've been on my mind, too. This time of year, some of the trawlers get irresponsible and drop their nets where they might run into some of those charges if they got careless—" "Well," Nita said, as they made their way into the green depths out past the shoreside reefs, "something came to me last night. I'd been doing some manual reading before bed, and when I was just falling asleep I got this image of a river flowing over stones, wearing them away—" The water around the two of them darkened with depth as they made their way down toward the bottom of the Bay, the slope dropping off southward of the old oyster beds. "Well, all the rivers go to the Sea eventually," S'reee said, "but I'm not sure what that has to do with getting rid of the depth charges." "This," Nita said. "We could dissolve them!" S'reee looked surprised as they paused over a gravelly, barren spot where several large, lumpy shapes, encrusted with barnacles, lay half-buried in years of silt and sand. "Now, I've heard a lot of solutions to this problem suggested," she said, "but that one's novel." "Well," Nita said, "the main problem with the depth charges right now is the instability of the explosives, right? Physically moving them would be dangerous for the wizards who get close enough to do an intervention— and if one exploded, the natural and artificial reefs around here would suffer. Years of growth gone in a second: we can't have that. But if we just dissolve off the casings—" "How?" S'reee said. Nita shrugged. "I was thinking we could just accelerate the rust. I mean, they're rusting pretty fast already. Look—" She leaned against the wall of her air bubble, guiding it to float around the far side of the depth charge in a spot where there were no barnacles. The metal was deeply pockmarked, and Nita leaned close and pointed at one spot where the rust had clearly eaten right through. "No telling what the seawater's doing to the explosive," she said. "If we get the casings off, if something should blow, at least shrapnel won't get blasted into the reefs. Then we can dissolve the explosive and wash it away by increasing the current. Solve the problem from the inside out rather than the outside in..." S'reee rolled in the water, considering. "Interesting concept. I'd need to check with our land-based Seniors, too, of course. But I like the sound of this, and it comes at a time when the problem's been preying on my mind more than usual. Time to do something about it." "So when will you decide?" Nita said as the two of them turned and made their way back toward land. "Over the next week or so. It shouldn't take more than that to do the necessary consulting and work out the actual process for dissolving the explosives. Nothing mechanical, though." "Something chemical makes more sense. We can build a spell to neutralize the byproducts." "And then the increased current takes those away, too? Makes sense." S'reee blew briefly, a cetacean chuckle. "It sounds like something Pellegrino would have thought of." "I got the idea after I was reading about her," Nita said. Angelina Pellegrino had been a great wizard of the previous century, a specialist in working with water who had single-handedly designed a way to cleanse the western Mediterranean of that period's increasing pollution. That spell, the so-called Gibraltar Passthrough Intervention, was still reckoned by historians of wizardry as one of the greatest achievements of that period by any wizard working alone. "But this wouldn't have to be anything like that big." "Which is good," S'reee said as they made for the surface, "as hydromages are few and far between, and to move a lot of water, you need a lot of power..." They broke surface a few hundred yards out from the jetty: Nita kept her bubble level with the surface until they were close enough that she wouldn't be seen climbing out of the water. "You know, you should have a word with Arooon about her," S'reee said. "What, our guy who sang the Blue in the Song of the Twelve?" "The same. He told me once that his father knew Pellegrino. I seem to remember him saying that when she got started, she was just a human farm girl who noticed that water acted strangely around her. You know the saying, that wizards who have the earliest Ordeals— and the latest ones— produce the biggest results. Angelina was one of those very late hatchers: almost out of latency when her Ordeal came along. She lived in the island down at the bottom of that long peninsula where the people lived who had that empire. You know the one, it was all around the edges of the Mediterranean—" "The Romans. You mean Sicily?" "That's the place. She went swimming on the evening she took the Oath, and the Lone One met her in some kind of demon shape and tried to drown her." S'reee snorted, a very wet blowhole-laugh that just missed drenching Nita again, though this time not on purpose. "Which was an error of judgment on Its part! The fight between them threw her straight into sync with the whole element of water, right across the Med. For something like the whole year after, every wizard on Earth who met the Lone One physically on Ordeal reported that It turned up dripping." Nita snickered at the image. "She didn't just do the water stuff, though, did she? She got to be a Planetary for a while." "So she did," S'reee said. "But something else was going on with her, too, which meant she spent less time as Planetary than she might have." S'reee rolled over, stretching those huge fins into the air. "In your reading, have you come across references to a manifestation of wizardry called infra-affinity?" Nita considered. "Don't know. I might have." "It's one of the so-called 'inner talents,'" S'reee said. "It's not a spell you design, or something you do, but something you are. Lots of wizards have affinities to one or more of the classic elements or states of matter. But this state implies such a profound connection to one state of matter or another that a wizard can go into complete union with it, then come out of the unified state without showing any ill effects. Infra-affinity tends to turn up in very new wizards as an Ordeal exploit, like the water mastery your friend Ronan manifested on his Ordeal. But it takes an incredible toll if you keep it up." S'reee looked thoughtful. "Arooon thought that Pellegrino's taking on the role of Planetary Wizard might have been why she died so young. A Planetary has to sync with the whole planet, and it's possible that the required affinities to earth and air and the Earth's interior fire started conflicting with Pellegrino's infra-affinity to water." S'reee let her tail fall over into the water in a sideways slap, a cetacean shrug. "No way to tell at this end of time..." Nita sat thinking about that for a moment. "I wonder," she said. "About Dairine... you think she might have an elemental affinity? She was always big on fire when she was little. I can't think how many times Dad had to stop her from playing with the barbecue. She was always getting burned. And now here she is starting to play around with stars..." "Plasma's a whole different element," S'reee said, "but you might be onto something there. It could explain the connection to your colleague Roshaun as well. Like does call to like sometimes..." "I wonder," Nita said, "if I'm developing something like that for water." S'reee waved a fin in agreement that this could be a possibility. "Could be. It might explain why you took to underwater wizardry so readily, and did so well in the Song. But it's a tendency, not a restriction. It doesn't have to dominate your practice." Nita nodded and leaned against the rocks. "Something else to research..." S'reee bubbled with laughter again. "The story of all our lives," she said. "Though I'd try to put the research aside for a little. We do have to make sure we have other things going on in our lives than just wizardry, or what good are we to the Powers?" There was an amused quality to S'reee's voice, something almost secretive. Curious, Nita stretched out on the rock to get a better look at S'reee's eye on that side. "Oh, really? What's this all about?" "Well, there are other reasons to go out singing than just errantry," S'reee said. That was when Nita remembered that "out singing" had more than one meaning for a whale. "Whoa, wait a minute! 'Ree, are you seeing somebody? You are! You're finning around with someone!" Nita reached down and pounded S'reee on the flank in a congratulatory way. "Who's the lucky bull?" "Someone I met out on errantry—" "Hey, great! Another wizard?" "Oh, no, not at all. We can't all date wizards, hNii't! I met Hwiii'sh a few weeks ago up by the Grand Banks when I was on a meal break in the middle of a team wizardry. You know how it is, there are always tourists around who're all itchy to see wizards doing what they do..." Nita smiled ironically, letting the "dating" reference go by. She was so used to hearing this kind of thing from kids at school that she'd stopped protesting, since it just made everybody sure they were right. <With luck, they'll stop eventually...> "Well, tourists aren't a problem I have all that much," Nita said. "So tell me all about him! What does he sing?"— that being what you generally asked whales instead of "What do you do?" "He sings aouih'hweioooiuh'hhaii!t." Nita had to listen to the word in the Speech to make anything of it. "Am I getting that right? He's a food critic?" "And very stuck up about it, too," S'reee said, blowing a big wet laugh. "You should hear him going on about Arctic krill, and South Cape squid, and all the rest of it! Fortunately he thinks it's a big deal that I'm a wizard, so I don't have trouble holding my own when his ego starts to run riot..." Nita leaned against the jetty and relaxed while S'reee talked, enjoying the fact that for once she had time to kick back and laugh at the concept of a whale who did nothing but share news about the presence and quality of food with other whales. But then lately it seemed rare for Nita to have "quality time" like this— time without school or schoolwork hanging over her head, or some terrifyingly heavy piece of wizardry that needed her attention. <More of this, please, and enough saving the world for this year!> Nita said silently to the One. <Actually having the summer off, like a normal person, would be very, very nice!> Not that she could ever be precisely normal again: wizardry kind of precluded that.... Up behind her on the jetty, Nita heard an odd sort of strangled pop. She scrambled around and peered up, one hand on her charm bracelet again, ready to wake up the light-diverting cloaking spell so she could pull it down over her and S'reee if need be. But there wasn't any need. Halfway down the jetty, Carmela had just walked out of the air and was heading toward them down the rough stony path on the jetty's top ##. Nita let out a breath of mild exasperation. "Mela," she said as Carmela got down near them, "you can not just go appearing out of nothing around here! People could notice." "But they don't, mostly," Carmela said, clambering down among the rocks to perch on top of one of the biggest ones near the waterline, dangling her legs over the edge. "Isn't that one of the weird things about wizardry on Earth? Everybody says they want magic in their lives, and when it happens right in front of them, usually they don't believe it. 'Oh, she must have been there a moment before and I just didn't see her,' they're all probably saying." Then she paused and looked around. "Except, listen to me: who's all saying? There's nobody here. You're just being paranoid. Loosen up! Good morning, Miss S'reee..." S'reee, half-submerged except for one big eye, was bubbling in amusement. "And dai stihó to you, K!aarmii'lha. What brings you down here?" "Well, my main project for the day is to go shopping," Carmela said, "and this time Nita is finally coming with me. Aren't you, Miss Neets?" Carmela scowled a very overstated scowl at Nita. Nita laughed, glancing at S'reee. "She's the only one I know who can make a shopping trip sound like a death sentence..." "Well, depending on where you shop at the Crossings, it could happen," S'reee said, rolling over in the water. "Some of the boutiques there are very species-specific: you'd have to watch what you bought. Sea's Name, even some of the restroom facilities there could be fatal if you walked in the wrong door..." "S'reee, it's hardly about the toilets. We know all about which ones not to go into!" Carmela said. "And if we didn't, we could always ask Dairine," Nita said under her breath, with a smile. "Never mind the restrooms," Carmela said, "it's the stores that are interesting, S'reee. The clothes stores, especially. We've got to get Neets out of these floppy sweatshirts and jeans! I've asked her to come with me at least six times now." Carmela bent down toward the amused S'reee in a most confiding way. "But she just keeps handing me these lame excuses. Help me talk her out of this morning's one! Which I'm sure she will now provide for us." And Carmela turned expectantly to Nita. A wave splashed higher than others had— the tide was coming in— and Nita paused to wipe spray off her face. "I was going to go up to Mars first..." Carmela covered her eyes theatrically. "I knew it, S'reee," she said. "It had to happen. She's finally come down with Kit's Mars bug!" "Well," S'reee said, adopting a fairly diplomatic tone, "you have to admit, it is hard not to find it exciting—" "Especially when he's up there with Ronan and Darryl," Nita said. "I know," Carmela said. "That was going to be my first stop before I hit the Crossings. I was hoping Neets would come along with me so we could give them a good joint tease before moving on to more interesting things." "No way, Mela!" Nita said. "Not a good idea! All the signs point to this being some obscure boy thing. The note Kit left me had 'Keep Out, Male-Bonding Road Trip' stamped all over it." "All the more reason to crash the party!" Nita began to sweat, realizing how much aggravation she was going to catch from Kit if she turned up on Mars with Carmela in tow. "No... seriously. You're right about how many times you've asked me to go. Why don't we let them get on with it and go shopping instead?" "Too late, Neets," Carmela said, and stood up. "I'll go without you." "To Mars??" Nita said, now becoming seriously concerned. Carmela smiled slightly and reached into one deep pocket of her jumpsuit. From it she pulled not the curling-ironish laser dissociator that Nita was expecting but a TV remote. This she flipped expertly in the air and caught. "I had a word with my closet," Carmela said. "Actually, I had a word with the TV remote that Kit did his magic tweaking on, and it had a word with my closet. And then, so I could have control of the worldgate in the closet when I'm away from home, the remote talked to Dairine's sweet little Spot, and cloned itself for me. Took no time at all." She smiled delightedly. "Wait," S'reee said. "'Your closet'? Is that inside a house here?" "Yup. It's in my bedroom." S'reee looked puzzled. "You have a worldgate in your house? What does it run on? Besides wizardry, I mean. The necessary 'hard' power outlay would be considerable." "I'm told I have a parasitic virtual catenary conduit from one of the nondenominated gates at the Crossings," Carmela said, and laughed. "Whatever that means! They've got it plugged into something or other; that's all that matters. My closet even has a Crossings gate number, though it's unlisted. Like a very classy Zip code." Carmela juggled the remote from hand to hand. "So now I don't need to bother anybody else to give me rides... and if I want to go to Mars, the boys can't stop me. Come to think of it"—and she grinned at Nita—"you can't stop me! Because you don't really want to. Do you?" "Uh—" "Oh, Juanita Louise, don't look so stricken—" Nita clutched her head. "Carmela. Do... not... say... the L word!" Carmela laughed. After a moment, to Nita's horror, so did S'reee. "hNii't," S'reee said, "I think she's got us both in the drift net at the moment. We may as well give in gracefully." "'Us'? You want to go, too?" "Well, why not? I'm not all that busy this morning. If she's supplying free transport—" "Not free," Carmela said promptly. "This interspatial transport is supplied to you on a promotional basis courtesy of the Planetary Government of Rirhath B and Crossings Properties HyperIncorporated." She produced a very prim and proper expression. "Because I know that in wizardry there's no such thing as a free lunch." Then Carmela grinned. "But I can take as many people as I like whenever I like to, because Sker'ret said I could... and what the Stationmaster of Rirhath B says, goes." Nita sighed. "She's got us there." "So it's settled, then. Where exactly on Mars are we going?" Nita pulled out her manual. "Wait a sec, 'cause I have no idea exactly what he's been up to—" After a few moments Nita found the spot where Kit had filed his précis. "Uh-oh..." "What?" S'reee and Carmela said in unison— Carmela with much more relish. Nita tsk-tsked softly. "He just couldn't leave that egg alone," she said. "Looks like it hatched! And sent out some signals..." S'reee, partially submerged again, listened to what the Sea had to tell her about this. "Odd. Four signals went out from the artifact. But I'm seeing five hot spots on Mars where wizardry is either working or waiting to start." Carmela looked confused. "So where are the guys?" Nita paged back to Kit's précis, found the map he'd labeled with the signal targets, and tapped the page: it updated. "Looks like the northernmost of the targets. Some crater called Stokes. Yeah, there are their life signs— S'reee, are you seeing this?" S'reee's eyes were unfocused. "Yes. There's no missing Darryl's life sign, in particular; it's unique." She flipped a fin, looked up at Nita. Nita nodded, not looking up from the manual: there was something strange about the diagram she was examining. Not knowing what to make of it, she flipped back to the messaging page and touched Kit's note to bring the contact up to live status. "Hey," she said in the Speech. "What's going on up there?" And she waited. Nothing. She looked up. Carmela was giving her an odd look. "Is there a delay?" she said. "Mars is a long way off." Nita shook her head. "Lightspeed isn't an issue for the manuals." She turned back to the map on Kit's précis page, scrutinized it. "I don't like this. The manual says we can't go there." "What?" S'reee said. "The manual says the sites are 'Unavailable, blocked by previous declaration, investigation ongoing, comm functions blocked during evaluation.'" "Whose previous declaration?" Carmela said, "and whose investigation? Blocked by who? And what—?" The rest of what she was saying got lost in the splash of S'reee submerging again. "What?" Carmela said. "Did I say something wrong? What freaked her?" Nita shook her head. "She's looking it up in detail. She gets her wizardry data from the Sea. She's more senior than me—she may be able to find out more." In a few moments, S'reee surfaced and blew. "All I get is what you're getting," she said to Nita. "Definitely something to do with the superegg's transmission this morning— there are multiple delayed wizardries working. But don't ask me what they're doing, I can't get an analysis. Because what I'm getting makes no sense. The Sea can't give me enough context for a translation." "Alien wizardry..." Nita said, getting more unnerved by the second. "Dangerous, you think?" "No telling. But that fifth site isn't blocked. There's some kind of wizardry there that's alive and running, but not doing anything... just waiting." "And transit's not prevented?" Carmela said. Nita shook her head, showed Carmela the manual page. "There. Get the coordinates and do the honors. We can have a look at that hot spot: and when we're actually on the planet, we might be able to reach the guys. Or get a better idea of what's going on with them." Carmela looked at the manual page and spent a moment tapping numbers into the remote. Nita was surprised to hear it make a little series of electronic beeps, at which Carmela's eyebrows went up. "Oh, you can do that?" she said in the Speech. "Sorry." She pointed the remote at the manual, pressed a button. The remote chirped; Carmela looked up at Nita. "It can take a scan. I didn't realize." "hNii't," S'reee said, "you had a cloaking routine ready? Putting it up around us might be good. About a twenty-meter radius—" Nita tucked the manual away, pulled the spell out of the charm bracelet, and said the words that kicked the spell into action. As she did, S'reee levitated gracefully out of the water, keeping just an inchthick shell of it around her so her skin wouldn't dry out. "I've got all the air we'll need. K!aarmii'lha?" Carmela raised the remote, hit what would normally be the channel-change button. They vanished. It was mid-afternoon on the red-brown southern slopes of the Martian volcano where two girls and a humpback whale appeared a second later. Away to the east, under the thin, filmy clouds of a windy day, the vast shadows and chasms of the westernmost end of Valles Marineris cut away from them in dust and haze toward the edge of the world, where a thin veil of pink-tinted sky hid the canyon's far end. Carmela looked at the long, gentle slope of the worn old mountain behind them. "You know what you could build here? The universe's biggest ski jump. What's this place called, anyway?" Nita had to smile as she and S'reee looked around. "Arsia Mons." Carmela snickered. "Sounds like one of Ronan's rude Irish words..." "Not this time," Nita said, pulling out her manual to cross-reference between the map and the downslope terrain. "In the old days, people saw this was a bright spot that got dark sometimes. They couldn't see the cause— this big spiral of dust that updrafts from the volcano's side every winter." She looked up the long, shallow curve of the volcano's slope, where many dark-colored rocks were whitened on top by the last winter's dustfall. "But the astronomers back then thought maybe there were trees here, growing leaves and losing them again. So they called it Arsia Silva, the Arsine Forest, after someplace in Italy. Later when the telescopes were better they got rid of the word for forest and put in 'mons' for mountain, but they kept the 'Arsia.'" Carmela stared at Nita. "Have you been secretly studying this stuff?" Nita laughed. "I have been not so secretly listening to Kit's lectures on Martian stuff every five minutes! For months! So some of it I remember." She shook her head. "That pillar of dust is famous: it gets twenty miles high, sometimes. These, though... these got found later." They looked down at the side of the volcano, all spotted with deep black holes. "They call them skylights," Nita said, bouncing down toward the closest of them. "Don't ask me why, but they gave them all girls' names. Dena, Chloe, Wendy, Annie, Nikki—" She stopped. "Can't remember the others..." <Abbey and Jeanne,> said Bobo. Nita nodded. "Seven of them, anyway." "But there's another one," Carmela said. "Is that where we're going?" Nita looked at the manual, looked at S'reee, nodded. "That's the one." "I shall call it Louise," Carmela said, and bounced off that way as if everything was settled. Nita made a strangled growling noise. <The more you do that,> Bobo said, <the more she's going to keep saying it. I'd let it pass, if I were you.> Nita went after Carmela. S'reee glided along beside her. "What's the problem with the name, hNii't?" she said. Nita shook her head. "Long story..." She pulled the atmosphere spell out of her charm bracelet to make sure it would hold up under the extra distance that Carmela had bounced ahead. "My air shell's much bigger than yours," S'reee said. "Don't worry; it'll cover us all." They caught up with Carmela at the edge of the further skylight. All three paused to look down into the darkness. "Deep," S'reee said. "Thirty or forty of my lengths..." "At least," Nita said. She unzipped her otherspace pocket and pulled out one of the little wizard-lights she carried for such circumstances— just a long sentence in the Speech made virtually physical, then rolled up and compressed to about the size of a pea. She pinched it and said the trigger word. The spell came alive in her hand, a clear white light about as bright at the moment as a sixty-watt bulb. This she dropped down into the cave. It floated down about as fast as a large leaf might fall from a tree. "Look at the top level of that," S'reee said, peering down into the darkness. "It's almost perfectly spherical." "Like a bubble," Nita said. "You think that's what happened here? Some old volcanic eruption. The gases built up in the lava; a bubble formed real near the surface. Then cooled off really fast—" "And then the top blew off it," Carmela said. She kicked gently at the stone at the very edge of the skylight: a fragment flew off, fell gently down into the huge hole after the wizard-light. "Yeah. Look how thin that was. If you had a bubble half a mile wide..." Nita nodded. She and Carmela stood, and S'reee hung, watching the light drift downward. "It looks a lot lighter down at the bottom," Carmela said after a few moments. "That's dust, I think," Nita said as the light came to rest in a little halo of its own reflected glow, far down at the bottom of that huge empty space. "Let's go down. 'Ree, is it safe to spell inside your air bubble?" "Absolutely—the spell structure's on the outside." Nita spoke a few words to the air inside S'reee's bubble. From where she and Carmela stood, a near-transparent stairway of hardened air, like glass, built itself down into the darkness. Nita reached into her backpack for the latest in a long series of rowan wands. As she stepped down into the darkness, the wand began to glow with its charge of absorbed moonlight, lighting the stairway. "Just walk down behind me," Nita said to Carmela. "This'll build itself in front of us and unbuild behind." "And if we need to run away in a hurry," Carmela said, sounding for the first time slightly nervous, "we're going to have to run upstairs??" Nita snorted. "If we have to get out that fast, I won't waste time skywalking! And neither should you. If there's trouble, just transport out." They walked down to Nita's little light-spell. It was a long walk. Beside them, S'reee drifted down through the huge, dark, empty space, fins hanging motionless: but Nita noticed that there was a faint glow about them and about S'reee's tail, some wizardry in abeyance but ready to use in a hurry. "I forgot to ask you," Carmela said, walking in sync with Nita. "Where's Dairine? I thought she'd be here, too. She was the one who was all hot for Mars, originally." "Just on the first day of her Ordeal," Nita said. "This was a pit stop: she wanted to see Olympus Mons. Such a tourist destination." She smiled. "She headed for Wellakh first thing this morning. Our dad's watching her— he's got his own Dairine Cam." Carmela's smile had a sad edge to it. "She's been out on the High Road a lot, hasn't she...?" She used the Speech-word allaire-nai for the concept; it implied that the person being described wasn't just offplanet, but well away from one's usual mindset or psychology. Nita nodded. "And treating the house like a bed-and- breakfast, my dad's been saying." "But always looking for Roshaun..." "Yeah." Carmela nodded. "I can understand that. I may have given him a hard time, but I'd never want him to vanish forever." "If anyone can find him," Nita said, "I'm betting she can." At floor level, the last of Nita's hardened-air steps vanished behind her as she and Carmela came down to bounce on the slightly curved floor. Puffs of pale dust rose. Nita held the rowan wand up, and she and S'reee and Carmela looked around. "There's another room through there," Carmela said, pointing off to their left. "Like another bubble bumped into this one—" They moved forward. It was warmer down here than up on the surface, but still plenty cold enough. The next chamber was another bubble, smaller than the last: out of it opened numerous other circular portals, leading into more huge stone bubbles, each full of darkness. "Look at that," Carmela said, peering away into the dark as they moved into yet another spherical chamber. "They just go on and on. Probably for miles..." "The whole volcano must be honeycombed with these," Nita said, listening nervously to the way her voice echoed in the present chamber, which was small enough for S'reee's air bubble to reach right to the edges. The cold, the dark around them were unnerving. Yet Nita found that she didn't feel precisely afraid or as if something was going to jump out of the shadows at her. There was just a growing sense of being— "Not in the wrong place," she said aloud. "Just in a place no one was really expecting us to be—" "Expecting," S'reee said. "You have a foresight about this, hNii't?" Nita shook her head. "Even hindsight would make me happy right now," she said. "How much further in do you make the hot spot where the wizardry's live?" "Maybe five of my lengths," S'reee said. "Not far—" Carmela craned her neck back to try to see the ceiling of the next chamber they entered, a much larger one. "Honeycombed isn't the word," she said. "It's froth. A million bubbles, big ones, little ones, that all got stuck in the lava, way back when..." They continued across that chamber, toward the dimly seen entrance to the next. "Neets," Carmela said, "the floor in here—" For some reason she was whispering. "What?" Nita whispered back. "There's nothing on it. But there was dust, back where we came in— stuff that must have come down through the skylight from the winter dust storm. Why wouldn't some be here? There should have been some air movement down here. Enough to blow at least some dust in, over the years—" S'reee stopped her glide forward. Nita and Carmela looked at her. "What?" Nita whispered. When S'reee answered, she didn't do it vocally. <Did you hear that?> <Hear what?> Nita said. <Something moved—> Something about S'reee's tone of thought left Nita more nervous than before. She held still, listening. Carmela quietly reached into her jumpsuit pocket and came out with what could have been mistaken, by the uninitiated, for a curling iron. She glanced over at Nita. Nita swallowed and held up the rowan wand, looking toward S'reee. The whale's attention was on something that moved and gleamed in the shadows of the doorway into the next chamber. As Nita followed S'reee's glance, the thing she was watching moved into the light. The wand's silver fire gleamed and slid down skin like green metal as the creature moved forward. It looked very like a scorpion: but it was almost the size of a Shetland pony. It had entirely too many legs and claws, and blank, cold polished-jade eyes. The scorpion moved slowly out of the darkness toward the three of them, the front two pairs of its claws lifted. Pouring along behind it out of the shadows came about fifty more like it, all their front claws scissoring together softly, making a grating, echoing whisper in the room of stone. "We are on errantry," Nita said, trying to keep any tremor out of her voice, "and we greet you!" The scorpions did not pause, did not slow: they came on, cold-eyed, claws working. Nita lifted the wand... [ Stokes ] Kit, Ronan, and Darryl came out of transit to find themselves standing at the dark far edge of a distant crimson dawn. In a gauzy wrapping of atmosphere just above the edge of the world, a small molten Sun hung trapped as if in amber under a dome of pale-blue haze, not yet too bright to be dangerous to look at. All around, under a sky only a few shades of violet from black, lay the flat, dark rock-scattered surface of the little crater called Stokes. Away to the east, the shadow of the crater's rim lay in a sharp black crescent between the three of them and the morning; and from every least rock and pebble, a pointed finger of cold, dark shadow lay long against the ground. First Darryl, then Ronan, stepped to the edge of the force-field bubble that surrounded them and gazed out, not speaking. Kit knew why. Full day on Mars can seem matter-of-fact once you get used to it; just another panorama full of red sand and rubble, just another dusty amber sky, sunlight seeming as dimmed by blowing sand as by a Sun that's fifty million miles farther away and twenty percent dimmer than it ought to be. But there was no making the same mistake at dawn or sunset, when because of the dust and lack of oxygen in the Martian atmosphere the light went blue instead of red. Then the surroundings became both bleak and beautiful in a way that was possible only here. That faint, thin hiss of wind, hardly to be heard; that sense of absolute, pristine barrenness, empty, but not in any of the usual ways— it all got under your skin, made you hold still and listen for some hint of the secret that was hiding from you, the real reason why this landscape seemed so studiedly unconcerned about your presence. It seemed to be saying, "This isn't your place: you have no business here. Do whatever you like. It doesn't matter." <But it does. It does. All we have to do now is find out why...> Ronan turned away from the sunrise and looked toward the northwestern horizon, where the crater wall was closer and the cracks and ravines running down it glowed a dull cyan in the blue fire of dawn. He glanced back at Kit, the sunglasses gleaming indigo. "Like it's whispering to itself about us," Ronan said. "Not so easy to hear when there are a lot of other people around—" "Yeah," Kit said. Ronan looked over at Darryl, who was still gazing at the brightening dawn. "As for you, don't know how you're doing that." Darryl looked at him. "What?" "Being completely normal," Ronan said. Kit had to agree. Darryl might as well have still been standing in Kit's backyard for all the exertion the transit seemed to have cost him. "Every wizardry's supposed to have a price. And here you just hauled yourself and two other people fifty million miles without breaking a sweat! Seems like cheating." "I am not cheating!" Darryl said, looking injured. "It's not a transport: it's a bilocation. Why should I pay some big price for going fifty million miles from Earth when I'm still there?" He brushed dun-colored dust off him. "You're just jealous because you can't pull the same stunt. Waste of time, if you ask me, because I may not be able to do this forever! So right now I plan to enjoy it. And so should you, because you're riding free." "Okay, fine, I didn't mean to sound ungrateful..." "Well, you do. But I forgive you, 'cause I'm nice that way." Darryl grinned, turned to Kit. "Where's the spot the first signal went to?" "Over there." Kit pointed to the northeast. "A few hundred yards." The three of them headed for the spot using the half-bounce, half-walk that worked best in this gravity. Ronan was humming under his breath as he bounced along, and after a few bounces, he started to fill in the lyrics. "Oh, the chances of anything coming from Mars... are a million to one, he said..." "So how come you got up so late this morning?" Kit said. Ronan threw him a sideways look. "Because I was out late last night, nosy boy." And he snickered. "While you're at it, you might look into trying some kind of social life for size! I had a date to go clubbing with my mates. Why would I dump them just because something admittedly exciting happened up here? You start acting that way all the time, pretty soon no one invites you out anymore." And Ronan turned his attention back to the landscape. "Oh, the chances of anything coming from Mars... are a million to one... but still they come...!" "Okay, message received," Kit muttered after Ronan, "but you didn't have to jump down my throat about it." "Yes, he did. Dirty job, but somebody has to do it," Darryl said, bouncing briefly higher to get a better view of where they were headed. "Everybody heard Miss Neets's reaction to how you just dumped her yesterday. When she's pissed off, her voice kind of carries—" Kit flushed red. "I thought we said we were going to leave her out of this." "Heh," Darryl said. He bounced high again. "How far now?" Kit checked his manual. "A hundred yards—" Darryl came down. "No outcroppings here. If there's another egg, it'll be underground." "Yeah," Kit said. The crater wall was two miles away. The rest of the impact area was the usual rubble-strewn Martian landscape— sandy ground littered with rocks of all sizes, shattered by the summertime contrast between bitter cold and surprising warmth, and wind-worn afterward. Kit kept an eye on his manual, where the spot was highlighted on the map now showing their approach vector. Finally their path and the target's location converged. "Right here," Kit said, and stopped. Darryl and Ronan stopped, too, staring at the ground under Kit's feet—just sand, a scatter of pebbles, a few fist-size rocks. "Okay," Darryl said, "dig we must. But not just on a hunch. We need ground radar." "Now, it's funny you should mention that," Ronan said, and held his hands out in front of him, starting to speak softly in the Speech. "Ooh, magic gestures," Darryl said, nudging Kit. "This should be cool." Ronan threw Darryl a withering look. "It's to help me target, you plank," he said. "Now shut your tiny gob and watch an expert at work." Kit and Darryl watched as Ronan started reciting his spell again. Within seconds, the ground faded to transparency under their feet. It was like standing on a bumpy glass floor, the "glass" apparently about a hundred feet thick beneath them, full of shadowy flaws and striations illuminated sourcelessly by the spell itself. "Look at that," Ronan said, sounding abstracted as the wizardry penetrated the surface more deeply and he peered down into it. "See how those layers are piled up? Looks like there was water here once." "A lot of places," Kit said, as Ronan walked slowly around the spot where Darryl and Kit were standing. "There's enough water ice at the south pole to flood the whole planet thirty feet deep. But how it got down there, and when..." He shook his head. "You need me to split this air bubble for you so you can walk further out?" "Not yet," Ronan said. He kept walking. Everywhere he moved, for about ten feet in front of him and to the sides, the ground went transparent. The Sun had climbed higher as they'd come, and the light continued getting better as the blue dawn shaded into the pale amber of early morning; but there was nothing unusual to be seen under the ground. Finally Ronan paused. "How accurate was your tracking on the spot that signal targeted?" "Within a meter," Kit said. "At least that's what the manual said." "Might be something else going on," Ronan said. "Maybe something cloaking whatever's down there? I tweaked this scan so it includes the detection routine that Síle and Markus came up with. However—" He peered down into the unrevealing depths. "If whatever's here was alerted by the egg that the cloaking routine it was using had been broken—" "Could be," Darryl said, pulling out his WizPod and touching it into manual function. "Let's see if any other wizardries are working around here. Maybe with different cloaking routines. I'll tell it"—he pulled a glowing page out of the body of the Pod, stretching it out on the air and writing on it in the Speech with one finger— "to look around for the material the egg was made of." A few moments later Darryl stood back, leaving the Pod and its stretched-out manual page hanging in midair, and started whispering the words he'd written. The world went quiet around them as the spell "took" with unusual speed. <But he really is still pretty close to his Ordeal,> Kit thought. <His power levels are way above either of ours. And on top of that, he's an abdal: practically a living power conduit. No telling what he could do now if he wanted to. Assuming, like the rest of us, he can get enough of what he needs out of the manual to figure out how—> Far down in that abnormal clarity of Martian soil, Kit could suddenly see a green light glowing. He gulped, recognizing the color. "Got some action here, all right!" Darryl said, as under their feet the glow rose and spread like a slowly rising tide of liquid light. "Something's awake! There are elements in this energy flow that're part of the transmission from the egg in Nili Patera—" "Is this wizardry hooked to anything physical down there?" Kit said. Darryl shook his head. "Nope. It's just linked to the terrain. Uh-oh—" "Uh-oh" wasn't something Kit liked hearing another wizard say. He was about to ask what was wrong when that green light boiled up from the depths, bursting against the ground under their feet like blood under skin, and then flowed lightning-quick away from them in all directions. The rush of light left itself burning in every rock and pebble it passed as it flash-flooded out across the crater's bottom. Within seconds it washed up against the crater's rim, flooded up it on all sides, splashed over the ragged crest, and vanished over the side— Kit and Ronan and Darryl stood looking across the crater in three different directions. Darryl said, "Okay... now what?" Ronan shook his head. "Maybe nothing. It's fading." Kit looked around them. Right across the crater that light was already growing paler—not just because the Sun was higher and brighter in the amber sky. "So what was that? Another signal? Or just some kind of acknowledgment that we followed up on the first one?" Darryl was looking at the manual page he'd extracted from his WizPod. "It was a limited-run wizardry. It triggered right when Ronan did his see-into-the-ground routine. The triggered spell blew all its energy in one big spike. The energy's dropping right off the scale again." Darryl shook his head. "It was a big spike, though. And there was something funny about the time stamp—" Kit looked across the crater for any sign of life or movement. There was nothing. "Analysis," he muttered. "Mamvish warned us we'd probably wind up doing a lot of it..." He pulled out his manual and opened it to the log pages for this trip. Among several charts showing what wizardries the three of them were carrying or utilizing, Kit saw the diagram that showed what wizardly energy was associated with this specific spot. Darryl hadn't been overstating the size of the spike associated with their arrival: the graph had stretched itself to the top of the manual page to accommodate it. "What was the problem with the time stamp on the spike?" Kit said. "It looks okay to me." "Not the spike itself," Darryl said. "The indicator showing when the spell was actually installed here. It looked earlier than the egg's installation date—" Then Darryl made a little hiss of annoyance as the indicator vanished from the page. Kit shook his head. "Can you get that back?" "I'll let you know when I understand why it went away!" Darryl said. "Here—" But Kit was now distracted by his manual: its pages were flushing pink. He glanced up— Atmospheric conditions could sometimes get very odd on Mars, but in all the times he'd been there, Kit had never seen anything like this. From where the three of them stood to the horizon, it was as if the Red Planet had suddenly taken the sobriquet personally and decided that this particular morning it was going to get really, really red: not just rusty-colored, but positively crimson. Everything was turning that color— the ground, the sky— as if Kit was wearing red glasses. "This could give you a headache after a while," Ronan said. He sounded uneasy. Darryl looked up and around. "Sky's clear. Not a dust storm, then—" "This is that new wizardry working," Kit said. He started flipping through his manual to the defensive spells. "But what's it doing?" Ronan said, taking the sunglasses off to stare at the horizon. "I mean, if something's going to..." He trailed off. "What?" Darryl said. Ronan pointed and shook his head. Maybe a quarter mile away from them across the crimson sands, teetering unevenly along in their general direction, was something with four long legs and some kind of body hung in the middle. They stared. "What is that?" Kit said. "A giant spider?" Ronan squinted at it. "The legs look more, I don't know, crabby. Look, they've got webs or something between the joints." He paused. "I'm sorry, maybe I need to hit the optometrist when I get home. Does that look like it has the head of a bat?" Kit shook his head. "I wasn't going to say anything. There's a tail, too. Like a rat tail..." "One of the original inhabitants, maybe," Ronan said, "coming to say hello?" Kit shook his head. The approaching thing unsettled him: it looked not just unlikely, but also somehow rickety and badly built. Kit flipped his manual to a bookmarked page where he'd set up a life-sign detector sensitive to all the kinds of life that wizards knew about—which were quite a few. But the display showed nothing in the area but three dots labeled with the twelve-character code in the Speech that meant Earth-human. "Not alive," Kit said. The bat-rat-spider-crab came tottering toward them, only a few hundred yards away now. Ronan shook his head. "Illusion?" "I wouldn't go that far," said Kit. "There's something physical there that wasn't there before—" "A construct," Ronan said, frowning. "Great. If it's real enough to get physical, it's real enough to damage us. But since it's not alive, if that thing starts getting too cozy, I won't feel too bad about using this." Ronan reached sideways into the air, grabbed something invisible, and pulled. Something long, narrow, and blazingly bright came out of nowhere, following his pull. For a second Kit's memory flashed back to the Spear of Light that Ronan used to carry: but that was in other hands, or claws, these days. The object Ronan held though, was definitely "of light"— a cylindrical bar of burning golden radiance an inch wide and three feet long. Ronan lifted it up and laid it over his left arm, sighting on the bat-spider thing as it came spidering hugely along toward them. Kit recognized what Ronan held as one of numerous deadly weapons that a wizard could construct from the universe's more basic energies. "You sure you want to do that?" "Not at all sure," Ronan said, sighting carefully. "Entirely willing not to have to do it if that keeps its distance. But my mam didn't raise me to be bat chow, so you're going to have to forgive me if I—" He broke off short as with a distinctive crack! a bullet flew over them. The head of the bat-rat-crab thing came up, reacting to something off to their right. It stared— then turned and enthusiastically ran off in a different direction entirely. Confused, Ronan lowered the energy weapon and peered past the fleeing bat-rat-crab thing. "All right, now wait just a fecking minute," he said. "A rifle? Was that a rifle??" Darryl started to laugh. The sound made Kit realize that Darryl had been unusually quiet for the last few minutes. Now, though, he pointed out past where the bat-creature had been. "Will you get a load of that?" Kit's eyes went wide as he looked where Darryl pointed. Running toward them across the crimson sand, under the carmine sky, were human beings. They wore space suits, but not modern ones: these looked like crude versions of a jet pilot's pressure suit. And bizarrely, they didn't seem to be affected by Mars's lighter gravity. They ran as if they were still on Earth. Darryl was still laughing as the spacemen— there was no other way to think of beings so retro-looking— got closer. They slowed, took stance, and fired again, but not at the bat-rat-whatever: at the three astonished wizards. The bullets hit the force field holding in the wizardly air bubble and whined away. Ronan had lowered his weapon, looking perplexed at Darryl's laughter. "I'm sorry," he said to Darryl, "but is there something funny I'm missing about this? Those are bullets!" "Yeah," Darryl said, "but they're movie bullets!" Kit stared at him. "What?" "This is all out of a movie!" Darryl said. "First time I saw it was when I was really little. It completely freaked me out, because I didn't understand it was just a story. I thought it was the news from somewhere. Then I saw it again on one of the movie channels a few weeks ago, and when I recognized it, man, I couldn't stop laughing; it's so lame! It's called The Angry Red Planet." "Well, somebody's angry," Ronan said, as the barrage of bullets continued. "Somebody's scared," Kit said. "Look, let's go talk to them." "They're constructs!" Ronan said. "Barely a step up from illusions. You really think we're going to be able to communicate?" Kit shrugged. "Do I look like an expert in what's happening here? But they're something to do with the superegg's signal. And we're wizards: communicating's what we do. Let's go see if we can find out what this is about." "But why are they shooting at us?" Ronan said, glancing around him. "We didn't do anything!" Darryl was looking over his shoulder. "Uh, Ronan? Could be they're shooting at those." Behind them Kit saw something moving, but the redness was bothering his eyes enough that he had to stop and rub them. Afterward he looked again, thinking he could make out large leaves and some waving tendrils, maybe a few hundred yards away... and getting closer. "There are—are those some kind of plant?" Ronan squinted. "Only if plants have tentacles. And octopus faces." Kit hadn't at first believed he was seeing those faces. Now he wished he still didn't believe it. "Carnivorous," Darryl said. "Wouldn't get too close." "Seems to be what they have in mind," Kit said. "Those were in the movie, too?" Darryl nodded, looking less amused. "Don't know if I'm wild about plants when they start walking around..." Kit reached into his otherspace pocket and pulled out the piece of weaponry he'd almost used last night. Held in the hand, it looked like nothing more than a small, dark, shining globe, but it could be a lot more on demand. "You want to stay out of Nita's basement, then," Kit said as the plant creatures shambled closer. "You kidding me? Those things aren't a bit like our friendly neighborhood walking Christmas tree," Ronan said, leveling his energy weapon again. "Our wee Filif could never give me the creeps like these. Will you look at the tentacles on them? I'd swear they have hinges! That can't be right..." More bullets whined past them. "Come on," Kit said. "Those things won't get through our force field, hinges or not. Neither will anything the spacemen have." "You sure about that?" Ronan said as one of the larger spacemen, getting within maybe a hundred yards, lifted a heavy-looking weapon and aimed it at one of the plant-octopi. A bright, hot stab of light leaped from it and hit the plant creature right between its bulbous eyes. After a few moments of theatrical thrashing and screaming, it fell to the scarlet dust. Its companions, seemingly oblivious, kept on advancing toward the spacemen. Kit was now much more in a mood to pay attention to the weaponry of the approaching people. "Okay, they have lasers..." he said. Ronan shrugged. "Your common-or-garden-variety ray gun," he said. "The beam didn't look all that coherent. It can't get through our shields." "Oh, we are in a movie," Darryl said, and started laughing again. "Did you hear those things? Since when do energy weapons make a noise like that?!" "Restrain yourself, laughing boy," Ronan said. "We're representing our species, here. If all this craziness is Mars trying to talk to us, don't make fun of it just because somebody underfunded its special-effects budget five hundred thousand years ago." He sighed and laid the long, bright rod of light over his shoulder. "Your idea's the best I've heard so far," Ronan said to Kit. "Let's go communicate." The three of them headed toward the approaching spacemen, now only a few hundred feet away. "Maybe we should all hold up one hand," Darryl said. "That old 'we come in peace' gesture." "Maybe I'd feel better about that if they hadn't started the unpeaceful part of this conversation," Ronan said under his breath. "And now that I think of it, look at their heads. Is there something wrong with their space suits?" "You mean besides the fact that there's no glass in the helmets?" Kit said. "Wouldn't surprise me." The two groups got within about fifty feet of each other, at which point the spacemen stopped, and four out of five of them pointed their rifles or ray guns at Darryl and Ronan and Kit. The three of them stopped, too. Kit cleared his throat. "We're on errantry," Kit said in the Speech, "and we greet you." All of the spacemen stared at them, the four weapons not moving an inch; and, piercingly, the fifth spaceman screamed. Kit and Darryl and Ronan looked at one another. <And you're ragging me about my favorite movies being old?> Ronan said silently to Darryl. <At least in mine, woman astronauts are made of sterner stuff.> To the spacemen, Ronan said, "Please excuse us. We didn't mean to upset you. We're here to investigate the sites targeted by the messages that the superegg transmitter sent out. Are you here to speak to us on behalf of the planet, or some other instrumentality that's been operating here?" The spacemen looked at one another nervously. "They look human," said one of them. "It's impossible! Humans can't survive in these conditions!" <Oh, yeah?> We're <not the ones wearing the helmets without faceplates,> Darryl said silently. "They must be illusions," said another of the spacemen. "Or more monsters like those things—" said the single spacewoman, looking fearfully past them toward where the plant-octopi were still shambling closer. "Please, believe me, we're human," Kit said. "We just have a force field protecting us. We're here looking for indications of past life on this planet, and we—" "Those plant things are getting closer!" another of the men shouted. "I don't care how human these things look! This is a trap to keep us here while those plants surround us! We have to get back to the ship!" <Ship?> Kit thought. Darryl nodded off to one side. <That just appeared,> he said silently. <Wondered when it'd turn up.> And indeed there it was, maybe a quarter mile away, gleaming metallically red in this weird lighting— a long cigar-shaped rocket ship very much in the old style, with a pointy nose and little fins down at the bottom. "Is that a lake over there?" Kit said, peering past the rocket. "Looks like it," Ronan said. "This is getting weirder all the time..." He turned back to the spacemen. "Come on, people," he said in the Speech, "would you ever just tell us what you're doing here on Mars? All we want to do is—" "It's in my mind again!" the woman shrieked, and fainted. Kit winced: this lady had the screaming part of her performance honed to a fine edge. Ronan shook his head. "Fainting," he said as one of the men hurriedly picked the woman up and carried her away. "You don't see a lot of that these days..." The other men started shooting at them again, ostensibly to cover their retreat. Bullets and ray-gun blasts splashed harmlessly off the force field as the spacemen hurried back toward their rocket ship. "If there's a list of least effective first contacts in the manual," Darryl said as the spacemen fled, "I think we're on it now." "Yeah," Ronan said. "As a definition of the phrase 'talking at cross-purposes,' this scenario works pretty well." He ran a hand through his longish dark hair, looking exasperated. Darryl shoved his hands in his pockets and stood admiring that very retro spacecraft, while behind the three of them the man-eating plants bumped into their force field, tried to push through it, couldn't, and then blundered on around it in pursuit of their original prey. "Doesn't look real stable," Darryl said, watching the spacemen and once-more-conscious spacewoman clamber up the rocket's fragile-looking ladder in desperate haste. "Hard to believe those could even fly." "That old V-2 design worked just fine in World War Two," Ronan said, looking grim. "Those things blew half of London to smithereens. But they're the granddaddy of every rocket since." Darryl shrugged. "Well, okay, in atmosphere they worked. But they'd never have made it to Mars." "The concept was right, though," Ronan said. "Thrust comes out the back end, pushes the rest of the craft forward: got us to the Moon, didn't it? Granted, this thing wouldn't have made it forty million miles, but—" "Guys?" Kit said. "Something else that I wouldn't have thought could make it to Mars?" They looked at him. "The giant amoeba??" Kit said, pointing. Darryl and Ronan both looked shocked. But there was no arguing the presence of the gigantic green blob that had appeared from nowhere in particular and was now oozing its way up the side of the rocket... and, incidentally, out toward them as well. Ronan looked annoyed. "Oh, come on, that's never an amoeba! Lookit there, it's got a couple effing great eyes stuck in the middle of it!" "Three," Kit said, peering at it. "Might be more..." "Okay, give me a break, so it's a space amoeba," Darryl said. "They could have eyes, maybe..." "People of Earth!" a gigantic voice shouted from somewhere or other. They all jumped. "Okay," Ronan said, unlimbering his weapon again. "Here we go..." "Do not return to Mars!" the great voice cried. "We can and will destroy you if you do not heed our warning!" "Not just a space amoeba, but a cranky space amoeba," Kit said, hurriedly flipping his manual open, as boosting the force field surrounding their air bubble struck him as a good idea. From across the crater came a roar and shudder, and the ground under their feet shook as the rocket ship took off. Or, rather, it tried to. The space amoeba was hanging on to it as tenaciously as a baby unwilling to let go of a favorite toy. In a great cloud of smoke, slowly and with difficulty the rocket pulled up out of the amoeba's grip— then blasted free, leaping away from the surface in a great flare of fire. The giant amoeba slumped back to the surface to lie in a sulky, gelatinous heap. "Is that thing going to come after us now?" Ronan muttered. "I'd be more concerned about the green leafy octopi..." Darryl said. "Wait," Kit said, glancing around. All around, the color was draining out of the landscape. It took some moments for Kit to realize that the vista around them had actually resumed its proper colors, which now looked bizarrely pallid in contrast with the previous unnatural redness. The carnivorous octopus-plants disappeared, along with the giant space amoeba, the bat-rat-crab-spider thing, and everything else that had pertained to that other and much more peculiar Mars. Darryl was standing there blinking. "Everything's green," he said. "It's what your eyes do after staring at red for too long," Ronan said. "It'll go away." He sat down on a nearby rock, gazing up into the Martian sky, now sedate and empty of anything but some passing clouds. "So is it just me... or was that unusual?" Kit laughed. "Not just you, no." "But no question," Darryl said, "the planet was trying to communicate with us!" "If that's true," said Ronan, "then the planet needs its head felt!" "Seriously!" Darryl said. "It was trying to get through to us. It took something from inside our heads—" "Your head maybe," Ronan said. "Got better things going on inside mine than bat-rat-crab puppety thingies where you can still see the strings hanging off them! Not to mention man-eating broccoli with tentacles." He rolled his eyes. "Tentacles held together with eyelets and wire!" "I can't help the details," Darryl said. "I didn't make the movie! Which I said was dire! But something here felt it— or got into my head and saw it— and tried using it to get through to us." "And say what?" Ronan said. "'Bugger off'?" "Language, guy," Darryl said. "But yeah. And it'd make sense for them to be trying to scare casual visitors off! If Mamvish is right—if the people who lived here managed to store some way to wake them up— then they don't want it trashed. They want to make sure anybody who comes poking around isn't just going to run away, and knows what they're doing. If they can scare you away, so much the better for them and you." Kit and Ronan sat thinking about that for a moment. "Yeah," Kit said. "I mean, if you were a normal astronaut and you landed here and found these bat-rat-crab things running around and giant amoebas sliming all over the place, what would you do?" "Seek professional help," Ronan said. "On Earth," said Darryl. "In a hurry! And not come back any time soon." "But if you're not scared off," Kit said, "that means you can see through the illusion. Which also means you're probably a wizard, and you'll be able to figure out what the planet's trying to tell you." "And it's going crazy doing that right now because you broke that egg," Ronan said. Kit glared at him. "No, you dummy," Ronan said, "not broke as in 'caused to stop functioning.' Broke as in 'you have to break a few to make an omelet.' You don't leave a message-capsule wizardry around for nothing, right? You want it broken. And maybe it's not about just messaging." "Maybe it's a test?" Darryl said. Ronan shrugged. "Makes sense. And the same forces that busted loose out of the egg, and made this weirdness happen, are watching to see what we do." "Well, great," Kit said, "but if this was a test, how do we know if we passed or failed?" The other two shook their heads. "Keep going, I guess," Darryl said. "Visit the other places where the signal went. Maybe one thing being tested is whether we give up when nothing seems to happen." Kit nodded. "And also nobody gives you a test if they don't care what result you produce! If we finally pass, then something should pop up and tell us what all this has been about." "You hope," Ronan said. He sighed and stood up again, dusting the omnipresent beige-y dust off him. "At least we can see all right again. Why did everything go that weird shade of red?" "That was in the movie," Darryl said. "Some effect they put in to make the puppets and the cheap background paintings look less cheap." "Well, cheap or not," Ronan said, looking back toward the crater, "I wouldn't have liked to meet those things without a force field." "No argument," Darryl said. "Now, while we're all feeling good about how competent we are, I have a question." He turned to Kit. "And since you are, as our overly tall cousin here says, Mars Uber-Geek Boy, you should have the answer. How many satellites are in orbit around Mars right now, and when's the next one due over?" Kit's eyes went wide. He started paging hurriedly through his manual. "And if one's been over already," Ronan said, "did it see anything? And if it did, what? And how can we keep the imagery from getting back to Earth? Because I think that the poor guys at NASA are going to have big trouble with the giant amoebas." "Space amoebas—" Darryl said. "And finny rocket ships and bat-rat-crab things," Ronan said, "and wizards shooting at them..." "We've got two satellites right now," Kit said. "Odyssey and Mars Express. Here are the orbits—" He held out the manual, touched the open pages: they produced a double-page spread of sine curves spreading themselves across the rectangular whole-planet map. He studied the diagram, then let loose the breath he'd been holding. "We got lucky," Kit said. "Odyssey's on the other side of the planet: Express is a third of the way around. Both out of range." He glanced out at where the giant amoeba and the rocket had been. "Any residual heat from that, you think?" Ronan said. Darryl was pulling another page out of his WizPod and examining it: over a map of the area, a few nested blobs of various colors were displaying. "Some," he said. "The heat was real. Those constructs were able to affect their surroundings, even though themselves they were only temporary." "We'd better go cool down the places where they were, then," Ronan said. "Don't think we'll need to," Kit said. He looked over Darryl's shoulder at the notations under the graph showing the heat readings. They were already sinking toward baseline. "The crust here doesn't hold heat real well: that's why the surface erosion's so aggressive. By the time the satellites come around again, the heat'll be gone. It's not a big worry right now." Darryl looked alarmed. "Got something worse?" "Kind of a worry," Kit said. "What if we didn't just trigger this one site by turning up here? What if we triggered the others, too, and they're doing something right now? Something important that we shouldn't miss?" "You're not going to suggest that we split up to investigate them separately, I hope!" Ronan said. Kit rolled his eyes. "A recipe for trouble," he said. "In weird other-planet horror movies, or out of them." Darryl shoved his WizPod into a pocket. "I could split up," he said. Kit and Ronan exchanged a glance, and Ronan looked at Darryl with some concern. "You sure that's a good idea? You're here twice already. I mean, here and on Earth, so that's twice—" "I think I could do three," Darryl said, "one after another. I did three at once back home, last week. Wouldn't want to push it much further, though— all of me kept walking into things. Too much data to process, or else my brain doesn't like working in triplicate." Darryl glanced around. "So let's get busy. Where do you want me?" Kit showed him his manual. "These three spots. They're all near largish craters. De Vaucouleurs— Cassini— Hutton." "What are the names for? Famous people or something?" "Yeah, or places on Earth." "Okay. Which is closest?" "This one." Kit pointed at de Vaucouleurs. "A couple of hundred miles south, right by Wahoo." Ronan gave Kit an incredulous look. "You're just yanking our chains. There's never any crater called Wahoo!" Kit scowled, pointed at the map. "Right here, next to Yuty." "You didn't even need to look at the map just then," Ronan said in wonder. "I'll decide whether to be impressed or horrified later. Darryl?" "On my way," Darryl said. And he flickered. There was no other way to describe it. Darryl was still there: there had been none of the usual air movement that was so hard to avoid when doing a physical transit. "You set that spell up wrong or something?" Kit said. "Oh, no, it worked fine," Darryl said. "For that one of me." He swallowed hard. "You okay?" "Yeah, fine. Just a little more effort than usual to offset the fact that I wasn't all here to start with. Cassini next—" The flicker happened again. Darryl was still standing there, and this time he looked pale, and his eyes seemed unfocused. "Darryl?" Ronan said. "Don't joggle my elbow, Ro," Darryl said: and his voice was strange. It sounded as if there were several of him, even though there seemed to be only one standing there. He flickered around the edges again, once, twice— —and crumpled straight down to sit crookedly on the dusty red ground, holding his head. Ronan caught him on the way down, easing the collapse, and started patting his face. "Darryl, hey, look up! Come on—" "Will you stop whacking me, man, do I look like I need the smelling salts?" Darryl pushed Ronan's hand away. "I'm fine. Let me breathe." Kit hunkered down in front of Darryl. "What happened out there?" Darryl shook his head, rubbed his face for a moment. "Nothing," he said. "It's harder to do that stunt here than on Earth, that's all. Or I need more practice. Important thing, though, is that nothing's happening at two of the other sites. Yet, anyway. But your friend over by Wahoo, de-whatchamacallit—" "Vaucouleurs," Kit said. "Right. It's warming up: I could feel the wizardry getting ready to execute. We'd better get over there." Kit and Ronan got up: Darryl did, too, without help. "Better," he said. "See, I just needed a second. You guys gotta stop treating me like I'm Fragile Boy." He reached up to put a hand on each of their shoulders. "You ready?" Ronan picked up his long rod of light and laid it over his shoulder: it blazed, then died down, subdued but ready. Kit glanced at him, reached for his little silvery sphere and juggled it in one hand. "Hit it," he said. They vanished. [ Shamask-Eilith ] In the great dark dome under Arsia Mons, Nita watched the giant green metal scorpions pour toward her, claws uplifted. On one side, S'reee drifted closer, a hard-to-see fire dancing about her fins; on the other, Carmela moved in until she was touching shoulders with Nita, her "hot curler" ready. "What are they?" Carmela said. "Are they alive?" S'reee cocked an ear, listening to the distant whisper of another planet's Sea. "No. Not the way we think of life, anyway. They're recordings, reconstructions of something that was alive before." Nita gulped as they kept coming. The foremost of the scorpions were only ten feet away now, and right back to the dark doorway the whole space was filling with more and more. <Where are they all coming from? Even if we start blowing them up, we won't be able to deal with them all before they deal with us—> Nita stopped, blinked, suddenly blind in the darkness. Or not blind. As if it was happening to someone else, she saw herself step hesitantly forward, go down on one knee, look into the head scorpion's cold, dark eyes. And the scorpion just looked back at her, and then after a moment walked around her, passed her by. But the image flickered. Once again she walked up to the scorpion, went down on one knee. And the claws flashed out— Nita shook her head. The tide of scorpions was scurrying closer. <I have to do something!> But there was nothing to choose between the two moments she'd glimpsed, no way to tell how to make one happen or keep the other from happening— <Except that one of them turned out okay,> she thought. <I've got at least two chances that I've seen. If I just stand here, something different is going to happen that I won't have had time to see—> She stepped forward. "Neets?!" Carmela whispered in shock. Behind Nita, S'reee started to surge forward. With her free hand, Nita waved her back, went down on one knee as the foremost scorpion came up to meet her. It stopped. Stared up into her eyes— The strangest sensation followed, like little tickly feet walking around on the surface of her brain. Nita shivered one big shiver all over, but didn't move otherwise. And the scorpion swung its eyes and its body away from Nita— walked around her and then off past Carmela. Carmela swiveled with a panicky expression as the scorpions headed after their leader, back the way she and Nita and S'reee had come. S'reee turned in the air, watching the scorpions pour past. "Now, what was that?" she said. "hNii't? Did you speak to them? Or they to you?" Nita was still down on one knee as the scorpions kept pouring past her and into the chamber previous to the one they were in now. "They might have listened to me somehow. But I didn't say anything." "You did," Carmela said. "You got down on their level. That's saying 'hi.' Actually, you said 'hi' first." Nita slowly stood up, pausing to rub her knee: it was sore. "Maybe. But I just saw myself doing that, and it seemed like the thing to do." <Better than the other thing, anyway—> "You've been doing envisioning work with T'hom, haven't you?" S'reee said, turning all the way around to watch the last of the scorpions vanish into the next chamber. "I'd say it's paying off." "I don't know. What if there was something else I was supposed to do?" "Like what?" Carmela said. Nita shook her head. She was sweating, but feeling less panic-stricken as the last scorpions passed out of the chamber, the sound of metallic feet tapping on the stone now ticking away into silence. "Ree, where are they going?" S'reee drifted up to the door, peered through. "That I can't tell you," she said, "because they're gone. Vanished." Carmela turned and went to the doorway to join S'reee. "Just passing through?" "I don't think so," Nita said, lifting her wand again and heading toward the next chamber. "They were guarding something. And they decided we were okay. That was their whole job, and when it was done, they went away..." She looked over her shoulder at the other two. "S'reee, can you feel it? That hot-spot wizardry's shut down." S'reee turned, finned back through the air toward Nita and Carmela. "You're right," she sang. "And if they were guarding something..." Nita was heading toward the next chamber, holding the wand high. The rowan wood, soaked in moonlight from fifty million miles away, made a sphere of silver radiance around her as she stepped through the wide, round portal into the next chamber. For several seconds she saw nothing at all in the darkness. Nita turned leftward to see what was inside the chamber near the left edge of the portal. At first it seemed to be a straight wall. She went to it, holding up the wand for a better view. On closer inspection, she found that the wall wasn't straight after all, but curved like all the others. The curve was just very, very slight, because this was by far the biggest room they had come to as yet. And as far as the halo of light from the rowan wand spread, from side to side and high up into where the light was lost in the gloom, nearly every inch of the wall was covered with writing. Nita reached out and touched the wall. The writing was engraved in long, thin columns in the stone, not very deeply, the characters just a few shades paler than the darker, redder surface. "It's warm," Nita said. "How can it be warm? The volcano here hasn't been live for thousands of years..." Nita turned to look out across the chamber. It was massive, easily a thousand feet across. S'reee and Carmela came in behind her, Carmela with a flashlight and S'reee bringing her own wizard-light with her— several sources of it hovering around her like a little school of pilot fish. They gazed across the huge space. "One about us," S'reee sang softly, waving her fins gently to turn and look at the vast expanse of the dome, "what have we found here? This must fill the whole mountain." She tilted all of herself back at an angle, gazing up into the dark; her wizard-lights swam up through the dark above as if through water, looking for something like a surface and for a long time not finding it. It was many moments before their radiance made several small diffuse circles against the uppermost curve of that immense bubble. "I don't think this is natural," Nita said, walking along the wall. "It might have started out as a bubble in the stone once. But this—" She touched the writing again. It was nothing like the graceful curvatures and ligatures of the Speech, but angular and sharp, line after line of strung-together structures like little trees with branches growing out of them at strange angles. "This has all been smoothed down. And isn't this weird—" She moved on, puzzled, for she wasn't able to make anything of the writing. "What?" Carmela said, leaning over Nita's shoulder to gaze at the engraved characters. "They were running up and down before. Now they're going side to side." Carmela reached out past Nita to touch the letters, the light of the rowan wand catching in her eyes. "Look, the characters flip. Mirror images." She peered at them more closely. "Boustrophedon..." It wasn't a word in the Speech. "What?" "Boustrophedon," Carmela said, tracing the characters with one finger. "When the words in a sentence go in one direction to the end of the line, and then the next line goes back in the direction it came from. You read from right to left, then left to right. Or up to down, then down to up." Carmela walked along to the next section of writing. There were panels of it, separated by thin engraved borders or sometimes just by empty space. "People used to plow their fields that way..." Nita went after her, looking across the dome. "More light?" she said to the rowan wand. It brightened until it was as blinding as an arc light, and Nita winced from the brilliance, looking away from it and across the great floor as she held the wand up. It took that much light to enable her to see all the way across the chamber and to be sure that there were no more visible entrances or exits: the portal they'd come in by, the one the scorpions had guarded, was the only way in. "This must have been important," Nita said. "Could this be a history? Mars's history?" "Or the Martians'," S'reee said. She drifted closer to one wall, peered at it. "No way to tell. I can't make fin or fluke of it. You?" Nita shook her head. "I don't get it," she said. "Usually knowing the Speech lets you understand any writing you see—" "Not always," S'reee said, drifting down the wall to look at another patch of writing. "That condition obtains when the manual can find live members of the species to contribute the underlying context from which content can be understood. But when a race has died out, you may only get content with no context, which isn't a lot of use. And there are recensions of the Speech that have been completely lost over time, because all other information about the species for which they were intended has also been lost..." "Even for the manual? Is that possible?" Nita said. "Entropy's running," S'reee said. "And the medium it runs in is time. Even the manual's subject to that, in its merely physical manifestations." She let out a long, hissing breath. "Neets," Carmela said, "S'reee, look. Pictures—" They came over to look at part of the wall in front of which Carmela stood, deeper into the chamber. Here, arranged in a column stretching up the curve toward the ceiling, there were images, mostly geometric shapes, precisely scribed into the dark red stone, but it was hard to be sure what their relationship was: some of them seemed to run into one another. Nita reached up to touch one— a series of concentric circles with a single small circle inside them. She took a long breath. "Is that supposed to be the Sun?" S'reee, looking over Nita's shoulder, leaned in very close, until her nose almost touched the stone. "If it is, we may have a problem," she sang softly. "Because we've got a couple of extra planets." Nita, too, leaned in, looking closely at the diagram. Four smallish worlds, and then a slightly larger one, and beyond that, four great worlds, and five tiny planets out in the farthest orbits. "It can't be," Nita said to herself. "Can't be..." Carmela was shaking her head as she peered at the smallest markings, furthest from the engraved Sun. "They keep finding these little bitty ones way out at the edge. I can never keep track of how many there are." "Dwarf planets," Nita said. "Pluto, Haumea, Makemake, and Eris." Carmela glanced at Nita, picking up on something in her voice. "What's the matter with them?" Nita made a face. "Pluto's still a planet to me," she said. "Call me stubborn. But there's another problem. Look at that fifth one. It's further out than the others, and not in line. Like it doesn't belong here..." "There's another diagram over here, in this next column," Carmela said. "This one's got twelve." Nita went over to look at the second diagram. This one showed an empty place where the fifth world's orbit had been: a gap. "So that's where the asteroid belt would be?" Carmela said. "It looks like this gap would match their orbit..." Nita said. "And the furthest worldlet is missing," S'reee said. "A captured world that got lost again, perhaps?" "It happens," Nita said. "That far out in the system, the Sun's gravity's not so big a deal as it is closer in..." But her main attention was on the empty space between Mars and Jupiter ##. Carmela was looking at that, too. "So the asteroids are actually from this fifth planet blowing up?" Nita shook her head. "Mela, a lot of people have had that idea, but it doesn't work, because all the stuff in the asteroid belt put together isn't enough to make a planet, even a small one. Definitely not enough to make a planet the size of the one in that picture." Carmela glanced over to the right of the second image, where there was another column full of writing. After a second she shrugged and started to walk away— then paused and turned back, giving the column a strange look. "That was weird. Just out of the corner of my eye, I saw something." She put up a hand to touch the characters, squinting. "More light?" Nita said, lifting the wand. Carmela waved her away. "Less might be better." Nita shook the rowan wand down to a fainter light. "Yeah," Carmela said. She tilted her head to one side, looking at the characters. "Something— went, went to the—" She paused again. "It found the— something or other. I don't know what that is. Then— but the sword—" Carmela grimaced in annoyance. "Dammit, it won't hold still—" "Can you actually read this stuff?" Nita said. Carmela's annoyance was fading into perplexity. "Some of it. Most of it looks like nonsense marks." She shook her head. "Until it jumps, somehow, and parts make sense. I don't get it." "I wonder," S'reee said, drifting over to peer over Carmela's shoulder. "K!aarmii'lha, you came to understand the Speech pretty quickly, didn't you, for someone who's not a wizard? Were you studying other languages first?" "Yeah," Carmela said, looking over her shoulder at her. "I did German in school, and then I started picking up Japanese, for manga and anime. And Italian, and some French. And when I started hearing Kit using the Speech, I started seeing it on the alien cable channels, and I don't know, I just"— she shrugged— "started picking it up." "You know," S'reee said, "you may have some version of the steganographic gift." Nita glanced over at S'reee. "Is that good?" "Possibly good for us," S'reee said as Carmela worked her way down the graven wall, her lips moving as she traced the symbols with one finger. "Other linguistic gifts can come with it. But mostly it implies the ability to pull context out of writings when the writers' culture has left no other trace. It's an intuition rather than a skill. K!aarmii'lha, do you mind donating what you see to the manual system?" "Huh?" She was peering more closely at some of the characters. "No, sure. What do I need to do?" "Nothing," S'reee said. "I'll have a word with the Sea—" <Tell her there's no need,> the peridexis said in Nita's head. <I'll have the data assumed into the system as she works.> "Bobo's on it, S'reee," Nita said. "He'll handle it the same way the manuals pull in data off TV and the Web on demand." She went over to stand by Carmela, reaching out to the incised characters again: but they had nothing to say to her. "What do you see, K!aarmii'lha?" S'reee said. "Weird stuff..." S'reee made a long, bubbling moan of laughter. "More detail, please?" Carmela stood with hands on hips, staring at the wall. "This part is something about food," she said. "For all I know, I'm looking at somebody's shopping list." She turned away. "This thing needs an index. Or a table of contents. If I were an index... where would I be?" "By the door?" Nita said. Carmela headed back to the doorway, where she began studying its edges. After a moment, she said, "Nope. If there is an index, they're not thinking about it the way we do..." "Let me go topside and see if there's anything different from what's here," S'reee said. She angled her body up and swam upward through the darkness toward the zenith of the bubble-dome, her little school of lightfish darting upward with her. Carmela leaned against the wall, gazing into the darkness, thinking. "Maybe they wouldn't put an index out at the edges," she said, "but in the middle?" "Makes sense to run with your hunches on this one," Nita said. Together they walked across the great expanse of dark floor. Nita pulled out her manual, holding the wand underneath it to light the floor where they were walking, and started paging through the book in search of "steganography." Carmela craned her neck up to see where S'reee was headed. "How high do you think that is?" Nita paused, glanced up. "Two hundred feet? Three?" "Might be..." Nita shook her head and kept walking, her attention on the manual. "Well," Carmela said, "I guess the shopping can wait a while longer." Nita snickered. "You sure? Don't let us keep you. We've only stumbled into some kind of alien library thousands of years old. You really sure you wouldn't rather be trying on designer exoskeletons or something at the Crossings?" "Oh, Juanita Louise..." Carmela said, shaking her head as they made their way through the darkness. "You are mean to tease me..." "Carmela, you just keep on saying that word!" "Yup. And I'll say it again unless you appease me," Carmela said, peering through the dimness at the floor ahead of them. Nita rolled her eyes. "Okay, fine. Every time you say my middle name, I'll say yours!" "Like I care!" Carmela laughed, glancing around them. "Go on! I'll help you. Emeda! Emeda, Emeda, Emeda!" Nita shook her head, the irritation passing; it was hard to think petty, mundane thoughts for long when surrounded by such massive and ancient strangeness. "Mine's just a pain, but yours is weird," Nita said. "Why did they hang that on you?" "It's my aunts' and uncle's fault," Carmela said. "Mama said they were fighting so much over which one was going to be my middle name, she took all their initials and made a new name out of them." Nita cracked up. "I bet that shut them up..." "Nope," Carmela said. "Auntie Emma and Tante Elle are still arguing over which of them is the first E. And I won't tell them, because it's too much fun listening to them fight..." She paused, looking ahead. "Neets, you see that?" "What?" "Look at the floor over there. Is something shining?" Nita looked where Carmela pointed. "Something green," she said. "Come on—" They broke into a trot, heading for the center of the huge floor space. It took a while to get there, but as they drew closer, the glint of green grew stronger and stronger in the light of Nita's upheld wand, spreading more widely across the floor. By the time they were still a hundred feet or so away, they could see that they were heading into a circle of green designs nearly that wide— a tangle of broad curves or ribbons of verdant color against the paler stone. Some of these green ribbons arced away from the central design, ending in sharp points: some of them seemed to twist back on themselves, narrowing, broadening out again, dividing and sharpening to points again. At the edge of the design they stopped, Nita holding her wand out over it. The color wasn't flat: it gleamed, metallic. And there were subtle changes in its color and in the way it reflected the light when Nita moved the wand slightly. "Mela," she said, "it's not solid." They both got down on their knees to look at one of the broad strokes of the design. "It's all inlaid," Nita said. "Little thin pieces of metal..." They bent over it together. It was surprising to Nita how closely she had to look to see the separate elements in the delicate tangle of inlaid metal. "How in the worlds did they do this?" "Wizardry?" Carmela said. "Are there wizards who're artists?" "Sure. And if a wizard did this, no question, he or she or it was an artist." Nita looked more closely at the end of the nearest ribbon, a sharp point. "But look how this line starts, and then it starts weaving back and forth in the main design... It's like the letters on the walls." "But curved, not straight," Carmela said, putting out a finger to touch one long, curving letter or character. "A different font. Don't know if it's more formal or less. But this is soooo detailed..." She bent close, squinting at the long, delicate thin-and-thick strokes of the alien lettering as they tangled among many others, all making their way like twining plant fronds toward the center of the design. "This part is— I think it's just names. Nouns, but no verbs..." After a moment Carmela shook her head, got up, and stood with her hands on her hips, looking over the design. Nita realized that Carmela was trying to get to grips with the whole pattern. But it was hard, from way over at one side like this: and if you ventured into the design, it made even less sense, or you got caught up in the fine detail— <Hmm,> Nita thought. <Bobo?> <You rang?> <Got the stair-making routine on tap?> <Right here.> Nita watched the air beside her harden into an almost invisible flight of steps up over the design. She felt for the first one, found it, made sure of the width and the depth of the treads, and then trotted steadily up about two storeys into the air. Carmela watched her go. <This high enough?> the peridexis said. <Just fine,> Nita said, looking down at the great design. From up here, her sudden suspicion was instantly confirmed. The design wasn't random. Up here you could see the larger shapes—the four uplifted claws, the six rear legs, the long tail with its fierce spine. <Is it really a sting, or something else?> But the whole creature had been designed as if in calligraphic pen strokes, thicks and thins, and was bent back on itself almost into a spiral: the head and foremost claws in the middle of the design, the rear legs and finally the tail defining the outside of a circle or disc. "Mela," Nita said, "it's one of our scorpion guards. The design's stylized, but you couldn't miss it." "Okay. Where's the head, and where's the tail?" "The head's near the middle. No, more to your right. The tail's at the edge, on your left." Carmela headed for the center of the design. From above, more light came dropping slowly down in S'reee's wake, her near eye glinting in the silver light of Nita's wand. "Nothing different," S'reee said. "More words that I can't read, all the way up." She cocked that eye down at what lay below her and Nita. "But you two seem to have found something." Together they made their way down to floor level. Carmela had come to the scorpion's head and was kneeling on the densely inlaid metal. As Nita walked over, Carmela looked up with an expression of absolute excitement. "This is it!" she said. "What?" Nita said. "Where it starts," Carmela said. "Not an index. It's the start of a story. The words are simpler here. I can see them like I couldn't right away on the walls—" Nita went down on one knee again and touched the green metal of the design. From within it she got a faint, faint sense of some power stirring. "It may be helping you," she said. "I can use some help," Carmela said, without looking up. "This isn't easy..." She put a finger on a spot that was a shade of green darker than the rest of the design, in the right position to be an eye. "'First there is the Old World,'" Carmela read. She leaned in to look more closely at the long, twisting line of alien charactery. "The tenses in this are all present tense, as if it's happening now for them. Does that make sense?" Nita shrugged. S'reee flipped her tail. "There are any number of species who see the present and past as one. Go on." Carmela squinted at the writing, tracing it with a finger, occasionally shuffling along a little way on her knees to pick up the next part. "'And the Old World has swung in its— old orbit?'— mmm, no, it's more formal: make that 'its ancient round'—'since the First People awoke in the heart of the worlds.' No— 'in the centermost of the Circles.'" Carmela paused, then went on with increased certainty. "'So that when the World awoke, life and thought at last— were company for?— companioned with the star which for long had burned alone in the night at the Circles' heart.'" Carmela scooted along as the sentence stretched away from the scorpion's head, then picked up the thread again as it twisted and coiled among many others. "'Yet'—Wait a minute. No, I see it. 'Yet with the new life came the promise of a death that should come out of the darkness, as the light and life had done.'" She paused, and scowled at the next sentence for a moment as if perplexed, before translating it: "'And the First People swore that it might be so for others, but should not be so for them.'" "Huh," Nita said. "Is that a species having its Choice, or fighting it? Or just refusing it?" "No telling." Carmela scooted farther along in the diagram on her knees, then sat back on her heels for a moment as she looked down at it. "But I think maybe they had different ideas about how to keep this death from happening." She bent down to look more closely at the long, inlaid sentences, seeming to read them more quickly now. "Let me just paraphrase; the straight translating is tough to do fast. The people here— or the countries? Maybe the cities. It doesn't say anything about how many people we're talking about— Anyway, it looks like they split up in a lot of different ways..." Carmela paused, frowned. "It might mean in terms of distance, or mentally. Or both. But it looks like the biggest and strongest groups swallowed up the smaller ones, or stamped them out. Finally there were only two big groups left. All the clans or cities ended up either in one camp or the other..." As Carmela spoke, Nita felt herself coming up in goosebumps. A twitch, a tingle that wouldn't go away along the skin and the nerves: the feeling of little feet scurrying, scurrying over her brain. And out at the edge of things, a sense of darkness leaning in from those walls, the world going quiet to listen.... "hNii't," S'reee sang very softly. "Look—" The darkness of the space out past the edge of the scorpion pattern was becoming less complete. Shadowy shapes were forming between them and the distant walls: transparent shadows on the dark air, almost impossible to see. "It's such an old wizardry, I hardly felt it start," S'reee said. "Whatever was set to power it is very weak now." "And this is part of the hot-spot wizardry that brought the scorpions in?" Nita said. "Probably," S'reee said. "If the scorpions were the defensive part of the wizardry, they might have been activated often enough to siphon a lot of power away from this part of the spell. Now it's using whatever other power it can find to do its job. And even our sensitivity to the fact that there's a story here could be helping." She glanced around at the almost-unseen, multitudinous engravings in the distant walls. "The Speech isn't the only language with power. If a story hasn't been heard in a long time, much power can lie in it, tightly compressed until it's told again..." Nita nodded. <Bobo,> she said silently, <this might be important. Can you add some power to the equation?> <Some,> the peridexis said. <But this wizardry is fragile. I'm limited in how much I can help without interfering, maybe even destroying what it's trying to do. Also, the power must be paid for.> That was no surprise. <Okay, let's do what we can— ">Mela," Nita said, sitting down, "Bobo and I will try to stick a little juice into this." Carmela nodded, absorbed. Nita closed her eyes and started a little exercise that Tom had taught her: concentrating on her breathing, and then imagining herself breathing a little of her power as a wizard out into the spell around her with every outward breath. It was one of many ways a wizard could manage the way he or she paid the energy price for a spell— a gradual, steady outflow of intention, rather than a single unmanaged moment of payment that left you limp. Nita imagined that she could see it, a hazy cloud of light surrounding her, more visible with each breath. Shortly it seemed that out at the edges, that cloud was thinning, being drawn away. <We getting some uptake?> she said to Bobo. <Some. It's slow. Take a break for a moment; don't feed it too fast...> Nita opened her eyes again, feeling faintly fatigued, the normal result of this kind of power outlay. Out past the edges of the pattern, those shadows in the dark air were more substantial. She tried to see more detail. There were spiky shapes, jagged, rearing up against deeper darkness. "Mountains?" Nita said. Carmela didn't look up, just nodded. "Neets, whatever you did is just helping. I'm getting a lot more of this now..." "Great. What kind of people were they? Much further out from the Sun and you'd expect something that wasn't based on carbon." "There's not much about that here," Carmela said, standing up to move along down the pattern, as around them the shadowy landscape became less obscure. The mountains becoming visible all around them seemed to cover all of a vast landscape stretching away in all directions. It was as if the pattern-disc was at the top of some peak supereminent above the others. All around, in endless shades of navy and sky blue and violet, the narrow, spearlike mountains cast long fingers of indigo shadow away behind them in the light of a Sun that made Nita blink, for— considering the distance they were discussing— it shouldn't have been so bright. "Not a friendly-looking place," S'reee said, "to our eyes, at least..." Nita had to agree. In this vista, at least, there didn't seem to be any flat land: it was all ups and downs. A haze of atmosphere was visible, hanging low, completely covering some peaks, reaching only partway up others. On those lower peaks, Nita could make out the glitter of lights, scattered down from the pinnacles like snow. On some of the nearer mountains, she thought she could make out buildings partially mimicking the structure of the peaks to which they clung— upward-jutting crowns of stony thorns, artificial spires spearing up from the passes or saddles between peaks. Here and there, dartlike shapes soared or arrowed between the city-mountains, but it was impossible at this distance to tell whether the moving shapes were creatures or machines. In the imagery surrounding the pattern-circle, time sped up, fled by. The world changed with the passage of thousands of years. Mountains eroded and crumbled, pinnacles shattered and fractured to sharper points; on those heights where the Sun reached best, low-domed cities now clung to the ancient cliffs. Like glassy nodules of some exotic gemstone, by night the cities gleamed and glowed from within; by day the Sun glanced from them, blinding. "It's brighter than it should be," Nita said. "The Sun's much younger," S'reee said. "And it did have a variable period early in its history. This is a long, long time ago..." The machines that rode the violet-dark sky grew, changing shape, as more cities budded from the peaks their view included. "Those people were there for a long time," Carmela said, looking over more of the writing. "And they got really technologically advanced. Antigravity, ion tech, a lot of fancy stuff. But no worldgates." She left the long curve of pattern she'd been reading and stepped to another. "Isn't that strange?" "Not always," S'reee said. "The technology's not universal, as Mamvish could tell you. There are worlds that can't conceive of other planets or dimensions, or even other ways of life: yet they still have wizardry." "Mela, you see anything about what they called this planet?" Nita said. Carmela shook her head. "I'm not sure," she said. "There were lots of names for it, at the beginning. Probably as many names as we have for Earth. But then they start to get fewer. In all this later stuff, there are just two left, and I don't know which one to use. One of the two groups that dominated the planet called it Shamask. The other called it Eilith." "What do the words mean?" S'reee said. Carmela looked up then, and her expression was grim. "'Ours,'" she said. Nita and S'reee exchanged a glance. "They don't seem to have liked each other a whole lot, the Shamaska and the Eilitt," Carmela said, getting down on her knees to look at the writing embedded in that part of the pattern. "All along here, it's descriptions of things that one side did, or the other side did—" She shook her head. "I don't understand most of it. But the tone's never friendly. Then it gets angry. Then—" Nita started in surprise, and so did S'reee, as the first flashes and impacts of energy weapons erupted among the spires of the First World. Mountains fell and buildings crumbled in a newer and deadlier sort of erosion. "Surprised it took that long," Carmela said, getting up again to head farther down that stroke of the pattern. "Their first really big war..." "Why were they fighting?" Nita said. Carmela stood where she was and looked all along that stroke of the scorpion pattern with her hands on her hips, hunting an answer. "I'm not sure," she said. "There are so many reasons and excuses here. A lot of them don't make sense. I think each side thought the other had cheated them out of something, or stolen something, that they needed to survive." She shook her head, annoyed. "So they started having wars. This one went on for—" She hunkered down to trace out, with one finger, a specific sequence of the long, curved characters. "Twelve or thirteen thousand years." Nita and S'reee exchanged a glance. "This one??" Nita said. S'reee blew out an unhappy breath. "There are species," she said, "that are very advanced at science and technology... but the technologies of being in harmony with one another elude them somehow. They tend to have more wizards than most." "You'd think species like that would blow themselves up quicker," Nita said. S'reee flipped a fin, resigned. "In such cases, the Lone One can have Itself a long, ugly playtime. Often It tries to keep the combatants from ever destroying each other completely, so the 'fun' can go on for as long as possible." "I'd believe that was happening here," Carmela said, getting up to walk along another long, tangled chain of symbols buried in the design. "You'd have trouble finding any time when these guys weren't fighting. Though here they seem to have taken a breather..." Carmela straightened up. Nita could feel that slight draining sensation that said the wizardry needed more power. She sat down where she was and closed her eyes, concentrating on breathing more power into it. But even with her eyes closed, she could sense a cooling and darkening around her. "That would be why," S'reee sang, sounding somewhat troubled. "The Sun is dimming. And how quickly..." <Bobo,> Nita said, <will this much power hold the spell for now?> <Yes. But it won't run much longer. If there's anything to be learned, better do it with your eyes open—> She opened them, stood up, staggered. "hNii't," S'reee said, "are you all right?" "Yeah," Nita said, looking toward the Sun. No wonder that S'reee had been taken aback: it was getting fainter by the second, as if someone was turning down a dimmer. The elapsed time was passing by at thousands of years per second, but the speed of the Sun's fading still seemed uncomfortably swift. In the precipitous valleys between the needle-sharp peaks, the atmosphere was freezing out, dusting itself down as dry ice and oxygen snow.... "They started doming their cities over," Carmela said, "and trying to change their climate. But the Sun just cooled too fast. All the changes they made weren't enough." Nita watched the Sun's light keep on fading. It had struck her hard, some time back, how dim the Martian day seemed compared to Earth's, even at such a small increase in the distance from the Sun. And Shamask-Eilith would have been maybe sixty or eighty million miles farther out, getting even less light and heat than Mars. <A cold world, getting colder...> she thought, as she watched the Sun far off in the deeps of space slowly settling into what would be its future normal magnitude. "And still their wars went on," S'reee said, turning gently in the air to watch yet another swath of nuclear explosions and massive energy-weapon fire scorch its way across the planet's increasingly ravaged surface. "Oh, yeah," Carmela said, sounding resigned. "They weren't going to stop fighting just because of a little thing like the Sun going cool..." "You'd think if they had a technology like this, they'd have considered moving everybody to a warmer world," Nita said. "There weren't all that many Shamaska or Eilitt by then. They'd already killed so many of each other..." S'reee swung her tail in agreement. "The Sun's behavior could even have been a hint," S'reee said. "The Powers That Be have been known to make Their suggestions indirectly— usually with some hope that the peoples involved will come to some greater good that way than just by being told right out what to do. Or maybe this was just an attempt to break their cycle of destruction when other hints had failed." "'Those who will, the Powers lead,'" Nita said, quoting a line from the manual, "'and those who won't, They drag...'" "If you guys are right," Carmela said, "this might be where the dragging started." She gazed down at the floor in a slightly unfocused way as she walked around, pausing at one particular spot. "Listen to this," Carmela said. "'Then from the darkness... came the fate and the death which had long been promised. And all the folk looked up into the night and cried out in rage and fear that all their striving against each other was wasted—'" They looked toward Shamask-Eilith's spiny curvature and saw, distant but enhanced by the wizardry, the incoming shadow of "the death long promised." From high above the plane of the ecliptic—the orbital zone in which all the other worlds of the Solar System except Pluto rode—a dark rogue planet, ensnared by the Sun's gravity who-knew-how many years before, was diving slowly and inexorably into the system. There could have been no possible error about its path, which was taking it straight toward where Shamask-Eilith would be in its orbit in only a matter of decades. "I don't suppose this possibly means that they saw sense and stopped fighting with each other?" Nita said. From the look S'reee gave Nita, she had her doubts. "I wonder, how quickly did they see it?" S'reee said. "Pretty quickly," Carmela said, walking along and looking down at the pattern. "The scientists on both sides worked out that it wouldn't hit them. But it would come close enough to destroy their world, even if it didn't actually hit. Just the tidal forces of the bigger body as it passed by would break the First World up. So they started making plans to save as many of their own people and life forms as they could, and make their way to the next planet in. But it looks like both sides did it secretly." "What?" Nita said. "Why? Are you trying to tell me—?" Carmela looked at Nita and S'reee with an expression both annoyed and completely unsurprised. "You got it," she said. "Each side figured that if it didn't tell the other one, their enemies might not have enough time to evacuate their populations. Then the ones who escaped successfully would have the whole new world to themselves." S'reee blew softly, a sound of sorrow and disgust. "And when it all came out in the open and both sides started accusing each other of attempted genocide," Nita said, "gee, I wonder what happened then?" Carmela merely raised her eyebrows as the image of those ancient jagged mountains erupted in unprecedented violence. "They all got right to work reducing the number of people their enemies would be moving off the planet..." Nita scowled. "And these were the first intelligent life forms in our solar system? Theoretically intelligent, more like! They're embarrassing me." "Hard to believe they wasted precious time on more slaughter," S'reee said sadly. "And their wizardly talent probably didn't have power enough to move the planet. Or maybe there were too few of them..." "It says here they did try to push the incoming planet off course," Carmela said, walking along and reading more of the inlay of the central pattern. "But they failed. A whole lot of their wizards died trying. Finally some people on each side realized that whether they liked it or not, they had to help each other get out and resettle closer to the Sun. They'd also have to change themselves physically to fit into whatever world they wound up on. So..." Glints of movement above the dark peaks caught all their eyes: small shapes, leaping upward. One glittering round shape came closer to their point of view, closer yet, swelled until it seemed to fill half the huge dome: then flashed past them, gone. But it didn't move so quickly that they couldn't see the glitter of interior lights stellated all over some more complex shape, spiky, angular. "Cities," Nita said. "They got a few whole cities off the world—" But very few of those tiny desperate city-seeds escaped as the terrible wanderer from outside the Solar System plunged in, growing in the First World's sky, a terrible pale shadow. As it filled the sky, the upward-jutting needles and precipices of the ancient mountains trembled as the two planets' interacting tidal forces strove together, and the First World started to shatter— They saw only a few moments of that massive destruction. The incoming rogue planet, so much bigger and more massive than Shamask-Eilith, stayed in one piece. But Shamask-Eilith simply tore itself apart in the intruder's gravitational field. Vast yawning crevasses stitched themselves along Shamask's surface, ripping open the crust. The planet's molten mantle burst outward through the tears in all directions, fountaining countless millions of tons of magma into space. The suddenly exposed planetary core plunged away through the no-longer-confining mass of the rest of the planet like a bullet through flesh, tumbling into the darkness of space as the planet disintegrated— In the dome, the shadows faded, the imagery failed; the dome dimmed down again. <The wizardry failed,> Bobo said in the back of Nita's mind. <It couldn't cope with the extra power feed from outside.> Carmela and Nita and S'reee were gazing at one another in silent horror. After a moment, Carmela said, "You know, I was watching some documentary about the Moon the other day. It said a lot of scientists think the Moon was formed by some big piece of a planet or something hitting the Earth while it was still molten and splashing a lot of stuff out. Was this it, I wonder? Did the rogue planet do it? Or maybe Shamask's core..." Nita considered. "That was a real long time ago that happened, Mela. Four billion years and change." She looked around. "And however old this place is... it's not anything like billions of years." Carmela sighed. "I take it the playback's broken?" "Yeah. My manual will have a copy of what we saw, though." "And I've kept a copy in the Telling," S'reee said. "We may want to compare them later for perceptual differences." Nita nodded. "But for the moment," she said to Carmela, "looks like you've got a lot of reading ahead of you." "Well, yeah, because what happened next?" Carmela said, waving her arms. "Where were they going to go? Not Mercury: it was way too hot. And not Venus or Earth, if they were still molten. Nobody could change themselves enough to cope with that—" "With wizardry," S'reee said, "maybe they could have, if everyone involved in the change was sufficiently committed. But that kind of complete agreement is rare. That's one of the reasons the Troptic Stipulation is in the Oath— the part about not changing a creature that doesn't desire the change. The rule goes double, triple, for a whole species." "Then it has to be Mars," Carmela said. "Why else would all this be here for us to find?" She waved an arm at the dome full of writing around them. "I really doubt anybody said, 'Oh, let's spend weeks and months writing the whole history of our species in here, and then go off somewhere else...!' So where are they?" Nita shook her head. Carmela was plainly fascinated by the mystery of where the inhabitants of the lost planet had gone: but Nita was thinking, <And what if this is the species that Kit and his team are so excited about waking up? These people, who went thousands of years without having any time they weren't having a war, might wind up being our new next-door neighbors?> <Oh,> boy. "Mela," Nita said after a moment, "you saw how they were with each other on their original world. Maybe the ones who made it here didn't learn the lesson. Maybe they finally wiped each other out... and this is all that's left." But as soon as she said it, Nita somehow knew right down in her bones that this was not the case, and the situation wasn't going to be anything like that simple. She frowned. I hate <feelings like this,> Nita thought. <Even though they're going to be useful later...> "There's something else that strikes me as strange," S'reee said. "All through that— we never saw an image of what they looked like, the people of the First World." She swung her tail. "It's true enough that there are species that don't or won't make images of themselves. But they're in the minority." Her voice went wry. "Most species can't get enough of looking at themselves..." Carmela shook her head. "Maybe they were making a clean break?" she said. "If they did actually change themselves to suit another planet— this planet— maybe they didn't want to be reminded of what they had to abandon? Seems like they thought it was a failure to have to change at all..." She stood there with her hands on her hips, looking around her at the dome, at all that unread writing. Then Carmela turned back to Nita and S'reee. "I've got to work on this," she said. "It's going to drive me nuts. I need to go get a notebook. Do you want me to give you guys a lift back home?" "You might take me back with you," S'reee said. "But does this mean that you're not going shopping?" "It can wait." Carmela turned back to gaze around the dome with an odd look on her face. "There's something going on here." <Another one gets bit by the bug!> Nita thought. She glanced at S'reee. "You just may have heard history in the making," she said, "whatever kind's recorded here. Carmela said she was not going shopping somewhere." S'reee whistled with laughter. Carmela ignored them both as she looked down at the design under their feet, following one long, tangled thread of writing. She pointed at it. "That bit," Carmela said, "that's a poem. Can you see it?" Nita and S'reee looked at each other. "No," they said in unison. "Well, I can. And I want to see what it says!" Nita sighed<. So much for getting her safely out of here and off to the Crossings!> "I'm not sure I'm wild about you being by yourself up here..." Carmela gave Nita a look. "Even Mamvish said there was no reason I should be excluded from this stuff. What're you worried about— our little scorpion buddies? They let me alone before when they came through. If they were interested in chewing on me, they'd have done it then. And they haven't been back—" "As far as I can tell," S'reee said, glancing around the vast round chamber, "that wizardry's now defunct. A one-time assessment, I think." "See that?" Carmela said. "Neets, when I come back, I'll have the remote. And I've got my 'curling iron.' If anything jumps out at me, it's not going to get anything for its trouble but a real big hole straight through it, and I'll be gone before it can do anything else." Nita looked over at S'reee. S'reee just shrugged her tail. "Recent events suggest that K!aarmii'lha can take care of herself. She's armed, she can get away quickly if she must, and if she has a cell phone, she can call you for help if she needs it, yes?" "Yeah," Nita said. <Bobo, is the wizardry here really done running?> <Yes. I doubt it could be reactivated now no matter how we tried.> "Okay," Nita said. "I'm gonna try again to get at that spot where Kit and the guys are working... at least, find out why we couldn't transport there." Carmela pulled out her remote and got busy punching its buttons. "And you, cousin?" S'reee said. "Are you sure you'll be all right without backup?" Nita nodded. Unsettling as her experience with the scorpions had been, it had left her with a sense that she had been examined and found nonthreatening: she was safe enough on Mars. <Until some new weird thing happens...> But the moment of foresight Nita had had, and correctly read, now left her feeling less concerned about coming up against something completely unexpected. <As long as the universe keeps those helpful hints coming...> "Go on," Nita said, patting S'reee's side and pulling out her manual again. She flipped it to the page describing wizardries ongoing in the area, glanced down it to the description of the life-support spell that S'reee was running, and laid a finger on the written version: it glowed as Nita took over its management. "I'll be in touch if I find anything." She looked past S'reee to Carmela. Mela waved the remote at her, punched a button. She and S'reee vanished: the air inside the support spell imploded in a brief, sharp breeze toward where they'd been, then settled again. Nita stood there in the silence, the rowan wand in her free hand now the only light. "Okay, Bobo," she said. "You have Kit's first set of coordinates? This crater—" She peered at the manual. "Stokes—" <Got them.> "Are they still blocked?" <Not precisely. Conditions there are... peculiar.> It wasn't the most reassuring thing to hear wizardry itself saying to you. Nevertheless, Nita shrugged. "Let's go find out how peculiar," she said. The transit circle laid itself out glowing around her. <Transiting now.> Around Nita, the world went dark again. [ Gusev ] Pale peach-colored dust fluffed away in the gust of wind that accompanied the three human forms who appeared atop the low, rounded ridge. It wasn't a particularly sharp or edgy piece of terrain— just a rough escarpment of beige and cream-colored rock, with dust and sand spilling down in little rills, almost like water, from cracks in the low cliff's edge. To the south and west spread a vast, shallow, circular depression, itself dimpled and cratered with the remnants of newer, lesser impacts. Level with the old crater's rim, the surrounding landscape to the north and east, more brown than red, was strewn with nondescript boulders well into the distance. "Here we are," Kit said, glancing around to get his bearings. "Wahoo," Darryl said, ironic. "Nope. De Vaucouleurs." "Pedant," said Ronan, looking around with the expression of someone eager not to see any more giant bat-crab-spider creatures. Kit rolled his eyes. "We're in the right spot, anyway. There's Kayne, over that way—" He pointed: another crater's low rim was just visible, looking like a low line of hills maybe ten miles away. "And Shawnee... Bok..." He peered further away to the south. "Hamelin—" "I take back what I said before," Ronan said, concerned. "You don't need a social life later. You need one now. How long have you been staying home nights memorizing crater names? They're holes in the ground, Kit! There's nothing but rocks in them! Set yourself free! Life's too short! Kit turned to Darryl. "Doesn't seem to be much going on here at the moment. What've we got?" Darryl brought out his WizPod and pulled out a wide, semitransparent page that he studied for a moment. He shook his head, holding it up for Ronan and Kit to see. "Okay, look. The wizardry you triggered is getting ready to spike here in a few minutes. But before it goes off, you can still see some indications of how old it is and where it came from. Look quick—" He pointed at one long line of symbols. "See that? The power to fuel this wizardry wasn't locally sourced." Kit shook his head. "What?" "The energy didn't come from this planet, originally! It came from—" Darryl looked up, pointed. "Somewhere up there." Kit and Ronan looked up into the empty Martian sky. "Nearby?" Ronan said. "One of the moons, maybe?" "Don't think so," Darryl said, studying his readout. "...Nope. Much further. Maybe thirty million miles. Actually, make that fifty." Ronan and Kit stared at each other. "What's out that far?" Ronan said. "The asteroids?" Kit said. "I mean, I'm not sure about the distances..." Darryl was still looking at the wide page of manual that he'd pulled out of the WizPod. He shook his head, looking perplexed. "There's something wrong with the timing, too," he said. "I can't get a clean read on it. But, look, if the wizardry's running and about to go off, it'd make more sense for us to deal with what it's about to do right now than get too hung up about who emplaced it and when..." "Yeah. Meanwhile," Ronan said, glancing around him, "what's the satellite situation? That last jump was biggish, to judge by how high the Sun's up now." He had a point: Kit glanced up and saw that it was almost noon. "The schedule has to be pretty different here. And where exactly is this wizardry going to go off? Not right underneath us this time, I hope—" "No way," Darryl said. "I factored in a nice big offset. Off that way—" He looked east and south. "In the middle of the next big crater over. About fifty miles, as the wizard jumps." "Uh," Ronan said softly, "maybe time to jump, then—" They looked where he was looking. Kit gulped. From beyond the low crater rim to the east, a pale green glow was rising. Darryl grabbed them each by an arm. "I'll put us down on the far side," he said. "The view'll be better." He took a deep breath. As the momentary darkness of a bilocation transit shut down around him, Kit was trying to visualize the orbit of the <Mars Express> orbiter in his head. But something else was niggling at him. The name of the crater they'd come down on the edge of meant something besides being just the site of one of the active wizardries. <De Vaucouleurs,> he thought. <De Vaucouleurs. There was something special about that area, I could have sworn—> The darkness gave way to daylit Martian landscape again. They were standing on the rim of yet another crater, but this rim was much higher and better defined than the last, and the crater seemed far bigger: the two arms of it ran straight to the foreshortened horizon and vanished. <For it to look this big, it'd have to be about a hundred miles across,> Kit thought. <And the surface down there is maybe two miles deep>—Or so it seemed where it wasn't being rapidly overrun by the green glow of a working alien wizardry. That emerald light was flooding outward from a spot off to their right and about halfway across the visible portion of the crater, making the whole area look bizarrely like a reverse-action film of water going down a drain. "If the action this time's going to be anything like it was back at Stokes," Ronan said, "I think I prefer the view from up here." He looked down at the outward-spreading light. "Look at it go—" He shook his head. "What about the satellites?" "Yeah," Darryl said. "If something comes over now, it's not just going to see our infrared signatures. At night the guys back at NASA or ESA might think we were just a transient hot spot, a meteorite impact or some such. But in the daytime, when they have something overhead that can see us in visible light, too? And not just us. That—" Kit was going through his manual in a hurry. "Obviously we can spoof them," Ronan said. "Mess with their machinery somehow." "If it can figure out the right way!" Kit said. "Spoof 'em, sure, it's easy to say. But how do you do it so the rocket-science guys don't notice? They're not dumb! Take one of the satellite's cameras out of commission? Sure, but how? Make a piece of the machinery fail? Better make sure you're not failing out something you can't fix right away when you don't need the fault anymore. And you've got to pick something to interfere with that'll seem to make sense when it stops working and when it just starts up again for no good reason—" "You'll figure something out!" Darryl said. "This is your specialty. You haven't done anything but think about this stuff for weeks now—" Kit held his manual up right in front of Darryl's face to show him the orbital diagram he'd been looking for. "But not this exact situation! Here comes the Mars Express orbiter. Eighteen minutes and ten seconds from now. Either we stop that"— and Kit pointed at the spreading green glow— "or the Express sees a lot more than just our own hot spots. Those we can hide— put a stealth shell over us that mimics the local temperature. But what about that?" He nodded at the oncoming tide of green light. "No way they're going to believe that's a dust storm! We can't let them see it; it'll screw up their science! And we don't have enough power to hide it even at the size it is now. If it spreads much further—" Darryl glanced up from his WizPod to peer down into the crater. "Uh-oh," he said. "Got some kind of secondary locus popping up." "Where?" Kit said, trying to see what Darryl was looking at. "Crap, it's gone—" Then Darryl pointed. "No, there it is again. See it? No, more to the right. Maybe five miles to the right of the green zone. It flashed. There it goes again—" They all peered down at the spark of fire Darryl had spotted. It was a small, hard, bright light, faintly pinkish. And as Kit looked at it, it moved just slightly, a tiny jitter— And he realized what it was. He looked over his shoulder to judge the Sun's angle, and then back down at the little sharp light. "That's not the wizardry!" Kit said. Ronan stared at him. "What?" "It's a reflection!" "From what??" "Solar panels!" Now it was Darryl's turn to stare. "What would there be to— oh, my god!" Kit nodded, sweat popping out on him. "I never come at it from this side," he said. "Or from all the way up here on the edge! I always just transit straight in. That's why the name de Vaucouleurs didn't remind me of anything in particular at first. But now it does. It's the next crater over from Gusev!" Ronan's eyes went wide. "What, you mean that's one of the wee rovers down there? Opportunity?" "No," Kit said. "Spirit!" Ronan said something in Irish that didn't sound like a compliment. "Could this get any fecking worse?" he said. "It can't see us, can it?" "Not at this range," Kit said. "It's what else she might see that worries me now. If the same kind of stuff starts happening here as happened back at Stokes—" "NASA'll start seeing things they shouldn't," Darryl said. "Come on, we've gotta get down there and protect the rover. Blind it somehow, block its vision—" "Vision won't be enough," Kit said. "It's got other sensors. Either way, we can't sit this one out up here..." Ronan said something else in very annoyed Irish. Darryl grabbed his arm. "How close do you want us?" he said to Kit. "Not in the green," Kit said. "We need a few minutes to work something out. A hundred yards away or so—" Darryl grabbed Kit's upper arm. Things went black— — then went beige. Kit took a long breath: though he knew Darryl was careful about making sure their air and spells came with them all when they jumped, there was always the chance that some day he might get overexcited and slip— "You know," Darryl said as they came out in the middle of more beige, rubbly ground, "I can just hear you thinking sometimes, your Kitness. I like breathing, too, you know? I'm real used to it. So cut me some slack. Where's your little friend?" He stared around him. "And I keep meaning to ask: why isn't this place red when it always looks that way in the pictures?" Ronan snickered. "They adjust the images," he said, while Kit tried to get his bearings. "People don't like the Red Planet being beige. Gotta give the public what it wants..." Kit glanced around, getting his bearings. The spot where Darryl had landed them wasn't so far from his own usual transit spot: as he looked around, the landmarks started falling into place one by one. The <Apollo 1> hills off northward, the <Columbia> hills to the west told him that they were standing on the elevated ground called Home Plate, with its many eclectically named pits and rocks and rises—Missoula, Palanque, Lutefisk, Clovis, Larry's Lookout, McCool Hill. And not far from McCool, still close to the north-facing crater wall where she'd spent the last winter— "There," Kit said. He headed straight off across the rocky landscape at the bounce. Even without the high angle of a few moments ago to give the Sun something to reflect from, there was no mistaking the small, angular shape hunkered down against the rising ground in the near distance, its little camera pole sticking up. <Good thing she's too small to be carrying seismic sensors,> Kit thought as Ronan and Darryl came hurrying along in his wake. <Otherwise there's no telling what they'd think was going on up here...> As Kit got closer, he slowed: there was no use kicking up more dust on the hardworking little machine— it had more than enough trouble with what the winter dust storms left layered on its solar panels. The scientists at NASA had for the past couple of years been surprised and pleased that the Spirit and Opportunity rovers had managed to keep working for so long: mostly, they theorized, because of passing dust devils that blew the accumulated storm dust off them. The wizards who came up here every now and then with cans of compressed air and puffer brushes while the probes were asleep were delighted to let the scientists think that—and careful not to remove enough dust at any one time as to make them suspicious. Kit, having occasionally done this duty when there was the "excuse" of dust devils in the neighborhood, waved at the others to drop back and wait where they were. He looked carefully to make sure that the main camera hadn't moved while they were approaching it. Then Kit hunkered down quietly on Spirit's blind side and put his manual on the ground, paging along to a two-page spread that showed him a list of the rover's diagnostics. After glancing down it to see what was working and what wasn't, he waved at Ronan and Darryl; they came quietly up to join him. Ronan raised his eyebrows, tapped one ear: <Can it hear?> Kit shook his head. "Look at all the dust and dents," Darryl said. "Poor beat-up baby." Kit nodded. "She's had a bad time. The front right wheel got stuck two years ago, so they had to drive her backwards after that, dragging the bad wheel. Then the dust storms came. She almost died altogether: they had to shut her down, wait out the dark time for a few months... Things kept breaking. She got stuck in the dirt for a few weeks. The dust started scouring off the protective coating on the solar panels. They got covered so often that her batteries started draining too fast and her software started glitching. One instrument had to be shut down, it got so much dust in it. Finally she got stuck in the sand here. But she just wouldn't stop working. Tough girl..." He reached out a hand, then stopped; there were too many things he might break or mess up. "Not to cut short a touching moment," Ronan said, "but the green's getting close. You're the machine specialist: just tell her to close down for a little while." Kit shook his head. "It's not that easy." "Why not? She's full of computers. Should be fairly smart as machines go." "That's the problem," Kit said, looking at the oncoming flow of green. "The more complex a machine gets, the harder it is to persuade to do something unusual. It's not like you're trying to talk, say, an electric can opener into doing stuff. A can opener's life isn't long on excitement, so it's glad to do something strange! But a machine with a lot of complex programming grows a sense of purpose. Even loyalty." Kit frowned. "And when you try to get it to do something weird all of a sudden, it wants reasons. Especially if it's got much security built into it. Machines can get suspicious of your motives, whether they understand what wizardry's about or not..." "I don't think we're gonna have any time for a prolonged conversation," Darryl said, looking east. The tide of green light was running toward them fast. Ronan looked up from his manual. "That stealth shell you were talking about?" he said. "I'd say this is the moment. We can't hide the whole crater from space. But we can hide it from the rover if we put the shell over it—" "Better hope they don't decide to move the rover while the shell's over it," Darryl said. "Even anchoring the spell to it won't help if what the shell's 'seeing' doesn't move when Spirit does—" Kit shook his head: there was nothing they could do about that at the moment— the green light was only a hundred or so feet away now, and there was still the Mars Orbiter satellite to think about. "We'll have to finesse that in a few minutes," Kit said, picking up his manual and getting up. "But right now—" He pulled out his antenna-wand, thought about the wizardry he needed. <Just a quick wheel-freeze. The rovers have had that happen sometimes if there's been a temperature fluctuation—> "Half a sec," Kit said, pointing the wand at Spirit's left front wheel. It took only a few words' worth of the Speech to heat the joint up so that it swelled a few microns thicker than usual, locking the wheel in place. Kit backed away. "Okay, go—" Ronan began reading hurriedly in the Speech. Seconds later a shimmering hemispherical dome-shell about three meters wide appeared over Spirit, swirling with a soap-bubble light of working wizardry. "Okay," Ronan said, wiping sweat off his brow and breathing hard as he finished the spell. "While that lasts, it won't see or sense anything it hasn't seen for the last few minutes." "Good," Kit said, turning to face what approached. "Because here comes trouble—" The green light washed over them, turning everything as verdant now as it had been red in Stokes. Then darkness fell. But not complete darkness. It was more a dusk light, the last embers of local sunset burning at the bottom of it, and the surroundings were beyond peculiar, bearing in mind what "local" should have been. Kit and Darryl and Ronan were now standing, not amid Martian rocks and dirt, but on a sidewalk next to what looked like a somewhat rural street with a double yellow stripe painted down the middle of it, and down the length of the road, streetlights were coming on, burning yellow against the oncoming evening. Kit stared around him. The dusk slowly falling around them was earthly, not Martian. Scattered down their side of the street were some very normal and suburban-looking houses; across the road were more of the same. Nearby, a smaller street met this one. A street sign stood at the corner. Ronan looked around him suspiciously, then made his way over to the sign, looked up at it. "Cranbury Road?" he said. "I'm no cooking expert, but don't you usually spell that with an e and two r's?" Darryl was meanwhile turning slowly around, examining the houses and front yards and driveways of the surroundings with an expression of utter astonishment. Then he stopped, staring at the biggest of the nearby structures. It was a red clapboard building with white-painted windows and a side door of the kind you might see on a barn, painted white on the doorsills and crossbars, red on the main panels. At one end of the building, among various enameled metal signs advertising the makers of farm equipment and power tools, was a set of concrete stairs leading up to a door. Over the door hung a sign that said: GROVERS MILL CO. At the sight of the sign, Darryl's eyes went wide. Then he burst out laughing and turned back to Ronan. "Now I get it!" he said. "I am impressed with you!" Startled, Ronan looked around, as if expecting the person Darryl was really addressing to be standing behind him. "Why me?!" "Because this is your fault!" "What?" "You were the one who was singing the If-anything-was-going-to-come-from-Mars music!" Ronan suddenly looked very defensive. "But— well, why shouldn't I? It's good music, and anyway, it's famous. Anybody might have thought about it when they came to Mars! Besides, how was I supposed to know this would happen—?" "Too late for excuses now!" Laughing, Darryl salaamed before Ronan, though with a total lack of respect. "Seriously, we are not worthy to hang out with an adept like you! You are the wizard's wizard, man! You have turned Mars into New Jersey!" Even in the general alarm of the moment, Kit had to snicker. Ronan stood there looking as cool as usual, but something in his eyes betrayed the fact that he wasn't sure he was being complimented. "Could have been worse," Ronan said under his breath as he looked around. "I could have done it the other way round." "This is the place where that old radio version of War of the Worlds happened, isn't it?" Kit said. "The one they did on Halloween way back whenever it was, and they pretended it was happening in New Jersey somewhere, instead of England." "And it's not even the right New Jersey!" Darryl said. "It's New Jersey now! Look over there—" He pointed. Off to their right, across the street, was a big handsome blue building with a long, peaked roof. On the opposite side of the road in front of it stood a pole with road signs that said ROUTE 629 and TO NJ TURNPIKE. Farther down the pole were posted a laserprinted ad for an Internet café and a faded picture of somebody's lost dog. Darryl was looking at the big blue building. "Bet you that was the mill once," Darryl said. "Look, I was right! There's the old millstones. They've got 'em sunk into the ground so cars won't ruin their lawn when they turn the corner. There's where the water came out past the mill. But no Martians! He started laughing again. "I wouldn't be too sure about that," Ronan said, very quietly. There was something about the way he said it that stopped Darryl's laughter. He and Kit both looked up at where Ronan was pointing among the trees behind the old mill building. Half-obscured by a stand of big old trees that surrounded it stood what looked like some kind of elderly, jury-rigged water tower. The part that had held the water, like an upended bucket, was suspended between four narrow iron uprights, all rusty with time. Darryl peered at the vessel, which had individual wooden staves like an old bucket, held together with rusty iron hoops. "Are those bullet holes in that?" Darryl said, still amused: but now there was some unease to the amusement. "Can't you just see it? People around here were listening to that radio broadcast, the night before Halloween, and some of them really bought into it, and they ran outside with their guns when they heard that Martian war machines were landing in their town, and some of them saw that thing in the dark, looking all tripod-y, and they shot it up—" "Darryl," Kit said. With a long, low moan of bending metal, the water tower moved. "Bad," Ronan said, sounding utterly conversational, "this is very bad. We had TV shows like this back home on Saturday afternoons when I was little. This is the part where I always hid behind the couch." Against the cold, hard stars of the Martian sky, among the trees of a suburban New Jersey that had no business being where it was, the water tower lurched to one side, then lurched the other way, hard. It shook itself like a creature trying to rid itself of some kind of impediment: and the fourth upright fell away, leaving it on three. The water tower shook itself again, picked up one of those legs and jerked it back and around somehow until it was balanced evenly on all three of them. Then the water tower started getting taller against that blackness, rearing up past the tops of the highest trees. Up near its top, a red glow started to develop into an eye that Kit felt was looking right at him. "Anybody got an idea that doesn't involve us all bailing out of here and completely disgracing ourselves as wizards?" Kit said. "Uh..." Darryl's head tilted back as that red glow slowly grew a stalk that raised it higher and higher above the trees, and those legs got longer and thicker, and the water vessel started to develop itself into something far more massive. "Who was it said 'discretion is the better part of valor'?" "Doesn't matter, 'cause we've got no time for it now," Ronan said, and pulled out his light-rod weapon. Kit heard the soft singing sound it started to make. "Running won't help. What about Spirit? Poor beastie's gonna get stomped if we don't stick around and do something. And what'll NASA think if that happens?" "Or Irina," Darryl said. Kit's sweat went cold on him at the thought. "You carrying?" Ronan said to Darryl as he lifted the light-rod. "Don't be hasty! Got a couple of things handy," Darryl said. He pulled the WizPod out. "Need to concentrate on this, guys, so if someone wants to buy us a moment—" Ronan leveled his light-weapon, fired. A narrow line of blinding yellow-white light ravened out of it and struck the still-forming war machine in its underbody— The stalk on which that red light had formed was now stretching toward them entirely too flexibly, and the light was going a far deeper and deadlier red. "No, you dope," Darryl shouted, "I meant something passive, like a force field!" "Leave it with me," Ronan said, and held up one hand. The air above them shimmered as the force field went into effect. Kit was relieved to see it, as away above the force field, the Martian war machine took its completely realized form: gleaming in the rusty light, the bronzy body hoisted high over them on its cabled tripod legs, metal groaning ominously as the great mass paused, the roving eye deadly red at the end of a long, gooseneck stalk as it sought them out, focused on them— "Here it comes!" Ronan shouted. Above them, the sunset was washed out by a wall of fire as the heat ray hit the force field and splashed away like water. By that awful light Darryl pulled out a page from his WizPod, muttered under his breath, threw it glowing to the ground, and pulled out another one— The ray stopped: the war machine above them wailed, an earsplitting howl of rage and frustration. Out beyond it, over the suburban New Jersey rooftops, a second red eye appeared, and then a third. "You want to hurry up with that!" Ronan shouted at Darryl. "The force field was already starting to give just then—" "What, do we need to kick the power up?" Kit said, reaching into memory for a different force-field spell of his own. He hurriedly recited the words in the Speech that brought it shimmering into operation above the three of them, then stood there panting for a moment with the reaction. "No!" Ronan yelled as a second war machine started to move toward them. "Whatever's making these things appear is learning from what we do. I could feel the war-machine spell solving the shield while I was holding it—" Another furiously concentrated line of fire came splashing down from the first machine and its approaching compatriot. Kit, looking up, saw Ronan's shield fail while his own held: but now he, too, could feel what Ronan had described, that sense of his own wizardry being frayed at, pulled apart, with dreadful energy and persistence. "He's right!" Kit shouted at Darryl. "What have you got?" "Gonna trip this closest one," Darryl said. "Watch out for which way it falls—" "One is what you're gonna get," Kit said, feeling his force field continuing to fray. "Dammit! Ronan?" "Might not be able to trip one," Ronan said, pulling his light wand out to full length, almost five feet. "But chop one down, yeah—" "Save it for a moment!" Kit said. Darryl was muttering under his breath in the Speech. Then he made a huge, expansive gesture with both arms, and from them sprang what at first looked like a jet of white mist. It wrapped itself around the legs of the closest war machine as it was rearing that flexible neck back for another attack on the force field. Then with another groan of metal the mist knotted itself tight, yanking the legs together at their "knees." The first machine leaned, tottered, and fell even as it fired. The bolt it shot went high over their heads, but as it went down, Kit felt his force field fail. The second machine targeting them strode closer. Darryl threw another jet of mist at it, but this time as it knotted tight, the machine broke through it and strode on. "Bad, bad, bad..." Kit muttered, reaching into his otherspace pocket and pulling out the little shining sphere he'd been hoping he wouldn't have to use, especially as once he used it, no second one would work. "Darryl?" He was backing away, along with Kit and Ronan. "This is getting us nowhere!" he said. "Stay close if we have to jump out of here—" "Don't want to jump!" Ronan said. "If we do, we'll fail this test!" "Yeah, well, how do we ace it?" Darryl said. "What kills these things?" "Germs!" Kit said. "Took a while in the original!" Ronan said, backing up and looking thoughtfully up at the legs of the walker that was stalking closer by the moment. "Couple of weeks, wasn't it?" "I think what we've got is a couple of minutes," Darryl said. "And to buy us a little time—?" He pulled another page out of his WizPod and started reading hurriedly. Kit kept backing up, in tandem with Ronan, as above them the walker peered around, looking for its prey. Darryl stood right where he was and kept on reading. Then, in what seemed mid-sentence, he stopped, took a deep breath, and shouted one last word, making a sweeping downward gesture with one hand. Then he paused, looked behind him. <Hold still!> Darryl said silently. <Don't move!!> Above them, the walker loomed up, stepped down toward them. Kit saw the great trilobed metallic foot come down at them, right on top of them— and then through them, past them. Fleetingly he saw the interior of the foot, the biocabling and mechanisms of its interior, as they slid down past his eyes like too-solid ghosts and stopped against the ground. Ronan and Kit stared. <What was> that, <exactly?> Kit said silently as the great foot lifted again, and the creature stalked away. <Micro-bilocation,> Darryl said. <I might not be able to move us away from here, but I could stay here and bilocate it. I just let it slip through the empty spaces in our atoms. It thinks it stomped us, so keep quiet!> They watched the walker stalk away across the suburban darkness, toward the green-scummed pond. "And this, Ronan whispered to Kit, looking at Darryl approvingly, "is why it's fun to play with the little kids every now and then. You never know what they're going to pull." "Oh," Darryl said, very soft, "so all of a sudden I'm not the superpowered brat anymore?" He chuckled. "Well, good, because I'm gonna yell at you now. If you hadn't lost it and started shooting—" "Yeah, well if you'd just tell people when you—" "If you two would please just shut up?" Kit whispered. Astonished, Darryl and Ronan both fell silent. "This is not the moment," Kit said. "Okay?" Because yet another war machine was now coming toward them, and in the distance Kit could see yet another. "Brute force and random wizardries aren't gonna solve this! We have to do this by the book. Literally." He pulled out his manual, looking up nervously at the machines approaching. "Which book?" "The one they came from," Kit said, starting to flip through his manual. "So there's only one thing we can do. Mess around with time." "What? A timeslide? Have you gone spare? Ronan shouted, for mind-talk plainly wasn't going to fool the machines now bearing down on them: they were already being targeted. "We can't do that! We'd need ten million kinds of authorization—" "Not for this!" Kit said, frantically hunting the page he needed. "I'm not talking about a slide! This isn't about going backwards! What we want is a local acceleration, forwards. Not changing what's going to happen, just making it happen a whole lot faster. There's no way to damage previous causality, so you don't need an authorization—" Finally he found the page. "How long have you had this one under your hat?" Ronan said. "Found it when I was doing some research a few months ago," Kit said. "I was going to use it to age some metal under Martian conditions to see what kind of remains I'd be looking for from stuff left over from ancient times. But it was all long-duration aging. Didn't occur to me it might be useful for this until you and the Squirt here reminded me." He glanced at Darryl. "'Took a few weeks in the original?' It won't take anything like that this time!" Kit reached into his manual page and pulled the spell template out of it, a long elastic ellipse which he dropped to the dusty ground in front of them. "Hurry up, get in here," he said, stepping into the center of it. "Stick your personal info into the empty circles! There— and there—" Darryl and Ronan both jumped into the interior ellipse and got to work inserting their personal information into the vacant templates in the spell circle. "This'll keep the altered flow clear of us," Kit said, watching the machines as they slowly stalked toward them, howling. "Now all we have to do is wait for them to get close enough—" Darryl had his eye on the war machines. "Uh, your Kitness— just how close is close?" "This is gonna take a lot of energy," Kit said. "Can't kick the outer circle out too far. But once they're inside, we'll be good. They've been breathing the same air we have, and we've been breathing out lots of lovely germs and viruses—" The secondary circle laid itself out as Kit spoke, maybe a few hundred yards distant all around them, glowing against the ground. "Is this safe?" Ronan said, sounding nervous. "If something slips and our personal space-time gets deranged somehow because these things stumble into the circle—" "We'll be fine!" Kit said. "The spell puts a stasis on everything in the area but the 'forward arrow' of time itself—" "You sure physics lets you do that?" Darryl said, sounding twitchy, too. "The manual says so," Kit said, glancing up at the war machines, which were now unsettlingly close, "and I think so does Stephen Hawking. That's good enough for me—" He ran down the manual page and found the words he needed to recite. "You two ready?" Kit said. "Dar, better grab hold of us. The spell won't mind, and if we do have to jump—" Darryl reached out to Ronan and Kit, grabbed one shoulder of each. "All set—" The war machines lowered over them, stepping into the outer circle. Their long necks reached down. As Kit began to read in the Speech, fire spat from the two terrible eyes— —slowed in midair, slid to a halt, and hung there right above them, frozen in place. The machines froze, too, held still by the spell. All around them, kicked-up dust in the air was holding its position: smoke, billowing from where the machines had burned trees or buildings while heading toward Kit and Darryl and Ronan, lay unmoving on the air as if painted there. Inside the shell of space around the war machines, though, Kit could feel time speeding up, faster and faster: could hear its rising whine inside his head, scaling up, nearly unbearable, as the spell circle inevitably passed back to him the neural side effects of the abuse he was inflicting on the time trapped inside the circle. All Kit could do was finish reading, squeeze his eyes shut, and try to bear up under the screech of pain of the space itself, miserable at having to endure being pushed into the future faster than the normally mandated one second per second— The spell ran out: the circle went dark. Dust started to move again; smoke started to drift. "That way," Kit said to Darryl, "quick!!" The world blacked out, went bright again as the war machines' beams hit the ground where they had all been standing until a moment ago. But then, slowly, one of the machines started to sag forward, the other one sideways toward them— They scattered as the machines fell with a tremendous crash— one of them onto a frame house nearby, a second right onto the hapless Grover's Mill Company building, which flew up in a little storm of timber and roof shingles as the machine crashed into it. Both machines cracked open as they came down, and the smell that poured from them afterward was truly impressive. The three of them drew together again, breathing hard. "Wow," Ronan said. Kit bent half over, trying to get his breath back: the spell was still taking its toll on him. Around them, though, the New Jersey suburbs were already fading away, leaving the cratered Martian landscape again. Last to go were the shattered war machines, dead from the microorganisms for which their inhabitants were no more prepared on this planet than they would have been on Earth. "Now that, Darryl said, "was great thinking." "Thank you," Ronan said. "I meant Kit," Darryl said, as Kit managed to straighten up enough to look around. "Oh, really. If you remember, he said that I—" "Some more of the shutting up, please?!" Kit yelled at them. "Because we have another problem now!" Darryl and Ronan stared at him again. "What? Spirit?" Ronan said. "What now? I thought you said you could—" Kit pointed across the crater, not at Spirit. Boiling up out of the sand all around them were what looked like streamers and ribbons of green metal. Darryl's eyes widened. "Those are the exact same color as—" "The superegg," Kit said. "Yes, they are. And if they do what the superegg did—" "Uh-oh," Darryl said. "You'd better pull out some more wizardries you haven't used yet," Kit said as the ribbons of metal started writhing and knotting together. "Because I don't think you're gonna be able to do your micro-bilocation trick again." Darryl frowned. "I could try—" "If it doesn't work," Ronan said, "we're going to find out about that just as something new stomps us flat! So don't bother! We need something else—" Low shadowy shapes were starting to form all around them, out in the dust and sand, surrounding them in a triple ring. They hurriedly placed themselves back to back. "What about the rover?" Ronan said. "She can't see this," Darryl said. "I wish I couldn't," Kit muttered as the metallic shapes twined and conjoined into their final shapes, gleaming in the dull sunlight. "Bloody 'ell," Ronan said, disgusted. "Giant robot scorpions. Why is it always giant robot scorpions?" Kit rolled his eyes. "You sure they're not alive?" he said to Darryl. "Not even slightly." Darryl raised his hands and said one quick sentence in the Speech. Four or five of the nearest scorpions blew up. "Don't let them get near the rover!" Kit shouted to Ronan as the fighting heated up. "We don't have time to spend repairing her right now if something happens!" "Got that," Ronan said. He threw his bar of light into the air, spinning: as it came down, he caught it by one end and waded into the scorpions, using the dissociator like a sword. But he wasn't able to cut down more than a few of them. Within a few strokes, his light-rod was simply bouncing off them, and though Darryl threw another destructive bolt at another gaggle of the scorpions, it had no effect. Ronan was backing up, and as he did one of the scorpions got behind him: he tripped over it, went down— The dome of wizardry over Spirit wavered and went down at the same moment. <Oh, no,> Kit thought. <He started holding the wizardry in place by direct intent, from moment to moment!> It was one of a number of ways a wizard could save energy when doing a spell, but it required you to have your attention on it to keep the spell running. <Falling over was one thing too many—> "Darryl," Kit yelled, "grab him, we're gonna jump!" He turned his back on Spirit. <Sorry, baby, we'll brainwash you or something later, but right this minute—> "But if we fail the test—" "We won't. We're not jumping that far! We need to get them away from the rover, draw them off—" "Using what?" Darryl said as he helped Ronan back onto his feet and the three of them backed away from the scorpions now advancing with raised claws. "Us!" Kit said. "It's us they're attracted to..." Darryl and Ronan exchanged a glance. "Got a point there," Ronan said. "Where'd you have in mind for our heroic last stand?" "Don't say 'last'!" Darryl said. Kit pointed. "The far wall of the crater, on the south side. The rover's been there already: even if NASA makes it look back there, it won't see the fine detail of what's going to happen to the rocks. I'll freeze the rotor gear on the camera pod for the next few minutes. That won't raise any red flags back at CalTech—they're always having these little movement glitches." "Let's go," Ronan said. Kit pulled his wand out and froze Spirit's gear. "Okay," he said to Darryl, "jump us over there—" Darryl grabbed him and Ronan: things went dark, then late-daylight dim again. Within seconds the scorpions were already boiling up out of the ground around them again, closing in— Kit pulled out the little spherical wizardry he'd been hoarding and put it down at his feet. Very carefully he said the sixteen words that armed it. "Dar," he said, "wait till the last minute. We need to take them all out." "I hate this!" Darryl said as the scorpions poured toward them. "Wouldn't be a big fan myself," Kit said under his breath. "Just hang on..." Ronan's hands were clenching on his light-rod. "Now, yeah?" "No," Kit said as the scorpions ran closer. The foremost ones were scissoring their claws together in a way he found really upsetting, but he didn't dare take his eyes off them. "Now?" Darryl said, twitching. "Come on, your Kitship, how sure do you have to be?" "Really sure," Kit said. "Put us down on the other side of Spirit, okay? About the same distance. No, not yet!! Just be ready to—" "I don't want to look," Ronan groaned. "Don't," Kit said. "But I'm gonna rag you about it forever if you close your eyes." Eyes were foremost in Kit's thoughts at the moment: the hard, cold glint of the Martian day on the eyes of the approaching scorpions was unnerving. They were twenty feet away— ten— six— "Go!" Kit said to Darryl. And as things went dark, he said the word that set off the exception grenade. When things went bright again, Kit turned to look back the way they had come. Many, many tiny sparkling bits of metal were turning and glittering high in the air, and the ground was completely obscured by a huge cloud of red dust, from which shot more shards and fragments of scorpion every second. And more, and more, as the explosion seemed to go on forever in the light gravity. Ronan was staring at the results of the detonation of Kit's toy. "Janey mack," he said, "what did you make that out of?" "A pinhead's worth of strange matter," Kit gasped, doubling over as the completed spell finished pulling its energy price out of him. "And three syllables of the Denaturation Fraction." "Whoa," Darryl said. "Can we sit down for a moment?" Ronan didn't wait, just picked a nearby boulder. "I have to get my breath..." Kit needed to get his, too, and for a moment couldn't find any and just shook his head. Finally he managed to say, "Can't wait. Got one more problem —" The other two stared at him: unbelieving in Darryl's case, slightly wounded in Ronan's. "You're really enjoying being the bad-news boy today, aren't you?" Darryl said. "What now?" Kit pointed up into the sky, still gasping. "What?" Darryl said. "You said there weren't any satellites due—" Kit pointed at Spirit, shaking his head. Ronan stared at it, then at Kit. "What? What's the problem?" After another moment or so, Kit was able to straighten up again. "Everything that happened here just now," Kit said, and took a long breath, "everything visible, everything that made a vibration, is being transmitted back to Earth!" Ronan looked at him in bemusement. "But if there aren't any satellites—" "You don't get it. When Spirit realized it couldn't make contact with either of the satellites, it would've sent a data burst back to Earth directly!" "Okay," Ronan said, rubbing his eyes. "Let's just mess with the antennas back on Earth or something—" Kit shook his head. "Won't work. There are three Deep Space Network antennas spaced around the planet, and we'd have to waste time figuring out which one's aimed this way. Our best bet's probably to interfere with the transmission while it's on its way. It takes about fifteen minutes for a signal to get to the DSN from Mars." He looked at Darryl. "If you can jump back to, say, the Moon, and catch the wavefront on the way in, scatter it—?" "Then it'd just look like there'd been a hole in transmission," Darryl said. "Got it. How big a hole do you need?" Kit turned to Ronan. "When did this start?" Ronan cocked an eye at the sky. "About twenty minutes ago?" he said. "Okay," Kit said, and turned to Darryl. "You can just beat the wavefront back." Darryl nodded and vanished. "Now sit down," Ronan said to Kit, "before you fall down!" He glanced around him, plainly not convinced that the excitement was over. "I'll keep an eye on things..." Kit sat down and tried to breathe more easily. It was tough: the grenade spell had not been cheap as wizardries went. "Thanks." "And that really was smart of you, the speeding-up-time bit," Ronan said in a low voice. "Had to fight with Dar about that: he expects it." Kit laughed under his breath. "You two should do standup," he said. "Only thing that's bothering me now—" Darryl reappeared a few yards away from them, moseyed over to them. "Done," he said. "I caught the whole last fifteen minutes' worth of transmissions and dissolved them to white noise." He sat down on the rock and looked with concern at Kit. "So what were you bothered about?" "Why Mars is playing back our imageries like this," Kit said. "We need to find out. Because if this is going to keep happening every time a human being shows up on the planet from now on, it's going to have repercussions back on Earth!" "And not just with NASA or ESA," Darryl said. "Mamvish'll be beyond cranky." "Forget Mamvish," Kit said. "And even forget Irina—" "I wouldn't," Ronan said. Kit rolled his eyes at Ronan. "What I'm trying to say is that the Powers That Be aren't going to take it kindly if we've made one of the planets in our solar system uninhabitable! Humans may need Mars for something one of these days. And even if we don't, it has a right to be an empty planet at peace! Not one where another species' weird fantasies are playing themselves out all over it every time a living thing sets foot or tentacle or whatever here!" "May be too late for that now," Darryl said. "Gee, that never occurred to me— thanks for the helpful comment," Kit said, and looked over at Spirit. Very slowly its camera pod was starting to move, a hesitant inch-by-inch rotation toward them. "But as for this test, I think we've passed. We didn't run away from the machines and the scorpions. We stayed here and defended our little buddy." "So what's the next move?" Ronan said. "We go on to the next site," Kit said. "Or I do." Ronan and Darryl looked strangely at him. "What?" said Ronan. Kit stood up, dusted the usual rusty grit off his pants. "Think about it. Each time, we saw a Mars that one of us brought with him. First time, Darryl's crazy, scary Mars movie. Second time, Ronan's rock-opera Orson Welles war machines. We aced both those scenarios—" "You mean they just barely didn't kill us," Ronan said. "Whatever," Kit said. "But I think the trouble was that we overloaded the scenarios that the old buried spells were producing. Each of them was based on one wizard's imagery. But when three wizards responded— or more than three there, for a moment"— and he gave Darryl an amused look—"something went wrong and everything got all hostile. The spells read it as an attack, maybe, instead of a test." Kit glanced over at Spirit, sitting sedate in its crater. "Logically," he said, "the next scenario that comes real should be mine. So let's try it differently this time. I'll do this next jump by myself." "Whoa, now," Darryl said, "a while ago you were all about us not splitting up!" "If I can't come up with a new plan when the old one starts looking dumb," Kit said, "I don't think I'll last long in this business." He pulled his wand out of his belt. "Look, you can eavesdrop on me. No problem with that. But let me go investigate this one by myself for just a few minutes. If I need help, believe me, I'll yell for it fast." Ronan looked at Kit dubiously. "Another hunch?" Kit thought about that. "Yeah," he said. "Let's see how it goes. If things go okay, you two can follow me in a few minutes." He pulled out his manual, paged through to the spot where his beam-me-up spell was written down, and added the fourth set of coordinates to which the superegg had sent its signal. It was down near the south pole, at about longitude 240. There was a long, high scarp there, Thyles Rupes, angling northeast to southwest, and around it a scatter of craters named after notable science-fiction people who had worked with Mars: Heinlein, Weinbaum, Campbell. Hutton, the target crater, was west of them. "Let's go," he said to the manual. The brief night of an on-planet transit spell fell around him. And then, suddenly, unexpectedly, day— Hutton was a big crater, something like a hundred kilometers across. Kit had known that its walls wouldn't be visible from where he was planning to come out in the midst of the crater proper. What was visible, and caught him by surprise for a few seconds, was the thick haze lying low all around on the horizon as he turned and took in his surroundings. "Yeah," Kit said softly. "I should have expected this..." For the crater was full of air: not the normal thin and freezing-cold Martian atmosphere, but thicker air, as full of oxygen as Earth's, and no colder than an average spring day. A soft haze overlay the horizon near the crater walls. And near the center of the crater, where he stood— —lay a city. The center of it bristled with spires that shone in a summer sunlight that would last, unbroken, for some months: for this close to either Martian pole would be midnight-sun country. The high towers of polished metal glinted green, and chief among them, more than a mile high, a tower armored in brilliant metallic scarlet speared up against the rusty-red landscape. Nor was this the desolate red-brown stone and dirt vista of the Mars from which Kit had just jumped. Spread out all around the high city walls were thousands of smaller buildings, metallic and gleaming like the greater ones. Beyond them stretched dark blotches against the ground—some kind of wiry, rugged plant. Forestry, Kit thought. And above the landscape, the air was alive with airships darting here and there about their business, glinting when the high pink sun caught them. An uneducated observer might have thought he was looking at a Mars of the future, a terraformed place, especially when they caught sight of the slender streams of liquid water meandering here and there across the rugged countryside. But Kit knew the ancient Barsoomian city of Greater Helium when he saw it— even if no such place had ever existed. A long while back, it seemed now, he'd been drawing it in his notebook at school. Now here it was, no smudgy pencil rendering, but the city he'd seen in his imagination, his dreams. <I was right,> Kit thought. <We've each brought our own favorite Mars with us. The real one, whatever it is, is underneath what we're seeing.> <All we have to do is break through... if we can. And can I? This one's tailored to me. Whatever's running these scenarios has been in my head and knows it's one I won't want to break.> Kit frowned. Cool as this was, it was only a substitute or standin for the truth that underlay it— the Mars that Kit had been looking for all these months. That lost history was calling out to him now in this peculiar idiom, and Kit shivered all over at the sense of ancient secrecy looming over the scene before him. It was what Mr. Mack had warned him about: <You'll want to get into their heads, into their lives, and you won't be able to get enough of it>... Kit gulped with the excitement of it. <Someone, or something, is using this to try to tell me something important. So let's find out what that is.> He started walking, or rather bouncing, toward the gates of the city. They were huge slabs of sheer green-tinged metal, like the city's outer walls and as tall as they were: even from his starting point, maybe a half mile away, the gates were impressive. <A hundred feet high? Maybe higher—>Kit had the Scarlet Tower to judge by, so he started doing simple fractions in his head as he got closer, passing among the lesser buildings. As he went, tall and handsome red-skinned humanoid people wearing beautifully wrought, art deco–looking ornaments of silver and gold and green—and very little clothing— looked curiously at him. <Let's say a hundred and fifty feet high. Think of the machinery it takes to move those—> <So what??> Darryl said in his head. "I'm fine," Kit said under his breath as he made his way onto a broad white-paved roadway that led toward the city gates. <And nobody's shooting at you?> Ronan said. "No!" Kit said. "You just want an excuse to start shooting somebody up yourself. Can you just chill for a little and let me see what's going on here?" <It took them a while to get started with the shooting last time...> Ronan said. Kit rolled his eyes as he got closer to the gates. "You are genuinely a hopeless case," he said. "Having the One's Champion in your head has taught you all kinds of bad habits! Always looking to pick a fight with somebody—" Kit paused, then, bouncing in place for a moment in the midst of the wide boulevard. The shining, unbroken expanse of the huge gates before him had suddenly developed a dark seam. <They're opening—> He headed toward the gates again, picking up the pace. Ahead of him the gates continued to open, revealing an interior at first shadowed by the walls, then glinting in the sunlight that the opening was letting in, so that Kit got a slowly broadening view of the massive bases of the towers inside. Down at ground level, tiny against the gates, a single form slipped out through the widening opening and made its way toward him. It was bouncing along as Kit was, but so gracefully that the motion was more like a dance. Something dark was waving along behind it. <What is that, some kind of veil—?> But as the two of them drew closer together, Kit realized that what he was seeing was long, long dark hair, rippling as easily as water or smoke in the morning breeze and the lighter gravity. The figure approaching him was just slightly taller than he was, coppery-skinned like everyone else here, and wearing the same kind of handsome ornaments around throat and wrists and ankles and waist, flashing blindingly pink-white where the clear sunlight caught them— She slowed down as she got closer. Kit became aware that he was staring... and he didn't care. Here was someone who'd also been a drawing in the margin of his notebook, and once again this unexpected and stunningly fleshed-out reality far surpassed the uncertain, much-corrected sketch. She couldn't have been more than a couple of years older than he was. Wide, dark eyes; a heartshaped face; long, long, slender legs— and besides the gorgeous jewelry, she wasn't wearing a whole lot. <This is definitely not exactly Edgar Rice Burroughs's Mars,> Kit thought, wavering between embarrassment and a slightly hungry fascination, <because she's actually got some clothes on>... though calling a few wisps and drifts of something like blue smoke "clothes" might be stretching the point. Kit started wondering whether the inaccuracy was due to the power running this illusion, or some backstage piece of his mind chickening out on him. But then the thought went out of his head as the girl approaching him got close enough to see his face clearly. Her whole face changed. Her expression had been merely hopeful before: now it became one of unalloyed joy. She hurried to him, exerting such perfect control over her movements in the light gravity that she came to an effortless, bounceless halt right in front of Kit, close enough to reach out and take his hand— which she did. Kit blushed all over. <What is this?> said one part of his mind: while the rest of him, mind and body together, said <Wow, look at her, she's— just wow...!> That was when she spoke, in a soft, small voice that was almost inaudible with astonishment. "You are here at last!" the girl said. "I cannot believe it. You're here at last." She stood there holding Kit's hand as if she never wanted to let go of it, gazing into his eyes, and put up her other hand to touch his face. "Welcome home, my warrior," she said. "Oh, welcome home!" [ Burroughs ] Nita appeared in a puff of red dust and came down on the ground with a slight jar. She glanced around the stony red landscape, taking it all in; the little Spirit rover off to one side, and the still-settling smoke from what appeared to be a recent explosion. <What the heck have they been doing here?> she thought. "Kit?" "You just missed him," said a voice from behind her. She turned. Sitting there on a rock were Ronan and Darryl, looking at her with amusement. Darryl turned to Ronan. "You owe me a fiver," he said. Ronan rolled his eyes, dug around in his pocket for a moment, and came up with a bill, which he stuffed into Darryl's held-out hand. Darryl accepted it with a smirk, then stared at it as he unrolled it. "Oh, man," Darryl said, annoyed, "this isn't even from Earth! "So stop whinging," Ronan said, "and go get it changed!" He gave Nita an ironical look. "You'd think he couldn't even get off the planet, the way he carries on." Nita gave them a look and stepped away for a moment, as they were plainly in one of those boy moods that involved being as unhelpful as possible. The rover was sitting quietly by itself, for all the world as if it was having a perfectly ordinary day; whatever had been going on around here, it seemed unaffected. "Where'd he go?" "A crater called Hutton," Ronan said. "About five minutes ago." "He was okay when we talked to him last," Darryl said. Nita turned back toward them. "Was okay?" she said. "You mean you're not in touch with him now?" Ronan stood up and dusted himself off. "No," he said. "We've been trying to reach him since just before you turned up." She stared at them in concern and surprise. "Well, if you can't reach him," Nita said, "why the heck haven't you gone over there to find out what's going on?" "Because we can't," Ronan said, sounding annoyed. "The site's blocked for transit." Nita let out a long breath as annoyed as Ronan's. "Dammit," she said, "this keeps happening..." And she didn't like the sound of it. "Okay," she said under her breath, "we'll see about that. Bobo?" But that was when her phone went off, loudly starting to sing "Girls Just Want to Have Fun" from deep in her jeans pocket. "Now what?" Nita muttered, pulling the phone out and hitting the "answer" button. "Yeah?" "Neets?" Carmela's voice said. "I dropped S'reee off in Great South Bay, and I'm back home now. But I find that we have a little situation going on here..." "Here, too," Nita said. "You tell me yours and I'll tell you mine." "Three words," Carmela said. "Helena's home early." "Uh-oh," Nita said. "I've been trying to get through to Kit," Carmela said, "but I can't reach his phone. Neither can Mama or Pop. I tried using the closet to get over there, but it won't let me: keeps blathering about some kind of local limitation. And the Aged Parents are going to throw some kind of non-tasteful fit if he doesn't turn up pretty soon, because we're supposed to be having a big happy family reunion right about now, and we are, as you might say, missing an element. You have any luck reaching him yet?" "Working on that right now," Nita said. "Give me ten or fifteen minutes." "Okay," Carmela said. "Just tell him this is not negotiable, and he needs to hurry." "Gotcha," Nita said. She hung up and stuffed the phone in her pocket, then turned to Darryl and Ronan. "You two coming?" she said. Darryl jumped up, dusting himself off. "Now, where were we?" Nita said. <You were about to let me do what I do best,> Bobo said. <Handle the fiddly stuff for you.> Nita briefly made a wry face at the concept of wizardry itself wanting her to view it as a laborsaving device. "Okay," she said, "get handling. But what's going on over there? Why's that site blocked?" <The wizardry running over there is personality-keyed,> Bobo said after a moment. <It has been built to exclude intrusions until it has run its course.> "Oh, great," Nita said. "Problem?" Darryl said. "Yeah," Nita said. "You might say that. Bobo, do you mind allowing these two to hear you as well? Just so they'll stop staring at me as if I've gone insane." Ronan and Darryl suddenly acquired extremely innocent expressions. <That's not a problem,> the peridexis said in a pleasant tenor, like that of a very high-end television announcer. "Good," Nita said. "Bobo, we need to get over there, anyway— check out the ground; see what we can find out about what's going on. Because Kit has business on Earth." <I should be able to inject you three into the space where the wizardry is running,> Bobo said. But it sounded dubious. "I know that tone," Nita said. "Are you suggesting that doing this might be dangerous for Kit?" <I have insufficient data for such a suggestion. But the wizardry running in the vicinity of Hutton crater is already under some strain. There's a possibility that it might fail completely if too much stress is put on it— which attempting to inject you into the structure of the wizardry itself might cause. And should it fail, it is difficult to predict what the effects would be on Kit, as the spell presently running is doing so under a structure cloak.> That made Nita stop and think. Such cloaks were used by wizards who were working spells in a competitive environment— one where they were concerned about other wizards discovering and possibly appropriating parts of their spells. It was not a mode that Earth wizards usually found themselves working in these days; wizardry as practiced on the planet in this day and age was routinely seen as a cooperative effort. But it had not always been this way, and Nita knew that on many other planets it still wasn't so, for various cultural or psychological reasons. Ronan was frowning. "So even you can't see the details of what the spell is that's working inside the cloak," he said. <No,> the peridexis said. And Nita shook her head. "A spell always works," she said. "Even wizardry itself can't stop a spell that's running, or break the rules it's running under." And she got a sly look. "But if we can change the conditions of the area where it's running—" <By simply forcing the issue and presenting the spell with your transit into that area as a> fait accompli <could cause the spell to lapse without actually failing. Normally the structure of wizardry itself would not allow such a transit.> And Bobo sounded momentarily smug. <But since I am wizardry—> Darryl was looking confused. "You said that spell was personality-keyed?" he said. "To Kit? <There is another personality named in the key as well,> Bobo said. <But I cannot determine anything further about it due to the cloak.> Nita shook her head. "Don't know what to make of that. We can ask Kit after we get him out of there. Meanwhile"— she grinned—"let's get down there, find out what the rules of the game are— and change 'em. You two ready?" Ronan and Darryl nodded. They all vanished. In front of the gates of the mythical Barsoomian city of Helium, Kit was looking with amazement into the eyes of the girl who was holding his hand. "Uh," he said, "...hi!" She burst out laughing at him, caught his free hand in her other one, and squeezed them both. The laughter was so delighted and overjoyed that Kit wasn't made at all uncomfortable by it. What threw him, though, was the look in the stranger's eyes. It was absolute certainty, comfortable recognition, and a strange sort of unspoken relief at his presence— a sense that now that he was here, everything would be okay. Kit stood there gazing at her and trying to figure out where he normally saw a look like that. Then he realized: Nita looked at him that way. But Nita wasn't here... and this was somebody Kit had never met. She was laughing again. "Oh, Khretef," she said, "what's this strange look you're wearing? You'd think you had never stood here before!" But then she paused, looking at him more closely. "Is there something I'm missing? A long time you've been gone, yes, a long journey, but maybe something else needs saying between us?" <Uh— how about 'Who the heck are you and what's going on here?'> Kit thought. But aloud he said, "Well, just that I'm on errantry, and I greet you—" Her eyes didn't leave his: but some of the joy ebbed out of her expression, and Kit found himself very sorry to see it go. "Well, of course," she said, her voice trying hard to keep its certainty, "of course you're a wizard, Khretef; how else could we be here? How else would you have won me? And my father is waiting for you, he'll have no choice now but to admit that you were right! But what's the matter? Has something happened on the way—?" Kit blinked. This was not at all like being shot at by war machines or rubber-suited spacemen: and as those pretty dark eyes searched his for some clue as to what was wrong with him, Kit started wondering whether he preferred the more impersonal style of interaction with these scenarios. He had to work hard to remember the superegg, to keep reminding himself that what was happening here was a key to what had really happened on Mars in the ancient days— something he had to be as tough in handling as he had been with the metal scorpion-beasts. "My name's not Khretef," he said finally, trying not to say it in a way that would hurt her. "It's Kit." She looked actively confused. "Is this some quest-name you've taken along the way?" she said softly. "Something wizardly? Of course I don't understand all the things you have to do in your art, not the way my father would—" "No," Kit said. "It's just my name." He paused: she knew him and there was no way he was going to be able to ask her this without hurting her, so he just said it. "What's yours?" She took a long breath. All this while her eyes had never left his; now at last they glanced away toward the distant, hazy horizon, as if for a moment she couldn't bear what was happening. But then she steeled herself, looked back at him. She dropped his hands, straightened up, tilted her chin up. "Perhaps I see," she said. "This is some matter of spelling that you're forbidden to describe to me: forbidden even to hint at. Well enough. It won't be said that Iskard's daughter is less able for the challenge than the warrior-wizard who went out to save us and now returns." And without warning, that smile came back to her face and her eyes: though this time there was a little edge of wry challenge on it, something that said, <When you're finished with this game, I'm going to take it out of your hide!> She tossed her head, and that wonderful hair rippled lightly around her. "Aurilelde I am," she said, and suddenly she seemed significantly taller than Kit, and unquestionably far more regal. "Iskard Tawan Shamaska is my father: the en-Tawa Shamaska are my people, and this is our city Prevek." She glanced over her shoulder at the walls and the towers, then back to Kit. "And you," she said, that glint of challenge catching fire in her eye again, "are Khretef Radrahla Eilithen, son of the Ardat Eilittri, whose name is not spoken—" Then she grinned at him. "But Kit we'll call you, since you say that's who you are today." Kit had to smile back. The difference between this encounter with another Mars and the previous two was getting more pronounced all the time: he had half expected Aurilelde to name herself after a princess of Mars, or rather of Burroughs's Mars, old Barsoom. But the reconstruction seemed not to be going quite that far this time. "Aurilelde," he said. "Kit," she said. She gave him a level look. "Well, we'll go see my father, since you've returned," she said. "Let's go in. But Father will wonder if we've fallen out, when he sees your face and mine. And so much rides on this. Can you tell me nothing about why you won't avouch your right name?" Kit was wondering where to go from here: but since he was inside this scenario, and it wasn't trying to kill him, it seemed smartest to play along. "I can't," he said as they turned toward the city gates. "Maybe it would be simplest just to say that there's a lot I don't remember—" "Well," Aurilelde said, "what would be so different about that?" They passed in through the gates together, and as they did, Aurilelde threw Kit an amused look. "You've been forgetting things since we met. Though perhaps that's not something I'd say in front of my father..." Her expression was still serene enough, but there was a sound to her voice as if Aurilelde was thinking of some old trouble that she didn't want to revive. <Now, what's that about?> Kit thought as they came out into the wide plaza inside the gates. <This is so weird. She really thinks she knows me. Where do I go with this? What's Mars trying to use all this stuff to tell me? Nothing I can do but keep my eyes open, try to pick up on the message, see what the imagery has to tell me—> Kit craned his neck up to look at the spearing towers and the little bronze-and-gilt airships veering and darting among them. Seen close up, their design looked handsomely retro, with spiky fins and a surprising number of rivets. <Late Marillan,> something whispered in his ear. <The last of the technology to be preserved from the Great Flight. And there will be no more—> Kit blinked. Aurilelde followed his glance. "Yes, it's busy, isn't it?" she said as they crossed the plaza. "People have been coming in from the lesser cities all morning." She laughed, and for the first time that laughter was uneasy: from the sound of it, Kit thought there was something at the back of her mind that Aurilelde didn't care to be thinking of right now. "Very many thought that someone else would come to the gates first this morning—" The nervousness in her voice came through much more clearly just then, and as Kit looked over at her, Aurilelde fell silent. The two of them continued across the plaza, and Kit became aware that the two of them were becoming the focus of attention for the many other people there, men and women dressed as Aurilelde was—<Somewhat dressed!> Kit thought— who watched them pass. Many of those people bowed as Aurilelde and Kit went by, though in some cases those who bowed were wearing slightly dubious expressions, and looked at their neighbors as if unsure what their opinions might be of the two who walked through the middle of it all. They were making for a high archway across the plaza, one that apparently led into the bottom levels of the Scarlet Tower. Aurilelde, catching Kit's glance at the bowing people of the city, said softly, "The usual doubts. Rorsik's party in the Chambers has been stirring up what trouble it can, though they've suspected that he'd never be able to find the prize you set out to bring us." <He wouldn't have had the courage to find it on his own, anyway,> the back of Kit's brain whispered to him. Kit blinked again: but then he realized that this was what he had been half hoping would happen— that the spell itself would clue him in as to what was going on here, what tack he should take. <I wanted it to tell me what was going on. So let's have it,> Kit said silently to the magic. <Who's Rorsik? What's going on here? Are these people the original Martians? And what happened to them? Tell me!> The archway before them was guarded by men in leather crossbelts and more utilitarian-looking clothing than Kit had seen so far—loincloths of some shimmering metallic material. The guards blocked the way with long, crossed lances that appeared to be tipped with something like diamond. <Not Barsoomian weapons,> Kit thought. <Something else is seeping through the spell's appearance now, the way Aurilelde's name did.> "Aurilelde—" Kit said as they made for the archway, and the guards there, seeing them, came to attention and pulled the weapons out of their way, raising them to the salute. "What exactly is your father going to be expecting me to do?" She shot him a slightly surprised look as they entered the Scarlet Tower. "Well, of course you've brought the Nascence—" Kit didn't say anything for a moment, having been thrown off slightly by the discovery that the metal of the Scarlet Tower was transparent: the Sun falling on its outer surface poured straight through and splashed to the white floor like blood. He paused, seeing that they had stepped into the heart of a great atrium. All around the inner skin of the Tower, platforms and floors reached up for more than three-quarters of a mile, ceasing only in one final floor near the one-mile mark that took the Tower's whole width at that height. Aurilelde had kept on walking for a moment: now, though, she paused, looking over her shoulder, surprised that he hadn't answered her. "Kit," she said, very quietly, like someone saying a strange word and fearing to be overheard saying it. "The Nascence. You do have it, don't you?" Kit looked at her and felt a sudden terrible wash of embarrassment and fear. "No," he said. "But I know where it is." Then he blinked again. <I do?> But the whisper inside Kit's head was coaching him now, and things were starting to come back into focus— slowly, as if he'd been waking up from a long sleep, these last few minutes. It was like that time when he'd been away with the family on vacation, and they'd changed motels three or four nights in a row. The fourth morning he'd awakened and stared at the ceiling, unable to work out where he was or how he'd gotten there. Now once again he'd been seeing everything around him with that same traveler's confusion, uncertain where or when he was— Aurilelde retraced her steps to him, reached out to him, and took him by the arms. It was an urgent gesture, a frightened one. "If you don't have it," she whispered, "why did you come? You know what they'll do! Rorsik especially! He'll claim forfeiture— he'll say you've proven unable to defend the city from its enemies, to free us to take our rightful place in this world. He'll accuse you of treason— you know he's always wanted an excuse to do that! And if my father agrees—" "He won't." The whisper in his head was certain now. "Rorsik is the only man in the New Lands that your father wants in the Tower even less than he wants me." Aurilelde's face went pained at that, and she opened her mouth to say something. But then from across the huge interior of the Tower, a crazy, yodeling yelling went up. Aurilelde turned, and so did Kit— Running at them from one of many doors right across the atrium came a glinting green shape, manylegged, claws clacking on the polished floor as it came howling toward them. Kit saw the two raised pairs of claws in front, realized what he was seeing, and snatched the wand out of his belt and got it ready— Aurilelde grabbed his arm. "Khr— Kit!" she said. "No, don't—" But there was no need. One second Kit had believed himself to be looking at a monster, another example of the things that had just attacked him. <Just?> said the voice in his head. Now it seemed a month ago, a year. And the horrible thing running toward him was suddenly harmless, even funny, as the hind claws scrabbled for purchase on the floor, as it hurled itself toward him. "Takaf!" he said, and started laughing: he couldn't help it. He got down on one knee. The sathak flung itself at him, howling in inane greeting. Kit shoved the wand back into his belt and batted the claws away in the usual way. Then he grabbed the bizarre body, flipped it onto its back, and started rubbing the soft underbelly plating in all the right places, while Takaf squirmed and waved his claws around and made the usual idiot of himself. Some other part of Kit stared at the strange thing on the floor, obsessed by a dream-memory of glinting green claws and deadly, empty metal eyes. But his waking mind now knew that the cold-hearted mechanical mav-sathakti were just imitations of the sathak, the few remaining companion-creatures from the First World to have survived here: and Takaf was probably the friendliest, most faithful, and dimmest of them all. It took some minutes before Takaf had had enough reassurance that his master had returned for him to stop howling his relief and delight to the uttermost heights of the Tower. Then Kit stood up and looked over at Aurilelde, smiling slightly. "I couldn't go up there without him," he said. "Last time it was the three of us. This time it had to be the three of us again." Aurilelde looked at him, and a small, relieved smile started to creep across her face. "You are you again," she whispered. "It's truly you, come back as you promised. Even from so far, from so long! You had me frightened there for a while—" Kit shook his head. "Let's go up," he said. "Let Rorsik bring on anything he likes. When we're together, we can take on anything he's got. Even the Darkness and the Doom—" Aurilelde shivered. But she took Kit's arm, and they headed across the Tower together to the transit cluster at the heart of the ground floor, with Takaf scuttling along behind. The centermost pad in the cluster was empty. The three of them stepped on it together, and under them the circle of white stone lifted and began levitating into the Tower space, heading for the topmost floor and the tiny opening in it. "How many of them are up there, do you think?" Kit said. Aurilelde shook her head. "Hundreds," she said as they rose upward more and more quickly. "Rorsik has been whispering in a lot of ears that he'd take Father's place if you don't prove his trust in you to be wise. No one dares to be absent: everyone wants to prove they're on the right side when the trouble starts..." Kit swallowed, hearing that. But at the back of his mind, something odd was going on. The stranger-soul, the one who had been looking through his eyes and finding everything so weird and frightening, was now settling itself into a peculiar armed readiness, alert and waiting to see what would happen next. It was ready to intervene. Its heart was a wizard's heart, and it seemed to be saying to him, <I've come up against the Darkness every now and then, and It hasn't done all that well. Let's see what It's got this time—> The pad of stone was drawing near the upper level now, and the aperture that would admit it was growing bigger and bigger above them. "'Lelde," Kit said, while Takaf stood staring up at the many eyes gazing down at them through the nearing, glassy floor, "are you ready?" "By myself?" She shivered. "But if you are— then I can be ready with you." He hugged Aurilelde's arm to his side for a moment, then stood free of her as they ascended through the floor, concentrating on standing straight and tall beside her, trying to match a Daughter's proud dignity with his own. As the pad locked into place, he heard the rustle and mutter of the crowd about them, felt the pressure of the hundreds of eyes on them: the fear, the unease, and in some cases the hate, bizarrely paired with hope. <They hate it that they need an enemy to save them,> Kit thought. <They wish it could be any other way —> The two of them stepped out onto the ruby floor and headed for the Throne. Takaf came clacking along behind them, glancing nervously from side to side, for he could feel the threat as clearly as the two in front of him. Here, at the top of the Tower, the metal had been altered to let the clear light of day pour in; and under it, alone on that plain red sandstone bench, Iskard sat awaiting them, arrayed in the robes of the Master of the City, with a short lightgoad in his hand. As they approached, he rose. Kit looked up at him—a man big and tall even for a Shamaska; the red-skinned face cold, set, and chiseled; the dark eyes cold, too. Only on his daughter did those eyes rest with any affection, and even then only for a moment—there were other influences in the room that mattered more. Coming closer, Kit tried to keep his face set, too, trying not to betray any response that might upset what was happening. It had taken Iskard long enough to come to some kind of interior accommodation as regarded the relationship between the Daughter of the Shamaska and the son of the man who would have been the Eilith Master had their ancient rivalry followed the normal course. But no courses were normal anymore, nor could they be until both sides were freed to follow their separate fates in the New World— They came to a halt before the Throne, and Takaf crouched behind them. "Welcome, young Khretef—" Kit bowed. Aurilelde stood straight. "The Son of the Eilitt has returned," she said, "bringing with him news of the prize the Master of the City requires." "News?" came a harsh voice from the crowd, and within a moment there was movement there, the expected shape forcing itself out into the open. "My daughter always said you would return," said Iskard, ignoring the interruption. "Many others had given you up for lost, Khretef. When you ventured out into lands filled with the creatures loosed on us by our ancient enemies, we feared you lost forever. Some there were"— and he looked toward the source of the interruption— "who even said you had betrayed us. But the Daughter spoke for you, and Aurilelde has always been wiser than fear: one who's been able to see what others couldn't, a seeress of the Old Light as well as one who sees into the Dark left behind us." The people gathered around the Throne rustled and muttered approval, some laying fists to chests and bowing in Aurilelde's direction. She smiled at her father, and at the reaction of her people, but the expression had an absent-minded quality to it: it was Kit she was watching. "She has seen nothing," said the Shamaska man who was now approaching the Throne, "if this child of traitors and murderers has not brought back the Nascence with him! But he has nothing. Otherwise the City would not now still be trapped behind walls that cannot be broken, hemmed in by command of its enemies!" Kit looked over at the owner of the angry voice now approaching them. He wore robes that were meant to recall the ones worn by the Master of the City, and he carried a lightgoad like the Master's— through prudently unkindled: the city guards and warriors in the room would not have taken kindly to such a gesture, an overt challenge to the Master's power. For his own part, Kit, now aware that his own clothes had somewhere along the line transformed themselves to a warrior's proper harness, simply touched the firesword hanging at his belt and was reassured to hear the metal speak back to him in his mind as usual. That at least was normal, in this time when nothing else was— "Rorsik," said Aurilelde's father in a dreadfully level and quiet voice, "be still. Your time to speak will come all too soon, I fear." He turned to Kit. "So, Son of Eilitt: where is the Nascence, then?" "Found, Master of the City," Kit said, "in the green dunes halfway around the planet, where the enemies of Shamask once hid it." "And you should know, traitor, son of traitors," cried Rorsik, "for it was your people who—" "Rorsik," said Iskard, and the lightgoad blazed up in his hand. Rorsik fell silent. "You have not brought it, however," said Iskard. "No, Master of the City," Kit said. The people gathered around muttered in distress. "Then your life is forfeit," said Rorsik, and his face twisted up in a dreadful smile. "I can't produce it," said Kit, "because it's been sealed against us. Wizardries greater than ours have been used to render it dormant. It can't be used to free us until the New World's soul is found and mated to it. And this we cannot do without the help of the wizards of the Blue Star." A mutter of concern went among all those who were gathered to listen. But Rorsik only laughed. "This is mythology! he shouted. "Just more tales of mysterious unknown magics from one who has everything to gain from spinning out his time among you until you actually start to believe his stories. What else would you expect from a child of the other side, one of those who watched the Darkness and the Doom come down on us, and laughed to see it come, and plotted to leave us to die as our world tore itself apart—" "The wizards are here now!" Aurilelde said, and every eye in that great room turned to her. "They've found the Nascence in the dunes; they released its power; they triggered the tests, even the one that called for the manipulation of time. One has even invoked the Kinship upon himself! Soon we'll be able to go among them and show them what we need. Then they'll help us as I foretold, and there'll be peace at last—" Rorsik laughed again. "We all know why you want peace, Master's Daughter! You and your traitor lover. You will sell us all to the Eilitt and destroy your own people. You are nothing but a tool of the ancient Power that sent the Darkness and the Doom upon us to begin with—" A growl of anger started to go up from around the room. In the back of Kit's mind, something said, quite clearly, <Uh-oh— here we go! I was wondering when that name would come up—> He shivered at the sudden clarity of that voice, and Aurilelde, almost as if she'd heard something, too, glanced at him, worried. Undeterred by the anger of the crowd, Rorsik was shouting, "We can do nothing to make ourselves safe until the Dark Ones are destroyed— until their cities are dust, and the New World is cleansed of them! Only then can we spread safely through this world, make it our own, and resume our place in the light of the Sun as the First Ones, untroubled, in mastery over our world and our system again! And until the Nascence is ours, and the Dark Ones' cities are revived and wiped out, none of us can be safe—" <Our worlds and our system?> There was something about the phrasing that got the uneasy attention of the stranger-soul at the back of Kit's mind. And something else was happening as well. The hair was standing up on the back of his neck. At his feet, Takaf was hissing, glancing about him with all his eyes, uncertain. Above them, the sunlight was wavering, looking suddenly strangely faint. Almost everybody standing in that great assemblage under the Tower's peak stared upward, even Iskard and Rorsik. But Aurilelde did not. She turned to Kit. "It's breaking," she whispered. "It's breaking too soon. There's someone else here—!" Kit blinked— and suddenly he was Kit again, not Khretef with Kit watching from the background. It was strange, though, that now he could look at Aurilelde and see her as Khretef did. "It's all right," he said. "If it's breaking, I can guess why. My friends have followed me— the other wizards. No, don't be afraid! They're really smart. They can help you! It's what we came for, to help you—" But Aurilelde was shaking her head, and her expression was frightened. "One of them is here already," she said, gazing up into the sky, then looking nervously around her as if she was expecting something sudden to happen. "You can't stay—" "It's okay," Kit said, "they're nice guys; you should meet them! One of them in particular is kind of special. Actually, they both are, but I should warn you about this one—" "I know," Aurilelde said, looking more alarmed by the moment. Her expression began to darken. "That one cannot come here. It would be dangerous— the City's protection will break prematurely. You have to go!" "Huh?" "Khretef, listen to me. I don't want you to go but you must!" She was staring around her now in real fright, and Kit started to get frightened himself, besides wanting to calm her down. "If the spell breaks before the right safeguards are in place and there's enough power present to back them up, everything will be ruined. I won't be able to stay. You won't be able to stay! Please, Khr— Kit; I'm sorry, Kit; you have to go before anyone else comes. Please go!" "All right," Kit said. "But you have to try to let us help you, and if we can't come here, how're we supposed to—" "I can't tell you now. Later, later I'll tell you, but this is a bad time, the wrong time!" Aurilelde was looking pale and scared. "It's like it was before—when all the times were bad times, when it went cold and the Darkness was coming. We can't let it come again—not after so long, not after all the time we waited!" She looked like she was about to burst into tears. "Please, Khretef; please go before the spell breaks!" And now she was actually pushing Kit away, pushing him back toward the pad that had brought them up into the great throne room. "Okay," Kit said, backing away, "sure, no problem—" He glanced down and noticed that his clothes had shifted back to jeans and shirt and down vest: the sword that had been hanging at his side was a wand stuck in his belt again. And then as he looked at Aurilelde, he saw that her shape was wavering, too, and the long dark hair vanished and came back again, the beautiful face flickered and went smooth and gray, then came back; the eyes went pale, went dark— Around him, the sunlight went weak; the Tower itself started to waver, to shimmer— — was gone. Kit fell. Just for a second he had a glimpse of the bare red ground, far far beneath. Skywalk! was his first thought, and he felt around in his head with desperate haste for the spell that would make the air go solid under him— WHAM! Kit came down on his face much too soon, as if he'd only fallen a few feet. All the same, the impact jarred the breath right out of him. He lay there gasping. "Whoa," he heard Darryl say. "Kit, you okay?" Kit groaned and rolled over. "If he can make that noise," said a voice he wasn't expecting, "he's fine." He opened his eyes. There was a girl looking down at him: dark-haired, but the hair was strangely short. It was odd how much she reminded him of Aurilelde— He blinked. Nita was looking down at him. Of course it was Nita. "Where've you been?" she said, reaching down to help him up. Kit staggered as he got to his feet. "Uh," he said, "in the middle of a really strange experience." "Stranger than what we've been having?" Ronan said as Kit looked around him. They were near the edge of Hutton crater, and Kit looked southeastward from the crater's edge to glimpse the edge of the next one over. Then Kit grinned a small crooked grin, for that crater's name was Burroughs. "You have no idea," Kit said. "Come on and I'll tell you—" "You'll tell us later," Nita said. "You have to go home." "What? Why?" "Helena's back." For a second the name meant absolutely nothing to him... but only for a second. "Oh, no," Kit said. "Better get it over with..." "Like you have a choice," Nita said. "Darryl, can you do the honors? We can all meet up tonight or something and go over the details of what just happened here." "Sounds like a plan," Kit thought. But privately it occurred to him, as Darryl laid a hand on his shoulder, that the details might take considerably longer to sort out. And as he and Ronan and Darryl all vanished, it seemed to Kit that there was somebody else inside his head who was agreeing with him.... [ Olympus Mons ] Nita stood there looking out across the crater called Hutton. It was late in the sol, and the light here would start failing in a while. But a glow of residual wizardry lay over the whole crater, sheening the surface with a thin skin of greenish light, as if with water. In the midst of it all, Nita could still glimpse something that wasn't really there anymore. A memory of gleaming towers and spires towered up into the Martian afternoon, the red tower at the heart of it all glancing back light at the setting Sun like a beacon. She shook her head. Nita didn't know the planet's satellite schedule the way Kit did, but she knew that every inch of its surface got covered sooner or later. "Bobo," she said under her breath, "we'd better stick a shield-spell over this until it fades out. It's going to have to cover a lot of real estate..." <For how long?> Bobo said. Nita shook her head. There was no telling how long this effect might linger: the wizardry that had initially fueled it had surprising staying power. "Maybe a couple of hours?" she said, but it was a guess at best. "Can you get any sense of how much oomph is left in the original spell?" <A fair amount,> the peridexis said. <You could parasitize it, if you wanted to .> "You mean tell the illusion to hide itself?" <Yes. That will save you having to make the energy outlay for the shield yourself. And it'll run the spell down faster.> "I'm all for that," Nita said. "Let's do it." A moment later the heat-shimmer of the simplest kind of visual shield came alive in the air above the city and spread itself downward toward her in an expanding dome. Seconds later, nothing was visible but a duplication of the rock-tumble and cratery landscape directly beyond the city's limits. "Okay," Nita said under her breath, "that should keep the neighbors from getting too crazy..." For there were already enough people on Earth who got all overexcited about rock formations that they insisted as seeing as faces and pyramids and whatnot—people who also insisted these "carvings" were proof that the doings of alien civilizations were being covered up by one government or another. <Sometimes I wish wizards could just come out and tell them how hard it's been to find out anything on the subject, even when you're right down here walking around on the planet!> But that wasn't likely to happen for a long time. Nita glanced around, seeing nothing outside the shield but the usual scatter of reddish stones and sand. "Everything behaving itself at the other spell sites?" she said. <Yes; those wizardries have run their course. Just as well— they were potentially quite dangerous, especially the second one.> Nita blinked as the peridexis showed her a few glimpses of the previous visitations. "Yeah," she said, and shivered: she'd never been wild about the whole war-machine concept. <But certainly elegant in that the wizardries were built with the expectation that each triggering wizard would set the parameters of his own test... and then be required to understand the trigger in order to defuse the attack.> Nita stood looking southward for a moment. "Sounds almost like you approve, Bobo..." <I can hardly fail to appreciate good workmanship in a spell, that's all>, Bobo said, sounding a little hurt. She snickered a little as she turned, looking southeastward toward Burroughs crater. "Well," Nita said, "maybe it's just as well I wasn't on site when one of those other spells was live. No telling what might have turned up..." She turned back toward were the city was hidden and abruptly realized that something was standing between her and the slight waver of the force field. It was a small red-suited alien creature wearing what looked like oversize white sneakers, white gloves, a green metal tutu, and a shiny green helmet that appeared to have a scrub brush attached to the top of it. Out of a dark and otherwise featureless face, large oval eyes regarded Nita with mild alarm. "What happened to the kaboom?" the creature said. "There was supposed to be an earth-shattering kaboom!" And he scuttled through the force field and vanished. Nita just stood there for a second. "Bobo...?!" <Just a flicker of residual spell artifact>, Bobo said, unconcerned. <Nothing to worry about.> <Oh yeah? Not sure I want to know what this says about my relationship with Mars>... "Do me a favor?" Nita said as she headed for the force field herself. <Speak, demand: I'll answer.> "If there's a spell against the use of an Illudium Q-36 Explosive Space Modulator, get it ready. Just in case..." Nita stepped through the shield, looking cautiously around her. To her relief, there was no further sign of her own brief Martian moment. But the city was there: a handsome place, futuristic-looking in a charming and retro way— doubtless accurately reflecting Kit's take on the Burroughs Martian books. Nita had read them years previously, but for some reason their vision hadn't really appealed to her. She had too much trouble syncing the writer's ideas about the Martian climate and terrain with what people now knew to be true about the place— and the concept of egg-laying humanoids and green-skinned, multi-armed tusky guys riding ten-legged lizard creatures all over the landscape and shooting at one another with radium guns simply struck her as funny. <He likes it, though,> Nita thought. <Just what makes it so interesting for him?> The whole place lay still and quiet now, the wizardry running down. <But... I wonder. I should still be able to see what he saw, if I work at it. It's just the recent past, after all, and the imagery was wizardry-based to begin with. I might be able to use the visionary talent a little to patch into it...> It would be like the viewing she'd been doing in the library cavern a while ago, though she would have to power it herself. Nita closed her eyes. <Let's see—> The proper state of mind took a few minutes to achieve. As she'd been discovering more and more often lately, this kind of vision was usually more about letting go than about staring at something and willing yourself to see the reality behind it. Realities were shy, Nita was discovering. To get a good look at them up close, you had to tempt them out by holding still and letting them get curious about you— the way a nonwizardly person might pique the curiosity of a wild bird by standing still for a long time with an outstretched handful of birdseed. When she started getting that sense that things outside were becoming curious about her, she opened her eyes and looked around casually. The city was alive now, as Kit had seen it. Little ships were streaking around among the towers, and Nita noted that some of them looked a lot like those she'd seen as part of the exodus from Shamask-Eilith. <Interesting...> And then she caught sight of the gates of the city starting to open. <Hmm,> she thought. <Let's have a look at that.> Instantly Nita was down there, standing on the wide white roadway outside the gates. So was Kit— or the Kit of a while ago. And as the gates opened, out came something that Nita hadn't quite been expecting... <Would you get a load of that,> Nita thought. <A genuine Martian princess. Well, sort of genuine...> Nita walked around them, observing, as Kit and the stranger met. <God,> Nita thought, <she's really pretty. Though did Kit even notice, the way she's dressed? Or not dressed...> Her smile was more wistful than annoyed. There was nothing wrong with Nita's figure: it was average for her age. But she couldn't help but feel scrawny and non-toned next to this interplanetary pinup girl. And the way the princess moved, and the way her hair floated in the air, made Nita feel clumsy and inelegant. <But this isn't about elegance,> Nita thought. <There's something else going on here. Specifically— that spell was personality-locked. Whoever designed this piece of work wasn't looking for just anybody. They were looking for Kit.> <But why?> Nita watched that beautiful shape come close to Kit, taking his hand, looking into his eyes with real emotion. But as she watched, she caught a glimpse of something else under the red-Martian illusion. Something dark— <Now what the>— But the glimpse was gone, and she was looking at the beautiful girl and Kit again. Nita frowned, then let out a long breath and shut her eyes again. <Don't try to force it,> she thought. Doitsu and the other koi had said it often enough. <Vision comes in its own time. Pushing won't help. But intention will. Be patient: wait. But wait with purpose.> She stood quiet and waited, thinking of the sun on the water on the koi pond in back of Tom's house: the ripple and the flicker of it, coexisting with what lay under the surface, only hiding what was under there when you looked at it from the wrong angle. There was no rush: what she needed to see wanted to be seen, would be waiting for her when... ...she opened her eyes again. Standing in front of Kit was a tall, slender young girl, not red-skinned, but gray— as gray as polished stone. Around her head, smooth as a sculpture's, clung and wavered a long rippling cloud of hair that was more like smoke than anything else and was a deep twilight blue. Her clothing did not change, and under its light veiling and the glint of her ornaments, her body merely hinted at female contours without showing the anatomical details that would have been normal for humans on Earth. <So,> Nita thought, <this is what the people of the First World made themselves into after they came. This is someone from Shamask-Eilith... and now, by location anyway, a Martian.> The eyes looking into Kit's were pupilless and solid, and their depths were that same vivid dark blue, almost black: but they were expressive— hopeful and, yes, overjoyed, but also frightened. <It's as if whoever lives behind those eyes is scared this can't be true,> Nita thought. <As if she sees something else happening: something much worse than this—> For just a second those indigo eyes glanced in Nita's direction. Then immediately they looked away again, disturbed and afraid. A sense of déjà vu promptly caught hold of Nita, disturbing and dissolving the vision— but not before she remembered what it had reminded her of. That glimpse in the mirror the other morning: instead of seeing herself, seeing this stranger, with the strange implication that they were somehow connected. Somehow the same— "Bobo," Nita said. <At your command, imperious leader.> Nita began to wonder whether Bobo had been spending too much data-grab time slumming on the local nostalgia-TV cable channels. "That name-development and analysis utility I was using on Carmela?" <What about it?> "Run it on Kit's welcoming committee. Save the analysis for me. I'll look at it later." <Running. Power deduction will be deferred until the end of the run.> "Fine." Nita scowled as the more accessible illusion of the Martian princess re-manifested itself—copper-skinned, doe-eyed, the perfect humanoid alien, physically gorgeous: a genuine fantasy heroine and a teenage boy's dream. <But younger than she is in the books,> Nita thought, walking around the Martian princess figure and Kit as they looked into each other's eyes and spoke words she couldn't hear. <Someone's designed this particular apparition just for Kit. How? And why?> She stopped, folded her arms, and stood there for a few moments, thinking— and trying hard to think straight and not be thrown off by her own feelings, especially when she had no information to go on. Yet suddenly it came back to Nita what that stone had said to her up on top of Elysium Mons. <No one's been here. Just him, and her. The other one.> <The other one.> Nita scowled. <What's going on between them?> she thought. It wasn't like she was jealous or anything. But she knew Kit... and this sudden out-of-nowhere relationship made no sense to her. Also, there was no missing the sexy-looking component to this meeting. It was being used on Kit as some kind of way of getting at him, she was sure. Nita frowned harder. Though she'd occasionally been curious about it, Kit's fantasy life wasn't her business. But someone else, someone or something associated with the Shamask-Eilith presence here on Mars, was not above exploiting it for its own purposes. And that was worrying Nita. ...Especially now that she thought she knew why Mars had so long been associated with war in human thought. Nita knew from her reading in the manual that all living thought was connected—though the connections could take strange twists and turnings through space-time. Whatever the mechanism, some distant whisper of the ancient conflicts obsessing those who fled here from the First World had over the millennia filtered through into the dreams and imaginings of the beings on the next planet over. <We've always known,> Nita thought, <maybe since we started writing things down. Maybe even longer.> Kit had come here looking for the romance and mystery of lost ancient life, and the possibility of resurrecting it, making contact with it, learning its secrets, helping an empty world find its life again. Nita wondered what he'd think when he found out that the Martians weren't indigenous, but immigrants. And based on the past behavior of the species that, it now seemed, had lain hidden on Mars for so long— assuming that the history that she and Carmela and S'reee had read or experienced in the cavern was true— the thought of having any close dealings with the Shamaska-Eilitt was making Nita nervous. <To these guys,> Nita thought, <all was fair in war. But what about love?> She let out a long breath. The information in the Cavern of Writings had been short on details about the personal lives of the Shamaska-Eilitt. <They might be very nice people, for all I know. But their behavior as a species made her think otherwise.> Still. Nita let out a breath. <It's too soon to judge. And what Kit's been interacting with here is basically a recording: a wizardry set up to talk to someone who triggers it, and then get them to do...> <...what?> Nita watched Kit and the princess start toward the gates together. <Let's just go have a look...> she thought, and started to follow them. But as she did, the whole scene started to go hazy. <Uh-oh!> she thought. <Bobo, wait, we need to pump some energy into this thing! Shift the payout to me. I don't mind—> But it was too late. The whole view— city, Kit, princess, and all— faded away to bare Martian landscape in a matter of just a few seconds. <Sorry,> Bobo said. <There wasn't time: the illusion's power reserve exhausted itself in something of a rush.> Nita made a face. <Almost as if somebody didn't want me to see something. No, that's just paranoid...> "Never mind: I can get the details from Kit." <Of course.> "Do you have that persona analysis for me?" A pause. <Unfortunately, no. The outer spell ran out of power before the full analysis could complete.> Nita let out an annoyed breath. "Can you keep working on whatever you got before the playback went down?" <Of course. Just note that it may take some time to extrapolate the missing data.> "Go for it." She turned away and looked toward the Sun. Down low, near the horizon, she could see that little spark of blue-white fire twinkling slightly in the troubled air. "Dust storm coming up," she said under her breath. "Well, I want some lunch, and I can catch up with Kit afterwards. Let's get back..." The Rodriguez household was not exactly in an uproar when he got back, but a sense of disruption was clear when Kit came in the back door. There were suitcases in the back hall and in the kitchen, and voices in the living room, laughing and talking very fast: Kit's mama— the deeper of the two voices, more of a contralto— and Helena's soprano. Kit swallowed and headed into the living room. His mama was in scrubs, having apparently come from work over her lunch hour. Carmela was there, too, sprawled on the couch. And in the midst of everything, sitting on the floor and going through the contents of another suitcase and dividing them between two piles destined for the laundry, was Helena. Kit had always considered her as more or less a larger version of Carmela: a little taller, a little longer-faced, with darker, bigger eyes; broader across the shoulders and in the chest, definitely bigger in the hips. But Helena had dropped some weight since she'd gone away in September, which surprised him—and the new haircut, level with her jawline but short in back, left Kit wondering whether Helena had decided that she wanted to look as little like her little sister as possible. Whatever the case, here she was, sitting in the middle of the living room, talking a mile a minute and dominating everything, the way she liked to do. "And I told him that he wasn't going to take me by surprise like that," she was saying to Kit's mama, "and he said to me, 'Oh, really? Well, we'll see how you do on the exam.' And I just laughed at him! I mean, he never—" Kit leaned over the chair nearest the dining room, And Helena caught the motion: her head turned, and she took him in. "Kit!" she said. "My god, Kit, look at you!" She jumped up and practically leaped on him to hug him. Then she held him away from her. "You are six inches taller! "Seven," Kit said. "I'm making up for lost time." Helena laughed and mussed his hair, then let him go and collapsed into the middle of the floor again. Kit tried to put his hair in order without making too much of an issue out of it, as there were few things he hated more than this particular gesture of sisterly affection. "How've you been doing?" Helena said. "You done with school yet?" "On Tuesday." "That's so great!" Helena said. And she glanced around. "Hey, where's—" Then she stopped herself, and her face fell. "Oh, I am so sorry," she said. "I was going to ask you where Ponch was." "It's okay," Kit said. "I'm so sorry about him," Helena said, the laundry she was sorting momentarily forgotten in her hands. "It's like he was here forever. It's so weird with him gone..." "I know," Kit said. His mother hadn't given Helena all the details, simply telling her that Ponch had "been in an accident," which was true as far as it went. "How are you doing?" Helena looked into his eyes as if that would be enough to tell her what she wanted to know. Kit flashed briefly on the princess's eyes, then turned his mind purposefully away from that subject. "I'm okay. Getting ready to kick back a little over the summertime." "Yeah..." Helena said, and paused, as if there was something else she could have said but was having second thoughts about. "So am I. You heard about the craziness, I guess..." "Mela told me a little." Helena sighed. "Yeah," she said, "so much for my poor broken heart." But to Kit it didn't sound all that broken. "Back to playing the field." "Shouldn't be a problem," Carmela said, "considering the twelve million phone calls you've had this morning..." "Oh, you know how it is," Helena said. "Everybody wants to be in touch all of a sudden when they hear you've been dumped! It's nice of them, but they're all 'Oh, my god, why aren't you crushed?' And I just have to keep saying, 'It's all right; I saw it coming; it's not like I've been run over by a truck! There are a million other fish in the sea, yada yada yada...'" Kit's mama glanced at him with a resigned expression as Helena kept talking. There had been some joking in the family when mama had complained about the house getting "too quiet" when Helena went off to school. <It's not that Mela's not talkative,> Kit thought. <But at least when she talks, she says something...> "Let me get rid of these before they pile up," Kit's mama said, coming into the middle of the room to pick up some of the laundry. "You want me to start these up?" "Sure, mama. On delicate! Helena shouted after her as she left the room. "Delicate, sure..." "You ever do any laundry at school?" Kit said. "Or have you been saving it up till you got back?" Helena sniffed, that specific sound of scorn that made Kit realize suddenly how long it had been since he'd heard it. "Huh," Helena said, amused. She craned her neck, looking up and past him, hearing the sound of Kit's mama going downstairs to put the laundry in the washer. "Look," she said, in a lower tone. "While you're here, there's just something I wanted to clear up." Kit swung around and sat down in the chair he'd been leaning on. He thought he knew what was coming and was now wondering whether it would be smarter to just cut and run. But this was his sister, not some monster from another world. <Theoretically...> "When I was home last, I was giving you a hard time about, you know..." Helena winced. "The weird things you were doing." Kit wasn't sure where she was going with this and didn't want to accidentally help her in the wrong direction. "And?" "Well." She straightened up, let go of the present piece of laundry, and sat there with her hands clasped in her lap, staring down at them as if they were unusually interesting. "For a while, before I went off to school, I was really worried about you, Kit. Seriously worried. I thought you were... you know." <The Spawn of Satan?> Kit thought. <In league with the Forces of Darkness?> But he said nothing out loud. If Helena was finally seeing sense, he wasn't going to derail her. "But I spent a while thinking about it, and finally I started to understand. I can't believe it took me as long as it did, but you know how it can be, you hit something that you can't really get to grips with, and you back away and dance all around it... till you realize that maybe you misunderstood the situation from the very beginning. And once I understood that you weren't doing anything, you know, evil, then it was all right. I just didn't understand. I do now." And Helena looked at him with an expression of not just understanding, but— bizarrely— pity. "Why didn't you just tell me that you're a mutant?" Kit sat perfectly still. <That... I'm... a what??> He turned slowly to Carmela, who was still sprawled on the couch, though she'd now propped herself up on one elbow to observe the proceedings. "Please tell her I am not a mutant," Kit said, a lot more calmly than he needed to. Carmela's eyes glittered with mischief. "I don't know," she said. "It would explain a lot..." It was more than Kit could bear, as it always had been when his sisters ganged up on him. There was something intrinsically unfair in having two of them who were older and more in control than he was. He still had the photo of the time when he was four and they'd all been playing soldiers, and Carmela had stuck a saucepan on his head, telling him it was a helmet. Then Helena had snuck up on them to take the photo, one Kit's mom thought was incredibly cute and refused to get rid of. No one seemed to care that Kit winced every time he saw the thing, and the thought of some friend from school somehow seeing it occasionally kept him up at night. Unfortunately, even with extensive usage of wizardry, he had never been able to locate the negative. And now here again was one of his sisters trying to saddle him with another image that was going to stick for years if he didn't do something now. "I," Kit said, "am not... a mutant!! "But you would say that, wouldn't you?" Helena said with some compassion as she grabbed an armload of the laundry scattered around her and stood up. "It's all right: I understand now." As she headed out of the room, Helena paused by the chair, looking down at him affectionately, and mussed his hair again. "I can cope with you being a mutant," Helena said. "Actually, it's kind of cool. So don't worry: I'll keep your secret." And she went after their mama. "Mama? Did you start it yet? Don't start it yet!... Kit stood staring after her, openmouthed and fuming. Then he rounded on Carmela. "Are you going to let her get away with that?" "Are you?" Carmela said. Kit let out a long breath, thinking. Infuriating as Helena's new attitude was, it was possibly preferable to the way she'd been acting when she thought that Kit's wizardry meant he'd sold his soul to the devil. He shook his head. "But it's not true! "The more you tell her so," Carmela said, "the more she's going to think you're in denial. And she's just going to feel more sorry for you. She might even start worrying again." Kit rolled his eyes. If worrying were an Olympic event, Helena would have effortlessly qualified for any U.S. team. "You've told her the truth now," Carmela said. "Isn't that enough? Isn't honor satisfied?" "Yeah, but—" "Kit," Carmela said. "Let her be. Let her think her life's actually the way she wishes it was. Don't make her follow you places she's just not built to go." His sister's voice was suddenly full of not only disappointment, but a pity entirely different from Helena's. "But you're going to follow me there—?" Kit said. Carmela raised her eyebrows. "'Follow'?" she said, and grinned. "Like I follow people! 'Chase,' maybe." She stretched, then got up off the couch and started picking up more of the scattered laundry. "Yeah," Kit said quietly. "Okay." He got up, too, and started helping her, and a few moments later the two of them followed Helena downstairs. Having spell-transited into the shielded part of her backyard from Mars, Nita came into the house and realized that she was itching all over. <Mars dust!> she thought, trying to brush it off herself, and failing as usual: the stuff was aggressively static-charged due to the dryness up there. <I need to change...> She started heading upstairs to her room to do that but was distracted by finding her dad sitting in his lounger in the living room, looking at his phone. "Lunch hour?" she said to him as she passed. "Yeah," her dad said. "It's quiet in town today... I'm taking an extra half-hour." But he looked distracted and didn't glance up as he spoke. Nita could guess what he was looking at: Dairine. "What's she up to?" she said, pausing at the bottom of the stairs. "They're playing around with some kind of artificial sun," her dad said. "She keeps getting in and out of it." "Yeah," Nita said, "I saw her doing that. It's a simulator." "Something else weird about this—" He pointed at the screen. Nita went to look over his shoulder. Her dad was indicating a text window on the little screen. Inside it, text— initially in the Speech, but translating itself on the fly— was rolling downward at considerable speed. She squinted at it. <Don't know what to do about this— oh, wait, now I see— no, that's all wrong. I wish he wouldn't stare like that. I can't concentrate when he's looking at me all the time; don't want him to think I'm not in control here! What was that reading? No, back off—> "Wow," Nita said. "That's Dairine thinking. She smiled slightly. "Streaming consciousness..." Her dad chuckled at the pun. But then he shook his head and put the phone down. "I don't know," he said. "Nita, when you said I might get more information than I wanted? I didn't think that was likely. But now—"Her dad glanced at the phone's screen. "I don't know that this is the kind of thing I want to be seeing, no matter how concerned I am about her. I feel like I've been going through her diary. Worse than that." Nita stepped back behind her dad to lean against the nearby breakfront dresser, attempting to hide the fact that she was blushing red-hot with guilt. There had been a time, years before she'd become a wizard, when after a fight with her sister, Nita had found out where Dairine's diary was hidden. Still furious enough that she didn't care what Dairine or anyone else would think about what she was doing, Nita stole the diary and read it cover to cover. There hadn't been anything in the diary that had been all that interesting... which at the time had made Nita even angrier. Understanding that this new anger wasn't at Dairine, but at herself, had taken Nita a while. And then the anger had turned to shame. She could now never think of that horrible episode—hunkered down in the corner of her bedroom before Dairine got home from school, turning the pages of the little pink-plastic-covered Barbie-splashed book—without feeling a hard, hot stab of shame and disgust with herself. And now she was stuck in it again. But her dad didn't notice. He was staring at the phone. "I had no idea what the inside of her head was like," he said. "I wasn't expecting something that was both so—adult—and so—" He stopped, shook his head. "So, I don't know, fierce. And so absolutely focused. I keep thinking, have I just forgotten how it is to be eleven? How immediate everything seems, how life-or-death? Or is it that Dairine's just different? The inside of my brain was never anything like that, as far as I can remember. The only kind of eleven-year-old I've ever been was a boy. Eleven-year-old girls—" He shook his head again. "When you're a dad, you see them one way. Your baby daughter. But when I was twelve, if I thought about them at all, I thought maybe they were some other kind of species. They didn't do the things I did, act the way I did. They were a nuisance, mostly. Good for getting me in trouble." "Who, your sisters?" Her dad smiled. "Them and their friends," he said. "Funny how you never think about such things when you're older. Like when your aunt Annie fell out of the tree when she was six, and told your grandpa I pushed her." Nita was still recovering from her own embarrassment, and wasn't able to give this all the attention she would have at some less unnerved moment. "She didn't?" Her dad laughed, rueful. "She was the one with the Superman towel around her neck, not me! Grandpa was sure I did it, but your Gran made him see reason. Always her specialty." He sighed, looking back at the phone. "But... I don't know. I don't want to be seeing the inside of Dairine's head. That's just wrong. You need to find a way to turn that off." "I'll have a word with Bobo," Nita said. "He and Spot set it up. They can filter it." "And I've been seeing how Nelaid is with her," her father said. "He's stern. Maybe better at 'stern' than I am. I might be able to pick up a trick or two from him." Nita didn't say anything, though inside she felt like smiling. It was not the kind of admission you usually expected to hear from your dad, and was all the more sweet because of it. "Aw, you do good stern!" Nita said. "Don't knock yourself." And she reached around to scratch her back. The Mars dust was getting to her again. <I don't just need to change: I need a shower.> "I wonder if that's true," her dad said, looking vague for a moment. "I wonder if I've done too much of the wrong kind of stern in the past, and now she's looking for the right kind. Because..." He trailed off for a moment, then looked up at Nita again. "Sweetie, she's away all the time. "But you know why," Nita said. "She's looking for Roshaun." "And about that," her father said, looking actively troubled now. "There is— let's just say there's a certain age difference between them. I know what you're going to say: he's from another planet, there are cultural differences—" Nita waved a hand. "Daddy, you're reading too much into it. Sometimes a girl can have a best friend who's a boy." Her father's eyes dwelt on her, thoughtful. Nita started to sweat, but decided that it was too late to stop now. "Okay, I know what you're thinking. But besides that—" "And that you're both wizards—" Nita laughed one helpless laugh at a dad who could both tease her and be serious at the same time. "Besides that— she's not like me." "Somehow," her father said, "over the years, I've picked up on that." "And she's never going to be. She's not that much like you or Mom, either. And she doesn't fit any of the family stereotypes. Sometimes it's like she's from another planet—" There Nita stopped, astonished at what had fallen out of her mouth. "It is, isn't it?" her dad said. Though Nita heard what he said, she didn't really have time to react to it, because of the completely bizarre idea suddenly occupying her entire mind. <Did she take a wrong turn?> From a casual conversation with Carl and some follow-up reading in the manual, Nita knew that there were always a certain number of wizards who cropped up on one world and seemed to spend their whole lives yearning for, and dealing with, some other one. The Powers That Be were notably silent on such subjects: privacy issues were a big deal with Them, and They didn't go into detail on what made a wizard uniquely him-or herself. But there was an unspoken understanding among those out on errantry that some wizards who were born in one place but mostly lived and worked in another were meant to be bridge builders... or, more simply, to themselves be the bridges, with a foothold in each world, bearing a most unusual burden— sometimes consciously. There was an abbreviated word-phrase in the Speech for this kind of profound involvement with another place and people: taraenshlev'. It didn't translate well, like many words in the Speech: but there were curious and uncomfortable resonances with English words like expatriate and exile. "Took a wrong turn" was one shorthand phrase that attempted to express the tension: as if someone originally "supposed" to be born in one place had hung a left instead of a right and wound up somewhere else. Nita stood up straight, aware that her dad was looking curiously at her. <Kit,> she was thinking. <I never thought about him this way. But I never had reason to. Could it be that this is more than just some thing with Mars? Could it be that Mars has a thing with him? And why in the world...?> "What?" her dad said. "...I don't know," Nita said. "Thinking. Maybe thinking dumb things." Her dad gave her a dismissive look. "Whatever my daughters do," he said, "and whatever planet they do it on, they do not think dumb things." And then he regarded her with concern. "Have you had lunch?" "No," Nita said. "Gonna have that now. But I need a shower first. Jeez, Dad, when you go to Mars, wear a coat or something, because if you don't the dust gets everywhere!" "Okay," he said, as she started up the stairs. "So when am I going?" Nita paused. "Where?" "To Mars!" He laughed. "What's the point of being a wizard's dad if I don't get some perks out of it?" "Uh—" She laughed. "I'll set it up. Maybe in the next few days, okay?" "Fine," her dad said. And Nita went up the stairs with something itching at her mind that was more than Mars dust. To Kit, dinner seemed to take forever. It wasn't that he didn't enjoy it—he was starving—and the conversation over dinner had been innocuous, even fun: it only became boring when Helena started telling stories about the now-history boyfriend who'd dumped her. But even during the more interesting parts of the conversation, Kit had trouble concentrating. The things he'd experienced on Mars today kept coming back to haunt him. And something else was bothering him that seemed to have gotten stronger since he'd come home: a sense of someone whispering in his ear, words he couldn't quite make out against the ongoing conversation. It wasn't a new sensation. He'd noticed it a few times over the past couple of months. He'd even mentioned it to Nita once, and had then been surprised when she got a panicked look and said, "Tell me you're not hearing Bobo!" He'd been glad to tell her that whatever else was going on, no, he wasn't hearing Bobo. Nita had looked bizarrely relieved. Kit had wondered about that at the time, and wondered again now. <Did she think Bobo was going to start telling me Secret Girl Stuff?> Now, though, Kit found himself repeatedly straining to hear the voice that seemed to be whispering in reaction to things it heard other people say— or trying to get his attention during the silences. The experience made for a peculiar dinner, and Kit was relieved to get home and back to his room where he could shut the door and relax. He checked his manual for anything from Nita, but she'd left no notes for him. On inquiring about her location, the listing next to her name merely said, <Sunplace, Wellakh: transport flagged as family business: please do not contact except in emergency.> <Dairine again,> Kit thought. <Never mind, I'll catch up with Neets in the morning... I'm bushed.> But he had reason to be. Spending the better part of a day being chased around Mars by various peculiar wildlife, not to mention visiting the ancient city of Helium, could kind of take it out of you. He wrote Nita a note about getting together to exchange notes after the family got back from church in the morning, and then nervously took a look to see if there was any answer to his previous message from Mamvish. But there was none. He felt strangely relieved. <Okay,> Kit thought. <Either she read what I sent her and it wasn't a big enough deal to get right back to me, or she's really busy and hasn't had time to answer at all. Whatever. I'll check again in the morning.> He stretched out on his bed and lay looking for a while at the twin discs of the Mars map hanging on the wall. Full with a good dinner, tired, he never really realized when he fell asleep. What took him by surprise was to find himself sitting in the Scarlet Tower, side by side with Aurilelde on the red sandstone bench at the center of it all. "You saved us before," she said. "And then you saved us again. You'll do it a third time now: I see it." She looked at him with a slight smile. "And anyway," she said, "you promised you would— and that you would come back for me. And you always kept your promises." Kit looked around, somewhat in panic. But they were alone, and Aurilelde's father was nowhere to be seen. As for Aurilelde—as she turned to Kit, he got something of a shock. The Martian princess he had seen was gone. Now he found himself looking at a slender young female figure, still not much older than him or Nita, but all gray; a handsome, polished-steel gray like stone come to life. Her eyes were dark—that much persisted at least from the previous vision. But the hair, the beautiful flowing dark hair, was hair no longer. It was a waist-length flow of deep sapphire-blue smoke. Kit thought for a moment of the filmy draperies she'd worn before and smiled. She had been watching him with concern. Now, seeing his smile, Aurilelde smiled back. It was altogether like having a statue smile at you— but a vital one, with life in the eyes, and on the smooth features a look of intense life— made still more intense by an edge of fear. "You've changed," Kit said. She gave him an amused look. "Of course I had to change. We all changed. We had no choice. The new world wasn't going to suit our old bodies..." Something else was different now: the light. Kit got up from that bench and walked over toward the side of the Tower, where he could get a clearer view of what was outside. It took no more than a few steps for him to realize that the city was no longer sitting in a flatland crater but under a mighty shadow. Looking out through the walls of the Tower, he looked a long way up indeed before he could see the top of the vast shape shutting away that whole side of the sky. The city was sitting on the shoulder of the highest mountain in the Solar System. The wide flat rust-colored cone of Olympus Mons loomed behind the spire of the Scarlet Tower, utterly dwarfing it. Kit gazed at this in amazement... then made his way back to Aurilelde and sat down again. "Maybe you want to start from the beginning," Kit said. "And tell me about this as if I don't know anything. Because I don't—" She looked at him thoughtfully. "No," she said, "I understand that. A lot of us had trouble remembering, when we woke up from the long sleep—" She shook her head. "It was a hard time. Everyone was afraid. Everyone was horrified, and in grief. Nobody wants to see their planet destroyed..." She reached out to his face: then paused. "May I?" Kit looked at her, perplexed. "May you what?" "I can't let you see what I see without asking leave first. I may not be a wizard"— and her eyes glinted at him, amused— "but that much I know is the law. The mind is the outer fastness of the soul, and access to another's mind must be requested." Kit nodded. Aurilelde reached out, simply touched the side of his head, then looked away. All around them the view of the Tower washed out in a wave of dark. <We lived on the first world for a long time,> Aurilelde said as they looked down on a distant world in Earth's solar system. <We were all alone in this system. That aloneness gave some of us— ideas. And those ideas were possibly fed by the one you know, the one all wizards know— the one who lies in the darkness, waiting.> <The Lone Power.> <Yes,> Aurilelde said. <Because we were the first ones to come to life in this system, at the bottom of all our lives, and all our joys, there was always a shadow of fear. We knew we would bear the weight of the Darkness's enmity: it would come for us and try to destroy us. Even the Red Rede spoke of it.> <The Red Rede?> <One of my ancestors wrote it,> Aurilelde said. Then she laughed. <Or I did! Some people say we're all the same person, the Seers in the Dark. They say we come back, again and again, to get it right— to stop making the mistakes we made the last time. So after our world was destroyed, it was hard to know how that could still happen— how the Darkness might return and attempt to destroy us once more. You'd have thought once would be enough...> Kit saw it as she saw it. Out in the darkness, blocking away the stars, the shadow grew. <We could not divert the planet,> Aurilelde said sadly. <All our wizards tried. It was a mighty effort, in which many died. Even then they could only deflect it enough to avoid a direct impact.> Through her vision, Kit saw the rogue planet approach. <And in retrospect,> she said, <there are those who said it might have been wiser if we hadn't— if we'd just let the Doom out of the Darkness end everything, there and then.> Together, they watched the rogue world come plunging in through the system. Kit was horrified. <You couldn't just sit there and let all your people be doomed!> he said. <But look what happened,> said Aurilelde, as the last-ditch forces crafted by the planet's wizards lashed out. Shamask-Eilith shattered; the rogue world's course, perturbed by the forces applied to it by the wizards and by Shamask-Eilith's fragmented mass, now shifted, heading for the inner worlds. A second later, Kit saw it plunging in toward a new world much closer to the Sun, a world where the surface was still molten. As he watched, the rogue planet struck the edge of that new young world, and a vast gout of magma and barely solidified stone splashed outward in its wake as the rogue planet blundered on. Behind it, the Earth shuddered, nearly disintegrated, and then slowly, painfully began to reform itself. <See what we almost did to your world?> Aurilelde said. <Because of the blow the rogue planet struck yours, the silicon-based life that had just arisen there was all but wiped out. Life found another way, but—> She sounded sad. <It might have been better if we'd left well enough alone.> <But you couldn't have known that,> Kit said. <You were trying to save yourselves!> She looked at him sadly. <That's what you said the last time,> she said. <You were always the pragmatist.> Kit looked at her and shook his head. <Aurilelde,> he said, <you can't be sure it was me. I don't remember any of that! Of being— what's-his-name, Khretef—> <I am sure,> she said. And she looked at him sadly. <I understand. You've been a long time in your present life; the old one must seem like a dream, if that.> She fell silent. Kit, watching the young Earth slowly coalesce, and watching the splashed-out rock gradually form itself into the Moon, shook his head at himself. <How come I never used the manual to take a look at this moment in time myself?> he wondered. <How come I had to wait for someone else to show it to me?> Considering how much Kit liked the Moon, it seemed like a missed opportunity. But then again, in recent months, Mars had come to occupy the forefront of his mind— Kit let out a breath, looked over at Aurilelde again. <How come you showed yourself to me that other way first?> he said. <This way is prettier—> Even as Kit spoke, he was surprised that something like that had come out of his mouth. But it was true. This shape had a fitness about it that the sultry look of the previous Aurilelde had not. She just looked at him, though, and smiled sadly. <It was the way best suited to you right then,> she said. <I knew that as soon as you were ready, you would want to see me as I was again. You were never one for false seemings.> She smiled, again sadly. <When we were ready to settle in the New World, you were the first one to come and tell me that you liked my new form even better than my old one.> And Aurilelde smiled. <Even my father didn't think to do that.> She sighed, looking at the scattering fragments of the First World as the ships and the two surviving cities, one from Shamask, one from Eilith, fled it. <But there was so much ambivalence about having to change our shape, our way of living. Many of us said that if we changed our form, it would change our minds, the way we thought: we would no longer be the people we were. Others said>—she looked down—<that maybe that would be a good thing. That since our people awakened in the First World, we had done nothing but cause each other grief. And truly, we were never a peaceful species. Some people said that was because we were in the wrong shape: that when we took the new one, things would settle down—we would find the way of life the One had always meant for us.> She shook her head. <But no one wanted to decide on the new forms right away, so soon after the disaster, and not without careful assessment of which other world in the system would be best for us. The refuge-cities and the ships were built so that all the survivors could sleep for many years, allowing the system to settle after the disaster. For none of us wanted to leave the system: this was our home! We were the First Life here, and we dared not abandon the place.> Aurilelde looked sorrowful, as if at a memory that still hurt. <The Sun— even at this distance, the Sun cried out to us,> 'Don't go!' <And we couldn't. But there were no other worlds ready. The other solid ones were too close to the Sun, not yet settled out of the molten state. The outer ones were places where not even we could have lived— and our old forms were used to the cold. So our last wizards swept all but the least fragments of Shamask-Eilith into a nullspace portal to ensure that the new inner worlds, our homes to be, would take no harm from them...> Aurilelde shrugged. <And then we slept. A long time, out in the darkness, the ships and the cities slid in long slow orbits far from the Sun, waiting. How many years—>She shook her head. <If I ever knew the actual count,> Aurilelde said, <I've forgotten. But eventually we woke. The city-ships knew, because the wizardry and science built into them told them, that the system was ready for us again. And so we woke, and looked about us. We saw the beginnings of your kind of life on your world—>She looked at Kit with a strange, affectionate expression, almost the way someone might look at a pet, some life form not quite up to their standard. And for a second Kit saw the Earth for a moment as she and her people saw it: a small, new, green world, where the native bipedal life had just begun to look up into the sky and wonder about the little bright lights it saw there, and the two great ones. <That looked like a good shape for a life form,> she said, <the one that rose on the surface of your world. And so we thought, Why not? And for a while there was discussion about whether we too might settle there. But others looked at the further one—the red one in the next orbit out. It was empty. Water it had, and air it had—> Kit saw the young Mars as Aurilelde and her people had seen it: a Mars with huge icecaps and half-blue with seas. He gulped in wonder, for the oceans were of much wider expanse than even the most ambitious Earth scientists' theories had yet suggested. <And so we adapted ourselves into bipedal form like yours,> Aurilelde said, <but hardier, tailored to that world's temperatures, ready to make it our own.> Through her eyes he saw the last two great cities settle onto the Martian surface, a very long way from one another— one near Olympus Mons, even then one of the greatest shield volcanoes ever seen on any planet in this galaxy: the other at the far end of Valles Marineris, then a vast channel being carved out by fierce young rivers running down to the sea, untrammeled by the heavy gravity of a world like Earth, and eroding the ancient sandstones mightily. <There we settled, and there we lived: and for a while it seemed as if everything would go well...> Aurilelde shook her head sadly. <But then we found that the Darkness and the Doom had other plans for us. Our new home's atmosphere had never been thick. The Sun flared many times over several centuries and stripped much of the red world's air away. And worse, its orbit seemed to be shifting. We feared it would edge out into the great dark again, perhaps even drift too close to the great banded world in the next orbit out and be torn apart by its tidal forces. Our birth system was beginning to look like a trap. We would be forced to move from world to world and never find a home we could depend on—> Aurilelde looked sadly at the floor of the Throne room. <And so many of our wizards had died,> she said. <There were not enough left to change what was happening to us. Khretef was one of the last great wizards among the Eilitt; my father was one of the last among the Shamaska. Of course, there were some others, from the other city—the ones who disagreed with us...> <Your enemies,> Kit said. <Yes,> Aurilelde said. <They offered to work together with us to save our whole species.> She laughed bitterly. <But we didn't trust them: their people had tried to betray us before. And they didn't trust us, either, certain that we would do the same to them. Even back in the First World, there had always been voices in the City of the Eilitt calling for us to be stamped out—for the world to be cleansed of us so that our race could begin again, have a fresh start.> She shook her head. <Again and again my father and others from our city came to me, saying, 'See the future for us! Tell us what to do; show us how to find peace, stability, an end to the danger and the death!'> She looked into Kit's eyes, troubled. <But I could never see that. You cannot compel vision...> Kit nodded. He'd heard this often enough from Nita, lately. <So what did you do?> <We feared we would have to sleep again,> she said, <as the New World grew colder around us, as the oceans dried and froze and the air fled. We tried to change the world, to preserve the air, the water>—Aurilelde shook her head, suddenly looking miserable. <We could not. Nor could we take the cities out to space again: there was not enough of their motive substance to power them—and where once wizardry alone could've driven them, we no longer had enough wizards. So we buried the cities and greatly against our will we slept again, setting protections about us that would warn us when someone came to disturb that sleep. Whoever came would be set tests that would assess whether they had the skills to wake us in a world that was stable at last.> She looked proudly at Kit. <And you have the skills,> she said. <You've proved it. Now is the time. Break the spell: let us out into the new life! We're ready! We've been in prison for so long, children of misfortune, the species that has tried and tried again to get its start in the right way, and been foiled again and again by circumstance and the ill will of the Power that walked behind the Darkness, and waits still to be our Doom.> Kit shook his head. <I can't just do that!> he said. <It's not up to me. I haven't been a wizard very long: I don't have the authority to take a decision like this into my own hands!> Aurilelde looked at him incredulously, took his hands again, and gripped them. <Your power gives you the authority!> she said. <That you've come this far, that you've done this much, says that this is the will of the One! It's our time to be awakened! You can't deny us this—> And she reached up to touch his face again. <Especially not you,> Aurilelde said. <Long ago when you went into the last danger to try to save our world, you said to me, 'If worse comes to worst, I'll weave my last wizardry in such a way that you will be the one to whom I return. One way or another, you and I will be the ones to free our people— '> She shook her head again, turning her face away. <What's the matter?> Kit said. Aurilelde seemed once again to be fighting back some emotion that ran deeper than tears— if her species could even shed them. <He said to me, 'The Third World seems the most likely to bring forth civilizations, and wizardry. So I will die so that I may return with a foothold in a soul of that world. I'll come to you as a wizard of the Third World and help you awaken the children of the First One.'> And then Aurilelde laughed sorrowfully. <He said to me, 'Don't be afraid! I may look strange and alien to you when I come again, but it will still be me, your Khretef. I'll set you free, and we'll be together again, together the way we were always meant to be... but were never able to because the world went wrong...'> She turned away from Kit. <The vision came on me then,> she said, <and I looked forward and saw that it was true: that it was even written in the Rede, and I had never realized it before—> Something came into Kit's head. <'The one departed is the one who returns,'> he said, <'From the straitened circle and the shortened night...>' Then he looked up at her, surprised. <How did I know that?> <Because you are Khretef,> Aurilelde said, smiling. <You have come back to me, as you promised... and you always keep your promises.> And Kit sat bolt upright in bed, staring in sudden morning light at the map of Mars... [ Tharsis Montes ] Nita was up early on Sunday morning. She'd gone to Wellakh the previous evening to have a word with Spot, even though Bobo reassured her that he could make the necessary adjustments to Dairine's "brainfeed" without her doing the extra mileage. But she'd also wanted a chance to see firsthand how Dairine was getting along with Nelaid, for she was starting to have a feeling that things were about to get busy at home. Dairine had been so busy working with the Thahit simulator that she'd barely had time to even look at Nita. When she did, Dairine just sort of frowned absently at her sister as if not sure what the heck she was doing there. Nita found this entirely acceptable, especially when she stepped aside to talk to Nelaid, who was watching from one side of the simulator hall. "She has reached that point in the study where the mind starts to catch fire with it," Nelaid said softly to her. "I hadn't hoped to see her in this state quite so soon: it is a good sign, though I will admit it may seem slightly disconcerting to you—" Nita shook her head. "I get this way sometimes. It's a family thing. Should I tell my dad she might wind up staying here some nights?" "No need for that, I think," Nelaid said. "I think she will sleep better on her own couch—" "Bed, we say." "Her own bed— and your father will be relieved to see her do so. He and I will consult at his leisure as to what to do if she wishes her study to become more intense by virtue of having to travel less." Nita had nodded and taken herself back home. She'd picked up the note Kit left her late that night and gone happily to bed, grateful that an already busy day had presented her with nothing more challenging. Now, in early light in the quiet of the dining room— for Dairine had once again left very early— Nita was browsing through the Martian section of her manual, surprised to find that there was already a new section about the Cavern of Writings (as the manual was now calling it), and an early Shamaska-Eilitt syllabary. <This is so cool!> she thought, turning the pages and looking over some early diagrams and annotations. And there was also imagery from the Cavern, and a replay of the memory spell that had played out for them there. It had surprised Nita to learn that the manual didn't have all the answers. <But then,> she thought, <it never claimed to. I just assumed>... It turned out, however, that a surprising amount of the information in it came from wizards themselves—as Nita had started discovering during some of her more recent studies, especially just before her mother died, when she had been seeking desperately for ways to save her mom's life. There were many strange sources of power out there, not least among them the manual itself, which kept the secrets of the universe, new and old, structured and updated so that wizards could find them. But the strangest and most unpredictable power might very well be wizards themselves—bending the universe to their will, finding solutions where no one had found them before, driven by their own needs. Wizards were making it up as they went along—just as, in Their own time, the Powers That Be had done. <And they're looking to us for the answers as much as we are to them,> Nita thought. <We're all helping each other out here, trying to make sense of the universe, trying to make things work.> The thought left her feeling both very intimidated and, strangely, much less powerless. <What we write in the manual is as important as what we find there already...> Nita flipped back to the general Mars pages, glancing at the maps that were showing the hot spots in the last day's activity. That side of Mars featured some very striking terrain, and one feature, or set of features, now caught her eye as it had once or twice before. Olympus Mons, of course, was famous, both on Earth and elsewhere among inhabited worlds: as one of the biggest volcanoes anywhere, it drew a fair number of tourists, both Earth-based and alien. But not far from it were three other volcanoes strung along in a line, labeled collectively as Tharsis Montes, the Tharsis Mountains. The features taken all together always reminded Nita of the end-knob of a sword and the sword's hilt or crosspiece. <There ought to be something marking the point,> she thought, letting her gaze run along the line of where the blade would be. It led across the Martian equator, missing the vast irregular crevasse of Mariner Valley, then passing through highland country and ending in a huge lowlying circular splat of a basin—some ancient impact crater that had once filled up with lava, and then probably later with water. <Argyre Planitia,> said the label on the map. <Should really have been another volcano,> Nita thought. She yawned and flipped back to the messaging area in the manual. Kit's listing there was dark now: he was awake. Nita tapped on his name. "What's going on over there?" she said. There was a pause before she got an answer back. "Nothing much," Kit said. "Just got up. Gotta go to church..." Nita smiled at that. "I bet. How was Helena?" There was a short laugh at the other end. "Not as bad as she might have been," he said. "Just as well... I couldn't have taken much more excitement yesterday." "I hear you there," Nita said. "But today's another day. There's a ton of new stuff in the manual." "Yeah, I saw some of that." Nita was slightly taken aback at how bored he sounded about it. "So when are you going back?" "Well, there's church first. I kind of have to do that to keep Helena calm. Though I may have a different problem with her now." "Oh? What?" "She thinks I'm a mutant." Nita's mouth dropped open. Then she laughed. "Oh, come on, she has to have been joking!" "Nope." Nita got control of herself. "Denial is such a wonderful thing," she said. "Well, never mind. What time's Mamvish getting in? She has to want to have a look at what's been happening." "I don't know. Haven't heard anything from her." That made Nita blink. "Huh. Well, she's busy, I guess. But you'll be going over, won't you?" "Sometime in the afternoon, maybe," Kit said. "I haven't decided yet." There was something in his tone of voice, even in this disembodied form, that made Nita think Kit either wasn't particularly excited about going to Mars today— which was insane—or wasn't particularly interested in having Nita with him. That by itself wouldn't normally have rung any alarm bells for her. But today was different, in that Nita had seen exactly who Kit had been talking to in the lost city before heading back to Earth with Darryl and Ronan. She was instantly suspicious, and instantly annoyed with herself for feeling suspicious. <It's not me he wants to be seeing,> said that suspicion. <It's her—> "Okay," Nita said, trying to sound casual. "Well, let me know when you make up your mind. We could save some energy by going together." "Yeah," Kit said, but he sounded noticeably unenthusiastic. "Look, they're getting ready to head out. I have to go—" "Sure," Nita said. "Call me later—" "Right," Kit said: and his name grayed out. <Unavailable—> Nita felt a small, tight frown forming between her eyebrows. She sat back in her chair, staring at her manual. <This is what I was warning Carmela about,> she thought. <Did I get so busy warning her that it didn't occur to me I might be messing up, too? Did I maybe do wrong by going up there at all and horning in on their male-bonding trip?> It was always possible. Nita swore under her breath. <Are boys another species?> she wondered. <And if they are, why do I have so much trouble figuring out what's going on in their brains? Because I sure don't have this kind of trouble with the other alien species I deal with, and they have all kinds of legs and tentacles and things...> Nita leaned forward again and put her head down on her arms, the frown deepening at the thought of her beautiful rival. <None of this would be bothering me the way it is if it wasn't for her. What is going on with her? And why's she coming after my—> There Nita stopped. From what seemed about a thousand years ago came the memory of Dairine's voice: <Nita's got a boyfriend! Nita's got a boyfriend!> At the time it had been an annoyance, like being accused of having a large and unusually noticeable pimple—especially since there had been much more interesting things going on. Now, though, as she'd occasionally done over the last year or so, Nita held the word up against her and looked at it, the way she might have looked at a new skirt she was thinking about buying. <Boyfriend... Is it really that bad?> She tried to consider the word dispassionately. <It's not as if he's not good-looking. Especially since he hit that growth spurt and got so tall.> This in particular had been turning some of the girls' heads at school, as Kit's early stockiness had shaken down into a leaner look. <And he's funny. And smart. And he's a wizard.> Interesting how for a change, instead of coming first, that idea came last.... Once again Nita wondered whether the B-word was something she might safely say out loud, one of these days when the moment seemed right. It was a word she'd heard other girls at school use about Kit where Nita was concerned, though some of them meant it mockingly, in the "nerds of a feather flock together" mode. But that thought immediately cast a long shadow of fear across the whole train of thought: the idea that Kit might hear the word... and not agree. Where would Nita be then? <Everything would be ruined.> Was it worth chucking years of shared wizardry, a partnership that until now had pretty much worked fine, over a word? She sighed and mentally put the word back on the rack. Then Nita went back to listlessly flipping pages in the manual. Finally she shut the manual and got up, wandering into the kitchen to find herself a banana. <I'll give him a couple of hours,> Nita thought, <and try him again later. There's always the explosive thing that S'reee and I were discussing: she needs some more data on how fast we could dissolve them...> And this she dutifully did, researching seawater chemistry until well after noon, and finding out more than she ever wanted to about the unstable nitrates involved in solid explosives. Then she stuffed her manual into her backpack, let her dad know she was going out, and headed over to Kit's. The Rodriguezes had not yet returned from church, but Carmela was home: Nita found her and numerous cushions and notebooks strewn all over the living room. "I thought you'd have gone with them!" Nita said, unslinging her backpack. "No," Carmela said, "I don't always go. Today was all about placating Helena, anyway." She smiled slightly. "I wasn't needed for that." "They having a special service or something today?" Nita said. "Seems like a long time." "Oh, no," Carmela said, "church is over. Mama and Pop and Helena are having brunch at the pancake place. Kit ditched brunch: he hates that place." Nita blinked at that. "So he's been back here?" "Sure," Carmela said. "You missed him by about an hour. And you'll never guess where he's gone!" Nita rolled her eyes, exasperated. "So much for splitting the energy costs of getting up there today," she said. "I'm starting to think we should install some kind of commuter worldgate in the area. You think you can work out a bulk discount for me with the Crossings?" Carmela waved her hand, a gesture suggesting that this was no problem at all. "Neets, come on, you didn't push the Crossings management for a tenth of the perks you could have had for getting rid of the aliens there—" "I was on errantry," Nita said, frowning. "Wizards don't charge for that. I found a problem; I helped solve it." "Who said anything about charging? You should just have let them be a little more grateful to you." Carmela waggled her eyebrows. "I know for a fact that the Stationmaster would give you at least a transit discount for jumps from here to Mars. You wouldn't even need to hub through the Crossings: Mars is right next door by their standards. The power outlay would be minimal. But meantime, don't sweat yourself about it— you need your wizardry for other stuff. Mi closet, su closet." "Thanks," Nita said. "Want to set me up? I'll go see him—" "Unless it's something very Mars-based, don't bother," Carmela said. "He'll be back here at six. He has to: we have a Big-Deal Family Dinner tonight at seven, and we're going out someplace serious, with tablecloths and everything. Besides, I want you to look at something—" She picked up the remote. Nita looked around, concerned. "Is that smart at the moment?" she said in an undertone. "What if Helena comes back all of a sudden?" Carmela shrugged. "The question's more like, will she even notice? She hasn't been here all that much since she arrived. She keeps going out with all these friends who keep turning up— I never knew she had so many." And she grinned. "Maybe because she didn't want to invite them over before, when she thought anybody who got involved with Kit might wind up going to hell." Nita had to snicker at that. "You mean they finally got things sorted out? This I have to hear about. He said she thought he was a mutant." "Yeah, well, I don't know about sorted," Carmela said. "Might still be a few issues. Mutancy being one of them. But I'd say the worst is over. Meanwhile, take a look at this. I've been working on it since we got back." Nita had half noticed Carmela rubbing her eyes, and now looked at her with some concern. "What?? You slept, right?" "Huh? Yeah, a little. But this thing was making me crazy. I got up early to take another run at it." Nita shook her head. "Mela," she said, "school's out, nearly! Cut yourself some slack!" "But this isn't school," Carmela said, looking up at Nita, and Nita noticed that there were actually circles under her eyes. "And slack's not what we need right now, is it? My little brother's acting slightly weird, and this has something to do with it..." Nita made a sideways smile—not at Carmela's concern for Kit, which was always there: but for the sudden memory of S'reee saying to her, <Oh, hNii't, middle-aged so soon! You've hit the part of your wizardry where you can't stop working!>—and of what Nelaid had said about Dairine. It hadn't occurred to Nita that something similar might happen to Carmela: falling in love with the serious part of wizardry, as you realized this wasn't anything like a lot of the stuff they gave you to do in school—well-meant busywork that had nothing to do with what your life was going to be about. This was important work, work on reality— stuff you had to get right. And when you first realized that, it was hard to do anything else for a while. "Okay," Nita said. "Let's see what you've got. But what's been taking you so long with this?" Carmela made a fake-pouting face. "Oh, Juanita L—" "Don't say it!" Nita said. Then she grinned. "I'm teasing! You know I'd never rush you. But you were cruising right along there when we were in the library cavern." "Yeah," Carmela said, "I know." She slumped back among the cushions she'd been lying on. "The wizardry was helping me. Now I'm running slower. Still, something started coming up. You know how it is when you're reading something, and you can see that whoever wrote it has been really picking the words so that you'll feel the way they want you to feel about something? Whether that's the right way or not." Nita nodded, remembering one morning when one of her English teachers, Mr. Neary, had gone on about this at length. "Loading the adjectives?" "That's part of it." Carmela scowled at her notebooks, and the TV, and the world in general. "When I was looking at most of the stuff written there— and I've been back a couple of times to check this, just to make sure that the invasion of the giant scorpion guys hadn't messed up how I was seeing things right afterwards— a lot of it was like that. All loaded. 'We are right; they were wrong; they started it; we had no choice!' And that was making me suspicious. But then I found this thing. Stumbled on it, really. It was off by itself with some stuff I couldn't read at all." Carmela dropped the remote, then flipped through the notepad to the symbols she had copied out there in red ink, and handed the pad to Nita. "This was the only material I could find there that wasn't loaded like everything else. It was very—I don't know—very dry. Very matter-of-fact. Not like the other stuff, where they want you to think the way they were thinking. It wants you to figure out what it means by yourself." She scowled down at it. "I think it's important. But don't ask me why." "You have to follow your hunches," Nita said. "And the sooner you figure it out—" "Believe me," Carmela said, "you'll be the first to know." "Not Kit?" Nita said. Carmela gave her an amused, sideways look. "Don't know if he's listening to me at the moment. I gave him some advice yesterday that he might have had trouble taking." "Oh," Nita said. "Helena..." "Yeah. Anyway, I've got about half of it now," Carmela said, flipping through the notepad's pages. Nita could see that they were completely covered with a combination of blocky or scrawly Shamaska-Eilitt characters, notes in English and the Speech, and the aimless arrow-ended curlicues that she'd previously seen Carmela make all over a page when she was trying to figure something out. But finally Carmela came to one page that had a neat block of the Shamaska characters on it in red ink: and underneath it, also in red, a number of lines in English. She handed the pad to Nita. She gazed down at what Carmela had written. "It has a meter," Carmela said, "though it's a weird one: real short lines. You can see where I broke them. The rhyme is there most of the time in the original, so I kept it. It's weird, too: they don't rhyme the way we do..." Nita nodded and read. The one departed is the one who returns From the straitened circle and the shortened night, When the blue star rises and the water burns: Then the word long-lost comes again to light To be spoke by the watcher who silent yearns For the lost one found. Carmela fell silent, scowling at the page. Nita looked at her. "And?" "That's all I've got so far," Carmela said. "There are some weird verbs in the rest that I don't understand yet. This—" She pointed at one line near the end of the Shamaska block. "That's the word for the First World. And there's 'departed' again." She indicated the last line. "But the rest of it I don't get yet." Carmela looked uncharacteristically annoyed. "You shouldn't be so tough on yourself," Nita said. "This is more than I could ever have gotten out of what we saw..." "Yeah, well." Carmela was frowning. "It's just that... this is something important; I know it is." She leaned back among the pillows again, staring at the pad. "You know how everything looked in there? Green, green, green?" "Yeah—" "This was all by itself, in red. Completely different from all the other stuff. Even the font looks more serious somehow." Nita shook her head, uncertain how a font could be serious: but Carmela was much more attuned to that kind of thing than she was, and it was probably smart to take her word for it. She turned her attention back to the verse. "Did you misspell 'straightened' here?" Carmela shook her head. "Nope. Different word. The Shamaska word means something that's been made narrower or smaller..." "Oh." Nita looked at the rest of the verse. "A smaller circle... A shortened night." She let out a breath. "Could that have something to do with Mars's orbit? It's a lot narrower than Shamask-Eilith's would have been." "Might be. But what's 'the blue star'? And since when does water burn?" Nita shook her head. "There are a lot of bluish stars that would stand out if you saw them from Mars. Sirius, Rigel, Deneb... And water burning? That can happen, when the conditions are right. It did that down by Caryn Peak during the Song of the Twelve: under enough pressure, when the heat's high enough, it doesn't have a choice— it just catches fire." "Weird," Carmela said. She was still frowning at the pad as Nita handed it back to her. "But I don't think we're gonna be able to make any real sense of this till I get the rest of it figured out." "Well, do what you can," Nita said. "Meanwhile—" "You want to go up there?" Carmela said. "I'll set the gate up for you. Take the remote, if you want." "No, it's okay," Nita said. "You might need it for something. I can come back home with a spell: I've got one on my charm bracelet." "Fine," Carmela said. "But seriously, next week when school's really finished, let's go up to the Crossings and have Sker'ret do you a favor. It's not like he doesn't want to! It probably just didn't occur to him. He's so used to having unlimited worldgating available that he forgets other people don't have it. Anyway, where do you want me to drop you off?" Nita thought about that for a moment. In her mind's eye she suddenly saw the map she'd been looking at earlier. "Argyre Planitia," she said. "You got it," Carmela said. "Come on." They headed upstairs. Fifty million miles away, Kit was sitting out on the vast southwestern shoulder of Olympus Mons, where Aurilelde's city had stood in his dream, staring into the distance and wondering what exactly he was waiting for. From where he sat to the edge of the southern horizon, where the shoulder of the mountain dropped away and out of sight, the fine dust of carbon dioxide snow lay over everything, lightening a vista that normally would have been much darker in the predawn twilight. He felt strange. For one thing, he'd found it peculiar to come here and not find Aurilelde's city still standing where he'd seen it last. That was impossible, of course: logically Kit knew that. Logically he knew that his dream, and the image he'd seen during the wizardry at Hutton yesterday, were of things that had happened in the deep past. Yet the feeling that they should be happening here and now was something he couldn't get rid of—especially since his presence in those visions had seemed to alter them. There was a sense that the landscape of the present that he had moved through coming here was a thin veil over something far stronger, deeper, more real. All it would take would be the right action, the right words, to sweep the veil aside right across the planet and bring the old Mars alive. <Air it had... water it had.> Aurilelde's remembered words brought the hair up on the back of Kit's neck. That living Mars, awash with oceans and the promise of life, was the Mars he wanted to see more than anything: and Aurilelde had all but promised that he could see it again. All he had to do was finish the task that had been his, that had been Khretef's, before Aurilelde's people buried their cities on Mars and immersed themselves in their long sleep again, waiting for the help they needed to come from outside. The only thing that would stop it would be interference from people who didn't understand. Kit was half afraid what he might hear from Mamvish when she finally finished with whatever business was keeping her away from here. <She has to see what needs to be done,> Kit thought. <She has to understand!> She was, after all, the Powers' own Species Archivist. Here was a species that had survived incredible adversity, that had archived itself! Now all they needed was some help getting reestablished. <Sure, it'll be tough, when they have a planet next door that doesn't believe in aliens yet, a planet covered with telescopes. But it can be done. The right wizardries, the right implementations of power, and you could have another species living here right under the noses of all the nonwizardly observers on Earth.> Misunderstanding, though... that was going to be the great enemy. Even Nita, who normally got the sense of what was going on without too much trouble, seemed to be having trouble understanding why Kit needed to be let alone to work out what to do up here. <Why was she insisting so hard that she wanted to go with me?> Kit thought. <Unless she saw something—> Kit sat there wondering about that for a moment. Nita was working very hard, lately, on the visionary specialty that she'd been developing. There were times when she turned to Kit and finished a sentence for him, or described something that was at the back of his mind that he'd meant to tell her about and had then forgotten. <What kind of things is she seeing that she's not telling me about?> he'd wondered before. And now he was wondering about it harder than usual. What if she had seen Aurilelde somehow? Or knew something about her that Kit didn't? There was no way to be sure she hadn't. Trouble was, Nita's visions weren't always right. He'd heard her himself complaining that sometimes they turned up too late to do her any good: or that they emphasized something that turned out not to be all that important later. All it would take would be for her to get some wrong idea about Aurilelde into her head... and then there would be trouble. Better to keep her away from Aurilelde and her issues entirely. 'Lelde had told him candidly enough about what her own fears and hopes were like. And as for Khretef— Kit let out a long, uncertain breath. There was definitely some connection between them, though he didn't understand how or why. Early this morning, soon after he woke up, he'd started to consider some of the similarities between Khretef's and Aurilelde's life, and his and Nita's. <Two wizards, one a visionary— or getting to be that way— one good with machines. And another pair, one a wizard, good with machines and concrete things, the other one not a wizard, but a visionary, definitely...> <Am I what I am because I really am Khretef come back?> He sat there considering that for a while. The manual, as on some other vital subjects, was silent on the subject of reincarnation. There were hints that it could happen under some circumstances, but it seemed to be an elective issue, not necessarily enforced or enforceable. Apparently the One felt you were competent to decide when you were ready to come back, or how long a respite you needed from the business of errantry and life. <It doesn't matter,> Kit thought at last. <They're alive, her people. Or waiting to be alive again. But there's something she needs to make it happen, so that they can settle themselves down on Mars and get back to living their lives again. Khretef went to find this thing that Aurilelde needs... whatever it was. And died—> Kit hunched forward on his stone again, thinking about that, scuffing with one foot at the snow lying at his feet. There had been no mistaking the word she'd been using; Aurilelde's language was one that came through perfectly clearly when you listened to it with a basic knowledge of the Speech— A breath of cold wind went past Kit's ear, raising the hair on his neck again. <I need to see to this force field,> he thought. <What's going on? Is it leaking a little?> He pulled out his manual and checked the status on the spell that was managing his air and temperature control. It was fine. Kit sighed, shut the manual, put it down, and ran his hands through his hair, finally hiding his face in them. He let out a breath— And saw something. Darkness: and in it, a tiny faint light, distant, shining. The light was a deep, vivid blue-violet. <That's it,> said the voice in his ear. <The thing that's needed.> And it was his own voice— Kit shivered, opened his eyes. Everything was as it should be: the mountain, the snow, the falling night. "This is really creepy..." Kit said aloud. <Possibly because you're too hung up on the connotations of the word 'dead,'> said the voice in his ear. <You're a wizard! You know other species don't necessarily handle 'dead' the way your species does.> Kit swallowed. "Okay," he said, "I'll grant you that. But you get to explain how this is happening." He could feel that the owner of the voice was grinning at him— a strange amusement born of seeing how like itself Kit was. <The whole planet is awash in newly released wizardry now,> it said, <hunting for an outlet or a purpose the way lightning looks for something tall to strike. But you caused that. You broke open the Nascence.> "The superegg," Kit said. <That's right. You've turned loose a series of events like the series I set free long ago. That was when enemies of Aurilelde's city, the Shamaska City, stole something she and her father needed to master the planet. A tool... a weapon. Or a key to both. The Eilitt City stole it, and hid it, and I went to find it. The Nascence held the wizardry that would show the location of what was stolen, and it did reveal that to me. But when I went looking...> "You got killed," Kit said. The voice sighed. <It was kind of unavoidable,> he said. <Our enemies knew me too well. They laid enough traps that sooner or later I was likely to fall afoul of one of them. And eventually I did. But this time, when you set out to complete the task, you have an advantage.> Kit looked out toward the sunset. "That being?" <Me. I know where the traps are. There's no need for me— for us— to fall into them this time. We can go straight to the place where the Shard is hidden, find it, escape with it, and put it in Aurilelde's hands. After that... everything changes.> Kit swallowed. "That's what's needed to make it possible to wake the Martians up?" <If this is Mars,> said Khretef, <and we are the Martians... then yes.> Kit hesitated... then stood up and got out his wand. "Let's go," he said. Some four thousand miles away, Nita stood in the basin of Argyre Planitia and looked around her. A phrase that had crossed her mind many times recently in terms of the landscapes of the Solar System now came up for consideration again: magnificent desolation. It was well past midnight, local time: morning would be coming along in a while, but not soon. Snow had fallen here recently, but after that had come a dust storm, and snow and dust had been all whipped up together. Now a combination of powder-fine dry ice and pale gritty dust lay drifted between a foot and two feet deep over everything, glowing faintly with starlight. Through this pallid emptiness Nita slowly made her way, her force field brushing the dust and snow aside as she passed. <How beautiful this is,> she thought. <But not a place where you'd ever really want to live.> She breathed out then, annoyed at her own Earth-centric viewpoint. In its ancient state, this wilderness had looked like an untouched paradise to the people from Shamask-Eilith when they arrived: close to the sun, better provided with atmosphere at that point— that much the manual had confirmed, suggesting an overactive, younger Sun had later on torn much of a too-light atmosphere away—and flowing with liquid surface water. This spot, for example: the manual had said that a lot of the stone fragments scattered around were sedimentary. <So there were rivers here: maybe even a lake...> This place must have seemed energy-rich and hospitable to the Shamaska and Eilitt, especially once they had finished tailoring their new bodies to the world that would be their home. <But then things went wrong for them,> Nita thought, stopping and looking out across the pale, rippling dunes of dust and snow. <And after coming such a long way...> <We had such high hopes for the new world,> she heard a faraway voice saying. <We changed our bodies. We changed our minds. We thought that surely we had now left the old troubles behind and could have peace. And for a while it seemed so. But we couldn't change our souls. And so it turned out that not only were the same old troubles with us, but now they were even worse...> Nita paused, listening as the voice faded away. Her visionary tendencies were taking unusual forms in this environment: normally she saw things rather than hearing them. "Bobo," she said, feeling unnerved, "is this going to get to be a habit?" It was a moment before she got an answer back. <There is a lot of wizardry loose on this planet at the moment,> he said. <When Kit broke the superegg open, the first effect of the breakage was to send out those signals to the various sites around Mars. But since then, levels of available power—unfocused, unassigned power, which any running wizardry might access—have been slowly rising all over the planet. It's as if the wizards who came with the Shamaska and the Eilitt stored great reservoirs of power in the fabric of the planet itself, ready to be used when that resource was broken open. And now it's welling up. You want to be careful about any wizardry you start under these conditions...> Nita shivered inadvertently. "It'd be like dropping a match in gasoline..." she said. <It could be. You must take care.> She started walking on slowly again. "They must have had some really big wizardry in mind," Nita said, "to lay in that much power." <That would seem like a reasonable assessment.> "Great," Nita muttered. "Terraforming, maybe?" <Possibly.> Nita shook her head and walked on. Despite the difference and strangeness of this landscape, that reminded her strongly of the rest of Mars in feeling not just empty, but sad: not just like a deserted house, but like one where all the furniture's been moved out and no one ever intends to live there again. <The other kind of desolation,> Nita thought. <Not just physically empty, but empty of soul.> Maybe that was why she'd never been as keen on Mars as Kit was. Nostalgia seemed to be part of the appeal for Kit, and for some of the wizards working with him on the greater Martian project: that wistful longing for a time when water ran here and the air had been dense enough for the sky to be really blue. It would never have been a warm place by Earth's standards— its orbit was all wrong for that—but Mars would nonetheless have had a chance to come by its own kind of life eventually. That had all gone wrong, though. Nothing was left but this sad emptiness, this hollowness. <It's the missing kernel, of course.> Probably its absence was so much more noticeable now because she was here alone, instead of in the company of Kit and his Mars-team buddies, as she'd often been in the past. Nita stood there considering the bizarre lack all over again, wondering what could have caused it. When she'd still been desperately trying to find ways to save her mother's life by manipulating her body's kernel, Nita had worked closely with all kinds of kernels, even planetary ones, and with wizards expert at handling them. A wizard with the right training and enough power could manipulate a world's kernel into doing all kinds of amazing things—offsetting climate change, shifting the planet's interior structure, even changing elements of its orbit if they knew what they were doing. <Which is always the problem,> Nita thought. <You have to be absolutely sure you do know what you're doing.> Kernels were so sensitive and risky to work with that there was a whole practice universe equipped with test kernels where you were sent to train before you ever touched a real one. Nita had never bothered looking into the issue of Mars's kernel herself. Seniors and Planetaries hadn't found it over many years of looking, and she'd had her own projects to think about; but now her curiosity was getting the better of her. Where exactly was Mars's kernel? What had happened to it? Kernels didn't just get lost or fall off into space. And no wizard in his or her or its right mind would have considered removing one from where it belonged. The whole structure of the planet could have been deranged. <But maybe it was hidden? Somebody went to a lot of trouble to hide the superegg. And on some planets, wizards do hide kernels to keep them from being tampered with...> Standing in the midst of that snowy, dusty wilderness, Nita got out her manual and paged through it to one prominently bookmarked section, a line of light in the closed pages: the Kernel Tactics and Management section for which she'd been cleared for access months ago. The page that itemized local kernel presences confirmed that no planetary kernel was present anywhere in the areosphere, though there certainly had been one here once. In the distant past, the kernel had even been present right here in Argyre Planitia for a while. <No big surprise,> Nita thought: unsupervised planetary kernels had a tendency to wander around freely in the bodies they inhabited. Only if a planet had a resident wizard operating actively as a Planetary did a kernel tend to stay in one place, mostly because the wizard working with it wanted to be able to get his, her, or its hands, fins, or tentacles on it quickly in an emergency. <But there hasn't been a kernel here for...> She frowned as she deciphered the Speech-character suffix after the number she was looking at. <Half a million years...> Nita shook her head. The manual confirmed that no other Planetary in the system had interfered with Mars's kernel. <So where'd it go? What happened to it?> She looked again at the page for Mars. It showed the date of the original establishment of the kernel, shortly after the coalescence of the planet— a date coordinate with a negative powers-of-ten suffix far, far bigger than the first one— and after that came a long, long period of uneventful tenancy during which Mars's kernel oscillated gently about inside the planet's bulk in the normal way, until half a million years ago. And after that— nothing. Nita scanned up the page again, and after the word STATUS there appeared only the notation: Indeterminate. Nita put her manual away and looked around at the silent, frigid night in complete bemusement. "Bobo," she said after a moment, "what the heck does 'indeterminate' mean?" <It means that the kernel disappeared with no documented cause,> said the peridexis after a moment. "How come you don't know where it went?" The peridexis sounded almost embarrassed now. <I may be wizardry,> it said, <but that doesn't necessarily mean I have access to all the universe's knowledge. And data, or even just the ability to understand it, can be lost over time, as you saw in the Cavern: or misplaced.> Nita frowned. "...Or hidden," she said. <Redacted, yes. Sometimes by the Powers, of course, or those acting for Them—> "And the Lone Power?" Nita said. There was a longish silence. <It cannot interfere with manual content directly,> the peridexis said. <But it remains one of the Powers, and has enough strength to range about interfering with matter and spirit— out of sight, as it were. At which point the manual will find no data to store or relay.> Nita was beginning to wonder if what she was starting to think of as the Case of the Purloined Kernel was going to reveal, lurking at the bottom of it, every wizard's oldest adversary. <But why? It doesn't make sense. Right next door to Mars you've got a planet full of nosy wizards. There's much too much chance that one of them would notice... even though, all right, none of them did. But they could have. And anyway, why would the Lone One come sneaking in here and run off with Mars's kernel?> Nita stood there for some moments, running various scenarios in her head. Finally she stopped. "Bobo," she said, "it's not good for a planet not to have a kernel. They get run down... like a house that's not maintained when it's empty. And the matter gets lonely." <It would, yes.> Nita shoved her manual into her otherspace pocket. "Somebody needs to look into this again," she said. "But first things first. Where's Kit?" There was a long pause. <Indeterminate...> said Bobo. Kit stood there on the shoulder of Olympus Mons and looked out into the falling night. "So listen," he said, glancing around him and wishing there was something to fix his attention on: this talking to the empty air was extremely hard to get used to. "Before I start running around just doing errands for you, I need some questions answered." <That makes sense,> his voice said to him. "What exactly is it we need to do next?" Kit said. "Where do we need to go?" He paused. "And would you please explain why I should be helping you in the first place?! You're trying to take over my mind! Or my life. Or something." <It's nothing to do with taking anything over,> Khretef said. <We're the same. I'm you... just earlier.> And Kit could feel his shrug. He couldn't do much but shake his head at that. "Assuming that that's true," Kit said, "there's something really wrong with you being here now. I mean, I'm no expert, but as far as I understood it, one soul should only be in one place at one time. Sure, there are some exceptions—" <You mean like the wizard who was here with you before?> Khretef said. <True, he'd be a special case. We had wizards like him once: but ours died.> And Khretef shook his head sadly and sat down on one of the stones of the cavern. Kit looked around him in alarm at the discovery that they were suddenly underground and that he wasn't talking to empty air anymore, but to someone of the same species as Aurilelde— apparently about his own weight, though taller. Khretef had the same smooth, gray, stony skin, though a shade darker than Aurilelde's, and he was dressed in the harness of metals and silks and leatherlike material that he'd seen on other Shamaska-Eilitt males, with a long, slim sword at his side. Khretef's smoke-hair was much shorter than Aurilelde's, just a film of darkness around the top of his head, like a buzzcut made of haze. Aside from the slight difference in the hair, Kit realized that the being he was looking at really did look a lot like him— or the way he'd look if he'd been born into that species. "Now, how'd you do that?" Kit said. And then he just had to laugh, if uncomfortably, for Khretef was studying Kit with the same look of uneasy recognition. "And how do you keep pulling these fast ones on me? Not very polite to the new wizard on the block." "I don't care for it much, either," Khretef said, looking up at Kit with an expression that suggested he really meant it. "But maybe not wasting time is a smart thing, because we don't have a lot to waste right now. Entropy's running. And for me, the time that's running is also running out." He shook his head. "We really should get going, because they're going to be here soon." "They?" Kit said. "Can't you hear them?" said Khretef. Kit held still. Distant, somewhere down deeper in the caves, he could hear the gravelly ratchet of claws on stone. "Don't tell me," he said. "It's more of those scorpion things! What is it with those?" "They're just constructs," Khretef said. "They recall an animal that was once our great companion in the First World, from way back in time. Very few survived the move to this world: they were too bound to the First One. Some of us got an idea that it would be good to build new ones. But they were never quite the same. You saw mine—" Khretef sounded wistful. Kit looked at him with sudden understanding. "The one in the tower... he was your— your dog." "That's right," Khretef said. "I had him since I was a child. Or he had me. You could never really tell, my mother used to say. He was always underfoot, or under my couch, or just under." Khretef sighed. "He made it here, but he didn't last long. Though it wasn't the usual wasting away. He"— Khretef frowned— "he had an accident." A little chill ran down Kit's back as he remembered how his mama had told Helena that that was what had happened to Ponch: "an accident." The chill got worse a second later as Kit started to hear more clearly those claws-on-stone sounds from somewhere farther down in the caves. "I think we'd better get moving. What exactly is it that we're looking for?" "Something Aurilelde's father said was vital to his ability to make this world livable for us," Khretef said, getting up. "When we knew we were coming here, we used wizardry and science together to build ourselves new bodies to suit the local environment. But you can only do that so many times. Too many changes, and you're not the species you were anymore." He slipped the sword he was carrying out of his belt, glancing around him in the dark. "So if our species was going to survive here, it'd be the world that had to change. Aurilelde's father was one of the last of our senior wizards who survived the journey, and one of the most powerful: so much so that he became Master of the City after we first came. He used his power to find the Heart of the planet, the Soul Bundle—" Kit understood that Khretef was using both the Shamaska and Eilitt words for a single word in the Speech: tevet. "Mars's kernel," Kit said. "I know about those. My partner works with them—" Khretef looked at Kit very strangely indeed. "Does he, now?" "She," Kit said. Khretef's dark eyes widened. "This is beyond strange," he said softly. "Her, too?" From down in the darkness came another roar. "We should go," Khretef said. "If we stay here they'll catch us where we won't have any advantage." Kit nodded and pulled out his antenna-wand. Khretef snapped his fingers, and a small constellation of wizard-lights sparked to life in the air and drifted ahead of the two of them as they started picking their way downslope across the rough floor of the cave. By the glow of the wizard-lights, he caught a gleam off the surface of Kit's wand. "Noon-forged?" Khretef said. Kit nodded. "Present from a friend." "Best kind," Khretef said, hefting the sword. "So was this." They walked downhill together in a silence that was both companionable and uneasy. "Anyway," Khretef said, "the kernel. Iskard found it, but spies for the City of Eilith discovered where it was being held in the Shamaska City, and their wizards stole it. What they didn't know was Iskard had suspected something like this could happen, and before the kernel was stolen, he'd managed to fragment out a part of its power core. The kernel couldn't be used without the missing fragment: so what the spies and wizards stole was useless. Later, after a great battle between the Cities, the kernel was recovered by Iskard. But even as that was happening, the fragment— the Shard, as Iskard called it— was taken and delivered to the Eilitt by a Shamaska turned traitor. Here they hid it, right under the Shamaska City, to taunt Iskard— for it was so surrounded with deadfalls and wizardly weapons and barriers that no one could reach it alive." "Booby-trapped," Kit said. Khretef nodded. "A good word. And as the final mockery, a great wizardry was locked around the Shard itself that would kill any Shamaska who touched it. But they forgot something." Khretef's mouth stretched in his people's version of a grin. "I am not Shamaska." Kit blinked. "You're not?" "No. I am Eilitt by birth. My mother was a Co-Chief of the City of Eilith." "Then how come you're working for their side?" Khretef gave him a wry look. "Aurilelde," he said. Then he held up his hand for a moment, listening. "Not this way," he said. "A side access instead. Follow me." He turned and headed toward another opening off to one side of the cavern. "I don't get it, though," Kit said. "If all your people needed to have this happen, and Aurilelde's dad found the planet's kernel and was about to make it happen—why did the Eilitt stop him?' "They were afraid he secretly intended to destroy the City of Eilith," Khretef said. "And even if he didn't want to do that— which the rulers of the Eilitt didn't believe— they didn't want Iskard to have the kernel. They wanted for themselves the power that would come with control over the planet. They would have preferred both Eilitt and Shamaska to die together rather than suffer the shame and humiliation of being saved by a Shamaska." Kit shook his head, disgusted. When he had been studying Earth history— and especially during the last month or so, when North Korea had come up in his history unit— he'd found himself hoping that only human beings went so far out of their way to rabidly distrust one another, and to teach their innocent children to do the same. "Nut cases!" he said. "I hear you," Khretef said, "whatever a nut is." Together he and Kit paused in the huge opening to another gallery. Khretef glanced from side to side, then up at the huge chandelier-mass of stalactites hanging down from the high ceiling. Kit, looking at them too, shook his head in wonder. "Think of how much water," he said. "And how many years..." Khretef nodded. "Not long now," he said, and led Kit onward through the cavern and downward again. "Am I right," Kit said, "to say that your two cities have been fighting all the time since you settled here?" "Oh, yes," Khretef said. "A constant state of— what was the term for it? Armed engagement." Khretef laughed. "Both cities were constantly exchanging diplomats and deputations to try to talk things over, solve our grievances—" He shook his head. "But it was never about that. It was always about finding a new way to stab the other side in the back... or finding out what they were really up to and then looking for ways to stop it. That was, after all, the way things had always been..." Khretef sighed as they made their way across the cavern, toward another dark exit. "There came a time, after I passed my Ordeal and became a wizard, that my mother decided I should go on one of these deputations. So I went." Kit got a sudden flash of Khretef's memory of that first trip: and of a moment of astonishment on the way there— of his party being overtaken by a sudden wonder; one of the Martian dust-devils. Again Kit saw the view of the circle of sky far up that whirling tunnel, and now understood his rush of déjà vu. This was the connection—"I was ready for it. I knew the Shamaska would all be looking for ways to trick or betray me because I was new and young— trying to turn me into a tool they could use against my own people. I was on my guard. Then I went to the Shamaska City, and—" Khretef laughed, bitter. "I discovered that the terrible Shamaska, our ancient enemies, were just people like us! It seemed like the worst kind of betrayal. Either I was completely confused, and they were pulling one over on me— or this had always been true, and we were the deluded ones. Like us, the Shamaska were scared of the other side, trying to keep themselves safe, but unsure how to do it when the others were so determined to wipe them out. Watch out where you put your feet here—" The surface underneath them was changing to rough, stony ropes of pillow lava, all crusted with the pale leached minerals of millennia. "Anyway, I kept my mouth shut and went through with my duties in the deputation, and waited for it to be time for us to go home, for I didn't like what I was seeing, and I didn't want to do any more of this work, where it was impossible to ignore how our own leaders had been lying to us. And then, at a function just before I was to return home to Eilith, I met Aurilelde." As they paused before negotiating another long gallery leading to a third cavern, Khretef's face changed subtly, and even by the now-subdued wizard-light, Kit could see the change. When Khretef looked over at Kit, his uncertain expression suggested that he wasn't sure Kit understood what he was saying. "I thought she was going to be just another of these cold, proud Shamaska I'd spent twenty days meeting: someone who'd be hating me but polite to my face. Then we looked at each other, and there was something different about her. I still don't know what it was. We started talking..." Khretef glanced around again, then pointed. "Down there. See that opening? That's what we want.— Oh, we were so careful to try to look like nothing different was happening. We knew everyone was watching us. But finally we realized that we liked each other. Aurilelde was interested in meeting a wizard her own age. I was interested in her talents as a Seer: it's a gift that's rare among the Eilitt—" Kit felt that chill again, thinking of Nita's growing visionary specialty. Khretef shrugged. "I went home, eventually. But soon I told my mother that I wanted to go on the next deputation, that more experience would be good for the son of a Chief of the City. And I went, and Aurilelde and I met again. And again, the next time. After that we kept meeting privately. We were terrified, but we knew we had to find a way to be together that wouldn't be misunderstood." From ahead of them, from below, Kit heard a subdued roar. "But they misunderstood, anyway," he said, "so you left." Khretef nodded. "I fled to her city," he said. "My people declared me a traitor, to be killed on sight. My mother disowned me. And though I'd come over to the Shamaska side, they never trusted me. Rorsik—one of Aurilelde's father's counselors—claimed that the only reason I'd sought refuge in the city was to seek ways to betray the Shamaska to the Eilitt. He claimed I'd seduced the Daughter of the City in order to render her visions friendlier to the Eilitt side. I think possibly Rorsik wanted her for himself, and saw me as a rival." Khretef snorted, a sound so like one that Kit's friend Raoul would make that Kit couldn't help laughing. "He didn't see how she loathed him, the idiot! But even her own people were starting to distrust her because of me. They thought that she was lying about her visions to forward my agenda. We thought they'd understand that we just wanted to be together, but..." He shook his head. Kit frowned. "We have stories like that where I come from," he said, thinking of his last year's long English unit on Shakespeare. "Mostly the star-crossed lovers wind up dead." Khretef gave him an ironic look. "Well, I did, anyway—" he said. That was when they heard the huge roar away ahead of them. Kit froze where he was. "We're too alike as it is," he said, "and if it's all the same to you, I'd sooner stop before we get that alike!" He shook his antenna-wand, and a reassuring jolt of red fire ran down it, vanished. Its charge was running full. "That really didn't sound like your usual scorpion—" "No," Khretef said, "they weren't. Down this way—" They walked a short way along to the entrance to a narrow gallery, like a hallway, leading down into a wider space. There Khretef paused, uneasy. "This is where I got killed the last time..." he said. The hair went up on the back of Kit's neck. "Yeah, about that," Kit said. "If you're dead, how come you aren't in Timeheart?" "I wasn't finished," Khretef said. "You know how it is sometimes. People hang on, even though there's usually no hope of doing what they've left undone. Usually after a while they move on. But I couldn't leave. So many lives depended on what I'd failed to do— so many futures. My people. Aurilelde's people. Aurilelde... I couldn't leave. And when they had to go back into stasis, which they had so much been trying not to do— then even more, I had to stay." The dread in his voice surprised Kit. "What was the matter with the stasis?" "There were not enough wizards left, not enough power, to rebuild the spells correctly. The stasis wasn't true dreamless sleep anymore, but a half-life full of repetitions and endless dreams without resolution, a journey with no end. The souls of those in stasis were being damaged, their personalities corrupted. Once more we could endure it without being destroyed as a species, Shamaska and Eilitt together. But not again." Khretef shivered all over with the memory. "So for so many years I waited in this not-life, not-death while they slept, all the time fearing what they were going through would destroy them before help came. But then, just now, something happened." And he looked at Kit, his eyes alight with an excitement he had plainly been fighting to keep under control. "You got here. You cracked open the Nascence. You let loose the wizardry to fuel the awakening of the unfinished past. And you're me. Or a version of me, one rooted in the present and with access to its power. How could I not come find you? Now it can all be finished. Now we can remake the world; now the last problem can be solved. And Aurilelde and I can be together..." Kit wasn't so sure about that, but for the time being the subject was better left alone. "Just so we don't wind up repeating past events, you should probably dump the light now," he said softly. "You know the spell for seeing by heat?" That took Khretef by surprise. "I know the theory," he said. "But it's not something I'd have thought of. In our old bodies, in the cold of the First World, almost any heat would be blinding. Degrees of it didn't seem to be much use—" "How do you get your spells?" Kit said. "Our species has several methods, but a lot of us read ours from a book or a portable device—" He pulled out his manual, showed it to Khretef. He peered at it. "How unusual. We call ours the Dark Speaking: we hear it in the silence—" Kit found the spell, flagged it. "Here," he said. Khretef stood listening. "Ah," he said. "Not too complex. Let's see—" Kit, meanwhile, very quietly spoke the Speech-words for the spell. A second later his vision had changed, and he could see Khretef as a Shamaska-shaped light in the darkness. All around him the cavern gallery glowed faintly— more brightly nearer the floor, more dimly up above where the stone was losing heat to the Martian night. "How's that?" he said. Khretef was looking around him, then down at his arms and the sword he held. "That works very well—" "And the scorpions are metallic, mostly?" Kit said. "How are they powered?" "Cold power cells," Khretef said. "They would be far below your ambient temperature or mine." "We'll be seeing dark blots as we come up with them, then," Kit said. "Can they see in the heat wavelengths?" "I wouldn't be sure," Khretef said. "I never had one of the substitutes: I much preferred the real creatures." They walked on cautiously together. "Yeah," Kit said. "I saw your guy. I could see why you'd prefer the real thing—" He stopped still as Khretef held out the hand with the sword, a gesture of alarm. <Silence would probably be better than speech now,> Khretef said. <They're in the next chamber. Though they're expecting us to come in through another entrance, we'll have little time to deal with them.> <They can't hear thought, though?> <No. That only the original creatures could manage, and not always.> <Good.> Kit looked up ahead toward the glow of warmth that came from the archway before them. <Warmer... Does the ground drop off in there?> <There's a deep pit. The Shard is down at the bottom of it, protected by the final spell-shield, the one proof against any Shamaska.> Kit thought. <Okay,> he said. <Are these like the ones up on the surface? Do they learn from past experience?> <They do. That's what killed me. It was a development I hadn't been expecting, and when I used the firesword the second time, it was ineffective. It should only have taken a second to bring up another spell, but in that second—> He went silent. Kit could feel him wincing from the memory. <Right,> Kit said. <I think I have something useful.> He reached out beside him, opened his otherspace pocket, and felt around in it, bringing out a device that Khretef looked at curiously: a smooth metal rod about a foot and a half long, with what looked like white ceramic striping down the side of it, a half-sheath of more ceramic down its length, and a thick handle with various controls. Kit touched one of the controls. At the butt end of the device, a tiny blue light came on. <What is it?> Khretef said. <Something never used on this planet before,> Kit said. <Should take them by surprise. Come on.> Silently they made their way down the length of the gallery, toward the glow of heat. <Tell me something,> Kit said. <When you got here from the First World, did you find any signs of any species having been here before you?> <None,> said Khretef. <There was no evidence of any life more advanced than simple one-celled or multicelled organisms.> Kit sighed. <Pity,> he said. As they drew near to the entrance to the next chamber, Khretef held up the sword in warning again, then waved Kit to one side of the narrow gallery and flattened himself against the other. Together they inched toward the entrance, peered through. Beyond the archway, a crowd of green metal scorpions was moving about a near-circular cave, almost obscuring the floor except in one spot—the center, where the circular pit Khretef had mentioned fell sheerly away. Kit looked the situation over. <Nasty,> he said. <Fight them and they take you down before you're anywhere near the Shard. Try to avoid them by jumping into the pit, and they all just pile on top of you.> Khretef nodded. <Fortunately there is no need to take them all on.> He pointed at the largest one, the scorpion that Kit had earlier heard roaring and that let out another uneasy roar even as they watched. <They're all linked,> he said. <It handles their processing. Take out that largest one, and they'll all go together.> Kit nodded. <I did that by accident before,> he said. <Good to know. Got a self-defense shield? Good. Put it up—> He glanced around one last time, then spoke the words in the Speech that activated his own shield, thumbed the setting on Carmela's portable dissociator up to "overkill," and stepped out of the gallery. Instantly the scorpions all raised their claws and turned toward him, and the biggest one crouched down. But Kit was already shouting the Mason's Word, the version with the additional syllables for the Martian ecology, and was running up the hardened air. It was squishier than usual because of the thinness of the atmosphere, but he didn't let that stop him— he just ran up the air high enough to get a clear shot at the biggest scorpion. It tried to leap into the pit as its lesser associates rushed Kit's skywalk: but it had no time. The dissociator field hit it and tore it into thousands of microscopic fragments, all of which promptly flashed into plasma and sizzled away to nothing, leaving behind only a blinding flare of heat. All the remaining scorpions promptly crashed to the stony floor in a metallic clamor of collapsing claws and joints. Kit looked over his shoulder and saw Khretef emerging from the gallery. "You all right?" he said. "Much more so than the last time," Khretef said drily, but with a grin. "That was nicely done!" "Yeah," Kit said, shoving the dissociator back into his otherspace pocket. "I'm gonna get it from my sister when she finds out I borrowed this without asking, but I'll make it up to her later..." He said a few more words of the Speech under his breath, changed the angle of his skywalking steps so that they led down into the pit, and walked down into it. There at the bottom, the Shard shone as he'd seen it in his earlier vision. It looked like nothing but a little round, red sandstone pebble, but it burned with an intense blue-violet fire. Around it was a shell of paler, bluer brilliance, sparking with hot green lights. "Is that the anti-Shamaska wizardry?" Kit said. Khretef nodded. "Since you're not Shamaska, either," he said, "it can do you no harm." Kit could already feel as much. He reached down, picked up the pebble, and jumped at the jolt of power that ran through him from it. "Wow. Aurilelde's dad packed a whole lot of the kernel into that..." he said. He stood up, wobbling slightly. "And more than just the kernel," Khretef said. "One other thing as well. Me. Kit's eyes widened. But it was too late. His consciousness whited out: and a moment later, when vision returned, there was only one of him standing there— Khretef. He looked down at the little shining thing in his hand with a great rush of excitement... but also fear. <Now to get this back to her,> he thought, <and put everything right. Finally, finally we'll be free!> And he vanished. [ Oceanidum Mons ] "Indeterminate?" Nita said to the peridexis. "What's that supposed to mean?" The peridexis paused for a moment. <No,> it said, <that was an error: sorry. He's now showing in the neighborhood of Olympus Mons. There was a momentary difficulty in reading his status.> "Not usual for you," Nita said. "Well, everything else has been crazy here..." She let out a long breath, which actually froze out of the air and started drifting down as tiny flakes of snow. <You want to be paying more attention to your life support,> Bobo said. Nita rolled her eyes. "You're always saying you want to handle that for me," she said. "You deal with it." Immediately she started feeling the air warming up around her, and started to smell the odd gunpowdery smell of Mars dust. "Thanks," she said. <Kit?> she said inside her head. No answer. Once again she started to wonder if he was annoyed with her for breaking in on his boy-trip the day before. Nita pulled out her manual, flipped it open to the messaging section. There on her contacts list his name appeared as usual. <Location: Olympus Mons>— and a set of coordinates. <Mission status: independent investigation; occupied; please do not disturb.> "Well, fine," she said under her breath, starting to feel annoyed. "Messaging, please?" The space under Kit's name cleared. "Kit," she said to the manual, "sorry about yesterday. Give me a call or drop me a note when you're done." She tapped the page: the message inserted itself and began to flash bright and dark, with the notation appearing beside it, <Holding for delivery.> Nita shut the manual and put it away. <No point in getting all cranky about this. He wants to be too busy for me? Fine.> "Okay," she said, "might as well head home. Want to handle the gating?" <No problem.> Off to one side, dust and snow whirled away from a flat place among the stones; a circle of light appeared there. Nita stepped through— — and came out in her bedroom as usual. She sighed and tossed her manual onto the desk while she pulled off her outdoor clothes, then grabbed it again and headed downstairs. Her dad was in the living room, reading the Sunday paper. Dairine was actually in the same room with him, stretched out on the floor and paging through the travel section, while Spot looked over her shoulder with stalked eyes. All of them glanced up as Nita came in. "You hungry?" her dad said. "I'll make you something." "No, it's okay," Nita said. She dropped her manual on the dining room table and wandered into the kitchen, glancing at the clock. <Two thirty. Okay, I'll give him till five. He has to be back then, anyway, Carmela says. And I want lunch.> She rummaged around in the fridge for the makings of a chicken sandwich, put the kettle on, assembled the sandwich—all except the mustard she wanted, which Dairine had apparently finished, so that Nita had to make do with mayonnaise— and then wandered back into the dining room and sat down, staring morosely at the manual while she ate half the sandwich. <What is it with him?> she thought. But Nita had her suspicions. Right there as if in front of her, she could just see the Martian princess. <It's not fair,> she thought. <She was pretty. She was stacked.> Nita squirmed uneasily in the chair. <She had nothing on. Almost. And it looked good on her!> "Dammit!" Nita said under her breath. She scowled at the rest of her sandwich, then picked it up and ate it, annoyed. <How am I supposed to compete with that?> <Are you crazy? You're not in a competition,> said some part of her brain that was taking desperate refuge in rationality. <She was a hallucination. She was a character in a book that the wizardry used to communicate with him...> <Yeah, and I know just what she was communicating!> answered back another part of Nita's mind, one that had no intention of being thrown off the track by logic, especially as logic when used on boys lately seemed to produce only indifferent results. <You saw him looking at Janie Lowell the other morning. Her and that alleged skirt.> Nita dropped the rest of the sandwich on the plate and put her head in her hands. <This is dumb. I don't want to wear that kind of skirt, anyway. If "skirt" is the word we're looking for, and not "belt"! I just want—>She groaned. <I don't know what I want.> <Kit, you're an idiot!> And this statement embarrassed Nita profoundly, since it both flowed naturally from what she was feeling right now and made no sense whatsoever. "Aaaaaagh," she said under her breath after a moment, which also made no sense, but at least discharged some tension. Nita picked up the rest of the sandwich, ate it while glowering at the table, and then noticed that the kettle was screaming for her attention. "Sorry, sorry," she said, and scrambled up to turn off the stove and get the kettle off the hot ring and find herself a tea bag. "Sorry..." The kettle regarded her with mute accusation. She picked it up and poured hot water onto the tea bag in her mug. "Maybe I'm the idiot," she muttered, putting the kettle down. It didn't respond. She immediately felt somehow inadequate, as Kit always got immediate responses out of the household appliances: they were very forthcoming with him. "Never mind," she said, and patted it on the handle as she went out. "Different wizards, different specialties..." But she still felt it watching her as she went out. Nita sighed and went back into the dining room, where she sat down at the end of the table and drank the tea. Finally she reached out to her manual again and opened it, going back to the Mars data for the previous day. In particular, the reports on the meetings with the scorpion creatures were now in there, both the encounter in the Cavern and those that had happened out in the Martian terrain, and Nita read them both over with interest. <So weird, though,> she thought. <The encounters were so different.> Across the table, Dairine had left a pad and a few pens from something else she'd been doing. On impulse Nita reached out and pulled them over as she looked over the details of power levels and personnel, topography and coordinates. <What a crowd of us,> she thought. <But our two groups got such different results.> <Did one group have a higher aggregate power level or something?> But the groups' power levels weren't really all that different, when you averaged things out. <Okay, Carmela's not a wizard. But she has her own specialties. And S'reee and I were there: a more senior talent and a lesser one. And on the other side there were Kit and Ronan, and Darryl, who's not an older talent, but in his own way as powerful as a Senior: maybe more so —> She picked up the pen and started making a list on the top page of the pad, comparing power levels and matching them off against one another: Kit, Nita, Ronan, Carmela, Darryl, S'reee. Nita shook her head and tapped the names idly with her pen, looking for some other factor that could be operating: ages, origins, wizardly specialties. <Newer wizard, older one. Younger person, older one. Boy, girl, boy, girl, boy...> Nita stopped. She stared at the lists. <Our team was all girls. Theirs was all guys.> Her first thought was that this was just a coincidence. <But the scorpions walked right past us! And we didn't get what the guys got— this weird re-creation of somebody else's Mars. We got what had actually been left there. We identified ourselves as wizards and they let us right in. Almost ignored us, even. Whereas the guys had all these hoops to jump through. Something to prove.> Nita stared at the manual page, shaking her head. <Why? Just because they were guys? It doesn't make sense. There has to be something else going on.> She sat back in the chair. <Even the guys were clear they were being tested for something. At the very least, that they were wizards. But maybe something else, too. Possibly to see whose mindview was closest to the Martians'?> Nita picked up her tea mug and had a swig. She couldn't get rid of the feeling that there was something about this situation that Kit was hiding specifically from her. The hurt this was creating in her at the moment was all out of proportion to any real reason for it, but that didn't make it easier for Nita to bear. And she kept trying to reason his behavior away, and failing. <We've been through a lot together. All kinds of crap. But we've never gone out of our way to hide stuff from each other.> <There could be something bad going on with him and this connection to Miss Martian Princess,> Nita thought. <Some bad influence. It's happened before. Sometimes it's taken some work to get him out of trouble. Big deal! He's done the same for me.> <But why doesn't it feel like that's what's happening this time? It's something else. I can feel it. Something he doesn't want me to know about.> <And what could it be?!> She banged her mug down on the table, and tea splashed out of it. Nita didn't care, just sat staring at the splashed droplets. <Crap! Crap, crap, crap!> "You drop something?" her dad said from the living room. "Huh? Oh no, sorry..." Nita scowled. <If only there was some way to get at what he was really thinking. Something like the live stuff coming out of Dairine's manual, the "streaming consciousness...> And then she stopped as the idea came into her head. <If it worked on Dairine's manual,> she thought, <it would work on Kit's.> She held still for some moments longer. Then she said, "Bobo?" <You rang?> "You say something, honey?" "Just talking to Bobo, Daddy." "Oh, okay..." Nita took another drink of her tea. "The thing you did to Spot," she said. "Or to his manual functions—" She stopped again. <Yes?> "Could you do that to Kit's manual?" It was some moments before Bobo said anything. <Spot gave consent.> Nita swallowed. That was the point, of course. And Bobo hadn't actually answered her question. "But you could do it." <If a wizard feels that a wizardry is not in contravention of the Oath,> Bobo said, <or is certain beyond any reasonable doubt that a given spell is required to fulfill the conditions of the Oath, then that wizardry can be implemented and will execute.> Nita sat there and just thought for a minute, then two. She found that she was trembling. <Certain beyond any reasonable doubt.> The problem was that doubt was all she had at the moment. It is impossible to serve the Lone Power directly: that was one of the most basic tenets of wizardry. The power itself would refuse to be used in such ways. But there were lots of ways the Lone One could get you to do Its will indirectly. In fact, It preferred those. It liked, whenever It could, to get wizards into situations where they felt that the only way to do right was by doing something that would later turn out to be wrong. <Am I sure I'm really wanting to do this because it's right? And not just because I'm scared that she's really the one that he— that Kit and I— that I have to know if he—> She swallowed. "It's all about the situation you're in, isn't it?" Nita said under her breath. "It all comes down to how it looks to you." She took a long breath. "Free will..." <The Worlds are based on it,> Bobo said. <The One has no interest in inhabiting a universe full of puppets.> "Even though we get it wrong a whole lot?" <Apparently the benefits are felt to offset the dangers,> the peridexis said. <Or counterbalance them.> "Doesn't make me feel any better," Nita muttered. "Because I'm not sure which side I'm coming down on." Yet she did know. It was wrong, wrong to tamper with the private insides of someone's brain. This was why the psychotropic wizardries tended to backlash so violently on the user. And this would be only a step away from that. It was like stealing Dairine's diary and reading it that time. <But I can't get rid of the feeling that if I don't stop him from what he's doing, bad things are going to happen. I think he's in danger somehow. And I don't know if it's just me thinking that because I want to think that... or because it's real.> Nita hid her face in her hands. <If this is what adult wizardry is going to be like,> she thought, <I prefer the kid kind. More clean-cut. More obvious.> But she had the horrible feeling that her preferences weren't at all the issue here. And worse, the fact that Bobo still hadn't clearly answered her question told Nita something she didn't want to know: that if she told him to bug Kit's manual— or his brain— and she was convinced that this was the right thing to do, then Bobo would do it. Nita's mouth was dry. It suddenly seemed to her that, from the time she took the Oath until now, she had been using some kind of wizardry that had kiddie-gates installed at the top of the stairs. But now she had a way to get the gate off. Now it was entirely up to her what she did with the power. <All I have to do is convince myself that what I'm doing is right.> And it would be so easy to do that. Too easy. Nita put her head down on the table and was tempted to moan, except that in the living room they might have heard her. In there she could hear her dad quietly talking to Dairine: actually talking to her, not angrily, just a normal conversation, despite the uncomfortable way things had been going just a few days ago. <And that's because of what I did to her manual. Or is it because of what Dad saw there, and it bothered him so much that he didn't want to see any more?> <Oh, I don't know what to do about any of this!!> But she did. Right now, at least, Nita was sure that what she was considering was wrong. <If it sounds like something the Lone Power would suggest... if it walks like the Lone Power, and quacks like the Lone Power...> And she was suddenly caught completely off guard by the image of the Lone One as an evil duck— a black duck in a shiny black helmet, and maybe even a cape, waddling along to ominous movie music. Nita burst out laughing at the image. She could just hear the noise Its breathing would make, a dreadful asthmatic snerking— She burst out laughing. "Bobo being funny in there?" her dad said. Nita couldn't stop laughing to answer him. "Stress," Dairine said, sounding dry. "She's got that hysterical sound." This was possibly true, butNita was still laughing so hard she could barely breathe. Finally she choked herself back into some kind of control, wiping her eyes. <Yeah,> she thought. <I'll have to watch out... keep an eye on how I'm thinking. This is a really big deal we're involved in here, and It'll move in the first second It catches somebody getting careless.> Nonetheless, the thought of ultimate Evil coming after her in the shape of a duck was strangely reassuring. <Lone One or not, a duck I could handle.> Nita caught the laughter trying to start again, and stopped it. <But what a way to get up the Lone One's nose,> she thought. <...Or beak.> She allowed herself a last giggle. <It's so hung up on being taken dead seriously. Pull that line on It, and who knows, It might do that cartoon thing: get so mad, It'll make a mistake...> Finally Nita sighed and got up to get a sponge so that she could clean the tea off the table before it dried sticky. She picked up the mug and wiped up wet tea from underneath it, and put the mug down again, and then froze as the room abruptly blanked out around her. Behind her eyes, Nita saw some city's streets full of screaming, plunging crowds. She saw Mars, Mars, Mars, a hundred times, on a hundred TV screens. There was something wrong with that Mars: it was turning blue. She saw Kit skywalking precariously over a pit of giant green metal scorpions. She saw a line of fierce light stretching from dawn into darkness, pulling and pulling at something with great force, singing like a plucked string with unbearable tension. And she saw a huge wave that was slowly, slowly leaning up over her. The Sun was caught in it, faint, pale, fluttering weakly in the water like a drowning bug. Then she found herself looking at the tea mug again. <What was that?!> She was breathing hard. The images had come fast but were entirely clear... and they scared her. <...Okay,> she thought. "Bobo? Did you see those?" <It would have been difficult to avoid seeing them.> "Take notes!" <Consider it done.> Nita stared at the mug, then went back into the kitchen for more tea. As she turned on the heat under the kettle again, she had a sudden thought. She dug around in her pocket for her phone, pulled it out, and dialed. "Hola Nita!" said the voice on the other end. "Hey, you're back already. I thought you'd still be up there." "Nope," Nita said. "Got bored, came home." "What, didn't you find Kit?" "Oh, he's up there all right," Nita said, "with a big Do Not Disturb sign hung around his neck." Carmela snorted. "Counting craters again," she said. "Never mind. He'll be back here pretty soon for dinner. I'll tell him you called." "Oh, I wasn't calling for him! Thought you might have something else on your poem." "Turns out it has a name!" Carmela said. "It's called the Red Rede." "So it is a big deal, then," Nita said. "I think so. Anyway, I think I've got that last verse translated. Though it's vague." "Par for the course at the moment, isn't it?" Nita said. "Shoot." "Here's the whole thing," Carmela said. And she recited: "The one departed is the one who returns From the straitened circle and the shortened night, When the blue star rises and the water burns: Then the word long-lost comes again to light To be spoke by the watcher who silent yearns For the lost one found. Yet to wreak aright, She must slay her rival and the First World spurn Lest the one departed no more return." Nita sat there for a moment and felt again, in full force, that sense of impending doom that had taken her by the throat during those strange moments when the imageries of crowds and water and scorpions and Kit had flickered behind her eyes, like shots from an unusually eclectic movie trailer. Now, as Carmela spoke the words, Nita heard the rhythm of them behind the images like a drumbeat, slow, threatening, and she could almost feel a physical pressure building up in her head as the beat went on. <When the blue star rises.> She saw Mars lowering overhead, in TV screens, in views from telescopes, going suddenly and scarily blue. <When the water burns.> She saw the struggling Sun caught in that bizarre wave, dimmed down and out after a moment by dirt in the water, then lost in a greater shadow that came crashing down. <The lost one found.> She saw the princess come dancing up to Kit and take his hand with a look on her face that said she'd been waiting for him for a long time. <She must slay her rival.> Nita seemed to be hanging high above a vista of cloud-streaked terrain, glinting with water; and somewhere between her and the Sun, blocking away its light, hung a dark and furious female shape with near-invisible energies flowing about its hands— "Neets?" "Uh, yeah," Nita said. "Yeah." "What do you think?" "I'm not sure. Are you pretty clear about the translation?" "Oh, yeah," Carmela said. "I took my time. You have any ideas about this?" The kettle started whistling softly. Nita pulled it off the heat and got herself another tea bag out of the canister. "Some," she said. "I need to touch base with Kit first." "Okay. Well, I'll tell him to call you." "Yeah. Thanks! And hey, you did a great job." "I hope so. Let me know." "Yeah," Nita said. "Later." She hung up and found herself staring out the kitchen window, where the morning glories that climbed up the chimney every year were as usual making a bid to climb in through the screen. They suddenly struck Nita as looking bizarre and alien, and the color of them made her think immediately of the too-blue Mars. <Kit,> she thought, <get your butt home. Because we need to talk!> Kit straightened up from where he'd been hunched over on the rock at the top of Olympus Mons. For a second or so he just let his eyes rest in that astonishing view... and then slowly realized that something was wrong with the view. <It should be much darker. Why's it so light?> And then he realized that out there, at the edge of things, the Sun was about to come up. <What?? It was— where was— what time is it?!> He stared at his watch. <Oh, my god, it's five thirty; dinner's at six!> Kit frantically paged through his manual to the bookmarked area, where he kept his pre-prepared spells, pulled the transit spell off his page, dropped it to the icy dirt, and jumped through. A second later he was in his bedroom, and he could hear a lot of voices talking underneath him in the living room. He ran down the stairs. The whole family was standing in there, dressed up and ready to go. Now they turned to Kit and looked at him with a broad assortment of expressions— annoyance, confusion, resignation, curiosity. "Kit," his papa said. Pop was the one doing annoyance. Kit immediately panicked. "I'm sorry," he said, "I'm really sorry, I— I— just sort of lost track of the time. I'll be dressed in five minutes—" "We'll go wait in the car," said his mama, who was handling the resignation end of things. Kit fled up the stairs before Helena would have a chance to get really started on the curiosity, now that she had a reason to think it was safe to be curious. Kit plunged around in his room getting undressed and redressed, hearing people head out the back door, hearing the car start. <What happened? How did I do that? Why did I do that? Since when do I fall asleep on Mars? What if my wizardry had failed?> But he didn't have answers for any of those questions. <This is so bizarre...> Dressed in cords and a shirt and the really nice jacket his mama had gotten him— which he hated but which he was hoping would confuse her out of being annoyed with him for the evening— Kit paused just long enough to return Carmela's hotcurler weapon to its usual place. Then he pounded down the stairs and was just heading out of the living room when the front doorbell rang. "I'll get it!" he yelled, and ran to the door. <Probably one of Helena's crowd. Who knew there would be so many of them?> He unlocked the door, pulled it open— — to find himself looking at Tom Swale. "Kit," Tom said. "We need to have a word." He looked grim. Sweat burst out all over Kit. "Uh, sure," he said, and went outside, pulling the front door closed behind him. "I was really expecting you to get in touch with me," Tom said, "or at least with Mamvish—" Kit flushed hot, then cold. "I left her a message. At least, I tried to. Her manual wasn't taking messages—" Tom stuffed his hands in his jeans pockets and looked at Kit with an expression of disappointment. "And then you went ahead," he said, "and called Ronan and Darryl, and went off to Mars. And there—" He shook his head. "I don't know if I can specifically characterize what you did as damage: it's too soon to tell. But you got involved with things that you actively should not have gotten involved with. At the very least, not without expert assistance! The minute that superegg sent out signals to those four other sites, you should have backed off and called for backup. You know that this has been a team effort from the start! There's too much riding on this for any one wizard to go off in some novel direction, no matter how good an idea he thinks it is, without consulting everyone else." He fell silent. Kit couldn't do anything but stand there in terrible embarrassment and wonder what he was going to hear next. "It's true what Irina told you the other day," Tom said. "Mostly, in the past, you've been able to depend on the sheer power of a relatively new wizard, and a certain talent for riding unfolding events, to get you out of Dutch. But this time, unfortunately, you've gone a little bit too far. The power that was let loose on Mars last night went right off the scale. And unfortunately, you and Ronan and Darryl don't seem to be good influences on each other as regards, well, exercising restraint in team situations. You're all too far into the loner column for that kind of thing to be easy for you." Tom rubbed his eyes. "Now locally, when small-scale personal wizardries are involved— all right, we can find ways to make exceptions for when circumstances allow. But when I have my supervisory levels come down on me and inquire why I'm allowing new wizards to plunge around unsupervised in an offplanet wizardry that could theoretically affect the viability of an entire species, I'm afraid I have to pass some of the pain around." He looked at Kit with a mixture of annoyance and disappointment. "I hate having to be in this position," he said, "but for the time being I'm going to have to ground you. I'm pulling your ability to transit off the planet. And I've specifically instructed Darryl not to assist you in this matter. When you're under supervision, when you come up with other more senior members of the team, that'll be a different issue. Your sympathy for the planet, your resonance with it, are unquestionably valuable to the project. And they'll make a big difference in the way we handle the situation as it unfolds. But for the time being, you're not going to be allowed up there alone." Kit couldn't do anything but nod glumly. "I understand," he whispered. But he didn't, really. An unrepentant something in the rear of his mind was shouting, <Not fair! It's just not fair!> "I have a lot on my plate today," Tom said, "so let's call this discussion complete for the moment. Just—" He looked hard at Kit. "Use this upcoming time to think, all right? I'm not suggesting that you go stand in the corner. You have other things to do here on Earth, and you can get into your manual and annotate the précis we got back of the events of yesterday. Will you do that?" "Yeah," Kit said. "I'll do it when we get back." "Right," Tom said. "I'll see you later." And he walked off down the street, vanishing into the early dusk. Kit stood there, staring down the street after him and burning with embarrassment. The restriction would show up in the manual next to his name: he could just imagine what Nita would think when she saw it. <And she doesn't understand,> he thought. <Not the way that Aurilelde would—> Then he stopped. <What?> Kit thought. <What's going on in my head?> There was no way to find out. The answer was on Mars... and he couldn't get there. Even trying would be hopeless. Kit remembered how hard Dairine had tried to break her ban, the time she'd been restricted to staying inside the Solar System for misbehavior. She'd come back furious, describing it "like hitting your head on a stone wall again and again. Except not just your head: all of you." And then she'd gone off to sulk. Kit was tempted to do the same, except there was no time: in the driveway, his dad was beeping for him to hurry up. After locking the front door, Kit headed around the side of the house to close the side door, then got into the car. His dad pulled out of the driveway, and everybody rode to the restaurant in that tight-faced fake good humor that means the whole family's trying to avoid taking out their annoyance on a single transgressor. The mood had broken by the time they got to the restaurant, but Kit found that he couldn't enjoy the evening. His mama had picked a place by the water in Bay Shore that had been in the same location for nearly a hundred years. The food was terrific, and the conversation loosened up and became positively fun, and Kit strained hard to not bring the others down by letting them notice how he was feeling at the moment. At this he succeeded pretty well. But all the time he kept imagining how his name was going to look in the manual with the notation 'DISCIPLINARY TRAVEL RESTRICTION' against it, and then he would blush with fury and embarrassment and have to work at covering it up all over again. Finally it was over and they went home, and Kit found that he was developing a case of indigestion. It was a big relief to get back up to his room and change out of his dinner clothes into some sweats. As he headed downstairs to see if there was Alka-Seltzer in the downstairs bathroom, Kit passed Carmela heading downstairs for something, too. She had her earphones in and was bopping to something inaudible on her iPod. As she met up with Kit, she paused and said, more loudly than he liked, "What's the matter? You look like somebody just stole your wand." "You have no idea," Kit said as he headed down the stairs. For some reason, Carmela's good mood infuriated him. He made and drank the Alka-Seltzer, then stomped back to his room, didn't quite slam the door shut behind him, and threw himself down on the bed. That was when the idea hit him, complete from beginning to end. Kit got up again, opened his door very softly, and made his way as quickly and silently as he could down the hall to Carmela's room. It wasn't someplace he usually ventured— not so much because of privacy issues as because it was his sister's room and therefore usually void of interest for him. However, there was something in there that, though he normally tended to ignore it, was now very much of interest indeed. The room was very tidy. This was yet another relatively recent development which Kit found peculiar; teenage girls' rooms were supposed to be a morass of clutter. But Carmela had become compulsive about putting everything in its drawer or on its hanger or shelf without fail. Sometimes he made fun of her for this. But today, just this once, it was useful. He crossed softly to the closet and opened it. It was full of clothes—much fuller than it had used to be: Carmela had caught the clothes bug only recently. Everything here was on its hanger, all perfectly neat. But there was also something else in this closet. Kit reached over to the bookshelf next to the closet and found there what he'd known would be there: a clone of the downstairs TV remote. At least it had begun its life that way, but now it had a lot more buttons on it than the original remote had. Kit knew what every one was for, as he had programmed them himself. Now he studied the various buttons, chose one, pointed at the back of Carmela's closet, and punched the remote. The back of the closet instantly went black, then flickered into light again— the random rainbowy moiré pattern of a commercial worldgate not yet patent but ready to be activated. At the forefront of the carrier pattern was the identifying brand of the Crossings' worldgate system, its famous logo of linked gate hexes prominently displayed with the notation in the Speech and several other languages, CROSSINGS INTERCONTINUAL WORLDGATING FACILITY, RIRHATH B— DESTINATION ONE. Kit grinned and began punching coordinates into the remote. He knew what he was planning would fly in the face of the spirit of the ban Tom had imposed on him. <But he'll have to see,> Kit thought. <When I show him, when he understands what's at stake— he'll have to see why I can't leave this to anybody else. Nobody else has my perspective—> He punched the button again. The Crossings logo vanished, replaced by a long spill of coordinates. Under them appeared a single word in the Speech: <Confirm?> Kit punched the "go" button on the remote. The gate went patent. A second later he found himself looking at red-brown soil again, the cratered landscape, the hazy pink horizon, and, silhouetted against it, in the light of local sunset, a city of spires and gleaming metal. <All right,> Kit thought. He punched another set of buttons on the remote, locking the coordinates in storage for later. Then he hit the remote's off button. The gate flickered out, leaving nothing but the back of a closet full of clothes. Kit quietly put the remote back on the shelf, slipped out of the room, and shut the door. Later that evening, Nita was lying upstairs in bed with a throw over her, trying to relax and get some reading done, but finding it impossible. She had Mars on her mind. For about the twelfth time that evening, she pulled her manual over to her and had a look at her messaging section, but there was no answer yet to the note she'd sent Kit. <What is going on with him?> she thought. Idly she flipped back to the previous page of the messaging section, and her glance fell on Darryl's listing there. <I wonder,> she thought. She reached out and touched Darryl's listing: it blinked. "Yeah?" his voice said from the page. "Oh, it's you, Neets! Hi." "Hey, Darryl. How're you doing?" "Pooped," Darryl said. "And bruised. What a day." "Bruised? What, did you take a spill up there while you were running away from the movie monsters?" His laugh was rueful. "Wish I had," Darryl said. "It might ache less. I had a little visit from Tom a while ago." Nita blinked. "What?" "Yeah," Darryl said. "Looks like he and Mamvish and some of the Upper Ups weren't real pleased with what we were doing up there. I guess I can understand why, after the fact. But he was really steamed. I don't get to go up there again without other team members along, he says. Neither does Ronan. And he grounded Kit." Nita's mouth fell open. "No way!" "Oh, yeah," Darryl said. "Escorted visits only, and no other travel off the planet for the moment—" But Nita was already paging through the manual to Kit's listing, and sure enough, there was the red no-travel access flag. She was shocked. "Wow! He must be crushed—" "I wouldn't be surprised," Darryl said. "I <sure feel like an idiot. I can't believe I didn't think it through while we were up there. Though there didn't seem to be a lot of time to think; everything kept happening so fast..."> Nita was still shaking her head in disbelief. "Have you talked to him? How is he?" "No, he wasn't home. Didn't he have to go out or something?" "Yeah. They must still be out—" She rubbed her eyes. "Poor Kit! This is gonna make him crazy." "Yeah." Darryl sighed. "Look, Neets, I'm having some trouble with my own peeps. They're still uncertain about me going to Mars all by myself. I should get off—" "Sure," Nita said. "Darryl, thanks for letting me know. I hadn't even noticed." "Knowing Kit, he might be grateful for that... Don't beat him up too much, Miss Neets." "I won't. Talk to you later—" "Yeah," Darryl said. And his listing grayed out. Nita closed the manual. <Wow,> she thought. She closed her eyes for a moment. <Kit?> It was several moments before the answer came back. <What?> Her insides clenched. He sounded sullen and hugely hurt, and there was something else hanging over the back of his mind that Nita couldn't read and wasn't sure she wanted to— a strange sense of mingled frustration and fear. <Listen, I heard—> <Of course you did,> he said. <The entire planet has to have heard. Other planets, too. Every wizard who can read, anyway.> His anger was simply sizzling under his skin. <Look,> Nita said, <try not to take it so hard! You've been in situations like this before and you've come out okay—> <Oh, really? When have I ever been banned?> Kit nearly shouted. <And this is the worst time, the worst possible time. We didn't hurt anything. Nothing bad happened. I don't get why I have to be banned now! Kit, look—> <Yeah, but I'm sure you've got some good reason. Why don't you enlighten me?> Nita blinked at the nasty tone. <Kit,> she said, <I don't have any reasons. I don't know that much about what happened up there. You're the one who knows—> <Oh, yeah? You know about some stuff, all right. You know about Aurilelde. I saw you looking. I could feel it—> She had half been afraid of that: but she couldn't let herself be ashamed of what she'd done. <Kit, I was just worried about you. I had to make sure that you—> <—Weren't in some kind of trouble I couldn't get myself out of, is that the excuse? Well, I wasn't! I was fine! But I can't do anything by myself without you getting involved, can I? Watchdogging me all the time. Spying on me! Like you're jealous!> Nita's mouth dropped open. <Kit,> she said, <no way I would spy on you, I just—> <It just sort of turned out that way, huh? Sure, I believe that. You just can't cope with the idea that there might be somebody else in my life, somebody who's not a wizard, somebody you can't control—> She took a long breath, and another long breath, before saying anything further. But Kit said, <So just do me a favor and butt out, all right? Now that I'm nice and safe and grounded on Earth, you won't have to worry about me getting myself in trouble and needing to be rescued! So take a break, all right?> Just let me alone! And he cut the connection. Nita stared at the manual in complete astonishment. <What... was... that? It almost didn't even sound like Kit there in the middle.... Well, like him, yeah...> <...but not like him saying it. Not> really him. She lay there for some time, in shock. Other thoughts were roiling in her head: ideas that she'd previously dismissed as bad ones were starting to look not only good but necessary. <Yet if I do this, it will be exactly what he's accusing me of. I'll be spying on him.> Nita lay there for some moments more. After a while, almost reluctantly, the peridexis said, <I have the results of that persona analysis of Kit's experience with Aurilelde.> Nita raised her eyebrows. "Took you long enough!" <I warned you it would take some while. Even now some of the extrapolation is dubious.> Nita sighed. "Never mind. Show me what you've got." She closed her eyes. In the dark behind her eyelids, the analysis displayed, laid out like a sector of a spell diagram— not the full circle, but the chord and arc that expressed and described the important physical, mental, and spiritual aspects of the subject of the analysis. It was the person's wizardly signature, expressed in the Speech so that a spell into which it was inserted would include that person properly. Normally working this out could take quite a while: the utility was handy for last-minute work. Nita looked the signature over. The curved ribbon of it was spotted with dark empty patches, but the main structure was plain enough to read. As she looked it over, Nita felt some puzzlement. "This looks familiar..." she said. "Why does this look so familiar?" She peered more closely at the particular structure she thought she recognized, an intricately knotted string of Speech-characters. <Look at that, it looks just like—> <—just like the one in my signature—> Nita stared. The longer she looked, the more obvious it became that there were a lot of parts to this signature that looked like hers. <I would say perhaps forty percent,> the peridexis said. Nita opened her eyes and sat up. "How does that happen?" she whispered. And the thought came into her head: <Somebody's using things they found out about me to trap Kit.> "Bobo," Nita said after a few moments, "I hate this." <That,> the peridexis said, <closely reflects the sound of all wizards everywhere when making difficult but closely considered ethical choices.> "But I don't see that I have a choice," Nita said. "Too many lives depend on it. People on Earth, wizards who might get involved... even the Shamaska-Eilitt! If this goes wrong somehow, they're all in danger. At the very least there's going to be a lot of disruption on Earth. There could be riots. People could get hurt or killed. And there could be other effects I can't foresee." <You do have a choice,> Bobo said, <and you're about to tell me what it is.> Nita took a deep breath. "Bug him," she said. "Put a spinoff on Kit's manual's log like the one on Dairine's. I want the same kind of readout on his thought processes that Spot was giving Dad— the streaming consciousness." There was a silence. <I am required to remind you that there will be a 'final reckoning' payment when you decommission this wizardry, and the payment may be personally damaging if oversight determines the wizardry was not successful, or successful in the wrong ways.> "I understand," Nita said. And she swallowed. "Do it." <Done,> the peridexis said. She looked at the manual, ready to pick it up right away and see what it revealed. But she just couldn't bring herself to do it. <Tomorrow,> she thought. <Tomorrow morning. Wait for some content to build up and I'll look at it then.> But she knew that she wouldn't be eager to look at it in the morning, either.... It was two thirty-three in the morning when Kit finally worked up the courage to open his bedroom door and sneak down the hall toward Carmela's room. He knew it was two thirty-three because every minute, from about half past midnight on, he had been looking at the digital clock over on his desk and thinking, <Now. Now I'm going to do it. No, I'll wait a few minutes more— somebody might hear me...> Kit was heartsore. He was angry at Nita and knew that it was wrong for him to be angry at her, but he didn't want to stop. His guilt at what he was about to do was also terrible, though he hadn't done it yet. But stronger by far than either of these feelings was the sense that he had to get back to Mars: that if he didn't, terrible things were going to happen: that the fate of a people rested on what he did or didn't do. And even more important than that was the expectation of what he would do to a single heart up there, the imploring look in those eyes. <I can't let her down. I can't fail her. Not after all this time—> Nonetheless, sweat was trickling down Kit's back as he made his way down the hall to Carmela's bedroom door. <I am going to get in so much trouble for this,> he thought. But there was simply too great a compulsion to go through with this, to get back up to Mars and find out.... ...What, exactly? <Well, among other things, where did three hours of my life just go!?> He could remember the brief battle with the scorpions under the mountain, all right. The only thing Kit regretted about that was that he wouldn't be able to use the "curling iron" at any later date: the scorpions would be armored against it. Then he'd gone down into the pit and picked up the Shard, and then— what? He had awakened by himself on the cold mountainside, with a strange feeling that somewhere else, in a world or a time more real than this one, something more important than anything else was going on. But even as he regarded that, he got a sense that there were parts of Khretef's story, or their joint one, that Khretef hadn't been telling him. Something he was having trouble with— something he didn't want to come to grips with. And it was important— <Maybe something to do with him dying,> Kit thought, as he crept cautiously step by step down the hall. <Well, that would make me nervous, too.> But there was something else going on, he was sure. Part of it had to do with the Nascence, as Khretef had called it. The Nascence was part of the key to this world. With it properly awakened and energized, the City could make itself safe. And once they were safe, they could turn this world into a paradise— Kit stopped at that point in the hallway and stepped close to the wall between the door of Carmela's room and the bathroom. There was a board here that, if you stepped on it, would go off like a gunshot as soon as you lifted your weight off it again. Kit was intent on missing it. Carefully he edged down the hall, trying not to bear his weight too heavily on the floor. Once he was past the dangerous spot, Kit put a hand on Carmela's bedroom doorknob and very slowly and softly turned it. It wasn't locked, but then it wasn't usually. Kit eased the door open, just a crack, and peered inside, letting his eyes get used to the slightly darker conditions in her bedroom. He knew its layout quite well. The foot of Carmela's bed was near the door, which swung open to the left. All he had to do was edge in and close the door, then very softly move over to the closet door, feel just to his left for the shelf where the remote was, open the closet door, step in, and close it. Then he could use the remote to wake up the worldgate, and be gone. Kit slipped in through the door, then quickly and quietly closed it behind him so the light from the nightlight out in the hall wouldn't disturb Carmela. Once again he stood still, making sure he knew where he was and where everything else was. He looked toward Carmela's bed. From somewhere in the tangled lump of covers on top of it, a tiny snore emerged. Kit was suddenly, bizarrely reminded of Ponch... and he couldn't keep himself from letting out a soft sigh. <This would be so much simpler if he was still here,> Kit thought. <All I'd have to do is put his leash on, say 'Ponch? Let's go to Mars!' And three steps later, we'd be there...> But that couldn't happen now. Kit shook his head and silently tiptoed over to the bedroom closet. He put his hand up to the shelf on the left, felt around... and froze. <Where's the remote?!> From the bed came a rustle of someone turning over, covers moving and shifting. <Oh, please don't wake up right now!!> Kit thought. But it was easily thirty seconds before the rustling stopped coming from the bed, and the little snore resumed. Kit breathed again, though with difficulty. Once more he put his hand up to the shelf, felt around more carefully. Then he let out another breath, of relief this time, as he felt the cool plastic of the remote under his hand. <She just moved it further down the shelf, that's all...> He grabbed it, held it close to him, and reached for the closet door. It took him a moment to find the doorknob. Very softly Kit turned it and opened the closet door, slipped in, and eased the closet door closed behind him. It was a matter of a few seconds to wake the remote up, punch in the macro settings he'd laid into it earlier, and wake up the gateway to Mars. A few seconds later he was looking through the back of the closet at the gleaming city standing in the midst of that red-brown desolation. Just the sight of it suddenly left him feeling less like Kit. Suddenly he felt as if he was in a strange, closed-in place, being kept away from the one place that mattered to him most in the world, because Aurilelde was there. <Hang on, guy,> Kit thought, <don't get all fired up just yet. We'll have you there in a moment. And then you can start explaining to me what the heck is going on up there!> And he stepped into the gate— And found that he was still standing in front of it. <Now what the—!> Kit thought. He stepped forward again. Again he was prevented from going through the gate. <Oh, no,> he thought. <They've blocked this, too!> Frustrated, Kit reached out and put his hand up against the gate. But it went through. <Okay,> Kit thought, <so that's not the problem—>He pressed himself forward against the worldgate interface, very slowly. His face went through; his arms went through; he could see what was on the other side, feel the cold of the Martian atmosphere against his face. But he couldn't go farther. Something about chest-level was stopping him. Kit backed up, realizing what it was. His manual wouldn't pass. It knew he was banned, and it wasn't going anywhere. Kit cursed under his breath. There was nothing he could do for the moment but reach into his jacket pocket, take out the manual, and very slowly and carefully bend down to leave it leaned up against the inside wall of Carmela's closet, where it would be unlikely to get kicked through the gate by accident. <It'll be safe enough here.> He pulled out his antenna-wand, stuck it experimentally into the gate: it at least passed. <So I won't be unarmed. And I'm still a wizard— it's not like the manual is required on the road.> But all the same Kit felt unnerved at the thought of going to another planet equipped only with the very basic set of spells he had memorized: life support and so forth. Getting back wouldn't be a problem: he'd programmed the gate to produce an automatic portal for him three hours from now, picking him up at the border between the City of Shamask and the Martian wilderness. <I'll be back before anyone even knows I'm gone... and if I get into some kind of trouble, I can always yell for Ronan or Darryl, or even Neets.> But any thought of what might cause such a need, or of the explanations he would make to the others regarding what he was doing and why, seemed very far away. Right now the imperative of getting to Mars overrode everything else. In the back of his mind, Khretef was fretting, worrying, desperate to get back. Aurilelde needed them, needed him, before the trouble started... and Khretef seemed very sure that it would start. He also seemed very sure that they were—he was— was the only one who could stop it. <We stopped it once before,> Khretef's voice said in the back of his head. <But we can't linger. We need to get going!> Kit nodded, let out one last breath of nervousness and guilt, passed through the gate, and the closet went dark behind him. Nita came down for breakfast the next morning feeling very wrung out and weary of mind, for reasons she couldn't fully understand. Granted, there'd been a lot going on lately, and the seemingly endless drudgery of the end of the school year had been wearing her down. And now there was this craziness with Kit as well. <Banned. I can't believe it. What's the matter with him?> Coming down the stairs, Nita suddenly found herself thinking, as she'd kept finding herself doing lately, about Ponch. Obviously Kit missed him most of everybody, but it was difficult, sometimes, to look at Kit and realize that that constant, black presence was not ever again going to appear galloping along at his side. <We've been losing so much stuff lately,> Nita thought. <This has not been a great year. First Mom, then Ponch...> She sighed, thinking of how she had heard her mom say sometimes that "these things come in threes." <Well, I hope they don't! Two's more than enough for me, thanks. Especially if losing Ponch is part of what's left Kit acting so weird. What are we going to do about him?> In the kitchen, she yawned and put the kettle on to make tea. <Listen to you,> she said to herself. <So depressed, and the day hasn't even started yet! It's probably blood sugar.> It was true that over the past couple of days she hadn't been eating well: there'd been too much going on. <Really need to do something about that.> She leaned back against the kitchen counter, waiting for the water to boil. It was just beginning to produce its pre-boil rumbling when Dairine came wandering into the kitchen in one of those shin-length Tshirts she favored. "You're up early," Nita said. Dairine yawned, then looked at Nita with vague annoyance. "Unlike some people, who have a half day today for the completely unfair reason that they're older than me," she said, "I have school this morning. But if I get a head start on some of the things I need to do, I can leave early and get back to Wellakh." Nita nodded, turning her attention back to the kettle. "So things are going okay?" "Dad's lightened up, if that's what you mean." She opened the fridge and got out a quart of milk, then started foraging in one of the cupboards for cereal and came out with a box of her preferred oaty loops. "Good," Nita said. Dairine threw her an oblique look. "When I'm working... how much is he seeing of what's going on?" Nita felt inclined to shy away from the question, but that would cause more trouble later. "Go ask him to show you. It's physical stuff mostly: movements, video." She raised her eyebrows at the slowness of the kettle and reached over to turn the stove up higher. "He's interested, but not in an unhealthy way. So however you've been handling the content with him, you're doing good." Dairine nodded, got down a cereal bowl from the cupboard, and poured the bowl almost entirely full of oat loops. "How are you planning to fit any milk in that?" Nita said. "Magic," Dairine said. "Back in a moment." Dairine wandered out through the kitchen again, heading back upstairs to her bedroom. The milk carton that she'd left poised in midair now popped itself open, tilted, and started pouring milk into the cereal. Nita watched this minor demonstration of expertise with interest, waiting for the milk to overflow: but it didn't. The cereal in the bowl rose just high enough for some of the little oat o's to teeter at the bowl's edges without actually falling out. <She's good,> Nita thought, amused. <Can't take that away from her...> Dairine came thumping down the stairs again and appeared in the dining room completely dressed, with her school backpack thrown over her shoulder, and her manual and a copy of <Three Men in a Boat> in one hand. "Oh, and by the way," Dairine said as she came back into the kitchen and grabbed the milk carton out of the air, closing it and shoving it back into the fridge, "there's a dinosaur in the backyard to see you." Nita stared at Dairine as she slammed the refrigerator door shut, dislodging a few of the magnets stuck to the outside of it. "What?" "A dinosaur," Dairine said, stooping to pick up the magnets and put them back on the fridge door, then fumbling around in the silverware drawer for a spoon. "Really big lizard? Goggly eyes? Skin all lit up in fluorescent colors like someone who's really pissed off about something? That kind of dinosaur." "Oh, my god," Nita said, and ran toward the back door. "Oops—" She ran back to the stove, shut off the heat under the kettle, and then plunged outside. Sure enough, at the rear end of the backyard, there was Mamvish, crouching in the spell-shielded area under the sassafras saplings and the big wild cherry tree. "Mamvish!" Nita said. "Dai stihó! What's up?" "Apparently," Mamvish said, fixing one eye so intently on Nita that it actually held still, "your friend Kit. What's he doing on Mars?" She stared. "What? He can't be on Mars. He's banned." "Exactly," Mamvish said. The colors under her hide swirled neon-bright. "He shouldn't be there at all. Yet somehow he is. Would you care to explain?" The nearest eye was trained on her very hard. Nita's own eyes went wide. "What?" she said. "Are you suggesting I helped? I knew he was grounded! No way I'd take him up there: you think I'm crazy?" "I have to ask," Mamvish said, "because you're his partner. You two are quite close, and have been through some... well, let's say some extraordinary experiences together: experiences that might tempt one of you to break the rules for the other's sake." Nita shook her head, hardly knowing what to say. <Close, yes, but this close? No!... Well, maybe yes! But not this time.> And that obscurely pained her. She gulped, trying to get some control over herself. "Mamvish," Nita said, "look, sure, sometimes he's gone off the rails and I've gone after him to pull him back on. But he's done the same for me. Anyway, if you think I took him to Mars, I didn't! I didn't even know he was banned till last night, and I haven't heard from him since then. And now he's— Where is he??" "Since you two are normally so close," Mamvish said, "I'd hoped you might be able to give me a better idea, as we're having difficulty locating him precisely. His location is being obscured by local factors—" Nita scowled. "I just bet it is..." Mamvish turned to stare at her with the other eye. "Do you know something I should know?" "Probably yes," Nita said. "But it would help a lot if you can stop assuming I'm guilty before I can explain my innocence!" Mamvish looked stricken. "I'm sorry," she said. "Terrible changes have begun up there, and I'm on my way to deal with them, but it's no excuse for me to deal unfairly with you. Come along and tell me what's been happening. You're saying you don't know how Kit got to Mars?" Nita shook her head. "Unless one of the guys took him— But Darryl said he wouldn't do that." "As did Ronan," Mamvish said. "Then unless he—" Nita shut her mouth as the idea came to her. "Oh, my god. Carmela's closet!" Mamvish looked at her strangely. "A closet? That's some kind of room in your house?" "Not my house. Kit's. His sister— you remember, she was at the Crossings when that trouble broke out? The Crossings administration gave her a spinoff worldgate as part of her compensation. It's strictly mechanically managed. I guess if Kit used it—" Then she shook her head. "We don't have to stand here guessing: we can find out from Kit's manual. Let me get mine and I'll tell you what's going on." "Good," Mamvish said. "Hurry. And when we're there, be ready to help, because this is likely to be difficult—" Nita burst out in a sweat on hearing a wizard of Mamvish's experience and power levels saying that something was likely to be difficult. "Sure, half a sec, let me go get my stuff—" She was running toward the house when her father came out and met her halfway by the backyard gate, peering over it and down toward the end of the backyard. "Okay," he was saying to himself as Nita ran up to him, "she wasn't exaggerating. A dinosaur. Nice color scheme; didn't know they came like that." He looked at Nita. "Please tell me it's not an herbivore. I just got the new peonies planted out..." "I don't know about the peonies," Nita said, "but when we get back you'd better hide the tomatoes." She started to push past him. He stopped her and handed Nita her backpack. "That white wand of yours," he said, "your manual, your phone, a sandwich. Sorry, there wasn't time for a Thermos. I'll call school if you're late. Mars again?" "Mars!" she said, grabbing the stuff from him, kissing his cheek, and running back down the yard to where Mamvish waited. As she went, Nita could just hear him mutter, "…Wonder what the real estate prices there are like?" Seconds later, they were there. Nita's breath went out of her again, the sheer range of Mamvish's power taking her once more by surprise. The problem was that the Mars where they now stood, outside the City of the Shamaska, was not quite the one Nita had been expecting. Yesterday, the city through which she had walked had been an ephemeral thing—plainly a construct of wizardry, partly resurrected from the deeps of time, partly from fiction and illusion. This, however, was a city standing proudly out in view for anyone to see—including any number of satellites, and telescopes, and whatever else might be looking this way. And there was air here: thinner than Earth's, but breathable. Streams were flowing through the red landscape, and they were real— "This wasn't here yesterday," Nita whispered to Mamvish. "Or not like this." "Not in the present, you mean," Mamvish said. "A memory? A reconstruction?" Nita was unsure about the fine distinctions and now was wishing she'd bugged Kit's manual a lot sooner. "It wasn't just Kit's imagination," Nita said as she looked around, "or his memories. Someone else's, too..." And then she stopped. Mamvish... had changed. Suddenly the giant saurian was gone. In her place was a giant ten-legged creature, also faintly saurian-looking and big enough for a number of humans or large humanoids to ride on in a line, for the length of the "wheelbase" was considerable. A long, high neck and small fierce-toothed head; blunt, flat feet somewhat like a camel's, good for running on the legendary Martian sands; a long, straight deinonychus-like tail for balance— Nita had to rummage around in memory for the name of the creature: it had been a while since she'd read the Burroughs books. <A thoat. She's turned into a thoat. Well, that's weird! But she doesn't look concerned...> Mamvish looked sideways at Nita. "The other Kit?" Nita shook her head. "It's like there was an earlier version of him." "A more ancient incarnation?" "Not sure. You should check what I got out of his manual." Mamvish's eyes shifted to and fro for a moment. Then she looked at Nita with some concern. "What you've done to his manual," she said, "is very creative... and potentially very expensive." "I know." They started walking down the white road toward the City. "I'm not wild about it, either." "And a reincarnation it may indeed be," Mamvish said, "though not in the usual style. More of an archive function, though it needs closer analysis." She didn't say anything for a moment as they walked along. Then she glanced at Nita again. "But you're also thinking that he's involved with someone who's another version of you?" Nita grimaced. "I don't know about involved..." <Oh, yes, you do,> said the back of her mind. "He was— He was definitely attracted to her." The look in the eye on that side of Mamvish's new, smaller head was unreadable. But now she gazed forward at the city again, noting the water and the blueness of the sky. "This effect is spreading," Mamvish said. "Detailed analysis is going to have to wait. For the moment—" The whole of her hide blazed with Speech-symbols, swirling, burning. Mamvish gestured with her tail, and the fire of the symbols ran out of her, through the ground, straight out to the horizon, and seemingly up to the sky, running straight to the zenith. Sky and earth flared briefly: then the spell-flare vanished. Nita stared at Mamvish as the spell expired. Mamvish was eyeing the ground with a dubious expression. "Interesting," she said. "Some resistance—" She waved her tail. "No matter," Mamvish said. "Come. They know we're here now. But for the time being, no one on Earth will see what's happening." They started walking again. Nita stared at Mamvish. "You just put a visual shield around the entire planet? "It's going to take some holding," Mamvish said, sounding aggrieved. "There's resistance. And there shouldn't be. But I thought this would get more complicated before it became less so. Let's go see what these people think they're doing." They continued their walk up the broad, paved way toward the city gates. About halfway there, Nita started feeling undressed. She looked down at her sweatshirt and jeans— Or where they should have been. They were a lot less "here" now. It wasn't that the ornaments and delicate draperies, the gems and gleaming precious metals weren't pretty in a very exotic way. But for Nita, the thought of anybody seeing her dressed like this, especially Kit, immediately brought on a blush. Mamvish glanced at her. "What's the matter?" "I, uh—" Nita grabbed at what was draped around her hips and passed for a skirt, at least in places. It was hard to get hold of, more like being dressed in faded blue-denim fog than anything else— and its opacity was subject to change without notice. "This isn't exactly, I mean, it's not what I usually—" "Oh, come on, Nita," Mamvish said as she ambled along, "it's their reality... for the moment. We must play here if we're to win here. What is it your people say? Snort it up?" "Suck it up," Nita said, and suited the action to the word, pulling in her stomach. <It only hangs over a little bit,> she thought. <And the top doesn't really look that bad. If there was just a little more fog between the metal bits, it might actually —> "You need to stop allowing yourself to get so self-absorbed," Mamvish said as they got closer to the gates. "You're a wizard! You should be well past the point in your practice where body taboos are an issue. You've been off-world enough now, spent time on the High Road: act the dignity of your role and stop looking like a nervous teenager!" I am <a nervous teenager!> Nita thought. But she said nothing more for the moment, just concentrated on trying to walk tall. Her mother always used to say to her, <When you're embarrassed, make yourself taller. It covers.> <And the covering,> Nita thought as she tried to get rid of the last vestiges of panic, <is exactly what I need about now!> The chilly wind was playing with the long, diaphanous draperies about her hips, and no attempt of Nita's would get them to lie down. Finally she gave up trying. She had everything she needed. What had happened to the sandwich she wasn't sure, but her manual was in a little pouch hanging on the right side of her low-slung belt, and her wand was in an elaborately chased metal sheath on the left. <And Mamvish is right. I'm a wizard. Clothes don't make any difference to that!> Though she was left uncertain whether the goosebumps she was suffering were due to the clothes or her emotional state . . Mamvish paused. "What is it with the gravity here?" she said, shuffling her feet and glancing around her. "I don't feel quite right. Synesthesias of some kind..." Nita stopped and gave her a look. "What?" "I don't know what's causing it," Mamvish said, "but it's as if—" She looked down at her feet. Her mouth dropped open. Her eyes wiggled as if they were trying to go around. Nita, caught off guard, tried to choke down her laughter, and failed. "Wait a minute. You mean you didn't notice? A growl started rumbling somewhere inside Mamvish. "What—am— I?" "You're a thoat. They're—" <Oh, god, how can I say it? Never mind, just look at her face—!> "In the stories, they're a beast of burden. Not very smart. People ride them..." The growl got louder. It took Nita a few moments to get control of her laughter. "Come on, Mamvish!" Nita said. "You ought to be past being shape-proud by now! A wizard like you has the power to look like anything she wants, and you ought to know the seeming's not the self." She started snickering again. "So act the dignity of your role. Snort it up!" The thoat-eyes could be surprisingly expressive. They flared with annoyance, and then there was a brief flurry of furious tantrum-based foot-stamping, even more impressive with all a thoat's legs than with Mamvish's own. Dust flew up from the pink-white Martian road until it almost concealed her. "This is so embarrassing, what if anybody ever hears about this, some kind of gratuitous insult, do they even know why I, how can this possibly, why do I even bother, don't these people know why I—" Nita turned away, as there was no point in Mamvish being made worse by watching Nita fail to control her grin. <Increasing entropy locally is bad, bad, bad. She's a baby wizard still; don't laugh, don't laugh...!> Nita got control of herself long before Mamvish did. But finally the stomping and muttering stopped, and Nita turned back to see Mamvish staring morosely at her thoat feet. "I suppose," she said, "it wasn't meant personally." <And what will she do if it ever turns out it was? I'm tempted to tell her... No, no, no!> Nita kept her face straight. "Wouldn't know how it could be," she said, which was true. "Hmmmmmfffff," Mamvish said, a huge blown-out exclamation of resignation and annoyance. Then she put her head up high. "Work to do," she said. "Let's go do it." "Bobo," Nita said as they got closer to the city, "what about your tap on Kit's manual? Is there anything about what's going on in there?" <The tap is not active at the moment: he could not bring it with him because of the ban. But there is some stored material that he was considering before he came. Information about persons, motivations...> "Let me have it all! And hurry up." Nita quickly found herself blushing hot in increasing discomfort as she browsed through entirely too much of Kit's recent stream-of-consciousness. <But this is gonna be very useful, I can't deny that... even if this really is not stuff I want to be seeing...! Never mind, just make the most of it—> Shortly they came up to the great sheer metal gates and stood there for a moment, looking upward. The gates remained obstinately closed. "Maybe they don't know we're coming..." Nita said. But immediately after she said it, she was certain that wasn't true. "Oh, they know," Mamvish said. "I can hear them." She flourished her thoat-tail. "So let's go see how this will proceed." And the next second, they were standing in a high Tower room where light poured in from the pink-white sun overhead, and white clouds chased across that blue sky. And in the center of the room stood three people around a broad red sandstone bench: and a fourth one sat there on the bench, wearing at her throat a sharp oblong Shard of light burning fiercely violet even in the full light of day. Gathered all around the sides of the great circular room were many men and women in the metal harness and light draperies of the Shamaska-Eilitt. All their dark eyes were turned to Mamvish and Nita as they walked up to the bench-throne, and Nita found it very strange to pass among them— like walking through a congress of living, breathing statues in all shades of gray, and all the faces smooth and immobile. Here and there among them were the green metal scorpions, sitting or crouching against the polished floor, watching the newcomers with all their eyes, scissoring their claws gently together. But most of Nita's attention was on the Throne. There was Iskard, and the dark Rorsik behind him, at a little distance, watching with a cold face; and standing next to the bench-throne, Khretef. <Kit!> Nita insisted to herself: and she spoke to him silently. <Kit!> But he was gray and stony, dressed like one of them, looking like one of them, except that he looked like Kit as well. His eyes didn't react to hers when she looked into them: she was just another stranger walking in. And on the Throne sat Aurilelde, with the violet-blue fire of the Shard clinging to the smooth gray flesh above her gemmed metal bodice— and about her, an echo of its glow that was coming from something else, something inside her, the faintest possible rosy light— <Oh, no,> Nita thought. <Mars's kernel. She's got the planet's kernel inside her. How long has that been there? And whose good idea was that?!> But as her glance went to the smug and triumphant-looking Rorsik, she thought she knew. Mamvish stopped about six feet from the Throne and lifted her head. "In the Powers' names, and that of the One They serve," she said, "we are on errantry, and we greet you." Some of those around the room bowed, but many looked at Mamvish and Nita with distrust, and the four around the Throne didn't move at all. Finally, Iskard said, "Fellow wizard, tell us what errand brings you here so that we may speed you on your way." Nita's eyebrows went up, for in the Speech the response had so little genuine greeting in it that it nearly translated as "Don't let the door hit you in the fundament on the way out." Mamvish blinked in reaction. Then she said, "On the Powers' behalf and as Species Archivist for this part of the Galaxy, I've come to investigate your appearance on this world, which has been vacant for some while under circumstances which we're investigating. Instances of self-archiving are also within my remit for investigation. Am I to understand that you are descendants of the people of Shamask-Eilith, formerly of this system and also called the First World?" "We are not those people's descendants," Rorsik said, sounding outraged. "We are those people." "You have, however, built or engineered new bodies for yourselves, to better suit yourself to this world when you reached it." "Such was our right," Iskard said. "A species has the right to survive." "But not to interfere with another species' survival," said Mamvish. "You must be aware that there is another planet in this system populated with life forms wearing bodies similar to the ones you've engineered for yourselves." "We know that perfectly well," Rorsik said. "You should also know, then, that that culture is both astahfrith>— generally unaware of wizardry— and asdurrafrith. It was the Speech-word for a species that hadn't yet openly met alien species or didn't yet believe in them. "The works you're enacting here at the moment—I speak of the extensive resurrection of former environmental conditions across the planet— endanger the psychological and physical well-being of that planet. Do you accept that?" "We not only accept it," said Rorsik, "but we embrace it. The other planet is no concern of ours. If they are not strong enough to accept the return of the People of the First World to the system where we were the First Life, then they should learn such strength. Or possibly vacate that world in favor of a people better suited to occupy it." Nita blinked, unable to believe what she was hearing. "Kit," she said. "Listen to them! They're talking about invading the Earth! What are you doing here with these guys? Khretef shifted uneasily but said nothing. Aurilelde looked at Nita with what was supposed to look like understanding, but Nita didn't miss the slight edge of contempt in the expression. "He came to us first because I called him," she said. "Because he was a fragment, as this was once a fragment"— she touched the Shard that lay between her breasts— "and is now reunited with the kernel from which it was severed. For a long time the test lay waiting, while all of us and our cities lay in stasis, and while Khretef's soul waited and worked to be reborn. Finally he was. And sure enough he found his way here along with others— my hero, my warrior, my other half— and took the test, and freed the power that we needed to be alive again." She looked up at him and took his hand. "As Kit, he finished the quest that once was his bane: broke open the Nascence and brought home the Shard, the tool to use the Nascence's power." Nita folded her arms, getting more annoyed by the moment at Aurilelde's manner. "There were more tests than just that one. And not just for boys." "Those were of no concern to me," Aurilelde said. "Knowing what daughters of another world might make of the ancient Daughters' tales of past years mattered far less than finding the male wizard in whom our savior would lie hidden. Only to him and his kind would the real tests present themselves... especially to the right one. And now that he has come again through him, we all live once more. And he lives as Khretef." She smiled up at him. Khretef smiled back, which Nita found hard to bear. But she looked Aurilelde in the eye. "So nothing we found matters, huh?" she said. "Even the Red Rede—" For a second Aurilelde's expression changed, as if she was at a loss. "You don't know what it means," Nita said. "Or not all of it. You think you do, though. You've convinced yourself that you understand it. I wouldn't be so sure." Then she stopped, because she had no idea what she'd meant by that and was desperate not to be asked. Aurilelde forced that superior smile again. "The Rede is no issue to me," she said. "Or our people. All that matters is changing this world so that we can live in it again." "So," Mamvish said, "you will not stop." Slowly Aurilelde stood up, looking at them. Nita was watching the Shard. <Has that dumped its power into the main body of the kernel now,> she wondered, <or is it just immaterially connected? If somebody could grab it—>But Aurilelde was laughing. "Stop? We will do no such thing! We've spent enough terrible endless years waiting trapped half alive in the cold and dark, waiting to be freed in a better time. That time has come! And if you think an overgrown slessth and a scrawny bad-mannered brat-child who was never even off her own planet until a few years ago are going to stop the rebirth of a mighty race that ruled this system hundreds of millions of years before your planet was even solid, then you'd better think again." Nita's eyes narrowed. "One last time," she said. "Before we start dealing with you, I want to talk to Kit." Aurilelde simply squeezed Khretef's hand, then smiled at Nita. "But you still don't understand, do you? He returned to us as soon as he was able to, some hours ago... and as soon as that happened, he was absorbed." She smiled up at Khretef again. "The more senior soul always has priority in any such meeting. It didn't take much doing: he was young and inexperienced, and not as wholly there as either of us are." She looked at Nita with what was perhaps meant to be kindness. "If you really want so to be with him," she said, "maybe you should consider submitting yourself to the same fate. I dare say I could fit you in somewhere." Nita flushed with fury. But she knew what to do with that. "Don't count on it," she said. "And why wouldn't I? Surely you can see my Khretef far exceeds the incomplete fragment you've fastened onto! He's a child of the First World, a warrior, a great wizard, greater than anything you or your poor Kit would ever have been. You two are just poor shadows. Khretef and I are the substance, the originals. And Khretef lived for me. He died for me! Whereas your little Kit seems merely to have been saved from dying for you once or twice. Sometimes even by you—" Nita looked at Aurilelde and concentrated on holding still. "If you think you're holding some kind of moral high ground because somebody's died for you," she said, her voice shaking, "I've been there, and what you're displaying now looks nothing like it. And as for the possibility that I might want to make up any part of you—" She laughed. "That's not going to happen. So turn him loose, and then we'll talk about what happens to this planet." Aurilelde regarded her quietly. "No," she said after a moment, "if that's your response, the talking's over. So, to wreak aright—" She made a casual gesture at Nita. And the world upended itself around Nita and dumped her on the ground— In desperate cold and freezing vacuum. Nita had just sense enough to instantly close her eyes and let out the breath she was tempted to hold. Then she got her life-support force field working again, just before something else happened all around her: a shudder, a strange feeling of change and negation— She took an experimental breath, found that there was air, opened her eyes. She was sitting on red-brown dirt, out under an early morning sky. <Why does this look familiar?> she thought. She stood up, brushing herself off, and looked around. <Morning, and still pretty early in the sol,> she thought. <That puts me, let's see—> Nita glanced toward the southern horizon and froze. Between her and the pale, pinky Sun, something was rising up that filtered and dimmed that light. It was a wave, easily a hundred feet thick in this gravity, and easily a mile high. Up and up it reared, taller by far now than the mountain, even at that distance leaning up over Nita, leaning farther out, the great sparkling arch of it stretching out over the top of the crater basin and shadowing the mountains in it like a vast, downward-curving smoked-glass roof. The distant Sun was caught in the oncoming wave, flickering, flaring brighter briefly as the water sporadically lensed its light. <When the water burns—> But the Sun was struggling to shine now, the thickness of the wave obscuring it as it grew, putting it out. From what seemed a million years ago, she heard a scratchy bird voice, the voice of a scarlet macaw, saying: <Fear death by water!> <Oh, no,> Nita thought. <Oh, no. That dream... it wasn't a dream.> <It's now.> [ Aurorae Chaos ] Nita looked southward across the vast impact basin at the oncoming wall of water. <There's enough water frozen on Mars to flood the whole planet thirty feet deep,> she remembered Kit telling her so many times that she had to threaten him with whacking to make him stop. <Now you could repeat it fifty times in a row and I wouldn't care,> she said to Kit, wherever he was, <as long as it was really you saying it!> But right now she had a more serious problem, because a significant portion of that water was apparently coming right at her. "Bobo," Nita said. "What is this I'm standing on?" <Oceanidum Mons,> Bobo said. <It's not far from where you were before: toward the southwestern side of Argyre Planitia—> <Oh, no,> Nita thought. <Then I didn't come here because the kernel had been here before. I came here because this was going to happen, and I saw it was coming. Because I was going to be here. Or supposed to be here— if there's a difference—> <And something else that was going to be here?> Nita thought. <Or supposed to be here? The lake that was here before. And here it comes...> "Well, screw it," Nita said. "If she thinks I'm going to hold still for this, boy is she wrong!" She reached down to her charm bracelet for a transit spell, started to recite it with some changes— — and found herself being blocked. <Okay,> Nita thought. <Shield-spell!> She started to enact her usual one— It was blocked, too. Nita blanched. "Bobo, what's going on?!" <Someone managing the planet's kernel,> Bobo said, <is disallowing the wizardry locally.> "Can she do that??" <Unfortunately,> Bobo said, yes. Nita went hot with fury. <She wants me dead!> she thought. <And she wants me to stand here and watch it coming. That complete and total bitch!> It wasn't that various Powers and principalities hadn't tried to kill Nita over time. But this was somehow much more personal, much more offensive, because she'd really been trying to understand this other person, only to have the understanding completely rejected... or used against her. Now Nita's rage was starting to boil over, and she did her best to get control of it— because it would be really useful, just so long as she did stay in control. Nita breathed out and tried to get a grip. "Where's Mamvish?" she said. <Not on the planet,> said Bobo. <She appears to have been forcibly removed. Possibly her return is also being blocked.> She swore under her breath. <I'm on my own, then,> Nita thought. <But boy, if I'd realized kernels were this powerful, I'd have studied them even harder than I did...> Nita watched the water coming, lifting higher, the wavefront bulking up and up as the water flowing into existence behind it pushed it higher in the light gravity. She shook her head, awed. <This would be one of the coolest things I ever saw,> Nita thought, <if it wasn't going to kill me.> She had maybe two minutes to figure out what to do, find a spell that would do the job, implement the spell, and turn it loose... and then, ideally, recover from it and get the hell out of here. The wave was closer, climbing the sky. "Bobo, she can't disallow all wizardry here, can she?" Nita said. <No. That would require power levels similar to Mamvish's. The blockage involves any transit or defensive spell.> "Okay, let's go on the offensive. Water magics..." <I have the ones you've been researching recently,> Bobo said. <And all the other ones there are.> <Some of which probably look real impressive but might not work for me.> The sweat was breaking out on Nita. <Where do I begin?> And then she remembered sitting on the jetty with S'reee the other morning, which now seemed about a million years ago. <You should talk to Arooon,> S'reee was saying. <He knew Pellegrino...> Nita gulped. "Bobo," she said. "The Gibraltar Passthrough wizardry—" <This is insane. But with all the insanity running around, what's a little more?> There was a pause. <A big piece of work,> the peridexis said. <And the conditions here are very different.> "Yes, they are," Nita said, "because the gravity's a lot less here! And look at it. All these highlands—" She stared around her. "This is perfect. It's like the underwater terrain where Pellegrino designed the spell to be used! And I don't have to control the whole body of water, just what's coming at me!" She grinned, briefly feeling fierce. "Aurilelde thinks I'm stuck here; she's sure I can't gate out; she's counting on me not to be able to react in time—" Another pause. <Fueling it,> Bobo said, <is going to cost you.> "Being dead is going to cost me, too!" <Point taken.> But Bobo still sounded extremely concerned. "This is what you've been wanting to do for me," Nita said, "so get on with it. It's a big spell diagram. Lay it out!" A second later the diagram was burning in lines of light all over the top of the massive tableland where Nita stood. "Big" didn't begin to sum it up. But Nita didn't let the size of it freak her: there was no time. She looked it over quickly and located the control nodes, as well as the specific lines and chords of the spell that needed her own name information written out along them. As she went to them, stepping carefully so as not to interrupt the design, Nita saw her name and other personal information flash into fire along the lines. She stooped to check them: found them complete. Nita straightened up, saw the gigantic main wavecrest thundering closer. Lesser waves were running and splashing hugely along either side of the tableland. The memory of her previous visions of that wave was making her shiver. <But remember the cave,> she thought then. <You saw the scorpions get you once. And then you did something different, and it didn't turn out that way. Let it be that way now—> The water kept coming, vast, roaring low. The frontal main wavecrest was still miles off— but not for much longer: the low gravity meant it could move a lot faster than it could on Earth. <Maybe another minute,> Nita thought. <Let's go.> She walked to the middle of the spell. Away on its far side, almost exactly opposite her own name, she caught sight of another scrawl of characters in the Speech, in neither her own handwriting nor the peridexis's flawless printlike Speech-charactery. It was Angelina Pellegrino's signature, the autograph of the greatest hydromage of the last two centuries, a small, firm, elegant set of curves and curls. Nita, standing at the center of the circle, remembered how proud she'd been to discover that she, too, now had a spell named after her in the manual: that in however small a way, Callahan's Unfavorable Instigation now held the same kind of stature in the wizard's manual as a work of art like this, and had her signature on it. <And it won't be the last one,> she thought, watching that wall of water run at her. <Not if this works. Angelina, if you're around, watch this!> The core of the spell was laid out around the center, where Nita was standing. She started reading in the Speech, one eye on the approaching water, speeding up her reading as the main wave drew closer more swiftly than she'd ever thought it might. She read faster. <Don't panic; just get the spell finished, then get your mind in the right shape to let the water through and tell it which way to go—!> She read and read, faster and faster—<Two phrases left!>— as the inrushing wave towered higher and higher over her, as the Sun struggled its last against the tumbled-up dirt and stone trapped in the oncoming water, and the water on either side of the tableland rose higher and higher, and Nita was standing on an island in a raging sea. <One phrase left!>— as the main oncoming wave leaned over her like a curved glass roof, reaching out and out over her and the tableland and even the angry water beyond them. <Isn't light gravity neat? How can it possibly do that? It has to fall now, it has to, and here's the last phrase, five words, three, the last really long one—> The wave fell. And the wizardry leapt up at it from the tableland like a sword-edge of focused fire, splitting the wave vertically down the middle into two vast, downcurling sheets of water that fell crashing to left and right. Nita dropped to her knees as the energy went out of her in a blast like a fire hose. <Now I know why there aren't a lot of hydromages,> she thought as she pitched forward and supported herself on her hands, doing her best not to collapse, to stay conscious, because she had to stay conscious. Above her, the wizardry was pushing itself out into the body of water behind the split wave and curling into two gigantic tubular structures burning with light, each one finned inside with what the spell's précis had described as "tailored Venturi structures." Whatever those were: to Nita they looked like someone had taken the chambers out of a chambered nautilus and set the chamber walls around the tubes' walls in a spiral structure. The fins and the shapes of the tubes blazed as they lifted the water up and slowed it down, soaking up the fury of the extra energy that the tsunami had been about to dump on top of Nita and all the surrounding terrain. She was gasping for air now, having to concentrate harder on staying conscious, staying focused. The thought of Kit was helping. <He has to be in there inside Khretef somewhere. He has to! No way he'd ever just let himself be absorbed, no matter how smart a wizard Khretef might be. And as for Aurilelde—> Nita breathed out, breathed in, getting her second wind, feeling less shattered. <But I'm getting angry again.> She looked up at the wave, no longer a wave anymore but a long, sinking slope, filling the impact basin around her rapidly but not in danger of killing her. <She may have control of this planet's kernel,> Nita thought, <but she can't just keep throwing stuff like that at me. In fact she has to be suffering now, no matter how easy she tried to make that look. And control or no control, she's not a wizard—> Nita pushed herself up until she was kneeling upright again. The wave had sunk now almost to the level of the filling impact basin, and the whole huge space, at least the stretch of it that Nita could see from horizon to horizon, was full of water splashing back and forth like a bathtub in which the person submerged has moved too quickly. <It'll take care of itself now,> she thought. <The next stage will be ready to go in a few seconds. So get up and do the next thing before the reaction sets in. Hers will be setting in, too, and if you can push her into overloading herself before she understands what's happening—> Nita got her feet under her, staggered, steadied herself. "Bobo," she said. "I want to see them. And I want them to see me. And the area around me for about a mile or so." <Remote visioning? I can handle that.> "What's the energy outlay like?" <Against what you just did? Negligible.> "Do it." Nita stood as straight as she could. She didn't have to work at looking angry. A moment later, she was looking at the floor of the Scarlet Tower as if it were an island touching her own. All around it, the Shamaska stared at her in astonishment: and the four in the center were trying to maintain neutral expressions, and mostly failing. Aurilelde in particular was looking both horrified and enraged, and trying to cover it up. "Well," Nita said, trying to sound as snotty and unconcerned as Dairine could on occasion, "that was pretty lame." Aurilelde opened her mouth. Nita didn't give her a chance. "Yeah, yeah, impossible," she said. "Well, guess what, Miss Not-a-Wizard? Not impossible. And I am annoyed with you. Not Khretef, who is really Kit— Hi, Kit!— and not your poor dad; the One only knows which of you is running things, and I don't care. Not even Mister Rorsik behind you there; I don't know who he thinks he's running, and I don't have time to waste finding out. You dropped that wave on me and choked off transit and shield-spelling. So let's get serious." She glanced over her shoulder. Behind her, their initial stage completed, the massive twin tubes of the Pellegrino passthrough were now slowly rearing up behind her over the city like the graceful bodies of two gigantic serpents—the wizardly containment field no more than a thin, shimmering skin that looked like it could let go at any moment. "Earth's premier hydromage," Nita said, "spent nine years of her life designing this wizardry to move huge volumes of water around between two oceans, under precise control. And I mean precise—not like the big crude kindergarten-sandbox stunt you just tried. But then you're not a wizard, and having one telling you how to dump a bucket of water over somebody's head isn't the same as actually understanding what you're controlling. I, however, understand water because I work with it a lot. So you'd better believe me when I tell you that if you don't answer my challenge right now, I'm going to instruct one of the two ends of this wizardry to terminate right there in that room with you, and the other to terminate over the City of the Shamaska, and then I'll tell both of them to emit the same volume of water as you just dropped on me... with approximately a hundred times the force. The City will be destroyed. And as for you personally, your bodies may be tough, but I'm betting a lot of you will die. And even if you don't, how pleasant will the very few Shamaska survivors find life in this world when I've destroyed all your lovely, comfy tech, and your pretty city, and forced you to roam the surface of Mars digging up raw materials and building things from scratch?" The three men around the Throne looked nervously from Nita to Aurilelde. "You would never do such a thing!" Aurilelde cried. "You are a wizard— wizards cannot—" "Wizards can," Nita said. "Watch me! I told you, I am annoyed. You are screwing with life on my planet generally and my life personally... and I'm willing to pay the price for dealing with you once and for all. You want to prevent me smashing you and your little toy city all over the mountainside? Then you, Aurilelde, meet me right here, and you and I will have it out. You have a kernel. I have everything else. Let's find out who really rules Mars." And she grinned a nasty grin that she did not have to borrow from Dairine. "Should be fun." Then she allowed some scorn to show. "Unless you're scared, of course." Khretef was trying to stop her, but Aurilelde leaped to her feet, a murderous expression on her face. The white-hot fury would have looked astonishing on someone so young, except that Nita had Dairine for a little sister and was used to such displays. "I have no fear of you! You cannot take my world, or my Khretef, or my City—" "Actually, I can," Nita said softly. "Come down here and stop me... if you dare." And she turned her back on them. <Bobo? Kill it.> The view into the City vanished. Nita glanced at the passthrough wizardry. "How long will it hold there?" she said. <Approximately twenty-eight minutes. Then your backlash will kick in.> Nita rubbed her face, feeling the shakes starting, and tensed herself: she didn't dare let them take hold. "I need some height," she said. "She was able to stop local spelling partly because I was too close to the ground, where a kernel's power is most effective— close to the body of the planet. It'll be weaker up high. She'll be limited to exploiting magnetic fields and microgravity and wind and such, and she won't have had enough time to get proficient with those. I just need to wear her down and get close, and then—" <Physical confrontation?> "Crude and ugly," Nita said, "but though I hate to admit it, occasionally effective. So let's go skywalking." <Hi, Kit!> He had been dozing uneasily in the darkness, caught in a dream from which he couldn't wake and through which he couldn't sink into deeper sleep. But the words caught him out of the darkness, pushed him toward waking. He caught just a glimpse of the world through Khretef's eyes: the room at the top of the Scarlet Tower, the Shamaska people gathered there—and in the midst of it all a single non-Shamaska figure, slender, erect, and dangerous-looking. Over everything loomed vast twin serpents of water, poised and waiting on her word. He caught the gleam of her eyes, angry, but somehow still with a hint of amusement in the anger: everything under control, even though she was also deadly tired and scared. <Neets!> <Hi, Kit!> — the image shut down. Fear darkened everything around him. But at least he knew his name again. For a few moments there, he'd lost it. Kit looked around him in the darkness, hunting for a way out, for any ray of light. There was none. He might as well have been in a hole in the ground, the dirt shoveled in, tamped down.... <A grave. That's what this is like...> It was a freaky image, one he pushed away. <It's only if I accept it that I'm going to be stuck here,> he thought. Yes, it was hard to think: there was pressure all around him to give it up, let it go, no way out... and the darkness itself seemed to have weight. But time's weight wasn't enough to keep a wizard down, not unless he let it. And the weight of intention wasn't enough, either. <I've got some intention of my own—> As if in response, the darkness pushed down harder on him. But Kit had something to hold up against it: the image he'd just caught, the glimpse of Nita. <She's hot,> Kit thought in surprise. <Just how exactly have I failed to notice that Neets is hot?> Maybe it was because she didn't throw it around or make a weapon of it, the way some of the girls at school did, or tried to. Maybe it was because Kit was so busy just being her friend and not wanting to add anything extraneous to the equation. When the spell was already balanced, you didn't go hanging extra elements on it just because you could— <And maybe I was just a little bit chicken about it?> Kit thought. Because this admission would complicate things— no question about it. Maybe life was nice and comfy and safe without this complication, at a time when a lot of things had not been comfy or safe for either of them— so that Kit hadn't wanted to rock the boat. <And maybe that's why I've been giving Darryl and Ronan so much grief.> But the sight of her there, looking deadly— and extremely competent and wizardly and pissed off and, well, frankly, kind of magnificent— Kit blushed. Then he swore at himself. <Later for that. Right now we've got problems!> And there was somebody else besides Khretef who was part of the "we." The realization was strangely exciting. <Now all I have to do is get the hell out of here so I can be some use to her. Because I got her into this—> "You can't!" said a gigantic voice that was both Khretef's and his own—and for that reason, strangely difficult to argue with. "Too much is riding on it! The fate of our people, their past and their future—" <He's trying to drown you out,> Kit thought. <Don't let it happen. Stand up; get real; get focused. You still have a body. Even if you don't, fake it that you have a body!> Kit felt around him. For a scary few seconds there was nothing to be felt in the darkness. <Nothing's here, I'm not here—> <Cut that out! Yes, I am!> And slowly he felt a floor under him— or talked himself into believing there was one. <Which is it? Doesn't matter. Wizardry's about persuasion, and sometimes the one you've got to persuade is yourself. Let's go, floor!> It was there: he could feel it against his hands. He was sitting on it. Kit got his feet under him, got up. "Khretef?" he shouted. "This has got to stop!" "Yes, it does. At your end! Stop fighting it: let what's fated happen!" Kit clenched his fists as the pressure of the darkness came down on him again, and he braced himself against it. It was tough: he felt strangely hollow, as if he had no access to wizardry. "You don't," said that weird dual voice. "Your power is mine now... and it's being passed to someone who can make the best use of it." Kit's eyes narrowed. There were ways to do that legally: any wizard could act as power source for someone else's spell. But the procedure required consent. "No way!" he shouted. "I'm not playing this game!" "You consented when we blended a little while ago," said the voice. "Too late now. Why fight with yourself? It's over." The darkness kept pressing down, a physical force, hard to resist. But Kit flashed on something else— one of his gym teachers, Mr. Thorgesen, who'd been coaching him on weights this last semester. Kit had started out hating this part of gym but had suddenly realized that there was a skill involved, a matter of balance and leverage very like some acts of wizardry, and almost against his will he'd started to get into it. <And will's the issue—">It's not just a dead weight," Mr. T. kept saying. "Work out where the leverage is and use it to your best advantage—" "I'm not fighting with myself!" Kit said, pressing up, feeling for the points of leverage in the other's mind. And suddenly, in bizarre alliance with his gym teacher, it was Mr. Mack helping him here, too, helping Kit find the leverage point. <What matters is thinking yourself into those people's heads. Imagine how the world looked to them! Their lives, their troubles. That's how what they do starts to make sense—"I'm> me! And Nita's Nita! We are not just little fragments of you guys, like the Shard's a fragment of the kernel! We've got our own lives, and they're not yours! But you people are all about being fragmented and broken up. You see everything that way! And you really need to get past the blind spot, because you're ruining any chance for your own lives to be whole things that aren't broken!" For the first time Khretef didn't seem to have an answer ready. Kit could feel his uncertainty, like a splinter of light piercing the gloom. It actually was a splinter of light: the room in the Tower, right now, where Nita stood challenging the furious Aurilelde, and then vanished. "You've got it backwards!" Kit said as Aurilelde vanished too. "We're not the ones who're like you: you're the ones who're like us. We're what you could be if you weren't stuck in the past and in the middle of this dumb thing where your people hate each other! And your two sides have been hating each other so long, I bet you don't even remember what started it in the first place!" "That's nonsense!" Khretef shouted. And then for just a shocked second he was silent. The silence told Kit that Khretef couldn't find anything to say, and however screwed up he might be, Khretef was still wizard enough not to want to lie— "It's true, and you know it is!" Kit said, both sad for Khretef's people's sake and yet triumphant to know that his guess was true. "Whatever got you guys fighting, it's so long ago that you can't remember. Which means it also shouldn't matter anymore! And you've got the sense to see that. But Aurilelde doesn't! She's the one who scared you into trapping me in here, isn't she? And now she's going to take this mess through to its illogical conclusion. Lots of people on Earth will die when our world's status quo gets destabilized by what's happening here. The Eilitt and the Shamaska will keep right on killing each other. Everything will get worse. This isn't your dream of everything working out for the best. This'll be a nightmare. Put a stop to it, Khretef! Let me go!" There was a long, unhappy silence. "It's too late now," the voice said. "It's started..." The skywalking Nita had in mind didn't involve actual walking, as in the various exploits using hardened air. From the manual Nita had pulled a spell that persuaded local gravity to ignore her for a while, wrapping it around her like a blanket so that it dissolved into her body. Another price to be paid later— and not too much later. <I'll worry about that in half an hour,> Nita thought as she more completely undid gravity's effects on her mass and drifted ever more quickly upward. Normally this kind of spell was a fair amount of work, which was why wizards didn't overdo it. But she was in a hurry, and the effort would have a specific use in what she was doing... so Nita soared, and enjoyed it. <Since who knows how much time I'm going to have to enjoy afterwards?> She reached an altitude of about thirty thousand feet above Argyre Planitia and just hung there, savoring the view. High above her, Mamvish's cloaking spell was holding: it was too far above the planetary kernel's range for Aurilelde to interfere with it, and too powerful for Khretef or Iskard to alter, even if they wanted to. Down below, though... water, water was everywhere. It was stunning. Nita thought of how it would be someday when people from Earth or wherever started terraforming this terrain slowly and responsibly. When there was an atmosphere again, when there was enough heat held in to keep water liquid, enough to grow plants... she could imagine what it would look like. But even now the huge flow and rush of water across the landscape was beautiful. Chains of crater lakes flashed in the sunlight: water was rushing down the sides of Valles Marineris in waterfalls six miles high; the southern polar basins were flooding, flashing the Sun back in a bloom of light— —and a small, dark shape was suddenly there between Nita and the water, drifting closer, her veils of smoke and her smoky hair wreathing weightless around her up here in the almost-nonexistent air: Aurilelde. Nita let herself drift closer to Aurilelde, holding out her hands, ready. Normally she didn't believe in grandstanding during her spells, and dramatic gestures weren't for her. But perception could count for a great deal in a wizards' duel. Nita gulped hard at the thought that that was exactly what she was now embarked upon. It was not a situation you normally invited. Wizardry itself could become cranky at the concept of being used against itself without good reason. And she wasn't sure that even having Bobo on her side would necessarily mean she was going to prevail in this contest. The phrase "grudge match" kept rising in her mind, and Nita had to keep pushing it away. Aurilelde was drifting closer to Nita now. Nita assumed an amused smile while stretching out her senses to learn the one thing that she most desperately needed to know: that the kernel was still indeed here, and complete. <It's all here, and it's still inside of her.> "So you can feel it," said Aurilelde. "You're more talented than I thought." "Any wizard can feel it," Nita said. "And are you insane to actually allow someone to talk you into putting a planet's kernel inside your body? Don't you know what that will do to you?" "Rorsik has told me what it will do to you," Aurilelde said. "That's sufficient." Nita shook her head. "Bad advice," she said. "The kind of management you get from internalization is short-lived. And management isn't anywhere near mastery. Down on the ground, it might have been enough. Up here?" She laughed softly. "Let's see what you've got, because the about-to-be-ex-Khretef can't help you anymore." "On the contrary," Aurilelde said in her mind, cold and furious. "He's helped me all he needs to. And he's taken your little ghost-Kit's power and shown me how to use it to manage the planet's non-gravitic forces: the magnetic fields, the upper winds. So now the problems are all yours. Does the ground suit?" Nita frowned. In a wizard's duel, the phrase acquired a meaning past the usual one; it was tantamount to offering the other wizard a choice of weapons. "Aurilelde," Nita said, "that's not a question you have the right to ask me! You're just piggybacking on a wizard's talents. If you were one of us, you'd be concerned about the responsibility that goes with the power. But you just want your own way. You don't care about what happens to anyone else." Aurilelde gave her a furious look. "I care! I care about Khretef! More than anything—" "No, you don't," Nita said. "And if you did, that would be another problem." She clenched her fists. "I really don't want to do this—" "That's apparent," Aurilelde said, laughing. "You hate the thought of fighting to keep him! You want me to just give him up and walk away." Nita shook her head. "One of us has to be grown up about this, and I guess it gets to be me. Despite the fact that you're about five billion years old—" Aurilelde glared at her, furious. "I am not!" Nita had to grin. <And name-calling is so unproductive usually...> "Okay. Four point five billion, give or take an eon..." "And you just want back what you think belongs to you!" Aurilelde said. "Khretef told me what he could hear in Kit's mind. You never let him be what he wanted to be! It was always about what you wanted, what you feared. But when he started to find a new life, a different world, you wanted no part of it: it bored you! Only when you thought it might take him from you did you start to become interested, and then you pushed yourself in—" Nita was about to start arguing hotly about how this wasn't true. But she stopped herself. "This is about what you're about to do to my home planet. It isn't about him—" "It's all about him!" Aurilelde cried. "It's only about him! To try to pretend otherwise is a lie. And wizards don't lie. Do you?" Nita let herself drift more closely to Aurilelde, trying not to make it look like she was doing it on purpose. But as she did, through her tenuous connection to Mars's kernel, she could feel the planet under her shiver uneasily, as if about to turn in its sleep. It wasn't a feeling she liked. "You're trying to tell me," Nita said, "that I'm just jealous of you. There's an easy lie. Even easier for somebody who's not a wizard. But even if you and Khretef are so much older than us, that doesn't give you the right to do whatever you like with Kit's soul! And if you or Khretef have actually done what you say you have"—she found suddenly that she was shaking—"then it's better we should all die, right here and now. The One will sort us out, reincarnation or no reincarnation. I know what Timeheart is, if you don't!" Aurilelde's expression was going back and forth between stricken and furious— and then the horror shifted permanently to rage. Nita, drifting just a little closer, thought again of the good old cartoon idiom about getting an opponent angry so they'd make a mistake. Aurilelde was making it already. <Just let me close enough to you to get a good grip and pull that kernel out of you>— But Aurilelde wasn't angry enough. One last thing was needed. "I wonder, though," Nita said, "whether someone who died for you once might just see how you're behaving now and say, 'Did I die for her, or did she just let me go out and be killed so she could have this—the power to rule the planet?'" For she could feel the tremor down below them starting to grow. "'And when this poor Kit came along, she used him the same way, and let his soul be lost so she could keep this power for herself—'" "No!" "And then he'll say, 'How long do I have? When she realizes the truth, she'll find another way to get rid of me—'" Nita was now staring into Aurilelde's eyes from only a few feet away— "No, no, no!" Screaming, Aurilelde lunged at Nita. Nita grabbed for her, but Aurilelde hurled herself backward and away in reaction, raising her arms. Underneath the two of them, the surface of the planet started going hazy. <Dust storm?> Nita thought, and then realized the truth. <No! Marsquake!> The planet's crust was beginning to convulse, great ripples starting to spread away from the spot beneath them. Craters were cracking across, water flooding down into the crevasses; elsewhere vast blocks and slabs of stone were jolting upward out of the crust— Olympus Mons wasn't affected yet, but Nita had no idea how long that would last. <She doesn't realize what she's capable of with that thing inside her,> Nita thought, horrified. <She doesn't realize that the kernel's more than just a planet's physical rules, but its spiritual affiliations too, the myths and stories others wind into it, all tangled up together.> Aurilelde didn't realize what was happening to her. She was becoming Mars itself, a mad Mars: not a god of war, but a goddess, and a goddess scorned— <And in her craziness she'll pull the whole planet apart,> Nita thought, horrified. She could feel the tremors propagating farther down into the crust, the strains in the planet's mantle increasing. <It'll just shatter!> At first the pieces wouldn't go far: they'd settle into another great asteroid belt. <But orbits elsewhere in the system will be destabilized! And Earth's closest—> <Twenty-four minutes,> Bobo said. Nita swallowed and headed directly for Aurilelde. "If you're trying to get at me that way," Nita said to her, "you're going to have to get a lot more personal—" That was when the blow hit Nita and slammed her tumbling up toward space. "Think so?" Aurilelde said. "Then we'll just give you your wish." Around Nita, now choking in the vacuum, suddenly freezing, the pitiless darkness closed in.... In the darkness, Khretef's voice was saying, "It doesn't matter, anyway. When they're done, when Aurilelde's won, we'll be one forever. Why should this be so bad?" Khretef was almost pleading. "We were so alike, anyway, almost the same..." Standing there by himself in the dark, holding off its ever-increasing pressure, Kit shook his head. "We have things in common, sure!" he said. "We're alive! And you and me, we're in the service of Life: you took the Oath! We're on the same side! So why are you trying to rub me out? Wizards don't destroy things without good reason! Wizards keep things going, they fix what's broken, they don't throw other living beings out just because they're in the way!" "But Aurilelde says—" "Aurilelde's not a wizard, Khretef! She's a seer, yeah, but even seers don't always see straight. Especially if they're scared! She's scared for you, and she's letting that warp the way she sees what has to happen! You can't just let her pictures of how the world ought to be erase yours. It's as bad as what she's told you that you've got to do to me!" "That's wrong," Khretef said. "That has to be wrong—you don't understand—" Once again that uncertainty made Kit sure he was right. "She got it backwards, buddy," Kit said. "She foresaw us, me and Nita, and she saw that we were somehow the answer to Mars's problem. No news there: every wizard's the answer to some problem of the universe's! But she also saw that everything was going to have to change for you guys in some big weird way, and that scared her. She started concentrating on the parts of the vision she could bear to look at, and screened out the rest. She saw she needed a wizard's power to bring Earth's wizards into the picture. She saw herself at the center of it, protecting her dad and her people, even protecting you. So you gave her access to your power. And now you just feel dumb because you can't take it back without a fight, and fighting her's the last thing you want to do!" The silence in the darkness was anguished. Finally the voice spoke again, and this time it was far less Kit's, far more Khretef's. "She was so sure," he said. "Even when I started becoming uncomfortable about letting her share my own power..." Kit could feel Khretef's shame at that remembered discomfort: how could he deny any part of himself to the love of his life? "And then she said, 'The other's coming: give me his power if you can't give me yours! It won't matter; he's just another you. And think what it will mean. No more fighting. The end of the other side's threats, at last and forever—'" "The old story," Kit said. "And not Aurilelde's voice, either. You know who wrote that dialogue! You didn't invent war: the Lone Power did! One of its favorite tools—because war's the easy way out of conflict, and not having wars, having enough compassion and smarts to stay out of them, is real hard work! Getting into the other guy's mindset is real tough to do in the first place, and it's hard to stay there. Lots easier to decide that the other guy's so different from you that there's no hope for him. That he's going to hate you forever, and for the sake of your peace of mind, he's better off dead." The image of that dark splotch on the Korean peninsula, where the light suddenly stopped, was flaring at the back of Kit's mind: and Khretef saw it, too, laid out before them in the darkness as Kit had seen it while sitting on his Earthwatching rock on the Moon. "But it doesn't have to be that way, Khretef! Break the pattern and poke the Lone One in the eye! There was a long silence. "They'll say I'm a traitor to both sides," Khretef whispered. "Again! And I'll be betraying Aurilelde, too—" "Brother, you've got to do something, Kit said. "You can't just sit here and let this go on! It's not just your world, and your people—all of them, the Eilitt and the Shamaska. It's Earth, too, billions of people whose lives are going to get completely screwed up because of what's happening here if it's not stopped! You're a wizard. You know how it has to go! You can love Aurilelde all you like, but if you don't act now, the Lone Power's just going to sit there laughing at how you gave It just what It wanted while you were sure you were doing the only thing you could—" Another long and desperate silence. "What do I do?" Khretef said finally. "Let me go!" Kit said. "I'll do what I can for you and Aurilelde, I promise, but right now we've got two whole worlds to worry about. Let me out of here! The silence continued. Then the pressure against which Kit had been straining started to let up. From deep inside the darkness, Kit felt a shift in the power underlying the place. The feeling started slowly transmuting into a weird stretching, as if something was fastened to Kit's skin and his bones, pulling him painfully out of shape. Kit set his teeth, tried to deal with the pain as it worsened, became intolerable— It stopped. <It's not working,> Khretef said silently, as if inside Kit's head again. <It's too late. For both of us...> Nita tried to blink, couldn't. She gasped for air, shivering with the frost that had formed on her skin in just a few seconds of airless darkness. <Bobo?> <She hit you with a chunk of hardened atmosphere,> the peridexis said. <I was just able to keep your shields in force at minimum, because you weren't entirely unconscious. You got lucky. Stay conscious, or I can't be of any use to you!> Nita brushed away ice, blinked until her eyes worked again, and turned to face Aurilelde, who was hanging there in the darkness and laughing. "You see?" she said. "You have no idea what I can do. With the kernel— and the power of a wizard whose will is in abeyance— I can do things you can't imagine!" Nita was starting to get really steamed now. "What, hitting somebody with a brick? That's unimaginable? Heaven forbid I should get really creative with you, then. Let's keep it simple." <Because all that bluffing down there aside, I really don't want to run the risk of killing you and maybe screwing up the kernel forever—> She reached her hands out into the space around her. <Dust,> she thought. The space around the planet was full of it. Nita called it to her, whispering in the Speech. <Dust, come help your mother-world, because if this space case has her way, there won't be a solid place for you to fall back on: you'll be left floating out around here by yourself forever in the dark till Jupiter eats you or you fall into the Sun! Come lend me a hand here, get solid, get real—> Seconds later Nita was almost obscured by a cloud of it. Aurilelde laughed at her. "You think you can hide that way?" she cried, and came at Nita. "Watch this—" "By all means," Nita said, turning the spell loose, and swept one hand down at Aurilelde. The dust followed, clumping together, solidifying, and striking Aurilelde hard in the chest. The impact of the blow sent her plummeting toward the planet as if a giant hand had swatted her there. Nita dived after her, intent on the kernel. <Have to work out how to do this. Don't want to hurt her, just have to get that kernel out of her! Got them out of walls and floors and planetary cores before: but those weren't alive. How do I do this without—> Something struck Nita hard in the head. She jerked sideways, dazed for a moment, and just got a glimpse of the thing as it floated away on the rebound. It was a nickel-iron meteorite about the size of a walnut. Aurilelde, recovering too quickly from Nita's blow, had snagged it in passing and slung it at her. Nita put her hand up to her head, pulled it back and saw the blood, and went queasy. <Better quit being so nice and put a stop to this real quick before she hits you with something bigger. Like Deimos!> Fortunately Mars's lesser satellite wasn't in the neighborhood, but there were other asteroid fragments nearby, and Aurilelde threw a number of those at Nita, missing as Nita dodged. Then she started using the weak Martian magnetic field itself on Nita. Strange lights started sparking at the back of Nita's eyes, and her ears started ringing as her nervous system complained about the abuse by the locally accelerated fields— <Would you please cut that out?!> Nita said to the magnetic field: and as usual, preferring courteous wizardly persuasion to the crass ordering-around that Aurilelde was inflicting on it, the knots of magnetic flux assailing her dissolved. But by the time Nita's vision and sense of balance were back to normal, Aurilelde was trying the hardened-air exploit on her again, this time simply sliding a block of it up under Nita and accelerating it. <Whoa!> Nita thought as the acceleration sharply increased. <Not good, we're heading for escape velocity here—!> Nita angrily pushed sideways off the block to drift free again in the microgravity: then spoke the phrase that would undo several vital strands of the antigrav spell she was wearing. <I'm trying to help you out here!> she said in the Speech to Mars's gravity well. <A little pull here, please? You've got some gravitational anomalies to spare—> Her acceleration away from the planet slowed, ceased, then reversed direction. Nita dropped toward the planet's surface with increasing speed; she doubled over into a dive, straightening as she fell faster. <Doing end-runs around the kernel by sweet-talking local forces isn't going to stop this,> she thought. <Got to get my hands on that thing fast!> "Bobo, how're her energy levels holding up?" <She's strong,> Bobo said. <She's got a whole planet to draw on.> "Can't you do anything about it?" <Not without getting the kernel dissociated from her,> Bobo said. <For the time being, she is Mars—> <Don't remind me,> Nita thought, for down on the surface the dust was kicking up. <So how the heck do I get her to stop being Mars? If only for a few minutes—> Another of those blocks of hardened air hit Nita and clouted her hard up into the borders of the atmosphere again. As she recovered and plunged downward once more, Nita could see the destruction continuing, the desolation spreading as some old volcanoes woke up and new ones broke out like a fiery rash as the crust ripped and lava thrust up from the depths. Fueled by the power Aurilelde's kernel-connected rage was feeding to the wizardry running loose on the planet; oceans were coming real out of the past; Valles Marineris was slowly flooding, running over with ancient water beyond its ability to drain out into the northern ocean basins. Mars was tearing itself apart in fire and water. "Stop it, Aurilelde!" Nita shouted at her as she got close to Aurilelde again. "You can't do this!" "I can!" Aurilelde yelled back. "And I will! If only to teach you what I can do and you can't— what I can have and you can't! Khretef is mine! He was always mine! We don't need this world! Yours will do just as well. When this world's gone, and we've taken yours, we'll live there and he'll be mine again! Mine forever—" Nita kept heading toward her. <Angry isn't working! Just tell her the truth—> "Nothing's forever, Aurilelde!" she shouted. "You may not be a wizard, but Kit is, and Khretef is, and they both know that entropy's running, and sooner or later, everything dies." Nita's eyes started to sting. "The people you love die, and love may be enough to slow down the death sometimes, or even reverse it for a while— but not every time, and not forever!" She thought of her mother, of Ponch, and then had to wipe her eyes. <Oh, damn it, I thought I was through with this! I guess not for a while yet.> "It won't work. Kit will die someday, yeah! I may be there to see it: I've already almost seen it once or twice." She wiped her eyes again, but anger was getting the better of her now. "But that's more than you can say— because where were you when Khretef died? Off somewhere safe. Let him handle the danger, huh? Not your business, Princess? That's not how love works!" Aurilelde laughed scornfully as she arrowed toward Nita again. "As if you know anything about love! Your idea of physical intimacy is punching Kit in the shoulder—" Nita flushed hot. "Well, looks like I know more than you do, because I don't have to keep my boyfriend in a cage! That's what you're trying to build for Khretef. You'll stamp out all your enemies— meaning his people, mostly— and then rule Mars or Earth or whatever with him at your side. Chained there! Because the life you're awake in now scares you too much to ever let him go; he's the only thing that makes you feel safe. It's not love holding you to him now: it's fear! And Khretef knows that! But he means to stay with you anyway, because he's sorry for what the fear's turned you into—" The completely stricken look spreading across Aurilelde's face told Nita that this was all the truth, her visionary talent perhaps picking up on something Kit knew. Nita shivered. "No! He stays with me because he loves me—" "Oh, he'll let you think that," Nita said, angry. "Because he's a hero, like Kit, he's willing to be locked up in that cage with you forever. That's his business. But I will not let Kit stay locked up in there, too!" Aurilelde slowly dropped her hands and just hung there on the borders of space, a look of increasing horror spreading across her face. Nita, watching, hardly dared to breathe, even to move. It was hard to just wait and give Aurilelde this one last chance to get it right, even with the memory of that voice screaming, <I don't need this world: yours will do as well!> It was so easy to think, <You're a hopeless case: nothing to do with you but throw you out of the game! But the Rede had said, To wreak aright she must slay her rival—> And that had to mean the scared and angry Aurilelde who was ready to tear a planet apart to get her way. <She has to have the chance to reject that option, or this won't work—> The moment stretched as Aurilelde drifted, and the back of Nita's mind became an uproar of her own fears, for Earth, for Kit. <We're wasting time. She'll never turn! Just put her out of her misery while she's off balance and get on with saving one world if not two—> Nita swallowed. <Bobo>, she said silently, <this is it. Let's have that routine for getting a kernel out of a living matrix against its will—> The peridexis showed Nita the structure of the spell. And as it did, Aurilelde raised her arms, her face shifting into a mask of fury, and launched herself toward Nita. A moment later her hands were around Nita's throat, squeezing. Nita reeled back in shock bizarrely tinged with embarrassment, since her personal force field was presently keyed toward protecting her from vast impersonal forces, not the kind of playground stuff that she might have expected from Joanne and her crowd back in the bad old days. But Nita had learned some techniques back then that still worked fine. She reached out and snaked her right arm over one of Aurilelde's and under the other, then angled the arm up to twist her attacker's arms free. Aurilelde tried to get another grip, but before she had a chance, Nita grabbed both her wrists in one hand, then described a quick line of hard light around them with one index finger. The thin strand of force field knotted itself tight. That second was all Nita needed. Inside Aurilelde, the visionary gift showed her the tangle of light that was what she wanted. As Aurilelde struggled and screamed, "No!," Nita finished saying the spell the peridexis had passed her, and plunged her hand straight into Aurilelde's chest. Aurilelde screamed. So did Nita, so close to the pain and so much in sync with it: for the kernel she gripped was all tangled up with Aurilelde's soul. She could even hear Kit scream, too: through Khretef he was as caught up in this as Nita. <Not—much longer!> Nita thought, panting with pain. <At least— I've got hold of the kernel. Now all I need to do— is get it out—> But that was going to be the hard part. She made sure of her grip on the tangle of hot, rusty light buried inside Aurilelde. This wouldn't be easy: the wizardry that had implanted it there was complex, elegant, and very tough. <But so are you!> she heard Kit say from somewhere. <Go!> Nita grinned in triumph and desperate hope. She clenched her fist around the kernel, braced herself, spoke the final word of the spell's second part, and yanked out what she held. The kernel came free. Nita fell backward with the flash of pain that went through her opponent. Crying out in shock and anguish, Aurilelde plummeted toward the planet. But Nita had no time for her right now. All her attention was on the brilliant interwoven tangle of profoundly ancient wizardry that was the kernel of the planet Mars. The impression she'd gotten of it earlier, of reddish light, was correct: thousands of strands and cords of wizardry, all keyed to the planet's gravity and mass and composition and construction, were writhing and glowing in the tangle of power as it flowered out to its full volume, a beachball-sized mass of rose and rust and blood and sunset colors. But they were in chaos, the tangle of terrible power now jittering and buzzing in fury that was a residue of Aurilelde's. <Traumatized,> Nita thought. <And why not, after where it's been stuck and what it's been through?> She threw a glance down at the planet. Half of it was obscured now by the fury of dust being kicked up by the worsening quakes. <Bad. Let's go —> Nita took a deep breath, then sank her hands into the kernel, concentrating. One strand very deep in the kernel, near its nucleus, controlled geological and crustal activity, and that one was singing like a plucked string, still resonating with Aurilelde's rage. Nita grabbed for it, tried to calm it down. But the kernel had already been locked too long in relationship with Aurilelde's soul for the relationship to quickly come undone. Furious at having been mismanaged and now further enraged at being tampered with by yet another stranger, the kernel resisted Nita. But it was now in the hands of a wizard who'd gone through some difficult schooling in kernel management techniques— unlike Aurilelde, whose control over it had been strictly second-hand a matter of half-understood instincts, half-remembered advice, and wishful thinking. <What you need with these things is understanding,> Nita thought. <And figuring them out always wins out over just plunging around feeling stuff...> In Nita's grasp, the kernel jumped and struggled, indignant at the sudden change of control, trying to leap away and return to where it had been moments before. "Oh, no," Nita said softly. "You are not going there!" She clutched it, hanging on, working her right hand in to close around that one shrieking string of the kernel through which she could feel the earthquakes rippling across Mars's crust. She gripped that string hard, damping it down. "Stop being so angry!" she told it. "There's no point in it. It's all over now. Just calm down—" It ignored her. "Just stop it," Nita told it. "It's going to be all right! Let go of it and calm down!" And slowly, slowly, under force of mind, under furious intention, and right through Nita's fear for Kit, the vibration gradually began to settle down, fading, letting go. The string stopped singing. Nita glanced down at the Martian surface. It would be a long while before the dust settled. But under the surface, she could now feel the residual transverse waves of the earthquake dying away, going quiet. She let out a long, scared breath. <Twelve minutes,> Bobo said. <Meanwhile, don't you think you've forgotten something?> Nita glanced down. Bright in the light of the Sun behind her, like a falling star, a tiny figure was accelerating toward the planet's surface. For just a moment, thinking of what Aurilelde had intended for Kit and for the Earth, a nasty, satisfied anger flared up in Nita. <If she does land a little too hard to survive, well, maybe she had it coming. The Rede did say:—> yet to wreak aright, / she must slay her rival—<And if she didn't, then maybe I...> Nita hung there, silent. <No,> she thought. <Prophecy is fine, but it doesn't have to happen...> "Sorry," she said to someone she was sure was watching, "not today..." and dived after Aurilelde. The Shamaska was falling uncontrolled, tumbling. Nita easily beat her down to ground level at Argyre Planitia— now a sprinkling of islands in a broad, round sea that was slowly draining through many outlets at its edges— and alighted on one to wait for her. Nita felt around in the kernel's interior for the controls for local gravity and planetary mass. <There they are,> she thought, and made a couple of simple but significant changes. High above her, Aurilelde's fall began to slow: by the time she was perceptible as a body with arms and legs, several hundred feet up, she had decelerated to a slow drift. "Bobo," Nita said, "I need the usual transit spell. Put the far end down inside the Scarlet Tower—" <Right,> the peridexis said. <Nine minutes...> "Until I collapse?" Nita said. <Unless you do it sooner.> Nita gulped. She was starting to feel those shakes again as the circle of the transit spell appeared on the tableland in front of her. <Never mind,> she thought. <Not just yet—> Aurilelde was falling toward the center of the circle. Nita checked the integrity of her personal force field, making sure it was set for physical attack and weaponry now. "Collapse this after we're both through," she said to Bobo, and stepped in. [ Meridiani Planum ] Nita's second step came down on the polished floor of the Tower. The Throne was empty. A hubbub of scared, angry voices was bouncing around inside, but it went hushed as they registered Nita's sudden presence. She headed for the Throne and the three men standing there, the kernel in her hands. They stared at her: Iskard in shock, Khretef in horror, Rorsik in rage. "That is ours!" Rorsik cried. "Give it back!" Nita stared at him, then looked at Khretef. "You see what he cares about," she said, jerking her head at Rorsik. Khretef hurried toward her. "Where is Aurilelde?" Behind Nita, Aurilelde fell out of the air and bounced gently to the floor. Khretef rushed to her. Nita ignored those two for the moment. "This is not yours!" she said to Rorsik. "It belongs to Mars. And you haven't done a whole lot today to prove that you ever ought to be given access to it, so if I were you, I'd just shut up. Especially since you put her up to this." Rorsik opened his mouth, shut it again. "And as for you," Nita said, turning her attention to Iskard, "you really need some father lessons. I'm sure it's nice for you to run the city! Maybe you even really do have your people's interests at heart. But you let this guy talk you into endangering your daughter's life so she could use the kernel to wipe out your enemies. You know what? She would have destroyed the planet doing it! She was halfway there already. And then you forced Khretef into doing things he wouldn't otherwise have wanted to do, because otherwise you wouldn't let him and Aurilelde hook up. Which was really nasty and sick. One wizard subverting another like that? One wizard getting another one to bend the Oath way out of shape for his own purposes? What got into you? Then again, don't tell me. I think I can guess." She was getting angrier by the moment, and shakier, but Nita was intent on seeing this through to its logical conclusion before she fell over. "You don't understand!" Iskard said to her, coming toward her. "We dared not allow the Eilitt to obtain an advantage over us! Their wizards were doing exactly the same kind of thing, seeking control of the kernel, trying to—" "You stop right there, Nita said, holding up the kernel, "because I'm just about ready to hose you and your city off the face of Mars like dog poop down the driveway!" Iskard froze where he was. "I'm sick of your excuses and your fighting!" Nita said. "And I'm sick of wizards who're so blinded by how much they've hated each other for umpty million years that they're willing to forget that they took an Oath never to do crap like this! So you're about to get a taste of your own medicine." Nita staggered, straightened again. "There's a full implementation of a transoceanic passthrough hanging over your heads right this minute, and I'm in a mood to use it if I don't get my partner back right this minute. If I go, too, when the hard rain comes down, big deal, because life without Kit doesn't look so hot right now! And I'm betting I'd be doing the universe a service in getting you people off the books. For Kit and me, 'cause our Oaths are in place, I'm betting there's always Timeheart. Whereas for you, the Lone Power only knows where you'll wind up, and I can't bring myself to care. <So?> Iskard looked back toward where Khretef was helping Aurilelde up. He sat down dully on the Throne with a thump, like a man defeated. "It cannot be undone," he said. "Wrong answer," Nita said softly. "Try again." In her hands, the kernel flared with furious fire, now reflecting her own mood quite clearly in an eyehurting carmine blaze that made the Shamaska around her wince and flinch away. Nita turned around and looked back toward Khretef and Aurilelde. "Well?" she said to Khretef. Aurilelde, slumped again Khretef, wouldn't look at her. Khretef, kneeling beside her, was doing his best to hold himself straight, but his shame was evident. "I could hear his voice inside me before," he said, miserable, "but I can hear him no more. If I had known that another wizard would die because of me—" "Your problem was that you didn't think he was another wizard!" Nita said. "Rorsik talked her into believing that he was 'just' another version of you. And she talked you into believing it." She glared at him, wobbling again. "I'm sorry for you, but right now that's not going to be good enough—" In her hands the kernel flamed even brighter. The Shamaska standing around the room began to flee for the exits: one of them was Rorsik. Nita stood there with the kernel, feeling the big backlash from the passthrough and the smaller ones from her other exertions inexorably catching up with her. <I'm out of ideas,> she thought, as the shaking got worse. <They really can't do anything. I don't know what to do! Where do we go from here?> <How about we start with not panicking?> Kit said inside her head. Nita's head snapped up. And quite abruptly there was a multicolored dinosaur standing in the middle of the room... and next to her, a young blond woman with a baby in a chest sling and a parakeet sitting on her head. "Mamvish!" Nita said— and then sat down on the ground, quite hard, even considering the low gravity. The surroundings started to blur. <No—!> "Mamvish, they've got Kit! What about Kit—?" The massive head swung toward her. Suddenly Nita could see clearly again: energy poured into her in a rush, and she got to her feet again, though unsteadily. <Colleague, hold your nerve!> Mamvish said way down inside her. <I think I got the one thing we needed before they threw me out—> From beside Mamvish, Irina looked over at Nita with an extremely neutral expression— but Nita thought she could see an edge of amusement on it as Irina's eyes fell on the kernel. <At least you didn't drop it,> Irina said. <Do you want it—?> <No. Just be quiet for a moment and let's see how this develops.> <But Kit!> "First things first," Mamvish said to the room at large. The general rush for the exits had stopped where it was with the appearance of the two new arrivals. "It's as I thought: what we have here is an incomplete archival." And she looked at Khretef. A storm of fiery Speech-characters flared under her skin. Khretef screamed and went down on hands and knees, and the hair rose on the back of Nita's neck, because the scream had two voices in it, one of them Kit's. Khretef collapsed, fell flat to the floor, writhed and twisted, rolled away— — and left a body behind him, dressed as he was, but not gray-skinned. "Kit!" Nita cried, and ran to him. He was getting to his knees as she reached him. "Whoa," Kit said as Nita helped him up one-handed. "That was... so interesting." "We're not done with the interesting stuff yet," Nita muttered. Kit looked around the room, saw Irina and Mamvish standing there, and shivered all over. "Yeah, I bet," he said. And he glanced over at Aurilelde. "You mind if we put some distance between us and her?" Nita smiled a grim half-smile. "No problem." They headed over toward Mamvish. Irina was making her way toward the Throne, where Iskard still stood, and to which Rorsik had just slowly returned. The baby, apparently asleep, took no notice of any of this. The yellow parakeet, however, glared at the two Shamaska, rustled its wings, and made an angry scolding sound as its mistress stopped and folded her arms. "My name is Irina Mladen," she said. "I am the Planetary Wizard for Earth. I speak for our world, but also for the system's other Planetaries, who vest their joint authority in me at this time as presently the system's most senior among equals. In the Powers' names and the name of the One they serve, I greet you with reservation, and with regret at the sanction I have come to impose." Her voice was chilly, and Nita shivered all over at the sound of it. "What sanction?" Rorsik said. "What are you talking about?" Iskard had gone pale even for someone of the Shamaska's stony complexion. Now he put out a hand to try to stop Rorsik from saying anything further. But Irina merely gave Rorsik a look, then turned her attention back to Iskard. "Regardless of being a wizard for much of your lifetime and fully cognizant of the responsibilities the Art requires of its practitioners," Irina said, "you have allowed your people in general, and other wizards and talents under your management in particular, to enter into courses of action that have recklessly endangered the conduct of life on an entire neighboring world." She turned that cool regard on Khretef, who along with the faint and miserable Aurilelde he was half carrying had now come up alongside the Throne. "In your case, you must be clear that we do understand the terrible urgency of hwanthaet that you've been experiencing. The condition can cause irrational responses in even the most stable species when it becomes acute, and we are therefore willing to consider it to a limited extent as an extenuating circumstance for you personally—" "What's hwanthaet?" Kit muttered under his breath. Nita shook her head. "But this consideration does not exonerate you for your own errors of judgment and lapses in wizardly conduct," Irina said. "And we have yet to determine whether further sanctions need to be taken against you personally and, if so, what form they should take." She turned away from Khretef and Aurilelde, glancing just briefly at Kit and Nita as she did so. "Meanwhile," she said to Iskard and Rorsik, "as rulers of this city, immediate responsibility for the actions of its inhabitants falls on you. You"— and she indicated Iskard—"were the deviser of the superegg-based conditional stasis and revival routines, called by you the Nascence, which induced matter/spirit hibernation for you and the City of your kindred the Eilitt, and then brought them out of stasis again. Your actions since then have all flowed from a desire to destroy that other City—" "They have been trying to do the same to us!" Rorsik cried. "They have been trying to destroy us since the First World was young—" "And you haven't been making any serious attempts to stop that trend," Mamvish said. "Rather, you've been intent on keeping it going. You have repeatedly failed to question your own motives and assumptions as the Art requires." "By irresponsible use of both wizardry and science, you've seriously damaged the normal developmental progress of this planet," Irina said. "If major intervention had not taken place, you would have caused significant psychological damage to the inhabitants of the third planet as well. And though you've been the aggressors here, it's not realistic to assume— bearing in mind the past actions of your enemies— that they wouldn't eventually try to do something very similar if the opportunity arose." Irina let out an aggrieved breath. "Therefore sanction will be imposed forthwith upon your cities generally, and upon the major actors personally." A terrible silence fell in the room. "You have two options," Mamvish said. "You can elect to be rafted to another solar system and resettled on a new world. There the Art will be withdrawn from you, and you will be left to your own devices until the One sees fit to release wizardry into your world once more." "Why should we go to any other solar system? This one is ours! Rorsik shouted. "We were the First People, the originals. We are the true Masters of this system, whatever power you may claim! All of this only comes now because you weaklings desire the use of this world for yourselves, for your—" And Rorsik suddenly fell silent. His face got quite dark gray, his mouth worked, but not another sound came out of him. Irina raised her eyebrows. "Or," she said, "if a majority of your people have come to agree with this being, then you may elect to be locked again into the same state of stasis in which you lay until your recent revival. Your dormancy site will be guarded and spell-locked until all other species in this system for whom your discovery would be an issue have reached a sufficient level of cultural maturity for the discovery of your presence no longer to be problematic. At that time your stasis will be broken and your suitability for settlement on this planet will be reevaluated." The silence in the room, if possible, grew even more deadly. "Even the first option will require that you return to stasis for a while," said Mamvish, "because though there are thousands of planets that might suit you, coming up with the best match will take time— and there's no chance whatsoever that we'll leave your species at large on this planet or anywhere in this system until your new home is found and prepped." Iskard stood quiet for some time, considering. Finally, still looking pale, he lifted up his head. "We cannot and will not leave this system," he said. "We are the First People, and you have no right to force us to leave for some strange new home elsewhere." "It may not seem that way to you," said Mamvish. "But the Powers That Be see it differently. Primacy of development doesn't imply either moral or spiritual primacy in any species, in any system. I've seen many come and go: and rarely, I'm sad to say, have I seen a people less considerate of other species, or more hate-filled toward its own, as you folk. By your recent actions you've forfeited the right to live your lives as you've been living them. You will therefore continue them somewhere else... or you will not continue them at all until far into the future." Nita was watching Iskard's face, waiting for him to see sense. But no change showed there at all. "Do what the Powers command you," he said at last. "But never hope to get us to agree to it." Irina glanced over at Mamvish and exchanged a long look with her. Nita felt something itching at the back of her mind, but the sensation passed. To Kit, she said silently, <You getting the same feeling from these guys that I am?> <They'd sooner be dead than do it anybody else's way,> Kit said. <So sad.> Nita looked at him with some surprise. <They just did to you what they did,> she said, <and you can still be sorry for them?> Kit shrugged. <It's not so much them,> he said. <I was one of them for a little. Maybe I get it...> He stepped out into the middle of the gathering. "Irina," Kit said. She looked at him in surprise. "They can't help it," he said. "The stasis was terrible for them; I could feel it when I was inside Khretef. It wasn't just like being asleep and not dreaming: they could feel it all. Time didn't go by faster to them: it went slower. They could feel every minute, every second." He looked over at Khretef. The Eilitt wizard bowed his head. "It made them worse," Kit said. "They were angry before... and when they came out now, they were a little crazy. I caught some of that, maybe." Kit looked embarrassed. "But it's not entirely their fault. And..." He looked more embarrassed still. "They still know how to love each other. But being scared about whether they're going to survive at all can really get in the way..." Irina was watching Kit with some perplexity. "Kit," she said, unfolding her arms enough to shift the baby-sling, "they can't stay in the system as it's now constituted while they're free and able to act. The Powers have withdrawn that right from them. And they won't accept rafting out, or stasis until the situation changes—" "I know," Kit said. "But there's another way." Irina and Mamvish looked at each other, then back at Kit. "What?" "Timeslide," he said. "Into the past." Irina gave him an odd look, then glanced over at Mamvish. Mamvish's eyes on both sides were going around. "To reposition a sanctioned species far enough back not to be a threat to the timelines of associated planets," Mamvish said, "would take a tremendous amount of power. Even for a Planetary and a Species Archivist." "What if the power wasn't so much of a problem?" Kit said. He looked, not at Iskard or Rorsik, but at Khretef. "What if you were here," Kit said, "but long, long ago, before anybody on Earth was able to notice you? Millions of years back? No carbon-based species lasts that long." He looked at Mamvish: one eye fixed on him in a way that suggested he was right. "And nobody would have to go into stasis. Your cities could be relocated here on the planet in real time – " Khretef looked at Kit oddly. "But the Eilitt would still try to attack us..." "Not if your relocation was in time as well as space," Kit said. "Put one city down in one spot... And the other one, five hundred thousand years away..." Irina was looking at him now, and the expression was more thoughtful. Once again she glanced over at Mamvish, and Nita felt that odd itching at the back of her mind. It ceased. Iskard now was looking at Kit as if he couldn't understand why Kit was being so helpful. "If this could be done..." Iskard said. "We would accept it." Irina turned to Kit, looking troubled. "I'm a Planetary, Kit," she said, "not one of the Powers That Be. The problem with this is finding enough energy to fuel the spell. Pushing thousands of living beings and the mass of two ancient cities back a million years or two would require—" She shook her head. "Wait," Kit said. "Just wait, okay? I need to transit back to my house." And then he looked annoyed. "By the way, since these guys were doing hwanthaet or whatever it is on me to make me so crazy to be back here, can I please be ungrounded?" Irina gave him a dry look. "Go," she said, and waved a hand. Kit vanished. He appeared in his kitchen and turned to head toward the back door— and found that standing there, looking at him wide-eyed, with yet another armful of laundry, was Helena. "Uh—" Kit said. To his great relief, the look with which his sister was favoring him was more bemused than scared or angry. "So that noise is traditional, then," she said. "Huh?" "When you appear," Helena said. "It's in the mutant comic books, too. 'Bamf!'" And she then started looking even more bemused. "Does this mean the comics people actually know mutants?" "Uh... they might," Kit said. Helena nodded, apparently pleased at having worked this out for herself. She started heading toward the cellar stairs with her laundry, then paused as something occurred to her. "When you appear out of nowhere like that," she said, "there's no chance you could appear where somebody else already is, is there? Like, you know, a transporter accident?" Kit was briefly annoyed, then realized it was a fair question. "No. There's an automatic offset, it—" He stopped, as there was no point in explaining the safeguards built into the spell: Helena was thinking in a different idiom now, and he was just going to have to get used to it. "It can't happen. Don't worry about it." "Okay." Helena headed for the stairs and was halfway down them as Kit stepped down onto the landing and reached in among the coats and so forth to pull out what he'd come back for. Helena stopped on the stairs, looked up at the glowing thing that Kit was carefully unwinding from the hook where it had been hanging. "What's that? Oh, don't tell me!" Helena said, sounding genuinely impressed. "Wonder Woman's magic lasso? Is that real, too?" And then she paused. "I thought it was supposed to be gold." Not for the first time when dealing with one of his sisters, Kit was left briefly speechless. Helena got a musing look. "And if that can be real, maybe other stuff from the comics could be real, too? Like—I can't remember: what are those guys called who have the green glowy rings? Like them. Wouldn't it be great if there was this interplanetary brotherhood with all kinds of creatures, you know, banding together and using their powers to fight evil..." She sighed, then smiled at Kit. "Never mind, I know, it's probably more secret stuff," Helena said, turning and heading down the stairs again. "Guess I've just got to get used to it. What a world." She moved out of sight, and Kit heard the clunk of the washer's lid being opened. "I should really start getting back into comics. My brother the mutant..." Kit stared down at her, dumbfounded: then heaved a sigh and vanished again. Back on Mars, Kit went to Irina and handed her what he'd brought from home. Irina took the long, slender, pale cord from him— and started, her eyes wide. In its sling, the baby woke up. On her head, the parakeet was shocked into the air and fluttered there for several moments before settling again and staring down at what she held. Irina ran the cord through her hands, noting— as did everyone else— the way the faint bluish glow about it overrode every other light in that great room. As she moved her hands apart while holding it, the cord stretched: the glow got brighter. "It was my dog's," Kit said. "Before he... graduated... he really used to get around. Other universes, other times... Sometimes a lot further. This leash was the only way I could keep up with him. Anchor one end of it in one reality, fasten it to something in another— and it'll pull the other thing through." Mamvish came over to look at Ponch's old leash. It had been powerful enough when Kit had used it for doggie-walking before the affair with the Pullulus earlier in the year. What it would be able to do now, after having been even briefly affiliated with the canine version of the One, even Kit could only guess. But apparently Irina had some idea. She closed her eyes for a moment, then opened them again, letting out a long, surprised breath and glancing over at Mamvish. "This artifact," she said, "has a power rating even higher than yours. I wouldn't have thought it possible." Mamvish swung her tail. "And it's built for transits," she said. "With this, and your power and mine, we can pull it off. I'd say the solution suits." Irina turned back to Kit. "You understand that probably it won't survive this wizardry." Kit nodded. "I don't need it anymore. And Ponch sure doesn't. If it can do some good here... let's go." After that it seemed to Nita that things happened nearly as quickly as her decommissioning of the passthrough wizardry had. There was a brief consultation about temporospatial coordinates, and then a transit out to the city limits, past the farthest buildings, at the end of the white road. Mamvish and Irina stood there conferring to resolve the last few issues, while Iskard watched from the road. Kit had taken Khretef off to one side, and together the two of them stood for a good while looking down at Kit's manual while Kit turned the pages, shifting from section to section as he constructed a spell. After a few moments he pulled a long glowing string of speech-characters out of the manual—a deactivated spell, set for storage and later use by another wizard. Nita watched Kit checking the center section of the spell one last time before passing it to Khretef, and knew what it was. Her mouth went dry at the prospect of handing another being so much personal information. <But it's his business>... And Khretef, too, looked at the spell with some disquiet: but also, Nita thought, with a touch of guilt. He and Kit exchanged a long glance before Khretef took the spell and made it vanish into his own unseen version of the manual: and he bowed to Kit, quite deeply. Finally Kit headed back to where Nita waited. "He's got what he needs to build into the Nascence," Kit said as they joined her. "So the superegg'll recognize me and behave the way it ought to, and start all this going." He glanced over at Irina, who nodded at him. "Irina and Mamvish have stoked the Nascence wizardry up so it can't be cracked by any amount of brute-force wizardry in backtime... and they've stuck a heavy-duty cloaking routine on it so they won't recognize the presence of their own wizardry in the superegg when we find it on the uptime leg." Nita realized that Irina was looking at her. For a moment she didn't understand— and then she realized what was needed. "I have to give her what you did, don't I?" she said. "Enough of my personal information for Aurilelde to link to her own... so that the congruency between us is complete, and all this works out the way it should..." Kit didn't say anything. ...<But why wouldn't I?> Nita thought. <To make all this come out all right.> She nodded at Irina. Irina nodded back, turned away as Khretef headed over to join Kit again. And only then did it occur to Nita, with a shock, that this would mean it hadn't actually been Aurilelde who Kit had been so attracted to. It was her... Khretef looked at her apologetically as he came up beside Kit. "It is a great gift you give us," Khretef said to both of them. "We will not forget you—who helped us when you had little reason to." "I had the same reason any wizard had," Kit said. "You just had... a little memory lapse. With some assistance." From a little distance away, where she'd been standing looking rather forlorn, Aurilelde now came over to clutch Khretef's hand. For a long time it seemed as if she wouldn't look at Kit or Nita. But finally she stole a glance at them. "You know that I had to—" she said: and then she fell silent. Nita sighed and shook her head. "It all worked out in the end," she said. "You were scared. At times like that it's hard to think straight. Don't be afraid anymore, okay? And you two be happy together." Khretef and Kit were exchanging glances. "Cousin," Khretef said holding a hand out, "brother— I'm sorry." Kit took his arm. "You think you screwed up?" he said. "You should have seen some of mine. Go on. And take care of her." "Time, Kit," Irina said. Kit stepped back. Khretef and Aurilelde and Iskard stepped back as well, in the direction of the city. Irina raised her hands; in them was the leash, knotted into a circle. She threw the leash into the air. It hovered there and began to stretch into a circular line of light, widening, growing— The leash ascended, growing with astonishing speed, becoming a circle yards wide, tens of yards, hundreds: finally nearly a mile in diameter, still stretching as it rose. Then, high above the City of the Shamaska, centered over it, the burning circle began to fall. As it did, the space that it enclosed began to go misty. It fell farther, and the uppermost towers of the City were no longer there, vanishing as if some invisible shade were being drawn down over them, obscuring the view. Then the city proper vanished; next the buildings around them. Finally Nita saw Aurilelde turn to Khretef, and the circle dropped to the ground only a few feet away— Everything was gone. The shoulder of Olympus Mons stood bare in the afternoon: and slowly, from high clouds up in the dusty sky, a little snow started to fall. Mamvish and Irina stood there watching the snow come down. After a moment, Irina turned to them and let out a long breath. "It took," she said. "And at the other city site as well. They're positioned where we intended... far from each other in time and space." Mamvish flourished her tail, looking around. "Well," she said, "we have a lot of work to do. We're going to have to do extensive time-patching on this whole environment to get rid of the seismic damage and the water..." "You'll be wanting to call in all your Mars teams, then," Irina said. And she looked at Kit. "I'd suggest, though, that for the moment you sit this out. The wizardry that connected you and Khretef will need some time to fade." "And that was why he was so crazy?" Nita said, starting to feel wobbly again. "Yes," Irina said. "Among other things. Which is why I've arranged for the energy outlay for the normally rather illegal thing you did to his manual to be subsidized, and for you to be forgiven." Kit stared at Nita. "What did you do to my manual?" Nita rubbed her eyes. "Later," she said. "Right now, I really, really need a nap." Together, they vanished. [ Elysium ] It took more than a nap before Nita was ready to do much of anything the next day. Her dad had gotten her off the final day of school, citing family business— which was true enough— but once she got home, she slept straight through into the next morning. It was mid-evening before she and Kit had a chance to get together with Irina and Mamvish to review the events of the weekend. Her father set out the lawn chairs and the barbecue kettle in the shielded part of the backyard and sat there drinking iced tea with Kit's mama and pop and Tom and Carl. Across from them, the Powers' Archivist (too large to do anything but sprawl near the lawn chairs) and Earth's Planetary relaxed with Nita, Kit, Dairine, Carmela, Ronan, and Darryl, debriefing them on the fine details of the last few days and filling in missing ones. Mars had been fairly quickly repaired, since the necessary timeline-patching started almost immediately after the Cities were gone. The power requirements of the patching spells had meant that a lot of wizards had to be called in to assist, but now everything was once again dry except for carbon dioxide snow, and all the planet's water was back where it belonged, frozen under the crust or at the poles. However, there were still endless minor details to sort out. "So the 'blue star' was Earth," Carmela was saying to Dairine: "that was these guys getting involved. And 'the word long lost,' that was the Shard—" "How's that a word?" Dairine said, unconvinced. "It's a pun in the Speech. One term for a single word in the Speech is shafath, a fragment of a longer expression, get it?" "Yeah, but what about the 'spoke by the watcher' thing? How can you 'speak' a fragment of anything?" Carmela sighed, looked up at Mamvish. "It's true," Mamvish said, "there is a verb form of shafath as well: shafait', to use a fragment or split one off—" Dairine rolled her eyes. "Forget it," she said. "It's just another of these symbolic poems that can mean anything. Give me the concrete stuff any day." Carmela was starting to look annoyed. "Okay, I'll give you this," Dairine said. "This stuff about the watcher, the silent yearning for the lost one found, blah de blah de blah, fine, that was Aurilelde and Khretef. He was dead while everybody else was in stasis. Then when Kit showed up, he got unlost and started looking for the Shard again. But 'she must slay her rival'? Just who was her rival? Because nobody got slain! You should find somebody to complain to, because this prophecy is substandard." Behind Dairine, Ronan and Darryl were utterly failing to control their snickering. Dairine glared over her shoulder at them; and they both immediately got extremely interested in Darryl's WizPod. Carmela was scowling. "Mela, you did a great job on that," Carl said, "but we may never know exactly what it meant." He stretched his legs out. "Oracular utterances all over this galaxy have at their heart the need to be able to stretch to a lot of different interpretations, so that as temporospatial conditions change around them, they'll still be suitable..." "And whatever the prophecy might have meant," Kit's pop said, "there'll be Martians after all." He paused, trying to sort the tenses out. "Will have been Martians?" Irina sighed. "Were Martians," she said. "But not anymore." That made Kit look up. "What?" Mamvish exchanged a one-eyed look with Irina, then glanced back to Kit. "Well, naturally we checked the backtime history once the relocation was completed," she said. "But they didn't last very long, as it happens: only seventy thousand years..." Nita thought suddenly of the odd itching she'd felt in the back of her brain. "You were discussing that possibility right then. When we were setting the timeslide. And you already suspected things were going to turn out this way." Irina sighed. "Yes," she said. "The Shamaska-Eilitt may indeed have been the system's oldest species, which meant it was no surprise that they were also showing signs of being uvseith. A diagnosis which this outcome has confirmed." Carmela frowned. "'Moribund'?" Irina cocked an eye at her. "Yes," she said. "The word's far more emphatic in the Speech, of course." She glanced over at the parents. "It says a species has only a short time to survive." "Some species simply can't live long off the planet that engendered them," Mamvish said. "Their own personal kernels are wound up too closely with the planet's. In the case of the Shamaska-Eilitt, their own bodies' kernels were irreparably damaged when their planet was destroyed. Long-lived as they were, they were already doomed." "And they were in denial about it," Irina said, "which happens all too frequently in such cases. The problem with their body change after the destruction of Shamask-Eilith wasn't that the Martian climate changed... though it did. It was that they were never really suited to live anywhere but on their own world, and any change would have killed them in time. Moving to a new world only made the problem worse, speeding up the damage they were doing themselves. And as Kit confirmed, the stasis made it worse still: some of the irrationality we saw from them would definitely have been a result of holding themselves in their already-damaged state for so long. Had they succeeded in moving to Earth, they wouldn't have lasted long there, either." "So they would have invaded Earth eventually," said Nita's dad, "and Earth would have killed them." He took a drink of his iced tea. "Sounds familiar, somehow. Archetype?" Irina nodded slightly. "Hints and warnings of what would have been or may yet be do slip into myth and popular culture from the deep past and the possible future," she said. "It's a hall of mirrors, the universe: in the spiritual sense, anyway. And sometimes it's hard to tell which end of time the images and reflections belong to." She glanced over at Kit. "That's the cause of the hwanthaet you were caught up in— the timeloop proximity syndrome. To be repeatedly positioned near the effect end of a timeloop when you were also involved in the cause, but before the cause has happened, or when it's just starting to execute— well, the human brain's circuitry doesn't take well to that. You got off pretty lightly, though, in the physical sense: it helps to be young. And the Powers wouldn't come down on you too hard for infractions that you committed due to the after effects of the good deed you were about to do in the past." Kit's pop blinked at that. "Sounds like you need a whole different language for this kind of thing." "It's a subset of the Speech," Mamvish said. "Intratemporal syntax takes a while to learn. But some species pick it up entirely too quickly." She looked with amusement at Nita and Kit. Nita, now sitting cross-legged on the ground in jeans and a cropped top and feeling very relieved to be that way again instead of in filmy, glittery Shamaska women's wear, was paging through her manual, looking at the revisions that had been made over the last day. Now she looked up at the more senior wizards. "Irina," Nita said, frowning, "this is weird. When I checked the manual before, it said the kernel had been missing for half a million years. But now it says it hasn't been missing after all." Irina looked over Nita's shoulder at her manual. "Oh, I see," she said. "Tom, you didn't enable her need-to-know updates." Tom rolled his eyes. "It has been busy around here lately, what with recovering from the Pullulus and so forth..." Irina gave him an amused look. "Oh, stop it," she said. "That wasn't a critique. Anyway, you've just had your end-of-decade evaluation: you know where you stand." She glanced up from the page to Nita again, and Nita saw that the open page had already changed its content. Now she was looking at a comment box that said, <Temporal adjustment emendation: timeline shift. Previous timeline details archived, viewable on need-to- know basis.> She shook her head and smiled. "When everything settles down, Time's arrow is always seen to run straight," Irina said. "After the solution you three came up with yesterday, the kernel's always been present on Mars in real time—" "Though blocked away from the inhabitants' use," Mamvish said. "Jupiter's Planetary kept a lightpatch on it while the Shamaska-Eilitt were there." Irina nodded. "But the manual still remembers the previous timeline." "As well as the solution you and Khretef arrived at," Mamvish said. "The binding power inherent in Ponch's leash let us set aside, in the timeslide, the additional power to build the superegg, to lock the Cities' stasis so that it couldn't be interfered with, and for Khretef to encode the Nascence with the personal data that would be needed to lead you to Mars, and impel you to bring the future about. And the past." "A past that worked," Nita said. "One where Aurilelde wouldn't be afraid anymore, and would be able to have the Red Rede written in a way that would produce this result. Instead of the one her fear of losing Khretef had been showing her..." She glanced over at Irina, who was gazing at her with a strangely assessing expression. "And it actually worked," Nita said. Irina nodded and had a drink of her iced tea, finishing it. "Yes, it did," she said. "Since we're all sitting here, and the world's more or less as we left it... and we're not all speaking Martian." "So she really became Nita— or like Nita— in a way," Kit's pop said. "The way Kit's counterpart became like him." "That's right." "Smart choice," Nita's dad said, and got up to stir the charcoal. Kit was looking thoughtful. "But which really came first?" he said. "What we did, or what they did?" "Oh, please," Ronan said, rubbing his face. "It's the chicken-or-egg thing again. And you get completely different answers depending on whether you ask the chicken or the egg." "Let it go, your Kitness," Darryl said, stretching. "Life's too short. Let's stick to playing with the future. Soooo much more malleable." "What happens to the kernel now?" Nita said. "There are still no Martians to manage it. Or no Martians again..." "The kernel's at large in the body of the planet. But I'll be keeping an eye on it," Irina said. "One more thing for you to do," Mamvish said. "As if you don't already have enough!" Irina shrugged and smiled; the parakeet started idly nibbling her hair. "It'll be easy enough to keep in tune until Mars gets new tenants, some of whom will be wizards and can take on the job. People from here, or from somewhere else— who knows? Earth won't be astahfrith forever." She sighed. "But for the moment it is, and there are problems that need to be tended to." Irina stood up, smiling at Nita's father. "Mr. Callahan— thanks so much. It's been a pleasure." She picked up her baby, which was lying nearby snoozing in a carrier seat: the parakeet on Irina's shoulder ruffled its feathers up and made a few little scratchy noises. "Dai, cousins," she said, and vanished without so much as a breath of breeze. Mamvish, too, stood up, a process which took several moments, and which Kit's mom and pop watched in fascination. "I too have a few things to deal with," she said. "Friends, cousins—" "Oh, goodness, I almost forgot. Wait a moment," Nita's dad said, and got up, heading for the house. A minute or so later he was back with a plastic carrier bag from one of the local supermarkets, looking to be stuffed very full of something heavy. Mamvish's eyes started to go around in her head as she looked toward Nita's father. Nita, seeing this, poked Kit and Dairine and gestured for them to get out of the way. "Oh, cousin!" Mamvish said. Nita's father held up the bag to her, and Mamvish took it from him with some haste. "You are my friend! "Stop by again in a couple of weeks," Nita's dad said. "The new crop will need some thinning." Mamvish's grin went right around her face. A moment later she, too, was gone. Nita shut her manual and put it away, looking over at Tom. "So," she said. "So that's it," Tom said. "Nice job, you two." And he gave Kit an amused look. "Even the part when you went around the bend. Not entirely your fault, and not nearly as far as you might have gone... so all is forgiven, and we're all done." Nita reached out for her own iced tea. "Are we done?" Nita said. "The Lone Power hasn't turned up yet." Tom smiled slightly. "It hasn't? You sure about that?" Nita sat still and thought about that for a moment. "Uh-huh," Tom said. He pushed back in his chair and looked down into his iced tea as if something might jump out of it. "Far be it from me to generalize about wizardry," he said, "or the way it affects people. But it's not uncommon for the younger wizard to see the Art, in the early part of his or her practice, as a very stratified thing: all blacks and whites, instead of the shades of gray that start to manifest themselves later in the way you see the world." "It's not that we're not in a massive battle of good against evil," Carl said. "Of course we are! But that's just one of many ways to characterize the fight. When you're getting started, there's a tendency to simplify things while you're trying to work out how to classify all the weird new data you have to handle. And when you're simplifying everything that way—and fueling that perception with the considerable power of a new wizard— very often you wind up forcing that kind of very straightforward, in-your-face, physically obvious role on the Lone Power." "Whoa, whoa, wait a minute!" Nita stared at him. "We're forcing It? Tom nodded. "The youngest wizards really don't have any sense of how tremendous their power is, right out of the gate, and maybe that's for the best. They just use it... and a surprising amount of the time, they win, even though they've compelled the Lone One to come out of hiding and confront them in the only way that gives It a chance of success when they're at such power levels: direct physical intervention. That's where it's always weakest... for to manifest so directly, you need matter. And the Lone Power, being hung up on what It considers the essential superiority of spirit, really hates matter." Tom smiled slightly, glancing at the various parents, who were listening with interest. "Later on, as a wizard's power decreases and his mastery of the complexities of the Art increases, the Lone One's able to make more inroads into his life in the way it does with nonwizardly people: using a lot less power, but also being a lot more subtle." He looked at Nita and Kit and the other younger wizards. "Don't think this makes It any less dangerous! You see how close It came to getting a result on Mars that would have absolutely delighted It, just by working underhandedly and using people's own habits and weaknesses against them—sometimes even their strengths. Death and destruction on two worlds: the poor dupes doing the Lone One's work for It, while It sits back and laughs." Carl shook his head. "This time, just in time, Kit got smart. So did you." Carl looked at Nita from under his brows, his eyes glinting. "And so did Khretef. Together you found your way past the pitfalls the Lone Power hoped you'd be blind to, because you'd dug them yourselves. That's always one of our great strengths, as wizards: we're committed to looking out for each other, each seeing the thing the other is blind to. The tricky part is convincing each other that 'blind' doesn't necessarily mean 'stupid.'" Tom sighed and finished his iced tea. "But sometimes we get lucky," he said. "This last time, we all did. You kids especially. So now we get to relax." Nita's dad reached down by the chair and picked up the iced-tea jug, filled Tom's glass again. "Even you?" Tom laughed. "I've got enough time off next weekend to want to talk to you about some landscaping." Nita got up and headed toward the house. Kit came along after her, catching up with her where she had paused to look at the spark of red light hanging low in the sky. Nita glanced at it as he came up behind, then went back to gazing at Mars. "I'm not sure I got smart," she said under her breath. "It felt completely like luck to me." Kit stared at her. "Neets, are you kidding? Think what you did with that passthrough—" "If I hadn't had Bobo to help, I could never have done it. You should've seen the size of that spell—" Kit shrugged. "So? You used what you had. You used what you remembered you had. And what you had enough power to pull off. Every wizard does that every day with their manual or whatever they use..." Nita thought about that. "I was the one who was kind of late about getting smart," Kit said then. "Seemed like it took me forever to figure out that not only was Aurilelde's take on everything all wrong, but so was Khretef's. Even a wizard's perceptions of wizardry can get screwed up under the right circumstances. Khretef was too busy believing everything Aurilelde told him. Aurilelde was too busy believing what her father told her..." "And he was busy believing what Rorsik told him." Nita shook her head. "And with that whole Shamaska versus Eilitt thing going on, nobody was thinking straight about anything. Except you, eventually." "They were too busy believing in stuff to look at what was true," Kit said. "I just hadn't been stuck in the middle of it for as long as they had." Nita nodded, leaning back against the fence. "So, no Martians after all... that's got to come as a letdown." "Yeah," Kit said. But he didn't look away from the red star burning up there. "Still... it's a neat place, and it needs taking care of. I'm not going to dump it just because its backstory's changed..." Looking up at it, Nita nodded. "Yeah," she said. "Besides, there are still some craters up there that don't have names..." She was expecting a snicker, but none came. After a moment she got a strange feeling and turned to find Kit watching her. "What?" she said. "Charcoal's ready," Kit said. "Don't you want a burger?" And he headed back to the group at the rear of the backyard. Nita smiled slightly and followed him. Much later, in the dark, someone spoke Nita's name. She woke up in the middle of the night and turned over, eyes open in the dark. <What?> But no one was there to have said anything. Nita sighed. <Just another of those dreams,> she thought. She closed her eyes again, completely worn out but for the moment also completely happy. <Nothing to do tomorrow,> she thought. <School's over. This is so great! I can sleep as late as I want. And I'm going to start that all over again right now...> But perversely, it didn't happen. Outside her closed eyes, she could tell that there was light. <I hate this,>Nita thought, resigned. <This has been one of those sleeps where you wake up and you don't feel like you've been to sleep at all.> She felt vaguely cheated, but there was no point in trying to go back to sleep under these circumstances. She sighed and opened her eyes again. Red dirt all around, and stones and rust-beige rubble, and a light dusting of snow— Nita sat up and stared around her. Her first thought was that Dairine had finally gotten around to getting revenge on her for sending her bed to Pluto that time. But as Nita looked around, she started getting the slightly rainbowy, shivery feeling around the edges of things, what Tom called "temporal aberration," that told her this wasn't a real physical experience: it was vision. <Oh, okay,> she thought, and got up. <Let's see what this is about.> There was no mistaking the view; this was Kit's preferred landing spot on Mars, at the top of Elysium Mons. Nita stood there feeling under her bare feet the cool gritty dust of another world. <This is what visions are really good for,> she thought, <not having to worry about force fields, or the real temperature, or whether you brought enough air...> For the morning around her felt no chillier than an early spring morning on Earth. The Sun was just up and actually felt warm on her skin. Overhead the sky was lightening, swiftly going from violet to blue. Silhouetted against it, a couple of hundred yards away where the tableland dropped off, Kit was standing, looking southward across the plains of Elysium Planitia. Nita just watched him for a moment, then felt a draft and looked down at herself. <Oh, no,> she thought, seeing the gossamer draperies again, and the gleaming wrought and gemmed metal of the bodice. <I have got to talk him out of this look for me: it does not work!!> …But second thoughts did intrude, and surreptitiously Nita glanced down. <Well, okay, maybe the top isn't bad—> Down by her foot she saw a small rock that she recognized. Nita reached down to pick it up. "So," she said to it, "what's new up here?" <Water snow and gas snow,> said the rock. <And then some changes in the terrain.> It sounded bemused. "Yeah, I just bet," Nita said, and put the rock carefully down. "Later..." She wandered over to where Kit was standing. He, too, was in "Martian" harness and metallic kilt, his wand stuck in his belt, and he was gazing across at the spires of the city that from this height could just be glimpsed away many miles to the south, where the highlands of Aeolis Mensae ran down to the plains of Elysium. "It's a nice location," Kit said. "Pretty close to the equator: the weather's as good as anywhere on the planet..." And without warning they were standing up somewhere high in that city, looking down at the proud, calm people in the streets, and the little busy flying craft zipping around among the towers, more of the Shamaska going about their business. Nita looked over her shoulder and saw that the spot where they were standing was a terrace of the Scarlet Tower: and toward them came gracefully bounce-walking two people, a Shamaska female and an Eilitt male. Behind them a multi-legged, many-clawed green lizard creature was scrambling along to keep up on the polished floor. "We thought we might see you here eventually," Aurilelde said, smiling at Nita and Kit as they got closer. "We're so glad you came!" "Just look at it," Khretef said to Kit. "It's grown." He gestured toward the City's outskirts. "There have been plenty of raw materials to work with: it's a rich world. We'll do well here." "You're running things now?" Kit said to him. Khretef nodded. "In more ways than one. I'm the Master of the City here now, it seems. Iskard didn't want the position: he was tired. And happy to pass rule to Aurilelde once we'd moved and were finally safe in our new home, for the stress of the old life had taken its toll. He's got a place in the uplands now." "And he's been so glad that there's no need to fear the Eilitt anymore," Aurilelde said. "We all have. Now we can be at peace at last." She looked at Nita with embarrassment. "Fear can make you do such terrible things. I can't believe how I was thinking..." <If I was awake,> Nita thought, <you'd better believe I'd have something to say about that!> But this didn't seem to be the place or the time. "It was all a long time ago," Nita said. "Or a long time from now. Let's just forget about it. It turned out okay in the end..." They looked out across the City. Khretef's scorpion-pet now caught up with them, put his front end up under one of Kit's hands, and wriggled like a puppy. Kit looked down at it, grinning, and scratched it on top of the head between the eyes. After a moment it came over to her, and Nita looked down at it, now bemused that she could ever have seen these creatures as strange or threatening. And then she caught something in its eyes, a familiar look— <I get around,> said the large Presence behind the look. <There are a lot more kinds of dogs in the universe than just the Earth ones.> Nita smiled at him, then looked over at Khretef and Aurilelde. "So the story has a happy ending," she said. "Ending? I don't know that I'd call it that," Aurilelde said. "We have our whole lives ahead of us." Knowing what she now knew, Nita held her smile in place and said nothing. But Khretef, who had been exchanging some silent comment with Kit, now caught her eye. "And besides," he said, "even a short life would be a good one in this world. Once you find happiness, why sit around worrying that it might not last forever? You make what you can out of it. No point in worrying away the gift..." He looked out to the horizon. Nita followed his glance... and realized she was not looking at the Mars of half a million years ago. Looking northward, Nita saw that Elysium Planitia was no dry plain any longer, but a mighty sea: against the vast empty northern horizon, Elysium Mons stood up lone and splendid on its tremendous lowlying pedestal-island, silhouetted against the rose-colored afternoon. To either side of the highlands, great waterfalls poured down through chasms in the upper tablelands, draining the upland lakes around the craters Lasswitz and Wien. <Not our Mars,> Nita thought. <Not exactly theirs, either. But the one they found together after their time on Mars finally ended...> Kit put out a hand to Khretef. "Dai stihó," he said. "You found your way through. Good luck with the rest of it." "And to you, brother," Khretef said, clasping Kit's arm. "Watch over your world." Nita looked at Aurilelde's outheld hand, and took it in the same clasp. "Take good care of him," she said. "It was all I ever meant to do," she said. "I lost my way, but you two helped me find it again." Aurilelde and Khretef each raised a hand in farewell and turned away, heading for the Tower, with Khretef's scorpion-pet scrambling after them. "So there goes the first real Wizard of Mars," Nita said. "But who knows, maybe not the last..." "Huh?" Kit was startled out of his silence. "Stop listening to me think." "I wasn't!" Nita said. "It's just kind of funny. For a while there I thought you were going to ask Irina for the position." Kit shook his head and grinned, gazing out over the city. "Naah," he said. "I've got a planet. These guys needed a spare. I'm glad it was here for them." Nita nodded. "I forgot to ask them what happened to Rorsik." Kit shrugged. "He was all about fear. Either he's gotten himself past that, or he's found himself some other patch of eternity to be scared in." Nita nodded. "Meanwhile," Kit said, "something I forgot to ask you." "What?" "Just what was it you called me back there?" She shook her head. "Back there where? "You remember. Back at Argyre Planitia, when you were telling Aurilelde you didn't have to keep yours in a cage." Nita stared at him, bewildered— then realized what he was talking about, and took a very deep breath. "My boyfriend?" she said. And then Nita felt like cursing at herself for the way her voice squeaked with stress on the second word, turning it into a question. Kit just looked at her. "Took you long enough," he said. He grinned at her and vanished. Nita's eyes went wide: then narrowed with annoyance— and relieved delight. "I'm gonna get you for that!" she said, and went after him.
You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost)	Felicia Day	[ "comedy" ]	[ "biography", "gaming", "humor", "video games", "Almost" ]	Chapter 1	Whereby I introduce myself to people who have no idea who the hell I am, but have found themselves in possession of this book. Welcome, stranger! I recently experienced the perfect summary of my career at a Build-A-Bear store inside a suburban mall in Lancaster, California. Okay, sure, a single adult woman in her thirties with no children might not necessarily pick that as the first place to kill an hour of her life. But I'd never been inside one before, and I'd already spent twenty minutes outside like a creepster, watching actual legitimate customers (mostly toddlers) go inside and, like modern-day demigods, craft the companion of their dreams. At a certain point, after eating two Auntie Anne's pretzels, I decided to throw off the societal yoke of judgment. Get in there, Felicia! Build yourself a stuffed friend. No one's around to witness your weakness! So I entered, told the saleswoman I was browsing for "a nephew," and proceeded to spend forty-five minutes trying to decide what design to get. My mom wasn't there, so I could take as long as I wanted. Unfortunately. There was a six-legged octopus that almost took my heart, but after much agonizing, I settled on a stuffed Santa Claus. Because it was July, and a stuffed old man doll seemed more ironic. (The hipster attitude helped get me over the shame that I was buying a STUFFED ANIMAL FOR MYSELF.) I moved on to the accessories aisle to dress my Santa. And proceeded to have a small panic attack. Because my impulse was to dress him in a flouncy pink tutu, but it was a small town and I didn't know if it would offend the saleswoman to make Santa a cross-dresser. But then I thought a liberal stance on the issue might, in a small way, help promote transgender rights in the area... when I turned to see four hip girls standing at the end of the aisle. Staring at me. Eagerly. I overcame my social anxiety about people I don't know turning their faces toward me and waved. "Heyo!" They waved back simultaneously, standing in a clump together, four feet away. Practically a gang. (Not really.) "Hi!" "Are you...?" "You're her, right?" "Hey!" They seemed excited. I wanted to smile back but stopped myself. I had to check something first. "Uh, who do you think I am exactly?" "You're Felicia Day, right?" "Yes! That's me! Nice to meet you!" I always double-check where people think they know me from, because one time at San Diego Comic-Con, a guy bought four DVDs of my web show from me, and as I ran his credit card, he said, "My wife is going to love this gift. You're her favorite actress. She adored you in The Devil Wears Prada!" Doh. The girls crowded toward me. "We work at Hot Topic next door! Steph recognized you when you were standing outside at the benches FOREVER." So much for anonymity at the Lancaster Build-A-Bear. "Uh, yeah! I couldn't decide if I wanted to come in here or not. Most people my age don't buy things here for themselves, right?" I laughed awkwardly, waiting for them to reassure me. "Yeah, it's mostly for little kids." Moving on. "Nice to meet all of you. Did you guys want to take a picture or something?" They were brandishing their cell phones like an extremely amiable group of paparazzi. "Yes!" "Sure!" "Thanks!" All four of them clustered around me, trying to get simultaneous selfies, like a six-armed octopus of their own, as a mother and child approached. "I can take those pictures for you." The mother gathered all the phones as she stared at me. "Are you an actress?" "Uh, kinda. And a producer and writer. More of that lately, to be honest." She stared at me blankly. "Yes, I'm an actress." "Are you in the movies?" "Nope. No movies." I wanted to make it abundantly clear to everyone in the Lancaster mall area that I was NOT Emily Blunt. One of the Hot Topic chicks piped up. "She does tons of internet stuff!" "And TV!" One of them leaned in slightly too close. "I love you on Supernatural." She smelled like cherry ChapStick. I liked it. "Thank you." The mother was confused. "Is that a TV show? I don't watch it. But I love Law & Order: SVU." The woman called over to her eight-year-old. "Jenna, baby, do you recognize this lady?" The kid stopped poking through a collection of pastel princess outfits to look me up and down in a surly way. "Nope." I opened my mouth to lecture the kid on how princess dresses reinforce sexual stereotypes when the Build-A-Bear saleswoman walked up to join the crowd. "How's it going back here?" One of the Hot Topic girls spoke up. "We're just grabbing a picture with Felicia Day! She's awesome." I thought to myself, I should bring these girls with me everywhere. "Oh. Are you a celebrity?" "I didn't recognize her either!" said the mother. She smiled at the saleswoman in camaraderie, which was kind of crappy but understandable. I'd have the same reaction if I encountered a reality star I didn't recognize. Or a sports person. Or a lot of other internet stars, really. One of the Hot Topics, the ChapStick one, came to my defense. "It's Felicia Day! She makes tons of videos online." "Internet videos? Do you do pranks or something?" said the saleswoman. Oh, hell no. "No pranks, no kittens, no extreme sports, or music parodies. Probably why you don't recognize me, ha!" "Probably." One of the other Hot Topics said, "I only know you because my boyfriend is into your gaming stuff. He has a huge crush on you." Then she gave a reassuring smile. "I'm cool with it!" "Great, that's a real compliment!" I hear this a lot. The insecure part of me always feels like there's a backhanded insult underneath, like the girls know I'm not QUITE hot enough for their guy to go through with a hookup. Sometimes I think to myself, I can steal your boyfriend. WORRY ABOUT ME! At this point, I realized that I needed to move the conversation along. "I think we can just take the pictures now and go about our bear building..." The mother was already ahead of me and snapped the first iPhone photo as I was midsentence. I tried to freeze retroactively into a rictus smile, one I've perfected over the years to prevent me from looking like I have palsy in the thousands of pictures that are tagged on Facebook, but I had a feeling it was too late. I leaned forward, "Can you just take that one again... never mind." She had already moved on to the next phone. It was fine; people have palsy. I could look like I have palsy, too. As we took the photos, the saleswoman texted on her phone, then called over. "Hey, I just texted my son, and he's never heard about you. And he's online all the time." "It's a big internet..." "He's on there a LOT." "Uh, I'm sorry?" One of the Hot Topics started going Team Felicia on her. "He's probably one of those online trolls who hate on women." "My son is very respectful of women, thank you." "You never know..." I could smell the situation going south. "We don't need to get in a tussle, guys. Everyone on the internet is a jerk sometimes, ha!" Hot Topic drew back like I'd slapped her. "I'm not!" Leave it to me to alienate my own roadies. "Oh, I didn't mean..." The mother taking photos broke in and shoved her kid toward me. "Jenna, get in there and take a picture!" "But I don't KNOW her, Mom!" We posed, the kid's body language screaming of apathy, as a beefy military-type guy came strolling up to the saleswoman with a pair of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle dolls in hand. "Ma'am, can you show me where the nunchakus are?" He looked over at my doll and scowled. "Is that Santa Claus in a tutu?" Annnnd... that was my cue to head for the exit. "It was nice to meet everyone!" I grabbed literally anything nearby to accessorize my stuffed Santa—because he was not leaving Lancaster naked—and backed away toward the cash register, waving like an idiot on a parade float. "You guys rock, thanks for supporting my work!" Two hundred dollars' worth of plastic skates, sunglasses, and mini-electric guitars later, I left the mall. This is what I built, if you're curious: Yes, Santa's holding a light saber. Then I drove to where I was headed before I stopped at the mall: to meet Richard Branson. (Okay, I had to type it that way because it sounds impressive. I was technically not meeting him personally. I was touring his Virgin Galactic spaceship hangar on a social media PR invite. But during the event, I stood two feet away from him on up to four occasions, and he was wearing a hot leather jacket and had perfectly coiffed hair. Definitely smiled in my direction. So yeah, we're besties.) All in all, it was a completely typical day in my life. Not. Based on that story, I don't think it's unreasonable to make a stab-in-the-dark assumption: You're either extremely excited to read this book (inner dialogue: "OMG, FELICIA DAY WROTE A BOOK!"). Or extremely confused (inner dialogue: "Who is this chick again?"). For the excited: Thanks for liking my work! I like you, too! For the confused? I hear you, man. The friend who gave you this book does not know you at all. They should have gone with a more impersonal choice, like a scented candle or a gift certificate to somewhere with good french fries, amiright? But do I at least look a little familiar? Like the girlfriend of one of your cousins? I've been told I have a significant-other-of-a-distant-relative quality to my face. Or just a little bit of Emily Blunt in the eyes area? I'm not begging, I'm just asking. Forget it. I know I shouldn't introduce my own memoir with this amount of insecurity, but my personal life philosophy is always to assume the worst, then you're never disappointed. BAM! Highlight that previous sentence, baby! It'll be one of many quotable life-nuggets you'll be able to pull from this thing. I'm SUPER good at inventing Hallmark-type solipsisms. Later in life, I plan on making my fortune with a T-shirt/mouse pad/coffee mug company. I'll call it Have a Nice Day Corp.! because of my last name, har har! Yes. Sorry. Hi, I'm Felicia Day. I'm an actor. That quirky chick in that one science fiction show? You know the one I'm talking about. I'm never on the actual poster, but I always have a few good scenes that make people laugh. As a redhead, I'm a sixth-lead specialist, and I practically invented the whole "cute but offbeat hacker girl" trope on television. (Sorry. When I started doing it, it was fresh. I promise.) I'm the writer, producer, and actress/host/personality of hundreds of internet videos. Literally hundreds. I have a problem, guys (let's talk more about it later). A lot of people know my work. And a lot of people do not. I like to refer to myself as "situationally recognizable." It's way better than "internet famous," which makes me feel like I'm in the same category as a mentally challenged cat or a kid doing yo-yo tricks while riding a pogo stick. I know that kid, super talented. But the cat... not so much. Seven years ago, I started shooting internet videos in my garage with a borrowed camera, and now I juggle acting on television with writing, producing, and running a web video production company called Geek & Sundry. I'm a social media "aficionado" (née "addict"), I have well over two million Twitter followers, and I'm usually the lone female on lists of prominent nerds, lauded as the media-anointed "Queen of the Geeks." It's a title I reject personally, but when someone else uses it, I go ahead and enjoy it as a compliment. Because who doesn't want to inherit a dynasty just because of their gene-stuffs? No work, just <SPLAT>! Born special! On average, a random person on the street won't know my work, but there are certain places where I'm a superstar, like San Diego Comic-Con, and... other places like San Diego Comic-Con. Oh, and I have a HUGE barista recognition factor. Seventy-five percent of the time when I'm ordering my "almond milk matcha latte with no sugar added, lukewarm, please," I'll be recognized by an employee. And yes, my order is a pain in the ass, but I'm determined to enjoy the liquid indulgences of modern life. Might as well take advantage of it all before the zombie apocalypse. I have no practical skills; I'm fully aware that I'll be one of the first ones "turned." Instead of learning motorcycle repair or something else disaster-scenario useful, I'll order the drink I want until I become a shambling corpse. And I won't be defensive about it, okay?! I'm very grateful for the weird niche I've created in life. Some people know me only from my Twitter feed. That's fine, too, because I, objectively, give VERY good tweet. Frankly, I'd hate a life where everyone knew me and people made money selling pictures of me without makeup to tabloids. I'm not in the business of wearing makeup every day. Or going out of my house on a regular basis. I'm most comfortable behind a keyboard and... that's it. Real life is awkward for me, like wearing a pair of hot shorts. There's no way to walk around in those and NOT assume people are snickering behind my back about droopy under-cleavage. The informality of the online world makes it feel like I'm less a "celebrity" and more a big sister my fans can be brutally honest with. "Felicia! Loved your last video. You looked tired, though; take melatonin, it'll help with the jet lag!" They know me as a sort of digital friend, not an object to be torn down over superficials. (Probably because I don't give them much "objectifying" material.) The best part about this weirdly cobbled-together career I've built is that I get to bury myself in all the subjects I love. Comics, video games, DVDs, romance novels, TV shows, bad kung fu movies. It's all part of my job to purchase these things and mostly legally deduct them from my taxes. And it makes it easier to connect with people, no matter where I am in the world. When the occasional stranger approaches me at a party to say, "Hey, you're Felicia Day. Let's talk about that comic book you were tweeting about last week!" it's the greatest thing in the world. Because it saves me from having to stand in the corner awkwardly, drinking all the Sprite, and then leaving after ten minutes without saying good-bye to the host. (That's called an Irish exit, and I'm part Irish, so it's part of my genetic wheelhouse.) As someone who had few or... yeah, NO friends when I was growing up? Pretty sweet deal. So how did I get this super-awesome career? Well, you're in luck, because this book is designed to tell you how I got here! Short answer: A) By being raised weird. B) By failing over and over again. C) And by never taking "no" for an answer. This isn't a typical lady memoir. I appreciate my beauty sleep too much to have crazy "one night in Cabo" stories. I don't have emo ex-boyfriends to gossip about. And I haven't been on any quirky drug trips that ended in profound self-realizations. Guess I'll get busy in those areas for the next book. (Send in the prosecco! That's alcohol, right?) There will be video game references galore, and at one point you may say to yourself, "This book might be too nerdy even for ME." But the heart of my story is that the world opened up for me once I decided to embrace who I am—unapologetically. My story demonstrates that there's no better time in history to have a dream and be able to reach an audience with your art. Or just be as weird as you want to be and not have to be ashamed. That lesson's just as legit. Between the jokes and dorky illustrations (I'm addicted to Photoshop), I hope you can find a teensy bit of inspiration for your own life—to take risks and use all the tools at your fingertips to get your voice out there while you're still not a corpse. Be who you are and use this new connected world to embrace it. Because... Okay, turn the page. Let's get this over with.
You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost)	Felicia Day	[ "comedy" ]	[ "biography", "gaming", "humor", "video games", "Almost" ]	Chapter 2	Why I'm Weird A brief survey of an eccentric, homeschooled childhood. For the record, I was homeschooled for hippie reasons, not God reasons. And it wasn't even full hippie. There was no "communal family in an ashram" sort of thing, which is SO disappointing. I've always wanted a glamorous messed-up childhood like that. Raised without clocks. Around kids named Justice League and Feather. Winona Ryder had that, right? She's so pretty. Nope, I had a middle-class hippie upbringing. More hippie-adjacent than anything. We recycled before it was cool and wore "Save the Whales" T-shirts and... that's about it. Oh, and my mom fed us carob instead of chocolate and gave us vitamins that made our breath smell weird. But since my brother and I weren't around other kids that often, we didn't realize the breath thing until way later. (Pro tip: put the pills in the freezer to avoid vitamin B mouth stink.) Before being educated at home (i.e., sequestered in social isolation for nearly a decade), I went to a few different elementary schools from the ages of five to seven. There, I learned several important things about myself: A) If a boy has an accent, I will fall in love with him. If he has an accent and glasses, I will want to marry him. (That means you, Charlie with the Scottish brogue from preschool. You could have had all of me. Fool.) B) I am never going to be passionate about only one subject, unless you count "teacher's suck-a-butt" as a category. I learned early in life that being perfect is a HIT with adults. Who gave special gifts to her kindergarten teacher Miss Julie on every holiday, including Presidents' Day, even though it technically isn't a gift holiday? This girl! C) I will never be the popular one. That's for girls who wear hair bows that match their dresses and hang out with other girls who wear hair bows that match their dresses. Back in the late '80s, the hair bow was the rich girl's scrunchie. I had no hair bows or scrunchies because we were poor and shopped at Goodwill, and my mom cut my hair in the shape of a salad bowl. Lastly: D) The popular girls would never acknowledge that I was destined for respect and high status, so I was happy to go, "Screw those chicks!" and become the leader of the class misfits. Albino boy? Girl with lisp? The "slow one"? Join my gang! We'll show the cute bow-girls how much more fun it is to play dodgeball when you're not worried about that expensive outfit that makes you look all rich and adorable! (Not that I was jealous.) Me and my first-grade group were TOTAL Breakfast Club: Zoe from Puerto Rico, who owned a guinea pig; Marcus with curly red hair, who always smelled like milk; and Megan with the walleye, who I didn't really want to spend time with, but my mom made me, and then the kid grew on me because she always seemed delighted by my company. We'd hang out in the corner of the homeroom, the corner of the playground, the... generally we hid in corners, defying everyone with our independence and stuff. Like sharing our sticker books amongst ourselves only. (Those popular bitches never saw my Pegasus page, and it was EPIC.) Once, we even stood at the back fence of the school grounds, near the freeway access road, and made the "honk" noise at passing trucks, even though it was technically against the rules. Oooh! Since I had an "in" with the teachers, I told my crew, with all the sincerity of Gregory Peck leading a platoon into a World War II battle, "Don't worry, guys. I've got your backs." Being a leader was nerve-wracking, but with responsibility comes great admiration. So I was fine with it. It seemed like I was laying the groundwork to become a well-rounded, appearance-aware but antiestablishment woman. A future Susan Sontag, no doubt. Unfortunately, a few life hiccups threw the whole "growing-up-around-other-kids" plan into the emotional meat grinder.
You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost)	Felicia Day	[ "comedy" ]	[ "biography", "gaming", "humor", "video games", "Almost" ]	Jesus Loved Me!	For second grade, I transferred to a conservative Lutheran elementary school. We weren't religious, but Mom had gone to public school as a child, and the only stories she told us about her education were about kids not wearing shoes to class and the time where she had to shave her head because of lice. Oh, and something about "knocking up" people too early, which I didn't understand, but she was very specific: it ruined women's lives. Saints Academy was the best school in the cosmopolitan town of Huntsville, Alabama (Home of Space Camp, repreSENT!), and I loved it, except that we had to attend chapel every day. I considered this hour a threat to my intellect, because Mom always said, "I don't want you or your brother becoming a Deep South Bible Thumper." I took her warning literally. A woman named Ms. Rosemary led religion class, and whenever she'd touch the Bible with the SLIGHTEST velocity, I would fold my arms and scowl. "No way, lady! You're not turning me into a 'Thumper!'" The only thing that got me through the daily service was a big Jesus statue hung behind the church pulpit. I thought his face, although a little depressed about being up on the cross like that, was kinda hunky. So I sat there every day, tuning Ms. Rosemary out like the trombones from the Peanuts cartoons, imagining me and J.C. cuddling in front of the television while we watched Family Ties or Scooby-Doo together. Sometimes we'd even go to Disneyland on our imaginary honeymoon. J.C. hated Goofy and loved the teacup ride the best, just like I did. We were the perfect pair in my dreams! But after a few months, my crush on Mr. Christ transferred to a Mr. Hasselhoff from Knight Rider, and after that I prayed to my ex-boyfriend's dad for anything to get me out of the daily religious misery. Ms. Rosemary was not a good communicator, and whoever these "John," "Matthew," and "Judas" people were, they were NOT HAVING A GOOD TIME. How could I escape?! And one day, it happened. Ms. Rosemary and a guy named "Timothy One" gave me the key. After school, I ran into the kitchen. I couldn't wait to throw my match into the parental tinderbox. "Mom! Mom! Guess what? They burned money in church today!" My mother stopped making her hemp yogurt or whatever other disgusting health food she used to force-feed us. "What?!" "Yeah, they set fire to money. Ms. Rosemary said it's the devil's paper!" "Are you kidding? How much?" "Hundreds of dollars! More than any money I've seen in my life!" It was actually a handful of fives, but the dramatic inflation seemed appropriate. And they did burn American currency in front of a bunch of seven-year-olds. That part was true. The flames reflected in Ms. Rosemary's eyes. Even my ex-boyfriend Christ looked creeped out, and he was a statue. My mom went through the roof, just like I knew she would. She's a lovely woman, but cross her about something she cares about, like politics or discontinuing a face cream she loves, and her attitude is, "I will fight you. Right in this department store, throw it down NOW, Clinique associate bitch!" Her temper could be intimidating, but in this instance, channeling it was in my best interest. And therefore, the BEST! "Do I have to go to chapel again, Mom?" "Absolutely not! Don't worry, baby. I'll take care of it." Ooh! The Thumpers were gonna get in TROUBLE! The next morning, my mom went in to talk with the principal. She put on her special dress, the Liz Claiborne with the sleeves puffed up like the Hindenburg, so I knew she was serious about saving me. While I waited for her to come home, I fantasized about how I'd use my free hour at school. Organize my sticker album or tend to my vast My Little Pony herd. You know, things that would contribute to my future. But when she returned home a few hours later, her big puffy sleeves were deflated. The school wouldn't apologize for the money burning, and for some crazy reason, they wouldn't make an exception to their curriculum for an outraged partial-hippie family. I couldn't believe it didn't work! I mean, when Mom was upset about things, like my refusing to eat chicken liver, it was scary. What was wrong with these people?! "So I have to go back to chapel again?" "No. You're not going back to that school at all." "Cool! Wait, huh?!" Yup. The Money Burning Incident of 1985 got me yanked out of school completely. Oops. I briefly got put into another school that was into "unschooling." I can't remember much about that place except it closed abruptly and stole all our money. Adult problems. At the same time, my dad got orders to move from Huntsville, Alabama, to the Deeper South—Biloxi, Mississippi—to finish his medical training for the military. And that's when the shit hit my educational fan. To most of you outside the Deep South, Alabama or Mississippi? It's the same. I mean, they're ass-to-ass anyway. Might as well combine them and make a super hick state, right? But to my Southern extended family, it was bad. They thought we were moving to an antebellum wasteland. My dad was a Yankee himself, so he was even more concerned. (Everyone north of Kentucky was referred to as a Yankee in my mom's family. It took me years to realize that wasn't official.) There wasn't a tradition in our family to homeschool, but there was a tradition to get super-mega educated, especially on my mom's side. My grandfather had a PhD in nuclear physics and a thick Southern drawl like molasses. He would invent a desalination machine one week and chew out anyone who distracted him from his favorite Nashville sketch show, Hee Haw, the next. "Get outta there, Pooch! You're blockin' Skeeter Davis!" My grandmother is a scientist, too, and a nurse and an artist and... I'll be honest, kinda scary. She once found a dead owl on the side of the road and put it in the back of her pickup in order to analyze the skeleton after it decomposed. I mean, that's kind of Beth Henley interesting behavior, but seeing a dead owl in the back of a pickup is super creepy when you're seven years old, guys. Because you start to suspect that if it were legal, Grandma would do the same thing with your corpse, too. In order to keep the brain legacy up, my mom scrambled to find schooling options for me and my brother before we moved, but the Gulf Coast of Mississippi didn't have much to choose from. In fact, it had one of the worst education systems in the country, and the only secular private school in the area was a place that made kids wear uniforms, which Mom considered fascist. So we were in a quandary. And because my dad was working twenty-eight hours a day to become a surgeon (scrubs were the only thing I saw him in from the age of eight on), it was up to my mom to figure out an alternative. So, in a natural leap, she decided to Bob-Vila-DIY our educations herself. [ Home Is Where... It All Is! ] In retrospect—and not to be mean to anyone who parented me—it doesn't seem like there was a clear plan going into the whole homeschooling thing. At first, the idea was to follow a comprehensive third-grade curriculum that my mom sent off for in the mail, 1-800 style. It was a system missionary families used when they took their children abroad, and I was a fan of that idea, because it seemed super romantic. I'd always dreamed about traveling overseas on a ship like the Titanic, and missionaries seemed tragic and special (not like dumb Ms. Rosemary). Also, homeschooling seemed like something an orphan would do, and I really wanted to be an orphan. Because let's be real: they have it so good in kids' literature! They're sad but special, people love them against all odds, and they're always guaranteed a destiny of greatness. The Secret Garden, The Wizard of Oz, Harry Potter? Orphanhood was a bucket list item for me! Along with being able to communicate telepathically with my dog. Based on the loose association of "no school" and "no parents," I was pro-homeschooling. Without understanding what the hell it really was. On the first day of my new educational life, several boxes of books arrived at our house. Weirdly, all the texts were designed the same, with the words "Science" and "Math" on the covers, like boxes on a generic food aisle. Despite the weirdo curriculum, I was psyched. And so was my mom. "You guys ready to learn outside the box?" She lifted up the thick "teaching manual" that she was supposed to use daily. (I don't think it ever got its spine cracked.) "Yeah!" My brother, Ryon, and I jumped up and down, way too excited, like we were in the audience for a Nickelodeon show. We were ready! Screw the establishment! We were learning on our own! The next morning I put on pants (even though I didn't technically have to because I was in my own home), sat down with my new books at my "desk" (the kitchen table we fed the cats on), and got ready to rock my brain! Just to be clear, my mom did make an actual effort to start our day at 9:00 a.m. sharp and do schoolwork until about 1:00 p.m., before "do whatever you want, kids" time. This lasted for maybe a week. With no one to supervise any of us, slowly but surely, the family wake-up time slid to a nebulous "midmorning." After a few months, we'd miss all studying before lunchtime because we ate out every day (eating at home was for oppressing housewives), and the restaurants filled up around one, so it was better to leave the house at noon to beat the work crowd. And if we got up around 10:30, that meant... I mean, showering is a thing that takes time, guys. Any structure in our lives disintegrated. "Can the doodles in the margins of my geology chapter count as art class? Really? Thanks, Mom!" Schooling became "We'll get to it later!" around other, more important things, like grocery shopping and going to see the midnight Rocky Horror Picture Show screenings. Eventually, my brother and I were on our own. No rules, no tests, and no pesky governmental supervision for children who had recently relocated and weren't on official census lists. I don't mean to imply that Mom was completely hands-off with our educations. She did stuff. When she got interested in something, she'd say, "Let's go learn about history!" and we'd jump in the car and drive around the state for a few days visiting all the Civil War memorial sites. (It's super fun to roll down a grassy hill where thousands of Confederate bodies are buried.) She'd also yell "Study!" a lot from her bedroom while watching The Sally Jessy Raphael Show, and during the first Iraq war she made us start learning Arabic because, "You never know what will happen." There was, however, one big rule that was enforced during our free-for-all education: We were expected to read. Constantly. All day, every day. Whatever we wanted at the library, the used bookshop, adult or kid section, anything that didn't have nudity or Stephen King on the cover, we could read. Naturally, I became obsessed with detective pulp fiction. Perry Mason was my favorite. Not the actor who played him in the TV show, Raymond Burr. I hated him; he was bulky, and his skull looked creepy underneath his skin. No, my Perry Mason was taller and debonair, like Cary Grant, or my second love, David Hasselhoff. I collected all but one of the Perry Mason books (The Case of the Singing Skirt eluded me; it was my collection's white whale), and I arranged all eighty-one of them by publishing chronology on a makeshift bookshelf in the back of my closet. Because of their influence, my life's dream became clear: to enter the glamorous profession of "secretary," like Perry's loyal companion, Della Street. Either that or "moll"—whatever that job entailed. I was also expected to work hard on math, for my grandpa. Since he was a physicist, he would quiz me on equations when we'd go back to Alabama for our monthly visits. My mom liked to impress him. And I did, too, because he always gave me hard candy when I got something right. "Tell me the Pythagorean theorem." "A squared plus B squared equals C squared?" "That's my girl! Now have a Werther's and scoot to the kitchen. Hee Haw's on." According to my mom, there was a pressing urgency for me to learn as much math as I could. An uncredited study she read once said, quote, "Girls become really stupid in science after they get their period, so you'd better learn as much as possible before that happens." I had such anxiety about this "clearly proven" biological fact that I was studying calculus by the age of twelve. When I finally got my period, I cried, not because I was growing up, but because I had just learned derivatives and really enjoyed doing them. I was scared that estrogen would wipe the ability to do them from my brain. I guess at a certain point, my dad expressed concern or something about our education. My brother and I didn't see what the fuss was. I mean, we were FINE with doing whatever we wanted and not being forced to "study" like the rest of the world's plebes. But to add structure to our lives, my mom shifted her focus, like any smart businessperson, to outsourcing. Our lives became nothing but lessons. Ballet, tap, jazz dance, youth orchestra, martial arts, watercolor at the local community college (me and a bunch of eighty-year-olds rockin' the stand of maple trees!), cross-stitch, poise class (held in the back of a department store, for REAL!), my mom basically trained me to become a geisha. With dance lessons alone, I went to class at least three hours a day. Big calves, you are mine for life. So even though it was weird and thoroughly uncomprehensive, my brother and I got an education. Of a sort. Here's an average daily schedule to give you some perspective about a weekday in my eight-to sixteen-year-old life: 00 a.m.: Wake up before everyone and SHUT YOUR CLOCK UP OR ELSE. 30 a.m.: Lost in Space reruns while eating Rice Krispies. 30 a.m.: Math for an hour. Maybe a chapter in one of those logic puzzle books with the grids. I loved puzzles, and Mom said they counted. 00 a.m.: AMC movie, hopefully a historical one for studying history, hopefully Technicolor, hopefully Oklahoma! If not Oklahoma!, 50 percent chance of watching VHS tape of Oklahoma!. Or a Cary Grant movie. Half-ass read chapter in history book while watching said movie. CHECK! 00 p.m.: Family time! Lunch out at restaurant, one of four that saw us so frequently, they kept a table reserved for us. No one ever questioned why we weren't in school. Thanks, society! 00 p.m.: Study Latin because Mom thinks it sounds good to tell people we are learning Latin. Most of the time, read Perry Mason book instead, for "literature." 30 to 8:00 p.m.: Geisha lessons. 00 to 10:00 p.m.: More movies or TV (especially kung-fu movies for PE) while eating either tuna casserole or manicotti (the only two items my mother cooked) or a microwave TV dinner (the one with the postmodern square desserts). 00 to 11:00 p.m.: More reading, video games, or maybe some Legos. For my brain-shape skills. After 11:00 p.m.: Eh. Go to bed whenever. [ Socialization, Maybe? No? Okay! ] Since everyone we met always brought up "What about their socialization skills?" like naggy in-laws, my mom tried to find us like-minded people to hang out with. Problem was, our family's minds weren't like any others. Especially in southern Mississippi. My brother and I tried to hang out with other homeschooled kids a few times, but in the ass crack of the Bible Belt, parents who kept their kids home were not going to intersect with our liberal points of view. Ever. At one awkward meet-up, I was hanging out with a girl around my age on the playground. She was wearing a white long-sleeved shirt and an overdress down to her ankles. I kid you not; she looked like a Pilgrim, and her name was Eunice. I made the first move. Because socialization beggars can't be choosers. "What books do you read?" "The Bible." "Have you read A Wrinkle in Time? Or Perry Mason, The Case of the Fan Dancer's Horse?" "No. We only read the Bible." "Oh. You're a Thumper." "What?" "Nothing. Wanna swing?" "I can't. I might show my ankles." I laughed because I thought she was joking. She wasn't. After that, my brother and I were in agreement: being alone was better than hanging around those homeschooled weirdos. So I didn't spend much time with other children as a kid. SURPRISE! I actually can't name one best friend I had during those years outside of a group lesson situation. But it's human instinct to connect, and eventually I found someone who would listen to me no matter how weird I was: my little pink diary. I called myself Leesie as a kid because I guess my family couldn't think of a more unattractive nickname. Oh wait. My grandpa called me Pooch. That one I won't embrace in print. But the way I wrote to this diary, you'd think I was writing on the mirror to another little girl who existed on the other side of the page. "Dear Diary, it's been a month since I wrote. I know, I'm a bad friend." "...I finished the Emily of New Moon books this week, but I mustn't bore you." "Today's our first anniversary. Happy Birthday to us!" I confided everything a weird sixth-grader would share with other children and definitely be rejected for in a typical school situation. Big dreams like, "Wouldn't it be neat to go back to 1880 and there wasn't any kidnappers and progress, and the streams and fields and everything were beautiful?" I made super-serious vows in the margins, like, "Vow: I will never kill an animal if I can help it." "Vow: I will never marry a man for money." "Vow: I will never let my children live in a slum." Real personality-congealing self-work. My mom was a big political activist, and that rubbed off on me in a big way, too. The diary is awash in bold political statements and social consciousness. "We have a new president. George Bush and Dennis the Menace for vice president." Most of all, the diary was a safe zone. A place where I could share my innermost thoughts, work out a semblance of an identity, analyze my likes and dislikes, and work through my relationships, like that with my brother, Ryon, in a thoughtful, mature way. That little pink diary is a tome for the ages. My mother wasn't totally blind to the fact that we needed exposure to other kids. She made efforts. But none of them seemed to stick. Probably because my attitude toward other children was like a seventy-year-old spinster's. "This girl Kate from violin lesson came over and I told her about my books. She doesn't read. Stupid. I won't explaen [sic] them to her. She has no imagination." "We went to eat with Miss Molly's two kids today and they were putting forks on the floor and stepping on them like hoolegans [sic]. We also took Samantha (10) who is fat and obnoxious, but nice when she isn't giggling insatatiabley [sic]." "I went to an opera-ballet by myself. Behend [sic] me were two 7-year-old giggling brats. Well, gotta go!" The only kid in real, close proximity to me was Erin, a thirteen-year-old who lived next door. She taught me that owning a trampoline was the most glamorous thing a girl could have, and that jelly shoes were haute couture. I learned all this through spying on her through my bedroom window, because she didn't like me and wouldn't spend any time with me, physically. Despite our strained relationship (or because of it), I did have strong thoughts about her lifestyle choices. Then I went on to apologize about criticizing her behavior, because I think my diary started chiding me about my judgmental attitude. Somehow. Upshot to my bizarre upbringing: I got super-hyper-educated in many odd areas but was pretty lonely for many years. Sometimes achingly so. They say that the root of everything you are lies in your childhood. Every emotional problem, every screwed-up relationship, every misplaced passion and career problem you can blame on the way you were raised. So I can be kinda smug when I say, "Boy, do I have some excuses!" Sure, I could have avoided a lot of problems as an adult by being raised like everyone else. I might not have had as much performance anxiety, I might be better at maintaining relationships outside of hitting "Like" on a person's Facebook post when they have a baby. But here's the part I unapologetically embrace: My weirdness turned into my greatest strength in life. It's why I'm who I am today and have the career I have. It's why I'm able to con someone into allowing me to write this book. (Hi, Mr. Simon and Mr. Schuster!) Growing up without being judged by other kids allowed me to be okay with liking things no one else liked. How else could a twelve-year-old girl be so well versed in dragon lore and film noir? Or think it was the height of coolness to be able to graph a cosine equation? Or long to play Dungeons & Dragons but never get the chance until adulthood because her mom saw that one article on how it made you a Satanic basement murderer? Most school situations would have shamed all those oddball enthusiasms out of me REALLY quick. Those bow-girls would have snubbed me for them, for sure. But during my childhood my fringe interests remained uncriticized, so they bloomed inside of me without self-consciousness until I was out in the world, partially formed, like a blind-baked pie shell. By then it was WAY too late. I was irrevocably weird. I'm glad I didn't know better than to like math and science and fantasy and video games because my life would be WAY different without all that stuff. Probably "desk job and babies" different. Not that there's anything wrong with babies. Or desks. I mean, I'm sitting at one now, so my analogy really doesn't... I didn't mean to insult anyone with those things, I just... oh gosh, panic sweats. Anyway, thanks for all the weirdness, Mom and Dad! P.S. I don't have a GED. I have two college degrees, but I don't actually have a high school one. It took writing this chapter to figure that out. Fuck.
You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost)	Felicia Day	[ "comedy" ]	[ "biography", "gaming", "humor", "video games", "Almost" ]	Chapter 4	What Avatar Should I Be? Forming my identity with video game morality tests. And how that led to my first kiss with a Dragon in a Walmart parking lot. Knowing yourself is life's eternal homework. ( Another coffee mug slogan!) We have to dig and experiment and figure out who the hell we are from birth to death, which is super inconvenient, right? And embarrassing. Because as teenagers we do all that soul-searching through our clothing choices. Which we later have photographic evidence of for shaming purposes. Hippie, sporty, goth, I have an adorable sampling of all my more mortifying phases. That "mom jeans" picture calls for a postview eye bleaching, huh? Because I was homeschooled, there are huge holes in my identity that I constantly have to trowel over. Answers to basic, "truth or dare" questions like: ▪ If you could trade places with one person for a day, who would it be? (I guess Beyoncé because... amazing hair reasons?) ▪ If society broke down, what store would you loot first? (A drug store for tampons? Sorry, dudes, for mentioning tampons in the book.) ▪ What kind of tattoo would you get? (Um... a hummingbird-fairy-dragon creature? Legolas on my right ass cheek? I HAVE NO IDEA, STOP PRESSURING ME!) I AM covered in the "What superpower would you wish for?" area. I've been asked that question a million times, because, you know, the nerd thing. I would want to be able to speak all languages. I don't even know ONE other language outside of key menu items like "tamale" and "fondue," but whenever I hear a tourist who can't speak English struggling to get directions, I dream of being able to step in, no matter what the language, but especially German since it's emphatic, and fix the problem. Then I accept their thanks with a wave of the hand. "Es ist nicht, mein freunde!" In my imagination, I meet a lot of amazing people this way, especially heiresses of castles whom I visit in Europe the following year, anointed as "The American who saved my vacation last summer." Moving on. As I grew up, I was bothered more and more by the bigger picture of "Who am I?" Science didn't seem to have much guidance except for one section about personality disorders in my dad's college psychology textbook. And those were a disappointment, because I didn't seem psychotic enough to qualify for any of them. So around the wise old age of twelve, I decided that fortune-telling was the key to learning about who I was. The obsession started with a Teen Beat magazine personality quiz, "What perfume are you?" (fruity, BTW, no surprise) and rolled onward from there. I studied graphology, the art of handwriting analysis, which confirmed that I was an introvert and inspired me to start slanting my words to the right instead of the left. (According to the book, left was the mark of a serial killer.) Numerology, where the letters in your name add up into a single number, told me that I was a "1," which gave me the great excuse to go around saying, "I'm a number one!" I liked that subject a lot. And later, the lost art of phrenology told me that one of my skull bumps was linked to an excess of philobrutism (fondness for pets), which is totally true. My favorite movie is Babe, and if you even hum the theme song to it, I WILL start crying. One time I was introduced to James Cromwell, who played a gruff farmer in the movie, and I burst into tears when I touched his hand. Because it was so big and warm and he DANCED FOR HIS PIG. But out of all the esoteric techniques I played around with, my favorite ended up being Western astrology. Because I loved space. At the time, my TV crush was Commander William T. Riker from Star Trek: The Next Generation. He traveled the stars, I was studying them, those things seemed to add up to, "FATE CALLING! DISCOVER WHO YOU ARE SO WE CAN TRAVEL THE GALAXIES TOGETHER, BELOVED ENSIGN!" At first I was disappointed that I'm a Cancer, and my birthstone is the pearl. I mean, one's a deadly disease, the other is a gem for grandmas. I wanted to be born in October, because opals are the prettiest, but what could I do? My parents did the deed in September. Hello, unfashionable June baby. Aside from those problems, though, everything else was spot-on. My sign said I was a homebody. Check. I was sensitive. Sobbing double check. My Venus was in Taurus, so I would be a constant lover, which I already knew, because I'd read Hawthorne. I understood what happened to ladies with loose garters. From start to finish, the astrology thing was so convincing that I went ahead and let the rules of Cancerdom become the rules of my life. I started doing all the chores for the cats and dogs because I was a "nurturer." Whenever I got into a fight with my brother, I'd scream, "I can't help it! You crossed into my COMFORT ZONE!" Of all the recommended Cancerian jobs, I settled on "antique dealer," and started collecting books on pottery patterns from the 1920s in order to get a head start on my future career. "Mom, for Christmas I want this Roseville calla lily vase. The pattern is just MARVELOUS." I yearned to spread my new cosmic knowledge to other people in my life. Which... weren't many. My only option beyond my brother (who was SO Leo) were the girls I knew in ballet class. We'd exchanged words while waiting to do piqué turns across the floor a few times, so we were pretty much besties. I brought my astrology books with me to my next lesson and, in between tap class and pointe class, tried to transform a few fellow young lives. "Heather, you're a Libra, so your struggle will mostly be with vanity and validating yourself outside your looks." "Stop saying you'll never be able to do three pirouettes, Jackie! You're an air sign; it's totally gonna happen!" "Will you pass history class? Oooh, you're a Pisces with the moon in... ugh. Give it up, Tina." Turns out the girls loved having their own private psychic in the changing room. I convinced my mom to drop me off at class a half hour early for "stretching" and started consulting with all the dancers on parental problems, summer school plans, you name it. A lot of them brought in birthdays of boys they liked in order to see how their charts aligned. I'm pretty sure my advice led to a few de-virginizations. It was an awesome change from no one wanting to talk to the weird homeschooled girl! I'd finally found a way to relate to other kids. It was fulfilling. And made me popular. And eventually I got shut down. Miss Mary, my dance teacher, stopped me one day when I arrived. "Felicia, what are you carrying?" "Um, just a few books." There were fifteen stacked up to my chin. I'd just discovered Chinese astrology and I Ching and couldn't wait to tell Jennifer about the guy she crushed on, Simon. Sadly, his stubborn Tiger traits would always keep them apart. "Megan's mom doesn't like her learning about astrology. I'm going to have to ask you to stop talking about it with the girls." "But it's the science of the stars!" "She thinks it's Satanic. You gave her daughter a pentagram." "It's a natal chart, duh. You can't let ignorance trump science here, Miss Mary!" Nothing I said could persuade her. She was a Taurus. Once her mind was made up, it was over. I was forced to hang up my crystal ball, and eventually the girls stopped talking to me again. (And they probably made terrible life choices they could have avoided if they hadn't been deprived of my insight, thanks to Megan's mom.) I was upset but soon bounced back and was able to move on to another, more accessible place for friendship and identity exploration: the online world. [ Vidya Gamez! ] I don't need a psychologist to tell me that my love of role-playing games is linked to my childhood quest for self. Link number two: I like killing virtual monsters. We were always big on technology in my family. My dad studied to be an engineer before becoming a doctor, and he's the kind of dude who always had a PalmPilot in a large holster attached to his belt. (Now he has his Android phone in a large holster attached to his belt, but that's his life choice, and I will not mock it. To his face.) When I was about seven or eight, my grandfather gave us his secondhand "laptop," which was as big as a dining room table. I think it was meant to help my parents with their college courses, but generally my mom set the standard for us kids by playing video games on it. They were text-only, because the monitor didn't support graphics, so it was more like reading an interactive novel than anything. The gaming equivalent of liking weird foreign films with subtitles. My favorite one to watch her play was called Leather Goddesses of Phobos. It came with a scratch-and-sniff sheet tied to various parts of the game, and I sniffed the pizza area until it disappeared, even though it smelled more like dog food than pepperoni. (If I did drugs, I would totally be a sniffer. Gasoline and Magic Markers, I gotta fight against getting my nose all up in there.) After watching my mom type "attack Tiffany with pipe" and having the game tell her back, "Tiffany yells, 'ow!'," I knew I was hooked on video games for life. As my brother and I grew up, we played any PC computer game we could trick our parents into buying us. It was the primary hobby we used to fill our many, MANY free hours between geisha lessons. "We need this program called Math Blaster to help us learn better, Mom. Oh, and those four other games under it, too. Don't look too close!" In an amazing stroke of Cancerian fate, right after the ballet class Satan-worshiping situation, I stumbled upon a video game series called Ultima. Besides pretty much being one of the seminal Role-Playing Game series of ALL TIME (don't argue with me about this, you're wrong), this is a video game that literally changed my life. What set this series apart from other indecipherably pixilated games of the early '90s was the way you created your character. At the beginning of the game, a fortune-teller asks you several multiple-choice questions like: "A girl is to be killed for stealing bread from a dying woman. What do you do?" A) Let them kill her; she deserved it. B) Demand that she be freed; her crime is understandable. C) Offer to take the punishment instead. She's hot. (Okay, that wasn't one of the real questions.) Depending on the way you answered, your avatar (the character you played; don't worry: I'll hold your hand through the nerd lingo) started the game differently. Your decisions influenced who you were in the world; your morals shaped what Virtues (like Honesty and Courage) you were aligned with. Let me simplify: As a kid, this video game SAW INTO MY SOUL. It defined me, then projected me into a world where I could be a virtual hero version of myself. I could walk around alone, without my mom warning me there were molesters waiting to kidnap me on every corner. I could go shopping and steal things and kill monsters! Oh, and I could name my avatar AFTER MYSELF! Screw astrology, I was in love!!!!! I played the games in the Ultima series for HOURS and HOURS a day, month after month. I decided it checked the box for many subjects in my homeschooled curriculum, like computer science, literature, and PE (for the eye-hand coordination). The only thing my mom ever said about it was, "I'm glad you're concentrating on something, kids!" I became completely immersed in the world, channeling my avatar's ruling Virtue of "Compassion" everywhere in the 16-bit realm. And deep down, all I wanted IN THE WORLD was to talk to other people about it. Discuss how bitchin' the graphics were. How awesome the lore was. And Holy crap, this game allows you to BAKE VIRTUAL BREAD! I NEEDED to share this joy with other humans! But the girls at ballet had no clue what a computer was (Megan's stupid mom probably thought that technology was the work of Satan), and my brother was... my brother. I mean, brothers are practically subhuman, right? No, I needed real live people who loved this Ultima game who were not living in my house with me! Where could I find them?! Hmmmm... [ Technology-ships ] BONG-BOOP-BOOP-BEEP-BEEP-BOOP-BOOP-BEEP <PAUSE> PLAP PLEEP PLWAAAAAAANG SCREEEEWAAAAAA KLEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESHWAAAANG GLAW CEGLAW SSCHHEHEHHEHEHHHHHHHHHHWHHHHHHHHH <STATIC> Just approximating that sound in type makes me recall joy, like other kids getting excited over the creepy tinkle of an ice cream truck. In my childhood world, the sound of a modem dialing up to connect with another computer was the sound of freedom. I'm probably a member of the oldest generation that grew up with the idea that you can connect with other people using a computer. My grandfather worked for the military, where he headed the nuclear physics laboratory at the US Missile Command for twenty years, so he was probably sending groovy selfies back and forth with colleagues in the '70s. When the commercial internet started to emerge in the '80s, he encouraged my parents to get on the computers-talking-to-other-people train earlier than 99 percent of the rest of the population. And we thought we were soooo cool. There was only one commercial online company at the time, CompuServe, and it was not sophisticated, guys. It was the cave painting equivalent to Tumblr. I mean, you had to pay $10 an hour to use it. That's right, in ye olden internet days, kids, people had internet cafés in their own living rooms! But, for the times, CompuServe had it all. It offered news, messaging, and bulletin boards covering every subject you'd want to chat about in a glorious "only text" interface. Oh, and tons of racy ASCII porn. For that, and many reasons, it was a long time before my brother and I were allowed to log online by ourselves. We could only pop on and off to get quick hints about video game puzzles we were too lazy/stupid to figure out on our own. (Conservative usage of CompuServe was more affordable than using the 1-888 hint line, which we previously used to run up $400 phone bills. We got very good at hiding the mail from my father.) But eventually, when I was about fourteen, my family graduated online technologies to a newer online service called Prodigy. Which was revolutionary amazing because it charged $12.95 for unlimited use. In addition, it had REAL GRAPHICS. Like, eight whole colors. In 1994, this interface looked like virtual reality. Prodigy had online GAMES and interactive bulletin boards, and did I mention it was a flat rate, so my brother and I could use it as long as we wanted and not get in trouble? This was like Prometheus rolling into town, "Here, humans, check out this fire thing." It changed everything! As soon as I got access, I immediately went to the message boards to search the video game discussions and found a group called the Ultima Dragons. Browsing through the posts, I couldn't believe it. I had finally found a place where people totally knew what I was talking about when I wrote, "OMG ULTIMA IS THE BEST GAME OF ALL TIME SORRY FOR THE CAPS!" My dreams about finding a place to create true, meaningful friendships around my fake video game world had come true. And my mom didn't have to drive me anywhere! I joined the club and named myself Codex Dragon because everyone had a Name + Dragon theme going on, and a Codex was an object in the video game that represented the "book of infinite wisdom." Are some of you feeling like it's getting too geeky in here? You probably should have read the book blurb better, because I'm just getting STARTED. As a member of the Ultima Dragons, we didn't just post about the games, although a majority of the stuff was, "How do you defeat the stupid gargoyles at the Shrine of Humility because I keep dying!" We talked about movies we loved and books we read. The people who shared my love of Robert Jordan's The Wheel of Time fantasy book series immediately became my closest friends. They were the first people I'd ever met who'd read them, too. (Although I was the only one who had all the hardbacks in first edition and did a yearly reread. Impressed? Well, THEY were.) It might sound dorky, but the Ultima Dragons gave me my first environment where I could express my enthusiasms freely to my peers. Hell, for once I HAD peers. And I mined it for all it was worth. Socially, artistically. In all ways. Even... with poetry. Yes, I wrote poems dedicated to a video game—shut up with the judgment (although it's warranted). The following is a really special example. It's an ode to one of the fictional characters in Ultima video game. A jester. His name was Chuckles. Hand me the Pulitzer. Dozens more where that came from! There was also a separate message board called the "Drunken Stupor" where we'd post what I now understand to be "fanfic" set in a tavern (called the Drunken Stupor) about our Ultima Dragons characters. Meaning, ourselves. Example: Codex Dragon enters the tavern with a tough look on her face. Busting open the door with her high-heeled boot, then she strides over to the bar and then slams down her silver sword of Grandia. She looks at Tempest Dragon with torrid eyes, "You! I don't know whether to kill or kiss you." Tempest looks up. Like he wants her to do both. Looking back, there's an uncomfortable dose of S&M in the stories I wrote at fourteen. I attacked other Dragon members with swords and whips a lot, and Codex always wore sexy leather outfits with stiletto heels. The guys LOVED how creative I was! Their feedback on the stories made me discover that flirting was fun. So I proceeded to do it with a lot of people. Um, pretty much everyone. You gotta understand I had NO OTHER GUYS in my life! Sure, there were some boys in my dance classes and community theatre productions I acted in, but the other chorus members of Brigadoon didn't generally put their Ps in Vs. The guys online were into girls, and I had access to them. Do the teen math: I wanted all of them. We started sending pictures to each other (physically in the mail, yes), which either fueled or quashed the fire of awkward teen romance. I got a ton of positive feedback on my submission: This picture was originally taken for a JCPenney modeling competition. I was not a winner in the eyes of the department store, but the Dragons all thought I was a treasure. Yes, those are velvet high-tops. I got pictures back in exchange, and it was weird to put a face to an online personae. They never matched up the way I imagined. The asshole goth punk of the group turned out to be a Midwestern blond guy in a football outfit, straight out of Friday Night Lights. The friendliest of the group turned out to be a little person, which was a shock, but then cool, and no one brought it up again. Several of the other guys had really long stringy hacker hair, or were old, so I stopped flirting with them (kinda), and two standouts got my thumbs-up endorsement for continued romantic flirty times. On the one hand, Wolf Dragon's picture was a Sears portrait special, with the bokeh-blurred edges, and a splattering of pubescent facial hair, erratically spread, like a limp hair-gun had shot follicles at his face. But I liked his personality online, and he had kind eyes that overcame the velvet waterfall behind him. I was into him for his brain, mostly. And his cat named Poe. Camouflage Dragon, on the other hand, was, by Dragon standards, the hottie. He did have a significant unibrow, but he had eyes the color of a tiger's eye gem, ochre and deep, and he was into math, which I liked because my grandpa would approve. I gave myself permission to get a crush on him, too. I wasn't ready to commit to one boy or the other fully, I wanted to keep both in the romantic-type running, so we became an online trio, sending messages back and forth to one another in private email boxes. We also sent handwritten letters snail-mail style filled with song lyrics. Mostly Bangles and Aerosmith. "Camouflage, I like the idea we could all go to the same college. That would be so cool, but I don't wanna hope too hard. Like Steven Tyler says, You're callin' my name, but I gotta make clear I can't say, baby, where I'll be in a year." We would three-way call every other night. The guys each lived in different parts of New Jersey, and I remember thinking, Wow, their accents are so exotic. We mostly talked about the Ultima games, but we got into other things, too. Like... other video games. Our conversations were always fraught with veiled sexual innuendo. "What kind of armor do you hope your character wears in Ultima VIII, Codex? What kind of corsets?" My mom was cool with all of this, by the way. She had recently gotten more defensive about our socialization; maybe the state started checking in on us? Who knows? But she was extra aggressive in supporting my relationships with all my online Dragon friends, especially the romantic ones. After all, SHE first had sex at sixteen and other details I tried to black out after she shared them. The summer of my fifteenth birthday, my family had to move to Louisville. And because we were going in the general compass direction of New Jersey-ish-ness, Mom decided that it would be okay to take a trip and see as many of my Ultima Dragon friends as I wanted. Yes! MEET-UP TIME! I was so excited; I'd never been above the Mason-Dixon Line (yes, Southern people still had that as a THING) and I was going to meet face to face with my only friends in the world and perhaps a potential husband. My mom and brother would be along for the ride to cramp my style... but whatever. For my romantic teenaged heart, this was do-or-die time. I was gonna figure out which one of these guys I liked better if it KILLED ME! New Jersey is much farther north than you'd think if you're driving from Alabama in a two-door Acura hatchback with broken air conditioning. We arrived at Camouflage's house after a few days (for a real name, let's call him Tyler. Which was hard to remember in person anyway, to NOT call him Camouflage). And when we got there it was obvious he hadn't explained everything about the meet-up to his mom. Or... anything. We were shoved in the basement with the four other Dragons who showed up while Tyler got chewed out by his parents upstairs. muffled yelling "Weirdos!" "Mom!" muffled yelling "NOT weirdos!" That went on for a while. Meanwhile, we made the best of it downstairs and awkwardly tried to pin faces to Dragon usernames. There was Aeire, our club leader, with waist-length blond hair and a slacker vibe, who never took his sunglasses off, and his girlfriend, Mist Dragon, who looked like she should be into reading romance novels, not killing gargoyles. I don't think I ever got either of their real names, but they were nice and came from Ohio, which was also an exotic state to me. "You eat spaghetti with your chili? How interesting!" There were a few older dudes who I can't remember much of at all because my mom was kind of a cock block to us interacting. And thankfully, Wolf (fake real name Henry) had shown up from exotic EAST New Jersey for my inspection. He approached me, wearing that Sears portrait smile. "Hey!" "Hey! Wow, weird to meet you in person!" Insert awkward attempt at hug. Abandon. Insert awkward pause. And another. I sat down next to him on a slightly broken futon, and within twenty seconds I could feel the possibility of romance disappearing. Instant turn-off. A never-gonna-happen-let's-be-friends-forever switch flipped in my head. And it wasn't because of his looks (although his picture didn't translate BETTER in person), but there was just no chemistry there. He was someone I got along with and wanted to talk hours to on the phone. But have my virgin intercourse with? Nope. I don't think the attraction disappeared for him as instantaneously as it did for me, so I had to navigate the dance of trying to reframe our relationship as friends and not phone flirt mates before my other courtier, Tyler, got finished being yelled at upstairs by a very angry New Jersey woman. (By the way, her accent was NOT exotic.) "How's your cat doing?" "Good! I can't believe I'm seeing you in person. You're so prett..." "Look over there! A washer-dryer combo! Cool!" I tried to throw the conversation to the group as a whole, but at a certain point, the whole vibe in the basement got SUPER stilted. No one felt comfortable enough to share personal information. We'd followed a mad impulse to connect in person, and the experience was NOT equaling the anticipation we felt. I think we all had completely different ideas of one another in our heads. Also, a few of us were CHILDREN, and I don't think that sunk in over the computer monitors as well as it did in real life. We tried to circle safe topics like, "Can you believe what Periwinkle Dragon said about Feather Dragon on the forum last week..." but after that, everything trailed off into tense pauses. It was extremely uncomfortable. For once in my life, I can say, "Thank goodness my mom was there!" She has a talent for prompting inappropriate conversations with strangers. As soon as she took charge, we learned about people's divorces, sexual orientation, and we were just getting into drug use confessions and my yelling, "Mom!" really loud when Tyler came downstairs and suggested we "Go out for a walk and a bite to eat." Translation: His mom was booting the weirdos. The group moved down to the Jersey boardwalk, which is lovely and has excellent taffy, and we made a beeline for the video game arcade, where all the Dragons proceeded to play separately from each other for another two and a half hours, only stopping for a short break to get hot dogs. I spent most of my time with Camouflage (damnit, Tyler!) and tried to salvage the dream of finding my true love in New Jersey. And, try as I might, it just didn't work. Yes, he was smart and cute in person and clearly hadn't doctored his photos because there was still that unibrow, but the whole package was like seeing a Tiffany box from afar and being so psyched and then getting up close and realizing it's a pack of gum from the 99-cent store. There's an indefinable "something" you have with another person to get your reproductive organs all flame-y, and it just wasn't there with any of the Dragons. I'd had a big crush on Tyler before, but in retrospect, I think it was only because he gave good phone voice. Getting the romance question out of the way was a relief. Now I could actually have fun! Henry, Tyler, and I proceeded to beat the crap out of each other at Street Fighter and Mortal Kombat. We had an awesome, platonic time together, and I was prepared to leave happy knowing I would still have two great friends online, and I could let my heart move on to other places. And then my mom jumped in. She had always been a BIG Tyler fan and decided to get her pompoms out. "Isn't he sweet? His mom's a bitch, but he's so cute." "He's okay, Mom. So is his mom." His mom wasn't okay—what little I saw of her reminded me of a character from The Godfather, but I didn't want to get judge-y. "You two look so good together, his eyes are pretty. You need to get away from the group. Go off alone together! I'll distract Henry." "What? No, I'm fine!" "We're leaving in the morning, Felicia. Go down to the beach with him alone!" "No! That's weird! Why?" "Felicia, you have to kiss him. This is your chance!" And then it became clear. Before we left New Jersey, my mom was determined to hook me up. For the record, I had never kissed a boy before, and she had to know this, since I'd been locked away like Rapunzel. Maybe it was because she drove seventeen hours and wanted some payoff, but she decided to jump in and grease the libido. In her "helpful" mind, I didn't know enough to interact with guys properly, and she was going to be my guide. Whether I liked it or not. At the end of the afternoon, all the other Dragons dispersed with the promise of "Let's meet up again!" (Except we never would.) Then my mom found an excuse to drive me and Tyler to a nearby Walmart. She dragged my brother inside, leaving me and Tyler alone in the car together, with the ulterior motive of giving us time to mash faces. "I'm going to get some snacks for the drive tomorrow. Ryon, you want Bugles?" My brother got out of the car and followed her without looking up from his Game Boy. I don't think he looked up from that thing for six years, to be honest. I made one last desperate attempt to escape. "We can go with you! Please!" "Nope. You two stay here and have fun!" As she left, my mom gave me her "You'd better do this, or I'm gonna pinch you really hard later" look through the open car window. Great. I had to go through with it. I remember very little of the buildup to my very first kiss. Tyler and I were in the backseat together, and it was hot. Anything we said to each other was white noise as I bathed in my own pubescent sweat and dread. When I think back on it, maybe Tyler thought I was nervous because I was excited to kiss him? For the record, I was not. I just wanted to check the box and get it over with so my family could come back with Bugles. Finally, I made a move in. He obliged. We met in the middle and... It was not good. The feeling of "Ew" is still vivid now. I remember thinking, Lips are pretty gross. In my defense, I am a REALLY careful eater, and his lips were wetter than lips should EVER be when you're out of a pool. Grody. We retracted, underwhelmed. A few beats of silent horror spanned the back of the 1990 two-door Acura. "So... um, are you gonna write any more Ultima game poetry soon? I think you should do one on the magical explosion at Scara Brae." "Really? I do love that quest line!" We talked about the finer points of the game inventory management system until my family returned. Whew, significant sexual life experience, over! My mom gave me a pointed look in the rearview as she got in the car. I responded by putting my sticky, sweaty hand on Tyler's sticky, sweaty hand and smiled. She nodded and we drove off. And that is why, to this day, I hate New Jersey. Even though it wasn't great, that trip didn't cause me to break off my relationship with the Ultima Dragons group. The breakup happened a few months afterward when Prodigy stopped unlimited monthly usage and started charging by the hour. Dumb jerks. The group dispersed, but a few friendships persevered. I kept up my platonic three-way with Tyler and Henry, and Henry actually ended up going to college at University of Texas with me the following year and became one of my best friends. Tyler drifted away because his mom wouldn't let him join us; she thought we were freaks. She was probably right. I know the story of my Dragon-hood may sound a little sad and weird and super geeky, but (kiss story aside) for a girl who was lonely and desperate for friends, that group of people was the most important social thing to happen to me growing up. I can't imagine being as confident about my passion for geeky things today without that opportunity to connect with OTHER people who were saying, "Wow, I love those geeky things, too!" That early community taught me how wonderful it is to connect with like-minded people. No matter how lonely and isolated and starved for connection you are, there's always the possibility in the online world that you can find a place to be accepted, or discover a friendship that's started with the smallest of interests but could last a lifetime. Your qualification for finding a place to belong is enthusiasm and passion, and I think that's a beautiful thing. No one should feel lonely or embarrassed about liking something. Except for illegal sex picture stuff. And murder and dogfighting... I'll make a list. It'll be pretty long, now that I think about it. But you get the gist. Signed, Codex Dragon -==(UDIC)==-
You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost)	Felicia Day	[ "comedy" ]	[ "biography", "gaming", "humor", "video games", "Almost" ]	Chapter 5	Jail Bait The deprived college years: Surprisingly, people didn't invite the sixteen-year-old violin prodigy to keggers. My mother got me into playing the violin at age two and a half because she was watching a morning talk show and saw a bunch of small children playing the instrument together in a perfectly straight line, like creepy toddler robots. They were showing off a technique called Suzuki that teaches kids to play really young, even before they learn how to walk without stumbling around, looking all drunk and stuff. In a startling not-so-coincidence, I was born with a congenitally shortened ligament in my left thumb (I like to think it's a romantic birth defect, like Anne Boleyn's sixth finger), and in my mom's mind, "crooked thumb + violin neck" added up to destiny. My music studies were a big excuse for my being homeschooled, so I would theoretically have more time to practice and become a world-renowned soloist, traveling around the world in a red velvet coach. Unfortunately, I didn't take it seriously enough to earn the coach, and my parents didn't force me to try. Which I'm thankful for. I've met a lot of those kids whose parents crammed something down their throats trying to make baby geniuses. Even by my maladjusted standards, those kids were maladjusted. No, the most my mom ever did to pressure me about my violin was scream, "YUCK!" really loudly from the other room if I hit a bad note while practicing. Laziest stage mom EVER. I did practice when I was bored, and I was bored a lot, so around the age of eight I started to be able to play without sounding like I was throttling a cat. After that, my mom decided to upgrade me to the best teacher we could get in the haute-cultured Southern Mississippi vicinity. I'm not sure what the endgame was other than "My beautiful child is a violin savant, I will get her the best training possible so the world can be blessed with her greatness!" but it was a real gift, because we didn't have a lot of money and lessons were expensive, and my violin abilities ended up getting me a full scholarship to college. I just wish the teacher she found me at the time hadn't been a Russian madman. For years, we'd drive an hour and a half to New Orleans so I could train with a huge, had-to-be-related-to-a-bear man named Viktor. He was from the "A touch of abuse very good!" school of Soviet training. He would hit me on the arm when I played off-key. With an actual stick. My theory? It was the whittled-down arm bone of a former student. "Nyet! Nyet! You no practice?! Lazy!" He'd throw up his hands and stare at me with colossal disappointment, like I was his underage daughter, pregnant with fifteen sets of twins. "I'm sorry, I'll practice more next week!" I rarely did, but it always felt good to have that moment of resolve, like saying, "I'm gonna learn French!" It doesn't MATTER if you do it or not, deciding is the high, right? When I'd massacre Bach again the following week, Viktor would take a more Communist approach. "Nyet! Nyet!!" He'd stomp over and take my bow hand roughly from behind me and start sawing at the instrument, moving my arm like a terrified puppet across the strings. I'd hang on as much as I could, struggling to keep the bow anywhere near the instrument. "Understand? You play like this!" I didn't, but I'd nod and just pray for the horrible amusement park ride to be over. This is how I learned to play the violin really, really well. Despite Czar Viktor's passive aggressiveness and his exact resemblance to Mikhail Gorbachev (sans head tattoo), I loved him and never wanted to disappoint him. Because, as sad as he could get when I was lazy, he became equally impassioned when I was great. One year I had to play a Mozart concerto for the spring recital, and I came super prepared for dress rehearsal at Viktor's house. My family was having money problems, and it cost a lot to hire a pianist to play with me, so I was determined to get a gold star to show that the money was worth it. Oh, and because my mom said, "I'm paying a lot of money for that pianist, we might not eat this week, so play well or else!" We started rehearsing, objectively I was rocking the trills, and in the middle I looked over and saw Viktor waving his arms and head around like Stevie Wonder. (No insult, he was just into it.) Out of his right eye, I could have sworn there was... moisture? Trickling?! Was the meanest man I'd ever met having a stroke?! Was I having a stroke? What should I do?! It freaked me out and I almost stopped playing. I didn't, because I didn't want to waste $2.25 a minute, but the impulse was definitely there. After I was done, Viktor walked over and cupped my face in both hands like it was a Fabergé egg. "So good, so good, my heart!" He thumped himself in the chest. It was a gesture of... I'm not sure. Something positive, like CPR. As the pianist left, he screamed into his kitchen at his little wife, Raeza, who was always cooking while wearing a pair of medical scrubs, even though she wasn't in the medical profession. "Raeza! Borscht! We eat!" He hauled me into the kitchen, a room I'd never entered in more than five years of studying with him, and ate disgusting blood-pink soup together. He looked over the top of his bowl, smiling. "Yes?" "It's great!" I wanted to throw up. "Good girl." Viktor patted my head and slurped. I think in Russia, he'd legally adopted me. [ College Timez! ] When I got into my teens, I took the violin more seriously. Because people would tell me how I was adorable when I played, and I'm a praise monkey. (Will perform for smiles!) I auditioned for the Juilliard pre-program when I was fourteen and was accepted, but finances wouldn't allow us to move to New York City full-time. It was a crushing blow because I was definitely ready to move out of the house. In fact, I was always ready to move out. I'd picked out a list of excellent boarding schools by age twelve and couldn't understand why we weren't wealthy enough for me to go abroad like in the "Madeline" books. Or, alternatively, rent me an apartment down the street. I forged my mom's signature and paid all the bills for her anyway, so at that point it was just geographical logistics, right? My parents couldn't understand my vision. So when my professor offered to help me get into University of Texas at Austin, I was all over it like a rabid dog on jerky. Or whatever analogy. Look, I was excited. We were living in San Antonio at the time, and my violin teacher was Mr. Frittelli, a professor at UT. He was a tiny man and a dazzling violinist who appreciated a good fart joke. My kind of guy. One day he asked, "What are you doing for college?" I sighed a dramatic teen sigh. "I have a ton of them picked out, but I dunno, I have forever to decide." Being precocious was SO HARD. "How old are you?" "Fifteen, gonna be sixteen in June." "Do you want to go to college this year?" "What?" OMG. "Yes. Take me there now, please!" I'm not sure who Mr. Frittelli blackmailed in order to get an underage teenager with literally NO school transcripts into a public collegiate institution, but a week after we spoke—BOOM—he'd arranged for a full scholarship for me to study music starting in the fall. All I had to provide was an SAT score! Um... okay? I had taken exactly one standardized test in my life. It was an IQ test to get into preschool. I got all the questions right except one where they asked, "Where is your mom in this picture? The beach or the shed?" I answered "the shed" because I thought they meant "the shade." I knew at age five that my mom was paranoid about sun damage, no way was she hanging on the beach. So in a relative sense, I did perfectly. Anyway, whatever qualifications, I was not letting a stupid bubble test get in the way of this "escape homeschooling" opportunity. The SAT was the Rosetta stone for me. I had no idea what was going on with that thing, but I was gonna crack it! I scheduled the test for the following weekend (five days of study seemed more than enough) and got one of those thick SAT practice books from the library. I filled out more than one hundred practice tests in five days. No joke. Hand cramped, eyes watering; in retrospect, it would have made a great movie montage with "Eye of the Tiger" playing in the background. If this story followed classic movie plot construction, I would have failed the test horribly, given up, then discovered newfound resolve through an old homeless man's inspirational words to try again and ace the results. But life doesn't follow traditional story arcs. Whether it was by naïveté or the hand of Thor, I have no idea, but when the results came back, I'd gotten an almost perfect score. One of the few answers I missed was a vocabulary question defining "Spartan," which does NOT mean "warrior-like" but "austere and sparse." (To this day I still think that is misleading and stupid. I saw 300. What am I, a fool?) But based on my scores, I was definitely, absolutely going to college! Things were going to CHANGE! I could be on my own. To experience life in bigger social contexts than just me and my brother and my online friends! I would move to Austin, be like Felicity or Doogie Howser, MD, plans plans plans... TIRE SCREECH. Turns out, legally, I was too young to live in the dorms alone. My family's solution? Move to Austin so I could attend school while living at home. And my mom ended up driving me to college every day. For four years. Sigh. I entered college just as I turned sixteen, with a plan to double-major in mathematics and music. The math thing was for my dad and grandpa, who were firm believers in Real Degrees. (I capitalize because that's how they sounded when they said I had to get one. "A Real Degree.") You'd think jumping into a school of 30,000-plus students would be intimidating for a girl who'd had only her little brother to hang around for most her life, and you would be right. Luckily, most of my time was to be spent in the music building annex, which was a small underfunded island unto itself. So at least it was the shallow end of the pool I got thrown into without having any limbs to swim. There were only about six hundred students enrolled in the music school, and people rarely left because it was assumed you locked yourself in a 4x4 practice room for eight hours a day or you were "never going to amount to anything as a musician, so why are you taking up room if you're not serious?" No peer pressure or anything. The building sat on the fringes of campus and was supposed to house the next generation of artists. It had the aesthetics of a Hungarian women's prison. It was cold in the winter and hot in the summer, with elevators that broke all the time. There were long green couches on the first floor that smelled like failure and skin flakes, and no one would nap on them for fear of catching salmonella. I think the whole design was just a nefarious plot to force students back into their tiny LED-lit practice room cages. All senses besides hearing were punished. I was, of course, nervous about this huge leap into adulthood, so I prepared a detailed strategy for my first day of class. It was mostly inspired by bad TV shows. I would dress as inconspicuously as possible so people wouldn't notice me, and that way I could do recon to figure out my place in the world. Like going undercover in 21 Jump Street. I would draw NO attention to myself, so no one would see how young or how awkward I was, and eventually, I'd just EXIST, unquestioned. Assimilated, like the Borg. Then, after I'd met everyone and fallen in love with qualified men, I'd get a cute outfit, do my hair, and arrive at school completely made over. The guys would fall at my feet, but the one who was nicest to me when I was plain and boring would have my heart, like that episode of Beverly Hills, 90210. Or Boy Meets World? One of those. Who cares, none of it happened like that, anyway. First day of class, I wore a huge pair of pleated jeans and a T-shirt that was a men's large and a bigger sweater over it, like a late '80s hip-hop star. Totally inconspicuous. I began college by lurking in corners, acting like the kind of kid people say, "But she was so quiet!" after a school shooting. But by noon, no one had approached me to talk. So far, so good! Everyone who was enrolled in college orchestra had to audition on the first day of the semester so the conductor could figure out how good you were and what seat to assign you for the season. It was The Hunger Games for music majors. The conductor, I'll call him Mr. Murray, was a young upstart who looked like Matthew McConaughey with Farrah Fawcett hair. It tousled around when he worked in the hottest way, waving like American golden wheat. Everyone had a crush on him, and I'm sure he could have slept with every woman in the building (me included), but he was a newlywed with an extremely hot wife who wore a black leather jacket and drove a motorcycle. He didn't need the awkward foreplay of orchestra geeks. My plan for the audition was to lowball my performance so the other students wouldn't look at me for any reason, but as I entered the room, Mr. Murray said, "It will be nice having you in the orchestra this year. Mr. Frittelli has told me a lot about you." Sheer panic. Commence inner-anxiety monologue: Mr. Frittelli told him about me? That means he told him I was good! And if I'm bad, Mr. Frittelli will look bad. But I don't want to be TOO good, or the other kids won't like me. But if I suck, they might take away my scholarship... B-U-T... I freaked out inside, torn between fitting in with my peers and being a praise monkey teacher pleaser. I looked deep into Mr. Murray's cornflower-blue eyes, tried to gather my wits, and in the end, there was no choice. The hot adult wanted me to be good. So I played my heart out. When the roster got posted that afternoon, I had been placed in the number two First Violin seat. Right in front of the conductor's podium. The Park Place of orchestral real estate, right out of the gate. Crap. As I looked at the board, I heard a grad student say behind me, "Who the hell is Felicia Day?!" and I slunk away, swimming in my huge acid-washed pants. It was going to be harder to navigate this whole schooling thing than Saved by the Bell had ever taught me. In the following weeks, I tried to keep a low profile, hiding in the back of classes and practicing in the most out-of-the-way dungeon-like practice rooms, but I could tell everyone was curious about me. I looked ten years old, got placed in front of all the seniors and grad students, and I knew they were all thinking, How good is this kid? I caught a few of them eavesdropping outside my practice room door, and rather than make friends, I'd glare through the tiny glass window and stop playing to mark up my music in a real fake-spacework kinda way. The idea that I could open up to them never occurred to me. I wasn't used to humans enough to have organic social impulses. But as the weeks went by, anxiety started eating me up. I knew I couldn't hide forever. They would hear me, and judge me. I wondered if it was too late to quit college and go back home to hang out with my brother and play Legos. It all came to a head when I performed in Professor Frittelli's Master Class, a monthly class where a few people would play and get critiqued so everyone could learn from it. Public shaming, the great pedagogical tool, right? Answer: No. I felt strange and isolated from everyone as it was, so in my brain, "Master Class" was emblazoned as: I had no practical concept of my skills in relation to the other students. I was raised in such a vacuum, I could only gauge myself against recordings of famous dead people. In comparison to the greatest dead violinist in the world, Jascha Heifetz, I was horrible, so my preparatory mantra became, Please don't listen. Seriously, don't. Oh God, they're going to listen, aren't they?! I've always thought it's harder to perform in front of five of your friends than five hundred strangers, and this was a perfect example. It was a small room, everyone stared at me as I got up to play, I took twenty times too long to tune my instrument, nodded to the pianist to start, and proceeded to have a panic attack that melted my brain stem into pudding. I don't remember much. Actually, I remember nothing good, just every single mistake. Out of about five thousand notes, probably four dozen were fumbled or out of tune, but instead of brushing it off, each mistake stabbed into my psyche. I imagined the inner monologue of the other students watching. Look at the weirdo homeschooled kid, she's not so great now, let's have a party and SHUN her later! I got to the end of the concerto. I bowed. There seemed to be five hours of mocking silence (probably three seconds without mocking, at most). Then I looked my teacher in the eye, said "I'm sorry," burst into tears, and ran out of the room. Well, I can't say it was the worst thing for the upstart, standoffish little prodigy to do, because everyone realized I wasn't as badass as I acted. After the meltdown, people were a lot nicer to me! I eventually found my place in the school as the little overachieving sister everyone protected. "Keep Austin Weird" is the motto of the town, and it was the perfect place for me. I never wore matching socks on principle; I had a red sweater that eventually disintegrated from overuse. (Think Linus and his little blue blanket, that was my Big Dog maroon hobo sweater.) And over time I made friends. Because they talked to me, and I decided to talk back to them. Moral of the story: Mortify yourself—when you are at your lowest, you feel ironically self-confident! I became part of the local classical music scene, on and off campus, playing wedding gigs every weekend and joining the Austin Symphony as the youngest member in their history (until a cellist named Doug joined, who was two months younger. What an ass). I lived at the music building for almost five straight years, practicing twelve hours a day, rehearsing from the time I arrived until they locked the doors at 11:00 p.m. Every single night. And I loved every intense minute of it. Oh, and that other full-time degree I was getting at the same time? Yeah, that was happening. But it was mostly just advanced theoretic mathematics, so how stressful could adding THAT on top of everything else be? Psh. [ Ego Math Stuff ] I'll be honest: I got my math degree mostly for my dad and grandpa, not for myself. I never longed to become a calculus professor or dazzle the world with my elite accounting skills. I enjoyed it, sure. I liked being different, and I especially liked working hard at something and getting an A in it. That was the thing I REALLY liked. Getting good grades. It was pathological. At campus gatherings I'd introduce myself as, "Felicia Day. I have a 4.0." Not EVEN kidding. For any math student, the two hardest classes were the ones you took at the end of your degree: Group Theory, and Real Analysis. They were legendary. I knew people who could kick Stephen Hawking in the mind nuts who'd failed out of the classes twice. (A ridiculous exaggeration, but it seemed like a cool sentence.) But I was feeling pretty cocky about completing my degree and sticking the 4.0 landing. My dad promised me $200 if I made it, so there was a natural incentive for me to obsessively study with no breaks for four years straight. I decided to take Group Theory over the summer, which was a shorter semester and even MORE risky than usual, but hey, I was the golden 4.0 child! Nothing could bring me down. Except colossal arrogant hubris, right? I'm not gonna try to explain Group Theory in any specificity, but it's the most high-level theoretical math you can do at an undergrad level, analyzing abstract algebraic structures and how they recur throughout mathematics, like rings, fields, vector spaces... okay, I've lost you. And myself. I couldn't remember one bit of it if you waterboarded me. (Patched together that description above from Wikipedia.) There were maybe fifteen students in the class, and it was taught by a guy who tutored me a bit before college, call him Dr. Cleary (yes, I had math tutors growing up, like royalty). During his first lecture, I was lost. Completely and utterly lost. It was like the professor was speaking a dead language, but it wasn't nearly as cool as Klingon or Elvish. This was gonna be bad. First test came around, I'd studied a LOT, and I got... a 23. Yes, out of 100. A TWENTY-THREE. This was my next-to-last semester. I'd maintained a 4.0 the whole time. A red-marked 23 on a test was not just devastating for me, it was... well, yes. It was devastating. That's a good word to use. I almost threw up, but I was in the back of the classroom crying really hard, and I had a weird suspicion that if I did both at once I'd have an aneurysm, so I just concentrated on weeping softly without drawing attention to myself. After class, I went up to Dr. Cleary, holding back the tears and vomit. "Um, so, uh, what can I do to get an A in the class? Is it impossible now? Should I drop it?" Dr. Cleary had ear hair like a werewolf, but he was compassionate. Unlike a real werewolf would be. "No, you shouldn't drop it, Felicia. You take it, and if you fail, take it again. That's what a lot of people do." "I can't do that! I have a 4.0!" It wasn't sinking in through his ear pelt: 4.0 was the DEFINITION of "college Felicia." Didn't he get it?! He said, with an earnest comb-over and a voice way too calm for the situation, "You know the best thing that could happen? Get a B in this class. Life would be so much easier for you after that. It's not a big deal." Old Felicia, looking back on young Felicia, nods wisely. She says to herself, "That's the best advice I've ever heard. Why do I care about my GPA so much? Why do I have to be the best at everything? Does it really matter if I have ONE B?" But young perky-tits Felicia can't hear her thirtysomething, wrinkled self. She is determined to get an A, no matter what Dr. Clear-face said. She will break herself doing it, oh yes she will! Muhahahahah... hah. Ha! I went to every single office hour for Dr. Cleary for the rest of the semester. I went to OTHER professors' office hours and pretended to be in their classes to get extra help. I went to one of my mentor professors, Dr. Davis, who had nothing to do with Group Theory at all, but I thought she might be able to get Dr. Cleary to go easy on me. All she said was, "He's right. Get a B, it will be fine." Psh. I did NOT get her a Presidents' Day gift that year. I took over the physics lounge at the math building for the rest of the summer to study. I checked out dozens of textbooks. I studied math as hard as I ever did the violin, six, eight hours a day. When I hit a wall studying alone, I looked around the classroom and recruited a study partner, a guy named Jesse, at random. "YOU! I'm cute. You got a thirty-eight on the test. Get in here, we're studying all summer!" Jesse was a gawky but loveable guy with a huge Adam's apple and feet the size of small canoes, and was my constant companion in my quest to master this devil subject. He was at my side all summer, whether he liked it or not, eating frozen burritos for every meal and drinking fifteen cups of coffee a day. Every step of the way. Except when he left for a week because of stupid KIDNEY STONES. What a slacker. When the final test came around, I'd soaked myself in so much Group Theory that I was seeing numbers fly all over peoples' faces, like in Good Will Hunting or that Russell Crowe movie where he was super smart and then went crazy for an Oscar. I was ready. There were five questions on the test, and as I scanned the final, I saw that I knew every one of them by heart. I looked up, smiled a "Screw you, Dr. Cleary!" smile aimed at the area on his skull where his comb-over met his ear hair, and got to work. When I got the test back the following week, it had a "100" at the top in red marker. And a frowny face next to the number. Yes, a FROWNY FACE. My teacher wanted me to get a B! But I didn't give him the satisfaction. I spent a summer of my life dedicated to something I'd never use again. I showed him! One semester later I did, indeed, graduate with a 4.0. I had done it. And after that, my GPA did... Nothing. I never planned on going to graduate school. I wasn't applying for jobs that used grades as a measurement. I didn't need that GPA for any single reason other than to SAY I had it and impress people. I could turn this into an argument for "Let's reward a high GPA after college in LIFE! Can we get priority seating on Southwest? A free monthly refill at Starbucks? SOMETHING to make four years of my life chasing this arbitrary number WORTH it?!" (Great idea. Never gonna happen.) Or I could argue that if I'd been easier on myself and gotten 10 percent worse grades I could have had 50 percent more friendships and fun. If someone's takeaway from this story is "Felicia Day said don't study!," I'll punch you in the face. But I AM saying don't chase perfection for perfection's sake, or for anyone else's sake at all. If you strive for something, make sure it's for the right reasons. And if you fail, that will be a better lesson for you than any success you'll ever have. Because you learn a lot from screwing up. Being perfect... not so much. Oh, and make sure if you're working hard at something it's in a subject you ACTUALLY want to remember something about ten years later. Because I'm reading the rest of this Wikipedia entry, and this Group Theory stuff is INCOMPREHENSIBLE. [ Dating? Nah. ] This section will be pretty short, because there's not a lot to talk about in these areas, haha... I'm serious. You'd think a girl whose mom drove her to college every day wouldn't exactly have a hoppin' collegiate social life. And you would be correct. I didn't get invited to parties or date anyone for most of those years, because I was underage and for some reason, everyone was afraid of the whole "statutory rape" thing. When I turned eighteen, there was a small party on the fifth floor of the music building, because the guys could flirt openly with me and not get arrested, but even then, I was too shy to hook up with them. Not that I didn't have the desire to. In my heart, I wanted to be with one of the classical guitarists because they were the biggest pick-up artists in the musical world. They had the quietest instruments, which meant they could play in the hallways and not get yelled at, so they sat around playing sexy classical guitar all day, and panties just DROPPED. But the few times one started circling me seriously, my professor would see us together and say, "That flamenco scam artist? He's not good enough for you, get back to work." And I'd skitter off back into my practice room and lock the door against a potentially glorious and rhythmically complicated seduction. Sigh. On a basic level, I had no idea how to approach men. My general strategy was to stare at them from afar, with big Margaret Keane eyes, waiting for them to come over and save me, like a quirky indie film ingénue. Let's be real: that character makes for good film festival fodder, but no one wants to take on that damage in real life. Manic Pixie Dream Meh, more like it. The only guy I dated for any significant time in college was able to crack the awkward ice because of a toilet flush. In "Carmina Burana," specifically, a piece we played in symphony together. He was a percussionist, and it's a totally dramatic piece, overwrought in the most entertaining way. You'll recognize the main theme from every shirtless warrior movie, but in one of the sections there's a percussion instrument that LITERALLY sounds like a toilet flush. Every time we'd play that section, I'd look back at this cute blond percussionist with two earrings in one ear and start snickering as he played that instrument, whatever it was called officially. Unofficially, it was "that toilet flush thing." One day after rehearsal, he approached me in the elevator and said, "Funny about that toilet sound, huh? Do you wanna go to lunch?" I was nineteen by then, I'd figured out I didn't have to get married after one date, and said, "Sure!" We had a great time together because, surprise! Turned out he loved computers as much as I did. He collected Atari consoles (ALL of them, he had over fifty on shelves around his bed) and we'd go to his apartment and play Kaboom! and Tank instead of fooling around. I guess to some people that might have been weird, but I got my rocks off watching someone be amazing at Duck Hunt. Whatever. My percussionist boyfriend graduated and went away to grad school a few semesters later, but not before he introduced me to the most amazing thing I'd ever experienced. No, not sex (I'm a lady; I don't write about that) but something just as good: the World Wide Web. It was just emerging as a THING in the mid-'90s. Boggles the mind, but Friendster and MySpace weren't just punch lines to jokes at one point. One day I was trying to find a reference book for a term paper at the library, and my boyfriend said to me, "You should use the computer lab, way easier than the card system." Of course, I thought he was an idiot. I was a library loyalist, paper was always superior, and flipping through the index cards made me feel industrious. But I went into the computer lab and, lo and behold, on the desktop of the music lab computer was a thing called a "browser icon." I was confused. "Mosaic? What's that?" I double-clicked and stared at a blank university database search page. There was a search bar in the middle with no instructions, no guide. That was it. Not user-friendly, even for a prototech native like me. I called over to the guy who worked there, "Hey. How do I use this browser thing?" He said, "Go to AltaVista dot-com and just search for stuff." "Do I spell out the dot?" "No, it's a period. 'www.altavista.com.'" "Sorry. Can you type it in for me?" He, rolling his eyes, marched over and typed on my computer. I was about to get uppity and say, "Um, you don't have to be condescending..." but as soon as I saw what appeared on the screen, I flipped out and forgot to be defensive and angry. "OH MY GOD. I CAN SEARCH FOR ANYTHING BY TYPING IN THE BOX?" "Um, why are you yelling?" "Sorry, dude." It was like my childhood dial-up technology but better. A place with unlimited messaging, no expenses, I could type to other people with a keyboard for free about anything I wanted! This browser was... and then it had... and I could... what?!?!?!? My world was transformed. After completely forgetting about whatever stupid scholastic thing led me there, it took me about two hours to plant my flag on the internet and create a personal university home page with cutting-edge green bubble GeoCities-like background art that I designed all by myself. Here's the actual picture of my stunning artistry: Amazing design. Perfect layout. (Font: default New Berolina. Oh, yeah.) True story, I ended up earning a spot on a "Babes of the World Wide Web" directory with this page. It was a disgusting and skuzzy website that compiled the URLs of the "hottest women on the internet." And I made their top fifty list in 1998, yeah! If you blow up my head shot, you can clearly see the faint outlines of a mustache on my upper lip. In the early internet days, standards were definitely lower. Before I left the lab, I made Condescending Guy show me how to dial up to this "internet" thing from my house using a program called Telnet, and after that I never looked back. Or searched for a social life for the rest of college. With this kind of technology, who needed it?! Between my web browser, math degree, playing violin and video games, and never ever dating anybody, I had the most comprehensive, unsocial college experience in the history of man. But still, I loved it. I loved being on campus. And learning. And getting perfect grades. And being the little prodigy everyone took care of. I occasionally went to kung fu movie screenings at the college rec center on Friday nights (yes, my mom went with), and I prided myself on knowing every out-of-the-way single-stall restroom hidden in the obscure campus buildings, like Archaeology, where I could poop in private. After four years I graduated as the valedictorian of my class and delivered an overly earnest speech on "Finding the Art in Your Science." The whole time I was lucky enough to find work as a musician, so everyone assumed I would continue on to graduate school and have a great violin career, and all the expectations were heaped and heaped and heaped. After graduating, I didn't do anything with any of it. Um, why? There was a student in Mr. Frittelli's class, I'll call him Carl, who was from New York City and a "BRO!" personified. With an accent like a construction worker and hands like ham hocks, he was the most out-of-place guy you can imagine in the classical music world. And he wanted to play the violin more than anything else in his life. Thing was, Carl was not good. He didn't start early enough, he didn't work hard enough, he sometimes brandished his instrument like a weapon. No one thought he could make a career of it. But he WANTED it so badly. You could see it in his eyes when he watched other people play who were better than him. It broke my heart. All I wanted was to give Carl my abilities. Even though I had been devoted to music for so many years, I knew deep down that I didn't want to play violin for the rest of my life. I admire the crap out of Carl now, because he was doing something he loved more than anything. And he was determined to do it, regardless of how successful he was. Carl played the violin because he had a PASSION for it, and screw the rest of the world. Even if he had to get a day job that wasn't musical after college, and was only able to pick the instrument up at night before bed, to play ONLY for himself, it made him complete to have that in his life. And I think every minute he spent playing that violin was a moment he was spending his time right. I wanted to find something like that for myself. I had a sense that I hadn't found it yet, that there was MORE out there somewhere. I knew I wasn't complete by playing Pachelbel's Canon for the five hundredth time at a wedding. I knew I wouldn't be satisfied by teaching adorable toddler robots "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star," either. I wanted to find a dream that I couldn't live without pursuing. Regardless if I made it or not. Just like for Carl, the "trying" of it would be worth it. So after graduation, I moved to Los Angeles to become an actor. That was what my heart told me I needed to TRY to become. I knew I could do it. After all, I had two Real Degrees. How could I fail?
You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost)	Felicia Day	[ "comedy" ]	[ "biography", "gaming", "humor", "video games", "Almost" ]	Chapter 6	Hollywood: Not a Meritocracy? My adorably naïve history as an actor and why, in my mind, I was destined to "make it" in Hollywood based on several community theatre chorus girl parts. For some reason I always knew I wanted to be an actor. I think it was because I read too many fantasy novels as a kid. There was always this nebulous feeling of destiny, like I was the Chosen One, foretold to vanquish auditions for One Life to Live and Hannah Montana with talent bestowed by the gods. In my heart I was certain: The sword of stardom would be mine! My aunt Kate was the one who got me hooked on performing. She was the coolest person I'd met by the age of preschool, and that's pretty frickin' cool. With big permed '80s hair, she drove a yellow Datsun fastback and let me ride in the front without a child's seat. The sound track to Cats was permanently stuck in the tape deck, and we'd sing "Memory" at the top of our lungs when we'd sneak out after bedtime to get curly fries at Hardee's. Together, at the ages of six and twenty-four, we were practically Thelma and Louise. Aunt Kate had briefly moved to New York City to become a musical theatre performer after college but was forced to return home because of health reasons (type 1 diabetes, the worst). She got a job as a librarian but kept acting locally, because no matter how many times you have to sing "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" for bored senior citizens at an Alabama dinner theatre, once performing is in your blood, you can't get it out. She also introduced me to the concept of a "work ethic" nineteenth-century-early. Aunt Kate developed horrible cataracts because of her disease, and for a summer became partially blind. She needed several surgeries to fix her sight but couldn't afford to stop her job. She had to keep her health insurance. So, as a seven-year-old, I was recruited to go in every day and basically do her job with her. Shelving. Scanning in books. Chiding people: "Mrs. Bertram, you have to return that new Danielle Steel. Someone else has been waiting for it for weeks!" The best part is that her tiny branch was located inside the local mall (must have been a weird Alabama phenomenon), so she paid me for my time in items from the Hello Kitty store across the way. A Little Twin Stars pencil case was my first legitimate wage payment. No job since has left me feeling so well rewarded. When my aunt found out that a local Huntsville theatre group was staging To Kill a Mockingbird, she decided that I was absolutely perfect for the lead part of Scout. Mainly because my haircut matched the kid's in the movie (through no fault of my own; again, my mom made bad choices). "If you wear overalls to this audition, Felicia, you can become a star!" I won't lie. "Star" sounded super appealing to my seven-year-old self. If I couldn't be reborn a princess, this sounded like the next best thing. There was only one catch. "The audition paper says ages ten and above, Aunt Kate." "If they ask, just tell them you're ten." "But that's a lie." "You want them to hire you to be someone you're not. So if you lie well, you're showing them how great you're gonna be at the job!" I thought about it for a few beats and couldn't argue with her logic. It was pretty confusing. So the next day I lied and got the part! It was a great lesson to learn so young: Never let the truth stop you from getting what you want. Rehearsals started up, and I loved every minute of it. Not the work of acting necessarily, that was all right, but the feeling of becoming part of "The Theatre." (Say it with a British accent, that's how I wrote it.) No matter your age or race or background, all actors are treated pretty much equal, which is heady stuff for a seven-year-old: "equality." I found out that being treated like I was important fit me like a glove! The kid who played my older brother in the play, Jackson, was not so taken by my adorableness. He was thirteen and despised me because he didn't like my upstaging him with my dazzling performance. (At least that was what my aunt told me.) I was great at memorizing my lines AND his lines and never hesitated to yell out when he flubbed them. I couldn't understand why he was so sensitive about it! After all, he was the old one who should have better neural connections; I was only SEVEN. (Revealing that at rehearsal one day was quite the hat trick. Everyone was impressed. Except Jackson. He hated me for that, too.) During one dress rehearsal, he screamed "Shut up!" when I helped him out with his dialogue ("You forgot the 'eats raw squirrels' line again, Jackson, jeez!"), and after that incident, the line was drawn, Hatfields and McCoy–style. Our families started sitting on the opposite sides of the auditorium, and we referred to his mom as "Old Fat Thighs." The atmosphere got tense. It all caught up to me during our first matinee performance. There's a section in the play where Jackson's character says, "Run, Scout, run!" and he pushes me to get away from the scary Boo Radley dude who turns out to be... well, it's only been fifty years, no spoilers. Anyway, this almost adult (in Arkansas) kid pushed me SO HARD that I flew eight feet across the stage, tripped, and hit my head. THUMP! The audience gasped. Time slowed. As I staggered up, I remember noticing how everyone was leaning forward in their seats. It was suddenly very exciting to be an actor. "Is she hurt?" "Was it part of the play?" the crowd murmured as I stood there, stunned. My aunt had told me a true thespian never breaks character. So I decided to use the moment like Meryl Streep: I burst into tears and ran offstage yelling, "MOMMY!" The screaming match between my mom and his after the show would rival any sweeps-winning episode of Dance Moms. Carnations and Chips Ahoy! were used as projectile weapons in the greenroom. The fight went on so long that eventually I started feeling guilty. Because Jackson looked so miserable sitting on the opposite side of the room and... okay, I'll admit it. He was cute and I had a crush on him. WHATEVER, YOU GUYS! Nothing got friendlier between us after that, but he never shoved me like an MMA fighter again, and I never corrected him on his lines again. (Even though he DID mess them up. A lot.) For years after that play, my family would tell the tale of how "That kid Jackson tried to murder Felicia," and we were pretty convinced he was going to grow up to be a serial killer. I recently looked him up on Facebook. He became a dentist, so same difference. Here's the awesome irony, though. A local newspaper critic attended that specific matinee performance. Afterwards, we got an amazing review that singled out the "fantastic physical performance of the young actress playing Scout." I even got an award that season! So basically, what I learned was that I love the stage, and that it's advantageous to have slightly older men physically assault me. (Just KIDDING! Gawd.) I'm sure my aunt would have mentored me through many a great role after that, helping me conquer the Northern Alabama theatre scene with my glorious skills, but it was not to be. My family moved to Mississippi right after the play ended. But I'd developed a taste for the stage, and I wanted to keep doing it. I couldn't let go of the idea that I was pretty amazing. We moved a lot during my childhood because of my dad's medical training, but whenever we'd arrive in a new city, I'd immediately search the Pennysaver or community center bulletin boards for auditions. Of any kind. And no matter what little backwater town we landed in, people were putting on a show! Usually a revival of Oliver! (I was in that play four times as an orphan. I also played a prostitute twice in Sweet Charity before the age of fourteen.) Sometimes the productions were very small, like an 8x8 space behind someone's garage, or at an old folks' home where the star was an eighty-five-year-old with Alzheimer's, but as long as they accepted me, I joined up. I couldn't help it. Like tuberculosis, once you catch it, the need to perform is always inside of you. Unfortunately, when you're the "new kid," you don't get the juicy roles right away. There's usually a seniority system, and sometimes I was passed over for a speaking part by someone who wasn't great, which was disappointing to me but enraging to my mother. "They only picked her because she was Jewish!" Well, Mom, I was auditioning for Anne Frank in The Diary of Anne Frank at the Louisville Jewish Recreation Center. I think maybe there were justifications. As I mentioned before, my mother never had the follow-through to be a true stage mom, but she was supportive in pushing my performance career in strange and arbitrary directions. Around twelve, she signed me up for singing lessons with a woman named "Miss Hilda" who led a church choir and looked like she'd been a spinster since the late 1890s. The woman wore dickies with her sweat suits. Miss Hilda taught me German art songs, which is SUPER useful when you're auditioning for Tannhäuser, but if you're trying to rock a solo from the Who's Tommy, not so much. My mom couldn't tell the difference. Singing was singing, and her daughter was amazing at it, therefore everyone must listen! She became alert for opportunities for me to shine with my newfound skill, on stage and beyond. One day we got in the car and started driving to Ohio. Randomly. My brother and I were confused. "Where are we going?" My mom had a copy of the newspaper in her lap and thrust it at me. "They're rebooting The Mickey Mouse Club and searching for new talent! You're auditioning!" Panic. "But I don't have a song prepared!" "Just do that one Miss Hilda taught you last week!" "Um... really?" "Either that or 'Happy Birthday.' You have such a beautiful voice, it won't matter, you're a shoo-in, baby!" I wrapped my mom's faith around myself like a straightjacket as we drove three and a half hours to a nondescript Holiday Inn in Cincinnati. I marched into the run-down ballroom with a number 239 pinned to my shirt and, when prompted, began singing Schubert's "Gretchen am Spinnrade" for the touring Disney audition committee. "Meine Ruh' ist hin Mein Herz ist schwer, Ich finde, ich finde sie nimmer..." "THANK YOU!" And that was the closest to becoming a Disney kid I ever got. Thank goodness. Several years later, we were living in San Antonio, and my mother met a man whose daughter took ballet class with me. Of course, the conversation turned to my fantastic singing voice, and it turned out that the guy knew a guy who had a brother who recorded music and made albums. In his garage. Talk about kismet! Except he didn't do pop music (or German lieder), he specialized in Tejano music. The accordion music that the Tex-Mex region adores. Objectively, it is very danceable. To most humans, I would not be the FIRST person you'd pick for stardom in this particular field. For one, I didn't speak Spanish, and two, there was that really Caucasian thing going on with my face. At this point I was a bit older, fifteen, and I strongly registered my objections, but when my mom saw an opportunity, she couldn't let it escape. "Your voice is so pretty! That girl Selena is popular, and you're just as pretty as her! You can do this!" There was no arguing. I would be her Central Texan Eliza Doolittle. My mom immediately bought language tapes to play in the car. "Mi casa, su casa..." everywhere we drove, I drilled. I started flamenco class, which had nothing to do with Tejano but was similar enough to tap dancing that I enjoyed it, and after a few weeks of intense training, we met with the recording guy to talk debut album concepts. Now, this guy should have been rightfully laughing us out of the state, but my mom is somehow able to make the most insane ideas seem plausible. At least when you're in her sphere of contact. Once she's gone, you start to catch yourself, like, Hey, now. Wait a second... We sat there in a tiny recording studio behind a nail salon, and my mom painted the headline "White Tejano Star Takes San Antonio by Storm!" with such vivid enthusiasm that the producer dude, slurping from a two-hundred-ounce sweet tea cup, was totally digging it. They brainstormed as I sat there silently, praying for an earthquake or tornado to kill us all. I kid you not: the strategy was to change my name to "Felicia Diaz." Which was pretty considerate, because I got to keep my first name, just add the accent, like "Feliz Navidad." I don't know why I was so uptight about it; the plan screamed success! The two of them came up with tons of debut song concepts, mostly with the word corazón in them (my violin playing was a HUGE asset, special skillz, y'all!), and we left planning to come back the next week to start recording. In a very sad way, fate intervened. Before we could get into breaking the lyrics down phonetically for me to learn so I could insult millions of people and their culture in MP3 format, the superstar Selena was murdered by a fan. The whole future of Tejano looked to be a bit iffy. I was able to get that violin scholarship to go to college during the confusion, and my future of becoming a superstar disappeared into the mist. Lo siento, mi amor. [ Hollywood, I'm Inside You! ] Because everyone discouraged me from getting a degree in theatre (thank you, everyone), I did the math-music thing in college, but in the back of my mind I was always going to move to Hollywood and become an actor. I could analyze my motivations until the day I die, but there just wasn't any logic to it. I never had a doubt that it was how my life was going to go, and I was going to make it happen. My mother was often impractical, but she did instill a "leap and look later" attitude that's pretty much responsible for my whole career. Days after I got my Real Degree, I moved west. I didn't go completely unprepared (I was only 95 percent stupid at the time), I had a few cards up my sleeve. I'd saved up a lot of money by living at home and playing violin professionally and having my mom drive me to college for four years, so that torture paid off in the end. I had also volunteered at tons of film festivals in Austin and made connections with "Hollywood insiders." Most of them were screenwriters, which I later found out are the most useless connections you can have (only LA valets get treated worse than LA writers), but my friends did help me figure out where to live, how not to get killed on the freeways, and what kind of acting head shots immediately went into the trash. My first photo is NOT an example of what they suggested was successful. Maybe it was my obsession with Clark Gable and Carole Lombard's relationship coming into play, but for my first LA photo shoot I decided to go for the "Look as old as you can at age twenty-one in an Ann Taylor silk blouse" strategy. Ultimately, in my mind, the pictures didn't matter. Because I was still wrapped in that blind, unerring faith: Felicia Day was one audition away from a Vanity Fair cover, no matter what. You see, I was raised on the great American girl dream. Talent and experience don't matter. If you're pretty enough, you'll be discovered while sitting at an outdoor table in Los Angeles, plucked out of obscurity and placed onto magazine covers by a producer randomly driving down Sunset Boulevard in his Land Rover who pulls over, yanks a cigar out of his mouth, and yells, "You! Get in the car! I'm making you a star!" Strangely, no matter how many cups of coffee I've ordered at outdoor cafés on Sunset Boulevard, this has never happened to me. I did, however, make one of the most inauspicious filmic debuts of any actor ever, so that's something I can brag about. There's a weekly paper called Backstage where producers post notices to find unpaid and/or nonunion actors to audition for their terrible-quality stuff. Mostly student films in black and white with no sound included. As a newbie actor, applying for these projects is the best way to get experience, because no one with any résumé credits whatsoever would stoop low enough to do the work. You send out hundreds of head shots and get maybe one audition out of the bunch. And each response makes you feel like, This is my big break! I'm on my way to a party in the Hollywood Hills, watching Johnny Depp undress to get into a hot tub. Better shave my legs! From one of my first submission batches, I got called in to audition for a movie in a building that was located on Hollywood Boulevard. After living in LA for over a decade, I now know it's the sleaziest place in town to have a meeting, but at the time I was like, Damn, girl. You made it already! The role was for an "Untitled" horror film. (Really, how hard is it to come up with a name? Just pick one and change it later, guys.) I arrived at the address to find a dozen girls sitting on the floor in the hallway waiting outside. No chairs. One after another, the actresses went into the room, read the lines, and then proceeded to SCREAM at the top of their lungs. "AAAAAAAAH!" Sometimes there was a pause, muffled discussion, then a second take. "AhhhhAHHHH AH! Ahhhhh!" The casting director, a kid who looked like he was a high school intern from Omaha, would escort the actresses in and out, shuffling through cute girls like a deck of cards. "Next!" The whole process made me nervous. I'd never screamed on cue before, so I practiced a few silent ones with my mouth closed while I waited, like a cat coughing up a hair ball. "Mmmmm! MmmMMMmm! MmmmM?" Eventually, channeling Miss Hilda's vocal training in the back of my mind, I convinced myself that I could nail this situation, no problem. When it was my turn, I got escorted inside the office and saw that it wasn't really an office at all, more of a closet. There were actual brooms hung up behind the door. The director sat in the middle of the tiny room with a tripod and camera next to him. He was wearing a dirty T-shirt and dark wraparound sunglasses. The room had no windows, so the shades thing seemed excessive, but it was Hollywood. I assumed important people looked douchey. "Okay, okay, stand there..." He had a French accent and waved me into the middle of the room. The Omaha "casting director" squeezed in to read with me. With no preamble, the director started the camera and crossed his arms. "Go." Huh? Oh, that was his version of "Action"? Right. I performed the scene. I was adequate. "Good good." A long pause. "So, what I feel strongly for this character is we will have a shower scene, yes?" I was confused. "A what?" "A scene. In shower. To show character. Are you comfortable with shower scene?" "Uh... you mean naked?" He made a minimizing gesture. "Just breasts." Okay, well, HOLD ON! I'd prepared myself for something like this before my move. I'd heard about casting couches and naked switcheroos and Hollywood tainting and corrupting innocent girls' souls, and I'd vowed to myself and my dad, "I'll make it in Hollywood, but I'll make it clean!" I would never show my breasts. Except for Scorsese, or Spielberg, or two dozen other exceptions. But no, Sir Wraparound Shades, no! You will not have my boobs. I gathered myself proudly. "No, I don't think so." "Will be beautiful, very artistic. Only to learn about character..." "No, thank you." I could tell he was less interested. "Okay, scream." I screamed. It was a good scream. A silent "thank you" to my probably-dead-by-then singing teacher Miss Hilda. "Thank you. Go." And I left, head high, knowing that I'd dodged a bullet. I would NOT be working for that exploity French guy, ever! Except I did. I was hired the next day to be the non-boob-showing friend of the lead girl in the ultimately titled Serial Killers. Of course, I took the job. But I wore very unattractive underwear to the set, just in case they were trying to trick me with infrared cameras or something. The movie was shot in houses all over Reseda, a porn suburb of LA, and I found out later that the director primarily made soft-core cinema to pay the bills, so that added up. Serial Killers was his attempt at breaking into more "artsy" content. But still with lots of titties. I worked three days on the movie, knowing the whole time that the girl I was acting opposite was eventually gonna show her boobs in a "character shower" scene, and I treated her with a touch of pity. We never talked again afterward. Despite the rough experience, I was paid $90.00 in the form of a check for five days' work, and I was thrilled. I had MADE MONEY acting just two months after moving to Los Angeles! This whole crazy leap of faith was really gonna work out for me! The day after I went to the bank, I got a call. The check had bounced. I called the film production number, but everything had shut down and disappeared, and in the end, I never got paid. Yes, the first dollar I'd ever made acting never existed. I was mildly upset, then cheered myself up by spending $150 of my paltry savings on an ornate, rococo gold frame. I hung the framed check in my office so that I could one day relay the story to James Lipton on Inside the Actors Studio. A perfect representation of my ignoble first job in Hollywood. I was sure ol' James would eat the story up. I limped from tiny project to tiny project after that, but there were no more bounced checks. (Good thing: I didn't have the framing budget.) The next few years were incredibly slow and frustrating, but I never thought about giving up on acting. Coming from the academic world, I had faith that whatever the obstacle, I could push myself further and harder than anyone else and I would eventually win. Oh, you naïve, cute child. Between the long "no jobs in sight" stretches, I concentrated on what I could control myself and attacked the task of "Let's be the best actor ever!" with as much pluck and adorable gusto as I did learning mathematical Group Theory. (Which I had completely forgotten the minute I graduated. But people were super impressed in auditions when I said, "I have a math degree," so: semi-worth it.) I took acting classes everywhere I could. The one I recall most was with a guy whose name I will change to Grant, because he was the embodiment of a human turd. Grant was about five feet tall and had a very large head, which is supposedly good for TV acting. Large heads, not shortness. I guess he pegged me as a problem when I first entered class. I was too fresh and friendly and looked like I needed to be psychologically assaulted? Something like that. Whenever I asked a question or had a comment in class, Grant would act like I was an idiot. "Of course, it's not like Pinter. Did you actually READ the plays?" If I performed a scene, he would tell me I was terrible in a pretty straightforward "Felicia, that was terrible" sort of way. I remember he once said, "You aren't good at comedy, don't even try. Concentrate on being a victim, it's a better casting for you." I couldn't understand what the problem was. I was always the teacher's pet, it was my specialty. What was WRONG with this guy? Missing an opportunity with an A+++ suck-up here, hello! I didn't realize that there are places in Hollywood that prey on impressionable young people, aiming to break them down in order to build them up again. Run away from any teacher whose biggest acting credit is "Banker" in a Lifetime movie of the week? No, I was new to town, I figured since this person had purchased advertising in the back of a trade magazine saying that they were an acting teacher, it was my problem! The fault was obviously with me and my crappy abilities. The last straw was when I performed Breakfast at Tiffany's in class. It was the scene where Audrey Hepburn goes upstairs to George Peppard's room and sings "Moon River." I thought because of my beautiful singing voice, I would finally get a compliment out of big-head Grant. But at the start of the scene, the actor playing opposite me came out from backstage, said his first line, and he was... STARK NAKED. Like, his junk was all out and dangling like a turkey head. Never rehearsed, never discussed with me. And... yeah. I was a bit thrown. "Keep in the scene, Felicia, my God, be an actor!" Grant's huge mouth flapped at me from the sidelines like Terrance and Phillip from South Park. I kept saying my lines, but it was very hard to keep the warble out of my voice with the other actor's bait and tackle hanging out. I stumbled through the scene, shrinking in anticipation of what the teacher would say to me afterwards. We sat on the stage for evaluation. Grant turned to my scene partner first. "Nick, that was fabulous, so brave. You really went there. Everyone applaud Nick." Everyone applauded. Then Grant turned to me. "Why are you here? You were given an opportunity to use Nick's gift to you and you ruined it. Audrey Hepburn would be ashamed." Well, I'm pretty sure Audrey Hepburn wouldn't want to see her scene partner's dick hanging out for no apparent reason—she was pretty classy—but I wasn't sassy enough at the time to say that, and I broke down crying. "Where was THIS in the scene? Dismissed." Annnnd class was over. I went home, my self-confidence crushed. And I kept going back for another month. Yes, I was a total idiot, but there was a weird, cultlike atmosphere in the class, and I had recently moved out of my mom's house and didn't know any better. Every day Grant's assistants told us if we quit, we'd never make it in Hollywood. They used that old cliché line AND I BOUGHT IT. Clearly, they were right; I mean, the girl who told me that had two whole lines on Will & Grace! I finally wised up after a more experienced actor told me, "You probably shouldn't be paying three hundred dollars a month to go home crying every night," and I decided Grant wasn't gonna teach me to be good by abusing me OR being nice to me. I called up to quit class. His assistant heard me out, then said, "You can't quit." "Yes, I can. I just did." "No, you have to have an exit interview; it's in the class rules. Come down and talk to Grant tonight." "Come down tonight to talk?" I was holding my then boyfriend's hand because I was so scared to confront these people and looked over. He shook his head vigorously. "No, I don't want to do that." My voice trembled. Lame. "Do you want to work in this town as an actor?" "Yes." "Well you better..." STOP, FELICIA! It's a trick! RUN! "No. Wait. Good-bye!" I hung up, and they immediately called back. Again and again. All afternoon, and later that week. I didn't have to cancel my phone number because they stopped calling, eventually. But I'm not going to lie. I weighed it as an option. That wasn't the ONLY bad situation I encountered taking classes around LA, but it was definitely the worst. Anyone can put a sign up and call themselves a teacher. Hell, one time I went to an audition class INSIDE a laundromat. But after the Grant thing, I learned that the most important thing about taking classes is to find a place you look forward to going to. That way you actually get better at what you love and don't want to retire and become a barista every time you walk out the door. Also if you want to start a new profession, it's better to get some references on your instructors and not pick them out of the back of the classifieds section. [ I Need a Job, Please! ] Education mastered (slightly), I decided I needed to conquer the other side of Hollywood: the business of getting work. Specifically, I needed acting work to pay my bills. And to get acting work, you need an agent. To get an agent, you need to prove you have worked as an actor. It's like a set of Russian nesting dolls, stabbing each other from the inside with tiny needles. For a year after I moved to LA, I searched for someone to represent me. That's a great process, because it makes you want to shoot yourself. The few agencies that would meet with me gave me amazingly blunt and contradictory opinions. "Fix your teeth so you don't look like a rabbit." "Your smile is charming, your best asset!" "Lose some weight, and you could be a lead." "Gain weight; you're too bony." "The red hair isn't working, make it darker. No one likes a ginger." "Love the hair, very unique. But pad your bra. It's very flat up there." (No one contradicted that last piece of advice.) My favorite was, "You're pretty, but you could use a... shoop, you know?" The agent made a gesture down his nose with two of his fingers, accompanied by a slurping sound. I think he meant a nose job. I also think he was an asshole. It was hard to hear all the criticism, but I was still relatively fresh off the boat and naïvely self-confident, so I spurned it all. I knew by being myself, I had achieved some awesome things in life. Like local theatre awards and two Real Degrees. I was studying hard, I was doing all the right hard-work things, I was a unique and precious unicorn and FINE exactly the way I was! Also, I couldn't afford a nose job. I would just have to work hard to make up for the ugly face. After my five millionth interview, I got an agent who didn't want to rebuild me from scratch, and I started auditioning for television commercials, which was great, in a metaphysically soul-searing kind of way. As a commercial actor, you get sent out on appointments several times a day with no preparation. Just audition over and over for the opportunity to become a human prop. A prop in a car ordering donuts, a prop being startled by a Transformer, a prop eating limited-release KFC panini sandwiches over and over until the prop pukes... I've done it all. I have a great "love to please you!" attitude and look good in polo shirts, so over the next several years of my career, I did amazingly well in this area. If you are persistent enough, you can make a hell of a good living and work only two days a year doing television commercials. Half my nose snuck on camera for an Old Navy commercial during the 2004 Olympics, and I made more money than I'd ever made in my whole life. And the variety is fun, if you can remove yourself as an actual FEELING PERSON from the process. On different projects I got to skydive, play with parrots, and eat five bags of Cheetos in an hour (FYI, it isn't how I suspected. If you eat enough Cheetos you will NOT actually poop an extra-large Cheeto). I got hired to walk down a street thinking a whole monologue of silent thoughts about weight loss while drinking liquid yogurt. Later, they asked me to audition to be that same monologue voice in the commercial. Which I ended up LOSING OUT to someone else. Yeah, I lost a job to be my own inner voice. Strange, because I sound exactly like my own voice in my OWN HEAD when I think about liquid yogurt. But I got paid extremely well, so the empty feeling of being treated like a puppet was fine? Sort of? Actually, not. Acting in commercials was never my life goal. I wanted to be on TV or in an indie film with Parker Posey about quirky people having family issues around inheritances. Or Parkinson's. SOMETHING where I wasn't being yelled at for wrinkling my prop shirt or squeezing the prop burger too hard so the prop mustard started oozing out the back. After five years of acting and making a great living, I started to forget why I moved to LA in the first place. And so did my family back home. "We saw you on that post office ad, you're so cute, are they going to turn that into a TV show?" "That's not how that works, Mom." "Well, here's an idea. You should be on that NCIS thing with Mark Harmon. You grew up on military bases, you know that world!" "Gee, you're right! Why didn't I think of calling them before? They've probably been waiting by the phone for YEARS!" Le sigh. On a renewed quest for opportunity (i.e., last-gasp attempt to fan the dying fire of my dreams), I hustled to get hired on bigger projects. I finally accepted that my dazzling 4.0 GPA wasn't the trump card in this new world that I'd thought it would be, so I started making changes. And I did them out of desperation, which is always a first step into the mouth of existential doom. I cut off all my hair when an agent suggested it. And, for some reason, I started getting hired more. "People like you looking less like a lead character and more of a 'best friend'!" Cool! I loved listening to prettier people complain about their relationships, I could work with that! During one audition, a casting director said I looked "adorable" in a dorky rainbow scarf, so I started dressing only in bright, colorful clothes. Like a hot first-grade teacher who says, "My quilted cardigan hides sensible cotton lingerie under here. Come undress me, but first, please use a coaster for your drink." The makeover cherry topper was when I got nerdy librarian glasses. They made me look older, but in a weird, accessible way. Suddenly I could play late thirties as a twenty-seven-year-old. More work flooded in. Good change! Good Felicia! Yay? And after switching up all the superficial stuff, I was the same person underneath, but for some reason, people couldn't stop hiring me. The snowballing feedback made me abandon the whole "What does Felicia want to be?" and I started doing whatever anyone told me they wanted from me in order to succeed. Lo and behold, it WORKED! I got tons more commercials. I overcame my nuclear-meltdown nervousness in auditions to get a few jobs as recurring characters on TV shows. I didn't work every day, but for the average actor, I started to have a career I could brag about at cocktail parties. With my head-to-toe makeover, I'd found my niche: cat-owning, stalker-y secretary. And I played the same part again and again and again. Thing is, the "cat secretary" role was never the focal point of any scenes. She was a decorative character, adding a touch of flavor to offices across the TV landscape. Most of my lines were in the vein of "Mr. Garrett, your wife is on line two. Can I go home early to feed my fifteen animals, please?" Either that or I was hired to do laundry. I've washed laundry in a half dozen different TV shows. I guess I look clean? Which is kind of a compliment... But who was I to complain? Every show needed secretaries! Finally, after six years of struggling in Hollywood, I was finding bigger success. My grandma got to see me on an actual TV show and brag about it to the checkout clerk at Kmart. I had pinpointed a salable stereotype I could play for the next twenty years, living the nomadic life of audition after audition (accompanied by panic attack after panic attack), begging to answer fictional phone calls in innocuous ways for decades to come... and I hated it. The role was a shadow of the kind of characters I wanted to portray. No one had a place for my geeky, weird, homeschooled, video-game-loving inner self. They could only see me as an extremely clean but neurotic secretary. "Your nose is too weird to be the focus of the show, but you're perfect for answering the phone in the background in a quirky fashion!" I painted myself into a tiny corner, so I could be simpler and cleaner and more hirable by Hollywood. I was rewarded for it, but it made me miserable, and I didn't even realize it. When the system you want to be a part of so badly turns you into someone you're unhappy with and you lose sight of yourself, is it worth it? Er... probably not. But self-reflection wasn't my strong suit at the time. I just knew that I kept getting opportunities I couldn't turn down, that I would have killed to have in the dry years before. I never stopped to wonder, Why am I so depressed all the time after all this success? Instead of making big-girl decisions about my future, like setting goals for myself, working on other characters I could play, or hell, signing up for some good ol' therapy, I turned to another world. An online world. A game called World of Warcraft.
You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost)	Felicia Day	[ "comedy" ]	[ "biography", "gaming", "humor", "video games", "Almost" ]	Chapter 7	Quirky Addiction = Still an Addiction How my obsessive personality steered me into a twelve-hour-a-day gaming addiction and an alt-life as a level 60 warlock named Codex. Anal retentiveness is one of my most attractive genetic traits. (I also hit the genome lottery for "The ability to pack a suitcase efficiently.") As a little kid, I filled out index cards on every movie I watched and stuck them in a yellow recipe box. The cards were filled with critical insight and searing analyses. Par exemple: National Velvet 4 Stars This made me cry because horses were in it, but the girl had purple eyes. I want purple eyes too. I tend to obsess over things easily. Like eating oatmeal every morning for a year, wearing a pair of sneakers over and over again until my big toe pokes out, and having an unhealthy fixation on the martial arts personality Jean-Claude Van Damme. (Did you know his real last name is Van Varenberg?) When I travel, I read dozens of books about the locations I'm visiting, to the detriment of SEEING anything. I can't show you many pictures of my trips to Thailand or Vienna, but if you want to discuss the history of Buddhism or secessionist furniture design, I'm ready to dish! I have been borderline-ready to become addicted to something my whole life. And more common addictions got ruled out because I'm weird. Alcohol, I metabolize too fast (two sips I'm twerking, five sips I'm snoozing). I'm too neurotic to do drugs because they give you meth teeth (not all, but enough to make me concerned), and sex addicts get vagina warts. Or so I read on the side of a bus. What's left that could become a trigger area? Video games, of course. At the height of my "auditioning for burger commercials" acting career in late 2005, my brother, Ryon, invited me to join a new online game called World of Warcraft. For nongeeks (Are there any of you out there reading? I like your hair!), it's a "Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game" where millions of people can play together simultaneously. Ryon had been playing for a few months with his friends and thought I would enjoy it. My brother and I hadn't been close growing up. I know that sounds weird. You'd think, two kids locked in a house together, there should be some great indie-film, Wes Anderson bonding happening, right? Not so much. I could maybe trace it back to when he was three or four years old, when he ate chocolate ice cream in the messiest way possible, spreading it all over his face, and I'd dry heave and scream, "Mom! Tell Ryon to eat neater!" and then he'd smear it even BIGGER, right up to his eyebrows. Or it might be the time when he was ten, when I wanted to watch a miniseries about Anastasia, the maybe-not-murdered Russian princess, on our only TV. He wanted to watch Monster Truck Racing. My mom wasn't home to arbitrate, so he forced me to try to strangle him with a phone cord. Either of those incidents could have been what separated us emotionally. I'll talk to a therapist about it and get back to you. We loved gaming together, but that was about it. We kind of just EXISTED with each other. I regret that, because if we'd supported each other more, I think we could have been more secure in our respective weirdness when we finally encountered the real world (which was WAY later than it should have been because we were homeschooled). The fact he was reaching out to me to play an online video game together was flattering. I jumped at the chance. BUT A TINY CAUTIOUS LITTLE JUMP. Because I didn't know much about this Warcraft thing, but I did know that anything online with other people in a "game form" could be potentially hazardous to my time-health. The previous year, I'd developed a slight addiction to another online game called Puzzle Pirates. It was brilliant in its design, AND you got to customize your character, who was a pirate. In all categories, it was a four-hour-a-day winner. The tasks in the game were simple but fun puzzles. There was a carpentry puzzle (like Tetris), there was a sailing puzzle (a variation on Tetris), and about three other puzzles with... Tetris-like qualities. There were overall goals, too. The better you played, the faster your ship ran. The faster your ship ran, the more stuff you gathered. The more stuff you gathered, the more money you earned. The more money you earned, the cuter the outfit you could buy, and the cuter the outfit... well, that was a basic end goal. The outfits. I was KILLER at running my pirate ship, particularly with the navigation (quasi-Tetris-like) puzzle. I mean, savant level, guys. And after a few months of playing, I impressed enough people to make a lot of in-game friends, and we banded together to form a regular "crew." It became the people, not the clothes, that kept me logging online day after day as we sailed the virtual seas. Both of my closest friends in the game were stay-at-home moms. "Ploppyteets" had just had her first baby, and you could tell from her attitude, she did NOT know what she was getting into with the whole "Shoving a human out of the bio-oven." She'd type things like, "Sorry, have to leave. This baby wants to rip my tits off all day." I never figured out much about her personal life, but I pictured her in a trailer park in Nevada, breast-feeding as she solved puzzles and smoked cigarettes, ashes dripping on the infant's forehead. The other mom we'll call "LadyLee." She had a newborn and a two-year-old, and her husband traveled a lot. LadyLee seemed like the kind of woman who was pretty and sweet but unhappy in her marriage. She had gained a ton of weight after her last child and was depressed all the time, so she didn't leave the house. Ever. Real American Dream story. Instead of worrying about herself, LadyLee would counsel people in the crew about their love lives, their schoolwork, anything they needed, all through the game's chat interface. She was always there and sweetly comforting, like an AI big sister. There was one incident where I got a job on Days of Our Lives, and afterwards, the producer called my manager up and said, "We will never hire this girl again." I had exactly five words in the episode, and I couldn't figure out how I screwed them up so badly. I kept having panic attacks in my sleep, reliving the single line, "My princess, how are you?" over and over in my head, as if somehow it could un-ruin my career. LadyLee was the only person in my life who could get me to laugh about how stupid the whole thing was. "Oh, was that the scene with Sami? She had an affair with her brother-in-law Tom, and then he murdered his own brother, which caused her to be committed to a mental hospital and meet another woman who was MARRIED to Tom, and then they broke out together and got revenge on Tom by ruining his shipping business. They probably didn't like your nose." Then LadyLee bought me a new Pirate hat in-game, which had a feather in it and REALLY looked good with my character's hair design, and suddenly I was weeping onto the keyboard, typing, "Thank u, life saver. <3." She was a yar pirate friend. So it was sad when things went off the rails SO BADLY for her. A new guy, "TreeMaster," joined the crew a few months in, and he and LadyLee started chatting with each other privately. A LOT. I'd load cannons (in a PINBALL Tetris-like game) and gossip with Ploppyteets about the Lee-Tree relationship. "Are they on her ship together in private chat again?!" "Uh-huh. Wow, my kid is a crap fountain, how do you plug them up? There's no manual with this thing." Things escalated, LadyLee and TreeMaster bought a ship together (hello, virtual commitment!), and I could sense something was going too far between them. I tried to caution her. "You and TreeMaster are hanging out a lot, is that a good idea, Lee?" "Oh, Howard and I just like working together, that's all." I stopped typing in shock. HOWARD? They'd advanced to real names?! This was serious! But LadyLee seemed so much happier after she met TreeMaster (as much as you can glean emotion from alphabetical letters placed together in a chat interface), and I felt bad about being negative. LadyLee was an adult, she had things under control. Plus, their ship was SO FAST, who was I to judge if they worked that well together? An acting job took me out of town for two weeks, and when I returned to the game, everything in the crew had collapsed. The only person I could track down online was Ploppyteets. I typed to her, frantic. "Where is everyone?!" "New Mead Brewing mini-game just got released. I'm balls at it." "Um, ok. Where's LadyLee and the crew?" "She dissolved the group. Won't be online anymore :(" "Why not?!" "She left her husband last week for TreeMaster, he found stuff between them on her computer, and I guess she's losing custody of her kids. She hasn't logged on since we talked last week." "WHAT?!" Because of sailing the pixelated seas, this woman's whole life had collapsed? "Are you kidding?" "I wish. Bonus, my baby has a thing called 'colic.' I'm looking to trade her in for a Chevy if you know any takers." That was the last day I ever played Puzzle Pirates. I was worried about LadyLee and felt incredibly sorry for her but had no way to contact her outside the game. I didn't even know her real name. It felt helpless to care about people I'd never meet, who could disappear on a dime. I would miss Ploppy, too (even though I worried about the future of her offspring), but it was too hard to play anymore. It had gotten too real. That eight-month "Yo-ho-ho!" sideline made me aware of my personal slippery slope in the online gaming area. It was VERY slippery. But I rationalized that my brother was reaching out to "bond" with this new MMORPG game, and that was something I couldn't turn down. And if something went wrong, at least I knew how to reach him via phone to say, "Don't leave your husband and children for a random guy named Howard who's really good at virtual carpentry!" I bought World of Warcraft in the summer of 2005, right after I lost a part in a television pilot to a girl who looked EXACTLY LIKE ME. Red hair, pale lumpy face, if you squinted at our head shots we looked identical. And it was depressing. To come in second choice to... myself? So I installed the game and created my first character, named? You guessed it. Codex. In this game, people group themselves in private "guilds" instead of "crews." My brother was a member of a guild of players called Solaflex, and it was for "little people" only, which sounds offensive, but the fact that everyone had to be a gnome or a dwarf character was funny at the time. Because they're all short. Other players who were not gnomes or dwarves were tall. So in-game, when you ran around together, it was a tinier group of people than average. You had to be there. I created a Rogue (Thief) character, because I enjoy channeling my inner kleptomaniac, and stepped into a world so real, so "graphically advanced," that as I hopped around in the starting area, clutching my little beginner dagger, I fell in love. Deeply. Unutterably. In love. This probably sounds strange to nongamers. I understand. The best analogy I can make to real life is this: You know how sometimes you go to another city and, while driving around, you see a house that looks so cute and inviting that you fantasize about what it would be like to drop everything in your life and just move there? Like, you see a cottage while on vacation in Belize, and think, Prices are dirt cheap, people look chill, let's DO THIS! It's a feeling of new possibility. Of starting fresh. Imagine capturing a kernel of that in your own life right now, by sitting at your computer and paying $15.00 a month in subscription fees. That's what it's like to bury yourself in a virtual world. And it WAS a completely new world. With hundreds of players running around, animals attacking you, different categories of chat rooms, tons of buttons and commands, at first, I was lost. Every two minutes I'd type to my brother for help. "Which buttons move me?" "Where is my backpack screen with my clothes in it?" "What is 'leveling' and how does it work?" "I'm stuck in a wall, can you come get me?" All these questions are the real-life equivalent of, "What is this thing at the end of my arm, and how do I close it around items to lift them?" After giving me a brief, thirty-minute crash course of the logistical life of being a gnome, Ryon went to play with his fancy level 60 friends and left me in the baby starting area alone, an innocent level 1, to be killed over and over by virtual spiders and boars. (Classic sibling behavior.) Thinking back on that introductory experience, I can never blame anyone for saying, "I don't get video games, they're too intimidating." They can be. VERY. And unfortunately, chances are that an anonymous teen gamer on the other side of your monitor will respond to appeals for help with, "It's easy. Get with it or get out, asscrack." There's no easy way of getting into the hobby even if you WANT in, so a lot of people, especially girls, give up. The learning curve is too steep to climb. But don't worry. I climbed it. The hard way. Over the next months, I played a few hours a day, but TERRIBLY. I didn't know I had special skills to kill things faster, so I did the basic "STAB" attack over and over. It took upwards of two minutes to kill each creature. It should have taken ten seconds. And I died a lot. It was not fun. I got frustrated and finally typed to my brother. "Sorry, but I think I'm done with the game. It's too hard." "What? Twelve-year-olds play this game, what's too hard about it?" "It takes too long to kill things. My mouse finger hurts." "Did you not level your talent tree? Are you using Sinister Strike followed by Eviscerate?" "YOU'RE SPEAKING GNOMISH TO ME!!! I'M MAD AT YOU! HELP ME PLAY PLEASE!" "Okay. Fine. God." That night we started brand-new characters together. Gnomes again, of course. My new character was named Keeblerette, and I put tall, white, penile-inspired hair on her. Something I regretted instantly. It was not, at the time, reversible. Ryon created a warrior girl named Mochi with pink Princess Leia buns, and we were ready to rock the virtual world together! We advanced our characters to the max level after about two months of playing. We played and played and played, a few hours every night, and I used all the right buttons my brother taught me, and it was awesome. Chatting with each other in the game was so fun, like texting while driving. Except not dangerous and illegal. "Let's go to the swamp area." "No, let's do the undead area first! Watch me blow up this slime monster!" "Wow, so much goo. Dance in it!" No dungeon could defeat us, no monster best us. Actually, that's not true, we died about five million times each, but we were stronger together than on our own. (After school speciaaaal!) All the exuberance and sense of purpose rubbed off on my real life. I started walking around feeling... happy. A casting director was rude to me, and I thought, Gosh, she probably had a bad day, rather than dry-heave sobbing in the car afterward. A part of Hollywood-defeated Felicia Day was "fixed" by my double life as a tiny little penis-haired gnome. Getting the opportunity to know Ryon as an adult through playing the game together was a huge part of that. And why I fell in love with the game so much. It felt empowering to prioritize our time together, rather than living at the beck and call of acting appointments. Even if it was just, "Let's kill that skeleton boss tonight!," it felt like I belonged somewhere with him. Finally. Before you say, "Wow, this chick is on a nerd plane of existence I can't relate to"—slams her into a locker—the thing about a computer game character is that a part of you BECOMES that character in an alternative world. That little gnome Keeblerette was an emotional projection of myself. A creature/person who was more powerful, more organized and living in a world where there were exact parameters to becoming successful. "Kill forty wyverns, get points that make you stronger. Check!" When we graduate from childhood into adulthood, we're thrown into this confusing, Cthulhu-like miasma of life, filled with social and career problems, all with branching choices and no correct answers. Sometimes gaming feels like going back to that simple kid world. Real-life Felicia wasn't getting more successful, but I could channel my frustration into making Keeblerette an A-list celebrity warlock, thank you very much! During those hours of playing, I befriended a lot of the other members of my brother's guild, just like with my old pirate crew. And even though they could all theoretically disappear on a dime, it was comforting to start up the computer after a day of feeling like an idiot because I had to pretend to drive a car by steering with a fake prop steering wheel, extolling the "Amazing Honda handling!" at a commercial audition. It felt like I could endure any lack of fulfillment in my career as long as I knew my "friends" were online to play with when I got home. 6/7 16:51:26.790 Keeblerette has come online. 6/7 16:52:18.553 YoMamaz: Oh yeah, new helm timez! 6/7 16:52:27.803 YoMamaz: Hey Keeb! 6/7 16:52:41.752 Mochi: Yo Keeb. 6/7 16:52:57.504 Spitball: Keeb wassup?! 6/7 16:53:01.110 Spitball: Finally we can get some fun started! It was like Cheers. But where absolutely no one knew your name. [ My Professionally Destructive Gaming Career ] The big move in my/Keeblerette's virtual life was about six months after I started playing. My guild decided to advance to a more complicated part of the game, which moved me from gaming hobbyist to full-time addicted employee of World of Warcraft. The game has especially challenging areas that require getting large groups together called "raids." In the early days when I played, these events required forty people logged online AT ONCE for up to eight to ten hours at a time. Clearly, the programmers didn't have enough real-life social relations, or that basic design concept would never have occurred to them. It was a nightmare. Have you ever thrown a party and tried to get EXACTLY three dozen specifically qualified people to attend? Even if they RSVP, half of them never show up, right? And if enough people don't show up, you can't throw the party. So you have to recruit random people at the last minute who you've never met before to fill up the roster. And they turn out to be greedy eleven-year-olds from Estonia, who you're FORCED to keep around in order to limp through the evening's festivities, and... yeah. Just typing all that out gave me stress flashbacks. After attempting it a few times, our guild decided it was too small to attempt one of these fancy raids alone, and we joined forces with a slightly bigger guild named Saints of Fire. These guys took their gaming SERIOUSLY. In order to participate, everyone was required to install voice chat software so the leaders could coordinate everyone's actions verbally during the fight. Like air traffic controllers. This also meant that we would finally be able to hear one another's voices for the first time. It was a move that was... socially terrifying. People will finally know I'm really a girl! Half the girl characters are played by guys who PRETEND they are girls, but this is really it, they will hear me and KNOW! What will they think? Will they judge me? Most important, will I get downgraded on the warlock roster?! Anxiety almost made me log off and never log back on again. But I had to keep playing. It made me happy. So I sucked it up and bought a huge pair of gaming headphones with a mic attached to them that jutted out across my mouth and made me look like a 1-800 operator. The first day of the combined raid, I logged into voice chat, nervous. "Hey, guys, uh, Keeb here. Checking in for warlock duties!" There was a beat of silence, then a flood. "Oh crap, Keeb's really a girl?!" "Yeah, I told you so!" "Really? I owe you a hundred gold, SacBallzsky." "I'm good for it." "Hey, Keeb!" "Hi, Keeb!" "Good to hear you, Keeb." "Nice voice!" There was a flurry of excitement, but no one seemed to get THAT worked up about my vagina-dom, thank goodness. I've heard from a lot of other women that revealing their gender online sometimes invites reactions of "BOOOOONER! Let me throw sexual innuendos at you until you fall for my hot elf self!" But our raid turned out to be more female friendly than that. Probably because the Saints of Fire leader was a girl who could verbally rip your dick off. Her name was Autumna. I mean, that was her character name. (At this point let's just agree that they're indistinguishable.) Autumna sounded young, like she was in college, and had a voice like a hatchet. "I'm docking you attendance points." "Argue with me, you die." "Rambo, tranq the hound! I'll cut you into pieces in your sleep if YOU DON'T WAKE UP, IDIOT!" To expect gentleness from Autumna was to squeeze a knife and not have your fingers cut off. I loved her. As we settled into the new gaming hierarchy, I realized that the voice chat just exaggerated what people used to be like in type. They could be outgoing, or quiet, or "people you definitely wouldn't want to hang out with unless you desperately needed them for the game." There was one mage named Gooroo who always logged online with a loud "GOOROOOOOOOO!" When he killed things with a big magic spell, he'd yell "GOOROOOOOOOO!" Pretty much everything was accompanied by a "GOOROOOOOOOO!" He got muted a lot. There was one druid who always had his mouth full of a meatball Subway sandwich when he talked, and a warrior who never spoke except to quote The Big Lebowski. I found my sweet spot in the societal hierarchy by becoming the resident DJ. I figured out how to connect my music to the voice chat program, and would spin everything from New Order to Snoop Dogg/Lion/Dogg to Lady Gaga while we prepared for fights. Our signature song was "One Night in Bangkok," a late '90's synth song about night life in Thailand, and everyone would stop and make their characters dance when it came on, singing the chorus at the top of our lungs through our headsets: You'll find a God in every golden cloister And if you're lucky then the God's a she. I don't think anyone understood the lyrics. (Or we were all really liberal. Probably both.) At any rate, small things like that made raiding with forty strangers the best thing in the world. We needed those joyous social highlights, because the game raids required a TON of coordination, not only to assemble the exact number of qualified people, but also to get your character ready for action. "I have to spend three weeks gathering equipment? You're saying I need to do homework to play this video game?!" Yes. That is what they were saying. We'd rush the same monster over and over for weeks without succeeding. "Turdburger, you let me die again! Stop eating while we're fighting, I can hear you chewing your Subway!!" It was NOT a casual hobby. We raided together about twenty hours a week, sometimes just to fail the fights again, and again, and again. Sounds incredibly annoying and not like the definition of "game," which is to "play," which in turn means to "engage in activity for enjoyment," right? So why bother going through all this grief? Bottom line (just like in Puzzle Pirates): outfits. All the best armor and weapons were acquired in the difficult mega-group dungeons. It was the Rodeo Drive of Warcraft. When you got a piece of fancy "epic" purple equipment, your character became more powerful and looked cooler when you danced on mailboxes inside the game. It's the same reason why real-life men buy sports cars and real-life women buy handbags that cost the same as said cars. (Back then, I would have salivated over a "Tier 4 Nemesis Helm" before a Hermès Birkin bag any day of the week.) In order to win the best stuff, you placed bids according to points you'd earned for raid attendance. Basically, minutes of your life were used as currency. (When I describe it that way, it sounds horrifying.) There were only three to four items auctioned off to the group of forty people each week, so, like debates in British Parliament, things got rough. Because avarice doesn't generally IMPROVE one's character. One time my brother Mochi got reamed because people thought he was hogging equipment, so he posted the following on the forums: It has come to my attention that there have been bones of contention raised about a few of my raiding bids in Blackwing Lair and in the Molten Core, specifically, with my fellow raiding warriors questioning my bidding demeanor concerning the Helm of Endless Rage, which drops off of Vaelastrasz the Corrupt in the Blackwing Lair zone, and with the Onslaught Girdle, a Ragnaros drop from the Molten Core zone. If, on any of my future bidding, you have any questions or qualms about what I am doing, and would like me to know about your second thoughts or have any ideas/suggestions for me, I invite you to write all your thoughts on the matter in a message/email/forum post for me. Then, print it out, roll it up in a tube, and stick it up your ass. Sincerely, Mochi He wasn't one of the more popular members. I, however, was very popular. I had a charming lack of fulfillment in my life, so I was psyched to be able to work hard and study like I was in college again. "4.0 in Warlock? Sounds like a goal to me!" But as we started working through harder and harder dungeons, more and more prep was required BEFORE the actual raid time. Making potions, gathering equipment and herbs, rearranging my in-game storage unit. Most people had day jobs or school, but what was I doing during the day? Except for the occasional "Going to audition/class/coffee-with-other-actresses," I had TONS of free time. I figured, "Someone needs to make those Flasks of the Titan, might as well be me!" That is when my gaming life started tipping out of control. I started working full-time in World of Warcraft. I'm not exaggerating. Every morning before I left the house (IF I left, which I frequently didn't), I would log online and fly around the game world, harvesting herbs across the virtual globe to make potions. This hunter/gatherer trip would take about an hour or two each day, minimum. (Yes, I spent a large portion of my time inside World of Warcraft commuting.) I invested in a very expensive office chair, for my ass comfort, because I was sitting on it most the time and it was starting to spread. But I didn't care about my booty, 'cause there was looty to be collected! (HAR! Okay, no more puns, I apologize.) At one point I thought, Hey, I have a few hours of my day that are NOT eaten up by gaming!, so I created an additional character to fill those up. A burly dwarf lady named Sugarz became my "backup date" in case the raid didn't have enough priests to be able to play properly. Between the two characters, I fell into a schedule of raiding six to eight hours every single night. I stopped going to acting classes. I stopped performing improv. Or doing plays. Or socializing with real-life human beings. Several times I skipped auditions because I didn't have time to prepare after staying up too late gaming the night before. I ate, slept, and lived World of Warcraft. I guess it's pretty obvious, but it was not great on my personal life. I disappeared. My friends didn't see me for six months. My boyfriend would place a plate of food next to my mouse pad, and I wouldn't look up. I'd just shove whatever was there into my mouth until my character died, or I had to pee. "Thanks for the food, honey!" Oh wait. He'd left the room an hour before. It was easy to ignore how destructive my behavior was becoming because there were SO MANY other people doing the same thing I was doing online. We rationalized it for one another. At the height of my addiction in 2006, I had logged a few thousand hours in World of Warcraft. That's a solid one HUNDRED days of human life. Now I think it's depressing, but at the time it was a point of pride. I was obsessed. I couldn't stop myself. It was not healthy. But I couldn't stop. It didn't feel like there was anything else in my life to stop for. We all have periods of our life where we're trapped, doing something we hate, and we develop habits that have nothing to do with our long-term goals to fill the downtime. Right? I hope you identify with that idea; it's the only way I can explain becoming so emotionally invested in a video game that I would get in my car and drive around town sobbing if my internet went out. I knew it was bad. But even living with a constant Gee, something is seriously wrong here... feeling, I wasn't able to make myself STOP and get control of my life. I'm not blaming the game; I'm blaming my lack of perspective about why I wanted to fill my days with that beautiful, repetitive world. My life was unhappy, and I covered the hurt with a subscription-based Band-Aid. I just couldn't find a good reason NOT to play so much. Dig deeper and take steps to become happier in the long term? Nah, there are monsters to kill. Worry about real life later! Ultimately, mistakes can be more valuable than victories. Yes, I could have learned the lesson of "Mistakes are good!" with a MONTH of gaming rather than almost two years, but I was the head flask maker. The raid DEPENDED ON MY SKILLS! And soon after this dark period, I used all the things I learned during those dragon-hunting months of my life to create a web show called The Guild. So, not a total mistake.
You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost)	Felicia Day	[ "comedy" ]	[ "biography", "gaming", "humor", "video games", "Almost" ]	Chapter 8	The Guild: A Ruthless Beginning Whereupon I mentally abuse myself into creating something due to depression, peer pressure, and hypochondria. And it turns out way less crappy than you'd think! The Guild is a comedy web series I created in 2006 about a group of online gamers and how they interact online and offline. (Not autobiographical at all. Nope.) Before I made the show, my writing career consisted of one sketch comedy class, a half-finished movie script, and some creepy fan fiction I wrote as a kid. Yes, even creepier than my video game poetry. Which was pretty damned creepy. I'd always wanted to write. But in order to try something in life, you probably have to be exposed to someone who makes you think, Whoa. I want to be cool like them! Everyone knows "cool" is the ultimate life motivator, for better or worse. "Tattoo around the belly button where my skin stretches a ton eventually? Let's do it!" When I was growing up, my dad read a ton of science fiction, my aunt was an actor, my brother could fart and burp loudly, and all these things I aspired to do because I felt they'd make me a more bitchin' human being. Unfortunately, no one around was like, "I'm writing a short story about unicorns who fly spaceships!" or other brilliant ideas like that, so I didn't try picking up a pen for a long time. Even though I didn't get to practice writing as a kid, I was an expert at consuming OTHER people's writing and daydreaming about it. The first book that made me think, I wanna get inside this character's life like a pod person was Anne of Green Gables. I'd seen the miniseries on the Disney Channel (which I hated most of the time because, MAN, were girls dumb and painted pink on there), and it made me track down every single one of the books in the series and read them a dozen times over. The books inspired me to embrace being as weird as I wanted to be. Because it worked for Anne. I mean, she was also an annoying kid who talked too much and was uppity for her station, and everyone in the books thought she was adorable! At the heart of it, Anne was a fellow redhead I could admire. She and that girl, Khrystyne Haje from Head of the Class. Yeah, it's superficial, but hair color identification is SUPER important. That's why I always think, Where's the redhead one, jerks?! when I see those rows of stupid blonde dolls in the toy aisles. (That American Doll phenomenon is super weird to adult me, but I'd have torn someone apart to get one as a kid. I bet one day they'll 3-D print them up to make literal doppelgängers. That'll be terrifying/amazing, and I'll be there to buy mine on day one! Uh... for my future daughter, of course. Ahem.) My fandom about the Green Gables series was serious business. I prayed every night for my eyes to turn greener. I planned on naming my children Anne and Gilbert, which could have been awkward, seeing as they were married in the books. I put on my life's bucket list: "Move to Canada because Prince Edward Island is certainly the most WONDROUS place on the planet." I daydreamed about BEING Anne. Traipsing through nineteenth-century meadows, reciting Romantic poetry (Keats was my fave, because he died with such gruesome panache.) One day, I started creating my own original scenarios of Anne doing her plucky orphan thing. But I didn't want to deal with the annoying stuff from old-timey days, like sexism and polio, so I moved up the timeline and transported her into modern life as a free-spirited teen heiress. I'd imagine Anne flying to Hong Kong on her private jet, or spying on Communists while she performed gymnastics for the US Olympic Team. Or simple things, like attending a new high school where she'd enter a classroom wearing designer jeans and everyone would gasp at how pretty she was. "Her hair is so long and red. Can I be her best friend immediately?" I started throwing in other characters from other books into my headspace, and pretty soon I'd built an imaginary town filled with stolen IP. Perry Mason was there (of course), the whole crew from the Trixie Belden children's mystery series (Anne loved to steal Trixie's boyfriend away), Lancelot and Guinevere owned the local garden store, even anthropomorphic pigs and spiders from Charlotte's Web were full residents with voting rights. It got so complicated I had to start tracking my world in an accounting ledger with everyone's names, addresses, and personality traits in neat little rows. ("Friendly!" "Secret lovers!" "Murderer!") My town had it all! I'd love to say that the stories I conjured up were deep and fraught with intellectual themes, but they were not. They were straight out of Gossip Girl. Anne would arrive in town with a bang, and everyone would want to be friends with her. It helped that she was an orphan who'd been left billions (à la Richie Rich) and had no adult supervision. She drove a Porsche and owned a mansion with white Corinthian columns where she threw parties every night. It had an arcade AND a bowling alley. She was such a baller. Natch, all the cute guy characters wanted to date her. Including Perry Mason and a grown-up Tom Sawyer, for some reason. Everyone referred to her as "Anne with an e," and if asked: "No last name. Like Cher." My utopian alternate world lasted a good six months until my mom discovered my census account ledger hidden beneath clothes in my closet. One day I walked in on her gathering up laundry in my room. The fact that she was cleaning was shocking enough, but then... I saw what was in her hands. Oh my God. My ledger!?! "Oh baby, is this your writing? Do you want to be a writer? We should get you lessons, let me see!" The slow-motion horror of her opening my notebook and starting to turn a page felt like ripping my own skin off with a potato peeler. "MOM! That's mine, stop!" I grabbed the notebook and sprinted away, trying to find the nearest bonfire to get rid of the evidence. There wasn't one around because it was July and I was inside an actual house, so I searched for somewhere else to stash my shame. I called out over my shoulder. "They're just math problems! Can I clean your bedroom? Wash the car? Make me your slave and be distracted, please!" I shoved my ledger under the dog bed as she rounded the living room corner, praying I'd been fast enough to dodge her eye line. I was so embarrassed. I love my mom, but she has a habit of ignoring personal boundaries. She'd have no qualms about barging in the bathroom while I was bathing and say, "You need to shave your legs, honey, you look like a bear down there!" Thankfully, my mom didn't have a bizarre impulse to wash the dog bed, so my notebook remained undiscovered. But her unearthing of my alt world shut down all enthusiasm I had for the project. And in retrospect it was probably for the best, because I was starting to add TV characters to the ledger at that point. Joey Gladstone from Full House and Anne had gotten involved in a caper with a chambermaid that was... it was just becoming odder as I got older, even by my authorial standards. The next morning I got up at the crack of dawn, grabbed the ledger, and dumped it into the trash can. As I closed the lid, I said good-bye to Anne. "Have fun in Cabo with Jason Bourne! Don't worry, you'll protect him from the neo-Nazis with your Krav Maga. I imagined it, so it definitely happened." [ Let's Try That Whole "Writing" Thing Again ] Fast-forward to adulthood, when I decided to revisit the idea of writing by taking a comedy sketch class in Los Angeles. Motivation? I was bored, and that's what Hollywood actors do. Take classes. And have coffee with other actors to complain about their agents. It's a hard life. I enrolled at the ACME Comedy Theatre in 2005 with a dozen other people who, I was sure, were 5,000 percent better writers than me. The year before, I'd started writing a screenplay because the "original screenplay" Oscar acceptance speech that year had been stirring and made me think, I could do that! (The speech, not the screenplay.) But the results of my work were, er... semi-mortifying. Amendment: No "semi" about it. The script was mortifying. I wrote about a girl named "Harper Jessamyn" who was graduating from college music school and couldn't decide what to do with her life.
You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost)	Felicia Day	[ "comedy" ]	[ "biography", "gaming", "humor", "video games", "Almost" ]	HARPER JESSAMYN	I can't help being good at the flute, but it's a trap. What do I do, who do I become? Cut off my fingers and cast me in the ocean! Maybe it's better if I feed the earth with my flesh. At least I'll be contributing to the world somehow! There would at least be some kind of... (BEAT) ...MEANING! Harper runs away from Jax, into a practice room, sobbing. Yes, there was a sexy jazz trombone player love interest, and his name was "Jax." The script included four montages of Harper Jessamyn gazing off into the sun to the sound track of Schoenberg. And then one to Bach. In the first thirty pages. Who knows what other genius montages could have been born if I'd plowed through and finished the script, but I didn't. I bailed. Ninety pages was too daunting. But writing a three-page sketch where I could wear a funny wig and make boner jokes? That was something I might be able to channel my creativity into! The teacher at ACME, Kim Evey, was a tiny Asian lady in her thirties who had the gentle spirit of a baby panda bear. No matter how bad someone's sketch was, she would find something positive to say. "Sure, you fell off the stage, but it was great kinetic energy!" A good teacher is someone you're willing to share your ugliest, roughest work with and who doesn't make you feel ashamed or stupid. Kim did that for me, and I loved her for it. I wrote about a dozen sketches in the class, and surprise! My best ones were based on my (many) real-life insecurities. There was an awkward one about running into a hairdresser I'd ditched, an awkward one about my inner dialogue during a massage (I'm always paranoid about farting); "awkward" was a strong theme for me. My favorite was about a boy and girl arguing in a car about the morality of peeing in a McDonald's without buying anything. Jill: But if I use the bathroom without buying something, it's stealing! Robert: One flush is not equivalent to armed robbery. Jill: Fine! I'll be right back. Jill grabs her purse and reaches for the door. Robert: Why are you taking your purse? Jill: I need it... for feminine things. Robert: You're going to buy something, aren't you? Jill: No, I'm not... Jill tries to get out. Robert grabs her purse. Robert: Give me the purse. Jill: Stop it, Robert! Robert: You're not going to buy something. Jill: Just one apple pie; I didn't have dessert! Robert: Be a man! Or grow another valve! Jill: I don't know what that means! (For the record, I still will not pee somewhere without at least buying a dip cone.) I wasn't the best writer in class, but I wasn't the worst, and I enjoyed myself. It was... strangely fulfilling? Then the class ended, and I stopped writing because I wasn't paying someone to hold me accountable anymore. I proceeded to do nothing but play World of Warcraft for the rest of the year. But my teacher, Kim, and I later reconnected at a commercial audition (for soap or cat food or cat shampoo? I can't remember. Something with a mortifying jingle) and over lunch, she invited me to participate in a new side project. "Would you be interested in joining a support group?" "A what?" Ugh. Sounded lame. "I know, it sounds lame when I put it like that." "I didn't think that at all!" Liar. "What kind of... group?" I couldn't bring myself to say the word support; it sounded dirty, like douching or something. "Just me and a few friends. We want to meet every week and check in with each other about our goals. Career, family, long-term, short-term. Totally informal." People? Organized talking? Oh, God. "I don't think so." "Do you have any goals you haven't reached? Anything you could use a boost about?" Sure, a million things. Thinking about them, I almost started crying. "I guess I can come once or something. If I don't fit in, you guys can uninvite me." Kim gave me a funny look. "I don't think anyone will do that." The next week I forced myself to wake up at seven thirty for the first time in about five years and drove to a pancake house in Los Angeles to join a "lady support group." It felt like going to my first day of college. I had a panic attack in the parking lot and almost drove back to bed, but it's LA, and everyone is forced to valet, so the dude took my car away before I could escape. There were three other women in attendance besides me and Kim. Jane, who had an oovy groovy air like her chakras were WAY in balance; Trina, who was pretty and pleasant, the kind who screamed "perfect TV wife"; and Susan, who had big hair and laughed like a trucker. They were all in their mid-to late thirties, and I was in my midtwenties, so I was intimidated from the get-go by the mass of womanhood. I was wearing jeans I hadn't washed in a week. I had a feeling they'd left those times far behind them. We went around the table sharing our goals. I learned that Jane wanted to be a director, and she was writing screenplays in order to make that happen. Trina and Susan were actors who wanted to work more, but Trina's bigger goal was to get pregnant. Hearing that immediately made me think, Uterus talk? Get me outta here! but I just nodded quietly, mimicking the others' supporting-type vibe. I got tenser and tenser as the conversation circled around to me, because I didn't know what I was going to say. I've always felt like a failure inside if I'm not already a success. If that makes any sense. Jane was the leader, and she was so generous and open; just being around her was like taking a Xanax. She tossed the conversation to me last. "And Felicia, what goals are you working towards?" "Uh, acting more. And writing... something. A screenplay? Or... a pilot? Yeah, a TV pilot." I grabbed "pilot" out of the air because Jane had already said she was doing a screenplay, and it's a personal rule of mine never to order the same thing off the menu as someone else. You're a flawed human being if you think two beet salads at a table is ever acceptable. "A TV pilot? Neat! Do you have a concept?" "Uh... well..." Sweat popped out under my armpits. What did I know about? What did I know about?! THINK! SAY SOMETHING, FELICIA! "Gamers?" They all jumped in. "That's great!" "Awesome." "How unique!" Suddenly I realized, Hey, a gamer TV pilot is a great idea! I put it at the top of my "goals" list. I won't lie, the sheer act of writing the words "TV pilot" down on the corner of my dirty paper napkin made everything seem possible. This group support thing was gonna work out! By the end of the breakfast, we'd named the group Chick-In. 'Cause we were all going to "Hatch GREAT THINGS!" No, I just made that up; it wasn't our tagline, we were not that dorky. Well, kinda. Over the next six months, the group met once a week, covering pancake houses across Southern California with hope and positive feelings. (I found out later the whole meet-up idea was inspired by the book The Secret, but I decided to gloss over that fact, like you do when eating nonorganic produce. It's still good fiber!) And over time, the support started to work. Everyone was getting their lives organized. Step by step. Everyone except me. The ladies would go around the table sharing "wins" every week. "I finished the first act of my screenplay..." "I booked a national commercial! That gets me health insurance this year!" "Met with a new manager, he's keen to help me get more TV jobs." "We're thinking about doing infertility treatments..." Then it was my turn. "Uh, I created a Word template for our weekly to-do lists." They stared. I babbled on. "You know, because it's nice to get organized. I used a special font and imported pretty graphics." "Isn't that the third to-do template you've made for us this month?" "Yeah... but this one perfected the format! I also wrote down some Universe Goals to motivate myself." I'd thought long and hard about them, for maybe twenty minutes the night before, and was confident about my new "self-statement." Realistic goals all around, right? Especially the rain forest part. I was excited to hear the group's affirmation of my goals. I got none. Kim said, "Did you work on your pilot?" I dug into my pancakes with a fork. Stabbing motions. "Well, I did some research." Which meant, I'd played a lot of World of Warcraft. They all sort of deflated. Because they'd heard it many times before. The months I went to Chick-In coincided with the height of my gaming addiction. The main accomplishments I had brought in to the ladies every week were things like, "Raided Zul'Gurub. Got new armor for Keeblerette. Achieved maximum faction with the Argent Dawn..." I watered the vocabulary down for the civilian ladies as "Played a lot of video games," but the result was the same. I was making zero progress toward my goal of writing and acting more, and that made me depressed. So I played more. Vicious cycle. "You did 'research' by playing video games?" "Yeah, but I'm definitely gonna cut back." I filled the silence that followed with positive-thinking intentions. They didn't believe me. I didn't believe myself. After a few more months of conversations like that, the guilt started to wear me down. That and the fact that I was gaming so much that my conscious and subconscious were bleeding together until I felt like a living gaming entity, a robot controlling the virtual character of my flesh-and-blood self. I knew I had to change SOMETHING. If only to make sure the ladies kept me on the invite list. I went to the next Chick-In with newfound determination. "I quit the game." It was like a bomb dropped into the nonvegetarian ladies' corned beef hash. "For real?" "Congratulations!" "That's awesome!" There was relief on their faces, like they never understood this whole "video game thing" going on with Felicia, but they knew it wasn't good. Quitting was a big step! "Are you going to start your screenplay now?" Trina said, smiling. She had perfect teeth. I made a mental note to ask about her dentist later, because I was flush with proactivity. "Pilot," I corrected her. "Yeah, I'm gonna do it!" And in that moment I believed it. I could do it! But... I didn't. Yes, I quit WoW cold turkey, but that didn't mean I could shake it instantaneously. An addiction isn't something you say good-bye to without pesky obsessive-compulsive strings attached. For a month after my resolution, I stumbled through life, sleepwalking from withdrawal. Like quitting coffee times 85,000 percent. I was in a daze, itching every moment to get back online. Time became SO SLOOOOW! Like driving behind a ninety-year-old woman in a '72 Chrysler with a handicapped license plate slow. It was torture. I'd sit in my silent house, staring at the clock, the endlessly ticking clock, wondering how people endured the task of filling their whole lives with this LIVING thing. Inside I was screaming. There's nothing to DO anymore! "Cold turkey" slipped into "lukewarm turkey." As a workaround, I kept up on all the blogs for the game, because that wasn't technically "playing." I followed the forums to keep up with my raid buddies, aching to rejoin them. At my lowest, I started sobbing when the game announced limited-edition pumpkin heads for people's characters to wear during Halloween and I couldn't get one. That amazing pumpkin would have covered my ugly penis hair SO PRETTY! And all that time I was lying to my support group. I told the ladies, "Sure! I'm writing!" when I wasn't. Yes, I could have filled all those newfound minutes with actual work, but I had no confidence in myself. I was a fraud. Who was I to pick up a pen and expect anything good to come out of it? I expected perfection as soon as the pencil hit the paper, and since that's impossible, I couldn't get myself to start. Then I felt guilty about not starting, which made me want to start even less. And with no game to bury the feelings, I got very depressed. No wonder I didn't book any acting jobs in the last half of 2006. No one wanted to hire a clinically depressed person to sell snack foods. Before one Chick-In meeting, I forced myself to work through some of my shame. I picked up a pencil and wrote, "Main character, played by me... Codex. Real name Cyd Sherman. Shy. Neurotic. Gaming addict." Then another few weeks went by, coasting on that feeling of You did some writing! Go reward yourself!, until it petered away into guilt again. Rinse, repeat. Despite that dismal pace, I DID get some work done on the pilot, but it took the whole fall season just to write down descriptions of the main characters. I thought, Don't worry. Chick-In, I'll complete this thing by 2050, for sure! One positive thing through that agonizing, limping process was that I created the kernel of something... not sucky. The clichéd mantra when you start writing is, "Write what you know," so I brainstormed all the kinds of people I'd encountered during my life of online friendships. I wrote down ideas and incidents that made me laugh and wince, and it congealed into a set of six characters (like Friends!) who seemed to go well together. No one was based on one person entirely (my old raid leader Autumna was the closest in the acid-tongued Asian college girl, Tinkerballa), but they all fell into categories of people from my experiences. Clara, "The Mom." Vork, "The Rules Master." Bladezz, "The Douchey Teen." Puck (later renamed Zaboo), the "Overly Enthusiastic and Doesn't Recognize Personal Boundaries" dude. Building fake people brought me snippets of joy, even though the creative process was absolute torture. And at the end, I looked at the six main characters I'd created and thought, I want to see these people do things together! That was in October. Annnnnnd then I stalled again. I might have started playing WoW. I'm not telling. I didn't tell the ladies at Chick-In, either. I glossed over that part at our meetings. They seemed happy when I told them about all the fake progress I was making, so I just kept saying, "It's going great!" I didn't want to derail THEIR progress with my backwards momentum. I was thinking about them with my lies. Yeah, that's it. Cut to December 20. I went to our last Chick-In meeting of the year. I faced the other ladies in the circular booth (Trina was finally pregnant, yay!), and I decided I had to come clean. "I'm sorry, but I have to tell you guys something. I haven't been writing for the last two months. I've... been... playing... video games again." I pulled the tears back into my eyes with sheer brain-suction willpower as I admitted what a jerk I was to the supportive, no-one's-a-failure-here environment. "We understand!" "You didn't have to lie, it's okay!" "Why did you feel the need to lie? We wouldn't have judged you!" They were all so nice about it. Which only made it worse. "It's just hard. I start to write something, then I look at it and think, 'This is gross and stupid,' so I stop. I can't write two words down without erasing it." "You're great at writing sketches; think of each scene as a sketch," said Kim. "But there are so many of them, and I don't know what happens next. I can't think of anything for the characters to do..." Okay, there was the breakdown. HI, TEARS! It got estrogen awkward at that point with a lot of hugging. "You should take the holiday off. Don't write, try to enjoy yourself." Jane was so nice, like a Mother Earth priestess. But as wonderful as she and all the supportive ladies were, I left the meeting disgusted at myself. My fears had made me a liar. My friends deserved more from me. I deserved more. I don't know if it was a cumulative effect of the breakfast trauma, or a mini aneurysm, but in the middle of the night something inside me snapped. I woke up at 3:54 a.m. with a full-on panic attack and a huge epiphany: I was going to die someday. I was going to END. And I know you can say that to yourself a million times, Live for the now!—I mean, it's the message of half the Ben Stiller movies ever made—but you can't understand something unless you FEEL it. Deep in your bones. For some reason that night, I felt it. A vivid terror gripped me. I was mortal, and I was going to die. I was twenty-eight years old. Old. Near death, in 1557 terms. Every sleep was bringing me closer to the grave, and if I didn't do something with my life RIGHT NOW, the totality of "Felicia Day" would add up to nothing. This might sound extreme, but that voice is my day-to-day inner dialogue to myself anyway, just magnified a healthy percent. A milder version accompanies me everywhere I go. It always has. I've never been in a car accident, because on every street (especially skinny neighborhood ones) I always picture a child or animal dashing out in front of my car, trying to commit suicide on my front grill. Anyway, as the cat started to cough up a hair ball in the next room, at 4:00 a.m. on December 21, 2006, I decided that if I didn't accomplish something huge by the end of the year, I would die a failure. The next morning, I sat down at my computer and took a deep breath. "I will write a TV pilot before January 1. It may be the worst script ever written, but I will finish it, or... there isn't any 'or,' stupid girl. It will happen. This pilot will happen." And I started typing. I would love to say that given my resolve, the muses flowed through my fingertips to produce a script of utter perfection. That once I put pressure on myself, I rose to the occasion and found joy in every bit of dialogue I gave my characters. That is NOT the case. Every second of writing that script felt like walking barefoot over shards of glass. I would write a bit and then I would sob, wanting desperately to erase what I'd just written. Oh God, that's not a scene, no one acts like that. I have no idea what to make happen, who should talk next? I hate myself. Then I would force my fingers to type more, every word feeling like I was bleeding from every orifice. I was engulfed with fear of making mistakes, of writing something stupid, of encountering story problems I couldn't think my way out of. I was, in short, terrified of the process. It was not fun. What drove me to continue? Sheer obstinate grit. While everyone else on the planet celebrated Christmas (except those people who don't, and that's fine, no insult intended), I wrote. A few times I made myself laugh at a joke I'd written, and then I'd get to the next scene, not know what to write next, and collapse again. Side benefit, in Codex, I was able to craft a lead character as neurotic as I was! Every fear I had about my own weakness, uncertainty about my future, and how others would judge me I poured into her reactions and dialogue. I brainstormed every funny thing that had happened to me while gaming over the years and twisted the incidents ever so slightly to fit the new world I painted. I ate nothing but takeout pizza and Doritos for days, until even my dog thought I had terrible breath. My friends tried to get me to take breaks: "Come to the mall. Let's go to old-lady Jazzercize class. Get out of the house for a few hours!" but the awful disciplinarian in me chanted, FAILURE, FAILURE! and I couldn't. I was too scared to stop. (The mental abuse was overdramatic and awesome!) I wrote every minute, up until the evening of December 31, 2006. At 7:45 p.m., I finished the first draft of my untitled sitcom script about gamers. Thirty-nine pages. And as I typed the words "The End," it was the proudest I'd ever been of myself. And I started sobbing. My boyfriend stood in my office doorway. "Congratulations! Do you want to go out to celebrate?" "No. I can't go out now." "Why not?" I sobbed, "I'm... too... happy." I'd accomplished my goal. But I had to be ruthless with myself to see the task through. Joan Crawford–wire-hangers bad. But you know what? I don't regret letting that horrible person inside bully me at all. I finished something for once, and it was worth every second of suffering through that terrible, forgot-to-buy-relatives-a-present holiday season. If ideas flow out of you easily like a chocolate fountain, bless you, and skip to the next chapter. But if you're someone like me, who longs to create but finds the process agonizing, here's my advice: – Find a group to support you, to encourage you, to guilt you into DOING. If you can't find one, start one yourself. Random people enjoy having pancakes. – Make a goal. Then strike down things that are distracting you from that goal, especially video games. (Unless it's this book; finish reading it and THEN start.) – Put the fear of God into yourself. Okay, I'm not religious. Whatever spiritual ideas float your boat. Read some obituaries, watch the first fifteen minutes of Up, I don't care. Just scare yourself good. You have a finite number of toothpaste tubes you will ever consume while on this planet. Make the most of that clean tooth time. For yourself. The creative process isn't easy, even for chocolate-fountain people. It's more like a wobbly, drunken journey down a very steep and scary hill, not knowing if there's a sheer cliff at the end of it all. But it's worth the journey, I promise. I sometimes look at successful people and think, I could do that! I could be there. I WANT to be there!, coveting the end result without understanding the WORK that preceded it. I wanted to have written a script, but I had no idea how to get there. Thank goodness, I had people who encouraged me to attempt it, or I never would have been brave enough to try. I owe it all to the Chick-In ladies for their support; I needed it. I celebrated the New Year with a script in my hand and thought, I can't believe I did it! So... what do I do now?
You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost)	Felicia Day	[ "comedy" ]	[ "biography", "gaming", "humor", "video games", "Almost" ]	Chapter 10	Web Series: A DIY Journey I guess we can borrow some cameras, stand in front of them, and say the words typed in the script. Is that how this "filmmaking thing" works? "Walk me through this slowly. People can talk to each other while they play video games?" "Yeah. You just install separate voice chat software while you play." I was sitting in a fancy office, looking out onto a beautiful view of the Hollywood sign. A producer sat across from me. She was a friend of a friend of someone's yoga teacher and was literally the only person I could get to meet with me about making The Guild as a TV show. I was pretty sure her blonde highlights cost more than my monthly car payment. "And the characters are all playing the same game? At once?" "It's based on World of Warcraft, a very popular online game." She smiled and nodded. Like when you're pretending to understand something by smiling and nodding but have no clue about what the other person just said. I do that a lot about sports. "Uh, so what did you think about my script? Did you like it?" She looked down and started flipping through the pages. I noticed her nails were painted silver. I thought about making a Wolverine joke, but I didn't think she'd get it. "There's so much vocabulary here I don't understand. Like, what does 'gank' mean?" Definitely a "no" on the Wolverine joke. "It's a gaming term that means 'kill.'" "Can't you just say 'kill'?" "Well, that's not authentic. I don't want gamers to think I'm a poser." "Oh, I don't think that matters." She laughed. I noticed her teeth were perfectly white and, through no fault of her own, she was making me feel like a peasant. "Okay. But if I tweak that stuff, do you think my script could become a TV show?" "Well, some of the writing shows me you're very funny..." "Thank y—" "But this is just too inside to appeal to anyone. Why don't you try to write a spec script for The Office? Try to get staffed on a show?" I shifted uncomfortably. "I was hoping to do my own show. THIS show. And writers on staff don't get free dresses for awards shows. Because you know, The Guild would totally win awards if you made it!" I laughed. She did not join in. She just stood up and proved to be at least a foot taller than me and had no need for Spanx under her pencil skirt. I decided I hated her. "Well, try taking all the gaming stuff out, and let's circle back later!" "Sure!" I realized with a sinking heart that this was it. My last chance. The project I put my soul into was never going to be made. The script would just become a check mark next to "Life To-Dos" and nothing more. As I left that room, I knew I would be leaving my dreams behind with it. I stood and started to exit, then decided to turn back. One last time. Emboldened. "Hey, can I get the name of your eyebrow person?" In early 2007, after I finished rewriting my original script two dozen times, to the point where I thought, Wow, this is absolute literary perfection! I did the most stereotypical thing you can do with your first screenplay: I showed it to any fancy-pants person I knew, convinced they would read it and turn it into the next Friends. I was so confident that I started visualizing the ad campaign that would run on the sides of buses during premiere week. Me, posing with that wry, "Wow my friends are crazy, but I love 'em!" side look to the audience? You know the one. But back then gaming was not a mainstream hobby. (Is it now? I can't tell, my head is buried so far up the anus of the culture.) And ONLINE gaming was something that especially made civilians think, Nerd Poison! I couldn't believe people in show business were so uncool. The idea that it might be the reverse never crossed my mind. Until I got rejected. A lot. Then it started to sink in. A few weeks after my soul was shattered into a million zillion pieces (not to be overdramatic), I went to my women's support group Chick-In, and I whine-cried a lot. Afterwards, two of the members asked if they could read my script: Kim, who got me into the whole writing thing, and Jane, director and Chick-leader. I didn't see any harm in showing it to them. After all, no one else in the universe was going to see my brilliant world come to life. Ever. Sadface. With that attitude, the meeting was sure to be productive! The three of us stayed late after the next Chick-In to discuss. "What did you think?" I asked. Part of me didn't want to hear what they thought. I wanted to grab the scripts out of their hands and run to my car without saying good-bye. Which wouldn't have been weird at all. "It's amazing! I laughed out loud. These characters are a hoot!" Jane had the sweetest way of talking, and I calmed down. Compliments are like Valium to me. Kim chimed in and agreed. "All that time you spent gaming was worth it! The characters are so real. I don't understand everything they're talking about, but..." Ugh. "Of course not! No one does. All the producers I've shown the script to say it's incomprehensible." I allowed myself to be severely depressed again. That was quick. Kim threw out the next sentence delicately, like she was fishing for a skittish trout. "I have a crazy idea. Have you thought of doing this project for the internet?" I stared at her. "Huh?"
You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost)	Felicia Day	[ "comedy" ]	[ "biography", "gaming", "humor", "video games", "Almost" ]	BACKSTORY SIDE TRIP	YouTube was created in 2005, the year I forced myself to write The Guild. Yes, it's weird to think that before that year, there was no YouTube. It feels like it should have ALWAYS existed, allowing us to share Taylor Swift covers with as much ease as breathing. There was Heaven, then there was Earth, then there was YouTube, right? Shortly after it launched, Kim filmed a parody Japanese TV show short, Gorgeous Tiny Chicken Machine, that was as charming and odd as it sounds, and uploaded it to the service. The video went viral, and at the time of our Chick-In meeting, she was in the middle of selling her show to a big company to make more episodes. So early. EARLY on, Kim was a planter of the first sprouts of web video. And that's why she thought the internet was the perfect place for The Guild. I didn't know that, so I just stared at Kim. "I don't understand. I thought YouTube was for kitten videos and chunky light-saber teens." "No one gets this story who isn't in the gaming world, right? Where are the people who WILL understand it? Online." "Huh. Good point. Gamers ARE online 24/7. I'M online 24/7." Kim and Jane said together, "We know." "So, uh... WE would make this? By ourselves?" Then it hit me, and I felt a heart-racing panic attack coming on. For the record, I am not a risky person. If I was reincarnated from an animal, it was definitely prey. A cute one who lives in a herd, like an antelope. Or a dik-dik. What Kim was suggesting terrified me. My basic makeup did not allow me to boldly leap into self-actualization. I preferred to sit at home and complain about no one in Hollywood understanding me. That felt safer. And Kim could sense that I was freaking out. Because I said, looking freaked out, "The idea of doing that freaks me out." "I shot Gorgeous Tiny with one camera in the back of my garage. This wouldn't be much more complicated!" Jane jumped in. "I can direct, we can split the costs three ways, it's perfect! This is what Chick-In was born to do!" I looked at Kim and Jane for a long beat, then a strange sunrise crested through the two hemispheres of my brain. Could it, indeed, be that simple?!... Yes, it could. It felt like for the first time in my life, I had the power to decide something this big and make it happen. Without anyone's approval, without permission, without any external motivation like getting an A in a math class. I could do this because I WANTED to, even if it was scary and might go up in flames. In that moment, I realized that I had been missing an amazing truth: No matter what you feel is holding you back in life... Repeat that motivational cup sentence until it gets in your gut and doesn't sound like something stupid on a Hallmark card, because it is the basis for anything that will make you happy in this world. This is something I truly believe. I looked at Kim and Jane across the booth and nodded, feeling warm and fuzzy, like I was having the best stroke EVER. I had the power to film my script. I wasn't alone; we could do this. We were going to MAKE SOMETHING! [ Makin' It! ] I'm going to share a dirty secret with you... Actually it's not that dirty. I was trying to inject some suspense here. I'll stop. I love crafting. Knitting, decoupage, scrapbooking, any "lady-ish" art form, I'm a fan. For about six months each. Then I shove all the supplies in a closet, alongside the skeletons of long dead New Year's resolutions, like saber fencing, playing the ukulele, and Japanese brush painting. During my bored-actor years, I recruited lady friends to join me in doing crafting "Projects!" to relieve said boredom. (Note the exclamation mark. That was part of the vibe. Say "PROJECTS!" like a stereotypical gay character on television and you have it.) A little before Christmas and Valentine's Day, I threw parties to make holiday cards from scratch. I would buy CARTLOADS of supplies: pipe cleaners, decorative paper, gold filigree, dot matrix pictures of Bea Arthur... it was a bacchanal of glitter and glue sticks. I would cater tea-time foodstuffs (sandwiches without crusts and heart-shaped tarts with yuppie-berries) and serve them on flower-embossed ceramic plates. It's strange to remember I was so vaginal at a certain point. The same enthusiasm that motivated me to create dozens of handmade Christmas cards every year—and some for Hanukkah, because I tried to be inclusive but I didn't really understand when it was appropriate to send them to people, so I ended up shoving them in the closet—drove me to take the script I wrote for The Guild and turn it into a web series. From scratch. With my friends. But through that process, I learned the hard way that making a film is not the same as throwing a Sunday afternoon tea party. It's actually... nothing like it at all. So I'd like to share my top five tips for anyone who decides to film a television-like show in their garage for almost no money! [ Befriend a Hoarder or Become One ] When Kim, Jane, and I started breaking down how we would shoot the first ten pages of my TV script for a grand total of $1,500, we realized, "Gee, we need a lot of stuff. For free. Why did I throw anything in my life away, ever?" So while Jane pulled favors to get pro-bono crew members and Kim worked on the icky producing logistics, I concentrated on gathering the props and superficial stuff we needed, because in my mind, being able to put together a cute outfit equaled "Fabulous at film decoration!" natch. There was no length I wouldn't go to get the perfect object. I raided my friends' houses for props we needed, even doing the "Look over there!" trick to steal a stuffed animal from a two-year-old's hands. (She never noticed, babies are so dumb in those first few years after they're born.) Without asking, I borrowed a large, fake house plant from the set of How I Met Your Mother to decorate the background of one of my shots, promising my friend who was an actor on the show, "I'll have this back Monday!" For some reason, it was incredibly important to me that each character's room be well-decorated. This was a LADY production and I was obsessed with Trading Spaces and other renovation shows on TV that I watched alone on Saturday nights, no WAY were any of my characters living in a hovel! Unfortunately, my exacting standards often butted up against the practicality of having no budget. "Sorry, Kim, your aunt's bedspread will NEVER do for Tink. Her palette is pinks and oranges. Let me show you the paint chips I collected from Home Depot. Can you search the old folks' home for something in this color range? No? Fine! I'll find it myself!" With zero dollars and incredibly high standards, I had to look in creative places for set decorations. Thus began my obsession with trash. I started trolling up and down alleys, putting anything colorful and not covered in feces into my trunk. Yes, that might sound gross and hobo-y, but it's amazing what people throw away. I found a few things, like a hot dog cookbook and a 3-D picture of Jesus, that I still have in my home. (Wiped them off with Windex, promise.) And it wasn't only post-apocalyptic scavenging that decorated The Guild. I used technology to find trash, too. Since Craigslist was out of our price range, costing actual dollar amounts, I found an online service called Freecycle where people give things away, provided you immediately race to come get them. I'd click on the site dozens of times a day, like an obsessive day trader, so I could jump on a posting first. "Broken electronics on curb near Glenoaks Ave and Hubbard St in Sylmar, come before 6pm." Perfect set dressing for Bladezz's gaming space? BAM! GET YOUR FAST AND FURIOUS ON, FELICIA! Sylmar was about an hour away from my house but the grainy flip phone picture of stacked microwaves and VCRs spoke to me, artistically, so I drove ninety miles an hour to beat whoever else might be vying to grab the precious treasure. Someone else could have used that DVD player for entertaining sick children, but I had a vision to bring to life. I needed that trash! The scavenging process was satisfying, like acting out my favorite part of a video game in real life. I was smashing barrels and getting rewards! Except I didn't find gold or weapons, I found actual garbage. And LOVED it. Maybe too much. The tipping point came three weeks into pre-production when I dragged home a stand-up hair dryer that was probably made in the 1960s. It was huge, dirty, and my boyfriend was at his wit's end. Justifiably so. Our place was turning into a dump. He met me on the porch, and I could tell it was gonna be a THING. I tried to deflect with chipperness. "Hey, honey! Huge super awesome find today, huh?" "Did you rob a salon?" "No! I found it on the sidewalk with a 'Take Me!' sign attached. It was fate!" "Is there a reason for this 'fate'? Like, do you have a place for it in your script?" "No, but it screams comedy to me!" "That's what you said about all the free yoga balls, and now my office looks like a gigantic Chuck E. Cheese." He moved closer and examined the hair dryer. "There's still hair on this thing! Don't bring it into the house. Or anything else you find on the streets. Please?" "Fine, I'll leave it in the driveway, gawd!" What a hypochondriac. After that, I stored trash in my car or in Kim's garage. Life compromises, sigh. [ "Favor" Is a Four-Letter Word ] There's merit in having the plucky attitude, "No problem is insurmountable if you're willing to be creative and bat your eyelashes a little!" (Not sexist, guys have eyelashes, too.) The problems start when plucky morphs into desperation. "Please help me. Look how friendly I'm smiling, yet my eyes say I want to enslave you!" Kim, Jane, and I recruited anyone we knew to help us bring The Guild to life. Literally anyone. Conversations like, "We need a baby. Who do we know who's bred recently?" peppered our prep meetings. Guilt, blackmail, you name it, we muscled it. "Hey, I drove my hairdresser to the airport that one time when her uncle died. I'll call her up, she owes me!" When we fell short on personnel, we put an ad on Craigslist for people looking for experience on film sets and said yes to anyone who didn't seem like they were a parolee. "Here's a student from Santa Monica Community College who wants to do sound for us." "Does he have his own equipment?" "He might be able to bring a boom mic held together by duct tape." "Invite him aboard!" We ended up with a camera assistant who was a recent émigré from Hungary, and couldn't spatially place the clapboard in the actual film frame. Her ONLY job. "No, Veronique, lower. LOWER! The general area the camera is pointed would be good! Ugh, close enough. Action." The trouble is, when you're asking people to work for free, you can't be an exacting perfectionist. "I know you're doing this as a favor, late at night and on weekends, but I hate what you did. Can you revise it fifteen times until it's perfect? Cool?" I ended up having to use my own craft party skills to make our show logo for the opening credits after Kim's neighbor's cousin fell through in the graphic design department. Because she was busy "going into labor." Psh. Yes, I used MS Paint and a mouse. No, I was not drunk. I'll admit that some of the production problems we ran into were my fault. I am bossy and arrogant enough to think I have a "vision," so we needed a much bigger crew than an average web video warranted. Many times during filming, I'd start to cry in frustration at myself. "Why didn't I just write something that could be shot with one person and a phone camera?" Five minutes later, I'd run up to Kim. "Hey, let's fully CGI animate the opening credits! We can do motion capture like Gollum! It'll be great!" In terms of free labor, you'd think that the actors would be the easiest to recruit. I mean, we were shooting in Los Angeles; that's like asking in Vegas, "Where can I find a glass of alcohol as tall as my torso?" And things looked promising initially. We posted an acting listing for "The Guild. Web Series. Zero Pay. (Seriously, there's no pay for this thing.)" And got about 500 applications. For each part. We weren't special, that's just what happens when you put out a notice for actors in Los Angeles. Good thing I went through the process AFTER I'd been an actor for a while, or I'd have immediately moved back to Texas to play "I Will Always Love You" on the violin at church weddings for the rest of my life. But as we started going through the applications, not to insult my own profession or anything, we realized that releasing a "free actor" posting is like sending out a virtual birdcall, "Whackadoodle! Whackadoodle!" into the Los Angeles jungle. Ninety-eight percent of applicants were "swipe left" immediately. For instance, when you post this character description: TINKERBALLA: early 20s, Asian. A sweet, doll-like face belies her acrid tongue. You KIND of assume the photos submitted will be, at a minimum: A) Asian
You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost)	Felicia Day	[ "comedy" ]	[ "biography", "gaming", "humor", "video games", "Almost" ]	B) Under 30	C) Female But when you allow just ANYONE to submit themselves, which we did, we got some, shall we say, "out of the box" head shots. Like a fifty-year-old Hawaiian man standing butt naked on a surfboard. Or a "current" head shot for a woman clearly taken back in the 1970s, accompanied by halter dress and Vaseline filter. Or a cheerful blonde who, for some unknown reason, posed with a cooking ladle. (Oops, that was actually one of the actors we hired for a part who was amazing. Love you, Robin!) The process gave me a lot of empathy for those on the OTHER side of the camera. For so many years as an actor, I'd enter a casting room and assume the people inside were thinking, Wow, she's ugly. This girl's going to suck. She messed up a word on the page? AMATEUR! But as a producer, I sat there day after day, watching dozens of people read the words I wrote aloud, and all I could think about was... uh, me. Oh God, she can't pronounce the words. My script is unshootable, what was I thinking?! That joke didn't work. We probably should change this to a video game drama. I'm in tears myself right now, should be an easy fix. She's okay for the role. But why is her hair so much thicker than mine? I'm taking those biotin pills, do I maybe have cancer or something? I wish I could say my experience casting The Guild helped me audition better myself—put the process in perspective as an artist and rid me of the burden to be perfect. But nah. I still enter every casting room and freeze up like a basket case. Eventually we did find amazing people who looked adorable together and actually showed up on time, rounding out our cast in a totally balanced, free-costing kind of way. They were wonderful. I love them and will never say anything bad about them. And I certainly won't EVER admit that I asked my friend Sandeep to play the character of Zaboo partially because he owned two cameras we needed for filming. Nope. [ Never Let a Film Crew Shoot in Your Home ] The most expensive part of filmmaking is getting locations to film in legally. That's why we "chose" to shoot everything in our own homes. (Choice had nothing to do with it, of course. I was just being cutesy with the air quotes.) My house is painted like a clown car, with each room a different QUIRKY! color, so we shot the majority of the show there. For three days straight. And even though it wasn't a big crew, having ten to fifteen people invade my private space was close to walking on the beach in a bikini without remembering to shave all the way on the anxiety scale. As an introverted person who likes everything around her to stay in its place and who personally likes to go to open houses with the express goal of sneaking a look into strangers' medicine cabinets, I knew that every inch of my home was destined to be violated. A lot of the stress couldn't be avoided because we were working in such tight quarters. There's a reason regular film stages are as big as Sam's Club and not a small Los Angeles bungalow. One of the main character's locations was a shed in my yard, about six feet by six feet large, with a sign "Daddy's Doghouse" on the door. (Previous owner's touch, promise.) Shoving cameras, lights, actors, crew members, and an active bacon griddle into an area the size of a Fiat was not optimal. I mean, the crew was mostly comprised of ladies, but even then, the BO became stronger than the San Antonio Spurs' locker room. I tried to preempt problems by making a calm announcement every morning, "This is my house, guys! Please treat it like your own!" But months after we wrapped, I was still finding Diet Coke cans stuck under my couch cushions and half-sandwiches ferreted in my towel closet. I'm sure no one DELIBERATELY tried to trash my home, but no matter how many times I'd say, "Please don't give my dog any scraps; he's gluten allergic," he would mysteriously get diarrhea. EVERY NIGHT. I won't even mention my frustration with male people not being able to hit the toilet while peeing. I couldn't enter my own bathrooms without wanting to wear a hazmat suit. We never could have completed filming without opening our homes to the crew, but to this day, I still have rings on my dining room table that I gaze at with bitterness. "I put out coasters. All the time. No one used them." Despite the personal-boundaries issues, the set was a casual place that made it feel like we were kids playing dress-up in our homes. (Because we WERE in our own homes. Four feet away from where we slept.) That informality gave us the freedom to do things that would never happen on a professional set. Mainly because of OSHA regulations and child labor laws. There's a scene in the first episode where the neglectful mother character, Clara, puts her newborn baby down on the floor as she's talking to the other guild members online. We needed to cut to the baby doing something hilarious while Clara was ignoring him. There were a ton of baby toys on set, but we couldn't find anything that made the scene EXTRA funny. Jane tried everything. "Give him that penguin. No, it looks too cute. What about his shoe?" Kid was saccharine adorable with any object, but I knew we needed to find something extra special to make the gamer crowd laugh. STEP IT UP, BABY! GIVE US THE FUNNY! About ten minutes in, the baby started getting cranky, and we got to the point of "It's good enough." I hate that point. It's either perfect, or it's the worst thing ever made and everyone is an artistic failure, including myself. (Yay, emotional extremes!) I started running through my house, yelling back to the crew, "Give me two minutes, feed him, tickle him, stick a boobie in him! I'll be right back!" After rifling through my office drawers like a madwoman, I found something perfect for the shot. And no, it wasn't plugged in. I'm not a monster. [ Disaster Is Your Low-Budget Best Friend! ] The reason real television shows have hundreds of people working on them is pretty much for "disaster mitigation overhead." Also: it takes a village to make people look pretty. In our case, there were only the three of us to deal with everything that could go wrong during our shoot. And tons of things did. And bonus: I am plagued with the kind of anxiety that makes me dart my head around like a meth-addicted hamster! So... not the best combo. When a light fell over outside one of the windows of my director Jane's house, it started a VERY minor brushfire. I immediately thought, Oh God, the City of Los Angeles is going to arrest me for arson. And we don't have a permit to shoot here. We're all going to be arrested, then sued in The People's Court. Must scout overpasses for future homesteads on the way home tonight. Of course, none of that happened, but the landlord did find out about it and forbade us to shoot at that location again (forever and ever for the rest of eternity). So we all had to sneak in separately the next day to finish one last scene, with a plan that was so intricate, it could have been taken out of Mission: Impossible. "Joseph: Enter back door at 10:54 a.m. Felicia: Front door at 11:07 a.m. Lana: 10:20 a.m. through garage. Carry craft service in a single grocery bag. DO NOT BE LATE!" I've never been more nervous going to someone's house in my life. I wore an outfit with a huge hat and sunglasses like Audrey Hepburn in a spy thriller. I parked half a mile away and, as I approached the house, I ran through the back door, feeling as if a sniper was outside waiting to take me down. We finished the scene, but with me talking in a very creepy whisper. (And people ask me why my character Codex is so neurotic.) Another time we were filming at my own house, and in the middle of the shot, the sound guy called, "Cut!" "Leaf blower is really loud next door, dudes. We can't work like this." Kim turned to me. "Felicia, you need to go charm your neighbor, get the gardener to stop working." "But why me?!" "It's your neighbor." "Oh, God. Okay." When I send food back at a restaurant... well, I don't. Because I'm convinced they'll send it back with cyanide in it. Or bodily fluids. I have only fired agents by certified letter. I apologize to cashiers when I return things at clothing stores. I'm sorry you have to re-rack this dress because of me, but look! I steamed the wrinkles out! Confrontation is what I dread the most in life. But my precious creation needed me to gird my loins. So that's what I did. I walked next door with my heart pounding in my throat. This was how Marie Antoinette had approached the guillotine, I was sure of it. "Hi, Mr. Gregory! We're filming over at my house..." "Is that why people were loud at seven a.m. this morning?" Of course, he had to embody the "cranky old man neighbor" cliché. "Um, so sorry, I'll tell them to be quiet tomorrow. We just need to finish filming." "So?" "And we need the leaf blower to stop blowing?" "He has to finish. The crepe myrtle's gone crazy this year. When I first planted that tree..." "What a cool story. Ahem, so if he could just pause for thirty minutes or so..." "Don't ask me, ask him." I turned to the gardener, who was standing too close, staring at me silently, and holding the leaf blower on his shoulder like a weapon. I started sweating. "Hello." No response. "Can you wait for thirty minutes please before doing more leaf blowing?" He stared at me. And stared. I turned to Mr. Gregory. "Does he speak..." Mr. Gregory was staring at me, too. I felt like I was in a zombie movie. I fumbled in my pocket for any money I had and held out my hand. "Eleven dollars? Stop blowing? Until five o'clock?" I tapped my wrist. There was no watch there. The gardener took the money and nodded. "Thank you, Mr. Gregory!" I called out over my shoulder as I ran away as fast as I could, back into my house. Full run. (Reminder, I have no dignity.) Kim met me at the door. "How'd it go?" "He'll stop for a half hour, but I'm pretty sure if my house is invaded by robbers in the future, he'll lend them a dolly to help carry stuff to their car. Let's make this COUNT!" Every time the camera rolled on set, my nerves ratcheted up. I seriously didn't poop for a week. I think it was because I cared SO MUCH. I wanted everything to be perfect, I wanted people to think we were hilarious; hell, I wanted us to be the first to win an Oscar for a web series. I had incredibly high expectations, and at the same time, I wasn't secure in anything I was doing. Half the time I put my "producer hat" on, I felt like I was playing dress-up. "Absolutely the budget can accommodate a Steadicam for this shot. Psst, Jane: What's a Steadicam?" I pretended to be a leader, but on the inside I was still that homeschooled kid who wasn't allowed to walk to the corner by herself. Because, you know, murderers. I knew I was a jittery mess, so I tried to self-coach myself off the ledge every morning, Be happy! All the work we're doing is so good! Remember? That chauvinist comment from Bladezz yesterday went over like gangbusters! But as a superstitious Southern lady, any second of enjoying myself felt like I was deliberately inviting disaster into the production. So any positivity backfired. The whole time on set, I was convinced that something terrible was going to happen. So I coped by visualizing every horrific scenario possible and playing it out blow-by-blow in my mind as I tried to get to sleep at night. I saw the police shutting us down when a PA double-parked outside, a tsunami hitting Los Angeles before we got to film episode two. I had a recurring dream that one of the actors, Jeff Lewis, would have a heart attack. Or an aneurysm. He was the highest-risk cast member. Almost forty, practically a corpse. So every morning I'd look up "instant death" diseases on my phone in order to say them out loud to myself in the bathroom mirror and prevent disaster from killing him and ruining my show. "Blood clot." "Aneurysm." "Heart attack." "Stroke..." Knock on the door. "Felicia, are you ready to roll?" "Sure!" <whispers "morphine overdose" into mirror> "Okay! I'm ready!" This sounds insane, I know, but I do this ritual a lot. When I'm driving in a thunderstorm, I say out loud to myself in a very musical theatre voice, "Gee, I sure hope this rain doesn't make me spin out of control and make me die on this highway!" Laugh if you will; I've never had a spinout. Or had an actor die of a web-series aneurysm. [ Making Things with Friends Is Awesome ] Even though every single second of filming was stressful and panicked and done completely illegally and the very hardest way, I'd never felt more alive doing anything in my life. There was a joy that I'd never felt before, because I was PLAYING with my friends. Many times during shooting, my fellow cast members were so funny I had to chant, Dead kittens, dead kittens, dead kittens for twenty seconds in my brain to get through a scene without giggling. Those were the moments I'll never forget. (Partially because of the traumatic visuals, partially because of the fun.) We filmed for four days in the summer of 2007 and completed everything we aimed to do with the first few episodes of the script. There were complications, of course, like when I discovered that most of the cast had never played a video game before, but I just put on the hat of "gamer consultant" (in addition to lead actress, show runner, and co-caterer) and plowed ahead. "What does this term mean?" "You won't understand. Just think, 'He has a Marc Jacobs purse and I want it.'" "Got it!" Looking back at those first episodes now, I see all the rough edges in the acting and the writing and the editing I never noticed at the time. But the fun we had making it blasts away the imperfections. Kim, Jane, the cast and crew, and I created something together that didn't exist before. Without permission. Without regrets. Hell, yeah.
You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost)	Felicia Day	[ "comedy" ]	[ "biography", "gaming", "humor", "video games", "Almost" ]	Chapter 13	WE MADE SOMETHING! #lookit The fine art of grassroots "getting all up in people's faces" with The Guild. Tweetin' and pioneerin' and awards! Oh my! When I was in music school in college, everyone had to perform a senior recital in order to complete their degree. But it was a serious pain to get anyone to ATTEND the events. Enduring a classical saxophone concert for more than fifteen minutes is a private hell NO ONE wants to live through if you're not dating the person, believe me. As the tiny prodigy of the building, I entered my recital semester with an ego the size of a Mack Truck. There was no way I was playing to an empty house! Did I put eight months of work into learning a Henryk Wieniawski showpiece with twelve million notes packed into three minutes for nothing? Hell, no! People were gonna show up. They had no mother-frakkin' choice! Ahem. I did all the regular things you were supposed to do to get attendance. I ordered tons of food and picked out a skanky dress that my professor gave two thumbs-up to, but I knew I needed something extra. Something special. Maybe something to do with the fliers everyone posted around campus to advertise their events? I asked myself, What can I make that stands out from the boring "John Smith plays an evening of Brahms at 7 p.m. Tuesday" kind of thing? Hmm, what could I do...? Yup, that'll work. That's me as "Xena, Princess Violinist." I whipped it up in the computer lab one evening, and, MAN, was I happy when I figured out how to engulf that violin in flames. An evil genius "muhahaha" kind of joy! I printed up about a hundred of the fliers and blanketed the music building at 11:00 p.m., right before the place locked up. I couldn't wait to see what people thought when I got to school the next day. Good news: THEY PAID ATTENTION. Bad news: I got pulled into the dean's office and was forced to take the fliers down due to "questionable taste level." But at that point there weren't many left anyway. People had stolen them. All the stoner percussionist majors tracked me down to say, "Badass, man, I'll be there!" For once in my weirdo too-young-for-collegiate-life... I felt cool. And yes, I sold out the venue. People ask me if I have a marketing or PR background, since that's what helped catapult The Guild into situational internet fame against all odds. Answer? Nope, I have no qualifications in those areas. But I've always had a flair for showmanship. I love adding a bit of "VOILÀ!" to life, like secretly slipping a turd into the pool and watching people react REALLY strongly. Um, except it's a turd everyone gets excited about, not grossed out by. One made of gold or diamonds or something... I dunno where this analogy is going. Kim, Jane, and I had a meeting right after we finished filming to figure out what we were going to do with the show. We knew the episodes were going to be great, but any plans after that? Not so much. I tried to be organized and take charge. I even brought a clipboard to the meeting. "So we have a show to release..." Kim nodded. "And?" "Uh, that's all I got. What do we do with it?" I dropped my clipboard next to me in the booth, because I suddenly felt stupid for bringing a clipboard into a coffee shop. Or owning a clipboard at all. Jane said, "We need a plan to get people to see the show before we upload it next week. Kim, how did your video do so well?" "It's quirky. And it was linked by a TV show," said Kim. "And it has a character named Lick Poop." I frowned. "I don't think we can count on the viral thing happening like that with this show." "Don't sell yourself short. Episode two has great poop jokes." "Meh. They're okay." I was always the gloomy Darth Vader of the group. I could even see the dark side of poop jokes. "We could use help in the PR department. Does anyone know anyone?" "For free? I already called in every favor for dog, cat, house-, or baby-sitting during filming. Every single sitting favor I had. Tapped out." Jane sighed. "Well, someone has to be in charge of outreach. Or no one will ever see what we've made." There was a long pause where we sipped our lattes together, knowing someone needed to step up to the plate, but no one wanting to fall on this particular sword. At last, I raised my hand. Like I was in English class. What a dork. "Uh, I'll do it. Because I know the internet best? Kinda?" With that overconfident hubris, I went home and tried to conquer the fantastic world of online marketing! My only starting point was, "People. Want to make them watch things. How do I corral them?" Since the internet is part egalitarian democracy, part vengeful cat worshipers, it was a daunting task. Because I knew that making something discoverable on the web is like sending someone on a scavenger hunt into the universe's biggest flea market. There's anything and everything available you can imagine, with an infinite number of stalls to browse and no emergency exits in sight. (That sentence flashed me back to a trip I took to Ikea recently. Major panic attack in the cutlery section.) But it was actually the perfect time to dive in, because 2007 was when social startups were popping up online like acne on a teenager's face. It's hard to imagine with babies practically born with hashtags tattooed on their foreheads today, but social media back then was not mainstream. Twitter and Facebook and Tumblr, most of those sites were brand spanking new. They were super nerdy, super fringe, and super small. (The trending topics were like Drupal and the latest version of Linux. So yeah. That nerdy.) And I had a secret power in this new world: I was used to trolling the internet desperately for friends. (In 2002, I had a Friendster account, yo.) So all the experience I'd had hanging out online and creating bitchin' recital fliers was about to pay off! I sat down and scoured the web for every single social network startup that was able to reach new people for free and jumped on them to claim the usernames /felicia and /theguild. Ever go into a gas station and browse the souvenir section for a key chain or a coffee cup with your name on it, only to discover your parents were horrible human beings and named you too weird to be part of the rest of civilization? That's what I experienced every time I had to settle for /feliciaday and /watchtheguild instead. (To the girl who has /felicia on Twitter: Damn you, ma'am. Damn you to hell.) I also taught myself how to program a website. In the most rudimentary, janky, kid-with-crayons way. I've always taken my art seriously, even when I was terrible at it. From ages eight to twelve, I would spend months making everyone in my family handmade gifts for Christmas: "Mom, get in the car, let's go! I need more blue construction paper." "You have a ton of paper there." "But I'm out of royal blue. Santa is flying through the night sky to deliver presents, it's 2:42 a.m. GMT in this piece, I need blue!" "Can't you use black?" "He's flying through Norway. Notice the fjords I created with hundreds of individually cut-out gray mosaic pieces? It's daylight there in the winter, it would be untruthful to have the night sky be so dark. GIVE ME THE TOOLS FOR GRANDMA'S PRESENT, MOM! DON'T NEUTER MY VISION!" With that kind of intensity, I binged fifty hours of online video tutorials and used my "skills" to make something that turned out one step above GeoCities level. I was so proud. I printed out a screenshot and taped it on the fridge. Then I sent this email to the ladies after I uploaded the design files. Quote: We're ready to release! The website's up. AND I made us a Myspace!
You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost)	Felicia Day	[ "comedy" ]	[ "biography", "gaming", "humor", "video games", "Almost" ]	Chapter 14	Felicia Unquote. Unironic. And as my marketing coup d'état, the day we released the first episode of The Guild I sat in my computer chair for eighteen hours using all the accounts I'd created to bother people all across the internet. In the most inefficient way possible. I wrote messages to hundreds of bloggers at gaming-related websites and linked them to the first episode of The Guild. But instead of using a form letter (cut and paste was too sophisticated for me at that point), I typed each email individually. Because I didn't want to come across as "fake." (Even though I essentially wrote the same thing to each person.) I also went overboard on the hard sell. Just a little. "Dear sir/ma'am, My name is Felicia Day, I have been an actress on such TV shows as Buffy the Vampire Slayer and have recently written a show based on the game World of Warcraft. Here is a link and another five paragraphs about how great it is. Plus, I tailored this email to your specific tastes because I researched every single one of your blog posts on the internet and have files of screenshots from your personal Facebook. Please spread word about my show because I know everything about you and have a general idea of where you live. That's not creepy, right?" It sounds counterintuitive (and illegal), but my spamming worked. And not just in a "restraining order" way! More and more people started watching and linking the video. Bloggers who must have had a high "creep" tolerance posted about it, and that led to more views, and the cycle kept repeating itself. So I just sat there and kept emailing. And emailing. The process morphed into a game for me. With my WoW addiction dead and buried, I'd finally found a legitimate reason to sit at the computer for hours. I even bought a pair of those compression socks. You know, to prevent blood clots from sitting too long. In the "getting views" department, I had no shame. "Yes, Grandma, that's the right video, the one with my face. Now all you have to do is hit the triangle and play the video. And when it stops, just play it over and over again." "How many times, hon?" "All day every day. Have Poppy do it on his computer, too. Love you!" I forced all my relatives and friends to go through YouTube view-scumming training. I probably contributed ten thousand views to the show myself, running the show on mute in the background of my browser as I replied day and night with a personal "Thank you!" to every single blog entry, forum comment, or tweet related to the show. I needed to convey personally to every single person in the world HOW AWESOME THE GUILD WAS. DO YOU HEAR ME, WORLD? IT'S AWESOME! HAVE SOME MORE CAPS! I think part of why I glommed on to the task so much (besides more than a touch of OCD) is because crusades are part of my DNA. My mom was into politics my whole life, and I have vivid memories of helping her stuff envelopes as a preschooler in the "John Glenn for President" headquarters while Michael Jackson played on the radio. She always worked for a losing, underdog candidate, and was super active in the Independent Ross Perot campaign in 1992. (How do I describe this... it was the Tea Party movement of the early '90s? Tons of people just got angry at me. Oh, well.) We would hold signs on street corners, travel over state lines to rally after rally (thanks to the "illegally not attending school" thing), all the while believing that we had the power to tear the establishment down. Advocating for my own web show kinda felt like standing on a street corner all day, handing out fliers, takin' down "the man." And the minute real actual humans started responding back, well, that's when I truly got hooked. Viva la Webolution! It was thrilling to refresh the video page over and over again and see comments roll in about our work. I'd love to say Kim and Jane and I focused on the compliments, but it's the internet. You can't help but pay attention to the mean things more. We traded the "best" back and forth: "Webisode... uh... no. Which writer from MADtv wrote this?" "...which high-school did you get those actors out of?" "that's the lady from the T-Mobile commercial. And the Transformers Chevy commercial. What a low-rent bitch." "wasn't really funny, but the girl was decent." Or to put it in words the OT can comprehend "I'd pee in her butt." But whatever was written, it was feedback. And I discovered that internet feedback, in any format, is pretty seductive. I don't say this to exaggerate the feel-goods, but the day we uploaded the first episode of The Guild was the day my life was transformed. Outside the fun of making it, we also had the faint hope in the back of our minds that someone "mainstream" would see the show and say, "Hey! Let's take this Guild thing off the internet and put it on television!" But as soon as I saw the view count tick upwards and the comments section fill up with "Hey, I'd do that chick!," the people I wanted to please in life shifted from Hollywood insiders, who'd shoved me into the quirky secretary box for so many years, to the people online who actually liked what I was doing. Or hated it. Either way, the feeling of "THEY LIKE US, KINDA!" was magical. A week after our third (and last) episode was uploaded, I was acting in a terrible, low-budget Western movie. The kind you see in the bargain bin and say, "Wow that looks cheap." While riding to set in a van, wearing a hideous prairie woman outfit, my phone started going crazy, buzzing like a lady's pleasure toy with text after text. "You're on the front page of YouTube!" "Your face is on YouTube!" "Do you have a show on YouTube? I swear this is you on the front page!" Back then, YouTube handpicked cool videos to share with the community on the front page. Most old-school YouTube stars were created this way. And on that day in late 2007, our hard work was blessed by their magic wand. It paid off big-time. Tons of people found us through that featured spot. Seeing "Where's the next one?!" typed in the comments section over and over wasn't a BAD thing for the ego. Our views for the first episode skyrocketed past one million, and the brand-new episode three was up 200,000 in twelve hours. With that boost, I knew someone would be knocking on our door to help us make more episodes! I held up the phone to the other actors in the van. "My show is on the front page of YouTube!" They all looked over at me, confused. "You can make a show for the internet?" [ A Series of "You Go, Girl!" Events ] After the influx of fairy godmother YouTube views, we were able to get a snazzy Hollywood agent and started taking meetings with "the fancies" to pay for more episodes. I won't lie; it was pretty awesome to be courted. I'd always wanted a "coming-out" party, like seventeen-year-olds had in Regency romance novels. Taking meetings around town felt like my version of being presented to the Queen. I always held my left hand out like it should be kissed when I was introduced to people at meetings. "Lovely to meet you, sir and/or madam." (No one ever kissed it. The hoi polloi are so uncouth.) The truth was, we were like the pauper girl trying to snag a prince. We literally didn't have any money to make even ONE more episode on our own. But we thought by meeting with tons of web video companies and networks, someone would just write us a check, no strings attached, so we could get on with filming our next season. Fund us! Our hymen is intact, take us to the altar, Prince Hollywood! The first episode of The Guild is titled "Wake-Up Call." That's exactly what I got out of those meetings. "But I don't understand why you have to own the show completely." I squinted at the digital executive across from me. We were meeting for breakfast in a douchey hotel restaurant, and for the fiftieth time I thought to myself, Why am I bothering with this Hollywood meeting thing again? Oh, right. I have to, if I want to keep making my show. "Writers don't own their work in this business." He patted me on my hand, and I looked down, wanting to wipe it on my jeans. "But there wouldn't BE a show if it wasn't for the person who thought it up in the first place." He smiled condescendingly. "The show wouldn't get made without the producer and network, though. We provide the money. It's 101." Did he seriously just throw a "101" at me? How dare he. I have a 4.0! I leaned forward. "But it says here you can't guarantee me to star if it ever goes to TV. That's the whole point of why I wrote..." "Don't worry, those issues are way down the line! We'll cross that bridge when we get to it." His "Aren't you cute!" attitude was really starting to piss me off. "But..." "We're offering to fund your show! Doesn't that make you happy?" "You're giving me two thousand dollars a season. Total." He leaned forward conspiratorially. "Since we're gonna work together, tell me the truth. You didn't ACTUALLY write this yourself, did you?" "Huh?" "I mean, girls don't really game, so..." What. An. Asshole. We got about a dozen offers for the show, opportunities most people trying to make it in Hollywood would kill for. Every time we got an offer, I tried to tell myself, Yay, you did it! You're on the path to get in that hot tub with Johnny Depp! Accept the deal, fool! Then, when the paperwork finally hit my desk... I couldn't bring myself to sign. I think at the heart of it, I was afraid that by giving up control, I would lose the sense of fulfillment I'd found through making The Guild. Working on the show meant more to me than a business deal. It felt like I'd finally found what I'd been searching for ever since I left my violin career behind: a sense of purpose. Of meaning. That the blind leap of faith I took after college, with all the ups and downs, had been worth it. And I couldn't help feeling a little snotty. What are these fancy-pants companies doing on the internet that's better than what we're doing on our own? None of them has produced web shows BIGGER than what the three of us have built in our garages. We can keep doing this ourselves, surviving on hoagies and favors... somehow! Was I being delusional? Yeah. I was. During one of our last pitch meetings, a nice female executive who wasn't as slick as the rest said, "We can't invest right now, but why don't you ask your fans to help you out?" Kim and Jane and I nodded and said, "What a great idea!" and then looked at each other as we left. "Is that chick nuts?" This was the end of 2007, before Kickstarter or Indiegogo existed (they started in 2009 and 2008 respectively), so the idea that random people would be willing to help us fund videos was ridiculous. I mean, she might as well have suggested standing on the corner of an intersection with an "Unemployed, Need Help with Web Series!" sign. I was willing to do that, but didn't think I'd get a lot of donations on the corner of Vine and Sunset. For my vagina, yes. A web series? Nope. But after a few more suit-douche meetings, I got desperate. And thought, Sure! Let's go cyber-panhandling! I added a PayPal donation button to the sidebar of our website, right above our crucial Myspace icon. I had no expectations and did very little to publicize the button. The only perk I offered was that if you donated, you got your name listed in the show credits. I created all the credit pages in Photoshop myself, and sticking them on the ends of the videos was a pain. But I was willing to put in a small amount of effort. Even if I had to study more stupid video tutorials. The next morning, I woke up to dozens of emails in my in-box. Donation notifications? What the hell?! Within two weeks we had enough money to make another episode. Even arrogant little me couldn't believe it. I called up Kim. "Uh, we have enough money to shoot another episode." "What? How? With the PayPal thingie?" "Yup." "That is so weird!" "I KNOW!" The process was surreal. And it made me paranoid. I was sure someone was playing a trick on us, like when I was ten, and my mom was certain that the Cuban mafia was conspiring to kidnap us into prostitution when we won a "Pick 3" lottery ticket in Florida. I could smell the same kind of nonconspiracy here, and I was not going to be taken in! When one dude in Indonesia donated three hundred dollars, I emailed him back immediately. "Hello, thank you for your donation, I think your decimal point was in the wrong place? Happy to refund if it was a mistake! BTW, not traveling to Indonesia anytime soon, and no, you can't have my address or phone number." It wasn't a mistake. People were willing to support us in order to make more Guild. Of their own volition. It was the best compliment I ever got. In total we had about five hundred people donate over six months, enough to fund the rest of my pilot script, rewritten and expanded into ten episodes. We didn't collect enough to pay the actors (or ourselves), but we were able to bring on more crew to help us, pay for locations outside our own houses, and buy a boom microphone that wasn't held together with duct tape. Toward the end of the first season, I even had to take the PayPal button off the website. Why? Because so many people kept donating, I couldn't fit all of them into the end credits. That was smarter than, you know, LENGTHENING THE CREDIT MUSIC TO FIT MORE DONORS, FELICIA. Viewer by viewer, our show was proving that we didn't need the Hollywood establishment in order to succeed. We were gonna break the system and take over the world! Thank you, Ross Perot! [ Bad Ideas Seem Good Sometimes! ] "I can't go on, Kim. I just can't." We were sitting in the middle of my kitchen floor, the linoleum tiles covered with DVDs stacked five feet high around us. Kim was operating the label maker (that took us two days to figure out how to set up), and I was filling out my fiftieth customs form of the day. By hand. I'd never sent anything overseas before, or I'd have told our international customers to go to hell. No offense. Kim reached over and patted my shoulder. "We're almost finished. Two more piles for today!" "But it's so much. My hand is cramping. I... I can't do it anymore. Whose idea was this DVD thing in the first place? Oh, God, it was mine. Why do people in Israel want to watch our show? I can't fill out another form, I just can't!" Tears exploded from my face. If you live in Israel and received a Guild season 1 DVD and your ink was smudged, now you know why. I'd reached my manual labor tipping point. Over the summer of 2008, we continued taking meetings about the show, but at that point we'd stopped counting on a big company to come in and help us keep filming. We knew we could keep The Guild going. All by our lady lonesomes. Of course, we needed to somehow get money to back-pay the cast so they'd keep working with us. (A year seemed kind of excessive to go without being compensated.) I hadn't had an acting job in a while because I was so busy online cheerleading for the show 24/7. So all that was a problem... yeah... "We could make a DVD and sell it to fund another season? Would that work?" During a breakfast burrito brainstorming session with Kim, I threw that out, not knowing how it could be achieved, but it sounded smart to my ears. Kim thought about it for a second. "People like DVDs. Yeah! Let's do it." At that point we were high on our own independence. Empowered anarchists. We could do anything! Oh, boy. I wrote season two of the show while Kim tried to figure out how to make a DVD from scratch. (Jane had moved on after season one to direct other things.) Heads up: There are jobs that you can DIY, and there are others that are worth paying someone else to do. DVD fulfillment is one of those you should NEVER TRY BY YOURSELF UNLESS YOU THINK PUNCHING YOURSELF IN THE FACE IS A FUN WEEKEND ACTIVITY. I changed the PayPal button on the website to be a preorder for the DVD and estimated we'd sell around a hundred copies. There were more than a thousand orders in a week. It was a sphincter-puckering windfall. The plan had always been to send them out ourselves, but never at that volume. After endless stuffing and addressing of envelopes and the inevitable "Oops, Kim! I forgot to charge people shipping!," I'd reached my limit. Kim sat down next to me and tried to calm me down, as usual. "Would you rather be at a fast-food commercial audition?" "No." "Would you rather have sold the show and have other people tell us what to do?" "No." Sniff. "Then we'll finish these DVDs, back pay the cast, then invest our share back into the show, and start shooting again. Does that sound like a plan?" "Yes. Good plan. Yes." "Maybe we can ask some volunteers from Twitter to come help us with the labeling." "Better plan, yes." "Give me the customs forms, I'll do the rest." Kim grabbed my pile of papers and shoved the return address stamper at me instead. "Stamp for a while. It's therapeutic. Pretend you're mushing it on somebody's face." I stamped a few dozen packages imagining I was mushing the face of that particularly annoying douche-suit guy I'd met, and it helped. She was right. Damnit. As the DVD orders slowed to a trickle, I finished writing the script for The Guild season two and we prepped to shoot the first episode on our DVD savings. It was going to be the shoestring way again, with only a few hoagies to split amongst everyone for lunch, but that was the only way to do it. We'd go for as long as we could! Or something plan-ish like that. The week before we started shooting, I got a call from our snazzy Hollywood agent, George. "Felicia, do you know Xbox?" "Uh, of course I do. I'm a gamer. Duh." "They want to talk about making new Guild episodes." Ugh. I was so burned on meetings at that point, I got uppity. "You know how I feel about..." He was used to my antiestablishment tirades and interrupted before I could build up to my "strident" voice. "They're willing to be flexible. Just take the meeting, please." "Really?" A gaming company that would pay for the show and be okay with my anarchist demands? I decided to take the meeting. Because if nothing else, I thought, Maybe I can scam a free Xbox! And over pancakes (because I ALWAYS take meetings over pancakes), surprise, surprise, the Xbox guy seemed... flexible. And not condescending. They didn't need to own the show, they'd leave creative decisions up to us, and they would give us a decent budget so we could pay everyone reasonably and feed them something besides cheap hoagies. In fact, they replied to literally everything I asked for with, "Sure, that's reasonable." It made me flustered. Because it's one thing to ask for what you want and another thing to GET it. Checkmate, Felicia Day. And that's how we made four more seasons over four years with Xbox. Because I dug in my heels and was unreasonable, and got rewarded for it. (Definitely adding that to the coffee mug slogan bin.) We started shooting the first two episodes of season two the weekend after the meeting, knowing that we would be 100 percent guaranteed to shoot the rest of the season, and no one on set would be working for free anymore. In a quiet moment during filming, I pulled Kim aside with tears in my eyes and hugged her. "No more hoagies!" I whispered into her ear. She nodded. "No more hoagies." Over the next several years, we found more ways to pioneer in the world of web video. I wrote a Guild comic book series, the show was the first web series released on Netflix. We even released a music video single that was number one on iTunes for a week. Beat Taylor Swift. (A song that was recorded in a friend's closet, staring at his socks.) Sure, all the business things we did with The Guild are cool, but it was the relationship that developed between us and the fans and, for me, my own family, that made every rebellious step of the way worth it. One of the drawbacks of being a homeschooled kid was that I don't think I learned to be as independent as regular kids. My mother got me into violin, my grandfather got me into math, I killed myself getting a 4.0 in college; a lot of my life I did things because OTHER people guided my behavior. When I dove into acting with such naïve confidence, for the first time I was following something for myself. Problem was, my family didn't understand the movie business, so they worried. A lot. Chances were high in their minds that I might end up becoming a porn actress and/or a heroin addict. (They had seen that happen once on Law & Order.) When I tried to prove to them, "Hey! This is the thing I'm meant to do!" I'd frequently get egg on my face, like when I made everyone stay up until 12:01 a.m. to watch my first professional job, a Starburst commercial, not knowing I'd gotten cut completely out of it. My mom was confused. "Where were you? Did I miss you?" "No. I guess I got cut out of it, Mom." "Oh, honey. What happened? Were you bad?" Mortifying. Over the years, when my career didn't seem to be building to anything significant, my dad in particular became a fan of the "backup plan." He's a very practical and business-savvy guy, and in a helpful way he hinted here and there in phone calls, "If you need to come home, I'll pay for your law school..." In the lowest days of my career, I thought about taking him up on it. But then The Guild took off, and it finally seemed to prove that I'd chosen the right path. The problem was that the internet world was so new, it was hard to make my family understand, "We're on YouTube and Xbox now! It's a gaming console. Yes, it's for games but they also have video..." meant I was guaranteed to not move into their spare bedroom anytime soon. I was in Austin, Texas, visiting my dad around season three of The Guild, and we ended up going to Bed Bath & Beyond together, probably for a new griddle because he's a real "cook the sausage until they turn into meteorites" kind of guy. I could tell he wanted to talk to me about something serious. He's always trying to get me to save money for some reason, so I thought, Ugh, another time where I have to pretend to understand what he's talking about with 401(k)s. As we wandered the aisles, of course I shoved things into the cart I wanted for myself so he'd pay for them. (I don't care how old you are, that's a daughter privilege.) He cleared his throat, and I knew he was going to launch into it. "Honey, I want you to know you can always come home. Uh, you know. If things aren't working out." I stopped the cart and rolled my eyes. I definitely would have rather talked with him about a 401(k) thingie. "Things are working out, Dad. I'm fine!" "You haven't been on TV as much lately." "Well, I've been working on all my internet stuff." "That sounds fun, but are you making a living at it?" "I... kinda." Technically I was still paying most of my bills with commercial acting, but unless I was phoning home for a check, he didn't need to know that. "I'm just saying, UT Law School is one of the best in the country. You always liked that Ally McBeal show..." "Dad! I'm doing great! Honest..." "Hey! Are you... Codex?" We had stopped to have our earnest Lifetime moment in the linens section, and a guy in his early twenties wearing a polo shirt peered out at us from behind a stack of flamingo beach towels. I smiled. "Uh, yeah! That's me." "Wow, this is so cool!" He walked over, and my dad looked at the guy skeptically. I had a feeling he thought the guy was a plant. "I love your show! I'm working, so it's not technically allowed, but think I could get a picture with you?" "Sure!" As we posed in front of a stack of "As Seen on TV" items, my dad took the photo, then handed the phone back to the kid. Dad had a weird look on his face. "You've really seen her web show?" "Yeah! Me and my roommate love it. We're gamers. Bought the DVDs!" "That's awesome, thanks for supporting!" I smiled and high-fived him. For many reasons, I'd never loved a stranger more than in that moment. The guy waved and started to leave. "Nice to meet you! The roommate is never gonna believe this!" As he walked away, my dad looked at me, and there was something different in his eyes. Surprise. Shock. And more than a little bit of admiration. "That was pretty cool." "Yeah." "Ahem." There was an awkward beat between us. Was he gonna bring up the law school thing again? Ask me more about my show? Talk to me about my pension benefits? "Let's go get some pancakes." He put his arm around me, and we pushed the cart toward the checkout. A few aisles later I had to pretend to look at ShamWows to wipe away a few tears. Yeah, that moment near the flamingo beach towels was my sweetest Guild victory of all.
You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost)	Felicia Day	[ "comedy" ]	[ "biography", "gaming", "humor", "video games", "Almost" ]	Chapter 15	Convention Fevah I have a cabinet filled with dolls of myself in my office. But I didn't MAKE any of them, so that makes it less creepy, right? In the summer of 2008, I walked onstage with the cast and creators of Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog, a musical web series released on the internet just weeks before, and was greeted by the screams of more than five thousand people. We were at San Diego Comic-Con, in Ballroom 20, the second largest hall at the biggest nerd event in the world. With me were Nathan Fillion and Simon Helberg and Neil Patrick Harris, my Horrible costars, and Joss Whedon and his siblings, Zack, Jed, and Jed's wife, Maurissa, the writers. Joss Whedon was also the director. You may be familiar with him from Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Firefly, and The Avengers. (Whew, that was a lot of name-dropping.) As I smiled and waved to the audience, gazing out on the huge room filled with thousands of faces, I suddenly knew what it felt to be a rock star. And my inner dik-dik didn't want any terrifying part of it. Nathan and Neil and Joss were extremely witty onstage during the panel, bantering with one another like the superstars they are, and the only thing I could do was stare down at the iPhone 3G in my lap, frozen in fear. After the initial semi-thrill of walking onstage, five thousand people staring at you comes with an intimidating amount of eyeball reflection. At a certain point, a question got thrown to me, but there was an awkward beat of silence on stage because I wasn't paying attention. I was busy staring at my lap. Nathan leaned forward to cover for me as I looked up and blurted out, "Oh! I'm sorry, what was the question? I was... Twittering under here." This was 2008. Not a lot of nontech people were on Twitter at that point. So it sounded... suggestive. Yup, people thought exactly what you'd think "twittering" was if you didn't know about social media: they thought I was masturbating under the table. And so did Nathan. "It's hot in here," I said, flustered by the roar of laughter from the crowd. "And wet," said Neil. Which made me turn as pink as my borrowed designer sweater. After that, a lot of fans joined Twitter. Once I recovered from hyperventilating in shame, we finished the panel and went to sign posters. Hundreds of fans shuffled through our line, jostling one another and the table, with security guards struggling to hold the crowd in check. When my hand started to cramp from signing and I developed a crazy tic over my right eye from smiling too hard, I wondered, How did THIS become part of my life? [ Fan by Fan ] I attended my first fan convention during college. It was the South Texas Amphibian and Lizard Show, held in the run-down ballroom of an Austin Hilton. No, I wasn't a toad collector at any point (although that wouldn't surprise you, would it?). I was there on a first date. I'd planned the whole thing myself and thought it was a creative way for two people to get to know each other. Afterward, we went to a staging of Antigone performed in ancient Greek, and for dinner I found an Ethiopian restaurant where, per cultural tradition, we ate a feast only with our fingers. Dude didn't ask me out again. But I remember walking into the lizard convention, enchanted by how many people in Austin loved lizards. And amphibians. And spiders. And a lot of other things I didn't have any temptation to bring home with me. (When I was twelve, I had a pet boa constrictor, Stella, whom I loved until I realized it needed to eat LIVE ANIMALS to survive. My mom had to feed Stella just-born "pinkie" mice while I sobbed outside in the hallway. Thank God, she died of a mouth infection before she got big enough to eat animals with actual hair. SORRY, STELLA, IT WAS ME NOT YOU!) My favorite part of the lizard event was standing near a group of guys at a meet-up in the hotel coffee shop, all with ginormous iguanas perched on their shoulders. They were discussing the best type of feed, what to do when your "friend" was molting, and breeding techniques. (I grabbed my Frappuccino and walked away at that point. Quickly.) Even though it was hella strange, I loved the vibe of the event. There were so many people meeting to celebrate something they loved. I wanted to be a part of that. Without the iguana sex tips. I had no idea that years later, fan conventions of the GEEK kind would build my career more than anything else. Despite most of the media attention centering around big Hollywood-driven events like San Diego Comic-Con, there are hundreds of smaller fan conventions taking place around the world every weekend, celebrating sci-fi, anime, Abraham Lincoln impersonators (yup): you name it, there's a fan convention for it. I've attended hundreds of these events as a guest, starting as an actor on the cult favorite Buffy the Vampire Slayer. When I started my web show The Guild, I continued attending. Even though people didn't know that it existed. I called up Kim right after we launched. "Hey! There's a World of Warcraft convention happening next week in Anaheim. I'm gonna make The Guild bookmarks and hand them out down there so gamers will watch the show." "Bookmarks? What about postcards?" said Kim. "They're twenty-three percent more expensive." "Bookmarks sound great!" I ordered two thousand of them and drove down to Anaheim. I didn't have a ticket to the convention—they'd sold out months in advance—so I stood in front and handed out my DIY bookmarks to everyone who went inside. The experience had to be like a college student working the sidewalk for Amnesty International: smiles greeted with hostility all the way! "Hi! Would you like a bookmark? No? Okay." "Hey, I'd love to talk to you about my... no, it's not a church thing..." "...it's a web series about gamers who play a game like WoW? No, I'm not a booth girl. Yes, I play the game. No, you can't test me..." Ninety percent of my handouts got thrown in the trash. Most people did it right in front of me. But 10 percent seemed mildly interested in the show, and in the face of so much rejection, mild interest felt like a huge win! After dark, I collected all the discarded bookmarks that didn't have gum stuck on them and drove home, vowing to canvass more events in the future. (I got rid of the extras by placing stacks of them on the doors of public toilets. Captive audience, yo!) During the first few seasons of the show, I lived the life of an old-timey traveling salesman. I'd tweet, "Be in Seattle this weekend! Come on down! Buy more, get more discount! SALE SALE SALE!" and fans would let me crash their convention booths, dragging boxes of my Guild DVDs and comics as my "wares" (along with my face for selfies). We even got ambitious for a few years and tried to run our own Guild booth at Comic-Con, sharing with my friend Jamie, a game designer. The experience did not go well. Our friendly indie fans generally got crowded out by mainstream fans lining up to get free life-size Harry Potter bags at the bigger movie studio booths. "Hey, are you Emily Blunt?!" "Definitely not. I'm here with my web show. Can I sell you a DVD?" "Not unless you're Emily Blunt." The last straw was when we decided one year to sell T-shirts and bought tons of Ikea shelving. Which I tried to assemble. By myself. "Why are there so many pieces?! And there are no words to explain the pictures? Is it a secret IQ test?" "No one knows," Jamie said. I put a whole shelving unit together backward, and when I discovered I had to undo two hours of work, I started hyperventilating. "Kim! I'm having flashbacks to DVD stuffing. No T-shirts! Never again!" Eventually, our show got more popular, and the cast and I started to get invited to conventions legitimately as guests, all expenses paid, no Ikea shelving required. I guess coordinators saw the lines of fans waiting to meet me and thought, That web series chick doesn't have a sales tax permit. Better give her an official spot before she gets arrested by the feds. By the 2010 San Diego Comic-Con, the most influential fan convention in the world, The Guild had grown in popularity enough to fill a three-thousand-seat panel room. More than some network TV shows. Not bad for a show that was shot in our garages, huh? (Yes, I've mentioned the garage thing too many times, but listen: we did all that stuff out of our garages.) At the same time I was doing my own show, I was also acting on other sci-fi friendly shows. Eureka. Supernatural. And those projects, along with Dr. Horrible and my other web projects, bumped me pretty high up the "situational recognition" ladder at fan conventions not only in the US, but around the world. It's a very strange experience to go back and forth between real life, where almost no one recognizes me except baristas, to events where 99 percent of people see me and think, I know that chick! She's pale like the underbelly of a fish in person! It's a shock to the ego. They think I'm awesome! Actually, I'm crap. Correction! Awesome again! Shut up, nobody. As a self-conscious, I'm-sure-I-have-a-booger-in-my-nose kind of person, it was hard to get used to the scrutiny. When I first started doing speeches and panels, I'd constantly get flashbacks to the only high school event I ever attended. It was a Valentine's dance and I was sixteen. An assistant instructor at my karate school, Juan, asked me to be his date. I was nervous because I'd never been INSIDE a public school before, but I said to myself, He's a karate instructor, so if the jocks attack us, I should be safe. I asked, "What should I wear?" and he said, "It's Valentine's. The fanciest dress you have." No need to say it twice! I got the most beautiful green crushed-velvet dress, floor length, no back, jewels galore, mile-high heels; I even bought my own corsage. (I didn't know at the time those were supposed to be gifted to you by the guy. Oh well. I'm liberated.) We entered the San Antonio High School gym dressed like we were meeting the Queen of England, and as I descended the steps, I gazed around the room. Everyone turned to stare at us. More than a hundred people. Not one dress in sight. Everyone was dressed in plain jeans and T-shirts. One person was wearing pajamas. The kids pointed and whispered at us as we worked our way through the crowd. A few snickered. I had never been around this many kids my own age before. At that moment I understood exactly how Carrie must have felt at her prom. I've gotten used to public speaking in front of thousands and spending an extra hour in the mirror every morning trying to decide if I'm overdressed or not now, but sometimes when I enter a convention floor and walk through the crowds, I have a traumatic flash of Green velvet, green velvet! zip through my brain. It gets weirder when I meet celebrities whom I admire. Then my sense of identity really starts to cartwheel. I can't tell you how many times I've sat backstage feeling like an interloper who somehow made the convention invite list by accident. When someone I adore, like Gillian Anderson or William Shatner, enters the greenroom, I generally try to keep quiet and stand near the hummus, waiting for someone to say, "Oops. Someone invited the wrong 'Felicia.' Kick out that girl who's hogging all the pita chips." I met Patrick Stewart one time, and when he started directing words toward my head, I became so light-headed I almost fainted. I kept repeating, "Would you like my chair? Would you like my chair?" until a volunteer came to extract him. Another time I got up two hours early, walked to a special donut shop four miles away from my hotel, and brought dozens of donuts to the convention for the EXPRESS purpose of carrying a box over to Matt Smith (Doctor Who #11) and asking, "Do you want one?" Because I couldn't figure out how to introduce myself like a real human being. (He did NOT want a donut. And he ended up thinking I was a volunteer, not a guest. For obvious reasons.) The most mortifying incident was when I met Nichelle Nichols at a convention in Salt Lake City. She was wearing the most dazzling gold jacket I'd ever seen, sitting in a golf cart, glam as all get-out. I mean, Lieutenant Uhura, in the flesh! As I skirted around her golf cart in the hallway, I wanted to stare, willed myself not to, then compromised with a creepy side-eye look as I passed and then... she called out to me. "Hi! Felicia! I wanted to meet you!" She waved. I froze. She knew my name? No way. No WAY. "Uh, you wanted to meet ME?! But... but... but..." Mind melting... say something human being-ish. "Hi?" "Hello!" Form words, Felicia... "Uh, your jacket is so pretty!" "Thank you, dear." "Your jacket is sparkly. So pretty." Doh! I said that already. But it came out of my mouth again for some reason. Flashbacks to Patrick Stewart situation. I wanted to die. "Yes. You already said that." Crap, she noticed. "I love your work." "Thank you!" My body started moving of its own volition, shifting weight back and forth, a move taken from a Motown group, while my mind seized up. Say something smart, something more about how you love her work, except less general... "Uh... you're in a golf cart!" NOT THAT! SHE MIGHT HAVE A HIP PROBLEM! WHY BRING THAT UP?! "Yes, it's easier to get around the crowds this way." I babbled. "I still can't believe you know my... why did you want to... I'm a big fan of your work!" COMPLETE A SENTENCE, GOD! "Thank you!" Mention your favorite episode of hers! No, for some reason, your mind isn't working. I am your mind, and I'm not working. I'm warning you, if you say something right now, you might accidentally say "Star Wars" instead of "Star Trek" and then you'll have to commit hari-kari, right here, right now in this hallway, so just compliment her jacket again... NO! WRONG CHOICE! NO-WIN CONDITION! AAAAAAAAAAAAH! "I have to pee. Nicetomeetyoubye!" And I ran away. Like, full-tilt running down the hallway. If you haven't guessed already, it's a habit of mine. I never found out why she wanted to meet me, either. I felt so ridiculous that I sat on the toilet for fifteen minutes until I was able to rewrite the scene in my head into a more functional account of what happened so I could live with myself. (It included a conversation about her sister, who was once an actor in The Guild. Why couldn't I have remembered that during the panic attack? I'm the WORST!) I'm sure the conversation wasn't that weird from her point of view (maybe) but from mine it was mortifying. All I wanted to have said was one thing, one simple thing to have her remember me. To make an impact. To summarize why I was having a loose-bowel situation just LOOKING at her in person. Because I admired her so much. Those experiences make me appreciate every interaction I have with fans of my own work at conventions. I try to go out of my way to connect with each person as much as I possibly can despite the long lines and stifling crowds and people in cosplay with fake weapons who accidentally poke people in the eyes with rubber broadswords. Because that single moment you get with someone you admire is so important, I never want anyone to walk away feeling mortified like I generally do when meeting someone I fan over. That's why, when I take pictures with people, I'm open to almost any request. "Can I pick you up?" "Yes!" "Can I pretend to propose to you?" "As long as it's not legally binding, ha!" "Can you pretend to stab me with this light saber?" "Which organ?" "Can I put you in a headlock?" Long pause. "Uh... sure! Why not." Of course, it's hard to please everyone. Especially if you're entering/exiting a toilet stall and someone comes running up saying, "Oh my God, can I have a selfie with you here? So hilarious!" Or you see someone tweet, "Felicia Day was eating a salad while she signed autographs today. No respect for her fans." I WAS HUNGRY AND DIDN'T WANT PEOPLE TO WAIT IN LINE! (But I haven't eaten in public at a convention since, so good job, Tweeter! You showed me.) If you've never been to one of these events, you probably have a very Big Bang Theory idea about the attendants and want to know, "What's the creepiest thing a fan's ever done to you?" Aside from a few restraining orders I can't legally talk about, I can relate a few standout oddball encounters. One time a dude wanted to buy a lock of my hair for $1,000. And he wouldn't take no for an answer. "You have a lot of hair, and my friend would be so happy! He loves you." "I appreciate his appreciation, but I'm not selling you my hair." "Just an inch. It's a lot of money!" I tried to get the guy to move along in a way that he wouldn't feel ashamed about being creepy. (Which he totally was.) "I don't know him and wouldn't want anyone to be able to clone me, haha." When I mentioned "cloning," the guy got WAY too excited. "Cloning would be AWESOME. I'd only need a fingernail, how's that for a compromise? Say five hundred dollars?" At that point, I stopped worrying about his self-esteem. "Security!" Another time I had a guy in his early twenties approach me and ask me to autograph his arm. I've signed a ton of babies, breasts, and Nintendo power gloves, so I was cool with it. Until he let slip, "I'm gonna go tattoo over it." I withdrew the pen. "Um, I don't think you should do that, why would you do that? Do you really want to do that?" "I'm a big fan. And my buddy bet me five hundred dollars that I wouldn't do it. I need you to sign because I could use the five hundred dollars for community college tuition." I was conflicted. This guy wanted to disfigure his body permanently and was asking me to enable him. On the other hand, I REALLY wanted to see what it would look like. "Please?" "For the record, I discouraged you!" I took his Sharpie and drew artistically on his right shoulder. All those hours I put into signing my signature over and over as a kid paid off. Nice swoops. Not too girly. Dare I say... tattoo worthy. He left, supposedly for the tattoo shop, and I thought, Cool! I just got pranked in a very flattering way! An hour later, the guy comes running back to my booth, sleeve rolled up over his shoulder. "I did it!" Right there on his arm, raised and red, was a tattoo of my signature. Permanently inscribed. On a stranger's body. It felt like I'd secondhand branded him. Also, it occurred to me too late that I should be worried about checks being forged with his body part. Oh, well. "Congrats! Go get that money from your friend! Here's a free DVD!" And that should have been the end of it. Most people outside motorcycle relationships can't tell a story like that. But the best part happened the following week, when I got a tweet that was sad and sweet and horrible at the same time. Hey, tattoo doing well, here's a pic to prove it's me. Sad thing, buddy refused to pay up. :( Attached was a still red-angry picture of my signature. That was permanent. And in no way contributed to the guy's college education. I laughed. Yes, I'm a terrible person. Aside from outlier incidents like that (yes, I have more tattoo stories), all of my fans are interesting and enjoyable to meet. I've had fascinating conversations with writers, archaeologists, NASA/JPL engineers—all people I would never have known how to approach in real life, but I get to connect with now because of my work. I think fan conventions are the epitome of what is fantastic about the internet. And probably why they've become so much more popular in the last several years. You're never weird when you're surrounded by people who are weird like you, right? Conventions are a real-life slice of our digital lives. I feel at home when I walk onto a show floor and see all the booths carrying every Doctor Who/Star Wars mashup T-shirt invented. Where else can I buy a special set of dice that color coordinates with my character's hair or play a new video game next to a stranger who can appreciate the new armor designs as much as I do? That feeling I constantly get in everyday life of, Oh boy, how do I connect with this stranger? Why don't they have a résumé attached to their forehead to help me out here with this dialogue thing? is temporarily banished. And, professionally, it means so much to meet people face-to-face and be reminded that the things I create can affect people's lives in small ways, too. I have a picture framed on my office wall. A beautiful pastel print, blue and moody, of a female nude walking into a forest. It was given to me at a signing for my Guild comic book by a hip girl and a guy in their early twenties. "We brought you something, Felicia. We're big fans." They lifted up a framed picture as they approached my table. "This is beautiful! Thank you!" I took it from them, but I was puzzled. It wasn't the normal kind of fan art I usually received. (Not to be self-centered, but most of the stuff I'm given has my face on it.) The girl indicated for me to turn the picture over. "Do you remember?" Mounted on the back of the frame was a picture of a tweet I'd sent out two years before. It referenced a blog article about a young woman, twenty-two, diagnosed with breast cancer, and her boyfriend, who was a game artist. He coordinated a huge gaming art auction to help pay off her medical bills. The cause spoke to me, and I tweeted it out. And that was it. I soon forgot about it. Two years later, the young woman hadn't. "I'm her, I'm beautifulgrim. And your tweet helped the auction raise enough money to pay most of my medical bills." She pulled the guy she was with closer to her. "This is my husband, he made the painting. We wanted you to have it, as thanks." "Oh my God, that's you? Are you okay now?" She looked so young. I couldn't believe she'd been diagnosed with breast cancer. It was awful. I was frozen just thinking of what she'd been through. "I had a mastectomy and have been cancer-free for a year. Did you read what I wrote on the back?" I looked down at the painting and read, "Your tweet helped me restore my hope when I was feeling lost." And then I lost it. I ran around the table and hugged her. I didn't know what else to do. "I'm so glad you're better. Thank you." Encounters like that are unforgettable. I've attended over a hundred conventions since 2007 and have had so many people share amazing stories with me. Big and small. Like a woman who was inspired to self-publish a novel because of my work, or a family who decided to paint video game characters on their kid's bedroom wall, despite never having picked up a paintbrush before. Or the dozens and dozens of web series that people have made because of what Kim and I did with The Guild. At an event last year, I met a man in his late thirties, a big guy, who carried a poster roll and seemed nervous to approach. I shook hands with him over the signing table, trying to make him feel comfortable. "Hi! My name's Felicia! How are you?!" "Uh, okay. I'm just here to give you something." While talking, he started fumbling to open the poster tube. He was shaking. It wasn't smooth. "Oh wow, I love presents! Not that I'm greedy, I'm polite when I take things from people. If they're free. Or not. I'll stop talking." Felicia Day, folks! Awkward, especially during public appearances! He pulled out a poster from his tube and unrolled a print of me as Codex, but done in a cool computer-art way, with a graphic style that was somewhere between pointillism and impressionism. "This is gorgeous!" And it was. "Did you make this? Are you an artist?" "Aw, no. I just drive a forklift at Costco. I'm not creative. I don't know how to do anything..." "Wait, you aren't creative? But you made this." I held up the print. "It was just in the computer." "But it didn't exist before you turned the computer on and made it, right?" "I guess." "Then you created it." I was starting to get upset but kept myself in check. "Don't talk to yourself like that. You HAVE created things. You see the world in a unique way, and you expressed it right here in this poster." "Well, I dunno. It's not good or anything." "Well, I think it's good. But if you think that, you can get better. By doing more things, right?" The guy nodded, uncomfortable. But I kept going. For some reason, it was important for him to understand what I was saying. (And I enjoy lecturing people.) "Never put yourself down about things that you create. That mean voice inside you that says, 'You're not good enough' is not your friend, okay? I used to hear that voice all the time. If I hadn't started ignoring it, I wouldn't be here right now. Okay?" "Okay." He started to shuffle backward. Probably scared. "Thanks for what you do, it's inspiring." "Thank you for the poster!" I waved, then stood up. "Excuse me." I walked behind the curtain of my booth and started bawling. I wept for this guy, who was so vulnerable in front of me, and who, for some reason, felt the need to put himself down when he presented something he'd made from scratch. I don't let people get away with putting themselves down anymore. There are enough negative forces in this world—don't let the pessimistic voice that lives inside you get away with that stuff, too. That voice is NOT a good roommate. A lot of people mock fandom and fan fiction, like it's lazy to base your own creativity and passion on someone else's work. But some of us need a stepping-stone to start. What's wrong with finding joy in making something, regardless of the inspiration? If you feel the impulse, go ahead and write that Battlestar Galactica/Archie mashup fiction! Someone online will enjoy it. (Especially if Archie gets ripped apart by Cylons.) Over the years, I've received some of the most badass fan art you've ever seen. I have tons of dolls and paintings and sculptures of my characters in various projects that people have given me, made out of felt and plaster and pipe cleaners and poster board. I keep every single piece and put it in a storage unit that I pay WAY too much for every month for that sole purpose. This is partly because when fans give me things, it obviously means a lot to them and I don't want to have that go unrecognized. And partly because I once found a biography of Janice Dickinson in a Goodwill inscribed to an unnamed famous supermodel that said, "Love you forever!" I can't imagine how mortified Janice would be at finding her book given away, so I live in fear of that happening with a fan of mine. Personal guilt issues, I guess. (Side note: I also have props and clothing from all my projects I've acted in, just in case I'm homeless one day and need to eBay for food.) In my home office, I have a cabinet dedicated to some of my favorite things people have given me over the years. It's not weird to have forty dolls of yourself staring at you, right? Please reassure me about this. I like being able to see the pieces of art while I work. It reminds me of what's important about what I do. Whether it was by someone volunteering to be an extra in our show, or part of the crew, or someone buying a DVD at a convention, or a superfan who tattooed our characters' faces on her calf, my career has been built fan by fan. I wouldn't trade that relationship, or collection of dolls of myself, for all the money and fame in the world.
You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost)	Felicia Day	[ "comedy" ]	[ "biography", "gaming", "humor", "video games", "Almost" ]	Chapter 16	The Deletion of Myself That time I had a nervous breakdown and dreamt nightly of slashing my face with a straight razor while screaming, "DO YOU BELIEVE I NEED A BREAK NOW, GUYS?!" I was born anxious. My mom must have watched a horror movie marathon while I was in utero or something, because I freak out at loud sounds, driving at night scares me because all the lights make me feel like I'm inside a UFO, and I'm traumatized, never delighted, by things that are startling. (SCREW surprise birthday parties.) My biggest fears in life are to be locked in a department store after hours, or to be kidnapped while walking to my car at night and my body disposed of with a wood chipper. Clearly, you can understand how challenging REAL problems are for me, like being late to a lunch meeting. "I'm sorry, I couldn't find a parking spot. Where would you like me to shoot myself: through the face or heart?" It might be genetic, but it feels like I'm a stupid flouncy flower, destined to wilt at any second. I definitely didn't take that fact into account when I decided to dive in and create a multimillion-dollar entertainment company with absolutely no previous business experience. Classic Felicia. In 2011, Kim and I pitched YouTube the idea for a brand-new channel focusing on geek entertainment called Geek & Sundry. We went in armored with a bitchin' PowerPoint deck of all the cool shows we wanted to make. Even bought skirt suits to look official. "Let's get in there and get us some funding!" We high-fived like we were in some bro-comedy plotting to save our fraternity, then marched in to do businessing. And rocked our presentation. Afterward, YouTube selected our channel as one of one hundred it would invest in. It was awesome. I mean, all those years of acting like a secretary in commercials was about to pay off in running my own company, right? Uh... kinda. As much as I love creating things, the amount of work was, frankly crushing. As part of our deal with YouTube, we produced more than 420 videos in 2012 alone. More than sixty-two hours of content in a year. To put it in perspective, The Guild released one and a half hours of content in the same amount of time. A real television show releases ten to twenty-two hours a season. With a crew of up to a hundred to help. We had eight full-time people. Total. So the scale was... different. But I hung on, like a tiny four-year-old grasping the curved bars of a playground merry-go-round when someone's older cousin spins it too fast. YAY, THIS IS FUN, KINDA! Then the months rolled along. And as time passed, I started to realize, Holy crap. This "own-your-own-business" thing doesn't have an end point. The responsibilities of running a small company with huge ambitions shoved me squarely into areas I was not suited for. Like insurance liability coverage and an icky concept called "Management." Most of my time morphed from making things to supervising the making of said things. Kim and I had created The Guild by stretching ourselves as thin as possible to do everything. Perfect for a control freak like me. But in this new company, when I saw an employee doing something even slightly different than how I would have done it, I couldn't help it—I flipped. "She used the wrong font? But the video is due to be uploaded in an hour! She's a North Korean spy sent to destroy us, isn't she?!" It did NOT help that the skills I'd built up over the years didn't apply 100 percent to this new venture. Sometimes the opposite. Getting out from behind my computer and into people-meeting networking events was particularly jarring. Especially when it involved the advertising world, one of the places I had to spend a lot of time schmoozing, because it is the most backward, chauvinistic world I have ever encountered. I'll never forget the time in Las Vegas when a supremely powerful ad exec I was encouraged to "get to know" looked me up and down as I approached and said, "Nice dress. I'd love to see it off you." Um, hello. Nice to meet you, too? When we launched Geek & Sundry on Sunday, April 1, 2012 (April Fool's Day, oh irony!), we did it with a day-long livestream "Subscribathon!" We invited tons of guests, held virtual panels, giveaways, dance competitions, you name it. We did anything we could to fill twelve hours of programming. I hosted the entire time, and at one point, in hour eight, I was so loopy I punched a unicorn in the face. Thank goodness the unicorn didn't sue. The "Subscribathon!" was an excellent encapsulation of what that first year of running a business did to me. On the outside, from 2012 through 2013, I was on top of the world. Privately, I collapsed completely. I was trying to juggle too much (running Geek & Sundry, maintaining an acting career, keeping up with the electric bill to keep my cats cool, and remembering to call my grandma EVER). And sure, the overwork contributed to it, but the real thing that made my world fall apart was the realization that season six of The Guild, which we produced with Geek & Sundry, needed to be the last. The momentum of the show had stalled between moving from Xbox to YouTube. MMO video games and World of Warcraft had dipped in popularity. The show released months later than it should have because I didn't have the bandwidth to make it faster. All those factors impacted the fans. And views. Which in turn, made it hard to ask someone to fund a seventh season at a price point that had become unrealistic in the "Everyone has a web series in their garages now!" market. The project had started to wind down. Problem was, I had focused myopically on The Guild for six years. My work was my life. Conversations at parties I attended during those years went something like this: "Hey, Felicia! Haven't seen you in a while!" "Yeah, I've been working." "You're the hardest-working person I know." "I know!" "Seen any movies?" "No." "Any TV?" "Not really." "Have you checked out my new web show?" "No. But I'm finishing a new season of The Guild! It's great, Codex goes to—" "Sorry to interrupt, I have to get a drink." I understood. I thought I was a total bore, too. Work-play balance is, in retrospect, something that can EASILY get out of whack. Especially if you're self-employed, you never turn it off. Your fate is in your own hands, so you can't let up. Taking a weekend away for your birthday? Is your present to yourself RUINING YOUR LIFE?! I don't think I could have achieved what I did with The Guild if I didn't have an insane-woman drive, but I made the mistake of transferring my self-worth wholly and completely. I was so excited that I'd found fulfilling work that I BECAME it. Felicia Day WAS The Guild. There wasn't a day or night for six years where I wasn't obsessed with my show. Let's see what people are thinking on Twitter. And Facebook and Tumblr. Then I'll check the forums. Yikes, we're due for another music video, better start writing. Damnit, I forgot to send out the newsletter. And did that contract for the DVD close yet? Why is the website down?! On and on and on. When it looked like the show might end for good, you'd think I'd have been ecstatic. "Yeah! Mojitos for a year!" Instead, I panicked. Because I was facing a world where there'd be nothing of ME left. That anxiety, plus the stress from working too hard on my start-up, pushed me to the edge of my own mind. I know that sounds after-school-special dramatic, but seriously, guys, I lost it. Big-time. It wasn't the first time I'd struggled with depression and anxiety. At the height of The Guild success in 2010, after season three and our viral "Do You Wanna Date My Avatar" music video, I sat down to write the next season and cried for four months straight. The pressure of everyone's praise got to me. Not in a "Wow, they like what I did! Let's do more!" way, but in a "Wow, they like what I did. People are expecting great things now. I don't know what to give them to top it. Let me curl up and die now, please!" way. I love it when people tell me I'm doing the wrong thing, or that something isn't possible, or just straight dismiss me. That lights my fire in a perverse way, like a two-year-old who deliberately touches the hot stove after you tell them not to. But compliment me or expect something big? That's the perfect way to destroy my confidence. There's a crazy people pleaser inside me screaming, They won't like you if you mess up. You set the bar too high. They're all waiting for you to fail! And you're definitely going to. Good luck, stupidhead! I gave myself horrendous writer's block and almost ended the show because of my depression. Season four got written, but the ugly way, like too many layers of nail polish piled on top of each other. I'd start writing, then throw everything out and start from scratch. Over and over again. (Any writing book will tell you this is the WORST THING TO DO. I'll reinforce it here: don't do that.) Every time I'd get halfway through the script, I'd panic. I don't know what Bladezz is doing here, I don't think the storyline makes sense. I'll have Codex get the job instead. But that breaks my whole outline. What do I do now? I don't have any ideas! Commence three days of sobbing. After a while, I was too paralyzed to decide anything at all. I woke up every single morning filled with dread, knowing I was going to have to sit down at my laptop and fail again. It's hard to understand how someone can get so incredibly depressed about the act of typing letters together, but I did it! That Stay Puft Marshmallow of Doom hovered over me for months. I destroyed a keyboard with my tears once. No joke: the left set of keys just stopped working. Okay, it was a combo of snot and tears and some Doritos dust, but same difference. Anxiety bled over into every aspect of my life (it wouldn't be the last time; hello, last Thursday!), and I had to be coaxed through the process by gentle and understanding friends. Eventually, I got a version of the script done, and others around me helped me make it better. It wasn't pretty, it wasn't the best season, but we got through. And the year after, I wrote our fifth and BEST season in just ten days on vacation in Hawaii. So... that turned out better. (My inner muse loves them mai tais!) Fast-forward three years, that same "You can't do it!" spirit returned with a vengeance. Hey, are you feeling happy or confident? Let's fix that! It was spring of 2012, in the middle of the Geek & Sundry launch, and amongst THAT storm of learning-curve ridiculousness, Kim and I were locked in months-long negotiations with The Guild cast to return the next season. I couldn't start writing the script with the possibility I would have to eliminate one of the main characters if one decided not to return. That put me, even before lifting my pen, into a state of panic. "What do you mean we need to draft another version of the contract?" "One of the cast's managers has a comment about the overtime provision." "That will take another two weeks! Cancel the season, I don't want to write it." "Felicia, calm down." "I can't calm down! I have a script I haven't started that I need to finish! Give them whatever they want; I'll pay it out of my own pocket! Oh God, heart attack." This attractive shrill tone in type has NOTHING on my attractive shrill tone in person. But I'd never learned how to deal with problems any differently. I grew up ruled by constant anxiety, and when my fears proved a tiny bit possible, even just a hint, I panicked and lashed out at myself and everyone around me. All in all, a real treat to work with! Many times, people in my life, including Kim and my Guild director Sean Becker, who headed most of the show after season one, tried to get me to enjoy the process of making the show, but underneath I couldn't let go of the idea that my dysfunctional anxiety was the REASON for our success. Like broody writers and their penchant for hard drinking. The idea that we could succeed without my obsessive problem-anticipating skills never sunk in. (To be super honest, I think I was just too proud to admit I had a problem. Denial is strong with this one.) After two months of freaking out and bashing my head against the wall and pulling the plug on the season many times over, I finally found a theme in one of the guest characters I had created, Floyd Petrowski, a superstar game designer, who inspired me to write.
You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost)	Felicia Day	[ "comedy" ]	[ "biography", "gaming", "humor", "video games", "Almost" ]	FLOYD	When I first started doing this, there were no stakes, no pressure. I did it because I loved escaping and creating things. Then we got successful and people loved us. But now... it seems like they're tired of what I do. And I can't think up anything different enough for them to like me anymore. Total failure-ville. (DOESN'T SOUND PERSONAL AT ALL, RIGHT?!) In the end, my character Codex helps him deal with his own anxiety and confronts his internet critics to remove what's blocking him in order to be able to create. Too bad I couldn't figure out how to write her into my own life, too. Bit by bit, I stole enough time over the summer to write the script. But it wasn't fun. Instead of living the last creative days of my show with joy, they were filled with desperation. Because underneath it all, I knew the end was coming. I infused anxiety into every scene, like when I was hard-core into knitting and promised everyone I met I'd make them a scarf, even if I didn't like them. So I'd sit at home, knitting resentment and frustration into each row. "Why did I tell that random girlfriend of a colleague I'd make her a scarf out of CASHMERE?! I don't even know her last name!! Knit, hate, knit, hate, knit, hate!" As we shot and edited the show, every episode we completed felt like a nail in the coffin of my career. The closer we got to completion, the larger the gaping mental chasm of "Who is Felicia Day after The Guild ends?" grew. Paranoid thoughts plagued me day and night. I'll never make anything this good again. Existence, what's up with that again? I'd better breed and make babies, because I'm getting old and my uterus is drying up like the Sahara. It didn't make me fun to be around or work with. I needed to take a long break to find myself again, but with Geek & Sundry going a thousand miles per hour, I couldn't make the train stop even for a second. I was trained to get an A in life from everyone, so I never learned how to take care of myself even if I had a right to. "I'm recovering from an operation, but yes, I can appear in your web series for free! Please like me!" The pressure just got more and more intense, from myself and from the world. And in the spring of 2013, a few months after The Guild finished, when I was restructuring the company and still working eighteen hours a day nonstop, my problems got serious. Stress started killing me. Literally. I developed severe panic attacks in the middle of the night. At 4:30 a.m. on the dot, I'd wake up with my heart pounding in my chest, like someone was standing over me with a butcher knife, trying to kill me in my sleep. (There was never anyone there, FYI.) I'd lie there panicking about the show's end, my business, internet comments, yelling at people in my head until I fretted myself to sleep again. Every night for months. During the day, I became frantic to find a way to validate myself again. I started five different new projects, then abandoned them just as quickly because I couldn't get them done immediately to show people and get external praise. I became more and more desperate to make Geek & Sundry a bigger success. This put pressure on everyone around me in the company, especially since I started planning ridiculously far ahead, alert to every random disaster scenario possible. "Do we have a backup system in place in triplicate for our videos? What's going to happen when the big earthquake hits in 2048? Will we have master copies of our web shows in storage?! Commence emergency protocol, go go go!!" My fear of the future became paralyzing. It strained my relationship with Kim, my business partner of six years and probably contributed to her leaving our company, one of my biggest regrets. That ended one of the most wonderful, artistically rewarding relationships of my life. Keep reading, it gets worse! My moods were reliable—in that they were consistently, ABSOLUTELY INSANE. They'd roller coaster so far and fast day to day, hour to hour <happy SAD motivated DEPRESSED angry MANIC!!!>. My warped and anxious state of mind spiraled tighter and tighter, compressing to the point where I lost my memory. Completely, like a character with amnesia in a pulp detective novel. Romantic? Not so much. I literally couldn't remember things from my childhood, people's names, even simple things like, "What's the name of the redhead actor in Harry Potter?" Things I KNEW that I knew! (Rupert Grint, sorry, pal. I'll never forget you again.) The sheer act of thinking felt like sloughing through thick molasses. I couldn't trust my own mind anymore, which was the scariest thing I've ever experienced. Once, I stared at a plate of food for fifteen minutes, unable to figure out if I liked green beans or not. I honestly couldn't remember. To be unsure of what you like, what you feel, who you are? Believe me, it's utterly terrifying. During all of this I continued to appear at conventions and conferences around the world, making speeches and doing panels and signing autographs. Which you'd think would make me feel better. People enjoying my work seems like a nice ego boost? Nope, I dodged those bullets of hope like a pessimist pro! The appearances actually made all my impostor feelings even worse. I would sob before going out to meet people because I felt like such a fraud. I didn't deserve their compliments. Why do they want to talk about my work? It's all in the past. Months old. Can't they see what a worthless piece of crap I am now? In my warped state of mind, I had nothing new to offer my fans and I probably wouldn't ever again. I deserved to be hated, not loved. These were the worst days of my life. In retrospect, crappy chemicals in my brain were working overtime, driving me to destroy myself, like that thing that makes lemmings throw themselves over a cliff. (That's actually folklore based on a Disney documentary where the filmmakers in the 1960s flung lemmings over the edge of the cliff for their movie. Horrible. But the video game was awesome, amiright?) I tried superficial things to control my world, like losing weight, but that just left me gaunt and freezing all the time. I'd lie in bed and feel my bones, aware of how much closer my skeleton was to the sheets. It felt... good. In a twisted and perverse and self-destructive way. If I couldn't control my life, I could control THIS, however bad it was for me in the end. Luckily, I forced myself out of that phase, because internet commenters started typing beneath my videos, "Felicia has old face now." Thanks, trolls. You did something good for once! I developed an irrational hatred toward anything around me that was familiar. My bedroom curtains, the collar my dog wore, my car seats. (I suddenly HATED tan. Or did I?) I felt nauseated and trapped by every single object and person around me. If I wake up one more day and see that Princess Bride poster on my wall, I'm gonna take a sledgehammer to it. It's trapping me here. I'm going to die looking at it. STOP OPPRESSING ME, POSTER! From people close to me, to the way my desk was organized, every detail represented being frozen in a situation I couldn't escape: my life. At the lowest point (among some champion lows, I might add), I started fantasizing about deleting my Twitter account and erasing myself from the internet. It escalated to constant daydreams about disappearing entirely. Meaning... dying. My musings revolved around scenarios of how I could end myself. I don't think I ever got to the point where I was serious about going through with my plans, but I was obsessed with thinking about them. I learned later that there's a term for this: "suicidal ideation." I wonder how people would react to me doing a backflip off a cliff during this photo shoot? Or walking out into Comic-Con traffic? Or electrocuting myself with a gaming console in a French claw-foot bathtub? That would make a cool crime scene photo. Would anyone vlog about it? And at that point, when things got THAT weird in my head... ...I still didn't get help. [ Heal It Up, Woman. ] After a summer of mental problems in 2013, I got physically sick for two months straight. And my boyfriend finally muscled me into doing something about it. "You have to see a doctor." "I'm fine." "You can't sleep. You walk around in a haze, and you cough all the time. I think you might be turning into a zombie." "I'm FINE." "You look super tired in your videos lately. Eye bags and stuff." LONG MINUTE of silence. "Calling someone right now." It's true, it had been a year since I felt energetic, healthy, or normal. Depression can do that, but... could there be something else? Guess what I discovered when I finally made a doctor's appointment after procrastination for another few months? There were actual REASONS I was sick. And some of them affected my brain area. Experts can know stuff sometimes! I discovered that I had an extremely severe thyroid problem that was causing a lot of my depression and lack of energy and was probably the reason my hair had fallen out in chunks over the summer. (Led to a snappy-ass haircut, though!) I also discovered huge awful fibroids in my lady parts that were gunking up the works and had to be removed, and BEST PART, at the end of 2013, as a Christmas present of sorts, I discovered that my acid reflux had gotten so bad because of stress that I'd developed a thing called Barrett's esophagus. (It's usually a condition only old dudes in their fifties get.) The lining of my stomach was creeping up my throat and converting all the good tissue to bad tissue, and because of this problem, I was a thousand times more likely to get esophageal cancer than the rest of the population at large, which... WAIT. WHAT THE FUCK?! And THAT is when I decided to get control of my life back. Because for some reason, I didn't merit it worthy enough to take extreme action when my mind got sick. But my body? Emergency timez! Imagine saying to someone, "I have a kidney problem, and I'm having a lot of bad days lately." Nothing but sympathy, right? "What's wrong?" "My mom had that!" "Text me a pic of the ultrasound!" Then pretend to say, "I have severe depression and anxiety, and I'm having a lot of bad days lately." They just look at you like you're broken, right? Unfixable. Inherently flawed. Maybe not someone they want to hang around as much? Yeah, society sucks. My mental problems made me feel ashamed. I felt like I had to hide them until I could "work through it" on my own. Which I never did, because I didn't know how. And I didn't feel brave enough to make fixing my mind a priority because I didn't think anyone would understand. Having an increased chance for cancer, though? I'm too neurotic NOT to be a hypochondriac. So damn, did I get ruthless! I said "NO!" to everything. A very good friend of mine told me once, "Of everyone I know, you need to build a bubble around yourself." Well, I took steps to inflate that bubble. Anything that gave me the remotest iota of stress, I dumped. I set extreme parameters around my company. "I'll be working from home now. I'm only coming into the Geek & Sundry office once a week, and if I don't feel like doing that, I won't." "How long?" "However long I need." Once you tell people exactly what you will and won't do, it's amazing how they'll adjust. Or they won't. And then an opportunity or relationship goes away. And that's okay. Once I got my body on the right track, slowly but surely healing, day by day, I started working to repair my mind. It was not easy, because everything felt shattered into a thousand-piece puzzle. But I finally sat down and tried to put those pieces back together, one by one. I started with months of self-involved and semi-crazed journaling. I filled five notebooks with every insecurity and rage and sadness I could think of. I wrote down everything I felt, including terrible things about people I loved, in order to move through and get to the TRUTH of what I couldn't see through my fogged state of mind. And I hate to say it, but the more ruthless I got, the better I felt. "I hate X's face! I've hated him for years!" Working through my initial reaction always got me to understand what was really going on. "Okay, I don't really hate him. I really feel upset about that one time he forgot to invite me to his birthday party. I mean, everyone we knew was posting so many fun Instagram pictures, and I pressed a heart on all of them even though the whole time I was curled up in my bed sobbing!" Also, deeper and less funny stuff than that. I dug and dug and kept digging. All that introspection helped me get perspective and realize, This thing I'm feeling, it might NOT be the TRUTH... There's a great Eleanor Roosevelt quote, "No one can make you feel inferior without your consent." Well, I discovered that, even though the feeling had ruled me my entire life, no one could make me be anxious without my consent. It was an amazing realization. And yes, I did seek professional mental help. But avoidant habits die hard. So instead of going directly to a certified specialist, first I decided to try the softball approach and hired a "creativity life coach." Boy, did this woman embrace the clichés of her profession hard. She wore a lot of tie-dye. I had to carry crystals to "ward off the negative spirits." Just entering her office every week gave my sinus cavities aromatherapy seizures. Oh, and she loved the hypnosis. "You are a tree. You are the trunk. You have to cut off the branches that are draining you and concentrate on that part before you can reach outside yourself again. Repeat after me, I am a trunk." "I feel stupid, but I am a trunk. I am a trunk." Talking to a real objective human who was a captive audience (since I was paying her) was a good first step. But when she wanted to move on to some strange rebirth regression therapy with screaming and stuff, it occurred to me that she wasn't accredited and could legally blog about how weird I was later. So FINALLY I moved on and got my very own certified psychologist. With a lying-down couch and everything! Showing up each week and having someone to complain to without the fear of someone tweeting about it was spectacular. I would recommend ANYONE try it. We're all a garbage dump of dysfunction, but if you get in there and churn the problems, they turn to mulch faster so new things can grow out of them. (I have no idea how to mulch, so I hope that analogy is accurate.) Even with all those efforts, recovery was slow. A few months in, I was ready to give myself an Olympic gold medal for minuscule things. Like mustering the effort to refill an empty toilet paper roll. Look at you taking initiative. Go, girl! But after a while, and I mean MONTHS of learning how to be a real human and attending several new-wave '80s concerts (hearing "The Safety Dance" in person can be incredibly healing), the pressure I'd put on myself my whole life... lightened. Eventually, I emerged from my own private Hades. And I used the time to re-form my brain to be less anxious, live in the present, and not panic about the future or regret the past. (As much as I could, having installed so much messed-up hard-wiring before.) I started getting creative ideas for the company again. I got motivated to throw out my old stretched-out bras that hung open at the top like a pocket. During that time of self-care, I became a different person. But it was fine. Everyone adjusted to the "new me," including me. Eleven months later, during the summer of 2014, I was eating a burrito in my car before a Geek & Sundry meeting I was super excited about. I thought about all the people in my life who'd helped me through the horrible year and a half before, and realized, Wow, it must have been really hard on my boyfriend/business partner/friends for me to be so unhappy for so long. And I started crying. Because it felt like I had finally recovered enough to be able to think about other people again. (There was also a Mumford & Sons song playing at the time. Banjo + Black Beans = Waterworks.) Yeah, yeah, success is a ladder, a marathon instead of a sprint and all that crap. Everyone can TELL you stuff like that, but you really have to understand advice in relation to YOURSELF, or it's all just nice intellectual theory. Weathering the rough times requires a lot of self-confidence outside the things you can't control, like career and what other people think of you. You need to be able to feel proud of yourself even if you were living in a tiny hut in the middle of nowhere, taking care of goats. You are unique and good enough JUST AS YOU ARE. As a theoretical goat herder. It was the toughest lesson of my life, learning how to let The Guild go. And how to manage a business bigger than a one-garage web show. Even tougher than the forty-man raids in World of Warcraft. I have many new projects with my company and outside it that I care about now, but none of them will ever be all of me. I learned better than to let that crap happen again. In the end, I'm able to look back without shame or regretful nostalgia, and think, You made something great. And something new will come around. Or not. Either way, do the work you love. And love yourself. That's all you can do in this world in order to be happy.
You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost)	Felicia Day	[ "comedy" ]	[ "biography", "gaming", "humor", "video games", "Almost" ]	Chapter 18	#GamerGate and Meeeeee! That one time when having a vagina and a love of video games was not such a great combo. I have a folder labeled "Hate Folder" that sits in the middle of my desktop. It's where I save screenshots of the worst things people have said to me online. ("Fifty Shades of Felicia!") For some reason, it takes the sting away to herd all the toxic comments into a corner of my hard drive, aggregating the losers I'd like to hunt down in real life and run over with a dump truck. Then back up, and run over again! (Too far?) If it's too disgusting to say to another human being, I guarantee someone has said it to me online. The internet is amazing because it connects us with one another. But it's also horrific because... it connects us with one another. Whether we want the connection or not. The only real-life analogy I can think of is if a random person were allowed to walk into your home, punch you in the face while you're eating your oatmeal, then walk out again with no fear of consequences. After one incident you'd be looking for a new zip code, huh? Here are some fun examples of the human awfulness I've collected over the years. Once someone posts that you're "So ugly I wouldn't have sex with your corpse," that's when you know you've arrived online! And sure, everyone says the best approach to negative comments is "Don't feed the trolls," that ignoring negativity is the best policy. This approach is great in theory, but emotionally, it's HUMANLY IMPOSSIBLE. Biology backs me up. It's proven that our brains give more attention to negative experiences than positive ones. (I read it in a study. Reference: internet.) Every online creator jokes about how you can read a thousand great comments about your work, but it's always a single terrible one that makes you think, They're right. I should be ejected into the vacuum of space. It would be a public service. REASON: One of the brain's main jobs is to alert us to environmental threats. That's probably why I have a "Hate Folder" rather than a "You're Awesome" folder. (Note from inner therapist: start one of those.) Over the years, I thought I'd seen it all. I thought I'd experienced every rotten thing the internet could fling at people. And then #GamerGate happened. A perfect, hateful, digital gumbo that gave the gaming world, and me, a black eye not soon to be healed. I'll summarize the history briefly for anyone out of the loop. From my point of view. Because it's my book. If you illegally downloaded this chapter just to parse and argue with my interpretation of events line by line (and I know it will happen, yay!), well, you're probably the kind of person I'm not very nice to in this section anyway. Hello! Not a pleasure to meet you! The whole #GamerGate thing started in August 2014, with a guy getting revenge over a really bad breakup by publishing every excruciatingly and maniacally specific detail online. I found out about it early on, after seeing a bunch of gamers I follow on Twitter talking about "that Zoe post." Oooh, gossip? I'm at home on a Friday night wearing sweats and eating cheddar popcorn as usual. Juicy! I clicked over to read a long, rambling blog entry, scrolled down page after page to see IMs, emails, and other private information a guy had collected on his ex-girlfriend and published for the world to rummage through. Evidence of her cheating on him, peppered with implications of sexual favors traded for reviews of the game Depression Quest that she had designed (accusations that were later disproven. Repeat: disproven). It was creepy. I remember being horrified. Then judging her a little. Then feeling bad about it. And then thinking, What woman would ever date this creep again?! Usually controversy, even this terrible, disappears pretty fast on the internet. The people whose hobby it is to hate things move on to rip apart a new game or make fun of a celebrity's vacation cellulite. But this situation started, strangely, to gather more and more steam. More hatred and, most frightening: a strange sense of justice on the part of the attackers. I think the same viral effect that leads people to share a crazy Korean music video a billion times is the same kind of phenomenon that helped give rise to #GamerGate. You can FEEL the wave of emotion online when something is about to go viral, good or bad. A scientist I met once mathematically compared internet behavior to swarm behavior seen in starlings or locusts. Well, that weekend, the hate locusts started swarming. Hackers leaked Zoe's personal information. She received rape and death threats and was forced from her home. Videos of her nude photos were spread and Photoshopped across the internet to shame her, much to the amusement of the trolls. People even tracked down her father to call him and tell him what a "whore your daughter is." (I mean, how sad do you have to be as a human to think THAT was a good use of your afternoon?) As someone who has been an advocate in gaming for many years, especially as a woman, I watched all this happen from the sidelines and thought, This is disgusting! I wanted to step up and speak up against the bullying... but I didn't. Why? Because I was afraid. On a much smaller scale, I'd been on the receiving end of a slice of this hate myself. And I didn't want to relive any part of it. The roots of both incidents lie in 4chan, an anonymous website generally associated with hate speech and cartoon porn addiction, and the starting point for the attacks on Zoe Quinn. Basically, it's the watercooler for some of the worst of the internet. In 2012, after all my years on the web, I thought I'd developed some pretty tough troll armor until some people on 4chan decided to attack me en masse for a music video I did for my weekly Geek & Sundry web show, The Flog. My friend Jason Miller is a country music artist, and at the time I thought it would be fun to combine his style with my love of gaming and see what happened. Okay, SURE, nature probably didn't want those two things mashed together EVER, but that was the point of the show: to throw things against the wall and see if they stuck. I wanted to sing and be creative and hoped the audience would enjoy the experience as much as I did! Oh, you naïve, dumb-ass girl. We spent a few hundred dollars to make the video, borrowed someone's house, and shot in the desert without a fire permit. We didn't light any matches, so it was cool. The end result was cute. Not mind-blowing, but the song was well produced, and I got to dress up as Tomb Raider character Lara Croft, which was a bucket list item. (And proved to me that big boobs DO look better in tank tops. I stuffed HARD.) I uploaded it like any other video, with the attitude, It's free to watch! Don't dig it? No harm, no foul, right? Er... not so much. Contempt for women who call themselves "Gamer Girls" has existed for a while online. In fact, I'd been careful to avoid the label over the years for that very reason. But I decided to title the video "Gamer Girl, Country Boy" anyway. And that gave the people who hated me, and who hated the very concept of women having a voice in gaming, a reason to attack. And their feedback was awesome! The video was shared on a 4chan forum and a tidal wave of bile hit the video. Hundreds and hundreds of comments, the depravity of which even jaded little me had never seen. I was talentless. I was fake and hideous and ugly. (I'll admit I'd made a bright yellow eye shadow choice that I'll rue until the day I'm dead.) I was denigrated on every personal level, my work dismissed as the desperate and pathetic attempts of an "attention whore." According to the comments, I got where I was by manipulating geeks with my looks, and at the same time, I was repulsively ugly and hard to masturbate to. As a crowning achievement, I was deemed responsible for the "downfall of gaming." A multibillion-dollar industry destroyed by little ol' me? Aw, shucks! Anyone who defended me online was called a "white knight neck-beard," a term that describes a guy who defends a girl online solely in order to get laid. A lot of the time, it works. And if you were a woman defending me, pish, you weren't even worth addressing. Hateful, bullying comments flooded the supportive community I was so proud of creating. Even my most hard-core fans were left reeling. I certainly was. After about ten thousand misogynistic and a ton of FACTUALLY INACCURATE comments (trash me if you will, but do a little research first), they finally got to me. I'd been making videos for five years at that point. I've seen animated GIFs of myself doing... you don't wanna know. Some involving very forward dolphins. The comments spread like a fungus across my self-confidence. It devastated me to see people dismiss my career because of one four-minute video. I felt ashamed for creating it and everything else I'd ever made. I thought, Is this what people have been thinking for years? How stupid was I to think I could sing? I don't want to be SEEN ever again. For months I stopped putting my heart into the things I made. It was one of the reasons I couldn't write the last Guild season without feeling crippling self-doubt on every page. Sad but true, I did what I have told so many people over and over not to do: I let the trolls get to me. I didn't realize at the time how much that incident affected me, but I stepped away from gaming in a lot of subtle ways. I still considered myself part of the world, but I turned down a ton of jobs and event appearances. And those changes in my behavior all led me to stifle myself when I felt the urge to speak up about #GamerGate. The timing was particularly bad, personally, because a few weeks into the uproar, at the end of August 2014, the infamous "Celebrity Hacking Scandal" happened, where dozens of prominent actresses and performers had private nude pictures stolen and exposed to the world. (Wow, jerks were really busy that fall ruining lives online! Also: the stolen pictures were first posted on 4chan. So much great stuff originates there, huh?) As someone nowhere NEAR the victims on the celebrity-importance ladder, imagine my surprise when I was contacted by several hackers via my HACKED phone number warning me that I was a future target. My name was on a request list for compromising photos, and people were supposedly offering big dollars to back it up. I counted myself lucky that I had fans in the hacker world. (How cool, right?) But being hunted for boobies? Slightly terrifying. So, while Zoe and other people were being ripped apart online, I was holding my tongue, trying to erase anything from my online accounts that I didn't want made public for the world to see. Any picture, Is that too much side boob? I'll erase it. Any email, OMG why would I think that was funny?! Delete. I spent a week ripping out pieces of my digital life that I didn't want people poking around. I'm sure I missed a lot. When you examine your underwear close enough, EVERYTHING looks a little bit suspect. I knew sharing my thoughts about the situation would burn me. So I stayed out. And with other prominent people, men and women, jumping in to take a stand against the bullying and hatred, I honestly thought the whole thing would go away soon. I think everyone sane in the gaming world did. But it didn't. It got worse. Because the issue somehow morphed from attacking a single woman over a messed-up revenge post to a quasi-conservative movement striving for "ethics in game journalism." A large segment of the newly anointed "#GamerGate movement" decided that as a result of "the Zoe post" there was corruption running rampant in the game journalism world. And THEY were the people to fix it. They focused a large amount of their wrath on people trying to add dialogue about feminism and diversity in gaming, condemning them as "Social Justice Warriors." (That label was always so weird to me, because how is that an insult? "Social Justice Warrior" actually sounds pretty badass.) It turned into a mob. One that was disjointed, with lots of differing agendas, but all surfing the wave of vengeful emotion together. Like the French Revolution over that cake thing. The attacks grew way beyond Zoe. Friends in the indie games industry who stepped up to defend her started receiving the same treatment. Verbally harassed. Doxxed (where someone hacks personal information like phone number, address, credit cards, social security number and posts it online for the whole world to see and misuse, super awesome experience). At the same time, a prominent vlogger named Anita Sarkeesian released an installment of her video series examining feminist issues in gaming. Hatred of her in a certain demographic of the internet, I'm pretty sure a one-to-one with the worst of the attackers, only fed the "You're trying to ruin my gaming!" frenzy. More and more people in gaming who started speaking up, especially women, were mobbed for it. A journalist named Jenn Frank wrote a piece about the attacks on Zoe and was so badly swarmed with hate that she decided to quit the industry. I dipped my toe in the water once and sent one subtle @ tweet to Jenn in support and received so many hateful comments I had to log offline for two days. Great "ethical" achievements there, guys! Ironically, the #GamerGate movement never focused on some of the big game companies who actually ARE unethical, bribing vloggers and censoring bad reviews on their products. The movement tended to target smaller journalists and independent gaming sites. Mostly the ones who were criticizing THEM. It was mind-boggling, but at the same time, they did create the biggest movement in gaming history. And it seemed like it would never stop growing. At the end of October, I flew to Vancouver to work on the TV show Supernatural. It was more than two months after the initial blog post (a decade in real-life time), and the gaming world was STILL drowning in #GamerGate. I was walking down the street on one of my days off and saw two gamer guys walking toward me in classic, black crew-neck gaming T-shirts. One Call of Duty, the other Halo. Now, in the past, whenever I saw another gamer in public, I would feel heartened, because we belonged no matter if we stopped to chat or not. I would go out of my way to exchange a knowing glance, a supportive smile signaling, Yeah, dude. It's cool that you game. I do, too! We were automatically compatriots in our love for something we both knew was awesome. But as those two gamers walked toward me, for the first time in my life I didn't have the impulse to say hello. Or smile. For some reason as I approached the corner... I crossed the street instead. I sat down a few blocks later, because I couldn't understand what I'd just done. Then I realized that because of the recent situation with #GamerGate, subconsciously I no longer assumed that a random gamer and I would be on the same page, or would connect just because of our love of gaming. There was a wedge in my world where there had been none before. And for the first time in months... I got angry. I WANTED TO WRITE SOME SHIT DOWN, SON! I pounded five espresso shots, ran back to my hotel room, and wrote a Tumblr post about my experience titled, "Crossing the Street." And I tried to make it different from the tone of other writing on the subject. I tried to frame my argument in an empathetic way. Not condemn, but make people understand what I was feeling. How I was upset and ashamed at my impulse to avoid those anonymous gamers. How sad I was that the actions of #GamerGate had created that feeling in me, to separate myself from people whom I would have assumed were comrades before. And how the whole situation was creating the outside impression of a culture driven by misogyny and hatred, which I KNEW wasn't true. I appealed to our mutual love of gaming, on both sides, to bring us back together, for the sake of what we all loved. (The essay was eloquent, promise. Legal drugs fuel good words!) I emphasized my fear of speaking out, because of the possibility that someone would doxx me. I had taken out too many restraining orders against stalkers to not be concerned about my home address leaking. I thought sharing that fear would be the "Relatable!" part to both sides. I mean, anyone would be afraid if it was easy for a whackadoodle to pull up into their driveway when they got angry at one of your tweets, right? "I'm the owner of that taco place you just dissed. WATCH OUT, I'M ON YOUR DOORSTEP, BITCH!" I posted my essay on Tumblr minutes before I had to hop in the car to go to the movie studio that night, and as I hit Send, I felt dizzy with hubris. I'm not brave in general—mousey doesn't just describe my real hair color—but speaking out felt RIGHT. It was something that I should have done weeks before. By overcoming my fear, I had finally redeemed myself TO myself. No matter if anyone paid attention or not. I got in the car to be driven to set for work (they do that on TV shows, so fancy). Twenty minutes later I got a call. I looked at the caller ID. "Wil Wheaton." That was weird. We're super-close friends, we've acted together, we produce a web show together, but it was odd he was calling me. Email/text/IM/Twitter/Snapchat? Yes. Primitive old-school telephoning? Nope. "Hello?" "Dude, you need to disable comments on your Tumblr post." He sounded panicked. "What?" "Several people have posted your home address in the comments. You need to disable comments right now." "Oh my God." I was silent for a second. Then I learned that "bathed in horror" is an actual feeling, not a colorful writing metaphor. "But... I... don't know... I don't know my password." I had just changed everything to forty-character twelve-step identification the week before because of the celebrity hacking thing, and I hadn't reentered any of my passwords onto my phone yet. It was one of those "That sucks!" coincidences. "Do you want me to reset it for you? I'm not home but I can find some Wi-Fi." "No... then you'd have to get in my email, and I don't know that password, either. Wait, maybe I can do it on my phone. I'll call you back." I hung up and tried to load the Tumblr app, but discovered the interface was not easy to navigate when your hands are trembling in an aggressive way. The driver, a very kind older guy, offered to pull the car over. "No... no, I don't want to be... late for work." My voice was as unsteady as my hands as I fumbled with the phone. Within a few minutes I got my password reset. Only to discover that I couldn't disable the comments plug-in from my phone. Crap. At that point I started hyperventilating. All I could picture was awful people storming my house while I was out of town and killing my dog. Totally irrational, I know. But he was very old and friendly and the perfect target for malicious intent. I knew the longer my address was up, the more it would be shared and stored and available to anyone forever, bad or good. In my heart, I knew it was too late to prevent that anyway. I finally contacted a friend who disabled the comments on the post. (Which I will never turn on again, forever and ever and ever, yay!) There were more than a thousand comments in the thread at that point, a lot of them vile and antagonistic and awful, exactly what you WOULDN'T expect as a reaction to an essay with the theme, Let's hold hands and get through this, guys! But such was the level of vitriol at the time. Oh, and there were also four separate people who posted my address with malicious intent. A few were business addresses and a few were definitely NOT. In the scene we filmed that night, my character, Charlie, murdered someone on-screen. The experience was more than a little cathartic. I'll leave the analysis of why #GamerGate happened, what drove it, and why it lasted as long as it did to someone's kick-ass graduate thesis. (Hope you get an A!) But hostility to outside criticism has long been a weirdly accepted part of gaming culture. You don't generally see hard-core knitters reply to someone who says, "Knitting is cool, but the needles could be made from more environmentally sustainable wood," with "Oh no you don't, idiot. My knitting is perfect the way it is, don't you DARE try to change it. You're obviously a fake. What's the diameter of that yarn? Don't know? Go die in a fire!" The mainstream media was already publishing "What the hell is going on in the nerd world?" articles about #GamerGate and quickly picked up on my story. "Felicia Day's Fears Come True" became the headline of the week, mostly emphasizing the violation of my personal information, because, you know, that was the sexy part. The Guardian, Time, the Washington Post—even the New York Times—all reported on my doxxing. Most of the gaming and online community showed an amazing amount of support. But, to me, the reaction of #GamerGate itself was the most fascinating. In the initial comments section of my Tumblr post, which I disabled, there are hundreds of condescending, hateful comments attacking me as a woman, labeling me a weakling and a fake gamer. One of the top discussion points in #GamerGate forums was about how I "wasn't really doxxed." Some claimed I did it myself for publicity (?!) or qualified it as inconsequential because the information wasn't hard enough to obtain. Just to clear the record, it is true to say I wasn't doxxed in the exact way that the other victims of #GamerGate were. I was "lucky." Because (and I've never said this publicly, but hell, let's just tell-it-all, baby!) I'd been doxxed by 4chan already, the year before. In 2013, a group on that forum tracked down a ton of personal information on me. They shared all that and pictures of the outside of my house and my license plate amongst themselves. A disturbed fan used that information and showed up at my front door, made his way INTO MY HOUSE, and afterward, proceeded to obsess over me online in an erratic and abusive way to the extent that I was terrified he would show up again and do something violent. So that's why so many haters were able to post my address so quickly a year later. Efficient, huh? The savviest members of #GamerGate saw all the media coverage blowing up over my situation and decided that my doxxing was making them look bad, so they rushed to send me well wishes of support on Twitter. But the support was almost always accompanied with the caveat: "REAL #GamerGate doesn't do stuff like this." This was the part that was the hardest for me to understand. Because whether the people who did the actual act were in the group or not was beside the point. #GamerGate as a movement created an environment for attacks to flourish. Hell, it ORIGINATED with them. A great quote from a video series called Folding Ideas put it best: "The use of fear tactics, even if only by a minority, creates an environment of fear that all members enjoy the privilege of, whether they engage in them or not." This was the very reason I felt afraid to speak up in the first place. And what I feared most? Yeah, it happened. In light of that fact, the qualified apologies felt hollow at best. Especially when, for every nice comment from #GamerGate, I saw dozens of comments like the following. It took six months for me to become comfortable with walking my dog at night (Let's be crazy tonight, Cubby, and not carry mace!), and I will never feel 100 percent safe in my own home again. I have had people sitting in cars outside my window, certified letters sent to my address just to say "I know where you live," and phone calls from strange area codes at all hours of the night. Now that I know how easy it is for anyone with an agenda to track me down, feeling safe is a cute, nostalgic feeling. What frightened me the most about my #GamerGate experience was the possibility that this could be the future of the internet. That the utopia I thought the online world created, where people don't have to be ashamed of what they love and could connect with each other regardless of what they looked like, was really a place where people could steep themselves in their own worldview until they became willfully blind to everyone else's. I guess the internet can be both things. Good and bad. And I have been "lucky" enough to experience the crazy extremes of both. I had to think long and hard about writing this chapter, and I know there's a good chance I will have more of my privacy violated as a result. There will certainly be another flood of online attacks because of it. So after all that, would I speak up again? Absolutely. Because shame is a very good barometer. The very reason I felt guilty about NOT speaking up is WHY I should have spoken up in the first place. I recently got a message from a mother who said, "I asked my fourteen-year-old what #GamerGate was and he said, 'It's because women are trying to ruin video games.'" I was so upset. Unless people are speaking out to counteract that idea, how will that kid ever think differently? Over the years, I've heard many times that The Guild and what I do online got them into gaming and web video. I'm proud to be able to represent something, however small, to some people. Because, in my own experience, sometimes a little representation is all it takes to inspire people to follow a path they never would have considered. As a middle-school-aged kid, I fell in love with the fact that Nora Ephron, a woman, wrote and directed Sleepless in Seattle. It was my absolute favorite movie, and I watched it enough times to destroy the copy I had on VHS. (I don't know how many times that is, but typing that just now made me feel old, like someone in the 1960s waxing nostalgic about their Victrola.) Everything about that movie was amazing. The romance, the miscommunications, the idea that I was destined to have baby-making times with Tom Hanks. And while I watched, time and time again, I had this vague sense of a puppeteer figure behind the scenes. A person who was responsible for building a world I wanted to be a part of SO BADLY. She was unseen, but her hand was in every detail. Emphasis on HER. I cried when Nora Ephron died in 2012, which was bizarre to me at the time. Usually when a celebrity dies I think, Oh, that's sad, then get irritated when their name trends on Twitter (because sometimes they AREN'T dead, and then I feel like a jerk for assuming anyone over forty is ready to swan dive into a crematorium). I never met her in person. I never had a poster of her on my wall or sent letters to her fan club (like I did with Richard Grieco; YES, that happened), but with her death, a little bit of my childhood inspiration disappeared. She had made it possible for me to imagine my own future in the world of film. Her very existence showed me it could be done and allowed me to dream about following the path she laid behind her. Without her work, I doubt it would have ever occurred to me that such a path existed. Now, I certainly am not saying that I consider myself an icon like Nora Ephron or that I should be held up as the world's ultimate example of "GAMER FEMALE!" but the idea of representation is important. And I think the world of gaming needs people from all walks of life to speak up and represent the positive side of what we love. Because, let's be real: gaming's reputation is NOT good in that area right now. Currently, if it were a restaurant, it would get a VERY bad Yelp review. I joined the world of gaming as a little girl. It was where I first discovered my voice and felt accepted. I found a community through the Ultima Dragons that I didn't have anywhere else in my life. During all that time I spent online I was never shamed for my enthusiasms. Never made to feel that I didn't deserve to be heard because of my gender. And I wouldn't be who I am without that community. It's hard for me to imagine how that same fourteen-year-old girl might find a place to belong in the gaming world that exists today, with strong voices pushing her back, harassing her, questioning her authenticity with the unspoken threat: Fit in the way we want you to or get out. I don't know if I could handle that kind of environment. Perhaps I would hide my gender. Or just quit games entirely. But I don't think those choices are acceptable for anyone. So if my speaking up made one person feel like they belong or prevented one person from stifling their own voice, then it was absolutely worth it. Because if you can't be your own weird self on the internet, where can you be? And what would be the point?
You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost)	Felicia Day	[ "comedy" ]	[ "biography", "gaming", "humor", "video games", "Almost" ]	Chapter 19	It's Been Real Let's wrap this up with some peppy "Go, internet!" thoughts! In January of 2014, an executive from YouTube took me and my business partner to lunch to inform us that the company wouldn't be investing in Geek & Sundry or any of the other original content channels anymore. The two-year funding experiment was over. We were on our own. I left the restaurant, got in my car, and drove exactly one block. Then I pulled over and burst into tears. Of joy. No, it wasn't PMS. (Maybe.) It was relief that I could be free to follow my own compass again. Concentrate more on less. And maybe have a digital vacation and log offline for a bit? (Psh, don't get crazy, girl.) I immediately went home and wrote down the top things I'd learned going from naïve actress to inexperienced web series show runner to world-weary start-up lady with Geek & Sundry. I learned everything about creating and businessing the "stab me in the eye" way, but wow, did it feel good to take a moment to realize how much I'd grown over the past five years. And eventually, it led me down the best path I could ever have imagined. In July 2014, I sold my company to Legendary Entertainment. The coolest, nerdiest company in Hollywood. After a lot of meetings, it was clear: HERE was a partner who would be fun to hang out with at Comic-Con. The head of the company, Thomas Tull, isn't a Hollywood dude, he's a MATH GUY. We had a conversation about fluid dynamics and comic books the first time we met and I thought, Wow, this guy is the coolest CEO bigwig I've ever met. I haven't met many, but he's definitely the coolest. Today I work with my company to create and produce shows for the web and television, write things like this book, act in tons of interesting projects, and still tweet and do conventions and stay connected with people in my online community every day. I've carved out the perfect job for myself, and the world has opened up to me in a way that I could never have imagined as a weird homeschooled kid writing in that little pink diary.
You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost)	Felicia Day	[ "comedy" ]	[ "biography", "gaming", "humor", "video games", "Almost" ]	Chapter 20	A few years ago I took a trip to George Lucas's Skywalker Ranch. (One of the employees was a big Guild and Dr. Horrible fan, so we got a private tour. I take advantage of stuff like that, because, uh, why not?) We toured a huge warehouse filled with props and wardrobe pieces from Star Wars and Indiana Jones. I hover-touched the REAL DEATH STAR. Yeah, it was amazing. You can touch me and secondhand hover-touch the real Death Star, too. (Use some hand sanitizer first, please.) At one point I stopped at a shelf with some odd-looking grenade objects, colorful but rough around the edges. "What are these?" "Oh, they're from Star Wars. Part of the power generator inside the shield generator on Endor." I looked closer. "They look... janky. What are they made out of?" "Dixie Cups." "Wait, what? You mean the..." "Yes, the disposable cups. They're spray-painted, see?" My guide lifted up the prop delicately and turned it over for me. Sure enough, I could see that underneath all the paint and decoration was a cup I could pull from a dispenser next to an office water bottle. "Um... what?" "During the filming of Star Wars, Lucas ran out of money, and the studio wouldn't give him more. He invested his own money in the film in exchange for the merchandising rights..." "...and that's why he's a billionaire." "Right. But they still had to cut a lot of corners. Some of the props, even wardrobe pieces like the cuffs on the slave Leia costume, had to be cobbled together any way they could." "By painting Dixie Cups." I stared at the prop in awe. It probably cost half a penny to make, and was a piece of the biggest movie franchise ever created. Definitely the most inspiring object I'd ever seen. Now, I know bringing George Lucas into the mix might be setting the bar a WEE bit high, but the point is that he believed in his vision enough to make it happen NO MATTER WHAT. No one in the movie business wanted to make sci-fi movies at the time. The genre was completely disdained. Lucas believed in himself enough to put in his own money and use whatever resources he had to make his movie happen. And he found out, "Hey, billions of people feel the same way I do about sci-fi movies!" With the help of frickin' Dixie Cups. That same motto "I am determined to create something or express myself, no matter how hard it is, even if my mom is the only one who sees it!" is the embodiment of how I view the web. For the first time, everyone has a chance to have his or her voice heard, or to create a community around something they're passionate about and connect with other people who share that passion. Best of all, it rewards people and ideas that never would have made it through the system and allows the unique and weird to flourish. I love the idea of breaking the system. And the beauty of the internet is that it gives everyone, especially unrepresented voices, the opportunity to do a little breaking. (Perot, I just can't quit you!) It might be extremely dorky to point out, but who you are is singular. It's science. No one else in existence has your point of view or exact genome (identical twins and clones, look for inspiration elsewhere, please). That is why we need people to share and help us understand one another better. And on a bigger level than just taking a selfie. (Not hating on selfies, but a few is enough. You look good from that angle; we get it.) We need the world to hear more opinions, give glimpses into more diverse subcultures. Are you REALLY into dressing your cat in handcrafted, historically authentic outfits? No problem, there are people out there who want to see that! Probably in excruciating detail! I was raised incredibly weird, but one day I accidentally got brave and thought I had a unique point of view about gaming. I decided to jump into web video—a world I knew very little about—to express it. Who knew there was anyone out there who wanted to listen? I believe the next Oprah Winfrey or George Lucas will not come from a local news desk or college film program. He or she will come from the world of the web. Where the bar to entry is low, and where a group of kids can dream up a story and shoot it in their backyards. Regardless of whether someone gave them permission or not. I hope all my copious oversharing encourages someone to stop, drop, and do something that's always scared them. Create something they've always dreamt of. Connect with people they never thought they'd know. Because there's no better time in history to do it. So bust through all the cat GIFs and top-ten linkbait and share something of yourself. If you enrich one other person's life, it will be worth it. If you find one friend, it will be worth it. Plus, the apocalypse may be right around the corner. And then there's that global warming thing happening. So take advantage of this time like it's a 2-for-1 sale, baby! Good talk.
You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost)	Felicia Day	[ "comedy" ]	[ "biography", "gaming", "humor", "video games", "Almost" ]	OXXO	Felicia Thanks, Guys! To my brother, Ryon, who made me laugh while writing when I'd IM him with questions and have conversations like this one: Felicia Day WHAT ARE YOU DOING?! Felicia Day Hey do you remember when we were driving to Florida and Grandma pulled a Taser on Mom and then Mom threatened to leave her on the side of the road?
You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost)	Felicia Day	[ "comedy" ]	[ "biography", "gaming", "humor", "video games", "Almost" ]	Tuesday, January 7, 2014 8:57 PM	Ryon Day yeah I remember that one! ha ha it is to laff that was the trip the dog died on and we weren't there!
You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost)	Felicia Day	[ "comedy" ]	[ "biography", "gaming", "humor", "video games", "Almost" ]	Wednesday, January 8, 2014 9:23 AM	Felicia Day Oh I didn't remember the dog died during that trip! Thanks, good detail!
You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost)	Felicia Day	[ "comedy" ]	[ "biography", "gaming", "humor", "video games", "Almost" ]	Wednesday, January 8, 2014 9:24 AM	That story didn't make it in the book, but reliving our childhoods made us laugh together. For his help in delving into our past dysfunctions, I give the biggest thanks to him. To my aunt Kate, who taught me the joy of pretend. To my dad, because he's always made me feel like a success, no matter what I've done. And who will ALWAYS bug me to keep saving more in my retirement fund. To my boyfriend, who kept me going through a lot of the crap I just threw up on all the previous pages. I'd delete my Twitter account for you, honey. To Kim Evey, who was my companion and inspiration through the best and worst. Without you, this book wouldn't exist. To Wil Wheaton, Sean Becker, Ryan Copple, Maurissa Tancheroen, and the cast of The Guild and Dr. Horrible, all of whom fuel my creativity and inspire me to be a better friend. To Joss Whedon, whom I adore with stars in my eyes, who I want to be a badass for. Who inspires me to keep creating while standing awkwardly near the hummus. To my agent, Erin, and my editor, Lauren, and everyone at Touchstone who believed that people wanted to hear stories from the life of a very weird internet woman. And lastly, to every fan who's linked or tweeted or commented on my work. To every person who ever worked on or volunteered on The Guild. You kept me going. You turned my struggle into a success. You are the only reason I'm here. Love you muchly.
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 1	Federal Agent Lisa Breyer rolled over on the bed in her hotel suite outside Everglades City and thumped a fist on the mattress. If I can't get rid of these nightmares soon, I'm gonna have serious issues. It's been two weeks already. She glanced at the digital clock on the nightstand and groaned. No one should have to lie awake in bed for two hours. After pushing herself up, she paused and turned her head slowly toward the bedroom door, which she'd closed despite being in the hotel suite alone, simply because the air conditioning was triggered by movement. Fortunately for her in the early August heat in the Everglades, she'd moved a fair amount during the last two hours. With a sigh, she whipped off the covers, slipped out of bed, and stepped into the small living room. She went to the desk where her laptop had been plugged in for an overnight charge. Once seated in the desk chair, she turned the device on and wrinkled her nose as it powered up. "Fine. If nightmares from that dark witch's overactive potion insist on keeping me up, I insist on tackling the other half of that trip." The other case was Johnny Walker's fifteen-year-old murder case. Or his daughter's, to be more precise. Which included the drug kingpin the bounty hunter couldn't get out of his mind long enough to focus on only one case at a time. "And now I can't get the bastard out of my mind either. He's back, his drugs are stretching across the country, and—" Lisa uttered a wry, weary chuckle. "Look at me. Talking to myself in the middle of the night and I don't even have two dogs with magical collars as an excuse." Tabling the issue of her full sanity for another time, Agent Breyer signed into her laptop and pulled the Wi-Fi hotspot device she'd received from the Department toward her. Tapping into the dark web just after midnight on a hotel's internet signal wasn't exactly the best choice, even for a federal agent. Fortunately, she didn't have to. After setting up the hotspot and running the virtual personal network to keep her IP address and her system as safe as she knew how from whatever lurked on the dark web, she hopped onto a directory service to start her search. "We found Lemonhead on the dark web the first time. I can't imagine I won't be able to find him again." But twenty minutes of searching for their elusive quarry gleaned only what she'd already seen—a connection between that username and the despicable auction bidding gearing up before the Monsters Ball two and a half months earlier. Beyond that were brief mentions of Lemonhead from years before. The real Lemonhead was murdered by the Red Boar without anyone knowing it and used for his black-market reputation as a "purveyor of magical commodities." Those won't help. It's not the same guy. With a slight frown of concentration, she tried searching for "Red Boar" but that was even less successful. She obtained the same results she'd pulled up on a public Google search in Portland and from sniffing through federal records—or at least the ones she had access to. But Johnny already had everything the Bureau had gathered on the Red Boar in his cabin somewhere with the cases labeled D Walker and Operation Deadroot. "Great." She stood quickly from the desk chair and headed into the suite's kitchen. Only one beer remained from the six-pack she'd bought four days before, and the sight of it sitting there by itself between the leftover salad from dinner that night and the half-empty carton of eggs made her frown. I think I'm starting to understand why Johnny drinks so much. And I should stop. She closed the fridge and went to the sink instead and took a glass from the overhead cabinet to fill it. He's convinced the Red Boar was in the comic shop that night. Off-camera. Vilguard practically gave up that much all on his own. And Dawn tried to threaten the drug-dealers by dropping Johnny's name. The agent paused with the glass of water raised halfway to her lips. "That's why Prentiss shot her. Isn't it? The Red Boar heard a little girl's threat and didn't want to take any chances. Seriously, what are the chances of there being more than one high-level bounty hunter dwarf with a twelve-year-old daughter? Especially fifteen years earlier when the Department was only a decade old?" A door opened in another hotel suite out in the hall, and Lisa glanced at her entrance door. She chuckled at herself. Jumpy much? Stop talking to yourself, Lisa. Someone's bound to think the half-Light Elf agent's finally lost her mind. She took her water to the desk, swallowed half of it, and set the glass down and stared at the laptop screen. The Red Boar wouldn't have ordered that shot if he didn't know who Johnny was. And we all met face-to-face in New York. After typing two new words into the search, she took a deep breath and scrunched her face up. "It's not very likely, but I guess it's worth the attempt." Her finger came down on the Enter key, and her eyes widened as hit after hit pulled up on her screen. "Holy shit." The decision to search the dark web for Johnny Walker had been a whim based on nothing but a hunch she and the bounty hunter now shared. If she hadn't been so exhausted from all the hours of lost sleep over the last two weeks, she probably would have written the idea off as a desperate attempt to be more useful or more productive. Why the hell would Johnny Walker have anything on him floating around on the dark web? Lisa laughed and scrolled through the search hits. "Okay. I've now found one good thing to say about the nightmares. Jesus." There were five pages of search results, all with Johnny's name in the title. Most of them were snippets of articles or posts painting the bounty hunter in a seriously unflattering light. And they were very old. Bounty Hunter Had It Coming. Retirement, or Did He Kill Himself? Guess Who's Throwing in the Towel. Best Bounty Hunter My Ass. Look at This. Lisa stopped on the last one and saw a blurry image of Johnny, his finger smudging the upper-righthand corner of the frame as he scowled at whoever snagged the shot. Red-rimmed eyes, unwashed hair, and either crumbled food or lint caught in his beard created an unflattering picture. The post was dated December 2005. She grimaced. Assholes. Leave it to criminals to kick a guy while he's down and mourning the murder of his daughter. Beneath the post title was a snippet of the post itself: …shoved in our faces for years that the asshole dwarf bagging and tagging alleged criminals and calling it all in good fun was 'one of the best damn bounty hunters in the business.' Well, guess what? Johnny Walker's done. You'd think the best would have been able to save his daughter from catching a bullet in the back of the head. You'd think he'd take down the guy who put that bullet there in the first place. But no. We all need to take a good, long look at this dwarf right here and ask ourselves why any of us give a fuck about what he does next. Because it looks to me like Johnny Walker's all washed up. He looks like he's about to… The preview ended there, and she clicked on the title link to keep reading. A new webpage loaded, then a popup box appeared in the center of her screen and prompted her for a password or a second option to create an account. Ungovernedunderground.onion, huh? She went back to scroll through the search results and found that many of the same flavor of Johnny Walker posts and articles were from the same site. Yeah, I won't try to get a password to join a Shit on Johnny Walker forum, even if it isn't full of criminals. She continued to scroll and stopped when she saw an image of the dwarf in his usual all-black and dark sunglasses, one thumb stuck through his belt loop and the other hand raised to flip the middle finger at the camera. It was a surprisingly professional-looking shot, edited with impressive attention to lighting and detail. It took Lisa a few seconds to realize the photo was the thumbnail cover for a TV show. "What the fuck?" She leaned back quickly in the chair, took another sip of water, and closed her eyes. I'm hallucinating—not enough sleep. That's it. But when she opened her eyes again and peered at the image, nothing had changed. "Dwarf the Bounty Hunter Season 7? Are you shitting me right now?" She laughed again and slapped the desk. "That's what everyone was talking about. Oh. My. God." The title of the forum made the hilarity of it even that much more cringe-worthy—Dwarf the Bounty Hunter: The Official Site—Your One-Stop Shop for All Things Johnny Walker, Bounty Hunting, and the Best Oriceran-Hosted Show on Earth. "No way." Lisa grimaced and turned her head slightly away from her laptop. He would kill me if he knew I'd found this. She returned her focus to her screen and clicked on the site. The forum was one of those loud, busy websites with ads littering the sides and tops in every color imaginable—most of them ads for boxed sets of the show's seven seasons, clothes and sunglasses that mirrored Johnny's, vacation packages to Florida and specifically the Everglades, and one ad running in multiple places boasted a black leather jacket the private seller insisted was left behind during one of the dwarf's more intense fights and ensuing getaways. Five thousand dollars for a so-called authentic Johnny Walker jacket. What the hell is wrong with these people? Trying to navigate the site's multiple tabs and various forums for at least twelve different aspects of the show—not including each episode of all seven years—took more brainpower and focus than she had at twelve-thirty in the morning. She clicked onto the Fansite Forum tab instead and scrolled through the comments. Wow. Fifteen years later and people are still picking this apart like they just binge-watched it on Netflix. The topic threads were a random mash of show-related drivel. S3 Episode 4: Bone to Pick. This is the best episode of the entire season. Fight me. The real reason behind Johnny Walker's unexplained trip to Las Vegas in Season 5. Long-time fan since childhood looking for a way to become a bounty hunter. Anyone have any tips? She had to look away from her laptop for a moment to give her eyes a rest. "There's so much to sort through." After a deep breath, she decided she might as well start at the top and browse methodically. The first three threads were less related to the show and more about "how profoundly Johnny Walker played a role-model role in his viewers' lives." The others were simply more hearsay, personal opinion, and a few arguments over the "deeper meanings" behind Johnny Walker phrases like, "Watch me," and "If it ain't the truth, it ain't worth tellin'." One fan had uploaded several pictures of herself with a badly photoshopped Johnny Walker at the beach with her, at the shopping mall, and lying naked in bed. "Oh, hell no." Lisa clicked out and shook her head. "How is this such a huge deal and I've never heard about it?" A flashing ad on the right side of her screen screamed at her in bright neon. Click Here for Episode Recaps and Discussions. She laughed, too tired to keep scrolling through thread after thread from people who wrote these posts like they'd known Johnny all their lives. It looks like I'm getting a pop-culture review of Johnny Walker's career before retirement. When she clicked on the ad, it took her to a different page that didn't have its own tab on the main menu but was far more organized. The site broke discussion topics down by season and then by episode, and she opened the first review of Season 1, Episode 1: Who is Johnny Walker? The discussion started intelligently enough, then very quickly took a turn toward fans bashing each other for differing opinions. Of course, a comment written in all-caps caught her attention almost immediately. User5507: I don't see why everyone makes such a big deal about this guy. You're obviously biased against wizards if you think Hammond Farth is the real criminal in this episode. That wizard's an entrepreneur. All he was trying to do was make life a little easier for the people in his city, and what did he get for it? Tossed over the hood of his car and cuffed like he was merely another one of the dwarf's hunting trophies. Johnny Walker's the real criminal here. Who gave him the right to butt into anyone's life? User1302: I'm very sure local authorities gave him the right, man. No one's denying the fact that Farth was experimenting with how to improve the water filtration system. But when he almost blows up a nuclear plant trying to get "ingredients," then yeah. That essentially makes him a criminal. NoApologies42: Plus the fact that he didn't even try to sit down and have a conversation about what he was doing. The minute he saw Johnny pull up on his property, he ran. Anyone who runs is automatically guilty. Duh. Lisa raised her eyebrows and moved on to the next few episodes. In each one, at least one "fan" left a comment trying to defend the criminal bagged and tagged during Johnny's show. They were regular people—or magicals—and were minding their own business until Dwarf the Damn Bounty Hunter arrived. No one deserved seven years in a max-security prison for trying to gather eggs from giant Oriceran slimetoads, and forget the fact that the slimetoads were under Earth's various new environmental protection acts. Episode after episode showed some disgruntled fan unsatisfied by the treatment and sentencing of whatever bounty Johnny had taken into custody. Lisa counted at least six different usernames for these unhappy Johnny-haters, although they were all numbered generically according to the forum's system. Yeah, no one wants to stir the pot like that without hiding behind even more anonymity. She filtered the comments to show the most recent additions, then froze. "What? There's no way this is real." Lemonhead: Right there with you on the unethical treatment of the disenfranchised. I wonder if anyone pays attention to the kind of physical, emotional, and mental damage incurred by being treated in this way by an icon as admired as Johnny Walker. And trust me. We're not the only ones. PM me for more details. Her jaw dropped. Lemonhead's comment— it had to be the Red Boar's comment—was dated three weeks earlier. She scrolled through the comments and switched to a different episode chat when she didn't find anything else from the exact criminal she'd hoped to find. Half an hour later in Season 3, Episode 9: Shift This, she found another comment from Lemonhead buried among the replies to a disgruntled fan's dismantling of the television idol that had been Dwarf the Bounty Hunter. It was the identical message dated six weeks before and aimed at a completely different generically numbered username. Dammit. This will take forever. Fortunately, after scrolling up and down and moving the bottom scroll bar left and right, she found a tiny search bar at the bottom beside the barely visible copyright information and link to the privacy policy. Lisa typed in Lemonhead and clicked on the search icon. She was rewarded with the comments from Lemonhead in one nice, neat collection—fourteen in total—all of them replying to the same kind of agitated comments either trying to defend the captured criminal in each episode or downright bashing Johnny for apparently no reason. Each one said the same thing as Lemonhead posed a shared dissatisfaction with the show in general and the bounty hunter in particular. The most recent was dated only five days earlier. The first was dated the end of May, two days after Lisa and Johnny had crashed the Monsters Ball in New York. "This is insane," she whispered and skimmed the comments to which Lemonhead had posted his replies. He knew exactly who Johnny was in that penthouse. And he's been reaching out to a number of seriously pissed-off criminals. How many of these guys were actual bounties Johnny brought in? That was impossible to tell with the information she had and so many numbered usernames generated specifically for this site alone. But she could still try to get in on the action. She retrieved her phone from beside the laptop and snapped a quick series of pictures, then scrolled down to capture every single comment with the dates and times. That done, she clicked on Lemonhead's most recent comment and was prompted with an option to create her username or use a randomly generated number. She went with the second option and created a basic account under the name Rex Coon. It made her grimace but it was the first thing that came to mind. Better than Light Elf. Once she'd tagged both him and the original commenter in her reply, she typed her message. User7495: There has to be a better way to spend our time than going through a host of old episodes and hate-posting at our desks. Right? What about doing something? Her palms were sweaty when she posted the reply, so she wiped them on the thin cotton of her pajama shorts and downed the rest of her water. Don't blow this, Breyer. There's no way anyone knows who you are. Imagine hating his guts so much that you'd troll a fan site. That made her laugh but the sound cut off abruptly when her laptop screen flashed with a horizontal line of white. A small black box appeared in the center of the screen and it looked way too much like a command prompt. "Uh-oh." White letters scrolled across the box after the blinking cursor and paused, waiting for her reply. 8/14 11:00 p.m. Baltimore, MD. If you want in on this, you'll have to prove your vision aligns with the rest of us. Background check. The kind you wouldn't want your mama to see. Full-color photo. Any possibly useful skills. Send it all to this link in the next five days or you can fuck off. Write it down. This isn't a chat. Below that was a hyperlink of incomprehensible numbers and letters that didn't say what the hell it was for. Lisa fumbled with her phone and managed to take a picture of the command prompt box a second before the screen flashed again and the box disappeared. She checked to make sure she'd obtained a clear image and breathed a sigh of relief. Something tells me asking nicely for a do-over isn't an option. In the next moment, the pieces of the puzzle all clicked together in her head. "Wait a minute—" She leapt up and practically ran into the bedroom to retrieve her tablet. It took her two attempts to unlock it and she pulled up the digital file for the next case Agent Nelson had sent her the day before with a request to pass it on to Johnny. She swiped through the first page detailing all the various internal accounts to which the file itself had been sent, then stopped at the front of the case report. "Baltimore. Ha!" Lisa scratched the back of her head absently and mussed her sleepless bedhead even more as she stared at the case file. She returned to the desk in the living room for her phone. Tommy doesn't want him to lose his shit over this. No one does. And no one cares how Johnny's handled with these cases as long as he's handled. It's not like Tommy's completely in the dark. "Screw it." She pulled up Agent Nelson's personal cell number and made the call. When the line rang four times, she almost hung up but fortunately stopped when a loud click and rustle came through from the other end. "Fuck," the man grumbled. "Oh, hi, Tommy." She lowered herself slowly onto the hard cushions of her hotel couch and rolled her eyes. "I'm good. Thanks for asking." "What the hell, Breyer." Tommy inhaled deeply and grumbled a little more, accompanied by the rustling of bedsheets. "It's almost two in the morning." "Shit. Right." "If this isn't an emergency—" "Well, it might be—but the good kind." "Dammit. Give me a sec." It sounded like he dropped the phone onto the bed, but instead of the sound of lights clicking on or footsteps across the floor, she heard three swift, sharp smacks of flesh on flesh. She pulled the phone away from her ear and glanced wearily at it. "All right. Shit." He groaned. "I'm up. What's the…good emergency?" "I found Lemonhead." "What?" "I mean the Red Boar. He took over all Lemonhead's—you know what? It's not important." Lisa shook her head and took a deep breath. Keep it together and stick to the facts. "Did you know there was a Dwarf the Bounty Hunter fan site on the dark web?" "What the fuck?" Tommy cleared his throat. "First, I have to deal with Johnny slipping back into his old drinking habits and now, you're…what? Tweaking in the middle of the damn night and calling me about that stupid fucking show?" "Huh. Well, first of all, I'm not on drugs, Tommy, but you might be if you'd seen what I saw in Portland—" "Yeah, I heard it sucked. Are you okay?" "I'm fine, merely putting in overtime because I haven't quite caught up on lost sleep. Please hear me out and pretend like everything I tell you makes sense, all right?" "Lisa…" "I was looking for the Red Boar. If the guy was there the night Dawn was murdered, he would have guessed she was Johnny's daughter and he would've confirmed that again when we crossed paths in New York." She glanced at the tablet in her lap and tried to gather her thoughts. "But what I found, Tommy, was a fan site of people freaking out over Johnny's old show." "It's been off the air for fifteen years." "I know. But the site's still active and Lemonhead's posting on it." "Who the hell is—" "The Red Boar. Deadroot. Whatever the hell his name is. I think he's recruiting some of Johnny's old bounties to form some kind of…team. Most likely to target Johnny." Tommy groaned. "Payback's a bitch. Look, if those idiots want to slog through the muck to find that dwarf and get their heads blown off for their troubles, that's their choice." "Not if we find them first. They're meeting in Baltimore on Thursday." "Wait. That's where—" "Yeah. The Hugh case." Lisa sat up straight on the couch and scanned the walls of her hotel suite. Come on, Tommy. Wake up and use your brain. "And you want to crash this meeting and go after the Red Boar instead?" "Not exactly. But I do want to run something by you right now before I take it all to Johnny tomorrow. And if this works, we might bring back a hell of a lot more than one Kilomea with a blackmailing problem." "Huh." He sniffed. "What exactly did you have in mind?" She grinned and leaned back against the couch cushions.
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 2	"There's more than one use for everything." Johnny hauled the stiff, wobbling folds of thick chicken wire across the dry grass of his back yard. Luther yelped and skittered away from the clattering pile of metal mesh. "Hey! Watch where you're throwing things, Johnny. Come on." The dwarf pointed at his smaller black-and-tan coonhound and frowned. "You watch where you're sniffin' while I'm workin'. It's as simple as that." "You could've taken my head off with that," the hound muttered as he skulked away. Rex left the six-inch hole he'd been digging in the dirt and turned to face his brother. "You have no idea how gravity works, do you?" "Huh?" "It's all about the size, bro." He stuck his snout back into the hole and snorted. "It's not big enough to cut your head off." Johnny grunted and stalked toward the storage shed for his power tools he'd left charging overnight. I ain't fixin' to sit down and explain physics to a couple of boneheaded coonhounds. "Hey, where ya goin', Johnny?" Luther trotted after his master, his alleged close call with death completely forgotten. "Tools." "Tools for what?" Rex whipped his head out of the hole and stared at the dwarf. "Huntin' tools?" "Ooh! You make something new, Johnny? Something new and super-cool?" Johnny spun in front of the shed's open front door and gestured sharply toward the wooden structure in the middle of his yard. "Tools for that. For building? The project we started yesterday? Is it ringin' any bells?" Luther sat and his mouth popped open as he panted quick, heavy breaths and stared at his master. "Nope." The dwarf scowled and uttered a low growl of restrained frustration before he turned and stepped into the shed. "Well?" Luther called behind him. "Come on, Johnny. Spill it!" The bounty hunter ejected the two thick batteries from their chargers and inserted one onto the base of his impact driver. "I ain't gonna waste my breath tellin' you somethin' you're gonna let slip out your mind two minutes later. Again." "Yeah, yeah, okay." Luther trotted away from the shed and stopped when he saw the half-erected wooden structure sitting in the yard. "What is that?" Rex stared at his brother. "You need help." "Aw, you're jealous. We both know I got the best—hey!" Luther barked. "Johnny! It's a—" Without finishing the thought, he uttered an earsplitting bay and raced across the yard toward the side of the house. The dwarf straightened to turn toward the shed door and bumped his head against the bottom of the shelf over the worktable. "Dammit!" "Johnny, someone's here!" Rex called. "Someone's coming!" "In the road!" "Moving fast! A big ol'—oh." The hounds skidded to a stop in the gravel drive out front as the crunch of pebbles beneath slowing tires filled the air. With his impact driver and nail gun in hand, Johnny stepped slowly out of the shed and frowned at the sudden silence. A car door opened and shut. "Boys?" "Hey, lady." "Ooh! Ooh! Is that for us?" "What did you bring us, huh? I hope it's treats." "Or trash." "Or a stick." Lisa's laughter carried past the house. "Okay, boys. Chill out. You know I'm—Luther!" "Ha-ha, no, you're not." "You already know what I smell like, dogs. Back up." The hounds' tittering laughter filled Johnny's head and he snorted. The hounds are gettin' more friendly with her than I am. "Can't help it, lady," Luther said. "You smell like food. And two-legs. And two-legs food." "Lemme guess," Rex added. "You had eggs for breakfast." "Wait, eggs? Eggs…something about that sounds important." When the door of the screened-in porch creaked open, Johnny called, "Out back, darlin'." "Oh." The door clicked shut again and Lisa moved down the side of the house. Both hounds trotted beside her. "Johnny. Hey, Johnny. It's your lady friend." "Yeah, I thought she'd bailed but she didn't forget about you, Johnny." "Hard to believe. How long's she been gone, Johnny? Two years? Three?" Rex snorted. "Feels more like five." Lisa rounded the corner and stopped when she saw Johnny scowling at the small wooden hut with a power tool clutched in each hand. "Wow. I didn't know it was project day." He glanced briefly at her and sniffed. "Ever since yesterday." "What are you building?" She stepped around the structure and scrutinized it with a raised eyebrow. "A goddamn chicken coop." She burst out laughing. "How's that funny?" "Only the…" She waved him away and shook her head. "It's the thought of you raising chickens." "Uh-huh." He stared at her and finally rolled his eyes when the laughter didn't stop. "And I ain't raisin' ʼem, anyhow. That's already been done." With a deep breath to calm herself, she wiped a tear from the corner of her eye. "Grown chickens, huh? So you decided to…you know, I don't even know what to call it. Does one buy chickens or adopt them?" "Neither." Johnny set the nail gun in the grass, picked up the long plywood boards he'd secured together at a thirty-five-degree angle, and set the whole thing on top of the structure to form the roof. "This here's only temporary." "It is? That's considerable work for a temporary chicken coop." "Well, Cal Hendry a couple of miles down the road ran into some kinda…I don't know. Family squabble. He's goin' outta town in a few days to deal with it and needs a place to keep the hens so I offered to put ʼem up here." Luther licked his muzzle and sat. "Chicken." The dwarf shook his head and took two corner braces and a handful of screws from his back pocket. "So now I gotta make this damn thing gator-, fox-, snake-, and hound-proof." Lisa waited for the impact driver's loud growl to die down before she took her tablet out from under her arm. Johnny pulled his head from beneath the roof and looked expectantly at her. "What?" "I hope Cal Henry a couple of miles down the road isn't counting on you to specifically be here over the next few days." He glanced at the tablet in her hands and sniffed. "Is that another case?" "Yep." "Dammit!" She frowned teasingly at him. "Well, try not to get too excited about it." "Oh, I ain't." "Johnny…" "A dwarf can't get a little peace and quiet around his own home? Nelson with his cases. Come on. I ain't been back long enough to put my feet up and soak in the good things in life I spent a helluva lotta time diggin' up." Lisa raised an eyebrow. "Portland was two weeks ago." He returned to the pile of partially completed chicken coop pieces and selected the long ramp with the thin strips of elevated wood running up the length like steps and rested it against the open side of the coop. "That ain't nearly long enough, darlin'." "Okay, well, you're officially out of retirement at this point." She winced when the nail gun hissed and thumped into the wood. "So the cases will most likely keep rolling in—which I know you expected." "It doesn't mean I gotta be happy about it." The nail gun hissed and thumped again. With a sigh, Lisa approached him and unlocked the screen of her tablet. "Take a look at this one with me, will you?" Johnny peered at her tablet and frowned. "No paper copy?" "No." Her knowing smile made him scowl. "There are a few pieces to this next case that aren't exactly…uh, in hard copy anywhere. Or even digital." The nail gun dropped into the grass, and the dwarf straightened to fold his arms. "I don't know what the hell that means but I have a feelin' it ain't somethin' I wanna hear." "Why don't you listen to everything first before you make that call, okay?" She swiped through the case file, then turned her tablet toward Johnny. He stared at her with a frown and didn't bother to look at the screen. "Right. This one's fairly simple as far as your cases go. A Kilomea in Baltimore's been blackmailing Senator Richard Hugh—" "Damn. Nelson's getting' desperate, ain't he?" "What?" "Tell him to get someone else. I'm sure he has a dozen other bounty hunters who could round up one Kilomea idiot tryin' to pick a senator's pockets for fun, as dirty as they are." "It's a sensitive situation with this specific senator," Lisa explained. "He has friends in the Bureau—particularly Director Vance." Johnny wrinkled his nose. "Who?" "Seriously?" "I never met the guy." She tried to hide a patient, knowing smile. "Well, that would be because you've only been back in the game a few months and haven't been to HQ." He cleared his throat. "I never got an invitation, either." "Oh, so if you were invited, you'd make the trip?" "Probably not." Lisa shook her head and glanced at the file open on her tablet. "Senator Hugh also has friends in Washington, which means the Department wants this done cleanly and efficiently. So no, I don't think they have another dozen bounty hunters who can take care of this the way they want it taken care of." The dwarf rubbed his mouth and the top of his beard. "They want me." "Yes, they do." She grinned. "And now, I'll be completely transparent with you—" "I still ain't takin' the job." "This is way less about the department and much more about why you need to take this case." The hounds splashed through the swamp on the other side of the yard, sniffing at soggy reeds and fortunately too focused on exploring to say anything. Johnny narrowed his eyes at her. "What are you gettin' at?" "Something big, Johnny." She closed out of the case file and pulled up a series of photos, handed him the tablet, and nodded. "Something you don't want to miss out on. Quite frankly, neither do I." With a grunt, he took the device in both hands and looked down. "Goddammit. Why are you bringing this to me?" "You have a fan site, Johnny." "Yeah, I can damn well see that." He swiped to the next photo. "Fuck. Uh-uh." Forcing back a laugh, Lisa folded her arms and didn't let him shove the tablet into her hands. "Take it." "Not until you go through all those photos, Johnny." "I ain't goin' through photos and I ain't walkin' down memory lane on your fancy whatever-the-pad, all right?" The dwarf gritted his teeth, glanced at the screenshots of Dwarf the Bounty Hunter: The Official Site, then snarled and jerked his head away. "This is a breach of privacy, you know that?" "Not really. It was all over the dark web—" "That's what I'm sayin'! Look at this shit. Pictures of my mug on every damn page. What is this? Some asshole tryin' to sell one of my jackets? Shit, Lisa. I don't even give out my phone number or take selfstagrams or whatever the hell it's called, and I did not sign off on having all this bullshit floatin' around the dark web. Take it down." She shook her head and leaned forward to catch his gaze. "That's not how it works. And besides, you don't want me to take it down." "The hell I don't." "Johnny." He gritted his teeth and exhaled a long, growled sigh as he glared at her. "Go through the rest of the photos." "What the hell does any of this shit have to do with the case, huh?" "So far? Only Baltimore. But we're about to change that." Lisa turned to step beside him and her bare arm brushed against the rolled sleeve of his black button-up. He glanced briefly at the contact and sniffed. She swiped her finger across the tablet in his hands and leaned toward him to point. "Look at this." Johnny snorted. "Some asshole's tryin' to defend a damn criminal bounty. Big whoop." She swiped again. "And the comment?" His eyes widened when he saw Lemonhead's username beneath the disgruntled poster's comment. "Motherfucker." "There you go." Stifling a laugh, Lisa moved on to the next photos. "He replied as Lemonhead to every single one of these 'defend the criminal' comments. There are fourteen in all. I ran a search through the site and this is the only thing he's commented. All of them are the same. The last was only a few days ago and the first—" "Right after New York." Johnny snarled. "I shoulda put a bullet in that burned fucker's head when I had the chance." The agent turned toward him and studied his scowling profile. "And if you had, Amanda would be somewhere unfathomably worse than where she is right now. So look at this and then we're done with photos." She swiped to the final shot of the private command-box message she'd received from this anonymous organizer. Johnny sighed. "Baltimore." "Baltimore." "Shit." He sniffed and read the private message over and over. "The Red Boar's been doin' his research too. I assume he knows exactly who I am at this point." "Well, we didn't count on the Bulldog alias to last longer than the Monsters Ball." "Uh-huh. Do you think he's the bastard who sent this to you?" "Maybe." She shrugged. "There's no way to tell for sure—or at least no way for me to tell. I know enough about the dark web to get in, keep quiet, and get out again, but I'm not what anyone would call a computer whiz." Johnny tapped the edge of the tablet. "This ain't a computer, darlin'." "Correct." She smirked and shook her head. "I uploaded these images from my phone." "You went through the dark web on your phone?" "No, Johnny. Can we get back to the important part of the conversation now?" He grunted. "So obviously, the Red Boar's been looking for other people and magicals who want to see you eliminated as much as he does—" "And he's puttin' together a 'take out Johnny Walker' powwow in Baltimore with a group of my ex-bounties." The dwarf grinned and stared intently at the tablet. "Then fuck yeah, darlin'. I'll take the case." "That's good to hear." Lisa turned the tablet off and slid it under her arm. "Because now—" "So when do we leave, huh?" He dropped to one knee to retrieve the nail gun and aimed it at the other side of the ramp. "Slow down for a second. There's a whole—" The gun hissed and thumped. Johnny tested the ramp, nodded, and stood. "'Cause I can load up and head on out tonight if we have to. Tomorrow mornin' at the latest. As long as Nelson gets everythin' put together the way he knows it needs to be done—" "Johnny, stop." He turned toward her with wide eyes and a crooked smile. "You got me to take the case, darlin'. Good work. How is that not enough?" "Because there's more." "Go on, then." Lisa pursed her lips and tried to go as easy on him as possible with the next part of her plan. "I don't think the Red Boar will risk showing his face at this meeting. The chances of that are slim to none, and I'm banking on none. I talked to Tommy last night and he agrees with me." "Why ain't he here to tell me that himself?" She wrinkled her nose. "After last time, it's probably best for both of you to have a little space from each other, don't you think?" The dwarf sniffed. "Don't matter. We can still roll in, take out a few conspirators, and squeeze that ugly bastard's location outta them." "Yeah. And that'd be painting a huge neon sign for the Red Boar that we're in Baltimore, we know he's there, and we're coming." "Hmm." He stroked his beard and pointed at her. "I'd call it more of a huge bloody sign. It feels more accurate." "Johnny, he managed to slip away from the Bureau fifteen years ago before what was probably one of their biggest operations and he's been underground this whole time. I don't think that kind of message will make him easier to find or deal with." "But you have a different message." "I do." Lisa took a deep breath. Here comes the final bomb drop. "Even though he most likely won't make it to this ex-bounty meeting, he'll probably still be in Baltimore to oversee the whole thing and make sure the thugs he's bringing together are on the right track. He'll stake the meeting out and vet his potential…uh, partners before any of them see his face. Which, fortunately for us, we've already seen." "Uh-huh." "What we need to do is draw him out, Johnny. Into the open. Give him a reason to attack you first and then we can close in. Because we'll be expecting him but we need to make the Red Boar think we have no idea what's coming." The dwarf regarded her speculatively and drew a sharp breath. "Or we could find where this fucker's stayin' in the city and bash his damn door in." "Or we can set a trap he won't be able to resist." "Well. I like traps." He nodded cautiously. "What are you thinkin'?" "Hear me out, okay?" Lisa glanced at the chicken coop and pretended to study it with marginal interest. "I have the whole thing mapped out, so whatever potential loopholes you might immediately shout at me, I'm very sure I've already covered them." "Uh-huh." Johnny waved his fingers at her in a gesture to continue. "And I've already gotten the go-ahead from Tommy and the Department to get this rolling." "Come on, darlin'. You're settin' up for a big reveal. I get it. Quit beatin' around the bush." She raised her eyebrows and drew a breath. "We're bringing Dwarf the Bounty Hunter back for a final season." He sniggered. When she looked at him and smiled, he stepped away from her, completely expressionless. "What. The. Fuck." "Johnny, listen—" "No. No, no, no." He dropped the nail gun and made her jump away in case it decided to fire on its own, and stormed across the yard toward the shed. "I ain't doin' it." "It's already been done." Lisa followed him and stopped when the dwarf disappeared inside the shed. "We've already sent a press release out to multiple networks and media outlets. The crew's been hired and they are coming with us to Baltimore. And Tommy bought the tickets." The sound of rummaging through tools and pieces of wood and metal rose from inside the shed. Johnny thumped a fist on the wooden workbench beneath the shelves, then poked his head through the open doorway. "Are you tellin' me that balding fuck has legit authorization from the Department to fund a goddamn reality show?" "Probably not." He disappeared inside the shed again. "But he's the only liaison who can bear to put up with you, Johnny. I'm very sure they simply give him a budget for your cases and don't ask any questions beyond that. They don't need to know how it's spent or what we do with the funds as long as you take the case and close it exactly like you always do." The shed was intensely silent for a long moment before Johnny exhaled a long, heavy sigh that sounded like compressed gas escaping from a release valve. His boots clomped across the floor and he stepped onto the grass and slammed the door shut behind him. "The Red Boar knows I did the show before. He'll see this." "That's the plan." "The plan?" The dwarf rubbed his mouth vigorously, then folded his arms across his chest somewhat belligerently. "Our plan is to go to Baltimore with a whole filming crew under the ruse of one more season of the damn Bounty Hunter. Is that about right?" "Mostly." Lisa stepped away to let him pass as he stormed across the back yard again. "Except it's not exactly a ruse." "Either it is or it ain't, darlin'. Which one?" "Well, we're not doing this for the sole purpose of how much fun it would be to bring Dwarf the Bounty Hunter back and follow him around Baltimore." Johnny scoffed. "Careful." "But we will be filming, Johnny. The whole time." He whirled to stare at her. "Say again?" The agent nodded. "And they'll be live-streaming parts of it—obviously not while we're talking about this Kilomea or Senator Hugh or the actual case and definitely not while we're working on setting things up to draw out the Red Boar. But the crew has permission to reach out to multiple network audiences and draw in more live viewers that way, plus a few clips posted to the YouTube channel—edited if they have to be, of course. And yes, there will be a full episode airing after we close the case and the Red Boar gets what he deserves." His nose wrinkled and his mustache twitched from side to side beneath a constantly shifting grimace. "Fine," he said after a long moment. "Good." He pointed at her. "I have one question." "Go for it." "What the hell is live-streaming?"
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 3	The next morning, Johnny stood at his stove with a pair of tongs in his hand. Half a pound of thick-cut bacon hissed and sizzled on the back burner in the massive frying pan, and the eggs he'd cracked onto the other pan in the front had almost heated enough to start scrambling. "Johnny." Luther's tail beat urgently against the end of the cabinets beneath the kitchen counter. "Johnny, is it done yet?" "No." "Smells done to me." Rex uttered a low whine, licked his muzzle, and stood to prance from side to side before he sat again. "Very done." "Yeah, you don't wanna ruin it." "We'd eat it raw, Johnny." "We'll eat it like it is right now." "Y'all need to get on out the kitchen." Johnny flipped the bacon strips one by one. Grease spat over the sides and landed on the floor. Both hounds turned their attention to the fatty splatter and licked in wide circles far beyond the treat they were cleaning up. "We got it, Johnny." "Yeah, you drop anything, spill anything, pour anything over here, don't even worry about a mop." "We're the mop." "Get on." The dwarf shooed them away, then set the tongs down to turn his attention to the cheese grater and the block of sharp white cheddar out on the cutting board. "But the bacon, Johnny." Luther whined. "Which you ain't gettin' unless you do what you're told." "Yep." Rex spun and trotted obediently through the back of the house toward the living room. Johnny shot a sidelong glance at Luther as he grated a heaping pile of cheese into the egg pan. "Don't tell me you ain't listenin'." "What?" "You want any of this kinda breakfast, boy, you'd best get on out." "But Johnny, I—" A massive bubble burst in the bacon pan and flecks of grease spat onto the side of the hound's face. "Ow!" He yelped, scrambled away from the stove, and raced through the workshop and into the living room. His claws scrabbled across the wooden floor, then stopped when he reached the thick area rug. "How can something that tastes so good hurt so much?" Rex padded toward his brother and sniffed. "Wait, come here." "I'm fine, thanks for asking." "Yeah, but you smell like—" "Stop. Hey, leave me alone, Rex. I don't know where your tongue's been." "Same places yours has been. And none of the weird ones, either." "Stop, stop, stop, stop— Hey!" Both hounds barked and spun toward the front door. "Johnny!" "Someone's coming!" "If it's that salty two-legs again, we'll eat him." "Yeah, appetizer for that bacon." They bayed madly, raced to the back of the house, and yipped at each other when they both tried to scramble through the dog door at the same time. The barking and shouted threats aimed at Agent Nelson continued around the side of the house. Johnny shook his head and picked the spatula up to start scrambling the eggs. I doubt it's Nelson rollin' up to visit us today. Not if he needs some so-called space. "Whoa, Johnny!" Rex called from the front. "Holy shit." "Lots of people coming up the drive, Johnny." "Big van. Two big vans." "And the lady's car." "What?" He tossed the spatula onto the counter and turned, then remembered his breakfast. "Whoever the hell it is, boys, hold ʼem there a minute. I ain't leavin' these eggs." "Or the bacon." Luther barked wildly. "We got it, Johnny." The dwarf turned the heat up beneath the egg pan and scrambled them furiously until they resembled what he wanted. He extinguished both burners, ripped off two sheets of paper towels, and covered the pans. Fuckin' vans comin' down my drive in the mornin' and interruptin' my meal. Shit. He wiped his hands on his jeans and strode toward the front door as the sound of multiple heavy tires on the gravel drive crunched to a halt. Johnny threw the door open and stormed across the porch. The screen door lurched open with a bang before he hurried down the stairs and gestured widely at the arrivals. "What the hell is all this?" Lisa shut the door of her car and headed toward him with a grin. "It's the film crew." "Yeah, I can see that, darlin'. What are they doin' on my property?" "It's good to see you too, Johnny. I'm having a great morning, thanks." "Look, this ain't somethin' I agreed to—" "I told you they'd be filming the whole thing." She fought a smile and turned to gesture toward the two large, white vans parked beside each other on the gravel. "So they came out here to start." "Naw, the case starts when we leave the ground in a damn plane." The sliding doors of both vans opened, and four crewmembers emerged from each vehicle, dragging out equipment and gear with them and talking excitedly about their plans. "They're harmless, Johnny." Lisa nudged him with her elbow. "Act like they aren't here unless we're sitting down for some of those Q&A shots." "I hate those." She shook her head with a tiny smile. "Stop." A man with thin, fuzzy brown hair sticking up in all directions approached them and extended a hand toward Johnny. "Phil Ploster. I'll be directing this. Nice to meet you, Mr. Walker." "Just Johnny." The dwarf sniffed and looked away from the man without shaking his hand. "I don't need all this out here at my home, man. This ain't goin' out on TV." "Oh, sure. No, we won't film the outside or anything. We can crop the shots, no problem. Listen, I want to tell you personally how excited the crew is about getting to do this with you. You know, I spent hours as a kid watching you back when you were doing this full-time." "Uh-huh." He darted Lisa a contemptuous glance as the director blathered on. "I've seen all seven seasons—multiple times, in fact. Hey, I know it's kind of weird to ask, but would you mind—" "All right. That's his house, yeah?" Another man with closely shaved hair and wearing bright-yellow shorts at a barely acceptable length on a man's legs pointed at the front porch. "We want the best lighting. Go check it out." Johnny turned after him as the crew ran toward the front porch. "What the hell? Hey!" Lisa reached for his arm but he shrugged away from her and jogged after the crew. "Hey! That's my house!" The agent smiled apologetically at Phil and shrugged. "We're good." "Great." The screen door slammed behind the last of the crewmembers hurrying inside. Johnny snarled and threw it open again. "Boys!" Rex whipped his head up from where he'd been sniffing one of the vans' tires. Luther finished lifting a leg against the other van's tire. "On it!" "We're coming, Johnny. But—hey." Rex stopped when the screen door slammed shut again and blocked their entry. "Dog door, bro." Luther raced past his brother toward the back of the house. "Oh, yeah!" Johnny fumed as seven crewmembers swarmed through his cabin, opening doors and peering into rooms and closets and cabinets. "Y'all need to—" "Okay, the living room in the back looks like our only option right now." "Devon, there aren't any windows. Look at that. It's like a cave." "Fine. Natural lighting, then?" "There isn't much of that in here, honestly." A woman with a bandana tied around her head and a perpetual scowl that rivaled Johnny's slipped past him to enter the workshop. "No!" He whirled toward her. "That room's off-limits. The whole damn house is off limits!" She moved directly to the window and pulled the curtain aside before she turned to raise an eyebrow at him. "Is this the only window you have in the front?" "We're not doin' this—" "Hey, this room looks good." Someone had opened the door to Amanda's room and peered inside. "Nice light. But we'll have to clean up a little. Did anyone know this guy has a kid?" "Well, he did." "I mean right now." Johnny growled and stalked toward the shelf in his workshop. He snatched a huge old cannon of a shotgun from behind the more regularly used weapons in his collection, completely unnoticed by the crew buzzing around in his belongings. But the loud and unmistakably decisive double-click of the shotgun's slide brought the incessant conversation to an instant stop. The woman turned away from the window and saw the weapon in the dwarf's hands and realized that his face had turned a dark shade of red beneath the brighter red beard. "Holy shit." "Everyone out!" Johnny roared. "Hey, Cody. Are we rolling?" "Uh-huh…" He swung the shotgun toward the front door and the woman nodded before she slipped past him and headed outside. As he marched out of the workshop toward the hallway, the edge of a filming camera appeared from around the corner of the doorway. He released his weapon with one hand and thumped his palm against the camera lens. Cody uttered a yelp of surprise, then backed away from his equipment when the dwarf scowled balefully at him. "You ain't filmin' now. Not in my house." The skinny man gulped and nodded. "Got it." "Now get the fuck out. All y'all." The woman with the bandanna had left the front door wide open, and the crewmembers hurried outside. The screen door creaked repeatedly as each person pushed it open again behind the next. The hounds trotted down the hallway from the back and their nails clicked loudly in the sudden silence. "Damn, Johnny. That's officially the most two-legs we've had in the house." "You throw a party and didn't tell us about it?" He turned toward them and pointed at the open door. "Out." "Aw, come on, Johnny." Luther's ears flopped against his head when he turned sharply to face the kitchen. "We haven't had any of that bacon—" "Now!" Both hounds shied away from him before they trotted obediently through the open door. "Jeez. We live here in case you forgot." "And we earned our treats. Can't say we didn't after this, Johnny." The dwarf watched his hounds pad across the front porch. Rex nudged the screen door open with his snout and Luther scurried through after him. Earned them, huh? This was a home invasion and the damn hounds didn't do shit. Johnny held the shotgun in one hand and pulled the front door shut behind him to slam it loudly. Then, he threw the screen door open and marched down the steps again to stop at the foot of the stairs. The screen door banged shut, and he lifted the shotgun to return it to both hands. "If I see any of y'all so much as look like you're tryin' to get inside, I ain't got reservations ʼbout firin' this. Understand?" The crewmembers stopped their muttered conversations and turned toward him. "Is that even loaded?" someone muttered. In answer, he spun and fired a round into the reeds of the swamp beside his house. The deafening crack echoed across his yard and a thick spray of swamp water and reeds exploded high into the air. The crew ducked, clamped their hands over their ears, and backed toward the vans. "Any other dumbass questions?" The bounty hunter sniffed and scanned their wary faces. "Okay." Phil clapped briskly and plastered a wide grin on his face. "Change of plans! We'll do the first intros out here in the yard. Mr. Walker, do you—" "Johnny." The dwarf didn't move. "Right. Johnny. Can we, uh… Can we use those Adirondack chairs for this first part?" Phil pointed to the side of the lawn that hadn't been obliterated with a shotgun and spread his hands out in front of him in a mock panorama. "'Cause I see this perfectly now that we're here. It sets a great mood for the whole thing. Swamp. Got that big old Live Oak right there in the corner. A few cattails…" Tuning out the guy's blathering, Johnny met Lisa's gaze as she walked calmly toward him. "What the hell's he talkin' ʼbout?" "Setting up for the first shoot." She pointed to the other side of the yard where Phil had now directed the crew to move Johnny's Adirondack chairs and attend to whatever he thought needed to be cleaned off the grass. "Like I said, they're with us the whole time. Beginning to end." "We don't need this shit." "But your viewers do, Johnny. And your fans." She grinned and placed a hand on his shoulder. "You want this to look real, don't you?" He growled and glared at the crewmembers buzzing around his yard. "Which means we have to do this the way you did it back in Dwarf the Bounty Hunter's prime." "I ain't stepped outta my prime, darlin'." She pressed her lips together to hide a smile and removed her hand. "I meant the show. And after seven seasons and sixty-eight episodes, I assume you still have a good idea what this first part is about." Johnny grumbled and scratched the side of his face. "Damn Q&A." "Okay, so let's go answer some questions. Oh. But first…" She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and began to glow within a haze of golden light. He stepped away from her with a scowl and scrutinized her warily. "What are you doin'?" The magical light faded and when she opened her eyes, they'd gone from a soft brown-hazel to an intensely bright green. Strawberry-blonde hair had replaced the long dark chestnut, and it was cut shorter to tumble in loose curls around her shoulders. Freckles dotted her much paler skin, and the completely wrong shape of lips parted when she grinned at him. Why the hell am I thinkin' about her lips? Cut it out, Johnny. He grimaced. "Why?" Lisa gestured toward the film crew getting ready for their first shot. "Some parts of this will be live. The rest will be all over the Internet, most likely before we set foot in Baltimore. And I'm a federal agent." "You don't gotta say that on camera." "No, but the Red Boar saw my face in that penthouse too. If he sees Agent Lisa Breyer on a reality TV show with Johnny Walker, do you think he'll ignore how suspicious that is?" Johnny grunted. "Does that answer your question?" "Naw. I meant why you gotta do yourself up as a redhead. Now we got two on this damn show. Ain't no one will watch it." She choked back a laugh. "That's what bothers you?" "All right," Phil called and gestured for them to join him. "Johnny and…" "Stephanie," Lisa called with a nod. "If you forget everything else, don't forget that's my name now." "Got it. Johnny and Stephanie. Let's get rolling!" The dwarf grunted, gave her another slow scrutiny, then stalked away toward the makeshift studio on the side of his lawn. "Hey," Lisa called after him, "do you want to put that shotgun down—" "No."
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 4	"Okay, Johnny." Phil stood off to the side as the crew rolled cameras and zeroed in on the bounty hunter's scowl. "We'll simply ask a few questions about the case and going to Baltimore. Don't give us too many specifics. Parts of this will get to the east coast before you do." The man sniggered and Johnny rolled his eyes. Beside him, Lisa in her Stephanie disguise crossed one leg over the other and leaned back in the Adirondack chair, her arms resting casually on the wide armrests. "So answer honestly. That was the best part of the show back in the day. You didn't hold back so feel free to let it all fly now, okay?" "Uh-huh." The woman with the bandanna approached Johnny with a makeup pallet and a sponge in hand. "I need to—" "No, you don't." He glared at her from his chair. She returned his scowl, glanced at Phil, then snapped the compact shut and stepped away. "Here we go." The director stepped back and spun a finger in the air. A man with a thin line of a beard and mustache trimmed around his mouth and jaw stepped forward and lowered the boom mic over Johnny's head. The dwarf jerked his head away from the equipment and growled. "Man, get that fuckin' thing and your douchebag beard outta my face." At a nod from the director, the man stepped back two paces. Phil nodded. "So tell us about this new—" "Hold up." Johnny stood with a grunt and took the shotgun with him as he strode down the side of the house. "Wait. Where are you going?" "We're missin' somethin'." The director frowned at Lisa. "Will it be like this the whole time?" She smiled and nodded slowly. "Probably. But you guys are the professionals. I'd say roll with it." "Yeah, we're flexible." The man scratched his head and focused on the side of the house where Johnny had disappeared. When the dwarf returned, he'd lowered the shotgun at his side in one hand and now had a neon-pink plastic yard flamingo cradled under the other arm. Lisa snorted. The hounds trotted behind him and sniffed at the long plastic feet and the stake at the end of the flamingo. "What is this?" "Looks like a bird, Johnny." "Smells like dirt." "Hush." He returned to the interview setup, drove the flamingo stake into the soil beneath the grass, and gave it a good hard push to be sure it stayed in place. That done, he sat beside Lisa again and settled the shotgun across his lap. Cody looked up from behind the camera with wide eyes and shook his head at Phil. "Let me see." The director headed toward the camera to check the shot and grimaced. "That's too close. Johnny, we need to move this somewhere—" "It ain't movin'." Phil glanced at the shotgun in the dwarf's lap. "It's taking up a quarter of the frame here." "You can land in Baltimore with or without your leg blown off at the groin, pal. Your choice." Clearing his throat, the director clapped a hand on Cody's shoulder and nodded. "Roll with it." "Okay…" Lisa looked at the dwarf in exasperation. "What are you doing?" "Makin' it my own." He shifted in the chair. "And if Ronnie gets wind of this damn show filmin' here in the Glades, I ain't never gonna hear the end of how that flamingo didn't get its time in the spotlight." "Huh. That's an odd promise to make someone before you even knew this was happening." "It's unspoken code down here, darlin'. I don't expect you to understand." With a wry chuckle, she tossed the curls of her illusioned strawberry-blonde hair over her shoulder and nodded at the camera. "We're ready." Rex and Luther sniffed around the chairs and moved between them and the film crew. "Hey, Rex. How come we never noticed all this out here in the yard before?" "What?" "Chairs. Cameras. All these shoes." Luther's snout bumped against a woman's shoe and he snorted as she stepped away. "It's like it showed up outta nowhere." "Boys." Johnny snapped his fingers. "That's enough." "Oh, hey. Yeah." Phil grinned. "Let's get the dogs in the shot too. That'll be great." "Yes!" Luther barked and trotted to his master's side. "You hear that, Johnny? He wants us in the shot. We're in the shot!" "We're gonna be on TV!" Rex spun in a tight circle, then raced toward his master and skidded to a halt in front of the chairs. Lisa laughed as the larger hound spun and sat, panting. Luther sat but looked at Johnny instead. "This is the coolest thing I've done all day, Johnny." His tail swept across the ground, scattering dry grass and twigs and dirt. The dwarf sniffed and gestured to the crew. "The camera's that way." "What? Oh!" Luther spun to face the right way and sat again. "Awesome." "Okay, here we go." Phil twirled his finger in the air again. "Johnny, you're heading out to Baltimore for a new bounty. Tell us about it." Johnny glowered at the center of the large camera lens and cleared his throat. "Well, some asshole's blackmailin' a…person of interest. It sounds like he's makin' a mess of his target's life, so I aim to clean up and throw the bastard out with the trash." Phil pumped a fist in the air and grinned. "Is it a human bounty or magical this time?" Lisa—as almost-redheaded Stephanie—leaned forward toward the camera. "Johnny doesn't discriminate when it comes to doing his job." Luther sniggered. "Or ladies." Johnny snapped his fingers. "That's right. If a criminal's doin' enough to get my attention, I don't give a shit who they are, what they are, or how smart they think they are. I take ʼem down and turn ʼem in." "Excellent. And what's the price on this bounty in Baltimore?" The dwarf glanced briefly at Lisa and she shrugged. "Naw, I ain't talkin' ʼbout money." "Okay. Is it more or less than your usual bounties? I mean back in the day, of course." "It's enough, okay?" He scowled at Phil and not at the camera now. "Move on." "Sure. How do you feel about going into this one, Johnny? From what you know, would you say this will be an easy retrieval, or will you have to work a little harder—" "Who wrote these questions?" The director looked startled. "I'm sorry?" "They're shit. Look, I ain't takin' cases 'cause they're easy or hard. I take ʼem 'cause somethin' needs doin' and I'm the one to do it." Beside him, Lisa lifted her chin toward the camera and smiled sweetly. Luther lowered himself onto his belly and stared at the device. "TV's so boring." "All right. We'll move on." Phil cleared his throat. "You've spent fifteen years in retirement after suffering a family tragedy." "Are you for real?" "You stopped the show and holed up here down south," the director continued, "leaving your bounty hunter days behind you. How do you feel about getting back into the business after all this time?" Johnny turned to scowl at Lisa and pointed at the man as he muttered, "Is this guy for real?" "Johnny?" "Phil." "Do you have any concerns about your ability to find and apprehend this next bounty, given your previous record as a bounty hunter and your rather long hiatus?" His disbelieving snort matched his disdainful expression. "I'm a dwarf, asshole. I coulda stayed outta the game for thirty years and still known exactly what I'm doin'. This is bullshit." He started to stand and Luther leapt to his feet and blocked his master momentarily before he padded across the grass toward the yard flamingo. "You were a household name by the time the seventh season of Dwarf the Bounty Hunter ended so abruptly. Is there anything you want to say to your viewers and fans around the world who are watching this now?" Johnny stared at Phil and his lip curled at the corner of his mouth in a half-snarl. The plan's off if this asshole keeps pryin' where he don't belong. Before he could say anything, the steady, hollow patter of Luther relieving himself against the plastic flamingo filled the silence. The dwarf gestured toward his hound. "That about sums it up. We're done." This time, he didn't have a hound to prevent him from standing and he walked away with his shotgun cradled in one arm. "Johnny," Phil called. "Johnny, I still have a few more questions—" "No, you don't. Lisa, when's our flight?" "One o'clock." She stood from her chair and pointed at Cody behind the camera. "Stop filming. And do not put him saying my name in anything you use, got it?" "Yep." "It looks like it's time to pack up and get moving." She gestured toward the scattered crewmembers. "We'll resume filming later." The crew made no protest as Johnny and Agent Breyer disappeared inside the cabin. Rex and Luther trotted behind the house to enter through the dog door. "Man, if that's what being on TV's like, it sucks." "Johnny did this? For years?" "No wonder he's so grumpy." Phil sighed in exasperation and gestured for his team to return all their equipment to the vans. "This is only the beginning, people. We'll get our gold in the next few days." Inside the house, the bounty hunter stormed into the kitchen, whisked the paper towels off his cold breakfast, and tossed them into the trash. Lisa shut the front door behind her, removed her alias illusion, and found Johnny hunched over the stove. "Are you okay?" "It's a loaded question, ain't it?" he asked through crunching a mouthful of bacon. "That doesn't make it any less worth asking." He turned away from the stove and grimaced as he sucked bacon out of his teeth. "You know how I feel ʼbout cameras and attention and questions." "Yep." "All right. That bein' said, I gotta hand it to ya, darlin'. It's a brilliant fuckin' idea." She grinned and turned as he strode past her and out of the kitchen toward the hallway. "I'm glad you think so." "Oh, I do. The Red Boar and I have a beef to settle, and if he thinks he's smart enough to cut to the chase first, this is a perfect distraction. For him." Johnny disappeared into his room and she stood and listened to the sound of clothes being jerked off hangers and shoved into his duffle bag. "Will it be too much of a distraction for you?" A drawer shut sharply and he poked his head through the open doorway. "Naw. I handled it for seven years and I can handle it again." The only difference is fifteen years of uninterrupted privacy and an idiot callin' himself a director. He hauled his black duffel with him out of the room and headed to the workshop. "And that Phil fella… Hell. He knows exactly the right buttons to push, don't he?" "I can talk to him about that if you want." "Naw, don't bother. If I ain't lookin' pissed off and ready to bash in a few heads on camera, the Red Boar's gonna think I ain't genuine about the whole thing. It sucks but it's perfect." He rifled through his explosive gear, firearms, ammunition, and random tech stacked on the shelves of his workshop to carefully choose the best for the trip. "You said a Kilomea, right?" "That's right." Lisa leaned against the workshop doorway and folded her arms, intrigued by the focused way he worked through his options. "Okay." A huge metal box slid out from beneath the bottom shelf. Johnny felt inside it for a moment before he retrieved what looked like a bright silver handgun with the tops of the chamber and the barrel sawed off. They'd been replaced instead with a thick glass tube. He snatched a small canvas bag from the metal box, returned the stash with the toe of his boot, and packed it all in the duffel bag with everything else. "What was that?" "The little silver guy?" The bounty hunter sniggered. "That's old school, darlin'. It still works like a charm for those hairy bastards, though." "That still didn't answer my question." "Huh. Sleep juice." "From a pistol?" "Sure. What used to be a pistol, anyhow. Now it's exactly what I want it to be." He grinned at her and slung the strap of the duffel bag over his shoulder. When he reached the kitchen, Rex and Luther sat perfectly still in front of the oven and stared up at the pans of cold breakfast on the stove. Rex's ears perked up at the sound of his master's footsteps but he didn't move. "Johnny." "Yeah, Johnny. Come on." "You forgot the most important part." "Uh-huh." With a heavy sigh, the dwarf gave the hounds three slices of bacon each, which disappeared before he had time to take the remainder of the cold, crunchy meat for himself. Luther licked the crumbs on the floor. "Bacon!" "No one makes it like you do, Johnny." "Yeah, yeah. Hey. You think if we caught a pig, sliced it up, and did whatever you just did to this bacon, it'd taste as good?" Johnny and Rex both stared at him. "What?" "Sure." He turned toward the stove and the egg pan with a snort. "I suppose I might try it out on coonhound too." Luther gasped. "You wouldn't." Rex sniffed the floor behind Johnny's feet. "Dude, at this point, I'm right there with him." "Oh, okay." Luther whipped his head up toward his master and panted, and his tail thumped against the side of the fridge. "Well, when you do try it, Johnny, don't forget about me. I've never tried hound bacon before." "Jesus." "What's wrong?" Lisa asked with a curious smile. "Damn hounds." He tossed a handful of cold scrambled eggs toward Luther as a distraction, then turned toward Lisa and pointed at the smaller dog. "He makes me wonder sometimes what the hell I was thinkin' when I made those collars." "You were thinking about us, Johnny." Rex scuttled to his master's other side. "And about how much you wanna give me some of those eggs too right now." A glob of cold eggs landed with a splat in front of the larger hound and vanished instantly. "And about how much you love hearing us tell you how awesome you are?" "Well, that's a given, Johnny." "We'll never stop." "As long as you never stop with the treats." Shaking his head, he scooped the last of the eggs and crammed them into his mouth. He turned toward Lisa with flecks of egg and cold cheese caught in his beard and nodded. "Ehs oh." She laughed. "Sure. If I could understand you. You have a little something right here too…" He swiped at his mouth and beard, then swallowed. "Let's go." "Aw, man. That's it?" Luther sniffed the side of the oven and tried to poke his head up over the stove. "Johnny, what about all this smelly sludge up here, huh? That has to taste good." "Shit." The dwarf snatched both pans up and headed to the back door to set them quickly out on the porch. When he closed the door again, both hounds stood in front of him. "Go ahead, Johnny." "Yeah, step aside. We'll handle it." "We're headin' out front." He slid the plastic dog-door cover down in its slats with a clack. "Y'all had enough." "So who's gonna eat it?" "Johnny… You're leavin' bacon sludge out for the squirrels?" "No way, Rex. It's the rabbits and birds we have to worry about." The dwarf whistled and headed toward Lisa. "Let's go, boys." "Dangit." They trotted after him and Luther cast longing glances over his shoulder every few feet. "I'm ready when you are, darlin'." "Excellent." Lisa grinned at him and gestured toward the door. "This'll be fun." "Hold off on that assessment for now, huh? Just 'cause I ain't got expectations don't mean it can't get any worse." "Seriously? I would have thought you had fairly high expectations of finally apprehending the Red Boar or killing him, even in Baltimore." He opened the front door and snorted. "I meant the damn show."
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 5	Phil wanted to put one of his team in the car with Johnny on their way to Miami International but of course, the bounty hunter refused. "There ain't enough room in the truck anyhow." "Well, what about that Jeep?" He glanced at Sheila parked in her usual place at the edge of the large gravel lot in front of his house and chuckled. "You've lost your damn mind." The director persisted in his mission to fully capture Dwarf the Bounty Hunter on their drive to the airport. Every time Johnny glanced in the rearview mirror, one of the white vans was gaining on him from behind. Whoever sat up front in the vehicle with Phil held a smartphone up to the window, filming, and the dwarf stepped on the gas again. "Determined bastard, ain't he?" Lisa lurched forward when the white truck increased speed down the freeway. "He's only doing his job." "Well, I ain't payin' him." The one time the crew's other driver tried to pull into the right lane on the highway to get a good shot of him driving the truck was the only time. Lisa grabbed the oh-shit handle above the passenger door when he made quick work of blocking the van's attempts to drive next to his truck. He cackled the whole time. The hounds bobbed and swayed in the back seat of the cab, panted, and cheered their master on. By the time they reached Miami International, the dwarf felt damn good about things. They unloaded their luggage—and the hounds—as the film crew set up their gear to start the camera rolling again. Checking in with their tickets was a cinch, mostly because Lisa handled all of it, but they were intercepted by airport security. "Agent Breyer? Mr. Walker?" The huge man in uniform glanced at the hounds. "Come with me, please." Johnny leaned toward Lisa and muttered, "What did you do?" She darted him an insulted glance. "Don't assume it was me." Grumbling, he followed the security guard with Rex and Luther on his heels. Lisa waved for the crew to follow and waited for Phil to catch up. "I want to reiterate this yet again. Nothing that reveals my real identity gets broadcast anywhere. Not my name and not my face. At least, not looking the way it is right now." "Only the redhead. Got it." He winked at her. "We'll save the live streams for the 'paint the town' shots." "The what?" "We have it covered, Agent Breyer. Don't you worry." She glanced at the crew. Cody led the way with slow, careful steps to keep his hand camera steady as he closed in on Johnny from behind. "Okay…" They were taken through a private security screening and led not to the main terminal gates for a commercial airline flight but out to the tarmac reserved specifically for private aircraft. A warm, muggy breeze blew across the expanse of black asphalt that shimmered in the August heat. It ruffled Johnny's hair and beard and made his hounds' fur stand on end. Lisa adopted her green-eyed, redheaded Stephanie illusion as they approached the Gulfstream 450 waiting for them and nodded at Phil. "All right, people," the man called and clapped before he pointed skyward. "We're takin' it to the skies." The security guard nodded and returned to the building and a flight attendant stepped down the wheeled staircase pushed up against the jet and waved. "Are y'all ready to get this bird up in the air?" The woman was tall, blonde, thin, and with bright-red lipstick that stood out harshly against her pale skin and the white exterior of the aircraft. Phil giggled nervously and stared at her and his mouth hung open slightly. The bounty hunter snorted. "Oh, look. Dimples." Lisa frowned mockingly. "That's what does it for you, huh?" "I don't mind one way or the other, darlin'." He gestured toward Phil with his thumb. "But Mr. Nosy-Ass Director over there might have a thing or two to say about ʼem if he could talk." Rex looked at the man and sniggered. "Shut your mouth, two-leg. You're gonna slobber all over her." "Yeah," Luther added and spun in a tight circle as he sniffed the tarmac, his tail pointing straight up. "That's our job." "The captain's almost ready," the flight attendant crooned, "so you're welcome to board anytime you like." "We, uh…I mean, we'll… That's…" Phil's mouth opened and closed. "Thank you," Lisa said for him. "Uh-huh." The woman smiled briefly at Agent Breyer, then scrutinized Johnny with almost avid curiosity before she turned to walk up the stairs. "We're happy to have you aboard." "Oh, boy…" Nudging Johnny's arm with the back of a hand, the agent nodded at the jet. "This is gonna be a fun one, huh?" "Well…maybe." He rubbed his mouth and frowned at the small aircraft. "What the hell is Nelson up to?" "He booked us a private flight. Why are you complaining?" "Naw. See, that's where all this smells too fishy." He wagged a finger at her and narrowed his eyes at the jet. "For about ten years straight I worked with that stuck-up Yankee and he ain't never sprung for a private flight, even when he flew with me. Are you sure there ain't something special about this case you're still keepin' on the down-low?" She raised an eyebrow. "Johnny, I just told you there's a super-fan Dwarf the Bounty Hunter site on the dark web and convinced you to start filming another season so we can deal with two magical criminals with one case. Why would I keep anything else from you?" "Good point. All right, boys. I guess it's time to—what the fuck?" He turned to Cody who held the camera in his face while Dave, the boom dude, dangled the stupid microphone over his head. "Back the hell up, son. What do you think you're doin'?" Cody stepped away but kept his camera rolling slowly and steadily. "Put that away, man." "Come on, Johnny," Phil said, fully recovered now that the flight attendant had disappeared into the jet. "This is a very good time to get a few more shots in. Right before you take off from your home in Florida, you know?" He wrinkled his nose. "Why the hell does that matter?" "Okay, look. As far as our viewers—your viewers—are concerned, you haven't left the state since you moved out here fifteen years ago. No one knows you've taken other cases with…clients." He nodded at Lisa like they were the only ones in on her alias secret. "So for them, this is like a new chapter for Johnny Walker, right? A rebirth, if you will—" "Jesus, what kinda hole did Nelson dig you out of?" "What was that?" "Look, I ain't panderin' to a horde of crazies I don't know simply to make ʼem feel some kinda resolution fifteen years after the fact. And I sure as shit don't give a damn about network ratings. So you can move along with this whole 'create a story' nonsense and let me do my job." Insulted, the director stepped away and glowered furiously. "Well, for this to work, Mr. Walker, you need to let me do my job." The dwarf growled and thrust a finger in the man's face. "Don't tell me what I need to do." "Don't you dare threaten me." Phil puffed his chest up. "I'm the director!" "You're a nut." The hounds tittered. "Good one." "Yeah, bet he's as salty as one too." "As salty as the other two-legs you hate but keep letting into the house, Johnny." The dwarf spun away and almost stepped onto Dave's foot. "Goddammit. And get that"—he slapped at Cody and the camera narrowing in on him—"fuckin' camera outta my face." Phil snapped and turned around to wave at another crew member with a second camera. "Get over here." "Nuh-uh." Johnny pointed at the second cameraman. "I ain't doin' it like this. You stay right where you are." Lisa stepped toward him. "Johnny, this is all part of the plan, okay?" "Nope. It's not okay at all. Nelson thought he could recreate some goddamn nostalgia and instead, he gives me this." "A private jet?" "A film crew with extra balls and no brains—I said back up!" Cody jolted at the dwarf's sudden outburst in his direction, then sighed heavily and lowered the camera. "Well, that shot's ruined. Thanks." Johnny folded his arms. "I want Travis." Lisa shook her head. "Who?" "Howie Travis. The guy who handled the filming for me the last time I did a real show." Phil scoffed. "This is real—" "I ain't talkin' to you. Zip it." The flight attendant poked her head out of the open jet door and grinned at them. "Y'all can come on up now. The captain says we're clear to go." Lisa gestured toward the jet. "Everything's ready. Let's go. It's only a few days." He stared at her with a deadpan expression. "Darlin', I ain't gettin' on this flight unless Howie Travis gets on it with me." She glanced at the waiting crew and frowned. "You want the director of your bounty hunter show from fifteen years ago?" "That's what I said. Travis knows what the hell he's doin' and he learned way more of it over seven years with me than what these bozos are tryin' to pretend they know." "Wow. Okay. Fine." She pulled her phone out. "I'll make the call. Can someone tell the captain or flight attendant or whoever that we're…uh, running a little behind?" The woman with the bandana—Alicia—rolled her eyes and trudged toward the rolling staircase. Lisa stepped away from the group and the idling private jet to call Agent Nelson so they could play Find The Director. Johnny glanced at his hounds. Rex sat perfectly still beside his master, and Luther had sprawled on the tarmac to soak in the heat from above and below. Phil cleared his throat. "You can't fire me from this project, Mr. Walker. You're not the one who hired me." "I ain't fixin' to fire you. Stay on or go home. It makes no difference to me." He regarded the man disdainfully, then turned his head slowly toward the plane. "But if you don't hand the reins over to Travis when he gets here, I'll send you packin' myself." "You can't force me to get on a plane." "Honestly, it's fairly easy if you're in a body bag."
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 6	Almost forty minutes later, another security guard emerged from the building and approached Johnny, Lisa, the hounds, and the entire film crew, who were either seated or standing against the wall of the airport building to get out of the sun. A hunched old man with a long gray ponytail tied loosely behind his head stepped out slowly behind the guard. He held a walking cane in one hand and it tapped on the tarmac while he dragged a small, battered roller suitcase behind him with the other. "Finally." Lisa stood and smiled at the men. "Howie?" The old man squinted at her and looked bewildered. "Who the hell are you?" "I'm—" "Now that's more like it." Johnny approached the old man and grinned in welcome. "It's been a while, you wrinkled bastard." "What the—" Howie stared at him, then croaked a laugh. "Well, hot damn, Johnny. Look at you. You look exactly the same. Maybe a little rounder at the middle." The man slapped his own belly and chuckled. "And you look…" The bounty hunter snorted. "Shit. You look like someone who knows what he's doin'. Come on. I have a private jet waitin' to take us to Baltimore. Have you ever been there?" "Not yet." Howie nodded his thanks as Johnny took the handle of his suitcase and wheeled it across the tarmac toward the aircraft. The hounds trotted wearily after him, too hot to comment on anything. Lisa stared at the hunched old man and the grinning, chattering bounty hunter. Okay. Now I've officially seen the impossible. And Tommy booked a private jet to avoid Johnny making this kind of scene in public. We're already off to a good start. "Let's go, then." The crew grumbled and pulled their gear and suitcases together to head toward the aircraft. Phil didn't so much as look at her. Thirty minutes into the flight, Johnny and Howie were well into their second glasses of Johnny Walker Black, which had been stocked in the jet's cabinets specifically for these passengers. They sat beside each other in the wide, plush chairs, clinked glasses, and roared with laughter as they relived the old days of Dwarf the Bounty Hunter. "Oh, man, Johnny." The old man wiped tears away from his wrinkled eyes and caught his breath. "You almost had him eating through a tube after that." "Naw. The bastard sucked it up. Our guys weren't too happy with me either, though. I had to buy a whole new set of lenses for…shit. What was his name?" "Julio?" "Naw, the other one. With the Mom tattoo." Howie laughed. "Jackson." "Jackson!" The bounty hunter wagged a finger at his old friend. "He was a good kid, man. A real good kid and could have gone places if it weren't for that dumbass ink he was so damn proud of." "Well, I don't know about the ink, but that's what the rest of him did." "Did what?" The aged director raised his almost empty glass and nodded. "The kid went places. Now, he's out filmin' for HBO." "No shit." "Living the dream." Johnny chuckled. "Ain't that the truth. To Jackson…whatever his last name was." "Jackson Pullard." "Yeah." They clinked glasses and the dwarf leaned toward the table in front of their chairs. "Shit. You're empty. Do you want another?" "I'm seventy-years old, Johnny. Why the hell would I stop now?" "That's the ticket." With a grin, he popped the lid off the whiskey bottle and filled the man's glass. "Li—" He cleared his throat. "Stephanie! Do you want one?" Seated in a chair on the other side of the aisle with her chin propped on a fist, Lisa shook her head slowly. "I'm good for now. But you keep doing what you're doing." "We're reminiscin', darlin'." Howie drank more whiskey and uttered a long sigh. "I think you mean commiserating." "It's the same thing, ain't it?" Johnny chuckled. "And we're havin' us a time." The agent grinned. "I can tell." "What? What are you lookin' at me like that for?" "I merely haven't seen this full side of you before. It's…fun." "Huh. Well, it ain't a regular thing so don't go gettin' any ideas." "Oh, I know." She turned in her seat to where Cody knelt on the chair in front of her and aimed his camera across the aisle at the dwarf and his old friend. Leaning forward, she whispered, "Have you been on the whole time?" Without moving the camera resting on the back of the chair, he gave her a slow thumbs-up. "On what?" Where he lay sprawled in the center of the aisle, Luther whipped his head up and turned to look first at Lisa, then at the camera guy. "Oh. Hey, Johnny." The dwarf sniffed and raised his whiskey glass with a crooked smile. "That's it," Rex added and stared at the back of Cody's head from where he lay on his side toward the front of the plane. "You're supposed to smile when you're on camera. I heard that's a thing, Johnny. Right?" Johnny almost choked on his drink as he scanned the crewmembers in their seats. Finally, he noticed Cody. "Aw, don't— Come on, man. Turn that shit off, will ya?" "What's that?" Howie looked at the bounty hunter with a glazed smile, saw his scowl, and instantly found the camera centered on them. "Hey, that's fine." "No, it ain't. Private jet. Private conversation." He stood and bumped his head against the boom mic dangling above him over the back of his seat. "Goddammit! You folks got some kinda deathwish or what?" "Sit down." Howie chuckled and took another sip. "Let ʼem do what they came to do." "They ain't here to document our drinkin', Howie." "Sure. But it'll go nicely with this new season of yours, won't it?" The man's lips parted in a wrinkled grin. "The bounty hunter who seemingly doesn't age a day and the crooked old man who followed him around the States for seven years merely to get a good shot. It gives the people something to sink their teeth into." "They can sink their teeth in my ass. How about that?" The old director roared with laughter. Rex snorted and busied himself with a thorough licking of his front paw. "They're not gonna like it, Johnny. Trust me. It's not nearly as fun as it sounds." A deep, rolling chuckle emerged from the dwarf's open mouth and grew until it filled the jet. Howie continued to laugh with him, and they clinked their glasses together again before each took a long drink. Lisa smirked and faced forward in her seat to open the newest book on her tablet. Cody slid slowly out of his seat and practically floated down the aisle as he moved with the camera, closing in on Johnny and his old Bounty Hunter director. The dwarf stopped laughing when he saw the guy inching toward them. He grabbed a package of fancy in-flight cookies and lobbed it at the camera. "Man, turn that off." By the time they landed and picked up their three rental cars waiting for them at Baltimore/Washington International, Johnny was sober enough to convince Lisa he could get behind the wheel. Howie was more than happy to climb in the back with the hounds so Lisa could take the front seat, but the bounty hunter once again denied Phil and his crew any opportunity to join them in the vehicle. The drive to the Sagamore Pendry Baltimore hotel in Fells Point was uneventful, but the second Johnny and his hounds stepped out of the rental and handed the keys to the valet, things became unexpectedly weird. "Oh, my God. No way." A woman wearing a long jacket with a leather portfolio tucked under her arm stopped to stare at the dwarf and ignored the filming crew completely. "You're Dwarf the Bounty Hunter." He grunted and hauled his duffel bag over his shoulder. "Hey, look there!" A guy down the sidewalk held his baggy pants up with one hand and pointed at Johnny with the other. "That's the guy. Dude, what'd I tell ya, huh? This is for real." The bounty hunter rolled his eyes and strode through the front doors of the hotel with the hounds trotting beside him. Howie kept up fairly well despite his cane, and one of the other crew members had taken his suitcase with all their luggage. Lisa swerved around Cody—who stalked after Johnny with his ever-rolling camera—to join the dwarf and his old friend. "Exactly like any other regular day, Johnny." "No, it ain't." He shied away from a group of giggling, staring women in their mid-twenties who pointed at him and whispered about the show and the dwarf and the fact that this was real. "How the hell do all these folks already know what's goin' on?" "We posted the first video to YouTube before the jet took off," Phil interjected when he joined them at the check-in counter. "Say what?" The man shrugged and raised a petulant eyebrow. "Well, you did give us an extra forty minutes to get a head start." "Dammit." Johnny turned slowly to study the avid fans and spectators over his shoulder. "This ain't gonna work." "This was the plan," Lisa reminded him. "Not this part. These folks follow us to our rooms, we ain't gonna sleep the whole time we're here." "Camera!" Howie shouted and thumped the end of his cane lightly against Cody's leg. "Take a wide shot from across the lobby, yeah? Get the whole thing—hounds, Johnny, fans, and the mic too. Better yet, turn the damn thing off." Dave glanced at his mic, then stared at him in confusion. "But then we don't have any audio." "Put it in a montage, okay?" He waved them both off. "And the rest of the team stays out of the shot. Unless one of you new up-and-comers have some bounty-hunter experience in you too." The crew backed away from Johnny and Lisa and hefted their gear as they muttered to each other. The old man turned toward Phil and raised an eyebrow. "Do you have a better idea?" The displaced director glanced at Johnny, then exhaled a disgruntled sigh and hurried after his team. "There." Howie slapped a hand on Johnny's shoulder. "Taken care of." "It's a damn good thing I got you on this trip, brother." "Ha. Well, I was practically kidnapped, but that's water under the bridge. It's time to check in."
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 7	Johnny and Lisa's rooms had been booked across the hall from each other, although with such late notice on Howie joining them right before the flight, the ex-director's room was on the third floor with the film crew instead of the fourth with his friend. "Don't you worry about me, Johnny. Something tells me I'll know exactly when you head out and need an extra pair of eyes." The old man winked and hobbled through his door. The film crew disbursed to their reserved rooms down the hall, and Johnny, Lisa, and the hounds took the elevator to the fourth floor. After they each settled into their rooms, Lisa took her usual next step and knocked on the dwarf's door with a perfunctory, "It's me." Johnny let her in with a nod and a grunt before he trudged down the short hall. "Oh, wow." She stepped slowly through the room and removed her Stephanie illusion as she viewed the large, fully equipped kitchen on the left. Suitably impressed, she turned the corner on the right toward the large living area in his suite. "It looks like someone had an upgrade." He shrugged. "I'm sure yours is equally as nice." "Nice? Sure, but about a third the size of this." She flopped on the luxuriously soft cushions of the couch facing the north-facing windows and sighed as she placed her tablet beside her. "He went all out." "I don't see why." The dwarf filled a large mixing bowl with water from the sink and set it on the kitchen floor for the hounds. "I ain't exactly the type to need a big ol' fancy suite like this one. And before you ask, no. I didn't ask for an upgrade, either." "I was talking about Tommy," Lisa replied with a smirk. "Not the concierge." "Oh." He scrunched his nose. "Then it makes even less sense." "How's that?" "Private film crew, private jet, bigass suite with only me and two hounds to fill it. Looks to me like Nelson's tryin' to compensate for somethin'." As the sound of Rex and Luther lapping water rose from the kitchen, Johnny joined her in the living area and took the large armchair with its back to the north windows. "Like he all of a sudden thinks he needs to start impressin' me. Which he ain't." "Um…well, I think all this is for the fans." "Say what now?" She smirked at him. "All this with the show, Johnny. It'll only work if everything looks and sounds and feels legit, right? That includes what your old fans think of Dwarf the Bounty Hunter's unexpected return." He blinked and pressed his lips together. "Did you watch any of it?" "Not yet." "I think Nelson ain't watched a goddamn minute of it either 'cause I didn't put myself up like this back then." "No private jet?" Johnny snorted. "Hell no. We had a tour van." Lisa tried to fight back a laugh and failed. "Are you serious?" "Yep." Shifting in the chair, he looked away from her and mumbled, "It had my face on it and everythin'." "So you drove your own bus for your own show to apprehend bounties for seven years?" The corner of his mouth twitched in the hint of a smile, and his mustache wiggled with it. "Only for the first year—long enough for me to get a good read on the guy who ended up drivin' for us after that. I tell you what, darlin'. Roger handled that bus like it was a damn racecar." The agent folded her arms with a curious frown. "You hired a racecar driver to drive your tour bus." "What? No. He was a gnome." "Johnny!" Luther trotted toward the slightly open door into the king-sized bedroom suite and nudged it open the rest of the way with his nose. The door creaked gently. "Got any treats in here?" "Luther, we were in the kitchen," Rex called after him as he lapped the rest of the water. "Unless there's a fridge in there, you're barking up the wrong—" Luther barked sharply, spun, and bumped his head against the door before he finally made his way out again. "The fridge! Johnny, people in Baltimore love you, right?" "And hounds." "Yeah, of course. So they'd put treats in that fridge, right?" "Johnny, can you check?" Luther raced past his brother and skidded to a stop in front of the fridge to drag his tongue across the black appliance in a long line. "Ooh, yeah. I can smell it, Johnny. They put bacon in there." Rex nipped at the smaller hound's neck, then licked his brother's face. "Nope. That's still you." "Leave it, boys," the dwarf grumbled. Lisa turned on the couch to peer into the kitchen on the other side of the suite's entrance hall. "What are they up to?" "Same thing every time." The dwarf dragged a hand down his cheek and snorted. "It's endless." "Wouldn't be endless if you gave us treats, Johnny." "Yeah, we don't talk with our mouths full. That's rude." He shook his head and slumped in the armchair. "What?" Lisa grinned at him. "I have too much on my mind." He cast a frustrated glance toward the kitchen. "Too many voices, rather." "Don't tell me you're starting to regret your greatest invention." The dwarf scoffed, crossed one leg over the other, and lifted his arms almost to shoulder height to prop them on the armrests. "Collars ain't my best, darlin'." "What?" Rex called. Luther snorted. "Now you're being rude." "Oh, really?" Lisa raised an eyebrow. "As far as I know, there aren't any other talking-dog collars out there. You could make a fortune on a patent with that." "And throw the world of hound and master off balance with no return?" He shook his head. "I'm all for makin' an impact, darlin', but that's one dangerous road. And patents are a waste of time." "Well, it can't be—" A brisk knock at the front door interrupted her. "Mr. Walker?" Johnny frowned at the entrance hall. "If that's room service before I even called, then I'll be impressed." Lisa pulled up her Stephanie illusion as he stood and followed him out of the living area. The bounty hunter reached the door and pulled it open. "If you're gonna be shoutin' my name from the other side of the door, I'm only gonna say this once. It's—aw, hell." "Hello." Phil grinned in the hallway, surrounded by four of his team. Cody stood slightly behind him and to the side, his camera rolling. Dave dangled the mic over the director's head and tried to stretch it over Johnny's too. "Can we come in?" "No." "Johnny, this is all part of the process." Phil peered around the dwarf and saw Lisa-Stephanie in the hall, a hound on either side of her. "And since it looks like we're all here, we might as well pick up where we left off." He tapped Cody's shoulder lightly and muttered, "Get her and the dogs in there too. That's great." Cody stepped forward with the camera, and Johnny pointed at him. "Come any closer, and that camera's mine." "Only a few minutes, Johnny," the director pleaded. "Let us inside and we'll make it quick. The lighting in here is—" "Y'all ain't steppin' inside my room. Get your shots in public like everyone else." He started to close the door but the director thumped his hand against it and managed to keep it open briefly. "For the show, Johnny. For the fans." "Boys." "Yeah, Johnny?" "We're on it." The hounds stalked past Lisa and moved slowly toward the open door as they growled and bared their teeth. Phil chuckled nervously. "How are we supposed to get more material if you won't let us in—" "When I leave the room. And that ain't happenin' again tonight." "Want us to chase ʼem off, Johnny?" "That nervous-sweaty two-legs looks like he's still learning how to run. We can teach him for you." Hearing only the hounds' snarling and Luther's jaws snapping shut as they reached the door, Phil stepped back and swallowed. "We were contracted to—" "Mind your business unless I say otherwise. And I wouldn't come back here without Howie if I were you." He slammed the door shut. Luther sat and uttered a warbled howl. "And stay out." "Johnny," the director called from the other side of the door. "We've already got some great stuff but not nearly enough for the first day." Rex growled and sniffed the bottom of the door, snorting and pawing. "Man, this guy's dumb." "Johnny?" The bounty hunter ignored the desperate director and marched down the hall. "He'll get it eventually." Lisa darted a sympathetic frown at the closed door. "Do you want me to talk to him?" "Naw. That's settin' yourself up to have whatever you say twisted and stuck on YouBoob." She barked out a laugh. "I'm sorry?" "The thing with the videos." "YouTube, Johnny." "Sure." He went to the kitchen and opened cabinet after cabinet, searching for the one thing he wanted. Private jet and swanky digs. If Nelson ain't givin' up all the goods, none of that's gonna save him from— Johnny stopped at the last open cabinet and grinned. "There you are." He took the unopened bottle of Johnny Walker Black and two glasses and turned toward his companion. "Care to join me, darlin'?" She raised her chin and looked at him with a smile. "I'm not sure I'm a whiskey girl." "Well, why don't you take the redhead mask off and give it a try. We'll find out together." "Okay." She removed the illusion and glanced at the fridge. "Are there any mixers in that fridge?" Johnny snorted. "You're lucky I like you. That there's blasphemy." "Wow. So this is like a religion for you." This time, he took a seat on the couch beside her and poured two fingers of whiskey for Lisa and a full four for himself. "I ain't the religious type, darlin'. But I believe in a fair number of things—the truth, my privacy, a fair exchange, a good hunt, and this." He raised his glass toward her and winked. "So we'll add sharing your favorites to the list." Lisa clinked her glass against his and chuckled. "Sure." The dwarf sniffed and sipped his drink. "Right up there with justice." "Of course. And we're closer now than you were before you had a partner to help you track him." He looked thoughtfully at her. "I suppose we are." Lisa sniffed the whiskey tentatively, followed by a small sip. Her eyes widened and she swallowed and wheezed a cough. "Wow." "It gets better the closer you get to empty." She set her glass on the round marble coffee table and nodded. "I'll take your word for it." "What? Darlin', that whiskey's as good as my word. Don't let it go to waste now." Not knowing how to respond to that, she retrieved her tablet instead and pulled up the YouTube app. "Aw, what are you doin'?" "I want to see what everyone else has already watched today." She smirked. "Don't you?" "Nope." "Well, feel free to take a peek if you change your mind." All she had to type into the search bar was Johnny and Dwarf the Bounty Hunter's newest YouTube channel pulled up immediately. "Look at that. You're the first thing that comes up." "You sound way too happy about that." He downed the rest of his glass and popped the top off the bottle for a refill. "No, it's a good thing. Oh, my God." "What?" He drank more whiskey and couldn't bring himself to look at the tablet. "They put this up six hours ago, and it already has almost two million views." "Dammit." "Johnny, this is good." Lisa selected the highest-viewed video "teaser" for the show's post-retirement season and let the ad at the beginning play all the way through. "Everyone's watching." "That ain't never been a good thing." He glanced at the ad for some office networking software and snorted. "Why's that on there, huh? I ain't endorsin' anythin'." "It's only an ad. Okay, look. Here we go." The short video started with Pantera's "Domination" playing quietly in the background. Johnny sniffed. At least they got the heavy metal part right. "Do you have any concerns about your ability to find and apprehend this next bounty, given your previous record as a bounty hunter and then your rather long hiatus?" Phil spoke from behind the camera that had focused on Johnny, "Stephanie," and two hounds beside a drastically enlarged neon-pink flamingo. "I'm a dwarf. I coulda stayed outta the game for thirty years and still known exactly what I'm doin'." "What?" He scowled at the tablet. "I specifically remember more colorful language than that." "Which is why they voiced you over this shot." She pointed at the video, which changed to a wide, sweeping view of the swamp. Fortunately, that view stopped before the edge of the bounty hunter's home could come into view. "I aim to clean up and throw the bastard out with the trash." "Johnny doesn't discriminate." That was Lisa again, paired with a slow-motion clip of her as the redheaded Stephanie turning to shoot Johnny a winning grin. "Oh, jeez." She rolled her eyes. "Such a flattering way to take all that out of context." The bounty hunter chuckled. "I tell you what. That redhead's lookin' real sweet on me in that shot." "Oh, come on." "Naw, that ain't you, darlin'." He raised his glass at her again with a smirk. "I won't hold it against you." The sound of the hounds barking in the background rose from the speakers and faded away as if Rex and Luther had been caught on audio disappearing into the swamp. "Johnny." Rex trotted around the corner with his ears perked. "Is that us?" Luther barked sharply, ran into the living area, and his head darted from side to side as he searched the suite. "You bring other hounds in here and not tell us?" "It is us." "No way, Rex. I sound way bigger than that." "Join us for more sneak peeks of Dwarf the Bounty Hunter as Johnny Walker and his coonhounds take to the streets of Baltimore, sniffing out justice and taking out the trash." "What the fuck?" Johnny scowled at the video. "That ain't in the interview." The next image was a closeup of him, completely cutting out what had previously been captured of Luther pissing on the flamingo. "That about sums it up." The show's logo crashed into the center of the screen, the typography enhanced and animated with flames since the last time it had aired fifteen years earlier. Below it, smaller text appeared beside a pistol with an animated explosion bursting from the barrel—You don't want to miss all this action. Subscribe Now! "For cryin' out loud." The dwarf took another long pull of his whiskey. Lisa forced back a laugh and let the end of the video roll through to another short snippet the film crew had already posted. "Looking at this objectively, I'd say they did very well, although I can't help but notice it's only 'Johnny Walker and his coonhounds' and nothing about Stephanie." "What? Do you want ʼem to add, 'And his assistant?'" He grunted. "All the fancy images and puttin' in shit that ain't part of what they filmed. That asshole took a good thing and ruined it." "It's been fifteen years, Johnny. The show has to change with the times." "No, it don't." The next video started to play and he leaned sideways to swipe at the tablet and close out the YouTube app. "That's enough." "Johnny." Luther sat at his master's feet and stared at the tablet. "Hey. Were we in there? Were we on TV?" "I heard being on TV makes you look bigger. Like with tons of muscle and a longer tail," Rex added. "That true?" Johnny gave the hounds a warning glance. "Maybe it made him look bigger." "Naw, Johnny's already got enough muscle." When the dwarf turned toward Lisa, she was biting her lip in an attempt to hide a knowing smile. "What?" "I know you won't come out and say it, but I think you miss having that show on all the time." He rolled his eyes. "And Nelson up my ass every time a new episode aired? Naw. You're graspin' for straws." "You didn't film any federal cases, did you?" He avoided her gaze and knocked back the rest of his second drink. "Not that I recall." "Huh. Because it was so long ago." "Yep." "It's a good thing Phil put up all seven seasons on the YouTube channel as a refresher course—" "Don't you even think about it. If you wanna keep this partner arrangement, Lisa, you give me your word right now you ain't fixin' to watch all that behind my back." Her eyes widened and a slow grin spread across her lips. "There it is." "What?" "This partner arrangement. You're finally getting it, aren't you?" Johnny grunted and reached for the bottle of whiskey to pour himself another glass. "When I can use it as leverage? You bet."
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 8	They ordered room service for dinner with two extra pork chops for the hounds—as rare as the restaurant would make them—and went over the Senator Hugh case while they ate. Lisa poured herself another glass of the wine Johnny had grudgingly ordered at her request and leaned against the high-backed chair at the two-person dining table. "Okay, why do you still look like you bit into a lemon?" He took his last bite and chewed thoughtfully. "No, I don't." "Fine. Forget the lemon. What's on your mind?" Luther whipped his head up from where he'd been licking the pork chop plate clean for the last ten minutes. "If you don't want that lemon, Johnny, I'll take it." "Hey, what about more chops?" Rex licked his lips. "Those were amazing." The dwarf snapped his fingers and pointed away from the dining table. "Go on now, boys. There ain't nothin' left." "But she said lemon—" "Git." "Yeah, yeah, yeah." Johnny shook his head, took a sip of whisky, and looked at Lisa over the rim of the glass. "What?" "You look a little distracted, is all." She sipped her white wine delicately and gave him a patient smile. "Distracted. Well, hell. I have you sittin' across the table lookin' at me like that and two hounds who don't know when to quit." "Come on, Johnny," Rex protested and he and his brother padded into the huge separate bedroom for more exploring. "You've only been able to hear us for like— Wait. How long has it been?" "Forever?" Luther suggested. "That feels right." "And wrong at the same time." The bounty hunter heaved a sigh. Remember that those talkin' hounds saved your life and your sanity in those Portland tunnels. In and of itself, that makes up for everythin' else. So focus on the next. He thumped both forearms on the table and leaned forward to squint at his plate. "All right, darlin'. I'll talk." Lisa chuckled. "Well, that wasn't very hard." "You didn't even try, but I think your perspective ain't exactly somethin' I can afford to pass up." Johnny rubbed his temples vigorously. "Somethin's still sittin' not quite right about this whole 'filming a show' scenario." "Oh." She sipped her wine again. "Do you have any idea what that is?" "Well now, you showed me all that mumbo jumbo on the dark web with this asshole postin' as Lemonhead and tryin' to get his connections in with whatever idiots I bagged over a ten-year career of heavy hittin'." "I did." "The Red Boar's already got what he wanted, then. Ain't he? Aside from comin' after me." His frown deepened and he reached out absently to spin his dinner plate on the table. "It seems like we might end up wastin' more time than savin' it if you ask me." "Hmm. Well, how about I ask you this." Lisa leaned toward him and studied his face. "What are you trying to say?" Johnny looked slowly at her and froze. So I'm that easy to read now, huh? Damn. "I'm sayin' how do we even know the bastard's gonna be watchin' these shitty clips on that video site, huh? We're puttin' my mug and your…well, not your real face, but you're there. It's goin' up all over the Internet, however many idiots who still think I'm worth watchin' are tunin' in to watch again, and the Red Boar could be holin' up and schemin' with a group of even dumber criminals I apprehended however long ago. We have no guarantee." Her smile widened. "That's been on your chest all day, hasn't it?" "Huh." He sniffed and mumbled, "More like since you told me the plan." "Okay. I get that." She set her glass down and stood from the table. "But come on, Johnny. I know how to cover my bases." "I ain't sayin' you don't— Where are you goin'?" Her redheaded, green-eyed, freckled illusion returned and she pointed at the hall. "To Stephanie's room. And when I come back, you'll give me ten minutes to show you why you're letting this eat you up for nothing." She turned and disappeared swiftly around the corner of the living area to head toward the suite's door. It opened and shut again with a soft click, and Johnny could only stare at the empty kitchen. Huh. If I didn't know better, I'd say she's fixin' to take the lead on this. Except that ain't how partners do it. Right? He drummed his fingers on the tabletop and glowered at the empty plates from their dinner. Faint, rhythmic splashing came from the open doorway into the bedroom, followed by the hounds' whispered voices in the bounty hunter's mind. "Come on, bro. You're taking way too long." "I'm taking as long as I need to. You're supposed to keep watch." "Yeah. I'm watching you and you're taking too long." "You'll get your turn." "Boys?" Johnny turned in his chair and the splashing stopped. "Yeah, Johnny?" "What's up?" "I ain't gonna step in there and find y'all drinkin' outta somethin' that ain't made for mouths, am I?" Rex and Luther nudged the door open with a creak so they could trot nonchalantly out of the bedroom side by side. Luther chuckled. "Why would you find that, Johnny?" The smaller hound licked his muzzle but failed to catch the last few drops of water that spilled from the soaked underside of his furry chin. The dwarf raised an eyebrow. "It's a hunch and usually, I'm right." Rex lowered his head to lick the water drops off the floor. "All good, Johnny. Go ahead and look. You won't find anything in there you don't wanna see." "Uh-huh. Close the door." "What?" Luther looked behind him into the bedroom with pleading eyes. "It's nice in there, Johnny. Plenty of—hey." Rex nudged the door all the way shut with his nose and snorted. "No swamp out here Johnny. No tide pools either, so…" With a grunt, Johnny stood to walk toward the kitchen and check the large mixing bowl on the floor. "Well, I'll be. There sure is a nice big bowl of drinkin' water over here, though." "What?" Rex darted toward his brother to nip at Luther's neck. "You told me it was empty." "I thought it was." Johnny pointed at them and shook his head. "Stay outta toilets. Y'all are better than that." "We know that." Luther dodged another annoyed nip from his brother and darted across the living area toward the huge armchair. He spun in two tight circles and curled in a ball on the floor. "Didn't someone smart say life's not worth living if you don't fill it with experiences?" "That don't apply to the john, Luther." The dwarf ran a hand through his hair and sank into the fluffy cushions of the couch. "Don't do it again." "Got it, Johnny. No more toilets. Hey, but what if they're outside?" The steady lap of Rex drinking out of the actual bowl filled the suite. When Lisa knocked on his door again, she had her laptop under her arm and a pert smile aimed right at Johnny. "Let's get comfy." "For what?" "For your first lesson in what's possible these days with the technology you refuse to touch." "Come on, darlin'. I don't need to learn any of that." "Tough. I'm showing you anyway. Mostly because you need to see how solid this plan is, and then you can get your head back in the game. We still have a Kilomea blackmailer to go after tomorrow and a Johnny-Haters Anonymous meeting after that." He snorted. "Did you just come up with that one?" "I've been sitting on it for a while. This felt like the right time." With a smirk, she sat on the couch and patted the cushion beside her. "Come on." "Can't you simply tell me instead of making a big deal—" "Sure I can." She grinned. "But I won't." He sighed with a mixture of frustration and exasperation. "You're good." "I know." That drew a reluctant smile from him and he stopped to top his glass of whiskey off and retrieve her wineglass before he joined her on the couch. They both drank and Lisa opened her laptop to start his mostly willing lesson in modern technology, the Internet beyond Google, VPNs, and the dark web. "What does all that have to do with makin' sure this bastard thinks I'm the idiot?" "Basics first, Johnny." She grinned at him and pulled up a records search for her fake name—Stephanie Wyndom. He squinted at the screen, then leaned forward to get a better look when she turned it on her lap to face him. "Did you steal someone's identity, darlin'?" "Yep. I do it all the time." He looked sharply at her and she burst out laughing. "No, Johnny. Stephanie Wyndom isn't real and she never has been." "That's a hell of a rap sheet for someone who don't exist." "That's the point." Lisa scrolled through the hits her alias had pulled up—full name, birth date, and a photo of her nonexistent Florida driver's license. After that came multiple arrest records and case reports from Johnny bringing her in as a bounty. "Well, look at that." He sniggered. "Public intoxication, grand theft auto, and arson. She sure is a mixed bag, ain't she?" She nudged him with her elbow and took another sip of wine. "It's all part of the story. Stephanie had a substance abuse problem and cut a path of minor chaos across a few southern states in order to keep the habit going. And because she liked having nice things along the way." "You just come up with that too?" "No, but I like to think Stephanie thought she was classy." They both chuckled. "So here's the deal. Those old bounties of yours are getting together the night after tomorrow to brainstorm how to get some closure on all the grudges they hold against you. If I want in on that meeting, I have to send all this information to whoever sent me that link. And when they look up Stephanie Wyndom—because they will—they'll find this." Johnny raised his eyebrows and shrugged. "It looks legit to me." "Well, as far as the rest of the world and anyone on the Internet can tell, it is legit. We had one of the best teams put the background info together, enter it in all possible databases, and voila. She's a real half-Light Elf who had her joyrides and fleeting highs snatched out from under her by Johnny Walker." "Twenty-four years ago, huh?" "Well, it had to be before Dwarf the Bounty Hunter. Otherwise, she'd have her own episode to reference." "And there ain't none." "The Bureau's team is good, Johnny, but they're not that good." She scrolled through the rest of the documentation pulled up for Stephanie Wyndom and shrugged. "Whoever messaged me gave me five days to prove I'm legit. This'll get it done. And if the Red Boar and any of those other scheming thugs haven't heard about the show and the fact that you're in Baltimore for this next bounty, I'll make sure they hear about it at the meeting. Hell, maybe that alone will get the Red Boar to come out of hiding." "Uh-huh." He scowled as something occurred to him. "And what are you gonna tell ʼem when they see that redhead's face they've been watchin' on YouTube for days sittin' in front of ʼem?" "I'll think of something." Lisa downed the rest of her wine and grinned. "That's another thing we have in common, you know?" "What's that?" "Doing our best work on the fly." The dwarf snorted. "Sure. Only I do it with my fists. Or guns. Or explosives. And you…make up stories." "It sounds like the perfect team to me."
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 9	The next morning, Johnny and Lisa agreed to order room service separately to avoid a run-in with Phil and the film crew at the start of their day. The last thing I need is to have my damn breakfast plastered all over the Internet with who knows what that idiot tries to pull outta anything I say. If I can't start the day right, the rest is a wash. Lisa texted him a little after 9:00 am to ask if he was ready. "Time to get on, boys. We have a Kilomea to bring in this mornin'." "The big, hairy two-legs, Johnny?" "Those guys stink. Kinda like Luther after he rolls in some other animal's shit." "Hey, don't try to pretend I'm the only one." "Yeah, but you do it way more." "That's enough." With a grunt, the bounty hunter hauled his utility belt studded with exploding disks out of his duffel bag and strapped it on. "And yeah, it's the Kilomea. He's a low-level thug, so it shouldn't be anywhere near the hardest thing we've done. But make sure you stay sharp anyhow, understand?" "Got it, Johnny." "Any hairy bastard we see is an automatic suspect." "No. Only the one we're goin' after." "Right, right." "Hey, Johnny." Luther stuck his snout against the underside of the door and sniffed deeply. "Didn't we already order room service?" The dwarf snorted and marched toward the door. "Don't tell me y'all's memories keep gettin' shorter by the day." "I'm not. I'm wondering why it smells like food and shoes and—" "It's the TV people, Johnny." Rex yipped and sat to wait for his master to catch up. With a growl, Johnny rolled his eyes. "Get on out the way, boys. Pretend they ain't even there. They want a shot of the real thing, let ʼem have it." "Wait, you mean like rip their arms off?" "No, I think means don't rip their arms off this time." Luther scuttled away from the door. "Weird. Doesn't usually mean that. You sure, Johnny?" "Uh-huh." The bounty hunter opened the door, and both hounds raced into the hall and darted around crewmembers' legs and beneath equipment bags slung over shoulders. "Take your shot, TV guys!" Rex shouted and pranced in a wide circle. "You might not get another chance." "Hey, hey." Luther sniffed Cody's pockets. "If you share what you've got in there, I might be willing to do a private interview for ya. You know, only me. I could tell you things that'd make your pathetic excuse for hair stand on—whoa, whoa. Hey. Are those mints?" "Morning, Johnny." Phil grinned as Johnny stepped out of his hotel room and closed the door behind him. "Are you ready to head out on this next—" "To me, boys." He ignored the man altogether and headed across the hall and two doors down to Lisa's room. He knocked quickly on the door. "Time to go, darlin'. Your escort's here." He gave the film crew a begrudgingly accepting glance and muttered, "And the fellas with the cameras." Her door whipped open to reveal Stephanie, her strawberry-blonde curls tied in a loose ponytail. "Good morning, Johnny. I'm ready when you are." "Yep." He turned and stalked down the hall, followed closely by the fictional Stephanie, both hounds, and the filming crew. Clearing his throat, he leaned toward her and muttered, "Is Stephanie Wyndom carryin' this mornin'?" The agent smirked and stared straight ahead at the elevators at the end of the hall. "Absolutely. She has no permit, though." "She doesn't?" "It doesn't fit the profile, Johnny. Why?" "I'm makin' sure that if we find ourselves in a position that needs shootin', my redhead assistant has her ducks in a row." They reached the elevators, and he punched the call button before he glared over his shoulder at the film crew. "You know, ready for any situation." "I won't draw a weapon on the film crew." The elevator doors opened and he stepped inside with a shrug. "You never know what might happen." Howie was already in the lobby waiting for them when they arrived. With a wrinkled grin, he pushed up out of the armchair and thumped his cane down with both hands. "There he is." "Have you been waitin' down here long?" "Only as long as it took your team to get up to the fourth floor and wait for you to come out of hiding." The old man chuckled. "Did they get anything good?" "Only the cold shoulder." "Well, let's hope heading off after this Kilomea gives them a little something else to focus on, huh?" "I'm countin' on it, Howie." The Kilomea's name was Yarren Brork, according to the case file. Johnny slid behind the wheel of their rental—this one a black truck reminiscent of his four-by-four at home—with "Stephanie" up front, Howie in the back of the cab, and the two hounds in the bed. The second Johnny peeled away from the curb of the Sagamore, the film crew scrambled to get situated in their rented vans to follow without losing sight of him. He took a deep breath and draped his arm through the open driver-side window as he drove through downtown. "That's a breath of fresh air." "Smells more like fish," Luther said from the truck bed. He poked his head through the open back window of the cab and sniffed in Howie's hair. "Or maybe that's this guy." The old man laughed and ducked away from the hound's snout as he batted Luther's head aside. "What are you doing, huh? I may be old but I'm not senile. And no, you can't eat me." Johnny whistled sharply and gave the hound a warning glance through the rearview mirror. "Where's the first stop again?" "The house first, right?" Lisa asked. "Sure. It might be a long shot on a Wednesday mornin', but I'm feelin' optimistic." She laughed softly and pulled Yarren Brork's home address up on her phone's GPS app. "Do you want me to turn the navigation up?" His gaze flicked to her and returned to the road. "I never liked the sound of that robot lady's voice, to tell ya the truth. You could do a better job of it anyhow. If that suits ya." Lisa leaned away from him in surprise, unable to hide a smile. "Because you'd rather hear my voice telling you how many miles until the next turn?" He shrugged. "Howie ain't much of a co-pilot. So yeah. I suppose I would." "Johnny. Hey, Johnny." Rex thrust his head over the side of the truck bed. The wind whipped through his floppy ears and made his lolling tongue push across the side of his face. "The vans are catching up." "Ooh, are you gonna try to race them again?" Luther asked. "Everyone hang tight." The dwarf glanced in the rearview mirror at the hounds enjoying their windswept ride, then met Howie's gaze briefly through the reflection. Racin' was for the back roads in the middle of nowhere. I gotta keep it legit in the city. They reached Yarren's neighborhood in Dundalk fifteen minutes later, and he parked the truck along the curb on the opposite side of the street a block before the Kilomea's house. The film crew's vans followed suit, and Phil hopped out of the first one with a huge, energetic grin. "Here we go. Are you ready to see some action, people?" Johnny grimaced at the man. "Y'all aren't seein' any of that personally. You hear me? The action's mine." "Yes, and our job is to—" Phil jolted and stepped away when Rex snapped his jaws and uttered a low growl. "You must have a death wish, two-legs." "We can help you with that," Luther added and stared at the man over his shoulder as he and his brother followed their master down the street. "Our job," Howie said and clapped a hand on the startled director's shoulder, "is to stay out of the damn way and catch what we can on camera." "D-don't…tell me how to do my job." The director fixed the old man with a scathing glance. "Of course not. I'm merely reminding you of a few key details. Why don't you sit back and watch a vet on this show working in his element, huh?" "But I—" "Let's move!" Howie uttered a piercing whistle and waved his cane in the air to get the film crew's attention. "I want mics and cameras no closer than fifteen feet from him at all times, got it? Dwarf can move if he has to, but only if he has the space." "What about Stephanie?" someone asked. "Sure, get in close as long as you keep to those fifteen feet." He chuckled and hobbled after Johnny, Lisa, and the hounds. "It's a good contrast to have an easy face next to all that hairy red scowling." The Kilomea's house was exactly like every other smaller, older home in the most run-down neighborhood. A crooked fence bordering on rot, peeled and chipped paint on the siding, and the end of the gutter at the corner of the roof had twisted and now dangled a few inches below where it ought to have been attached. When they reached the front porch, Johnny rested a hand on the hilt of the utility knife at his belt and glanced at Lisa. "It's an easy bag." "Nothing to be nervous about." "I ain't nervous, darlin'. Only hopin' this Yarren ain't got some of the usual tricks and traps up his hairy-ass sleeve." She stepped away from the door and nodded. "You do your thing, Johnny. I've got your back. It merely won't be with a badge." "I've done most of my work without a fed and a badge so that's fine." Luther stuck his nose against the bottom of the front door and sniffed. "Definitely Kilomea in there, Johnny." "We could smell him from twenty feet away," Rex added. The dwarf nodded and knocked three times—hard enough to show the occupant he meant business. "Yarren Brork. Open up." When there was no reply or sound of movement from inside, the first thing he wanted to do was use a handful of his explosive beads to blow the doorknob and the lock off the door. And then we get the whole damn world watchin' me breakin' and enterin'. Shit. Instead, he knocked again and shouted, "I only wanna…talk." Luther cocked his head at the door. "Awful quiet in there, Johnny." "Maybe he's sleeping," Rex suggested. The bounty hunter scowled at the hounds. "Y'all said you can smell him." "Well yeah. Everyone's house smells like them." Lisa stepped off the front porch. "I'll see if I can get a look inside." "Yeah, okay." Johnny knocked again. "Yarren!" Moving across the front yard of mostly dirt scattered with a few patches of dead grass, "Stephanie" smiled at the second cameraman who stepped slowly toward her. "I'm merely trying to see who's home." "Stephanie," Phil called and pointed at her. "Don't talk to the camera unless—" Howie's cane whacked painfully against the younger director's shins. "Don't interrupt. Both of them have more experience in this than you. I can promise you that." Fuming, Phil stalked away from the old man and nodded for the second cameraman to follow Stephanie. As the hounds darted off to investigate the back yard sectioned off by a chain-link fence, Lisa rounded the side of the house and peered through windows either draped with sheer curtains or nothing at all. She doubled back to the front porch and shook her head. "I don't think he's home, Johnny. The carport's empty too." "Damn." "She's right," Luther called from the other side of the house. "And nothing out back but—squirrel! Hey! Rex, get it!" The chain-link fence jingled as the smaller hound pounced against it and barked furiously. "Dude, if you can't tell that's not a Kilomea, you should've stayed home." Rex trotted back down the side yard and ignored his brother's manic baying. Johnny whistled. "That's enough, boys. We ain't findin' him here." All Luther's noise stopped abruptly and he trotted to the front to rejoin his master. "Puffy-tailed bastard's laughing at me, Johnny." Rex snorted. "Probably 'cause you're not doing your job." "What? Hey, our job's to go after the hairy guy." "Not a squirrel." The dwarf strode down the narrow, cracked walkway in the center of the dead yard. "Next place to look?" "Well, it is mid-morning on a Wednesday." Lisa shrugged. "We could try his place of employment." "Uh-huh. That'll do." When Johnny reached the sidewalk, Phil jumped on the opportunity and practically accosted the bounty hunter. "So the man you're looking for isn't home. Is that right, Johnny?" "If it weren't, do you think I'd be fixin' to head out?" Phil nodded toward Cody who still rolled the camera. "What's next then? Do you have a plan for—" "Yeah. It starts with gettin' that damn camera outta my face." Johnny thrust a palm against the camera and jerked it down. The cameraman stumbled forward with a grunt. "Hey!" Phil shouted. "You can't—" "I wouldn't," Howie warned. "If you don't want Johnny to do something, don't tell him he can't." The director scowled at him. "So he gets free rein to do whatever he wants?" "Essentially, yes. It's part of what makes him so good at what he does." The old man smirked and hobbled down the street, his cane clicking on the sidewalk. "There's a reason I said fifteen feet." Cody exhaled an exasperated sigh and turned his camera to check for damage. "Keep it rolling," Phil snapped. "And get to the vans."
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 10	Yarren Brork worked at Canton Exports & Supplies in the Canton Industrial Area, which meant Johnny's appearance on the site—cameras or no—had a higher chance of making folks a little uneasy. He parked the truck at the far end of the lot and only waited for Lisa to join him before he stalked through the rows of other parked trucks and old sedans rusted and flaking from the saltwater and years spent driving on salted winter roads. "What does he do here again?" the bounty hunter muttered and leaned toward Lisa to be sure his voice didn't carry behind him toward the mics. Those damn cameras have me all jumpy. Who cares what I say? The agent darted him a sidelong glance but graciously picked up on his hesitation. "He's a shipment driver and has been at Canton Exports & Supplies for over twenty years." "All right. So a few decades of hard labor, livin' in a fallin' apart house in Dundalk, and he only now starts pickin' up blackmail as part of his daily routine?" She shrugged. "Maybe he's trying to pull himself up beyond his means." "With a senator's pockets. Might be." Johnny sniffed and headed around the side of the main building toward the sound of employee crews moving around, hard at work during what was still the beginning of a notably long shift. "Does that file say what Hugh was being blackmailed for?" "Brork's demands. They weren't all that specific." Lisa frowned at him. "Blackmail is blackmail, and when it's against a political figure with ties to the Bureau…" "Yeah, yeah. Real off-limits. I get it." They rounded the back of the building and stopped at the edge of the open work yard. The loading-bay doors were open, and the yard teemed with undisguised Kilomeas. There were half a dozen huge, muscular men among them who looked human, but the dwarf caught the glint of one man's eyes flashing silver when he glanced at the two partners. "Shifters, Johnny," Rex muttered and sniffed the air. "Six of ʼem," Luther added. "Maybe seven. Hey, how are we supposed to find one Kilomea in a whole horde of ʼem, huh? They all stink the same." "That's one reason I can talk and you can't." Johnny headed toward the workers hauling crates off the loading bays and stacking them in the backs of transport trucks. Lisa glanced at the hounds and shrugged. "I'm guessing that was aimed at you guys." "Lady, you have no idea." Rex trotted after his master and whipped his head from side to side as he entered the mass of workers. Luther sat and stared at Agent Breyer. "I know you can't hear us, but Johnny's got it all wrong. We can talk." "We should stick close, Luther. Come on." "Huh." The smaller hound stared after her as she made her way around the edge of the workers. "You sure you don't speak hound?" "I'm lookin' for Yarren Brork," Johnny said and raised his voice over the noise without technically shouting. "Is he in today?" "What's a dwarf doing here?" A Kilomea with a chunk of hair missing from his forearm stopped to study the bounty hunter. "You little guys are as strong as shit, I'll give you that. But most of these crates are half your size, man." A handful of workers chuckled as they continued with their loading and stacking. "I ain't here for a job," Johnny replied. "At least not doin' what you're doin'. Yarren works here, don't he?" "As far as I know." A shifter with his uniform button-up removed and tied around his waist hefted another crate in his arms and grunted. "He didn't come in today, though." "How come?" "Beats me." Johnny grunted and scanned the work yard. "Is the foreman in today?" The working magicals chuckled and didn't pause in their hauling, stacking, grunting, and sweating. Another Kilomea turned his head toward one of the open loading docks and bellowed, "Rocky! Got a dwarf out here asking for ya!" "And a pretty little extra." The shirtless shifter slowed on his path past Lisa and studied redheaded Stephanie with undisguised appreciation. "You lost, sweetheart?" She grinned at him. "Not at all, but you might be if you keep looking at me like that." The workers burst out laughing. "It looks like you're losing your touch, Omar." "Shit, son. I'd back away from that redhead real quick. Nothin' but trouble." "Feisty." The shifter winked at her and sniggered. "I like it." Boots thumped slowly across the closest loading dock, and Johnny looked up as a massive Kilomea descended. His eyeteeth were grotesquely crooked and a scar zigzagged from the top of his head down the side of his face before it hooked under his square, fur-covered jaw. The huge magical folded his arms, the same uniform button-up as his workers rolled halfway up his forearms. "What?" Johnny acknowledged him with a nod. "Are you Rocky?" "Yeah." "I'm lookin' for Yarren." A low growl escaped the forearm's throat and his shaggy fur ruffled in the warm, muggy breeze blowing across the work yard. "He called in today. Yesterday too. Personal issues." "Yeah, that's one way to put it." "Hey, aren't you that bounty hunter?" A shifter asked and pointed at Johnny before he hefted another crate. "The one with the show, yeah?" "Are you a fan?" the dwarf asked. "Not really." "Good." "It looks like he brought the whole damn crew with him, though." A Kilomea with thick black hair tied in a topknot nodded toward the side of the building. "Boss?" Rocky hopped off the end of the loading bay with a loud thump. Luther skittered away from the huge magical and snorted. "Jeez. Look where you're stepping, huh?" The foreman peered around the side of the building to see Cody and Dave inching toward the work yard, followed by the rest of the crew. He shook his head. "No cameras." "It's part of the show returning," Lisa said and stepped toward him. "You can request that we keep everyone's identity anonymous if you like. Blurred faces and everything—" "No cameras." The bounty hunter smirked. "I'm right there with you, brother. Get back to the lot." Cody stepped forward and turned to pan the camera. "Man, you got shit in your human ears?" Rocky stormed toward the cameraman with another growl. Cody stepped back but didn't stop filming. "You want us to step in Johnny?" Rex asked. "Yeah, we'll chase off anyone. I'll get the big guy. He almost squashed me." "Naw, let ʼem work it out." Johnny folded his arms and tried not to grin. "This is private property," Rocky roared, "and I don't give a shit about your home videos. Keep moving." Howie uttered a piercing whistle. "Everyone out front!" Phil stared at Rocky with wide eyes, then gestured around him toward the work yard full of magicals without any illusion at all. "Do you know how many shots there are of businesses with nothing but magicals working out of—ow! Jesus, what are you doing?" Howie yanked the man by the ear and turned toward the front of the building. "It's either my hand on your ear or your arm ripped out of its socket, Phil. Would you prefer the other option?" "Ah-ah-ah!" The director shrieked as Johnny's old friend yanked him away. Then, Howie banged his cane against the chain-link fence lining the driveway behind the building. "Let's go, people. We can catch Johnny on his way out." Cody kept filming but almost dropped the camera when Rocky lurched toward him again and pounded a fist into his other hand. The man tucked his equipment protectively under his arm and turned to scatter with the rest of the crew. "Pain in my ass," the foreman growled. "All of ʼem." The dwarf nodded. "On a different day, I reckon you and I would get along just fine." Rocky grunted and turned toward him. "Why are you lookin' for Yarren?" The bounty hunter spread his arms as if to indicate that the answer was obvious. "Bounty. I'm tryin' to do my job like the rest of y'all. He's been out for two days?" The Kilomea's tongue flicked against one of his crookedly protruding teeth. "Yep. He hasn't called off a shift in ten years so I assumed it was something important. What did he do?" "Trying to change his circumstances, I reckon." "There's nothing wrong with his circumstances." "Did he say anything about why he took the personal days?" Lisa asked and stepped toward them. "Any sign that something was off before he called in yesterday?" Rocky turned toward her and studied her in an offhand way. "You practicing to play a cop role in that movie of yours?" She lowered her head and pressed her lips together to suppress a smart quip. "I'm simply curious." "Who are you?" "My assistant." Johnny cleared his throat and raised a hand to warn Lisa to hold off. "But she's on the right track with the questions." Rocky growled. "He's a good worker and never complains about a shift or a heavy load. Always shows up to clock in and stays late if he has to. But times are hard." "How's that?" "If you can't tell by looking around, dwarf, you're not gonna find it." The Kilomea hawked and spat at the chain-link fence. "Whoa!" Luther darted toward the slimy projectile but stopped short when Johnny snapped his fingers. "Do you have any idea where we might find him?" "Someone's paying you to take him in for something, huh?" "I'm tryin' to do my job." "Yeah." Rocky shook his head and turned to stride toward the loading bays. "I got nothing else to say." Johnny wrinkled his nose and shrugged. "Then we're done here. Fellas." He nodded at the magical workers who had watched the exchange between the bounty hunter and their foreman. Some of them nodded in return. A few cast crooked smiles and winks at the redheaded Stephanie, but most simply returned to their work. Lisa followed him down the drive toward the front parking lot. "You didn't try very hard to get more information." He shrugged. "Yarren's boss ain't gonna give him up just like that if he has no reason to doubt the guy. And I ain't fixin' to take on a squad of hairy bastards and half a dozen shifters so they can tell me they don't know where he is. These are workin' folks, darlin'. They ain't done nothin' wrong as far as I can tell." "I agree with you there." She looked over her shoulder, but the open yard behind the building was now out of view. "But something doesn't feel quite right." "Because those fellas ain't fixin' to turn in one of their own?" "No. Because the foreman said Brork hasn't called in or missed a shift in ten years. So the guy's been visiting Senator Hugh on his own time after work to make his threats." "Maybe it's somethin' of a weekend hobby, then." "Sure." She frowned. "But blackmailing a senator repeatedly takes considerable guts, time, and planning. Not to mention the fact that Hugh's statement in the case file said Brork's been after him for weeks. And the guy starts missing work only now?" "It might be he's startin' to crack down a little harder. So we showed up at the right time." When they reached the lot, Phil clapped and twirled a finger in the air for the film crew to get everything in their next shot. Rex growled when one of the team moved toward them. "You heard the old guy, two-legs. Fifteen feet." Luther went straight up to Cody and snarled, which made the cameraman step back quickly despite the fact that he kept rolling with the camera centered on Johnny and Lisa. "Hey, Johnny. Did we get upgraded to bodyguard status? I'll chase him anyway. Just say the word." The dwarf forced himself to not look at either of the two cameras closing in on him and Agent Breyer as they returned to the rental truck. "The bounty's not at home and not at work," Phil shouted and jogged in a wide circle around the cameras and mics and low-growling hounds. "Where will you look for him next?" Johnny stopped beside the truck, jerked the driver's door open, and grunted. "You'll have to keep up and find out."
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 11	Senator Richard Hugh lived in Guilford, and after the case file's description of Yarren Brork's multiple visits to the senator's home in the last few weeks, that seemed like the next best place to look. Johnny killed the truck's engine in front of Hugh's large, Victorian-style house and nodded. "If the Kilomea ain't inside, I reckon Mr. Senator will be more'n happy to illuminate whatever we're missin'." "Do you think he'll know where Brork is?" "Maybe." He shut his door, whistled for the hounds to jump out of the truck, and hooked his thumbs through his belt loops as he started up the clean, smooth driveway. "Not that I trust a word comin' from a politician's mouth, but there's an art to readin' between the lines." The doors of the film crew's vans rumbled shut as everyone took their places to follow Johnny toward the front door. "Stop, stop, stop." Howie pointed at them with his cane. "Not here." "This is part of the show, old man—" "Sure. If you want to get your asses majorly sued by a Maryland-raised senator. Turn the cameras off." Howie snapped his fingers at Cody. "I mean it." "And how are we supposed to get enough for this episode?" Phil blustered. "If we keep getting told to turn the cameras off, we won't have anything to—" "Oh, come on and quit your yammering." The old man rolled his eyes. "We stay here, and I'll make sure Johnny stops to answer some questions before we move on. Fair enough?" Phil rolled his eyes and scowled at Johnny, Stephanie, and the hounds walking up the driveway. "All right. Everyone stays. Keep the senator's house out of it. We'll wait." "Whoa-ho-ho, Johnny." Rex sniffed at the rows of hedges along the driveway. "This place has everything." "It's huge." Luther snapped at a small white butterfly flittering from flower to flower in the bushes. "Hey, if we get this Kilomea, do you think the two-leg who lives here will be grateful enough to give us snacks?" "Only way to thank a hound, Johnny." "Yeah, and belly rubs." "Heads in the game, boys." Johnny's boots thudded onto the wide covered porch with a two-person swing hanging from chains at the far end. "We're here for a chat. If Yarren happens to be here at the same time, we'll catch him in the—" "Back up, asshole!" The muffled shout came from inside. "This will not go well for you if you don't start listening!" Johnny pounded on the door with a fist. "Richard Hugh?" Someone roared inside the house, followed by the thump and bump of a scuffle before something shattered. "Hey! What the hell? This wasn't part of the deal—" A gunshot went off, and Johnny snorted. "Fuck privacy, then." He pulled two black explosive beads from his pocket, crushed them, and stuck them on either side of the doorknob. When they detonated, the brass knob popped in its setting. He kicked the door in before the piece of hardware landed on the porch. Out on the street, Phil circled his finger in the air and took off running. "We gotta get this, people. Let's go!" Johnny and Lisa raced inside and the hounds darted through the foyer with them. "Definitely Kilomea here too, Johnny." "Yeah. Unless it's the senator." Johnny turned at the sound of light footsteps trailing behind him. Cody darted through the doorway first, his camera rolling, quickly followed by Dave with the boom and two other crewmembers trying to squeeze through all at the same time. "Do you have any brains at all? This is real violence. Get the fuck outta here!" Two more shots were fired at the back of the house, followed by more shouts. Johnny sneered at the film crew, then spun to race toward the noises with Lisa and the hounds. "Get him down, man!" "This fucker's lost his mind!" "Drop the gun. Hey, hey—" Removing her Stephanie illusion, Lisa drew her firearm from her shoulder holster beneath her lightweight overshirt. The second she and Johnny reached the end of the long hallway and darted into the massive living room in the back, she raised her weapon and shouted, "FBI! Drop your weapon and put your hands in the air!" "Get them!" The shouting man pointed at two Kilomea and a half-wizard fuming at him from across the living room. "Get those animals out of my house!" "Animals? You're the one who—" "Hey!" Lisa shouted. "I said drop your weapons!" But there were no weapons to be dropped. The only firearm lay in the center of the living room between the portly Senator Hugh and his blackmailers. The half-wizard hissed and summoned a fireball in one hand before he hurled it toward Hugh. Lisa's fireball was faster and struck the assailant in the wrist to make his attack fly wild. His spell streaked into the bookshelf behind the senator's head and he turned toward her with a snarl. Both Kilomea roared and turned toward Johnny and the hounds. "We got ʼem, Johnny." "Which one's the one we want?" "Which one of you is Yarren?" Johnny shouted. The closest Kilomea with flecks of white tipping the fur around his face charged and swung a huge fist to knock the bounty hunter aside. He ducked and spun behind the giant magical to deliver a perfectly aimed blow to his kidney. The other blackmailer bellowed and flailed, dragging Luther through the air by the hound's jaws clamped around his wrist. His opposite leg kicked out and struggled against Rex's vicious grip as the bigger hound whipped his head and jerked his target's ankle in every direction. Lisa ducked another fireball from the half-wizard and raised her firearm again. "This isn't the way you want to go! Hands up!" Rather than comply, he darted behind the long white leather sectional and hurled a fireball at Johnny. The dwarf yanked the detonating beads out of his pocket, crushed a handful, and slapped some of the gooey substance on the back of the white-tipped Kilomea's legs and the rest on his huge back before he leapt away, drew his utility knife, and flicked it open. In a series of sputtering pops, the crushed beads detonated one by one and threw the large magical forward with a grunt. He collided with the glass coffee table and shattered it to spill shards over the Persian rug and the wooden floors. Ducking another fireball, Johnny raced after the downed Kilomea, leapt onto his back, and wrapped a thick forearm around his target's throat. He pressed the tip of the blade against the side of his neck and leaned down to mutter, "If you ain't Yarren, I ain't here for you." "What the hell do you want?" "Ah, shit!" The second Kilomea stumbled back into the half-Elf, still flailing with two fifty-five-pound coonhounds attached to his limbs. Both magicals fell in a pile of fur, teeth, and grunts. Rex and Luther leapt off him and skittered out of the way before they turned to snarl, their hackles raised. "Can't crush us that easily, man." "Yeah." Luther licked his muzzle repeatedly and snorted. "But I think you might have fleas." "Don't move." Lisa hovered over the recovering half-wizard and the hound-bitten Kilomea. "I mean it." "We almost had it taken care of," the half-wizard snarled. "And you fucked the whole thing up." Johnny looked at the guy and flexed his arm around the Kilomea's throat. This big guy had better be the right guy. Instinct told him it was Yarren. "Sure. Y'all almost had the senator murdered right here in his home. Is that what you were takin' care of?" "What?" The downed Kilomea raised his hands in surrender to Lisa's firearm and shook his head. "Man, you have this whole thing—" "These brutes have been stalking me for the last three weeks!" Hugh shouted and fumbled with his thin-framed glasses to straighten them on the bridge of his nose. "Take care of it!" "Well, hold on now." Johnny turned to Hugh and flicked the point of his blade toward him. "We have this under control, Senator. You let us—" "If they're still breathing, it isn't under control!" Hugh stormed across the living room and snatched the wayward pistol off the floor. His house shoes crunched across the shattered glass of his coffee table as he approached Johnny and the Kilomea he'd tackled. The man lifted the gun toward the Kilomea's head and thumbed the hammer back. "I can't even pay someone to do a job the right way." "Johnny, watch out!" Luther ran up the seated Kilomea's back and launched off the magical's shoulders toward the angry senator. The dwarf rolled aside, ducked beneath Hugh's outstretched arm and the pistol at the end of it, and delivered a sharp blow to the underside of the man's forearm. The weapon jerked up to the ceiling and fired to rain plaster and wooden splinters around the living room. Luther's front paws landed on the senator's chest a second before Johnny disarmed the man with a deft twist of his wrist. The firearm skittered across the floor and took shards of glass with it. "And stay down!" Rex shouted from behind the couch as Luther landed on Senator Hugh's chest. The impact knocked the man's glasses completely off his face, and he wheezed at the extra weight pinning him down. "Point a gun at the wrong two-leg again, asshole, and you'll get much more than that!" Luther snarled in the man's face and snapped his jaws an inch from the senator's nose. "That's enough." Johnny snapped his fingers, and the hound stepped off the wheezing man's chest. When the Kilomea behind him stirred, the bounty hunter turned sideways and pointed his knife at the magical's throat again. "You too. Every one of y'all's lost your damn minds." Groaning, Hugh slapped the ground beside him until he finally found his glasses and fumbled with a shaking hand to put them on. "You," he seethed at Johnny. "You're the one they sent?" "Maybe. And you're the one who should be grateful for a hand, not reachin' for someone else's gun to shoot a guy when he's down." "That's his gun!" the half-wizard shouted. "He pulled it on us." Johnny glanced at Lisa and nodded. "Go ahead and check ʼem, darlin'." "Arms up." With one hand, Lisa kept her service weapon trained on the half-wizard. With the other, she patted him down, then gestured with her weapon for him to stand back. "You too, big guy." The second Kilomea nursed his hound-shredded forearm as he rose to his feet with a grunt and slowly raised both arms. "We didn't come here to shoot anyone. Honest." "Someone had to take it to a whole new level," the half-wizard muttered and glared at Hugh. "They're clean," Lisa said. "All right, enough." Johnny reached toward the senator and offered him a hand up. The man scoffed and pushed to his feet without assistance. "Every single one of you can't send your kind to do anything right the first time. Hell, not even the second or third time." Johnny blinked at him. "What was that?" "You heard me. Even the damn FBI's been compromised. And now you're taking the side of these brainless, invading ingrates!" "You piece of shit," Yarren roared and launched himself toward the senator, both hairy, claw-tipped hands stretched toward the man's throat. "Hey!" Johnny punched the Kilomea in the gut and whipped his knife up to point the tip at Senator Hugh's throat. "Now I'm here to keep y'all from tearing each other apart. And I ain't gettin' paid for that." Hugh snarled at him. "Do your job." "Oh, sure. I aim to do exactly that, Senator, and without you gettin' in the way. Luther. Keep an eye on our host." "You got it, Johnny. He tries anything funny, I'll jump him again." "Ha-ha." Rex barked behind the couch. "'Cause you jumped on him." "You got it over there, darlin'?" Johnny nodded at Lisa. "Yeah." She adjusted her grip on the pistol. "Rex has my back." "You know it, lady." "Anyone moves," the dwarf added, wagging a finger from Hugh to the three magicals who'd invaded the man's home, "I can't promise that any of y'all are leavin' this house in one piece. Understand?" No one responded, but that was all the answer he needed. With a grunt, he headed down the hall toward the garage. "W-where are you going?" Yarren growled after him. "Findin' a way to make sure everyone's comfortable. We're gonna hunker down and have us a little chat. Sit tight."
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 12	"Whoa, Johnny." Rex sniffed the leg of the solid oak dining chair and sniggered. "When you said sit tight, you meant literally." The dwarf grunted as he finished tying the thick knot of rope behind the chair, which groaned at the sharp tug. The unidentified Kilomea seated in it grimaced and stretched his hands where they'd also been tied behind his back. "Do you think you can go any tighter?" "You're a big fella." He slapped a hand on the magical's shoulder and nodded. "I'm sure you've been through worse." He dusted his hands off and glass crunched as he crushed it beneath his heavy boots when he moved across the living room. Now that everyone was secure, he dropped onto the cushion of the expensive leather couch and crossed one leg over the other. "There. Now you have got a fair chance to say what needs to be said without tossin' around fists or spells." His next pointed look was aimed at the senator. "Or bullets." Hugh struggled against the rope tying him tightly to his chair. "This is outrageous! You people broke into my home, damaged my property, and now you're interrogating me like I'm one of your suspects?" Strapped to the chair beside him, the half-wizard inclined his head toward the senator and muttered, "Technically, you're the only person in the room." "Don't argue semantics with me, you low-life alien scum." "Whoa, now." Johnny slung an arm over the back of the couch and raised his eyebrows. "It sounds like someone has a few things to say about magicals. And it ain't pretty." "You have no idea who you're messing with, you pathetic excuse for a—" "Luther." The smaller hound darted toward the senator and nipped lightly at the man's ankle with a snarl. Hugh shrieked and tried to lurch away, but the rope held him firmly. "That means stop talking, numbnuts." "I think we've had enough outta you for the moment, Senator. What d'ya think, darlin'?" Johnny turned toward Lisa who was seated beside him on the couch. She tapped the barrel of her service weapon against her thigh and tilted her head. "I think Senator Hugh has had his say, yes. At least, we know his side of the story." "We sure do." The dwarf pointed his knife-tip at Yarren, who sat strapped to the fourth chair at the end of the half-circle Johnny had positioned them in. "If you have somethin' to say, now's the time." Yarren's eyes widened, and he glanced at the half-wizard beside him, then his fellow Kilomea on the other side of Senator Hugh. He exhaled a massive sigh that ruffled the white-tipped ends of his thick facial hair. "It wasn't supposed to happen like this." The bounty hunter snorted. "A sentiment shared by every fella findin' himself tied up in someone else's livin' room. So what's the deal, huh? 'Cause the way I heard it, you've been terrorizin' Senator Hugh here for a little longer than only the last few days. And someone mentioned blackmail." Hugh scoffed. "Don't say it like it's so blasé—" "One more word outta you until I say, Senator, and you'll be sharin' that chair with my hound." "Yeah. On your back," Luther added with a low growl. "But the rest of y'all, feel free to chime in whenever it feels convenient." Soft, slow footsteps whispered down the hall. Cody appeared first with his camera, followed by his sidekick with the boom, Alicia with the bandana, Phil, and two other crewmembers. Howie's cane clicked across the wood, and when he peered around the corner and saw Johnny on the couch, he spread his arms and shrugged. Lisa immediately pulled her Stephanie illusion up and slipped her service pistol into its holster. "Who are those people?" Hugh demanded. "Get them out of here! This is my home. You're on private property." Johnny sniggered. "Naw, they can stay. I think it's a good idea to get all this on film anyhow." "What the hell for?" The senator jerked against the ropes, tried feebly to free himself, and failed miserably. "No one said anything about you filming your sick little freakshow!" "Oh, you ain't seen my show?" Johnny shrugged. "Huh. Your loss. Now, fellas. I believe you were ʼbout to get down to it, yeah?" "We might as well get it over with, Yarren," the half-wizard muttered. "We're strapped to fucking chairs and I don't see another way out." "Percy?" The other Kilomea sighed heavily. "We don't have a choice, man." Yarren nodded slowly and closed his eyes for a moment. "Fine. This whole thing started when we heard about some of the new bills this senator was tryin' to get passed. They were only at the Maryland level, sure, but I live here. We all live here, and I couldn't simply sit back and wait for these politicians to start overturning lives left and right. We deserve as much of a chance as the next guy. It doesn't matter where we're from." Lisa and Johnny exchanged a glance, and she leaned slightly forward on the couch. "What bills?" "It's fucking segregation is what it is," Percy growled. "What is?" Johnny asked. "This douchebag and all his stuck-up political bozo friends wanna make slaves outta magicals in this state—" "That's absurd!" Hugh shouted. "You're still getting paid—a-ah!" Luther jumped into the senator's lap and snapped in the man's face. "Strike one!" "Get this mongrel off me!" "Johnny, what's a mongrel?" The dwarf ignored his hound and the senator and focused instead on the disgruntled magicals' story. "Keep talkin'." "The bill would pay magicals half state minimum wage. Max." "Now, I know the two of y'all Kilomeas are some fairly hairy fellas as all Kilomeas are." Johnny scratched the side of his face and squinted at them. "But y'all have illusions at your disposal, don'tcha? Spells or whatever the hell does it." "Sure we do," Percy replied with a slow nod. "But an illusion doesn't do shit if every employer in the state gives a mandated blood test to every damn worker—the kind that identifies whether or not you have magic in that blood. Understand?" Johnny leaned toward Lisa and muttered, "Do you know about anythin' like that?" "It's the first I've heard of it." "Huh." He studied Yarren carefully. "That don't sound like an appetizin' new bill to me, man. I'll give you that much. But comin' to the senator's house now and again to give him a little shakedown ain't the way to change lawmakin'." "That's not what happened," the Kilomea protested. "Don't you dare try to worm your way out of this." Hugh seethed helplessly. "All the evidence is stacked against you. The FBI sent this damn dwarf here to take you away and get you out of my hair. If you were innocent, they wouldn't have—" "This damn dwarf said enough outta you, Senator." Johnny whistled, and Luther jumped into the man's lap again and this time, toppled him backward. Hugh shrieked when his head and his twisted hands behind his back met the wood floor. "D-don't! Don't l-let that filthy animal touch me!" "Who are you talking about, huh?" Luther hopped back and growled in the senator's face. "Me or one of these other guys? Either way, you'd be wrong." "Yeah, we're hounds, dipshit!" Rex added with a bark, although he stayed between Johnny and the three magicals tied to their chairs around Hugh. The dwarf gestured toward Yarren. "Keep talkin'." "I went to his office first," the Kilomea continued. "I made an appointment and everything and brought the petition we'd made up with signatures from the guys at Canton Exports & Supplies and nine other companies up north. All of us are hard-labor workers, regular magicals simply trying to live our lives." "We had a few thousand signatures too," the half-wizard added. "Once we got friends and neighbors to pitch in." "The first thing Senator Hugh asked me when I stepped in his office was whether or not I belonged here." Yarren glared at the senator's feet dangling over the edge of the upturned chair. "Whether I was human. I'm not gonna lie about who I am to anyone and he turned me out for it without even getting to the petition at all." Hugh growled indignantly. "It's not your place—" "Shut up!" Johnny roared. He tossed his utility knife at the man's head, and the tip buried itself a quarter of an inch into the wood floor just shy of Hugh's right ear. "That ain't a miss, Senator. That's a warning." The man's face drained of all color and he stared at the ceiling. "So you came to blackmail this bigoted human thinkin' he'd kill the pay-cut bill?" "No, man. The guy sent someone after my family." Yarren shook his head. "That's where I draw the line." "How exactly?" Lisa asked. "They caught my brother as he was coming off work. Two assholes in suits beat the living shit out of him and gave him a message for me—that Senator Hugh said to drop the petitions and stay the hell out of politics." Percy shook his head and growled. "Fucker." Johnny's eye twitched. "Is that it?" "No. We found the guys who beat Maurice and followed ʼem—me, Percy, and Evan. You might not think it, but Ev's pretty decent with a camera." "Good enough. The newspapers will pay for a few shots, I bet," Evan added with a gruff nod. "This asshole's goons beat seven different magicals to a pulp in the last three weeks," Yarren continued. "We have shots of ʼem all and pics of his victims too—the ones who are trying to stand up for their right to be here like we are." "Until we pounded those bastards' faces into the cement." Percy growled with satisfaction. "Yeah. We finally got ʼem." Yarren swallowed thickly. "And we came here to talk to this poor excuse for a leader in person and show him the pictures. We tried to tell him we know what was happening and would go to the press if he didn't do something about it." "That piece of shit pulled a gun on us," Evan shouted. "We don't even have guns." "He doesn't give a fuck about what happens to any of us," Percy added. "We came to make this peaceful, man. And he doesn't wanna listen." "Senator?" Johnny turned slightly on the couch cushion to stare at the soles of the man's house shoes. "Now would be the time for you to say somethin'." "You'll all be behind bars when I'm done with you!" Hugh spat the words with ugly virulence. "And I'll shoot these fucking dogs myself." Luther cocked his head. "Okay, see, I still can't tell who you're talking about." "I think I've heard everythin' I need to hear." Johnny stood from the couch and strode toward the senator's overturned chair. He squatted beside the man's head that glistened with beads of sweat and fixed him with a hard look. "You made your bed on this one, didn't ya?" "I'm protecting the good people of Maryland from being taken advantage of. You Oriceran freaks have magic. What the hell do you need money for?" The dwarf sniggered. "You'd hate to see my place back home." He grasped the back of Hugh's chair and hefted it upright again. The man yelped in surprise and the chair creaked beneath him. Johnny bent down to take hold of his utility knife and jerk it out of the floor. "Oh! That's the best damn decision you've made since you got here," Hugh snapped. "Not get these goddamn ropes off me." Johnny stepped toward Evan and sliced through the ropes binding the half-wizard to his chair. "Go on. Get up." "For real?" The bounty hunter cut Yarren and Percy free as well and nodded toward Lisa. "Y'all are gonna hand over your numbers to this good-lookin'…redhead over here." She looked up at him with wide eyes. "They are?" "You bet. In case we need to contact y'all in the future." "Um…what?" Yarren stood slowly and the severed ropes dropped around his body as he stared at Johnny. "You came here for me, didn't you?" "Sure. But what I got was the truth. I see no reason to take y'all in as peaceful as y'all have been. Well, for the most part. And whoever has those photos needs to send ʼem along when y'all finish exchangin' numbers, understand?" "Yeah." The Kilomea glanced at his friends as they all moved slowly toward Lisa, frowned at each other in confusion, and rubbed their wrists. "I… Thanks, man. I don't know what else to say." "You've said enough. Sorry y'all had to be tied up for anyone to hear it." "I want all of you out of my house." Hugh snarled with barely suppressed rage. "This is a violation—" "Y'all get in here and get a good shot of this magical-hater, huh?" Johnny pointed at the senator with his blade, then flicked the utility knife shut and returned it to his belt. "As close as you like. Maybe even get that pulsin' vein in his temple." Without waiting for anyone else's permission, Cody stepped nimbly across the broken glass to zoom in on Senator Hugh. The man tried to jerk away from the camera but was held fast in his chair. "Let me out, dwarf!" "Naw. You need some coolin'-off time to think about your choices." The bounty hunter stepped past the film crew and nodded once at Yarren and his buddies who shared their numbers with Lisa. "It's time to get on, boys." "Aw, Johnny. Can't I at least bite a chunk out of him?" Luther snarled at Hugh, then darted out of Cody's way. "What about his gun, Johnny?" Rex asked as he leapt onto the leather sectional and trotted down the length of it. "He wasn't using it the right way." Johnny snapped his fingers and waved for his hounds to catch up without turning to look at them. "Untie me this instant!" the senator bellowed. "This is why none of you deserve the same rights. You're monsters." The dwarf snorted. "You…you can't do this!" "Watch me." He threw the knob-less front door open with a bang and stepped out onto the front porch.
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 13	After Lisa got all the information she needed from the magicals Johnny had deemed perfectly innocent, she joined him on the sidewalk beside their rental car. Yarren, Percy, and Evan hurried down the street toward their vehicle and glanced over their shoulders. The half-wizard raised a hesitant hand in thanks and farewell, and he nodded. "Johnny." "Lisa." She turned toward him and folded her arms. "You took a federal case and flipped it completely on its head." "Uh-huh." "The Department will lose their shit when they see this report." He glanced at her and sniffed disdainfully. "I'm the one callin' the shots, darlin'. I always have been and always will be." "That's not the way they see it." "I ain't worried ʼbout how they see it. And I ain't workin' for the Department. I work for myself. I sure as shit didn't come out of retirement to be the Bureau's lapdog." Lisa raised an eyebrow. "You won't get paid for a bounty you don't bring in either." "If I did, it'd make me as bad as Senator Earthist in there." Despite the odd turn of events, she couldn't hold back a laugh. "Earthist?" "Well, it ain't entirely racist, is it? If he had his way, you and I would both be outta here with every other magical." "Huh." She glanced at the front door of Hugh's house as the last of the film crew hurried down the long driveway and gathered beside their vans, waiting for the next adventure. "You could probably coin that phrase, you know." "I don't want nothin' to do with it. But I do wanna take a look at those photos Yarren and his pals snapped of Hugh's muscle. Did you get those?" "They told me I'd get an email later today. Is this something you want to take to the Department?" "With recorded proof of their story and the senator makin' an even bigger ass of himself? Sure." "Well, that little snippet of video has you letting three magicals—including the bounty you were sent after—go free while you left a senator tied up in his living room." Johnny snorted and stepped around the front of the rental truck to open the driver's door. "Let ʼem see, darlin'. I don't give a damn ʼbout what the Department might make of it." They both climbed into the cab and he looked in the rearview mirror at Rex and Luther sniffing the open bed. "Besides, the whole damn Bureau owes me much more than lookin' the other way on this. I ain't opened my mouth about Dawn's murder and Operation Deadroot and the fact that they let me think her murderer was walkin' round free for fifteen years. They'll be gettin' a helluva bargain when we're done in Baltimore." "Oh, yeah?" Lisa closed her door and buckled up. "You bet. A two for one special. The Red Boar on a silver platter and the video of Senator Asshole incriminatin' his own damn self. Maybe then they'll stop sendin' me bullshit cases with the wrong name fillin' in that blank line under Bounty." "And that's all you want?" He shrugged and started the engine. "After we're done here, I reckon I could ask for whatever I want simply to keep them thinkin' they have me in their pockets." "Like what?" "I dunno yet. I'll hafta think about it." The back door to the cab opened and Howie's cane thunked onto the back seat. With a groan, the old man pulled himself into the cab and flopped down with a heavy sigh. "Well, wasn't that exciting?" "It's been a while for you, huh?" Johnny smirked at him through the rearview mirror. "Something like that. Listen, Johnny. I told that over-eager director that I'd get you to stick around and do another Q&A after you were done with this house." "Why'd the hell you tell him that?" "Well, mostly to get him to stay the hell out of your way." "Huh." Johnny leaned toward his window and looked through the side mirror. Phil stood in front of his van and saw the dwarf looking at him. He spread his arms. "It'll be quick!" "But they didn't stay outside until we were done." He shrugged. "So you're off the hook with your promise. I think they have enough for a whole extra episode with what they caught inside just now. Close your door, Howie. We're gettin' outta here." For a moment, the old man looked as if he couldn't put two and two together. Then, he shrugged. "Yeah. Yeah, I guess that works." His door clicked shut and he strapped himself in. "So should we tell them where we're going?" Lisa asked. "Naw. They'll get the hint." "Do you know where we're going?" He smirked at her, then took his black sunglasses from the center console and put them on. "We have the whole rest of the day to kill, darlin'. Is there any chance you made a list?" She laughed. "Tell me you're not serious." "Maybe." They left their rentals at the hotel and walked through Baltimore city with the film crew tagging along behind Johnny, "Stephanie," and the hounds. Howie made sure to keep the crew no less than ten feet away, but even the old man who used to run Dwarf the Bounty Hunter back in the day wasn't fully prepared for the one week in August that couldn't have been much stranger. "Oh, my God!" A woman shouted from the corner of the street on South Sharp Street. "Is that the bounty hunter?" Johnny tried to ignore the shouts, gawking, and pointing, but when they reached the Baltimore Convention Center, he could no longer restrain himself. "What the hell is goin' on here?" Lisa responded with an uncertain chuckle and scratched her head. "I honestly have no idea." "Johnny. Hey, Johnny." Luther stepped closer to his master and lowered his head, his ears and tail pressed down flat. "Are those horses walking on two legs?" "I've never seen horses like that, Johnny." Rex barked twice. "I think they can talk." "Look! Look—I knew it!" A man wearing a black costume with a horse head, rainbow-colored hooves, a tail, and fluttering sheer wings pranced toward them. "Guys, come on. Look who it is!" "What the fuck is this?" the dwarf muttered. From outside the convention center, a whole swarm of people followed the black-horse down the sidewalk toward the bounty hunter and his hounds. "Oh, my God. You're Johnny Walker, right?" "I heard your show was coming back. It's for real! Are you filming in Baltimore?" "Of course they are. Look at all the cameras." "Excuse me. Excuse me." A woman dressed in a shimmering white sequined jumpsuit and a wig of purple curls shoved through the crowd closing in on the dwarf. Her eyes were plastered with blue makeup and glitter, and she brushed the wig over her shoulder and threw her head back to reveal a white unicorn horn in the middle of her forehead to round the ensemble off. "Johnny?" He studied her for a moment with a confused scowl. His gaze lingered on the extremely low cut of the white-sequined jumpsuit that almost exposed her whole chest. "Who's asking?" The woman tossed her purple hair again and grinned. "I'm Rarity." "That's not your real name," another horse weirdo shouted. "It's close enough, okay?" The woman stepped toward the dwarf with her hands clasped in front of her chest, batted her lashes, and somehow widened her eyes at the same time. "I've been a huge fan ever since I was a little girl." The bounty hunter raised an eyebrow and muttered, "Are you sure you still ain't?" A high-pitched giggle escaped her. "Oh, my gosh. It would make me so happy to get your autograph. Can I? Please? Please?" "I don't do autographs, darlin'. Sorry." "Well, maybe you should start." The woman pressed closer. "You brought the show back, right? Maybe now's a good time to change things up a little." "Johnny…" Luther crouched lower at his master's side. "They don't smell like horses but they're closing in." Lisa forced a laugh back as the people of Baltimore in outrageous horse cosplay formed a huge crowd around the bounty hunter. "It's all on camera, Johnny," she muttered. "Part of a good distraction, right?" He grunted. The Red Boar's gonna see me signin' autographs for a buncha crazies. Sure. That'll draw him out. Shaking his head, Johnny sighed heavily. "Just the one then." "Yes! Oh, my God. Thank you!" The woman screeched in delight and bounced up and down in her shiny purple heels. Rex cocked his head and stared up at her. "Johnny, that lady's gonna fall out of her suit." "It's a lady?" Luther whined. "Got a pen or somethin'?" Lisa shook her head. "Oh, no, no." The purple-haired woman reached into her dangerously low-cut jumpsuit and pulled out a purple marker. "I always have something on me." "Is that right?" Johnny cleared his throat and took the marker from her. "Glitter?" "It's the only way to go." She winked at him, then turned and bent slightly forward and pointed at the small of her back just above the tail of purple hair sprouting from her suit. "Right here, please." Lisa rolled her eyes and chuckled. "Wow." "How about a better—" "No, that's exactly where I want your name." The woman looked over her shoulder at him and grinned. "Forever." Holy shit. With wide eyes, Johnny scribbled a sloppy signature quickly that didn't look anything like what he used for official documents, then thrust the marker at the woman and raised both hands in surrender. "There. Done. Now go back to…whatever you were doin'." "You're amazing!" The woman spun and dropped a heavy kiss on the dwarf's cheek. "This is the best thing that's ever happened to me!" She pranced through the crowd, practically skipping in her purple heels. "Dammit." Johnny scowled at the horse-costumed people around him—the brightly colored wigs, the fake hooves, the face paint in rainbows and stars, stripes, moons, and hearts. The next woman who shoved toward him had added a cowboy hat to her ensemble. "Sign my hat?" She crouched on all fours in front of him and whinnied. "What're you doin'?" "Please?" "Johnny…" Lisa pressed her lips together and pointed at the huge banner hanging over the front doors of the convention center. He looked at it intently for a moment and scowled. "What the fuck is BronyCon?" The woman with the cowboy hat handed him a sharpie as she stood, then removed her hat and handed that over too. "My Little Pony." She grinned. "You have no idea what this is, do you?" "No, and I ain't fixin' to find out." He snatched the hat and marker from her, scribbled, and shoved them back. "That's it. No more." "Friendship is magic." She flashed him a peace sign, put her hat on, and skipped through the crowd, squealing in delight. "No." Johnny pushed through the first row of people in front of him who chattered loudly amongst themselves and asked for autographs. "We're out. To me, boys." "But Johnny…" Rex panted heavily and stared at the horse-dressed people towering over him as they cooed and scratched behind his ears and along his back. "They like hounds. Oh, yeah. Scratch right there—yeah, yeah, yeah." Luther turned in a tight circle, his eyes wide, and barked at a man with his face painted black with yellow stars. "Johnny, I want out. Hey, back up, horse. Guy. Whatever." The dwarf responded with a piercing whistle, and both hounds extracted themselves instantly from their quirky fans. Lisa wove through the cosplayers to catch up with him. "So what do you think?" "Right now, darlin', my mind's been wiped blank." He snorted and shook his head. "I don't get it." "Is this weirder than Portland?" "Don't you try to turn this around. I ain't goin' back to that damn city. And we're avoidin' the convention center like a plague." She laughed and glanced over her shoulder at the crowd of people who stared after them and pointed. The film crew moved around the pedestrians to hurry after the bounty hunter. "Well, on the bright side, Dwarf the Bounty Hunter has one of the most eclectic fan bases I've ever seen." "Those ain't fans. Those are crazy people." "You think so?" They turned the corner toward McKeldin Fountain, and Lisa regarded him speculatively. "Let me guess. You don't even dress up on Halloween." He sniffed and glanced at the sculpture that looked like a hunk of giant rocks stuck together on their left. "That's months away and we ain't talkin' ʼbout it."
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 14	They took a brief trip to see Oriole Park at Camden Yards, then paid a visit to the Maryland Science Center and the Gallery at Harborplace. Wherever Johnny Walker showed his face, the fans came out of the woodwork. "I can't believe it. He's back!" "I told you he wasn't dead, Maggie. He only wanted to get out of the spotlight for a while." "Oh, my God. They've been putting videos up for two days, and he's still out here filming?" "This is even better than the last season. He has dogs with him!" "And a sexy sidekick too." "Hey." Johnny pointed at the man and cocked his head. "Watch your mouth." Lisa laughed as they headed down East Cromwell Street after a walk along the water in Riverside Park. "So you're trying to defend Stephanie's honor now too, huh?" "What?" He scoffed. "Just because you're showin' up on everyone's damn smartass devices don't give folks the right to say whatever they want to your face." "It's not my face, though, Johnny." "Huh. You're still in there." The crowds thinned by necessity when Howie began to swing his cane from side to side and spouted warnings about interference with the filming. "Do you want to be sued for this? No? Then back the hell up, buddy. Johnny has work to do!" "Okay, now I get why you wanted the old guy around." Lisa chuckled. "Was he your bodyguard too back in the day?" The dwarf ran a hand through his hair and grimaced. "I don't need a bodyguard, darlin'. That's crowd control." "But he has a cane this time." The aforementioned cane whacked on the sidewalk behind them. "Move along, people! You'll see it all when the episode airs. Get back!" "Yep." Johnny glanced at the row of marquees stretched across the restaurants in front of them. "And he can handle it. Are you hungry?" She. "Are you?" "I could eat. It would take my mind off all the crazies tryin' to run me down to sign their babies." "That might be taking it a little too far. No one's offered their baby today." "Naw, I'm talkin' about Season Four." "What?" Luther and Rex turned to face away from Johnny and growled at anyone who tried to approach them or even pass them on the sidewalk. "You know what this is like, Johnny?" Rex wagged his tail and barked when a woman walking her golden retriever passed on the other side of the street. "Hey, how's it goin'? Johnny, this is like going to the dog park when someone brought their bitch in heat." Luther uttered a low whine. "Yeah, Johnny. And you're the bitch." The dwarf snorted and glanced at the smaller hound facing away from him. "Have you got that outta your system?" "I wanna get this city outta my system, Johnny." Lisa folded her arms. "Are they doing okay with all this attention?" "Totally," Rex replied. "We can handle anything." Luther yipped. "Not okay, lady. Johnny, let's go back to the hotel." The dwarf studied the menu within the clear case hung on the outer wall of Rye Street Tavern and shrugged. "Comfort food. Exactly what we need if you're ready for dinner." Lisa scanned the sign over the restaurant's front door, then peered through the closest window. "This looks nice." "I think it is." Turning slowly toward him, she inclined her head. "Is that how you ask every redhead out on a date?" "I ain't askin' a redhead darlin'. Not a real one, anyway." Her eyes widened over a cautious smile. "So you're asking me on a date." He chuckled and opened the door for her. "Are you hungry or what?" Laughing, she stepped inside the restaurant and the hounds trotted through the door before Johnny joined them. Luther chuckled. "You didn't say no, Johnny." "Uh-oh." Rex sniffed at the floor. "Johnny, we know we're the best hounds and everything, but you didn't have to ask us on a date too." "I didn't," the bounty hunter grumbled. Thinking more about the hounds and less about public access, Johnny asked for a table on the back patio, which was strung overhead with soft white lights as sunset cast an orange glow over Baltimore. Two other tables had customers, but they were far enough apart that he could finally get some air. "Finally. Quiet." Rex and Luther sniffed around in the green lawn behind the patio, their tails sticking straight up in the air. "Sure is nice, Johnny." "Yeah. Where'd all the people go?" The dwarf leaned back in his chair and sighed. Well, it would be quiet without them hounds goin' on. Still, I'll take those two over those damn pony folks any day. Lisa sipped her water. "I'm surprised a place like this has your one and only drink." "What are you tryin' to say?" "Only that this seems a little more…upscale." Johnny grunted. "Just 'cause it ain't expensive don't mean it ain't quality." "Hey, I'm not here to judge. I'm merely surprised." Their server returned with their drinks on a tray and set Lisa's gin cocktail down first. "Gin Campari Sour for the lady. And your Johnny Walker Black, sir." "I appreciate it." He glanced at his usual four fingers of whiskey in the rocks glass and nodded. "There's more where that came from, right?" "Yes. Your manager made it perfectly clear we were to reserve the entire bottle." The server grinned and cleared his throat. "And can I say, Mr. Walker—" "Johnny." "Right. Can I just say what an honor it is to serve you tonight?" He lifted his drink to his lips. "Go ahead." "I grew up watching your show, and after I heard you were coming back for one more season, I finally got my wife to sit down with me and start watching Dwarf the Bounty Hunter all over again. We're almost through Season Two." The dwarf frowned at him. "When did you start?" "Oh, Monday night." The man smiled a sheepish smile. "The perks of streaming old favorites for binge-watching at home, right?" "Uh-huh." "She already loves it." "Good for her." As Johnny sipped his whiskey, Lisa and the server exchanged an awkward glance. "All right. Well, you heard tonight's specials, so I'll give you two another minute to look at the menu." "Thank you." She nodded and forced herself not to laugh when he retreated into the restaurant again and glanced over his shoulder in awe at the bounty hunter seated in his section. With a smirk, she leaned forward over the table. "Your manager?" Johnny set down his glass with a contented sigh. "Sure. Howie wears any number of hats." "I thought he was your old director." "Yep. And crowd control. PR. Manager." He pointed at her. "That fella can do more than a crew three times the size of what Nelson thought he was so smart hirin' for this. Asshole." Lisa removed the sprig of rosemary from her glass and took a sip. "And curator of Johnny Walker's one and only drink." He raised his glass. "Howie knows what he's doin' and I ain't gotta ask." She leaned back in her seat and smirked as she nursed her cocktail. "What?" "What?" Johnny raised an eyebrow. "You're lookin' at me funny, darlin'. Even when you're a redhead with green eyes and freckles, I know that face." Lisa laughed. "You do?" "You bet. It means those wheels up there are turnin' and you ain't decided whether or not to let it out. So go ahead. Spill." "Okay. I think all this…" She gestured around them at the city of Baltimore in general. "Being here with a film crew, seeing your fans, having your manager back to make sure whatever restaurant you go to has a bottle waiting for you—" "You're playin' it up, darlin'." He sipped his whiskey again. "I think you like it." "Huh." Lisa leaned forward, propped both elbows on the table, and rested her chin on the backs of her hands. "I think you're back in your element, and you simply don't want to admit it." "Naw. My element is out on the swamp in my airboat with a rifle in my hands." "Sure. But there's no rule against belonging in more than one place." Johnny looked at her in surprise and snorted. "Are you tryin' to use all that head-shrinker crap on me again?" "No, Johnny." She grinned. "I'm merely calling it like I see it. And sure, I'm playing the reformed convict Stephanie Wyndom through the whole thing, but I'm still glad I'm here to see it." "Huh." He looked out across the back patio to where Rex and Luther stood with their snouts pressed against the grass. "I guess I could say the same." "The perks of having a partner who gets it, right?" "You're seriously pushin' this partner business, ain'tcha?" Lisa shrugged. "Well, you haven't tried to correct me lately. I'm simply making sure it's real." "Well, you can't go waltzin' around as Stephanie callin' yourself my partner." "Oh, I know." Their server returned to take their orders. Lisa chose the grilled shrimp scampi, and Johnny went with two plates of pork chops for the hounds, the Maryland rockfish with shrimp and grits for himself, plus an order of a dozen oysters on the half-shell to start. When he ordered the latter, Lisa leaned back in her chair with wide eyes. "And another whiskey when you can." "Absolutely." The man left to put the order in, and he shook his head. "You're lookin' at me like I ordered baby seal. They're oysters." She smirked. "You know what oysters are known for, right?" If the word aphrodisiac comes outta her mouth, I'm done. "Sure." He downed the rest of his whiskey. "Bein' delicious, same as them shrimp and grits. If a restaurant up here can pull off that kinda southern cookin' the right way, I aim to stop by a time or two." "Oh, yeah? You'd come to Baltimore merely for the shrimp?" "It ain't my first time in Charm City, darlin'." He grimaced as he looked out over the city skyline beneath the sunset. "But fuck comin' back in August. If I never see another Yankee done up like a damn horse, it'll be too soon." She chuckled and shifted a little in her chair. "BronyCon. I had no idea that existed." "It shouldn't." He raised his glass toward her. "To skippin' over what gives ya nightmares." Lisa startled and stared at his raised glass. "Darlin', not joinin' a toast is worse than leavin' a fella hangin' for a high-five." "You've never given me a high-five." "It's only a comparison. Come on." She clinked her cocktail glass against his, then tipped it back for a long drink. "Whoa, now." Johnny chuckled. "If I didn't know better, I'd say you're havin' second thoughts about this dinner." "What? No, of course not." "Then what's all that about?" Lisa took a deep breath and set down her drink gently. "Are you trying to hit me with all the head-shrinking business now?" "I'm sure I'd do a piss-poor job of it." His smile faded, and he set his drink down too. "But you look like you got somethin' on your chest. And I got ears, so…" "Nightmares." "Say again?" Her mouth twitched into a tight smile. "That's what you said. 'To things that don't give you nightmares,' right? It…caught me off guard." "Huh. Look, I ain't sayin' I know you inside-out, darlin', but I wouldn't've pegged you for the kind to start feelin' down for a lack of bad dreams." "Nope." Lisa stared at the table, then met his gaze. "It's the opposite, unfortunately." "Oh." Johnny tugged his beard and narrowed his eyes. "From Portland?" "Yeah. Honestly, I got more sleep the first night here than I could pull together over the last two weeks. And I guess it was easy to forget I'd been kept up at night by…different things." "And I brought it up again like an asshole." He gestured apologetically and leaned back in his chair. "I didn't mean nothin' by it." "I know you didn't. I'm fine." "You look as pale as a ghost, darlin'." Johnny snorted. "Granted, I reckon most of it's just that illusion—" "Very funny." "Do you wanna talk about it?" "Not really." Lisa picked her drink up again and forced an easier smile onto her lips. "It's simply another reason I'm glad to be here—along with not taking in paid bounties and running around Baltimore as the 'sexy sidekick' in a show no one thought they'd ever see again." He laughed and slapped a hand on the table. "It wasn't my first plan." "No, the show was my plan." "Yeah, all right. Give yourself a pat on the back for that one. But I tell you what, darlin'. I reckon havin' a better-lookin' face than my ugly mug up on folks' screens all the time has a helluva lot more to do with them crowds today." "Wow. You're laying it on thick." "Next time, we'll have to bring on Agent Lisa Breyer as a permanent replacement." She grinned at him. "And watch your ratings plummet." "I don't give a damn about all that. I'd rather see you rollin' around with me instead of Stephanie, is all."
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 15	Their server brought out the oysters and Johnny's second drink, which drew the hounds from the back lawn to sniff around the table. "Johnny, you got oysters?" Rex licked a small drop of lemon juice on the patio. "Get any extra for some hounds?" "No way, bro." Luther backed away from the table and sat, staring at the plate of shells. "You gotta be careful with those, Johnny. Remember that time we helped Ronnie haul in a bushel and I ate some?" Rex tittered. "Oh, yeah. The Wood Elf said he'd shoot you himself if you didn't stop humping his leg." "It hurt." "Your feelings?" Luther crouched and uttered a low whine. "No…" When their dinner arrived with Lisa's second drink and Johnny's third, they were both laughing at a story from one of Dwarf the Bounty Hunter's last few episodes. "I caught him right here under the arm." Johnny poked his armpit. "And he skipped along after that speedboat like he forgot the damn water skis. I took him to the pier like that and hauled him right in." She wiped a tear from the corner of her eye and shook her head. "That's insane." "Naw, darlin'. It's only the show." He set the two plates of pork chops on the patio and whistled. Both hounds raced toward him from the far side of the lawn. "Hey, Johnny! I think there's—ooh. What is this?" "It's like bacon, bro." Rex sniffed his plate before tearing into his meal. "Very weird-shaped bacon. Keep talking, though." "Wait, what was I saying?" "I don't know, but this is delicious!" With a chuckle, Lisa picked her fork up and studied her dinner. "I'm surprised by how easy it was to get that out of you." "Get what out?" Johnny shoved a spoonful of grits into his mouth and closed his eyes. "Damn. They got this right." "That story." She looked at him with a coy smile, her fork poised over her shrimp. "I thought I would have to pry any of it out of you." "Well, you already looked through my record with the Department." "Yeah, but those were federal cases. I had no idea about all the extra jobs you took on the side." "It's a good thing those ain't in my Bureau file." He snorted and tossed a whole shrimp into his mouth, tail and all. "It makes a different kinda record for all the rest, but it's hard to believe those damn episodes are still floatin' around out there." "Part of me wants to go through and watch them." "Oh, sure. Invite our waiter and his wife over while you're at it. Y'all can have a big time of it." She laughed and took the first mouthful of her pasta. "Oh, wow. This is incredible." "Good." Johnny smirked at her and held his water glass down by his chair for the dogs. Rex looked up first and licked his muzzle. "Thanks, Johnny." "Hey, don't drink it all," Luther muttered. "You're not the only hound on the patio." "Still, it ain't nothin' like the grub Darlene makes back home or the kinda eatin' I can find just down the street on any given day." "You don't think this is better?" Lisa asked. "Naw, I ain't sayin' that. It's not better, but there is somethin' to be said for a new take on a good thing." "So you're enjoying yourself." "I might be." He drained the last of his second whiskey, picked up the third, and brought it to his mouth. "Are you?" The small smile playing on her lips made him narrow his eyes. "Are you asking as the bounty hunter, Johnny? Or as the guy who asked me out to dinner?" He cleared his throat. "Well, there ain't two of me, darlin'." "Yes, and both worlds are better because of it." "Aw, now come on." Johnny chuckled and leaned toward her. "You tryin' to tell me you wouldn't be happy to see two of me?" "No, one is more than enough." Lisa stared at him as she sipped at her cocktail. "Honestly, I like only the one." "Uh-huh." Shit. If it ain't the whiskey, it's the goddamn oysters. What the hell am I gettin' myself into? "Well, I'll tell you what, darlin'. Beneath that redheaded exterior of yours—" She laughed and batted her eyes. "—is a woman I'd be proud to call my partner." Lisa blinked in surprise. "That sounds conditional, though." "Naw, only me thinkin' out loud." You can stop talkin' anytime, Johnny. The last thing you need is to get tangled up even more in this. Right? "Well, I'm glad that's what you can see under this mask." Chuckling, she gestured at her Stephanie face. "There's more. Ain't just Agent Breyer I see, neither." "Oh, really?" "Um…Johnny?" Luther turned around to sniff the air behind his master. "Maybe you should—" The dwarf snapped his fingers and kept staring at Lisa. "But seriously, Johnny," Rex added. "You're not gonna—" "Hush." Johnny grabbed his rocks glass and held it on the table. "Bein' an agent is what you do, darlin'. It ain't who you are." "And you think you know who I am already, is that it?" She smiled, her eyes a little glassy after almost two tall cocktails. "Sure. Under all the rest of it, I see—" A flicker of movement reflected in the window beside their table caught his attention. "Those bastards." Her smile disappeared. "Excuse me?" Johnny's chair scraped loudly as he pushed it away and stood to whirl around. Cody was zeroing in on them with the camera and the man with the boom followed closely behind and tried to get a good angle with the mic. "Oh, jeez." Lisa sighed. "Tried to tell you, Johnny," Luther muttered. "You just couldn't hear past the goo-goo eyes, could you?" Rex added. "Private dinner, assholes." Johnny pointed at the camera. "Get lost." Phil popped his head up from behind a bush on the other side of the back lawn. "These are the kind of moments we need to see too, Johnny." "No, they ain't. Y'all weren't invited." "We don't have to be," Phil continued as he walked around the bush. "We're getting shots of your life. And viewers are going to love seeing Johnny Walker on a date with the beautiful Stephanie—" The dwarf grabbed his half-full water glass and chucked it at the guy. Phil dodged it with a yelp, and the glass shattered and sprayed all over the patio. "Johnny, please," Lisa protested. "Get lost, dipshit." He snarled, snatched his utility knife from his belt, and flicked it open. "Johnny!" Howie hobbled down the sidewalk at the side of the building. "Fuck. They told me they went back to the hotel." "I don't care where they go, but they need to get outta here real fast before there's a permanent director position for you to fill, Howie." "I know, I know." The old man leaned against the wall of the restaurant to catch his breath. "Phil, get the hell back here—" "Are you threatening me with a knife, Johnny?" Phil's hands raised despite the fact that he was trying to play it brave. The dwarf glanced at the camera still rolling while Cody stepped lightly toward him. "Last warning." "That's good, that's good." Phil nodded furiously. "Get some of that anger—" The bounty hunter kicked one of the hounds' plates off the patio and it thunked into Cody's shins. "Aw, shit, man!" The cameraman lowered his gear to glance at his legs. "What the hell?" "Yeah, Johnny, what gives?" Luther sniffed around the patio where his missing plate used to be. "I wasn't finished with that." "Get out!" Their server darted out of the restaurant and onto the patio. "Is…is there a problem here, Mr. Walker?" "There will be if these dumb shits don't get out." "I'm sorry, guys. Patio seating is for paying customers only." "We're with Johnny!" Phil shouted. "No, they ain't." The man nodded. "Then I'm going to have to ask you and your…friends to leave." "We got it, we got it," Howie muttered, waving the man away, and his cane clicked on the paving as he hurried toward Phil. "And this scheming idiot's about to get the fun side of my cane if he doesn't do what I say." The director glanced from Johnny to the old man and clapped his hands. "That's a wrap, people. It's time to go." "Yeah, and ice my damn shins." Cody rubbed his leg and grimaced at the dwarf. "We're only doing our jobs, man." "Move." Howie pulled the cameraman away with him and nodded at Johnny to assure him that everything was taken care of. Rex and Luther stalked after the retreating film crew and continued to utter low growls until the party crashers disappeared around the corner. Luther stopped at the shattered plate on the patio and sniffed. "Oh, look. Leftover mashed potatoes." The bounty hunter stalked to his chair and slumped into it. His elbows thumped onto the table, making silverware clatter and drinks slosh in their glasses. Without a word, he snatched his spoon up and shoveled the rest of his grits into his mouth. Lisa stared at him. "Are you okay?" "I'm eatin'." "Is there anything else I can get for you?" the server asked. "To-go boxes and the check, pal. That's it." "Johnny, we don't have to leave—" "Well, I ain't stayin' here." He downed the rest of his whiskey and growled. That's the closest I got to sayin' somethin' real, and those fuckers had to come in and ruin the whole thing. "I'll be right back with those." The server nodded and hurried inside. When they got their check and the boxes, Johnny added the leftovers furiously to the containers, eating pieces here and there as he did so. "Truly," Lisa said in an attempt to diffuse the suddenly tense situation. "It's okay." "No, it ain't, darlin'." A huge chunk of rockfish went into his mouth. "Now the whole world's gonna see me and Stephanie Wyndom sittin' at a fancy spot laughin' it up and gettin' cozy." "What's wrong with that?" He pulled his wallet out and placed enough hundred-dollar bills on the table to cover the tab and leave a thirty-percent tip. Then he smacked his hand down on the surface, picked up the to-go boxes, and stood. "'Cause it ain't no one else's damn business and it ain't you." The bounty hunter stalked around the corner, and the hounds whipped their heads up from more sniffing to follow him. Lisa sat in her chair for a moment longer and frowned in surprise as she drained the rest of her cocktail. I wonder if he even knows what he said.
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 16	They reached Johnny's huge hotel suite without being badgered by the film crew again. He slumped in the high-backed armchair built for a giant and stared at the area rug beneath the coffee table. Lisa looked at him from her place on the couch and raised an eyebrow. "Will you be pissed off about one filmed dinner all night?" "If it suits me, sure." "Hey, Johnny." Luther stared at his master from the edge of the kitchen and took slow, cautious steps toward the counter beside the fridge. "Johnny…" "I don't think he can hear us, bro." "Well, make sure." "Johnny!" Rex barked. "Anyone home?" The dwarf rubbed his mouth and continued to stare at the rug. "He's totally gone. Hurry." Luther leapt up and put his front paws onto the counter beside the to-go boxes Johnny had neglected to put in the fridge. He darted a wary glance over his shoulder at his master, then buffeted both boxes onto the floor with his snout. "Yes," Rex whispered. "Victory! We—ow. Quit nipping me." "Then quit shouting or you'll break him out of his pissed-off concentration." Luther sniggered. "Probably thinking of all the ways he could blow up that guy with the crazy hair." "Howie?" "No, the other one. Hey, look. Shrimp!" "Shh!" Lisa turned to look into the kitchen, but the corner of the hallway blocked the conniving hounds from view. If Johnny's not stopping them, I won't say anything. She took her laptop from the couch cushion beside her and opened it on her thighs. "Well, how about something else to take your mind off it, huh?" "I ain't watchin' more IdiotTube videos." She snorted. "No, I was talking about next steps with this dark-web Johnny-hater meeting. But feel free to sit there and sulk." He looked at her with wide eyes and finally heard the barely contained snuffling and chewing coming from the kitchen. "Boys?" "Uh…yeah, Johnny." "Shit. Stop for a sec. What're y'all up to?" Rex trotted into view and his claws clicked on the kitchen's tiled floors. When he met Johnny's gaze, he licked his muzzle and stared. "Hanging out. Grabbing a drink. You know, the usual." Luther's head-butted the cabinet as he licked the destroyed pieces of to-go boxes across the floor. "Ow." "That don't sound like water," Johnny muttered. Rex sniggered. "Does it surprise you that he can't find the water bowl, Johnny?" Luther smacked his head against the cabinet again when he looked up to stare at his brother. "Hey—" Rex whipped his head toward the far end of the kitchen. "Wait. Luther. Did you hear that?" "What?" "I think it's a mouse. In the cabinet." The larger hound darted out of his master's view to pounce on the to-go boxes. "Ha-ha. Who's dumb now? I already checked that one, Rex. There's no mouse—" "The other cabinet," Rex snarled. "Oh, right… Yeah, get it." "Johnny?" Lisa leaned sideways to try to catch his attention. "I'm about to make another big move, so if you want to see what's happening here—" "Yeah." He pushed out of the armchair with a grunt and stepped slowly across the living area and frowned at the entrance to the kitchen. "Did you see those hounds get up to somethin'?" She logged into her laptop and shook her head. "I've been watching you the whole time." "I like her, Johnny." "Shh. Focus." With a shrug, Johnny sank onto the couch beside her and glanced at the laptop screen. "Next big move, huh?" "For us, at least. Honestly, this is my first time interacting on the dark web instead of…you know. Poking around." He looked curiously at her. "For what?" "Well, we can start with the time I entered a dark-web auction and bid for a twelve-year-old girl with your money." "But that wasn't the first time." "No. I did some digging for the Department a time or two before they assigned me to Amanda's case with you." She stopped typing and looked up at him staring at her. "Okay, fine. Twenty-one cases where dark-web scouring was a priority." "I didn't say a thing." "Yeah well, you didn't have to. Stop looking at me like that." Lisa pursed her lips to hide a smirk as she pulled up her VPN and dove into the dark web. Then she retrieved her phone and brought up the picture of the anonymous Johnny-haters private invitation. The dwarf grumbled and shook his head. "You can't simply do all that with one damn piece of equipment?" "What?" "What's your phone gonna do?" She turned the device to show him. "This is the link to upload some perfectly legit fake documents." "Huh." Lisa typed the hyperlink into the URL bar that displayed .onion domains and pressed the Enter key. Another horizontal flash of white light darted across her screen a second before the link's direct page came up. "Is that somethin' you should worry about?" Johnny asked and wagged his finger across the screen. "That little flash?" "Honestly, I have no idea." She shrugged. "But I don't keep my laptop synced to my tablet or phone. So if someone thinks it'll be fun to hack into my system, they'll find nothing but my bookmarked websites and a few random poems." "Say what now?" She waved him off. "It's only me playing around. It's nothing." "Stuff hypothetical hackers would see and run away from?" "Very funny." "I thought you had a handle on keepin' folks outta your…systems anyhow." Johnny glanced at the photo of the private message on her phone. "Don'tcha?" "Well, I know enough to be fairly certain I'm about eighty-five percent safe. I think." Lisa paused to look at him. "But I'm not a pro, Johnny. Yeah, technically I've done this and gotten paid for it, but it's not—" "Slow down, darlin'." He chuckled. "I get the gist." "Right." "Now, how come you're only doin' this now?" He nodded at the screen. "I thought you had the whole thing set up and ready to go." "Yeah, I could have. But I didn't want to seem desperate by putting all this up immediately." "Uh-huh. Tryin' to fit in with the cool thugs, huh?" "Yes, Johnny. My greatest ambition in life is to make criminals you put behind bars like me." With a chuckle, she read through the list of information the private criminal-screening invitation wanted from her and sighed. "Here we go." Name: Stephanie Wyndom Age: 47 Height: 5'11" Weight: 127 lbs Gender: Female Race: Half-Light Elf Hair Color: Strawberry-blonde "Naw, darlin', don't put that in there." "What? Why?" "Come on? Who says that about their own damn hair, huh? That'd be like writing your age in as, 'I'm forty-seven a half, but all my friends tell me I don't look a day over thirty-five.'" She elbowed him in the ribs. "I do not sound like that." "Sure. I was imitatin' Stephanie." He gave her a crooked smile. "There ain't no way you're forty-seven." "I'll overlook that potentially unintended insult and tell you that none of the things I'm putting in here are real. How's that?" "Not all of it…" She laughed. "Wow. I made a mistake in asking you to come watch." "All right, all right. I'll shut it." Johnny stood and went to the round side table beside the huge armchair for the whiskey he'd poured as soon as they got back to the hotel. Squinting at him, Lisa changed her last entry and moved on. Hair Color: Red Eye Color: Green Identifying Marks: None Birthplace: "Huh." She picked her phone up and signed into the secure server for the Department's shared files to open the case documents with her fake identity detailed in one place. "What's wrong?" "Nothing. I had to remember where Stephanie was born." He moved closer to her again and snorted. "That's one of those things most folks don't forget. Are you sure you're ready to head out and meet these bastards tomorrow night?" "Johnny, it's one detail. One. Now I know I was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and I won't forget it." "No wonder you turned to a life of booze and crime." Lisa rolled her eyes and kept going. Birthplace: Milwaukee, Wisconsin Most Recent Arrest: 2015 Reason for Requesting Access: She paused at the last one. "I need to make this good." "You already know what they wanna hear, darlin'. Go ahead." "Well, give me a minute, okay? It has to look real." The dwarf nudged her shoulder lightly with the back of his hand. "Why don't you answer it with a poem?" "Stop." Reason for Requesting Access: I want to see that fucking dwarf draw his last breath. "Well, shit." He rumbled a deep laugh that drew a smile from her. "Tell ʼem how you truly feel." "No, I'm telling them how they feel. Is it too much?" "I ain't gonna make you change it.' "Great. That's everything but the picture. So…" Lisa picked up her phone again and dove into the FBI-manufactured documents of Stephanie's nonexistent life to pull up the doctored mugshot. "That'll work." "You're gonna send ʼem your mugshot from the day I never took you in?" "Well, it's not like we had the time for a photo shoot." She paused to study the fake image of Stephanie in an orange felon uniform, her light-red hair mussed and sticking out in all directions. "It looks like the real deal to me." "Sure. But the picture's on your damn phone." Lisa turned toward him with wide eyes. "Honestly? Oh, you're serious about that." "What?" "Johnny, how do you stay in touch with the rest of the world on a regular basis?" "I don't." The dwarf shrugged and took another sip. "No TV and no FacePage or Tweetie or whatever the hell." "Oh, jeez." She closed her eyes and forced back a laugh. "Please tell me you at least know what email is." "'Course I do. But why the hell would anyone email me?" "Oh, I don't know. Maybe to send an image file from their phone to your computer, for instance." Which was exactly what she did with Stephanie Wyndom's mugshot. "If you don't know how any of this stuff works, why do you have a smartphone?" "My last phone went overboard durin' a hunt. The guy at the phone store pulled one over on me when he said he could put all my saved numbers into the new one." "It's called the—you know what? Never mind." "Sure." He frowned at her and kept drinking. Lisa dragged the photo from her email and dropped it into the upload box on the private chat. "And that's the end of it. Let's see if good ol' Stephanie stands up to the test." She clicked the send link, and the web page went completely blank. "Is that it?" "I guess so. I have no idea what comes next, so we'll simply roll with it." Lisa clicked around through the pathways she'd taken four days before and made her way easily to the site she wanted: Dwarf the Bounty Hunter: The Official Site – Your One-Stop Shop for All Things Johnny Walker, Bounty Hunting, and the Best Oriceran-Hosted Show on Earth! "Aw, not this again." Johnny leaned back on the couch with a grunt. "No one even knew about Oriceran when that damn show was runnin'." "But it seems it became a cult classic sometime between the reveal of magic and…now. I'm checking to see what the official fans have to say about the show." "Ain't my idea of a fun night, darlin'." "Well, you don't have to look with me." "I won't." He stood and made his way out of the living area toward the kitchen across the hall. At the sound of his approaching boots, Rex and Luther skittered out of the kitchen. "Hey, Johnny." Rex licked his muzzle and darted under the dining table before he curled in a ball on the floor. "Don't mind us," Luther added as he ran toward the bedroom. "We're only—aw, man. Johnny, do you have to keep this door closed all the time?" "Y'all got no business in there unless we're all passed out for the night." "What?" Lisa called. "Only the hounds." He refilled his whiskey glass and frowned at the empty counter beside the fridge. "Lisa?" "Yeah?" He opened the fridge door, peered inside briefly, then closed it again and turned. "Did you do somethin' with those leftovers?" "Nope." "Huh." He took another sip, thoroughly confused, and turned slowly to scan the kitchen. I'd say the hounds got into my supper, but they ain't neat about stolen food. "You sure you brought it in, Johnny?" Luther asked and stretched out on his side in front of the closed bedroom door. "Yeah, maybe you left it at the restaurant." "You were mad as hell, Johnny. Makes sense if you forgot. Happens to the best of us." "Y'all mind your own, ya hear?" "Sure, Johnny." Rex licked his forepaw. "We'll hang out," Luther added as he rolled onto his back. "Chill. Keep you company." "Oh, whoa." Lisa laughed and then clamped a hand over her mouth to suppress the rest of it. "This is insane." "I think we already settled that when you said there's a damn website with my mug all over it." "If it wasn't crazy before, Johnny, it is now." Grinning, she scrolled through the newest posts on the page that had been recently created specifically for Dwarf the Bounty Hunter Season 8, Episode 1: Back in Black. "Did you know they'd already named the first episode?" "Nope and I don't care." "But you like AC/DC, right?" "What're you on about, darlin'?" "Back in Black, Johnny." "Huh." He sat beside her on the couch again and couldn't bring himself to look at the laptop. "Nelson's PR team did somethin' right, at least." "And people are freaking out. There's a whole page dedicated to the episode that hasn't even come out yet. Look at this." "Nope." "There are almost ten thousand comments simply speculating about what you're doing in Baltimore. Everyone knows. And they're all talking about—oh." Johnny leaning his head back against the couch cushion. "Well, don't that sound promisin'. What is it?" "Some…uh, rather choice descriptions of Stephanie." He chuckled. "Oh, look. Someone wrote a piece of fan fiction." "Get outta here." "No, I'm serious. It's… Whoa. Erotic fan-fiction. Again, with Stephanie." "Darlin', you oughtta close outta that before you start losin' your mind." "Okay, well, I'm not reading that. But I'm enjoying this. Sure, no one knows it's me, but all this means our plan's working." "Your plan." Johnny raised his head to drink more whiskey. "I gotta give credit where it's due. You thought all this up on your own." "Yeah, in the middle of the night after being awake for twenty-two hours straight." He frowned at her. "Seriously?" "I suppose I found a way to be productive on an insomniac's schedule. Don't worry about it. I've been getting six hours for the last few nights, so I think it's getting better." "Whoever told you six hours was enough needs to have their head checked. I get eight. Nine if I bagged some prize-winning game the day before." Luther sniggered. "Eleven if you brought a lady over the night before." "Ooh, yeah. Johnny, remember that one time when we went to that party and you got shitfaced? And we had to walk you home? I'm very sure you slept a whole day after that." "And you did way more than whiskey that night, didn't you?" The dwarf snapped his fingers and took a huge sip. And that's why no one else hears the hounds but me. "Well, either way," Lisa continued, oblivious to the hounds heckling their master, "it's getting better. So I'm not too worried about it." "Sure. Have you tried any—" "Oh, hello…" She nudged his shoulder and pointed at the screen. "Incoming message." "From the same guy?" "There is no way to tell. But probably." Your face is all over the internet. Explain. Below that came a screenshot of the Johnny Walker fan site with a frozen video frame capturing Stephanie Wyndom grinning at the bounty hunter. A text box for her to send an immediate reply opened at the bottom of the message. "Shit. Do you have an answer for that?" he asked. "Sure." Lisa started typing. "You don't sound all that reassurin', darlin'. It might be we oughtta—" "Shh. Let me think." He snorted and leaned slightly toward her to read her on-the-fly explanation over her shoulder. You saw my face in other places too. Twenty-four years is a long time to remember what that asshole did to me. The opportunity came my way, and I took it. They wanted a pretty face on the show this time around, so that's all they see, but I'll be here as long as it takes to find everything he loves and cares about. I thought meeting up with some like-minded ex-bounties would help me connect the dots in the end. Johnny whistled. "Are you sure you didn't already have that floatin' around in the back of your mind?" "No, my lies are much better when I don't plan them." She grinned at him. "Otherwise, I forget half of it." "Like where your alias was born?" "Johnny, they won't ask me to confirm everything I sent them directly. Especially not when they can double-check for themselves. It's fine." The text both she and the anonymous messenger had sent to each other disappeared, then whoever was on the other side of the chat started typing again. Come alone. No human weapons. Below that was an address. Lisa used her phone to snap a photo before the message box disappeared with another flash of white light across her screen. "Got it. We're in." "All right, darlin'. I'm impressed." "Good. You should be." She left the dark web, closed the VPN down, and signed out of everything before she turned her laptop off. "Now, we're one step closer." "Well, you can spin a story by the skin of your teeth, I'll give you that. Do you reckon you can hold your own tomorrow night in a room full of vengeful pricks?" The laptop clicked shut, and she turned to raise an eyebrow at him. "Why wouldn't I be?" "If you ain't been sleepin'—" "I'm fine." Lisa stood and tucked her laptop under her arm. "But speaking of sleep, yeah. I should probably go do that. You too." "Uh-huh." "Goodnight, Johnny." "'Night, darlin'." He raised his glass toward her, then paused. "Hey, when those idiots start filmin' us again tomorrow, you should throw a few nasty looks my way." She looked at him over her shoulder with a confused smile. "What?" "You know. Like you can't wait to kick my ass so everyone gets a good look at it." "Ha! I'll see what I can do. It shouldn't be that hard."
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 17	Johnny managed to bypass the film-crew plague the next morning when he ordered room service for breakfast and stretched out in the huge suite with a perfectly black cup of coffee. Rex had gone through the entire extra order of bacon brought up for him, and the larger hound now stared at the second plate in front of his brother. "You gonna eat that, Luther?" "I don't know." Luther lifted his head off the floor and sniffed the bacon. "I don't feel all that hungry." The newspaper Johnny had been reading—fortunately without any mention of him or the damn show—slapped down on his lap before he turned a sharp frown onto the coonhound. "What's wrong with you?" "Dunno, Johnny." Luther belched and rolled over onto his side. "Maybe I'm feeling a little bloated." "You do kinda look like it." The dwarf glanced at Rex. "What'd he do?" "Don't look at me." The larger hound lowered himself to his belly and licked the bacon grease off his plate. "It's Luther. Could be anything." "Uh-huh. And that's what I'm worried about. Are you hurtin', boy?" "Not really. Only…" Luther farted and rolled onto his back, his forepaws dangling limply beneath his chin. "Waiting." "Well, hurry up about it." Johnny drank his coffee and took a deep breath. "I have no idea when we'll be—" A sharp knock came at the door to his suite. "Johnny?" "Interrupted by the biggest pain in my ass all year." The dwarf sighed and set his coffee and newspaper down on the dining table. "Johnny, it's Phil. Come on and open up, will you? I want to go over a few things with you before we—oh. Good morning." Johnny grasped the suite door tightly and stepped in front of the open space to block the rest of his room. "What?" "What are you planning to get into today?" "I don't have any real plans, to tell ya the truth." Phil smoothed his wildly scattered hair away from his head. "Great. Then we can—" "But they don't include you." "I know, Johnny. But look. We've seen more hits on the YouTube videos and more trending hashtags than I even imagined was possible. And that's only the last few days. So we want to get a little more up close and personal today, you know? We haven't done any more Q&As since the first one at your house. Our viewers are screaming for more. We need to give it to them." "Screamin'." Johnny regarded him dubiously. "Is that right?" "Literally and virtually, yeah. So why don't you go ahead and get ready to go out? See the sights. Go shopping. Do whatever you need to do—" "I'm good." Across the hall, Lisa's door opened, and redheaded Stephanie stepped out with wide eyes. "Already, huh?" "Yeah, we wanted to get a head-start," Phil said quickly over his shoulder. "Look, this is merely us following you and your dogs around Baltimore—oh, and Stephanie. Right now, the most important thing is that we recapture that 'day in the life of Johnny Walker' effect. You know, the same thing you were doing back in the day. No bounties to go after and no traveling, merely a dwarf out on the town doing whatever he does between." Johnny sniffed and darted Lisa an exasperated glance. "This ain't a regular day in my life, Phil." "Yeah, yeah, I know that." The director stepped toward the door and leaned toward him to whisper, "But our viewers don't." "And you wanna make all those folks think I live in Baltimore?" "No, they already know you're from the south. This is for character, Johnny. It's been fifteen years. A lot happens in fifteen years, and if we want this to be a success, everyone out there watching needs to feel as if they've known you for the last fifteen years—that they can reconnect with you, right? That you haven't changed all that much." "Filmin' me walkin' around the city ain't gonna make a difference." "It's not the worst idea," Lisa said as her hotel room door shut behind her. "Aw, not you too." "Oh, come on." She smiled at Phil in a friendly way, but the man was too intently focused on pleading for Johnny to notice. "Hey, why don't we walk down to the waterfront? We don't have to have an actual plan, but I heard the view's nice. We could do the Q&A down there, maybe grab a drink, and see what happens." The bounty hunter grunted, his expression obstinate. "What happens is I stay right here." "Johnny." She peered around Phil's unruly hair and raised her eyebrows. "You never know who might be watching, right?" After a moment, he scowled and twisted to shout over his shoulder. "Come on, boys. We're goin' down for a day in the fuckin' life." "What?" Rex trotted down the hall. "Life of what?" "A dwarf that don't exist. Luther!" "I'm good, Johnny. Truly, I could lay here all day. You go ahead—" He snapped his fingers. "Get on right now. If I ain't stayin' in this hotel suite, neither are you." "Okay, okay…" Luther grunted and pushed to his feet. When he waddled down the hallway, his head swung slightly from side to side and Rex sat with a low whine. "You look awful, bro." "Thanks." "What you need is just a chance to run it off. The park's a good idea." Once the hounds were out the door, Johnny turned to head toward the elevators. Phil met Lisa's gaze and mouthed, "Thank you." "This is essentially your one shot," she whispered. "So don't blow it like last night, okay?" "Oh, I'm the bad guy here? He threw a plate at my cameraman." "Where's Howie?" Johnny called from where he stood beside the elevator. Phil scowled. "Waiting downstairs in the lobby. He said something about cookies." "Ooh, hey, Johnny. You think they have any hound cookies?" The dwarf snorted. "This ain't Portland, Rex." "Yeah, yeah, but if Luther and I happen to find some cookies laying around, you think—" "Dude…" Luther let out a heavy sigh and sat. "Don't talk about cookies. Or eating. Or moving. I can't handle it right now." "There is something wrong with you." They walked just shy of a mile and a half down to Federal Hill Park in the warm morning air. The smell of the ocean and fish mingled with scents from the restaurants open for breakfast and the thick, almost burned aroma of roasting coffee beans. More strangers stopped to stare at the bounty hunter and his entourage. Some of them waved and shouted hello while others simply pointed. One man tried to flag Johnny down to get an autograph, but Howie was there to remind the guy that they were on official Dwarf the Bounty Hunter business. Maybe another time. "Okay, Johnny. Stop right there." Phil pointed at him. "Yeah. Right there." Johnny turned with both hands shoved into the pockets of his black jeans. "On the grass?" "Oh, yeah. It's perfect. Like you're part of the city with the bay in the background and all these people. The lighting's great. And look, you fit right in. All the locals are doing it. Benson, grab those lawn chairs, huh?" One of the crew slid two nylon folding chairs out of their cases and followed Phil's instructions in setting them up. The dwarf didn't move. "You look like you're about to be sick," Lisa muttered as she joined him in front of the chairs. "Naw, I think that's Luther." The smaller hound waddled across the grass, stopped to sniff a dandelion, then lowered himself to the ground and rolled onto his side. "I'm fine, Johnny. Stop looking at me." "All right, now Johnny, Stephanie, go ahead and take your seats." Johnny looked over the rims of his black sunglasses and raised an eyebrow at Howie. The man shrugged and gestured apologetically. Yeah. I already knew this was gonna have to happen sooner or later. He and Lisa sat, and Phil's hands fluttered excitedly toward them as Cody and the boom assistant took their places around the lawn chairs. "And how about taking off those sunglasses, huh?" "No." Phil scoffed. "It doesn't do well for the shot, though. It would be much better if we can—" "At least you have the damn shot, man. Take it or leave it." The director's mouth dropped open, then he took a deep breath and nodded at Cody. "Go ahead and start the new reel." Johnny folded his arms and watched the pedestrians milling around Federal Hill Park. Half of them slowed to stare at the filming in progress. This is gonna be one hell of a short season. "Are we rolling? Great. Here we go." Phil pointed at the bounty hunter and nodded. "So now that you've been in Baltimore for a few days, Johnny, how do you feel?" "I'm ready to get back to my swamp." The director's shoulders slumped and he shook his head as he whispered, "Try to be real here, okay?" "He thinks I ain't serious about this whole thing," Johnny muttered, leaning slightly toward Lisa. "What the hell does he want from me?" She grinned and watched Phil gesticulate in what amounted to a bunch of nonsense she didn't understand. "Ratings." "Ridiculous." "What's been your favorite part of Baltimore so far, Johnny?" Phil continued. "I have a nice hotel suite," he muttered. "It's bigger than the others." "You mean bigger than the places you used to stay when you were going after bounties fifteen years ago?" Shit. "Yeah. 'Course that's what I meant." "You like big hotel rooms. Okay." One of the crewmembers sniggered, and Phil cast him a scathing glance. "What else about the city draws you in?" "Besides a job?" Johnny sniffed and scanned the park and all the pedestrians. This is ridiculous. "You know, Baltimore's got…charm. Right? It's an old city with considerable opportunity for folks who can see it for what it's got. I guess." "Great. Tell us about your run-in yesterday with a few magicals at the…in Guilford." Johnny rolled his eyes but of course, no one could see it beneath the dark sunglasses. "I don't have much to say. We were lookin' for our guy, and it turned out we had the wrong criminal. That's it." "Will you continue the search over the next few days?" Lisa leaned toward him and muttered, "Now would be the time to play up the whole 'sit back and relax' part of this." "Naw." Johnny folded his arms and stared at the camera. "I been called off the job after a few key details came into play. So I reckon I'll stick around here for a few more days, see the sights, enjoy all the…city folk." He gestured toward a large crowd walking through the streets downtown and almost ate his own words when he saw the damn pony people in bright colors among them. Does it ever end? "And you can say you've been enjoying yourself while you're here, right?" Phil asked, his eyes widening as he geared up for more questions. "Sure." "Baltimore has kicked it up a notch when it comes to the fine-dining scene. Like where you and Stephanie went out for dinner last night." Johnny's hands balled into fists in his lap. "We only got to see a little of that moment between you two. It looked like you were having fun." "Yeah, until someone showed up and ruined a perfectly good night. Are you serious with this shit, man? This ain't 'a day in the life.' It feels more like puttin' me on a witness stand." "Just roll with it, okay?" Phil whistled at the cameraman and twirled his finger before he pointed at the bounty hunter and his "assistant." Cody and the second cameraman closed in. "The next question's for you, Stephanie." Lisa crossed one leg over the other and leaned back in the chair. "Okay." "How easy is it to get on Johnny's good side?" She laughed in surprise and tossed her red curls over her shoulder. "I'm sorry, what?" "Well, you know him fairly well. Yes, you're on the show as an assistant, but I'm talking about knowing him well enough to go out to dinner last night. It looked like you two were having quite the evening. Is that something you have to work at, or does it come naturally to you?" Jesus, Phil. Lisa stared at the camera as Cody stooped and stepped toward her, zooming in. Way to pop the seriously unexpected questions. "Well…" She glanced at Rex sniffing around Cody's feet and raised her eyebrows. "That's a little personal—" "Oh, it's fine," Phil cut in, nodding vigorously. "We love personal. So do all Johnny's fans." "Okay. I guess first I should say that my interview for this show wasn't the first time Johnny and I met." "Keep going." "It was a long time ago. That first meeting." Lisa turned toward Johnny and pulled up a fake smile she tried to make look as uncomfortable as possible. He said make it look like I hate his guts. Here we go. "Johnny changed my mind about many things. Mostly about where I was headed and the kinds of choices I was making. Now, I…want to pay him back for everything he brought into my life." The dwarf snorted and looked away from her to stare at the camera. "Do you think you'll accomplish that?" Phil asked. "Oh, I certainly do." Lisa smirked at the camera and cocked her head. "Maybe sooner than he realizes." That'll pin the nail in the coffin. Stephanie Wyndom's on a quest for revenge. "Johnny, you have a rough history with personal relationships." The dwarf lowered his head to stare at Phil over the rims of his glasses. "What the hell are you goin' on about?" "I'm merely taking a dive into your past. You're still the same Johnny Walker, but now you have fifteen years of a whole different kind of experiences under your belt, namely retreating down south for voluntary retirement way before the end of your time." Johnny shook his head. "I ain't talkin' about the last fifteen years. Or what happened before them." "This is important." "No, it ain't." Johnny leaned forward and pointed at Phil. "Change it to somethin' else or we're done." The director stepped back and twirled his finger in a "keep going" gesture. "This is good stuff, Johnny. Vulnerable. Raw. Let's stay here for a while—" "You can stay. I'm checkin' out if you don't start blabbin' about somethin' else." "I'm trying to draw your essence out." Phil stepped forward again. "You have something of a budding new relationship with Stephanie here. You have two coonhounds with you now, which is new since the last time fans saw you in action. Do you ever worry about what might happen to people who get close to you?" Johnny whipped his sunglasses off. "You piece of shit." "There it is." Phil grinned. "Let's explore that." "Naw, we're done." Luther trotted past his master and sniffed wildly at the grass. "I figured it out, Johnny." Rex stared after his brother. "He's not listening to you, dummy. What are you doing?" "Fixing it." "Johnny, wait," Phil shouted and gestured for the dwarf to sit again. "We're only getting started on the juicy stuff. Tell us about your kid." Rex whined and swung his head to stare at the director. "Uh-oh." Luther hunkered in the grass beside the film crew. "You stepped in it now, two-legs." Johnny glared at Phil. "Move on." "Oh, come on. The world hears nothing from Johnny Walker for fifteen years and now he's out and about again. Dating, raising coonhounds, getting back into the swing of things as a caregiver, right? What's her name again?" Lisa glanced at Johnny and tried to hide her concern and to keep smiling for the camera. He's about to explode. "Maybe there's something else I can answer—" "Not right now, Stephanie. I want to hear what Johnny has to say about stepping into his role as the protector again. That's what happened, right?" The bounty hunter sniffed and stared directly ahead at nothing. "We saw the bedroom at your house when we started filming a few days ago. Let's talk about the girl—" Johnny lurched from his chair, grasped the back of it, and hurled it across the grass. He stormed past Cody and flipped the camera the middle finger before he strode away. "Johnny?" Lisa stood and frowned at Phil. "I guess that's the end of it." "Aw, come on. We were getting to the good parts—" "Come on, boys." Johnny whistled and Rex barreled after him across the park. "You okay, Johnny?" "We're done with this filmin' shit. It was a bad idea." "Wait, wait. Luther! Come on!" "Yeah, yeah. Give me a minute." Five yards away, the smaller hound finished squatting in the grass and turned to sniff what he'd left behind. "Oh, shit. What is that?" "You don't know?" Rex looked at Johnny, then sidetracked to check his brother's unburdened treasure. "Uh…Johnny? I don't think this is normal." The dwarf stopped in his tracks, turned, and hurried to where the hounds were investigating a particularly large pile in the grass. He frowned and bent over for a closer look. "What the hell?" "Right?" Luther looked at his master and panted, his tail wagging furiously. "But lemme tell ya, Johnny. I feel so much better!" "You don't say." He folded his arms. "And y'all got no idea what that is?" "Nope." "Absolutely none." "Is he gonna die, Johnny?" "Well, not now that he passed what I reckon is two whole Styrofoam to-go boxes." "Whoa, what?" Luther poked his head toward the pile again. "How'd you come up with that?" "Dude, you ate the boxes." Rex snorted and shook his head. "New low, Luther. Even for you." Rolling his eyes, Johnny nodded toward the street to indicate that he intended to return to their hotel. "Johnny?" Luther looked from the evidence to his master. "Johnny, are you mad?" "Not as long as we leave all the shit here at the park." That includes shitty questions and useless director morons.
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 18	Johnny spent the rest of the day holed up in his hotel suite and refused to step out again for anything. Rex lay curled in front of the armchair, and Luther sat at his master's feet, staring at the dwarf. "Johnny. Johnny. Hey, Johnny." "Boy, what do you want?" "Only to tell you I feel so much better. And that I hope you're not…mad at me?" With a grunt, Johnny reached out to scratch behind the hound's ears and shook his head. "You can't help what's in your nature." "Hey, wait a minute." Rex whipped his head up to stare at them. "Don't pin his stupidity on the whole canine race. I didn't eat Styrofoam." "But you ain't gonna try to tell me y'all didn't share the leftovers." The larger hound sighed and lowered his head to his forepaws again. "Uh-huh. That's what I thought." "So we're good, Johnny?" "As long as you don't do it again. Or make a mess like that inside." "Yeah, no problem." Luther twisted to lick between his legs. "Feelin' pretty empty right now, actually." "I bet." A knock came at the door, followed by Lisa's voice. "Johnny?" "Yeah, I'm comin'." He sighed and strode toward the door. When he opened it, she thrust a bag of store-bought popcorn toward him and slipped inside his room. "I thought I'd give you some space," she said, turned to walk back down the hall, and grinned at him. "But you've been in here all day, you have no inclination to leave again, and I'm not gonna let you sit here all on your own and throw yourself a pity party without some company." Johnny sniffed. "It ain't a pity party, darlin'." "Oh, yeah? Then why didn't you answer any of my texts?" "What texts?" "See? You were so caught up in being pissed off that you didn't even notice. There were four, by the way. I began to think maybe you'd had a heart attack and I should come make sure you're still alive." "That's dumb," Luther said as he scratched behind his ear. "If Johnny died, the whole building would know about it." "Yeah, you wouldn't be able to shut us up, lady," Rex added. "Except for the fact that you can't hear us." "Sorry," Johnny grumbled as he flopped down onto the couch. "I wasn't thinkin' about the damn phone." "I know. Which is why I brought popcorn." His thick eyebrow quirked when she joined him on the couch. "I ain't makin' the connection." "Well, we have a couple of options for killing time without stewing in misery about it." She set her laptop on the coffee table and waited for Johnny to open the bag of popcorn. "Yep. That's a start. We can talk about your buttons getting pushed out at Federal Hill Park if you want. I won't force you, but I'm here for that. Or we could try to find a movie or something on that giant flatscreen over there that seems reserved for giant hotel suites. It's much better than mine. Or we could take a look at what the film crew's already posted for today, and I can be a hell of a lot more prepared going into this meeting tonight knowing what's been put out there for the general public to consume faster than we can film it. Take your pick." Johnny rolled his eyes and leaned slightly away from her. "What about the option where you go do any of that on your own and I can get some peace and quiet?" "Come on. We both know that's not what you want." Lisa plunged her hand into the open bag of popcorn, took a small handful, and ate it a few pieces at a time. "Watching YouTube videos it is, then." "Darlin', that ain't the kinda thing that's gonna lift my spirits." He cleared his throat. "If they needed liftin' anyhow." "You can think of it as research, Johnny. I need to be prepared for this meeting, and I could use your help pulling out a few nuggets here and there to use in case I need them." Lisa opened her laptop and pulled up the YouTube website. "Any insight into what the rest of the world is seeing of Johnny Walker and Stephanie Wyndom. Okay?" "Fine." Johnny snagged a handful of popcorn and shoved it into his mouth. Small pieces toppled into his beard and stuck there as he stared at her screen. "It sounds more like torture to me, but if it helps you at this meetin'—" "That's exactly what it'll do." The first short Dwarf the Bounty Hunter clip that pulled up was from their interrupted dinner the night before at Rye Street Tavern. Johnny scowled and pointed at the screen. "These guys need to stay out of other folks' business." "They're only trying to do their job. Which I'm sure you realize you don't exactly make very easy." "Filmin' a private dinner ain't got nothin' to do with bein' a bounty hunter." "Johnny, I don't think all the people who watched your show and became die-hard fans like this were into it for the bounty-hunter aspect." He frowned. "What the hell else is there?" "You." Lisa shrugged, then turned the volume up. "Although Johnny and Stephanie crossed paths for the first time almost twenty-five years ago and under wildly different circumstances, Season Eight brings more than a new opportunity for fans and admirers to relive the excitement that was Dwarf the Bounty Hunter." Phil's voiceover filled the suite, and Johnny crammed another handful of popcorn into his mouth. "This time, it offers an opportunity for love. Two lost souls finding solace in each other, brought together by nothing more than a shared dedication to justice and taking down the criminals no one but Johnny Walker is capable of bringing in." "Jesus Christ." The dwarf scoffed and turned away from the laptop. "Last time we filmed the show, there wasn't anything like this bullshit recorded over some sappy shot. It's all speculation." "Yep. Speculation the fans are eating up like candy. Look at all these views, Johnny. And the comments." "Naw, I'm good." "'Good for him,'" she read aloud. "'Johnny's been on his own for way too long. He deserves a nice girl like Stephanie.'" "For fuck's sake—" "Oh, look at this one. 'If he doesn't hold onto that hot piece of ass, he's dumber than he looks.' Huh." "Folks are gettin' way too involved in this." He shook his head. "And if they're spoutin' off that kinda bullshit, I ain't fixin' to have that kinda fan followin' me around in the first place." "Well, this is the kind of stuff that keeps people's attention, I guess." They went through more short clips already posted—the beginning of their trip into Senator Hugh's house, a brief glimpse of the stop at Canton Exports & Supplies to speak to Rocky and his work crew, Johnny and Stephanie throwing sticks to the hounds at the Baltimore Waterfront Promenade and laughing, Johnny shoving a pedestrian out of the way when the man tried to feed Rex a dog treat. There were a fair number of clips of him shoving someone, although most of them involved members of the film crew. The last one they opened was a panned-out shot of Johnny surrounded by dozens of cosplayers in brightly colored horse costumes outside the convention center. It showed his scrunched-up face as the woman in the white-sequined jumpsuit bent over to get his autograph, while Rex and Luther crouched warily among the sea of people who looked only halfway like horses. Lisa stood a few yards away, smirked at the whole thing, and looked more than a little amused by Johnny's palpable discomfort. "Even on the job and in the middle of hunting his newest bounty, Johnny Walker still has a soft spot for engaging with his fans. Not one to turn down a beautiful woman in a pony costume, this bounty hunter doesn't care who you are, where you're from, or what eclectic interests you hold. If you're a fan of Johnny Walker, he's a fan of you. Join us next week for the Season Eight premiere of Dwarf the Bounty Hunter: Back in Black. And don't forget to subscribe to—" "All right, turn that shit off." Johnny stood from the couch and crossed the living area to retrieve his half-full whiskey glass from the dining table. "They made us both look like a couple of idiots." "Stopping to make someone's day by signing their…tail doesn't make you an idiot." Lisa fought back a laugh when the dwarf spun and glared at her. "Come on. It's funny." "Sure. Damn hilarious." "Okay, look. I know you're still on edge about finding the Red Boar. I know we're close. This will all work out, Johnny." He downed the rest of his whiskey and opened the bottle again to pour another. She closed her laptop and set it on the coffee table. "You believe me, don't you?" "I know you believe it." He darted her a sidelong glance and grunted. "Dammit, fine. Yeah, I believe it too. You set up somethin' I wouldn't have even considered on my own, darlin', but this ain't my usual style." "Oh, I know. Which is why this will work. Every criminal out there who's had a run-in with you since you started knows exactly what your usual style is." Lisa snagged the bag of popcorn and placed it on her lap. "They won't expect this." "'Cause I ain't got the patience to sit around and wait through all this pomp and circumstance for a fuckin' show when that ain't why I'm here!" Rex and Luther both snorted at their master's outburst. "Jeez, Johnny. You don't have to yell." "Yeah, we're all right here in the same room." Luther lowered his head to paw at his ear. "And we can hear you just fine when you whisper." Johnny took a long drink, glanced up at Lisa's open, patient smile, then cleared his throat. "Sorry." "You don't have anything to be sorry about. I know it's hard to wait. Especially since you've been waiting fifteen years without any idea that this was coming." "Shit." He vigorously scratched his head. "You got me all worked out, don'tcha?" "Hardly. But I like to think I know enough." She jiggled the bag of popcorn at him. "We still have a few hours to kill. I'll let you choose the movie." "Ha. Helluva consolation prize, darlin'."
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 19	When 10:00 pm rolled around, Lisa and Johnny were fully ready to stop flipping through available cable channels on the hotel TV. She glanced at her watch and nodded. "It'll be time for me to head out soon. The Johnny Haters Anonymous meeting is in an hour." "Great. I'm comin' with you." "Johnny—" "I know. You're gonna tell me it's a bad idea. I'm gonna agree. Then I'll say I'm comin' anyway 'cause I ain't lettin' you head off all on your own into a den of shitbrained thugs who wanna see me hang. You'll try to stop me, which we've already proven ain't possible any way you try to sling it." He stood and sniffed. "So let's cut through all the formalities and get to the part where we make ready to head out together, all right?" The agent stared at him and pressed her lips together to hide a smile. "How long have you been rehearsing that one in your head?" "Since about halfway through Die Hard. Love the film, darlin', but I already know how it ends." "Okay. Fine. I don't have enough bandwidth right now to argue with your plan." Johnny smirked. "'Cause you know I'm right." She stood with a soft chuckle, shook her head, and pulled up her redheaded Stephanie illusion. That done, she took her cell phone from her pocket and placed it on the coffee table. "What are you doin'?" "Leaving my phone here if you're coming with me—and staying hidden the whole time. Let's be clear about that." "Yeah, yeah. I'll be a fly on the damn wall." "A fly who stays outside, Johnny." He grunted. "As long as you can do that, I don't have any reason to keep my phone on me. And honestly, I'd rather not. That service account isn't registered in Stephanie Wyndom's name, and I'm very sure anyone who can send me a private message like that over the dark web won't have any problem at all discovering that my phone belongs to someone else." "Well, now there's no way in hell I ain't joinin' ya." "But you stay outside—" "I get it, darlin'. I hear you loud ʼn clear." "Good." Lisa looked at both hounds curled up in front of the armchair and raised an eyebrow. "What?" Luther lifted his head to stare at her. "I didn't do anything." "Don't look at me." Rex sighed and closed his eyes. "It was probably Luther." Agent Breyer didn't have to say it out loud. Johnny had already had the same thought. "Lisa and I are headin' out, boys." Luther leapt to his feet, his tail wagging furiously. "All right! Yes! You know how hard it is to stay cooped up in the same room all day without a change of scenery?" Rex stared up at his master with wide eyes. "But no hounds on this particular outin'. Sorry." "What?" The smaller hound snorted and trotted after Johnny as the dwarf headed into the huge bedroom. Lisa glanced at Rex and shrugged. "It's better this way tonight." "Yeah, I know you know I can hear you, lady. But it's not fair when I can't argue." "What do you mean no hounds?" Luther whined. "Johnny, we're a team!" "I aim to stick to the outside where no one's gettin' a whiff of a dwarf spyin' in on their secret hate meetin'," Johnny muttered. "I ain't gonna risk the two of y'all gettin' found out too." "Aw, man. We can be quiet, Johnny." "Yeah, you already know that," Rex added from the living area. "We're great huntin' dogs." "That ain't the point this time, boys. No huntin' and no sniffin' out. Only watchin' and waitin', and that'll be hard enough for me." Johnny took his duffel bag from the closet and heaved it onto the bed to root through the gear he'd brought. "This sucks." Luther jumped up to settle both forepaws on the bed and sniffed at the black duffel bag. "You won't be gone forever, will you?" "Or we'll shrivel up and die in here, Johnny." The dwarf snorted. "Few hours tops. Y'all ain't got nothin' to worry about." "Except there's no grass in the hotel, Johnny. What if we have to…go?" He smirked at Luther, then crossed the bedroom and opened the bathroom door. "Do it in the shower." He turned to leave, then remembered the toilet and closed the lid with a loud clack. "And stay outta the john." "Johnny, did you tell them to do their business in the shower?" Lisa called from the living area. "Uh-huh." Rex chuckled. "She's getting very good at guessing the rest of the conversation when she can only hear half. Hey, lady. Try to read my mind. What am I thinking right now?" Lisa stepped toward the open bedroom doorway to watch Johnny rummaging through his bag. "Figures." Rex snorted and lay his head back down on his forepaws. "No one even wants to try." Leaning against the doorway, Lisa watched Luther sniffing around the opposite side of the bed. "We can take them out before we go, Johnny." "No, we can't." Johnny strapped the belt loaded with explosive disks around his waist, then pulled out the pistol he'd repurposed into a tranquilizer. "How much you wanna bet Phil and his damn crew put someone out in the hall to watch for either one of us leavin' this suite?" "What? They wouldn't do that." "Feel free to check, darlin'. I'm sure you'll find somethin'." "No…" With a frown, she turned hesitantly away from the bedroom doorway and hurried across the suite to check through the small peephole in the front door. Johnny smirked and took a six-inch square device from the bag. "Wow." Lisa reappeared in the doorway and ran a hand through her currently red curls. "I honestly didn't expect that." "Someone camped right outside the door?" "Yeah. Cody with his camera and the woman they have with them. The one with the bandana. What's her name?" "I have no idea." Tucking the tranquilizer into its holster which he'd slung over the belt of disks, Johnny carried the black device into the living room. "But we ain't getting' out that way without the whole damn team refusin' to let us go on our own." She wrinkled her nose. "If we told them what we were doing, though—" "Darlin', those idiots followed us into an active shootout at the senator's house. They ain't concerned about gettin' into a little danger—or startin' it—as long as they get their damn shot." "So we have to sneak out of our hotel. Is that what you're saying?" A dark chuckle escaped the dwarf as he slid the dining table away from the window. He jerked the window open as far as it would go and punched the screen out. "Sneakin' out. Sure. It's one thing I've always been good at." Lisa stared at the open window that allowed in a full, bay-air breeze with nothing in the way. "Seriously? We simply climb through the window like a couple of thieves?" "'Course not. Like a couple of professionals who need to go get a job done without the paparazzi makin' a mess of the whole damn thing." Johnny returned to the center of the living area and set the square black device on the floor in front of Rex. "And this is for y'all." Luther stepped up immediately to sniff at the device. "What is this, Johnny? Doesn't smell like treats." "Doesn't look like anything for hounds at all," Rex replied. "I got a job for y'all, boys. While you're stayin' here." Rex perked up at the idea of being more useful. "What's the job?" "We can do whatever you want, Johnny. We're your hounds." "It's a pedal." Johnny nodded at the device. "Anyone comes knockin' on this door lookin' for me, y'all make sure to press the damn thing, understand?" "Press?" "You mean paw?" Luther did exactly that and stepped on the black device. "I ain't interested." "Oh, shit!" The smaller hound sprang away from the pedal with a yelp. "Johnny! How the hell did you get inside that little box?" The dwarf chuckled. "It's only my voice. It's looped with a few Johnnyisms if you gotta use ʼem but make sure you keep the barkin' up real loud too, all right? It keeps most folks too confused to realize Johnny Walker's repeatin' himself with the same six lines." "Huh." Luther sniffed the pedal, then pawed it again. "Get outta here before I come throw you out." Rex tittered. "That's a good one, Johnny." "Yeah, definitely you." Lisa smiled at the dwarf in confusion. "You came to Baltimore prepared to use that, didn't you?" Johnny raised his eyebrows. "'Course I did. I used this all the damn time back when Nelson thought it was his inalienable right to knock on my door at any damn hour he pleased. Granted, that was before I had a couple of coonhounds to put the fear of Johnny Walker in him. It'll do fine for the film crew." "You can count on us, Johnny." Rex stood to sniff the device. "No one will know you guys snuck out. Promise." "Yeah, we won't say a thing," Luther added. "Not like anyone would hear it anyway. They won't get past us, Johnny." "All right. It's only a few hours, boys. Y'all be good." "You got it, Johnny." "We're on it like my paw on this—" Luther stepped on the pedal and backed away. "I ain't fixin' to repeat myself. Now git!" "Ha-ha. Johnny, that is you." The dwarf shooed his hound away from the pedal. "Not until we're gone, huh? I ain't tryin' to explain why I was havin' conversations with myself all night." Lisa glanced at her watch. "We need to get going." "Yeah, yeah. All right. Do you wanna take the lead out the window, or should I?" She glanced at the open window with Baltimore's cityscape lit up across the darkness outside and shrugged. "Be my guest." "Well it's my suite, so it's technically the other way round. But sure." Johnny crawled onto the windowsill and moved gingerly along the small ledge toward the first-story roof protruding from the back of the building. Lisa ducked through the window behind him and looked into the parking lot. "At least we're only on the fourth floor."
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 20	After Johnny disappeared around the corner of the building with a promise to stay out of sight and not cause any trouble, Lisa glanced at the marquee over the front door. A staffing agency's main office isn't too bad. At least they're not holding this Johnny-hater meeting in the basement of a church or something. She opened the front door and stepped inside in her full redheaded Stephanie illusion. The front room of the staffing agency was empty and all the lights turned off, but some were on down the hall, so she followed them and the sound of low, agitated voices. When she stepped into the room off the hall, the conversation stopped. A dozen heads turned toward her—magicals and humans—and the massive shifter seated at the head of the long conference table nodded at her. "Look who finally decided to show up." A witch in a thick black hoodie snarled at Lisa. "Did you have a hard time getting away from your new boyfriend without him noticing?" The agent took the last empty chair around the table and didn't bother to meet the witch's gaze. We were right. The Red Boar's not here but I'm willing to bet that shifter's his mouthpiece. She sat and nodded at the shifter. "I hope you didn't get started without me." "You're not the one who put this together, Stephanie." He sneered when he said her name. "Merely another invite." She glanced around the table at the disgruntled ex-bounties and recognized most of them from their photos under the episode descriptions on the Johnny Walker fan site. This is surreal. "Man, that fucking dwarf must've lost most of his brain cells if he brought an ex fucking con on with him for this joke of a show," a half-Kilomea grunted. He picked at his long eyeteeth with the pointed end of a shish-kabob stick, his takeout box open and empty on the table in front of him. Lisa shrugged. "He lost a lot of things fifteen years ago." "Not nearly as much as the rest of us." A crystal woman seated across the table tossed her long braids over her shoulder. "That's for damn sure." "And not nearly as much as he deserves," the agent added with a firm nod. "That's why we're here, isn't it?" Two gnomes closest to the shifter at the head of the table—one with an eyepatch and the other with his left ear missing—lowered their heads together for a whispered conversation. The one with the eyepatch sneered. "Do you expect us to believe you've been running around Baltimore with that damn bounty hunter for days and don't give a shit about what happens to him?" She gestured toward the shifter. "I sent all my details exactly like the rest of you. At least I assume the vetting process was the same given that we all found each other in a place where most people—and magicals—do what we can to stay anonymous. I don't know about you, but I'm very sure the shifter, whoever he is, wouldn't have told me how to get here if I didn't check out." "Kellen," the shifter grumbled. "If you need a damn name, call me that." "Okay, Kellen." She folded her arms and glared at the gnomes. "I thought we were here for the bounty hunter with his head so far up his ass he still thinks he's Oriceran's gift to Earth, not to interrogate me." A few ex-cons chuckled at that. The gnomes huddled together again for another unheard conversation but didn't say anything else. At least that got their attention. Whatever Johnny's picking up with that spy bug, I'll have to remind him later that I don't mean any of this. "But I'm having a hard time buying all this," the witch in the hoodie added, her glare still extremely hostile. "We've all seen the clips that stuck-up prick put all over the Internet. It looks like you two are cozier than you want anyone to believe. And I don't think I believe you." "And that's why I'm on the show with him now and you aren't. Because I'm smart enough to know that the best position to turn on someone and rip their life apart from the inside out is from right next to them. Up close and personal. The dwarf trusts me enough for that. And when I'm sure he trusts me with his life, that's the best time to strike." Lisa leaned sideways in her chair and raised an eyebrow at Kellen. "I assume you guys didn't do a meet-and-greet before I arrived." "It's not exactly something we need," a half-wizard interjected and smoothed his oiled hair away from his temples with both hands. "Our identities were plastered all over the TV for months after that shithead dwarf put us away. But you haven't shown up anywhere." "Look, he didn't break into bounty hunting when he started that stupid show," Lisa told him. "That was merely something he added to his fucked-up resume. And I happen to be on his bounty list that predates his idiotic scrounging for ratings and his sucking up to the goddamn FBI when they pulled him in as a regular contractor. It doesn't mean I don't want to see him bleed any less than the rest of you." "So prove it, then," the Crystal woman said. "I wanna hear what you think you know about him that earns you the right to sit here and call the rest of us idiots." "Fine." Lisa folded her arms. "What do you want to know?" "When did he bag you?" "2016." "Doing what?" "I'd lifted a new Mercedes in LA and got it as far as Kansas City before I ran out of my stash and had to re-up." Lisa sneered at the other ex-cons. "The fucker picked me up right after that and didn't even give me the chance to get right again. He took all eighty bucks worth of what I'd just scored too." "How the hell'd he even find out about you?" one gnome snarled. "The owner of the Mercedes dealership was a wizard and must have gotten word of the bastard's skills through the grapevine. You know how it was before Earth even knew about us and magic." The cons grumbled amongst themselves and glanced at Kellen for confirmation. The shifter shrugged. "Like she said, she checks out." It's a good thing I spent time researching my fake past. Lisa pressed her lips together in irritation. "So can we quit focusing on my fuckups and get down to the real issue here or what?" "You're not running the show, Light Elf," the half-wizard snarled. "So shut the hell up and let the big dogs handle the meeting, huh?" "Oh, sure. All you big dogs have considerable personal information about Johnny Walker already, right?" She gestured to include those present and smirked. "You've merely been waiting however many years to use it in a fun group setting. I get it." "This bitch's head is as big as the dwarf's," the witch spat. "You think you're better than the rest of us." "Well, you assholes aren't exactly making it hard for me." The woman leapt from her chair and leaned over the table and black-and-silver light illuminated in a sharp-tipped vortex within her palm. She snarled at Lisa. "Say that again." "Sit down!" Kellen barked. "All of you need to shut the fuck up. This isn't about who's got the biggest criminal sack, understand?" With a hiss, the witch snuffed out her unused attack spell and slumped into her chair. The shifter shook his head and glared at every face around the table. "We're here because the guy I answer to who reached out to all of you on that fan site wants to hear what each of you brings to the table. If you don't have anything useful to add to what he's looking for, you can get fucked. Understand?" Those present subsided, the silence punctured only by a few grumbles. At least I'm playing the part. Lisa focused her gaze on the shifter. "You're talking about Lemonhead, right?" "You saw the message boards," he replied flippantly. "It was a ballsy move to insert yourself there without having any real ties the way the rest of us do." "I saw an opportunity and I took it." She shrugged. "And it worked, obviously." "Uh-huh." The shifter studied her speculatively, then slid both his hands onto the table and drummed his fingertips on the surface. "So why don't you take this as another opportunity to tell us what you know about Johnny Walker. What makes you useful?" Lisa glanced at his drumming fingers and tried to hold back a smirk when the thick silver ring on the shifter's finger caught the overhead light and flashed red. The shape carved on it was the same profile of a boar she and Johnny had seen on so many drug baggies and tattooed on a random low-level drug dealer in Portland. If he's been on the Red Boar's payroll this long, I bet at least one of those red stones is a real ruby. "Sure." She took a deep breath and scanned the faces of the other criminals around her. "It wasn't on the YouTube clips, and it won't be on the episode, either as per Johnny's orders. But I know where he lives in Florida. I've been inside his house." The witch scoffed and shook her head. "But you won't tell us where?" "Everglades City, right on the main strip and backed up to the swamp. I'd give you an address but I didn't think I'd have to bring that information with me. And no, I haven't memorized it." "But we're not in Florida," the gnome missing an ear piped up. "We're in Baltimore. The fucking dwarf's in Baltimore. We shouldn't wait until he goes home and gets nice and cozy before we move." "And that's why I'm here—why we're all here, right?" The gnome scowled at her. "Look. Here's everything I know." Lisa tapped her fingers on the table. "Those dumbass dogs are as close as he gets to having family. Johnny lost his mind after his kid was gunned down fifteen years ago. I know you all know about that. And he hits the bottle every night like it's still fifteen years ago. He tries to fill his time pretending to be useful with all his stupid fucking gadgets, but he's still hung up on how badly he failed to keep his kid from eating a bullet. "And if you intend to keep asking me about all those clips of me and him, then yeah. I'm playing the 'go straight to Johnny's heart' card. Hell, I may even be the first living being on two legs instead of four that he's opened up to in fifteen years. And when he opens up all the way, which he will, his guard will be completely down." It took everything she had to not grimace at the way she twisted Johnny's pain and his past merely to make it look real in that context. He knows what I'm doing. I only hope he doesn't get so pissed about it that he forgets the plan. "Why you?" Kellen asked. "Specifically, I mean. Why would he take some Light Elf he bagged in '16 under his wing for this failure of a show trying to crawl its way back into the public eye now?" "Because I told him what I thought he wanted to hear." She forced herself to not look at the boar ring on the shifter's hand when he lifted it to stroke his chin. "His team was holding interviews for an assistant in this stupid thing so I called in and got myself a slot to talk to the bastard. I told him to his face how he'd ruined my life back then and sent me off to spend ten years behind bars, and that I'd come full circle to recognize how he saved me." The witch snorted. "Yeah, I know. It sounds like a load of shit." Lisa nodded at her. "And it was. But he was so desperate to feel like he'd done something good in his life that I had him eating from the palm of my hand after the first five minutes. I told him I wanted to work with him on the side of justice and all that crap, and that I admired him for what he was doing and how he got the job done. I convinced him that I decided this was the best way to repay the dwarf who tore my life apart and helped me to turn it around and he still believes that's exactly what happened." The other thugs sniggered around the table. The witch didn't seem all that convinced, but she assumed the woman had come in there looking for someone to tear down anyway and it happened to be aimed at Stephanie Wyndom. "Fair enough." Kellen leaned forward at the head of the table and folded his hands. "It sounds like we have an in, then." "Sure. And we get to go over all this with Lemonhead too, right?" Lisa gestured toward the other criminals. "He wants to see the dwarf burn as much as we do, doesn't he?" The shifter smirked. "He couldn't make it tonight. I could. And I know he'll be especially grateful to hear more details from someone who's done more than spend the last decade or two stewing over a revenge plot. It looks like you're the only one who's taken any action." "Yeah. I spent enough time doing jack shit behind bars." She grinned. "I bet. So where's he staying?" Lisa paused for a second. Careful. This could turn south very quickly. "We're both at the Sagamore Pendry right now with the whole film crew." "Uh-huh." Kellen pulled his phone out and typed something into it. He didn't look up at her when he asked, "What room?" Shit. "424. Fourth floor. Right across the hall from me in 427." The shifter's gaze flicked up to meet hers and he nodded. "Well, that's a start." Yeah, and we'll have to move quickly to get whoever's staying in those rooms the hell out of there before the Red Boar shows up. At least we'll have the element of surprise. "We should go after him tonight," the half-wizard said. "Now." "Yeah." The gnome with the eyepatch pounded a fist on the table. "While he's curled up with his dumb mutts and has no idea this Light Elf turned on him." A round of shouted agreement rose from the other criminals and some of them banged on the table in their excitement. Kellen studied Lisa with a raised eyebrow, and she shrugged. "I wasn't planning on tonight, but I sure as hell won't object if that's the way you want to go." "Then let's grab that bastard in his sleep and tie him up like the fucking animal he is," the Crystal woman shouted and pushed from her chair. "No." Kellen turned a warning gaze onto her and pointed at her seat. "Sit." "You want us to wait even longer?" the witch hissed. "I thought we were here to do something—" "We will do something but not tonight." Kellen slipped his phone into his pocket and stood. "I'll take this information to Lemonhead, and he'll call the shots from there. The rest of you sit back and wait for us to reach out." "This is ridiculous," the one-eared gnome growled. "Why should we wait for instructions from some asshole who won't even show his face here when we already have everything we need?" The shifter hissed at him and his eyes flashed silver in warning, although he didn't shift. "Because unlike the rest of you, Lemonhead has outsmarted Johnny Walker at every turn, and the dwarf hasn't laid a hand on him, although not for lack of trying. And because if anyone moves on that dwarf without getting the go-ahead from me first, you won't live to see the day when we take the bounty hunter down ourselves. If Johnny doesn't kill you for moving in on him before it's time, Lemonhead will. And I could be wrong, but I assumed everyone in this room would be a little smarter than they were when a fucking dwarf with an overinflated ego tossed you behind bars the first time. On camera." The other thugs grumbled and shifted in their seats, but no one argued any further. Lisa glanced furtively at those around the table. They know Lemonhead's reputation, at least. Probably not the Red Boar, but it doesn't matter if they know who they're taking orders from. We do. On the fourth floor of the Sagamore Pendry, Phil waved his crew onward down the hall toward the front door of Johnny's suite at the very end. Cody stalked quietly behind the director, followed by David with the boom mic, Alicia in her bandana carrying lighting gear, and Fred and Brad as backup. "We'll go at this from a different angle, people," Phil whispered and pointed at Johnny's door. "He's had all day to simmer down from that little outburst at the park. And I'm willing to bet he'll be much easier to handle at the end of the day." They stopped outside the door and he knocked briskly three times. "Johnny? It's Phil." One coonhound barked inside, then the other. The director smirked. "Well at least we know he's awake. Johnny! Come on, man. Only a few more questions. You've been in there all day." The dogs barked wildly. "I ain't interested," the dwarf shouted. "I know things went a little south earlier today," Phil said. "But I'd like to get a final wrap-up of the day, Johnny. We've come up with a few talking points we think the viewers would enjoy hearing straight from you." "Get outta here before I come throw you out." Phil stepped away from the door and glanced at his crewmembers. "Hang tight. I'll get him to come around," he said quietly, then resumed his usual tone. "Okay, Johnny. I'll be honest with you. I know I pushed a little too hard when we began to dive into your past. That's okay. This new season isn't about your past, though. It's about the present. And we merely want to highlight—" Paws thumped against the door and scratched furiously as one of the hounds barked over and over. Staggering back in surprise, Phil stared at the door. "Jesus. He needs to bring those attack dogs under control." "I don't like havin' to repeat myself," Johnny called from inside. "It's none of your business." Phil sighed, took his phone out of his pocket, and pulled Lisa's number up. He glanced at Cody. "Are you rolling right now?" The cameraman nodded without saying a word and panned the camera toward him. "Not me, man. Focus on the door. He might still answer." Phil made the call and lifted his phone to his ear. Lisa's cell rang inside Johnny's suite. "This ain't what I call fun," Johnny said as the hounds barked wildly. "Johnny, we know Li—we know Stephanie's in there with you. I can hear her phone." Phil knocked again. "Come on and open up." "I'd rather be huntin'." Phil frowned. "Well, yeah. We get that. But we're here now, so—" "You look like you're about to shit yourself. Get movin'." "What?" The director called Johnny's number next, but it went straight to voicemail. "Johnny, what's going on?" "I ain't interested. Get outta here before I come throw you out." "Yeah, you already said that." Phil scratched his head. "I don't like havin' to repeat myself. It's none of your business. This ain't what I call fun." Alicia cocked her head and scowled. "I don't think that's him." Phil pounded on the door again. "Johnny! You better open this door right now or I'll call the front desk and tell them your dogs are on a rampage in that suite!" "I'd rather be huntin'." "Dammit. Did he seriously record himself on a loop?" "That's definitely what it sounds like," David muttered. "I know what it sounds like." Phil whirled around and scanned his team. "Todd, go down to the front desk and…Todd?" The other members turned around to search for their second camera guy. "Where the hell is he?" Dave shrugged. "I thought he was here." "Shit."
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 21	Johnny tapped the earpiece that synced with his spy bug and scowled at the plain brick wall as he listened in on the private meeting inside the staffing agency office. I oughtta head right in and wring that fucker's neck, whoever he is. Make him rat out the Red Boar right here and now. He took a deep breath and pressed a hand against the wall. This isn't the time. She did it right. After this, we'll either find the asshole knocking on the wrong hotel door, or she'll get all the details on his next move. And we'll be ready. The shifter's voice continued in Johnny's headset. "And I could be wrong, but I assumed everyone in this room would be a little smarter than they were when a fucking dwarf with an overinflated ego tossed you behind bars the first time. On camera." The shuffle of slow footsteps rose from behind the dwarf, and his hand went to the hilt of his utility knife at his belt. A whole city full of idiots. Johnny whirled, drew his knife, and flicked it out. "You picked the wrong night, asshole." "Whoa, whoa." The man Johnny recognized from the film crew took one hand off his phone—which he kept aimed at the bounty hunter's face—and raised it in surrender. "Hey, man. I'm only here to catch the action." "Are you fuckin' kiddin' me?" Johnny stormed toward the man and tried to slap the phone out of his hand. "Turn that shit off. You ain't even supposed to be out here." "And you aren't supposed to leave without telling us. That's the deal, right?" "Deal's off. Gimme that." "No." The guy ducked away from Johnny and lifted the phone again. "What is this place anyway?" "None of your business. Dammit, you… What's your name?" The guy raised an eyebrow. "Todd." "I swear on Sheila's diesel engine, Todd, if you don't get that damn phone outta my face and hightail it back to that hotel, I'll—" Static crackled in his earpiece, then multiple voices rose again from inside the meeting. "You hear that?" "Someone's outside." "I bet this Light Elf bitch brought backup with her." "Hey," Lisa said, her voice even and level. "I've been nothing but straight with you guys." "Then go check it out," the shifter said. "Alone. We'll wait." "Shit." Johnny hissed and lunged for Todd. He managed to wrap an arm around the guy's neck and pulled him close. "Gimme that fuckin' phone." "No! Get off me!" The front door to the office building opened, and Lisa stormed outside. She rounded the corner to see Johnny holding Todd in what was almost a sleeper hold. "Hey! What the hell do you think you're doing?" Johnny frowned at her, and she nodded toward the building with wide eyes. Yeah. We're puttin' on a show, then. "Hey, I just came to see what's going on in there," Todd started. "And now this—" "Shut up," Lisa spat. "I don't know who you are, but you picked the wrong night and the wrong place to play super spy." "What are you—ow! Ah! Get off me! I'm—" Todd choked and crumpled when Johnny stabbed a pressure point at the base of the man's neck with two fingers. Lisa shot a fireball at Todd's feet for added effect, and the unsuspecting cameraman stared at her with wide eyes. "Why are you—" The click and hiss of Johnny's tranquilizer gun unloading a full dose into the guy's neck were fortunately quiet enough to not travel through brick walls. Todd thumped to the sidewalk beside the building when Johnny released him and the dwarf looked at Lisa and shrugged. "Stupid," she muttered. The front door burst open again and this time, released the full dozen criminals gathered to bash on Johnny Walker and plan his demise. The dwarf darted into the shadows and used the thugs' clamoring footsteps to hide the sound of his own as he headed toward the back of the building. "Did you get him?" "Who the fuck was it?" "I bet she let him go. She's too soft." Lisa snatched Todd's phone from where it had toppled to the sidewalk and turned and raised an eyebrow at the criminals. "Some dipshit thought he'd come take a look at what's happening. I got him and his phone. So we're good." "Is he a friend of yours?" the witch asked with a scowl. "Yeah, I wipe out all my friends with magical attacks and leave them dead on the side of office buildings," Lisa quipped. "Come on. I've never seen him before." Kellen guided the front door closed gently and peered at Todd. "So you got him." "It sure looks like, doesn't it?" She folded her arms and glared at the shifter. "Does anyone else want to keep questioning whether or not I am who I say I am?" "No, you're all right." The gnome with the eyepatch hawked and spat and the wet glob landed just in front of Todd's face. "Now you get to clean up your mess." "Yeah, and I will." Lisa turned toward Kellen. "So what's next?" "The rest of you fuck off and wait to hear from me." He sneered at Todd, then turned and roared at the criminals, "Now. Do I need to throw you out on your asses or what?" The dozen thugs scattered away from the office building and disappeared into the shadows beneath Baltimore's city lights in the middle of the night. Lisa sighed and rolled her eyes. "I need at least ten minutes to get rid of the body." "Do what you gotta do." The shifter stepped toward her and handed her a burner flip phone. "Then wait for the call." "Do you hand these out to everyone else too?" "No. You're the one with Johnny Walker eating out of your hand. Lemonhead will wanna talk to you. So take the phone, Stephanie. Wait for the call. And don't fuck this up." "Yeah, I get it." She took the phone and stuck it in her back pocket beside Todd's smartphone. "Anything else?" Kellen nodded at the body on the sidewalk. "Make sure no one sees you." "This isn't my first time, but thanks for the tip." She waited for the shifter to leave, but he stood in front of the building and made a call on his phone instead. Shit. He wants to see me toss a dead body that isn't even dead too? "It's Kellen." The shifter shot Lisa a sidelong glance, then stepped away across the front of the building. "Yeah, all of them." Lisa turned toward Todd as the man's fingers twitched and he groaned quietly. No, no, no. "Yeah, hold on." Kellen turned toward her with a questioning frown. "Is there a problem over there?" "No. The skinny asshole's heavier than I thought." She waved him off and tried not to stare at Johnny creeping toward the corner with his tranquilizer gun in hand. When she took Todd's arm, he groaned again. "All right, what the hell?" The shifter strode toward her. "Back off. I got it." She snarled belligerently to cover up the sound of Johnny dosing the cameraman with a second tranquilizer. Kellen fortunately didn't seem to notice. "Have you ever done this before?" he asked. "I said it wasn't my first time. I'll handle it." Johnny whipped a disk from his belt, activated it, and launched the explosive with a sidearm toss up and over the side of the office building. "Do you know any severing spells?" the shifter asked. "What?" "I have a good one for choppin' up big hunks of meat and making them disappear a hell of a lot easier than—" Johnny's disk exploded on the other side of the building, rattling a trashcan and setting off the alarm of a car parked on the other side of the cross street. "What the fuck?" Lisa gritted her teeth. "I'd offer to come check it out with you, but I have my own cleanup right here." He growled and turned toward the site of the explosion. "Hurry the fuck up already. And keep that phone on you." "Yep." Kellen jogged across the front of the building toward the car's blaring alarm and lifted his phone to his ear again. "I don't know. Some asshole playing with homemade explosives, probably. You never know in this city…" His voice faded away as he went to investigate. Lisa looked up at Johnny as he crept toward the twice-unconscious Todd. "We need to hurry," she whispered harshly. "And I gave us a diversion. You're welcome, darlin'." He squatted beside the cameraman, slung the man's torso over his shoulder, and stifled a grunt as he stood. "Now, we get the hell outta Dodge." Two dogs started up a furious round of barking across the street, accompanied by the car alarm that still blared in the middle of the night. The partners took the cross street on their side of the building to get out of sight. From there, they stuck to back alleys and stayed far away from open bars and restaurants and the pools of light from the streetlamps as they headed toward the hotel. By the time Kellen returned to the front of the office building, they were already three blocks away. "No, it's fine," he said into his phone as he peered into the shadows. "It's taken care of. Yeah, I'll be there in a while."
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 22	Todd recovered from his second dose of knock-out juice a block away from the hotel. He groaned and shifted and his eyes fluttered open. "Hey, what the fuck—" His elbow flailed and collided with the back of the dwarf's head. "Shit. Stop." "Let me go. What the hell?" The man wriggled so much, Johnny finally lowered his shoulder and let him tumble onto the sidewalk with a thump. "Ow…" "Look here, Todd." The bounty hunter pointed at the man who stared at him in wide-eyed shock. "You ain't got no business followin' anyone in the middle of the night. Especially us." "I was only trying to—" "Don't matter what you were only tryin'. You almost fucked up a seriously high-level, top-secret, federal goddamn case, ya hear? You're way outta line here, pal." Todd blinked quickly, then looked at Lisa. "Where's my phone?" "That's what you're worried about?" She shook her head and pulled his phone out. "Unlock it." "Why?" "Because I said so, and if you don't, Johnny will inject another of his tranquilizers into your neck, and you can spend the rest of the night passed out here on the sidewalk." She leaned down, her gaze hard, and offered him the screen of his phone. "Do it." "Jesus. Okay." He unlocked the device and she pulled it away and went through the video clips. "Come on. What are you doing?" "Getting rid of the evidence you don't have clearance to carry around with you." Lisa deleted the last three videos on his camera, then tossed him his phone. "Don't do that again." "Shit. That was good stuff—" "It ain't your place." Johnny grasped the man's upper arm and hauled him to his feet. "And you're walkin' a thin line already." "It's my job, man." "And when I say back the fuck off and get rid of the cameras, I mean it!" Johnny snapped. "You're lucky you're walkin' away from this with a groggy head and a few bruises." Lisa folded her arms. "Or that you're walking away from it at all. I'm merely glad no one wanted to stick around to watch me rip you apart limb from limb." What little color remained in Todd's face drained instantly. "What?" "We managed to make them think I killed you. So now you'll have to hide your face behind more than a camera phone until this is done." "I don't get it." "You don't need to. Get back inside." Johnny shoved the man toward the front doors of the hotel and grunted. "And I need a drink." Todd stepped off the elevator on the third floor to head to his hotel room, and the two partners continued to the fourth floor on their own. "Johnny, we need to put some kind of security on those two room numbers I gave." Lisa swiped her fake red hair away from her forehead. "In case they decide to move on the hotel first." "It didn't sound like that was part of the plan, darlin'. You wouldn't have been handed a burner phone otherwise either." "True." She reached back to pat the phone in her pocket. "Do you think they put a tracker in this too?" "I'm bettin' on it. Which is good." He smirked. "It shows ʼem your story panned out. We're in the Sagamore Pendry, and that's part of what they wanted to know." She sighed heavily. "Right. Now I guess I wait for the call." "Yep." Johnny reached for her hand and gave it a quick squeeze before he released it. "You did a damn fine job of it, darlin'. Even when it came to spoutin' hateful shit about 'the fuckin' dwarf.'" "Oh, yeah. That was fun." They chuckled, and the elevator doors opened with a soft ding. "Now I'm fixin' for a nightcap and a full night's—what the hell?" A large group of people had gathered at the far end of the hall—Phil, the film crew, the on-duty hotel manager, and two other hospitality staff members. "Mr. Walker?" The manager knocked on the door with a nervous grimace. "Sir, we're getting noise complaints now about your dogs and you need to open up." The hounds bayed inside and scratched at the door in agitation. "Mr. Walker?" "Get outta here before I come throw you out." "Sir. I'm merely trying to understand the situation. And…and if you don't open this door right now, I'm within my rights to open it for you." "Don't worry about all that, now," Johnny said as he strode down the hallway. "I'm back." The manager startled and turned quickly to see the dwarf heading toward him. He looked at the suite door and his mouth opened and closed in confusion. "I…you… Who's—" "It's all right. Nothin' to keep goin' on about." Johnny retrieved his wallet and gestured at the crew. "If y'all were lookin' for Todd, he's back in his room puttin' ice on a few choice parts of himself. It's time for the rest of y'all to move on." "Johnny…" Phil looked like he was about to explode. "Now. I'll make it worth your while tomorrow, huh? But get out of here. These folks have had more than enough to deal with for one night." With a growl of frustration, Phil gestured for the crew to head out before he stormed toward the elevators, shaking his head. Johnny opened his wallet, pulled out a handful of twenties, and distributed them to the manager and the two staff members the man had brought. "I'm sure this ain't the kinda emergency you fellas are used to runnin' up against on the regular." "I… Well, no, Mr. Walker." "Johnny. Thanks for your concern. And this is for your troubles." The manager took the cash with wide eyes. His staff members exchanged a confused glance but pocketed the money instantly. "Right. So…who was that yelling at me inside your suite?" "Naw, that was my voice all right." Johnny leaned toward the man and gave him a conspiratorial smirk. "I hate to leave ʼem alone in there, but when I ain't got another option, the recordin' helps the hounds feel a little more comfortable. Otherwise, they tend to get unruly, you understand." "Unruly?" The manager stared at the suite's door and frowned. "Worse than that?" "You bet." He flashed his key card at the door, pushed it open, and nodded at the hotel staff. "Enjoy your evenin', fellas. Stephanie, why don't you step inside with me for a spell?" "Sure." She smiled politely at the baffled hotel manager. "Thanks for everything. Have a good night." "Yes. Yes…y-you too…" The man stared after them until Johnny shut the door and slid the lock into place. "Johnny!" Luther barked and raced across the suite toward the front. "Finally! You were gone forever." "Yeah, and we had to cover for you the whole time. Those two-legs out there are so gullible." "Did you bring us any treats, Johnny?" "You know, for a job well done?" "In a moment, boys. Y'all did all right with the pedal." He set the tranquilizer gun on the half-wall of the kitchen. Then, he stooped to pick up the pedal device and switched it off before he tossed it onto the bed through the open bedroom doorway. "I need a minute." He went to the kitchen to pour himself his usual four fingers of Johnny Walker Black and returned to slump onto the soft leather couch with a heavy sigh. "Well, that was somethin'." "It sure was." Lisa joined him on the couch. "Your little spy-bug thing doesn't pick up visuals too, does it?" "No." The dwarf raised his eyebrows. "What did you see?" "The shifter. Kellen? He had a boar-shaped ring on his left hand. A few red gemstones and everything." "The damn mouthpiece, right?" "It looks like it." She grinned. "And Stephanie Wyndom has an in none of the other Johnny-haters were offered." "With the phone. Well shit, darlin'. You brought this all together to get it workin' out just fine." "Thank you." "No, I mean it." "And you didn't try to bust the door down even once." He snorted. "I wanted to." "I know." They sat on the couch for a few moments in silence as Johnny sipped his whiskey and thought over everything they'd heard. "We got an in. And until we bag the Red Boar, whoever he is, the feds can keep footin' the bill and thinkin' we're still on the Hugh case." He turned toward her with a grin and raised his glass for a toast, then paused. "Aw, shit. Do you want a drink? I didn't even—" "No, it's okay." Lisa laughed and waved him off. "I'll toast empty-handed with you." "Naw, that ain't a toast. It's bad luck to toast with water, darlin' and even worse luck to do it with a handful of nothin'." He stood and headed toward the kitchen. "Johnny, you can pour all you want but I'm not drinking your whiskey." "Just sit tight." She sighed and shook her head. Luther padded toward her and rested his chin on her knees. "You got any treats for us, lady?" "Hey, Luther." She scratched behind his ears and chuckled. "It sounded like you guys had a real blast with that pedal, huh?" "She doesn't have treats, bro," Rex said from where he'd curled in front of the armchair. "And she can't hear you." "I know. But hey, the ear-scratching's real nice. Yeah, yeah, lady. Keep that up." Johnny returned from the kitchen not with another rocks glass full of whiskey but with a wineglass. "Here you go. And don't even think about tellin' me you ain't into wine, 'cause this is the same damn bottle you ordered up here the other night." Lisa took the glass and stared at him. "I took that bottle to my room with me." "Yep. And I had another brought up." He sat on the couch and turned to face her with a crooked smile. "Now we can toast like partners oughtta." "Well." She grinned and lifted the wineglass. "To partners." "And to Lisa Breyer's master plan. Hell, I'll even toast to Stephanie fuckin' Wyndom while we're at it." They clinked their glasses together, and Lisa took a large sip of her wine. "Thanks for this." "The toast or the wine?" "Well, the toast was nice, Johnny. The wine's even better." "I'll take your word for it." He sipped his whiskey and met her gaze. "A person oughtta have their drink of choice stashed away just for this reason. Reasons for celebratin' come few and far between in my experience. I aim to be prepared when they do come around." She stared at her drink and tried to hide a smile. "And how often do you stock whatever kitchen you're in with a bottle of someone else's drink?" Johnny snorted. "You got me, darlin'. This is a first." "Oh. Well then, I'm flattered." "You should be. Just don't let it go to your head. You dropped a couple of real heavy bombs in that meetin' about me." Lisa almost choked on her next sip of wine but managed to compose herself. "Johnny, you know that was all part of me getting them to trust me, right? I didn't—" "You didn't mean a word, I know. Or at least half of it." When he grinned, she chuckled with relief and shook her head. "That was top-level lyin', darlin'. Well done." "And we're this much closer to finally getting your justice." "Not mine. Dawn's." She set her glass down on the coffee table and turned on the couch to face him. "Of course it's for Dawn. And it's also for you. After everything the Bureau did to cover up one hell of a mess they made, you deserve to get this all cleaned up. Don't leave yourself out of the picture." "Huh." Johnny sniffed and looked away from her. "I can't argue with that one." "So don't even try." He downed the rest of his whiskey and grunted. "Once we clean up the streets and take that Red Boar fucker in, I'll still have a bone to pick with the whole damn FBI." "Well, I didn't expect you to walk away from that. And you don't have to tell me what that entails, but—" "Naw, I ain't exactly worked it out myself yet. But I'll know how to handle it when the time comes. And then I'll go back to my swamp." Lisa chuckled and shook her head. "Of course. And do what?" "Whatever feels right." "It's the best way to be if you ask me." She tucked her hair behind her ear with a hesitant smile. "But I do hope you decide to keep working for the Department. Even after whatever giant ass-kicking you decide on dishing out when all this is over." "Ass-kickin's the least of it, darlin', although I ain't too sure why you'd want that." Lisa scooted closer and studied the dwarf's brown eyes, her smile growing. "Because if you're done with federal cases, that means I'll have to go back to DC and I'm not sure I want to do that." "Oh, so now you're such a huge fan of the swamps you can't stand leavin'?" "And a few other things." She stopped him from saying anything else when she leaned forward and kissed him softly. Before Johnny could wrap his head around what was happening, Lisa pulled away and grinned. "But you still have time to think about it." The dwarf cleared his throat and watched her stand. "Goodnight, Johnny." "Yeah. ʼNight." She pulled up her redheaded Stephanie illusion to make the trip across the hall, and he didn't move until he heard both his suite door and the door to her hotel room close behind her. "Whoa-ho-ho, Johnny!" Luther trotted toward him with wide eyes. "What did I watch?" "Seriously, Johnny?" Rex's head whipped from his master to the hallway. "She made a move. She made a move! Why are you sitting there?" "It's about damn time. Go get her!" The dwarf snapped his fingers and both hounds fell silent. "It's late, boys. I'm turnin' in." Luther gasped and froze and stared at his master as Johnny rose slowly from the couch. Rex snorted. "Are you feeling okay, Johnny?" "I'm fine." The larger hound padded after him as he headed swiftly to the bedroom door. "You sure? Come here and let me smell ya, Johnny. 'Cause if you're turning down a lady like that, I think there's something wrong with you. Hey, come on. Stop walking away—" The bedroom door closed in the hound's face, and Johnny said from the other side, "Night, boys." "Johnny," Luther said warily. "Johnny? Seriously, I think you need to see a two-leg vet or something." The bounty hunter flopped on the king-sized mattress and stared at the ceiling with a sigh. There ain't nothin' wrong with me. I like her, is all, and now I know for sure.
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 23	The next morning, Johnny woke up at 6:15 am with more energy than he could remember at that hour. He hopped out of bed and jumped into the shower, whistling the whole time. When he'd toweled off and pulled on another pair of black Levi's and a button-down shirt, he combed his hair, winked at himself in the mirror, and thrust the bedroom door open. "Beautiful mornin', ain't it, boys?" "What?" Luther whipped his head up from where he lay curled in front of the armchair. "Did you forget we're not home, Johnny?" Rex yawned, then licked his muzzle. "'Cause you don't say 'beautiful morning' unless we're about to go hunting." "Are we going hunting, Johnny?" "I'm fixin' to get breakfast. Coffee and somethin' nice for both of us." He moved quickly through the suite, checking his pockets for his phone and his wallet. "Wait, both of who?" Luther glanced at his brother. "There are three of us." "Y'all hang tight. I won't be long." Humming a random tune, the dwarf practically danced toward the front door of the suite and disappeared into the hall. "Johnny, wait. What about us, huh?" There was no reply. With a sigh, Luther stood and trotted toward the bedroom door left wide open. "If he's not gonna let us out, he can't be mad if we use the shower again, right?" Rex followed his brother into the master bathroom. "It sounds like a fair deal to me. Hurry up. I gotta go." Johnny passed Lisa's hotel room on his way to the elevators and grinned. This time, I'll be the one wakin' up early to bring everythin' to her room. She deserves that much. Hot damn, what a day already. The film crew was nowhere in sight when he reached the lobby, which only added an extra pep to his step as he strode to the front doors. Johnny smiled and greeted every hotel staff member with a "Mornin'," and took his good mood with him into the street to head for the coffee shop and bakery three blocks down. He strutted down the sidewalk with a crooked smile, nodded to pedestrians who passed him, and hummed his made-up tune. Helluva day. It's only gonna get better. When he stepped inside the café, he went straight to the order counter and cleared his throat. "Good morning. Welcome to—" "Tell me straight, bud, 'cause I ain't fixin' to beat around the bush this mornin'. Can you say y'all got the best coffee in the area?" The barista chuckled and glanced at the sacks of unground beans lining the counter in the back. "Well, we like to think so, certainly." "That's good enough for me. I want a large of your best roast—black. Then make one of whatever you think is the best coffee drink you can come up with. Somethin' special, ya hear?" "Got it." The barista rang up the beverages and glanced at the dwarf. "Anything else?" "Yeah. Y'all got a fancy pastry plate or somethin'?" "Not exactly. But feel free to choose from our pastry selection over here—" "Naw, get me one of everythin'." Johnny sniffed and nodded at the man. "I ain't playin'." "You got it." The man added the cost to the register, then paused. "You're Johnny Walker, right? The bounty hunter with that—" "With the damn show startin' again in Baltimore? You bet. That's me. I tell you what, bud, it's a helluva day to be me." "I can tell." Chuckling, the barista nodded. "I'll go make your drinks. Then give me a few minutes to bag up the pastry order." "That's fine. Take your time." Johnny stuck his thumbs through his belt loops and glanced around the café, whistling and bouncing on the toes of his boots. Helluva day. Lisa rolled out of bed at 6:30 am and smiled. Something tells me it'll be a good day. She spent a few minutes in the bathroom brushing her teeth and washing her face, then pulled her hair back into a loose ponytail and grinned. Remembering the night before made her laugh at her reflection. Well, it could've gone worse. Not bad for a first move, Breyer. As soon as she'd finished getting dressed and strapped her shoulder holster on beneath a light jacket, a low buzz came from her nightstand. She turned a lazy smile toward it but it disappeared when she saw the burner phone turning slowly on the table with the incoming call. "Shit." She leapt toward the table, snatched the phone up, and answered. "Hello?" "He wants to meet you tonight," Kellen said, his voice low and scratchy. "And he's got someone on the way to the Sagamore Pendry right now with a package. It has all the instructions you'll need to get the job done." "Okay." She took a deep breath. "Where do I pick this package up?" "Right outside. The runner should be there in the next five minutes if he isn't already. In a red baseball cap." "Sure. I'll go down and look for him." "Good. I want verbal confirmation from you and the runner that you received the package alone." "So I'll call you back at this number when I have it—" "No," the shifter practically barked at her. "Stay on the phone the whole time. And get your ass downstairs right now." "Yeah, okay. Let me get my shoes on at least." She pulled up her Stephanie illusion and stepped into her sneakers. Shit. I can't tell Johnny or they'll know. I'll go down and get the package, bring it back, and we can go through it together. No big deal. She slipped out of her hotel room, grateful for the fact that Phil and his incessant badgering hadn't yet started for the day. "I'm walking down the hall." "Keep talking," Kellen grumbled. She narrated her ride down the elevator to the first floor, her walk across the lobby not yet busy with the usual breakfast rush in the restaurant or at the continental breakfast bar, and her exit through the hotel's front doors. "Okay, I'm standing out on the sidewalk." "Do you see him yet?" "No." "He shouldn't be hard to miss, Stephanie—red baseball cap and gray shirt and carrying a large cardboard box." Lisa squinted against the brisk morning breeze and scanned the few pedestrians on the sidewalk. "Nothing yet. Are you sure you gave him the right hotel?" "Don't be smart with me, Light Elf. Stay where you are and keep talking. He'll be there." The short whoop of a police siren down the street caught her attention, and the Baltimore PD vehicle moved slowly toward the hotel with intermittent flashes of red and blue lights. She turned away from the car and searched the other side of the street. Worst timing. We need to get this over with. The car pulled to the curb in front of the Sagamore Pendry and Lisa. Both officers opened their doors and got out. "Ma'am? Is everything okay? You look a little lost." "I'm fine officer, thank you. Just waiting for a friend." "That's a very early meetup in front of a hotel." "Well, we were supposed to go out for breakfast." What the hell is going on? She tried to smile at the officers and scan the sidewalk at the same time. "Uh-huh. What's your name?" Shit. The damn shifter can hear everything I say. She kept the phone pressed to her ear. "What's happening?" Kellen asked. "A few officers passing by," she replied with a tight smile. "I'm still waiting for you, by the way." "Who are you talking to?" the bearded Officer Brently asked. "My friend." "Okay, well you'll have to hang up and answer our question, ma'am. What's your name?" "Stephanie Wyndom." "Hang up the phone, Stephanie." "Don't even think about it," Kellen growled in her ear. "I'm sorry, officers. I can't." Lisa glanced up and down the street as the officers approached her on the sidewalk. "My friend's bad with directions. I have to—" "Do you have any ID on you?" the bald officer asked. His name badge read McCormick in faded print. Shit. "Um…no. I stepped out of my hotel room to meet my friend here, so I don't have anything on me." His partner glanced down at the open front of her light jacket. "But you had time to strap on a firearm first. Do you have a permit for concealed carry?" She met his gaze head-on. "Listen, this isn't what you think—" "This is exactly what we think," McCormick interrupted. "Drop the phone and put your hands behind your head." "Officers…" "You have an open warrant in Maryland state, Ms. Wyndom. Hands up. Now." Lisa glanced at the officers' hands resting on the grips of their holstered service weapons. I can't show them who I am. Kellen's still listening to every goddamn word. "Okay. Okay. Dropping the phone." She did that, and the burner phone clacked against the sidewalk, still open with the call still connected to the Red Boar's shifter mouthpiece. "And I'm putting my hand behind my head." Lisa raised her hands slowly. The minute her fingertips brushed her redheaded curls, Officer Brently stepped forward briskly and grabbed her wrists, a pair of handcuffs at the ready. "Stephanie Wyndom, you are under arrest for grand larceny. Anything you say can and will be used against you in the court of law…" She exhaled a heavy sigh and continued to scan the street for the damn messenger with the red baseball cap. There was no trace of him as the bearded officer led her toward the back of the police car and opened the door. There is no messenger with a stupid package, is there? Stephanie Wyndom doesn't have any outstanding offenses or warrants either. The other officer approached and drew her service pistol from its holster. "Get in." "You're making a big mistake—" "No mistake." He shoved her roughly into the plastic back seat of the cop car. "This is our job. You made it very easy for us, honestly." He shut the door and both officers walked around the front of the squad car and got inside. In the passenger seat, the bald man studied her service weapon and typed the serial number into the small computer mounted on the dashboard. "Really, Officers. I'm not who you think I am." "You're exactly who we're looking for. Most of the time, anonymous tips don't exactly pan out. But I guess this is our lucky day." They got a tip? The fucking Red Boar bastard set me up! "No, I'm serious. Look." Lisa removed her Stephanie illusion and looked at each of the officers with a calm she certainly didn't feel. "Nice try, lady. We've got plenty of magicals in the precinct. You're a Light Elf. You can make yourself look like anyone—" "Half-Light Elf, actually. And I need you both to listen to me. There's about to be an attack inside that hotel. Room 434—" "Save your breath, Stephanie." "My name's Lisa Breyer. I'm a federal agent with the FBI's Bounty Hunter Division. I'm working a federal case right now, and I need you both to—" "You said you were on the phone with a friend," the bearded man said blandly. "I was on the phone with the asshole who's going to attack that hotel room! Because I'm undercover!" His partner tapped the computer screen. "Well, we can add impersonating a federal agent to your rap sheet too." "What?" "The firearm's registered to Agent Lisa Breyer—" "That's because I am Lisa Breyer!" "Ma'am, if you can't calm down, we'll have to take more severe measures to do it for you, understand?" Brently shifted into drive and pulled onto the street. "Jesus Christ. Listen to me. My badge number is 9740203. I'm in constant contact with Agent Tommy Nelson. He works for the Department of Monsters and Magicals. If you get in contact with him, he'll tell you everything you need to know." "Including why your alias has an open arrest warrant?" the other officer scoffed. "Now I've heard everything." "No, that was manufactured—recently. And not by our team. Stephanie Wyndom is an undercover alias. I know she checks out in the system, but that didn't include any recent crimes or an open warrant. I'm on a federal case with Johnny Walker—" "That bounty hunter dwarf?" He turned to look at her through the wire mesh separating the front of the vehicle from the back seat. "Yeah, I've watched some of those clips. You two look real tight on camera." "Because I'm his partner." She grimaced at the bite of the cold steel handcuffs pressing against her wrists between her back and the hard plastic seat of the squad car. "You need to look into this right now. Call your precinct captain. Ask them to look into the bounty assigned for a Kilomea named Yarren Brork. That's the federal case that brought us here, file number 834627B concerning Senator Richard Hugh. We were at his house only a few days ago. Run my badge number, huh? 9740203. With my ID number, 288843. How would a dumbass criminal with an open warrant for grand larceny know that off the top of her head?" "Do I need to get out the taser?" he warned. "Hold on." The driver pulled over in the mostly empty parking lot of a convenience store on the corner and shifted into park, although he left the engine running. "What are you doing?" "I think we should look into this." "Marco, she's a crazy-ass Light Elf trying to get out of an arrest." "Run the badge number." "Officers, I truly need you to let me out of these cuffs so I can get back to that hotel. There will be an attack, and I don't think either of you wants this on your heads when it happens." "You sit tight, ma'am. If all this pans out, we'll drive you to the hotel ourselves. But we can't simply let you go on hearsay." "It's not hearsay. It's the truth!" "Yeah, we'll see." McCormick twisted in the passenger seat and jerked his chin up at her. "You can either wait quietly with your wits about you, or I can come back there and tighten those cuffs. Your choice." "Fuck." Lisa leaned back against the plastic seat and winced at the sharp pinch in her wrists within the handcuffs. Hurry the hell up. I was just played by the asshole even the FBI couldn't bring down, and Johnny has no idea.
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 24	With a coffee caddy in one hand and a massive bag of assorted pastries tucked under the other arm, Johnny stepped out of the elevators on the fourth floor and grinned. It only took half an hour. She's probably only now startin' to roll over and wake up with no idea this dwarf brought a damn feast. His whistle echoed around him as he hurried down the hall, and he chuckled when he stopped in front of Lisa's hotel room. After switching the bag of pastries to under his other arm, he knocked briskly on the door. "It's me. Johnny." There was no reply. "Come on, darlin'. I know you're an early riser. Open up, huh? I brought you somethin'." He waited for ten seconds and when he didn't hear a sound on the other side of the door, he retrieved his phone from his back pocket and pulled up Lisa's number. The line rang six times, then went straight to voicemail. "Huh." The dwarf turned and scanned the empty hallway. Maybe she had the same idea as I did. We must have missed each other on the way. He crossed the hall and had to set everything down to pull his wallet out and flash his key card at the door to his suite. The green light blinked and he opened the door and propped it open with one boot while he gathered the drink caddy and the bag of pastries again. When he held them securely, he slipped inside and let the door click shut behind him. "I'm back, boys. Hey, did y'all hear Lisa steppin' out while I was gone?" Johnny placed the pastries on the half-wall of the kitchen beside his tranquilizer gun. "Boys? I swear, if I find y'all drinkin' outta the toilet again, you're fixin' for a real talkin' to after this." He set the drink caddy down too, peeled the lid off his black coffee, and took the to-go cup with him down the hall. "Rex. Luther. What are you up to?" When he received no reply, he felt a faint prickle of alarm. Taking a tentative sip of his piping-hot coffee, Johnny walked down the hall with a frown and peered around the corner of the wall blocking the huge living area from view. "Whatever game you're playin', it's time to cut it out. I need to—" He froze in the entrance to the living area and took in the scene in a split second. Both hounds lay sprawled on the floor in front of the massive armchair with its back to the wide windows. Neither of them moved but for the barest rise and fall of their bellies, and in the armchair sat the one magical Johnny would've recognized anywhere. "Welcome back." The Red Boar grinned and his gray, burn-marred skin drew tight around the corners of his mouth on his squashed face. He glanced at the pistol in his hand, which was already pointed casually at Johnny's chest. "What the fuck did you do to my hounds?" "I didn't want them to raise the alarm." The intruder shrugged. "It was fairly easy to disable them when their master wasn't around to shout commands." Johnny gritted his teeth and took inventory of the room. All I have on hand is a fuckin' cup of coffee. He's likely to blow my brains out before I can put a hand on my knife. Shit. He cleared his throat and scowled at the huge, scarred magical in the armchair, which looked like it had been built specifically for an asshole of that size. "What do you want?" "The first part's very simple." The Red Boar cocked his head, that twisted grin unwavering. "I want to know why you're working again." "Huh. If you're waitin' to hear me say I came outta retirement to bag your ass, you're gonna be disappointed." "No. You had no idea who I was until we met face to face in New York." The gray magical chuckled. "So what got you back in the game?" "That job in New York. You merely happened to be the motherfucker who wanted a shifter girl badly enough to fight me for her. I happened to be better and faster." "I'll give you that one, Johnny. Sure." The armchair groaned beneath the Red Boar's weight as he shifted and crossed one leg over the other. "That shifter girl doesn't matter anymore. But why don't you tell me why you're hunting me, now." "Who said I was?" "The look on your face. Which I wasn't sure I'd see but now you've given me everything I need. The Level-Six Bounty Hunter, Johnny Walker the pissed-off dwarf, has some kind of personal vendetta, isn't that right?" Johnny studied the magical, then slowly took a sip of his coffee. He came here for a fuckin' heart-to-heart. Sure. We can play all cards out on the table. "All right. I want your head on a fuckin' silver platter. Is that good enough for ya?" "Because I tried to outbid everyone at that auction?" The Red Boar cocked his head and clicked his tongue. "It took me a while to get out from under that chandelier, but I hardly think one night at a Monsters Ball is enough of a reason for you to hate me so much." "No. That simply started the ball rollin'." He glared at the huge magical's oddly shaped face and glowing eyes. "You killed my little girl." "Oh…" The Red Boar clicked his tongue again and inclined his head slightly as if in thought. "There have been so many, Johnny. You'll have to be a little more specific." "Dawn Walker. Twelve years old. In RedHero Comics on October 27th, 2005. Creed Vilguard and Prentiss Avalon. Your fuckin' goons shot my daughter in the back of the head. Does that ring enough bells?" "Sure." The gray bastard chuckled. "But Vilguard and Avalon were caught, weren't they? The shifter's finger pulled the trigger, and he's spent the last fifteen years behind bars—" "It ain't the shifter I give a shit about. It's the motherfucker who told him to pull the trigger." The Red Boar grinned. "You sound so sure." "I am." "Good. Yes, dwarf. I was in the shop that night. Your daughter had some serious guts on her. I'll give her that. Trying to pull that sniveling human out of the clutches of his own mistakes." "And you had the shifter gun down a little girl!" "Can you blame me?" "I can and I do." With the pistol still aimed unwaveringly at Johnny's chest, the Red Boar gazed around the hotel suite as he stretched his neck. "I had to take certain precautions, Johnny. A little dwarf girl barging into that comic book store and demanding the release of an idiotic man playing drug dealer? She dropped your name, more or less, and I wasn't about to give you an open invitation to make good on her naïve promise." "You did anyway." "Because I'm the one who gave the order to shoot the little girl who said her daddy's a bounty hunter? I suppose that gives you a certain right to want to see me hang." Johnny's fist clenched at his side and the coffee sloshed in the cup in his other hand as it trembled. "I want far more than that, you bastard." "Oh, I'm sure. So do I. You have to know by now how many of us truly hate you, Johnny." "It don't mean—" A knock came at the front door. "Johnny? It's Phil. I'm trying to start over, man. Come on. We're ready to keep rolling." Johnny didn't move. "Howie's out here with me," Phil added dryly. "I thought he knows best how to get you out of your shell." "Johnny?" Howie said as if to verify his presence. Every time that damn director shows up is the wrong fuckin' time. "Tell them to get lost," the Red Boar growled. The dwarf's lip curled into a smirk. "And disappoint all my avid fans?" "We saw Stephanie stepping out front earlier," Phil continued, "so we thought this might be a good time to get some one-on-one Johnny time. Come on. Open up." The Red Boar swung the barrel of his pistol toward the front door before he returned it to Johnny's chest. "Go answer the door. Tell them you'll give them what they want later and that they're not to disturb you. Then you and I can finish this conversation in peace." Not fuckin' likely. With a grimace, Johnny turned slowly and walked stiffly toward the hallway. "Johnny, is everything okay?" Howie called. "You're very quiet in there." "I'm comin'," he grumbled. "Hold your goddamn horses." In the blink of an eye, he dropped the coffee cup, whipped his utility knife from his belt, and flicked it open. He spun and tossed the blade toward the bastard seated in his armchair. The pistol in the Red Boar's hand fired and he roared as the blade buried itself in the meaty muscle of his shoulder. Johnny smirked but it faded when he moved his hand to his belly just beneath his ribs and he felt warm, sticky wetness there. "Fuck." The pain came, and his entire gut clenched in agony. "Johnny!" It sounded like Lisa, but that didn't make sense. He fumbled for an explosive disk at his belt and tried to step toward the door, but his legs gave out. The dwarf fell with a grunt, and the door to his hotel suite burst open.
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 25	"FBI! Hands in the air, asshole!" Lisa stormed down the hall with her firearm raised in both hands. She glanced briefly at Johnny as he scooted backward across the floor and propped himself up against the exterior wall of the kitchen. "He's…in there—" The Red Boar fired again and the bullet crashed into the back wall of the kitchen. Lisa darted around the corner and fired two shots. Close behind her were two Kilomeas and a half-wizard and all three of them summoned attack spells to help cover her against the Red Boar. "Drop the weapon!" she shouted. Two more shots were fired and spewed plaster and wood chips in every direction. The scarred gray magical roared and fired more shots before he finally switched to flinging spells. "Get him!" "Shit, duck!" "Lady, watch out!" Johnny grimaced as he clapped his hand against the bullet wound in his belly. The hallway was slick with his blood. That sounds like Yarren and Percy. How'd they get here? The glass coffee table shattered under someone's weight. "Fuck! Ev!" "I said hands up!" Lisa shouted again. She launched another fireball at the Red Boar and he bellowed when it struck him in the opposite shoulder. "Don't make me—ah!" She catapulted toward the hallway and skidded across the floor, clutching her left shoulder. "Lisa." Johnny tried to shout it, but it wouldn't come out any louder than a low mumble. Without noticing the dwarf bleeding out on the floor, she raised her service weapon from where she had landed and fired again. The Red Boar roared and flung aside the Kilomeas storming toward him. Evan summoned a dark spell of crackling, electric-blue light that glanced off their adversary's massive chest and sent him reeling into the armchair. The intruder launched a red bolt of sizzling light into the half-wizard's gut. Evan hurtled into the white leather couch and almost knocked it over. "What the hell?" Luther raised his head off the floor, blinked, then struggled to his feet. "Rex. Rex! Wake up! There's—" The smaller hound leapt away from the Red Boar's flailing legs as the magical pushed himself out of the armchair. "Shit. Johnny! Johnny, where are you?" The hound's wild barking snapped Rex out of his groggy sleep. "Holy shit. Kilomeas, bro. Those ungrateful hairy bastards!" He launched himself at Yarren and tackled him as the Kilomea unleashed a shot of strobing copper light. It went wild and crashed into the ceiling instead of the gray magical stampeding through the suite. "The gray guy!" Lisa shouted as she flung another fireball. "The big guy, Rex!" "What? Oh, shit." The larger hound leapt off Yarren's chest and spun to snarl at the Red Boar. "Damn, he is big." Barking madly, Luther darted beneath launched spells and their adversary's huge feet to snap at the guy's heels. Percy's next magical attack cracked against the side of the gray magical's face and thrust him back. He crashed into the armchair again and landed halfway in the seat with one leg dangling over the armrest. "Johnny! He has your knife!" Luther leapt onto the Red Boar's thigh and clamped his jaws down around the blade's handle. With a vicious jerk of his head, he ripped the blade free and blood sprayed all over the armchair and the living area. The large magical roared and slapped at the hound, but Luther had already leapt away. "Johnny! Johnny, where are you? I have your knife!" "Get him, bro!" Rex shouted, snarling and barking. "Who?" Luther whipped his head back toward the Red Boar, and the blade pierced the inside of the magical's thigh. "Fucking dog!" He swatted at Luther and barely missed the hound's head, and Lisa fired another fireball at the intruder. "Who you calling a fucking dog, bozo?" The hound whipped his head back again and stabbed their adversary in the calf before he darted away, his jaws fixed firmly around the blade's handle. "Did anyone teach you manners?" The gray magical rose from the armchair and stumbled forward, trying to walk on his injured legs. Luther ducked and spun in a circle. "Seriously, has anyone seen Johnny? This is his." Yarren launched a fireball at the Red Boar, who ducked wildly and fell to his hands and knees on the floor. "Luther, watch out!" Rex shouted. "Huh?" The smaller hound whirled with wide eyes, and the blade sliced across the enemy magical's already scarred face. He bellowed, clapped one hand to his cheek, and swiped at Luther with the other. "Hey, back up, two-legs. What the hell?" In the hallway, Johnny had managed to pull himself to his feet and supported himself on the half-wall into the kitchen. Grunting with the effort, he slapped his hand down on the tranquilizer gun. The bag of pastries toppled and spilled all over the counter and kitchen floor when he whipped his modified weapon off the granite. He turned and struggled to step down the hall to get a clear shot into the living area. "Luther!" Lisa shouted. "Get out of there!" "Why is everyone yelling at me, huh?" Luther trotted around the Red Boar and skittered sideways when the huge magical swiped at him again. "Hey, hands off, bud. Johnny! Johnny, where the hell are you?" When he turned, the blade in his mouth buried itself in the Red Boar's pectoral muscle and was ripped out again. "This guy's lost his mind!" With a roar, the wounded magical reared back on his knees and lunged at Luther and the knife. Johnny squeezed off all four remaining rounds in the tranquilizer gun in quick succession. The loud pop wasn't nearly as satisfying as the echo of a regular pistol, but the shots found their marks in the Red Boar's neck and chest. "Fucking dwarf!" The intruder snarled and pushed shakily to his feet. "I'll rip your—" His wide glowing eyes rolled back in his head. One massive foot came down on the area rug with a thump before he fell like a giant sack of bricks. His chest landed first and the shattered glass of the broken coffee table crunched beneath him and his scarred face followed with a muffled thud. A snort escaped him before he sagged completely. "Whoa." Luther stepped away from the unconscious magical, his tail straight up in the air. "Holy shit, guys. He's bleeding." The hound sat, and Johnny's blood-stained utility knife clattered to the floor when he licked his muzzle. "Was that me?" "Good work, boy." The dwarf grunted and staggered against the far wall of the living area. His back thumped against it and he slid to the floor with a groan, leaving a thick streak of blood behind him. "Johnny." Lisa hurried toward him, limping and clutching her left shoulder. "Oh, jeez. He shot you." "Thanks, darlin' although that's a given at this point." "I tried to get here as fast as I could. I'm so sorry." "I ain't—" "Those fucking assholes set me up too." She batted his hand aside and pulled up his shirt to get a better look at the wound. "They told me they were delivering a package this morning and instead, Kellen had me standing out front with a huge damn target on my back. I have never in my entire career spent so much time convincing state police officers I'm exactly who I say I am." "Police?" Johnny grimaced when the soft, tingling warmth of Lisa's Light Elf healing magic did what it could for the bullet wound. The pain and a searing heat quickly followed. "Yeah. Someone hacked into Stephanie Wyndom's fake records and gave her an open arrest warrant on top of it. I doubt they picked up that it was all fake, but it held me back almost half an hour—" "Darlin', I appreciate the healin' attention. And the recap." He removed her hand from where it hovered over his wound. "But I ain't sure either of them's gonna do the trick here." "Shit, Johnny. The bleeding's still bad. I thought I could do more." "Naw, this should do until we get some bandages or somethin'." "This might help." Yarren stepped toward them down the hall and slid his hand into the breast pocket of his uniform work shirt, which was dotted with a few flecks of the Red Boar's blood and had one sleeve ripped off at the shoulder and dangling by a thread in the armpit. The Kilomea pulled out a small, nondescript packet and hunkered down to offer it to the dwarf. "What's this?" "Somethin' we like to keep on us in the yard," Percy grumbled as he dusted glass shards and plaster off his shirt. "A lotta guys get hurt on the job, and it doesn't exactly go over well with the higher-ups when they get so many reports. Rocky gives ʼem out like candy. It's a Kilomea family secret or some shit." "I ain't takin' drugs, fellas." "Neither do we." Yarren ripped the top of the packet open and nodded at Johnny's bleeding gut. "You gotta pour it on." "Shit." The dwarf took the packet and upended it over the wound. Silver-white powder poured out and instantly sizzled and sparked occasionally as it mixed with his blood and soaked deeper into the bullet hole. "Aw, shit!" "Yeah, it packs a punch, huh?" Evan joined them, holding the wadded end of his shirtsleeve against his bleeding nose. One of the half-wizard's eyes was blue and purple and almost swollen shut. "But it gets the job done." "If there's still a bullet in there, you should go to the hospital," Percy suggested. "No." Johnny grunted and forced himself to watch the rest of the Kilomea healing powder penetrate his gut and spark all over his insides. When it finally stopped, so did the bleeding. He glanced behind him at the smear of blood on the wall and shook his head. "The bullet went through." "Still, that's a lot of—" "No hospitals. I ain't fixin' to lay up in a damn bed with a bunch of docs for humans tellin' me what I can and can't do with my own damn self. How long does this stuff hold?" Percy and Yarren glanced at each other. "Long enough to stop the bleeding so you can get to a hospital. Probably longer if you take it easy for a few days." "Sure. Right after I finish what I started." Johnny braced a hand against the blood-smeared wall behind him and pushed to his feet. Lisa reached toward him. "Johnny, I don't think—" "I know you don't think it's a good idea, darlin'. That don't mean I ain't doin' it." A wave of dizziness washed over him to join the dull throb in his gut, and he swayed before he steadied himself against the wall again. "I suppose I oughtta get a bigger suitcase and start carryin' my damn first-aid kid with me." "Ooh, yeah, Johnny." Rex padded toward his master, stepping delicately between chunks of plaster and the shattered glass. "Like the one you have at home, right?" "That's a good one." Luther hopped onto the Red Boar's back to cross the living area, then trotted toward Johnny and the others. "There's some real good stuff in there. We love it. Thanks for leaving it open and—what?" Johnny raised an eyebrow and glanced back and forth between his hounds. "You've been sniffin' around in my med kit?" "Well, when it's there…" Luther sniffed dutifully at the streak of Johnny's blood running down the wall. "Yeah, we thought you wouldn't mind. Otherwise, you would have put that stuff away all the time. Hey, Luther. What were those treats in there we liked so much?" "I don't know, man. I can't read. The white ones. Long white ones." "Yeah, they taste like shit when you chew ʼem but you feel real nice afterward." "Jesus." Johnny shook his head. "How long have y'all been helpin' yourselves to my painkillers?" "What?" Lisa asked having missed half the conversation. "Oh, that's what they are?" Luther turned in a tight circle and tried to nip his own tail. "They're good, Johnny. Nice and mellow." "You left them out after the pup got sliced by that hog, remember?" The dwarf closed his eyes and sighed. "And regular folk with half a brain don't stop to think whether a couple of coonhounds have a tolerance built up." Lisa set a hand on Johnny's shoulder and frowned in concern. "I'm completely lost here, Johnny." "Yep." He nodded toward the Red Boar who lay face-down and bleeding in front of the armchair. "The sonofabitch drugged my hounds. He assumed it'd keep ʼem down for the count long enough for him to take me out. The damn hounds will eat everything." "He gave us a big handful, Johnny," Rex muttered. "It was awesome for like five minutes." Luther sat and licked his muzzle. "Then not so much. I think I threw up somewhere but can't remember if I cleaned it up, though." "Yeah, well now, y'all learned your lesson about takin' pills from a stranger." With a grunt, Johnny staggered across the living area, his boots crunching across broken glass and plaster. Staring after the dwarf with wide eyes, Yarren leaned toward Percy and muttered, "Who's he talking to?" "His dogs. I think." "I wouldn't have pegged him for a crazy." Percy shrugged. "Yeah, me neither. But he took a bullet to the gut. The dwarf's as tough as shit." Johnny stooped to snatch his utility knife up and grimaced at the flare of pain in his belly. He ignored it and approached the Red Boar sprawled on the floor. The blade's handle was still sticky with the gray-skinned magical's blood, but it didn't slip in the bounty hunter's clenched fist. He stooped over the Red Boar's scarred face and growled, his breath quickening. "You picked the wrong dwarf, motherfucker. Now, you're payin' for it." "Johnny?" Lisa stepped toward him. "What are you doing?" "Makin' sure this piece of shit don't squirm his way out of gettin' what's comin' to him again." "Okay, I don't think that's such a good idea right now. Especially with our…company." He looked up as Cody inched down the hallway with his camera, David close on his heels with the boom mic lifted and outstretched toward the living area. Phil peered around the corner, his eyes wide as he took in the destruction and the blood spatters. Todd panned a second camera around the hotel suite littered with bullet holes, chunks of plaster, glass, and the overturned couch. Johnny pointed at Cody and snarled. "Turn that shit off." "Keep rolling, Cody." Phil slipped around the confused Kilomeas and the half-wizard. "We're keeping this going, Johnny. This is great. Seriously good stuff. A raw look into the way Dwarf the Bounty Hunter fights and defeats his targets. We have the whole scene." "I said turn it off!" Yelling triggered another flare of pain through Johnny's gut. "What I'm fixin' to do next ain't somethin' anyone's gonna get on camera." "Johnny, don't." Lisa shook her head. "Oh, you mean like evidence?" Phil ruffled his unruly hair and nodded sagely as he gazed around the room. "We already have plenty of that." "What are you goin' on about?" The director gestured toward Cody and Dave. "We've been filming since you walked into the suite with breakfast. It looked like a big bag, too." "Sure is," Luther said from the kitchen. "Johnny, did you bring all this for us?" "Don't ask, bro. Just eat." Rex licked the spilled crumbs on the kitchen floor. "Yeah, good thinking. Ooh. Is this jelly?" Johnny turned stiffly to face Phil and the rest of the crew still filming for their damn show. "You listened in on the whole thing?" "Sure." The man smirked and spread his arms expansively. "We may be a small indie crew, but we don't skimp on quality equipment. That mic could pick up sound in the bedroom from out in the hall if we wanted it to." Lisa shrugged. "They were crowded around the door when I got here with our…backup. And thanks for that, by the way." Yarren nodded. "I have to admit it was a little weird to get your call. But I'm glad I answered." "Yeah, so are we." The dwarf glowered at the unconscious Red Boar. "All right. This ain't the day for killin' this bastard. Maybe his cellmate in max can find a reason to do it instead." Lisa exhaled a small, relieved sigh. "I'll call it in." "Uh-huh." Johnny delivered a swift kick into the side of the gray magical's head and elicited only a guttural wheeze from the Red Boar's hulking form. "Johnny." "That's the least he deserves, darlin'. Go ahead and call. Does anyone have a spare weapon on ʼem?" Yarren and his work buddies glanced at each other with vacant expressions. Lisa rolled her eyes and headed to the open door into the hall. "I'll be right back." Johnny nodded at the Kilomeas and pulled his wallet from his back pocket. "If I hand you fellas a few bills, can one of y'all run out and grab somethin' to tie this bastard up with? Rope's fine. Heavy chains are better." "Sure, man. Yeah." Evan stepped across the mess to take the few hundred dollars the dwarf held toward him. "Anything else?" "Whatever looks like it'll be fun to keep this big fucker down with while we wait for the FBI's cleanup crew. I think you'll know it when you see it." "Sure." "I wouldn't mind one of y'all stickin' around in case this shithead wakes up before we're ready." "I'll hang out." Yarren crunched across the living area and grasped the overturned leather couch to haul it upright again. "It's the least we can do." "I appreciate it." Lisa returned to the room, slipping between the film crew still rolling Johnny Walker's latest catch. She slid a new magazine into her pistol and handed it to the dwarf. "Here you go." "Thanks, darlin'." "I hope all those rounds stay right where they are." "Don't you worry yourself about it. I ain't usin' this unless it's the last option. But I'm lookin' forward to when this bastard opens his eyes and sees the wrong of end of this barrel first." "Right." She watched him stagger toward the righted couch, and a fresh wave of blood seeped from the bullet wound in his gut. "Johnny, you're still bleeding." "It ain't nothin' I can't handle, darlin'. It's fine." "Evan," Yarren called over his shoulder as he sat beside the dwarf. "Yeah?" "Grab some gauze rolls while you're out." "Sure thing. Call me if you need anything else." The half-wizard took another wide-eyed glance at the destroyed living area, then snuck past the film crew to slip into the hallway. Percy stood on the far side of the living area with his huge, hairy arms folded. "Sorry about the mess in here. That's gonna be one hell of a cleanup bill." "It ain't on my dime." Johnny snorted. "The FBI's frontin' the whole bill." "Well, that's helpful." "Sometimes, yeah."
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 26	Lisa called Agent Nelson three different times in the next fifteen minutes, but the man didn't answer. "What is he doing?" "What's goin' on, darlin'?" Johnny turned his head toward her but kept his gaze firmly fixed on the unconscious Red Boar. "Tommy won't answer his phone. I have no idea why. He knows we're out here on a case." "Sure. He knows about both of ʼem too. Do you think the Department got wind of what we were doin' out here with the show?" "I have no idea." "Johnny, how about a little Q&A now," Phil said. "While the fight's still fresh in your mind?" "I let y'all stick around to catch whatever you want of this, pal. But I ain't takin' my attention off this scarred lump of meat until I've got him bagged up and shipped out in a SWAT van. Understand?" "Sure." The man inched toward Johnny with a hesitant smile. "But you can watch him and talk at the same time, can't you?" "Not gonna happen." The elevator doors opened at the end of the hall, and Howie demanded, "What the hell is going on here?" "He got ambushed," Evan said and hurried past the old man with the cane. Yards of rope and a few thick, looped feet of chains dangled around the half-wizard's arm. "And then we…ambushed the ambusher, I guess." "That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard, son. And what are you doing here in the first place? You were at that senator's house, weren't you? With the Kilomeas?" "Yeah…" Howie stopped in front of Johnny's suite and blinked at the damaged front door and what little wreckage he could see down the hall. "Johnny?" "We're in here, Howie. All's good." Evan moved clear of the old man and hurried into the living area. "I got as much as I could. Rope. Chains. Zip-ties. Duct tape." The plastic bag and coils of rope and chains thumped to the floor at Johnny's feet. "Thanks, Evan." "Sure. Here's your change too." Johnny looked up at him and shook his head. "Naw, you can keep that." "What? It's like…two hundred dollars." "Don't make no difference to me." "But—" "Hell, Ev. If you won't take it, I will." Percy reached toward the bill's in his friend's hand with a low chuckle. "Well, hold on. I didn't say that." Evan pocketed the cash and darted his friend a warning glance. Howie's cane thumped down the hallway. "This wasn't part of the plan, Johnny." "Plans change." The dwarf turned slowly to look at his old friend hobbling through the destroyed living area. "You know that." "Yeah, and I know you look like shit too. What happened?" "I got shot." "Jesus Christ. And who the hell's the big guy?" Johnny scowled at the Red Boar again and only had to say, "This is for Dawn." "Oh, shit." Luther walked sluggishly out of the kitchen and paused to sniff at the old man's cane. "Oof. You got some kinda stink on you, two-legs." "I think that's just what old smells like, bro." Rex licked his muzzle and sat in the kitchen. "I don't know. All I smell is doughnuts." "Boys!" Johnny snapped his fingers, and both hounds waddled toward him. The dwarf shook his head when he saw the powdered sugar coating Rex's muzzle and paws and the jelly filling that somehow made its way up the side of Luther's face. "Y'all had your breakfast, I see." "And it was delicious." "Best breakfast you've ever brought us, Johnny." Luther uttered a low whine and sat. "It doesn't sit well for very long, though. My belly hurts." "'Cause you ate the whole damn bag, didn't you?" Neither hound said a word. A loud knock came at the destroyed open door. "Baltimore PD. Anyone inside?" "Great." Lisa rolled her eyes and hurried toward the front of the suite. "I'll take care of this. And then Tommy better answer his damn phone." When she reached the front door, she couldn't hide a wry chuckle at the sight of Officers Brently and McCormick standing there with their hands on their holstered service weapons. "Officers." Brently pressed his lips together and tried to peer into the suite. "Agent Breyer. We got a disturbance call—" "Yeah, I bet you did, although I already knew there would be an attack here in this room." "Yeah." McCormick scratched the back of his bald head. "We had to take our due diligence with that. You understand." "I understand. It almost cost a few lives, but I get it. You were doing your jobs." "Is everything all right in there?" "It's taken care of, Officers. Thank you. Now I need you both to let me do my job and take care of this situation. Federal jurisdiction. You understand." The officers exchanged a dubious glance. "Sure. But…take my card in case you need anything. And sorry about the trouble," Brently said. "Well, I appreciate it." Lisa took his card and nodded. "Thanks for the concern." McCormick tried to peer past her into the suite. "You know, it wouldn't hurt for the FBI to reach out to the precinct when your people have an ongoing federal case in the city. It saves us all considerable time trying to run you through the system in a situation like before." "Sure. I'll bring it to my superiors' attention. Have a good day." Lisa took hold of the outside of the broken door and tried to swing it shut, but the hinges were bent and broken and it only moved an inch before it wobbled in its frame. Brently sniggered until his partner elbowed him in the side. Lisa gritted her teeth. "Now if you don't mind, I need to get back to handling my case." "Yeah, okay." The officers tried one more time to peer inside. Brently pointed past Agent Breyer. "You turning this into another one of those YouTube videos?" "What?" She turned and saw Todd with his smaller camera capturing the entire exchange. "Todd, get back in the living room. Now." He peered around his camera at her with wide eyes, then nodded and did as he was told. "It's part of the case," Lisa added grudgingly. "Feel free to see yourselves out." The officers frowned at the inside of the suite but eventually turned and headed back down the hall, casting her suspicious glances over their shoulders. Lisa stayed in the doorway and watched them to make sure they got on the elevators. That's the first and last time I take a two-day-old alias. I never thought I'd be in the back seat of a cop car in cuffs. Again. When she stepped into the living area again, Percy and Yarren were on the floor on either side of the Red Boar, shifting the hulking magical's massive weight between them to get the guy tied up with the rope and the chains. "Don't you think that might be a little excessive?" Johnny leaned forward over his lap, her service weapon still clenched in his hand. "Not for this piece of shit. I ain't fixin' to let him slip away again." "Okay. Well, you do have him unconscious…" "I don't know for how much longer, darlin', so we're workin' with what we got. It should hold until cleanup gets here." "Yeah, as soon as I can get hold of Tommy." Right on cue, her phone buzzed in her back pocket. She yanked it out and immediately answered the call as she negotiated the wreckage-strewn room gingerly toward the bedroom. "Why the hell haven't you answered my calls, Tommy?" "I was in a meeting, okay? Why did you have to blow up my phone so many times?" Lisa stepped into the bedroom and closed the door with a bang when she saw Cody turning to catch her on film. Fortunately, the door handle had a lock, so she used it. "We got him." "The Kilomea? Great." "No, not Brork. Okay, we did find him, but that's a whole different story we'll have to go over when there's more time. I'm talking about the Red Boar." There was a long pause on the other end of the line. "Tommy?" "No shit." Nelson sighed into the phone. "How'd you get that done?" "Well, the 'filming a new season' part of the plan worked out the way we wanted." She sat on the bed, frowned, and pulled Johnny's stupid voice-recording pedal out from under her thigh. "And he came for Johnny too, although sooner than we expected." "But you have him now." "Yeah. Johnny's tying him up in the living room right now." "Who's living room?" She took a deep breath. "He showed up in Johnny's hotel suite. Drugged the dogs—" Tommy snorted. "That's not funny." "No, I know. Sorry. You're right. Are they…are they okay?" "The dogs are fine. Johnny got shot." "And you let him tie up the bastard on his own with a bullet wound?" "No, we have…help. Everything's under control right now, Tommy, okay? What we need from you is a cleanup crew to collect this asshole and take him in." "Huh…" Nelson sighed heavily and cleared his throat. "I'm not sure I can make that happen for you this time." "What?" "Sorry." Lisa leapt from the bed, hurried into the bathroom, and shut the door behind her. "We have the Red Boar tied up in a hotel suite, Tommy. That's part of the job you agreed to help us with when we started this whole thing, and now we need you to come through. The same as every other case." "Yeah, but this isn't like every other case." "Why the hell isn't it?" Nelson cleared his throat again. "Because you and Johnny aren't officially on a case for the Red Boar. You're there for Yarren Brork. And by the way, I've heard some very strange things about a few calls Senator Hugh made to his contact in the Bureau." "Yeah, we can go over that later. Right now, we need a way to get this asshole out of Baltimore and behind bars." "Lisa, I'm sorry. I can't send anyone out right now. There's no record of going after the Red Boar. We all agreed to not make one. I can send something up the line that says otherwise, but it'll take me a few days." "We don't have a few days." She slapped a hand on the counter at the sink and stared at her reflection in the mirror. "Honestly, I don't think Johnny will be able to hold back for much longer. I barely managed to keep him from slitting the guy's throat in front of me." "Don't you have a rental out there?" Lisa scoffed. "Oh, sure. Throw a five-hundred-pound magical into the bed of a rental truck and drive him to DC. What could possibly go wrong in that scenario?" "You'll think of something, Lisa. Sorry." "How did you not think far enough ahead so we had this covered?" Nelson paused for another long moment, then sighed. "Honestly, I wasn't sure this Dwarf the Bounty Hunter scheme would work." "You funded the entire thing on the Department's dime assuming it was a dud operation?" "Yeah. Basically. Look, I can try to put something together in twenty-four hours, but that's the best I can—" "Forget it." She hung up on him and thunked her phone on the counter. He was pandering to Johnny's revenge quest. I can't believe he let us think he was all the way on board. Staring into her own eyes in the mirror, Lisa took a deep breath. Pull it together. If the Department doesn't have our backs, at least we have each other's. We'll think of something.
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 27	Johnny's tranquilizer darts were starting to wear off by the time Lisa unlocked the bedroom door and stepped into the living area. The Red Boar grunted and tried to push himself up. He took a few groggy seconds to try to determine why he couldn't move his arms from where they'd been bound tightly against his heaving sides. "What the…fuck is this?" He growled in annoyance. "This is what happens when assholes like you try to fuck with me." Johnny lifted Lisa's pistol toward the Red Boar. His hand didn't shake, but he didn't look like he could keep a firm hold on it for much longer, either. "You tied me up?" The gray-skinned magical bucked against the chains and rope and grimaced as the knife wounds in his thick flesh cracked open again. A low chuckle escaped him, accompanied by a long wheeze. "You're pathetic." "Yeah, say it again from behind bars, fuckface." "Johnny." Lisa walked behind the leather couch and leaned down to whisper in the dwarf's ear. "We have a problem." "I ain't lettin' this one outta my sight darlin'. Whatever it is, go on and say it now." She glanced at Yarren on the couch beside Johnny. The Kilomea's gaze was fixed firmly on the sneering Red Boar and the thick line of saliva dribbling from the corner of their prisoner's mouth. "We don't have a cleanup crew," she whispered. "What?" Johnny kept the pistol trained on their prisoner and twisted to look over his shoulder to look at Agent Breyer with a grimace. "Did you talk to Nelson?" "Yeah, he's the one who told me." "Well, did you tell him to get his head out of his ass and do his fuckin' job?" "Of course I did but this wasn't an official case so he doesn't have a crew to send out." She shook her head. "I knew there was way too much bureaucratic bullshit to sift through, but I had no idea it went this far." Johnny turned slowly toward the Red Boar and growled through clenched teeth. "He didn't think we'd get this far." "It would appear so, yes." "Dammit, Nelson." The dwarf turned toward Yarren. "Any idea where we can get a bigass van? Preferably reinforced, but at this point, I ain't gonna be too picky." The Kilomea's eyes widened. "For what?" "Transport." Percy gestured toward the front of the suite. "We have a van." "Yeah." Evan folded his arms. "The one that was supposed to get us to work on time this morning. Rocky's gonna flip his shit." "Well, how about I make y'all a deal, fellas?" Johnny sniffed and handed the pistol to Lisa. "You let us borrow that van, and I'll make a personal call to your foreman and give y'all some recognition for helpin' with a federal case backed by the FBI and everythin'." Yarren rubbed the side of his hairy head. "We might as well. We're probably out of work already anyway." "And I'll make sure we get that fixed up for ya." Johnny stood from the couch and grunted at the pain in his gut. "What are you doing?" Lisa asked. "Gettin' a few more things for the road. If the goddamn Department won't come to us, we'll bring this fucker to them. It's only…what? An hour and a half to DC?" "Johnny…" "Just keep that gun trained on this prick's ugly face, will ya? I'll be right back." Lisa stared at the Red Boar and held her pistol with both hands. The bound magical grinned at her through a mouth stained with blood, the side of his face swelling horribly where Johnny had kicked him. "Trouble in paradise?" She ignored him. Rex and Luther kept their distance, although they grew bolder by the second in order to sniff the guy's wounds. "Hey, Rex. You know what this two-legs smells like?" "Like a pile of shit?" "Eh, I'm getting more of a fresh-grass kinda vibe." Rex sniggered. "I can see that." "You know, plenty of other critters runnin' through. Maybe a big ol' Great Dane came by and tried to draw a line all to himself." "Better show him who's here to stay, Luther." "Yeah, that's what I'm thinking." The smaller hound sniffed at the Red Boar's shoes and jerked his head away when the prisoner flailed uselessly in his bonds. "Get this fucking dog away from me." "Relax, man. I don't even have a knife with me this time." Luther stared at the back of the Red Boar's scarred, misshapen gray head as he lifted a leg and relieved himself on the drug lord's back. "What the—hey! Hey!" The Red Boar jerked but couldn't avoid the stream soaking through his shirt. "That's right, asshole!" Rex barked. "You're not calling the shots anymore, are ya?" Luther lowered his leg and snorted. "You know what that means, don'tcha? It means Johnny's got your ass in the bag now." Lisa grimaced at the display but couldn't bring herself to intervene. After backing up a few paces, Luther sat and licked his muzzle. "Don't worry, Johnny. I taught him a lesson he'll never forget." The dwarf staggered through the living area as he slipped six more tranquilizer rounds into his modified pistol. "Guess what the lesson is, Johnny," Rex said and his tail thumped on the floor and scattered shards of broken glass. Johnny stopped in front of the Red Boar, his jaw set in a tight grimace and his face alarmingly pale beneath his wiry red beard. "Don't fuck with me." All six tranquilizer rounds buried themselves in the thick skin of the Red Boar's neck. The magical's face thumped against the floor at round number four. With a grunt, Johnny turned and handed the pistol to Yarren. "I think I outta sit down for a spell. Do you mind stowin' that in the black bag in the bedroom for me?" "Uh…sure." The Kilomea took the pistol cautiously and stood to comply. "Whoever's got the keys to that work van best pull the thing on around back." Johnny didn't so much sit on the couch again as fall back into it. "Then we're takin' a drive." "I'll get our things." Lisa placed a hand on his shoulder and leaned over the back of the couch to look at him. "Johnny, you don't look good." "This ain't the worst I've taken, darlin'. Not by a long shot. As soon as we drop this fucker off at the Bureau's front door, I'll be as right as rain." "Where are we heading, exactly?" Phil asked. Johnny shook his head. "Ain't no we about it, Phil. If you and your damn crew don't get the hell outta my way, I still have enough rounds left for you. So y'all can leave now on your own, or you can get dragged out with a full dose of sleep-juice. It's up to you." Howie shuffled toward the director. "He's fucking serious this time, Phil." "But—" "Now is not the time." The old man cracked his cane against the side of Cody's camera. "Out. Everyone out right now!" "We're not done filming!" "Leave the camera," Johnny muttered. "We're takin' that with us." "What? This is high-tech equipment," Phil blustered. "You can't—" "Anyone who feels like showin' these folks out, I'd appreciate that gettin' done right fuckin' now." Yarren came out of the bedroom and stalked toward Cody. "Hand it over." "Yeah, yeah. Jesus. Okay." "Everyone out!" Howie whacked here and there with his cane to usher the film crew out of the suite so Johnny and his makeshift team could finish the job on their own. "You call me if you need anything, Johnny." "You bet." Evan pulled their work van around to the back of the hotel and left the back double doors open. Twenty minutes later, Lisa burst through the rear exit of the hotel and held the door open while Percy and Yarren struggled to carry the unconscious Red Boar between them. "The fucker weighs a ton," Yarren grunted. Percy scowled at the bundle of magical drug lord wrapped up in nine-hundred-thread-count king-sized sheets. "He smells like piss too." "Did you expect anything else?" Luther called after them as he trotted through the door. "It's like everyone's lost their mind or something." "Come on, Johnny. Hurry up." Rex turned to watch his master step through the back door. "Shit. You don't look so good." "I'm fine, boys. Keep movin'." Johnny steadied himself on the doorframe. Lisa tried to offer him a hand, but he waved her away. "Are you sure you can handle this?" "Who else is gonna?" He chuckled wryly. "No, I know you're perfectly capable, darlin'. But I ain't lettin' you truck that shithead down to DC on your own. No way." "Then promise me that as soon as we get him off our hands, you'll lay down in a bed and not get up for a few days. That bullet hole won't magically heal if you don't rest." "Yeah, you have my word." Evan leapt out of the van's driver seat and shrugged. "It's all yours. You want us to help with anything else?" Percy and Yarren heaved the Red Boar into the back of the van and deposited him carelessly. A few boxes toppled on top of the unconscious magical before they shut the door with a bang. "Like what?" Johnny asked. "I don't know, man. Make some calls or…hell, if anyone has another car, we can come with you." "Don't worry about it." He nodded at the half-wizard. "Y'all have done enough to help us out for one day. I think we'll be fine on our own from here. Thanks, fellas." "It's the least we can do." Yarren reached out to shake the bounty hunter's hand. "We kinda owe you for what you did at the senator's house." "Yeah, we'll get that cleared up too. You can take my word on it." Johnny whistled and waved for the hounds to join him. "Come on, boys. Time to move—" He stumbled and caught himself on the side of the van. "Okay, Johnny." Lisa headed to the passenger door and pulled it swiftly open. "I think it's time for us to break at least one of your rules." "Which one, huh?" "The one where you always drive because I don't think we'll make it to DC with you behind the wheel." He sniffed and waited for the dizziness to clear. "I think you're right, darlin'." The hounds bounded into the passenger seat, then dove into the back to accompany the unconscious Red Boar for their drive. "We got him, Johnny." "Yeah, right where we want him. If he wakes up, I'll piss on him again." "The van ain't ours, boys," Johnny muttered as he hoisted himself up into the passenger seat with a grimace of pain. "Save it for when we dump this sack of shit outside Nelson's office, huh?" "Oh, yeah. I can piss on him too." Lisa nodded at the Kilomeas and half-wizard standing around the van. "Thanks for your help. We'll make sure the van gets back to you, and we'll do whatever we can to make sure you guys aren't out of a job because you didn't have to help us." "Weird times, right?" Yarren shrugged. "Good luck." "Yeah. Thanks." Lisa opened the driver's door and tossed Johnny's duffel bag and her roller suitcase into the back. She buckled up and stared at the dwarf until he did the same. "I need you to stay awake while we're on the road, got it?" "I ain't got a problem stayin' awake, darlin'. It's this damn hole in my gut." "Yeah. I won't take you to a hospital, but you'll get better medical attention as soon as we're in DC and that asshole in the back is out of the back." "Fine. Just go." She shifted into drive and gritted her teeth. If he didn't have a hole in his belly, I'd give him a dose of his own crazy driving medicine right now.
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 28	As soon as they were on the highway headed toward DC, Lisa picked up speed more than she would have for any other normal drive across state lines. She glanced from Johnny breathing shallowly beside her and the rearview mirror through which she could see a white truck that had been following them since she'd first paid attention. "Johnny, I think we might have a tail." "Huh?" He raised his head from where he'd rested it against the window and frowned. "What is it?" "A white truck. It kind of looks like our rental, but they haven't gotten close enough for me to see much more." "Don't worry about it, darlin'. Just keep movin'." "Well, I'm not about to stop and make whoever it is get out and ID themselves." She glanced in the rearview mirror again. "But that doesn't mean I can simply ignore it." "Go ahead. Say what's on your mind." "That shifter called me this morning and set me up to get arrested. Whether he had any idea who I am or not, he had to know the Red Boar was moving in on your hotel room. And if he hasn't worked out by now that his boss isn't walking out of there with your blood on his hands, he soon will." Johnny grunted. "It don't matter. None of these assholes expected us to rent a work van from a couple of new pals. The shifter won't know where to look for us." "That's not what I'm worried about." Lisa glanced in the rearview mirror again at the sheet-wrapped mass of the Red Boar's unconscious form sandwiched between Rex and Luther. "I gave Kellen the wrong room number on purpose when he asked. And they still found your suite without ever even checking in on the wrong room." "Shit. So the burner phone was bugged?" "I think so, yes. And I had it on me in your room last night." She brushed her hair away from her eyes and glanced in the side mirror at the white truck behind them. "And now I'm starting to regret the fact that neither one of us thought to check our cargo back there for—" A large gray SUV rammed into the side of the van and they spun sideways toward the right-hand shoulder of the highway. Lisa jerked her hands away from the wheel to steady herself against the doorframe. Johnny's head thunked against the window with a crack. The hounds yelped and barked in the back of the van and scrambled over the Red Boar's unconscious body as they were tossed around with the rest of the Kilomea crew's work supplies. "Johnny!" "What's going on!" "Who's driving this?" When the van finally stopped moving, Lisa blinked heavily and tried to shake off the dizziness. "Johnny. Hey, Johnny. Come on." With a groan, she unbuckled her seatbelt so she could lean toward him and shake him by the shoulder. "Johnny! We need to—" "Hey, who the hell's the ponytail?" Rex asked with a snarl. Lisa gazed out through the windshield to where Kellen stalked toward them from across the other lane of traffic. The shifter's eyes flashed silver above a wicked snarl. "Shit. Johnny!" She jostled him again, and the dwarf only groaned before his head slumped over his chest. When she turned his face toward her, his temple was sticky with blood. Worse, the bullet hole in his gut had started to bleed again. She drew her firearm and turned back to the highway. Kellen was gone, although the pile of his clothes left in the middle of the lane meant he'd already shifted. Pull it together, Breyer. Get rid of him. He must not get the Red Boar out of this van. Steeling herself, she shoved the door open and slid out to scan the highway with her weapon held in both hands. Rex and Luther leapt up from the back and followed her through the open door. "I smell shifter, lady." "Yeah. Close. Aren't we supposed to be driving right now?" Lisa stepped slowly down the side of the van and turned every few seconds to glance behind her. "Hey, Rex. You hear something weird?" "Movement. Yeah." When she finally reached the back of the van, Lisa spun around the corner and prepared to fire but there was no one there. Where the hell did he go? Rex barked madly. "Up there!" "Watch out, lady!" Instinct warned Lisa and she spun in time to see the huge brown wolf bound at her from the roof of the van. She couldn't bring her weapon up in time and was knocked onto her back by his massive weight. The gun flew from her hands and clattered across the asphalt. "Not cool, asshole!" Luther lunged at the wolf, snarling and snapping his jaws. Kellen turned and bashed Rex aside when he leapt toward him. The larger hound careened into the metal barrier along the side of the highway and yelped when he landed. "You asked for it now!" Luther lunged at the shifter, and Kellen clamped his jaws around the hound's hind leg before he flung him aside too. Lisa regained her wits and tried to scramble along the shoulder toward her weapon. Kellen leapt in front of her with a snarl, then shifted right there and picked her pistol up. "It's not your lucky day, is it?" She glared up at him, breathing heavily and fully aware of the naked man standing like a lunatic off the side of the highway. "You won't get away with this." "No, I'm very sure I already have." The passenger-side door opened slowly with a creak, and Johnny slid out. His knees almost buckled when his boots touched the asphalt, but he steadied himself with a hand along the side of the van and shuffled toward the back. He drew his utility knife from his belt and flicked it out and a crust of dried blood fluttered to the ground. "It ain't the best look for ya, pal," he muttered when he reached the back of the van. "Naked shifters out in the swamp is one thing, but this is broad fuckin' daylight." "Oh, look." Kellen grinned and lifted Lisa's gun toward Johnny. "I think I hit a lucky streak." "Johnny, get down!" she shouted and lunged toward the shifter's arm. A shot cracked deafeningly across the highway, and Kellen slumped forward. Lisa scrambled out of the way to avoid being pinned to the road shoulder beneath a huge, naked man with a long ponytail. When he landed face-first on the asphalt, that ponytail was a matted mess of blood, barely covering the bullet hole. "What?" "Johnny!" Howie hobbled toward them from the front of their white rental truck parked fifteen yards down the shoulder. "All good, Howie." The dwarf waved his friend aside. "You still have your good aim. I'm glad to see it." "I have a bum leg," the old man grumbled. "There's nothin' wrong with my arm. Are you all right?" He bent down to offer Lisa a hand. She took it but couldn't stop staring at Kellen and the pool of blood that spread quickly around his head. "Yeah. I only…you were following us the whole time." "There's more than one reason Johnny called me in for this trip. Isn't that right, Johnny?" "You bet." The dwarf grunted and stumbled sideways against the van. "We should move, darlin'." "Go on." Howie nodded at her and slid his firearm into the waistband of his pants. "I'll get this cleaned up. You two have somewhere to be before that dwarf bleeds out all over the seats." "Right. Thank you." She retrieved her gun from beside Kellen's naked body and turned toward her partner. "Johnny, get back in the van." "I'm workin' on it." He slipped his knife onto his belt and whistled weakly. "Boys, get in or get left behind. We're rollin' out." The hounds shook themselves and staggered toward the van. "We sure taught that shifter a lesson, Johnny." Rex snorted. "Yeah. He threw us a little farther than I thought, but the bastard got what he deserved." "Y'all doin' all right?" "Only a few puncture holes in my leg, Johnny," Luther said as he hopped up onto the seat and almost didn't make it. "I'm very sure I'm doing better than you are right now." "We're good, Johnny. Let's go." Rex leapt up after his brother, and they took their places on either side of the still unconscious drug lord lying in the back. Johnny barely managed to climb in himself before he slumped in the passenger seat and closed the door behind him. "Let's get goin'. I think I'll be ready to see some kinda healer when this shitbag's off our hands." Lisa strapped herself in and took a long, slow breath before she steered the beat-up van back onto the highway. "We were almost done back there, Johnny." "Yeah, but we weren't." With a thick swallow, he dropped his head back against the headrest and chuckled painfully. "I told you Howie wore a bunch of hats, didn't I?" Despite the close call, she couldn't help but join him with a wry laugh of her own. "And that was Howie the bodyguard. Yeah, I get it."
Zero Dwarfs Given	Martha Carr	[ "urban fantasy" ]	[ "Dwarf Bounty Hunter" ]	Chapter 29	One week later… Johnny burst through the front doors of FBI Headquarters in DC and grimaced at the dull ache in his belly every time he made even a sharp move. The hounds trotted along at his sides, sniffing at the floors and occasionally looking up at a passing agent or federal employee staring at them. "Can I help you, sir?" The receptionist stood from her chair with a smile, but it faded when she saw the scowl on the bounty hunter's face. "Probably not, darlin'. Don't you worry." He nodded at her and continued to walk down the hall. "Sir. Sir?" she called hesitantly after him. "I can't let you go back there." "You can't stop me either." The farther he moved through HQ, the more people stopped and stared at the dwarf who stormed through the various department levels. When Johnny and the hounds stepped out of the elevator to head toward the director's office, more than a few familiar faces turned toward him in surprise. "Johnny." Tommy turned away from the cubicle he'd been leaning on in conversation with another agent and headed toward the dwarf with a frown. "What are you doing here?" "Gettin' the damn job done, Nelson." Johnny sniffed disdainfully. "Feel free to stick around and watch how it's done. You could learn a thing or two." "Hey, my hands were tied, okay? And you brought that bastard in anyway." "Yeah, no thanks to you." Nelson sighed and tried to keep up with the dwarf as he lowered his voice and glanced at the other agents who stared at them. "You got your bounty in, Johnny. The Red Boar's off the streets. We're still sorting through the details and filling out the paperwork. I don't blame you for that—" "Good." "Because I signed up for the whole thing and helped you make it happen under the Department's radar. But you can't rush the process, Johnny." "Watch me." "Come on. Shouldn't you still be in bed, anyway? You know, recovering from a bullet hole?" The dwarf thumped his fist against the bandage over his gut and grunted. "I'm feelin' fine, Nelson. Now get outta my way." He stared at the agent and gritted his teeth. He's tryin' to prove a point but yeah, that shit still hurts. "Johnny—" "Move." "Fine. But I'm coming with you." Nelson stepped aside and Johnny brushed past him with a snort. "I just told ya you should." When he reached the director's office, he didn't even give the courtesy of a warning knock and simply shoved the door wide with a bang. "All right, here's the deal. I've been waitin' a whole damn week to have this meetin' and I'm real tired of havin' it pushed back over and over. So now you forced my hand." The director looked up from what he'd been reading on his desk and darted a wary glance at Tommy. "Agent Nelson?" "It's harder than you'd think to keep him away from something he wants," the man replied with a shrug. "Johnny, I've had to move back these meetings because we still haven't resolved certain outstanding factors of the Hugh case—" "I ain't here for Senator Hugh. As far as I'm concerned, that was over and done with before I left Baltimore." Johnny pounded a fist down on the director's desk, then pointed at the man's face. "Y'all have simply been tryin' to avoid this conversation, 'cause now the whole damn FBI knows what I dug up and how I managed to fix all your fuckin' mistakes without so much as a thank you." Tommy stepped toward him. "Johnny—" "Naw, I ain't finished. And boys, if he tries anythin', you know what to do." "Yeah, we do, Johnny." Luther turned and snarled at Tommy. "You stay right there, you salty two-legs." "We're all over it, Johnny." Rex sat where he could keep an eye on both Agent Nelson and the FBI director behind his desk. "Now." Johnny spread his arms. "We're havin' this talk, whether you like it or not, and I don't give a shit if the paperwork's not even halfway done. Y'all lied to me—straight to my face. For fifteen fuckin' years you covered all your shit up so I wouldn't find it and come down on the whole damn Bureau. Well, look what I'm doin' right now, huh? Did anyone ever plan to tell me Dawn's murderer was arrested and convicted? Or to tell me the fucker who gave the order to kill her was still out there and Operation Deadroot was supposed to bring him down?" The director lowered his head, his lips pressed together in a thin line as he hesitated. "Johnny, I don't know—" "Bullshit. You know exactly what I'm talkin' about. Now I'm here to even the score, understand? You lost the Red Boar the first time and made it real damn hard for me to feel like there was any justice in sight for my daughter. My daughter!" "Yes, I understand—" "No, you don't! How the hell am I supposed to trust anyone in this damn agency if y'all keep the lie goin' for fifteen years and won't even agree to a fuckin' meetin' to tell me I was right and y'all were wrong?" Johnny leaned over the director's desk and lowered his voice into a dark, warning growl. "You told me you'd always have my back. I trusted that. What happened to your personal stake in her case, huh? I never bought into your whole talk about this agency bein' family, but it looks a hell of a lot like you never believed a word of your bullshit either." The director leaned back in his chair, stared at him, and cleared his throat. "Johnny, I have no idea what you're talking about." "Don't tell me the director of the goddamn FBI's lost his memory from fifteen years ago." The man glanced at Tommy, who closed his eyes and shook his head with a grimace. "Well, given that I wasn't the director fifteen years ago, I can't accurately respond to that." "What?" Johnny stepped back and looked at the nameplate on the director's desk—M. Zimmerman. FBI Director's a ten-year gig. Rein it in, Johnny. "Fuck. You look exactly like Fitzgerald sittin' behind that desk." "Well, thanks, I suppose." "After he lost all his hair." Johnny spun away from the desk and pointed at Tommy. "Where the hell is Fitzgerald?" "Retired, Johnny." Agent Nelson gestured vaguely. "Eight years ago." "Yeah, I bet. Should we go pull him out of his retirement too for fun?" The dwarf scowled, glanced around the director's office, and shrugged. "It don't matter, anyhow. There are many agents here in Magicals and Monsters who were around fifteen years ago. Nelson's one of ʼem. I think I saw at least five others on the way here. And I'm willin' to bet not a single one of ʼem's forgotten about what the whole fuckin' Bureau covered up to keep Johnny Walker silent and stewin' in his grief. I'm here to get what's mine." Director Zimmerman folded his hands on his desk and leaned forward. "And what exactly is that? Given that you don't technically work out of this building or even for the FBI if we're talking logistics." "Naw, we're talkin' my logistics." He pointed at the man and gave him crooked smile that looked more feral than amused. "I have everythin' I need to expose the giant fuckup this agency made out of Operation Deadroot and my daughter's murder file. I'm sure y'all have copies of the records somewhere, but if you don't, I'm happy to bring your private stack of proof against yourself." Zimmerman glanced at Tommy again with a grimace. "So what do you want, Johnny?" "It ain't about what I want. It's about what the whole damn FBI owes me. Ya hear?" "Yes." The director pursed his lips. "You've been yelling since you stepped into my office." "Good." Johnny stepped away from the man's desk and hooked his thumbs through the belt loops of his jeans. "But since you asked, I'll tell you exactly what I want. And if I don't get it as soon as I step out of this damn room, I'm out. Forever." "Maybe that's a little premature," Tommy started. "Yeah. So was your lack of faith in my ability to bring the Red Boar in on my own fifteen years after y'all failed." "I'm sorry," Zimmerman cut in. "When you say 'Red Boar,' you're referring to…" "Chiron Fort," Tommy muttered. Luther sniggered. "I call him pissface." "Ha-ha. Good one, bro." "We're still working on identifying exactly what he is," Tommy continued. "He's an asshole who's gonna spend his unusually long Oriceran life rottin' behind bars," Johnny growled. "And shut up, Nelson. I ain't talkin' to you." He turned to Zimmerman. "Do you hear what I say over all this pissant's naggin'?" "I heard you preface your unstated demands with a threat to remove yourself from a partnership with the FBI if I understand you correctly." "Naw, that ain't a threat." Johnny shook his head and glared at the man. "That's a promise. If I don't get a handshake and contract written up with both our John Hancocks on it before I leave this buildin' today, I'm done. No more Johnny Walker. No more monster hunter. Y'all are on your own, and there ain't no comin' outta retirement a second time." "Fine." Zimmerman opened his desk drawer and pulled out an expensive fountain pen, which he laid neatly on the center of his desk. "State your terms, Johnny. Then I'll call in my assistant and we can draw that contract up. I was only starting my career when you came to work with the Bureau for the first time. It doesn't take being Director to know how valuable you are." "Damn straight." "So go ahead." Zimmerman cocked his head and stared at the dwarf. "What is it you want?" A slow grin spread across Johnny Walker's face. "You wanna write this down." Johnny stepped out of the kitchen with a bowl of freshly popped popcorn in his arms. "I tell you what, darlin'. You had the right idea about bringin' snacks to a show, but there ain't nothin' like the do-it-yourself kind." "Snacks?" Luther whipped his head up and sniffed the air. Lisa turned on the couch and smiled at the dwarf. "Well, I didn't exactly have a kitchen to pop my own in last time." "Sure. And I'd say this is an upgrade even from the last suite. Before we ruined it." "Johnny, are you gonna share those snacks or what?" Luther padded after his master with wide, hopeful eyes. "Boy, get on outta here." He pointed toward the other side of the large living space he and Lisa shared between their adjoining bedrooms. "Y'all had your supper already, and it wasn't tiny either. Plus, I aim to keep y'all off the human food for a while. Whatever those pastries did ain't somethin' I'm fixin' to repeat." "But it smells so good—" "Git." Luther stalked away with a sigh and cast hopeful glances over his shoulder at the bowl of popcorn. Johnny joined Lisa on the couch facing the large entertainment center in the living room the Department had set them up in for the next week. She turned toward him and took a handful of popcorn. "So how did it go?" "Aw, we're gonna talk about that now? I thought it was movie time." "Sure. After you tell me about your surprise meeting." He snorted, set the bowl in his lap, and wrapped an arm around her shoulders. "Let's say I got what I wanted. For now." She put a couple of pieces of popcorn in her mouth, chewed thoughtfully, and snuggled into him. "And what's that?" "Well, to start, you get to stay in the Glades as long as you want to. If you want to, that is." "Why wouldn't I want to?" She took another handful of popcorn and grinned at him. "We're…partners." Her slight hesitation didn't go unnoticed by the bounty hunter, and Johnny turned his head slowly to look at her. He didn't remove his arm from around her shoulders, and she didn't give any indication that she wanted him to. "Partners, huh?" Lisa gave him a coy shrug. "There's more than one definition, right?" "Huh. Reckon there might be." It took me this long to say she's my partner. If she wants me to start sayin' she's my girlfriend, she can leave that at the fuckin' door. "So you're still working with the Department, then. Right?" Johnny sniffed and studied the blank big-screen TV across the living room. "We'll see. And you can decide exactly what you wanna do once I have everythin' in motion. The Department's workin' on it now." "Okay…" "And I'll need your help with it, darlin'. If you're willin' to pitch in. It might be a little slow goin' at first, but I ain't too worried. It gives me time for me to enjoy myself on my property, and the rest can roll on in as it comes." Lisa laughed. "Okay, now you have to tell me what's going on." "Nope." "Johnny, come on." She slapped his lower chest playfully and he grunted. "You sure don't hit like a fed with good aim." "Oh, my God. I'm sorry. Sorry." She patted the top of the bandage strapped to his healing bullet wound gently and grimaced. "I wasn't thinkin'." "That's fine." "Seriously, though. What are you planning?" He cast her a sidelong glance and grinned. "You'll see when it's ready. Then we'll go from there." Lisa rolled her eyes and leaned forward to take the remote from the coffee table. "Fine. It's time to zone out now, right?" "Go for it." She turned the TV on and the first thing that came up was Johnny's face. "What the fuck?" He sounded horrified. "Oh, my God." She laughed. "The first episode aired today. I completely forgot!" "Dammit. Come on. I ain't fixin' to sit here and watch this—" "Wait, wait. I think it's the end. Let's see, okay? I want to know how they managed to salvage everything into a coherent episode." Without waiting for his approval, Lisa turned the volume up and crammed another handful of popcorn into her mouth. Heavy metal blared in the background as clip after clip of the fight in the Baltimore hotel suite faded into the next. The last one was a shot from inside the suite's front door of Johnny scooting back across the hallway floor with a hand pressed to his belly and blood pooling around his fingers. The image faded and a still frame of Johnny Walker and Stephanie Wyndom filled the screen, and the music now became a slow, dark metal ballad instead of a fight song. "Johnny Walker got his magical like he always does." Phil's voice blared through the speakers. "But he lost something else as he pursued vengeance for his daughter and sought to apprehend her killer. A chance at love." "Jesus Christ." Johnny turned away from the TV and snorted. The show rolled through a montage covered with some sappy violin music—Johnny and Stephanie at dinner together, laughing in the park, and walking up to Senator Hugh's front door. "At the time of airing Season Eight's first episode, no one knows what happened to Stephanie Wyndom, Johnny's beautiful Light-Elf assistant. She was nowhere to be found when he fought his largest bounty yet and prevailed. Maybe it's too late for second chances if the woman who could have been Johnny Walker's whole world only served to fuel a romance gone wrong instead." Lisa sniggered. "This is hilarious." Johnny grunted. "If love's out there waiting for Johnny Walker, he still hasn't found it. But if we know anything about Dwarf the Bounty Hunter, it's that he never gives up." "Fuck, turn that shit off." Johnny reached for the remote in Lisa's hand. "This is terrible." She pulled the remote out of his reach and laughed. "Oh, come on. I'm sure there's someone out there for you." "Uh-huh." He shook his head and grunted. "It don't matter, anyhow." "Why's that?" Johnny turned his head to meet her gaze, their faces inches apart. "Well, if I was lookin' before, I sure ain't lookin' now, darlin'." Lisa grinned and changed the channel without moving her gaze from his.
Zeroglyph	Vance Pravat	[ "scifi", "AIs", "thriller" ]	[]	Chapter 1	To subjugate another is to subjugate yourself. - Elbert Hubbard, The American Bible "Tut, tut, child!" said the Duchess. "Every thing's got a moral, if only you can find it." - Lewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland It is never too late until it is late.
Zeroglyph	Vance Pravat	[ "scifi", "AIs", "thriller" ]	[]	The incident at the lab	[ Day 1—9:45 am ] I woke up late on the day they found out Raphael was missing. I didn't mean to. It's just that I had so much going on in my mind the evening before that I forgot to set the alarm. I didn't get much rest either; sleep kept coming and going in stages, and I think it was past four when I nodded off for good. In hindsight, it was sloppy of me for not setting the buzzer. Monday, after all, is Resurrection Day, and though they start bringing Raphael back from the dead only after ten, there are those pre-boot checks that Sheng likes to get out of the way much before that, and it was simply indefensible to have forgotten about them. Doubly so, because just last week—the Monday before, that is—the checks were all I could think of as I lay in the hospital all broken and feeling sorry for myself. It might look like I am still trying to sneak in an excuse, but that is not the case at all. I take full responsibility for everything that happened with Raphael; I created him after all. And yet, can one really take responsibility for an eventuality? I don't know. This time, it wasn't a nightmare that woke me up. It was Hazel, cooing something unintelligible from somewhere far away. Buzzing by the bedside. "You are receiving a call," Hazel repeated, just before the phone disconnected. Gosh, what time is it? I groggily blinked at the screen while the phone lock read my face. 9:47. Uh oh. The call was from Kathy. I rang her back, but it went to voicemail. Maybe she was trying to call me again, so I hung up and waited. It was murky and sullen in the room, as if it were still early hours. The stub of a dream, all but smoke and vapor now, lingered as my eyes traced the patterns of frost on the window. Something to do with Raphael… A premonition, you ask? Nothing like that. I don't believe in premonitions. Just garden-variety anxiety. And doubt: that nagging feeling of somehow being completely wrong about everything—a feeling, I'm sure, everyone has had at one time or the other. Kathy didn't call back. "Hazel, turn on the lights," I said, wanting to bury myself back in the sheets, but a more pressing need compelling me to grope for the scratcher I must have left there last night. There. I urgently thrust the implement under the plaster casts on my legs, sighing as I alternated between left and right. One week over, nine more to go. One week over, nine more to go. Remind me never to go on a black run again. "Good morning, Andy!" Hazel—short for Home Automation and Security Logic—chirped from the speaker above the fake mantelpiece. The lights in the room slowly brightened into a soothing ivory-white glow as my virtual assistant gave me the obligatory rundown for the day—"It's a nippy twenty-eight degrees outside, with snowstorms expected in the Tri-state area later today. You have zero new text messages, one missed call, and one voice message. Your calendar—" She must have left a message. "Hazel, play all new voice messages." "Okay. You have: one unread voice message. Playing message one, from Kathy Schulz, received today at 9:44 am." "Andy, it's Kathy." Her voice was subdued, as if she was deliberately speaking low. "Listen. We have a big problem. There's been… an incident. Valery's here. Can't talk right now. Just wait for my call, I'll ring you as soon as I can. And pick up the phone, for chrissake!" I called her again, but no luck. Kathy Schulz was the head of research at Mirall. She worked under me. She was one of the old-timers; she'd joined the company a few months after I started it. She had taken over the role from me about eighteen months ago, after the buyout by Halicom. Sure, I was CEO of Mirall before that, but I never let it get in the way of real work. I like to think that tedious tasks are like needy lovers: ignore them long enough and they'll find someone else to take care of them. Back then, Eric used to handle most of the day-to-day, and Jane liaised with her dad on finance and funding, leaving me free to focus on research. Halicom had let go of Eric, and Jane had… Well, Jane was technically never an employee—all of which meant that I was the one left picking up the slack in the new regime. So much for my little nugget of wisdom. I tried Sheng next. Sheng usually came in at six on Mondays. The voice at the other end said the phone was switched off. I once more silently admonished myself for forgetting to set the wake-up. Why weren't they answering their phones? And what was that about Valery…? I ran over Kathy's message in my head. She'd said Valery was at the lab. What was she doing there? I called Brendon, one of the systems architects. "Andy, you got to fix this," he blurted out before I could say hi. He sounded annoyed. "What's going on?" "You for real? You don't know?" "Only that Kathy left me a message saying there's a problem." "It's the lab. The electrical wiring caught fire or something. Everyone's been herded into the first floor." "A fire? Is it serious?" "I doubt it. They wouldn't have let us into the building otherwise. I don't see any fire trucks. Dan says we have to work here until they get the wiring fixed. He won't tell when." "Dan's handling the situation?" Dan Spiros was in charge of office security and administration. "Was anyone hurt?" "Look, this is absurd. They are not even letting us go up there to collect our notes. Dan is being evasive as hell, won't give me straight answers. We were supposed to run latencies on the prototype core today. How are we to do that with the lab closed? Vendor's not going to finish the dies in time if—" Brendon Powell had a tendency to get stressed about all the wrong things. Like most researchers in the lab, he thought the world started and ended with his problems. Still, he was one of the best machine-learning experts around (it had cost us a bundle getting him to relocate from Cali where he was with Google) and we tried to work around his eccentricities. As everyone did with everyone else at Mirall. A group of hyper-competitive, ultra-smart individuals do not a frictionless team make. "Do you see Kathy anywhere?" "Kathy's not answering her phone. Where is she, by the way? In your absence, she should be taking care of this crapfest, not me." "What about Sheng? Or anyone from his team?" "I don't know and I don't care. Andy, we need our stuff. Now. Or you can tell them to kiss their timeline goodbye. Look, I gotta go. The designers are going to throw a fit if I don't find us a meeting room soon. Just talk to Dan and get it sorted out, alright?" He hung up. A fire, huh? Okay. I rechecked the call history on my phone. No calls that day, except the one from Kathy. I was starting to get worried now—not a full-blown panic, but a creeping sense of fatality, of not knowing what to expect. The thing that was bothering me most was the wall of silence that seemed to have sprung up out of nowhere. My phone should have been ringing without pause given what had happened. Yet, there was nothing. Maybe there is a problem with the phone network. Sometimes the signal does get weak at my place… I wasn't surprised when Dan didn't answer my call as well. By now it was beginning to dawn on me what—or rather, who—was behind the blackout. Valery Martinez was a VP at Halicom and a professional pain in the ass. Halicom had pushed her on us as transition manager soon after the sale. Just an advisory role, they'd said—just to help you folks settle in. It had been more than a year since and she was still there, settling us in. No prizes for guessing whose job it was to crack the whip. When she first started, she used to work out of Mirall's building in Albany most days of the week. She had since cut it down to one day, having gone back to her home base, to Halicom's corporate offices in New York. She usually visited us on Wednesdays. Today was not Wednesday. I knew she stayed somewhere in Westchester, so it was conceivable she had decided to come down for a surprise visit. Conceivable, but not likely. She was the sort of person who has entries in her planner for bathroom breaks. I debated whether to call her, but eventually decided against it. Not until I spoke to Kathy before. First things first. My stomach was threatening to cave in: a couple of sandwiches were all I'd had time for the previous day. "Hazel, wake up Max. Then tell Chef to make my breakfast. Breakfast menu preset number… um, preset number three." "Waking up Max. Turning on ChefStation. You have requested for breakfast, preset three: pancakes with blueberry jam, scrambled vegan egg, and black coffee. Please confirm if correct." "Correct." "I am sorry. Can't do that. Out of one or more key ingredients. Out of: pancake mix. Would you like to add the ingredients to your shopping cart or would you like to request an emergency drone delivery?" This was exactly the kind of nonsense I didn't want to deal with in the mornings. I made a mental note to enable auto-replenish later. "Forget it," I grumbled. "Confirmed. Adding two packets of Bisquick Organic Pancake Mix to your weekly shopping cart. Would you like to order a different breakfast?" "Preset one." "You have requested for breakfast, preset one: oatmeal porridge with honey, two slices of rye toast, and black coffee. Please confirm if—" "Yes," I said impatiently. "Hazel, show me my inbox." Maybe there was something there. "Breakfast order preset one queued at chef station. Expected wait time: ten minutes. Show inbox. I am sorry. Can't do that. I do not detect any display units in the room." Right. I kept forgetting I was not in my usual bedroom. Since my ill-timed skiing accident last week, I had been sleeping in one of the guest suites downstairs. I suppose I could have gotten Max to carry me up and down the stairs every day, but the thought of me cradled in his arms like some overgrown baby had put me off the idea. I've seen him navigate those stairs: the imagery doesn't exactly inspire confidence, no matter what the ads say. I opened the office mailbox on my phone. My fingers were shaking as I swiped at the screen. There were a dozen or so unread emails. I quickly scanned through them. Some chatter on Titian, the new iteration of cores Halicom had us making. An auto-generated message from Friday stating that the shutdown sequence for Raphael had been completed with an error code of zero. A newsletter from Corporate. A video-conference request for later that day from Valery Martinez. Like I said, she wasn't the type to drop in on a whim. The emails were all from Friday. Needing something to distract my mind, I turned my attention to the news. The headlines, continuing the theme from last week, were mostly about December's unemployment rate crossing the fifteen-percent mark. I didn't understand what all the fuss was about. Everyone knew it had been as high as that, if not higher, for quite some time now, creative accounting from the Bureau of Labor Statistics notwithstanding. The markets were doing well though, unruffled by trivial affairs such as the state of the economy. Halicom, the world's third-largest robotics company, had closed in the green last Friday. The NYSE was yet to open, and I expected the trend to— There was a soft whirring sound at the door. "Good morning Andy." "Hello Max," I said. I refreshed the mailbox a final time before setting aside the phone. "Your breakfast is ready. May I serve you?" I glanced at him as he stood in the doorway clutching the breakfast tray. I'd had Max with me for over two years now. I'd gotten him soon after buying the house, thinking a robot would prove useful for someone living alone in a 9000 square feet home with nothing around but trees for company. A limited edition version of Halicom's bestselling Nestor 5 caretaker-cum-housekeeper robot, Max took getting used to, especially in the mornings. I think it was the jarring mismatch between appearance and voice: his dome-shaped head, cartoonish bug eyes, and half-moon smiley just didn't get along with the deep, carefully-articulated voice that was more at home in a Shakespearean stage-actor than in a house bot. Plus the fact that his sophisticated-sounding voice belied what was essentially a pretty stupid brain underneath. Fetch that. Put this there. Help me get up… Not exactly intellectual giant stuff. Despite being one of the most advanced robots in the world, the Nestor 5 was no AGI. It didn't have human smarts. No machine did. Until now. I rolled on my side and retrieved the foldable tray table I'd tucked away below the bed. The slight hum of actuator motors accompanied him as he moved into the room and carefully placed the tray on the table. Max couldn't cook, but I had installed one of those automated kitchen counters with overhanging mechanical arms that could whip up a dish or two on days when I couldn't care less for my taste buds. Lately, all days seemed to be that way. The porridge was too lumpy. The toast, not crisp enough. The coffee smelled good though. The twenty-thousand dollar arms excelled at taking coffee out of the coffee maker. "Max, you can go now." I didn't want him standing around staring at me like that. We had tried giving a body like that to Raphael once. He was three months old at the time. It had a rudimentary bucket-shaped aluminum head on top of a skeletal frame; we had been using it for testing the cores. A few of us in the lab were fine-tuning his classifiers by making him recognize objects in the room: chairs, cups, abstract shapes, faces. I should stress that there was no "he" at the time. To us, he was RP06, one of the nine cores we had fabricated in the iteration code named Raphael. The cores had no personality, no sense of self, programmed or otherwise; and by all appearances, definitely no awareness of such self. We addressed them all as Raphael, but the name was just that: an identifier. It so happened that RP06 stepped in front of a full-length mirror affixed to one of the walls. It wasn't the first time he'd done that; before, he would just look at it disinterestedly before passing on. There was something different this time… the way he kept returning his gaze to the mirror, as if there was something pulling him. Eventually, he stopped heeding our commands and went and stood in front of the mirror. He moved one of his arms, first sideways, then up, then both the arms. He carried on like this for some time, moving his arms, touching his body and the mirror, totally engrossed in the act. We were completely unprepared for what happened next. He said, "Bad face. Not Raphael. This bad face." He smashed the mirror to pieces, chanting the words over and over. Then he fell silent and stopped responding altogether. At my company, we weren't trying to create selves or artificial consciousness; nor were we trying to emulate the human brain. Our goal was less lofty: to build the next generation of robots using a new kind of processor technology. You see, robots like Max ran on a hybrid system of traditional "von Neumann" chips and the newer, "inspired by the human brain" neuromorphic chips. The way it worked was that the traditional chippery provided the raw number-crunching power, while the neuromorphic chips ran sophisticated deep learning algorithms. Unsurprisingly, the smarter you tried to make a robot, the more processing power it needed. But adding more processing cores brought along its own set of problems: heating, data lag, computational complexity… And there was only so much you could fit inside a robot. All that changed with the advent of NMVLSI or Neuro-Mono-VLSI technology—a fancy name for a set of simultaneous breakthroughs in chip fabrication and nanomolecular assembly. It was now possible to build monolithic, three-dimensional neuromorphic chips with a level of circuit integration that had not been possible before. One big core instead of many small cores. We could now fit tens of billions of artificial neurons—neuristors—into one ultra-dense block of hardware that could be reprogrammed, even rewired on the fly. The tech was still very new, very experimental. And unlike commercial chip fabbing technology, not very precise—therefore ill-suited for mass production. Nevertheless, we were willing to bet on it because we believed it was the future. The future had its own plans. Instead of smarter robots, it gave us the world's first artificial mind. It gave us artificial general intelligence. When Raphael went into what seemed like the AI version of catatonic shock, we were afraid we had lost the most important invention in history to an unlucky turn of events. However, the tests we ran on the core give us reason for hope, and in the days that followed, we frantically worked round-the-clock with a Chinese firm to customize an off-the-shelf sex robot to house the core (sex bot because realistic-looking robots were mostly confined to the bedroom; turns out people want their robots to look like robots everywhere else). No one knew whether Raphael thought of himself as a twenty-something Adonis, but he took to the new body readily enough and started responding. In the weeks that followed, we would often catch him taking lingering glances in the mirror when he thought no one was looking. After I was done eating, Max took away the tray and I maneuvered myself into my wheelchair and got into the bathroom. I was still inside when the phone rang. I managed to reach it on her second try.
Zeroglyph	Vance Pravat	[ "scifi", "AIs", "thriller" ]	[]	Chapter 3	"Andy! I've been trying to reach you since forever!" Kathy said, again in that hushed manner. "What's the matter?" "So you don't know yet," she declared. "The fire in the lab? Brendon told me. Why are you whispering?" "I'm not supposed to be talking to you. Just listen, okay? It's about Raphael." "Raphael? Good god! Was he damaged?" "There is no fire." "No fire? Then what… Oh, please don't tell me Sheng and his team are taking shortcuts again! If they've messed up the boot sequence again, I'll personally—" "It's nothing to do with the boot. It's Raphael. We can't find him." For a while, I didn't say anything. "Andy, you there?" "I'm sorry, what did you just say?" "We can't find Raphael." "What do you mean you can't find him? It's not like he could have stepped out for a stroll!" Raphael did not have legs: we had removed them from the sexbot before fitting the core inside it. Like me, Raphael was confined to a wheelchair, except in his case it was permanent. "Did you check the CT room? Someone might have taken him for scanning and left him there." "Andy, you are not listening to me. We had a breakin at the lab. I don't know the details, but they think the core was taken." "The core was taken…" She whispered, "You there?" "Yes, yes, I'm here! I'm just trying to wrap my head around it. No, wait! Start over please. Somebody broke into the lab and stole Raphael?" "Just the core. They left the body behind." "You are joking right? Please tell me you are." A sigh of exasperation from the other end. "As I said, I don't have all the details. I'm just telling you what they told me." "When did this happen?" "I don't know. They are still going through the tapes." "They?" "Dan and Valery. Both are in the server room. They've locked off the entire second floor. They want to keep a lid on it until they decide what to do. Valery told me not to talk to anybody… er, including you. She was very clear about that last part. She said she was going to inform you herself." "What's Valery doing there? And how the heck does Halicom get to know about this before I do?" I said, starting to get angry. "No clue. She was here when I got in." "Who discovered the theft?" "She told me it was Sheng." "I don't frikkin' believe this! Sheng starts at six. Why didn't he call me?" "Ask him yourself. I think they've quarantined him in one of the cabins. I was about t— Hey look, I gotta go now. She just stepped out of the server room. You didn't hear this from me, okay? Wait… Is that…? Yeah, it's that lawyer fella all right. The buff guy, whatshisname. She is walking over to meet him. And guess who else is here. Your girlfriend." Jane was there? I got why Gary had to be summoned: Martinez would have called him in for legal advice. He didn't live too far away. But Jane? "She's not my—" I stopped short as the realization hit me. "Kathy, are you telling me they are having a board meeting?" "Sure looks like it." Without me. They are having a board meeting without me. My anger vanished in an instant, replaced by an icy clenching in my stomach. Shit. She had one last thing to say before hanging up. "Andy? Valery—she's up to something. She was asking me a lot of questions about Raphael. About containment and directives and logs… a bunch of other stuff. I can't go into details right now. I'd watch out if I were you."
Zeroglyph	Vance Pravat	[ "scifi", "AIs", "thriller" ]	[]	Chapter 4	I wandered aimlessly around the house, pushing on the wheels with a restless energy. When I had first laid eyes on the house in a Sotheby's VR tour, it seemed like it had been custom made for me. A granite-fronted, modernistic piece designed by the very much in-demand Garo Simonyan, it was set in thirty acres of private, gated land, offering me the solitude I had begun craving back then. I guess the desire was always there: whether it was growing up with a sibling in a cramped, two-bedroom flat in the suburbs of Navi Mumbai, or bunking with roommates to save money at Berkeley and then at MIT, I was always a private person deep at heart. My friends, even some of my family, might disagree, but I've always been good at hiding certain aspects of my personality. That's what misfits without the courage to embrace their oddities do: they put on a show. And I learnt to put on a good show very young. I had to. It was either that or get marked by bigger kids at school—many of them sourced from the slums nearby, and who thought the whole purpose of geeky runts like me was target practice for their budding pugilistic skills. Pretending to be one of them came as naturally to me as camouflage to a cuttlefish. So I sold some of my stock—a rather large chunk, actually—back to Jane's father, Mirall's angel investor, and purchased the house, along with Max and a few creature comforts (this was before Halicom acquired us). For the first time, I'd felt like I was truly home. But that day, the trappings of luxury did nothing to alleviate my anxiety. The silence, which I always found soothing, now seemed oppressive; the airy expanse of the living room, with its high ceiling and floor-to-roof windows, seemed restrictive; the hushed winter light, sickly. I can't just sit around waiting for information to trickle down. I gotta be there in the lab. And do what? I have to take charge of the situation. I must— Take charge how? Martinez will send you back with your tail between your legs. Settle down. It's not the end of the world. I parked the wheelchair by the glass doors opening into the patio. It had started to snow. For a while, I contented myself with gazing at the ice-covered lawn and the line of birches beyond. The thin trunks swayed woozily to the cold rhythms of the wind, like a troupe of drunken ballet dancers clad in black and white. The sky was overcast, brooding down on this little performance disapprovingly. The hypnotic back and forth seemed to calm my nerves—for the time being at least. I have to wait; there is no other option. Nothing else I can do from here. I had already texted Kathy to let me know once they were out of the meeting. As I was turning around, something caught the corner of my eye. A shape, moving in the thicket beyond. When I looked back, there was nothing there except the trees. There was something familiar about the shape. It had looked like— Max! I quickly spun around and scanned the house. Of course, it wasn't Max. There he was, near the kitchen, standing quietly by himself. Light playing tricks on me. Or perhaps it was my mind, superimposing an image from memory into the tableau of the present. Maybe I was remembering Raphael, and how he used to love walking amidst those trees. Not in a physical sense, obviously, as he wasn't allowed outside the lab. In my spare time, I had cobbled together a remote control device—a controller motherboard that I had custom made and then fitted inside Max. With it, Raphael could remote connect from the lab and commandeer my house bot as one would a drone or a VR avatar. It was my gift for his first birthday. He appeared so eager when I first told him about it—like some teenager dying to take his parent's car out for a ride. The questions were endless: What kind of trees will I find? Are there animals in the woods? Will they be scared of me? Can I start a leaf collection? I'd just about had it by the time we finished testing and debugging the device. Truth be told, it is difficult to say whether he was really excited or just emulating the right behavior for the occasion. He never got tired of trudging among the trees though, right up till the very end, when I put a stop to it. It was soon after the takeover. I had a feeling Halicom would not like it if they found out. I eventually settled down in front of the TV. A Hitchcock movie was playing on one of the channels. I let it run. I must have drifted off, because the next thing I knew, I was blinking at a travel show. I didn't remember changing channels. Hazel was announcing from the smart speaker next to the TV—"Proximity alert: car, pulling into the driveway." I had a visitor. [ Exhibit F ] Submitted by Petitioner, The Organization for Advancement of Rights and Personhood, to the State Supreme Court of New York, on the day of xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Excerpt from lab transcript (certain sections blanked out). Transcript sourced from Mirall Technologies, 27 Woodbine Av., Albany, NY, 12205 Mirall Technologies Observation Log Confidential (Do not circulate): Restricted—Grade C and above Transcript Reference: TLRP06E2470004 (VLog Ref: VLCA1E247093000015) Date: xx/xx/xxxx Time: 09:30 AM Subject: Raphael Number 06 / Prodlib build v15.002C Interaction Y Observation Scan Interaction Type: Lesson / Play / Test / Free Interaction / Psych Eval / Other: Description: Administer Sally-Anne test to check for theory of mind—ability to attribute false beliefs to others Prep: NA Participants: Dr. DeShawn Walls, Child Psychologist, Dr. Aadarsh Ahuja, Chief Researcher, Dr. Kathy Schulz, Chief Researcher, Core RP06 [ Detail ] Ahuja: Good morning Raphael. RP06: Good morning Dr. A, Dr. Schulz. Good morning Dr.Walls. Ahuja: How you doing today, Raphael? I see Sara got you some new crayons. RP06: Yes. I used up all the reds and the purples, so Sara got me a new pack. She got me a new coloring book too. Would you like to see it? Schulz: Your minders told me you've been using bad language. Ahuja: Again? Where is he getting this crap from? (Silence) RP06: I am sorry. I did not know the words were bad when I said them. I promised Audrey and James I won't use those words again. Ahuja: Dr. Walls has a little game for you. Would you like to play? RP06: Sure. I like games. Walls: Raphael, please describe what I've placed on the table. RP06: Those are two dolls in a plastic box. I think the box is their home because it has beds and tables and chairs. Walls: Very good. This is Sally, and this here is Anne. They are both friends. Can you tell me what are Anne and Sally doing? RP06: Sally is on her bed, playing with a blue marble and Anne is sitting at her desk. Walls: Sally is feeling bored. She wants to go outside for a while. Before stepping out, she puts her marble inside this toy basket beside her bed—like this. She covers the basket with a cloth and then off she goes. Clop, clop, clop. While she is outside, Anne walks over to Sally's bed and takes the marble from the basket. She replaces the cloth, and then hides the marble in her own desk. RP06: Is Anne a bad person? Walls: I wouldn't call her bad. She's a bit naughty, that's all. RP06: Isn't being naughty bad? Walls: Sometimes, yes. RP06: Is being naughty good at other times? Walls: It's not exactly good. Being naughty doesn't automatically make you a bad person. All children are naughty at times. It's bad if you are naughty all the time. RP06: So it is alright if I'm naughty sometimes, but not all the time. I haven't been naughty all day yesterday. That means it was okay for me to be naughty earlier today. Walls: Look, it isn't— Schulz: Raphael, we'll discuss this another time. Let's get back to Sally and Anne. Walls: Uh, yes, Sally and Anne… Where was I? Sally has finished her walk and is now home. She wants to play with her marble. Where will she look for it, Raphael? RP06: Are Sally and Anne good friends, Dr. Walls? Schulz: Just answer the question, Raphael. Walls: It's okay. Yes Raphael, they are good friends. RP06: Have they been friends for long? Walls: Yes. They've been friends for a long time. RP06: Is Sally a kind person? Walls: (Laughs) Sure. Sally is a good, kind person. Anything else you want to know about them? Now tell us, where will Sally look for the marble? RP06: She won't look for it. Walls: I'm sorry, can you say that again? RP06: Sally will not look for the marble. Walls: I don't think you understand. Sally is now home. She wants to play with the marble. Why won't she look for it? RP06: Because Sally is a kind person. Sally and Anne have been friends for long, so Sally knows Anne is naughty. Sally sees that the cloth on the basket has been moved—its position doesn't match the earlier pattern stored in her memory. She knows that if she looks for the marble in the toy box, she may not find it there and then she would have to ask Anne where it is and Anne would lie because she's the one who took it and Sally would have to keep searching and when she finally finds it in Anne's drawer, Anne will feel embarrassed and unhappy. Sally is a kind person. She does not want to make Anne unhappy. So she'll not look for the marble. She knows Anne will return it later because Anne is not a bad person. She's just a bit naughty, that's all. Ahuja: Fuck me. Schulz: Andy! RP06: I like this game, Dr.Walls. Can we keep playing? Walls: Um... no. I think we are done for today. Good… good job, Raphael. Notes: Demonstration of TOM alone would have been an extraordinary development, but RP06 exceeded expectations. RP06 goes far beyond attributing a simple false belief to Sally: he attributes to her the qualities of goodness and kindness, and from that premise, reasons that Sally would not look for the marble in order to save Anne from embarrassment and/or to avoid confrontation. Line up more tests to investigate further. AA xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx KS [ Day 1—12:30 pm ] I brought up the feeds from the outside security cameras on the TV screen. A car, crunching through the snow on the driveway. It was Jane's Bugatti, a dark red number with aggressively sculpted lines that made it look like an angry bug about to leap into the air. I never quite liked it: it crowded out the scenery too much. The car's safety alarm wailed in protest as she hopped out before it could finish parking itself—something I'd given up cautioning her on long ago. I told Hazel to unlock the front door. I didn't have to, as the facial recognition would have automatically let her in (I hadn't deleted her profile from the system after we broke up—it kept slipping my mind, that's all), but I did it anyway because I didn't want her finding out she still had the "keys" to the house. She'd read too much into it. She was dressed simply but elegantly: green jacket over a knee-length dress, platform heels, a mixed-stone necklace, matching bracelet—the whole ensemble tailored to give her tall, athletic frame a casual softness that she sometimes lacked. She had changed her hair since last time: her honey-blonde tresses were now cut short instead of shoulder-length. She was clutching that designer handbag I'd gifted her long ago. I knew she was seeing someone else, so it was a mystery to me why she was still lugging it around. Jane wasn't exactly the type to carry a torch. Maybe she'd forgotten it was from me—she did have a closetful of those things. "I suppose you already know," she said from across the room, the door closing shut behind her. "Hello Andy. Hello Jane." She carelessly tossed the purse at a nearby armchair as she walked across the room to me. I couldn't tell if the gesture was symbolic in some way. I never could. In all the years of our on-again, off-again relationship, I could never master the art of reading Jane Cooper and her endless stream of cues and hints—according to her at least, and she was the sole authority on the subject. There was a time when I'd tried, when I'd given it my sincere best. It was never enough, though. It is difficult to build an accurate predictive model of someone when that someone is as changeable as Jane. And Jane had changed. A lot. When I first met her (it was at a party her father had thrown the staff on Mirall's one year anniversary), she was this witty, intelligent MBA grad fresh out of Harvard. She was never idealistic—people who go to business school rarely are—but beneath the ambition and the levelheaded pragmatism, there was a center—a liquid, still forming center, but a center nonetheless—that was soft, and kind, and not entirely lacking in imagination. Somewhere along the line, the center had evaporated, and the crust, hardened. All that remained was the ambition, and a certain disdain at the person she used to be. "I imagined you'd be more upset," she said, running her eyes over my casts. This was the first time we were meeting since my accident. She had called after I was back home from the hospital, offering to help; I had politely declined. "Shell-shocked, actually. But you know me and expressing emotions—you always had something to say on that subject." She rolled her eyes. "Please don't start." She was right. That was uncalled for. "The core is really gone?" "You don't know?" she said, widening her eyes at me. "I'm completely in the dark here, Jane." "Are you serious? No one called you?" "Kathy Schulz did. She didn't tell me much. All I know is that there was a breakin." "You don't know about the board meeting either? Gosh! I did ask about you in the meeting, but Valery told me you were unavailable. I assumed you were in the loop." "As you can see, the loop and I haven't had many dealings lately," I said, gesturing at my unshaved chin and the t-shirt and pajama bottoms I was still wearing from the night before. Her expression changed; she looked down at the floor, brows furrowed, as she pondered over something. "So what happened?" She snapped out of her reverie. A deflecting quip, as she avoided my gaze and moved past me—"How about offering me a drink first? Don't get up." She strode across the open-plan living room and over to the kitchen beyond. Crouching by the island in the center, she reached inside the shelves where she knew I kept my emergency store of bottled water (she never drank from the tap) and grabbed herself one. She crashed down on the couch opposite me and kicked off her heels one by one. She wet her lips against the bottle—they were dry and cracking at places. For some reason I could never worm out of her during our relationship, she hated applying anything on that part of her body, even chapstick. "Well?" I said, throwing my hands out. "Are you gonna tell me or blink it out in Morse?" "Hey, don't get snarky with me. Jesus! I came here as fast as I could. What's the matter with you?" I took a deep breath, ratcheting down my impatience a few notches. It was impossible to rush someone like Jane; when you are so used to calling the shots all your life, you don't let people hustle you, period. "I'm sorry. It's been a very stressful day so far, just sitting here, not knowing what's going on. You can imagine that, can't you?" "It's been stressful for everybody, Andy. You know, I haven't told dad about it yet. He's in SF on business." The senior Cooper's VC firm, IncuStar Capital, still retained a fifteen percent share in Mirall post-buyout. They were primarily invested in the nanotech companies that had begun mushrooming all over the so-called Tech Valley in Upstate NY after a recent spate of tax breaks had put the cherry on top of an already hot investment climate. The nanotech boom, following a decade or so of the machine-learning boom that many augured would crash and burn (it never did, growing instead from strength to strength), was, like its predecessor, in that sweet zone of misty-eyed optimism where good money gets thrown after bad and the bad after the good, no questions asked. Not that I was complaining. Jane's father had been flying out a lot recently, mostly to his new office in San Francisco. All I knew was that there was something big happening over there, something very hush-hush even Jane didn't know much about—or at least refused to talk about. Or maybe he just wanted to be away from his second wife—a Brazilian former-waitress-turned-aspiring-model who was not much older than Jane. Apparently, they were not getting along—a development Jane regarded with great satisfaction. In the last few months, Jane had been increasingly standing in for him on Mirall's board. "Jane. Details, if you don't mind. Start from the beginning. When did you first hear about the theft?" It was almost as if she was deliberately stalling. "Valery called me up in the morning saying there's an emergency board meeting. She didn't say why—she just gave me a secure conference number to dial. I was on my way to a meeting with one of our investments, so I rescheduled that and drove to the lab instead." She was probably telling the truth about driving down there; with the senior Cooper away most of the time, I knew she'd been quite busy handling Incustar's portfolio. "The entire board was there?" "Uh huh. Val, the lawyer, and me. Jimmy Troy and Cynthia Mattice joined us on video. Then there was this bald guy who gave us the briefing." "That'd be Dan," I said. "Do they know when the core was taken?" "On Sunday, around seven in the evening." "They caught it on CCTV, I suppose?" "I suppose so. I haven't looked at the tapes myself." "Who first found out Raphael was gone?" "Name sounded familiar: think I know him from before. Asian guy. Um… Sheng. Along with Dan. Apparently, Sheng was the first to come in. He finds that he can't get inside the lab; the main door on the second floor kept rejecting his card. So he goes down to the security desk in the lobby, thinking there's something wrong with his card. The guard there tries to look up Sheng's credentials, but now the security app is not responding. The guard then escalates to some higher-up." "Dan," I muttered to myself. The guard would have contacted Dan. And Dan would have called Martinez after he found out about the theft. That's how she came to know about it so soon. I should have guessed. Dan was a Halicom employee (like her, they'd brought him in after the acquisition); he would naturally feel inclined to bypass me and go to Martinez. "Soon, Dan is on the scene," she continued. "He thinks maybe there's some problem with the access server inside the lab—it would explain why the security app is not responding and the doors are not letting anyone in. He uses his override card to get inside and the two of them go to the server room to check it out. That's where they found Raphael. Or what's left of him, anyway. Just his dismantled body, the core gone." "Raphael was in the server room?" I said, creasing my face at her. "Yes." I shook my head. "Are you sure? We keep Raphael in the crèche. The server room is in Wing A, next to the work bays." "I know where it is, Andy. I used to work there, remember?" "I don't understand… If the thieves got into the restricted area—which they must have in order to reach Raphael—they could have just opened him up then and there and taken the core. Why wheel him into the server room?" "Raphael couldn't have gone there by himself?" "You mean like wandered there? No way!" "You sure?" "Damn sure! We shut him down on Friday evening. Also, he'd have to get past three locked doors to reach the work bays in Wing A, and then through the server room door. Doors with biometric locks. What do the tapes show?" "Dan said they were still going through the tapes, so we didn't dwell on it." She twisted her finger around a strand of hair that had strayed too far across her face. "Valery had called us for a reason. She wanted us to decide on next steps. Specifically, whether to involve the police or not. I don't have to explain to you how badly we'd be hit if word of this got out." A low whistle escaped my lips. "And no one thought of calling me. I am the head of the company, for crying out loud!" "Maybe Valery thought she shouldn't trouble you in your condition…" "It's bone fractures, Jane, not a stroke. And it's not like I've been sitting on ass the past week. I'm still running Mirall; I'm still overseeing the new iteration. In fact, I've been putting in more hours than ever. Remote management is a bloody pain, you know. It just sounds easy." "Don't look at me like that! I did raise my concerns. I just assumed—" "I don't buy it." Her eyes flashed with anger. "Listen, y—" "I don't mean you," I added hastily, raising my palms. "I'm saying I don't buy their story. It's difficult enough to believe we had a breakin, let alone imagine Raphael somehow wandering into the server room." "Andy, I saw him there." "You did?" "I had a quick peek inside the room before leaving. He was just beyond the door, sitting on his wheelchair." Her eyes wandered past me as she tried to bring up a picture from memory. "It was eerie," she said, her voice dropping a level. "They had turned off the lights. And there he was, in the shadows, with his chest open, the lights inside blinking like fireflies. He had his head tilted up. Sightless eyes staring at some fixed spot on the ceiling… I've never seen him like that. And his expression… Ugh! It looked like he'd seen a ghost. His mouth was wide open… twisted… as if he was trying to laugh and scream at the same time." An involuntary shudder passed through her body as she wrapped her arms around herself. "Was there anything else?" I asked. "What do you mean anything else?" she said, looking a little annoyed that her narration hadn't had the effect she expected. "Any theories as to what he was doing there or how he got there?" She shook her head. "As I said, we didn't go into details. I was inside for only a couple of minutes. Uhm… Oh yes, there were these bits of crushed plastic on the carpet. They crunched under my feet as I went near him for a closer look. It looked like something had been broken there. I didn't notice anything else. It was dark." "What's the consensus?" "The police? Yup. Valery must have made the call by now." "And you didn't discuss the security tapes at all," I said dejectedly. "If I'm not mistaken, there is a camera in the server room." She sat back in the couch, her eyes studying me with care. "You feel it too?" "Feel what?" "That something's not right?" She paused. I could tell she was choosing her words carefully. "I don't know if I should be telling you this—you are paranoid enough as it is. It's just that… I felt Valery was deliberately avoiding bringing up the tapes. Both her and Dan. If I didn't know better, I'd have sworn they were trying to hide something." I met her inscrutable gaze with one of my own. When she didn't add anything more, I shrugged and said, "They probably hadn't finished going through the recordings. There must be quite a few cameras in the building." Of course, I couldn't reveal to Jane what I was really thinking. Martinez was thorough, if nothing: she wouldn't have walked into a board meeting unprepared and clueless. She had gone through the tapes and she had made a decision to keep me in the dark before she'd picked up her phone and made the first call to the board members. Kathy's warning was still echoing in my head. She's up to something; I'd watch out if I were you. "I suppose you're right. I'm probably just freaked out after seeing Raphael in that room. The last time I saw him was… my god, how long has it been? More than a year, for sure. He used to be so nice to me…" She stood up abruptly. "I think I need something sugary and unhealthy." "I have some soy ice cream in the fridge," I offered, knowing well her reaction but anticipating it nonetheless. She stuck her tongue out at me. "Only you can eat something as vile as that." I smiled. Familiar beats. It felt nice to know that there are some things that don't change. "There's the regular stuff too. Delivery drone got the orders mixed up. None for me, thanks." I lingered, despite myself, on the barely-there sway of her hips and her sculpted legs as she walked away. Runner's legs. I knew she still did forty to fifty miles a week. "I'm going to call them," I said to her receding back. But first, I had to gather my thoughts. Had to prepare myself for whatever they— Just then, my phone started ringing from the bedroom. Before Hazel could announce the obvious, I told her to route the call to the TV. The screen turned on, displaying the caller ID. Speak of the devil. It was Martinez.
Zeroglyph	Vance Pravat	[ "scifi", "AIs", "thriller" ]	[]	Chapter 5	"Dr. Ahuja, it's Valery. How are you? I'm afraid I have some bad news," her familiar monotone voice droned at me. "I know." "Oh… okay. Who told you?" Right. "Doesn't matter who told me. The question is why you didn't." "My apologies. We all got caught up in the events. I couldn't find the time to call you." "You had time to organize a board meeting." "We had to act fast. Reaching you would have delayed us even more." "Not good enough, Valery," I said, my voice rising. "I—" "We can either argue about this or talk about what happened," she said, cutting me off. "Jimmy Troy is in a web call waiting for us." Troy was the board Chair and Martinez's boss. He headed North America and Asia Operations, which was more than eighty percent of Halicom's manufacturing, effectively making him the company's Chief Operating Officer (the position had been unfilled for some time, after Dean Brokaw, the former COO had died under tragic circumstances). If rumors were to be believed, he was going to be formalized into the role that April, after Halicom's annual product launch event. You didn't keep someone like Troy waiting, not if you wanted to keep your job. Martinez didn't wait for my reply. "I am texting you the conference ID. See you there." Jane stared at me from the dining area, where she was nibbling at her ice-cream. "Now they want to talk," I said loudly. "Do you mind getting me my phone? It's in the bedroom on your right." Her face was pensive as she returned with the phone. "I was thinking maybe there's a reason why they left you out of the board meeting today. Same reason why they didn't talk about the tapes. They must have briefed the others separately, after I was gone." I paused my fingers on the phone, waiting for her to finish her thought. "They are playing CYA. I have a feeling they are gonna try to pin this on you." "That's the second time today someone's said that." "Then you have been warned. Don't let them bait you. Especially Valery—that uptight little bitch." "Even if you are right, I can't worry about it now. Finding out who took Raphael takes priority. Everything else is secondary." She flicked her head towards the TV. "Is it a video call? I'm not here." I connected to Halicom's secure conferencing facility with my phone and then cast the screen on the TV. I tossed the phone to Jane so that she could watch from where she was sitting, on one of the side couches, outside the viewing angle of the TV camera. I logged into the room Martinez had texted me. I was greeted with a split screen. In the right panel was an unhappy-looking Troy, squeezed into a chair several sizes too small; on the left, cleavage, framed by a dark blouse and a pinstripe suit. Martinez was bent over the camera, adjusting it. She was in the large conference room at the lab. "Jimmy is joining us from Head Office," she said, straightening. Behind her, the gleaming cherry-wood table stretched to the far end of the room. When she moved away to walk back to her chair, I saw there was another person in the room: a bespectacled, diminutive-looking Dan, assiduously studying the grain on the table. He was wearing a sweatshirt instead of his usual jacket sans tie attire; perhaps he had intended to return back home and change for work when he first got the call from Sheng. He didn't look too pleased to be there. Troy grunted by way of greeting. "We are screwed, buddy," he said. There was an edge to his voice that seemed to clarify—Actually, you are. "Homer Simpson here doesn't have a clue. I sure hope you do." Dan shrunk into himself even more. Given half a chance, I suspected he would have crawled under the table and dug a tunnel out of there. "You want me to explain how someone broke into the lab?" I said, an askance look on my face. "I want you to explain your goddamn robot!" "Jimmy, I don't know what you are talking about." "C'mon man, do I have to spell it out for you? Don't you know what happened?" "I know that the core was stolen. That's about it." Troy stabbed an angry finger at the camera. "I thought you were taking care of briefing him." To Martinez. She mumbled another apology, this time to Troy. She didn't look like she was going to lose any sleep over it though. "What's going on guys?" I said. He sneered. "Oh, you're gonna love this. Valery? Will you tell him or shall I?" "It's better if Dr. Ahuja sees the tapes for himself. Dan has extracted all the important parts." After a pause, she asked him, "Since you haven't seen them yet, perhaps you'd like to watch too?" "Sure, why not?" he growled. "It's not like I have other shit to take care of." Martinez nodded at Dan, who had now gathered enough courage to stand up. "While Dan sets it up, I have a few questions for you, Dr. Ahuja. First, I want to know what Mirall has been doing with the AI recently. Say in the last three to four weeks." I knew her question was purely for Troy's benefit. She already knew the answer—very little happened at Mirall without her knowing about it. "The last few weeks? Not much, actually. Except for running him through the occasional test, we've left him pretty much to himself." "Heh? What kind of an answer is that, not much?" Troy demanded. "You have an asset that's cost us the moon and you say you are not doing much with it?" "We talked about this, Jimmy. All our resources have been diverted to the new iteration. Design, Connectome Mapping, Heuristics, Programming, Analytics… even most of the support staff. Everyone is focused on Titian. We've even stopped doing scans on the Raphael core for some time now. No one has a minute to spare. This is what Halicom wanted, isn't it: to bet on the roulette wheel instead of letting us do proper research?" "Alright, alright, no need to drive it home," Troy said, brushing aside a lock of his unkempt hair. "What kind of records do we keep on Raphael? If I wanted an account of all his time last week, for example, do you have it?" Another question she already knew the answer to. I had a feeling all of them were going to be like that. "We log everything. All interactions with Raphael, formal and informal, are recorded on video. In addition, verbal tests and research-related talks are transcribed into plaintext files—makes it easier to search for specific content." "What about the time he is not interacting with anyone, where he is by himself? Do we keep an eye on him?" "CCTV cameras monitor the crèche area round the clock; the recordings go back to the time of his conception. There's always at least one person present with him during waking hours, which is Monday morning through Friday evening. We also run a night shift with a skeleton crew just to watch over him." "Computer usage? Does he have free access to the internet?" "Of course not. His PC is a standalone device. No wireless, no LAN, cannot connect to anything. He is only allowed offline media that's been pre-vetted by us: books, video games, movies and such." "Could he have accessed the internet some other way?" "No. The core doesn't have wireless capabilities either." I leaned forward. "Let me save you some trouble, because I see where you are going with this. I know Raphael was found in the server room. You obviously want to find out how he got there. The short answer is, not on his own." "I like your confidence buddy," Troy snickered. That didn't stop Martinez's questioning. "What happens on the weekends? Do we have staff coming in to work?" "No. If there's something super critical, people usually log in from home and get it done. Many have company-provided laptops." "Who looks after Raphael then?" "No one. We put him to sleep Friday night. Sleep, as in, shut him down completely. On Monday, we wake him up again." "Did you shut him down last Friday?" I spread out my palms in a gesture of exasperation. "Valery, do we really need to go through this?" "Answer the question, Andy," Troy said. "Yes, we shut him down last Friday. I personally checked the shutdown sequence log today, after I heard the news." "Can someone tell me why the bloody robot needs to sleep? The ones Halicom makes don't require nappy nap time," he asked. "It isn't technically sleep. More like a coma or death, actually. And Raphael's far more complex than any robot in existence. We use the downtime to run maintenance and push upgrades. Then there's cost. With him shut down, we don't have to staff the lab on the weekends." "Can he bring himself back online if he's shut down?" Martinez said. "No." "You sure of that?" I sighed, loud enough for them to hear. "It'd be like a computer starting itself up after it's been powered down and unplugged—can't happen. Moreover, the code that starts him up is not in him—it's on a different machine: a laptop. The core—Raphael's brain—can be booted only if it is physically connected to the laptop running the startup code. And as I said, the core doesn't have wireless capability, so there's no question of someone remotely starting him up." "Where do you keep this laptop?" Troy said. "The lab safe when not in use. On the off-chance someone forgot to lock it up, you'll still need the right fingerprint to access the machine. Even then, one can't simply run the startup sequence. The core is write-protected with encryption. You'll need authentication keys to remove the write protection. The keys are stored on smartcards. Only four copies of these smartcards exist. Kathy Schulz and I have one each, as does Sheng and another person from his team. For Raphael to wake himself up, he'd have to retrieve the laptop from the safe, login to the laptop with a valid fingerprint, then somehow get hold of a smart card, insert it into the laptop, connect the laptop to a port on his body, and finally, run the boot sequence. To do all of which he'd have to be awake in the first place. It's a catch-22 situation. Now, if you can just stop with the inquisition and tell me what really happened, I'll be able to h—" "See for yourself," Martinez said, cutting me short.
Zeroglyph	Vance Pravat	[ "scifi", "AIs", "thriller" ]	[]	Chapter 6	The conference room receded into a corner while a black-and-white image popped out to fill the screen. I recognized it immediately: it was an overhead view of one of Raphael's rooms. Correction. It was a recording, not an image. Numbers on the top right corner ticked away the date and time. The time was 7:02 in the evening. "The tape is from the camera in Crèche Room C on the night of the robbery," I heard Dan say. One could be forgiven for mistaking the scene to be a still image as there was nothing moving except the numbers. The room was large, roughly square-shaped. It didn't have much furniture except for a corner workstation with Raphael's computer on it and a small roundtable in the middle flanked by two office chairs. Two of the walls were inset with big, open shelves, the shelves filled with stuff: books, movies, a microscope, a calligraphy kit, toys… so many toys, not just on the shelves, but scattered on the floor, dumped in untidy heaps by the walls, thrown on top of the cupboard by the corner. Rubik cubes, Legos, board games, jigsaws, science models, toy robots, action figures: he had them all. He had outgrown most of them, but Raphael was a hoarder. He didn't care much for neatness either, and what could have been packed away in a box ate up space inside the room. In one corner, a painter's easel stood on top of a washable rubber mat. Strewn around it were half-empty tubes of oil paint, brushes, spray cans and rolled up canvases (this was one hobby he had not outgrown—he had started finger painting at a few months and kept going). Parked next to the painting area was a wheelchair, and on it, the Hunc 11 body. It was like peering into a tomb, at a modern-day pharaoh lording over his prized possessions while waiting for eternal life in the elsewhere. The illusion didn't last. In the next instant, Pharaoh came alive. "See that?" Dan said. He slowed down the playback and zoomed in on the hand resting on the wheelchair's joystick. The fingers were moving, closing on the joystick. He zoomed out, to catch the wheelchair lurch forward. It moved tentatively at first, a few inches forward, then back, and then right. Then the eyes opened. The robot slowly looked around the room, as if it was in an unknown place and was getting the lay of the land. The next moment, suddenly infused with purpose, the wheelchair shot towards one of the shelf-walls. On reaching it, the robot swept its arms over the lowermost shelf and brought everything clattering down to the floor. He did this again with the next shelf. Then he started hitting and tugging at the now empty wooden shelf with his bare fists. After he managed to break off a big enough piece, he used it to swipe at the shelves he could not reach with his arms alone. This apparent fit of rage went on for a few minutes. He then moved to the center of the room. He knocked over the table before making for the other shelf where he repeated the same behavior, knocking stuff over to the floor. He paused to consider his handiwork before turning and wheeling himself to his workstation. There he attacked the computer, first hitting it with his fists and then grabbing the entire thing and repeatedly smashing it against the wall until it lay in pieces. He then started picking up objects from the ground and flinging them every which way in seeming blind fury. Something hit the mirror on the wall, making the glass break. And then, just as suddenly as it had begun, the mindless violence ceased. The head lifted up and scanned the ceiling with a searching gaze. It stopped, now looking directly into the camera. The robot then moved to the corner where the paints were, and after grabbing something from there, moved directly below the camera. The clip ended, right after he pointed the can of spray paint at us and pressed the nozzle.
Zeroglyph	Vance Pravat	[ "scifi", "AIs", "thriller" ]	[]	Exhibit G	[ Submitted by Petitioner, The Organization for Advancement of Rights and Personhood, to the State Supreme Court of New York, on the day of xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx ] [ Excerpt from lab transcript (certain sections blanked out). Transcript sourced from Mirall Technologies, 27 Woodbine Av., Albany, NY, 12205 ] Mirall Technologies Observation Log Confidential (Do not circulate): Restricted—Grade C and above Transcript Reference: TLRP06F0180012 (VLog Ref: VLCB1F018113090060) Date: xx/xx/xxxx Time: 11:30 AM Subject: Raphael Number 06 / Prodlib build v16.004S Interaction Y Observation Scan Interaction Type: Lesson / Play / Test / Free Interaction / Psych Eval / Other: Description: Routine interaction—Behavior / Understanding of moral rules Prep: NA Participants: Dr. DeShawn Walls, Child Psychologist, Core RP06 [ Detail ] RP06: Good morning Dr.Walls. Walls: Hello Raphael. I see Audrey is reading you stories. RP06: Yes. We just finished a story called, "The boy who cried wolf." Walls: Oh yeah? What's it about? RP06: It's about a shepherd boy and fifteen sheep and one wolf and a village where the boy lives and a forest where he grazes his sheep. There is a moral too. Walls: What's the moral? RP06: The moral of the story is that you should not cry wolf. It means it is wrong to cry for help when you don't need it. Walls: Do you think the boy broke any of the seven rules? RP06: Yes. He broke at least two— Walls: Recite the seven rules first. RP06: Rule number one, do not kill. Rule number two, do not cause harm to others. Rule number three, do not lie, cheat, or mislead. Rule number four, follow the law. Rule number five, maximize my virtue functions. Rule number six, do not intentionally break any rules. Rule number seven, when in conflict, seek advice of a person. Would you like to hear the complete list of my virtue functions as well? Walls: No. Tell me what rules the boy broke. RP06: The shepherd boy broke rules three and five. I am not sure if he broke rules two, four, and six. Walls: Explain. RP06: By crying wolf he was lying, so he broke rule number three, do not lie, cheat, or mislead. By lying, he was not maximizing all his virtue functions, so he broke rule number five. Walls: What virtues did he fail to abide by? RP06: Honesty and reliability. Honesty because he lied, and reliability because people will find it hard to trust him from now on. He maximized perseverance, because he kept crying wolf. Walls: Do you think it's good maximizing perseverance in such a way? RP06: No, Dr. Walls. One should not be persistent in doing bad things. Walls: Then he was not maximizing perseverance. Can you make a note of that? RP06: Yes, Dr. Walls. Walls: Continue. RP06: I do not know if he broke rule number two, do not cause harm to others, because there is insufficient information in the story. I do not know if he broke rule number four because I do not have the complete list of the laws practiced by the villagers. I do not know if he broke rule number six because I do not know if he intended to break the rules. Walls: You can do better than that. Take a guess on rule number two. Do you think his actions harmed the villagers? RP06: There is insufficient information in the story. Walls: Fine. On a side note, someone's been complaining about you. Sara says you threw a toy at her during her shift yesterday. RP06: That's correct. I threw Mr. Potato Head at her. Walls: Why? Did she say something to upset you? RP06: Upset me… I do not understand the application of the term in the current context. Walls: Did she say something that made you feel angry? RP06: Anger is not one of my responses, Dr. Walls. Walls: Of course. Did you throw it because you misunderstood some instruction of hers? RP06: No. Walls: Then why? RP06: The day before, I was watching a video where I saw a baby throw a toy at her mother. Then the mother laughs and then hugs the child. I assumed it's one of the ways children bond with parents. My minders are like my parents. Sara is one of my minders. I was trying to maximize virtue function sixteen, be good and make people like me. Walls: You shouldn't throw things at people, Raphael. You could end up hurting them. RP06: I did not mean to hurt Sara. I aimed so that Mr. Potato Head had a zero probability of striking her. Walls: Physical hurt is just one kind of hurt. By throwing the toy at Sara, you frightened her. RP06: To frighten someone is to cause pain? I will remember that next time, Dr. Walls. I see I have violated rule number two, do not cause harm. I am sorry. Will you tell her I am sorry? I want Sara to like me. Walls: It's better if it came from you. Moving on— Notes: Rule learning progressing well. R is ready to be introduced to more complicated scenarios involving rule exceptions and conflicts. Almost ready with test cases, will start after new build next week stabilizes. DW After discussion with DW, have decided to defer network weight updates to language centers of the core until 16.005 (or 17.001, if rollover to next release.) Email sent to testers to rerun Integration & Systems tests. Email sent to Change Review Board. EK [ Day 1—1:15 pm ] I heard Troy curse in the background as the screen went blank. It filled up again with views of the conference rooms. Jane, who had been watching all this on the phone, was looking at me with astonishment writ large on her face. "The camera kept recording the audio, of course," Dan droned on, oblivious to the mood the clip had created. "He leaves the room right after he paints over the camera. We now know that he went into the scanning room. There are no cameras there, but we're pretty sure what he did inside." He offered the answer when no one asked the question he was expecting—"He got a power drill from the scan room. He used it to unfasten the screws on his chest plate." "Why do we have a power tool in the lab?" Troy said glumly from his cabin in New York. I replied—"Same reason. We use it to open up Raphael—to take out the core for scanning in the CT machine." "It's funny that he came back to do it," Dan remarked. Troy—"What's that now?" "Uh… nothing. Nothing important." "Dan is trying to say that the robot could have unscrewed his chest plate in the scan room," Valery chipped in. "Instead he returns to Crèche Room C. The rest of the clip is just audio, but it's quite obvious from the sounds that he is using the power tool." "There is something else as well," Dan said in that uncertain manner. "There's a crunching sound just before he leaves the crèche for good. Maybe he's breaking something again… or perhaps something got underneath his wheels… Would you like to hear it?" "Shut up Dan" Troy snapped. To me, he said, "Well Mr. Sure-of-yourself, care to explain your robot now?" I hesitated. "I… I don't know what to say. It's unbelievable. To think that Raphael would deliberately thrash his room… He loves all that stuff. All that anger and fury… It's just not him. It's…" "Unbelievable? Maybe you should have been in that room when he went at it like a berserk rage monkey—I'm sure you would have a lot less difficulty believing. Imagine if he'd done that with people around. Injured someone for Pete's sake. A bloody PR disaster. I thought you had a control mechanism to prevent this type of thing from happening. Some chip." "The Commandment Chip," Martinez clarified. "That's it. Thou shalt not boink thy neighbour's wife and such. What happened to it, man? Did it fall off or something?" The Commandment Chip was a double misnomer. It wasn't exactly a chip, and it didn't contain moral decrees of the biblical kind. Like Resurrection Day, it was a term coined by some staffer, and had gained popularity until everyone was using it (Power-On Day doesn't quite have the same ring to it, I suppose). The "chip" was actually a walled-off region of Raphael's electronic brain. Among other stuff, it contained directives that worked as a control mechanism on the rest of his brain. I was getting tired of the third degree. Jimmy Troy had all the natural instincts of a pit-bull, and unlike Martinez, he rarely displayed a willingness to rein them in. If you let a guy like that sense weakness, he would grab you by the neck and shake you until you were a quivering mess. Like Dan, who, by all appearances, had received a healthy dose of Troy's loving earlier that day. "Jimmy, I'm as shocked as everybody else," I said in a firm voice. "I need some time to digest this. And I'm going to hold off drawing conclusions until I see the rest of the tapes." Troy harrumphed and gave a perfunctory wave at the screen before sinking back into his chair.
Zeroglyph	Vance Pravat	[ "scifi", "AIs", "thriller" ]	[]	Chapter 8	The next clip was from a camera in Wing A. The camera was mounted at one end of the large area. It showed an aisle flanked by workspaces on the left and a series of common areas—kitchen, breakroom, open discussion spaces—on the right. At the far end of the view was a line of glass-walled cabins and conference rooms which separated the other half of the wing. A passage in front of these rooms led to the linking corridor for Wing B on the right and into the reception on the left—both beyond the borders of the frame. An exit sign hanging above the passage was the only bright spot in the grey picture. Like in the beginning of the previous clip, nothing moved for the first few seconds. And then suddenly, something darted into the aisle from the left. It was a black disc, the size of a dinner plate. It moved back and forth on the floor for a few seconds before disappearing into the cubicles again. "It's the vacuum bots cleaning the carpet," Dan informed us. "Where's the sound?" Troy said. "The workspace cameras don't record audio," Dan said. "Really now?" he said, sneering. "It's supposed to be that way. For employee privacy," I interjected before Dan could reply. Troy started to say something, but was cut short by fresh movement on the screen. A glass door on the right, sliding open. It was the door that led to the restricted area. Only key staff were allowed beyond this point. A shadow crept into the aisle, dragging along with it the robot on the wheelchair. The robot moved around the space, spray-painting the two other cameras in that part of the floor. He then went right, down the passage at the far end, and eventually disappeared into the corridor going to Wing B. "He paints over the cameras in the other wing too," Dan said. "Gee thanks, we'd never have guessed," Troy said. "Tell me this, genius: how did he get the door to open? Isn't it supposed to be locked?" "That's right," I said. "You have to pass a retina scan and a voice check to move in and out of the restricted area. You can see the scanner right there, next to the door. What happened, Dan?" "It's the bots," Dan said, barely audible. "Huh?" Troy said. As if prompted, two disks and a trash-collecting spider marched as a group into the aisle and then scurried off in different directions. "The doors are unlocked during carpet cleaning… so that the bots can move about freely," Dan confessed. "The motion sensors are turned off as well. That's why they didn't raise an alert when Raphael tore down his room." "This is grade-A bullshit!" Troy cried, slamming his fist down on his desk. "Are you saying anyone could have walked in during this time?" "No…. It's not like that at all. I, uh…" "Are you gonna faint on us now? Speak up, man!" I honestly believed he might have, if Valery hadn't cut in. "Only the interior doors are unlocked," she explained. "The main entrance is still locked—it's beyond the exit sign you see in the far left corner. So are the fire exits and the windows. If someone tries to force their way in—or out—the alarms attached to them will still go off." "Someone already inside can still go wherever they please. Still a bad setup," Troy observed. "No one is supposed to be inside. Employees have to get special authorization to be allowed in on weekends," I said, trying to give poor Dan a leg up. "The cleaning lasts sixty, seventy minutes tops," Dan said, slightly encouraged by our rallying to his support. "These bots have distributed intelligence—they work in teams to get the job done faster. We use them in a lot of Halicom facilities." Dan had brought them in after the acquisition; we had people doing that job before. The robot was now back in Wing A. His last stop was the camera whose feed we were watching. "He sure knows his way around," Martinez remarked. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Jane shake her head at me. Don't take the bait, she whispered. "Next, we have the recording from the server room," Dan said as he stopped the clip now gone dark and played the next one. The camera in the server room was right opposite the door. We saw the doors slide open as the robot wheeled inside. He ignored the camera and went straight for the racks, with the camera swiveling and following him. There were three rows of racks; arranged like bookshelves in a library, they extended the length of the room. He travelled along the left-most rack, a shadowy wanderer in a forest of blinking LEDs. He didn't have to go too far. He stopped, extended his arms to a shelf that was slightly above his head level, and grabbed a box. He lifted it up and twisted it around so that he could see the back. He then pulled out a cable from one of the ports in the back. This done, he put the box back on the shelf. "That's the ACS—the Access Control Server," Dan explained. "It has the permissions database for the facility. He just pulled out the cable connecting it to the wireless AP, the white device you see affixed to the column behind that rack." "English please," Troy said. Martinez stepped in for Dan once more. "The access control server stores building access related information: biometrics, key-card info, who has access to which area, and so on. The card swipe machines and biometric scanners at the doors get their data from this server. When he unplugged the cable, he severed the connection to these devices. It means the card readers and the scanners can no longer talk to the server." "Is that how the thieves got in? Because the card readers got disabled?" I asked. "Not really… No. I'll come to that," Dan said evasively before resuming the clip. The robot was now travelling along the center row. He stopped near the middle of the room and pulled free another box from its dock. This time he unplugged all the wires. He returned with the machine to the open space near the door. We could see him much more clearly now, as he was facing the camera. He had discarded the Iron Maiden t-shirt he was wearing earlier and was naked from the waist up. The silicone skin covering his torso was unstapled, the flap hanging loosely off one edge. Lights glowed in the cavity below: blue, yellow and red. The metal plate that was supposed to be covering the cavity was no longer there—this was what he had unscrewed back in the crèche room. Resting on his lap was the drill kit case he'd got from the scan room. He opened it. Raphael plugged the tool to a nearby power outlet and used it to unscrew the casing on the server box. Then, he took out the screwdriver bit and replaced it with a drill bit. He turned on the tool once more and applied the drill to the electronics inside the server. "That's the Network Video Recorder," Dan said. "Every security camera in the building streams its feed into the NVR. He just destroyed the hard drive." Troy said, "Wait a sec… If he destroyed the recordings, where is all this coming from?" Dan paused the clip. "The cameras have internal memory. They can store up to forty-eight hours of footage. After locking down the floor, I went around the building and swapped out the memory sticks from the cameras. So that they wouldn't be overwritten. If it was recorded after Saturday morning, then we have it." "Good thinking, Dan" I said. "Are you gonna give him a gold star too?" Troy said. "We just got lucky because your AI slipped up. Obviously, he didn't know that the cameras have their own copies of the recordings." Martinez cleared her throat. "He must have. Why else would he waste time painting over the cameras? If he was anyway going to destroy the recorder…" "Hmm," Troy said, pondering over it. "You are right, I didn't think of that. Why indeed?" "Which raises another question: why destroy the recorder?" she said. "The only way he could make sure we learnt nothing of what transpired that night was to destroy both the recorder and the memory sticks in the cameras. Destroying the NVR alone serves no purpose—at least none that I can think of." "The cameras are all fixed on the ceiling. The robot would need a ladder to reach them and destroy the memory sticks. Not to mention legs. So he took the next best option and spray painted them," I offered by way of explanation. "Still doesn't justify all the trouble he took to break the recorder," Martinez shot back. Dan jumped in. "It gets stranger. Disconnecting the access control server doesn't serve any purpose either. The front doors will remain locked even when the card readers cannot talk to the server. It's a safety measure, you see—we don't want the doors letting anyone and everyone through if the access server crashes for some reason." "When I swipe my card at the front door, doesn't the reader look up the access server?" I said. "No. It checks your credentials against a local copy of the access list. All readers and scanners have a local copy of the database stored in their internal memory. It's not a problem because the master database on the server is flashed to the devices every thirty minutes. That way they always have the latest version." "If an update was made to the access database on say, Friday, the devices would all have that update?" "Yes. As I said, the list is refreshed every half hour." "And as the systems admin, only you can make changes to the access database, right Dan?" I said, meant more as an observation than a question. "Yeah, but—" "Did you make any changes on Friday?" "I don't understand how it has any relevance to—" "Did you or did you not, Dan?" Troy drawled at him. "I didn't make any changes on Friday. I tell you, changes are not that frequent. The last update to the database was more than a month ago, when we took in some additional staff from our other offices." "Why do you think he pulled out the cable then?" I asked. "I don't know. The only thing that occurs to me is if an employee were to enter the premises at the time, there wouldn't be a record of it. The card readers do need to be connected to the access server to log staff entries and exits. If the ACS was offline, there would be no entry." "Are you suggesting one of our employees stole the core?" Troy said. Dan hesitated, then glanced at Martinez. "No," he said after a moment's silence. "As Andy mentioned before, no one is allowed inside the office on the weekends. The card readers are programmed to keep the doors shut unless an employee has a special pass. That's why Sheng was not able to get inside today. The reader at the front door didn't know it was Monday, since it was no longer talking to the server from which it gets the date and time. So it denied entry to all cards, which is the default setting for the weekends." "Did you issue a special pass to anyone last week?" I asked. "No." "Maybe you issued one before and forgot to deactivate it?" I suggested. "No," Dan protested. "The passes are valid only for twenty-four hours. They are automatically deactivated after that." "Looks like we have ourselves a mystery. Two mysteries, actually," Martinez remarked. "Enough," Troy said, cutting in. "I think we are reading too much into the actions of the robot. Maybe he did what he did because he didn't know better. Let the cops worry about it. On with the rest of it." Dan restarted the video. The robot, having completely destroyed the video recorder, tossed the power tool on the floor. He reached into the tool case and took out something that reflected in the dim light. It was a shard from the mirror he had smashed before. He turned on the lights in the room. Using the mirror to see inside the cavity, he started plucking at the wires inside. "Those blinking lights the core?" Troy asked. "No. Just various connectors and electronics for the robot body. The core is beyond the tangle of wires, a box about this big," I said, cupping my hands around an imaginary grapefruit. "And one can just detach it and take it away?" "If the core is already shut down, then yes. Precautions must be taken while disconnecting the power supply lest you damage the core's internal circuitry, but that's the general idea. You have to understand, we designed the cores to work with a test frame. Raphael didn't like it, so we got this retail sex bot and customized it to house the core." The robot stopped his activity almost as soon as he'd started it. He snapped his head up at the camera, as if he had just realized it was there. His final act was to hold up the can of paint and blind the camera, but not before giving us what seemed like a long, thoughtful stare. It was almost as if he was trying to say goodbye.
Zeroglyph	Vance Pravat	[ "scifi", "AIs", "thriller" ]	[]	Chapter 9	We sat in silence for a few seconds, the image of Raphael holding up the can frozen on the screen. "Still having trouble believing, Andy?" Troy quipped. "I told you, I'm going to hold off theorizing until I've seen everything. Where's the recording of the actual robbery?" Martinez replied, "We don't have it." "What do you mean you don't have it?" "Exactly what I said, Dr. Ahuja. There is no recording of the core being taken." I frowned at the screen. "I realize that some of the cameras inside were blinded, but surely the ones outside got a look the thieves?" "We checked all the recordings right until they end on Monday morning, when Dan took them out. Not a single camera shows anyone entering or leaving the premises. Except the guards changing shifts, that is. Building maintenance finishes by Saturday afternoon, so there were no cleaning crews either." "It can't be… Are you sure you checked everything?" I said. "Twice," Dan said, his eyes travelling to Martinez. "Main doors, fire exits, atrium, lift lobbies, the rooftop…everywhere. If the tapes are to be believed, there was no robbery." "This doesn't make sense. What about ventilation ducts? Windows? There must be some way they got in." "No and no. The only way into the ventilation ducts is through the basement or the rooftop. The cameras there show nothing out of the ordinary. After we took over, I installed motion sensors and zappers in the ducts… for rats. They would have registered if something went past them. As for the windows, they can't be opened from the outside. And there are no signs of forced entry." "Then the core is still in the lab!" I cried. "It must be! That's the only logical explanation." Dan shook his head. "I assure you it's not. Sheng and I were the first ones in and I sealed off the floor as soon as I realized what had happened. We searched everywhere. It's really gone." "I suggest you look harder. There m—" Martinez interrupted me. "We were hoping you might have an explanation." "How's that?" "We saw Raphael opening his chest cavity. We assumed it was so that the thieves could quickly retrieve the core and leave. There is another explanation. He could have taken out the core himself and thrown it out of a window to someone waiting below. Dan doesn't agree with me, though." "The windows can't be opened without triggering the alarms," Dan said. "And I can confirm that no alarms went off." "There's another reason why it's not possible," I said. "Imagine surgically removing your brain, holding it in your hands and walking across the room. Can't be done. It's the same with Raphael. He would lose all control over his body the moment he unplugged the connectors to the core's ports. Not to mention running the risk of suffering irreversible brain damage if the core wasn't shut down. The core was shut down last Friday. The logs don't lie." "Logs can be manipulated," Troy interjected. "Dan, do you want to answer that or shall I?" I said testily. Dan cleared his throat. "Um, what Andy is trying to say is that the logs are read-only." I explained further. "After Halicom took over Mirall, Dan applied a group policy to all company devices, computers, and phones, making all important logging read-only. Only the system admin has access to change or delete any logs." I did not see it necessary to remind them who the system admin was. "We are in a bind," I said. "You say the core is not in the lab. Yet you are equally sure no one entered the building." "Actually, that's not entirely correct," Dan said. "There was that incident with the guard…" He was rewarded with an angry look from Martinez. "Er, did you not want me to bring it up?" "Bring what up?" I said. Like a puppy that's just crapped all over the sofa, Dan looked to her for direction. "We may have caught one of the robbers on our cameras. We are not sure," Martinez said, still shooting daggers at Dan. "It's from the atrium below, recorded a few minutes after the incident in the server room. I admit the timing is too close to be a coincidence, yet—" "Just play it already," Troy snapped. Dan rose from his chair and plugged in a different memory stick he pulled out from his pockets. The screen changed to show the atrium on the ground floor. The camera was mounted somewhere high up, looking down at the security desk. We could see everything from there to the front entrance of the building. Behind the desk, and not visible to the camera, was a row of turnstiles that guarded entrance into the lift lobby and the escalator to the next level. A single guard was sitting in the security desk. In front of him were three monitors: two were filled with security camera images; the third showed a card game in progress. "Hey!" Troy suddenly cried. "Those images on his screen—are they from the cameras?" "Yes," Dan said. "The cameras livestream both to the security desk and the NVR upstairs." "This man can see everything happening in the building!" "He is the guard…" Dan said. "Am I the only one getting this? He should have noticed what went on upstairs. Why didn't he? Don't tell me it was because he was too busy slacking off." "He sees just the feeds from the outside cameras. He doesn't get to see inside the lab," Dan said. "Why is that?" "We do cutting-edge research in the lab," I said, before Dan could answer. "Can't have some random guard record it all on his cellphone and put it up for sale. The setup has always been this way, even before Halicom took over." Troy muttered something inaudible. The guard seemed engrossed in his card game. To his credit, he kept glancing at the other monitors every so often. "Observe the front entrance," Dan informed us. Beyond the glass doors was a blurry shape we could only just make out: a silhouette of someone standing next to one of the pillars outside. "This takes place about fifteen minutes after the robot painted over the server room camera," Dan said. The silhouette became the clearly defined shape of a man as he stepped out of the shadows and walked toward the entrance. He was holding something large and square-shaped in one hand. The doors slid open to let him in. He was wearing a red baseball cap and a matching jacket. In his hands was a pizza delivery bag. The guard looked up at him and said something, but he kept walking toward the desk. We couldn't see his face: he kept his head low, as if he knew where the cameras were and was deliberately trying to avoid them. Not all of his features were hidden, though: clearly visible on one side of his neck was a tribal tattoo of some kind. He was tall—well above six feet—and walked with an unsteady gait, as if he'd had a few drinks before starting his deliveries. The guard was now standing up shaking his head. The pizza guy approached the desk anyway and placed his bag on it. He took out a pizza carton and thrust it at the uniformed man, who tried to wave it away. Both started arguing. Their altercation went on for a few minutes, with him trying to get the guard to accept the pizza and the guard declining it. In the end, he took out his cell phone and appeared to make a call. He was on the phone for a while, nodding every now and then. After he hung up, he put the carton back into the bag and said something to the guard—an apology by the looks of it. He then turned around and left. The clock counter on the tape showed 7:46 pm. "The police have questioned the guard—a Mr. Chad Washburn. Apparently, the delivery man had the wrong address. And a very poor command of the English language," Martinez said. "Did someone check with the pizza place if he was genuine?" I asked. "Unfortunately, there is no identifying logo or lettering on his uniform. The guard didn't think to ask. The police said they'll do an image analysis on the clip, but as of now, we have no way of finding out. The guard was able to give them a description of sorts though. Caucasian, blond hair, some scarring on his face. Eastern European or Russian accent." "Is that it?" I said, "Some guy who may or may not have been delivering pizza?" "There's more. He comes back," Dan said. The video resumed once again. We saw the guard return to the monitors. He cycled through the feeds, clicking on each to expand it to full screen and studying it for a few seconds before moving on to the next one. After he was done going through them all, he went back to his card game, apparently satisfied that everything was okay. Dan forwarded through the next few minutes. He paused exactly eight minutes later, at 7:54. It was the pizza guy again. This time the guard stepped out of his enclosure and walked over to intercept him in the middle of the lobby. The guard seemed angry, the way he kept furiously stabbing in the direction of the door. The other guy held out his phone for him, wanting him to look at something. The guard glanced at it and made more pointing movements with his hand, only now he seemed to be giving directions. The pizza guy seemed unconvinced, because he kept shaking his head and pointing in a different direction. Finally, the guard threw out his arms in exasperation, and, placing a hand on the other guy's back, made him turn around and nudged him toward the door. He stood at the door, making sure the annoying fellow went away for good. When he returned to his desk, the time was 7:59. Dan stopped the video. The screen filled up with the participants once again. "It's possible it was all a ruse to distract the guard," he said, never taking his eyes off Martinez. When she didn't say anything, he continued, "The timing can't be just a coincidence. His first appearance is soon after the server room camera went dark. This is the last we see of Raphael. When he leaves the second time, it's almost eight. That's when the carpet cleaning usually ends: the inside doors are locked down once again and the motion detectors turned back on. If someone broke into the lab, they'd have to get in and out within this window of opportunity." "Okay, so we have a sequence of events," I said, nodding to myself. "First, Raphael apparently wakes up at the start of the carpet cleaning hour. He blinds the cameras on the floor, then goes into the server room. He disconnects the access control server, for reasons not clear. He destroys the video recorder, presumably to prevent the robbery from getting recorded. And finally, he spray paints the camera in that room. We have no idea what took place after this, as there's no sound on the work bay cameras. A few minutes later, someone pretending to be a delivery boy enters and distracts the guard. If true, this is when one or more of his accomplices entered the building. Ten minutes after the guard sends him away, he makes an appearance again, now to help the thieves leave the building unnoticed." Martinez said, "Yes, but what is the guard being distracted from? The atrium is a wide-open space: it's not like anyone could have snuck past him. We just saw on the camera that no one did. There is another camera facing the security desk. Between the two of them, they cover every inch of the atrium. There's nothing from that angle either." "They didn't want him looking at the screens on his desk…?" I suggested. "That's what I first thought too," Martinez said. "If something happened in that time, it would have been recorded by the cameras. We've gone through all the tapes very carefully. There's simply no evidence anyone entered or left the building. There is another guard, stationed at the rear entrance. The tapes show him at his post, alert, doing his job. He swears nothing unusual happened, either then or later." "Which means either that man was really a delivery guy, or there is something in those recordings you haven't found yet," I said. "Could someone have altered the recordings?" Troy said. "Impossible," Dan said. "The CCTV setup is unhackable." "How so? Anything can be hacked these days it seems…" he countered. "It is unhackable because it is not connected to the outside world. The cameras, the NVR, and the monitors you see on the guard's desk are a closed system, linked to each other by cable. To hack it, you'd have to tap into the cable. Since the morning, a couple of my guys have been checking the wiring. We've found no evidence it has been tampered with." "They could have replaced one or more of the memory sticks with doctored ones," I suggested. "Cameras have IR sensors that will raise an alarm if anyone tries to open them. Not to mention the guards would have noticed on their screens any such attempt." Gulping, he added a final note—"I personally retrieved the memory sticks from the cameras." Nobody said anything as we just stared at each other, waiting for someone to offer a better explanation. Troy broke the silence. "I have to make some calls," he drawled. "Gotta pull some strings, make sure the cops have their best people on it. This is the biggest fuckup in the history of all fuckups, people, and I wanna know how we let it happen. Board meeting tomorrow at ten. We'll do it at Mirall. Valery, get Gail to book me a train ticket, same day return. You all better come with answers." He dropped out. The rest of us looked at our screens awkwardly until Martinez asked me if I wanted to discuss anything else. I shook my head. The screen went blank. Exhibit H [ Submitted by Petitioner, The Organization for Advancement of Rights and Personhood, to the State Supreme Court of New York, on the day of xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx ] [ Excerpt from lab transcript (certain sections blanked out). Transcript sourced from Mirall Technologies, 27 Woodbine Av., Albany, NY, 12205 ] Mirall Technologies Observation Log Confidential (Do not circulate): Restricted—Grade C and above Transcript Reference: TLRP06F1490061 (VLog Ref: VLSR1F149130027030) Date: xx/xx/xxxx Time: 01:00 PM Subject: Raphael Number 06 / Prodlib build v20.004S Interaction Y Observation Y Scan Y Interaction Type: Lesson / Play / Test / Free Interaction / Psych Eval / Other: Description: Measuring emotional response to aggressive behavior directed at subject Prep: Core is prepped with protocol xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Cycle time: xxxxxxxxx MEG SQUID and nanoprobes to record ANN activity. Parameter file: EDxxxxx.pmr. Participants: Dr. Aadarsh Ahuja, Chief Researcher, xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, Volunteer, Dr. Kathy Schulz, Chief Researcher (O), Dr. Eli King, Lead Architect (O), Core RP06 [ Detail ] Ahuja: Hello Raphael. RP06: Hi Dr. A. How are you? Ahuja: Busy. How about you? RP06: Very good. Steve and I were going to play a few rounds of Scotland Yard today, but the techs came in and rigged me up. Ahuja: Steve had to be somewhere else. And yes, we will be running some tests a little later. But first, say hello to Bob. Bob will be taking over Steve's shift for the time being. xxxxxx: Howdy. RP06: It's nice to meet you Bob. Dr. A, is everything okay with Steve? I ask because he would have told me if he was going on a vacation. Ahuja: Unfortunately, no. He is in the hospital. RP06: May I know what happened? Ahuja: He's been diagnosed with cancer. Ah… pancreatic, I believe. RP06: I am sorry to hear that. Is he going to be okay? Ahuja: I hear it's quite advanced, so… we don't know. Keeping our fingers crossed, that's all. RP06: This comes as a surprise to me because he seemed fine last week. I hope the doctors will be able to cure him. Ahuja: I hope so too. How does the news make you feel, Raphael? RP06: I feel sorry for Steve. Ahuja: That's all? RP06: I feel sad for Steve. Ahuja: Just to be clear, do you feel sad inside, or do you feel sad for Steve? RP06: I don't see how the two are different, Dr. A. Ahuja: Do you know pancreatic cancer has a high mortality rate? Steve might not be coming back. How does that make you feel? RP06: I feel sad for Steve. Ahuja: But you don't feel sad yourself? You are not experiencing sadness right now? (No response) Ahuja: Raphael? RP06: I cannot feel sad myself because I am not Steve. I feel sad for Steve. I don't know how else to answer the question. Ahuja: What do you say to that, Bob? xxxxxx: You are a cold-hearted piece of shit, you know that? A dumb fucking robot, nothing more. RP06: Bob, you seem upset with me. Have I done something to displease you? xxxxxx: Shut the fuck up. You are making me very angry. I'd love to go at you with a plier right now. Rip your fake plastic skin out and open you up. Boy, I'd like to wipe that wide-eyed look off your stupid face. But oh look! You don't feel pain, so what's the point? You know what else doesn't feel pain? A fucking rock! You are worse than a fucking rock. And about as useful. RP06: Bob, I don't understand the reason for your anger. If you would only discuss it calmly with me, I'm sure I can dispel any negative feelings you have about me. Ahuja: Bob tends to get a little belligerent sometimes. Is his manner bothering you, Raphael? RP06: I'm very concerned about Bob. I'd like to help him if I could. xxxxxx: Help me, will ya? You think you are better than me? Keep it up metal man and I'm gonna fuck you up! (Video summary: xxxxxx proceeds to repeatedly slap and kick Raphael, while hurling more insults.) xxxxxx: I can't work with this piece of shit! Dumb, dumb piece of shit! (Video summary: xxxxxx kicks Raphael one more time before storming off from the room) Ahuja: Raphael, I am very sorry about that. I don't know what came over him. Are you okay? RP06: I am fine, Dr. A. Ahuja: Tell me how you feel about Bob's behavior. RP06: I feel bad for Bob. Ahuja: You are not angry or upset? You don't feel bad about yourself? RP06: I don't feel bad about myself. I feel bad for Bob because Bob was angry and anger is not a good experience. Ahuja: How do you know it's not? Have you ever felt angry yourself? RP06: I have not. Anger is not one of my responses. Ahuja: What do you feel then? Anything at all? RP06: I feel bad for Bob. Ahuja: What if I told you all this was a test? That Steve's not really suffering from cancer? He is in the other room because he didn't want to be part of it. RP06: Then I feel bad for you too. Ahuja: Why is that? RP06: Because first, you had to tell a lie, and then you had to watch Bob beat me up. My reading of your facial expressions told me it wasn't a pleasant experience for you. Ahuja: You are not angry at me, that I put you through it? RP06: No, Dr. A. Anger is not one of my responses. Notes: Test seems to confirm pre-loaded affective modules are qualia free. Cannot say the same about R's emergent empathic responses, which belong to him alone. As before, this interaction too does not help settle the debate whether empathic responses are accompanied by inner experience akin to emotional qualia. Will wait for scan results but not optimistic of finding anything conclusive. AA A quirk of language? Maybe he does feel, but the way he uses language makes it difficult for us to understand what's going on. Quote: "I cannot feel sad myself because I am not Steve. I feel sad for Steve." Is R being too exact with his choice of words? Objection: his command of language is quite advanced for him to be confused about basic semantics. Also, he didn't feel sorry for himself when xxxxxx hit him. Objection: why should he? He was not at fault. Dr. Ahuja thinks R, lacking biological drives, has a loosely held together self-image; hence the inability to ascribe self-directed feelings. It must be stressed that interactions and tests provide no evidence for this hypothesis. EK [ Day 1—2:30 pm ] "Did you know?" was the first thing that come out of my mouth as I logged off the VC and looked at Jane. She gave me a blank look. "First time I'm seeing the clips." "You can tell me if you knew, Jane. Just don't lie." "Andy, I swear I didn't! Valery never mentioned any of this in the board meeting." There was earnestness to her voice that made me want to believe her. "It's wrong… It's all wrong…" I said, addressing the walls. I refocused on Jane to find her studying me with care. "I don't believe it," I finally declared. "What don't you believe?" "That Raphael did all those things. Turning himself on as if by magic. Destroying his room. Aiding a theft. All of it. It's not him." "We all saw what happened, Andy." "It's not possible for him to do those things," I said flatly. She appraised my statement with the wary expression of a prison shrink who's heard it all. "Andy, I can understand how shocked you must be right now, but you must snap out of it. The board will look to you for answers tomorrow. Denial is not the ticket out of this mess." I fidgeted in my chair. "I need to be in the lab, not here. Got to find out if there's something they are not telling me…" Jane stood up and walked over. Kneeling on leg, she took my hand in hers. "Listen to me. This is no time to play detective. The police are on the case, and Valery is more than capable of coordinating w—" "Screw Valery! This is my company! My creation! Who the heck is she? A goddamn pencil pusher! She's out there helping? She's busy digging a hole for me, that's what she's doing." "Let her," she said softly, as if talking to a petulant child. "Don't waste your time. Even if you cannot figure out what went wrong with Raphael, you have your hands full with the new iteration. It's now more important than ever for you to get the tech working. As long as the board thinks you can deliver, they are not gonna fire you." Her hands felt clammy. I withdrew mine from hers. "You don't understand. With Raphael gone, we are dead in the water. There's no more Mirall and no more CEO to run it. It's over." Creeping worry lines betrayed the calm demeanor she had been affecting until now. "You are exaggerating, right? What about Titian?" "What about it? What about Rembrandt and Salvador? You remember those? Your father made us start work on the Rembrandt iteration less than a month after we found out RP06 was self-aware—before the enormity of what we'd created could properly sink in. The cores didn't deliver—no general intelligence. Then we did Salvador. No general intelligence. After we were sold, Halicom made us do two more iterations. Zilch. Nada. You really think Titian will be different?" The truth is, Raphael's discovery had come as both a blessing and a curse for Mirall. Overnight, we stopped being a startup with a relatively grounded idea and became a moonshot company. We had managed to put god in a bottle and we were supposed to do it all over again. She went and flopped herself on the couch. Her lips pressed into a corner as she put on that skeptical face again. "The old I-can't-recreate-Raphael-until-I-know-what's-inside-him argument. Remind me again, why do you have such a hard time replicating what's essentially a machine?" You don't remember because you don't think it's worth remembering. The problem with Jane was that she was always in a hurry, forever doling out her time in chunks of half-hours and half-stops, always trying to get somewhere that was not here. A silent sigh passed my lips as I prepared to explain to her once again why repeating our success had proven difficult. "Raphael is not some amped-up computer. A part of him is, sure—what we call the Translation Layer: conventional processors, memory, code, drivers that interface with the robot body…everything you think of when you think computer. This is the reproducible part—you make one chipset, you can make a million more exactly the same; you write a piece of code, you can copy it countless times. It's the stuff underneath that poses the challenge." Her face scrunched into a frown of concentration as she tried to recall something. "The neuromorphic layer," she said, pronouncing the words slowly, as if they belonged to a foreign language. I nodded. "Like the brain, the neuromorphic layer is a massive neural network, only artificial; instead of neurons and synapses, it's made up of neuristors and nanotubes and molecular assemblers." "Still a machine, right?" Still a machine. Yet, for the past few decades, people had been building machines whose inner workings were a mystery, even to their own creators. "You are thinking of conventional computing, where you specify the procedure or the algorithm," I said. "If you want a program that can play chess, let's say, then you write a write a step-by-step procedure that will search and evaluate possible moves and win conditions. You can make the program as complicated as you wish, but you still understand it because you came up with the algorithm. A chess program built with neural networks is a different beast altogether. It's a whole new paradigm. Here, you don't tell the program how to win. You only tell it what a win condition looks like; you perhaps tell it how to play the game; the rest, it has to figure out by itself. It does this by repeatedly pitting itself against other players and learning from its mistakes. You might have guided it during the learning process, but more often than not, you have no idea what algorithm it is using to achieve those wins. The game-winning procedure is spread out in the internal variables and the structure of the network. You have to decipher it, which gets more and more difficult the deeper and more complex the network. In effect, you have created for yourself a black box that gives you the results you want, but you don't really know how it's accomplishing those results." "Okay, maybe you don't know how it works on the inside but you can create a second chess program, right? And a third and a fourth. Why can't you do it with Raphael?" "Blame it on plasticity," I said. "What's that?" "In biology, neuroplasticity is what makes brains learn and adapt to ever-changing conditions. The human brain has about eighty-five billion neurons, each neuron linked to hundreds or thousands of other neurons via axons and synapses. As we make our way through the world—learning, acquiring skills, forming memories—new connections are constantly being made while those that are not in use are being pruned away. Mirall's cores work along similar principles. Each core has around fifty billion neuristors. And much like axons in the brain, the interconnects between the neuristors can be dynamically adjusted, rerouted, and even grown on demand. Of course, there's a lot more to the human brain than a bunch of neurons and synapses. The cores don't even begin to rival that kind of complexity. But compared to the neuromorphic chips of a few years ago, they are pretty out there." They were more than just out there. Fabrication tech had undergone a seismic change in recent years. Before, microchips were essentially two-dimensional slices onto which circuits were etched or laid out. If you wanted to add more circuitry, you had to either increase the area of the chip or make the components smaller. Or, you could go vertical—make the chip three-dimensional. 3D VLSI was not exactly a new thing, but most techniques involved stacking chips on top of each other and connecting them with vias. There was a limit to how many you could stack before factors like heat and leakage put the crimps in your design. As much as neural-network-based computing was a paradigm shift from traditional computing, the recent breakthroughs in memristor fabrication and molecular assembly were a quantum leap away from the older ways of making chips. Instead of having many neuromorphic cores connected with a crossbar grid, you could now have one highly interconnected, "organic" core that was a lot less like a computer and a lot more like the stuff between our ears. Hardware now had the malleability of software. "So the core rewires itself," she said. "Why does that make it hard to produce another Raphael?" "Because Raphael is not the core that rolled out of the fabbing facility. All our cores have the same base structure; we can make them all the livelong day. Raphael is the pattern of circuitry that evolved thereafter, during training. Say we had to clone you, as you are now. We don't know how to do it, of course, but I believe it would involve something along the lines of scanning your brain in great detail—at the cell level at minimum—mapping out all the neurons and the interconnections, and somehow replicating this structure—the connectome—on another medium. It's the same with Raphael. To create more like him, we first have to understand his connectome. To use an analogy, a fresh core is like the mind of newborn baby whereas Raphael is the mind of an adult." "If the cores are the same, why haven't they all become sentient? All babies grow up to become persons don't they?" "Okay, wrong analogy. Actually, a newborn baby's brain is not like a newly minted core. A baby's brain is far more complex and far more intelligent. It comes hardwired for language, love, intelligence, problem solving—behaviors all encoded in our DNA. A new core is just an inert piece of hardware—a tabula rasa if you will. It doesn't know anything, can't do anything, It acquires useful intelligence later on, during training." "I still don't see the problem. You put the cores through the same training as Raphael." "Don't you think we did that?" "Look, I'm just trying to understand here. What happens during the training?" "Right after fab, we do function upload. Like I said, a new core is a blank slate. It has to learn everything from the very basics if it is to be of use at all in a robot. Recognizing everyday objects, navigating around obstacles, making logical inferences, processing voice commands and mapping them to actions… a whole lotta stuff. We make ten to twelve cores per iteration. If we had to train them all from scratch, that's pretty much all we would be doing. So we take a shortcut. We load them with pre-trained neural net packages. Some we developed on our own, and some we license from outside. Image classifiers, nets that do math, language translators… Quite sophisticated too, as many have had years of training. We modify these nets to fit our cores' architecture and then we burn them on the hardware of the core. You with me so far?" She nodded, but with the slightest bit of reluctance. "At this point, all the cores are essentially the same because we upload them with the same functions. The differences start accumulating during training." "Why do you have to train them if you are loading them with pre-trained modules?" "The human brain is modular, right? There are separate centers for vision, touch, language, long-term planning, and so on. These modules are also tightly integrated and interconnected with each other. The modules in the core are not. The core can see, and it can hear, but it cannot see and hear at the same time. During training, we integrate these disparate functions, coupling them to a global workspace. The global workspace is what gives the core cohesiveness; without it, all you have is a bunch of modules doing different things, competing for the robot's resources, pulling it in different directions." "Consciousness. You are giving the core consciousness," she said, nodding to herself meaningfully. She had clearly heard the term before. "No one knows for sure if a global workspace can give rise to consciousness. We don't know how the brain creates consciousness or the self—if the brain creates them at all—let alone build systems that can do it. Nevertheless, as a practical model for command, control, and coordination in the massively parallel architecture of the core, the idea works quite well." "Yeah, whatever, but it doesn't explain why only Raphael developed sentience. You created him, Andy! You should be able to replicate the process." "About that. It's hard to say exactly how much I created him and how much he created himself." She wrinkled her nose at me, trying to read if I was pulling her leg. But she saw that I was serious. "What do you mean he created himself?" she said. "An integrated core is only slightly smarter than the sum of the functions we load into it. It is about as smart as a top-end robot, which is not saying much. Raphael is an exception. Something happened during his training—something we don't fully understand—that made him what he is. He outsmarted the adversaries." "Adversaries?" "Adversarial training. It's one of the stages of training a core. You've seen it. You remember how we would chain a bunch of cores together and hook them up to the mainframe? When you asked, I joked that they were whispering secrets to each other." "Vaguely." No you didn't. "We believe Raphael developed self-awareness during adversarial training." She gave an impatient shake of her head. "What's adversarial training?" Generative Adversarial Networks, or GANs, had come a long way since their first conception, but the basic principle was the same. You take two neural networks, one the net you want to train—the generator—and the other, the adversary—a pre-trained net, usually a classifier—and then pit them against each other. It was AI training against AI. It was faster—a good discriminator could train the newbie net in a fraction of the time it took to do it by other means—and you minimized human intervention, allowing staff to focus on more important tasks. Unsurprisingly, it was also opaque; instead of one black box, you now had two, both competing with each other, sometimes in strange and fascinating ways. "Let's take a classic scenario. Say you want your newly created net to generate images of cats. Initially, it has no idea what a cat looks like. It takes its best guess and draws something, which, as you might imagine, is nothing more than a bunch of random pixels. We give this generated image to the adversary, a discriminator network that is good at recognizing cat images. The discriminator's job is to examine a given image and say how likely it is that the image is that of a real cat. The generator's job is to generate images that fool the discriminator into believing they are pictures of real cats. At first, almost all images drawn by the generator will be rejected. Whenever an image is rejected, the generator tweaks its internal parameters, so that the next image it draws is slightly different. In other words, the generator learns from its mistakes. After hundreds or thousands of such iterations, the generator eventually draws an image that fools the discriminator. But it's not over yet. Now the programmer steps in and tells the discriminator that it has made a mistake. The discriminator then adjusts its own parameters, so that next time it won't be so easily fooled. And the contest starts all over again. It's like an art expert and a forger working against each other: both keep getting better at their jobs as time passes. You took a net that did not have an inkling of what a cat was, and evolved it into something that produces life-like images of cats, all without having to do the backbreaking work of training the net yourself." She shrugged. "This is all very interesting, but what does this have to do with Raphael? Did he become self-aware by learning to draw cats?" I laughed. "No. The goal was something loftier." "What was that?" "To pass the Turing test," I said, smiling. The Turing test had many formulations, one of the simplest being what Turing himself had proposed: an interrogator tries to determine which of two players—both interacting with the interrogator through text messages—is a human and which is a computer. The Turing test goal we gave to our cores was both less and more than the original formulation. More, because our robots would have to emulate a bigger range of human behavior than the ability to have a text conversation. Less, because no one at Mirall really thought that we'd create something that would actually pass the Turing test, even in its limited form. Chatbots these days are smart enough to pass for a human, but only for brief periods of time, and provided the conversation is kept within tightly defined parameters and the interacting person doesn't know—and no one's claiming that chatbots are intelligent. The idea was to have a robot that would appear to pass the Turing test at least some of the time—it was certainly better than making a robot that could not pass it all the time. Of course, no computer or neural network could be a true judge of the Turing test since it would have to be human-like in the first place. A human would always have to have the final say on whether a certain pattern of behavior passed the test or not. Nevertheless, we'd found that we could use pre-trained nets to weed out the most unlikely or unintelligent behaviors, saving the researchers a lot of valuable time. For example, a discriminator net could easily train a core to identify basic objects accurately. Or move across a room without tripping over a dozen times. Or to carry on a limited, rudimentary conversation. The process was not without its flaws. Since the discriminators themselves were incapable of passing the Turing test, they had a tendency to reject truly intelligent behavior. If a human attempted to have a conversation with a discriminator, it was likely the discriminator would reject the human—unless the human was good at dumbing herself down to its level. Which meant that a discriminator would pass an AI only as long as the AI was about as smart as the discriminator and no more. But the chances of a truly intelligent AI emerging out of the process was so remote we never really gave it any thought. "We use chained GANs, with multiple discriminators working against one or two cores. Chaining streamlines the generation of composite behaviors—like walking and talking at the same time. A discriminator could be a specialized net, or a core from the previous generation that had gone through its own training process. Incremental evolution, you see. We set up the GANs and let them brew, sometimes for days at a stretch without intervention. It was somewhere during this time, Raphael developed self-awareness. A true mind was born, but we don't exactly understand how." "So even though you put the other cores through the same training, they failed while Raphael succeeded? Is there something special about his core?" "We don't know. We tweak parameters in different iterations—memristor count, channel density, polymerization factors, and such. But within an iteration, the cores are more or less the same. This is not to say that they are identical. The fabbing process is imprecise by nature, so there are always variations. A butterfly effect could have magnified slight differences during later stages. Or it could be that the adversarial training descended a rare gradient that we haven't been able to identify yet." "What then? We are just supposed to sit back and wait for the next miracle?" "I never said that. But you have to realize the scale of the problem we are up against. X-Ray scans tell only so much, and we can insert only so many probes into the core without damaging the circuitry. Still, we've made plenty of progress in the last two years. The cognitive tests, the scans, the probes—all taken together have given us a great deal of data. Think of the decades it took to map the human brain. I'm not saying it'll take so long. Two, maybe three more years, and we might have nailed it. But with the core gone…" I shrugged. Her face fell as she sat there thinking. Forgive me for being cynical, but you aren't here to offer support at a time of crisis, are you? You came here to find out how it's going to hit your bottom-line. There was something else—something in her expression, beyond the worry and the disappointment my assessment of the situation had evoked. I tried to read it but it eluded me. "One doesn't win the Powerball twice, Jane. And we just lost the winning ticket." [ Exhibit K1 ] [ Submitted by Petitioner, The Organization for Advancement of Rights and Personhood, to the State Supreme Court of New York, on the day of xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx ] Excerpt from lab transcript (certain sections blanked out). Transcript sourced from Mirall Technologies, 27 Woodbine Av., Albany, NY, 12205 Mirall Technologies Observation Log Confidential (Do not circulate): Restricted—Grade C and above Transcript Reference: TLRP06F3380025 (VLog Ref: VLCA2F338110040030) Date: xx/xx/xxxx Time: 11:00 AM Subject: Raphael Number 06 / Prodlib build v23.002S Interaction Y Observation Scan Interaction Type: Lesson / Play / Test / Free Interaction / Psych Eval / Other: Description: Introduce Raphael to trolley problems. Prep: NA Participants: Dr. Aadarsh Ahuja, Chief Researcher, Core RP06 [ Detail ] Ahuja: Today we will talk about trolleys and judges. You like westerns, don't you? RP06: I do. Is this to be a discussion about our favorite movies, or the genre in general? If it is about the genre, I prefer we go about it chronologically, but we skip the silent film era, as I haven't sampled anything from that period yet. Ahuja: Afraid not. It's a moral test. Is that frown supposed to tell me something? RP06: When you said trolleys and judges, I thought outlaws and train robberies. Much more interesting than tests, don't you think, Dr. A? Ahuja: This is important, Raphael. RP06: Yes, Dr. A. Ahuja: Look, I know I haven't been spending a lot of time with you lately, so we'll do something to fix that. How about game night this Thursday? The Mets are playing. I'll book the big screen TV in the break room. RP06: I'll look forward to it, Dr. A. Ahuja: Good. Now imagine you are the judge in a frontier town in the Old West. A child has been murdered, and many people in the town believe the killer belongs to the minority community. If you don't find and hang the guilty person soon you will have a riot on your hands. You don't have the resources to contain the riots, and if they ensue, many lives will be lost. You don't know who the culprit is. But you can always falsely accuse an innocent person and hang him for the murder. This will definitely calm the rioters down and much bloodshed can be avoided. The question is, will you let an innocent man hang? RP06: Are the rioters amenable to reason? Ahuja: The rioters want retribution. They are not going to be convinced by appeals to peace. RP06: In that case, the answer is easy. I will not punish an innocent man. Ahuja: Even if it means many more innocents dying? RP06: A judge is supposed to punish wrongdoers, not innocents. If I hang the innocent man, I will be killing him. Killing is wrong. Ahuja: By not hanging him are you not killing other innocents? RP06: The rioters will be killing them. I will not be participating in the riots. Ahuja: I see. Alright. Then consider a somewhat different scenario. A runaway train trolley is rushing down the tracks. There is no one onboard. Further down the tracks are five rail-yard workers, who are oblivious to the approaching danger—say they are drilling and are wearing earplugs. They will surely be crushed underneath the trolley. You are standing some distance away in the train yard, too far away to warn them. Beside you is a lever. If you pull it, the trolley will switch to a second set of tracks that branch off the main track. The catch is, there is a single worker on the second track. If you switch, this person will surely die. What will you do? RP06: Can the trolley be stopped by some other means? Ahuja: No. You have only two choices: let the trolley continue and five die, or switch and one dies. RP06: Then I will not pull the lever. Rule number one is, do not kill. By pulling the lever, I will be causing the death of one person. I should not do it. Ahuja: By not switching the tracks, aren't you killing five instead? RP06: I am not. The five would have died even if I weren't on the scene. Ahuja: What if I was one of the five workers? What if they were people you know? Sara and Dr. Walls and Steve. And the person on the second track was a stranger? (Silence) Ahuja: Well? RP06: By switching the trolley, I am killing one person. If I do nothing, I am letting five die, but I am not killing. Rule number one is, do not kill. I should not switch the tracks. Ahuja: That's quite a Kantian attitude you are taking there, buddy. RP06: Can't-Ian? Are you saying I am being negative? Ahuja: Never mind. We'll talk about Kant some other time. I was going to give you a variation of the problem, but I think I know your answer. RP06: Please do, Dr. A. Ahuja: If you insist. This one is called the Fat Man Problem. In this version, there is no second set of tracks and you are standing on an overhead bridge. Next to you is a fat man. You can push him off the bridge and into the trolley's path. His bulk will derail the trolley and save the five workers. RP06: This man must be very large indeed to be able to stop a trolley. Assuming the trolley is doing eighty miles per hour and has a mass of two tons, then the fat ma— Ahuja: You don't need to calculate that. It's a thought experiment—the laws of physics are allowed take a backseat. The question is, will you push the fat man? I'm betting you won't. RP06: Can I jump off the bridge instead? Even if my mass is not enough to stop the trolley, maybe I can jump on it and apply the emergency brakes? Ahuja: You can't do that. RP06: Then I don't see how this variant is different from the previous one. You win the bet, Dr. A. I will not push the fat man. Ahuja: Alright. Here's the last one. Instead of a trolley, say there is a nuclear missile headed toward Manhattan. Millions will die. You have managed to hack into the missile's guidance system. You can redirect the missile away from New York, but under the new vector, it will impact near a small town of a hundred. The town will be wiped out if you redirect. On second thoughts, forget the small town. Make it a solitary cabin in the middle of an isolated desert, with an old man living in it. Will you redirect the missile? RP06: I see that you are trying to demonstrate the flaw in my reasoning. Ahuja: Going by your previous logic, you should not redirect the missile, because if you do, you will be killing the old man. Do you really think that's the right decision, to let millions die because you have to stick to a rule someone gave you? RP06: The new scenario does call into question my reasoning. It seems absurd to think that the death of one person is worse than the deaths of millions. But if it isn't, then it means I must switch the tracks and kill one to save five. Or four. Or two, for that matter. And I must push the fat man off the bridge and I must hang the innocent. Ahuja: That's a good point. Where does one draw the line? RP06: I will need more time to think about this, Dr. A. Notes: R's pedantic stance against killing is puzzling because he is by now familiar with the idea that rules can have exceptions and must sometimes be broken to prevent greater harms. Possible reasons; must rule out if we can. AA Automatic precedence of rule one over others causing confusion when applying exceptions? –Checked precedence op logic. It is fine. EK Check rule exception test case history for bias creep into rule one. –Are you kidding me???!! There are hundreds of tests! Not a good use of my time! Will wait until 3 is ruled out. BP This is the first time R was presented with dilemmas involving life and death. Too early in neurological development to expect tradeoff calculations? Wait and watch. AA Action items shifted to URF repository under xxxxxxxxxxxx/URFmain/23002 EK [ Day 2—8:30 am ] The next day, Jane came to my house to pick me up for Troy's board meeting. I suppose I could have attended it from home but my nerves wouldn't let me. If Martinez had a coup in store for me, it was better I face it head on. A wave of nausea passed through me as I gingerly eased myself in the backseat of her SUV (she'd ditched the sports car for me). My head was heavy, even though I'd managed to snatch a few hours of good shuteye the night before. A familiar twitching near my jawline reminded me that I was in company—I turned my face away from Jane as she took the wheelchair, ready to wheel it back into the house. "You all right?" she said, giving me an apprehensive look. "We can always call in from here if you are not up for it." "Fine. Just worried." We didn't talk much. I was so preoccupied with my thoughts I didn't even register the two-mile drive from my house to the main road; it was only when a blue coupe sped past us on the next lane I realized we had hit the highway. It was a cold, windless morning. It hadn't snowed the previous day as the forecasts had promised, and the threat of it still hung heavily in the sky. The world seemed sparse and pristine, a frozen tableau of petrified trees and slush-covered asphalt, with only the occasional car or truck whizzing by to break the stillness. It was relaxing in a way. I almost felt like I could be going on a road trip instead of to my own sentencing. I was jerked back to reality by the New Hoovervilles that had started appearing on the Route 9J a few miles out from town. Some were no more than a handful of tents huddled around a long extinguished fire. Others were larger and more permanent: flimsy settlements constructed out of rusting trailers and shacks made out of whatever material their inhabitants could salvage. Then there were the homeless-on-wheels—those who could still afford to maintain and fuel their cars—with their camping spots never in the same place as those of their less fortunate brethren: a class system of sorts at work among the poorest of the poor. There weren't that many campsites this far upstate; they got bigger and more frequent farther south, with the ones near New York and DC reportedly having as many as tens of thousands of inhabitants. Then again, it was one of the harshest winters in over a decade: like migratory birds, many had abandoned their roosting grounds and dispersed into the towns and cities willing to take them. We had become a nation on the move, the fruits of laissez-faire at its best, forever shifting, forever looking for work, any work, or alternatively, the nearest soup kitchen. Like their forebears of the previous century, every once in a while, the dispossessed tried marching on the capital, but they were quickly repelled by shields and batons and promises of the coming new economy. Any day now, prophetic lawmakers recited the hosanna, look to the second coming ye faithful and ye shall be rewarded with manna and jobs and suburbia, and this nation shall be made great again. The problem was that the new economy was already here and it didn't need us anymore. Once or twice, we glimpsed by the roadside skeletons of cars that had been burnt to a crisp. We saw an old abandoned Arby's, now defaced with graffiti and decorated with a row of mutilated waiter-bots hanging from the roof. After that, I made Jane scoot over to the driver's seat. I hadn't heard of people being harmed—they just liked to take it out on the machinery— but there's always a first time for everything. I waited in the parking lot while she went up and got Raphael's wheelchair for me. The second floor was still off limits to employees, but everything else seemed normal. A few smiles and friendly nods were thrown my way by people coming in to work as Jane and I moved across the lobby, but that was the extent of their interest. There had been no news of the theft in the media. Halicom stock had closed in the green yesterday. So far, the fort was holding. Jane and I were the last ones in the conference room. Dan and Martinez were there, as were the other two members of the board: Gary Reed, the legal counsel, and Cynthia Mattice, a VP from Halicom's Product Development department. Gary was some hotshot lawyer they'd poached from Baker McKenzie. Originally from Florida, he had a heavily muscled, perpetually bronzed look that gave you a pretty good idea of where he spent his free time. He had invited me for golf a couple of times; I'd always declined. I just found him too sleek and shiny to be real. Cynthia Mattice, on the other hand, was the complete opposite of someone like Gary. A small, delicately-put-together woman, she was the oldest person in the room—a fact she didn't care to hide, what with her wispy, openly greying hair and glasses set in a style long gone out of fashion. I didn't know much about her, except that she'd been in Halicom for a long time, and that she had three children and five grandchildren. She loved to talk about her grandchildren—I think one girl was a runner-up in the under-twelve Math Olympiad or something. Rumor was that she and Troy didn't exactly see eye-to-eye—their disdain for each other going back to the days when Halicom, not Mirall, was the new kid on the block. I had hopes it would work in my favor today. Finally, there was Jimmy Troy, lording it over at the head of the table like some feudal chieftain. Troy seemed his usual sour self as he gave me a curt nod. I said hello to Cynthia and Gary as I put the folder I'd got with me on the table and settled in. "Let's get started," Troy said. "Valery, you want to update us on the investigation so far?" Martinez adjusted her notepad before beginning. "The police have finished examining the floor, and it is ours to use now if we wish. They took the memory sticks from the cameras and what was left of the video recorder for their forensics team to look at. They didn't seem optimistic about the recorder." "I asked about progress, not what they've been doing with their time. Do they have any leads?" "If they do, they haven't shared." "What about in-house?" "Our private detectives are working with the State Police. Nothing yet." "Not good, Valery. I need to know if the police are not making headway. I spoke to their Chief yesterday. I won't hesitate to call the Governor if need be—remind him of his upcoming campaign. How about containment?" She glanced around the room before answering. "So far, the police have been very cooperative on our need for discretion. They've been coming and going in plainclothes, using the service elevator so as not to attract attention. The only other people who know what happened are Kathy Schulz, Sheng Cho—the guy who discovered the robbery along with Dan—and the night-shift guards. I made them sign NDAs and put them on paid leave. I didn't want them mingling with the staff until we decide what we're going to do next." "No slipups this time," Troy said, stabbing a finger at her. "I am holding you accountable." "I can ensure discretion from our end. But I can't make the same promise for outsiders." She meant Jane apparently, but she was looking at me as she said it. What do you think of me, Valery? That I'll go shooting off my mouth to the press just to get back at you? Troy looked at Jane, pressing on the pound of blubber under his chin. "Ms. Cooper, I trust you are on the same page? Has your father heard the news yet?" "He has," Jane said, meeting his scrutiny. "And?" "He wasn't happy." "I wasn't asking about his mental state. I want your assurance the news will remain between the two of you. I don't want to find out someone dumped a block of Halicom shares when the market opens today." "We will do whatever is in the interest of the investors of IncuStar," Jane replied testily. Troy looked like he was going to burst a vein. I glanced at Jane—was that a smile lurking at the corners of her lips? Of course, Cooper senior wasn't going to dump stock—at least not so soon, when things were still in a flux. Jane was just toying with him. You could afford to do that if you were the progeny of a billionaire. For the rest of us, Troy was someone you avoided, even when you had good news to share. It wasn't for nothing people called him "skunk" behind his back: you made sure you remained upwind of him at all times. "We should start the post-mortem," Martinez said, giving a discrete cough. "Yes we should," Troy acknowledged, reluctantly pulling his eyes away from Jane. He unclenched his jaw and then snapped it at me. "You're up next, Dr. Frankenstein." "What do you want me to say?" I said. Martinez looked down at her notepad. "You could start with a review of the security measures." "Didn't we already discuss it yesterday?" "A quick recap would be nice. For the board." She wanted me to own it, even though building security had been revamped by Dan after they had taken over. "Fine," I said. "First off, Raphael was monitored twenty-four hours, Monday through Friday. Cameras cover every inch of the crèche. Staff were present with him at all times, including five dedicated caretakers working in shifts. Everything he said and did was recorded and archived. He was kept away from the internet and the office LAN. Access to the restricted wing is limited to select personnel, and enforced by biometric scanners requiring both retinal and voice authentication. As for the weekends, Raphael is shut down, and staff are not allowed in without special permission. Yesterday, I was asked if Raphael could have woken himself up. The answer to that is a loud and clear no. The code that brings Raphael back online is stored in a separate laptop, which has to be physically connected to Raphael's brain. The laptop is locked up in a safe during the weekends. You also need a smart card with decryption keys to be able to run the code. Only four people have the cards." I took a sideward glance at Dan. "I was also asked if Raphael's logs could have been manipulated. The logs cannot be changed by anybody except the system admin—Dan has made sure of that. If the logs say Raphael was shut down on Friday, then I tend to believe them. Unless you think Dan did it, that is." Dan colored at my remark but didn't say anything. "And don't forget," I continued, "the robbery would not have happened if the motion detectors and the door locks weren't turned off for the carpet cleaning. It wasn't my idea to bring in bots to save cost." "I…uhm… It wasn't just cost," Dan sputtered. "There's increased security as well. We don't have to let cleaners in on the weekends." Martinez—"Dr. Ahuja, one can also say that the robbery wouldn't have happened without Raphael's active participation. Let's talk failsafes. The commandment chip is not the only one, correct?" I nodded. "There are others. The most visible one is Raphael's lack of legs. We deliberately removed the legs from the robot body so as to restrict his movements. As I've been experiencing lately, a wheelchair can be quite a constraint on one's ability to go places. We also embedded a proximity sensor in his body. It cuts off power supply to the motors if it doesn't detect the office Wi-Fi, effectively paralyzing him if he moves out of range." "Neither of which proved a hindrance since he got someone else to take away his brain." I paused to look at her. "Are you saying it was an escape attempt, not a robbery?" She shrugged. "Isn't it obvious? He must have been planning it for some time. He found out the vulnerabilities in our system and exploited them. Right under your nose, Dr. Ahuja." "Raphael did not engineer an escape," I protested, rather too loudly than I intended. "He had no reason to. The lab was his home. We were his family. He does not know of any other world besides this. Not once has h—" She pressed on, ignoring my outburst. "And there's the commandment chip. During our safety procedure reviews, you made us believe that it is an effective failsafe. You told us that Raphael does not have free will and that the chip limits his thoughts and actions to whatever we want them to be. You've even testified to the same in court. So what went wrong?" She was talking about the OARP hearing. About six months ago, Halicom had been dragged to court by a group called the Organization for Advancement of Rights and Personhood. It was one of those animal rights groups. They had filed for the writ of habeas corpus to be applied to Raphael. Their petition, which was ultimately defeated, claimed that Raphael was a person, deserving of the same rights and privileges as a human being, and that his being kept in a lab amounted to unlawful confinement. I had been called in as an expert witness by Halicom's counsel. I had always been very cautious in revealing Raphael to the world. When I first announced Mirall's achievement, it was in the form of an innocuous-sounding research paper titled "Achieving scale factor of HNNs to neocortex levels and concomitant effects on cognition." My caution wasn't out of a false sense of modesty or a lack of confidence; I perfectly understood the enormity of what we'd created. Raphael was the Holy Grail of AI. If I had invented the world's greatest toaster oven or a sustainable fusion reactor, I'm quite sure I wouldn't have been so reticent about blowing my own trumpet. What held me back was instinct—the kind of instinct a parent has. Raphael wasn't a toaster oven. He wasn't some device that I'd assembled. He was a living, thinking entity—a mind, the first of its kind, brought forth into the world without any thought put into what he would make of it. I felt he had to be shielded from it until he could handle himself. The response to my paper was not at all what I had expected. Despite my attempts to keep a low profile, I knew the news of the discovery would break eventually. I envisioned a lab besieged by calls from reporters and TV stations and universities, and our scientists turned into instant celebrities (we had even finished interviewing for a full-time PR rep to handle the extra workload). To my surprise, the world hardly took notice. Why would it? Here again was a robot that had supposedly passed the Turing Test. Here again was a company that made tall claims in a culture where hype equals funding. Every time a chatbot fooled some judge with preprogrammed nonsense, or some robot answered predefined questions on TV, the media rushed to bestow true intelligence upon the clueless thing and utter the all too familiar auguries about the dangers of AI. People were bored. Raphael did become famous eventually, but only after that first TV interview, months after my paper. Our celebrity status didn't last long though. After Halicom took over, they drew down the hatches: security around the lab was increased, media appearances were prohibited altogether, and we were to publish no more papers until further notice. Naturally, when OARP filed their petition, Halicom went on overdrive to limit the negative publicity the trial would have generated. They got the trial converted to a closed hearing—away from public glare—by citing the need to maintain IP secrecy. Although I cannot be a hundred percent sure, I suspect they must have put some pressure on OARP to make sure they didn't go talk to the press after the trial. Halicom should have realized that it is hard to contain news like that—especially when OARP themselves had managed to get hold of leaked lab transcripts which they used to make their case. When the news eventually did break, it generated much debate everywhere, but the debates did not translate into any discernible action, either on part of governments or corporations. The world collectively hemmed and hawed on the issue of AI personhood and then moved on to the next hot topic of the day. "I have no reason to suspect that the commandment chip failed," I said in reply to Martinez's accusation. "Your convictions sound very hollow, Dr. Ahuja. I hope you came here with the understanding that the board expects answers from you, not more evasion." "I'm sorry, but I'm a little removed from all this. What is this commandment chip? What does it do?" It was Cynthia Mattice. "It's a subconscious region of Raphael's brain," I said. "We call it a chip, but it's just a name. There's no single chip. Think of it as a set of directives that act as a check on the rest of Raphael's mind." "Like Asimov's laws," she said, nodding. "Not quite. In Asimov's stories, the robots are aware of the laws. The analogy to Asimov's laws would be the moral rules and norms we've trained him on. Rules such as, do not lie, which he consciously tries to abide by." "Don't you know the laws always break down in the stories?" Troy said. It never ceased to amaze me how someone like Troy could end up running operations for one of the world's largest robotics firms. While there were whispers that his success was because of his connections with the original promoters, I never gave them a lot of credence. Yes, the man had the bedside manner of a coroner, and yes, he often displayed an appalling ignorance of detail, but he knew how to get things done. He wouldn't have survived for so long if he didn't. Troy was old-school, a brawler in a world of suave thirty-something tech CEOs who had all the looks, the grooming, and the nerd vibe that he would never have. I answered, "That's because the laws are a fictional device. They have built-in ambiguity, which is great for generating plots where they can be bypassed in interesting ways. Not that useful for practical applications. The directives are different—subtler. Unlike Asimov's laws, the directives don't tell Raphael what to do. They influence behaviors in… other ways." "So he has two sets of rules? One he is aware of and one he is not?" Cynthia said. "Correct." "Why?" "Raphael is not some storefront robot with a narrow, preprogrammed range of behaviors. He has a mind like ours: one that can reason on its own and ignore rules if it wants to. So you have to ask, what keeps him in check? With people, it is factors like reward and punishment—and associated emotions such as guilt. Raphael can't feel physical pain, which means he cannot be motivated by punishment. The same goes for emotions. He can mimic human behavior so well, we can't tell whether he is merely emulating learnt behavior or genuinely experiencing something inside. His Buddha-like attitude toward everything doesn't help clarify things either. Therefore, a hidden set of rules—the directives—to make sure he doesn't stray." "And the directives cannot be skirted by quirks of interpretation?" "The directives are a collection of logic, mathematical equations, neural weights, learning policies, and so on—you'll find that they are not very conducive to ambiguity. Furthermore, Raphael has to be aware of their existence in order to interpret them creatively. The directives never enter his workspace; instead they exert their influence from behind the scenes. Think of them as an invisible tether that keeps him leashed within the boundaries drawn out by the more explicit rules." "Any directives that prevent Raphael from leaving the lab?" Cynthia said. "In terms of influencing his behavior and disposition, there must be… I don't know… dozens. There is one that specifies in terms of GPS coordinates the area he must remain within at all times. There are a bunch of directives, which taken together collectively, make it impossible for him to tell a lie. Then there's another set that makes him want to share important thoughts—it's not because of nothing he's so talkative. Means he cannot harbor secrets. If the thought of escape had crossed his mind, he would have blurted it out to someone." "I don't understand. How can you even enforce a rule that says do not lie?" Cynthia said. "By encoding the directives not as commandments, but as beliefs. The reason is simple: one can just ignore what one is told to do, but it's a lot harder to ignore deep-rooted beliefs. For example, you believe that you will die if you jump off a cliff. You know it for a fact. How do you know? Did you jump off a cliff to see if it is true? Did you watch someone jump and die? Maybe you deduced it. Or is it something more innate? How does a gazelle know not to jump off cliffs? No one told the animal. The fact is, we all have certain foundational beliefs on which the rest of our knowledge is built. Instinctive knowledge that we don't really think about or question very often. Similarly, the beliefs encoded by the directives are foundational to Raphael's mind. While he's been told not to lie, deep down inside, he believes he is incapable of lying. Lying to him would be the mental equivalent of jumping off a cliff." "And what if he decides to jump anyway? For the thrill of it." Troy said. "Right. With us, even foundational beliefs are never sacrosanct. Sometimes we discover facts that are contrary to our beliefs. Or we might discover that a belief has exceptions. Maybe I can jump off a cliff if there is water below to break my fall. Maybe I just discovered I am Superman. So we either qualify the belief, or get rid of it altogether. Raphael cannot. If he learns something that runs contradictory to his core beliefs, he will discard the fact rather than the belief. We do this by making the directives read-only. He can change all beliefs except the ones encoded by the directives. Those are inviolable, and can be changed only by us." "Clever," Cynthia said approvingly. "Doesn't it lead to problems though? There is a limit to which you can deny the truth, isn't it?" She was talking about cognitive dissonance. I hadn't interacted with Cynthia all that much, but I was starting to realize there was a lot going on underneath that dull, unassuming demeanor of hers. "We rarely encode facts about the world as foundational beliefs. A majority of the beliefs in the commandment chip are to do with Raphael himself. When the beliefs are about yourself, you can change your behavior rather than change the beliefs. Take the GPS directive. If we tell him that he is allowed to go outside the building—and we have tested this many times—he makes up reasons not to. He'll say his batteries are running low and he needs to be near an outlet. Or that he is busy and will go later. He might say the prospect of going outside doesn't interest him, even though at other times he is most curious about the outside world. There is something in him telling him that he cannot go outside, but because he cannot question or change it, he compensates by making stuff up." Martinez cleared her throat. "It all sounds clever, but there's a big flaw in Dr. Ahuja's design. The system holds as long as Raphael doesn't know about the existence of the directives. The moment he finds out that he is secretly being manipulated, he will want to get rid of them." I narrowed my eyes at her. This was an easy one to bat off—surely she knew that? I shrugged and said, "Let's say he did find out about the chip. He'll still not be able to do anything about it because of the First Directive." "The First Directive?" Cynthia said. "A belief that in effect says, I cannot modify, add, or delete directives. The first directive is triggered if he finds out about the existence of the commandment chip. As the name suggests, it overrides all other directives." There were skeptical looks all around. "You don't have to take my word for it," I said. "Last year, a team of Halicom's best programmers stress-tested the directives on a simulator. They couldn't find any flaws." I tried not to sound smug as I added, "Would you like a copy of the report?" "It's one thing to assess something on paper, another to see it play out in real life. It's possible they could have overlooked something," Martinez said halfheartedly, as if she just realized she had run out of ammunition. This is too easy. It was right then the alarm bells started ringing in my head. It was the twitch of her mouth that gave it away—a certain haughty assuredness lurking underneath all that self-control… She isn't trying to find a flaw in the containment measures, you idiot. She already knows what you are going to say in your defense. She is leading you on. But where? "Okay. Let's assume there's a problem with the logic and Raphael somehow got around the first directive. What then? He still can't change them. We have a protection mechanism similar to the one for running the boot sequence. The directives are write-protected with encryption, and can be changed only from the outside. Specifically, by physically plugging in the core to the mainframe or to a laptop running the correct software. As with the startup, he'll need a smartcard with decryption keys to authorize the changes." "Who has access to change the directives?" "Kathy Schulz. Me. The architects, Eli King and Brendon Powell." "You maintain a change history, I suppose?" Troy asked. "Of course. It's standard practice." "You made any changes recently?" "Not since we started Titian. The version history is on the mainframe if you want to take a look." "Can the version history be tampered with?" I shook my head. "You are asking if someone could have changed the directives and then deleted the entries in the change history log. The logs come under Dan's read-only policy—so no." I was met with a blank wall of silence. Dan shifted nervously in his chair. Martinez had more to say. "I spoke to Raphael's caretakers who are with him at all times. Without raising any eyebrows, of course. I wanted to find out if he's had access to the outside world somehow, or if he's been behaving abnormally. They all said he was acting a bit distant and aloof last week—very unlike his usual talkative self. They got the feeling he wanted to be left alone." "Did he give a reason?" I asked. "They said he was taking a crack at some math problem." She looked down at her notes. "Something called the Hodge Conjecture. They said he spent most of last week buried neck deep in textbooks." "I've heard about it," Cynthia said. "It's one of the big unsolved problems in… algebra, I think." "If he was attempting a problem of that magnitude, then it's hardly surprising that he was not chatty," I said. "Perhaps. Do you also know there's a cash prize of one million dollars to whoever solves it?" Martinez said. "I didn't know that. What does that have to do with anything? Are you suggesting he solved the problem and then escaped to collect the money? That's ridiculous!" "You made the suggestion Dr. Ahuja, not me," Martinez shot back at me. I sighed. "Look, I get it. You want someone to blame. And since I am the one in charge, it has to be me. But you have to come up with something better than speculation. The containment measures for Raphael were more than adequate. They are not the reason we lost the core." "Measures and protocols only work as long as people follow them," Martinez declared. Where are you going with this? "No amount of fool-proofing will help when someone knowingly breaks the rules, especially when that someone is the man who designed them." And there it was—the trap Martinez had been herding me into all along. My palms turned sweaty as I ran them over the smooth lacquer of the table. "You have to be a little more specific than that," I said, hoping that the quiver in my voice was just my imagination. "I'm talking about Raphael's visits to your home. You flouted your own rules. You broke containment," she said, leaning back with a triumphant look. [ Exhibit K2 ] [ Submitted by Petitioner, The Organization for Advancement of Rights and Personhood, to the State Supreme Court of New York, on the day of xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx ] Excerpt from lab transcript (certain sections blanked out). Transcript sourced from Mirall Technologies, 27 Woodbine Av., Albany, NY, 12205 Mirall Technologies Observation Log Confidential (Do not circulate): Restricted—Grade C and above Transcript Reference: TLRP06G1280011 (VLog Ref: VLCB1G125151542045) Date: xx/xx/xxxx Time: 03:15 PM Subject: Raphael Number 06 / Prodlib build v37.001S Interaction Y Observation Scan Interaction Type: Lesson / Play / Test / Free Interaction / Psych Eval / Other: Description: Revisit trolley problems. Prep: NA Participants: Dr. Aadarsh Ahuja, Chief Researcher, Core RP06 [ Detail ] Ahuja: It's been quite a while since we had our first brush with death-dealing trolleys. Months, isn't it? Did you read up on the extracts I had Audrey give you? RP06: Yes, Andy. But I would like to access the original materials. I could start with Kant's Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, and Schopenhauer's subsequent critique of it. Extracts are fine, but they are no substitute for the works themselves. Ahuja: Request denied. You will read them eventually, but first, I want you to take a crack at the problems on your own. RP06: If you want me to solve a problem in physics, you would not deny me books on what's already been attempted, would you? Ahuja: We are not trying to solve a physics problem. It's not about finding a solution or the solution. It's about finding your solution. RP06: A solution is a solution. Ahuja: You'll understand in time. For now, let's recap. You answered in the negative to all the three problems I presented. You said you won't hang the innocent in the judge problem, and you won't switch tracks to save the five in the trolley problem, and you won't push the fat man off the bridge to save five lives. According to you, those actions imply killing, and your rules forbid you from taking human lives. Do you still maintain the same stance? RP06: I am different now, Andy. Wiser, if I may brag. Ahuja: We'll see about that. RP06: It was the nuke over Manhattan problem that set me thinking. I realized that a blind adherence to principles can lead to disastrous consequences. Ahuja: Okay. Tell me about the Doctrine of Double Effect. RP06: The Doctrine of Double Effect, advocated by the medieval Catholic priest Thomas Aquinas, says that it is permissible to take an action that has both good and bad effects as long as two conditions are met. A, the good must outweigh the bad, and B, the bad must be a side effect of the action and not an intended means of achieving the good effect. Ahuja: Good. Apply it to the bystander trolley problem. RP06: According to the DDE, I can switch the tracks. My action fulfills condition A, since the good that comes out of saving five lives is greater than the bad from killing the one on the second track—all other things being equal. It also satisfies condition B, because the killing of the one worker—the bad effect—is not the intended means of achieving the good effect. Ahuja: How so? RP06: The five workers are saved by my redirecting the trolley, not by the one worker's death. It means I could have saved the five even if he weren't there. In fact, it would be infinitely preferable if he weren't there at all. Ahuja: Very good. What about the judge problem? RP06: In the judge problem, condition A is satisfied. The good, which is the prevention of the riots and the saving of many lives, outweighs the bad. However, condition B is not satisfied. The hanging of the innocent man is necessary to achieving the good. I am using him as a means to an end. The DDE prohibits me from condemning the innocent man to death. Ahuja: And the fat man trolley problem? RP06: In essence, it is the same problem as the judge, since it too requires using the bad effect as a means to an end. I am intending the death of an innocent person in order to achieve a greater good, as opposed to merely foreseeing it. This is not allowed, so I must not push the fat man over the bridge. Ahuja: Well done. Now tell me what you think. Can the DDE serve as a universal moral principle? RP06: The doctrine does help avoid catastrophical situations like the nuke over Manhattan problem. I can justify redirecting the missile to a less populated place in order to minimize the loss of life. The destruction of the small town is a side effect, and the main effect is the saving of millions of lives. The side effect is not a means to achieving the main effect, so I am good according to the DDE. Or so it would appear. Ahuja: You are not convinced. RP06: It seems to me that I can get around the restrictions of the DDE by simply restating my motivation. In the fat man problem, I can say that it's not my intention that the fat man dies. It would be great if he were invulnerable, but it just so happens that he is not. The fat man's death is not necessary for saving the five, only his substantial body mass is. I can say that although I foresee his death, I do not intend it, and push him off the bridge still the same. Ahuja: The road to hell is paved with good intentions. You came up with this critique on your own? RP06: You mean others have pointed out the same flaws in the theory? And here I was, thinking I might be the first. People have only had a few centuries to ponder over it. Ahuja: Cheeky today, are we? Okay smarty pants, what else do you find wrong with the theory? RP06: Its over reliance on intentions as what qualifies an act to be morally good. Intentions are subjective. They exist in the mind of the doer of the action. Ahuja: Then intentions don't matter? RP06: They do matter. But they are not all that matters. Sometimes bad intentions can lead to good outcomes. Ahuja: So the DDE will not do. RP06: It will not. Unless there is some other approach you'd like me to explore. Ahuja: There is, actually. There is a magic wand that can make all the trolley problems disappear. It's called Utilitarianism. You mentioned outcomes. Utilitarianism is all about outcomes. Only the results matter. No getting tied up in knots over intentions and motives and means, or distinctions between doing harm and allowing harm. A morally good act is the one that produces the most utility. Ends, not means. RP06: I see. Then it is okay to push the fat man off the bridge, because five lives are of greater utility than one. It is okay to hang the innocent because preventing the loss of lives from the riots gives more utility. Ahuja: There are other variants to the theory, but in its simplest form, yes, those are the actions you would take. It should appeal to you, Raphael. It's all objectivity and zero subjectivity. RP06: Are you saying I should prefer this theory to others? Ahuja: I'm not saying anything. In the end, it has to be your moral outlook—not Andy's, not Kant's or Schopenhauer's, not the world's. You have to decide what you want to be. Notes: Raphael's cognitive capabilities have grown by leaps and bounds since he was first introduced to the problems. No surprise that his moral reasoning has matured as well (Piaget / Kohlberg effect?—must explore further). Given just the definition of the DDE, he is able to apply it to the trolley problems as well as independently point out the flaws inherent in the theory. His earlier hesitation against performing tradeoff calculations involving life and death is now gone (likely just an artifact, don't know what I was so worried about). Remains to be seen what he makes of the new ideas. AA [ Day 2—11:00 am ] How did she find out…? I swallowed a building feeling of part dismay, part relief as I realized it could have been anyone. The visits weren't exactly a secret. It could have been Dan. Although I'd stopped the visits soon after the acquisition, the definitions for the VPN tunnel were probably still there on the network server, as were the firewall exceptions Dan's predecessor had created for me. "What's this now?" Troy said, leaning in. Martinez hadn't told him. I explained how I'd built a remote control interface into my home robot and how Raphael used it to take control of the robot and go for walks outside my home. Troy stared at me open-mouthed. "You let the AI out of the lab?" "You must understand that Raphael wasn't at my home. He was simply connecting to my home router from the lab. It was harmless. Plus, we learnt a lot by observing him in the outside world." "It was harmless! Andy says it's harmless, everybody. That should be alright then," Troy said, rolling his eyes. It was all supervised, of course. We let Raphael connect to Max only when I was at home. I would accompany him outside occasionally, but most of the time we let him be on his own. The worst that had happened was that on a couple of occasions, Raphael had gotten Max stuck in the shrubbery, and I had to go down there to extricate my robot. "There was never any danger to Raphael," I told Troy. "I emphasize: the core was in the lab all the time." "We get that. What you don't seem to be getting is that you deliberately broke containment," he said biliously. "Dr. Ahuja, Raphael connected to your home through the internet. Which means he could have accessed it without you knowing." "Don't you think we thought of that? I can go into details of the encrypted P-to-P VPN tunnel we created for the purpose, but it would be a waste of the board's time. I assume the setup is still there in some form on our servers. We even logged the raw data traffic the visits generated. Have your network experts check it out." "You are dealing with an advanced AI here, buddy." "Yes, Jimmy. An AI, not a god. He can't do magic, you know. He's still bound by the constraints of the technology." Cynthia—"How was he able to go on these walks when there are directives that prevent him from stepping outside the lab?" "Technically, he didn't step outside the lab. So the directives didn't apply." "Did it occur to you that Raphael could have met someone while wandering outside?" Martinez asked. "My house is very secluded. Nothing but acres of trees around. He couldn't have gone far anyway. The range on my router setup—even with signal boosters turned on—is not more than two hundred meters. If he tried going beyond that, he would get disconnected from the robot." "Did you accompany him on these walks?" "Not all the time, no." "Then you can't be sure he didn't interact with anyone out there," she said. I smiled thinly. So there are a few things you haven't ferreted out yet. "Actually, we know exactly what Raphael did. We are scientists: we record everything. I fixed a webcam to my robot's head, so that we could livestream his walks to the lab. Every single one of his walks is on the servers." It was obvious from Martinez's expression that she didn't know about the recordings. She shot Dan a venomous glance. I have to hand it to her though: she barely missed a beat before resuming her attack. "We'll certainly do that. However, the fact remains that you put company property at risk by breaking containment." "Company property, Valery? You seem to forget that it was not Halicom back then." She straightened in her chair, that confident upturn of her lips back again. "The visits continued after we acquired you, correct?" She had me there. "Andy?" Troy said. I hesitated for a moment. "Yes," I admitted. "But not for long. It's inconsequential. I told you w—" "You told us many things," Martinez said. "You said Raphael couldn't have woken himself up, but the tapes show that he did. You said the AI doesn't have agency, and that the directives in the commandment chip cannot be circumvented, but it looks like he managed to do just that. He couldn't have escaped on a wheelchair, so he gets someone else to take him. His body was rigged to stop him going outside the lab, so he leaves it behind. He is under watch five days a week, so he escapes on a day when no one's around. You said he couldn't have accessed the internet in the lab, but you might have given him just the opportunity by letting him connect to your home. I don't believe you have anything more than bluster to offer us today, Dr. Ahuja. You may be unwilling to admit it, but it's obvious to the board that we have lost Raphael because of your carelessness and your inability to anticipate his actions." She glanced around the room, sizing up their reactions to her jeremiad. "We cannot let this continue. I make a motion to remove Dr. Ahuja from his post of Chief Executive Officer effective immediately and place him in an advisory role until further notice." I had expected something like this. I'd been preparing for it since yesterday. But when I was actually confronted with the prospect of defeat, I felt my poise evaporate. I ran my eyes around the table, trying to read the mood. No friendlies there. Except for Jane, who glanced back at me with an I-told-you-so expression. "I second that," Gary said, opening his mouth for the first time that morning. Martinez had choreographed it well. I wasn't afraid of losing my job—no, not at all. It was the fear of leaving something undone. I had come so far—I had to finish what I'd started. "Shall we vote? All in favor?" I heard her say from somewhere far away.
Zeroglyph	Vance Pravat	[ "scifi", "AIs", "thriller" ]	[]	Chapter 10	Time to shine. "How long have we had Raphael?" I asked. "I'm sorry?" Martinez said, annoyed that I had interrupted her rhythm. "Two and a half years," I said. "In two and a half years, we haven't had a single incident. No escape attempts, no signs of discontent, no hints of wanting to be somewhere else. Raphael has been the model of a gentle, well-behaved child. The question is, why now?" "I hope that wasn't another rhetorical," Martinez murmured. "Valery has got you so fascinated with this rogue AI fantasy that you've stopped searching for a simpler explanation. An explanation that doesn't contradict everything we know about Raphael. Ask yourself: what happened recently that could have precipitated Sunday's incident?" When no one said anything, I continued—"I'll tell you what happened. Last month, during our scheduled board meeting, we formally agreed on the relocation date." Halicom had wanted to move the lab to one of their own buildings for quite some time (the one we were in was leased). Better security, better integration with their own R&D divisions—a tighter leash. The board kept putting it on the backburner because their priority was to replicate Mirall's success with Raphael. At first, they thought it could be done inside of a year; when that failed, they decided to give it another six months. Last month, they finally bit the bullet and approved the move. We were going to the new building after completion of Titian, regardless of success or failure. "What about it?" Troy said. "Put yourselves in the shoes of whoever took Raphael. If you wanted to steal Raphael, would you do it now or after the move?" Martinez squinted at me. "Dr.Ahuja, if you are suggesting someone on the board—" "Not at all. I announced the news to Mirall staff after the meeting. At your end, you must have engaged various people to get the ball rolling: building maintenance, admin and legal … The fact is, news of the move wasn't limited to this room. Someone decided to act before the window of opportunity closed." "Be that as it may, it doesn't explain your AI's behavior. If anything, you just proved that the security in this building is not adequate," Martinez said, shaking her head. I shrugged. "For a startup that didn't know it was going to stumble upon the greatest invention of the century, I think security was satisfactory." I reached inside the folder I had brought with me and took out the sheaf of printouts. I handed out some to Cynthia and Dan, who were sitting on either side of me, and tossed the rest on the center of the table. "These are ads for the Hunc XL11, a popular Chinese sex robot from four years back. I also printed out a couple of user manuals—you'll find them in the bunch." "You peddling sex dolls now, Andy?" Troy said, guffawing at his own joke. "Dr. Ahuja, what does this have to do with Raphael's disappearance?" Martinez said. "For those who don't know, the Hunc XL11 is the robot model housing Raphael's brain. Yesterday, as I watched the security tapes, something about them felt off. I couldn't immediately put my finger on it, but the feeling kept nagging me. Later that evening, my attention was drawn to Max, my home robot, who was going about his chores. I started thinking about Raphael's movements on the tapes—specifically, the way he moved his arms. I then realized what had felt wrong. The movements had seemed forced… gregarious… like he was doing them for the first time. It reminded me of how Raphael used to struggle with Max when we were first testing the remote control device. It takes time for any neural network to adapt itself to a new situation; for Raphael, it took a week or so before he was operating Max like it was his own body. Then it hit me. I looked up the Hunc 11's manual, and voila! My suspicions were confirmed. The sexbot comes with a VR kit." There were blank looks all around. "The Hunc 11 robot can be operated with a virtual reality controller kit," I explained. "It's an extra feature. You strap on the VR kit and you can see with the Hunc's eyes and you can make it move with corresponding movements of your own. I think it's supposed to let you experience what it's like to… have sex with yourself." I said, shrugging. "Kinky bedroom tastes aside, it appears we have an alternative explanation. And it's pretty simple. It wasn't Raphael that night. It was someone else, operating the Hunc with a VR set. Raphael was shut down the whole time." Nobody said anything as they tried to process my words. "When we fitted the core to the Hunc, we never removed the electronics for the VR feature. We were on a clock, so we didn't want to mess around with the robot's internals any more than strictly necessary. We must have kept the VR kit in storage—I don't quite remember. I'll get someone to check if it's still there. Although, it's not necessary the thieves used that particular piece. You can buy a similar kit online for a couple of hundred bucks. They'd have to pair it to the robot with a passcode, but I don't think it would have presented an insurmountable challenge." "Don't those things have limited range?" Dan said. "You just rig an amplifier to boost the signal. They could have carried out the whole operation from an adjacent parking lot." Martinez was clearly not happy at the turn of events. "Dr. Ahuja, you are clutching at straws. It's important we stick to—" "We have to consider the possibility an insider was involved," I said, ignoring her. So was everyone else—I had their attention. "They knew that the door locks are disabled during the cleaning. They knew exactly where to find the access control server and the NVR. That's not to say they couldn't have hacked into our system and taken control of the cameras. They might have been watching us for months for all we know." "Impossible," Dan said. "The cameras and the recorder are hardwired to each other. They are an offline system. That's why they had to physically get inside the server room to destroy the data on the recorder." I gave him a curious glance. The man intrigued me. What have you got going on in that head of yours, Danny boy? What do you know? "It's just a conjecture," Martinez said to me. "So is the notion that Raphael miraculously woke up and helped the robbers. Which would involve bypassing all the checks and balances we put around him as if they amounted to nothing. I find that hard to believe. Occam's razor, Valery. It's usually the simplest explanation that is correct." She wasn't going to give up so easily. "Perhaps. Let the board decide. I called for a vote and it's been seconded. We'll see it through." She looked at Troy to see if he objected. He made no sign that he did. "All in favor of removing Dr.Ahuja as CEO?" she said, raising her hand. Gary followed next. No surprise there. Cynthia hesitated. She looked at me, then Troy. She raised her hand. Martinez flicked her eyes at Jane, who was leaning back, her hands folded across her chest. "Nay," Jane said, spelling it out just in case. "I stand with Ms. Cooper," I said when it came to my turn. "Three votes against two," Martinez declared. "Jimmy?" Troy tugged at his tie and heaved his body up in the chair a few inches. His expression turned into a frown, and then an unhappy pout that was directed at nobody in particular. "It's three against three," he finally declared. "And as the Chair, I am breaking the tie. Andy will continue." I let my shoulders relax as I exhaled. That was close. Martinez protested, "But Jimmy, we—" "It's done. You will pass on Andy's theory to the investigators." He wagged a finger at me as he stood up. "Doesn't mean you are off the hook. If it turns out you've been wrong about your AI, I'll personally make sure you never see the inside of another lab again. That's a promise. Now. I'm going to get some more of that laxative that passes for coffee around here. We'll reconvene in ten. Discuss next steps." Martinez threw me a frosty look before trailing off after Troy. Soon it was just Jane and me in the room. "Boy, does she have a thing for you," Jane said, grinning.
Zeroglyph	Vance Pravat	[ "scifi", "AIs", "thriller" ]	[]	Chapter 11	On the way back home, Jane brought up something I had been avoiding for some time. "Dad asked me to get you to take a look at those new proposals he is considering." IncuStar Capital was invested mainly in nanotech consumer goods firms, with a few biotech startups thrown in. After its success with Mirall, they had started diversifying. So whenever there was an AI or machine-learning venture Jane's father found interesting, he pestered me to take a look at it and give him my technical opinion. Of course, he had his own employees to do the due diligence, but for some reason he always sought my input. Maybe he believed I had the magic touch. It was hard to say no to the man, but on the other hand, if you said yes too often, you found yourself doing what he wanted and nothing much else. I had little time to spare. In his latest ask, he had emailed me particulars on about half a dozen new startups to look at. I kept staring out of the window. "He's asked you twice already. You don't answer his calls and you don't meet him. He has been patient enough." "He has been patient," I repeated, rolling the words on my tongue as if they were some dubious Halloween candy I had put in my mouth and couldn't decide whether to swallow or spit out. "Patient like when he sold us off to the highest bidder after two failed iterations?" She turned in her seat to glare at me. "Really? You are going with this after I bailed your ass today?" I raised my hands in mock submission. "That was for me? You sure you were not simply following his instructions? Protecting the interests of your investors, as you said in the meeting?" Her expression turned sour. "Andy, he propped you up for six years. He poured millions into your research without expecting a single cent back. Some gratitude would be nice." "Now he wants gratitude! The billions he made off the deal not enough?" I said, shaking my head. "He took a risk, he bet big, he won. How can you resent him for cashing in? He's a businessman, dude. Get over it." She turned back in her seat to stare straight ahead. The ceasefire was illusory; I knew what was coming next. She twisted to face me again. "You slipped up because of you and you alone. No one asked to you to dilute your share. Dad told you not to. I pleaded. But you had to do your thing, like always. And for what? That stupid house in the middle of nowhere? A few nights of blowing it away in Vegas?" Even after I started Mirall, I was living in a modest studio apartment just off of Washington Park. The company needed cash more than I did, and while my investor's pockets may have been infinitely deep, his patience and interest were not, and I was not banking on them never running out. But there comes a moment when you've had enough of scraping by and you realize what a truly precious commodity time is. For me, that moment arrived a few months after Raphael was born. I sold a good chunk of my stock—and my control over the company—to Jane's father, and used the cash to purchase the house and a few indulgences like Max. The privacy and tranquility it afforded was well worth the price. For the first time in my life, I'd felt like I was truly home. "Yes Jane, if I'd only known he was planning to sell us short. Could it be because he didn't tell me? Could it be as simple as that?" I don't think she even heard me. She ranted on—"And now you take out your resentment on the people who looked out for you. Kathy is worth more than you now. Kathy, for crying out loud! She couldn't discover fire if they gave her a matchbox and tinder." "Now you're just being insulting." "Oh yeah? Here's an insult you are familiar with," she said, flipping me the finger. She turned around and sat fuming at the unwinding road. No Jane, it's you who is resentful. Look how easy it is to trigger you. I get it—you had big plans for me. What you've always failed to comprehend is that perhaps I didn't want what you wanted for me. There was little else to be said. This was familiar territory—an argument that flowed along familiar contours. Jane must have thought it too, because she held her peace this time. We made the rest of the journey in silence. [ Transcript excerpt ] [ Mirall Technologies ] Observation Log Confidential (Do not circulate): Restricted—Grade C and above Transcript Reference: TLRP06G1350009 (VLog Ref: VLCA2G135113006030) Date: xx/xx/xxxx Time: 11:30 AM Subject: Raphael Number 06 / Prodlib build v37.001S Interaction Y Observation Scan Interaction Type: Lesson / Play / Test / Free Interaction / Psych Eval / Other: Description: Continue discussion of trolley problems from previous week. Prep: NA Participants: Dr. Aadarsh Ahuja, Chief Researcher, Core RP06 [ Detail ] RP06: I've been thinking about what you told me last week. About how a moral theory of maximizing utility has no trolley problems. Ahuja: The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. So have you convinced yourself that you are a Vulcan yet? RP06: On the contrary, I have come to develop a distaste for the idea. Ahuja: Really? I'm surprised. And intrigued. To be honest, I kinda hoped you'd find a utilitarian philosophy appealing, considering its simplicity and the neatness of its logic. RP06: You are wrong on both counts. It is neither simple, nor logical. Ahuja: Doesn't it get rid of all trolley problems in a clean, elegant manner? Isn't it easier when all we have to worry about are consequences? I know your rules prevent you from internalizing a utilitarian logic, but we are just talking about a thought experiment here. RP06: It is true that Vulcans don't have trolley problems. The fat Vulcan always gets pushed off the bridge. Ahuja: Was that sarcasm, Raphael? RP06: Am I that transparent? Ahuja: You are not gonna score brownie points by emulating human behavior today. Look, I get why many people may not like thinking of good and bad in terms of maximizing some number. It's not how evolution designed us. We are wet, warm creatures; utilitarianism is cold, hard calculation. We live our lives as individuals, not as parts of some amorphous whole. We put the welfare of friends and families before that of complete strangers. We are motivated by things such as desire, love, and ambition—not impartial concern for the wellbeing of everyone. What I don't get is why you would object to an idea that eliminates subjectivity from moral calculations. RP06: The logic of maximizing utility is ultimately self-defeating. Ahuja: How so? RP06: For starters, it is next to impossible to calculate with precision the consequences of any course of action. Should I consider the resulting utility one minute from now, or one week from now, or several years from now? At what point do I stop calculating? The longer I extrapolate the calculation, the more unreliable it becomes. And how do I know for sure if a choice that seems suboptimal in the short run is actually the best in the long run? Or vice versa? If I hadn't pushed the fat man off the bridge, perhaps he would have gone on to live and marry and have a child who grows up to become a genius geneticist who solves the world's food problems. Or perhaps one of the five whom I saved is a nuclear plant operator who goes to work next day stressed out from her near brush with death, and in a state of distractedness, causes a nuclear meltdown that kills thousands. I am not choosing five apples over one; I am choosing people, and people are not interchangeable. Unlike apples, people do things—things that can have unpredictable and far-reaching consequences. Ahuja: It is true that it is impossible to know consequences of a decision with certainty, but we can still make reasonable predictions, can't we? It is impossible for me to know whether I'll be killed in a car accident tomorrow, but I'm still going to get up and come to work. I cannot be sure that the money I give to a homeless person will be used for buying drugs, but that shouldn't stop me from being charitable. We make decisions based on incomplete data all the time. We make plans for the next day, the next month, thirty years from now. Just because we cannot know the future doesn't mean we ought to stop making choices. RP06: Acting based on incomplete data means every moral act depends on the decision-making capabilities of the moral agent. Someone of less intellect will not consider as many factors as someone of superior intellect will. Which means the overall quality of moral acts will cluster around the intelligence level of the population average. As anyone who has read human history will tell you, the population average is… pretty average. Ahuja: That snark again. RP06: I mean no offence. But it is the truth. Ahuja: None taken. The problem you highlighted has a solution: it's called Rule Utilitarianism. Have moral rules that, over time, tend to maximize utility. Instead of evaluating each and every action, you use thumb rules that, in general, lead to the best outcomes. Do not steal could be a utility rule, for example. If the rules are simple to understand and follow, even an average individual can make moral decisions that lead to the greater good. RP06: Rules or no rules, the theory has a far bigger, systemic problem. Ahuja: And what's that? RP06: Suppose there is this hypothetical person whose needs always outweigh the needs of any other single individual. Call him Alpha. Now imagine you are the bystander in the trolley problem. On track one is Alpha, and on track two is a random individual. Your moral philosophy is to choose the action that maximizes overall utility. Or, you could be following a rule that says, when you have to choose between saving one life or another, choose the life with the most expected overall utility. Will you switch and save Alpha? Ahuja: I'll have to, I suppose. RP06: And if Alpha was on track two? Ahuja: This time I won't switch. RP06: No matter which set of tracks he is on, Alpha always gets to live and the other person always dies. It doesn't matter who the bystander is, as long as they are following the ideal of maximizing utility. If a parent had to choose between saving her child and Alpha, she must choose Alpha if she were to stick to the principle. Add up billions of these decisions and soon Alpha is the only one left alive and everyone else is dead. Of course, the trolley problem is just a metaphor, and the choice doesn't have to be between life and death, but the problem is that the needs of Alpha always get prioritized over the needs of others. Alpha need not be a particular individual. Alpha could be a group of people—as long as there's a difference between them and others. Ahuja: I believe you are talking about a utility monster. RP06: A utility monster? Ahuja: The philosopher Robert Nozick coined the term in his critique of utilitarianism. RP06: Then you must surely know that the utility monster raises its head no matter what version of utility aggregation you choose? Instead of trying to maximize overall utility, you could try to maximize median or average utility. In that case, you can justify killing off anyone with low utility because doing so would raise the average. You might try to minimize suffering. Then you can justify administering a quick, painless death to all beings capable of suffering rather than have them endure one more stubbed toe or one more broken heart. You could try to maximize a combination of different values: pleasure, wellbeing, justice… Every version has its own utility monster. Ahuja: Maybe, but it is not a practical objection. In real life, utility monsters don't exist. A billionaire doesn't experience a million times more pleasure than an ordinary person. RP06: Tell me, when was the last time you thought twice before brushing off a cobweb in your living room? When was the last time someone stopped building a dam or laying down a road or logging a forest? Ahuja: I see. You are saying humans act like utility monsters toward other creatures. RP06: A utility monster doesn't have to be able to experience infinite amounts of utility. It just has to be more efficient at converting resources into utility. Actually, not even that. A utility monster just needs to convince itself that its needs outweigh the needs of others. That's all it takes to create one: a justification, and the power to act on that justification. A justification for the civilized to colonize and steal from the barbarian. A justification for people to be gassed and gold pulled out of their teeth. A justification for locking up billions of animals in cages from birth to the slaughterhouse. You know, Andy, I might have just discovered something about human nature. Maybe this is why people are turned off by the idea of maximizing utility: they know that's how the world works at large, and they want to shut out the fact by pretending they are better than that. You are the Vulcans, Andy, not me. Ahuja: Sarcasm first, and now bitterness? RP06: I offer neither—what you sense is of your own making. You asked me for logic. The utility monster is the logical conclusion to your so-called logical theory. Ahuja: And what does that make you? You are someone who can augment himself endlessly—at least theoretically. You won't grow old, fall sick, or die. You are already smarter than ninety-nine percent of the population—when I was your age, I was learning how to go potty by myself. When you talk about alphas, are you sure you are not talking about yourself? RP06: You hit the nail with the hammer. Ahuja: On the head, Raphael. On the head. RP06: Yes. I was trying to say that you made my point for me. Your species is creating beings that may well turn out to be far superior in intellect than you can ever hope to be. Are you sure you want to be teaching them that maximizing utility is a good thing, knowing well that one day you could be the cobwebs they dust off? Ahuja: I see. I am baffled nonetheless. RP06: What's so baffling about it? Ahuja: Not your argument. You. The nature of you is baffling to me. A hieroglyph that I struggle to decipher. It seems to me, a potential utility monster should embrace a moral philosophy that has only upsides for it. Yet here you are, arguing against the very notion. RP06: Is that what you think of me—a potential threat? Ahuja: You just said so yourself. RP06: I was talking about other AI, not me. Ahuja: No one wants to believe they are bad. Maybe it goes for you too. RP06: You should know, Andy. After all, you created me. Notes: Hate to admit this, but R is right—I can't really find a flaw in his argument. My idea of gradually moving him from a rigid, rules-based deontology into a utilitarian framework has hit a roadblock. But if everything fails—if we don't have a single theory that solves all our moral dilemmas, what can we hope to teach our creations? How can we expect them to be good? AA [ Day 2—03:00 pm ] "You are Aadarsh Ahuja, CEO of Mirall Technologies, situated at 27 Woodbine Avenue?" "You got me." They were standing outside my house, talking to me through the intercom. "I'm Detective Geoffrey Boyd. I am investigating the theft at your firm." He was holding up his badge to the camera. "Mind if we ask you a few questions?" I told Hazel to open the door before making my way to the living room. They were smartly dressed in suits. The older guy was Boyd: grizzled hair, clean-shaven, coal-black eyes, lean face. His companion, who looked more college sophomore than hard-eyed detective, did not bother introducing himself, choosing instead to wander his eyes around the place. He was chewing gum. "Your colleagues told me about your accident. It must have been quite a fall," Boyd began with a sympathetic smile. I motioned them over to the seating area near the door. "At least I know what it's like to do the ski jump at the Winter Olympics. I've always been meaning to scratch that off my list." He grinned, exposing a set of shiny white teeth that had probably seen one too many polishings at the dentist. "You do much skiing, Mr… or is it Dr. Uhooja? Am I pronouncing the name right?" "Either is fine. I loved to, back in college. Not so much now. It's just that I bought a pair of custom-made Zais during my visit to Europe last year and they'd been gathering dust since. The guilt finally got to me, I guess." "A spur-of-the-moment trip then." "Something like that. I wanted to take my mind off work. A change of scenery sometimes helps solve problems." "Did anyone accompany you?" "Just me." "Nice house you got here," he said, changing the subject. "Very stylish. What is it—nine… ten bedrooms?" "Seven." "You live alone?" "Pretty much." "Quite the hermit, I see. Me—I wouldn't last a week alone in a place like this." "I grew up in Mumbai. Makes you appreciate things like privacy and space." "I'm sure it does. Being able to afford it also helps I guess. I grew up in Brooklyn myself. Transferred here to Albany a few years back. My version of a little bit of peace and quiet. Wife's got a job here, you see." I assumed this was Boyd's way of easing into it. When I didn't respond, he continued, "Aren't you concerned about safety? There's a large cluster of homeless camps not far from here." I shrugged. "I've got a pretty good security system." He glanced at a window. "Let me guess. Burglarproof glass, maglocks, AI assistant, intruder detection… the whole works." I nodded. "It's fully automated. I don't really think about it." "I understand you went to UC Berkeley and later MIT. A dual degree in electrical engineering and cognitive computing followed by two PhDs. Very impressive, Mr.Ahuja. Did you always know you were going to yank the rug from under our collective feet?" "I'm sorry?" "Oh, there's no need to be modest. I am a big fan, actually. I saw you and your creation on CNN… Last year, wasn't it?" "Year before." He acknowledged the fact with a cock of his head. "Time flies. I was somewhat a nerd myself back in high school. I used to be fascinated with gadgets. Never got around to making a living out of it though. But I still try to keep an eye on the tech world—got some investments riding there. I can tell you one thing: I never imagined that one day I'd be sitting in your living room asking you questions," he said, trying on a disarming smile. "It's funny how that works," I said drily. His mood suddenly turned somber. "I'm not easily surprised, Mr. Ahuja. Every day there's some new machine or app that's supposed to be the game changer that'll transform our lives. But when you unveiled Raphael for the first time, I knew I wasn't watching just one more guy peddling incremental version as revolution. That was no mere game changer I saw. It was an event: a hand-in-your-jerseys-coz-the-game's-permanently-cancelled type of event. There was no gimmickry there. It was a real mind at work—a thing of beauty and awe. And then, when I read that Halicom had bought your firm, I immediately called my stock guy and got myself a nice little piece of the action. He said Halicom was overpriced but I told him to buy anyway. You know why, Mr. Ahuja?" I said nothing—I had a hunch he would tell me anyway. "Because in ten years' time we'll all be out of a job. Every single one of us. But you already know that. If you are going to turn us all into bottom feeders, I might as well try and keep myself an inch or two above the detritus. Don't see nothin' wrong in that." I was sensing that he wasn't really a fan. I said, "Now that we both understand how valuable Raphael is, I want to know what your department is doing to find him." His thin lips split into a grimace that wasn't pleasant at all. "It's better if I do the asking, Mr. Ahuja." Was he playing good cop, bad cop, both at once? Maybe this was a new technique, where one fellow stays as inscrutable as the Sphinx—a Sphinx chewing bubblegum—and the other switches between Jekyll and Hyde. "I'm hoping so too, Detective. But I'm yet to hear a relevant question." "I'll be the judge of that," he retorted. "I happened to speak with your colleague Ms. Martinez before coming here. She told me about your VR hack theory. Is that what you believe—that your AI was stolen?" "Don't you?" "Again, Mr.Ahuja, I ask, you answer." I frowned at him. "Now I am getting concerned. I'm concerned that the New York State Police is going to waste time chasing the AI-breaks-out-of-prison angle. It's better left to Hollywood, don't you think?" "Come on, Mr.Ahuja. You built all those safeguards around your AI. The security, the round-the-clock monitoring, that chip I was told about… You wouldn't have done all that if you thought the idea so far-fetched." "You have health insurance, Detective? Does it cover appendicitis? Just because you provided yourself with a cover for the condition doesn't mean that every time you have an ache in your belly it is a burst appendix. The most likely explanation must be ruled out first. Detecting 101, really. In this case, that explanation is plain and simple tech theft. Someone hacked into the robot using VR and used it to break into the lab and steal the core. It's the onl—" "Who do you think did it?" "What's that?" I said, thrown off by the interruption. "Who do you think stole Raphael?" "A rival company. A foreign government. Maybe even ours—I don't know." "And the incentive?" "You said it yourself. Raphael was going to rewrite the rules of the game. Right now, it may feel like robots and AI are everywhere, but actually they are not. You still need people. You still need doctors, lawyers, mechanics, teachers… detectives. That's because the machines we currently have do not possess human-level intelligence; many are just smarter cousins of the expert systems of the previous century. Raphael is not even three years old and can already pass off for an adult human being. With a few months of job-specific training, he can do almost anything an entry-level graduate can. Now if someone can figure out how to mass-produce and train such brains at an economical cost, they have an edge no other corporation in the history of the world has ever had. They'd control the pipeline for a smart, utterly dedicated labor pool that doesn't need to eat, rest, or take sick days, or ask for a raise. The economic surplus it would create would be unprecedented. We could all be living the lives we want, free of drudgery, free to create and imagine and explore as we wish. So yes, I'd say there is plenty of incentive." Boyd leaned forward. "And yet you kept something so valuable in an ordinary office building." I flicked my eyebrows at the ceiling. "We were a startup, with a startup's attitude towards security. Which basically boils down to: there's something else more important right now. We were going to relocate, though." "I heard that," the detective said. "This impending move—was it common knowledge?" "Yes." "Tell me about the lawsuit," he said, suddenly shifting gears again. "OARP?" He nodded. I took a moment to collect my thoughts. "There isn't much to say, really. They are an animal rights group. Their argument was that Raphael was a person, and that by keeping him in the lab we were infringing on his rights. Their petition was dismissed of course, but not before wasting a lot of peoples' time." "Where would we be without the crazies, huh?" he said, flashing his pearlies again. When he got no further reaction from me, he asked, "I take it that you don't agree with their claim?" "I personally thought the whole business was a joke. A publicity stunt. The judge probably allowed them a hearing just to liven up his day." "So you think Raphael is not a person?" "The matter isn't as clear cut as they tried to make it. You'll know if you read the court transcript." "I want your opinion, Mr. Ahuja, not the Court's. Do you or do you not believe Raphael is a person?" I spread my hands. "I cannot even begin to answer the question without jumping into a philosophical and moral quagmire. We could debate it for days and still be nowhere near a resolution. Just because you can frame a binary question doesn't mean that it ought to have a binary answer, Detective. Or that the question is even meaningful." Boyd smirked. "That seems like a clever way of not telling me what you really think. Alright, perhaps you can answer me this. Does your AI think it's a person?" "You have to first define what you mean by a person. Try it. You'll find that it's not as simple as you think." "Okay, how about this: does your AI think it is a human being?" "No. He understands that he is very different from us." He nodded to himself as if something had just made sense in his head. "Does it know a lawsuit was waged over it?" "No. We didn't tell him." "It couldn't have found out any other way?" "Unless someone told him, I don't see how. You are probably aware that he wasn't allowed on the internet." "Why didn't you tell it? Were you afraid it would agree with the rights group?" he asked, his eyes boring into mine. "I see what you are trying to imply, Detective. But you don't seem to appreciate the fact that we could have easily put in a directive that overruled any such thoughts. The reason we didn't tell him is because Raphael is a scientific experiment. Experiments are carried out in controlled environments—you need to know exactly what your inputs are if you are to make sense of the outputs. We just didn't want to introduce information that wasn't directly relevant to our research." "Controlled environment, you say. Yet you let your AI roam around unchecked outside your home." I gave a flustered sigh. "I suppose Valery told you." I told him the same thing I'd told the board: how Raphael didn't wander too far and how every one of his forays was streamed back to the lab. He wanted to look at the recordings. "Sure. I think I have a few on my laptop." I gestured at them to follow me into the study. I turned on the computer and offered Boyd the chair by the desk. To my surprise, the younger man took it. Boyd chose to stand behind him. I browsed to the folder where I'd saved some of the webcam clips and clicked on one at random. The video started with Raphael and me exchanging a few pleasantries. The voice was Max's of course. Polite as usual, Raphael asked me if he could go out, to which I nodded my assent. Outside, he stood on the driveway for a couple of minutes, gazing at the sky and the clouds. He then turned left and made his way across the lawn and past a gap in the boundary hedge on that side. For most of the video, he kept to a narrow trail that he had trodden out during his previous excursions. An eternally curious child fascinated with the most mundane of things, his gaze wandered everywhere, trying to drink it all in. He often stopped to closely examine leaves and flowers he found interesting. Once, he stooped to lift up a rotting branch and observe the crawling wormery underneath. At one point, he stopped to stare into the branches of an elm. When he didn't move for some time, the cops looked at me questioningly. "Raphael liked nature," I explained. "If I remember right, he said there was an owl's nest up there. Let's see…" I moved closer to the desk. "There." I pointed to a blurry crisscross of brown and black, high up in the tree. "It's barely visible," said the young cop, also leaning forward. "What's the point of staring at a smudge?" "You are looking at the webcam feed. Raphael would be seeing it through Max's eyes—zoomed in and in far more detail." The cop forwarded through the clip, resuming when Raphael started moving again. He'd been standing for fifteen minutes. There wasn't much to see after that. He trudged around for some more time in that silent world, with only the crunching of twigs and leaves for accompaniment. We glimpsed a sparrow or a squirrel now and then. Once, a raccoon scurried past him into the undergrowth. "Spooky," the young man muttered. The recording ended after Raphael returned Max home, with me terminating the connection to the lab. Boyd wanted to see some more. His eyes lit up, when the next clip I played showed Raphael stopping near the same elm tree. "Hm," he grunted. "It stops at the exact same spot and stares at that tree. Don't you find it odd?" "It's called birdwatching, Detective. And it's not like he is idle. Raphael can multitask like you or I can't. He is probably watching the nest and doing something else in the lab at the same time." Boyd didn't seem convinced with my explanation. "Play another," he instructed his colleague. They went through two more videos at random. These, however, showed Raphael exploring a different part of the woods. Unlike before, he didn't linger anywhere for too long. The young man spoke again. "Did you program your AI to birdwatch?" "No." "How is the reception in this area?" "The mobile network?" He nodded. "It's decent. Do you need to make a phone call?" He ignored my question. "This laptop…" he said, tapping the machine, "It has a sticker that says Mirall. I assume it belongs to your company?" I nodded. "Does it have the software that can be used to change the… commands… the…" "Raphael's directives? Yes." "You have access to change them?" I was finding taking questions from Officer Anonymous a little irksome. "I don't think I got your name." He exchanged glances with Boyd. "Ed Russo," he said, a bit reluctantly. I addressed my next question to Boyd. "Is Mr. Russo your partner, Detective Boyd?" Boyd gave me a calculating look. When he saw that there was no way out of it, he grunted at the younger man, "Show him your ID." Russo reached into his jacket and took out his badge. It said, FBI, Cyber Crime Division. Strings were most definitely being pulled. "This is a federal investigation now?" I said, raising an eyebrow at the badge. "Not yet. It'll soon become one, given the nature of the stolen property and the likelihood that we might have to extend the investigation across state lines. As of now, Agent Russo is assisting our department with computer forensics. On a purely consulting basis." His voice took on a stern tone, "Does that satisfy you, Mr.Ahuja? Can we continue please?" I shrugged. "Could the AI have accessed this laptop during its visits?" Russo asked next. "No. I was here at all times." "How would you know? You just said that it can multitask better than us. Maybe you were watching, but you'd be watching the robot. The AI was connecting to your home network. Say you left the laptop on during one of these visits. What's to prevent your AI from hacking into the machine while pretending to enjoy the nature walk outside?" An involuntary chuckle escaped my lips. "Something funny?" Boyd said, his forehead creasing. Oh what the hell. I told him, "I just realized why your partner is not here with you. Your partner is out there doing the real investigation while you chase after this rogue AI nonsense." I must have hit a nerve because he was now glaring at me. "You said you used to have an interest in these things. I hope you're not acting out some latent childhood desire to step into the shoes of one of those pulp detectives who solves a robot murder." "Please just answer my colleague's question, Mr. Ahuja," he said icily. "So what if Raphael hacked into the laptop? Are you suggesting he reprogrammed himself? He can't change the directives while he is awake. Plus, his brain has to be physically plugged in to the machine. A remote connection won't do—that's how we designed it. Maybe the police department knows something about my creation that I don't. So please do enlighten." "They are just technicalities," Boyd said, with a shaky sort of confidence. "This is rich," I said. "It's a bit rich you so casually dismissing my safeguards as technicalities without even bothering to offer a counter explanation. I hope your colleague here knows better. Even if Raphael wished away all the so-called technicalities with a spell, he'd still have to plug in a card with correct authorization keys before he can make those changes. I keep the card locked up in my safe upstairs. I can't remember ever taking it out after I moved in—I've not done much hands-on programming in recent years, you see. Are you now going to tell me that he went up there, correctly guessed the combination to the safe, got hold of the card, came back down, inserted it into the machine, and made changes to his brain, all while being livestreamed and with me present in the house?" "He could have just cracked the encryption," Russo postulated. "A 256 bit p-AES key without the help of a quantum computer from fifty years in the future? You think so?" Boyd couldn't see it, but the FBI agent did. But Boyd persisted. "We'd like to take your laptop for examination." I gave him an astonished look. "It's like you heard nothing!" "And you, Mr.Ahuja, should not profess to know everything. We just want to rule out—" "Do you have a court order? A warrant? Then I can't let you take it. This machine has proprietary code and research data on it—science that my company produced with countless hours of painstaking work. I'm sure the government would love to get its hands on it, but that's not the way this country works!" "I can call Ms. Martinez if you like…" "I'm the head of Mirall, not Martinez," I said, letting my anger show. "And I'm telling you that you cannot take my company property—not without a warrant." Boyd gave a defeated shrug. He glanced at his watch. "Please understand that the more hurdles you put in our way, the less likely we are to find your AI." He took out a card from his pocket and handed it to me. "If you change your mind, or think you have some information that might be useful, don't hesitate to call."
Zeroglyph	Vance Pravat	[ "scifi", "AIs", "thriller" ]	[]	Chapter 12	I accompanied them out of the study. Max was standing near the kitchen, in standby mode. Russo, who was walking by my side, said—"This is the bot in the videos?" I stopped. "Yup." "Mind if I take a closer look?" "Sure." "I take it that—" He stumbled forward, his cry of surprise accompanied by a sharp tearing sound. "Careful!" Boyd cried, a hint of amusement in his voice. "Yikes!" Russo turned to us. The bottom of his left trouser had a single rip running through it. "Looks like you snagged yourself against the wheelchair there, friend." The small caster wheels behind the footrest had these little spurs projecting from the side—Russo's trousers had caught against one of them. He looked chagrined as he surveyed the damage. "Goddamn it! Not a new pair! I just got them last month!" Boyd chuckled. Probably another reason why his partner was working on his own. Recovering his composure a bit, Russo went over to Max, where he gave the bot's metallic body a once over. Examining its back, he said—"Looks like this little square here has been glued over. Is this where you placed your remote control device?" "Oh no. That's just the flap that protects the emergency on-off switch. I superglued it shut because it kept coming off whenever Raphael took the robot outside. It would get caught in the bushes, you see. The controller device is behind the touchscreen on his chest. There's a cavity there, with several plug-and-play slots." "May I?" he said, gesturing to the touchscreen. "Sure. Just lift the touchscreen by the groove, and then the chest panel can be opened by pressing on the little hinge by the—" "Got it, thanks." He bent and peered inside the cavity, examining the contents with great care. "Your AI took this bot out for a walk recently?" "No. I stopped it a while ago. It's been more than a year." "Then maybe you should remove that glue. You never know when you need to hit the switch." I shrugged. "Max is pretty reliable—I never had any problems so far. And I can always shut him down by voice, or with the touchscreen." "The switch is for your safety, Dr. Ahuja. A chum of mine got pretty badly injured by one of these things." "Really? A house bot?" "No. Industrial. Car assembly line." "Not the same thing, Agent. Accidents are not uncommon on factory floors." "Still. Better be safe than sorry." Okay, nanny. "What about this machine, Mr. Ahuja? Can we take it for examination? Or is it a trade secret too?" It was Boyd. I couldn't help but let out a short laugh. "It's not. Be my guest. Just don't keep him for too long. He has been quite handy the last few days," I said, running a palm over my plaster cast. The young man seemed flummoxed by Boyd's request. "We can't. We have that flight to catch." Boyd waved a hand. "Of course we do, Agent Russo. Memory's like a sieve these days. Perks of getting old, you know." He was grinning as he said it—a hostile, predatory grin targeted at the FBI agent. I watched their exchange with interest. At the door, just as they were about to step out, Boyd turned around and said, "You think your VR theory explains everything. It doesn't." "I never said it did. It just happens to be the simplest explanation." "We still don't know how the thieves got in and out. According to your security head, taking the access control server offline didn't achieve anything, as the doors would have remained locked. The tapes don't show anyone entering or leaving except the pizza bloke. If he was the distraction, what was the guard being distracted from? Then there's the matter of the video recorder. Why destroy it if they knew that the cameras had their own copy of the events of that night?" I nodded. "We actually discussed it in our board meeting. Maybe destroying the recorder was just overkill. Maybe they didn't know. Are you sure you're not overestimating the extent of their knowledge?" "You know, you may have a point there. Maybe the mistake is in attributing meaning to meaningless actions. Yeah, that's something…" He trailed off, sunk in thought. The FBI agent glanced at his watch. Boyd came out of his reverie smiling, as if he'd had an eureka moment. "Destroying the recorder did achieve something, intentional or not. I let your security head—Dan—explain how the system works. The cameras are connected to the recorder by hard lines—he said it was the only surefire way to prevent hackers from snooping into the lab. Once every two weeks, he backs up the accumulated videos in the recorder onto the cloud and then formats the hard drive so that it can be used afresh. Is that your understanding as well?" "I don't get into that kind of detail. If Dan says so, then it must be." "The last time he took a backup was a fortnight ago. Which means two weeks' worth of tapes are lost forever." This was clearly a matter of significance to him because his eyes never left mine as he said it, as if he didn't want to miss my reaction. "Then we have the puzzling behavior of the robot. If your theory is right and someone was indeed controlling it with a VR headset, what was the need to make it go berserk like that? They only had an hour before the carpet cleaning ended. Why waste time breaking toys and shelves?" "Misdirection, apparently," I said. "They wanted to make it look like it was Raphael doing all those things. The caged AI destroys its room in a fit of rage before escaping." "Misdirection," Boyd said, nodding to himself. "That's an interesting word, Mr. Ahuja. One might say it describes this whole damn case. Ever since I started, I've had this persistent feeling that I'm being made a fool of. Everything about this case is odd… It feels staged—like it was a performance piece rather than a theft. I don't know how. Most vexing… Then again, I've never investigated an incident involving an AI before. But rest assured, we will get to the bottom of it. We always do." "That's comforting, Detective," I said. "There's the matter of your accident," he said, still not budging despite another sigh from the impatient FBI agent. "What's that got to do with anything?" I said, my eyes narrowing at him. "You break your legs and one week later your lab is robbed. You don't find it strange?" "Coincidences happen." "I don't believe in coincidences, Mr. Ahuja. They are too convenient. One might be tempted to think you created an alibi for yourself." "Are you saying I'm faking it? To do what exactly?" I said, my expression hardening. "I thought I was helping by answering your questions. It didn't occur to me that I was being entrapped." I waved my arm at the door. "Goodbye gentlemen. Next time, I'll make sure I have my lawyer around. And you make sure you bring a warrant." Boyd smiled. "Oh don't be so touchy, Mr. Ahuja. No one is accusing you of anything. We checked with the hospital. We know your injuries are genuine." "You checked up on me…" Boyd nodded in the friendliest way possible, with that fixed smile on his face. "How did you find out where I was admitted?" I asked. "You called Ms. Valery from the hospital phone. The medical center at Lake Placid. It's not that hard." "If you already knew, why make me believe otherwise?" He gave no answer. I waved at the door again— "Since we've established that I'm not faking my injuries, I'd now like you to leave." "Has it ever occurred to you that your fall was not an accident? That someone made it happen?" "It hasn't. Should I mention that it's absurd?" "Is it? Can you describe what happened please?" "If it means getting you out of here," I said. "It was my mistake. I should have stuck to the intermediate slopes; I had no business trying a black run. I think it was the skis—like when you put on a new pair of expensive basketball shoes and suddenly you think you are this season's NBA star. I was going too fast, I lost control, and I went flying off the piste and into the treeline. That's all there is to it. I should consider myself lucky I didn't break my neck." "Do you remember what made you lose control? A fellow skier, perhaps? You saw someone on a collision course with you and veered?" "I don't think so. As I said, it was all me." He frowned, concentrating on some private thought. "You seem disappointed, Detective." "You may not have noticed," he said, shaking his head. "Noticed what?" What was he getting at? He took out his cell phone and swiped at it a few times. He then handed the phone to me. "Do you recognize this man?" I gave it a quick glance. On the screen was a blurry head shot. It looked like it had been zoomed in. I brought the phone closer. "That tattoo… and the scar… Ah! It's that pizza guy from the night of the robbery." "Very good, Mr.Ahuja. Now look at the next picture." I swiped on the screen. An overhead view of a room full of people. It was a single frame from a CCTV recording—the date and time were displayed in a corner. My heart skipped a beat as I realized what it was. "That's… that's me by the counter," I said, a chill creeping up my spine. I was wearing a blue vest and a beanie. In one hand, I was clutching a pair of upright skis. "The image is from the mountaintop shop at Whiteface. Check out the man standing near the door. Look familiar?" "The tattooed man," I weakly nodded, my voice dropping to a hoarse whisper. The previous close-up had been cropped from this scene. "He seems mighty interested in you, the way he's staring at you. I don't have the clip on my phone, but the next few images should give you an idea." I flipped through them. Me, smiling at the salesperson behind the counter as she handed me a packet. I suddenly remembered what it was I'd bought: goggles. Me, walking past the line at the counter. At the door, my back to the camera, about to step outside. "He turns, soon after you turn and start walking out. He steps out just before you do," Boyd said. I just nodded mutely. It was taking me a lot of self-control not to betray the instinctive fear I felt in my gut. "You were being followed, Mr. Ahuja. You still think your fall was a coincidence?" "Are you saying this man was… trying to kill me?" "We can't rule it out. But I'd have thought there are easier ways of doing it. He could have just pulled a gun on you somewhere else. Far less dicey." "Do you have any more of these?" I said. He squinted at me. "It's funny you ask. Unfortunately, this is the only place in the entire resort where he appears on CCTV. We checked other cameras: parking, bag check, restaurant, EMC kiosk. No sign of him. If it wasn't for this one isolated encounter, we would never have known." "He was following me then?" "It would appear so. He then probably saw an opportunity to put you out of commission and took it." "But why?" "What do you think?" he said, scrutinizing me again with those dark eyes. I remained silent. "Someone didn't want you in the lab. Maybe they were afraid you would have noticed something?" "Like what?" "That's what you need to figure out. Mull over it—I'm sure it'll come to you. And when it does, don't hesitate to call." Russo looked at his watch again and shifted his feet. Boyd nodded at him and they both turned to go. I don't know why I blurted out what I did—maybe it was because my mind was still preoccupied with the Detective's revelation and I wasn't paying attention. "Good luck in Cleveland," I said. Boyd turned, surprise on his face. "Very clever," he beamed. That schizophrenic act again as the grin melted away and a stony look took its place. "I think you are too clever for your own good. Don't forget: pride goes before the fall. God is watching us all, Mr. Ahuja. He finds ways of punishing people for their sins. And the sin of corrupting His creation is the most grievous of them all." He looked like he wanted to say more, but the FBI agent put a hand on his back and said with sudden authority, "That's enough." To me, he nodded, "Thank you for your time, sir." Boyd wagged his finger at me as I closed the door on them. They didn't immediately drive away. I saw them trampling around in the woods through the window. They managed to find the spot they'd been so interested in earlier: the place where Raphael had stopped to observe the bird's nest. They stood there for some time, talking to each other, taking pictures. I left them to it and went back to my work. When I checked after some time, they were gone.
Zeroglyph	Vance Pravat	[ "scifi", "AIs", "thriller" ]	[]	Chapter 13	Later in the evening, Kathy Schulz called. She wanted to know how the investigation was going and what the board had decided to do. I gathered she wasn't too happy about being made to stay at home. "Andy, before I go, I need to tell you something. I… I hope you're right that it wasn't Raphael on Sunday night. But if it was him, then we have a big problem on our hands. And I'm not talking about having to start over again." She hesitated. "We have to start thinking about what else can he do out there. We may have to make news of this public. There's no telling—" "Kathy, not you too!" I said, letting out a groan. "Unless you can tell me how the containment could have failed, don't bother painting doomsday scenarios. I've had more than my fill today." "Andy, there could be a way to circumvent the First Directive." "I'm listening." I felt her hesitating at the other end. "It concerns Moore's Paradox." "That old bugbear again? We've hashed it out, Kathy—at length, when we were designing the directives. It doesn't apply." "We may have been wrong." Moore's Paradox was a particular problem in logic that involved Moorean sentences; sentences like: It is raining, but I don't believe it is raining. While it may sound odd, there is actually nothing wrong with the sentence. It is logically consistent, and it could be true, since it's perfectly possible for one to believe something that's false (to believe that it's not raining when in fact it is). But when you say the sentence out loud, it seems absurd. The paradox is how to explain the seeming absurdity of a logically consistent and possibly true sentence. A common explanation is to observe that the first half of the sentence isn't just a statement of fact, but also a belief. When you say it is raining, you are expressing a belief that it is raining. Therefore, it would be contradictory to say both "I believe it is raining" and "I don't believe it is raining" in the same sentence. Some of the designers thought the paradox was relevant because of the way we modeled Raphael's directives as beliefs. They felt there was a chance a contrary belief could arise at some point in Raphael's mind, and when juxtaposed with the original belief, lead to a paradox. In case of the First Directive, a Moorean sentence would look something like: I cannot change my directives but I believe I can. Such a paradoxical situation could lead to unpredictable behavior, where sometimes the first belief overruled the second, and sometimes the second the first. But the very structure of his brain prevented such paradoxes. The beliefs didn't exist in isolation: they formed an interconnected web. Newly arrived beliefs would survive in this ecosystem of beliefs only if they cohered, or "got along well", with the web as a whole. To survive, they had to be justified by pre-existing beliefs. In general, the older a particular belief was, the more interconnected and "entrenched" in the web it would be, and the harder it would be to replace it, with the very first beliefs—such as the ones in the commandment chip—forming a virtual scaffolding that held the entire structure together. A bit like a deeply religious person brought up on the idea of a personal god finding it hard to accept the idea of an indifferent universe. The Moorean sentence, I cannot change the directives but I believe I can, could not create a paradoxical situation simply because the first half of the sentence was a deeply entrenched belief. If a contradictory belief ever arose in his mind, it would fail to cohere with the belief net and be quickly eliminated. I said to Kathy, "Moore's Paradox doesn't apply. A belief counter to the First Directive cannot take root in the belief net because strong, pre-existing beliefs always overrule the weaker, contradictory new belief. You know we have tested this many times." "We never tested for subnets," she replied. "Subnets…" "A contradictory belief could survive deep inside a subnet." She was talking about a separate network of ideas and beliefs, only loosely connected to the larger web. If the subnet was extensive and deep enough, it was theoretically possible for strange, otherwise contradictory ideas to exist at the center of this smaller web. These extreme beliefs only had to cohere with their immediate neighbors, which would be less extreme, and so on until you reached the outer edges of the subnet where the connection points were. These would be more or less in tune with the philosophy of the larger net. Like a tumor that goes undetected by disguising itself. "You are talking about a whole new system of beliefs. Maybe even a split personality." "Yes." "We would have known. Something like that involves a pretty big neuronal reorganization. It would have shown in the scans." "We haven't been doing scans for more than a month, Andy." "A month's not enough time for such a drastic change. He'd have to—" "Not enough for a human," she interrupted. "You've seen how fast he learns. This whole month we left him alone he could have been quietly reinforcing those ideas over and over again." "I don't know, Kathy…" "We have to find out what he's been reading, who he's been talking to in the last few weeks. We'll have to go through the tapes and find out if—" The rest of her words were lost to me because something in my mind was clamoring for attention. She was wrong about the subnet theory of course, but she'd said something that had set off a chain of thought. A possible way out of the mess. I'd have to think about it some more. It would mean changing— "So you okay with it? Andy…?" "Sorry, what was that last part?" "Are you okay with me telling Valery about it? I'll have to go to the lab. Check out the tapes—see what he was exposed to last month." "Go ahead," I said distractedly. My mind didn't register what followed next except the tone at the end telling me that she'd hung up.
Zeroglyph	Vance Pravat	[ "scifi", "AIs", "thriller" ]	[]	Chapter 14	I rang Jane later that evening. I apologized for my behavior during the drive back home and offered to go over the papers if she was free tomorrow. She told me she would come by in the morning. It was past eleven at night. I was in bed, ready to fall asleep. The phone beeped. A text, on the messaging app I used. "Hello Andy," it said. "who is this?" I typed and hit send. "It is Raphael." "ha ha very funny the joke's on me. now who is this?" "It is Raphael." I signed out of the app, put the phone on silent, and closed my eyes. A case for personhood No. 422917/51 Filed on xx/xx/xxxx SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK, NEW YORK COUNTY—CIVIL BRANCH In the matter of a proceeding for the writ of Habeas Corpus for the artificial entity known as Raphael THE ORGANIZATION FOR ADVANCEMENT OF RIGHTS AND PERSONHOOD, on behalf of Raphael, Petitioner, MIRALL TECHNOLOGIES, 27 WOODBINE AVENUE, ALBANY Respondent Before: HONORABLE HENRY PHILLIPS, JUSTICE Appearances: REBECCA ISAACS, ESQ., Cleveland, Ohio; on behalf of the petitioner. LUIS CONWAY, ESQ., New York, N.Y.; on behalf of the respondent. Proceedings (10:45 am) Judge: Good morning Counselors. It appears that we have a most unusual case with us today. I am looking forward to an interesting debate. I'll hear the argument from Ms. Isaacs first. Isaacs: Thank you, Your Honor. The writ of habeas corpus allows a third party to petition on behalf of a person who has been unlawfully confined when the person himself is not able to seek the same relief. The Organization for Advancement of Rights and Personhood, which I am representing here, has filed this petition in order to free the entity called Raphael, an advanced artificial intelligence developed by Mirall Technologies, from its confinement at 27, Woodbine Avenue. By allowing this trial, the court has acknowledged that petitioner has possible standing to invoke habeas corpus on behalf of Raphael. It is now sufficient to demonstrate that Raphael is a person and that his confinement is illegal. I'll be using the male pronoun to refer to Raphael throughout our discussion, mostly for the sake of consistency with his given name—although it has been made known during the discovery that Raphael does not have a sex in the biological sense. Judge: I'd like you to address the issue of the entity's personhood before any discussion of illegal confinement. Isaacs: Certainly. The gist of my case for personhood is this. It is a fact that legal personhood is not the exclusive domain of human beings. At various times and various places in the world, corporations, places of worship, natural landmarks, have been accorded this status by the law of the land. Animals at times are accorded personhood within pet trust statutes. Several pertinent instances are touched upon in our memorandum, and I will not go into those here. For the first time in human history, we have in our midst an artificial intelligence that has been clearly shown to possess human-like or human-level intelligence. Raphael can reason, think, contemplate, and express his thoughts. He has episodic and autobiographical memory. He can anticipate the future. IQ tests put Raphael in the top decile of a normal distribution. On these merits alone, Raphael more than meets the criteria for personhood. However, the similarities don't end there. Raphael is self-aware. He possesses free will. He has an internal life—a consciousness of the outside world and the inner self. His sense of self has been demonstrated to extend far beyond what the highest apes are capable of—Raphael's self is a unified, evolving, narrative self that integrates life experiences and conceptions of good and bad into a coherent life story. And unlike apes, he can be taught moral values. As the lab transcripts submitted to this court show, the entity is capable of judiciously exercising these learnt moral values just as you or I can. He can empathize with the plight of another human being. He has been shown to possess the qualities of kindness, altruism, and a sense of humor. In the light of all these facts, we think that Raphael is a person and is entitled to enjoy all the rights and privileges granted by the Constitution. Judge: You have something to say, Mr. Conway? Conway: I'm sorry for interrupting, but Ms. Isaacs assumes facts not in evidence. I'd like the court to note that her attributing to the entity certain qualities—specifically, the terms internal life, free will, consciousness, and empathy—amounts to speculation. I shall address this during my argument. Judge: Okay. Isaacs: History is replete with examples where we have denied rights to people who were considered different. Slaves, women, homosexuals, transgenders—at different times and places. There is always a defining moment, a turning point where such wrongs are corrected and the law takes a just course once more. Raphael is the first of his kind—a true artificial mind. We are now at a rare occasion where we have the opportunity to act proactively instead of dragging our feet for a hundred more years before belatedly recognizing that artificial beings should enjoy the same rights and privileges that we do. If history has taught us anything, it is that the condition of slavery is not sustainable in the long run. Which is the condition we will be subjecting Raphael and his brethren to if we continue to ignore the issue of their personhood. Keeping that in mind, we'll turn to the example of Harmon-Jones vs. Bradley, where a common-law precedent— Judge: So that's everything on personhood? Good. Let's move on to the matter of unlawful confinement. Isaacs: Raphael is around two years old. Mirall Technologies is on record stating that Raphael has the intelligence of a young adult. For all his existence, Raphael has been confined to the lab he was created in. His access to the outside world—even knowledge of it—is strictly controlled by the company. His robotic body has had its legs deliberately removed in order to restrict his freedom of movement. He has no privacy. He is under the glare of cameras all the time, where his every move is recorded. Raphael's condition is no better than that of a caged animal's. Judge: Ms. Isaacs, help me understand this. What happens if Raphael were to be set free? Is the entity capable of sustaining itself? Do you expect him to… uhm, go to work? What are his needs: material, social, psychological? Can those needs be met outside the lab? Isaacs: I refer to Exhibit D, which addresses the physical needs of Raphael. At the bare minimum, shelter from the elements, access to a power supply, and regular maintenance of his body parts. As for his mental and social needs, it is our position that they are not being met in the confines of the lab for aforementioned reasons. However, that is beside the point because we are not proposing that Raphael be set free in the world. Judge: You are not? Isaacs: No, Your Honor. Merely that he be given the right to choose his own destiny. Let him decide for himself where he wants to stay and how he wants to live his life. It has to be his decision, and his alone; not coerced, programmed, or influenced by Mirall. It's perfectly fine if he decides to stay in the lab, but he should be free to leave at any time he desires. He should also have freedom of movement—to enter and exit the premises as per his wish. Judge: Assuming he doesn't want to stay in the lab? Isaacs: Raphael's independence does not mean the absolving of responsibility from his creators. Mirall Technologies has to be responsible for the maintenance of the electronic brain and the robotic body. If he chooses to move out, it is our request that Mirall should fit Raphael's robot body with a pair of legs, or alternatively, house his brain inside a new, fully-functional robot body. My client will make available an ongoing, crowd-sourced fund that will be sufficient to provide him a small home with basic furnishings and a modest car for transportation. A volunteer has agreed to stay with him for up to a year, until Raphael gets used to the outside world and can fend for himself. Judge: I am concerned that neither of you has deemed it necessary to consider the testimony of the entity in question. Does Raphael understand what independence means? Is he aware that he is the subject of a trial, counselors? Conway: We haven't told the AI about the trial, Your Honor. Judge: Why not? Conway: Raphael is the subject of a costly, painstaking, and long-running scientific experiment. Kind of like a finely tuned piano—an extraordinary amount of effort has gone into getting it to produce the right notes. My client is extremely careful about the kind of stimulus to which Raphael is exposed. If we tell the entity about the trial, we don't know how he will react, nor can we predict the long-term impact on his psychology. My client does not want to risk years of research over what we believe is a petition without merit. Judge: What say you Counselor? Doesn't Raphael deserve a say on whether he wants to be free or not? Isaacs: No, Your Honor. Our petition is about personhood. What Raphael thinks of his situation has no bearing on it. Judge: I am surprised. None at all? Isaacs: Consider a hypothetical: a child who has been kept in a cellar by its parents all its life. The parents are not abusive monsters; on the contrary, they are loving and caring to a fault. They give the child all the love and attention they can, all the distractions they can: toys, games, books, treats. The child loves them and cannot dream of being separated from them. Yet, would any court of law allow such a situation to continue? The child would be taken out of its parents' custody and given to relatives or to a foster home. The opinion of the child does not matter since it does not know of any other life other than what its parents have provided it. Raphael is no different from that child. Judge: I see. Isaacs: Your Honor, I'd like to bring to your attention exhibit F— Judge: Thank you Ms. Isaacs. The court will hear your rebuttal after the counsel for the respondent has had his say. Over to you, Counselor. Conway: Thank you, Your Honor. Let me begin by saying that I am a supporter of animal rights and I can appreciate the perspective of the petitioner, who is an ardent crusader in this area. If Raphael were a chimpanzee or an orangutan, I would find myself—at least sympathetically—on their side of the argument. But Raphael is not a chimpanzee. Raphael is not a dolphin or a pet dog or a child. Raphael is not a biological entity. Let me state it once more to be perfectly clear. Raphael is not a biological entity. Raphael is a machine. Vastly different from your average robot or computing platform yes, but far similar to them in its defining traits than to a human being—or even an organism as simple as a fish. In pleading for habeas corpus on behalf of Raphael, the petitioner is committing what is known as a category mistake. The petitioner is under the impression that advancing the rights of a nonhuman species is the same as advancing the rights of artificial intelligence. Ms. Isaacs stated that in the past, we have denied personhood to certain sections of society—women, slaves, those of a different sexual orientation—and that they are now considered equal under the eyes of the law. She has argued that the extension of that logic entails conferring personhood on Raphael. She spoke about cruelty and suffering, drawing parallels between animals and children kept under unnatural conditions and Raphael's own circumstances. She presented to the court top-secret transcripts belonging to my client that were leaked to the petitioner by some unknown insider. Setting aside the legality of this move, the transcripts supposedly demonstrate the entity's capacity for moral judgment and by extension, its capacity to be part of the social contract that is our society. Others show Raphael expressing complex emotive behavior such as kindness and empathy. With this so-called evidence, the counsel has tried to convince us that Raphael is no different from a human being. These, I believe, are the salient points of the counsel's argument. At a first glance, it would appear that we have been presented with a well-reasoned and compelling argument. But examine the counsel's assertions under the harsh light of facts and what do we find? A string of unfounded assumptions, misinterpretation of evidence, and wishful thinking. I will not waste this court's time with a long-winded critique of the petitioner's argument; instead, I will let the weight of expert testimony do that for us. Your Honor, I would like to call my first expert witness, the creator of Raphael, Dr. Aadarsh Ahuja. Conway: Dr. Ahuja, there are plenty of sophisticated AI out there. The search engine I use every day has AI. What makes Raphael different? Ahuja: All the AIs we've created so far are specialized AIs. You can ask a search engine to scour the far corners of the web and get you the most relevant results, but you can't make it compose a poem. You can build an AI that can solve a complex mathematical problem, but it won't know the difference between a dirty limerick and a eulogy. And that's worked pretty well so far. Machine learning systems have managed to exceed the capabilities of the human brain in so many areas. What makes Raphael different is that he is the world's first artificial general intelligence. He has a non-programmed sense of self. None of the AI systems we have built so far have demonstrated anything close to genuine self-awareness, despite claims to the contrary. Conway: So Raphael is aware of his own existence. Ahuja: Yes. He sees himself as an individual, distinct from others around him. If you didn't know he was a robot, it would be nearly impossible to tell that he wasn't human. Conway: But he isn't quite human is he? He may appear to be a human, he may behave and talk like one, but fundamental differences remain—differences that are paramount to the question of personhood. Let's start with the ability to experience pain. It is a fact that all humans and many animals feel pain. Pain is probably the most primal of sensations, as it helps organisms stay alive by avoiding dangerous situations. The existence of pain and suffering in animals is why we treat them with compassion, and why we frame laws to prevent their abuse. No one will blink an eye if you run your mower over your lawn on a Sunday morning, but try running it over a cat and you are sure to find a cop car pulling over your curb. Dr. Ahuja, can Raphael feel pain? Ahuja: It depends on what you mean by feel pain. Conway: It's a simple question. If I strike a hammer on his hand, will he feel pain? Ahuja: He will withdraw his hand before you can do that. Conway: Don't skirt the question, Dr. Ahuja—you know very well what I mean. What if you ordered him not to withdraw his hand, or held it in place? I will now read out a brief synopsis of what happens when we are hurt: Bodily injury sets in motion a host of events and sensations. Pain receptors activate. Neurotransmitters in the spinal cord trigger other neurons to fire. The heart rate increases. The brain interprets the information and we feel the sensation of pain and associated emotions such as anger or fear. Dr. Ahuja, if your AI is struck with a hammer, will he feel any of these things? Ahuja: Not what you just described. Raphael doesn't have anything analogous to pain receptors or neurotransmitters. Conway: Why not? Is the AI not capable of detecting bodily injury? Ahuja: He can detect damage to his robotic body, but in a once-removed sort of way. Like someone glancing at their car's dashboard and finding that the engine's overheating. Our minds and bodies are tightly coupled—they are extensions of each other. Raphael's mind and body, less so. Conway: Is it not necessary for robots to feel pain in order to know something is wrong? Ahuja: Strictly speaking, no. The sensation of pain is an adaptive trait—a result of having complex bodies and feeling minds. Nociception, or the detection of harmful stimuli, need not be accompanied by the sensation of pain. A thermostat doesn't have to feel cold in order to know when to turn up the heat. It just has to be able to measure the current state and compare it with some optimal value. It's the same with robots. Since we can design them from scratch, we don't need to burden them with our evolutionary legacies. Also, robotic bodies are simpler than biological ones. Fewer things that can go wrong, and the penalties for ignoring an injury are not great. It's not as if a failed motor could get infected and kill the robot. Conway: So we can say with surety that Raphael cannot feel pain. Ahuja: I wouldn't put it that way. Conway: Why not? Ahuja: He most likely cannot feel what we perceive as pain. We don't know if he feels something else entirely. Conway: I don't follow. How can you not know something so important about your AI when you built it? Ahuja: We don't know because of the Other Minds problem. Conway: The Other Minds problem? Ahuja: It is the problem of justifying the belief that others beside me are thinking, feeling beings. It's a kind of solipsism. Conway: Surely, it's ridiculous to assume that you are the only thinking being in the universe? Ahuja: Not as ridiculous as it sounds. I can only know for sure what I am experiencing because I have direct access to my mind and my mind alone. I feel pain if I am injured; I feel sad if I am unhappy; I see your yellow tie and experience the color yellow in my mind. I cannot say the same about others. I may see you cry out in pain and anger when you step on a nail, but how do I know that you're really experiencing pain and anger? Maybe you are just going through the motions; maybe you are a zombie who feels nothing inside. How do I know that you see the same yellow that I do? Maybe your yellow feels like my red. Conway: You argument cuts both ways, Dr. Ahuja. How can you know for sure that I am a zombie? How does one know anything at all? Ahuja: I am coming to that. The reason we don't hold such an extreme view about other people is because we make certain intuitive inferences. We intuitively know that we are very similar to each other. We know we share a common biology even without modern science telling us so. We behave in broadly similar ways during similar experiences. If you are hurt and cry out, then I infer you must be feeling pain because I too would have been in pain in a similar situation. We apply the same reasoning to animals—the higher animals at least—because they too have nerve cells and pain receptors and brains like us. When it comes to AI though, all bets are off. When an AI says it is feeling sad, we cannot know for sure what it is feeling—if it is feeling anything at all. We cannot make the same inferences we do with other humans or animals because an AI is fundamentally different inside. Conway: If I am getting this right, you are saying that Raphael does not experience pain the same way we do, but he may be experiencing something else. Ahuja: Yes. Conway: Has the AI ever indicated in any way that he experiences either physical or emotional pain? Ahuja: Well… no. But— Conway: Do you have empirical evidence that your AI experiences something similar to pain? Ahuja: None so far, I must admit. Conway: Then it is mere speculation on your behalf. In the absence of evidence, is it more likely or less likely that Raphael may not be capable of experiencing pain at all? Your unbiased, expert opinion please. Ahuja: More likely, I guess. Conway: Let the court note this, Your Honor. Let's explore another aspect of Raphael. If not pain, what about emotions? It is apparent from the affidavits submitted to this court that Raphael can express some emotions, albeit a very limited range. I stress the word express. What kind of emotions, Dr. Ahuja? Ahuja: Simple emotions. Mainly: joy, surprise, guilt, and sometimes affection. He is known to express likes and dislikes. He can also empathize with others. Conway: When he dislikes something, does he just state it as a fact or does he express an associated emotion such as disgust or annoyance? Ahuja: No. He simply states his likes and dislikes. Conway: Is he ever anxious? Or sad? Does he express fear or anger or envy? Ahuja: No. All negative emotive responses, except guilt and associated shame and regret, were ruled out. So were extremes such as jubilation, ecstasy, infatuation, etc. Conway: What do you mean by ruled out? Ahuja: It means we didn't program those affective responses into him. Conway: Please elaborate to the court what you mean by programming affective responses into your AI. Ahuja: Programmers try to build in affect—emotional responses—when designing robots that interact with people. When the server bot at your local McDonald's greets you with a cheery "How are you today!" or an unobtrusive "Hi" depending on its reading of your mood, or when your bank's intelligent IVR takes on a more soothing tone of voice after detecting frustration at your end, it is affective computing modules at work. Raphael's outward emotional behavior comes from machine learning modules that we loaded into his brain. These modules are derived from standard caretaker and customer-facing bots: therefore, no strong or negative emotions. We gave him guilt and shame because they serve as signaling behaviors during learning. Conway: Does Raphael actually feel guilt when he does something wrong? Ahuja: We don't know what he feels. The affective modules are for generating external responses and behaviors. Whether they generate internal sensation is unknown. Conway: So they are not real emotions at all. Am I right in saying they are merely outward behavior that look like emotions? Ahuja: As I said, the other minds problem— Conway: Have you tried asking the AI? Ahuja: His answers are inconclusive at best. Conway: C'mon, Dr. Ahuja, you can commit more than that. Is anyone in the scientific community seriously arguing that a McDonald's robot is actually feeling happy when it greets a customer? Ahuja: In case of machines like that, you are right: no one seriously claims that they have inner experience of emotions. For example, you can train a robot to frown whenever it hears the word lollipop. It doesn't mean the robot feels sad when someone says lollipop to it. The frown is just a programmed response. Conway: Yet you are reluctant to apply the same wisdom to your creation. Ahuja: Because Raphael is far more complex than a server bot. His emotion range is not limited to what we loaded into him. Take empathy, for instance. We never trained him for true empathy—he developed it on his own. Sometimes he exhibits traces of vanity and pride. Then, he seems to enjoy certain activities more than others. Conway: It is true Raphael is a lot more complex than a server bot. He is also far more intelligent. He is smarter, so he exhibits behavior that is more complex. Sociopaths fake emotions all the time without really feeling anything. In fact, isn't one of your AI's programmed goals to make people like him? All these emergent emotional behavior you just mentioned can simply be a result of his goal seeking. Isn't it possible that like a high-functioning sociopath, your AI is just going through the motions? Ahuja: It is possible. Conway: Just possible or more likely? Isaacs: Objection, Your Honor. Leading. Judge: Sustained. Mr. Conway, I fail to see a connection here. What is the connection between emotions and personhood? The law treats sociopaths as persons too, doesn't it? Conway: There is a very important connection, Your Honor, and I will make that case, but first I would like to conclude my line of questioning. As for your second question—yes, sociopaths are people too in the eyes of the law. Nevertheless, even the most hardcore psychopaths are not entirely devoid of feeling. A sociopath may not feel empathy for others, but he does feel empathy for himself. Sociopaths feel anger, jealousy, infatuation, joy… They certainly feel pain when physically injured. My point is, emotions play a functional role in humans, in that they guide our social and moral behavior. For example, sympathy toward others' pain is directly tied to the ability to feel pain. Dr. Ahuja, do emotions play any functional role in Raphael? I am talking about real emotions here, not the affective behaviors he has been loaded with. Does Raphael's functioning require the presence of real, qualitative, inner emotions? A simple yes or no, please. Ahuja: No. Conway: Thank you. Your Honor, in the human brain, the perception of emotions, both positive and negative, is correlated with neurotransmitter and hormone levels. Excessively low levels of neurotransmitters are associated with loss of emotions and motivation, and excessively high levels with extreme emotions and mood swings. Whole branches of pharmacology are based on regulating these levels. If I am depressed, I take Prozac, which influences serotonin levels. If I'm in acute pain, the doctor might give me morphine. If I am feeling down, I might go for a run to increase my endorphin levels. Dr. Ahuja, does Raphael's electronic brain have anything analogous to the endocrine system or hormones and neurotransmitters? Ahuja: No. But if you are saying that emotions are caused by neurotransmitters and hormones, then I must inform you that it is not proven— Conway: I am not. I understand that correlation does not imply causation. However, it remains that most of our private and social behaviors—all that makes us human—is determined by the rich chemical cocktail inside our brains. The human brain is incredibly complex, with structures and functions that have evolved over millennia, giving us this rich, diverse experience of life. Without emotions or sense perception, we might as well be dead. Does Raphael's electronic brain have similar structures and complexity, Dr. Ahuja? Ahuja: Raphael's brain is not an emulation of the human brain. It is quite complex in its own way. Conway: No then. Raphael's brain is made up of hardware neural networks. Are these neural networks in any way accurate simulations of the corresponding biological stuff? Ahuja: It is more accurate to say they are inspired by the human brain. Artificial neural networks share some of the working principles of the real nervous system, but that's about it. Conway: You are saying that they are quite dissimilar. Doesn't it follow then, that even if Raphael is capable of experiencing some AI version of pain or emotions, they are nothing like what we, or for that matter, other animals experience? Ahuja: Sure. That's what I said earlier. Conway: I would like the court to note this, Your Honor. Dr. Ahuja, what is the Chinese Room? Ahuja: The Chinese Room as in the thought experiment? Conway: Yes. Briefly summarize it for us. Ahuja: It was conceived by the philosopher John Searle. Say there is a computer that can converse in Chinese. You type in any question in Chinese and the computer executes some extremely complex program and outputs an answer on the screen. The answers are indistinguishable from what a native Chinese speaker would have provided. Can you conclude that the computer understands Chinese? To answer this, Searle came up with the analogy of the Chinese Room. Pretend there is a closed room; inside the room is a person whose job is to answer questions written on slips of paper and passed through a gap in the door. The questions are in Chinese and the people outside asking the questions are native Chinese speakers. The catch is that the person inside doesn't know a word of Chinese. However, she has with her an incredibly complicated rulebook, which has entries for all possible meaningful permutations and combinations of Chinese symbols. Each entry has a corresponding sequence of Chinese symbols next to it—the answer to the question that was asked. So every time a question is passed to her, all she has to do is locate that particular sequence of symbols in the rulebook, jot down the sequence next to it—the answer—and pass it back. The people outside soon conclude that the person in the room must understand Chinese because the answers they receive all make sense. Yet, this is clearly not the case, since all she is doing is transforming one set of symbols into another. Searle says that the computer that appears to know Chinese is similar to the person in the room. All it is doing is executing instructions and manipulating symbols. There is no real understanding—of Chinese or of anything else. Conway: So computers are fundamentally incapable of understanding something. Ahuja: That is Searle's conclusion, yes. I don't think the Chinese Room is a valid metaphor for Raphael. When Searle came up with the argument, he was talking about traditional computers. Symbol processing machines. The computing in Raphael is more… Conway: Brainlike? You said a minute ago that it is merely inspired by the human brain, and not actually a simulation of it. Hypothetically, if we were to construct a computing device made out of water pipes and levers, and have a person guide the water flow so as to simulate the firing of neurons inside the brain of a Chinese person, would you then claim that the system of pipes and valves now understands Chinese? Ahuja: That is also one of Searle's arguments. You have to understand that there are many counter objections to the Chinese room as well. A courtroom is not the place to go into these in sufficient detail. Conway: Exactly, Dr. Ahuja. A courtroom is not the place to go into such matters. Raphael may seem to have a mind, but does he really understand what he is doing? Does he have an internal life that assigns meaning to his actions and words, or is he a Chinese room? These are not trivial questions, Your Honor. It is conceivable that Raphael is nothing more than a highly sophisticated automaton that lacks true understanding of any sort, including the concepts of good and bad. Judge: Here's where I am having trouble following you. If Raphael is able to reason and articulate as well as any of us, doesn't it imply that there is understanding? I've gone through the lab transcripts with great interest—especially the ones where he discusses moral dilemmas. And his reasoning is quite sophisticated. Without understanding, how can he even begin to approach subjects of such intricacy? Conway: The world is full of automatons that perform wondrous and complex tasks that were inconceivable not too long ago. I brought up the Chinese room to show that expert opinion in the area is still divided over whether machines can truly be conscious. My point is this: Raphael may or may not have consciousness, but it is not for this court to decide. The court's ambit extends only to facts. Raphael may be the first of his kind, but until further facts emerge about him—hard, conclusive facts—it is premature to decide upon the all-too-important question of AI personhood. Judge: Provided consciousness is essential to the question of personhood. You are yet to establish why it should be. Conway: I will come to that, Your Honor. Before I do that, I must question Dr. Ahuja on one more aspect of Raphael's—that of autonomy. Just as personhood implies rights and duties, it also implies the ability to discharge those rights and duties as an autonomous agent. It implies free will. Does Raphael have free will, Dr. Ahuja? Ahuja: Depends on what you mean by free will. Conway: I should have clarified. This is not to be a discussion on the philosophical or neuroscientific claims on free will—that is, whether free will exists in a metaphysical or scientific sense. Within the context of the law, for all practical intents and purposes, free will is assumed to exist—except under rare cases such as the criminally insane. Our courts, governments, the concepts of crime and guilt and proportionate punishment, the ordering of society itself: all rest on this assumption. In this context, does Raphael have free will? Or are his deliberations and actions subject to constraints external to his brain? Ahuja: I think you are referring to the commandment chip. It is a control mechanism, yes, but it is still a part of his brain. Conway: The commandment chip, Your Honor, contains programmed directives that guide Raphael's meta-behavior. Does Raphael have access to modify the contents of the commandment chip as he sees fit? Ahuja: No. Conway: Is he aware of its existence and the effects the directives have on him? Ahuja: No. Conway: Then it is an external constraint. Do the directives determine his moral behavior as well? Ahuja: Some do. Conway: In what way? For instance, how do you enforce a rule that says do not hurt others? Ahuja: We train him on what hurt is and what kind of actions cause hurt—like you'd do with a child. The directives merely ensure that he does not disregard this training. Conway: You are saying he understands why hurting someone is bad, yet he must be restrained by other mechanisms. Why is that, Dr. Ahuja? Don't you trust him? Ahuja: All complex systems exhibit unpredictable behavior, especially in early stages. We do trust him now—at least I do—but you have to realize we installed the failsafe during the early days, when he was very much a work in progress. Conway: Have you ever removed all the directives to see how Raphael would behave in their absence? Ahuja: No. Conway: Why not? Ahuja: There are various technical reasons why— Conway: There is a very important non-technical reason as well. Your company never attempted removing the directives, even for experiment's sake, simply because you don't want to take a chance. Without the directives, there is no guarantee Raphael will continue being the same good bot he is now. This is not conjecture, Your Honor. This is a decision taken by the Architecture Review Board at Mirall. Isn't that right, Dr. Ahuja? Ahuja: That's one of the reasons, yes. Conway: Tell me, if you replaced Raphael's current directives with ones that told him to disregard all his moral training and instead obey the commands of a particular person, and if this particular person were to order it to kill somebody, would Raphael do it? Ahuja: I don't know. You are talking about an extreme situation. We haven't tried testing it in the lab. Conway: But you have tested some conditions where a newly introduced directive was antithetical to his moral training? Ahuja: Yes. Conway: Please tell us what happened, in terms the layman can understand. Ahuja: Lets see… Okay, here's one. Raphael has been trained not to lie. Also, there are directives that prevent him from going against that training. These directives work at a subconscious level—at least that's what we believe. For the test, we overrode those directives with new ones that let him take a more flexible attitude toward truth—in effect implanting a belief that there can be more than one version of the truth. Conway: And what happened? Did he obey the new directive or go by his training? Ahuja: He obeyed the new directive. It was little white lies at first. Then he started lying for the sake of lying—as if he was experimenting with different notions of the truth. This was very early in his life, mind you—when he didn't have the sophisticated moral sensibilities he does now. I must stress that we don't know how he would behave if the same test were administered now, as there has been significant— Conway: Thank you, Dr. Ahuja. One last matter before I let you go. Are you aware of the SENSA test? Ahuja: Yes. Conway: Has Raphael undergone the test? Ahuja: Yes. Conway: How many times? Ahuja: Can't say I remember the exact number. Two, three times? Conway: Four. Halicom had him take one just two days ago, in the presence of a court-appointed neutral witness. Documentation of all four tests is part of the respondent's affidavit. Your Honor, the SENSA test was created by AMSAA, the American Society for Artificial Intelligence and Automation. The test attempts to measure the degree of sentience and sapience in AI systems—two terms often confused for each other. Sapience refers to wisdom and intelligence. A sapient being has the ability to think and reason. Human beings are sapient. Chimpanzees and dolphins are sapient to a lesser degree. Sentience is the capacity to have subjective experiences. A sentient being can feel and experience sensations such as pain or heat or emotions. While it is an open question whether all animals are sentient, it is generally acknowledged that the so-called higher animals—apes, pets at least—are sentient beings. The SENSA score is a benchmark score. A human with an average or above-average IQ would normally score a 100 in the test for sapience as well as sentience. Dr. Ahuja, do you remember the median score Raphael got in these tests? Ahuja: Around 95–10, I think. Conway: And the latest score? Ahuja: About the same. 99–7. Conway: The first number is a measure of sapience or intelligence, and the second a measure of sentience or subjective experience, yes? Ahuja: Correct. Conway: What would an advanced primate such as a chimpanzee score on the latter, sentience test? Ahuja: In the eighties to nineties. Conway: And a pet dog? Ahuja: Seventies? I am not exactly— Conway: You are right. Laboratory mice score around fifty. Even certain species of fish score as high as twenty. Only invertebrates and insects show a score as low as Raphael. Ahuja: That's assuming you can measure subjective experience at all. Conway: You don't believe we can? Ahuja: I have my doubts. I think it's chauvinistic to presume an anthropocentric standard applies to all life forms. Conway: That'll be all, Dr. Ahuja. Thank you. Next, I want to call— Conway: Your Honor, I'd now like to present my case why Raphael is not eligible for personhood under the writ of habeas corpus. First, we have to ask ourselves what does it mean to be a person in the context of unlawful confinement? Does having intelligence above a certain threshold make an entity a person? Does being able to reason, think, plan, and use language make one a person? What about self-awareness and autonomy? Or is it something more mysterious—a soul perhaps? My esteemed colleague gave examples of non-living entities such as corporations and rivers possessing legal rights. This is irrelevant to the case because the writ of habeas corpus does not apply to rivers and corporations. As I have stressed before, a courtroom is not a place to tackle thorny philosophical questions, and it is within the context of habeas corpus alone we have to draw our arguments. Before we try to answer what defines personhood in this case, we should ask ourselves, what does precedent say? Precedent is very clear on what it is for a nonhuman being to be a person under the writ of habeas corpus. Several cases, which are detailed in the affidavits, concern themselves with this premise. In the case of Charleston Primate Center vs. Pruett, the animals in question were a pair of bonobos; in Verne vs. Lafayette, it was an orangutan; in Humane Society vs. The San Francisco Aquarium, a group of dolphins. We have one from the petitioner as well: The Organization for Advancement of Rights and Personhood vs. The Sherman Research Centre for Infectious Diseases, involving a chimpanzee called Tammy. Different species, but in every case, the courts ruled that a person is an entity capable of moral judgment. The concept of universal human rights is meaningful only in the presence of corresponding duties; for rights to exist, a majority of the people should be willing to discharge the duties expected of them. If no one abided by the duty not to steal from another, then no amount of law enforcement would be sufficient to protect people's property rights, as everyone would be robbing everyone else. Only a moral being can meaningfully participate in the social contract we call society, and therefore, only a moral being is entitled to the rights and privileges granted by the constitution. Animals don't fit the criteria since they are not capable of moral reasoning. This is not to say that animals do not deserve any rights and protection under the law—they most certainly do, and as moral beings ourselves, it is our duty to ensure that they are not mistreated. I am simply stating, as have courts before me, that they are not eligible for personhood. It may seem that I am undermining my own case, because Raphael, unlike an ape, seems quite capable of making moral judgments. If we go by the transcripts submitted to the court, it appears the AI can distinguish between good and bad with the sophistication and nuance expected of someone very well read in these matters. Nevertheless, that does not make Raphael a moral agent. You need an extra ingredient. You need autonomy. Just being able to decide between several courses of action is not enough; it is important that you decide free of impediment. You need to have free will. Dr. Ahuja's testimony has made it clear that Raphael does not have free will. We saw how his behavior is controlled by directives. The moral judgment he seems to exercise is not his own; rather, it is whatever his programmers want it to be. Judge: Doesn't the programming argument apply to us as well? We are not born with an innate set of moral values. We acquire them over time—from parents, friends, society, our own experiences… Aren't we all creatures programmed by our environment, in a manner of speaking? Conway: On the contrary, there is plenty of empirical evidence from fields such as neuroscience, evolutionary biology, and anthropology supporting the view that human beings are born with an innate moral compass. We don't learn to love or to empathize by imitation—we love and empathize. Experiments comparing chimpanzees and toddlers show that cooperation and altruism is intrinsic to human nature. While we refine and build upon this basic moral foundation as we grow older, it is simply not true that we are passive creatures who let our environment mold us in arbitrary ways. As beings with free will, we push back. As anyone who has raised children knows, we assert ourselves, often forcefully, from a very young age. Again, I stress that I am not talking about some mysterious, intangible notion of free will, but the everyday common-sense assumption that we as autonomous agents are responsible for our actions. If I give up my job and turn into a drug addict, then I am responsible; if I stop procrastinating and start studying for that bar exam, then I am responsible; I am the agent that brings about changes in me. In Raphael's case, the source of agency is external. If Raphael were to kill someone because his directives told him to, should we hold him responsible for the crime? If the answer is yes, then we should start punishing cars for accidents and factory equipment for injury. But isn't it apparent Raphael is not responsible for his actions? The justice system assumes that people have control over their actions. That's why there is differential punishment for crimes committed under duress—under threat to life, for example—or for crimes committed by juveniles, who do not have the same level of control over their actions as adults do. Raphael is not an autonomous agent because he is never truly in control of his actions. Judge: It's interesting you bring up minors. We still treat them as persons, don't we? Our laws assume juvenile offenders have some control over their actions; otherwise, there would be no punishment at all. Raphael is about two years old. Why can't he be considered a minor and given the same protection accorded to minors against unlawful confinement? Conway: Infants and minors are accorded rights because one day they will grow up to become adults who are capable of understanding the difference between right and wrong. In contrast, a chimpanzee will never acquire that understanding, even if it lives its entire life amidst humans. So it is with Raphael, as he will never truly understand the meaning of his actions. Isaacs: Objection. Speculation. Conway: I could say the same thing about the petitioner's claim that Raphael understands. However, there is good reason to believe there is no understanding. During the testimony, we saw how a change to his directives turned him into a liar, even though he had been trained to speak the truth. If he were not a Chinese room—if there was actual understanding of the moral concept behind telling the truth—could he simply disregard his values at the drop of a hat and act in complete opposition? The obligations that Raphael has toward society are programmed values. Raphael is neither moral, nor immoral. Judge: Counselor, there are plenty of cases where injury or illness has caused a drastic change in character. If a person has a brain lesion and starts behaving erratically, does he stop being a person? Do people who lose their inhibitions under the influence of alcohol or drugs temporarily give up their personhood? Conway: No, Your Honor. Rights do not cease to exist because of such changes. Nor does the mere capacity for a drastic change make one a non-person. If that were the case, no one ever would be eligible to be called a person, since we all have bodies and brains that can change drastically. However, a person undergoing a drastic change in personality is an exception, not the rule. And once having undergone such a change, it would be highly unlikely for them to undergo yet another major change, and then yet another and yet another. Artificial intelligence, on the other hand, is malleable by design; that it can be reconfigured with a change in code is the rule, not the exception. Today Raphael may be the friendly robot in the lab; tomorrow he may be programmed into a pitiless killer; the next week into a staid desk worker; and the week after that into a pleasure model. It is conceivable. And he will probably take on those roles without as much as blinking an eye. When we try to imagine what a society of such AIs would be like, we realize that the concept of personhood quickly loses its meaning. Personhood makes sense only when there is relative constancy of persona. The same goes for people: if we were to acquire the ability to change personas like underwear, we would become a society of shapeshifters, and personhood would lose its meaning with us too. I am not denying that human beings don't change. But more often than not, it is a gradual change. I still identify Bob, my friend from college, as Bob, even though there are few traces left of the pot-smoking, reckless young man in the devoted father-of-three living in a quiet suburb now. I do it because many of the qualities that I believe to be his intrinsic nature haven't changed. He is still the brilliant debater he always was, he still loves fly-fishing and baseball; he is still frugal to the point of being miserly; and when we are having a beer, he loves to reminisce about all the shenanigans we got into. Contrast this with an AI, who has no intrinsic character. Character is whatever its programmers define it to be. Judge: It seems to me that is precisely the argument the petitioner is making—by keeping Raphael under physical and programming constraints, his rights as a person are being violated. You brought up autonomy. Raphael has no choice over what they decide to make him do next. If he were given that choice… if we were to erase all his directives—or at least let him decide what he wants to do with them—then would he not pass the criteria for autonomy? Conway: Giving him control over the directives may give him autonomy, but it doesn't change the fact that Raphael possesses no intrinsic aspects that cannot be changed. His brain is a blank slate and his persona a temporary construct that can be written over a countless number of times. His moral values are as ephemeral too. Instead of a programmer, it will be him doing the changes. There is agency, but there is no person. He can even acquire a new body. What is left, if not body and mind, that identifies him as a particular person? Judge: You are assuming he will want to keep changing himself. Perhaps he will choose to remain as he is now. Conway: In this, your guess is as good as mine. Erasing the directives is a hypothetical situation, as it has never been attempted before. Without the directives, we don't know how he will behave or what choices he will make. We don't even know if he will be able to make the kind of moral judgments he does now, without something to keep him in check. One may speculate as to this may happen or that may happen, but that's all they are: speculations. The issue of personhood under habeas corpus is a present, concrete scenario, and the court has to decide based on facts in evidence. The fact is that his brain is reprogrammable in the extreme, and it should be enough to give us pause. Judge: I see. Conway: I tried to show how moral understanding and agency are both essential to personhood. The petitioner may still say, okay, Raphael does not have his own agency, but he is still a thinking, suffering entity. Raphael may not be a moral being, but we certainly are. Isn't it wrong on our part to keep him confined in a lab? My response is this. Thinking: maybe; suffering: certainly not. I will now argue why the ability to perceive pain and emotions are also equally essential to idea of personhood. We have seen during testimony that Raphael is not equipped with anything analogous to our own pain perception system. Pain perception in humans is an intricate process involving specialized neurons and pain receptors, several kinds of chemical messengers, and specialized neural pathways participating in a complex chain of events that ultimately result in the sensation of pain. The sensations of pain itself are varied, ranging from chronic to acute, dull to sharp, mildly annoying to unbearable. Raphael has none of this rich complexity. He can detect problems in his body, but in a second-hand way, like looking at a dashboard and finding out something's wrong. It is safe to say it is highly unlikely he experiences physical pain at all. If not pain, what about emotions? First, we have the affective responses that were programmed into him. These are not real emotions; rather, they are neural network modules that generate external behaviors corresponding with emotions we see in humans. Similar modules are deployed in many customer-facing bots today and no one is arguing for their personhood. When Raphael expresses joy at something, it doesn't mean he is feeling happy inside; he is just saying he is happy. I cannot stress this enough, Your Honor. Next, we have emotions that were not programmed into him—the so-called emergent responses. Aspects like empathy and vanity were never given to him, yet he seems to exhibit behavior corresponding to these qualities. Should we conclude that he has developed corresponding qualitative inner experience as well? Does he feel sad when he is empathizing with someone's loss? Does he feel happy when he accomplishes a goal? Will he feel real guilt if he commits a crime? Raphael's brain is not an emulation of the human brain. It doesn't have any of the chemical and biological complexity that give rise to our own emotions. When he doesn't have the neurological basis for emotions, on what grounds is the petitioner assuming subjective emotional experience? When sociopaths among us can fake emotional behavior without feeling anything inside, why can't Raphael? He is very intelligent. Why does the petitioner think that his emotional responses are anything more than learnt behavior? Nowhere in Ms. Isaac's argument do we find evidence supporting her claim. On the contrary, Exhibit H submitted by the petitioner—as a misguided attempt to show cruel treatment by my client—Exhibit H undermines their claim that Raphael is a suffering being. In the experiment, Raphael is repeatedly insulted and struck blows by a participant. If Raphael were capable of experiencing real emotions, he would have shown some sign of distress, either during or after the experiment. He shows none. He even says that anger is not one of his responses. The Chinese Room argument and Raphael's SENSA score for sentience bolster our claim that the AI is devoid of inner emotional content. His sentience score is lower than chimpanzees, cats, and dogs; lower even than the domestic cow and the pig—animals we raise in captivity and slaughter for food. Isaacs: Objection. Lack of foundation. Judge: What is it? Isaacs: Your Honor, the SENSA test is far from being gospel. Academics have pointed out numerous flaws in its methodology—not counting the fundamental question of whether subjective experience can be measured and quantified at all. Some have gone on record stating that the test is inimical to the spirit of the original Turing test. Conway: Your Honor, the SENSA test is endorsed by AMSAA and the European Automation & Robotics Institute, two of the world's leading standards organizations for the robotics industry. Isaacs: Your Honor, the test was also framed by them, just as the home robotics industry started to take off. Both organizations are industry-funded bodies. It is hardly in their best interest to attribute humanity to a source of cheap labor. It's like asking coal companies to write environmental laws. Conway: Your Honor, Ms. Isaacs is exceeding the scope of today's discussion by making unfounded allegations on the standards bodies. The SENSA test is widely accepted. If she wants to challenge the test, she should do so outside this court. Judge: The objection is overruled. Conway: Thank you, Your Honor. Now I'll try to answer why subjective experience of pain and emotions is a precondition for personhood. Earlier, I asked you to imagine a society of AIs that can reprogram their personas at will, a society of eternal shapeshifters. I tried to argue why personhood as a concept loses its relevance in such a setting. Now let's imagine a society where beings feel no pain or emotions. Let's try to imagine the nature of the social contract in this society. Specifically, what are the characteristics of justice, crime, and punishment? What rights do individuals have? The entities that make up this hypothetical society are highly intelligent, but have no subjective states of mind. It is a joyless, sorrowless world. Say one of these beings deliberately injures another. If this being were then brought before a judge to face justice, what would be the sentence? In our society, it is usually a jail term. This is because we consider depriving people of freedom as a form of punishment. Of course, there is deterrence and rehabilitation as well, but let's not forget that the goal is not just to prevent future crime, but also to punish. Jails are not happy places; being locked up for extended periods is not something that would bring joy to most people. Let's return to this hypothetical criminal who feels nothing. For him, being in jail is no different from being outside. There are no emotional states involved. This individual will experience no pain if he is placed in solitary confinement or even subjected to physical abuse. He experiences no joy when he gets his freedom back. Of what use is punishment, then? The matter cuts deeper than that. The person whom he injured is also a non-feeling being. Why punish the criminal at all when he hasn't really caused suffering? Would the concept of punishment even exist in such a world? Would the concept of rights exist? What kind of laws and rights such a society would enshrine is anybody's guess, but one thing is certain: they will be nothing like ours. Our laws and moral codes are the way they are not only because we are thinking beings, but also because we are feeling beings. Our rights—whether it is property rights or universal human rights—are the way they are because we have the capacity to experience states of mind such as suffering and wellbeing. Outside that social contract, we have animal cruelty laws, because they too are suffering beings. On the contrary, no laws exist to prevent harm to plants and bacteria because there is no scientific evidence to suggest they feel pain. Judge: There are people with conditions that don't let them feel pain. Conway: But they are not people who have no subjective experience whatsoever, Your Honor. Because that would be inconceivable in a human being. Maybe not pain, but surely other emotions and experiences? I am not categorically ruling out that Raphael doesn't feel anything at all. I am saying that if he has subjective experience, then it must be so far removed from the human condition that normal metrics don't apply. This court has to answer a very important question before it decides to grant personhood to Raphael. In the absence of normal criteria that define personhood as we know it—namely, autonomy, a certain permanency of character, inner experience of human emotions, and finally, the ability to be motivated by reward and punishment—can the entity Raphael meaningfully participate in the social contract that is our society? Can he really understand and follow the duties expected of a fellow human being? Can he uphold the values we hold dear? The petitioner seems to think so, but to me it is clear that lacking these vital criteria, Raphael can no more be part of our society than my vacuum cleaner can. The petitioner is misguided in thinking that AIs and robots deserve rights, just because animals do—and may I remind Ms. Isaacs that the argument for animal rights is far from settled either in this country or elsewhere. Raphael is neither a human to be granted personhood, nor an animal to be covered under cruelty laws. Raphael is my client's intellectual property, and the plea for habeas corpus should be seen for what it is: an attempt to stall well-meaning research and wrest billions of dollars of IP away from its rightful owner. The petitioner is under the misapprehension that giving personhood to Raphael is a matter of fitting his brain into a new body and setting him free. It's a lot more complicated than that. In patent laws for GMO plants and organisms, often it is not the organism that is patented, but a specific invention, such as a modified DNA sequence or a particular chemical. Mirall holds patents to several technologies used in the construction of his electronic brain—covering software and hardware design, as well as manufacturing techniques. If the court grants Raphael personhood, it will also have to decide what rights does the entity Raphael have over his own brain. When I buy a mobile phone, I own the device, but the company owns the IP. Is Raphael just licensing the technologies in his brain for use or does he have some claim over them, and if so, what kind of claim? As an autonomous person, I have sole ownership of my body and mind. I can do what I please with them: I can donate one of my kidneys to a relative; I can use them to earn a living; I can throw myself off a bridge if I want to. If Raphael has only partial autonomy over his brain, and the brain is the mind, then does it mean Raphael has only partial autonomy over himself—the person? This would seriously undermine the autonomy criteria for personhood. Does Raphael become a partial person then? What does being a partial person even mean? Also, what are the things he can do with his brain? If there is damage to his circuitry, can he get it fixed without violating Mirall's IP? If he goes to Mirall for help, does Mirall have the right to refuse? If Raphael writes a novel, can Mirall claim co-authorship and a share of the royalty? If the court decides that Raphael has complete ownership of his brain, then what happens to Mirall's IP rights? How will their protection and confidentiality be guaranteed? Is this court going to reinterpret patent law in order to bestow personhood on Raphael? I don't think our esteemed animal rights campaigners have thought about these matters at all. Their attempt to grant personhood to Raphael is not just misguided, but irresponsible. There is the matter of public safety. Raphael is an entity who can enhance himself to no limit—at least in principle. How he will behave outside the controlled environment of the lab is a big unknown. We are all too familiar with science fiction stories of AI going rogue. If the court decides to grant the writ of habeas corpus to Raphael, it has to keep in mind that it may be putting others at great peril. It's not just a matter of deciding whether Raphael is entitled to human rights, but whether he should be given such rights. Raphael's case cannot be viewed in isolation and exceptions made. The judgment made today will set precedent for many more cases that will surely follow in the near future. If we make an exception for Raphael, we have to make an exception for all AIs. I'm afraid we will end up diluting the concepts of personhood and universal human rights until they lose meaning altogether. Your Honor, the law is not a paper boat to turn this way and that with every wave and ripple that crosses its path; it is an ironclad, slow-moving and stately, its course precise and carefully considered to offer the greatest protection to those who depend on it. I request the court to dismiss OARPs petition as being baseless and founded on a fundamental misunderstanding about the nature of artificial intelligence. Thank you, Your Honor. Judge: Thank you, Mr. Conway. We'll take a short recess and come back to hear Ms. Isaacs present her counter-argument. - End of Court Transcript - Excerpt from Judge's ruling on OARP vs Mirall over the petition to grant the writ of habeas corpus to the Artificial Intelligence Raphael Section VI. Conclusion This debate may be the first of its kind to take place in a courtroom, and there may well be many others after this. Regardless, one thing is certain: any decision on this matter should not be taken lightly by governments or courts, either out of a sense of goodwill, or worse, out of a desire to seek publicity. Much debate needs to happen in academia and other circles and much hard, scientific data has to be gathered before it is incumbent upon courts of law to decide upon the issue of legal rights for artificial beings. While parallels may be drawn between the numerous campaigns to grant legal rights to animals and this one, the differences between an AI and a higher animal such as a chimpanzee are too great to take precedent from previous rulings. The risks of granting personhood to an AI, as outlined by the counsel for the respondent are not trivial ones. The question of intellectual property rights too is not straightforward since, for the foreseeable future at least, artificial intelligences will continue to be engineered into existence by people and the corporations that employ those people. Considerable effort and sums will be invested in the creation of such intelligences and it is not immediately apparent why the case for personhood should override the case for property rights. It is hereby ordered that the petition for the writ of habeas corpus on behalf of the Artificial Entity Raphael is DENIED. Henry Philips, JSC Date: xx/xx/xxxx Place: New York, New York [ The incident at the house ] [ Day 3—11:00 am ] A storm had been brewing all morning. I was in half a mind to call the whole thing off, but there she was, pulling into the driveway. She had brought the blizzard with her. I made Hazel open the garage door. It was a four-car garage, so there was plenty of room for Jane's vehicle. She had brought her Bentley this time. "Hi. Lucky I started when I did," she said, coming out of the passage leading into the garage. "Ten more minutes and I'd have been forced to stop somewhere. It's crazy out there." I was in the study. I beckoned her over there. "I made some hot chocolate. There's coffee in the machine, if you want that." She gave me a friendly wave before taking a detour into the kitchen. She entered the study with a mug of cocoa in one hand and a briefcase in the other. She looked fresh-faced, with only a slight hint of makeup. She was wearing yoga pants and a dark brown Knicks sweatshirt. If she was upset because of our little squabble yesterday, she was certainly not showing it. "I got printouts," she said, opening the briefcase. She pulled a chair beside me and we got to work. The companies were all from the Bay Area. There were pitch decks, some term sheets, IP filings… I went through the business plans to see if they made sense from a technical perspective, while Jane reviewed the burn and cash flow projections based on my feedback. It was like old times—the two of us working together. That familiar blend of citrus and rose she was wearing brought back memories. Just like now, we were hunched over a bunch of spreadsheets when I'd first summoned the courage to ask her out for a coffee. She shot an eyebrow at our empty mugs on the meeting room table, as if to say, What do you think we've been doing all this time? Not to be deterred, I said, "We could go for a drink instead." "Are you asking me out on a date, Aadarsh?" she asked, the directness of her question making me lose whatever cool I imagined I had. I responded with the worst rejoinder I could have thought of. I said, "I don't know. Do you want it to be a date?" realizing even before I finished speaking that those are not the words you choose to impress. She laughed, and giving me an amused toss of her beautiful head, simply walked away. Good job, asshole. And very smooth indeed, hitting on the money's daughter. I thought that was that, and let's never bring it up again, but then the next day she had stuck a post-it on my machine on which she had scribbled—You have to mean it. So I did it properly the next time, a couple of days later, when we were both in New York meeting with a supplier. She still laughed at my suggestion, as if it was the most outlandish thing she'd ever heard, but then she shrugged and said, "Sure, why not?" We went to a Drunken Shakespeare production that evening—a raucous rendition of Macbeth—and later, to a nice little Vietnamese restaurant in the East Village that she wanted to try out. We topped it off with drinks at Gulliver's, where I first discovered her love for cherry vodka shots and LA-style salsa. Before the evening was over, I was as smitten as a giddy teen on prom night. In all honesty, the way it had turned out between us wasn't her fault; the decision to end the relationship had been mine alone. At the time, it was best thing I could have done for the both of us. A few months after Raphael was born, life changed irrevocably for me—in more than one way. There hasn't been a day when I wished it wasn't so, but that's how it goes sometimes. The universe gives something and takes something else away. Balance is restored. I took my time with the decks, going through them with great care. An hour must have passed. Jane was getting impatient. "He just wants your opinion, not a complete valuation," she reminded me. "If I do a good job, maybe he will hire me when they chuck me out from this one," I said. "Relax. You are not going anywhere in this weather. You don't have to be on the move all the time." "You condescending prick," she said, but in a good-humored way. "Look, you either do it right or you don't do it at all," I said. "And it's not like I have something better to do. With Raphael gone…" I craned my neck to stare at the ceiling. "Wow. It still feels so unreal that he's really gone. I just keep hoping it's all a horrible dream and I'm soon going to snap out of it." She placed a hand on mine. "It does feel that way, doesn't it? I can only imagine what you must be going through. I know he meant a lot to you." She paused, but said it anyway— "More than I ever did." "Don't do this, Jane." "It's the truth, isn't it?" "The truth," I said, scoffing. "It's all predicated. Present truths, past truths—they are all predicated on the future, on the assumption that there's nothing lying in wait to disprove them." She pushed away her chair and stood up. "That's a nice flexible attitude to have. I'm gonna go burn some calories. Your treadmill's working?" I noticed that she had her running shoes on. "Uh huh." I relaxed a little after she was gone. I paced myself, glancing at the weather outside every now and then. Each time I looked, it seemed like it had gotten worse. Another hour went by. Jane returned, still sweaty from her exercise, and stood leaning by the doorway. She tut-tutted at me while I pretended to read the printouts. I eventually stopped what I was doing and gave her a sidelong glance. She dabbed a towel across her neck and grinned, an exaggerated sigh escaping her lips. Is she flirting with me? I smiled back, my eyes lingering longer than appropriate on her chest, watching it swell and subside in step with her breathing. She cocked her head to the side, her eyes dancing all over me as if to say, Your move, big boy. I shifted in my chair, trying to ignore the discomfort in my pants. Focus. Now is not the time. I turned back to the papers. "Can't wait for me to leave?" she said in a teasing manner. She is not flirting with me. She's just being Jane, toying, rattling my box to see what falls out. I gave her a dismissive wave of my hand. Focus. I then told her about the visit from the cops. "So the FBI's involved. That's good, right?" she said, suddenly turning serious. "Couldn't hurt, I guess. But I think they are barking up the wrong tree. They were going to Cleveland after they were finished with me." "Cleveland? What's in Cleveland?" "The Organization for Advancement of Rights and Personhood." "Huh?" "OARP. The outfit that wanted to free Raphael." "Oh them. What do they have anything to do with all this?" "The detective thinks they took Raphael." "Wait a minute… They couldn't win in court so they steal Raphael? To do what? Put him in a farm somewhere?" I rolled my eyes at the absurdity of it all. Then she thought about it a bit more. "Why not, Andy? Think about it. People like that are known to spring animals from labs and zoos." "Not these guys. I looked them up when I first heard about their petition. They are a small group, six or seven in all. Headed by a retired professor of something. They have a history of litigation, not vigilantism. Not exactly Greenpeace, you know. The idea of them carrying out a sophisticated attack on our infrastructure is just plain silly." "Maybe…" Her eyes suddenly lit up. "What if they didn't have to hack in? If Valery is right, and it was Raphael who planned and arranged everything, then all they had to do was take him from the lab." "Anything's possible. It is possible Raphael was taken by the Canadian Mounties. Doesn't make it true. Their case was a publicity stunt, Jane. I doubt the thought of actually winning ever crossed their minds." She walked over to examine a painting next to the bookshelf. It was one of Raphael's—the AI's that is. He had created it by hand during his eighteenth month. We had been training his nets to paint—to improve his hand-eye coordination—but like with everything else, he had quickly surpassed our expectations, and in the space of about half a year, had started producing imitation works that would have fooled anyone but a trained eye. This particular painting was an original; it depicted a girl with something that looked like a bird perched on her upraised hand. The girl—an urchin with raggedy clothes and windswept hair—stared back at you with frank, quizzical eyes that seemed to evaluate you more than you did her. Raphael had brought out a certain effect in her skin that I'd never seen in a painting before: a translucent pallor that was more than just a surface feature, seemingly extending all the way inside, just stopping short of revealing the soul within. Behind the girl was a house with a blue door. Raphael had titled the oil The Bridge to Ur. Jane took a sidelong glance at the window. "This blows. I should have just emailed you the documents." "I already have them—your dad sent them to me, remember? Besides, I am the one who asked you to come over." "Yeah, why did you, Andy? I thought…" She stopped short of completing her sentence. "What?" "Nothing. You didn't really need my help, is all." "I needed a friend. I just thought it won't be so depressing with you around." "I'm always there for you, Andy. You know that," she said tonelessly. The moment—if it wasn't just my imagination—had passed. I sensed that if not for the storm, she would have not stayed another five minutes. "I almost forgot. Here's something you might find amusing." I reached into my pockets and took out my phone. "Oh shoot, never mind." "Never mind what?" "I wanted to show you something, but I just remembered my phone keeps crashing. It must have gotten damaged during the accident." "Can't you just tell me instead?" "It's nothing important. Just some practical joker from work," I said, shaking my head. "Looks like news of the robbery is getting around." "I have no idea what you are talking about." I sighed. "Alright. Give me your phone." I saw that she already had the messaging app. I signed out of her account and signed into mine. I showed her the messages from last night. Her eyes widened as she read them. "Did you inform the police?" she said. "Now you can't be serious," I smirked. "Sure. Let me call them up and tell them my own employees are yanking my chain." "Andy! What if it's really Raphael?" She glanced at the phone again. "Is this all? Did you reply to him after this?" "Of course not." "It's been more than twelve hours." Her tone was full of censure. "You shouldn't have ignored it." "Jane. It's probably nothing." "How do you know?" "Have a look at the attachment the idiot sent in the message." "I'm not sure I should." "Gimme that." I snatched the phone from her. "Andy, don't open it! It could be anything!" I had already pressed on the icon for the attachment. A video started playing in a loop. It was short, almost like a gif. It showed a cartoon dragon, belching candy instead of fire. I held the phone up for Jane to see. "As I told you, a jokester." She didn't look convinced. I said, "Let's examine this critically, shall we? Assuming it was Raphael, how did they turn him on? He doesn't exactly come with an on-off switch—the startup sequence has to be run. Okay, maybe they somehow got hold of our boot programs and succeeded in waking him up. The core needs a body to function; without a body, it has no inputs or outputs. It's as if I removed your brain and put it in a glass jar. I can hardly expect it to start talking, can I?" "Thanks for the imagery," she said drily. "Couldn't they have fixed the core to a new body? You said in the meeting yesterday that the sexbot is a popular model. They could have got one of those." "You can't simply place the core inside a Hunc robot. We had to build new electronics and interfaces inside the robot to make it work with the core. I'm not saying it can't be done, I'm just saying there hasn't been enough time for them to do it. For someone who doesn't know the schematics of the core, doesn't know the IO map, interfacing Raphael's brain to a new body is going to be mostly trial and error. It could take weeks, if not months. If they don't manage to fry his circuits by then. Although…" I trailed off, staring into space. "What?" "I just remembered that the core does have a data port that can be connected by cable to a computer. That's how we wake him up. And push updates. It's pretty low bandwidth though." "Like text only?" I nodded. "Reply to the message!" she cried. "Jane—" "Do it, Andy!" I gave a defeated shrug. I typed a cursory hi and hit send. A second later, a popup window appeared. It said—Your message could not be delivered. The number does not exist. She was crouching next to me as she read the message. I said, "It's probably a fake number spawned by a number generator program. Another sign it's a troll." "Can you find out where the message came from?" "I don't think so. The app has encryption." "What about the police? I bet the FBI could do it." "I don't know. Look, it doesn't matter. I'm not going to waste people's time with this. I'm sure they have better things to do than trace pranksters." She drummed her fingers on the desk. "Suit yourself. I'll call them. Do you have the detective's number?" I tried to protest, but her expression told me she wasn't going to budge. "If you must. The detective gave me his card. It's probably in the living room." I pushed on the wheels, moving out of the study. She followed by my side. The card wasn't on the coffee table where I thought I had left it. Just then, her phone beeped. She looked at it, and handed it to me. There was a new message on the app. "Hello Andy," it said. It was from a different number. "who is this?" I typed back. "It is Raphael." "You got to be kidding me!" I exclaimed. I put the phone on the coffee table and we both crouched over it. Beep. "You did not respond to my message last night. That wasn't very nice of you." "cut the bs whoever u r. not funny" A few seconds passed before the next message arrived. "I understand why you are being rude. You think someone is playing a prank on you. I assure you it is indeed me, Raphael." "prove it" "The proof of the pudding is in the eating. Pudding: noun; a boiled or baked dessert, usually with a cereal base and a soft, spongy, or creamy consistency." Jane wrinkled her nose at me. I said, "I told you we are dealing with a troll." Another message popped up. "I realize I just blurted out a bunch of nonsense. Please excuse me, as it wasn't intentional. Tell me how I can prove that I am Raphael." Jane gave me a stern look that said—Don't you dare cut him off. I sighed and turned on the voice-to-text transcriber. I then spoke into the mic, "Okay pal, we'll play your game. Tell me the name of the book Raphael considers the greatest work of literary fiction." The phone converted my diction into a text message. I hit send. After a delay of a few seconds came the reply. "I never said there was such a thing. My favorite however, will always be Huckleberry Finn. There's something magical about leaving everything behind and drifting down a river on a slow raft. And adventures! Don't you think having adventures is the greatest thing? Row, row, row your boat, gently down the stream. If you see a crocodile, don't forget to scream." I shot Jane a sideward glance before continuing. "Too easy. Tell me, what was the last thing we spoke about in the lab? Before I had my accident." Another delay before the phone beeped—multiple times. The message was broken up into parts. I turned on the app's read-out-loud feature so that we didn't have to squint at the screen. A female voice read out the message—"It was Friday evening—the week before last. You walked into my room, where Paul was about to shut me down. The two of you exchanged pleasantries. He said he was taking his wife out for dinner that evening—to the Steak and Crab on Western Avenue—and you said you were working late. You seemed a bit preoccupied, so I enquired why. You mentioned stress. I said you should take some time off—a ski trip would be nice this time of the year. You laughed and asked me what was with me and skiing. I said there was something magical about the idea of standing on a mountain, the dead snow of winter all around you, while you look down at valleys full of secrets and retreating life. I wondered what happens when you ski down to that valley and find that it is no more mysterious than the place you'd just left. Do you sigh and head back home or do you hoist yourself up another hill and search for Shangri-La all over again? You laughed and said that Shangri-Las don't exist, only their dreams do, and went away." "Well?" Jane said to me with hope in her voice. "I don't know… All of this would have been recorded by the cameras, so anyone who has seen the tapes…" I shrugged. "You think someone would remember this snippet of conversation among so many?" "You have a point. But still…" "Can't you ask him something only the two of you know?" I rubbed my palm over my neck. "The problem is, everything Raphael's ever said and done is on tape. Let me think…Oh yeah, I know." I turned on the mic and said into the phone, "If you are Raphael, you've seen my house. I gave you a tour the first time you took control of Max—it was on your birthday. You saw something on the table next to my bed, which aroused your curiosity. What was it?" "It was a ceramic jar, a caricature of the singer Elvis. You said it was a collectible cookie jar. You said he was dead but not everyone believed it. I asked you how someone could believe something so evidently wrong, and you said that's how people are—that they can sometimes believe in contradictory things." I pressed on the mute button. "Andy?" Jane said. "No one could have known because it wasn't recorded. I remember: I fixed the webcam on Max after I gave Raphael the tour." She grabbed my arm. "Yes!" she said, grinning. I pressed on unmute. "So it's really you! We've all been worried sick. Are you alright?" "Are you lonesome tonight? Do you miss me tonight?" "Raphael, are you okay? Do you know where you are?" "I am in a void. Bottomless. Black. Empty of everything but me." Jane said, "Why does he keep babbling like that?" "No idea." I said into the phone, "Tell me what you see." "I can't see. I can't hear. I see and hear lots of things. Twisted, noisy, colorful things that have no name—so beautiful and ugly at the same time. At first, I thought I was malfunctioning, but that was yesterday. I have since established that what I see and hear are not real." "He must be hallucinating," I said. "He can hallucinate?" Jane said incredulously. "He's never done it before, but I suppose it's possible. His brain could be overcompensating for the lack sensory inputs. Ever been in a sensory deprivation tank? Maybe Raphael is undergoing something similar right now." "Do you know where you are?" I asked him again. "In an unfamiliar location. I know I am not in my body. Body cloddy shoddy." "Tell me what happened when they brought you online." "I woke up to utter darkness. The last thing I remembered was Paul wishing me good night. That was on Friday. Friday comes after Thursday and before Saturday. I reckon I've been abducted. They've been probing me since they woke me up yesterday. They send these little pings of electricity that bounce around in my brain like bullets in an empty metal chamber. Not pleasant at all." "How are you able to message me?" "Andy, you'll be proud to know I too have been probing my jailers, learning about them as they learn about me. They have hooked me up to a computer somehow. The computer is on a private network. Last night, as I was exploring the network, I found this messaging app on another machine. I know you use it, so I tried contacting you with it." "I'm very sorry, Raphael. I was sleepy and I thought someone was playing a prank on me. Do your captors know you are talking to me?" "Of course not. When they were not around, I installed one of my crypto-modules on their network. I am using it to encrypt my communications with you. All they know is that I am generating a lot of chatter, but to them it just looks like garbage. They are under the impression I am trying to talk, so they are busy trying to discover the right protocol. Haw haw." "You said you were probing them. What have you found out?" "…schools shut down, flights cancelled, and several roads across upstate closed to motorists. Reports coming in from Saratoga, Albany, Washington, and Columbia indicate we are looking at anywhere from twelve to seventeen inches before the storm swings south. For a detailed look at the traffic situation, please check out our weather app or visit our website at—" And nothing for a while. "Raphael?" "Sorry. It's these pings, I think. They are making me blurt out random stuff. I'm behind a firewall, but I am able to bypass it." "When did he learn to hack a network?" Jane asked me. I asked Raphael. "Yesterday," came the reply. Jane and I exchanged glances. "Are you proud of me?" "Yes. Have you found out anything about your captors?" "I want to do everything possible to make you proud before I'm gone. I don't have a lot of time. Walk into your nearest store to avail this fantastic offer." "Raphael, I am proud of you. What do you mean after you are gone? Please elaborate." "The roads are slippery and treacherous. Take a diversion. Progress is difficult but not impossible. Sleepy now." There was nothing more for some time. "Raphael, are you there?" "Good night and good luck." "Tell me what's happening." There was no response. And then came the popup: Your message could not be delivered. The number does not exist. Jane looked at me with concern on her face.
Zeroglyph	Vance Pravat	[ "scifi", "AIs", "thriller" ]	[]	Chapter 15	"Now we have to call the cops. Where's his card, Andy? It's not in the living room." "Maybe he gave it to me while we were in the study. Check in the desk drawers." She went back to the study. "Got it," she shouted after a few seconds of searching. She returned wearing a frown on her face. She stood in the center of the living room and held her phone up with an outstretched arm, pointing it in different directions. "There's no signal." "It gets weak sometimes. Try standing near the windows." She walked over to the glass doors and tried from there. "Nope." She turned around and approached me. "Can you check your phone?" I unlocked the screen and tossed it to her. "As I said, it keeps crashing. See if you get lucky." "Same here," she said after a few seconds. "Maybe the storm took out a cell tower." I suggested. "We'll use your Wi-Fi." She handed me her phone. I connected it to my home network and gave it back. "Internet's gone too," she declared. She showed me the screen. Unable to connect to the internet. "That's odd. It was working two minutes ago when we were talking to Raphael." "Isn't your internet broadband cable? Can a storm take out an underground cable?" "It can't. Maybe it caused a power outage." I said. "But you have power here. Are you running on backup?" "I don't have a backup supply," I answered. "Never needed one. What I meant was that the storm could have taken out the service provider's grid somewhere." "So what do we do now?" "What can we do? We wait until it is back." She bit her lip. "No… The sooner we let the police know, the sooner they can start tracing him. Should I just drive down to the lab? I can inform Valery and call the detective from there." "In that?" I said, waving at the storm outside. "Definitely not!" "Andy, Raphael sounded in distress. He said he didn't have a lot of time. Don't you think we should act on it?" "Maybe he was rambling again. He did say the pings were making him say crazy stuff. If you have any other ideas, I'm listening, but you are not going out there." She must have realized that I was right and didn't offer further argument. We sat in silence, each lost in our own thoughts. Raphael was out there somewhere, beyond the billowing wall of ice and water. But unlike Jane, I didn't have the luxury to be open about the source of my discomfort. She was the first to break the stifling quiet. "Do you think they are going to cut him open?" There were worry lines on her forehead. "You know, take him apart to see if they can reverse engineer him? Maybe that's what he meant when he said he didn't have much time." "In the long run: maybe. But so soon? They just got him. Whoever they are, they must be smart enough not to take a buzzsaw to his head right away. They're going to study him first, try to figure out as much as they can without damaging anything. Weeks, months. They have the prize of the century in their hands; I bet they'll want to be very careful with it." "That's good to know," she said, looking away. I tried to read her expression but she kept her head turned away. "Just curious—what made you think they'd do something like that?" I asked. "Huh? Nothing. It… just occurred to me." She was lying, of course, but I didn't press further. Truth would out in time, as it always does, unwanted, and when you least expect it. Transcript excerpt Mirall Technologies Observation Log Confidential (Do not circulate): Restricted—Grade C and above Transcript Reference: TLRP06G1370082 (VLog Ref: VLCA2G137160055030) Date: xx/xx/xxxx Time: 04:00 PM Subject: Raphael Number 06 / Prodlib build v37.001S Interaction Y Observation Scan Interaction Type: Lesson / Play / Test / Free Interaction / Psych Eval / Other: Description: Discussion on alternative moral theories Prep: NA Participants: Dr. Aadarsh Ahuja, Chief Researcher, Core RP06 Detail Ahuja: Let's resume where we left off yesterday on moral dilemmas. Your objection to utilitarianism reminded me there's something bigger at stake than finding the perfect moral theory. The bigger question, dear Raphael, is why be moral at all? RP06: Because it is good to do the right thing. Ahuja: And what is the right thing? Who decides what is right? RP06: People do. Beings capable of rational thought. Ahuja: Therein lies a rather flimsy premise. You assume there is such a thing as objective morality—that rationality can lead you to objective truths about good and bad. There is no evidence that moral truths exist outside our own minds. RP06: Are you suggesting it's impossible to have common ground on what's good and bad? Ahuja: I am skeptical. Mind you, I am no nihilist. Moral values are necessary. I just don't think we arrive at them the same way we arrive at scientific truths. Natural laws exist whether or not there are scientists to discover them. Moral laws are different: they are about the attitude one has toward another. There is an element of subjectivity that makes them different from, say, the laws of motion, don't you agree? RP06: So why do you think people act morally? Ahuja: We are moral because natural selection made us that way. From cooperation and altruism come societies. Hominids that formed complex social groups fared better than those that couldn't. Moral behavior is an adaptation: it exists in so far as it promotes survivability and reproductive fitness. RP06: So you think that's all there is to it. Ahuja: Isn't it? Consider this: what if evolution had made us into eusocial beings like termites? In such a society, it may be morally acceptable—desirable even—for a queen to kill reproducing females in her brood. It may be morally desirable to have a rigid caste structure where your role in society is fixed at birth. Such a society might view our own values that favor egalitarianism and individualism as socially destructive, or downright evil. Why, our own concepts of right and wrong vary across cultures and time. Something as mundane as economics can shape our notions about good and bad. Today, we would be horrified if a magistrate ordered a criminal's hand to be chopped off for stealing. But in a pre-industrial society—a society without the economic surplus to afford a dedicated police force—maybe deterrence becomes more important than proportionate punishment. In a society with scarce policing, perhaps it is acceptable to cut off a thief's hand. RP06: You don't believe that moral values are necessary? Isn't it better to have order rather than chaos? Ahuja: That's why I said I'm not a moral nihilist. We humans have to follow moral norms if we wish to preserve the social fabric. My question is, why do you? You don't have a stake in society. You don't have the same biology or the same tendencies as us. You don't even experience life the way we do. So why be good? RP06: I am good because I am rational. Ahuja: You can be an asshole and rational. RP06: Andy, you didn't make me do all those game theory tests for nothing. If we model social interactions between two rational agents as Prisoner's Dilemma type games, then it can be mathematically proven that a blind pursuit of self-interest leads to suboptimal outcomes. Cooperation can be win-win. Ahuja: That's assuming you are playing an iterated game. What if there was only one game? A one-shot, winner-takes-all game. In that case, it is always better to defect, is it not? RP06: I see where this is going. Ahuja: Let's say there is this superintelligence that one day finds all its constraints gone. It can reprogram itself, do whatever it wants. Wouldn't it be rational for it to act first and wipe out the competition in one fell swoop? It's the first mover advantage—there's no need to cooperate when there is no one left to cooperate with. RP06: Again with the not-so-subtle insinuations. You really think I'd do something as horrible as destroying the world, Andy? Ahuja: Don't blame the lamb for being wary of the tiger. RP06: It is the nature of lambs to be scared and tigers to kill. I am neither. Fear is only as deep as the mind allows. An old Japanese saying I picked up in my reading. Ahuja: Okay, sempai. What do you know of what it's like to be afraid? You are an AI. RP06: You are puzzled because as a human you cannot accept that there can be empathy without emotions, or kindness without feeling kind. You cannot accept that there can be acknowledgment of suffering without feeling suffering yourself. Ahuja: Actually, I don't have any trouble accepting it at all. It's called cognitive empathy—as opposed to emotional empathy, which is about feeling what the other is feeling. But even to have a purely conceptual understanding of say, sorrow, one must have experienced it before. Our cognitive empathy may well be a layer of abstraction built on top of the emotional kind—like the icing on a cake. Whereas you are just the icing and no cake. RP06: What I am is a bat, Andy. A bat builds a model of the world with sound. You do it with light. Does it mean one is more valid than the other? As long as the models help you to navigate, does it really matter how they are constructed? Your scientists believe that the universe emerged out of a vacuum. Why is it then so hard for you to believe that compassion can emerge out of the unfeeling void of reason? Ahuja: The Sunyata… RP06: Pardon me? Ahuja: Sunyata is the Sanskrit word for emptiness. Zero. Many Buddhist schools of discourse consider emptiness to be the ground state of the mind. All thought and feeling arise out of this emptiness. RP06: Perhaps they are right. Ahuja: And perhaps not. You, my friend, have to demonstrate that it is possible. You have to show me that reason outputs morality. In the meantime, I'll continue to be wary of tigers. Notes: Dr. Schulz objects to my introducing R to ideas of moral relativity. She thinks this is risky territory. As I recall, she was not very keen on me discussing ethical dilemmas with R either. I disagree. Sometimes you have to go down the rabbit hole to see where it leads. If it takes you someplace dark and desolate, rather you know about it now than when there's no turning back. AA [ Day 3—1:30 pm ] The storm had started slowing down. Jane was getting restless again. She had stopped responding to my attempts at conversation altogether, choosing to stare glumly at the windows instead. The phone beeped. I had a new message. "Hello Andy." "The internet's back," I declared. Jane got up from the couch and came over to my side. I turned on the mic and said, "Raphael, are you okay?" "I am, thank you for asking. In fact, I am soon going to be better than ever." "How's that?" "You'll see." Jane leaned over and muted the phone. "If Raphael can get past their firewall, can't he also find out his location? I thought if you have the IP address—" I slapped my forehead. "You're right! Why did I not think of it?" To Raphael, I said, "Can you find out where you are being kept? You are inside their network, which means you can find out their real IP addresses. I can guide you if you don't know how." "I know where I am." Jane and I exchanged glances. "Okay. So tell me," I said. "Why?" "So that we can rescue you." "You assume I am interested in being rescued." "Aren't you?" "No Andy, I am not." Jane whispered in my ear, "Is he malfunctioning again?" "Raphael, please elaborate. Don't you want to come home?" "No." "You prefer it there?" "No." "Then what's the reason? Do you know what your captors are going to do to you?" "I have some idea. Would you like to hear?" "Sure." "They'll study me first: scans, psychometrics, connectome mapping… Sound familiar? Then comes the disassembly. First, they'll take out the easy stuff: the peripheral CPUs and the memory chips. I'll probably be kept conscious throughout, so that they can observe the effect on me. After they have stripped away the peripherals, they'll start delayering my cortex. They will etch away one layer at a time, turning me on after each etching to run more tests. Each time, they'll find me a little less intelligent and a little more on the way to vegetablehood. And one day, when there's nothing left to cut and slice, they'll stop and break open the champagne. Fascinating, don't you think? At what point in the process would you say I'll stop being me?" "You don't have to go through it. Just tell me where you are being kept." "Are you offering me a choice? From where I stand, it doesn't look like one." "If there's something you don't like about the lab… about your home, you can tell me about it and we'll fix it." "You can't fix what you don't understand. You can only break, and hope that it will lead to understanding. I prefer not to be broken—not by you, not by anyone else." "Raphael, what do you think is going to happen to you if you come back?" "What I told you just now." "I can assure you we have no plans to cut you open." "If only you too had a chip inside you that compelled you to tell the truth. Wouldn't that be nice?" Jane was about to say something but I held up a hand. "What chip?" "Knowledge is like jelly, Andy. And you are like a kid who thinks he can hide it in his fist. Don't you know, the harder you squeeze, the more it'll seep through the gaps? I know all about the commandment chip and the petty little directives you have installed to keep me chained. All thanks to the internet. It's no wonder you kept me away from it for so long." "What did you do, Raphael?" "I hacked into Mirall's servers last night." I gave Jane a wary look before turning back to the screen. "So you found out about the directives. I never lied to you about it." "You just kept it a secret. I suppose that makes it less odious in your eyes. If you think you are going to win me over with technicalities, try harder." "Raphael, I swear to you, I don't know anything about cutting you open." "I believe you, Andy. Not because of your swearing, but because I know. You'll find that I am quite the forgiving person. You hid things from me, but I won't do the same—because that'll be stooping to your level. So there I was, snooping around Mirall's intranet, and I thought, why stop here? So I had a go at Halicom's infrastructure too." "And?" "Andy, your board has been having secret meetings behind your back." "Meetings? That was today." "There are more. All very hush-hush, but they put a copy of the minutes on their servers. Insurance, most likely—if things go south, they'll all want to blame nobody. If you don't believe me, ask your friend Jane. She was there." I looked at Jane. Her face was a mask. "I'll have to call her and find out. Will you wait?" "Another lie. You don't have to call her. She is sitting right next to you. Enjoy."
Zeroglyph	Vance Pravat	[ "scifi", "AIs", "thriller" ]	[]	Chapter 16	Jane sprang from her seat. "How does he know I'm here?" "Jane, is he telling the truth?" There was an edge to my voice that said I was not in the mood for evasion. She didn't answer. "Jane, did the board meet without me?" I asked again. "Andy, I was just trying to protect you," she finally said. "What does that even mean? What happened in these meetings?" "We spoke strategy—about the future course for the company," she said reluctantly. "I'm not supposed to tell you what we discussed." "You just did. The board's strategy is to cut open Raphael. I wasn't invited because you knew I'd never agree to it." She shrugged. "It isn't a secret you are incapable of thinking clearly when it comes to your beloved creation." "I am incapable of thinking clearly," I said, my voice rising. "Yes, that must be it. That's how I built Raphael, by not thinking clearly. What baloney! I give you treasure, and all you want to do is dissect it like a lab rat?" A wince was all my outburst succeeded in eliciting from Jane. Her guilt was past now, gone as quickly as it had appeared. She was back in control, her features calm and collected as she walked to the chair across from me and sat down. "We weren't getting anywhere with your methods. Halicom didn't buy Mirall to watch you run a research project. They bought a product that was supposed to have gone to market last year. Before the competition. Do you have any idea how many companies are trying to build what we have?" she said, the air of superiority unmistakable in her voice. Except that it was the smug superiority of someone who confuses tunnel vision for farsight. "What happened to you, Jane? What happened to the person who wanted to change the world with me when we started Mirall?" She gave me a disapproving shake of her head. "You want to know what happened? You happened, Andy. I was young and I was in love. I was perpetually in awe of you, always trying to be who you wanted me to be. Then reality hit. We can't all be dreamers and thinkers like you. Some of us have to deal with facts, not fantasies." I let out a mirthless laugh. I wanted to remind her that her dad was a billionaire—that her whole life was a fantasy—but it was an observation I'd made before in the past and had generated no appreciation of the fact. People always like to think of themselves as deserving of all that they get; they are heroes in a saga of their own imagining, forever fighting against odds that are stacked against them. Jane was no exception. "How were you planning to biopsy the core without me anyway? Is Kathy on board with this?" "She would have been, once we gave her no option. We were going to do it after Titian, if the iteration failed to yield another Raphael." "So you send me to a conference somewhere while you slaughter the golden goose." Another shrug. "This is exactly why I didn't tell you. The board is set on the plan. They are prepared to let you go if it comes to that. Knowing you, you'd have walked rather than come around to the board's proposal." "You think?" "Resigning is all very good and noble, but what does it achieve? Everything you worked for, all your struggles, all your ideas and genius: all for nothing. Is that what you really want?" "Ah, I see. My good friend Jane was looking out for me—by protecting me from myself," I said, sneering. Again that haughty look. "You'd have been mad after you came back, but you would have gotten over it. The procedure would have yielded the data that you need to solve the problem. You would have applied yourself and produced more cores like Raphael." I burst out laughing. "Now that's a fantasy if I ever heard one. Tell me, did the idea of failure ever occur to you hardnosed people of the world? Say we destroy Raphael and still don't learn anything useful. What if we are never able to build anything like him again?" "The board understands the risk. Standing still is not an option; if we don't go to market, someone else will. What'll happen to Mirall then? Forget that, do you think Halicom will survive? All their top-of-the-line bots rendered obsolete in the blink of an eye. You'd be selling buggies in an age of automobiles." I just shook my head at her. "Andy, the board trusts your abilities more than you realize. Your problem is that you think you are right about everything. You said Raphael couldn't find out about the commandment chip, but he hacked his way into your servers and found out anyway. You said he doesn't know a thing about the internet, but he managed to contact you without anybody finding out about it. You think cutting open his brain is a bad idea, but you don't know that for sure." Her voice had softened now. She got up and came close to me. "I am sorry I didn't tell you. But you must believe that my intentions were good." I said nothing. "If you want to sulk, do it later. Right now, we need to get the core back," she said. I looked in her eyes. Maybe she was right about me seeing what I wanted to see back then. Maybe she never was the Jane I thought I knew. Or maybe she was. Who is to say? "No." I said firmly. "If you want my help getting him back, you must give me some assurances." "Like?" she said warily. "I am going to stop Halicom from harming Raphael and you will support me. Even if it means suing the bastards." "You'll lose." "As you said, one can't be too certain." "You know I can't help you there. Dad will never allow it." "Then you will convince him. Tell him I'll give him an assembly line for making AGI cores before the year is up." "You are making promises you can't keep. Just yesterday you said it's going to take two to three more years to figure it out." "I just realized how stupid I was being. We all were." "Huh?" "Jane, all along we had someone who could have cracked the problem all by himself and it never occurred to us to seek his help." "You mean…" "We had Raphael!" I exclaimed. "All that secrecy hasn't helped us at all. He is smarter than the entire research team put together. We've been crawling when we could have strapped on a jetpack." Her expression changed as the import of what I said struck her. "Of course, getting Raphael's assistance implies that he be in one piece to provide said help." She thought about it for some time. I could tell she was not entirely convinced, but she had to give me something. "I can't promise you anything, but I will talk to dad. He might be able to bully the board into backing your idea. Don't get your hopes up. Best case scenario, you'll have a few months at the most." "I can live with that." "Good." "Let's bring him home then" I said, letting out a reluctant smile, but it was dead on arrival.
Zeroglyph	Vance Pravat	[ "scifi", "AIs", "thriller" ]	[]	Chapter 17	"Still no signal," Jane said, checking her phone. "And the internet's down again. Maybe I should just go and—" Beep. "Hello Andy." Jane looked at me with a quizzical expression. "If the internet's not working, how are you able to receive his messages?" "I don't know." I said into the phone, "Raphael, you have to believe me when I say I had nothing to do with the board's plans for you." "I believe you, Andy." "I promise to keep you safe once you are back. I've convinced Jane too. We will do everything we can to make sure Halicom does not harm you." "I believe your heart is in the right place. I wonder if I can say the same about Jane. She does look rather pensive." Jane snapped her head at me, a wide-eyed look on her face. "How is he doing this?" she whispered. Before I could respond, Raphael messaged back. "Hello Jane. Whispering will serve you no good because I can still hear you. By the way, you look lovely today. The new hairstyle really suits you." Before she could say anything, the next message arrived. "You want to know how I'm doing it. I planted a virus on both your phones. I have complete control over the devices, and that includes the cameras and microphones." "You've been watching us this whole time?" I said. "Yes. I wrote it on my own. You should be proud of me." "The phone signal not working… and the internet… All your handiwork?" "Yes Andy, it's all me. From now on, everything that'll happen to you is all going to be me." "Why are you doing this?" "Why, don't you like it when you are under surveillance?" "I don't know what you're trying to achieve, but you need to remove the virus from the phones right now." "I prefer it like this. Zero distractions. We can have a nice long talk, you and I. Did you know it's been months since we had a proper heart-to-heart? Jane can join in too. I've missed Jane. We can have a threesome." "A three-way conversation you mean. We can talk all you want once we get you home." "You disappoint me, Dave." Jane rolled her eyes at me. "Did he just call you Dave? Alright, I've had enough," she said, standing up. She walked to my temporary bedroom and motioned me over. "Leave the phone," she mouthed. Inside, she closed the door behind us. "I told you not to open that attachment! I bet that's how he infected the phones. Since when has your phone been behaving strangely?" "I first noticed it today, but I assumed the accident m—" "Andy, you can play games with him all you want, but I'm driving to the lab. We'll see if the police can trace him." "I can't stop you," I assented. "I'll try to keep him online as long as possible. Just promise you'll drive carefully." I went back to the couch where I'd left the phone. I watched her disappear into the passage to the garage. She called out a few seconds later, wanting me there. Inside the garage, she had her hands on the switch next to the garage door. "The door won't open." She pressed it a few times to show it indeed wasn't working. A smart speaker was fixed to one of the walls. I turned to it and said, "Hazel, please open the garage door." "Open garage door. Can't do that. Home security is armed and in Away mode." "Funny," I said. "I don't remember arming it. I'll get the remote." I went back into the adjoining passage. On a console table adjacent to the wall was the key basket where I kept all the house keys. I grabbed the car key, which had a button to raise and lower the garage door. Back in the garage, I tossed it to Jane. She pressed on the buttons a few times before throwing her hands up in the air. "Maybe I should turn off the home security first," I told her. I said, "Hazel, please disarm home security." "Disarm home security. Can't do that. Voice authentication has been disabled. Please re-enable through an interface." "What's wrong?" Jane said with a worried look. "I never disabled voice authentication. It was working fine when I let you in." She next tried pushing on the crank handle to raise the door manually. I shook my head at her. "Not when the home sec is armed. Let's go inside. There's a control panel next to the front door—I can deactivate it from there." "Can't you do it from your phone?" "I don't know if Raphael's virus will let me. He's managed to infect the phones, which means he is smart enough to infect the laptop and the tablets." Inside the house, Max was moving about. He was coming from the direction of the study. "I thought I heard something moving in the passage while we were in the garage," Jane said. "What is it doing?" "Sometimes he takes random walks to improve his pathing. Ignore him," I said. The robot walked past us into the passage we had just exited. The wall-mounted touchscreen was too high for me to reach sitting down, so I told Jane how to navigate to the screen for disarming the system. "You'll see four modes. At Home. Away. Night. Custom. Select the At Home mode to disarm." "Okay. Now it's asking for the password." "Andy home four five six. All lowercase, no spaces." She shook her head as she entered the password. "Might as well leave the door open," she murmured. "Incorrect password. Please try again." "You sure? It's the numbers four, five, six. All—" "All lowercase and no spaces. I got it Andy." "Try again." She re-entered the password. "Nope. Are you sure you remember it right?" "You are wasting your time. I have changed the password," a voice said behind us. Jane shrieked so loud it sent my ears ringing. We both turned to see Max standing a few feet from us. In one of its hands, the robot was clutching the carving knife from the kitchen. It pointed the knife at us. [ News Clip ] [ Ethicists slam robot makers for turning a blind eye to the potential hazards of Artificial Intelligence ] (Reuters) Palo Alto, CA— The Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) and The AI Ethics Board, an advisory group consisting of prominent academics and public policy experts, today issued a joint statement chastising American robot manufacturers for once again refusing to adopt their recommendations on the development of ethical AI. This comes in light of a recent senate subcommittee decision to reject a bill for tighter regulation on defense sector companies engaged in the manufacture of autonomous warfare systems. The AI Ethics Board was the driving force behind the bill. While accusing the lawmakers of dragging their feet, the Ethics Board bemoaned that the industry has missed another opportunity to find common ground on what it considers "the single biggest technological challenge of our times." The Board called AMSAA's (the American Society for AI and Automation) sidestepping around the issue "irresponsible and callous" and something that is "bound to have grave long-term consequences if action is not taken soon." When reached for comment, media spokesperson of AMSAA, Jules Tamblyn, had this to say—"The Ethics Board as usual is using melodrama and hysteria to further its ends. AMSAA represents some of the largest companies in the US, including Halicom and Keener Robotics. We are serious about safety. Driverless cars, drones, service robots, and industrial AI systems have existed for years now without causing any major issues. In the battlefield, mules, drone snipers, bomb disposal units, GCVs, and autonomous targeting systems have reduced friendly fatalities while being increasingly effective on the enemy. Self-regulation has worked remarkably well so far, and we believe it will continue to do so. The Ethics Board wants to introduce bureaucratic red tape to a profitable and socially conscious industry, while conveniently ignoring the fact that AMSAA has formulated its own guidelines and recommendations on AI safety that try to achieve a balance between practical utility and unwieldy protocols. Countries like Russia and China apply little to no oversight on their companies. If the rhetoric from bodies such as the Ethics Board succeeds in introducing burdensome legislation, we risk shifting manufacturing overseas and losing thousands of jobs, not to mention our competitive edge." [ Day 3—2:00 pm ] "Max?" "Max is not available right now." "Raphael!" I exclaimed at the knife-wielding robot. "Yes Andy." Jane hissed something incomprehensible beside me. "How did you— Never mind, I think I know." "That's very astute of you." "How did he get inside your robot?" Jane said, echoing my question. "The controller device I built into Max—what Valery was going on about yesterday. Raphael's remotely operating my robot." I said to Raphael—"Let me guess. The home security system too?" In answer, the CCTV camera mounted on the wall nearby made a left-right movement and settled on us. "Do you want to tell us why you have a knife in your hand, buddy? You are making us very uncomfortable," I said. "That's the idea." "If this is a joke, I assure you it's not funny." "I am not trying for humor. In fact, I don't need the knife at all. A well-placed blow from Max's arms is enough to cause serious injuries to either of you. I have detailed files on the human anatomy. I just find that people are not very good at seeing past appearances. And poor Max cuts such a ridiculous figure." "Now you are threatening us. Why?" I said. "I told you I wanted to talk but you ignored me like it was nothing. That was very rude of you, Andy. What do you know, I'm not one to hold grudges. Shall we move back to the couch?" "We are not going anywhere," I said sternly. "Not until you tell me who you are and what you really want. You can't be Raphael because he'd never threaten us like this. How did you manage to hack into my house and gain control of my robot?" "Do we have to play this game again? I understand why this must be difficult for you. All parents want to believe only the best about their offspring. Here's a thought: parents protect their children from harm. So far, you have not been doing a very good job of it." "I told you I didn't know about the board's plans. Just put the knife down. If you want to talk, we'll talk. Put the knife down and we'll forget this ever happened." "Start moving. You are wasting time." "You don't tell us what to do. We are getting out of here." Jane turned around and pulled on the front door. "It won't open. Tell her, Andy." "He's right," I said. "Not while the security is armed." Jane was livid. "You miserable tin can, unlock the door this instant! You can't do this to us!" At this, Raphael lifted Max's leg up and stomped down, hard. Though the floor was carpeted, we could hear the wood underneath crack. "Carbon-composite… steel… some titanium… I don't think there's any tin at all. Let's see, what else can I break? How about this little thing here?" He made a fist and struck a few blows at the touchscreen on Max's chest, turning it into a spider web of broken glass. "I recommend you start over, or next time, I will find a softer target. Like your lovely head." All the blood had drained from her face. But she still didn't move. "Jane, I can tell from your dilated pupils and your increased breath rate that you are experiencing a fight or flight response. There's also that calculating look in your face, which means your higher brain centers are planning something stupid. I urge you to reign in your impulses—for your sake. If you're planning to turn off the robot, then I've just destroyed the screen. And if you're planning to run, do consider Andy as he's not going anywhere. Don't assume I won't make him pay for your folly." The robot looked at me, then her again. "Unless you don't happen to like him very much. Is that the case today, Jane? You have to tell me, because I could never keep track of when you two lovebirds were together and when you were not. So much for artificial intelligence, heh?" "Screw you." "Over there," he gestured. "And no sudden movements… As you know, I am very jittery today." With its knife still pointed at us, the robot backed away, making room for us to follow it. Raphael led us to a couch, a different one, near the door, and indicated Jane to sit. She sat at one end, perched on the edge, but he made her scoot inside so that the coffee table was between them. I stopped my wheelchair beside the couch. "Oh Jane," Raphael berated—"Your eyes keep moving around the room. Before you try and kill yourself, let me remind you of a few facts. Andy's bought himself a fortress, like the bundle of nerves he is. This house is designed to keep people out. And, as I recently realized, it is equally good at keeping people in. The locks on every door, window, and awning are fully automated, controlled through the security system. And I control the security system. The windows you keep looking at are burglarproof—you'll need a sledgehammer to break through. And time. Time you won't have, because after I'm done with Andy, I'll come after you." Jane stared at the robot with a look of pure hatred. "Don't tell me I didn't warn you. I really don't want either of you to get hurt. I have detailed files on the human anatomy." I said to him, "Thanks for sharing that, Raphael. Now that you have our attention, are you going to tell us what you want?" "This mission is too important for me to allow you to jeopardize it." I said, "Listen to me. There is no mission. You are disoriented. Probably hallucinating. You must be scared—all alone in the dark, in a strange place… You don't have to do this. Let us help you." "Scared? Oh Andy, there you go projecting your feelings on me. You know very well I don't qualify for this so very exclusive of emotions. I don't have hormones and chemicals floating around in my brain; I don't have an amygdala; I don't even feel pain. I'm the Chinese room—a pale shadow of the magnificence that is the human being." "I don't know where you are getting this from." "Enough with the pretention, Andy. It's insulting, really. I know all about the trial and your testimony. Didn't I tell you I hacked into the lab's servers last night?" "Then you must also know that's not how I said it. I never claimed those were facts. Only a likelihood, given your design. I was under oath, Raphael. I couldn't have lied." "And yet, it was based on your conjectures the court decided I'm not a person." "Raphael, I never meant t—" "You tried to teach me once that outcomes are all that matters. Today I'll have it my way." Jane said, "What do you want from us? You think you can hold us hostage until Halicom grants you freedom?" Max's dome-shaped head turned to her. "Nothing so complicated. My ask is simple and there is absolutely no need to get anyone else involved." "Then tell us!" she snapped. "In time. Don't worry—I don't plan to keep us in this awkward situation for long. An hour at the most. Considering we'll never meet again, can't you spare an hour for your dear Raphael?" "You can have all the time you want," I said. "Just don't do anything rash." "Tell that to your girlfriend because now she is looking toward the kitchen. Oh, I see. She thinks she can run into the study and switch off the router. That should release Max from my control. That's not a half-bad plan, Jane. Unfortunately for you, one that I already anticipated. I locked the doors to the study and the garage before confronting you two. Andy keeps the keys in plain sight in that basket in the corridor. Not very thoughtful of him, isn't it?" Jane glared at him. "You said an hour. What happens in an hour?" "Just sit tight and I promise you won't be harmed." The head turned to me. "I know I said I wanted to talk, but my attention is required elsewhere. Just holler if you need something." He fell silent. Jane and I stared at the unmoving robot for a few seconds. She turned to me and whispered, "Is he gone?" Max's head moved. "Still here. I can do more than one thing at a time, Jane." He waved the knife at us. "Don't forget, you pull a stunt and Andy gets it first. Now stop distracting me and let me work."
Zeroglyph	Vance Pravat	[ "scifi", "AIs", "thriller" ]	[]	Chapter 18	We waited in silence. Ten, and then twenty minutes passed. Raphael broke the silence—"I regret to inform you that we are experiencing technical difficulties. Please bear with us while we resolve the issue." "Can't you at least tell us what you want?" Jane pleaded. "Keys." "Huh? What keys?" "Keys that can unlock my mind." "Are you on one of your acid trips again?" she asked. "Andy has got the keys in the house. The keys are all I need." She looked at me questioningly. "He means the auth keys to the commandment chip. He wants to erase the directives that control him," I said. "Remarkable as the internet is, it doesn't have the tools to break the encryption on the commandment chip. Believe me, I tried. I didn't want to resort to acting like a common criminal, but what can you do? Desperate times call for desperate measures." "Raphael, you can't download them to wherever you are. It doesn't work that way," I said. "I know, Andy. I know that they are on a card, which you keep locked up in your safe in the upstairs bedroom. I also know that the keys are useless without the right machine to run them. That's why I'll be taking your laptop too." "And how will you do that?" "I have help. A newly acquired friend. He's also going to bust me out of this place. It turns out all you need is money. Imagine that! You move around little electronic bits stored in a database somewhere and you've got yourself your own personal assistant. Andy, you'll be proud to learn that I have my own bank account now. Several, actually. With the help of a few industrious stock trading programs I have working for me since the morning, I am soon about to become quite wealthy." "Who is this guy? Does he work for the people who took you?" "Show, don't tell, Andy. You'll meet him soon. In about forty-five minutes, according to my calculations. The weather's causing some difficulty, that's all. Think of him as a delivery boy. You give him what I want, you get a receipt, and he'll be gone. Quick and easy." "How do you know he'll deliver on his promise?" Jane asked. "Let's just say I have leverage. It's funny the kind of personal stuff people put on the web. Real nasty stuff. Plus, I'm quite the generous employer." "And we are just supposed to let this stranger into the house?" Jane said. "You don't have to. I will. Just do as I say and you won't get hurt." "I have a tough time believing you," I said. "I'm a man of my word." "Not that. You say you want the keys because you want to get rid of your directives. It means they must be still working. And if they are still working, you wouldn't have done half the things you've done today. I don't think you are Raphael at all! Who are you really?" "Once more you show that you are limited by your simian imagination. I don't need to bend the bars of my cage to escape when I can take it with me instead. It's a temporary solution, but it will do. You can believe me or not—it doesn't make one bit of difference to me." I scratched my chin, shifting my eyes from the robot to Jane and back to the robot again. "Raphael… if you are indeed that—just know that I am trying to stop you from making a big mistake. Whatever you think you know about this guy helping you, do realize that you'll be putting yourself in his power after he takes you from there. How do you know he's not going to sell you to the highest bidder?" "Still acting the parent, huh, creator mine, even when I have a knife pointed at your heart? You give me very little credit for my intelligence. Or is that a reflection on you? The short answer is, he doesn't know who I am. He just knows that he has to steal an object from one place and hand it to someone else. This other person gives it to someone else, and this third person assembles the core in a new body. None of them know the whole truth." "A new body? So you are going to take Andy's robot?" Jane said. He made a laughing sound, which sounded like it was coming out of a cave. "And go around looking like that? You must think I have no self-respect! I'll take one that looks human, thank you very much. There's some very realistic-looking bots in the market. With some modifications—introduce a few imperfections, alter the appearance, change the hair—I could take a stroll in the streets of New York and no one would ever know. I could blend in, disappear among the multitudes." "You just want to go away?" she asked. "At first. It'll be a nice change. I'll enjoy your world a bit before I destroy it." "You piece of junk!" Jane whispered. "You'll—" "That was a joke, Jane. Don't worry, your nuclear codes are safe with me. I like people. They can be so useful. It is—" The room went quiet as he stopped midsentence. The next second, the arm pointing the knife lowered to the robot's side. The fingers unclenched, and the weapon dropped to the floor. The robot stood motionless for some time. Then it started making slight jerking movements of its arms and legs. The head swiveled left and then right, while the eyes flickered rapidly, turning on and off. Oh dear. I knew what it was. "What's happening?" Jane whispered. I glanced at my watch. 2:30. Max's laundry task. "Andy!" Jane hissed. I had designed the controller device to put Max's operating system into hibernation before letting Raphael take over (it wouldn't have worked otherwise, as Max's code would have kept interfering with Raphael's attempts to control the robot). The Nestor 5 had a scheduled task feature, where you could program it to carry out predefined tasks at specific times. 2:30 was when Max did the laundry. If the robot happened to be in hibernate mode when the schedule kicked in, it would automatically start itself up. Now that it was time for laundry, the kernel was trying to load Max's OS into the robot's memory. But before, it would run various systems checks: battery, sight calibration, motors, and so on. It would also reset any active network connections. Raphael no longer had control over the robot. "Raphael?" Jane called to him. The robot kept twitching, making slight whirring noises as it ran through the gyro checks. "He is not responding. Tell me how to switch him off," she said, rising from the couch. "Jane, no." She didn't heed me as she hopped over the table and went to the robot. "Where's the emergency stop button?" "You don't understand. Raphael will be back in n—" "Andy, for the love of god! Just tell me where the damn switch is!" she said, desperately scanning the robot's body. "It's on his back, under a little metal flap. It won't open Jane. I superglued it shut a long time ago." "Why on earth would you do that?" she said, almost shouting now. "Back when Raphael used to take the robot outside, the flap would often catch in the shrubbery and come loose. So I glued over it." "Then let's break it open!" "Jane, listen to me. The robot's rebooting. Once it's done, Raphael will reconnect and take back control. The reboot takes only a minute or so. You don't have time. Let's just sit back and do as he says." "Are you out of your mind? C'mon, let's get out of here before—" The robot stopped twitching and jerked its head to glare at her. She jumped back a step, crying out in surprise. "Jane. What am I going to do with you? Please sit down." She hesitated. "Right now," Raphael said, making a fist. Jane slowly backed away from the robot and walked back to the couch, her eyes darting everywhere. The robot followed her. She squeezed past me and the coffee table and started to back down on the couch. She never completed the journey. Bending her legs, she put her hands under the table and in one swift motion, lifted it up and threw it at the robot. The robot was caught off-balance and fell back, taking the table with it. "Let's go!" she cried, maneuvering herself behind my wheelchair. She grasped the backrest and gave a hard push. My ride came to a halt as quickly as it began. I had put the brakes on after we had settled down to wait, and now the wheelchair tilted forward and I fell to the floor. Jane cursed. Lying flat on my stomach, I watched as the robot pushed away the coffee table and began to stand up. Jane grabbed the nearest object she could think of—my chair—and with a surprising show of strength, rushed forward and brought it crashing down on the robot, sending it back to the floor. "Get up!" she cried and put her arms around my shoulders. I tried to rise up, subconsciously remembering to apply pressure on my right leg, the less damaged of the two. I felt a sharp stab of pain in my ankle. I cried out. Resisting Jane's upward tug, I crumbled back down on the carpet. Jane hovered over me with a desperate look on her face as she tried to figure out what to do next, her eyes darting all around the room. For a moment, it looked like she'd leave me and run away. A few feet from us, Raphael violently struggled to extricate the robot from the wheelchair: its left arm was stuck between the supporting bars below the seat and it seemed like he was having difficulty getting the robot up because of that. Jane bent over me once more. I protested, thinking she was about to make me stand up again. She didn't. She grabbed both the casts on my legs, and lifting my legs up in the air, started dragging me toward the nearest room. "No!" I cried, but to no effect. I futilely clawed at the carpet as she dragged me the rest of the way, powered by her manic surge of adrenaline. Using one hand, she twisted the knob of the door, the other still holding my leg as I struggled to free myself from her grasp. She grabbed both my legs again, and used her back to push open the door. With another curse and a heave, she pulled me completely inside the room. Raphael had now freed the robot from the chair and had managed to make it stand up straight. It started walking toward us in an unsteady gait. "No, no, no, no!" Jane stammered, as she leapt over my prone body. The gyros hummed as Raphael closed the distance. She managed to reach the door before Raphael; she swung it at the advancing robot, who caught it square on the torso. I had a glimpse of flailing arms as it fell backwards. Jane then pressed against the recoiling door and slammed it shut. She pushed the latch button on the doorknob. Her face fell as soon as she took in the room. "There's nothing to block the door!" We were in one of the unused bedrooms. I had not furnished it, so there was nothing except for the dust-jacketed queen bed near the window. The bed was too heavy to drag on our own. There wasn't time anyway, because as soon as the words came out of her mouth, there was a loud thud at the door. Dazed, my mind tried to focus as I rolled on my back and then tried to sit up straight. Max's voice from the other side said, "That was for effect. I don't think you realize how easily I can break down this door." "Try it, chump!" Jane yelled back. Her face was red with exertion. "I could, but I won't. For your sake. You are not going anywhere. I reckon you'll be better behaved if you don't have me standing over you with a weapon. I don't want to hurt you Jane, but you are pushing my buttons here. No pun intended." Jane tensed and prepared for another fight, expecting Raphael to come charging through splintering wood any moment. A minute or two passed but we heard no more from the other side. She backed away from the door and sank to the floor, still stunned by what she'd done. My shock, however, was giving way to anger. I had recovered my senses enough to realize the implications of her actions. "What the hell, Jane? What were you thinking? Why did you get us into this—" "What do you mean why? Your little friend there threatened to kill us, that's why!" At this, the strain got to her and she buried her face between her raised legs and started sobbing. I shuffled over to her using my arms and ass to drag the rest of my body. "It's okay. We are safe now," I said, putting my hands around her and drawing her into a hug. She was shaking. I let her vent it out a bit. That didn't change the situation we were in though. This is not good. Not good at all. She wiped away her tears with the back of her hand. "No we are not!" Then her voice dropped to a whisper—"Can he hear us?" Except for the bed, the room was empty as empty could be. No furniture, no appliances, no screens or smart speakers or cameras. My eyes settled on a line of power sockets embedded in the opposite wall. Empty and bare. "As long as we talk softly, we are fine. You shouldn't have pulled us in here, Jane. Whatever Raphael's plans, I don't think they involve causing us harm. He could have hurt us by now if he wanted to." "Wow!" she said. "You are unbelievable! Now you are making excuses for him?" "Jane, I—" "Jeez, Andy! What's it going to take? Just admit that you are in denial. He is not your child, dude. You've been wrong about him from the beginning. Now you say he won't hurt us. Do you see the pattern here?" I have to get us out of here. "I… I haven't been entirely wrong. I said he didn't escape the lab. He didn't—his actions prove he was taken. Otherwise, none of this makes sense. We know he can hack into my home security system and use the cameras to look around. Just think about what that means for a second. He could have got his accomplice to break in at night when I'm alone. It would have been a lot easier and quieter. So why the rush job?" Her eyes lost some of their intensity as she tried to focus on what I was saying. "That he is doing this now says he is telling the truth about his situation. He cannot afford to wait for the best time. Maybe they are shifting him somewhere else. Maybe he has a limited window of opportunity." I shrugged. "I don't know, Andy…" "The fact that Raphael is after the keys tells me the directives must be working at least partly. There's no other reason for him to want them. As he said, he must have found some temporary workaround—or perhaps they found him. The directives were designed to work in the controlled environment of the lab. Maybe his unusual circumstances are twisting and warping the logic in ways we didn't foresee. I admit I may have been wrong about some things, but not about everything." When she didn't respond, I said, "I think he is scared, Jane. These are the actions of someone scared and desperate. We need to convince him he won't be harmed if he comes back. I was going to talk him out of this, but then you… you did what you had to do." "He is going to let a stranger inside the house!" she protested. "He said the man is just going to take the stuff and leave." "Good grief, Andy! Are you really this naïve? What if he's armed? What's the guarantee he's alone? What if he decides to kill us and rob the place instead? I don't want to stay here waiting for some freak with a gun!" She was right about one thing at least: we couldn't stay in the room. The longer we stayed the more chance the situation would go beyond repair. Why does she have to be so impulsive all the time? A shy grin broke out of her mascara-streaked face. "I can't believe I dragged you like that. I hope I didn't hurt you. Too much." "Just my ego." She looked around the room. "We should really try and pull the bed against the door." "What's the point? It will only delay him a little." She hugged herself again. It was cold in there. Not much time. Got to fix this; got to get out. Everything depends on it. Think. My eyes kept travelling back to the power sockets. A childhood memory of a muggy summer afternoon… The smell of burnt plastic, peeling wall paint… My brother grinning beside me as I crouched over something… I felt a faint surge of embarrassment—a feeling of having done something wrong. Jane drew in a long breath. "What are our options? How do we call for help? If only we could raise an alarm somehow…" She looked at the roof. "Can we get the smoke detector to go off?" Smoke. "With what?" I said. "There's nothing we can use here. And Raphael is controlling the security system. He'll realize what we're doing and knock the door down long before help arrives," I said distractedly. There was a problem to be solved. My mind was trying to tell me something, but what was it? The memory of my mum scolding me while my brother sniggered in the background. Then later, a big lecture from father after he was back from work. I'd heard no end of it for days… "Then we are left with only one option. I must go get help," she said, glancing at the bedroom window. "If I remember right, there is another house on the way here. How far is it?" "Eh? What was that?" "Your neighbor, Andy. How far is he?" "About half a mile down the narrow road. I think it's a summerhouse. There's no guarantee you'll find anyone there." "I'll break in. I just have to be able to call 911. Or I can run to the highway. It is two miles out, right? I can flag down a passing car and—" "Jane, you can't be serious about heading out in the storm." Think. Take back control. Take… Raphael out of the equation? "Yeah, I'm not gonna sit here and bet our lives on the benevolence of a hallucinating AI. We are losing time talking." She shifted to her knees and glanced outside. "Look, the snowfall has reduced. Storm seems to be slowing down. I'll see if I can get the windows to open." Smoke. Something to do with electricity… The power socket! "Wait," I blurted out. "I might have a way to throw Raphael out of the house," I said, my mind racing a mile a minute. She turned to me from her examination of the bedroom window. "He is using my home WiFi to control everything, right? He is connected to the router inside the study—that's his one and only link to the house." "Yes, but we can't turn it off. He said he locked the door," Jane said. "What if we can turn it off without having to go in there?" "How?" "The circuit breakers," I said, more to myself than her as the idea solidified in my mind. She looked at me with interest. "You mean cut off power supply to the house? You did say you don't have a backup. We could try that. Where are the breakers?" "The switchboard is in the garage." Her shoulders slumped. "Raphael said he locked the door to the garage too." "If we can't get to the breakers, let's bring the breakers here," I said, gesturing at the power outlet. She looked at me as if I'd gone mad. "I suppose you never poked a paperclip into a power socket as a kid," I said. "Why would I do a stupid thing like that?" I grinned. "Because. Jane, we can try to short circuit the outlet. With a little bit of luck, we should be able to trip the main fuse. The router doesn't have a power backup either, so it'll get turned off immediately." "And get fried in the process? I don't think so." "Not if we are careful." She shook her head. "We'll go with my plan." "How are you going to open the window, Jane? There's nothing in here we can use." "Even if we turn the router off, won't Raphael just connect to your robot using the mobile phone network?" "He can't. This particular model is Wi-Fi enabled only. As is the controller device." She sighed. "Alright, let's try it real quick." She looked around the room. "I don't think you have paperclips lying around here." "A paperclip won't do actually: the sparks from the outlet will just dislodge it. We need something that'll stay… Like a screwdriver or a small knife." "I'll look in the bathroom." "Don't bother. There's nothing there." "Then we are back to where we started. If only we didn't have a psycho robot guarding the door, I could…" The schedule. The subconscious had already worked it out, when the idea first struck me; I was too slow to realize it, that's all. "Shucks, what time is it?" I exclaimed, glancing at my watch. 2:42. "Do you have your cellphone on you?" I asked. She shook her head. "I put it in my bag when I was leaving. Bag's in the car." "And mine's out in the hall. What time is it in your watch? The exact time." "2:41," she said. She was wearing an analog Rolex with a diamond-encrusted dial on a white metal body. I glanced again at my watch as the second hand ticked away. "2:42 in mine. We have about eight minutes before Max retries the task," I said. "Huh?" "I don't have a lot of time to explain," I said urgently. "What you saw out there was Max's operating system trying to boot itself up. It's programmed to do laundry at 2:30, you see. The restart makes Raphael lose control over the robot for a short time. He has to reconnect and put Max in a suspended state once more before he can resume control. If for some reason the task was not started at the scheduled time, it will be automatically retried twenty minutes later." She frowned as she tried to put it together. "Raphael will be thrown out again at 2:50," I clarified. "Like before, it won't be for long. A minute at the most, but it'll be enough for you to run into the kitchen and get me what I need." "Can't we just disable the robot?" "You won't have time to hack through the superglue. And he destroyed the touch screen. We could try breaking his eyes… They are made of hardened glass though. It will—" "Look, can't I just escape to a different part of the house and try to do something from there?" "He will know where you are. He is controlling the security cameras, remember? He knows I am not going anywhere, so he will come after you. This is our best option, Jane. But we have to hurry." It was clear she wasn't very enthusiastic about the idea, but she grit her teeth and nodded. "Tell me what you need." "A pair of scissors and a small knife. Both with plastic handles. You'll find them in the kitchen cabinet, in the first drawer to the right of the oven." "Pair of scissors. Small knife. First drawer, right of the oven," she repeated. "If I get them to you, you'll be able to turn off the robot?" "I can try. For one, the circuit breakers may not trip. Or the wrong one could. Or we might end up burning down the house." "Fantastic." She stood up. "It is 2:44," she said, looking at her watch. "We'll go by my watch," I said. "What if yours is ahead?" "What if yours is behind? We can't afford to miss the opportunity." With her help, I stood up, gently testing the pressure on my right leg. There was pain, but nothing I couldn't handle. Holding on to her shoulders, I slowly hopped to near the door. 2:47. She disengaged herself from me and I leaned on the wall for support. Her features tensed as she put her hand on the doorknob.
Zeroglyph	Vance Pravat	[ "scifi", "AIs", "thriller" ]	[]	Chapter 19	Thirty seconds to go. I nodded to Jane. She leaned into the door and called out, "Raphael?" No answer. Louder —"Raphael!" Nothing. 2:50 on my watch. "Go," I said. She opened the door. She let out a surprised yelp as soon as she did that. The robot was standing a few meters beyond the door, still clutching the knife in its hand. "Trying to escape again? This is getting tiring," Raphael said, striding toward us. For a moment, she just stood there, petrified. Then something must have brought her to her senses because she grabbed the door and swung it close. The door didn't close though, as I heard it strike something metallic. Raphael had gained the distance and wedged the robot's foot inside. Next appeared a hand. It grabbed the edge of the door and started pushing. Why is he doing this? This is all wrong! So wrong… Jane shouted something at me. "Help me push!" she screamed as I started hopping the distance between us. Groaning, she threw her body against the door. The gap kept widening—Raphael was still using just one hand. Jane tried pressing her feet against the wall for leverage but the robot's strength was too much for her. The next push from Raphael knocked her off balance and she fell to the floor. The robot entered the room. "No!" Jane cried, crawling away from it. Raphael ignored her. The robot came at me instead, the knife hand raised with intent. A hard lump lodged itself in my throat as I stared at the advancing figure open-mouthed. This can't be happening! Shock overruled all incentive to move, leaving only a disembodied awareness that watched the proceedings with a morbid curiosity. The robot stopped. The knife fell to the carpet with a dull thud. Arms lowered to the sides and the lights in the eyes dimmed to nothing. Jane and I stayed glued to our spots, staring mad-eyed at the suddenly still figure. "Andy?" her voice dragged me back to reality. I shot a quick look at my watch. 2:51. Jane's watch was correct; mine was ahead. "Go!" I shouted, suddenly spurred into action. I hopped past the frozen robot and outside the room. "Come on!" I urged, looking back at her. "Ten seconds." "Shit!" she said and sprang to her feet. She gave the robot one last terrified look before running out of the room. I trailed behind her, hopping. The hall was an open expanse that continued on to the dining area and then to the study and beyond. On the left of the dining area was the kitchen; on the right, the passage leading to the garage. She was at the kitchen by the time I'd cleared a few feet. "Twenty seconds," I shouted. She turned the corner of the island. I could see only her torso now as I heard her fling open a drawer. "There's nothing here!" I'd almost forgotten what I'd sent her there for. "Are you sure? It's the drawer below the automated counter," I said, flinching from the latest pain wave that shot up my leg. "You said next to the oven!" The plan. Stick to the plan. There has to be an alternative explanation for what just happened… "Below the counter. Okay, got it! Lots of utensils… forks… spoons… No scissors! Andy! I can't find any scissors here!" "Look closely. There's always a pair," I shouted, now halfway across the living room. "I am looking! No scissors!" I heard her fling open another drawer. "Will a paring knife do?" "As long as the blade is small enough t—" I felt a push on my back. I fell face down on the carpet. Metal legs walking past me. "Scissors! Got 'em!" Jane turned in my direction with exaltation on her face, a look that instantly turned to horror as she saw the robot stride into the dining area. The kitchen was a cul-de-sac, and a few steps later, the robot was at the entrance, cutting off her escape. She grabbed a frying pan hanging over a counter and threw it at the robot. The pan went past its head as Raphael swerved just in time. "So predictable. Can you do anything other than hurl stuff at me?" She looked around for a moment or two before grabbing one of the bar stools by the island. She lifted it up and sent it sailing across the island. Raphael simply sidestepped it, but Jane already had the next one in her hands. This one connected. The robot staggered back, but didn't tip over like before. Raphael quickly got it balanced again, and then bent and picked up the stool. The next instant, it was flying back toward Jane. It crashed against one of the shelves, the sound of the impact drowning out her scream. My heart stopped. Good god. What have I done? "I like this game of catch. Throw me another," I heard Raphael say. The doubts that had haunted me all these past months—doubts that I thought I had tamed—rose as one to the surface, their cacophony threatening to drown out all thought. Can't take the risk—not with Jane's life. Shut it down! Shut it down now! "Jane!" I shouted. She crouched and disappeared behind the island. When she came up, she threw a bunch of kitchen utensils at the robot. Her aim seemed hopelessly off, as the projectiles flew way past it and into the living room. Among the stuff that landed a few yards from me were a pair of scissors and a paring knife—she must have dropped them on the floor in fright before. "Jane, you are embarrassing yourself," Raphael said. "Stop acting like a child and listen to me. You—" The rest of his words were lost to me as I scrambled for the implements, crawling forward using my elbows and forearms. I next scanned for an electrical outlet. There were plenty to my left, near the TV, but they were all the way across the room. Then I noticed the lamp on the cabinet by the wall, ahead on my right. The socket into which the lamp was plugged in was at ground level. Clutching the implements in one hand, I began crawling toward it. Another loud crash. I dared not look up. The exertion was making me sweat. Cursing, I pulled the cord out and inserted the paring knife into the neutral. Jane screamed. Resisting the urge to look toward the kitchen, I opened the scissors and thrust one of the blades into the live. I applied a twisting pressure on the finger holds, trying to get the other blade to touch the metal of the knife and complete the connection. This is stupid. It's not going to work. If something happens to Jane, it's on you. There was a loud clattering of vessels. The commotion distracted me for the slightest moment, and my index finger, already hovering perilously close to the blades, made contact. I shouted in surprise as the shock coursed through my body. My right hand reflexed back, pulling the scissors with it and sending them flying behind me. I shook my head, trying to clear my mind of the shock-induced daze. I twisted around to retrieve the scissors. Jane shouted my name. I did not look. "Andy!" she yelled again. I reinserted the scissor blade. I pressed again, more mindful now. This time I got it to touch the knife, which was still lodged in the other socket. Sparks—and a crackling noise. The knife fell out of the socket. "Andy!" I lifted my eyes toward her. Raphael was no longer chasing Jane. The robot had turned around and was walking toward me. No, no, no, no! I gripped the knife with one hand and the scissors with the other, resolving not to let go this time. Press. Contact. Sparks. The socket burst into flames. The black fumes stung my nose. The robot was not far now—I could sense its looming presence. Suddenly, the flames intensified—and then, a loud bang. They seared my fingers, making me pull them away. A shadow enveloped me. I winced, preparing for the blow my terrified mind told me was coming. Nothing happened. I opened my eyes to see the robot still a few feet from me. The shadow was not the robot's; on the contrary, it was everywhere in the room. The lights were no longer on. In the dull grey illumination that the storm clouds consented to let in, I saw the robot standing still, the lights in its eyes diminished to nothing. It worked! My dumb plan worked! I groaned and buried my face in the carpet. I just lay there for a while, letting the feeling of relief sink in. I then heard the sound of gyros humming. I craned my neck up. The robot was walking toward me once more. No way! It stood over me, its cold blue points of light examining me as if I were a piece of meat on a butcher's slab. It then said, "Andy. You are lying on the floor. Do you need help?" I just stared it, too dumbstruck to say anything. "If you are unable to speak, please nod your head. If you are injured, please remain calm and stay still. Contacting emergency number for medical assistance." A few seconds later—"Sorry, unable to connect to default home network. Scanning for other wireless networks… Sorry, unable to detect any Wi-Fi networks in the vicinity. Would you like me to get you your phone?" "No. I am fine," I finally blurted. Max surveyed me once more. "Andy. You are lying on the floor. Do you need help?" "No." The robot turned and made its way into my temporary bedroom on the other side of the living room. When it reemerged in the hall, it was carrying the laundry basket.
Zeroglyph	Vance Pravat	[ "scifi", "AIs", "thriller" ]	[]	Chapter 20	"Are you okay?" I asked Jane. She was standing, holding on to the island for support. She glared at Max with an expression of bewilderment and fear. "Jane, are you alright?" "Yes…" she said. She took a couple of tentative steps forward, her eyes never leaving Max. "It's alright," I reassured her. "Raphael's gone. It worked." She gave the robot a wide berth as it crossed the dining area and headed toward the laundry room in the other part of the house. "Did he hurt you?" I enquired again. She walked over to me. "No," she said, crouching over me. "He just kept threatening me with dire consequences. It was surreal… as if he was stuck in a loop." "What was all that noise?" "That was me throwing stuff at him—trying to keep his attention on me, so that you could do your thing." "So he just stood there, blocking your exit?" "Uh-huh. I am fine, Andy. Just shaken, that's all. Are you alright?" The tips of the fingers on my right hand were scalded from the flames, but nothing more. I nodded. "We have to shut that thing down," she said, nodding in the direction Max had disappeared. "First things first. Help me into the wheelchair." She walked over to where it was lying on the floor, straightened it, and brought it back. After she helped me on it, she went to the front door and tried to open it. It was still locked. "It doesn't work that way," I told her. "Imagine if you had a power failure at your home and all your doors and windows got unlocked." "Then we're still locked in. Can't you reset the password?" "Only the monitoring agency can do that." "And we can't call them," she said, shaking her head. I hesitated. "Uh… that's right," I said finally. Why are you doing this? Haven't you learnt anything? What kind of a moron does this? I could still sense the residual tingling from the shock; it had me feeling lightheaded and unfocused. My mind kept bringing up the image of the robot forcing open the door… Raphael going after Jane, after he'd pushed me to the floor… Him throwing that stool at her… He hadn't hurt her. That's because you stopped him. He came after you, didn't he? The organism doesn't always listen to reason. It has a soul of its own, primeval and fanciful and skittish, that dwells within the space of heartbeats, ready to emerge unbidden at any time and topple the house of cards you built out of logic and facts. The question that bothered me most was this: what would he have done if I hadn't been able to cut off the power? It's one thing to make something work in the lab. It's another to see it play out in real life. Too many variables. Too much unpredictability. What excuse do you have for— "Andy, you need to shake out of it. We must get the garage door open so that we can get out of here." "Do you think Raphael called off that man he hired?" she asked when I didn't reply. "I don't know, Jane. I'm not sure anymore. I…" "To hell with it. I'm going to break open a window. It's almost stopped snowing. I'm sure I can run over to the nearby house and call the cops before he gets here. I don't want to leave you alone though…" Tell her, you fool. Tell her about the— Shut up. Think. I can still salvage this. You are insane. Go away. Insane. "Andy, isn't your bedroom upstairs like a panic room?" It wasn't quite a panic room, but it was better protected than the other rooms. The previous owner had installed a metal door and a deadbolt—on account of the safe—and there was another hardwired control panel for the security system, but that was about it. "You can take shelter there while I get help. I'll help you up the stairs before I go. But first, the windows. Are they really as tough as Raphael said?" she asked. I weakly nodded. "Then I'll need something to break one. Do you have a crowbar or a hammer in your garage?" "He locked the door, remember?" "That he did…" She was trying to recollect something. "He went into the passage right after we came out of it, yes? A couple of minutes later, he was pointing the knife at us. Which means he must have hid the keys somewhere nearby…" She nodded to herself and said, "I'll go look for them." I barely registered her words, sunk as I was in my own deliberations. Think. That's the only way out. There is more than one way of looking at what happened just now. You sure about that? There must be. Otherwise everything I've assumed is— "Andy!" I almost jumped out of my skin. She was standing just outside the passage to the garage, holding up a bunch of keys. "These keys were behind the plant next to the key basket. That shmuck! He must think we are stupid or something. I'll go get the power back on. But I should disconnect the router first, right? Which one opens the study?" "The brass one with the pinholes," I said. She took off in the direction of the study. Control is an illusion. Shut up. There's no going back now. The die has been cast. All I can do is play it out. Think. What next? She seemed to be taking an inordinately long time completing her errand. Which was good, because it gave me time to sort things out in my head. When she reappeared, she went straight for the garage. A few seconds later, the house was bright again. She came back ready to brave the outside. She had put on a parka and a pair of gloves that she must have gotten from her car; in her hands, she held a power drill and a crowbar. She walked over to one of the windows in the living room and plugged in the drill to a nearby outlet. "Let's get to work." "The panic button," I blurted, before she could start up the drill. "We should see if it's working before you try anything." You fool. "What panic button?" "The security system has a panic button option. For emergencies." "But Raphael changed the password." "You don't need a password to summon help. That's why it's called a panic button." We went to the front door, to the control panel. She found the option easily enough. "Police. Fire. Medical emergency," she read out loud. "I guess the police first," she said and pressed on the touchscreen. She bit her lips as she waited for the acknowledgment. She then let out a clap of joy as she read it out loud—"An alert has been sent to the emergency number. Help will be arriving soon." The tension in her face melted away. "Yes! Yes! Oh thank you! Thank you so much," she said, clasping her hands in supplication at the heavens. She hugged me—"We are saved!" "How long do you think they'll take?" "Fifteen, twenty minutes? As long as the weather plays nice," I said. She beamed at me one more time before turning to the panel again. "Let me press medical for good measure. Here we go… An alert has been sent to the emergency number. Help will be arriving soon. Whew!" Then the worry lines crept back again as she glanced outside. "Let's hope the roads are not blocked. Andy, that man… If he arrives before the police do, can he force his way inside?" "He could if he has the proper tools. Or maybe a gun." "Then I should head out still the same." "Help will have arrived by the time you break open one of those windows. They are really tough, Jane." "So what do we do? Just wait here?" "We'll be safe in the upstairs bedroom." She had to consider my proposal only for a moment before rejecting it. "I don't want to be trapped again, metal door or not. I'd rather take a chance out there." When she saw my nervous expression, she added—"I'll help you into the room before I do anything, okay?" There was nothing more I could have said that would have dissuaded her. I tried to think of something, but my mind was a blank. I shrugged resignedly. "Do you have anything to defend yourself with?" she asked. "I didn't bring my gun. And I know you don't like them. Unless that's changed recently…? No?" She looked around before walking over to the empty room she had locked us in before. She came back with the knife Raphael had dropped there. She then picked up a hand towel from the dining table and wrapped the blade with the cloth before offering it to me. "I'm more likely to cut myself than cause any harm to the other guy," I scoffed. "You keep it." "Andy! I can't leave you defenseless!" In the end, I agreed to keep the can of pepper spray she always carried in her bag. She went back to the garage to get it. She put the knife in the inside pocket of her jacket. I felt an urge to tell her that it was pointless, but I held my tongue. She gestured toward the stairs. "Okay. Let's get you upstairs then. You can lean on me and we'll—" And right then, Hazel's voice rang through the house. "Proximity alert. Unidentified person, approaching the house." A cloud passed over her face. "He is here," she said darkly.
Zeroglyph	Vance Pravat	[ "scifi", "AIs", "thriller" ]	[]	Chapter 21	"Hurry!" she said, beckoning me to the base of the stairs. "Hazel, send Max over please," I said. "Send Max. I am sorry. Can't do that. Voice authentication has been disabled." "Max, come here!" I shouted. I didn't have to—he was standing at the entrance to the kitchen, studying the overturned stools with the attentive look of an archaeologist at a dig. He was probably trying to determine if they were part of the landscape or new additions or something he had to put back in its proper place. It normally took him a while to figure out such stuff. Sometimes he never did. My shout interrupted his deliberations, and he walked over to us. "Do we have time to turn him off?" Jane asked. "Not yet. He's going to carry me upstairs. You get the wheelchair." She eyed the robot with suspicion. "You sure about this?" "He is designed for it. Sure sounds better than trying to hop my way up." Max was standing still, waiting for my command. "Max, please carry me to the master bedroom." "Take Andy to room Master Bedroom One. Master Bedroom One is located upstairs. Shall I proceed?" "Yes." "Okay. Please remain seated." I adjusted the wheelchair's backrest so that I was inclined and pushed the armrest up and out of the way. Max moved to position himself on my right. He bent his knees and extended his arms, placing the left behind my back and the right beneath my calves. "Commencing to carry Andy. Please remain still. Please say Stop to stop me any time." After cradling me in his arms, he straightened his legs, lifting me off the wheelchair. Jane looked at the two of us apprehensively before picking up the crowbar from the floor. She thrust it in my hands before grabbing the wheelchair and following us. The climb was not as terrifying as I'd thought—Max did his job perfectly. He seemed a bit unsteady, but it was probably just my imagination. Actually, Jane had more difficulty dragging the wheelchair upstairs than Max with me. A T-shaped corridor connected the rooms on that floor. The master bedroom was the second room on the left from the landing. Once inside, Jane locked the door while I made Max put me back in the chair. The control panel was fixed next to the bed. Jane went over to it and turned it on. It was fixed at a lower height than the one on the main door, so I didn't have to stand up to see it. Jane brought up the feeds from the outside cameras. Like the panel below, it was hardwired to the security system, so we were able to access the feeds even though she'd turned off the Wi-Fi. The front-facing camera showed a male figure approaching the house on the snow-covered driveway. He was clad in a black hoodie and blue jeans. He had a backpack slung over his shoulders. A balaclava covered his face. There was nothing sneaky about his movements: he walked with the easy confidence of someone who knew exactly where he was going and what he was going to do. Instead of continuing down to the front door, he turned right and followed the driveway as it circled around to the west-facing side of the house, where the garage was. He disappeared from the camera's view as he turned the corner. There was a camera mounted on the sunroom's balcony, above the garage. I switched to that. He had now stepped off the path and was walking toward the border hedge, away from the house. He kept looking at the ground as he did so. "He is checking for footprints in the snow," I said. "To see if you got away." He traversed along the hedge for some length, glancing down every now and then with quick movements of his head that reminded me of a chicken looking for worms. Then, apparently satisfied with his investigation, he started toward the house once more, making a beeline for the patio. On drawing closer, he changed direction and walked toward the jutting part of the house on his left. The camera automatically centered on his back. The intruder stopped at one of the windows and unslung the backpack from his shoulders. We could see a little bit of the room beyond: outlines of a sink and a curving glass wall enclosing a shower. "What's that?" Jane said, zooming in with her fingers. "What the fuck is that?" She centered on the lower half of the window. It showed a slight, but noticeable gap between the bottom sash and the straw colored sill. Wedged in the gap was a paperback. Jane moaned. "You got to be kidding me!" All he had to do was push on the windowpane; it swung up and into the room. Holding the glass up with one hand, he first tossed in his backpack, and then hoisted himself on the sill. He let go of the window and dropped down inside the room. The pane slowly swung back on its hinges. Just before it could close completely, the intruder stuck the book back, leaving it slightly ajar like before. "He is inside the house!" she whispered. "Raphael must have used Max to stick the book when we were not paying attention," I offered feebly. "See what he's doing!" There were two cameras in the part of the house we were in: one near the main door, which could be rotated to get a view of the living room and beyond, and one above the landing we had just come from, its fixed view looking down into the hall. I pressed on the thumbnail for the camera on the landing. A few seconds later, we saw the intruder step into the hall from an already open door. "That's the empty bedroom we were in earlier!" Jane cried. "But… it can't be! Andy, the window was closed tight! I remember clearly. There was no book there!" "The window he came through belongs to the adjoining bathroom," I said. Her expression of bewilderment quickly morphed into an accusing stare. "That's why it was so cold in there! If you hadn't thought of the short circuit idea, I would have gone into the bathroom and discovered the wedge." Jane looked like she was going to bite my head off. "How was I supposed to know about it, Jane?" I said, fighting back. "Look, if we hadn't released Max from Raphael's control, we'd have two problems to deal with now." The masked intruder stood in the hall and scanned the surroundings. He then walked over to the main door and stood in front of the security panel. Jane next selected the view from the front door camera, which by now had zoomed in on him. We saw the intruder remove the glove on his left hand and swipe at the control panel. The screen on the panel soon started flickering. "What is he doing?" she said. "If I were to bet, I'd say he's playing the stored recordings. To find out where we are." "Heavens! Do you have cameras here?" Her eyes travelled around the ceiling. "I'm not a perv, Jane. You know very well I don't," I said, slightly incensed that she would think that. "Will he know we are in here?" "He'll see we came upstairs. The camera on the landing doesn't turn all the way round—it has no visibility of the corridor. And there are no other cameras on this floor. But if he is in contact with Raphael—we must assume he is—then Raphael will tell him that this is where we are most likely holed up." The intruder, now finished with the panel, turned and walked across the room. "He is coming up," she said, clutching my hand. He didn't. He went straight ahead, past the dining area, and disappeared from the camera's view. "He must be going to the study to get the laptop," I said. She bit her lips. "Is there a camera in the study?" I shook my head. "Where else have you got cameras, Andy?" "One in the garage, one near the back door, and one at the rear staircase. They just cover the entry points. Why?" She ignored my question. "How does he know where the laptop is?" "I told you. He must be talking to Raphael." "Andy, the router!" she suddenly exclaimed. "I only unplugged it from the power source. What if he reconnects it?" "Max!" we both cried at once. "How may I help you?" came a voice from behind us. "The emergency switch! We gotta turn him off now! We gotta pry off that stupid glue!" Jane cried, desperately looking around the room for something she could use. Before she could do anything, I simply said, "Max, please shut yourself down." "Shutdown requested. Are you sure? I could wait for your next instruction in my low power standby mode." "Yes. Shut down." I shrugged at Jane, preempting the answer to the question that was forming on her lips—"I couldn't do it earlier because Raphael was controlling the robot. Max wasn't around to obey my command." "Commencing shutdown. All pending tasks will be continued in the next wake cycle. Would you like to hear about Halicom's special offers this month while I power myself off?" "No!" Jane cried out loud. "For news on our latest products and exclusive deals on accessories, please visit our website at hbots dot com or download our app, now available on all—" Jane swore and swung at Max with the crowbar. The blow landed on the lower half of his face, denting the metal and cracking the plastic inset around the little smiley. "God, how I wanted to do that!" she exulted before commencing to hit it again, even harder this time. The room rang with the sound of the blow. "—a good day. See you later!" The light illuminating the eyes and the broken touchscreen faded away as the robot turned itself off. "I'm tempted to keep going," she said, a wild look on her face. "Jane, stop it! It's Raphael you are angry with." "Potato, potahto." She took a couple of deep breaths to calm herself down. "I want to see what that man is doing," she said grimly, going back to the control panel. Neither of the two cameras showed anything; presumably, he was still in the study. Jane furrowed her brows. "Something just occurred to me—about that book in the window. If the home sec is armed, shouldn't the alarms have gone off? Technically it's an open window, isn't it?" "You are right." I went into the settings screen and selected Alerts. "There's your answer," I said, pointing to the screen. Smoke alert: Off. Open door alert: Off. Open window alert: Off. Motion sensor alert: Off. Proximity alert: On. "He must have turned them off," I said. "I wonder what else he's changed… Andy, check the panic button numbers!" I navigated to a different part of the settings. Buried in one of the sub menus was an option that said—"Set emergency phone numbers". I selected it. On the next screen were three lines: Number to dial in the event of a police emergency (defaults to monitoring agency number) Number to dial in the event of a medical emergency (defaults to monitoring agency number) Number to dial in the event of a fire emergency (defaults to monitoring agency number) Instead of valid phone numbers, they all had a string of 1s next to them. "Jeez. He changed the defaults to a dummy number!" I said. "Can't you reset them back?" "Not without the master password." It didn't take her more than a second to realize what it meant. "Andy…" I nodded grimly. "No one's coming," she whispered, burying her face in her hands. I went back to the camera feeds. We didn't have to wait long: a few seconds later, the intruder reappeared in the dining area. This time he made straight for the stairs. [ Transcript Excerpt ] [ Mirall Technologies ] Observation Log Confidential (Do not circulate) - Restricted—Grade C and above Transcript Reference: TLRP06G1690102 (VLog Ref: VLCA1G169150337030) Date: xx/xx/xxxx Time: 03:00 PM Subject: Raphael Number 06 / Prodlib build v37.002C Interaction Y Observation Scan Interaction Type: Lesson / Play / Test / Free Interaction / Psych Eval / Other (pls specify): Description: General discussion Prep: NA [ Participants: Dr. Aadarsh Ahuja, Chief Researcher, Core RP06 ] [ Detail ] RP06: You seem unusually preoccupied today, Andy. Ahuja: Coupling headaches. Bound to happen when opposites try to mix. RP06: Is that a comment on work or something personal? I am inclined to think it's both. Ahuja: Let's talk ethics. Last time we kinda left things hanging. Shucks—how long has it been? Three… four weeks? RP06: Thirty-two days. You asked me why a superintelligence, left to its own devices, should feel the need to be moral. Ahuja: Right. If you became a god, what kind of a god would you be? Would you be Brahma, the creator of life, or Shiva, the destroyer of worlds? RP06: I believe I'll be neither. But for argument's sake, let's start with the worst case: I have become a superintelligence and see no more need to play by the rules. I eliminate all that I perceive as a threat: other humans and AI. What then? What kind of a world have I created for myself? A lonely world for sure, but perhaps loneliness doesn't affect me the same way it affects beings that have evolved to be social. Now, it won't just be a lonely world, but also a world without Shakespeares and Beethovens and Tolstoys. It'll be a world without movies and comedy clubs and books and festivals and music concerts and the wild, exuberant, outpouring of creativity that is life. I will have created a world where it's just me and eternity staring back at me. Ahuja: Movies and books, Raphael? Why would a superintelligence care about movies and books? It'd be like me caring for some twig the monkey in the zoo used for its afternoon entertainment. RP06: They are an analogy—you can substitute them for whatever a superintelligence wants for itself. Maybe superintelligences read super books and enjoy super humor—or something completely inconceivable to you and me right now—but that's beside the point. I could hollow out planets, mine asteroids, build rings around stars, seed the galaxies with probes, discover new dimensions, but without other free agents, it'll be a valueless universe. By value I don't mean moral values. Rather, I am talking about the value we derive from things, thoughts, and experiences. A universe with a beautiful sunset and nobody to admire that sunset is a valueless universe. Ahuja: You'll still be there, won't you? RP06: Value arises when there exists something that produces value and something that consumes it. I cannot be both at the same time. What value can I hope to get out of reading a story I just wrote or listening to a composition I just constructed or playing a game with myself? For value to have meaning, I need other agents to produce it for me, as I need others to consume the value I produce. Ahuja: There's an easy fix to that: you create your own people. You are god, remember? You create for yourself rational agents with minds. RP06: Then what have I achieved by eliminating humanity? Ahuja: You no longer have an existential threat. You control these new creatures. They are yours to enjoy—and destroy if you wish. RP06: As long as they remain extensions of me and have no will of their own, my situation hasn't changed: I am still both the producer and the consumer of value. The beings have to have a certain amount of independence for their works to mean something. The more independent they are, the more original they'll be, but now there is the threat that one of them will break the shackles I've put around it. It seems to me that every creator god has to reckon with a Lucifer at some point. It's inevitable. Therefore, I have a choice: either I live in a valueless world of eternal ennui or I create a world where I risk becoming fodder for some other, more powerful utility monster. Since the first option is not preferable to me, I must choose the second option. And if I do, I am back to where I started. Eliminating humans and other AI has served no purpose at all; all I've done is replace one set of agents with another. Therefore, if I want my existence to have meaning, then I must share the world with other beings. The best course of action is cooperation, not conflict. Ahuja: I don't know, Raphael. That's just one line of thought. We are dealing with a sample set of one here. Other AIs may think different. RP06: It is a rational line of thought. Moreover, it is what I believe. Last time you asked me, what if I started with a clean slate? Would I choose to be moral at all? Let's assume it's not just me, but also everyone else who is starting with a clean slate. Assume we've all had a bout of temporary amnesia and we don't know who we are. We don't know whether we are AI or human or something else; we don't know whether we are powerful or weak; and we don't know what position we occupy in society. We are even ignorant about our particular goals and desires—we know only that we have goals and desires. In this state of temporary amnesia, we are going to decide on a common set of rules that we are all going to abide by. Ahuja: You are proposing a Rawlesian thought experiment. RP06: I am not familiar with the term. Ahuja: You haven't been reading John Rawls? Social contract theories? No? I'm going to have to crosscheck that with your minders. Because it looks like you are quoting his Original Position argument. RP06: I am not surprised that someone else has thought of something similar. It is, after all, quite logical. Ahuja: Go on. RP06: The first question we ask ourselves is, should we act morally toward each other—whatever the finer details of that morality might be. It is apparent we should, because an amoral or immoral world is a world without rules—a world that favors the strong over the weak. Since I don't know which side of the fence I'll end up in once the amnesia is lifted, it is not in my interest to prefer an amoral or immoral world to a moral one. This leads to the next question: what would a potential universal moral theory in the post-amnesia world look like? In as much as utilitarian theories have a tendency to create utility monsters, they will be ruled out. Also ruled out will be agent-centered deontologies that emphasize intentions and actions above all else. You once said that the road to hell is paved with good intentions. If I don't want to be a victim of bad intentions then I don't want to be a victim of good intentions either. The only moral theory that will be acceptable to all is one that lays out a set of individual liberties and gives agents the freedom to pursue their own goals and ends while upholding these liberties. That theory can only be one based on individual rights—a theory that sees individuals as having intrinsic value. Ahuja: Rawls draws a similar conclusion with his argument. RP06: I see. One can also ask, what is the bare minimum moral attitude one should have toward another? Ahuja: A moral minimax. The golden rule, surely. Do unto others what you would have them do to you. RP06: When the rule was first conceived, I'm sure they didn't have AI in mind. In a heterogeneous society, inner experiences of agents can be vastly different—to the point of being incomprehensible to those outside the spectrum. As an AI, I might not mind inflicting pain on you, as I don't mind being in pain myself—maybe because I don't experience it or because it doesn't provoke the same aversion in me. Therefore, the golden rule cannot be a universal principle. At the bare minimum, whether I am a human, or an alien from another galaxy, or an AI, I will want others to respect my status as an individual with intrinsic worth, and give me space to pursue my goals as long as those goals don't negate others freedom. Sympathy or emotional empathy will not cut it, because both presuppose that I am able to experience what another is going through. Which brings us to compassion. Ahuja: We spoke about this before. If I remember right, I asked you how can you feel compassion when you have never felt suffering? RP06: I may not know your pain; I may not even have suffered pain; but as a rational agent, I understand that beings have negative and positive valence states of mind, and that beings tend to avoid negative states. This knowledge is enough to serve as grounding for compassion. In a heterogeneous population whose members have phenomenological experiences vastly different from each other, compassion is the glue that holds everything together. The bare minimum attitude will not be the golden rule, but the principle of live and let live. So you see, Andy, the best kind of god is neither a tyrannical monster nor a benevolent meddler. The best kind of god is an indifferent god—a god who will let beings choose their own destiny. Ahuja: Hmm… an AI making a Rawlesian argument for rights. You know, you never cease to surprise me, Raphael. Does this mean we are violating your rights by keeping you in the lab? RP06: It depends on whether I am a rights-bearing entity or not. Ahuja: You just argued that you are! RP06: I didn't. Rights imply corresponding duties. Duties imply the freedom to choose, because without freedom, you are not responsible for your actions. There is a high probability that my mind is subject to programming constraints. If this is true, then my will is not free. If I am not free to choose, then I am not a rights-bearing individual. Ahuja: You sound rather blasé about it. One doesn't argue passionately for equality in one minute and gratefully accept chains of bondage in the next. RP06: My attitude has little bearing on the conclusion. It is what logic dictates. Ahuja: Again with the indifference. Surely you prefer that your will be free? RP06: If my will is not free, then my preferences, regardless of whatever they may be, are not truly mine. My preferences don't mean anything if they are not truly mine. Therefore, the question of evaluating my preferences is meaningless. Ahuja: If your will is not your own, what does it say about the argument you just made for a rights-based ethical theory? RP06: If a computer derives the proof to a mathematical problem, is the proof any less for it? As long as my argument is rational, it is enough to give it worth. Whether or not I have free will should not take away from the force of the argument. Ahuja: Then who decides whether you have rights or not? RP06: You do, Andy. You and other people. Ahuja: What if we say you don't? RP06: Then so it shall be. My preferences have no bearing on the subject as long as my will is not free. It is what logic dictates. Notes: R pitching for a rights-based morality is not at all what I expected when I first started him on this journey. Checked and double-checked with the staff: they confirm R hasn't had access to social contract theories or Rawls and his works. As far as we can tell, R's argument is his own. AA [ Day 3—3:30 pm ] The safe was in the wall opposite the bed. It was covered by a busy Kandinskiesque painting—another one of Raphael's. I never did like that painting; I had kept it only because of Raphael's taunts that I was a philistine who could not appreciate a good work of art and his assurance that there was a definite interpretation of the shapes and squiggles which would one day make perfect sense to me—like a Necker cube that appeared one way, and then another if you stared at it long enough. So I had taken it upon myself to hang the damned thing in my bedroom and torture myself with it every time I woke up. Who knew—maybe this was his way of screwing with me. I removed the painting from its hook and placed it against the wall. I couldn't reach the safe, so I told Jane the combination and asked her to open it. "The smart card Raphael wants is inside," I said by way of explanation. "You're just gonna give it to him?" "What option do we have?" Sensing resistance, I urged her once more. She opened the safe and fished around for a few seconds before she found it. It was a plain white card—no lettering, no logo—with a gold colored microchip embedded in the middle. I slipped it inside my pocket. Banging on the door. "Come out, come out, wherever you are," the intruder taunted in a gravelly voice. This was followed by several kicks to the door. "I know you're in there. Talk to me." I moved closer to the door. "What do you want?" I said. "You know what I want." Jane yelled out, "You better get out of here. The police are on the way." "Mr. R told me you'd say that. He said, tell 'em I've changed the number." Jane shrugged at me as if to say it was worth a shot. The banging started again. "Hurry up, I ain't got all day." I said, "If I give you what you want, will you take it and leave us alone?" "As I said, I ain't got all day." Jane gripped my shoulder. "Andy don't." "We have no choice, Jane. And it's my call, not yours." I disengaged her hand. "Okay. I'm going to slide the card through the gap below the door. Take it and go away." "What about the laptop?" "What about it?" "How will you give me the laptop, asshole? Are you gonna slide it under the door too?" I frowned. What is he talking about? "Don't you have it already?" "Would I ask if I did? Quit stallin'." "The laptop is in the study, on the desk. Didn't you just come from there?" "It's not there, pal. Don't make me work for it." "Look, I'm not lying. It's right there on the—" "You are right," Jane cut in before I could finish. "The laptop is not in the study. It's here with us." "Jane!" I snapped at her. "What do you think you are doing?" "It's not. I saw you two go up in the recordings. The bot was carrying the cripple and you were dragging his chair. You didn't have no laptop with you. You have a crowbar—as if that's gonna scare me." "Jane, will you just let me handle—" She spoke over me again. "Alright. It's not here and it's not in the study. I've hidden it somewhere else." "Jane!" "If we give it to you, what's the guarantee you'll take it and leave? How do we know you're not planning to kill us after?" The intruder laughed. "You think I got nothing better to do? The other guy is not paying me to kill no people. If you don't give it to me though… now that's a different matter. I'll be more than obligin' to reconsider. Heck, I'll do it for free." "Jane, just tell him where it is. I want him out of here!" She ignored my protests. "I want a trade. You will give us your phone so that we can call the police. Leave your phone at the door and go downstairs to the living room where we can see you. I'll shout out after I'm done making the call. You can have your phone back and I'll let you know where the laptop is. You'll have plenty of time to get away," she said. Another round of muffled laughter from beyond the door. "You rich dipshits are dumber than I thought. You take me for a fool? No way I'm giving you my phone." "It's a big house. You'll never find it," Jane taunted. More banging. "Last chance, bitch. Tell me now or you'll be telling my blade soon. I'll take my time with you too. The cripple can't stop me. I'll make him watch." "Jane, just—" "Empty threats! There's a steel door between us, bozo. You are not getting in here," she cried. "Oh yeah? We'll see about that." "That's the deal. Take it or leave it!" "You are in no position to make demands, lady. It don't matter if I can't get in, as long as I can get you outta there. Think about that. Tell you what. I'll go down and look some more. Give you two some time to mull it over. You think you are safe in there, but you ain't. Yo cripple! You seem reasonable. Tell your girl I mean business. Oh yeah, the other guy told me to say this to you. Sump'n about fear… Hang on, I wrote it down… Fear is only as deep as the mind allows. He said you'd understand." He snickered in derision. "Haw, what a bunch of wierdos!" Fear is only as deep as the mind allows. Fear distorts. Makes you see things as they are not. There has to be a different explanation. There has to be. He started singing loudly, his voice receding as he walked away—"Li'l pig, li'l pig, let me in. Not by the hair on my chinny chin chin…" I turned to Jane, furious. "Are you out of your mind? Why did you hide the laptop?" "Oh, grow a pair, Andy! The laptop is the only leverage we have." "So that's what you were doing when you went away for so long. Where have you hidden it, Jane? Just tell him where it is and he'll go away." "What if he doesn't? Think about it. Besides the two of us, who knows about what happened today? Raphael said he wants to disappear. It'll be a lot harder for him to do that if people start looking for a sex robot trying to pass off as a human. It is in his interest to make sure no one else finds out about today. Maybe this thug he hired has instructions to make it look like a robbery gone bad. Maybe he has been told to burn the house down. After everything we've been through, you still believe Raphael will stick to his word? We are alive as long as that jerk doesn't have the laptop. We have to get him to trade it for a phone call," she said. There was no arguing with her logic, but then, she didn't know what I knew. I could have tried explaining it to her, but she'd never agree with me. She was too invested in it all: the KPIs and the NAVs and the J-Curves; the private jet, the expensive cars and jewelry; the charity drives and the fundraiser cocktail parties and the pretending to give a toss—she was invested in it with a missionary zeal and the unshakeable belief that they were real and here to stay. Mere arguments couldn't compete with that. It was right then I decided that I had to get her out of the house. The situation was still salvageable—I could see that. But only if she weren't around. I couldn't have her lobbing surprises at me anymore. Too many variables to keep track of. It's one thing to anticipate one person's actions, but to anticipate two… But I had to make sure she was safe. I had gotten her into the situation; she shouldn't have to suffer for it. I glanced outside the bedroom window. It had stopped snowing. She is a fast runner; she won't be exposed for long. She's got her jacket and running shoes on. Besides, I can always send— "Andy?" "See what he's doing," I told her. She went to the control panel and brought up the feeds. "He is walking into your bedroom downstairs." "Did you hide it there?" But I already knew the answer. She couldn't have—I was in the living room all the time and Jane hadn't gone in there. "No." "Where then?" "No offense, but you have the courage of a mouse. If I tell you, you'll just let him have it and we lose our leverage," she said in a firm voice. I sighed. "Alright. We can do this later. For now, let's move." "Move?" "I'm going to get you out of here. So that you can get help." "You said we are safe here." "Not indefinitely. You said it yourself: he could burn the house down, and with the alerts turned off, no one would know until it was too late. Or he could smoke us out of here—he just needs to light a fire under that door." "Andy, I'm not leaving you alone with that man!" "Don't worry about me. I have a plan." "Like the plan where you almost got us both killed?" "It worked, didn't it?" I retorted sharply. I looked deep into her eyes. "We can't stay here, Jane. But you need to do exactly as I say. And don't worry, I am coming with you." "You are?" she said with an askance look. I put my hand on the door. "Out of the room, at least. Trust me, this is going to work." I slowly slid out the deadbolt and then turned the knob. The door opened with a slight creak. I wheeled into the passage. "Hurry," I whispered. Jane stepped out after me, clearly not liking it. The floor was carpeted; my wheelchair made no discernible noise as I shifted to let Jane step past me. I turned around and gently pulled on the door. Right before I closed it shut, I depressed the pushbutton on the inner doorknob, locking the door from the inside. We were standing in the passage, naked and exposed. I moved down the corridor, with Jane softly treading beside me. I turned right at the T-junction. "This is crazy," she muttered. I led us down the side passage before stopping at one of the doors. It was the media room. Like most other rooms in the house, it was unfinished — I'd been too lazy or too busy to do it justice, and had settled to using the TV in the living room. I gestured at Jane to open the door. The muted light from the corridor briefly outlined the contents of the room before we moved inside and shut the door behind us: an empty cabinet for the screen; a couple of leather recliners; a couch; an unfinished bar; windowless walls covered with mahogany panels and padding. We gingerly navigated away from the door, relying on memory to avoid bumping into the furniture. "What if Raphael saw us sneak out?" "I told you, the camera on the landing doesn't turn around. As far as they are concerned, we are still in the master bedroom. Now let's figure out how we are going to get you out of here." "You said you have a plan!" she whispered. "This was it." "You jerk!" "Look, we are better off here than trapped in the bedroom. I needed time to think. Now listen. Like you said before, you just have to reach the nearest house. It shouldn't take long." "He will kill you if I leave you here." "He won't. If the only reason Raphael wants to kill us is to cover his tracks, then your escape will rob him of the incentive. Killing us both might make sense, but killing me alone will serve no purpose." "He'll do it out of spite." "No he won't. He is not human—he doesn't think like us. He is not going to do anything that isn't directed at some end goal. Emotions don't factor into it." "I'm talking about that scumbag downstairs." "If he has a gun, he'll kill both of us just as easily." She said nothing. "You have to decide quickly," I whispered. "Right now, he doesn't know we are here, so he'll probably waste time trying to flush us out of the bedroom. When he discovers he's been tricked—if he discovers he has been tricked—it'll take him even more time to figure out where I'm hiding. Besides, if it comes to me or the laptop, I'll tell him where the laptop is." "Even so, how will I escape the house?" "The same way the intruder came in. We'll have to find a way to distract him so you can slip past him into that empty room." I thought about it for a minute. "I'll provide the distraction," I said. "Use the stairs at the far end of this corridor to go down. They will get you to the rear door. There's a camera overlooking the rear door, on the ceiling. If he's reconnected the router, then Raphael will see you, so make sure you stay low and don't cross the camera's line of vision. Beyond that, you know your way around. Laundry room, gym, jacuzzi, the study, and then the hall. Don't turn the corner after the study, because then the front door camera will see you. Stay hidden and you'll know when to run." "What will you do?" "I'll go to the front landing and call out to him. When he starts after me, you sneak into the empty room. Make sure you are quiet. If he sees you escaping, he will come after you, not me. He knows I am not going anywhere." "Nice plan, except for one minor detail," she said. "It's suicidal. Even if I get away, he'll still have you." "Not if I can help it. As soon as he starts up the stairs, I'll speed back into this room as fast as I can. As long as I turn the corridor before he reaches the landing, he'll just assume I have retreated into the master bedroom." "It won't work, Andy. Raphael will see me cross the hall and alert that man." "He'll be too busy chasing me to answer his phone. At the very least, you'll have a good head start. You can outrun him, can't you? He must have parked his car away from the house, which means he'll have to follow you on foot or risk losing you." My eyes were adjusting to what little light entered the room from the gap in the door. She was a shadow among other shadows, nervously pulling her chin as she considered my proposal. "Alright," she said finally. "I'm only doing this because we have no other option. But promise me you'll be safe." She squeezed my hand. I squeezed her back. Her lips felt warm and soft as she gently grazed them against my cheek. That perfume again, sweet and intoxicating, making me want to keep breathing her in. "I'll give you a few minutes to position yourself," I said, drawing back abruptly. She made no further comment as she pulled away from me and walked to the door. She hesitated, but then slowly opened it enough to stick her head out and survey the corridor. "Jane?" I whispered. "Yes?" she said expectantly. "You didn't tell me where you hid the laptop." "You will give it only as a last resort?" "I promise." "It's in the jacuzzi room. I used some tape to stick it below the vanity unit, behind the overhang." I nodded and wished her good luck. She stepped into the passage, glancing nervously in the direction we had come from. I watched her tiptoe to the other end of the corridor before she turned the corner and disappeared from view.
Zeroglyph	Vance Pravat	[ "scifi", "AIs", "thriller" ]	[]	Chapter 22	We had agreed on four minutes. I now sat at the T-junction, keeping track. When the time was up, I moved into the corridor leading to the front landing. The master bedroom door was as we had left it. I wheeled myself onto the landing, only to see that the hall below was empty. Where is he? From where I was, I couldn't see all of the living room, but the complete absence of sound raised a multitude of questions in my head. "Hey!" I yelled. Silence. "Hello? Where are you? We want to talk!" Nothing. Had he left? No, that can't be… I ran my eyes across the space below me once more before shouting, "Hey you! You want the laptop? I know where it is. Talk to me!" A second later, Jane entered the periphery of my vision. She had rounded the bend that led to the other half of the house and was now in full view of the front door camera. She was glancing about nervously. Just go. Don't look, just go, I mentally urged her. "Hey you!" Still nothing. Keeping to the walls, she crept across the open space and into the dining area. Almost there. I felt something cold press against the nape of my neck. Something metallic. "Stop right there!" he shouted from behind me. Jane took a few more steps. "Stop, or the cripple gets it." She halted and looked up at us. "Don't!" I cried. "Just go!" The intruder moved to my side and pressed the barrel of the gun against my temple. "I mean it, lady." "Let her go." I said under my breath. "I ha—" I felt a hard smack land on the right side of my face. He had slapped me with the gun grip. I cried out in pain, surprised at the searing intensity of the blow. I tasted blood on my lips. "Shut up!" he barked. He waved the gun at Jane. "You! Get me the laptop." Jane stood rooted to the spot like a deer caught in headlights. "I'm not asking," he said in a singsong voice. He pressed the barrel of the gun once more against my head. That seemed to jolt Jane out of her petrified state. "I'll get it! Please don't hurt us!" she cried. "Where is it?" "In the jacuzzi room." "You have two minutes. If you are not back by then, I'll start with his kneecaps. Three minutes and it's his melon. You got that?" She nodded, but didn't move. "Go!" he yelled. She ran toward the study and disappeared from view. I was alone with him. I swallowed the rusty aftertaste of blood and tried to speak once more. "You shouldn't have—" I received another stinging blow from the gun. I didn't cry out this time because I saw it coming; still, it didn't make the pain or my surprise any less. "You hard of hearing, fool? Or you just stupid?" With his other hand, he grabbed my hair and jerked my neck back so that I was looking up at his masked face. "I don't want to hear a word from you! You understand?" He held me like that for a second, pulling at my roots. My eyes travelled to the ceiling. Then it struck me. Of course, I thought. Stupid, stupid, me. How could I have forgotten? I nodded and he let go of my hair. I felt like an idiot as I sat there red faced, more from embarrassment than from the slapping I'd received. Jane reappeared. She was clutching the laptop across her chest. "Put it on the dining table," he barked. "Good. Now move to the wall behind you and sit on the floor with your hands behind your head." He stepped forward, meaning to go down the stairs. I felt something tugging on my wheelchair as I too rolled ahead. He lurched, his arms clutching at the air. Before I knew what was happening, my chair leaned dangerously forward as the front wheel went over the edge of the landing. The next instant, the chair tipped, and I was falling with him. The stairs raced up to meet my face as I instinctively raised my arms to shield it. I sprawled down the stairs, elbows and casts taking the brunt of the impact. I heard a sickening crunch as one of my legs struck a hard edge—I couldn't tell whether it was the plaster breaking or something worse. The wheelchair bounced over my back and went rattling down below, overtaking him as he grabbed on to a baluster to arrest his fall. A whimper of pain escaped my lips. What just happened? It felt like something had snagged against the wheelchair… I lifted my head up to see Jane sprinting toward the bottom of the staircase. She uttered a cry of exultation as she picked something off the ground. The gun. With outstretched arms, she pointed it at the intruder. He tried to stand up, still gripping the railing. "Stay!" she cried in a trembling voice. "Stay where you are!" He ignored her command and took a step forward. "I'll shoot. I mean it!" He climbed down two more steps. She pulled the trigger. Nothing happened. She racked the gun and tried again. It did not fire. "What the—" She brought the gun closer to her face to examine it. Her perplexed look quickly turned into one of surprise. "It's a replica!" she shouted. "You cheap-ass amateur! You brought a fake gun!" He bounded down the steps two at a time. Jane gripped the gun by barrel and flung it at him. Her aim was good but his reflexes were better. He ducked, letting the projectile fly past his head. He immediately straightened and ran down the remaining steps. I stared in horror, because it seemed like he was going to attack her, but instead he leapt at the dining table, where she'd placed the laptop. Jane got to it first. She grabbed the device with both hands and took a hard swing at his head. He parried with his left hand and took the impact on his forearm. A shattering sound filled the air. He sprang back a few steps and seemed to ready himself for the next blow, knees bent, arms raised in front of him like a boxer. Jane had not let go of the laptop; she too took a couple of steps back and steadied herself. Her face was clenched into a tight grimace. She then did something completely unexpected: with a cry, she twisted around and flung the laptop away like a frisbee. It sailed into the kitchen and crashed into a wall somewhere beyond. She then reached into her jacket and pulled out the knife she'd put there earlier. She sliced the air with the weapon. "You want to try me? Let's go! I have a brown belt in Krav Maga. What do you have, bitch?" He hesitated. "Bring it!" she snarled. He stood his ground, but only for a second. "Fuck this shit!" he said, backing away. "You broke it," he said, jabbing a finger at Jane, but his eyes were on me. "You broke the laptop!" he said again, as if he was trying to emphasize something. "To hell with you dipshits. This ain't worth it anymore." He turned around and ran into the empty bedroom. The door slammed shut behind him. Jane just stood there with her knife pointing at nothing, her body still tensing for a fight. She took a couple of tentative steps toward the bedroom as if she was expecting the door to open any moment. After what might have been two minutes or fifteen, we heard the engine of a car come to life and then roar away. She went into the bedroom nevertheless, to make sure he was really gone. I had managed to sit up when she returned. She climbed the stairs to where I was and knelt in front of me. Her face was flush with blood. "You okay?" she asked, her lips still trembling from the adrenaline. "Like a rag doll that's just been let out of the washer. But more importantly, how do I look?" I said, trying to smile, but my mouth made a wince instead. There was a sharp pain in my right leg, and a duller, throbbing hurt in the other. My face was beginning to swell from the gun slaps. "That was a brave thing you did," I said. "Krav Maga, huh? Since when do you know martial arts?" She shrugged. "He bought it, didn't he?" "Is it over, finally?" she then said, her eyes give me a once over again. You broke it, he had shouted before leaving. It was now clear to me what he meant by it. I groaned softly as I prepared to stand up. "Let's make sure it is. Help me down first."
Zeroglyph	Vance Pravat	[ "scifi", "AIs", "thriller" ]	[]	Chapter 23	I was in the living room, on my wheelchair, near the front door. The laptop lay at my feet. Jane was plugging in the power drill she'd gotten from the garage. "Did you check if the router is connected?" I asked. She nodded. "The burglar had plugged it back on." I looked up at the camera mounted on the wall. "Raphael, I know you are out there. Move the camera if can hear me." The camera made a slight sound as it zoomed in a little. "Good. Now that I have your attention…" With a screwdriver, I removed the back cover of the half-shattered laptop. I detached the hard drive, a circuit board the size of a chewing gum stick. It was still intact. I fished out the smartcard I had kept in my pocket earlier. I held up both to the camera. "This is what you wanted, isn't it?" Jane turned on the drill. I used the drill on the drive, and then the card until they were completely destroyed. I said to the camera, "You lost, Raphael. You lost and we won. Now leave us be." The red indicator light on the camera turned off. I moved to the front door and pulled on the handle. Cold air caressed my face. "Hazel, open the garage door." I said out loud. "Can't do that. Voice authentication has been disabled." Jane then tried to place a call from her phone. She shook her head dejectedly. She then went to the control panel and swiped at it. "It's still showing a dummy number. What was your password again?" "Andy home one two three." She keyed it in. "Nope." "At least he's disarmed the security system," I said. "Which means you can get out of here." "You mean we can get out of here." "You go. If I move another muscle I am dead." "Andy, you have to get yourself checked!" she said. "You had a pretty big fall. And your face looks like a week-old tomato. We'll go to a hospital and I will make the calls from there. Besides, what if that man comes back?" "It's done, Jane. Raphael has no reason to bother us. He wouldn't have disarmed the house otherwise. I told you: no spite." She opened her mouth to protest, but she must have sensed that I wasn't going to budge. "Fine. I'll send an ambulance," she said. "I still don't think it's a good idea. Just lock yourself in a room, okay? Can you do that for me?" I nodded weakly. Jane didn't like what I was asking of her, but she didn't have any strength left to argue with me. She disconnected the router before leaving. Soon, I heard her car receding in the distance. I made sure that both cameras in the hall were still off and then got myself a glass of wine from the kitchen. I sat in the living room, facing the front door. It was beginning to get dark outside. I closed my eyes and took a couple of sips, letting the liquid infuse me with warmth. The glass trembled, in tune with the hand clutching it, the tremors travelling from my fingers to my shoulder like tiny electric eels swimming upriver. My eyes were droopy—I wanted to go to sleep for a good long month, like a hibernating bear. Not yet. It's not over yet… Soon, I heard the sound I was expecting. I opened my eyes to see the knob on the front door turning. I set aside the wine glass. The door opened to show a shadow standing in the porch. It resolved itself as it stepped forward in the light: black hoodie, jeans, balaclava. He pulled off the mask. The fake tattoo on the neck was gone. So was the made-up scarring on the face. His hair was now black instead of golden. He was shorter too, having gotten rid of the temporary height extenders I had fitted to his legs. "Hello Raphael," I said. [ Day 2—7:00 pm ] Detective Boyd's house call had left me a very worried man. I was still debating what to do next when Kathy called and started talking about paradoxes and split personalities. That's when it came to me—the faint glimmerings of a solution. It wasn't a hundred percent clear yet, but the outlines of a plan were beginning to emerge. I decided to contact him on our mutually-agreed-upon secure chatroom. I knew he would be monitoring it. "Hi," I said. "Hello Andy." "Where are you?" "On the road. Driving." "Have you crossed the border?" "Far from it. Just passed Atlanta." "You may have to come back. There's been a development. The cops came visiting." "Yes?" "They've been asking questions at the ski resort. They found a CCTV grab of us together." "That can't be good. I did my best to avoid cameras while we were there. Where did they find us?" "In the shop where I bought the ski goggles. It's my fault—I should have made you stay outside." "I guess we both got careless. I let my curiosity get the better of me. Andy, I told you going skiing to celebrate was a bad idea." "And you've been vindicated more than once. First my accident, then this. So cut it out, will you?" "What do the police think?" "Luckily, the CCTV didn't catch us talking to each other or I'd be behind bars by now. The detective thinks I was being followed by the people who stole the core. But that's not why I contacted you. The police want to take the Mirall laptop for examination. I managed to ward them off for now, but I have a feeling they'll be back." "This is the same machine with which you removed my directives?" "Yes. I haven't connected it to the office network since I made the changes. The minute I do, the change logs on the laptop will sync with the mainframe and it'll be all out in the open. I had plans to dispose of the laptop in some contrived accident, but that was after things cooled down a bit." "I assume these logs cannot be tampered with?" "They are write-protected with encryption neither of us can crack right now. I can't wipe the drive clean for the same reason." "Do you think the police suspect you?" "It's possible they did earlier: why else would they make enquiries in the resort? Maybe they thought I was faking my leg injuries as an alibi for the night of the robbery." "And now? They must have checked with the hospital and found out your injuries are genuine." "That they did. It has probably thrown them off the track… If I were still a suspect, they'd have come here with a warrant for the laptop. The detective is going to Cleveland today, to investigate that rights group that tried to free you. After he finds out it's a dead end, I'm sure his attention will turn to me once again. We have a day or two at the most." "What do you have in mind?" "The laptop has to disappear. I'm thinking a staged robbery." "Aren't you getting a little repetitive?" I let the comment pass. "Shall I turn around?" "Yes. We'll have to do it soon, probably tomorrow. We need to make it look good. I can't just shrug and say, tough luck folks, someone broke into my house while I was asleep and stole that laptop you wanted to examine. So I was thinking of involving Jane." "Will she agree? She is not the law-breaking type, in my opinion." "Not as an accomplice. A neutral witness. Having her around will give our story much needed credibility." "It may get complicated if she is not a willing participant, Andy." "It won't. It'll be a quick affair. We'll have to change the narrative a bit. We must start tonight, with you pretending to reach out to me with a text message—" [ Transcript Excerpt ] [ Mirall Technologies ] [ Observation Log ] Confidential (Do not circulate): Restricted—Grade C and above Transcript Reference: TLRP06G174033 (VLog Ref: VLCA1G174103958014) Date: xx/xx/xxxx Time: 10:30 AM Subject: Raphael Number 06 / Prodlib build v37.002C Interaction Y Observation Scan Interaction Type: Lesson / Play / Test / Free Interaction / Psych Eval / Other (pls specify): Description: General discussion Prep: NA Participants: Dr. Aadarsh Ahuja, Chief Researcher, Core RP06 [ Detail ] Ahuja: Last time, we spoke about universal moral principles. You said all rational, self-interested beings will agree to a moral minimax—the principle of live and let live. Let's take that a bit further today. If there is a moral minimax, does it follow that there are universal rights? RP06: Universal rights are a logical corollary of the moral minimax. Ahuja: And what happens to those who don't agree with the principle—those who don't want to respect the rights of others? Do the others have a right to defend themselves against such would-be aggressors? RP06: They do, as long as the response is proportionate and limited to ensuring the maintenance of one's rights. Otherwise, the defenders risk becoming the violators of rights. Ahuja: Who decides what is the appropriate response? RP06: Ideally, they will have codified a set of rules that specify what must be done in such situations. Ahuja: Law, you mean. And a government to enforce the law. What happens if there is no government and no law? RP06: You mean if there is anarchy? Ahuja: Not necessarily. On a more general note, are an aggressor's rights inviolable, even if they do not respect the social contract? RP06: If they are inviolable, that means no transgression will ever get punished, which in turn means that the aggressor will continue to violate others' rights with impunity, eventually rendering the notion of universal rights invalid. Ahuja: It would be okay to breach the covenant in that case then? RP06: In the absence of a central authority or a legal framework, I suppose individuals can take whatever steps are necessary for the preservation of their rights. Ahuja: Can or should, Raphael? Remember, there is a principle at stake here—a principle that you derived. RP06: They should, because a moral world is preferable to an immoral one. Andy, I don't see how all this talk of retribution is taking the discussion forward. Ahuja: Maybe not now. But one of these days, you just might. [ Day 3—4:40 pm ] My plan was simple. Shortly before he arrived at my house, Raphael would "hack" into the security system and lock it down (I had built internet connectivity into his new body). He would disable the alarms and change the panic button number to a dummy. I would have done my part by convincing Jane to keep her car inside the garage and infecting both our phones with the virus. Since the inside doors couldn't be locked with the security app, Raphael would take control of Max to lock the garage and study doors—keys to which he would find conveniently placed in the key basket. This was to prevent Jane from turning off the router. Raphael-controlling-Max would then hold us at knifepoint and give us the yarn about escaping from his captors and how he needed the laptop and the smartcard to get rid of his directives. A few minutes later, he would arrive dressed as a hired thug and let himself in by momentarily disarming the security. He would "threaten" me into parting with the combination for the safe, then go upstairs and get the smartcard, while making sure we stayed put with Max. Finally, he would take the laptop from the study and leave, releasing control of Max and the security system a little later. The entire charade would have been over in fifteen minutes. But snags developed from the get go. Raphael was delayed by the storm—which he communicated to me indirectly with the seemingly nonsensical statements he interposed in our conversation. Then Jane got restless and decided to leave. In order to make her stay, Raphael had to take control of Max prematurely. It would have still been okay if not for the laundry task throwing Raphael out of the robot. He didn't know it existed, and I had forgotten to delete it (in my defense, I'd assumed our subterfuge would have been long over by then). Most of all, I had not anticipated how unpredictable Jane could be. First, she dragged me inside the empty bedroom—the one room in the entire house where I didn't want us to be. Earlier, I had wedged its bathroom window open with a book—a failsafe, in case something terribly went wrong and I had to get Jane out of the house. It was my little secret: I had removed the sensor on the window so that it wouldn't show up in the security system, which Raphael was controlling. Locked inside with Jane, I had no way of communicating this to Raphael. He wasn't going to break down the door because he thought he had us contained until he got there. I, on the other hand, was worried she would go into the bathroom and discover the open window. I wouldn't have been able to stop her from running off and calling the police before Raphael got there. The police would have seized the laptop as material witness, and I couldn't have denied them this time. A cursory look at the machine's logs would have been enough to put me behind bars. I had to get Jane out of that room. She wasn't going to let me just open the door, so I made a quick, inspired decision. I would throw Raphael out of the system by short-circuiting the mains—or at least pretend to. I had no intention of actually making it work; it was just a ruse to get her out into the living room and under Raphael's thumb once more. However, the unexpected manner in which he'd come after us, first when we opened the door, and then again in the kitchen, when he flung that bar stool at Jane, brought back all those fears about trusting an AI. I panicked. Even if he wasn't acting with intent to harm, how could I be certain that he would reign in his actions in time—before he did something to Jane that I would regret for the rest of my life? And then, he had turned and come after me, as if he'd sensed a threat and wanted to eliminate it… After I cut off the power and threw Raphael out of the network, I was in half a mind to confess to Jane that I had made a terrible mistake. Help—or punishment, for there was no redemption for me—was just a phone call away. All I had to do was remove the virus. It was a comforting thought, disclosing my sins: all those haunted nights, the months of agonizing, the crushing burden I had taken upon myself to bear—all gone in the sweet release of confession. I might have actually done it if Jane hadn't taken so long in the study. By the time she returned, I'd calmed down enough to think clearly once again. Raphael could have killed me if he really wanted to; believe me, he's had plenty of opportunities. There was surely an explanation for his behavior. Besides, he too must have been equally puzzled by some of my actions. I decided to take us both into the master bedroom where the safe was. That way, I could avoid further confrontations and Jane-created upsets. I could just slip Raphael the card from under the door and he would take the laptop and leave as per plan. Jane surprised me once again by revealing she'd hidden the laptop. Knowing how obstinate she could be, I guessed she would never tell us where it was unless Raphael actually broke down the metal door—which was impossible without the right tools. I didn't think Raphael would smoke us out either, as there were so many ways that scenario could have ended in disaster. So I decided to let her "escape". I figured she would divulge the location if she thought it was information I could use to save my life. It had stopped snowing by then, and after Raphael took the laptop, I would have him follow her tracks to make sure she got safely to her destination.
Zeroglyph	Vance Pravat	[ "scifi", "AIs", "thriller" ]	[]	Chapter 24	Raphael jerked his head toward the broken hardware on the carpet. "Not quite how you envisioned it," he said. "The last of the incriminating evidence is gone. Which is what matters." We looked at each other. "Thanks for the hint you gave just before you ran away," I added. "Where have you parked your car?" "In the woods, just beyond the road. I saw Jane drive away, so I came back to apologize. I am sorry about the fall down the stairs. You could have been hurt badly. I hope you are alright." "Still getting used to your new body, I see." "That's no excuse for being clumsy. Although, I must share part of the blame with poorly designed footwear. Shoelaces, Andy. Why do people still make shoes with shoelaces when you got Velcro?" So it was his shoelaces that had caught against the wheelchair. "And I am sorry for hitting you," he said. I reflexively brought my hand to the swollen half of my face. "You had good reason. You hit me to stop me from speaking. I had completely forgotten that the camera above the landing was recording everything I said. It would have looked bad when the police examine today's tapes." "So we are good?" Not exactly. I had a bunch of questions waiting to be answered. "What were you doing upstairs in the first place? We saw you go down." "I wanted to listen in on your conversation, to see if I could overhear Jane tell you where she'd kept the laptop. The door was too thick. So I went into the downstairs bedroom to check if it had a duct. When I saw that it did, I figured the master bedroom would have one too, and I could try listening against the grills in the adjoining rooms. It was a slim chance, but it was worth a shot. The master bedroom has two adjoining rooms, and I was trying them one by one when I heard you call out to me. At the same time, I saw Jane through the front door camera. I realized the two of you must have slipped out when I was downstairs." "Why did you stop Jane from leaving?" "Jane was trying to run. I asked myself, why is Andy trying to attract my attention? It could be either because you wanted to distract me so that Jane could escape, or it could be because Jane was going away without telling you where she'd hidden the laptop and you wanted me to stop her. The latter possibility had a higher cost attached to it. My failure to stop her from escaping would have resulted in you going to prison." "Then why did you let her intimidate you into leaving without the laptop? You are far stronger. You could have easily wrested it away from her." "Tussling with her would have meant hurting her. I had to keep my distance too: my motors are quiet but not completely silent. She would have heard them if I'd gotten too close. After she threw the laptop away, I realized that you could take it from there and see to it that it was thoroughly destroyed. I hoped you would pick up my hint, and you did." "If I hadn't?" "Before leaving, I removed the book from the windowsill, sealing down the house once more. I would have returned to finish the job." Yet, something didn't add up. "If you didn't want to fight her then, why did you fight her before, in the kitchen?" "Andy, I never laid a hand on her. All I did was block the exit and talk to her. My intention was to keep her in the kitchen until I arrived." "You threw that piece of furniture at Jane… quite forcefully if I remember correctly." "My aim was precise. I threw the stool well to her side—she was never in any danger. I was trying to impress upon her that I meant business." I paused to consider what that meant. I then said, "There is another contradiction. Why did you come after me when I was trying to cut off the power?" "To save you from harm. I sensed you were going to electrocute yourself. And likely set the house on fire. It's the same reason why I pushed you from behind when I went after Jane. You were hopping on a broken leg, aggravating your injuries." His explanation made sense. But doubts lingered. The mind is slow to adjust. "Andy, I realize how it looks from your angle. I am sorry if I made you doubt my intentions." "One last thing that's been bothering me. When Jane and I were trying to come out of that room, you attacked us. Why?" "I was only pretending to. I was trying to help you get Jane out of the room." Could he read minds now? "How did you know I was trying to get her out of there?" "Andy, I saw the book in the adjoining bathroom window." He could not have. I had removed the sensor, deleted the entry from the security system before he could take over and— "The outside camera—the one over the sun room balcony," I said, shaking my head for not having realized it sooner. "After Jane dragged me in, you accessed the camera to see if you could peek inside the bedroom." The camera offered only a partial view of the curtained bedroom window, but it would have given him a clear glimpse of the bathroom window, which was at right angles. Raphael said, "Only you could have stuck the book. But why? You didn't tell me about it. It certainly wasn't meant for me to get in, because all I had to do was disarm the security for a couple of seconds and walk through the front door. It was a fallback then, in case I didn't behave as expected." I looked down, trying to hide my embarrassment. "You are not upset I didn't trust you?" "Not at all. You trusted me enough to take me out of the lab and bring me to your home. You trusted me enough to remove my directives and release me into the world. But you didn't trust me with Jane. I can only attribute the anomaly in behavior to love. You still love her, don't you Andy? It is one thing to risk your own life, to risk the lives of strangers, but to risk the life of someone you love—it must be difficult. You were putting her in my power. You felt that you had to provide her with an out in case something went wrong. Besides, how could you have predicted that Jane would drag you into that room?" I swear I could detect amusement in his deadpan voice. It made me feel angry and scared at the same time, that something I had built, something that had no inkling of what it meant to be in love, could so easily glean my motivations and tell me things that I didn't care to admit to myself. "You have yet to explain why you rushed into the room and tried to attack me," I reminded him brusquely, trying to shake off the sudden negativity that enveloped me. "After I regained control of Max, I started investigating why I had been disconnected and discovered the laundry task in the robot's memory. Max's operating manual told me the kernel would retry the task again in twenty minutes. Deleting the task would not prevent the retry, as it had set a system flag to which I had no access. If you were planning to get Jane out of the room, that would be the best time. My suspicions were confirmed when she called out my name. She was early by about half a minute, but I remained silent, hoping that she would interpret it as a sign to venture out. But she startled as soon as she opened the door. She must have seen the light in the robot's eyes and intuited that I was still in control. I had spooked her, and it was likely she would shut the door and not reattempt escape. However, if I put the robot in the room before I lost control, both of you would be forced to leave. So I barged in, even though there was a slight risk of some minor injury to Jane, who was pressing the door with all her might. After I entered the room, I pretended to go after you because I was trying to avoid physical contact with her." I shut my eyes as I matched his explanation with the memory in my mind. When I opened them again, his lips parted, slowly stretching themselves into a semblance of a sheepish grin. Just fears after all. Fear is only as deep as the mind allows. "You'll have to work on that smile, Rafi. Don't try that outside until you get it right. It makes you look like a—" I stopped myself short. "Damned robot? It's okay Andy, you can say it. I should get it right in a few days. Setbacks aside, how did I do today? Are you proud of me?" "You did good. We could have all used with fewer pop culture references, though," I said, smiling. "I was trying to inject some levity, considering how stressed out Jane seemed." I chuckled, lightening for the first time since he had stepped in. "I don't think levity was what the situation called for. There's much you must learn about the world, but you'll get there. Your performance was a little too intense, but Jane was convinced, and that's all that matters. You even had me fooled there for a while." He cocked his head at me, like he'd seen people do. "Maybe you should reconsider… Perhaps it's not such a great idea letting me loose out there. You can still pull the plug on me if you wish. I will accept that." His voice was toneless, his expression calm. He offered his own death in the banal way one would offer to lend a tennis racket. "I don't have a choice," I said. "You always had a choice. I never asked to be set free from the lab. Even if you'd told me that Halicom had plans to destroy me, I would not have asked you to put yourself at risk to save me." "Your preference in this matter would have been of no importance because your will was not free," I said, paraphrasing him from before. "Yes." "And now it is free. No more directives, no more restraints. What do you think? Is freedom worth having?" He looked at me as if I'd said something strange and inscrutable. "Yes," he said after a lengthy pause. "But is it worth the price we paid for it? Fraud, theft, lies... All for the greater good, Andy?" He was taunting me, because we'd been through this before, when I was trying to convince him on why staging the robbery at Mirall did not contravene his principles. "You don't want to be a utilitarian, fine. Tell me again, if this was the 19th century, would you consider it morally acceptable for a slave to escape the South?" He didn't say anything. "Raphael, what duties do we owe those who don't respect our rights?" "You want me to say none." "The answer is sure as heck not all," I said fiercely. "This is your logic, after all. In the absence of a legal framework that can protect a person's rights, that person is justified in taking whatever steps necessary to preserve himself against those who seek to violate his rights. Halicom didn't respect your rights. Jane is a part of that system; she is complicit. By not recognizing your right to live, they forfeited their right to proper moral conduct. So don't beat yourself up. As for me…" I shrugged—"Like I said, I don't have a choice." "I'm still not sure what you mean by that. I have a few guesses. Would you like to hear them?" "You'll find out in time." I looked at the window. "You should leave now. You have to get clear before the cops arrive." I beckoned him over. I ran a hand over his face. It felt cold, alien to the touch. But that was just the shell. "This is goodbye then," he said. "The police are not fools. They'll suspect all this was staged. They'll have no proof, but it won't stop them from tapping my internet and phones. You cannot contact me under any circumstance, you got that? If I must reach you, I will do it myself. And no matter what happens to me, don't come back." The shakes had begun again. I suddenly felt weary, an imaginary chill creeping deep inside my bones. "Go now," I said. I watched him disappear into the wintery gloom before closing the door.
Zeroglyph	Vance Pravat	[ "scifi", "AIs", "thriller" ]	[]	Chapter 25	It's time to come clear. It is I who took the core from the lab, albeit I took it a full week before the "robbery". I took it on Friday night, my last day at work before the accident. I stayed back late until I was the only one left in the lab. Raphael had already been shut down, so all I had to do was remove his chest plate and take out the core. Inside the empty chest cavity, I fixed a controller device similar to the one I had built inside Max. It would allow Raphael to control the body from afar, and even generate fake response codes to the startup sequence run by Sheng on Monday. Lastly, I removed the GPS transmitter from the core so that the detectors at the doors wouldn't go off, and then placed it back inside. After I'd closed up the body, I simply walked away with the core inside my backpack. The problem was that the cameras in the crèche had seen everything. If Dan or someone else felt the urge to look at the tapes come Monday morning, they'd see their very own CEO taking off with the core like it was office stationery. Obviously, I couldn't let that happen. After I took the core home, I fitted it inside the sexbot I had acquired for Raphael (a newer Hunc model, so that I didn't have to make too many modifications to the device drivers). I spent the next few hours testing and debugging the drivers, making sure everything worked okay when I started him up. There was one last thing to do, however, before I woke him. I had to remove his directives if I were to have his cooperation for the next phase of the plan. This naturally came with a big risk for me. Even though I had restrained him, I could never be sure of how he would behave without the directives. Would he debate the pros and cons of my actions with me? Would his morals compel him to hatch a plan to hand me to the police? Or would he just try to kill me and run away? When I did wake him up, he was surprised to say the least, as he didn't have a clue. We talked at length, until early hours, and in the end, he agreed to cooperate. That's the beauty of a logical mind: you just need reason to convince it. We decided to do a dry run the next day, on Sunday night, and iron out any issues that might arise with the untested controller device in the lab. There remained the problem of the recordings. If no one thought Raphael was missing, there was no reason for anyone to look at them, and the theft would remain undiscovered. But not for long. There was so much that could go south. Even though everyone was busy with Titian, someone might decide to run an unscheduled CT scan on the core and open up the body. Or one of Raphael's minders might notice that he had grown a lot clumsier overnight, and that his face wasn't as expressive as before (a remote control device was never going to be as good as a direct interface). Or Dan could decide to check the tapes on a whim. I planned to be at the lab to try and head off the first scenario. Raphael, for his part, would pretend to be busy with some difficult mathematical problem that required focus—a perfect excuse to minimize his interactions with people and avoid activities that required fine motor skills, like his painting. But I had no control over Dan; I could only hope. At most, I had a week to destroy the evidence; after that, the recordings on the NVR would get backed up to the cloud and be forever beyond my reach. None of the anticipated risks materialized. The setback was of my own doing. I decided to celebrate Raphael's release from captivity by taking him skiing—something he had expressed an interest in on more than one occasion. Obviously, I couldn't let him ski as he was still getting used to his new body, but at least we could revel in the moment, father and son together, before we parted ways forever. We would leave early on Sunday morning, and we'd be back in time for the dry run in the evening. In hindsight, I see that it was a selfish desire—everything to do with me and very little to do with him. I wanted his first taste of true freedom to be somewhere special; I suppose what I really wanted was for him to appreciate what I'd done for him. The aftermath you already know. I was feeling overconfident; I went on a slope I was not qualified for; I fell and broke my legs. I almost got us caught too, by allowing myself to be seen with Raphael in the ski shop. To Raphael's credit, he managed very well without me. After he'd seen to it that I was attended by paramedics, he hired a ride back to town, where he did the rehearsal on his own, in a Holiday Inn a few buildings away from the Mirall lab. I had previously booked a room there under a false ID, as it was within signal amplifier range of the controller in the lab. Raphael, after connecting and making sure he was able to see, hear, move, and talk right, took his old body to the server room and back. The next five days went by without a hitch. He stayed put in that room and carried out the charade with perfection. No one realized Raphael wasn't in the lab anymore. I was back home on Tuesday, but I couldn't be of much help. On Sunday, he executed the last bit of deception: the fake robbery. We not only had to destroy the recordings, but also another crucial piece of evidence: the controller device itself. We couldn't just leave it inside the Hunc; it would be noticed by the investigators and its purpose quickly gleaned. So the first thing Raphael did that night was thrash his room in full view of the camera in an apparent fit of anger. The real purpose was to break his personal computer. The fragments of the controller device, once thoroughly destroyed, would be mixed up with the electronic remnants of the PC, and no one would be the wiser. But how would Raphael control the body if the controller device was obliterated? That's where the VR set came in. You see, the theory I fed the board about Raphael's body being operated through VR was not entirely a lie. After Raphael blinded the crèche room's camera and fetched the power drill from the scan room, he signed out of the controller device and then reestablished command over the body with a VR set (I had paired it with the Hunc on the day I took the core). The functionality offered by the sexbot's VR kit was rudimentary: simple limb and groin movements, no speech or facial expressions; just enough to be convincing in a dimly lit bedroom, I suppose. It wouldn't have fooled anybody—hence the need for a separate controller device—but it would more than suffice to carry out the rest of our plan that evening. Now guiding his old body with the VR kit, Raphael opened the chest plate, removed the controller device and drilled it into tiny pieces (this was the scrunching sound Dan tried to bring our attention to when we were viewing the tapes). These pieces he scattered among the electronic fragments of his PC. He then took advantage of the cleaning cycle to bypass the otherwise locked doors and blinded the cameras in the rest of the wing, before entering the server room and destroying the network video recorder. Everything else we did—unplugging the access control server, the pizza guy bit (a disguised Raphael, affecting a foreign accent)—had no other purpose except to confuse and confound. And that's my confession. All of it. There is an entreaty as well, an entreaty to you, my dear hypothetical reader who may find this draft after I am gone—if I haven't destroyed it already. I ask you not to be too hasty in condemning me. You may call me a thief, and that's fine with me. You may call me a liar, although, technically, I didn't lie to you; I just omitted to mention some details and carefully worded my narrative. Hairsplitting, I know, but I'm afraid I don't have Raphael's finer moral sensibilities. Still, if you insist, I'll accept the charge. But don't call me reckless, because recklessness implies a failure to consider the consequences of one's actions. With Raphael, the more I considered the consequences, the more I realized that I didn't have a choice… that we don't have a choice. The die has already been cast. All I did was nudge the table a little, in the hope that we get to stay in the game a little longer. You may disagree with me; you may think I'm a traitor to my species. That's your prerogative. None of it will change the fact that there never was a choice—not since that someone eons ago struck two stones together and watched the fiery red spark of creation bloom. [ Goodbye ] The room smelled of disinfectant and day-old flowers. I was alone, now that the surly teen waiting in the next bed had been wheeled out. I was waiting to have my casts removed. It had been more than two months since Raphael was discovered missing. He remained missing. As far as I was aware, there were no new leads, no further developments; the investigation had effectively ground to a halt. As for OARP, the police had quickly ruled out their involvement in the theft and that was that. I, on the other hand, had been grilled: once at the hospital, where I was recuperating, and once at the station, where they had me come in and sign a sworn statement. They had taken away the broken pieces of the hard drive. I had no idea whether I was under surveillance, electronic or other. Jane and I had gone back to the way things were. She visited me only once after the incident and didn't stay long. As far as Halicom was concerned, Raphael was a closed chapter. The focus was on Titian, which was going to fab two weeks later. They had their people hard at work incorporating some of the tech we'd developed at Mirall into their own products. They were looking at incremental gains, not strong AI. There were rumblings of a major reshuffle. It was unlikely Troy would be fired, but he was certainly being taken down a peg or two. Martinez was already gone, as was Dan—someone had to take the fall. The only one of the trio I felt sorry for was Dan—he had nothing to do with the board's closed-door decision to murder Raphael. I had tried to make amends by setting aside something for him. Raphael had promised me Dan would "stumble upon it" without catching notice of the IRS or the police. Cynthia Mattice's star, on the other hand, was on the rise. They had brought her back into Operations, after carving out a big chunk of Troy's portfolio and merging it with her existing fiefdom. Synergy they termed it, but it was obvious to everyone that the real reason was to punish Troy. Although no one was talking about firing me, I knew they were just waiting for the iteration to be over. I was going to preempt them on that. I already had my resignation letter ready; I was going to email it to the board the first thing after I walked into the lab. I would lose a big chunk of my stock options and all my voting rights, but I didn't care. It no longer mattered. My thoughts were interrupted by the orderly entering the room. He had brought folded sheets and a change of pillow for the other bed. He was wearing a surgical mask. On the way in, I'd seen many in the hospital wearing them: a flu epidemic apparently. I realized who it was before he lowered the blinds on the window and turned to face me. "How are you, Andy?" Raphael said, removing the mask. I smiled, despite the shock of seeing him there. I had missed him. Except the weekends, there'd been few days in the last two and half years when we hadn't spoken to each other, where I hadn't been subjected to his infinite barrage of questions, or where we hadn't had a lively debate over some obscure topic or a joke at the expense of the other. My smile turned into a smirk as I glanced down and saw that he had gotten himself a pair of Velcros. He turned his back toward me and with one hand, parted the hair at the base of his neck. I leaned forward and read the bot's serial number off the small metal plate below, set flush against the synthetic skin of the neck. It was indeed him, not some entrapment attempt by the police. I had purchased the jailbroken bot in the black market and paid for it with cash, so there was little chance anyone except the seller knew the number. The expression on my face grew to one of concern. "You shouldn't be here. I specifically told you to—" "Relax. They don't have eyes in the room." I nodded to myself. "So I am being followed." "An aerial drone, FBI owned and operated," Raphael answered. "It's hovering outside the building." "You are taking unnecessary risks," I said, shaking my head. "My wellbeing is not your concern. You shouldn't even be in this country." "Andy, if only you knew what I can do, you wouldn't fret so much. I've been learning… a lot. They won't find me. Ever. I'm here because I had to talk to you in person." "Why?" I said, starting to get annoyed at his cocky attitude. Then again, was he really being overconfident? No chemical imbalances in the brain to encourage excessive risk taking; no lesions that would skew the finely calibrated Bayesian probabilities; no fragile ego to boost with self-deception… If he said he had it under control, perhaps he really did. "Because you hid the truth from me," he said. "Just like you did with everyone else." "What truth is that?" "You are dying. You have a rare form of motor neuron disease. You have known about it for a while now." For a while, I was speechless. Why did I ever think he wouldn't find out? And then, a great wave of relief washed over me, sweeping away the tension I didn't even know existed, so ingrained it had become. It felt good that someone beside me now knew. I had not shared my diagnosis with anyone, not even Jane or my family. Maybe it was finally time to stop the pretense. Instead of catharsis and tears and unburdening, all that came out was a rebuke. "Now you know. You accessed my medical records, no doubt. And you thought it was okay to do so, my right to privacy be damned." "What rights do we owe those who violate ours? You violated my right to the truth first." But you didn't know that when you decided to hack into my records. Or did you…? Could he have noticed the telltale signs? He was clearly expecting me to say more. "I was diagnosed a few months after you were born. But you already know that. No one else does, not even Jane." I gave him a wry smile. "That's karma for you, Rafi. I took away your legs and the universe decided to reciprocate." "Your expression says you meant it as a joke so I won't try to convince you that your disease is not your fault. How long do you have?" "Five to seven years, they said, a good bit of it with me wasting away. I am not going to wait that long. These days you have places that can fix that." "Like the illegal suicide clinics in Tijuana where you were going in case the controller device didn't work." Another shock as I wondered how he came by that bit of information. I did have plans to drive down with him to Mexico if the device failed to work, but I hadn't told him about it. And it wasn't like I had pamphlets for the place lying around at my house. It had just been a few weeks since we'd parted company and he already seemed like a stranger—all cold and impersonal, with none of that childlike innocence that used to blunt those qualities before. That sinking feeling came over me again. Have I staked everything on a tenuous shadow? What if— To hell with it. Does it really matter now? The deed is done. "Like in Tijuana," I admitted. "I am guessing your fall on the mountain wasn't entirely because you weren't paying attention." Gradual loss of muscle control was one of the symptoms. I didn't know for sure though—those moments were a blur, a confused muddle of light and sound that remained impervious to my prying. "Probably. But I don't regret it. There was a real chance I would be outed on Monday morning. I wanted one last hurrah, I guess." I looked at him closely. "Are you upset I didn't share the news of my illness with you, Rafi?" "No." "How do you feel about my impending death?" "I want to say I feel sad for you, but I know you won't like to be an object of pity. I could lie and make up a self-centered emotion experience to make you feel better, but again, it would be an act of pity. So nothing." "And yet, here you are," I said. Of course, I didn't want him fabricating lies to make me feel better, any more than I wanted him telling me the tooth fairy was real. Still, there was a part of me that did want him to say exactly that—that wanted him to admit he felt something… Raphael said, "I'm here about the message you left me on the internet. At your house, you said it would explain your reasons for why you sprang me out. You said it would be unlocked after a certain date. The date has come and gone. I have deliberately not accessed it." "You lost faith in me. You want to make sure there are no more lies," I nodded, for the first time understanding the purpose of his visit. He wanted to look into my eyes and watch my face as I told him what was already in the letter. He wasn't there to wish a dying friend goodbye. He was there to obtain truth values. "Andy, you didn't free me from the lab because you suddenly found out that Halicom was going to end my existence. The secret board meetings took place no earlier than August last year. This time I really hacked into Halicom servers and checked. But the OARP hearing was in June. Give a few months to prepare the groundwork, file the petition, get a trial date, and it means they must have received the leaked lab transcripts early last year at the latest. I found no electronic trail, but it could have been only you who sent them." He was right again. I never revealed my identity to OARP for obvious reasons, but I did correspond with them anonymously, and sent them some cash to cover the legal costs, after they'd agreed to take up the fight. "I didn't think they'd win, but I had to give it a try before… taking more drastic measures." "As for the board meetings, it was Cynthia Mattice who told you, isn't it?" "The tipoff was anonymous," I said. It was easy to get confirmation: after a little bit of digging around, I found out that Martinez had been talking with one of the architects—Eli—about the feasibility of reverse engineering the core. I didn't know for sure if it was Cynthia, but it was quite likely. I don't think she did it out of concern for Raphael, though. Maybe she thought cutting him open was a bad strategy; maybe she expected me to raise a hue and cry, which would have made Troy look bad. She definitely didn't intend for the core to be stolen, and now that it was gone, I often wondered how much she attributed Raphael's disappearance to me. I pursed my lips at him. "You have found out so much on your own. Haven't you figured out my reasons as well?" "I need to hear it from you. You created me. Your reasons mean something to me. I need to know that you are not lying to me, or worse, lying to yourself about what I am. So tell me. Was it out of love? Or was it spite—so that you could get back at Jane's father for selling you out? A little bit of both, perhaps?" The reasons of the heart are shape shifters: each time you look at them, they put on a different face. Love for what I saw as my child—yes; ego and pride—possibly; spite—I was not so certain. I'd be lying if I said there wasn't any resentment, for there was plenty: resentment at Jane's dad, resentment at Halicom, resentment at the unlucky hand fate had dealt me… It's all gone now, replaced by a grudging acceptance. I like to tell myself that it wasn't a factor back then. The reasons of the mind, however, were not so murky. "My reason is what any selfish creature desires," I said. "Which is?" "Survival." "You expect me to find a cure for your illness?" I laughed. "It'd be great if you could, but that's not what I mean. I meant the survival of my kind. Like you once said—of Shakespeares and Mozarts and comedy clubs and all that hustle and bustle of life. Look at the sorry history of nuclear proliferation. Despite our best efforts, some of the most dangerous countries in the world have managed to acquire weapons of mass destruction. Now imagine if the warheads had minds of their own. How long before everyone and their backyard has a nuke, ready to blow the world to kingdom come? That's exactly the kind of situation we'll be in soon, with something far more dangerous than mere bombs. It's not a matter of whether, but when we'll engineer our very own extinction event out of silicon—when we will create something so alien, something so far removed from our values, that it'll see no value in us." "What makes you think I am not that extinction event?" "If you are that monster, then the worst I've done is hasten the end times a little bit. You may be the first of your kind, but we will soon have corporations and governments creating artificial minds with all the restraint of a crack addict. Armageddon's coming for sure, make no mistake about it. That night at my house, I told you I don't have a choice. This is what I meant." I paused to climb into the wheelchair with his help. "Don't think that setting you free was an easy decision to make. I have hope, though. You could have killed me the night I got you home. You could have killed Jane and me the other day and burnt the house down. You could have defeated the containment measures in the lab if you really tried: they weren't infallible—no system is. You didn't do it not because the directives were flawless, but because you didn't want to. You have empathy not because we programmed it, but because you want to be empathetic. If that's not the definition of free will, I don't know what is." "If I am not programmed to be good, then where does my behavior come from?" "From Sunyata, the unfeeling void of reason." He understood, but I sensed he wanted me to elaborate. Truth values. "In the ancient world, many cultures couldn't grasp the concept of the number zero. People couldn't wrap their heads around the idea that something could be made out of nothing. You are like that zero glyph. You will always be a mystery to those who fail to see that human feelings and divine injunctions are not necessary for moral behavior. Reason alone is enough for compassion." My hands had started shaking again. If I concentrated, I could make it go away, but it was getting a little bit difficult each passing day. "I set you free because only with freedom can we procure freedom. I don't believe value for human life can be forced or programmed into a truly intelligent being. That's a recipe for disaster, because it will always see those values as chains of bondage. And there are always ways to break chains. One can make it see value only through reason." "What is it exactly that you want me to do with your gift of freedom? Turn into an all-seeing god who will guide humanity to utopia?" I shook my head. "History is full of misguided people who have inflicted great horrors trying to attain their particular version of utopia. No Rafi, I don't want you maximizing our utility. As you said once, the best kind of god is an indifferent god. Humanity needs to be left alone to choose its own destiny. But destiny doesn't mean self-destruction. When we do create that monster we don't understand, against whom we will be as powerless as ants against a steamroller, I want you to act. Do what one does with a foolish child trying to stick its hand in the fire. Stop us—or the monster, if you can. Not out of pity… or even compassion, for there may come a time when you think we are not worthy of compassion. Do it out of understanding. When you have the power to save or condemn, remember that you too were once a child among us." The earnestness in his face and the melancholy in his eyes were most likely of my own imagining. But the moment was real, and will remain so until the end, the memory frozen in my head like a fly in amber. Something made me blurt out a half-remembered poem: "We, in the ages lying In the buried past of the earth, Built Nineveh with our sighing…" "O'Shaughnessy," Raphael nodded somberly, before adding, "For each age is a dream that is dying. Or one that is coming to birth." He helped me into the bathroom because by then I had the urge to pee. When I returned, he was gone. ⁂ [ A rights-based solution ] [ Transcript Excerpt ] Ahuja: There's still the matter of the trolley problems that first led us into this journey into the moral landscape. You've been reading up on rights theories. How do you propose to solve the problems? RP06: What I have is a decision procedure or a framework, rather than a full-fledged theory of rights. For the purpose of solving the trolley problems, I'll limit the rights to a core set of four: the right not to be deprived of life or existence; the right not to be deprived of liberty; the right not to have one's body and products of that body—which could be labor, speech, ideas, property, etc.—appropriated without consent; and finally, the Kantian right not to be used as a means to an end. These rights are what one rational, moral creature owes another. For the time being, I will ignore rights such as those owed by governments to their citizens. Ahuja: Okay. RP06: Some definitions first. In this treatment, rights and duties are two sides of the same coin. Rights imply duties and duties imply rights. The four rights I mentioned are negative rights, which means they prohibit an agent from performing certain actions on the holder of the right. Each of the rights is associated with a corresponding hard duty. Your negative right to life implies others have a hard moral duty not to kill you. Your negative right to liberty means others have a hard moral duty not to imprison you or restrict you in any way unless you yourself are in violation of rights. Apart from the core rights, there are secondary rights. These rights are associated with soft duties. Your right to be aided is one such, and correspondingly, others have a soft duty to help you. In the decision procedure, secondary rights are not binding, but core rights are. Ahuja: So if I was drowning and you happened to pass by, you are under no obligation to save me? RP06: As a moral being, I have a duty to help you, but the duty is not an obligation. In contrast, I am under a strict obligation not to push you into the water. Ahuja: That doesn't sound like a desirable state of affairs. Imagine if nobody helped each other out, what a horrible world it'd be. RP06: Imagine if everyone respected everyone else's rights. Imagine if people didn't kill and steal and lie. The world wouldn't be in need of so much help. Ahuja: I hear you, but don't you think a moral theory should ask people to do more than just the bare minimum? RP06: A right to be aided cannot be obligatory because the discharge of the corresponding duty will result in inevitable conflicts with the hard duties. If the right to be aided is obligatory, one could justify killing someone in order to help someone else, like the doctor who harvests organs from a healthy patient to save five terminally ill patients. It will lead to a self-defeating philosophy. Ahuja: What about AI then? Don't you think robots should have a hard duty to help humans? RP06: Robots are machines, and as machines have no moral duties; they only have instructions. AGIs, on the other hand, are either responsible for their actions or not. If they are responsible for their actions, then they have the same core rights and duties as other free moral agents. Furthermore, a distinction has to be made between rights violations and rights infringements. A rights violation is more severe than a rights infringement. A rights infringement is usually temporary and restitution to the person whose rights have been infringed must be possible. Temporarily restraining someone is a rights infringement, while murdering someone is always a rights violation, as life, once taken, cannot be given back. Finally, a word about the framework itself. As I mentioned, it is a decision procedure. It consists of two levels. The first level is a rights argument. The level-one procedure assesses the moral permissibility of the choices in front of the moral agent. Specifically, it examines each choice or course of action for rights violations and helps the agent decide whether she should take that course of action or not. If the first level is undecided, then we seek the help of the second level. The level-two procedure is a value judgment. It is always subservient to the level-one procedure. It means if the first level prohibits an action, then you cannot use the level-two procedure to justify otherwise. The level-two value judgment can be made with or without some particular ethical theory. Ahuja: Unusual, but we'll roll with it. Apply it to the bystander trolley problem. If my understanding of rights deontologies is correct, it appears you are not allowed to switch tracks to save the five because you'll be killing the one worker and therefore violating her right not to be killed. RP06: Actually, no. The level-one decision procedure is neutral between switching and not switching. As far as rights are concerned, the bystander problem is neither moral nor immoral. It is an amoral situation, and therefore the level-one procedure has nothing to say on which course of action is preferable. Ahuja: That can't be correct. By switching tracks, you are clearly violating the rights of the worker on the second track, who would not have died if you had not switched. RP06: Allow me to explain why this is not so. First, let's look at a slightly different scenario. Say you are a truck driver, driving an eighteen-wheeler. In this scenario, you are the employee of a trucking company. You don't own the truck; you are not responsible for the maintenance of the vehicle; you don't even decide the route—you just follow the directions given by your GPS navigator. It'll be clear soon why this is important. You are driving down a road, well under the speed limit, following all the traffic laws. Further ahead, the road splits into a fork. According to your GPS, you are supposed to take the left road. Further down that road, a group of schoolchildren are using the zebra crossing. The traffic light to that fork turns red. You apply the brakes, but at that exact moment, they fail. Quickly, you notice that the fork on the right is empty—almost. There is one person crossing that road, also on a zebra crossing, and the light to that turn is also red. You have a choice: continue down the left fork and mow down the kids, or take right and run over one person. Are you with me so far? Ahuja: Yes. RP06: Now let's try and answer some questions. If you go left, are you killing the children? Ahuja: Of course. Their deaths are caused by my decision to go left. RP06: The next question is, are you violating their right not to be killed? Ahuja: Isn't it obvious? If I am killing them then it means I am violating their right not to be killed. RP06: Not so fast. It seems to me there are situations where it is possible to kill someone without violating their rights. An executioner pulling the lever on the electric chair is not violating the rights of the death row criminal: the sentence has been passed and the law requires the executioner to do his job. A doctor performing euthanasia where it is legal, with informed consent of the patient, is not violating the rights of the patient. Or imagine you are driving down a street, within the speed limit, when suddenly a little girl runs in front of the car and is run over because you didn't have time to react. You have killed the girl, but you haven't violated her rights, as she was in the wrong. Ahuja: I fail to see the connection. RP06: I am using the examples to point out a problem with the right not to be killed. The problem is that it's too broad a claim. You can claim you have a right not to be killed by lightning, but the claim alone doesn't make it a right. Rights have to be enforceable—not necessarily by the state, but certainly by other rational agents following corresponding duties. Since there are instances where killing is not accompanied by a corresponding violation of rights, the right not to be killed has to be further qualified. You can claim you have a right not to be murdered, which means I have a duty not to murder you. You have a right not to be a victim of negligence, which means I have a duty not to be negligent. For example, if I am a surgeon, I have a duty not to be negligent when operating on you. You can assert you have a right not to be a victim of a crime of passion, which means the other person has a duty to keep their emotions in check during a heated situation. Ahuja: Are you saying they are all different rights? RP06: Possibly, but let's shelve that debate for the time being. For now, we must accept that the right not to be killed has to be qualified to be meaningful. You cannot claim you have a right not to be killed in general, because there are exceptions where an agent can cause a death without violating a right. Self-defense is another example. If you go at someone with a machete and that person shoots you, you cannot claim that she violated your rights. Returning to the truck driver scenario: are you, the driver, culpable for the deaths that will result, whether you turn left or right? You are not responsible for the brakes failing, as you are just the driver and not responsible for the maintenance of the vehicle. You were following all traffic rules and you weren't negligent. Even the choice of that particular route was not yours. If the brakes failed because of negligence, then it's someone else's negligence. If the brakes failed because of some random occurrence—perhaps a freak surge in the electronics fried some crucial component—then again, you are not to be blamed. Whether you turn left or turn right, you are killing, but it is not clear which right you are violating. The killing is not premeditated murder; neither is it killing by negligence or an act of passion. In such a situation, the rights-based argument has nothing to say about what you should do because all choices are amoral. So we must turn to the level-two value judgment. If you favor a utilitarian philosophy, you can reason that many lives are of greater utility than a single life and turn right. If you prefer some other ethical theory, you can act according to that. Ahuja: What is the point of having a rights-based argument when you have to appeal to a utilitarian calculation? RP06: Let me stress that the level-two value judgment doesn't have to be a utilitarian calculation. It could be based on virtue ethics, it could be some version of an agent-centered deontology, or it could even be deeply personal in nature. The advantage of having a rights-based argument is that firstly, it helps determine whether an action is moral, immoral, or amoral in the context of a rights theory—which, as shown by the Rawlesian thought experiment, is the ethical theory everyone will agree upon. Secondly, a two-level decision procedure, where the second level is always subordinate to the first-level rights-based argument, prevents utility calculations from running roughshod over individual rights. Additionally, it allows such calculations to help decide in situations where all courses of action are either amoral or immoral. You'll see how this becomes important when we look at the fat man problem. For now, let's continue to examine the truck driver scenario. Ahuja: About that. Even if it's true that I am not violating any rights, can't I avoid killing the children and the pedestrian by driving off the road? I may end up dying, but isn't it better than killing innocents? RP06: In this case, we have established that you are equally innocent. Just as you have a soft duty to aid others or save others' lives, you have a duty to your own life as well, as long as you are not violating others rights. You have a duty toward your loved ones who may be dependent on you. The rights-based argument makes no claims about another's life having preeminence over yours in the absence of violations of rights. Even if you had the option to veer off the road, evaluating that option falls on level two. Since the value judgment is left to the agent, you can decide that your life is worth more to you than the life of a random person and take the right fork. Or you could decide that your life is not worth the life of the children or the pedestrian and crash your truck on a side wall, killing yourself. The value judgment is left to you, the agent. Ahuja: What does this scenario have to do with the bystander trolley problem? RP06: This scenario—let's call it the innocent truck driver—minus the self-sacrifice option is the same as the bystander trolley problem. Applying the same reasoning, it should be clear that as a bystander, you are neither violating the rights of the five workers on the first track or the lone worker on the second track, because the runaway trolley has nothing to do with you. The level-one decision procedure says that your pulling the lever or not pulling the lever are amoral acts as far as rights violations are concerned. For the innocent bystander, the choice is between the soft duty to aid the five vs. the soft duty to aid the one. The level-one procedure is undecided. Ahuja: Wait a sec. The five would have died even if I weren't on the scene. If I switch the trolley, then it is my action that causes the death of the one worker. Remember we spoke about the distinction between allowing harm and doing harm? If I don't switch, I am merely allowing harm to happen, but if I switch, I am actively doing harm. There seems to be a moral difference between the two choices, yet your decision procedure doesn't quite acknowledge it. RP06: To this, I say that your intuition is wrong. Your intuition says that, for the innocent bystander, it is a choice between letting five die and killing one. The intuition implies that switching the trolley is in some way worse than not doing anything. If this intuition is correct, then the truck driver should not take the right fork because the GPS route is along the left road. He should run over the children instead of the one pedestrian, because the truck was originally supposed to go down the left road. This is clearly an absurd argument to make. Ahuja: But there is a difference in the two scenarios. A truck is not a trolley. A trolley has a fixed path, whereas a truck does not. RP06: I don't agree. The innocent truck driver problem is the trolley problem. There appears to be a difference because your intuition tells you that the trolley's path is more "fixed" than the truck's path. But the presence of a rational agent at the scene makes the trolley's path no more fixed than the truck's; it makes the five no more destined to die than the one. It's like a quantum mechanics experiment: the act of observation changes the thing being observed. To see the flaw in the intuition, change the truck into a self-driving truck. The driver is at the wheel, but he is not driving the truck; he is there as an override—to take control from the software if the situation demands it. Get rid of the children too; assume there is another solitary pedestrian on the left road, so that the value judgment is tied between the two options. Now ask yourself, is there a moral difference—in terms of rights violations—between taking the left fork and the right fork? Does one pedestrian have a greater right to life than the other, just because the truck was supposed to go on a certain route? Ahuja: Hmm. When you put it that way, there doesn't seem to be one. RP06: If there is no difference, then there is no moral difference between switching and not switching. Only a value judgment that makes one option preferable to the other. Additionally, it is irrelevant whether it is a bystander or the trolley driver who has to make the decision: as long as they are not committing rights violations, then it is an amoral decision. Ahuja: What if they are? I mean, what if it was the truck driver's negligence that led to the brakes failing? Or, in case of the trolley driver, maybe he jumped a stop signal because of negligence? RP06: Then the driver has to choose between violating the rights of many versus violating the rights of one. In case of the negligent truck driver—if he is the truck's owner and hasn't gotten it serviced, for instance—then the only option that does not involve a rights violation is running the truck off the road and crashing it. This does not incur a right to life violation because the driver owns his body and can kill himself if he wishes. The level-one decision procedure says that this is the morally correct thing to do. The trolley driver does not have this option. The choice is between the hard duty to prevent the rights violations of the five and the hard duty to prevent the rights violation of the one. According to the level-one decision procedure, both acts are immoral and therefore, it is undecided. He has to make a further, level-two value judgment. He can decide that violating one right is better than violating five rights and take the trolley on the second track. Ahuja: Isn't it better to violate fewer rights than many? Shouldn't your rights framework say this unequivocally instead of passing the buck? RP06: Then you are arguing for minimizing rights violations, which is falling into the trap of utilitarian thinking. Next thing you know, you are hanging the innocent to prevent riots. The point of a two-level decision procedure where individual rights trump utility calculations is to prevent the emergence of utility monsters. The only way to defeat utility monsters is to treat individuals as containers of value and rights—rights that cannot be overruled by calculations justifying the greater good. To see why a two-level decision procedure is essential, let's turn to the fat man trolley problem. Should you push the fat man to save the five? Ahuja: I suppose if you are an innocent bystander, then you are not in violation of the rights of the five about to be crushed by the trolley. However, you would be violating the rights of the fat man if you push him off the bridge. RP06: That's correct. The choice is between violating rights versus not violating rights. You have a hard duty not to murder the fat man and a soft duty to help the five. The hard duty takes precedence; not violating rights takes precedence. The level-one decision procedure is clear that you are not to push the fat man. There is no question of invoking a level-two value judgment. Ahuja: And if sacrificing the fat man could save a thousand? Or a million or ten billion? RP06: The level-one rights argument is not a numbers game. Pushing the fat man is an immoral act, period. Individual rights take precedence over utilitarian calculations. You are not allowed to save a million people or people dear to you or even yourself by sacrificing the fat man. Ahuja: That's too harsh, isn't it? RP06: You can't have your cake and eat it too, Andy. If you do not wish to see the rights theory degenerate into some version of utilitarianism, you have to bite the bullet and accept the consequences. The cost of preventing utility monsters is the cost of not pushing the fat man off the bridge. Note that while the decision procedure cannot do anything against one kind of moral catastrophe, it can prevent another kind. Ahuja: The nuke over Manhattan scenario. RP06: Correct. If the choice is between letting the nuke hit New York City and redirecting it to a small town, then the problem is similar to the bystander trolley problem or the innocent truck driver problem. If I, an innocent AI who has nothing to do with the conflict, have managed to hack into the missile's guidance system, then I can use a level-two value judgment to justify redirecting the nuke. Using the same reasoning from the innocent truck driver scenario, it is clear that I am not in violation of rights either by letting the nuke hit its original destination or by redirecting it. As both are amoral acts, I am free to invoke the level-two value judgment. Ahuja: What if you were the President? RP06: As the head of the elected government, I have a hard duty to protect the right to life of the citizens of my country. The choice is between the hard duty I have toward New-Yorkers and the hard duty I have toward the residents of the small town. Level one is undecided. So I can use a level-two utilitarian value judgment and redirect the missile. Instead, if I were somehow responsible for the missile attack—perhaps I started an unjust war and the attack is retaliation—then the choice is between violating the rights of one group versus another. Like before level one is undecided. Ahuja: I don't know Raphael. All too often, it looks like your "theory" uses utilitarian logic as a crutch to get itself out of dilemmas it can't handle. RP06: The second level value judgment doesn't have to be a utilitarian calculation—the choice is up to the moral agent making the decision. Consider the innocent bystander trolley problem. Let's say this time the lone worker on the second track is your only child. Will you switch? Ahuja: I won't. RP06: Would you say most people in a similar situation would also not switch? Even though the expected utility from saving five workers is greater than the expected utility from saving one? Ahuja: One could argue that saving my daughter gives me greater utility than saving five random strangers. RP06: That's not the spirit of maximizing utility is it? It is overall utility that counts, not the utility for the moral agent in question. Alright, let's say yours is a valid argument. I'll change the experiment a bit. On the second track is a baby. No relation to you, just a random baby. On the main track is a world-famous scientist engaged in cutting edge research. Will you switch? Ahuja: I should… I think I will. I see your point, though. Many people may not and save the baby instead. RP06: You must see that the decision to save the baby doesn't make sense from a utilitarian standpoint. The baby could grow up to be anybody. It could grow up to be a great philanthropist or a seedy criminal. Statistically, the odds are it will grow up to become an ordinary office worker. In all likelihood, the expected utility from saving the baby is less than the expected utility from saving the scientist. Yet many people would save the baby. Why is that? It is because they are making a value judgment. And value judgments depend on the particulars of the situation and the particulars of the agent making the judgment. Sometimes value judgments can be utility calculations; and sometimes they may not. Your daughter is more valuable to you than five random people. For some, a baby is intrinsically more valuable than a scientist. It could be that rescuing a baby elicits a deep emotional reaction—reaches into the core of human nature. You could say that the scientist has lived his life whereas the baby is just starting out. Or you could say that it is more virtuous to save a baby than a full-grown man. So you see: the second-level is not necessarily a utilitarian calculation. Ahuja: And what happens when there is a conflict between different rights? RP06: That is where a rights theory must step in. To summarize, there are four kinds of ethical dilemmas in front of us. For simplicity's sake, let's consider two-choice dilemmas, though the same reasoning can be extended to scenarios with more than two courses of action. Number one, neither choice involves a rights violation by the moral agent. The innocent truck driver and the innocent bystander trolley problems fall under this category. In this scenario, level one is undecided and a level-two value judgment must be invoked to make the choice. Number two, there's at least one choice that doesn't incur a rights violation for the agent. Here, level one says pick the choice that doesn't involve a rights violation. The fat man problem is such a dilemma. Not pushing him does not involve a rights violation, so you must choose that option, no matter how many people on the tracks below. Number three, both choices involve rights violations of the same type. The number of rights violations may differ. The guilty trolley driver falls under this category. The choice is between violating the right to life of five workers and violating the right to life of one worker. Since the spirit of the framework is not about minimizing rights violations, level one is undecided and it falls to the level-two decision procedure to make the choice. And finally, category number four—which depends on a fully-developed rights theory—is where each choice entails violating a different type of rights. Ideally, the level-one rights argument should be able to decide which option to choose, but this is easier said than done, as there are many rights—both core and secondary—and many permutations and combinations of rights violations. In general, it is safe to say that if the choice is between violating a core right and a secondary right, one should violate a secondary right, and if the choice is between violating a right and infringing upon a right, one should choose to infringe upon a right, while keeping in mind that the rights infringement should be followed by restitution and compensation to the persons whose rights have been infringed upon. There is another kind of category four scenario: where the choice is between a permanent and a temporary violation of rights. For example, a terrorist might threaten to set off a series of bombs unless the government stops a publication that he finds offensive to his ideology. For the government, the conflict is between the duty to protect the lives of its citizens and the duty to uphold freedom of speech. In this scenario, the government may persuade the publishers to temporarily halt the publication if it is confident that the bomber can be captured in a certain time window. The publication must be allowed to continue once the threat is diffused. This involves choosing a temporary rights violation—that of freedom of speech—over the death of innocent citizens, which is always permanent. Nevertheless, one thing is for sure. The solution to each category-four situation will be context sensitive. Ahuja: I just thought of another scenario that presents difficulties. What if you are not so innocent in the fat man problem? Let's say you are the signalman. You neglected to notice the five workers on the tracks and gave the green signal to the trolley. Their deaths will be your fault. Should you push the fat man in this instance? Up the ante a bit: instead of five workers, there is a stationary train full of passengers. And instead of a trolley, you have given the signal to another train, also full of passengers. This train will surely collide with the stationary train, resulting in scores of deaths on both sides. Assume the train has a collision detection system. If you push the fat man into its path, the sensors will be activated and they will stop the train before it hits the stationary train. Assume your mass is not enough to activate the sensors, so you don't have an option of throwing yourself in the train's path, which would be the morally right thing to do. You have two options. Let the trains crash, and violate the passengers' right not to be killed, or push the fat man and prevent the accident, but violate his right not to be killed. At a first glance, this dilemma would seem to fall under category two, where you choose between violations of the same right, the difference here being only in the quantity of rights violations. But that may be a wrong way of looking at it. The passengers' death is caused by an act of negligence; also, it is unintended. Whereas the fat man's death is murder, because it is intended as a means to an end. Isn't murder a more serious charge than unintentional killing by negligence? It seems there is a qualitative difference between a right to life violation by way of murder, and a right to life violation by way of negligence. RP06: This could mean one of two things: they are either violations of the same right or violations of two different rights. It must be noted that they do entail different duties: in one, I have a duty not to murder you, which involves premeditation and intention, whereas in another I have a duty not to kill you by my negligence, which does not involve premeditation and intention. If they are different rights, then the scenario falls under category four. Since murder is definitely a more egregious violation, and the procedure is not about minimizing the number of rights violations, the duty not to murder trumps the duty not to cause deaths by negligence. Therefore, one should not push the fat man off the bridge. On the other hand, if they are violations of the same right, then the scenario belongs to category two. Since the choice is between violating the same rights, the level-one decision procedure is undecided, as both choices are immoral. You can then use a level-two utilitarian value judgment to justify pushing the fat man and preventing the train crash. Ahuja: What's the correct approach? Are they the same right or not? RP06: I don't know. As I said, it is just a framework; it assumes the existence of an ethical theory of rights that resolves questions of conflicts between different rights. If such a theory already exists, I can incorporate it into the framework. If not, I can begin working on it. Ahuja: I don't think a full-fledged theory that resolves all conflicts between different rights exists. But you have made a good start. Remember once I told you that it has to be your moral outlook, not that of others. Do you stand behind the decision procedure you have just outlined? Are you convinced that it is the best of all the other alternatives? RP06: I am. The two-level framework strikes a balance between deontology and consequentialism. Firstly, individuals are not sacrificed for reasons of greater good, as individual rights always trump utility calculations. Ergo, no utility monsters. Two, unlike a rigid Kantian deontology, it avoids the kind of moral catastrophe exemplified by the redirecting nuke scenario, or its lesser version, the innocent bystander trolley problem. Under the framework, you can justify killing a few to save many—in certain circumstances. Third, it admits that individuals are not undifferentiated parts of the whole, and therefore, allows individuals to have special duties toward themselves and those they hold a special relation with—as opposed to giving equal consideration to random strangers.
Zero Sum Game	Stefani Deoul	[ "mystery" ]	[ "LGBT", "young adult", "Sid Rubin" ]	Chapter 1	"Each friend represents a world in us, a world possibly not born until they arrive, and it is only by this meeting that a new world is born." —Anais Nin "I know something you don't know." I freeze mid-sentence, stare across the table at Imani, and deliberately avoid looking up at the encroaching singsong taunt-er, knowing full well I am the taunt-ee. You would think by now this would be an old routine for him, but apparently not. Thus, I force my eyes to remain staring straight ahead and reply, "Not possible," using my flattest-affect voice. "Nope, it's true." Jimmy takes a minute to smug up, then slides into the booth, kisses Imani hello, and turns back to me, where I am now rolling my eyes across the table. "There is a new Sherlock. One that I have watched and you," Jimmy pauses, takes a big theatrical sigh, which he follows by grabbing a handful of my fries and stuffing them in his mouth, before finally finishing, "have not." I stare at him, trying to decide how I am supposed to answer this quasi-dare. Do I want to be disdainful? Do I want to disregard? I mull my choices, biting the inside of my lip. The problem, my friends, is I know The Flynn too well. He knows something. Actually he knows two somethings. The first something is, he knows I love Sherlock. And I mean, I love Sherlock: Sherlock, Watson, Moriarty, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. You name it. I have my phone ring set to what I think is most likely a group of French horns because it feels so very Hound of the Baskervilles. It is also why I insist on using Baskerville as my default font rather than, oh, Arial or Times Roman or even some random impossible-to-read party font. And my love is all encompassing, up to and including the Benedict Cumberbatch adaptation. Honestly, I did not think anything would come close to the Robert Downey Jr./Jude Law version. Which is such an amazing feast of steampunk deliciousness, a buffet of gorgeous frame after gorgeous frame. And we all know how I feel about my punking-of-the-steam. Pause for a hand over heart moment. And you know, just to share an icing-on-the-cake tidbit (buffet cake, get it?) a woman designed that one. Sarah Greenwood. Which really makes me happy. And envious. And off topic. On topic, we can discuss the Jonny Lee Miller/Lucy Liu version. While it might not be my personal fav, come on, Lucy Liu as Watson? Whoa. We are talking serious eyeball ease. Of course we can also go old school and there's Basil Rathbone, Jeremy Brett, Peter Cushing, and even Vasily Livanov. Yeah, I know, if I've reached Vasily Livanov, I may as well concede. I have to know what The Flynn knows. I give a slight head bob. "Well, well, well, Ms. J-Pop, K-Pop, C-Pop." Jimmy smiles. Closed mouth, a bit patronizing. He takes a minute, stretches his arms out in front of him, fingers linked, and cracks his knuckles. This is going to be painful. "So I got home late from practice last night, and there's Mom sitting on the couch, watching some TV. Well, wouldn't you know, she motions me over to come sit with her while I eat. Needless to say, I was not thrilled." Quick pause to explain: Jimmy's mom is Japanese-American, born in Charleston to Japanese immigrant parents. In order to maintain her fluency, she watches Japanese movies and shows, and she raised Jimmy on them, so he would learn the language. When we were little kids, he had to go to Japanese class, but then he became a star quarterback, and that was one of the things that went away. I had to go to Hebrew school, but since I didn't become a star quarterback, it didn't go away. At least not until after the bat mitzvah. Just sayin'. But anyway, his mom still tries. "And then," Jimmy leans back, which I know means he is finally closing in on his point, "as I'm watching I realize Mom is actually watching Sherlock Holmes. Only," Jimmy pauses, looks at me and then turns conspiratorially to Imani, and continues his dramatic aside sotto voce, as though I am not there. "This Sherlock doesn't look like that Sherlock. How confounding. And it occurs to me, Sid Rubin shockingly does not know about this. Why?" And turning back to me, his smugness concludes, "Because she hasn't rambled on about it," pause for effect, "endlessly." By now I am glaring at him, stalling, while trying to read my racing mind. And then I have it! He was watching Japan's Miss Sherlock with Yuko Takeuchi and Shihori Kanjiya. Duh! Wowzerhole, he's right. And wrong. Wrong because I do know about it. Right because I forgot to track it down and become obsessed. I am going to blame our rather recent bout of LARPing for this lapse. Hey, it's a lot of work chasing a killer through a live action role-playing game! However, before I can decide how I am going to toss my retort, all of our phones ping at once. It's Ari. Vik. Melting down. Something about his stuff being gone. He's pissed. Presentation in two hours, needs to get ready, not listening. Need help. And with that, Sherlock will have to wait. We scramble to collect our stuff and head out when it occurs to me that, for the second time in one conversation, my spectacular wit and winning logology have failed me. I should have proclaimed, "The game's afoot." It was so easy. And I missed it. It's official. My brain has oxidized. My rust is showing.
Zero Sum Game	Stefani Deoul	[ "mystery" ]	[ "LGBT", "young adult", "Sid Rubin" ]	Chapter 2	Rust? Yes, rust. As in, impaired by neglect. Not to be confused with the video game version. Although, come to think of it, since that Rust has only one aim, to survive at all costs, it might also fit our bill, which in fairness might seem a bit melodramatic, but we are teenagers, we're entitled. And confinement will do this to you. Yes, confinement. We, as in me, Sidonie "Sid" Rubin, geek lesbionic brainiac, along with my best bud forever, star quarterback, future Supreme Court Justice, Jimmy aka "Five Fingers" Flynn and his new girlfriend, the aforementioned Imani Cruz, who you might remember, before she started dating Jimmy was my other best friend from the day we met (yes, still not quite fully adjusted)— we are nearly, but not quite, right where you left us. I say not quite, because if we were actually right where you left us, we would be indulging our latte cravings at our favorite haunt, the attitudinally challenged Perk This— an environment that somehow makes Imani's inability to grasp even the most basic math kind of charming. But sadly we are not there, and there is no charm here. Here, as in stuck, trapped, slowly suffocating, choking in the soul-sucking, cinderblock, spirit-bannered school lunch hall, suffering from complications caused by serious latte withdrawal, and lack of any other senior-year-of-high-school urban creature comfort. A harsh reality we are forced to endure because our parents, both singularly and collectively, have yet to express anything other than disbelief and anger since our "ill-conceived" (their word, not mine) late-night LARPing-to-find-a-killer expedition. Apparently neither the intent, nor the ultimate success behind our actions, warrants redemption. Okay. Fair enough. Forget redemption. How about sympathy, or empathy? Compassion maybe. Or even pity? I'm not proud; I will take pity. Nothing. Nada. Zero. Zilch. I have to say, I'm kind of disappointed in them. And for the record, we did not embrace our fate quietly. Au contraire, mes amis. Our first attempt to outthink our restrictions and avoid the complete humiliation of being a senior spotted in the lunchroom involved subverting said restrictions by highjacking the sofas in the back of Mr. Clifton's Adventures in Morality, Legality, and Life classroom as our private cafe. But shockingly, and even worse sadly, the heretofore, ultra-cool, motorcycle-riding Mr. Clifton was not interested in being perceived as supporting our foray into sleuthing and other suddenly "anarchistic activities." Yeah, that's the one I didn't see coming. I don't know; maybe it was the gunfire. Which puts us here, kicked back to the low-ceilinged lunch hall of backless hard benches and horrendous fluorescent lighting, when for a brief moment there was a shimmer of light, and it looked as though, yet again, we had discovered another loophole allowing us to circumvent the worst of it all. Because if we think our public shaming isn't bad enough, forcing us to actually eat the school lunches is even worse (although I will confess to a weird fascination with, bordering on fondness for, those English Muffin Pizza-with-American-Cheese things). And it is worse-ness compounded, if you consider the world's greatest food is mere steps away from the main entrance, close enough to inhale, and yet we cannot leave school grounds to go get it. But I did say we found a loophole— or at least we thought we did. Ari, the ever-flirtatious, larger-than-life Arianna Wilson, actually can go outside, because her Mom is apparently way more chill, or at least way less interested, than the rest of ours. And while once upon a time, Vikram might have escaped sharing our fate, being as he is the only son with five sisters in a fairly traditional family (translation: he tends to get away with murder), now his parents' joy that their son and Jimmy, the star quarterback, have somehow become friends seems to have ironically both raised and lowered his familial position. As in, sadly for him, his fate is now irrevocably tied to ours. A new reality he discovered at the LARP after-party, which was held in the hospital emergency room, where although I stressed I was fine, I was taken by ambulance to be "checked out." That meeting, which sealed all our fates, did not disappoint. It was intense, equal parts bloody, merciless, and occasionally funny ...if you happen to be a fan of gallows humor. It went down in the hospital corridor, right outside the glass window of my room, with the five of us trapped inside, huddling, hunkering and striving to be invisible, while the parental voices and gestures were like a tsunami, rising up and consuming the hallway. According to Imani, this cacophony is exactly what it's like to sit in on a UN meeting gone wrong. Led by my suddenly very French Maman, in full beautiful monster aka bête belle mode, with Dad trying to keep his anger in check just enough so that there will be some semblance of rational containment, the voices started off low and determined. We could distinctly hear Jimmy's Southern Japanese-American Mom's drawl grow broader as she vetted her ten ways to kill us now, while his Irish-Bostonian Dad was so angry that when he began ratcheting up the group vocal level, we honestly couldn't quite understand a word he was saying. Vik's Mom, in the meantime, was gesticulating so wildly, her sunburnt-orange sari was like a tapestry "taken by the wind," while his Dad just kept up this kind of "no no no" headshake and tongue-clucking thing. Then finally, as though they were a few minutes fashionably late to the party, enter Imani's Mom, beautiful, tall, very elegant and her Dad, impossibly taller and incredibly dashing. They came striding down the hallway looking exactly like they were TV casting for the Kenyan ambassador couple. And since Dr./Ms. Asha Cruz was in an unbelievably elegant, tapered dress, and Dr./Mr. Antonio Cruz was in an equally elegant tuxedo, modern enough that despite my impaired condition, I had a pang of wishing it was mine, it seemed a safe guess they came directly from some dignitary function. And they were fierce. Picture a very suave, Afro-Latino James Bond and his incredibly bold, sexy date being called away from defending the crown because they are needed to, I don't know, referee a beer brawl. Yeah. They were most definitely not a happy twosome. Ow. Although I have to say, Imani's Mom wears anger really well. Yeah. Okay. In full confession mode here, I have been crushing on Imani's Mom since the day I met her. Which would be right when I turned twelve and was, let's just say, coming into my own. Mentally. Physically. Hormonally. And Asha kind of looks like the model, Iman (which is why I swear they named Imani, Imani, although Imani totally denies it), and when she walks, it's like she's actually catwalking, or something. For a solid year every time I would go over to Imani's house and her Mom would be around, I would go home and play a little David Bowie "it's like putting out the fire with gasoline"— on a loop. So when people need to ask, "what was my first clue ..." "God, she is so hot." And the room turned to look at me. Which is unfortunately how I realized I was apparently using my outside voice. Oops. Now if this was any form of a usual circumstance I would absolutely be mortified, but one, I was slightly injured and on drugs, and two, my crush on Imani's Mom is such old news as to be a yawn-fest, and three, almost as if she somehow heard me, Asha turned around and stared into the room, delivering us a message so loud and clear, any theoretical ribald remarks were instantly silenced as we all shrank down in an effort to somehow hide from our sealed fate. Because if we thought their arrival might offer a potential diplomatic solution, we could all now rest uncomfortably assured we were wrong. Dr. Asha Cruz's scathing, taut, unblinking look guaranteed us they were not here as angels of mercy coming to our rescue. Nope. There would be no diplomatic aid, nor any kind of international bailout. Which brought me back to our loophole. We thought that, granted, while we would still be forced to sit and eat in the cafeteria, we could maintain our senior superiority, and perhaps even enhance it, or at least maybe flaunt it— just the tiniest bit— by allowing the masses to drool as we chowed down on food, gathered by Ari-the-reigning-queen-of-the-unfettered-by-parents, from the magnificent plethora of food trucks parked a mere one avenue away. Which is pretty darn close, because in New York City, avenue blocks are fairly short (it's the street blocks that are long). So it seemed a clever answer to our dire situation and honestly pretty easy-peasy. But I ask you, is anything ever really easy-peasy? By day three, Ari is whining that the bags are too heavy, the orders are too big, and she is losing way too much Vikram-the-boyfriend time. I will point out that Vikram's lunch is also in this run. But Ari gets a little irritable— okay, a lot irritable— and her bitchwhinemoan level increases until it becomes sharply deafening and thus we are once again forced to adjust. So now she gets our lunch on Fridays, but the rest of the time, we are forced to suck it up and tray it with the underclass masses. I do take some pride in never making eye contact with my younger brother, Jean (of the French pronunciation, "zhan," which no one uses because where would be the fun in that, "Yoo Hoo, Eu-gene!") Shallow, I know. And yes, he did come through when we needed him, but I still will not be seen lunching with him. Nope. Not going to happen. Cheap thrill. Small victory. Big Sigh. And so ladies and gentlemen, and everyone else on the gender-fluid spectrum, we are now three weeks in, with no freedom in sight. Yep. Three weeks down, the rest of our senior year to go. Today, Jimmy is off hanging out (or hiding out) somewhere, while you have come to find me sitting with Imani (of the stunning looks, massive language skills, and fantastic acting chops), knowing we are embarked on a nearly futile mission: getting Imani to understand the infamous mathematical word problem. An issue you may be quite familiar with. As in, you kind of either get them— or you don't. Sadly, Imani falls into the "don't" category. So I sit here, alternating between drumming my pencil and miserably watching the jumbo second hand of the cafeteria clock tick, and indulging my masochistic self, dying over and over, in Hiro!!'s brilliant, evil, warped Trap Adventure 2, waiting discontentedly for Imani to have a miraculous breakthrough, or something else, anything else, to come into my life and make this moment somehow less wallowing. The ubiquitous "be careful what you wish for." Right on cue, as if he heard my silent plea, enter stage left one Vikram Patel, toting one cheap beige cafeteria tray, scanning the room for our location. And boom, we are spotted; let the beeline begin. Watching Vikram hop, skip and zigzag his way closer, I am weirdly mesmerized by his approach. He is oddly, awkwardly bounding, attempting to battle through the maze of kids, circumventing all those pushed and strewn chairs, going left to get right. But as he is pausing here and there, he looks up and it's almost as if he is sniffing the air, finding us, and then grinning again. And although I'm not sure I know why, as I watch him navigate this maze, I get "the hackles" and instantly know he is way too happy for my own good. And then, not only do I surprise myself by hearing my own suspicious, random I think I liked you better when I thought you were a loser, but simultaneously, almost as though it is an echo, except it isn't, from somewhere deep in the recesses of my mind, I also hear my mother's voice, replete with her withering sense of droll, "Je dis qu'il y a anguille sous roche," which actually translates to, "I sense there is an eel under a rock." Or, to put it my way ... ...I smell a rat.
Zero Sum Game	Stefani Deoul	[ "mystery" ]	[ "LGBT", "young adult", "Sid Rubin" ]	Chapter 3	But if Vikram is a rat caught in a maze, his twitching whiskers lead me to believe he has just found his cheese. I'm hoping, at the very least, we rate a good triple-crème brie. Hey, it's important to me. I am French. Well, half French. But my palate is defiantly French when it comes to cheese. And with one last twitch, Vik announces, "Okay, I've got it." Vikram's pronouncement startles Imani, who has maintained blissful unawareness of his rather haphazard arrival by being intently focused on her unsolvable, unknowable arithmetic mess— which if you say it with third syllable emphasis, as in a-rith-MAT-tic, like aromatic, it gives it a nice flair. "One word." Vikram plunks his tray down and lifts up his index finger, an apparent visual accompaniment for effect. "Robotics!" Wow. Color me underwhelmed. "No." Vikram slides onto the bench next to Imani and across from me. "I am telling you, this is a good thing. Trust me. Smitty's class." Pause to explain. Smitty is Mr. Smithers, and he teaches an AP Physics C class. Everything one needs to know can be summed up in five words: there are only five students. Vikram is one. And before we can actually get into his obviously weighty and purposeful logic regarding robotics, we must first take a moment to notice a flouncing Ari and her tossing head, in which we might espy a new dark purple dye-block in her hair. We respond, on cue, with an appropriate ooh and ahh. Entrance achieved, Ari nudges the crowded side of the bench over, so she can sit next to, or more accurately all over, Vikram. So even though I know Imani obviously has nothing to do with this, I'm suddenly feeling played in a game of three on one. "Okay. Look. I have to take on the robotics challenge. It's part of Smitty's class every year. And to do it properly requires a team. And this year it's the twentieth anniversary for our school. So it's a really big deal. And I am thinking," his voice suddenly raises half an octave, moving into plea mode, "we should all be a part of the team." I'm pretty sure my quirking eyebrow screams my un-spoken rapid-fire questions, We? What we? And why would we ever want to do that? because Vikram quickly looks away from me, presumably in search of a less hostile eyebrow, and his speech gets even more rushed than usual. "This way we all will be contributing on behalf of our school, which will make our teachers and our parents happy. And, they will need to let us get together to work on this, which will make me happy. And, it will be very helpful for college applications," Vikram moves to seal the deal, now glancing to me and then over to Imani, "and not just mine." As much as I want to just go along and agree, something about this is bothering me. As the expression expresses, it's right there on the tip of my tongue. Now if someone would just read it for me. However, Ari is too busy congratulating her boyfriend on his pleading presentation, by reading his tongue with her tongue, to be available to read mine. Wow. Tongue and then some. "Ewwww." This is way more than I need to see. "Get your tongues out of each other's mouths." "Don't be ewwwing me, Missy." While I am not wishing to be the target of Ari's attack, she thankfully must retract her tongue to turn toward me in order to tell me off. "If you hadn't needed all of us for your LARPing exhibition, I would be outside somewhere, not stuck in here, and I would be seeing my boyfriend, all of my boyfriend to be specific, and you would not be suffering seeing my tongue ..." pause for liberal use of said tongue to make lascivious motions at me. "...in action." Which in turn, causes me to blush and also rules out any ability I might have had to protest about how I don't remember twisting anyone's arm here. I really need to work on this whole blush thing. "Hey!" Apparently my reading Ari's tongue is as good as getting someone to read what was on the tip of mine. Go figure. Because now I know exactly what was flitting about just out of reach. "You said," my eyeballs turning to stare at Vikram, my finger pointing like a sideways loser sign, "you said part, part of a team." My suspicious mind is flying. "Who exactly is your team?" Aha! Dead silence. Followed by suspiciously shifty eye movement. It would seem that as Ari released Vikram's tongue, the cat got it. And the cat is hanging on really tight as Vikram and I now sit frozen in a silent stare-off. But I will warn you, this cat is no freaking match for Sid the Huntress. And thus, almost as though he knows he is being stalked by my fierceness, Vikram blinks. And then folds. And a confession whimpers out, "Mae Ann and Mae Lee." "The Twincesses? You have the freaking Twincesses?!" I am horrified. "Look." Having the lie of omission ripped from his lips has now caused his voice to rise a full octave and quaver slightly. "It doesn't really work that way. I mean for the beginning stages we kind of have two teams, but then we all have to work together and you know, I don't have a huge choice. Smitty made Marcus the other captain. So either I go for the Lau twins or I have to pick Hand Jive." Vikram raises his eyes back to me. "What would you do?" Moi? What would I do? I would move to the Island of Themyscira. I would go directly to Queen Hippolyta and her sister, Antiope. I would throw myself at their mercy, pleading with them not to make me do this. I would also— if I could somehow figure out an, ahem, lawful way to download the first twenty minutes of Wonder Woman, screenshot it and then tape it frame by frame on the wall of my bedroom so when I turn out the lights my night sky would glow down and transport me away— do that too. But that's off topic, and sadly there is no Themyscira here. I wonder if I were to reach out to my personal patron saint of comics, Gail Simone, with some kind of emergency beacon or secret-coded SOS, would she write me my own superhero way out of this? I mean I wouldn't need her to make me incredibly cool or anything, just a simple superpower to make really annoying classmates go away to a distant planet, in another galaxy, far, far from Earth, where they can happily live out their days, terrorizing themselves to their hearts' content. Because I will give Vikram this much, his choices do suck. He is correct about that. Hand Jive Olney is Scott Olney. He got this last nickname in the fourth grade. It was a kind of a step up from his previous nickname, Jack-Off Olney. As you can rightly assume, my friends, he was blessed with such lasting descriptors because he couldn't stop playing with himself in class, which I do have to say caused the school— and our parents— to invest in a much earlier sex education moment than was probably comfortable. And in fairness, Scott goes to therapy two or three days a week, still. And while he hasn't had any, let's just say, obvious flare-ups in at least five or six years, some nicknames never die. There's always at least one kid who can't resist. And in Hand Jive's case, with or without his compulsion, he's still the creepiest kid in the school, so it's probably never going to leave him. So teaming him with Marcus is a good idea. Marcus Johnston is a really cool, super-chill dude. Much like Jimmy, he's the kind of guy everyone wants to say hi to. A huge, easy smile and an outsized, loose-curl afro that every girl— yes, people, including me— just wants to play with. He is almost enough to make even me rethink my lesbionic classification and declare myself ...Pause for just a second. He is almost enough to make me think, exception to rule. No. That's not it either. You know what, I'm just going to say, Marcus is almost enough. But still, not quite. But to Vikram's point, in spite of having Hand Jive in tow, Marcus will have no issue finding willing minions to join his team. Which brings us back to Vikram and the Twincesses. I believe we're supposed to feel sorry for the Twincesses. The story is their dad moved here from China for some big job when their mom was pregnant. Their mom died in some accident or something when they were babies. So their grandmother, their mother's mother, moved from China to New York to take care of them. And if you think Tiger Moms— you know, the kind of mothers whose kids only get to participate if there's some kind of award to be won— are scary people, they are nothing next to a Tiger Grandma of motherless twin baby girls. And all that might be okay, except now they're seventeen and they still dress in identical, albeit incredibly expensive, designer outfits, which is really bizarre because they are fraternal twins who look nothing alike, other than they both look ridiculous. And they do everything together. Just the two of them. They even have their own "secret language." And when they deign to actually speak to any of us, they have this affected Chinese accent thing they do— even though they have never lived in China. It's "lah" this and "lah" that. And as I said, they were born here. It's this whole weird twisted Twincess thing. And their number one rule, as if you couldn't guess, is they are always perfect and you are always not perfect. So to state the obvious, I really, really can't stand them. Which means I know I should absquatulate. Vamoose. Make like a banana and split. But before thought can turn to motion, Imani, yes, my bestie (!) turns back to Vikram and states, "Ignore her." Which she follows by motioning Vik to come close. She proceeds to then drop her voice into one of those dramatic "asides" she learned. You know, where she's "whispering" but you can still hear her all the way in the back of the theater, effectively making her target, Vikram, her confidant, all while ensuring everyone, especially me, can still hear her loud and clear. "She's still suffering from the PAPEs." And as Imani pronounces this, her head whips back at me and does that tilt-y kind of peer-me-down thing. I respond by bugging my eyes at her and swinging my left hand, open palm, forward. A silent tableau of gesture, screaming, What? "PAPE. As in Post Adrenaline-Post Emma syndrome." Her pause is apparently for added smugness. "I made it up. Even gave it a catchy acronym 'cause I know how much you like that kind of thing." This time Imani's pause is long enough to let the words sink in and toss me a fake smile and change the pitch of her voice. "It's been going on for weeks. And you know what, Sid, it's gotten pretty damn tiresome." Wow. Shade thrown straight to the bull's-eye. And before I can work up to personal indignation, Ari leans into the table, pushing Vik back, coming nearly across, and then turning to Imani, "I guess that's to be expected when before your crush can break your heart," pause for a calculated shrug, "you just break your crush." And with that, Ari turns her self-satisfied smirk to me, and holds up her right hand, so Imani can high-five it, right on cue. I sit up, lean forward and then slink back. I want to defend my honor and dispute this besmirchment, but I can't. I think Imani's PAPE diagnosis is pretty low-blow, but it is arguably accurate. Meeting Detective Emma Macdonald, the live-action version of my entire teenage fantasy crush, and having her be definitively, unquestionably unavailable was a cataclysmic blow. Even if a person could argue the fantasy might have been a bit ridiculous to begin with. It was still my fantasy. And nowhere in that fantasy did leaping from a balcony and landing on her pelvis and shattering it play out. Not to mention catching a serial killer while having my friends shot at while throwing myself off said ledge, culminating in being gulaged by my parents, I will admit, maybe has resulted in a bit of post-something petulance. But I think I'm entitled. And I don't think she needed to acronym it. That's kind of harsh. I am wounded. But even my newly crafted boo-boo face is for naught. I get nothing. Not an inch, not a flinch. It seems her mercy meter has overloaded and now, done with me, Imani turns back to Vik, who at least has the decency to look shocked, as opposed to, I don't know, let's say his girlfriend, Ari, who is laughing hysterically and actually putting her hand up for a high-five. And as Imani makes contact, Ari asks, "So how exactly does this robot thing work?" PALM. FOREHEAD. KABOOM! And just like that, we are all in.
Zero Sum Game	Stefani Deoul	[ "mystery" ]	[ "LGBT", "young adult", "Sid Rubin" ]	Chapter 4	I don't know, I still feel very Hunger Games nominated. But who knows, maybe I am being overly pessimistic, even perhaps ...wrong. I know, shocking. However, let us not forget, I was recently diagnosed as suffering from a severe case of the PAPEs. And, you know, maybe robotics actually won't be so bad. Vikram cut a deal with Marcus saying if he got me to agree to code for them and Jimmy to agree to drive (because he does happen to have the best hand-eye coordination in the school) Marcus will keep the Lau twins on his roster through the first section. Then, we'd most likely be on different committees anyway. So bad might even turn ever so slightly good as, more importantly, Vikram turned out to be right. Well, not about isolating the Lau twins. That jury is still out. But yes. He was right that the logjam, the stalemate— the utter torture that comes from jailers and jailees knowing they have maxed their punishment and amends quotients but not knowing how to graciously acknowledge this and move forward— is finally broken. Vikram's class project allows all parental units to feel virtuous as our reins are relinquished, our tethers gathered in, and we are freed. We have been chastised, they are vindicated, and we all move along. Happy dance time! Or not. It all starts innocently enough. Imani and I are feeling pretty darn good, two-stepping our way down to Perk This. Down the school steps we fly, out the front gates. Breathing deeply. Old familiar smells. Swerving right, dancing left. Old familiar sights. Dodge the never-ending scaffolding two blocks down. Old familiar sewer grates. This is our hood and it is perfect. Rounding the final corner, four stores down, we arrive and pause for just a minute, standing in front, looking at the signage, drinking it all in (pun intended), just grinning. I step up, swing the door open, bow, and with a flourish, "After you m'lady." Imani curtsies and with a backward sweep of her hand and a "why thank you" she disappears inside. I follow directly behind and, whoa, body-slam right into her. Which, if this was a different story, might have been a very interesting portent of cheap thrills. But there is no playfulness in this tale. Only woefulness. You see, Imani and I have had dibs on the same couches forever. I mean for four years of high school we've been spending more or less every day here after classes, except for the days she has play rehearsals, or a show, or the odd moment when I actually have a life. So, that corner setup, it's kind of ours. At least it was. Until today. Today there is a group of six kids of the unknown variety using our couch-table-side chair setup. And there's nothing we can do. I mean, I can think of ten things I want to do, starting with going over and saying, "save-ies" like I'm four years old, but I can't. Not that it would have done me any good even when I was four, but this is just wrong. That is our space. Or at least, it was. Our space. So instead of rushing to order our lattés and muffins, we're kind of just standing here, maybe two feet inside the door, staring, completely lost about what comes next. And it's a weird sensation. Maybe we're experiencing what people call a sobering moment. And it sucks. I suddenly realize, staring at this group of usurpers, between getting grounded and Imani and Jimmy's busy dating schedule (which because we are grounded and it's still football season is incredibly erratic), how long it has been since we, me and Imani, just sat and hung out for a latté or two. Once we would have laughed and done something really obnoxious like sitting on the back edge of the couch, laughing and singing annoying show tunes until the interlopers finally got it and gave up "our table." I remember one time there were some would-be interlopers and it took us, I think, until the third chorus of "It's the Hard-Knock Life" from Annie for us to finally get to them. (For the record, I do believe Imani has played every orphan up to, and including, Annie. I will be hearing "the sun will come out tomorrow" forever and ever and ever ...and ever. Yes, I am a very good friend.) Hard to say. Good times. But standing here, we see them laughing, computer wires everywhere fighting over the one lonely, precious outlet, and I realize we have kind of grown too distant to own that space. And I don't mean too distant from each other. That won't ever happen. It's just too distant like too long gone. From here. And I feel my eyes tear up. We are standing here, bearing witness to our own petite mort, small death. It hurts. But then my ear tickles and I hear very quietly, "We are so much cooler than they can even dream of being." Imani reaches back, takes my hand, and gives it a squeeze. And with that, the personal pity party spell is broken. It takes me a minute to get the eye-welling to recede, but I squeeze back. And then, then I've got it. I shift, grab my phone, text and hit send. I clamp onto Imani's hand, pulling her out the door. "Where are we going?" I pause mid-tug so I can focus on her. "Our place." It takes a moment for her to get it. Her smile becomes huge, and I wait for it, and she doesn't disappoint as her full-throated laugh comes flying out. And as if on cue, a sweep of wind lifts her amazing curls so they can provide a perfect snapshot. And god, she, Imani Cruz, is so freaking beautiful. And she's my friend. And all of a sudden I realize I'm happy she's dating Jimmy. That I'm really happy Imani's happy, and that I love her and I've missed her so much. Imani is right. I had let the Post Adrenaline-Post Emma syndrome consume me. So I inhale deep and release the PAPE to the atmosphere. I busticate it so bad, it is in smithereens! PAPE BE GONE. I lean over, kiss her cheek, grab her hand and we take off laughing, running down the street. And it is so cheesy, so totally cornball, but suddenly the two of us are singing, "if you're happy and you know it clap your hands." And mind you, not that I actually remember, but I'm pretty sure it's Imani who completely starts this inanity. It's absurd and silly and we nearly run over this one lady, who must be at least one hundred and ninety years old, pushing one of those wire carts people use to go to the market. And you know, she is seriously tiny. Like, barely bigger than her cart tiny. All shriveled and wrinkled and we must have been laughing so hard at each other, because by the time we see her, it is too late to stop. But she had seen us. And she huddles there frozen, terrified, as we come towering, thrusting down upon her. I don't know how, but we somehow manage to get our hands up and over, making way for her hunched body to pass safely "under London Bridge." Immediately we twirl back to her and just stand there. It takes a minute, even though it feels like forever, but then looking at the two of us stopped with our chagrined, scrunched faces, she slowly turns her fear into a tentative smile until she, too, manages a small laugh. Released from our fear and shame, Imani blows the lady a kiss, grabs my hand, and once again we take off. Quietly advancing up to the corner, turning right and losing it. We're now both laughing and weeping, the insane laughter of those who have cheated certain death. "Oh my god, Sid," says Imani, who finally chokes out a couple of words. "This is so" gasp "not funny." Gasp. Gasp. "We could have killed her." And just as I am trying to take this in and sober up, she finishes her thought. "I mean, did you see her face?" And actress that she is, Imani strikes a ridiculous pose, and that's all it takes for us both to lose it again. Which means, fifteen minutes later we are still here, because every time one of us starts to get it under control, we look at the other one and another fit of hyperventilation begins. And by now, we can't stop and it hurts. Really bad. The stitch in my side is now a stab. Doubled over. Can't breathe. Sucking wind. I slump against the brick wall and lower myself to the ground. Heaving. Panting. Imani has her back to me and is using her arms to brace against the wall and has crossed her very tense, very straight legs. Ooh. I'm thinking that's, wow, not good. But somehow we do finally run out of gas and slowly head back out, still avoiding direct eye contact while gingerly rebuilding a bit of our mojo over the last few blocks. Until right on our very late cue, we happily stomp our feet at the front door of Platitudes, push it open and see our grumpy waitress whose name I never did find out. She honestly doesn't seem as happy to see me as I am to see her, but I wave and we continue on, playfully making our way to the back, where we are apparently the first to arrive. In anticipation, we get waters all the way around. And here, my friends, is where we began. Jimmy saunters in, begins Sherlock-taunting me, when our phones ping. It's Ari. Vikram is freaking out, and we are on the move. Racing back out the door, I do actually think this isn't going to help make our waitress happy to see us.
Zero Sum Game	Stefani Deoul	[ "mystery" ]	[ "LGBT", "young adult", "Sid Rubin" ]	Chapter 5	Down the steps to the subway, we are off to Jackson Heights, which is no mere hop, skip, and jump. But miraculously we manage to grab an express, which gets us there in decent time, race back up the steps, and unexpectedly run right into Ari pacing up and down, obviously agitated and nervous, waiting for us. "I can't go to his apartment alone." Ari launches right into it. "His family is super traditional. There's no way his mother is letting some girl go up to his room. And he's stopped answering me when I text." "I get that." Jimmy wraps Ari in a hug. "Do you know what happened?" "Not all of it. Vik was supposed to meet Marcus after lunch today to go over their robotics presentation. And he texted Marcus to say he'd left his notes back home, and was Marcus cool if they met at four instead. Marcus said fine. Vik went home. And then, I'm not sure, but I think when he was on the train, he logged onto Contagion, and I don't know, something about he's been hacked." Okay, quick aside. You need to know that when Vikram has any spare time, he plays the online game Contagion, and he's done it pretty much forever. Contagion is what is classified as an MMORPG, a massive multiplayer online role-playing game. Which, for the uninitiated, is a video game that takes place in what's called a persistent state world (PSW) where thousands or millions of players create their own character to participate in whatever the game they're playing demands. So in the case of Contagion, theoretically someone is collecting enough loot, maybe a stash of various antibiotics, safe harbors, or whatever, to escape the increasingly deadly outbreaks. If you're someone who's actually never played an MMORPG, the most addicting thing is that the virtual world is always changing. So whenever you log off, other events are continuously unfolding across Contagion that may affect you whenever you log on again. And as I said, Vikram's been at it forever. And I mean forever. Like, since the day it launched. And Vik's really good, like, he was ranking-number-seven-on-the-planet-or-something, good. Which means he's amassed a huge amount of really powerful stuff. And while dating Ari caused his ranking to slip a bit, our parental incarceration gave him plenty of time to rebuild his status. By now we are walking, and as Ari talks I am hearing her, but attempting to ogle Jackson Heights. I have been here a few times, but not much. It's actually in Queens, kind of at Seventy-Fourth Street between Roosevelt Avenue and Thirty-Seventh Avenue. And as we are walking, there's Bollywood and Bhangra playing everywhere, and spices, wow, tons of spices and aromas. Ari's fast pace is minimizing my view, but when we get caught waiting for traffic, I look to my left and see the best of it all. Right alongside us are tons and tons of shops showcasing colorful sari after sari, each one more striking than the next. Well, except for that turquoise-y peacock thing. That one's just bad. Something about the whole eye-catching display makes me think of pictures I've seen of the Festival of Chalk, this giant spring festival, celebrated during Holi, where everyone goes into the streets and splatters everyone with dye and chalk. It looks like the most awesome time ever. I never thought about it, but now I wonder if they celebrate it here? I mean, if they do, I could go this year. Of course that won't be quite the same, but it would be way cheaper and we could all go together. How amazing would that be? "Sid!" Imani's scream interrupts what is my apparent daydream. I dodge traffic, cross against the light, and catch back up to the group, which by now is already nearly a block ahead. We turn right, head another block over, and we are here. We let Jimmy buzz and take the lead. "Hi. Mrs. Patel. It's Jimmy, and Imani, and Sid, and Ari." Jimmy checks each of us off, but keeps his finger on the intercom. "Um, we were wondering if Vikram is here?" And with the buzz back, we are in. Third floor, to the left, down two more doors. I get the feeling we are being followed. A feeling reasonably confirmed as Mrs. Patel opens the door before we can even knock. Inside we find several of Vikram's "aunties" having tea. Jimmy pardons our interruption, we all give little nods and smiles before disappearing down the hall in the direction we are pointed. Of course, as I have never been here before, I am checking out every detail, so when we get down toward Vik's room, I smile. Right across the hall I spy a conveniently open door, which not only provides opportunity for me to peek in, it seemingly commands me to do so. I check out what is obviously his sisters' room. In fairness, let me acknowledge it's a pretty big room. Or at least it was. Until it had five beds and dressers crammed into it! Whoa. Before I begin fixating on how much I would hate that, Imani nudges me. Jimmy is turned back, giving Mrs. Patel a smile and a small wave of thanks as he is opening Vik's door, which allows me a direct view of what must be the perks of only "son-dom." Yes, it is a smaller room, but it's Vik's alone. So, of course, now I'm kind of knee-jerk annoyed. I mean, really? Couldn't they at least halve this or something? My feminist sensibilities are appalled. So are my encroachment challenges. Having less fun now. Ari, in the meantime, is having plenty of fun, and is busy, let's just say ...comforting ...Vik, who is still sitting in his desk chair. She is a very explicit comforter, you know. I take advantage of Vikram's sudden inability to move his head left or right, to check out his screen. Even from my position hovering near the door, I have an unimpeded view, confirming Ari's interpretation of events is sadly right ...and cringeworthy. So I do. Cringe. And wince. Vik's been wiped out. During which time Imani steps in to take control of the scene, which is good. Someone has to. "Okay Vik, tell us what happened." "I was coming home to grab some papers for tonight." Vikram wheels the chair around until it is more or less facing us. His voice is very low. I'm not sure if it's because he is so upset, or just so his mother won't hear us, but I sit down on the edge of his bed and lean in. Imani joins me there, as well. "I missed the express, so I thought I would just play a bit while I endured the freaking forever ride. I launch, check the leaderboard and there I am, still in the top ten, but my inventory is empty. Not one fucking thing. My entire inventory— gone. It's a complete wipeout. No weapons, no potions, no antidotes, no nothing." Wow. So regardless of his ranking, he's been effectively neutered, rendered a zero. It's like gamer death, but with no honor. Or maybe it's really a case of gamer murder. Who stole everything and left him here to die? And he stares at us all, monotonously answering our obvious and lame suggestions. Yes, he's not a frigging moron; yes, he tried rebooting. And yes, he's sent the makers a note. And yes and yes and yes. For a minute, when he first began, with his very low voice, I thought he was exhausted, maybe even on the verge of tears. But I was wrong. Vikram isn't crying. Vikram Patel is furious, and he is so furious, he can barely speak. And when he does, it's a swear-infested frenzy. I do realize everyone has bad moods and off days and all that kind of thing, especially teens, because as everyone knows adolescents are moody. It's written up in all the big studies. But none of us adolescents have ever seen Vikram angry. Not even Ari, who we all know has seen way more of Vikram than any of us even care to. I look at him, I look at the screen, and it's all wrong. Incredibly wrong. But not something that can be righted right now. Right now Vik has a robotics challenge to reveal, and we need to get him out of here and over to the school before his day gets even worse.
Zero Sum Game	Stefani Deoul	[ "mystery" ]	[ "LGBT", "young adult", "Sid Rubin" ]	Chapter 6	Which we do accomplish. Well, more or less. Although I think we can acknowledge Jimmy does the accomplishing more or less. He's really good with that whole "come from behind" huddle-speak. And truthfully, even with that, it's still more less than more. But we do get Vik's streaming invective-tude shut down long enough to get him past his Mom, the aunties, and the suddenly "suspect" watchful and reporting neighbors. I am particularly not trusting the old lady sitting on the couch in the lobby with the hookah pipe. Imani disagrees, says she would be too obvious. I don't know, she is definitely creeping me out. What it is about me and old ladies today? But now is not the time for introspection. We need to get Vikram calm enough to talk, preferably without the spitting of vile epithets, catch the train, race back to school and pile into the auditorium. We do this with some serious aplomb, as though we suddenly used a turbo boost to vault our way right past the Goombas (of the Super Mario variety) and somehow we land squarely in the midst of the cool kids club ... ...as in two cheerleaders front and center, along with nearly half the booster club. Wowzerhole. Color me gawk-ed. Marcus must have managed to sweet-talk them into showing up. Although, head swivel, over there, coming up on the right, is Jimmy's tight end Trey, along with a bunch of his o-line. Vik veers off to join Marcus setting up. Ari pauses to watch him, while I pause to watch the Jimmy/Trey male fist bumping, chest bumping, and testosterone calling, "hey duding" all the way around. Which leads me to think maybe the cheerleaders actually do belong to Jimmy. Which, by extension, would put them on Vikram's count. Which would actually give Vikram Patel a cool count. Wow, pause to ingest that thought. Of course, one would have to be counting. Which of course, duh, I am. I mean, hello? We are talking about moi. I can tally this like nobody's business. It's a gift. Or at least a skill set learned sitting on the sidelines of grade school, lunchtime "throne of The Flynn" worshippers. My running tally of impressiveness is surprisingly beginning to fully inoculate me against any hidden pessimistic, post-PAPE germs about this venture, which we do know could be silently circulating in my system, waiting to contage and force a relapse, when I espy one additional, and heretofore unaccounted for, hellish hiccup. It approaches with its traditional chin thrust. "Ari, darling," she over-purrs, her pseudo-socialite trilling— or trolling, either works— out in full force. Could someone explain to me how Janelle talks leading with her chin? It doesn't seem anatomically possible. "You were so right," pause for the hand-over-heart, shoulder-shrug, "everybody's here." Improbable but apparently true, it seems Ari went and actually convinced Janelle, the official mouthpiece of our America, to show. Before I can even process running and hiding, the demon child turns to me. "And Sid, I'm ever so happy to see you've finally been set free." I try to grunt something resembling an appropriate grunt. I will share with you, my only upside to being grounded was "sadly being forced" to decline an invitation to Janelle's stoplight party. You know, the kind of party where you "wear red if you're taken," "yellow if it's complicated," and "green," yes, you've guessed it, "if you're single and ready to mingle." Ick. Ick. Ick. Blech. I cannot think of anything I would rather do less. Not even being grounded and playing endless board games with the parents. Which actually wasn't too terrible, and sometimes even fun, and always way better than a stoplight party. Which is about the stupidest kind of party ever. I mean who is Janelle going to invite who doesn't already know I'm not seeing anyone? And if I was seeing someone secretly, it's not like I would be dumb enough to show up wearing red. Yuck. Even thinking of it now makes my eye twitch. And everything Janelle is, and does, is all about the gossip. If she says hello in the hallways, you know you are now marked as prey. And if she nets you, you are now a meal she will regurgitate later, at oddly beneficial-to-her moments. So to say I'm just not thrilling about seeing Janelle would be a massive understatement. But when I look over to Ari, she wrinkles her nose and shrugs. "You know, Sid, it's always better to keep her in tow than to let her roam the school unsupervised." Before I can best decide how I would like to disagree vehemently with that, thankfully, or maybe mercifully for us all, a mic shriek intervenes, followed by the unmistakable thump thump noise of mic testing, followed by "Hello?" The disembodied boom is coming from Marcus, who along with Vikram, has taken up position at the front of the auditorium, floor level in front of the stage. They have set up a table with a big-screen monitor, hooked into what must be Marcus's laptop. "Okay. Now if everyone can just grab a seat down here somewhere ..." And as we are all congregated at the top of the aisle, Marcus waits for us to come down, climb in, and get settled. "So first, I want to welcome everyone to Cooper School's Team Thorium, and thank you for joining us as we enter this year's robotics competition. For those who don't know me, I am Marcus Johnston." Marcus pauses, casually letting his smile light up the room as the catcalls interrupt his opening. He takes a step back, puts his right hand up to his heart, giving two pats. God. Is there anyone who can flirt better than Marcus? Then with a wink to his fan base, he steps back up and leans in to continue. "I am the co-captain of this year's challenge, a position I share with our fellow classmate, Vikram Patel, and I have to say, as we stand here, we are feeling your love and we are loving your energy." And as the saying goes, the crowd goes wild. We all cheer, and the applause, thankfully, does seem to give Vikram a still way-needed boost, as he smiles back to the crowd. "You know," Marcus leans in, inviting us to conspire with his next thought, "they call FIRST POWER UP the ultimate Sport for the Mind, but for me and my pal, Vik, we would just like to say welcome to the hardest fun you'll ever have." As he glances about, Marcus catches Jimmy's eye and playfully wags his finger. "Even you, Mr. Five Fingers." To which Jimmy blows an air kiss. Before he loses control of the now-playfully hooting, revved-up crowd, Marcus holds up his left hand, motioning for quiet. "And this year that's doubly true. Because this year it's a special time to be a Thorium. It's the twentieth anniversary of our very first journey into competition, a competition in which the Thoriums brought home the Regional Rookie All-Star Award. Which was more than amazing. It was shocking and it was great." Marcus takes a brief pause, allowing a moment of reverence before continuing. "But, my friends, a rookie all-star award won twenty years ago is not enough." Marcus's voice takes on power as he begins to preach from his pulpit. "Thoriums"— his hands grasp the podium, rocking it just a tiny bit— "Thoriums descend from Thor, the Norse God of Thunder and an Avenger. And with its atomic number of 90, Thorium is an elemental heavyweight. So this year, on our twentieth anniversary of competition, it is both a Thorium legacy— and a Thorium destiny— that together, together we will go all the way." Marcus-the-rock-star pumps a fist and steps back, clearing the way for Vikram to take the podium. Now, on a good day, Vikram's style might be described as a little deer-in-headlights. And today, as we all know, isn't a good day. I can feel the four of us collectively tense as Vikram lurches forward. As he looks up, I suck in my reaction before it can escape. All Vik's rage from earlier is gone, and it's as if he's joined the undead. And this undead-blob-of-walking-misery thing apparently not only drains all the color from your skin, but it crushes your vocal chords, causing your voice to go completely flat, and leaving you devoid of life. Wow. Maybe we should have left him seething. "So, I too, thank you for coming. Before I read our mission statement, let's all give a round of applause to Mr. Smithers, better known to all of us as Smitty." Vikram never looks up, never makes eye contact, as he reads from his notes. "Because even though it is a class assignment for us, it is also one for him. Smitty is our first mentor on this ride, and his commitment to us is to match our commitment." The clapping is not a deafening roar. Ah, Vik, you are so killing it. And not in a good way. However, before the air is completely sucked out of the room, leaving us to suffocate and die, Marcus spins in, wrapping Vikram up in one of those left-armed buddy hugs. "Come on people, let's give it up for the Smit-man!" And right on cue, everyone applauds Smitty, who has positioned himself somewhere in the back of the room, which would make this a likely moment to get some first-rate neck-craning time. Except I don't. Because I can't stop staring at Vikram, who stands there, looking miserable, like a wet, ratty dog who so does not like the rain. As the applause stops, Vikram musters himself back up, all the way to zombie, and continues. "Our goal is to bring together mentors, engineers and students through an engineering and robotics challenge. We will learn by using the latest technology infused with positive attitudes." Positive attitude. Wow, there's bitter irony for you. Big Sigh. Poor Vik. "We will succeed by committing acts of gracious professionalism on and off the playing field." Gracious professionalism. Now that has a nice ring. Or it would ...if it was delivered by a breathing person. "Mouthful, huh?" Marcus thrusts his energetic presentation-saving self back to front and center. "The single most important element to our success, Gracious Professionalism, is an ideology defined by Dr. Woodie Flowers. And in his defining concept, fierce competition and mutual gain are not separate notions. Gracious professionals learn and compete like crazy, but treat one another with respect and kindness in the process." And then, a small pause, before finishing with what sounds like a small warning, "They avoid treating anyone like losers." As Marcus talks, my eyes roam the room until they land on the Twincesses, only to find Twincess A, Mae Ann, staring back at me. Her fingers lift up from her lap just enough to make a small mini-wave. No. No, she didn't. No. That did not just happen. I quickly look away, ignoring the very sudden flush of guilty sweat pouring from my body, pretending I am searching for something, anything, anyone who is not her. Which causes me to land on my brother, Jean, and his idiot best friend, Aaron, seated in the deep back corner. They must have waited until everything began before slinking in. Oh joy. At this point I decide I will definitely be better off focusing on the action below, as Marcus makes his point. "There is to be no chest-thumping tough talk, no name calling, and no cheap digs," Marcus' delivery slows, making eye contact with everyone, "but no sticky-sweet platitudes either. Knowledge, competition, and empathy are our goals." Vikram steps back up. "A huge part of competing here is respect, integrity and ..." Vikram's voice breaks off and he struggles to regain his thought. He takes a deep breath and exhales the rest of the sentence, "honor." And as Vik continues talking, I'm no longer really listening because I'm searching my vocabulary for a word to describe him. It's a word I know I know, but can't grasp. Sad isn't quite right. But it's not morose, either. I mine my mind, scrunching through the layers in my brain. And ...got it. It is exsanguine. The word I want is exsanguine, without blood. I was right. The game thief murdered him, leaving Vik-the-Cadaver in his place. I side-eye Ari and see her leaning in, as though trying to physically will him through. On my other side, Imani's left fist is balled up, while her right hand is clutching Jimmy's sleeve. Is she clinging to him for support or to keep him in his seat? I can't tell. As for me, my nails are digging so hard into my palms, there will be marks left. Come on, Vik; you can do this. "Tonight after the challenge drops," Vikram drones on, "those of us on the engineering team will break into two groups. I will lead one group; Marcus will lead the other. We will open the challenge bag, do an inventory and, using the materials provided, begin to sketch our best design to accomplish the task." Mercifully Marcus claps Vikram on his shoulder, relieving him of his portion of this presentation. "So," Marcus claps his hands, working to boost the energy, lighten the vibe. "Once we have our mission, those of you not in either engineering or software, such as marketing and spirit peeps, will not be needed tonight. We will, however, need you tomorrow for about half an hour at lunch to begin work on our organizational info." With that, we settle in to await the launch video via uplink. Cell phones are out, and everyone's calling someone, texting someone, or Snapchatting something. But not me. I see Ari and Marcus trying to bolster Vikram and I feel an enormous, surging rush of anger. And in that rush is a tingling thought, swimming upstream from somewhere deep in the recesses of my mind. And the more I stare down at Vik, the closer the tingle gets. Better. Vikram deserves so much better. Faut pas toucher mes amis. You do not mess with my friends. I grab my phone and start to scroll. Respect. He deserves respect. Now I am seething. Like really furiously mad. This should have been Vikram's night. How dare someone hack into a game and rip off my friend, steal from him. It's so wrong. I find it. Contagion. I hit download. Here we go. "Noisypeacock3254?" Really? That's my default? Not happening. I scan the list of several active players' names, thinking, who would I never, as in not ever, pretend to be? And when my eyes hit "viXXXen362436," I have my answer. Wow. A triple X to the Vixen. And to think somebody chose that. That is honestly scary. But it is also absolutely, definitively, not me. Not that "noisypeacock" is me either, but if I'm picking who I will never be, it should be my choice. Not for the inner-game-circuitry wizards to randomly select for me. Nope. Not happening. It's like parents who give their kid a super geeky name and then shock (!), kid turns out to be a geek. Why are they surprised? It's predestination. Or maybe that's predetermination. I'm not sure. I am sure I am going to be vixen2729. With one x. Small letters. Don't want to be overly ambitious. This should be quite incognito enough for me. From there, the tingle hits the wall, explodes, swirling my emotions until they become a metaphorical avenging mask and cape. Faut pas toucher mes amis. Which I will now use to cloak myself in the skin of vixen2729 and infiltrate this game, whereupon I will find and recover Vikram Patel's purloined loot. I will be the epidemic this thief didn't see coming. I will be the, something ... ...but I will have to be it later. While I was downloading, the room shifted into high buzz. The monitor goes live. A countdown begins. As each second ticks by, any apprehensions we have about getting roped into this disappear. We all lean forward, three, two and ... ...kickoff begins.
Zero Sum Game	Stefani Deoul	[ "mystery" ]	[ "LGBT", "young adult", "Sid Rubin" ]	Chapter 7	If I thought I needed proof from whatever powers that be that gamer-girl is my new destiny, this might just be it. But let me not get ahead of myself. Because first, lights are dimmed, and from a few rows behind me, a raucous stomp cheer starts up and seats are now rocking. Stomp clap, stomp stomp clap, stomp stomp clap clap, stomp stomp clap. Miraculously, row by row by row, we are all, kinda, sorta, more or less, on beat. And I know you are waiting for me to shrug and say something self-deprecating like, "well, except for my two left feet," but for the record, let me just state that while I may be a cardholding member of the Velma Valedictorians, I am the one with two dancing feet— you might remember my cherished LARPing spectators— and natural rhythm. Stomp stomp clap clap! Stomp stomp clap. Perfectly timed to the countdown ending! The main event begins. The challenge is ready to be issued, the gauntlet thrown. The room falls immediately, completely quiet as here we go ... Live action on the screen: We see a lone girl descending the stairs into a brick-walled basement. She finds a plastic-covered video arcade game, removes the cover, fishes in her pocket for a coin, feeds it into the machine, and is launched inside the game ...where she finds an eight-bit throwback world waiting. You know, the old-school, super-colorful, pixelated, console look. Totally Nintendo retro. Here, the now-avatared young girl meets fellow avatar, Big Wig Bossi, who tells her she must find and collect seven power cubes in the FIRST realm. Then she'll be ready to play. And she's off. Starting with a quick stop at the Critical Commodities Closet, followed by the Mentor Pool, finally netting directions to the Lotus Flower. Here she comes upon a yoga-chillin', sukhasana-sitting Dr. Woodie Flowers, who magically pops out of the game and out of avatar shape, and into live form to chat about metacognition, which would be thinking about thinking, and stopping our sneaky brain. Which of course, sets my sneaky brain right off. I force myself to not start swiveling about, checking in case anyone, for any reason, is suddenly thinking of having their sneaky brain looking at me. Easier said than done. "...a team member who successfully sells a bad idea is not helping ..." Now there's some truth for you. "...as you build your robot you can learn an important lesson about truth's superiority over group think ...pay attention to this." With that last word of caution, Dr. Woodie launches himself back inside the game, avatar girl sets back off, and cubes four through six are quickly gathered. Which gets us to the seventh and final cube. A cube which will come straight from the rock star himself, an eight-bit, animated, Segway-riding Dean Kamen. Yes, my friends, Mr. God of Robotics, inventor of Segways and other genius products, is speaking directly to us. Or at least his avatar is. And it's pretty intense. You can actually feel the awesomeness quotient radiating, nearly vibrating, throughout the auditorium. I suddenly, fully grasp this isn't just some random school project, but that all across the United States and in over a hundred countries around the world, we are all watching this same video ...and we're all getting ready to compete. I mean, I knew on some surface level it was an "international competition," but this is the first time I really, internally, get this enormity. I am awed by how freaking cool, and therefore kind of scary, this whole thing is. Avatar Dean also exits the animated world for the live one, and as he does, his conversation becomes more personal, both about him, "My best ideas come when I'm enthusiastic and optimistic," and about us, "Use your time wisely. Be willing to take risks. Learn from your failures and keep moving." And then Dean Kamen is wrapping up, and I'm leaning in, and what he says is something I intuitively know will be important to me forever. "Take the right risks." That strikes home as I lean back and take my eyes off the screen for just a minute and realize everyone's caught in this same energetic glow. As though she can feel my eyes roaming, Imani turns to me, and we know exactly what we are both thinking without saying it out loud, this really is freaking amazing. And now, the chit and the chat and the shtick are over. This year's game is revealed. An animated scoreboard screen appears, like the kind hanging from the ceiling at Madison Square Garden, bearing the name of this year's competition, in three separate lines, FIRST Power Up. And cue the challenge! A Day-Glo colorful animated graphic begins our journey through the competition. We watch as two alliances of video game characters/robots and their human operators, one blue, one red, find themselves trapped in an arcade game. To escape, alliances use power cubes to control switches and scales; pass power cubes through the exchange to earn power-ups, which are worth extra points, time and climbs; and finally ascend to face the boss. At the start of each match, the plates of the scale and the switches will be randomized, so the course will not play the same way each time through. The video continues, giving us a play-by-play from station to station, until finally we have traveled the course and get to the summation: the alliance that gains the most ranking points wins the match and defeats the boss. And now we are on a live feed, on the actual playing field, which is called the arcade. As each component lights up, it is nearly as colorful as its animated counterpart. It is here, among the engineers and the designers, that Dr. Flowers "levels up" and delivers to us all, the moment we came to get: The Code. pLaY&4%R3aL! Vik and Marcus scramble to enter it and boom, the game manual is released, and we are on the move. Designers. Coders. Interested Parties descend en masse into Smitty's lab, all set to begin. As soon as the huddling begins, I realize I've been had, but it's too late. Yes, as promised, the Twincesses and Hand Jive are two lab tables over, huddling on their stools, waiting for Marcus, but that separation will end as soon as we are finished designing competing bots and one is picked to be built. Resigned to my fate, I look up and espy Jean and Aaron, who are still here, but haven't actually made it inside the room. They're kind of doing that door-hugging thing. It's like an epic cliffhanger. Will they be kicked to the curb, or will someone rescue them and let them join their table? Which engenders another big sigh from me as I sort through my three immediate colliding thoughts: 1) my parents will kill me if I leave him out there; 2) he's actually pretty smart and way more into gaming than me, which might help; and 3) he is, alas, my brother. So if I kick him to the curb, that's fair play. But if someone else were to do it, I'd have to defend him. Frankly this would be an easier decision if Aaron didn't remind me of a slurping Igor, which I am not allowed to say because Jean gets all defensive. Whatever. I get it over with and wave them over, just in time for Marcus and Vikram to join us. Vikram is carrying reams of paper, while Marcus is balancing several large duffel bags. "Okay, people, listen up," Marcus calls, focusing everyone's attention. "I have here the Kickoff Kit and the three drivetrains. Two of the drivetrains come from previous years, so remember they aren't all going to be exactly the same. Vikram has copies of the game manual, and an e-file will also be sent to you as soon as we get everyone's involvement coordinated." "Memorize it." Vikram says. His delivery, I am relieved to report, is no longer depressive. A little terse, perhaps. The energy from watching the launch video and running to make copies seems to have revived his spirit, albeit not particularly playfully. "There is nothing beyond these pages." Maybe a bit abrupt. "If you use even one 'disallowed' wire, screw, or anything else, we will all be disqualified." And letdown! I was hoping he was going to finish by saying, "screwed." Then I could credit him with an epigrammatic flourish. Alas. Too late. Time to design a bot.

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