SALTAROS: Shadows and Light

[zzambrosius_02]

CHAPTER TEN: Teaching and Learning

Ambros dropped in to his preferred spot in New York state, in US Imperial Line Six: at the bottom of the ridge near the former town of Peekskill. He was in his Commando armor, with all the weapons and gear the combat belt carried. He looked around, worrying.

‘Lots of snow,’ he thought: ‘It’s more than head-high in places.’ He walked between high banks of snow, where folks had shoveled and hauled it. The walls on either side alternated between layers of pure white, slowly compressed into ice at the bottom, and other strata of smoky gray. ‘Snow is normal for early December hereabouts. But this much? I don’t think so. It’ll only get worse as the year comes to an end...’ The sky was grey and threatening, the air very chilly: ‘Tech Guilds predict no summer for this Line, for at least the next year. Oh well.’



He dragged the garden cart full of supplies up the gently sloping path. ‘A lot of the potholes are filled with gravel,’ he thought: ‘and tamped down pretty well. Still, there are places where the track is slippery with ice. I’d best be careful.’ He crossed a patch where footsteps had churned the mud and left rough patches when the path re-froze. He bumped the cart over them, and turned and turned again, following the line of minimal slope towards the top.

Trees lay lopped upon the snow, partly limbed and sawn, somewhat buried in ice. Heavy booted feet left footprints all about the base of the each dropped tree, trampling the ice and snow to merely waist high.

He stood by one such tree, noting that its removal created a sight line to the watchtower at the refuge atop the ridge. He waved at the man on watch, who set his rifle aside and returned the greeting. He could see several new graves in the lower meadow, where the weak and occasional sun still kept the snow to a minimum. Also: a head, barely more than a skull, sat atop a pole near a very large mound of dirt and rock, twenty yards away from the refuge’s established cemetery. A crow landed on the skull, and pecked at the remaining skin and hair.

The mixed and twisted remains of two-dozen or so motorcycles lay atop the mound.

He thought about that. The narrative that he constructed to account for the bikes and the mound—and the skull—was not pleasant. He made a face and shook his head.

He followed the path into view of the main gate.

His usual contact, the woman named Martha, stuck her head up over the gate: “Hello, and welcome,” she said, smiling with relief.

‘Is she relieved that I am here with more supplies, or that I am not a raider come to assault the walls?’ He shrugged, a minimal gesture unseen by those watching him.

“We decided to invite you in for tea, this time,” Martha said. “If you’re willing, that is.”

He smiled, and raised his face shield so she could see the smile clearly: “I’ll risk it if you will.”

He stood patiently as the improvised gate slowly rolled to one side. When it was open far enough, Martha came out.

She stood about five foot six, with brown hair and pale skin. Trousers, a skirt below the knees, and a greatcoat hid her figure from his sight, but he guessed from her facial features that she had been a stout woman, now diminished by the privations she had suffered. She wore Wellington boots, repaired with glue in several places along the top of the left foot.

She limped a little as she stepped down the slope to him. She came in arm’s reach and offered her hand: “It’s nice to see you again.”

He pulled off his right gauntlet and grasped her hand: “Likewise. I see you’ve expanded.” He waved at the newer part of their fort, noting that there were more chimneys smoking and a greenhouse was visible within the newer fortified area.

She smiled: “Yes. We figured we needed some area under glass to start growing food, and more living space, too.” Gesturing towards the nearest town, she said: “We’ve about foraged everything in Peekskill that’s of any use to us, except windows for glass for the greenhouses. We have to go further afield for canned or frozen food, now. And for fuel...It costs fuel to find fuel, or time if we hike for it.”

She drew him by the hand towards the gate. Two kids, a boy and a girl by their clothes, came scampering out and relieved him of the cart. They dragged it in through the gate, calling out in high-pitched voices. Their breath steamed in the air as they ran.

“You getting more refugees in? People you’re willing to take a chance on?”

She looked over her shoulder, her expression canny: “A few. And also some we decided were a bad risk. That bunch we...convinced to move on.”

He lowered his brows and considered what those negotiations must have been like. “Is that a mass grave down there, near the cemetery?”

She made a face: “Yes. Bikers who didn’t want to move on. I’m afraid they didn’t realize how well-armed we are, or how many of us are sharpshooters. So...” He’d already filled in the details with his imagination. He shook his head again. She led him inside.

They came into a small roofed courtyard surrounded by walls of dry turf. Crossbows, compound hunting bows, and rifles stood racked along the walls, with quivers of arrows and quarrels and magazines for the rifles carefully stacked nearby.

“This is our reception room, and it also serves as the armory.” She pointed at a set of portable steps, perhaps looted from a grocery or hardware store: “Up those stairs to the runway behind wall...we can hand out the weapons and defend the entire circuit in about two minutes from the ringing of the alarm.”

He nodded, impressed. He realized that she intended both to brag, and to caution him: ‘Just in case I’m not who I seem to be,’ he mused.

A table in the center of the courtyard held a large teapot and some mismatched cups and mugs. He did a quick count: ‘Six: five of them, and me.’ He looked quizzically at Martha.

“We’ll leave the gate open, so you have a bugout route.”

He smiled: “I appreciate that.”

“Jake is up in the tower. The rest of our...” she shrugged, “our leadership, our council, are on their way from duties.”

He smiled reassuringly: “I understand.” He sat to one side of the table, with a wall at his back, and the door leading to the gate to his right, visible to him at all times.

She sat opposite him, her hands folded on the tabletop. The silence grew, lengthening. He set his gauntlets on the table, to his left a little.

A man entered the courtyard, wearing a navy pea coat over new-looking fatigues in desert camo. He stepped up to the table and reached across: “I’m Ed. I’m the one shot at you the first time you showed up.” He offered his hand and Ambros shook it; Ed’s hand was strong and the handshake firm but not overly so.

‘He’s confident,’ Ambros thought: ‘He feels no need to compete with grip strength, or get his hand to the weak part of mine.’

The hand was tanned and callused, and Ed’s face featured a full dark brown beard.

“It was polite of you to miss.” Ambros raised a knowing eyebrow.

“Yeah, it was.” Ed sat down.

A pale fellow came in then. He had grey eyes, white hair, and plump pale lips. He was clean-shaven, with a very youthful face. “Eric,” he said, offering a soft hand for a very gentle handshake.

“Ambros.” He tried to figure out how such a man could have survived the chaos of the previous month.

“I was lucky,” said Eric, as though reading Ambros’ mind. “And clever. And ruthless. Also...” he grinned self deprecatingly: “I’m pretty, and I suck. Cock, that is.”

“Got it,” said Ambros.

“Don’t let him fool you, sir,” said Martha. “Eric is the best sniper we have here.”

“Well,” said Ambros: “If I underestimated him due to his sexual preference, I’d be fooling myself. He’d have very little to do with that.”

Ed looked a little bit uncomfortable, then chuckled: “I hear ya. Been there.”

Two more women came into the room, then. One sat next to Ed; she carried a plate of cookies, still giving off heat and a bit singed on one side. She was plump and smiling, and had curly brown hair partly concealed by a kerchief.

“Sorry I’m late,” she said. “The oven was a little too cool, then a little too hot.”

Ed smiled at her: “This is our benefactor, Ambros. My wife, Laura.”

“Pleased to meet you, Laura.” said Ambros, distracted.

While Laura poured tea, and chattered on about the food stores and fuel to melt ice and snow for drinking water, Ambros stared at the other woman, and she at him.

There was just a touch of African heritage visible in that not-yet-named woman’s features; her skin was light enough that she could have ‘passed’ during the years of American apartheid. Her eyes, brown with black flecks, bored into his, examined his face, what she could see of it.

He lifted the helm off of his head and set it on the table, near his gauntlets. He pulled off the padded coif that he wore under the helm, then looked right at her. Her eyes got wider.

“You,” she whispered, pointing at him: “You are a dead ringer for my father.”

“I’m sorry, I am not actually him.”

“I know you aren’t. He’s dead. I saw his body, back in Rochester, before I ran. How can you look so much like him?”

He nodded just a little: “There’s a relationship, but it’s complicated. You are, as you put it, a ‘dead ringer’ for my daughter Andrea.”

“That’s my name,” the woman said. “Andrea.”

He smiled: “Pleased to meet you. Your mother’s name was probably ‘Tina’ or some variant of that. Your father was a Carl or a Carlos or perhaps Charles...”

“Karl,” she said: “With a ‘K’. And yes, Tina. How...?”

He nodded again: “How much did you hear about the disaster that this Line suffered?”

Ed frowned: “Not much that I believed. Mysterious invaders, a lot of hogwash about this and that, and then...boom. The Russkies or somebody nuked us good.”

The others related what they’d heard, similar to Ed’s story.

Martha had the most coherent account: “I heard a report on NPR, and the host had a cell phone connection to some field reporter near Rochester.

“She said that she could hear people marching and shouting, and that it seemed to be coming from a forested area outside of town. She snuck along through the woods until she could see what was happening. The connection was not very good, but a lot of what she reported seemed insane.”

Martha frowned: “She said that whole troops of men, soldiers actually, were walking and marching out of a big hole in the side of a hill. They had tanks, and artillery pieces, and armored personnel carriers, she said. She insisted that the men were heavily armed, that the hole was a kind of matte black color that hurt the eyes to look at. She also said they were speaking some kind of French dialect, which the reporter couldn’t place. She got a brief grainy shot of the scene, using the cell phone camera, but then she got cut off. I thought it was some kind of a joke, like the Orson Welles thing, you know? Until...”

Ed shook his head, disgust evident: “Such BS. Such utter bull.”

Ambros sat nodding. After a while, he said: “The most unbelievable parts of what you heard on the news, just before the missiles flew, were true.” He raised a hand to ask for silence: “I can prove that it’s true. And I will, before I leave here today.”

He caught and held each person’s eye; they all were frowning, except Eric, who was grinning.

He grinned back at the albino and said: “Alternate worlds exist. Timelines come in...I guess you could call them families. The Timeline we are sitting in, right now, my friends and I call United States Imperial Timeline Number Six. The people who invaded this Timeline came from one we call L’Iriquois Imperial, or the Prime Authoritarian Timeline. ATL Prime, for short. The only reason you haven’t had to deal with those soldiers in this part of the world is that most of them were still too close to the Gate when the Russians nuked it.”

Eric was nodding. The women were frowning or shaking their heads. Andrea just stared at him, leaning back in her chair with her arms crossed defensively.

Ed chortled. “Bullshit,” he said.

“Agreed,” said Andrea.

Ambros sat up in his chair and laughed. After a bit, he slapped his scaly chest plate and said: “So, this outfit, where did I get it? Ever see anything like it before? How am I finding all these supplies that I’ve been bringing you? What about that medicine, the stuff that reversed your radiation sickness? Ever heard of such a thing?

“Where do I come from, and where do I go when I leave?”

Ed waved a hand dismissively: “I don’t care. It’s all bullshit.”

Ambros’ grin turned exceedingly wry: “Well, then,” he said, standing up and putting his hand slowly into his pocket: “Make this into bullshit, if you can.”

He triggered a Shift, jumping back down to the turn in the path. He could see right in through the gate. Eric sat in his chair, head back, laughing happily. The others all stood, in various attitudes of shock, staring at the space where he’d been. He heard the echoes of the ‘pop’ that his sudden disappearance caused.

He waved his hands above his head, until he had their attention, then Shifted back to his starting point.

He sat down, slowly, and opened his hands in a sardonic shrug: “I didn’t believe it at first either.”

Eric said: “So where are you from? What Timeline, what do you call the place you are from?”

“I am a native of US Imperial Seventeen. My cross-Line activities are based out of another Line, though, which we mostly call Commonwealth Prime.”

Eric said: “Ha! Commonwealth, huh? I like that.”

“Yeah, you would.” Ed seemed to be recovering.

“It’s not exactly a good translation, but it’ll do to go on with.” Ambros looked intently at Ed, sizing him up: ‘Tougher than me, and younger. If it came to a fight I’d have to cheat, put him down fast and not give him a second chance to make a move.’

Aloud he said: “I’m sensing some divisions here...”

“They never quit bickering,” said Andrea, somewhat bitterly.

Ed broke in: “Eric here is basically a commie. And Andrea comes from a whole clan of an-ar-kaist activists. They always want everything to be done by consensus, blah, blah.”

Martha said: “Ed, on the other hand, thinks he ought to run everything, even though his one and only skill set is military.”

“A military background is an asset in these circumstances...” Ambros began.

Eric interrupted: “Yes, of course.” He leaned forward, head tipped to one side: “As long as he sticks to defending the settlement, and doesn’t assume that his service leaves him entitled to more than his share.”

“I put my life on the line...”

Martha spoke: “I know, Ed, but so do all the rest of us. Every time! And we appreciate your knowledge, and we follow your orders when there are weapons in play, even though Martin is probably better qualified to command...”

Ed waved a hand dismissively: “He doesn’t want to...”

Martha just kept talking, right over him: “...but you don’t know anything about greenhouses, or vegetable starts, or sewer lines, or...”

“...or anything else, as far as I can see.” Eric put his hand inside his jacket.

Ed tensed up: “You point a pistol at me again, you better pull the trigger, punk.”

“I’m not pointing it. But after our last disagreement, I’m not gonna get caught without it, either. The next set of stitches might get infected.”

“I apologized, dammit!”

“And I accepted your apology, but...”

“Stop it!” Martha demanded: “Both of you, stop now.”

“Yeah,” said Ambros. “I’m more than a bit of an anarchist myself, Ed, and I don’t appreciate your attitude. You have all done a lot of work, considering that you probably arrived here in small groups or couples, shell-shocked, and you’ve only had a month to put this place together. I doubt that you coulda done it by yourself. Right, Ed?” Ed seemed uncomfortable.

“Anyway, I brought you all a present.”

They all looked at him, apparently forgetting their differences for the moment. He pulled a Commonwealth laptop out of the patch pocket on his left thigh: “Here, this is sort of like a video player, but it just has some documents on it.” He unfolded it and set it up.

“This has a bunch of reading material, everything I could think of that might be of use to you. Simple tech manuals, Foxfire One through Five, and the entire run of the Whole Earth catalog. There’s a series of pamphlets about stuff like welding and electricity, some Commonwealth tech papers about simple solar arrays and how to build them with minimal equipment...Then I added some social science essays by anarchists and other sorts of egalitarians, some famous essays about the founding of the Commonwealth, in the one Line where it was successful...scroll it like this, here’s the menu.”

Eric took charge and scrolled through the contents at high speed. He looked up, grinning: “Kropotkin, Bakunin, Debord and Vaneighem...that’s a lot of heavyweight stuff.”

“Complete works, of each of them,” said Ambros: “Rosa Luxembourg, Emma Goldman, and Lucy Parsons, too—I had to search the FBI vaults in a Quiet Line to get a lot of that stuff, especially Parsons. Some of the early Commonwealth works are outstanding. I recommend the works of Danni Messenini Strimen’Eleni, and also Magistri Arrendi’s Histories.

“Now, however,” he said, rising and picking up his helm: “I gotta go. I have three more wagons worth of supplies to deliver in this Line, and a couple in my own.” He put on his gauntlets and donned his helm: “See ya!”

He Shifted.




The remaining deliveries went routinely, so he arrived in the Commonwealth in plenty of time.

He dropped into the War Room, as usual; he intended to meet Voukli for a lesson, which made him (as always) a bit nervous. He considered why that was: ‘It’s hard to keep up with her teaching style; it’s one thing after another, all of it pretty sophisticated.’

It occurred to him, not for the first time, that her teaching style was a lot like his: ‘Rapid-fire instruction, say the same thing in multiple ways, let the student recall five percent of it per lesson...and increase the sophistication of the lessons as fast as the student advances, so he’s always looking ahead.’

He went through his routine: he wandered around the War Room looking at things and asking occasional questions, then went up to the Main Hall, checked the Shifter, and crossed the street to Red Warrior Skolo.

He arrived at a training area: Magistri Anni usually taught students there, but it was an hour until her class.

Voukli awaited him, lightly armored, a reedsword in hand.

“Full speed, then,” he remarked, as he began to prepare: gambeson, coif, light helm, gauntlets.

“There’s not much I can teach you except at full speed. Not anymore.”

He looked her in the eye and realized she meant it. She put on the helm.

He donned his: “That’s disturbing,” he said.

“It’s true. We’ll do some slow work now and then, so I can show you anything you missed. But I can’t see anything wrong with your slow work these days. I have to stress you at ballistic speed to find your weaknesses.”

And did she ever.

She saluted him, and he returned the salute. They circled each other for a while, then she attacked. He felt pleased at first: he deflected or covered most of her attacks, though he rarely struck her.

He began to see ways to do that, though: ‘I can’t do it, yet; I see how, but...’ She sped up, forcing him to do the same.

After an exhausting series of such combats, she allowed a pause. She demonstrated several parries that could have saved him a bruise or two. He tried them during their next set.

After he’d mastered them, somewhat, at full speed, she upped the ante: “Now we try a different scenario: you need to get by me. You can’t delay. Something horrible is happening over there...” she waved at the shelter: “...and you have to get there, now, five minutes ago. No circling, no measured distance, no delay. Now! Go!”

He attacked, raining blows, pushing into close distance, shoving, tripping, kicking. She stopped him repeatedly, but he clearly did better than she’d expected.

When they stopped at last she said so: “That appears to be a strength for you. Your personal style is easily adapted to that sort of urgency. Well done!”

They worked slowly again, for a while, as she showed him openings that he had created and missed during his previous assaults.

“All right, same drill, faster!” She paused: “Try this: Regulos is over there, and he’s about to rape Kim...get past me, stop him...GO!”

Interiorly, he shrugged off the psych job: or so he believed at first. He strove to be faster, more accurate, more aggressive, in line with the drill. His imagination played with the scenario Voukli had described, though.

He didn’t even notice when his vision narrowed, or feel his conscious mind shut down. Her hands, her movements, her sword crossed with his, his attacks: those things filled his vision and occupied all that remained of his consciousness. ‘Now! Get past her! Now!’

He nearly tripped over a stool, stumbling and coming to his senses. “I’m inside the shelter,” he muttered.

He turned slowly.

She was on the ground, face down. She lifted herself to her hands and knees, then sat back, removing her helm: “Very well done, Spathos. I’ll send a video of this to Arrenji.”

She rose and saluted; he returned the salute.

She disarmed and then stood staring at him for a moment, eyes slitted. He met her gaze, slowly comprehending the message: “I...cut you and I threw you and I cut you again...and...”

“You achieved your objective. You ‘won’ the drill.”

She saluted again and strode away, even as he saluted in return.

His MPS pinged him: ‘Ten Lepta until Magistri Anni’s class.’

Anni found him sitting there, on the stool that he’d so nearly tripped over. She said nothing, but walked across his visual field, getting his attention.

He frowned, and then grinned, and returned her salute.

She looked at him oddly, askance. He gazed back: “I have to learn to throw that switch, on purpose, when I need to.”

She nodded, seeming to understand: “I hear you.”

She made a few minor preparations, arranging the classroom as she wanted it, then sat down in front of him: “What switch? When do you need it?”

He frowned: “The switch that changes my fighting from a drill to the real thing. The one that makes me a berserker, but with a clear head and concentrated on an objective. I used to be able to throw that switch at will, when I fought in SCA tournaments in my own Line.

“Like the time I won the prize sword at Lily of the Valley...or when I won Coronet, after Duke Willem Argyle said some racist shit about Tina. That sumbitch likely still doesn’t know what happened to him.” He looked up at Anni.

“See, I was a very high-end fighter in a medieval re-creationist group in my own Line.”

“You wrote about that on the Kyklo.”

He nodded: “Yeah. What I didn’t say there was, I always knew I could be even better, if I let myself. If I weren’t so intent on avoiding injuries to my opponent, if I just flipped that switch and crushed the opposition...now I need that switch available, at a moment’s notice. This stuff is real now. I need to practice flipping that level of fight on, without having to warm up, or I’ll fail at reaching my objectives. I have to be able to twist the dial all the way to cuisinart, in one quick turn.”

She squeezed his shoulder: “No doubt. I don’t have the foggiest idea what a cuisinart is, but I take your point.”

He grinned: “Food processor. Chops the raw materials into bits.”

She grinned.

Students began to arrive. As he usually did, he joined the beginner’s group, putting himself under the tutelage of Regulos. Reg, as usual, took Ambros’ presence and his practice of beginners’ drills as a personal affront. He snarled and needled, trying to irritate Ambros, troubling the students in the process.

Ambros took it all in silence, moving slowly through the guards and strikes, guiding the movements of his partners.

As always, the moment came when Regulos was at a loss, and the students mortally confused: ‘Reg either doesn’t understand the drill, or he’s unable to find the words to describe it properly...’

At last he took control: “Look, Spathos, here’s the problem: you have to get them stepping correctly first. Like this!” He demonstrated, moving through the steps: “If they don’t understand that, the opening that this drill is meant to create will not appear. The Archarae will just get confused and discouraged.”

“What do you know about it? Barbarian...”

Ambros sighed: “Okay, I know. I’m from a primitive Line with backward politics and a truly foul economic system. That doesn’t change this, though: the opening between sword and buckler occurs only as a result of this movement, and is visible only from this angle. Eh?”

He could see the youngsters figuring it out; some of them began to get it right, and they started teaching each other. Regulos glowered from the sidelines as Ambros coached and corrected the Archarae, gently.

Reg stomped off and began to remonstrate with Anni; she showed no patience, but spoke firmly to him. Eventually she spoke loudly enough for Ambros to hear: “No, Spathos, I will not permit any more of that. He’s already demonstrated his superiority on your body. You will not challenge him.”

‘The idiot is about to challenge her,’ Ambros thought.

Instead, after a moment of fuming, Regulos left in a huff.

When the rest break arrived, Anni approached him: “I seem to have lost an instructor. Can you take over his job?”

His heart sank as he realized what he’d done: ‘I’ve just added another task to my week—tenday—whatever. Oh, well.’

“I can get another Spathos to come in now and then, or even for every lesson, if you can’t do it...” She trailed off, doubtful.

“I’ll take a look at my calendar,” he said, resigned.

“Really,” she said: “I can get someone else...but...”

He raised his eyebrows: “But?”

She shrugged: “I don’t know where I’d get a teacher as good as you are, unless it’s a Magistre.”

He sighed, looking over her shoulder to the horizon: “Grace and gratitude,” he whispered: “Accept compliments with grace and gratitude.” He looked back at her and smiled:

“I’ll do my level best to be here, every lesson.”

“Thank you. All right, class, back to it!” She left him there as the youngest students gathered around.

“Very well,” he said: “Let’s start where we were: let’s get that footwork right.” He began to evaluate the students in a new light: ‘Which of these Archarae could take over on a day when I can’t be here? And there will be days when I simply can’t be here...’

Class over, he strolled along through the City. He never seemed to grow tired or bored with the amazing things that he could regularly see, without directing his steps in any way: ‘I fall into a dérive, with no effort. Look at those boots!’

He stepped to the edge of the street to gaze in astonishment at them. He lifted them, admiring the perfection of the stitching and the beauty of the decoration.

The Master Cobbler sitting behind the counter rose and greeted him. He said: “I believe those are too small for you, Spathos. I could make a pair to fit, and decorate them fittingly for your Guild and rank...and in anticipation of your future rank.”

“No, no,” Ambros demurred. “I merely wished to admire the workmanship.”

“You are kind. You are also modest.”

“That’s not a compliment in this Timeline.”

“It’s not,” the Cobbler agreed: “But I don’t intend an insult, either. You are from some other Line, I believe?”

“Ambros Rothakis, from USIT Seventeen...”

“Ah, I remember you now. I am Votos.”

“Pleased to meet you, Magistros.” The Cobbler saluted him, and Ambros returned it. Inside he was in a swivet: ‘Oh sweet f-ing gods, the man’s name means “bootman”. This is the most famous shoemaker in Athens, for crying out loud, and he wants to make a pair of boots for me...”

He could see no way out: “I would be honored to accept a pair of boots from so skilled a Maker.”

“I am honored that you would accept such, one who puts himself in danger for the good of the Whole.”

He sat silently as Magistros Votos measured his feet and very quickly constructed a pattern. They parted amicably.

Ambros walked away muttering about grace and gratitude.

He also wondered: ‘I will certainly gain a little perceived Status by this exchange. Will Master Votos?’

As he wandered, he pondered: ‘Maybe, a little. But if I continue to gain in Status, it will reflect back on him...a bit more with each of my accomplishments, each of my promotions. Votos is perhaps wagering on my continued increase in what folks in the SCA would call word-fame. Reputation. Status.’

He arrived at his destination, his favorite plaza among the very many in the City. He sat in his usual seat, where he could see the statue of Socratos, and hear the bustle and hum of the street outside the cul de sac.

He noticed a man standing in the center of the Plateo: after a moment he recognized him: “Ambassador Harvey, from Ob Prime.” He spoke under his breath, so that he was surprised when the fellow turned to look at him. Harvey began a slow walk towards Ambros, who smiled dryly.

The Ambassador sat down, saying in English: “You don’t mind if I join you, I hope.”

Ambros waved a hand, and spoke in American: “Not at all. You hungry?”

“Fookin’ starved. I can never figure out which place will serve me, and it changes all the time.

Ambros laughed. He rose and approached the nearest food stall, where he negotiated with the old woman who cooked there, waving and pointing at the Ambassador. She ladled up a couple of big bowls of steaming soup; Ambros carried them over.

Harvey ate like a blacksmith, as though he really were starving.

When the food had disappeared, the Ambassador leaned back, assessing his host: “You are not from around these parts, as they say in America.”

“USIT Seventeen, Ambassador. And you are from Objectivist Prime.”

“Earth, as we call it. Can you explain this system to me? I’d like to get regular meals and all that.”

Ambros nodded: “Some of the people here will serve you one day, then not the next. Some are friendly, some not. Some start out surly and get nicer. Looks pretty chaotic, from where you stand.”

“Yes.” Harvey sat there, grumpy: “At first it was easy. Wait my turn, as near as I could figure it, then ask for what I wanted. But every day, somebody turns her nose up at me, who fed me yesterday...Explain this randomness, please.”

“Okay. ‘Please’ is the key, in the sense that people do as they please. That’s it.”

“What?”

Ambros shrugged: “The Commonwealthers would deny that they are Anarchists. They’d point to multiple power centers in their society and talk about a ‘distributed oligarchy’ and ‘from each, to each’. But what it adds up to is, no one Guild or Deme can dominate the Polis, or the people who make it up; and the Polis doesn’t rule any individual. Such power as exists is spread horizontally, for the most part. And there’s no money, only Status, earned by doing something.”

“Doing what?”

“Anything, near as I can tell.” Ambros grinned at him: “Your problem may be right there.”

“I don’t get it.”

“No, you wouldn’t. See, when you arrive at a food booth, you present as an ordinary person. Your whiskers and clothing are a little odd, but no more so than a lot of other folks’. So at first you get fed in a routine manner. The only people who would refuse you at first would be the finest chefs in the City. But those don’t distribute their Art in the Plataeae, so you’d never see them.”

“So what? They find out who I am, what I represent, and then they refuse me? They hate my Timeline? Or my office?” Harvey was working up to a high dudgeon, and Ambros found it amusing.

“No. Hate is overstating it, I’m sure. By now every purveyor of ordinary victuals in the City must know who you are. So who feeds you and who doesn’t depends on who thinks you are of any use. When it comes to accessing the really good stuff, the top twenty percent or so of the output of any Guild or Deme, Status is all. ‘Whoever does more is better; whoever does the most is best.’ You are here in the Commonwealth to represent the interests of Objectivist Prime and to negotiate with us—whenever you can find someone who can and will negotiate a deal of some kind with you. Mostly that’s gonna be the military: the War Guilds. They are the Commonwealth’s interface with Timelines outside of our Coalition. You have to deal with and through them...us.” he grinned: “I’m in Sacred Band.”

Harvey grunted and frowned.

Ambros continued: “So some people think you are useful, and that you are doing a sort of service to the Commonwealth. Others wish you’d go away. Many others simply don’t care. Each person reacts according to her estimate of your usefulness to others and to the Whole.

“But remember: even complete Slackers don’t go hungry here in the Commonwealth. You can always get raw materials suitable for a meal from the distribution points, and the Apprentice Cooks make basic meals available to everyone, even those aforementioned Slackers. They would feed you, for the most part.”

“For the most part? What does that mean?”

“It means that you cannot coerce people in this Timeline, that’s what it means. If the person you approach thinks you are a Slacker, or worse, an enemy, then she won’t serve you. But at the Apprentice booths, someone will. Wait for the willing to step forward.”

“To whom do I complain about someone who refuses?”

Ambros laughed: “Anyone you want to, but it won’t do you a lick of good.”

Harvey looked sourly at Ambros: “Who. Is. The. Boss? Where do I find the person in charge?”

“There is no Boss. There are no bossed. The larger booths have, usually, a Magistre or Senior Cook who supervises. That person’s job is quality control and instruction. The line cooks tend to be Archarae and Juniors, who assist in preparations and accept instruction, but no one, even in the most complex enterprises, is ‘In Charge’ in a way that you would recognize.”

Harvey evinced disbelief: “This system can’t possibly work.”

“Ideology. Rhetoric. It does work. It has always worked, in every Timeline, in every country, whenever the ruling class got out of the way.”

“Nonsense.” Harvey shook his head.

“Okay, fine. It doesn’t really work. I’m telling you lies.” Ambros had lost patience: “There’s a secret network of bosses, and we are not letting you see them. Nevertheless, I’ve shown you how to get fed. I recommend that you patronize the smaller booths at first, until you begin to figure out the system. In a pinch, old Vertisi there has agreed to serve you, so you can always have a bowl of soup.

“Also...I recommend you Rationalize your name. Érvi sounds like a woman’s name, you ought to call yourself Ervós.” He got up and prepared to leave, picking up his bag and stretching a little.

“But...”

Ambros said, gently: “I have my own affairs to be about. I will talk to you again at a later time, if you desire it. Your professed ideology demands that you accept my decision, since theoretically no can be coerced in Ob Prime, either. Right?”

“Correct,” said Harvey, resignedly.

Ambros headed back to the Command Complex: “I’m supposed to meet Deputy Dan in Veneta in an hour my time.”




Megan had his chai ready by the time he got to the café in Veneta.

He felt a moment of panic: ‘Am I getting too predictable?’ He thanked her, and tipped her, and went to his usual table.

He recalled that he’d told Megan ahead of time that he’d be there at that hour. He let that brief panic motivate him, though, and sent some changes to his calendar via the MPS. ‘Usually, the mere fact that I’m running my life on two contradictory calendars is enough to keep a measure of chaos in my schedule...let’s give that some more thought, though.’

Deputy Dan Samuelson entered the café a few moments later. Ambros watched him as he worked the room, shaking hands and making small talk. He finally reached Ambros' table.

“Ambros,” he said, sitting down.

“Dan. How’s it going?”

Dan made a face and sighed: "Not great. Sorry to be late. Had a wreck out 126..."

"Everybody okay?"

Dan sighed again: "Two fatalities. Maybe the little girl's gonna die, too. Touch and go."

"Sorry," Ambros said. He waited with such patience as he could muster: 'Dan wanted this meeting...the frisbee is at his end of the field.'

Finally Dan sighed a third time: "At least I didn't have to call on the next of kin..." After another pause, he said: "The reason I asked you to meet me..." He paused again, looking distressed.

Ambros tipped his head to one side: "That reason?"

He shook it off: "I got a tip from my brother-in-law; he's a cop in Portland. On the fraud squad. He has a friend who works in real estate, on the financial side...to make a complex story simple, the finance guy talked to my BIL and they are worried about the ethics and legality of an attempt to seize your house through foreclosure."

"Hmm." Ambros nodded, pursed lips and lowered brows.

Dan looked intently at him: "You don't seem surprised."

He shrugged: "We had a weird document show up on our doorstep a couple days ago. Purporting to be from your department, and notifying us of a ‘sheriff's sale’ of our property."

"Whoa. See, I checked, when my brother-in-law called me. There's no paperwork on file at the Courthouse on that. Whatcha do with the doc?"

"I took a photo and sent the hard copy to Castle." Ambros opened up his Pismo and called up the photo with a few keystrokes: "Here it is."

Dan leaned in and stared for a while: "It's a fake."

"I thought so," said Ambros: "We are paid up on the mortgage."

"It's a damn good fake, though: there's only one telltale here. This number..." He pointed at a barcode near the bottom of the page: "That's way too small to be real. A Lane County Sheriff's eviction-and-auction notice would be at least twenty digits this time of year, what with the economic downturn and all."

"Got it." Ambros put the machine away: "Thanks for the heads-up. I wondered what was happening."

"Your lawyer has the original, though?"

"Yeah, Castle should crush this easily."

"Umm."

"You got more information for me," Ambros said. It wasn't a question.

"Yeah," Samuelson nodded: "The reason I heard about this, is that the impetus for that fake document apparently came from high up in my BIL's buddy's company." Dan named a big mortgage corporation, the one that held Rose House's mortgage: "Toby—that's my brother-in-law—Toby's buddy is buried in foreclosure cases, and he's been nervous about something he calls 'robo-signatures' in the subcontractor who handles the actual foreclosures for this part of the country."

Ambros narrowed his eyes: "So Toby's pal is already smelling a rat—or a bunch of rats..."

"And then he gets orders to pursue a blatantly illegal seizure..." said Dan.

"And he hits up his buddy on the fraud squad to find out if he's liable to be charged if he carries through on it." Ambros nodded.

"Which Toby couldn't tell him, one way or the other. That'd be an FBI-level fraud case, if it ever got charged. And Toby hasn't had a chance to talk to the DA yet."

"Yeah."

"So, Toby got a few details from the realty guy, and then tipped me, since I'm in the neighborhood."

"Okay," said Ambros: "Thanks. I owe you one."

Dan rose: "You're welcome. I gotta go."

"Right. See ya."

Ambros nodded thoughtfully, eyes narrowed; he watched Dan stroll out of the joint, still working the room as he went.

He had some Commonwealth documents on his laptop, which he wanted to compare to records he’d copied from the local newspaper’s morgue. He had the three-D display up, perusing one pile and then the other, when he sensed someone approaching from behind. He cursed his carelessness: ‘The screen is visible...’

“That’s a helluva cool machine you have there,” came the voice from over his shoulder.

He tapped a key and the display vanished.

“Never seen anything like that,” the fellow continued.

He had a coffee cup in hand, and smiled as he came around in front of Ambros.

‘The smile never reaches his eyes,’ thought Ambros: ‘Well, he’s a politician, after all.’

“Mr. Rothakis?”

“I am. And you are James Patrick Thomas, mayor of Eugene.”

“Call me Jim.”

Ambros demurred: “I believe I’ll call you Mr. Mayor, for now. We are not yet on a first-name basis.” Nor ever liable to be, Ambros vowed.

Thomas’ smile remained pasted to his face. He was extremely obese: ‘Gotta be a sixty-four inch waist band on those trousers,’ Ambros thought: ‘Spankin’ new suspenders, silk tie in Harvard colors, thousand-dollar shoes. This guy’s a walking inferiority complex.’

Aloud he said: “Well, have a seat, Mr. Mayor. If you are looking to chat, that is, and not just trolling for votes.”

Thomas laughed more heartily than the witticism warranted.

Ambros sent the mayor a pointed look, and said: “I am doing some work here. Don’t take too long.”

“I just want to ask you a couple of questions, Amb...Mr. Rothakis.”

“As long as you don’t demand answers, you’re free to ask.”

“Well, I’m hoping you can answer at least some of my queries. I was wondering if you could tell me anything about this person. She intrigues me.” Thomas tossed a photo onto the table, apparently taken by a security camera in the Benham neighborhood.

Ambros’ right eyebrow raised a little bit. “Her name is Arrenji Athenini. I met her at the Country Fair last summer. She’s become a mentor to me. Why do you ask?”

Thomas shrugged: “She’s turned up in a dozen security videos around Eugene and Springfield—and many more in Veneta—in the past couple of years.” Thomas raised a hand to forestall any response: “Never in a criminal context, you see, so the police are not interested in her that way. But...”

Ambros sat there, a little smile upon his face, until Thomas spoke again:

“Well, you’ve been seen around with her, so I wondered. She has no local address, that we can find.”

“She’s not from around these parts.”

“Aha. No sign of her flying in or out of the airport. Never bought a train ticket, or used the bus. So we wondered.” The Mayor lowered his chin. A third jowl appeared on each side of his face. “She was at the Holiday Fair that day, with you.”

“Which day was that?” Ambros said, exuding innocence.

Thomas frowned: “The day that Officer Thompson and his partner wound up in an alley, butt naked, hypothermic, and suffering from amnesia.”

“Oh yeah, I read about that. Amnesia!” He laughed: “Your cops seem to be having a bit of an epidemic of it. Maybe you should check the HVAC and water supply at the cop shop.”

The Mayor said: “That ‘bit of an epidemic’ of amnesia you are talking about, it coincides with massive failures of recording devices.”

Ambros nodded: “That is interesting, isn’t it? A very uncanny coincidence.”

“So you didn’t have anything to do with that?” Thomas was still smiling, but Ambros was not fooled.

He finished his chai. He smiled: “Come on, Mr. Mayor. Just how could I have accomplished such a thing?”

“I have no idea.”

“Well, then. I do have some work to do,” said Ambros, pointedly.

Thomas showed no signs of leaving.

Ambros rose, intending to go to his second-favorite café.

“So there is nothing you want to tell me about this...lady.” Thomas tapped the photo.

Ambros shook his head: “You should just think of her as a superhero, y’know? Like Wonder Woman, but with a temper. Leave her alone, don’t cross her.”

“That’s it?” Thomas seemed befuddled.

“It’s the best advice I can give you,” said Ambros, as he packed up his belongings: “Let her be, and no one will get hurt.”

“Is that a threat?”

Ambros made a wry face: “I state a fact, you view it as a threat. I think that says more about you than about me. Or about Magistri Arrenji. Have a nice day, Mr. Mayor.”

Ambros pulled up the hood of his cloak as he exited the place into the wind and rain.




Ambros keyed open the door of his Salon. He sighed as he passed through the main hall: ‘Been a long day,’ He palmed the door to his office and bedroom. He sat in the comfy visitor’s chair in the office and picked up a crochet project that he’d been working on. He made sure the correct hook was with it, then turned on his desktop computer with a wave.

“Find that online video from GQ magazine that I bookmarked last week, and start playing it on my mark.”

“Dhulyena,” the machine responded. While it searched, Ambros got out a little bottle of capsules and a vial of brownish liquid. He swallowed a pill, washing it down with the liquid.

Almost immediately the machine said: “Ready.”

“Mark,” he said.

He leaned back in the chair and started crocheting while the video began: “Hello,” said the man on the screen: “I am Lauren Hoff, your host for This Year’s Man. Tonight we’re going to take a very close look at the latest in evening wear fashions for the well-dressed gentleman. I’d like to introduce my guests, now...”

Ambros leaned back in the chair, focused his eyes on the screen, and set to work: ‘Finish this shirt, and memorize a bunch of minutiae about men’s fashion, which I never thought was something I’d need to do...’




Kim found him, hours later, asleep in the chair.

“We were supposed to have a date tonight, sweetheart...” she said, shaking him by the shoulder.

He popped awake reaching for her, then aborted the reflex: “Oh, dear. Sorry, I guess I fell asleep.”

“I guess you did. What were you doing?

“I was studying men’s evening wear...fell asleep after the video was over.” He gathered up the nearly finished shirt and put it and the hook in a drawer next to the chair.

“Well,” she said: “They do say that sleeping after study helps nail down the memories.”

“Yes, and when you add memory RNA and a Commonwealth hypnotic into the mix, it’s even more effective. I daresay I’m now something of an expert on the rules of men’s black and/or white tie.”

She laughed: “But how closely will you follow those rules?”

He shrugged, smiling crookedly: “As closely as I feel I must, and not a whit closer.”

“Based on experience, I’d say you mean not at all...”

“Sorta. I’m leaning towards some Commonwealth variation on Scottish-style white tie for the New Year’s Eve party.”

“Woo-hoo,” she said: “I do like a man in a kilt.”

“Lucky me,” he said.

“Lucky both of us.”

“Indeed...”

“Still want to go out?”

He stood up and stretched: “Yes. We’ve hardly seen one another for days, except in bed. I have some news...”

They arrived shortly at Samuel B’s. As it was not Saturday but Sunday, none of the regulars were about, save an older man whom Ambros had had little interaction with. They waved at each other, but each minded their own affairs.

He and Kim took a table near the door and chatted happily about their various workdays.

At length, Kim said: “You said you had news...”

“Oh, yeah. I was out at Borderboro—in the swamp, you know?”

“Yes?”

“I saw Matthew and Diana; apparently they are living there now. Did he lose his job?”

“I don’t know...that worries me, for Diana’s sake. Matthew was always particularly nasty when he was broke.”

“I can see that. Guys in this culture tend to let a lot of their self-image ride on their earning ability.”

“Yeah,” said Kim: “And Matthew was so insecure...that’s why he was so jealous and possessive, really.”

“Figures,” said Ambros. “So what should I...or we...do about it?”

“I don’t know...I wish we could get her away from him.” Kim looked miserable.

“She hasn’t been very nice to you...”

Kim made a dismissive gesture: “Oh, I know. She’s always gossiping. I suppose you heard her story about my twentieth birthday?”

He shrugged: “She admitted that she wasn’t at the party, and I called her out on gossiping. Then she got really angry at me when I refused to be scandalized.”

“I bet. Well, the story is reasonably accurate. I wanted to have a lot of sex that night; it seemed appropriate.”

“Okay by me. I like orgies, too.”

“I had noticed,” she laughed: “But what good would it do to be angry at her? She’s a really deluded sort of person, but the more I study Commonwealth society, and the more I read your work, and Arrenji’s, the less I feel anger at people like her. In another, more sane culture, she’d probably be a fine person.

“And I’d certainly rather not see her dead, or injured. Or even Matthew, for that matter. If Matthew thinks someone out there in Borderboro is hitting on her, he could go ballistic.”

Ambros nodded: “Andy...or any of a couple dozen of the men out there...any one of them could and surely would chop Matthew into chum if he started anything. Couple of the women are pretty badass, as well.”

Kim said: “And we’re back to ‘What should we do?’”

“I’ll think about it. At least I can talk to Sarge, and Mark, and Andy, so there’s a bunch of eyes on the situation...”

“Yeah, I guess that’s a start.”

They walked hand-in-hand along Benham Avenue, chatting: “What’s up for you tomorrow?”

Ambros chuckled: “Gotta figure out what I’m doing for the kids’ history lesson on Thursday. Maybe...there are interesting parallels and differences among Lincoln Fair, as they sometimes call it, and Agincourt, and Bosworth. Maybe I’ll gas about that for a while.”

“What’s that?” she said, alarmed.

A quite large truck bore down on them, its right wheels already on the sidewalk. Ambros didn’t need to ID the truck to know that it was bad news; the thing seemed out of control.

“This way!” he yelled: “Into the parking lot!”

He dragged her along one row of parked cars, until screeching brakes and the smell of burnt rubber told him that the vehicle’s driver had reacted. As soon as he heard the truck’s engine gunning, he yanked Kim’s arm and pulled her between two cars and into the next aisle, continuing to run towards the grocery store.

The truck pursued them, two rows of cars and trucks in between it and them, until they reached the end of the row. Now they had in front of them a large open space, with the probable safety of the lighted store front about a hundred feet away.

Ambros shoved Kim in between two pickups and said: “Stay there until I call your name, then run for the store, okay?”

“Yes.” Bystanders were running in all directions, yelling madly into their cell phones.

He turned tail and ran, drawing the attacker away from Kim. He fled until the thing had almost caught him, its engine revving. He could hear rebel yells and hoots of joy from the cab of it; he dodged away, in between cars again.

“Bastard!” Ambros exclaimed, as the truck hammered into one of the vehicles. He barely escaped getting pinned between them, but made to the next aisle in time.

“KIM!” His voice came out higher pitched than he liked it to be for such occasions, but it did the job: Kim hopped out from shelter and ran flat out for the store.

The bad guys stopped their truck with a squeal of brakes and began to back it in her direction, as fast as it could accelerate.

“That’s it,” he muttered under his breath. He drew the Commonwealth sidearm out of his patch pocket, flipped the safety, and fired six pellets into the big green pickup. He hit two tires, the radiator and engine, the windshield, and with the fifth shot, the gas tank. The truck rocked violently as a result, and steam exploded from the space where the radiator once sat. The men in the cab shrieked as the front seat filled with a mix of noxious steam and hot oil.

The fools spilled out of the truck as it caught fire; two had been badly burned. Big Green finally stopped its rapid backward motion when it hit a delivery van and set that vehicle ablaze as well.

Ambros ducked behind a van, swapped the pistol for his Shifter and Saltated to the corner of the grocery store opposite the parking lot.

He stood for a moment taking deep breaths, listening to sirens and shouts as the delivery vehicle’s gas tank exploded.

He shook his head, put the Shifter away, lowered his eyes to the ground and trudged west along the blank wall of the store, toward the entrance, trying to look like a tired old man heading for supper after a long day’s work.

Kim anticipated his tactics; she met him at the corner of the building and he took her hand. They walked away from the disaster, heading for his Salon a few blocks away.

“That was exciting,” she said, ironically. She trembled, but that was all.

“Yeah,” he said. “Another vehicular assault, another green two-ton pickup. Almost certainly Posse Comitatus.” He sighed: “Next time they try something, I’m gonna have to kill them all.”

“Really?”

He nodded: “Posse C never stops once they get you in their sights. I expect they are pissed because I beat the cops at every turn since I got to Eugene: I mean, they kicked the hell outta me, but I won the war. There are a couple of very bent cops on the Posse’s membership list, so that’s probably the origin of their grudge against me...”

They walked along for a few minutes, and Kim finally said: “They’ll kill you if you don’t get them first, huh?”

“They won’t stop until I am dead, or they are. It’s obvious that they will also target you.”

“Okay.”

He knew that was the only acknowledgment that he would get from her. ‘Marie would shoot them herself...Luisa won’t even want to know about this, but I think she needs to.’ He sighed again.

He keyed open the Salon and led Kim within, only then feeling the tension in his shoulders. He relaxed, purposely. She felt that; she turned to him, buried her face in his jerkin and started to cry.




Late that night he slipped out of bed, leaving Kim deeply asleep. ‘Or early in the morning really,’ he thought, not bothering to check. He wrote a note to Kim: “Places to be, people to see...”

He dressed, and gathered up a few things; he went out into the Salon and Saltated to his campsite in the swamp.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posse_Comitatus_(organization)

http://www.bopsecrets.org/SI/2.derive.htm