SALTAROS: Shadows and Light

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CHAPTER TWELVE: Just Another Day or Two

 

 

Ambros tapped away at the keyboard on the ‘house desktop’ at Rose House. He had the place to himself, and he’d been sitting there when inspiration struck, so he just opened a new document and set to work.

 

‘Been thinking about this for a while...’

 

Marie and Kim came in the door; he typed a couple more lines and then leaned back in the ladder-backed chair, stretching until his vertebrae popped.

 

“Hey, sweetie, whatcha doin’?” said Kim, coming over to embrace him.

 

Marie blew a kiss and headed to the kitchen with a bag of groceries.

 

Ambros said, raising his voice to include Marie: “Writing an essay.”

 

Marie stuck her head out of the kitchen: “About what?”

 

“How to win the Timeline Wars.”

 

“Oh,” said Kim, ironically: “So, easy-peasy, huh?”

 

He shrugged: “The idea is simple. The execution is likely to be complex and difficult. Not to mention very dangerous. I’m working on the Introduction, explaining some historical examples I am going to refer to…”

 

“Bounce it off of us...” Kim sat down and looked over his shoulder.

 

“Okay, the idea is old as civilized versions of warfare. Not ‘civilized’ as in polite, but as in capturing cities and castles.”

 

“Go on...”

 

“Okay. It’s called ‘Strategic Flanking’ or ‘deep flanking’ by some. Related to ‘choosing your ground’ but more to do with mobility...

 

“Maybe the best way to get it across is with an example, one that has been well-studied ever since Lee blundered into Gettysburg.”

 

“You think Lee shouldn’t have fought there?” Marie asked.

 

“Not after the first day. Most critiques of Lee and his subordinates concentrate on tactical matters: they mention that the terrain is not in Lee’s favor, but then go forward as though with different decisions he could have changed the outcome. His underlings failed to capture Cemetery Hill on the first day, and Union troops occupied it; after that, Gettysburg is a losing fight for the Confederates.

 

“Once he’d seized the town, and looted all of the supplies he could find, Lee should have split. I cannot overemphasize how stupid it was to attack the high ground to the south of Gettysburg. But Lee was intent on destroying the Army of the Potomac, so much so that he seems to have lost all sense of proportion, not to mention forgetting all the lessons he’d learned in previous battles.”

 

“What kind of loot were they looking for?” asked Marie, ever practical.

 

Ambros laughed: “Well, food and fodder, of course. But the main thing Pettigrew was looking for was shoes.”

 

“What?” Kim looked incredulous.

 

“General Heth sent him to look for shoes. The Confederate armies were chronically short of footgear. A lot of rebel footsoldiers marched and fought their way through the entire war barefoot.

 

“Wow,” said Kim.

 

“Yeah, wow. But once you’d stolen all of the sneakers you could find, there’s no point to holding Gettysburg or fighting there. Imagine this: General Lee orders a retreat through the town while Union troops are digging in, redeploys his army and marches towards Philadelphia.” He typed a few words and displayed a map: “Straight through these small towns, like a spear to the heart of Philly. Then threaten Baltimore and DC. Epamanondas would have done that in an instant. Or Sun Tzu. You don’t even have to attack the cities, just appear threatening while destroying infrastructure and avoiding a battle. Like Sherman did in Georgia and the Carolinas.”

 

“Huh.”

 

“Wow.”

 

“Yeah,” Ambros laughed: “But such a critique is meaningless if you can’t learn a general lesson and adapt it to circumstances. So: ‘What is the meaning of mobility in a Multiple Timeline War where both sides have Gate and Shifter technology? What is the meaning of Strategic Flanking?’”

 

“What’s the answer?” asked Kim.

 

“That’s what I’m working on.” He grinned: “Such as: The Commonwealth knows ‘where’ in the Multiverse the major Authoritarian powers are located, and we know, or can find out, where they are headquartered in each Line. They are nowhere near that level of knowledge when it comes to us. It’s a major intelligence advantage.

 

“Can we keep tabs on all the important sub-dictators, consuls, and Commanders? If there is any kind of general assault on non-authoritarian Timelines, can we find those people and snuff them?”

 

He put an adapted Commonwealth data crystal into the USB port on the side of the computer, and saved his file to that: “I need time at the Library in Athino now. I need a look at seven-D charts in three-D form if I’m gonna get specific. And specific is the point of this essay.”

 

“Ha! I guess it would be,” said Kim: “So you’re heading to the Commonwealth?”

 

“Yeah. You need a lift?”

 

“No, I’m gonna write my essay for the next issue of Commonwealth Times. But you are teaching tonight, right?”

 

“Yes, regular Thursday night class...”

 

“I want to take a lesson.”

 

“Sure. Allie’d love to have another female in the class...”

 

“I’m not sure I’ll be in the class. I just want to, you know, get a better idea what it is you do.” She blushed: “Probably just watch again, mostly...”

 

“Whatever you want. See you then.”

 

 

 

 

As the class broke up, Ambros stripped out of his armor. Allie and Gustav were apparently getting a ride home from Randy, which gave Ambros pause for a moment: ‘Patrick and Jonie must have come to trust him, I guess,’ he thought. He once again adjusted his estimate of Randy upward.

 

Kim hit the women’s locker room, and he heard the shower start. He’d been surprised at how she’d persevered during the drills and sparring, though violence in general was clearly not her thing.

 

Marie and Luisa came in through the main entrance just as Andy was leaving. Andy was always the last student to depart.

 

He felt a little thrill: ‘When the three of them all come here at once it usually means some hot sex...the big bed is the best place for a menage a quatre.’

 

He hit the shower himself, in anticipation.

 

He came out dressed in slippers and a linen tunic. He detoured through the office to get a box out of his ‘wayback room’. That room was a long narrow space along the northeast side of the building; with no windows and Commonwealth palm-locks on the doors at both ends, it was a good place to store the outré technology that his life now depended upon. He grabbed the box he wanted.

 

He strolled through the office and into the bedroom, which was situated at the southeast corner of the building. He sat on the bed, where Luisa and Marie reclined. Kim was sitting in the easy chair in the corner, reading a stack of loose documents in Rational Hellenic.

 

“What have you there, old man?” asked Marie, sitting up and scooting over beside him.

 

“That box is from Hellas,” said Kim, looking up: “I wager he has some new technology for us. New to us, anyway.”

 

Ambros laughed: “Right in one try, Kim. Did you guess, or did Averos clue you in?”

 

She shrugged, batting her eyes: “Averos may have casually mentioned some such thing...”

 

“Hmmm. Well, this stuff will make all of our lives easier. I gather it’s seldom given outside the War Guilds, and Averos has been re-building and re-programming these for a couple tendays. Anyway...here they are.”

 

He pulled three leather-like bracelets out of the box. They were each about an inch wide, and looked a little too small to go around a grown person’s wrist. They each were marked with a Greek-style letter: Kappa, Mu, and Lambda.

 

“You’ve all seen me use my version of this, that I call a Multiversal Positioning System. These are more limited versions, specially designed for you. They do three things, instead of hundreds, but those three things are gonna be really helpful.”

 

Marie jabbed him in the ribs with her elbow: “Out with it, then. What do we have?”

 

He tapped the back of his wrist and activated his MPS, letting it be visible to the others: “You can activate yours the same way. The first thing it’ll do is act like a cellphone, and the second is to let you call a cab.”

 

Luisa started grinning: “Oh...it contacts the Commonwealth!”

 

“A precise place in the Commonwealth: the Sacred Band War Room in the Command Complex in Athino Prime.”

 

“I see,” said Luisa: “So a quick dizzy trip, and we can each do our own things in Athino, without having to get a ride from you.”

 

“Why does it make us so dizzy?” Marie had more trouble with vertigo than the others.

 

“The trip is kinda round-about,” said Ambros: “No one ever makes a straight Jump to or from Commonwealth Prime. You Saltate to a random Quiet Line, and from there to a satellite orbiting Jupiter—the planet Zeos, in Hellenic—and from there to the War Room. You’ll be in the sights of a computerized alarm system as you pass through Deep Space Zeos. If you don’t check out, people on the station look you over. If you are a bad guy...you don’t go to Athino.” He didn’t mention the fate of bad guys, because he didn’t want to dampen the mood.

 

 

“So slide them onto your wrists, like mine. The band will fade into your skin; no one can see it.”

 

“Cool,” said Kim.

 

“Okay, here is the other function of your version of this tech—don’t do this now, okay? But if you slide your little finger under the band, right below the holo, it will read your fingerprint and act as a ‘panic button’.”

 

The women looked from one to the other, all frowning.

 

“I can’t emphasize this next part enough,” Ambros said, holding their eyes: “Use that only in the most dire emergency, if your very lives are in danger. If you ‘press the panic button’, heavily armed Hellenic Warriors will drop in all around your position in space-time. They’ll have had no briefing, and they will be in hair-trigger mode. They’ll prioritize rescuing you over all other matters. So...”

 

Marie grinned: “So don’t push that button just because I’m late for class.”

 

“Not even if you are about to get arrested. Unless the cops are about to kill you...Cuz those Warriors will very likely kill anyone who even appears to be a threat to you.”

 

“We get it,” said Luisa: “And this will be very helpful. Partly because it will take a load off your schedule.”

 

“And off his mind,” said Marie. “He won’t worry so much when he’s far away...or in another Line altogether.”

 

“Good point!” Kim was enthusiastic.

 

“Okay, Megálos is on duty now, and he’s expecting a test call from each of you. Call him: Marie; then you Luisa; then Kim.”

 

While the women did their check-ins with Megálos, Ambros headed for the men’s room.

 

He heard a cat yowling, and frowned. He traced the sound, tipping his head from side to side.     

 

“There you are,” he said, as he opened the small door in the garage. “What’s up, buddy?”

 

“Yowp!” the cat declared. The dead mouse it carried muffled its vocalization.

 

The cat was a nearly perfect jellicle: yellow eyes, black face, white whiskers and a broad white stripe from chin to crotch, like an upside-down skunk. All four feet were white. It also bulked extremely large: ‘Gotta weigh in at eighteen pounds or so,’ Ambros thought.

 

“Yowp!” The cat repeated.

 

“Well, we can talk about that,” Ambros replied: “But I don’t need the mouse. You can eat it, if you like.”

 

“Mrmph.”

 

“You look pretty stout for a stray cat. You live around here somewhere?”

 

The beast dropped the mouse into a planter, then buried it lightly, with a few swipes of the paw.

 

“Mmmm. A lefty, eh?”

 

“Rrrrrr,” the cat purred. It stepped forward, looking up at him, and rubbed against his leg.

 

He saw that the animal’s left ear was clipped: “’Save the Ferals’ got to you, huh? I’m gonna guess that you lived somewhere around here, your humans abandoned you, then the feral cat folks nipped your little nubs and released you. You lookin’ to move in with me?”

 

“Meow,” said the cat, entering the garage bay and looking around. “Urmph?”

 

“I don’t have any cat kibble or anything. There might be some sausages left in the mini-fridge.”

 

The cat’s tail waved languidly; clearly it believed things were settled.

 

“Well, c’mon in, then. I’ll get you some water, at least.”

 

The creature followed him in to the office. Ambros dug out a flattish bowl from under the printer table, and filled it from the tap. “Thirsty?”

 

“Mr-r-r-r,” it said. He—it was definitely a he, or had been once—he began to slurp away at the water.

 

“What about a name?” The cat ignored him. “You look like Sylvester the Cat. I could call you Sly for short.”

 

The beast looked up and blinked, slowly.

 

“Okay, Sly it is. Let’s look for some food.”

 

Marie came out of the bedroom, and stopped short: “Who is this?”

 

Sly arched his back and got a little sideways.

 

“Oh, yeah,” said Ambros: “There are other people around here, pretty often. They’re all good folks, though.”

 

Kim and Luisa came into the office. Sylvester suffered himself to be introduced, and then allowed the women to take turns petting him. He purred audibly during the petting, and vocalized several times, never repeating the same word. Then he turned to Ambros with a “Yowp!”

 

“Okay, okay, food.” He dug into the fridge and produced some week-old hotdogs: “Best I got for ya, at the moment.” Sly dug in, rending the sausages asunder, and purring and growling at the same time.

 

“What, did this guy just show up?” said Kim, laughing.

 

“Yeah. He seems to have won the throw, too. Brought me a mouse as a bribe, which I politely refused. However, I think we could get along. The mouse population out in the nursery area has been getting out of hand. I won’t need traps if this guy can keep the rodents at bay.”

 

“Well, you’ve given him a name. I guess he’s yours, now,” Marie declared, amused.

 

“That’s one way to look at it. The way I see it, we’ve agreed to share the space. I’ll put a cat door in the back, by the nursery. He kills mice, I provide supplementary kibble, a water dish, and a warm dry bed. Right, Sly?”

 

“B-r-r-rrup!” Sly replied.

 

“You have a pretty large vocabulary for a cat,” said Luisa.

 

The beast gazed scornfully at her: “Mrrr-ow.”

 

“Okay, okay,” she said, hands up in surrender: “I won’t mention it again.”

 

Kim logged on to his desktop and began merging their calendars. She shook her head: “This is very vexing...”

 

“What is?” Luisa asked.

 

“Scheduling,” said Kim: “Running all of our schedules in two calendars, one a seven-day week, and the other into ten-days...”

 

Ambros spoke: “The Sacred Band and Postal Guild techs have an algorithm that can make that easier for you.”

 

“What’s it do?”

 

“It splits your life up into seventy and two hundred and ten day units, rationalizes all of your classes and appointments and holidays into those units and highlights conflicts between regular appointments in the two systems. It updates my schedule whenever I drop in to the War Room.” He gestured at Kim: “You saw Arrenji’s version of that at the I & DG board in Athino.”

 

“Right...” She trailed off, thoughtful.

 

He touched his MPS to the desktop’s screen, and displayed his calendar. He moved the cursor around with handsigns and finger waves: “Of course, 210 days doesn’t match up with a real year; and seventy is messed up in either calendar as well. So I always fix the display to show the Commonwealth calendar and the US one, above and below the main line of events...I don’t let my copy of the software do updates, I just have it highlight potential problems...certain things have priority: lessons at the Salon, time with you three, requests from my mentors...and now, teaching at Red Skolo...since the 70/210 system is not tied to the sidereal clock, it’s always Day One of Seventy or of Two-ten on your calendar, moving forward each day...visit Averos, he’s the one who clued me in to this.

 

“Now, one thing I like about the conflicts between the two calendars is that it makes my movements kinda chaotic.” He shrugged: “I have enemies, and it’s harder for them to find me, or catch me alone, since my sked is all twisted up.” He didn’t say that the women’s schedules had also become chaotic, and that it made them harder to find.

 

‘That’s a pain in the ass for me, sometimes, but I like it.’ He thought: Now that they each have a panic button...I like it even more.’

 

Kim had zoned out looking at his display; she shook her head and said: “I should have thought of that.”

 

He snorted: “Cut yourself some slack, Kim. You found out about the existence of the Commonwealth...” He scrolled back on his calendar: “...on August Thirtieth. Under a hundred days ago.”

 

Luisa leaned back in the chair and stared at the ceiling: “I already see the whole world a little bit differently than I did before I visited Athino. What changes will we have to make to ourselves as we continue forward in this...’brave new world’?” She air-quoted her reference.

 

After a long silence, Ambros said: “I’m a changed man already. Not all of the changes are for the better...” He gazed bleakly at the three women, then shrugged: “There is always a price for change, right?”

 

He pulled his shoulder bag from under the desk where he’d shoved it that afternoon, and dug into it until he could pull out his latest prize. “At least we are changing from one more-or-less stable system to another. This book comes from the first century of the Commonwealth.”

 

“It’s beautifully bound. What’s the book called?”

 

“Untitled. It’s a compilation of the five volumes of Magistri Arrendi Korinthini’s History of the second half of the first Century of Hellas, told through the eyes of people she knew. People like Eleni and Nikos and Selos and Xenos.” He paged slowly through the book: “On facing pages we have the facsimile version and a translation into modern Rational Hellenic. I’m trying to read the facsimile; it’s handy to have the translation right there, though. Really helps with the odd abbreviations used in Old Rational Hellenic.”

 

Kim said: “Cool pictures.

 

“Yeah. This is a reproduction of one of the antique copies at the Library. Eleni provided illustrations for that particular version, so those are reproduced here, along with other drawings by her.”

 

“What kinds of abbreviations do they use?” Luisa asked. “Acronyms?”

 

“No, actually. Modern RH uses those a lot, but during the pre-printing press era, the written language is full of shortcuts used for entire words. Sometimes for whole phrases...here, here’s a page with a bunch of them.”

 

They gathered around to check the book out. Ambros said: “See, here is the letter ‘epsilon’ in the upper case. There’s this squiggle following, then an ‘iota’.”

 

“E-squiggle-i. What’s it mean?”

 

“In this book it means ‘Eleni’. The copyists saved a lot of time and energy—not to mention sore hands—by doing that kind of thing for any name used a lot in the text. See, here: ‘Sigma dash o-s, Ksi squiggle i-o-s’. That’s Selos Xenosios.

 

“Or here: all lower case, ‘sigma squiggle omicron’. That’s ‘spatho’, sword.”

 

“I get it,” said Luisa. “The facsimile side is printed with really wide margins...”

 

“Yeah. That’s so I can annotate it as I go. This copy has Voukli’s annotations in green ink,” he turned the pages to show examples: “Arrenji’s in red, Nikodemos the Latest‘s in black. I got this deep purple pen here...” He held it up.

 

“They expect you to...” Kim paused.

 

“Yes.”

 

“But...”

 

He spoke solemnly: “Arrenji and Voukli think I am suitable material for Mastery in the Sacred Band. So they assigned—not the right word, or even the right concept—but they expect me to make original contributions to the study of this and a number of other texts.”

 

“Hmmm,” said Marie.

 

“That’s what I said, too,” said Ambros. “This book was originally a gift to old Nikodemos from a mentor, and went from him to Arrenji to Voukli.”

 

“Wow,” Kim said.

 

“I believe I also said that, a couple times.” He shrugged: “Anyway, my point is, the people who told these stories to Arrendi back in the day helped to forge the Commonwealth in it’s formative years. They leapt from a feudal government and a manorial money-and-barter economy with a fairly intolerant Christian ideology overlaid on their society, to something completely different. Eight hundred years later, with technological progress and the slow global spread of their ideas, we get the Multiverse-spanning Commonwealth Coalition.”

 

Kim said: “But that’s not eight hundred years of smooth progress. They suffered setbacks, they argued and fought among themselves for centuries. Almost every generation brought some aspect of the Social Contract back into contention.

 

“And they still contend with each other,” she continued: “Their meetings, whether virtual or in person...”

 

“...Or both,” Ambros interjected.

 

“...are usually mad wild free-for-alls, where they use technology to allow hundreds of opinion threads to play out...and very often they re-forge some part of the Social Contract.”

 

Ambros smiled: “It’s not so much ‘they’ as ‘we’. The people of the Commonwealth, as a whole, will expect us to participate. The next time…we…hold one of those planet-wide virtual meetings in the Arena in Athino, we’ll be in there adding our bit to the debate. We’ll be allowed to be, anyway.”

 

“Hmm,” Kim said: “Interesting.”

 

“Philosophically fascinating,” said Luisa.

 

“But we had other reasons to be here tonight.” Marie dragged him into the bedroom while Luisa relieved him of the book. Kim pulled his tunic, wrestling it off of him, while Marie and Luisa undressed each other.

 

It wasn’t long before philosophy disappeared entirely from his thoughts.

 

 

 

 

Ambros exited the City of Athino by the Piraeo Gate, which let directly into the road to Piraeo, between the ancient Long Walls.

 

The Road, with the walls to either side, ran just west of southwest, straight as a ruler. There were houses and agoras and plataeae within the long walls, as if part of the population of Athens had been squeezed out like toothpaste into that space.

 

He worked his way through the fairly light foot traffic until he could pass down a side street to the first exit in the south wall. There was a lesser road, barely more than a footpath, which wound southeast up towards the Walls of Athino.

 

“That’s the path I’m to follow,’ he thought. He began the climb.

 

He wore his practice armor, as Arrenji had requested: leather scale over an arming coat of linen. He carried a very heavy leather helm, in the same anachronistic ‘Corinthian’ mode as his Commando helmet. The leather helm hung by its chinstraps from the haft of an extra-heavy reedsword, which rested over his left shoulder.

 

“Oof,” he said aloud, feeling the perspiration break out over his whole body. He paused to shift the sword to the other side, then continued up the hill.

 

“Hello, Spathos,” Arrenji said, as he came into her sight. She wore a sort of popover robe, a bit big on her. She seemed to be unarmored. She saluted lazily, and he returned the salute crisply.

 

‘I guess it’s not her I’m to be fighting,’ he thought. ‘I wonder what’s up...’

 

 

She rose from the folding chair she had lounged in, and came over to where he was standing. She turned him around and gestured at the scene: “It’s nine kilometers in your Line’s measures to the docks at Piraeo. Under one of those piers is a Passport, a deactivated ATL Shifter. You are going to retrieve it. Bring it back here to me.

 

“The space between the Long Walls is off-limits to you. There is one pedestrian overpass, down near the Gate to Piraeo.”

 

He nodded: “I’ll have to cross there. I expect I’m going to have to fight my way across, eh?”

 

“You’ll see,” she said, grinning: “You have hills and flats, rocky terrain and soft soil, a river, a couple bridges. There are no restrictions on your route, except for the road between the walls. I’ll wait here until Sixth Bell; after that, you’ll find me at the Command Complex.”

 

“Yes, Magistri,” he said, and waited.

 

She saluted; he returned the salute. Then she sat back down. She picked up a paperback novel—one of his!—and began to read.

 

He put on his helm, pulled the gauntlets loose from his belt and donned them. He took the opportunity, then, to look over the terrain. He used his MPS to ‘see through; the various obstacles, like copses of trees and the rocky hills that rose out of the plain, seemingly randomly. “I see three possible routes,” he said. One was easy; too easy. One was nasty, and had a number of choke points along it, where an ambush might get him.

 

“This way then,” he muttered, and began to descend the hillside in that direction.

 

He jogged along the track, with open country all around him. Since there was no chance of an ambush on that part of the trip, he enjoyed the run: the air was cold and clear, the grass golden from fall frosts. Deciduous trees were bare, but for a few clinging leaves. He sped up a bit as he approached the first copse of trees: sure enough, there were swordsmen lying in wait.

 

He had only an impression of them as he crashed through: light armor like his, plain tan belts. He was swinging his sword in a pattern that set aside a bunch of strikes and took all the force out of the two that hit him. He blocked a final strike with an Alta Donna. He sped up even more, not looking back. ‘My objective is down at the docks; these fights are a distraction.’ He kept running.

 

Two more groups tried to stop him as he paralleled the South wall, and another as he detoured around the first bridge over the Illysos River. He actually had to fight one guy, who pursued him into the forest. He got ‘cuts’ to both of that fellow’s legs; the man conceded and sat down on the trail.

 

‘Loop through the forest, cross the river at the ford above the second bridge, cross the road by the overpass...somebody is waiting there, I bet...’

 

He’d been gradually slowing down as he jogged along, fatigued and breathing hard. There was a stitch in his left side and he was soaked in sweat despite the chilly air. He peered out of the shelter of some shrubs by the side of the road, suddenly cautious: ‘Nobody at the ford? Must have guessed I wouldn’t come this way.’ He waded across.

 

When he was out of the mud and ooze on the other side of the river, he stopped to clean his boots a bit. Then he sat on his knees for a brief rest: ‘Best not sit too long,’ he thought: ‘I don’t want to cool down too much, and I think time is part of this test.’

 

He took several deep breaths, calming himself, then got up and began to jog again. He was happy to note that the pain in his side was gone, and his breath was coming easier. ‘Second wind...or third, maybe.’

 

As he’d expected, the overpass was held against him: ‘Big guy, two belts, black and white...oh, shit, that’s Megálos.’ His mind was racing; he knew he’d have to be clever, because there was little chance of defeating the man by skill, and none at all by strength. He saw a possibility: ‘Can I do that? Physically? Gotta try it!’  He slowed for a moment, feigning reluctance, as people using the overpass backed away or scuttled off the ramp. Most of them seemed amused, but a few people evinced annoyance.

 

Megálos took a guard, standing just beyond the ramp to the actual overpass. Ambros ran straight at him with a shout.

 

When he was about twenty feet away, he sped up again, sprinting directly at the Magistros. He saw Megálos settle his weight onto the balls of his feet, squatting a bit to brace for impact. At the exact point where he could have struck at Megálos, Ambros veered away to the left.

 

He sprinted perhaps twenty ells along the outside of the ramp and then leapt upwards, grasping with his right hand at the railing above his head. He tossed his sword over the rail as he jumped. Using the upward momentum of his jump and his recently enhanced biceps and grip strength, he was able to scramble up and over the rail. He grabbed the reedsword and ran for the top of the overpass.

 

As he reached the top of the ramp, he glanced back: Megálos was standing arms akimbo at the bottom, head tipped to one side. He waved, then began to climb after Ambros, evidently in no hurry to catch up.

 

“He’ll be waiting for my return, I don’t doubt.’ Ambros took a look around.

 

He stood staring down at the end of the Long Walls, just outside the City Wall of Piraeo. He could see eateries and taverns between the walls, extending some half a league northwest towards Athens. The taverns surrounded several plazas, each with its own stage and outdoor seating and lounging areas. He also noted a couple of stoae, the kind that usually served as hotels.

 

‘Clever,’ he thought. ‘This is obviously a party district, and it is outside the main City complex, so...not a problem if things get a little noisy.’

 

From the overpass, Ambros was slowed down considerably, since he was negotiating city traffic. He relaxed, and walked as fast as the ambient flow allowed, no longer hurrying. He stopped at a plataeo and shed his helm and gauntlets, drinking some tea and eating some carrots. He gauged the time by looking at the sun and shadows: “It’ll be Fourth Bell soon: noon. Getting here took an hour, my time. Not great, but not bad...’ He had a plan for his return route, which he was just starting to elaborate upon.

 

He reached the docks in short order. He stood looking along the row of piers, northeast to southwest, and back again.

 

He pondered the situation: ‘If I can figure this out, I’ll save a lot of effort. Where would Arrenji hide the damn thing? If she could have been sure of my route, and knew which end of the waterfront I’d arrive at, she’d probably have put the thing at the other end. But...she couldn’t know which end I’d hit, or if I’d get here near the middle, so...’

 

A couple little boys, eight years or so, and a slightly older girl, came running up: “Watcha looking for, Spathos?” the little girl was sassy and pert. ‘Or maybe,’ Ambros thought: ‘Just “normal” for this Timeline…’

 

He grinned. “What makes you think I’m looking for something?” he asked.

 

“Oh, come on,” said one of the boys. “You’re on a training run. Magistri Arrenji sends students out fairly often, you know.” He noticed the chevrons on Ambros; belt: “I never saw such a high-ranked Spathe sent out on this run, though.”

 

“I’m a relatively new recruit,” he admitted. “High rank, because of experiences in my own Line. But not much experience.”

 

“Oh.”

 

“I have to find a de-activated Passport. Looks like a cylinder, about this long, with no markings or visible controls. It’ll probably be matte black; at least all the ones I’ve seen so far have been.”

 

The kids looked from one to another. Then they scattered, hooting at one another as they ran up and down the docksides and peered under every pier.

 

“Those hoots really carry,” he said.

 

Pretty soon one of the boys popped out from under one of the docks—not the one he’d disappeared into—and called out.

 

Ambros jogged over to him, and the boy, after hooting on a rising note, led him down under the pier: “I think that’s it,” he said, pointing and grinning.

 

“I think you are correct,” said Ambros. “Thanks.”

 

“It’s fun,” the kid shrugged: “We help the Skolarae all the time.”

 

“Does Arrenji know you do that?”

 

“I dunno,” said the kid: “Who cares?” He ran off yelling for his friends.

 

Ambros had to wade out into the water for a few paces, then jump up to dislodge the Passport. He secured it in a pouch on his belt and climbed out onto the boardwalk.

 

Instead of retracing his steps, he began to work his way southeast along the dockside.

 

 

 

 

About two hours later he arrived at the place where he’d begun. Arrenji was still lounging there, an electronic scroll and a couple of books nearby.

 

“Well,” she said: “You’ve been through a bit of the swamp by the look of you. And by the smell...”

 

“Yup. It was not fun. But it got me back here without having to do any more fighting.”

 

“I heard how you got by Megálos. Clever.”

 

“Yeah,” he said, grinning a little: “But that wouldn’t have worked twice. So I walked the shoreline to the edge of the Falerum, and along the boggy edge of the swamp to the ford. Here’s your Passport.”

 

She took it. She made a call on her MPS, presumably to announce the end of the exercise, then picked up her stuff and led him back towards the Command Complex.

 

They picked up their Shifters at the front door and headed for the locker room. Once they’d stripped and were in the shower, Arrenji said: “What did you think of today’s little exercise?”

 

“It was petty straightforward,” he replied, looking her in the eye: “You need to test me, I suppose, in the same ways that you would test a new recruit from this Line; I imagine that having a holo-video of today’s exercise on my record will help you sidetrack any objections to the ranks that you’ve laid on me.”

 

“Clever,” she said: “That’s true. Some of the things Voukli or I’ve been asking you to do are rites of passage that others of your rank have had to struggle past. Distance running for training and discipline is very often a highly disliked form of exercise. Now that you’ve shown that you can do it, some of the critics will shut up. Especially since you did today’s run on a sore knee.”

 

“It hurt a little. I didn’t see any criticism of me on the Kyklo—not on that subject, anyway.”

 

“We Magistrae have meetings that you don’t get into, as yet. For the most part. We critique each other’s choices and actions pretty hard, especially in Sacred Band. Keeps everyone alert and cautious.”

 

He nodded: “As you should be, I suppose.”

 

“As we should be. How did you feel during the run? Competent? Or out of breath and on the edge of failure?”

 

“Competent, barely,” he admitted. “I was never a very fast runner, although in my youth I could lope and jog for long distances. I’m in better shape now than I’ve ever been, even as a teenaged wrestler and baseball player.” He paused, pondering: “I suppose that during my twenties, when I was earning my belt in jiu-jitsu, and swordfighting my way to competence in the European martial arts, I guess I was close to this level of strength and stamina.”

 

They had by then left the shower and begun to dress. Ambros felt a vibration at his left wrist: “Hang on a lepto or two, okay?” he spoke to the air: “Yes? Okay...I think so, let me check...”

 

“We about done here?” he asked Arrenji.

 

“Sure. What’s up? If it’s any of my affair...”

 

He shrugged: “Averos wants to see me about something.”

 

“Get going,” she said, tersely. Then: “See Voukli at the firing range, Seconday at First Bell, yes?”

 

“Yes Magistri.”

 

He nodded, returned her perfunctory salute, and strode out of the room. 

 

He looked back to see her watching him, that penetrating, calculating, utterly unemotional and observational stare that so freaked him out when he’d first met her. ‘Freaked me, and attracted me. It’s probably a good thing she saw me as a recruit rather than a vacation sex toy. Worked out for the best, anyway. So far.’

 

She raised her eyebrow, and slowly, ever so slowly, grinned her wry smile.

 

He shivered as he walked down the hall to the elevators.

 

 

 

 

He stepped out of the car right into Averos’ lab. That worthy had put on part of the powered armor that he’d been working on for the previous few tendays, and was cautiously moving about.

 

Ambros stopped right where stood. He watched as Averos wriggled and squirmed, moving the arms of the suit very slowly. Averos’ movements jerked and yanked, as the tech cursed quietly.

 

Ambros coughed a little, and Averos looked up: “Ah, there you are. Let me...”

 

The right arm of the suit whipped back and nearly hit Averos in the head. Moving with extreme caution, he touched a pad on the workbench nearby, and the suit fell limp.

 

“Is it off now?” Ambros asked.

 

“Yes...”

 

Ambros walked slowly over and helped Averos disarm himself. He said: “I suppose you want me to try this thing on?”

 

“I’d appreciate it. Maybe you can make it work better, or at least give me a clue what’s wrong with it.”

 

“Sure.” Ambros carefully donned the suit, attempting as he did so to figure out how it worked: “These soft sort of pad things...?”

 

“Those are the—actuators, I guess you’d call them. They are supposed to detect all of your movements and amplify them. I can’t make the suit work as it should, and it may be just me...”

 

“Gotcha,” said Ambros, in American. “Okay, I’m armored. Gimme the helm.”

 

With the helm on, Ambros could see several telltales on the inside of the face guard. “Projected controls on the inside, here.”

 

“Yes,” said Averos. “See what you can make of those, please. Ready?”

 

“All in.” Ambros took a few steps away and stood, hands by his sides.

 

Averos touched the bench top, and Ambros felt the suit stiffen and move to touch him all over.

 

“Strange feeling,” he said.

 

“It is,” Averos agreed. “Try moving around. At your discretion, I mean.”

 

Ambros nodded, and about wrenched his neck. “Shit, Averos, this thing is a menace.”

 

“Yes.”

 

Ambros began a slow-moving form from his Tai chi studies. The suit did fine as long as he kept the form super slow.

 

He sped up just the slightest bit, and wound up in a heap on the floor a good ten ells from his previous spot. Glassware lay shattered all about.

 

“Turn it off!”

 

“It’s off.”

 

Ambros doffed the suddenly limp suit, and set the pieces one-by-one on the workbench. He rubbed a bruised elbow and rolled his left shoulder repeatedly until the pain from his long-ago injury faded. He said: “I think it has a logarithmic amplification curve. That can’t be a normal setting, it’s outrageously hard to control. The controls on the inside of the helmet are all color-coded. I recommend you find out how to dial them all down to minimum.

 

“I’m willing to bet that the people who use this stuff start out with suits that increase the strength and speed of the wearer’s movements by ten percent. You should aim to get the suit set at that before you call me again.”

 

Averos nodded: “I’ll look into that. Thanks for the assistance.”

 

He began to turn to the bench, clearly about to begin tinkering again, when they heard a disturbance in the hall outside the lab.

 

“Theosae,” sighed Averos. “Her again...”

 

“What?” Ambros asked.

 

“Zekathari.” Averos shook his head: “I better go see what she’s doing this time.”

 

Ambros followed the Magistros into the hallway, and found himself staring at the most amazing person. She had ragged clothes and dirty hair, looking to him every bit as disheveled and filthy as any homeless madwoman he’d ever seen in his home Line. She stared at him, malevolently.

 

“Zeka!” said Averos, more authoritatively than Ambros had ever heard him speak: “What is the problem?”

 

Zekathari turned her attention to Averos and then looked down: “Sorry. They’re following me again.”

 

Averos sighed: “Where are they now?”

 

“Oh, gone, as usual. They never stay when anybody else is around.”

 

“I know,” said Averos, suddenly kindly: “Are you coming or going?”

 

“I...don’t remember...yes, coming. The lab...the vibrations are right, you see. They don’t like to let me work when the vibrations are right...”

 

Averos stepped forward and took the woman’s arm: “Let’s get you to your lab...”

 

“Yes, that will work. Once I start, they can’t bug me. The noises, the music, the vibrations...”

 

Ambros followed, intensely curious: “This woman is clearly mad, and not in a socially acceptable way. I’d not seen such a person since I got to the Commonwealth.’

 

Averos escorted Zeka to the door of a very curious laboratory, which seemed to combine a recording studio with a physics lab with something quite bizarre that Ambros couldn’t identify.

 

As soon as she saw the equipment, Zeka changed. She stood up straight, shook herself, and stepped up to the controls. She began to manipulate a synclavier-type keyboard with one hand and control a holovision tank with waves of the other hand.

 

The sounds were alternately sweet and sour, sometimes horrendous. The holograms looked like old Vorticist paintings, but in three-d, with swirls of bilious colors and long black twisty bits of outline. Ambros felt a headache coming on, and backed towards the door.

 

After a moment or two, Zekathari turned around: “Get out of here. Now.”

 

Averos backed out of the room, cautiously. Ambros followed suit, and closed the door behind him, cutting the music off completely.

 

They walked away, heading for Averos’ lab.

 

“Okay,” said Ambros: “Explain.”

 

“She’s insane.”

 

“Obviously. Why...”

 

“Because we won’t—we can’t—coerce her. If she’d accept treatment...”

 

Ambros nodded: “I’ve had some experience with that. She doesn’t want to change; her madness is precious to her. But she has her own lab?”

 

Averos made a face: “She was a genius, one of the youngest people ever to achieve Mastery in my Guild. Before she was twenty-five, she found a sub-family of Timelines branching from the Chinese Hegemony. Predicted their existence, that is, and guessed or calculated ‘where’ we could find them.”

 

Averos led the way back into his workplace: “In that room, using that equipment, she found something no one else even suspected was there...and a few seasons later, she slowly lost her mind.

 

“She’s completely paranoid, won’t let anyone see what she’s finding...if someone more stable could look at what she’s working on, like, say, Iyelisi...”

 

“...or you,” Ambros suggested.

 

“Yes. But it would be an unforgivable invasion of her person and agency to do that.” He shrugged: “Who knows what she’s found?”

 

“Maybe nothing,” said Ambros. “But maybe a lot.”

 

“Maybe a whole weird lot, maybe stuff that would change the way we see the Multiverse.”

 

“She won’t show it to you.”

 

Averos spoke sadly: “Maybe when she dies...like everyone else, her research is backed up several times a day, into storage at the Library.”

 

Ambros nodded: “And when she’s dead, her stuff will all be available to everyone else, right?”

 

“More or less...most research is open to everyone’s inspection at all times. Her paranoia causes her to check constantly on whether anyone is ‘spying’ on her. The Guild eventually placed a lock on her files, for the sake of peace and quiet.” Averos made a rueful face.

 

After a moment, Ambros excused himself: “If you’re finished with my services…”

 

“Yes, of course. Go on about your affairs. Efharisto yia sou voithiaso.”

 

“Dipota.”

 

Ambros strolled along Odo Aeolena, gently massaging his still-sore shoulder. He pondered the phenomenon of a paranoid schizo genius in a room full of powerful equipment, in a City full of semi-anarchist “Mind-your-own-affairs” types: ‘She refuses treatment, the Polis says “Okay, don’t hurt yourself” her Guild says “Here’s your lab, go ahead and work” and she does...and because she makes it clear that she doesn’t want anyone to look at her work, the Guild acquiesces. No one looks at her work. Huh.’

 

A mist had developed over the City, and a breeze freshened from behind him. He shivered a little, and thought of getting indoors. He decided to go on to his favorite indoor cafe, and picked up his pace.

 

His thoughts rolled on: “And she’s working in the basement of the War Guilds’ collective Command Complex,” he muttered, then shrugged: “That actually may be the best place for her. She’s buffered from any accidental contact with enemy Lines, and all that. Hmmm.”

 

The fog thickened suddenly into light rain, and the wind kicked up a bit. He raised the hood of his cloak and turned down an alley, which his internal map said would eventually open onto the street he desired. He took advantage of awnings and the overhanging eaves of various houses to limit his exposure to the rain.

 

As was common in Athino, the narrow way led among homes and apartments; many sizes and styles of domicile stood packed closely together along the alleyway. He passed by crossing streets of various types, none much larger than would permit two handcarts to pass. When he approached forks or five-or-six-way intersections, that internal mental map he’d absorbed under RNA training kept him on track to his destination.

 

‘This pattern of city planning, with large areas of wide streets and long sweeping avenues, interspersed with these tightly packed residential neighborhoods where families live cheek-by-jowl with singles, couples, multiples, and other arrangements...really quite civilized…’

A number of dogs trotted along the alley or lay in niches along the outside walls of the residences. One of them walked up to him and turned its head aside, so he stopped to stroke it. He resumed his walk-and-think: ‘I’d wager there’s a lot more open space in these residential areas than appears from the alleyways. About every fifth building is a villa, and they all have gardens inside. The gates are usually open as well.’

 

A very large brindled tomcat climbed out of a sewer adit carrying a dead rat in his jaws. The tom proceeded to eviscerate his prey, occasionally glancing up suspiciously at Ambros.

 

“I don’t want your supper, kitty,” he said to the cat.

 

“Mrumpf,” the beast replied.

 

Ambros could feel his legs cramping up a bit: “After today’s exercises, that’s reasonable.’ He stopped beneath an awning, set his bag down on a dry patch of pavement, and did a few quick stretches, easing his hamstrings and quads. He stretched and rolled his shoulders and twisted his upper body, feeling the knots in his obliques dissolve. He heard laughter from nearby; he looked around to see who it was.

 

Shoehorned into a space between two apartment blocks he found a long narrow space that had obviously become a cafe, where locals were accustomed to gather for drinks and conversation. He ducked under the curtain that partially closed the opening, and looked around.

 

People of all ages looked up from their snacks and drinks and greeted him pleasantly. The noise level dropped a little as those who cared to inspected him. His garb, and the belt and other accoutrements of his rank made his Status clear. One by one the locals went back to their affairs.

 

Tables sat to one side and then the other, creating a serpentine pathway that led toward the back. A large table covered with food and cups and glasses sat at the rear.

 

He figured out immediately that it was a serve-yourself set-up, so he chose a bite and a drink and picked out an empty seat at an unoccupied table.

 

A young man sat in a chair behind the table, wearing Culinary Guild colors and playing some game that involved careful hand movements controlling a holographic image that hung before his face. Ambros grinned: ‘Like an amorphous three-D version of Tetris,’ he thought. He was reminded of Zekathari’s machine, though the young man’s game did not disturb his eyes the way her mad creations had.

 

His shoulders ached, both of them, and the left one occasionally spiked a sharp pain.

 

‘The general ache is from training and it’s worse today because of the weights I did two days ago...not to mention the weather change. The left one is always painful under stress; once dislocated, never really perfect again, I guess...’

 

Since everyone seemed friendly but disinclined to disturb him, he got to work: “What is the true nature of being? Calm...relax...what indeed ...who am I?”

 

 

 

 

Ambros grunted and griped to himself. He sat at a table in the corner at Samuel B’s, working on several projects at once.

 

‘Rather,’ he mused: ‘I am working on several projects in alternation. I should shut down all but one…’

 

He cleared the illusory desktop of several documents, leaving three.

 

A fellow he sort of knew, who hung out with the Country Fair crowd on Saturday evenings, came sauntering over: “Ambros, isn’t it?”

 

“That’s right. I am afraid I don’t remember…”

 

“Ah, my apologies, I’m Harlan Goldman.”

 

The fellow said ‘Haahlan’; Ambros said: “I assume there’s an ‘r’ in that first name.”

 

“Yeah. Bahston never really goes away, right?”

 

“Right. Sit down. Can I buy you a drink?”

 

“I don’t want to interrupt…” Harlan began.

 

“First, you already have. And I didn’t send you packing, because my writing projects are not going all that well anyway. So...sit down, and tell me what you’re drinking.”

 

“Don’t mind if I do.”

 

When they had shots and chips in front of them, Harlan asked: “So, what are you writing? If you don’t mind me asking, that is.”

 

Ambros grinned: “Careful, or you’ll end up in my novel.”

 

Harlan laughed, perhaps a little more heartily than the joke deserved. He said: “A novel, huh?”

 

Ambros shrugged: “I got three projects still open here,” he gestured at the screen. He raised a hand to keep Harlan from leaning around and looking: “I’d rather you didn’t. But, I have a novel about an imaginary revolution in Thirteenth Century Greece. That’s already spun off a couple short stories; those are not open at the moment. I’m also working on a couple essays. One’s about a theoretical way to end a certain war, and the other is about the Oregon Country Fair. I call that one ‘An Appreciation and Critique’.”

 

“Huh.”

 

Ambros raised an eyebrow: “You a Fair Family guy?”

 

Harlan laughed: “I was. One of the first. I got...tired, disgusted.”

 

“Yeah?”

 

“Uh-huh. I worked Security, but I never got up high in the organization.”

 

“Say on.”

 

Harlan shrugged: “I got tired of the hypocrisy. We decided to declare the Fair drug-free---don’t think that didn’t come at a cost, either. Lotta good people got chased away by that BS.”

 

“I can imagine.”

 

“Yeah, maybe you can. Anyway, once we went drug free, we hadda start searching people’s bags, right?”

 

“I suppose you did.”

 

“Well…” Harlan paused, then looked at Ambros sidelong: “Not right away. But bit by bit, the searches got more…”

 

“Stringent?” Ambros suggested.

 

“Yeah. I hear things have calmed down some, lately.”

 

“My experience at the most recent Fair backs that rumor up.”

 

Harlan nodded: “For a while there, we’d pull weed, coke, booze, all kinda stuff out of people’s gear. And it all worked its way back to Security Camp, too.”

 

Ambros laughed: “Let me guess…”

 

“You’d guess right. I couldn’t deal with it anymore, right? If you confiscate drugs at the Gate, but smoke it and snort it and drink it yourself before the week is over, what’s that about?”

 

Ambros held up a hand: “It’s theft, of course. But I visited Security camp a couple times last summer, during the Fair. Nothing like that was going on, that I could see. Of course…”

 

“Yeah?”

 

“They didn’t do a very thorough search of my bag at the pre-Gate area. More worried about weapons and glass than any illicit substances, it seemed to me.”

 

“That’s cool. Probably people mellowed out after a while.”

 

“Yeah. And you know, if the groundlings started keeping most of the stuff for themselves, the elite’s supply would mostly dry up.”

 

Harlan chortled: “That was already starting to happen, when I buggered out.”

 

Ambros gazed at the man skeptically: “You still hang out with the Fair Family folks.”

 

“Oh, yeah. I got no beef with anyone. I made my choice, that’s all. My kids are working Teen Crew this summer. Should have a blast.”

 

“Oh yes indeed,” said Ambros: “They surely will.”

 

“Yeah,” said Harlan: “I expect they’ll both get laid, too. ’Bout time. My girl’s overdue, it’s affecting her attitude.”

 

“Huh.”

 

“Oh, I know. I’m a bad dad.”

 

“Not in my book. Just unusual, right? In a country where men threaten to shoot their daughter’s beaus if they even suspect anything is happening…”

 

“I always hated that shit. When I was boy, I mean. Why would I do that to some young fella? If he hurts her, yeah…but she needs to get a life of her own, you know?”

 

Ambros nodded: “I know. I most assuredly do know.”

 

Harlan saw another friend of his and excused himself. Ambros went back to staring at the documents on his screen, pondering the weirdness that filled his life. He read the opening paragraphs of the essay about the Country Fair, then read them again; after musing over the complete inadequacy of his descriptions, he closed the document.

 

‘That leaves the novel, and the essay on Deep Flanking...that essay is important, more so than the novel...I’ve been going nowhere with it though...What would The Exile do?”

 

He started typing, noting that Mathilde had given him no direction. He worked over the seventh chapter of the novel, trying to get into the head of an ideological Pacifist from the Thirteenth Century of the Christian Hypothesis: ‘The religious thing, the whole absurd bloodless revolution idea...next chapter I get to introduce Nikodemos...but I don’t want to shift the POV to him, even if he is more pragmatic. I want to stay in Mathilde’s head, and show the tragic consequences of the Revolution...what she saw as tragic, that is, and why…’

 

At that moment, he saw how the arc of the story was going to go, and he grinned maniacally. He glanced up, transfixed by the revelation, just as a group of pre-teen kids on bicycles went screaming past on the sidewalk.

 

He scrolled down and set up the next three chapter headings, adding short paragraphs to explain the action. A wave of relief swept over him, as he realized that the troubles he’d been having advancing the plot were over: ‘I know the History, and I read the Exile’s books...now I have the arc, the needed acts and incidents, the crucial…’

 

Allie and Gustav burst into the pub, followed by two other girls of Allie’s age. They attacked the bar as though summiting a mountain, getting root beer and cookies and chips.

 

Allie got her snack first, and noticed him sitting there bemused. She swept across the room, the others in her wake, and sat down across from him without a by-your-leave. He grinned internally, but said only: “Should you kids be crashing a pub without an adult present?”

 

Gustav sat down to his right: “No. I mean, we’re allowed in here until eight-thirty, but...Luckily, you’re here. That’s why we stopped, cuz it’s starting to rain.”

 

“What, I am now your chaperone? Not something I volunteered for…” Looking out the window, he saw that the mist had indeed thickened into a drizzle: “The longer you wait, the wetter you’re likely to get, when you do head for home.”

 

The kids ignored him, shedding their helmets, hats, and coats and starting to eat. Ambros sipped his whiskey and regarded the kids somewhat skeptically. Listening to their talk, he determined that the girls were headed home with Allie for a sleepover, and that Allie judged the rain to be a shower; hence, a break for snacks, then on home before dark.

 

He looked down at his work and made a few corrections.

 

“Watcha writing, Ambros?” Gustav asked.

 

“Working on the novel right now,” he replied.

 

“Oh.”

 

Ambros sipped his drink again, and sighed contentedly.

 

“You drinking Irish whiskey again?” This from Allie, who had paid attention to his preferences.

 

“No, actually.”

 

“What then?”

 

“This is an eighteen-year-old scotch, by name ‘The Macallan’.”

 

“What difference does the age of the booze make? Why does it matter?” Allie asked.

 

“Hmmm. You know what everclear is? Plain grain alcohol, 98 proof?”

 

“Yeah…”

 

“Ever had any?”

 

“...No.”

 

Ambros grinned inside; he shrugged: “It’s not very tasty, that’s all. The flavor of whiskey or bourbon comes from the barrels; the longer it’s in the barrel, the more flavor it picks up.” An idea came to him: “So, what’s your favorite food?”

 

Allie laughed: “Marzipan!”

 

“Okay, Marzipan...suppose you had a box, that would hold a pound of marzipan. And suppose you knew that the longer that marzipan stayed in the box, the better it would taste. It would get sweeter, up to a point; the nuttiness, the almond flavor would become more intense, and the texture would gradually get smoother and more pleasing to your mouth. The aroma would improve. And every year you’d open the box and take a little taste, and a day would come when it would be perfect.” He raised his glass: “Then you’d put it in a bottle, so to speak.

 

“I see. But wouldn’t the barrels just make the booze taste like wood?”

 

“Sorta. There’s a definite ‘oak note’ to the Macallan. But there are different kinds of barrels...the Macallan uses sherry barrels from Spain, which are burned on the inside before the sherry goes in. So there’s charcoal and wine flavors, and the oak, and for some reason oak barrels tend to make a vanilla taste, as well. Some scotches are really smokey, like burnt peat. I don’t care much for those, mostly.  Anyway, the older the booze, the more complicated the taste gets.”

 

Gustav asked: “And more complicated is better?”

 

“Not necessarily. That’s why most distilleries have expert tasters who go around every few months and check the barrels for flavor.”

 

“Oh.”

 

One of Allie’s friends had pulled out a notebook and was scribbling on the back of it; he noticed that she’d made a series of molecular diagrams.

 

“What’s that?” he asked.

 

The girl said: “This is cellulose, and this is charcoal...I don’t know how to indicate the *flavors* of the sherry, so I just marked this with my initials...and this is alcohol, the drinking kind. I was just trying to figure out where the vanilla would come from.”

 

Allie pointed to the bottom of the drawing and said: “Maybe there? If the charcoal were tannic, like tea…”

 

Her friend shook her head and then shrugged: “I’ll look up more formulas later. It’s on the page now, so I’ll remember. It’s gotta come from the stuff that’s there right?”

 

“Right!” Allie looked out the window and raised her arms above her head, wiggling her fingers. She said: “The rain has stopped, you guys. We better go now, cuz we gotta be at my house before dark.”

 

Ambros raised an eyebrow as the kids donned their gear.

 

He thought: ‘I could let the novel sit for a while, let the new arc percolate and mature—like whiskey in a barrel.’

 

He re-opened the essay on Deep Flanking...