The Garbage Chronicles Page 29

When the bomb hit, King Corker was standing on a balcony overlooking the courtyard of his castle. He was in the middle of shouting a command to the captain of the Corker guards when a warning trumpet sounded.

  Before anyone could react, the courtyard was swarming with voracious, razor-toothed fruit flies. King Corker had only half turned toward his room when the flies caught him. He died a terrible death, his flesh consumed in a horde of frenzied attackers.

  The screams of dying Fruits filled the air.

  From the other side of the moat, Brother Carrot heard the screams. Five minutes later, a pervasive, deathly silence settled over Corker Castle. Brother Carrot knew it was over. He felt bad about it, but knew it was something that had to be done.

  After another five minutes, Brother Carrot gave the Command to turn on the Mother Hummer. When his men were slow to react, he snapped angrily, “Faster, men. We don’t want flies killing all the Fruits in the valley. Who would do our work for us?”

  Two soldiers jumped now, flipping switches on the sides of the bomb trailer. A large, clear plastic funnel rose out of the trailer bed. A loud drone-whir filled the air, throbbing and pulsating with that one sound no tiger fruit fly could ignore.

  A steady stream of flies left Corker Castle now, making a straight course for the trailer. They disappeared into the funnel.

  “Beastly little creatures,” Brother Carrot said to his gunnery officer.

  “Yes, but cross-bred with herpes stock to perfection!”

  “War is hell,” Brother Carrot said, watching the last flies enter the funnel. Looking up with moist eyes, he saw slaves all along the castle walkways. Some lowered the purple Corker banner. Most of the slaves were carrot men, but Brother Carrot spotted occasional cucumber, lettuce, and cabbage people.

  Five plump tomato girls from King Corker’s harem appeared on one wall now, waving white lace and squealing so loudly that Brother Carrot could hear their words from across the moat. “Long live Brother Carrot!” they said. “Long live Brother Carrot!”

  While Brother Carrot watched, the drawbridge was lowered. Then he brushed dust off his uniform and called all the officers forward. “This is our moment in history, lads!” he told them.

  Soon after that, Brother Carrot led a company of men along the short, curving section of road that led to Corker Castle. The men had grown quiet, and Brother Carrot knew why. Each of them had imagined this moment for so long, in so many waking and sleeping dreams, that now they could only savor it with their eyes.

  Layers of puffy white clouds moved rapidly across the sky. To Brother Carrot they looked like the fleeing ghosts of fat little Corkers. He smiled.

  The smile hardened when three dead banana men came into view. They were laying face up in a grassy planting area at the center of the road. Most of their flesh had been torn away by the savage fruit flies.

  “See that?” Brother Carrot said to the company colonel as they passed. “Good slaves. We could have called the flies back a little earlier.”

  The colonel nodded and murmured in solemn agreement.

  They reached an uphill straightaway now, with high English hedges on each side, the last stretch before reaching the castle. Brother Carrot felt his pace quicken. The men chatted excitedly in low tones. Freed Vegetable slaves cheered wildly and waved brightly colored cloths from the castle walls above.

  The drawbridge was only a few steps away when a wrinkled old prune woman in a frumpy brown dress stepped through an opening in the hedge. Stopping at the side of the road, she leaned her chin on a carved wood cane and stared up at Brother Carrot. She had a most curious expression on her face. Brother Carrot judged it to be a combination of sadness and bemused tolerance. He wondered how she had survived the Fruit Doom bomb.

  “Greetings, Brother Carrot,” the old woman said in a throaty voice. “And greetings to your lean, hungry warriors.” She used one hand to smooth her dress.

  Brother Carrot raised his right arm, causing the procession to stop. The old woman was terribly wrinkled, and her skin was a pale plum shade. The eyes were unmistakably sad, Brother Carrot decided. And the mouth was mildly amused. “How long have you been here?” he asked.

  “All the time,” she rasped.

  “Why didn’t the flies get you. Are you a magician? Or a witch?”

  The old woman laughed. It was a wheezing, choppy laugh, like the strainings of an engine that didn’t have long to run. “What would flies want with an old prune lady?” she asked. “My skin has lost its sweet bloom. It is old and leathery.”

  Brother Carrot stared at her.

  “I am Priscilla the Prunesayer,” she said. “Once I was a lovely young plum, easily the fairest in the land.”

  “And now you tell fortunes?”

  She straightened for a moment, then leaned on the cane again. “That is correct.”

  “And what is mine, old woman?”

  “Why, the same as King Corker’s, naturally.”

  “You mean I will die?” he asked.

  “We all die sometime,” Priscilla the Prunesayer said.

  “That wasn’t what I meant,” Brother Carrot said. He stepped close to her, intending to grill her militarily with questions.

  The old prune woman closed her eyes, and a serene expression crossed her face., Then she tottered for a moment.

  Brother Carrot reached out to steady her, but she slumped to the ground.

  “I think she’s dead, sir,” the company colonel said.

  As Brother Carrot looked down on the prunesayer’s body, thousands of Fruits fled the area. Many ran up the trail toward the lake that covered Dusty Desert. Others crossed the western grasslands. Still more reached the eastern seashore and took to boats.

  Two who escaped by boat were Matteo and Nacho Pear. They used their own sailboat, not at all a large craft—less than eight meters in length and sloop rigged. Matteo and Nacho had sailed it often to the small unnamed island they saw now across the strait, on picnics and other happy occasions. This island was the first in a necklace of isles that stretched across the sea. Legend told them this. The brothers planned to hop from one landfall to the next, seeking refuge as far away as possible.

  But never before had they sailed beyond the first island.

  Feeling a strong wind against his face, Matteo pulled the mainsail halyard. He thought of the good times he and Nacho had enjoyed on this boat. A dark cloud structure bore down on them from the sea, bringing with it a chill wind and a misty rain. He secured the mainsail, then raised the jib.

  The little boat began to pick up speed.

  “I’ll get even with those rotten Vegetables!” Nacho yelled. He stood at the tiller, finding the best angle on the wind.

  Matteo heard these words as he knelt in the bow, securing the bowline on a cleat. He saw the dark outline of the unnamed island on the horizon. “Death to the Vegetables!” he bellowed.

  In less than a day Lord Abercrombie would soil-immerse himself permanently. There would be enough time to look over his recycling facility and meckies one last time.

  For now he was soil-immersed in the usual half-committed way, knowing he would be back in Flesh in a matter of hours. With the visual and auditory sensors in each droplet of seawater, Lord Abercrombie heard the angry words of the pear brothers. He saw the lumpy form of Matteo as Matteo fine-tuned the rigging to get the most speed out of the boat. And he saw Nacho at the tiller, trying to steer a straight course in changing winds.

  With countless sensors all over the planet, Lord Abercrombie eavesdropped on other Fruits as they vowed eternal revenge. All this triggered a moment of introspection in Lord Abercrombie. The past and future of his planet appeared before him like a magnificent, fluxing historical tapestry.

  Vagabond Fruit armies made thrust after thrust against a fat and sedentary Vegetable kingdom. The Fruits were lean and oppressed, with all the power and fury of righteousness on their side. In fast forward across the tapestry, he saw the Fruits in power again, with wronged Vegetables hiding in the hinte
rlands plotting revolution. These Vegetables were led by Brother Carrot. The cycle repeated itself over and over in much the same pattern. Different faces appeared and disappeared. But the words and deeds were much the same.

  Lord Abercrombie laughed at the timeless folly of the situation. Every pore of the planet echoed his laughter. Then the laughter became a storm of embarrassed rage, for Abercrombie came to understand the foolishness of his own paranoic fears. His laughing rage blew across the surface of Cork in a powerful, howling wind.

  It was late morning, and Prince Pineapple walked briskly along the dirt meadow trail, well ahead of the others. Over one shoulder he carried a dark green gortex stuff sack Javik had let him use. The sack rattled, being full of treasures from the AmFed garbage cannister. The jagged white cliffs ahead seemed just as far away now as when they broke camp. He quickened his step.

  He became aware of distant, murmurous laughter. It seemed to bounce off the white cliffs, traveling on an angry wind across the scarlet flower petals of the meadow. He felt the wind pick up now, pressing the flowers around him against the ground. The laughter became loud. Menacingly loud.

  Frightened, he turned and bolted back down the trail.

  Javik saw Prince Pineapple running back at full speed, with his bag bouncing on his back and his pineapple face contorted in terror. “Run!” Prince Pineapple yelled. His black button eyes were wild.

  Javik heard the laughter now. It grew louder as Prince Pineapple approached, becoming a thunderous, booming cacophany as the prince ran screaming by. Javik covered his ears. He and the Moravians fell to the ground.

  Looking back, Javik saw Prince Pineapple trip and fall.

  The laughter grew fainter now. Soon it was gone.

  “What the hell was that?” Javik asked. He became aware of a pain in his right hand. Namaba had been squeezing it too tightly. She was wearing the lemon yellow vari-temp coat and pants he had given her.

  Namaba released her grip. “I don’t know,” she said.

  Prince Pineapple crawled back with his bag, joining the others. “Is it gone?” he asked.

  They increased their pace after that, walking so hard toward the cliffs that Javik felt a muscle pain in the front of one thigh. Late morning became midday, then mid-afternoon. Three Corkian suns baked the travelers and withered the flowers along the trail. Perspiration covered Javik’s body. He wiped his brow often with moist-pak towelettes.

  Heat waves simmered in the distance. Javik shielded his eyes with one hand to look at the white cliffs ahead. “That bog has to be way behind us,” he said. “But I’d swear those cliffs were not one step closer than this morning.”

  Prince Pineapple fell to the ground in a heap. “Let’s rest,” he said. “A little nap . . . a recharge . . . ” He was lying in a bed of flowers asleep as the last word crossed his lips.

  “Sounds good to me,” Javik said.

  “Hand me that shovel and cord,” Rebo said. “I’d like to recharge and go on ahead a ways.”

  Javik unhooked the nutrient kit from his belt and handed it to Rebo. “You think something’s just ahead?” Javik asked.

  “It’s his yenta,” Namaba said acidly.

  “I just feel a little restless,” Rebo said, smiling crisply at Namaba. “And I don’t claim to have any damned yenta.”

  Namaba sat back on her haunches and smiled apologetically. “Sorry I picked at you,” she said. “I’m tired.”

  Rebo took the shovel and cord a few paces off the path and went through the now familiar recharging ritual.

  Moments later, Javik saw Rebo’s tripod form loping away on the trail ahead, framed against the distant white cliffs. Javik watched him for a while, then removed a tiny yellow plastic square from a side pocket of his survival pack. The square was smaller than a sugar cube. At Javik’s mento-command, it flowered into a white sheet lean-to with three foam pads on the ground.

  Manually, Javik moved the lean-to so that it afforded shade for Prince Pineapple. “Don’t want any cooked pineapple,” Javik said, winking at Namaba.

  She smiled.

  Javik and Namaba settled down for a nap on two of the pads, using the remaining shade of the lean-to. Before falling asleep, Javik asked Namaba about her mother. “She was an alchemist, wasn’t she?” he said.

  “Uh huh, I used to help her with her experiments. I caused the fire that nearly killed both of us, you know. If it hadn’t been for Rebo happening along.”

  “I’ll have to thank Rebo for that sometime,” Javik said. “No. That might be rubbing it in. Do you think he’s jealous?”

  “Yeah. But he likes you.”

  Javik grunted.

  “My mother used to call me Nama,” she said.

  Javik was tired and silly. “Your mama called you Nama?” he said.

  “Oh, you!” She tickled him in the side.

  Hearing the rhyme in his sleep, Prince Pineapple did a powerful backflip, knocking over the lean-to and clicking his heels when he was airborne. He landed in an angry heap in the rubble of the lean-to. “What the hell?” he said, still not fully awake. Moments later: “Who said a rhyme!”

  “Uh . . . sorry,” Javik said. “You heard that in your sleep?”

  “That’s the most dangerous time, when my muscles are relaxed!” Angrily, he pushed the twisted lean-to away and curled up on the ground.

  Javik straightened the lean-to and set up resting places under it again for himself and Namaba.

  “You can call me Nama too,” Namaba said, suppressing a giggle.

  Javik stretched out on a pad next to her. “Are you sure?” he asked.

  “I wish you would.”

  Wizzy lost all sense of time. His memories faded like the decaying thoughts of an old man. His attention span grew baby short. He was a rock now, condemned to sleep in a bed of slime.

  Bursts of anger from the life remaining in him were drowned out in a muddy death that permeated every cell of his magical body. Like a dying fleshcarrier looking for a warm place to curl up and die, he burrowed deeper in the mud. Soon he reached firm, moist soil.

  Then, in a quick, angry thrust of his remaining energy, he darted a short distance between two rocks, pushing soil behind him as he went. This blocked the short tunnel he had dug, preventing Bottomless Bog’s slime from advancing through it.

  Only barely conscious, Wizzy found himself in a tiny, dry underground chamber. He glowed a sickly shade of yellow, then flickered out. It was the quietest, darkest place in the universe.

  CHAPTER 14

  Often it is a matter of degree. It is wrong, but not that wrong; right, but not that right. It seems that black and white are ideals, obtainable only by paint pigments, and even there . . .

  A Timeless Truth

  It was nearly time for Lord Abercrombie’s final soil immersion. He moved from metal man to metal woman, inspecting his meckies for the last time. Using a chamois cloth, he burnished a brass “rebuilt” plaque here, flicked dust off a shoulder there. It was a solemn occasion, with all the meckies standing in three neat rows near Lord Abercrombie’s throne.

  Wearing a cardinal red caftan with gold scrollwork on the sleeve and half collar, Lord Abercrombie glided to his throne. He felt a final urge to sit upon it and look out at his underground mechanical staff. The black satin cushions felt soft beneath his half bottom. “I’m leaving soon,” he said.

  A blue female meckie rolled forward from the ranks, asking, “You’ve made a decision, Lord?” This was the artistically programmed linguistics expert, the one with the gargling voice.

  “I have.”

  “Flesh or Magic?” the meckie asked.

  “Magic. It may not be the correct decision, but at least it’s a decision. That’s something, anyway.”

  “Good luck, Lord Abercrombie. What should I put on the history wall?”

  “I’ll take care of that myself. If I turn into any sort of a decent magical planet, that should be a minor matter.” Lord Abercrombie felt a tear welling up in his human eye. The thou
ght of never seeing his recycling facility again was a burden. Then he remembered the visual sensors he would have when he became the planet. Still, it would not be the same.

  The blue meckie rolled back into the ranks.

  “You’ve all done your best,” Lord Abercrombie said. “I want each of you to know that.” He rubbed his eye.

  “Goodbye, Lord,” the meckies said in unison. They waved stiffly and noisily, clanking their metal arms.

  Lord Abercrombie glided to the corridor. He heard mechanical voices behind him in the main chamber, and poked his head back in. The linguistics meckie was touching the arm of his throne, acting as though she wanted to sit upon it.

  “Go ahead,” Lord Abercrombie said, smiling softly in his half-faced way.

  She started. Turning to face him, she said, “You mean sit on it?”

  “Sure. Why not? It’s of no use to me anymore.” He turned and left.

  As he negotiated the intricate maze of passageways leading to the Soil Immersion Chamber, Lord Abercrombie did not feel happy or sad. It was a numb, neutral feeling, possibly in preparation for the killing of his remaining fleshy self.

  Minutes later, he dropped into the immersion hole with more than a little trepidation. Sitting down, he covered his fleshy leg with dirt. The soil was warm. He closed his human eye and visual sensors and lay back in the hole. Warmth greeted his fleshy half-backside.

  In a flurry, Abercrombie used his hand to pull dirt over the rest of his exposed skin. His hand was last in. It remained outside for several seconds. Then it made a waving motion and pulled itself into the hole.

  Goodbye, Abercrombie thought. And hello.

  After a short nap, Javik recharged. He felt fresh. Returning to the lean-to, he nudged Namaba to awaken her. “We’d better get going,” he said. “Should try to cover more ground before dark.”

  She sat up and yawned.