Lesser Gods (36 page)

What could have happened to Alice?

I turned back toward the ocean. The steady rhythm of the incoming waves was drowned by a noisy churning. Something was surfacing out there. Something monstrous from the looks of it.

I reached for a weapon and found nothing, and then realized I was standing naked and defenseless on the beach.

I commenced a frantic search for my clothing, half expecting the Loch Ness monster to come wading ashore after me when whatever was below the water surfaced — nothing was too awful to imagine after the last few days of Huntington and his nightmares.

But instead of a horrible monster, the exact opposite bubbled to the surface: Alice, this time really doing a very exact rendition of the Birth of Venus, right down to the clamshell and costume.

Or lack of costume thereof.

I couldn’t resist commenting on her outfit. “I thought you said that you wouldn’t ever appear like Venus —”

“That was last night, in another time and place. And anyway it’s a woman’s prerogative to make a fashion statement with the dawning of another day. Were you born in Kansas?”

“Now that you mention it…”

“Stand back, shut up, and listen. And close your mouth; you look like a perfect moron.”

I didn’t remark that “no one is perfect” because in viewing the perfectly formed woman before me, that statement would have been patently false. Little wonder I was transformed into a speechless dolt.

So I closed my mouth and said nothing, bearing in mind the old truism that people might mistake a fool for a wise man if the fool just kept his trap shut long enough.

As she neared the beach, Alice stepped from her surfboard shell and waded ashore, splashing through the gentle waves.

Then she fought off my advances. “Settle down and listen, you masher. Maybe I should slip into something more appropriate.”

“Not necessary.”

“Let’s see. A nice little number in barbed wire, perhaps.”

“I’ll behave,” I lied. “Just stay as you are.”

“This way then,” she said, taking my hand.

I trudged alongside her down the long white beach. And was disappointed to learn she really did only want to talk.

“It’s time we held our council of war,” Alice said, squeezing with my hand in hers. “It’s time we go on the offensive.”

“I’ve been offensive all my life.”

“Ralph! Get serious.”

“All right. Now I’m serious. Can’t we just stay here the rest of our lives. This isn’t Earth, is it? Why not just relax and enjoy ourselves?”

“We could. But —”

I could hear a cosmic bell of doom peal its warning. “But? What’s wrong with doing that?”

“But, Huntington isn’t going to leave us alone. We’re his only threat. As far as I know, no one else has survived playing in the SupeR-Gs with him which he seems to have used as a test of some sort to find those who might be a threat. He’s killed the others off. We’re the last two.”

“So sooner or later he’ll be out for our blood,” I agreed, glumly finishing her line of thought.

“He won’t rest until he finds us. After last night I’d think you of all people, would realize just how dangerous he can be.”

“Point taken,” I said, trying not to shudder at the memory of being chopped asunder.

“Huntington needs to be stopped for other reasons,” she continued. “Have you ever thought about what he’s up to — I mean beyond playing around at the SupeR-Gs and honing his skills? Think about what he’s doing.”

I scratched my head, unintentionally doing an excellent ape imitation. “I suppose he can do about anything he wants to do at this point,” I finally said, continuing our stroll down the beach.

“As he gains more power — and I believe he’s doing that very rapidly now — he can transform Earth according to his whims. And not for the better. He has a cruel streak.”

If he could duplicate himself and others — cause inanimate objects to obey his orders, he could shove anyone and everything around however he wanted. Little by little he’ll turn the whole world into a giant nightmare where anything bad that could be imagined would happen.

She stopped and took my hands in hers. “Sooner or later he’ll find us and devise a way to destroy us. Hack us up and burn some of the parts, launch our heads into space, or —”

“Okay, okay,” I said. “I got the picture.” No need to let her go into the part about the crabs and seagulls eating our eyes.

We started pacing down the beach again.

“So?”I finally said.

“So?”

“So,” I countered, “I’m betting you have an idea.”

“Thought you’d never ask.”

She turned and planted a big kiss right on my surprised face. Before I could recover, she was pulling me back the way we’d come. “Now be quiet. I’ll tell you my plan on the way back to camp — and keep those paws to yourself, buster.”

Alice Liddell

I explained my plan to Ralph. He sat a few moments mulling it over before speaking. “Your plan isn’t half bad.”

“But?” I asked.

“But I it may have a couple of holes in it.”

“Then let’s patch them.”

“Patch what?”

I laughed. “The holes in my plan.”

So we spent more hours plotting, debating, and rethinking while eating the fruit that floated to the shore like a private cornucopia. I soon realized that life could be amazingly pleasant for the two of us if we could just get Huntington out of the way and then keep the new form of jet under wraps so no one else could alter themselves (the thought of someone like Ralph’s Death with jet capabilities gave me the weird willies just considering it).

We were nearly done ironing out the wrinkles in our scheme when Ralph groaned, I leaped to my feet.

“Sand fleas?” I asked.

“This is serious. I just remembered I left my body, one of my bodies, with Huntington.”

“You what?”

“Or maybe I left the real me with him and I’m just a duplicate. I…” Ralph seemed to run out of mental steam, just standing there. Finally he spoke. “I don’t know what’s real and what’s just something that I thought was real. Or… “ He swore.

“Don’t worry,” I said, taking his hand. “Your real body is right here.”

“Yes, but —”

“I’m sure you only saw a projection Huntington created to confuse you. People don’t go around leaving their bodies behind. Just think what kind of place the world would be if they did.”

“I’m serious.”

“So am I.”

“This isn’t funny.”

I tried to suppress my smile. “I’m afraid it is. Very.”

“Get serious.”

“I will. There. Now I am.”

“What?” he asked.

“Very serious. Listen, even if that was your real body back there, I don’t think it would be dangerous for you. I don’t believe time is really passing on Earth while we’re here. I’m betting if you went back now, or tomorrow, or a year from now, that even after you’ve spent all that time in this place —”

“With you,” he added squeezing my hand.

“With me,” I agreed. “When you went back it would be the same time it was when you left there last night.”

“What makes you think that?”

“Because I went back to my house before you woke up this morning. The time was the same there as when I left. Half a day passed here, not more than a second there — and I’m betting no time passed there at all.”

“But…”

“Remember when you winked out from the operation table at the detox ward?”

“Much as I’d like to, I can’t forget it.”

“All right then. We promenaded around and then ate dinner together before you went back. We must have spent several hours together. So how much time had passed while you were gone?”

“You’re right. The med-bot was still right where it was when I’d left it. Hadn’t moved an inch, otherwise I would have got stabbed by its rusty hypodermic. But I still don’t see how time could pass here while nothing happens back on Earth.”

“Watch this then.” I closed my eyes and concentrated, then opened them to find the sun had vanished and it was dark. Stars twinkled overhead.

Ralph jumped to his feet. “What the —?”

I laughed. “When I was little, I thought the whole world became dark whenever I closed my eyes. Here it really can if you wish it so. Our every wish is our universe’s command. Everything here’s just whatever we want it to be.”

“Now you’re spooking me. Please bring back the daylight.”

“Do it yourself. It’s time you learned to control your powers. You’re the most undisciplined person I’ve ever met.”

“But I don’t think…”

“Don’t think. Just do it. Go ahead. Make the sun come back.”

“Fat chance for success,” Ralph muttered.

“That’s right. Positive thoughts.”

Ralph closed his eyes and then opened them.

It was still dark.

“See,” he said. “Can’t do it.”

“Don’t give up so easily.”

He closed his eyes again and then opened them — to sunlight.

“Did you do that?” he asked suspiciously. “It would be just like you to trick me.”

“No, silly. You did.”

Ralph sat back down. “Our plan doesn’t seem quite so impossible now — though if there was a bookie in our tropical paradise, I would be tempted to bet the farm on Huntington.”

Five days later (Alice Savings Time), one second later (Earth time), we put our plan into motion.

Ralph Crocker

I stepped over the four corpses lying at the front entrance to Death’s lair. It looked like he was in fine form today.

“Well, look what the cat drug in,” the meso guard quipped.

“I need to see Death.” I said.

“No problem, Ralphy.” The thug grabbed me by the back of the collar and dragged me through the armored entryway into the main lair.

I waited as the mech-clock ticked off long seconds in the room, reminding me that I might have lived a whole lifetime with Alice during each click, had I been in the hidden zone she had created. That waste of time coupled with Death’s theatrics designed to prolong a victim’s anguish made me angry, and suddenly I didn’t feel a bit guilty about what I was about to do to him and his men.

Death finally turned around, rotating slowly in his chair to stare across the smoke-filled room, a permanent insane grin plastered across his chrome face. His antenna quit their angry twitching and he spoke. “Give me one good reason not to kill you.”

“I know where Huntington is.”

Death’s claw slashed through the air and stopped just inches from my left eye. “I’m listening.”

“I can give you the address. I have it written down.”

Death nodded and the meso released me so I could reach into my pocket and extract the slip of paper. I handed it to Death who read it. “So. He’s clear down in New Sarasota — isn’t that the place that got nuked.”

“Yes. But residual radiation is at safe levels now.”

“Why’d a rich guy want to be down there?”

“He’s got eternal treatments. Maybe he figures he can rejuve fast enough to keep from getting cancer.”

Death’s eyes turned red in the dim light. “Nice job, Ralph. Too bad you’re so late. Once more: Any reason I shouldn’t kill you?”

I swallowed. This would be the hard part. I had to be careful not to blow it. “You might need me again. To get more information.”

Death laughed a grating chuckle. “If we get Huntington, and the new jet he’s supposed to have, we won’t need nerds like you any more.”

The mesos and Death all had a good laugh. “Take him out and snuff him,” Death finally said. “No, wait. Better yet, take him into the back and let me kill him.”

Two of the mesos dragged me into the back room, turned me around in front of a bullet-pocked wall, and fastened my arms to the chains embedded in the concrete. Then I waited.

Death, with his unerring sense for drama, let three minutes pass, the clock in his office ticking away loudly enough to be heard in the back room as it marked the last seconds of my life. To say I looked scared when he came in would be an understatement. I was beginning to have second thoughts about our plan.

Did Alice and I make a grave error?

Death finally entered, pistol in hand.

“I think you ought to reconsider this,” I said. “You’re making a big mistake if you just haul off and kill me without —”

“Shut up and I’ll make it quick. No one can say I’m not fair. A quick death will be your payback for coming in and settling up old debts. If you hadn’t missed the deadline by a couple of days, it would be different even though we won’t be needing you. But I’m a businessman. I have my image to uphold.”