During the next few months, young Donnerjack cajoled the bracelet into teaching him a method for finding his way home through phase shifts. Then, somewhere, during that year, he learned to slip through and touch the things of Virtu. The bracelet had little to say about it, and Reese did not know what to make of it.
“It’s not even theoretically possible,” he said. “Your dad did do some very strange things with space and time within Virtu, but even he was never able to pull these random crossovers. I’m going to have to revise some of my theories, I fear.”
“Will you tell me about your theories?”
“When you’re older and know more math I’ll try.”
“Would you say something to Dack, so he might start me a little early on the math?”
“Surely.”
“Could I ask you a question about yourself?”
“Yes. Ask away.”
“Did you ever have any kids of your own?”
Reese was silent for a little longer than usual following a question. Then he said, “Yes.” He paused for a moment again, and continued, “It’s a terrible thing to outlive your children. I had two sons and a daughter. They’re all dead. Two grandchildren. Ditto. One great-grandchild—a girl, Megan. She’s in grad school in math and physics. She’s been a great comfort. She does come to see me, and we like each other a lot. I do miss all the others, though.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. I should be grateful for what I’ve had and what I’ve got, shouldn’t I? I do miss one little boy’s smile, though, and another’s laugh, and— Oh hell! I’ve lived long, you see, and done a lot. I should be happier than most. Probably am. Why’d you ask me a question like that, anyhow?”
“The way you treat me I thought you might once have had kids of your own. That’s all.”
It was no trouble for Reese to keep his Virtu persona from blushing. He reached out and mussed up Donnerjack’s hair.
“Let’s talk a little about number lines,” he said.
“Okay.”
At first, Reese came by regularly and young Donnerjack would slip over the line into Virtu to join him. Reese would shake his head as he did it.
It was Reese Jordan who first fastened on calling the boy “Jay.”
“‘John’ simply won’t do—at least not for me. ‘John’ is your father’s name and calling you such would lead this old man into confusion and madness.”
He laughed and young Donnerjack laughed with him. Although intellectually he knew that Reese Jordan was an old, old man—far older than his father would be if his father was still alive, far older than most of the other residents of his Verite rest home—when Reese came to tutor his friend’s son in Virtu, his virt persona was the unchanging aspect of a man in his thirties.
This tutoring had caused some concern when Caltrice detected the oddity in young Donnerjack that permitted him to cross the interface without resorting to the usual mechanical and electronic contrivances. The genius loci had analyzed the situation and concluded that, since Donnerjack somehow brought his entire body across the interface, the increased time flow would age him prematurely. Out of deference for Reese’s need to make as much as possible of what years remained to him, young Donnerjack visited his mentor in Caltrice’s locus using a virt persona. Soon he acquired an education far beyond what any observing merely his physical years would believe possible.
They made an odd pair: the old man with the appearance of a much younger man and the boy with the knowledge—if not the wisdom—of one far older. However, the friendship was real and strong. Young Donnerjack privately came to consider Reese Jordan as the father he had never had. Reese Jordan, in turn, came to love the boy both for himself and out of respect for the memory of his father.
Indeed, as time passed, Reese realized that though he had known John D’Arcy Donnerjack as well as any man had, he had never felt more than professional respect and comfortable affection for him. John’s son, now, even with his odd seriousness, his somewhat analytical way of looking at a joke, and his peculiar perspective on human affairs, his son was something entirely different.
“No, ‘John’ will not do—forgive me, son,” Reese said. “I believe another form of your name would suit me better. That is, if you don’t mind.”
“Not at all, Reese,” young Donnerjack said, looking up at the older man with interest. He was aware of a certain sense of ritual in the occasion, almost a coming of age. Obscurely, he felt he would be a different person when Reese had renamed him. “What name do you think would fit?”
“Well, we could call you by your middle name, but I think ‘D’Arcy’ would be a bit too pompous. It adds a certain ring to the whole, but no… not by itself.”
“Okay.”
“‘John’ is a particularly fruitful name for diminutives,” the old man continued. “It gives us both ‘Johnny’ and ‘Jack.’ You do not strike me as a ‘Johnny’ and ‘Jack Donnerjack’ sounds like something from a nursery rhyme.”
Caltrice, who had been listening, head just above the water, green hair trailing out, a Sargasso Sea in miniature, laughed—a pleasant sound like the plashing of waves. Young Donnerjack frowned serious agreement and nodded for Reese to continue.
“Then, since you are named for your father, you are also a Junior. Together with your given name that makes you ‘John Junior’ which is a bit of a mouthful. It shortens to ‘JJ’ of course.”
Reese Jordan glanced at the serious mien of the young man seated next to him. Even barefoot, with his toes trailing in the water of Caltrice’s pool, he was clearly no more a “JJ” than he was a “Johnny.”
“But then there is simply ‘Jay.’ It is a name with great possibilities.
It recalls your given name quite nicely and it invokes a number of rather tidy totemic images.”
“Totemic images?” young Donnerjack repeated, entranced.
“Why, yes. There is the letter itself—a clean simple curve like a fishhook in print, a double curve like an infinity symbol slightly askew in cursive. There is also a class of birds called ‘jays.’ Blue, more commonly than not, scavengers and thieves, some say, but with an eye for things of value as well. They warn other animals of predators and do not hesitate to band together against their enemies. They are related to ravens and crows. ‘Jay.’ What do you think?”
“I like it,” said John D’Arcy Donnerjack, Junior.
“Then it shall be so,” said Reese Jordan, and with a fine sense of ceremony, he cupped a handful of water from Caltrice’s pool and baptized the boy with his new name.
Lounging on the bank, the dog Mizar, who recalled neither his making nor his naming, beat his tail on the grass in applause. He did not realize that this same tail had once had another cable, a thick one of dark red. Nor would he have cared to know of his earlier self. Alone of those from Death’s realm who watched over and played with the boy, he knew nothing of his first master and, knowing nothing, neither did he care.
“Jay,” said the boy aloud and oddly happy. “Jay.”
Then he was overwhelmed by emotions far too complex and too confusing to bear. With a whoop and a leap, he jumped into the pool, splashing Reese thoroughly and almost, almost succeeding in grabbing Caltrice by a trailing strand of her seaweed hair.
And on days when Reese was not available, Jay Donnerjack would slip off with Phecda, Mizar, Dubhe, or Alioth to explore the multilevel world of Virtu. Ruined cities, empty cities, vacated boardrooms, gymnasiums, brothels—they could feel their way into the downsides of things not being used. And jungles, mountains, beaches, Escherscapes, deserts, and the undersides of seas were all places they viewed and explored.