Also me, adds Isabella moreover, thrusting her gun outward in a display of it.
Yeah! enthusiastically shrieks the crowd, drunk with the taste of the attackers’ blood in their collective, gaping, and toothy mouth. And though they can only imagine how this blood might taste, the taste is quite visceral, as though they’ve once before torn open some invader’s throat to feast on the clots of putrid gore that froth forth like the carbonated eruptions from a thousand shaken-up bottles of cider.
It’s really obvious that the people are willing to do anything they can to stop the evil force from taking away everything they believe in. Even risk their lives. Even kill. That is just how much the city means to them.
That is. How much. It means.
Are we all in together now? questioningly bellow Gregory Eternity and Isabella in stereophonic dual tonality.
Yeah, deafeningly responds the crowd in kind.
Then to the shores, thunders Gregory Eternity, for that is where we shall meet them!
OLPERT COULD NOT recall the last time he’d held hands with anyone, let alone a grown man, let alone a strange boy. A classmate’s maybe, buddied up on a fieldtrip as a kid. Had his grandfather ever held his hand? No, it seemed impossible — in fact up sprung a memory of trying to take the old man’s hand in the crowd flooding out of a Maroons game. He’d recoiled and growled, What are we, going steady?
Thirty-some years later, here Olpert was hand in hand with Gip and Sam wading across the Islet. The water had quickly reached halfway up the ground floor of every permanent residence and summerhome and cottage and cabin and beach house. In the deepest spots Olpert wrapped an arm around Gip’s waist and heaved him out of the water, placidly the boy allowed himself to be moved. From the ticket booth to the ferrydock arched a little bridge, now each end disappeared into lakewater, the docks were submerged. Olpert led Sam and Gip up to the walkway’s midpoint, let go of their hands, and said, We’re okay, it’s dry here, we’ll just wait for the ferry across.
We’ll wait here, said Sam. The towel frothed over his eyes, and from the breastpocket of his stolen NFLM shirt protruded the TV remote.
Olpert looked across the Cove: islandside the Ferryport was empty, no one lined up, there was no ferry in sight. Bay Junction seemed closed. Beneath the walkway flowed a river, household items floated past: a wicker trashcan, an empty pack of Redapples, some sort of manuscript, all those pages ant-trailed with type, plastic bags by the dozens — most from Bargain Zoom.
Hey, look, said Gip, pointing. People.
Around the Islet’s eastern promontory appeared a strange convoy of watercraft. Roped to a central rowboat heaped with boxes and furniture were four canoes, two paddlers in each, a passenger hunkered amidships. Bongos harmonized each paddlestroke as the flotilla progressed into Perint’s Cove.
Hello, hello! Olpert shouted. Help, help!
Gip echoed him: Hello, help!
The southerly wind caught and swept their voices back over the Islet. None of the canoeists broke rhythm, the drums kept time. Shrill clear instructions came across the water: Stay together, everyone stay together!
The woman in the yellow bandana sterned the lead boat. In the bow, digging into the water as though trying to tunnel out the other side, was her grizzly partner. Between them someone’s child knocked bongos. In another boat were the two men and the woman who’d fled the roominghouse that morning. Twelve people in alclass="underline" the entire Islet community, save Olpert and Sam.
Face pointed toward the Cove, Sam was shouting, his words garbled.
Save us please, called Gip, his voice reedy as a blade of grass and just as effortlessly rebuffed by the wind.
They can’t hear you, said Olpert.
A pillow floated past.
Across Perint’s Cove the silver miracle of the city gleamed against a cerulean backdrop of sky. The drums were fading. A seagull screeched by overhead, two sharp cries of despair or mockery, and swooped out over the lake.
What do we do? said Gip. I’ve got to get back, I told you. I’m the one!
Sam said, I don’t know how to swim okay.
Olpert stared at all that water. I don’t know if I know how to swim.
Sam said, We need a boat.
Do you have a boat? Where can we find a boat?
I could build a boat.
What? You could?
If there was time.
Olpert looked back over the Islet. All that remained were treetops and the second storeys of the taller houses. He imagined the roominghouse on the far shore, waves nudging the upstairs windows, begging to be let in. Maybe even pouring in.
Oh no, he said. Jessica.
Jessica? said Gip.
She’s trapped. We’ve abandoned her. I —
Olpert pictured her terrarium churned to mud, a little mole-nose valiantly sniffing for air — and water smothering it. He reached for the bridge’s railing for support. And, steadied, discovered something bright and brave shining through his despair. It took him a moment to identify: courage.
I have to rescue her, said Olpert.
You can’t leave me! wailed Gip. I have to get over there and finish Raven’s illustration because I’m the one, he told me so.
But Olpert was already wading back into the water. I’ll be two minutes, he said, just wait here. And, in a voice he hoped was not ridiculous, but the brassy baritone of a hero, he added, And then I’ll take us across!
LET ME GO, said the Mayor.
You’re certain? If that’s what you wish, Mrs. Mayor, of course, I’m happy to set you loose. You’re aware what’s below, I assume?
Wait.
Yes?
Where does it end.
This? Oh, you know. I’m not sure it exactly ends. Though I can’t say for sure.
What does that mean. Can you say something that’s an actual thing, please. Everything’s just words with you.
Words are things. Words aren’t things?
Answer my question: if you let me go what will happen.
Oh, I don’t know. Who can say? Doesn’t what happens just happen?
The Mayor was silent. Raven rocked her gently, almost lovingly — with a hand? a foot? Or might this just be some telekinetic capacity he had? With a tremor of horror, she wondered if, beyond a voice, he was even there at all.
Ventriloquist, spectre — whatever he might be, he was speaking again: It’s hard enough to just be somebody, let alone try to make everyone else a little bit more of themselves. What do people want? How can one know when they don’t even know?
What are you talking about. I want my body back. I want to get out of here. I didn’t want any of this. I just wanted everyone to have a nice weekend. I even thought it might be fun. Make it normal. You need to fix what you’ve done. That’s what I want!
What’s normal? Isn’t normal what I’ve been trying to show you? And by normal I mean the truth — the normal, quiet truth beneath the clatter of your busy city lives. Though did I achieve such truth this time? I have my doubts. I can’t judge it myself, as I’m within it, you see? Who knows, I say what I do aren’t illusions, but maybe they are. Maybe they’re just lies. Don’t truths which no longer entertain become lies?
You’ve put an entire city in chaos. That’s what I think. That’s the truth.
Surely it is the acts of people that destroy them? At most I merely provide the means.
This is pointless.
I wonder, the people — are they at least afraid? Are they truly afraid?
You need to put right what you’ve done.
No. Mrs. Mayor, I shan’t. Not yet. It’s so delightful down here, away from it all, and it’s good to chat with you. I’m in no hurry to go anywhere. Are you? To what?