Shuttered Sky

The path was coming toward the end of the wood, and the bare gray walls of the plant loomed between the thinning pines. Tessic stopped, and turned to her.

“Do you believe in God, Lieutenant Haas?”

She hadn’t expected the question. “I can’t see how my beliefs are your business.”

“The way I see it, there are only two possibilities,” Tessic said. “Either there is purpose and meaning to our lives, or there is not, and everything is random and meaningless.”

“I’m not surprised you see everything in binary.”

Again he laughed. “That’s all everything comes down to, isn’t it? Zeros and ones? The separation of light from dark on the first day of creation.”

“And which do you believe in Mr. Tessic? The zero, or the one?” Oddly, she found herself actually caring about his response.

“I’m a practical man. The way I see it nothing can be gained by believing in a meaningless world. No accomplishments would be worth celebrating, no comfort in success. When you see life as mean­ingless, no amount of money in the world can buy the joy you desire. I’ve always found it practical to hold to the other alternative: that there is meaning and greater purpose to life.” He casually brushed some pine needles from his vicuna overcoat. “And so my trappings of success do not trap me. For that same reason, I believe there must be a purpose for the existence of Dillon Cole—and I can assure you it is not to rejuvenate livestock and despots.”

“I wouldn’t have pegged you as a spiritual man.”

He nodded. “9906753,” he said, and at first offered no explanation. A phone number, she thought. Was this all just an elaborate come-on? His offhand demeanor darkened then, become a shade more sol­emn, “My mother was a survivor of the death camps. Did you know? The rest of her family died in the gas chambers.”

“I’m sorry.”

“A few years ago, I arranged for her to undergo laser surgery to remove the number on her arm, but she refused. For her it was a battle scar. 9906753. A badge of courage and a reminder of those lost.”

Another officer jogged past them, this one a bit more interested in their presence than the first. He caught their gazes, but offered nothing more than a quick “g’morning” as he passed. It got them both moving again toward the plant.

“You see, Lieutenant, I must have faith that there is justice,” Tessic said before he left her. “Punishment for the wicked, and liberation for the innocent.”

And as Maddy went to prepare for her new assignment, she couldn’t help but wonder what Tessic was planning, the punishment or the liberation.

7. Slugger

Transcription excerpt, day 201. 13:29 hours

“Do you think I’m evil, Maddy?”

“That depends—are you going to share that sundae?”

“No, I’m serious.”

“Why should you care what I think?”

“People out there think I’m God or the devil, and they don’t leave room for anything in between. I want to know there’s someone who can see me as human.”

“I wouldn’t be here feeding you if I thought you weren’t human.”

“If the Shards are agents of evil, here to end the world, I wouldn’t be too pleased about that, but I’d understand it. If we were spat out here to be gods, I could understand that, too.”

“From what I hear, you’ve been both those places.”

“And so I know it’s wrong. There’s some other purpose, I just can’t figure it out.”

“You’ve been in lockdown for six months, and you still haven’t gotten over yourself?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Just because you are what you are, it doesn’t ordain some grand purpose. Maybe it’s your purpose to sit here, and be fed by me. Have you ever thought of that?”

“You don’t believe that, Maddy. Any more than you believe it’s your purpose to feed me.”

* * *

Eighteen hundred miles away, a dentist with no future was called to service in a war against Dillon, and the Shards. Martin Briscoe was, in fact, the perfect candidate, as his mind had been sharp­ened and focused into a weapon by a single image that plagued him.

It was the image of his dead wife and son that obliterated most every­thing else in Martin Briscoe’s mind. He was particularly focused on the day he had been fired, and then saw the angels.

“How are things, Marty? Getting better?” His afternoon began in a conference. Banning, who sat at the head of the marble conference table, took the lead. He was a blowfish of a man with such bad breath that his patients preferred to be knocked out rather than endure his halitosis on novocaine. They all must have heaved a collective sigh of relief when he gave up the drill for dental administration. He was the type of officious asshole who would add an “a” in front of a patient’s name, as if their little dental factory wasn’t impersonal enough.

“Fine, fine. Couldn’t be better.” It was a rote response, geared at curtailing any further interrogation. It wasn’t anyone’s goddamned business how he was. Martin sat down, grinning at the half-dozen faces seated around the table. None of the associates of Eureka Dental had much of a poker face; they telegraphed their intentions long before saying them aloud. “Actually,” Martin added, “I’m having a marvelous day.”

The clutch of dentists looked to one another with that troubled, self-important gaze, like members of a secret society. Yes, Martin knew why they were gathered, and he was going to force them to go through the exercise in slow, tortured strokes. Let them be the ones to suffer the pain of this particular extraction.

Judith the Compassionate was the next to speak. “We’ve had even more complaints, Marty—from quite a variety of your patients.” She glanced down at a folder in front of her. “I have them right here— would you care to look them over?”

Martin grinned, imagining that they were all bobbing heads in a shooting gallery, and he was firing away with the disgruntled joy of a postal worker. “No thanks.”

Banning the Halitoxic snatched the folder away from Judith and Hipped through the pages.

“A Mrs. Susan Bernstein claims that you injected her daughter’s novocaine right through her tongue.

What’s the problem? The little bitch is pierced just about everywhere else. Martin only grinned. Banning continued.

“And a Tommy Watkins claims that you carved your initials in his molar.”

Just like he’s been tagging his initials all over town. The spray paint was still on his fingertips. Martin only grinned. Banning angrily flipped a page.

“And now, a Mr. Fisher claims that this very morning, you urinated into his rinse sink during your examination! I couldn’t believe it!”

“I could,” mumbled one of Banning’s minions.

Banning slapped the grievance folder on the table for emphasis “Good God, what were you thinking?!”

That Fisher was a prick in a power tie who deserved a little piss on his life. “Listen, I’ve got a pulpotomy in ten, are we almost through here?”

The tribunal of dental pharisees gave each other hot-potato glances, wondering who would deliver the bad tidings. Banning, of course took the initiative. “We know you’ve suffered great loss, Marty. No one should have to bear the death of a wife and child—God knows we all feel for you . . . but behavior like this. . . Well, whatever the reason, we just can’t tolerate it any longer.”

And then the potato went round.

“You’ve left us vulnerable to a dozen lawsuits.”