Authors: Walter Basho
“What’s going on?” the Old Person asked. He asked it gently, like they were greeting each other on a walk.
“Stop him, Brother Richard,” the commander said. “Make him stop. Please.”
Albert took a dry swallow and then spoke. He projected for the crowd. “Hello, Hail, Brother Richard. Sir. Sir, our leader fails to understand the distinction between discipline and abuse. It’s hurting our morale. I’ve asked him to correct his course. He had a particularly poor moment.” For a second, then, he became aware of himself. His words felt like Adept words, from the military training and the schooling that Sister Alice had passed to him. He felt strong and clever.
“He’s lying, Brother Richard,” the commander pleaded. “He’s a traitor.”
Richard looked at each of them for a moment. Then, he said, “Albert, Nikola. May I take a moment to observe your memories?”
“Yes, sir,” Albert said. “Thank you for asking.” The commander whimpered an assent, the sword still at his neck.
Richard closed his eyes, held still for a couple of moments, then opened them with an exhalation. “Albert, you’re obviously being insubordinate. You’re also right.
“Nikola, dear. This isn’t working out. We talked about this, yes? About this need to dominate others to feel secure. We agreed it wouldn’t become a problem, didn’t we? But now, here we are, and you are contributing negatively to the effort.”
Nikola started crying. His last bits of dignity flooded out of him. Richard kneeled beside Nikola and almost invisibly moved Albert’s sword away as he did so. He touched Nikola on the forehead.
“There, there. Don’t blame yourself. I made an error in judgment. This is a new world, and it can be difficult.”
Nikola curled his big head into Richard’s tiny shoulder and wailed.
“We’ll send you back with some supplies. You’ll meet Brother Calvin at the outskirts of the Old City encampment. We will help you work through this.”
Richard then looked at Albert. “So. You are the commander now.”
“What?” Albert said. “I mean, excuse me, sir?”
“You’ve just undermined this one’s authority and made a successful argument against his ability to do the job. What would you suggest I do?”
“I don’t know. Shouldn’t you punish me, send me back or lock me up or something?”
Float me up a mile in the sky with a magic box and then drop me?
Richard smiled. “I’m trying an experiment. Let’s hope I don’t regret this decision, dear. Please allow Nikola to stand.”
Richard walked Nikola away. Everyone turned to Albert and stared.
Albert turned to Aengus. “The boat’s all right?”
Aengus and the soldier next to him nodded dumbly in unison.
“Right,” Albert said. “So, I guess we need to make a perimeter.”
+ + +
The next morning, he received a note from Brother Richard, calling him into the Adepts’ camp for a first briefing. The Adepts camped several yards away from the troops, on clearer and more even ground. The tents gleamed in Albert’s view as he approached. They were a clean white, formed of the same oiled canvas used for sails, sturdy and waterproof. They were laid out at right angles, with good spacing in between. Albert and Aengus slept in a tent made of animal skins and shellacked wool, with plenty of leaks, and they had one of the best in the militia.
Albert approached the center tent. Richard emerged just as he came to the entry. Albert reared back and yelped.
“Nothing to fear here, Albert,” Richard said.
“Thank you. I’m still not used to, um.” Albert stopped himself.
Richard gave back a smile, wry but open. “It’s fine. Please come in.”
Sunlight cast a warm beige glow through the canvas. Beds and animal skins covered the ground, and a long but very low wooden table sat in the far corner. The table held a desperately organized set of books and papers: military history, maps with arrows, but also some diagrams that Albert recognized from Thomas’s physics. One map was marked up extensively with pins and with lines and dots in many colors of ink.
“I’ll make some tea, Albert,” Richard said.
“Thank you, please, or, that is, you don’t have to, I can make tea . . .”
“That’s kind of you to offer, dear. I’m fine. Please sit.”
He did. The stool was like a baby’s stool, but he managed to squat on it. He looked over the papers on the table. He tried to scoot closer to the table but banged his knees on the edge of it. “These are the plans for the incursion?”
Richard nodded. “This is Terra Baixa. You know from your lessons at school, yes? This,” he pointed, “is us. This, here, is our destination. The march will take a few weeks. First, we will wait here for all our troops to assemble, and then we will take the front to the Baixans.”
“Will we have surprise on our side?”
“I doubt it. We’re very visible, even now. We have a significant advantage in numbers, though. Were I a Baixan, I would feel a sense of inevitability about it.”
“Won’t they send some Administrators to negotiate with us or something, then?”
Richard smiled and patted his hand. “They don’t have Administrators, Albert.” He looked directly at Albert in that Adept way, eye contact that didn’t break, no matter how uncomfortable it got.
“They aren’t organized in the sense that we are. That’s much of the point. We assume many things about how people work, how groups work: those things are not true here. There is no central Administration to negotiate with. There’s only us, against the chaos that is Terra Baixa.”
“But they attacked us and want to invade us. Right? How can they do that if they don’t have an Administration?”
“
Invade
is a strong word.” Richard paused. “There’s no doubt that they are aggressive. They were lashing out at us, and we had to respond.”
He took a longer pause, lost in thought. “I could hear some skepticism in your voice just then, yes? Please trust that we are doing the right thing here. We will tame the chaos here and bring our civilization to Terra Baixa. I know you can see the benefit in that. Your parents made their way across this land. They told you stories about this place, didn’t they?”
Albert nodded.
“When we finish, Terra Baixa will be a happier place, like the White Island. That alone will make this all worth it.”
Albert shrugged.
“How are your troops?” Richard asked.
“I think they’re glad to have someone human in charge. They talk to me a lot.”
Richard smoothed out his robe. “That’s to be expected. And how are you? Are you well?”
Albert said the first thing that came to his mind, surprising himself. “I saw Thomas—Thomas Newton—at the Abyss. Where is he now?”
Richard smiled, squeezed Albert’s hand, and looked him in the eye. Even though Richard was standing, their eyes were almost level. “Of course. Thomas trains right now at our support camp in the Old City. In London.” Albert blinked and gasped when Richard used the sacred name for the Old City. “He’s part of a program we’ve undertaken. We are teaching the next generation of Administrators about war and how it should be waged. This is the first war we’ll fight, but it won’t be the last, unfortunately. War is an engine of civilization.”
Richard poured a tiny draw of the steeping tea into his cup, checked it, then put the pot and cup back down.
“The future lies in the growth of Thomas and other Administrators, Albert. We and the Adepts can only begin civilization. For it to last, you must learn to civilize yourselves.
“You miss Thomas, don’t you? It’s fine to miss him. You two were very close.”
Albert wanted to speak but kept silent.
“Full disclosure, Albert: primogeniture is part of the experiment. Do you know what that is?”
“I don’t.” Albert paused for a moment. A guess popped into his mind. “Something to do with Administrators and marriage?”
“You’re right, Albert! Such a quick mind. Primogeniture existed before the apocalypse, for hundreds and hundreds of years. In these early stages, we need to manage the economy of Administration, to ensure a continuity of property and rule. Primogeniture helps us do that. It keeps things stable. It had faded away from our world before apocalypse, but when we first began rebuilding, we thought it might have some value as a model.”
“I don’t see the point. Why this one man and one woman rule for Administrators? It makes things less resilient. Less adaptable.”
Richard smiled, took the lid from the teapot, looked inside, then put it back. “Good. It’s a valid question. I would argue that it’s more about the children than the marriage, and that, at this early stage, stability supersedes resilience and adaptability. But I’m certainly open to a healthy discussion.” He tented his fingers before his face, tapped them against each other.
“More disclosure, Albert, to reward your thinking. We first introduced primogeniture with a range of experiments: a range of genders, numbers. We were wary of bringing an antiquated model back to the world. The Administrator class took strongly to marriage as we have it now, though. They liked the strictness of it.
“These aren’t hard rules. We’re trying things, and we may change. Frankly, it’s trivial that you and Thomas are both male. If your union would move progress forward, we’d find other individuals to help you all produce children. It’s not difficult.” Richard then paused, smoothed out his robe again, and returned to the tea. Albert felt something on the edges of him.
He got excited. He said more than he planned to
, Albert thought.
“Our union wouldn’t do that, though.” Albert said. He felt cold. “Because I’m not an Administrator. The problem isn’t that we’re both boys. The problem is that I’m common.”
Richard gave a furtive stare at him, said, “No, of course not, dear. You . . .” then stopped himself, locked his gaze to the teapot, and said: “Yes. Perhaps that will change someday. But, yes.”
Richard poured into tiny cups. He placed one before Albert with his small, delicate hands. He closed Albert’s right hand around the teacup and gently touched a spot on it, the tender point where thumb and forefinger meet.
Then he spoke. “There are the systems that organize us, and then there are our lives themselves. We have to respect the systems. Without them, there is no meaning. In my enthusiasm, though, I sometimes forget when God is in the details.”
Albert, confused, looked at him helplessly.
“I could say I’ve had to deal with far worse in my life. And I have: far, far worse. But that’s not the point. I’m sorry, Albert. Drink your tea, child.”
Albert drank. It was perfect: full and the perfect temperature. It smelled like flowers. Albert had never tasted anything like it. “Thank you, sir.”
Richard looked at him a moment and then put a hand to Albert’s face. It felt like a child’s hand. “Of course, son. This new world, with its big, sad boys.”
+ + +
They built a beachhead. They found a decent source of water, and set up routines for fishing and hunting, and scheduled patrols and defenses. Albert had to think differently: organizations and dependencies, individuals working in concert, the orchestration of work and people. It was complex. He’d helped his parents with the farm for years, though, and knew complexity.
The beachhead grew over the weeks, with troops arriving from the west of the White Island and from the Green Island, which lay beyond. The rocky cliffs in the north of the Green Island held immense power. Every Adept trained in the shadow of those cliffs. Every Adept was created there.
Albert and Aengus went to the shore to greet the Green Island’s boats when they first arrived. The troops from the Green Island wore breastplates and gorgets made of beautiful black iron, the handiwork superior to anything the White Island could yet produce. They saw the tallest and meanest-looking of them and assumed he was Peter, the commander from the Green Island. Aengus gave the salute they had been taught in training. Peter started laughing, then kissed Aengus full on the mouth, then punched him in the shoulder, hard. “They taught the babies well,” he said. He looked at Albert. “What are you supposed to be?” he asked.
“I command the White Island’s troops,” Albert said.
“Do you, now?” Peter leaned in toward Albert. “They’re playing army games with you now? I guess I shouldn’t be surprised.” He sniffed at Albert, then cleared his throat and spat at his feet.
Albert stood taller and put his hand on the hilt of his sword. Before he could do anything more, Peter shoved him hard, sending him back several feet.
“Don’t do something that will get you killed,” Peter said. “Stay out of our fucking way. That goes for both you and your troops.” He walked away without another word.
The camp and the exposed beach were a mere lip on the edge of the vast hills and forests of Baixa. They watched the woods intently, but nothing emerged from the Baixan forest onto the beach. Albert would sit with the camp guards sometimes. He talked most often with Henry, who was from the Western coast of the White Island, a place called the Horn. Henry had sailed to the Green Island before.
“We went a few times. You lived by the water, too, didn’t you? You never got on a boat?”
“I’ve been on a boat, sure. My father and I would sail up and down the channel,” Albert said. “We just never sailed that far. My parents had traveled for years. They didn’t want to go anywhere.”
“We went a few times to pick up Adepts. That’s where they come from,” Henry said. “They don’t have to use a boat. They can open doors and go anywhere, is what my mother said. I don’t know why they took a boat. Maybe they wanted to be more like us.”
“What was the Green Island like?” Albert asked.
“It’s like magic, like you’re dreaming when you’re there,” Henry said. “The Green Island is madness. All you folk from the east, I don’t think you’d be able to handle it.”
“We can barely handle being here,” Albert said.
One day, Albert found Aengus comforting a soldier in their tent. He stepped back out to give them some privacy.
“I want to go home,” he could hear the soldier sniffling from within the tent. “I just want to go home.”
“I know, I know. We all do,” Aengus said. “It’s going to be all right. We’re doing a good thing. We’ll tell our children about these days. They’ll be proud of us.”