NEWDIE STEADSLAW

The seven forty-seven sighed and closed its eyes as it glode through the air, feeling the cool wind upon its wings, the warm sun upon its back, and it—finally free from Lopkit-induced shenanigans—enjoyed the serenity of flight, the provenance of its lineage, and the glory of its sure fate. It did not notice when some parachutists approached it in stealth and snuck aboard via the drinks service, entering first class—classy ’chutists indeed, entering unnoticed, as they did, and opting for the opulentest locale available. They found it a long-empty series of chambers as good as catacombs; a predictable result, seeing as how nobody had that kind of money nowadays—and yet, the airline companies left the carrot to entice losers to unmake their station—not for their own personal development, of course, but for the fundage they could potentially provide companyward—but every day the compartment went unrented, and every day its price rose, until no one knew how to yearn so loftily, excepting the kings whose greed was boundless—though everyone’s always is. Well, never mind the corporations’ woes; that’s a problem for the shareholders to bite their lips over.

Now, those parachutists numbered two, an easily-countable number on a Monday like this. The first was a fox—not a goat—named Tuberlone, who wore a handsome suit and had a brain of diamond. The second was the most beautiful lady in the land, and she had golden hair, and all of her eyes were pitch-black, and she was named Jum Burie. Tuberlone and Jum Burie disquipped their parachute assemblages and took note of the loneliness in which they found themselves.

Tuberlone spoke first, and it said, “Is this the place?”

Jum Burie gazed at nothing, standing about with the exaggerated calm of a suite of additional senses. “The path leads here.” She paused, and was perhaps thinking. “I don’t make mistakes.”

“I don’t claim you did,” said Tuberlone, eyeing Jum Burie. “And where from here?”

Tuberlone took in the sights—what sights there were, anyway—casting its eyes here and there and in between, probably in case anything spottable might have value. Jum Burie had, of course, already seen everything seeable in their environs, and had not seen the one thing she sought. They had pursued the anthophilian trail thus far, and at here it began lacking. The commissar had known no further—she would have to admit that.

“There’s no one here,” said Jum Burie.

“I’m aware of that,” said Tuberlone. “Do we need to go find someone?”

After a breath, Jum Burie said, “No.”

“Then, where does the path go from here?” said Tuberlone.

Jum Burie hesitated—defiantly, as far as she could tell. “No trace remains,” she said. Afore Tuberlone could demand the obvious, she added, “I do not want to—”

“You must,” said Tuberlone.

“It’s taxing,” Jum Burie said.

“Taxing! To you? I find that hard to believe,” said Tuberlone. “Let us not delay. Follow me. There’s sure to be someone around here, somewhere—”

Tuberlone glanced down, and around its feet it saw a small woodwind orchestra as it—or “they,” depending on the seaside—crawled out from between the ridges of a dime and attempted to stage a coup on stage, but ere the ’chestra could raise a ruckus towards anyone’s consternation, a sensible lettuce arrove, juggling the best basket, and ready to throw dice until a snake could see, and—

“Follow me,” said Tuberlone to Jum Burie. They both left and went to the porthole to economy class. Tuberlone strode with purpose; if it had never been in this place before, it was untellable, for it exuded a great sureness as it passed through the tangling tunnels in the staff quarters and archery ranges ’tween first and economy classes, and Jum Burie, too, walked with head held high—the good ol’ three-aitch stance—and feet firmly falling—the three-eff stance, a little more newer, you might not know it yet—but to her was a different air, if any.

Tuberlone opened an arbitrary door; it was a broom closet, but it was unempty, and occupied currently by a shoeshine boy watching vids on his fly celly. Upon the interruption, he soaply dropped the device and turned into a different shoeshine boy—one without a fly celly.

“Shine your shoeses for you twoses?” the boy said.

That didn’t seem to be necessary; Tuberlone’s shoes were in immaculate condition, and Jum Burie—well... never mind about that.

Tuberlone swiftly installed an orrery, as empty as it was accurate, and scanned it with an eye upon the shoeshine boy. It was all for show, of course, and what a show it could make—not now, not now. Not this time. That was a stunt for the younger generation; it’d gone well past that era now. As for what was in the orrery, Tuberlone saw and knew it surely, and kept it away from everyone else.

“Jum,” said Tuberlone, nodding to the boy, “he will suffice.”

Jum Burie glared at the boy as he decorated no cakes, narrowing her pitch-black eyes and perceiving him in ways he would never know. She turned to Tuberlone. “Do you think he knows enough?” said Jum Burie. “A child at home in a closet?”

“Find out, then,” said Tuberlone.

Jum Burie stiffened and took a slow breath as Tuberlone met her gaze. At last, she said, “Fine.” She turned to the shoeshine boy.

“Won’t cost but a tuppence!” said the shoeshine boy. He shook a megalomaniacal beer bottle, hoping to find the rhythm or the rhyme.

“We’re looking for someone,” said Jum Burie. Tuberlone shook its head. “Have you seen them?”

“Me? Seen?” said the shoeshine boy. “That’s not even a thing! It’s just me here, always been. Me an’ my conch!”

The shoeshine boy took from his pocketbook a conch shell, and set it upon an ice skating rink, where he named it Toby Skirtout, the First Marbleer. Toby drew a long cigarette from the scabbard of a saber of a twelfth-century cavalryman, who was named Toby Skirtout, the Second Marbleer—in this case, a linguic fluke in the seeming match, for “Marbleer” was Old Berianese for “pickle-eater,” and “Second”—well, let’s just say that the pickle nation had an advisory against non-essential travel in Beria.

“A man who came aboard from the sky,” said Jum Burie. “I should think that event would stand out.”

The shoeshine boy, Toby, and Toby shared looks amongst themselves and kept them that way—and looking was all they had, for they had no language in common, Berianese being a wholly separate branch which no one knew where it came from. I mean: which from where it came, no one knew—I think that’s right. Anyway, at a length, the shoeshine boy said, “What sky? I been told to stay under the seat cushions ’til we’ve surfaced!” He gasped, and went on, saying, “Wait, you ain’t tellin’ me we breached now, are ya?”

“Jum,” said Tuberlone. “You are wasting time.”

“We waste more time if he doesn’t know everything,” said Jum Burie.

“He knows enough,” said Tuberlone.

Toby and Toby—never to be called “The Tobies” unless you want your nose broke—glazed the worst part of a ham in the best possible way, and parted without paring or pairing, and so were shoeless, which was the secret to their friendening of the shoeshine boy—unshod as they were, their contact was surely unwork-related, and could be taken as genuine. In order to cement their deep acquaintanceship, they filled a trophy with just about the worst sort of thing you could fill a trophy with: washed beans.

“So,” said Jum Burie, “you are useless.”

“Not so!” said the shoeshine boy, engazing at Jum Burie’s feet. “You want those polished or not?”

“No,” said Jum Burie.

Jum Burie lifted one of her feet up high, and then with force brought it down—and the shoeshine boy, Toby, and Toby were gone.

“Jum!” said Tuberlone. “What do you think you’re doing?”

“Nothing,” said Jum Burie, without malice.

“I can see that,” said Tuberlone, with malice.

“He was a poor choice,” said Jum Burie.

“We can’t afford these delays,” said Tuberlone. “Don’t do that again. Do you understand me?”

“I understand,” said Jum Burie, looking at nothing.

“Don’t be difficult,” said Tuberlone, striding to Jum Burie and glaring up at her. “Remember, you have a duty. We both do.”

“I remember my duty,” said Jum Burie, each word a perfect match for the space the sound filled.

“Good,” said Tuberlone. “Now, let’s go. Follow me.”

They moved on, and it came to pass that they found a wide-open and deserted land, and wandered it swiftly, due to their competence, and at the far end of this bleak place they crossed a grand canyon. Just a grand canyon. It wasn’t that grand, really, but it was the only one on the plane, so by default, y’know. And, while its maw spanned a mile, a kilometer, and a secret, third thing, Jum Burie and Tuberlone were not met by difficulty in this endeavor, and so it barely bears mentioning, one would think—but the grand canyon took such offense to being crossed that it rose up against them and blared its challenge.

“No one crosses me in such a manner!” said the grand canyon. “Well, you’ve done it, at least—then, say no one double-crosses me! Aye, I’m a single-use pit, that’s for truth!”

Tuberlone and Jum Burie attempted to pay no heed to its words, but it was all around them, and its noise was manifold, as the sonics of its voice echoed in its self, the reverberations mounting, speech filling up the lakebeds and long-dried riverways, until all there was, for a moment, was the sound of sound, filling the sky, shaking the land, and endarkening all the light they could see.

Tuberlone strode onward.

“I’ll cross you again, if you wish,” said Jum Burie with a glare and a stare and without a care.

“Oh? You think you’ve that kind of way?” said the grand canyon.

“Jum,” said Tuberlone impatiently, “let’s move on. We have work to do.” It did not look backwards at whatever Jum Burie was doing over there. She would follow.

“It’s irritating,” said Jum Burie.

“Ear and taters?” said the grand canyon, for, with the sound of its own echoes spilling over, sounding out others’ words was a handful past its capacity, but the threat of spuds was an untakable menace, and so the canyon rose up and gathered to its abundance a throng of majors and miners, each bearing a stake and a steak, and they formed a pyramid shape in how they stood, and bore their arms, ten and two, which glinted in the fluorescent light.

Jum Burie looked at this sight.

“Jum,” said Tuberlone.

Then Jum Burie turned her back on them and they were gone.

And then, finally, Tuberlone and Jum Burie passed through the saloon doors and there was the discotheque, wherein were the gathered dancing folk—or rather, the gathered folk, for there was no hint of dancing any longer. Their number was a thousand and a thousand more—but, who’s counting?—and they rung about the corpse of the fallen disco ball, and each of them had a pixel of rhinestone in one of their hands, and a tub of Orangutan Glue™ in another, deigning to see the ball mended, restored to its holy position as their mentor and teacher, to rise above them once more, and shine with the inmost light, the beacon of glory, mascot of holy ways, the legend that once lived among them, and, were the gods willing, would live once more.

Tuberlone must have seen what lay ahead, for it said, “Jum, work quickly. Remain focused on the task at hand. Anyone here should do well enough—they seem at least to be half-wits.”

Jum Burie beheld Tuberlone, weighed its orders, and then beheld the gathered folk. “What transpires?” she said.

“Just work quickly,” Tuberlone repeated. “We have not the time for any more distractions.”

Alas for Tuberlone, it and Jum Burie had not evaded notice—the gathered folk saw this dismatched pair, and, with unsmotherable nascent curiosity, carefully stepped toward them in a normal fashion, attempting not to bely their traditional gyrating ways.

“Who’s this?” said the gathered folk. “Who’s you? You’ve come requestless? Put a little point to your presence, won’t you?” They had, after all, been recently byejilled, and were eager not to reexperience it, or anything akin to it.

“We’re looking for someone,” said Jum Burie. “Have you seen him? Say the words of your past, if you have any.”

“Might be we did,” said the gathered folk. “Might be we didn’t did. What’s it to you? Who’re you to us? Wait—are you guys cops?”

Jum Burie looked at Tuberlone. Not for answers.

“No,” said Tuberlone, “we’re not cops.”

“Oh!” said the gathered folk. “Well, now things’re different! We can say more. So, look and behold! Our maestro, the fathomless disco ball, has been sundered. We’re wayward now. Who’ll lead the dance for us? Who’ll show us the steps? No one, that’s who! ’less you, or you two, have some glue to spare? Put some glimmer back in our boy—stat, if you don’t mind!”

The gathered folk, who were creeping past their wits’ ends, pressed themselves too close to Jum Burie and Tuberlone, and even as Tuberlone’s countenance was twisted by the delay applied to them—or mayhap an odor-related displeasure—Jum Burie looked at it for answers. She did not need to say her well-known questions.

“As I said—half-wits,” said Tuberlone. “Dancing is too dangerous to be permitted. Better for all that you stay stopped.”

“What? You’ll forbid us?” laughed the gathered folk. “On what grounds? Oh, but on grounds! But, in airs? Oh, no law’ll come for us here! We dance to our hearts’ content and then a little more! Or can it be that you know a move or two yourself? Perhaps you’re next—to take up the pose of our leader? Shake something and call it a test!”

Now Tuberlone looked to Jum Burie and said nothing but glared. She could have been silent, she could have done her duty without argument, but now an impossible conversation was happening.

“My time is more vital than that,” said Jum Burie, head bowing. She put her gaze away from the gathered folk and Tuberlone alike.

“That’s right,” said Tuberlone. “We’ve dawdled enough.”

Right around then is when the seven forty-seven said, “Hang on—what’s this itch in my belly? Someone’s thinking about dancing again?”

“Oh! Oh!” cried the gathered folk, who by now clearly were gathered dancing folk after all, the illusion no longer sustainable nor necessary. “Big guy, you’ll never guess what—” they sayed, but they got no further, for the seven forty-seven began a rumbling trost whose volume superseded any other attempts at language.

“Oh!” shouted that plane. “Again with this! Again! No—I’ll have it no longer! This has gone undeerable for too long! I’ll crash on the purpose—I’ll take you all out with me! I hope you’ve got unfinished business!”

With that, its anger paramounted, and the seven forty-seven nosedove straight toward a hospital for kitty cats and puppy dogs who had been sick but had just gotten better and were about to go find forever homes and live happily ever after, and also it was adjacent to an ice cream store that gave out free ’cream to kids all hours every day, and also a toy factory was probably nearby. Needless to say, this threatened destruction upon a most happy scene, all but ascertaining plucked heartstrings all ’round—and nothing could be done to curtail the disaster.

“Jum!” snapped Tuberlone, as the swiftly tilting plane’s angle of attack began to disbalance the whole of the thereabouts.

Jum Burie took a deep breath and then said, “Very well.”

She reached with one of her arms into the crowd of gathered dancing people and grabbed wrongly like a toothpaste any man with some hands and visible teeth, and drew him close to herself, the fingers of her hand ever-tightening about him so that he was clenched true and freeless.

“M’lady,” said the man, “may I have this dance?” He beamed, quite proud of so wittifully finding a clever line in such a daring moment.

“No,” said Jum Burie.

She squeezed wrongly like a toothpaste that man, crushed him until his body was closed, until his bones ground up to fine grit, until his skinparts burst like unholy bubbles, and his top popped and all his organs and brains came out, and she captured his brains in a good glass bowl, and boiled his brains down into wine, and drank it slowly, and deeply, and without pleasure, and all the things that had made him him were hers. There wasn’t much. And so she searched, and—

—corduroy, she’d notice corduroy, she’d said she’d liked it, even though it was so tight, felt so weird. Itchy. Stiff. But it was bearable for her. For her. Anything for her. Well, nearly anything. Surely at least pants, right? But they fit so badly, looked so odd. Scratching, constricting—or these were the only pants that’d ever fit right, fit normal? Was this what it was like? Was this what it was supposed to have been like? Would it be like this from now on? It’s time to grow up, to join the ranks, go with the flow and fit in. Lower your flag. Were kings dressed so afore they aged? Or, was it the dress that aged them? Accept the normality of love. You cannot have what you want. For Saint Plasticine’s Day I’ll get her a pan. For an apology I got her a pan. All because of a—

In the apartment, everyone is gathered. Everyone put up their decorations, and they posed all about, filling the seats, covering the floor, toying with machines new and old. Here were warm hearts for once. I feel welcome here, loved, and afraid. The gold man will never say anything. Did they take this from me? No, they’re welcome to it. I’m welcome here. This is the final evolution for which this place was always destined. This is what things were always meant to be like. I did it. I actually did it. I made it, and everything’s going to be okay from now on. From now on—

There’s a knock and a stranger and loneliness, and I have to face them, have to face them all. They don’t know me. They don’t remember me. They don’t want me. What am I supposed to do? No one has any answers. No one has ever had any questions but the stranger is asking things I don’t understand. I want to see the machines. Anything I touch, I destroy. No, I can’t let them know. I can’t let them see me. Everything’s coming out, everything’s coming apart, if they knew, if they could see me, if they knew why I did it—

I could whisper on and on, if anyone were listening.

Are you listening? What are you trying to find?

What are you trying to take from me?

Jum Burie took a deep breath.

“Damnation,” muttered Tuberlone. “Are you all right?” it asked Jum Burie.

“Yes,” said Jum Burie slowly. “I’m... fine.”

“Then,” said Tuberlone, “let’s depart at once—you can find the path from the safety of the ground!”

Jum Burie took another deep breath and looked about and saw what she was looking for, and said, “I see it. But it’s very strange. From here, into a doctor’s office, and then—” She stopped, as Tuberlone was already making haste for a nearby escalator so as to disembark before the plane struck its target.

“That’s enough!” said Tuberlone. “Now come! Quickly!”

Jum Burie rose and followed it, and they both backflipped out of the seven forty-seven—right before it chickened out and dodged the puppy mill et al at the very last second, opting instead to crash into a bouncy castle, which was no crash at all, but resulted in a fun party time for everyone.

Well, everyone except that dead toothpaste guy, but he sucked, anyway.