SEA OF GLASS Read online

  SEA OF

  GLASS

  BARRY B. LONGYEAR

  Enchanteds Publishing

  PO Box 100, New Sharon ME 04955

  www.Enchanteds.net

  Sea of Glass

  is a work of fiction. The contents of this work are either products of the author's invention or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons or events are coincidental. Enchanteds Kindle edition copyright © 2011 by Barry B. Longyear, all rights reserved including the right to reproduce this work or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information write: Barry B. Longyear, PO Box 100, New Sharon ME 04955.

  Sea of Glass was originally published by St. Martin's Press (1987).

  Manufactured in the United States of America

  To Jean

  With special thanks

  to

  Tom Eastler, Kathy Lynch, and Sharon Webb

  SEA OF

  GLASS

  And I saw as it were a sea of glass mingled with fire, and those who had overcome the beast and its image and the number of its name, standing on the sea of glass, having the harps of God.

  The Apocalypse 15, 2

  Wardate: 21:36-7AUG2033

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  100

  My name is Tommy, and this is what I know:

  Year is as long as it takes for Earth to travel around Sun. 365 days make up Year, except every fourth year when an extra day is added.

  Day is sunrise to sunset. Night is sunset to sunrise. But Night is also a part of Day.

  Day is divided into hours.

  Hours are divided into minutes.

  Minutes are divided into seconds.

  Daddy says this. I try so hard to look like I understand but there is no Earth, there is no Sun. Because there is no Sun Mommy makes me take pills. But Daddy says there is Sun and it is Outside with Day, Night, and Moon.

  Daddy says that this is the year Two Thousand and Twelve. I wonder why Year has that, or any, number.

  Sun, Day, and Night are Outside with the men in black.

  Hours, minutes, and seconds are kept in a box on the wall.

  I must remember to ask again about Moon.

  In the time called winter the world smells like burning wood. The world is both dark and light, full of love and fear.

  The fear.

  The windows are dark. Painted black and nailed shut. If they weren't, things from Outside might see us and get in. We must never let the Thing from Outside see in.

  The light is the fireplace. It is red. And the light is the electric lamp beside my bed, my mother's face, my father's arms. There, too, is the warmth and the love.

  The world is the house.

  Daddy says that the house is in a city called Peterborough, which is in a province called Ontario. Ontario belongs to a national district called Canada, which belongs to the Compact of Nations. They are curious words, but they are like Earth and Sun: only words.

  I only see the house, so the house is the world.

  Daddy says that Peterborough is also called Petertown, but not to call it Petertown because Mommy doesn't like the name.

  "'All the world will be your enemy, Prince with a Thousand Enemies, and whenever they catch you, they will kill you. But first they must catch you—'"

  "Why?"

  Mommy smiles as she looks up from the book and strokes my cheek. "Frith isn't mean. If he lets the rabbits multiply and eat up all of the food in the world, all of the other animals will starve. Frith must look out for all of the animals."

  "Why?"

  "Because. Just because."

  "Is Frith God?"

  "It's just a story, Tommy."

  The world is fear.

  The fear comes from the men in black. Daddy says it again and again: "Tommy,

  "Never open a window.

  "Never move the downstairs shades.

  "Never talk, laugh, or cry loudly.

  "Never answer the door.

  "Never answer the telephone.

  "Never, never go Outside.

  "If anyone comes to the house, hide in your attic room and be very, very still. And you must obey this. If you disobey about this like you do sometimes when you should clean up your room, and give me that little smile and that twinkle in your eye, it won't be like when you should clean up your room.

  "I won't get cross for a moment and then laugh.

  "I will die.

  "Your mommy will die.

  "And the men in black will come and take you away forever."

  I ask my daddy "Why?"

  "Because. Just because."

  Because must be a terrible monster. I imagine Because as it hovers over the world flapping its leathery wings, waiting with its great hooked beak and sharp talons to fall in swift horror upon those foolish children who venture Outside.

  Sometimes when Daddy is watching I am allowed to use the telephone in the living room to call Mommy on the kitchen unit. The numbered buttons are black. To begin a call I must push the silver button. The black buttons are always cold, the silver button warm.

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  99

  The world is made of black marks on yellowing paper. The paper smells like dust and mildew.

  It's a little girl in a red cloak being chased by a wolf.

  It's a very special spider.

  It's a wizard in an emerald city.

  It's a circus that flies among the stars.

  It's a boy and a black man drifting lazily down a river called the Mississippi. It's a knight who rescues a king. It's a lord who becomes a forest bandit.

  It's a young sailor who is imprisoned. The sailor digs through the walls of his cell and finds a great teacher. The teacher gives the sailor knowledge, wealth, and freedom.

  The books are Daddy's, and I am to take very good care of them. They cannot be replaced.

  Daddy says he has a surprise for me. It will be here this afternoon. I love surprises, and I watch time in the box on the wall for when Daddy gets home.

  Daddy teaches at a school. He teaches different things about theater. Theater is when some people get together to play pretend a story for others instead of for themselves. Daddy is just finishing up teaching History 227, which is about movies.

  When I asked him what are movies, he said to wait for the surprise.

  I wait.

  There is a window to the universe. It is a glittering colored screen.

  It calls itself the eye to the world. It calls itself the greatest communication medium that has ever existed. It calls itself mindless, a wasteland, corrupt, filthy, biased, immoral, and antigod. Once in a while it calls itself television.

  Daddy is finished teaching his history, and the school doesn't want the television anymore because it's getting a new one. That's why it let Daddy buy this one.

  It is wonderful.

  We can make our own shows or bring in shows from Outside. I love movies. The stories, the worlds, the lives—the places I can go, the people I can be, the worlds I can see.

  And I see trees, flowers, animals, and people. People. A world of people.

  Children.

  A world of children.

  Boys and girls.

  The children have other children to be with, to play with. They have friends. I want to know why I can have no friends.

  "Maybe the television was a bad idea." Daddy's voice sounds very serious.

  Mommy's voice sounds impatient. "You know he's different. You should have thought of that." She folds her arms. "Well? What do we tell him now?"

  "I guess we tell him the truth."

  The truth.

  I can have no friends because the men in black will come and take me away.

  "Why don't
they come and take away the boys and girls on the television?"

  "You'll understand when you get older. The things you see on the television aren't always true, Tommy. They're like the movies; not always true. Wait until you get older."

  It doesn't seem fair, but I don't want them to take away the television because they think it upsets me so I nod. Still, it is unfair. Somehow I sense I can lay the blame at the feet of Because.

  Outside.

  There is the something they call Outside on the TV. They call it Outdoors, the Woods, Wilderness.

  There is a part of Outside called the Grand Canyon. I would trade my life to stand on its rim for an hour.

  I see a part of Outside called Space: there is Moon, Sun, Saturn, men in strange suits walking around on Mars, men in strange black crawling machines on Venus, and Stars.

  Stars.

  I would trade my life and a thousand Grand Canyons to go there. So would the men and women on the television. They don't think that humans can ever reach the stars. We can't travel fast enough. Our beginning, our ending, is here on Earth.

  Just where is Outside? What is it? Is it even real? Above Wilderness is something called Sky. Blue and red and black and orange and white and gray. Sometimes Sky will carry the huge, blinding ball called Sun.

  Sky at Night carries Stars, and now I know about Moon. They write of Sky in the books I read. It is like Heaven or Outside. It is nice to think about, but it is not something to want. If you want what cannot exist you become unhappy.

  Sky is just a nice thought that an author or television person dreamed of, like the Mississippi, like Oz, like the Enterprise, like Wonderland.

  I am grateful that there are men and women who dream up such thoughts for me to enjoy.

  In the breaks between programs on the television, there is a number, and it is always the same:

  21:36-7AUG2033

  Sometimes when I see the news program at noon or in the early morning I see the same number. Mommy says she doesn't want to know what the number is for.

  On the television they just call it "then" or "the date." One documentary calls it the "optimum war probability projection date," and they talk about it like it was a fairy tale from ancient times.

  Daddy says it's the Wardate. "It's when the war happens."

  "Is it like the clock Marshal O'Neil looks at all the time in Outlands to see when the bad men arrive on the shuttle?"

  "No. Marshal O'Neil's clock tells how much time is left. His clock is like a number called the Downlimit. The Wardate tells what time it will be. The Downlimit tells how much time is left, or something like that. And the Wardate is no movie. It's real."

  "Marshal O'Neil is very real to me."

  My daddy laughs and plays another movie for me. It is called High Noon. In it there is a Marshal Will Cain and a clock and a train full of bad men arriving at a particular time. Marshal O'Neil's story is an old one, set in a different time.

  "Just because it is an old story," I ask Daddy, "does that mean that it isn't true?"

  He thinks for a long time. Looking at me he says, "Being old makes it truer, but a different kind of truth. Many times we feel that to do right we must go against unfair odds, and we must fight the bad guys all by ourselves—all alone. The special kind of truth used by the two movies is that just about everyone would like to believe that, faced with the same challenge, they would do like Marshal O'Neil and Marshal Cain."

  "Doesn't the world have any Marshal Cains in it, or any Marshal O'Neil's?"

  Daddy thinks again for a long time before answering. He gets to his feet. "Maybe. But I never met one."

  Daddy says that he will get a copy of an even older story for me to see. It will have a different kind of character and a different kind of right. The character is a swordsman named Cyrano de Bergerac.

  Daddy smiles and says maybe we would just like to believe that such characters can exist in the world. He says, "My daddy used to say that movies are mental chewing gum—a collection of impossibilities in a nonsense universe, massaging the eyeballs of malcontents. Does that make any sense to you?"

  I shake my head.

  Daddy makes a small laugh and he looks at the floor. "I guess it doesn't mean anything, except that my father disapproved of me watching movies."

  He kneels in front of me and takes my shoulders in his hands. "But if we can't believe in the possible existence of a Marshal O'Neil, what happens to our desire to become better persons? If we can't believe in THX's escape, or Montag's defiance, or that we can someday reach Watership Down, what is the point to any of it?"

  He studies my eyes. His eyes glisten. He laughs and shakes his head. "You don't have any idea what I'm saying, do you? Don't be frightened."

  "I'm not frightened, but I don't understand. What's THX? Where is Watership Down? Do you mean the story that Mommy read to me?"

  His lips repeat the question, where is Watership Down. "Where, indeed?"

  He pulls me to him and holds me tight. "I love my father, Tommy. I really do. But he just won't listen. He just won't listen." He holds me out at arm's length.

  "Tomorrow. Tomorrow when I come home we'll see if we can find Watership Down."

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  98

  "But after a time the rabbits wandered everywhere, multiplying, and eating as they went.

  "And the Great Frith told the Prince of Rabbits, 'If you cannot control your people, I shall find ways to control them.'"

  Daddy laughs and tells Mommy that Frith must think he's Aubry Cummings. Mommy gets up and goes into the kitchen.

  The small rabbit, Fiver, sees a vision of the fields bathed in blood. It is coming, this horror, but only he can see it. He tries to warn the rest of the rabbits, but only a few listen. Those few leave the warren on a search for a safe place. It is a grassy hill from the top of which the rabbits can see the world. A hill is sometimes called a down, and this is Watership Down.

  It's like the old book Mommy read to me at night. But this is an animated movie. Daddy is watching the story with a frown on his face. With each minute that passes, the creases on his forehead grow deeper.

  I want to ask Daddy if he doesn't like the movie, but I don't ask right away. Soon I am caught up in the story, the adventures of Hazel, Bigwig, Fiver, and the rest as they find the down, get other rabbits to join them, and then fight to protect the down against the General and the bad rabbits.

  After Hazel grows old, dies, and joins the Black Rabbit, I look again at Daddy. The screen is blank, yet it is as though he sees something there.

  "It's over, Daddy."

  He nods and repeats, "It's over." He pushes himself to his feet and removes the disc from the player. Placing it on the palm of his hand, he studies it. "Funny. Like seeing it for the first time. With a different set of eyes."

  He puts the disc back into the player.

  "—the rabbits wandered everywhere, multiplying, and eating as they went.

  "And the Great Frith told the Prince of Rabbits, 'If you cannot control your people, I shall find ways to control them.'"

  Daddy removes the disc, slowly shaking his head.

  I don't know what's bothering Daddy. My head is filled with the images and ideas of the story. Frith. The Black Rabbit. The terror of the General. The bloody battle in the run, with Bigwig and the General fighting to the death.

  In the dark in my bed, I think of the Great Frith, creator and god of the rabbits. The Wizard of Oz turned out to be only a man. The god of the tortured animal people on the Island of Lost Souls, the hand that struck the gong, was only a mad scientist.

  But the old rabbit, Hazel, did die. And Hazel did see the Black Rabbit, and the Black Rabbit does the will of Frith. If Frith created all of the animals, then Frith created me.

  Daddy climbs up the stairs and sits on the edge of my bed. I ask him, "Daddy, is Frith real?"

  "What?"

  "The god of the rabbits. Is the Great Frith real?"
br />   "No, no, no." He shakes his head and smiles. "That's just a story. A cartoon."

  He still looks sad. "Daddy, is everything all right?"

  It is almost as though I can see the answers to my question being tested and discarded behind my father's eyes. At last he answers.

  "Sure. Everything is fine. Go to sleep."

  I know Daddy is lying. He is still thinking about his daddy.

  They hate each other. I think my daddy is trying to decide if he wants to change that.

  I hope they become friends. It would be fun to know another human.

  That night I hear Daddy tell Mommy about special TV discs for educating gifted children. Daddy would like to bring some for me. Mommy forbids him.

  "It would be stupid! Do you think the police are stupid?"

  I am not going to get the special discs.

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  97

  At last Daddy finds a copy of THX 1138.

  On the screen is a bald man in white clothing. He is with another bald man, dressed the same, and they are running away from men with steel faces dressed in black.

  "Daddy, are those the men in black?"

  "No, they're only characters in a story. Not men at all, but robots. Which is not to say that the Compact Police are not robots." He laughs.

  "David, you're confusing him." My mommy's voice sounds a little angry.

  I watch this story. Daddy says it is forty-two years old. It is about a man who has a number instead of a name. He lives deep underground in a land without sunlight.

  He has a wife that is bald and dresses the same as him. Except that she is not really a wife and is taken away, or she leaves. Another bald man, SEN, tries to take her place. Her name is LUH. THX works remote arms and takes a lot of drugs.