Word Carrier 9: Thou Hast Prepared a Table

by Heidi Kortman -

Douay Bede took two deep breaths, as Pangur Ban stretched. When the quarr turned its head and flicked its ears, Bede swallowed hard then followed the bishop and Brother Charles. He trailed three strides behind, which did nothing to avert his being the center of attention when he reached the refectory doorway. “Pangur Ban,” he whispered, as the bishop spoke the first syllables of the blessing, “do not hunt here.”

The table and its benches never seemed so long. Pangur Ban paced beside him, tail twitching. The scaled length struck Bede’s calf through his robe, as he walked behind the brothers, the manuscripts, and the other Bibles all seated beside their newly-assigned priests. Murmuring and indrawn breaths, audible beneath the bishop’s prayer, followed his steps.

Bede passed his parents, seated on the opposite side of the great table. After another eight paces, he reached the only open place. Bede hiked up his robe before stepping over the bench. When he settled on the seat, he felt the pressure of Pangur Ban’s weight on the backs of his ankles.

“Stay there,” Bede whispered. That earned him a bump from the elbow of the priest on his right.

The man to his left, his partner for this life’s mission, was shorter than Bede. The man kept his head bowed until the blessing concluded. When he reached out with his chopsticks for a curried seraph nymph, he handled them deftly despite the missing first joint of his right index finger.

“Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel, because he has visited and wrought salvation for his people.” Douay Bede said, as he reached for some wolner-grain bread.

The priest swallowed his mouthful. “To shine on those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace,” he said.

“Douay Bede.”

“Father Oaku. The cook here is good.”

Bede ladled himself a serving of the chowder, and poured aniila oil into the communal plate between them. Wolner-grain bread was tasteless without it. He dipped his bread in the oil.

“When the banquet is finished, I’ll begin work on my first homily for the mission. Be ready with Acts 13, verses four through twelve.”

About to take his first bite of the meal, Bede was forced to pause. “Yes, Father Oaku. But—” A large chunk of the oil-soaked bread fell from the slice and plopped into the thick chowder. The splash spattered the sleeve of the priest at Bede’s right, earning him another poke with the man’s sharp elbow.

“What? You are Published, are you not?” Father Oaku glared at Bede.

“Yes, Father. This morning. I know the passage you need, but Bishop Guash has ordered me to speak with him after the banquet.”

The priest with sharp elbows snorted. “They’ve saddled you with a trouble maker, Oaku.”

Father Oaku Mary, his lips contracted like the top of a closed drawstring pouch, leaned away from the table. His back made a crackling sound. He sighed. “I’ll keep him too busy for much.”

Under the bench, Pangur Ban shifted his weight. Bede ducked his head. He didn’t dare whisper to the quarr again. Instead, he poked his spoon at the oil slick in his chowder. Across the table, the other priests and Bibles were enjoying their food. Bede dredged the sodden bread from the soup, and ate it.

Maybe, if he focused on the food, the others would ignore him. The clack of serving spoons and utensils echoed in the ceiling vault. Bede took another spoonful. Lukewarm now, the chowder lacked appeal. “Father Oaku,” he whispered.

The priest crunched another mouthful of curried seraph nymphs. “What is it?”

“After the bishop has finished, may I please take a few minutes to speak with my parents?” Bede glanced down the table, and caught sight of his father doubling over. The explosive coughing fit made other diners lean away. Brother Reita, the assistant infirmarian, rose from his place to help Silas leave the table.

Father Oaku laid his chopsticks across the dish. “Douay Bede, speak St. Matthew 8:22, the Word of the Lord.”

Bede closed his eyes and took a shaky breath. “‘But Jesus said to him,’” he quoted, ‘Follow me, and leave the dead to bury their own dead.’” When he opened his eyes again, his lashes were wet, and he needed to blink. His mother was still at the table, and she was dabbing her eyes with the coarsely woven napkin.

Had she heard his voice through all the other sounds in the room? Did she think him cold-hearted? Bede prepared to stand, but Pangur Ban leaned more heavily against his calves, then wrapped his tail around Bede’s ankles.

Bede subsided on the bench. The quarr’s tail weighed heavier across his insteps than such a thing should do. Brother Reita returned, pausing for a moment beside Bede’s mother before continuing around the table to his former place. “Please, Father Oaku—how else will I get word about my father?”

The priest shook his head. “The man has ash lung. You know there’s no cure.” He laid aside his chopsticks again. “You have word from the Lord, Douay Bede. Speak St. John 10:28. That’s the only thing you need to know about your father.”

Bede stared down into the bowl of chowder. It had reached the stage where it coated the spoon. “And I give them everlasting life; and they shall never perish, neither shall anyone snatch them out of my hand.”  It was true, but to spend the rest of his days with a man who could cast a chill on such a promise? Bede shuddered.

Encoded Vellum: Part 6

by Jeff Chapman

The Abbot paused his monologue, apparently lost in some winding corridor of thought. The older brothers shared this habit of stopping in the middle of discussions to think. Sebastian found these pauses annoying. A life of prayer and contemplation no doubt diminished one’s sense of urgency.

Sebastian could suppress his curiosity no longer. “And what was that extraordinary event?”

“Your question suggests that something turned the course of his life, like an unexpected comet cutting across a ship’s course. But wouldn’t you say deciphering the Lord’s message is a type of puzzle, the greatest of all puzzles?”

Sebastian paused to consider the wording of his response, how to disagree with the Abbot. “I suppose his messages are sometimes cryptic to the uninitiated, but I don’t believe the Lord wants to hide anything from us.”

“Not hide. Not conceal. But the Lord expects us to struggle to answers and the struggle, which might last a lifetime, may be more valuable than the answer, for it is in the struggle that we find and achieve our purpose.”

Sebastian nodded, considering his own life--Christchurch, Trinity University, seminary, all of which had fallen into place. He had moved from one phase to another with the ease and certainty of a confident student following a well-lit and well-marked hallway to an exam for which he knew all the answers.

“You look pensive,” said the Abbot.

“I don’t believe I’ve encountered any such struggles. Either, forgive me for my bluntness, you are wrong or I am treading the wrong road.”

“Be patient,” said the Abbot. “You haven’t lived long enough. Now, back to the story of Brother Septimus.”

The Abbot drank several gulps from his glass of water. Depression clouded Sebastian’s judgment and he found his life’s journey wanting. How could he minister to anyone, exercise any sense of understanding and empathy? Patience did not number among his virtues.

“Like most young men, Brother Septimus was restless for adventure, eager to be part of something new. Dax and Macbane were organizing the first expeditions to Eclectia at the time. What ambitious young man would not leap at such adventure? At seventeen he had no skills, other than a quick mind and a persuasive tongue. Somehow he talked his way into a position on Macbane’s third expedition.”

“The third,” said Sebastian. “Wasn’t that...”

“Yes, the ship crashed in the vicinity of Mount Olympus during a dust storm. Septimus was one of the three who walked out of the hinterland to the coast. You might say he was the only survivor. The other two died of ash lung within months. The trek was a remarkable achievement without maps and only rudimentary knowledge of the land. I believe they were the first to discover that the bugs are edible. When Septimus returned to the Avenir, he enrolled to study for the priesthood.”

“Was he religious before his ordeal?”

“Not at all. He numbered among the young atheists, I believe.”

“What happened to him out in the desert?”

“We don’t know. The official report was lost in a core collapse and Brother Septimus wrote nothing else about it.” The Abbot turned toward the patient and the cryptic manuscript on the bedside table. “As far as we know.”

Encoded Vellum: Part 2

by Jeff Chapman -

Brother Sebastian and Brother Peter each held one of the Abbot’s arms as they guided the gasping man into a chair. The Abbot’s face was blanched despite his rapid breathing and his eyes remained fixed on the patient quietly sleeping through the turmoil.

“Are you in pain?” asked the medico. “Any palpitations?”

The Abbot instinctively pressed a hand to his chest, but the veteran of three heart attacks shook his head. “No, no,” he told Brother Sebastian. “I am quite recovered. I have had a shock, that is all. But my nerves....”

The director frowned at Brother Sebastian. “You should lie down, Anthony. Let our able medico examine you. It may seem nothing but turn deadly serious without warning.”

“I am fine, Peter. If you lie down at my age, you may never get back up.” The Abbot smiled at Brother Sebastian. “You are frightening our young medico. He doesn’t want the first patient he loses to be the Abbot.”

“I assure you my medical reputation is the furthest....”

The Abbot raised his hand to silence Brother Sebastian. “I am certain your heart is where it should be. I was only teasing, one of my vices. Now, as to our patient here. Have you checked the DNA archives?”

“Of course,” answered the medico with a force that surprised even him. Whether spoken in jest or not, he still chafed at the previous remark questioning his charity and professionalism. Brother Sebastian was young and ardent and the abbey had not yet washed his soul of pride. He glanced at the director, who was busy taking the Abbot’s pulse, and consciously checked his tone. “We queried all the standard repositories. The results were negative, not even a close match for a relative.”

“I don’t doubt it,” said the Abbot.

“Most births in the land villages, among the miners and hunters and of course the nomads, go unrecorded,” said the director.

“This man was not born on Eclectia but on the Avenir.”

“You know this man?” asked Brother Peter.

The Abbot took a deep breath. “I believe I do.”

Go, Therefore

by Heidi Kortman -

Another three steps, and the pacing corps of graduates left the confines of the tunnel, scattering across the great gallery to greet those who had come. Douay Bede blinked. A cluster of chatting people dispersed, and there she stood with her all-weather at her feet.

He wanted to run, but one fruit of the Spirit was self-control. Douay Bede compromised by taking the longest steps his black robe would allow. She wore the coppery headdress of folded thoric leaves that she always saved for special occasions. Perspiration dripped from her chin.

“Mother,” Douay Bede called as he drew closer. She didn’t give him the smile he expected. “What’s the matter?”

“Take him now, son. Quickly.” She moved her all-weather, which covered a large, perforated metal box, their quarr carrier. “Your father trapped him on the west range two days ago. The kit has already tasted spider eggs, and he’s about to have his growth spurt.”

“Oh, Mother.” No wonder she was tense. Depending on how many eggs the quarr kit had eaten, the growth spurt could be astonishingly quick. He’d witnessed it on the last day of a summer in his fifth Founding, while his name was still Ruben.

Wandering along a trail on the east range his family worked for the Palmer Corporation, he had heard a musical sound, and wanted to know its source. Rounding an outcrop of basalt, he found his way blocked by the gray-streaked hindquarters of a scaled beast whose forequarters were busy displacing ash and pumice.

“Striper,” he’d said, “what are you quarrying for?” The beast continued to work. He’d stayed, watching and repeating the name.

Down in the valley, the buz herd had sent up ticks of contentment as the buzy grazed. A six-winged seraph locust flew past, taking his attention from the scaled beast. When he focused on Striper again, the beast’s haunches were more than twice as large. The layered ash above the creature’s head was cracking, tumbling down.

It backed out of the hole and shook ashy webs from its tufted ears. Eight vividly ringed legs protruded between its jaws. One swipe of its tongue took them in.

“Striper, you’re eating a tunnel spider.” So that was why his father’s herds were doing so well on this range. The beast made a strumming sound, and pounced on prey Ruben hadn’t seen. He heard a carapace crack. Then the beast brought an oozing carcass and dropped it at his feet.

He fled. The beast followed at his heels, in a steady pumice-crunching trot. When the drop-off to his right made his heart pound, he expected to be knocked from the trail into thin air.

A bump on his right hip drove him up against the cliffside. Striper had walked the very edge, keeping pace with his increasingly wobbly steps. The beast’s squarish body and muscular legs blocked him from the precipice.

“Remember how you screamed the day Striper followed me home?” Douay Bede looked into his mother’s face. That brought a smile.

“Not for long, not after he pounced on that pink stripe spider so near to little Tabitha, but go, son, go.”

His cousin hadn’t been able to say quarrier, so Striper was soon dubbed a quarr. Douay Bede grabbed the handles of the box and jogged against the general pattern of traffic flow. He had to be alone in a closed room with the kit. If the quarr wasn’t domesticated before the growth spurt hit, it would be a menace. The nearest hope of private, secure space was his former cell.

“You do remember,” she panted as she followed him toward the tunnel.

“Yes, Mother.” Before he came to the Abbey, he’d taught her to domesticate. She could have kept this kit herself. “Please, wait out here.” The box in his hands wasn’t any heavier; now if only the path ahead stayed clear. He picked up his pace, hindered by the skirts of his robe. Lord, let me get there, he prayed, as his sandals skidded on the floor. The kit poked one serrated center claw through a ventilation hole.

Douay Bede ducked into his old cell. He set the box down, then slid the door panel closed. Time for the first step in domestication.

The Sickening Plunge Part 4

by Jeff C. Carter

When Lancet opened his eyes the morgue was empty.  He was completely alone.  Even his constant companion, his smart sword, was gone.

"Hello, Lancet."

A tall, older man in an archaic gray wool suit appeared.  He was bald, with creases around his eyes and mouth but an upright posture that made his age hard to guess.  He smiled reassuringly, yet Lancet saw something calculating and not quite human behind his eyes.

Lancet felt trapped and defenseless.  He involuntarily groped for his missing weapon.

"Ah, one moment," the old man smiled.

There was a tingling in Lancet’s head and suddenly his sword was back, nuzzled against his body. He could feel every part of it, as if the sword had truly become an extension of him at last.

"Are you Beebe?" Lancet asked the stranger.

The old man put a hand on Lancet's shoulder and gave him a grandfatherly squeeze. "I am.  It is so good to see you, lad."

"Are you... a Dreamer?"

Beebe smiled cryptically. "I've certainly dreamed of this moment.  I've known your family for a very long time.  I've watched you grow, seen you become the kind of man who could change the course of history, as your ancestors once did.  I knew I could trust you to step forward now, to do what must be done."

Lancet had waited his entire life to hear those words.  His heart filled with pride but his stomach clenched in uneasy anticipation.  He could feel that he was no longer in control of his life.  He was rapidly being swept away by the tide of fate.

One by one, Moab, Anansi, and the doctor blinked into visibility, looking shaken and confused.  The wizard Pavlovon appeared in several places at once.  Was this her ‘distributed intelligence’?

"Hello again, everyone.  This is an encrypted simulation space.  We are now in direct mental contact via your new implants.  In case you haven't guessed, I am Beebe.  I am pleased to report that no one was compromised by alien influence, and that each of you has my complete trust and undying gratitude.

"Here is what we know:  the aliens have infiltrated society with their followers, dupes, and parasite infested thralls.  They believe that Eclectia is doomed.  They want to accelerate this apocalypse, and with access to our technology they might very well succeed.

"I did not choose you to root out the infestation or declare a pointless war.  I gathered you for your talent, your leadership and your vision.  You believe, as I do, that humanity is destined for more.  This alien threat has the potential to rock our stagnated society to its foundation.  We are the ones who shall decide which pieces remain and how they fit together,” Beebe said.   

"So we're going to use these Rahab maniacs to light a fire under their butts?" Moab stroked his mustache approvingly.

Beebe gave him a knowing smile. "Never let a crisis go to waste."

Encoded Vellum

by Jeff Chapman

Brother Sebastian Norwich observed the rise and fall of the thermal blanket covering the old man’s torso and legs. That something made from minerals hacked out of rock could be soft and comforting never ceased to amaze the young medico. A monitor mounted on the white wall above the bed displayed the man’s vitals—stable but weak. A cyclops scanner—so named for its single, pulsing, blue eye—whirred and clicked as its gaze travelled up and down the length of the man’s body.

Brother Sebastian had removed the oxygen mask an hour ago. Tubes for feeding, hydration, and disposal disappeared beneath the blanket. Rising hues of tan and ochre had beaten back the man’s initial pallor. One might think him simply asleep, not locked in a coma. Considering the man was a day from death when he arrived at Lazarus House a fortnight ago, Sebastian was much pleased with his patient’s progress, but only prayers could help him now.

Sebastian turned his attention to the curious manuscript that arrived with the old man, strapped to his chest like an instruction manual. The pages were stiff but malleable and crinkled as Sebastian turned them, like nothing he had ever handled before. The unfamiliar sound, deafening in this wing of the House reserved for the sickest patients, set him ill at ease, so he tried to be quiet as if he delved where he should not be trespassing. Row after row of uniform characters in some dark yellow ink packed the pages. Stray Greek and Hebrew letters stood out amidst the scribbles like rubies and sapphires in a bowl of white marbles. The man must be a priest or a scholar of ancient languages, he surmised, but he wagered only a priest would trust Greek and Hebrew.

He translated the familiar letters, recording them on the touchscreen of his notepad to test his theory that the scribe embedded meaning in the white noise of the unrecognizable scribbles. When he finished a page, he scanned the string of letters, expecting them to snap into words, a message to shout at him, but all he heard was a noise of random sounds. Simple letter shifts up and down yielded nothing more. Perhaps the Greek and Hebrew was the noise or the old man was simply insane.

“How is our mystery patient?”

Sebastian dropped his notepad, which bounced once on the tile floor. Its shock resistant rubberized case absorbed the impact.

“Brother Peter.”

The director of the infirmary, Brother Peter An Loc Maria, stepped into the sickroom which now seemed very crowded. Peter smiled at Sebastian, whose hand still rested on the open manuscript, and raised his eyebrows.

Sebastian reached to close the book but stayed his hand. He stood to answer the director. He felt less like a child caught sinning when he looked across at his superior rather than up. “He’s stable but very weak. To be expected. I’ve been watching after I removed the oxygen mask. He’s a tough one.”

Peter nodded. “Any hope?”

“He’s in God’s hands now. Always was, I should say.”

Peter smiled, his almond-shaped eyes nearly squinting shut, and slapped Sebastian’s shoulder. “We are but humble instruments. I’ve arranged a mass to be said for him tomorrow morning.”

Sebastian nodded.

“And what of his manuscript?”

“It’s like a puzzle.”

“We must learn what we can about a patient. If he cannot talk, we must read what he has written.”

Sebastian summarized his investigation and theory that the man was a priest. “He must be at least seventy Foundings.”

Peter nodded. “Interesting. We should check the chronicles for missing priests.” He turned a page and scanned the text. “This must be how vellum felt to the scribes working in the monasteries of the ancient past. Fitting that as we race into the future, we find the past.”

“And can’t understand it,” added Sebastian.

Peter grunted.

“Do you think it’s important?” said Sebastian.

“Very much. Someone has gone to a lot of trouble. The Abbot should be along shortly. If he agrees, we can put all the students to work on it. Give them something challenging and new.”

They discussed the other patients under Sebastian’s care as they waited. Then the Abbot’s staff clicked on the tile in the hall as he approached. The staff, a gift from an old hunter, was carved from the carapace of some giant beetle and adorned with a simple cross on top.

“Brother Peter. Brother Sebastian.” The Abbot, Brother Anthony Mary de Guadalcanal, leaned against the door frame, gripping his staff with both hands, and panted from the exertion of his walk. “Blessings.” The director and medico echoed the greeting. The Abbot was the last of his generation and joked that what he lacked in skill and knowledge the Lord had compensated him with longevity. “So this is our mystery patient?”

Peter and Sebastian parted as the Abbot took a heavy step forward to look at the old man.

The Abbot’s eyes grew wide and his staff clattered on the floor. “Mother of God.”

The Sickening Plunge Part 3

by Jeff C. Carter

Everyone in the morgue was struck silent by Beebe’s announcement.  Lancet’s heart skipped a beat and he felt a fleeting kinship with the dead body laid out nearby.

“If the angels did cause the riots they must have used those spinal parasites to boost their psychic signals,” Anansi stated confidently, “Is that why you brought us inside Sheba?  Their signals can’t reach here?”

Lancet frowned.  He was irked that Anansi was putting things together faster than he was.

“That is correct,” the wizard finally sparked to life, “Although we have taken other precautions as well.  We cannot assume Sheba is secure, merely furthest from the signals.  We know a good deal about this thanks to the late Mr. Jon Valljon.”

She indicated the body on the slab.  Dr. Kes peeled back the side of Valljon’s head and exposed a cratered brain, filled with tangles of gleaming circuitry and the oily tendrils of a dead parasite. “Luckily for us he had a standard servant control implant in his head long before he was infected.  Not only was the chip ultimately able to override the parasite’s control, but we were able to pull memories of the alien transmissions directly from his brain.”

“Control implants allow me to monitor the hostile aliens in secret.  They will also protect you from coming under their control.  Pavlovon will fit you each with such a device,” Beebe said.

The wizard hefted a sinister gun with a long drill bit and smiled obligingly.

“You can’t be serious?” Councilman Moab gasped.

Lancet thought about the agonized look on Valljon’s face as the implant shut down his brain.  Everyone took a step back from the wizard.  Even Anansi’s smile was replaced by shock.

“I’m sorry, but this is not a request.  Any one of you could already be under alien influence.  Until we know for certain I cannot allow any of you to leave Sheba,” Beebe said.

Lancet knew this was just a step towards Beebe’s master plan.  He knew that they would have to fill this morgue a thousand times over to make it a reality.  If he was going to commit himself to this cause then he must be willing to start with his own body if necessary. “I’ll go first.”

Pavlovon lifted the drill and aimed it at Lancet's right eyeball. The wizard's face was blank again, her thick black goggles staring somewhere else entirely.

As the drill bit veered closer to his eye Lancet saw a cluster of needles jutting out, as thin as the woman's own silvery hair.

"Try not to move,” she mumbled.

The drill plunged forward with a sickening crunch.

The Sickening Plunge Part 2

by Jeff C. Carter

Lancet immediately recognized the body on the slab.  It was his old ‘servant’, Valljon, the man who had tried to kill him.  He didn’t know the skinny man in the rubber smock.  He appeared to be some sort of doctor.  He understood now why they were meeting in the damp gray morgue, but not why they had been made to travel to a morgue on the dark side of Sheba.

“Welcome.”

The soothing voice came from a speaker in the ceiling.  Lancet recognized the voice – it belonged to Beebe, the mysterious man who had been his long-distance mentor for most of his life.  They had never met face to face, and he was beginning to doubt that they ever would.  He was even beginning to doubt if Beebe had a face at all.

“Please allow me to make a few introductions.  Councilman Dresden Moab you surely know.  He is a long serving and distinguished member of the Peace Council,” Beebe said.

Beebe didn’t introduce himself, which indicated that everyone there knew him well enough that they would travel to Sheba without asking why.  It was a small group and introductions didn’t take long.  

Lancet began to understand what role each person was there to play. 

Anansi Tolliver, the stylish dark skinned man with the big smile.  Confidence man.  Smooth operator.  Trickster.

Pavlovon Neumann, the pale woman in the goggles staring off at something no one else could see.  Distributed intelligence engineer.  Lancet knew better than to think he understood what wizards did or what they were capable of.

The one in the smock was Dr. Kes.  Beebe had brought him up from Zirconia because he had made some important discovery.

Dr. Kes asked everyone to come closer to Valljon’s corpse on the gurney. “A short while ago I performed a detailed scan on a smuggler named Almer Croix. There was something unusual with his nervous system that a lot of physicians would have missed.  I was able to refine the image and find a separate life form.  The patient’s immune system was ravaged and failing and this life form was to blame.  It was actually a highly evolved alien parasite that had taken root in the poor man’s spinal cord.  

Lancet couldn’t see what a sick Zirco had to do with the St. Christina’s Riot and the Rahab murders that had precipitated this secret meeting.

“Dr. Kes graciously agreed to perform the autopsies on the inmates of St. Christina’s clinic.  They all shared the same parasitic infestation, which I believe is linked to the recent wave of criminal insanity,” Beebe said.

Dr. Kes proudly held up a pair of tongs and dangled a long, oily ribbon of flesh.

Councilman Moab cleared his throat.  He awkwardly looked at the speaker on the ceiling, unused to addressing someone he could not hold in his glare. “Are you saying that the riots happened without a leader?  There was no agenda?”

“Quite the opposite, Councilman.  I have uncovered patterns of association between individuals on Avenir and Zirconia that suggest a loose organization.  When combined with the parasite cases an unmistakable network emerges.  There has been almost no communication between these individuals, however.  All of which leads me to believe that this network is coordinated through psychic transmissions,” Beebe said.

Lancet’s stomach dropped.  Was there going to be a war with the aliens?  Had it already begun?

Rockstars: Lion Killers

by Walt Staples

I knew it was time to drink up and leave when Choice Ranson pushed in through the doors. Crazy Eddie's isn't the most high-toned place in Heartbreak Pass. The fact that Eddie hasn't picked Ranson up by the scruff and seat and pitched him back out the door is proof of this.

Ranson is a troll. He likes to pick at people. On the whole, he's a pretty fair geologist, which is why Survey keeps him on—that and they don't have to look at him in the home office. That no one's shot the creature yet is put down to people's basic law-abidingness here on Sheba, or the general opinion that Ranson isn't worth the waste of powder.

The bridge game conversation had turned to Admin's latest publicity blitz to try to attract more settlers to Sheba. Old Ed Grinder was saying, “They been tryin' to make it safe an' borin' fer years.”

Ranson loomed over the table with his beer. “Boring? You find settling this place boring? You old coot, this is the greatest adventure in the system! And you sit there and call it boring! Madness!”

The four of them sat looking up at him in silence. Dick Ewell, George Topolopis, and Harty Gunther were old enough to be his father. Ed, old enough to be their father.

Ed carefully laid his cards face-down on the table as the color rose in his neck and face. His voice, though low and even, betrayed strain, “Admin up on Avenir's doin' their dangest to sanitize life here on this rock. They want to convince ever'body that livin' and workin' here is safe, routine, an' borin' as bein' up on Avenir.”

The others put their cards down as he warmed to his subject. Ed's stringy muscles knotted as he gripped the edge of the table and continued, “One reason is to sucker people into sellin' ever'thing they've got to come down here—that's good fer gettin' rid of the troublemakers, extra mouths, an' relievin' crowdin'. It's also good fer their buddies who buy up the stuff fer next to nothin'. But the main reason”--he raised an index finger--”is that they are bureaucrats. An' the knee-jerk reaction of a bureaucrat is to cover his butt. No matter what might happen, he's scared he's the one who's gonna be tossed out the airlock—so nothin' ever happens, ever'thing is always A-OK an' routine...safe.”

He swallowed. “But it ain't safe. It ain't routine. An' things happen.” He looked at the others at the table, then back up at Ranson. “We come here before there was a hole in the ground. I was lucky; I partnered with my missus. Hoppers weren't invented yet; you yomped ever' single kilo in on yer back. It took a generation to get rockhead environment suits to the point they sorta work. Like I say, I was lucky—the missus wasn't. I buried her three years to the day we made planetfall.

“Way back when sometime, they was a critter called a lion—some kind of mantid maybe—that ate people. A boy became a man by killin' one.” He swept a hand to include the others at the table. “These men killed their lion. They went through it. They survived it. They ain't quit. They won't.

“Now, let me ask you a question.” He pointed up at the younger man. “Who are you partnered with? Anybody?” At Ranson's silence, he continued. “No, I figured not. That, maybe, suggest somethin' to you? Man don't live out here long without somebody to watch his back. Somebody who cares about him.” Ed hooked a thumb at George. “Now George, here, is my bunkie. He puts up with my feet an' I puts up with his wind. Are we cuddle-bunnies? Nope, but we're partners an', generally, friends.” He picked up his cards and the others followed suit. The old man didn't bother to look up from his cards as he dismissed Ranson, “Boy, you come back after you kill your lion.”

Ranson stood looking at the bridge players, then at the rest of us. Nobody gave him any slack. Even Eddie just returned a blank look. After a couple of minutes, he sat down his glass, turned, and slowly walked out.

Word Carrier: Mission

by Walt Staples -

In the infirmary, Brother Kadfell, the abbey’s medico, asked, “With or without, Douay Bede?”

The Bible smiled at him. “Without, Brother.”

The other nodded. “As you wish.” He set the hypo to dispense the first-aid spray without its anesthetic component and sprayed Bede’s blistered palm. The choice of each newly Published Bible was a secret Brother Kadfell would keep. It was a choice that by tradition was not discussed with anyone.

Outside the infirmary, Brother Charles waited for Bede with a frown. Bede took in his erstwhile teacher’s expression and his heart sank. His assignment had been decided. He had hoped to be assigned to a mission among spacers with the priest he would be paired with. From Brother Charles’ face, he knew it was bad. Probably a mining settlement on either Sheba or Quatermain. He consoled himself with the thought that if it did turn out to be Sheba, at least he could visit the abbey on occasion. He took a deep breath. “I take it that my assignment has been decided?”

Brother Charles nodded grimly. “Yes, I’m afraid so.”

Bede braced himself. “Where?”

Brother Charles answered in a voice of doom, “Thou art assigned to the Spacers’ Mission.”

Bede blinked. Had he heard right?

Brother Charles leaned against the wall and crossed his arms. “You know, you might want to close your mouth before Hubert or one of the other cats decides to go rat hunting in there.”

It took Bede a couple of tries to get enough air to ask, “Why didn’t you just say so?”

His teacher grinned at him. “Because I was afraid you’d try to swarm up me and slobber all over me.” Putting the lie to his fears, Brother Charles threw his arms around the Bible in a bear-hug. “Congratulations, boy. You worked hard for it and you’ve earned it.” He held Bede at arms’ length. “You’ll do us proud.” He raised an admonishing finger. “But only in a proper non-Seven Deadly Sins meaning of the word. Understand?”

Bede beamed back at the big man. “Yes, Brother. I’ll remember. When and where do I go?”

Brother Charles dropped his hands and folded them within his sleeves. “The where is the Spacers’ Mission Mother House on Avenir, sort of neutral ground, as it were. The when is a couple of days from now; after all, it would be a bit rude to skip dinner with his Excellency and the rest of the abbey, tonight.” He cocked his head and squinted one eye. “Besides, you left off the most important part of the question as far as your future success goes.”

The Bible raised his eyebrows. “What’s that, Brother?”

“The who. You’ve been matched with Father Oaku Mary, T.O.R.”

“What’s he like?”

His teacher shook his head. “Don’t know, really. His records look okay and he’s fresh-caught like you. His Ordination was day before yesterday. I guess you’re going to find out first-hand in a few days.” He changed the subject. “Let’s go find your folks. I suspect your mother probably wants to maul you some. I hear their parish priest sprung for their fare?”

“Yes, bugherds don’t make a lot, so Father Mack came up with it. Said only that it had to do with a penance.” They turned the corner.

Flashback: In Remembrance

by Walt Staples

Dr. Nordheimer Pomphee slammed his fist on his desk, producing an almost musical note. “I will not have it. Not in my team.”

The little man on the other side of the desk raised one bushy eyebrow. “Oh? And you plan to do what exactly?”

The head of the Avenir's astrophysics team purpled as he gripped the arms of his executive swivel chair. Through gritted teeth, he answered, “The name stays 'Sheba.' I am the team lead...ergo, I am the team.”

The other preened the huge mustache that hid most of his lower face, a green glimmer playing in the shadows beneath his luxuriant eyebrows. His reply was quiet, “Then you are a team very close to fragmenting and flying off in unfortunate directions. Look, it was bad enough that you personally jumped the gun and announced that 94 Ceti A's second planet has a satellite before we're close enough to nail down why that planet has a fast wiggle of its axis. What's the rush? I mean, how long has Avenir been outward bound from Earth? A week or two more's going to make a difference? Then you had to go and name that satellite, 'Sheba,' without input from the rest of the team. Why 'Sheba?' Where did that come from? What has it to do with 'Eclectia?'”

“Rank hath its privileges.” The tall man brought his hands together on the desk in front of him and looked down a beaky nose at the astrochemist before him. “Now, get out.”

Tony Brazzi was waiting in the companionway outside. “Well, that went well,” he said brightly. “A rather rank situation I should think.”

The little man squinted one eye at the astronomer, then smiled ruefully as he tapped the bulkhead. “Does seem the shipwrights skimped a bit on sound-proofing.”

“So, what do we do, Dr. Niemand?”

Clasping his hands behind his back, Dr. Niemand set off toward the lift. “So, you go back and try to find out why both Eclectia and Sheba have the shimmies. And I go and try to find out where 'Sheba' comes from.”

Tony hooked a thumb back toward the door. “What about him?”

The astrochemist cocked his head. “I've always been of the opinion that once someone flatly rejects reason, the only course open is to find a comfortable place to sit and watch them make a fool of themselves. After all, one should not stand in the way of high art.”

#

During the dog watch, the little astrochemist stopped before the door of an auxiliary to the main data office. After bypassing the door sensors and those of the office, he settled himself at the subsupervisor's console. He punched in “Personal: Nordheimer Quintilius Pomphee” and a long string of alpha-numerics. He leaned back watching the blur of information flow across the screen. At the point of Pomphee's sixth birthday, he slowed the flow and turned up the volume. He replayed the sequence three times, watching the young Pomphee joyfully accept his wiggling birthday gift. Dr. Niemand sat lost in thought for some time, then coming to a decision, made a modification to the record so that it could only be opened with Pomphee's biosignature.

#

Tony rubbed tired, aching eyes, then looked at the numbers on the screen once more. There was something there, but he just couldn't put his hand on it. He turned to where Dr. Niemand lounged, feet up, reading a hardcopy from Tony's collection. The astronomer sighed, linked his hands behind his head, and tensed his muscles. He relaxed and asked, “Which one are you reading?”

The astrochemist smiled and answered without looking up, “King Solomon's Mines.”

Tony grinned. “Printed that out yesterday. Stayed up most of the night reading it. Alan's quite something.”

The little man turned a page fondly, “We're old friends, the hunter and I.” He looked up. “Problem?”

Tony gestured toward the numbers. “There's something hiding in there, but every time I get close, it skitters away.”

Dr. Niemand gazed at the screen thoughtfully as he ran a finger over his mustache. “Ne, as someone said once, 'when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.'”

Tony turned back to the screen with a frown. After a moment or two, his eyebrows went up. He stared at the screen unseeing for a moment longer, then said quietly, “Oh, my.”

#

“They are Sheba I and Sheba II,” Pomphee blazed. He and the astrophysics team had been deadlocked for the past four days. One by one, those who normally backed his decisions had fallen by the wayside; either convinced by argument or through exhaustion. He looked from grim face to grim face like a boar brought to bay. His glare settled on one who entertained a half-smile. “You find this funny, Niemand?”

“Sorry, gas.” The astrochemist replied blandly. He nodded slightly to Elizabeth Rona, the tall, shapely planetologist.

Taking her cue, she spoke, “I can make it worth your while, Nord.”

He stared at her, thunderstruck. Coming to himself, he stormed, “First argument, then threats, now you offer yourself?”

Her laugh was musical. “No Nord, I have much too much respect for both of us. No, what I offer is something unique on the Avenir. If you will yield and accept Tony's name for the second moon, I will supply you with one chocolate covered fresh strawberry per day until we reach orbit around Eclectia. Think how long it's been since you tasted one, Nord. Each from my personal plant in hydroponics.”
The team leader's face lost its anger as he looked back over the decades to a very special birthday. He licked his lips and swallowed. He nodded curtly. “All right. The second moon is Quat—what was it again?”

“Quatermain,” Tony supplied.

“Fool name.” Pomphee lowered his head as if in remembrance of something and walked out.

“Not perhaps as good as the name of a beloved pet from when one was a boy, but a good name on the whole,” Dr. Niemand observed to himself just loud enough for Tony to overhear.

The astronomer asked from the side of his mouth, “How did you know he would go for it?”

“Ah, t'would be telling.” He tilted his head and grinned.

Tony shook his head. “You are a scary man, sometimes.”

“Sometimes,” the little man agreed.

Word Carrier: Publication

by Walt Staples -

In the silence of the chapel, the muted roar of the blowers was noticeable as they ran on “high” to handle the smoke and soot from the unusually large number of candles burning to either side of the altar. The Rite of Publication was one of the few times Brother Marius, the abbey’s life support engineer, allowed such abuse of his air-handlers.

Bede and the other Manuscripts stood shoulder to shoulder as they faced the main celebrant, Bishop Guash. The usually dyspeptic prelate actually seemed to be in fine fettle and to be greatly enjoying himself, as the occasional smile escaped his Excellency’s bulldog-jowled continence. As an acolyte on his right handed him a lit candle, he sobered. “My sons, you have been called to one of the highest callings in Mother Church—that of Bible. Know you that you carry God’s Word to and among his children—all of his children. You may not force yourself on others, but you must be ever ready to open yourself to any who wish to hear God’s Word. It is not an easy calling that you follow. The evil one has used fire in the past to try the destruction of God’s Word. This flame is to remind you of what you may be called upon to face…and what you may save souls from by your efforts.”

Each Manuscript held out his left hand. From left to right, the bishop passed the flame under the outstretched palm. Bede sucked in a breath as the flame reached Antonio, the Ignatius Manuscript on his left. His stomach muscles tightened as readied himself. He would not show a sign! Not before his parents, up from Eclectia. Not before Brother Charles Maria, his second teacher. Nor before Brother Eustis, his first teacher, who, Bede was convinced, watched from a higher plane. There was an instant of burning pain, and the flame passed on to Tommy, the James Manuscript, to his right.

Bishop Guash handed the candle to the acolyte on his left. His face broke into a huge smile. “My sons, today you are no longer Manuscripts, but are Published Bibles. From this point on, you will be known to all by your personal name, and that of your version.” He made the sign of the Cross in blessing over each of them in turn. “Go you hence and serve all.”

#

In the infirmary, Brother Kadfell, the abbey’s medico, asked, “With or without, Douay Bede?”

The Bible smiled at him. “Without, Brother.”

The other nodded. “As you wish.” He set the hypo to dispense the first-aid spray without its anesthetic component and sprayed Bede’s blistered palm. The choice of each newly Published Bible was a secret Brother Kadfell would keep. It was a choice that by tradition was not discussed with anyone.

Outside the infirmary, Brother Charles waited for Bede with a frown. Bede took in his erstwhile teacher’s expression and his heart sank. His assignment had been decided. He had hoped to be assigned to a mission among spacers with the priest he would be paired with. From Brother Charles’ face, he knew it was bad. Probably a mining settlement on either Sheba or Quatermain. He consoled himself with the thought that if it did turn out to be Sheba, at least he could visit the abbey on occasion. He took a deep breath. “I take it that my assignment has been decided?”

Brother Charles nodded grimly. “Yes, I’m afraid so.”

Bede braced himself. “Where?”

Brother Charles answered in a voice of doom, “Thou art assigned to the Spacers’ Mission.”

Bede blinked. Had he heard right?

Brother Charles leaned against the wall and crossed his arms. “You know, you might want to close your mouth before Hubert or one of the other cats decides to go rat hunting in there.”

It took Bede a couple of tries to get enough air to ask, “Why didn’t you just say so?”

His teacher grinned at him. “Because I was afraid you’d try to swarm up me and slobber all over me.” Putting the lie to his fears, Brother Charles threw his arms around the Bible in a bear-hug. “Congratulations, boy. You worked hard for it and you’ve earned it.” He held Bede at arms’ length. “You’ll do us proud.” He raised an admonishing finger. “But only in a proper non-Seven Deadly Sins meaning of the word. Understand?”

Bede beamed back at the big man. “Yes, Brother. I’ll remember. When and where do I go?”

Brother Charles dropped his hands and folded them within his sleeves. “The where is the Spacers’ Mission Mother House on Avenir, sort of neutral ground, as it were. The when is a couple of days from now; after all, it would be a bit rude to skip dinner with his Excellency and the rest of the abbey tonight.” He cocked his head and squinted one eye. “Besides, you left off the most important part of the question as far as your future success goes.”

The Bible raised his eyebrows. “What’s that, Brother?”

“The who. You’ve been matched with Father Oaku Mary, T.O.R.”

“What’s he like?”

His teacher shook his head. “Don’t know, really. His records look okay and he’s fresh-caught like you. His Ordination was day before yesterday. I guess you’re going to find out first-hand in a few days.” He changed the subject. “Let’s go find your folks. I suspect your mother probably wants to maul you some. I hear their parish priest sprung for their fare?”

“Yes, bugherds don’t make a lot, so Father Mack came up with it. Said only that it had to do with a penance.” They turned the corner.

Word Carrier: Anticipation

by Walt Staples -

“Okay, Bede, what’s the problem?”

The young manuscript looked up from the potato he was peeling. “Pardon?”

Brother Trout, the abbey’s cook, stood hands on hips, one of which still held a ladle. “You’re paying far too much attention to your duties. Normally you’d be bored out of your mind stuck here on kitchen duty. Now, what’s eating you, my son?”

Bede looked back down at the potato and peeler. “I’m sorry, Brother. I was just thinking about what it’ll be like out there.”

The Corpulent friar set the ladle back in the stock pot and wiped his large scarred hands. “Nothing wrong with that, boy. Every manuscript wonders about that.”

Bede began peeling again. “I just wish I knew where I’m headed. Which church I’ll be the Bible for.”

Brother Trout chuckled. “Yes, and there’s a seminarian on Assisi wondering the very same thing. Which church he’ll be pastor of, once he’s ordained, and what his Bible is going to be like.”

“Where is Assisi at the moment, Brother?”

The friar was silent as he did the calculations in his head. He pointed upward and just to the right of the hanging rack of pots. “About there, Bede. They’ll be transiting the plane of the ecliptic sometime around Michaelmas.”

The manuscript gestured in the direction of the asteroid with the peeler. “You were at the Abbey of Francis; what’s it like?”

The cook leaned against the counter and folded his hands within the sleeves of his brown habit. “Not all that different from here actually. Gravity’s a bit less because of the slower spin. That‘s why retired religious are sent there when they’re unable to get around.”

“What else?”

“Well, the Jesuits have their observatory there because it gets them up out of the dust and gunk down on the plane.” He thought a moment. “I was there the same time Father Patrice was there. Me a novice and him a seminarian—“

He was interrupted by the arrival of Hubert, chief of the abbey’s cats. The tiger tabby walked over and laid a deceased rat at Brother Trout’s feet and sat back in expectation. The human beamed at him. “Very good, Hubert! Thou art truly the master of the hunt.” He leaned over rubbed the cat’s head and back. The resulting purr was diesel-like. As he straightened, he spoke to Bede, “Would you please dispose of the spoiler of grain while I give Hubert his reward? And mind you, wash those hands when you’re finished, young sir.”

Bede grinned and went for the cleaning equipment. As he used the tongs to drop the rat in the recycler, he thought about what it would be like to be a Bible out on his own. Probably a mining camp somewhere on the backside of beyond. Or one of the underwater habitats. Or—he paused as he washed his hands—space! He and his priest on a roving mission, going from spacecraft to spacecraft as requested.

“Someone looks like the kitten who got into the cream pitcher.” Brother Trout broke his train of thought.

“Sorry, Brother. Woolgathering.”

The cook smiled at him. “As long as it wasn’t a near occasion of sin, I shan’t worry about it. Now.” He pointed at the stool on which Bede had been perched. “Potatoes.”

The manuscript grinned and sat down. Picking up a potato and the peeler, he said, “Yes, Brother.”

Cafeteria Duty

by Holly Heisey -

Hoepi ladled a slap of green algae slosh on another cracked plastic tray and watched another miner’s nose wrinkle in disgust. If the powers that be could afford to hold a hundred and twenty-nine miners in a station tethered to the coolest spot on one half of Sheba…well. They could afford to give those miners decent meals. And hire a cook, for once. She was stuck with cafeteria duty.

A rumble of voices at the door made her look up, not because they were loud or male but because she recognized the first and her hand faltered just a beat on the ladle.

“Hey!” One-armed Micki, her latest victim in the slop line, jumped back to avoid getting green slosh on his coveralls.

Hoepi turned back to the slop line and stared to blush, then thought better of it. “You just watch yourself, Micki.” Which made no sense, so she turned her back and stirred the steaming pot of proto-meatballs with a vigor.

“Hey.”

She whirled. Tennant. She met his eyes for the briefest flicker.

“Hey, Hoepi.”

He knew her name.

She shook her head. Yeah, idiot, of course he knows your name. You only mine with him every second five-day.

She brushed dark hair from her eyes. “Yeah, what do you want?”

Tennant held up his tray and gave her a weary, flashing grin. “Some puke-my-guts special with a side of almost-ham.” He patted his flat stomach. “Worked hard today.”

Hoepi flustered and dumped green slosh and proto-meatballs in a mess on his tray. He turned to the tables…then stopped.

“Hey Hoepi. Was gonna play handball later in the tank. Want to?”

She opened her mouth. He turned more fully, an impish smile on his cracked lips. “Say yes.”

She nodded.

“Good enough!” He flopped down at a table and promptly fell into terse conversation with another knot of miners.

Hoepi stepped back from the slop line. A grin stretched her mouth from ear to ear.

“Hey, Hoepi!”

She turned to the next in line and scowled at him. “What?”

Charity

by Joseph H. Ficor -

The Enforcer at the checkpoint, just off the elevator, at Upper Level Six smiled after he cleared Shouhei for entry.

“We’ve been expecting you.” He said while maintaining that ominous smile.

Shouhei just said, “Thank you,” as he passed the still-smiling Enforcer.

The orders that had been printed out at the checkpoint stated that he was to proceed to Stateroom 14. He was there in five minutes.

Two guards, both Peacekeeper Level Twos, stood on either side of the door leading into the stateroom. They wore immaculate navy blue uniforms with white berets and broad white sashes extending from their left shoulders to their right waists.

Shouhei saluted and the salute was returned. The PKL2 on Shouhei’s right inserted Shouhei’s ID card into a portable reader. He showed it to the other PKL2 who just grunted and mumbled something about Shouhei being the one.

The ID card was returned to Shouhei. The door opened and Shouhei entered a large office with white walls and red carpeting. Many abstract paintings hung neatly on the wall. A large luxurious desk made of smoothed Zirconian black coral stood four meters in front of the young Enforcer.

A large man with skin as dark as the desk and wearing a robe of bright orange and red came from behind the desk and greeted Shouhei.

“Welcome,” the man bellowed, “Enforcer Third Class Fiko! I have been looking forward to meeting you for a few months now.”

Shouhei’s training brought him back to his place. He straightened and saluted, but his face betrayed his confusion at the Governor’s greeting.

The Governor just smiled. “My boy, I can see that you do not understand that I’m your benefactor.”

Shouhei’s face betrayed more confusion.

“I am your sponsor. I chose you from the dregs of Adagio to become an Enforcer. You are my act of charity.”

“I’m sorry sir. But I don’t understand. I thought that I was accepted because of my scores on the entrance exam.”

“Don’t be silly,” the Governor said, and laughed. “The test was just a formality. You were already in by my word. You see, I had a small wager with some of the members of my club that I could choose anyone from that waste on Eclectia and sponsor him through the Enforcers. They doubted me, but you proved them wrong…”

Each of Governor’s words was like the beating of a hammer driving a spike into Shouhei’s heart.

“…and my boy, you paid handsomely—two platinums. So I’ve decided as a special reward to make you a member of my personal security detachment. What do you think about that?”

Professionalism—and his faith—prevented him from expressing the words.

Promotion

by Joseph H. Ficor -

Shouhei exited the shuttle. Sheba’s orbital spaceport, Carlston’s Cove, handled all incoming and outgoing traffic. Most of the station’s space was devoted to shipping the precious ore mined from Sheba to Avenir and Eclectia. The upper levels of the station housed exact copies of the luxurious staterooms of Avenir. Here, the masters of Sheba relished in the wealth that the broken world brought them.

Shouhei mentally prepared himself for a life of policing the mining settlements on the surface. He had not told his parents about his assignment to Sheba. Fear and humiliation restrained him. His folks were so proud that he had been accepted into the Enforcers. It was a rare chance to leave the dust of Adagio for a better life. Sheba was not a better life.

The Enforcer at the custom checkpoint smiled when he saw Shouhei. He looked for a moment at the crisp new uniform of the “shiny.”

“Welcome to the dump of the system,” he said with that irritating smile. “You must have pulled someone’s chain the wrong way to be sent here.”

Shouhei said nothing. He gave the cynic his ID card.

Cynic inserted the card into a slot in his terminal.

The cynic’s smile melted into a scowl as he read the screen.

He pulled the card from the computer and thrust it and a station map at Shouhei.

“Follow the map to Upper Level Six.”

“What?” Shouhei just stood dumbfounded. I’m not going to the surface? Why?

“Upper Level Six, Shiny!” Cynic shouted.

Shouhei’s confusion blazed like the exposed interior of the world below.

Cynic clarified, “You’ve been assigned to Governor Bokkasa’s personal security detachment. Now move along! Next!”

Shouhei moved along.

Replacement

by Walt Staples -

Douay Charles Maria hesitated at the cell’s door. He made to knock but allowed his fist to hang in mid-air. His indecision was broken by a voice from within, “If you are coming in, come in then. I don’t bite—at least not as I’ve just been fed.”

The Bible took a breath and pushed the door open. Brother Eustis sat in a rocking chair facing the door. His blind eyes gleamed whitely in the near darkness. “Yes?”

The younger man said, “It is Charles, Brother.”

The ancient man’s face broke into a wide grin. “Charley! It’s good to hear your voice again. Oh.” He reached to the side and turned up the lights. “Forgive me, my boy. I’ve lived so long in the dark I forget others don’t have my blessing.”

“Blessing, Brother?”

The old friar chuckled. “Lose one of the seven senses, and the others become more acute, supposedly to compensate for the lost one. Personally, I don’t buy it. Brother Ignatius Mary lost all sense of smell and taste back when he worked in the smelting works, before taking the cowl. He still managed to trip over things.” He smiled in apparent fond memory. “Only man I know who could trip over a beach.” After a moment, he went on, “No, I think it’s just the lack of distraction.”

Douay Charles smiled at the picture just described. “Perhaps.”

Like many of the blind, Brother Eustis kept his face toward his guest as much as possible when talking. “I heard you landed yesterday about Terce. Why so long coming to see me?”

“Well, I…I, er…” The Bible let it peter out.

Brother Eustis smiled at him. “You were embarrassed by the fact that you’ve been recalled to be my replacement. Not so?”

The other looked at the floor. “Yes, Brother, I’m afraid it is.”

The elderly friar laughed. “Charley, Charley. It’s not like you’re speeding me to my grave. The good Lord and Father Time are doing that between them just fine.” He pointed in the direction of an armchair. “Take a load off. No, quite the contrary, I am extremely happy you’re here.”

The chair made a squeaking “whoof “ sound as the Bible settled into it. “You are?”

“Oh, yes, quite happy. Look, you and I both know I’m not going to see the Feast of St. Paul Tong Buong. That’s why I asked specifically for you.”

Douay Charles looked at him with surprise. “You did?”

Brother Eustis snorted. “You don’t think the Abbot came up with your name on his own, do you? Abbot Mary Chuck de Yeager, O.F.M. is a saintly man, a thoughtful man, and probably one of the greatest leaders this abbey will see, but he knows nothing of teaching new Bibles. I think the fact that his novice master chose to give him the name of the patron of spacers is probably an acknowledgement that the future Abbot Chuck was no man of letters. On the other hand, he’s smart enough to listen to those who do know.”

The Bible grinned at his old teacher. Blindness may have come upon him with the decades, but he still saw quite clearly.

“Beating one’s gums tends to be thirsty work. So’s having to listen to said beaten gums. Would you join me in a cup of tea?” He raised an admonishing finger. “And none of that ‘Are you sure there will be room for both of us?’ mind you. I remember your rather questionable sense of humor.”

Douay Charles laughed. “Yes, thank you, Brother. I would like a cup.”

Brother Eustis touched a button on the arm of his chair. A young voice issued from a speaker, “Yes, Brother Eustis?”

“Tommy, could you see if Brother Trout still has some of the Jerusalem Mint tea? And if he does, would you ask if he would mind making a couple of cups for us?”

“Right away, Brother.”

“Thank you, Tommy.” The old man smiled. “He’s one of our James; has about a standard year to go. Brother Levi tells me he’s probably going to be one of the best.”

The Bible grinned. “Do the other manuscripts still call them ‘Kings?’”

The Brother chuckled. “And since when do things change in the Church? After all, we Douays are still referred to as ‘Rhemis.’ Though for the life of me, I have no idea where the word comes from or what its original meaning was. But enough old times.” He changed the subject, “You have work to do, Charley. We have one Douay, Bede, who is close to publication. I expect by Advent, he’ll be ready .”

Douay Charles nodded. “I remember my publication. One minute, I’m a manuscript. Then Archbishop Patel passes the candle flame under my hand and I’m a Bible. Who’s celebrating Bede’s?”

“Bishop Guash.”

“Um, better than nothing I suppose. What about the younger manuscripts?”

*

There were a number of sniffles and red eyes among the manuscripts, especially the Douays, as the abbey’s congregation left the chapel. Brother Charles—formerly Douay Charles—-and Manuscript Bede lagged behind. Bede glanced back at the entrance of the crypt. He sniffed and ran a finger under his eye. The erstwhile Bible placed a hand on his shoulder and gave it a squeeze. “I miss him too, son.”

“Douay—“ He stopped. “Sorry, Brother Charles. I’m not used to you not being a Bible anymore, I guess.”

“Bede, I’ll always be a Bible, just as you will always be a manuscript. It’s a part of us that never goes away. The good man we just laid in the crypt was a Manuscript, a Bible and a Brother. Lord willing, and I think he probably is, Eustis will also be a saint.” He put his arm around the younger man’s shoulders. “Our calling, yours, mine, and our teacher’s was to be the Living voice telling man that no matter how bad things are, there is still hope. Once upon a time, Bibles were on paper only and people burned them. That’s why the candle flame during publication; to remind us what may be involved in carrying the Word.” He released his hold and the two of them genuflected and left the chapel.

Thanksgiving

by Joseph H. Ficor -


The trip from Avenir to Sheba was uneventful. Shouhei sulked in his cabin. The dream of serving on a security cruiser in the Space Service was dead. He just knew that the rest of his time with the Enforcers would be spent breaking up payday saloon brawls between miners on that cracked rock.

A memory came to his mind. He was around fourteen and he had failed an opportunity to be part of the soccer club sponsored by the Countess Barslow Memorial Charity. Anger and juvenile despair had a stranglehold on his heart. His mother told him about an old saying that people should give thanks to God in all situations, especially the bad ones. She said that people needed to release their pains and disappointments to Him. This gave the Big Man an opportunity to make the situation right. The advice and resulting prayer of thanksgiving lifted his heart.

Shouhei gave a prayer of thanks for his current disappointment.

The peace that followed relieved his mind and spirit.

Evolution

by Jeff Carter -

Dr. Kwame Singh basked in the shimmering blue light and felt the pulse of ocean currents against his skin. Even though he was 30 km beneath the surface of Sheba, he felt as though he were in the oceans of Eclectia. The miners had used the blue mineral pectolite to gild the walls of their cathedral with every color of the sea. The rhythm of the waves came from a circle of drummers beating a slow and somber cadence. Since a lifetime of inhaling grit and ash had rendered them unable to sing, they offered up prayers with drums made from the shells of giant sea snails.

He thought of his frustrating time in dank Port Xenia. The study of Theological Drift had come to a halt around the same time as the Avenir. His parents and grandparents had made their contributions, charting the fracture, conglomeration, and slow dissolution of Ancient Earth religions. The long journey across the void had opened space for a spiritual Cambrian explosion. Kwame intended to capture it by pioneering a new field called Evolutionary Theology.

The colonists of Port Xenia were wistful about the so-called ‘angels’ they rarely glimpsed through the portholes, but there was nothing ecstatic or transcendent in their middling culture. The first true believers he met were the miners on their pilgrimage from Sheba. Their hair was unkempt and their skin was like leather, but their eyes were tranquil and electric. These men and women had contact with the ‘angels’ more frequently and intensely than Dr. Singh had ever observed.

He had followed the miners back to Sheba and discovered the cathedral that they had built by hand. A bright light carved across the ceiling, interrupting his reverie. Supervisor Braun was stomping towards him, his helmet light glaring. “Third shift is starting. Break it up.”

As the miners shuffled out they genuflected to the statues of patron saints that had been streamlined with fins and curving fluke tails. The supervisor looked at his chronometer and scowled. “Isn’t there an abbey topside for this? If they don’t spend less time banging drums and more time working, the technology we depend upon will fail.”

Dr. Singh smiled with dawning understanding. “They risk freezing vacuum and hellish inferno every day to feed their families. Do you really think it is just technology that they depend on?”

Byblos

by Walt Staples -

The man in the brown habit wore the battered face of a former boxer. As he shuffled, long experience caused him not to notice the tremor running through the walls and floor of the abandoned mine shaft. Sheba was just being Sheba.

The Abbot halted his silent progress down the hall of the scriptorium. He eased open the Judas slot on the door marked “Ignatius” so as not to disturb those on the door’s other side. From within came a newly cracked voice, “…In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the…” The tall, stooped man slid the slot closed.

He continued to the next cell. Its name was “Jerusalem.” This time, he heard, “…and the word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Though Him all things…” He smiled and went on to “Douay.”

He listened and began to frown as he heard, “…The same was in God—” A much older voice cut the younger off, “No.” It continued more gently, “No, Bede, it goes this way; now listen carefully. ‘The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by Him, and without Him was made nothing that was made.’ There you see?”

The Abbot’s forehead cleared as the first voice said, “Sorry, Brother Eustis,” and began again, “The same was in the beginning…”

He thought about Brother Eustis as he walked toward “James.” The old friar had earned a proper retirement years ago, but continued to teach the young Douay Bibles. The Abbot shook his head and smiled, old men and old hunting dogs.

As if conjured by the thought, Fezik, the oldest ratting dog, trotted by. He wagged at the human and went about his business. He and the chief cat seemed to have a competition as to who could bring Brother Trout, the abbey cook, the most rats.

At “James,” the ancient heard, “…All things were made by Him, and without Him was not anything made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in…”

He went on greatly cheered. The new crop of Bibles were coming along well. Even young Bede showed promise. By Advent, all six of the present class would be ready to go out to their respective churches. The Abbey of Francis might produce priests, but they were crippled without his Bibles. He caught himself. No! In that direction lay Pride. He whispered an Act of Contrition.

He turned his thoughts back to their original path. Yes, he thought, six new Bibles by Advent. His face broke into a toothless grin of pure happiness. His expression sobered somewhat as he was reminded of the problem of Brother Eustis. Which of the older Douays should he pick to replace the old friar when the sad time came? He padded on through the halls of the Abbey of Jerome.