Peculiar Soul

In short, gentlemen: this farce must be called out for what it is. The organization that was meant to advance our understanding of souls for the benefit of all men has been supplanted by a labyrinthine and twisted tumor on the flank of government. I have no control over it. Though you will not recognize it, this chamber has no control over it.

What more to say? To state my regret once more, perhaps, but I have minted enough of that particular coin that I find it greatly devalued. In lieu of a final apology I will instead leave you with a warning: the monster I have created will happily devour you if given the opportunity. Do not let him grasp the levers of power. Do not speak to him except via intermediaries, who must then be considered compromised. He is not your subordinate or even your ally.

I have said my piece. Good-bye, gentlemen.

- Stanza’s Complaint to the Assembly (excerpt), 671.

Michael woke to find a young man staring at him. His sleep-fogged brain took a few moments to parse this oddity before remembering that there had been another occupant in this room when he had laid down. The man was wearing the red clothing that appeared common to this barracks, with a light olive complexion and sharp features under a bristle of dark hair. He was thin, though with a wiry aspect to him that did not speak of malnutrition.

“Where’d you come from?” he asked. “The doctor was only away for two days, did he fish you out of the sea?”

A surge of anger flashed through Michael at the man’s words. He clenched his hands into fists, his mind swirling with images of fractals and mirrors tracing over a glassy-calm sea - then stuttering as it ran into an absence at the center of it all. Rage shaded into confusion, then concern. Michael swiped a weary hand over his eyes.

When he opened them once more he saw yet more confusion and concern, written on his bunkmate’s face.

His hands went up in an appeasing gesture. “Just asking, yes?” the man said. “Okay if you don’t want to say.”

“I - no,” Michael said, shaking his head. “Sorry, there’s something wrong with my memory. I think it’s part of why I’m here.”

The other man’s eyes widened fractionally as Michael spoke. “You’re not Esroun,” he said. “Ardan?”

“Is that strange?” Michael asked, raising himself to sit up. Now that the distinction had been made, he could hear the clipped vowels of continental Gharic in the man’s speech. He thought of Ricard for a wistful moment. He missed his manservant terribly, as though they had been apart for months. As though he was sure they would never meet again. A note of discordant worry spread up in his heart.

His thoughts began to teeter worryingly. With a force of will he pulled back from dwelling on the subject. “This is an Institute facility,” he said. “I should think most of the people here are Ardan.”

“Here on the island, yes, but not here in this building.” His bunkmate peered curiously at him for a moment, then shrugged and extended his hand. “But if you’re here, you’re here. I’m Luc.”

“Michael.” He shook the proffered hand and slid back to lean against the room’s bare wall. “I don’t suppose you know where I could get some food? I wound up missing dinner last night.”

Luc nodded. “Mealtime is soon, we can walk over. Should probably get you some reds to wear, too.” He gestured to his own shirt and loose trousers, both dyed a somewhat sun-faded red. “Guards here are nice, but we wouldn’t want them to think you’re supposed to be out at the field, yes? We can stop at the laundry, it’s on the way.”

Michael frowned and looked down at his clothing. His shirt and trousers were simple and not well-made, but he felt a certain amount of pride looking at his stitching-

His thoughts collapsed into discord once more. His stitching? Since when did he know how to sew? Ricard handled his clothing, and his father would slice him to ribbons if he caught wind of such a womanly inclination in his son. Yet looking at the rough seams of his trouser leg he recognized his own hand.

“Hey,” Luc said, jarring his attention back to the moment. Michael realized that he didn’t know how long he had been staring at his clothes; his bunkmate’s concerned expression said that it had been more than a glance.

“Sorry,” Michael said. “I drifted off.”

“It’s fine,” Luc said. “Everyone here remembers how it was the first time. Free bed, free food, nice soldiers - you just walk around waiting to see how you’re being scammed.” He smiled and shook his head. “I’ve been here ten years,” he said. “I’ll let you know if I figure it out.”

There was an extended silence while Michael mulled over those words, broken when Luc jerked his head toward the doorway. “Come on,” he said. “We wait any longer, we’re going to be late for breakfast.”

Michael plucked at the red cloth of his shirt absently. It was simple in make but machine-sewn, and it lay well on him as the day’s heat began to build. He had been loath to give up his clothing but had to admit that these garments were more comfortable, even if the color was somewhat glaring.

“Here,” Luc said, sitting down across from Michael. They were in a large, dim room with rows of tables, suitable for seating hundreds. As it stood there were merely dozens, all clad in the same red garb. Luc slid water and a steaming bowl of porridge to Michael before happily addressing his own portion.

The smell of it hit Michael like a physical thing; his mind dredged up a hundred memories only to have them slip away half-seen. Frustration built in him. He hadn’t cooked a day in his life, so why-

“It’s not poisoned,” Luc chuckled. “Come on, eat while it’s hot - that’s the best part of living where we do, by the time the white-shirts get theirs it’s gone half cold.” His expression faded a bit. “Not that they mind.”

Michael took a bite, chewing with methodical slowness and trying to ignore the riot of failed connections thrashing about in the back of his mind. “What’s the difference?” he asked. “Between the red and the white.”

“Red is the control group, white is everyone else,” Luc replied. “All the white-shirts have some sort of interesting soul, and the doctor works with them to do his research. Only - some souls work on other people.” He shrugged and took a bite. “So they bring us in and stand us in front of a Pulse or a Jitter or something. I won’t lie and say that it’s a good time, but we don’t have to do it much. The rest of the time we just - do whatever. Fish, swim, go on a walk. He’s got books, if you can read. Tutors if you can’t.”

Michael’s attention drifted as Luc chattered away about how he liked to spend his days. The difference between him and the white-shirts he had met before was stark, and like that latter group Michael had been brought to the island for his soul. A face hung in his mind once more, smiling and vacant. It was doubly frightening in that he could not remember why it struck such fear into him.

Luc had stopped speaking and resumed his breakfast, having sensed that Michael’s thoughts had pulled him away. He looked up and smiled when he saw Michael’s attention return to his food. “Everything all right?” he asked. “You were saying how hungry you were.”

“I have a soul,” Michael said, almost managing to sound as if his imagination was not tormenting him with the horrific implications of that fact. “I don’t think I’m meant to be part of the control group.”

Luc raised an eyebrow. “But the doctor sent you to us?” he asked. Seeing Michael’s nod in response, he shrugged and leaned back. “There you go. He must have his reasons. He’s a good man.”

“Would the white-shirts agree?” Michael asked.

The smile faded from Luc’s face, and he set his spoon down in his bowl. “They aren’t treated poorly,” he said. “They get food and a place to sleep just like we do. It’s all I ever wanted, out in the world.”

“But there’s something wrong about them,” Michael insisted. “Something broken. You can’t tell me you don’t see it.”

Luc snorted. “The world breaks people,” he said. “You think a man who comes back from the War with half his face gone is less broken? The girl born into a brothel who never leaves?” He leaned forward. “I lived in an orphanage in Tenouf before the doctor found me. The woman who ran it rented us out to a cotton mill as scavengers - to work under the machines, yes? Pick up all the cotton that spilled off while it was spinning.”

He took an irritable drink of his water. “Sounds like easy work, but they never turned off the machines. They would hiss and clank just overhead, very low. You must keep yourself flat against the ground and hope you have not grown too big, or that this machine does not pass a little lower than the others. Most years at least one of us died. Others lost fingers, feet. All of us lost hair.” He turned his head to the side so that Michael could see a bare patch amid the short fuzz of hair on his scalp.

Michael opened his mouth but could think of nothing to say, and so shut it once more.

“Yes, see?” Luc said. “It is horrible, and it is real. People are living it right now. I was lucky enough to meet the doctor, and so I live on this upside-down island where the unsouled have their leisure and the ensouled work the fields. Back in Tenouf I never had a dream so pleasant as the life they live.”

“I’m sorry,” Michael said, still at a loss for words. “I didn’t know.”

“Most don’t, unless they were born into such a life,” Luc replied. “Even then the ones who escape tend to stay far away so they can pretend it doesn’t exist. Only a few remember and reach their hand back for others. The doctor is one of them.”

“I had never heard a thing about this place before I arrived,” Michael admitted. “What I did hear-” He winced. “I can’t really remember a lot of it, but I think it was made out to be fairly horrid. I had certainly never heard of him taking in Esroun orphans.”

Luc’s grin returned. “I don’t think he tells the Ardans that,” he said conspiratorially. “They care about results. We are an unimportant step of the process, and to them it makes no difference where we came from.”

Michael nodded, and having nothing further to add resumed eating his meal. His hunger reasserted itself after a few bites and he was shortly left with a clean bowl, much to Luc’s amusement.

“Not bad, yes?” he asked. “A good way to start your day. Now we can-”

Luc broke off, his eyes widening as he looked past Michael. The room had been quiet before save for the gentle noise of people eating and holding soft conversation, but now the air stilled entirely. Michael turned to look, nearly certain of what he would see.

“Hello, my young friend,” Spark said, looking much-improved from the last time Michael had seen him. There was no anger left in his eyes, and a hint of the manic energy had returned. “I see you’re settling in well. After some reflection I have a notion of our path forward from here.”

Michael felt a chill in his gut. “You do?”

“I do indeed.” Spark smiled, then shifted his gaze to Luc. “My word, I haven’t seen you in months. I meant to ask you…” He trailed off, looking troubled. “Oh my. It was important, and I’ve forgotten.”

“You had lent me some texts, sir,” Luc supplied. “Was that it?”

Spark leaned forward, suddenly-enthused. “Yes!”he said. “Rashid Bahloul’s third treatise, what did you think of it?”

“I’m afraid it went over my head, sir.” Luc smiled, and Michael had the sudden impression that this same conversation had played out multiple times in the past. “I don’t know that I’m meant for mathematics.”

“Ah, well,” Spark said. “Perhaps we’ll stick with biology, I recall you enjoying the items you’ve borrowed from Claude’s library. Now, if you don’t mind - I need to kidnap your friend here for a moment. He and I have some work to do.”

The sun shone down on them as Spark led the way back to the main hall, though a light breeze meant that the heat was not oppressive. Rather, its light worked to further-imbue Spark with cheer.

“I have decided that we shall operate,” Spark said, “under the assumption that my subordinates are not complete idiots. That your soul was in fact unaligned as they claimed on the day you received it, and that some event has taken place to skew that alignment.” He turned to flash a wild grin at Michael. “Well?”

“It - sounds logical,” Michael ventured. “I’m afraid I’m not sure what might have happened.”

Spark’s expression turned rueful. “Through no fault of your own. That will have to be a lesson for me, and a painfully-earned one at that. But oh, oh! To change alignments! My boy, do you have any idea how absolutely spectacular that would be? I had hoped - well, I had hoped many things, and many more.” He shook his head and turned back forward.

“The problem with souls is that they act upon man like any other force of nature,” Spark said. “Fear and trembling and cowering before the majesty of the storm, all of that nonsense is not a useful way to approach life. When the waves and tides threaten we build breakwaters, when storms blow we refine metal and shape stone to withstand them. But against the whims of the soul we have been utterly helpless.”

He made a grand gesture, flinging an arm out to the side with such gusto that Michael had to take a step away. “But now!” he said. “Understanding this change you have experienced may bring about a new era of animetry. We shall simply have to accept that the experiment started on its own, before I knew I had started it.” He gave a self-satisfied little nod.

Michael followed bemusedly as Spark’s conversation lapsed into happy, tuneless humming. A few minutes later they were back in the main hall and in another featureless exam room, with the distinction that this time they were not alone. Two men stood waiting for them, one wearing white clothing and the other in more normal wear.

The man in regular clothes was nondescript, with a stance and build that told Michael he was one of the Institute’s men - though he did not know why that was the case, upon reflection. The white-shirt, by contrast, was tall and gawky with a prominent nose. He bore the fixed half-smile common to the island’s laborers and did not look at Michael when he entered.

“Excellent, excellent,” Spark said. “Michael, I’d like you to meet Claude. He’s our staff anatomens on the island, he’s got a real talent for detail work.”

Claude inclined his head slightly, then returned his attention to Spark. “Where should we begin?” he asked. His voice was not what Michael had expected - thin and high, with a whispery quality to it.

“That is ever the question, isn’t it?” Spark said, rubbing his chin. “That a change would occur implies a template, and given that we’ve observed only one major reaction so far…” He turned to look at Michael. “Well, it gives us a set of circumstances to root around in, at any rate. Who did you bring along?”

“A form-based soul,” Claude murmured. “Common grade of potens, mild enhancement to body strength with minimal durability increase. Picked it up as war-wounded for the grade enhancement trials from three years back.”

Spark began to walk slowly around the other man, inspecting him up and down. “Those did not work at all,” he mused. “A shame, really. I was quite optimistic about that effort. I should probably check - Michael, have you seen this man before?”

A building disquiet had settled into Michael’s chest, a hollow ache behind his ribs. “I don’t think so,” he answered. Immediately, the ache in his chest intensified into a blinding agony - then abated as Spark took a step backward.

“Fascinating,” Spark said. “Claude, I do believe we’re on the right track. Mark this as a zero-affinity trial and make a note that the response begins with observed intent.” He stepped forward and grabbed a small scalpel from the table, swiping it lazily across the white-shirt’s throat.

Hot, electric agony tore through Michael’s veins, driving him to his knees. Red stained the white cloth, dripping down to pool on the floor. The man never stopped smiling.

Michael stood watching a faint mote of light sail upward to the void. He had opened his eyes to see it shining there in front of him, looking bereft and aimless for only a second before it swam away to join the distant stream of lights overhead.

He did not know how long he stood there, staring into blank infinity long after the light had faded away to nothing - but at some point he realized that the distance sparkle had become starlight and the abyss nothing but a moonless sky, hanging broad and chill over a denuded orchard.

A flare of orange drew his eye to the side, where he found the old man sitting on a stump with pipe in hand, looking pensive. He looked up as Michael approached and shook his head.

“Nothing I can say that would make it better,” he said. “Nothing I would say. Some things are horrible beyond rationalization. Stark reminders that the world has no inherent boundaries. No respect for your sensibilities.” He took another draw on his pipe, the flaring light highlighting the crags in his face. “Have to view it with clear eyes. Decide if it is something your will can prevent. If not, you learn to live with it. If it is - that is when you exercise your will, and see it done.”

Michael looked at him and felt hopeless. “How could I do either of those?” he asked. “Living with it seems worse than dying, and I don’t know what I could do to stop it. I feel so - broken.” He stopped. “This is it, isn’t it? This is how it starts, with the white-shirts. Years of living here, being made to suffer and experience suffering. I’m already a little bit like them.”

The old man grunted. “That terrifies you,” he said. It was a statement, not a question, but Michael nodded slowly. The shadows of the trees around him flickered with the faces from his vision, a man dropping to the quay with a smile on his face and blood running from his nose.

“I’m not sure what to do,” he whispered, staring out into the dead, smiling forest.

There was a small chuckle, and Michael looked up - but the man had vanished. His attempt to search for his mysterious companion was brought up short by roots clasped tightly around his foot. Michael stared at them for a moment, then knelt to try and prise them off.

It was fruitless. The roots held like steel rather than wood, and gripped so tightly that his leg had already started to fuzz unpleasantly with pins and needles. There were no stones or branches that he might use to aid in his escape. There was only the dark, the cold, and the ruined orchard.

The dark was all the more terrifying because on some level he knew that the dark and despoiled clearing had been beautiful once. A different image overlaid itself on the night for a moment - one in which the trees were whole and healthy, sun-dappled with the last rays of day amid a warm breeze. It came to him not with the uncomfortable and sharp-edged clarity of those memories on the quay, but instead as a soft and well-worn balm.

The warmth faded away to leave him with the night once more, but the night had a taste of warm and sun-dappled evening to it. It had been beautiful here, once, even if the dark had cast that beauty aside. He looked at the few standing trees and saw how they had once arched up with leaves and flowers in the spring, bent down in autumn laden with sweet fruit. How they grew bare, as they were now, only to surge forth again when the sun returned to warm them.

He saw the roots buried deep in the soil where the cold’s bite was not so harsh, the dormant wisps of life that lay sleeping. Even the broken trees would grow once more, and the ones that did not would decay to add their richness into the soil below. There were no endings in this charred and torn landscape, only change and potential that seethed in the chaos left by the old order’s destruction.

In his mind’s eye the roots felt the first tickling heat of the spring sun and drank deep of the ashen water in the soil, stretched leaves out from their remaining branches and began anew. The ground turned lush and green, then speckled into a riot of color as flowers grew up from their hiding places. It was not how this orchard had looked, once upon a time - but it was still beautiful.

He held the image in his mind for a long moment before he opened his eyes. When he did, he saw night. Ice dripped in skeletal points from the trees. Yet the dark was not an oppressive force occupying the clearing, nor the cold an eternal tyrant over the land. It was simply how things were at the moment, and change followed every moment.

“Nothing stays the same,” he murmured, looking down at his feet. The roots that currently lay entwined around his foot did not want to be aboveground in the cold air. He bent down to trace his fingers over their rough bark, feeling the strength of the wood as it trailed away into the frozen ground.

The bulk of the root was still down there, slumbering until spring. He let his mind wander beyond what his eyes could see, imagining the natural path of the tree, the impulse that drove the root to slowly wander forward in search of fresh soil. Simple choices, tree choices. Moment by moment he drew the path through the ground, through the life of the tree.

When he opened his eyes the roots had withdrawn from his foot.

“Mind frees the soul,” the old man said from behind him.

Michael turned to smile at him. “Soul frees the body,” he replied. “I - knew that, from somewhere. From here, perhaps, but at a different point along its path. When it was beautiful and safe, and I never wanted to leave.”

“Change is a fact of life,” the man grunted. “You know that too. So you also know that this garden of yours could grow once more. Not the same as it was, but in a way the old garden could never see.” He lifted an eyebrow. “Do you know what you’re going to do?”

“What, about all this?” Michael asked, sweeping his arm over the orchard. “Not in the least. But if this is my mind making sense of my mind, as you said before - then it appears I have a lot of work to do.”

The man nodded and drew on his pipe. “And how do you plan to do that?” he asked.

Michael’s mind reached out for a thread of thought at the phrase, racing towards a memory that it knew must be there. He almost flinched away from it, from the horrid blank space that lurked at the center of those shattered memories - but then he remembered the root. The longing for that natural path, the state of things as they should be. He held the thought still until he found the thin trace of that broken path and let the thread settle into it with a small, satisfied grin.

The moment of connection was electric, enthralling, like a breath of vivified spring air. “I had a friend who once told me the answer to that question,” Michael said, smiling at the old man with a renewed warmth. “He taught me a lot of things about life and death, about the paths that our choices make. About pork and porridge and how to mend my clothes. And, most importantly, how to approach particularly recalcitrant problems when they intrude into your garden.”

Jeorg smiled. “One day at a time,” he said, then paused as his expression faltered. “You know that I’m not him.”

“I know,” Michael said. “You explained it about as well as I could expect from someone wearing that face. A shadow of a thing I cannot yet grasp.” He frowned. “One of a great many such things, with no end in sight.”

“One of the few constants in a life well-lived,” Jeorg chuckled. “Although hopefully the particulars shift over time.”

Michael snorted. “Stop it, I can’t take the nuggets of wisdom seriously when I know they’re ultimately coming from me.”

“Perhaps I’m just a wiser part of you,” Jeorg replied. “If you don’t like it then you can find a way to change. Me, this garden, even that part of you that your mind recognizes as its own.”

The garden lay dark around them, and Michael turned his head to look at it. The gentle drip of melting icicles played a dissonant beat against the soil, and he smiled as a fat drop of water struck him on the cheek.

“Maybe later,” he said. “For now, I have a few ideas on where to start.”