Roger Zelazny - Donnerjack

Virginia wept. Where her tears struck the ground, tiny white flowers with hearts of gold sprung forth. Their perfume was sweet.

Jay Donnerjack bid his ghostly mother farewell, notified Dack that he planned to take an extended trip into Virtu, and departed his father’s castle. When he crossed the Great Stage, he carried with him Dubhe, the dark simian creature who had betrayed the orders of the Lord of Deep Fields. Whistling, he summoned to him Death’s dog, Mizar, who knew nothing of his origin, but who loved the boy. Feeling well accompanied, Jay shook his black hair from his shoulders and breathed the crisp morning air.

“Any idea where we should start looking for this train, Jay?” Dubhe asked.

“Not really. I want to go visit with Reese first, tell him what we’re doing. He had surgery again, recently. The report I got from the Institute says that he made it through, but I bet he could use visitors.”

“I… can find… the way,” wheezed Mizar.

“Good,” Jay said. “I won’t be able to stay with Reese long—not since I’m in my real self—but it’s a place to start.”

They traveled then, walking across cracked beds of dry lava, swimming beneath the waters of an aquamarine ocean, skiing down a mountain of perfect powder. The route they took was far from the easiest, but Mizar tended to be rather direct and Jay was not concerned about his own comfort. What Dubhe thought, he kept to himself.

When they neared Caltrice’s site, Jay wrote a message on a leaf and set it on a raft made from twigs. This he set into a stream that he knew would enter Caltrice’s site. The message, like so many he had sent in the past, said simply: “I am coming to visit and would like to see Reese if I can. J.”

Arriving, they found Reese seated on his favorite rock, working out a series of formulas on a datapad manifested as a chunk of raw slate. He set down his chalk when he heard them enter the grove and grinned.

“It seems like forever, Jay. Where have you been?”

“Getting into trouble,” Jay answered. “How are you feeling?”

“In virt, just fine. In RT, the operation was fairly successful, but apparently they had to remove my right leg from the knee down. I know it’s silly to mourn an appendage that I haven’t used for years, but I find myself in a rather bleak state of mind. Distract me. Tell me about your adventures.”

Jay did so, beginning with his encounter with the caoineag and ending with his resolution to seek out Death. Finishing, he braced himself, waiting for the inevitable argument. Reese merely cleared his throat and studied him.

“You’ve grown up.”

“I guess so.”

“And you feel this is something you need to do.”

“I don’t see that there is any other reasonable choice, Reese. Both Mother and Father tried fighting the Lord of Deep Fields. Their battles gave me time to grow up. Now I can go and confront him on more equal terms.”

Reese nodded. “Apparently, he still wants you, so your education and maturity have not ruined you. Has it occurred to you that he might want you merely as a source of spare parts? I know of no other successful mating between Virtu and Verite.”

Jay swallowed hard. “I hadn’t, but I’ll take that risk.”

“And you mean to find your father’s peculiar train.”

“That’s the idea.”

“I have never seen it, but I did learn something about it from John. Before you begin your run into Deep Fields have it carry you to the grove where strange attractors grow. These may arm you as they armed your father. Of course, the lord of that place may have learned new defenses since your father challenged him.”

“Do you know where I might find the Brass Babboon?”

Reese sighed. “No, it is long since I cared to venture more than briefly from Caltrice’s site. That reminds me. If you are in the flesh, you should not remain here long. Go, son. Send me a message when you succeed.”

Jay hugged him. “I will, sir.”

“Where will you begin your search?”

“I first heard about the Brass Babboon from a pliant who claimed to have met my father. He was the first one to mention Dad’s journeys into Deep Fields to me. I’ll seek him out and learn what I can from him.”

“Good thought. Fortune walk with you.”

“Thanks.”

The old man watched Jay depart, the dog before him, the monkey moving through the boughs overhead. Reese had hidden from Jay the fact that if he did not concentrate his virt persona had a tendency to fade out, beginning with the amputated leg. Caltrice could find no reason for it, but Reese suspected that his hold on life was almost ended.

He wondered if he died in Virtu would he see the moire first.

When Desmond Drum arrived at his office, Link Crain was waiting. He considered it a courtesy that the girl waited in the hallway, since she was quite capable of picking the lock. When he opened the door and ushered her inside, he wondered that anyone could take her for a boy— there was a sway to her walk, a roundness to her hips that marked her as female to his admiring gaze. And those green eyes! Such lashes. She’d never be a beauty, but if her mother was any indication she would continue to improve with age.

Pouring them both shots from his favorite bottle, he toasted her, silently mocked himself. He suspected that Link did not bother to watch her body language when they were alone since, after all, he knew her secret and—anyhow—he was far too senior to her for her to see as a man.

“Do you have any news for me?” Link asked eagerly, setting down the glass barely touched.

“I do.” He paused, teasing her with his silence then relenting. “It may not be what you want to hear, kid.”

“Go on!”

“Very well. First, I checked and there is indeed no one named Jason or Jay MacDougal residing in Scotland who could be our young knight. Moreover, I checked birth certificates and did not find anyone by that name who could be our friend.”

“Yes?”

“Without a photo record, I could not do more on that front so I started working on the names you gave me. There were two: Milburn and Dack.”

“Right.”

“Since Milburn was the person Jason contacted when he was in New York, I started with him. There were a number of dead ends, but eventually I found someone who may answer.”

“And?”

“There is an AP named Milburn who resides in New York. He is in the employ of the Donnerjack Institute and part of his job description includes chauffeur and pilot.”

“That sounds promising.”

“Even more promising is that the listed owner of the Donnerjack Institute is one John D’Arcy Donnerjack. His place of residence is listed as a castle on an island off of the coast of Scotland.”

Link’s naturally active mind had been honed by her choice of profession. “The initials are similar—if one omits the ‘mac’—and Scotland is where Jay said he was from. Why does the name John D’Arcy Donnerjack ring a bell?”

“He is one of the great engineers of virtual reality design. You’ve probably visited his Inferno at some point.”

“I think I did. Didn’t like it much. Did you call the Donnerjack Institute?”

“Better, I called the castle directly. The robot who took the call said that the master was traveling. I asked him to identify himself and he said that his name was Dack.”

“That’s the place! But Jay couldn’t be this John D’Arcy Donnerjack, could he?”

“No, Donnerjack would be far older—older even than your mother— maybe even as old as me.”

Link missed the joke. “So, who is Jay?”

“I have a thought on that,” Drum said. He flipped a holo-album across his desk. “I got some pictures of Donnerjack—found some from when he was younger. See anything?”