John Shirley - A Song Called Youth

“You’re supposed to have it memorized, expert! It’s the southbound platform at Metro Franklin Roosevelt. That’s on the Champs-Élysées—not far from the arch. Oh-nine-hundred. Tomorrow morning. You know, things happen real symmetrically, Hard-Eyes. We get a little good luck, a little bad luck, a little good luck. Latest good luck, we snag this regroup message. Latest bad luck, we’re on the wrong side of the fucking arch. Nazi shit-heads’re camped all around it. We could get to the arch but not past it. On one side is the yellow-dust zone, on the other side they got their headquarters. The streets are blocked off unless we go right under the arch… So how do we get through to regroup at Frankie Roosevelt?”

“We’ll figure something.”

“Hey—that was a rhetorical question. ’Cause I got something figured, man. I want you to promise you won’t fuck me up on this. Give this to me. My last gig, Hard-Eyes. Listen…”

“This is bloody stupid.” Kurland muttered.

It was an hour before dawn. They were trudging through the gouged streets, through blue-black shadows and silver-limned patches of fog, through rubble and char and the cold smell of ashes. And they were carrying sound equipment on their backs.

Hard-Eyes could hardly believe it himself. But when Kurland kept complaining, Hard-Eyes said, “There’s no talking him out of it. We’re gonna do it. So shut the fuck up.”

Rickenharp, leaning on Claire, grinned at that. “Good to hear you say that to somebody else, Hard-Eyes.”

“You shut the fuck up, too.”

Claire was carrying a guitar and medical kit. Kurland had the PA horns. Yukio carried weapons—and a rhythm box. Bonham had cords and mikes, miscellaneous hardware, and Rickenharp’s shotguns. Hard-Eyes had two portable amps strapped to his back and the assault rifle in his arms, the M-83 over one shoulder. They carried their gear through the twisted stub of a skyscraper, between fantastic shapes of melted glass and plastic; through the ribbed remains of a cathedral; through a field of ravaged mannequins where a department store had stood. All the time sweat was running icy under their clothes.

“Fucking absurd, I’m telling you,” Kurland growled, as he shifted the weight of an amplifier.

Claire said, “The war is absurd. Racism is absurd. This—” She gestured at the wreckage of Paris. She didn’t have to finish the sentence.

“I just hope I don’t get rained out,” Rickenharp said.

They hid from passing patrols twice, and then crept on, concealed by mist and the night and the megalomaniac overconfidence of the fashes.

And then they’d reached the Étoile. The Star. The arch stood at the center of the twelve-pointed star where the avenues met. It had been decreed by Napoleon in 1808, begun by Chalgrin the same year, not completed until 1836. Made of massive stone blocks, the Arc de Triomphe was fifty yards high, forty-four across the front, twenty-two on the side. Its facades were intricately carved, its arch sheltering the flame of the unknown soldier. Long since gone out, overwhelmed by the wind of a thousand thousand unknown soldiers passing on…

On the face of the arc facing the Champs-Élysées was the high-relief group, a carving representing the departure of the war volunteers. The central figure was the Marseillaise with her wings spread, her out-thrust sword pointing the way, her mouth opened in an eternal shout, a shout carved in stone.

The Arc de Triomphe was bullet-scarred but still standing.

Nearly dawn. The night sky relented a little, admitting some blue. Most of the fashes were encamped on the far side of the arch. To rendezvous with the NR, Hard-Eyes had to get past them.

There were a few sentries on this side of the arch—but between Hard-Eyes and the sentries was the cover of overturned trucks, crashed hovercars, gouted tanks, rubble, and long shadows.

Aching under their burdens, they crossed the Étoile; crouching, darting through the twisted wreckage, Kurland and Bonham with their thoughts written on their faces: This is irrational, this is insane.

Just inside the door that led to the stairwell, in one of the arch’s massive legs, two neofashes squatted by a sickly-yellow chem-fire.

Hunched down behind a truck, Hard-Eyes screwed the sound suppressor onto his assault rifle. He crept around the circular curbing surrounding the arch till he was out of the line of sight of the sentries, and then dashed back to the arch’s support, pressed himself flat against the stone. He listened, heard soft, unconcerned voices from inside. A trapezoid of sulfur-colored light projected onto the concrete from the door to his left.

Don’t let ’em get off a shot, he told himself. Quiet, got to be fast and quiet.

He edged up to the door.

“The bloody resistance is a bloody fucking joke,” said someone inside. “Waste of time to be sitting out here for a bunch of ticked off frogs and wogs.”

Hard-Eyes smiled. He pivoted, turning to step through the door, tracking to center his sights as the men looked up, gaping. The rifle’s suppressor hushed the report of the bullets, as one man fell over backward, his chest opening up with faucets of blood, while the second was training a submachine gun at the intruder, at Hard-Eyes, who was thinking, Right through the brain so he doesn’t get a shot when he goes down. Letting his trained fingers do the work, the HK spitting flame, hissing, licking away the top of the guy’s head; the man spun, blood spiraling from his shattered skull, the gun clattering to the floor. That was the only sound the gun made.

And they had taken the Arc de Triomphe.

They carried the equipment up piece by piece. Up the stairwell inside the arch; up to the observation deck at the crown. Claire and Hard-Eyes helped Rickenharp climb the stairs. They set up the equipment, jacked in Rickenharp’s guitar. Rickenharp sat on the amp, to everyone’s amazement meticulously tuning up the guitar in the earphones, the chill, damp wind whipping his hair. Charcoal-edged, silver-hearted clouds flowed behind him. Rickenharp smiled crookedly, as he tinkered with the guitar settings, looking weaker, paler than ever. Yukio sat beside him setting up the grenade launcher, the automatics.

Hard-Eyes made them up two shots apiece with the syringes from the medikit; each shot contained a solution of one part blue mesc, one part synthmorph, one part energizing vitamins. Just to see them through. He made it in a tin mess cup belonging to the dead sentries.

Kurland stared but said nothing.

“It’s funny, the arch being the symbol of the NR,” Rickenharp whispered. “I mean—seems like I remember it was all about Napoleon. A fucking tyrant.”

“Became a symbol of the French Republic,” Yukio said, finishing setting up the weapons. He sat back, resting, his voice distant, eyes closed. “Democracy. Anyway, we appropriated it. Gave it our own meaning. Fascism is anti-traditional. What’s good in tradition is what makes people want to fight Nazis… Arc celebrates culture, tradition, for us. Not tyranny… for us it’s not about tyranny…”

“Rickenharp,” Hard-Eyes said, as he pulled back on the syringe plungers to suck the solution through the needle, “an operation might restore your eyesight. Or a transplant or a prosthetic.”

“Come off it, man. That whole side of my body’s going numb. I still got strength in my arms, my fingers. But it won’t last long. Something’s busted in my brain, Hard-Eyes. Always was—” He grinned. “But now it’s fucked up for good. You guys won’t get through unless Yukio and me create a diversion. And Yukio and me—we’re screwed anyway. He ain’t gonna leave his arch. Made up his mind when our compadres got flattened. These Japanese motherfuckers are crazy!” Said admiringly. “And Yukio feels bad, man, that he didn’t get it, too. With all of his friends. And…” He gave a crooked smile.