John Wright - Fugitives of Chaos

"But what about seeing our parents? Our families?"

"Good question. The people whom the war would kill have parents and families, too. Now then, they are just mortal men, or, as Corus would say, 'cattle.' But since you seemed to think it inadvisable for me even to influence the captain's glands while he was thinking, I assume you do not share the view of Corus on this matter."

I said, "I certainly do not share Corns' view on the matter. How dare you think that of me?"

"Well, there is also the matter of the promise you and Quentin and Vanity made to the Head of Bran.

Quentin takes such promises very seriously; broken promises directly interfere with his abilities to manipulate his magnetic entities he calls 'spirits.' Need I say that, if the universe is destroyed, it is unlikely that the British Isles will be preserved? You at least would need to exact a promise from our relatives to spare England from general and universal destruction before we went home and triggered the general attack from Chaos."

I sat there, a sinking sensation in my stomach. I had been hoping to see my parents, whom I had never seen. Helion and Neaera. I am sure Quentin felt the same way: people who would understand us, for once; people who would be on our side, for once; people around whom we would be the normal ones.

Our people.

People who would be glad to see us.

Loved ones.

Colin did not even know the name of his mother. I don't think we knew the name of either of Victor's parents.

I said in an empty voice: "But—what else can we do… ? We cannot go back to the school."

Victor shook his head. "As long as we put a higher priority on freedom than on staying alive, no one can imprison us again."

He meant that we should kill ourselves rather than be captured again.

Sometimes I love how calmly he puts things. A "higher priority," he calls it.

5.

He continued, "Besides, I am not certain you have exhausted all the cases. We could remain at liberty on Earth. We could return to Chaos in disguise. We are alleged to be shape-changers, although I have not noticed Quentin or Colin practicing to see what new shapes they could form themselves into. We could hire actors and actresses to impersonate us, and have them go back to the school in our stead, so that the Chaoticists will continue to be reluctant to attack."

I said, "I don't know how likely any of those options are." Victor said, 'The most likely scenario is one that has several severe disadvantages. As I see it, the enemy obviously thinks our aid, given to one side or the other, could allow a clear victory in the coming civil war. I am not sure why they are so optimistic; myself, I do not see how I can do anything Dr. Fell cannot do, for example. I think, by the way, there is still a mystery here as to what they so fear from us. I have been assuming they were afraid of something personal we could do that they could not. Although, the more I think about it, it is more reasonable to assume that they are simply afraid that we can summon aid from the various armies of Chaos."

"What about your 'most likely' scenario? You didn't say what it was."

"Sorry. I thought it was obvious from context."

"Mate it more obvious."

"We could select which faction among the Olympians to help, and use our powers or position to set one of them on the throne of Heaven. Once there is a strong leader, an army, and whatever else the Olympians need to fend off an attack from Chaos, we are no longer an issue in any way. Then we can go home."

"And if we are not willing to help the Olympians maim and murder each other? That is what we are talking about. War is murder, king-sized."

"If we are not willing to help the Olympian civil war, there is always life. Life on Earth. We may have more than one Earth to choose from, if Vanity's boat does what she says it does. There is also the possibility that Vanity can go home; her situation is not exactly parallel to ours (if my understanding of the situation is accurate, which, I admit, it may not be)."

I looked around at the wide swimming pool below our balcony, at the windows and balconies around us, the tastefully appointed corridors I could see, the chambers and shops beyond that. I smiled and said,

"Life on Earth does not sound that bad to me, considering—."

I turned to him and leaned forward on the table, and said, "What are your dreams, Victor? What do you want to do with your life on Earth?"

He looked a little surprised at the change of topic, but he answered, "I think I want what all young men want: a wife, a home, and a family."

I had to smile at that. "The average young man wants a harem, a beer, and a pot of gold, or maybe a race car."

"And how would you know what the average young man wants?"

"I've never heard any young man say he wants a home."

"And you've met so very, very many young men…"

"I know. I know what the average young man wants."

"And what does he want?"

"He wants the egg of the Roc. He wants to find the lost city of El Dorado in the Amazon. He wants to ride the decks of a man-o'-war and give the pirates blast for blast, even while the scuppers fill with blood. He wants to plant the flag upon the desert sands of Mars, and leave the first footsteps of Man upon that frigid, rust-red world. He wants to cross blades with Cyrano de Bergerac and match him rhyme for rhyme, blow for blow, parry, riposte, and counterparty! He wants to slay the dragon. He wants the Most Holy Grail."

"So I take it all men are unhappy and frustrated, except for Sir Percival, Saint George, and maybe John Carter of Barsoom and Captain Horatio Hornblower, right? Is there anything else men want?"

I looked at him from under my lashes. "There are other things a man wants. He wants Sophia Loren and the Queen of Sheba and Helen of Troy and Marilyn Monroe in a little white dress, her skirts blown up around her knees."

"I would add Joe DiMaggio and Menelaus to my list of non-unhappy men, except that, as I recall, things did not turn out so well for either of them. Once these men have Helen of Troy, do you know what they expect to do with her? Even Paris took her back home to live with him. I think you are describing what Amelia Windrose wants in life, not most men. How would you know what anyone else in the world wants, but you?"

"I've read books."

"The books we read in school? I am not sure they are a representative sample. The young men in those books divide into three camps: those who want to defeat Napoleon at the battle of Borodino; those who want to defeat the Persians at Marathon; and those who wish to live lives of temperate virtue, untroubled by the clamor of the senate and left in peace by the spies of Caesar. Un-less you want to talk about the plays we read, also? All the Shakespeare comedies end in mass marriages. So don't tell me men don't think about marriage. What is the first thing Romeo and Juliet did?"

"Achilles chose a short and glorious life rather than a long one. He was a hero."

Victor said in a saturnine voice, "Among all your heroes and demigods, Amelia, you seem to forget that Odysseus was doing nothing but trying to get home to his wife and kid, and Aeneas was trying to find a new home for himself and his people. And they were men, heroes, some would say, more heroic than Achilles, by a long shot. The whole poem was about nothing but his lack of self-control."

"So what is your goal in life, really, Victor?"

"All living organisms desire to reproduce. It is programmed into us at a fundamental level. Likewise, thoughts form 'memes' or self-replicating mental viruses. They desire to be passed on also. A stable environment, a family, in fact, is the only way to pass one's memes and genes along."

"That sounds sooo romantic. A robot factory manufacturing another robot factory."