John Wright - Fugitives of Chaos

2.

There was a noise like the end of the world. Over the shoulders of everyone else in the way, I saw the huge engine-cylinder get crushed like an empty tin can, and smashed out through the broken grilles. Part of the wall had been exploded outward, also.

Colin called happily over the noise of the storm, "Well! I guess I am feeling kind of inspired tonight!"

Soon we were all on deck, being lashed and drenched by the storm. I could not face any of them. I kept my head turned to the wall, and I clutched the box containing the wedding dress to my chest with both hands.

Someone put a hand on my shoulder. I thought it might be Victor, and the thought that Victor would understand, and would come to comfort me, was comforting.

But Colin's voice came into my ear, "Hey, uh— Amelia. We were just kidding around, okay? I mean—

don't be mad at me—okay?"

I shrugged his hand off. It was not Victor. Victor no doubt made his judgment based on the words he heard coming out of my mouth; and no doubt it was a harsh judgment. Not that I blamed him.

I said, "Go to the stern. Change shape. Save the others. Try to get back over the boundary, the ward.

No talking. Go."

The hand was removed from my shoulder. In the midst of the storm noise, I heard no sound of footsteps, no final words, well-wishing, or good-byes. Maybe there were none. Maybe they expected me to live through this.

3.

The winds buffeted me as I moved forward. When I came to the main deck, I took shelter underneath an overhang of the deck above. Originally, there had been deck chairs and cafe tables here. Now the space was empty, and metal grates had been pulled down across the windows.

You might wonder where I found the strength, the courage, to go forward. Any reasonable person would have run away.

But I was upset about Colin and Victor.

Upset? Upset is not the word. I was choking on tears.

My life had been ruined, and there was nothing I could do about it. It wasn't bravery. I wasn't sure I had a life worth worrying over. Maybe that is what saved me.

But I was crying, and sobs made it hard for me to breathe, and my eyes felt raw.

I sat in the rain-shadow of the deck for a time, weeping. I hope it was a short time.

When I looked up, I saw that there were lights shining from upper windows, but the ship seemed strangely silent. I could not hear the alarms or klaxons. Had they been shut off? Or was the wind merely drowning all noise? ,

Lightning flashed. I saw that part of the deck before me, the beautiful deck with the handsome appointments and polished rails, had been driven in, and the bulkhead smashed inward as if a freight train had plowed through the steel and glass.

I picked my way across scattered rubbish and litter. Metal fragments screeched and hissed as they were pushed along the deck surface by the winds, scraping.

There was light to my left. Three decks of balcony and bulkhead were crumpled and staved-in as if a tree had fallen on them. It would have had to have been a redwood tree, I suppose, and made of iron.

Perhaps dropped from orbit. Never mind the tree; it looked like a bomb had gone off.

The covered pool was now open to the sky for at least half its length. I walked forward, and was standing on tiles. Not long ago, this had been indoors. There were lights burning on the balconies to the left; those on the right had been extinguished. The balconies, deck upon deck of them, were cracked and leaning, and tables and chairs had been flung each way like leaves in a hurricane. There were metal shards and crumpled wreckage to my left, where tons of steel had fallen as the roof and upper deck had collapsed. To my right was the deep end of the pool. The diving board was still intact. There were tables undisturbed and pretty, sitting beyond, and doorways and storefronts of certain shops built along that deck. It all seemed so normal, that little corner. The shallow end of the pool was beaten to froth by the rain. The deep end was tranquil.

I saw headless corpses floating in the water. One of them wore a white jacket. Was it Miguel? Another had a green-and-gold jacket I had last seen on Klaus, the man who had wanted to take a Jacuzzi bath with me.

I heard a slithering sound behind me. Glass and metal snapped and groaned.

I turned.

4.

Fathom upon fathom and yard upon yard of snaky folds were draped across the deck. Some sort of phosphorescent crusts or barnacles were clinging here and there in scattered scales along her belly. Her scales were gray and green, but with spots and dapples of rich purple, vermilion, poisonous yellow, blood-red. Every few yards along the coils of bunched muscle, translucent flukes of singular delicacy waved like the fans of an angelfish.

Up from the mass of knotting and unknotting coils rose two swaying columns of scaly flesh. One was her tail, which was fluked like an eel, and bore an enormous swollen sting, lolling like the sting of a scorpion, and the stinger was going in and out, wet with shivering venom. The other blended into her curving hips, narrowed to a sudden waist, above which was an ample bosom, delicate shoulders, graceful arms with slim fingers. She had them over her head at the moment, like a ballerina caught in mid-gesture.

Atop a slender neck was a girlish face, but of a classical beauty: a firm chin, perfect cupid's-bow lips, a straight nose, deep and large eyes beneath level brows. Her hair hung in dark ringlets across her shoulders and down her back, curled like ivy vines, but black as nighty and shining with water. Imagine the Statue of Liberty if she were younger. Her eyes were turned upward at the moment. I don't know what she was looking at.

Between her naked breasts, on a necklace that glinted with mingled silver fire and starlight, hung a green stone, a tear of polished marble. It was not the twin of Vanity's necklace, but it was at least a cousin, the work of the same craftsman.

There was darkness overhead, and she stood framed in a great panel of wreckage where she had pulled loose the bulkhead and several balconies. Rain fell all around her.

I do not know how she was able to shrink from something twice the size of an ocean liner to something merely twenty yards long. But it should have occurred to me before this that she could change, or ignore, her mass and length and dimension. After all, the dress I was carrying in my arms fit a girl my size.

She caressed one arm with the other, in a gesture that at first seemed very odd. But then I recognized it. I did it in the shower. She was washing.

She rubbed her hands together, and then, sliding forward in a tremendous rush and rustle of scales, knots of coil opening and folds unfolding, she bowed her head a bit, and dipped her hands into the water of the indoor pool. She shook pink stains off from her delicate fingers. Her profile seemed so serene, so pretty.

Echidna was washing blood off her hands.

It was only then she seemed to notice me. Her head was no higher than mine off the ground at the moment, for her snaky body had dipped to let her touch the pool water. She turned her classic profile, and I looked into her eyes. It was like looking into the eyes of a glacier. Her face was drawn and pallid with anger and grief. Her lips were drawn and bloodless.

Her face was so cold. So pretty, and so very stiff and cold. Imagine a fury and a sorrow too deep to leave any trace of expression.

I didn't know what to say. I didn't say anything.

She stared at me, frozen in surprise, a lioness seeing a bunny sitting fat before her, not running.

I opened the box and shook out the dress. The fairy garment shone and shimmered like smoke.

I held it out.

Echidna stared at the dress, and her eyebrows drew together. A slightest wrinkle of frown creased her ivory brow. There was no other change of expression.