Ivory Angel #11 [Part 1]

This post is a little different because I’ve been reading Isaac Asimov and I felt the urge to write a story. It’s set in a future where religious fundamentalists (called Ascendants) rule a totalitarian global government during day and independent gangsters reign over the onyx world of the night. See if you can spot the life goals. Forgive me if it’s a little rough, but it’s kind of rushed.

"And Ivana Decided to Die Today"
A serial in three parts.

Somewhere, a girl stands atop a red stone that the village elders call Blood. The girl sees everything with her clean, green eyes; she hears everything with dark, slim ears. And tonight she has damp hair and dark dreams and a stick she uses to draw spaceships in the dirt.

Somewhere, such a girl looks up, expectantly, and she sees the ocean explode.

- I trust you understand how important this is to me. And to you, as well…
- Oh really, Father-Colonel, I don’t see how a city girl like me should possibly care anything about a damn cow’s death wish-
- Tea for our guest, Yamita.
- Yes Father-Colonel.
- Yes, that’s better. Now don’t be so coy, Miss Angevine. Of course your grandmother’s affairs matter to you. There’s a punishment for lying to a holy man, you know. And you’re not very good at it.
- If you asked me here to recite a list of my flaws or preach to me, Father-Colonel, I’m afraid you’re wasting your time and mine. I shall bid you farewell-
- I think that would be most unwise, Miss Angevine.
- I thought you Ascendants abhorred thinking. If I’m staying in this abysmal place for however long you chose to keep me here, can I at least smoke?
- Ascendants abhor thinking? A common misconception. Not in here, my dear- smoking is terribly bad for your health.
- A lot of things are. Getting involved with affairs of the Council of Interior Affairs, for one.
- Miss Angevine, I’d find it most refreshing to exchange pleasant witticisms with you all day, but we have urgent matters to discuss. Specifically, your grandmother. How is your assignment going?
- Peachy-cream, my darling Father-Colonel. Simply spasmodic!
- Sarcasm doesn’t suit you, child.
- Well, you try dealing with that archaic bitch!
- I have had-
- She’s eighty years out of style and she has no common sense! Doesn’t she realize now she’s been outmaneuvered? But no, giving up doesn’t appear in her lexicon. Surrender is only for the well mannered or the rational!
- I’m sure you’ll be able to persuade her of where her true interests lie, Miss Angevine. You won’t like the consequences if we find your efforts…unsatisfactory.
- What are you going to do, shoot me? I don’t think so. I’m the only link you have.
- I don’t need a link, I need a tool. And a broken tool must be disposed of.
- Why do you want her silly outerplanetary jaunt stopped so much, anyway? You seem to be going to a lot of trouble for this. She’s just an outdated old hag- what harm could she possibly do?
- What harm, Miss Angevine? I don’t know, and that’s the problem.

Ramona lightly pinched her nose inside the sanitarium. She didn’t like hospitals, didn’t like the way they smelled. So damn sterile. So damn nice. They were not meant to be lived in by humans, not meant to be smudged with the dirt that inevitably trailed Ramona’s patented leather thigh-high boots as she walked in from the rain. There was a mat that she tried to wipe the heels on it (tan and woven-style- how quaint. Someone had painted a word on it, or a bunch of scribbles that might be a word. Ramona didn’t speak anything but English and was damn proud of it.) She gave up on getting clean eventually, knowing that she’d never be neat enough for the hospital. Besides, what else were janitors for?

“Where is my grandmother?” she demanded to the desk clerk. He was small, brown, and his smile was almost as big as his ears. Wasn’t there one proper plastic surgeon on this rock? “I’m looking for Ivana J. Angevine.”

“Ningo,” the boy murmured, pointing vaguely. “T’es Ykkun the bling-bling?”

Ramona grimaced. “ENG-LISH!” she said, slowly and loudly. “I ONLY SPEAK ENG-LISH!” Now they seemed to lack both proper plastic surgeons and proper educations.

The boy, perhaps understanding her at last, slid out from behind the counter and pattered barefoot over to her. He grabbed the edge of Ramona’s sleeve with a grubby hand- she’d have to wash it later. “Ningo,” the boy repeated, and began tugging her towards an open doorway. The sun was shining through, leaving a sun-pattern on the white carpet that was somewhat reminiscent of a giant, golden parakeet. Ramona sighed. Back outside to the mud.

Ivana was sunning herself in a chair. As usual, she looked ridiculous. Still slim as a whip, her glassy skin stretched over aristocratic bones like an elastic blanket. You wouldn’t know it from her outfits- it was the deepest heart of summer and every inch of her was covered in at least two layers of clothing. Today Ivana was shoeless, which only mattered because one of her socks was green and the other orange with indigo stripes. Beneath a billowing yellow raincoat, Ivana also wore a purple, sleeveless moo-moo and a silver belt made out of woven linked, grinning skulls. One yellow sleeve was folded back to reveal elbow-length leather gloves patched in worn places with denim. You wouldn’t know Ivana’s hair was the platinum color that Ramona would die for either- the whole yard of it had been stuffed unceremoniously into a drooping wicker sun hat. It had stuffed birds on the brim, and if Ramona looked at it long enough, she began to feel as if the dead black eyes could somehow see inside her.

She was knitting, as usual. The laughable ensemble wouldn’t be complete without the needles and the eye-shredding colored cloth oozing, snakelike, from her lap. Since being committed, Ivana had decided to make the best of it and learn to crochet. “Always wanted to do that before I die.” Unfortunately, her tastes seemed to run to making shapeless, neon-pink sweaters that were the bane of all human sight. And they smelled like that putrescent homemade dyes Ivana used- Biological weapons, Ramona thought to herself. If the Ascendants truly cared about the welfare of humanity, Ivana’s sweaters would be classified accordingly.

“Ah, Ramona,” Ivana’s smile was wide and crooked. Wide hazel eyes, half obscured by the hat brim, did nothing to dim the grandeur of her large, pointed nose. She truly is the Wicked Witch of the West. “So good of you to visit your daft grandmother. Heaven forbid I be both deranged and denied the sight of such a pretty face. How much did you spend to make it that way?”

The boy was tugging at Ramona’s sleeve again. “Tip?” he asked.

“Get a haircut!” Ramona snarled, yanking her sleeve away. The boy winced and looked at Ivana uncertainly.

“Tugovae Niei Barhst De Bitcheo, Ell Notres Degamo Samat Oje.” Ivana told him. “Ignore the cheap bitch. She hasn’t had a man today.”

The boy laughed and scooted away. “You needn’t translate your crass humor to me,” Ramona growled, dusting off a nearby chair. It might have been white once, but now it was a lost cause. Ramona sat on the edge very gingerly.

“One of my few remaining pleasures,” Ivana said with a shrug. “Petty, I know, but there it is. The nice thing about being a deranged crank is that you can’t really be help responsible for anything.” There was silence for a moment, except for the click of crochet needles. “Ramona, why are you here?”

“Because I know you have the money. I want to know where it is.”

“Oh?” Ivana put aside her knitting and smiled. “And why should I help you? It was you who put me away in the first place, remember?”

“And I can get you out again,” Ramona’s hands were gripping the sides of her chair so hard one of her violet stick-on nails was beginning to come off. She didn’t notice. “I can take you back to that miserable hovel you call a home. Then you can go back to growing cabbages or whatever it is you do.”

“Mangaroes,” Ivana corrected softly. “Have I told you how my friend gave me the seeds as a gift for freeing him from a bogus murder charge? They’re special, really one of a kind, the only ones like them in the world because he destroyed the recipe. Wonderful man. Good in bed. I wrote a book on it, you know. Innocent Depravity: How They Slaughter Us with Justice. It was on the best-seller list for three solid months…”

“Yes, yes,” Ramona waved impatiently. “I know all this, and I know you’re not as senile as you’re pretending. Where’s my money?”

Ivana’s eyes narrowed. “If there was any money, I believe it would belong to me, and not you.”

“I could have you moved, you know. I could send you somewhere less…pleasant.”

“I would like a change of view,” Ivana replied flippantly. She went back to her knitting.

Ramona sighed. “You are truly impossible.”

It wasn’t as if she was after her grandmother’s money out of greed. No, no…nothing so crass. Ramona was doing what she did for reasons of patriotism- the purest of the pure motivations. And if she happened to profit from that nationalist spirit, well, who would oppose it? Father-Colonel Domin Needleham had his toughs pull her off the streets of New Rotterdam and hustle her into a dark office specifically for the purpose of protecting the State. He had told her there that the entire Globality was at stake. Of course she was somewhat flattered by his regard, and if he didn’t treat her quite like an equal, that was to be expected. Domin was the fifth-most powerful man in the world, a member of the Council of Interior Affairs, and he knew his own worth.

“I have just received word,” Domin said in his quiet, gravely voice, “that your grandmother has just decided that it’s time for her to die.”

“Good,” Ramona replied. “The bitch should have keeled over years ago. If only that assassination attempt had left her in a grave instead of a wheelchair, the world would be a more sparkly type of place.” And I would be about four hundred million dollars richer.

Domin raised a polished silver eyebrow. “I don’t suppose you had anything to do with the attempt, did you?”

Ramona colored. “N-n-no,” she stammered. “Of course not… I would never…”

“Too bad,” Domin said, and Ramona decided that she liked him.

But good ol’ grandma Ivana wasn’t just committing suicide- she was doing a suicide with style. She had apparently commissioned some out-of-work Irish hack to build her a rocket ship, just like they had in the old days.

“A spaceship?” Ramona was incredulous. “But why would she want something like that?”

“My sources tell me,” Domin paused, then shook his head, “something that simply cannot be true. They tell me she wants to die flying. Not in a plane, not in a wingsuit…and of course skydiving is clearly not an option, given her inhibited condition. Zero-gravity is the closest thing to real flight she can get.”

“Die flying, eh,” Ramona chuckled. “It sounds just like the sort of insane thing she would do.”

Domin’s eyes blazed for a moment. “You underestimate your grandmother. She may be dangerous, but she isn’t crazy.”

It turned out that long ago Ramona’s grandmother had been in close contact with the CEO of FarStar Inc. before he ran off to create his colony on Mars. There had been an entire series of pictures in the newreels of the once-multi-millionaire, his nose smudged with sweat and red-orange dirt. He was the laughingstock of Earth, kept everyone entertained for months, giggling their asses off. Where were his flamboyant silk suit and ties now? Some paradise.

At any rate, the “Outlanders” (as they soon were named, nobody knew how the title started but it just stuck), were notorious for their flaunting of Ascendant religious law and Globalic regulations. It didn’t reassure the people of Earth that the colony was primarily populated by sexual deviants renowned for their instability. The fact they had refused to dismantle their nuclear weapons like the rest of the human race was just the icing on the cake. The Ascendants put them under Interdict. Unfortunately for everyone concerned, “Shepherdton” was doing just fine without any supplies from the Globality whatsoever. Somehow they’d become self-sufficient. Who’d have thunk? Nuclear power had been outlawed too after the Great Calamity, which made it impossible to establish colonies with living conditions that were remotely decent. So between the lack of colonizing incentives and the ban on communications and trade between Mars and Globality, there just wasn’t much point to space anymore. Yet Ivana was going. Ivana wanted to die flying. And she had known subversive CEO Jay Gardner, founder of the Mars colony.

“We don’t talk about this to just anyone, Miss Angevine,” Domin informed her coldly. “So you must understand, this is a matter of the most sensitive Globalic security. But the precarious balance between the Globality and Shepherdton requires us to strike now, or lose our home world forever. The Outlanders have nuclear weapons and are planning to use them. A preemptive strike is the only way we can preserve security, for ourselves and for our children.”

“A preemptive strike?” Ramona asked. “So this has nothing to do with the recent revolts in Myanmar and St. Louis?”

“Nothing,” Domin’s smile had no warmth. “Nothing at all.”

Ramona, despite the assumptions people made about her, wasn’t stupid, and she didn’t swallow bullshit as if it was caviar. But it did make sense that her grandmother might have an agenda, might be bringing the sexual perverts some warning, or news of weaknesses, or something else equally as traitorous. What would be the point of going to space otherwise, and wasn’t she the most famous Subversive of their century? But Ramona didn’t need Father-Colonel Domin to know that she knew all this. If he thought her a fool and easily manipulated, it might that could be turned to her advantage later. “I don’t know,” Ramona blinked slowly, doing her best impression of a country-bumpkin drawl. “Grandma’s a really formidable woman. You can’t stop her when she makes up her mind.”

“But I can assure you that if she was stopped,” Domin leaned forward conspiratorially. “We’d be sure to make it worth your while.”
Ramona smiled. “How much worth my while?”

“I think your grandmother isn’t the only one in the family with a flair for politics. I could give you your own region to Administer- for the good of the people, of course. More than a pipsqueak island where the people don’t even have telephones. And a salary to match the weight of your new…responsibilities. Ivana is a volunteer, so she doesn’t get to experience any of the real perks of the job. But I see you as the kind of girl who knows how to take advantage of a sweet offer.” Domin took her hand lightly. “I know what you want. You want to get out of your grandmother’s shadow. You’re sick of being just ‘the other Angevine.’ And I think that you’ll be a stronger, better Administrator than she ever was. And that’s why I’m asking you, and not anybody else, to do this for us.”

Ramona’s smile widened. She wondered if her teeth needed whitening. “I think you have yourself a government conspiracy.”

But she would have done it anyway, just to spite the old biddy. And there was the matter of a certain gambling debt… diverting off dear grandma’s funding would fulfil the purpose twofold: stopping construction of Ivana’s ship as well as giving Ramona a little pocket-change to play with. It was like taking two birds with one stone.

Except the stone was more like a microscopic pebble…And the birds were vultures the size of long-drowned Manhattan.

Ramona first tried her hand at forgery. She stopped in at Ivana’s island for a surprise visit, and Ramona’s grandmother welcomed her with joy-filled arms. Ramona wasn’t used to sleeping on grass mats rolled out on the floor, but it was worth a little insomnia for a shot at four hundred mil. And carefully, she watched as her grandmother signed everything, collecting old handwriting samples Ivana threw in the garbage, waiting for an opportune moment to collect the latent thumbprint off a cold glass of vodka. Ramona scraped together the last of her money to pay off the best forger anyone knew: Johnny the Hand, so called because he had traded in his hands for lobster-like claws that were made of steel and had the accuracy of computers. Talk about irony.

When Ramona came back to her grandmother’s island, she brought with her a check complete with signatory thumbprint that so precisely matched Ivana’s hand, the old bitch herself would have been completely fooled. The check was for an excellent sum, and Ramona took it to Ivana’s accountant with pride.

Martin G. Maddock was short and round with glasses the shape of teacups and an office that smelled like pumpernickel. When he smiled, Ramona saw that, like Ivana, his teeth were all crooked.

“If you were going to try forgery, Miss Angevine,” Martin said mildly, “you could have at least tried to do a credible job of it.”

Ramona stormed out of the smug accountant’s office without a word. Her grandmother sent her a Hallmark Hologram back in New Rotterdam, where she had been sulking a straight three days with her latest boy-toy, Howard. “Sorry about your failed business transaction,” a sympathetic seal told her. “Here’s hoping that next time that you have a ball!”

Ramona smashed the projector, but not before a red and blue rubber ball began rotating slowly on the now smiling seal’s wet nose. Funny. Fucking hilarious.

So Ramona did the only thing she could think of- she got Ivana committed. Ivona was going to attempt suicide, right? That definitely meant she was mental. So Ramona put on her grieving granddaughter face and gone to a doctor who was perfectly willing to be distracted by a miniskirt and the wad of cash shoved hastily into his hand (a loan from Howard Ramona had paid for…in trade). The doctor swore fealty and committed Ivana to his sanitarium on the sea. By rights and by law, all Ivana’s money now fell under the control of her only living kin- Ramona.

Unfortunately, there was no money to be had.

Nothing. Not a cent in any of Ivana’s accounts. They had been cleaned out two days before, almost as if Ivana knew this had been coming. But that was impossible, wasn’t it? Ramona hadn’t told anyone her plans. Except the Father-Colonel of course. Perhaps the lines were bugged.

Ivana was still in the hospital, two weeks later, not seeming to mind a bit. But Ramona was on the verge of cracking. So many millions…so close…she could almost feel the slide of cash under her fingertips, hear the roll of loaded dice as she made her millions expand and dive upwards along income blue-inked charts…like some spectacular, ever-rising hot air balloon…

But it wasn’t to be. The accounts were empty. And Ivana sat in a chair, knitting away without a damn concern in the world. Ivana was grinding her teeth again. Her dental health official hated her for that, but she didn’t care about that one iota right now. If only she could shake the woman’s composure just a little, prove Ramona was in control. She was the one who had Ivana committed. She was the one who was calling all the shots!

“I will repeat this slowly so your old, dried-up ears can hear me,” Ramona hissed. “WHERE’S…MY…MONEY? You can’t possibly have spent it all, not even on that spaceship of yours.”

“Spaceship? I have no clue what you’re talking about.” Ivana shrugged between stitches. “Well, as the doctors say, I’m quite insane. I don’t quite know what I did with my money. It’s all one big blur.”

“It’s that damned accountant, isn’t it, the one with the potbelly? He’s done something illegal or…hidden them somehow. I swear, if you don’t cough up the truth now, you won’t go down alone. The Peace Forces will be down on his ass so fast he’ll think he’s being sodomized. There’s only one way to protect him.”

“Careful,” Ivana smiled. “It’s treason to talk about a priest that way.”

Ramona felt the color leaving her. “He’s…a Brother?”

“Yes,” Ivana nodded. “He gives me private services every Sunday. He has the loveliest sermons. Very uplifting.”

“But you’re…you’re an atheist!”

“Doesn’t mean I don’t fear for my immortal soul,” Ivana crossed herself fervently. And winked.

“You’re exasperating!” Ramona shouted. “I don’t know how you managed to corrupt a Brother but-”

“But nothing. He has Divine Diplomatic Immunity for Life. Unless you can prove he’s not keeping up on his Ascendant duties properly, there’s nothing you can make stick to him.”

Ramona snarled and stomped out. Of course the priest would be top drawer- there was no real question about that, or Ivana wouldn’t have mentioned it as a possibility. Ramona wondered if the hag was even now thinking of some witty card to send to add to her misery. Maybe, “Poor in cash but lucky in love?” “I’d donate a kidney if I wasn’t at the organ bank selling my spleen?” For one hundred and eighteen years old, the woman was certainly juvenile. She’d probably throw fake vomit on the floor next time Ramona saw her.

Ivana’s voice echoed out behind her. All joviality and mocking had vanished without a trace, leaving a polished, serious voice that sounded awfully grave. “I’m dying of Rosencratz Syndrome, Ramona. Nothing more, nothing less. Can’t you just let an old woman die in peace, living a dream, the way she wants to? I just want to go out with a little dignity.”

Oh, Ramona thought, there will be no plutonium powered ship to take you away from this misery. This humiliation. You’ll be here when your brain breaks down and you start drooling on your pillow. And I’ll be hear to enjoy it.

***

Ramona had tried something else when she found out Ivana had emptied all her accounts. It made her feel dirty and common, but by law, the house was hers now, so it wasn’t really burglary.

Anyway, there had been nothing to burgle. Not even a bed. Ivana lived in pathetic squallor considering her reputed amounts of wealth. She had a was a three-room hut made out of mud and straw that didn’t have a temperature regulator, or even a carpet. Ivana had never been sophisticated enough to stock away works of art- no sculptures or holo-picts or not even one goddamned Van Gogh. There were some photographs, but they were all of Ramona’s father, Crispin, before he had died in the accident shortly after Ramona herself was born. There was an old economics diploma, framed and half-sticking out of a stack of scribbled French poetry, a red hoola-hoop bent out of shape and missing it’s Hoverall, a certificate of merit for services to the government, a copy of some bullet serial numbers with two casing counts circled, and a bundle of plastic, yellow day lilies that had been stacked haphazardly on top of a gnashed brown boot. There was nothing, period, except for useless junk.

The only things of remote interest were the books on Ivana’s shelves. She didn’t seem to have any real possessions but the mountains of paper bound in leather. Ramona thought of all the trees butchered, their livelihood smeared with large quantities of slick ink spilling out in eight different antique languages. Even the English was incomprehensible- mostly archaic junk that Made Ramona’s brain ache just thinking about it. She began tearing out the pages, hoping she’d discover a secret cash stash, but to no avail. Ramona did find some of her grandmother’s book lying around- they were out of print, maybe she could auction them off for a little. Better yet, one was autographed. “My dearest darling dove- you are the light that drives my ship to safe harbor, the inspiration to make angels swoon.” Ivana’s name was signed with so many flourishes the each consonant could have been a stretched bedspring. And was that just the faintest hint of perfume on the back cover? Ivana rolled her eyes. Sentimental rubbish.

Something about the perfume made her think about Nick, though. She didn’t know why. Ramona slammed the book shut and shoved it in her purse. She didn’t take anything else from the flea-ridden house, or open any other book there ever again.

***

“I-AM-LOOKING-FOR-A-SPACESHIP,” the strange woman with the light skin shouted, waving her arms in what could be best described as resembling a duck. “YOU-KNOW! MACHINE-WHIR-BANG! ZOOM-ZOOM-WHOOSH-FLY-STARS-COME!”

Chief Wasseem Breadbringer wanted to laugh at the woman’s mad gesturing, but he kept his mien as still as stone. I am not deaf you ignorant foreigner, Wasseem thought to himself. And you do not need to shout. Ivana Twotongued has warned of you, viper, and we stand prepared. You bring venom and not riches, and we shall not allow ourselves to go gently into that dark night.

For the moment, Wasseem pretended ignorance. He spoke Esperanto and English fluently, and he had a degree from Oxford, but the villagers had decided it was great fun to force the white woman to squawk to get whatever she wanted. So Chief Wasseem slowed down his words and thickened them with an accent bordering farcical. “I have not seen this thing you speak of,” he said, politely offering tea. She took it with a put-upon sigh that was recognizable in any culture. “Perhaps you are mistaken?”

“NO!” Ramona Snakewoman said, sniffing at her tea. She put it down with a grimace. “No. This thing…you will not have seen it before. You would not understand it as a machine because it does not look like the things you might expect to see. Now, this is a giant flying dragon with flames coming out the ass.”

Wasseem had to concentrate on the fly crawling slowly up the wall of his hut. Very slow, that fly. Very steady. “I know no dragon,” he said at last. “We are peaceful people. We have no uses for machine or silly monsters.” Her voice really did sound better when she was not shouting. It had a certain cadence to it that sounded Dutch, if he could remember. He realized the silence had gone on too long and cleared his throat roughly. “No, no, there is nothing like that here. You have surely drunken too much swamp-sauce. You should find nice man. To settle you.”

Ramona’s eyes narrowed. She had very pretty eyes, for a foreigner, though Wasseem didn’t like the way they seemed to be rolling all the time. “You’re lying,” the woman said. “I don’t know why, but you are lying to me.”

This wasn’t a game any more. The girl was being very serious. “You insult my honor,” Wasseem said softly. “You insult my word.”

The girl shifted nervously. “No, no, of course not,” she stammered. “But…you might be mistaken… or there must be others keeping things from you.”

“I think not,” Wasseem said, even softer this time. “Unlike you, I trust my brothers and my sisters.”

“But there is a spaceship,” Ramona said. “I know there is a spaceship. And if there is, by your creed and by the contract my grandmother signed when she became Administrator of this island, that would be forbidden technology. It is not I that dishonors your ancestors. It is not I who treats your word like pig slop.”

Wasseem’s frown deepened. This Ramona child did not sound as foolish when she spoke anymore. He wished she would cover herself properly, though- he felt uncomfortable when she leaned forward. “Administrator Ivana’s ways are not our ways. We understand this and allow her some leeway. She has never brought harm to us because of this.”

“Hasn’t she?” Ramona asked quietly. Conspiratorially. “I thought this was a drought year. Perhaps your ancestors are telling you something.”

“Perhaps they are telling us that we should not listen to foreigners who do not even understand the tips of their own noses.”

“Perhaps,” Ramona shrugged. “But don’t the sacred text say that all technology is abominable in the eyes of God? That it is an insult to the world we walk on? Your island suffered a catastrophe because of faulty technology- your people would have been even more prosperous if some foolish scientists had not ‘usurped the will of the Almighty by soiling their hands with the creation of baubles made in their own image.’ ”

“You’ve read the sacred text?” Wasseem asked, eyes widening. “You’ve know our teachings?”

“I am not as worldly as I appear,” Ramona’s black lashes dipped slightly and she looked out at him from the corner of her eye. “ ‘And behold, thy shall not only look to wisdom in men, yea, because woman also may guide thee to the doors of righteous dominion, as long as they be pure.’ Remus Karmali.”

“ And ‘the devil can cite scripture for his purpose,’ ” Wasseem replied. “William Shakespeare.”

Ramona surprised him by laughing. “Touché,” she said with a perfect smile. “But please, think about it. If a plant that generated power for only a few thousand homes caused unimaginable devastation to your island and your way of life, how much more damaging would an accident involving a ship that has the power to travel millions of miles be?”

Wasseem did think about it. He shook his head slowly. “Ivana would never betray us.”

“She’s getting old,” Ramona replied. “She has a disease. Rosencratz. Brain degeneration. The end will not be pretty for her. She might be sliding now.”

“She would not harm us. Even if her I.Q. becomes next to nothing, she would not hurt us.”

Ramona shrugged. “Perhaps. You must do what you think right, of course.” She reached out and took his hands between her own. Her eyes found his and held them in a vice grip, and her fingers moved surprisingly gently across his old skin. She really did have the most amazing eyes. No flaws whatsoever. “But you will think about what I said, won’t you please? You don’t have to decide right now, of course, I just want you to think about it. I know you are very wise. I know you are a good leader. And I am certain you’ll make the right decision.”

Snakewoman indeed. I would tame you and make you a wife, if I could. You would be useful at the boring meetings of nattering elders. “I will consider the matter, but I doubt my answer will change.”

“Consider.” Ramona withdrew her hands and looking down shyly, “That is all I ask.”

***

Two weeks later, Ramona was driving down the freeway at top speeds, her car phone clutched in one hand, the wheel clutched in the other. “WHAT?” she yelled as she swerved around some idiot who thought a merge lane was actually a rest stop. “WHERE IS SHE?”

“I told you, Ivana’s returned to her home. Your transfer to the worse hospital was exactly what she wanted. Apparently, the head doctor there is a friend of hers, owes her a favor like everyone on that damn island seems to and so signed the orders to send her into outpatient care immediately.”

“I’ll castrate the bastard.”

“Wouldn’t do much good, being that the doctor’s female.”

“Whatever, I don’t care, just get her back. You said you could take care of things?”

The doctor paused, as if he was licking his lips. “Well, it was out of my jurisdiction…it wasn’t my fault you…”

“JUST SHUT UP! I NEED TO THINK!” Ramona almost threw the phone out the window but thought better of it. She screeched by a grandmother-driven convertible with her horn shrieking. The domes of New Amsterdam, glowing white with the sun, rose in the distance, echoing the boom of sonic jets hanging just above where the cityscape scraped the sky.

“At least you still have control of the money,” the doctor at the other end of the line said, hesitantly. “She’s still insane. The only difference is she’s at her own house now. Even the head doctor of a clinic doesn’t have the clout to override the will of the Ascendants.”

“Idiot! It takes more than a signature on a state-sanctioned page to give me control of what rightfully should already be mine. The bitch is clever, I’ll give her that, but she not clever enough. Not nearly.”

The doctor paused. Then timidly he asked: “Orders, please? I have patients I need to-”

“Yes. Go then, but watch her. Carefully, this time. If she gets off-planet we’re both dead. Find the money and that damn spaceship ASAP.” Ramona didn’t wait for his reply to hang up.

Something fast was on the radio. Turbo-folk. She kicked the dashboard before remembering she finally realized she had the voice-interaction fixed. “Car, switch stations. I’m sick of this shit. Give me something…hardcore.”

The car buzzed pleasantly under her. “Yes, mistress. Warning: traffic jam ahead.”

“Shit,” Ramona said. Then: “Car, Dial Father-Colonel Needleham. I want to tell him there’s been a slight change of plans.”

***

Ivana was dressed in the same assembly as she wore in the hospital, only this time she wore a navy blue apron over the tawny raincoat. If she looked closely at it, Ramona was certain she’d see cutesy-kitty paw prints. How quaint. There was also the wheelchair instead of those dreadful off-white chairs, of course. The wheelchair looked like it was trying to devour Ivana’s torso. Just looking at it sagging and swallowing her slowly made Ramona gag.

Ivana was cutting long, orange vegetables and pushing them to the side of her cutting board. She didn’t turn when she heard the ominous click. “I wondered when you’d be coming back.”

Ramona gripped the gun harder. It was government issue, untraceable, bullets unnumbered. “I don’t know how you do that. By hand, I mean. Why you gave up all the machines and civilization and everything.”

“You never will,” Ivana said. “And I can’t explain it to you. I don’t even know if I can explain it to myself. There’s a satisfaction to doing things this way, you know.”

“Oh how provincial,” Ramona sneered. “So rustic and so romantic. I’ve got a gun pointed at your head, by-the-by.”

“I know,” Ivana replied. She didn’t turn around.