American Elsewhere - By Robert Jackson Bennett Page 0,214

to bring us here. If Weringer were to die near a—a focal point for this sort of energy…”

“The lens,” says Mona.

“Yes. Then someone could have used it. It could change the very nature of reality, like the finger of a god. A death, an inheritance, an impetus to return… that would be easy. Probability itself could realign to ensure that what the focal point wanted to happen happened. I can see the way fortunes and potential futures fade, merge, emerge, broaden. It is much more shapable than you imagine, Miss Bright. The possibilities of such a focal point—and such an energy—are limitless.” Kelly stands, stiff and erect, hands clasped behind his back. “Personally, I think it was used as a beacon.”

“A beacon for what?” asks Mona.

“For all the pieces of Mother that were missing,” says Kelly. “To pull in all the missing bits beyond Wink. Or the one, really. You, of course.”

“What the fuck do you mean?” asks Mona.

“Most everyone here of note has an anchor, don’t they, Mona?” says Kelly. “My kin in the town operate from afar, anchored to this place by those awful little creatures buzzing in people’s heads. Some physical part of ourselves must remain on this side, holding us down, acting as a window into this world, while their true selves remain sealed up in not-quite-heres and inaccessible facets of reality and… what have you. It’s all very complex, but the more I realized exactly how Mother had set up our existence in this world—and She had set it up, micromanaged it to the tiniest possible degree—I began to wonder why She hadn’t thought to do something similar for herself before She died.

“But when you showed up, I realized She had, of course. I mean, why else have a relationship with a man? Why else have a child? She had to leave some piece of Herself behind, some tiny, living part of Herself to anchor Her being to this world. Having a child, of course, would be the easiest possible way to do that.”

“What the fuck are you saying?”

“It’s easy enough,” says Kelly. “You’ve seen those fleshy, reedy little creatures swimming in the backs of peoples’ eyes.”

“So?”

“Well, what do you think you are?”

“What? I’m me. Just me.”

“No. You know you’re much more than that. The question you asked remains quite valid, Miss Mona—why are you here? The answer, I think, is because Mother is bringing Herself back. Before She died, She designed a way for Her to reenter this world, to return from death. For though some of us—like Weringer, like Macey—are not quite as beyond death as we’d assumed, Mother, well… Mother remains a very different sto—”

Kelly stops. The screen flutters, like the film has just run off its track. Yet what lies behind the film is not a bright, white space, but what looks like a dark, shifting abyss…

It’s only for a moment, for Gene Kelly’s handsome, smiling face quickly returns, but Mona realizes she didn’t see an abyss, not really: she saw a face, long and dark and bereft of most conventional features—mouth, nose, ears, etc.—but one surrounded by coils and coils of writhing arms and feelers, as if the face of that thing in the screen was at the center of a monstrous tangle of tentacles… yet at the top of that long, narrow face had been two black, bulging eyes, like the eyes of a shark, facing outward.

Yet now there is only Kelly, who says, “Whoop! Looks like we had even less time than I thought.”

Mona, who is still shocked by what she glimpsed, tries to focus. “What? What do you mean?”

“We’re going to have to cut this short. Someone is about to try to kill me,” says Kelly cheerfully.

“What?”

“Oh, don’t worry about it,” says Kelly. “I’ll be fine. You already saved my life. And thank you, by the way.”

“I… I what?”

“I do wish we could have talked longer, little sister,” says Kelly sadly. “I am sure we have so much to discuss. And I wish I could prepare you for what’s about to happen. But don’t fret. It’s my experience that it’s best to sit back and allow the tides of fortune and fairness to take you where they wish. Though it can be a little confusing, sometimes.” He winces a little. “You may especially want to relax now, considering what I’m about to do to you.”

“Wait. Stop. You’re going to do what now? To me?”

“You do love the word what, don’t you?” asks Kelly. “It is a good