Smoke, Mirrors and Deep Space Read online

  “Am I early?” he asked.

  “Right on time,” she laughed, taking his arm and drawing him inside.

  Dinner was a mixture of small talk and subtle sexual innuendo, of indirect mutual flirtation coupled with the careful avoidance of any mention of Alex or his mission. They’d finished the wine Ray brought with their dinner, so Gena produced an excellent brandy for dessert, and they went into the living room to enjoy it. Ray wandered over to the CD collection while Gena made herself comfortable on the couch.

  “You mind if I put some of these on?” he asked over his shoulder.

  “Sure, anything you like,” she smiled, relaxing back onto the sofa and crossing her legs.

  A moment later the sultry voice of a female jazz singer filled the room. Ray walked over to where Gena sat and reached for her hand.

  “Dance?” he suggested.

  This was almost too close for fantasy. Her heart scurried into a nervous palpitation, her palms felt suddenly clammy, and she wiped them surreptitiously on the couch as she got up. “Oh, okay,” she said, looking doubtful.

  “Don’t worry,” he laughed, “it’s just a dance.” He held her out from him in an old-fashioned posture. “Look right here,” he ordered, pointing to his eyes.

  “W-what?”

  “Just keep your eyes on mine; our feet will do the rest.”

  It was magical, that dance. Joined at the eye, they were perfectly in tune with every step, more connected than if they’d been body-pressed together. And it was intoxicatingly sensual. The next dance he did pull her close, reaching around her waist and drawing her into him, so that she nestled against his chest and, after a moment, closed her eyes, sighing.

  As the CD played on, one romantic bluesy song after the other, she could feel the heat of their bodies growing. Not stopping the movements of the dance, he let go of her back, and reached around with that hand to tilt her lovely face up to his. Bending forward, he kissed her long and deep as they swayed back and forth in time to the music, swaying in the darkened living room. She could feel his hardness press up against her, a tantalizing nudge from the distance between them. He kept his mouth on hers as his hand returned to her back and then slid slowly down to her buttocks, pushing her into his erection a little harder.

  Somewhere in all of this a little voice from the left side of her brain sniped, “You know he’s just like Alex, don’t you?”

  But the primal part told it to shut the fuck up and just keep kissing.

  All of a sudden the front door opened, and Andy stood in the entry hall looking at them with disgust.

  Gena jumped back from Ray, out of the fire. “Andy! I thought you were spending the night?!”

  “Bobby got sick. I walked home,” he said, then went to his room and slammed the door.

  “I, I think I’d better be going,” Ray said.

  “Uh, yeah,” Gena agreed, flustered and embarrassed. She walked him to the front door, where he paused, his brow creased in concern.

  “You, you’ll talk to the boy about this, won’t you? Make sure he—”

  “Don’t worry, Ray; I’ll make sure he doesn’t tell anyone,” she nodded. “Good night.”

  She closed the door behind him, leaning her head against it for a minute. Then she went to talk to Andy.

  * * *

  33. So, Now What?

  URIEL USED HIS hand device to erase the images on the stage, one by one. It looked oddly unidimensional with nothing on it, a void without light or form.

  “So, now what?” Uriel asked Alex.

  “Shit, I don’t know. Let’s say, just for the sake of argument, that I decide not to relive my old life. Let’s say I want a different role this time. What then?”

  Uriel shrugged. “You pick a new one.”

  “But how do I go about selecting? How do I get to see my choices?”

  “Your choices?” Uriel smiled. “You want a demonstration?”

  “A free demo? You mean, try one out, no strings?”

  “A vignette,” Uriel nodded.

  “Sure, hell yeah. I mean, if it’s going to be my life…maybe I ought to take it for a little spin first.”

  “Fine,” Uriel said. “Pick a country.”

  On the movie screen at the front of the auditorium, a geopolitical map of the world appeared.

  “This doesn’t count, right? It’s just a demo?”

  “Just a demo.”

  “So, I’m not going to get stuck into something I don’t want?”

  “I’m not a used car salesman, Alex…and I don’t work on commission,” Uriel said. “Pick…please.”

  “Okay, then, how about…France?”

  “Great,” said Uriel, pushing a button.

  The map on the screen zoomed in on France.

  “City?” Uriel asked.

  “Paris, I guess…I don’t really know France.”

  The image on the movie screen zoomed in closer, becoming a video aerial view of the city of lights at night. It was stunningly beautiful, a treasure chest overflowing with sparkling multicolored jewels strung like necklaces along the boulevards, the photography so clear it was almost three dimensional.

  “Date?” Uriel asked.

  “What about in the future? Can I pick something in the future?”

  “By definition, the future hasn’t happened yet. It is being created moment to moment. You would have to create it before you could enter it, and once created – even in your imagination – it becomes the past.”

  “So no future I guess.”

  “Only if you choose to go into a total unknown role and create it as you go, but it’s nothing you can revisit now.”

  “Oh okay, so let’s say early 1940’s; that was an interesting time in Paris, I understand.”

  The lights suddenly go out on the video map. Air raid sirens split the air and quell the soft laughter of romance; muffled explosions and flares of light can be seen in the distant countryside beyond the city’s perimeter.

  “Sex?” Uriel asked.

  “Not just yet,” Alex responded.

  “I meant, do you want to be a male or a female?”

  “Oh. Well, I’ve always thought being a hermaphrodite would be fun. But,” he amended, seeing Uriel’s expression, “let’s go with the male.”

  “Occupation?”

  “Pilot… No, wait, then I should be British, shouldn’t I? RAF and all that. Besides, that’s too much like what I am now… How about a French whore?” he grinned. “Female.”

  The darkened city on the movie screen at the front of the auditorium winked out altogether, the screen itself rolled up and the stage lights behind it came on, revealing a large, sparsely furnished room.

  It was night, and the barren, dingy room was lit only by a single dim light bulb suspended from the ceiling. The two windows in the room were both covered by dark cloth. There were five women and eight men in the room, all but one in various states of repose, either leaning against the wall, sitting on the floor, or straddling one of the wooden chairs that, along with a table on which maps and various blueprints were strewn, and a solitary dirty mattress in the corner, were the room’s only furnishings.

  A tall, unkempt man in his late thirties, apparently the leader, paced with primal energy as he gave out the night’s assignments to the women. The other men looked on and occasionally looked out, peeking through window coverings and cracked doors for any signs of incipient trouble.

  Alex leaned forward in his seat, intrigued.

  “Francine, you’ll act as lookout for Claude and Etienne while they place the bombs, oui?” the leader said.

  Francine, a gaunt and unattractive woman in her late thirties nodded soberly. “Oui. Louis.”

  The leader now turned to a serious-looking young woman in her mid-twenties. There was a certain fondness in his eyes when he spoke to her, his voice just a little gentler.

  “Monique, you majored in chemistry in college before the war, right? So you must work with Alexandre and Paul to make the
bombs. And don’t blow off any pretty little fingers, okay?”

  Monique pursed her lips, nodded, then looked over at Alexandre and Paul, raising a brow.

  Louis now turned to a plump, homely girl in her late teens, sighing as he contemplated her usefulness.

  “Okay,” he said finally, “Marie, you’re to go out into the community and try to scrounge us the supplies we need, not for making the bombs, but food, water…a little wine would be nice.”

  Marie immediately objected, her voice a nasal whine. “I don’t know what to get, and everything is rationed!”

  The leader shot an exasperated look to one of the other men, who shrugged. He had plans for Marie on the mattress, later.

  Louis took a deep breath, opting for patience over scorn

  .

  “Use your ingenuity, Marie. Steal. We’ll give you a list. And I’ll put Eduoard on it as well. Between the two of you, you should manage. You know how to use a gun?”

  She shook her head. He tossed her one from the table.

  “Well, you’d better learn,” he advised. “When we set off the bombs in front of the embassy, you’re going to join Eduoard, Eugene, and Henri in providing cover fire for our escape.”

  “This is the French resistance, isn’t it?” Alex whispered excitedly to Uriel, as if the holograms on the stage could hear him.

  The leader had now turned his attention to the remaining two women in the room. Reclining casually in a chair was Millicent, a sexy-looking woman in her early thirties. Standing near her was Emilie, a very attractive girl of around twenty, who’d just pulled a revolver from the waistband of her skirt and was waving it excitedly at the leader.

  “I can shoot, Louis! I have expert marksman rating. My father taught me.”

  “And I’m sure he taught you well,” Louis smiled, “but the resistance movement needs your special talents elsewhere.”

  “Where?” the girl asked.

  “Ask Millicent, she knows.”

  Millicent smiled, crossing her legs to expose an expanse of luscious thigh.

  “In the Embassies, the Chateaux, the hotel ballrooms…on the arms of German Generals and statesmen, of course.”

  “Doing what?” Emilie asked suspiciously.

  “Don’t be naive, Cherie,” Millicent laughed. “What do you think? Dancing, charming…seducing.”

  Emilie whirled toward the leader, her hazel eyes aflame.

  “Damn it, Louis; I’m a soldier, not a whore!”

  “Well, we happen to need a whore, sweet Emilie,” he told her, coming over to put a fatherly hand on her shoulder. “No, that’s not quite true, either. What we need is information. Intelligence. And if it takes a whore to get it, then a whore is what we need.”

  “But Louis!”

  “Look, sweetheart, it’s my duty to assign my soldiers appropriately, to make the best use of their assets. Now, obviously no one of any consequence would want to fuck Marie here—sorry, Marie, no offense—”

  Marie glanced up coldly, nodded, and went back to examining her new revolver with

  increased interest—

  “or Francine, for that matter,” he continued.

  Francine licked her two fingers and made a pass at her crotch, unsmiling. “But you and Milli, you two could unzip the flies—and loosen the lips—of half the German army with just a wink.”

  By now he’d moved up very close to Emilie: pressing the sexual tension between them.

  “Then I’ll wink,” she told him, looking up into his face.

  He reached under her short black skirt and grabbed what he found there.

  “This pussy could free France, you know that? Be thankful God gave you such a nice one.”

  Emilie raised her own pistol and put it against his temple with a little smile.

  “Can I blow their heads off afterward?” she asked sweetly.

  Louis stepped back, taking his hands off her crotch and shoulder, and raising them in the air, laughing.

  “But of course, Cherie. Their heads, their balls…”

  * * *

  Alex turned to Uriel, grinning, “I like her, she’s…interesting.”

  “Good, great! So you want this role, then?”

  “Hold on, now,” Alex protested. “I didn’t say that! I’d have to go in as an infant, right?”

  “Zygote, actually…”

  “So, there’s a whole boring childhood to go through before I’d get to this part,” Alex pointed out.

  “You didn’t enjoy your childhood?! Odd, most people look back on that period as the best time of their life!”

  “Selective memory,” said Alex. “Can I see a small portion of it, the girl Emilie’s childhood?”

  “Sure, why not,” Uriel agreed, pushing a few buttons on his control device.

  The images on the stage flicked off and new images replaced them. The shabby apartment was now the enormous back yard of a large private estate. It was a warm spring day, fresh after recent rains which had left the grass moist with clinging droplets of water, the tree leaves shimmering in the sun. There was an elaborate children’s birthday party going on, complete with clown, pony and a small musical carousel.

  Little Emilie, who now was about 8 years old, was standing in a long line for the pony, waiting her turn for a ride around the garden. She shifted from foot to foot impatiently, looking out of sorts and uncomfortable in her white cotton dress with its shirred bodice and lace-embroidered collar. She’d finally reached the front of the line, and was about to climb up into the sidesaddle when the birthday girl came running up in a frothy pink cloud of organdy and self-importance.

  “My turn, my turn!” the little girl cried, trying to pull Emilie away.

  “No it’s not,” said Emilie, straight-arming her. “I’ve been waiting in line half an hour for this!”

  She climbed up into the saddle, staring down at the birthday girl defiantly.

  “Well it’s my party, so I get to ride whenever I please,” the birthday girl informed her, hands on her hips. “Now you get down from there!”

  Alex, watching this exchange from his seat in the auditorium, mouthed the word “No” at the same time as Little Emilie down on the stage said it.

  “No!”

  “You get down or I’ll make you get down!” the birthday girl ordered, her French braids flying back in anger. She grabbed Emilie’s feet and began pulling on her. As Emilie kicked outward, trying to free her feet from the other girl’s grip, her hard-soled shoe accidentally struck the pony in the flanks. This was too much for the pretty little Welsh mare, which began to spin in circles, bucking and kicking, with Emilie hanging on for dear life. She quickly lost her grip and flew off into a pile of mud and fresh manure at the outskirts of the flower garden, where she sat crying in rage, her white dress ruined, as the pony ran off across the lawn with its handler giving chase.

  “Now see what you’ve done!” the birthday girl complained, looking down at her. “I’ll just have to ride my carousel instead.”

  As she stomped off in the direction of the carousel, Emilie got to her feet, looking after the girl in sputtering fury.

  “Watch!” Alex whispered to Uriel. “The carousel’s going to break down.”

  Uriel said nothing, but looked over at him with mild surprise.

  A moment later, just after the birthday girl had displaced another guest to take the favored steed, there was a terrible grinding noise, and the carousel came to a shuddering stop. This was followed almost immediately by a loud cracking sound, whereupon the carousel listed sharply to one side, dumping the birthday girl in her pink organdy dress face first onto the muddy ground. Its organ music slowly faded, supplanted by the birthday girl’s shrieks of outrage, the sound of Emilie’s distant laughter.

  Up in the auditorium, Alex turned to Uriel, puzzled.

  “How did I know that was going to happen? This whole scene seems vaguely familiar. Have I played this role before?”

  “It’s possible.”

  “We
ll have I or haven’t I? You must know.”

  “There’s billions of roles,” Uriel hedged. “I can’t remember them all. I’d have to go look in your file.”

  “I want to see my last life again,” Alex said suddenly.

  “What for? We’ve played it to death…no pun intended.”

  “I need to check something. Go to Mission Control, a little before the trouble started.” He looked at Uriel, adding, “Please.”

  “As you wish.”

  Down on the stage the operations room at Mission Control once more reappeared Gena and Andy could be seen through the glass wall of the visitors’ gallery, along with numerous other people and a bank of reporters and news cameras.

  Colonel Petersen stood in front of this viewing area on the Mission Ops floor. He was giving the reporters a rundown of what was going on in the space flight at that moment. As he talked Alex left his seat in the auditorium and went down onto the stage.