Rollerskater: Aftermath

Many things ended. Many more things began. Such is the nature of things.

It came like a great wave, shaking the foundations of the Earth and all the great powers that dwelled upon it. The Apocalypse of the Blood Moon had thoroughly and irrevocably altered the course of human history.

The stage-sets collapsed, the artifice replaced by a great question mark.

There was not a nation in the world that was not suddenly and permanently aware that there existed forces far greater than the conventional sciences could explain, far wider in scope than any religion could hope to encompass, far beyond any contemplation that could neatly fit into narrow philosophy, far above any critical or ideological debate.

Chaos reigned.

It always had.

In Great Britain, it was Bernardette LeTellier who first noticed the way the winds were turning. Upon receiving the news that the Captain had shot himself, she immediately liquidated SAID-MI5, dismissing every member of staff with one stroke of her pen. She then calmly hailed a cab for Heathrow Airport, paid the fare in cash, boarded a plane for Switzerland under an assumed name, and was never heard from again.

Within weeks, the United Kingdom had functionally ceased to exist.

It was as though a floodgate had burst. Every frustration came out in a torrent of rage that utterly swamped all else. The facts were known, of course – the curfews, the lockdowns, the internment camps, the conscriptions, the executions, the botched nuclear attacks on Wiltshire – but all of them were drowned out in a frenzied dismantling of all that had come before.

The spell had been broken. The harried and outraged people seized what they could and went on the offensive, quickly overwhelming the already demoralised political institutions that clung desperately to power.

England, a nation whose identity had been maintained for centuries as a way to preserve and expand the privilege of a moneyed and propertied class, suddenly found its supports bludgeoned and hobbled; its central pillar torpedoed.

The day came that the Union Jack lost all meaning. The United Kingdom, that grand and ancient state, which had once sat at the head of an empire that had compassed almost a quarter of the Earth’s surface, was no more. It was replaced by a loose confederation of new, fledgling republics, governed by regional capitals.

The monarchy-in-exile, who had fled for Canada and the United States, issued complaints, of course. They demanded a restoration of the old ways. But it was not to be. There was nowhere for them to return to. The map had changed, the territories had shifted, the door behind them had closed. They were obsolete. They would spend the rest of their days surviving off of the waning generosity of their hosts.

The Palace of Westminster stood empty and desolate.

There was talk of converting it into a museum.

Much of Whitehall had been vacated, also, as powers of central government transferred into regional government. For a duration after the collapse, however, 10 Downing Street remained open.

Afua Boateng assumed the title of Prime Minister after the death of Barnabas Mortimer. Her title had been deprecated, of course; in the absence of the monarch, she had no real authority. Thus, she acted simply in the capacity of a steward, organising the transfer of power to the regions as peacefully as she could.

They had avoided outright anarchy, and for that, she was grateful. But the nation she had come to as a child no longer existed. It had been destroyed, by the combined efforts of Gabriel Seymer, Barnabas Mortimer, and Douglas Baird. The stooge, the opportunist, and the usurper.

She sat at her desk in Downing Street, looking out of the window at the Union Jack which still hung from a window across the road, fluttering in the breeze.

They never had found Mortimer’s body, and Baird had vanished at the same time as the Rollerskater.

She imagined the flag in the sun, getting lighter and lighter, first losing its reds, then its blues, until nothing remained but pure white.

The flag of surrender? Perhaps. But also the flag of tabula rasa.

The world as they had known it had ended, but still the Earth turned upon its axis, just as it had for so many billions of years.

Even as she became the last Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Afua Boateng had a hard time convincing herself that this was a wholly bad thing.

*

The sun blazed over St. Peter’s Square.

By the fountain opposite the Cross to the southwest of the square, a man sat, playing a saxophone in short bursts. He played against the rhythm of the city, the humming of the trams, the murmur of human voices, the hiss of wind rattling discarded papers and leaves.

The material of the world had not changed. These buildings and monuments still stood: the great rotunda of the Central Library, the former Manchester Town Hall, St. Peter’s Cross, the Cenotaph and the tram stop.

The ideas, however, had changed. In that sense, they were now in a different country, a different space entirely. So much had changed so quickly.

The streets had been reclaimed. Where once there had been parking spaces, there were now long stretches of parkland, decking and comfortable benches, waterways and trees. Children played in the street, people walked their dogs, the trams still followed their appointed routes.

And yet, so much still remained unknown.

They sat, the two of them, eating vegan ice cream in the late afternoon sun.

“Hot, in’t it?” Demeter Lincoln said.

“Aye,” Nas replied. “I guess the Blood Moon didn’t fix global warming.”

Demi laughed, then sucked at some ice cream that had melted on to her hand.

“Can’t believe a year’s passed already,” she said. “Just a year ago I thought we were all done for.”

Nas recalled the terror of those hours. Holding Daisy as she cried inconsolably, shedding tears herself. The end of the world had come, it seemed.

And then all at once, the air was fresh, the sky was clear. They had stood, still holding each other, and embraced, laughing. The disaster had been averted.

Yet, she couldn’t shake the feeling that the world really had ended. At least, the world she had known.

She sat back, closing her eyes. She could see shades of light orange, the light passing through her eyelids. She opened them again.

There, hanging over all, was a faint pink sphere, dyed almost lilac by the blue sky.

Nas leaned forward again, smiling.

“Should be back at uni in the autumn,” she said. “Union dispute’s finally settled. The university board lost their case. They’ve waived all our fees. Small victories, eh?”

“Aye,” Demi said.

Then, her hand was on Nas’s hand, and Nas met her gaze.

“Everyone knows about…about us. About what we’re about,” she said. “People are starting to learn who I am. What d’you think’s gonna happen to us?”

Nas looked at her, then down at the ice cream in her hand, and smiled.

“I dunno,” she said. “But I’ve got a good feeling.”

*

In Bexleyheath, there was a building.

Its outside was shiny-new, with a stylish chrome-and-plastic frontage and glass windows. There was a line drawing of a pretty woman winking and smiling, a set of horns atop her head.

In neon lights, the name of the establishment could be read:

The Lucky Devil

A young woman opened the doors and stepped in.

There was a young man behind the bar, wearing a collared shirt and skinny jeans. He had cropped haircut and a pair of round-lensed spectacles at the end of his nose.

“Hello, love,” he said, in an Irish accent.

“Love what you’ve done with the place,” the young woman said.

“Oh, aye, it’s grand, ennit. Took us a while, mind.”

The young woman smiled, holding out a hand. “Harri-Bec. Spirit of London Transport.”

The young man took it, politely.

“Rowan,” he said. “What are ye drinkin’?”

Harri-Bec smiled.

“I’ll have a pint of the black stuff, please, if you would be so kind.”

“You’ve got it.”

Rowan went to the Guinness tap to pour a pint, allowing Harri-Bec to inspect the surroundings. The bar top, which she had at first assumed to be marble or polished granite, now appeared to be made of white stone flecked with gold.

It was penumbric.

The floors and walls were done up in mirrored metal and there was air-conditioning to protect against the hot summer air. It looked nice, but it was also sad. There was no trace of the old pub left. Not that she could see.

That was, at least, until she turned her gaze to the top shelf, above the Kahlúa, Drambuie and Cointreau. There was a painting of a fat man, balding, wearing, as he always had, a stained heavy metal T-shirt, and grinning at the viewer.

“Oh, Paddy,” she sighed.

“Hmm?” Rowan said, waiting for the pint to settle. “Oh, aye. Real shame what happened to him. Good fella, so I’ve heard.”

“He was,” Harri-Bec said, smiling. She wiped her eye with the back of her hand. “Here, Rowan, why don’t you pour yourself something? My treat.”

“Oh, y’know, I’d love to, darling. But I’m workin’.”

Harri-Bec looked around her at the empty bar.

“Come on, Rowan. Live a little.”

Rowan smiled wryly, then reached for another glass, pouring himself a Heineken.

He handed her the pint of Guinness, which had settled, and placed the pint for himself beside it.

Harri-Bec took her glass and raised it.

“To Paddy,” she said. “And to better and brighter days.”

Rowan took hold of his glass and bumped it against hers, and they both took a sip of the coldest and best-poured beer for miles.

And for one day, just one day, London experienced no major transport delays, no crime that could not be righted instantly, no sorrow that could not be balmed with love, and no news of great import.

For just one day, everything was fine.

*

The knock at the door came unexpectedly one morning as Emily Bush was making coffee.

She opened it to find a girl standing in front of her.

“Emily Bush?” the girl said.

She was small, far shorter than Emily, dressed in a simple white dress, with no shoes on her feet.

Emily covered her mouth.

“Oh my God,” she said. “It’s you, isn’t it?”

“May I come in?” Liberty said.

“Yes, of course. I do apologise about the mess.”

She was living in a small cottage in Kent under an assumed name, as she had been for a year after the incident.

The Project Director had suffered something like a nervous breakdown in the days following the breach.

They found him on the floor in his office, staring into space, repeating the words “nine o’clock” over and over.

She had learned, as they bundled him into an ambulance, that his name was David.

David Smith.

What a terribly average name for such a monstrous man.

She had expected to be shot for what she had done. But that wasn’t how it went. MI5 no longer existed, they told her. There was an uprising happening, one the decapitated government could not bully out of existence, unlike so many others before it.

If she agreed to change her name and keep her nose clean, they said, they’d leave her alone.

She agreed, and so it was that Jessica Blake, a woman who existed only on paper, ended up living in the Kent Downs. Nobody ever came to visit her. It was quite lonely.

And now Liberty Parish was here.

“How did you find me?” Emily asked, sitting at the dining room table.

“Many things can be found through the strings,” Liberty said. “May I sit?”

“Of course,” Emily said. “Anywhere is fine.”

Liberty nodded and sat herself on a ratty sofa.

Emily thought she looked like a fairy. Maybe she was.

“Would you like something to drink?” she asked, in the absence of anything else to say.

“No, thank you,” Liberty said, her hands gently passing over the hem of her dress. Then she gazed at Emily, and Emily felt strongly that Liberty was looking at something beyond her eyes. A gold light glowed in the centre of her forehead.

“I have come to you to talk about my father,” she said. “I understand he spent some time in your care during his internment.”

“Yes,” Emily said. “Is he alright?”

Now Liberty bowed her head, and turned her gaze back up.

“He died in my arms,” she said, slowly and carefully, as though afraid the words may break something.

Emily felt like the floor had given way beneath her.

“Oh, no,” she said, quietly.

“I’m sorry,” Liberty said. “He absorbed the deaths of five-thousand people. He gave his life for theirs.”

Emily seated herself, dazed. She shook her head.

“He made it back to you,” she said. “I told him, go and find her, and he did…I wanted him to live the rest of his life happy and safe with his daughter…”

“Our lives were never meant to be peaceful,” Liberty said. “We were always fated to be the guardians of this Earth. We knew that Geb would someday return. My father died in defence of humanity. You did the right thing, Emily.”

Emily looked at Liberty, tears in her eyes.

“I’m so sorry,” she said. “God, I barely knew him. It must be an insult that I, his prison guard, am shedding so many tears for him.”

“No,” Liberty said, standing. “Stop that. Don’t you dare.”

“But I—”

Liberty silenced her with a motion of her hand.

“Of all the hundreds of people who guarded that base, Emily Bush, you were the one person who saw him as a person. Not a weapon, not a thing to be used. A person, Emily. You kept him alive. Alive long enough that he could see me once more. Could you have done more? Undoubtedly. But in the end, you did enough. I forgive you.”

Emily covered her eyes in shame and grief, and broke down.

“I…I let them hurt him,” she said. “I let them hurt him for months and months. And I didn’t say anything, because I was scared they’d kill me. I don’t deserve forgiveness.”

“You do,” Liberty said. “Do you believe I would have sought you out if I did not think you deserved compassion? You are a good person, Emily, fundamentally.”

Emily continued to cry.

“Why would you tell me this?” she said.

“Because it would be crueller to let you believe otherwise,” Liberty said.

She sighed, placing a hand on Emily’s shoulder.

“Because deep down, you know, don’t you?”

“Know what?”

Liberty did not answer.

Emily wiped her eyes with her sleeve.

“He loved me,” she said. “He really, really loved me.”

“I’m sorry,” Liberty said.

Emily shook her head.

“It’s alright,” she said. “I suppose I had felt it…just before the Blood Moon went away, I felt this horrible despair, like nothing else I’d felt before. I held out hope, but…God, I’m so sorry.”

Liberty pulled Emily into an embrace. Emily was surprised by the firmness of her grasp; her slight frame did not betray her strength.

“I will do all in my power to ensure that you live a long, happy life,” Liberty said. “I promise you that.”

Emily Bush looked to Liberty, whose stern face softened into a smile. Emily returned the smile, after a few moments.

“Will I see you again?” Emily asked.

“I’m always around,” Liberty said. “Just look up.”

Emily watched Liberty go, then returned indoors, closing the door behind her.

That was where Emily Bush’s story ended.

Yet, despite everything, she lived.

*

“We’ve been Ella Foe and the Oscillations! Goodnight!”

It was strange to be saying that as herself, Daisy thought, but Ella had agreed to it. They had an understanding. She wanted to be more vulnerable. And they’d started working on some new, experimental stuff, stuff with keyboards, less pop, more rock. She’d thought about bringing in a string section. Rock music is always better if it has a string section.

As they retired to the green room, she grabbed a bottle of chilled water and sipped at it. Ollie smiled.

“Well, that’s another show without someone trying to kill us,” he said.

“That joke gets less funny every time you tell it,” Lewis said, grabbing a cold beer, then another, and lobbing it in Ollie’s direction.

“Ah, suit yourself,” Ollie said, catching it and cracking it open.

“I think we’re getting a good response,” Daisy said.

“Oh, definitely,” Ollie replied, sipping at the beer.

“How’s things on the…” Daisy said.

“The Trafalgar Square front?” Lewis said. He puffed air out of his cheeks. “Well, far as I can tell, nobody’s willing to prosecute. Now all this shit has come out about the cops handing people over to MI5 for suicide missions…”

“Yeah,” Ollie said. “Though I’ve heard rumours.”

“What about?” Daisy asked. This was the first she’d heard of it.

“Something about a connection to the Blood Moon. People saying Naomi was a stooge for some wider shit going on.”

Daisy frowned, sipping at the water.

“It was a bad time,” she said. “I don’t think any of us can keep our hands completely clean in a time like that.”

“Maybe,” Ollie said, his voice becoming low and quiet. “Maybe.”

Daisy folded her arms and sat back. She’d thought for a time that Ella Foe and the Oscillations was done for good. She’d destroyed her bass guitar, the one thing that kept her tied to Jules, and for a while she really hadn’t been able to see the point in carrying on.

But seeing Ollie and Lewis once more had made her want to play again. She’d acquired herself a new guitar that summer, despite the ongoing supply chain issues. While it wasn’t, and could never be, the same, it felt like a turning point in her life.

“Hey,” she said. “I love you guys.”

“Love you, too,” Lewis said. “Where’s that come from?”

“Maybe I don’t say it enough,” Daisy said. “It’s a whole new world. Whole new me. I want to play music with you until I’m old and I can’t any more.”

“Sounds like a deal to me,” Ollie said. “Long as you can put up with us.”

“Of course,” Daisy said, with a small laugh.

She sighed.

“It’s been a funny last few years. And you know what?”

She stood, then turned to face them, her eyes shimmering opalescent.

“For the first time in my life, I feel like everything’s gonna be okay.”

*

They got back together in the end of July, after so long apart. At first, they hadn’t been sure if it would work out, but as it turned out, absence had made both of them desire the other even more.

Naomi Carter escaped, and spent much of the Blood Moon’s brief reign hiding in a suburban London bungalow, out of view of anyone.

Nobody ever came to arrest her, because she could make herself invisible to the powers that be, and so she was assumed to be dead by the authorities, until those authorities themselves collapsed, and she was lost to them forever.

Thus, she was free to move around again.

She knew, of course, that the Blood Moon had used her. Others did, too. But nobody held it against her. How could they? She was scared, and it was a great evil, and it had taken advantage of her fear. So, she faded back into the crowd, forgotten by most people. The Girl Who Was.

Later, when the existence of SAID-MI5 came to light, she learned that the Captain had been found dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound in South London.

“He deserved worse,” she said, bitterly.

Hugh held her all the time. She was terrified to be alone and would shake uncontrollably if left in a silent and empty house for more than a few minutes. There was a long road to recovery ahead of her.

Yet, she had love. She saw her parents again for the first time in a long time, and they all cried because for a time, they had thought they’d never see each other again.

It had been a frightening few months, and there was much tumult and, indeed, chaos ahead. But she didn’t mind.

She had foreseen Armageddon, and under her guidance, as many people people as possible had survived it.

The nightmares continued, of being alone and scared in an empty world, but always she woke up in the arms of her fiancé.

She was no longer afraid of ghosts.

*

It was safe to say that Arthur Fenwick had had a very bad year.

First, he had woken up to find a whole week of his life was missing and at his age every day brought him closer to the end. So losing a week had been quite stressful for him.

Then, of course, there had been the political fallout, the fingerpointing, the alarming rapidity with which a new Prime Minister was appointed. And after that came the creeping authoritarianism. Suddenly police were swarming the little town where he lived, and there were soldiers going door to door.

He’d had to retire early because the stress was getting to him. He and Reggie had remortgaged the house and downsized, and they began living in a small cottage in view of a brick water-tower. It was quite picturesque, but the nearest train station was an hour’s walk away, and with the amount of checkpoints when driving, they barely went out.

On the day the darkness came, he and Reggie had bunkered down under the kitchen table, eating cold Spam from a tin, expecting the worst. Not one of their proudest moments.

Then, the next morning it seemed like, there were no more soldiers. They’d all crawled back where they came from, like ants after rain. All the newspapers wrote about the Pink Moon a lot while it was a novelty, but after a while it became another fact of life.

A few weeks later, they’d taken a drive to the next largest town and found people wandering around as if dazed. Stopping the car, he asked: “What’s happening?”

“Haven’t you heard?” asked a man of similar age to him. “The government’s collapsed.”

It had. In fact, the whole country had collapsed. People were dazed because suddenly they had no idea who or where they were. A strange nostalgia set in, like that he’d read of in the collapse of the Soviet Union, where suddenly people who had spent their whole lives in one country were now being asked to recontextualise their entire lives in another.

He would still dream, sometimes, of another time and another place. He would dream of speaking Dutch in America, and the strange, tall, lilac-haired woman with blue eyes. Who was she? She looked so familiar…

Every other night he’d wake from these dreams, bathed in the eerie pink glow of the sphere in the sky. He’d stare at it for five minutes, as though trying to remember something on the tip of his tongue – presque vu, they called that – and then he’d go back to sleep and not remember any of it.

He never did see any of them again.

*

Socks’s parents were alright, in the end.

The whole time he had been on the run, he had been worried about them, what the Captain had done to them, whether they’d even recognise him.

In the end, he found them safe and sound, back in Stevenage. They had been briefly arrested for questioning about the whereabouts of their son, which, of course, they didn’t know, and let go without further repercussions.

They had also been worried sick about him. His mother cried and hugged him when he turned up out of the blue, with Liberty waiting just behind him.

He had wept, too. He decided that right then and there was the time to come clean with them about everything. They scarcely believed it, until Liberty confirmed it, spreading her wings for them to see.

He had spent the rest of that summer with his parents, eating his mother’s cooking, and grieving the loss of his best friend.

It was funny how much he missed Stevenage during his time away. Stevenage, of all places.

He was repeating his final year of university, naturally. He heard that Daisy had dropped out, but he really wanted that degree. He’d been through a lot, after all. Sunk cost fallacy or not, he wanted that degree. The fees had been abolished, so it was really just a case of supporting himself.

So much had changed and yet so many things were the same. All the money still had the Queen’s face on it because they hadn’t printed up the republican banknotes yet. The Royal Mail still delivered your post in many parts of the country, since the transition would take some time to set in. It was a confusing time, but it wasn’t like there was no food, water or electricity. The fact was that nobody had any idea what they were doing any more.

Then again, perhaps they never did.

All that had happened, really, was that the artifice had fallen away.

Socks had come into knowledge of the true nature of time, and of his world. He knew the fractal structure of time. He could walk between worlds as easily as taking a shortcut across an open meadow.

He expected to feel at least a little different, but he, too, hadn’t changed much.

After some time, he journeyed back into the root system. He emerged in the Notherethere, to which he could now travel out of his own free will.

There, an old friend was waiting for him.

“You survived, then,” Magpie said, dryly.

Socks supposed that for Magpie, it would seem as though not very much time at all had passed since they last spoke.

“We won,” he said. “We lost people. But we won.”

Magpie nodded, giving a sad smile.

“As it must always be so,” he said. “What’s the plan now?”

“I’m back to uni in the autumn,” Socks said. “I hope to finally get my degree.”

He turned his gaze downward, as if in shame.

He reached into his pocket and held the crystal that used to be Monica.

“I feel guilty for letting my life go on, despite everything I lost,” he said. “I wish I could have done something.”

Tears brimmed in his eyes.

Magpie placed a hand on Socks’s back.

“Listen,” he said. “I know someone in your position can’t help looking at the past. But if you want my advice, don’t dwell there, son.”

Socks looked at him, then pocketed the crystal again.

“There’s just one thing bothering me,” Socks said. “That envelope. You said a friend gave it to you.”

“That’s true.”

“There’s a few things I still don’t understand,” Socks said. “Do you know if I can talk to them?”

Magpie smiled.

“I’ll put you in touch. Give us a mo.”

He reached behind his back for something. He took a few steps towards Socks, holding it up to him.

It was a hand mirror.

Socks raised his eyebrows, as he understood the meaning of it.

“Wait,” he said. “You mean…?”

Magpie nodded, then held up a hand.

“You’ll know when it’s time,” he said. “I’m quite patient. You’ve got all the time in the world, sunshine. Not to mention many others, too.”

Socks smiled.

“Thanks, Magpie. For everything.”

“Don’t worry about it, son,” Magpie said. “Now, go on and live your life. Don’t let me keep you.”

He reached up and stroked the tail of the cat, Schrödinger.

Mrrowww,” the cat said.

Socks never did learn who Magpie was, nor where he came from, nor what his name was before he made the Notherethere his home.

He left him, then, but not for the last time.

Illustration © Joanne Rey Neal, 2023. All rights reserved.

*

Dolores Mykhailiuk and Chelsea Rose were married in a ceremony in Camden, more than a year later.

Dolly wore a yellow silk gown, patterned with lace butterflies, which swept up the back and into the shoulders. In her ears were two earrings with peridot, her birthstone, and her hair was done up in braids. She was walked down the aisle by her father, a Ukrainian man who was just beaming with pride.

Chelsea wore her hair loose about her shoulders. She was dressed in a white bridal gown with a pleated skirt, and floral decorations down her arms. It was the dress she had dreamed of wearing ever since she was a child. Chelsea was walked down the aisle by her Uncle Barry, who stepped up to the role.

No mention or acknowledgement was made of those absent. They did not deserve to participate in the occasion, anyway.

All their friends were in attendance. Socks, Nas, and Harri-Bec all sat together and watched as the two made their vows. Daisy stood just behind the celebrant, dressed proudly in pastel pink. Liberty Parish stood at the edges, sending a permanent cascade of petals fluttering through the air.

“I take you, Dolly, to be my wife, forever and always, as my friend, my lover, and my companion. I will always stay by your side, and I will grow old with you. Even if we argue, I trust you to the ends of the earth. I shall never put myself above or before you, but beside you. Now, let’s get on with it. The open bar closes soon, and I’m gasping.”

Laughter erupted from the aisle.

“I take you, Chelsea, to be my wife, forever and always, as my friend, my lover, and my companion. I will always stay by your side, and I will grow old with you. Even if we argue, I trust you to the ends of the earth. I shall never put myself above or before you, but beside you. I would also like to get on with it, that cake wasn’t cheap.”

Dolly laughed, but there were tears in her eyes.

They exchanged rings, and had their hands fastened together by the celebrant. They removed their hands, and the string remained knotted.

The celebrant smiled.

“It is my great pleasure and privilege to pronounce the brides, Chelsea and Dolores, to be married. You may now kiss, as a symbol of your union.”

Chelsea swept her hand into the small of Dolly’s back, bending her back against her leg as they kissed. A near-involuntary whoop rose in the assembled crowd.

“Wow,” Dolly said. “You know, in the next sixty-odd years of kisses, that one’s going to be hard to beat.”

“Sounds like a challenge to me,” Chelsea said, smiling.

They proceeded to a table by the altar. Dolly signed her name at the bottom of the marriage certificate, and Daisy, specially appointed by Chelsea, signed in her stead.

“I’m married,” Chelsea said, in disbelief. “Oh my God, I’m married. To the hottest girl in the world. Nobody pinch me!”

Dolly kissed her on the cheek.

“If you’re dreaming, don’t wake up,” she said. “Mrs. Chelsea Rose-Mykhailiuk.”

The celebrant gave the blessing, and the attendees clapped, cheered and cried.

Socks walked up to Daisy, who was enjoying a glass of champagne.

They’d started talking again in recent months. Daisy’s anger at Socks had finally subsided, and they were once again on speaking terms. It would be some time before they could ever be as close as they once were, but Daisy recognised her own grief over Jules in Socks’s own grief.

“Hey,” Socks said. “You look beautiful.”

“Thank you,” Daisy said. “You don’t look so bad, yourself.”

Socks smiled.

“What a weird couple of years it’s been,” Daisy said. “The time’s flown by.”

Socks nodded.

“You know,” he said, “Despite everything I’ve been through…I don’t regret inviting…her to that Christmas party.”

Daisy placed a hand on her hip, mock-disapprovingly.

“I believe her name was K-Os, Socks,” she said.

“Right,” Socks said. “It’s just hard to say her name, still.”

Daisy tightened a corner of her mouth and placed a hand on his shoulder.

Dolly came over with a flute of champagne in one hand, and Chelsea’s hip in the other.

“Now, now,” she said. “I don’t want anyone moping at my wedding.”

“Sorry,” Socks said. “We’re just reflecting on…memories, you know. The people who couldn’t be here.”

“Of course,” Dolly said. “She was a stubborn old bint. God, I miss her.”

“I think we all do,” Chelsea said. “Much as it pains me to say it. Christ, I can only imagine what she’d be like if she was here. Sitting in the corner, refusing to drink or eat anything. You know, this wedding really is missing a buzzkill-in-residence.”

Harri-Bec approached them, then. She was dressed in a sleeveless bodycon dress, in the maroon hue of the Metropolitan line.

“Congratulations,” she said. “Timothy sends his regards.”

“Thank you,” Dolly said. “And thank you for not bringing him.”

Harri-Bec laughed.

“Well, I wouldn’t want to frighten your poor old Mum and Dad.”

“Quiet! If my mother hears you calling her ‘old’, I’ll never hear the end of it.”

Harri-Bec laughed even louder.

Nasmeen Osmani, whom Socks had never actually met before, came over and introduced herself. She wore a lavender shalwar kameez, with a black hijab on her head. She was not partaking in the champagne, and held a glass of fresh mango juice in her hand.

“Congratulations to the happy couple,” she said.

“So glad you could come,” Dolly replied.

“Aye,” Nas said. “Glad they finally got the trains running again between Piccadilly and Euston. Only in England would we found a republic, and still have privatised bloody trains.”

“Preach it, sister,” Harri-Bec said.

“You’re always welcome at ours,” Dolly said. “Eh, Chelsea?”

“‘Course,” Chelsea said.

She smiled a drunken, besotted smile, as if she just remembered something.

“You’re my wife!”

“Yes, love, we established this when we exchanged rings.”

“I know,” Chelsea said. “Just doubt I’ll ever get tired of saying it.”

Socks bowed his head with a small smile, then turned his gaze across the room. Liberty, who looked like a flower girl anyway, was waving her arms, constantly changing the shape of the flower arrangements in the trellis, as though conducting an orchestral performance.

Unusually, she was wearing a pair of shoes: ballet flats with thin soles. The venue had insisted upon it.

“Oh, for God’s sake,” Daisy said. “Would you go over there and talk to her? You’ve been looking at her all through the ceremony.”

Socks turned to Dolly, who smiled permissively.

“Go on ahead, Socks. I need to keep Chelsea from drinking too much, anyway. We’ve a flight to Paris tomorrow morning.”

“Just try and stop me!” Chelsea shouted, triumphantly.

“God, I love you,” Dolly said.

That shut Chelsea up. She went red in the face.

Socks looked to Daisy, too, who smiled back, as well. She punched him lightly in the arm.

“Teddybear,” she said.

He crossed the room to Liberty, who turned and gave him an affectionate embrace.

“Let’s head outside,” he said. “Should be a bit quieter, we can talk.”

“Is that all okay with Dolly?”

“Of course,” Socks said, offering her his right hand.

She took it, and they ventured outside, into the cool evening air.

It was a clear night in October, and you could clearly see the Plough just above the horizon. The Pink Moon stayed high in the sky.

“Lovely ceremony,” Socks said.

“It really was,” Liberty said. She closed her eyes and smiled. “So. I suppose you have something to ask me.”

“I totally understand if you’re not up for it,” Socks said. “But…”

Liberty smiled.

“Well, the Great Seal of Ur is broken,” she said. “I’m no longer beholden to the covenant. I can live my life as I please, I suppose.”

“So, is that a yes or a no?”

“I think it would be nice, yes.”

“Great! I mean…thank you. I mean…”

“Oh, for goodness’ sake,” Liberty said, and she pulled him into a kiss. It seemed to last hours. Then, after a few minutes, they came apart again.

“You’re amazing,” Socks said.

“So are you,” she replied.

Socks bowed his head and sighed. He felt a tear start in his eye and wiped it with a finger.

“What’s the matter?”

Socks reached into his pocket. The crystal. He kept it with him, everywhere he went. This wedding was no exception.

It hadn’t sung in well over a year.

“Is that…?” Liberty asked. She held out her hand. “May I…?”

“I’m sorry,” Socks said, placing it in her palm. “I didn’t mean to ruin the moment, it’s just…”

Socks,” Liberty said, chidingly. “Why didn’t you say anything?”

“I don’t know. I guess…I guess I just didn’t want to upset you.”

“Oh, Socks…” Liberty said. She placed a hand on his back.

And just then, something amazing began to happen.

The crystal began to sing.

“What are you doing?” Socks said.

Liberty smiled as tears ran down her cheeks.

“Socks…” she said, gently. “Monica is a homunculus.”

Socks’s eyes bulged.

Liberty held the crystal to her mouth and breathed on it. A golden mist flowed from her mouth and into the crystal.

“You know, we can’t save everyone,” Liberty said. “And that’s a fact. But just this once…”

The crystal began to sing and glow.

“Just this once, I’d like a chance to get to know my daughter.”

The crystal unfolded like the birth of a new star, and there on the ground lay a figure, made of alabaster white crystal, the word ONE on her forehead now replaced by a yellow circle.

Monica Eno sat up, looked at Socks and Liberty and down at her hands.

She smiled.

“I’m back,” she said. “But how…?”

Socks immediately seized her, throwing his arms around her and weeping openly.

“Hi, Dad,” she said, standing and hefting Socks off his feet. She still towered over him.

“Don’t ever do something that stupid ever again,” Socks said.

After some time, he let go of her, and she turned to Liberty, clearly reticent to act.

It was Liberty who initiated the embrace, in the end, and Monica bent down to reciprocate.

“I’m sorry about the way I treated you,” Liberty said. “I’m going to make it right to you. Starting with this.”

She smiled, and Socks noticed that the Eye of Ur on Liberty’s forehead had shrunk in size.

Monica straightened her back, and from it, there unfurled six wings of white crystal.

“Oh,” Monica said, examining them. “Oh!

She took a step forwards.

There was no brrrrt-clunk-a-CHING.

Monica placed a hand on her stomach and looked to Liberty inquisitively.

“I gave you the breath of my life,” Liberty said. “You are not a machine. You are my daughter. You are Monica Parish.”

She turned to Socks.

“Monica Oxford-Parish?”

Socks stood in shock a few moments. It was a lot to take in.

“Absolutely,” he said.

Liberty beamed.

“Now, then. I have much to teach you, Monica.”

“Wait,” Socks said. “What do you mean?”

Liberty turned her gaze up to the Pink Moon in the sky, and pulled Socks’s ear close to her lips.

“Is she really gone?” she whispered. “Or is it that you haven’t gone looking for her?”

Socks turned his gaze up in turn, then back to Liberty.

He grinned.

Liberty took her daughter by the hand.

“Wait, where’s Dad going?” Monica said.

But already, Liberty had spread her twelve wings, and into the sky they soared.

*

Chelsea and Dolly Rose-Mykhailiuk left a little after three in the morning in a cab that had “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” by Tears for Fears blaring on the radio. It was and would remain Socks’s main memory of the night, even years later. For indeed, there would be many more years.

Socks returned to his hotel room shortly thereafter.

He removed the tie and the suit jacket, then caught a look at himself in the mirror.

Three years older. He looked so different, now, and yet the same. He really had been a kid.

He bowed his head, smiling.

He went to the door of the ensuite bathroom and opened it.

Beyond it was not a bathroom, but an endless field of flowers in every colour, as far as the eye could see. The air was perfumed with the fragrance of this infinite garden.

Above the flowers was a sky, permanently tinged golden yellow, like early evening sunset.

He wandered in this field a long time. There was a sweet aroma under the smell of the flowers. The smell of compost, of petrichor. It was the smell of life itself, and of the thousand little deaths that make even a single life viable.

He did not feel lost.

As a matter of fact, he felt right at home.

It was after many hours of walking among the long dirt paths that he found what he was looking for.

There was a figure standing a short distance ahead of him, flanked on either side by rows of wildflowers.

She was tall, dressed head-to-toe in white.

On her feet were two rollerskates, the most pristine he’d ever seen them.

Her lilac hair fell loose about her shoulders.

She turned, slowly, and regarded him with pale blue eyes.

He smiled.

They called him Socks.


Another time, another place.



Illustration created using elements of images by Annie Spratt and Geri Mis on Unsplash.


Creative Commons Licence
This work is distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.


ROLLERSKATER
2019-2022

Thank you very much for reading.


ARC FOUR: BLOOD MOON
I
| II | III | SSI | IV | V | SSII | SSIII | VI | VII | SSIV
VIII | IX | X | XI | XII | SSV | XIII | SSVI | XIV | SSVII | XV | SSVIII | XVI | XVII

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