Fearful Symmetry

by septithol

In the time of the Future Imperfect events, a girl grows up, trying to save what is left of the animals in the Bronx Zoo from the ravages of war. In a world ruled by one monster, can another monster be any better? What makes the difference between a monster and a man, anyways? Tags Maestro, Hulk, Morbius, Vampire

26. Chapter 26

Chapter 26. The Labyrinth

Aster's training turned into a blur. Sometimes her mind seemed as dark as the night. Day and night and time lost meaning. There was running and exercises, outside in the dark, wet, and cold, where she was constantly tripping and falling (though admittedly far less often than she had at first. Then more training, running through tunnels in an unused section of mine, where it was even darker (though admittedly warmer and drier), where one could easily run into a wall, or get lost. When they did get lost, nobody would help them. They either had to find their own way back, or stay lost forever. Eventually, they always found their way back, though sometimes it seemed like forever.

It was scary in the mines, and there were parts of it that were roped off, where neither Aster nor most of the other members of the Army of Darkness were allowed to go (on pain of extreme displeasure from His Royal Highness, General Erick Monroe). Sometimes there were strange noises from the roped off sections of the mine, and once or twice, there were screams. Aster tried not to think too much about what might be hidden, there in the darkness. She was a member of the Army of Darkness, and should not be afraid of the dark. Besides, it could be that the screams were just animals. There were a number of ways into the mine, and wild creatures sometimes came in, looking for shelter. Especially possums and squirrels. Which went into the cook pots, once they were tracked down. They needed every bit of food they could get.

Eventually, they learned to remember where they were running, and to mark their way with chalk, or unroll a long thin spool of thread, so they could find their way back. The mines and the darkness seemed less frightening to everyone than they had been. Though the odd noises never became any less creepy, and were often the subject of discussion in the minutes before they went to sleep. Some few members of the Army thought that perhaps the Vampire, Morbius, had somehow followed the people from Wisconsin, first to Dystopia, and now to the mines, and was now haunting the depths of the place. This did not seem at all likely to Aster. Morbius drank blood. Human blood, specifically, and if he had been in the mines, there would have been either attacks or deaths due to him. Nevertheless, a few of the members of the Army occasionally asked Dave Miller and the other people from Wisconsin if they thought the screams could perhaps have been from Morbius, or his unfortunate victims. To which the answer was always 'No', but Aster sensed an odd hesitation in the way they spoke, making her wonder afresh what it was that they were hiding about the Vampire.

Besides, the screams were probably just animals. She hoped. The twisting stone corridors of the mines tended to distort sound.

Often, Aster would see General Monroe's two children, Evan and Gina in a well lit chamber of the mines being tutored, by Trask or Lucy, or a few other people. Sometimes they were taught reading and math, sometimes manners, sometimes they did exercises or learned weapons. She heard that they were being taught to ride horses, but only during the day so far. Their father treated them like they were a treasure of some sort, down to having at least two guards near them at all times. Aster sometimes she wondered whether they were his only children, or merely the only ones he cared for, for some reason. She wasn't about to ask him. There were a lot of things she thought they ought to have been taught, but weren't. She was afraid to mention what they were, to General Monroe. He seemed to have it in mind that his children ought to be groomed to be Royalty of some sort. Which confirmed her suspicions that Monroe had ambitions to be a King of some sort. After all, all Kings wanted a dynasty. Even the Maestro, though there was no mere human woman capable of giving him one.

Well, Evan and Gina were not going to be a King and Queen. Not if Aster had anything to say about it. Not only did the people who lived in Wisconsin undoubtedly have their own rulers, and would surely be rather unwilling to accept foreign ones, but Aster had had enough of Kings. She didn't want King and Queen Evan and Gina any more than she wanted King Erick Monroe, or King Maestro. Well, they were young. It would be ten or more likely fifteen years, before they would be able to rule, and a lot could and would happen between now and then. Especially since General Monroe would have far less influence, once they got to Wisconsin. In fact, from the frail looks of him and the way he often coughed, he might not even live much longer.

Aster certainly didn't want to kill Evan and Gina they were just little kids, no more responsible for the sort of monster their father was than the unborn Gamma child that had ripped it's way out of Betty… Patricia, had been responsible for the things the Maestro had done. No, she wasn't cruel enough for a pre-emptive political murder, but she could and would certainly influence them, so that they wouldn't even want to be King and Queen.. Sometimes she would entertain them, making toys for them out of sticks and string and bits of lumber scraps, and telling them certain carefully selected stories she knew, such as one about a tailor who posed as a prince, only to be given a magic needle and find that there was more wealth and happiness to be found as a tailor, than as a ruler. Or another one about a boy who was turned into a squirrel by a witch, and spent seven years cooking for her, and when he became a human again, became the most famous and wealthiest chef in the entire kingdom. General Monroe occasionally listened as Aster told his children stories, but did not seem to realize what she was doing.

Sometime late in February (or so Aster thought, she had lost track of the nights and days in the Underworld). General Monroe came down, as he often did, to see Aster practicing with the gun. He looked closely at her targets, which had groups that could be covered with his hand, from 75 feet away.

"That's really very good." He said. "You're different than most women. You weren't ever afraid of the gun."

"I was at first." Aster said. In fact, she had been terrified at first. She wasn't sure why, now. She had gotten used to it.

"Really." General Monroe seemed to be in thought. "Well, you didn't seem like you were."

"Well, I was."

The older man gazed at her for a moment. "Indeed. That's… interesting."

Aster failed to see what was so interesting about it. General Monroe thought for a few seconds on whatever it was he found interesting, then said: "I want you to come with me."

Aster frowned. Being unexpectedly summoned by someone with power was seldom good. "Did I do something wrong? Am I in trouble?"

"No. In fact, you might be able to help all of us."

Apparently she wasn't in trouble. Or perhaps she was. Her frown deepened. 'Helping' everyone in the Army of Darkness was not likely to be some easy, trivial task. She had long worried as to exactly why General Monroe had been so interested in her shooting ability in particular, and now it seemed that she was about to find out.

She followed General Monroe down several narrow, poorly lit tunnels of the mine, until they got to the chamber that served him as a combination bedroom and headquarters. He opened the rough wooden door. Daniel Wolfkiller was inside, sitting on a wooden chair with faded blue paint. General Monroe pointed to another, nearly identical chair. Thankfully, not the very uncomfortable one that Aster had once been made to sit in.

"Sit." He ordered her.

Aster pulled the chair a few feet away from Wolfkiller, and sat, looking and feeling not at all happy. General Monroe sat down in another chair, this one made of pale, new wood, with leaves carved in it. Aster found that interesting. It was a new chair. There were not many people actually making furniture, or anything else, any more. Most of it was simply scavenged from what had been made before the War. Apparently someone in the Underworld had woodworking tools and a fair amount of skill in using them.

General Monroe studied Aster for a moment, as if she were some new, raw, recruit, in the Army. Someone whose use and worthiness were still highly questionable, at best. True, she had only been in the Army for a few months, but that was just as long as almost everyone else. He folded his hands together.

"Let me ask you something." He said. "What would be the easiest, fastest way to shut off all the power in the Maestro's palace?"

"There's no easy way to do it." Aster felt compelled to correct what she perceived as a wrong assumption. "But the way that would be easier than anything else… there's a room with fuse boxes. But there's always two guards by the door. With guns. Machine guns, I think, from before the War."

The General looked at Daniel Wolfkiller. "Have you seen this room?"

The former horsemaster shook his head. "My quarters were in the stables. I was seldom allowed into the Maestro's palace at all, and then generally only in the throne room for some special occasion or the other. It would have been very suspicious for me to wander around just anywhere. Only the Maestro's women, staff, and special favorites were allowed in most parts of the palace."

"Women. Like her. I wish to God that this Doctor Llewellyn you told me about were still alive. Or that we could find that nurse of his. Or perhaps not. She'd be too old, and might not be any good with the gun."

He looked at Aster again, not giving her time to dwell on the one question she had no answer to. "How well trained, really, do you think the Maestro's guards are?"

"Compared to us?" Monroe nodded, and Aster gave it a few moment's thought. "They have machine guns. And some tanks and other vehicles with guns and weapons. But… I don't think they are really trained all that well. They know how to march, mainly because the Maestro likes them to parade around sometimes for him. But I think they depend mostly on people being afraid. Afraid of them, and the weapons, and the Maestro. Especially the Maestro. They used to beat me… and.. and do stuff to me. But they were in groups. And I'm not as strong as a man, no matter how hard I exercise."

It was a bitter admission and brought on bad memories. Aster swallowed and went on. "They're good at bullying helpless and weak and frightened people when they outnumber them. But compared to our army… no, I don't think they are well trained at all. I think either you or Wolfkiller would take any one of them out pretty quickly, if they weren't in a group and didn't have their guns. In fact, any of the men in the Army would. And they don't train at all in the dark. Which is why we do."

"I see." General Monroe looked tense. Aster's assumption that he could take out one of the guards was probably wrong, given his condition, but she didn't need to know about that. "Listen to me. When we attack Dystopia, I need you to sneak into that palace, ahead of all the rest of us, and pull the fuses. You're the only one here who knows the layout of the palace, and the procedures there well enough to do it. I need those lights out."

Aster's heart began racing. "I… I don't think I can. There's two guards, I told you. With machine guns. They all know who I am. If they saw me, they'd kill me."

She felt ashamed. Ashamed of the little child in her that felt like crying out: But I'm afraid! And ashamed of disappointing General Monroe. And as her head sunk down to hide the tears welling in her eyes, Aster realized that at some point in the past several weeks, she had started thinking of him as a real General, and not just someone who had pinned a title onto himself. After all, he did have a real Army, The Army of Darkness, and it seemed to Aster that even though she felt afraid, they were all becoming very well trained, and were not just a rabble or a joke.

When does a fiction become REAL? Aster wondered. How many people have to believe it and live it, before a game is truth. Before it's REAL. And when do I become REAL? Real again? The way I was before the Maestro. Before I was afraid all the time?

"Stop crying!" General Monroe ordered her. "You think we aren't all scared? That you're special or something?"

"I.. I'm sorry." Aster wasn't sure what she was apologizing for.

"Now, you listen to me." General Monroe said. "Think about the animals in your zoo. A lot stronger, and faster than you, weren't they? But they were inside the cage and you were outside it, weren't you?"

Aster nodded, wiping her face.

"That's because you were smarter than them. You don't fight a stronger, faster animal face to face. You outsmart it. You don't even let it see you, if you can help it. You use the right weapon. Or if that's no good, you use the right bait, and lure it into a trap."

"Like you did, when you were a bandit." Aster pointed out. "Which is why you were a successful bandit."

"Precisely." The man nodded once. "Jumping out from around the corner, shooting with a pistol when they have a machine gun would be stupid. You get close to them, distract them… then shoot them."

"But how do I get close to them?" Aster protested. "Everyone in the palace knows me. They'd kill me on sight, if they saw me."

"With the right bait. To start with, you won't look very much like yourself. We've got stuff to disguise you. Such as this…" He went over to a small, long chest, opened it, and took out a wig of golden blond hair. "I had a hell of a time convincing three women to part with their hair, to get this made. Try it on."

He handed her the wig and a few thin wire clips. Aster examined it. The wig was made of small bunches of blond hair carefully sewn to some sort of pre-war mesh cloth.

"Careful with it." General Monroe cautioned her. "It'll take hours to fix it if you tear it."

Aster put it on her head, and the General handed her a mirror, a round circle set into wood with several scratches and faded spots. Aster moved closer to the lantern and looked at her own reflection.

I look like Thumb. She thought. Or at least, a little like what Thumb would have looked like if she had lived to Aster's age. She was taller than Thumb would have ever been, of course, but the months of poor rations had thinned out her face and made her features thin and sharp like Thumb's had been. She wasn't about to share her intimate memories with General Monroe, though, and ran her fingers cautiously through the strands of hair. Having come from three women, there was quite a lot of it.

"It's heavy." Aster said. "Almost like Freya's golden hair."

"Freya? Someone you know?"

"No. From a story. From Viking mythology, I think." Aster turned her head and looked in the mirror from one side. "The Vikings had warrior women, like we do in our army. They were called Valkyries."

Aster thinking of fierce warrior women was definitely an improvement over Aster crying, at least so far as General Monroe's strategy was concerned. He needed her motivated, to do what needed to be done. She didn't believe in him, that much was obvious from her repulsed look whenever he carried out necessary discipline. But perhaps she could believe in herself. Or at least her stories. "Indeed. Perhaps you are a Valkyrie. Or could be. Tell me about these 'Vikings'. Then their stories."

Aster left the blond wig on her head, the better to remind her of Thumb and the Viking stories she had once read, and told General Monroe, as best as she could recall, what she knew of the Vikings and their stories. That they had live in Iceland, (or perhaps it was Greenland) a long time ago, traveled around in ships with sails, and waged war and robbed people (they had been fierce bandits, much like General Monroe). And that when one of their kings died, he had an elaborate funeral that involved putting his body in a ship, letting it go out to sea, and setting it on fire. General Monroe seemed to find this amusing, for some reason Aster couldn't understand. At least his lip quirked, and he made a rude noise that could have been a suppressed laugh.

Then Aster told some of the stories Vikings had told. About how the trickster God, Loki, had caused Thor's (or perhaps it was Odin's, Aster said) wife, Freya, to lose her hair, and when her husband had become angry and threatened to kill Loki, Loki had gotten some Dwarves to make Freya new hair out of solid gold beaten into strands as soft and fine as hair. About the Valkyries, who were female warrior angels who took the souls of dead warriors to Valhalla, the Viking heaven. And how the Vikings had their own stories about the end of the world, Ragnarok, where, rather than the War that had happened, the Gods would fight the Frost Giants, and in the end, all the Gods and Frost Giants would be killed in the battle Ragnarok, and only human beings would be left.

"No more Heroes or Villains." The leader of the Army commented. "This 'Ragnarok' sounds good to me. Better than the War we had. We've hardly any men left, and too many Villians. Especially that Green Bastard. Though, from what I here, there's plenty of men left in Iceland, and no Heroes or Villians there. So perhaps they did have their Ragnarok, after all. Or maybe the Viking gods are the only real ones, and are watching out for them. If I believed in any Gods, I'd try praying to them. I could use some divine intervention."

He turned his attention back to Aster. "As for you, you won't look a thing like yourself. And you can get close to the guards, if you just use the right bait."

"What bait?" Aster had a complex mind, but not one devious enough to understand what General Monroe was referring to."

"Seduction." He said simply. Then sighed. "The problem is, of course, from what I've seen of you, you're about as seductive as a mule. Which is a big problem. Tell me something, are you an Ovoid?"

Aster recognized the slang term for a lesbian. She flushed. "No… I like men. At least I think I do. Their pictures, anyway. I've never really met one I liked all that much in person."

Her mind flashed for a moment to a dream, nearly lost in years of horror, of a dark haired man, as tall as she was, and elegant as a prince from her books of fairy tales, standing next to her in a still intact Zoo. She pushed it away. That was just childhood wishful thinking. There was no more Zoo, and no prince for her. No man of any sort. The Maestro has ruined her for that.

"You don't need to like a man to seduce him." General Monroe explained. "In fact, it often helps if you don't like him. Just what you can get out of him. Seduction is pretty much of a lie. Which maybe is your problem with it. You're a lousy liar. Hell, you can't even keep your mouth shut most of the time. But tell me something… can you act?"

"Like in a play?" General Monroe nodded. "I think so. I used to do skits sometimes with Thumb… my sister. Back when I was a kid."

General Monroe did not mention that to a man as old as himself, Aster was still not much more than a 'kid'. "Do something for me, from a skit. Let me see if you're any good."

"Let me think… do you know the story Little Red Riding Hood? With the wolf?" The General nodded, and Aster decided that constituted permission. She thought for a minute, then put on an innocent, surprised face.

"My… what big eyes you have, Grandma!"

She turned, making a sly, feral face, like a tiger hunting it's prey. "The better to see you with, my dear."

She turned, playing the role of Red Riding Hood again. "And what big ears, you have, Grandma!"

Again, the tiger face, and a voice with just a hint of a growl in it. "The better to hear you with, my dear!"

She put on a slightly alarmed face. "And what big teeth you have, Grandma!"

She turned, and her voice came out as nearly a snarl. "The better to eat you with, my dear!"

Aster took off her tiger face, and looked at General Monroe anxiously. "Was that any good?"

"It wasn't bad." Actually, it was better than a lot of so-called 'actors' he had seen. Whatever she lacked in dishonesty, Aster could apparently make up for in imagination. But he didn't tell her that. He didn't need her getting a swollen head and deciding that she didn't need to go to any efforts.

"It's workable. It will probably help that men are stupid." He glanced at Daniel Wolfkiller. "They want to believe seduction. Even though they know it's a lie. So let me see how much work there is to do, when it comes to that. Show me how you would go about seducing me."

Again, Aster's heart started pounding, as if it would come out of her chest. She bit her lip to hold back the tears. "Don't want to."

"I don't care about your 'don't want to'. I told you, you're nothing special. Are you part of this Army or not?"

"I… I want to be part of the Army." Aster didn't have the words to explain that not only didn't she feel as if she were 'part of the Army', but that she didn't even feel part of humanity, and hadn't for a very long time."

"Then, obey your orders, soldier."

She swallowed. "I… I don't know if I can. I don't like you." She refused to even use the word 'love' around someone as cruel as the General was.

"I told you, not liking someone makes seduction easier. Think of it as an act, as bait for a trap. You're trying to trick a man you hate, into a trap. If you trick him well enough, you'll get what you want out of him. Now tell me, who do you hate?"

That one was easy. "The Maestro."

Perhaps too easy. General Monroe shook his head. "You can't seduce the Maestro. Any more than you can seduce a hurricane. He takes what he wants. But from what Wolfkiller here tells me, you have other men you hate, don't you? Men who can be tricked. If you're clever enough to trick them. Do you know any men like that?"

One came to mind immediately. "Paul Rasse. Him and all his sicko friends."

"Him, then. If you can trick him, you can get what you want. You have things you want, don't you? If you can do this, if you can get the lights out, I'll give you anything you want, that's in my power to give. Tell me what it is you want. Do you want Rasse dead? If we find him, I'll give you his head on a platter."

"Dead…" Aster thought about that. A quick death was too easy, after what had happened to her, and her family. "I don't want him dead. I want him alive. I want Rasse alive and I want him to live, until I've made him suffer. Then I want him dead."

"It's hard to catch a man alive, but I'll tell people to try. I can't guarantee it, though. He may not even be in the palace when we attack. Is there anything else you want? Something easier? Jewels? Desserts?"

Aster had much of the magpie in her. She liked sparkly things. Jewels were tempting, though other than their value as trade goods, she was just as pleased with faceted and polished glass. As were desserts. Only those with high rank in the Army got desserts, and then only once a week. She did not have high rank in the Army and hadn't had an actual dessert since the Maestro had expelled her from his palace.

Still… things that pleased the eye and tongue were transitory, and not of that much use. She thought about everything in the Underworld, and what would be of the most use in the future. Her eyes half closed, as she thought about what she would need to do, to someday get revenge on the Maestro. There was a way, she was sure, but it was a slim chance in the far future, and there was so much to do between now and then, and she would need the cooperation of so many people. Not to mention the Vampire himself. Aster had enough self-awareness to know that she lacked the leadership skills to simply persuade others into helping her, but there were other ways of getting cooperation. Bribery for instance. But how to get enough wealth to bribe enough people with, for years and decades? General Monroe hardly had enough jewels stashed away to begin to be anything like the amount she needed.

She thought about the book she had read a long time ago. There had been a woman in it, who had commanded a price no other woman had ever gotten. The book made it sound romantic, but Aster could only feel sick despair. The character in the book, Dagny, who had commanded a higher price than any other woman, had never been afraid and desperate like Aster was most of the time. She thought about Thumb, and her plans. There had been another character in the book, one who often was afraid, the one who had prayed to the God of Trains.

In the name of what is best in us, I must now start this train.

There were no trains in the Underwold. But now Aster knew what she needed. She opened her eyes. "A truck."

This was not a request General Monroe had expected. "A what?!" He honestly hadn't understood her statement, so great was his astonishment. He had had women ask him for all sorts of favors before. It was his ability to grant favors, his power, that attracted women. The sort of things they asked for were always the same. Jewels. Clothing. Food. Punishment for someone who had offended them in some way or another. Always easily granted, and never anything surprising.

A TRUCK was definitely surprising. But then, Aster wasn't attracted to his power, which was unusual, so he shouldn't have been surprised she would have an unusual request.

"I want a truck. One of those rigs, and a long trailer. I want Wolfkiller here to teach me how to drive it, and I want to drive it to Wisconsin, and I don't want anyone else opening it to see what I'm going to put in it."

"And just what are you going to put in it?"

Aster was not about to tell anyone that. "Does it matter? You said I could have whatever I wanted. That's what I want. My own truck, to fill up any way I like and drive all by myself."

General Monroe shook his head. "There's no way to block all the radiation from the cabs. At least part of the windows have to be uncovered, to see. Whoever drives those trucks is going to take a heavy hit of radiation. That's why all our Seed Corn, our women, children, and younger men, are going to be in the trailers, surrounded by as much metal as we can carry."

Aster's lip curled. "Well, then there's no problem. I'm not part of our Seed Corn, am I?"

"No, but you're 30 years younger than anyone else whose going to be driving. You might not ever have children, but you've got plenty of years of your own life. And cancer isn't a fun way to go." In fact, it sucked. Monroe knew that from the tumors eating at his own guts. The price of too many trips through the wastelands, to rob hapless travellers from Dystopia. Lately he'd been smoking a pipe of opium twice during the day to keep functioning, and again at night, to dull the pain enough so he could sleep.

"I've no intention of dying of cancer." Aster said. "Take a look at the Millers and the other people from Milwaukee. They made the same trip, coming the other way, and none of them got cancer. If I'm right, there's a radiation cure in Wisconsin. And if I'm wrong, we're all screwed anyways, so it doesn't matter."

And perhaps they wouldn't be taking as much of a hit of radiation as Monroe feared. Aster had thought of a possible way of protecting even the drivers, late the previous night. But she wasn't about to mention it. Not until she knew if it was possible, and she wouldn't know if it was possible unless they could take the Maestro's palace. Which meant that, as repulsive as it was, she would have to find a way to do what General Monroe wanted. Damn him, and damn herself as well for being nothing more than a high priced whore.

"So, show me." General Monroe said. "If you want this truck of yours."

Aster was still hesitant. "Good lord, I'm not going to rape you. I could get away with that as a bandit. Not as a General. Especially not with the famous Zookeeper. And you're not my type. You're too damn tall."

Aster wanted to ask if Wolfkiller could leave, so she at least would not have to humiliate herself in public. But then, she would be in public in the palace, if she actually went through with this. There were two guards in front of the room with the fuse boxes. Always two.

I hate this, but I'll do it. For my truck. And to get even for Father and Thumb. And for the kids in the Army. Not for this bastard.

She recalled what she had read in books. The rather dull (or so she had found them at the time) romance books in the Maestro's palace, and other books she had read back at the Zoo and the Library, about human anatomy. She did not want to do this, but if she were going to do it, she would do it (as it said in the book that had talked about trains) superlatively.

What followed then was not anything like what General Monroe had expected from someone so apparently shy. He was too shocked to say anything for a few seconds. After that, he didn't want to say anything, and it was only the realization that Aster had actually opened his pants and was about to start handling him that shocked him into pushing her away.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" He roared furiously. "I told you to seduce me. Not… not that!"

"That's…" tears of confusion rose to her eyes. "That's what I was doing."

"Why the hell didn't you stop her?" He glared at Daniel Wolfkiller, who had looked pointedly away during the entire incident. As if it were somehow the horsemaster's fault.

"What did you expect?" The sneer was obvious in his tone. "I told you, she doesn't know how to lie very well."

"That's…" He shook with fury and frustrated lust. "That's not seduction. I told you, seduction is bait. It's… like the steam and smell of a pot of stew. What you were giving me was the whole bloody pot, with a cherry pie on top for good measure. Now, just how the hell do you expect to lure an animal into a trap, if the first thing you do is feed it before it even gets near the trap?"

"I don't know. It's…" Aster thought about the things she had seen other women, the Betties, do and say at the Maestro's palace. "I've seen women do things like that. Teasing men, to get what they want, and never actually giving them anything. I… I don't like that. It's CRUEL. It's like dangling food in front of a hungry animal to make it more hungry, then snatching the food away and never feeding it. I used to punch other kids, back at the Zoo, for teasing animals that way."

A great deal of confusion became clear. Women were cruel creatures, except perhaps for this one. But cruelty and lies were what men responded to. Which perhaps said something about men, as well, that they would rather starve than eat, and preferred lies to the truth.

As for Aster Aversa, she was no more human that one of her zoo animals. Intelligent, yes, but miles away from the norm in her reactions. Wolfkiller had told the General what Dr. Llewellyn had had to say about Aster, a week ago when he had objected to what Monroe had planned for her.

oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Dr. Llewellyn had had words, of course. Medical terms from before the War. Aspbergers, mainly. But they had liked their neat labels, back then in their neat world, and such words were meaningless to Wolfkiller. He knew horses, and drink, and women, and killing. Not medical terminology. So Llewellyn described Aster to the horsemaster more simply, and perhaps more truthfully.

"She's a Monster."

Wolfkiller snorted at the thought. "She's a girl. Hardly a monster like the Maestro."

"There's more than one sort of Monster. And to be a Monster, isn't the same as being evil. Angels are Monsters, if you think about it. What's wrong with her is actually far worse than what's wrong with the Maestro. Just not as loud. There's plenty of people like you the Maestro around, who would step into his shoes if they had his strength. Not a whole lot like her. That's why I need you to try to protect her.

"Protect a Monster? What for?"

"Maybe it takes a Monster to fight one. So the way I see it, why not throw all the Monsters we can, at the Maestro. Maybe one of you will find a way to take him down. If not you, then her. Or perhaps this bastard Monroe you know.."

"I'd give Monroe better odds than Aster. He's stronger, anyways." In fact, Wolfkiller would give himself better odds at taking down the Maestro than Aster. The girl might be a good hunter, but she lacked the killer instinct. The fact that plenty of killers such as himself and Monroe had tried, and failed, to defeat the Maestro didn't occur to him. He glanced at Llewellyn. "How about you? You're not a Monster? Not part of our exclusive little club?"

"No, I'm not."

"Aster's a monster, and you're not? You're far worse than she is."

Llewellyn shook his head. "The essence of a Monster isn't good or evil. It's purity."

"Purity?" Wolfkiller took a drink from a scratched bottle on the rickety table he had salvaged from some pre-War ruins and brought to the stables. "The Maestro's ripped her open. Had every hole on her, for all I know. She's been gang raped half a dozen times by Rasse and his friends. And you call that pure?"

"Oh, pah." Dr. Llewellyn waved one hand dismissively in the air. "Get whatever stupid notions you've picked up from the priests you claim to laugh at out of your head. To start with the idea that someone's soul can be sullied by something done TO them. And secondly, do you honestly think that purity has anything to do with sex? Just because most human beings have mixed sex with the impure for so many thousands of years that we can't tell the difference between the two any longer, and the priests have been making a con game out of it, doesn't make sex itself dirty. Really. Get your head out of that bottle for a minute and think. Can you really picture Aster selling herself like these women you're so fond of? Or leading a man on to get favors and then giving him nothing?"

He disregarded Llewellyn's advice about 'getting his head out of the bottle' and took another deliberate, long drink. "She's a kid. Not to mention an ice cube. I honestly can't picture her choosing to fuck anyone at all. Even if the Maestro hadn't ruined her for it. Is that what you mean?"

"Oh. She could choose it. At least when she grows up a few more years. You'd be surprised. A man would be very, very lucky to get her interested. Or would be, if she hadn't been ruined inside by that Green Bastard. And if most men weren't too stupid to believe it."

The horsemaster took another drink. "I don't get it. How can both being a virgin, and fucking both be pure?"

"Let me show you." The doctor got up from his seat and picked up a chunk of coal from a bucket near the small iron stove that was in one corner of Wolfkiller's quarters, and drew a small glass of water from another bucket.. He poured a little water on one side of Wolfkiller's table then set the chunk of coal down on the other side. He waited a moment, then picked up the coal, and wiped the water away with his hand. "Now take a look. No mark where the coal was, and the part where the water was is wet, but not dirty, either. Now, watch this."

Dr. Llewellyn took a small pre-War folding knife with a faded red handle from his pocket, opened the smallest blade, and scraped across the coal, letting powdery flakes fall into the water in his glass. The previously clear liquid turned muddy, and when he poured a few drops of the liquid onto the table, it left an obvious black smear.

"It's contamination that's impure, that make things dirty. And Aster has none of that. Any more than the Maestro. They're both monsters. Perhaps that's why he took her. To prove he was the strongest monster."

"You can hardly compare the two." Wolfkiller objected. "She's done a few bad things, stole from me once, but she's not pure evil, like him."

"No, she's not. The Maestro is pure, simple evil. Now Aster, she's more complex. Both good and evil. But not like the rest of us. Not muddied waters. More like" Llewellyn thought for a minute. "Like one of those mazes they sometimes print in the newspaper. Distinct black and white lines, in a complex pattern." Actually, Aster was more like the Mandelbrot set, but Wolfkiller wouldn't understand the mathematical reference.

Wolfkiller took another drink. "I hate those bloody mazes. I never could solve them."

"Just try to keep her alive." Llewellyn sighed. "If we're very, very lucky, she might someday be part of a maze that even the Maestro can't solve."

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"You… are a monster." General Monroe told Aster. "And a damned lucky one that I need you. Not to mention that I'm physically incapable. Got more cancer than guts in me, these past several months."

He sat down and tapped his fingers. "I think you can do this… but it's going to take work. I'm going to have to find someone to teach you what to do. For some reason you never learned what every other woman on the planet seems to know by instinct. Tell me… will you do it?"

She had already made her bargain for the truck. "I'll do it."

"Good. Come back tomorrow morning. I'll have someone here who can hopefully teach you something. Tomorrow afternoon, I'll have Wolfkiller start teaching you how to drive this truck you want so badly. God only knows why you want to commit suicide in that particular fashion, but I don't really give a good god damn any more, so long as you carry out your part of the bargain. Now get out of here. Go to the kitchen and tell someone to bring me a damn bottle of wine."

Aster left, and General Monroe waited until he was sure she was out of earshot before shouting angrily at Daniel Wolfkiller.

"That's what you and that idiot of a Doctor call pure? That? I admit, she had me fooled before, but I ask her to seduce me, and she does that? When she obviously can barely stand me, and you call her pure? I've met whores purer than that!"

"Oh yes." Wolfkiller said. "Get whatever notions you've picked up from the priests you claim to laugh at out of your head. Because what she just did was pure. It was one of two things I expected of her, based on what Llewllyn told me. And obscene, obviously. But pure. I told you that last week."

"You're crazier than she is!"

"It took me the longest damn time to work it out, even after Llewellyn explained it to me. But let me tell you a story. A long time ago, Aster stole a bottle from a shed, where I used to take whores. I thought at the time, she had a problem with what I was doing. But eventually, that made no sense to me. She didn't have a problem with sex in the zoo animals, hell, she helped her father collect sperm from them. So, why did she have a problem with me?"

He waited a moment, then answered his own question. "It wasn't what I was doing, but how I was doing it. Sneaking around. Paying for it. Contaminating what should have been pure - at least in her mind. Making myself unclean. Not that I would have stopped then, any more than I will now, for that. But if I'd known what the problem was, I would have handled it far better than I did. As it was, I gave her the right advice, in the wrong way. I should have been far more direct and specific in what I said. Even if I had been specific, I don't know. How do you explain to a child like she was that they will be punished for being good?"

"I don't know." General Monroe sat down, and thought. Wolfkiller had told him about what Llewellyn had said, that Aster would have (if she hadn't been ruined inside by the Maestro) make some man very lucky. At least, if the man weren't too stupid to believe it. Because, as he had realized before, most men (including himself) preferred lies to the truth, and starvation to being fed. Which said something interesting about the human race. "I don't know even know if she's the monster, or all the rest of us are."

"There's more of the us, than her." Daniel pointed out.

"Might makes right?" Monroe said. "In a practical sense, it does. But in an ethical sense?"

Wolfkiller said nothing to this. Monroe's head ached and the cancer was making twinges in his guts again. He needed to get some more opium. And he could never let himself smoke as much as he would have liked, to get rid of the pain entirely. He needed to be able to think, to plan. Probably he was addicted to the opium. Definitely he was, but it didn't matter. He didn't have that much time left, anyways. He wished like hell that he had some of the pre-War painkillers he had read about that left one's head clear. But they were just over the rainbow, the only place they still existed was Dystopia, and he could hardly go there and get them.

"Your Doctor Llewellyn was right about one thing." Monroe said, after a long silence. "The priests are pulling a con game. What is religion but a way to trick people into being good, without actually rewarding them? And who benefits from it? Those who aren't good, of course. Like most priests. If I were a priest, I'd pray like hell that it is only a con. That there aren't any actual Gods. Because if I were a God, and someone was using me as part of a con, I'd be pretty damned pissed. And Aster… I'd rather be a priest than her. It must be pure hell, to be her. To be a monster with a conscience."