CHAPTER TWO
Maung avoided staring at the Old Man’s wrinkled skin, which formed a labyrinth so complex it reminded him of a human brain, but he also couldn’t bring himself to look at the man’s eyes, which were almost like the Sommen’s—deep and black. He wheezed whenever he inhaled. The man wore an oxygen amplifier on his belt so that a plastic hose ran under his shirt, where it entered a port in his chest, pumping nearly pure oxygen to the lungs. Maung imagined the cost. Even the general, who had smuggled a small fortune in gold from Myanmar, couldn’t afford such a procedure for his mother, who the entire neighborhood mourned; her death had involved months of suffocation.
“You look troubled, Maung,” the Old Man said.
“I am, Grandfather. Deeply troubled. I may lose everything, including my mother and my son.”
This was not Maung’s grandfather and to use the honorific made him a liar. They were in the old slave market. It was an ancient structure that until now Maung had only read about, and he imagined how difficult it would have been for the men to stand in these stalls for hours, waiting while the air refused to move for anything, least of all the heat. Even now, Maung wished he had thanaka.
“There is nothing that cannot be solved,” the Old Man said. “I’ve lived in this country since I was a boy—far longer than you. I was glad when they decided to bring all of you in. Glad that so many of my countrymen were joining me. And in all these years as an American, I’ve learned one thing that you may not have picked up yet.”
“What, Grandfather?”
The Old Man smiled. “Money. It makes everything go away. I imagine even the Sommen had a price, but for the life of me I never found it.”
“Wait,” said Maung, curious. “You knew the Sommen? Met with them?”
“I never met with them, exactly. I met with their go-betweens. One of the things we first learned was that the Sommen value only one thing: war. So they didn’t bother with money or business or supplies. They have subjugated races who handle these things, creatures collected off thousands of conquered planets. There was a rumor that one man from Russia or Ukraine went to serve the Sommen and was the only one to ever return. But my men never confirmed it.”
“And what did the go-between tell you?” asked Maung.
“Nothing about his masters. I asked if they had a cure for lung cancer but it was a stupid question; what would the Sommen care of human disease after all? I was foolish.”
Maung recalled the thing he killed at the spaceport and shivered. “I think I ran into one at the spaceport the other day. I was there when something happened at the Sommen complex, the one they dismantled.”
“Ah?” The Old Man’s eyes flickered with interest. “And you’re alive! That is a story to tell.”
“What do they look like? The Sommen. Some say that is what I saw but nobody knows for sure.”
The Old Man sat up. He reached for a cup of iced tea and sipped, then placed it carefully on the table again before wiping his forehead with his handkerchief. “Is that why you’re here?” he asked. “Because I can answer your Sommen question, but this is valuable information and perhaps I even have pictures; but it will cost you.”
“No,” said Maung. “I came for something else.”
“Yes. Of course you did. So let’s get down to business and why don’t you tell me what you really need, Maung.”
The man used a remote. Servos drew an electrified curtain across his stall and then a soft static sound filled the space.
“White noise and electromagnetics to make sure we can talk safely,” the Old Man explained. “Old, but still effective.”
Maung squatted on the floor. By the time he finished telling his story—a web of lies, one that avoided the fact that he was a Dream Warrior—his knees ached and his body craved a cigarette.
“So you need to disappear,” the Old Man said, “but you can’t really tell me why. And you have no money?”
Maung nodded. “I know. And I need to support my mother and son. It is impossible.”
“Difficult, yes, impossible, no. If you were a young girl I would give you a new identity and you could work it off in one of my brothels—maybe five years of service. But you aren’t.” The Old Man paused and tapped a finger against his chin. “Still, I have an idea but it will take time to research. Can you go home or is that now a dangerous place?”
“It is too dangerous, Grandfather.”
The Old Man nodded and picked up a notepad and pen. He scribbled something down, ripped a sheet off, and handed it over. “That is the address of a hotel outside the city. Take a bus. Wait outside and one of my boys will come get you in a few minutes to drive you there.”
Maung stood and clapped his hands together, pressing them tightly as he bowed, over and over. “Thank you, Grandfather, thank you.”
“Don’t thank. What I have planned will not be easy and you may never make it through, but for someone in your position it’s the only option. And I don’t do this out of charity. You will be performing a valuable service. For me.”
The hotel was attached to a strip club. Maung could barely take three steps in his room and the bed folded down from the wall, which thumped and vibrated from the music on the other side, and there was a small shower and toilet cubicle. Maung headed to a tiny window. The room was air-conditioned so he hated to open it, but he had to smoke and the driver’s instructions were clear: stay inside or the deal was off. So he let the humidity in, feeling it wash over his arms and chest as he blew smoke rings.
By the third day claustrophobia almost forced Maung’s mind to the breaking point, where he considered giving up on the Old Man. The room smelled dank—a mixture of sweat and cigarettes—and Maung kept the window open all the time now, so he could sit by it and breathe fresh air to imagine that hot breezes carried thoughts to his son. A girl opened his door. Maung barely noticed when she placed a tray of food on the floor and then shut the door behind her. The smell of curry filled the room and Maung’s eyes watered with the memory it brought: his mother cooking dinner, his son banging a fork on the table.
On the fourth day the driver returned and took him to the Old Man’s home; Maung had never seen such a place, and he thought that not even the general’s house in Yangon was as beautiful. Four stories of historical mansion in downtown Charleston met him when the driver let him out, and a battery of servants ushered Maung through the door and onto the piazza, a huge columned porch that led to mahogany double doors. They strolled through a living room paneled with deep purple wood, and finally into the Old Man’s study. The servants were all women. Young girls with thanaka patterned on their faces took him gently by the arm and brought him iced tea. Maung marveled at their beauty and the smell once again made him think of home. He sat in a huge leather chair; it was not long before a girl wheeled the Old Man in, then shut the door to give them privacy.
“How do you like it?” the Old Man asked, gesturing to the rest of the room.
“It is a beautiful home, Grandfather.”
The man nodded. “America. This is where it’s all possible, Maung. Anything.”
Maung listened to the ticktock of the massive grandfather clock that sat in the corner and he was so exhausted from not getting sleep that the sound almost made him pass out. Finally he shrugged.
“What is the news, Grandfather? Do I have a way out?”
“Yes,” the Old Man said. “I found a way out. But that way is for a normal human, and you aren’t exactly normal are you? That doesn’t mean it’s impossible, only that the price goes up since now we’re talking about hiding a super-aware. You’re a Dream Warrior. Funny how you failed to mention that.”
Maung stared at the man. He wasn’t surprised, not anymore, because the arrival of the government men already prepared him for eventually being discovered and the only surprise came from the fact that it was this man who found him and not the Americans.
Maung shrugged. “Yes. I couldn’t tell you, Grandfather.”
“Did you think I wouldn’t figure it out? A Sommen appears out of nowhere and American soldiers believe they’ve killed it with autocannons but upon closer inspection nobody can figure out how it died; there is no damage to the thing’s armor. None. But you were there and government sensors detected a super-aware. Then the feds sweep in from DC with all their surveillance gear and you come to me with a crazy story about how you can’t go home—that you need to hide.” He paused and smiled. “It wasn’t hard, Maung. Now your name is all over the net, all over the news, your biometrics fed into every police system out there. Because when they came to speak with you at home, you’d already disappeared.”
“So it was a Sommen? That day at the complex?”
The Old Man smiled. “Of course it was. And it’s important that you appreciate something, Maung: I can still get you out. It’s all been arranged but you must understand that if you take this gift from me, I own you. If you ever act out of line, I can just turn you over to them and sell the information I have for the reward. Or I can go after your family. You will be my tool in an operation that could kill you, until I decide you’ve paid your debt.”
Maung nodded but his mind worked overtime, processing everything the man said before he understood. “These girls. Your servants. You own them too.”
“The ones I like best serve here, the rest I send to the brothels. They are sold to me, usually by their parents or grandparents who need money for all sorts of things, Maung. Things that only I can give them. The more appreciative the girls are, Maung, the shorter their service.”
The Old Man handed Maung a stack of papers. He took it but felt as though he should be taking a shower instead, and Maung imagined there were germs in the air, scum particles that detached from the man and floated alongside the dust to infect anyone who got too close.
“You will learn to be appreciative, too, Maung. These papers are your new life. It turns out that the only biometrics they have on you are the basics—height, weight, eye color—nothing that really matters. They haven’t had time to go through all the refugees yet and do retinal scans, fingerprints, and the rest. So getting you into the system will be easy.” He handed Maung a card. “That will be your new identity card. The papers provide the back story so read it all—memorize the details. Then destroy them; we did this on paper so there will be no digital trail whatsoever of the changes we’ll make.”
“How?” Maung asked. “You can’t just create a new person.”
“No. But someone couldn’t pay his debts and when that happens there’s no reason to let them keep breathing, and why shouldn’t you take his place? He had no family.” The Old Man handed him one more sheet. “You have one hour to memorize your identity and then report to this address near the warehouses; tell them I sent you. The rest is up to you, Maung. Once you arrive at your new destination, your new life, I will contact you with additional instructions. Things are happening all around us, things you know nothing about but that I’m sure you feel. Why bring all of Southeast Asia into America? Why, after all these years, does a single Sommen rise from the depths and attack? Why did the someone kill all the Dream Warriors but let one get away?”
Maung’s mind wandered and drowned among all the questions and the best he mustered was a shrug; it was too much. All he remembered was saying “thank you” after the Old Man agreed to give his mother a weekly allowance, and an overwhelming urge to run flooded over him. It vaulted Maung back into the humidity before the Old Man’s cold and dry breath made him vomit. In war, Maung had killed. But it had been a long time since he met real evil and if the Old Man was American, no longer a Myanmarese, then this was another reason Maung would never trust this country, another motive to day dream of the jungle near Yangon where human parasites got slaughtered.
All afternoon he studied. The wind blew off the water and onto Charleston’s Battery, and pink and brown Americans surrounded him as they walked their children and dogs. Maung ignored them. He read the information he’d been ordered to memorize and immediately smiled at the Resident Identity Card’s name: Maung Mi Tun—from Mandalay, the city where Maung first trained at the Chinese-built Academy. He didn’t even have to change the most important part of his name because he’d already lived the geography. If Maung never said anything good about the Old Man he could say this: He picked the right identity, which couldn’t have been more perfect. Maung said a prayer for the real Maung Mi Tun, and begged for forgiveness, asking the man’s ancestors to allow him peace for the sake of his mother and son.
The address on the last sheet of paper from the Old Man was in Summerville, a surgeon’s office in a white neighborhood. Maung opened his wallet. He figured he had enough paper money to pay for a few fares, and on his way to the bus stop he dropped his bank card in a mailbox. He said another prayer—that whatever money was left found its way to his mother. Maung pocketed his cash and new ID card, and threw everything else into the bay. He hoped, once he got there, he could make it from the bus stop to the doctor without anyone asking why a refugee had wandered into all-American territory.
“I’m Doctor Lawrence,” a man in a white lab coat said, “and I’m told you need me to input some biometrics and then prepare your employment physical.”
Maung sat on the table and shrugged. “I don’t know. They just told me to come here.”
“That sounds about right.” The doctor reached for a green flexi-pad, snapping it open so that glowing lines appeared. He tapped at them, moving them in a pattern that meant nothing to Maung. The doctor noticed something and stopped.
“This is odd; the Old Man stopped sending people there two years ago but you’re the second person he’s sent to me today.”
Maung sat up straight. “What? Where am I being sent?”
“It says you’ve been assigned to Karin 2. A prison. As a guard.”
Maung smiled at the name. Karen. It had to be a sign, he thought, and he thanked the memory of his great grandmother, a Karen herself, her family part of a movement that once sought to overthrow the government of Myanmar.
“Karen with an e?” Maung asked.
The doctor shook his head. “With an i.”
“It’s still a good name,” Maung said. “Where is it? In Charleston?”
He laughed and then shook his head again. “Are you serious?” When Maung folded his arms, silent, the doctor’s grin disappeared. “Karin is a maximum security prison in the Kuiper belt, on an S-type asteroid with the same name of one that used to exist near Mars; Karin 2 was the former site of an American base for interplanetary operations. Our forces retreated there when the Sommen came. One of the major corporations bought it a while back and converted it into a penitentiary.”
Maung forgot how to breathe. The realization that by going to space he wouldn’t be able to get back to his son made him hyperventilate, and he clawed at the doctor’s jacket, pulling him in closer so he could get a better look at the flexi-pad.
“Are you sure?” he asked. “I’ve never been off-planet. How can they spend me to space?”
The doctor pried himself loose. “I’m sure it will be fine, Maung. Look, there’s only a narrow window for this particular job because they need you on the next transport out; we have to get going. I have to input all your biometrics including retinal and DNA data and then give you a physical but the Old Man specifically forbade me from actually conducting a physical on you so basically I’ll be making up most of my data. This is going to take about forty-five minutes, only after which will you be a fully integrated identity. Do you want the job or not? I cancelled appointments for three paying Americans just so you could be taken care of, so make a decision.”
Maung clenched the table to keep his hands from trembling. He couldn’t speak. He’d never considered going to space and had no idea what would happen to his family while he was gone, how they would be taken care of or if the Old Man would even keep his promise. But there were no other options. He nodded, and prayed that this was the right path and that he had the strength to fulfill his part of the bargain.
“Why?” he asked. “Why does the Old Man want me on Karin, so far away?”
“I have no idea. He doesn’t give me any details other than what he wants done, Maung. You know as much as I do. And there will be no training for the Karin job; you show up as is. Have you had any military experience?”
“Yes. I was in the Tatmawdaw—the Myanmar Army—and fought in the last war, against the Americans.”
“I figured,” the doctor said. “Combat experience should help because from what I hear, it’s a violent place.”
By the time Doctor Lawrence finished, it was after five and Maung got on a bus heading back into the city. His mind raced. The day had turned into a mix of horror and uncertainty that he wanted to forget and tears welled in his eyes, then slid down his cheeks as he looked out the window. It was impossible to know when he’d see his son again, and now it would be almost impossible to send money. And the thought of going up the spaceport elevator terrified him. For a moment he raged against his ancestors: How could you let this happen to your family?
His bus ride passed in a blur. Eventually Maung arrived at the address the doctor gave him, at a partially demolished warehouse on the river just as vapor lights flickered on, after which someone told him to stay out of the way until they were ready. Maung held his nose; the warehouse must have been used to store fish and it smelled like all of them were still there, rotting. He watched while a group of men struggled with fiberboard crates; they wrestled them off a forklift and into the back of an enclosed semitrailer, and once they finished with these they lifted what—to Maung—looked like a huge birdcage. A fine silver mesh covered its sides. In the dying sun the stuff shimmered and Maung stared at it, thinking it was beautiful, when another man waved him over and then helped Maung into the back of the trailer.
“Where do I go?” Maung asked.
The man pointed. “Into the cage.”
“Why can’t I just sit on a crate?”
“Look.” The man climbed into the trailer and opened a flap on one side of the wire mesh, leaving just enough room for Maung to sneak through and inside. “I’m just doing my job. For some reason, our boss wants you inside this; it’s a Faraday cage and will block any incoming or outgoing electromagnetic emissions. You’re to stay there until arrival at Orbital Station One, Cargo Section Seven-Seven-B, at which point someone will come get you.”
This bothered Maung, who until then had been dreading the ride upward on the elevator. He stepped into the cage and sat on a foam cushion. “You mean I won’t get to look out a window on the way up? I won’t see anything?”
“I make a good salary,” the man said. “I mean I work here, loading and unloading and I’m not in a union, because here I make more than those boys do. You know why?”
Maung shook his head. The man’s accent was southern and thick, and he had to concentrate to understand it.
“Because I don’t ask questions. For some reason, they want you on the space station, in a Faraday cage, with the rest of the cargo. To me this says, ‘You really don’t want to know anything about this one because someone is going to an awful lot of trouble to sneak this scumbag refugee off planet.’”
The man jumped off the trailer before Maung could ask anything else, and then they loaded the rest of their crates, sandwiching his cage between walls of fiberboard boxes. Soon it was pitch black. Maung considered lighting a cigarette but then realized he’d already smoked them all and it hit him: He might not ever smoke again. If it was forbidden on the space station and in flight, things were about to get truly horrific.
Maung woke up. It was still pitch black and he heard a distant banging. Then things went silent again, leaving him to his thoughts and the darkness, which played tricks on him. He imagined shapes, black figures slightly darker than the darkness itself and Maung reached out to confirm they existed only in his imagination before he began praying, asking for help with the journey.
The cushion beneath him vibrated. Soon after there was a loud clanking and he heard the sounds of rockets, this time from the perspective of a passenger—not a laborer looking up from the street—and the feeling of acceleration made him smile as he got heavier and heavier, until finally the rockets cut off. Maung had seen this from the outside, hundreds of times; rockets helped the elevator start its journey upward. Now it climbed on fusion-powered servos, massive engines that turned a series of cogs, which in turn pivoted the gripper wheels and made the elevator rise. Maung yawned. For once he felt safe and the letdown made him tired, a kind of sleepiness that he hadn’t experienced since the war and as he drifted off everything seemed a bit lighter.