Interlude 2—The Goldman's
Location: Goldman House, Houston, Texas
Time: December 30, Merge Night
Bill Goldman was watching the news with his wife Sandy. It was a strange night. The networks had interrupted a movie to show what purported to be magic working. Sandy was muttering, "Tomorrow's New Year's Eve, not fucking April Fools. Don't those idiots check their sources at all?"
"They're claiming that it's live coverage, so if it's fake it's a really good fake."
"If it's fake?" She pointed at the screen. "That's a goddamned dragon. Of course it's f—"
In that moment, Bill felt he was two people in two places.
Then David was screaming. Bill was out of bed in a moment, but not before Sandy. They ran down the hall to David's room, but as fast as they moved, by the time they got there David had stopped screaming, he was sitting up in bed eyes wide and panting.
"What happened?" Bill asked, just as their daughter Becky showed up at the door.
"I was falling," David said panting "I died. I remember. I hit the ground. Then nothing."
"Just a nightmare," Becky said, somewhere between disgusted and relieved. Becky was Bill and Sandy's seventeen-year-old daughter.
"No. It was real," David insisted, "I took the broom, but it was damaged. I was at five hundred feet when it died. You remember, Dad."
"You mean from that game we played?"
Bill did remember the game, mostly because it was the only time that David ever played WarSpell. "That was four years ago."
David had insisted on playing a Harry Potter character, in spite of the fact that it was a standard WarSpell campaign taking place in the Kingdom Isles. The game master accommodated him by making him a natural/book wizard from a wizardry school. But that was the sum total of the similarities. The broom was a just-built magical item that hadn't been aged long enough to hold a sweeping spell, much less a flying spell. But David had shoved magic into the thing until he was exhausted, then it had crashed on him.
"I know it was. But it wasn't. It was just now, and it was real," David said, sounding confused. "I remember falling and I remember the rest of it. Not just the game. My whole life."
And, as though that was the trigger, Bill remembered too. Not that game, not the one time David played, but another game, a game that Bill played just last Friday over at Leroy Johnson's house. And, like David, he didn't just remember the game. He remembered the whole life of Sir William Deforest, right up to where they left off the game, just as he was getting ready to board the dirigible with the cabby hot on his heels.
"Lord of hosts, preserve us!" Sandy said and Bill looked at her because that was not something that Sandy would ever say. They attended church, but Sandy was more inclined to say something along the lines of "what the fuck?" or "oh shit!" than "Lord" anything.
"What is it, Sandy?" Bill asked, his surprise at her choice of words driving his memories of Sir William back a step.
"I too remember another life," Sandy said in a voice that was hers and yet not hers. Then she proclaimed, "I am Sandra of Corinth, Sword Virgin and Knight Templar, who has never known a man's touch."
"I can't say I like that," Bill muttered. Then, louder,"For right now, I think the real issue is David."
"Yes, of course," Sandy agreed. "What do you know of his memories?"
"I know the character he was playing died," Bill half whispered.
Sandy—or maybe Sandra of Corinth—sat beside David on the bed and said, "But you're not dead. Even if that other you did pass beyond, you have his memories. You maintain his soul."
✽✽✽
Two hours later, they were all in the dining niche. The TV was on, showing a repeat of a newscaster—from California, of course—merging on live TV.
They had established that each of them had the memories of a character they played. Bill, Sir William Deforest, Sandy, Dame Sandra of Corinth Sword Virgin and Knight Templar, David, David Welsley of the Gryffindors, and finally his daughter Rebecca, Becky the Hand, an eighteen-year-old fourth level thief in a Dickens era Londinium slum.
And only one character apiece. Bill had played dozens of characters, maybe hundreds in the years he'd been playing WarSpell. But the only set of memories he got were those of William Deforest. A thirteenth level amulet wizard with only a couple of zero level spells that didn't need amulets. He did have Sir William's fighting skills, which weren't great but were better than Bill's. He didn't even have the see magic spell. That was cast into his, Sir Williams', goggles.
Bill went into the living room and used his memories to cast dewrinkle. It was so weak that it didn't even clean clothes. It just removed the wrinkles in whatever clothing he was wearing. In this case, pajamas. It took him about fifteen minutes to construct the spell. It would have been quicker to drag out the ironing board. Of course, part of that was the fact that Bill was being exceedingly careful. The experiment worked. He, Bill Goldman, could do magic.
When he returned to the living room, it was to see a jug of milk take itself from the fridge, fill three cups, which then migrated to the microwave and from the microwave to the table where hot chocolate mix added itself to the cup and mixed into the milk without benefit of spoon. The three cups of hot chocolate then delivered themselves to David, Sandy, and Becky.
"Sorry, Dad," David said. "You weren't here, so no hot chocolate for you."
"I was checking to see if I could do magic."
"And I perceive you can," Sandy said. "Though a more slothful spell I cannot imagine. Magic is not to be used as a servant, but only to do God's work.
"Is Sandy still there, or are you entirely possessed by Sandra of Corinth?" Bill asked. He chose the word possessed, with malice aforethought, because he wanted to shock Sandy into thinking, not just reacting with the, apparently, fanatical devotion of Sandra of Corinth. Until now Bill had been the more devout of the two of them, with Sandy going to church more as a social event than a religious duty.
There was a pause. Then Sandy said. "I'm not sure. I just seem to be me. It's more like I am more aware of the way the world works, more certain of right and wrong, than I was, and so am freer to express that certainty."
"Sandy, I can't speak to the game world of Sandra of Corinth, but in this world Jim Jones drank the kool aid too. Certainty isn't proof of rightness."
"You make an interesting point, Bill, but I remember my morning devotions and the Lord of Hosts' hand upon my soul. In this case, certainty flows from proof of rightness. I wonder how my other self is dealing with the memories of married life?"
That got nods around the table, for they all wondered how their game selves were dealing with the memories. All except for David, of course. Bill wondered how Sir William was dealing with them. At least he wouldn't be dealing with a pastor wannabe.
Location: The Airship Angola, over Southern Angland, Approaching the Isle of Éire
Time: August 25, 1878
"You sound like a pastor, Alan." William shook himself. "Never mind. It was a different world and a different time."
"A different time . . . was it the past?"
"No, the future. Well, a future. Not ours. It was the twenty-first century, Alan, but a twenty-first century that didn't have magic. They had dirigibles, but they were monstrous things that didn't use magic at all, but just the difference in the weight of gasses to provide their lift. And they had airplanes . . ."
"What's an airplane?" Alan asked, after waiting for a few moments and seeing William's arrested expression.
"An airplane, my friend, is a heavier-than-air craft that works on principles that ought to apply in our world just as well as they did in that other world, the one that Bill Goldman lived in."
"Is this another one of your projects?" Alan asked, feeling a bit of trepidation. Sir William's magical experimentation was often useful but always, always expensive. In fact, his friend could live quite well on his income from his small estates, if it weren't for his constant experimentation.
"It could be, Alan. It could be. The thing is, Bill Goldman was a history professor, not a scientist. He knew about airplanes and had a basic idea of how they worked, but not the details. If it works, though, it will be faster than an airship, and I think rather less expensive to build."
"Do you hear yourself, my friend? You think less expensive to build than an airship. My family is wealthy, Billy, and they indulge me, but not so much that they will let me spend the cost of an airship on the whim of a mad man."
"I'm not mad, Alan."
"Perhaps not. But you will certainly be seen as mad if you repeat this story of Bill Goldman to the wide world."
After he got William's nod of agreement, Alan looked around the lounge again. No one seemed to be paying them the least attention. There were some Egyptian gentlemen in their white suits and fezs two tables over, but they were speaking Farsi, not one of Alan's languages. "For now, I think any discussion of your friend Mr. Goldman should be tabled. Curious as I am, I think we should wait for more private circumstances to speak of him and any ideas that he may have. For the moment, I think it better that we discuss this cabbie you have attached to us."