Children of the Knight, Michael J. Bowler [classic book list txt] 📗
- Author: Michael J. Bowler
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What manner of sorcery is this? he thought. Merlin, my old friend, if thou could only see the marvels of this world! Thine own wizardry should seem quaint by comparison!
Unable to pull his gaze away, he noted that one screen displayed a young couple preparing to have sex, while another showed a violent program with fighting and shooting, the third presented some teens smoking pot, and fourth displayed images of people who did not look quite real holding guns and stealing a motor vehicle.
“What be these images, Lance?”
Lance finished a flip on his board and stepped to the window.
“Oh, just TV,” Lance said matter-of-factly. “And that’s a video game.” He pointed at the images of people who did not quite look real. “It’s mostly for kids, to keep us busy. It’s all cool, I guess. Me, I’d rather skate, you know?”
“These images doth be for your entertainment? For the entertainment of youth?”
Lance shrugged. “Yeah, so?”
“And if you or other children do these things the images be doing, are you punished by thine elders or the authorities?”
Lance’s mouth dropped open in surprise. “Yeah, we are. I never thought about it like that before. They either punish us or put us in jail.”
Arthur noted the thoughtful expression on Lance’s young face as they moved away from the window and continued up the boulevard toward the Chinese Theatre. As they walked, Arthur watched Lance, and knew his First Knight was looking at this world with different eyes than he had but moments before. Perhaps, Arthur thought, he’s seeing what I see – a world of emptiness.
They ended up at Eucalyptus Park in Hawthorne later that night because Lance wanted to show Arthur some of his skating moves. Even though the skate park was closed, Lance knew how to sneak in, as did all the neighborhood kids. It was well after midnight, and the area was deserted. It was a small skate park, no really big or daring ramps, but it was good enough to hone his skills on, and Lance had used it often.
He regaled the delighted Arthur with a series of flips and spins and ollies, ups and downs on the various ramps, high-flying stunts, heel flips, calf wraps, space walks—Lance’s repertoire was endless. He always landed clean, always completed his moves with ease. Arthur clapped with joy.
Finally tired and sweaty, Lance skated over to Arthur and plopped down beside him. “What’d ya think?” he asked, breathless, pushing matted hair off his face.
“I think ye be a marvel, young Lance. In my day we had jousts and swordplay and feats of strength, but nothing to equal the grandeur of thy movements. You soared like a majestic hawk.”
Lance beamed with pride and flushed with embarrassment. “Thanks, Arthur. Nobody believes me, but I’m gonna be in the X Games one day. And I’m gonna win.”
“I’ve no doubt, my boy.”
Lance smiled again, his eyes wide with gratitude.
“Lance, what be ‘The X Games’?”
Lance threw back his head and laughed. He hadn’t laughed in so long it almost hurt his stomach. “I forgot you come from back in the day. Way back! Dude, the X Games is only the biggest skate competition in the world. They got ramps ninety-six feet straight down! And I’m gonna get me a gold medal.”
Arthur reached out and clapped the boy on the shoulder.
Lance leapt to his feet. “What you doing, man?”
Arthur looked at him in bewilderment. “I did merely intend to congratulate you on thine achievements.”
Lance backed away and gripped his board in a defensive posture, as though he might use it as a weapon. His breaths came in short gasps, almost hyperventilating.
“Lance, what doth be troubling thee?”
Lance forced calm into his voice, forced air into his lungs.
Breathe, Lance, breathe… it’s okay… it’s okay….
“Sorry, Arthur,” he weakly muttered, his stomach churning, his nerves fraying. “I just… I just don’t like no one touching me. Okay?”
Arthur nodded, not moving. “Okay.”
Lance looked at Arthur, uncertainty dancing across those poignant green eyes. “Are you mad at me?”
Arthur shook his head. “Of course not. Thou hast been a blessing to me. I be eternally grateful for your help and your presence.”
Lance smiled again, his racing heart drawing down. “I’m sorry. It’s just….”
Arthur held up a hand to silence the boy. “There be no explanation required, my boy.”
Lance blushed, glad of the darkness to obscure it, and glanced down at his prized skating shoes. “Thanks, Arthur.”
He dropped the board to his side as Arthur stood, and they walked quietly for a time further into the park proper. They approached a well-worn swing set and rusted-out jungle gym. Arthur looked sad as he noted graffiti scrawled all over the benches and play area.
Lance halted near the rusty swings. “This be one of my favorite places, Arthur, not just ’cause of the skate park, neither.”
Arthur stopped beside him. “Why is that?”
“You won’t think me no girly-boy if I tell ya, will you?”
“I do not know what a ‘girly-boy’ is.” He smiled to reassure Lance that no derision would be forthcoming.
Lance glanced at the man shyly. “Sometimes, late at night like now, when there ain’t nobody around, I like to do the swings, ya know?”
“Show me.”
Lance glanced furtively around again, then eagerly, almost like a small child, leaped onto the nearest swing. Kicking off with his legs, he soon had the swing soaring like a bird, almost at a ninety-degree angle to the ground, his long hair flying back like a cape. The chains creaked and groaned ever more loudly with pain the higher Lance flew.
Arthur gaped at him in wide-eyed amazement.
“C’mon,” Lance called from way up high. “Try it. It’s awesome!”
Arthur hesitantly stepped to the swing next to Lance’s and sat down gingerly within the soft, curved seat. He attempted to move the swing, but scrunched his face in confusion when nothing much happened.
Lance laughed with delight at Arthur’s puzzlement. “Kick out wit’ your feet, Arthur!” he called. “Push against the ground and kick up when you start moving.”
Arthur followed the boy’s instructions, and the swing began to move haltingly. After a few moments he got the hang of it. Soon, a big smile breached his bearded face as they swung side by side, Arthur soaring nearly as high as his protégé.
Lance chortled, “Great, huh?”
Arthur grinned. “It makes me feel so free.”
Lance laughed. Next to skating, this was his favorite thing to do. “I know!”
Filled with joy, the two friends swung back and forth. Freedom had no time limit. They simply were, together, just being. And that was enough.
Chapter 2:
Children Of God
Within the Hollenbeck station, Ryan and Gibson stood before a large map of Los Angeles. Placed at various points were pushpins of various colors. Both men noted the locations of the pins, attempting to triangulate from where the mysterious tagger might be coming.
“The guy’s gotta live someplace, Gib,” Ryan grumbled, chewing on a pencil, “and it’s likely somewhere centralized. How else could he be hitting these different ’hoods and vanishing without a trace?”
Gibson shook his head, slightly loosening his tie and collar. He always wore a tie to work, ever since his promotion to detective. He believed the look made him more respectable in the eyes of superiors and perps alike. Ryan, on the other hand, preferred the rumpled look: open collar, wrinkled brown or beige jackets, khaki Dockers, ratty sneakers. He’d been with the department so long he didn’t give a rip what anyone thought. Truth be told, that was what Gibson liked most about him.
“If he does, and anyone knows where, they’re not talking,” Gibson remarked. “My gut tells me this guy’s a loner. Got his own private agenda going on out there.”
Ryan turned from the map to face his partner, talking around the pencil between his teeth. “I agree. Which will make him that much more of a bitch to apprehend.” He snapped the pencil in two with his teeth and spat the pieces onto his desk. “Hell, we don’t even have a description! This guy’s a freakin’ shadow man.”
Ryan hated weird cases like this one, and Gibson knew that about his partner. Ryan liked cases nice and clean. Murder for hire. Drive-by. Domestic abuse. Murder-suicide. Standard-issue stuff. But this case, hell, it was going nowhere and the mayor’s office had begun riding them for a quick resolution.
“Any brilliant ideas, Gib?” Ryan asked, grabbing another pencil and absently gnawing on the eraser.
Gibson took the pencil from his partner and tossed it on the desk. “Yeah, Ry, we go home. Look around you, partner. It’s late, and there’s nobody here but us. I gotta call my son, and you’ve gotta get some rest before you eat every pencil we have.” He tried a smile, but fatigue turned it into a grimace.
Ryan sighed, reaching for his rumpled tweed jacket hanging from his chair. “You’re right. Ain’t gonna accomplish anymore tonight. Maybe a new day will give us new ideas, or there’ll be another riot to put down.”
“Let’s hope not. Last two weeks have been quiet. If we’re really lucky, this guy’s left to pick on some other city, like New York.”
Ryan chuckled. “Doubt we’d get that lucky.”
The two men trudged from the station, leaving the night skeleton crew to take care of business.
The following night, Arthur and Lance rode Llamrei many miles through twisting and turning storm drains to the very end of the line in Long Beach. The river itself, when water churned through it, emptied into the Pacific Ocean at the Port of Long Beach, but the storm drain exited on San Francisco Avenue at the Long Beach Tree Department.
As always, the hour was late when they arrived, and stillness reigned. On exiting the storm drain, they found themselves in what looked to be an abandoned parking lot. They had to break the padlock on the storm drain gate, but that was, by this time, a simple task with the crowbar Lance had found in a dumpster. Working their way toward the waterfront with only the clop, clop sound of Llamrei’s hooves as accompaniment, Arthur and Lance glanced around at the water and the ships and the factory smoke stacks spewing pollution and the ghetto surrounding them. The houses and apartment buildings looked battered and dilapidated, with dead or overgrown lawns and trash littering the streets.
“I never been here before,” Lance whispered. “Man, this looks worse than Lennox by a mile.”
Arthur nodded, sadness welling up within him at the poverty. How could there be so much obvious grandeur in this country and yet this pervasive poverty? As High King, his responsibility was to care for his people, to maintain such order that prosperity could be had by all. Did not this government feel a similar responsibility?
From what he understood of the American Constitution, which he’d studied upon awakening from his deep slumber, the government’s primary duty, besides protection of the people, was to provide any and all opportunities for commerce and prosperity. What had happened in the intervening years to change that ever- so-excellent ideal?
Suddenly Lance tapped Arthur on the shoulder and pointed to a vacant lot just up the block. Arthur stopped Llamrei in the shadows so they could watch without being spotted. Up ahead two thuggish-looking teen boys dressed in baggy jeans and brown hoodies harassed a very small boy, who appeared to be about five or six years old.
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