Conversation · Joyce Messier

"No -- almost certainly. The Commune would have forced you. Such was the fate of the undecided."

"Happily."

The wind stops, there is silence on the dark water of the Martinaise inlet...

A dog barks, a gunshot echoes off the walls of some distant building.

"Good. Not that it would have mattered -- in the end, the Commune forced everyone to the barricades."

"No way. I wouldn't have fought with the communards."

The wind stops, there is silence on the dark water of the Martinaise inlet...

A dog barks, a gunshot echoes off the walls of some distant building.

"Then you would have died fighting against them. Long before the Beachhead... our time is a shadow cast by that day."

"I would have made off with the mineral rights."

"You and everyone else. But that's got nothing to do with preventing the Revolution. Ah, well... What was was, I guess."

Your jaw clenches -- give the lady a taste of your wisdom.

"That's enough about the times."

"They are what they are -- who knows, an afterbloom may yet come..."

"Anyway, enough sentimentality. Is there anything else you want to know?"

Now's your chance -- ask her who she is -- she won't get out this time.

"Or -- you could not eat all the candy at once, let the ma'am rest for a while, and return to this later?"

"No. More. NOW."

"Voracious," she nods approvingly. "I'm up for it. What'll it be?"

"Later, yes. Let my mind cool a bit."

"Too much reality at once can prove too much," she nods. "There's plenty of time later. For now, is there anything else I can help you with?"

Not so fast -- who is she in all this? Ask her who she is, she owes you an answer.

"Who got shot in the head?"

"Those would be the communists. Generally speaking, 40 million people got shot in the head during the World Revolution. But the communists -- they all got shot in the head."

She's not gloating. It's a relieved celebration.

"Oh, and the anarchists too! They shot them well. So well one forgets they even existed."

She likes the totality of it.

"Did the communists and the anarchists shoot back?"

"Did they ever. Before they got shot themselves, they shot two million people."

"Truly a kerfuffle."

"It was a kerfuffle all right," the lieutenant mumbles from behind his notes.

"Yes. The Insulindian Deluge they call it."

"Anyone else get shot in the head -- on the opposing side?"

"Oh, lots of people. Even the king got shot in the head, or thrown beneath a horse. Or drowned. Accounts differ. It was unceremonious." She shakes her head. "Just as well -- he wasn't actually the king. Just the king's nephew."

"The real king abdicated and lived out a long and productive life as a venture capitalist in Graad."

"Smart king."

"Yes, King Guillaume had a nose for bad PR. He ran before it -- what is the expression -- went down? Anyway, Gil got out alive and his nephew Frissel got shot in his place..."

"Him and tens of thousands of his wonderfully fascist kingsmen. It was a wild time."

"Cowardly king."

"I prefer the term risk averse. King Guillaume was nobody's fool -- he could smell a PR disaster brewing. So he got out alive and his nephew Frissel got shot in his place..."

"I don't care about kings. Tell me one more thing..."

"About head-shooting?" She smiles.

"I loved that king. Fucking communists..."

"Which one? Actually -- it doesn't matter. King Guillaume has always been my favourite. He could smell a PR disaster brewing. So he got out alive and his nephew Frissel got shot in his place..."

"I had a deluge too. In my head." (Point to your little head.)

"Yes, an acute thiamine deficiency can be exacerbated by alcoholism." She blinks her green eyes. "Exacerbated means 'made worse.'"

"I see, yes. A deluge of geopolitical questions."

"Sounds like they should have shot more people in the head then."

"This does not represent the official RCM opinion," the lieutenant says from behind his notes.

"Don't worry, Kras Mazov shot fifteen million people in the head. But that was all the way over in Graad."

"That's a tragedy."

"Yes -- the red deluge. The Insulindian Deluge they call it."

"You could say they got totally shot in the head."

"Indeed. They piled them in mass graves in Ozonne and, well -- that's the last anyone heard of those people."