Laughing Wolf Read online

  Laughing Wolf

  Laughing Wolf

  Nicholas Maes

  Copyright © Nicholas Maes, 2009

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise (except for brief passages for purposes of review) without the prior permission of Dundurn Press. Permission to photocopy should be requested from Access Copyright.

  Editor: Michael Carroll

  Copy Editor: Shannon Whibbs

  Design: Jennifer Scott

  Printer: Webcom

  Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

  Maes, Nicholas, 1960-

  Laughing wolf / by Nicholas Maes.

  ISBN 978-1-55488-385-1

  I. Title.

  PS8626.A37 L38 2009 jC813’.6 C2009-900505-0

  1 2 3 4 5 13 12 11 10 09

  We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council for our publishing program. We also acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program and The Association for the Export of Canadian Books, and the Government of Ontario through the Ontario Book Publishers Tax Credit program, and the Ontario Media Development Corporation.

  Care has been taken to trace the ownership of copyright material used in this book. The author and the publisher welcome any information enabling them to rectify any references or credits in subsequent editions.

  J. Kirk Howard, President

  Printed and bound in Canada.

  www.dundurn.com

  Dundurn Press

  3 Church Street, Suite 500

  Toronto, Ontario, Canada

  M5E 1M2 Gazelle Book Services Limited

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  To Gershom, Yehuda, and Miriam

  Yeladim ze simcha

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter One

  Marcus Licinius Crassus was standing in the street, surrounded by two hundred slaves who were holding buckets and awaiting his signal. Before him was an insula, a badly built apartment block of brick and timber, overcrowded, unhygienic, and easy to catch fire. That explained why its middle stories were ablaze and threatening to spread the flames everywhere.

  Next to Crassus was the building’s owner. As tenants on the upper floors pleaded to be rescued, and a crowd gathered to watch the drama, and pedestrians cursed because the street was blocked, he turned to Crassus and tugged at the great man’s toga. “I’ll sell it for a million denarii and not a sestertius less.”

  “Ten thousand denarii.”

  “Ten? Are you mad? Five minutes ago you offered me fifty thousand …”

  “And five minutes from now I’ll offer you a mere three thousand.”

  “This is robbery, Marcus Licinius! I’ll not have anyone forcing my hand …!”

  “Then I’ll leave with my slaves and you can watch your building burn.”

  “This is preposterous…!”

  “Eight thousand denarii.”

  “Eight! But you just offered me ten! What effrontery!

  No, wait! Eight it is! Douse the fire and she’s yours for eight ….!”

  At the blast of a whistle Felix started from his reverie. He steadied the book that was slipping off his lap — a leather-bound edition of Plutarch’s Life of Crassus — and sat up in his g-pod. Why had the whistle sounded? And was it his imagination or were they hovering in mid-air? He glanced at an info board and saw that, sure enough, their velocity stood at zero MPH.

  He glanced at his reflection in a Teledata screen. A serious-looking face stared back, its eyes blue-green and brimming with confusion, the nose long and bony (exactly like his father’s), the hair straw-coloured, and the chin sharp and dimpled. With a grunt of impatience he engaged the screen and murmured, “External monitor.”

  Almost instantly he was looking at a view outside the shuttle. Below him was the coast of Greenland — it was covered in piping and switching stations but was otherwise uninhabitable. On impulse he said, “Pan three hundred and sixty degrees,” and the scene changed abruptly, revealing pale blue sky, cumulus clouds and … Wait. Over there, at NNW 315 degrees, a Medevac was flying toward them, its blue flashers signaling a Code A health priority. What …?

  “Honoured passengers,” a voice announced, “InterCity Services regrets to inform you that Shuttle 947, from Rome to Toronto, is experiencing a medical crisis on board. A Medevac will be docking in fifty seconds and will convey the affected passenger to the nearest Health Facility. Service is expected to resume momentarily. All g-force pods have been hermetically sealed and will disengage on the completion of our disinfectant protocols. We apologize for the inconvenience and appreciate your patience.”

  Felix was bewildered. How could a Health Priority develop in mid-flight? Citizens were scanned for health anomalies at home, at every Portal and before any shuttle took flight, to prevent emergencies like this from occurring. Why hadn’t this illness been caught in advance? And what did “disinfectant protocols” mean?

  He felt a vibration. On the screen the Medevac was beside the shuttle and extending an Evac-tube to its roof. A moment later, halfway down the aisle, a circular panel of the roof swivelled open and a Flexbot arm appeared inside the shuttle. Seizing a pod six rows down from Felix, it maneuvered it to the ceiling egress and into the tube that joined the crafts together. Felix spied the patient — an elderly man. His head was slumped and he was encrusted with blisters; they were red and covered every inch of his skin.

  Wishing he could help this man, Felix watched as the panel on the ceiling closed. Seconds later his g-pod trembled as the Medevac drew away from the craft.

  “This system is so old,” a voice spoke over his pod’s speaker. Glancing around, he spotted a teen his age who was seated across the aisle from him. He was tall, big-boned, and confident-looking. His features, too, were unnervingly calm, a result of the ERR (Emotion Range Reduction) he’d undergone. And his dark eyes were sparkling from his retinal upgrades.

  “My name is Stephen Gowan,” he said, “Does it mean something to you?”

  “No.”

  “Then you obviously aren’t a programmer. I placed first in the North American Advanced Algorithmic series and work now as a consultant in Rome. In any event, the software on this shuttle is M4. You know what that means?”

  “No.”

  “It was installed in 2210 and hasn’t been upgraded. Three whole years without a partial upgrade! That explains why the sensors didn’t catch that man’s illness — although it’s odd his home monitor didn’t detect it either.”

  Felix was going to ask if he’d seen the man’s blisters, but with a resonant hum the shuttle accelerated westward. Greenland was fading on the Teledata screen and the Medevac itself was just a blip in the distance. But … how strange. A blue haze was streaming from its rear exhaust, a sign that it had switched to its fusion thrusters. That happened when a craft was leavin
g the earth’s atmosphere and why would the Medevac travel off-planet instead of delivering the patient to Stockholm or Oslo? Before Felix could work this puzzle out, Stephen Gowan spoke again.

  “What’s that?” he asked, pointing to Felix’s lap.

  “This?” Felix asked, holding up the Life of Crassus, “It’s a book.”

  “A real book? Like the ones you see in museums?”

  “Yes.”

  “Hold it up so I can look at it more closely.”

  “It was printed four hundred years ago,” Felix explained, pressing the book against the pod’s membrane.

  “What’s that funny writing?” Stephen asked, wrinkling his nose in curiosity.

  “On the right you have classical Greek; on the left is a version in Latin.”

  “What are Greek and Latin?”

  “They’re languages that were spoken in ancient times.”

  “You mean, before everyone learned Common Speak?”

  “Before that, even. Plutarch wrote this work two thousand years ago.”

  With a look of disbelief Stephen asked how he had come across the book. Felix explained that his father ran the world’s last Book Repository and had filled their home with stacks of tomes. His father was also trained in Greek and Latin — there were only two such experts alive in the world — and had been teaching them to Felix for the last eleven years, from the day he’d turned four and been old enough to read. He’d also been studying these civilizations, hence his frequent trips to Rome.

  “Why not use a Portadoc? It’s easier to carry and holds every text that’s been written, including Blutarch’s books.”

  “Plutarch. My father won’t allow me. He says a book enhances the pleasure of reading because the contents seem unique and important, whereas a Portadoc jumbles everything together.”

  “Your dad sounds old-fashioned.”

  “That’s for sure. If he could, he’d stop all weather regulation, protein synthesis, retinal upgrades, synapse modification, ERR, genetic transference …”

  “Has he ever had a real job?” Stephen smirked.

  “Ten years ago he uncovered a temple in France. It was hidden from sight for two thousand years until he discovered its existence through an old Roman text.”

  “What’s a temple?”

  “It’s a building where people gathered and gave thanks to … they communicated with something they called gods.”

  “The way we admire Reason on World Union day?”

  “Yes. Something like that.”

  “That sounds exciting,” he said, implying the exact opposite with his tone, “but I think we’ve arrived.” As if to confirm his observation, a voice announced the shuttle had docked in Toronto’s Central Depot and passengers should disembark at their leisure. There was no further mention of “disinfectant protocols.”

  “Nice to meet you,” Felix called to Stephen who, now that the seals on his pod had opened, was standing in the aisle and hurrying away, as if anxious to escape this talk of books and ancient temples. When he failed to answer, Felix shrugged and packed away his book.

  It was the same old story. As soon as people learned about his interest in the past, they assumed he was crazy and refused to talk to him further. His father suffered from the exact same problem — apart from his wife, he didn’t have any friends — and was always warning Felix that their studies of the past would lead to ridicule and isolation.

  By now the shuttle was empty. With a sigh, Felix climbed to his feet, headed to an exit, and made his way into the station. As always, it was crowded with people from all over the globe, Buenos Aires, Nairobi, Jerusalem, Mecca. Moving toward a Dispersion Portal, he admired the totalium vault overhead, then let his glance drift to the lower western wall, part of which was built on the building’s earliest foundations that could be dated to a time when people travelled by train. His father, too, had once mentioned a door that led to something called the subway system, a network of tunnels served by underground transport. Felix had always wanted to explore this system, but the law clearly stated that this subterranean area was strictly off limits.

  He joined a lineup at the Dispersion Portal. As passengers were catabolized in the doorframe’s wave of current, he thought about the Life of Crassus and how he had to finish it before his father arrived home …

  Wait. What was that? A short distance off, a woman had stumbled — one moment she’d been walking; the next she had collapsed to the floor. Had she slipped …? No, she was lying in a motionless heap. As the crowd paused and wondered what to make of this scene — their ERR prevented them from reacting promptly — Felix started forward to offer his assistance. He’d taken just a couple of steps when two Service Units pulled up and stopped him in his tracks. Signaling that this was another Health Priority, they ordered people to keep away from the woman. What …?

  The crowd was backing off. The two units had formed a stretcher between them and lifted the woman onto its surface. As they floated soundlessly toward an exit, Felix glimpsed the woman’s hands: the fingertips were crimson.

  The room returned to normal. With the Service Units gone, the travellers hastened to their docking ports. For his part, Felix retreated to the Portal and, moments later, was poised at the head of the line.

  “Destination, please?” a voice asked politely, as the Portal’s turquoise current swirled, like water on the verge of freezing over.

  “Area 2, Sector 4, Building 9,” Felix answered.

  “Processing,” the voice announced. Then a moment later, “Please advance.”

  Felix stepped into the field. In the instant it took his atoms to be scrambled, dispatched across the city and reconfigured in the Portal outside his home, he just had time to register the thought that something was askew in their carefully ordered world.

  Chapter Two

  Crassus was standing in front of his tent. He was dressed in a sculpted breastplate of silver, a helmet with a horse’s crest and a blood-red cloak whose folds reached his calves. His face was stern as he eyed his legate Mummius. Ten metres away, five hundred soldiers were waiting at attention; despite their ramrod posture, they were ill at ease.

  “Spartacus worsted you and your legions?”

  “Yes, sir. He attacked us from two sides at once.”

  “And you lost three thousand men?”

  “That’s correct, imperator.”

  “And these cowards dropped their arms as they fled from the slaves?”

  “Yes, sir. But with all due respect, Spartacus has beaten two other armies —”

  “Silence! Our discipline is slipping and must be restored!”

  Eyeing his troops, Crassus told them to muster into fifty groups of ten. With typical Roman efficiency, they organized themselves within a matter of seconds. Strolling past these ranks, Crassus selected a single man from every decade, until fifty troops stood apart from the others.

  “Sir!” Mummius pleaded. “Not a decimation! It wasn’t our fault …!”

  “Quiet!” Crassus thundered. “Romans die before they flee! And if ordered to retreat, they never drop their arms! To instill these truths, these men must die. Maybe then the others will remember their training. Swords drawn!”

  Instantly, the troops who hadn’t been chosen unsheathed their swords. Their fifty friends stood motionless, intent on meeting death like Romans.

  At a nod from Crassus the killing began….

  “Excuse me, Felix. Might I make a suggestion?”

  At the sound of Mentor’s voice, Felix looked up from the Life of Crassus. As soon as he’d arrived home, he’d greeted Mentor, “purified” himself in an ultraviolet scan and settled at a table to finish studying for his lesson. He still had thirteen chapters to go.

  “Of course you can, Mentor.”

  “According to my sensors, you are low on protein.”

  “I am a little hungry. I wouldn’t mind a fruit shake, please.”

  “My thoughts exactly. Processing time, forty-five seconds.”


  Felix smiled as Mentor’s circuitry hummed. The sound brought back a host of happy memories. Mentor was a 3L Domestic System and had been installed in the house when Felix had been born. His father hadn’t wanted a machine to tend his son, but had soon agreed that Mentor was a marvel, feeding Felix, guarding him, and teaching him to speak. Over the years new versions had appeared on the market, ones with many more features than Mentor, but Felix had refused to replace his friend. “Mentor’s part of the family,” he’d insisted, and his parents had agreed to hang onto this system.

  “Here is your shake,” Mentor spoke, producing the drink from a nearby dispenser. Seating himself in the kitchen, Felix sipped his drink.

  “Thank you, Mentor. It’s delicious as always.”

  “Did you have an interesting day?”

  “I studied several temples in the Roman Forum.”

  “After you have read with your father, we must go over some physics.”

  “Fine, Mentor, fine. By the way, a man fell ill on the shuttle home and was picked up by a Medevac. And a woman collapsed in the Toronto depot.”

  “That is unusual. I hope these events did not prove too upsetting.”

  “No, well, I don’t know. I hope those people are okay.”

  That said, Felix finished his shake and placed the glass in Mentor’s hygiene recess. As he climbed to his feet, Mentor sterilized the cup and cleaned the counter with an ultraviolet “burst.”

  “Have you viewed your mother’s message?” the computer asked.

  “Not yet. I was intending to watch it when my father comes home.”

  “My records reveal your father viewed it at work.”

  “Oh. In that case, I’ll look at it now.”

  Felix entered the living room and approached a flashing Holo-port. Moments later, light cascaded from sixteen lasers and assumed the shape of his mother’s lean features. Her face displayed its usual animation and Felix grinned as the hologram began to speak. As always happened when he viewed such recordings, he shivered at the thought that she was standing on Jupiter’s moon, Ganymede.