Day 6

‘You must’ve known. All this time, you must’ve known.’

The dark grey heavens of the sixth day had opened, the rain pummeling the windows of Sham’s grimy apartment. He was alone but for Recollection, having chosen again to give Riot some space. Or, at least, that was the reason he was telling himself—deep down he knew he feared the truth that was awaiting him. And the gods knew he had quite enough new truths to face.

‘Why?’ Recollection retorted. ‘Just why should I have known?’

‘Cos it’s in there with you! Or are you gonna start saying there’s more space in there than you thought?’

Sham pulled himself from the mattress, feeling his skin, so slick with sweat, stick against the bedsheets. This wasn’t the normal sweat of toxins being released from his body; that only happened on the first few days of the Loop. This was something else. This was fear.

‘Look, I’m operating with all the same information as you are, here.’

‘So you’re not keeping anything from me?’

‘No.’

‘And would you tell me if you were?’ Sham asked.

There was the briefest of pauses. ‘Only if it was for your own good. But that’s not what’s happening here. This… this Fringe business is news to me too.’

Sham eyed up the bottle of whisky, thanking the gods in this moment that it was shattered upon the floor, otherwise even his Common-grade Hardened Liver skill might not have been enough to stop him relenting to his addiction.

‘So we’re acknowledging it as an addiction now, are we?’

‘Don’t change the subject. Tell me. Now. What do you know?’

‘Nothing. I know nothing, like I told you.’

‘You—’

‘But I could make some… educated guesses.’

Sham wasn’t quite sure he liked Recollection’s tone, but he bit his tongue. Maybe it was worth hearing what the living skill had to say, as long as he was able to keep his own mind on the matters.

‘You’ve got to understand what I am. I’m living memory. It’s all I’ve ever known myself to be, and all I remember. So if the Fringe had a hold of me, or of you… If there were… gaps… I’m not sure I’d know how to recognise them.’

Sham contented himself to begin making a cup of tea, in place of the whisky that he really wanted. ‘So there are gaps?’

‘Did I say that? No. Listen. There might be gaps. I can’t say for sure. But it would make a certain sort of sense, wouldn’t it?’

‘There ain’t much about any of this that makes sense if you ask me.’

‘Well, exactly,’ Recollection responded. ‘These past few Loops, back since the revolution began, they’ve been rather messy, haven’t they? Haven’t you noticed? We’re not exactly—’

‘Yes,’ Sham said, ‘I know. Messy. Hard to keep track of everything. Hard to prioritise the stuff that needs prioritising. I’ve been… we’ve been a bit all over the place. But what could the Fringe gain from that?’

The kettle boiling, Sham poured the hot water over the dark brown leaves. Steam billowed into the air under his nose, carrying the malty notes of the tea with it.

‘I suppose we know it wants the Loop preserved. Perhaps sowing chaos in this way is its manner of doing so.’

‘If that was its goal, it could do better. I’m still here. I’m still functional. And we’re well on our way to taking down the Legion. Surely the Fringe knows that the Loop’s days are numbered. Surely it could do better than this.’

‘Maybe it’s not powerful enough to do better. Look at you. You’re a mess—’

‘Thanks.’

‘—but you’re nothing compared to Julya Emerson. Maybe it hasn’t a full hold on you yet. Or perhaps there is less in you than there is in her. Whatever the reason, this seems to be all it’s capable of: using its position in our mind to distract us from our quest. All since the revolution was born.’

‘No,’ Sham said as he took his first sip of tea. ‘It wasn’t since the revolution was born. It was longer than that. It was since Julya laid her hands on me.’

As Sham gulped down the hot tea, not caring for a moment that it was just an ounce too hot to be comfortable, the man and the living skill considered their situation.

‘Forget the Legion,’ Sham finally said. ‘Mona’s smart. Between her and Tripe, they’ll sort it out, and I can just lend a hand when they need me. I’ve—’

‘Got bigger fish to fry?’ Recollection guessed.

‘Well… yes. But only the gods know where I’m gonna start.’

The living skill snickered. ‘Then call me a god.’

‘What do you—’

MEMORY UNLOCKED (RECOLLECTION)

You don’t know then what you know now; that there are dozens—perhaps hundreds—of Loops ahead of you. The leader of the greencloths stands ahead of you, amongst her flock fresh from the evening service. ‘No,’ she says, ‘Not perfect memory.’ You question this—it bloody well is perfect. Can’t get the damn things out of your head. But to this, she smiles. ‘Have you looked at a map lately?’ she asks.

Sham nodded, placing the dirty cup back down atop the cupboards. ‘Alright,’ he said, ‘To church, then.’ Then, before the living skill could reply, he added, ‘And, no, I’m not calling you a god.’

* * *

The Church of the Loopkeepers was in session when Sham arrived at the makeshift plaza, so he contended himself to sit in front of the as yet unlit fire that the greencloths were building in its centre. He saw Mona and Tripe hurry on by at one point, acknowledging him only with a nod and a polite smile, and he could only presume that the both of them were continuing with the Legion-related recon work.

Finally Ariel’s service ended, and the doors of the church swung open once more. Sham waited for the last of the greencloths to drift away, to head back to their chores, before he approached.

‘Ariel,’ he said.

The church leader’s eyes drifted to the door. ‘Welcome, brother,’ she replied in that airy voice that had fooled even Sham for a good few Loops. ‘Do we have church matters to attend do?’ Ariel hurried over to the double wooden doors, scanning the area outside for signs of eavesdroppers, and then pulled them tightly shut. With that, she breathed a sigh of relief, collapsing against the wood.

‘Tired?’ Sham asked.

‘It’s draining, you know. Keeping up appearances. Having to manage so many people. More with every Loop, too.’

‘Up to what, sixty now?’

Ariel nodded. ‘A lot.’

With a shrug, Sham replied, ‘Surprised it’s not more, to be honest. You’d think with how many Loops we’ve had, more people would have stumbled across Recollection vials. Guess the skill doesn’t have quite the same draw as, say, Vigour.’

‘Oi!’

Ariel wiped her face with her hands, and then led Sham down the aisle to the rear of the church, pulling a blanket off the hidden Resistance materials. ‘I’ve never known you to just want to make small talk, Sham. What is it?’

‘I’m… in trouble.’

‘Aren’t we all?’

Sham ignored the rhetorical question, and continued. ‘I suppose I should probably tell the others too, but… I’m not sure I can lead, any more.’

This caught Ariel by surprise, as evidenced by a stumble, mid-step. ‘Don’t know if we ever officially made you leader, but I take your point. Why?’

‘You remember what I told you before. About what I saw inside Julya’s mind when she touched me?’

The church leader nodded. ‘You made it quite clear it wasn’t her fault.’

‘Well, what I didn’t realise then, is…’ Sham smacked his lips, choosing the words carefully. Maybe Riot was right, maybe that was an annoying noise. ‘The Fringe latched itself onto me, then. It’s inside me. It’s… it hasn’t taken my new skill away, but it definitely has its claws in it.’

Ariel narrowed her eyes, this information enough to distract her from her work and causing her to take a seat instead. ‘What… does that mean?’

‘I don’t know. Just that, like I said before, I dunno if you can trust me. I dunno if I can lead. I’m vulnerable.’

The woman in front of him burst into a sad smile. ‘We all have our weaknesses, Sham. You’ve seen my flock. Do you think there is a single one of them who hasn’t a vulnerability. But they did what you did, Sham. They did the right thing. They told someone. I don’t think any of us here would have managed this long without the support of others.’ She trailed off, staring into the middle distance. ‘Can I ask—have you seen Kryl lately?’

Sham nodded, the verbal response getting lost in his throat.

‘How is he?’

‘He’s doing just fine, believe me. Hard at work with his own… crusade.’

Ariel’s smile grew sadder, if that was possible. ‘Does he speak of me, ever?’

‘I…’

‘No, it’s OK. You don’t have to say it.’

Sham shook his head an ounce more forcefully than was perhaps necessary. ‘It’s not that. We just… we haven’t spoken.’

The church leader’s smile grew artificially brighter, as though to reassure. ‘OK,’ she said, but she seemed not to believe him. She slapped her hands on her thighs as though to rouse herself. ‘The matter at hand, then—your Fringe problem. Don’t tell the others, I know they have enough on their plates. Some of them in particular.’

‘No? I thought you’d be all about openness and trust.’

‘The fake me, maybe. The church leader. But not Ariel Marsh; there’s a little more nuance to her. Just be sure to tell me if the situation… develops.’

Sham nodded. ‘I will. But I didn’t just come here to open up. I need to… I’m trying to learn more. And right at the start of my Loops you said something that suggested you might be the person to ask.’

‘About perfect memory?’ Ariel responded, a sparkle in her eye. It shouldn’t have been any surprise that she’d know exactly what Sham was talking about. After all, she’d lived with her own Recollection for a lot longer than he had. She’d surely got a better handle on her’s than she had on his.

‘Yeah. And about… You mentioned a map?’

A sharp intake of breath. ‘Ah,’ she said. ‘Yes.’ With that, she stood, and disappeared into one of the two small rooms that adjoined to the main church building’s atrium. Minutes later she returned, a great scroll in hand. ‘Come,’ she said, waving Sham over to the table in the corner.

Before she could unfurl the great parchment, she turned to Sham.

‘Yes?’

‘Let me ask you. Just how many cities are there in the world?’

Sham screwed his brow together. ‘What is this, a warm-up question? Might as well ask me what colour the sky is.’

‘Should be easy, shouldn’t it?’ the church leader responded. ‘Go on. If it’s so easy, answer it. How many cities?’

‘Two.’

Ariel’s eyes lit up with… not happiness, not sadness, but some kind of ferocious emotion in between. ‘And in my head, that’s all I can think of too. Haven and Harbourage. Just as it’s always been, right?’

Before waiting for an answer, she rolled out the document onto the table, pinning the corners down with prayerbooks. It was a faded map, one with Haven in the centre, on the coast of a great landmass, and Harbourage not so far to the north. But then there was another city marked on—one called Hazard—just to the east. And to the west, another landmass, with a city called Garden on its coast. More still, inland. And more, further afield. In total, this map referred to not just the two cities, but…

‘Fourteen,’ Ariel said. ‘Fourteen cities.’

‘So? Just makes it a work of fiction,’ Sham replied.

‘Does it? That was my immediate response, too. But there’s other documents in this city, if you know where to look. I’ve found reference in them to not quite all, but most of these cities. Trade routes. Diplomats. Ancient wars. These places, Sham, they were real.’

Sham shook his head, stepping back from the map as though it was some cursed object that he could not bear to touch. ‘No. No, that can’t be right.’

‘What’s across the sea, Sham?’ Ariel pressed.

‘I… I don’t…’

‘The world doesn’t just end. You know that. So what’s out there?’

Sham’s own world began to spin. To grow faint. ‘No, that’s not…’

‘What’s out there, Sham?’

‘It… it must be… I don’t…’

‘What’s out there?’ Ariel asked again.

‘I don’t remember!’ The words escaped Sham’s mouth before he had a chance to truly consider them. At realising what he’d said, his legs gave way beneath him, and he found himself, suddenly, on the cold ground.

The church leader stood over him. ‘Exactly,’ she said, reaching a hand down and assisting him back up. ‘Exactly. And you know what we’ve seen do that before? You know what is the one thing that has power over Recollection?’

Sham, of course, knew where she was going with this. ‘The Fringe.’

Ariel nodded. ‘We think of the Fringe as having only impacted the world recently. And we only know it from absences. A void where there was once supply routes. A void where we once had transport links. We don’t know what we’ve lost, because we don’t remember it. But let me tell you, Sham. We’ve lost a lot.’

Sham managed—barely—to sit himself down on a pew, and breathed deeply into cupped hands until the room stopping spinning around him. ‘Why didn’t you tell us sooner?’ he finally managed to ask.

‘You remember what I said earlier? About openness and trust? I… don’t tend to tell people things that will only scare them. And this… this is nothing if not terrifying.’

Sham nodded, because that was all he could, in this moment, manage.

‘Maybe you’ll join us for evening prayer?’ Ariel asked. ‘You don’t have to believe in these things to find value in it.’

‘No,’ he said. Then, realising it might have been too snappy an answer, he added, ‘It’s not for me.’

‘Well, then… how about this? Go pay Riot a visit. I sense that it’s… overdue.’

She was right, of course. In the middle of all this madness, he’d forgotten what really mattered to him. If the world was ending—and based on what he’d just learned, it really bloody seemed like it was—then maybe he should be spending more time with the person he really cared about.

And maybe he’d find out just what in the hells had got into her.