Sarsuk 24 (Patreon)

I'm at that awkward part of the process where I've got most of Sarsuk's story and the ending, but I'm still working out not just the little gap in between but the changes I'll have to make so the story and ending line up. I'm staring at the Promontory in Box Elder county and wondering where that golden spike is going to fit in.

Anyhow, this is the second-to-last scene in the story. I'm not thrilled with it, but I feel confident that it'll be better when I have the other pieces and do me rewrite. I don't actually know if it will be scene 24, but it's not 17 which would be up next, so I'm leaving some space.

Oh! Also, I should mention that @Millerdark had a great suggestion for the name of this book, so unless something better comes along, it'll be "Nobody Left Behind". Get it? Since Sarsuk is such a nobody and he has "no body"!

Regardless, let me know what you think of this one, or skip it, and wait for me to get the draft done where I've actually connected it somehow.

Sarsuk 1
Sarsuk 1.1
Sarsuk 1.2
Sarsuk 2
Sarsuk 3
Sarsuk 4
Sarsuk 5
Sarsuk 6
Sarsuk 7
Sarsuk 8
Sarsuk 9
Sarsuk 10
Sarsuk 11
Sarsuk 12
Sarsuk 13
Sarsuk 14
Sarsuk 15
Sarsuk 16

———

Siki stuffed her javea mug into the backpack and headed to the corner where the lab’s single fake plant sat. Her watering can—the javea bribe delivery can, as Sarsuk called it—sat inconspicuously beside it.

The geroo waved goodbye as she walked to Sarsuk’s head. “Still, it’s sad that I never did get your secret,” she said. “That was what Palani was paying me to do, after all.”

The krakun smiled. “I told you all my secrets!” he insisted with a laugh. “That lio is just weird. My life is an open book to you.”

Siki rolled her eyes. “Everyone has secrets.”

“Everyone has details they haven’t shared,” he responded. “I didn’t tell you what I had for breakfast on my last birthday, but that doesn’t mean it was a secret. I’d tell you if you wanted to know. I’m not holding anything back.”

She stuffed the watering can into the pack, but the spout was too long and stuck up through the top. She zipped the two sides up as closed as they would go. “Well, it hardly matters now,” said the geroo. “I’m going to head out. I still need to pack up my room. Leaving for Archipelago Tech in the morning.”

Sarsuk closed his eyes and gave her a quick tip of his chin. “It’s been a true pleasure, Siki—apart from turning my air off that one time,” he amended. “That really sucked.”

She nodded and threw the straps across her shoulders. “I’m still sorry that I had to do that,” she said. “Maybe I’ll see you next summer?”

“I’m not going anywhere,” he promised.

# # #

Commissioner Sarsuk typed in his hacks, circumventing security, and overwriting controls. The code changes were simple, and he’d compressed the instructions to make typing them in as efficient as possible. But tapping buttons and on-screen keys without being able to see the display was always an error-prone nuisance.

At last, the communicator he’d tucked under his armpit buzzed three times, signaling that the code had been uploaded and accepted. Then, he set the communicator back down and hurried to the front closet where he retrieved his umbrella. From there, he lumbered outside and down five flights of stairs to the sidewalk below.

He paused on the last step, as he always did, worried that it wouldn’t work, but his claw touched concrete and the simulation didn’t reset. With the umbrella’s metal tip, he sought out the left edge of the concrete path, then hurried across the sidewalk with the umbrella guiding his way.

He took the first left then the second right. Crossing the street was always unnerving since there was no sidewalk edge to trace. He took twenty-seven paces, then swung the umbrella in low, wide arcs until it tapped against the curb—nearly perfect, right on course.

Following the curb with the umbrella, he walked two blocks, pausing at the appropriate spots to get around trash cans and lampposts. Right, then two blocks more, nine paces forward, and three at a diagonal to the left. When the makeshift cane tapped against the door, he discarded the umbrella and moved forward slower, using his palms to guide him now.

Through the door, following the left wall, around the potted plant, right, two steps across to the counter, two more steps, feeling his way to the open counter space between the register and the glass cabinet full of pastries. He wished he could smell the shop.

Finally, he was through all the easy stuff, and now the challenging part began. He drew a breath and released it slowly. With his left claw trembling, he reached slowly forward across the counter, left and right.

He hated pretending, making his claw tremble. It felt … manipulative, but so far, the schtick proved more reliable than anything else he’d tried. He touched a napkin dispenser. He touched a flimsy triangular sign made of folded cardboard. And then… And then… A soft palm warmed the back of his claw. Ah, success!

He reached forward with his right, gently setting his palm atop the stranger’s claw. “I know you can’t hear me, Ashiok, and I can’t hear you either,” he whispered. “You must think I’ve gone blind and deaf and mute, but I need you to listen to me.”

He squeezed the barista’s claw twice, then pulled the one claw away. He raised a fist. He used his thumb to mime a clicking motion twice. Then, he mimed writing in the air.

When he first started making his nightly trips to the virtual version of Solar Bark, he would bring a pen with him, but Ashiok always kept one nearby, so using charades to get it from him proved trivial enough.

When Ashiok handed him the pen, Sarsuk searched the counter again for the folded sign. He unfolded it, turned it inside out, and in the tidiest penmanship he could manage, he wrote: “Urgent! Crucial you come with me!”

That worked nearly every time. Sarsuk tugged on Ashiok’s wrist with all the urgency he could convey. With his free claw, he pointed back toward where the door was located. Another thirty seconds of silent cajoling, and the barista’s resolve weakened.

He led Ashiok to the door and out, back to the sidewalk, and on in the direction he’d been heading initially. Ashiok made this easy. He was a natural at guiding, even while holding claws. Sarsuk didn’t need the umbrella while he had the barista with him.

“Oh, Ashiok,” the yellow krakun sighed as they walked together, “someday I’ll find the bit of code that resets everything when I fall asleep, and I’ll cut it out.”

Sarsuk grinned wide. “That’ll be glorious! Until then, well, I guess nothing really matters. You won’t remember this tomorrow, and we’ll be starting over fresh once more.” He leaned his head on the red krakun’s shoulder, admitting, “Truthfully, this reset problem has been rather liberating. I don’t overthink anything. If I screw up today, I’ll just try again tomorrow, try harder.”

He walked in silence a little longer, wondering what Ashiok must be saying. “Where are you taking me? What’s so important? I have to get back to my job!” But whatever, it hardly mattered if Sarsuk got him fired. When he fell asleep, the simulation would reset, and Ashiok—and his job—would too.

“Tomorrow is the weekend. That’ll give me a few more hours to search for the sleep code.” Sarsuk grinned. “And I promise to save half the weekend for us! Then, we’ll get eighteen hours together instead of only four. You’ll love that—at least you seem to, once you get over the fear of being fired, that is.”

Eighteen hours wasn’t nearly enough, but at least it would give the two a chance to talk. Talking to Ashiok was easy. The young krakun kept a pen and a fresh pad of paper in his cramped apartment.

Listening to him, unfortunately, was much more of a challenge. For yes and no questions, Sarsuk put his palm on Ashiok’s cheek so he could feel him nod or shake his head. But for anything else, Ashiok had to trace the individual letters onto Sarsuk’s chest one-by-one.

Sarsuk rather enjoyed the intimacy, and after doing this a few times, he knew generally what the other krakun would ask him and in what order. The frustrating thing was that it took about ten hours of failing to communicate with Ashiok first before the younger male even got comfortable enough to touch Sarsuk’s chest, and that only left them eight hours to talk.

He sighed. “You don’t know this yet, and I don’t know if I’ll be able to convince you that it’s true, but I love you. You’re the reason I keep striving, the reason I keep at it all.

“You’re the secret I’ll never give up, no matter how many interns they have interrogate me.”

———

Reviewer's link: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1qrMgKAdoKEDh7uC8SlIX43V6aTzaGEOBSFH8J3-AUCk/edit?usp=sharing

Thoughts?