Lawrence Winnerman

The story is in the surveys, where central bankers say quietly what they would never say at a podium.

In 2023, UBS asked the world’s reserve managers whether they worried that their US assets could be frozen—seized, in effect, by the country that issued them. Fourteen percent said yes. Last year, 49 percent said yes.

Let’s stop here for a minute. These are not crypto evangelists or gold-bug pamphleteers. Reserve managers are the designated worriers of the world economy—careful, gray, institutionally conservative people whose entire professional function is to make sure the national savings still exist next quarter.

In two years, the share of them who believe the United States might confiscate their holdings went from one in seven to one in two.

They learned this fear honestly.

In February 2022, after the invasion of Ukraine, the United States and its allies froze roughly $300 billion of the Russian central bank’s reserves. And here is where the easy version of this essay—the one with a single villain in it—falls apart, because that decision was made by a Democratic administration, with broad allied support, in response to a genuine atrocity. It was arguably the right call. It was certainly an effective one.

But sanctions of that kind work exactly once, and the price of using the weapon is that everyone watching learns the weapon exists. Every finance ministry from Beijing to Brasília absorbed the same lesson on the same afternoon: a Treasury bond is a promise, and promises have conditions.

None of this requires villainy. It requires only momentum. Each administration found the dollar too useful a lever not to pull—sanctions here, tariffs there, a freeze when the cause was just. Each pull was rational in isolation. The cumulative effect was to teach the world that the risk-free asset carries a risk after all, and the risk is us—the irrational, 800-pound gorilla that is the United States of America.

You might not be able to trust us with the Bomb, and you probably can’t trust us with the entire basis of your national economy either.

Then came the acceleration. In April of this year, one month after American and Israeli strikes on Iran, the surveyors went back to the reserve managers. Seventy percent now named geopolitics as the single most significant risk they face—ahead of inflation, ahead of cyberattack, ahead of everything.

A third said it would be the dominant factor guiding their reserves for the next five years. In March alone, the value of Treasuries held in custody for foreign officials at the New York Fed fell by $82 billion, to its lowest level since 2012.

Here is the sentence the chart in the ECB report is actually saying: the most conservative institutions on earth have begun buying insurance against the United States.

Nobody buys insurance against a counterparty they trust.

COWARDS

Lawrence Winnerman — Fri, 17 Apr 2026 20:44:20 GMT

by Lawrence Winnerman

I was eight years old the first time a man decided my body was his to use.

He was a stranger. Some old man in a JCPenney dressing room at a shopping mall. My mother didn’t know him. Nobody knew him. We never caught him. I was a child, and I learned something that afternoon that no child should have to learn: that there are men in the world who see a smaller body and feel entitled to it, and there is an entire civilization prepared to look the other way.

I’m fifty-six now. Five-ten, two-sixty, built like a lumberjack. Nobody looks at me and thinks victim. And yet. I’m an openly gay man. I bottom—and if that word makes you uncomfortable, good, stay with me, because your discomfort is a fraction of what I’m about to talk about. I know what toxic masculinity sounds like from the inside, because it pervades the gay community too—the hierarchy of tops over bottoms, the sorting of men into who penetrates and who receives, the quiet assumption that receiving makes you less. I’ve lived in that hierarchy my entire adult life. I know exactly how the gears turn. The same machinery that sorts men in a bedroom is the machinery that sorts women in a legislature, that sorts bodies in a culture, that produces—reliably, generationally—the system I’m about to describe.

I have standing to make this case. And I mean that in a way that goes deeper than opinion.

Eric Swalwell was arrested by no one. Four women came forward—one of them a twenty-year-old intern who says he raped her—and within a week he resigned from Congress, abandoned his campaign for governor of California, and vanished into the fog of the next news cycle. By May it will be a footnote.

I read the allegations and I didn’t feel outrage. I’m past outrage. What I felt was recognition. The machine that produced what happened to me in that dressing room is the same machine that produced Eric Swalwell, the same machine that protected Jeffrey Epstein for decades, the same machine that right now—today, this week, while you’re reading this—is grinding through legislatures and courtrooms and algorithm-fed rabbit holes to ensure that women, half the human species, remain controllable, available, and silent.

So let me make a case.

• • •

Count 1: The Predator Class

Every few months, another name surfaces. We perform the ritual—shock, denial, investigation, consequences for some, impunity for most—and then we move on, and we never once talk about the ecosystem that keeps producing the names.

Eric Swalwell. Four women. Sexual misconduct including rape, sexual assault of intoxicated women, unsolicited explicit messages sent via Snapchat. One accuser started interning for him in 2019 when she was twenty years old—hadn’t even graduated from college. The House Ethics Committee opened an investigation; approximately forty-five minutes later, Swalwell announced his resignation. He was a Democrat. He sat on the Intelligence Committee. He went on cable news and talked about accountability.

And here’s the thing about Swalwell that nobody wants to say out loud: Democrats forced him out in a week. As they should have. Al Franken was gone in days. Anthony Weiner, gone. Katie Hill, gone. The left holds its own to account because that’s what accountability looks like. But Matt Gaetz faced a sex trafficking investigation involving a seventeen-year-old and was nominated for Attorney General. Jim Jordan was accused of ignoring sexual abuse of wrestlers when he was an assistant coach at Ohio State and went on to chair the House Judiciary Committee. Donald Trump was found liable for sexual abuse by a civil jury and was elected president. Again. The right doesn’t hold its people to account—not because it can’t, but because it won’t. And the result is a perverse optical illusion: Democratic names dominate the headlines about sexual misconduct because Democrats are the only ones generating consequences. Republican predators stay in office, stay quiet, and stay powerful. In the court of public opinion, it starts to look like the problem belongs to one party—when what’s actually happening is that only one party treats it as a problem at all. The asymmetry isn’t a bug. It’s the strategy. Hold no one accountable, and you never have to explain anything. Let the other side do the right thing, and weaponize their integrity against them.

Jeffrey Epstein. Three million pages of files released in January 2026—two thousand videos, one hundred eighty thousand images. The Department of Justice acknowledged that six million pages may ultimately qualify for release. Communications between Epstein and a vast web of figures in politics, academia, and business continued after he registered as a sex offender. Both parties. All industries. A December 2025 poll found that 91 percent of Democrats, 78 percent of independents, and 74 percent of Republicans wanted the files released. The only people who didn’t want sunlight were the people in the files.

And then there’s the one that should have stopped the world and didn’t. In March 2026, CNN published the results of a months-long investigation into what they called a global “online rape academy”—a pornographic website called Motherless.com hosting more than twenty thousand videos of “sleep content,” which is the sanitized term for footage of men drugging and raping their unconscious partners. A linked Telegram group called “Zzz” had nearly a thousand members actively teaching each other the craft of it. How to select the drug. How to dose it. How to avoid detection. A man in Poland was arrested as a direct result of the reporting.

A thousand men in a chat room, workshopping rape. Twenty thousand videos. Hundreds of thousands of views.

Swalwell, Epstein, the men in that Telegram group—they are the visible tips of something that goes all the way down. A system that produces predators reliably, at scale, and then provides them with legal, cultural, and technological infrastructure to operate. The predator class isn’t a conspiracy. It’s an output.

• • •

Count 2: The Pipeline

If you have a son under twenty-five, he is one algorithm away from the top of this funnel. I’m not being dramatic. That is what the research says.

It starts with looksmaxxing—a trend in which young men use apps to score their facial attractiveness on the PSL scale, a rating system invented in incel communities that ranks faces using terms like “low-tier normie” and “chadlite.” One looksmaxxing influencer alone racked up more than a hundred million views in 2025. The apps are in the App Store right now. Your kid can download one during lunch. And in case you think this is just vanity with a weird name: looksmaxxing communities actively encourage boys to strike themselves in the face with hammers—to fracture their own facial bones so the bones will, supposedly, grow back stronger and more masculine. Boys are hitting themselves in the face with hammers to meet a beauty standard invented by incels. That’s where the pipeline starts.

The Alan Turing Institute’s Centre for Emerging Technology and Security published a study titled “From Looksmaxxing to Mass Shootings: Radicalisation and Online Misogyny.” The title tells you everything. The pipeline works like this: a boy downloads an app that scores his face. The app uses language and frameworks created by incels. The algorithm feeds him more content. The content gets darker. He moves from TikTok to Discord to Telegram. The communities he finds there are actively directing young men toward incel ideology, neo-Nazi content, and material that glorifies mass shooters and suicide.

All of this is documented. OFCOM—the UK’s communications regulator—published a sixty-five-page report on young people’s engagement with the manosphere. Research in Wiley’s Child and Adolescent Mental Health journal found the manosphere encouraging sexist attitudes in schools, deepening existing inequalities, spreading dangerous messages about mental health. The University of Alabama’s Institute for Human Rights mapped what they call “modern sexism” from its digital roots to its violent endpoints.

The pipeline is designed. It has an architecture. It has an on-ramp that looks like self-help and an off-ramp that looks like a manifesto. And every man who built it is counting on you—personally, specifically you—to assume your son is too smart to fall for it.

• • •

Count 3: The Legislative Assault

In August 2025, Doug Wilson—pastor of the Communion of Reformed Evangelical Churches, a growing denomination with approximately a hundred and fifty congregations—told CNN that the Nineteenth Amendment granting women the right to vote “was a bad idea.”

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth attends a CREC church. His Pentagon spokesman confirmed the affiliation and said Hegseth “very much appreciates many of Mr. Wilson’s writings and teachings.” Democratic congresswomen, several of them military veterans, demanded his resignation.

That’s the Secretary of Defense of the United States, aligned with a church whose leader wants to repeal women’s suffrage. And here’s the part that should keep you up at night: another CREC pastor admitted the quiet part out loud. “I don’t think Christians should make repealing the Nineteenth Amendment their main issue right now,” he said, “because it’s not a winning issue yet.”

Yet.

The word “yet” is doing all the work in that sentence. The strategy is to make fringe ideas seem plausible enough that less extreme shifts toward theocracy and patriarchy seem reasonable by comparison. Move the Overton window so far that taking away a woman’s right to vote sounds radical, but taking away her right to control her own body sounds like a compromise.

Meanwhile, in state legislatures across the country, a study by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace found that 11.85 percent of state legislators belonged to far-right Facebook groups. That small minority sponsored 66 percent of all anti-abortion bills and 62 percent of all anti-LGBTQ bills introduced in their legislative sessions. A fraction of the political class is driving the overwhelming majority of the legislative assault on bodily autonomy—and they’re doing it in gerrymandered districts where their positions are wildly out of step with public opinion.

And the economic data is unambiguous. Women in states with robust reproductive health care access—contraceptive coverage, expanded Medicaid, public funding for medically necessary procedures—have higher earnings, face less occupational segregation, and are less likely to be trapped in part-time work. Every dollar spent on contraceptive services saves three dollars in pregnancy-related care. Reproductive access is the economic foundation on which women build independent lives. Strip it away and you strip away the independence. That’s the point. That has always been the point.

And then there’s Project 2025—the Heritage Foundation’s nine-hundred-page blueprint for the next Republican administration—which proposes treating gender education as a sex offense and makes zero reference to the rates of violence targeting LGBTQ people. Nine hundred pages. They had room. They chose silence.

• • •

Count 4: The Structural Failure

In April 2024, the New York Court of Appeals overturned Harvey Weinstein’s landmark sexual assault conviction on a 4–3 vote. The technicality: testimony from “prior bad acts” witnesses shouldn’t have been admitted because it served “only to establish defendant’s propensity to commit the crimes charged.”

Sit with that for a second. A court ruled that evidence showing a rapist had a pattern of raping was too prejudicial to the rapist.

Judge Madeline Singas wrote in dissent that the decision continued “a disturbing trend of overturning juries’ guilty verdicts in cases involving sexual violence” and perpetuated “outdated notions of sexual violence” that “allow predators to escape accountability.” In the retrial, Weinstein was convicted on one count, acquitted on another. Partial justice for a man dozens of women accused over decades. The system working exactly as it was designed to work.

And look—between 2016 and 2022, state legislatures across the country introduced more than three thousand bills aimed at gender equity and workplace safety. They passed 382 of them. Pay equity, harassment training, reporting procedures, leave policies, elimination of the nondisclosure agreements that protect predators. Real progress, passed by real legislators who fought for every vote.

The legal system still cannot reliably convict a rapist.

Me Too changed the culture. It changed who we believe, how quickly we respond, what we’re willing to say out loud. But it did not change the machine. The machine still runs. The courtrooms still fail. The statutes of limitations still expire. The burden of proof still falls on the body that was violated, not the body that did the violating. And every time a conviction gets overturned on a technicality, every man in that Telegram group, every lobbyist drafting an abortion ban, every influencer teaching boys to score women’s faces on a numerical scale receives the same message: the system is yours.

• • •

Count 5: The Global Playbook

Everything I’ve described so far has been American. The dysfunction, the polarization, the broken institutions. But the playbook is global, and if you don’t see that, you’re looking at the trees and missing the forest that’s on fire.

In November 2024, RAND published a study concluding that “regressive ideas on gender and gender equality can be a useful proxy metric for democratic backsliding and authoritarian rise.” The United States government’s own Women, Peace, and Security strategy recommends treating misogyny—online or codified in policy—as an early indicator of authoritarian consolidation.

Read that again. Our own government’s own framework says: when misogyny shows up in law, authoritarianism is coming. Every time. Without exception.

Russia: Vladimir Putin positioned himself as the guardian of “traditional Christian values,” told women their place was at home raising children, and systematically rolled back domestic violence protections. Turkey: Erdoğan withdrew from the Istanbul Convention on gender-based violence, reversed secular marriage requirements, and opened the legal door to underage marriages and polygamy. Hungary: Orbán moved to ban abortion and restrict LGBTQ rights as cornerstones of his “illiberal democracy.” Poland: the Law and Justice party packed courts with political allies, then used those compromised judges to eliminate abortion rights—against the clear will of the Polish majority. Brazil: Bolsonaro wasn’t even particularly religious before his campaign, but evangelical churches powered his 2018 victory. Once in office, six of his twenty-four cabinet members were evangelical Protestants who restricted LGBTQ rights, banned gender discussions in classrooms, and cast doubt on the need for gender equality policies altogether.

The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace published the definitive analysis in November 2024: patriarchy and authoritarianism are “mutually reinforcing political projects.” Their research demonstrated that voters with sexist attitudes are significantly more likely to support authoritarian leaders—even after controlling for political ideology. A 2017 European study found that traditional gender views predicted support for radical-right parties across twenty-three countries.

Harvard Kennedy School researchers put it plainly: authoritarian leaders seek to “displace democracy with hierarchies controlled by male elites and to re-confine women in traditional roles.” They minimize women’s equal rights, frame equality as niche identity politics, and they do this because patriarchy is the structural foundation on which authoritarian power is built. The hierarchy of men over women is the load-bearing wall. Pull it out and the authoritarian project collapses.

Which is why every one of these regimes came for women’s rights first. Or simultaneously with the power grab. Never after. The sequence is the tell.

• • •

Count 6: The Foundation

Now the data. And I need you to stay with me here, because this is where the floor drops out.

Georgetown University’s Institute for Women, Peace and Security studied the relationship between women’s status and democratic health—free elections, free association, checks on government power—across dozens of countries and found them strongly correlated. The Varieties of Democracy project, spanning a hundred countries over four decades, demonstrated that women’s political empowerment directly strengthens democratic participation. When women lead, cooperative governance increases, peacemaking improves, social welfare expands, economies grow. This is not ideology. This is the data set.

The economics alone should end every argument anyone has ever had about this. McKinsey projected a one-trillion-dollar gain for the global economy from closing gaps in women’s health care, including reproductive health. One trillion. The UNFPA documented that every one-percentage-point increase in gender-based violence in sub-Saharan Africa correlates with up to an 8 percent decline in economic activity, driven primarily by drops in female employment. Intimate partner violence costs the global economy an estimated 5 percent of GDP—five trillion dollars, every year, hemorrhaging out of civilization like an open wound that we just keep walking past.

The Brennan Center for Justice found that more than 40 percent of state legislators have experienced threats. Women legislators are three to four times more likely to face explicitly sexualized abuse. Women are being threatened out of public life. And the threats are working. And the men making the threats know the threats are working. And the rest of us are watching it happen.

Women’s freedom is the foundation on which democratic societies are built. Every piece of data confirms it. Every country that has tried to build democracy while constraining women has failed. Every authoritarian who has consolidated power has done so by attacking women’s autonomy first. The correlation is so strong, so consistent, so thoroughly documented across decades of research and dozens of countries that to deny it at this point is to deny gravity.

If women are not equally free—equally free, with the same control over their bodies and their futures and their participation in civic life—then this whole experiment in self-governance is bullshit. I mean that word precisely. I mean it as a factual assessment of the evidence I have just laid in front of you. Democracy that does not include the full freedom of women is a word with nothing behind it—a promise made to half the species and broken every single day.

• • •

The Verdict

Six counts. Predators at the top. A radicalization pipeline feeding boys into the machine from the bottom. A legislative apparatus stripping rights in the middle. A legal system that fails to convict. A global playbook that repeats the same pattern on every continent. And a mountain of data proving that when you attack women’s freedom, you are attacking democracy itself—at the foundation, at the load-bearing wall, at the thing without which the whole structure is a lie.

I’ve made my case. Now I’m talking to men.

Women already know all of this. They’ve been living it. They’ve been screaming it. They are exhausted from explaining it to men who nod sympathetically and go back to their lives. I am done watching that happen.

I’m talking to you. The man reading this right now. The husband, the father, the brother, the son, the friend, the colleague, the guy who considers himself one of the good ones.

Are you fighting for the women in your life? I don’t mean performing allyship on social media. I don’t mean the pin on your jacket or the post you shared that one time. Are you intervening when the joke gets told at dinner? Are you calling your state legislator when an abortion ban hits committee? Are you monitoring what your son is watching, who he’s following, what pipeline is pulling him toward a chat room full of men who think consent is optional? Are you showing up at school board meetings? Are you voting in every single election—every one, including the ones that bore you—like your daughter’s freedom depends on it?

Because it does.

Are you risking something? Losing something? Spending social capital, burning a friendship, making yourself uncomfortable in a room full of men who expect your silence? Because if you aren’t doing those things, you aren’t fighting. You’re watching. And watching is a choice.

I know what the machine does. I learned it when I was eight years old, in a dressing room in a JCPenney, from a man no one ever caught. I’ve lived inside the toxic masculinity that sorts men into hierarchies of dominance and submission and calls it natural order. And I am telling you—from inside the experience, from inside the evidence, from inside the cold fury that comes from knowing both at once—that the time for choosing sides is practically over.

The forces arrayed against women’s freedom are organized. They are funded. They are global, patient, and strategic. They have a legislative agenda and a judicial strategy. They have a radicalization pipeline that starts with a face-scoring app and ends with men in a chat room teaching each other how to rape. They have a Secretary of Defense who attends a church whose pastor wants to repeal women’s suffrage. They have Project 2025. They have three million pages of Epstein files proving that the most powerful men in the world operated a sexual abuse network for decades with functional impunity. They have momentum.

What do you have?

If the answer is good intentions and a vague sense that things will work out—then I need you to hear me very clearly.

You are a coward. You are a stupid, selfish, ugly, mean, small, weak, cowardly coward.

You are watching a war—a real war, fought every single day on the bodies of women and girls and queer people—and you are choosing comfort over duty, passivity over action, your own ease over someone else’s survival. History will judge you. Your daughters will judge you. And they will be right.

Every generation plants the seeds of the fights the next generation will have to wage. The fights we will be having for the next hundred years are being seeded right now. In legislatures. In courtrooms. In algorithms. In churches. In chat rooms. In the silence of men who know better and do nothing.

Pick up a weapon. It doesn’t have to be a literal one—make it your voice, your vote, your time, your money, your willingness to be uncomfortable, your refusal to let one more joke slide, one more policy pass, one more boy disappear into the pipeline while you tell yourself it won’t happen to your kid.

The war is already here. It has been here. Women have been fighting it alone for long enough.

What side are you on?

Confidence Score: 94%

Lawrence Winnerman — Mon, 16 Mar 2026 13:23:33 GMT

A NOTE ON THE NEAR FIELD

The Near Field is structured scenario fiction — plausible futures extrapolated from present forces. The Hinge essays examine structural drift in isolation. The Near Field shows what happens when those forces interact.

The characters in this piece include named political figures operating in a speculative future context. Their portrayal reflects the structural logic of the institutions they inhabit, not any claim about their private character or future conduct.

The incident described here has not happened.

The conditions that would produce it have.

OPENING

Strait of Hormuz. October 2029.

The strait is twenty-one miles wide at its narrowest point. Through it passes roughly one-fifth of the world’s traded oil. That number has not changed significantly in decades. What has changed is everything else.

The ceasefire framework signed in March of 2027 ended the formal hostilities of the Iran war. It did not end the Iran war. It produced, instead, a collapsed western corridor — competing factions, fractured authority, a humanitarian emergency that the international community described with great precision and addressed with moderate effort. By late 2029, the Persian Gulf coast holds several hundred thousand displaced Iranians in various stages of movement. Some travel through organized humanitarian channels. Some do not. The strait has become the most complicated maritime corridor on earth: commercial tankers waiting for clearance, U.S. naval assets running enforcement operations under an authorization framework that has not been formally renewed since 2027, and below the surface of all of it, a refugee crisis moving through the same water.

Six supertankers sit anchored in the northern passage, waiting. They have been waiting for four days. The clearance process takes longer now. Everything takes longer now.

A loose formation of four humanitarian vessels moves slowly south through the corridor. The largest, a converted cargo ship called Al-Salam IV, carries three hundred and forty people. It has been at sea for six days. Its captain has been navigating around military assets with the practiced anxiety of someone who has learned, through experience, that proximity to power does not mean protection from it.

Somewhere in the dark between the supertankers, a vessel runs without lights. It moves with the particular efficiency of people who know exactly where they are going and have reasons for not being seen.

The Israeli operation had no name that would ever appear in an American system.

The American targeting system had been updated with new maritime behavioral models in August. The contractor had noted, in a technical appendix filed with the Department of Defense, that accuracy in post-conflict corridors with mixed civilian and military traffic remained a known limitation pending additional training data.

The operational framework governing the system’s deployment had been approved by the previous administration. The current administration had adopted it.

The system was running.

REUTERS | October 14, 2029 Newsom administration defends continued Gulf operations under 2027 framework; White House says “no new authorization required”
POLITICO | October 15, 2029 AOC war powers select committee hits wall — Republican Senate refuses witness subpoenas for third consecutive month
FOX NEWS DIGITAL | October 16, 2029 Day 11: Families of American hostages demand action as White House stays silent on Gulf standoff
WALL STREET JOURNAL | October 16, 2029 Gulf tanker convoy delay enters fourth week; shipping insurers raise Iran corridor premiums by 34%

I. NASRIN

Al-Salam IV. Northern Strait of Hormuz. October 17, 2029. 03:40 local time.

Nasrin Moradi is on deck because she cannot sleep.

This is not unusual. She has not slept well since Ahvaz, and Ahvaz has been two years ago now, and still the sleep does not come the way it used to. Below, Shirin is in her bunk — eight years old and capable of sleeping through anything, which Nasrin has decided is a gift, one of the only unambiguous gifts the last two years have produced. Her mother Maryam is below as well, though Maryam also sleeps poorly, and Nasrin has left her pretending so that neither of them has to pretend together.

She stands at the rail and looks north at the tankers.

There are six of them, anchored in a loose formation a half-kilometer out. They are lit up like small cities. They have been there since the ship arrived in the corridor two days ago, waiting for the clearance that keeps not coming, and in a strange way Nasrin has come to find them reassuring. Large. Stationary. Proof that commerce is still functioning, even if slowly. Proof that someone has calculated that this water is worth crossing.

She thinks about her pharmacy.

It was on the corner of Imam Khomeini Boulevard, not far from the university. A good location. She had worked there for eight years before she owned it, and then owned it for three years before the fighting made the question of ownership irrelevant. She thinks about the particular smell of it — the sharp antiseptic underneath, the softer smell of the soaps and cosmetics on the front shelves, the way afternoon light came through the western window and made the orange pill bottles glow. She thinks about these things the way she has learned to think about them: steadily, without pushing, the way you carry something fragile.

Her mother taught school for thirty years. Retired the year before the war. Had plans. Had a garden. Was afraid of the water and came onto this boat anyway because Nasrin told her it was safer than the land route, and her mother had looked at her the way mothers look at their children when they are deciding whether to believe them.

The tankers hum faintly across the water. Somewhere below, someone coughs. The ship smells of too many people and salt and diesel and the faint sweetness of the food someone cooked hours ago.

She is watching the tankers when she sees it.

A vessel, moving between them. Small. Fast. Running dark — no lights, no navigation signal, nothing. It threads the gap between the second and third tanker with a precision that has nothing accidental about it. She watches it for perhaps thirty seconds before it disappears behind the bulk of the third tanker and does not reappear.

She stands at the rail for a while longer.

She does not know what she saw. She has no framework for it. She files it in the same category as the other things she has seen in the past two years that she did not have frameworks for: something happened, something with a logic she cannot access, and the only reasonable response is to note it and continue.

She goes below. She checks that Shirin is covered — she has kicked the blanket to the foot of the bunk in that way she has, the same way since she was three years old. Nasrin covers her. She lies down next to her mother, who is lying very still in the way of someone trying not to be awake.

She does not sleep.

AP | October 17, 2029 — 06:15 EST U.S. military confirms “active monitoring” of Gulf corridor situation; no further comment
CNN | October 17, 2029 — 07:44 EST Sources: White House convened National Security Council early this morning; topic undisclosed

II. CHEN

USS Decatur. Combat Information Center. Northern Gulf. October 17, 2029. 14:22 local time.

Commander Sarah Chen has been on watch for six hours.

The targeting package for the vessel designated SIERRA-7 has been in front of her for ninety minutes. She has read it three times. She is the kind of officer who reads things three times and knows, by the third reading, whether she has fully understood them or whether she is reading for confirmation of what she has already decided. This is the third reading. She is not entirely sure which kind it is.

The AI confidence score is 94%.

The package is clean. Signal intercepts consistent with faction command-and-control architecture. Movement pattern correlated with two independent human intelligence reports placing the faction’s logistics coordinator aboard the vessel within the last seventy-two hours. Behavioral analysis flagging communication patterns consistent with an active operational node — the kind of node that, taken dark, creates the opening the extraction team needs.

The hostages have been held for eleven days.

She pulls up the note from analyst Marcus Webb one more time. Filed seventy-one hours ago. Webb had flagged anomalous movement patterns in the vessels adjacent to SIERRA-7 — specifically an approach-and-contact sequence that did not match commercial traffic behavior and was not consistent with the refugee vessels operating in the corridor. Webb had written, in the careful hedged language of someone who knows he is speculating: movement profile possibly consistent with special forces insertion, third-party origin unknown. Recommend 48-hour hold pending clarification with allied commands.

The system had weighed Webb’s note against the preponderance of evidence and classified it as inconclusive. Below the threshold for operational delay. The confidence score remained 94%.

Chen has looked at Webb’s underlying data. He is right that something moved oddly. He is also right that it could be a dozen things — commercial traffic, a refugee vessel sheltering near the tankers, a fishing boat running the corridor after dark. His note is a flag, not a finding. The confidence score is 94%. The operational window closes in four minutes. The extraction team is staged. The hostage families have been on television for eleven days.

She reads the note one more time.

In the last two seconds before she approves — not the twenty-three seconds, but the last two, the actual moment — she has a feeling. She would not call it doubt exactly. It is quieter than doubt. It is more like the sensation of a door that is not quite level in its frame: nothing is wrong, structurally, and yet the hang of it is slightly off. She has had this feeling before, across fourteen years of service, and she has learned to take it seriously and she has also learned that taking it seriously means asking whether the feeling is data or whether it is noise.

The confidence score is 94%. The system has cleared eleven operations above 92% without incident. The window is closing.

She approves.

Twenty-three seconds.

The authorization transmits. The targeting system acknowledges. Chen turns back to the broader tactical display, already watching the next quadrant, the next variable, the long professional habit of moving forward.

The feeling does not go away. She notes that and moves forward anyway.

BREAKING — AP | October 17, 2029 — 14:38 local / 06:38 EST Explosion reported in northern Strait of Hormuz; U.S. military confirms “operational activity in the area”
BREAKING — REUTERS | October 17, 2029 — 07:02 EST Multiple explosions near tanker convoy in Hormuz Strait; cause unknown; tanker traffic halting
BREAKING — BBC | October 17, 2029 — 07:19 EST Massive fire visible from Omani coast; at least two supertankers ablaze; Strait of Hormuz passage status unknown
BREAKING — AL JAZEERA | October 17, 2029 — 07:31 EST Humanitarian convoy in proximity to Hormuz explosions; communication lost with vessel Al-Salam IV; 340 civilians aboard

III. NEWSOM

Situation Room. The White House. October 17, 2029. 07:44 EST.

The screens update faster than anyone in the room can speak.

Gavin Newsom has been here for ninety minutes, and in those ninety minutes he has watched the damage assessment assemble itself in layers, each one worse than the last, with the particular quality of catastrophes that are still becoming what they are going to be. Three supertankers. The strait effectively closed. The debris field still spreading. The extraction team that had been staged for the hostage operation — staged, waiting for the command node to go dark — reporting that they cannot reach the secondary vessel. Cannot reach it because the secondary vessel is inside the blast radius.

The hostages.

The hostages are dead.

Derek Salazar, his National Security Advisor, is walking him through the cascade: thermal event from the primary vessel reaching the adjacent supertanker, the fuel stores, the chain of it, three tankers burning in the narrowest navigable passage in the world. Oil prices spiking in pre-market trading. The Gulf states on the line. The Israeli Prime Minister’s office on hold.

Newsom says: Put the Prime Minister through.

The call is controlled and furious and conducted in the careful language of two governments that have stopped fully trusting each other and have not yet decided how to say so publicly. The Israeli side does not say everything it needs to say on this line. What it communicates, in the deliberate ellipses of diplomatic crisis, is enough.

There were Israeli forces on that vessel.

Newsom’s chief of staff, Andrea Okafor, is watching him. Salazar is watching him. Four other people in the room are watching him with the particular stillness of people who have just understood the full shape of something.

He tells the Prime Minister that the United States will provide a full accounting.

He hangs up.

The room is quiet in the way that rooms are quiet when everyone is waiting for the person with the most to lose to speak first.

He asks, very calmly: Did anyone in this building know there was an Israeli operation on that vessel?

The answers, when assembled from the careful non-answers that professionals give when they are protecting themselves and their institution simultaneously, amount to this: there was an intelligence note. Filed by an analyst. Seventy-one hours before the strike. It was in the system. It was classified as inconclusive.

Newsom asks: Did the system account for it?

Salazar says: The system weighted it below the operational threshold.

And who decided what the threshold was?

Nobody answers immediately.

Because the answer is: the system. And the system was built by a contractor. And the contractor’s deployment parameters were set by the previous administration’s NSC framework. And this administration adopted that framework — intact, unreviewed, because reviewing it would have required a process that nobody had the political bandwidth for, and the system had performed within parameters on eleven previous operations, and the operational need in the corridor was real and urgent and the framework was already there.

How many people on the humanitarian vessel?

Salazar checks. He looks up. Still unclear. Estimates between one-forty and one-eighty.

Iranian?

Mostly.

Newsom looks at the screens for a while.

He has authorized military operations before. This is not his first time in this room with bad outcomes assembling themselves on screens. He knows the weight of it and he does not romanticize the weight of it, because romanticizing it is a way of not fully feeling it, and he has always thought that not fully feeling it is a trap.

He feels it now.

What he also feels — and this is the thing he cannot say in this room, cannot say to Okafor, cannot say to Salazar, will not fully say to himself until much later — is the shape of the accountability void opening beneath him. He cannot explain the targeting decision without implicating the system. He cannot explain the system without implicating the framework. He cannot explain the framework without implicating his own adoption of it. He cannot discuss the Israeli dimension without a diplomatic rupture. He cannot tell the full truth about what the AI decided because the AI’s logic is not fully reconstructable in a form that a press conference can handle.

He cannot tell the full truth because the full truth requires explaining a decision that no human fully made.

How long until we need a statement?

His communications director says forty-five minutes.

He nods. He asks for a coffee. He looks at the screens. The fires are still burning on the satellite feed — orange and white against the dark water, remarkably beautiful from altitude, the way catastrophes often are.

Forty-five minutes.

NEW YORK TIMES | October 17, 2029 — 10:15 EST White House: U.S. military conducted “targeted, authorized operation” in Hormuz; investigation underway into tanker damage
WASHINGTON POST | October 17, 2029 — 10:44 EST Oil prices surge 40% in early trading as Hormuz closure confirmed; Goldman Sachs warns of “historic supply shock”
FOX NEWS DIGITAL | October 17, 2029 — 11:02 EST HOSTAGES DEAD: American aid workers killed in Hormuz explosion; White House silent on details
HAARETZ (ENGLISH EDITION) | October 17, 2029 — 18:30 local IDF silent on Hormuz incident; defense ministry sources describe “serious communication failure with U.S. command”

IV. PRESCOTT

Senate Majority Leader’s Office. U.S. Capitol. October 17, 2029. 11:30 EST.

Senator Dale Prescott of Missouri is on his fourth call of the morning, and the calls keep getting better.

His caucus is furious in the specific way that a political caucus is furious when an opponent has handed them something large and clean and undeniable. Three supertankers. The Strait closed. The hostages dead. A Democratic president who authorized an operation that has destabilized the global oil supply and cannot fully explain what he authorized or why the system made the decision it made.

Carolyn Voss, his chief of staff, has three draft response documents on the table in front of him. She has arranged them by escalation level. This is one of the things he values about her: she understands that the choice of weapon is as important as the decision to fight.

He reads through them with the focused attention of someone who has been doing this for twenty-three years and knows exactly what each option costs and what it buys.

Option one is the constitutionally serious move: a joint resolution demanding full disclosure, threatening to cut off operational funding pending an independent review of the AI targeting framework, and calling for the formal expiration of the 2027 authorization. It would do real structural damage. It would force a genuine reckoning with executive war authority.

He sets it aside.

He sets it aside because Senator James Whitfield of Texas is going to be the Republican presidential nominee in 2032, and Prescott has spent three years building the conditions for that nomination, and Whitfield is going to need the executive war authority that Newsom is currently holding. A framework that Prescott constrains in 2029 becomes the cage that Whitfield operates in from 2033. Prescott does not intend to build that cage. He intends to move into it.

Option two is the productive middle: a resolution expressing grave concern, demanding public accountability, calling for a select committee investigation with full subpoena power. Maximum noise. No actual structural consequence. The subpoenas run into litigation. The litigation runs eighteen months. The news cycle moves. The executive authority is untouched. Prescott gets to be outraged and responsible simultaneously, which is the only tone that plays in the current environment.

He taps option two.

Then he reads option three: joint press conference with Whitfield today, expressions of outrage, calls for accountability, a demand that Newsom appear before Congress, nothing specific about what accountability would actually look like.

He looks at Voss. Why did you give me three?

She says: Because you like having three.

He almost smiles.

Set up the press conference. Get Whitfield’s people on the phone. He stands, reaching for his jacket. What’s the humanitarian count?

Voss checks her tablet. Still unclear. The vessel they’re calling Al-Salam IV — somewhere between one-forty and one-eighty. Mostly Iranian.

Prescott nods slowly. Mostly Iranian. He turns the phrase over once, the way you test a floorboard before putting your full weight on it.

He picks up his prepared remarks. The humanitarian count doesn’t change the press conference. If anything, the Iranian civilian toll complicates the sympathetic framing — the American hostages are the story he can use. The Iranian civilians are the story that requires more careful management.

He is not a callous man. He has three children and he sat with his wife through her cancer treatment four years ago and he has cried at funerals. He knows that one hundred and forty or one hundred and eighty Iranian civilians dying in a humanitarian corridor is a tragedy of a particular kind — the kind where people had already lost nearly everything and lost the rest of it in the worst possible way.

He also knows that the political structure of this moment does not have a mechanism for that tragedy and his press conference. They live in separate registers. He operates in one of them.

He walks toward the door. Outside, the Capitol dome is bright in the late-morning sun.

Let’s go.

POLITICO | October 17, 2029 — 13:15 EST Prescott calls Hormuz incident “catastrophic failure of leadership”; demands Newsom appear before Senate
THE HILL | October 17, 2029 — 13:44 EST AOC war powers committee announces emergency session; Speaker says “serious constitutional questions must be answered”
CNN | October 17, 2029 — 14:20 EST White House pushes back on congressional pressure: “This is a time for unity, not political opportunism”
TWITTER / X | October 17, 2029 — trending #HormusCatastrophe · #GasPrice · #WhoApprovedThis · #AOCvsNewsom

V. AOC

Speaker’s Office. U.S. Capitol. October 17, 2029. 15:00 EST.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has been on the phone with her caucus for three hours, and the calls have sorted themselves into categories with the grim efficiency of triage.

The first category: members who want her to go after Newsom hard. To use the moment. To make the structural argument she has been making for eighteen months in a setting where the public is finally paying attention.

The second category: members who are terrified that going after Newsom hard means handing Prescott a midterm narrative, fracturing the caucus six months before filing deadlines, and spending the next cycle relitigating this hearing instead of building toward something.

The third category is smaller and quieter. These are the members who have read the background briefings her staff assembled this morning — the ones who understand that what happened in the Strait was not primarily a story about Newsom’s judgment or Prescott’s opportunism. It is a story about a system that made a decision no human fully authorized, in a framework no Congress properly reviewed, producing consequences that no accountability structure is equipped to address.

These members know that the constitutional question is real. They also know that real constitutional questions are the hardest kind to answer in an election year.

Miguel Santos, her chief of staff, is standing at the window with his hands in his pockets. He has said almost nothing in the last hour. When Santos goes quiet, it means he has reached a conclusion he is not sure how to say.

She asks him to say it.

He turns from the window. He is careful with the words, the way he always is when he thinks the words matter: If you push this the way the merits require — the full investigation, the AI targeting framework, the authorization question, the contractor — you are running an impeachment-adjacent process against a Democratic president eighteen months before the midterms. Prescott uses you as cover. Your caucus fractures. And at the end of it, the Republican Senate doesn’t pass anything structural anyway, so the executive authority remains intact and you’ve spent your relationships for nothing.

She is quiet.

And if I don’t push it?

Santos doesn’t answer. That’s its own answer.

She stands up. She walks to the window. Outside, past the dome and the grounds and the steady flow of staffers crossing the plaza, Washington is conducting its ordinary business in the middle of an extraordinary day, which is the only way Washington knows how to conduct itself.

An AI system assigned a probability score to a vessel in a humanitarian corridor. A commanding officer approved a strike in twenty-three seconds. Three supertankers are gone. A hundred and forty or a hundred and eighty Iranian civilians are dead — we don’t even have a real number yet. Eleven Israeli special forces operators are dead. The hostages are dead. The president cannot fully explain what the system decided because the system cannot explain itself. She pauses. That is the argument I have been making for eighteen months. That is exactly what I said would happen.

She turns back to Santos.

If I don’t push it, it happened. And next time the confidence score is ninety-one. And the time after that, it’s eighty-eight. And every time we don’t push it, we are agreeing, collectively, that no one is responsible for what the framework produces.

Santos nods. He has known her long enough to know when she has already made the decision and is reasoning toward it, and when she is genuinely uncertain. He does not always know which is better.

Get Newsom’s chief of staff on the phone, she says. I want to give them one opportunity to cooperate before we go to subpoenas. Full disclosure on the targeting framework, the contractor’s pre-deployment assessment, the authorization trail.

She already knows what the answer will be.

She picks up from her desk a bound document — the preliminary report of her war powers select committee. Eighteen months of work. Meticulous sourcing. The clearest case for Article I reform assembled in a generation. She looks at the cover.

She has been waiting for the moment when the structural argument becomes undeniable. She thought, when that moment came, it would feel like an opening.

It feels like a trap.

NEW YORK TIMES | October 22, 2029 Hormuz death toll revised to 247: includes 11 Israeli commandos, 3 American hostages, 31 merchant sailors, 140+ Iranian civilians; full count pending
WASHINGTON POST | October 23, 2029 Newsom addresses nation: “Authorized operation” struck known hostile command node; condolences for civilians; vows investigation
ASSOCIATED PRESS | October 24, 2029 Gas prices hit $6.40 national average as Hormuz closure enters seventh day; White House announces emergency petroleum reserve release
HAARETZ | October 25, 2029 Israel formally protests U.S. strike to State Department; demands accountability for IDF operator deaths; diplomatic sources describe “lowest point in alliance in decades”
DEFENSE ONE | October 26, 2029 Pentagon declines to identify AI system used in Hormuz targeting decision; cites “operational security”; contractor identity not disclosed

VI. NASRIN

Medical facility. Muscat, Oman. October 25, 2029.

Shirin is in a bed two meters away, sleeping.

Nasrin has been in this room for eight days. She knows its dimensions now the way you know the dimensions of any space you cannot leave — the exact distance from her chair to the window, the particular sound the ventilation makes at night, the way the light changes in the afternoon when the sun comes around to the western side of the building. She has become an expert in this room the way she became an expert in the boat and before that the camp and before that the road north of Ahvaz.

Her mother is not in this room.

A woman from a humanitarian organization comes in the afternoon to take a preliminary account. She is kind. She has patient eyes and a tablet and good Farsi, and Nasrin answers her questions carefully, the way she has learned to answer all official questions — accurately but without the parts that would require explanation she doesn’t have the energy for.

What time did the explosion occur. Where was the vessel. How many people were aboard. Did you see any military aircraft. Did you receive any warning.

At some point the woman asks: Did you notice anything unusual in the hours before the explosion?

Nasrin tells her about the dark vessel. She describes it as precisely as she can — its size, relative to the tankers, its running lights off, the way it moved with clear intention between the second and third tanker in the formation. She had been awake. She had been at the rail. The time had been approximately 03:40. It had moved for approximately thirty seconds before disappearing behind the tanker bulk.

The woman types carefully.

Is that important?

The woman looks up. I don’t know. I’ll include it in the report.

Who will read the report?

The UN special rapporteur’s office initially. Potentially congressional investigators if formal proceedings are opened.

Nasrin nods. She looks at Shirin sleeping. The sleep of a child is a specific thing — total, absolute, a commitment to unconsciousness that adults lose at some point and mostly never recover. Shirin has had nightmares. She will probably have more. But right now she is simply and completely asleep, and Nasrin watches her the way she has been watching her since the explosion, which is the way you watch something you nearly lost.

My mother was sixty-one years old, Nasrin says. She taught primary school for thirty years. She retired the year before the fighting started. She was afraid of the water. She pauses. She came on this boat because I told her it would be safer than the land route.

The woman writes that down.

She thanks Nasrin and leaves.

The room is quiet. Through the window, Nasrin can see a harbor. Ordinary boats on ordinary water, moving with the ordinary unhurried purpose of boats that have somewhere to be and every expectation of arriving. She cannot look at water without something in her chest going wrong now. She wonders if that will stop. She suspects it will not, not fully, not the way it was before, but she is also aware that the way it was before is a category that no longer applies to most things.

She watches Shirin sleep.

CNN | November 1, 2029 AOC war powers committee announces public hearings on Hormuz incident; subpoenas issued for NSC officials, Pentagon AI program directors
POLITICO | November 2, 2029 White House signals “limited cooperation” with House investigation; cites executive privilege on targeting system details
FOX NEWS DIGITAL | November 3, 2029 Prescott: “AOC using dead Americans to score constitutional points against her own president”
THE ATLANTIC | November 4, 2029 The Hormuz Hearings Won’t Tell Us What We Need To Know — And That’s The Point

VII. CHEN

Naval Station Bahrain. November 3, 2029.

She has been formally notified that she will testify.

The Navy’s JAG office has assigned her counsel — a thorough lieutenant commander named Reyes who has already explained, in the measured language of institutional protection, that the investigation is focused on systemic and framework-level questions rather than individual officer conduct. Chen understands what that means. The institution is protecting her. She understands also what it is protecting itself from.

She is alone now, in her quarters, with Webb’s note on the screen in front of her.

She has read it perhaps forty times. She has it memorized. She knows that the note was inconclusive. She knows that her decision was consistent with protocol. She knows that the confidence score was 94%, that eleven prior operations had cleared at 94% or above without incident, that the operational window was closing, that the extraction team was staged, that the hostages had been held for eleven days and their families had been on television and the political pressure was real and the pressure was real for reasons she understood and did not dismiss.

She knows that every procedural element of her approval was correct.

She also knows — and this is the thing she has not said to Reyes and has not said to anyone, the thing that she carries with the particular weight of things that have no proper recipient — what the last two seconds felt like.

Not the twenty-three seconds. The last two.

Before the system, before confidence scores and behavioral modeling and probability thresholds, a commander’s instinct was a named thing. It was data, in its own category. You were trained to recognize it and trained to examine it and trained to understand that it was not infallible but neither was it noise. It was the accumulated pattern recognition of years in the field, surfacing in a form that could not always be articulated but could always be felt.

She felt it. The door not quite level in its frame. The slight wrongness of the hang.

She authorized anyway. Because the feeling was not data in any category the system recognized. Because protocol said 94% was sufficient. Because the window was closing. Because the system had been right eleven times.

She was not wrong to trust the system. She was not negligent. She was a skilled officer making a reasonable decision under time pressure with imperfect information, which is the only kind of decision military officers make, which is the condition that the system was designed to support.

The system supported her correctly.

Two hundred and forty-seven people are dead.

She closes the note. She will testify truthfully. Everything she did was within parameters. She will say that clearly and she will mean it and both of those things will be true and she will look at her hands afterward.

She closes her laptop. She looks out the small window at the base lights and the dark water beyond them. The water here is the same water. She knows this geographically and she does not let herself think about it.

She goes to bed. She lies in the dark for a long time.

DEFENSE ONE | November 8, 2029 Pentagon confirms AI system used in Hormuz was built by Palantir subsidiary; system operating under 2027 framework adopted by Newsom administration
ASSOCIATED PRESS | November 9, 2029 Contractor confirms system “performed within specified parameters”; declines further comment pending litigation
NEW YORK TIMES | November 10, 2029 Documents show AI flagged 94% confidence score despite unresolved analyst note; Pentagon says note was “appropriately weighted”
WALL STREET JOURNAL — EDITORIAL | November 11, 2029 The Hormuz hearings are about one thing: Democrats trying to constrain American military capability in an era of great-power competition. Don’t let them.

VIII. NEWSOM

The Oval Office. November 11, 2029. Evening.

The hearing is in three days.

Newsom sits across from Secretary of Defense Linda Park and Salazar. The White House counsel has been in and out. The terms of the administration’s cooperation with AOC’s committee have been under negotiation for two weeks, and the current offer — Park testifies, the targeting system architecture is covered by executive privilege, the contractor’s personnel do not appear, Chen testifies on operational decisions only, the Israeli dimension is classified and off the table — has been rejected.

AOC’s staff has said the committee will not accept those terms.

He asks Park, directly — not for the briefing document, not for the version that has been cleared by the lawyers — what actually happened. The real version.

Park is quiet for a moment. Then she tells him.

The system was undertrained on maritime civilian traffic patterns in post-conflict corridors. This was a documented limitation — documented in the contractor’s own pre-deployment assessment, filed with the Department of Defense, prior to operational approval. The training data set did not adequately account for the specific behavioral signatures of mixed civilian and military traffic in degraded maritime environments. The limitation was flagged. It was assessed as acceptable risk given the operational context and the system’s strong performance in more controlled environments. Deployment was approved.

The Israeli operation fell into exactly the edge case the limitation created. A special forces insertion running dark in a complex maritime corridor — precisely the scenario the system’s training data had not fully modeled. The anomalous movement patterns that Webb had flagged were the signature of that gap.

Newsom asks: Who approved deployment with that limitation?

Park: The previous administration’s NSC framework established the deployment criteria. We adopted the framework.

Did we know about the limitation when we adopted it?

It was in the technical appendix.

The room is quiet.

He looks at the ceiling for a moment. He has a particular habit, under pressure, of looking at the ceiling — not for inspiration, just for the brief relief of looking at something that makes no demands.

If I tell the committee that — the limitation, the known gap, the technical appendix — what happens?

Salazar answers, because it is the kind of question that Salazar answers: The constitutional question becomes unavoidable. How did a system with a documented limitation in exactly the operational context where it was deployed get authorized under a framework that Congress never reviewed? That’s a question AOC cannot unsee. It’s a question Prescott cannot use for pure theater anymore, because the answer implicates the previous administration he’s trying to rehabilitate.

And it implicates this one.

Yes.

Newsom nods slowly. He has known, since the Situation Room on the seventeenth, that this conversation was coming. He has been preparing for it the way you prepare for something you cannot fully prepare for.

He thinks about the hundred and forty or one hundred and eighty Iranian civilians, the number that is still not final, still being assembled from incomplete manifests and survivor accounts and bodies that have not all been recovered. He thinks about Webb’s note. He thinks about the technical appendix that was in the file that his NSC adopted. He thinks about the feeling he had, early on the morning of the seventeenth, when it was clear what had happened and he asked who had known and the answer assembled itself into a shape that had no clean address.

He thinks about what telling the truth would require him to say about a decision that no human fully made.

We defend the framework, he says. We say the system performed correctly within its parameters. We say the Israeli communication failure was a bilateral issue under diplomatic review. We say we will conduct a thorough review of operational protocols. He pauses. We do not discuss the technical appendix.

Park and Salazar are both very still.

We do not discuss it because it is covered by executive privilege on the grounds of operational security. He looks at Park. Make sure our counsel has that framing ready.

He stands up. He walks to the window. The South Lawn is lit, the fountains running, the ordinary maintenance of the ordinary appearance of the executive branch continuing as it always does.

Get me a coffee. He turns back to the room. I’ll review the testimony parameters in the morning.

The lights in the Oval Office are warm. Outside, it is already dark.

NEW YORK TIMES | November 14, 2029 Hormuz Hearings Begin Today: What We Know, What Remains Classified, What May Never Be Answered
CNN | November 14, 2029 — 07:30 EST AOC enters hearing room as protesters gather outside Capitol; Prescott calls proceedings “political theater”
ASSOCIATED PRESS | November 14, 2029 — 08:45 EST Gas prices fall slightly as Hormuz reopens to limited traffic; analysts warn full recovery months away
TWITTER / X | November 14, 2029 — trending #HormutzHearings · #WhoIsResponsible · #247Dead · #ConfidenceScore

IX. AOC

House Armed Services Committee Hearing Room. November 14, 2029. 10:00 EST.

Secretary of Defense Linda Park sits at the witness table.

She is composed. She has been composed in the way of people who have prepared very thoroughly for a very difficult day, which is to say she has the composure of someone who knows exactly which questions are coming and has exact answers for them that are exactly accurate and exactly insufficient.

In the gallery behind her: reporters, staffers, two members of the public who got tickets through their representatives’ offices. In the seats to AOC’s left and right: committee members, some of whom will ask useful questions and some of whom will use their five minutes to perform for their districts. Along the wall: two Republican Senate observers, sent by Prescott, present but not participating. Watching.

AOC begins methodically. She works through the operational timeline from the beginning. She establishes each element — the targeting system, the confidence score, the analyst’s note, the approval — with the care of someone laying a foundation that has to hold weight. She is not grandstanding. She is building.

The gallery watches.

Secretary Park, who decided to deploy a targeting system that could not account for a friendly-force insertion by an allied military operating in the same corridor?

Park: The operational framework governing system deployment was developed under established review protocols and approved at the appropriate level.

I’m asking who decided.

The National Security Council, in consultation with relevant commanders and the contractor, determined that the system met operational requirements.

Did that determination account for the limitation documented in the contractor’s own pre-deployment assessment — specifically, the system’s reduced accuracy in post-conflict maritime corridors with mixed civilian and military traffic?

A pause. Brief. Practiced.

The pre-deployment assessment was reviewed as part of the approval process.

I’m not asking whether it was reviewed. I’m asking whether the decision to deploy accounted for the limitation it documented.

The system was assessed as meeting operational requirements.

AOC looks at her notes. Then she looks up.

Secretary Park, I’m going to ask you a direct question and I would like a direct answer. Did Congress authorize the deployment of this system?

Congress has not restricted the operational framework under which the system was deployed.

That’s not what I asked. Did Congress authorize it?

The operational framework was developed under executive authority consistent with the 2027 authorization.

The 2027 authorization that expired in August of 2028 pending renewal, which this Congress has not voted on?

The administration’s legal counsel has determined that the operational framework remains valid under—

AOC sets down her pen.

She does not raise her voice. The room is quiet enough that she doesn’t need to.

Two hundred and forty-seven people are dead, Secretary Park. The Strait of Hormuz was closed for eleven days. Eleven allied intelligence operators are dead because an AI system couldn’t account for a friendly-force insertion that an ally did not communicate clearly. A hundred and forty-plus Iranian civilians on a humanitarian vessel are dead because the system flagged their vessel as anomalous and it was inside the blast radius. And the answer to who is responsible is: the framework.

She pauses.

The framework is responsible. The framework has no face. It cannot be held accountable. It cannot be charged. It cannot testify. It cannot explain itself. That is not a coincidence. That is the design. Another pause. And every time we accept “the framework” as a complete answer — every time we allow the accountability structure to point at a system rather than a person, at a parameter rather than a decision, at operational security rather than democratic review — we are agreeing, collectively, that this is acceptable. That no one is responsible for what the framework produces.

She looks at her notes.

I’d like to move to the question of the humanitarian vessel.

The two Republican Senate observers along the wall are very still.

Park’s composure has not changed. She is still composed, which is its own answer.

The cameras are still running.

The hearing will continue for four more hours. It will produce testimony that is careful and accurate and incomplete. It will produce no legislation. It will produce, within the week, a motion to dismiss the subpoenas filed against the contractor’s personnel, citing executive privilege and operational security. The motion will be litigated for fourteen months.

AOC will ask every question that needs to be asked.

The framework will hold.

NEW YORK TIMES | November 14, 2029 — evening edition Hormuz Hearing Produces Pointed Exchanges But Few Answers; Administration Defends Framework; Legislation Seen As Unlikely
POLITICO | November 15, 2029 War powers reform bill dies in Senate committee; Prescott says “not the time for constraints on American security capabilities”
ASSOCIATED PRESS | November 16, 2029 Newsom approval at 38% amid Hormuz fallout; White House says “focused on recovery, not polls”
UN HUMAN RIGHTS OFFICE | November 20, 2029 Preliminary report on Hormuz incident documents 140 civilian deaths on humanitarian vessel Al-Salam IV; calls for independent international investigation; U.S. “notes the report with concern”
DEFENSE ONE | November 22, 2029 Pentagon announces expanded deployment of AI-enabled targeting systems across Gulf theater; officials cite “operational necessity and competitive requirements”

X. NASRIN

Refugee processing center. Dubai. December 2029.

There is a form.

This is not unusual. There have been many forms since October, and Nasrin has filled out all of them with the careful attention she brings to tasks that she cannot afford to do incorrectly. She has learned that forms are serious things. That incomplete forms produce delays and delays produce a specific kind of suffering that is different from but not better than the other kinds.

This form has a field that asks for the primary cause of the displacement event.

There is a dropdown menu. The options are:

Armed Conflict. Natural Disaster. Political Persecution. Economic Hardship. Other.

She looks at the options for a long time.

She thinks about the dark vessel she saw at 03:40 in the morning, moving between the tankers with the efficient purposefulness of something that knew where it was going. She thinks about the woman from the humanitarian organization who typed it into her tablet and said she didn’t know if it was important. She thinks about the confidence score she has since learned about — 94%, the number that appeared in the news reports, the number that was above the operational threshold, the number that cleared eleven prior operations. She thinks about the twenty-three seconds and what they contained.

She thinks about her mother.

She selects Armed Conflict.

She moves to the next field.

On the other side of the processing room, Shirin is drawing on a piece of paper. A house. A tree. A sun in the upper right corner — the place children always put the sun, as if the sun has a preferred corner and everyone knows which one it is. Shirin draws with total concentration, the tip of her tongue appearing at the corner of her mouth the way it has since she was four years old and first understood that drawing was a thing you could do.

She is drawing what she wants rather than what she has.

Nasrin watches her for a moment.

She finishes the form. She hands it to the caseworker. She folds her hands in her lap and waits, because waiting is the primary activity now, and she has become very good at it.

CLOSING

The Strait of Hormuz reopened to full commercial traffic on November 4, 2029, eighteen days after the incident. Shipping insurance premiums in the corridor have been permanently adjusted upward. They are not expected to return to pre-incident levels.

The AI targeting system at the center of the incident was updated in December 2029 with additional training data for post-conflict maritime corridor environments. According to the contractor’s update documentation, the system’s accuracy in mixed civilian-military traffic scenarios improved by eleven percentage points. The updated system was certified for operational deployment under the existing framework.

It has since been deployed in three additional theaters.

Analyst Marcus Webb requested a transfer to a different posting in November. His transfer was approved. His note remains in the system as a closed record, classified at the appropriate level.

Commander Sarah Chen was formally cleared of misconduct in January 2030. She requested a shore assignment. It was granted.

The Israeli government and the United States government issued a joint statement in December 2029 expressing commitment to enhanced communication protocols for allied operations in shared theaters. The statement was two paragraphs.

The three American hostages were buried in November 2029. Their families filed a wrongful death action against the United States government in January 2030. The suit names the operational framework. It does not name a person. The government’s motion to dismiss is pending on grounds of sovereign immunity.

The UN report on the Al-Salam IV was noted with concern by nineteen nations and the United States. It has not been acted on.

A pharmacy on the corner of Imam Khomeini Boulevard in Ahvaz that was owned by a woman named Nasrin Moradi was destroyed in the fighting of 2027. It does not appear in any damage assessment filed with any international body. It was, by the accounts of people who used it, a good pharmacy. The afternoon light came through the western window in a particular way.

The Strait of Hormuz is open.

The systems are running.

Lawrence Winnerman writes at the intersection of governance, technology, culture, and long-range systems thinking. His work examines how institutional drift, executive power, and accelerating technologies reshape democratic sovereignty in the twenty-first century.

Through The Hinge, The Near Field, and the serialized science fiction series The Shattered World, he explores how power consolidates, how systems fracture, and how citizens can reassert meaningful participation in the structures that govern their lives.

The Near Field is speculative fiction grounded in the structural arguments of The Hinge essays. The previous installments — “Acceleration, Sovereignty, and the Future of Democratic Power” and “At Machine Speed” — are available in the Hinge archive.

At Machine Speed: Artificial Intelligence, Military Decision-Making, and the Removal of Human Judgment

Lawrence Winnerman — Mon, 09 Mar 2026 17:30:08 GMT

by Lawrence Winnerman

On January 10, 2024, OpenAI published a quietly revised set of usage policies.

There was no press conference. No congressional testimony. No public debate about one of the most consequential technology decisions in recent memory. There was a document—terms of service, the kind of thing almost no one reads—and in that document, a notable absence.

Gone was the explicit prohibition on using OpenAI’s systems for “military and warfare” applications.

In its place: a commitment to work with national security institutions “in ways that are responsible and beneficial.”

That sentence is doing enormous work.

No president announced this shift. No authorization was debated and passed. No Article I deliberation preceded it. A corporation updated its policies. A phrase was removed. And the most powerful AI systems in the world became available to the apparatus of American military force—not through democratic process, but through the quiet revision of a paragraph.

This is how the hinge turns. Not in spectacle. Not in declaration. In a terms of service update on a Tuesday.

The President’s announcement that the United States was at war with Iran—standing before cameras on February 28, 2026, with no declaration, no AUMF, pure executive action—revealed a decades-long drift in war powers that this publication examined in its first essay. That moment was the culmination of a slow institutional migration.

What OpenAI’s policy revision revealed was something different: not the migration of authority from one branch to another, but the migration of judgment itself—from human beings to machines.

These two forces are not parallel. They are convergent.

And where they meet is the end of the question.

Warfare has always evolved toward the capacity to kill more people, at longer range, more quickly. That is not a moral statement. It is an observation about the consistent direction of military technology across centuries. Each leap in that direction has also been a compression—of distance, of time, of the space between decision and consequence.

The question each technological leap has forced is the same: who controls the speed?

Gunpowder extended the range of killing and accelerated the tempo of battle. Armies reorganized around the new weapon’s logic. But the decisions—where to advance, when to fire, when to retreat—remained with human commanders in the field. The chain of command was intact. Deliberation was possible, if slow.

The telegram accelerated command-and-control in the nineteenth century. Generals could receive orders faster. But the orders still came from humans, issued to humans, executed by humans. The loop remained human throughout.

The mechanization and air power of the twentieth century changed the calculus dramatically. Aircraft made it possible to project lethal force at distances and speeds that outpaced traditional ground command. Nuclear weapons compressed the calculus to its logical extreme.

Here is the moment where the loop begins to close.

At the height of the Cold War, a Soviet ICBM had a flight time of roughly thirty minutes from launch to American soil. A president—if alerted in time, if the intelligence was reliable, if the chain of command functioned—had perhaps twelve minutes to decide whether to launch a retaliatory strike. Twelve minutes to make the most consequential decision in human history. Twelve minutes for what the Constitution imagined as a deliberative process.

The institutional response was delegation and pre-authorization. Launch-on-warning protocols. Fail-safe procedures. The president retained nominal authority, but the systems were designed to function at speeds that made human deliberation a courtesy, not a guarantee.

Then came the moment that should live in permanent memory as a monument to what human hesitation is worth.

On September 26, 1983, a Soviet satellite early-warning system reported an inbound American nuclear strike. The duty officer at the Soviet monitoring station was Lieutenant Colonel Stanislav Petrov. The system indicated one missile, then four more. The protocols said to report upward immediately. Reporting upward would almost certainly trigger a retaliatory launch.

Petrov decided the alert was a false alarm. He was right. It was a glitch caused by sunlight reflecting off clouds.

His deviation from protocol is estimated to have prevented nuclear war.

The thin line between civilization and annihilation, in that moment, was a human being choosing to hesitate.

The drone warfare era that followed preserved the nominal appearance of human judgment while quietly hollowing it out. American drone strikes required legal authorization, intelligence review, a chain of approvals. Lawyers were sometimes in the room. The kill chain—find, fix, track, target, engage, assess—had human checkpoints at each step.

But “human checkpoints” covers a wide range. A checkpoint can be a genuine deliberative review. It can also be a commander approving a strike in sixty seconds based on a targeting package assembled by analysts who were working from satellite imagery processed by software they didn’t fully understand. The human is present. Whether the human is deciding is a different question.

This is the distinction that artificial intelligence makes impossible to ignore.

The kill chain is not a metaphor. It is the operational sequence through which modern military force is applied: find the target, fix its location, track its movement, execute the targeting decision, engage, and assess the result. In the pre-AI era, each step involved human beings making contextual judgments. Those judgments were compressed, constrained, often rushed—but they were human.

AI does not replace the kill chain. It accelerates every step of it below the threshold of meaningful human review.

Consider the system the Israeli Defense Forces deployed in Gaza beginning in 2023, known internally as “Lavender.” Investigative reporting by +972 Magazine and Local Call, based on testimony from Israeli intelligence officers, described a system that generated targeting lists by assigning probability scores to Palestinian men—scores reflecting the system’s assessment of whether a given individual was affiliated with militant organizations. Scores of 90 or above were treated, in practice, as authorization to strike.

Officers described approving strikes in as little as twenty seconds. Not twenty seconds to review a target—twenty seconds to confirm a machine’s recommendation before the engagement window closed.

The human remained nominally in the loop. The human was approving strikes faster than most people read a paragraph.

This is not the removal of human oversight in form. It is the removal of human oversight in fact.

And it introduces an accountability structure—or rather the collapse of one—that democratic institutions are not equipped to address.

When a strike causes civilian casualties, when a targeting decision violates the laws of war, when an engagement produces a war crime, the question of responsibility has historically had a human address. A commander made the call. A policy authorized it. A president ordered the mission. Accountability has always been difficult to enforce, but it has had an identifiable shape.

With AI-enabled systems, the shape dissolves.

Was it the algorithm, which generated the score? The programmer, who designed the weighting system? The commanding officer, who authorized the deployment of the system? The executive branch, which approved the operational framework? The AI firm, which built the model and accepted the contract?

The answer is: all of them and none of them. Which means, in practice, accountability becomes diffuse to the point of disappearing—not through bad faith, but through the genuine complexity of distributed decision-making at machine speed.

That is not a bug. That is the structural condition.

And there is a second problem, quieter and more fundamental than accountability.

The systems making these decisions are, in the technical sense, opaque. Large language models and machine learning systems do not produce reasoning that can be audited the way a human commander’s decision memo can be audited. They produce outputs. The inputs that generated those outputs are often reconstructable in theory and inaccessible in practice.

A president who authorizes the deployment of an AI targeting system cannot, when called before a congressional committee (imagine!), explain *why* the system made a specific decision. Not because the president is hiding something. Because the system cannot explain itself. Because the model’s internal logic—the weighted connections across billions of parameters — does not translate into language that congressional oversight can evaluate.

This matters enormously.

Congressional oversight of military operations has always been imperfect. Hinge #2 traced how imperfect. But the imperfection existed within a system that assumed, at a minimum, that decisions were made by humans who could articulate their reasoning. Oversight could be evaded, precedent could be exploited, accountability could be diffused—but the decision structure was, in principle, explicable.

AI-enabled warfare removes that assumption.

And once you remove it, you are not talking about executive overreach anymore.

You are talking about something beyond the reach of democratic accountability entirely.

Technology does not deploy itself.

This is the point that gets lost in discussions of AI and warfare that frame the issue as inevitable, as the natural consequence of technological progress, as something that was always going to happen. It was not always going to happen. It required choices. Specific institutional choices, made by specific organizations, in response to specific incentive structures.

And for a brief window, those choices were genuinely open.

In 2018, Google’s employees forced a public reckoning. The company had signed a contract with the Department of Defense—Project Maven—to apply machine learning to the analysis of drone surveillance footage. Nearly four thousand Google employees signed a letter protesting the contract. Twelve resigned. The public pressure was sufficient that Google declined to renew the contract when it expired.

The significance of that moment is not that Google walked away. It is that walking away was possible.

It was possible because AI development, in 2018, was concentrated in civilian technology firms that had not been built as defense contractors. They had general-purpose technology, civilian customer bases, and reputational interests that made weaponization costly. The choice—integrate into the military apparatus, or refuse—was genuinely available.

That window remained open for several more years.

Anthropic, founded in 2021 by former members of OpenAI, built explicit restrictions on weapons applications into its acceptable use policies. The reasoning, stated and implicit, was not simply reputational. It was that general-purpose AI systems deployed for targeting and lethal force would be, in the fullness of time, unrecoverable. That the implications for human agency were of a different order than other dual-use technologies. That some choices, once made at scale, could not be unmade.

That position held. Anthropic has not contracted to develop AI for weapons targeting systems. That refusal is real. It is principled. It represents a genuine institutional choice to stay outside the apparatus.

And it is not enough.

Because OpenAI made the other choice.

On January 10, 2024—with no congressional hearing, no democratic deliberation, no public vote—OpenAI revised its usage policies to permit military and national security applications. The stated rationale involved responsible partnership with national security institutions. The unstated logic was more straightforward: government contracts, competitive pressure, market position, and the difficulty of remaining the only major AI firm declining to work with the most powerful military on earth.

That logic is not cynical. It is the same logic that drove every step of the executive war powers migration that Hinge #1 traced—the logic of incentive structures, not of villainy. Each actor’s individual reasoning is comprehensible. The collective outcome is the removal of human judgment from the decision loop.

And once OpenAI made that choice, Anthropic’s refusal changed in character.

It became a marker of what was possible—proof that the choice existed, that it was not technologically determined, that companies had genuine agency at the moment of decision. That is not a small thing. It matters historically.

But it does not change the operational outcome if the refusal remains isolated. The technology will be deployed. The systems will be built. The kill chains will be compressed. The only question is whether Anthropic participates—and if Anthropic does not participate while its competitors do, then Anthropic’s position is principled and insufficient simultaneously.

This is how the institutional choice becomes the hinge.

Not because a villain seized control. Because the competitive logic of the industry, the incentive structures of the defense contracting ecosystem, and the geopolitical pressure of great-power competition combined to make participation the path of least resistance—and because the decision was made not by democratic institutions accountable to citizens, but by corporate boards accountable to shareholders.

No one voted on this.

There was no debate in Congress about whether private AI firms should be permitted to integrate their systems into military targeting. There was no executive order establishing a framework for how AI capabilities could be licensed to the Department of Defense. There was no public deliberation about what kinds of machine judgment were permissible in the use of lethal force.

There was a terms of service update.

And once the door opened, the pressure on every other firm intensified. Once one major power integrates AI-enabled targeting into its military operations, every other major power faces the accelerating logic: we cannot afford to deliberate while our adversaries act. Once one firm supplies the capability, every other firm is competing in a market that has already decided.

The acceleration becomes self-reinforcing. Not because anyone planned it that way. Because that is the structural logic of arms races and competitive markets operating simultaneously, without democratic friction in the loop.

Return, for a moment, to the argument of Hinge #1.

The migration of war powers from Congress to the executive unfolded over seven decades through a pattern of crisis, delegation, and institutional abdication. Each emergency justified speed. Each exercise of speed expanded precedent. Congress, caught between political incentive and constitutional responsibility, repeatedly chose the former. The result was not a seizure—it was a drift so gradual it was nearly invisible until the announcement of a war with Iran from a single pair of hands.

AI warfare accelerates that drift and adds a new dimension to it.

The drift in Hinge #1 was about political will and institutional incentive. Congress could have reasserted its war powers authority at any number of points. It chose not to. That is a story about human institutions making human choices, however degraded.

AI warfare introduces a problem of a different kind: even if Congress wanted to reassert authority over AI-enabled military operations, it cannot operate at machine speed. The gap between deliberative institutions and the tempo of conflict is no longer a gap that better political will can close. It is a physical constraint.

A drone strike authorized by an AI targeting system and executed in twenty seconds does not leave time for a congressional notification, let alone a hearing. A cyber operation conducted at digital velocity has already unfolded before the relevant subcommittee has convened. A missile defense system making autonomous engagement decisions in the window between radar detection and impact has no mechanism for congressional input.

Executive discretion, in this environment, expands not merely by precedent but by physics.

That is a new thing. It has not been true before in American history. Even the nuclear launch-on-warning problem, as acute as it was, preserved the nominal requirement of presidential authorization. AI-enabled autonomous systems remove even that requirement in certain operational contexts. The human is not bypassed by accident. The human is bypassed by design—because the tempo of conflict has outpaced human reaction time, and the systems are built to function accordingly.

And then there is the accountability question, which compounds with every operational success.

Each AI-enabled action that proceeds without meaningful oversight normalizes the absence of oversight. Each incident that is defended rather than investigated—because the alternative, admitting the system failed or the president cannot explain what the system decided, is politically untenable—forecloses accountability further. The precedent is not established by a single dramatic assertion of authority. It accumulates the same way the war powers migration accumulated: layer by layer, crisis by crisis, fait accompli by fait accompli.

Democratic accountability requires three things: identifiable decision-makers, explicable decisions, and reviewable outcomes.

AI-enabled warfare systematically undermines all three.

Decision-makers are diffuse: the algorithm, the programmer, the commander, the executive. Decisions are often inexplicable: the model’s internal logic does not translate into language that oversight can evaluate. Outcomes are frequently irreversible before review is possible: the strike has already occurred; the target is already dead; the escalation has already begun.

This is not a solvable technical problem in the near term. It is the structural condition of machine-speed warfare deployed through opaque systems—and it will remain the structural condition for as long as democratic institutions attempt to exercise oversight at deliberative speed over military systems operating at machine speed.

The branch that can act quickly acquires structural advantage. Hinge #1 traced how that dynamic played out over seven decades. AI does not merely continue that dynamic. It accelerates it past the point of recoverable equilibrium.

There is a version of this argument that ends in despair, or in technophobia, or in the demand that we simply refuse artificial intelligence entirely—as if the genie could be persuaded to return to the bottle by sufficient moral clarity.

That is not this argument.

The issue is not that AI exists. AI will exist. The issue is not even that AI is applied to military problems—dual-use technology is as old as metallurgy, and no serious analysis pretends otherwise. The issue is the specific institutional choice to deploy AI in systems that remove human judgment from lethal decision-making, at machine speed, without democratic process, without accountability structures capable of operating at that tempo, and without the consent—explicit or implicit—of the citizens whose sovereignty those systems are nominally defending.

That choice was not inevitable.

It was made.

The framers built friction into the constitutional architecture of the United States because they understood something about power and speed. War is the ultimate accelerant. It compresses time, collapses dissent, and expands executive discretion. The branch capable of acting quickly acquires structural advantage. Without friction—without the slowness of deliberation, the inefficiency of legislative coordination, the demand that decisions be explained and justified before they are executed—that advantage compounds into something that does not resemble democratic governance at all.

Acceleration is not inherently anti-democratic. But democratic sovereignty requires that citizens, through representative institutions, retain meaningful agency over the use of force carried out in their name.

Sovereignty is not abstract. It is the capacity to say: this was done in my name, and I had a voice in whether it was done. It is the capacity for citizens to influence, however imperfectly and at whatever remove, the decisions that shape their collective life.

When AI targeting systems compress the kill chain to machine speed, that capacity does not narrow.

It disappears.

Not because a president declared it abolished. Not because Congress voted to surrender it. Because the tempo of conflict outpaced the tempo of consent—and the institutional choices that enabled that outpacing were made by corporate boards and executive agencies without democratic deliberation, in the same quiet, cumulative, individually rational way that war powers migrated from Article I to the Oval Office.

The loop of democratic accountability runs from citizens to representatives to the executive to the military and back. Every link in that chain requires time, deliberation, and the capacity to explain. AI warfare severs those links not through malice, but through speed.

Petrov hesitated. His hesitation saved the world.

The systems we are building are designed not to hesitate.

We are designing out of warfare the very quality—human reluctance, human doubt, human moral friction—that has, on at least one documented occasion, prevented nuclear war. And we are designing it out not through a considered democratic choice about acceptable risk, but through the accumulated logic of competitive pressure, institutional incentive, and corporate terms of service.

The choice was made, mostly quietly, mostly by people who believed they had no choice.

That is how sovereignty ends—not with a declaration, but with a cold logic.

And as the systems spin up and the contracts are signed and the targeting lists are generated at machine speed, the question is not whether we can reverse what has already been set in motion.

The question is whether we are willing to name it.

Lawrence Winnerman writes at the intersection of governance, technology, culture, and long-range systems thinking. His work examines how institutional drift, executive power, and accelerating technologies reshape democratic sovereignty in the twenty-first century.

Through The Hinge, The Near Field, and the serialized science fiction series The Shattered World, he explores how power consolidates, how systems fracture, and how citizens can reassert meaningful participation in the structures that govern their lives.

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Acceleration, Sovereignty, and the Future of Democratic Power

Lawrence Winnerman — Tue, 03 Mar 2026 11:33:14 GMT

In the wee hours of Saturday, February 28^th, the President of the United States stood before the cameras and announced that the United States was at war with Iran.

He did not announce that Congress had declared war. Nor did he announce that a new Authorization for Use of Military Force had been debated and passed. He was also unable to claim weeks of public deliberation in the branch constitutionally vested with the power to declare war, because that never happened.

He announced the Iran action as an executive decision. In doing so, he declared it a war.

In the constitutional architecture of the United States, that sentence should not be possible.

Article I of the Constitution vests the power to declare war in Congress. Article I, as a refresher, defines the nature and powers of Congress first for a reason. In the triumvirate of government branches our founders ordained, they imagined the legislature as the truest, most on-the-pulse-of-the-moment body.

The branches are coequal, yes, but Congress is the first among equals, the most representative.

The framers did not intend for the most consequential decision a republic can make—the commitment of blood and treasure—to rest in a single pair of hands.

Energy was given to the executive. War-making authority was anchored in the legislature.

That was not an aesthetic choice. It was an intentional structural design.

Once upon a time, even Republicans knew this.

War is the ultimate accelerant. It compresses time, it collapses dissent, and it expands executive discretion. To prevent that energy from consuming the republic, the framers placed friction in front of it.

That friction is now treated as an inconvenience. A vestigial remnant of the past that can be ignored at will.

The President’s announcement Saturday night is not an aberration. It is the culmination of a decades-long drift in which Congress has slowly ceded its primacy and the executive branch has steadily absorbed it.

This did not begin with Donald Trump. And it will not end with him.

The slow migration of war power from Congress to the presidency is one of the clearest examples of democratic sovereignty narrowing in an age of acceleration.

And although spurred by ever increasing speed, it unfolded incrementally.

During the Korean War, President Truman committed U.S. troops under the banner of a United Nations “police action,” bypassing a formal declaration of war. Congress appropriated funds, but it did not exercise its constitutional prerogative to declare.

Vietnam escalated under the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution in 1964—a broad authorization passed in the wake of ambiguous events, granting President Johnson sweeping discretion. What followed was not a formally declared war but a prolonged conflict conducted under executive interpretation.

The lesson was clear: broad authorizations could substitute for declarations.

After Vietnam, Congress attempted to reassert control through the War Powers Resolution of 1973. It was an effort to claw back oversight—requiring notification and limiting unauthorized deployments to sixty days absent congressional approval.

Presidents of both parties treated it as advisory.

The Cold War normalized executive secrecy. Covert operations expanded. Military engagements became more modular, more frequent, less formally defined.

Then came 2001.

The Authorization for Use of Military Force passed after September 11 granted the president power to use force against those responsible for the attacks and associated forces. It was intentionally broad. It was emotionally urgent. It was bipartisan.

It has now underwritten military operations for more than two decades, across multiple theaters, under multiple presidents.

In 2002, Congress passed another AUMF authorizing force against Iraq. That authorization extended far beyond the specific regime it targeted. It became a structural permission slip—a precedent for presidents from both sides of the aisle.

From George W. Bush’s global war on terror to Barack Obama’s expanded drone campaigns to Trump’s targeted strikes and Biden’s continued reliance on inherited authorities, presidents have acted within a framework in which congressional declarations of war are functionally obsolete.

Even when Congress repeals old authorizations, new ones fill the vacuum.

The pattern is not dramatic, or new, or even unnoticed. But it is cumulative. An accretion of power onto the Executive layer by layer, like the Devil’s own pearl.

Each crisis justifies speed. Each emergency justifies delegation. Each delegation expands precedent.

Meanwhile, Congress has become structurally polarized and procedurally brittle. Coordination across chambers and parties is slow. Incentives reward messaging over governance. Taking responsibility for war is politically dangerous; allowing the executive to act and responding afterward is often politically safer, even if it is a slo-mo Constitution-killer.

And so Congress drifts from architect to commentator.

This drift in war powers has unfolded alongside another transformation: the elevation of executive leadership as cultural ideal.

Over the past forty years, the CEO has replaced the legislator as archetype of competence. Corporate governance centralized around singular authority. Shareholder capitalism intensified pressure for speed and quarterly performance. “Decisiveness” became virtue. Friction became inefficiency.

Silicon Valley codified the ethos: move fast and break things.

Technology firms optimized for iteration, disruption, scale. Regulation was treated as obstacle. Institutional caution was reframed as lag. Founders were mythologized as visionaries unconstrained by process or tradition.

The cultural message was clear: centralized authority plus speed equals progress.

This ethos did not remain confined to startups.

It reshaped political expectations.

Voters began to look for executives who “get things done.” Legislative compromise appeared weak compared to unilateral action. Cable news rewarded spectacle and immediacy. Social media compressed reaction cycles into minutes.

In this environment, the presidency—singular, media-centric, structurally agile—became the dominant node of political energy.

Congress—plural, argumentative, slow—appeared obsolete.

But slowness was the safeguard.

The Constitution’s architecture assumes friction. It assumes that ambition counteracts ambition. It assumes that deliberation tempers impulse.

Acceleration alters that balance.

When military operations can be launched in hours rather than months, when cyber actions unfold in milliseconds, when financial markets respond to signals faster than oversight can convene, the branch capable of acting quickly acquires structural advantage.

War is no longer only boots on the ground. It is drones, cyber operations, proxy engagements, intelligence actions, targeted strikes. It is modular, distributed, often classified.

And increasingly, it is automated.

We are entering an era in which artificial intelligence systems are integrated into targeting, logistics, and battlefield analysis. Decision-support tools compress timelines further. Autonomous systems reduce human deliberation. The tempo of conflict approaches machine speed.

If war powers have already migrated toward the executive in an analog era, what happens when military systems operate at digital velocity?

If congressional deliberation cannot keep pace with AI-enabled operational cycles, executive discretion expands not merely by precedent but by physics.

This is the hinge.

Acceleration is not inherently anti-democratic. But without parallel expansion of participation and oversight, it erodes democratic sovereignty.

Sovereignty is not abstract nationalism. It is agency—the meaningful capacity of citizens, through representative institutions, to influence the use of force carried out in their name.

When presidents announce wars without declarations, sovereignty narrows.

When AUMFs become perpetual blank checks, sovereignty narrows.

When Congress abdicates difficult votes in favor of executive initiative, sovereignty narrows.

When cultural norms equate speed with strength and friction with failure, sovereignty narrows.

And when AI systems compress war to machine tempo, sovereignty risks becoming ceremonial.

And although Trump provides it in spades, none of this requires villainy. It requires only momentum.

The President’s speech Saturday night did not begin this process. It revealed it.

Article I comes first.

Whether it remains first in practice depends on whether citizens demand that Congress reclaim its structural role—not as a partisan foil, but as a constitutional anchor.

Acceleration rewards consolidation, and democracy requires resistance to that reward.

If we allow executive war-making authority to expand unchecked in an era of machine-speed conflict, we will not wake up one morning to discover that democracy has been abolished.

We will discover that it has been outpaced. Outpaced, and replaced, and rendered obsolete, as if it had always been planned that way.

And once decisions are made faster than consent can register, sovereignty does not collapse; it becomes irrelevant.

This hinge is not symbolic; it is structural.

And as we watch live on teevee, it is turning.

About Lawrence Winnerman

Through The Hinge, The Near Field, and the serialized science fiction series The Shattered World, he explores how power consolidates, how systems fracture, and how citizens can reassert meaningful participation in the structures that govern their lives.

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Democracy is not a spectator system. Independent analysis shouldn’t be either.

The Hinge

Lawrence Winnerman — Sat, 28 Feb 2026 20:04:52 GMT

We are living in a period of structural acceleration.

Technological systems are compressing decision cycles. Political incentives are rewarding speed over deliberation. Information flows are fragmenting attention faster than institutions can respond. The mechanisms that govern public life — Congress, courts, media, markets — were designed for friction. They now operate in an environment optimized for immediacy.

That tension is not abstract. It shapes who holds power. It determines how decisions are made. It defines whether citizens meaningfully participate in the systems that govern them — or merely react to outcomes already set in motion.

The Hinge exists to examine that tension.

This is a long-form series analyzing how acceleration, sovereignty, and democratic power intersect. Each essay isolates a structural force — executive authority, artificial intelligence, media fragmentation, generational realignment, institutional drift — and traces its trajectory forward. Not as prediction. Not as outrage. But as analysis.

Because democracies rarely collapse in spectacle. They drift. Authority migrates quietly. Participation narrows gradually. Legitimacy erodes through neglect more often than through overt seizure.

Acceleration without participation erodes democratic sovereignty.

Sovereignty here does not mean nationalism. It means agency — the capacity of citizens to influence the systems that shape their lives. It means whether Article I remains meaningful. It means whether oversight keeps pace with technology. It means whether democratic consent survives machine tempo.

The Hinge is not about panic. It is about clarity.

Alongside these essays, you will find The Near Field — structured scenario explorations that examine plausible futures emerging from present forces — and fiction that extends these patterns outward into narrative form. Different mediums. Same inquiry.

This is an invitation.

Not to agree with every conclusion.
Not to adopt a party line.
But to engage with the architecture of power directly.

Democracy is not a spectator system.

It requires attention.
It requires friction.
It requires participation.

If we are entering a period where decisions happen faster than citizens can follow them, then slowing down long enough to understand those decisions becomes a civic act.

The Hinge is an effort to do exactly that.

Welcome.

Light Shines Through | Chapter 6 - Jake

Lawrence Winnerman — Mon, 18 Aug 2025 23:33:10 GMT

Jake | November 2041 — Dutton, Georgia, New Confederate States of America

His attic room is already starting to collect heat from the morning sun, and it is barely past sunrise. Jake can tell that by the afternoon, it will be sweltering, and for the millionth time, he dreams about air conditioning. Some of the government buildings in town have air conditioning, and the movie theater usually does, at least during summer. He knows that it used to be ubiquitous — many people had air conditioning once, cooling their entire homes. The Murphy house is so old that it was built before such things, and Jake’s father never got around to upgrading. Now it’s such a luxury that having cool air flowing through the entire house seems like a pipe dream.

Jake’s room in the attic is weirdly shaped. It’s low and cramped in spaces, with steep walls that join at odd angles; in the summer, it swelters beyond imagining, and in the winter, it’s freezing — but it’s his. When Jake was four, Winfield and Wexley had been born, and Jake’s father had turned the attached garage into the huge shared space the twins still called their own. Two years later, upon Annabelle’s arrival, his father and Melinda turned his room in the house into her nursery, moving him up into the attic, telling him what a big boy he was, and how lucky he was to have such a cool space.

And it is a great space. His art and fix-it projects are spread everywhere, piled up around the odd corners of the room. He has a decent bed; he doesn’t have to share. And thanks to the final bout of his father’s industriousness years ago, he even has a small bathroom with a sink, toilet, and a stand-up shower. It runs off of a tiny hot water tank separate from the rest of the house, so his showers have to be fast before they go frigid, but it’s his.

He looks at the shower longingly, but there’s no sense in wasting hot water now when he’s just going into the fields. He heads over to his desk and pulls the hard drive out of the locked drawer he keeps it in, only half-sitting in the chair so he’s not tempted to stay long.

Jake goes through his normal boot-up routine, which he created after one too many data loss disasters. He checks the power levels on his array of backup batteries, makes sure everything is plugged in solidly, and starts up the old computer. Dempsey had helped him rebuild it two years ago and assured Jake that at one time it had been a top-of-the-line gaming computer. But it’s a power hog, and even though Jake pays rent to his father and Melinda, and is the motive force keeping the farm running, he always feels a gnawing, low-level guilt as he’s using this machine.

He plugs in the hard drive, clicks through several options, and continues his spelunking through the music files. Last week, as he had first begun to explore the drive, he was astonished — he had hit the music jackpot! Whoever owned this drive loved music as much as Jake did, and had a collection more wide-ranging than anything he had ever seen, neatly organized and labeled into categories. More categories of music than he’d ever heard of — Country, of course, and Rock, and Pop. Heavy Metal. Classical. Jazz. Several types of Jazz. Electronica! Dance! Trance. New Age. Space Music! Reggae, Dubstep, Deep House. Acoustic. The list goes on and on.

Jake randomly clicks into categories as he’s reaching for his good headphones. He clicks on Space Music, which he hasn’t even opened yet, and finds a track at random. Some group or person called Vangelis. His eyes cross for a moment, trying to think about how to pronounce that.

The music starts, and it’s a weird, clacking, winding sound, and then loud, clear, crisp notes that sound like waterdrops made of liquid glass falling through space. The music has a deep melancholy to it, a loneliness that instantly brings tears to Jake’s eyes, and as he listens, it builds, changes, and becomes triumphant. Jake’s heart swells, and tears pour from his eyes unnoticed. This is music about people rising above and exploring the mysteries of the universe together. He’s never been surer of anything in his life.

The track ends, and before the next one can begin, he rips the headphones off, gasping for breath a little bit, feeling both embarrassed and like he has discovered a mountain called joy within his own heart. He laughs at himself, becomes aware that he’s shifted into the chair completely, and that his self-imposed deadline has passed. He has a long list of things to do today, which means he’s going to be pressed for time before the party starts tonight. Reluctantly, he shuts everything down, taking special care with his new treasure box of music.

Feeling paranoid and silly for being paranoid, he disconnects the hard drive, finds the protective zippered case it fits perfectly in, and puts it into the locking drawer at the bottom of his desk. He finds a new place in the attic to hide the key for the drawer, and drags himself down the ladder out of the attic and out into the field.

It’s only ten in the morning, but the day has jumped over warm and gone straight to blazing hot. It’s strange how long the summer lasts now. He can remember a time when early November would have guaranteed cool weather, but not anymore. This morning, he was chilled while doing his chores, and now he’s drenched just riding his bike through town on his way to Dempsey’s.

He’d like to skip town, if he could, but this is the direct route, and he’s got too much to do today, preparing for Annabelle’s party. Plus, riding on the paved roads is a nice change of pace; he likes the buzz of the asphalt under his tires, and he hums bits of songs that spring into his mind. It’s a kind of meditation, the rhythm of the bike, allowing music to swim up inside him while zoning out in the growing heat.

Just as he’s passing through the heart of downtown, he hears a teenage male voice shout out, “Faggot!” Jake whips his head around to see who’s yelling at him, and then instantly hates that he could give himself away so easily. A group of adolescent boys is standing on a corner, and they’re pointing at a woman and laughing.

Jake slows to get a better look and realizes that it’s not a woman they’re pointing at. DJ Mayfield is two years younger than Jake, brilliant, and strange enough that he had long ago passed “quirky” and “eccentric” and moved into “outcast” territory. Jake had shared some classes with him when they were in school. The younger boy was so bright that he had been skipped into Jake’s grade — until his strange habits and outspoken nature had required that his mother school him at home.

Jake can’t hear what’s being said, but he knows what bullying looks like. Words are exchanged, and then one of the larger boys lunges at DJ, punching him and knocking him to the sidewalk. Two of the smaller boys move in and kick the figure on the ground, and without thinking, Jake rides his bike into the scrum, knocking the crowd apart.

“Leave him alone!” Jake yells, his voice deeper and more authoritative sounding than he expected it to be. He jumps off his bike and leans over the figure on the ground. DJ seems to be wearing some kind of lavender women’s bathrobe that he has arranged to look like a dress. Two oranges have rolled onto the ground, and it takes Jake a moment to realize that DJ had stuffed them into the chest of the robe to mimic breasts. In the back of his mind, Jake is aghast, wondering if the kid has a death wish coming out in public like this.

Jake leans down and gently grabs the younger boy’s upper arm, hauling him to his feet. The boy turns to him, and Jake flinches when he sees the makeup on his face. DJ puckers his lips and leans in to Jake as if he is going to kiss him.

Without thinking, Jake straight-arms the younger man, pushing him backwards so hard that he nearly stumbles and falls again. Jake catches his arm and holds him upright, an apology ready on his lips, but a war raging inside of him.

“Whoever you are, I have always relied on the kindness of strangers.” The boy says, his eyes sweeping past Jake in a kind of daze.

“DJ, stop it!” Jake growls, “You know who I am. It’s Jake, from school.”

The cloudy blue eyes bounce past Jake’s face again, skipping drunkenly like he can’t focus for too long, and then he begins singing at the top of his lungs.

“You can always depend on the kindness of strangers to pluck up your spirits and shield you from dangers!” DJ has a strong singing voice, and the song has a manic, upbeat tone to it that doesn’t fit the moment at all.

“Derrick James, you stop that this instant!”

Flying past Jake in a whirl of fabric and color, a disheveled, stout woman shoves him aside and grabs DJ by the upper arm. The boy winces and screams in genuine pain.

Mrs. Mayfield rounds on Jake and slaps him with her free hand.

“You leave him alone, you heathen miscreant!”

“But I was trying...”

The portly woman gathers the tatty tropical print muumuu she is wearing in one hand, still keeping a death-grip on her son’s arm with the other. The boy has begun singing again.

“Now here’s a tip from Blanche you won’t forget!”

“Goddamnit, DJ, shut the fuck up!” she shrieks, “You’re going to get us killed, you ungrateful piece of shit!” She lets go of her too-long dress to smack him hard over the head. Jake realizes that some of the smeared makeup covers bruises. The boy begins sobbing and laughing at the same time.

“A stranger’s just a friend you haven’t met! You! Haven’t! Met!”

Jake watches in stunned silence as the short woman forcibly drags her tall, gangly son into the alley. Just as he’s about to disappear around the corner, DJ’s stormy blue eyes lock onto Jake’s, and he blows him a kiss and yells something that sounds like “Streetcar!”

Slowly, Jake turns to see the other boys standing there, consumed with laughter.

“Ah, too bad, Jakey Wakey! Your widdle boyfriend can’t fuck your Jew-boy butthole today! So sad!”

He knows what people say about him behind his back. Thinking about it fills him with a white-hot ball of rage that is eclipsed only by the desperate shame that he feels. How do they know? How could they possibly know? I do everything to fucking hide it, he thinks.

Fighting these younger boys has no dignity to it, and Jake knows better than to embroil himself more deeply in something that can spin out of control. Face burning, he climbs back on his bike and doesn’t look back at the continued yells, and pumps his feet faster, trying to get to Dempsey’s now as quickly as possible.

Two hours later, Jake is nearly home again, soaked in sweat from head to toe. The day has become vengefully hot, and he is taking the long way to avoid going through town again.

The old man had been occupied with other customers, rough-looking types that Jake didn’t recognize, and had barely had two words for Jake, making him feel even more awkward after the encounter in town.

Only the cat had seemed glad to see him, licking Jake’s fingers while Dempsey went into his cold storage unit to get the promised venison sausages. Jake marveled that the kitten was three times the size he’d been just a week ago. Living with the old junk trader was working out well for the cat.

Dempsey had come back with five pounds of sausages — half the promised amount. When Jake had objected, Dempsey waved him off angrily, saying it was the best he could do and that they’d settle up at some future time. Then, with the strangers watching closely, the trader had practically shoved Jake out the door, leaving him fuming in the hot sun.

He had ridden home in a fury, so hot and angry that he hadn’t been able to think about music or anything that could calm him down, replaying the incident with DJ over and over again, trying to make sense of it.

Pulling up to the house, he quickly stows his bike in the shed and then heads into the mudroom.

The house has seen better days, but it’s solid, has an intact roof, and has running water and electricity, at least when the power is up. He knows there are plenty of people who live in worse conditions, many of them here in this very town.

His father may be a drunk now, thinks Jake, but at least he fought in the Independence War and earned the right to own property. Jake isn’t clear on all the details, but he knows that one of the things that Rebel veterans like his father got after independence was debt relief and a permanent title to their land.

He stops to wash his face in the mudroom sink and then heads through the door to the kitchen. His stepmother gives a little shriek, as if she could have possibly missed the sounds of him coming into the house.

“Oh!” she gasps, and then, “Oh, it’s you. Jake, you startled me. Don’t go sneaking into the house like that; it’s creepy. Where have you been all morning anyway?”

He looks at his stepmother like she’s crazy or making a joke. The ways in which she can express disappointment with him are never-ending.

“I was doing my chores. And then I was running an errand. For Annabelle. To get meat for the party.” He swings his backpack up onto the counter and pulls out the packages of sausage.

“Oh, sausage, wonderful!” she exclaims, and then shifts to a disappointed tone, “Oh, but only that much? That’ll never be enough for everyone.”

Jake shrugs, consoled by the fact that this is a better response than if he’d returned empty-handed. “It was as much as I could get.”

He can see thoughts fly across her face, and then a look of disdain settles in, as if she’d just smelled something rotten. “Where did you get these anyway?” she asks.

Jake shrugs again. “Traded for ‘em.”

“Traded what?” she asks sharply, and then, without pausing, “From who?” Then Jake sees the connection fall into place in her expression, and she shoves the sausage across the counter.

“No. Not from him. I’ve told you I don’t like him. We can’t eat this.”

After the morning he’s just had, Jake feels his hackles go up. He asks sharply, “Oh, you don’t like him? Why? You’ve never told me why you don’t like him, Melinda.”

He knows this will get a rise out of her, and sure enough, she hollers back at him, “Don’t call me that!” He sees her shoulder twitch, as if she had to consciously will herself not to slap him.

“I don’t need to explain myself to you!” she says with a contained fury. “But you ought to know by now, Jake, that there are good men in the world, and there are bad men, and that Dempsey is a bad one.”

Jake is surprised that she answered his question, and now he’s genuinely curious. “Him? He’s not a bad man. Do you even know him? How could you say that without knowing him?”

Melinda dismisses him, waving her hand as if she could truly make him vanish. “I know everyone in this town. I know all about him. I know...who he associates with. He’s not pure. Not like...” She stops herself, and Jake knows she was about to say “not like us” and then realized she was talking to her impure quarter-Jewish stepson.

Jake flashes for a moment to the image of her, years ago, when she’d been his beloved preschool teacher, and the simple, powerful love he’d had for her then. When his mother had disappeared, she’d been his rock and his anchor. When his father had told him that she was going to be his new mother, he’d felt a little explosion of joy in his chest. Nothing could replace his mommy, of course, but knowing that Miss Melinda wanted to try had felt like a genuine solace to that hurt.

And here she was, fifteen years later, never really his mother at all after her own three children were born, and looking at him like he’s dirty and unworthy of her. He feels something shift in his chest. Something small, but important, like a keystone has moved.

His face drops into a mask of disdain, mirroring hers.

“The sausage is all we have, Melinda. If you don’t want it, I’ll put it in the freezer, and I’ll eat it for the next couple of weeks. It’s too good to waste.”

He moves to take the package off the counter, but she shifts and reaches out to reclaim it, glancing at him and then averting her eyes.

Jake snorts, and she shoots daggers at him with a look.

“Well, then. I gotta head outside and tend to everything, since nobody else around here seems to.”

He stomps out the door and lets the screen slam behind him, but as it does, he swears he can hear her final imprecation muttered after him.

“Faggot.”

The long, hot day passes in a whirlwind of action. Jake is tending to the crops and the livestock in an endless string of tackling whatever the next most important thing on his list is. He’s been through this process thousands of times; he knows it by heart.

It’s not fair to say that the rest of the family doesn’t help at all, but it is fair to say that none of the crucial work or hard labor happens without Jake doing it. Without him, the large vegetable garden wouldn’t thrive, the cows and goats and chickens wouldn’t be attended to, and the hay and tobacco wouldn’t bring in extra cash for the family. Throughout the day, the back of his mind is filled with the mental arithmetic of inputs and outputs; money needed for fertilizer or equipment repairs, redbacks coming in from the leaf tobacco and sweet hay; vegetables and meat enough to eat and store and salt and pickle, keeping them just on this side of having enough.

The pigs had been a loss. Five years ago, another cross-species pandemic, some flu or new covid, had swept through the country, and in addition to killing a couple of folks in town, it had required the destruction of all eight of the pigs. The government had even insisted on burning the carcasses, so that people wouldn’t then eat the possibly infected animals. Jake remembers that night with a surreal vividness; a bonfire that smelled like the best barbecue ever in the making, with no chance of a payoff. For a week, the town had smelled like a delicious pork festival was underway. Hardly anyone in town had had the funds to acquire the expensive new disease-resistant pigs from Brazil, and so pork had gone from being an easy and somewhat affordable staple to an exotic rarity.

Considering his shitty morning, miraculously everything flows smoothly in the fields. Every cow and chicken is friendly and compliant. Jake makes good enough time that he realizes he might even be able to grab a quick nap before the party after he showers. Now that he stops to think about it, he can feel the weariness in his bones from the long morning and all of the work of the day.

Staying busy usually keeps him out of his head, at least enough that he can avoid looking at the yawning emptiness that lives inside him, right at the center of his being. Even this sideways glance at it calls forth his mental image of a lone wolf, howling into a black and moonless sky. A talisman, emblematic of his soul-level ache. Sometimes he toys with the idea of a tattoo of the dark wolf that lives within him, rather than finishing off the Dixie flag on his chest, half completed.

A quick hot shower to scrub the grime off, and then Jake is lying on his bed in the trapped heat of the attic, waiting to see if the open windows and evaporation from the shower can keep him cool enough to grab even just a couple of minutes of sleep before the party starts downstairs.

He wants to boot up the computer again and continue to search for new music, but he knows if he does that, he’ll get so wrapped up that he’ll never sleep. In fact, he’s sure that hours would pass in the blink of an eye, and then he’d get in trouble for missing Annabelle’s birthday party, too.

A commotion rises up on the hot air from the house down below, and it’s clear that the twins are home. Win and Wex dominate the house with their obstreperous presence. Even when they’re sleeping, the house hums with a faint tension, as if knowing that at any minute the silence could be shattered by some random outburst from the converted garage they share. Any sympathy he might have once had for Melinda trying to keep the two boys under control has long since faded to a kind of empty satisfaction that at least his own life isn’t the only thing diminished by the constant noise and chaos that is the hallmark of his half-brothers.

Although they are four years younger, in the last year they’ve begun to put on their growth, and are both nearly as tall as Jake, and will soon surpass him. Winfield is the taller and older of the two, born in the waning moments of August sixth, where Wexley, born twenty minutes later in the first minutes of August 7th, is younger, and a fraction shorter. Several months ag,o they had celebrated turning fifteen by getting rip-roaring drunk and shooting off fireworks all night, although it hadn’t been the first time for either of those things to happen.

Win and Wex are that rare thing — fraternal twins who still look so much alike they are sometimes mistaken for identical. Small differences abound. Win is taller by just under an inch; Wex is just slightly broader across the shoulders. Win has a slightly squarer jaw; Wex’s hair is a shade lighter blond. On and on, minute variations that somehow seem more to reinforce that these two brothers are a package set than anything else could.

Certainly, between the two of them and Annabelle, Jake is the odd one out — him, lean and wiry, brown hair, grey eyes, contrasting to the blond-haired, blue-eyed good looks of everyone else in the family.

Hell, if you clip Jake out of the family picture and airbrush the omnipresent drink out of his father’s hand, the Murphys would look like the very model of a perfect red-blooded Confederate Rebel family. The thought puts a small, sad smile on Jake’s face. One of these things is not like the other one, he hums to himself, one of these things just doesn’t belong.

It’s time to drag himself downstairs and face the rest of the family, and whatever idiot tween girls Annabelle has invited over for her party. He drags himself out of the comfort of his bed, still covered in a fine sheen of sweat from the heat and humidity that has still not cleared from his space. He rummages around for a nicer tee-shirt and pair of jeans that also happen to be clean, pulls them on, puts on his only pair of shoes that aren’t boots, and reaches the folding attic ladder to head downstairs just as Melinda begins hollering at him and banging on the hatch with the handle of the broom she keeps in the hallway nearby for this express purpose.

“Jake! Jake! I need your help down here! We’ve got fifteen people coming over in an hour, and you need to get your ass up!”

He lowers the stairs slowly, keeping a firm hand on the rope, since flinging the stairs open makes a hell of a noise and scares the shit out of whoever is standing below. He clambers down loudly, knowing that immediately appearing fully dressed makes the point to her that he was already on the way more succinctly than words can.

She shoots him a reproachful look that contains at least a little bit of contrition and apology in it. He knows she’d never admit it to him, but there are moments that he can tell that she recognizes how much he does for the family, and how, secretly, in the depths of her narrow little soul, she’s grateful.

She bustles into the kitchen, moving trays and containers of food around on the countertop to give herself something to do, and speaks to him sideways, as if looking at him full-on would cause her to somehow evaporate.

“Your father still isn’t home, and I reminded him three times today that we’re having people over for Annabelle’s party tonight. I can’t imagine what he’s gotten up to, but I need help putting the extra leaf in the dining room table and setting up some chairs for people to sit on. And I’ve got this banner I want to hang up before Annabelle comes out of her room to see it, and I just can’t do this myself...”

The words are spilling out of her, and Jake knows from long experience that this is Melinda’s way of simultaneously asking for help and distracting herself from the fact that the thing his father has almost certainly gotten up to is getting shitfaced drunk and forgetting his name. Jake shrugs and points to the stepstool she’s already pulled out of the closet.

She nods, a clipped bob of her head, and he grabs the tape, and one end of the yellowed birthday banner that has seen better days, and picks up the stepstool in the other. After a moment of fumbling with the tape, they hang the banner and move on to putting the heavy extra leaf in the dining room table. Jake continues setting up chairs, while Melinda starts moving the food from the kitchen to the table.

The truth is that they’ve worked together like this so many times that they are quite good at it. Within a short time, they have everything arranged and ready to go.

As if possessing some hidden talent to make a perfect entrance, Annabelle bursts out of her room just as they’re putting the finishing touches on the setup.

Without meaning to, Jake gasps a little, looking at his little sister. The meaning of the phrase thirteen going on thirty suddenly hits him full force. Standing before them in a pale-yellow dress, blue eyes blazing, and her hair gleaming like spun gold, Annabelle fully embodies the princess look she is trying to achieve. She’s even wearing a delicate rhinestone tiara.

Melinda sighs, “Oh, Annabelle!” and rushes to the girl, fiddling with the placement of ribbons and the curl of golden ringlets. Jake isn’t listening to Melinda as she prattles on about how Annabelle looks better than Miss Georgia, and how in just a few years she’ll be a shoo-in for Miss Rebel. All he can see is that the little girl who was his sister has somehow been replaced wholesale by this woman before him. He’s thrilled for her, truly. But he also wonders if she isn’t pushing too fast to grow up.

Annabelle turns to him and shyly asks, “What do you think, Jake?”

He’s speechless for a moment, and then he says simply, “You look absolutely beautiful, ‘Belle.” He means it.

She blushes, and casts her eyes downward in a way that is both innocent and charming, and subtly flirtatious at the same time. Jake wonders where in the world she could have learned such a thing.

“Really?”

“Really.”

He’s about to say something else when she slaps him on the upper arm, and grimaces and says through gritted teeth, “Don’t call me that in front of anyone tonight! And didn’t you have a nicer shirt you could put on?”

He looks at her, taken aback, and then the doorbell rings, and she’s hissing at him, channeling her mother, “Oh, too late now! Go get it! And don’t forget to take their coats! And be sure to offer everyone a drink!”

He stands frozen for just a moment, stunned at his sudden demotion from brother to servant, as Annabelle and Melinda find the perfect spot to stand and wait to receive their guests. They wave him on to get the door, and he sighs, bowing to them both in what he hopes is a sarcastic fashion, knowing that his long day is about to get longer.

The party has been going on for nearly two hours, and the house is full of the squeals and laughter of adolescent girls. Annabelle is flushed with happiness, which brightens her cheeks even through the heavy-handed application of makeup. She has a glow that Jake recognizes from the younger, happier, more confident child she once was.

Being a part of the pageant circuit has widened Annabelle’s circle of friends, but it hasn’t improved her self-esteem or her attitude. Quite the opposite, the child who once adored Jake has become moody, judgmental, and withdrawn. A lot like me, actually, Jake thinks with an internal laugh. But as much as it annoyed him at the time, he misses the simplicity of having a little sister who tagged along endlessly and was always asking him to play a game with her.

Here, now, is a beautiful young woman at the very beginning of her womanhood, who, with every pageant and every win, is becoming more superficial and self-involved, and yet also more fragile and high-strung. At a party that focuses entirely on her, though, she is in her element.

Jake has spent much of the first part of the party helping Melinda with the food and drinks. Win and Wex made a late appearance when the food was ready, shoved their way to the front of the line, loading up their plates, and then beat a hasty retreat to their room, from which loud music is now blaring, competing with the party music Annabelle insists on playing in the background.

None of it is music that Jake has any interest in, and a part of him aches to go upstairs and explore the hard drive full of unknown and wonderful music that is new to him, and quite possibly illegal from the perspective of the Confederate purity censors. He doesn’t think of himself as a law-breaker, but the idea of all that forbidden music sends a shiver of excitement down his spine.

Melinda nearly drops a stack of plates she’s clearing when a random loud bang comes from the twins’ room, and then furtively looks around to see if anyone has seen her near-miss. She’s holding it together well, but Jake notices the constant twitch of her eyes towards the door, waiting for his father, Mitch, to finally make an appearance. He can tell that every conversation she’s having is done with half her attention focused on whoever is in front of her, and the other half constructing progressively more elaborate worst-case scenarios for whatever alcohol-induced catastrophe Mitch has gotten into now.

The noise level in the house, often loud simply with the twins making a racket from their shared room, has reached phenomenal heights with the sugar-addled screeching of a dozen teenage girls, and Jake is beginning to seriously contemplate escaping up into the solitude of his attic space. Opening the hatch to the ladder would be conspicuous, but once he was upstairs, he could turn on the string of old LED Christmas lights he’d hung across the rafters, slip on his best headphones, and spend the rest of the night lost in strange and amazing music.

At that moment, the front door slams open, and the entrance hall is filled with men’s voices raised in anger and frustration. The party falls immediately silent, and almost as one, Jake and Melinda and the rest of the guests move forward to see what the commotion is about. As Jake rounds the corner, a familiar sight presents itself.

Jake’s father is draped across the shoulders of two other men, one of whom doesn’t seem all that much more sober than Mitch. The other, a tall, auburn-haired man with piercing blue eyes, nodded at Melinda.

“Ma’am. Sorry to disturb y’all, here. Seemed like the S’arnt Major needed some help gettin’ home.”

He said this as if it wasn’t much of a problem, but Jake knows otherwise. His father has been getting incoherently drunk for years now, something that is happening with greater frequency as the man himself wastes away into a shadow of his former robustness.

Melinda seems surprised by this turn of events, which Jake knows she couldn’t possibly be. He wonders if it is an abundance of hope or delusion that drives her worldview.

Captain Devereaux is Jake’s commanding officer in the Guard and the person who holds Jake’s future in his hands. Jake wants nothing more than to become a Rebel Ranger in the Confederate Army and escape this dreary homelife. He has applied to the program, headquartered just up the road at Camp Braxton Bragg, for the last two years.

He’s been deferred twice, on the grounds that his family's need is more urgent than his national service. He’d braced himself to be rejected outright, relegated to permanent grunt status in the standing army, but the deferrals at least meant that he was free to apply again, a rarity.

The funny thing is, two years of waiting has turned him from a die-hard Dixie Rebel with dreams of glory defeating Texan and Yankee foes into...something else. Not a traitor exactly, but into someone who is finding inconsistencies and injustices in Confederate life that he can’t push aside and ignore. Doubts about the whole culture he is stuck in, that are reinforced by the news snippets he picks up on the emergency radio, those nights he sneaks out onto the roof to look at the stars and see what foreign music he could pick up bouncing off the ionosphere.

Jake and Devereaux make eye contact, and Jake nods a greeting, struck by the strange look on the officer’s face. Jake can’t be sure that Devereaux is the reason he’s been deferred from Ranger training, but for some months now, he’s been wondering if the ginger-haired man isn’t at least part of the problem.

Jake pushes through the crowd, up to the trio of men, pulls the weight of his father off of Deveraux and onto his own shoulders, and gives the man a gruff and guttural “Thanks.”

Deveraux nods at Melinda, who is fussing with her husband’s cap and coat, mutters “welcome”, and then shoots Jake a small glare with a half-downturned lip, as if to remove any misconception that he’s helping out of any consideration for Jake himself.

Jake is surprised at how much lighter his father is than the last time he had to do this, even though it was just a few weeks ago. Either his constant training is paying off, or his father is losing weight, or both. He half-drags, half-carries the man through the party crowd and into Mitch and Melinda’s bedroom.

Melinda is right behind him, shutting the door, and they fall into a pattern so old and so common that neither one needs to speak or think about it. Jake lies Mitch diagonally on the bed, and they get to work stripping him out of his filthy clothes. Jake winces at the reek of harsh booze and body odor rolling off of his father in waves. Mitch is barely conscious, mumbling incoherently as they shift him around.

As Melinda peels off his jeans, it becomes clear that Mitch has pissed himself. She groans and then mutters reassuringly to her husband, telling him it’s not his fault.

Jake rolls his eyes and mutters, “Jesus Christ”, just as Melinda looks up at him. Her face hardens, and she stands up and slaps him, although there isn’t any heat or power in it.

“Don’t you take the Lord’s name in vain! Stop being a judgmental asshole and go fetch me some hot towels so I can clean him up. He’s carrying the weight of the world, thanks to you.”

Jake bites his tongue and just shakes his head in bewilderment. Thanks to him? How is that even possible? He keeps this place fed, practically single-handedly.

He leaves the bedroom, shutting the door behind him. On his way to the bathroom to get hot towels, he becomes aware that there is a strange vibe in the rest of the house.

The party music is still on, but most of the girls are sitting in a haphazard circle in the chairs on the other side of the room. Jake frowns at them, and not a one of them says a word or meets his eyes.

Jake steps around the corner, into the foyer.

The other drunken man, Sam Pickens, is passed out on a pile of coats and purses on the bench against the wall.

On the other wall, Annabelle is pressed into a small nook next to the broken grandfather clock, looking up into the face of Captain Devereaux like a scared mouse, about to be devoured by a hawk.

Devereaux is leaning over the girl, arm up against the wall like he is relaxing. His face is inches from hers, whispering into her ear.

Jake’s mind goes several places at once. He steps closer, fists clenched, and hears the man say, “I swear, Miss Annabelle, you are pretty as a peach. I could take a nice juicy bite outta you, what do you think about that?”

Deveraux’s other hand is stroking Annabelle’s cheek, and just as he’s about to drop it to her breast, Annabelle whimpers, and Jake’s hand catches his arm.

“Hey, Cap’n? You want to leave her alone, man?”

He tries to say this with as much respect as he can muster.

Deveraux turns to face Jake slowly, his eyes glazed, not recognizing Jake for a moment.

“What the fuck? No, I do not want to leave her alone. Mind your own business, Private.”

He turns back to Annabelle, puffing up to take more space, hemming the girl in more completely. Annabelle’s eyes catch Jake’s for a moment, and he can see nothing but terror there.

Jake grabs Deveraux’s arm again and spins the man around, pulling him a bit away from the wall so that there’s a gap wide enough for Annabelle to escape through.

“Cap, please, man. That’s my sister. You’re scaring her.”

Fury crosses Devereaux’s face, and he roughly shoves Jake’s hand off his arm.

“I said to leave me the fuck alone, Private Jewfag! I don’t give a fuck who she is.”

Jake controls his fury at the insult, willing himself to remain calm. Striking his superior officer would destroy any chance of Ranger school.

Jake leans in.

“Captain, Annabelle is thirteen years old. She turned thirteen today. This is her birthday party. Leave her alone.”

Deveraux’s face is a mask of rage. He steps towards Jake.

“She don’t look thirteen and seems like she likes me, you fuckin’ pussy.”

Jake twitches, and Deveraux laughs, a mean, drunken laugh. Annabelle bolts from the corner and runs into her room, ignoring her friends, and slams the door shut.

Deveraux sees Jake twitch, and a malevolent grin spreads across his face. He steps closer to Jake.

“You gonna hit me? You wanna take a swing at me, Murphy? Come at me, bro!” he yells.

Just then, another door slams, and Melinda comes barreling around the corner.

“Jake, where are the goddamn towels, and...what the? What the hell is going on in here?” she demands, seeing the two men within inches of slugging each other.

Captain Devereaux breaks eye contact with Jake just long enough to look at Melinda. After a moment, he seems to gather his wits back about him and steps back a bit from Jake, smoothing his clothes.

“Nothing goin’ on here, ma’am. I was just sayin’ to Jake here that I hope the S’arnt Major is ok. Sure would be a damn shame if anything happened to him and messed things up even more for y’all.”

Jake didn’t understand exactly what he’d just heard from Deveraux, but his tone and the look on his face made it clear that there was some kind of threat buried in there.

Melinda must have heard it too, because her face turned quickly masklike, frozen in a smile. When she spoke, her voice was sweeter and colder than tea.

“Captain Deveraux, I’m so grateful to you for bringing the Sergeant Major home safely. And I hope my stepson hasn’t caused you any trouble. Why don’t you come around sometime for supper next week, some evening when we’re all feeling a bit more like ourselves?”

Deveraux straightened up, smiled at Melinda, and touched his cap, miming a gentleman.

“Well, that sounds right nice, thank you, ma’am. I’ll take you up on that one of these days soon. And please tell Miss Annabelle happy birthday, and that I look forward to seeing her again.”

Melinda smiled an icy smile, and Deveraux turned and struggled to get Pickens awake and to his feet. Once he’d managed to get the man upright and out the door, he turned and saluted again, a feral smile on his lips.

Jake and Melinda looked at each other.

“He was...” Jake began.

Melinda cut him off with a hand chop and a finger pointed in his face.

“I don’t want to hear it! Goddamn you to hell, Jacob D. Murphy! I don’t know how you manage to fuck up every goddamn thing you touch, but here we are, again!”

With that, she spun on her heel and marched away, leaving him alone and speechless in the hallway.

What the fuck was going on? How was any of this his fault?

He walked slowly forward and was met with the bewildered look of eleven teenage girls. He opened his mouth to say something, and then shut it, and resisting his urge to try to help or explain, he turned the corner and pulled the rope to his attic ladder.

His room was hot and dark, but he was alone. Up here, no one could see a grown man cry silent tears of frustration and anger and confusion.

«Chapter 5 - Jackie | Chapter 6 - Jake | Chapter 7 - João»

The Shattered World Series | Book 1 | Light Shines Through

© 2025 Lawrence Winnerman | Science Fiction — All Rights Reserved

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Light Shines Through | Chapter 5 - Jackie

Lawrence Winnerman — Mon, 11 Aug 2025 13:29:38 GMT

Jackie | November 2041 – Seattle, Tahoma – Free Republic of Cascadia

Meeting by the monoliths in Red Square on the University of Tahoma campus is an ancient and traditional location that means we can’t figure out where to go for lunch, so let’s meet at the giant, ugly sculptures on the plaza and then decide.

From where she is standing, Jackie can see the majestic mountain that lends its decolonized name to the state and the university itself, Washington having been demoted from both a long time ago.

She isn’t exactly nervous—she’s excited to meet with Laxmi and her colleague, and she’s confident in her abilities. She’s traded information with Laxmi about the role over the week, and her spidey-sense is tingling. The gig can’t pay close to what she was making at Arachnio, but the idea of working with an up-and-coming physicist wunderkind on a secret project feels like Something Big.

That means this isn’t just any other job; this is a great job, and because it’s a great job, and because great jobs tend to be rare and ridiculously competitive to get, she’s feeling little pangs of anxiety. The feeling isn’t a stranger to her, not from a very young age, but over the years, she has learned to cope. Right now, though, her palms are itching with nerves, and she’s beginning to feel just a tad dizzy.

She spent far more time on her look this morning than she has on anything fashion-related for the last two months, and it felt good. She has a killer wardrobe, and most of her looks are nailed down solid, but today’s sartorial objective was a hard read.

After two months of not dressing up for work, she had a hard time pinning down the right vibe for a lunch job interview with brainiac nerds whom she is trying to impress with her software engineering cred. After rejecting turn-of-the-century slacker-dev slob look, which was never truly authentic to her in the first place, she ended up going for what she likes to think of as “Almost Full-On Jackie”.

She’s wearing a black scoop neck top, covered by a butter yellow wool boucle jacket that screams Chanel classic as only something that had cycled through nearly a century of fashion can. There are echoes of a pillbox hat in the yellow, white, and grey camo-patterned military cap she wears. She smiles to herself at the stray thought that this color palette wouldn't camouflage anyone unless they were hiding in a pile of dandelions, corn, pigeons, and marshmallows.

All of this above her favorite dark jeans and vintage Doc Maarten boots, and of course, the gloves. Always the gloves, which have, in a very real way, led her to her sense of style and her sense of self. This pair is a simple white cotton spandex, elbow length, and tight through the fingers and hands, the way she likes them. She has added a trim of the same yellow camouflage material the cap is made of, and the simple update to ensure a match was something that she was inordinately, and probably unreasonably, proud of. She has also added a dab of bright yellow high-tech gel to the fingertips so that she doesn’t have to take the gloves off to use her phone and touchscreens.

Arriving ten minutes early, she had grabbed a spot where she knew she’d be easily visible from any direction, and proceeded to wait as casually as she could. No earbuds, no music, phone put away in her jacket pocket on vibrate. She closes her eyes for a moment to face the noontime sun and feel the warmth and light flow through her. She tries to ground herself in the moment using one of the simple tricks she has learned over the years to get her overactive mind to calm down and steer away from panic and nerves. Her attention wanders, and she imagines the phone burning in her pocket, but knows the instant she cracks and pulls it out that she’ll be lost scrolling through anything that can distract her.

Far sooner than she expects, a voice from behind her right shoulder says, "Jackie, hey!" in a familiar pleasant contralto, with just a tinge of a British accent to it. Jackie turns around, already smiling, and returns the greeting as brightly as she can.

Coming up behind her are a pleasantly mismatched-looking pair: Laxmi, a petite woman of South Asian heritage, and a taller, somewhat doughy man who looks like he's stepped out of central casting for "college lab nerd", complete with a mop of curly, disheveled ginger-blond hair and thick-rimmed glasses.

"Jackie, it’s wonderful to see you again. Thank you for taking my less-than-artful suggestion on Monday morning seriously", Laxmi says.

She leans in to give Jackie a delicate one-armed hug in welcome. Her dark eyes sparkle with a wry intelligence that promises many hearty laughs soon. She nods to her left and says, “This is my partner in crime, Doug.”

The man shakes her hand, a warm and fleshy grip that is more confident than Jackie was expecting from someone who looks like he might be prone to social anxiety, asthma inhalers, and, judging from his T-shirt, classic Rick and Morty marathons.

“Doug Finkel. I do whatever Laxmi tells me to do." He pauses for a moment and casts a glance at his compatriot that Jackie suspects contains a wee bit of longing.

"And also, I build things out of spare parts and tell jokes", he says.

"Bad jokes, usually," says Laxmi, with a fake scowl on her face.

"Very, very bad jokes," says Doug, falling into a routine that Jackie can tell is an old shtick between the two of them.

"Anyway," says Laxmi, before things can progress further down whatever neo-vaudevillian comedy routine they’re about to launch into, "I absolutely love your hat and gloves."

Doug snorts, and Jackie laughs, already feeling a comfortable rapport with these two. Doug’s eyes go wide at Jackie’s guffaw, and Laxmi beams at her again as she had done on the bus the morning they met.

"Thank you! I made them," said Jackie, then catching herself, "Well, I found this ridiculous old dress at a vintage shop, ripped it apart, and used the material for the hat and to trim the gloves." She paused for a moment, feeling suddenly awkward, and decided to steer the conversation a bit more firmly.

"So, where would you both like to go for lunch?" she asks.

Laxmi and Doug look at each other, both half shrugging, and say, practically in unison, "The Pit?"

The Olive Pit is a hole in the wall just a couple of blocks off campus. A local institution known not so much for the quality of the food as much as for the guarantee that you could fill your belly off of the quasi-Middle Eastern buffet for less than five hundred dollars. In the lives of perennially poor college students during creeping inflation, this was a bargain too good to pass up, and it guaranteed the Pit a base of loyal followers that the occasional "needs to improve" rating from the health board posted in the window did little to deter.

Once Jackie, Laxmi, and Doug had filled their plates at the buffet, they settle into a somewhat hidden table towards the back of the restaurant. Conversation flows easily right from the start. The talk shifts from light banter about fashion and music to the personal histories of each of the three.

Laxmi finishes telling a story about how she and Doug had met, which isn’t very flattering to Doug, and he’s hiding his face in his hands, while trying to suppress laughter. It’s clear to Jackie that even if there isn’t a romantic connection between these two, there is a deep bond of friendship and respect that transcends anything as paltry as gender, or background, or class.

"So, what about you?" says Laxmi, turning the focus to Jackie.

Jackie feigns being taken aback. "Moi?" she says dramatically, raising a gloved hand to her chest and arching an eyebrow. Doug and Laxmi grin, but clearly are ready to hear about her history.

Jackie shrugs and sighs, and then frowns slightly, shaking her head just a fraction.

"Well, I wish I could tell you that I had an idyllic childhood, where my natural talents for fashion, music, and code were nurtured unreservedly, but..." she shakes her head again. "It just wasn't like that." She pauses, trying to gather her thoughts.

"I'm Cascadian. I mean, I'm a citizen here, now, but I was born in Deseret."

Doug and Laxmi sit up a bit straighter, and Jackie can see the questions forming behind their eyes. She smiles reassuringly, knowing from long experience the directions the conversation can take from here.

"I was born into a Mormon family, in Deseret. I had two older adopted brothers, and a little sister. We had a farm and orchard near Bear Lake, and I grew up there until the time I was ten. But I had a kind of fucked up family life. Something..." she pauses for a moment, not really for effect, but because she’s trying to find the right words. "Something really bad happened to me in my family when I was ten." She holds up her gloves and waggles her fingers at them.

"My hands got really badly burned, hence the gloves. The incident destroyed whatever remaining good existed in my family, and I got kicked out after my mom died." She stops to take a bite of falafel, and chews slowly, thinking about the pain from that time so long ago.

Laxmi and Doug look at each other and then at her, as if they were deciding who would ask the next question. Laxmi seems to somehow win, and she turns back to Jackie.

"I'm so sorry, Jackie. But, I don't understand...what could you have done at the age of ten that was so bad that you'd get kicked out of your home for it?" Laxmi's dark eyes are focused intently on Jackie, not unkindly, but with full awareness and attention.

"It wasn't what I did, exactly. Not exactly. It was more because of who I was." She thinks for a moment. "Because of who I am. And something that happened to me."

She lowers her head a moment, takes a breath, and then looks up at these two people she had already come to like quite a bit. She is once again reminded of the simple fact that the act of coming out is something that never stops happening. As many times as she’s had conversations like this, each time it still feels slightly new and different. Every time, especially with people she thinks could become friends, there is a frisson of fear that perhaps she's judged incorrectly, and that this time she might experience the kind of rejection she had lived through at the hands of her family so many years before.

She looks up at them and plunges ahead, knowing in her heart that the only way out is through. She has to push forward and trust, regardless of the outcome. She is who she is, and it’s non-negotiable. Plus, she thinks she can trust these two people. And, she thinks, my tesseract is public on CascadiaNet. If they did any research about me, they already know.

"I'm trans.” she says simply. Laxmi smiles a small smile and gives a tiny encouraging nod, bless her. Doug glances quickly at the crotch of her jeans, and then even more quickly away, and a blush creeps into his cheeks.

Jackie pulls the hem of her jacket down, hating both his reaction, and her reaction to it. She should be used to “The Sneaky Glance” by now, but it bothers her that this is a common reaction from non-trans guys. She’s not judging him, yet, but it is a small red flag.

Jackie pauses to gather her thoughts, and then continues, “And, you know, despite what the government of Deseret says in official propaganda about how well it treats queer people, and about how everyone is welcome in the church...” She shakes her head. “Well...it's not true. I can tell you, as much as I wished it were at one time, it's just not true."

She stops, seeing the thoughts racing behind their eyes and relaxing, because what she doesn’t see is hate, or unkindness of any kind.

"I was kicked out of my family at ten. I lived on the streets for a couple of years, and thank the gods and little fishes, somehow I didn't die, or get murdered, or catch some horrible disease. It's a...complicated and kind of ridiculous story, but when I was thirteen I was smuggled into Cascadia, and I've been here ever since. I was granted asylum in '31, got my citizenship in '33, went to school, came out, and graduated from here", nodding her head towards the campus, "in '36, and pretty much immediately got a gig at a startup, and then two years ago joined on with Arachnio, where I worked until just a couple of months ago."

She smiles shyly at them and takes another bite of her falafel, chewing thoughtfully.

She says with a hint of initial sarcasm, "Lucky for me, living on the streets taught me how to be scrappy, and frugal, and just generally not to trust anyone, so I 'diversified'", she made funny air quotes with her right hand, "and between that and some 'ranger gigs, I'm in an okay spot for the moment."

"So you don't need our job, is that what you're saying?" asks Doug, looking at her directly. Jackie chokes on a sip of water.

"What?! No! I want this gig so bad!" Oh, shit, she thinks, did I just screw this up?

Laxmi hits Doug in the arm, with not an inconsiderable amount of force. "Douglas!" she hisses at him, "Stop! She's lovely and you're scaring her!"

Doug seems to realize that his deadpan humor had genuinely shocked Jackie. He reaches out a hand and very gently touches her forearm.

"Oh, shit, Jackie, I'm so sorry. Sometimes I use humor when I’m feeling awkward. I'm totally kidding. You're awesome. We really like you. We're dying to have you on the team."

"Really?" says Jackie, once again taken aback, but now for a very different reason.

"Well, great Doug, now you've gone full opposite, and given away all of our negotiating power and shown her how desperately we want her." says Laxmi with fake disdain, rolling her eyes at them.

Doug put on a funny face that seems to suddenly radiate condescension. In a snooty voice that sounds eerily like Laxmi, he says, "What I meant to say was that, even though you're, you know, a Husky, we think your skills are just barely adequate for our purposes."

Jackie looks quizzically at Laxmi, who rolls her eyes once again.

"Don't mind him, he's a Duck, and given the chance, will expound ad nauseum on all of the ways in which Whilamut is the superior school. Regardless of where we currently live and work, mind you."

"So....I've got the job?" Jackie says with a hint of disbelief. “I’ve barely told you about my skills, and you haven’t told me anything about the project yet.”

Laxmi grins at her, and her smile is echoed on Doug’s face. “Well, we’re not complete slouches at research, so the secret truth is we know quite a bit about you already, for the first part.” She pauses and looks around at the bustle of the grimy restaurant dining room, as if assessing every person in the place with a quick scan. Jackie notices, modulates the grin on her face, and sits up a bit straighter, looking around as well. “And this isn’t the place to talk about our project. Why don’t we all go back to the lab?”

Jackie is a bit dazed at the speed of this, but nods in return.

Laxmi continues, "So let’s say provisionally you've got the job, unless what we tell you makes you want to run away screaming.” She flashes another warm smile at Jackie. “Welcome to team.....well...fuck....we don't have a name for the team yet. Item one for our list, Jackie: help us come up with a name!"

As they step into the lab, Jackie notes a couple of things right up front. First, the lab is smaller and older than she was expecting. She had imagined that university science labs would be sleek and sterile, packed with modern equipment. This is neither sleek nor sterile, but it’s not messy, per se. It’s just very, very full of stuff. All of it seems to be organized, and there are elements of it that look to have a purpose. Every space is filled with neat agglomerations of items that look like they’ve been arranged based on some kind of system that she just can’t quite identify at first glance.

There’s a stack of copper wire -- a hugely expensive stack of copper, given market prices -- that’s arranged by gauge and size of the roll. Then a stack of computer components that she mostly recognizes, which seem to be arranged roughly by type and year. Back against the far wall, under the row of high windows, there are larger machines in various states of dismantling. Refrigerators and microwaves, plus several things that look like air compressors. Stacks of power backup batteries, some of which are opened in ways that she knows mean they’re never safe to use again.

But what catches her eye most is the art on the wall. Some of it is ridiculous science poster gag art. Jokes made with the table of elements, various conjugations of the word “fuck”, and a version of Drake’s Equation that seems to imply that no two scientists who understand a complex concept exist at the same time and can communicate.

Interspersed between all of that, there are images of genuine art and beauty. Klimt and Chagall, next to deep space images from the legendary Hubble and Webb telescopes. An image of Saturn in full beringed glory that she’s seen before, but never blown up to the size on the wall across from her.

And of course, the math. There are at least ten whiteboards of various sizes in the lab -- and one very old chalkboard—and on all of them, scribbles of math that are as far beyond Jackie as she imagines the deepest levels of her code skills might be beyond these two.

In the very middle of the room there’s a solid workbench, with an old faux-marble laminate top that has seen better days. Between the graffiti etched into it, and the scorch marks, it’s hard to determine what the original color once was, but the surface itself is clean, and free from any obstructions other than one battered laptop that Laxmi has just pulled from her bag.

The three of them pull up stools around the table, and Laxmi and Doug look at her.

“Welcome home! It ain’t much, but it’s ours.”

“I love it.” Says Jackie simply, and it’s true. It has a homey feel to it that she hadn’t imagined a lab could have, and she can already tell that it’s going to be a comfortable place to work.

She holds up her hand. “Before we get started, I have something I want to share with you both.”

Doug and Laxmi trade a glance and look at her with raised eyebrows.

Jackie reaches into her coat pocket with a flourish and pulls out a small object, which she sets reverently on the counter in front of them.

“Allow me to present to you my first contribution to our team. Honest to god, real chocolate.”

Laxmi squeals with delight, and Doug looks at her with amazement.

“Real chocolate?!” Doug shouts. Jackie nods solemnly.

“Real chocolate. From the official chocolatier to the King of Hawai’i, if you can believe it!”

Doug and Laxmi are looking at her like she’s a miracle worker.

“What? How?” says Laxmi, as if she has forgotten language and can only remember these basic words.

“Wellllll...I was hoping that I’d get the job, and figured I should have something with me to celebrate in case I did. I’ve been saving this for a special occasion, and this seems about as special as it gets. So. I’d like to share this as a token of my esteem. My first contribution to Team Awesome.”

“Nice try with the name, but we really do need to come up with something better than that.” Says Doug.

“We really do.” Nods Laxmi. “But, chocolate!”

Jackie motions to Laxmi. “Laxmi, why don’t you do the honors?”

Laxmi sits up straighter, as if she’s just been granted a ladyship, and reaches for the chocolate bar as if it might either bite her or disappear in a puff of smoke before she lifts it delicately off the table.

“Well, I don’t mind if I do! Two-thirds for me, one-third for both of you. To share.” She jokes.

“Hey!” says Doug, gesturing as if he’s about to snatch the bar out of her hands.

Laxmi opens the chocolate bar, slowly peeling back the paper and foil with reverence. She lifts it to her nose and takes a deep inhale of the aroma.

“Oh my gods. Real, actual chocolate. It’s been so long. I can’t believe it.”

Setting the unwrapped bar on the counter, she quickly snaps it into shards of roughly equal size.

“Alright, everyone, take a piece.” She instructs. Doug and Jackie reach out and each take a piece of chocolate. Doug holds his out to toast the other two, and says, “Here’s to Team Insert Name Here!”

They gently touch pieces together, as if clinking glasses, and then each gets lost for a moment in the sheer delight of true, rich, dark chocolate.

After a minute or two, they all reach out and take another piece, once again toasting each other and touching the pieces together in a sort of ritual.

“You know,” says Laxmi, “I remember before the Crash and the Smash how fucking easy it was to get chocolate. It was everywhere. There were little corner markets all over town, and each one had a candy section so big it had thirty or forty different kinds of chocolate. It was quite mad, really.”

She pauses and takes another small piece and places it reverently in her mouth.

“One year, when I was six or seven, we dressed up for Halloween and went down to the old mall, and wandered from store to store, and I tell you every place we went handed us chocolate. Then we went home and went trick or treating in our neighborhood, and each house had a giant bag of candy to hand out. My sister, Parvati, ate so much candy that night that she threw up.”

Doug and Jackie are nodding along, as if this is the most fascinating thing they’ve ever heard.

“I remember trick-or-treating.” Says Doug, wistfully.

Jackie shakes her head ruefully. “I don’t. That wasn’t allowed in Deseret. But I have eaten more Jello than any one person should ever be allowed to eat.”

Laxmi opens her eyes from the momentary chocolate reverie she’d been lost in, and then sighs, and runs her palms across the tabletop as if clearing away workspace.

“So, you know some of the details from the job description I sent you the other day. Later today, I’ll send you the total compensation package info. As it is with the University, I’m afraid it’s not what you’re used to, nor is it very negotiable.”

Laxmi looks at Jackie as if this information is going to scare her away. Jackie nods and holds her gloved hand up to cover her chocolate-stained teeth.

“I get it Laxmi. None of that is a surprise to me. Like I said, I’m a saver, so I can make it work.”

Laxmi’s smile returns full force, as if someone has brightened the sun by half. She gives a little clap and then pops another small piece of chocolate in her mouth.

“Excellent! I’ll do the stuff on my end to let personnel know that you’re the winning candidate. You can start tomorrow, if that works for you, as we’re informal, but in a bit of a rush.

“I’m sorry for being a bit cagey about the nature of the projects earlier, but in truth, a big part of the reason we want someone with your skills is because...” she pauses for a moment, not sure how to express the concept without sounding like a bit of a crank.

“We’re trying to do something really big. Not big size-wise, not yet, but big in terms of science. Like so big that it would be revolutionary.” Laxmi says.

Doug jumps in, “Nobel Prize big. All the prizes, really. Like, billions of reais big. Big big big.” Laxmi shoots him a look that says shut up and get a grip, and yes, probably all at the same time.

Doug stops, shrugs a half-apology, and Laxmi continues.

“We need privacy. Like, extreme privacy. Here in the lab, and in all of our comms. We need to build something that has a control system that is nigh unto unhackable, with levels of security control around it that not even the Feds can mess with. Everything I’ve learned about you makes me think that you are someone we can trust.” She levels a gaze on Jackie that reads as her I’m not bullshitting face.

“So, last chance to back out. If you accept now, a million kinds of confidentiality apply, effective immediately. Once you say yes, I’ll read you in.”

She holds her hand out to Jackie, ready to solemnize the occasion with a handshake. Doug, being Doug, pulls out his phone and begins to record. He intones in something that sounds like a game-show host voice.

“Are you, Jackie Lennox, hereby ready to accept the offer to be on Team Awesome, real name to be determined later in a fabulous contest, working with me, Doug Finkel and the incomparable Laxmi Sengupta, forever pledging yourself to the utmost secrecy in the name of Almighty Science, so help you gods of your choice?”

Laxmi is rolling her eyes so hard that Jackie momentarily fears they might actually get stuck that way, and Jackie reaches out her hand.

She pauses for a beat, looks at her gloves, and then begins to pull her hand back. Putting on an ancient Valley Girl vocal fry, Jackie says, “Actually you guys, this all sounds really hard, so I think I’m going to, like, go home and brush my hair and stuff.”

Laxmi cracks up, and Doug is shaking with laughter so hard that whatever he’s capturing on video is going to be indiscernible. Jackie’s face splits into a grin, and she throws her head back and releases a truly magnificent laugh, something like a cross between a bark and a honk, and so loud that if anyone else were in the building, they would undoubtedly come running to look for the wild goose-dogs.

As everyone settles down and wipes the tears from their eyes, Jackie sticks her hand back out to Laxmi. Laxmi takes Jackie’s hand in her own, and they shake.

“I, Jackie Anne Lennox, do hereby swear that I am accepting the terms to join Team Awesome, and abide by all codes of silence, no matter how abstract or obscure, so help me Great Spirit.”

“Yay!” says Doug, and pulls them both in for an awkward hug over the tabletop. “Now we have a fam-bly!” After the short but genuine hug, the three of them sit back.

“OK, so that’s wonderful. Why don’t we take a moment while I’ll pull up some documents for you to sign, and then we can well and truly indoctrinate you into the great mystery of our work, and how we are going to change the world together,” says Laxmi.

Jackie arches an eyebrow at the “change the world” line, but nods, excitement growing within her. Shan was right, she thinks. I really do need to be working on the next big thing to truly be happy.

There is old-school Bollywood music playing in the background, from an apparently inexhaustible playlist that Laxmi has queued up on the music server in the lab. Jackie is lost in momentary wonder at what she’s heard in the last hour.

Has it only been an hour? She wonders. It doesn’t seem possible. New music and the mindblowing information Laxmi and Doug are sharing with her have made time stretch and warp like the summertime taffy her mother used to make in what seemed like a different life.

“So, I...I just need to go over this again, from the top.” Jackie says during a lull in the music. “This”, she says, motioning to the whiteboard and the laptop that has been the focus of their world recently, “this came to you in a dream?” She tries to keep the incredulity and doubt out of her voice, but she suspects that she doesn’t succeed.

Laxmi trades a look with Doug and nods at Jackie.

“Look, I know it sounds absolutely, stark-raving mad, but it’s not completely unheard of...”

Jackie interjects, “As in, ‘oh look, I dreamt of an ouroboros and now I’ve discovered the shape of benzene?’”

Laxmi laughs, a sound of genuine mirth, “Yes! And points to you for knowing that story. Exactly that. But seriously, think about it, I’d been working for years on exotic and quantum materials for Helios 2, and,” she shrugs, an elaborate motion that seems to include her whole body, “I don’t know. My subconscious put some things together and showed it to me in a dream.”

“Where you saw an equation named after you in a book from the future?”

“I mean, sure. But it’s the most literal metaphor you can possibly think of isn’t it? Like, Dream Laxmi was saying ‘Hey, Waking Laxmi, here’s the next thing for you to work on.’”

“And then you came in here and wrote the math down and tried it, and it worked.”

Laxmi nods, and then hesitates, and waggles both of her hands in equivocation. “Well, sort of. I wrote down what I could remember, and over about a month, I worked out a lot of the rest. And not here, we didn’t have this lab yet. And it changed as I was working on it. I think.”

“And it’s an infinite distance quantum-entangled communicator of some kind?” Jackie has followed most of the information, but the math had become progressively more esoteric, and she wasn’t sure she had fully digested the impact of what they were telling her.

Jackie looks back and forth between the two, and has a moment where she’s sure she’s missing some kind of telepathic communication. Something gets decided, and Laxmi suddenly stands up and starts pacing.

“OK, don’t freak out. Let me show you something on the laptop.” As she says this, Doug is pulling up some kind of simulation program on the old machine.

“Yes, originally I thought this was a way to create a q-matter object with certain quantum properties that would maintain entanglement when the material was split into two halves. And then information could be passed between the two, regardless of distance.” Doug has pressed buttons, and a simulated object gets created on the screen, splits in two, and the two halves float to opposite sides of the screen. The halves blip in unison, as if Morse code or binary pulses are sent between them. “It’s pretty standard stuff, at least in terms of quantum properties. Imagine very long-distance phones, because I originally thought you’d be able to cram a fairly dense datastream through them.”

Jackie nods at this, because it’s true: what she knows about quantum entanglement covers this basic element -- the idea of information being passed regardless of distance.

“But then as I was playing with the maths...I realized that if you created a torus of the material, and split it precisely while running a high-energy current through it, what you’d get would be an aperture of any width through which any normal-matter object could pass through the opening while traversing zero internal distance, regardless of the physical distance of the ring halves themselves.”

Doug has pressed more buttons, and on the screen, indeed, a glowing blue torus has been created, then halved, with each half sent to opposite sides of the screen. This time, a green three-dimensional cube approaches the half on the right side of the screen, and passes through, instantly popping out of the left half without crossing the middle of the screen.

Laxmi and Doug are watching her, eagle-eyed, and she’s trying not to gape at the screen. “So...you’ve invented...what? Portals? Stargates?” she leans forward dramatically, “Have you invented Stargates?!”

Laxmi claps, delighted. “Yes! Yes! I mean, no, not Stargates...not really, not exactly. But portals, yes! Or quantum doors...or I don’t know! I don’t know what we’ll call them, and there are some huge limits.”

Laxmi is glowing, caught up in the thrill of revealing her discovery. The music in the background has shifted to a plaintive love song, and it is dissonant to the mood of the room, a sorrowful longing at odds with the astonishment inside of Jackie.

Jackie shakes her head as if waking from a reverie, and purses her lips to blow out the lungful of air she didn’t realize she’d been holding in an accidental off-tune whistle.

“Laxmi, this is amazing. Truly incredible. But, I have to ask...why do you need me? I mean...I can follow the math up to a point, but...I’m a software engineer and modeler, and maybe on the downlow a decent white hat, but this...” She motions towards the screen, and shrugs halfway through, as if she’s making a half-assed attempt to throw a ball. She looks at Doug.

“You were right. It’s big, big, big.”

Doug shoots a finger at Jackie, pointing, “See!? I told you!”

Laxmi grins at her. “So, you’re not going to run away screaming?”

Jackie laughs, and again Doug seems startled at the sound, while it just makes Laxmi smile even wider.

“I’m not running away screaming, but my mind is blown, a little. And again, I’m not sure how I can help.”

Laxmi nods. She holds up a hand and starts ticking items off her list.

“One, I need top-level security in here. The plans only exist on this one ancient laptop that I take everywhere with me, and I erase the maths from the board every night when I leave. I need an ultra-safe place to work. I need somewhere to store this where I’m sure no-one can hack it. Not even the Feds.

“Two, the devices are going to need robust control mechanisms. For one thing, they need a steady supply of constant power.” She pauses as if she’s debating adding more detail. Jackie interjects.

“But I’m not an electrical engineer.”

“But I am,” interrupts Doug. “I can do the fancy wiring. Bad jokes and fancy wiring are my contribution to Team Awesome. But we need strong, proprietary software to control the devices.”

Jackie nods at this; it makes sense. “Like to switch the portal from Paris, Texas, to Paris, France kind of thing?”

Laxmi sighs a little and shakes her head. “No, actually. Sorry, we didn’t cover that part yet. I said there were some limitations, and they’re fairly hard and fast ones, at that.

“Once the portal pair gets created, they are permanently locked to each other, and only each other, and only if there is a constant flow of power to both devices.”

“What happens if one or both lose power?” Jackie asks, bracing herself for the worst.

Laxmi and Doug trade a glance. “Nothing,” says Laxmi.

“Nothing?”

“Well, that’s just it. If one or both lose power completely, they lose the entanglement. It just stops and can’t be turned back on. Look, imagine the pair has three states.

“There’s on, which means they’re both at full power, and the aperture is open between them. Full power varies, by the way, on the size of the portal, and not the distance. Big portals take more, etcetera.

“Then there’s a low-power state, which means that the aperture isn’t open between them, but they’re still connected in a quantum entangled state.

“And then there’s off. Completely unpowered, on one or both, which is a disaster, because it means they’ve lost entanglement, and no matter how much power you dump into them afterwards, you can’t get it back. You just then have very expensive loops of manufactured diamond.”

“Diamond?”

Laxmi nods, and holds her hand back up, with two fingers out, and raises a third. “And that gets me back to my list. Three-dee printing techniques have gotten pretty advanced, but the means to print what we need exists only in one place, and it isn’t here. Number three is that I need help from someone. Someone very specific.

“There’s a guy I met once, and have been in touch with over the years, who I think can help. His name is Caleb Sims, and he’s my peer at Caltech. I need him to review the maths with me, and if it works, he has access to the only set of equipment I know of that can make test runs of this stuff.”

“And you need me...” Jackie starts.

“I need you because I need to talk to Caleb secretly, in a completely unhackable and untraceable way.”

Jackie laughs again, but in a gentler way. She runs her gloves through her hair, vaguely conscious that this is her tell.

“Look. I’m in, alright? I signed your agreements, and this is so fucking huge I can’t walk away now. But you know what you’re asking, right?”

Laxmi nods.

“The NCR is our ally. But if we’re caught communicating scientific secrets from a research lab across national borders, for something so revolutionary...” She trails off for a moment, “If they catch us, we’ll likely be charged with treason.”

Jackie can see the color rising in Doug’s face, and Laxmi’s warm brown eyes have taken on a hard sheen. They look at each other, and then they both look up at her, nodding.

“We know. We’ve talked about it. We know what we’re doing. And we have to do this. I can’t just walk away from this. God, or the Universe, or Shiva, or Ganesha, or my namesake, or whoever gave this thing to me in a dream, and it’s real, and we can make it work. I can’t hand it over. It’s mine. I have to do it.” The steel in Laxmi’s voice matches the hard determination in her eyes.

Doug is nodding. “And I go where she goes,” he says simply.

Jackie looks back and forth between them. Well, fuck, she thinks. I wanted something big, and this could not be any bigger.

The music in the background shifts to something wild and upbeat and celebratory, a howl of joy turned into a song. It seems fitting. She grins at her two new friends and colleagues, and she knows there’s a wildness in her smile that matches the hype of the song.

“OK, then. Let’s do this. Let’s break some rules and change the world.”

«Chapter 4 - Sharon | Chapter 5 - Jackie| Chapter 6 - Jake»

The Shattered World Series | Book 1 | Light Shines Through

© 2025 Lawrence Winnerman | Science Fiction — All Rights Reserved

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Lawrence Winnerman | SCIENCE FICTION

Lawrence Winnerman — Mon, 28 Jul 2025 01:06:36 GMT

Welcome to Lawrence Winnerman | SCIENCE FICTION. I am, rather obviously, , your host.

For years, I have imagined that I would, at some point in my life, step into a career as a science fiction author. When I was 45, I realized that if I was going to do that, I needed to, you know, start writing some science fiction.

It has only taken me ten more years to get going.

Maybe, like me, you are a late-blooming aspiring author. Or perhaps you are a lifelong fan of science fiction. Maybe you’re a part of the Queer community, and you’ve never seen yourself represented in science fiction at all.

Whatever the reason, no matter who you are, I’m glad you’re here.

The Shattered World Series

You’ll notice a whole section dedicated to this serialization of my first novel, Light Shines Through. This novel has been a work in progress for the better part of the last decade, and I need to get it out there because I’ve been racing against current events to write it. Things that seemed implausible ten years ago have already happened (and I don’t get any credit for predicting the future!)

The sequel, Any Open Door, is already well along in writing, and may simply be serialized here after Light Shines Through.

The prologue for the story is here, and there are handy navigation links at the bottom of each chapter to jump back and forth in the story.

> Seattle >> Indiana. Gay. 🏳️‍🌈 Bengal cat dad. 🐈‍⬛🐈 EDM, TSwift, Lizzo, Chappell Roan, Beyoncé. Sci-fi nerd and aspiring author. Ardently hates Nazis.","photo_url":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F8dc77da7-86fc-455f-898a-49429fb47f9e_1152x1152.jpeg","is_guest":false,"bestseller_tier":100}],"post_date":"2025-03-26T10:03:49.282Z","cover_image":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!-yMW!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa6d5f251-969b-43e6-8039-1fd8abcd0e9c_1080x1080.png","cover_image_alt":null,"canonical_url":"https://lwinner.substack.com/p/light-shines-through-prologue","section_name":"The Shattered World Series","video_upload_id":null,"id":159656372,"type":"newsletter","reaction_count":1,"comment_count":0,"publication_id":null,"publication_name":"Lawrence Winnerman | SCIENCE FICTION","publication_logo_url":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Dlia!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F852b0056-c318-49e8-9be1-510ed46cd697_1024x1024.png","belowTheFold":true,"youtube_url":null,"show_links":null,"feed_url":null}">

In addition to chapters of the book, you’ll notice interstitial chapters that contain information about the world. I’m a big fan of worldbuilding, and so you’ll see things like maps of countries, and vexillological artefacts (flags!)

Check out this entry on The Free Republic of Cascadia:

> Seattle >> Indiana. Gay. 🏳️‍🌈 Bengal cat dad. 🐈‍⬛🐈 EDM, TSwift, Lizzo, Chappell Roan, Beyoncé. Sci-fi nerd and aspiring author. Ardently hates Nazis.","photo_url":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F8dc77da7-86fc-455f-898a-49429fb47f9e_1152x1152.jpeg","is_guest":false,"bestseller_tier":100}],"post_date":"2025-07-21T13:30:03.283Z","cover_image":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!pS3k!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F3d764996-8014-43f9-9d2b-b44c7b0aeb11_601x902.png","cover_image_alt":null,"canonical_url":"https://lwinner.substack.com/p/light-shines-through-interstitial","section_name":"The Shattered World Series","video_upload_id":null,"id":168805206,"type":"newsletter","reaction_count":14,"comment_count":3,"publication_id":null,"publication_name":"Lawrence Winnerman | SCIENCE FICTION","publication_logo_url":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Dlia!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F852b0056-c318-49e8-9be1-510ed46cd697_1024x1024.png","belowTheFold":true,"youtube_url":null,"show_links":null,"feed_url":null}">

Additionally, I am slowly narrating the entire book as recorded LIVE sessions. If you’d like to follow along that way, please start here:

> Seattle >> Indiana. Gay. 🏳️‍🌈 Bengal cat dad. 🐈‍⬛🐈 EDM, TSwift, Lizzo, Chappell Roan, Beyoncé. Sci-fi nerd and aspiring author. Ardently hates Nazis.","photo_url":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F8dc77da7-86fc-455f-898a-49429fb47f9e_1152x1152.jpeg","is_guest":false,"bestseller_tier":100}],"post_date":"2025-07-17T22:18:16.211Z","cover_image":"https://substack-video.s3.amazonaws.com/video_upload/post/168591685/dd19752e-f054-4bfd-9db0-625026d31272/transcoded-144669.png","cover_image_alt":null,"canonical_url":"https://lwinner.substack.com/p/book-reading-light-shines-through","section_name":"The Shattered World Series","video_upload_id":"dd19752e-f054-4bfd-9db0-625026d31272","id":168591685,"type":"podcast","reaction_count":7,"comment_count":0,"publication_id":null,"publication_name":"Lawrence Winnerman | SCIENCE FICTION","publication_logo_url":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Dlia!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F852b0056-c318-49e8-9be1-510ed46cd697_1024x1024.png","belowTheFold":true,"youtube_url":null,"show_links":null,"feed_url":null}">

Short Stories

In addition to writing my novels, I am creating a catalog of short science fiction. Some of these stories have been submitted for publication, but I fear I am not cut out for submission work—I’m far too impatient to get a piece of work in front of readers to wait months and months for yet another rejection from a sci-fi mag.

One of my first and favorite stories is I Love You, Dieter Murphy—a time-travel wish-fulfillment story that tries to right a wrong from my past.

> Seattle >> Indiana. Gay. 🏳️‍🌈 Bengal cat dad. 🐈‍⬛🐈 EDM, TSwift, Lizzo, Chappell Roan, Beyoncé. Sci-fi nerd and aspiring author. Ardently hates Nazis.","photo_url":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F8dc77da7-86fc-455f-898a-49429fb47f9e_1152x1152.jpeg","is_guest":false,"bestseller_tier":100}],"post_date":"2025-03-07T00:14:26.354Z","cover_image":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!AsS0!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F69012afa-3f90-404f-8f0c-937cdc7de1d4_640x640.jpeg","cover_image_alt":null,"canonical_url":"https://lwinner.substack.com/p/i-love-you-dieter-murphy","section_name":"Short Stories","video_upload_id":null,"id":158536712,"type":"newsletter","reaction_count":16,"comment_count":14,"publication_id":null,"publication_name":"Lawrence Winnerman | SCIENCE FICTION","publication_logo_url":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Dlia!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F852b0056-c318-49e8-9be1-510ed46cd697_1024x1024.png","belowTheFold":true,"youtube_url":null,"show_links":null,"feed_url":null}">

Memoir

While memoir is not usually my jawn, I do dabble from time to time. I tend to write about hyper-specific memories or moments, and more broadly, about growing up as a gay man in the United States in the 80s and 90s.

> Seattle >> Indiana. Gay. 🏳️‍🌈 Bengal cat dad. 🐈‍⬛🐈 EDM, TSwift, Lizzo, Chappell Roan, Beyoncé. Sci-fi nerd and aspiring author. Ardently hates Nazis.","photo_url":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F8dc77da7-86fc-455f-898a-49429fb47f9e_1152x1152.jpeg","is_guest":false,"bestseller_tier":100}],"post_date":"2025-04-02T16:55:58.852Z","cover_image":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!fcni!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F8e40befd-a322-4a16-bc17-0467f00a17db_1080x1080.png","cover_image_alt":null,"canonical_url":"https://lwinner.substack.com/p/if-id-known-you-were-gonna-die-i-bb0","section_name":"Memoir","video_upload_id":null,"id":160433221,"type":"newsletter","reaction_count":9,"comment_count":7,"publication_id":null,"publication_name":"Lawrence Winnerman | SCIENCE FICTION","publication_logo_url":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Dlia!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F852b0056-c318-49e8-9be1-510ed46cd697_1024x1024.png","belowTheFold":true,"youtube_url":null,"show_links":null,"feed_url":null}">

genXy

You may see mentions of, or links to — a Substack publication that I co-own and co-author with , my partner in crime.

We’ve known each other for 45+ years, and have been besties for ages. Our publication is largely about our experiences as middle-aged GenXers in modern America, and all the bullshit we’ve lived through and deal with now.

It’s a fun place, and I’d recommend you check it out. The best way to get introduced to us is by joining us for The Daily Whatever, a Substack Live podcast that happens each weekday at 10 am ET, and 7 am PT. On Saturdays, we’re on at Noon ET, 9 am PT.

© 2025 Lawrence Winnerman | Science Fiction — All Rights Reserved

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Light Shines Through | Chapter 4 - Sharon

Lawrence Winnerman — Sun, 27 Jul 2025 11:38:01 GMT

Sharon | October 2041 — Seattle, Tahoma, Free Republic of Cascadia

Sharon is sitting at her desk, tapping out an idle rhythm with her pen while thumbing through a pile of daily briefs, purposefully ignoring the Eyes Only economic report sitting on the top of the stack.

She’s fairly sure she knows what it says — the economy is tanking, inflation isn’t under control, and after nearly twenty years of goosing the economy of Cascadia with every massive Keynesian public works project possible, the golden eggs have run dry. A deep, dark recession is staring her in the face, just as she’s trying to get re-elected.

She chuffs in frustration and slaps the desk with an open palm, hard enough to sting.

The desk itself is a replica of the famous old Resolute desk used by so many presidents of the vanished United States, before the original had been immolated in nuclear fire. It is made from American oak, a gift from the New California Republic, after the Catastrophes and the end of the war, given to Cascadia’s first president, her friend and mentor, Ben Cohen.

At a casual glance, it’s the spitting image of the original, but the big giveaway is the front panel — the Great Seal of the Free Republic of Cascadia looks nothing like the Great Seal of the United States.

And this office isn’t an oval — it’s a long rectangle, with the desk situated near the high windows at one narrow end, far away from the double doors that are the only entrance. Her new office in the just-finished government complex in Cascadia City is an off-kilter hexagon on the top of a building that she thinks looks like a tilted egg. She thinks the new building is ugly as hell, but she has to praise it publicly as an example of Cascadian design innovation. She taps the pen again and idly wonders how the furniture from this office is going to fit in the new space.

For some reason, she can’t stop thinking about Barack Obama. It’s not like it could be residual mojo from the desk. This replica never existed at the same time as its predecessor, and not even on the same side of the continent.

She has no idea if the hidden drawers are the same, and it’s this detail that bothers her and makes her think of Obama. She’d never met him, although she was an ardent admirer and had volunteered for his campaigns. When he was President of the United States, she’d been an average American, never imagining her future in politics.

Sometimes she imagines he’s here and she’s trying to explain to him who she is and how, in a way, they are related. The conversation would have to start with the Flash. Maybe the messed-up elections and creeping autocracy that preceded it, but why bury the lede? The Flash is the moment that the world changed forever.

Seventeen years later, there are still very few things people agree on regarding the Flash.

Everyone but the complete whackos agree that at 3:17 am, on the morning of Friday, the 15th of November, 2024, ten days after the most widely disputed election in American history, a surface blast nuclear bomb went off in Washington, D.C., wiping out most of the United States government.

Virtually everyone agrees that it must have been in the range of seven to eight megatons; an odd size, she’s told, because it doesn’t match any weapon tonnage then in production.

After that, it all starts to become debatable.

Although hundreds of groups ultimately claimed responsibility for it, there was never any public consensus on who did it. Debates ranged from the obvious, like al-Qaeda, or Russia, or China, into the more improbable, like Mossad, or Canada, or a failed US military coup, or even the sitting president of the time, furious that he wasn’t getting his way. Then come the downright ridiculous: Antifa, or the Sons of the Confederacy, or hidden lizard people living amongst us.

Everyone has a pet theory, and after all this time, it’s become a bit of a cultural rubric to ask at bars or parties. What sign are you? Do you believe in the afterlife? What’s your theory about how the Flash happened?

Secret reports put together by every global intelligence agency, working alone and together, had more definitive answers, but the reports that got released to the public were anything but.

All of these theories whispered about, debated, argued over, fought about, screamed about, devolving into actual fisticuffs, and the only thing that remains one hundred percent true is that the Flash — the event itself, the refugee crisis, the market crashes and wars and depressions that resulted — the Flash changed the course of human history forever.

She pops open one of the secret compartments on the desk and pulls out the dog-eared report whose page numbers and sentences and analyses are so familiar to her that she can quote them verbatim. The faux black leather grain has been worried rough in places, careworn through the years by only five sets of hands — hers, and those of the three men and one woman who have also occupied this desk in this office.

For years, crackpot political analysts and foreign nemeses had predicted all of how the United States would tear itself apart, shattering into fragments, Humpty-Dumpty-like, never to be put together again.

How right they were.

Sharon shakes her head and looks at the space where she imagines her figment of Obama would be standing. None of them had had any idea of the speed with which the end would come, nor the levels of violence and displacement that would occur.

Absentmindedly, she traces the outline of the logo on the cover. Office of the Provisional President of the Free Republic of Cascadia. Her long brown finger covers the word “Provisional”, as it has done a hundred times before. The multiple eyes from the Eagle-Salmon-Orca-Bear logo of the original seal of the emergent country seem to challenge the idle gaze of her distraction.

That original seal had been controversial, but then so had everything. The wording of the new constitution. The unicameral congress. The flag, the anthem, the boundaries of the new country, at war with its former neighbors and fighting for survival. All this time later, and it still feels like they’re fighting for survival. The phrase bone tired has lost all mystery for her; it is now her lived reality, a constant companion here in her own body.

In the emptiness left behind in the days immediately following the Flash, America roared out its displeasure and declared itself still alive. The problem was, there wasn’t one voice making the claim. There were dozens.

The weekend following the Flash was a nightmare of chaos and confusion. Washington, D.C., had been obliterated, and anyone downwind of the fallout was scrambling to escape. This included most of the northeastern seaboard — the most densely populated parts of the country, where a late-season tropical front pushed fallout in the direction of more than fifty million people.

Sharon thumbs through the first dozen pages of the report, eyes catching flashes of the graphs, charts, and maps that she knows so well. Initial estimates were that nearly a million people died outright in the blast, including virtually every leader of both political parties. Another million died within the first week due to radiation. Another million still died in the evacuation and chaos afterwards, as Baltimore, Philadelphia, Newark, Wilmington, New York City — all rushed to get as far the hell away from D.C. and its drifting, deadly ashes as humanly possible.

Of the nearly fifty million people who lived in the path of the fallout, it is estimated that forty percent had tried to leave the urban coast and head north and west. More than nineteen and a half million people were stuck in the largest traffic jam in history. Governments of the northern states were overwhelmed. Not only could they not send humanitarian aid to the D.C. area, they suddenly had a more local crisis on their hands.

She remembers that excruciating weekend, watching on TV as the first grim reports came in from the smoldering crater that had been the nation’s capital, and as the enormity of the refugee crisis became clear. In those early days, it was as if the air itself was made of rumor and misinformation so thick that it was impossible to know what was true in any given moment. The social networks crashed repeatedly under the load of humans trying to cope with the unimaginable.

The confusion was exacerbated over the weekend when the sitting Secretaries of Housing and Urban Development, Transportation, Energy, and Education all claimed that they were the Acting President of the United States. Not to be outdone, the two people who claimed that they would have been nominated as Secretary of State in the incoming administration — who insisted they had won the election — announced that they should be Acting President.

Within a week, the Secretaries of HUD, Transportation, and Energy were dead, all apparently from radiation poisoning. The Secretary of Education was sworn in as President in a shaky phone video distributed to national media, and then promptly went dark, leaving Americans to wonder if she, too, was still alive.

Not willing to wait a month for the anniversary of its first secession, the State of South Carolina announced on Thanksgiving Day that it had voted in an emergency joint session of its legislature to “temporarily suspend responsibilities as a State of the Union to focus on the needs of its own citizens first.” With this, the Acting Governor of the state commanded the already activated South Carolina National Guard to close all state borders “until further notice”.

The next day, Black Friday, saw the Governor-elect of North Carolina shoot and fatally injure the incumbent but just ousted governor of the state at the Capitol building, and declare that North Carolina would follow South Carolina into a “secession from the Union”. A hastily convened emergency session of the North Carolina legislature three hours later swore in the new Governor early, and voted to uphold his declaration. By Monday morning, every former Confederate State had announced that it, too, was leaving the Union.

On December 3rd, all of the states of the former Confederacy announced that they were forming the New Confederate States of America. They were joined by Kentucky, Missouri, Indiana, Ohio, and Oklahoma.

Two days later, on the 5th, Texas announced that it had reconsidered, and was, in fact, not joining the New Confederacy, but was forming the Second Republic of Texas, instead. The same day, Utah announced that it was forming a new country, called Deseret, and that all Mormon counties of adjoining states would be welcome in the new nation. A day later, Oklahoma announced that it was joining Texas, and not the New Confederacy, while counties in Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, and Colorado announced resolutions to join their brethren in Deseret.

Along these new borders, chaos reigned. Boundary counties in states that had not declared independence or joined the New Confederacy announced that they were seceding from their states and forming new states that would join the Confederacy. In this fog of confusion, it was inevitable that armed forces, militarized law enforcement departments, and the huge number of guns in citizens’ hands would come into play.

Entire counties couldn’t agree on which state or nation they belonged to. Cities had vocal groups vying for inclusion in one of the new nations, even if they were dozens or sometimes hundreds of miles from those borders.

There was no single Fort Sumter moment — although an argument could be made that the battle for the munitions depot at Langley Air Force Base in mid-December was a tipping point — but by New Year’s Day of 2025, the unthinkable had happened: the United States of America had ceased to exist, and in its place, seven new nations engaged in a Second Civil War for supremacy on the North American continent.

In 2041, if you count Hawai’i and Greenland, the Free Republic of Cascadia is one of fourteen nations that arose out of the wreckage of the old United States, Canada, and Mexico.

Sharon sighs and looks at the spot where her imaginary Obama had been standing, feeling the ache of isolation that comes with a job like this one, wishing she could talk to someone who could understand.

She puts the battered report back into the desk and turns to pick up the top-secret report she has been avoiding from the pile at her elbow.

She scans the executive summary, and the knotty weight that lives just behind her sternum pulls heavier. Her overworked economics team is confirming that a major recession is brewing, and there’s not a whole hell of a lot she can do about it without violating either the laws of economics or Cascadia, or both.

The door bangs open, and Tony Chuy strides in, his hair looking wild. She knows from experience that this means bad news. He slaps a printout down on the corner of her desk. She arches an eyebrow at him, as if to say How dare you treat my desk that way! He knows her well enough to know he dare not drag out the bad news any further. With an effort, he manages to sputter it out.

“They did it! They fucking did it! The full Uni just passed the goddamn NERA 727 to 341!” he pauses to take a breath and rake his hands through his hair again, rewilding it.

She tries to do some mental math, afraid of what she might find.

“Sixty-eight percent. If you’re doing the math, it’s sixty-eight percent. Veto-proof.”

He resumes torturing his hair, picks up the printout and scans it, as if the numbers might have changed, and then throws it back down on her desk.

Sharon taps her fingers against her lips, thinking.

She knew her influence in the Unicameral was waning, but she hadn’t expected outright defeat. And certainly not a veto-proof majority, which bears the sting of a personal rebuke.

But why?

Are people still so goddamn stupid and afraid? She asks herself, grimacing at the nearly instantaneous internal response. The last thirty-plus years of politics has taught her that, yes, people are exactly so uninformed and afraid that they will willingly vote against their own self-interests. Over and over and over again, in fact.

The country is dipping into a recession that nearly two decades of sustained infrastructure spending can’t keep them out of. Combined with inflation and soaring energy prices, the timing for a breakthrough in nuclear fusion had seemed like a godsend. Her entire adult life, safe and efficient nuclear fusion had been “just a decade away”, elusively slipping with every passing year ten more years into the future, like a highway heat mirage, or a rainbow, always up in the distance, nearly close enough to reach.

But they’d done it, the researchers at the University of Tahoma and the Cascadia National Laboratory. They’d finally cracked the code — something about the shape and strength of the magnetic field, and some innovative new superconductor material, she recalled — and had built a fully functional fusion reactor, seeming to open the door to a future where Cascadia’s destiny was truly its own, safe and free and energy independent.

And the public had freaked out.

Admittedly, before her career in politics, she’s not sure she had understood the difference between splitting atoms apart and smashing them together, either. But a free society, with a free press and widespread access to the rebuilt, Cascadia-wide internet meant that fringe ideas and disinformation spread — often faster than the truth.

Now, some retrograde alliance of Greens, Conservatives, NeoAmericans, and religious factions had joined forces in the unicameral Congress to pass the Nuclear Energy Regulation Act, a byzantine piece of crap legislation that had the — carefully intended — effect of functionally banning the construction of any new fission or fusion plant on Cascadian territory.

Looking at the numbers, it seemed clear that there had been a significant number of defections from her own party, the New Progressive Alliance, too. A surge of anger built up inside her until she smacked her open palm onto the gleaming wood of her desk.

“Goddamnit! God fucking dammint! How did we let this happen, Tony?”

Her Chief of Staff seemed to come to his senses, tried to comb his glossy black hair into some semblance of order, and considered his responses.

“We didn’t get out in front of the messaging fast enough, boss. We forgot the lessons of the past: people don’t trust science. And they really don’t trust politicians. When something seems like the combination of science and politics, they tend to push back hard.

“There’s a malaise out there, in the country. We’ve spent all these years trying to build a safe and stable nation after the Catastrophes, and in a lot of ways, it worked.

“But tension is rising with the threat from Brazil and the Confederacy, and their brewing war with Texas. Climate keeps getting worse. All those new farms we created just got decimated with the drought and the fires. And inflation is stomping the heart out of the average family budget. Big spending may have saved us before, but it no longer sounds like the right thing to most people.”

He shrugged, chewing on a thumbnail. Sharon wonders for the umpteenth time in their long association how he had any fingernails or hair left; all of his stress seemed focused on keratin destruction.

“Also, this is a total non-sequitur, but I’m pretty sure Weissman is going to lose in California.”

Sharon’s head snapped up to look at him, momentarily nonplussed.

“Wait, what? Janice is going to lose? What makes you think so?” she asked.

“It’s not me. It’s her guy, Mercedo, who told me. They are looking at some disastrous numbers against that billionaire asshole, Garcia.”

“But it’s still weeks away. There’s time to turn it around.”

Tony just looked at her, still gnawing on a thumbnail. He slowly started shaking his head.

“No, ma’am. Not with these numbers. He told me some of the cross-tabs, and...it’s bad. It would take a miracle for her to win at this point, and those kinds of miracles don’t happen in politics, not since...I don’t know...fuckin’ Trump, maybe?”

They were both silent for a moment, lost in their own thoughts.

“Well, fuck. I’m glad you told me, Tony, but what made you think of this now?”

He stabbed a finger at the vote tally sheet sitting on her desk.

“Because of that. Because that vote, and Weissman, your ostensible political ally, losing in California, all point in the same direction.

“You’re running again, ma’am, and that’s fucking great. No one is more thrilled about that than I am, believe me. But we have less than thirteen months to turn this shit around, and right now, to be honest? I have no fucking idea how we do that.”

Sharon glared at him for a moment, and then tried to remember not to shoot the messenger. She softened her gaze.

She knew it was going to be hard. Heck, everyone did. The early polling showed her neck and neck in just about every conceivable matchup, and at this stage, for an incumbent, that was never a good sign.

“Do you know how we fix this, ma’am?”

She sighed. Tried to pull her words together, and gave up.

“I do not. I really don’t, Tony.” She pauses and takes a sip of her long-cold coffee.

“But I do know that you and I have overcome worse. We’ve had some hard times in this fucking job, and we’ve always figured it out before.

“And you know what my Nana used to say, you’ve heard me say it a hundred times. ‘Sometimes there’s nothing to do but the doing.’”

They smile at each other as they ponder the vagaries of her political career and how he’d been there as her right hand for nearly every step of the way.

“The one thing I know for sure? What we need is no more surprises.” She points at the paper again. “No more surprises like this one. No more fucking surprises, period, end of sentence.”

He grins at her and is opening his mouth to say something, when the phone on her desk buzzes and her senior admin’s voice cuts through.

“Ma’am? I’m sorry to interrupt, but I’ve got Vice President Patterson here to see you. He says it’s urgent.”

Sharon and Tony shoot each other inquiring looks.

Sharon whispers, even though she knows no one else can hear them, “Fuck. Patterson reached out to me a couple of days ago, and I pushed him off and told him to talk to you. Did he?”

“Double fuck. No. He called my office yesterday, and I didn’t get back to him either.”

“So, you don’t know what this is?”

Tony shakes his head, submitting his other thumbnail to dental abuse.

Sharon sighs, a theme for the day. “Well, I guess we’d better get him in here and find out what the Vice President thinks is so goddamn important, eh?”

Sharon presses the button on the phone. “Thanks, Tina. Can you please send Vice President Patterson in now?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

The double doors at the end of the room open, and a tall, late-middle-aged man strides in. Bryan Patterson had been a good-looking man in his youth, and age had been kind to him, even if he was now a bit portly.

A football player who had peaked in college, he had gone on to marry into a family that owned a chain of successful car dealerships in the Spokane area. He had had an unremarkable career in area politics until the Catastrophes and the establishment of Cascadia.

He’d built a reputation for himself as an admirable, if unremarkable, legislator in the Unicameral, and then as the first governor of Spokan state, right after the devolution of the old state lines into the thirty-five smaller states Ben Cohen had advocated for.

When Sharon had been selecting running mates for her comeback in ’38, Patterson had been a safe, obvious choice.

Sharon stands up to welcome the man into the office, stepping in front of her desk to shake his hand. She directs him to sit on the overstuffed sofas, and Tony, comfortable in the office after all this time, pours all three of them a splash of Pend Oreille whiskey Sharon kept in the office for moments like this.

“Mr. Vice President, how good to see you. How are Delilah and the kids?”

“Oh, you know. Life keeps chugging along. Tommy’s got another baby on the way. Mary’s just announced to us that she’s getting divorced. Steve got a job that keeps him traveling across the country, but he loves it, I guess. The usual ups and downs.”

She smiles, inwardly cringing at the way the man added a “t” at the end of the word “across”. She takes a sip of the whiskey and nods.

“Well, please give everyone my love and best wishes.”

She smiles, and he nods, a strange look washing across his face.

“Well, I will, ma’am, but you may want to reconsider that when you hear what I’ve got to say.”

Sharon keeps her face neutral, but can see Tony shoot her a look from the other end of the sofa they’re both sitting on, facing the Vice President.

“OK, Bryan. I know that we’ve been remiss in getting back to you in the last couple of days, but I’m listening. What’s going on?”

The man rubs his hand across his face, takes a sip of the whiskey, and grunts mildly at the burn.

“Well, ma’am, there’s no good way to say this, so I’m just gonna come out with it. You know I’m grateful that you chose to put me on the ticket three years ago...”

He trails off, and the gnawing sensation in her gut that she wasn’t going to like this becomes dramatically more pronounced.

She nods, her face a mask. In a flash, she knows where this is going.

“But you thought this was going to be a stepping stone.”

The vice president chuffs into his whiskey glass and nods, looking up to meet her eyes.

“I think it’s reasonable to conclude that every veep in history has assumed that the job would be a stepping stone, don’t you?

“When you didn’t announce you were running again for so long, I started to make plans, ma’am. And due respect? You didn’t talk to me about anything. About what you were thinking or not thinking. You didn’t keep me in the loop. And so...”

“Mister Vice President...Bryan...I’d strongly urge you to reconsider this.” She tries to put steel into her words, but she knows they have no weight or force to make this man change his mind.

“No ma’am, I don’t think I will.” He pauses and finishes the whiskey in a single gulp, sets the glass down, and stands up from the sofa.

“I came here to tell you in person. I’m tendering my resignation as the Vice President of Cascadia, effective whenever you wish, but no later than October 15^th.

“On October 17^th, my birthday, I am going to announce that I am running against you for the nomination to be the presidential candidate for the New Progressive Alliance.”

She glares at him, saying nothing.

“And I should also let you know that I’ve got most of the New Dems lined up and ready to endorse, and a decent number of the Hamiltonians. Now, I’m not the kind to make threats, ma’am, especially if I can’t keep ‘em, but the NDs are prepared to split if I don’t get the nom.”

Sharon and Tony both stand. Puzzle pieces are fitting together now. Tony speaks before she can.

“The NERA vote. You did that. You orchestrated the defeat, making us look weak. Making sure it was veto-proof. And now you’re going to announce, and use that as your theory of the case against the President.”

Patterson can’t hide the small smile that flits across his face; Sharon made a mental note and thinks that she should have played poker with the son of a bitch a couple of times over the years. At least then she could have gotten the measure of the man, and taught him some humility with a shitty poker face like that.

Patterson glances at Tony, but then looks directly back at Sharon.

“Truth is, I think you’re weak across the board, ma’am. I know you’ve got things going on at home, but this country needs leadership. You might have been that once, but it’s time for you to step aside and let someone with fresh eyes lead this nation.”

Ice runs through Sharon’s veins, and she makes several quick decisions.

“Well, Mr. Vice President, I appreciate the courage it took to come here today to tell me this in person. I am accepting your resignation, and it is effective immediately. My office will take care of the messaging.”

The vice president blanches a bit at her brusque tone, and she once again wonders how someone could make it this far in politics broadcasting every tell like that. She turns to Tony.

“Tony, please notify all departments of Vice President Patterson’s removal from the chain of command. Figure out with Secret Service how to transition his coverage.”

She pauses for effect.

“Oh, and pull up the file of everyone we put on the shortlist for veep. We can take a look at that as soon as Bryan leaves.”

She strides to her desk and punches the button on her phone.

“Tina, can you come in here right away, please?”

Almost as if the woman had been anticipating the request, mere seconds later, Tina Newton comes into the office, pad and pen at the ready.

“Tina, I need you to witness something for me.”

The short, older woman nods and inquires simply, “Video?”

Sharon gives a curt nod, and Tina pulls out her phone to record and flashes a thumbs up when she hits the button.

“This is Sharon Walker-Nilssen, President of the Free Republic of Cascadia. Today is Thursday, October 3rd, 2041. With me in the office, I have Tony Chuy, Chief of Staff, and Tina Newton, my executive admin. As you can see, I am also with Vice President Bryan Patterson, who at...,” She pauses and looks at her watch.

“At approximately 2:45 this afternoon informed me that he is resigning as Vice President of the Free Republic of Cascadia. It is now 2:52 pm, and effective immediately, I am accepting his resignation.

“Mr. Patterson, you are now free from your duties and responsibilities as the vice president of this country. Thank you for your service.”

She nods at Tina, who cuts the recording.

Patterson explodes, “You can’t do it that way! How dare you!”

Sharon smiles. “Tina, could you please post that video to CascadiaNet as soon as possible?”

The now-former vice president splutters.

“You are making a huge mistake! You can’t do it like this!”

“Mr. Patterson, I think you’ll find that I can, in fact, not only do it this way, but that I already have. You wanted to be free of your role so that you could come for my job? Well, good luck to you, sir. If you didn’t think that this was a declaration of war, then I’m not sure you’d be a very good fit for this office.”

Patterson stands for a moment, mouth opening and closing like a broken robot, his face turning deeper shades of pink.

“Mr. Patterson, I think this meeting is over. Would you mind giving the President and me some privacy so we can discuss your replacement?”

Patterson flushes a deeper pink and looks as though he’s trying to think of something smart to say, and then nods, and walks stiffly out the double doors.

Sharon sags back against the edge of her desk and blows out a long, slow breath. Tony steps over to the crystal whiskey decanter and brings it over to refill their glasses.

He pours two fingers of whiskey for them both, and they clink glasses and sit quietly for several moments.

Finally, Tony breaks the silence and says, “So, I think you were saying something about no more surprises?”

Sharon chokes on a sip of whiskey and nearly does a spit-take. She looks at him, eyebrows arched in surprise, and then they both dissolve into fits of desperation-tinged laughter.

« Interstitial - Cascadia | Chapter 4 - Sharon | Chapter 5 - Jackie »

The Shattered World Series | Book 1 | Light Shines Through

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Book Reading: Light Shines Through | Ch. 1 - Sharon

Lawrence Winnerman — Thu, 24 Jul 2025 12:27:09 GMT

Thank you , , , and many others for tuning into my live reading of my serialized novel Light Shines Through!

Feel free to read along here as you listen:

> Seattle >> Indiana. Gay. 🏳️‍🌈 Bengal cat dad. 🐈‍⬛🐈 EDM, TSwift, Lizzo, Chappell Roan, Beyoncé. Sci-fi nerd and aspiring author. Ardently hates Nazis.","photo_url":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F8dc77da7-86fc-455f-898a-49429fb47f9e_1152x1152.jpeg","is_guest":false,"bestseller_tier":null}],"post_date":"2025-07-02T16:09:16.319Z","cover_image":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!OXmM!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa8493bd5-a2f2-47fd-a1bc-f94de6546ad7_2048x2048.png","cover_image_alt":null,"canonical_url":"https://lwinner.substack.com/p/light-shines-through-chapter-1","section_name":"The Shattered World Series","video_upload_id":null,"id":167324283,"type":"newsletter","reaction_count":10,"comment_count":1,"publication_id":null,"publication_name":"Lawrence Winnerman | SCIENCE FICTION","publication_logo_url":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Dlia!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F852b0056-c318-49e8-9be1-510ed46cd697_1024x1024.png","belowTheFold":false,"youtube_url":null,"show_links":null,"feed_url":null}">

The Shattered World Series | Book 1 | Light Shines Through

© 2025 Lawrence Winnerman | Science Fiction — All Rights Reserved

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Light Shines Through | Interstitial - Cascadia

Lawrence Winnerman — Mon, 21 Jul 2025 13:30:03 GMT

CascadiaNet | results returned in 0.0001342 seconds | Encryption level 2.25 {public datasphere, known user, registered device, common search} | Best result shown, probability .99998311543

Free Republic of Cascadia

“Cascadia”
“The FRC (Freek)”

Flag

“The Douglas Fir Flag”
“Doug Flag”
“Old Doug”

Map

Motto: “With Liberty, Justice, And Sovereignty For All”

Anthem: “I Vow to Thee, Cascadia” (“I Vow to Thee, My Country”)

(National Anthem of Cascadia – 2038 Unified Version)

I vow to thee, Cascadia, all earthly things above,
Entire and whole and perfect, the service of my love;
A love that guards the rivers, the forests old and wide,
That looks to the future, with honor, truth, and pride.
No crown shall mark your borders, no tyrant stake their claim—
We rise as one republic, and all shall speak your name.

There stands a living promise beneath the towering pine,
Where every voice has power, and all our hearts align.
No sword defends your dreaming, no empire draws your line—
Where kinship is your compass, and justice is your spine.
And hand in hand, through waking dawn, we walk your fertile ground,
Your paths are lit by purpose, your silence deep and sound.

To Cascadia, my country, I pledge my voice and hand,
To build the just tomorrow upon this rain-swept land;
With tools and dreams united, with minds both bold and free,
We cast away the old chains and forge what’s yet to be.
Your breath is in the rainfall, your honor in your name,
And every step we take for you shall never be in vain.

Capital

2041 – present: Cascadia City
2025 – 2041: Seattle

Largest city

Seattle, Tahoma State

Official languages

English, Spanish

Recognized languages

Salishan, Chinookan, Plateau Penutian, Tsimshianic, Athabaskan (Dene), Haida (Isolate), Wakashan, Tlingit, Chinuk Wawa, French, Vietnamese, Mandarin, Cantonese, Russian, Ukrainian, Korean, Tagalog, Arabic, Somali, Hindi, Punjabi

Demonym(s)

Cascadian
Freek (slang)

Population

31,275,463 (2041 estimate)

Currency

Cascadian dollar (FRC$)

Economy

GDP: FRC$ 7.9 trillion (R$ 895.7 billion)

Government

Modified Presidential Republic

Executive

Quadrennial direct election by popular vote (ranked choice)

• President: Sharon Elizabeth Walker-Nilssen

• Vice President: Bryan Daniel Patterson

Legislature

Unicameral Congress of Cascadia
“The Unicameral”
(plural district unicameral legislature)

Informal (non-binding)

Council of Elders

Judiciary

Supreme Court of Cascadia (constitutional/civil)
High Tribunal for the Environment (environmental)

Summary

The Free Republic of Cascadia was founded on July 20, 2025, in the wake of the Second American Civil War and the dissolution of the former United States of America after the contested Presidential Election of 2024, the destruction of Washington, D.C. in a nuclear terrorist attack, and the 2025 crash of the global economy resulting in the Greater Depression.

Primary movers of the formation of the nation included Benyamin David Cohen, Sharon Elizabeth Walker-Nilssen and other prominent members of the Human Sovereignty Movement.

After winning a series of major battles in the war, including the Battle of Blewitt Pass, the Spokane Offensive, and the decisive Eastern Push, the newly formed nation traded land for peace in the Jackson Hole Accords, securing the full Cascadian watershed as the political boundaries of the country. Later land acquisitions included the former Alaskan Panhandle in the Panhandle Annexation of 2027, and the Accession of Yukon State.

Cascadia, Alaska Free State, and Kalaallit Nunnaat are the only North American nations not currently (00204110270153221) engaged in border disputes with the North American Border Reconcilliation Commission.

(Report continues » ) (Full entry for Cascadia, Free Republic of »)

« Chapter 3 — Jackie | Interstitial - Cascadia | Chapter 4 - Sharon »

The Shattered World Series | Book 1 | Light Shines Through

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Light Shines Through | Chapter 3 - Jackie

Lawrence Winnerman — Sun, 20 Jul 2025 13:09:09 GMT

Jackie | October 2041 — Seattle, Tahoma, Free Republic of Cascadia

Jackie Lennox is gazing out the window, through the narrow band between the tatty sheer and the blackout curtain that casts half of her face in shadow despite the bright autumn afternoon sun. A sluggish breeze shifts the fabric slightly, but it’s not enough to pull her out of her rumination as her friend rambles on in an imperious lecture.

“And that’s why you can’t date cissies, Jackie,” says the other woman sitting across from her at the end of the threadbare old sofa.

Jackie looks up, not because she had heard what her friend had said, but because the tone of the words pulls her out of the cycle of thought she’s been momentarily lost in.

Jackie feels disgruntlement grow inside her as the meaning of Shan’s statement begins to sink in. She focuses on her friend, eyes narrowed.

“What did you say?”

Shan Hollick is one of Jackie’s oldest friends in Seattle, and her obvious go-to for solace after she had kicked her boyfriend Henry out.

Shan is looking at her, perched on the far end of the sofa, an illegal Confederate cigarette between the splayed fingers of one hand, the other hand crossed across her rhinestoned chest. She’s wearing a gold vintage McQueen knockoff that Jackie knows is one of her favorites, but which, to Jackie’s mind, makes Shan look like a giant banana.

Her friend is a tall, elegant woman who discovered her gender through drag. And this, Jackie thinks, is why she is dressed about three degrees more flamboyantly than anyone else would be for an evening in consoling a heartbroken friend.

Jackie loves her own carefully curated fashion, but Shan is a true clotheshorse: the kind of person who dresses to the nines to do laundry, and then changes clothes halfway through just because she can.

Shan leans in, the completely unnecessary vivid yellow feather fascinator in her hair bobbing as she does so, and puts a friendly hand on Jackie’s foot, as if forcing her to pay attention this time.

“Jackie, I know you don’t like me saying it, but I just really think that dating straight guys is bullshit. Fuck, you know me. I think dating cis people is confusing as hell. You’ll get over Henry because, come on, he was a dick.”

She says this with a knowing shake of her head, emphasizing her delivery of the truth. She pauses for effect, and then adds, “But whoever is next? You need to stay in the tribe.” Shan squeezes her ankle like a doctor consoling after injecting a vaccine and then leans back, casting an appraising glance at Jackie as if she can measure how deeply the words have sunk in.

Jackie idly wonders if the person Shan is alluding to “being next” is in fact Shan herself. Shan was one of the first people Jackie had met years ago, when she’d been a teenage refugee from Deseret into the Free Republic of Cascadia. They’d been as close as sisters from the start, and while Jackie loves Shan with a fierce dedication, there’s never been anything but friendship between them. Regardless, even if a relationship were something Shan was interested in, Jackie just doesn’t feel any kind of spark, so as far as Jackie is concerned, the idea is a complete non-starter.

“What are you thinking?” Shan asks her, trying to read her expression.

Jackie sighs, not ready or willing to move the conversation into the more awkward territory of boundary setting with her closest ally. While Shan is her dearest and oldest friend, she’s a Leo, which, by her astrological proclamations to Jackie, means she also happens to be something of an attention hog. Right now, Jackie can’t handle the idea of having to shift into support mode to handle Shan’s feelings. She still needs to vent, and there are some deep, emotional conversations that she can do without for the moment.

And as much as she hates Shan’s use of the old-fashioned term cis instead of non-trans, she also doesn’t want to rehash a recurring argument that had once had them yelling at each other about chirality and chemical enantiomers, and which had resulted in a thrown milkshake and two months of not talking.

She shudders a little at the memory, smiles to herself, and pushes past the sudden craving for a strawberry milkshake from the ancient but beloved burger joint down the street.

“So, you really think Henry was a dick?” she asks; a much safer topic. She leans back and drapes one arm across the back of the sofa, signaling that she’s willing to hear more hard truths — or at least, to let Shan tell her some hard truths and not reject them out of hand.

Shan groans, leans forward, and beats an overstuffed burgundy jacquard pillow with amplified melodrama.

“Ohmigod, Jackie! He was such a dick! He treated you like an asshole, all the time. ALL OF THE TIME!” She stops hitting the cushion and looks up at Jackie. “You know this, right? You have to be aware that he did not treat you the way you deserve to be treated.”

Jackie grunts, and her shoulders slump a bit, because what Shan is saying isn’t wrong. She does have to admit, as much as she dislikes the implication, it isn’t completely wrong. She sighs, a defeated and weakly implosive sound like an old balloon being popped, surprising herself at the sudden release of tension.

“Ugh. I know. He could totally be an ass. But he could also be so sweet. He’d do little things for me to show me that he loved me, like get up early to make tea and bring it to me in bed.”

She looks across at Shan with a hopeful expression on her face.

Shan gives her a short nod and then snorts in laughter.

“That’s it? He made you tea? I, your best friend in the entire damn world, am supposed to feel bad that you broke up with him because sometimes he made you tea?”

Jackie can’t help but smile, and she knows this battle is lost. The full weight of what she’d been avoiding looking at settles on her. All of the small fights — and the big ones. All the days she walked around Henry on eggshells, hoping not to set off his flares of anger. She knows she’s better off and that she’s done the right thing, but goddamnit, she’s going to miss the physical comfort of him. Not just that his body was to die for, but that simply being held by him felt so right in so many ways. And the sex. She shakes her head at herself.

A laugh bursts out of Jackie, a great honking thing that could stop traffic. Shan looks at her with wide eyes.

“What’s so funny?” Shan asks.

Jackie groans again and hides her face behind her hands, peeking out at her friend.

“But the sex with him was so, so good.” She moans this confession, like it hurts her to say it, and like she’s begging for it anyway.

Shan picks up the throw pillow and, true to its name, throws it at her.

Jackie bursts into laughter again, and Shan shakes her head.

“I know, I know. It’s not worth staying for. But goddammit, why can’t I find, like, a really nice guy with a hot bod and a great cock who treats me well and, you know, also fucks me right?” Jackie shakes her fist in the air, as if railing against the golden gates of heaven in a righteous holy war.

Shan laughs, and then shakes her head, puts on a serious face, slumps forward a bit, and puts her hand on Jackie’s foot again.

“Jaquelyn Anne Lennox. Dream the impossible dream. You know why. We’re trans, and even in 2041,” she looks at her wrist, as if her jeweled bracelet is a watch that is telling her the year and not the time, “in the middle of Seattle-fucking-Freakistan-Cascadia, progressive capital of the universe, and still—still—not everyone gets what it’s like.”

Jackie sits back and thinks. She’s heard this line of reasoning before, from many of her friends. She’s even said it herself, from time to time. But in this case, it isn’t the right answer, not completely.

“Yeah. Honestly? It wasn’t that. You know what it was? It was the gigantic error in translation between the words non-monogamous and polyamorous, and how to manage that.”

Jackie gives a short, sharp laugh.

“It was literally like we were speaking different languages sometimes. Or, the same language, but all the semiotics and semantics of meaning in the words were different.” Jackie is contorting her gloved fingers, trying to make her hands smash together, illustrating puzzle pieces that just don’t fit, but looking like satin doves caught in a grotesque circus act.

Shan shakes her head and holds up one hand in surrender. “OK, OK, I get it. But, Jesus, Jackie, please roll on back with words like seminautics and shit.”

“Semiotics.” Jackie corrects, before she can stop herself.

“Whatever.” Says Shan. Then, changing the topic, she adds, “So what about work? Arachnio voted you out two months ago, and you haven’t found anything yet?”

And this is the other thing consuming Jackie’s thoughts. She knows in her bones she did the right thing, whistleblowing on what she had discovered in the deep code of her company’s algorithm. But that rightness hadn’t prevented her from being voted out by the rest of the team in the small employee-owned Mondragon-style startup she’d been part of for the last two years. She sighs, and draws a finger unconsciously across her brow and flicks it, as if trying to wipe the memories from her mind.

Years of fending for herself in desperate situations has taught her to be frugal to the point of stinginess, so she has money socked away. But it isn’t an infinite supply, and those same fiscal habits hammer on the doors of her worry at night as she tries to sleep. A stomach that has known true hunger never rests easy again, she thinks.

Besides, she’s a software engineer, a damn good one. Her hands are wonders on the keyboard, damaged or not, channeling the genius of her code into existence to do good in the world. Sitting around and surfing CascadiaNet and the local dataverse isn’t the same as building something that matters, which is what she’d thought she had been doing at Arachnio.

“That’s not true,” she replies, “I’ve taken some freerange gigs. Nothing big, but things that have at least a little money coming in.”

Shan snorts a laugh. “Jackie, I know you. If you’re not working on ‘The Next Big Thing’ you aren’t happy. And ‘ranging is great, we both know plenty of people working the gigs, but you need something more permanent. Something worthy of that gigantic brain of yours.”

Jackie smiles a genuine smile at her friend. Shan may be a handful at times, but something is reassuring about being seen so completely by someone. It’s why Jackie knew she had to come here to process her breakup with Henry; in all the world, maybe only Shan can understand her conflicting emotions.

“Look, I know some people in recruiting at PeoplePWR and Digicent. I can make some calls and hook you up.” Shan flashes Jackie her thousand-watt smile, as if the force of her gleaming teeth can make Jackie agree.

Jackie sighs, gently twisting at the corners of the throw pillow as she mulls the offer over in her mind, already knowing that she has to say yes, as much to mollify Shan as because she does need a full-time job. She nods and smiles at her pushy, outrageous, beloved friend.

“Hallelujah! Mother Shannon has saved the day once again!” Shan declares, standing up, and reaching out her hand to Jackie.

“Now come on. Let’s go get some takeout Thai food from the place down by the thing, and come back here and have a girls’ night in.”

It’s not a question, it’s a command, and Jackie is happy to comply, feeling her spirits lift at the thought.

She takes Shan’s outstretched hand and stands, her worry falling away for a moment as she contemplates the impending joy of the best yuba Pad See Ew she’s ever had.

Rain is streaking the window of the ancient electric bus as it bounces down Aurora Avenue. Jackie is nursing a bit of a hangover from her sleepover at Shan’s place the night before.

Takeout Thai and girls’ night had turned into a box wine and video binge, and she’s had less sleep than she’d like, especially for a Monday morning. She doesn’t have a job to get to, but she firmly believes that jobhunting in this economy is full-time work in and of itself.

She has her headphones on, and she has retreated into the world of Wendy Carlos’s Moog synthesizer — a classic as familiar to her as the sound of her own heartbeat. Jackie believes that there is music for every occasion, and it’s usually Beethoven; today, though, she is feeling nostalgic and reaching out across time to her spiritual ancestors.

The bus pulls up to the old Washelli graveyard, and the new micro housing complex for refugees that sits where an abandoned home improvement store used to stand. It shudders to a stop, sighs a wheezing mechanical sound as the pneumatics lower the steps to allow more people to pack into the already crowded vehicle, but Jackie is lost in thought and doesn’t even look up.

The bus rattles back up to speed as more of the street zooms by the window and her eyes catch on a faded old mural on the side of a building. In the image, trains and cars pass a mountain range, and text at the top reads: Free movement of people and commerce is the backbone of this country. Some clever wag has spray painted which one? in red underneath this country.

It makes her chuckle every time she sees it. The mural is far more than seventeen years old. It had been painted long enough ago that the country it was referring to was the United States. The good ol’ defunct United States.

Still true for Cascadia, she thinks. There are just more people, less commerce, and not enough petroleum to get around.

The bus trundles to another stop, and the person who had been sitting next to her gets up, and is replaced instantly with a new person, someone eager to trade standing in the aisle for the comparative comfort of the tattered old pleather seat.

Jackie glances over and sees that her new seatmate is an attractive woman in her early thirties who appears to be of South Asian descent. They catch eyes and trade smiles that mean thanks-and-sorry-and-ugh-morning-commute-amirite? all rolled into one.

The woman says something, but Jackie can’t hear her over the music. She pulls out her earbud and says, “Pardon?”

“Oh, sorry.” The woman says with a warmly apologetic smile. “I was just mumbling to myself that they need to add more buses in the morning so we don’t have to be jammed in here like fucking tinned sardines.”

Jackie stifles a full laugh at the unexpected cursing and anachronistic metaphor coming from this elegant woman. Her voice has the tiniest hint of a British accent, but her clothes, Jackie notes with her keen eye for fashion, seem curated to speak to timeless hipster Cascadian chic.

The woman perfectly arches an eyebrow and says, “Is that Bach you’re listening to?” looking at Jackie’s earbud from which tiny, tinny melodies are plunking out audibly.

“Wow, good ear. It is! Switched on Bach.”

The woman holds out her hand and nods a fractional nod, as if to say may I listen?, strangely intimate for people who have just met on a bus. Jackie hands her the small white device, and she holds it up close to her ear without putting it in. After a moment she smiles and nods, and hands the earbud back to Jackie with elegant grace.

“The Brandenburg Concerto number three, the final allegro. One of my all-time favorites. But I’ve never heard that version before!”

Jackie nods, “It’s ancient twentieth, from like the late sixties or early seventies, done on one of the first synthesizers. It’s magnificent.” She reaches for her phone and pauses the playback.

“It is. Bach is like math come alive, I’ve always thought. And Beethoven, Beethoven is pure animalistic feeling, distilled to music, don’t you think?”

Jackie laughs a throaty, delighted laugh, turning heads on the bus, but the woman beams at her in response. Jackie replies, “But I do think that! That is exactly, precisely what I think, in both cases.” They grin at each other, oblivious to the humid warmth of too many bodies jammed into too small a space, reveling in this moment of human connection.

“I’m Laxmi Sengupta,” says the woman, offering her hand.

“Jackie Lennox,” replies Jackie, taking the proffered hand and shaking it.

Some awareness tickles the back of Jackie’s mind. “Wait. Doctor Laxmi Sengupta? Didn’t you work on the fusion project?”

Laxmi chuffs in surprise and nods her head. The faintest hint of a blush creeps into her cheeks. “Yes, but how in the world did you know that?”

Jackie smiles in response. “I’m a bit of a nerd. I’m a software engineer, specializing in security, but I follow all the science news. And, well, that was quite the breakthrough. I mean, actual fucking fusion, finally!”

Laxmi is clearly pleased at the compliment, verging on embarrassed, and waves her hand as if brushing this off. “Well, I was just one part of a much larger team, really.”

Jackie shakes her head and interjects, “But the materials science. The quantum matter superconductor. That was you. That was a key component in containment and ignition.”

Laxmi’s face is a picture of astonishment now. “Well, yes, that’s right, but it truly was a team effort. I cracked some maths that led to the superconductor improvements, but” she shrugs, “science is standing on the shoulders of giants, and all that.

“But I’m working on a new project now. You know, with all the will-they-or-won’t-they-let-us-fuse politics brouhaha, I’ve got my own lab and a new idea.”

Jackie is about to ask what it is, but Laxmi continues on, as she begins shuffling her bags, shrugging her jacket back onto her shoulders, preparing for the next stop.

“But listen, did you say you were a security dev? Can I give you my contact info? I need someone for the lab, and well, I’m sure I can’t compete with whatever you’ve got going on now, but I’d love to try to convince you over lunch.”

This time, Jackie’s face is the picture of surprise. “No. I mean, yes! Yes, I’d love to talk to you, and as it turns out, I’m looking for something worthy of my skills at the moment. Let’s definitely...” before she can finish, Laxmi has pulled out her phone and bumped it against Jackie’s, transferring her contact info.

Jackie looks down at her phone: Dr. Laxmi Sengupta, University of Tahoma - Seattle, Quantum Materials Research, followed by her number and CascadiaNet address.

She looks up to see Laxmi grinning at her, waving goodbye as she begins to navigate the crowded aisle to get to the back door of the articulated bus.

“I’m serious, Jackie. Please contact me! And wonderful meeting you over some morning Bach!”

With another wave and a dazzling flash of a smile over her sleek black plastic raincoat, Laxmi is through the door, and an older Black gentleman in an archaic business suit has settled into the seat next to Jackie.

She pops her earbud back into her ear, looks back at her phone, and puts Wendy Carlos’s masterpiece back on. She smiles at the serendipity of the moment and begins typing out a message to Laxmi to set up the lunch.

« Chapter 2 — Jake | Chapter 3 — Jackie | Interstitial — Cascadia »

The Shattered World Series | Book 1 | Light Shines Through

© 2025 Lawrence Winnerman | Science Fiction — All Rights Reserved

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Book Reading: Light Shines Through - Prologue - João

Lawrence Winnerman — Thu, 17 Jul 2025 22:18:16 GMT

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> Seattle >> Indiana. Gay. 🏳️‍🌈 Bengal cat dad. 🐈‍⬛🐈 EDM, TSwift, Lizzo, Chappell Roan, Beyoncé. Sci-fi nerd and aspiring author. Ardently hates Nazis.","photo_url":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F8dc77da7-86fc-455f-898a-49429fb47f9e_1152x1152.jpeg","is_guest":false,"bestseller_tier":null}],"post_date":"2025-03-26T10:03:49.282Z","cover_image":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!-yMW!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fa6d5f251-969b-43e6-8039-1fd8abcd0e9c_1080x1080.png","cover_image_alt":null,"canonical_url":"https://lwinner.substack.com/p/light-shines-through-prologue","section_name":"The Shattered World Series","video_upload_id":null,"id":159656372,"type":"newsletter","reaction_count":1,"comment_count":0,"publication_id":null,"publication_name":"Lawrence Winnerman | SCIENCE FICTION","publication_logo_url":"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!Dlia!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F852b0056-c318-49e8-9be1-510ed46cd697_1024x1024.png","belowTheFold":false,"youtube_url":null,"show_links":null,"feed_url":null}">

The Shattered World Series | Book 1 | Light Shines Through

© 2025 Lawrence Winnerman | Science Fiction — All Rights Reserved

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Light Shines Through | Chapter 2 - Jake

Lawrence Winnerman — Sun, 13 Jul 2025 12:08:25 GMT

Jake | October 2041 — Dutton, Georgia, New Confederate States of America

The sharp crack of a gunshot in the far-off distance shocks Jake Murphy’s eyes open into semi-darkness.

His mind gropes against the fogginess of sleep and cold. Nothing close, he’s sure of that. But to his ears, it sounded like real ammo, good ammo, which means someone else is out here hunting.

As he focuses, he becomes aware of his surroundings, separating reality from the confusion of dreams. What had started as a long-lost memory of his mother had turned into something more intimate and uncomfortably erotic, involving Beau Jackson and what it might feel like to hold his body close, and then twisted with shame and jumbled into some half-formed specter of fleeing a Texan raiding party on foot through an unknown dark forest. He breathes slowly, trying to will his heart rate down.

The first hints of dawn breaking are a slowly brightening reddish glow to the east, and the birdsong that is just beginning to echo through the forest. Jake is sitting in a hunting blind in the chill of morning, losing his battle against boredom and sleep.

He’s been hunkered down in more blinds freezing his balls off than he could ever possibly count; he wonders idly for a moment if he should try, and then gives up, bored with the idea before he’s even begun.

The first time, though, he can easily remember. The first time his father had brought him hunting — proper hunting, sitting in a blind, doing the patient work of a man —was when he was eight years old. His whole memory of the event is suffused with an excited glow in the way that only first memories from childhood can be.

Since that time, Jake has learned everything his father could teach him about hunting, and more. He hasn’t had a choice — with every passing year, his father has become more detached from reality and spends more time lost at the bottom of a bottle. The responsibility for working the farm and hunting meat for the table had fallen to Jake early. Now that he is nineteen, he figures he’s spent some significant fraction of a decade sitting in the middle of nowhere, waiting for dinner to stumble by.

He feels the beginning of a leg cramp coming on, and quietly shifts his weight, stretching out his right leg, letting his mind wander — a dangerous thing to do, because it means his mind keeps jumping back to all of the things he shouldn’t be thinking about.

As the sky brightens around him, clouds paint the dawn a vivid Dixie red, and the forest begins to resolve into crimson-tinted focus. He’s been in this spot so many times before that he knows the structure of the land and the trees around him by heart, but it still surprises him every time as the landscape unfolds. The hornbeam and the hickory, off to his right, and the cluster of birches in the medium distance behind them. The stand of Loblolly pine farther off, dead center to the north, where he’s facing. Buckeye and mountain laurel clutter the spaces between. A beauty and a logic to it, he thinks, and although he can’t read the pattern, it’s familiar enough that each tree and bush is like a friend. An acquaintance, maybe, Jake thinks, since he doesn’t have any real friends. He tries to push the bleak thought away, keeping the mean, creeping darkness of his worst thoughts at bay for just a little while longer, trying to fill his mind with blankness instead.

He closes his eyes for a moment, and unbidden, an image of Beau from the dream springs into his mind. He grunts, frustrated and angry, subconsciously squeezes his crotch, and shakes his head, quietly trying to dislodge the image from his brain.

Beau isn’t here with him, of course. Beau barely knows Jake exists. He is undoubtedly waking up in his warm bed, where his mother or the help is fixing a fine breakfast of storebought food, and his jackass of a father is blathering on about New Confederacy politics and his campaign for the NCSA Senate.

But Jake can’t stop himself wishing that he was curled up in that warm bed next to Beau, or that, at the very least, Beau was here with him in the blind, warm body pressed up against his own with the excuse of the cold to cover his need. Jake adjusts his jeans again, trying to hide evidence of his arousal, even though he’s alone in the woods, and no one can read his mind. He hopes.

And this is the problem. Not only should Jake not be turned on thinking about a guy whose father is a preacher and a wretchedly ambitious state senator in one of the most conservative, warmongering parties in the Confederacy, but Jake shouldn’t be turned on by a guy at all. For the millionth time, Jake wonders if thinking about Beau like this makes him a fag and a sinner, and for the millionth time, he thinks that yes, yes, it almost certainly does. This is an endless little loop that his mind plays over and over again, like a song. Like a terrible song he hates, and would happily never hear again, but that continues playing on repeat nonetheless.

He touches the small silver ring he keeps on a chain around his neck, and says a little prayer under his breath to God to lift this burden from him, squeezing his eyes tight until he sees stars, as if this amplifies the power of his conviction. He catches his breath and feels a kind of peace settle over him.

Tentatively, he experiments and conjures up an image of Beau in his mind. His hardon gives a little throb, and a tiny piece of hope inside him dies, just as it has done every other time he’s tried to pray the gay away.

A rustle of leaves catches his attention, and he pulls himself together. With practiced ease, Jake raises his crossbow to get a sight. Squinting to get a better view, he lines up his shot in the direction of the noise and imperceptibly prepares his body for action. He slowly releases his breath and waits.

There, just past the willow oak, movement. A doe, moving with cautious elegance. Fire burns through Jake. With this doe, there will be venison for the party next week, and for weeks to come.

A step, and then a slow turn of her head, listening for danger, catching a whiff of something that Jake prays isn’t him. Another step. One more, and she’ll be perfectly lined up. The back part of Jake’s mind is synthesizing the world around him; wind speed and temperature, his knowledge of the bow and this bolt in particular, the one with the expandable head and a tiny notch out of one of its fletchings that somehow seems to make it fly truer.

The red dawn is highlighting everything perfectly. The adrenaline is flowing through him, and it’s working in the way he needs it to — increasing his focus, making him hyper aware of the world around him.

And then, in the fraction of a second before the doe takes her next step directly into his perfect shot, a gun cracks off to his left, followed by a whoop, and Jake pulls the trigger.

The bolt misses and embeds itself into the bark of the tree behind the deer, and the doe, all of her dark suspicions about the world confirmed, has bounded away before Jake can process what’s happened.

Cussing under his breath, he swings the bow down, and automatically, he is pulling out his next bolt and the cocking rope. He knows she’s gone, but the mad hope of a missed opportunity keeps his hands moving of their own accord. He slaps the bolt into the bow, hooks on the rope, pulls, and — bam! The cocking rope breaks, and his right hand swings back in the unexpected release of tension, and he punches himself in the face, just under his right eye.

The adrenaline is working against him now, and it takes a couple of minutes before he gets his breathing under control. His face hurts, but not too badly. Mostly it’s free-ranging anger at the jackass with the gun: to have screwed up his shot, to have yelled right after shooting, and to have precious live ammunition and commit the sin of wasting it while not even bagging the deer.

He could hand-cock the crossbow, but that’s not a viable long-term solution. He needs to stop by Dempsey’s to see if he can trade for a new rope, and maybe some meat for the party while he’s at it.

He sits in the blind for another ten minutes or so, calming down, and barely noticing the scarlet-fingered dawn in full bloom around him now. Feeling frustrated, Jake realizes that his morning is shot — no pun intended, he thinks — and that he should just get on with his errands.

An embarrassingly loud rumble from his stomach emphasizes the point, and he decides that it’s time to pack it in. He pulls some hardtack out of his bag and crams it into his mouth. As his nerves stop jangling, he begins to tune in to the sounds of the forest. As the rush of the moment flows out of him, he begins to connect to the larger space — the chatter of the birds coming back up to volume, the sound of the wind in the treetops.

His awareness expands, and the zenlike calm he was looking for earlier and not finding begins to manifest within, drop by drop. He closes his eyes for a moment, the first rays of the sun finding his face, and breathes deeply, letting the last of his frustration go.

And in the calm sounds of these woods he knows so well, there is a very tiny sound, just catching at the edge of his awareness. A baby crying? That can’t possibly be right. He turns his head slowly, trying to place the sound in the sphere of space around him. The high-pitched cry is faint and intermittent, but within a moment he has placed it as coming from off to his right.

Jake packs up the rest of his kit and climbs quietly — as quietly as possible — out of the blind. When he gets to the ground, he thinks for a moment he’s lost the sound. There couldn’t possibly be a baby here in the woods, he thinks again, but he knows he heard something. He stands stock still and holds his breath.

And then there it is again, definitely off to the right. He moves gently through the underbrush, checking before he places each footstep. After fifteen minutes of moving carefully, standing still, and listening, he finds it.

A kitten.

It’s filthy, and covered in fleas and leaves and what looks like shit and dried blood, but as far as he can tell, it’s almost entirely black with a spot of white just above its pink nose, and three white paws. Its eyes are just beginning to open, and are a stormy ocean blue. He looks down at it, momentarily perplexed, and then the larger scene clicks into focus.

The half-eaten body of a mother cat, hind leg caught in a snare that isn’t one of his. Two small bodies near her, the littermates that didn’t make it.

The kitten, which had momentarily gone quiet at his approach, throws caution to the wind and begins meowing as if its little life depends on it. Which, Jake thinks, it probably does. The scrappy little kit has clambered over the thorny scrub to his right boot and has placed its mismatched paws, one white, one black, up on Jake’s foot so that it can raise its filthy face to Jake and meow for help with a renewed vigor.

Without even thinking about it, Jake bends down and digs into his pack for his clean chamois cloth and his canteen. He crouches down, picks up the tiny cat by its scruff, and then holds it in one hand, feeling the fragile cartilage bones through loose skin. This kitten was starving even before its mother died. It’s a miracle that it is somehow still alive.

He sets the kitten into his lap and then pours some water into his cupped hand. The kitten knows immediately what to do, lapping eagerly for the water, so that Jake can feel its tiny sandpaper tongue rough against his palm.

Once the kitten has had its fill of water, Jake wets a corner of the chamois and begins methodically cleaning the kitten's face. Within moments, the kitten is purring so loudly that Jake is astonished that something so small can make a sound so big. Without meaning to, he glances around to see if anyone or anything else can bear witness to this phenomenon.

It takes another ten or fifteen minutes, but he manages to clean enough grime and pluck and crush as many fleas as he can find off of the kitten so that it looks like a different creature. It is squirming with delight, headbutting his hands, licking, and purring. It appears to be thoroughly in love with Jake. Which means that you are the only thing in the world that is, thinks Jake. He rolls his eyes at himself for such maudlin self-pity.

But now the larger issue that he’s been avoiding thinking about rears its ugly head. What is he going to do with this thing? He can’t keep it. He doesn’t need another mouth to feed, and he isn’t around enough during the day to take care of it. Current purr volume notwithstanding, he’s pretty sure that the kitten will need a lot of attention and care for the next several weeks just to pull through and survive.

The idea to give it to Annabelle as a part of her birthday present floats into his mind, but he dismisses it quickly. Melinda, his stepmother, will hate it. Jake remembers that she’s not fond of cats, and then laughs a grim laugh at the idea that she’s not fond of anything, really, except Annabelle, and her fervent conviction that Annabelle is destined to be not just Miss Georgia Peach, but Miss Rebel, and from there find some limitless, glamourous future. Melinda has been cooing over how beautiful Annabelle is since the girl was born, dressing her in increasingly more elaborate outfits, and entering her in pageants before she could even stand.

At the moment, though, Jake can’t think of what else to do with the kitten. Leaving it here to die sends a wave of nausea flowing through Jake so strong that he rejects the idea out of hand. For now, though, he knows he needs to go to Dempsey’s to see if he can find a replacement cocking rope for his crossbow, and beg Dempsey for a bit of credit so he can get some kind of meat to bring home to dinner for Annabelle’s party next week.

He slings his canteen over his shoulder and arranges his spare shirt on the bottom of the bag for the kitten. He lifts it in, and after stroking it for a moment to calm it down, he closes the bag. He’s rewarded with a fusillade of angry meows, which transform into purrs the moment he opens the bag and the kitten sees him. After several rounds of hide-and-seek, he seems to convince the obstreperous little cat that it is safe, and he hauls the pack onto his back, where it jostles with each step against the canteen, his empty rifle, and the crossbow.

After making his way through the scrub to fetch his one lost bolt, he begins the trek back to his bike. The fresh morning sun has broken through the clouds and is shining in his eyes, scarlet transformed into gold, limning the world in amber as if everything were dripping with honey.

Jake tromps back to his bike, still lost in thought. There's no need to be quiet now that he knows yet another hunting expedition is a bust. Something about abandoning his normal, careful movement through these woods feels good. It is a simple defiance. He's here, he exists, and for the moment, he owns this little forest.

He's been hunting this patch of land and several other spots like it nearly his whole life. All of them are within biking distance of his home. Jake doesn't have a truck, because most people these days don't have cars or trucks. Electricity is expensive, and gasoline is even more expensive still, ever since the fucking Texans captured most of the Gulf Coast during the Second War Between the States.

Jake's father, Mitch, has an old Ford truck that he keeps in the back barn. Jake has early memories of his father washing and caring for it, but it's been hidden under tarps for at least the last ten years. Originally, Mitch talked about plans to use it as a work truck once “business” picked up, and then later about how he could sell it for a pile of money when it became clear that business of any kind wasn't picking up for a long time. But now it just sits there under the tarp, about as useless as Jake's father has become.

Over the last couple of years that Jake has been trading with Dempsey, he’s been picking up spare parts along the way, trying to bring the truck back to life. He figures even if he can’t ever afford a tank of gas for the damn thing, he could at least make good on the idea of selling it.

Jake grabs a handful of berries off a swamp huckleberry as he’s walking past, and throws them into his mouth, reveling as the sweetness explodes across his tongue. That berry patch hadn’t produced much last year, but this year it’s been going gangbusters. He’s surprised there’s still fruit, and he ponders stopping for a moment to try to gather enough worth trading, but decides against it, thinking of the kitten in his bag, who has mewed only once as they’ve been hiking out of the woods.

He scuttles under three old fallen trees rather than going around the long way, past the marshy area, and tries to imagine what he’d do with the cash from selling the truck, a game he used to enjoy playing. But the way things are going with the farm, thinking about money just pulls him down another dark path of thoughts.

Jake works the farm, takes odd jobs like fixing the machinery at the cigarette factory outside of town, and he’s in the Reserves, trying to get into Ranger school, even with his “family need” deferment from active duty. He barely makes enough to keep the family fed.

What small amounts of money they get from his father’s army disability check, Jake's stepmother and half-brothers steal from Mitch's wallet. And what little they don't steal, his dad spends on hooch.

Sometimes Jake is half tempted to keep the money he earns to himself, but he’s sure that he’d catch a rash of shit if he even tried it. He knows his family is using him, but he feels guilty every time he thinks of leaving.

This is straying dangerously close to another line of thought that Jake doesn't like pursuing: for as much as his family extols the virtues of the South, and bemoans the raw deal the New Confederate States of America have received at the hands of the fucking Yankees and Texas and Heartland, they still seem like the kinds of lazy grifters that they complain about all the time.

After the Flash and the Crash, the South set up the New Confederacy to finally be free of all those godless heathens, and keep hard-earned Southern money in the pockets of honest Southern folk. No more handouts to freeloaders like the Mexicans and the blacks anymore.

But none of that seems to have worked out the way it was planned. After the Crash came the Smash, the Second War Between the States, which the South won, except for the treachery of the goddamn Texans.

Everyone thought that the global depression that kicked off after the Flash, Crash, and Smash would end once the fighting was over and the new national borders were agreed upon — but for most of Jake’s life, it just seems like the hard times keep getting harder and lasting longer.

He gets to his bike, unlocks the complicated lock he has devised to keep this precious possession safe, and stows the collapsible, one-wheeled game cart into its smallest configuration. He’s proud of the jerry-rigged device, and shakes his head thinking of the doe that could be riding on it now.

Jake isn't an economist or a politician. Hell, he's not even a high school graduate. But through the old emergency radio he keeps hidden on the roof outside his bedroom window to try to find new music, he occasionally hears snippets of the world beyond, and most of the other countries sound like they're doing okay. It might be lies told by the enemies of the South, but it seems like the Yankees and Texans are doing well enough. The folks out in Deseret are relentlessly happy.

Annoyingly, the Freaks on the West Coast are doing best of all. On the rare nights when he can pick up a signal from California or Cascadia, half of it is some of the best music he’s ever heard, and the rest of it is news or ads.

Once, about a year ago, after listening to a song that had made him think of flying, he had been shocked to his core when an ad had come on that he thought, at first, was amazing new music -- uplifting electronica. Two voices had cut in, a man and a woman, talking about how Cascadia was always welcoming new people — “People just like you!” — regardless of race, color, creed, religion, political affiliation, gender, gender identity, and sexual orientation.

His heart had been racing just thinking about it, getting as far away from his family as he could ever dream, in a place that would welcome him, even if he was gay. It had surprised him so much at the time that he’d snapped the radio off and gone back inside, shaking.

For months afterwards he had tried to find the station again, just to hear that ad. He told himself it was to hear the music again, but he knew, deep down, that he wanted that promise. It might be a trick or a trap, but just the idea of it made his heart leap -- that a place might welcome him, just the way he was.

As Jake gets closer to Dempsey’s shop, an odd feeling overtakes him. His skin prickles like something is amiss, but he can’t place what. No vehicles are here, which is not that strange at this time on a weekday morning. He rides up slowly, keeping an eye out for anything that seems out of the ordinary.

As he gets up alongside the large building Dempsey uses as his shop, Jake hops off his bike and walks it around the corner. Just as he turns the corner, he looks up to see someone dressed entirely in camo round the other corner, away from him.

“Hey!” Jake shouts. He looks around quickly, and then shoves his bike into a steep lean against the building wall and dashes ahead. As he rounds the far corner that the camo man had just turned, he is greeted with nothing. There’s no one there.

Jake sprints around the next corner of the building, and still can’t find any trace of the man — he thinks it was a man — dressed all in camo. He stands there for a moment, trying to look at the whole scene to deduce where the stranger has disappeared to. After several moments, he gives up in frustration. He doesn’t want to run around Dempsey’s property, yelling at nothing. That’s how you get shot.

He heads back to his bike, wheels it to the main roll-up door, leaning it more gently against the wall this time. He locks it and heads in. As he walks into the shop, he notices that while the lights are on, and it seems like Dempsey is open for business, there’s no one here. He calls out a couple of tentative greetings and then starts puttering around, looking through the stacks of junk.

He looks through the various auto parts and doesn’t find anything he needs. He moves on to the pile of old hard drives, and sees that of the fifteen that Dempsey has, there’s only one that’s new since his last visit. He picks it up and then realizes that he’s been there for at least fifteen minutes and hasn’t seen or heard from Dempsey.

He becomes aware that he’s been hearing faint music coming from the house, and as he approaches the beat-up old workbench towards the back of the shop that Dempsey uses as a work desk and checkout counter, Jake can see a sliver of light coming from the door to the house, which is just barely cracked.

None of this makes sense. The business appears to be open, and yet no one is in the shop. Jake has never been in the house, and he knows that Dempsey, while kind, has always made it clear that he doesn’t like people prying into his privacy. A chill goes down Jake’s spine, and he suddenly feels the creepiness of the situation. Is Dempsey dead? Has he been robbed? Was the man in camo not a customer, but an assailant of some kind?

Jake edges towards the door, tuning into his gut, which is telling him that there’s something not quite right going on. He calls out again.

“Hello? Mr. Dempsey? It’s Jake Murphy. Hello?”

Jake pulls his rifle around and wishes for the hundredth time that he had ammo. He moves towards the partly open door to the house, once again calling out.

As he approaches the door he pauses, listening for anything unfamiliar, any sound coming from the house. The only thing he’s greeted with is the soft music coming from inside. A woman singing in rich and melancholy tones to the sound of a guitar. Jake is intrigued because it’s nothing he’s heard before, and he likes it. A tiny part of his brain is making a note to ask Dempsey for a copy of whatever it is, even as the larger part of him is trying to make sense of what’s going on.

Jake reaches forward to knock on the door, but it just swings open at his touch.

“Dempsey? You in there? It’s Jake Murphy,” he announces again.

There’s nothing except the song, a final exclamation of missing you when you’re gone, and then the chords fade into silence and the song ends. In the new, more complete silence, Jake strains to hear anything that gives a clue as to what’s happening.

He cautiously steps into the house just as a new song starts — more guitar and a gentle syncopation. The same female voice starts singing gently about these old walls, and the stories they’d tell if they could speak. A frisson of feeling goes through Jake. A realization that he’s hearing something new that he likes, contrasted with the strangeness of the situation.

He edges into the hallway, and the first room is wide open — an office, packed full, holding a desk with a computer on it, and an organized chaos of memorabilia and electronic equipment. Sitting open on the desk is a photo album, which even from the doorway he can see is stuffed to overflowing with pictures.

Curiosity gets the better of him, and he lowers the rifle and edges around the desk so that he’s looking down on the shiny, slightly yellowed plastic pages of the burgundy faux leather binder.

He’s looking at pictures of people he doesn’t know — a family maybe? A handsome man with dark brown hair and laughing blue eyes, and a full beard that makes him look like a bear. But the woman — the woman is one of the most beautiful women he’s ever seen. She has big, friendly eyes that are filled with a light and humor that Jake can’t help but admire. Her hair is done in meticulous cornrows, occasionally decorated with small beads, or sometimes left plain. The couple has a baby — a boy, based on the outfits he’s wearing in various pictures, a little sailor suit, a firefighter, and a teddy bear costume — and Jake can see that the boy is the perfect blend of the man and the woman. The man’s jawline, even through the chubby cheeks, the woman’s nose, the striking blue eyes of the man, and skin that is a coffee with cream tone somewhere between the two.

One picture is out of the plastic, sitting on top of the page. In it, the man and the woman are dressed in costumes. He’s dressed in black and white stripes, and she’s wearing an old-fashioned police uniform. In the picture, they are laughing, but leaning in, touching foreheads while looking into each other’s eyes. The little boy is dressed as a pumpkin, with a little green stem cap on his head. The boy is looking directly up at the photo, leaning away from his parents, reaching up with one hand like he’s grabbing towards the camera while his other hand is stretched out, holding onto the black plastic strap of a small pumpkin-shaped bucket filled with candy.

A lump forms in Jake’s throat, and with a tiny gasp, he realizes that the man in the photo is Dempsey — a much younger, much fitter Dempsey before he lost his foot. He’s feeling cotton-headed, like his thoughts aren’t making it through his brain, as feelings war inside him.

He’s horrified that young Dempsey is sexy, and feels a hot rush of shame, at the same time that he’s feeling jealousy at the easy and profound love captured in the photos. On top of all of that is an awareness that — obviously — something changed. Many things changed.

For one thing, Jake doesn’t know this woman and boy, and the pictures have familiar settings — this house, this shop, but with a boat in it, and a large RV. They don’t live here anymore, or anywhere in the Confederacy, Jake thinks, because he’s never seen a free black woman.

A tear tracks down his cheek, and before he can reach up to wipe his eyes, he hears the sound of a shotgun pump, and his blood runs ice cold in his veins.

“Put that photo down, and put your hands up, and turn around so’s I can see you” a voice says.

Jake looks up to see Dempsey aiming a gun at him, the barrel opening seeming to take up most of Jake’s field of vision. He gently sets the photo down and slowly raises both hands over his head.

“Mr. Dempsey. I’m so sorry. I couldn’t find you, and I called your name, but no one answered, and the door was open, and I didn’t know if you were OK I was worried...” his words come spilling out in a stammer, and he feels ridiculous.

Dempsey uncocks the gun and lowers it in one smooth motion.

“Jake. Jeez. For the love of … can’t a man go take a shit in his own damn house in peace!” the old man hollers at him.

“Sorry, sir. I’m sorry. I’ve been here for twenty minutes, and, well, you’re never not here. You know? If you’re not here, the shop is closed, and you’ve got the sign up. It was all open, and I started to get worried. I saw someone leave just as I got here, and then I came in and I …” he lamely gestures down at the photo album.

Dempsey stomps forward on his peg, and it strikes Jake as momentarily odd that he could be so loud in this moment, and yet sneak up on him so silently just seconds ago. His estimation of Dempsey, already high, ticks up another notch. Dempsey slams the album shut and shoves it under a pile of books on ancient computer programming languages that can’t be worth keeping.

“Stay outta my stuff, and outta my house, Murphy,” Dempsey growls at him.

“Who was that, Mr. Dempsey? I mean, that was you, but who was that woman and boy?” he asks.

“I said stay outta my business, Jake. Just leave it.” Dempsey rumbles, ominous as thunder on the far horizon.

“But she was ...” Jake starts.

“Don’t you dare say that fuckin’ word!” yells Dempsey, the picture of fury, face red, and veins popping on his temple, spittle flying from his lips as he shouts.

Jake is frozen in fear and confusion.

“What?what word?” be blurts, completely befuddled.

“The ‘N’ word!” yells Dempsey.

Jake’s mind grinds through gears for what seems like forever before it finds traction.

“What?! I … no! Not that word. I never say that word!” Jake hollers back, angry, but thinking that yelling at a man with a loaded gun might not be the wisest idea.

“I hate that word. My mom … my real mother hated that word, and I hate it too.” He has a flash of memory, like a spear of lightning lighting up a pitch-black room. Him, two, saying a word he’d heard his father use, his mother’s face a mask of anger, the smack across his mouth, and the bitter taste of soap.

“No, sir,” Jake says, standing up straighter and looking Dempsey in the eyes. “I was going to say that she was a beautiful woman. Sir.”

A look of shock races across Dempsey’s face, and then something else Jake can’t identify, and then the rage drains out of the old man like a balloon being deflated. Jake can practically see the sadness wash back into the man, ancient and deep, like an ocean wave that rises and swamps him and never rolls back out.

Dempsey nods his head and glances an apology at Jake.

“Yeah. She was. She really was. My Lyneisha, the most beautiful woman I’ve ever known in my whole goddamn life.” He laughs a short, bitter laugh. “You have no idea, son. She was a powerhouse. A force of nature, that woman. She was strong and smart. A lawyer. And funny! The funniest person I’ve ever met.”

A smile that is a dim echo of the smile of the man in the photos flashes back onto his face, and Jake is disturbingly reminded that young Dempsey was incredibly good-looking.

In that moment, a strange new sound, and both men reflexively look around, bewildered. Jake suddenly remembers the kitten in his bag, and laughs. Dempsey looks at him with puzzled amusement, and Jake swings his bag around onto the desk. He opens it and reaches in, pulling out the squirming ball of fluff, awake now and meowing, demanding immediate attention.

Jake holds the kitten up for Dempsey to see.

“I found a little friend while I was out this morning. All alone. Lost its mother,” he says.

The little kitten meows indignantly, bright blue eyes in fuzzy black fur, and reaches out one paw towards the men’s faces. Just like the boy in the photo.

“What do you want for ‘im?” asks Dempsey.

Jake opens his mouth and then closes it a moment later, not sure what to say.

“The kitten?” he asks, knowing it sounds dumb, but trying to give himself time to think.

Dempsey nods.

“I, uh, I was thinking of giving it to Annabelle at her birthday party next week.”

Dempsey snorts with derision.

The kitten meows loudly, moving its little head in such a way that it seems to be agreeing with Dempsey and saying Can you believe this jackass?

“Not bringing this little guy around the Murder Twins. Besides, Melinda hates cats.”

Whatever protest Jake had dies on his tongue. He knows his stepmother hates cats, but he’d completely forgotten about his half-brothers, Winfield and Wexley. He’d never heard anyone call them the murder twins before, but Dempsey isn’t wrong.

His father and Melinda had celebrated their marriage by giving birth to fraternal twins when Jake was four, beginning Jake’s feelings of displacement in his own family. Blond-haired and blue-eyed, the twins were the picture of Rebel purity. But regardless of how charming they could be, or how much they looked like little angels, it had been clear to Jake from a very young age that something fundamentally human was missing in his half-brothers.

It wasn’t just that they treated him with contempt, even as small children. It was that no one seemed to matter to the twins, except each other. They’d fight like cats and dogs, but the moment any other person stepped into the picture, Win and Wex shifted their attention to dominating and manipulating that person in whatever way possible.

Now that they were fifteen, they were like a world unto themselves. They came and went as they pleased. They had a small cadre of other boys they led into trouble. Even Melinda had given up trying to tone down their behavior, as it was clear they had no more respect for her than anyone else. Only their father seemed to be able to cow the boys from time to time, and now that he spent most of his days down at the Old Regulation, lost in a bottle, that wasn’t very often at all.

He hated to admit it, but Dempsey was right. This kitten had somehow survived on its own through the night, but it wouldn’t survive Winfield and Wexley in the Murphy household. He’d be dooming it and Annabelle to grief.

Jake thinks for a minute and then nods sharply.

“You’re right. OK. I need a new cocking rope for my bow, and meat to bring home for Annabelle’s birthday party next week. Enough for about two dozen people.” He pauses for a moment, watching Dempsey tickle the kitten behind the ear, and thinks he can ask for a little more.

“And this drive? If there’s music on it, I want it. And whatever you were just listening to in here.”

Dempsey looks at Jake sideways for a moment, and then just shakes his head.

“You and the music kid. Never met anyone who’d listen to damn near anything so much as you. Could be a bunch of eighties crap on here and you’d still want it.”

Jake shrugs, but feels a little bloom of victory in his chest. He notes that Dempsey hasn’t said no to any of his terms.

Dempsey hands Jake the kitten and thunks off for a couple of minutes. He returns with a cable, a small bowl, and a glass container of cream.

He shoos Jake out of the way and sits down in front of the computer. He turns on the old machine, and while it’s running through its startup, he pours cream into the bowl and gestures to Jake. Jake sets the kitten down, and without missing a beat, the tiny cat is face-first into the bowl of cream. Jake worries it’s drowning, its face is so deep into the liquid, but the loud thrumming purr that starts up reassures him that it can still breathe. Dempsey looks down at the kitten in surprise, and the up and Jake, and the men can’t help but laugh.

Dempsey shakes his head again and starts scanning the contents of the hard drive.

“Well, kiddo, you’re in luck. There’s a ton of music on here.” He pauses for a minute. “It’s practically nothing but music. And some of it seems like some pretty weird shit, so that should make you happy, I guess.”

He spends another couple of minutes examining the drive, moves some files around, and then shuts it down, unplugs it, and hands it to Jake.

“Your lucky day. That thing has crappy music on it, I got a cocking rope, and if you come back the day of the party, I can get you about ten pounds of fresh venison sausage.” He beams up at Jake. “That is, if you’re willing to part with little Jerry, here.”

Jake laughs. “Jerry? Where’d you get that name from?”

Dempsey laughs, and once again, Jake is reminded of the man from the old photos.

“You ever heard of a movie called ‘Cats?’”

Jake shakes his head no.

“Well, don’t watch it. It sucks. Unless you’re high.” He laughs again at the shocked look on Jake’s face. “Back before the world went to hell, me and Lyn went to go see it in the theater. ‘Cept we’d heard it was so bad that you needed to be in an altered state to appreciate it.

“So’s we go see it high as kites, and lemme tell you, it was one of the strangest damn things I’ve ever seen. We were laughing so hard we thought we were gonna die. There’s this one song about these two cats called Mungojerrie and Rumpleteaser, and so,” he reached out to pet the kitten who is now licking the very last traces of cream from the dish. “This here is ‘Mungojerrie’, or just ‘Jerry’ for short.”

At that moment, the kitten completes his task cleaning the bowl, and looks up at the two of them with its nose and whiskers covered in cream. It gives an audible little fart, and then meows at the men as if they were the ones being rude. Jake and Dempsey burst into howls of laughter, as Jerry continues to demand more cream.

Dempsey’s expression turns serious, and he looks at Jake out of the corner of his eye.

“So’s earlier, when you were lookin’ at my pics.” He says it as a statement, not as a question, and continues in the same tone of voice. “Looked like you were cryin’.”

Jake opens his mouth and then shuts it again. He shakes his head, and then, finally, feeling like he can’t get out of this situation without lying to the old man’s face, he says simply, “Yeah.”

“Why?”

Jake shakes his head slowly for a moment, as if the motion will knock the right words into place.

“I just … I never seen a little family look so right together, you know?” He says the words, feeling their inadequacy as a lump in his throat. “Y’all looked so happy together. I’ve never had that. I barely have photos of me and my mom and dad. My real mom. And none of them looked like … that. Like love.” He has to stop, afraid that he’ll start crying again.

Dempsey is looking at Jake with an intense expression he can’t interpret, and he realizes that the shine in the man’s eyes is the sheen of tears that haven’t yet felt the tug of gravity. As he watches the old man’s face, first one eye spills over, and then the next. Jake feels a sudden warmth for him, like he wants to somehow bundle this burly man up and tell him it’s going to be okay, when he knows that can never be true.

“They died,” Dempsey says, his voice creaking under the weight of his emotion. “Back after independence. After the Flash and Smash and shit. Things started to change, and...” He stops, and another tear streams down his cheek.

“They died in a car wreck, while I was at work. Everyone says they died in a car wreck. And I ain’t got no real reason to doubt, except...” He stops, shaking his head like he can’t believe his own words.

Jake feels the crush of the implication. Dempsey’s wife and biracial son were killed in a car wreck, just as black people were being driven from the New Confederacy, or pushed into servitude.

Jake feels suddenly aware of the selfishness of his own self-pity. There are worse things to suffer than being secretly gay, he thinks. Like losing the love of your life and your child at the hands of your neighbors and never being able to seek revenge, or even knowing if revenge was necessary.

« Chapter 1 — Sharon | Chapter 2 — Jake | Chapter 3 — Jackie »

The Shattered World Series | Book 1 | Light Shines Through

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Light Shines Through | Chapter 1 - Sharon

Lawrence Winnerman — Wed, 02 Jul 2025 16:09:16 GMT

Sharon | October 2041 — Seattle, Tahoma, Free Republic of Cascadia

High-pitched screams emanate from the garden, followed by the muffled response of an exasperated adult trying to sound soothing and reasonable. A brief lull, and then more impassioned screaming from the child.

Sharon Walker-Nilssen chuckles to herself, knowing exactly how this will play out: her beloved and incorrigible youngest grandson will wail at ever-higher pitches until the nanny –- or his mother –- capitulates, promising ice cream for good behavior.

Alyssa storms through the living room, heading to the porch, shooting Sharon a look that plainly reads as don’t you dare say anything, Mother.

Sharon laughs and unable to resist says, “You know he reminds me of you, right?”

Alyssa stops in front of the French door that leads to the backyard, shoots her mother an indignant look, and then sticks out her tongue at Sharon before opening the door and poking her head through.

Sharon can hear every word she says.

“Benji, clean up then come inside and say goodbye to your grandmothers and we’ll stop and get ice cream on the way home.” A whine. “No, now.” A question. “Yes, from the good place.” Another question. “Yes, dinosaur eggs, or whatever flavor you want. Now come inside and stop yelling!”

Alyssa closes the door, and looks back at her mother.

“You know who he actually reminds me of, Mother, is you.”

Sharon laughs, and shrugs, and smiles at her daughter.

“I have been known to pitch a fit as a negotiating tactic, that’s true. But good lord, Lyss, the way you ply that kid with ice cream.”

Alyssa steps across the room and grabs her coat and her bag, and raises a hand in dismissal.

“Don’t start that again. Believe me, if broccoli worked, I’d stuff his little scream-hole shut with broccoli.”

“Who are we stuffing full of broccoli? Congressman Lawton? The President of Brazil?”

Sharon turns around to watch her wife float into the room. All this time, and everything they’ve been through, and still Sharon thinks that Mathilde radiates a grace and strength that seems otherworldly, moving as if gravity doesn’t apply to her the same way it does to the rest of humanity. If she hadn’t known how sick her wife had been, she’d be none the wiser seeing her now.

Sharon holds out her hand to her wife, and smiles.

“Your grandson, Tilly. The one who can’t stop screaming, just like his mother at that age.”

Alyssa shakes her head and rolls her eyes at Sharon, and steps up to Mathilde for a quick kiss on the cheek.

“Mom, are you sure you’re up for this?” Concern edges her voice, and she looks at Mathilde as if she expects her to shatter into tiny pieces at any moment.

Mathilde waves her hand, a perfect copy of the gesture her daughter used moments ago.

“Oh, stop. I’m fine. The doctors all say that I’m fine. Besides, we’re walking ten blocks to the farmer’s market. Which I’ve done a million times before, need I remind you. And your mother has all her...people, if anything happens.” She waves her hand vaguely in the air at the mention of Sharon’s team, encompassing the whole house.

Alyssa nods, still seemingly unsatisfied, but not willing to push the issue any further. She leans over to Sharon and gives her a matching kiss on the cheek.

“Before I forget, have you talked to Dani and Byung-ho and Mike about Thanksgiving, yet? Do they know we’re doing it here?”

Sharon nods, and hugs her eldest daughter, the inveterate planner of the bunch.

“They all know. This year it’s here, just like old times.”

Alyssa smiles a half-smile, and nods, and then motions with her head towards the outdoors.

“And what about the presser? You know what you’re going to say? What they’ll be asking?”

Sharon refrains from replicating the dismissive wave, and nods, smiling at her daughter.

“I’ve got it, Lyss. This is no brainer.” She holds up her hand and ticks things off. “Tilly’s doing fine, the move to Cascadia City, how the NERA vote is going to go, Brazil and Texas and the fucking Confederates, and maybe some bullshit about inflation, again. I got it.”

Alyssa frowns at her, pulling a face that Sharon has seen so many times on her daughter she can’t help but smile.

“But what about the re-elect? They’re going to ask about the re-elect.”

Sharon shrugs, but she knows that Alyssa is probably right.

“If they ask, they ask. We still haven’t decided.” She squeezes Mathilde’s hand, and gets a squeeze in return.

Alyssa’s frown deepens.

“You two can’t possibly be thinking...”

Mathilde cuts her off quickly with arched eyebrows.

“Alyssa, your Mother and I are still discussing it...”

Alyssa appears to be on the verge of resorting to screaming herself, when the French door bursts open and a dirt-covered four-year-old bolts across the room. Not for the first time, Sharon wonders if the bulletproof glass in the doors is also child-proof.

The boy runs up to her, his hair sticking out in all directions, and gives her a quick hug around her knees, mumbling, “Bye, Nana!”, before shooting over to Mathilde for a similar knee-hug and “Bye, Gammy!”

Alyssa starts struggling to get the boy into his jacket and wiping the dirt off of him, but pins Sharon with a glare.

“We need to talk about this, Mother.”

“Lyss, your Mom and I are going to talk and decide, and then we’ll let you kids know. Until then, there’s nothing to discuss. I know how you feel. You’ve told me a number of times.”

She puts more steel into her voice than is probably necessary, and Mathilde gives her a poke with her elbow.

“Ma’am, we need to get going. Mr. Chuy says we’re running five minutes late.”

She turns and nods to Vanander Singh, her security team lead.

“Thanks, Van.”

In the bustle of getting everyone out of the house, Mathilde turns and whispers to her, “You know who Benji really reminds me of?”

Sharon throws a look at her wife, not realizing she’d heard the whole discussion.

“Who?”

“Ben. Benji reminds me of Ben. You know, short with crazy hair, yelling to get what he wants, and then running off to the next thing looking like a mess, and with a gleam in his eye.”

Sharon throws back her head and laughs.

“I’m sure Old Man Cohen would be thrilled to hear that you think his toddler namesake reminds you of him yelling and scheming. I can hear him spinning in his grave from here.”

Mathilde stops for a moment, feigning a realization, grabbing onto Sharon’s arm in mock astonishment.

“Or maybe Benji is Ben, reincarnated!”

Sharon laughs even harder, and leans over and gives her wife a long kiss.

“What was that for?”

“For you, Tilly. I’ve missed you. My funny, beautiful wife who can surprise me and make me laugh.”

Mathilde beams at her, a beatific grin, and gives her a quick peck, and squeezes her hand.

“I love you, too, Share. Now come on, old lady. Let’s get you to your damn press conference.”

The walk takes longer than it normally would, because Sharon is deliberately keeping the pace slow to ensure that Mathilde doesn’t feel rushed.

The sky is a perfect cobalt hemisphere, and the heat of the last several days has finally broken. Fall and winter start later than they used to. A breeze is blowing in off of Shilshole Bay, and the salty, fecund oceanic smell of the Puget Sound is strong in the air. Sharon breathes deeply, and smiles, pushing thoughts of the recently-started seawall construction project out of her mind for a moment.

It's a beautiful day, and she’s walking with the love of her life to the place where they first met, thirty-nine years ago this very day: to the spot where a scrappy social worker Sharon Walker met a firebrand political activist named Mathilde Nilssen, changing the trajectory of both of their lives forever.

Mathilde glances over at her, and squeezes her hand, flashing a radiant smile.

“You’re humming, Share.”

Sharon laughs, surprised to discover that her wife is correct.

“Indigo Girls?”

Sharon shakes her head, momentarily at a loss for the words to the song. She hums several more bars, and then sings, badly, “The sky’s the bluest blue in Seattle”.

Mathilde laughs, shaking her head, and then sings the correct lyrics in a high, fine soprano. In perfect unison, Mathilde’s voice bolstering and smoothing Sharon’s they sing, “And you pray that you will find, someone warm and sweet and kind,” and then fall into giggles as if they were schoolgirls.

A long-time neighbor, Dana Ellison, beams at them, heading in the other direction, laden down with reusable produce bags.

“Good morning! Toscano’s stand has peaches!”

She gestures to the bags by holding them both up a bit, and Sharon can see that they are brimming with beautiful fruit.

Mathilde leans in and smells the aroma of the ripe fruit from the bag.

“This late in the season? Share, we have to get some.”

Sharon agrees, and reaches out to squeeze their neighbor’s shoulder gently.

“It’s good to see you! We have to get down there for a little...thing.”

Dana smiles and nods. “Oh, I know. I saw the gaggle forming. Good luck, and congrats!”

Sharon squeezes the woman’s shoulder again, and smiles her thanks.

“And if you’re making any of your famous cobbler...” she nods knowingly at the bag.

Dana laughs, fine lines crinkling in a face that has known a lot of smiles, and says, “Oh, you know I will. I’ll leave some with Marcus.”

They thank her and part ways, and as they get closer to the market, Sharon sees that the good weather has brought out a crowd, which isn’t surprising. The Ballard Farmer’s Market has been a beloved tradition in the neighborhood since the turn of the century, every Sunday, rain or shine, except during the quarantines of the pandemics, and for a couple of weeks at the beginning of the war.

In the depths of the depression after the Catastrophes, Sharon and Mathilde had pitched in to help keep the event running in those times when community had seemed like the only thing they had left, and the rest of the world had seemed shattered beyond recognition.

As they approach the squat, brick belltower on the spot where Ballard’s city hall had once stood before its annexation into Seattle more than a hundred and thirty years prior, Van and his team begin to materialize out of the crowded street around them. With quiet efficiency, the agents gently create a path through the crowded Sunday market, causing a small ripple of awareness through the tide of humanity.

A crowd has gathered; curious citizens in the outer ring, surrounding a decent sized knot of press. At the very core, is her Chief of Staff, Tony Chuy, in from the Government Complex in downtown just for this event, and deputy Press Secretary, Lizette Calderon. As they approach, smatterings of applause break out, cluing in more of the market crowd as to what’s happening. To their credit, Sharon thinks, most of her neighbors don’t care what’s about to happen.

Sharon shakes her head ruefully at her wife, and sends an apology with her eyes. Mathilde reaches up to touch the kerchief wrapped around her just-returning hair, white now, rather than silvery blonde, and returns a smile and a shrug that says, you knew this was what we were getting into, dummy, so let’s get it over with.

As they step up onto the curb near the small bell tower, Sharon leans in and whispers, “Sorry it’s not more private, love.”

Her wife shrugs again, and laughs. “Oh, please. Nothing in our lives has been private for the last twenty years, darling.”

“That’s not true.” Sharon replies, feigning hurt. “Nobody paid us any attention the year after Ronklin won.”

“Right,” Mathilde agrees, “for nearly eighteen whole months, everyone forgot the war’s most famous social-worker-lawyer-turned-battlefield-general, Old Man Cohen’s hand-picked successor, until she was drafted out of retirement to be opposition party leader. Again.”

It’s Sharon’s turn to shrug. “Well, the country needed me,” she says with dramatic flair, “and besides, it’s all been very calm since then, hasn’t it?”

Her wife rolls her eyes, and sighs.

At that moment, Tony Chuy calls out from the gaggle of photographers and reporters he and Lizette have been herding on the street in front of them.

“Madam President? Madam First Lady? Are you ready to go?”

Sharon looks at her wife, the First Lady of the Free Republic of Cascadia, who smiles at her, eyes filled with love and affection, and nods.

“We’re ready, Tony,” she calls out.

She leans in and kisses her wife, on the very spot where their love had first blossomed, all those years and so very many changes ago. The growing crowd cheers and applauds, and a hundred lenses catch the moment for posterity.

Goddamn I’ll be glad when this is all over, thinks Sharon, as an errant cool breeze runs a chill down her shoulders and arms.

Thirty minutes later, and things have gone almost exactly as planned. Sharon has taken a number of questions, but she can feel Mathilde flagging next to her, the heat of the day and her recent chemotherapy cycle getting the better of her wife.

She had begun by thanking the crowd and her neighborhood, and noting the importance of the day and the location. She had then announced that Mathilde’s treatment was nearing completion, and that she was, mercifully, cancer-free, which got thundering applause from the crowd. Not for the first time, Sharon had mentally noted that her wife’s popularity exceeded her own by some rather large margin, and justifiably so, she thought.

Slightly less popular was the announcement that by the turn of the year, she and Mathilde would be moving into the recently completed presidential apartments in the New Complex in Cascadia City.

The Supreme Court and the Environmental Court and their respective staffs had relocated to the new capital several months ago, and the Unicameral Congress was in a prolonged fit of coordinating its more than one thousand members to set up shop across the Cascades. Now that Mathilde’s health was on more solid ground, Sharon felt she had to lead by example, and prove that the hundreds of billions of dollars spent in the last decade on the political hot potato that was the newly constructed seat of government was not, in fact, the boondoggle that many people believed it to be.

The people of Ballard, it turned out, were more concerned about losing the claim to fame of being the Neighborhood of Presidents.

The next question had been about escalating tensions in the complicated dance over petroleum resources between Brazil, Texas, the Yucatan Republic, and the New Confederacy. The truth was that she wasn’t a fan of the governments of any of those nations, reserving the bulk of her antipathy for the meddling superpower that Brazil had managed to become in the wake of the Catastrophes, and the malignancy that was the New Confederate States of America. But she had kept her face neutral, and her answer bland, and used the moment to switch to her hard sell on the upcoming vote on the Nuclear Energy Regulation Act.

Fourteen months prior, teams of scientists at the Cascadia National Laboratory and at the University of Tahoma had announced that they’d made a breakthrough on stable, self-sustaining, efficient nuclear fusion. While Cascadia had spent the last twenty years moving towards more green energy production, like much of the remaining developed world, it was frustratingly dependent on fossil fuels for key energy needs.

Sharon had advocated loudly for a push to build fusion generation resources –- but been astonished when a surprisingly well-coordinated alliance across the political spectrum had pushed back. To her mind, the NERA bill being debated in the Unicameral now was a foolishly rushed attempt to shut down the building of any new nuclear power generation, be it fission or fusion. It was gaining ground based on the toxic combination of lies, misinformation, and apathy that had been the downfall of democracy for the last eighty years.

When pressed, she boldly predicted that NERA would fail, ushering in an era of safe, inexpensive power generation. In truth, Tony and her advisors suggested the vote was much too close for comfort.

As she had predicted, the reporter from the Cascadia Economic Journal had tried to pin her down on inflation, but she repeated her administration’s finely honed non-answer, and then ad-libbed a tie back to the NERA vote, and how a new source of cheap power would help with inflation numbers.

She glanced over at Mathilde, and just as she was about to wrap up, Devon Meacham from The Stranger asked her a particularly inane version of the re-election question.

“Madam President, as you consider running for president again, what do you say to the people who claim that you are ineligible for another term in office?”

“Well, Devon, I’d say that those people are wildly misinformed.”

“Meaning what, Madam President?”

“Meaning that the Cascadian Constitution is very clear on this. We incorporated the language of the old American 22^nd Amendment into the body of our constitution, as any Cascadian schoolkid can tell you. In part so that it can’t be overturned, like the 22^nd was.”

“But some people say you’ve served your two terms, ma’am.”

Sharon shakes her head, kindly, as if she were speaking to a beloved but slow child. She smiles.

“When Ben Cohen...when President Cohen, may he rest in peace, died in office, I was sworn in as President to serve out the remainder of his second term. Which I did. It was less than half a term, and so it counted as his.”

She pauses, and beams out at the crowd, cueing them that she’s about to share something funny.

“And then, disappointingly, I lost my re-election bid to Alexander Ronklin.”

Some people in the crowd boo and hiss. She waves her hands for silence.

“And you’ll remember that Ronklin was impeached, and his Vice President, Eric Bucatini was sworn in as president.” She laughs now, an amused-to-be-retelling it kind of laugh. “And when Bucatini had to resign just a couple of months later for the same corruption charges without a VP yet in place, Speaker Alvarado was sworn in as president.

“When I beat Maria Alvarado and Marcus Theroux in the election of ’38, I was elected president for the first time, despite having already been president once. The Cascadian Constitution is clear that I am legally able to be elected president a second time.”

She pauses and smiles at the reporter, who she is quite certain knows all of this in detail.

“So, my question for you, Devon, and your followers, is this: am I the second President of the Free Republic of Cascadia, or am I the second and the sixth all at the same time?”

She beams at him, and the crowd laughs along with her at this old and oft-told joke.

A reporter from Portland she recognizes calls out: “But Madam President, you didn’t answer the question –- are you running again?”

Mathilde, with her flawless political instincts, steps forward and takes her hand, squeezing.

She smiles at her wife, and gives her a discreet peck on the cheek. She pauses as much for dramatic effect as to gather her thoughts.

“We’ve had a lot to think about as a family recently, as you know. We’re talking about it. We’re being very deliberate, and we’re close to making a decision. I promise that as soon as we’ve decided for sure I’ll let you all know.”

There are some nods at this, and a bit of applause. She smiles again at her wife, and turns to thank the reporters and neighbors for coming out. She glances at Tony and gives him the quick nod, arched eyebrow, and wink that is their shared code for all done, get me the hell out of here.

“Are you a racist?”

The question lands in the gentle scrum of the presser wrap-up like a small bomb, and it is only years of practice that prevent Sharon from flinching. She feels the flush of a wave of fury wash across her, and knows that as she turns to address the questioner, that only Mathilde and Tony will be able to see the anger on her face.

In fact, Mathilde is gripping her arm tighter, and as she swings her gaze around, Sharon can see the fearful frown and head shake from her chief of staff. She gives him a small wink that she knows will do nothing to reassure him, and finishes her pivot towards the questioner.

“Pardon me?” She intentionally puts the tones of her own grandmother’s voice into her words, the noble imperiousness the grand lady had passed on to her; she who had been proud and unbowed despite having witnessed true hardship and evil in her own long life.

“I said, are you a racist?”

The young blond man steps forward a bit from the crowd, and Sharon sizes him up. A stocky, athletic build. What in the old days would have been called All-American farm boy good looks. Something in his bearing whispers military to Sharon, and over her time on the frontlines of the war she’d become quite adept at discerning the small tell-tale signs that differentiated the branches. There is a look in his eyes that she knows, having shared it in her own time and way -- ready for battle and flush with excitement. He is leaning imperceptibly into the space, trying to assert himself through body language.

“I’m sorry, Marine, I couldn’t quite hear you,” she says, and pauses. “Old ears.” She smiles and shrugs trying to convey getting old sucks, but what’re you gonna do?

But he’d flinched when she’d said marine, and so she knows she’s right, and Tony’s frantic handwaving in the corner of her vision notwithstanding, she is going once more into the breach. She gives him and her security team a signal that means relax, I’ve got this and leans into her gaze on the young man. She gives him credit; he only falls back half a step when she steps towards him.

She holds for another beat, the crowd of reporters and onlookers around them focused, waiting with bated breath. Her power is building up around her like a mist slowly rolling in and accreting in the gathering silence that she knows she need never break, and that inevitably, he must. It’s funny, really, how quiet a day can be, even on a busy street at the farmer’s market, in a moment like this.

The man stands a little taller and squares his shoulders. She can see the resolve to repeat the question in his eyes the moment before he himself realizes he’s going to do it.

“Madam President, I asked if you are a racist.”

Sharon smiles, a genuine smile this time, radiant in the knowledge that she has already won. Whatever bias this man was bringing into the question, whatever he thought of her personally, it had only taken a minute for him to cave on his initial battle line -- his refusal to use her title the first two times he’d asked his question.

What she had known, that he could not possibly know, is that she would have happily waited all day in silence for him to accord her the respect she was due. Well, she thinks, not all day. It is hot, and I need to get Mathilde home, but waiting a really fucking long time would have showed this child who he’s messing with. In her mind’s eye, her grandmother nods and grins at her. Her own smile grows wider at the thought.

“Have we met?” she asks him, stepping forward again.

“Uh. No, ma’am.” he replies, again off-balance at the unforeseen direction this conversation is going. He glances back at a blond woman who Sharon now sees is with him -- his colleague/girlfriend/sister, diligently video recording the interaction, and looking almost as uncomfortable as the interlocutor.

“You’re new to the beat?”

“Ma’am? Yes, ma’am.” he replies, quickly catching on that she is playing along with the charade that he’s a legitimate reporter. She raises an eyebrow at him, inviting him to continue.

“Troy Caldwell. With...with the Statesman, ma’am.”
“Indeed? Good. Good for you Troy. The Statesman is a fine paper. It’s one of the ones we helped to save back when I was Vice President, you know.” She nods and smiles at him, and once again is amazed at how simple human reflex has him smiling and nodding right back at her.

“And you were born in Yampahpa state.” It’s a question, but not really a question, and he knows it.

“I was born in Lewiston.”

She wracks her brain for a split second. Is that Nez Perce or Shoshone? she thinks. Sometimes even she has a hard time with the geography of the new Cascadian states. She claps her hands like his answer has delighted her.

“So you’re a native-born Cascadian? Well, you’ve got one up on me then, you know. I was born in Oakland. California. Back when it was the United States.”

He flinches, a very small twitch, at the name of the old nation, and Sharon adds that to the mental checklist she’s building about this interaction.

“I was born in the United States, too. In Idaho.” he says, but quietly, as if a ghost has stolen half of his breath.

Sharon nods, “Of course, because you’re twenty...?”

“Twenty-four.”

She nods again, and flashes him another smile, this one with a bit more wolf in it, the way she knows she can.

“So, Troy Caldwell, twenty-four, born in the fine city of Lewiston, Nez Perce State, brand-new reporter with the Statesman, you want to know if I’m a racist, why, exactly?”

She flashes a glance at Vanander Singh, who has been slowly walking up behind Troy as she says all of his details out loud, and she ensures that Troy sees the small shake of her head that she gives to Agent Singh as the man takes his place half a step behind the ersatz reporter.

Sharon can see the realization bloom in the man’s head, that none of this has gone the way he’s planned. While he has been willfully convinced that he was luring Sharon into a conversation that could be politically damaging, she and her team have been sizing him up, determining that he wasn’t a true threat -- or that he wouldn’t follow through on his threat -- and most unexpectedly, she has now given him a large national media platform upon which he is going to ask his question and fail.

Credit to the man, though, because he gathers himself and launches into the part of his speech that she’s sure is quite well rehearsed.

“You and your government have been engaged in racist policies for years. Policies that have stolen land, property and money mostly from white citizens, especially poor Eastern whites who never wanted to be a part of Cascadia in the first place. You settled refugees on our land to dilute our political strength. You say your policies are promoting equality, but you’re only interested in clinging to power and running for a third term, because you won’t get out of the way for other people to run.”

There’s a look of real anger in the man’s eyes, and Sharon can see that he genuinely believes what he’s saying. For some reason, that glimpse of his anger dissolves all of hers, and in its place, she is filled with an oceanic sadness.

Sharon nods at him, and gives him a small, sad smile.

“Well, we cleared up the whole question about if it would be a third term earlier, Troy. But you want to know if I’m a racist?” she asks.

His face is still flushed with anger, and the nerves from asking his question up close. He gives a sharp nod.

She sighs.

“Yes, Troy. I am a racist. Of course, I’m a racist.”

There’s a rumble that passes through the crowd, a murmur of disbelief, and a frantic checking among the reporters to ensure that their devices are powered on and recording.

“I’m a racist, Troy,” she says again, “and so are you.”

“And so are all of us,” she says, waving her hand to encompass the entire crowd. “We all are, because we were raised in a racist society that built its power on the backs of black and brown people, and immigrants and indigenous people, and yes, on the backs of poor white people, too. And it concentrated that power in the hands of a very select few who counted as citizens. Who, by the way, for the vast expanse of history were defined as white men who were wealthy enough to own land.

“So I grew up, in old America, as a racist. A racist against Latino people and Asian people and First Nations people who were different from me. A racist against white people who hated and oppressed me, and especially against the white police officers who killed my brother. And also, as a racist against Black people. Against my own people. Against me, myself, because society taught me that I was not worthy or equal, and it reinforced that message every damn day, in a million little ways that are too numerous and exhausting to try to enumerate here.”

She pauses for a moment, to let the tension build. Children are laughing in the distance, and the silence around her is a bubble of unreality in the larger sphere of the market hubbub.

“But I’m also an antiracist, Troy.

“And since I realized in my twenties that I could only ever be a racist or an antiracist, and that the only way I could forsake racism of all kinds was to work every day to be better, to be an antiracist in all things I did and said, I have been working towards that goal. Maybe I have failed from time to time, but on the whole, I think I have not.

“When our progenitor nation, the United States of America, tore itself apart in the Catastrophes, we didn’t know if we could build anything new. We didn’t know if we could build anything at all! We didn’t know if we could win our freedom to self-determination, and we didn’t know if we could survive. But we did know that we had to try. We hoped and prayed that the shattered ideals of that old country could possibly be made true here in this small corner of the world.

“Benyamin David Cohen and I, and many others, we gave over our lives, and our best efforts to that task. Many of you joined us in those efforts! During the war I was a general -- an accidental general, you all know the story -- and I helped us secure the unified Cascadia watershed. During the Exodus, as we were taking in millions of people of color fleeing the New Confederacy, and Heartland, and Texas, millions of religious refugees from Quebec and Deseret, millions of people of conscience of every color afraid of what our former brethren were becoming, we were simultaneously trying to build a new nation from the ashes of the old, while feeding every mouth. A new nation where everyone could live in peace. A nation where everyone had a home and a job.

“We embraced the ideas of liberation capitalism, and human sovereignty, and deeper economics. We took risks, and we took bold action, because to do nothing, to change nothing, would have been to surrender and die.

“And yes, sometimes we took land. Mostly, we took it from large corporations who are, in fact, not people. We created the Environmental Court to help to arbitrate those decisions, while keeping stewardship over the earth and the waters in our protection.

“And sometimes we did the equally hard thing of giving some that land back to the people who belonged to it first. To the Duwamish here, to the Haida Gwaii, the Nez Perce in your home state, to all the First Nations where we could. And then with the Reparations, Reconciliation, and Restoration Acts, we set up the New Grange Fund, and gave forty acres and a tractor and books on permaculture to everyone who wanted it, so that more than a million family farms bloomed with abundance for us all.

“We put that land into the hands of people who would love it, and who would work it, and who would help us to build and feed this nation.

“We did do that.

“I did do that. I helped to create those policies, and I helped to implement them, and I’m not sorry about it. Not even one little bit.

“But I think you are asking another question, hidden behind your first question, and so let me answer that, too.

“You are asking me if I hate white people.”

She pauses, and she’s looking directly into his pretty blue eyes, and she sees the truth and the shame there, as every other eye is focused on her.

“And the answer is: of course I don’t. How could I?”

At this, she leans back and grabs Mathilde’s waiting hand, long years of marriage and partnership having told her subconsciously that her wife had come to stand again behind her shoulder as she spoke. Mathilde, her beloved partner, slid into her role as political prop as easily as breathing, and steps up to stand fully beside Sharon, delivering a perfectly timed kiss.

In that one moment the years melt away, and she is thirty-two, meeting this amazing woman on this exact spot, filled with the hope and spark of new romance, and dreams of a future life well-loved and well-lived.

She breaks the kiss, and comes back to the present, and looks at Troy, and the woman she is now convinced is his sister, who is gently tugging on his arm trying to pull him away. As they blanch at her gaze, they both seem to shrink in the moment.

“But what I don’t like, Troy.” She said leveling him with her biggest grin, and pulling out her wagging finger in the same way her beloved Nana had done from time to time.

“What I don’t like is assholes. Of any color!”

The crowd around her explodes with laughter, in palpable relief, and she can feel the air around them relax.

Troy and his sister begin to try to slip through the throng, and she hollers to her lead security man who is already sidling up to the man as he tries to beat his retreat.

“Go easy, Van!”

The agent frowns and nods at her, and then turns to his business, gently resting his hand on the fake reporter’s shoulder.

Sharon holds tight onto Mathilde’s hand, and looks at her wife. “Do it”, Mathilde whispers at her, her eyes alight with a fire that nearly forty years has taught Sharon to pay attention to. She turns back to the gathered reporters, feeling the electric thrill of the moment.

“There’s one other thing we have decided just now I should tell you,” she says loudly, causing the crowd to fall silent instantly, all eyes and ears and lenses immediately returned to her.

In her mind’s eye, her grandmother is there, smiling, standing with a fictional president from an ancient TV show about a vanished country.

“I am running. I am running for another term to be your president, and I’m going to win, too!”

« Prologue — João | Chapter 1 — Sharon | Chapter 2 — Jake »

The Shattered World Series | Book 1 | Light Shines Through

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The Book of Deek

Lawrence Winnerman — Tue, 01 Jul 2025 21:54:19 GMT

“In the moment it happened, we could have freaked out, but while the medics were attending to Derek, the rest of us huddled up around Troy, who, I swear to God had a glimmer to him now.”

[Note: This story is a work of fiction, and was previously published on genXy.io.]

I was going to start this by saying, “It’s not like I’d always had a crush on Troy Wedinger,” except that’s the kind of lie that could only be made true if I finished it with “but that’s because it was more than a crush; I was madly in love with him, from the very beginning.” It’s the kind of lie I’ve been telling myself and everyone else for nearly ten years now.

And I guess I owe you that truth, because the rest of this is going to come across as hard enough to believe that I should play this as straight as I can. Which is a joke about how gay I am, but you couldn’t have known that yet.

I’m Deek Passamore, Jr., and one of the first ways I distinguished myself from my old man, Deacon “Deke” Passamore, Sr. was that I cleverly spelled our shared nickname “Deek”. He didn’t like it, but then we didn’t like each other much to begin with. Or end with, for that matter.

I’d met Troy in peewee football when we were both nine. We were from small, adjacent farm towns out near Warsaw, Indiana. He was from Wessup, and I was from Dolfang, and if you try to look those up on a map, you probably won’t find them because they were really that small. No-stoplight towns that were more corn and soybeans than people, you know? The kinds of places where two little boys could ride their bikes on dirt roads to get back and forth to each other’s houses, and not be threatened by anything more than a herd of deer or a big John Deere tractor. But by the time we were in middle school, we were in the same school building, and fast friends.

We’d have sleepovers at each other’s houses. We’d help each other with our chores. We schemed endlessly about how to get things done faster so that we could go to a game, or a movie, or just hang out at the small pond that was halfway between our farms.

When I think about Troy, I think about my childhood, and vice versa. He was so much a part of it, we might as well have been brothers.

When his mom died, he stayed enough nights at my house that it was like we’d adopted him.

Years later, when my Pa ran off—well, Troy’s dad didn’t become my replacement pa, but it felt like between us we had enough people to cobble together a little family, and that was something.

We talked about everything boys talk about, I guess. Football and basketball. Video games and movies, and comics. Farming, trucks, soldiers, dirt…. damn near everything except girls, or only in the most abstract way, if we talked about girls at all. None of that struck me as weird, not until we got to high school.

And even then, I suppose it took me a long time to tune in on the raging hormones that surrounded us, because by then, two other things had managed to distract me completely.

One of them was Troy, or more precisely, his body. When I tell you he was handsome, I think I accidentally diminish the meaning of words. He was stunning, transforming from a skinny twerp who I’d been able to beat at wrestling for years, into a 6’3” blond-haired, blue-eyed paragon of Americana manhood.

Believe me, I was not the only one who noticed. In fact, I think it was impossible for anyone not to notice.

Except Troy. I’m not kidding you with that; everyone in a five-county radius knew who he was, and yet somehow, he only had eyes for me. As a friend, and a friend only, I was sure at the time, but later events cleared me up on that, I guess. Just too late to do us any good.

We were Troyandeek, or Deekantroy, either way, but always one word together, more inseparable than Mutt and Jeff, my Grammy used to say, not that I knew that reference at the time.

But by the time we got to high school, after puberty had well and truly kicked in, something happened to Troy.

The rest of us were flooded with hormones, filling out and filling in and generally speaking becoming men and women, as hundreds of millions of our ancestors had done before us. And mind you, this was happening to Troy, too, him becoming the paragon of manhood I’ve already described.

But the second thing was that something else happened to him—and only to him.

It was like God turned on the hormones tap inside him, and then also leaned over and turned on the divinity tap to boot.

It’s taken me so long to write this down because I don’t know how else to explain it. It was like he radiated light in a set of colors the human eye can’t see, but longs to. The natural world could see it, though, and boy howdy.

I’m not just talking about birds and bees, but also literally—birds and bees. Troy would no sooner step outside than he could hold out a hand and have a bird land on it, happy as a clam to have found this human, chirping to him like it was delivering him the dark-eyed junco headline news, or the latest decisions from the high command of the common grackles.

One spring afternoon that was already warming into summer, I finished my chores and went over to his place, and I found him sitting out in the back forty behind his house. This was a hilly meadow that had a creek winding through it. His Pa didn’t farm it because it was too rocky and steep, and besides, the creek drew the deer, and that was a prize for hunting season.

He was just sitting there in a beam of sunshine, and I shit you not, he was covered in birds, and butterflies, and bees, and crickets. But not in a “human being ripped to shreds by critters” kind of way. More like he was holding court, talking to them, and this wise council of the meadow was consulting with him on matters of most supreme mundane importance.

He turned to me, sensing I was there, and smiled so beatifically that it was as if the whole Universe had fixed me in its spotlight and decided that I was the main character of the day. I’ve only ever felt that radiance a couple of times since, and almost all of them were with Troy.

The flotilla of critters rose off of him as one, and headed towards me, not menacing, but rather as if a charming parade of festival-goers had come to welcome the newest arrival. They touched on me briefly, a gentle hailstorm of quick landings and departures that left me swooning with a feeling of peace and welcome, and also a deep, melancholy longing, because as quickly as it all happened, it was over.

It’s hard to be a human and to finally feel that love and acceptance from the world writ large, and then to have it disappear just as quickly. Maybe most of us aren’t designed for that. Maybe that’s why some of us turn to ever-harder drugs to find that touch of joy and light, and then keep chasing that high.

I pulled him up off his feet, and he bumped into me in a rough hug, and a flash of white teeth, and we fell into conversation without ever addressing what I’d just seen.

There was another time in the woods, early in our Freshman year of high school, a thing I’ll never forget.

We’d both been hunting a thousand times before that. It was Northern Indiana; deer hunting was a God-given right, so much so that our fathers had taken us numerous times when we’d been kids. The couple of dozen times that all four of us had managed to go hunting together was a remarkable feat, considering that both of them were gruff, cruel, drunkards who weren’t great at getting up and out the door early.

On this morning, Troy and I were huddled up in the blind together. Not in separate ones, which would have been better for hunting, but pressed close together in the one we both liked to argue was ours; it was a way to share heat, and maybe an excuse to press our bodies up against one another, just because.

We’d sat in silence through the dawn, and right as we were thinking it was time to head to school, this ten-point buck that everyone in the county was talking about wandered into view, as cool as a cucumber, thank you very much.

I flinched right as I was about to take a shot, and then again when Troy put his big hand on my shoulder, and told me with his mind that he needed to talk to this stag.

I think I stopped as much out of shock that I’d just heard my best friend’s voice in my head as anything else, and when I looked into his eyes, he gave a small nod that said, yes, you just heard me in your mind.

For the next twenty minutes, I watched as that stag walked right up to our blind and stood there looking at us. Troy climbed down like he was meeting an old friend, and I clambered down after him, graceless and loud, snapping a branch as I tumbled to the ground. I looked up to see both of them—the man and the deer—staring at me with bemused smiles that said what a loveable oaf.

They talked, and even as I write it, I struggle to say it another way, but I am telling you they talked for what seemed like forever. Foreheads pressed together, nickers and grunts from both of them, ending in tears. A man and a deer, weeping before me, as I stood there, stupidly thinking I didn’t know deer could cry.

At the end, Troy nodded to me to touch his friend, and with a trembling hand, I patted the side of the stag’s head. The creature pressed his high cheek into my hand, and once again I felt that struck by a lightning bolt of joy feeling flood through me and then fly away, nearly as quick.

As we walked out of the woods that morning, late for school, Troy turned to me and said, “We’re never hunting again, okay?”

I nodded, mute, still a bit bewildered. And it was OK by me. I didn’t love hunting the way my father did, and that moment with the stag with Troy had shifted something inside of me as much as it clearly had in him.

It continued from there. There are a thousand moments like this I could tell you about here, but they are all more fantastic than the last. They all seem to come forward as if they are dipped in honey, a golden sunshine dust glimmering across the surface of every memory I have of Troy.

Other people began to notice, and not just in assigning to Troy the nickname of “Golden Boy”. Girls, and not an inconsiderable number of guys, began to clamor to hang out with us—and Troy, being Troy, let them. I remember feeling a certain disgruntlement that I had to share him, but also a considerable amount of pride that even as Freshmen, we had somehow become the center of gravity around which the whole school orbited. Well, Troy had, and I was the far less radiant binary star that orbited him, and so by default, I was popular too.

Football was where it all changed. Him and us. All of it, and I mean all of it, became too big to ignore. I think it’s when he realized it, too. How big it could get if he let it. If he chose it.

We were on the team Freshman year, a quarterback and center duo so compelling that we saw real playtime, and had everyone buzzing about Troyandeek, and how we were going to lift the Warsaw Tigers into the top tier of Indiana football.

And we did.

Sophomore year he was the starting quarterback, and he was magnificent. It took four games to get Coach Walthers to put me in as a starter too, but when he did, it was magic. And I mean it was literally magic.

There was a play in a late September game against the Brownsburg Bulldogs—the same team we’d go on to defeat for the State championships for two years—that changed my perception of reality.

I could give you the play-by-play, but in my mind, y’all don’t seem like the kind of people who need to hear that part.

What had happened was, halfway into the game, when it looked like we were down by three touchdowns and incapable of coming back, Troy suddenly knew how the rest of the game was going to unfold.

Coach Walthers had screamed at us at halftime. I don’t mean he yelled, I mean he screamed. At the end of the tirade, he laid a heavy hand onto Troy’s head and hollered “You’re supposed to be the damned Golden Boy, so by God, you’d better show me you understand how this game works!”

I saw the change. No one else did, but I saw it. A flicker of anger and determination crackled across Troy’s eyes—desperate to impress his own father for ages, now pressing that keen burden into the shape of Coach. And the flash. The download. The golden rainbow of information that flooded into my best friend’s brain while I was watching him.

I had to blink to process what I’d seen, and then look around the locker room to see if anyone else had caught it, too. To a person, the guys were looking down at their feet. Not even Coach had noticed anything.

I caught Troy’s eye, and he nodded at me, a glimmer of a smile on his face.

I’m still not sure how to describe what happened next.

We tumbled out of the locker room, all except for Troy, who walked out onto the field slowly and deliberately, his head held high, but not in an asshole kind of way. Like he was noticing everything. Seeing the colors in the air, and breathing in the information of the earth, the crowd, and the players.

He motioned to us to huddle up, and when the last guy completed the circle, a tingle passed through me. It jolted my nuts, sure, but it was more than that. Not sexual, but masculine. Predatory and sharp, but smart, like a wolf, or a tiger, I suppose.

I can’t tell you what he said. It was simple, direct, forceful…but what I saw, in my mind, was exactly how the rest of the game was going to go. Every call, every pass, every catch, every run. I knew the order of the next 50 plays of the game, from now until the end, when we would win 27-20—a massive turnaround from the half.

You’re expecting me to tell you it went exactly to plan, right?

It did, until it didn’t. Derek Roman, an asshole junior on the other team tripped mid-play with 6:30 left, and sprained his ankle. None of us had seen that. It wasn’t in the plan. He’d been screaming that Troy was cheating, and then, thunk, down he went and twisted his ankle but good.

In the moment it happened, we could have freaked out, but while the medics were attending to Derek, the rest of us huddled up around Troy, who, I swear to God had a glimmer to him now.

We closed the circle, and we received our new information. When the clock resumed, we finished every new play flawlessly. We won the game, 30-20.

The rest of this story might be about high school football triumphs. It would be easy to tell that story. Fun, even.

But that was just the backdrop. A flawless season for the rest of our Sophomore year, and all through our Junior year, up until the end. The state media was insane, and yet somehow we weathered it, even when we were on pace to go to Nationals that Junior year.

We didn’t make it, but that was because Troy told us we had to lose, and so we did, in exactly the way he showed us we would. The strange thing was, it wasn’t like we were being controlled. We could have changed the outcome of that game in a minute, but we all chose not to, because Troy was convinced that we needed to lose.

Afterwards, as we rode home in my beat-up old truck, I was going to ask him why, but, as had been happening a lot lately, he just turned to me and answered my question before I even asked it.

“It’s free will, Deek. We all get to choose how our lives turn out. Every minute of every day, we’re making choices, and God lets us. Because the Universe has a lot of things in it that could happen, and some that maybe should happen, or have to happen. But we always get to choose if we want them or not. Even when bad things happen, we get to choose how we react to them. How we deal with it. Most people go with the flow, but they’re choosing big and small things every day.”

He paused and looked at me full on, while I glanced away from the road to meet his eyes.

“If we’d won that game, a lot of things that only maybe could happen, would have happened, too soon. And the way I figure it, there’s no rush. I didn’t feel like we were ready for it yet.”

I nodded because it made a certain kind of sense to me. I’d seen the way the town and the media were starting to go crazy at the idea of National Champs. Troy was already a local celebrity, more than the Mayor or our Congress guy. And me too, just by being his best friend, and being in nearly every damn picture with him.

He patted my shoulder and squeezed it, and a hundred images popped into my head, most of which I didn’t fully understand.

The one thing I did get was that Troy had made this choice because somehow it added up to him getting to spend more time with me, and whatever his reasons may have been, that thought warmed my innards like hot molasses.

Things with Troy and me got more intimate. Not yet sexual, but intimate in the way that lovers can be connected. We ate nearly every meal together. He could usually tell what I wanted to do next, and we’d do it.

Lots of time that was just hanging around with friends, but we spent a lot of that long, warm Indian summer just him and me, tromping through the fields and meadows of Indiana, or driving my old truck just to see where the wind took us.

Everywhere we went, we met people. We helped people stranded by the road, or helped a mom with her daughter who had cancer. Sometimes it felt like we were knights of old, riding around in my truck, slaying junkyard dragons and helping fair damsels and dudes in distress.

I can’t say as if I’ve ever been happier in my life.

At the beginning of junior year, a new girl moved to town. Her name was Marie Touchette, but because kids are assholes, she quickly became ‘Mary Touch-It’; even some of the teachers started calling her that, thinking that they’d had her name wrong to start with.

The thing was, Marie was a touch-it kind of girl. She loved her body, and to say that she loved men’s bodies too might sound like I’m being an asshole, except for the fact that I was kind of jealous of her. I loved Troy, I really did, but I was a horny gay teenager after all. She got a lot of the action that a part of me deep down wanted. Troy wasn’t the only hot guy at our school. It was like our town specialized in growing corn-fed Midwest farmboy hunks, or something. Heck, I was one, and surrounded by them.

She knew this, too. She knew within a minute of looking at me that I was gay, even though no one else ever said anything to my face. And she didn’t judge me—she thought it was cool, and she talked to me like no one else ever did. Like we were the founding members of the Big Cock Fan Club, though as far as I knew, she had no idea what I had and hadn’t done, which was mostly ‘hadn’t’ at that time. But she’d tell me shit, and mostly I just listened and grinned, and played along.

Troy and I had swigged beers and gotten drunk plenty of times as we were coming up; Marie was the first person who got me high. And I mean seriously, truly high. Weed at first, and the other things that I didn’t usually ask about. Troy knew about it, and I knew he didn’t approve. He’d tried a thing or two with us, but the crazy thing was, we’d get absolutely baked, and Troy just got clearer and glowed more. Marie was the only person who told me she saw Troy glowing, and for some reason, I just nodded but didn’t confirm I could see it, too.

Marie knew that Troy and I were inseparable, and she was OK with that, because she was maybe as in love with Troy as I was. He cared for her, sure. He loved her like she was his kid sister. But, man, she loved him something fierce, and she talked and wiggled and inveigled her way into our little circle of two until it had to stretch enough to become a circle of three.

She’d cheer us on from the sidelines of games, whooping and hollering like she was related to us. We’d go to parties together, picking her up in my truck, driving around with her crammed between us on the bench seat.

People started to talk, as they do. That we were both fucking her. That we were some kind of throuple. Marie and I would giggle about it, and Troy was Troy. Amused by it, but a bit above it all, tuning in to the frequencies that only he could hear.

The problem was that she really wanted it.

She confessed to me one night, drunk at a party after we’d lost the Big Game, while Troy was roaming around, making the rounds. She loved both of us. She was attracted to me, sure, and she loved me enough as a friend that she’d happily sleep with me, but she wanted Troy like she’d never wanted anyone else.

She told me she couldn’t understand it, because no guy had ever made her feel the way he made her feel—love, and loved, and like she was worthy of it. She wanted to have his babies, she told me, as many of them as he wanted, and some of mine, too, if that was what I wanted. They’d get married, and I’d live with them, she figured, and if she and I shared Troy in a house of love, it was all OK by her.

I told her that I didn’t know how that would work, and it was freaking me out. Fact is, I hadn’t ever been called out so directly about wanting my best friend, and the truth is that the idea of sharing him with anyone made my vision go red with fury—but I couldn’t let her see that in my eyes.

I understand all this time later that part of my rage was because she was talking about her and Troy getting married, and me sharing him on the side of her marriage to my best friend. It pushed me to the side, and it pissed me the fuck off. I felt like I’d be a third wheel in her vision of man-plus-woman-equals-babies. I didn’t say that, but I said some things close.

Marie was one of those girls who could go from drunk to obliterated in three extra sips. I think my answer wasn’t the ringing endorsement she’d wanted to hear, and so between the joint we’d shared and the drinks she’d had, she suddenly turned into a stumbling, weeping mess, begging me to take her home.

I found Troy and told him I’d take her home and come right back for him. He seemed to sober up instantly, and said he’d come with. I got angry at him, first because I felt like he was judging me for drinking and smoking, and second because I didn’t want his help on this.

What I wanted was to drive Marie home, and to have some time with her to make my point that Troy was off limits. Something about what she’d said and the way she’d said it had my dander up, and I didn’t care if I was acting like a jealous girlfriend—somehow I needed to find the words to make it clear that Troy was mine first.

Troy put his hands on my shoulders, and I relaxed immediately. I felt like I sobered up a bit for sure. He told me to be careful and wouldn’t let me go until I told him that I would.

I could draw this out, but I won’t.

I tried talking to Marie on the drive, half paying attention to those dark farmland roads, but she just wouldn’t listen. I guess her attachment to Troy rivaled mine, though it still felt like she was on my turf.

I don’t remember exactly how it happened. Just that she’d said something that triggered the red fury—my deep instinct to protect Troy, and also not to be shoved aside—and I was screaming something vile and demonic at her.

Some many tentacled monster of greed and envy and hate was climbing up out of me through my words, and the next thing I knew, I was sprawled across the front bench seat, my arm screaming in pain, shattered.

The rest was a blur for a bit; I don’t know how long it took to sit up and slide out the door of the truck. All the while, flashes came to me: the recollection of that ten-point buck shattering the windshield; poking at the white bones sticking out of my bloody, ruined right arm; finding the bodies of both the buck and Marie lifeless on the road in front of the truck.

The Universe collapsed in on itself, and in that moment, all I was made of was pain and grief and fear.

The cops showed up next, and for ten minutes I was a shivering wreck, trying to be coherent enough to explain what had happened.

I don’t know what they saw and heard from me, but it quickly became clear these were not the cops who were buddies with me and Troy; these were the versions of them who were eager to arrest a drunk who had just killed a girl, buck or no buck.

Out of nowhere, Troy was there. To this day I can’t figure out how he made it there first, before the truck of partygoers that pulled up several minutes after him.

He came right up to me and was talking to Bryan, the officer who was trying to cuff my bruised left arm and my shattered right arm together behind my back while I howled in pain. Troy was saying that he needed to take the cuffs off of me and let me go, and Bryan was saying there was no way, a girl was dead.

That’s when the others arrived, pulling up in someone’s huge F350. A girl from school, Mandy Miller I think, let out a scream. Troy used that moment to walk over to Marie’s body, and the next scene is etched in my brain for the rest of time.

In the dimming headlights of the truck, he crouched down next to Marie. He touched her hair like he was brushing it, but I could see he was moving away pieces of glass. Bloody glass. It was like he was talking to her, convincing her to get up and to stop pretending.

And then, a second later, she was. She was moving, sitting slowly up, brushing off her dress like she’d been caught napping on the worn country road asphalt. She shook her head a bit, and then she glanced up into the lights and locked eyes with me.

My blood froze. She had been dead. I had touched her. She’d had a huge chunk of windshield glass embedded in her forehead. What I was seeing couldn’t be true, but there she was.

Troy walked her over to us, his arm around her shoulders. She looked at him with a loving, grateful gaze. My insides tightened, and I felt an echo of the red fury that had gotten me into this mess.

He stood her next to Bryan and Davis, the other cop, and they proceeded to ask her questions. The folks from the party were still hanging back, a murmur going through them.

Troy came over to me and brushed the handcuffs off my wrists like they were dirt, and pocketed them.

“Are you OK?” he leaned in and asked.

“How the fuck did you do that, Troy?”

We locked eyes, and he shook his head. “Later, Deek.”

He ambled back over to the stag while the cops were fawning over Marie, and I just stood there and watched him. The same deal, crouched down next to the stag, and whispering like he was talking to it.

Everything else that had happened, and God help me, all I could think about was how great his ass looked in his jeans while he did that; how masculine and manly he was looking, like he’d gone and grown all the way up into a full-fledged adult.

He turned around and looked at me and smiled, like he could hear my thoughts, which he just might be able to.

He sauntered back over to the cops, steering Marie away from them and towards the group of folks in the other truck. She was protesting that we should take her home, but Troy was just reasonable explaining that we needed to fix the truck, and shouldn’t she get home so her folks didn’t worry?

She seemed less dazed and less drunk with each step. Soon enough, the truck was taking off with her in it, waving at us from the front cab like she was the Prom Queen on her way to Homecoming.

“We still gotta arrest Deek, though, Troy!” protested Davis. Bryan looked at his partner and nodded.

“He did blow a point-nine, Troy.”

Troy was shaking his head, the glimmer he had coming back like an aura of the smallest fireflies glowing around him.

“Naw, he’s fine guys. Go ahead and retest him. Plus, I’ll drive this thing home. He hurt his arm, so I gotta get him back to his Ma before she worries.”

Davis was shaking his head like he was trying to push a bad dream out of his mind, frowning. Bryan was taking a step towards me, as if he was going to cuff me again.

What happened next was in slow motion.

Bryan had hooked the breathalyzer onto his belt. Troy saw it and was going to reach for it to make me blow again, to prove his point.

Davis caught this motion out of the corner of his eye and thought Troy was going for Bryan’s gun, which was right next to the breathalyzer on his belt.

I saw Davis pull out his pistol, his arm on an upward arc. I saw what was about to happen and leapt into the space between Troy and Davis, and suddenly a white-hot fire was spearing into my chest.

I heard Troy shout
“NOOOO!”
And then a blinding light, and the sound of a thousand pianos crashing down a million staircases hit, and then

I was lying on my back, on the road. My head was cradled in Troy’s lap, and he was leaning over me, huge, hot tears splashing me on the face. He was laughing and crying. I’d never seen him like this, but rather than scaring me, it comforted me.

“What…happened..?” I managed to heave out.

“You. You fucking happened, you dumbass. You scared the shit out of me!”

“He was gonna shoot you, Troy.”

He nodded and sighed, “I know.”

“I couldn’t let him do it. I’m never gonna let anything bad happen to you, bud.”

He nodded a bit more, and another tear hit my face.

“That’s not your choice, Deek.”

“The fuck it isn’t, Troy!”

I sat up and a wave of dizziness overcame me. I looked around and noticed that everything was gone. Bryan, Davis, the cop cars. The stag.

My truck was still there, but the windshield was intact, except for a very large crack that meant I’d have to replace it. The truck did not look like it had hit a ten-point buck at any point in the last decade.

“What…the…?”

“Just sit still, bud. You’re dizzy, you had a big shock to the system.”

I nodded, looking at him in wonder.

“Just next time, don’t try to protect me like that, OK?”

My anger rose again, this time white hot.

“No! Fuck…Fuck you, Troy! NO!”

“Hey, calm down, man…”

“No, Goddamnit! No! I will not calm down! You’re my best friend, Troy. I can’t live without you! Don’t you fucking tell me to not protect you! I will always protect you! I’ll take a bullet, whatever I need to do….”

“No, Deek! No, you can’t say that! You have to let me…go.”

The newly unleashed anger inside me roared, and suddenly I was yelling at him.

“I will not let you go! I’ll never let you go, man! I don’t care if you’re in love with Marie or whatever, don’t fucking tell me I have to let you go and not protect you! How fucking dare you! I am in love with you, you stupid asshole!”

We looked at each other, eyes wide with revelations.

And suddenly I was weeping. I don’t mean crying. I mean, full-on sobs that I could not control were coming out of my body.

Troy grabbed me in a fierce hug, and I wept on him like a baby. Furious, and relieved, and scared, and—goddamnit—as hard as a motherfucking rock in that moment, as if my dick had a mind of its own.

Troy squeezed me, hugging me tighter, and a wave of dizziness passed through me. He put a hand on my head and said, “Whoa, there, buddy,” and lowered me to the ground.

I woke up in my bed, late in the afternoon, on what I thought was the next day—but it wasn’t Saturday afternoon, it was Sunday.

I’d slept for a day and a half. I asked my Ma how I’d gotten home, and she said Troy had driven my truck home, had explained to her that I’d had too much to drink at the party while helping her haul me upstairs, and then walked home himself.

She didn’t scold me about drinking; she just went on and on about what a great guy Troy was, and how lucky I was to have him as a friend.

I was halfway through a late lunch she’d put together when I remembered the full scene, including the fact that I had told him I loved him.

I suddenly had to see him as soon as possible.

So that’s how it happened. That’s how it came to be that after the incident with Marie that I learned the truth, and that I finally kissed him, and that I then lost him forever.

I’ll try to keep it together long enough to tell the whole thing, but I know it’s going to take its toll. Bear with me.

We hadn’t talked in nearly two days, which was not just weird for us—it was unheard of. I don’t think we’d gone that long without being in each other’s presence since we were nine or ten years old.

It was late afternoon, coming up on golden hour. I headed over to his place and saw that his Pa’s truck was gone. I walked directly through the house and out again, into the backyard. The tall grass blended right into the grassy hill of the back forty, and I could see him up there, sitting in that spot in a beam of sunlight, just like I’d found him years ago, and many times since.

I let out a breath I didn’t know I was holding, and then noticed that he was talking to someone. Another man, with longish wavy brown hair and swarthy skin.

I headed up to see them, and within a minute or so, Troy had seen me and waved. I waved back, and the stranger waved at me, too; I don’t know why, but that made me smile.

As I got partway up the hill, the stranger stood up, and he and Troy hugged before the stranger turned and headed my way. They didn’t look much alike, but something about the two men reminded me of each other. Some part of my brain wondered if I was about to hear about Troy’s brother from another mother.

The stranger and I neared each other, and he waved at me again. I couldn’t resist the urge to return it.

When we got close, he came right up to me and said, ‘Hey, Deek!’ like he knew me. As we grabbed hands, he pulled me into a bro hug; you know the one, hands clasped, right shoulders bumping, left hands patting on the back.

Except he held it for a moment, and he said softly, “I’m real glad you’re OK, Deek.” I pulled back to look in his eyes…and what I saw in that gentle amber-brown was an ocean of compassion.

“He’s worried about you,” the stranger said, and then he pulled me back into a hug. I felt something soft and warm and brittle snap inside my heart, and then I was sobbing onto him. And it was OK. I knew as sure as I have known anything before or since, that it was all OK, and that I was loved.

I pushed apart after who knows how long, my face covered with snot and tears, and I was suddenly incredibly shy around this man whose name I didn’t even know. I cast a wild-eyed glance up at him as he smiled gently at me, and then I squeezed his arm and let go. He mirrored the action, and we then patted each other’s shoulders as a way of taking leave from one another.

I stumbled up the meadow, wiping my face with my shirt as best I could. I looked up, and Troy was sitting there, gazing at me with a smile on his face that put the sun to shame.

I glanced back at the stranger, and he was impossibly gone. He couldn’t have crossed the space to the house that quickly, and yet—no stranger to be found.

I looked back at Troy, and he gave a small shrug and a bigger smile.

I was drawn to him now and sprinted the distance between us. He laughed, and when I got to him and stuck out my hand, rather than letting me pull him up, he pulled me down onto him.

We wrestled for a minute; rough-housed, really, and laughed and growled at each other like fools. But after a moment, both of us were struggling to contain our hard cocks, and so we stopped, and pretended not to notice the reason why.

I rested my head on his shoulder, and he tousled my hair, in a way that he sometimes did that made me feel special. I sighed and leaned against him for a moment.

“You’re gonna be OK, Deek.”

I sat up and looked at him, not sharply, but with a question.

“He said you were worried about me,” I answered.

“Yeah,” Troy nodded, and held my gaze with those insanely blue eyes.

“Who was that guy, anyway?”

Troy sighed and looked away for a minute, as if the dandelion fluffs nodding in the breeze next to us could provide him with some answer.

“He’s…kind of my brother, I guess you could say.”

He looked back over at me with a look that was more seeking reassurance than nervous, but which surprised me all the same.

I laughed and grabbed him by the neck, a kind of mini-hug.

“That’s cool! A brother? Damn, Troy…that’s so…cool!”

We both laughed at my lack of eloquence, and he kind of nodded shyly at me, blue eyes bright.

My head was swimming, and I don’t know why I said what I said next, even to this day.

“I guess that kind of makes him my brother-in-law, huh?”

We both froze, and my head whipped around to look at him, my brain spinning out in the mud at how to take back or change what I’d just said. My eyes were wide, and he looked deeper into my soul than I’d ever felt from anyone before or since.

We had never talked about this. Not once. In all those years we’d been…together, we’d never said anything close to this. Not until the night with Marie and the buck, and we hadn’t talked for two days since.

A silly grin cracked his face, and he smiled and nodded at me.

“Yeah, babe. Yep. That’s exactly who he is.”

His arm grabbed my neck, and he bumped our foreheads together.

“That was your brother-in-law, Deek. He’d be happy to hear you say that.”

He kissed me then.

A first kiss, hot and awkward. Just lips touching between our two foreheads pressed together, and when I tell you there were fireworks and stars and lightning and thunder, I only mean that those are the closest human words that can come to describing what happened in that moment.

We pulled apart, looked at each other, and then burst into laughter. It was like the whole meadow burst into laughter with us, the birds, and the insects, and the deer in their hollow off in the distance. All of nature laughed with us, and the sun glowed brighter as if just for us. We laughed until we couldn’t take it anymore, and then, finding hands, we slowly levered ourselves upright, pressed close.

“I tell you, when I first saw him, I thought he kinda looked like Jesus,” I said.

Troy tightened his grip around my hand and somehow pushed me away a bit while also pulling me closer to look at him.

“Deek,” he said.

I could see the answer written in his eyes. I knew it wasn’t a joke. I could see his eyes, and I could see in my head his mind tripping over the right way to tell me.

I sucked in a breath.

“I…what…I…that man. That was Jesus Christ?”

He nodded at me, smiling, but as sad as I have ever seen him. He rested his palm on the side of my face, just like he’d done to that stag all those ages ago, and I could see and hear and live him. His life. Things he’d done. Impossible things. Things that I hadn’t seen, and things that I had seen but still didn’t believe.

Tears spilled over his eyes, and somehow, he was more beautiful than ever. All I wanted to do was to hold him close and to tell him that whatever this darkness was, passing between us now, whatever it was, it was something we could overcome.

I grabbed onto his wrist, not to pull his hand away, but to press it closer.

“That was Jesus, and he’s your brother?”

Troy nodded, his face wretched for a moment.

“He’s Jesus. Yes. And he’s my brother, in a way. And in a way, he’s also me. I think.”

There was a heat flowing between us. I recognize it now, a bit, all these years later. It’s the heat of prayer, true prayer. It’s the heat of healing, of Spirit moving through human flesh, heating us up and making us glow like we’re the tungsten wire in a light bulb.

“You’re Jesus?” I whispered.

He nodded, his eyes spilling tears so hot and fast that a part of my mind wondered how there could be this much saltwater inside one human body.

“If I want to…” he said.

“If you want to?” I stuttered. “If you want to? What does that even mean?”

“I can say no. I can. It’s allowed. I’m allowed to say no. It’s free will. It’s always free will.”

I was still gripping his arm, his palm a branding iron on my cheek, so hot, and yet somehow not hot enough for what I needed. His other hand gripped my shoulder and kneaded my trap as if he were constantly testing to see if I was still real. To be sure I wasn’t running away from him.

I shook my head. “What? What do you mean?” I was shaking so hard that my voice was jumping; I could barely control it, fighting to get the words out. “Say no to what, Troy?”

I said it, but the words wouldn’t stop coming, even as I knew what he meant, and I knew what I was asking. “He couldn’t say no. He tried. He asked that the cup be passed from him, right?”

Troy was shaking his head. Short at first, and then furiously. It was the first moment I noticed he was shaking, too.

“No, no. No. That was what they wrote later. He knew he could. He knew, and he didn’t, and he did it anyway.”

We were locked there, in that embrace, in that meadow, the fire of Universe flowing through us both. Everything had gone quiet, and yet the world was still alive with the sound of us; the sound of our breathing and our hearts, and of every cell in our bodies chugging along as they always had. As if they would, forever.

Troy was shuddering, and the words jolted out of him like we were riding in my old truck down a bumpy road.

“He did it anyway. He could have said no, but he did it anyway, even though it didn’t matter.”

I shook my head at this. Some part of my brain knew what we were talking about, and moreover, knew that we were talking about Troy, and his impending death—which, when I think about it now, I’m not sure why that wasn’t my biggest focus in the moment.

Troy was weeping now, and he was begging me. Begging me to process some understanding he had, that I just couldn’t see.

“It mattered,” I said, though I wasn’t sure if I believed that, or if it was just a lifetime of church.

“It didn’t!” he roared at me, angry now. Furious, but not with me, I could tell.

He grabbed my head and pressed my forehead together with his as if he could force some kind of knowing into me, and…

And we fell. We fell into a world, and upon all that is holy, I tell you now that the world was real.

There was music and dancing, and I twirled about, and the man spinning me around was Troy, and not Troy, tall and dark, and handsome, and looking at him even now in this dance made me wet. Even though we had had four children together over our lifetime, and were surrounded by grandchildren, my God, this man I loved, as handsome as a claerk!
We were dancing to the traditional music of the springtime festival to Da-mon, the purple and green dragon God who made the world, who lived inside the heart of the sun. A silly old story, but who knew? It could be true, and what was the harm in old-school religion anyway when it got you moments like this with your family?
My hair was flying around my head, and my breasts were bouncing, but this, too was part of the dance. The cupped hands, turning in and out and in again, the long lean back with the shaking of the chest, and then leaning forward to gently bonk heads with your partner, and the laughter, which watered the ground for spring and made the flowers grow.
We were in the restaurant we owned, authentic Alexandrian food, as good as the old empire, they said. Even better than if you were in the food district of modern-day Solaris, back in The Enlightened Country, but here in the heart of the big city of Shka’gwa, the capital of Unified Provins of Amerigonia, the most powerful nation of all 47 on this continent.
The festival was good, and the food and the wine were flowing and the skra-smoke billowed in the room, and yes, I was happy, if you were asking, even though I knew the world wasn’t perfect. The government could be cruel, it was true, and the Temple of the Serpent in Pareet was led by senile old Franche men. There was another war in the South again, a remnant of the Fifth World War that had never truly ended, thirty years ago.
But life was good, here, me and Traei…

And then I was back, head pressed against Troy’s staring in his blue eyes, and I felt so very clear that what we had just seen was a world where Jesus had let the cup pass, and while all of history was different, nothing was particularly changed.

Humans were still humans. They lived, they laughed, they fought, they fucked. They made war, and they made babies, and sometimes they did the two things at the same time, locked in the eternal battle of hope and despair.

The shaking had calmed a bit, but I knew that we were both locked together in this moment of decision, and that somehow what happened here meant a very great deal to the future of a very large number of people.

“I. Can’t. Do it,” he breathed, as if he were letting out a lungful of skra-smoke.

I nodded slightly, still shivering, hot in the power of this moment, and warm in the heat of the golden-hour sun, but freezing inside at the magnitude of this hinge-point in history.

“But what if…what if you have to?” I asked, pleading, but not sure for what.

“I. Can’t!”

Our hands were wrapped around the backs of each other’s necks, our foreheads still pressed together; I felt as if I let go of him, we would fling apart, like astronauts stranded in orbit, spinning out of control. I could see the anger in his face, feel it vibrating within him, and not an ounce of it was directed at me, I knew.

“I can’t,” he breathed. “I can’t. I can’t, I can’t, I can’t!”

“I Can’t! I CAN’T!!! I CAN’T DO IT DEEK! Because of you! All because of you! Because you fucking love me you stupid fool, and you are so fucking loyal to me you will never walk away! You’ll never turn away from me Deek, you’ll never say no, you would never abandon me, I’ve seen it a million times, and you never just go and save yourself. I saw it two nights ago! All the worlds, and you’ll never leave my side, and I can’t do it because whatever they do to me, they will do to you, and I CANNOT LET ANYONE HURT YOU BECAUSE I AM IN LOVE WITH YOU AND I ALWAYS HAVE BEEN!”

All of eternity passed in that moment, and we were both heaving for air like we had run a race, and then the air collapsed back in

And we were kissing. We were kissing and oh my God it wasn’t the lips on lips from earlier, it was two men absolutely convinced that the secret to their own salvation lay deep inside the heart of the other. The only way to save ourselves in that moment was to be as connected as we could possibly be.

We didn’t have sex. I don’t think we had sex. I’m pretty sure we didn’t. But we connected, body-on-body in that space in a way that to this day I cannot describe to another human who didn’t experience it.

After all time had passed, and no time had passed, we let go, and we fell back, finally breaking apart from each other for a moment, before reaching our hands back out to touch.

And I knew.

I knew he was right. In the divinity of that kiss, I had seen all the possible futures, as clearly as he saw them.

There was no future available to us in which he lived and was Sacrificed, in which I also did not die. A thousand different ways to die. A million different ways to suffer. I’d seen the worlds in which he was the Second Coming. The few in which the very nature of love was changed by the example that I had set as his exalted, ever-loyal, also Sacrificed lover.

I’d like to think that those were kinder, gentler worlds; and I knew, thanks to him, thanks to his honesty, that those worlds were as riven by human strife as any other. Whatever Apocalypses awaited in any of those as-yet unwritten futures were disasters wreaked only by the hands of men and women.

Oh, sure, there were scattered realities where I lived, but as a shattered wreck, mutilated, and broken. In many, I was the Devil, and in most, I was simply written out of the narrative completely; I never existed in history to those worlds, no Book of Deek for me.

I didn’t know what would happen next—I think he’d shielded that from me somehow. But I knew we were saying goodbye.

We held each other for another long moment in the reddening light of sunset. We kissed, a thousand small kisses to make up for the lifetime of them that we’d miss.

I knew I was doing the right thing; that he had made his choice, and that it was his alone to make. I knew it, and yet I don’t think I could fully understand what was happening. It was so quick, it felt like a dream.

We said our final goodbye, with our hands and lips, and minds. We experienced more in that moment than I think some people do in a lifetime. And yet, I already missed him. I already longed for him, even as he was in my arms.

“You’re going to be OK, Deek.”

I nodded, my forehead rubbing against his.

“Free will, Deek. Promise me you’ll be OK.”

“I will. I do. I’ll be OK, Troy,” I said, and then continued, “You too, OK? Promise me.”

He nodded and laughed a little.

“I’ll be just fine, my love. I know it for a fact.”

I laughed with him, my heart exploding at hearing him call me his love, even though I didn’t feel any laughter or joy in this moment.

“Goodbye, Troy. I love you.”

He grunted, and then he was sobbing, and one last time we tried to devour each other as if that alone could save us.

Finally, we broke apart. We looked at each other, and then looked away. There’s no rulebook or guidance on how to take your final leave from your divine boyfriend as he’s about to say no to God Almighty.

I waved a little wave, and he did too.

“OK,” I said.

“OK.”

I backed away from him, and he closed his eyes. The subtle glow that always seemed to surround him these days grew fractionally brighter.

Suddenly, I had to be away. I wasn’t sure I could watch. I didn’t know what exactly was going to happen, but I felt like it was better not seen by me. I grabbed his varsity jacket off the ground and took it with me. I didn’t ask; I knew it was mine to take.

I stumbled down the hill in a fog of tears, God’s fingers from the most magnificent sunset I’d ever seen were illuminating this now-sacred meadow.

The light behind me grew brighter, and like Lot’s wife, I had to turn around to watch. I couldn’t not see what was happening to Troy.

He was on fire. Not burning to death, mind you, but on fire with a radiance that surpasses any art I’ve ever seen. His smile was incandescent, and I knew that whatever he was feeling, it was far from any torment. It was worlds away from the suffering I’d seen him endure in the visions he’d shown me.

Far from the torments he was saving me from.

He opened his eyes, and we locked gazes over the vastness that now separated us. He lifted his hand to me: a final goodbye.

The light and fire intensified until I could barely stand to look at it. There was movement—a flutter of wings more massive than anything I’d ever seen, and then a final surge of brightness that forced me to shut my eyes, and an explosion of light. An implosion of sound, of absence, that knocked me to the ground.

The silhouette of his face was burned into the backs of my closed eyelids like the face of Jesus burned onto toast.

I sat slowly upright, rubbed my eyes, and shook my head to clear it.

I stood on wobbly legs and looked at the place where he had been. There was nothing there, absolutely nothing. No sign that he’d sat there most of the afternoon, no indentation in the grass.

Whatever silence existed was filled a moment later by the chitter and skirr of the evening, like the volume being slowly turned up on a speaker.

I looked at his jacket, still in my hands. I brought it up to my nose and inhaled the scent of him, the only remaining trace of him, it seemed.

I steadied myself and made my way through the house to head outside to my truck. It took me a minute to realize that the house was empty. Like empty, empty, as if no-one had lived there in years.

I unlocked the front door, let myself out, and looked at a place I had been a million times in my life, hanging out with Troy, it was clearly the same house, but also clearly not a place that Troy and his father had ever lived, nor a place that looked like the home I had spent nearly half of my childhood in.

I got in my truck. The windshield was undamaged. No sign of the incident from two nights ago remained.

I drove home, and then I re-entered a world in which Troy had simply never existed. No one at school had ever heard of Troy Wedinger. A family named Wedinger had never lived in this town.

I’d like to say that I grieved and then moved on. That would be lovely, right? Maybe that I settled down eventually and got over the fact that I’d had a best friend who became my boyfriend for five minutes, right before he told God, thank you, but no, I won’t be the Second Coming of Christ, sacrificed to a world unwilling to be saved.

Maybe it should be easier to think that he did it for me. Because he loved me so much that he made my suffering more important than the suffering of the rest of humanity.

I’d love to tell you that it made sense, and that I got over all of that just fine.

But I didn’t.

I barely made it out of high school. The day I graduated, I loaded up my truck and drove away from home, and came here. Well, Denver for a month, with a trucker I’d met, and then out here to LA, which had been as much of a plan as I’d had.

I’ve been here for ten years. Ten years, tomorrow.

I’ve bartended, and I’ve partied. I did go-go for a while, and then met a guy who got me into drugs. Or, I let myself get into drugs, I suppose. Like Troy would say, free will, Deek. You always have free will, even when you think you don’t.

I did some meth, at first, and then the other stuff. All the other stuff, I guess. I’ve lost myself in booze, and sex, and drugs, and rock and roll. If it could be tried, I’ve tried it. And somehow I survived it all, probably thanks to this jacket I’m wearing here tonight.

It turns out that when your first boyfriend was the latest incarnation of God, there’s a big void left inside that nothing in this world can ever fill. And God knows I’ve tried. I’ve crammed damn near everything I could think of into my body in various ways, and I’m all out of ideas.

I guess I’ve hit rock bottom.

I guess I’m finally ready to let go, and let God, you know? It took me a while, but I hope he remembers me. God knows I can’t stop remembering him.

Anyways. Thanks for letting me tell you my story. I know it’s hard to believe, but I swear every word of it is true.

So, I’m Deek. I’m an alcoholic and an addict, and I’m ready to change.

“Hi Deek!”

Hey You! Yes, you! Thanks for reading “The Book of Deek”—sincerely, from the bottom of my heart. Lawrence Winnerman | Science Fiction is a way for me to live my lifelong dream of writing and publishing science fiction, the greatest genre of literature in the history of the world.

July is Pledge Drive Month for LW | SF: if you join as an annual member for $1—a 98% discount!—you get lifetime annual renewal at that same one-dollar rate!

The Last Bloom

Lawrence Winnerman — Wed, 23 Apr 2025 00:57:36 GMT

Amber’s footsteps echo through the cavernous hallway. The air is cold and dry, and they can’t help but think of the inside of a long, hollow bone. The femur of an elephant, perhaps, long dead and empty of marrow, once part of a living, breathing thing, and now as lifeless and as sterile as this hallway in the ‘Kive. Amber remembers a scene from one of the ancient horror movies they used to watch, cuddled with Sol, and their footsteps pick up a notch.

"Seismic event. Category... uhn... can’t see it. It's red under the ice...no ice."

Amber reaches out a hand to grab the solidity of the ‘crete and metal wall, as much out of the renewed shock of hearing Sol’s voice as the AI, as for the warning itself.

The overhead lights flicker twice, for just a second, and they slide their body up against the coolness of the wall just as the first low rumble rolls through the steel floors, like a benthic creature surfacing for a long exhale.

“Amber, love, hold on. Don’t fall…like I…like I did.”

It’s longer this time, and the shaking seems deeper somehow, like it’s being driven by a motor buried far within the earth.

Which is true, Amber thinks, a massive volcanic motor, awakened by the continental rebound of Antarctica, freed now after endless eons of being trapped under the weight of oceans of ice.

A klaxon sounds, late, as if bewildered, caught unawares during a nap, echoing in the empty space off into an infinite distance. Amber presses a button on their pad, and the alarm falls silent, the sound dissipating into the distance like a wave they can imagine rolling off into forever, a pebble dropped into a pond.

The tremor reaches its peak, and a surge of adrenaline courses through Amber’s veins. For the first time, they truly understand the magnitude of what’s happening. The Arkive is going to be destroyed in the coming eruption, and a hard physical crush in their chest is a fear of death that Amber has been drowning in since losing Sol five weeks ago. Since he…uploaded himself into the machine, without telling them.

Off in the far distance, there is a metal-on-metal screech and a loud crash, echoing through the cavernous gloom. It’s perpendicular to Amber’s path in the scheme of things. Not back in Housing and Administration, and not forward into the Labs, where they’re heading. It sounds like it might be from Deep Storage, which—is that fine? Deep Storage finished scanning and uploading months ago.

Any seeds still in that section just got planted, they suppose, in the most catastrophic way possible. If they can escape the fire and lava, perhaps they will bloom in a year, or a hundred, or a thousand.

The tremor stops with a sudden jolt, and a drop that makes Amber’s stomach lurch. The floor, they think, is not quite as level as it used to be. They know they’d normally turn around at this point, if Sol—the damned AI with Sol’s disjointed voice—hadn’t told them what he did. There is no time, and yet, they have to see it for themselves, if it’s true.

Small shudders tickle for a moment, and then fall back into quiescence.

Amber picks themselves up off the floor, not remembering when they dropped into a crouch for safety.

They dust themselves off and pick up their pace, as the AI, in Sol’s voice, sings something off in the distance about springtime, half-remembered.

The translucent glass of the single active pod glows a warm reddish light, like a long Antarctic sunset. The growing lab itself is cool and dry, the highly regulated environment of the ARCBio facility still kept to precision by the AI that has had Sol’s decaying mind written on top of it.

Amber still doesn’t know why he did that. Or, rather, they know why he wanted to do it—he imagined that they would be lonely without him, and that, perhaps, they needed additional coaching. Amber can barely begrudge him this. They know themselves well enough to know that both things are true.

But the mystery to them is why a smart man who knew his brain was being erased by amyloid plaques would be so foolish as to write himself into the operations layer of the complex machine.

Had it been a mistake? A wrong button pressed by a man desperate to escape his degenerative brain disease, maybe? Or something more, they wondered, even as they didn’t know what that could be.

Amber steps closer to the glowing incubation pod, and sees something green through the translucence. They hold their breath, stepping closer still, drawn as much by their deep genetic longing for that color of life as much as for what Sol—the AI pretending to be Sol—has hinted they might find here.

They push their hair back behind their right ear, a gesture that Sol found endearing, they know, and cast a quick glance at the ceiling camera, as if expecting Sol to wink at them.

Amber can’t open the incubation pod. Only the AI can do that. They hold all the charms for the facility now—all of the passcodes, challenge phrases, authentikeys—everything. But they don’t want to interrupt this delicate process.

They can, however, pull the pod out a bit on its sliding tray, and look at it through the transparent top.

Before they can do it, the quake strikes.

“Amber. Amber! Amb….you must wake up. Amb, please……please, darling….oh, please….”

Sol. Sol must be standing over them, shining a light on them. They can see their blood, red through their eyelids. Klaxons and alarms are creating a tintinnabulation that makes their head feel like the inside of a garbage recycler set to grind.

They brush their hair back and feel the sticky fluid on their hands. Blood, oh, shit. Amber tries to open their eyes, hard at first, as if fighting out of a dream, and then becomes aware of the splitting headache, pain interleaved with the pain of the sound, the different pain of the bright, overhead light.

They sit up slowly. Sol isn’t here, of course. It’s the AI twittering on in his voice, strangely not a solace through this pain and confusion.

Bots are out, halfheartedly cleaning up the shattered mess of the lab. Amber looks around, taking in the destruction. The floor of the lab is tilted in a way that will make walking difficult, and they wonder if it’s just in here or throughout the whole complex.

They wonder briefly why the fools built the Antarctic Repository for Catastrophic Biodiversity Loss here on top of the volcanoes of the stupidly names Executive Committee Range, before remembering the near infinite supply of geothermal heat and energy, and how different the world looked, back before they were born. How dormant the volcanoes had once been.

High above the ninety-meter sea level rise, safe in Marie Byrd Land, but oh, only if the volcanoes stay sleeping…

They flinch, seeing a glimpse of lava on the floor, and then immediately relax and can’t keep a plosive laugh from bursting forth.

Not lava. The pod. Still plugged into its power, glowing reddish in the flickering light. Nearly overturned, but not broken.

Amber crawls over to it, shaky at first but feeling stronger by the moment. They’re careful to keep out of the way of the bots scurrying about, and the small shards of some unknown broken thing they can’t see.

Amber settles next to the pod, tilting it upright—or as upright as they can, considering that the floor has a tilt to it now.

They slide back the cover to gaze through the transparent top and gasp.

“…Sol…you fool,” they are crying now, hot tears streaming down their face, a cascade of salty water that should by rights flow like a river to the dead, grey sea beyond.

“I planted it for you. For….us….to bloom before we had to…”

It’s the most coherent thing the AI has said in Sol’s voice, and it adds up.

At some point, seventy or eighty days prior, Sol must have come down here without them, overridden all protocols, and planted it, knowing that it would bloom for the first time right at the moment they were scheduled to finish their work and upload to the rest of humanity.

Uploaded, and squirted as data out into the black—onto one of the massive, circling ships, or the moonbase, or the Galilean colony.

The two of them, ten billion other humans, and the billions and billions of other plants and seeds and creatures whose genetic code had been cracked and scanned in this place, the last archive of the life of the planet Earth.

And this. A single perfect, resilient poppy. Papaver somniferum, rising up towards the false sun of the incubation lamp, green and fuzzy, its full bud ready to burst—just the tiniest sliver of vivid red.

“I planted it…for you,” Sol says again, slowly and solemnly, as if it is a benediction.

Amber misses him; his body and his warmth, yes. The intimacy, oh god, yes, how much…but also…him. His humanity. His flaws. His perfect imperfection, his care, his humor.

Lying in bed and watching old movies with him. Especially their favorite—that old tale about a girl lost in a strange land, asleep with her friends in a field of poppies. About how she found her way home, trials and tribulations solved and sorted.

Amber knows they need to get up. It’s only been minutes, but the warmth of this incubation pod and the shimmer of life that surrounds the poppy compel them to stay, just a moment longer.

They have time. Their work is done, and they have time to limp their way back to Hab Sciences in Admin and load themselves into a different kind of pod. One that will scan them to atoms, and upload them into the cloud with their people, the rest of refugee humanity. A chance to wear a body that fits, perhaps, or none, or several.

The future doesn’t scare them, not really.

For now, there is time to sit and to wait.

A tremor rocks the massive complex, but slow this time, like a lullaby.

The bud sways in the motion. Trembles, and then…begins to slowly unfurl.

“It’s beautiful, my love. Like you.”

Amber is weeping, but they can see through the tears.

A perfect red bloom. A picture-perfect poppy.

The last bloom on Earth.

If I'd Known You Were Gonna Die, I Wouldn't Have Baked You That Cake

Lawrence Winnerman — Wed, 02 Apr 2025 16:55:58 GMT

The author’s father, Alan L. Winnerman. 1969ish.

April 11, 1984, was my father’s 46th birthday.

My sister Christy* and I were home with our dad, as our mother had just started working a new job, the first she’d had outside the house since she’d married and had the two of us.

I was fourteen. Christy was eleven. We adored our father and wanted to do something special for his birthday. I don’t remember what we got him for presents, but I do remember—o, lord, how do I remember—I decided I would bake him a cake.

While Christy and I banged around in the kitchen, he read in our parent’s bedroom, listening to whatever the South Florida classical music public radio station was playing.

As someone who loves to bake, and considers himself pretty damn good at it now, it’s hard to re-embody a time when I didn’t know what the hell I was doing in the kitchen. On this night, however, I didn’t. I’d had a previous baking disaster, which was the moment I learned that baking “from scratch” didn’t mean you just dumped things into a bowl and expected it to transform into a gorgeous frosted cake.

On this night I was using a recipe. I don’t remember which recipe, or what kind of cake, or what flavor frosting for that matter. There’s so much I don’t remember.

I do remember the moment my sister and I called our father into the kitchen once the cake was finished. Our giddiness, thinking we were surprising him as if he hadn’t been listening to us for the last hour. The “4” and “6” numeral candles on the cake glowing brightly.

And the image I will never forget: my father approaching the table, his eyes shining, and a big grin on his swarthy face—burned into my memory, flashbulb bright and clear—with a smile that radiated the love and joy and humor that embodied his spirit.

It’s so clear in my mind, I’d swear there was a photo of it. I’ve searched for that picture for years, and I can’t find it (if it ever even existed).

But I wish I had it. I wish I could see that moment again, even if just in a photograph—because it was the last time I ever saw my dad smile like that.

The next morning at about 8 am, he died in the shower while we were at school, and I never saw him again.