Manuscript: Finding Wayside, Chapter 15

Grim’s house-arrest gave him a lot of free time to stew on his situation. The Viccars, who normally granted him complete freedom to come and go as he pleased, watched him like hawks now that Commander Osborne had issued his ultimatum. The pleasant and manicured gardens of the Orphanage seemed much more like a prison common area now that he knew he could not stray from it. The only two things to distract him were Cane, who awkwardly attempted to cheer him up by telling him about all the things he was missing in the market, and the daily visits from Ophelia. The latter was not, in Grim’s opinion, a particularly welcomed occurrence, as Ophelia’s interest in his past had dramatically increased since she took up a permanent post in Wayside.

Grim had started to find it challenging to maintain the façade of his constructed past with Ophelia, who wielded her deductive instincts like a cleaver, hacking away at the inconsistencies in his stories until she found a nugget of truth.

Grim often attempted to use Ophelia’s questioning to get answers out of her as well. He wanted to know more about the mysterious Caravan, and about the Grand Lord’s proclamation of Grim’s involvement in Wayside’s fate. Unfortunately, Ophelia seemed as adroit at double-speak as the other Caravaners he had met, and Grim often ended up more confused than ever after their talks.

One such inquisition was taking place today, as Grim, Cane, and Ophelia perched in the lower boughs of one of the Viccars’ oak trees. Ophelia asked about Grim’s grandmother and how she had come to live in the South Dakota wilderness, and Grim replied with the on-the-spot inspiration that her husband, his grandfather, had been a hunter and a fur-trader.

“What sort of things did he hunt?” Ophelia asked as she hung upside down from the tree branch so her face flushed red.

“Oh, you know. The usual sort of stuff. Bears. Mountain lions,” Grim yawned. Hanging around the Viccars all day had become a powerful soporific.

“He sounds very brave,” said Cane, who was trying to reach the next level of tree branches. His misplaced footings sent bits of bark raining down on the other two.

“I guess so,” Grim replied.

“Very brave,” Ophelia repeated, with that Sherlock Holmes tone in her voice that caused Grim’s hackles to rise.

“Look, you can see my past anyway, right? Why do you always ask me about this stuff?” Grim sat up on his branch and crossed his legs.

“The past isn’t always like a book. I can’t just open to a page and read all about the life history of Grim Munroe and his misfit family. If it were like that, I’d have helped Cane find his way home a while ago. It’s more like reflections…in a pool of water.”

Grim sighed his frustration. “But you knew about my father. You picked that memory of me and him. In the bazaar.”

Cane chuffed. “Yeah, when you guys left me behind to go play secret-agents or whatever you were doing.”

“Oh shut up.” Grim muttered. Cane slipped down a few feet and bark rained down again.

“Actually,” Ophelia crawled back up to sit on the branch, “I did no such thing.”

“Ha! And a liar too! You’re a piece of work,” Grim laughed.

The flush in Ophelia’s face darkened. “We don’t lie.”

Grim smirked and crossed his arms. “Ah, then why won’t you tell me what the Grand Lord meant when he said that I would be part of Wayside’s fate?”

There was a flash in Ophelia’s eyes as she saw Grim’s trap. She hopped down from the branch and looked up at the two boys. “There’s a world of difference between lying, and not revealing the truth. Anyway, about your grandmother.”

“Hey,” Cane shouted. “Race me to the top of the tree. I want to see if we can see the clock tower from –“

“Enough!” Grim shouted. Ophelia and Cane eyed him. “This is crazy! I can’t stay here anymore. And where the hell is Murphy? It’s been, like, a week since he showed up.”

Ophelia smirked, crossing her arms. “Why? Are we not company enough for you?”

Grim clicked his tongue. “I’m going. Tonight. To Murphy’s. Cane, you’re coming this time. I don’t care if the Viccar’s find out. As long as I’m not there when they do. I’ll stay with Murphy if I have to.”

Cane looked confused. “But won’t the –“

“It’s ok. I’ll say I dragged you along.”

Cane relaxed and shrugged. “Okay.”

“I don’t suppose I’m invited,” Ophelia raised an eyebrow in a particularly commanding way.

Grim shrugged. “Do whatever you want. Tenth tolling, outside the Viccars’ gates.”

* * *

The charcoal creaked and squeaked as Murphy put the finishing marks on his drawing. It was a decent representation, he thought. He had managed the shine in the piercing little eyes, and the crumpled, mottled look of the fur -- the overall menace of the thing.

Ask the rats, the man in black had said.

Murphy Fish pulled on his cigarette. He set the drawing on a pile of its cousins and looked out on Wayside from his room in the Garment District. The maddening pitch black and the red-yellow glow of the city was such a strange dichotomy, but one he had seen so many times now, that any mystery it held was lost in the monotony of familiarity.

When he had come here, the excitement of the place, the life of it -- a great city planted in the middle of the still void of forever, had appealed so strongly to his romantic nature that he had thought nothing further of his past or any of the struggles and joys of his previous existence. He registered his story with the Council and went about his merry way. But, over the span of the years, the thrill of the city itself dwindled, and he began to search for a new thrill. Thus he discovered the Foundling Society, a group of individuals charged with returning lost children to terra and joined the team within its ranks whose responsibility it was to venture out into the darkness of the Wastes and retrieve stray children.

He put out the cigarette on the drawing, and flicked the filter out into the alleyway below.

He had been with the Finders for what seemed like a very long time. He appreciated the companionship of the other members of the group. He even liked Lee, with his sour demeanor. Osborne’s patronizing leadership was even a small comfort, and reminded him of his father, who had fought in the Tan War before Murphy was born.

The ninth tolling sounded. Murphy shut the window and walked downstairs. He spared a glance to Madam Lenoir, who was smoking wistfully in the common room. She was lost in her thoughts and did not acknowledge him. He exited the hotel, leaving the door unlocked.

Murphy lifted his collar against the cool air. In life, he had been a vagrant. By the time Murphy was old enough to enlist, the Second World War had ended and so Murphy was unable to live up to his father’s expectations of glory or his two older brothers war-time heroism. So, when he turned nineteen, He decided to start a new life in the United States of America. This was, he discovered, a popular idea with many a young man his age, so he joined up with a group of them and they stowed away on a freighter bound for New York City. He never did see America.

The streets were emptying for the evening. The shops of the garment district had begun to shutter their fronts. The occasional passing person waved at him, and he nodded back.

Yes, here he was a hero. He was the rifle-wielding soldier of honor his father had wanted him to be at last.

And yet. Wayside was eternal. What glory was there in any life, when the consequences of action were stripped down, so? Here, the attention was only garnered by Foundlings, like Grim, or Emere, like Noura. They were living, breathing people, with lives beyond the city. Their actions affected things.

Murphy Fish wanted to affect things. He wanted another chance to live a real, meaningful life -- something beyond the walls of the city of the Lost.

He glanced around to be sure he wasn’t seen then turned down an alleyway behind Hanna’s Dress shop. Trash clogged part of the path, but he stepped carefully through the remnants of cloth and discarded food remains -- peels and rind. He paused, listening to the sounds of the alley – the hiss of steam, the buzz of electricity, the scurry of rats.

He knelt and peered into the dark until he caught the glint of small red eyes staring back at him.

“Erm…oy. Rat.” Murphy suddenly felt foolish, kneeling in a trash-filled alleyway, trying to get the attention of a rat. But, much to his surprise, the rat emerged from the shadow of the trash can without fear and scurried up a pipe until he was eye-level with Murphy. His dingy whiskers twitched and he tilted his head, and awaited Murphy’s request.

Murphy glanced around him, wondering if this was some kind of trick, but he had committed, and the risk was certain worth the reward.

He cleared his throat. “I want to meet with your master. I’d like to speak with Lif. Please.”

The rat paused, processing the words, and then with a chatter of his teeth he scuttled down the pipe and dove into the trash pile without a backwards glance.

Murphy blinked and stood. He scratched his head, smirking at the pile of garbage. What was he expected to do?

“Hello?” His voice bounced around the empty alleyway. He perked his ears and listened in the shadows, but the sounds of scurrying were gone.

* * *

The tenth tolling chimed. Grim and Cane, creeping on cat feet, snuck from their beds and out the dormitory window. They slunk across the green and through the foyer, out the double doors and into the front garden. When they reached the outer hedgerow, Ophelia was there, sitting cross-legged by a lamppost with her usual sense of nonchalance.

They crossed the Pages. It was a quiet night, and even the cats were keeping to their own. They passed by the Great Library and the myriad bookshops and cafes without notice, but to maintain their stealth they moved at slowed pace. By the time they reached the Garment District and Madam Lenoir’s Hotel and Laundry, it was nearly to the eleventh bell.

“Well,” said Cane as they stared up at the second story windows. “Do we knock, or what?”

“Or what,” announced Grim, as he pointed to the alleyway. He recalled the view from Murphy’s apartment window and worked his way through the alleyway until he spotted the right one.

Cane crept up behind Grim. “Throw a pebble at it, or something.”

“That’s silly,” replied Ophelia, who hopped over a bit of packaging to reach the two. “Let’s just climb that.” Ophelia pointed at the water pipe adjacent to the window, and no sooner then she had, Cane dashed to it, climbing like monkey to peer into the window.

“Careful, Cane,” Grim admonished.

“It’s dark inside,” Cane called in a lifted whisper from his perch. “You think he’s asleep?”

Grim sighed. “Well it’s only got one room, stupid. Is he in there or not?”

“Oh,” Cane replied. “No. I don’t see him.”

“Open the window then,” called Ophelia.

Grim looked at her. “We’re breaking in?”

Ophelia shrugged. “Well we came all this way. You’re not going to go in?”

Grim looked back up at Cane, who was pushing the window up, which hanging onto the pipe with one hand. “I guess.”

Cane had the window open, and Grim felt a weight on his shoulders as Ophelia gripped them. “Hang on.”

“Oh no. No no—“ A rush of wind and Grim’s perspective was wrenched as he found himself through the window and in Murphy Fish’s apartment, staring at the doorway to the hall.

Grim turned around to face Ophelia, green-faced. “Ugh. Was that necessary? We could have climbed the pipe too, you know.”

“And watch you fall on your rear? As funny as that mental image is, I don’t think so.” Ophelia grinned at Grim’s nonplussed expression.

“Heeeey,” Cane called as he poked his head into the window from outside. “That’s cheating.” He hopped onto the windowsill.

Ophelia began to scan around the room and nonplussed but curious, Grim joined her.

Grim strode to the hanging electric light and pulled the cord to illuminate the room. It was messy and there was a funny smell, but Murphy was not there.

“Maybe he just stepped out,” said Grim, pointed towards the front door. “He left the door open.”

“Or maybe someone broke in. It’s a wreck in here,” said Cane from his windowsill.

“Get in here,” Grim commanded browsing through the kitchen area.

Cane blew a raspberry at the back of Grim’s head, but stepped down into the room as he did. There was a snap as he did so, and wearing an expression of guilt, Cane lifted his foot to find a stack of drawings and a snapped stick charcoal. “Oops.”

Ophelia shooed Cane out of the way and picked up the pile. She rifled through them with a curious look on her face. She looked up at Grim with a face as white as a sheet.

“What?” Grim walked over, looking at the drawings. They were all the same, or more or less the same. A scraggly rat, long in the tooth with a sinister face and what, to Grim, looked like a perfume bottle with lines coming out of it. The words “Ask the Rats” were scratched through a cloud of smeared charcoal.

“Ooooook,” said Grim, flipping through all of the drawings himself. “What does that mean?”

“Well,” Ophelia said. “I’m not –“

“Oh come on!” Grim stomped. “Stop treating us like irresponsible children and give us some information, already. You obvious have some idea what’s going on.”

Ophelia shot him a stinging look, but he met her glare with all his pent up frustration. She glanced down.

“It’s a phial. We call it manna, in Caravan. It’s very dangerous.”

“But, why is it dangerous?” said Cane.

“It is part of Caravan’s shared memory, and so is sacred.” Ophelia paused. And who takes a drop from the Phial of Manna to his lips shall life be granted.

Grim shook his head, as the last words Ophelia spoke in what seemed like a room of full voices at once.

“What was that?” Cane said, eyes wide in disbelief.

“Mnemosyne,” replied Ophelia. “A shared memory.”

“That didn’t sound like Babel to me,” Grim replied.

“No,” said Ophelia. “It’s not in a language. It is a memory. Sharing it with you may be seen as a great wrong. I hope it was a wise thing to do.”

“Well it still doesn’t tell us why Murphy drew it, and why he’s not here.” Grim set the drawings on the window sill and looked out the window into the alleyway. “Why would he draw manna, and what’s with the rat?”

“Maybe we should follow the directions?” Cane had found his way to the couch and was lying down, staring at the light bulb hanging from the ceiling.

“What?” Grim said.

“You know,” Cane waved his hands and affected a spooky voice. “Aaaaask the raaaaats.”

“Rats don’t talk,” Grim muttered.

Ophelia giggled.

“What?” Grim said, indignantly.

“You live in a city populated by dead people, surrounded by an endless desert inhabited by monsters, your friends with a teleporting gypsy and you’re actually jaded enough to think it’s impossible that a rat might hold some hidden information?” Ophelia smirked at him and, much to Grim’s chagrin, so did Cane.

“We’re not friends, yet,” Grim muttered.

Ophelia’s smile doubled. “Come on, grump. Let’s go find a rat.”