Magazine - Interzone Science Fiction and Fantasy - 2009 - Issue 222 by May June (v1.0)

Author:May June (v1.0) [html] [June, May]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

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MOTHER OF CHAMPIONS—Sean Mcmullen

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Illustrated by Anne Stone-Coyote

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Sean McMullen has worked in scientific computing for decades longer than is healthy. In his spare time he has had fifteen books and over five dozen stories published. His novelette ‘Voice of Steel’ was a BSFA Award finalist, and a Nova Fantastyka Award winner. His next story in Fantasy & Science Fiction is about a dragon that ate the Eiffel Tower. The fourth volume in his award-winning Moonworld series, The Time Engine, is available now. For more information visit seanmcmullen.net.au.

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We Champions do not write, neither do we read, but we are very particular about time, numbers, family and memories. After all, we are perfect.

My vantage is the lowest limb of a shady tree, from where I watch the scavengers in their sanctuary of glass and metal, and observe the echo images on their machines. I watch and I shape, too, for Champions are shapers of tools. The scavengers study us from within their sanctuary, and my tree is only a few bounds distant. All that they do, I can see. All that they say, I can hear, for my familiar has given me a machine collar.

I watched as the echospeaker arrived in her shelter engine, then walked within the long, enclosed cage to the scavenger sanctuary. My familiar released the outer door and let her in.

"Mike, how are you?"

"Come on in, Ella."

"Can you believe this heat?"

"It's Texas, and it's summer."

"Man, but it's good to be back in air-conditioning."

"That's for the computers. I don't mind the heat."

"You're kidding."

"I do a lot of fieldwork, heat is in my job description."

"I'd die without air. That's why I'm in computers."

They chattered words called laughter, that had no meaning but signified that for now there would be no conflict between them.

"So, what brings you out here? The director said on the phone that you had a DVD file for me to view."

"Yeah, and he's paranoid about it! No copies, and no transmissions on the net. I have to play the file on this laptop, then take it back with me."

The echospeaker began to prepare her image machine to show its echoes.

"So, what do you do for beer, pizza and girls out here?” she asked as she worked.

"There's only one girl in my life, Ella, and there she is, draped along that branch. One hundred and thirty pounds of perfect, high-speed death."

My familiar, who was a mature male, swung his paw to indicate me. I favoured them by looking up, knowing that my grace and beauty would entrance them.

"Mike, did she look up because you waved?” asked the echospeaker in awe.

"She really did."

"Hey, now that's some lady. Is she the famous one?"

"She's Demelia, the fastest cheetah ever caught on radar. Just over seventy-five miles per hour, on a dead-flat surface, with no wind."

"I thought falcons were way faster, around two hundred miles per hour."

"Only in a dive, not in level flight.

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