Pieleazar's crazy time shift
68
Pierre sat, tense, hunched forward, eyes locked on the glass in Prime Minister Selena Eryx’s hand. He could visualise the red potion, swirling around in the dark red wine, and his heart skipped a beat. Time seemed to slow down, nearly grinding to a halt, and Pierre could feel a bead of sweat trickling down his forehead, slow like a lava flow dribbling its way out of a caldera down a rocky mountainside.
They were in an airship cabin. Below, through the reinforced glass floor, Pierre could only see white, the endless white of the Antarctic, stretching infinitely all around. Selena raised the glass almost to her lips. She stopped, and put the glass down.
“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” she said. “The last frontier. The great, mysterious south. Don’t you think, Eleazar?”
Pierre sagged slightly, and wiped his brow. Funny, it was so cold outside, yet Pierre was burning up. “Uh, y-yes. It’s amazing.” Please drink the wine. Please please please?
Selena’s hand remained on the glass, which was now resting on the table in front of them. “It’s the largest desert in the world, you know. But it’s not a total wilderness. In the later years of the Great War, it is said that Naci scientists established a base called Nouvelle-Picardie, and that this base exists to this very day. The French deny it of course, but even so…”
“I see.”
“And,” Selena said, picking up the wine glass, “we have been in communication with this base for some time, thanks to our agents in the Haitian Antarctic Company. They have a rather interesting piece of technology that they are willing to share with us, in exchange for…certain favours.”
Pierre sighed internally, looking at the glass. Drink, damn it, drink! “What sort of favours?”
She laughed. “Oh, a chance to live in peace somewhere that isn’t freezing cold! But now, this technology…it could potentially make Haiti the most powerful nation in the world. Apparently, several prominent Scottish scientists colluded with the Nacis, and a few of them went to Nouvelle-Picardie, including a certain Sir Robert MacGuffin. Accordingly, the technology is known to us as the MacGuffin Device, although I’m sure the Nacis have their own name for it.”
“Right.”
Selena lifted the glass to her lips, and-
…
No.
No, wait, I’m not going to tell you what happened next just yet. Instead, I’m going to take us back in time, to show how exactly Pierre and Selena Eryx came to be in an airship over Antarctica. I do admit, I might have slightly made up some of the details here, but never mind that, it makes for a better story. Antarctica, after all, is cool. Both figuratively and literally.
So Pierre was in his apartment, gazing out over the unreal city of Port-au-Prince, at the shifting form of the Hall of Records. Only, he wasn’t Pierre anymore. He was now Eleazar. He didn’t know what Eleazar’s surname was, which troubled him slightly. What had Molly called him; M. Minuit? Minuit, that will do.
“I am no longer Pierre Legrand,” he said to his reflection in the computer monitor in front of him, “but rather Eleazar Minuit. Yes, Eleazar Minuit. That’s a good name.”
So I look identical, but what of his mannerisms, his speech patterns? This was a troublesome aspect, but Pier-I mean Eleazar thought he would be okay as long as he didn’t try too hard. Just keep sensible and sober.
He had managed to arrange a meeting with the Prime Minister, saying that he had some new information about the attempts to bring down the Cloudbusters. Selena Eryx had readily agreed, and thus everything was set. They had agreed to meet in a nice little restaurant called La Vendangeur, which had various darkly lit smoke filled rooms where political machinations could take place undisturbed. They were there now.
“Ah, Eleazar, welcome,” said the Prime Minister, after taking a sip of her white wine. “Do take a seat.”
Pierre sat down. Pebble had been right; she was identical to Marissa. Well, it was technically the same body, but even so, Pierre was confounded by it. He had by this point had some time to get used to the idea, but it still seemed abhorrent. And Marissa, stuck in the void…how was it even possible? Pierre tried to push all his feeling of revulsion and dismay to one side, and concentrate on that task at hand.
A waiter, who had been waiting for him to sit down, came over, and Pierre ordered a lemonade.
Selena raised an eyebrow. “Not drinking? How unlike you, Eleazar.”
Crap! “No, I’m trying to, er, cut back on the booze. Doctor says it’s doing my liver in.”
Selena laughed. “Ah yes, you should always listen to the man in the white coat. Or woman, of course. Haiti is, of course, an entirely egalitarian society.” Yeah, everyone’s equally screwed. “So you said you had news about these pesky terrorists who keep trying to interfere with our Cloudbusters?”
Pierre nodded, and was given a moment to think by the waiter bringing his lemonade. White wine, that’s not ideal. He thought of the vial, filled with dark red liquid. That’s no good, no good at all. “Ah yes. Er, well you see I’ve been spending some time with the high tech low lives of Port-au-Prince, and it seems to be the work of an organisation called Parasol.”
“Yes, I already knew that,” Selena said impatiently.
Pierre thought back to his meeting with Pebble. What to say next? “Well, the twist is that Parasol doesn’t exist. It’s a front for a group of…West African terrorists called the Malian Liberation Front, who…er, want to restore the…Caliphate.” That doesn’t make any sense, does it? Damn.
Selena looked slightly puzzled for a moment. “I…see. West African, you say? But I don’t understand, how would bringing down the Cloudbuster programme help them establish an Islamic theocracy?”
Pierre nodded blankly. “Er, good question. I’ll have to get back to you on that.”
Selena frowned, in a way that Pierre recognised all too well, and then clicked her fingers to attract the attention of a female waiter. “Can I have another glass of this…whatever this is, please?”
“Another glass of the house white, certainly ma’am,” said the waitress.
As she walked away, Pierre realised he recognised the waitress as Lois Mimsy, one of the Saints of Infinity he had met briefly at number 27 Rue de Molay. “Excuse me a minute,” he said, “nature calls.”
He got up and hurried after Lois, catching up with her in the main bar. He grabbed her wrist, and she turned around in surprise.
“Oh, it’s only you.”
“Lois, what are you doing here?!”
Lois smiled a wide smile. “I gotta new job! I need to make a living somehow, you know.”
Pierre narrowed his eyes. “Yeah, but this isn’t just a new job though, is it?”
Lois shrugged. “Okay, if you must know, I’ve been lacing her drinks with Lysergic Acid. Makes people more suggestible. I thought it might help you out.”
“Lysergic- wait, LSD?? Are you insane? What if she starts tripping out on me? She might be an imposter, but she is also the Prime Minister!”
“Oh relax, I know what I’m doing. And it’s not technically the same thing as LSD, you know.”
“I really hope so.”
Pierre went back to the private room, and sat back down. Selena appeared to be okay, but it was difficult to tell. “So, I was thinking-“
“I like you, Eleazar,” said Selena suddenly. “I don’t know why, but I’ve always liked you. I feel comfortable around you, unlike your friend Maurice, who creeps me out. I can trust you, can’t I Eleazar? I think I can.”
Pierre smiled. “Of course you can.”
“That’s good, because I have some business with the Haitian Antarctic Company that needs taking care of, and Anton isn’t available. I’d like you to accompany me.”
“Anything you say!”