"The problem," said Gode, "is no one listens to you if they think you're a User."
The remnant of the unsealed road was a slender path of mud reaching out to eternity. It sucked at Gode's boots in a monotonous drain of energy, dampness seeping in through the soles.
"It's not like we're bad people. Not like we're stupid."
The short-legged hound that walked beside Gode declined to comment.
"Alright. Alright, the occasional moment of mental haziness I'll give you, but it doesn't mean we can't offer something of value to society.
The hound paused and peered slowly across the empty, treeless acres of grassland, as if to say 'what society, you mind-fucked cake-boy?'
Gode thought since they'd gone to all the trouble of pausing, stopping looked an attractive option. In the flat country one patch of ground made as good a camping site as the next. There wasn't any shelter, and no one drank the water in the occasional stream, (except Users, who kind of considered the streams the whole point). Gode unslung from his back the oiled skins that would keep most of the rain off them while they slept.
"Who needs architecture when you got skin, hey dog?"
Even the hound's animal intellect could detect the bitterness in the question.
The ancient words had been perverted beyond their original intent. 'Pusher', 'User' flashing by, cards in a crooked game of poker.
There's a terrified expression reflected in a blade, ace's high, perhaps, decrepit technology and streams, something in the Streams, modification irrevocable.
Chips down and what happened to the light?
Gode locked the memories away with less difficulty than usual on waking. There was a distraction. Outside the skins he could hear singing. More importantly, the dog could hear something, its head crocked in the direction of the high notes. And if the dog could hear it, there was a good chance it was real. Gode didn't understand why the hound's perception of reality should be clearer, it drank from the same streams as he did, but he had come to find its instincts reliable.
Gode stood up in the unescapable grey light outside to watch the alto approach. As the figure became more distinct, he was surprised to see a man of average height whose appearance made an unanticipated host for such a sweet, soulful voice. The singer, seeing he was noticed, stopped the song and waved, arriving at Gode's site a few moments later. His soot grey clothes were tailored close to his body in the city fashion, and neither expensive longcoat, nor small eyeglasses of blue quartz seemed affected by the rain.
"Tell me stranger, if no one travels, why is there a road?" said the man. "Not that it's a terribly fine road." The tone was easy, with a slight urban drawl. His presence was tangible, undeniably corporal. Gode was less sure of the butterflies of fluid that fluttered around the singer in a dense haze, wings flickering out of existence in small splashes. You couldn't have everything.
"I'm needing it, you're needing it. Perhaps this road was built exclusively for our use," said Gode, voice dry, having only had the dog to converse with in the past months.
"Seems almost likely stranger, I've never meet anybody but Users with a purpose for the Flatlands, and they stay well away from the road." The man looked over Gode with curiosity, which Gode made no attempt to satisfy. Eventually the singer reached out through the butterflies in a gesture that confirmed his Chartertown origins. "The name's Timothy."
Gode shook the man's hand in half remembered ritual, but was less forth coming. "You shouldn't be so loose with names in the Flatlands, Timothy."
"But people love a man named Timothy, we're the prophet's special people after all."
"Heretic," said Gode.
"Traditionalist," said Timothy.
Looking into eyes that were the same watered-down black of the sky, lenses doing nothing to hide their intensity, was unpleasant and Gode shifted his field of vision to take in the minimalist horizon for a few moments.
"So, want to know why I'm here?" asked Timothy.
"You make 'here' sound like a destination. Do you see the butterflies?" said Gode, watching one of the fragile creatures evaporate on Timothy's forehead.
"You being here makes it a destination. There are no butterflies."
"There are no butterflies, yet you are infected with them. I wonder what that means?" said Gode
"You're on the road, your eyes have pupils, yet you are a User. Or you're crazy. Does the thirst get to you even here?" There wasn't disapproval in Timothy's voice, only the mild curiosity belied by the grim, steady gaze.
Gode let Timothy have his King. "Why are you here?"
"The butterflies sent me," said Timothy, quietly.
"A truth I could live with."
Timothy smiled. "Yeah," he said. "It's like this," he said. And hit Gode across the head, sending him to the ground and into unconsciousness.
Coming back out of the darkness, Gode felt the bruises before he saw them. It took some convincing to get his swollen eyes to open, but, yes, the carefully folded arms in his line of sight were stained with purple and green matching the dull pain that wrapped him. Must have been under a long while for me to come out so pretty, Gode decided.
Beyond the arms, the countryside looked the same as before. Of course, in the Flatlands it was difficult to tell one place from the next, you could travel for weeks and not get a break in the scenery, but Gode decide to go with his gut, Timothy hadn't moved him far. Timothy.
"Welcome back, precious."
Timothy. Mostly visible in hazy side vision, the well dressed singer appear to be smoking, pale lilac clouds drifting from what must have been slow burn tobacco. The hound was no where in sight. Deserted, thought Gode.
Ash from the cigarette drifted in lazy circles as Timothy came to stand above him. Gode realised something had changed. "The butterflies are gone," he said.
"Have I lost the them? Or have you? Where's the book?" said Timothy.
What? The book... The city threw it out along with myself. Have you come to perform a more thorough disposal?" The questions gave way to violent coughing.
Eventually Timothy shook his head. "I only want the book."
"What interest could a follower of the Rewrites have in a book the rest of his fellows refused to even enter in to the records?" Gode tasted metal and wondered if he was dying.
"Names have power, but you shouldn't read so much into them. I can return you to yourself, to be as you were, but if you withhold the book I'll leave you sober forever. I am the Converter and it is within my power."
To be on the straight and level again... what of it? Gode had considered quitting many times. He was a User, but, unlike the others, not an addict. He could give up the streams anytime he wanted. Still could see the sky right? Still had pupils, yes, yes... The book was too important... Anyhow, what proof that this Timothy had the power to grant or deny anything?
Timothy seemed to know what Gode was thinking. He knelt down and bushed the tips of his fingers along Gode's cheekbone. The butterflies drizzled back into existence. A brush the other way and they were gone again,
The book. The book was...
The book was nothing. Not without butterflies, not without the million little things Gode would loose if he were normal again. So he nodded his head and agreed to take Timothy to the last stream he had visited. Where the book was hidden.
They'd slept twice before crossing the distance back. Timothy wasted no time in having Gode dig it out from its temporary shallow grave. With the death mix of relevance and reluctance he placed the book in the singer's hands.
"Not so difficult friend?"
Gode shut his eyes against the lesser of two evils, turning his back to the singer. "Please," he said, "the butterflies."
For a moment all was still and Gode faced the possibility he'd lost them also. But Timothy reached over his shoulder and suddenly the world seemed to stumble into sharper focus. Timothy walked around so they were facing each other again. He looked down at the earth stained pages of the book open in front of him, shaking his head with affection. "How primitive they were, gods nailed to crosses, forgiveness for everyone." He was still shaking his head, chuckling, surrounded by butterflies, as he walked towards to grey horizon, away from Gode for the first, and Gode hoped, last time.
Gode looked down to see what had moved against his leg. "Back are we?" he said to the short-legged hound.