THE LEGEND OF COUGAR LOU LANDIS

by Edward Bryant

Each of Edward Bryant’s stories of the gleaming city named Cinnabar is complete and delightful in itself, but as the story shards multiply they blend together into a fascinating mosaic of our far future; ultimately Bryant plans to collect them as a book. Meanwhile, we’ve had “Jade Blue” in Universe 1, and now “The Legend of Cougar Lou Landis,” a deceptively rich story about the wellsprings of heroism. Cinnabar is a near-magical city; you wouldn’t think of anyone as poor if she had the money to buy its technological wonders. But some people will always need more.

THE GARDENER Yakov lay dying in the desert gravel. He sprawled on his left side, eyes to the east, where he watched the stars blur above Cinnabar. Oh, for warmth. Was this how it was to die of cold? Yakov had always believed freezing to be a slow decline into gentle sleep. There was first the sharp bite of frost, yes. But then came the sleepy arrival of death. Not for Yakov; he had lain alert for hours. The gravel chaffed his skin unbearably. The beating administered him by his master had broken bones. Yakov moaned softly and prayed the cold to kill.

There was an answer on the wind. Yakov listened intently. Was it his master, returning to inflict more pain? Yakov tried to pull gravel over himself, to darken the shadows in which he hid. The wind brought the voice again, closer this time. “Is someone there? Who is it?”

Yakov pulled at the small rocks with his one good hand. He whimpered in spite of himself.

“I hear you. You’re at the foot of the dune. What’s the matter?”

A figure rose up in the night and bent over him. Frightened, Yakov flinched and closed his eyes. Hair softly tickled across his face.

“You’re hurt, aren’t you?” Fingers gently touched the gardener’s shattered limbs.

Yakov opened his eyes and blinked, trying to focus. “Who are you?”

“I’m a friend.” The voice was low and sympathetic. The woman’s fingers continued to probe carefully. “Lie perfectly still.”

“It hurts very much,” said Yakov.

“… hurts very much.”

“Is it worth the pain?” asked her mother.

She stared at her hands, flexing the fingers repeatedly, then made a fist. She extended the index finger and brought it slowly toward her nose. The finger touched her upper lip and she recoiled. “It’s worth the pain,” she affirmed. “The strangeness is something else again.”

“I think you’re dying.”

“I know. I’ve wanted to die for hours.”

“You’re cold,” said the woman. She pulled a piece of clothing, soft and warm, over Yakov. She flicked a lighter. “I’m afraid there’s no kindling for a fire out here.”

Yakov stared at her face. “I know you. I’ve heard of you. You’re Cougar Lou.” With a tired wonder he looked at her long, tawny hair and wide, violet eyes. Then the flame went out. “Will you help me?”

“You know that you’re dying.”

“I want vengeance.”

“Who did this?”

“Josephus the Administrator. I worked in his greenhouse. His favorite orchids were the flaming moths. Somehow they died of rust. Josephus was furious.”

“The son of a bitch,” said Cougar Lou.

“I think it’s getting colder.”

“I wish I had more than my cape. I’m sorry.”

“I’m glad I met you.” Yakov choked on the blood and twisted his head aside to spit.

“Would you like that bastard to die?”

The operating theater glittered like sunlight on snow. She felt like dying; then remembered how soon, how grandly she would live.

Yakov made a twisted smile in the darkness.

“Now lie back,” said Cougar Lou. “I can make it easier for you.”

Yakov coughed rackingly. He brought his knees up in the fetal position. “Too late… .”

“No,” she said. “Here.” Cougar Lou pressed a metal cube tightly against the gardener’s temple. His body spasmed.

It broke open, pushed free, gulped alien air, and wished somatically for the soothing liquid to return. Wailing, the baby was slapped, bathed, wrapped, and rocked. Later, it fed.

“Do!” he said, pointing. A proud voice: “He said it—his first word.”

Another time, the second word: “Get!”

The pride of parents: so precious, so bright. “We love you.” And they rocked him every time he cried.

“Brosie, Brosie,” said playmate Kenneth. “Little baby Brosie.” Kenneth was twice Brosklaw’s size; Brosklaw hit him with a rock.

“Brosklaw, you will go far,” said his mother.

“Listen to your mother,” said his father.

They pushed him, stimulated him with books and tapes and holos. Not too much music, though. Very little art. He became extremely capable and knowledgeable, and even suspected how good he really was.

“Brosklaw, you will go far,” said his tutor. “Just continue to apply yourself.”

By adolescence, he retained a long string of lovers.

“Sometimes I wonder what I’m doing here with you,” mused Tourmaline Hayes, the sex star. “Morbid curiosity?”

He laughed and made love to her again.

“Only the best education,” said his father. “Selden University.”

“The police?” said his mother.

“Real power is the control of human behavior,” quoted her son.

“You’ve got everything you want,” said each of his wives at one time or another. “What more?”

“I have everything I wanted,” he corrected them. “As I grow older I discover new things to desire.”

“Chief of police of Craterside Park,” his mother said, during a visit. “That’s impressive for one so young.”

Brosklaw smiled.

His mother said, “When will you move up to city administration?”

“That’s coming.”

Brosklaw walked down one of the clean, well-lighted streets of Craterside Park. A woman stepped from between two spiral towers and confronted him. He stared at the lithe body. “Don’t I know you?” he said. “You’re—”

Yakov the gardener shook convulsively a final time and died. Cougar Lou took the cold piece of metal away from his head. She retrieved her cape and watched him for a while. In the starlight, Yakov was barely visible against the gravel.

“… rather be anybody than who I am.” She looked defiantly at her mother.

“Your adolescence has been prolonged,” said Anita.

She picked up a film-viewer and hurled it at the wall. The viewer exploded in a thousand shining pieces.

“Don’t do that,” said Anita mildly. She put her hand to the cut on her forehead, and one finger came away red.

Cougar Lou shivered and rubbed her hands together. They were sticky with Yakov’s blood. It was real, and the smell of it made her sick.

The quiet of a Craterside Park night was shattered by the sound of a man attacking a sculpture in one of the district’s many scenic parks. The statue was the heroic stylization of a mastodon. Its massive feet were anchored solidly in a base. It could not move, other than to wind its trunk back and squirt water at its attacker. The man leaned against the statue’s haunch, repeatedly driving a fist into its ribs. The sound boomed hollowly. The sculpture honked in distress and discharged another ineffective stream.

Eventually, Craterside Park residents anonymously contacted the police. A patrol car whispered up to the square and set down. The two cops approached the mastodon’s assailant warily.

“Hey!” said the short cop. “Stop that. Turn around and keep your hands in plain sight.”

The second patrolman hefted his stunner, just in case.

The man slowly turned at the cop’s voice. He stared at the patrolmen vaguely. Hulking, he was at least a head taller than either cop.

“Easy,” warned the first cop. “Take it slow.”

They shined their lights in the man’s face.

The first cop gasped. “Chief Brosklaw? Is that you?”

“Chief?” said the second cop. He took a step closer.

“Chief?” echoed the man. “Chief?” His jaw hung slack. He turned back to the stylized mastodon and again began to pound its flank, the boom resounding far across Craterside Park.

Mary Elouise Olvera-Landis returned home quite early in the morning. She let herself into the huge old house on Feldspar Drive quietly. Only one of her contract husbands greeted her. “Are Nels and Richard asleep?” she asked.

Macy got up from the couch in front of the fireplace and stretched. “They didn’t last past midnight.”

Lou kissed him. She tried to play no favorites, but Macy held an edge in her affections. He was the practical one of her husbands, thinking rather than feeling. She often sensed he was troubled, as though trying to find his way out of imaginary labyrinths. Richard, her second husband, was undisciplined and lustful. She found him exciting. The third, Nels, was ethereally worshipful, but usually preoccupied with his researches at the Tancarae Institute.

“Where have you been?”

“Out,” she said.

“Cards at your family’s?”

She put her hands to her throat and unbuckled the cape. “I took the windhover out to the greenbelt. I wanted to walk alone in the desert.”

Smiling, he said, “Did you find a burning bush?” Macy was a librarian and knew all the old stories.

She shook her head. “I found a dying man.”

“Anyone we know?”

“Don’t joke,” she snapped. “He was a stranger.”

“I thought it might be your flair for drama.”

She nodded. “You’re right; it was a fiction. Forget it.”

“Do you want a drink?”

“Something hot. No stimulants.”

They sat by the fireplace and drank mint tea. “How long until morning?” Lou asked.

“Three hours, maybe four.”

“I want to sleep here by the fireplace.”

“Carpet’s filthy. Nels didn’t clean yesterday.”

“He forgot,” Lou said.

“Well, it’s still dirty.”

“I’ll put my cape down,” she mocked. “Do you mind?”

“I’m not finicky.” He reached for her. She allowed him to draw her down. After they had made love, the artificial logs still burned brightly. ‘Turn down the fire,” said Macy sleepily*

Lou twisted the valve. “Are you tired?”

“Yes.” He nuzzled against her like a child, left leg thrown over her waist.

“I’m not sleepy.”

He opened one eye. “What do you want?”

She smiled ingenuously. “A story.”

Macy groaned and sat up. “Once upon a time, there was a brave woman named Robin Hood …”

In the dim light of the fireplace, Macy looked exasperated. “Aren’t you tired yet?”

She shook her head.

“You’re worse than any child. All right, what do you want to talk about?”

“Anything.”

He considered. “Since I’m the newest of your husbands, let’s talk about you.”

“All right.”

“There’s a hologram in your room. Is that your sister?”

She was quiet for a few moments. “I didn’t expect that.”

“You don’t have to answer.”

“The hologram is not my sister. It’s me.”

His voice was surprised. “She looks nothing like you.”

“For convenience,” the surgeon said, “we have standard patterns.”

She shook her head. “I brought my own specifications.”

“The family’s prosperous,” said Lou. “We can purchase wonders. Have you any idea what I was like as a child?”

“You were extroverted, bright, and athletic. I imagine you were the center of all interest here in Craterside Park.”

“Wrong. I was bright, but I was also clumsy and fat. I was introverted to the point of catatonia. Months and months I wouldn’t go out of the house. I spent my time reading and viewing heroic fantasies—Joan of Arc, Robin Hood, Gerry Cornelius, all of them. I imagined I was all sorts of other people living in different times.”

“Escapist.”

“Didn’t you ever dream?”

“Of course.”

“Of what?”

He considered the question. “I don’t remember.”

“I dreamed I was a hero. I saw myself as strong and lithe as a cougar. One birthday, my parents gave me all that. It took months for the restructuring. Months more for physical training.”

Macy looked intrigued. “That holo—The difference is incredible.”

“Sometimes I wish I were her again.”

“That’s stupid.” He gently kissed a line along her jaw. “You’re beautiful now.”

“Would you feel that if I were still her?”

He hesitated. “I think so.”

“You only approach honesty.” She laughed. “You’re so damned politic.”

“Beautiful Cougar Lou.”

“What?”

“You dreamed of being a cougar. Cougar Lou. It fits.”

“It does,” Lou murmured, almost as a question. “It’s almost morning. Let’s make love again.”

Before sunrise, they moved to the tall windows facing east.

Better than lying with a book in an invented world?

He raised his head. “Did you say something?”

She shook her head slowly. “Do you know,” said Macy, “that you talk in your sleep?”

The elder matriarch of the Olvera-Landis family arrived shortly after noon. Lou greeted her mother at the door.

“Good afternoon, Mary Elouise,” said Anita. “Are your husbands about?”

“Macy is out,” Lou said. “Nels is at the institute and Richard is with a party hunting for sea snark.”

“Fine. I wish to talk with you alone.” She led Lou to the parlor. “This is nothing you haven’t heard before.”

“I expected that.”

“The family has been talking,” said Anita. “We are worried about you. Don’t you think that perhaps this house is a little large for you to manage?”

“I have three husbands.”

“And aren’t they also perhaps a bit too much?”

“I can manage.”

“Can you really, dear?” She placed a plump hand on her daughter’s wrist. “You are young and willful, Mary Elouise, but that will carry you only so far. What are you going to do?”

“I’ll live here.” Lou stared at the carpet, following patterns. “I intend to help people.”

“Heroes?” Macy once laughed. “Heroines? Killers and thieves-outlaws”

In a rage, she ordered him from her bed.

Anita laughed. “My dear, machines are for helping people. People have better things to do.”

Lou kept a stubborn silence.

“The family is reluctant to continue supporting you in this fashion. You’ve had a nice fling. Now come home.”

“Into the family business?”

“If you’d like. We won’t force you.”

“And my husbands?”

“Three seems a bit extravagant. Can’t you keep—” She rolled her shoulders. “Oh, just one?”

“So will you marry me?”

“The terms are good,” said Macy. “Why not?”

“Is that all?”

“This isn’t Le Morte d’Arthur, love”

“Mother, may I think about it?”

“Again? I suppose so. But you’ll have to return soon. The expense, you know. Supporting a separate house in Craterside Park is so ridiculous. You can’t expect these birthday extravagances to last forever.”

“I realize that.”

“Then I’ll talk to you again soon.” Anita rose to leave. “Oh, did you hear about our fine police chief?”

“What about him?”

“I saw it on Network this morning. He was picked up by his own men last night. He attempted to damage a nocturnal sculpture in one of the squares.”

“How odd,” said Lou.

“Indeed. Even stranger, it seems his entire memory is gone. The police suspect foul play.”

“Craterside Park used to be so peaceful.”

Her mother agreed. “These days, I don’t know what we’re coming to.”

After Anita left, Lou went to her special room. No one slept with her there. It was a retreat. The floor undulated over circulating liquid. The walls opened into infinitely expanded holovistas. Today Lou chose trees. She was surrounded by brooding, illusory forests. She lay down on the forest floor.

How blessed to rest. She still dreamed as Cougar Lou, but when she woke, could not remember those dreams.

She dozed, but did not sleep, and came awake disoriented and confused. She stared at the underbrush, wishing that once, just once, an unprogrammed animal would come slinking out to greet her. Lou turned over and watched clouds traverse the high-resolution blue sky.

Steal from the rich, give to the poor … That had come from Macy and the dusty, tattered pages of an ancient book.

What am I doing? she thought. How can I re-create a past that probably never existed? Whom am I helping helping helping helping …

Wake up, wake up, whispered the night wind. Lou jerked upright. “All right,” she said. “I’m awake.” The forests blinked out and Lou was alone in the small gray room.

Outside, Nels waited for her. He was clearly agitated. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I thought you ought to know. Macy and Richard are fighting.”

She rubbed her eyes. “What about?”

“You.”

“I’m still asleep,” Lou said. “Why should they fight over me?”

“Come on,” said Nels. He tugged her toward the hallway.

“Why me?”

Nels stumbled over the words. “It’s your family. We heard you’re going back. You’ll keep only one husband—”

“Let’s go.” They hurried along the corridor, Nels’s bony legs pacing her. “Who told you?”

Nels looked at her uncomfortably. “It was my cousin Ingrid. Her maid’s aunt is second housekeeper to the Olvera-Landis household. The aunt heard a discussion about you at dinner and couldn’t keep it to herself.” He ducked his head. “I’m sorry. I told Richard; then he and Macy got into it.”

“They’re idiots,” Lou said.

They clattered down the main stairs. Richard and Macy were in the dining hall. The table had been shoved to one side and the two men stood in the cleared space. Each was clad only in a pair of baggy white pantaloons, tied securely at waist and ankles. The two men jumped up and down, screaming epithets.

Lou stopped at the bottom of the flight. She wondered whether to laugh. “What are they doing?”

“Their pantaloons,” Nels said, pointing. “Each of them dropped a resurrectronic ferret in there. The first one whose ferret gnaws its way free through the cloth wins.”

“That’s stupid!” Lou cried. She ran into the dining hall and grabbed Macy’s shoulder. Without taking his eyes from Richard’s face, he shoved her aside.

“Leave us be,” said Richard. He was stocky, with long arms and head as smooth as a desert stone.

High-pitched squeaks came from the men’s trousers.

“Idiots!” Lou screamed. “When the ferrets are through, neither one of you’ll be fit for a husband!”

“Get away,” said Macy. “We have to settle it. First us; then Nels.”

“Nels, help me stop them.” Lou grabbed one of the spindly dining-room chairs and smashed it at a suspicious bulge on Macy’s calf. Her husband yelled and fell sideways. Something jerked and twitched under the fabric of his pantaloons. Lou swung again with the broken chair leg and heard sophisticated circuitry break.

“Damn you,” said Macy. He reached to stop her hand. She kicked him in the face.

Lou turned and found Nels and Richard rolling on the floor. Nels legs were locked around Richard’s waist. Jack-knifed forward, he pummeled a lump on Richard’s ankle.

“Richard! It’s over.” Her second husband glared up at her, then took his hands away from Nels’ throat.

The four people surveyed one another. Macy wiped his bloody nose with his hand. Lou gave him a napkin from the sideboard. Nels massaged his own throat gingerly. Richard sat up, looking sullen.

“You stupid pricks,” said Lou. “Is Nels the only one with any sense?”

“It’s true, then? You’re going back to your family?” Richard demanded.

“Who gets discarded?” said Macy.

“Anita came to see me today. That’s what she wanted.”

“So what are you going to do?”

“I haven’t decided. But I do know I don’t want you fighting over me like stud bulls.”

“Aren’t you the great romantic?” Macy said spitefully.

Lou turned on him. “No, not this way. Now all of you, get out. Just leave me alone.”

The three men stared at her. “Do you want to see any of us later on tonight?” Richard asked.

She shook her head. “I’m sore and I want to be alone.” Lou turned back toward the stairs. They watched until she disappeared past the upper landing.

She sat on the topmost parapet of the highest turret of the old house and dangled her feet into space. She drew the cloak about herself. The simulated cougar fur was proof against the night wind off the ocean.

Who am I? she thought. I’m Cougar Lou Landis.

No, replied Mary Elouise Olvera-Landis. I’m an ugly, awkward girl who finds only vicarious marvels. My heroes are in books and tapes and story computers. I am locked inside a walking fantasy. But that doesn’t change me. I’m still Mary Elouise.

I’m the new reality, thought Cougar Lou. I exist in my strength and grace.

You will always be Mary Elouise, answered Mary Elouise.

No. No?

Cougar Lou stared out toward City Center where the stars twinkled faster and became a blur. Tomorrow, she thought, Anita will return for me. I’m such a child; I’ll do as she asks.

I wish I were the hero I’ve pretended.

The scattered lights of Craterside Park spread below her. One of the tiny stars marked the home of Josephus the Administrator. “Yakov,” she whispered. “Little gardener, you’re my last chance for self-respect.”

Cougar Lou stood and balanced easily on the stone parapet. … steps. Stairs were the hardest. At first, the new perspectives came slowly. She stepped or reached, and often missed. The fine, lithe body throbbed with new bruises. She looped one end of a line around a crenelation and knotted it. Then she tossed the coil into the darkness. She clipped the rope around the break-bar secured to her belt, then looped the rope around her hips and began to rappel silently down from the tower.

As a young girl, she had attended garden parties at Josephus’ estate. Cougar Lou knew the route. She took alleyways and climbed over rooftops, avoiding Craterside Park’s safe streets.

Two patrolmen sat telling each other ghost stories beside the gateway to Josephus’ estate. “… out of the closet, jaws gaping …” The words floated across as she crawled through the shrubbery.

Cougar Lou anticipated little difficulty in getting to Josephus. There would be few safeguards. Craterside Park was relatively free of wrongdoing. The patrolmen patrolled because Chief Brosklaw had liked good appearances.

Once past the gateway, she ran across the checkerboard lawns. She reached the back of the house. A window turned silently inward and Cougar Lou let herself into Josephus’ kitchen. Pausing to orient herself to the new darkness, she searched back through her adolescence and remembered the master bedroom was on the second floor, south wing. Negotiating the stairs and hallways took a few minutes. Soon she was in front of the correct door. She slid it aside and took a cold metal cube from her belt-pouch. . . brought us memories of a better life. Why?”

She looked away from twisted limbs and shriveled souls. “You’ve never had riches.”

They stared at her.

Lights glared on. Across the room, Josephus sat up in bed and smiled at her. “Mary Elouise, how nice to see you. You were expected.”

Cougar Lou whirled, but the hallways were filled with black-uniformed patrolmen, stunners in hand. She turned back to the bedroom, ready to break past Josephus and dive through a window.

The administrator raised his hand, and she saw the wand of a stunner. “You must be tired. Sleep now, and we’ll talk in the morning.” She felt a momentary sting, then nothing else.

Mary Elouise awoke slowly. She stared at the dark, slender man and wondered who he was. The woman beside him also looked familiar. She blinked and realized the woman was her mother. The man was Josephus. She whimpered and tried to roll over, to go back to sleep. Josephus grasped her shoulders and shook her.

“Have some tea, dear,” said her mother. They waited while she sat up and drank. After several minutes, her eyes focused and she put down the cup.

“Anita?”

“You’re home, dear. Josephus brought you in quite early. It appears you’ve been bad.”

Josephus chuckled. He upended his palm and three metal cubes rolled onto the table. “Memory cubes. You planned to use one on me?”

“It was for Yakov,” Mary Elouise said. “I promised.”

“Whom?” said Anita.

“My former gardener, an incompetent. I was rather harsh on him.” He fingered the cubes. “Stolen memories … There was Brosklaw, of course. Who else? We’ve had several reports.”

“There were three more; a woman, two men. They were lucky people with power and accomplishments. They were gifts of birth. I gave their memories to cripples I found wandering out beyond the greenbelt.”

Anita pursed her lips. “You’ve been a very bad girl.”

“Me?” Cougar Lou glared. “Don’t condescend like that. I’m not a girl any more.”

Josephus slapped his palm down hard on the table and laughed. “Who is condescending? Do you think that murder by memory-theft and the gift of those memories to persons you deem less fortunate isn’t condescending?”

“No.”

“Child, you’ve got a lot to learn.”

“What are you going to do?”

Anita said, “You must be disciplined.”

“Punished,” said Josephus. “It’s an ugly word, but it’s more what I had in mind.”

“The steel rod?”

“Nothing so brutal. You must realize that memory retrieval holds a good deal more than the historical romances you absorbed for so long. You’ll experience some of the less pleasant memories.

My special selection.”

“You disgust me,” said Cougar Lou.

Josephus grinned again. “I think about a thousand subjective years will be appropriate. Then you’ll get your old body back.”

“I’d already decided that.”

“What do you mean?”

Cougar Lou smiled; then the smile slowly diminished. “You were waiting. How did you know?”

“How do you think?”

They took her out then, and in the hall her three husbands were waiting.

“Which one of you sons of bitches was it?” Cougar Lou demanded. “Who betrayed me?” She glared at Nels. “You? You got me the cubes from the institute.”

“It could be any one of us,” said Macy. “Or all. You talk in your sleep.”

“Was it you?”

“Who’s to know which you would have rejected?” Macy spread his hands noncommittally. “It doesn’t matter. Who loved you more? To whom would betrayal matter the most?”

“It matters the most to me.”

“From what book did you steal that?” said Macy.

She stared at him until he looked away. “No book,” said Cougar Lou. “My life.” Josephus reached for her elbow, to lead her out; she jerked free.

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