Inversion

Aric McBay

INVERSION

With the Black Dawn series we honor anarchist traditions and follow the great Octavia E. Butler’s legacy, Black Dawn seeks to explore themes that do not reinforce dependency on oppressive forces (the state, police, capitalism, elected officials) and will generally express the values of antiracism, feminism, anticolonialism, and anticapitalism. With its natural creation of alternate universes and world-building, speculative fiction acts as a perfect tool for imagining how to bring forth a just and free world. The stories published here center queerness, Blackness, antifascism, and celebrate voices previously disenfranchised, all who are essential in establishing a society in which no one is oppressed or exploited. Welcome, friends, to Black Dawn!

To the practical utopians.

Chapter 1: One Day in a Beautiful World

Char of the Ami

I was twenty-two when my grandfather went into the flamewall.

He had circled the world 348 times—a good age for anyone—and he was simply tired. He’d had enough of walking and his joints ached no matter how much milkroot he ate.

Grandfather declared this one afternoon, while we were burying broken equipment and old books. We held the ceremony that night, our relatives leaving one by one as they said goodbye. The next morning as the sun rose from the East Pole, my grandfather strode through the autumn leaves and into the flames, looking back only once with his bright green eyes.

He went in humming the steam-bending song, so that as a child in the next life, he might show aptitude for box-making or boat-building. Within the heat shimmer, his body seemed to come apart—not burning but dissolving like a wisp of smoke in a strong breeze.

The Winter People will find a green-eyed baby in one of their cradles when the flames recede.

My grandmother was the picture of equanimity; she had seen death, sudden and violent, at a young age. So, it was only ten minutes after my grandfather’s passing when she stood with clear eyes, hugged Uncle Tycho, and beckoned to me. Char, my granddaughter, she said. Let’s go meet the others in spring.

I wiped the tears from my cheeks and wheeled over a tricycle, which had room for two. She sat beside me in the broad and comfortable seat. We pedaled slowly, away from the wall of flame that had gained on us by twenty feet while we’d watched it.

We left behind a dozen supply caches (already engulfed in flame), a few comrades who would follow shortly, and my grandmother’s partner of fifty years.

It was autumn near the flame front, of course. The grass between the trees was yellow and lay close to the ground. The foliage on the oaks and maples above was orange and red and yellow. Fallen leaves on the path crunched beneath our wheels and stirred up in our wake.

We followed a coastal path that wound its way between the seashore on our left and intermittent patches of forest and prairie on our right. In the distant grasslands I spotted a herd of bison.

The scents varied as we traveled: the salt of the ocean, the smell of dew in grass, and flowers alongside the path. The breeze dried the last tears from my cheeks.

As we rode, the leaves changed—growing greener, fuller. The grass became verdant and upright.

Summer was my favorite season. On the air I could smell fresh apples; we passed bushes and shrubs weighted down by fragrant berries. We waved at a group of people—other Ami—in their circle of wagons around a campfire. A bit further, we passed a young couple building a cradle from stones and branches. When we reached early summer, I caught a glimpse of a faun through the underbrush. Songbirds frolicked above, their tunes mingling with the whir of the tricycle wheels.

Finally, after an hour or so of quiet travel, we reached spring. I glanced over to see my grandmother had closed her eyes, smiling slightly as the wind of our passage swept over her creased face and tousled her white hair.

As we passed into early spring, leaves receded into their buds. Blossoming flowers disappeared. The green grass shortened, brightened, and then vanished under a fine layer of ash.

I slowed to a stop as we reached the very edge of spring, and we disembarked. Children ran back and forth, searching for caches, their feet wrapped in thick leather to protect them from the latent heat of the flames just passed.

The spring flame front ahead was receding slowly away from us. The faithful flames consumed, but they also renewed.

A cradle had emerged from the fires. My cousin Theo rushed to it with excitement, but it was empty, as they all had been for months. Some Ami had begun to grumble that the Spring People had grown selfish.

Nearby, a few children laughed with excitement; they’d found the edge of a metal canister protruding from the ash, just where the map had said it would be. They waved for an adult and Theo approached with thick gloves and a shovel to dig it out.

The lid had my grandmother’s name etched into the top. Theo brought it to her and cracked open the lid. She reached inside and drew out a book—something thick and spiral-bound—still warm from the heat of the fires.

My grandmother regarded it skeptically and then gazed up across the world toward the rising sun.

The world is made of circles; you can see it at a glance.

From the Ami path, near the West Pole, I could raise my head eastward and see nearly the entire universe. From within the deep rainforest or the misty mountain valleys one might imagine the universe was any shape at all, even a vast expanse like in the days of old. But on a sunny day near the poles, one can see our universe exactly as it is: a hollow sphere. Its surface—continents and oceans, islands and coral reefs—all divided into three sections by three lines of flame that run from pole to pole.

The inexorable fires sweep slowly around the world like the hands of a clock, or so Uncle Tycho was fond of saying. He had a collection of watches and clocks he repaired with tiny tools. It was slow and tedious work that attracted no apprentices. We could all tell what time it was by the position of the sun. And what use was it to measure every second if you spent them staring into the minuscule gears of malfunctioning antiques from an age when the universe itself was broken?

The three sections of the world had their usual three seasons, visible in triplicate. As each flamewall progressed, it left spring behind it. Plants and trees matured into summer, birds laid eggs and hatched them, trees blossomed and set fruit. Then, as if exhausted by their efforts, the grasses would turn yellow, the trees would turn orange, and the autumn flamewall would arrive to begin the cycle again.

One month. That’s how long a given tree or patch of grass had in which to do whatever it wanted to do before it would be renewed.

At the forested equator, the distance the flamewalls traveled in the span of a month was enormous. But here, near the pole, spring and fall were less than a day’s walk apart.

My grandmother and I had made that journey swiftly by trike. As my grandmother inspected the book that had been pulled from the cache in the ground, my Aunt Scarlet approached. She gave my grandmother a hug, then turned to me. Char, can you find me some softleaf today? Victor has a sore ankle.

I shook my head. No time for herbs. I’m teaching with Uncle Tycho today. World lessons for the summer kids.

Of course! she said, remembering. My grandfather’s passing had disrupted the usual schedule. I trained with her in herbalism and bike repair several times a week, but this was my day with Uncle Tycho.

Like many people in their early twenties, I had ample freedom to dabble. I could apprentice in a dozen crafts each month. By the time I’m twenty-five, though, I’ll have walked a hundred laps of the world and the older Ami will start asking when I might choose a specialty—both to serve the community and to relieve an elder of some duties.

In the meantime, I could focus on my studies. I could get my hands greasy as a bicycle mechanic. And I could work to memorize each of the hundred different medicinal herbs on our circuit, their locations and active ingredients: the anti-inflammatories in softleaf, the analgesic sedatives in milkroot, the mélange of empathogens and cannabinoids in a friendship tea made from bitter licorice.

Saying farewell, I left Scarlet and my grandmother in spring and rode back toward summer. I found Tycho’s blue wagon in a fruit grove that overlooked the Western Sea. He wasn’t there—still making his way back from my grandfather’s autumn ceremony—but the walls of his wagon were covered in his favorite things: clocks, books, a few telescopes, and flame-crafted lenses and other contraptions.

My stomach was growling. I went to the closest buffet tree; some of its branches bore ripe pears, others apples, still others avocados, and I picked one of each for breakfast. Then I sat in the lush grass at the edge of the orchard and gazed out over the ocean.

There were dark sandy beaches to the north. But here the coast was flat and rocky, with long shelves of granite broken up by tidal pools and little inlets. I always felt relaxed by the sea, and I needed a moment of quiet after the emotional intensity of my grandfather’s passing. The sound of the waves and the distant polar gyre were gentle whispers, as if the sea were hushing herself. Shhhhhh . . . The fresh breeze coming up from the shore was infused with the scent of low tide, a briny mélange of fish and drying seaweed. My stomach growled as I ate.

The Western Sea before me was roughly circular, its surface gently dished to match the spherical contours of the universe. I felt as if I were sitting on the edge of an enormous bowl; not a bowl containing water, but a bowl made of water. The sea was speckled with distant polar islands of different colors—the Onyx Isle, the Gray Whale, the Red Rock—which encircled its whirling center. I breathed in deeply and closed my eyes, letting the gentle wind caress my face. My cheeks were tickled by a few free strands of hair that had come loose from my braid.

By the time I had finished eating, I could hear the laughter of children making their way across the orchard. With impeccable timing, as usual, Uncle Tycho pulled up on his bicycle, ready to begin the day’s lesson. He greeted me as always, Char, my favorite niece! I was his only niece. He hugged me and turned to the children.

Good morning, kids! he said. Let’s head down to the shore. Time to learn about the world.

The universe, Uncle Tycho told the kids in hushed tones, used to be inside-out. His diminutive audience—gathered around a tidal pool on the rocky shore—leaned forward to hear him over the sound of the waves.

This is too scary for the little children, he said, still speaking in a dramatic stage whisper, "but you are old enough to know." Violet, a five-year-old sitting beside me, leaned toward him, her eyes wide.

The world before ours—the cosmos, they called it—was inside-out, Tycho continued. The universe was not a cozy orb enclosing us like a cradle. It was a vast expanse of empty vacuum. He paused, turning to Violet. "That means you couldn’t breathe in it!

The sun was not our sweet small droplet of warm light, Tycho said, gesturing up, which moves each day from pole to pole like a faithful friend. It was a huge and ragged thing that grew redder and angrier by the day, boiling the seas as it lashed out with angry arms. Violet leaned toward me and clutched my knee.

When the universe was inside-out, the stars were not our neighbors, Tycho continued. They did not undulate gently above our campfires at night. They were distant beyond understanding; even their faintest flicker of light took many lifetimes to reach us.

Wait, interrupted Violet, if they were so far away, how did they clean our air? She sounded genuinely worried about it, so I put a gentle hand on her back.

They didn’t! Tycho replied, switching from a whisper to a booming declaration. They couldn’t. They weren’t the little companions we are used to but flaming monsters bigger than this entire world! And yet, they were so incredibly distant that we could see just a pinprick of light. If we were lucky, that is. For sometimes the stars themselves would explode without warning and instead of cleaning our air, they would send bursts of light so bright that it burned the air itself away!

I glanced around the circle. The children were rapt, the younger ones swept up in the storytelling while the older children were clearly trying to imagine how the ancient cosmos would have appeared. I did the same, gazing up and imagining that instead of a sphere of blue-tinged continents overhead, were we surrounded only by an empty void, a vast blankness broken only by hostile stars. The idea made me shiver. That was why we told these stories in daytime; telling children these things in the dark would only give them nightmares.

But the biggest danger wasn’t the sun, Uncle Tycho said, nudging me. Isn’t that right?

That’s right, I said, joining in. "A harsh universe made harsh people. Some of them were cruel. Instead of letting us go our own way, they chased our ancestors from place to place. Instead of taking care of themselves, they made us work for them. Instead of sharing, they took everything for themselves. They hated anyone different, and in the end, they ruined the land and even the stars themselves."

But our ancestors were wise and smart, Tycho said. They wanted us to be safe, to live as we saw fit. So, they brought us here to Germinal, where we would be protected. Just like the creatures in this pool. Finally, he gestured to the tidal pool, and the children leaned forward to peer into it.

The pool was crowded with life. Anemones with waving rainbow tendrils lined the ledges inside. Little crabs crawled back and forth in search of snails. There were even a few sea urchins and some five-limbed handfish.

Violet reached in to pet the closest handfish, and the nearby anemones puckered shut at the passage of her shadow.

It’s so much smaller than the ocean, said Violet. Do they have enough to eat?

They do, said Tycho. "Because they all share the pool. It’s their commons. And because every day the tides rise and fall to bring new water and food."

It’s like the flamewalls, I added, that keep the land fresh and new.

But what if a shark gets in and tries to eat them all? asked Violet.

Tycho was gentle. A shark can’t fit in the pool, Violet, even at high tide.

"But what if a shark gets in to eat us? she insisted. In our pool."

The tidal pool is just a metaphor, darling, Tycho said. We’ve been here close to a thousand years. There are no sharks to bother us.

By mid-morning our seaside lesson had progressed into simple play. Children were going from pool to pool, searching for the most interesting things before the tide