NOVELLA

The Trial Of Summary James — Chapter Fifteen

A great African nation has risen in North America. But something is… wrong: Chapter 15 of 20 in the novella.

Check out the links at the end of this story under “Notes” for additional chapters.

Chapter Fifteen

I woke up sweating, not knowing why, then I had the vision. It was no dream, no nightmare. I was wide awake. Sonata. My heart pounding, I called her, knowing it was too late but praying, trying anyway, my throat full of the kind of phlegm that only fear can produce.

“Longman!” she answered happily.

“What?” I asked, astounded.

“Silly man. You heard me.”

“I’m going to ask a stupid question. Have you seen a drone buzz over you?”

“Yeah,” she responded immediately. “It’s over my head right now. Good God that’s weird. Is it you? I thought it was Trace. It’s using Trace’s voice.”

“It’s not me, and it’s not Trace. Sonata, if you never, ever do anything I ask of you for the rest of your life, I will understand, but do this, please. Get out of your house instantly, get into your car, without even one more second of delay.”

“What’s going on? I…”

“DO IT!” I yelled frantically, nearly in tears.

“Okay, okay,” she said. “I’ll keep our line open, okay? So you know what’s going on.”

I was becoming a praying man awfully quickly these days. I both prayed and gave thanks. “Go.”

She did, switching on her phone’s video so that I could see her movements.

“Don’t take anything. Just get to your car.”

“I haven’t driven it in months, Longman,” she said as she was running through her house, presumably to her garage, “Ever since the navigation networks collapsed.”

“Do I really need to repeat myself?”

She was breathlessly scared, I could tell, but I didn’t care. She had less than five minutes, I reasoned, before Alon’s militia would be at her house with their arsenal.

I could see her entering a large dark area that brightened with lights as she appeared to sit in a vehicle. The vehicle started up without a problem, so she moved it forward out of the garage into the street. “A lot of people are still getting into accidents, Longman. I’m nervous.”

“Yeah, idiots still relying on their automation. Just keep your nav systems off and you’ll be fine.”

She was still out of breath as her car made its way somewhere. All I could see, with her phone presumably on its back but leaning somewhere that allowed a narrow view of what was probably the passenger window, were trees whizzing by. She was driving fast. The intent was good, but maybe too obvious. In between catching her breath, she asked, “I’ve never thought of looking this up. But why do rideshares work?”

“Isolated nav system. Separate. Not affected.” Good God, I thought, who cares? “Slow down a little. Drive like an urban housewife until you get out of your neighborhood.”

“There’s a big black van coming my way. Dark windows in front. Can’t see the sides yet.”

“Play it cool. Act normal. They may not know what your car looks like. They think you’re in the square having tea. It’s probably them.” I was astounded by how nervous I was. My hands were shaking as I held the phone. I couldn’t imagine what she felt like, but then, she hadn’t seen what I had seen.

I could tell through my phone that there was suddenly a lot of movement within her vehicle, which terrified me. “What’s going on?” I asked, alarmed.

“I’m just putting on a hat. My hair is sort of recognizable I think.”

“Oh, you are a smart lady. Have I ever told you how smart I think you are?”

She laughed nervously, and even that laugh was a reward. “About a hundred times, you odd little man.”

I had never been called little before. “Where’s that van?”

“Right on top of me, and… gone. They slowed down just a little, but I think I’m clear. No windows on the sides of the van, Longman. I think it’s them. What is going on? How did you know?”

“I’ll tell you when you get here.”

“I’m coming there?”

“Did you have somewhere else in mind? Wherever you’re safe is fine with me.”

“I’m coming there.”

She clearly floored it because the stuff in the window became a blur. She held the phone to her windshield so I could see the road in front of her.

I had never been so scared in my life. Not on Indigo, not in any of my previous convict kidnappings, not ever. I was afraid to measure my heart rate, so I didn’t. Even that would probably scare me at this point.

I continued to talk to Sonata as she made her way toward the bridge. I called a rideshare to follow her, but it couldn’t find her because her navigation systems were off. I wondered if it was worth the risk of having her turn them on, but I thought, no, off the grid is better. I canceled the rideshare.

I wanted to call Trace but that could be counterproductive if Alon’s men were in possession of his phone.

Meanwhile, I had to reconcile this vision I had with reality. I had never had a vision that foretold an event. Or in this case, a possible event. This could take a long time to analyze, I thought.

Other than thinking that it had occurred because I had a lot of emotional investment in the subject of this vision, I was going to have to let it all go for now. I’d have more time to talk about it with Sonata once she got here safely. Which wasn’t a given, which tormented my nerves even more.

I watched the screen of my phone so closely that I thought my eyes would melt into it. Once she was on the bridge, the oncoming traffic was barely recognizable. She was flying, reporting to me that traffic was light. There were no cars behind her. I was pretty sure that she wasn’t being followed.

I felt a sense of deep satisfaction thinking about the goons breaking into Sonata’s home, running into the square certain she was there, unable to answer for their mission’s failure.

Once she was over the bridge, I started walking her through the directions for getting to my hotel. She already knew how to get to the place.

When she arrived, she threw herself back first onto the bed.

“I don’t think we have a lot of time to relax,” I said.

“Give me just these few moments, Longman.”

I sat down next to her, facing the window of my hotel room, which looked out into the night over the bay.

“Tell me about your vision,” she said.

I shook my head. “I’ve never gotten one before the actual event, Sonata. So I thought…” I had to rally here. I was choking up. I cared a lot more about this woman than I had known, and I had known already that it was a lot.

I shook my head again. “It started with that drone. Thank God for that drone. I don’t know what kind of ransacking Alon’s men did to Trace’s place, but whatever they did they were able to salvage some stuff and certainly a lot of data. They found a way to somehow interpolate his voice, presumably based on recordings they found.”

She sat up and walked around the bed and sat next to me. “So they were the ones who sent the drone. It was a recording. I think. When I tried to interact with it, it just said something like, ‘Stay safe,’ and took off.”

I nodded. “Yeah, maybe. Makes sense. Anyway,” and again I felt a lump in my throat. “You went into the kitchen and made a salad. Some kind of cherry wine rosemary dressing.”

She cursed in exclamation as she said, “I made that dressing last night. I was just about to make myself a salad right before you called.”

“Artichoke hearts?”

She nodded.

“Palm hearts?”

“Uh-huh.”

“Maybe a couple radishes.”

“Dear Lord, Longman.”

“The romaine lettuce has been good this year. Extra sweet.”

She lifted her hands in the air and slapped them on her legs in exasperation.

“So you’re sitting at your patio table. Eating a salad. There are two cardinals in the tree in your square.”

“Every night, around dusk,” she said. “Loud, squawky things, but I love them.”

“Five guys come in. Fully armed and loaded and looking like they’re going to war, and they shoot you with, seriously, dozens and dozens of rounds of automatic gunfire.”

“What? Why me? Why not you?” She hit me on my shoulder when she said that. I couldn’t believe how lighthearted she was feeling about it, but it was probably simply a reflection of intense relief.

I looked down upon her unyieldingly beautiful face. Even in her harried distress, she looked amazing, even in just a very long plain blue cotton shirt draped over aging pale cotton loungewear, even with her hair mussed from her hat, the long, complex black braids looking frazzled and frizzled and outraged, she looked amazing. “Maybe to get to me? Maybe to get to both Trace and me. Maybe, more. Maybe because they’re worried about your Campeche congregation stepping into their turf? Maybe they even know something about Campeche that you don’t. Who knows? But they weren’t there to put a scare in you.”

“What do I do now? They’re in my house.”

“I’m sure they’re long gone by now. But it’s obviously not safe to go back. Look, I of course would love to try to play hero, but this is out of my league. We need to get your militia involved.”

She shook her head.

“You said that your congregation has one.”

“It’s kind of like two guys and a gun they share on weekends, Longman. It isn’t much.”

I was silent. I had to think. I didn’t think we had much time to think.

“Chances are they know where I am,” I said. “We aren’t safe here. I just wanted you near me. To know you were safe.” She took my hand, which sent waves of energy I had never connected with through my chest. It was the strangest feeling, worse than any high school crush. “The thing is, I don’t want to give in. Their reaction tonight proves that we are close.”

“I hate to bring this up now of all times. But your vision. It didn’t happen. Is there any chance any of the others didn’t?”

I shook my head. “I don’t think so. They have always happened after the fact. Like Sonoma Williams’s murder. I got the vision overnight on the day of his murder. Before it hit the news, but after it happened.”

“But it changes things. This vision. It shows that…” she stopped. “Well, I don’t know what it shows, do you? I mean, a vision of what might happen, that is so different than what will happen. Or has happened.”

“You can imagine how upset I was. It’s never been this way before. I don’t even know why I called you other than I didn’t know what else to do. But there was no doubt in my mind that you were dead already. None.”

“Whew,” she sighed. “That’s pretty intense.”

“Could be a very handy talent if I could use it to predict their next move, but I’m sure I have nothing resembling that capability. It’s random.”

“I don’t think it’s that random.”

“What do you mean?”

“After your very first vision, what happened to you?”

I shook my head. I had no idea what she was after here.

“You went on a crusade, Longman. Let’s call it what it is. After just the one. You saw this miscarriage of justice, and you began a crusade.”

“Well, no, I didn’t begin a crusade. I just went a little crazy and kidnapped a guy and found him a new home.”

“But your mind did. Your mind went on a crusade. Don’t you see it? It happened again. Then again. Then again. Had you ever had a series of such visions before?”

I shook my head again.

“These miscarriages of justice rankle you. There’s an emotional component to these visions. In my case, a very flattering one.” She smiled lovingly at me. “And sweet, and touching. I mean, it touches me in a way I’ve never been touched.” A small tear emerged from an eye.

“Hey,” I said.

“It’s okay,” she said. “It’s a good kind of tear. A blessed one. Anyway, you are going to absolutely detest my idea, especially because there’s a good chance it won’t work. But if we’re careful, it won’t matter.”

“No. And no. No, we won’t use you to lure these animals, and no, it won’t work. These visions just aren’t predictable in that way. Because we’d have to put you in genuine danger for there to even be a chance of the visions getting ignited, and if a vision didn’t happen, it’s lights out for Sonata Holmes.”

“There must be some way to use these to our advantage.”

“There isn’t.”

She thought longer. I didn’t like all this talk at all.

“Then we need to take advantage of their interest in me. Let’s assume they are interested in me, more than just as a way to get to you. If they only wanted to get to you, I don’t think they would have come at me like that. In that way.”

“Possibly so.”

“So somebody at Campeche or Navasota knowing what is going on at the internment housing seems like a real possibility.”

“If we’re okay with stretching possibilities as far as we can, yes.”

“We are. As a barrister for Campeche Apostolic Congregation, it’s within my rights to ask to take a tour of the internment facilities. Especially downstairs where all the action is, which of course will not be a stated reason for my request.”

“Why is it within your rights to make that request?”

“Because Texas Light is doing a lot of business that affects my congregation.”

“They’re a Houston-based congregation, in your hood, so to speak.”

“Something like that. They don’t have a legal obligation to honor my request, but there are a million unwritten rules among congregations. It would look bad if they didn’t. I’m pretty sure Sonoma Williams wasn’t in on their scheme. I think him finding out about it is what killed him.”

I nodded. “It sure wasn’t the argument he was having with Summary James. Let’s say you do this. For one thing, we have to find a way to survive long enough for all that to transpire. For another, they’ll just clean the place up before your visit. We do have the video that Trace has of the vanti operation if he kept a backup.”

She shook her head. “Inadmissible. No magistrate will allow it as evidence.”

I took out my phone and started dialing a number.

“What are you doing?”

“Calling Hiawatha Smith. He’s the only person in the country I know who might have the resources we need to challenge these people.”

I explained everything to Hiawatha. Forget the fiction, I said. This was real. I didn’t know if he’d believe the tales of my visions, but I blurted them out anyway. He said he’d have a team in Campeche within the hour. “They’ll keep sending that drone out until she gets back,” he said. I told him I wouldn’t use her as bait. We agreed to shelve the discussion until his arrival.

Nocona wasn’t very far from Campeche by tube. By the time we reached her place by rideshare, Hiawatha’s people would be in Campeche, too.

“Who is he, exactly?” asked Sonata somewhat suspiciously. “I mean, here you are all, what? Surprised about militias. Now you’re calling in the cavalry?”

I laughed. “Thanks to you. See, Hiawatha and I go way back. We grew up together in Nocona.”

“Longman. That does sound somewhat like a First Settler name.”

“Well, I’m not, but like most congregations, the one I grew up in has the tradition of changing our given name when we become adults to better represent who we are and who people say we are.

“Well, since I was around a bunch of Comanche twenty-four hours a day, Longman ended up being my nickname, so I just adopted it legally. Nocona, it’s very African and very Comanche. These days its demographics are almost like Seminole City. Lots of mixing, you know? Hiawatha,” I laughed, “I don’t know quite how he ended up with that name. And adding Longfellow is a nice touch. I always loved the guy. As purebred a Comanche dude as you’ll ever find. A Quahadi, I believe. Kinda lost touch for a lot of years but I knew I could rely on him now. And then you told me about the fact of these militias, and I knew that he was involved in congregational security back home, and, well, there you go.”

“Perfect,” she said, as she stood up, planting a big kiss right on my lips. “I adore you. Let’s go?”

“Well we could stay just a little longer,” I said, stunned, my eyes rolling between her and the bed.

“Longman?” she said sternly, with her hands on her hips.

“Yeah yeah,” I said reluctantly as I stood up. She took my hand, and we headed out the door as I dialed up a rideshare.

End of Chapter Fifteen

You can purchase the full novella for 99 cents here:

Table of Contents (links will appear as additional chapters are published daily on Medium):

Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12 Chapter 13 Chapter 14 Chapter 15 Chapter 16 Chapter 17 Chapter 18 Chapter 19 Chapter 20

NOTES

This short novella was unplanned. I wrote it under my legal name way back in 2021. Side note: The pen name Charles Bastille originated after the publisher of MagicLand convinced me my name would not be SEO-friendly — I’m no longer convinced that matters and haven’t decided yet if I should publish additional works under the Bastille pen name.

The novella takes place in an alternative North America that celebrates diversity, avoided genocide, and corrected the mistakes of slavery as a side-effect of a failed Revolutionary War. As such, although no human endeavor can avoid tragic error, it takes place on a much less dystopian continent than our current experience.

The world represented here is much larger than can be conveyed in such a short book. This world is more fully represented in a trilogy called Restive Souls, which begins in the late 18th century. It is still in final edits.

But the main character of this novella, Longman Jones, told me he wasn’t willing to wait for me to finish that novel. Maybe that is in part because he makes no appearance at all in the larger work.

But he is a restive soul, and he needed to get out of my head. So I took a couple weeks off from the main novel way back in 2021, and wrote this, in hopes he’d shut up. I never really promoted it, but I’m starting to now a bit.

If you enjoy this novella, please let your friends know that for 99 cents they can spend a couple hours with Longman in a more egalitarian world than what they may be used to. It will make him very happy if you do.

For updates on the Restive Souls series, visit https://medium.com/restive-souls. Or subscribe to my newsletter fiction here (takes you to a site off the Medium platform).

Consider this short novella a teaser for the broader work. And if enough people like it, I suspect Longman Jones will also make another appearance or three.

Thanks for reading!

This story was written by a human, not by AI or Grammarly GO (More Info).

Copyright © 2020–2023 Charles White

All rights reserved

The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

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Published in the United States of America