- IX -

* * * * *
         The room is a swirling wave of motion in front of him. As far as Brown's concerned, he has the best seat in the house, nobody at his back, the world right in front of him. Watching it all go by with roadside seats. He doesn't remember any lights being added to the atmosphere but it seems brighter in here, as if the friction generated by the bodies moving back and forth is creating its own kind of light. Maybe it's just him. Probably is.
         He seems to be an impromptu bartender for the moment, someone had come up asking for a drink and being the decent guy he was, he went and complied and the next thing he knows there's a line of people up and down the bar and they've all got hungry looks on their faces, as if the alcohol was a window into a world they've waited their entire lives to see. In a way it is, he guesses. Years ago, when alcohol used to affect him like everyone else, he remembers vaguely those floating hazy sensations when the beer is coursing through your veins like syrup and the world's just a different place. Everyone's your friend, everything's perfect, you could walk out naked in the snow and not feel a damn thing, it was just water off the duck's back. It can do some scary things though, Brown thinks. He stares out at the faces clustered in front of him and wonders how many of them he'll be picking up out of toilets and catching before they hit the floor before the night is over. Brown figures he'll be able to pay attention for a little while at least, make sure no one drinks too much and hits the wall. He really doesn't want the responsibility, this was supposed to be a night when he cast it away like a ratty old cloak, a cloak with big metal weights sewn into the lining. Of course old habits die hard, you can't be nursemaid over thousands of soldiers and think you can just hang up your hat at the end of the day and change into someone else. Thoughts don't change, feelings don't change, it's just perception and circumstance that alter our intentions.
         Brown's working almost automatically, his hands finding the bottles, the liquid in the bottles finding the right glasses, the glasses finding the right people and everything is just mixed perfectly. Like you're riding some sort of treadmill and it all just slides right into place with a click and a snap. He's even working it into a bit of an act, flipping glasses off his arm, pouring in a dozen different seemingly impossible ways, almost seeming to anticipate what you want before you even ask. Not that it really matters, the first drink is all really anyone has in mind, after that the taste buds go dead and all you want is to keep replenishing your system, keep the feeling going, float your liver away on an ethanol sea.
         Hopefully someone will come to relieve him soon. Knowing Will he probably convinced a few people to do it for him, they probably haven't shown up yet. One that Will owes him. He doesn't want to spend the entire night catering to people who want to dim their senses in a bottle, he would rather spend it out there enjoying himself, grabbing hold of the night and keeping a grip on it until his hands were too tired to hold anymore. That's the only way to do it, else you're just sitting there staring agape and blankly as the whole damn parade passes you right by.
         He can't even talk to people, it's all just babble, a stream of words hitting his ear at different angles, none of them coagulating into anything sensible. It was like being in the middle of a firefight, just things happening all around you too fast for them to even register and people are shouting and someone is probably telling you what to do but for the life of you, you can't figure out what the hell they or anyone else are saying and part of you wants to just curl up in a ball somewhere and pray that it all goes away soon. This isn't up to those levels yet, but he finds it funny that the comparison leaps so aimlessly to his mind. Once a soldier . . . you know the drill.
         Then there's a light tap on his shoulder and he turns to see a broad faced young man with a blond framing hairstyle trying to edge his way past him. "Hey, man, sorry about making you wait like that . . . thanks for pitching in . . ."
         "No problem," Brown says cheerfully, flashing the man a healthy grin while he pours another glass, sliding it toward a hand that grasps it and lifts it into a darkened crowd. It reappears less than a second later, utterly empty except for residue. Brown ignores it. "I needed the practice anyway."
         "You do this often?" the newcomer asks Brown, squinting at the bottles, picking one out and pouring it out carefully. His actions are a lot more deliberate, slower, he either doesn't do this very often or he's just a diligent person. This won't make the crowd go away any faster though, so he grabs a bottle himself and attempts to part the fog of people standing before them. It's funny how after a while faces just start to blend in and look the same, like if you cut everyone's features down to the bare essentials, we all just look the same. There's just no different. A mildly sobering thought on a night where no one wants to consider sobering anything.
         "I've had some experience," Brown replies, furrowing his brow for a second as he measures and launches a glass down the length of the bar, right into a waiting and mildly surprised hand. Brown laughs in a short burst. "Always wanted to try that," he notes to himself. He's enjoying himself already, this is just the kind of night he needed. How Tristian can't enjoy himself at these things is beyond him, it's almost like he makes himself not enjoy them.
         The crowd is thinning now, people either have all the alcohol they want or they're going to dance a little and get their second wind before coming back for more. Whatever. A couple folks are sitting at the bar chatting with each other, guys trying to pick up girls, girls doing the same thing with the guys, although more subtle, and Brown swears he thought he saw two guys hitting on each other. Beer's the great leveler, it puts everyone on an even playing field, it's hard to take advantage of each someone when everyone else is in the same boat and just about to tear their clothes off and jump on anything that won't outrun them. That visual image makes him laugh. Damn, he's sure that it's not that bad but he's sure he'll be seeing stuff like it by the end of the night.
         The new guy wipes his brow, pushing sweaty and stringy hair out of his face. For the first time Brown notices that it's definitely getting warm in here, the temperature is just going to keep climbing until the mercury ups and quits. Soon enough people will be stripping down to tee shirts and shorts and whatever their modesty or decency will allow them to get down to. Brown's only wearing a light shirt and he's worn heavier clothing in deserts so hot that the sand catches on fire and spontaneously bursts into glass shards. He'll manage.
         The blanketing noise of the party thus far has been layered over him, his ears unable to distinguish individual sounds anymore than one can find one's house from orbit around the planet. It cuts and falls apart suddenly though, dripping into meaty pieces and a blare of sound slashes through a buzzsaw heading straight for his brain.
         The radio sings through, fighting a losing battle against the party and determined not to give up.
         ". . . all the buttons of my overcoat, they have fallen off one by one, you wouldn't like me if you'd never had a drink, you wouldn't like me if you'd ever stopped to think . . ."
         His partner and bartender in arms taps his foot to the careening wailing beat and nods in appreciation. "Will always puts a variety of stuff on . . . that's one of the things I like about his parties" a girl already down to a sleeveless shirt glides past, destination unknown, her arms and shoulders already glistening with perspiration. Brown watches the fellow's eyes follow her. "Among other things," he murmurs, which Brown mostly gets through lip reading. Then the guy blinks and shakes his head, leaning down, one elbow on the bar, head in hand. "Ah, hell."
         There's a moment of silence, not that it's really all that silent. The crowd is a constant flickering phenomenon, and through sudden random gaps he sees images and scenes, as if taken from strict possibility, pictures on a wall that hasn't been taken down yet. A montage. Through glimpses and snatches he can see the pieces all settling into place, people lining up on the paths of the pattern and taking their roles. There's a couple already hot and heavy on the couch, before the crowd covers his view, he spies a hand seeking the inside of a shirt. One guy is dancing in a loose limbed rubber fashion that belies clear thinking and people are laughing because they really aren't much better and before long they'll be in his place. Brown swirls his drink around a bit, figuring he'll enjoy the taste on this one at least. He could down the entire rack of liquors behind him and only be drunk for about thirty seconds but that doesn't mean he should. He'll just savor the taste of the better stuff, pick and choose. He's not out to get drunk, if he wanted to toss his dignity away that much he'll just go run around naked outside. Amounts to the same thing, as far as he's concerned.
         "You know, you can go out there," the other bartender is saying to him. "I can probably handle it from here." He's got his own drink and is staring at it almost mournfully, as if expecting it to talk to him and give him some strange solution, something he might not have considered before.
         "Oh, sure, I probably will in a minute, just want to finish this," he holds up his drink, seeing it catch and refract light. Crystal motes float in the liquid for a split second. After thinking about it for a second, he suddenly leans over and offers his hand, "Joe Brown, by the way."
         "What . . . oh hey, Sam," he replies, shifting from confused to friendly in a moment's heartbeat, taking Brown's hand. There's a slick sheen of something covering that hand but Brown resists the need to wipe his hand on something. Not like most of his body won't be the same way when the night's over. "Thanks again for pitching in, I got here later than I thought."
         "Like I said, not a problem." Brown turns and leans his back against the bar, putting the party behind him, feeling it clawing and clutching at his back. He looks down at his half empty drink. Soon enough. "Feel free to grab me and drag me back though if you need a break. Seriously. I don't plan on doing anything so earthshattering that I can't come back and help."
         "I doubt that'll be necessary," Sam tells him, his voice dropping words in a near monotone. "I don't see myself leaving here tonight." He's casting his glance out constantly over the scene as he's talking, like he's lost control of his eyes and can't get them to look where he wants. There's longing in his stance but it's part hesitant, part forced. He's doing this to himself, he is. Brown can see that but he's not sure why, nor does he find himself caring all that much.
         "That's too bad," Brown tells him, seeing no reason to let his comment slide. "Because you'll be missing out." There's a feeling of strength, of victory coursing through him tonight, like he can do anything, like the world is scrambling to get out of his way because there really is no stopping him. Tristian saw that, he saw that Brown wasn't going to relent unless he started having some fun and stop pretending that life was just what you did in between handling crises. Just sitting there whittling time away until the world falls apart around you, wondering why you never get a moment to yourself. At least Brown likes to think that way. It's the atmosphere, the churning, heavy air around him, voices slipping into shouts, staggering into sighs, a tinge of a night stalled in time in every beat of the radio. Brown knows all about Time. He very much wishes he could stop it for all these people, stop them from moving forward, the ending snaking road. Just pause them right in their tracks, tell them they don't want to go any further. But that wouldn't be fair. In the end. It wouldn't be right. It just wouldn't.
         Voices bubble and burst behind him. They come at him in slits, in broken packages, peppering his ears with sound, teasing him with elusive meaning, a puzzle that can't be solved.
         ". . . and you won't believe what the hell he said to me, I mean, me . . ."
         ". . . I tell you, these things just get better and . . ."
         ". . . hear he's here, but don't know where he's at, probably going to take . . ."
         ". . . two hours, my friend, that's all it'll take . . ."
         ". . . God, you know? I was so scared and really, when it was time, it . . . it just felt so . . ."
         ". . . take that as a promise, if I ever see your stinking . . ."
         It's stretched tight and thin around him, whispery vague figures performing pantomime against a gauze backdrop, voices and forms but no faces. Brown shakes his head and grins, suddenly, fiercely. Anyone watching might think he's mad, or at least well on his way to being drunk. Brown's neither, he just can't believe that he's still standing here, when there's no reason in the world to do so.
         "You promised yourself, Joe," he says, swirling his amber drink down, warm against his palm and downs it in one simple, austere swallow, feeling it gather and glide down his throat placidly, running like fire and ice right into his stomach, hitting there like a snowball sent to hell, melting and running for the far corners of his body. He blinks, not expecting the strength of the drink. Have to be somewhat careful, or people are going to think that his liver is going to get up and crawl away, no matter how sober he seems. Even now, Sam is staring at him with a strange expression, an expression that ceases as soon as Brown turns toward him, giving a half friendly shrug, not really feeling any friendship with the man but for one goddamn he can be friends with everyone. He can try. For one night.
         Time to enter the party at least. After all this time it'll feel like an anticlimax, something expected, the inevitable conclusion to a sparse interweaving of patterns. Dammit, God, why must you always be so right? Brown's still grinning to himself when he turns on his heel to step around the bar and out into the part, feeling like he should stop a moment and brace himself. Diving into the ocean, right smack into a patch of cold water. That's what it'd be like, he thinks.
         There's a poke at his side and hears a voice saying, "Is that really you?" as if he could be someone else. As if anyone would want to be him. No, that's not true, he's a lot better off than most people. Hell, some people would be glad to get rid of their parents.
         There's a percolating, popping beat in the background. Brown turns in tune to it, wondering who called him, who touched him, who the hell else would remember him. You figure that if you disappear long enough everyone would forget you, isn't that everyone's greatest fear. It's apparently not true, we never forget anyone for as long as we live. He finds that vaguely comforting. It's going to be an interesting life.
         "Joe?" the voice says, asking, stating, probing. A girl has a hand on his arm and her eyes are bright and shining, matching the smile on her face. Her face is framed with dark hair, shorter than he remembers but even in the dark, with her face half caught in strobe, rendered in flash, he can still tell. There are some faces that don't ever leave our memories.
         He feels a cool, casual smile dawning on his face and for the first time he feels years younger. "Well hello there," he greets her simply, leaning one arm against the bar, the roguish gleam in his eye he imagines.
         "Joe!" she says again, throwing her arms around him and he returns the embrace wholeheartedly. In the background, the old soldier sense, he can feel eyes on him, staring and seeking. A quick glance shows someone standing nearby, arms crossed, a carefully placed neutral tone raised on his face. If Brown stares hard enough he might see something disapproving. He ignores it, he's greeting his friend, dammit and the hell if he's going to let anything spoil this.
         She feels so small against him, and he steps back to look at her. He feels so much older than the rest of them now, he can't help it, like turning around and staring in the mirror and realizing that you've become your parents, it colors your entire outlook.
         "Goddamn, Jina, I didn't expect to see you here," Brown says, his voice rasping into hoarseness, trying to hold a conversation in the face of a tidal wave of noise. He draws her back around the corner, trying to get out of the line of sight of the onslaught, trying to get away. That's what it's all about. It's what they're all doing.
         "Me?" she asks him, her face incredulous. "Joe, we went to school with half these people . . ." and she shakes her head. "How could you think I wouldn't be here?"
         He gives her that same mysterious, vaguely mischievous glance. "Well, now, maybe I just didn't want to get my hopes up. I so hate being disappointed." The last sentence is delivered in a voice bordering on mocking sadness, stepping off the cliff only to find that someone thought to put a foam mattress at the bottom.
         "You . . ." she shakes her head again, giving him a playful punch in the arm. "I just can't believe it . . . Tristian said you were here but . . ." she drops her hands to her side, giving up, her eyes suggesting surrender to the mystery. "Where the hell have you been?"
         "Oh, you know, here. There. And back here again." He sticks his head around the corner, just in time to see two utterly drunk people crash into each other, spinning and spiraling to the ground, attempting to help each other but failing miserably and thinking that it's the goddamn funniest joke in the entire world. Ever.
         She crosses her arms over her chest, giving him a cheerfully peevish glare, leaning up against the wall next to him. When you run into someone you were friends with, no matter how long ago it was, you fall into the same routines, the same conversations, almost picking up right where you left off, mid sentence, like no time has passed at all. That's the feeling they're both getting right now, and time stripping away in clumps. Years don't exist, they never did, it's just folded time and you step from one place to the other, no intervening space, no sensation of movement. It's just there. You're just there. It just is.
         "I'll get it out of you eventually," she tells him, making a threat a promise and if there was anyone out there in this great big party that could do so, it'd probably be Jina. Brown stares at her and the memories resurface, awakening, stepping from cold storage.
         "You're welcome to try," he shoots back, throwing the gauntlet down. But he'd never tell, he knows that, he can't make Tristian's mistake and let his lives intersect and fall into each other. They wouldn't understand, just as they didn't understand with Tristian. He wants them remembering good old Joseph Brown, and leave Commander Joseph Brown of the Time Patrol as a character in some obscure pulp magazine. He never existed, just some gross figment.
         So change the subject, fool, use the patented Brown charm. "But, seriously, you look good, if anything you've gotten more stunning than ever over the years." Bad pickup line, but good compliment. Never said the patented Brown charm was subtle. Never said that.
         She beams at the comment, taking it for what it's worth. "Thanks. God, it's really good seeing you here tonight." Her voice is muffled by the music, wrapped in foam from a long distance away. She's so close and yet falling farther by the second. "Um, are you sticking around for a while . . ." a hesitant question, not sure what subjects she's poking into, not sure about his life at all. He's the perpetual blank slate.
         "Perhaps . . ." preferring to leave his answer cryptic. "Why, are you finally going to come around to my obvious charms? Because that's the only thing that'll make me stay, you know." His tone is casually teasing, bouncing up and down, somehow not losing the nuances in the muddy pool of noise around them.
         Jina gives him a sideways glance, slyly, in another world, maybe even suggestive. Then she sticks her tongue out at him. "I was wondering how long it would take for you to say something like that. You never disappoint."
         "Right back at you, my dear," he tells her, giving her a half bow, elegant in his manner, poised. Outside their circle of conversation, the music jumps and throws itself at the air. Brown and Jina both wince, a chord struck that goes right into their heads. They both give a laugh at the mirrored reaction.
         "But this really isn't the place to hold a decent conversation," Brown finally says, pumping his ear with one hand, like he's trying to pull out something that fell into it. Then, a crinkled smile. "If you'd let me buy you dinner one night, perhaps . . ."
         "Ah, well, now, since you offered, how can I resist?" She takes a step back, as if seeing him for the first time, like he's changed that much. Looking him up and down, or trying to give him that impression at least, she says, "I think we have lots to talk about."
         "Well, you do at least. My life has been the epitome of boredom the last few years," he replies airily. "But then, I always figure that boredom can't kill you."
         "So they say. I don't believe it for a second."
         "Yeah but action looks good on you."
         She punches him again, then stops, as if a sudden stray thought has spun out of the air and into her head. Jina takes three steps back, and then grabs the hand of the young man who has been trying not to stare at them, trying not to hear their conversation, for the entire time. He staggers forward a few steps, tripping convincingly as Jina brings him over.
         "Joe, this is Brian . . ." she gives Brian a coy glance, her grip on his hand tightening. "He's a good friend."
         Aha. Brian gives a mildly embarrassed smile but recovers gracefully and shakes Brown's hand, the gesture tight but with a bit of tautness to it. Not a jealous bloke, but he's only human. Brown looks at him and then back and Jina and approves. Probably not her boyfriend just yet, Jina always had this habit of road testing her boyfriends before committing to them fully but then after Rich, he really couldn't blame her. That guy was a real bastard.
         "Hey, pleasure to meet you," Brown says cheerfully, leaning back on the wall again, subtly shifting his weight from Jina, a male gesture that Brian hopefully would understand. Pal, I'm not after your woman. Men speak plainly when they need to, color everything in complicated sentences when it doesn't make any real difference. Just the way things work. Women are just the opposite. Neither method really works well.
         "Yup, me and Jina go back a ways," Brown says, giving a lecture with his captive audience. "The girl always has captivated me, I just can't help myself," his voice is light, empty of meaning, Brian's eyes keep flickering in the lightdark but his expression is devoid of anything hostile. Like everyone, he's curious. Who is this guy that everyone seems to know so well. Brown's not used to being the mystery and part of him is really getting into it. "Asked her to marry me, what, a dozen times maybe," he glances at Jina for support but she's turned away, covering her mouth and shaking slightly. Fine, be that way. He gives a forlorn sigh. "But, alas I was rejected every single time." He waves a finger at Brian, who is now grinning easily, falling into the rhythms of the conversation. "At the peak of my youth, mind you, when I would have been the catch of the day for any fine girl with discerning taste." He traces his outline in the air with his hands, indicating his body. "Now, that I'm old and wrinkled and decrepit, my youthful figure part of a past I can't reclaim, I'm afraid my chance for Jina's hand is gone and lost." He seems to shake a bit with sorrow, turning his head to the side in an apparent attempt to collect himself. "I carry on, though. Somehow. The less . . . the less I think about it the better . . ." he wipes a single invisible tear from the corner of his eye.
         He covers Jina's ears suddenly, saying quickly to Brian, "Don't make my mistake! Strike while the iron is hot before-"
         "You're so full of it," Jina yells, laughing. She grabs his wrists and forces his hands away from her ears. It's the old days again, caught up in the magic, the neverending summer of youth. Even in the winter it always felt warm.
         Still grasping his wrists, Jina turns her head, peering into the murky cloud of dancing bodies. "I think I see Lena . . ." he thinks she says but he has no idea who "Lena" might even be. He's looking too, trying to peel back the dark and make out something more than constantly jumping forms, some seemingly joined at the hip.
         "Any idea where Tristian might-" but then she suddenly pulls him forward with a jerk that he's not ready for. His sentence is cut off as he attempts to maintain his balance, the world reeling and rocking for a brief second. He tries not to fall into her and thinks how fun a thing that might be. Her hands are surprisingly cool against his skin.
         "I think you owe me a dance, after all these years, Joe," she calls to him, laughing, turning and pulling him while she walks backward. Over his shoulder she mouths something to Brian but out of the corner of his eye, Brown can only see the other man laugh to himself and turn to Sam to get a drink, shaking his head in disbelief the entire time.
         ". . . I'd beg for some forgiveness, but beggin's not my business . . ." it keeps singing.
         He gives her a grin that reaches back to a different time. "No, Jina, I think it's you who owes me at least one dance."
         "Just one?" and there's something playful in her eyes.
         Brown sends it right back. It's only fair. "Only because I'm a nice guy and I don't want to wear you out." He shifts his weight and he spins her around, dangling her by one hand. She's lighter than he ever expected. "If I really wanted to keep track, I'd have you dancing the whole damn night."
         "One at a time," and he catches a glimpse of her eyes, partial reflections of his, a dancestep into timeliness, as she spins and lunges, laughing, taking his weight with her.
         Seeing no reason to resist, he lets himself go and together they plunge right into the center of the heaving storm.