How to Traverse Terra Incognita Read online

  “Dean Francis Alfar’s stories contain fantastic worldbuilding, crisp prose, and contemplative, poignant storytelling. Several of these stories made me cry. If you aren’t reading Alfar yet, you should be.” – Hugo Award winner Lynne M. Thomas, Editor-in-Chief, Apex Magazine

  “Dean Francis Alfar is one of the most inventive writers of speculative fiction today. It’s criminal that his often playful, sometimes serious, gloriously literate tales aren’t better known around the world. Although he’s a very different writer, his lyrical style seems to me to make him a Ray Bradbury for the 21st century.” – John Grant, Joint Editor of The Encyclopedia of Fantasy, and author of Warm Words and Otherwise: A Blizzard of Book Reviews and many others

  “Dean Francis Alfar is a wondrous storyteller, creating tales that take the reader far and wide. From reluctant dragon fathers and dueling weather gods to demanding, dying queens, he has a way of pulling you into his captivating worlds and never letting go. And really, who would want to leave anyway when there is something extraordinary around every corner?” – Hugo Award winner editor Ann VanderMeer

  “Dean Francis Alfar’s ambitious but aptly titled collection is a revelation. In these wide-ranging stories you’ll find the melancholy magic of Kelly Link mixed with the clever wit and bite of Etgar Keret mixed with the unrestrained passion of Harlan Ellison. Yet, How to Traverse Terra Incognita is utterly original. It’s like that amazing new band that you fall in love with instantly and want to share with everyone. Then you and your friends will be gladly building replicas of your kingdoms, barricading the house against fathers, and packing for the moon.” – Paul Tremblay, author of The Little Sleep and Swallowing a Donkey’s Eye

  “How to Traverse Terra Incognita is a kaleidoscope of strange realities. Dean Francis Alfar’s elegant prose offers tantalizing glimpses of broken fairy tales, urban magics, and everyday sadnesses.” – Ditmar Award winnner Tansy Rayner Roberts, author of Creature Court trilogy and Love and Romanpunk.

  “Dean Francis Alfar is an amazing talent. Profound, luminous and lyrical, How to Traverse Terra Incognita is the masterwork of an artist at the very top of his game. This collection is a must-read for anyone who cares about the magic of rubbing words together.” – Ted Kosmatka, author of The Games

  “When Dean Francis Alfar is at his best in stories like ‘The Ghosts of Wan Chai’ and ‘Securing Doors from Fathers,’ he illuminates human emotion with deft surrealism that merges the familiar and the unfamiliar, allowing the reader to view both in a new light. His clever use of sustained metaphor allows him to play with subtext, memory, and the intersection between personal and communal experience.” – Nebula Award winning author Rachel Swirsky

  “Like water coming and going from some strange invisible well, arresting style and uncanny subjects flow in the short fiction of Dean Francis Alfar. An innovative force behind him moves in each compelling story. With Dali-like detail, Mr. Alfar coolly raises hanging coffins, replicas of maritime kingdoms, phantom brides and Hong Kong suicides, whirling chatty lobsters, Mr. Sun’s face, and the remarkable art of making love to twins. He is never afraid to go out and seek what strange thing he may find. I won’t say this writer merits only finding a wider readership in the West: it is better to say that we are entitled to find him. Read something from this collection before you go to bed; rise with the wonder of what happened to your dreams.” – Danel Olson, editor of the Exotic Gothic series

  For my three muses: Nikki, Sage, and Rowan; and for my first storyteller, Monjierra Alonto Disini.

  CONTENTS

  Acknowledgments

  RESEARCH YOUR DESTINATION

  Simon’s Replica

  Fallow’s Flight

  In the City of a Thousand Gods

  Strange Weather

  TAKE APPROPRIATE PRECAUTIONS

  Ghosts of Wan Chai

  Securing Doors from Fathers

  Survey of Artifacts Found Aboard The Malaya

  Packing for the Moon

  WHEN TRAVELING WITH CHILDREN, BE SENSITIVE TO THEIR NEEDS

  Bruhita

  Poor, Poor Luisa

  Azamgal

  Escape

  UNDERSTAND THE CULTURE

  East of the Sun

  Ever, After

  Messiah

  The Many Loves of Ramil Alonzo

  GET TO KNOW THE LOCALS

  Remembrance

  The Face

  Sunboy

  The Fortune-teller’s Beautiful Daughter

  An excerpt from A Door Opens: the Beginning of the Fall of the Ispancialo-in-Hinirang (Emprensa Press: 2007) by Salahuddin Alonto, annotated by Omar Jamad Maududi, MLS, HOL, JMS

  Copyright page

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  While writing is a solitary endeavor, I’ve been fortunate to have wonderful traveling companions along the way.

  Much gratitude to Alex and Kate Osias, Andrew Drilon, Vin Simbulan, Kenneth Yu, Charles Tan, Ian Rosales Casocot, Gavin Grant, Ted Kosmatka, Danel Olson, Lavie Tidhar, Jeffrey Ford, Donald Webb, all of the LitCritters, Sarge Lacuesta, Joel Toledo, Joel Pablo Salud, Alma Anonas-Carpio, Katrina Bolasco, Susan Lara, Marjorie Evasco, Cristina Pantoja Hidalgo, Butch Dalisay, Ichi Batacan, Joey Nacino, Ruel de Vera, Carljoe Javier, Paolo Chikiamco, Honey de Peralta, Adam David, and Kristine Reynaldo—fellow authors and publishers whose support and encouragement kept me going.

  Special thanks to Jacque Calixto, who never lets me down.

  Great thanks to Nikki Alfar, partner, relentless editor, and kakampi; and Sage and Rowan Alfar, daughters who read and inspire.

  RESEARCH YOUR DESTINATION

  SIMON’S REPLICA

  IN THE FINAL decades of her rule that was characterized by an intense yearning to preserve memory, Mon Jiera, Reina of Lusan, Protector of Bisyas, and First Citizen of Danao, decreed the creation of a precise replica of her three maritime kingdoms.

  Those were days of incontestable bounty and quiet peace, when the network of roads and island-spanning bridges were new and led to uttermost parts of the kingdoms, when fishermen did not have to go beyond a cigarette’s distance from the deep harbors to make a day’s wage, when being a policeman was a part-time job due to the indolence of the dwindling number of criminals, and when the theatrical recitative was at its creative zenith, inspiring narratives about knowledge and devotion, mostly in the vulgar tongue for the edification of the masses.

  Within the Royal Enclosure of Lusan (that part of the grand manse where royalty of old celebrated with tuba or witnessed beheadings), Mon Jiera summoned Simon de los Santos, multi-decorated architect, composer, playwright, perennial beauty pageant judge and champion stock car driver; at forty-eight years old, already famous for the intricate pneumatic fountains at the Gate of Idad, the choreopoetic transliteration of Ibn al Faran’s Gestures Under Rainfall, and for being the five-time off-road record holder of the Seibu Annual Rally.

  “Favorite,” the withered Mon Jiera addressed him. “Would you say that, under our rule, our lands have come to a remarkable state of prosperity?”

  “I would, My Queen,” Simon de los Santos replied, with a graceful bow.

  “And would you say that what we have built with our hands and hearts will last forever?” the queen asked.

  “My Great Lady,” Simon said, choosing his words with care. “Only the human spirit is immortal. That, and the legacy of free will, beauty, and law that we pass to those who come after us.”

  “But will we be remembered?” the queen asked. “Will everything that we have created, all that we have worked for, will everything be remembered as things are?”

  “‘As things are’?” Simon repeated. “Books will be written, of course, My Queen; paintin
gs, murals, photographs commissioned. But those cannot possibly cover everything.”

  “We need everything to remembered,” the queen said, closing her eyes. “Everything.”

  “But—” Simon began.

  “Favorite,” Mon Jierra interrupted him. She opened her eyes and looked at Simon directly. “You will undertake a task for us that will make all your previous achievements pale like virgins about to be taken by brutes.”

  “As you will, My Queen,” Simon nodded, smoothing the near-invisible wrinkles on his white linen suit. “I am your servant.”

  “Yes, yes,” the old woman said. “And spare no expense. We will wear our funeral shroud soon.”

  A gasp resounded throughout the Royal Enclosure, flitting from lips to ear to lips, from courtiers to officers of the court, before escaping down the hallway in the mouths of secretaries and serving boys, and from them to the scullions, washers, mechanics, deliverymen, and gardeners on the palace grounds, then off into the polished streets where beautiful brown-skinned women with dark hair trembled in sadness, and handsome men with broad noses daubed their eyes with handkerchiefs, and into the mosques, gas stations, mercados, food courts, amusement parks and massage parlors where obese men’s hearts were given a double workout, and finally into the broad countryside and beyond, across the islands to the satellite towns, villages, and crofts, where the news was met with great sorrow.

  “Oh, no, My Queen,” Simon de los Santos protested, rising daringly to his feet. “It cannot be true!”

  “Spare us your theatrics, Favorite,” the queen said, gesturing for him to resume his initial kneeling position. “There is no true palliative against time. Now, we possess no charm to reduce our kingdoms to the size of a biscuit and keep them in a glass box. We do not believe that the miracles of science can etch the lives of people on to strangely flavored particles. And we do not think that people in heaven keep track of who has done what.”

  “True,” Simon de los Santos interjected. “That would be quite prideful.”

  “Indeed,” the queen said. “And in the absence of magic, science, and religion, what do we have left to keep the memory of who we were and what we did, what we achieved, when we yet lived?”

  “Art, My Great Lady,” Simon de los Santos replied, with moisture in his eyes. “Free-willed, beautiful, lawful art.”

  “You will create, beginning this very day and without relent, a replica of our three kingdoms as they stand. You will capture the spirit of our people and all we have built. It must be exact, faithful, and true. You will perform this task with all your talent and all your strength.”

  “With all my heart, Great Lady,” Simon de los Santos said softly.

  “We intend to see some semblance of its wonder before we close our eyes for the last time, Favorite,” the old woman on the ornate throne told him. “Now go. Begin.”

  “At once, My Queen.” Simon de los Santos stood, bowed, and walked away on legs weakened by the impossible weight of the Queen’s imperative, and when he was alone in his car, lit a cigarette, tuned the radio to sentimental love songs, and thought about glassworks, cartography, and the flickering nature of memory. Then he began to drive home, taking the opportunity offered by every stoplight to make calls on his cell phone to people he knew and to people who knew people he didn’t know.

  EIGHT MONTHS LATER, Mon Jiera, pale and tired, was informed over breakfast, by one of her attendants, that Simon de los Santos’s miraculous replica was completed.

  “Impossible,” the queen said, staring at the half-eaten soft-boiled egg in front of her. It took the better part of the day for her royal retinue to convey her, with the barest of pomp, to a large field on the outskirts of the capital, where a huge tent housed Simon de los Santos and his labors.

  Her traveling throne was set securely on a narra platform in the tent’s dimly lit interior. As the platform slowly ascended to thrice a man’s height, she steadied herself, squinting into the shadows that offered tantalizing shapes and forms.

  A lone spotlight suddenly illuminated Simon de los Santos, broad shoulders squarely set in a crisp white linen suit, standing on some lesser elevation.

  “My Queen,” he addressed her, his amplified voice echoing in the vast interior. “After months of dreams and labor, I humbly present Your Majesty’s three kingdoms!”

  At his signal, hidden voices began to sing, as lights shone in structured sequence, revealing Simon de los Santos astride the Cordil mountain range, rendered in miniature. All around him, forests and lakes and plains sprawled outward, gleaming roads racing towards coastlines. Provinces and their capitals glittered like gemstones, slender bridges arched across water linking island to island to island. Every single geographic feature of the each of the three kingdoms, every famous river and volcano and plateau, was on display, eliciting murmurs of delight from the courtiers and officers that stood below the queen’s platform.

  When everything on display was fully lit, when artificial waves lapped against the shores of the multitudes of islands, and when all the tiny rice fields transformed from paddies into bountiful harvest, synchronized to the rhythm of a troupe of dancing girls, Simon de los Santos raised his eyes toward his queen, certain in his heart of his success.

  Mon Jiera, unmoving and unmoved by the spectacle, met his gaze. “We cannot see the cities; they are too small. Do better. It is not as things are.”

  And with that pronouncement, the show was over. As the queen’s platform descended, Simon fought back the sudden nausea that enveloped him, rested a hand against the nearest mountain peak, obliterating vast tracts of miniscule forests, and thought about what to do next.

  When the queen and her retinue had departed, Simon de los Santos addressed the dejected crowd of set and lighting designers, miniaturists, geomancers, gardeners, cartographers, carpenters, engineers, electricians, musicians, historians, documentarians, reporters, caterers, dancing troupes, and child volunteers.

  “Clearly, my friends,” Simon said, stretching his trembling arms to full extension, “everything needs to be bigger.”

  THE NEARBY PROVINCE of Lagun was selected as the site of the next replica. When those who dwelled there were informed that their entire province—every road and field and house and mango grove—was needed, the general response was to give way to the queen’s will and to begin the task of uprooting themselves. With the provincial boundaries determining the edges of the site, Simon de los Santos and his growing population of workers and specialists and their families and hangers-on settled in and began to work. Over the next decade, doctors of forestry and mathematics, their famous university transplanted to another province, teamed up with landscape designers to render the archipelago in perfect scale, while oceanographers, animatronics experts, and animal rights advocates worked with officers of the Queen’s Navy to ensure the veracity of every beach, cove, and estuary, as well the appropriate distribution of each locality’s maritime wildlife. Massive tractors and excavators, powered by liquefied petroleum gas, flattened hills and shattered rocks. A network of polyvinyl chloride pipes stretched from Lagun Bay and created a new coastline, submerging all the small towns in a line from San Padro to Alamin, from Luisan to Silong. With an escalating portion of the kingdoms’ budget allocated to the immense project, materials arrived on the site via helicopters, ten-wheelers, and barges. Work never stopped, except out of respect for Ramadan.

  In the midst of this all, Simon de los Santos kept everyone and everything on schedule, his furious concentration undermined only by rumors of the old queen’s failing health: that she had suffered multiple strokes that left the majority of her body paralyzed; that her fatigued heart had been replaced with a mechanical marvel that permitted her no dreams due to its incessant whirring; that her mind had fallen prey to the disease of forgetfulness.

  Over the course of years he fought back the temptation to stop, to say that it was enough, to rush to his queen’s side, to simply be there for her as she faded. But a challenge was a challenge, a
nd Simon de los Santos was never one to accept failure, no matter how well-cloaked by extenuating circumstances. It was only when he was satisfied, after a period of intense personal review and scrutiny that he declared the marvelous replica completed and sent a brief formal telegram to the queen’s Office of Communications.

  IT TOOK THE queen, on an intricately designed wheeled conveyance encased in a delicate glass bubble, with Simon de los Santos mounted on a champion racehorse, accompanied by her retinue and palace security in various vehicles, thirty days to tour the province-sized scale model of her three kingdoms. Through it all, she kept her opinions to herself, permitting her guide every bit of space his narrative required, as he gestured to this mosque or that tree-lined hot spring. On his part, Simon de los Santos left no detail unmentioned, drawing her attention to the transition from dry season into wet with an elegant flourish of his hands, a signal for the aerial team of meteorologists and hydraulic engineers suspended above in a balloon to make rain. But he also could not help but look at the old woman behind the glass, her shrunken frame covered in Bengut blankets, despite her bubble’s climate controls. As he wondered how well she remembered him, he noted that it was her silence that affected him the most. Even as he mouthed his practiced words, he could not help but sense the fleeting nature of her attention. The old queen’s movements were so economical that Simon de los Santos often thought she had stopped breathing, and was utterly relieved when the tour was done.

  She gestured to him from within the bubble.

  He slowly knelt in front of her, ignoring the arthritic pains his own advancing years had developed.

  Her lips moved, and he strained to listen, but could hear nothing but a soft whirring from inside the bubble. He turned his face to one of the officers of the court for help.

  “Her Majesty remembers you and commends you on your good work,” the official said.

  Simon de los Santos permitted himself a sigh.