The Spaces in Between by Chase Henderson

way here. She said I was the only man that could make her laugh. Name this thing, and I’ll be on my way.” Cameron loaded another shell into his flintlock. Adam had a skill that was very unique to him – he was fluent in the Logos or True Language. The True Language was a Hebrew dialect spoken by God. Hebrew was the language that repeated itself the most across Creation. One of the goals of Kabbalah, the Kosher one, was to discover this dialect.
    There were few fluent speakers, but Adam was charged by God to name all things in creation. Unless Adam had named it, it was not part of Creation. He could not go an entire minute without reminding someone.
    “I really hate you Cameron Styles. So much that I’m willing to make a deal with you – if you can make it interesting.”
    “How about a year’s servitude?” Adam didn’t flinch. “Alright, my left hand. Your own access to the physical world.”
    “There are many people trying to find you, Cameron Styles, but there is only one of them that you fear. I want the flutter of butterflies put back in your stomach. For you to feel what it’s like to be an insignificant again. I want you to remember your place.” Adam opened his eyes. “I want you to remove the wards that prevent Lam from finding you.”
    “You have three seconds.” Cameron put the barrel of his flintlock to Adam’s forehead. “Make it a good name. Something masculine.”
    “I told you my terms,” Adam said, “I am not a mere Elemental you can threaten. Pulling that trigger would be the worse mistake of your existence.”
    “One!”
    Adam closed his eyes.
    “Two!”
    The Fillipre disease made a run for the door.
    “Three!”
    It became splattered across the walls of Adam’s barren throne room. Cameron inhaled deeply.
    “Alright, Lam can find me.” The Fillipre strand quickly reformed and spilled towards one of the broken windows. Adam stepped out in front of it and whispered in its ear.
    “Xibulba.” The writhing black mass jerked and took the form of rotting and fetid Cameron. Xibulba stared back at Cameron with a sullen and sunken green eye. Dirty red dreadlocks draped over a contorted face, and he let out a horrible scream. Cameron pierced Xibulba through the torso, and the screaming creature thrashed as he said the words of power over it.
    Adam looked smug and very pleased with himself.
    9
     
    Cameron shoveled four sugar cubes into his glass of pale green liquor. It quickly shifted to a cloudy color. He sipped his absinthe and held a bag of ice against his head. The tablets he rescued from Fillipre lie in his lap, but they were written in the Logos . He had a starship full of corpses that have finally stopped moving in tow. Xibulba thrashed and screamed from the room beside him.
    “Come and get me you sons of bitches.”
    The entire bridge was filled with little gray men. Their black eyes were all focused on Cameron. He raised a toast to them.
     
     
     
     

Intermission: Six Shooter Samurai
     
    Sakamoto Ryoma meditated upon his impending demise. Only moments before he was enjoying a meal with colleague and friend Nakaoka Shintarou in the basement of the Omi Inn. It had been a month since Shogun Tokugawa Yoshinobu accepted Ryoma’s Eight Point Plan, which would peacefully return rule of Japan into the hands of the Emperor.
    The Ronin from Tosa was to remain in hiding until the Tokugawa abdicated the throne in the next month. Despite turning down a position in the new government both sides were deeply threatened by him. This was not the first attempt on his life, but it would be the last.
    There was a knock on the door.
    “Come in.” Ryoma grasped the sandalwood handle concealed in his kimono. With a flick of this thumb Shinta loosened his sword from its scabbard.
    “ Oyasumi nasai ,” a man in a nondescript kimono stepped through the door. He wore only one katana and his hair was uncut in the front, which told Ryoma this man was a Ronin . The man was strikingly familiar. “