The Del Rey Book of Science Fiction and Fantasy

Chapter One The Elephant Ironclads Jason Stoddard Jason Stoddard lives in Newhall, California, with his wife, Lisa (who writes under the name Rina Slayter), and a motley assortment of tortoises and cars. He has gone from the discipline of engineering to the halls of advertising, then on to the wild world of interactive marketing. His short fiction has appeared in SCI FICTION, Interzone, Strange Horizons, Fortean Bureau, Futurismic, and GUD, and he was a finalist for both the Theodore Sturgeon Memorial Award and the Sidewise Award for Alternate History. Jason is currently working on novels based on his short fiction. His website is www.xcentric.com. "The Elephant Ironclads" is another alternate historybased (as most of the best of the subgenre) on some unbelievable but actual historical events. Ow, those are healthy elephants," Niyol Chavez said. Wallace Chee ground his teeth. Ahead of them, a caravan loaded with Mexican sugar was coming down the dusty road from the Albuquerque airfield. On top of the lead elephant, a fat merchant in a gaudy Hopi outfit bounced, wearing the satisfied grin of a man who has made an excellent deal. "See how they almost prance," Niyol said, pointing. "Healthy." "Stop it," Wallace said. "Look at how they shake their heads." "Stop it!" "They even sound like" Wallace turned and pushed Niyol, hard. Wallace caught a glimpse of his friend's broad, playful smile, then Niyol's legs tangled and he fell sideways into the scrub. "I was joking!" Niyol said, his dark eyes flashing anger. I didn't know the elephant was sick, Wallace wanted to say. Images of the dead elephant, lying in the dust outside the skeleton of his father's burned-out workshop, came unbidden. The slack stares of Niyol and Patrick and Jose, who had given all their Dine pesos for Wallace's tales of an elephant of their own, a trade route that would bring them riches before they were fourteen. The flaming anger of his mother when she'd discovered he'd taken her precious tourist dollars to fund his dream. Her tears when she saw the carcass. The way she looked from the elephant to the workshop and back again. And, finally, the few pesos he'd been able to get from the butcher as he began the grim job of rendering the elephant down to dog food and bonemeal. "I told you I'd pay you back." "No. You won't." Niyol picked himself up and brushed dust from his jeans. "No?" "We'll both pay your mother back." Niyol eyed the Dine airships that dotted the faraway field. "If there's any work left, that is." "What do you mean?" "The caravans are already coming south, so they've probably already unloaded." Wallace grimaced. Niyol was as sharp of mind as he was of tongue. He would probably go back to school next year, to The-Years-That-Finish- You. And after his years at the Americanized school, he'd be able to get a job in California or Mexico, rather than Dinetah. "There'll be other airships," Wallace said. Niyol scanned the empty blue sky and shrugged. As the caravan passed, the elephants' trumpeting sounded like laughter. At the Albuquerque airfield, a half dozen airships hung motionless in the clear blue winter sky. On one of the ships, Dine airmen were making repairs to the skyshields, their bright orange-and-red-tunicsDatlow, Ellen is the author of 'The Del Rey Book of Science Fiction and Fantasy' with ISBN 9780345496324 and ISBN 0345496329.