The Dead Town Read online

  A silver bead glistened on the Boze’s left temple, just like the beads on the faces of those zombie people in the jail cells.

  All the people in jail had waited like good dogs told “Stay.” And then the handsome young man had arrived and turned into an angel, but then not an angel, and then he had torn them all apart and had taken them into himself.

  Nummy hoped the handsome young man didn’t show up here anytime soon.

  Mr. Lyss closed the back door and crossed the room, leaving clumps of snow on the vinyl floor. He peered closely at the corpse but didn’t touch it.

  “He’s been dead awhile. At least eight or ten hours, probably longer. Probably it happened before dawn.”

  Nummy didn’t have any idea how you could know when a person must have died, and he didn’t want to learn. To learn such a thing, you’d have to see a lot of dead people and most likely examine them close, but what Nummy wanted most was never to see another dead person as long as he lived.

  From the table, Mr. Lyss picked up a sort of gun made of shiny metal. He turned it this way and that, studying it.

  On the table stood a bowl of fresh fruit: a few bananas, a pear, a couple of big apples that didn’t look quite ripe. Mr. Lyss pointed the strange-looking gun at an apple and pulled the trigger. Thhuuup! Suddenly on the apple appeared a gleaming silvery bead just like the one on Officer Bozeman’s face.

  Mr. Lyss pulled the trigger again, but nothing happened. When he fired the gun a third time—Thhuuup!—the second apple now had a silver bead, too. The fourth time, nothing happened again.

  “A two-cycle mechanism. What’s it do on the second cycle?” Mr. Lyss asked.

  There wasn’t any kind of cycle in the kitchen, not a bicycle or a tricycle, or a motorcycle. Nummy didn’t know how to answer the old man’s question, and he didn’t want to be snarled at again and told that he was dumb. They both knew he was dumb, he always had been, so neither of them needed to be reminded of it all the time. Nummy kept silent.

  As Mr. Lyss returned the silver-bead gun to the table where he’d found it, piano music rose from the living room. The Boze had a piano. He called it an upright, so Nummy figured it originally must have been in a church or somewhere clean and holy like that, not in some barroom. Kiku played the upright, and she taught the Boze to play it, but neither of them could be playing it now, both being dead.

  “Let’s get out of here,” Nummy said.

  “No. We’re in it now, boy.” The old man raised his long gun. “Cowardice is often a fine thing, but there’s times when it can get you killed.”

  Mr. Lyss went to the hallway door, which stood open. He found the light switch, and the dark hall brightened.

  As Mr. Lyss stepped out of the kitchen, Nummy decided it was scarier to be alone with a dead person than it was to go see who was at the piano. He followed the old man.

  The music was pretty but sad.

  At the end of the hall, the living room remained dark. Nummy wondered how anyone could play a piano so well in total darkness.

  chapter 11

  Sammy Chakrabarty never stood around waiting for someone else to get things done. He was always moving, doing, thinking, dealing with the task of the moment but simultaneously planning ahead. He stood five ten, weighed only 130 pounds, ate enough for two men, but couldn’t gain an ounce because he was so active and his metabolism was always revving.

  He had been helping to adapt the current broadcast to the failure of all phone service and Internet access, which seemed to be a crisis when it happened in the middle of a talk show. Now it wasn’t a crisis anymore, wasn’t even a problem, considering that two men had just been killed, men or something passing for men, and KBOW had plunged into the Twilight Zone.

  Sammy ran from the engineer’s control room to the kitchenette, which featured a refrigerator, microwave oven, ice-maker, and coffee machine. Sammy yanked open the cabinet drawer that contained flatware and various utensils, including a few knives, and he selected the biggest and sharpest blade.

  At twenty-three, Sammy was already the radio station’s program director, promotion director, and community-affairs director. He lived in an inexpensive two-room apartment, drove an ancient Honda, and invested half his after-tax income, doing his own online stock trading with considerable success. His plan was to become general manager by the age of twenty-six, purchase KBOW by the time he was twenty-nine, and use it as a platform to develop groundbreaking programming that might have enough appeal to be syndicated across the country.

  The extraordinary events of the past few minutes might have ramifications that would set back his plan as much as a year, perhaps even eighteen months. But Sammy Chakrabarty could not conceive of any circumstances that might delay him longer than that or thwart him altogether.

  Carrying the knife, he hurried back through the building toward the engineer’s nest, where the station personnel and the giant with the half-smashed face, who called himself Deucalion, stood over the bodies that looked like Warren and Andy Snyder but perhaps were not.

  Ralph Nettles, their engineer, was a rock-solid guy, known for his reliability, truthfulness, and common sense. So it must be true that Warren and Andy had tried to kill him, that this tattooed stranger saved his life and was their ally, and that pale blue vapor gushed from Warren’s nostrils during his death throes, as though he might be less a man than a machine in which some reservoir of coolant had been ruptured. It must be true, but everyone preferred to have a bit more confirming evidence.

  In the control room, in addition to Ralph and the giant, there were Burt Cogborn, the station’s advertising salesman and ad-copy writer, and Mason Morrell, their weekday-evening talk-show host, who had switched from live chatter to a prerecorded segment that he kept on hand for emergencies like this. Well, not exactly like this. The kind of emergency Mason had in mind was an unexpected attack of on-air diarrhea. Everyone but the stranger looked anxious and confused.

  In Sammy’s absence, the body of Warren Snyder had been stripped to the waist, and his pants had been pulled down far enough to reveal his entire abdomen, sternum to groin.

  “I don’t know exactly what you’ll see,” Deucalion said, “but I’m confident it will be enough to prove this wasn’t the real Warren Snyder.”

  The giant knelt beside the corpse and plunged the knife into it, just below the breastbone.

  Mason Morrell gasped, probably not because the mutilation of the corpse shocked or dismayed him, but only for effect, to suggest that he, an on-air talent, was by nature more sensitive than those who labored behind the scenes of his show. Sammy liked Mason, though the guy was always performing to one degree or another, whether at the microphone or not, and he was sometimes exhausting.

  A thin serpent of blood slithered from the haft of the buried knife and along the pale abdomen, and for a moment the cadaver seemed human, after all. But then Deucalion slashed to the navel and beyond, and the illusion of humanity was cut away. The lips of the wound sagged apart, and the blood—if it was blood—proved to be confined to the surface tissues.

  Deeper, all was strange, not the viscera of a human body. Some of the organs were the color of milk glass, others were white tinted unevenly with faint streaks of gray like the flesh of certain fish, and a smaller number were white with the merest suggestion of green, some smooth and slick, others textured like curds of cottage cheese, all of them bizarre in shape and asymmetrical. A double helix of opalescent tubes twined through the body trunk, and a creamy fluid leaked from those that had been nicked or severed. Throughout the body cavity lay a fine web of luminous filaments that seemed less biological than electronic, and they glowed softly even though this replicant of Warren Snyder was surely as dead as the real man that he had replaced.

  Leaving the knife protruding from the body, Deucalion rose to his full height.

  With a quiver of revulsion and with fear in his voice that dismayed him, Sammy Chakrabarty asked, “What is that thing?”

  “It was made in a labora
tory,” the giant said. “Hundreds or even thousands of them are in the process of taking control of this town.”

  “What laboratory?” Ralph Nettles wondered. He shook his head in disbelief. “Our science isn’t far enough advanced to do this.”

  “The proof is before your eyes,” Deucalion reminded him.

  Burt Cogborn stared not at the cadaver but at his wristwatch, as if his world of radio-spot sales allowed no room for a development of this magnitude, as if he might announce that he had a deadline looming and needed to return to his office to write ad copy.

  “Maybe a laboratory,” Ralph acceded. “But not on this planet.”

  “On this planet, in this state, this county,” Deucalion assured them with unsettling certainty. “Who I am, who made these creatures, I’ll explain soon. But first, you’ve got to prepare to defend the station, and warn others, both in Rainbow Falls and beyond, what’s happening here.”

  “Defend it with what?” Mason Morrell asked. “A couple of kitchen knives? Against hundreds—maybe thousands—of these … these things? And they’re stronger than us? Man, this isn’t a movie, there’s no big-screen superstar to make everything right in the third act. I can’t save the world. I can’t save anything but my own ass, split this place, get out of town, way out, leave it to the army.”

  “You won’t get out,” Deucalion said. “They’ve taken over the police, all authorities. Roads are blocked at both ends of town. They’re seizing key utilities—telephones, the power company. The weather helps them because people will tend to stay at home, where their replicants can more easily find them.”

  “Without phones or any text-messaging devices,” Sammy said, “without the Internet, KBOW is the only efficient way to warn a lot of people.”

  Ralph Nettles said, “I’ve got guns. I … collect.”

  Sammy had always thought that the even-tempered, responsible, detail-obsessed engineer probably had a plan for every contingency from falling in love to Armageddon. Although he’d never heard Ralph say a word to suggest that he collected guns, he wasn’t surprised by this disclosure, and he suspected that the collection would prove to be extensive, though just short of a quantity that would justify the use of the word paranoid.

  “I have enough to defend this place,” Ralph said. “My house is less than a mile away. I could be back here with arms and ammo to spare in … twenty minutes or so.”

  Deucalion said, “I’ll go with you, and we’ll be much quicker than twenty.”

  The front-door buzzer sounded. KBOW was locked to visitors after the reception lounge closed at five-thirty.

  “That’ll be Transport Number One,” Deucalion said. “They think they have four zombies to collect. Wait here. I’ll deal with them.”

  Sammy could never have imagined that the stunning revelation of the existence of the replicants and the sight of their alien innards would prove to be less startling than Deucalion’s departure from the room. He, Ralph, Mason, and even half-catatonic Burt all cried out in surprise, however, when Deucalion, turning away from them, did not merely walk out of the room but vanished from it.

  chapter 12

  Two extra cushions had been added to one of the kitchen chairs to elevate five-year-old Chrissy Benedetto, who otherwise would have been barely chin-even with the top of the table.

  The girl needed both hands to lift her mug of hot chocolate, and each time that she drank, her eyes widened as if with delight at the taste.

  “You make it different,” she said.

  “I use almond milk,” said Erika, who sat across the table from the child.

  “Almond like that nut almond?”

  “Yes. Exactly.”

  “You must squeeze real hard to get milk out of one.”

  “Other people do the squeezing. I just buy it at the store.”

  “Can you get milk out of a peanut, too?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Can you get milk out of a ka-chew?”

  “A cashew? No, I don’t think so.”

  “You’re very pretty,” Chrissy said.

  “Thank you, sweetie. You’re very pretty, too.”

  “I was the Little Mermaid at preschool. You know, last time it was Halloween.”

  “I’ll bet you charmed all the boys.”

  Chrissy grimaced. “Boys. They all wanted to be scary. They were like ick.”

  “Pretty is better than scary. Boys always figure that out, but it takes them a long time.”

  “I’m gonna be a princess this year. Or maybe a pig like Olivia in those books.”

  “I’d go with princess if I were you.”

  “Well, Olivia is a pretty pig. And really funny. Anyway, Daddy says what you look like on the outside don’t matter. What matters is what you’re like inside. You make good different cookies, too.”

  “I add pecans and coconut to the chocolate chips.”

  “Can you teach my mommy?”

  “Sure. And I could teach you, too.”

  The last quality that Erika Five—now Swedenborg—should have discovered in herself was a talent for relating to and nurturing the young. Having been grown in a creation tank in the Hands of Mercy, in faraway New Orleans, having gained consciousness as an adult, she had neither parents from whom she might have learned tenderness nor a childhood during which she might have been the object of the gentle concern of others.

  She was created to serve Victor, to submit to him without protest, and was programmed to hate humanity, especially the young. Even then, Victor envisioned a world that would one day have no children in it, a future in which sex had no purpose other than the relief of tension, a time when the very concept of the family would have been eradicated, when the members of the posthuman New Race owed allegiance not to one another, not to any country or to God, but only to Victor.

  “Mommy’s in the city buying me new teddy bears,” Chrissy said.

  That was what Michael told her. In fact, her mother was dead.

  “That stupid pretend mommy tore up my teddy bears.”

  The pretend mommy was the Communitarian that replaced the real Denise Benedetto. Michael had rescued Chrissy, and Carson had but moments later killed the replicant.

  “Where did that pretend mommy come from, anyway?” Chrissy asked.

  She seemed as fragile as a Lladró porcelain. The girl’s trusting nature and her vulnerable heart brought Erika close to tears, but she repressed them.

  “Well, honey, maybe it’s like bad witches sometimes in fairy tales. You know, sometimes with just a spell, they make themselves look like other people.”

  “Pretend mommy was a bad witch?”

  “Maybe. But pretend mommy is gone now and never coming back.”

  “Where did she go?”

  “I hear they threw her in a cauldron of poison that she herself was brewing to use on other people.”

  Chrissy’s eyes widened without benefit of hot chocolate. “That’s so cool.”

  “She tried to turn herself into a flock of bats and fly out of the cauldron to freedom,” Erika said, “but all the bats were still covered in the poison, and they just—poof!—turned into a cloud of mist and vanished forever.”

  “That’s what should happen to bad witches.”

  “And that’s what did happen. Poof!”

  From the study, along the hallway and into the kitchen, came again the voice of Jocko in the throes of hacker excitement: “Boom, voom, zoom! Got me the puddin’, now bring me the pie!”

  Putting down her cookie, Chrissy said, “Your little boy don’t sound like any little boy I ever heard.”

  “No, he doesn’t. He’s very special.”

  “Another plum, another plum, another plum for me! Jocko shakes the cyber tree! Ah ha-ha-ha, Ah ha-ha-ha-ha!”

  “Can I meet him?”

  “In just a little while, sweetheart. He’s doing his homework right now.”

  “Boogers! Boogers! Boogers! BOOGERS! Okay, okay. Sooo … clip it, flip it, jip it, nip it, rip i
t, tip it, whip it, aaaannnd ZIP IT! Jocko is king of the world!”

  Erika said, “You remember what you told me your daddy said about the outside and inside of a person?”

  “Sure.”

  “Well, Jocko is very pretty inside.”

  “I hope he likes me.”

  “Jocko likes everybody.”

  Chrissy said, “Does he like to play teatime?”

  “I’m sure he’d love to play teatime.”

  “Boys usually don’t.”

  “Jocko always wants to please. Honey, have you ever been afraid of something, then you discovered there was no reason to be afraid?”

  Chrissy frowned, considering the question, then abruptly beamed. “Like dogs.”

  “Were you afraid of dogs?”

  “The big ones with big teeth. Big old Doofuss next door.”

  “But then you got to know Doofuss better, huh?”

  “He’s really all sweet inside.”

  “And I’ll bet he doesn’t look scary anymore outside, either.”

  “He’s cute now.” Her right arm shot up, and she waved her hand as if she were in a schoolroom and seeking the attention of the teacher.

  “What is it, sweetheart?”

  “The duke. I first saw the duke, he scared me.” The duke was what she called Deucalion. “But then he picked me up and he held me like you hold a baby and said close my eyes tight, and he magicked us from there to here, and he don’t scare me anymore.”

  “You’re a good girl, Chrissy. And brave. Girls can be just as brave as boys. I’m proud of you.”

  Along the hallway, from the study, came Jocko’s voice as he continued hacking: “Jocko spies the cake! Gonna cut him a slice! Then cut a slice twice! They bake, Jocko takes! Delicious digital data! Go, Jocko! Go, Jocko! Go, go, go, GO!”

  chapter 13

  Rafael Jesus Jarmillo, chief of police, lived in a two-story American Victorian on Bruin Drive. The house featured gingerbread moldings along the eaves of the main roof and the porch roof, as well as around the windows and the doors. It was the kind of modest but well-detailed house that, back in the day, Hollywood routinely portrayed as the home of any reputable middle-class family like Andy Hardy and his dad the judge, before moviemakers decided that the middle class was nothing but a dangerous conspiracy of dim-witted, grasping, bigoted know-nothings whose residences in films should reveal their stupidity, ignorance, boring conformity, greed, racism, and fundamental festering evil.