Daughters of Death (Postmortem Anomalies Book 2)

by Josiah Upton

  Or was it last year?

  I growl and slam my head against the steel-fortified wall. I’m losing my mind.

  My nose twitches, the precursor to the meat goo’s arrival. A moment later I hear the internal pipes working, then the hose starts to rattle. I refused to eat the slop when I was first stuffed in here – one look at it oozing from the hose was enough to make me sick. But then I got desperate. How long was I going to be in here? Would I starve? I ultimately gave in, and ranked it as the most disgusting experience of my life, living or undead.

  However, my Hunger calls to me, this time more insistent than before. But I can hold out. At least one or two more times.

  After the hose turns off, some pills fall through the hole. A safe Hybrid is a happy Hybrid, a disembodied voice says. I haven’t taken the Mortetine, dropping the blue and black capsules down the hole in the floor intended for Hybrid waste disposal. I don’t know how they expect or enforce the others in the surrounding cells to take the Mortetine, but I see no reason to ingest them. If anything, it might cause an addiction in me. I’ve seen the human users before, knocking on Caesar’s door late at night. And I may not be human, but I’m not the garden variety Hybrid, either. I don’t know how the drugs will affect me.

  I pick the pills up now, imagining Zaul handing money to Caesar in exchange for a bagful of these. Maybe if he hadn’t set Caesar off, he wouldn’t have come after me and my dad.

  Maybe if I never met Zaul, my father would still be alive.

  Shut up, I tell myself. It’s more complicated than that, and you know it.

  When the rattling of the hose stops, my ears pick up something else, coming from the other side of my cell door. It’s low and muffled, but it’s loud. It sounds like shouting.

  My door demagnetizes, then slides open, and a serious case of déjà vu hits me. Caesar stands on the other side, pointing a gun right at me. A heavy duty rifle this time. He smirks, and turns to Robert Ortega. He’s at gunpoint as well, another officer holding a rifle to his back, while a few other armed officers look on. It appears some of his men are still loyal to Caesar. They’re probably the ones that let him in here.

  “I knew it,” Caesar says to Robert. “That Ugger in the Common you tried to pass off as a new containee, I remember the day he took Rockwell out. I never forget the face of a murderous monster.”

  “Neither do I,” I say.

  His gaze narrows on me. This pathetic excuse for a man killed my father. I won’t let him take me. I scream and charge at him, with every intention of crushing his windpipe with my bare hands. But once I clear the door, an officer waiting on the other side jabs me with a baton, sending a violent jolt through me. I collapse in excruciating pain. Just when I’m about to black out, the officer pulls the baton back.

  As I writhe on the ground, Caesar steps closer, and leans over me. “Look at you, all blue and white-haired and shit.” He grins. “An Ice Princess, a special snowflake of a freak. I don’t know what kind of Ugger you are, or what kind of voltage you can take. You might just fry like a turkey if I keep the shock going. So I suggest you behave yourself.” He looks down at his rifle. “And don’t ever charge a man holding a gun. You should know by now that I shoot to kill.”

  “Then why didn’t you?” I ask, slowly rising from the floor. The officer grips the shock baton tightly in anticipation. I don’t want another one of those. “Why didn’t you just kill me, like you did my dad?!?”

  “Because I need you alive.”

  Robert Ortega steps forward. “Whatever you think this will accomplish, son, it won’t. So let’s just stop this now, before it gets any more out of hand…”

  “No,” Caesar says. “It’s the only way. The AD wants her, and all the other Brains. Alive.”

  Robert contorts his elderly face in confusion. “Schutzhorne ordered this? Why didn’t he do it himself? God knows he’s got enough men with guns.”

  “He wanted me to do it,” Caesar answers. Sweat pours down his forehead. “I screwed up, and I need to make up for it.”

  “Make up for what?” I ask. “Botching my father’s murder?!”

  “Shut up!” Caesar screams, pointing the gun back at me. His hands are shaking. “You think I really wanted to do that?”

  “Well, you did threaten to kill Grest and his daughter,” Robert says. “That’s what forced me to put you in the Lock.”

  “That was all talk,” Caesar says. He grimaces at me. “A game I was playing with your stupid little freak boyfriend. But I wasn’t actually going to kill anybody.”

  “Then why did you?” I ask. “Why did you destroy my world?”

  “Because if I didn’t, Schutzhorne was going to destroy mine. He promised to kill every last descendant of Jorge Ortega, leaving me for last.”

  “My God,” Robert breathes. “Your brothers and sisters… Anya?”

  “Everyone,” Caesar answers. “When he got me out of the Lock, he laid down the threat, and said the only way to stop it was to take out Gordon, and set it up to look like she did it.”

  “Me?” I ask, reeling from this revelation. “Why would he want to frame me for my dad’s death?”

  “I don’t know,” Caesar says through gritted teeth.

  “And why did it have to be you?” Robert asks.

  “I don’t know!” Caesar screams. “But if I don’t get Ice Princess and all the Brains over to HQ soon, he’ll make good on his promise. Is that what you want, Dad?”

  “No!” Robert says, trembling. “Of course not!”

  “Then we need to move. Where are the others?”

  “Most are in the library,” Robert says, scrolling through information on his tablet. “But Zaul and Alice are...” He pauses, looking at me. He already got my attention when he mentioned Zaul. “They’re in the Rec Room.”

  “We also need Rigg,” Caesar says. I’m surprised to hear Benjamin’s name. I didn’t know he was in here. “The AD wanted him too. And before you ask me why, I don’t know that either. Just tell me which cell he’s in.”

  Director Ortega sighs, then nods to a cell a few doors down from mine.

  “Open it,” Caesar says. “And hurry. Schutzhorne is waiting.”

  Robert taps his fingers on the station screen, then places his palm to be scanned. I move forward as the door hisses, waiting to see Benjamin Rigg on the other side. When the door moves, there’s a grey, bald man sitting in the corner. He looks the same since I last saw him, except instead of a suit he wears the standard blue-and-black striped containment uniform. I look at his face, and a resentment fills me. If he hadn’t lost control and eaten his brother, Zaul’s welfare guardianship may have become a reality. But I’m starting to lose track of the people to blame for my current situation. And it seems I often forget to include myself.

  When Benjamin rises to his feet, the officers raise their guns, and another grabs the remote hanging from his belt. When the containee has a collar on, you don’t need to use shock batons.

  “Calm down,” Robert says to them. “He’s properly medicated. And I’ve known him for years, he wouldn’t hurt a soul.”

  “What about his brother?” Caesar asks, not lowering his rifle. “He sure hurt him.”

  Robert ignores the comment, and approaches Rigg. The Hybrid looks confused, his eyes foggy. “Ben, it’s me, Robert. You’ve been in here for five days. How are you feeling?”

  Benjamin locks eyes on Robert, but doesn’t speak. His jaw tightens. Something isn’t right.

  “Come on out, Ben. I can’t really explain it now, but we have to take a little trip…”

  Rigg shuffles out of the cell, slowly at first but picking up speed. And in a moment, he’s snarling with his arms out, reaching for Robert. Terror fills the old man’s face.

  “Shock ‘im!” Caesar shouts.

  “I am!” the officer says, mashing the button on his remote. “He’s not going down!”

  Rigg roars ferociously, his mouth wide open as he gets a hold of Director Ortega. Caesar screams and
shoots, putting round after round into Benjamin. It doesn’t stop him. His teeth clamp down onto Robert’s neck, blood gushing out as a tangerine-sized chunk of flesh is ripped from his body.

  Other officers open fire, filling Rigg with bullets. His body jerks from the force, but his attack continues. Growling, he grasps the top of Robert’s head, pulling until his spine snaps, and the skin and muscles around his neck begin to tear. He’s going to rip his head right off.

  Caesar stands over Benjamin, and starts shooting right into the back of his skull. The monster finally stops, but Caesar doesn’t. He empties every last bullet into the Hybrid’s head, until it’s just a pulpy mush of brains, skin and skull.

  Then the lights in the hall turn red, and a siren goes off. One officer – with a tag that reads Krecker – cusses and shakes his head, while the officers start to panic. One approaches Caesar. “What the hell is going on?” he asks. When Caesar doesn’t answer, the man grabs his shoulder. “Hey man, did you hear…”

  Caesar turns and points the rifle at the man, pulling the trigger. But with no more bullets, it only clicks. He raises it high, and slams the butt down on the officer’s head. Everyone is horrified, but no one dares to check if he’s alright. Caesar grabs the unconscious man’s rifle, then disappears into Rigg’s cell for a moment. When he returns, he pushes the barrel against me, nodding toward the door, and waving for the other officers to follow. The fact that he hasn’t shot me yet suggests I’m still valuable for something. I just don’t know for what, or for how long.

  I steal one last look at the gruesome violence that ended both Robert Ortega and Benjamin Rigg, before I’m pushed out the door. Caesar doesn’t bother to look back.

  Once we’re in the hallway, Officer Krecker speaks up as he attempts to wipe the blood off of the deceased Director’s tablet. “Does anyone remember the Lock-Down procedure from your orientation?”

  “You mean the one we never actually practiced?” an officer says cautiously, lagging behind a few steps, in case Caesar decides to dispatch him like the last man who asked questions.

  Krecker nods. “That’s the one. The Director has a monitor on him at all times. If his vitals go cold, the place goes into an automatic security mode. Officers can still move around the facility, and get to the safe rooms. But the final exits are sealed, so the Sludge doesn’t escape.”

  “So, what’s our move?” the man asks.

  “We’re going ahead as planned,” Caesar answers, breaking his silence for the first time since his father’s brutal murder. “We grab the other Brains. But we can’t get to HQ, so we wait.”

  “For what?” the officer asks.

  “Schutzhorne. He’s the man responsible for what just went down in the Lock. I can see now, it was his plan the whole time. He wanted this Lock-Down, he wants to waltz in here and take over. And when he does, I’m going to kill him.”

  A grim look comes over the questioning officer. Killing the Assistant Director of the APA is serious business. What Caesar and his men don’t know, however, is that he won’t get to take down Schutzhorne. Because I’m killing my father’s murderer the first chance I get.

  Chapter 43

  Zaul

  My fists clench as I look at the middle door, picturing it as a living thing, an enemy that must be conquered. I’m not sure if I have the courage to step through. I don’t know exactly what I’ll do when I’m on the other side. Such apprehension towards something that – especially for a creature like myself – should come so easily.

  My first time.

  The notion of virginity, and the significance it bears for humans, occasionally came up in my basement books. As a young Hybrid, filled with Lust and having little guidance on the matter, I often wondered what was so special about crossing that line. Just do it, I would think to myself. You want it, you need it, so just do it! And of course the possibility of crossing that line myself – with the exception of succumbing to my Prisoner’s vile insistence to take it by force – was never within my future.

  And yet here I am, standing at the line so many others have stood. Terrified.

  “Have you ever done this before?” Tran asks. I almost forgot he was there.

  “Excuse me?” I ask, still staring at the door. Alice is waiting in there. Waiting for me.

  We’ve exchanged brief glances over the days since I learned she chose me, and quickly averted our gazes when we did. But she hasn’t spoken to me, and she certainly hasn’t said anything about our upcoming time in the Lust Lounge. I even began to suspect there was some sort of mistake, but Tran reassured me of her choice.

  “Your other Brain’s Club members refer to it as ‘Lusting’,” he says. “As humans, we simply call it sex. Or, sometimes it’s referred to as making love, if an emotional bond is present.”

  “Yes,” I say. “I’m aware of the terminology. In my life before this, I had access to many books that described the act in detail.” I pause, remembering the absurd cover illustrations of muscular men with flowing hair, holding vulnerable women in delicate clothing. “The library here doesn’t have those books.”

  “But knowledge of and experience in are two separate things,” Tran states. “You seem hesitant. Nervous. Have you been with another Hybrid before? Either in your life before, or perhaps in the back room during kitchen duty?”

  I raise my eyebrow at him.

  “I’m aware of what goes on in the club,” he says with a chuckle. “Particularly with Ophelia, and her relationships with Walter and Richard. She’s been quite vocal about it in the past, even though it’s technically against the rules. But in my opinion, that expression is healthy.”

  “I haven’t,” I say, looking back to the door. It seems to have gotten bigger, more menacing. I breathe deeply. “Never.”

  “Zaul, if you’re having second thoughts…”

  “No,” I say. “I’m doing this.”

  “Then, what are you waiting for?”

  I hold my head up high. This is the moment, the crossing of the line. And I can’t back down now. I’m not sure when I’ll ever get this chance again. “Nothing,” I say, and step up to the door.

  When it opens, the first thing I notice is that the lighting is low and blue, like it was during the libido restraint portion of my Corridor test. Is blue light conducive to Hybrid arousal? The atmosphere seems to alleviate my tension. My joints feel lighter, and less stiff. My muscles don’t groan so much when I move.

  I step inside, and smell Alice before I see her. She sits on the edge of a bed, big enough for two. I’m not sure what I was expecting, but she isn’t naked, or posing like one of those silly women on the book covers. And she’s not acting overtly sexual, like Opha does, nearly every second of every day. She’s just sitting there, being Alice. But knowing her intention of picking me for this room, my heart starts to pump.

  “Hello,” I say to her. My breath feels tight, like my lungs are being stepped on.

  I’m slightly startled when the door closes behind me. A red clock on the far wall glows, starting to count down from 29:59. No turning back now. Either I’ll use what this room was intended for, or wait awkwardly by the door for the next thirty minutes.

  I walk, but not towards her. My attention draws to some of the peculiar items placed within the room: a small collection of nude human magazines on a table, different stations with odd shaped pillows and chairs, and bottles filled with mystery liquids. There’s one of the Betty mannequins from the Corridor, and her male equivalent, which I assume is Neddy. And in one corner is a table, with restraints and chains attached to it.

  I don’t remember any of these things from my books, and I’m not sure how I would use them, or if I even want to.

  “Um, are you hungry?” Alice asks, turning my attention back to her. She smiles nervously, and shakes her head. “Of course you’re hungry. We’re always hungry…”

  “You have food?” I ask, walking towards her. I’ll gladly converse about food, or Brains Club or what kind of shoes Tran is wear
ing today… Anything other than the obvious purpose of this room. I sit down in a chair opposite from her. Five feet away. Seems like a safe distance.

  The blue light overhead strobes rapidly for a moment, then glows steadily again. Somewhere far away, from the other side of the door, I hear an annoying, repetitive sound. Like an alarm. What is Tran doing out there?

  “He gave us some pig legs and goat intestines,” she says, pointing to a small box on a small table next to the bed. She presses the buttons on the side, and the aroma fills the room. “This isn’t Hunger Hall, but he said eating would be a good icebreaker for…”

  She clears her throat. I’m not entirely sure what icebreaker means. “He said it would be like a date.”

  We can only maintain eye contact for a second, before distracting ourselves with the food. We each grab a ham hock, and I pull out an unusually long sheep intestine. I rip it in half, and offer her the other end. While we snack, my Prisoner’s voice calls up to me, echoing those words from my Hybrid youth.

  Just do it. You want it, you need it, so just do it. Do it now. Your time is running out, you fool!

  I look to the clock. 24:33. I don’t know how long Lusting is supposed to take, but my apprehension makes me want to wait just a little longer. However, I’ve also finished my food, and I don’t want to sit here in silence. I look down at the crimson-stained box of food, almost empty now. “Isn’t it a little strange that Tran is so… nice to us?”

  “What do you mean?” she asks, leaning forward on the bed. Our dead-white eyes meet. My muscles twitch at the urge to jump onto those sheets and do Lustful things to her. I want it more than anything right now, and in inviting me here, it seems she does too.