Dead Mann Running (9781101596494)

by Petrucha, Stefan

  A few hours later, I was no closer to finding her on the road. That left the office. Once I scratched it off the list, the list would be empty. I was back in the Bones, a few blocks from home, when the dirty yellow haze that passed for dawn arrived. The day promised to be colder, the patches of ice thickened.

  I ditched the car in an alley between a wrecked walk-up and a deserted pool hall called Balls of Fire. It was the hangout of our few local LB crackheads. Misty always recoiled at the sight of the place, but times change. Praying I wouldn’t see her there, I stuck my head in through one of the glassless window frames.

  Six or so skeletal figures lay strewn around the pool tables, broken cues, and other mementoes of a lesser sin. One had an arm missing, another’s face was full of sores. I knew at a glance they were all livebloods. Don’t ask me how, I just did. If they were chakz, they wouldn’t stand out from the garbage in quite the same way.

  I didn’t see her, but I called out, “Misty!” in case anything moved.

  Nothing even raised its head. I tried to feel good about that.

  Hoping to avoid any eyes that might be looking for me, I stuck to the alleys and vacant lots. I did run into two danglers, but lacking mouths, they wouldn’t be able to talk about it later even if they did recognize me, unless they remembered how to write, and I doubted that.

  Expecting someone, hell, maybe everyone, to be watching, I stopped at the building next door and turned toward the roof. It was up there I’d spotted the figure. If the vantage was good enough for Red Riding Ninja, why not me? It was a plan.

  Living up to its name, the rear fire door had long ago been burned off its hinges. Inside, a skylight put a dull square on what was left of the stairs. Between missing steps, broken railings, and fallen pieces of wall, it took more than I expected to make it all the way up, but I managed, at least until I reached the roof. There were so many holes looking down into the lower floors, I felt like a drunken tightrope walker. Red was hot shit.

  I found what I thought was his spot, near a chimney. It faced east, so the sunrise would make it harder to see me, and provided a decent view across the alley and into my home sweet home.

  The place was ransacked, not that it looked all that different before. The sight of my ratty recliner, smashed and on its side, gave me a weird pang. I’d left pieces of myself in that old chair, literally. The desk was intact, but askew, as it had been on the webcam, the drawers missing. If Misty hadn’t somehow beaten me here, Red had found the false bottom where I kept our measly savings. I hoped the amount was too embarrassingly small to take.

  A thin black rectangle, less than a foot wide, lay sideways against a wall. Misty said the ninja kicked the netbook. Had it been overlooked? Ridiculous. I was probably looking at a hunk of plasterboard pretending to have a shape. I leaned out for a closer look. That’s when the iffy support beam holding my weight decided it’d had enough. It didn’t snap, but I wound up swaying out over the alley, snatching at the chimney to keep from falling thirty feet down into a Dumpster.

  That would have hurt. The old thing had been down there so long, it’d all but recycled itself. The wet mess inside had rotted into a mushy soup. Most of it, anyway. Something lay atop the ooze, barely distinguishable from its surroundings, like a zombie Waldo, gray as a corpse, about the length of an umbrella.

  From here it looked like an arm.

  I could’ve been hallucinating, I could’ve been wrong, but if that was the sucker that started it all, I had to check it out. The office, the building, the streets, all looked deserted. Yeah, looks can be deceptive, but I headed down anyway, a little too fast for safety’s sake.

  Arriving in the alley, I braced my feet against what used to be its blue metal side, gripped the frame and hauled myself up. One look and I didn’t want to go in. Close up, the gunk looked like something I could sink into. It was an arm all right, though, the arm, muscles that looked like Dad’s, the thick fingers he wished he’d had.

  Whatever voodoo science that gave it its get up and go, had got up and went. It was swollen from the rain, really dead. I pulled closer. Had it been that gray when it knocked on my door? Had it been gray at all? I seemed to remember it being pinker, but that’d be crazy.

  A bit of white at the end of its index finger looked like a paper scrap. Turned out it wasn’t at the end of the finger, it was the end of the finger, exposed bone, the flesh scraped off. Maybe some rat had gnawed on it. They’ll eat anything.

  But there were no little teeth marks. The finger had been worn to the bone, like the arm had done it on purpose, scraped its own skin away. On what? Why?

  Then I saw it, scratched into the metal, four letters, one word, KYUA.

  11

  Misty was gone and all I got was this lousy clue. KYUA. The imaginary god of the zombies.

  Did the arm get the joke or did it, like Jimmy Stewart in the coffeehouse restroom, have faith and expect the same of me? Faith was Misty’s bailiwick, what she said kept her sober, at least it had this morning. She tried to explain it more than once. The closest she got was telling me about this Hindu book, the Bhagavad Gita.

  It was basically a chat between God and Arjuna, a poor sap fated to start a huge war among his family. Only he doesn’t want to. Vishnu takes Arjuna aside and explains the universe, the whole ball of mortician’s wax. Once Arjuna supposedly understands, he accepts his role and starts the war. Let the bloodbath roll.

  Thing is, I never believed Arjuna really understood. I figured at best he got sick of all the yapping and said fuck it, shut up already, I’ll start the war.

  Assuming I was looking at the netbook and not an optical illusion, she may have had time to put some contacts on it. Could be a way to find her. It could also be a way to get D-capped. Sure, from above, the office looked barren, but someone had been watching everything else so far. I took a leap of faith, as in, fuck it, let the bloodbath roll.

  But I was no Arjuna. After climbing three flights and wading through the icy hallway puddles, my bravado wore off. I stood in a corner like a toddler doing time-out, went dead for half an hour. There wasn’t a peep, not a single car driving by, not even an electric hum. The silence was as unnatural as I was.

  I went in.

  I didn’t check for the netbook right off. Instead, in a rare sentimental moment, I prodded the broken recliner with my foot. The useless frame whimpered like a wounded dog. If I had a gun, I would have put it out of its misery.

  Most of our belongings had been scattered, but against the wall, right where I’d spotted it, was the netbook. If it was a genuine miracle, the battery wouldn’t have been drained and the AC adapter missing. If there was a way to get it going, it wasn’t here.

  Next, I checked the desk drawer, surprised to find the money still there. That meant Misty hadn’t been here and it wasn’t worth Red’s time. It put a few hundred in my pocket, enough for a new adapter, anyway.

  I grabbed my thrift store coat and went through the pockets. My digital recorder, my memory crutch, was gone. I tried to remember what was on it, but if I could do that, I wouldn’t need the damn thing. Then for some reason, I started cleaning. I gathered what I could of Misty’s things and put them back in her bureau, in case, I don’t know.

  I was busy stuffing some of my dryer clothes in a plastic garbage bag when a weird tingle caterpillared along my spine. I didn’t see or hear anything, but I went to the door. The sign with my name lay flat on the floor at my feet. The hall oozed nothingness.

  “Misty?”

  Nothing answered, but I didn’t trust it, so I headed for the window and tried to open it. It was a contest to see which would give out first, the frame or my fingers, but the wood creaked up enough for me to climb out.

  Bag in hand, I clambered down the fire escape. I doubt it was up to code when the building was new. Now, it was more paint than iron, my meager weight nearly pulling it free from the mortar. In the end, I fell, but by that time I was low enough to hit bottom in one piece.

  Short-liv
ed victory. I spent the next half hour wandering the alleys trying to remember where I’d left the Subaru. If I hadn’t left the case in it, I’d have given up and taken a bus. Once I found it, I tanked up, bought some supplies at the Quickie Mart, then swapped the plates with an out-of-state van. Why the hell someone would drive to Fort Hammer from out of state is beyond me, but there you have it.

  Next, I hit a big box electronics store. The security guy wouldn’t let me in until I showed him my money. I spent too much on a new recorder that didn’t look like it’d work and an adapter for the netbook that looked like it might. The cash about tapped, I headed for the second-most abandoned place I could think of, the warehouse district.

  The feeble afternoon sun was being bullied by some massive gray clouds, the ice on the road serious. As I wheeled among the giant corpses of Fort Hammer’s forgotten retail trade, I skidded more than once. The buildings looked so rickety I was afraid one whack would bring the whole block down. Even chakz didn’t bother making shantytowns here. The only guy who’d used the place in recent memory had been a serial killer. And while he was trying to cut my head off, at least he’d shown me which warehouse still had electricity.

  I found an outlet, plugged in the netbook, and turned it on. As I waited for it to boot, I pulled out my favorite piece of luggage and set it on the hood. No reason not to look now. The glass vials were the same, that single hairline crack on the one. I gently turned the other, sideways, upside down. It wasn’t viscous. The liquid moved easily. The color was rich, lighter than cerulean, the crayon a kid might use for an ocean if he’d never seen one. I put both vials on the passenger seat, and turned to the briefcase.

  There was something stuck in one of the hinges, a bit of pink nylon ribbon, smaller than a fingernail. I pulled it off, then tugged at the bottom layer until it threatened to tear. I got the sense it’d always been part of the case, that both were made just for those bottles. Drug trade gets pretty sophisticated, but I wasn’t thinking local distributor anymore.

  I worked my way around the edge of the foam, pulling, getting the same resistance. When I tried the top, though, one corner peeled away revealing something underneath; the end of a plastic card—a credit card or driver’s license.

  Ever try lifting a dime from the floor with wet fingers? The wrinkled pads of my fingers kept slipping over it. My nails were too short to get under. I could shred the foam, but might need the case for the vials.

  I fished the proverbial last dime from my pocket and used it to pry the card up. I had to see only the corner of the stylized double-R logo, for Revivals Registration, to know it was a chak ID. If a cop or guardsmen asked and you didn’t have one, into the camps with you. And they asked whenever they could.

  The embossed name on it—William Seabrook—had to be fake. Seabrook was the author of The Magic Island back in 1929, the book that supposedly introduced the word zombie to Western culture. Somebody had a sense of humor. The number was intact, but there was no picture, the plastic split where it was supposed to be. It’d be easy to put a new one in. This was exactly what a chak would need to escape the camps and start over. Maybe the arm was what was left of an escapee.

  The thought of shredding the foam gave me an idea. Everyone was looking for a briefcase, right? I pocketed the card, then tore off enough foam to wrap the vials in, secured them with duct tape and shoved the results into a cinder block. To make it look good, I wrapped the case in two plastic garbage bags along with a couple of bricks for weight, and sealed the whole thing up with duct tape. Then I found a great big vat full of water, tied a rope around the handle and dropped the sucker in.

  By now the netbook had booted, so I checked Misty’s contacts. She’d had the thing only a few hours, but there were two. One was Chester, and the other a first name, Mary. Her sponsor in the program. There was a phone number.

  I had the toad’s cell and mine, but wasn’t stupid enough to use either. There was a pay phone nearby. I’d used it to call Misty once, when I was bound with a leather strap around my neck. Don’t ask. And I had just enough quarters for a one-minute call.

  After three rings, a female voice, ravaged by cigarettes to the point where it sounded like a cartoon, said, “Yeah?”

  “Mary?”

  “Yeah?”

  I’d have swallowed if it would have helped. “Hessius Mann. I’m looking for Misty.”

  “She’s in the can. I’ll get her…”

  Something like relief flooded my bones. The other big addict in my life, Dad, tried getting sober, but it never stuck. He used to joke that he’d quit so often he should be getting better at it. Misty, bless her, still wanted to take care of herself. And if she was with a friend, she was safer than I was. Which meant now was not the time to stick my nose in.

  “Wait. I don’t want her to know I called. I just want to know if she’s all right.”

  A phlegmy laugh. “Well, she ain’t all right. She’s been fucked over, good.”

  “Right. I know. I mean to say, are you helping her out?”

  “Trying. You the dead Mann?”

  “Yeah. If she told you half of what’s been going on, you know there’s trouble. I don’t think she needs more.”

  “Shouldn’t that be up to her?”

  “I’m not talking emotional stress. Cars are blowing up. People are dying. You tell me, is Misty in any kind of shape to deal with that now?”

  Silence.

  “Good. I just want her to be safe while I try to work this out.”

  “Life ain’t safe.”

  “You’re preaching to the choir. Tell her I’ll be back in touch when I can. Tell her not to try to get ahold of me. Tell her…” my voice trailed off.

  “To have faith?” Mary offered.

  “No reason to talk crazy, but you get the idea.”

  “Yeah.”

  “And Mary?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Someone else calls from a public phone, don’t answer. It’s not going to be me. And it’ll probably be someone willing to torture or kill you.”

  “Fuck.”

  I hung up, thinking it was the smartest thing I’d done in days. Now all I had to do was figure out who was after the vials and find them before they found me.

  The GPS from the Subaru had my office, the motel, and the shack on it, so all I had was the card and that fucking word, kyua. The card was as big a mystery as the arm, and while I knew what kyua meant to me, I didn’t know what it meant to the believers. That’s what the Internet is for. I went back to the car, left the netbook open next to me and started driving, hoping it would beep or fart when it found itself a Wi-Fi signal.

  As it turned out, there was no sound. But, as I cruised a liveblood business district, a pop-up told me there were five networks available, two unsecured. I connected and started the browser.

  The first thing I saw wasn’t good. The local news feed on Misty’s home page featured a mug shot, probably taken during a stay in holding. Harsh lighting washed away the haggard skin texture, but the dry hair was a giveaway. If you saw this guy laid out in a coffin, you might think he was sort of handsome before the mortician went and ruined him.

  It was me, my mug right below a big headline: CHAK WANTED IN POLICE KILLING. That didn’t surprise me as much as the fact that I’d made it this far without being picked up. Maybe fate was saving me for something worse. They mentioned Misty, but didn’t have a picture.

  I Googled kyua and got about two hundred thousand hits. Most told me that the word was a) Japanese for cure, which I already knew, and b) the name of a nineties horror film. Chakz didn’t generally have Web pages, so I wasn’t expecting any sermons or religious blogs. I did hope some overachieving grad student had decided to do a study about nascent chak-culture or some such. Mostly, I wanted to know if there was any kind of organization involved, something I could tag to the arm and the vials.

  With so many chakz shipped off, what lame communications I did have with the so-called community had broken down. Jonese
y worked hard to keep his hand in, that was his thing. Once he was gone, for me, it was mostly watching Nell Parker on TV. She visited some of the camps, but only to show how nice they were.

  I followed some links, found photos of an abandoned cat found in Tokyo, for instance, but one reference stuck out. Kyua was the nickname of a local chak-camp, about five miles north of Fort Hammer, near a town called Chambers. More than that, it wasn’t the inmates who gave it the name, it was livebloods. I was surprised I’d never heard of it, wondering if I had but had forgotten.

  Camp Kyua, provided some more focused results, including a blog by the self-involved Kafka228, a liveblood clerk who handled chak intake forms at The Chambers Observation Center, the camp’s official name. He thought himself too smart for the room and wildly underemployed. He was also deeply amused by how eager some chakz were to get into Camp Kyua.

  “They seem to think it’s Disney World!” he wrote. “I think some actually failed their tests on purpose. Wish it were this easy to get rid of roaches in my kitchen.”

  An anonymous comment read, “If there were no kyua, chakz would have to invent one.” Another: “Kyua cures those who cure themselves.” Which, as the real Kafka pointed out, was kind of redundant.

  Why the rush to get in? That was the kicker. From what I could piece together, ChemBet, the folks who brought you tomorrow’s zombies today, used this camp to cull “volunteer subjects” for testing.

  So, a bunch of my fellow corpses had gotten it into their decomposing heads that Camp Kyua was a good thing. Given how hard we are to destroy, the smart ones figured ChemBet was hunting for a way to really kill us, quickly and easily. I could see it. Given the mangled results of failed efforts, that’s not an unwelcome thought, Still, not something I’d volunteer for. The not-so-smart ones thought it meant that ChemBet was trying to improve the RIP, really bring us back to life.