One Foot in the Grave - The Halflife Trilogy Book I

by Wm. Mark Simmons

  He slipped out of his trenchcoat, folded it neatly, and slid it into the valise. Then he sat down and began tugging at his left boot.

  It was midnight when I finished the last of my errands and returned to my room. My clothes were stiff with drying blood and clotted here and there with masonry dust from a bricked-up window I had kicked out in the back of the old hospital, on the first floor. Though I had done a fair job of restacking the bricks, there was no chance they’d pass muster in the light of day. I had to hope that darkness and other distractions would camouflage my makeshift exit until it was too late.

  I stripped off my clothes and cranked the hot water in the shower up into the lobster zone. I stood under the scalding spray until the water heater recycled and the temperature began to drop. My skin steamed as I toweled off, but inside my chest was a coldness that continued to grow. That felt as if it would never be warm again.

  I lay on the bed and tried to relax. I couldn’t.

  I closed my eyes and tried to find my way onto the dreampath. I couldn’t.

  Thought about Suki and tried to feel reassured about the way I had left her.

  I couldn’t.

  I lay there, as the hours passed, ignoring Lupé’s occasional, tentative knock at my locked door, and thought about monsters and fear and death.

  Of how my greatest fear was of what I was becoming.

  And the madness that seemed to be creeping closer.

  “Rise and shine, sleepyhead,” Jenny whispered.

  I was tired. My eyes didn’t want to open.

  “Come on, Chris, it’s sunup.” Her hand grasped my shoulder, shook it. “If you don’t get up, you know what I’ll do!” she teased.

  “Nooo,” I finally moaned. “You’re cruel woman. . . .” But I knew I had to get up: I couldn’t let her—

  My eyes snapped open and I grabbed for her wrist. She wasn’t there, of course. I was alone in an empty room. Sometime during the wee hours, I had drifted off to sleep only to be roused from my dreams by yet another dream.

  I rolled out of bed and began dressing. My tennis shoes were still damp: there was no help for it but to pull them on over dry socks. I buckled on a Bianchi shoulder rig, but discovered the Dartmaster pistol didn’t sit the holster properly. I pulled the harness off and rummaged through Smirl’s valise for something more suitable. The best I could come up with was his trenchcoat. A bit loose, but the pockets were large and serviceable.

  I sorted through the hypodermic darts, loading one into the gun, placing two more in my shirt pocket, and dropping the rest into the left coat pocket. Then I shrugged into the coat, hoping Smirl wouldn’t mind, and dropped the Dartmaster and the extra CO2 cartridge into the right pocket. Then I clipped the radio set to my belt and adjusted the headset so that the microphone and earpiece were positioned properly. The detonator was next, and I used four rubber bands to hold it snug against my left wrist.

  Special Forces. . . . I smiled grimly. All that training, largely gone to waste these many years. If the major could only see me now. . . .

  Last of all, I considered the piece of papyrus on the floor by my bed. I had dropped it there when I had dozed off, trying to memorize the text.

  “O! Amon Ra, oh!” I murmured, picking up the paper and folding it into the front pocket of my jeans. I picked up the pocketed vest, now devoid of half of its volatile adornment. “God of gods. . . .” I picked up the Sabrelight on the dresser as I crossed the room. I reached down and twisted the doorknob. “Death is but the doorway. . . .”

  I walked out the door.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  I knocked on the door to Bassarab’s room just as Mooncloud and Garou rounded the corner and started down the hallway.

  Wren opened it after a moment with an expression of mild surprise. “Too late,” he yawned, “he’s already asleep.”

  “Good.” I pushed Wren back into the room and crossed the threshold.

  “I didn’t invite you in,” he said, half-puzzled, half-annoyed. His eyes widened when he saw the gun in my hand. “Hey, there’s no need for that.”

  “I’m afraid there is,” I said, hearing the others pause at the open doorway. “Lupé, shut the door.”

  I heard them enter behind me and, as the door clicked shut, I pulled the trigger.

  “Ow—shit!” he said as the dart caught him in the shoulder. Garou grabbed my arm as Wren pulled the projectile out of his flesh and looked up at me, his face a mask of disbelief.

  “Too late.” I pulled my arm free and tucked the gun back into my coat pocket. “The tranquilizer is already in your bloodstream. It’s extremely fast-acting, I’m told.”

  It would seem I was told correctly: he took a couple of uncertain steps toward me and then seemed to misplace his equilibrium entirely. He staggered, sank to his knees, and then keeled over onto his left side.

  “You probably won’t lose consciousness entirely,” I said, picking him up and depositing him on the bed, “but you won’t be able to move about under your own power for the better part of the next hour or so.”

  “Are you mad?” Mooncloud wanted to know.

  “What is the problem, Doctor? It wasn’t very long ago that you wanted my allegiance in just such a betrayal. Now I’m doing your work for you.”

  “Wha—yoo—wan?” Wren slurred, head lolling on the pillow.

  “Your master and I have a little business to conduct,” I answered. “He may prove somewhat reluctant and I would prefer to not have to address your reluctance, as well. You should spend the next hour contemplating a career move. I think you’re about to become unemployed.”

  The packing case that served as Bassarab’s daybed was under a blanket and pushed up against the inside wall, blocking the closet. I yanked the blanket aside and opened the valise.

  “I think it’s time you filled us in on the rest of your plan,” Mooncloud said, a touch of fear tingeing her voice.

  I shook out the pocketed vest containing the plastique charges. “As I said before, Doctor, the less you know the safer we all will be. It’s time to choose: you can follow my orders, or return to your room now.”

  “What if I change my mind halfway through?”

  “I can command your obedience,” I said, giving her a mental push. “Remember?”

  Her mouth tightened. “Tell me what to do.”

  “Pull the shades.”

  She did, the room darkened, and Garou switched on a lamp in the corner.

  “Help me get this open.” They both came over and lifted the lid while I knelt by the midpoint of the camouflaged coffin.

  Just like some Hollywood cliché, Bassarab lay in repose, flat on his back, with his arms folded across his chest so that his fingertips were pointed toward opposite shoulders. His eyes were closed, his face a study in hardened wax.

  “Now what?” Lupé wanted to know.

  “Help me sit him up.”

  “What?” they both chorused in shocked whispers.

  “Help me sit him up!” I tugged on his arms. At the last minute they joined in and we managed to bend the old vampire at the waist until we bore a passing resemblance to the historical tableaux on Mount Suribachi. “Now we have to dress for success.” I unfolded an arm and slid it through the appropriate opening in the vest.

  “Pretty flexible for a sleeping vampire,” Garou grunted. “They’re usually pretty rigid when we pop them during the day.” She had to change her grip as I brought the vest around and behind. “Of course, once the stake goes in, they’re total stiffs.”

  Mooncloud didn’t smile at the pun. “We’ve never dealt with anyone half as old. And since we stake them as soon as we open the coffin, we really don’t know how much handling it would take to actually wake one.”

  “Or how much talking,” Bassarab said, just as I got his other arm though and pulled the vest closed across his chest. The vampire’s eye were open now, and I slapped the Velcro closures shut. “What are you doing, Christopher?”

  Mooncloud and Garou, sta
ggered back, clutching their heads; I suffered no personal discomfort. I held the remote detonator up before his eyes and sent him a mental picture of just what he was wearing and what I would do if he didn’t cooperate. Then, for the benefit of Mooncloud and Garou, I explained it again, out loud.

  His lip curled. “You can’t be serious.”

  “On the contrary,” I replied, “I’ve never been more serious in my life.”

  “And you’d detonate these explosives, knowing that you will be killed, as well?”

  “If you’ll recall, Vladamir, the original plan was for me to wear the vest. I’ve already died once and I figure the odds are against my seeing the sun set this evening. My only concern is that there are two people I’d like to take with me when I go.”

  “You blame me for your family’s deaths,” he said. “This is your revenge.”

  “I want Bey,” I said. “He’s the one who dug them up. He’s the one using them now. You’re my ticket to his destruction. I’d rather have Bey, but I’ll settle for you if you don’t cooperate.”

  He considered my words and then glanced at Mooncloud and Garou. “Perhaps you are willing to sacrifice yourself. But am I to believe that you would blow up your friends, too?”

  I smiled. “Have you forgotten so quickly? I have no ‘friends.’ Only allies. You taught me that.” I turned to Mooncloud and Garou. “What do you say, ladies? Would I blow you up, too?”

  Garou’s face was coarse with impending change: she nodded slowly. Mooncloud’s features were ashen. “I do believe you would,” she murmured.

  “So, it’s settled,” I said, pushing him back down into the long packing crate. “Cooperate and this might all work out so that we are both rid of Kadeth Bey. Mess with me, and we’ll all go find out what God really looks like.”

  He made no reply and I slammed the lid shut.

  Garou and I wrestled the packing crate down the hall and out the side entrance while Mooncloud drove the Bronco around to meet us. Even after dropping the tailgate and the rear seats, we had to shift the box in diagonally, letting a good foot and a half hang off the rear end. I crawled in with it to stabilize the load while Garou rode up front with Mooncloud. No one spoke during the short drive. Mooncloud kept glancing in the rearview mirror at the detonator strapped to my wrist. Garou sat in stony silence, glaring out the window as if some sort of meaning might be found in the passing scenery.

  We drove to Atkinson and then followed the rutted path across the field. “Around to the back,” I said as we approached the old hospital building. “Stop here.”

  You couldn’t miss it in the light of day: the bricks had been replaced in the southeast window, but now they were a jumbled stack instead of the uniform wall of the day before. Anyone coming up from the basement after sunrise would notice in an instant. Perhaps they noticed last night.

  Perhaps they noticed Suki. . . .

  While Garou and I wrestled the packing crate out, Mooncloud adjusted her transceiver headset and turned it on. “Now what?” she asked, as we set Bassarab’s transport on the ground, next to the building. “Do we knock?”

  “Yeah,” I said, picking up a melon-sized chunk of concrete. I hurled it through the old casement and the brick façade exploded inward. “Knock-knock.”

  The three of us lifted the crate over the tumbled sill and shoved it toward the shadows inside.

  “Now what?” Mooncloud repeated, dusting off her hands.

  “It’s very simple, Doctor,” I said, pulling the Dartmaster out of my pocket. I shot Garou in the thigh. “You are going to assist Lupé over to the Bronco while she can still walk, get in, and drive to the far side of the field where you will wait for further instructions.”

  “You bastard!” Garou cried, yanking the dart out of her leg. “Why?”

  “It’s a cleaner equation if you’re not part of the math. Better move toward the Bronco: I calculated a more potent dose to compensate for your lycanthropy.”

  She started to stagger and Mooncloud moved in to provide support. “Let me put her in the Bronco and then come with you.”

  “There’s no need for either of you to go where I’m going,” I said with a half smile. I turned and pulled myself up and through the ragged opening. Then I turned back and flashed the remote, strapped just below my left hand. “Remember, the far side of the field, and don’t come any closer until this deal is done.” I switched on my own headset. “Adios.”

  Garou was definitely getting wobbly. As Mooncloud attempted to shepherd her toward the vehicle, I broke open the Dartmaster and removed the CO2 cartridge. I didn’t know how close the test firings coupled with the two shots I’d used on Wren and Garou had come to exhausting the charge, but I wasn’t going downstairs without a fresh load of propellant. I changed cartridges and tossed the extra dart I had readied for Garou just in case the first dosage had been insufficient. I reached into my other pocket and loaded one of the special darts I had prepared for Kadeth Bey.

  And then I kicked open the lid to Bassarab’s box.

  “You are a dead man,” he hissed.

  “You have a knack for stating the obvious.” I repocketed the dart gun and gestured with the detonator. “Get up.”

  He moved sluggishly, except where the wedge of sunlight through the broken wall threatened to touch him. I slipped the detonator off my wrist and used the rubber bands to refasten it to the Sabrelight while he reached into the crate. He shook out the black duster that served him as a nineteenth century substitute for an eighteenth-century cape.

  As he opened the lining in the back of the garment, I wondered how he would upgrade his wardrobe for the next century. Nehru jacket? Probably not as handy for hang-gliding nor for concealing weapons like the Mossberg 9200 shotgun he was sliding into the opening that would drape between his shoulder blades.

  “This is madness!” he protested as he donned the coat and adjusted the shoulders against the awkward weight down the middle of his back. “How do you expect to pull this off?”

  I repressed the urge to say, “That’s for me to know and you to find out.” Instead I countered with a question of my own: “How come you didn’t travel the dreampath the day your house burned down?”

  “What?”

  “You were already burned by the fire. Why did you subject yourself to further damage from the sun when you could have transported yourself by traveling this so-called dreampath?”

  He scowled and studied the wedge of sunlight spilling through the shattered wall, a reminder that all of his escape routes were cut off. “It is not so easy. I was disoriented from the smoke, the heat. And the sun was up: I have never traveled a dreampath during the day. I’m not sure that it can be done.

  “To travel the dreampaths, you must relax, clear your mind. You must focus your mind on a specific destination or you may become lost in between.”

  “And where’s that?”

  He shrugged, moving closer to the inner door that opened on the central hallway. “Limbo. Between dimensions.”

  “Like being banished?” I was remembering Luath and the general.

  “Very like. Perhaps worse.”

  “But the first time I did it, I ended up in your room, and I wasn’t focusing on a destination at all.”

  “That was my doing. I sensed your movement within the dreamplane. I intercepted you to keep you from becoming lost in between.”

  “So, what happens the next time I dream? What if you’re not around to reel me back in?”

  “This is not to become a problem.”

  “Yeah? And why not?”

  “Because,” he said, “very soon we shall both be dead.”

  “Oh, yeah,” I said, “I forgot.”

  He eased the door open and peered into the darkness of the corridor. “However,” he said after a long moment, “if you and I were to both survive this—”

  “We’re speaking hypothetically here, of course. . . .”

  “Of course.”

  “Thought so.”

&nb
sp; “If we were to survive, I would probably find the time to coach you through a couple of controlled dreamwalks—”

  “I can’t believe you two are bickering about this,” Mooncloud’s voice crackled in my earpiece, “while Bey and Bachman are probably waiting right around the corner."

  “I was wondering when you were going to join us, Doctor. How’s Lupé?”

  “Still conscious, but unable to do anything beyond cursing your name. If they don’t kill you, there’s a very good chance that she will, once the tranquilizer wears off."

  “Don’t worry about us, Doctor: Bachman is already expecting us, and we’re making enough noise to let them know we’re not trying to sneak up on them.”

  “Perhaps we should not keep them waiting,” Bassarab said, reaching the junction of the hallway and the stairwell.

  “Okay, Doc, close your mike and listen closely: I can’t afford any distractions once the negotiations begin. If everything blows up in our faces, I want you to get over to Mount Horeb Hospital as fast as you can. There’s someone you’ll need to see in Fifth-floor-Psych, room 512. You got that?”

  “Room 512, Mount Horeb Hospital, Fifth-floor-Psych. Who and why?"

  “I’ll explain later. Just remember and get there as fast as you can after this is over. Bye, Doc.” I looked over at my hostage. “Ready?”

  He readjusted his duster, nodded, and started down the stairs. I followed a few steps behind.

  They were waiting for us in the furnace room, Bey and Bachman, insolently at ease and seated upon a jumble of crates like moldering royalty in an Egyptian tomb. Only a bare dozen candles were lit, shifting the clumps of darkness around us like stray cattle from a shadowy herd of the damned.

  Bey was a mess. His skin was black and shriveled from his torching at the Tremont, here and there, portions of ruined flesh had flaked away to reveal smooth, albeit grey, skin beneath. Bey the Deathless was on the mend.