The Heath 22.35
Flora had changed her mind.
She found it natural, now, that the body must require a soul even for a simple act like standing up. Even more remarkable, the soul required a body. What remained here of Eva was something that could be burned, or buried like so much rubbish.
Why are we born? What is the point?
That was the great mystery and of this Flora knew nothing. It was not included in the science of Death. Flora remained kneeling for a couple of minutes beside the vacated body and heard the whole area in uproar around her.
I can’t go on…
It was absurd. This morning she had been smoking and chatting with Maja as usual, now she was supposed to be saving souls.
Saving?
She didn’t know anything about it. The only thing she knew about the Place they were going was that it was a place you couldn’t know anything about unless you were there. And that there was Another Place, about which nothing could be said, ever.
Why her? Why Elvy?
Nana…
It was at least twenty minutes since she had called Elvy. She might already be standing at the gates. Even though Flora was afraid to go out, she ran down the stairs. All at once she felt like a little girl again. Nana would tell her, Nana would know what had to be done.
But I am the one who knows…
Life would never be the same after this.
The courtyard was deserted. No. The man without legs, the one she had encountered on the stairs, had got no further than the main entrance and was still dragging himself along by the arms. All around her there was calm, but the clamour inside her head was indescribable. An insane cacophony of cries, prayers, anger, pleas for help, howls of hatred.
She ran over to the man, crouched down and put her hand on his back, sent her knowledge into him, but the man resisted. He did not want to leave his wreck of a body. Instead he turned around and struck out at her hand, tried to grab her, baring his teeth.
Come on, you idiot. Don’t you get it…
Impotent rage bubbled up inside her; she jumped back as the man’s wrath and bitterness clicked in with her own, each feeding the other’s. She measured a kick at his face but managed to control herself; she left him there.
She reached the other side of the courtyard entrance and stopped abruptly.
All of the dead had left their yards and were moving toward the fence. The field was boiling with people. The gates were wide open and a number of police SWAT teams had already driven in, more arriving as she watched. Police officers jumped out with weapons drawn. The dead were trying to move toward the gates but were being held at bay by the police. As yet no shots had been fired but it was only a matter of time. There was maybe one police officer for thirty dead.
Have to…
Flora ran toward the seething mass. When the legless man had turned to her and bared his teeth she had seen something inside him. Hunger. He had used up his own flesh and needed more to sustain his non-existence. It was possible he would have let himself starve to death if he had not been met by this anger from the outside, driving him to satisfy himself. Now he was crawling as fast as he could toward the source of the anger.
Flora reached a young police officer surrounded by the dead and threw herself forward—a second after she felt his consciousness give way—to avoid the gunfire he was pumping into the bodies around her.
He might as well have been using a cap gun. The effect was the same even if the bangs were louder. There were small tugs at the flesh of the dead as the bullets hit, but they didn’t miss a step. Within a couple of seconds the policeman had disappeared in a mass of thin arms, legs, blue clothes.
Now there were shots from several directions. Flora reached the gates and ran past a SWAT unit where a policewoman in the front seat was shouting something about back-up into her radio. Flora ran on down the road and after a hundred metres saw Elvy hurrying along the muddy path.
The pistol shots were now distant, muffled cracks as if there was a New Year’s Eve party somewhere far behind her. She caught up with her grandmother, took her hand and said, ‘Come.’
As they walked quickly, hand-in-hand, back toward the gates an insight blossomed up inside Flora: It’s too late.
Elvy pressed her hand harder, said, ‘Someone. If only we can…how could I…I…’
We didn’t know, Flora sent.
Yet another couple of SWAT vehicles came bouncing along the field in the direction of the gates. One pulled up next to them, and the front window wound down.
‘Hey you! You’re not allowed to be here!’
Flora stared at the gates. The dead were pouring out now, in the direction of the road, toward the city.
‘For Chrissake,’ came a voice from inside the vehicle. ‘Jump in. Now!’
Flora looked at Elvy and for a couple of seconds they were able to share each other’s thoughts. Elvy’s great shame that she hadn’t understood, that she hadn’t done what she was supposed to. She didn’t care what happened to her, she was old and this was her last chance to put something right. As for Flora, she knew that she would never be able to return to a normal life after that second inside Death.
They had to try.
They took a step away from the SWAT vehicle toward the dead, but at that moment a side door opened and a couple of officers jumped out and grabbed them.
‘Are you deaf? You’re not allowed here!’
They were manhandled onto the bus, turned over to more waiting arms that received them, held onto them. The door was pulled shut and locked. The armoured vehicle backed up a couple of metres, until the police officer next to the driver said, ‘Take it once around.’
The driver asked what he meant and the man next to him gestured in a circular motion at the horde of dead people approaching the car. The driver understood what he was getting at, gave a snort and stepped on the gas.
There was a clang of metal as they hit the dead, who were thrown wide by the vehicle ploughing through them. Through the side window, Flora saw the ones who had been hit stand up again.
She held her hands over her ears, sagged into Elvy’s lap, but she felt the thud through her body whenever the car hit dead flesh.
It is over, she thought. It is over.
The Sea of Åland 23.30
Anna didn’t care where they were. There were no islands in sight; even the Söderarm lighthouse had disappeared below the horizon and they were floating down a silvery moon-river on an endless sea. The island of Åland was out there somewhere, and Finland beyond that, but these were names without significance. They were at sea; just at sea.
Light waves were clucking against the hull. Elias lay by her side. Everything was as it should be and if it was not, it no longer mattered. They were beyond, outside. They could go on floating for ever.
The sound that broke the silence was so wrong that at first Anna took it as a cosmic joke bestowed by the night: Eine kleine Nachtmusik, in an ugly electronic tone. She dug the cell phone out from under the blanket. Even though she had brought it in case of a situation like this, it seemed impossible that anyone could reach her out here: there was nothing here.
For a moment she was about to throw it overboard, the sound was so irritating. Then she came to her senses and pressed the talk button.
‘Yes?’
A voice buzzing with tension on the other end. Or else it was simply that the reception was bad.
‘Hello, my name is David Zetterberg. I’m trying to reach Gustav Mahler.’
Anna looked around. The light from the display had disturbed her night vision and she could no longer distinguish the line between sea and sky; they were hovering in space.
‘He’s…not here.’
‘You’ll have to excuse me, I have to talk to someone. He had a grandchild who…there is something I have to say.’
‘You can say it to me.’
Anna listened to David’s story, thanked him and turned off the phone. Then she sat there for a long time
looking at Elias, pulled him up into her lap and laid her forehead against his.
Elias…I’m going to tell you something…
She felt that Elias was listening. She related what she had just been told.
You don’t have to be afraid…
His voice echoed in her head: Are you sure?
Yes. I’m sure. Stay here until…until it’s time. Inside of me.
Through the blankets she felt his body slump together, becoming dead weight. He went into her.
Mummy? What’s it like there?
I don’t know. I think you are…light.
Do you think you can fly?
Maybe. Yes, I think so.
A whining sound, intensifying, carried over the water, as if a ferry were approaching, but the only light came from the moon and the stars. The whining grew stronger, drawing closer, and Anna changed her mind. She had Elias with her, he was inside her again as he had been when he began, and she was no longer willing to give him up. At the moment she thought this, she felt Elias start to pull away from her.
No, no, my love. Stay. Stay. I’m sorry.
Mummy, I’m frightened.
Don’t be afraid. I’m here with you.
The whining was in the dinghy now. From the corner of her left eye she saw a shadow slide across the moon. Something was sitting on the thwart. She could not look there.
Mummy, will we see each other again soon?
Yes, my love. Soon.
Elias was about to say something else, but his speech was going, becoming weaker as a white caterpillar broke free from his chest and a clump of darkness reached out from where it was seated. At the very end of the clump there was a hook.
Anna cupped her hand around the caterpillar and picked it up, holding it there for a couple of seconds.
I will think of you always.
Then she let him go.
The thought, so delicate, as hopeful
as the northward journey of the
light across the sky
in soft streaks
like snail trails
or mussels sensing the bottom of the sea
in the chest, mouth, hands
the heart, the beating heart
the cry of the brain.
MIA AJVIDE
Cries of Flight
Also by John Ajvide Lindqvist
Let the Right One In
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
THOMAS DUNNE BOOKS.
An imprint of St. Martin’s Press.
HANDLING THE UNDEAD. Copyright © 2005 by John Ajvide Lindqvist. Translation copyright © 2009 by Ebba Segerberg. All rights reserved. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.
www.thomasdunnebooks.com
www.stmartins.com
ISBN: 978-0-312-60525-4
First published in Sweden as Hanteringen av odöda by Ordfront
Handling the Undead Page 32
