Beautiful City of the Dead

by Leander Watts

  Tannis came into the room. "Something wrong?" she said.

  "Same old hissy fit from Jerod. He'll be back. He'll rip around the block a few times in his Acura. I don't know who he thinks he's showing off to. But he always comes back once he gets that crot out of his system."

  Relly went to the bathroom and I was alone with his mom.

  She pointed to a picture on the wall. Two girls, maybe my age. Back in the early '70s from the look of the hairstyles and the way the jeans were cut.

  "That's me," Tannis said, pointing to one of the girls. "And that's my sister. Did Relly ever tell you about his aunt Lissa?"

  "I don't think so."

  I heard the toilet flush and then Relly's footsteps as he went back to the attic. As usual, it felt weird being alone with Tannis. But for once I didn't try to get away.

  "We were only a year apart," Tannis said, taking the picture off the wall and handing it to me. "She was really into drama. You know: plays, theater. She was good. Very good."

  "Does she still do it?" I asked. It was easy to see which one was Tannis. Darker hair, heavier features. Tannis, at least in the olden days, was kind of cute. But her sister was beautiful. "She's the one in the kitchen, right?" I said. "The zodiac picture. Aquarius."

  "Yes, that's Lissa."

  We heard a car door slam and then Jerod came stomping into the house. "So what are you waiting for?" he asked me. "Let's get back to work."

  Just like Relly said, the fight was all forgotten. And if anything, we sounded even better after Jerod had his little tantrum.

  No more talk about the set list. Relly had added the last tune, "Silence Loud," and that was that.

  It was great, better, I bet, than any drug. So much power, so much joy blasting out of the amps. Relly faced in toward the drums. And me, too. With Jerod in the middle. We were a perfect four, banging our heads against the air.

  Afterward, I wondered what the real Silence Loud would've thought if she'd heard us. She was a pioneer girl from the olden days. She died when she was seventeen years old. That's what her stone said. Probably she'd run screaming from the room if she heard her song. I felt a little bad about that, stealing her name. Maybe in a hundred years somebody would steal mine too, thinking, Zee, that's the weirdest name I ever heard.

  I was OK with that though. And I hoped Silence would understand if I ever met her and had to explain it all.

  Twenty-six

  WE HAULED OUR GEAR TO the Bug Jar in Butt's van. Just like a real band, I thought. This is what it will be like when we tour. The four of us together, all cranked up, ready for the stage, hungry for the almighty noise.

  Only when we got big, we'd have roadies and the places would be huge.

  The Bug Jar holds maybe a hundred people. In the front room, a gigantic fly rotates from the ceiling above the bar. There's seedy old punks and a few biker types, college kids and teenagers drinking pop. Even though we were playing that night, we had to have our hands stamped with Xs. No beer for Scorpio Bone.

  Kruel and Unusual was already there, hanging around the bar. For a big-name act, they were pretty friendly. The lead singer talked a little with Relly, about mikes and amps.

  So we set up and watched the crowd come in. By the time we were supposed to go on, the place was packed. The back room is where the stage is. There's a booth for the sound man and about as much room on the dance floor as in Relly's kitchen. In the back was a table where one of the Kruel and Unusual girlfriends was selling CDs and band T-shirts. By eleven o'clock we could hardly get through the crowd to the stage.

  "All right," Jerod yelled, grabbing the mike stand with both hands. "We are Scorpio Bone and this is the end of the world as you know it." Butt gave us the four-count and off we went.

  How good were we? Better than ever. How did the crowd like us? They screamed for three encores, and that's saying something for the opening band. Everyone came to see Kruel and Unusual, but they went away talking about Scorpio Bone.

  We did all our best songs, which means all the ones I wrote the words to. With the crowd pushing up against the stage, with the noise ripping out of the amps like a horde of furious demons, with Jerod yelling my words, I thought nothing could ever be as good.

  My Ibanez and me were like one body. And Relly's crushing riffs were mine too. Butt's bass drum pulsed in my brain. Jerod screamed words that I had written, or copied off old gravestones. And the whole crowd was mixed up in our rising, roaring tide.

  I was back behind Relly and Jerod. Still, it felt like this was my night, not anyone else's. This was for me, and me alone. This was what I'd been waiting all those years for. To be real, to be wild and loud and free. And to have a hundred people yelling because they loved it.

  Twenty-seven

  FOR THE FIRST TIME, I truly got what the band was about. Each one of us had joined for a different reason. And each of us got a different payoff. Jerod could stand before the crowd like a pagan idol to be worshiped. Every girl in the place wanted to be with him. And every guy wanted his look, his moves, his voice, his godlike glow.

  Butt wanted to smash and pound, like he had a Mack truck in each of his hands. Diesel engine stink, noise, and raw power.

  Relly had his Ghost Metal.

  And me?

  I wanted to be part of something bigger than myself. And I got that. Of course, I also wanted to be near Relly. But the real payoff that night was to hear my words huge and heavy, blasting out of the speakers. Jerod sang and shouted, yelled and yowled. Only it was me, not him, the crowd was listening to. For once, my voice was really and truly heard.

  We came down off the stage and it was like we really were gods. I mean, I still didn't understand about tetrads and ancient, secret powers. But this made sense. People loved us. We'd grabbed them and shook them and they wanted more. We didn't have to burst into flame or make the rains come. This was the real magic power. Bass, drums, guitar, and a voice. That's all we needed to be gods.

  What happened right after is all a blur. I was so cranked up I hardly knew who I was. But I do know that Kruel and Unusual actually heard our set and they were just as stoked as the crowd. The singer asked Relly if we could do some more shows with them, in other towns. He talked about real money. Not just a little handful of sweaty five-dollar bills.

  Then he said his manager was there and did we want to talk?

  So we squeezed our way out of the back room and headed for a table. "He loved your set," the Kruel and Unusual drummer said. "He wants to talk about where you guys are heading."

  I took one look and froze. This manager was a creepy-looking guy with mirror sunglasses on. He had a drink in front of him and a ring on every finger.

  "It's Scratch," I said to Relly. I felt my stomach turning and my legs starting to wobble. "It's Scratch. This was all a setup."

  The place was so noisy, Relly didn't hear a word I said. I kind of hung back, fear gnawing at my brain. "Don't," I said. "Don't go over there." I reached for Relly, but couldn't hold him.

  Relly went and so did Jerod. I guess Butt was still enjoying all the high-fives and backslapping.

  "No," I groaned. "Don't."

  Then the manager guy took off his glasses and relief flooded through me. No bulgy eye like Scratch. He said, "You were great, really something," and his voice wasn't the one I'd heard on the phone and on the bridge.

  He stood up and he was way over six feet tall. "You could fill a place ten times bigger than this," he said. "A hundred times."

  He shook Relly's hand. The crowd pushed me closer and he took mine too. I felt like a little kid again, playing at being a grownup. He held onto my hand. And my sickening dread all drained away. "I'm Ray Kola." He spelled it.

  "I'm Zee," I said.

  "Cool name." When he smiled, gold glittered in his mouth.

  It wasn't Scratch in disguise, after all. Ray Kola was really his name and he really was a manager. I heard him talking with Relly about better gigs. I just let go then and kind of drifted, like this all was a pe
rfect dream.

  The fear was gone. Everything was going to be OK.

  It was three in the morning when Butt finally dropped me off at my house.

  Twenty-eight

  AT FOUR THIRTY THE phone rang. I staggered down the hall and grabbed it. "Yeah?"

  It was Tannis and she wanted to know where Relly was.

  "He was hanging around outside the Bug Jar with Kruel and Unusual when I took off. The gig went great."

  "He never came home," she said. "I called Jonathan and Jerod. He's not with them either." The panic in Tannis's voice brought me totally awake in a hurry.

  "He's not with you?" she asked.

  "No!" I was almost yelling. "Butt took me home about three."

  "They must have got him, Zee." Though she'd never mentioned their names before, I knew she meant Knacke and the others. "They've taken him hostage."

  "What are you talking about?" I shouted. It didn't matter how loud I got. My dad could sleep through an H-bomb attack.

  "I know it! I just know it! They've taken him prisoner. Knacke and Franken and Scratch."

  "Why would they do such a thing?" She didn't answer me. "Did you call the police? Or how about the hospitals? Maybe he was in an accident."

  I felt like I was living in two different worlds at the same time. In the normal one, we were just kids in a band. In the other one, which seemed to get more real every day, the rules were all different. The police couldn't do a thing against living human fire. Teachers were maniac wizards. The assistant principal of the school was also the mastermind of a kidnapping ring.

  "Relly was talking with a guy called Ray Kola. He manages Kruel and Unusual. Maybe they're still talking."

  "It's almost five, Zee. The sun will be up soon. It's not this manager guy. It's Knacke and the others. I just know it."

  I sat in the kitchen for an hour, watching the numbers flick away on the oven clock. Slowly, a watery dawn light filled the room. Tannis didn't call again. At six thirty I got ready for school. My dad was still sleeping when I went out to get the bus.

  Twenty-nine

  SCHOOL WAS ACTUALLY A good thing that day. At least at first. I mean it was normal. Boring, yeah. A waste of time, yeah. But it was something I could count on.

  Butt didn't come in. I figured he'd been out all night.

  And Relly never showed, so I was back to the way it used to be. All alone, kind of floating silently around the edges of the crowds. Some kids told me how much they liked our show. Mostly, though, I was back to being a stranger and a loner again.

  Of course, going to bio was the worst. Relly wasn't there. And Knacke was back.

  He did a lesson about lava and magma that day. On the desk was a miniature volcano. After the lights were all out, he tossed something in the hole and soon a weird reddish light was rising up. Then glowing orange ooze poured out the top, across the desk, and down to the floor in bright gooey trails.

  I just sat there in a daze and Knacke left me alone.

  Until the bell rang and the others all rushed out.

  I was at the end of the line. Knacke stationed himself at the door. As the last kid went out, Knacke cut off my escape.

  "We need to talk, Zee."

  I didn't argue. No point in fighting him now. Without Relly with me, I had no strength to resist.

  "You're aware that Relly is not in school today?"

  No point in answering.

  "You understand that he's with us now."

  "He's fire," I said. "You already got fire. Scratch said you wanted me, not him. You need a watergod, not fire."

  "That's correct. And that is why we're having this little talk now, Zee. Scratch made you an offer, which you foolishly ignored. And so we've had to add a little inducement. It's really very simple, Zee." He kept saying my name, stretching it out, savoring the sound. That made my helpless feeling ten times worse.

  "It's simple. You join us and make our tetrad complete again. Four and no more, forever more." He smiled his disgusting smile. "You join us and Relly will go free."

  "And if I don't?"

  "Then you'll never see your friend again. And nor will anyone else. Simple, really. Very simple."

  "Join you?"

  I remembered a math teacher saying once, "There are no stupid questions." Maybe he was right, but I sure felt stupid then. Join Knacke and the others? Did they have a band? This almost made me laugh. Maybe they played weddings. Or did corny old country stuff. "Lost Highway," "Your Cheatin' Heart," that kind of stuff. Maybe they needed a bass player.

  "Yes, join us. Four and no more, and we'll be restored."

  "I'm just a kid."

  "We understand that, Zee. But you're also a god. You know that. We know that. And we need you." He sucked in air, like a smoker fighting to catch his breath.

  "There was a fourth once, who made our tetrad complete. Surely Relly must have told you about this. We had all we needed. We were supposed to be four forever more. But she's gone now, and that's why we need you, Zee."

  "Stop saying that, all right?" It was like my name gave him power over me. "Just stop saying it!"

  "Fine, fine. If you need some time, I understand. But you'll have to deal with this soon enough."

  Then he stabbed both of his hands into the puddle of glowing liquid. And he held them out, as if offering me a handful of molten gold.

  "Join us, and you'll know power a hundred times greater than with your little kiddy friends. We're mature, seasoned by time, you might say. We have so much more to offer. Do you want to die? Or do you want to live forever, Zee?"

  "But Relly said that—"

  "Relly is a strutting fool. He has barely an inkling of how things truly are. He doesn't have the strength or the wisdom or the courage to be immortal. All he cares about is his idiotic rock band. Sooner or later his tetrad would fall to pieces. And then where would you be? But we will be together forever. Franken and Scratch and Knacke and Zee."

  "Shut up!" I yelled, and pushed past him to the door.

  "We'll talk later," he said. "You know how to reach me."

  Thirty

  I GOT OFF THE BUS at Slime Street. Tannis opened the door without me even knocking. She must've been watching from the kitchen window.

  "Knacke said he wants to trade," I told her. "He wants me to join him and the other two." I slumped down at the table, head in both hands. "He said Relly can go free if I just join them. That's all. Join up with three ugly, poxy, smelly old men. He said if I don't, no one will ever see Relly again."

  Tannis groaned and her face went gray. "I knew it. I knew it," she murmured. She clutched at the countertop.

  "I'm sorry," I said. "It's all my fault."

  If I hadn't joined Scorpio Bone, then none of this would've happened. If I'd just stayed all by myself, then Relly would be safe now. "I really am sorry. I shouldn't ever have talked to him."

  I don't know what I expected her to say. But she didn't disagree. She didn't come right out and blame me. She didn't need to. I was doing that just fine all by myself.

  "We've got to get him back," she said as she sat down beside me and took my hands in hers. No mention of the police. What good would they do? Again I had the dizzy feeling that I was living in two worlds. Yeah, police and courts and jails existed here. Tannis could pick up the phone and report her son missing. But I wasn't sure Relly was even in the same world as all that now.

  "What do you want me to do?" I asked. If somebody I could trust just told me, it would be so much easier. My dad? yeah, right. He'd be a ton of help. Other teachers? As far as I knew they all were in on this, one huge secret kid-destroying club.

  "I've feared this day since he was born," Tannis said. "I knew it was coming. I knew they'd come to steal him away." She clutched at my hands. Her voice trembled. "They'll do anything to get what they want."

  "You know Knacke?"

  "For what seems like my entire life," she whispered. "He's been out there, waiting."

  "So you were the one before me?"
>
  She shook her head.

  "I asked Relly if Knacke's fourth element was a girl. And he said she was."

  Tannis sighed, then asked, "How much has Relly told you?"

  "I have no idea. How much is there to tell?"

  She let go of my hands and stood. "Wait here," she said. She came back from the living room a minute later carrying a picture frame.

  "This is me. Do you understand?" The photo showed Tannis, maybe sixteen years old, standing at an iron railing. Behind her was a huge rushing river. And just to the side was the edge. "Niagara Falls. In the spring of 1973. My sister took this picture. Then she gave me the camera and we switched places. But that picture is gone. Long gone. I'd give anything to have that picture again. She did modeling, lots of ads and calendar work. But no picture ever captured her like the one I took that day at Niagara Falls."

  "It was her? Relly's aunt? She was the one?"

  "Yes. She was the one. Knacke claimed her not long after that picture was taken. Only a month or two. That's why I wish I had it again. It showed Lissa before. Lissa free. Lissa like she was supposed to be. Not tangled up with Knacke's fire."

  "She was his watergod?"

  "For years."

  "And Relly knows all this?" I asked.

  "Most of it. I told him what he needed to know. Since he was a little boy, he knew who he was, where he came from, where he's going."

  "So what happened to your sister?"

  No answer.

  "Is she still alive?"

  The word "No" came quiet as a breath.

  "Did Knacke ... I mean, was your sister ... How did she die?"

  Tannis sighed again, and I thought she was going to tell me the whole story. But she went back to Relly. "We've got to get him back."

  "How?"

  "Give them what they want. It's our only chance. You care about Relly. I know that, Zee. Give Knacke what he wants and you'll save your best friend's life."

  I wanted to say, What about my life? But I just sat there, looking at the pictures. Lissa had been part of Knacke's four and now she was dead. Everyone, Knacke and Tannis and maybe even Relly, wanted me to join the four. What about my life? The question kept asking itself in my head. The room was silent for a long time.