Land of the Dead

by Robert Swartwood

Conrad blinked. He looked up and on the monitor saw a young man approaching a table. On the table was a Pandora, the dark crystal cube shining in the light. Around the table were other Pandoras, maybe twenty or thirty. The room appeared to be made of steel, and slowly the young man approached, almost entranced, as if he could actually hear the pulse coming from the rock.

  “Now here,” Albert said in an almost whisper, as if the man inside the computer monitor might hear him, “once he picks up the Pandora a slat will open and a rabbit will be pushed into frame. Here it comes ... there.”

  And just like the scientist said, the young man picked up the Pandora and at once a gray rabbit appeared, dead as the day it was animated. The young man glanced up at it quickly, startled, and he almost set the Pandora back down. But he hesitated, holding the cube, and closed his eyes.

  In the young man’s hands, the cube began to glow.

  “Now watch carefully,” Albert said. “See what’s happening to the Pandora? It’s because the energy inside is fluctuating. It knows this young man, somehow senses him. But again, his body cannot absorb the energy. The only way to release that energy is what we have managed to establish over years of research. And as you will see very soon, the young man will follow through with what was asked of him. He will smash it.”

  As if on cue, the young man raised the Pandora over his head—the rock glowing even brighter now—and threw it down to the floor. It broke apart, shattered, and at once the Pandoras around him took on a sudden, blinding glow. But it was only for a moment, a half-moment, and then the twenty or thirty Pandoras were gone, all having dissolved ... and the rabbit that had been dead its entire existence was now living.

  “But do you see our test subject here? He’s still dead. He’s not affected, but the rabbit is.”

  The scientist rewound the file only a couple seconds, to the spot right before the young man threw the Pandora at the floor. Then he let it play out and Conrad witnessed it all again—the shards of quartz, the glowing Pandoras, the rabbit becoming all at once living.

  “Do you see?” Albert said, and there was something like childlike glee in his voice. “Do you see? Do you see?”

  More rewinding, more playing forward, and each time it never changed: the rabbit always going from dead to living, dead to living, dead to living.

  16

  At two o’clock precisely the bells rang and over five hundred dead children came scrambling out of the elementary school. Most went for the long line of gray school buses, while others headed for where their parents had parked along the curb. This was the suburbs, not the city, but enough homes were close by that even some of the children started off in different directions, most walking in groups, their small backpacks strapped to their shoulders.

  Conrad couldn’t remember the last time he’d picked up his son from school. He was sure he’d done it before, but he couldn’t remember when. He watched the children and wondered if it was possible that he had never stood against his car like this, waiting for his son to emerge from the building.

  He wondered at what point he had become his father.

  This was something he had never wanted, of course. He had promised himself when Denise became pregnant that he wasn’t going to become like his father. That he would never put his job before his family. He promised himself he would talk with his wife and child every day, see them as much as he could on his time off, always put them first. But what had happened? He’d started working more and more, gained more and more responsibility, and saw his family less and less.

  A lot had changed in the past couple days, much more than Conrad had ever thought possible. The bombing at Hunter Headquarters was the catalyst. While Conrad had gone with Philip and Michael and Kevin to Eugene Moss’s house, Denise had been at home with Thomas to keep her company. She’d been a wreck, nearly hysterical, trying to call his mobile phone (which he’d left in his car), trying to call the Headquarters itself (where there was no answer), then making calls to the police, the fire department, even the operator. But nobody could help her track down her husband who she was very certain was trapped beneath all that dust and rubble the news was constantly replaying on TV.

  And then Kyle had come home. He’d heard about the news at school, he was concerned, but it made no sense why his mom would be so upset. So what did Denise do? She got down on her knees, held her son’s shoulders, and told him the truth. Told him everything. She explained that was why she was so upset, why she was so frantic, because Kyle’s father was a Hunter, had always been a Hunter, and right now he had been expired along with all the other Hunters.

  When Conrad did call a few hours later, it was Thomas who answered, both Denise and Kyle too nervous to even touch the phone for fear of what news it would bring. And when Thomas heard Conrad’s voice he sighed, actually chuckled, and passed the phone to Denise. She barely got in two words before the phone was snatched away by Kyle, Kyle who quickly asked if he was okay, and then asked if it was true, if Conrad was really a Hunter.

  Since then Kyle had gained a new respect for his father. Before when Conrad had called home his son never wanted to talk to him for more than a minute or two, always doing the polite how-was-your-day-mine-was-fine, but now Kyle wanted to talk to Conrad for hours. Asking about how many zombies Conrad had killed, what it was like at Artemis, if now that the truth was out would Conrad help him train. Kyle didn’t seem too upset that the truth had been kept from him all this time. He seemed to understand. And all he wanted now was to talk to his father, hear his father’s stories, and Conrad, despite himself, told his son everything—or almost everything; he still kept Kyle’s grandfather out of it. But it was nice being truly admired by his son for a change, it was nice having his son actually want to talk to him, and not just do it because it was expected.

  But that wasn’t the reason Conrad now waited outside his son’s elementary school.

  After leaving Living Intelligence he had gone back home, chatted with Thomas—the old man asking him if he had been at that “Moss fellow’s house” and Conrad saying he hadn’t—then went inside to find Denise waiting for him in the existing room. She wasn’t happy. Apparently she’d just gotten off the phone with Kyle’s baseball coach. The man told her that when he’d talked to Kyle about how he wasn’t ready yet for pitcher, Kyle said he didn’t care. Kyle said it didn’t matter because when he got old enough he was going to be a Hunter, that it was guaranteed, because his own father was a Hunter. Thankfully Kyle had said this out of earshot of the other kids, and the only reason Kyle’s coached called Denise directly was out of concern—after all, he knew what had happened just the other day to the Hunter Headquarters and didn’t want Kyle putting himself at risk.

  But that wasn’t all, Denise said. Kyle was slipping back into his old ways. His grades were dropping, he was no longer playing the required hours of video games, and just the other day when he was asked to put his laundry away he just shrugged his shoulders and walked out of the room, as if he didn’t care at all. And this, Denise said, her voice rising, needed to stop immediately.

  So that’s why Conrad now stood outside his son’s school. He figured today was a better day than ever to have a serious talk with his son. Denise claimed Kyle was becoming a brat again, and maybe that was true. But just how was that Conrad’s fault? He had no idea what it took to be a father. His own father had never been around much, and the few times he had, Henry had only wanted to see what Conrad had learned in the ways of his training. This was why Conrad had always made sure he played catch with Kyle, or watched Kyle play the latest Henry the Hunter video game, or asked Kyle what was new in school. He wanted to take an interest in what his son wanted and not force his own interests on his son.

  He leaned against the car, his arms crossed, trying to look like every other parent who came every day to pick up their kids. Men and women who were secretaries, cashiers, clerks, electricians, salesmen, mechanics, or police officers like Eugene Moss—and for an instant Conrad wondered how the other p
arents saw him, did they know him for what he was, and then he wondered just what his existence would be like if he was just like one of them, how things would be between him and Denise, how much Kyle would look up to him then.

  “Dad?”

  Kyle was walking toward him with two other boys. Kyle asked them to wait, then hurried forward, his backpack bouncing on his shoulder. When he reached his father, he said, “What are you doing here?”

  “I’m here to pick you up.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah, buddy. Hop in.”

  A minute later, Kyle having said goodbye to his friends, they exited the school parking lot and turned onto the main road.

  “I can’t believe you came to pick me up,” Kyle said, his smile huge. “This is so cool. Is this like a surprise for my animation day or something?”

  “Do you want it to be a surprise?”

  “Do I only get one? Because if I only get one, then yeah, this is a cool surprise.”

  “What if you get two?”

  Kyle smiled again. “If I get two, I’d want a dog. Didn’t Mom tell you I’ve been asking for one?”

  Denise had mentioned to Conrad several times about getting Kyle a dog. Conrad had been all for it before, knowing his son was mature enough, would take good care of it, but now when he thought about it he thought about being in Eugene Moss’s kitchen and watching Philip put a bullet in the gray retriever’s head.

  “She sure did.” Conrad forced a smile. “That’s why I picked you up. We’re going to go pick one out right now.”

  They left the suburbs and got onto the Shakespeare, headed into the city. They came to a shopping mall and Conrad found a place to park right in front of Pluto’s Pets Unlimited.

  When Kyle started to undo his seatbelt, Conrad said, “Are you sure a dog is what you really want?”

  Kyle nodded eagerly. The seatbelt now off, he went to open his door but stopped when Conrad engaged the automatic locks. He looked back at his father with a frown.

  Conrad said, “And are you sure a dog is what you really deserve?”

  The frown on his son’s face started to fade, filling with a kind of understanding. “Dad, I—”

  “How did tryouts go?”

  “Dad, you don’t—”

  “Did you make pitcher?”

  Kyle dropped his head, muttered, “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “It doesn’t matter. Who wants to be a stupid pitcher anyway? I mean, I’m going to be a Hunter.”

  “You are, are you?”

  “Well, yeah.” Saying it like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

  Conrad stared hard at his son, not sure what to say or do. He’d never hit his son before, had always told himself he never would, but now he felt the urge more than ever.

  He counted to ten in his head, took a breath, and put the car in reverse.

  “What are you doing?” Kyle said. “Aren’t we going inside?”

  Conrad ignored him and drove out of the parking lot, got back onto the main highway heading into Olympus. They drove for another twenty minutes, the city traffic heavy, before coming to the place Conrad never wanted to see again. The street was still blocked off and he managed to find an empty spot on the curb to park the car.

  “You want to be a Hunter so bad, Kyle?” he said, staring out the windshield at all those construction crews still digging through the debris. “That’s what you get for being a Hunter.”

  One of the gray construction trucks was backing up with a pile of rubble in its bed, producing a low and distant beeping.

  “It’s not as glorious as you think. It’s not all fame and fortune. In fact, it’s none of those things. It’s hard work, very hard work, and when it’s all said and done nobody even knows you did anything. That’s the purpose of the Hunter Code, Kyle. You should know that.”

  Kyle stared out his window, refusing to look at his father.

  “And you hardly ever see your family. That’s one of the big drawbacks. That’s why a lot of Hunters never even marry. They never have children. And those that do almost never see them except for the few times they do make it home, and it’s like they don’t even recognize their family, just like their family doesn’t recognize them.”

  Farther up the street, right at ground zero, a jackhammer started up.

  “But worst of all, Kyle, there are some people that don’t appreciate what you do at all. There are extremists out there that think there’s nothing wrong with the living. And for them, Hunters are the real evil. And sometimes they go and do something crazy like blow up a Hunter Headquarters. They do whatever it takes to expire as many Hunters as they can. Do you see the danger? This isn’t one of your video games. This is real. You don’t expire in a game and then hit replay. When you expire, you expire.”

  Still staring out his window, still refusing to look at his father, Kyle whispered, “Why did you bring me here?”

  “Because I want you to see the reality of a Hunter’s existence. I want you to understand just how serious it is. This is why your mother and I kept it from you all these years. We were going to tell you eventually, when you got older, but now that you know the truth you have to understand why you can’t tell anyone.”

  “But—”

  “There are people out there that want to expire me, and they will do whatever they can to make it happen. And if that means taking you and your mother away, expiring you too, that’s just what they’ll do. Do you understand now? That is why it’s so important that you keep what I do for an existence a secret. You can’t tell anyone, not your coach, not even your best friend.” Conrad, realizing suddenly he didn’t even know who his son’s best friend was, said, “Kyle, did you tell your best friend?”

  Kyle glanced at his father, nodded slowly.

  “Who else?”

  “No one else. Just Eddie.”

  “Kyle, tell me the truth.”

  “I mean it. I just told Eddie, and Eddie’s not going to tell anyone. I made him promise he wouldn’t.”

  Conrad highly doubted Eddie would keep his promise, but he knew what was done was done. So he said, “Do you still want to be a Hunter when you get older?”

  Kyle nodded again.

  “Okay, then if that’s the case, you have to understand one important thing. You are going to get no special treatment. None. If you want to become a Hunter, you have to work for it. Understood?”

  Kyle had dropped his eyes to the floor. In a soft voice he said he did.

  “Say it like you mean it.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Good. Because you are what you make yourself, Kyle, not what others make of you. And right now you don’t want to make yourself a brat. Do you?”

  Kyle looked back up at him. He shook his head.

  “Say it like you mean it.”

  “No, sir.”

  Conrad turned the ignition, put the car back in gear. But before he pulled back out onto the street, the scene ahead of him caught his attention again. He found himself watching the construction crews, working together as a unit to clear all of the destruction.

  “Dad?”

  Conrad looked at his son.

  “Can we go home now?”

  He stared at his son, at the worry in his son’s face, and nodded. “Yeah, buddy. Let’s go home.”

  17

  Dinner that night was tense but bearable. After they were finished, Kyle asked if he could be excused. Denise glanced at Conrad but he was busy working on his second helping of fish and potatoes. She told Kyle yes, he could be excused.

  When Kyle reached the doorway, he stopped. He turned slowly, and when he spoke, his cracked voice was softer than usual.

  “Mom, I know it doesn’t change anything, but I’m sorry about my behavior the past couple days. It’s no excuse and I should know better.”

  He didn’t wait for a response and turned and left the kitchen.

  Denise looked at Conrad. “I’m shocked.”

  A forkful of
fish in his mouth, he nodded.

  “Well, okay,” she said, “maybe he’s not a brat all the time.”

  After they cleared the table, after they put the dishes in the dishwasher, Conrad and Denise went outside to sit on the deck. They sat close on the wooden step, staring out at the trees and the dark sky. Neither of them spoke. Conrad hadn’t told her about his talk with Kyle and he didn’t intend to. What he wanted to talk to her about was his discussion with Albert, what it would mean, and how much it would cost, but he kept finding excuses not to start.

  He thought about being back in Albert’s office, a quarter mile underneath the earth. He’d asked the scientist how he got around keeping the truth from his wife. Albert said he didn’t have a wife. Okay then, Conrad said, what about his girlfriend. Albert said he didn’t have a girlfriend either. Then it must be easy for you, Conrad told him, not to keep your secrets from anyone, and Albert said no, that wasn’t true, he still did. A silence fell between them, both men watching each other closely, and then Conrad, trying to keep his repulsion down, said, Oh. Albert nodded. Conrad said, But that’s illegal, meaning homosexuality, which, if caught, would mean immediate expiration for both parties involved. And Albert, smiling his stiff smile, said, These days, Conrad, there isn’t much that isn’t.

  Now, alone with Denise, it was his wife who broke the silence.

  “I’m sorry about earlier. The way I blew up at you, it wasn’t fair. I knew what I was getting into when I married you, the whole existence of a Hunter’s wife. But it’s just that Jess keeps putting these ideas in my head, like how you’re never home and how that should hurt me and Kyle, and ... well, I guess in a way it does.”

  “I’m sorry. I wish I could be home more.”

  “I know you do. But I shouldn’t have taken my anger out on you like that.”

  “Don’t worry about it.”

  “But I was acting like a bitch. And I’m not a bitch.”

  “Well ...”

  She slapped him playfully on the arm. “Ha-ha.”