Land of the Dead

by Robert Swartwood

  “No,” Scott shouted. “And keep your hands off me. Speaking to me like that is insubordination.”

  “You know where you can stuff your insubordination?”

  They came to another intersection. Conrad told Garry to make a right. Garry turned, cutting it a little too close, the SUV for an instant feeling as if it were riding on two wheels.

  “Garry,” Scott said, as calmly as possible, “stop and turn back around. We’re returning to LI.”

  Garry kept driving.

  Scott looked at him. “Did you hear me?”

  “I heard you.”

  They were coming up to a traffic light. Conrad shouted, “Straight!” and Garry punched the gas, speeding them through the intersection.

  Ruth said, “It looks like you have friends, Conrad. Friends are a good thing.”

  He stared back at her, his mouth open, wanting to say something but not sure how to say it.

  “Are you certain this is really what you want?”

  Conrad nodded.

  “Why?”

  “I want him to be safe.”

  “So you love him?”

  “Yes.”

  “Okay. Then I don’t need the toad.”

  The rain was coming down even harder than before, the windshield wipers working even more furiously.

  “Thank you,” Conrad said.

  Ruth nodded. “But just so we’re clear? It’s not a Pandora your son has gone out to seek. It’s life.”

  • • •

  Two police cars were already waiting outside 58 Orchid Lane. Their white and gray roof lights were flashing, flickering patterns across the nearby houses and lawns.

  As Garry took the corner hard and started to let up on the gas, he shouted, “Masks!”

  Each of them, even Ruth, had a black mask rolled up in a side pocket of their pants. They brought these out, threw off their hats, and pulled the masks down over their heads.

  Beside one of the police cars stood an officer. He wore a rain slicker and a plastic-protected cap. His arms were crossed as he watched the SUV speeding toward him, and when it started to slow he uncrossed his arms and held up his hands.

  Garry brought the vehicle to a sudden halt. All four doors opened and they piled out.

  “Excuse me,” the officer said. “What do you think you’re doing?”

  Conrad took the lead. He fished his Hunter’s badge out of his pocket, flashed it at the officer. “This is my house.”

  The officer started to say something else but Conrad walked straight past him, the three other Trackers and zombie following close behind.

  They cut across the lawn toward the front door. Conrad motioned Scott and Brooks to go with Ruth around the house. He’d already mentioned to the zombie that the back woods was where he suspected a Pandora lay.

  Garry walked with him up the porch steps, through the front door, and into the existing room. There they found Denise on the couch, flanked by two police officers standing in front of her.

  Even with his mask on she recognized him. One of the two officers had been saying something to her when Conrad and Garry entered. She had been listening, holding a wad of tissues in one hand, but seeing her husband she scrambled to her feet. She burst out sobbing as she threw herself into his arms.

  His one arm around his wife, he pulled off his mask and addressed the two officers. “What happened?”

  One of the officers held a notepad, and he was the one that spoke now, saying, “According to your wife, she was asleep when she heard a noise downstairs. She got curious and went to investigate. Her son’s bedroom door was open, so she looked inside and saw that his bed was empty.”

  She’d hurried downstairs then, he said, calling Kyle’s name, but there had been no answer. She went through the entire first floor, even down to the basement, and didn’t think to check the garage until she heard the puppy barking behind the closed door. She opened it to find that the puppy had been tied up, that the side door was slightly ajar.

  “And apparently,” the officer said, “that was where she also found it. Or rather, where she found the location of the missing item.”

  Conrad looked down at his wife, who continued holding him tightly, moaning and sobbing her dry tears.

  “What missing item?”

  The officer looked at his partner, then back at Conrad. “A shovel.”

  • • •

  Hurrying outside with Garry, Conrad was surprised to find not three people in his backyard, but four.

  The lights had been turned on, bright but not bright enough to illuminate the entire lawn. Scott and Brooks stood together in the middle of the yard, Ruth twenty yards ahead of them at the edge of the trees. In each of their hands was a flashlight, the thin beams sweeping through the darkness and rain.

  The fourth person in his backyard was Thomas. His old neighbor stood on the deck just under the lip of the roof, protecting him from the rain, but still he held an opened umbrella over his head.

  “How long have you been here?” Conrad asked him.

  “After Denise called the police, she called me. I came right over.”

  This was obvious by the gray pajama bottoms tucked into a pair of galoshes, his pajama shirt hidden by a raincoat.

  “Did you see anything?”

  “I inspected the tree line just as your friends are doing right now. It’s more than the police have done the past half hour they’ve been here.”

  “What did you find?”

  “I noticed some tracks in the ground just beyond the yard. They’re small enough to be Kyle’s, and they’re fresh. I told those three already, but they don’t seem to be doing anything about it.”

  In the backyard, Scott and Brooks still stood motionless, waiting for Ruth. The zombie was still at the border between the woods and the lawn. She no doubt saw the marks Thomas was talking about, but right now that wasn’t her main priority. It wasn’t Kyle she was attempting to find, but rather the nearest Pandora.

  At once Ruth stood up straight, turned around, and motioned Scott and Brooks to follow. She disappeared into the trees.

  Garry didn’t wait for Conrad to give any orders. He hurried down the deck steps and sprinted across the lawn. His boots made sucking sounds in the damp grass.

  Conrad started to move in the same direction when Thomas spoke.

  “Things definitely have changed a lot since my time as a Hunter.”

  Conrad paused, his body shaking, wanting to continue on but sensing something in his neighbor’s words.

  Thomas stood there, the umbrella over his head, watching Conrad closely. The porch lights were directed at the lawn, which meant hardly any light was aimed at Thomas’s face, but still Conrad could see his neighbor’s blank, stolid expression.

  “That was a zombie, after all. Or haven’t you noticed?”

  • • •

  When he reached the edge of the trees, his flashlight already in hand, some static crackled in his left ear and he heard Brooks’s voice.

  “I think Ruth’s got it, she’s moving pretty fast now.”

  Conrad tore himself into the trees. The only noise was that of the falling rain and the snapping of twigs and branches farther in the woods. Faint beams of light bounced maybe fifty yards ahead of him.

  Suddenly he heard Scott shouting, “Shit, shit, shit!” and then Garry’s voice, asking if he was okay.

  A cry of anguish sounded out, both from Conrad’s earpiece and from a place not too far ahead of him through the trees. He could just make out the two flashlight beams that had stopped moving forward.

  “What’s wrong?” Brooks asked.

  Garry said, “Scott twisted his ankle. The bone’s sticking out.”

  “Fuck, fuck, fuck!”

  Leaves and branches slapped at Conrad’s face, the ground had become muddy and threatened to suck the boots right off his feet. The need and desire to run even faster was quelled by the knowledge that he would be no good to anyone if he fell to the same fate that had befallen Sco
tt. He needed to find Kyle before it was too late, and he would do that, but he had to be smart about it, he couldn’t let his emotions overtake him.

  He reached Scott and Garry a few seconds later, just as the realization hit him that he had no emotions, just as Scott was feeling no pain. But Scott was able to fake it, just as Conrad was able to fake it, and right now Scott was doing a very good job, sprawled on the muddy ground, holding his left ankle with both hands.

  Garry was crouched beside him, shining his flashlight on the broken ankle. Just as he’d said, part of the bone was sticking up through the cuff of the Tracker’s black pants.

  “Go,” Scott managed through the nonexistence pain. “Just keep going.”

  Garry glanced at Conrad.

  Conrad looked down at Scott. He said to Garry, “Stay with him. If you can, get him back to the SUV.”

  Then he turned and continued on, going faster now. Up ahead the flashlight beams had become even more distant, hardly even there, and he didn’t want to lose them.

  “Brooks,” he said, “what’s going on?”

  “How far back are you?”

  “I don’t know, but I can see your light.”

  Ahead of him, the bouncing beam of light stopped momentarily.

  “Okay,” Brooks said, “I can see yours too.”

  The beam of light started bouncing again.

  “She’s right ahead of me. She’s moving fast.”

  “Stay with her,” Conrad said, as more leaves and branches slapped at his body and face, trying to slow him down. “Don’t let her out of your sight.”

  The woods themselves were about a mile across. Conrad thought so far he’d run about five hundred yards.

  In his earpiece, Brooks said, “She’s definitely slowing down.”

  Conrad pushed on harder, forcing himself to go faster.

  “I think ... yeah, I can see your son.”

  Running even harder now, even faster.

  “He’s already digging, Conrad.”

  Ignoring the leaves and branches, ignoring the rain, concentrating on the only thing that mattered to him.

  “Can you hear me? I’m going in.”

  He burst out of the trees seconds later. He spotted Ruth first, standing off to the side pointing her flashlight, and then he saw Brooks hurrying toward—

  “Kyle, no!” Conrad yelled, running even harder, because now there was his son, busy digging, his clothes wet and muddy.

  Heavy oaks towered over them, creating a darkness deeper than night itself. Apparently Kyle had brought a flashlight of his own, which he’d set on the ground aimed right at the hole he was working on now.

  The hole looked to be about three feet deep. Conrad knew there wasn’t much earth left before the Pandora was uncovered.

  Brooks had already reached the hole and now stepped into it, grabbing for the shovel.

  Conrad was less than twenty yards away when a branch reached out and snagged his leg. He fell flat on his face, dropping the flashlight.

  As he struggled back to his feet, he heard his son’s voice for the first time. Kyle shouted, “No, don’t!” as Brooks wrestled the shovel from his hands. Brooks was a large man, strong, and Kyle was just a boy, but he was a determined boy, and something was driving him right now. As he did when he played his video games, he waited for the right moment of attack. His move this time was to let go of the shovel. Brooks lost his balance, started falling back, and Kyle used this opportunity to punch the Tracker in the balls.

  Brooks shouted, letting go of the shovel. Kyle leaned forward, picked up the shovel, and swung it at Brooks’s head.

  Conrad was on his feet now, headed toward them.

  “Kyle!” he shouted again and stepped into the hole. Like Brooks—who was now holding his head, attempting to climb out of the hole—he grabbed for the shovel, started to wrestle it from his son’s grasp. And like his son he was determined too, but even more determined, and it was with this he found the strength to rip the shovel away and throw it into the trees.

  “No, Dad, no!” Kyle shouted. Ruth’s flashlight beam was aimed right at his twisted up face, the expression he always made when he was trying to cry.

  Conrad grabbed for his son but his son kept pulling away, Kyle actually punching his father with weak, feeble attempts.

  And suddenly Conrad let go of his son. He didn’t know why, but something about this scene was familiar, and for some strange reason he realized that in coming here, in wanting to stop his son, he had made a terrible mistake.

  Kyle turned away, dropped to his knees, began digging with his hands. Almost at once he uncovered a portion of the Pandora—Conrad saw some of the quartz sparkling in the beam of light, he saw a soft glow emit from that quartz when his son touched it—but then hands appeared out of nowhere, two sets of gloved hands that grabbed at Kyle and pulled him out of the hole.

  The hands belonged to Brooks and Garry—Garry having left Scott behind—and right now both men were dragging Kyle away, the boy shouting and crying and pleading and trying everything he could to fight his way back to what was buried in the ground.

  29

  After he had talked with the police, explained the situation, told them there was only one course of action to take and what that action was, he watched the two police cars drive away down Orchid Lane. Their roof lights were now dark and they moved between the houses like two stealthy beasts after finishing off their prey. In the backseat of the second police car, his son sat by himself in handcuffs, and as much as Conrad hoped Kyle would look back out the rear windshield, his face never appeared.

  The SUV was still where Garry had parked it earlier. The three Trackers and the zombie were waiting inside. As Conrad approached, the driver’s side window rolled down.

  “You guys take off,” he said. He glanced back at the house, which now sported Jessica’s car in the driveway. “I need to talk to my wife about what happened.”

  Garry said, “Albert’s going to be pissed when he hears about this.”

  “Don’t worry about Albert. I’ll deal with him later.”

  He stepped back and watched as Garry made the three-point turn in the street, the SUV then heading back down the way it had come and disappearing from sight.

  When he stepped into the house, he found Denise and Jessica in the existing room. They were both on the couch. Denise had another wad of tissues in her hand, streaked with patches of dead skin. Jessica had her hand on her sister’s back.

  Conrad didn’t enter the existing room; he couldn’t force himself to cross the threshold. He just stood there, trying not to meet the glare of his wife and sister-in-law.

  “Why did they take our son away?”

  The house was completely silent except for the clock in the kitchen. Kyle hadn’t been gone for more than five minutes and already the house had the sense of something missing.

  “Answer me, Conrad.”

  “Jess, would you mind leaving us alone for a minute?”

  Jessica glanced at Denise, who shook her head violently. “No,” she breathed. “She stays here.”

  “Denise, really, it would be best—”

  “Tell me why!”

  For the first time since he’d known her, Jessica looked uncomfortable. She took her hand away from Denise’s back, as if by touch Denise might infect her with a flesh-eating parasite.

  “It’s the law,” he said. “If a child is suspected of attempting to turn, he or she must be taken into custody and evaluated for possible psychological treatment.”

  “Attempting to turn? What are you talking about?”

  “Denise,” he said, his voice steady and even, “you know exactly what I’m talking about.”

  In the garage, the puppy started barking, a series of short, distant yaps.

  “Jess,” Conrad said, “would you mind checking on ...”

  He couldn’t come up with the puppy’s name and didn’t think it even had one yet. But it didn’t matter. Jessica nodded quickly, stood up, and hurried
out of the room.

  Not even a second after her sister had left, Denise said, “You bastard.”

  Conrad didn’t say anything.

  “I guess Jess was right about you after all. You don’t care about me, or Kyle, or anybody. You only care about yourself.”

  “Denise—”

  “Let me finish.” She leaned forward on the couch, the wad of tissues disappearing into her fist. “It’s always about you. About your career. You have to live your existence by the Code, everything has to be by the fucking Code, and if any little thing goes against it ... our son has been taken away, and you don’t even care.”

  She released the fist, the wad of tissues opening like a flower, then squeezed it again.

  “Do you realize you never tell me anything? And I’m not just talking about your work, I’m talking about everything. And now our son”—she shook her head—“is gone.”

  The puppy was still barking, Jessica apparently unable to quiet it, but Conrad was hardly aware. Even the clock in the kitchen had become silent to him.

  “Those men who were watching Kyle,” Denise said, her rotted teeth gritted, “you never should have called them off.”

  He opened his mouth but quickly shut it.

  She gave him a hard look. “What?”

  He shook his head.

  “What is it?”

  “You,” he said. “You were the one that wanted those men called off. Not me. If anybody’s to blame here, it’s you.”

  She jumped to her feet, charged at him, and slapped him across the face.

  “How dare you,” she said. “Get out of here! Get out of my fucking house!”

  He stood there for a moment, his eyes closed. He breathed in, breathed out, then opened his eyes. Denise was right in front of him, her hand raised to slap him again.

  Without a word he turned away, walked to the front door, and stepped out into the rain.

  30