by J. C. Staudt
As each day passed without sign of the Decylumites, Merrick’s dream of returning to the city north had begun to dwindle like the last length of wick at a candle’s end. Hayden, one of the Decylumite foreigners he’d met at the nomads’ camp, had seemed sure Raithur would return from Sai Calgoar. People down here seemed to like the nomads—trust them, even. Merrick wasn’t convinced. The savages were devious and scheming, if sentiment in the city north could be believed. There was no telling what might’ve happened to Raithur and his men in Sai Calgoar, and Merrick often found himself convinced he was waiting on a deliverance that would never come.
He knew the blackhands were the only ones who could teach him to use his gift, but he had begun to wonder whether he was using their absence as an excuse. I’ve healed before, he reminded himself. I can do it again, and I can teach myself to do it better. Maybe I can even figure out whether I’m capable of performing some of the tricks I’ve seen the other blackhands do. The orbs, the melting of stone and metal, the heightened speed and reflexes. He had seen one of them turn a concrete wall to dust with only the touch of his hands. If he could figure out how to do things like that, the barriers the Scarred Comrades had erected to keep out the southers would fall before him like torn cloth.
At the far end of the rooftop, Bucyrus was cursing his own existence, muttering to himself in his usual colored language as he mopped the sweat off his brow. “Coffing light-star, every coffing day. Ain’t had a drop of good rain or a sniff of cool breeze in weeks. Wind feels like a coffing furnace, crops are weak… ain’t sweated this much since the last time I got laid. Can’t even remember that, it’s been so coffing long. Why, I—”
A disturbance from beneath the awning halted Bucyrus’s complaints. One of the big clay vegetable pots had fallen from its rolling table and cracked on the ground. Cluspith was having another one of his outbursts. Swydiger was trying to calm him, but the conditions that triggered his brother’s episodes were not always easy to identify. Cluspith ambled away, his arms at his sides, and let out a whooping, nonsensical shriek that sent a chill through Merrick’s bones.
“Merrick Bouchard is a spy,” Cluspith said, his voice falling to a deep, gruff rumble. “He’s a Comrade, sent here to learn our secrets and root us out.”
“Clus… let’s quiet down,” said Swydiger, moving slowly toward him. “We’re outside, we need to hush.”
Cluspith gave another shriek. He shuffled off a few more steps, out of Swydiger’s grasp. His voice changed again into a nasally midtone. “I haven’t trusted him since he got here.”
“Cluspith Porter, that’s rude,” said Swy, edging slowly toward him.
Cornered, Cluspith crouched and tried to crawl away on all fours, but Swy grabbed him by the arm and pulled him to his feet, wrapping him in a heavy bear hug. Cluspith shrieked again, but Swy tightened his hold and put his mouth beside his ear, shushing him with a steady, even voice.
Merrick could see the color rising in Swydiger’s cheeks. He felt sorry for him, knowing how much his brother sometimes embarrassed him in front of the others. Swy was always so patient with Cluspith, so understanding, despite how much harder their lives were because of Cluspith’s condition. I don’t know how he does it, Merrick thought. I’d have given up on him a long time ago.
“Merrick Bouchard ought to be cut up and sent back north in pieces,” Cluspith shouted, his voice altogether different this time.
Swydiger continued to soothe him. “Clus, it’s time to settle down. Let’s have a seat over here.” He brought Cluspith to the brick ledge and guided him to a seat. He was firm, but not forceful.
Cluspith began to rock back and forth. Swydiger rubbed his back with a gentle hand and continued to speak soothingly to him until the episode passed. The other workers looked on with disdain. The guards heightened their vigil, wary now thanks to the volume of Cluspith’s outburst.
“I’m sorry about that,” Swy whispered when Merrick came around to pick peppers from the planter boxes in front of them.
“It’s alright.”
“You know he repeats things,” said Swy. “He didn’t mean anything by it.”
“I know.” Merrick did know, but that didn’t make hearing those things any easier. The other Gray Revenants were always yammering when he wasn’t around. Ever since their attack on the old church had claimed the lives of Caliber and Leuk, Merrick had felt as though Swydiger and his disabled brother were his only allies among the Revs. On days like today, he wasn’t sure he could count Cluspith among his friends, whether the dway knew what he was saying or not.
Peymer came out onto the roof through the low doorway, which the Revenants had concealed with a brick privacy wall to match the building’s exterior. A cadre of Revenants, dirty from their slog through the city, followed him out and stood beneath the awning, spraying themselves with the misters and rummaging through the baskets of fresh-picked produce.
Oban tossed up a plum tomato and leaned back to catch it in his mouth, but Rhetton’s hand shot out to snatch it before it could fall. He popped it into his own mouth, giving Oban a devious smile as gobs of seeded flesh spilled out between his missing teeth. Oban glowered at him, then picked up a whole handful of tomatoes and began tossing them into his mouth, one by one.
“Those aren’t yours,” Merrick said, approaching.
“They are if I say they are,” said Oban, his baggy eyes narrowing. “Who put fat boy in charge of the food anyhow?”
The others laughed.
Merrick could feel the heat of his anger rising inside him, though he had little energy to spare. The gloves he now wore at all times would melt off his hands if he ever let himself ignite uncontrolled. After a calming breath, he said, “If there are any three men here who deserve to go hungry, you point them out. We’ll see how they feel about you taking more than your share.”
Oban swallowed the tomato in his mouth. With a sour smile, he held his fistful of tomatoes over the till and squeezed. Red juice squirted through his fingers and dripped down to spatter on the tin. He held his hand out to Merrick. Empty tomato skins clung to his palm, oozing with fluid. “That’s your share,” he whispered.
Merrick bit back another wave of anger. “Did you come all the way up here just to be a dick, or do you have a good reason?”
“Sure do,” Oban said, licking tomato flesh from between his fingers. “We’re here for you.”
“Me?”
Peymer gave him a sly smile. “We’re going on a special mission, and you’re coming.”
This would’ve been just the thing Merrick was after, if he trusted Peymer and his buddies one iota. “What kind of mission?”
“The kind you’ll be good at.”
Merrick pulled his heels together, a habit turned instinct after years of taking orders in the Scarred. “I’m listening.”
“There’s a gang in these parts, calls themselves the Grits. They’ve got a brewing den not far from here, and we just got word there’s a cache of zoom hidden somewhere inside. Time to go shut ‘em down.”
“And you need me because…?”
“‘Cause I think it’s about time you showed us what you’ve got. See how well the comrades train their own.”
“Does that mean I’m finally getting my coilgun?”
Peymer’s thick black eyebrows buckled. “Now don’t get ahead of yourself, Comrade. You do well today, we’ll see about what comes next.”
“Alright. What do you want me to do?”
“What you’re best at. Looking hungry.”
“How, exactly?”
“You’re going to be our decoy. Show up on their doorstep and tell them you’re fixing to get doped up. Flash them a ten-inch of copper to prove you’ve got the hardware for a couple of rocks. Go inside and have a peek around. Come back out and tell us the layout of the place. Then, assuming our information is correct, we go in and have a little party. That’s all there is to it.”
When Merrick glanced at Swydiger, there was warning in his friend�
��s eyes. But the chance to do his share—to make himself more than just ‘another mouth to feed and another back to clothe,’ as Peymer had put it—was too enticing to pass up. “I’m in.”
Rhetton grunted his approval, giving Oban a back-handed slap on the chest.
“Good,” Peymer said. “We set out at dawn tomorrow. Meet us at the old fire station on the corner of Brooks and Hilliard an hour before dayrise. Make sure you’re in your plainclothes—no gear, no mask, no sign you’ve ever had any affiliation with us.”
“I don’t have any plainclothes,” Merrick said. “All I’ve got is my trencher, a brown t-shirt, and the camouflage pants I was wearing when I came south.”
“That so?” Peymer was amused. “Boys, who’s got a spare set of clothes for our decoy here?”
“Oban’s got plenty,” said Rhetton. “Oban likes his clothes, don’t you? Why don’t you lend him some of yours?”
“None of mine’ll fit over fat boy’s belly without splitting their stitches,” said Oban.
More laughter.
Bucyrus dropped his trowel onto one of the rolling tables and came over. “I’ve got some clothes he can use.”
“Keep your clothes, farmer. My men will find him what he needs. Won’t you, boys?”
They laughed, louder than ever this time.
Laugh all you like. When I’m Commissar of this whole Infernal-forsaken city, I’ll remember who was generous and who wasn’t, Merrick promised.
Jinks came back a minute later holding a shirt and a pair of pants. The wide-nosed man handed them to Peymer, who tossed them at Merrick. “There should be room for a man of your size in these,” he said with a chuckle.
Merrick held them up. There was a cotton tunic and a pair of denim so smudged and torn they looked more like shredded lettuce than any pants he’d ever seen. They smelled of urine and motor oil, with a musty undertone that spoke of the inside of a damp garbage bag.
“How ‘bout he goes and tries them on?” Rhetton suggested.
“Yeah, give us a fashion show, fat boy,” said Oban.
“Leave him alone,” said Bucyrus. “And get out of my garden, unless you’re keen to help with the afternoon watering.”
That cleared them out pretty quickly.
“An hour before dawn tomorrow,” Peymer reminded him.
“And don’t be late,” Oban added.
After the men had left the roof through the concealed door, Merrick looked down once more at the rags in his hands. These aren’t clothes, he thought. These are part of some cruel joke they’re trying to play on me. Merrick didn’t want to play into another one of their jokes. But if he ever wanted them to take him seriously, helping Peymer and his men complete a successful raid might be the only way. It’ll be like the old days in Mobile Ops, he told himself. Only I’ll be undercover this time.
Caliber and Leuk had seen Merrick’s value; they’d been the only ones to realize what he had to offer—a chance to overthrow Pilot Wax’s regime. Now Caliber and Leuk were gone, and Merrick was left pandering to a bunch of clowns in painted masks who would rather treat him as a laughingstock than as one of their own. They had no desire to see Wax unseated. The highest goal Peymer and his men had ever pursued was rooting out zoom junkies so they could sell them to the nomads for beer money.
That night, Merrick could hardly shut his eyes for fear of oversleeping the mission. He was up well before dawn, dressed in the putrid rags they’d given him to wear. Both garments were a tight fit, stretching around his waist and across his chest despite being nearly torn to shreds. It was all he could do for the first few minutes not to gag at the stench of them. Even if I don’t look like a drug-riddled vagrant, at least I smell like one, he told himself.
The Revenants were all inside the fire station when he arrived. He had half-expected to show up and find a group of them waiting there to point and laugh at him—or worse, to find no one there at all. But the worst he got from them as he entered the old mess hall were a few sniggers and some mumbled one-liners.
“You’re on time,” Peymer said, surprised.
“Why wouldn’t I be?”
“Some of us didn’t think you’d show up at all. Thought you might take it as a trick, or an effort to get you by yourself so we could beat the tar out of you.”
“I did think that,” Merrick said.
“And you still came? Well, now… either you’re a glutton for punishment, or you’re just dying to become one of us.”
Merrick shook his head. “Try again.”
“You was hungry and thought them zoomheads might make you breakfast,” said Mellobar in his northern drawl.
Merrick ground his teeth as the others laughed. “Just tell me where the place is so we can get this over with.”
“Head west down Hilliard. We’ll shadow you a block or two behind. After about six blocks, you’ll see a Unimart on your right. Go around back and knock on the stockroom door. Make it loud enough so we can hear. When they answer, tell them you’re looking to buy some zoom. Go inside and take a look around, but don’t act suspicious. Hopefully you’ll come across the stockpile we’ve been looking for. Here, you’ll need this to pay for it.” Peymer handed him a length of copper wire.
“These are gangers, right? I’m unarmed. What’s to stop them from taking my hardware and kicking me back out on the street? Or worse?”
“You don’t know much about how the business works, do you? They deal in repeat custom, not intimidation. Once you’re hooked, they’re happy to keep you coming back for more. You keep bringing them the hardware, they don’t have to find it themselves.”
Merrick knew plenty about how the business worked. He’d seen his father tumble into a life of addiction when he was just a boy. He’d spent plenty of time in the outer rooms of dens like the one he was about to enter, waiting while Gerry Bouchard filled his lungs in the back. But that didn’t make him feel any safer from these gangers’ suspicions. What they might do with him if they thought he was up to something was anyone’s guess. “We ready to get moving?” he asked, his heart already beginning to throb with fear.
“Not just yet,” said Peymer, pointing. “You forgot to take your gloves off.”
“I’m not taking them off,” Merrick said.
Once they saw he didn’t have fingernails, they’d have something else to harass him about. He could already hear them joking about how fat boy had gotten so hungry he’d tried to eat his way through a concrete wall.
“Take them off. Those are shooting gloves. You’ll stick out if you wear them.”
“I’ll stick out worse if I don’t. They’ll see my scar, and they’ll know I used to be a comrade,” he said, thinking quickly.
Peymer frowned. “Fine. But if you compromise the mission because of this, I’ll have your hide for it, scars and all.”
“Whatever you say, boss.” Merrick fled the mess hall to the sound of their jokes, now whispered as they felt the daylight coming on.
By the time Merrick was outside, the Gray Revenants had fallen silent. It was still dark, the streets cast in silver starlight beneath a film of pink morning clouds. He heard no sign of them as he began his trek down the shattered streets, and when he looked over his shoulder there was no one in sight. But somehow, he felt them. He’d walked these streets a dozen times with a gun in his hands and a squad at his back. When you were a Scarred man in the city south, you had to rely on things beyond sight and sound to stay alive.
The Unimart stood along the Hilliard Street sidewalk behind a single-row parking lot, its brick exterior broken only by the large windows that had been shattered, boarded up, broken into, and sealed again with whatever was on hand. A sinkhole had opened a great rift in the asphalt on the near side of the street, so Merrick had to circle around the building to find the back door.
Gangers paced the flat rooftop, brandishing fireman’s axes and nail-spiked baseball bats. One yelled down at him as he rounded the corner. “Hey, where you think you’re going?”
Merrick’s breath caught in his throat. He pointed toward the back alley, holding up the length of copper wire Peymer had given him. The ganger squinted down at him through the half-light. When he saw the wire, he ushered Merrick onward with a wave of his bat.
The alley was infested with sandflies and ripe with the perfume of old garbage. A man and woman were lying on the ground, bone-thin and half-asleep beneath a quilted blanket full of holes, and Merrick had to step over them to continue. Further on, a man sat against the chain-link fence behind a stack of moldy pallets, his eyes glassy and vacant.
Merrick found the door and knocked hard, as Peymer had instructed. He waited a long time, but no one came. He was about to knock again when the door slid inward and the drawn yellow face of an elderly man appeared in the narrow slit between.
“Whadda you want?” he slurred.
As Merrick studied the face before him, he realized the man wasn’t nearly as old as he’d first thought—probably no more than five or ten years his senior. His pink skin was covered in crusty red lesions, his hair a mass of dark brown strewn with shining gray. A tangled beard clung to his receding chin and the skin was stretched tight across his cheekbones.
“I’m here for some zoom—uh, dope. I want to get high,” Merrick stammered, feeling as awkward as he must’ve sounded.
“What’s your trade?”
Merrick flashed his copper.
The man eyed it, chewing his upper lip with teeth like rotting corn. He pulled the door open and stepped aside. Merrick entered a vast room, as black as a cave in the pre-dawn stillness. He gave a start when the door slammed shut behind him, but he hoped it was too dark for the man to have noticed.
“This way,” the man muttered, moving past Merrick like a shadow.
