"No!" the girl repeated. She came to stand beside the woman. "Go away!" she told Rye.
"Don't talk," the little boy said to her. There was no blurring or confusing of sounds. Both children had spoken and Rye had understood. The boy looked at the dead murderer and moved further from him. He took the girl's hand. "Be quiet," he whispered.
Fluent speech! Had the woman died because she could talk and had taught her children to talk? Had she been killed by a husband's festering anger or by a stranger's jealous rage?
And the children . . .they must have been born after the silence. Had the disease run its course, then? Or were these children simply immune? Certainly they had had time to fall sick and silent. Rye's mind leaped ahead. What if children of three or fewer years were safe and able to learn language? What if all they needed were teachers? Teachers and protectors.
Rye glanced at the dead murderer. To her shame, she thought she could understand some of the passions that must have driven him, whomever he was. Anger, frustration, hopelessness, insane jealousy . . .how many more of him were there—people willing to destroy what they could not have?
Obsidian had been the protector, had chosen that role for who knew what reason. Perhaps putting on an obsolete uniform and patrolling the empty streets had been what he did instead of putting a gun into his mouth. And now that there was something worth protecting, he was gone.
She had been a teacher. A good one. She had been a protector, too, though only of herself. She had kept herself alive when she had no reason to live. If the illness let these children alone, she could keep them alive.
Somehow she lifted the dead woman into her arms and placed her on the backseat of the car. The children began to cry, but she knelt on the broken pavement and whispered to them, fearful of frightening them with the harshness of her long unused voice.
"It's all right," she told them. "You're going with us, too. Come on." She lifted them both, one in each arm. They were so light. Had they been getting enough to eat?
The boy covered her mouth with his hand, but she moved her face away. "It's all right for me to talk," she told him. "As long as no one's around, it's all right." She put the boy down on the front seat of the car and he moved over without being told to, to make room for the girl. When they were both in the car, Rye leaned against the window, looking at them, seeing that they were less afraid now, that they watched her with at least as much curiosity as fear.
"I'm Valerie Rye," she said, savoring the words. "It's all right for you to talk to me."
Killers
by Carol Emshwiller
Carol Emshwiller is the author of six novels and more than 100 short stories. Her short work has appeared in numerous anthologies and magazines, and has been collected in several volumes, most recently in I Live with You. In her career spanning five decades, she has won the Nebula Award, the World Fantasy Award, and the Philip K. Dick Award. In 2005, she was presented the World Fantasy Award for Life-Time Achievement. Her most recent novel, The Secret City, was published in 2007.
Emshwiller can't help but wonder if our civilization will fall apart one of these days. But being the kind of person who loves the simple life—oil lamps, walking, pumping water for a shower, washing diapers at the shore of a lake on an old-fashioned washboard—-she's hesitant to say she's "afraid" it'll happen. She's not looking forward to it either, but she says it's just as much fun writing about regression and devastation as it is writing about a future full of new gadgets and inventions.
"Killers" grew out of Emshwiller's objections to the war in Iraq. The American people have been told that we're fighting terrorists over there so we don't have to fight them here. This story ponders what it would be like afterward if such a war did come to our shores.
Most people left because of no water. I don't know where they found a place where things were any better. Some of us felt safer here than anywhere else. And even way before the war wound down, it was hard to pick up and go someplace. No gas for civilians. Pretty soon no gas at all.
After the bombing of our pipeline (one man with a grenade could have done that), we got together and moved the town up higher, along a stream and put in ditches so that the water came past several houses. We have to carry water into the house in buckets and we have to empty the sink by hand, back out into the yard. At least the water flows into our kitchen gardens and past our fruit trees. In warm weather, we bathe in our irrigation ditch, in colder we sponge off inside, in basins, but there's hardly any cold weather anymore.
There wasn't much to moving the town since most of us were gone already. All the able-bodied men, of course, so it took us women to make the move ourselves and without horses or mules. The enemy stole them or killed them or maimed them just to make things harder for us.
No electricity, though some of the women think they can hook the dam back up and get some. Nobody has bothered to try it yet. In a way none of this bothers me as much as you'd think. I always liked walking, and we have rendered fat lamps and candles that send out a soft, cozy glow.
Our house was already well above where the town used to be. Good because I didn't want to move. I want my brother to have our old home to come back to. And besides, I couldn't move Mother.
Beyond our back yard there used to be the Department of Water and Power, after that Forest Service land, and then the John Muir wilderness. Now the town has moved above me, and of course there's no DWP or Forest Service anymore.
Our house has a good view. We always sat on the front steps and looked at the mountains. Now that everybody has moved up the mountain side, everybody has a good view.
The town below is empty. The Vons and Kmart are big looted barns. Up here there's one small store where we sell each other our produce or our sewing and knitting. Especially socks. Hard to get socks these days. Before the war we were so wasteful nobody darned anymore, but now we not only darn but reinforce the heels and toes of brand new socks before we wear them.
We moved the little library up. Actually it's got more books than before. We brought all the books we could find, ours and those from the people who left. We don't need a librarian. Everybody brings them back honor system.
We have a little hospital but no doctors, just a couple of elderly nurses who were too old to be recruited. They're in their seventies and still going. They've trained new ones. No medicines though. Only what we can get from local herbs. We went to the Paiute to find out more. There's a couple of Paiute nurses, who come to help out every now and then, though they have their own nursing to do on the reservation. (They moved the rez up, too, and they don't call it the reservation anymore.)
It's a woman's town now. Full of women's arts and crafts . . . . Quilt makers, sweater knitters . . . . And the women do the heavy work. There's a good roof repair group and there's carpenters . . . .
Lots of women went to war along with the men, but I had to look after Mother. I was taking care of her even before my brother left. She wasn't exactly sick but she was fat and she drank. Her legs looked terrible, full of varicosities. It hurt her to walk so she didn't. When the war came she got a little better because of the shortages, though there was still plenty of homemade beer, but she couldn't walk. Or wouldn't. I think her muscles had all withered away. Looking after somebody who can't walk seems normal to me. I've done it since I can first remember anything.
Now that Mother's gone I have a chance to do something useful. If I knew the war was still going on in some specific place, I'd go fight, but it seems to be over. Maybe. It didn't stop exactly. I don't know how it ended or even if it's ended. We don't have a way to find out, but there hasn't been any action that we know of for quite some time. Overhead, nothing flies by. Not even anything old fashioned. (Not that we ever had any action to speak of way out here. Except for the bombing of our pipeline and stealing our livestock, nobody cared much about us.)
But that's the way the war was, hardly a beginning and hardly an end. Wars aren't like they used to be—with two clearly separated sides. The
enemy was among us even before it started. They could never win a real old-fashioned war with us, they were weak and low tech, but low tech was good enough as long as there were lots of them. You never knew who to trust, and we still don't. Our side put all we could in internment camps, practically everybody with black eyes and hair and olive skin, but you can't get them all. And then the war went on so long we used up all our resources, but they still had theirs—sabotage doesn't ever have to stop. They escaped from the camps. Actually they just walked away. The guards had already walked away, too.
Lots of those men brought their injuries and craziness to our mountains. Both sides came here to get away from everything. They're hermits. They don't trust anybody. Some of them are still fighting each other up there. It's almost as bad as having left-over minefields. They're all damaged, physically or mentally. Of course most likely all of us are, too, and we probably don't even know it.
My brother might be out there somewhere. If he's alive he's got to be here. He loves this place. He hunted and trapped and fished. He'd get along fine and I know he'd do anything to come back.
Most of those men don't come down to us even if they're starving or cold or sick. Those that do, come to steal. They take our tomatoes and corn and radishes. Other things disappear, too. Kitchen knives, spoons, fishhooks . . . . And of course sweaters and woolen socks . . . . Those crazies live up even higher than we do. It does still get cold up there.
And they are crazies. And now one of them has been killing other men and dumping them at the edge of the village. They've all been shot in the back by wooden crossbow darts. Beautifully carved and polished. I hope it isn't one of our side. Though I don't suppose sides matter anymore.
Every time this happens, before we put them into the depository, I go to check if it's my brother. I wouldn't want my brother in the depository. Ever. But those men are always such a mess—dirty and bearded—I wonder, would I recognize him? I keep thinking: How could I not? But I was only fifteen when he left. He was eighteen. He'd be thirty-two now. If he's alive.
We're all a little edgy even if it's not us getting killed. And then last night I saw someone looking in my window. I'd been asleep but I heard a noise and woke up. I saw the silhouette of a lumpy hat and a mass of tangled hair flying out from under it, the moonlit sky glowing behind. I called out, "Clement!" I didn't mean to. I was half asleep and in that state I knew it was my brother. Whoever it was ducked down in a hurry and I heard the crunch, crunch of somebody running away. Afterwards I got scared. I could have been shot as I slept.
The next morning I saw footprints and it looked like somebody had spent some time behind my shed.
I keep hoping it's my brother, though I wouldn't want him to be the one killing those poor men, but you'd think he wouldn't be afraid of coming to his own house. Of course he doesn't know that Mother is dead. I can understand him being afraid of her. They never got along. When she was drunk she used to throw things at him. If he got close enough, she'd grab his arm and twist. Then he got too strong for her. But he couldn't be afraid of me. Could he? I'm the baby sister.
Mother was nicer to me. She got worried I'd stay out of reach or not help anymore. I could have just walked off and left her but until she died I didn't think of it. I actually didn't. I'd looked after her for so long I thought that's just the way life is. And I might not have left, anyway. She was my mother and there was nobody else to look after her but me.
If it's my brother been looking in the window, he must know Mother isn't here. She never left her bed. The house is small and all on one floor so he could have looked in all the windows. We have three tiny bedrooms, and one kitchen/living room combined. Mother and her big bed took up wall-to-wall space in the biggest bedroom.
I posted Clement's picture at the store and the library, but of course it was a picture from long ago. In it he has the usual army shaved head. I drew a version with wild hair. Then I drew another of him bald with wild hair around the sides. (Baldness runs in our family.) I drew a different kind of beard on each of them. I put up both versions.
Leo at the store said, "He might not want to talk to you . . .or anybody."
But I know that already.
"I think he's come looking in my window."
"Well, there you are. He'd a come in if he'd wanted to."
"You went to war. How come you're okay and most all the other men have gone wild?"
"I was lucky. I never saw real horror."
Actually he may not be so okay. Most of us never married. We never had the chance with all the men gone. He could have married one of us but he never did. He lives in a messy shed behind the store and he smells, even though the ditch passes right by his store. And he's always grumpy. You have to get used to him.
"If my brother comes around, tell him I'm going out to look for him in all his favorite spots."
"Even if you find him he won't come back."
"So then I'll go after that crazy person who's been killing those men."
Truth is, I don't know what to do with myself. I don't know how to live with just me to care about. I can go anywhere and do anything. I ought to find the man who's the killer. I have nothing else to do. Who better to do it than I?
But I might find that man right here, hiding at the edge of the village—or most likely looking in my window. Maybe I can trap him in my house. He must have been looking in for a reason.
I pack up and pretend to leave. I stay out of sight of the village. This is wild rocky land—lots of hiding places. Nobody will know I didn't go anywhere. My backpack is mostly empty. I have pepper. Pepper is hard to get these days so I've saved mine for a weapon. I have a small knife in my boot and a bigger one at my belt. Streams aren't stocked anymore but there's still fish around, though not as many as before. I bring a line and hooks. I'll use those today. I won't go far.
I catch a trout. I have to make a fire the old-fashioned way. No more matches. I always carry a handful of dead sage fibers for tinder. I cook the fish and eat it. After dark and the half-moon comes up, I sneak back to our house as if I was one of those crazies myself.
The door is wide open. There's sand all over the floor. Couldn't he even shut the door? These days we have sand storms and dust devils more often than we used to. Doesn't whoever it is know that? And that's another reason to move higher up, into the trees where it's less deserty.
I smell him before I see him. I put my knife up my sleeve so it'll drop down into my hand.
I can hear him breathing. Sounds like scared breathing. A man this frightened will be dangerous.
He's huddled in Mother's bedroom down between the bed and the bedside table. All I see is his hat, pulled low so his face is in shadow. I see his bare knees showing through his torn pants. I have a better look at them than his face.
Right away I think my brother wouldn't be in Mother's room, he'd be in his own room. Besides, the room still smells of death and dying. I call, "Clement?" even though I know it can't be him. "Come on out."
He groans.
"Are you sick?" He sounds sick. I suppose that's why he's here in the first place.
I wish I'd lit a lamp first. I was counting on the moonlight, but there isn't much shining in here. It still could be my brother, under all that dirt and wild hair and beard, gone crazy just like everybody else.
"Come out. Come to the main room. I'll light a lamp. I'll fix you food."
"No light."
"Why not? There's only me. And there's no war going on anymore. It's most likely over."
"I pledged to fight until I died."
(I suppose my brother did, too.)
I finger my knife. "I'm going to go light the lamp."
I deliberately turn my back. I go to the main room, light the lamp with the sparker, keeping my back to the bedroom door. I hear him come in. I turn and get a good look.
Pieced-together hat, long scraggly hair hanging under it. I can't tell if he's a brown man or just weather-beaten, sunburned, and dirty. A full beard with gray i
n it. Eyes as black as the enemy's always are. Eyebrows just as thick as theirs. He has a broken front tooth. Nowadays that's not unusual. Nobody to fix them. He has a greenish look under his tan and dark circles around his eyes. If he thinks he isn't sick he doesn't know much.
"You are the enemy. And you're half-dead already."
There's a chair right beside him, but he sinks sideways to the floor. Ends up flat on our worn linoleum. If he thinks he's still fighting the war, I should kill him now while I have the chance. He looks such a mess and smells so bad I'm almost ready to kill him just for those reasons alone. After Mother died I thought I was finished with disagreeable messes.
"Hide me. Just for tonight. I'll leave in the morning."
"Are you crazy?" I kneel beside him. "You're the one killing people. I should kill you right now."
He's trying to prop himself up against the wall. I don't want to touch him but I grab his shirt front to help him and the rotten cloth rips completely out.
"You stink something awful. And why would I think you won't kill me? You've been killing everybody else."
"I don't have a weapon."
"Strip."
"What?"
"Take those filthy clothes off. I'll burn them. I'll bring you a basin to wash in." (And I'll find out if he has a weapon.)
He hasn't the energy to undress or wash. I hate to touch him but I do it. I'm used to it. Mother was a mess as she was dying. (At the end I sprinkled pine needles all over but it didn't help much.) I thought that was the last of that sort of thing I'd ever have to do. I thought I was free. But, all right, one more thing. I wash him and dress him in my brother's old clothes, and . . .what then? If I kill him, the town will be grateful.
At least his body is entirely different from Mother's, thin and strong and hairy. It's a nice change. If he wasn't so smelly I'd enjoy it. Well, I do enjoy it.
He's half asleep through it all.
I burn his clothes in our little stove. After I've washed him, I feed him jerky broth with an egg in it, though I keep thinking: Why waste my egg on him? He falls asleep right after he's finished the broth. Slides down the wall flat out again, in what seems more a faint than a sleep.
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