A Perfect Machine

by Brett Savory

  Krebosche’s mind turned specifically to Adelina. The closest thing to a girlfriend he’d ever had. He had no doubt she was dead. He’d followed the men as they drove her to the outskirts of the city, shuffled her out, and led her into a rundown house. Probably filled with crackheads and God knows who else, he remembered thinking.

  All that he was certain of now was that she went into that house under her own power – yes, being led, but upright and alive – and never came out before it was destroyed. Krebosche had been frozen in place. Had no idea how to react, what to do, who to call. He remembered crying, beating his steering wheel. But within minutes, even those strong emotions, even grief that powerful, began to wane. He felt it coming out of his pores like sweat. For some reason he was still unsure of, he had the presence of mind to write down what he could remember from the night. He scribbled it furiously, breaking the nib of his pencil halfway through, hoping to Christ he had another one with which to finish up.

  Now, Krebosche got dressed, finished formulating his plan in his head, then remembered he didn’t have a knife with which to cut Palermo’s throat – and he assumed, as with all the other Runners, it needed to be a knife or a sword, since their bodies apparently just gobbled up bullets. It didn’t have to be anything special, though; in fact, the less special the better.

  Why waste a good knife cutting such a filthy throat?

  He stuffed his gun into his waistband nonetheless – if he did decide to carry on once he’d sliced the pig’s neck open, he’d want to at least put up a fight, take out a few more of Palermo’s men before he died. He knew he wouldn’t live long enough to take down more than two, maybe three of them, tops, but better than none.

  Some distant part of him tried to argue he was also avenging Carl Duncan’s and his uncle Gerald’s deaths, but those internal arguments held about as much water as a sieve in his new state of mind. He was functioning on all cylinders now. No more time for bullshit.

  This was for Adelina. For Marla.

  And this was for him.

  He put on his jacket, walked out of his motel room, spotted a Walmart across the street, headed toward it. Once inside, he made his way to the kitchen section, found the biggest knife he could. Bought it.

  Then the thought struck him – with a certain amount of glee, he had to admit – that maybe hollow-point bullets would do more damage to anyone he might need to deal with after he cut Palermo’s head off. Those might even kill a Runner if fired from point-blank range at the head or neck. He turned toward the ammunition section, bought some dum-dum bullets, then left the store, went back to his motel room. Undressed, went to bed.

  He slept for two hours, setting his alarm for 3 a.m. It woke him in the middle of a dream in which he was covered entirely in blood. Screaming. Pounding his fists against something. It was only upon waking, getting dressed, securing the knife down the side of his boot, the gun in his waistband, and leaving the motel room again that he realized it wasn’t Palermo’s blood, as he’d first assumed. It was Adelina’s.

  And the thing upon which he pounded his fists was enormous.

  Made entirely of steel.

  * * *

  It felt like there would always be snow now. It had waxed and waned over the past few days, but it seemed to Krebosche that it had never actually stopped. It was only due to the temperature being fairly warm that it hadn’t piled up to epic proportions. As Krebosche drove through the darkened streets, he imagined being suffocated under a mountain of snow. The thought appealed to him. He enjoyed the idea of that kind of peace, away from the noise on the streets, and in his head. It comforted him, calmed him.

  He barely passed anyone on his way to the street where he planned to park, a few blocks away from the warehouse. He knew security would be tight, so getting too close would be a huge mistake.

  All of this is a huge fucking mistake, he thought. But he was committed now. He felt that any choice in the matter had long since vanished. The only way through the situation was down. And down further still.

  I’m about to try to cut a man’s head off with something not much better than a bread knife. What a mess that’s going to make. But the thought pleased him. He pictured the skin coming away in chunks as he sawed through. Blood pumping out. Drenching everything.

  Tires crunching snow and gravel, he pulled his car into a dirt lot next to an abandoned building. Parked, got out. Surveyed the scene. From where he stood, he could just see the top of the warehouse. He’d need to be closer to know whether or not any lights were still on. But he supposed that was his own fault, since he, Duncan, and Gerald, were the ones who caused the breach.

  As he headed toward the rear of the warehouse, where the train tracks and Palermo’s caboose were located, he had to fight to keep his orientation. The streets – especially in the endlessly falling snow – all looked the same, and even when he approached a corner, the text of the street signs would appear blurred, swimming on the signposts. He had to blink and wipe his eyes, refocus, look down at his notebook, run the street names in his mind over and again. He resorted to repeating them out loud under his breath.

  Around one more corner, and there was the field and the warehouse. The caboose sat like a crouching animal in the darkness.

  No lights on anywhere.

  Krebosche touched the knife where he’d tucked it down his boot, then the gun in his waistband. Felt his heart thudding in his chest. For all his thoughts about not caring anymore, he certainly looked like someone about to do something unwise, and was scared to death of the consequences.

  Best approach is just straight up the tracks, right? Of course, there’d be a guard at the door of the caboose, maybe two. Especially now. And probably at least a couple on the roof of the warehouse. What would make this all the more difficult was the crunching snow. There was no way to be completely stealthy.

  Unless you crawl on your belly, idiot.

  So he’d crawl on his belly, slither along beside the tracks, then just pop up and attack everyone? Brilliant plan. This was beginning to look more and more unlikely.

  A distraction of some kind would be nice. Maybe another fool like Duncan to go die for me. The thought made even Krebosche wince – and he’d thought he was beyond pangs of conscience – at least for Duncan.

  He tucked himself behind the wall of the last building before the field opened up and cover was gone. Once he left the safety of this wall, he’d be entirely exposed. Just the open field and the train tracks between him and the caboose.

  He glanced up at the sky. At least the clouds were cooperating. Can’t have a fuckton of snow without clouds, he thought. So moonlight would be at a minimum. Maybe just the occasional break in cloud cover to expose his movements.

  He breathed deeply twice, three times. Decided on the belly slither. He laid himself down flat, poked his head around the side of the wall. No movement at the warehouse or the caboose. No sound. Just steadily falling snowflakes and his heart threatening to burst from his throat. Maybe the guards were hidden from view because they were afraid of getting picked off by a sniper. He didn’t know. But it was now or never. He felt his resolve weakening by the second.

  Just as he was about to work his way out, a voice from behind startled him.

  “Looking for someone?” Palermo said.

  T W E L V E

  “He would have told someone,” Henry said. “If he hadn’t already.”

  Faye didn’t respond. She couldn’t tear her eyes away from the pulped skull of her co-worker. Blood pooled around Steve’s body, and the clumps that had sprayed through Henry’s fingers crawled slowly down the wall like snails.

  Finally: “You don’t know that. You didn’t know that.”

  “He wanted to take a picture, Faye.”

  “So he deserved to die for that?”

  Henry was silent. At some point, tears had sprung from his eyes, grown cold now on his face. He tried to wipe them away, feeling ashamed of them. His clumsy fingers made it difficult.

  H
e distractedly wondered what color the tears were.

  Then: “Yes. He deserved to die. He would have exposed me. Exposed us. Or at least tried to. And I can’t hide how I used to when I looked human. That was a big part of what made it easy, I imagine. Now, though… look at me. No way this will be easy to cover up, explain away. Steve said it was hard to hold on to my image in his head, sure, but he was gone for a while, yet was able to still remember me enough that he knew to come back here to look for me. That would never have happened before. Not when I looked human.”

  Faye left the coffees alone, forgotten. Moved to the couch. Fell into it, put her face in her hands, elbows on her knees. She didn’t say anything for a long time. When she finally did, it hit Henry hard: “I want you to leave.”

  “Faye, listen–”

  “No. Get out.”

  “What are you going to do with…” Henry motioned toward Steve’s body.

  “I’ll deal with it. Just go. Get out. Now.”

  “Where am I supposed to go?”

  She looked up at him, locked eyes. “I hardly give a fuck.”

  As this exchange took place, Milo felt something push upward within him. That feeling of dread had coalesced into something new. Clearly, that feeling had been warranted, and was now at least partially realized with the dead body still leaking blood on the floor. But this was something else. That cold ball of lead in his belly felt like it was heating up; he felt like he was heating up somehow. Becoming more… substantial?

  He reached a hand out toward the table upon which Faye had placed the coffee cups. Closer to the cup handle. Closer. Then his fingers passed right through.

  But just as his heart was sinking, something caught his eye. He lifted his gaze quickly. Standing to one side of the table was the woman he’d seen in the hospital furnace room. As before, the air pressure in the room seemed to change with her appearance. But back then, she had seemed fairly calm; now she seemed agitated. And this time, Milo thought he heard sounds coming from her mouth. He watched her lips intently, realized he could make out a word here and there. She was telling him something, staring directly at him. And just as he had been feeling more substantial himself, so she seemed more substantial to him, as well.

  Concentrating harder, it was like someone had turned up the volume in his brain. Words formed – all of them at once in a sudden rush that shocked him and made him stagger back: “You cannot let him leave. You cannot let him leave. You cannot let him leave.”

  Milo turned back to Henry. Neither Henry nor Faye had spoken in the past minute or so. Henry just stared down at Steve’s body; Faye’s face was slack, her initial anger giving way to fatigue. Milo wasn’t sure that she was aware Henry was even still in the room.

  Milo was about to turn away from them and focus his attention back on the woman when he realized he was wrong. Faye and Henry were still talking; he just could no longer hear them. He watched their lips move. Henry gesticulated. Faye turned away from him. The anger was back in her features, clouded her eyes. Milo thought the look on her face bordered on hatred.

  He turned back to the woman, who was still repeating, “You cannot let him leave,” but had now added “They’ll kill him” to the repetitive refrain.

  “I can hear you,” Milo said.

  “You cannot let him leave. They’ll kill him. They’ll kill…”

  Milo stepped forward, nearly within arm’s reach of the woman. She shimmered the air around her with her intensity. “I said I can hear you, I can hear you.”

  The woman stopped speaking. She looked momentarily shocked, her mouth hanging slightly open. She closed it. Opened it again, said, “You can?”

  Milo nodded. “I cannot let him leave. They’ll kill him.”

  The woman nodded.

  Milo took another step forward, close enough now to touch her if he reached out a hand – and if he were able to touch anything at all.

  “Who are you?” Milo said.

  “Adelina.”

  “My name is Milo.”

  “I know.”

  They looked at each other for a moment longer, something powerful passing between them that neither really understood.

  “Milo, you need to stop Henry any way you can. He doesn’t know how important he is.”

  “To who? To what?”

  “To me, to you, to everything and everyone.”

  “Um…”

  “I know it sounds ridiculous, and you have no reason to believe me…”

  “Well, I’m inclined to believe you to a certain extent, considering you’re a ghost that’s decided to appear to me – a ghost myself – so there’s that.”

  “I’m not a ghost.”

  “Well, you look like a ghost. More substantial than me, sure, but still, uh, floating off the ground, you know?”

  “You’re not listening. Nothing can happen to Henry. He needs to be left alone. He needs to let his evolution run its course.”

  “Sure, and I’m not opposed to that – whatever it entails. That’s kind of the point of everything we’ve been doing our whole lives, so I get it. But I can’t touch anything, so that makes it a little difficult to stop massive metal behemoths from doing pretty much as they please, you know? Watch.”

  Milo swept one of his hands through the coffee cups on the table – or would have swept one of his hands through them, if his hand hadn’t knocked them both off the table and onto the floor where they shattered into a hundred pieces.

  Milo’s mouth dropped open. He looked at Adelina. Then at Henry, then Faye. They both looked back at him.

  Or seemed to look at him. After a pulse-pounding moment, he realized they were just looking in the direction of the noise, not at what caused it.

  “What the hell?” Faye muttered.

  “No idea,” Henry said. “That was weird.”

  “Yes. Yes, it was,” Faye said, her brow crinkling.

  “At least they’ve stopped arguing,” Milo said to no one in particular.

  “You can make yourself visible to Henry if you keep concentrating. Keep trying,” Adelina said.

  “What? How do I do that? I didn’t try to knock the coffee cups off the table, so I clearly have no clue how I did even that much.”

  “Once you’ve got a toehold, the more you assert yourself into physical space, the more it will accept you. The more it has to accept you. Trust me, just keep knocking things over. See if that works.”

  “This is insane,” Milo muttered, but floated over to a bunch of knickknacks cluttering up another of Faye’s tables in the living room. He swept an arm across them, shattering the entire lot.

  Faye and Henry stepped back, both wearing identical shocked Os on their faces. “What the fuck?” Faye said, standing now. “Is this something you’re doing, Henry? Because if it, it isn’t fucking funny.”

  Henry said nothing, just stared at the spot where the knickknacks had gone flying. “Hang on a second, Faye. Hang on. I think I see… something.”

  “Where?”

  “By that table.”

  Faye squinted. “I don’t see anything. And what do you mean by ‘something,’ anyway?”

  “I don’t know. Just–”

  A mirror in the hallway smashed.

  Shoes on the mat by the door flew across the floor.

  The glass doors of Faye’s china cabinet exploded inward. Everything inside, on all three shelves, was dumped out onto the ground. Pieces of cups, plates, and china dolls flew in every direction.

  Faye just stood rooted to the spot, her eyes closed, hands over her ears as the destruction took place around her.

  Henry, on the other hand, stared hard at the place in the air from which everything seemed to be falling. And then it happened. Not in gradients – like a fuzzy TV picture becoming slowly clearer as it’s tuned in – but like a balloon bursting. Suddenly, Milo was just there for Henry.

  Henry stared at his friend, who held in his hands a large silver tray with a full teacup set on it, about to bring it down at his
feet. His face was red with exertion.

  “Milo?”

  Milo looked up at the sound of Henry’s voice.

  “Henry? You can hear me?”

  Henry nodded. “I can see you, too.”

  “Holy shit.”

  “Henry, who are you talking to?” Faye said. “What the hell is happening?”

  Milo turned to Adelina, searched her face for an answer because words to ask a proper question would not come.

  Adelina understood, said, “She can’t see or hear you, Milo. I don’t know if she’ll ever be able to. But Henry can.”

  Milo turned his attention back to Henry. Felt a lump in his throat. Knew tears weren’t far behind. “Henry,” he said.

  “Yeah, Milo, it’s me. Put the tray down. You’re freaking Faye out. Just set it down gently, OK?”

  Milo looked down at the tray in his hands as though he’d no idea how it’d gotten there. “Yeah,” he said, shaking his head clear. “Yeah, sorry.”

  Milo moved over to the coffee table, close to where Faye sat still staring in disbelief at Henry. With shaking hands, Milo set the tray down.

  “Henry, are you going to tell me what in the fuck is going on? Who just destroyed my apartment?”

  “Milo did,” Henry said. “He was just trying to… get my attention.”

  Faye said nothing, just sat down on the couch, trying to get her breathing back under control.

  There would be no expressions of disbelief from Faye. No doubting what Henry told her. She’d just seen something whip around her apartment, smashing everything to bits – that much was certain. If Henry said it was his Milo, then great. Mystery solved. She had no gas left in the tank to fight him. What she wanted more than anything right now was to sleep. Close her eyes, fall away from the world.