I took some over-the-counter pain meds and waited for my stomach to settle down. When I was done, I didn’t feel altogether horrible. However, I knew it was going to be a long day. I went into the single car garage and found a Toyota Prius. I also found some yard tools to include a small shovel. Being in the middle of the Heights, the house didn’t really have a large yard and all that, but the previous occupant had the basics. Small or otherwise, a shovel was all I needed.
I borrowed some other stuff from the house, too. I got a heavier long-sleeved shirt to go over the “How Weird Street Faire” t-shirt I found in a dresser. I suspected Mr. Ralph Lauren pajamas wouldn’t mind. I strapped the KA-BAR back on my thigh and strapped on some of the other knives I’d obtained from the gun store, too. With a sigh I collected the backpack and loaded up, carefully easing the straps over my shoulders so that it wouldn’t rub on the bandages there.
Finally, I was as ready as I thought I was going to be without a Sherman tank and a backhoe. Louise wasn’t ready. She tried to talk me out of going back to the church on Bush Street. “It doesn’t matter,” she said. “You didn’t know that girl. You don’t even know her real name. Bathsheba was what Theophilus called her. Just like he called you Hasadiah. She’s not going to complain about you leaving her. I’m telling you, it’s safer to not go back. I’m telling you. Better safe than sorry is what Poppops used to say, right? Daddy would be disappointed in you. Mumsy would be upset. That girl just doesn’t matter. There’s nothing good that’s going to—”
“Shut up!” I screamed. Louise abruptly went away. “I don’t know what her name was, but she doesn’t deserve to be left lying there on the floor of a church like she was a bag of garbage!”
I stood in the man’s foyer and looked around in surprise. The mirror hanging on the wall to my right shook just a little, and I had to wonder if it was from the sound of my voice or from an earthquake. The oil-rubbed bronze chandelier above my head juddered in response. It was almost an automatic reflex to check my reflection. I very nearly expected to see Louise looking back at me. She’d be wearing some high-end dress. It might be Prada or Aqua or Eileen Fisher. Her hair would hang to her shoulder blades and be exquisitely styled with nary a single strand out of place. Her makeup would be applied precisely, her lipstick matching her nail polish. All of her colors would be offset by skin tanned in a salon. Her shoes would be something equally expensive and appropriate. Louise looked like a million dollars because she was worth about ten of those, and her trust fund was set in concrete in the best investment firm in San Francisco. She was a product of her environment. Perhaps she wasn’t perfect, but she was very close to it, and she would never let anyone know that she wasn’t perfect.
The woman who looked at me definitively was not flawless. Her blonde hair was mussed and bordered on ratty in places. Her eyes were blackened. The side of her face was swollen and the color of an eggplant. She had scrapes down her neck. Her lips were puffy and split on her right side. A tiny trickle of blood made its way down her chin. She didn’t look like ten million dollars. She looked like a couple bucks and change, ugly, nasty change that had been dug out of the crack of a worn sofa someone had left on the corner to be dragged away by the Department of Sanitation.
She was me. I was she.
“I’m going,” I said to the reflection. “I’m going to do right by Bath because no one else will.”
It took me a while to gather up the courage. I could feel Louise scratching at me from the inside of my brain. I muttered, “If I don’t stop this, I’m going to become totally schizophrenic. Seriously.”
I looked out the glass sidelights of the Victorian house and sighed. There wasn’t an easy way to do this. I simply had to do it. So I did. I went out the back of the house because I didn’t want to let anyone know where I’d spent the night. I was thinking ahead. It was possible I might need a place to hide and hide quickly.
I trudged downhill on Pierce Street, careful to look around me as I did. Although the sun had just popped through the clouds above the cityscape, they were still thinking about rain. I would have shrugged if it wouldn’t have hurt. The day was going to be warmish, and I was going to get hot and sweaty doing what I planned to do, so rain would help. After all, I had never dug a grave before, and I was sure that it was going to be strenuous.
In my mind’s eye there was a corner with lush greenery just outside the front of the church. A neatly trimmed tree with symmetrically placed bushes and flowers framed the large wooden sign that revealed the name and denomination of the cathedral. Every Thursday a gardener spruced up the corner so that it was apparent the church was doing well and its parishioners were generous. It seemed like it would be an appropriate place for Bathsheba. I didn’t know anything about her, so it was as fitting as dragging her corpse down to the cemetery near the Presidio. (Three miles?)
I slowed as I reached the rear of the block that housed the large Catholic church. There were buildings and parking there for all purposes, but Theo had gone for the big guns and used the main cathedral as his “saving” place. I slunk into the shadows and watched for movement. Across the distant downtown skyline I saw something flying, but it didn’t come closer, and I disregarded it.
The church steeple towered into the skies like a lonely giant, anxious for someone to come to visit. My muscles froze. It wasn’t going to get finished unless I finished it, and I didn’t want Louise to come murmur into my ears again.
I went around the side of the church and approached the front, pausing to listen. I didn’t hear a handbell or anything else. Only the wind blew its chilling tune past my ears and ruffled my hair in its wake.
I could peek into the church and make certain, or I could start digging. I procrastinated and started to dig. It took me about three hours to make an uneven hole that was body shaped and about three feet deep. It was a wretched first attempt at a grave. I hoped that it would be my last attempt.
“Six feet my tushy,” I muttered. “There’s no way I’m going to do that without killing my back.” I plunked the shovel on the ground beside the grave and levered my way out. The exercise wasn’t exactly bad for me; I could feel my muscles protesting only slightly. I had been in shape before Theo had slapped a manacle on my ankle. I hadn’t lost much muscle mass. My biggest problem was tearing open the wounds on my back. I stretched and checked for wetness. Thankfully, I didn’t find anything.
The only thing left to do was to go in the church, wrap Bath up in a sheet I’d brought from Mr. Ralph Lauren Pajamas’ house, and bury her. All the while I would steadfastly ignore the other body in the church. Theo could rot there. I wouldn’t bury him. I was more likely to pour a gallon of gasoline on his corpse and see if lighters still worked. I didn’t want to burn the church down, but it almost would have been worth it.
I took a long breath and approached the door I had left through two days before. It wasn’t closed all the way and that same tune-playing wind opened it just a hairsbreadth and pushed it shut a few moments later.
I had to shut my eyes for a moment to gather some self-control. The words from a Staind song filtered through my head. I was on the outside looking in. I felt ugly. It didn’t matter how much I tried to clean myself because that stain was never coming off my soul. When my eyelids came up, the door was fully open, and Theo stood there looking back at me. For an agonizingly long second I thought it was just my imagination, but my eyes fixed on the red swollen marks around his neck, and horrifyingly, I knew it wasn’t.
I’d like to say I didn’t waver but I did. I hesitated in a way that spelt my doom. Ultimately, I turned to run, and I thought I could make it. One of my feet made the next step before Theophilus grabbed my hair and yanked me backward. He was roaring things in my ear, but I couldn’t make them out as I tried to struggle. One of his massive arms came around my neck and snatched me closer. The blood pounded through my head as I finally comprehended some of his words.
“I’m praying now, Hasadiah! I’m praying for you, Hasadi
ah! God and I have had a serious discussion about your soul, Hasadiah!” he bellowed in my ear. His voice was hoarse as if he’d had a cold, and I hazily realized it was because I had strangled him. It occurred to me to reach for that KA-BAR I had strapped to my thigh, but both arms were trapped by Theo’s other arm. He hauled me closer, and the arm around my neck constricted.
I couldn’t breathe, so it wasn’t a surprise when a blanket of darkness descended.
Lulu’s Predicament
The Present - Colorado
How can I say that I panicked without sounding like a complete wussy? I suppose I can’t. But there it was, I panicked. I unreservedly, unashamedly, unabashedly panicked. I turned around in the theater and began to run. I forgot that I had a crutch under one arm. I forgot that there was a big hole in my leg. I forgot that I didn’t know where to go. I forgot that I didn’t have any friends around to have my back. I just let millions of years of human instincts guide the roaring deluge of heartfelt fear toward the place that just might be safer than the one I was in.
Run, you stupid idiot! whooshed through my head. Then I yelled silently, YOU BETCHA!
I immediately tripped as my leg failed me. I fell to the ground with a wretched-sounding clunk, and the air left my chest.
Someone said, “Calm down.”
“I don’t think—”
“Grab her!”
I scrambled with my good leg. The other one protested mightily and attempted to regroup its strength. I felt the bandage give way, and there was a squirt of warm liquid that soaked the outside of my thigh. I reached for my waistband and grabbed for Mr. Stabby, but someone got to it first.
“I don’t think so,” someone said, and I think it was Tate.
I focused my eyes on the theater’s exit. I didn’t care if The Bride of Frankenstein was playing or not; I didn’t want to stay in this place for even a second longer. The rechargeable lantern went flying, and someone said, “Dammit, she’s lost her gourd!”
Someone else landed on my back, and if there had been any air left in my lungs, it billowed out. I wanted to shriek at the person to get off, get off, GET OFF, but I couldn’t make the words come out.
“Calm down, Lulu!” Tate urged. His tone was matter-of-fact, so it didn’t really sink into my mind. “Calm down or you’re going to kill yourself!”
“Get the trank!” someone else called. “We thought this might happen!”
I found some air and wriggled desperately. I could feel the warmth spreading across my leg and hands ripping at my shirt. Someone tore the shirt from my shoulder and yelled, “Hold her still!”
Something very sharp went into my shoulder. I yelled inarticulately, but it was disregarded. My vision blurred but not before the vision of purest evil wandered before me. Behind the vision was that same black door I’d seen before. It wavered, and I perceived that it wasn’t real. However, the other was very real indeed.
I tried to scream, but failed miserably.
Chapter 10
Lula in La La Land Again
The Present – Colorado
I didn’t just pop into existence like some of my dreams. Instead, I gradually faded into being. I sort of coalesced from oblivion into actuality. It was an odd feeling, and I was somewhat confused as a result. I wasn’t trying to dream of anything, but rather I was being pulled into unconscious reverie. I tried to set my mind straight by thinking about what I did know. I lay on a bed that was actually a cot. A rough military-issued blanket covered me. My shoulder ached. My thigh ached worse. One of those cool rechargeable lanterns sat on a vintage green footlocker nearby. My head was pillowed on something very soft, and something was touching my cheek.
For a moment I was bemused. I didn’t feel threatened or alarmed. I simply was. I was in the middle of a dream and all was well enough. There wasn’t a man with a plum flower chain whip waiting to tear my back into shreds. There wasn’t a deep dark threatening figure ready to throttle me into nothingness. My thoughts floated.
Then I realized that my head was on someone’s lap, and that someone was the one stroking my cheek. I looked upward, and my stomach fell a thousand stories while I expected to see Theophilus above me.
Instead, it was Landers again. His icy blue eyes examined me carefully. “You’re not all right,” he said. He was all white hair and sheer lines. Concern etched his features into a starkness I was not familiar with.
“I’m not?” I repeated. Wasn’t I? “I don’t know what I am.”
“Lulu,” he said patiently with an obvious note of impatience. “What’s going on? Are they doing anything to you?”
“They drugged me,” I said. I felt at the top of my shoulder with my fingers. There was a small lump where I had been injected. “They said it was a…trank. A tranquilizer. I don’t know what they used.”
“Why would they do that?”
“I was upset,” I said. “Are you here or are you here?”
“I can’t talk to you when you’re awake,” Landers said with clear frustration. “You’ve cut yourself off, and now you’re in a tech bubble. It’s like slogging through thick soup. You’re there, but it’s so far away. I needed some help, so Zach is pitching in. So is Gideon. It’s not that easy because they’re in California and I’m in Colorado, but we’ve managed to cobble our minds together to make it work. This is why I’m in your dreams.”
Sophie had said something about Zach being able to pop up in her dreams while we traveled across the country and while we were in D.C. It sounded nice, like Skyping in your sleep. Who needed a computer when there was a world full of psychics with all kinds of weird powers?
“How do I let you talk to me when I’m awake?” I asked. It would be nice to talk to Landers once more.
“You need to open your mind,” Landers said. “You need to think about me and call to me. It won’t be like a dream. It’ll be thoughts in your head. You’ll hear me. I’ll hear you. Anytime you want. But it might be more difficult while you’re in there.” There, I assumed, was the tech bubble.
“Are you coming?” I asked as if I had invited him to a tea party. (Underground tea party with cannibals, mermaids, and whackjobs. Oh my. All I needed were ruby slippers and a brindle cairn terrier, but I was drawing the line at donning gingham. No one above the age of thirteen had ever looked good in gingham.)
“Yes, but Zach could come with the Phoenix more quickly.”
“I don’t think it would make a difference,” I said. “The tunnels are more comprehensive than Cheyenne Mountain. They must have been working these for a lot longer. It’s almost like a labyrinth down here. If they closed off the blast doors, it would take a mountain of dynamite to get through it, not to mention the whole tech bubble thing.”
“Your leg?”
“Bandaged. It’s throbbing. He said he gave me a shot of antibiotics, but that’s pre-change stuff. I don’t know how effective it will be. I can’t tell if the wound is infected or not.” I stuffed away the churning of my stomach. I didn’t want to think about what it would mean if my leg was infected. It wouldn’t be pretty.
“We have antibiotics,” Landers said. “The Portland tech bubble sent some last month. They’ve got a pretty good manufacturing base now. You should know that.”
I knew that. I had found the Portland bubble. I had helped set up two doctors and a nurse practitioner there. Then I had located a survivor who knew about manufacturing. The whole deal got supplied with power provided by water wheels in the Columbia River. Visiting there was like taking a step back in time. Once, I sat down nearby an office building with half the lights lit up and sipped a cup of cappuccino that they made with their machine. It felt like I was back in the auld days of yore. Then a troupe of Sasquatches tromped past on their way to the river, and it was back to business as post-change usual. (They liked to fish.)
“Maybe if you left it at the door,” I said. “I’m still breathing, so they must not want me dead here.”
Landers’s hand clenched into a tight fist. I settle
d back down and winced at the pain in my shoulder. I should have been used to pain; it seemed much more prevalent in the changed world. “What do they want?” he gritted out.
“I don’t know,” I said. I didn’t want to admit that I freaked out, and they put a needle in my shoulder because I had done so. I didn’t want to admit that I’d seen something that I wasn’t certain was real. It might make me seem insane.
“You’re not insane,” Landers said. His fist relaxed, and his fingers touched my cheek again. “You’re just…”
“Troubled? Stupid? Foolish?” I was happy to supply all the adjectives. It wasn’t anything I hadn’t thought about myself before. I hadn’t said any of the part about being insane out loud, but it didn’t seem to matter to Landers.
“I was going to say needing time,” Landers said and then added, “Like most of us have. There’s nothing easy about the world after the conversion.”
“Conversion,” I repeated. “That’s one way of putting it.”
“There’s something you should know,” Landers said, and it sounded like he was having difficulty with it. “Something else has happened. People are— ” his words got cut off as if by a slicing machete. He made a choking noise and said to someone else— “what if she can help? What if this is all connected? It has to be.”
“What’s connected?” I brushed his hand away and sat up, ignoring the pull of the bandages on my thigh. I abruptly realized that I wasn’t wearing anything under the blanket and gave a little gasp. “Dammit,” I muttered. “Doesn’t this dream have some good clothes? A little Prada? Maybe some Guess? Michael Kors? I’d go for something campy from Walmart right now. A Hawaiian shirt with surfboards and beach boys on it, maybe.”
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