Fire

by Alan Rodgers

  And the Air Force wanted to know about it. Air Force, hell: the whole damned Pentagon wanted to know. And they were going to find out too, by studying Bill and the two other people who’d been brought here.

  Bill had to admit that it pleased him to be such a center of attention. He wasn’t sure how much he liked being classified. Which was the other thing Major Carver had said — all three of them had been classified top secret or some such. Which wasn’t at all as though they’d given Bill a jumped-up security clearance. More like they’d made him into one. Which meant that, as of now, he couldn’t go out and take a pee in the woods without an armed escort. And he could completely forget about talking to anyone outside the research project.

  Which he could expect to go on for months. Years, maybe.

  That was the part he didn’t like especially.

  Though it wasn’t like there was a damn thing he could do about it.

  Someone at the far end of the table coughed; Bill looked up, automatically, to see —

  The boy was glowing again. Glowing, damn it, glowing.

  Blink.

  And not glowing at all. Not doing anything but being a boy.

  He’s touched, Bill heard himself thinking. He’s touched, and you can see it because it’s touched you too.

  Which didn’t make a damn bit more sense than the words Bill’d heard in his head before. He frowned, shook his head. Bill was seeing things. Hearing things. Under the circumstances it was kind of understandable, and that was all there was to it. The thing to do was ignore it; sooner or later his head would clear and the world would go back to normal.

  So he looked at his food. Set himself back to the task of putting it down — which was getting to be a considerable task, since Bill was beginning to lose his appetite. And that was a shame too, when you considered that dinner was some kind of a beef stew on top of egg noodles, and was a high cut above your everyday Air Force chow.

  The beef was a little on the rare side. Rare stew beef? That was kind of screwy, wasn’t it? Yeah, it was. Oh well; it wasn’t bad. Just the opposite. Exotic and peculiar and kind of nice.

  Hadn’t that first bite of stew been crumbly and well-done, cooked half to death the way stew usually was? It had. Bill remembered it clearly enough. Even if he had been a little distracted when he’d dug in, the memory of taste and texture was still clear.

  The bite after that one was right on the edge of being raw.

  What was wrong with the cooks here? Well, they were in Korea. Maybe they had a Korean cook working down in an Air Force kitchen someplace in this maze. Bill had never ate any Korean food, but he’d had take-out Chinese, and that had certainly been an alien experience. Hadn’t been raw, though. Kind of what you might call lightly boiled — and definitely cooked through, no matter how alien it was.

  Listen to what I’m thinking, Bill thought. And this time it was no question but he was thinking for himself. If anyone was listening to me he’d’ve thought I was one of them red-neck racist types like you find up in the hills.

  By this point Bill was finding himself pretty agitated. Partly for obvious reasons, partly for ones he couldn’t quite put his finger on. He took him a good look at his half-cooked stew, pushed the bowl away, looked up and around the dead-quiet table —

  And there that boy was again, glowing brightly-as-you-please.

  And, being agitated and all hep up about the raw stew, Bill had his mouth open before he could manage to put a stop to himself.

  “You cut that out,” he said to the boy. “What’re you doing taking a shine that way?”

  The words fell onto the quiet table like rocks falling down out of a sack of gravel.

  The boy looked up from his dinner — his stew didn’t look half-cooked, Bill noticed — and smiled at him cockeyed like he didn’t quite know what he was talking about. He’d stopped glowing again by this point, of course. Now that everybody at the whole darned table was staring at the both of them.

  “Cut what out, Mr. Corporal Roe? What kind of shine you mean?”

  Bill sighed. Embarrassed. He could feel hot pressure in his cheeks like they were turning red. “Nothing. Not nothing. Just a little off my feed from flying across that ocean, I guess.”

  None of them were eating any more; everyone at the whole damned table was staring at him. And not just like he was crazy, either. Though there was some of that. Mostly they were staring at him transfixed, like . . . like he was something in one of their experiments. Which, Bill reminded himself, he was. Up till that moment Bill had felt a lot more like an airman who’d pulled himself weird duty than he’d felt like a rat in some scientist’s laboratory.

  Major Carver coughed. “ ‘Taking a shine,’ Corporal Roe?”

  Bill frowned. Blushed. There wasn’t any sense in discussing it. Or, maybe more to the point, there was a lot of sense in not discussing it. Bill didn’t want to get himself dissected like some laboratory rat on account of him being crazy enough to see things.

  Not that the Major-doctor woman was about to let it go.

  “Did you see something, Corporal Roe? Do you think you’re hallucinating?”

  Bill wasn’t completely uneducated; he had his high school. Couldn’t have got into the Air Force without it. He knew about “hallucinating” — it was seeing things, like what happened to those dumb kids who took that LSD acid stuff, or ate some of those magical mushrooms. He’d almost got involved with that nonsense himself, back when he was in high school.

  Bill sure didn’t want to get himself busted out of the Air Force on some drug charge.

  “No ma’am. Not hallucinating. Just my eyes acting a little weird, kind of.”

  “What, exactly, did you see, Corporal?”

  Bill looked away. Looked at his stew, because it was in front of him and it was something he could stare at. There wasn’t any getting away from a question that direct. Not without insubordination. Or lying. And he knew that this wasn’t any kind of situation where he ought to be telling any lies.

  “Well, ma’am. It was kind of like I looked at the young fellow there, just out of the corner of my eye. And when I looked at him, just for this little moment, it was like he was glowing.”

  The silence was so thick that Bill could have heard dandruff falling on his shoulder. And it went on forever.

  “It could have been a trick of the light, I guess,” Bill said. “You all got some kind of screwy light bulbs in this room, maybe?” Which was maybe a good question to ask, and Bill knew it, because he knew that someone had taken the trouble to install some kind of easy-on-the-eyes light-bulbs in here, just as they had in the hall.

  More silence.

  “No, Corporal. There isn’t any way that the light here could cause you to hallucinate.”

  And more silence still. And Bill was beginning to feel like he was under a microscope, and everyone was still staring at him. And his ears were ringing, and his hands were beginning to shake. And he pulled his bowl of stew back toward him and dug back into it, even though he wasn’t hungry any more and the stuff was pretty darned gross. Because if he didn’t do something, anything, right there and right then, Bill thought he’d go out of his mind. . . .

  The first bite went plop right into his mouth without Bill even looking at it.

  And that was a serious mistake.

  Because the gravy-covered cube of beef in Bill’s mouth was raw.

  Raw. And warm. And bloody and quivery as living flesh.

  And Bill forgot all about the fact that the spotlight was already pointed at him. And he screamed, and spat that hunk of meat right back into the bowl he’d taken it from. Where it bled and pulsed, just as though it were alive.

  That caused a real stir. It took the attention off of Bill and the fact that he was seeing things real thoroughly. Not quite as thoroughly as when, a few moments later, everyone noticed that their own dinners
had turned just as raw as Bill’s.

  ³ ³ ³

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  WASHINGTON

  It wasn’t as simple as it should have been, of course. The crowd — which just a few moments before had been quiet and tired — was wide awake before the first soldier crossed the barricade. The mob might have been a bunch of untrained civilians, but all the same it fought well and hard — partly because they were furious, partly because none of Young’s men had the heart or stomach for killing unarmed civilians.

  The worst of it was that the mob wasn’t unarmed. Every one of them had a rock or a two-by-four or a carving knife, and there were more guns, half a dozen of them, at least. Two soldiers were shot point-blank in the face, where neither their helmets nor their flack jackets could do them any good.

  After that the men seemed to remember how to shoot, and the sound of their machine guns filled the highway.

  And the bloodbath started.

  A line of stray machine gun slugs hit the lamp post above the Vice President’s head; one of them cut through the cord that held him. No one saw that in the confusion. Not even the ones with the two-by-fours who’d been beating him a few moments before.

  And the Vice President, confused and unnerved and gasping for air, crawled down the embankment, off the highway, away from the riot.

  And no one noticed.

  Not until the fighting was done, and bodies covered the pavement, and someone thought to identify the dead.

  ³ ³ ³

  SOUTH KOREA

  What with all the commotion, no one ever did get around to asking Bill about the glow again. Which was just fine with him.

  Major Carver had taken one good look at her bleeding stew, and she’d said something or other about biologicals and infection, and she’d told her corporal to quarantine them off right away. A moment or two later Bill had heard her mutter something to the effect that she didn’t expect it to do any good if they were dealing with something that virulent — was that the word she’d used? — and she said it quiet enough to give Bill the feeling that she hadn’t intended anyone to hear it.

  Then she’d turned to the Navy lieutenant, and said, “Lieutenant Reynolds, Mr. Smith.” A nod to her other civilian assistant. “I want you to take one of these bowls to your lab, and I don’t want you to leave until you’ve isolated the agent responsible for this reaction. I’m serious. If you find yourself falling asleep on your feet, Corporal Conrad here will bring you a cot. Regardless, you’re not to leave — if you’re awake I want you working. Do you understand me?”

  The lieutenant said, “Yes ma’am.” The look on his face was the look you expect from an airman who’s just been told that he’s got to sweep a runway by himself with a push-broom. Smith didn’t look much more enthusiastic.

  And the Major had turned to Joey. “Gather up Mr. Rodriguez, the police officer from New York, and bring him to my lab. Take Corporal Roe with you, in case you need help. I’ll bring young Mr. Williams with me myself. There’s work to do — a whole night’s worth of work to do — but I want our subjects where I can keep an eye on them.” The major paused, huffed. “Don’t just stand there with your mouth open, Joseph. Get on with it.”

  Joey closed his mouth. Shrugged. “Yes ma’am. If that’s what you want.” Kind of sarcastic-like — or maybe not sarcastic, exactly, but right there on the edge of it. Which probably would have got Bill busted down to private all over again, for insubordination. It was a mild reaction from a civilian who was being asked to put in overtime without being given any choice.

  Three minutes later they were in that long white corridor again, walking a lot slower than Bill was comfortable walking these days. Especially when he was under orders. There wasn’t much to do about it; Joey was the one who knew where they were going. If Bill went on ahead of him he’d be sure to end up in the wrong place.

  “Don’t you think we ought to get a move on? The Major sounded in some kind of a hurry, I’ll tell you.”

  Joey let out a long breath; slowed almost to a stop to think about the question.

  “She gets that way sometimes. I don’t see that there’s anything to be done about it.”

  Which struck Bill pretty strangely, even if he wasn’t quite certain what it meant. “How’s that?” he asked. He hadn’t seen an awful lot of Major Janet Carver. What he had seen of her had impressed Bill rather highly.

  “I don’t get it,” Bill said. “What’re you talking about?”

  A silence that went on for longer than it ought to have, and Joey had this weird look on his face, like he was about to say something. For a minute Bill thought Joey was actually going to answer the question; but then his expression changed again, as though he’d thought better of it. “Never mind,” Joey said. And after that he didn’t say another word until he opened the door to the policeman’s room.

  When they got there, Bill saw that there was one thing about Joey that hadn’t changed: he still got all slick and sweaty when he was nervous. And it was nervousness that had him in such a sweat, too. Bill could see it in his eyes, the lines on his forehead and around his mouth. All over his face. At first Bill thought that maybe it was because of the conversation they hadn’t quite had, just a few moments before. No: look at the way Joey hesitated, not wanting to open the door. What on God’s earth was in there, to make him shake like that?

  “You going to be okay, Joey?”

  And Joey snapped. “Don’t call me that, damn it!” His voice was shrill. Or as shrill as a baritone ever gets. Just shy of hysterical. “My name is Joseph. Or Joe, if you have to. I’m not seventeen years old any more, and no one, no one, calls me Joey.”

  It gave Bill more than a bit of pause. He was about to say something sarcastic, something biting — and then he stopped himself. It wouldn’t do for him to get into a tizzy, too; not if Joey was about to slip a cog. “Sure, Joe.” The word tasted strange on his lips. “Joseph. Whatever you want. What’s in that room? What’s got you all hep up?”

  And Joey or Joseph or whoever the hell he was stopped dead in his tracks. Stopped moving, stopped trembling, everything. Let out a small sound that sounded as rattled as every other thing else about him. Turned, looked Bill in the eye.

  “There’s a man in here,” he said. “A policeman who got his head blown off in a riot in New York City. And he’s alive.”

  That didn’t sound all that frightening to Bill; he’d been dead himself not even two days ago. It wasn’t worth interrupting over.

  “There was a picture of him, right when it happened: the TV cameras, from ABC. Live on the networks. Right before the crazies took over the place. One minute he’s a cop, armed with nothing but a night stick. Trying to stop a riot when the rioters are armed with machine guns. The next minute there’s blood and bone and brain-meat flying everywhere, and the cameras are getting all of it, taking it in and sending it out into the air.”

  Joe took in a breath. Let it out slow.

  “I was watching the satellite feed when it happened. ABC, just a couple of minutes before it went down. I saw it, damn it — I might as well have been there. And three hours later someone notices that something is breathing inside a body bag.” Bill saw Joe clench his jaw. Reach forward, set his hand on the doorknob, turn it. Press the door just far enough open that Bill could tell the room inside was pitch black. “I saw him, damn it. I saw how he died.”

  Joe finished opening the door. Reached in and turned on the light. Stopped again.

  “There’s something else, too,” he said. And waited for Bill to ask him what he meant.

  There was something here — something wrong. The way Joey was acting, that was it. None of the things he was talking about — none of the things he’d told Bill about — seemed like anything that ought to make anybody tremble before he went into a room. Let alone Joey, who took it real easy when he heard how Bill used to be alive. “Yeah? What�
�s that, Joe? What else?”

  And Joey stepped back, toward Bill — to one side and away from the door. Kept his arm extended, holding the door open.

  “See for yourself.”

  And Bill saw the man.

  At first there was nothing special about him at all. A dark, kinky-haired, sallow-skinned Hispanic. Puerto Rican, from the look of him; or maybe he was a pale Negro. Staring off into space absently. Prone abed but wide-eyed and awake. His face was slack, vacant; at first Bill thought that was the face of a man at the far end of exhaustion.

  And then he got a second look.

  And saw that the void behind the man’s eyes was deeper and more impenetrable than tiredness or contemplation.

  Saw that there was nothing behind those eyes at all.

  “Trouble is,” Joe was saying, “That man isn’t really alive at all. Gives me the creeps in the worst possible way.”

  Dead, vacant eyes.

  “No,” Joe said, “that isn’t saying it right. I could live with the creeps. Being around the walking zombie makes me sick with myself, right down to the core.”

  Sick with himself: that was exactly what Bill was feeling. Dead down inside, like the fever he had when he was twelve that made him so tired that he wanted to let go of the world and slip away and die.

  “‘Walking zombie’? He can actually walk?”

  “Not very well. There’s just about enough of him left that if you take him by the arm and drag him, he’ll follow you. Not very well; sometimes he just stops, and there’s nothing you can do to get him going again.”

  Bill stood, still as stone, staring. There was nothing else he could do. “Have I got this right? We’ve got to share a room with this thing for the rest of the night? And maybe longer?”