by Ike Hamill
“It’s okay, Marta,” said Carol. “We’ll be okay with time." She dragged Lynne over to Marta and used her other hand to rub Marta’s back.
Carol’s breath felt hot in her lungs. Her heart went out to Marta, who had lost everyone, who had been betrayed and abandoned.
“Is that you?” asked Lynne.
Carol looked over to Lynne to see what she meant. Lynne was rubbing her throat and swallowing painfully.
“Are you doing something, Marta?” asked Lynne. “This is really uncomfortable. Is that you?”
“I’ll take it all,” Marta sobbed. “I’ll just take everything.”
Inside the airlock, Gregory looked away from the monitor when Andrew dropped to his knees. Nobody claimed to know exactly how Marta’s power worked, but they thought they had built a box to effectively block out her murderous power. The box, Gregory’s home when he was on the road, was constructed of several layers of materials—metal, ceramic, semi-conductor—and had provided a safe place for Gregory up to that point.
Andrew clutched at his throat. Gregory had seen many videos of people collapsing under Marta’s psychic grip, but none had looked like this. They normally just fell over. Andrew looked like he was choking; he looked like Lynne and Carol on the monitor, who had also dropped to the deck. Gregory felt none of the symptoms, but he imagined all of Pittsburgh, and then all of Pennsylvania reaching up and clawing at their throats. If her power could reach inside his ultra-safe box, how far could it reach?
Gregory stepped to the keypad and typed his emergency override. The door to the ship—a vessel he’d never seen except through the screens—opened on the interior of the cargo hold. Gregory bolted through and found the stairs. Gregory ran for the stern and came up behind Marta, who was still hunched at the rail. Carol and Lynne were sprawled on the deck, no longer moving.
“Marta,” said Gregory.
She turned and looked up with dark eyes that absorbed the moonlight.
He didn’t wait for a response or a welcome—he ran up to her and swept her into his arms.
“I’m so sorry,” he said.
Her body softened in his arms. Her chin rested on his shoulder. His ear tickled when she exhaled.
“I missed you,” she said.
“Me too,” said Gregory.
“I’m sorry I did this to you,” said Marta.
“Did what?” asked Gregory.
“When you were out at the mailbox that day. The day you died. I was watching you through the window and thinking about my little girl; my miscarriage. I think you were the first person I killed with my power,” said Marta.
“It’s okay,” said Gregory. “I came back. That life was barely worth living anyway.”
Marta buried her face in his shoulder.
“Agghh,” Lynne gurgled at their feet. “Bitch.”
Gregory hugged Marta closer. Marta clutched at his back with desperate fingers. He heard Lynne trying to rouse Carol.
“Don’t ever leave me,” said Marta.
“I won’t,” said Gregory. At that moment he meant what he said, but he knew it wouldn’t always be true. His mind immediately jumped to a thousand unspoken conditions.
“Good,” said Marta.
Gregory’s heart swelled. He felt peaceful then, with Marta in his arms. He didn’t know what their relationship would evolve into, but he felt like they were two sides of the same coin. He felt indelibly linked to her, like they shared the same heartbeat.
“You almost killed us,” Lynne said from her position seated next to Carol. Gregory and Marta were frozen, locked together in their embrace and swaying slightly with the rocking on the boat.
“I’m okay,” said Carol. “I still see spots, but I think I’m fine. God, I’ve got a headache.”
“What are they doing?” Lynne asked. “I see them really close to each other. Are they hugging or something?”
“Yeah,” said Carol.
“Domi,” said Lynne. “We left you on the boat, how did you get up here?” she asked as she saw the faint Sparkle of her cat. She reached out and stroked his back. He hopped on her lap.
They heard footsteps running up, slapping on the metal deck, and looked to see Andrew appear from belowdecks.
“Gregory?” asked Andrew.
“They’re having a moment,” said Lynne.
“Be nice,” said Carol.
“What? I didn’t come here to be nice,” said Lynne.
“Why did you come?” asked Andrew. He placed one hand on his side. Carol spotted the motion. She guessed that Andrew was probably armed.
“Let’s settle down and see if we can work this out. Marta?” Carol asked. “Gregory?”
“Guys?” asked Andrew. He stepped over and tapped Gregory on the shoulder.
At his touch, Gregory turned slightly towards Andrew. His arms stayed locked around Marta, and her arms stayed gripped around him. Gregory’s slight turn put them off balance. The pair leaned, slowly at first, and then picked up speed. Andrew saw that they were falling a second too late. His fast hands almost caught Gregory, but came away empty.
Gregory and Marta crashed to the deck.
“Gregory?” Andrew asked. He was kneeling at Gregory’s side in a blink. “Gregory?" He tugged harder at Gregory’s should and the man’s arm flopped away from Marta, banging on the deck. Andrew reached to his wrist and grabbed for a pulse. On the other side of the couple, Carol crawled over and reached for Marta’s arm.
Carol’s eyes met Andrew’s—“I think she’s dead.”
“He is too,” said Andrew.
“What?” said Lynne. “They’re still glowing. They’re dead? Are you sure?”
Carol went back to Marta’s hand, to re-check.
“Yeah,” said Andrew.
“Oh,” said Lynne. “There they go. They’re fading out now. Fuck me.” Lynne dragged herself across the deck and felt around until she found the legs of the dead couple. She pushed up the pants of the corpses to expose skin. “I’m going to touch them. You give me thirty seconds, no more, and then help me break my grip,” Lynne ordered. She touched both Marta and Gregory. Her body stiffened.
Andrew stood and smoothed back his hair.
Carol sat back on the ship’s deck and counted aloud. “One one thousand, two one thousand, three one thousand,” she said. She clutched her arms to her chest and felt goose pimples standing up on her skin.
Lynne didn’t need the full thirty seconds. After Carol reached eleven, Marta sat up, turned her face to the black sky, and screamed. A second later, a low moan escaped from Gregory’s parted lips. Andrew bent and pulled Lynne backwards until her grip on Marta and Gregory had been severed.
Carol rushed to Marta’s side and gripped her around her shoulders until she stopped screaming.
Andrew checked Gregory’s pulse. The man was alive, but unresponsive.
“Okay you guys,” said Andrew. He reached a hand behind his back and it came out with a black handgun. “Let’s go, get up.”
“Go where?” asked Carol.
“To the brig,” said Andrew. “He’s going to the infirmary, and I’m going to turn you over to the police and tell them the whole story. I’ve got video of the whole thing, and if I show them that then I’m going to have to give them you also.”
“We didn’t do anything,” said Carol.
“You came onboard, trespassing, to kill my boss,” said Andrew. “Look, nothing personal, just get moving. If he doesn’t recover, I’m not going to get implicated in this. Get up." He pointed his gun at Carol’s face.
“Okay, okay,” said Carol. “We didn’t do anything anyway. Come on, Marta.”
“Wait,” said Lynne. “You’ve got a bigger problem, Andrew. The world’s about to end, and we’re the only three people who can stop it.”
“My only priority is securing this situation,” said Andrew. “Get up.”
“Can you guys see that?” asked Lynne. She pointed towards the shore where the hillside was dark except a set of headlight
s.
“What? The car?” asked Carol.
“Let’s go,” said Andrew. He pulled back on his pistol’s slide—unnecessary to fire, but he knew the sound itself often inspired action.
“No, not the car,” said Lynne. “I guess you guys can’t see it, but no there’s like a thousand times more zombies over there.”
Andrew moved his arm to the side and pointed his gun at the water. He squeezed off a round into the river.
Carol screamed. Marta didn’t react. Lynne clutched her cat to her chest.
“LET’S GO!” yelled Andrew.
Carol scrambled to her feet and pulled on Marta’s arm until the two women were standing. Lynne joined them. Andrew herded the three into the ship’s brig.
NONE OF THE WOMEN SAID ANYTHING for a long time—hours. Lynne pet her cat. Carol chewed on her fingernails, looking at the walls. Marta stared down at her feet.
“I’m sure we’ll be fine,” Carol said to Lynne’s back. “They don’t have any proof that we did anything other than trespass.”
They sat on the same narrow bench in the small locked room. The room had no windows or portholes. A single buzzing light overhead resonated in Carol’s head, making it ache worse.
“I’m not worried about our legal troubles,” said Lynne. “You don’t understand—I think the world might have ended already while we’ve been out here. Those things…”
She was cut off by the door swinging inward. Domi jumped from Lynne’s lap and slinked through the gap.
“Hey. Let’s go,” said Andrew. He waved with his gun.
“Where now?” asked Lynne.
“That’s a good question,” said Andrew. “Look, my name is Andrew.” He check the gun’s safety and stuffed into the back of his waistband. “I’m sorry about before. We have to figure this thing out.”
“What thing?” asked Carol.
“Your friend is right, the zombies are everywhere and they’re pretty aggressive. I can’t reach anyone on the radios and the cell network seems down. So let’s talk this out and decide what to do.”
“What makes you think we’ll be any help now?” asked Lynne.
“I know you guys are all wrapped up in this zombie thing. We got intel about that yesterday afternoon. Let’s share what we know and make a plan,” said Andrew.
“Come on, Lynne, what do we have to lose?” asked Carol.
“Alright,” said Lynne.
Carol and Lynne took Marta’s hands and the three women followed Andrew up to the bridge of the ship. Domi was already sitting on the main console, looking out the forward windows. Lynne pulled away and shuffled towards the cat, stopping with her hands on the counter when she reached the front. She looked past the windows towards shore.
“I came to shore over there and they all came out and clustered on that dock. They’re like a senseless mob,” said Andrew.
“I can see them,” said Lynne. “There must be thousands.”
“Tell me what you see, and how you can see it,” said Andrew.
Lynne didn’t need any more prompting. She unloaded her story from the beginning. She started with the dream and the first time she saw Gregory. Carol told her story beginning with the birth of her daughter. Andrew took it all in and then gave the women a quick sketch of the relationship between Marta and Gregory. When he finished, Carol doubled-back and filled him in on what little she knew of Marta’s pregnancy and miscarriage. Marta stayed silent during the exchange.
“It was the nuns,” said Andrew.
“Pardon?” asked Carol.
“What nuns?” asked Lynne.
“From Carol’s story,” said Andrew. “Somebody has to be behind this. This Don guy couldn’t have just appeared out of nowhere, he had to have an accomplice, and the nuns came up with the story of him being dead. I’m telling you, they have to be behind this somehow.”
“That’s insane,” said Carol.
“It’s a working theory—that’s all we need,” said Andrew.
“He may be right,” said Lynne. “My roommates, Carrie and Barry, they used to work for those nuns. They’re both nurses and they worked for those nuns when I first had my dream and started seeing the Sparkle. They might have help the nuns do something to me.”
“Yeah, exactly,” said Andrew. “But don’t get hung up on it, we just need a working theory so we can figure out how to act. We have to stay fluid here. Use the theory until it wears out and then we’ll come up with a better one.”
“They kept trying to convince me that everything was normal,” said Carol. “Like I was the crazy one. It makes sense now.”
“Yeah, that’s fine,” said Andrew. “Move on. If it’s the nuns, then how do we proceed.”
“They’re grooming the girl,” said Lynne. “They brought her here to make the portals, to raise the dead.”
“Then they’ve done a good job,” said Andrew.
“And maybe we were part of that somehow,” said Lynne. “I’m the flower, she’s the vessel, and Donna didn’t want us to get together with Marta. We’re supposed to be three parts of something.”
“I’m the storm,” said Marta. Everyone stopped and stared at her. She’d been perfectly quiet during the conversation and they’d all assumed that she wasn’t even hearing their words.
“Yes, it’s a balance,” said Carol. “Life, death, and host.”
“They created us unintentionally,” said Marta. “When they brought Donna through, some cosmic equation became unbalanced, and that created complementary abilities in the three of us. Life, death, and host.”
“And Donna has called up her army. Lynne? Can you see her? Is she here?” Carol asked.
“Who, Donna?” asked Lynne. “I don’t know, maybe. How would I know?”
“Where’s the biggest cluster of zombies? She said she would make an army. If she’s here, she’ll be surrounded by them.”
“There,” said Lynne. She pointed up towards a hill that stood out against the night sky. “If there’s an army, it’s up there.”
“Then we go up there,” said Andrew, “and we find this Changeling and whoever is with her.”
“We’ll never make it,” said Lynne. “There’s a mob of zombies. They’re probably on every street. How will we get up there?”
“Monongahela Incline,” said Andrew.
“One more time in English?” asked Lynne.
“There’s a tram,” said Andrew, “that goes basically from the shore up to the top. It’s a tourist thing now, but I guess at one time it was a convenient way to get from the neighborhoods at the top of the mountain down to the river. Otherwise, it’s a really steep hill. It will be a haul, but we can climb the tracks. They’re elevated, so we should be able to slip right past the zombies.”
“And when we get to the top?” asked Carol.
“We’ll be heavily armed,” said Andrew.
THE ZOMBIE-PATROL ON THE SHORE followed the boat as they moved upstream. Andrew planned their assault as the boat crept along. He kept the speed low, as they made their preparations.
The women followed him to the port side, where he lowered a motorboat down from a boom.
“Can you clear that debris from the ladder?” Andrew asked Carol.
“Sure,” she said.
“Andrew, those things are following us up the shore,” said Lynne. “We’re not even going to get both feet on the ground before they’re on us.”
“We’re going in fast,” said Andrew. He lowered the motorboat even with the deck and piled in weapons and supplies. “We’ll use the cover of the boat until we’re coming up on the bridge and then we’ll pull around and head for shore just upstream of the pilings. They don’t seem to like water, so we’ll leave them on the north side of the bridge.”
“And then?” asked Lynne.
Carol screamed.
Andrew paused his hands, which were stuffing clips of ammunition into a small pack, and turned towards Carol. “What is it?”
“These are body parts,” she said. “
And they’re still alive." She was on her knees, leaning between the rails to where the ladder was affixed to the side of the boat.
“Yeah,” said Andrew. “I don’t want them tripping us up when we’re trying to load in.”
“What are they?” asked Lynne.
“This is awful,” said Carol. “There’s a hand and some fingers still gripping the ladder here even though they’re cut off. It’s terrible.”
“I had some problems when I tried to land earlier,” said Andrew. “They can’t hurt you, as far as I know. I’m set here. Lower that motorboat down to about eighteen inches over the water and I’ll go set the final course. Lynne, you’re in the front. Find that release handle. Carol and Marta, I want you in the middle." He disappeared back up towards the bridge.
Lynne moved carefully with Carol’s instruction and found herself on the metal bench of the inflatable dingy, gripping the release. Domi sat between her feet. She reached down and found his head. He ducked under her hand; he wasn’t in the mood to be touched. She attributed his attitude to the spray that misted them every time a swell hit the front of their little motorboat.
“Pull,” Andrew shouted from the back of the motorboat. She heard the outboard engine start and she tugged back on the handle. The bow hit the water first, and cool water splashed over Lynne. She could hear Domitius growling at her feet. Andrew lowered the stern to the water and gunned the outboard. Lynne sensed their acceleration. She’d never been seasick before, but her new blindness combined with the river-chop, and her stomach felt like it was churning butter.
Carol held on to her bench as the little motorboat bounced over the heavy chop. Marta sat and stared forward, not seeming to notice the bouncing.
Andrew steered across the black water. He waited until they were under the bridge to make his move. When he saw the black bridge blot out the night sky, he gunned the engine and brought the skiff around the big boat and steered straight for shore. He only slowed at the last second, jamming the outboard into reverse to lose some speed and cranking his hand to the left to get sideways to the shore. Andrew and Carol jumped for the shore right as the boat rubbed the rocks. Lynne waited until they called her across. She clutched her cat to her chest, but he wriggled free as soon as they were all on dry land. Marta followed.
