by Elisa Hansen
“I am Death. Not the state of being dead. I am the transition. But she, she is a condition.”
“So the state of being undead?”
“Her power is that of all affliction.”
“So when people are…afflicted…with undeadness, she’s getting off on it?”
“Or any physical malady. It is what she is.”
“So when people die, they stop being afflicted, and she loses the power or whatever energy she draws from them?”
“The undead do not die.”
Emily rolled her eyes. “I mean when they die from being afflicted with literally any other maladies or whatever.”
“The dead are useless to her, yes.”
“But they’re useless to you too, right?”
“You do understand how that is beside the point, don’t you?”
Did she? Yes, okay, it made sense. “And the other two? Also conditions?”
“The condition of yearning, hunger, need of sustenance. And the condition of conflict with others.”
Conditions the undead would eternally suffer. Until humans wiped out every last one. But how did Death being out of the way make that less of a possibility? Trying to follow the “logic” of cosmic beings made Emily’s brain ache. She watched Death’s back and forth focus until it settled on the bend in the road, and he set off toward the hill.
Together, then!
Emily followed along the dusty shoulder, trying to wrangle her simmering excitement. “What did she mean when she said she gave me to you? Am I really your legion or whatever? Is that a thing? Are you stuck with me now?”
He shrugged. “I could leave you.”
‘Kay… “So why don’t you?”
“I don’t like to travel alone.”
Emily missed a step. Dust puffed around her ankles. That couldn’t be all there was to it. Could it? He just wanted company? She could be anybody? “Wait, is that who I remind you of? Your horse?”
“No.”
She caught back up to him. “So who then?” Why did he look at her like that while she braided her hair?
“I feel responsible for your situation. I took part in creating you.”
Oh. Guilt, then. Fine. At least he had feelings at all. She massaged her sore fingertip as she thought of how his sister mocked him. “Yeah, Father.”
He sighed, and she smirked, but her expression soon dissolved, and she let a pace fall between them. So what if it was just guilt? Why should she care? “My real father died two years ago.” An image of him alive blossomed in her mind. The way his eyes would twinkle like Santa Claus’s when he closed a sale, the warmth of his big, strong hugs. She sighed and pushed the memories away, focused instead on the silky brown dust her boots kicked up with each step. Like little grenade blasts. Death’s cloak trailed over the ground without even leaving a groove. Despite its tatters, it remained perfectly clean.
“None of your immediate family are dead,” he said.
Emily rolled her eyes. “Seriously, whatever. He got zombied. So did my brother. For all I know, they’re chopped to pieces and burned to ash and scattered to the winds, but you’re telling me they’re still not dead. Fine, they’re undead. Forever.” Just like her entire team last night. And there was no release from undeath. Ever. She knew the universe was messed up, but the abysmal horror of it was more than she could digest. God… “I’ve lost everyone I ever cared about, and there’s not even any kind of afterlife or magical-religious crap to delude me into some kind of consolation.”
“Your mother is not undead.”
Emily’s despair immediately flushed into bristling hostility. “Yeah, she’s worse.”
Death wisely remained silent.
They walked for several minutes until marks in the dust caught Emily’s eye and her rigidity evaporated. “Footprints! Hey, look.” She dropped to a crouch. “Treads and shoes. Running’s too sloppy to be a vampire.”
Death watched her. “He wasn’t truly with them.” His voice softened. “The vampire I saw. It appeared they meant to destroy him.”
“Good.” Emily straightened and squinted at the bend. “Too bad it got away.”
“Hm.”
“Scott can’t be that far ahead.” She turned to Death. “We can still catch up.”
He took a small step backward, then seemed to think of something and took out his screen again.
“They have a gas jug,” she reminded him. “They must have a truck. Time is of the essence, right? Another chance like this might not come along.”
“Indeed.” Death looked to the hill, his hands clicking against the screen. “But they will not listen to you.”
Emily shook her head and caught the tattered edge of his sleeve.
She had a plan.
Time for some epic bullshit.
“Just tell me exactly what that gizmo of yours says about our pal Scott.”
20
Leverage
One of the most deplorable consequences of society’s downfall had to be the deterioration of the roads. Leif clenched his sharp teeth as another pothole bounced his head against the truck’s torn ceiling and one of his earbuds went flying. He snatched it midair and wedged it back into place. He refused to miss a moment of the music. The old battery in the ancient little machine managed to hold a charge for but a few hours, and the November nights lingered long. Half the music saved on it by whoever used to own it wasted Leif’s time. But the other half was quite nice indeed. As he hummed along to a satisfactory toccata, his fingers played the steering wheel with each pothole-avoiding swerve.
The speedometer quivered at sixty-six, and the truck groaned against every mile. The fuel gauge read half when he found the hulking thing cowering off the roadside a few hours ago, but now it edged toward E. Leif doubted the rickety contraption would make it many miles more. Diesel fumes swirled through his open window, the spicy odor waltzing with the cloying scent of rotting hay.
Leif estimated he had the better part of three hours until dawn. He would give himself an hour more on the road and then seek shelter. If nothing could be found, he could theoretically burrow between the rectangular hay bales in the back of the truck. But it was a risk; God forbid a hungry horse should wander by.
A horse… Leif could drain a whole team right about now. The proximity of Carol’s human had been torturous. His body’s fleeting warmth against Leif’s side still prickled through him, teased at his nostrils. Exquisite agony.
Why didn’t he simply grab the boy and run? Oh, regrets, regrets. But before tonight, Leif had never seen Death in one place for so long. And Leif’s sense of self-preservation always was his strongest trait. And so he fled, left the life behind for He Who Could Not Be Escaped.
“And did he claim you, beautiful boy?” Leif murmured to the music. “And will your Carol be lonely now? Such a shame. Such a waste.”
It was perhaps a touch delusional, but he fancied Death a bit of an acquaintance. With every life Leif took, the old fellow joined him, right at the end. He rarely stayed longer than a split second, but it was always one of Leif’s favorite split seconds. We are in this together, he would think. And it was a pleasant thing, to not be alone with a corpse in his arms. If only for a moment.
After more than four hundred years of it, one couldn’t help but feel a touch of attachment.
And so what would Carol do now? Would she bury the body? How sentimental could artificial intelligence be?
A wistful sigh sang past Leif’s lips. Could he ever find her again? Without a human to protect, he imagined she would be much less trigger-happy. They were going to New York. Would she continue her journey without her charge? What information did she possess?
Leif couldn’t help but think again how much indeed Lorenzo would value a machine with connections to Manhattan. How much he would value whomsoever delivered her to him.
But best not to mourn what never was. It had been a pretty idea, playing Lorenzo’s game one last time, long enough to finally take him down, like a ven
geful god. To be the One Vampire to end his reign and to topple the Accursed System sure to Doom Them All. For the credit to be Leif’s alone.
But it was time to let go of his foolish fantasies. Time to turn himself over to the great Apollonia in Manhattan. Tell his pathetic desperado story, confess his failures, and become a lowly cog in her wheel.
Leif squeezed his eyes shut, and the hard plastic of the steering wheel crumpled under his hands.
Another teeth-gnashing bump. Oh dear.
His eyes snapped open. Road kill this time, the smell of it distinctly human. Leif’s trembling thirst spiked, his shoe slamming the brake of its own accord. But as he slid out the door, he could already tell how less-than-fresh the corpse must be. He covered his nose and walked around the truck to have a look.
What remained of a twisted woman sprawled over the pavement. A swarm of ants writhed upon her carcass, gleaming black in the starlight. Those on the upper body feasted, unsympathetic to their twitching compatriots squashed by the tire’s tread at the corpse’s other end.
“And so you were here not long ago,” Leif said to the night as he imagined Death meeting this woman. Did he strike her down in wrathful fury? Or embrace her tenderly like a lover? The way Leif might have?
He sighed with longing as he used his foot to nudge the thing over. The ants streamed in every direction like black lava.
“Flee, little scavengers. Run home to mother.”
The body’s back side glistened white with maggots. There was nothing for Leif here, and his veins sobbed.
As he walked back up the truck’s side, he ran a hand along the wooden slats and plucked out a piece of hay. He was twining it between his fingers and reaching for the cab’s door when his body stiffened on instinct.
A small sleek shape zoomed through the air a few hundred yards ahead. This time of night, it wouldn’t be a bird. And if Leif doubted his ornithological deductions, the blinking lights gave the drone away.
Leif dropped beside the truck out of sight. But it was too late. A minute later, he caught the guttural rumbling of vehicles on the wind. Two of them, big ones with loud engines. Only a couple miles off and coming his way.
He eased up and scrutinized the black sky through his truck’s windows. The little drone was coming right for him.
Leif jumped atop the truck and launched himself into the air. He caught the drone and somersaulted into a landing. As he ran back to the truck, he punched at the thing’s switches until the lights blinked off.
Its two big lenses gave the impression of bubble eyes above a round knob of a nose. It was kind of cute. Leif wondered if he could get away with keeping it.
“Who do you belong to?” he murmured.
He didn’t expect an answer, but its lights blinked back on again. The damned thing was on a remote.
So much for that. Leif squashed it between his hands like a giant spider and punted it into the bushes off the side of the road.
The engine sounds picked up speed, coming from the northwest. Leif supposed it was too much to hope they would turn left at the crossroad ahead and drive away from him. He doubted his quaint hay truck could outrun such engines, but if he backtracked, perhaps he could lose them in the town he passed a few miles ago.
He reached for the cab door, but then froze again. This time because a hand like iron gripped his shoulder. The touch seeped warmly through his coat, but not warm enough.
Again?
Naturally, a vampire could catch up to him faster if they simply left their truck. Whoever the hand belonged to, the recent human scent wafting from them was oh too good. Leif shrugged off the hand and turned, preparing for Ricky v. 2.0. But when he saw who stood there, his brows shot up and an incredulous laugh escaped him.
“Nadia!” And who was that, coming up behind her? “Hector.” Of all the vampires in all the deserts, it had to be two from the very commune he abandoned last night. Damnable coincidence? Impossible they tracked him so far and so fast. His foot trail ended in Dog Flats, after all.
Nadia took a step back as Hector joined her, his great hammy hands flexing in the air, ready for a fight. They looked even less happy to see Leif than he was to see them. And Leif was very, very unhappy to see them.
“I’m so glad to see you!” He gave his most convincing smile. “But I knew you would fare well.” Last night, he fled the factory as soon as the attacking humans and their grenades distracted everyone. “Tell me, were there any casualties?”
“Not yet.” Nadia signaled Hector to have at him.
Leif jumped, alighting on the truck’s roof. He put a flabbergasted hand to his breast. “What is this animosity?”
“You ran away.”
“Coward.”
“Traitor.” They jumped onto the hay, triangulating on him.
Leif evaluated his chances. They both looked good, empowered, as it were. Nadia’s long black hair glistened, especially luxurious. Human blood flowed fresh in their veins. She was a sharp one, and Hector was a glorious giant of a vampire. Leif was too depleted to take on both at once.
It wasn’t going to be another Ricky situation. Leif would have to work for this one.
“Traitor? You offend me! I left to seek help.”
They laughed at him. Both of them. Leif hadn’t even known Hector could laugh.
“Demos told us how he found you.” Nadia’s pretty lip curled. “Trying to release our horde.”
“We were under attack.” Leif smiled. “It seemed the logical thing to do.”
“He caught you before you received the alarm.”
Leif let his jaw drop, and then he nodded as if in understanding. “Oh, so that’s why you think…” He shook his head and laid on a musical chuckle. “My dear, I sensed them coming.”
Nadia was not in the least charmed. Her lips pulled back in full snarl. “He caught you with the igniters.”
Oh, yes. Those.
But Demos did not know Leif calibrated them to his detonator or that he sprayed the caskets with explosive. There was no way he could know. All he knew was Leif had a pocketful of igniters and his hand on the latch of the cattle truck. Of course, the brat assumed the worst. True, he was correct, but he had no proof, no idea what Leif was really up to. For all he knew, Leif thought he could turn the flesh-eaters into bombs by shoving igniters down their throats.
Leif sighed as if all this wasted their time, and he shook his head.
“Saboteur,” Hector growled and started for him over the hay.
“Whoa there!” Leif lifted his hands. “That’s not it at all. I merely took initiative. Or tried to.”
“I knew we couldn’t trust you,” Nadia said. “I told him so when you came out of nowhere and offered to join us like you’re God’s gift to commune. I don’t care how old you are or how long you spent with Lorenzo. Demos calls the shots. The only vampire he answers to is Lorenzo himself.”
“Obviously I was wrong. I see that now.” Leif hesitated as if ashamed, lowered his eyes for added effect. “I panicked.”
“And you will pay with your head.” Hector lunged.
Leif jumped, landing on the road. He put his hands on the truck’s hot hood. “Oh no,” he said up to Hector. “Lorenzo prefers it attached. I assure you of that.”
“I don’t trust you as far as I could throw you.”
“To be fair, you could probably throw me rather far.”
Hector’s features wrinkled into a dark conglomeration.
“Listen.” Leif patted the hood, gestured for them to join him. “Call me coward; it is true I ran. But I can prove my loyalty, how about that? While I searched the desert for help, I made the most amazing discovery.”
Hector landed behind him with a ground-trembling thud, but he held off at a sign from Nadia. She stepped down onto the hood and eyed Leif.
He lifted a hand before she could speak. “I’ve found an android with intimate ties to our enemies in Manhattan. It’s out here alone, but heavily weaponized. Between the three of us, though, we co
uld capture it. Oh, we could. Think of it. This thing could provide Lorenzo the information and power he needs to finally break down Apollonia’s initiative and take Manhattan.”
Nadia was still for a long moment, and then she crouched, her eyes drawing level with Leif’s, her tight blue jeans stretching over her shapely knees. “Where is it?”
“I will show you.”
“No. You tell us where it is.”
“Southwest, about a hundred-twenty miles as the crow flies.”
“What makes you think it’s still there?”
“It is.” Leif nodded, very sure. “I trapped it in a rock cave.”
Hector grunted. “If it’s heavily weaponized, it can get out of the cave.”
Had he just used his brain twice in as many minutes? Leif should perhaps start to give Hector more credit.
Nadia straightened and looked down the road toward the approaching sound of the two big trucks. “We can’t make that before sunrise. What are you trying to pull?”
Leif laughed. “There is nothing being pulled.”
She landed at his side. “Tonight we go to this cave together, and if it’s not there, I take your head to Lorenzo myself.”
Oh-ho! She knew Lorenzo’s location? Well now, how could Leif get her to share that?
The squealing of brakes distracted him as the trucks pulled up. One was a four-door pickup with Nadia and Hector’s caskets in the back. Offensively ugly brown color. The guard driving it though, Karem, was a lovely shade of brown and looked beyond scrumptious through the windshield. The other was one of the semitrucks complete with livestock trailer. Undeadstock trailer. And it was full and groaning. Leif hadn’t expected that. The stench of the cargo might have killed his appetite if its driver, Muk, didn’t smell so combatively delectable.
Now what in the world were Hector and Nadia doing with Demos’s cargo?
And only two humans. Pity.
“Where is everyone else?” Leif asked.
“That’s not your privilege to know.”
Karem hopped out of the pickup truck. “Yo, what happened to my drone?”
“Sorry, old sport.” Leif offered him a smile. “I didn’t realize it was yours.”
