After the Fall (29 page)

Click.

“Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me!” I yelled. The thing had jammed when I needed it the most.

“There a little trick with the catch!” yelled Jeb.

I pulled back the hammer by hand and aimed it to the back when I heard a gurgling sound. Rayna had stabbed the thing in the throat, but it must not have severed the spinal cord, because it was still reaching and leaking its fluids all over them. I jammed the barrel of the shotgun into its face, all while trying to stay on the road, and pulled the trigger.

The world went blank for a second. All I could hear was a loud ringing sound in my ears. The smell of gunpowder filled the cabin. I almost drove the car off the road. It was a miracle we weren’t overturned on the side of the road. The thing lay slumped over the two of them. Rayna had gone back under cover and was trying to figure out how to get the thing off her.

“Can we pull over and get this thing out of here before it comes back?”

The smirk drew across my face. “Oh, I thought they don’t come back.”

“I would punch you if it wasn’t daylight.”

“You’re welcome to try.” I shoved the thing out the back. “I don’t think it’s coming back anytime soon. Most of its head is gone.”

“I don’t care. I want it out of here.”

The smirk drew a little wider on my face.

We drove the whole way back before I found a parking garage where I could destroy the thing to the point where it would not come back. The other two helped me siphon gas out of the truck and we set fire to the remains right there in the garage. Surprisingly, no one came and no one seemed to care. After the deed was done, nothing remained but ashes and bits of bone that Rayna crushed to dust under her boot. I drove us back to Rayna’s apartment, where I examined my companions.

Jeb had sustained minor burns. “Nothing I can’t handle,” he said. Rayna’s arms were a different story. It wasn’t as bad as I expected, but she had sustained second-degree burns, with ruptured blisters on her forearms and hands.

“We have to disinfect that,” I said. She objected, but I would hear nothing of it. It would be a lie if I said I did not get any satisfaction out of it. I ended up pouring a bottle of alcohol on her arms. She screamed in rage and took a swing at me that went wide. I wasn’t angry at her for wanting to hit me. After bandaging her arms, I dragged her upstairs and put her to bed. I took off her boots and left the room. I was fairly sure she wouldn’t be singing any praises to me right now. Jeb had taken himself to bed while I was upstairs, which left me with the mutilated couch to sleep. Call me paranoid, but that wasn’t going to happen. I wasn’t sleepy anyway, so I decided to read for now. At some point while I was sitting on the armchair with a book at my side, my good friend sleep came and took me.

“Wake up, councilman!” said Rayna as she kicked me in the shins with her boot.

“Do that one more time and you will lose that foot,” I said with no particular emotion. She backed off at once without even a witty comeback. There was a little bit of reserve about her that I had never seen before. Maybe she wouldn’t be as annoying today. Probably the wrong thing to say, but I wish she’d get sunburned every day.

Speaking of sunburn, her wounds had healed nicely. Her skin had regenerated without any scars. The only indication that she was ever burned was in the pinkish tone of her skin. Even that would soon fade.

We took our breakfast out on the counter. No one said anything. We definitely did not discuss what had happened earlier this morning. There was that sense of an elephant being in the room, only in this case it felt more like a mastodon.

I put my head down and sank into my thoughts when I was startled by a fist landing on the counter.

“Damn it!” said Jeb. “That’s just what I was talking about. I told you, Rayna. Don’t say I didn’t.”

“What are you talking about, Jeb?”

“Look at your arms! That’s what I’m talking about. Everyday we’re risking our lives, and for what, a few cows. A plot of wheat?”

“We’re protecting our food, Jeb. That’s all.”

“Yeah, but where’s the teamwork? I don’t see any of those stuffy Elders getting off their ass and doing some work. I damn sure don’t see any of them getting sunburns to save a few cows. Those idiots—no offense, Mordecai—”

“None taken, I assure you.”

“—Those idiots up there don’t give a damn about us. You know this, Rayna. You sat with them for a while, until you pissed them off.”

“I was just speaking my mind about the same things you’re saying.”

“That’s right. And where did that get us? They kicked your ass to the curb and now you’re out there fighting for your life. And what the hell is up with those zombies? Why do they keep getting back up?”

“I told you about them. I let you get all your jokes out of the way. For a while there, I started to believe you. Now they’re here, and we have to deal with them.”

“Yeah,
we
do. Not those damn talking heads up there. It’s us down here that have to deal with those things. Dan died so those humans can have their couple heads of cattle. Where’s his reward?”

I laid my head down and said no more.

“That’s right. None of you have anything to say. I’m getting out of here. Tell them I’m taking a day off, Mr. Councilman. Those guys can kiss my—”

“Jebediah!” Rayna yelled.

“What?”

“Don’t do anything stupid, okay?”

He made a saluting gesture with his hand and walked out the door.

“I should go talk to him,” said Rayna.

“You just did. Look at all the good it did,” I replied. “He needs time to cool off. He’ll come around.”

“Okay. Let me finish up here. I have to get ready for work.”

“I’ll join you,” I said.

“No, you can’t be doing this work. You’re a council member.”

“Says who? Did anybody actually make that rule?”

“Well, none of them ever do it.”

“That’s their choice. Besides, I can’t let you go out there alone, can I?”

“I can handle myself.”

“Sure you can.” I ran my hand over her pink arm. She recoiled and almost slapped me. “Come on, let’s go get geared up. Let Jeb have his night. He’ll be better tomorrow night.”

Jeb had the night off while we covered for him. It was actually an uneventful shift. There were no cattle deaths or incursions. Neither of us sighted a single zombie throughout the patrol zone. All the way until dawn, I was expecting a surprise attack or signs that one of them had broken through the fence. I was pleased that my expectations were not met.

Rayna had said nothing else about staying with her. I supposed she had made peace with it. In fact, she seemed quite disposed to let me stay another day. I would have stayed, in fact, if something had not happened to derail things.

Lucretius was at the door waiting. He pulled his pocket watch out and checked it. I’m not sure how long he had been waiting, but he seemed to think it was too long. He pulled up his cane and aimed it at me.

“You. I need to speak with you privately,” he said.

“I’ll see you later,” I told Rayna before going.

“Mordecai,” she said, tugging at my sleeve. “Thank you.”

I gave her a nod and went to speak with my fellow council member. His face was contorted like he had something disagreeable in his mouth he wished to spit out.

“Just what exactly are you doing?” he asked me.

“I am speaking to you,” I replied with all sincerity. For once, there was no sarcasm in my lips. He did not see it that way.

“You know what I mean,” he snarled. “Going about on patrols, almost getting yourself killed, and for what? To protect a couple of peons?”

“They’re good people,” I argued.

“They’re the
foot soldiers
. It’s their job to go out there and protect the realm, and it’s ours to tell them what’s good for them.”

“I’d like to believe you.”

“Mordecai, I know the times that brought you about. It was a simpler time, more structured. Those of us who were smart enough rose to the top. All the others stayed at the bottom, where they were happiest. It’s the order of things.”

“Well, since you put it that way.”

“Now, I don’t want to hear any nonsense about you going about on patrols. Our lives are far too valuable to throw them at the front lines. Let the others do that. We have a meeting tonight. I expect to see you there.”

“I’ll be there,” I said, with a bad taste in my mouth.

“Good.” He handed me a set of keys. “These are the keys to your apartment. It’s only a few doors away from here.”

“No mansion for me?”

He chuckled. “Unfortunately, those are reserved for the highest members. There are not too many of those available.”

“I see. Well, a place to sleep is a place to sleep, whether it’s a crypt or a mansion.”

“That’s the spirit!” He patted me in the back. “Now, I must go. The sun will be upon us soon. I will see you tonight?”

“Of course. Sleep well.”

“I always do.”

The Return of Politics

Lying on a bed I could call my own, I should have felt happy. Call me crazy, but I missed the couch. Yes, the same one with the axe mark right through the middle of it. I wondered when she was going to replace it, or if she meant to leave it there as a reminder.
Don’t let pompous nancy-boys crash at your place,
I imagined it would be. It doesn’t matter. I had not had three days as a council member and already I was sick of it. That was awfully early for someone that had nothing but time to sit in meetings. At least a human could take comfort in knowing that there was a light at the end of the tunnel, that their frangible bodies would one day cease to exist.

Okay, enough of that. If I keep ruminating on this, I will certainly drive myself insane. It’s not like I don’t have enough on my plate to add lunacy to it. The best choice—the only choice—is to go to the meeting. I could always walk away, leave this place forever, but where did it take me last time? It took me here, to a handful of stuffy gasbags who deigned to recognize me as one of their own. Do I really come off as that buttoned-down and insipid? If I ask Rayna or any of her companions, the answer would be yes. She’d probably call me a lily-livered mama’s boy, or whatever insult she happened to dig out of her seemingly infinite database of back-country wit.

A driver came and got me at 8 o’clock sharp. There was no need to knock me out this time. I was quite grateful for that. He took me to the old Anathorn Mansion, as I had come to know it. The butler ushered me through the door and directed me to the dining hall, where some of the council members were seated and waiting. The rest of the members showed and there was still no sign of Lucretius. Marie-Evangeline, the second most senior member, wondered if they should start the meeting without him. Fortunato, on the other hand, wondered if they could just adjourn for the night. This reminded me of the hopeless Parliament and Congress meetings. Someone was actually sadistic enough to film this tedious process all day. I imagined it was something to be shown to war prisoners for conditioning. These are the days when watching paint dry would feel like watching a thriller.

“Meeting is now convened,” said Lucretius as he rushed through the door. I imagined he had just left from an audience with Her Majesty, Queen of the Underworld and wondered what secrets he would bring us from the deep.

“I’m sure some of you are wondering about the incursion that took place yesterday. It’s been handled. I sent a crew out there to seek out and exterminate the interlopers.”

“What about the reports of mangled cattle?” asked Gustaf.

“That has been handled as well. The situation is under control.”

“There’s also reports that these undead zombies rise even after being killed. Is that true?” asked Marie-Evangeline.

“That’s absolutely false. Whoever is fabricating these lies will have to answer to me.”

“Are these things not responsible for the death of Daniel, one of the perimeter watchers?” she continued.

“Dan’s death was most unfortunate, and I think I speak for all of us when I say he will be missed, but these things happen and all we can do is keep moving.”

The posturing continued for a while, a good deal longer than I would have liked. There was one thing I could admire about these Elders, and it was their high tolerance to this tripe. I couldn’t imagine myself sitting here decade after decade taking stabs at the same people over and over. I would be liable to bring a sword someday and take things to a more literal level.

We convened, said our insincere goodbyes and parted ways. I was in a rush to leave, but Lucretius stopped me.

“Mordecai, where are you off to so soon?”

“Wherever everyone else has gone, I suppose.”

“You can’t go anywhere yet. The Queen has requested your presence. She is not one to be kept waiting.”

“All right, then. Lead the way.”

Sedition

We went through the same entrance and spiral staircase, but the Queen was not sitting at her throne.