Délon City: Book Two of the Oz Chronicles (3 page)

“Why...” I stopped myself. I was about to ask a question I didn’t want to know the answer to, but Roy read my mind.

“You’re wondering why I don’t do it myself. Why I don’t just grab you the way I was grabbed in the Georgia Dome and dig my mandibles through your skull and into your brain? Suck out your weak and feeble human essence and replace it with the glorious Délon essence?”

“Well,” I said. “I wouldn’t have put it that way, but, yeah.”

He laughed the same laugh I had heard on the banks of Alltoona Lake. It wasn’t just him. It was a demented chorus of laughter. Every Délon on the planet was laughing through him. “A king with a sense of humor. It is just what we need.” He stood and moved around the desk. “We discovered that sort of transformation is successful only during battle. We’ve tried it on various humans since the end of the war, but they either died or became halfers.”

“Halfers? Like Coach Denton?”

He nodded. “Foul, disgusting creatures really. They’re not to be trusted by either Délon or human.”

The Délon version of Devlin entered the room carrying my backpack and the brown paper bag full of maggots. “Here are his things, General.” He smiled and held up the paper bag. “Seven perfectly good screamers going to waste.” He looked at me. “Do you mind?”

I shrugged my shoulders. “Be my guest.”

Devlin reached in the bag and pulled out one of the white wriggling worms. His mandibles shot out from his mouth and snatched the maggot from his hand. The slimy little worm screamed as the mandibles retracted inside Devlin’s mouth. He swallowed and sighed in pure joy. “The screaming’s the best part.”

I cringed.

Devlin shook his head. “I don’t get humans. You don’t know what’s good.”

Without thinking, I snickered.

“What?” Devlin was visibly upset at my unintentional laughter.

“If I remember correctly, you were human yourself not too long ago.”

This set Devlin off. He charged me and grabbed me by the throat. He definitely wasn’t the same Devlin I had known, the chubby little middle-schooler who spent most of his time and energy looking for his next chocolate bar. That Devlin was soft and almost lovable. This Devlin was brutal and reeked of evil. “I was never human,” he growled.

General Roy stood. The spider legs on his head flared for the first time. He let out a sustained. Devlin released me and backed away. I tried to massage the pain out of my throat.

“Forgive me, General,” Devlin said as if he were pleading for his life.

“You dare lay your hands on our king!” General Roy approached his frightened soldier with murderous intent.

“Wait,” I said through bruised vocal cords.

General Roy backhanded Devlin sending him crashing into the filing cabinets.

“Stop!” I yelled.

General Roy turned to me. “Such insolence is only punishable by death.”

“But it’s Devlin.” I looked at the now kneeling purple beast with spider legs floundering on his head and though I didn’t see one shred of Devlin in him, he was still Devlin, and I couldn’t let General Roy kill him.

“You are... too human to understand.” General Roy pulled a twig from the pouch he wore on his belt. The twig sprouted long willowy legs and screeched. Upon closer review it was a praying mantis of some kind. It was a foot long and anxious to get at Devlin.

“But I am your king, and I say he deserves mercy.”

General Roy turned to me with a baffled expression. “Mercy?”

The concept was foreign to him. “I am ordering you not to kill him.”

General Roy smiled. “A human cannot order a Délon to do anything.”

“But I am your king. You said it yourself.”

“You are once you are a Délon. For now, you are merely a human who is to be our king.”

The praying mantis reached for Devlin, and Devlin cowered. The stick bug struggled violently to release itself from General Roy’s grip.

“If I am merely human, then Devlin was not insolent for what he did.”

This caused the general to pause. I could see the gears turning in his grotesque head. It was a logical argument that he could not get around. He looked at Devlin and then back at me. There was a bloodlust boiling inside him that he was fighting to control. He raised the hand that grasped the praying mantis and with a quick, forceful squeeze broke the insect in half. Breathing deeply, trying to calm himself, he stepped away from Devlin.

Devlin stood with his head down. He was in shock. He had escaped death when he fully expected to die.

General Roy was shaking. “This is mercy?”

I nodded.

“I don’t like it.” He spun toward Devlin. “Bring me a human.”

“Yes, General,” Devlin said as he bowed. He looked at me before he stepped out of the room. He clearly didn’t know what to make of what just happened. I couldn’t tell if he was grateful or angry.

“Why do you want a human?” I asked.

“This mercy has left a bad taste in my mouth. I must... exorcise it.”

“What are you going to do?” I was panicked. Had I just spared the life of a Délon at the expense of a human?

“What I was created to do?” He scanned me from head to toe. “You are weak.”

“Listen to me, you don’t have to do this. The drawing. Remember the drawing? The one Hollis talked about?”

He ignored my question. “I thought you’d be stronger, but you advocate this mercy. It is for the weak.” He was sounding more and more disappointed with each word.

I tried to reason with him, although clearly it was hopeless. “Hollis talked about Hyper Mental Imaging. HMI, remember? In the Georgia Dome... He said the Délons were the creation of a boy, a boy with Down syndrome who could image his visualizations onto the real world...”

“Our Storyteller, our prisoner, thanks to you.”

“Thanks to me?” In an instant it was all too clear to me. Before, the Takers held the Délons’ Storyteller. Because of that, the Délons were subservient to the Takers. When I killed the Taker Queen, the Délons took charge of their own Storyteller. They controlled their creator. They ruled the world because of me. I had done it again. The Takers existed because of the way I treated Stevie Dayton, and now the Délons were infesting the planet because I killed the Taker Queen.

Devlin burst through the door dragging a husky, curly-haired seventh grade boy behind him. It was Gordy Flynn. My best friend in the whole world... well, the world where Takers and Délons were nothing more than demented figments of the imagination. “Got one, boss,” Devlin said grinning as he tossed Gordy toward the back wall.

“Good.” General Roy reached out and gently took my face in his ice-cold hand. “We must rid you of this mercy. This one is yours.”

I pulled away. “Mine?”

“Don’t worry about me,” he laughed. “I have my own.” He pointed out the window. “You remember my... what was that word again... sister, is it?”

I turned to see another Délon standing in the school courtyard. This one had a slightly feminine air about it. It was Reya, Roy’s twin sister.

“And her friend,” General Roy continued.

Stepping out from behind Reya was Lou, her hands and legs in shackles, every bit as pretty and human as I had last seen her.

“Lou,” I whispered.

“Yes,” General Roy said. “Lou is mine.” He motioned to Gordy crawling on the floor, backing into the corner of the room. “This one is yours.”

“Oz,” Gordy pleaded. “Help me, man.”

Devlin began to cackle. “Oh, beautiful. We got us a beggar. I love it when they beg.”

“What do you expect me to do?” I asked.

“Kill him,” General Roy said flatly. He motioned to Reya to join us. She grabbed the chain of Lou’s shackles and yanked her toward the front door.

“I’m not going to kill him,” I said.

General Roy studied me. “Then you will kill the girl, and I will kill him.” He stepped over to Gordy and picked him up by his curly locks.

“Nobody is killing anybody,” I said. My voice cracked from trying to pass through my dry throat.

“You’ve killed before,” General Roy said gripping Gordy’s hair. He searched his pouch with his free hand and then groaned. “Devlin, your skinner.” Devlin reached in his own pouch, pulled out a praying mantis and handed it to General Roy.

“I killed Takers. That’s different.”

I watched in horror as the new praying mantis stretched out its legs. Its head was flat like a razor blade and two eyes dangled on the end of fiber thin appendages.

General Roy held it up. “You’ve never seen a skinner work before, have you?”

I said nothing.

“It’s a marvel really. It knows how to do two things, hate and skin its victims alive. Its favorite thing to hate is... care to guess?”

I gulped and tried not to look horrified for Gordy’s sake. “Humans?”

“Bingo,” General Roy said sounding pleased and excited. “Although, to be honest, they don’t really care for Délons that much either. It’s just that we introduced them to their favorite thing to skin. Another guess?”

I slowly shook my head.

“Humans again.” He forcefully tilted Gordy’s head back. The general methodically moved the stick bug closer to Gordy’s ear. The closer he got the more excited the skinner became. It thrashed about violently, and I could see that its razor-blade-shaped head consisted of two thin layers that rapidly moved back and forth like a pair of electric shears. The general and Devlin laughed. “It prefers human skin. There’s no accounting for taste, I guess. One skinner can devour a full-grown man’s skin in three hours.” He sized Gordy up. “I’m guessing curly here will take less than an hour.”

“You can’t do this,” I said panicked.

“Wait, you haven’t heard the best part.” General Roy said still grinning that horrible Délon grin. “They keep their victims alive through their entire meal. After they’ve consumed that last morsel of human flesh... when the skinner is fat and bloated with human skin, it injects its victim with an egg sack, and within minutes the skinner larva eats the poor skinless human from the inside until there’s nothing but bone. This process takes a little longer... two days maybe, and the vital organs are left in tact until the very end so the victim remains aware for as long as possible that he is being eaten alive.”

“Stop,” I yelled. Gordy had pissed in his pants. He was a sobbing mess. Before the Takers had come and changed my entire perception of life, Gordy was the tough one in our group. He was the leader of our little gang of four. I was his second. I couldn’t blame him for his present state, but still part of me hated him for not shaking loose from General Roy’s grip and socking the ugly creep in the mouth. That’s what leaders do after all.

“Orders again, Oz?” General Roy said. “Have you already forgotten, humans cannot give Délons orders...”

“Can it, you ugly purple pile of puss!” I meant to say that in my head, but somehow it escaped my lips. Something told me saying “I’m sorry” wasn’t going to get me out of trouble. My only choice was to continue with the tough guy act and hopefully buy some time until... I didn’t know what I was buying time for exactly, but I was hoping it would come to me.

Fortunately or unfortunately, it worked. General Roy released Gordy and approached me with the skinner in his hand. “What did you say?” He was beyond angry. The spider legs dancing on his head told me he was quickly losing control.

“I said ‘can it.’” It took every bit of my being to sound selfassured and in charge. “Stop it. Put a cork in it. Shut up. I don’t want to hear any more.”

General Roy grabbed me by my shirt collar and jerked me towards him until we touched chest to chest and his dead eyes were staring down at me. I could hear the scissors-like jaws of the skinner moving back and forth in his other hand. “You are testing my patience.”

“And you’re testing mine.” I said it, but I was quickly losing my ability to sound like I meant it.

General Roy sniffed the air. “I smell fear.”

“Trust me,” I said. “You don’t smell that great either.”

His eyes narrowed. “But I smell anger, too. Maybe you aren’t so weak.”

The door opened and Reya stepped inside dragging Lou behind her. “I’m tired of dragging this one around,” Reya said. “She is skinner food, and not worthy of my time.”

“Oz,” Lou said.

At the sound of her voice, I suddenly found the hope I was looking for. Her expression was noble and defiant. Her will was not broken. If anything, it was stronger.

General Roy sensed a change in my manner. He pulled me even closer. His spider leg appendages danced across my head and face. “This one gives you strength.” A chill ran up my spine as the tiny hairs of his spider legs moved across my skin. “Why?”

I didn’t answer. Not out of defiance, but out of ignorance. Nothing else mattered now that Lou was in the room. I didn’t know why. I just knew I would do anything to keep her safe.

“She might be useful.” The general released me. “But this one is useless.” He motioned to Gordy, and then held out the skinner. “Kill him.”

I swallowed hard and surveyed the room. The skinner’s jaws were moving faster now. It sensed it was about to eat.

“The skinner feeds on the fearful and obeys the fearless,” General Roy said. “Which are you?”

There was only one thing to do. I took a deep breath and let it out. Before one more shred of doubt entered my mind, I took the skinner from the general and held it at arm’s length. It squirmed and hissed and turned its eyes toward me. I told myself to be fearless, to control the flesh-eating bug as it contemplated whether I was food or master. I told myself this, but I had no idea if it would work. Much to my surprise and joy, the skinner’s eyes turned back toward Gordy. I sighed in relief, and then felt a wave of confusion as I realized that I was happy the bug wanted to eat my best friend instead of me. I still needed to find a way out of killing Gordy.

“C’mon, Oz,” Gordy said. “It’s me, man, Gordy.”

I stepped toward him. My brain cramped from racing so fast. I needed a plan, and I needed it fast. Another step. There was no way I could kill Gordy, but I knew if I didn’t, General Roy would use Lou as leverage. I couldn’t let anything happen to her. The skinner lashed out and almost leapt from my grip. Another step. General Roy watched me with anticipation. He was hungry to watch Gordy die, to watch anyone die. He was almost drooling. Lou shook her head. Her eyes begged me not to do it. Reya cackled and Devlin was jittery with joy. The room felt as if it was about to implode from the tension.