Authors: Craig Saunders
'You
were correct, Mr. Boyle. This is quite remarkable.'
A
researcher made notes and observations on a PDA. She looked up as O'Dell and
Boyle entered.
'Out,'
said O'Dell. She didn't argue.
'Go
ahead, Boyle. We all deserve a day in the sun.'
'It's
not just animation, Sir. It's
regeneration
.'
O'Dell
peered through the thick glass at the woman.
'How
interesting. Does she feel any pain?'
'Oh
yes,' said Boyle. 'She's heavily sedated now. She becomes agitated, and the
constant pain medication makes her...grouchy.'
'Dangerous?'
Boyle
shrugged, noncommittal. 'Very marginal, Sir...with the right tools. Give her a
gun and she'd probably pose some kind of threat. As she is? A kid could fight
her off.'
'Contagious?
Infectious?'
'Well...no.
Even when she came in, she tested negative for exposure. She must have
assimilated the compound at a remarkable rate. Perhaps on some cellular level
she was always a fast healer, or...honestly, Sir. We haven't got a clue as to
the how or why. We're still taking samples. Blood and tissue every day, but
she's showing no signs of degradation. She's healing at a faster rate that you
or I could, and that was when she was dead.'
'Boyle?
Was
dead?'
Boyle
couldn't contain himself any longer. He laughed, now, grinning like a lunatic,
like a comedian who'd hit a punch line with God-like timing.
'Field
footage puts the longest reanimation at three minutes and eleven seconds. But
she was never like those cases. She arrived with a bullet to the head, no
cognition, effectively blind and deaf. No sign of cardiac activity. But after
three days, she wanted to eat.'
'What?'
'Yes,
Sir. She was hungry. At first, we thought it no more than some idiot, base
impulse. Chewing motions. Bringing her hand to her mouth. Almost like
rudimentary sign language. Like an ape.'
'So
you fed her?'
Boyle
nodded. 'A living human needs fuel to replace lost cells, repair damage...something
similar seems to be happening with her. We know she digests the food because
she defecates. But that's not the limit - lung function, brain function, a
gradual return of her dexterity. A heart beat.'
'Excuse
me?'
'Yes,
Sir.'
'Well,
Mr. Boyle, you were true to your word. You really are full of surprise.'
O'Dell
pointed to Mrs. Farnham. 'I think I would like to meet our guest,' said O'Dell.
'Open the door.'
*
Boyle's
excitement felt like a tingle on O'Dell's skin and it was a distraction he
didn't need. He closed the door behind him so he and Eleanor Farnham could be
alone.
She
was clean, but that was the best that could be said of her appearance. As a
woman, a human, she was repulsive to the eye. The flesh around the exit wound
was shaven and the flesh angry and her brain, exposed, pallid and damp. One eye
was white, probably dead and useless, but her other eye roved wildly. He imagined
anything that she did see would only translate to her mind as a confused ramble
of pictures. The ragged stumps where two fingers had been amputated were open
wounds, but neither injury bleeding or scabbed.
Samples
of skin, muscle, brain had been excised.
Dead
people don't breath, but he could clearly hear the soft whistle of air as she
inhaled and exhaled.
'Wannwn...fashe...fush...'
O'Dell
took a step away from the woman, confused, rather than afraid. He was
unaccustomed to either feeling.
'She
talks
? '
'Same
thing so far,' said Boyle from the adjacent observation room. His voice sounded
sharper than usual through the tiny speakers set high within the walls. 'But
she only speaks to male attendants, Sir. We think she's asking if we want to
fuck.'
O'Dell
nodded, to show he understood.
But
it was Eleanor that held his interest.
Eleanor?
Is anything going on in there, Mrs. Farnham? Eleanor? Would you like to
talk? A cup of tea, perhaps?
Nothing.
Eleanor.
Poke your eye out. GOUGE it out. Go on.
There
were very few people able to say no to the man with fire in his eyes, when that
fire rose. But from Eleanor Farnham there was nothing at all.
Like
O'Dell himself, her mind was just dead space.
He
stared into the woman's crazily roving eye for a moment longer, then nodded to
Boyle once more.
'I've
seen enough,' he said. 'Boyle, open the door.'
O'Dell
stepped outside and headed away from the cell, his phone already out and ready
in his hand. Right then, neither hand shook and his eyes were bright with
purpose.
*
The
only man in the world above O'Dell answered at the first ring.
'O'Dell.
I assume you have something useful to say?'
'Yes.
We have a breakthrough. A single case only, Sir. But we have a test subject
exhibiting remarkable regenerative capabilities.'
'Mr.
O'Dell?'
'Sir?'
'How
does the expression go? I don't give a monkeys? Or is a rat's arse?'
'But,
Sir...'
'O'Dell.
It's time. Are you ready? Because I need you on form, not fucking around with
side projects. Miracles are not our business, are they?'
'No.
No, Sir.'
'Good.
Let's leave that shit to the Catholics. They'll be happy as pigs in shit soon
enough. Now, I repeat...are we ready?'
O'Dell
thought about the woman. He thought, too, about the boy he had freed for reasons
he knew he'd probably never recall.
But
if the boy was alive...together, he and his mother might hold the key to
something that might even pale his interest in fire. Some new genetic...
miracle.
'Sir...I
have interesting parties in the field.'
'Interested?'
'Interesting.'
'Are
they important?'
Kurt
considered the question. The boy might be dead. Probably was.
'Possibly.
Short term.'
There
was no sense in lying. The boss didn't want the boy, or his mother. It wasn't
like he didn't know most of what O'Dell reported far in advance.
The
boy, though. That niggled at O'Dell.
Why
in the hell did I let him go?
O'Dell could not answer that question
'Long
term is the only thing that matters. Hear me?'
'I
do.'
The
man on the other end of the phone hung up. O'Dell made a second call to a man
with a very dangerous finger.
'Go
ahead,' he said. 'All clear.'
'Code?'
replied the man.
O'Dell
gave it to him, relayed from memory. That, at least, he could remember.
But so
much else pushed aside, too,
he thought. That made him angry, as it
sometimes did.
'Understood,
Sir. Awaiting verification.' A pause, while the man checked counter codes and
fail safes on a simple screen before him. 'Verification received.'
Some
people needed a push. Some just like to watch things burn.
Like
O'Dell.
His
eyes brightened and his vision darkened.
Fire in London, Paris, Berlin, St.
Petersburg.
That's how it would start.
'Sir?'
'Execute,'
said O'Dell.
'Understood.
Scheduled 0800.'
'Good
day,' said O'Dell.
*
VIII.
Charnel
Francis
woke to terrible pain. Pain like dying, surely. Agony crashed in waves along
the torn flesh of her back from being dragged across a rough (
road? I was in
a car?
). Her feet burned inside the bones. She wasn't bound, but her back rested
against a wooden post and for some reason she couldn't move.
I
was driving. There was a passenger.
She
closed her eyes, one of which was swollen perhaps as far as her cheek. She
tried to remember how she'd been hurt so badly (
why am I not in a hospital?
).
The pain pushed back, though. Thought was difficult when the pain ebbed,
impossible when it crashed back again. She ducked her head and puked on her own
clothes, with no bucket and movement denied her, it was the only place for it
to go.
I
can see, though. Barely.
But
better than blind.
Night
time, she figured. She wasn't inside, like in a house.
I'm
not in hospital because of the quarantine...there are no ambulances. I'm still
inside...
Edgar,
she remembered. She'd come to get the man named Edgar.
She
couldn't see him, but she couldn't see much of anything. Wherever she was, it
was night and doors were closed. But not a house. The feel of the air was
different, the way the quiet felt...like it was larger. And something else,
too...a deep stink. Animal smells.
A
barn.
The
animals were all gone, but their smell lingered, in the hay.
If
Edgar (
older man
, she remembered, her mind rousing despite the pain) had
been in the car, then maybe he'd died. She couldn't hear anyone else, there in the
dark. Just herself, for a moment, her breath and the slight rustle of her
clothes.
The
pain was constant, made worse, she thought, because she couldn't see it. Now,
though, her eyes adjusted to the dark. She saw, and found seeing was worse.
My
feet...oh. My God.
The
barn floor was wood, not dirt, and someone (
kssh...ksash...
she
remembered it all now and wished she didn't know anything at all) had driven
thick nails through her feet and pinned her to the boards. The sight of it,
disgust at such a thing and fear, too...all those things snapped at her. Panic
rose. She could only think of dying and nothing else. She shook, cried, ground
her teeth against the pain.
Finally,
she stilled. Fatigue dragged at her. Maybe blood loss, too. But it was fear that
sapped her strength and it was pain that took her will. She might have slipped
into sleep, or unconsciousness, one more if not for a groan somewhere in the
dark.
The
sudden sound pulled her attention from her feet. Wide-eyed in the dark, she
flicked her eyes. It wasn't the '
kssh, ksash',
man. Edgar was in the
barn with her. He hung upside down, his feet tied in thick rope. A hook had
been pushed through the tear in his shoulder and someone had hung a sack of
something heavy on the other end of the hook.
Like
butchery,
she thought. Edgar, being bled.
Kssh
ksash. His teeth were sharp.
Edgar
was going to die.
But
even through her fear and pain, that cold part of Francis' mind still worked
for her. It
calculated
. She was a woman who had ice inside her. She'd
shot and killed a policeman named Ben, hadn't she?
If
I hear kssh ksash from the man with no lips
I'll scream 'til I burst.
But
that was her panic talking.
The
cold mind that made Francis want to live, no matter the cost, looked back to
Edgar. The hook hadn't torn free because it was caught on his collarbone. It'd
take more than a sack of potatoes to tear through bone.
Dead
men don't bleed, do they?
Maybe
a trickle
, she thought. Like a draining cow or a pig - hung to get the
blood out so you could eat it.
Eat
it. Kssh...
'Fuck
you,' she said.
The
man with no lips had long white teeth. Blood had stained his teeth. Suddenly,
she understood what happened to Kssh Ksash man's lips. He cut them free with a
shard of glass or mirror, placing the wet flesh into his mouth and chewed.
She
didn't doubt it was true. She didn't have to be George to understand that.
Edgar
grunted.
'Edgar,'
she whispered. She strained, eyes closed, listening for footsteps or (
kssh...kassh...
eat your facshe
). Nothing. Yet.
Francis
jammed her teeth together so she couldn't scream and stood.
The
bones in her feet grated against the nails.
Edgar's
eyes rolled toward her, fluttered and then drifted shut again. And in the
distance, outside the barn, she heard a door slam.
'Jesus...no...'
She
let herself scream, then - let her fear and pain strengthen her. Never give
in...
never
. She wanted to live. She always did.
With
all the strength she had left, Francis she tore her right foot free, the head
of the heavy nail surely breaking bone, or severing some tendons. She fell and
didn't need to worry about the nail in her other foot. Her weight freed her. Spots
drifted around, bright stars like fireflies in the distance, dancing in evening-light,
and pain stole her breath.
But
none of that change the slap, slap of heavy boots on summer dry dirt, or the
obscene sound of the Kssh Ksash Man chattering to himself in low, happy tones.
Slap.
Slap.
'Ksnnng.
Shnnn. Ksash...kash. Kash ksash...'
Edgar
grunted, like he, too, registered death's approach. Francis dragged herself to
him.
Got
to stand
, she thought, but even fear of death wouldn't give her the courage
to use her ruined feet. She couldn't do it.
I
can.
If
I can make it this far, I can take some pain. If I have to - to live.
I
have to save us because no one else can.
She
tried. She really tried. Agony floored her again.
A
metallic sound, then - as though the man were taking a lock from a hasp.
Something else, too - quiet metal thunder. Metal sheets in high wind, like the
sidings on a warehouse might make.
The
door slid away on runners in the dirt.
'Kss?
Mm-nn?'
His
face was in shadow from light behind him - a house, fifty yards distant.
Backlit,
Francis could tell what he held in his hand. A two-man saw, like lumberjacks
used.
Probably
uses it to quarter his meat,
she thought, horrified and scared at once.
It
quivered.
The
thunder.
She
had nothing to fight with. No strength. No courage.
The
hook in Edgar's shoulder
.
A
desperate last chance.
'Shkksh...shaash...krrssh.'
Insane noises
from a lunatic mouth. Closer, now, his teeth looked like pottery shards,
ceramic and sharp.
Francis
grabbed Edgar's hand. She felt his good shoulder give as she pulled herself
higher, onto her knees.
A
dislocated shoulder's better than dead, right?
She
yanked the sack free of the lower end of the hook.
But
while the man was insane, he was still quick. He swung the saw like a sword and
the long metal teeth sank into Francis' back. Searing pain buckled her entire
body, she convulsed, spittle flying and puke rising, but the hook came free.
Edgar's
flesh hung from the steel.
She
impaled Kssh Ksash foot against the floorboard, just as he'd done to her.
'Shaaa?'
With
both hands this time, adrenaline and joy pushing the pain back, she swung the
sharp curve up between his legs, and as he doubled she hit him a third time in
the back of the neck. The mad man and Francis both lay in the dirt and straw,
panting.
The
man died. Francis didn't.
*
Later,
early light roused Francis, and a dog's high bark somewhere nearby.
She
wondered if Edgar had died during the night. She wondered if maybe she had, too.
Nope
.
Dead chicks
don't bleed.
Francis
reached out and poked Edgar's dislocated shoulder. He grunted and growled,
unable to bring himself back from whatever nightmare he'd retreated to. She'd
have to do it. Edgar's blood, the dead man's blood, her own - all splashed
out on the dry boards. What little she had in her stomach came out. It
splattered her hands and hair and she didn't care.
I'm
alive. Edgar's alive. He's not.
The
heavy saw was there, too. Whatever the man had severed in her back made her
right hand tingly and numb, but she thought she could still manage to heft the
saw and cut through the rope from which Edgar hung. But she couldn't
get
to
the rope. Even the lowest point was around four feet too high for her to reach,
because she could only kneel. Mangled and messy, her boots were the only thing
holding her feet together.
She
hurt, but it was total pain, and so complete she felt suffused with it. A
sensory deprivation experience, but one that left agony rather than
free-floating thoughts and meditations.
And
pain like that was a goad to Francis, because as long as she hurt she couldn't
be dead. While she bled, her heart still beat.
She
clenched the saw in her fist and put her right foot down. One hand on the
floor, the other bunched around Edgar's collar, she dragged herself up.
She
shook. She wavered.
But
the saw, angled upward, now reached the rope.
The
teeth were brilliant peaks along the blade. Two long cuts was all it took.
Edgar fell and hit the filthy, bloody floor head first. Even that didn't rouse
him.
'Fucked
if I'm carrying you out of here,' she told him, still breathless from fighting
against the pain. 'Fucked if I am.'
She
stuck a finger in the hole in his shoulder. That did the trick.
Edgar
screamed and stared at her, his eyes huge and confused.
The
Kssh-ksash
man's van was right there, just outside the barn. At this
point she'd be a bitch if she had to. She really wanted to get the hell out of
the nuthouse.
'Stop
being such a pussy, Edgar. I've got two broken feet and that lunatic ran a saw
over my back. Your feet work. My arms work.
Get the fuck up
! We're getting
out of here. I nearly died, saving your skin.
Get. Me. Up!
'
The
effort hurt, but it was rain in the ocean.
It
hurt to see a man cry in pain, but she understood. Pain was...painful.
'Let's
go,' he said. He was pale but for spots of blood across his face. Seeing the
old man like that dragged back an uncomfortable memory of another man, Ben
North.
It
was unwelcome. When she took Edgar's belt buckle and took some weight on her
feet, she cried just as he had.
'Can
you walk
at all
?' he asked. Everything about him was weak.
But
she needed him, if only to get the hell away.
That
again, Francis? How deep does being a heartless bitch go?
'What...fifty,
sixty yards?' she said, trying to make her voice light enough to carry them to
the van, at least. 'Pfft. I can make it.
We
can...right? Team GB, Edgar.'