Norman paused.
“But that’s not all. Apparently we’ve had another breakthrough, one that may be the turning point in all of this.”
“What is that?”
“Heaven,” Norman said, and when he saw Conrad’s reaction he smiled and nodded slowly. “That’s right. We think we are very close now to finding its location.”
“How close?”
“They should know soon. That’s all I’ve been told. Just soon.”
Conrad sat there silent. He wasn’t sure what to say. His mind was a blur. The Government that financed and maintained the Living Intelligence facilities was the same Government that was now arresting and instantly expiring anyone with any ties to the living. Not only that, Heaven was now even closer than ever, and many believed that if and when Heaven was found and all the zombies inside it were destroyed, then the ongoing threat of the living would come to an end.
“So,” Norman said, trying once more at a genuine smile, “how much do you need?”
“What?”
“That’s why you’re here, isn’t it? You need money to help protect Kyle.”
Conrad only stared at him. After a moment he opened his mouth, started to speak, but Norman held up a hand.
“It’s okay, really. I figured you’d eventually come to me, and to be honest, I was hoping you would. I’m worried about Kyle just as much as you are. When my own son was animated, I was worried what would happen when he became ten. So that’s why I told Albert about your situation. I figured you wouldn’t mention it on your own. And now I’m guessing he’s told you about the special detail, and you’ve accepted, even though you can’t afford it.”
“Sir, I don’t want you to think—”
“I’m not thinking anything, Conrad. In a way you have always been like a son to me, which makes Kyle like a grandson, and I have no problem giving you the money.”
“But I don’t want you to give it to me, sir. Just a loan. I will pay you back.”
“Who are you kidding?” Norman produced a sad smile. “How much longer do you think I have in this world? Another year, two maybe, and then that’s it. I’ll be expired just like Beth. So I have nothing else to spend my savings on. So please. Let me help you. Let me help you protect your son.”
Philip was waiting
for him outside. For some reason Conrad should have guessed it, or sensed it, but he was still too taken aback by Norman’s offer. Had he known the captain was going to actually
give
him the money he needed, he probably wouldn’t have come here in the first place. He had never asked anything of Norman, and even now he felt there was something wrong about it, but it was clear the captain was determined and wasn’t going to take no for an answer. With the money he had to give it would be almost enough to pay all the costs, which meant Conrad would have to fork over only a little.
A weight had been lifted. He was thinking about his good fortune as he hurried back through the building, doing just as he had done his last day at the old headquarters, trying his best to avoid the Hunters even though many of them now probably didn’t even know who he was … though he guessed that wasn’t quite true, because Philip was still here, as well as Michael and Kevin, and they all would have happily let the new officers know just what kind of Hunter the son of the renowned Henry had been.
But he wasn’t worried about that, or even thinking about it. He was thinking about how he could tell Denise the good news, how for the time being all their problems were solved. And as he stepped outside there was Philip, standing almost right in front of the door, just a few feet away so that when Conrad walked out he had no choice but to stop or run right into the First Lieutenant.
Just as Michael and the two rookies had been smoking when Conrad first came here, so was Philip. He was almost halfway done with his cigarette when he turned slowly to regard Conrad with his deep black eyes.
“Well hello there, Conrad. When Michael called to say you had stopped by, I had to rush right over here to make sure I saw you myself. You didn’t make it to the memorial service.”
There had been a well-publicized memorial service for the Hunters lost in the explosion. The Government had used it as an effective tool to inform its viewers that it was going to be coming down even harder on living extremists.
“I was working,” Conrad said.
“Oh, that’s right.” Philip took a deep, long drag of his cigarette. “Your new job. Yes, I’ve been wondering about that. What exactly is it you’re doing again?”
A commuter bus passed them on the street. On its side was an advertisement for the latest dead-action Henry the Hunter movie. Philip’s glare left Conrad for a moment to track it, and when it returned it appeared even angrier.
“Did you see those people on the bus? They didn’t even glance our way. To them, we’re just like everyone else. Well, maybe you are now, you still haven’t told me about your new job. But me—I’m a Hunter. I protect their humanity. And they don’t even know to acknowledge that.”
“The Hunter Code says—”
“Fuck the Hunter Code. That was always your problem, Conrad, you were always following the Hunter Code. But guess what. Things actually can get done without it. You were there last week. You saw how I handled Moss. We got all the contact information for those pro-zombie fuckers we could, and none of that would have been possible had we followed the Code.”
Conrad pictured those floating dust motes as they danced and danced while Kent Moss screamed and screamed.
“The world just doesn’t give a shit about what we do,” Philip said. He finished his cigarette, flicked it out at the passing cars. “This ‘new headquarters’ they put us in? It’s a fucking joke. Do you know where we should be?”
Philip pointed a decayed finger straight out into the air. At first Conrad wasn’t sure what he meant, where he was pointing—all that was out there were buildings—but then his gaze focused on the tallest building, that black monolith that outshined all the rest of the skyscrapers in Olympus.
“That should be our headquarters, the fucking Herculean Building. It would represent everything that a Hunter is. Tall and strong and powerful.”
Philip had been keeping his arm held up, pointing out at the Herculean this entire time. Now he lowered it and looked back at Conrad.
“What do you think about that? Do you think it represents everything a Hunter is and should be?”
“I think it’s time for me to leave.”
He stepped around Philip, started to walk past him, but stopped when the First Lieutenant placed the vice of his hand on Conrad’s shoulder.
“By the way, thanks again for your help last week. If it wasn’t for you, we probably never would have gotten that zombie child, and if we wouldn’t have gotten the zombie child, who knows how much Moss would have told us.”
“Get your hand off me.”
Philip lifted the hand off his shoulder.
Conrad started walking again.
“The Code is finished. Just remember that.” Philip paused, waiting for a reaction, but when Conrad kept walking, he shouted, “The world needs to know who we are and what it is we do for them. The world needs to know it. Can’t you see that, Conrad? Can’t you see?”
Distorted music was
coming from the speakers inside the cell. It was the same kind of noise that had been there on Conrad’s past three visits, only this time it was different. This time there were voices added, though he wasn’t sure what the voices were saying or if they were even saying anything at all. He was here to ask questions—that was his deal with Albert—and since he had been sitting here now for five minutes without saying a word, he decided to speak.
“What is that?”
“What is what?”
“That … noise.”
“It isn’t noise, Conrad. It’s music.”
“That’s not music. Music is …”
“Yes?”
Conrad shook his head. All he knew of music was what they played on the radio and TV, in the movies, in the restaurants and bars and dance clubs, the synthesized music created only by computers.
Gabriel sat in the chair he had moved from his place by the bookshelves. As before, he had positioned the chair so that he faced Conrad on the other side of the bars. There was ten feet between them, maybe less, and it took everything Conrad had not to look away or stand up to leave the room.
When it was apparent Conrad wasn’t going to answer, Gabriel said, “This ‘noise’ is an opera. It’s called
Don Giovanni
written by a composer named Mozart. And the reason you cannot understand what the singers are saying is that it is in another language.”
“Another …”
But Conrad couldn’t finish the sentence. The realization had just hit him that he was having an actual dialogue with a zombie.
“Yes,” Gabriel said, “I know that there is only one language in the world. But a long time ago—before the Zombie Wars—when the world was all living, there were many different languages.”
Conrad remembered what he’d been told before, about how there had been different races and nationalities and skin colors.
“Unfortunately, not everything from that time period was saved. After the Zombie Wars, when the World Government came into power, they decided to do away with everything that involved the living. Then again, they still kept around buildings and airplanes and cars and TV and the Internet … but I suppose that is beside the point. Suffice it to say, they managed to propagandize the mistruth that imagination is what brought upon the living’s downfall, and that is why we are here today.”
The zombie looked rather despondent sitting slouched in his chair. Conrad had been told Gabriel was forty-five, but he looked younger. He had short gray hair which apparently wasn’t gray at all. Albert had said the zombie’s true hair color was a light brown, streaked with some gray, his skin color a very pale white, his eyes green and speckled with some brown.
These were all colors that meant nothing to Conrad.
“Anyhow,” Gabriel said, standing and walking away to turn down the music, “the Government said they had destroyed everything. But they hadn’t. They knew that they should keep what they could to study the living. After all, the living were and continue to be their one and only enemy. But they couldn’t make any sense of the books or music or paintings. So they started to destroy all that was left. Fortunately, some pieces were not found until many years later, when Living Intelligence was started. Those items were scattered among the different facilities all over the world. It’s a shame, though, because so much beauty has been lost forever.”
While the zombie spoke Conrad had focused his attention on the fish tank. Now staring at those living tropical fish, he said, “What makes you so special?”
“I beg your pardon?”
Conrad returned his gaze to the zombie. “Why are you here? Why am I forced to talk to you?”
“First, Conrad, you are not forced. You are asked. That has always been the agreement. Otherwise, what good would come of it if you were forced to talk to me? You would sit there and say nothing like the last two times.”
Evidently Gabriel hadn’t been told everything about Conrad’s visit today. It was Albert’s quid pro quo for allowing Conrad the extra few days off until Kyle’s animation day.
“Questions, Conrad. You are here to ask questions. I am here to answer questions. You must have some. At least one or two. So now is the time to ask, and now is the time for me to try my best to explain, so that …”
“So that what?”
“So that you can better understand your job.”
“I’m surprised you and the other zombies even go through with this. After all, we’re digging up these Pandoras, taking away the only things that”—he looked down, looked back up—“create more of you.”
Another smile, only this time it was very thin. “Yes, well, it is either that or be killed. And to be honest with you, I think there is still a possibility that someday the living and the dead can coexist. So that is why I’m here. I’m here to help the best I can.”
“It will never happen.”
“Perhaps.”
“The living and the dead will never exist side by side.”
“So you say.”
“Besides, the living had its chance. It’s called evolution.”
“Yes,” Gabriel said, “and I am sure it was one of the very first things they taught you in school. How one day every human and animal was living, and how the next day half the humans and half the animals were the animated dead. Complete chaos. Thus the beginning of the Zombie Wars. The dead defeated the living, drove the living into hiding, and here we are today. But tell me this, Conrad. Why then are there Pandoras? Why are the living still among the dead?”
Conrad just stared back at the zombie. The “music” coming from the speakers—he had to remind himself it was called an opera—continued, two of the low voices sounding as if they were talking back and forth to each other.
Gabriel took off his glasses. He held them close to his face, inspected them, blew onto one of the lenses, wiped it off. Then he stood up. He walked away from Conrad, back toward the shelves and shelves of books. The zombie selected three books, brought them back to the chair and sat down.
“The last two times you were here—actually, the last three—I noticed you looking at the books. You’re fascinated by them, aren’t you? It’s okay. You can be truthful with me.”
“I destroyed some once.”
“Did you?”
“When I was young, my father took me on a raid and we burned all the books and paintings that were there.”
“Henry prepared you well, didn’t he?”
Conrad said nothing, only stared back at the zombie, who now had all three books in his lap. He took the top book and raised it to his nose. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. When he opened his eyes again, he looked sadly at Conrad.
“It is a shame you cannot smell anything. Otherwise …” He lowered his eyes, shook his head.
“What does it smell like?”
Gabriel opened his mouth but shut it. He sat thinking for a moment, then simply said, “It smells like a book.”