Dead and Alive

Page 15

She threw open the door, swept into the master suite, and was shot four times in the chest by her beloved Maxim, whose treachery stunned her, though as she fell, she realized that he must have shot Rebecca, too.
JOCKO, CAPERING IN THE KITCHEN, dropped the apples when the gunfire boomed.
Knife. He had forgotten the knife. Victor waited to be killed, and Jocko forgot the knife.
He hit himself in the face. Hit, hit, hit himself. He deserved to be smacked twice as often as he was. Three times.
One drawer, two drawers, three … In the fifth drawer, knives. He selected a big one. Very sharp.
Tippytoe, tippytoe, out of the kitchen, into the hall.
CHAPTER 38
DUKE SLEPT in the backseat of the Honda during the drive east-northeast on I-10 and then west on I-12.
The dog’s snoring didn’t induce drowsiness in Carson, though it ought to have, considering how little sack time she’d grabbed in the past couple of days.
The half liter of supercaffeinated cola from Acadiana helped. Before crossing the city line, they stopped at a combination service station and convenience store that was open 24/7, where they drained themselves of some of the first cola they had consumed, and then bought two more half-liter bottles. They also bought a package of caffeine tablets.
As they hit the road again, Michael said, “Too much caffeine ties the prostate in knots.”
“I don’t have a prostate.”
“Carson, you know, everything isn’t always about you.”
One thing keeping her awake and focused was the suspicion that the Helios-Frankenstein case might be as much about her as it was about anyone. Not merely because she happened to be one of the two detectives who stumbled on the case. And not because her path crossed Deucalion’s just when she needed to meet him.
Of all the cops Carson knew, she and Michael had the deepest respect for individualism, especially when a particular individual was quirky and therefore amusing or even if he proved stubborn and frustrating. Consequently, they were more alarmed than some might have been by the prospect of a civilization with a single-minded purpose and a regimented population of obedient drones, whether that population was comprised of propagandized human beings or of pseudo-humans cultured in a lab.
But her respect for individualism and her love of freedom was not why this case was so powerfully, immediately, intimately about her. Early in this investigation, she began to suspect that her father, who had been a detective with the NOPD, might have been murdered by the New Race—and her mother with him—at the order of Victor Helios. Her dad could have encountered something exceedingly strange that had led him to Helios, just as his daughter would be led to the same suspect years later.
Her parents’ murders had never been solved. And the evidence concocted to portray her father as a corrupt cop—who might have been executed by criminal elements with which he was involved—had always been too pat, an insult to common sense, and an offense against the truth of her dad’s character.
Over the past few days, her suspicion developed into conviction. As much as the caffeine, a hunger for justice and a determination to clear her father’s name kept her awake, alert, and ready to rumble.
The vast lightless expanse of Pontchartrain lay to their left, and it seemed to have the irresistible gravity of a collapsed star, as if this night the world were rolling along its rim, at risk of spiraling down into oblivion.
Except in the headlights, the rain that came off the lake was black, insistently rapping against the driver’s side of the car as they drove west on I-12, as if the night itself had fists of bony knuckles. And the wind seemed black, blowing down out of a moonless and starless sky.
CHAPTER 39
HAVING BELIEVED that Erika Four was bursting in upon him, Victor fired twice, intending to stop both of her hearts, before he realized that the intruder was Christine. As the designer of her kind, he knew precisely where to aim. And because he started the job with such expert marksmanship, he had no choice but to finish it with two more shots.
Christine dropped, although death did not at once take her. She spasmed on the floor of the master-bedroom vestibule, gasping for breath, futilely pressing her hands to her chest as if she might be able to plug the wounds from which her life bled.
During Christine’s final throes, Erika appeared in the hall, just beyond the open door, and Victor raised the pistol from the dying housekeeper, to train it on whichever of his Erikas stood before him.
“Something was wrong with Christine,” she said. “She didn’t seem to know who she was. She thought I was someone named Mrs. Danvers.”
“Do you know who you are?” Victor asked.
She frowned at the muzzle of the pistol and at the question. “What do you mean?”
“Who are you!” Victor demanded with such vehemence that she flinched, as if reminded of the intensity with which he could deliver a beating when she deserved one.
“I’m Erika. Your wife.”
“Erika Five?”
She looked puzzled. “Yes, of course.”
“Then tell me—what is the most dangerous thing in the world?”
“Books,” she said at once. “Books corrupt.”
Erika Four had been allowed to read, which led to her death. Only Erika Five was created with a proscription against reading books. A resurrected Erika Four could have no way of knowing this.
On the floor, Christine said, “Manderley …” and her eyes glazed over.
She appeared to have died. Victor kicked her head, testing her response, but she didn’t twitch or make a sound.
Beside her on the floor was a book titled Jamaica Inn.
Returning the pistol to his shoulder holster, Victor said, “What was the word she just spoke?”
“Manderley,” said Erika.
“What language is it, what does it mean?”
Surprised, she said, “It’s the name of a great English house, a literary allusion. I’ve got it in my program. Like, I might say to someone we visited, ‘Oh, my dear, your house is even more wonderful than Manderley and your housekeeper isn’t insane.’”
“Yes, all right, but to what work does it refer?”
“Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca,” Erika said, “which I have never read and never will.”
“Books again,” he fumed, and in anger this time, he kicked the dead housekeeper, and then the book that had fallen from her hand. “I’ll send a team to bring this trash to the Hands of Mercy for an autopsy. Clean up the blood yourself.”
“Yes, Victor.”
SKIP, SKIP, HOP. Skip, skip, hop. Along the south hall. Skip, skip, hop. Knife in hand.
The back stairs. Three steps up, one step back. Three steps up, one step back.
Racing, in his fashion, toward vengeance, Jocko reminded himself of the speech he must make. As he drove the blade deep into Victor, he must say: I am the child of he who I was before I was me! I died to birth me! I am a monster, outcast and castaway! Die, Harker, die!
No. All wrong. So much practice in so many storm drains. And still Jocko didn’t have it right.
Climbing twice as many stairs as he descended, Jocko tried again: You are the monster child of he who I!
No, no, no. Not even close.
I am you he who I am who die!
Jocko was so angry with himself that he wanted to spit. He did spit. And he spat again. On his feet. Two steps up, one step back, spit. Two steps up, one step back, spit.
Finally he reached the top step, feet glistening.
In the second-floor south hall, Jocko stopped to collect his thoughts. There was one. And here was another. And here was a third thought, connected to the other two. Very nice.
Jocko often had to collect his thoughts. They scattered so easily.
I am the child of Jonathan Harker! He died to birth me! I am a juggler, monsters and apples! Now you die!
Close enough.
Tippytoe, tippytoe, east along the south hall, across soft rugs. Toward the main corridor.
Jocko heard voices. In his head? Could be. Had been before. No, no, not this time. Real voices. In the main hallway.
The corner. Careful. Jocko halted, peeked around.
Erika stood in the hallway, at the open master-suite doors. Talking to someone inside, probably Victor.
So pretty. Such shimmering hair. She had lips. Jocko wished he had lips, too.
“It’s the name of a great English house, a literary allusion,” Erika said to probably Victor.
Her voice soothed Jocko. Her voice was music.
As a calmness came over Jocko, he realized that he was different when in her company. With her, he didn’t feel compelled to do so much skipping, hopping, spitting, pirouetting, juggling, capering, nostril pulling, scampering, and walking on his hands.
She lied to Jocko. Lied about the tastiness of soap. Otherwise, however, she was a positive influence.
Eighty or ninety feet away, Victor Helios appeared. Out of the master suite. Tall. Trim. Excellent hair on his head, probably none on his tongue. Pretty suit.
Jocko thought: Die, juggler, die!
Victor walked past Erika. To the stairs. Said one last thing to her. Started down.
Jocko had the knife. The knife belonged in Victor.
A thousand knives belonged in Victor.
Jocko only had two hands. Could juggle three knives with two hands, put them in Victor. Trying to juggle a thousand knives, Jocko would probably lose some fingers.
To reach Victor with one pathetic knife, Jocko must run past Erika. That would be awkward.
She would see him. Would know he broke his promise. More than one promise. Would know he lied. Would be disappointed in him.
And she might smell soap on his breath.
Erika moved to the stairs. Watched Victor descend.
Maybe she saw Jocko. From the corner of her eye. She started to turn. Turn toward Jocko.
Jocko ducked back. Away from the corner.
Hoppity-hoppity-hop. Hoppity-hoppity-hop. West along the south hall. Backward down the stairs.
Kitchen again. Apples on the floor. Oranges would be even more round. Jocko must ask for oranges. And scissors to trim his tongue hairs.
Jocko capered out of the kitchen, through a butler’s pantry, across an intimate dining room.
Beyond was a large, formal dining room. Jocko didn’t see it too clearly because he had to, had to, had to pirouette.
Room after room, small connecting halls, so much house. Walking on his hands, knife gripped in one foot. Cartwheeling, cartwheeling, knife in his teeth.
North hall. Back stairs. Second floor. His suite.
Jocko hid the knife in his bedding. He scampered back into the living room. Sat on the floor in front of the fireplace. Enjoying the fireplace without fire.
She would say: I thought I saw you in the hall.
He would say: No, not Jocko, not Jocko. No, no, no. Not I who am from he who was, monster from monster, no, not Jocko, not in the hall and not eating soap.
Or maybe he would just say No.
Jocko would play it by ear. See what seemed right at the time.
After gazing at no fire for half a minute, Jocko realized he had forgotten to kill Victor.
Jocko hooked fingers in his nostrils and pulled them toward his brow until his eyes watered. He deserved worse.
CHAPTER 40
FOLLOWING THE FAILURE of the freezer motors, the saline solution in the transparent sack begins to warm.
After the busy visitor in the laboratory throws the sink that smashes the glass door, the pace of the warming accelerates.
The first improvement in Chameleon’s condition concerns its vision. In the cold environment, it sees only shades of blue. Now it begins to apprehend other colors, gradually at first, and then more rapidly.
For so long, Chameleon has drifted in the sack, mobility limited by the bitter cold of the fluid in which it is immersed. Now it is able to flex its abdomen and thorax. Its head turns more easily.
Suddenly it thrashes, thrashes again, a great commotion that causes the hanging sack to swing side to side and bump against the walls of the disabled freezer.
In semisuspended animation, Chameleon’s metabolism performs at a basal rate so low as to be almost undetectable. As the fluid in the sack warms, the catabolic processes increase.
With the energy provided by catabolism, anabolic processes begin to speed up. Chameleon is returning to full function.
The thrashing signifies a need for air. The highly oxygenated solution in the sack maintains Chameleon in subfreezing cold, but is inadequate to sustain it at full metabolic function.
Suffocation panic triggers Chameleon’s thrashing.
Although the polymeric fabric of the sack is as strong as bulletproof Kevlar, Chameleon’s combat claws rip it open.
Fourteen gallons of chemically treated saline solution gush out of the sack, spilling Chameleon into the freezer, through the missing door, and onto the floor of the laboratory.
Air flows into its spiracles and follows the tracheal tubes that branch throughout its body.
As it dries out, Chameleon regains its sense of smell.
It is able to detect only two odors: a specially engineered pheromone with which all of the New Race are tagged, and human beings of the Old Race, who are identifiable by a melange of pheromones lacking that New Race spice.
The smell of the New Race pleases Chameleon, and therefore they are EXEMPTS.
Because the Old Race lacks the artificial pheromone, their scent infuriates Chameleon, and they are TARGETS.
Chameleon lives to kill.
At the moment, it smells only EXEMPTS. And even all of them seem to be dead, sprawled throughout the room.
It crawls across the debris-strewn floor of the wrecked lab, through pools of water, seeking prey.
Every external tissue of Chameleon mimics to the smallest detail the surface under it: color, pattern, texture. No matter how simple or complex the ground under it, Chameleon will blend with it.
To any observer looking down on it, Chameleon is invisible when not in motion.
If Chameleon moves, the observer may sense something amiss, but he will not understand what his eyes perceive: a vague shifting of a part of the floor, an impossible rippling of a solid surface, as if the wood or stone, or the lawn, has become fluid.
Most of the time, the observer will interpret this phenomenon not as a real event but as disturbing evidence of a problem internal to himself: dizziness or hallucination, or the first symptom of an oncoming stroke.
Often, the observer will close his eyes for a moment, to settle his disturbed senses. Closing his eyes is the end of him.
If Chameleon is on a higher plane than the floor, perhaps a kitchen countertop, it will remain invisible from the side only if the backsplash is of the same material as the surface on which it stands. Otherwise, it will be visible as a silhouette.
For this reason, Chameleon generally remains low as it stalks its prey. A TARGET becomes aware of his attacker only when it skitters up his leg, ripping as it goes.