Had he just been reading Bradshaw’s mind? The captain crossed his arms and gave Cervantes a stony look. “It’s not my jurisdiction. I’ve learned not to ask.”
Stoddard slapped Cervantes’ back as the truck opened. A steel box came out on rollers and they guided it onto the conveyor belt. There were five more inside, each coated with ice, electronically sealed; and within each, a fallen soldier who would be inducted into the undead population. Somewhere, Stoddard knew, there were graves with empty coffins upon which grieving mothers placed tiny flags. But these boys were still serving their government, in a way. Whatever helps me sleep at night.
“Seal’s broken!” Thomas snapped, banging on the lid of the next box. Stoddard came around and hoisted the lid up to look inside. Though the body was in a clear bag, he wasn’t able to tell if there was any putrefaction. “You think it matters?” he asked Bradshaw.
“Dead is dead,” came the reply.
Stoddard forced the lid down and pushed the box onto the belt. “Can’t argue with that logic, boss.”
“Don’t call me boss.” Bradshaw tried to grimace, but Stoddard’s expression teased a hint of a smile from the corners of his mouth.
Ryland locked his office door and sat on the edge of his desk. His breathing was growing more shallow with each passing day. It didn’t hurt, it wasn’t uncomfortable; he was just afraid someone might notice. Good thing a yearly physical wasn’t required of him. He dropped into his chair and turned on his computer, entering several encryption keys before he could get into his files. Despite all that security — and a few extra measures he’d added himself — he knew that there was always someone reading his e-mail. That’s why his most precious files were in paper form.
Unlocking the bottom desk drawer to produce those files, Ryland checked the contents. All there. Could never be too careful. A medical report, written up by one A. Harmon, dated seven months prior. Blood work results. Digital photographs of his right hand. Removing his glove, Ryland saw the ugly scars. He tried flexing his fingers. There was stiffness and pain, only the pain seemed strangely distant, and even as the skin cracked and bled he continued closing his hand into a tight fist.
The URC, the energy in the earth that revived the dead, was never intended to be weaponized. Maybe in some horror movie, a corrupt military lab would try to turn URC into a contagion, but the real government understood the possible consequences. Still, factions within were sparring over what to do; and several months ago, Ryland had led a group of private contractors to New England to check out another Source. And… he began to laugh uncontrollably at the memory, the goddamn absurdity of it. “Fucking cat,” he gasped between giggles.
The cat’s love bite shouldn’t have had any effect, but Harmon had discovered an anomaly in Ryland’s blood when he returned to the base for stitches. He knew immediately what had happened. The URC had bonded with some virus lying dormant in the feline’s system. Some thought it possible. Now he knew it was. And just like that, it was a contagion. A cosmic roll of the dice, a sick twist of fate. All these hundreds of thousands of years, and only now had it happened… and to Nathan Ryland.
It took a few months of watching his arm die before he made the decision to transfer Harmon to the field and silence her. Grimm had been another story altogether…
Though the tissue in Ryland’s body was dying, he didn’t feel much discomfort. The infection was turning him undead piece by piece, yet he retained all his mental faculties, even if there was a cold hollow growing inside of him as his soul was forced out. Thus he had reasoned that, like the afterdead, he could maintain a healthy appearance and a clear head if he fed. The afterdead’s chum was trucked in biweekly and stored at the ass-end of the base where the smell wouldn’t offend. So Ryland had gone out to the storage building, walked in, shut the door, and promptly vomited at the sight of the festering meat spread before him. Dropped to his knees, dry heaving, arms shaking until he was prone on the floor in his own puke. “I–I can’t,” he had whispered, fighting the urge to keep retching. He looked at his dead hand. It felt so detached, like it wasn’t really part of him. It was almost surreal to see it scooping up a handful of rancid medical waste. He forced it down, stuffing his fingers into his throat and trying not to taste it. But the smell hit him again. He spewed chum all over his pants.
Then Grimm had walked in. He looked through the visor of his gas mask at Ryland’s bloody mouth and hand and clothing, Ryland sitting on the floor with a blank stare, like a boy caught playing with himself. Two days later, Grimm was living out in the neighborhood with the afterdead. Ryland had figured no one would believe the story if Grimm told them, but why take any chances?
Most of his body felt dead, somehow, and even though he was now able to eat chum and keep it down, there were still signs of it. If he sat in his chair too long he’d get mottled purple spots all over his buttocks, legs and back. Sometimes at night he’d wake up to discover his bladder had emptied itself. Trying to get out of bed, he found himself paralyzed by what seemed like rigor mortis. And Jesus Christ, he farted all the time, expelling the noxious gases of internal decay. He couldn’t eat nearly enough to stave off such things; he couldn’t risk being caught shoveling chum into his mouth again. St. John was already on his ass for three deaths.
Day by day, Ryland was growing accustomed to the spreading infection, and so was his ego. He decided it wasn’t chance, but that he’d been chosen. He would be the first true afterdead — not some soldier who took shrapnel in Lebanon and had his dead body dumped in that accursed swamp. No, Ryland was willingly giving himself over to the other side. There had only been one more test to pass, and that was Cervantes. The telepath hadn’t sensed Ryland’s condition at all. He was now confident that he was not dying, but evolving.
He longed to go out among the afterdead and see how they reacted, if at all. Would they attack him, or consider him one of their own? He chuckled at the thought. They were senseless animals without purpose. The scientists spent all day and night cutting the dead into pieces, burning them, pulling out their organs. They only sought to define the afterdead, to put it all in books and file it away, then they could sit back and relax knowing that humanity was still top dog. Insecure fools. He alone would know death firsthand, experience it in a conscious way.
Chosen.
He dug into the base’s historical archives — information suppressed from the general public — researching the ways that tribal peoples around Sources had explained the phenomenon. Of course, they had decided that dark gods were responsible. The gods were long gone, perhaps dead, but their leavings endured — including strange words that had probably been made up by the savages but were purported to focus and direct the chaotic Source energy.
He had been studying these words. His extensive education gave him a leg up on the military historians who’d catalogued and promptly forgotten these silly fables. He was beginning to understand the lost tongues of the old gods, and he was beginning to believe that he might be able to do greater things with the plague-energy that coursed through him.
Somewhere beyond death, off this mortal coil, lay godhood.
It was a long drive to Whittaker’s house. The rental car was running on fumes; Clarke had used Whittaker’s credit card to refuel, but it wasn’t long before he exhausted the remaining credit. Holding the dead man’s ID against the steering wheel, checking addresses as he drove, Clarke finally came to a small frame house with an unkempt yard. The first key he tried opened the front door.