Slimy Underbelly

by Kevin J. Anderson

  With a yelp, Robin emerged from our employee bathroom, fleeing the sounds of bubbling and splashing. “The toilet’s backing up.” She held a plunger as if she were a knight about to go into battle. “And it’s not backing down.”

  I relieved her of the plunger, since I’m more equipped to handle dangerous cases, and went in to tackle the situation. “Plumbing doesn’t solve itself,” I said. As a zombie, I could be relentless and determined, and if I needed to plunge for hours, I would. I worked and worked, but even our industrial-strength toilet plunger had no effect. The sheer sewage force was beyond me.

  “We’re going to need a lot more air fresheners,” Sheyenne said. “Bigger air fresheners.”

  Sludge continued to leak out of the bathroom and into the main offices. We called the building super, but Mr. Renfeld said he was “backed up at the moment.”

  I said, “When you agreed to partner with me, Robin, did you ever imagine our business would be so glamorous?”

  Robin wiped sweat from her forehead. “I had dreams of fighting man’s inhumanity to inhumans, making a mark . . . but this is just making a stain.” She found a container of Kleen Wipes and did her best to disinfect her hands.

  The phone rang, and Sheyenne answered politely and professionally, even in the middle of an actual shit storm. “Chambeaux and Deyer Investigations?” She brightened and handed the phone to me. “It’s Ramen Ho-Tep.”

  I took the phone, already concerned. My former client had once been the pharaoh of all Egypt (as he constantly reminded anyone within earshot), but after Robin had successfully emancipated him from bondage as a museum exhibit, Ramen Ho-Tep remained there as a special guest speaker, giving popular presentations and dramatic lectures about daily life in ancient Egypt. The mummy became quite a celebrity, and the exhibit held many priceless sarcophagi, papyrus scrolls, and souvenirs he retained from his ancient life, including one of his mummified cats.

  “Mr. Chambeaux, I need your help!” he cried, his dry voice so brittle it was about to break from the strain. “The museum is flooding, all the exhibits, and my nice, clean bandages! Please come and save me.”

  “On my way. Just hold on,” I said. Anything for a client. I grabbed the car keys for the Pro Bono Mobile, called to Sheyenne and Robin. “You two stay here. This could get unpleasant.”

  “I already don’t like the smell of it,” said Sheyenne.

  I drove through the streets, fishtailing through standing puddles and shooting up rooster tails of murky water. The old tires were bald, and water leaked in through small holes in the floorboards. I had to divert from a side street, where I could see the flow rippling across the intersection. Up the block, I watched brown water gurgle down into storm drains and manholes.

  The Metropolitan Museum was a fortress of ancient architecture. It held the usual natural history exhibits that had been there since before the Big Uneasy, but the museum was famous for its archive of magical items, cursed objects, stuffed creature specimens, artists’ interpretations of demonic manifestations, Civil War uniforms (oddly enough), and volunteer corpses or other undead who took turns being on display as a sort of performance art.

  The museum was located in a low-lying part of the Quarter, and now all the crap drained downhill, pouring through the gutters, along the streets and intersections, directly toward the museum.

  In front, a team of gargoyles and golems were working furiously like unnatural ants to stack sandbags in a barricade. Additional gargoyles flew in on their black batlike wings to deposit more sandbags for the golems to redistribute. Other golems formed a bilge-brigade of buckets, scooping and dumping water outside, although it flowed back in.

  After parking the car, I splashed forward, again reconsidering my stance against wearing galoshes, and spotted McGoo on the stone steps. Other policemen were doing their best to guide the work crews and to discourage curious bystanders. Public service warnings on all the competing weather stations told everyone to stay inside.

  McGoo was glad to see me. “We’ve deployed plumbing-response vehicles all over the Quarter, but we need every hand we can get. The museum is flooding, and they’re doing everything they can to save the Necronomicon.”

  He accompanied me inside, and we hurried along the museum corridors. Workers were frantically mopping and shoveling sludge that oozed through the halls. The original, and collectible, copy of the Necronomicon was featured in the main gallery on a shielded pedestal. The popular exhibit brought great amounts of revenue to the historical society, but because the book was so important, and dangerous, numerous security systems had been built around it. The book couldn’t just be moved and propped on a higher shelf. Right now two docents and their interns were piling towels around the pedestal, while a third official-looking man tinkered with the locks and security systems.

  “Is the book safe?” McGoo asked.

  The official-looking man glanced at us. “For now. We were preparing to move the volume anyway, since Howard Phillips Publishing needs access to the original for their special twelfth anniversary facsimile edition.” He shook his head. “I’m glad the book didn’t leave the museum, though—there’s no telling how much damage it might have suffered in the publishing offices.”

  I thought that if the smelly flood managed to get as high as the thirteenth floor of the Howard Phillips skyscraper, we would have a lot more problems than just saving the Necronomicon. Then I remembered all the slush-pile manuscripts Alma had been reading, and I knew she had enough material to build a solid barricade around the precious volume.

  “Ramen Ho-Tep called for my help,” I said. “I’ve got business in the Egyptian wing.”

  “Number one or number two?” McGoo asked. I don’t think he was suggesting there was more than one Egyptian wing. He jogged along beside me. “I’m at your side, buddy.”

  He soon regretted his decision as we began wading in sludge water, sloshing forward to the exhibit room, where I could hear a breathy and despairing series of moans.

  Ramen Ho-Tep, a small-statured and shriveled old mummy, stood up to his waist in backed-up brown water. His ornate sarcophagi now bobbed on the surface of the liquid, drifting along. The vitrine cases holding the papyrus scrolls had collapsed, and hieroglyphic-covered sheets floated like discarded grocery lists. (Maybe that was what they were; I couldn’t read hieroglyphics.)

  In his sticklike arms, Ramen Ho-Tep held a small pet-sized sarcophagus painted with an iconic representation of a cat. When he saw me, his ember-like eyes lit up within their sockets. “Help, Mr. Chambeaux! Everything else is ruined—can’t lose Fluffy, too.”

  Wading forward, I relieved him of his mummified cat and its case. McGoo began gathering up the floating papyrus. Canopic jars bobbed about like discarded milk bottles.

  “This is even worse than the Nile floods of September 4016 BC,” Ramen Ho-Tep said. “Every object here is worth a fortune, even though I got some of it in mausoleum sales.”

  On the wall of the Egyptian exhibit, I noticed that Ramen Ho-Tep had tacked up one of the posters for the weather wizard elections: Be a Dick Supporter!

  McGoo helped the mummy slosh out of the main chamber toward a set of stairs that led up to the next level, so that he could stand on the relatively dry landing. His bandages were soaked, waterlogged, and stinky (like everything else around us). He was shivering. “I was made for an arid climate. Even in the worst slums of ancient Cairo, we never had sewage problems like this.”

  Then a loud, crisp voice rang through the hallway. “My foggy bottom! I arrived just in time—Alastair Cumulus the Third, here to save the day.”

  I recognized him from his campaign posters, advertisements, and the weather network coverage of the Wuwufo elections. Cumulus flounced forward in his sky-blue wizard’s robe. He had golden brown hair and a thick beard that split in a wide fork, each prong of which curled up from his chin like long tongues. His hair was a mop of tight curls, as if freshly permed. He walked up to us. “Alastair Cumulus the Third, pleased to meet you
. I’m running for Wuwufo president. I hope I have your vote.”

  “We can’t vote in the elections,” I pointed out. “We’re not weather wizards.”

  “My foggy bottom! Of course you’re not, but that doesn’t mean I can’t be a hero anyway. A good Wuwufo leader cares even for the little non-meteorological people.”

  “How generous,” McGoo said with clear sarcasm. “But we’ve got this under control.”

  “Oh, I don’t think you do, Officer.” Cumulus twirled one prong of his beard. “Better leave the matter to a professional.” He glanced at the drenched and stained mummy, then peered into the flooded Egyptian exhibit. “I believe a drought is in order.”

  He licked his finger and held it up as if to test the direction of the wind inside the hallway. Satisfied, he stepped down the steps, waggled his fingers—and the puddles of effluent parted in front of him. He concentrated, twirled his fingers in the air again, and frowned further. “Something seems to be resisting my efforts.” He looked around. “Ah, I see what it is. A worthless distraction.”

  With a gesture, he parted the brown sea so he could walk through the exhibit without getting damp. The sludge flowed back together behind him. He reached the wall by Ramen Ho-Tep’s private sarcophagus and, with a flourish, tore down the “Be a Dick Supporter!” poster on the wall, ripped it in half with great verve, and let the pieces float on the water. “There, now I’m unencumbered.”

  He raised his hands, and bright light emanated from the ceiling and the walls. The air became parched, and the puddles of standing foul water receded, drying to an unpleasant film that covered everything. Roiling mists swirled around the chamber, but they, too, dissipated as Alastair Cumulus maintained his drought spell.

  At last, the Egyptian wing was protected. Ramen Ho-Tep was also dried out, though still stained. “You’re a hero, Mr. Cumulus the Third!”

  The weather wizard fondled his beard again. “Of course I am. And while I was at it, I took care of the rest of the museum, too.” He glanced at the stained mummy, then at McGoo and me. “See how much I care for the Unnatural Quarter? I hope you’ll support me in the election.”

  “My girlfriend was a Dick supporter,” said the mummy, “but after this, I wouldn’t vote for anyone else.”

  I knew that Ramen Ho-Tep had a long, long, long-term relationship with Neffi, the mummy madam of the Full Moon Brothel. I hoped the relationship was strong enough to survive an in-family political disagreement.

  “You are a hero,” McGoo agreed, taking the weather wizard’s arm. “Now let’s go see what else we can rescue around town until the sewers settle down.”

  CHAPTER 13

  Whatever had caused the intestinal distress in the sewers passed quickly. The waters receded, the manhole covers drifted back into place, and the underworld labyrinth became quiet and peaceful again.

  Nevertheless, I decided to postpone my expedition to the underworld to find Jody Caligari’s lab and speak with his intractable tentacle-faced landlord. I wanted to give the effluent a little time to settle.

  Back in the offices, Robin was queasy as we worked to clean up the mess. The toilet had finally backed down, and the water running out of the sink faucet returned to its usual murky color. Even so, it was going to take a long time and a lot of Evergreen Fresh to get back to normal. We opened all the windows, but the rotten smell of the outside air seemed even worse, yielding a net loss in freshness.

  After hours of scrubbing stains out of the carpet, and a fresh downpour washed down the streets (for once I didn’t complain about the vagaries of the weather), I decided we had to go. “It’s time for an expedition down where the sun don’t shine.”

  Robin gathered some documents and placed them in a manila folder. “If we’re going to confront Ah’Chulhu, I want to let him know personally that his case has no chance of winning—especially not when he’s up against me.”

  After the recent upheavals, however, I wanted to pay attention to the grim warnings Edgar Allan the troll had given me. I said, “Robin, you’re an impressive attorney, and I wouldn’t want you anywhere but on my side and at my side—but this is not a job for a human. The sewers are growing restless, and there’s no telling what’s lurking down there.”

  “Jody had his lab down there,” she pointed out. “He’s just a boy, and he commuted to work every day.”

  “True, but that kid is an evil genius supervillain in training. You’re just a lawyer.”

  “Some people might say there’s not much difference,” Robin said, but I could tell from the tone of her voice that she was having second thoughts.

  Sheyenne offered, “I’ll go with Beaux. Nothing sticks to me.”

  That seemed the best solution. Sheyenne followed me down to the basement level. The downstairs tenants were all still closed in their apartments, but I went straight to the sewer entrance. “Did you bring the address for Jody’s lab?”

  “Of course.” She waved a sheet of paper. “I even downloaded directions in case we get lost. We can take the main sewer thoroughfares or, if there’s a clog, I have an alternate route through the subsurface streets.”

  Through the door and down into the tunnels. I stepped into the gently flowing water, took care to find solid footing, and waded along while Sheyenne drifted ahead of me. I had to squint in the dim greenish glow of the tunnels. My eyesight hasn’t been the best since I rose from the dead; I think the bullet hole through my skull affected my vision, but I hoped I didn’t need glasses.

  As we passed under drainage openings from the streets above, rivulets of water splashed down; one culvert let in a wide, gushing flow. Sheyenne proved she could find beauty in even mundane things. “Look, a waterfall!”

  Nothing gets Sheyenne down. She sees the bright side of life, and afterlife, even though she’s been through enormous difficulties—having to support herself after her parents died, taking care of a younger brother who turned out to be a genuine dick (and no thunder about it), trying to make it through med school, supporting herself by singing in a monster nightclub, where she’d been poisoned.

  Our time together as humans had been all too brief, but it was good, a solid relationship with a lot of potential. I should have spent more time with Sheyenne, but there’d been no more time to spend....

  Now her ghost led the way, assessing the tunnel intersections, flitting ahead to double-check. Many of the catacombs didn’t have street signs, making navigation difficult. I plodded along, refusing to ask for directions. Far off, I heard the warbling notes of a pipe organ, but distances were deceptive in the labyrinth.

  We were lost for a while, but at an open sewer pipe Sheyenne found a family of mutant brown rats—a single mother and five children. The rats explained where we had gone wrong, and we set off again in search of the laboratory district.

  “If the lab doors are locked, I’m willing to break them open and retrieve Jody’s stuff,” I said. Another reason to do this without Robin, because she sometimes has inconvenient ethical objections to straightforward solutions. “Depending on how heavy the equipment is,” I added, picturing giant turbine engines, Van de Graaff generators, specimen tanks, chemical supplies, toxic waste barrels. “We’ll get the kid’s possessions back, one way or another.”

  Sheyenne had a wistful tone in her voice. “I still remember when you went to my old apartment to box up my belongings after I died. How sweet.”

  “That was a hard day for me, Spooky.”

  She had died of toadstool poisoning. I’d remained in the hospital room with her because she had no one else. In her painful glimmers of fading life, she made me promise to find out who had murdered her—and I wanted to kill the bastard for taking away this woman who meant so much to me.

  After she was gone, I went to her apartment to gather up her few things—sadly few, for she had collected very little in her life. But I wanted to keep every speck that was left of Sheyenne. Afterward, I went hunting for her killer—and ended up dead myself. Funny how things don’t turn out t
he way you expect them to....

  We finally found the right address after crossing a side channel and reaching a raised section of the sewers. It had vaulted ceilings, nice stone walls, and occasional graffiti, which I couldn’t read because it was written in ancient arcane languages.

  We found the entrance to Jody’s old lab. I could still see the large hand-painted letters of JODY CALIGARI on the door, but they had been covered over with masking tape, beneath which was a new neatly stenciled name, NEUMANN WENKMANN, M.A.D.

  “Looks like Ah’Chulhu’s already rented out the space,” Sheyenne said.

  “Never too late to be just in time,” I said. “Maybe Jody’s possessions were put into storage. We can worry about finding him a new lab after we get everything back.”

  I knocked on the door, pounded louder, but heard no answer. Buzzing, clacking sounds came from inside, along with electrical discharges and bubbling, foaming bursts. Sheyenne drifted through the door and opened it from inside. “He can’t hear you knock,” she said. “The experiments are too loud.”

  The new tenant had set up an ambitious mad scientist lab, a forest of beakers and connected glass tubing, fractionation tubes over Bunsen burners. Pumping bladders were connected to motors; crackling lightning bursts traveled up the prongs of a Jacob’s ladder. Boxy computer banks displayed multicolored lights blinking in a chaotic order; oscilloscope screens plotted sine waves and double sine waves. (They might have been arctangent waves, for all I knew; I was never good at trigonometry.) The bleeping, humming equipment spat out an endless curl of punched paper tape.

  The units were so new that some of the cellophane wrapping remained in place. Sales tags and price stickers were affixed to the sides, many components not even installed. Neumann Wenkmann, M.a.D., must have bought the whole modular setup like a man with too much money and a sudden passion for a new hobby. Deluxe laboratory kits like this were available from Lab Depot warehouse stores.

  Wenkmann bent over one of the modules with a screwdriver, adjusting a pair of fittings, taking readings, and frowning at the screen. He slapped at the side of the unit, grumbling in frustration.