Nocturnal

by Scott Sigler

  Above the columns, she wrote XY, XZ and YZ. On the left side, she drew Xs next to the rows. She turned it so the boys could see.

  Bryan leaned in for a closer look. “If someone like Rex had a child, the child gets … what … one chromosome from the mother, two from the father? The mother would always provide an X, and all his children would have three sex chromosomes instead of two, right?”

  Robin nodded. “That’s right. Three sex chromosomes is called trisomy.”

  Bryan again pulled the pad in front of him. “Well, since the only other two Zed examples we have are not trisomal, that means someone like Rex couldn’t be their father.”

  “You got it,” she said. “So, if Rex mates with a woman …” She pulled the pad back in front of her and she filled in the six boxes: two XXYs, two XXZs, two XYZs. “The XXY is Klinefelter’s. I have no idea what an X-X-Zed would be, but maybe it’s a female version of Rex. We know Rex was an X-Y-Zed, so at least in Rex’s case, X-Y-Zeds appear to be normal people.”

  Bryan stood and walked to the kitchen. “So Rex could make more Rexes,” he said as he pulled four fresh beers from the fridge. “But someone like Rex can’t make an XZ or a YZ.” He opened all four bottles and passed them out before he sat. “So what makes those combinations?”

  “Now for the really crazy part,” Robin said. She’d walked them through the other Punnett squares to introduce the basic concepts. Now they were ready for the bomb to be dropped.

  She turned to a fresh piece of paper and drew a box with two columns and three rows. She put an X and a Y above the columns. To the left of the three rows, she drew an X, a Z and then a second Z.

  Pookie rolled his eyes. “Sorry to be a downer, Robin, but this is kind of boring. Can you get to the point?”

  “I’m almost there,” she said. “Just bear with me. Say the father is a normal male” — she circled the XY — “and the mother is X-Zed-Zed” — she circled the XZZ. “Let’s say that — unlike Rex — this X-Zed-Zed mother can give only a single chromosome to her gamete” — Robin filled in the squares as she talked — “then you can get the X-Zed combination of the Blackbeard and the Y-Zed combination that killed Oscar Woody.”

  “Ewww, that’s nasty,” Pookie said. “You’re saying the two killers we know about, they have a mutant-Zed-chromosome mommy who is getting it on with regular dudes?”

  Robin nodded as she finished the Punnett Square: two XZs, two YZs, an XX and an XY. “You could even wind up with normal boys and girls. But what you couldn’t get is another X-Zed-Zed. There’s only one way to get that. Now, at the Oscar Woody killing, someone painted Long Live the King on the walls, right?”

  Bryan nodded. “Yeah, and I think Rex is the king in question.”

  She looked at John. “You were waiting for a punch line? Here it is, but I don’t think it’s all that funny — if you have a king, maybe you also have a queen.”

  Robin flipped to a new page and drew — three columns and three rows for nine squares total. “So, you take a king” — she marked the columns XY, XZ and YZ — “and a queen” — on the left side, she marked the first row X, the second and third each with a Z — “and something interesting comes up.” She filled in the boxes, making an alphabet soup of combinations: two XZZs, two YZZs, three XYZs, an XXZ and an XXY.

  She circled the two XZZs.

  Bryan looked up, the expression on his face one of shocked realization. “If the XZZ is a queen, then the only way to make a new queen is for her to mate with a king.”

  “Exactly,” Robin said. “If this is the way it works, then you have a eusocial structure with a breeding pair.”

  John shook his head in annoyed denial. “Wait a minute. Kings? Queens? Not like English royalty kings and queens but like … termites? Eusocial means one breeding pair producing all the offspring for an entire colony, like ants and bees, right?”

  Robin nodded.

  “Rex and the others are people, which means they’re mammals,” John said. “Eusocial creatures are insects.”

  “There’s at least two species of eusocial mammals,” Robin said. “The naked mole rat and the desert rat. They have a single queen, breeding males, and the rest of the colony are sterile workers.”

  Pookie pulled the pad in front of him. “I could live with fleshy-headed mutants, I really could, but come on … a king? A queen? Besides, ant colonies have more than just kings or queens, they have workers and drones, right?”

  “Right,” Robin said. “Those are called castes. There’s one more caste you didn’t mention. Blackbeard had no testicles. He was sterile, couldn’t have passed on his genes to a new generation. But he was strong, he was dangerous, and he could heal fast, which would let him recover from damage. Guess which caste is most likely to get damaged?”

  Bryan stared at her. His eyes widened. He leaned back. “Holy shit.”

  Pookie looked back and forth from Robin to Bryan. “What? Come on, tell me.”

  Bryan sagged in his chair. “She’s saying Blackbeard is like a soldier ant,” he said. “Soldier ants can’t breed — they just live to protect the colony.”

  They all sat in silence. Robin felt better for having shared the strange hypothesis. It was the only thing she could find to explain the limited data they had.

  Pookie took a long drink of beer, then let out a belch. “Attack of the ant-people,” he said. “Awesome. Just awesome. But then what’s with the costumes?”

  Robin picked up the pen, started making a random, back-and-forth doodle on the pad. “The costumes might be there to hide physical deformities. We really have no idea what we’re dealing with. The thing is, I think those teeth marks on Oscar Woody were exactly that — teeth marks. Not some tool designed to look like teeth. If that’s true, we’d be talking about someone with a wide mouth and two big incisors, so big you’d see it instantly. Maybe the masks and blankets hide more physical abnormalities?”

  Bryan shook his head, so slightly Robin wasn’t even sure if he knew he was doing it.

  John drained his beer in a long pull, then set the bottle on the table. “This new chromosome means we’re talking about a specific people, a genetic and possibly ethnic minority. As far as we know, someone is wiping out that minority — genocide — and Amy Zou is complicit in that act. Maybe there’s a damn good reason these ant-people have stayed hidden.”

  John brought up a good point. Technically, the Zeds weren’t a separate species, not as long as a queen could breed with normal men, or a king could breed with normal women. They were human … sort of. But what if they were all killers?

  “We don’t know enough,” she said. “We need to find that vigilante. Zou won’t give us information, maybe he will.”

  Bryan pulled out his phone, tapped it a few times, then held it out so everyone could see — it was a picture of the bloody arrowhead. “I watched Metz clear out the computer system. All of that data is gone. I’m betting they won’t let any of us anywhere near the bodies of Blackbeard, Oscar Woody or Jay Parlar. We won’t be able to search Rex’s house. That means this arrow is our only lead. Pooks, I think we have to go back and talk to the guy who literally wrote the book on the subject.”

  Pookie nodded. He reached into his wallet and pulled out a white business card. There was nothing on it but a phone number. He called, then waited for someone to answer.

  “Biz, this is Pookie. Sorry to clog your booty-call phone with a non-booty-call message, but we need to see you. Call me back ASAP.”

  Pookie put the phone away.

  “Who was that?” Robin asked.

  “Mister Biz-Nass,” Pookie said. “Your friendly neighborhood Tourette-syndrome-afflicted, throat-cancer-surving fortune-teller who speaks with a voice box.”

  Maybe he wasn’t making up the thing about the guy jumping across the street, but she knew damn well that one was bullshit.

  Pookie turned to Bryan. “Bri-Bri, it’s three-thirty in the morning. I suggest we don’t sit here and wait for Biz-Nass to call us back. Everyon
e is cashed out. I need some sleep, Bro. Let’s all go home and hit it in the morning.”

  Bryan’s jaw muscles twitched. Robin knew he didn’t want to wait for even a second, but he trusted Pookie.

  “All right,” he said. “Tomorrow.”

  Robin saw the three men out.

  The Monster

  So much pain.

  The dream’s blurry swirl engulfed him, lulled him, but the pain in his belly, the fire in there — that felt more real than anything Bryan had ever known. How could anything hurt so much? Being dragged, being kicked … what would happen to him now?

  He shouldn’t have gone out alone, and now it was too late.

  Savior had him.

  What would death be like? Would he go to the Hunting Ground like the old people said, or would he just end? The religion, it was all a lie, he knew, because he’d drawn the ward to chase the monster away and yet the monster still got him.

  Bryan’s hands and feet pulled against the restraints, but he was already too weak. The thing in his mouth muffled his cries for help.

  Sliding on the ground now, across grass, his stomach screaming with agony. Where was the monster taking him?

  Bryan looked ahead. He saw a cellar door, the angled kind that led down into a basement.

  The monster released him. The monster in his cloak, a faceless man-shaped thing of dark green, it opened the cellar door. Inside, shadows.

  The monster turned, grabbed Bryan by the neck and dragged him to the door. Bryan slid off the grass and onto concrete steps. The monster pulled him down, thump-thump-thump along the steps, rough edges digging into Bryan’s shoulder and hip as he slid. The shadows grew, engulfed him, swallowed him up until there was nothing but blackness.

  Bryan woke to someone pounding on his apartment door.

  He opened his eyes, blinked — was he still dreaming? If so, he was dreaming about his messy apartment and the cardboard boxes he had yet to unpack.

  He sat up on his couch.

  The door pounded again. From outside, a yell: “Bri-Bri, rise and shine!”

  He stood, shuffled to the door and opened it. Pookie walked in, two cups of steaming coffee in hand.

  “Pooks, what are you doing here?”

  “We have to go see Mister Biz-Nass. We left him a message last night, remember?”

  Pookie stepped inside. Bryan shut the door. He was still groggy, but now he recalled Pookie calling Biz-Nass the night before. “Yeah, I remember. Sorry, I’ll get ready.”

  “Answer your phone much?” Pookie said. “I was getting worried that I’d find you in the center of one of those bloody symbols.”

  Did that mean Pookie worried Bryan would be a victim, or the perp? Maybe that was a question best left unasked.

  “I guess I fell asleep on the couch,” Bryan said. “I was watching TV.”

  The exhaustion, the stress, the uncertainty — those things had been weighing on him, combining with the last remnants of the physical aches, joints that felt like they were stuffed with broken marbles and the lingering

  [it’s not cancer it’s an organ]

  chest pain.

  But he didn’t feel those things anymore. In fact, he felt no pain at all.

  “Bri-Bri, you get any sleep?”

  Bryan shrugged. “Four hours, maybe?”

  “Well, you look better,” Pookie said. “Way better, in fact.” He handed Bryan the coffee. “Here’s your milkshake. Four sugars, three creams, just the way you like it.”

  “Thanks.”

  Pookie walked to the coffee table in front of the couch. On it was Bryan’s pad, a pencil, and a scattering of hastily scrawled protection symbols. “Bryan, did you have another nightmare?”

  Bryan started to say no, but stopped. He had vague wisps of something grabbing him, beating him, maybe even stabbing him. He couldn’t lock it down.

  “I did,” he said. “Worse than the others.”

  “Worse? Ummm, do we need to drive somewhere, then? See if there’s a body?”

  Bryan shook his head. “Not unless the body is mine. I didn’t stalk anyone. This time I think something got me.”

  “Got you? Like, killed you?”

  Bryan tried to remember. A few more fuzzy images filtered to the surface of his thoughts. “Yeah. I dreamed about the guy in the cloak, Pooks. The archer. In the dream his name was Savior.”

  “Savior? Wasn’t the Saviors the group that Biz-Nass said burned Marie’s Children at the stake?”

  Bryan nodded. “Yeah, you’re right. This guy in the cloak, he messed me up pretty bad. He dragged me down some steps. I’m not sure what came next. All I know is that I don’t think I’ve ever felt so afraid in my life. He was going to do something to me.”

  Pookie nodded. He looked worried, like he was waiting for the other shoe to drop. “What happened then?”

  Bryan shrugged. “Don’t know. I woke up, drew some symbols, felt better, then went right back to sleep. I didn’t go out and put a gun in a kid’s face, if that’s what you’re asking.”

  Pookie forced a smile. “Of course not. Drink your coffee and shower up. Biz said he was making an exception to see us this early, so let’s move it.”

  Mr. Biz-Nass and the Arrow

  HELLO AGAIN OFFICER POOKIE … HELLO OFFICER FUCKER FUCKER DICKER PRICKER.

  Pookie smiled wide. Biz-Nass was actually happy to see them. “Biz-Nass, old boy, how they hanging?”

  LONG AND RED AND READY FOR BED … COME IN COME IN.

  Pookie and Bryan sat in the blue plastic chairs. Pookie was keeping a close eye on his partner. The night before in the private autopsy room, Pookie had thought Bryan was about to snap. The man’s pain seemed to be gone, but he hadn’t gone back to the reserved, emotionless guy that Pookie knew and loved. Now Bryan’s eyes showed a steady state of simmering anger, and he had an aura of impending violence that seemed a tiny spark away from erupting.

  THIS BETTER BE IMPORTANT. IT’S TEN IN THE MORNING AND I DON’T EVEN KICK MY BITCHES OUT OF BED UNTIL WELL PAST NOON.

  “We found something else,” Pookie said. “Maybe you can tell us what it means. Bryan, show him.”

  Bryan thumbed his phone, calling up a picture of the bloody arrowhead. He set it faceup on the table’s red velvet, then slid it forward. Biz-Nass didn’t move — he just stared down at the screen. He finally looked up, first at Pookie, then at Bryan.

  Biz-Nass started to pant. He tried talking without putting the voice box to his throat. Pookie couldn’t make out the hissing whisper, but he was pretty sure there was a fucker and pricker in there somewhere.

  Bryan pointed to Biz’s throat. “Your hardware, man. Don’t forget your hardware.”

  Biz-Nass stared at Bryan with real fear, then remembered his voice box. He lifted the device to his throat.

  SORRY I FUCK-FUCK … I MEAN I FUCK-FUCK … I FORGOT MYSELF.

  “You’ve seen this before,” Pookie said. “Why does it scare you so bad?”

  I’M NOT SCARED … I DON’T KNOW WHAT IT IS.

  “Biz,” Pookie said in a calm voice, “that article you have on the Golden Gate Slasher, it’s been wiped out of existence everywhere else. You know about the symbols. You know about Marie’s Children. You were writing a fucking book on the subject, Bro — there’s no way you didn’t research the arrow that killed the Slasher.”

  Mr. Biz-Nass looked at each of the cops, then spoke in a tone so pleading even the mechanical effect couldn’t hide it. I HAVEN’T TALKED. I SWEAR. MMMMM PLEASE DON’T HIT ME.

  Maybe Biz faked his Tourette’s, maybe he didn’t, but Pookie knew he wasn’t faking this. Wide eyes, fast breaths, open mouth, hands clutching — Biz thought he was about to get his ass kicked.

  “We are not going to hit you,” Pookie said. “People are dying. We need to know how to stop it.”

  Biz-Nass just shook his head.

  The first time Pookie and Bryan had visited, Biz-Nass had thought they’d come to rough him up. He’d thought that when they mentioned the sy
mbols. Biz had formally requested info on the symbols twenty-nine years ago — requested that info from the SFPD.

  Pookie suddenly thought of Chief Zou, leaning forward, her knuckles on the autopsy table, threatening Bryan Clauser with career destruction if not jail.

  “Amy Zou,” Pookie said. “You ever have a run-in with her, Biz? Or how about Rich Verde?”

  Mr. Biz-Nass set the voice box down and put his hands flat on his velvet table. He took a deep breath, tried to collect himself. His left hand put the voice box back to his throat, while his right hand pointed to his thrice-broken, crooked nose.

  MMMMM WHO DO YOU THINK DID THIS TO ME?

  Bryan leaned forward. “Zou and Verde did that to you? Why?”

  SHE TOLD ME TO STOP WORKING ON THE BOOK. MMMMMM SHE BITCHY-BITCHY-BITCHY-CUNTY-CUNTY TOLD ME IF I DIDN’T LEAVE IT ALONE, SHE’D KILL ME.

  Amy Zou, beating the hell out of a civilian. A week ago, Pookie wouldn’t have believed it for a second. Now? It sounded par for the course.

  “Biz,” Bryan said, “we’re going after Zou. She’s protecting a vigilante killer. You help us find him, you help us bring her down.”

  Biz-Nass stared, his eyes narrowing in disbelief. He looked at Pookie.

  MMMMM IS THIS TRUE?

  Pookie put his right hand on his heart. “Scout’s honor.”

  Biz licked his lips, then nodded. He reached out a trembling hand, picked up Bryan’s cell phone and stared at the picture.

  WHAT KIND OF BODY DID YOU FIND THIS IN?

  “Caucasian male,” Pookie said. “A cop killer. Six-foot-one, two hundred and thirty pounds. Full beard.”

  WAS HE WEARING A COSTUME?

  “No,” Pookie said. He looked at Bryan. “But we think others who might have been working with him were.”

  Biz-Nass nodded, as if that was what he expected to hear.

  THIS V-CROSS IS THE SYMBOL OF THE SAVIORS. THERE SHOULD BE ANOTHER SYMBOL ON THE SHAFT … AN EYE WITH A DAGGER THROUGH IT.

  Bryan took the phone, flicked to the next photo — the arrow shaft — and set it on the table in front of Biz-Nass.

  The fortune-teller stared, then nodded.