by Scott Sigler
“Their loved ones died,” Zou said. “Knowing what killed them won’t bring them back. What do you want, Chang? Do you want to tell the world that San Francisco has a killer cult, or that it has real-live monsters?”
“Both,” Pookie said. “People need to know that there’s something out there that can kill them.”
“No, they don’t need to know. When a killer shows up, Erickson puts it down.”
Pookie threw up his hands. “Are you insane? If you don’t make this public, more people could die.”
“People die every day,” Zou said. “That’s life in the big city. We’re talking two, maybe three murders a year on average.”
“On average? Those are human beings!”
“In San Francisco proper, eight hundred people a year get hit by cars,” she said. “Twenty of those accidents end in death, give or take, and then you have life-changing injuries, but do we take out the roads and make everyone walk because traffic is dangerous?”
“That’s ridiculous,” Pookie said. “You can’t compare shit like that.”
“Really? Well, can I compare apples to apples? Or should I say, murders to murders? We had fifty murders in San Francisco last year, forty-five the year before that and ninety-four three years ago. Most of those killings were gang related. So we know gangs kill far more people than Marie’s Children, yet we don’t get rid of the gangs.”
Her logic was faulty, fractured. Bryan couldn’t understand her reasoning. “Chief, we’re talking about serial killers. Monsters. We’re talking about the public’s right to know. The public knows about traffic deaths and people stay. Fine. Same for the gang activity. Fine with that, too. They don’t know about Marie’s Children.”
She shook her head as if Bryan and Pookie just couldn’t understand the obvious. “Sure, we tell the public,” she said. “And that makes property values plummet.”
Property values? Why would she say that? What did a cop care about property values? What wasn’t she telling them?
Bryan heard Chief Zou’s cell phone buzz. She pulled it out of her pocket and read.
She looked up at Bryan. “I’ve got to take care of something. Don’t go anywhere. We’ll talk about this later.”
Pookie raised his hand like a schoolkid in class. “Uh, Chief? Does this mean we have our jobs back? Maybe with a couple of accoutrements known as a badge and a gun?”
She looked at Pookie, but this time without her trademark cold stare. Then she looked at Bryan. She sighed and shook her head as if she’d already made a decision she knew she’d regret. She looked up at the darkening sky.
“I’ll get you back on the rolls tomorrow,” she said. “For now, I’ll let the watch sergeant know you can enter the hospital. And move your cars into the parking lot; we’ve got space allotted for police vehicles. You don’t have to sit out on the street all night.”
She turned and walked away, the phone clutched tightly in her right hand.
Bryan let out a sigh of relief. He had his job back, but more important, so did the friend who seemed willing to stand by his side no matter what.
And Chief Zou … that ridiculous logic of hers. Property values? He’d talk to her about that later. For the moment, however, he was a cop again, and his primary duty was to protect Jebediah Erickson from any harm.
Phone Home
THE HUBS: HONEY, NEED TO SPEAK WITH YOU. URGENT. GET SOMEWHERE PRIVATE.
Amy Zou walked through the hospital parking lot toward her car. Jack never sent texts like that. Had his father finally passed away? Had something happened to the twins?
She reached her car and got in. She shut the door, took a deep breath, then dialed her husband’s cell phone.
It picked up on the second ring, but it wasn’t her husband who answered.
“Hello, Missus Zou.”
A boy. It sounded like a teenager, or someone just about to enter his teen years.
“Who is this?”
“I want to meet you,” the boy said. “I’ve already met your family.”
Amy closed her eyes and took in a deep breath. A knot of fear blossomed in her belly. Amy knew what it was to be afraid for herself — being afraid for her children was infinitely worse. This might be nothing; maybe Jack lost his phone and some kid thought this was funny. She had to stay calm.
“What’s your name?”
“Rex.”
That feeling in her belly swelled into her chest, her throat. “Rex … Deprovdechuk?”
“You already know me,” he said. “How nice.”
Rex, the boy who had strangled his own mother to death with a belt. The boy who was somehow mixed up with Marie’s Children, somehow connected with the deaths of Oscar Woody, Jay Parlar and Bobby Pigeon.
The boy her entire police force hadn’t been able to find.
“Rex, listen to me. I don’t know what you think you’re doing, but you need to turn yourself in.”
“I’m at your house,” he said. “My family came to visit your family. You have a very nice house, Missus Zou.”
He was at her house? Oh, God, what was going on? Amy had to keep control of this, make the boy understand he was in deep shit.
“That’s Chief Zou,” Amy said. “As in chief of police.”
“Yes, ma’am. Why else would I want to talk to you?”
“Good,” she said. “Then maybe you know how much power I have, and what I’m capable of if you do anything to my family.”
Rex laughed. “Come home right now, Missus Zou. Don’t call for backup. I have people watching your neighborhood. We see cop cars, even those unmarked ones, and your family is in a lot of trouble.”
Amy’s eyes squeezed shut. She forced them to open. “Let me talk to my husband.”
“Sure,” Rex said. “Hold on one sec.”
Amy waited, her heart hammering in her chest, every inch of her body crawling and churning. How could this have happened? How?
“Baby,” Jack said.
“Jack! The girls—”
“We’re all okay,” he said. “But … they’ll hurt the twins if you don’t do what they say. Oh my God, Amy, these things … they’re not human.”
Images of the shark-mouthed man flashed through Amy’s thoughts. She felt tears streaming down her face.
The boy spoke again. “Twenty minutes, Missus Zou. Then we start slicing.”
“If you hurt—”
A click from the other end cut off her threats.
She set the phone in the passenger seat. She jammed the keys in the ignition, started the car and shot out of her parking spot.
Chillin’ Like a Villain
Rex tried to relax in a big La-Z-Boy recliner. Sly said it was the chair most like a throne, so Rex should sit in it. His feet didn’t quite reach the extended footrest — his heels dangled in the space between the pad and the seat cushion.
“I like this movie,” Sly said, laughing. “I’ve seen this one fifteen times. No, sixteen.”
They were watching Reservoir Dogs on Chief Amy Zou’s TV. Rex had never seen it. Roberta hadn’t liked gangster flicks. Rex was having a hard time concentrating on the movie, but it would pass the time until Chief Zou made it home.
Pierre was upstairs with the father and the girls. Rex had worried that Pierre might kill someone, kill them early, but Sly assured him that Pierre could follow orders.
“I wish she had Lord of The Rings,” Rex said. “That’s my favorite.”
On the TV, Mr. Blonde danced a slow shuffle across the screen, straight razor in hand, as the bloody, duct-taped cop breathed heavily through his nose.
“Love this part,” Sly said. “Mister Blonde is going to cut off that cop’s ear.”
“Hey, no spoilers.”
“Sorry, my king.”
“It’s okay.”
Rex watched. Such a nice house. Way nicer than where he’d lived with Roberta. Way, way nicer than Home. Home was really cool, but Rex wondered if the dampness and the dirt had an effect on everyone. There had to be a way to find them
a better place to live, yet keep them hidden from all the humans that would burn them, kill them.
Sly pointed at the screen. “See that Mister Orange, my king? Firstborn reminds me of him.”
“Which one is Mister Orange?”
Sly walked to the screen and put a finger on the actor lying on a ramp, his white shirt bright red with blood. “This one. You can’t trust Mister Orange. He’s looking out for himself. He’s not looking out for the gang.”
Sly wouldn’t stop talking about Firstborn. Sly was Rex’s best friend, but his hatred of Firstborn was starting to get in the way. Firstborn seemed like a good guy. It was so complicated. Firstborn had saved the people from extinction, saved Rex’s real mother, but he had also killed babies, killed Rex’s grown-up brothers and sisters as well. Sly hadn’t killed any babies. Sly had killed Rex’s enemies, had given Rex his new life.
And Sly had fought Firstborn when Firstborn wanted to kill Rex.
It was hard to figure all this out.
“Firstborn will be cool,” Rex said. “He knelt. He declared me king.”
Sly shrugged his big shoulders and returned to the couch. “Sometimes people lie, my king. Don’t forget — if something should happen to you, he’d be in charge again.”
“But I told the people to kill him if anything happened to me.”
Sly shrugged again. “Firstborn has ruled for over a century. His rule is all we’ve ever known. Unless you name someone to succeed you, then he might kill you and just take his chances, see if he can take over in the confusion.”
Rex fell silent. He watched the movie some more, watched Mr. Blonde’s white shirt blaze in the afternoon sun as he fetched a gas can out of the back of a white Cadillac.
Maybe Sly was right. Firstborn had led for … what … like a hundred fifty years? Maybe it was hard to give that up. Rex needed to take that motivation away.
“Sly, what if I actually named a … what’s that word? The word for who takes over if I’m gone?”
“Successor?”
“That’s it,” Rex said. “If I named a successor, made it real clear, do you think Firstborn would support me? Do you think that would work?”
Sly’s eyes narrowed in thought. “Maybe. You’d have to tell everyone all at once, I think, so there’s no misunderstanding about who would take over. If you did that, he’d know he can’t win.” Sly nodded slowly. “Yeah, then I think he’d follow you for sure.”
On the screen, Mr. Blonde doused the duct-taped cop with gasoline.
“You’d need someone you can really trust,” Sly said. “Otherwise, that person might try to kill you, too. I don’t want to see anything happen to you.”
Mr. Blonde flicked his lighter. Just before he could set the cop on fire, gunshots rang out — Mr. Orange shot Mr. Blonde several times. Mr. Blonde fell dead.
Sly said Firstborn was like Mr. Orange.
Rex turned in his chair to look at the snake-faced man. “Can I trust you, Sly?”
Sly looked down. Rex didn’t know if a man with green, pebbly skin could blush, but Sly seemed overwhelmed with emotion.
“Of course, my king. I’ll always do your bidding. If you’re going to name someone as successor, you could do it tonight, when everyone is assembled to see you enter Mommy’s cabin.”
Rex fell silent. Hillary said Rex had to go be with Mommy, start making new queens as soon as possible. “I’m kind of nervous about that. What if I don’t want to do it?”
Sly smiled. “Whatever you want to do, I’m there. If you don’t want to be with Mommy, well, I won’t let anyone mess with you. I’ll carry you out of the tunnels myself.”
Rex had never had a real friend before. Not one like Sly, anyway. Sly would do anything for him.
They heard the garage door open.
“Tell Pierre to bring them down,” Rex said. “Let’s get ready to meet Chief Zou.”
A New Need
Aggie James stared at the bassinet.
No, he couldn’t do it. He couldn’t allow himself to succumb.
Just ride it out … you’ll be free soon.
He looked away, not that there were many places to look. The tiny room must have once been part of the sewer system, back in the times when they built things out of rough-hewn rocks. At least it was warm. The room had power — Hillary had turned on a beat-up heater and an old dehumidifier as soon as they’d arrived.
He wore the same clothes he’d had on when Sly and Pierre had taken him to the white dungeon. The clothes had been waiting for him here. Hillary had cleaned the jeans, shirt and jacket. She’d given him a pair of tan work boots that were almost new, if you didn’t count the blood stain set into the suede.
For the first time Aggie could remember, he was clean, both inside and out.
Yet now he felt a powerful urge … an urge that made him feel dirty. How could he want that? How in the hell could he want that?
Aggie turned. He stared at the baby. So tiny. So helpless. But what would it become? Would it change to look like those things that had chased down the teenage boy?
The baby hadn’t hurt anyone. The baby just was.
Aggie walked to the bassinet and looked down. The baby slept so peacefully. So quiet, all bundled up in that blanket with the strange symbols. Aggie thought of the day his daughter had been born, thought of her tiny fingers and the way her eyes had closed when she’d slept against his wife’s chest. But this boy wasn’t like Aggie’s lost child. The boy was Hillary’s kind, the killing kind.
This was a creature of evil.
So why did Aggie wanted to pick the baby up? Why did he want to hold it? The urge consumed him. It was even more powerful than that inexplicable lust that had overtaken him while watching Mommy in her cabin.
It was more than a want … it was a need.
He needed to pick up that baby, needed to protect it.
He could fight it no longer. He reached into the bassinet and gently lifted up the tiny, sleeping form. Aggie held the baby to his chest, one hand under the baby’s tiny bottom, the other hand on the back of the baby’s head.
Aggie started to bounce lightly.
“Don’t you worry,” he said. “It’ll be okay. It’ll be fine.”
It was just a baby, goddamit. This child was no more responsible for what his kin had done than Aggie was responsible for the actions of his asshole grandfather. The boy didn’t have to turn out like Hillary — he didn’t have to turn out like those kids in the maze.
The small room’s metal door screeched as it opened, the bottom scraping heavily against the cinder-block floor. Aggie instinctively turned the baby away from the door, protecting it with his body. He looked over his shoulder to see who had come.
Hillary.
She entered, and smiled. “How nice. You are holding the baby.”
Aggie nodded.
She reached out her wrinkled hand and smoothed the baby’s blanket. Aggie fought an instinct to pull the baby away from her. He had to keep his cool.
She again looked at Aggie; her happy eyes returned to their normal hard-ice stare. “Are you ready to learn what you must do?”
Aggie nodded again.
“You are to find this baby a good home,” she said. “You take him out of here, find him a good home, a loving home, a safe home.”
She stared at him, as if waiting for an answer, waiting for confirmation.
He had no idea what he should say.
“Repeat it,” she said. “A safe, loving home.”
“Yes, ma’am. A safe, loving home. But … well, how do I do that?”
Hillary pointed a finger at the ceiling. “You live up above. Find someone who wants a baby. Someone who will stay in San Francisco, do you understand? They have to stay here. You must find someone. Do you know people?”
Aggie had zero idea of who would take in a little black baby, but he nodded. “Sure, of course. I know people just like that.”
“Good,” she said. “I knew I chose right when I chose you. When yo
u find the people who will take him” — she reached into her sweater pocket and pulled out an overstuffed brown envelope — “you give them this.”
Inside the envelope, Aggie saw a thick stack of hundreds.
“You listen to me now,” Hillary said. “You listen carefully. I have people up there. No matter where you go, we can find you by your smell. You do what I say, and you are free. You do not do what I say? Then wherever you go, I will reach out from here and pull you back in, and then you will be the groom.”
That giant slug of a woman, being tied to the dolly, then the maze, the monster children … Aggie nodded madly. If this was the price of freedom, he would fulfill her mission.
“Yes, ma’am, I understand, but …” His voice trailed off. He wanted to ask a question, but what if the answer made her change her mind? No, with all the trouble she’d gone through, she wasn’t going to suddenly take the baby away. He had to ask.
“Why don’t you take him?” Aggie said. “I mean, I’ll do what you ask and thank you for letting me live, thank you, but why wouldn’t you just take him up yourself?”
She caressed the sleeping baby’s cheek. “I can’t go far from Home. When I am away from Mommy for too long, I start to change.”
“Change into what?”
She didn’t say anything. For a long moment, it was so quiet Aggie could hear her fingertips sliding across the baby’s cheek.
Finally, Hillary looked up. “You ask too many questions. Don’t you want to help me?”
Oh shit, had he blown it? Aggie nodded, hard. “Yes! I want to do this for you. Never mind I asked, just let me take the boy up, please.” He would find the boy a home. Forget the questions, that was stupid — all Aggie wanted was to get away from this crazy place and this crazy old woman.
She reached out again, but this time her fingertips caressed Aggie’s cheek. It took everything he had not to recoil in disgust.
“Now I let you go,” she said. “I give you life. In return, you give this baby a future.”
He nodded again, couldn’t stop himself from nodding. “Thank you, Hillary,” Aggie said, and he meant it. “I’ll do it.”
“Follow me, and be very silent. I will show you the way out.”