Dearly, Beloved

by Lia Habel

  Ben and Franco’d already managed to isolate the injured living on A Level; several techs raced past me, headed there. I found the zombies gathered on B Level, most of them shouting or crying hysterically. Inside the metal ship, the noise was incredible. Tom and the others were busy trying to calm them down and keep them together—for the safety of the living staff, if nothing else. They were a ragtag lot—an equal mix of men and women, of all ages, maybe fifty in total. Some were dressed in worn but colorful finery, diaphanous shawls and candy-striped skirts and shiny top hats decked out with feathers and glass jewels. Others wore ratty street clothes. One man was seated in a wooden cart. For some reason, I could smell flowers.

  The ones contributing the most to the din were two women. They stood in the middle of the crowd, part of it and yet seemingly blind and deaf to it. One of them—tall, with tangled rust-colored hair and a face that could be best described as “mushy”—was taking the other to task. Her back was to me; all I could make out was long hair the color of red wine, part of it twisted up with a silver comb.

  “I told you this would happen! They’re turning against us again. We have to move, we have to protect our own!”

  “This is a misunderstanding,” the other woman replied.

  “What’s going on?” I asked.

  The red-haired woman turned, and I found myself staring at her perhaps longer than I should’ve. Her skin was as pale as marble, her eyes inky and almost unearthly. Her black dress set both off. “Who are you, sir?”

  “Name’s Bram Griswold. I’m here to help.”

  The rusty-haired woman seemed not to notice me. “We weren’t even doing anything for once. No big show, not stealing anything, not running any scams. Just carrying out your little utopian idea. Free clinics. How nice. Until one of them gets freaking ambushed!”

  The woman I’d spoken to lifted a hand. “Claudia, hush.” She returned her eyes to mine. “I’m Mártira Cicatriz. Leader of the Changed. This is my sister.”

  “The Changed?” Tom asked from the edge of the crowd, narrowing his eyes.

  “We’re a group of zombies interested in peace,” Mártira said. “We raise funds, sometimes we picket against anti-zombie injustice. We were providing medicine for the poverty-stricken undead in the Morgue when those people came.”

  “Why were they chasing you?”

  Claudia cut her way in front of Mártira, glaring at me. She wore trousers and a shirtwaist. “Because they were the living. What more explanation do you need?”

  “Claudia.” Mártira shook her head, and tried to engage with me again. “We’d been there not an hour. Suddenly, those people,” she stressed, looking at Claudia, “started gathering, yelling. Eventually they attacked. So we ran for the port. And thank God we did. Thank you—all of you.” She did her best to take in my men with her hands—before they faltered and she ended up pressing them to her chest. “I didn’t know some of us would attack. Those poor living souls.”

  “Those living people targeted us for no reason! There are more of us out there, still!” Claudia argued. “Groups that broke off. If the whole city is like this, we can’t just stay here. In a government boat, no less. We have to go help them!”

  Tom pointed out, “You can’t leave the ship yet. For your own safety.”

  “You guys haven’t heard the news?” Coalhouse’s eye was back in. He sounded sulky.

  “News?” Mártira’s innocent expression told me they hadn’t. “What news?”

  Before I could launch into an explanation, Evola came up behind me. “What’re we looking at?”

  “Look, any of you need medical attention?” I directed my question to Mártira.

  “Yes,” said a voice I hadn’t heard before.

  “Laura!” Mártira cried, looking around frantically at the sound of it.

  Another zombie girl materialized from within the crowd, her arm curled about the shoulders of a young dead boy. At first I thought she was wearing some sort of fanciful circus costume, something from a play or show. It wasn’t until she reached Mártira’s side, the smell of flowers intensifying, that I realized what it was.

  The girl was a walking garden. Flowers and vines had sprouted from within her very flesh, and were looped through hundreds of buttonholes and slits made in her shabby maroon gown for their passage. Once outside they were wrapped around her limbs and waist. The otherwise baggy dress was thus almost grafted to her, stems and thorns pinning the excess material to her body. A kerchief partially covered her apricot-hued hair, but her gentle, blood-bronzed features were readily visible. She might’ve been extremely pretty when she was alive. She looked about fourteen or so.

  “Whoa,” I heard Coalhouse breathe, sulkiness gone.

  “Dog was hurt.” The boy huddled closer to her at the sound of his name, refusing to look at any of us. “He won’t show me.”

  “Bring him.” Even Evola seemed to be transfixed by her.

  “You see?” Mártira said to Claudia. “Our sister knows what’s important.”

  Claudia opened her mouth to continue arguing, but then just shook her head and stormed away.

  “Brief them,” I told Tom and Coalhouse. “And stay with them.”

  We took Laura and Dog to one of the cloth-partitioned makeshift hospital rooms, walking by a few other repairs in process—a dead man’s leg being laced shut, a woman having a pump installed in her wrist for medication. She’d probably get a matching valve in her thigh for drainage. It took a lot of work to keep us going, work that Dr. Dearly had largely pioneered.

  “I need a better address than ‘by the fire hydrant in the Morgue,’ ” one tech said to her patient, pulling a curtain in front of us as we passed.

  Once we were alone we sat the boy, soon to be the latest recipient of Dr. Dearly’s work, on a stainless steel table. There we discovered his hand dangling from his wrist, useless, the bones crushed.

  “Oh God, Dog.” Laura turned her troubled eyes on us. “He never says anything. I didn’t know he got his hand under it. We were separated by a carriage for a minute. When I got to him he’d fallen down …”

  “It’s all right.” Evola started digging about in a nearby crash cart. “We could stabilize it with pins, or a splint. It won’t work, but it won’t do him any harm. Or …” He looked at the boy. “We could cut it off. Might be cleaner.”

  Dog appeared around ten years of age. He was dressed in a patchwork silk jacket and faded blue trousers, with a turban of dirty cloth wrapped about his head. At Evola’s suggestion he pulled the turban down over his eyes and tried to grasp onto Laura’s skirt again.

  “Dog.” Laura moved to hug him. “They’re trying to help.”

  It was a horrible decision, but one that had to be made. “Dog, I know you don’t know us, and I know it’s hard to think about. But a hand that doesn’t work is just going to get in your way. Doesn’t matter if it’s floppy or stiff. I think if we just set it, a couple weeks from now you’ll be so annoyed by it you’ll try to cut it off yourself. Might make it worse.”

  The boy shook his head violently.

  “Mr. Griswold is probably right,” Evola said. “Besides, maybe we could make you a replacement. We’ve done that before. Why, the young lady my friend here is courting? Her father’s got a whole fake leg made of metal. It is a thing of beauty, let me tell you.”

  The boy peeped out with one eye.

  “I bet Doc Sam would love to make a hand for you.” Probably not, but maybe Dr. Chase could persuade him. I smiled at Dog. “C’mon. You’re a big guy. What’s it going to be?”

  It took him a few minutes, but in the end he nodded before burrowing his face into Laura’s shoulder. She shut her eyes and held him.

  To Evola, I whispered, “Do it fast.”

  He nodded and withdrew a circular saw from the cart, before removing his monocle and replacing it with a pair of goggles. Then, with all the speed of a highly skilled nurse delivering a shot to a child, he darted in, grabbed the boy’s useless hand, and flick
ed the saw on.

  The second the saw started whirring, Dog rebelled. He started thrashing against Laura, who gasped and struggled to hold him closer. He bit her in retaliation, swift, scared strikes born of blind panic, managing only to earn himself a couple of mouthfuls of what was essentially salad.

  Quickly, before he could do any real damage, I pulled Laura away and took him into my own arms. His silent fit continued, but I was stronger. I managed to get a grip on his forearm and hold it out, steadying it so Evola could get to work.

  As the saw dug into the boy’s flesh, I encouraged him. “Go ahead. Bite me. I know you’re scared, and that’s okay. But you can’t bite the living, so bite me.”

  He did. He didn’t get through my clothes, but every nip brought back memories of being cornered and bitten in the mines down south—of the day I died, and got up again, and kept walking. Normally these were not memories I liked to dwell on, but today they offered me a strange sort of comfort. A sense of grounding. A reminder of what I was.

  I needed to remember what I was. What I was capable of if I forgot.

  When it was done, Evola wrapped up the stump. The boy eventually calmed down. The procedure couldn’t have hurt him badly—we could feel many things, but not a lot of pain, thankfully. All the ways it changed our bodies for the worse, the Laz at least extended us that one kindness.

  Laura looked at me. “Thank you.”

  I released Dog and stepped back. “No problem.”

  “Let’s get some meds in him before he goes,” Evola said, going for his faithful syringes. “He doesn’t have a wrist valve, and I don’t want to bother with one before the hand situation is resolved, so it’s going to have to be through the neck.”

  “I have some.” Laura reached into her pocket and drew out a vial of some purplish stuff. “At least we won’t use up yours.”

  Evola took the vial from her and squinted at it, studying its contents, before popping the rubber cork off with his thumb. He touched a finger to the liquid, then to his tongue.

  “What are you doing?” The sort of stuff that routinely went into all of us—preservatives, hydrating solutions, antibacterial fluid, the things Dr. Dearly had developed to keep us fresher, longer, as well as socially acceptable in terms of smell and texture—could not be good for living consumption.

  “It’s water, a little alcohol,” Evola declared, smacking his lips. “We’ve never used anything this color. Where did you get it?”

  The girl looked afraid, almost abashed, as if the situation was her fault. “A living person sold it to us. A lot of it—all he had. Mártira used almost all of the money we’d saved up to buy it. We’ve been going to the Morgue and giving it away.”

  The back of my neck tingled in anger. “Snake oil. Someone’s selling the undead fake drugs.”

  Evola took a cleansing breath. “Apparently.” He tossed the vial into a biohazard bin and told the dejected Laura, “Never you mind. We have plenty. And for the record, people pay what they can here. I’ve used my own money to get zombies their meds.”

  Laura appeared confused. “But Claudia said the living and the feds wouldn’t help us …”

  “Miss Claudia was wrong. Bram, hand me the usual cocktail?”

  Laura looked at the floor and lapsed into silence as I went to work. After a few minutes she asked, almost as if she couldn’t believe it, “You’re really a living doctor for the dead?”

  Evola finished Dog’s injections and grabbed a needle, threading it as he spoke. “Mmm. Only recently earned the title, but yes. Around here they call the surgeons and doctors who work directly on the dead ‘techs,’ as opposed to all the doctors who work behind the scenes on zombie research.” He started stitching up the tiny hole in Dog’s neck. “Few years ago I was studying to become a plastic surgeon, and putting myself through school by working for a funeral home. Sounds morbid, but my area of expertise was reconstructing corpses of people who’d had nasty deaths. Helps the family. Company Z recruited me before I was finished with my education. I was that good at mashing flesh together into something resembling a human being. A regular prodigy.”

  “So you weren’t scared when you saw the dead moving?”

  “Oh, first time I screamed like a girl.” Evola grinned at Dog. “But then I saw people I could help. Also, a way out of my mortuary insurance payments. Anyway, Mr. Dog, let me wrap up the hand so you can take it. Maybe later on we can mount your own skin on the prosthesis. You’ll look good as new. You’ll be Cyborg Dog! Stalwart defender of the playground!”

  Dog actually smiled.

  When we rejoined the rest of the “Changed,” it was to find the group newly somber and uncommunicative. Tom and Coalhouse must’ve broken the news. By noon they were anxious to get off the boat, and insisted that we allow them to gather abovedecks. We’d cleaned up and medicated as many as would let us, and an inspection of the group reassured us of the fact that no biters had gotten on board, so we let them.

  The biters were still being cleaned up down on the dock, put in irons and led away. There were a few the army didn’t bother with right away, and I knew they had to be dead. The sight of their prone bodies occasioned whispers and sobs among those remaining. I hoped they were all victims of the living, as horrible as that idea was—I didn’t want to think that Tom or I had killed any.

  Once the army finally fortified the barricade, the Christine lowered her gangplank. The undead disembarked as soon as it was safe for them to do so.

  Mártira came to thank me before departing. “Laura told us Dog should expect to hear from you. Ours is the large house on Ramee Street. You are always welcome.”

  “Come on. We need to go,” Claudia called to her. She was waiting with Laura and Dog by the gangplank. Laura had her arms wrapped self-consciously through the vines growing around her waist. Coalhouse was standing a short distance from her, practically drinking her in with his eye.

  “Same here,” I told Mártira. “I’ll be in touch. And if you could tell us where you found that grifter …”

  “It’s in the past. We’ll just be wiser next time.” She shook her head. “The medicine hawker scammed us, yes, but perhaps he had a family to feed. A sick mother. I’ll never know. He was a traveling man, and I dealt with him weeks ago. He must be far from here by now.”

  “That’s … generous,” was all I could think to say.

  The red-haired zombie shrugged. “Ever since dying, I find it very easy to forgive. Which is why I can’t believe my brothers would …” It seemed she wanted to say something more, but in the end stuck with, “I’m so sorry.”

  “Wish I could say the same.” Still, she struck me as idealistic to the point of foolishness. “But I don’t want that guy stealing from anyone else.”

  “Very true. But my main concern right now is getting my brothers and sisters home. Protecting them.” Mártira looked into my eyes for a moment longer before curtsying. “Take care, Mr. Griswold.” She joined her sisters, and all three swept away.

  Havelock appeared seconds after she left. His face was puffy and starting to bruise. “I should report you to the authorities,” he huffed.

  “Are you going to?” I was too tired to argue with him. I just wanted to know. “The army’s right down there. I’m sure a guy named Norton would love to talk to you.”

  The boy glanced out over the ocean, and decided, “No. Because you did save my hide. I guess.” He sniffed. “I do want a new chip, though.”

  “You got it.” I pointed to the ramp. “Now get lost.”

  He did so. Evola came over to stand with me near the barbette and watch him go. “I heard that kid talking. Is it true you punched him?”

  “Yeah.” I was calmer now—calm enough to regret my actions, to recognize how depressingly similar they were to the actions of the zombies I’d just had to take care of. “I know I shouldn’t have. Ever since we came to New London, I … it’s harder. There’s something about this place that makes the Laz flare. It’s too crowded. Too big.” Yet ano
ther reason I liked to keep the boats at my back.

  “You’re, what, eighteen now?” he asked, and I nodded. “Christ, I’m only six years older than you. I feel about forty.” Evola sighed. “So I’m telling you this as a friend, not someone in charge. You need to be careful for the very simple reason that up here, jail is not what you have to worry about. You’re a Punk. You served in the New Victorian army, yes, which is why they’re letting you stay here, but the two tribes are still enemies. If you get caught up in something, they’ll deport you.”

  He wasn’t telling me anything I didn’t know. He was right. The royals would jump at the chance to get rid of me. And where would I go? The Punks destroyed zombies on sight—and I couldn’t go home. My mother and my little sisters probably thought I was truly dead, and thank God if they did. It was healthier for them. Healthier for me. A clean break.

  And I couldn’t lose Nora. I loved her. I’d yet to say the words, because I didn’t want to freak her out—it’d only been a few months, after all. But I knew I loved her. Needed her. I didn’t need food, or water, or even oxygen, but I needed her. I’d never met a more spirited, intelligent, accepting, drop-dead-again beautiful girl in my life. She was my first, my everything, the thing that made me actually pray in church and try to tolerate the city and put up with her tribe’s insane courtship rules—which all seemed to boil down to “if you like a girl, you basically can’t do anything in public to show her how you feel.” Lord, I was getting sick of having to tiptoe around them. Especially when the Apocalyptic ride we were all currently on was showing no signs of slowing down anytime soon. My time was short. I didn’t want to waste it.

  “Right,” I said, recalling myself. “I’ll be smart. But I think we’ve got more important things to worry about than my small-town transplant angst.”

  Evola ran his fingers through his hair. “I know. That little boy. What a mess.” He returned his eyes to the zombies marching down the dock. “I hope they make it through this.”