A Boy and His Corpse

by Richard B. Knight

  “Don’t you call me an idiot!”

  “Stop it!” Alan shouted. “I’m so sick of the two of you arguing!”

  Without thinking, Alan lifted his hand and the two dead agents in the corner began to shake. They then pushed themselves up and got to their feet. Their eyes remained closed and their mouths were downturned, but they still stood. Everybody gasped, but Herbert gasped the loudest.

  “I’m—I’m not doing that,” Herbert gaped. “Are you, Alan?”

  Alan didn’t respond. A fresh sheen of sweat appeared on his brow as he focused his attention on the two dead agents. Alan’s hands shook. He’d never been inside two – make that three – bodies before. He felt like a spider, and trying to control eight legs at once made his head ache. He released his hold on Mort but remained inside the other two. Their bodies were thick and clunky. Each time he blinked, they took a step forward. He watched them travel up the stairs in jerky motions—left foot, blink, right foot, blink, left foot, blink, right foot, blink. They moved like The March of the Wooden Soldiers.

  When they reached the top of the stairs, they went into the living room. Alan had Agent Covington sit on the floor, Indian style and he made Agent Heinzelman go into the kitchen to open the top cabinet. That’s where the scent-killing lemon spray lived. Just as he opened the cabinet, there was a sudden knock on the front door.

  “Open up,” a woman shouted from outside. “We know you’re in there.”

  Alan completely lost his concentration and his mind returned to the basement. Upstairs, there was the sound of a body hitting the floor. When Alan came back from his haze, he saw his father, mother, and James staring up at the ceiling.

  “Who do you think it is?” Lorraine whispered.

  “I already told you, it’s your agents,” James said. “They probably waited until all the black cars left before they made a move.”

  Alan looked to his father who returned his look. But instead of fear in his eyes, there was pride. A smile creased his face.

  “How did it feel?” his father asked as the knocking continued.

  “It felt…odd,” Alan said.

  “Uh, hello, we have a major problem here,” Lorraine said.

  “No, we don’t,” James said, and he, too, turned to Alan.

  The knocking grew louder.

  “What do you mean?” Lorraine asked. “They’re probably going to knock down the door at this rate.”

  “Let them,” James said. “The ball’s in our corner now. As long as we play this right, we’ll get exactly what we want. Can you pick up the body upstairs again?” he asked Alan.

  “I—I think so,” Alan said.

  “Good. Then do it,” James said. “And Herbert, get Mr. Rovas on the phone. It’s time to make some demands.”

  “Demands?” Lorraine asked. “How can we make demands?”

  “Because we finally have our second necromancer,” James said, smiling. “Call the man.”

  President Rosewater

  President Rosewater sat in the back seat of a bulletproof, black car with a clenched jaw. His driver flew through a busy intersection in front of a mall complex, and four more black cars followed in their wake.

  “Sir, are you alright?” The secret serviceman driving asked. He was a blond man who couldn’t be older than 35. His black suit hugged his broad shoulders and Rosewater could see his blue eyes in the rearview mirror. The President shook his head to the question. He couldn’t stop trembling.

  “Adams, just g-g-get me to the address I gave you,” the President said. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  Adam’s partner, Hernandez, a Hispanic man with a shaved head and piercing brown eyes, sat to the right of the President. He was the same man who had cleaned the blood off the President’s suit after the leader of free world had jumped into the car after a full on sprint down Herbert’s street. Hernandez folded up his blood-stained handkerchief and tucked it in his pocket. He didn’t ask any questions. That wasn’t his job.

  “Turn right,” the GPS device said in a robotic voice.

  The driver turned right and down the entrance ramp onto Route 80.

  What if he’s not there? Rosewater thought before he said, “He has to be there,” to himself. Hernandez gave him a furtive glance

  “Do you want me to call the vice-president for you, sir?” The Hispanic man asked.

  “No, no,” Rosewater said. This has gotten big enough.”No need for that.”

  Rosewater grimaced as he replayed the grizzly scene at Herbert’s house in his head. The corpse’s hand went right through Agent Heinzelman’s back. Luckily, the man was expendable since he was a member of the Undead Militia and officially off the books. That’s why Rosewater went in alone with just the two of them. If something bad happened, nobody would ask for them or miss them. The Undead Militia called for a lonely existence. At least, that’s what Mr. Rovas had once told him.

  Speaking of Mr. Rovas, the town they were headed for was in the exact opposite direction of Mandolin Arsenal. The President didn’t even know how to get inside the secret, underground base. He did, however, know Mr. Rovas’ home address.

  “My house number is 742 Milburn Lane in Denville, New Jersey,” Mr. Rovas had told him on his second meeting with him. “I’m only telling you this in case you need to see me. And I’m talking end of the world, need to see me.”

  President Rosewater still remembered their first encounter. How could he forget? They met in a White House bathroom. Rosewater had been in office for little over a month when he met the man with long, black hair and cargo pants washing his hands at a sink.

  Rosewater nodded to him and headed for a stall. The man at the sink did the strangest thing imaginable. He followed him inside.

  “What in the—” Rosewater said, but Mr. Rovas put his wet hand over his mouth before he could finish the sentence. The man smelled like lemons.

  “Shhh-” Mr. Rovas had told him in the cramped stall. “I have something to show you.”

  Oh, God, Rosewater remembered thinking.

  The man pulled out a phone from his pants and showed him a series of short videos featuring former Presidents observing the undead moving. They watched on as a short black man controlled the shambling corpses by merely throwing out his hand. Legions of the undead moved at his command in what looked like an underground silo. That man was Herbert Chandler.

  Damn him, Rosewater thought as his driver took the exit off at Denville. He ruined everything.

  Mr. Rovas was right. Trying to force Herbert’s son into this was a bad idea. The President still didn’t know what he was going to say to Mr. Rovas once he saw him, especially with all these secret servicemen present. But the man had an obligation to do something.

  “Turn right,” the GPS said. The driver made a right past a Burger King.

  I really should have taken that damn call when I had the chance.

  “According to this GPS, we’re almost there,” the driver said. Rosewater turned around in his seat and watched the procession of cars that followed. It was now or nothing.

  The driver went straight until he reached a row of houses, each one cozier than the last. Rosewater stared out intently. For some reason, he imagined Mr. Rovas living in an isolated cabin like the Unabomber, not in a quaint neighborhood like this.

  “You have now reached your destination,” the GPS device said.

  “This is it,” the blond driver said. “Should I park on the side?”

  “Yes,” Rosewater said. “Both of you stay here unless I give the command to come out. I will only be a few minutes.”

  The secret serviceman next to him shook his head.

  “I’m sorry, sir, but we can’t let you do that. Not this time.”

  The President was about to say something, but he resigned himself to nodding instead.

  Seven forty-two Milburn Lane was a modest, yellow, two floor house. A grey Oldsmobile sat in the driveway. He reached into his pocket and finagled out his secret phone. He called it an
d waited, but nobody answered.

  “Dammit,” Rosewater said, hanging up. The lights were on inside the house, and the President wondered if he should just get out and knock.

  “Is there a problem, sir?” The driver asked.

  “No, there’s no problem,” Rosewater grumbled. He called again and nobody picked up.

  “Dammit,” Rosewater said again. “Stay here,” he told the agents, but they both got out anyway.

  The other black cars stopped behind his and those secret servicemen got out, too.

  “No, no, no. All of you just stay in your cars unless I give the order to come out,” he said.

  Across the street, people started looking out their windows. Some of them made phone calls.

  Oh, God, this is getting too big.

  More people started to show their faces and some even came out on their front lawns. It wasn’t often (or ever) that the President and his secret servicemen came to Denville, New Jersey.

  “Mr. President!” a man wearing basketball shorts called out. His breath was visible in the cold air.

  “Mr. President!” a woman called wearing a red Bubble goose jacket.

  The President waved to the burgeoning crowd and smiled. “Nothing to see here, people.”

  All the while, his heart raced so fast that he feared he was going to have a heart attack.

  When he saw a teenager holding his phone up in front of his face, Rosewater blanched.

  Good, Lord. He’s filming this!

  Rosewater motioned for a pale, red-headed secret serviceman to come closer. He ran up to the President.

  “Yes, sir?” the man asked.

  “Please tell the men to deal with these people. Especially that kid over there. Do you see him? No, don’t look. Over there! The one with the phone. He’s filming this. Take the camera away from him, but do it gently. We don’t need this getting on the evening news.”

  Rosewater watched his red-headed secret serviceman walk over to the others, and they made their way toward the people.

  What a mess.

  “Adams, Hernandez, let’s go,” Rosewater pointed at the two secret servicemen he drove in with. The three of them made their way to the front door. Hernandez pulled out his gun.

  “Put that away,” Rosewater said with a downward swipe. “This is a personal friend of mine.” I hope. “I don’t want you scaring him.”

  The man lowered his gun, but didn’t put it away, and Rosewater knew that was the best he was going to get. The three of them crept their way up the grass.

  Adams walked shoulder-to-shoulder with the President, keeping as close as possible. When they reached the front door, a crack of thunder rattled the sky. Strangely enough, the lightning followed the thunder.

  “Whoa!” Somebody said in the background. “Did you just see that?”

  Adams looped his arm inside the President’s and began pulling him away from the house.

  “Stop! I have to talk to him,” the President said.

  “Negative,” Hernandez said as he looped his arm around the President’s other arm.

  By the time they dragged the President half way across the front lawn, Mr. Rovas’ front door opened. Rosewater dug his heels into the dirt and nearly tripped everyone up.

  “Come on, get in here!” Mr. Rovas said at the front door. “Hurry up inside!”

  “You heard the man,” Rosewater shouted at Adams. “Let’s go.”

  The two secret servicemen looked at each other, and then moved forward with the President. All the while, Rosewater’s heart thumped like a machine gun.

  Herbert

  James slapped a cell phone into Herbert’s hand. “When we’re ready, you’re going to call Rovas.”

  Bargaining with Mr. Rovas still didn’t seem like the greatest idea in the world to Herbert, but now that James was in charge, that’s how it looked like it was going to be.

  “You sure you don’t want me to control them,” Herbert asked James as he glanced over at Alan who sat Indian style in the middle of basement floor. The two dead agents were still upstairs and a weak, green aura encircled his son’s body.

  The knocking at the front door turned into blunt shoulder ramming.

  “No,” James said. “Alan has to do this for himself. If he doesn’t, then all of this will be for nothing.”

  “All of what?” Herbert asked.

  “Our plans,” James huffed. “Jeez, I thought you didn’t want robots taking over your job. Did you really mean that or were you just talking out your ass?”

  Alan groaned and the green aura around his body flickered.

  “Is he in pain?” Lorraine asked, referring to her sweating and grimacing son who had his eyes clamped tight.

  James didn’t answer her question. Herbert sympathized with his son.

  You’re concentrating too damn hard, boy. Loosen up like you did before.

  Herbert remembered the phone in his hand. “Should I make the call now?” He asked.

  “Not yet,” James said. “I want to make sure that first time he moved the bodies wasn’t a fluke. Come on, Alan. You can do it.”

  Alan didn’t respond and the pounding on the door upstairs continued.

  Herbert hoped his next-door neighbor, Fernando, wasn’t home. Fernando recently had his house broken into. The last thing Herbert needed was for him to call the cops about a disturbance next door. He had no idea how he would explain the two dead bodies.

  “If Alan doesn’t—” Herbert began, but stopped the moment he heard the door fly open upstairs. It was followed by the loud footsteps of the Agents rushing in the house.

  “Oh, my God,” came a woman’s shrill voice upstairs. “Oh, my God!”

  “Okay, Alan, NOW!” James said, bending down and squeezing Alan’s arm. “Bring them down here.”

  There was the sound of shuffling upstairs followed by a male’s struggling voice.

  “Get the hell offa me,” the man said. “Lemme go!”

  “Bring ‘em down, Alan,” James said and Alan nodded.

  So he WAS listening the whole time then, Herbert thought.

  In the corner, Herbert noticed that Mort nodded along with Alan. Was his son still inside all three corpses? If so, then it was no wonder he looked so fatigued. Going from one corpse to several was incredibly rough on the body, and Herbert always felt wasted whenever he commanded a large batch of corpses.

  “Somebody please…open the basement door,” Alan said flatly with his eyes still closed.

  “Oh, yes, of course,” James said before bounding up the steps. The door opened and James came back down grinning.

  A woman with a red ponytail and a black suit came down first with her arms held behind her back. A zombified, Agent Heinzelman, kept her captive.

  “Oh, don’t hurt her, Alan,” Lorraine said. “She’s not a bad person.”

  Lorraine was about to touch Alan’s shoulder but James grabbed her wrist.

  “Don’t,” he told her. “He needs to keep his concentration. Alan, put her in the corner.”

  Agent Heinzelman forced his captive over next to Mort.

  “You won’t get away with this,” she said.

  The next Agent that came down the steps made them creak so loudly that Herbert was afraid they would snap and trap them all in the basement. The Agent’s gut bounced and wobbled as he was brought down the stairs with his arms held behind his back. Agent Covington’s broken neck bobbled back and forth like a spring as he hurried the fat man into the corner with his partner.

  Lorraine smiled at the scene.

  “Now you I don’t mind being captured,” she said to the obese Agent. “Serves you right, you fat thing.”

  “Daaaaad,” Alan croaked.

  “Yes, son?”

  “Can you…take over for me…Just for a little while. Please?”

  “Sure, son,” Herbert said. “Drop connection in three, two, one.”

  Herbert felt the spirit of his son retreat from the corpses as he jumped inside of them. It took l
ess than a second.

  “Can you still make the call while you’re inside them?” James asked. Herbert nodded.

  “What do you want me to say to him?”

  “Tell them that we have his new necromancer.”

  “Fine.” Herbert said. “Is that it?”

  “No. Also tell him that we have demands he has to meet if he wants Alan on his side.”

  “Demands like what?”

  “Just call him.”

  “How are you feeling?” Lorraine asked Alan.

  “I’ll live,” Alan said, turning his head from side to side, stretching his neck. He turned his attention to his father. “Make sure you let him know that I still want my wrestling league. I’m going to take a short nap.” He lay down and put his hands behind his head.

  A part of Herbert wanted to shake his son. “What did I tell you about that wrestling crap, boy?” But another, even deeper part of Herbert wanted to reach down and give his son the biggest hug of his life. Here was Alan, his only child, finally digging deep within himself and moving corpses. And, not only that, but he was also still as tenacious as ever about starting an Undead Wrestling League. In that moment, Herbert made a pledge to himself. One way or another, he would get his son that wrestling league. Even if nobody saw it (as nobody could see it since no one could know that corpses walked the Earth), he would still make sure that his son had it, one way or another. Mr. Rovas could go to Hell.

  “And what do you want out of all this, boy?” Herbert asked James. “I know you aren’t doing this out of the goodness of your heart.”

  “You’ll find out after you call him,” James said. “Just make the call, get him on the line and then shut up. Dial and put it on speaker. I’ve got some things I want to say to that man.”

  “If you’re going to do all the talking, then why don’t you just call him yourself then?” Herbert asked.

  “Because he doesn’t have Mr. Rovas number. Isn’t that right, James?” The red haired Agent in the corner said. “He never gave it to you because he knew he couldn’t trust you. Traitor.”

  James paid her no mind. “Make the call,” he told Herbert.