Plaguesville, USA

by Jim LaVigne

  —ad for Securo-Max Corporation service, circa 2050

  Lumler had never liked it when people talked about him as if he wasn’t there. It reminded him of when he was a little kid in the pediatrician’s office with his mom and the doctor telling her that her son was big-boned and had better watch it or he’d get fat when he grew up. Like he was livestock, or some kind of science project. Like he wasn’t there.

  At the moment, though, there wasn’t much he could do about it. Santiago had led him a twisted way to this place, a big abandoned warehouse on the south side of town, and then asked him to wait. They’d found some clothes that fit Lumler (not an easy feat) in a half-burned store along the way so that now, instead of his snappy black uniform, he sported a cheap suit, brown, ill-fitting, and of a style popular about twenty years ago.

  Adamantly not thinking about what he’d done and what the repercussions would be, he’d sat in the big empty space and listened to the little sounds of rats, dripping water, and the faint pop of rifle shots from somewhere outside. He’d started when a police siren suddenly blared forth from somewhere not far away, but then the noise had receded and faded out and he’d relaxed. He’d been waiting for an hour or so when finally the sound of hushed voices and footsteps told him that Santiago had returned. And he’d brought his friends.

  Now, sitting between a group of Santiago and six other men and women, he tried to sit still and keep his face flat as they debated his fate. Still, it felt just like the pediatrician. With an effort, he shook off the thought and listened to the argument. It didn’t sound too promising:

  “He’s a fucking Pig!” one of the group said. This was a short, thin black man with a shaved head and very intense dark eyes. “And you know what these fuckers do! Or have you all forgotten Miss Sarah and Fat Billy and the others? I say we shoot his ass right now, have done with it, and dump him in the fuckin’ river.”

  Another man, this one older, white, with a sort of scholarly air to him, nodded at the other man’s statement. “He’s right, Santiago,” he said solemnly. “I don’t normally condone capital violence, but this man is obviously a plant, a cheap effort to infiltrate our group. Yes, I think Daniel is right. Get rid of him now, before they can trace him to us.”

  “Now, hold on, Prof,” said a woman, a tallish gal, maybe forty years old, not bad looking but with a severe sort of aura. She walked up to Lumler and eyed him with a sneer before turning back to her comrades. “Maybe we can use this Pig. We could ransom him, for one thing, or we could even turn him, send him back to the Governor as a double agent. At the very least, we could sell him to the cannibals out by the East Gate. You know they got those AK bullets we need.”

  “Oh, come on, Still,” said Santiago, walking forward. “Get real! I mean, do we really want to stoop to that? Do we want to be as bad as the people we’re fighting?”

  Cowed, the six men and women shuffled and mumbled. Apparently his friend held some sway with these folks. That was good. Santiago let them grumble for a little while and then spoke up again.

  “Look, everyone,” he said reasonably. “I know this isn’t easy for you to wrap your heads around. The PF are responsible for a hell of a lot of pain, misery, and death. That’s a fact. But here’s another fact: People make choices and people can change. And Doug made a choice, understand? When he saved my life, when he gunned down another PF officer, he made a choice. And he changed.”

  Santiago paused—for effect, Lumler supposed—before continuing. “Now, I think that each of you should ask yourselves a question: What are we doing here? What’s our purpose?”

  He waited for a moment and the little black dude, Daniel, finally answered.

  “Overthrow the Governor,” he said, as if this was self-evident. “Reform New America. Ever’body knows that.”

  “Exactly!” said Santiago, raising one forefinger. “Overthrow and Reform. That’s what we’re all about. Not politics, not squabbling with each other. We don’t have that sort of luxury, know what I mean? So here’s the deal, either we accept Doug—and let him tell us all about the PF, how they work, their routines and little secrets—or we can turn him out and lose all that juicy intelligence. And for a measly couple of boxes of ammo? Well, you decide. But if you ask me? You’ll let him join, no question.”

  The others, with varying expressions of distaste and concentration, listened to Santiago’s little speech and then, nodding and talking softly with each other, withdrew to another part of the warehouse. Santiago stayed with Lumler. When the others were out of earshot, he grinned at his friend and slapped him on the shoulder.

  “Pretty good speech, huh?” he whispered.

  Lumler scowled. “What,” he hissed, “was all that shit about me tellin’ ‘em all about the PF? We never agreed to that!”

  “Hey, look,” said Santiago. “I had to give ‘em something, didn’t I? They aren’t just gonna say ‘what the fuck, let’s let the former Second in Charge of the Police Force in on our cabal to overthrow society’, now are they? Besides, what did you think? We were just gonna forget about it? Forget that you were Deputy Chief? I mean, we gotta use every weapon we got, man!”

  Lumler scowled some more, but his friend was right, as usual. “Yeah, OK,” he said finally. “But I ain’t too crazy about it. Some o’ them guys are pretty decent dudes, you know?”

  “Only some of ‘em?”

  “Yeah, well, a lot of ‘em—shit, most of ‘em—are just big dumbass goons, but still. I mean, the PF has almost a hundred guys, not all of ‘em are assholes. An’ don’t forget that a lot of these dudes were just plain shanghaied into it. They showed up here in New America and no matter what they’d been Before, if they were big guys they got stuck on the PF. Shit, look at me! I was a damn warehouse grunt! Think I really wanted to be a cop?”

  “I know, I know,” said Santiago. “That happened to everybody. We all have our jobs to do, all that crap. But like you said yourself, most of ‘em are goons and assholes, right?”

  “More or less. I mean, they’re none of ‘em somebody I’d like dating my sister or anything, if I had one, but some of ‘em ain’t so bad. Like there’s this one guy, Wilson, over in the Eighth Sector? An’ he’s—”

  Santiago interrupted him with an upraised hand. “Quiet,” he whispered. “Looks like they’re comin’ back.”

  Lumler looked at the six as they came back into the room and tried not to glare. Besides the ones whose names he knew, the Professor, Daniel, and the hard woman called Still (short, no doubt, for Stiletto), there was a short, older Hispanic guy, a tall, gangly, horsy sort of gal, and an old gray-haired lady dressed in Agro coveralls. All in all, he had to say, not the most imposing bunch by any means. But then, they’d been giving the Governor and the PF fits for almost a year now, so maybe looks didn’t count for much in this case. At any rate, whatever their names and abilities, they seemed to have come to some sort of decision. The woman called Still came out from the group as spokesperson.

  “OK, here’s the deal,” she said tersely. “We decided to keep him. Cause yer right, Santiago, this dude is way too valuable to just trade away to slavers. But we got a couple o’ stipulations.”

  “Such as?” asked Santiago.

  “Well,” said Still, eying Lumler, “first we wanna have a nice long chat with the former Sergeant. See what he can tell us, right? And if he gives us somethin’ good, somethin’ we can really use? Well, then we’ll see how it goes from there. How’s that sound?”

  Lumler scowled but stayed quiet. He didn’t much like the idea of being grilled by these people, but then he was pretty sure that they weren’t the type of people to use torture, either, so it didn’t worry him overmuch. Santiago shrugged and looked at his friend.

  “Well, Doug?” he said. “Up to you, I guess.”

  “OK by me,” said Lumler evenly. “But I wouldn’t waste a whole lotta time, neither. Cause Reform or no Reform, if the Army don’t stop the deformos, if they lose the War, well, you ain’t gonna have nothin’ left
to reform. Get me?”

  “Yes, well,” said the older man, the Prof, “we have our own plans in that respect. But for the present, what say we have some lunch. And then? A nice long, detailed discussion.”

  “Fine,” said Lumler, rising, his stomach gurgling. “What you guys got to eat around here, anyway?”

  Santiago laughed. “Oh, you’re gonna love it,” he said. “All the tofu you can eat!”

  Lumler muttered a curse. “Figures.”

  Chapter Fifty

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  Justin had never thought about the word or used it very often, thinking it overused and often trite, but, looking at the mind-bending state of the great mine chamber before him, the term ‘surreal’ most definitely came to mind. That or nightmarish. Because the huge area, maybe a hundred yards long by fifty wide, with an uneven ceiling some thirty feet up, was, just as Cass had said, decorated and fully equipped for some kind of party. Crepe streamers of all colors hung from the jagged ceiling, a series of tables, laid with festive place settings and mixed, haphazard decorations (a Santa Claus next to a big Valentine’s heart, a Hanukah menorah alongside a bridal display), had been set out, complete with folding chairs, and balloons of every shape and size bobbed and waved in the stinking, dank air. Yes, definitely surreal.

  At one end of the chamber were positioned what looked like tables of honor, three in all, set in a T shape, with even more garish and outlandish decorations. The place was glaringly lit as well, with a whole bank of big work lights casting knife-edged shadows of the streamers and balloons. From one corner came the wildly incongruous sounds of a sing-song recording of children’s music. Justin was pretty sure it was The Bear Went Over the Mountain.

  Naturally, all of this would have been odd enough, down at the bottom of an abandoned mine shaft as it was, but what put it over the top were the assembled party-goers. Like something out of a bad dream, the various twisted, freakish residents of this place gathered at most of the tables were as adorned as the chamber itself; funny conical hats, paper leis, goofy glasses and mustaches, little cowboy Stetsons. They looked like some crazy person’s idea of kids at a ten year old’s birthday party.

  More ominously, Justin saw that, placed in the middle of the chamber at about ten yard intervals, there were eight ten-foot tall wooden poles, old telephone poles, probably, that had been set firmly into the dirt floor. Lashed to each of these, hands above their heads and looking both scared and ridiculous in party hats and fright wigs, was a human being. Men and women, they were a mixed bunch, but most wore the remains of soldiers’ camouflage uniforms and all were more or less beat up, bruised and wounded. With a start, being hustled past these unfortunates, he saw that one of them was the Small Man, the one who’d kidnapped Lampert. He stared at the man, but the other was glaring at nothing, a spot on the ground, and didn’t seem to notice.

  Jostled along by a trio of gigantic, smelly, tentacle-armed beings, Justin, Teresa, Erin, and Cass were led past all of this to the head table, where only two chairs were currently occupied. At the end, in a ridiculously ostentatious, throne-like chair, festooned with feathers and glitter and balloons, sat a smallish man, beaming like a bridegroom, dressed in the complete costume of a Medieval king. Very pale, with long blond hair all matted and clumped together, this individual was flanked to his right by none other than Mr. Howard Lampert. Looking pissed-off and not all that well, sort of pale and listless, the Old Man looked up as the others approached and shook his head.

  “Jesus fuckin’ Christ,” he said quietly. “If this don’t beat all, I don’t know what fuckin’ does. I mean, holy shit Doc, am I wrong, or is this about the craziest fuckin’ thing ya ever saw or what?”

  Justin tried to rush forward to Lampert’s side but one of the big deformed guys grabbed him and forced him into a chair, two spots down from the head on the other side of the table, and jammed a ridiculous pointed party hat onto his head. Desperately, Justin leaned over the table.

  “Are you alright, sir?” he asked, watching the Old Man critically. “I was told you were not so well.”

  “Just a cold,” said Lampert brusquely. “Bit of a cough.”

  “Yes, well,” Justin said, but then the strange man at the head of the table cut him off. Standing up, the man in the king outfit grinned at each of them, nodding and bowing, before raising a pink plastic cup.

  “I bid you all welcome,” he called, in a dreamy, lilting way. “And thank you for coming to my Birthday Party! Yeah!”

  At this, the ensemble of malformed party guests hooted and clapped and made disgusting, sloppy noises of approval. King Suit waved them to silence.

  “This year,” he said, “we are lucky to have so many new friends! But sadly, the Emperor Johnson, Lord of the Underground, King of the Mutants, Brother to Jesus Christ and the Savior of the World, has not had the pleasure of making each one’s company! So, why don’t all of you be nice new buddies and stand up and tell us your names?”

  Justin looked around the table, but the others, sitting there in their wildly incongruous little party hats and garish leis, all looked too stunned to speak. Finally Justin cleared his throat and, feeling the stares of dozens of eyes, both normal and deformed, stood up.

  “Uh, my name is Dr. Justin Kaes,” he said, trying to summon a smile. “I’m an epidemiologist from New Atlanta.”

  “Isn’t that interesting?” gushed the man, Johnson. “You meet so many interesting people these days, don’t you think? I do! Now what about you ladies?” he asked, addressing Teresa, Erin, and Cass. Justin was shoved back down into his seat.

  Erin Swails hesitated and then stood up and gave her name.

  “Erin,” said King Suit contemplatively. “That’s another name for Ireland, did you know that?”

  Swails nodded indulgently. “Yes, I did know that,” she said deliberately. “My, uh, mother was Irish.”

  “Fascinating!” said King Suit. He seemed to zone out for a moment, staring glassily at nothing, before recovering and looking down at Teresa. “And what about this charming lady? Are you Irish, too? What’s your name?”

  Teresa looked helplessly at Justin, but he could only shrug. Finally she half-stood from her place, mumbled her name, and sat back down.

  “Teresa, is it?” said their host. “Why, that’s a very pretty name. Do people ever call you Terry?”

  Teresa glared at the man. “No,” she said. “Not nobody.”

  “Nobody but me!” said King Suit, grinning. “Because I think Terry is even better than Teresa. And since it’s my birthday, I get to decide.” Teresa glowered but remained silent. King Suit went on. “And this other lady I already know, so that takes care of the introductions. Best of all, though, we have a very special new friend! Everyone, let me introduce you to Mr. Howard Johnson… my grandpa!”

  The throng of weirdos clapped and hooted and slobbered as Lampert gave a half-hearted wave. Initially confused, Justin then tipped to the ruse and nodded and smiled slightly; the clever old bastard! He’d managed to convince this maniac that he was his grandfather! Howard Johnson indeed! But what would come of it?

  As King Suit rose and started passing out miscellaneous bottles of soda, liquor, and other beverages, Justin looked down and saw that, among the party favors and confetti on the table were scattered packages of pre-Fall food. His stomach rumbling, suddenly oblivious, he grabbed a pack of chocolate frosted Krillo Kakes, tore it open, and devoured the sweet, only slightly stale food. Following his example, the others snatched up their own chips and cookies and crackers; who knew when they’d get another chance to eat? And food from Before was not to be passed up, even under the strangest of circumstances.

  Fi
nally King Suit (Justin categorically refused to even think of him as Emperor anything), having doled out the libations, resumed his place at the head of the table. From over in the corner, the scratchy, ancient record player cranked up another ghastly children’s favorite, Teddy Bear’s Picnic, and the deformed party guests all noisily and messily drank their drinks. King Suit himself opened a dusty old liter bottle of vodka with a flourish, and then tipped it up and downed almost a third of it in one long guzzle. Justin stared in horror; a drunken madman? That couldn’t be good.

  With a belch, King Suit slammed the bottle down on the table and wiped his mouth on the sleeve of his regal robe. Up close, Justin could see that the costume was stained and flecked with food crumbs and other, less identifiable, bits of matter.

  This and the alcohol use aside, though, it was starting to look like this Johnson person might not be as bad as he’d feared. Eccentric, perhaps, maybe very, very eccentric, but not apparently violent or dangerous. Maybe this would work out after all. He was considering talking to the man, mainly to satisfy at least some of his curiosity about these people and their astounding deformities, when King Suit, having downed another inch of vodka from the bottle, stood up again and waved everyone quiet.

  “And now, my friends and relations,” he said cheerily. “It’s time for me to open one of my presents! Hooray!”

  Again the congregation of the deformed applauded and made nasty sounds of encouragement. Justin was thinking that this didn’t sound so bad, unwrapping a gift of some kind, when Johnson, leaving his ridiculous throne, suddenly whipped out a large and very sharp-looking kitchen carving knife. With a look in his eyes that made Justin’s hair stand on end, he gazed at the blade for a long moment and then, skipping, flounced away toward the center of the chamber.

  Justin looked at Lampert. “What’s he doing?” he hissed. “What’s he going to do with that knife?”

  “How the fuck should I know?” hissed back the Old Man. “Cut somethin’, most likely.”