The Year's Best Dark Fantasy and Horror, 2010

by Elizabeth Bear

  “But what if—suppose we could duplicate what happened to me? Not just once, but over and over—even if only for ten or fifteen seconds at a time—interfere with whatever it’s doing, seriously fuck with it.”

  “Then what?” the Lieutenant said. “We’re a thorn in its side. So?”

  “Sir,” Davis said, “those soldiers hit it. Okay, yes, their fire wasn’t any more effective than ours was, but I’m willing to bet their percentages were significantly higher. That’s what me being on board in an—enhanced way did to the thing. We wouldn’t be a thorn—we’d be the goddamned bayonet Han jammed in its ribs.

  “Not that we should wait for someone else to take it down. I’m proposing something more ambitious.”

  “All right.”

  “If we can disrupt the thing’s routine—especially if we cut into its feeding—

  it won’t take very long for it to want to find us. Assuming the second part of my experience—the thing has a look through our eyes—if that happens again, we can arrange it so that we let it know where we’re going to be. We pick a location with a clearing where the thing can land and surrounding tree cover where we can wait to ambush it. Before any of us goes to ruin the thing’s day, he puts pictures, maps, satellite photos of the spot on display, so that when the thing’s staring out of his eyes, that’s what it sees. If the same images keep showing up in front of it, it should get the point.”

  The Lieutenant took the rest of his meal to reply. Han offered no comment. When the Lieutenant had settled into his chair after tilting his tray into the garbage and stacking it on top of the can, he said, “I don’t know, Davis. There are an awful lot more ifs than I prefer to hear in a plan. If we can access the thing the same way you did; if that wasn’t a fluke. If the thing does the reverse-vision stuff; if it understands what we’re showing it. If we can find a way to kill it.” He shook his head.

  “Granted,” Davis said, “there’s a lot we’d have to figure out, not least how to put it down and keep it down. I have some ideas about that, but nothing developed. It would be nice if we could control our connection to the thing, too. I’m wondering if what activates the jump is some chemical our bodies are releasing when they’re under stress—maybe adrenaline. If we had access to a supply of adrenaline, we could experiment with doses—”

  “You’re really serious about this.”

  “What’s the alternative?” Davis said. “Lee isn’t the only one whose life is fucked, is he? How many more operations are you scheduled for, Han? Four? Five?”

  “Four,” Han said.

  “And how’re things in the meantime?”

  Han did not answer.

  “What about you, sir?” Davis said. “Oh sure, your wife and kids stuck around, but how do they act after you’ve had one of your fits, or spells, or whatever the fuck you call them? Do they rush right up to give Daddy a hug, or do they keep away from you, in case you might do something even worse? Weren’t you coaching your son’s soccer team? How’s that working out for you? I bet it’s a lot of fun every time the ref makes a lousy call.”

  “Enough, Davis.”

  “It isn’t as if I’m in any better shape. I have to make sure I remember to swallow a couple of tranquilizers before I go to work so I don’t collapse in the middle of trying to help some customer load his fertilizer into his car. Okay, Rochelle had dumped me while I was away, but let me tell you how the dating scene is for a vet who’s prone to seizures should things get a little too exciting. As for returning to college, earning my BS—maybe if I could have stopped worrying about how goddamned exposed I was walking from building to building, I could’ve focused on some of what the professors were saying and not fucking had to withdraw.

  “This isn’t the magic bullet,” Davis said. “It isn’t going to make all the bad things go away. It’s . . . it is what it fucking is.”

  “All right,” the Lieutenant said. “I’m listening. Han—you listening?”

  “Listening,” Han said.

  X

  4:11 am

  “So where do you think it came from?” Lee said.

  “What do you mean?” Davis said. “We know where it comes from.”

  “No,” Lee said, “I mean, before.”

  “Its secret origin,” the Lieutenant said.

  “Yeah,” Lee said.

  “How should I know?” Davis said.

  “You’re the man with the plan,” Lee said. “Mr. Idea.”

  The Lieutenant said, “I take it you have a theory, Lee.”

  Lee glanced at the heap of coals that had been the fire. “Nah, not really.”

  “That sounds like a yes to me,” the Lieutenant said.

  “Yeah,” Han said.

  “Come on,” Davis said. “What do you think?”

  “Well,” Lee said, then broke off, laughing. “No, no.”

  “Talk!” Davis said.

  “You tell us your theory,” the Lieutenant said, “I’ll tell you mine.”

  “Okay, okay,” Lee said, laughing. “All right. The way I see it, this vampire is like, the advance for an invasion. It flies around in its pod, looking for suitable planets, and when it finds one, it parks itself above the surface, calls its buddies, and waits for them to arrive.”

  “Not bad,” the Lieutenant said.

  “Hang on,” Davis said. “What does it do for blood while it’s Boldly Going Where No Vampire Has Gone Before?”

  “I don’t know,” Lee said. “Maybe it has some stored in its coffin.”

  “That’s an awful lot of blood,” Davis said.

  “Even in MRE form,” the Lieutenant said.

  “Maybe it has something in the coffin that makes blood for it.”

  “Then why would it leave to go hunting?” Davis said.

  “It’s in suspended animation,” Lee said. “That’s it. It doesn’t wake up till it’s arrived at a habitable planet.”

  “How does it know it’s located one?” Davis said.

  “Obviously,” the Lieutenant said, “the coffin’s equipped with some sophisticated tech.”

  “Thank you, sir,” Lee said.

  “Not at all,” the Lieutenant said.

  “I don’t know,” Davis said.

  “What do you know?” Lee said.

  “I told you—”

  “Be real,” Lee said. “You’re telling me you haven’t given five minutes to wondering how the vampire got to where it is?”

  “I—”

  “Yeah,” Han said.

  “I’m more concerned with the thing’s future than I am with its past,” Davis said, “but yes, I have wondered about where it came from. There’s a lot of science I don’t know, but I’m not sure about an alien being able to survive on human blood—about an alien needing human blood. It could be, I guess; it just seems a bit of a stretch.”

  “You’re saying it came from here,” the Lieutenant said.

  “That’s bullshit,” Lee said.

  “Why shouldn’t it?” Davis said. “There’s been life on Earth for something like three point seven billion years. Are you telling me this couldn’t have developed?”

  “Your logic’s shaky,” the Lieutenant said. “Just because something hasn’t been disproved doesn’t mean it’s true.”

  “All I’m saying is, we don’t know everything that’s ever been alive on the planet.”

  “Point taken,” the Lieutenant said, “but this thing lives above—well above the surface of the planet. How do you explain that?”

  “Some kind of escape pod,” Davis said. “I mean, you guys know about the asteroid, right? The one that’s supposed to have wiped out the dinosaurs? Suppose this guy and his friends—suppose their city was directly in this asteroid’s path? Maybe our thing was the only one who made it to the rockets on time? Or maybe it built this itself.”

  “Like Superman,” Lee said, “only, he’s a vampire, and he doesn’t leave Krypton, he just floats around it so he can snack on the other survivors.”

  �
�Sun,” Han said.

  “What?” Lee said.

  “Yellow sun,” Han said.

  Davis said, “He means Superman needs a yellow sun for his powers. Krypton had a red sun, so he wouldn’t have been able to do much snacking.”

  “Yeah, well, we have a yellow sun,” Lee said, “so what’s the problem?”

  “Never mind.”

  “Or maybe you’ve figured out the real reason the dinosaurs went extinct,” Lee said. “Vampires got them all.”

  “That’s clever,” Davis said. “You’re very clever, Lee.”

  “What about you, sir?” Lee said.

  “Me?” the Lieutenant said. “I’m afraid the scenario I’ve invented is much more lurid than either of yours. I incline to the view that the vampire is here as a punishment.”

  “For what?” Davis said.

  “I haven’t the faintest clue,” the Lieutenant said. “What kind of crime does a monster commit? Maybe it stole someone else’s victims. Maybe it killed another vampire. Whatever it did, it was placed in that coffin and sent out into space. Whether its fellows intended us as its final destination, or planned for it to drift endlessly, I can’t say. But I wonder if its blood-drinking—that craving—might not be part of its punishment.”

  “How?” Lee said.

  “Say the vampire’s used to feeding on a substance like blood, only better, more nutritious, more satisfying. Part of the reason for sending it here is that all that will be available to it is this poor substitute that leaves it perpetually thirsty. Not only does it have to cross significant distances, expose itself to potential harm to feed, the best it can do will never be good enough.”

  “That,” Lee said, “is fucked up.”

  “There’s a reason they made me an officer,” the Lieutenant said. He turned to Han. “What about you, Han? Any thoughts concerning the nature of our imminent guest?”

  “Devil,” Han said.

  “Ah,” the Lieutenant said.

  “Which?” Lee asked. “A devil, or the Devil?”

  Han shrugged.

  XI

  2005-2006

  To start with, the Lieutenant called once a week, on a Saturday night. Davis could not help reflecting on what this said about the state of the man’s life, his marriage, that he spent the peak hours of his weekend in a long-distance conversation with a former subordinate—as well as the commentary their calls offered on his own state of affairs, that not only was he always in his apartment for the Lieutenant’s call, but that starting late Thursday, up to a day earlier if his week was especially shitty, he looked forward to it.

  There was a rhythm, almost a ritual, to each call. The Lieutenant asked Davis how he’d been; he answered, “Fine, sir,” and offered a précis of the last seven days at Home Depot, which tended to consist of a summary of his assistant manager’s most egregious offenses. If he’d steered clear of Adams, he might list the titles of whatever movies he’d rented, along with one- or two-sentence reviews of each. Occasionally, he would narrate his latest failed date, recasting stilted frustration as comic misadventure. At the conclusion of his recitation, Davis would swat the Lieutenant’s question back to him. The Lieutenant would answer, “Can’t complain,” and follow with a distillation of his week that focused on his dissatisfaction with his position at Stillwater, a defense contractor who had promised him a career as exciting as the one he’d left but delivered little more than lunches, dinners, and cocktail parties at which the Lieutenant was trotted out, he said, so everyone could admire his goddamned plastic leg and congratulate his employers on hiring him. At least the money was decent, and Barbara enjoyed the opportunity to dress up and go out to nicer places than he’d ever been able to afford. The Lieutenant did not speak about his children; although if asked, he would say that they were hanging in there. From time to time, he shared news of Lee, whom he called on Sunday and whose situation never seemed to improve that much, and Han, whose sister he e-mailed every Monday and who reported that her brother was making progress with his injuries; in fact, Han was starting to e-mail the Lieutenant, himself.

  This portion of their conversation, which Davis thought of as the Prelude, over, the real reason for the call—what Davis thought of as the SITREP—ensued. The Lieutenant, whose sentences hitherto had been loose, lazy, tightened his syntax as he quizzed Davis about the status of the Plan. In response, Davis kept his replies short, to the point. Have we settled on a location? The Lieutenant would ask. Yes sir, Davis would say, Thompson’s Grove. That was the spot in the Catskills, the Lieutenant would say, south slope of Winger Mountain, about a half mile east of the principle trail to the summit. Exactly, sir, Davis would say. Research indicates the Mountain itself is among the least visited in the Catskill Preserve, and Thompson’s Grove about the most obscure spot on it. The location is sufficiently removed from civilian populations not to place them in immediate jeopardy, yet still readily accessible by us. Good, good, the Lieutenant would say. I’ll notify Lee and Han.

  The SITREP finished, Davis and the Lieutenant would move to Coming Attractions: review their priorities for the week ahead, wish one another well, and hang up. As the months slid by and the Plan’s more elaborate elements came into play—especially once Davis commenced his experiments dosing himself with adrenaline—the Lieutenant began adding the odd Wednesday night to his call schedule. After Davis had determined the proper amount for inducing a look through the Shadow’s eyes—and after he’d succeeded in affecting the thing a second time, causing it to release its hold on a man Davis was reasonably sure was a Somali pirate—the Wednesday exchanges became part of their routine. Certainly, they helped Davis and the Lieutenant to coordinate their experiences interrupting the Shadow’s routine with the reports coming in from Lee and Han, which arrived with increasing frequency once Lee and Han had found their adrenaline doses and were mastering the trick of interfering with the Shadow. However, in the moment immediately preceding their setting their respective phones down, Davis would be struck by the impression that the Lieutenant and he were on the verge of saying something else, something more—he couldn’t say what, exactly, only that it would be significant in a way—in a different way from their usual conversation. It was how he’d felt in the days leading up to Fallujah, as if, with such momentous events roiling on the horizon, he should be speaking about important matters, meaningful things.

  Twice, they came close to such an exchange. The first time followed a discussion of the armaments the Lieutenant had purchased at a recent gun show across the border in Pennsylvania. “God love the NRA,” he’d said and listed the four Glock 21s’s, sixteen extra clips, ten boxes of .45 ammunition, four AR-15’s, sixteen extra high-capacity magazines for them, thirty boxes of 223 Remington ammo, and four USGI M7 bayonets.

  “Jesus, sir,” Davis had said when the Lieutenant was done. “That’s a shitload of ordnance.”

  “I stopped at the grenade launcher,” the Lieutenant said. “It seemed excessive.”

  “You do remember how much effect our guns had on the thing the last time . . . ”

  “Think of this as a supplement to the Plan. Even with one of us on board, once the thing shows up, it’s going to be a threat. We know it’s easier to hit when someone’s messing with its controls, so let’s exploit that. The more we can tag it, the more we can slow it down, improve our chances of using your secret weapon on it.”

  “Fair enough.”

  “Good. I’m glad you agree.”

  Davis was opening his mouth to suggest possible positions the four of them might take around the clearing when the Lieutenant said, “Davis.”

  “Sir?”

  “Would you say you’ve had a good life? Scratch that—would you say you’ve had a satisfactory life?”

  “I . . . I don’t know. I guess so.”

  “I’ve been thinking about my father these past few days. It’s the anniversary of his death, twenty-one years ago this Monday. He came here from Mexico City when he was sixteen, worked as a fruit p
icker for a couple of years, then fell into a job at a diner. He started busing tables, talked his way into the kitchen, and became the principle cook for the night shift. That was how he met my mother: she was a waitress there. She was from Mexico, too, although the country—apparently, she thought my old man was some kind of city-slicker, not to be trusted by a virtuous girl. I guess she was right, because my older brother was born seven months after their wedding. But I came along two years after that, so I don’t think that was the only reason for them tying the knot.

  “He died when I was five, my father. An embolism burst in his brain. He was at work, just getting into the swing of things. The coroner said he was dead before he reached the floor. He was twenty-seven. What I wonder is, when he looked at his life, at everything he’d done, was it what he wanted? Even if it was different, was it enough?

  “How many people do you suppose exit this world satisfied with what they’ve managed to accomplish in it, Davis? How many of our fellows slipped their mortal coils content with what their eighteen or twenty-one or twenty-seven years had meant?”

  “There was the Mission,” Davis said. “Ask them in public, and they’d laugh, offer some smartass remark, but talk to them one-on-one, and they’d tell you they believed in what we were doing, even if things could get pretty fucked-up. I’m not sure if that would’ve been enough for Lugo, or Manfred—for anyone—but it would’ve counted for something.”

  “True,” the Lieutenant said. “The question is, will something do?”

  “I guess it has to.”

  Their second such conversation came two weeks before the weekend the four of them were scheduled to travel to Upstate New York. They were reviewing the final draft of the Plan, which Davis thought must be something like the Plan version 22.0—although little had changed in the way of the principles since they’d finalized them a month earlier. Ten minutes before dawn, they would take up their positions in the trees around the clearing. If north was twelve o’clock, then Lee and Han would be at twelve—necessary because Han would be injecting himself at t-minus one minute and would require protection—the Lieutenant would take two, and Davis three. The woods were reasonably thick: if they positioned themselves about ten feet in, then the Shadow would be unable to come in on top of them. If it wanted them, it would have to land, shift to foot, and that would be the cue for the three of them aiming their AR-15’s to fire. In the meantime, Han would have snuck on board the Shadow and be preparing to jam it. As soon as he saw the opportunity, he would do his utmost to take the thing’s legs out from under it, a maneuver he had been rehearsing for several weeks and become reasonably proficient at. The average time Han guesstimated he’d been able to knock the Shadow’s legs out was fifteen seconds, though he had reached the vicinity of thirty once. This would be their window: the instant the thing’s legs crumpled, two of them had to be up and on it, probably Davis and Lee since the Lieutenant wasn’t placing any bets on his sprinter’s start. One of them would draw the Shadow’s notice, the other hit it with the secret weapon. If for any reason the first attacker failed, the second could engage if he saw the opportunity; otherwise, he would have to return to the woods, because Han’s hold on the thing would be wearing off. Once the Lieutenant observed this, he would inject himself and they would begin round two. Round two was the same as round one except for the presumed lack of one man, just as round three counted on two of them being gone. Round four, the Lieutenant said, was him eating a bullet. By that point, there might not be anything he could do to stop the ugly son of a bitch drinking his blood, but that didn’t mean he had to stay around for the event.