The Undertakers

by Ty Drago

  “This concoction is made from the crushed bodies of pelligog,” he explained to me. “When injected into a host, it kills the parasite, thereby severing the nest’s influence. The victim’s normal brain chemistry is immediately restored, and more to the point, the nest is free to seize control over another mind. Attend.” The Corpse then addressed Helene again. “My dear, will you turn around please?”

  She didn’t look happy about it, but she did it. I watched helplessly as Booth placed one slimy, maggot-riddled hand on her shoulder. Clutching the syringe in his other fist, he jabbed its needle into the base of Helene’s neck with cruel force.

  She screamed.

  “Leave her alone!” I cried, pulling uselessly at my bonds. The Corpse ignored me, drawing the now-empty syringe out of the girl. Then he turned her toward me.

  Helene’s face contorted with pain. Her entire body shuddered. I felt awful watching her, but there was nothing I could do. Besides, what Booth had done would supposedly free her from the spiders’ control, and that might give us both a tiny shot at escape—before it was my turn.

  Gradually Helene’s expression softened. Bewilderment flashed across her face, followed by a terrible awareness. She screamed again, this time in heartbreaking anguish. She fell to her knees, burying her face in her hands.

  “Oh, Will!” she wailed. “I’m sorry! I’m so sorry!”

  “It’s okay,” I said, but she didn’t hear me. Wrenching, guilt-wracked sobs bubbled up from her throat, drowning anything I might say. I tried anyhow, shouting over her cries. “It wasn’t your fault! They made you do it!”

  She lowered her hands. “No! It’s not like that. I knew I was betraying you! I wanted to! I was sitting in that room, looking forward to it!”

  “Because the spiders made you!” I persisted. “That’s what they do!”

  “Enough!” Booth declared. One of his thugs wordlessly yanked Helene to her feet by the hair. He then pinned both her arms, holding her in an iron grip.

  Booth smiled wickedly. “Your turn, Mr. Ritter. What friends we’ll be!” He turned and reopened the pelligog cylinder.

  Just the sound of that writhing, undulating bug ball was enough to nearly cripple my resolve. But then Booth reached inside and drew out one of the ten-legged needle-nosed monstrosities—and my sanity almost slipped altogether.

  Use the fear!

  “Lift his jacket and shirt,” Booth ordered his other thug.

  With terrible effort, I focused on the tear-streaked face of my friend.

  Nobody our age should have to endure this. Nobody!

  “Helene,” I said, trying to keep my voice steady. Blinking, she met my eyes. “Remember: don’t test anything unless you’ve seen at least three other people test it first.”

  She stared uncomprehendingly at me. I felt my jacket and shirttail pulled roughly up past my shoulder blades, revealing the pale, freckled skin of my lower back.

  “Three times!” I repeated.

  Understanding dawned in her large hazel eyes. The barest hint of a smile touched her lips. “Yeah, I remember.”

  “Stop babbling, Mr. Ritter,” Booth cooed. “And don’t struggle. It’ll only hurt more if you do.”

  Then his thug said in Deadspeak, “Box. On. Back.”

  “Box? What box?” Booth replied absently. A pause. “What is that strapped to his—?”

  Gritting my teeth, I squeezed both my fists as hard as I could.

  The rectangular saltwater reservoir strapped to my lower back—the heart of Steve’s prototype weapon system—instantly exploded in the Corpses’ downturned faces. Booth groaned and stumbled backward, his limbs flying in every direction at once. The spider-thing was hurled over his shoulder, where it smashed against the concrete wall of the basement. Booth’s henchman clutched his face and then collapsed, falling into a twitching, helpless heap on the floor.

  At the same moment, Helene dipped her head forward and then slammed it up and back, right into the last dead guy’s face. More from surprise than pain, I suspected, he loosened his hold on her just for a second. Instantly she spun on her heel and drove a devastating kick into the creature’s kneecap. Then as the Corpse doubled over, she slammed both her fists down against the base of his neck—a human nerve center.

  The naked thug crashed to the basement floor, twitching.

  “Get me loose!” I cried. “Quick!”

  Helene unstrapped my wrists and ankles, fairly yanking me off the table and hugging me with a fierceness that, despite our predicament, made me squirm and blush. “You’re a genius!” she exclaimed. “Do you know that? An absolute genius!”

  “Thanks. Um—we should get out of here.”

  “Not without weapons,” she said.

  We ran over to my emptied backpack. Helene grabbed the Super Soaker. I took Sharyn’s sword. Everything else we left behind.

  “Wait a second,” I said. I went to Booth, who was still writhing on the floor. Reaching into the Corpse’s trouser pocket, I recovered my pocketknife. Then, standing over him, I said, “That body you’re in belonged to an Undertaker. You can’t have it anymore.”

  I lifted Vader and let it come down.

  Off went the Corpse’s head.

  Helene and I retreated up the stairs at a run.

  CHAPTER 46

  The Sun Room

  At the top of the landing, I peeked out the cellar door. The hallway appeared deserted. “How many Corpses does Booth keep around?”

  “Four altogether. There’ll be two more guarding the front door.”

  I nodded. “Then we’ll go out the back. I came in through the kitchen. You know a better way?”

  She thought for a minute. “Yeah, I think so!” She led me down the hall, through a nearby door, and then out into a long narrow room that looked like it made up most of the rear of Booth’s big house. One wall was lined with fancy family room furniture. The entire opposite wall was all glass from ceiling to floor.

  “He calls this his sun room,” Helene explained. “He spends a lot of time here reading newspapers and watching TV.”

  “Corpses watch TV?” I asked, surprised. I tried to imagine a bunch of milky-eyed dead bodies gathering around the tube to catch Scrubs reruns.

  “Booth likes to pretend he’s human.”

  “Yeah, I noticed that. Is there an outside door?”

  She pointed. “Down at the end. A sliding glass door. Outside, there’s a path down the hill. Booth showed it to me this morning, back when we were—pals.” She shuddered at the memory.

  “It wasn’t your fault,” I told her.

  She met my eyes. “It feels like it was.”

  “Let’s go.”

  We ran the length of the sun room. To our left, the night beyond the windows was so dark that only our reflections showed. I really hoped there weren’t any Corpses out there. If there were, the two of us would be pretty hard to miss.

  The room ended at two doors. One was Helene’s sliding glass escape route. The other looked more ordinary and probably opened into an unexplored part of the big house.

  Just as we reached the first door, the second one erupted.

  It didn’t just burst open. It was literally ripped off its hinges and hurled aside, where it shattered a nearby widescreen television.

  No more Scrubs reruns.

  The Corpse leapt into the sun room. He was a Type Two, his skin still slick but turning a dark, mottled gray.

  He was also totally, hideously naked.

  “Hello, Mr. Ritter,” he hissed.

  At the sound of my name, I let my eyes cross. Suddenly the Deader’s Mask became visible, showing a handsome, telegenic face that was twisted by rage.

  Booth!

  I didn’t bother wondering how he’d accomplished the Transfer. It didn’t matter.

  Helene raised her Soaker, but she wasn’t nearly fast enough. With one hand, Booth slapped the rifle from her grip. With the other, he shoved her hard in the chest, knocking her down and sending her body sliding back
across the tile floor.

  “Helene!” I cried.

  Her head struck a bookcase with a loud clunk. With a groan, she went limp.

  Desperately I lashed out with Vader.

  He dodged me, moving much faster than I would have thought possible in that rotting body. I came at him a second time, but he caught my wrist, holding the sword at bay. With his other hand, he clutched my throat, easily lifting me up onto my toes.

  Both hands squeezed.

  I felt the sword fall from my grasp and clatter to the tile floor. At the same time, my breath was cut off. Frantically I reached for the pocketknife in my pocket.

  The Corpse’s face split into a hideous smile. “Not this time, Mr. Ritter,” he hissed. Still clutching me by my neck, he shook me savagely. I felt like a rag doll in a dog’s mouth. I tried to hang on to the pocketknife, tried to hit the 2 button and release my faithful Taser—but the shaking was just too much. I dropped it.

  Booth tightened his grip and lifted me higher until my feet actually left the floor. The pain was terrible. I clawed at his hand, tearing off bits of rotted flesh, but he felt none of it.

  “Like my new body?” he asked. “I don’t. I took it because it was there in the closet, available. Any port in a storm, I believe is the human expression. Getting out of the body bag was problematic, but I managed it.”

  Back at First Stop, Steve had theorized that a Corpse needed to actually see its target body before possessing it. Apparently he was wrong about that. Too bad I’d never get the chance to tell him.“Tell me something, Mr. Ritter,” Booth said. He was carrying me deeper into the sun room now, walking casually, as if clutching ninety pounds of kicking and struggling twelve-year-old didn’t bother him in the least. “Have you ever heard of a caste system?” He didn’t wait for an answer. Just as well—I couldn’t give him one. He said, “It describes a society in which the members are separated into specific classes based on cultural status, education, wealth, or even intelligence. On my world, such a caste system exists. Most of the Malum that you’ve encountered, for example, have been from our warrior caste. They’re bred for loyalty and prowess but not necessarily intellect. I, on the other hand, represent the leader caste. We are born to rule—to be cleverer and more resourceful than our lesser brothers and sisters.

  “Let me give you an example. My underlings are still trying to recover from the damage you and your little friend did to them below. I, however, was able to manage a Transfer and escape the basement in time to—how’s the saying go? Cut you off at the pass?”

  My vision blurred. His voice was starting to sound very far away. Seeing this, Booth slowly turned me around, and with a casual flick of his wrist, he tossed me against the wall. I hit it hard and collapsed into a heap on the floor, clutching at my bruised neck.

  “A good effort, Mr. Ritter,” he said, “but it’s over now. The pelligog await. There’s no escape. There never really was.”

  “No!” I croaked. I tried to stand, but my head spun, and I fell back down on my butt.

  Suddenly an image of my mother, heartbreakingly vivid, flashed through my mind. Blearily I looked up at the looming cadaver. “You won’t…get our planet,” I coughed.

  “No?” he asked. “And why not?”

  I did my best to sound tough, to sound confident. It didn’t go very well.

  “I’ll…stop you…” I gasped.

  “Is that so?” He knelt down in front of me. He smelled of the grave, of death. “Another human cliché comes to mind: You—and what army?”

  The entire rear wall of the sun room—fully sixty feet of glass—shattered all at once.

  Booth leapt to his feet and spun around.

  Figures emerged from the darkness, stepping over the broken shards and spilling into the ruined room. There were two dozen of them at least, and each one brandished a Super Soaker. In the center of the line, a tall, dark-skinned boy came forward with a slightly shorter dreadlocked girl right beside him.

  “That’d be us,” Tom said.

  CHAPTER 47

  Raising the Stakes

  At first I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. I blinked, trying to focus through a haze of pain and dizziness.

  They’d come. Heck, it almost looked like all of them had come!

  For just a moment, Tom’s eyes found mine. The Chief smiled.

  He doesn’t look mad.

  I moved my gaze over to Sharyn.

  She winked at me.

  Booth glowered, his milky sunken eyes accessing this new threat that seemed to have appeared out of nowhere. Then to my surprise, the Corpse smiled and said, almost politely, “Mr. Jefferson, is it?”

  It was Sharyn who answered. “Ain’t nobody but!”

  Booth’s smile widened. It wasn’t a pretty sight. “This is a rare treat. I’ve heard so much about you.”

  “Same here,” Tom replied.

  “I’m surprised you made it past my security now that the power’s back on.”

  The Chief shrugged. “It ain’t as good as you think it is.”

  “Really? I’ll have to have my people look into that. And my two guards?”

  Tom brandished his Super Soaker. “A bit under the weather just now. As for those twenty Corpses you sent into Haven—they just found the place deserted. Go figure.”

  Booth seemed unperturbed. “Ah! But we watched you load your van. By now my associates have followed it to your new hideout!”

  Tom smiled thinly. “And which van would that be? By the time the one we loaded hit the streets, four more that look just like it were already tooling empty around the neighborhood—all headed to different spots all over town. Your thugs found nothing, believe me.”

  At that, Booth actually laughed. “I see! How wonderfully clever of you. But then I would expect nothing less from the leader of a group that has managed to so effectively evade me over these past few years.”

  “Thanks.”

  Booth’s smile vanished, replaced by a menacing sneer. “Of course, I wasn’t trying all that hard. After all, what threat did your so-called Undertakers really pose? A few stolen Seers. Some boldly dramatic rescues. Nothing more troublesome than that.”

  Tom’s expression was stone. “All that’s about to change.”

  “Really? Ready to raise the stakes? Are you sure, boy? Because tonight, you have become troublesome. After this I will hunt your little Peter Pan underground movement to every corner of this city. And I won’t rest until every one of you meddling brats is dead!”

  “Big talk,” Sharyn remarked, “seeing that we’re the one with the guns.”

  “Fire away with your toys!” Booth declared, spreading his huge arms wide, naked as a jaybird. “I’ll return as strong as ever! I will be mayor of Philadelphia, and when I am, there will be nothing to keep me from turning the whole of this city to the single purpose of your utter destruction!” The Corpse laughed mockingly. “You’re nothing, Mr. Jefferson! A boy playing general—commander of a children’s army. Even with your toys and tricks, you’re no match for us! No match for me!”

  “That right?” Tom asked, unperturbed. A slow smile crept over his face. He handed his Soaker to Sharyn. She accepted it without question, although I could read the sudden apprehension in her eyes.

  Tom took a step forward. He glanced first at me and then at Helene, who still lay motionless on the tile floor. “You’re good at beating up children, ain’t you, Booth?” the Chief of the Undertakers said. “How’s about trying your luck with a cooler partner?”

  Booth’s grin widened.

  This is what he wanted!

  The Corpse hissed, “My pleasure—Undertaker.”

  Booth launched himself forward with such blinding speed that I reflexively cried out a warning. I couldn’t believe that even Tom, as good as he was, could possibly defend himself against something that fast.

  He could.

  The boy sidestepped the dead man, sticking out his foot at the last moment. With a frustrated howl, Booth tripped, crashi
ng down onto the tiles. The Corpse recovered instantly, springing to his feet with tiger-like grace, his milky eyes wide with anger.

  Tom turned to face him, smiling thinly. Along the shattered glass wall, the Angels were swapping nervous looks. Sharyn’s trademark grin was gone. For the first time, I could see real fear on the girl’s face—fear for her brother.

  Raising one hand, Tom waggled his finger Booth’s way.

  And the Corpse came, but more slowly this time, never taking his eyes off his prey. Tom waited, calm but expectant, not retreating a step.

  “Get him,” I muttered.

  The instant he came within striking range, Booth lashed out with one lightning-quick fist. Tom ducked it. Then came the other fist. Tom ducked that one too, his head bobbing and his body weaving with each new assault. I noticed that he didn’t attempt to block a single swing. Doing so—given Booth’s far greater strength—would have been disastrous. Instead the Chief, with his usual calm confidence, was simply arranging not to be there when each blow connected.

  This went on for perhaps half a minute, although it seemed longer, and with each dodge, Booth grew more and more angry. Finally, with a frustrated roar, the Corpse suddenly hurtled himself forward, meaning to body-slam his irritating opponent halfway across the long room.

  This time Tom didn’t duck. He didn’t even crouch. He picked his moment and then launched himself into a single hard kick. The blade of his foot caught Booth in the midsection. Reflexively the Corpse doubled over.

  Tom then grabbed the cadaver’s decaying right arm, twisted it up behind his back, and with a single brutal yank—snapped it off.

  Sharyn let out a little whoop of victory, although she still looked frightened.

  Booth staggered a few steps and turned around, accessing the damage. He felt no pain, of course, but there was no way to miss the humiliation in his eyes.

  “You’ll pay for that,” he hissed at Tom.

  Tom merely smiled, still clutching the disembodied limb.

  The Corpse advanced again, the fingers of his remaining hand open and reaching for his opponent’s throat.