Lucas didn t stop playing the flute, and from what little attention Phil was able to give him he appeared to be struggling. Maybe he didn t have all that much practice with the instrument or maybe he had to concentrate on what he wanted Sue to do at the same time. Either way, if the slight slip-up in the song made him lose some of the control over Sue like it had a few seconds ago, then maybe that was where Phil should be concentrating his own efforts.
He ran to his right, past the nacho bar and the Froztee machine to get around the counter. Sue followed, moving slower than normal, as he ducked down below the counter to get his duffel bag. He unzipped it quickly and accidently sent a shower of stakes and books and various small magical warding devices flying everywhere. There was nothing inside, however, to hold off a zombie. He d kept such things with him once upon a time, but ever since he had started seeing Sue that had just seemed wrong. There were a couple of silver stakes for werewolves, though, and he grabbed one of these and stood up. Sue had stopped just short of following him behind the counter, her body still shaking as what she wanted to do apparently conflicted with what she was being forced to do. Lucas had taken a few more steps towards the door, still with the flute to his mouth and the song still going. He was approaching the end of the song, and Phil had to wonder what would happen when he finished, but he didn t intend to let Lucas keep playing for that long. He jumped up on the counter, or at least he tried. His foot caught on the edge and he tripped, falling face first over the other side and pulling one of the registers with him. He hit the floor and the register crashed and broke open right next to him to shower change all over his prone form. Lucas was still close enough that the change flew and bounced at his feet, and as Lucas shuffled back he made a note on the flute that sounded wrong, something just slightly too high. At the noise Sue let out a loud groan, but Lucas continued and she quieted.
Phil tried to get to his feet, moaning at the new pain in his ankle. It felt like he might have twisted it on the counter. He d intended to jump on it and then back down with plenty of time to hit Lucas and force him to stop the song, but that plan had messed itself up quick. Now he wasn t even sure if he could run from Sue if he had to.
Lucas stopped as the song came to an end. Phil half-expected Sue to suddenly come to her senses, but she was shambling back toward him again, moaning about his brains. Phil tried to pull himself to his feet again, and this time at least made it to his knees. Lucas continued backing away for a few feet then stopped, and the angry grin on his face disappeared as he looked at the counter. Phil didn t follow his gaze at first, instead trying to keep all his attention on Sue. Her slow shuffling walk was slowed even further as she tried to move around the broken cash register. Most of it was made of heavy plastic that had withstood the fall, but the drawer was out and various pieces made the floor in front of her treacherous to someone who didn t commonly pick up their feet when they moved. The silver stake was still in Phil s hand, but he didn t think he could use it on her. A stabbing wouldn t have worked, anyway. She wouldn t feel the pain, and she wouldn t be stopped unless the stake went right into her brain. He tried to think of any other way to stop her, any way that would not involve killing her again, but his mind was frozen.
He didn t realize what Lucas had been looking at until he made a sudden lunge at the counter just over Phil s head. Phil s first instinct was to try to move away from Lucas, but as he looked up at the counter over him he saw something bright hanging just over the edge. The cube. Lucas had almost left without the cube.
Phil lashed upwards with the silver stake as Lucas reached for it. The stake didn t do much more than graze Lucas s arm, but Lucas still pulled his arm back and screamed like he was in childbirth. Phil reached up and grabbed at the cube himself just as Lucas tried to grab at it again, and instead of either one of them getting it they simply managed to knock it aside. Phil pulled himself up using the counter for balance, but Lucas hit him with a punch to his kidney. Phil chuffed at the pain but still managed to grab for the cube again. It had been pushed to the far side of the counter, and when Phil s fingers touched it he accidentally pushed it farther away, making it slide just enough that it went over the edge and hit the floor on the other side.
Shit! Lucas screamed. You, dead bitch! Kill him already!
Phil was still trying to reach across the counter as Sue s clammy hand fell on his shoulder. He started to turn around and look at her, but she yanked him aside and off balance. Phil slipped in the change on the floor and fell to his knees again just as Sue stepped closer to loom over him. The stake was still in his left hand, and she was close enough and slow enough that he thought he could probably shove it up into her eye before her strange undead strength could rip his skull open. He knew it was the only way now. Whatever effect the flute had on her had not worn off once Lucas had stopped playing. She was still under Lucas s control and there was no way he knew of to break that control. He could either kill her (or rather re-kill her) or she would kill him.
And he couldn t do it. He looked up into her eyes, the eyes he would have to stab through to get at her brain, and he didn t see the blank and empty eyes most people saw in zombies. Even if he didn t physically see any sign that she recognized and knew him as the man who loved her, she was still that strong survivor type that had continued to show traces of itself even after she was in her grave. He couldn t be the one to do it. No matter how bad it got, he would still rather she killed him than he killed her.
Her head moved down so her mouth was only inches away from the top of his skull. Her mouth opened wider as one more moan came out of it.
Braaaaaiii
Phil closed his eyes and waited for her remaining teeth to tear through his flesh. The moment never happened.
He opened his eyes after a few seconds and looked back up at her. She had stopped as she brought her head down closer, and her entire body was shaking again. Her eyes weren t just staring thoughtlessly ahead anymore, but instead met his own as he looked at her. A few more seconds of shaking, of trying at the same time to kill him and back away from him, and a single tear went down her cheek from the right eye, the one that hadn t even existed at the beginning of the night. At the sight of the tear Phil felt like weeping himself.
Oh, honey, thank you, he whispered.
Something large and heavy hit him across the back of the head. It wasn t enough to make him black out, but his vision flashed with bright blue colors and he fell forward, only barely missing both Sue and the magazine and gum racks on the front of the counter. He groaned and tried to concentrate on the sounds around him, but there was too much going on to make much sense of it. He could hear Lucas screaming and Sue moaning, and another voice talking, maybe into a cell phone, but his head was too scrambled to do anything with any of this information just now. All he could think of was how Sue could have just killed him, how she was probably being forced by magical means to do so, and she hadn t.
If there was any greater way to prove that she loved him as much as he did her, then he didn t know what it was.
Chapter 24
Caleb and Gloria ran all the way from her apartment to the OneStop Mart, both with their duffel bags in hand as well as a sword for Caleb and a crossbow for Gloria, and it was much more exercise than Caleb had been prepared for tonight. Several of the cuts on his back and hand broke open on the way (although it was possible they had broken open during that other exertion he d just been through, whether it had really happened in this reality or not) and he was bleeding a little when they finally stopped. He had to double over and lean his hands against his knees as he tried to breath, but Gloria didn t seem to be having the same problem. Maybe after her earlier run her body didn t think this one was much to write home about. Caleb, however, felt like he was ready to die.
There was no time for resting when they got to the store, though. They both stopped across the street and stared at the cars in the parking lot. Both of them had seen these kind of cars before. There were two plain four-door sedans,
completely lacking in anything resembling personality and detail. They were intended to be inconspicuous, but in a place like the Hill inconspicuous was the most conspicuous thing you could be.
Shit. The cops, Gloria said. Caleb was too out of breath to say anything in agreement. They weren t just cops, they were the special cops. Their job was to patrol the Hill and take care of any of the problems that didn t fit too well on a proper police report. When non-human bodies that needed to be picked up and placed somewhere that a mundie mortician couldn t see them, or when there were dead people from obviously non-mundy means, these were the people that came and picked them up. Caleb could only hope that there weren t any bodies inside tonight, or at least that none of them were Phil s.
Gloria jogged across the street, Caleb following as closely behind as the stitch forming in his side would allow, and they slowed as they walked across the parking lot to take in the details. From the outside there didn t appear to be anything out of the ordinary, which at least meant no one was going to have to clean up giant dead armadillo bodies tonight. Gloria gestured at her crossbow and Caleb s sword, then pointed around the corner of the store where they kept the garbage dumpster. Caleb nodded and they both stashed their weapons in old milk crates next to the dumpster before moving to go inside. If the cops were here then it might not be the greatest idea to run into the store armed.
The thing about the special secret police was that they weren t supposed to attract the attention a normal officer would. Whoever came up with that idea apparently didn t realize that by the time the special police were called it would already be too late to avoid unnecessary attention, but that was still the rules the special unit went by. That meant that while the store would have been closed while they went and did their business if they were the normal cops, it had to stay open without any police tape or even locked doors. The result was that Caleb and Gloria could just stroll into the store as though nothing was going on, and so could any other customers. The fact that one of the two cash registers was on the floor with money still strewn everywhere didn t deter people from coming in to get their late night snacks or smokes. A line of five people had already formed waiting impatiently for Phil to check them out. They were going to be waiting for a while, though, as a cop was questioning Phil and he couldn t actually do what he was supposed to at the moment. Another cop was questioning one of the customers, what looked like a slightly too-tall leprechaun to Caleb, and neither of the cops seemed to be having much luck.
He was kind of, like, yay tall, the leprechaun said to his officer as he held up a flat hand and moved it up and down. The person he was describing could have been anywhere from three feet to five feet tall, and Caleb knew that if he was describing Lucas then he was still off. Beady eyes. Looked like the kind of guy who would kick a sloth, but only if the sloth could do really terrible things with bamboo shoots. Caleb actually felt some disappointment in himself that he actually understood what the leprechaun was trying to say. The police officer, on the other hand, looked thoroughly confused.
Caleb and Gloria moved over towards where Phil was standing answering questions, but Phil didn t seem to notice them at first. He was holding a hand to the back of his head and didn t seem to be seeing much of anything at the moment.
Could you tell me what his last name was? the cop asked.
No, I never asked him. For all I know Lucas might not have even been his real first name.
And you say he just threw the register to the floor for no reason and took off.
Yeah. That s kind of what happened.
But he didn t steal any property from anyone other than your zombie? Mr. Gorman, I feel I should remind you that necromancy is against the law.
In which law book is that written?
It s a secret law.
How many times do I have to tell you guys? She s not my property, she s my girlfriend.
Mr. Gorman, I feel I should remind you that necrophilia is against the law. And that one s not such a secret.
Oh gee, thanks, you re a real help.
In the end the only thing we can get him on here is destruction of property, the officer said. I hope you realize that.
That was finally when Phil noticed Caleb and Gloria standing there, and the tired look in his eyes vanished. Do you have any other questions, officer? I need to clean up all this money before someone tries to steal any of it.
No, I think that s about it, the officer said. He sounded bored, and Caleb couldn t say he blamed him. Destruction of property wasn t the most immediate threat that tended to occur on the Hill. The officer went over to his partner and listened in on the questioning of the leprechaun, who apparently was theorizing on whether Lucas had more resembled a troll or an ostrich. The questioning officer looked completely baffled.
Okay, what the hell is that all about? Gloria asked, pointing over her shoulder at the leprechaun.
He s the one who called the cops, Phil said. I think that might be why Lucas didn t do something to kill me. He wanted to get out when he realized the police might be on their way. I told the short guy that there were things here the police shouldn t know, so I guess that s his way of distracting them.
Thanks for that, Caleb said, then shook his head. Lucas. Seriously? I mean, come on. The guy could barely keep a hold of the sword we handed him yesterday. How could he have anything to do with this?
Maybe he s just someone Fluffy and Tuffy hired. Gloria said. Some minion.
I don t have the slightest clue who the hell Fluffy and Tuffy are, Phil said, but in the end there he sure wasn t talking like a minion. He sounded like he had a plan for the artifacts he took.
What exactly happened here? Caleb asked. Phil bent down to gather up all the money on the floor, and Gloria kneeled down to help. Caleb went around to the other side of the counter and started checking out customers on the remaining register. The cops nodded good-bye at Phil as they left, and the three of them were finally alone to speak louder on the subject. The customers might hear, but Caleb wasn t sure how much time they had anymore to wait.
I assume you finally got the damn message? Phil asked.
Yeah, so I know what little you told me there.
Why the hell did you even have your cell phone shut off to begin with? Phil asked.
Caleb blushed and looked at Gloria, who blushed as well and wouldn t look him in the eye. He, for one, didn t have any problem whatsoever with what had happened to them, but if she did then he was going to respect the situation and not talk about it. A million and one comments about it rose to the surface of his mind, but he smashed them all back down.
We were sort of busy.
Busy doing what? You were supposed to keep it on so I could call you when I got information. Didn t you think I could get any?
Well, sure, but we thought it was over. We thought we had all the artifacts back.
Well you didn t, he said. His voice was getting louder and rougher, and the remaining customers in line were starting to look uncomfortable. Caleb did his best to speed up ringing in their purchases. In fact, he had some of them here.
Which ones? Gloria asked.
He said at first that he had the cube, some amulet, and a penny. But after he used the cube again, the penny I guess disappeared and became some flute.
Gloria s eyes went wide as she turned to Caleb, and Caleb blanched. Oh, he said.
Oh what? Phil asked. What the hell was the deal with the flute?
Caleb looked at Gloria. He recognized that look she was giving him. That was her I told you so look. Caleb sighed. It s the Flute of All Flesh.
Is that supposed to mean something to me? Phil asked.
It controls exactly what it says. Play the right tune on it and you can control anything with flesh of any kind. Mostly it s tough, like there s only one song that can control humans and it s really difficult to get right. But it was created specifically to control the undead. There are hundreds of songs that would work for that.
Phil stood up and star
ed at him. His hands were full of most of the bills and change from the smashed register, but he didn t seem to notice it at the moment. His brow was furrowing and his mouth formed a tight line. You had something like that in your little collection. You knew whoever took it had it now and you knew I was going to be having Sue here for most of the night, but you never thought I might need to know?
I figured it wouldn t be a big deal. I didn t think it would take us that long to get everything back, anyway. Things like that are never a big deal around here. And I figured if she really loved you she could resist killing you if the time came
Phil threw all the money at him. The bills just flittered harmlessly to the counter, but all that change hurt. You asshole!
Caleb cringed. Dude, I don t think Big Maggie would appreciate you just flinging that around like that
Fuck you! Phil said. Gloria cleared her throat and turned to the last customer still waiting to be rung up. Everyone else, even the leprechaun, had gone by now.
You need to leave now, Gloria said to the customer.
But I still need to pay for my chocolate milk, and I don t have my smokes
Gloria unzipped her duffel bag and pulled out an unopened pack of cigarettes. Take these, and the milk is on the house. Now get the hell out. Seems we ve got some things to work out here.
Gloria followed the customer to the door and locked it behind him, but Phil hadn t stopped long enough to notice any of this. You know what, Caleb? You re absolutely right. She did fight it. He ordered her to kill me and she wouldn t do it. She loves me that much. But he still fucking has control of her! And he s not going to treat her right. He won t give a rat s ass if she gets hurt doing whatever the fuck it may be he wants her to do. She could get killed and you just don t seem to fucking care.
New Title 4 Page 15