Lynch

by Nancy A. Collins

“However, when the rumors concerning Viktor’s connection to the creature that had slain not only him, but at least six other people, began to circulate, I deemed it wise to remove myself from the Continent. That is when I came to this country. I first arrived in Philadelphia, where I quickly established myself under my new name … that of Dr. Anton Mirablis. For several years, I was able to pursue my experiments in relative secret, with able assistance from Pompey, who I purchased from the master who abused him so cruelly.

  “It was during these years that I attempted to refine the elixir revitae, combining it with the ancient Egyptian formulae. It was very difficult to locate the necessary elements needed for the mixture, and the slightest variation in temperature during the distilling could have proven disastrous. It was a long process of trial and error, but eventually I succeeded in keeping amputated limbs and other organs from not only rotting, but continuing their original functions as well. Yet, try as I might, I was unable to generate the necessary spark of life that Viktor had managed to infuse in his creation, hapless as it may have been.

  “I eventually came to the decision that what was needed for me to succeed was to combine my technique with that of Viktor’s. So I set about creating a giant womb, if you will, and filling it with elixir, whose special properties would be activated by passing massive electric currents through both it and the subject. Are you ready for some fresh air—?”

  “Sure,” Lynch said, taken aback by the suddenness of Mirablis’s suggestion.

  “Very good. I’ll use the occasion to introduce you to the subject of my first successful revival.”

  After the darkness of the cavern, the pale light of a winter day was enough to make Lynch’s eyes water. He stood for a moment in front of the cabin and stared at his surroundings, hoping to summon forth a memory that might tell him who he was.

  “So—where’s this fella you brought back from the dead, Doc?” he said, glancing over at Mirablis, who was bundled in a buffalo-skin coat and a hat made from a rabbit.

  “He’s over here, my boy,” he said, gesturing toward a small barnlike structure built alongside the cabin.

  The interior of the stable was dark and close, with most of the space occupied by a medicine wagon. Standing in the solitary stall was a coal black stallion, nosing a mound of straw. In the dim light, it looked as if the beast’s eye sockets were filled with smoldering fire.

  Lynch turned to fix Mirablis with a stare of utter disbelief. “A horse—?!?”

  The old man shrugged. “It was a matter of convenience. I needed to test my technique on something large—and it was far easier to get my hands on a livery animal than a baboon or gorilla. I suppose I could have used a pig, but their flesh spoils so quickly.…”

  Mirablis shuffled forward, smiling indulgently at the beast as it pawed the ground. “Do you know anything about mythology?”

  “I can’t rightly say,” Lynch said, shrugging his shoulders. “I remember something about a guy with thunderbolts—and something about a fella with wings on his feet and a pie plate on his head.”

  “It doesn’t really matter,” Mirablis replied. “Viktor used to joke about how he was Prometheus while I was Pluto. Prophetic, don’t you think, considering where I have ended up—and how he ended? Still, that is why I chose to name this fine animal after the horse that pulled the chariot of the Lord of the Underworld: Alastor.

  “In any case, as of June 27th, 1840, he became the first successful subject of my revivification process, and he has served me most ably ever since.” Mirablis’s hand dipped into his coat pocket and produced gobbets of raw meat. To Lynch’s surprise, the horse eagerly gobbled them down as it they were lumps of sugar.

  “That’s a good boy,” Mirablis smiled, stroking the beast’s neck.

  “Y-you just fed that animal meat!”

  Mirablis’s smile disappeared instantly. “It is cold out here. Let’s go back inside. I felt the need for some hot tea.”

  Pompey hurried forward and helped the old man out of his burdensome coat and hat as they entered the cabin. The old man hobbled to the table, where a white porcelain tea pot sat, along with a solitary matching cup. Mirablis motioned for Lynch to take the seat opposite him at the table.

  “You asked me the other day about the … side effects that accompany revivification. I will admit that I was … unprepared for such a question, and I responded most rudely. But you are right—if anyone deserves straight answers as to what to expect, it is you.

  “When I killed Alastor the first time, he was a three-year-old stallion at the height of his stamina. In the decades that have passed since, he has not aged a day, nor has he ever been ill. He can ride for days on end without rest or food and still remain as strong as a dozen horses. Yet there have been—changes in his nature. Such as the one you saw. Alastor is no longer a harmless herbivore, like others of his kind. He now has a taste for flesh. However, he only needs to be fed once every six weeks … not unlike certain large snakes.”

  “But he’s just a horse,” Lynch said anxiously. “That doesn’t mean those changes will occur in a human—right?”

  Mirablis sighed as he lifted his tea cup. “There is much even I don’t understand about the revivification process, I’m afraid. Why is there heightened strength? Why is there a reduction in the need for sleep and a suppression of appetite? And, most important of all, why can’t the subjects digest anything but raw meat?”

  “You mean I’m some kinda ghoul?” Lynch shouted, his voice cracking as he jumped to his feet. Pompey stepped forward and pointed a pistol directly at his head.

  “Pompey! Put that away!” Mirablis snapped. “There’s no need for it! Our friend is merely upset—and justifiably so! Please, Lynch—sit back down. You’re making Pompey nervous.”

  Lynch sat down slowly while keeping an eye on the mute. Pompey, for his part, did not lower the gun until Lynch was once again seated.

  Mirablis clucked his tongue in reproof. “You’re agitating yourself for no reason, my boy! As I said, feeding occurs only once every six weeks, and is easily controlled, if you prepare for it properly. A couple of bighorn sheep is usually enough to keep Pompey and Sasquatch satisfied. Just because you must eat raw flesh in order to survive does not make you a monster! Besides, your diet is the least of your problems. One major drawback to your new life is that you must pay a great deal of attention to your physical integrity. Since your pain threshold is so incredibly high, it tends to block signals regarding “minor” injuries. What this means is you are in constant danger of accidentally losing a body part without being aware of it. Fingers and toes are the most vulnerable, as well as the ears. However, it’s nothing a little needle and thread can’t fix.

  “You will need to undergo periodic checks for signs of corruption … since its likely not all portions of your body were infused with equal amounts of the elixir re-vitae. Those areas that may have been missed will gradually begin to rot, if not caught in time. I’ll show you the proper means of administering injections to yourself later on. Should access to the elixir revitae prove difficult, soaking your body in cold water is a suitable stopgap.”

  “That’s all well and good, Doc—but you still haven’t told me how you ended up living in a cave with Pompey and Sasquatch for company.”

  Mirablis blinked. “No, I haven’t, have I? I’m afraid I’m easily distracted nowadays. Thank you for reminding, my dear boy. Now, where was I—? Well, you can imagine how pleased I was by how Alastor turned out. Then, less than a week later, I was presented with a chance to try my process on a human subject! I was holding a dinner party for some of my fellows at the Academy. While I despise such charades, I’ve long accepted the necessity of maintaining the proper respectability, especially in a city such as Philadelphia.

  “However, much to my chagrin, Pompey suffered a massive heart attack and died while in the middle of serving the poached trout! Of course, it was simply ‘not done’ to cancel a dinner party because a servant—a slave, at that—had keeled over d
ead during the main course. Imagine, if you can, my consternation as I was forced to endure several more hours of meaningless chit-chat with those empty-headed boobies, all the while knowing that Pompey’s body was succumbing to decomposition! After the evening sherry and cigars were done with, I lost no time in hurrying my tiresome ‘fellow intellectuals’ out of the house.

  “It took hours for me to prepare Pompey’s body for revivification, using a variation on the voltaic cell developed by John Daniell to force a sufficient electrical charge through Pompey’s body, thereby activating the elixir and reviving him. He was just as he was before—save he no longer could speak. I was delighted to have my faithful assistant returned to me, but I was frustrated by Pompey’s inability to express his experiences and physical symptoms to me, except in dumb show. And since he had never learned how to read and write—after all, teaching slaves such things was sorely frowned on in those days—I was at something of a loss. Then there was the question of how to explain Pompey’s return after he had died very publicly, in front of my so-called peers, without alerting them to what I was doing?

  “Since I did not feel my work was ready for such scrutiny, I decided to leave Philadelphia and pursue my research elsewhere. For several years I wandered the country, keeping households everywhere from New Orleans to Minneapolis—all the while attempting to replicate my success with Pompey, but with disappointing results.

  “I discovered there was still much to learn—as Pompey and Alastor soon showed me. Little over a month after his revivification, Alastor went berserk in New Orleans and kicked down his stall—assaulting and devouring his stable mate. Not long after that happened, Pompey ate three servants in my employ. Luckily, they were slaves, so their disappearance did not raise any alarms. Believe me; Pompey was most contrite about what happened. And except for occasional lapses into frenzy—not unlike those of a woman enslaved to the cycle of the moon—he has remained as sober as a judge. Once I began to understand the nature of his attacks, I was able to prepare in advance, thus making sure Pompey received nourishment without killing anything more sentient than a steer.

  “When the War Between the States erupted, I knew neither North nor South would be safe for me—so I opted to head West.

  I assumed the guise of a medicine-show drummer, which allowed me to continue my experiments—and for a nickel, Pompey would bite the head off any animal the audience cared to provide, which helped cut down on expenses, as you might expect.

  “I used the medicine show to test various weakened and recombined formulas of the elixir re-vitae designed specifically for oral consumption, and discovered that while it could not cure the croup or the Regrets of Venus, it did seem to have an effect on cancer. Then, eight years ago, I came across the remains of an Indian camp.

  “There had been a recent massacre of unspeakable barbarity. Not only the braves, but the women and children—even the elders of the tribe—had been systematically butchered. I was lucky in that the massacre sight was relatively fresh and had yet to be scavenged by crows and coyotes. I harvested the least damaged body parts and proceeded to make myself a composite human, just as Viktor had done.

  “I will admit that my motives were a combination of scientific curiosity and pride. I was determined to stitch together a human that would be an improvement over Viktor’s infamous monster. The result was Sasquatch.

  “There is no doubt in my mind that he is superior to Viktor’s poor mad, rotting creature. However, Sasquatch was basted together from bodies that were far from … fresh, which may account for the difficulty he has with speaking. Another problem is that compared to Pompey, Sasquatch is noticeably … awkward, though astonishingly strong. Still, aesthetically speaking, he is far from pleasing. That is where you come in, my handsome lad.”

  “Handsome—?” Lynch snorted derisively. “You’re calling me handsome?”

  “In comparison to that which has gone before, you are Michelangelo’s David!” Mirablis said with a flourish of his hand. “Granted, the neck brace is far from fashionable, and your eyes don’t match—but you are otherwise presentable. Most importantly, my boy, you are white. What good would it do me to show the Academy a redskin I’ve brought back from the dead—? After all, they’re doing their damnedest to wipe them off the face of the planet!

  “More importantly—I need you to serve as heir to my work. You have demonstrated the intelligence and dexterity necessary to be trained in the techniques of reviving the dead. With my knowledge and your innate skill, mankind need never be inconvenienced by mortality ever again! Think of it, Lynch—just think!”

  “Yeah—I’m thinkin’,” Lynch muttered. “Look, Doc—I realize you did all this to help folks out, just like that fella that invented laudanum or Mr. Fulton and his steam engine. But did it ever occur to you even once while you was doin’ all this—that mebbe there’s better things than simply being alive … and worse things than being dead?”

  Mirablis frowned and cocked his head to one side. “Interesting. I wonder if you were as prone to philosophy before your death. Pompey, return our new friend to the cave.”

  The mute stepped forward and motioned with the muzzle of his gun for Lynch to rise.

  Chapter Eleven

  That night she came to him, emerging from the shadows of the cave as if she had always dwelt within them. She was lit from within by a pale fire that burned like a swarm of fireflies trapped in a jar.

  “Hey, Johnny.”

  Even though Lynch did not know his first name, upon hearing it on her lips, he knew it to be his. “Hello,” he replied.

  “Do you remember me?” she asked.

  “Yes, I remember you,” he said, his voice shaking.

  “I still wait,” she whispered, and, having said that, she disappeared like a candle flame snuffed between wetted fingers.

  Lynch lowered his head into his hands and stared at his feet. He remembered it all now: his family, the war, his life as an outlaw … and Katie. And he remembered how all those things had been lost to him, and then found—only to be torn away from him a second, horrible time. He looked up to find the twisted visage of Sasquatch peering down at him. To his surprise, the patchwork creature no longer frightened him.

  “How can you serve him?” Lynch asked the giant, speaking in his native tongue.

  Sasquatch shrugged his uneven shoulders. “Mirablis repaired me the best way he knew how. And now my tribe, though dead, lives within me still. In my own fashion, I am content, my brother.”

  “Why did you show her to me? It was you who did that, wasn’t it?”

  “I did it so that you would not forget. You were a man of honor, Johnny Pearl—and that sense of honor lives within you still.”

  “How did you know that was my name—?”

  “There are no secrets for those who speak with the dead,” Sasquatch said. “I saw it as my duty to awake your memories, since the old man was unwilling to do so. He is afraid you will insist on hunting down those who killed you and your squaw, if you knew the truth.”

  “Then he was right to be afraid—because that’s exactly what I intend to do!”

  Sasquatch nodded his head sagely. “I will show you how to escape this place, if that is what you want.”

  “Escape—? You mean I’m being held prisoner?”

  The giant fixed him with a dubious look. “Do you feel you are free to leave this place whenever you like?”

  “Good point,” Lynch grunted. “So—what do you propose? Wait until the old man’s asleep and then sneak out the door?”

  Sasquatch shook his head. “Mirablis is no real concern—the problem is Pompey. He is loyal to his master without question. And he does not sleep. He stands guard over the old man while he slumbers, effectively blocking the way through the cabin.”

  “So what are you telling me—that I’ll have to kill Pompey to get out of here?”

  Sasquatch shook his head. “No, there is another way out—one that not even Pompey knows of.”

  The gi
ant stood up and motioned for Lynch to follow, leading him into one of the smaller tunnels that branched off from the main cavern. The tunnel quickly narrowed so that they had to turn sideways in order to squeeze through. Suddenly the passage widened again, ending in a cul-de-sac. Sasquatch shot Lynch a conspiratorial smile over his shoulder as he reached out and moved a chunk of the wall, an impossible feat for anyone not possessing the strength of the resurrected. There was a sudden gust of chill air and a spill of dim light that—in comparison to the gloom of the cave—seemed as bright as the heart of the sun. Along with the burst of cold and sunlight came the odor of manure and straw.

  Alastor did not seem at all surprised to see Sasquatch and Lynch emerge from the wall. The stallion snorted and tossed its head, pawing the floor of its stall. Sasquatch smiled with his crooked mouth and stroked the beast’s raven black neck.

  “This animal has a great heart. He will take you where you must go without complaint or fear.”

  Lynch opened the barn door and glanced outside. The wind was blowing a mixture of sleet and snow down from the mountains. “There’s a storm coming.”

  “That is why you must hurry. If you wait much longer, it will be impossible to leave before the spring.”

  “But I can’t leave now! I’m not dressed for it! I don’t have any provisions—”

  “Have you eaten since you emerged from the tank?”

  “No,” he admitted.

  “Then what need have you for provisions? And as for your clothes,” Sasquatch gestured to the buckskins and woolen shirt

  Lynch was wearing, “you will find you are dressed warmly enough.”

  “Are you mad—? My blood will freeze in my veins!”

  Sasquatch smiled crookedly. “Blood? You have no blood.” Sasquatch held up his left hand and sliced open the palm with the knife that hung from his belt. A greenish yellow fluid welled from the wound, like sap from a sugar maple. “The cold is nothing to our kind, little brother.” He reached behind a bale of hay and produced a laden saddlebag, which he tossed to Lynch. “All you need is in that bag: flasks of elixir re-vitae, a syringe, and some needle and thread. Use it wisely.”