Zombies of the Gene Pool

by Sharyn McCrumb

  She refused to be offended. "I do believe it is you, Pat Malone!" she cried. "I don't know of another soul who could be so offensive and ill tempered on such short notice and little provocation. You just want to see what I'll say! Well, here goes. You don't look so hot yourself, Patrick. I don't think I'd have known you." She gave him a hug. "Now where the hell have you been since 1958?"

  He smiled, nodding to the others who had clustered around to hear his answer. He addressed them all. "Fandom may be a microcosm, children, but the rest of the world out there is reasonably large. I got lost in it. I found better things to do."

  Ruben Mistral was scowling. Before anyone else could speak, he stepped between the stranger and the rest of the guests, as if he were protecting them from an assassin. "Just a minute, folks!" he announced in his crowd-control voice. "Before anybody says anything else to this individual, I think we should consider the possibility that this is a publicity-seeking impostor. This is a media event, you know."

  The dark man smiled down at him. "Ah, Bunzie, don't tell me you've finally learned to look before you leap! If you had been able to do that in 1954, maybe Jim here would have checked the car radiator before we left for Worldcon, and we wouldn't have been left high and dry in Seymour, Indiana."

  Bunzie reddened. "Well, who made us late in the first place, Malone? You said you were going to set the damned alarm clock for six-thirty. And when did we wake up?"

  Jim Conyers eased his way to Bunzie's side. "If in fact this is Pat Malone," he reminded his host.

  With raised eyebrows and a cold smile, Pat Malone was scanning the group. "Conyers," he nodded. "Always the sensible one. Let me guess. You're an attorney now?"

  "More or less retired. But still cautious." Conyers seemed pleased to have been pegged so well.

  Pat Malone studied the others. "Brendan, of course. My old sparring partner. And-"

  "Erik Giles," said the professor quickly. "Good to see you again, Pat."

  The gaze moved on. "And-unless someone brought his father to this little get-together-this must be Georgie Woodard."

  Woodard managed a feeble grin. "I still publish Alluvial, Pat."

  "No, George. You put out a silly bit of drivel purporting to be Alluvial. That 'zine, I assure you, is deader than I am." Malone reached for the bottle of Scotch and took it with him to the loveseat. "Are you all going to stay in shock much longer? This one-sided chat is getting a bit tiresome."

  "We thought you were dead, Pat," said Angela. "We wrote tributes to you. How could you put us through all that grief when all the time you were alive, probably off somewhere laughing at us!"

  "You were grieved?" He sounded surprised. "Well, some of you weren't. I wonder if it's too late to sue Jackal Bexler for libel?"

  "Yes," said Jim Conyers.

  "I thought so." He gave a little mock bow. "But thank you for your professional opinion, counselor. Anyhow, I rather thought that after The Last Fandango came out, I was more feared than esteemed. In fact, I'll bet some people have been looking over their shoulders ever since they heard the news of my untimely death, hoping that it wasn't a hoax."

  "But why did you do it?" asked Lorien Williams.

  Brendan Surn, who had been listening with uncharacteristic attentiveness, patted her hand. "I expect that Malone considered an obituary the most dramatic form of resignation from fandom. Didn't you, Pat? And with a death announcement, you not only got to rid yourself of old associates, you also got to hear exactly what they thought of you. I've often thought that Peter-"

  "Peter Deddingfield is really dead, Brendan," said Erik Giles sharply. "He was killed by a drunk driver nine years ago. Besides, he was never the adolescent hoaxer that Malone has proven to be."

  Pat Malone's dark eyes blazed. "Was I such an artful dodger, gentlemen? Or were you simply a bunch of rumor-mongers who couldn't be bothered to check your facts?"

  Ruben Mistral felt that things were getting out of hand. Signaling for silence, he resumed his role as spokesman for the group. "Okay, Pat. We'll skip the whys and the wherefores. You're not dead. How did you find out about this reunion?"

  "You do yourself an injustice, Bunzie. The publicity that your people have put out has ensured that everyone on the planet had a chance to hear about this event. As one of the Lanthanides, I considered myself invited."

  Bunzie nodded impatiently. "No question about that. You had a story in the jar, too. But listen, the rest of us have agreed to certain business details. Percentages, representation by one agent, rights offered for sale. I hope you're not planning to come in as a maverick and queer the deal!"

  Pat Malone's eyes widened in feigned innocence. "Now I ask you, Erik, would I queer the deal?"

  Erik Giles blushed and turned away.

  "I did wonder, though, about the wisdom of digging up old sins."

  "What do you mean by that?" Ruben Mistral demanded.

  "Oh, you know, Bunzie, little things that were no big deal in the early fifties, but might be now. Now that some of us are Eminent Pros." His tone was mocking. "Such as?"

  "Remember that phrase that a certain member of the Lanthanides paid me a six-pack for? On one occasion, I happened to remark that when I was a child, I had always been puzzled by the phrase 'for the time being.' I took it literally. I thought there really was someone called the Time Being, and that people did things for him."

  "That's the basis of Peter Deddingfield's Time Traveler Trilogy!" cried Lorien Williams. "You mean it was your idea?" "Worth a lot more than a six-pack now, don't you think?" asked Pat Malone. "What's it in now, its twenty-seventh printing? And then there's that story that Dale Dugger and Brendan Surn collaborated on. It read a lot better when you won the Hugo for it in '65, Brendan, but the original idea was Dale's, wasn't it? And remember how grossed out we all used to be because George Woodard-"

  "That's enough, Pat!" Erik Giles shouted above the others' murmuring. His face was red now, and his eyes bulged from their sockets. "You could be asking for a hell of a libel suit."

  Pat Malone smiled. "Public figures? Truth is a defense? Right, Jim boy?"

  Conyers, the attorney, shrugged and glanced uneasily at the others. "I wouldn't venture to give you an opinion. But I don't see what you'd gain by embarrassing a bunch of your oldest friends."

  "Gain?" Malone surveyed the scowling group and seemed pleased with the effect of his announcement. "Didn't The Last Fandango teach you anything? I'm an idealist, folks. And you fat cats have sold out. You all think you're the Founding Fathers of the Genre. Look at old Thomas Jefferson Surn over there in his NASA jacket. I think it's time somebody reminded you of what a bunch of half-assed adolescents you used to be, and how little difference there really is between who made it and who didn't. A lot of luck, maybe, and-" he looked directly at Bunzie-"more than a little ruthlessness."

  "So you came back to screw us, did you, Pat?" asked Erik Giles.

  His tormentor surveyed the room again. "Speaking of matters procreational, I see that Earlene Riley and Jazzy Holt aren't here. I'll bet no one has even mentioned their names."

  George Woodard attempted to muster his dignity. "My wife was unable to attend."

  Malone whistled. "Oh, Georgie, Georgie, you didn't." He turned to Bunzie. "Which one of 'em?"

  Bunzie reddened. "Earlene."

  "Ah. Succulent nipples." His grin broadened as he watched the others' discomfort. "Well, George, I hope you're man enough for the job. Where is Jazzy Holt? Lounging under a lamppost in Bi-loxi? Hello, sailor. No, I suppose not. After all, she's sixty, too, isn't she? Funny how people in our memories don't age."

  Lorien Williams had recognized the name. She leaned over toward Conyers and whispered, "Does he mean Jasmine Holt, the famous S-F critic?"

  Pat Malone overheard the question. "She was a critic, all right. She once told me that my dick looked like a tadpole sleeping on two apricots. Another expert opinion," he said, grinning at Jim Conyers. "Where is the randy bitch? Not still collecting virgins at S-F cons, surely?"<
br />
  "She lives in London now," said Bunzie. "Although she wasn't one of the Lanthanides, I did invite her to attend the reunion, because of her-er-connections with the group, but she declined, telling me to use my own discretion about the disposal of the shares of Curtis Phillips and Peter Deddingfield. She doesn't need the money. Of course, there would have been some legal question about her entitlement anyway."

  "She was married to both of them," Lorien Williams explained. She was pleased to finally be in the know on a bit of Lanthanides gossip.

  "Separately?" smirked Pat Malone. "Or did you all take Stranger in a Strange Land as a directive from God?"

  "I think that's enough, Pat," said Brendan Surn quietly. "There is nothing to be gained by rumor-mongering, as you put it a few minutes ago."

  Bunzie looked relieved that order had been restored. "That's right, Malone. I asked you before, are you going to abide by the business arrangement already established?"

  "Certainly, count me in. I'm sure you drove a shrewd bargain, Bundschaft." He ambled toward the door. "I may have another little project to pitch to the editors, though. Strictly on my own. Good night, all." Without waiting for anyone's reply, he was gone.

  Bunzie stared dejectedly at the closed door through which Pat Malone had just left. "What the hell do we do now?"

  Chapter 9

  Why have you come here

  to this place you say

  you never liked, where

  mockingbirds read your mind…

  – DON JOHNSON

  "The House in the Woods" from Watauga Drawdown

  The reunion was only seven hours away, but no one was sleepy. The full moon shone on the newly resurrected Watauga River, which coursed again in its original channel, a ribbon of light in the muddy wasteland of the valley. In the long grass on the hillsides above the shoreline, crickets chirped in a ceaseless drone. It was a peaceful night in the mountains, but no one forgot that when the sun rose to reveal the barren lake bed, the dead would be back among them. Indeed, one of them had returned already.

  After Pat Malone's invasion of the Lanthanides' reunion, no one wanted to talk anymore about old times. Within a space of ten minutes, everyone at the reception in the Laurel Room had pleaded fatigue or the lateness of the hour, and had retired to their own rooms to ponder the evening's events.

  Jim Conyers had been unmoved by the encounter, and he felt a thickening in his senses that he knew was a craving for sleep, but Barbara, who was outraged, wanted to discuss it.

  She sat on the foot of the bed, staring at herself in the mirror as she did her customary one hundred strokes a night with her hairbrush. Her shoulder-length curls-still a rich shade of chestnut (now obtained from a bottle)-shone in the lamplight, and her face seemed as unlined as a young girl's.

  "That certainly was a performance tonight!" she remarked, brushing vigorously.

  "Bravado," said Jim, stifling a yawn. "The Lanthanides loved to make scenes. They used to remind me of a bunch of Shetland pony stallions: terribly fierce and sincere, but so insignificant as to be comical."

  "Well, it was a revelation to me," said Barbara, checking out his expression in the mirror. "I never knew that all those sexual high jinks were going on up at Dale's place."

  Conyers shrugged. "They weren't, really. Jazzy Holt was somebody the others met at a science fiction convention. She never even visited the farm. They-er-got together at conventions, and spent the rest of the time writing soulful letters to her. She married Curtis after he left Wall Hollow, in '56, I think, and they divorced pretty soon after, about the time of his nervous breakdown."

  Barbara sniffed. "Curtis Phillips was always crazy, if you ask me. Not that the rest of them were much of a contrast. Anyhow, it's a good thing for you I didn't know about such goings-on in 1954, Jim Conyers, or I'd have thought twice about marrying you." Another thought occurred to her. "What about Earlene Riley and Angela Arbroath? You can't say they didn't visit!"

  "Angie was a high school kid, and built like a pipe cleaner back then. Not exactly a femme fatale. Most of us treated her like a kid sister. And Earlene was a pudding-faced girl who used sex to build her self-esteem."

  Barbara stared. "Jim! Do you mean she thought she was worth something because that pack of drips wanted to sleep with her? Lo-ord God! They would have slept with an Angus heifer if they could have caught one!"

  Jim's smile was rueful. "Well, I wouldn't have!" he told her. "I had the prettiest girl in east Tennessee as my one and only."

  She put down the brush and came to hug him. As he enfolded her in his arms and lay back on the bed, he thought how good his life had been, and for the thousandth time he was glad he had never told Barbara about that one little incident with Earlene Riley. He wondered if Pat Malone remembered it.

  Several rooms farther down the hall, Ruben Mistral was pacing, while his preppy minion, still wearing a coat and tie, sat at the writing table by the window, notebook at the ready, in case there were instructions to be carried out. "He's not dead!" said Bunzie for the umpteenth time. "The son of a bitch isn't dead!"

  The minion, a recent USC film school graduate named Geoff, ventured an opinion. "Excuse me, sir? Are you sure he's really Pat Malone? We never asked to see his driver's license."

  Bunzie snarled. "Of course it's him! He may not look the same, but there's nothing wrong with that steel trap he calls a mind. His memory is perfect! Why couldn't he have gone ga-ga instead of poor old Brendan? Did you notice how out of it Surn was?"

  "Not especially, sir. I had never met him before. He did seem less forthright than Mr. Malone."

  "So did Attila the Hun. I should have known Pat's death was too good to be true! At that party tonight he remembered enough damaging tidbits to keep the Enquirer presses rolling for a month! If he tries to get chatty in front of the reporters, so help me I'll kill him!"

  "Would you like me to see that he is barred from the activities tomorrow?" said Geoff, whose job was to anticipate such assignments.

  It was tempting, and Bunzie hesitated, thinking of the serenity of a reunion without the Lanthanides' stormy petrel, but as appealing as the suggestion was, it was too risky. "He'd call a press conference the minute our backs were turned," he sighed. "He'd use the hotel fax machine to blitz the media. By the time we schlepped back to the hotel with the time capsule, he'd probably be booked on Oprah, Geraldo, and Donahue! I think we're going to have to take him with us-so that we can keep an eye on him."

  Geoff, whose threshold of modesty was considerably lower than his boss's, doodled a question mark on his note pad. "Has he really got all that much to tell? It was a long time ago, after all. Sounds like boyish pranks to me."

  "That's a point," murmured Bunzie. "Maybe you're right. After all, we live in a world where Supreme Court nominees smoke pot, and elected officials get caught screwing around. Compared to that, we're small potatoes."

  Geoff thought of adding, "And since you're not as famous as all that, who'd care," but he thought better of it. Instead he said, "It's not as if there were any terrible secrets within the group."

  Bunzie was silent for almost a full minute before he replied. "No, I suppose not. But you can never tell what will strike the public fancy in the silly season! Remember when a moose fell in love with a cow and made Newsweek? All the same, I want you to stay with him tomorrow. Keep him away from the reporters! And the editors, too! Don't let him get off by himself with anyone."

  "Sure. No problem." Geoff was careful not to react to this pronouncement. Privately, though, he was thinking, Holy shit! I wonder what those guys were up to back then!

  "It went fine tonight. Just fine," said Lorien Williams for the third time. "You were great! Have you taken your medication yet?"

  Brendan Surn, who was wearing his homespun monk's robe, was sitting on the edge of his bed, apparently unmoved by the evening's events. He had smiled his vague smile as Lorien helped him change clothes, and he watched the end of a television movie while she got into her pajamas. In re
sponse to Lorien's question about his pills, he looked about him for clues that he had taken it, a glass of water, the bottle of pills, but there was no physical evidence to jog his memory. He shook his head, giving her that helpless little smile that meant he didn't know.

  Lorien rummaged about in her suitcase. "No, of course you haven't!" she announced. "I hadn't even unpacked them yet. Here, open the bottle while I get you some water."

  Surn worked diligently on the childproof cap. From the bathroom, Lorien called out to him over the sound of running water, "Did you enjoy the evening?"

  He thought about her question until she returned. "Yes, it was quite nice," he said, accepting the glass from her.

  "It was interesting to meet them all," said Lorien, sitting down on the edge of the bed to continue the chat. "I wish I could have met Curtis Phillips and Peter Deddingfield, though."

  Brendan Surn frowned. "Weren't they there?"

  "No, Brendan," said Lorien gently. "They are dead. It was Pat Malone who came back. And I don't own anything of his that I could get autographed."

  He gave her a vague smile. "Pat Malone forgot that he was dead."

  Lorien, who was never sure whether or not Surn was joking, thought it best to overlook that remark. "Well, you are going to have a long day tomorrow, Brendan!" she said briskly. "There will be a lot of reporters and a lot of unfamiliar situations. Let's go through it all again, shall we? And then I think you should get some sleep."

  "I'm not tired," said Surn. "Is there some work that I should be doing?"

  His assistant stifled a yawn. "Do you want to finish your monthly letter to that fanzine you contribute to?" She went over to a small suitcase and extracted a sheaf of papers and a mimeographed journal bound in yellow construction paper. "I've made the notes here about the topics you wanted to comment on to each participant."