by Ilsa J. Bick
No more sound now. No more light. Only the agony in her chest remained: that, and a weird … hesitant … intermittent awareness … like the sweep … of the beam … from a lighthouse …
… and there was … something …
… something …
… in her head, someone …
BODE
Dungeon
“WELL?” BODE SAID. They’d come to a standstill at a four-way junction. “You know which way?”
“I think so,” Meme said, tossing an uncertain look from one opening to the next. “Give me a moment.”
Oh, perfect. Though he wasn’t angry at her. Each time this evening he’d unlocked and dragged open a door, cringing at every metallic clank and squawww, he half-expected Kramer and an army of faceless minions to suddenly appear. Nerves, that, and the noise: that continual ghostly yammer of the mad seeping through iron doors.
It was also the weirdness of the place working on him: these very bizarre tunnels and the way the air moved. So different from the tunnels through which he’d taken patients to other cells beneath the asylum. Tipping the iron pick in which he held their one candle, he watched as molten wax dripped to cold stone and instantly solidified. He’d done this the whole way, laying a trail of wax bread crumbs just in case they got turned around. Which they might be at the moment.
Where in God’s name are we? You didn’t need to be an engineer to know that these tunnels came from before Bedlam as he knew it now had been built. Those more familiar structures echoed the buildings: bricked and lined with cells, with each section gated off with an iron grate and wood door, like an old castle keep. These passages were very strange, as if they’d detoured into a much older, almost ancient portion of the asylum. The strangeness was in everything: the moist air that pulsed with a weird, faintly phosphorescent aura, emanating from walls that were no longer brick but carved, glassy stone. The light was just bright enough that there was almost no need for their single candle. He dragged a tentative finger over glowing, carved stone. Cool. And had he caught the slightest suggestion of a reflection?
Yet there were still cells: whole series of iron doors, one right after the other, with patients behind each one, if the noise was an indication. So eerie, though. More like a dungeon. What would lie out this way? He tried to imagine where they were in relationship to the surface, but there’d been so many turns and doglegs and crosscuts, he’d lost track. Had they veered off toward the back grounds? Perhaps the derelict criminal wings? But if there were still patients here, who looked in on them?
A sudden muffled shout sounded from somewhere close behind. He near about jumped a foot. Hot wax spilled onto his index finger as the candle trembled and tried to snuff, but he barely felt the burn. All the fine hairs on his neck were stiff as pikes. God, these poor buggers—how often did they actually see other people? They all sound alike. It was hard to think of them as people.
“Hate that sound.” Meme shivered. “You know, I sometimes think they don’t have faces at all? Just … bodies screaming sounds. No matter how many times I’ve been down here, working with Doctor, I never get used to it.”
He only nodded, a little spooked to hear his thoughts come out of her mouth. He peered into the tunnel on his right, at three o’clock, which seemed different from the passage they’d just exited at their six, and the other two at nine and twelve. Shadows swarmed, but he saw how the light from Meme’s candle bounced back from walls that faintly glittered. The tunnel’s mouth exhaled air that was much colder and laced with a sour and slightly noxious fume, like what the Thames smelled like on an ill wind: gassy as a sewer. Shite, probably the real thing: either human or animal droppings. Bats, maybe rats. He edged closer.
“Where are you going?” Meme whispered. “That’s the wrong way.”
She knew that for sure? “Just checking.” Another step, and now his nose tingled with a nip of icy air. Interesting. A draft? He wondered where this cut went. Not back to the main building, that’s sure. If there were bats, then there had to be an exit aboveground. Maybe once I grab Elizabeth, we go this …
A sudden, sharp scream pierced the air.
Christ. His heart seized, fisting to a knot that pushed into his throat. Startled, he blundered away from the tunnel’s mouth and stumbled back to the four-way junction. Had that been a patient? Someone in a cell, or out in a corridor? “Which tunnel did that come from?” he asked. The scream had dwindled to hollow echoes. “Could you tell?”
“No.” Meme looked as terrified as he felt. “Do you think it was her?”
The scream had certainly been high enough, but the edges were rough, mannish. He just wasn’t sure, and there’d only been the one scream. The sound had been so sudden that even the nutters had quieted. He could picture them, quivering in the dark, ears pressing against iron, listening above the thud of their hearts. Yet the scream had also been very loud. Must mean an open door somewhere.
Oh, come on. He turned a complete circle. Which tunnel, which way? Excluding the one they’d just left and the tunnel at three o’clock with its glittery stone, that left two: nine and twelve o’clock. Cocking his head, he stilled his lungs and listened so hard his ears rang. Come on, one more scream. Just one. Help me find you …
As if in answer, the shriek came again, and this time, he heard, very clearly, that brutish bellow. His head whipped left, to the tunnel at his nine.
“Bode?” Meme sounded suddenly tentative. “I think that was a man.”
“Think you’re right.”
“Then it’s probably not her,” Meme said.
“Yeah, but it was loud, and loud means an open door,” he said—and then slapped a hand to his forehead. “Shite.”
“What?”
Weber. He’s got keys, and he’s not in his rooms. “Stay here, stay here!” Moving fast, he plunged into the tunnel. The candle snuffed instantly, but there was enough rock-glow for him to see. His boots clopped; he couldn’t help that, and from the sounds of it, whoever had screamed was probably beyond listening for footsteps. He passed the blank rectangles of one cell door after another. The nutters had started up again, their wails rising and falling in waves. But he was headed the right way. The screamer had switched to shouts now, and no doubt about it: this was a man.
As he turned a tight dogleg right, he spotted a pale yellow rectangle in the distance. Light. Open door.
“You’ve done it now, ya blower!” a man roared. “You’ve done it now!”
God, that was Weber. And blower … He’s talking about a girl. He vaulted down the tunnel. Air raked his throat. Got to be Elizabeth, but then why isn’t she screaming? Wheeling around the open cell door, he saw two things, both of which stilled his heart.
Weber, swollen face smeary with blood, astride her body, his meaty paws clapped round her throat … and Elizabeth, eyes starting from her sockets, as her feet twitched in a final, feeble judder.
And stilled.
BODE
Last Gasp
1
“NO!” HORRIFIED, HIS blood roaring in his veins, Bode ducked his left shoulder and launched himself. He crashed into Weber, a solid body blow that knocked the man sprawling to his left. Weber banged into padding, the impact forcing the breath from the man’s lungs in a loud oomph. Bode scrambled after, trying to work his way from his knees to his feet on the uneven mattress. He managed to set his right foot and was just beginning to push to a stand when Weber rolled onto his back and scythed a leg.
The cut was vicious, the angle perfect. Bode heard the whisk of air as something huge and blocky whickered for his head. In the next second, his face exploded as Weber’s boot clubbed the underside of Bode’s right jaw. A fraction of an inch lower and Weber would probably have crushed his windpipe. As it was, his head snapped back; bright orange flashes popped before his eyes. Pain erupted in his face, and there was suddenly the metallic cut of blood in his mouth.
Gagging, Bode tumbled left. The top of his head slammed against a thin spot in the canvas an
d, beneath that, into solid rock. A lightning bolt of pain shot down his spine and spread through his limbs. For a second, he went stone-cold limp.
Where … where … Stunned, his thoughts balling in a snarl, he couldn’t bring his head around. Gawping, pulling for air like a suffocating fish, he tried to bring up a knee, but his boot slipped and he flopped facedown on the canvas. A second later, Weber’s stubby fingers were crawling through his hair. For a moment, Bode thought Weber meant to wrench his head around and snap his neck. No, no! Panicked, he flailed, slapping at Weber’s hands, his arms. Cursing, Weber swatted Bode’s already yammering jaw with a fist. Gargling a scream, he felt Weber’s hand crush the scruff of his neck.
Then he was airborne as Weber heaved him clean off the floor. Bode was taller, but the thickset Weber had more weight and meanness besides. With a bellow, Weber drove Bode into the wall the way he would a battering ram.
No! A split second before he hit, Bode turtled his shoulders around his ears and got an arm up. There was a sickening thud, and Bode choked out a scream as pain, hot as lava, raced up from his wrist to ball in his shoulder.
Weber loosed his grip. Bode flopped to the floor. His right arm was one long, bright shrill of agony. He could feel his mind beginning to slip, the way boots did on sheer ice. Get up, get away, fight! He would die here if he couldn’t get to his feet. And he’d failed, he’d failed her; she was dead, she was dead! Squirming, he pedaled, his boots sliding in an awkward scutter over worn canvas. It was like trying to work his way up a steep incline of naked stone. Weber, where’s Weber? Grunting, he planted his left hand. His arm trembled, weak as water. Get up, come on! If he could only make it to the door, pull it shut, lock this monster in here, he could get help, he could …
A huge, crushing weight dropped onto his back, beating him flat. He let out a strangled, nearly breathless shriek. Weber was riding his back, and he was heavy as an anvil, his bulk driving Bode down. Bode’s face sank into a rank pocket of mildewed canvas and moldering horsehair. Can’t b-b-breathe, c-can’t … Twisting to the right, he managed to clear a small corner of his mouth for a sip, but it wasn’t nearly enough.
“Enjoy that.” Perhaps no more than a minute had passed since Bode stormed into the cell, but these were the first words Weber had spoken. When his mouth moved, the slick exposed muscle beneath that torn flap of skin bunched and glistened. “You picked the wrong person to fight. ’member, I know you got Graves’s skeleton. It’s how you got down here, and then Elizabeth rebuffed ya, and you snapped. I’m sure Doctor will understand that I had to defend myself.” Weber’s lips parted in an orange grin. “Too late to save that poor girl, though. Pity that poor Meme. To think she was so sweet on you, too. I might have to comfort her.”
Meme. Had she gone for help? Too late; they’ll never get here in time. “N-n-no!” Bode gasped. He had a sudden horrible sense of what Weber meant to do. Gathering himself, ignoring the yammering of his hurt arm, he tried bucking Weber off, but Weber’s weight was on his shoulders, and Bode had no leverage, nothing to push against. “W-Weber,” he said as the man clamped both hands to his head. “D-don’t!”
At the last second, his arms already pinned, Bode managed a quick grab of air, but that was all. Jamming Bode’s face into the mattress, Weber leaned in with all his weight. Smothering me, pushing me into the mattress, got to get air, got to get air! Struggling only used what little air was left in his burning lungs that much faster. For a wild second, he thought, Play dead, go limp. That idea lasted five seconds. The ferocious pressure in his chest exploded in a fireball that swamped him in a red blaze and scorched away reason. Fueled by pain and panic, his body didn’t want to give up, but nothing can fight forever. His thrashing was turning feeble; his boots drummed canvas. His mind was closing down, collapsing in a heap, like poorly balanced bricks tumbling from a rickety cart. There was a bucking, heaving sensation at his belly, but he was too far gone to understand if this was anything but his body mustering all its remaining strength in a last gasp.
And then everything was lost as his starved brain let go of a single, coherent thought: Done for.
2
THEN …
From very far away—so far that if the sensation were sight, he’d have been peering down the wrong end of a collapsible spy-piece—he felt Weber jerk. An instant later, the pressure on his head let up as Weber moved again, more violently and in a herky-jerky dance, like a marionette whose puppeteer has given his strings a sudden yank. The crushing weight on Bode’s back eased as Weber began to list in a slow swoon.
Bode didn’t stop to wonder or think. Pushing up on his good left arm, he bounced Weber from his shoulders. The man toppled like a burlap sack of potatoes and without a sound. Bode was beyond caring what had happened; what he needed was air, and now he dragged in mouthful after screaming mouthful. Over the pounding of his heart, he heard something like the solid chock of an ax biting wood and then a sodden crackle.
What? Still blinking away black spiders, he pulled his head around. Who? Then he thought, Meme—
But it wasn’t.
3
WEBER WAS DOWN, on his stomach. The entire left side of his head looked like a boiled egg that someone had mashed with a heavy boot. His blood was dark as tar, and a slop of something gelatinous—probably brain—glimmered a dusky, faint purple. The only part of him still moving were his hands and booted feet, which jerked and fluttered, but Bode thought that would probably stop soon.
She was there, on her feet, swaying a little. A necklace of black bruises ringed her throat, and blood oiled from both nostrils and a corner of her mouth. She was staring down at Weber. Her expression was unreadable. But there was something about her that was … off, at odds. The way she’s standing. Or maybe it was the cock of her elbows, the set of her shoulders, and the way she gripped that metal jug.
“Elizabeth.” The word came out coarse as gravel. He swallowed, grimacing as pain lanced his throat. “Are you …” The words died as her gaze inched up from the twitching, dying muck that was left of Weber; and he actually felt himself flinch. Her eyes … so dark, darker than ever. “Elizabeth?”
“No,” she said.
BODE
The United What?
HER VOICE WAS very strange, much lower and as raspy as a file on stone, but then again, she’d just had the life nearly crushed out of her. Her gaze sharpened, scraping over his features, as if going through a mental checklist, ticking off items that matched. Releasing a breath, she nodded and then straightened. Her posture relaxed, the tension draining from her shoulders. After a long, speculative look at the jug in her hands, she tossed it aside, then came to stand over him.
“Jesus, man, are you hurt?” Her eyes ticked to his arm. “Shit. Is it broken?”
“I …” Had she just cursed? Flabbergasted, he stared up at Elizabeth, who seemed now to tower. For the briefest of moments, he almost saw the ghost of a different face taking shaping beneath her skin. “What is this?” Though what he wanted to scream: What are you? You realize you just caved in a man’s skull? “Your neck … I thought …”
“Hurts, but she’ll be okay, I think.” Elizabeth gestured with her chin at his arm. “If you need it, I can bind that for you, but you have to listen to me, man. This is important, and I don’t think I have a lot of time to explain.”
Bode blinked. “Explain what?”
“This girl?” She pressed a hand to her chest. “I know what you think, but she’s not Elizabeth.”
“She … she’s not,” he said, carefully. Christ, what have I gotten myself into? She was mad; she really was. Beyond, at the threshold, he heard boots, and then saw Meme at the door.
“No,” Elizabeth said, still in her rougher, deeper voice. “And this is the thing, man. Neither am—”
Meme cut in. “Get away from him.” Before Elizabeth could reply, she darted in and came up with the jug. “Now,” she said, cocking her elbows. “Stand up and move away from Bode, or I swear to God, I will stave in he
r head and you will all be finished.”
“Easy.” Holding her hands out, Elizabeth slowly rose from her crouch. Her chin and neck were streaked with blood. “Take it easy. I’m not going to hurt any …” Then Elizabeth broke off as if she’d gotten a good look at Meme for the first time. “Oh Jesus.”
“You’re not going to hurt anyone? Really?” Meme actually laughed. “Tell that to Weber.”
Elizabeth’s lids fluttered. “Listen,” she said, still in that rough, odd voice, “he was killing her. He’d have killed Bode. I had to—”
“Shut it.” Meme used her chin to point at the cell’s far right corner. “Over there. Back up, hands out where I can see them.”
“Meme.” Bode goggled. “What are you doing?”
“Meme?” Elizabeth said, not moving a muscle. “That’s your name? Is that someone’s idea of a joke?”
“You find this funny?” Meme hefted the jug higher. “Move, now.”
“What if I don’t?” Elizabeth eyed the other girl. “What are you going to do? You really going to beat my head in? You think you can take me?”
“Do not try me,” Meme said. “That is still another’s body, and a weak one at that. I am taller, and have better reach. You would not be taking me by surprise as you did Weber.”
“Meme?” Bode struggled to his feet. “What is this? Someone, please tell me what’s going on.”
“I just did, Bode.” Elizabeth’s gaze suddenly seemed to turn inward. “She’s waking up anyway. Listen, Bode, I don’t think she knows I’m here. Tell her it was Eric. Bode, remember the name: Eric. Tell her. She needs to know.”
“Who?” Bode asked.
“Did I say you could talk to him?” Meme shouted. “I said quiet!”
“Eric. Casey too.” Hands up, face intent, Elizabeth kept an eye on Meme and another on Bode. “Rima and even Lizzie, we’re here …”