Better Off Undead

by James Preller

  Kristoff raised his head to stare at me, momentarily revived.

  I stood in the deep gloom of a room filled with sickness, and sensed the nearness of death, as if it were another creature in the bed beside them. “What do you want with me?” I asked.

  Kristoff smirked, eyes closed. “Life. What else is there?”

  I said, “I don’t understand. Why me?”

  “My dear brother is rapidly failing. We believe that you hold the key to my—to our—freedom,” Kristoff said. He slithered out a bony hand from beneath the covers. His fingers were arthritic, gnarled into mangled shapes. Kristoff reached the trembling claw toward me, shaking from the effort. “You will give us the secret, boy Lazarus.”

  He fell back in a fit of coughing. For all his wealth, he was just a twisted, broken old man, his body racked with disease. Dr. Halpert produced a large syringe from a black leather bag. He held it up, frowned at the weak light cast by the chandelier, flicked the needle once, and plunged it deep into the shared chest of the twins. He went around to the other side of the bed, checking on Kalvin, touching his neck, gazing into his eyes. The doctor shook his head. “We’re running out of time.”

  The nurse brought the oxygen mask to Kristoff’s face. His eyes closed to a reptilian slit as the machine-forced air filled his lungs. After a moment, his eyes snapped open. He lifted his hand, signaling for the nurse to sit.

  Kristoff’s eyes widened. Revived by the shot, his head coiled upward, cobra-like. This time he spoke with more strength. “Yes, time is of the essence.”

  “It should be an almost painless process, considering your damaged nervous system,” Dr. Halpert informed me, as if something had just been decided. “I am skilled in the art of the knife. I simply need to take small samples, run tests, poke around.”

  I looked back to see Zander, Gia, and Dane clustered in a tight knot. Gia had bent to her knees with both arms protectively around Dane. She was whispering to him, touching his hair and face, working to keep him calm. As my eyes roamed the room, I noticed that the long burgundy drapes that covered the windows had been parted slightly. I could see a few faint stars in the sky, pale flecks of light that had traveled like arrows for thousands of years through blackest space to shine precisely now outside the window. Everything dies: stars, planets, galaxies. Even the Milky Way will one day whirl into a black hole. Yet in that instant, I glimpsed a movement, a faint shape, a hope hovering outside the window.

  Not a bird, but a drone.

  Talal was watching. I knew it in my bones.

  I looked away, not wishing to draw attention to Talal’s drone.

  “Come, we are wasting time, Doctor,” Kristoff snapped. Spittle flew from his mouth.

  “Wait, I have an offer!” I announced, stalling for time. “If you want me to help save your lives, I want you to change your ways. Promise that you’ll use your money to help protect the environment.”

  The doctor snickered but made no move. He waited for Kristoff’s reply.

  “After all,” I continued, “you’ve dedicated your lives to destroying it. You drill in the Arctic, you dump waste in our rivers, pump cancer-causing chemicals into the earth. You pollute the atmosphere, you stop at nothing—”

  “Silence!” Kristoff ordered, flicking his tongue past thin lips. “The time for negotiation has passed.”

  “Even now in your misery,” I said, “you only care about one thing: more, more, more. When will it be enough?”

  A smile crossed Kristoff’s face, a snake slinking across a barren desert wasteland. He was amused by me.

  I asked, in a soft voice, “What’s the point of living forever if our planet is ruined in the process? Look at this world that people like you have left us—floods and fires, earthquakes and droughts, rain forests cut down, entire species wiped off the planet, toxic water—”

  “And you blame us for this? We, the great men of industry and progress?” Kristoff asked, head trembling. “We are the job creators! You foolish, idealistic child. You little boy. You lollipop, you dum-dum. You know nothing about the world. Nothing about how it really works.”

  “I know what’s right,” I said.

  “You know nothing!” he spit out.

  “I’ll never help you—I hope you both die!”

  “That’s enough,” Dr. Halpert stated.

  Kristoff lifted the oxygen mask to his face and breathed deeply from it. Kalvin coughed weakly, eyes wandering, unfocused. The machines beeped and whirred in the background. The nurse began to stir again, uncrossing her legs, but Kristoff waved her off with a peevish flick of the hand.

  “No, no, no,” the old man protested. “I find the boy spirited and entertaining. Let him prattle.” Kristoff muffled a cough in his curled hand.

  But I had already said all that I had to say. I stood facing them, sapped of strength.

  Kristoff purred, cold eyes gleaming. “And after we die, Adrian? What then?” His eyes slid to the machines at his right. “We are only part of a greater engine. After we go, the machine marches on. K & K will continue, and it will do what it does best—it earns profits. That’s what corporations do. K & K will make money, filling someone else’s pockets with gold while people like you fill their heads with fear and needless worry.”

  He gave a long and hollow laugh, flashing yellowed, decayed teeth. He spit into his pillow. Red dots of blood appeared on it. Death was not far away.

  “You have no answers,” Kristoff said. “What could you possibly know, a boy your age? What comes after us? You see, our advantage over you is simply this: We do not care.”

  He grinned wickedly, delighted with his own words.

  “We don’t care what comes next. That’s your weakness, Adrian. You fret too much. Why not follow our example? Get rich. Be happy.”

  Dr. Halpert yanked me by the arm. The bodyguard came forward to grab my other wrist, twisting it high behind my back. The contortion didn’t hurt, but I was trapped all the same. The time for talk had ended. I swiveled my head to look out the window. “Now!” I cried, desperately hoping that Talal and his hacker friends could hear me.

  “Now, now, now!”

  Instantly, fire alarms blared.

  Lights flashed like dizzying strobes, pulsing in the dark.

  Torrents of water poured from the ceiling sprinklers.

  FIRE

  “The sprinklers!” bellowed Dr. Halpert in exasperation. Popping sounds came from the machines; sparks flew, systems short-circuited. The Borks lay in the bed, helplessly soaked, with Kristoff muttering curses.

  I watched as a joyous smile came to Kalvin’s face, like that of an innocent child exalting in an afternoon sun shower.

  Then chaos erupted.

  It took a moment for me to realize that Zander had leaped on the incredible hulk’s back and was punching the bodyguard on the head. Brave move, Zander, but not brilliant. The guard shrugged him off and with one backhanded blow swatted Zander to the ground.

  “Never mind them! Help me with the brothers!” ordered Dr. Halpert.

  The huge man stared at Halpert. A flicker of disdain flashed in his eyes. Maybe he was tired of taking orders. Maybe he just wanted to squash bugs. He snarled and gave me a two-handed shove that propelled me into the window. My forehead cracked against the thick pane. Then, in a slow, menacing movement, the great Goliath shifted his attention to Gia. She stood waiting, knees bent, balanced on the balls of her feet. Gia calmly clasped her hands, stretched her arms toward the ceiling. She loosened her neck, tilting it from side to side.

  As chill as a cucumber salad at a family picnic.

  The guard didn’t consider the skinny girl with purple hair a threat. He relaxed his defenses. That was a mistake. Gia delivered a lightning-swift, devastating punch to his neck. She instantly whirled and brought a whiplike roundhouse kick to his face. The hulk toppled to the ground like a great tree felled to the forest floor. The man slowly rose, shaking the cobwebs from his head in disbelief. He flashed an amused smile. Finally, happy
at last, he had found a worthy adversary.

  Gia waited in ready position, bouncing on the balls of her feet, hands open.

  “This isn’t the time for that!” Dr. Halpert blustered. “The brothers! You must help me now!” Water still poured from the sprinkler system.

  The massive man glowered at Gia. He snorted, a rhino’s grunt. Then he turned sharply away and gathered up the pale, wraithlike twins in his massive arms.

  Halpert called out instructions to the bodyguard over the deafening blare of alarm bells. “Carry them through the tunnels to the heliport. Move quickly! I’ll initiate the file-destruct sequence from the communication center.”

  The sprinklers slowed to a steady drip. Zander rose groggily from the wet floor. I could see that his nose was broken. Bright red blood puddled at his feet, turning pink on the floor as it mixed with the water. “Let’s go,” I yelled, yanking him by the arm. I lifted up Dane to my face and kissed him. Gia advanced to the lead, and the four of us swept out of the room.

  For some reason, the mansion’s sound system began blasting David Bowie—“Ch-ch-changes”—at earsplitting volume. Until that moment, I hadn’t realized that Talal Mirwani was a Bowie fan. But then again, isn’t everybody?

  “Turn and face the strange!”

  “What happened back there?” Zander yelled as we splashed and slipped down the hallway.

  “It was Talal!” I yelled over the noise. “He must have found a way to hack into the estate’s mainframe!”

  Dane sniffed. “I smell smoke.”

  “Dane’s right,” Gia confirmed. “It’s coming from the main floor. We’d better move.”

  I lowered Dane from my arms to the floor. I held my brother by the shoulders to get his full attention. “Go with Gia and Zander, they’ll take care of you.”

  “No, I want you,” Dane said, clutching at my shirt.

  “I’ll meet you outside,” I promised. “I have something to do first.” I looked up at my friends. “Take him outside. Find a safe place. The fire department should be here soon.”

  I squeezed Dane’s small body close to my chest. “I love you, Scarecrow! Now go!”

  Gia lifted Dane up in her sinewy arms. He clung to her, buried his face in her neck. “I’ve got him,” she called back. “Go do what you have to do.”

  I took off down the hallway. I needed to find some way to get in direct contact with Talal. There might still be a way to stop the Borks from fleeing. Halpert had mentioned a communication center. I tore down a long hallway, paused by a guard’s abandoned desk, and read a sign on the door behind it: DR. NOAH HALPERT.

  I tried the knob. It was unlocked.

  I scanned the room. Bookshelves, chairs, a large desk. Somewhere a phone rang. I recognized the ringtone. Dr. Halpert’s blue blazer, now soaking wet, lay neatly folded across a wooden armchair. I reached into the pocket and answered my cell. “Tal?”

  “None other,” he replied.

  “There’s a fire downstairs. Did you cause it?”

  Tal paused before answering. I could hear the clicking of a computer keyboard. “No, that must have been Halpert. They don’t want to leave behind any evidence.”

  “Can you put it out?” I asked.

  “I can try, no promises. I gained control of most of their operating systems, but they don’t have sprinklers at every level. Fires are not easy to tame—they have a way of going wherever they want. You’d better hurry,” he said. “The police are on the way. Fire department, too.”

  “The Borks are headed for the heliport,” I said. “See if you can stop them, or delay them, or whatever!”

  “I’m already on it,” Talal said, and I could almost hear him smile through the phone.

  “I’m headed there now,” I told him. I shoved the phone into my pocket, ran three steps, and stopped in my tracks. I picked up the phone. “Tal?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Which way to the heliport?”

  He told me.

  Next I ran down the hall, down two flights of stairs, pushed through three sets of heavy metal double doors, crossed an open yard, and arrived at a barnlike structure. Clack, clack, clack—tumblers turned, locks released, doors swung open before me.

  Tal was clearing my path.

  The barn was empty. Two huge sliding doors had been left wide open.

  A siren wailed in the distance, growing louder.

  My phone rang.

  “Yeah?”

  It was Tal. “Sorry, but Elvis has left the building.”

  An involuntary noise rose up from inside me, something between a gasp and a groan. A helicopter lifted off from behind a stand of tall pines. It hovered for a moment, tilted away, and disappeared. The Borks had made their getaway.

  No one would believe our story now.

  I spoke into the cell. “Thanks for everything, Tal. You saved us. I’ll never make fun of computer geeks again.” I paused, almost afraid to ask. “Is Dane okay? Gia? Zander?”

  “Safe and sound, wet and shivering, but with wool blankets wrapped around their shoulders,” Talal answered. “The first responders have arrived: cops, EMTs, firefighters, even the sheriff’s office. It’s all clear. You might want to say hello.”

  BY THE CLEAR MORNING LIGHT

  I slept hard that night, and dreamlessly, as if I’d fallen down a watery well. By the clear morning light, I awoke refreshed, renewed. Dane was on the floor in the TV room, organizing his Halloween loot. “Wanna trade?” he asked, before even saying hello.

  “You got any Jolly Ranchers?”

  Dane scanned his ridiculous stash. “Seventeen pieces,” he informed me.

  “What are you looking for in exchange?”

  “Kit Kats or peanut butter cups,” he said. “And Mounds bars for Mom. She likes coconut, no one knows why.”

  The kid cracked me up. “I think we can work something out,” I said. “Later, okay? I have to stop by the school.”

  “It’s Sunday.”

  “I know,” I said. “Zander’s already there. Gia, too. We’re helping out in the garden.”

  “Dorothy’s super strong,” Dane noted.

  “You mean Gia? Yeah, she sure is,” I agreed, still awed by her fighting skills. I recalled that famous quote from the boxer Muhammad Ali: Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee.

  That was Gia all right.

  I eased myself down onto the edge of a chair and softly asked, “Hey, Dane. You okay about last night?”

  Dane beamed. “It rained inside the house!”

  I laughed. “That was pretty crazy weather, huh?”

  “It was just like in the movie,” Dane said, “when we all had to be brave. In the end, the Wizard wasn’t so powerful after all.”

  “Promise me you’ll never again get into a stranger’s car,” I said. “We won’t tell Mom about that, okay?”

  Dane had to think about that one. “Secrets are bad.”

  It was my turn to think it over. “You’re probably right. If you want to tell Mom, let’s do it together, okay? We don’t want to worry her too much.”

  Dane tossed me a green Jolly Rancher.

  “Thanks, brother,” I said. “I owe you.”

  The world might have gone wrong in so many ways, but it still looked good to me as I pedaled to the middle school. The bee frame was back up. Ms. Fjord worked close to it, fully dressed in a beekeeper’s protective outfit. She waved a small container that blew smoke over the hive.

  Gia and Zander stood nearby. Zander wore a white bandage over his nose, with two white strips in the shape of an X. “Ouch,” I said.

  Zander shrugged. His eyes darted to Ms. Fjord, and he said, a little too loudly, “Clumsy me, broke my nose last night.”

  “He walked into a door,” Gia explained.

  “Uh-huh,” I said. “Does it hurt?”

  “Only if I breathe,” Zander joked. He gently probed the blackened and bruised area of his nose.

  Ms. Fjord joined us, lifting off the head veil.

  “So ho
w’s the colony?” I asked.

  “We got lucky,” she replied, stepping back to observe the restored frame. “This morning I used a smoker to calm them down. Then, with the help of your friends, I replaced a couple of supers and the outer cover, so the frame itself is now structurally sound. It’s late in the season, so there wasn’t much honey to speak of. Otherwise, it would have been a gooey mess. My big worry was the health of the queen.”

  Zander interjected, “Without a queen, a colony can’t survive. She’s the heart and soul of the hive.”

  “And?” I asked.

  “She appears fine, for now,” Ms. Fjord answered. “I might have to replace her with another queen, preferably in the spring. Queens only last two or three years, and it’s essential that she be a productive queen. Everything in the hive revolves around her.”

  Images from last night scrolled before me: the shock of seeing the powerful Borks in their crisp blue pajamas, sick and still bound together, brothers sharing one flawed, dark heart; the water gushing from the sprinklers; Gia’s roundhouse kick; Dane in my arms; and the sight of a helicopter’s blades slicing through the dark clouds.

  A feeling that it was over, for now.

  “What happens when bees swarm?” Gia asked, breaking my reverie.

  Ms. Fjord rubbed her brow with the back of her sleeve. “Well, let’s see,” she said. “A hive will typically swarm if there’s a problem in the colony, often because it’s too crowded or too hot, or if there’s a problem with the queen. A swarm is a fascinating natural event to witness,” she said. “The hive suddenly gets really loud, and thousands of bees rise up at once, like a swirling black tornado. They fly off to gather in a great clump, hanging off a nearby tree branch or bush. Keepers call them beards.”

  “Beards?” I said.

  “Oh, it’s incredible, just a great big dangling mass of bees! They’ll hang there for a full day or two while scouts go out in all directions to seek a new location for the colony. It could be a chimney, a hole in a tree, any kind of small, dark place.”

  “There’re lots of great videos online,” Zander suggested. “You should check them out.”