He Laughed With His Other Mouths

by M. T. Anderson

  Lily said quietly, “It might not be a person at all.”

  That made them both fall silent.

  “We gotta find him,” said Katie. She walked over to the door. “He’s out there somewhere.”

  She yanked the door open.

  And suddenly the whole chamber was wailing with sirens and blaring with lights.

  Lily and Katie reeled backward as the walls screamed.

  * * *

  I Horror Hollow #27: Sleepover of Doom.

  SHOCKING!

  Jasper Dash and his electrical passenger had reached the Second Wire City. Wires were strung in every direction between pillars of stone. The wires sparkled and tinkled with activity as energy beings zapped through the circuitry and bunched up to see the approach of the strange animal of metal and flesh.

  Ugh, said the spark in Jasper’s suit. Now I remember why I was an evil dictator. Look at them all. My former subjects. They’re terrible people. All they care about is glitter and sizzle. I really can’t stand them.

  Jasper watched the wires sway where the beings crowded.

  “You were an evil dictator?” he asked his rider.

  The Dirrillillim put me in charge of the rest of my people when we were brought here. I tried to get them all to simmer down. Through executions and frequent groundings.

  “But you’ve learned your lesson after your long imprisonment, and you’re ready to return?”

  No. I have not learned my lesson. That’s why I needed the metal on your suit to carry me between the old First Wire City and this new Second Wire City. My people kicked me out and exiled me long ago. I am going to invade them and rule with hideous might for a million years.

  Jasper stopped walking. “I don’t believe in any kind of dictatorship.”

  ZAP!!!

  Jasper jumped.

  The voice said, You don’t have any choice.

  “No! By gum,” said Jasper, “I have never played the patsy for any evil electrical dictator, and I never will!” He stood stock-still, stubborn as a mule, with his legs planted firmly on the alien dirt.

  Then the jolts started. ZAP! ZOT! ZOCK! ZIP! ZWAMP!!!

  Jasper danced and gurgled in agony.

  He fell to the ground. His hair stuck up straight. He panted for breath.

  He had no choice. Deliver this wicked warlord of wattage to his unsuspecting victims—or die of electric shock.

  VOLT FACE

  As Jasper crouched on the ground near the Second Wire City, his microphones began to pick up the faint buzzing of voices from the metal web.

  Ah.

  Hmm.

  Yes.

  Glory be.

  It’s an animal.

  Fancy, an animal!

  In metal.

  Isn’t there someone with it?

  I think I can see . . . Lovey-dove, isn’t that Bzzazzokk the Conquerer?

  It is! Bzzazzokk! It’s Bzzazzokk!

  Jasper crawled toward the Second Wire City. He croaked out, “Never fear . . . small electrical people . . . I shall not allow Bzzazzokk to corrupt your glorious network! Live in freedom!”

  ZZAP! Jasper cringed as Bzzazzokk sent another electrical shock right through him.

  But just as Jasper prepared to resist heroically, he heard the voices of the people again, buzzing through the wires.

  It’s all right, animal! Bring him to us!

  Do not resist him.

  It has been a long time since we’ve had an evil dictator.

  Bring him hither.

  We are bored.

  We might as well try an evil dictator again. Perhaps it will be comical or refreshingly diverting.

  Jasper lifted his eyebrow. The look was lost on the electrical people. “Jupiter’s moons,” he said. “Are you sure?”

  Step under the wires. Take him to our central node and release him.

  Bzzazzokk, flitting around the metal in Jasper’s suit, was full of confidence and joy. See, animal? crowed the sizzling dictator. They want me to return! I am greeted in triumph, with shuddering in the wires and great surges of voltage!

  Jasper had learned that aliens often had strange ideas about what made sense, so he wasn’t going to ask too many questions. “All right, fellows,” he said. “If this is what you really want, I’ll drop him off. Where and how?”

  The little voices called for him to drop Bzzazzokk off in the city square. It was a knot where all the wires came together.

  Jasper leaned down and crawled along through the tangle. The people of the Second Wire City were careful not to jolt him. Still, making it through all the slanting lines and coils without tripping was difficult. The shadows of power lines spidered over his space suit.

  After two minutes or so, he was right near the center of the knotted city of electricity.

  Thirty or forty tiny voices buzzed,

  Welcome, welcome, Bzzazzokk and his noble beast!

  Welcome to the Second Wire City!

  Rise, animal! Rise and release the warlord Bzzazzokk!

  Jasper stood carefully. He raised his gloved finger toward the bunch where all the wires came together.

  Bzzazzokk was making a speech. Citizens of the Second Wire City, you have made me so proud, to be back among you. Many of you I have not seen since you were just a few joules with barely any positive charge. And yet, to receive this hero’s welcome, to be able to return for a reign of crazed, despotic terror that shall last a million years, is really more than I expected from—

  Then the full blast of electricity hit.

  Jasper involuntarily threw himself backward and bounced on wires like a boxer hurled on the ropes.

  Everything was silent.

  Slow, small sparks licked up and down the wires.

  “Hello?” Jasper whispered.

  We’re eating, said one of the citizens of the Second Wire City.

  There’s been a drought. We haven’t had any electricity pass this way for months.

  No solar winds.

  No magnetic storms.

  We’re hungry.

  So we’ve divided Bzzazzokk up and we’re all taking part of his electrical charge.

  “You’re . . . eating him?” Jasper was horrified. “That’s . . . That’s awful! That’s terrible! You’re as bad as he is!”

  Was.

  Ha ha.

  “You can’t just—cannibalize someone! Even if they’re an evil dictator!”

  Well, said one of the voices, in a day or two, we’re going to do the same thing to you.

  “To me?!?”

  Your body is full of electricity.

  Your brain is electric.

  Your heart is electric.

  Your nerves are electric.

  We snack on the body electric.

  We’ll keep you here until we’re hungry again.

  “Ha!” said Jasper, pulling out his ray gun. “Keep me here? I would like to see the army that could!”

  ZZZZAAAPPPP! They hit him with charge!

  He went reeling—bumped into more wires—lit up—rebounded—was flung around like a pinball in a machine that was bursting with thumper bumpers, double scores, triple scores, SLAM TILT!

  He fired his ray gun—again—again!

  And the wicked little sparks ate up the energy. They cackled. They devoured his battery.

  More! More!

  They dropped him. He fell, exhausted, to the ground.

  All his muscles hurt from jolting. He looked at the twenty feet or so he’d have to crawl and bend himself around and make sure he wasn’t close enough for a spark to jump and—

  BZZZZT!

  They started jolting him again.I

  Don’t even think about escape! they buzzed. You’re staying here! You’re ours!

  You’re supper!

  Jasper Dash screamed, trapped in a web of fire.

  * * *

  I You know who knew a lot about electricity and physics in general? Busby Spence’s father. He had a job fixing appliances before the war. When he was sent o
ff to the Pacific, he worked as a radio operator with the Marines. Busby didn’t know exactly where his father was. He studied the Pacific on a map—all the island chains. But when letters arrived from Busby’s father, everything that might give away a position or a location had been cut out of the letter with scissors. (It would be dangerous if any of that information ever fell into enemy hands.)

  Busby and his mother read those letters home again and again. “Dear Flo and Busby,” the letters would say. “I miss you something terrible. I can’t say where we are or where we’re going. I can tell you it has palm trees, that’s it. But a whole lot of love, and don’t forget your pop!”

  It didn’t take Busby and his mother very long to read the letters.

  They waited for Busby’s father to come home.

  A WARNING FROM SPACE

  What terrible things happen to people in books. I’m sorry. All I want—all any of us want—is for all these nice people in the stories we read to stop being chased, shot at, electrocuted, taken prisoner, dropped from cliffs, tied to train tracks, locked in caves, gnawed on by griffins, and plunged into the sea.

  But we want a good story even more. So just as soon as they settle down, put their feet up, and start to play a slow, quiet game of cards, here we are again—the author and the readers—sneaking up through the bushes to peer in the window, knowing that at any moment some mobsters will bust in, or centipedes will come out of the walls, or the Christmas tree will start whapping people with its branches and ornaments.

  Things, for example, are not going great for people in this story. While off in the black-and-purple clouds of the Horsehead Nebula, Jasper Dash was waiting for his electrocution and Katie and Lily were fighting just to take a breath, Jasper’s mom—who was also fighting for breath, after her sprint—was surrounded by aliens in the frozen winter forest.

  The aliens were tall and gangly and goggly. They had ray guns.

  Mrs. Dash said, “I demand to know what you want, gentlemen.”

  One of the aliens stepped forward. He held up his ray gun. He said in a growly voice, “Are you Jasper Dash?”

  “No,” said Mrs. Dash. “Jasper is my son. And right now, he’s a very naughty boy.”

  “We have come for Jasper Dash.”

  “Well, boys, you’re out of luck, because my son has gone gallivanting off to the region of the Horsehead Nebula.”

  The lead alien rocked backward. “The Horsehead Nebula? Then he has already perfected the teleportation machine?”

  “You’re right he has,” said Mrs. Dash. “And when he gets back, he is going to be grounded for a good long time. Those trees’ll be green again before that boy gets his shrink-ray privileges back. Why do you want him? Who are you?”

  “We have come from the planet of Krilm.”

  “I haven’t had the pleasure,” said Mrs. Dash. “Anyway, you’ll never catch my Jasper! He’s far, far away.”

  “We are not trying to catch Jasper Dash. We are trying to warn him.”

  “Warn him?” repeated Mrs. Dash.

  The alien explained, “He has walked into a trap. And because he used that teleporter, the whole of the Earth is in peril.”

  THE SECRETS OF THE DIRRILLILLIM

  The aliens invited Mrs. Dash into their flying saucer for a hologram picture show. “It will explain many things.”

  “Why, that’s very kind of you,” said Mrs. Dash. “Although it is a little peculiar to receive an invitation to attend a party in my own yard.”

  They walked up a ramp into the spaceship. Inside, everything was sleek and cool and silver and white. The aliens—who were called the Garxx of Planet Krilm—stood around the outside of the room and pointed at the center.

  Suddenly stars appeared in the air. It was a hologram image in 3-D. And as the leader of the Garxx spoke, other images appeared before them.

  “Long ago,” said the leader of the Garxx, “when your race and ours were young, there was a very old race of creatures called the Dirrillillim. They were a violent and evil race. They came from the planet you call Zeblion III. For generations, the Dirrillillim had flown between stars in spaceships like this, which go at two or three times the speed of light.” Suddenly a fleet of gloppy, weird spaceships were hanging in front of Dolores Dash’s eyes.

  “You made this picture show especially for my son, didn’t you?” Mrs. Dash realized. There were tears in her voice. “It was for him to watch. . . . I am so sorry that he was not here.”

  The aliens shuffled nervously. “We’ve showed it a few other times to people,” admitted one of the Garxx of Krilm.

  Another one said, “Each time, we fix the music and stuff to make it better.”

  “I see,” said Mrs. Dash. “And do you show a picture of one of these . . . What are they called?”

  “The Dirrillillim. When there’s only one, it is called a Dirrillill.”

  “Very fine. Do I see one?”

  “We have never seen the Dirrillillim. We have no pictures.”

  “They are a mystery, then,” said Mrs. Dash.

  “Indeed. We know this history only from other races we have met. I shall continue. They tell the tale that the Dirrillillim spread far through the stars in their spaceships. But then the Dirrillillim invented the teleporter. An incredible machine. It would take them instantaneously across the galaxy. The problem was, they could not teleport just anywhere. There had to be both a sending machine and a receiving machine.”

  Mrs. Dash gasped as she saw a booth that looked very much like the one in Jasper’s room. A dotted line was drawn between it and a similar booth that hung near a far star in the diagram.

  “Using their spaceships to deliver teleporters across the huge distances between stars, the Dirrillillim spread their empire across one arm of the galaxy.” A map appeared, showing an arm of the spinning Milky Way covered with little lines and dots. Then bursts of light began bubbling up inside the Dirrillillim Empire.

  “Then they began to war among themselves. Whole stars were blown up. They were a powerful race. They attacked one another mercilessly. There was a giant blast, larger than any blast the galaxy had seen since the beginning of time. Several huge solar systems were destroyed. This is how the Horsehead Nebula was formed.

  “After this war, there were only a few Dirrillillim left. They were trapped on their home planet, Zeblion III. They needed new teleporters on other planets if they were ever going to expand their empire again. And so they began a great project.

  “The few remaining Dirrillillim realized that the quickest way for them to get teleporters built on planets they wanted to invade was to get people on those planets to build them themselves. But the problem was, on many of those planets, there was no one smart enough to build a teleporter. And so this is what they did, Mother of Dash: They sent signals into space—highly concentrated beams of information from their planet in the region of the Horsehead Nebula. These signals told how to create hyperintelligent members of the species on each planet. But hidden away in these plans was a secret: After many years of study and learning, these hyperintelligent children on hundreds of different worlds would each receive another signal . . . and in a dream, they would figure out how to build a particular kind of teleporter machine. And they would know to create a link with the Horsehead Nebula. And once this link was formed, then the Dirrillillim could use their teleporters to invade. That is the story, Mother of Dash! Your boy has built one of these machines and has traveled to the region of the Horsehead Nebula—where he shall meet the Dirrillillim and shall be taken captive and questioned! Then hundreds of the remaining Dirrillillim, with their powerful weapons and their ruthless self-congratulation, will invade Earth!”

  The pictures faded.

  The alien asked, “Do you have any questions?”

  Turning to the leader, Mrs. Dash demanded, “So who,” she asked, “are you?”

  “As we have said, we are the Garxx of Planet Krilm. We are one of several races that intercepted the beams sent out many years
ago. We have been trying to follow the beams to each planet so we can find the children the Dirrillillim created. We try to warn them not to build the teleporter. We recently discovered that such a communication was sent to Jasper Dash.”

  “And how many of these children have you warned?”

  The aliens were a little uneasy.

  “None,” said the leader. “We have always gotten there too late.”

  “Well, sir, you’re a little late again, apparently. My son headed off into the region of the Horsehead Nebula just last night.”

  “That is unfortunate.”

  “So what now? How do we save my boy? Do you propose to fly there in this ship?”

  The head Garxx said, “This ship travels at three times the speed of light.”

  This sounds very fast, but in fact, Mrs. Dash knew it was not nearly fast enough. The nebula was fifteen hundred light-years away. That means a ship going exactly the speed of light would take fifteen hundred years to get there, and a ship going three times the speed of light would still take five hundred years to get there.

  By that time, they would all be dead.

  “I see. So what do we do?”

  The head Garxx crossed his arms. “We had hoped to have Jasper Dash explain to us the secret of building the teleporter. But instead, let us go inspect the one he built—and perhaps we may learn its secrets.”

  “And then?”

  The Garxx looked at one another. “Then perhaps we can use his teleporter—to invade the Dirrillillim before they can invade you.”I

  * * *

  I Sometimes Busby Spence’s friend Harmon complained about science fiction. “This is what I mean,” he would say, pointing at a chapter like this one. “This story is crazy.”