Kiss of Life (38 page)

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"Popeye," he said. "Did you ...really ... see Karen ...get up?"

"I...think ...so," was his reply, but he didn't look at Tak when he said it.

Tak was angry with him, but he knew his anger was misplaced. The tactician in him knew that Popeye had done the right thing; if the Haunted House community were to lose him, Karen, and Tommy, they'd be decimated in no time. If in fact the police hadn't decimated them already.

He quickened his pace. The human in him, whatever small part that was left, wished he'd died the final death with the others.

"I ... I think ...George is ...dead, Tak," Popeye said. "Like ...really ....dead."

Tak nodded. He'd had the same suspicion. Tayshawn was probably a goner too. Maybe the priest was able to save Melissa, but it was just as likely that they'd knocked him aside and shot her like a dog.

But please, God, he thought, please not Karen. Please.

"Did you feel the ...bullets, Tak?"

"A ...little," he answered.

"Why did ...they ... do it?"

"Something's happened," Tak repeated. But what it was, he could only guess.

He didn't have to wait long for his answer. When they arrived at the Haunted House after the long walk through the woods, the "something" was on everyone's minds. There were over a dozen zombies in the unliving room when he and Popeye arrived. The boys from the foundation, Kevin and Cooper--

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were all waiting for them. Even Mai, who rarely budged from his rock, was there. Many of the zombies rushed at them as soon as they saw them, as opposed to waving, or ignoring him, like they usually did.

The questions and comments came all at once.

"Why ...did you do ...it?

"The ...police ..."

"Murderer ..."

He couldn't make any sense of the undead chorus until Anna, a girl whom he barely knew, made her way to the front and told him without pause, in a clear voice, that he had doomed them all.

"What the ...bloody ...hell ... are you talking about?" Popeye said, sounding exasperated.
"They
shot...at...
us."

The girl trained her pale gray eyes on him. "Because you ...killed ...that family."

"What?"
Popeye said. He looked at Tak, his mouth open wide enough to show gray gums and beige teeth.

"Why do you think ... we killed ...someone?" Tak asked.

"It was on ...the radio," said one of the other boys. "Every ...fifteen minutes there is ... an update. They give ...your ...description."

"The radio," he said. He had to laugh in spite of himself. "Who did they ....say ... we killed?"

"A lawyer ...and his family," was the answer. "Children."

Then he did laugh. One lie, one false accusation, and zombies everywhere are instantly discredited. To think that Tommy thinks he can actually make a difference, that he can effect

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change through discourse and nonviolence, when his enemies have the means to erase everything he's done in the moment it takes for a beating heart to exhale. Power in America, real power, the power to annihilate and erase would always be in the hands of the living.

"Zombies," he said. "We have ...not done ...what they are saying we have done. I've always said that death ... is a gift. But it ... is not ...ours to give."

Even as he said it, Tak was reconsidering his position. He looked at each of the zombies gathered around him in turn.

"The beating hearts ... are lying."

His whispered words silenced them. He knew they wanted to believe--there may have even been some who hoped he
had
committed a violent crime against the breathers, but for the most part the others would take Takayuki's word over that of a disembodied voice from the radio.

"We walked to Winford," he began, and continued to relate everything that had happened that night. His audience was dismayed to hear that George--a favorite around the Haunted House--had been taken, but they were devastated when he said that they weren't sure if Karen got away.

"What ... do ... we ... do ... now?" Anna asked. "The radio ...said that... the police ... were searching ... for three. They gave ...your ...descriptions."

Popeye groaned.

"The police ...will ...come here," Tak said. "You ...should not... be here ...when they do." "Where can ... we go?"

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Takayuki looked at Jacinta, who had been at the Haunted House only a week or so before the Hunters visited. Takayuki looked at her and thought that his heart would break, if he had one.

"I know ... a place," he said. He turned to the zombies shuffling around. "We will ...take you ...there. Bring whatever ...you think ...you need. Tell ...whoever else ... is here. Be back ... in five minutes."

Tak went upstairs and checked each of the rooms for zombies, but everyone had been downstairs. He stopped in the room with the wall of the dead. Downstairs, there was a crash and a thump and the sounds of slow, scared people trying to hurry.

He debated trashing the wall, thinking that maybe it wasn't such a great idea for the authorities to get so many mug shots, but then decided that he'd rather leave it. One of the recruitment posters with George fluttered in a breeze of unknown origin.

He found one of Popeyes markers and wrote on the poster, then went to join his people downstairs.

When he got there, Popeye was hugging Tayshawn, who had apparently just came through the front door

"Sorry ...I'm late," Tayshawn said, shrugging Popeye away.

"Better late ...than never," Tak said. He was glad Tayshawn had, made it, but not glad enough to hug him. "Did you see ...Karen?"

The look on Tayshawn's face reminded him what a curse hope was.

"I ...didn't ... see her."

Tak tried not to let his emotions show. His voice, made

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more hollow and raspy by the bullet that had passed through his lung, betrayed nothing. He was aware of the zombies gathering behind him, awaiting his instructions

"Don't get ...comfortable," he whispered to Tayshawn. There were a few of their people, Anna and a newlydead boy whose name escaped him, standing apart from the others. "See if you ...can convince ...the others. If you can't...after ...a few minutes ...leave them."

"Where are we ...going?" Popeye asked. He'd found another pair of sunglasses, with big round John Lennon--style mirrored lenses that looked almost comical on his pale white face.

"You'll know ...when ...you get ...there."

Tak turned, and the undead eyes of their community all trained on him. He'd thought of this moment often, the moment they would recognize him as their leader. Tommy's leaving had made it inevitable.

But when he'd thought of it, he'd always done so with Karen in mind. Just as he'd always known that circumstances would force the zombies to his side, he'd known that Karen would realize that Tommy's methods would not accomplish what needed accomplishing.

And now, looking into their faces and not seeing hers, he felt an emptiness unlike any he'd ever experienced before, save that of when he'd first returned from death.

He sighed, air passing in a wet wheeze from his punctured lung, and addressed his people.

"We have ... to go."

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CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

PHOEBE WONDERED
where all the zombies had gone. I She'd taken Adam's hand

when they were walking to class, a rare public display of affection, but she was unnerved and a little nervous by the stares they'd been getting, stares that had begun the moment they'd gotten on the bus. She'd have thought everyone was pretty much used to the idea of her and Adam being together by now.

Margi had prattled on during the bus ride as though nothing was amiss, but even she had quieted when she noticed the tense hush that swept through the corridor as they walked. "What's the deal?" she whispered.

"I have no idea." Phoebe looked up at Adam, who tried to shrug.

Principal Kim ended up pulling him out of their homeroom. Phoebe watched him struggle out of his desk to join the principal and Detective Gray, one of the men who had

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interrogated them in Undead Studies. Gray closed the door behind Adam once he was out, and Phoebe craned her head to try and see where they were going.

"When they were out of sight, she realized that the entire class was silent and staring at her, even Mrs. Rodriguez.

"What?" Phoebe said. "What's going on? Where are all the zombies?"

Many looked away, but Mrs. Rodriguez held her gaze. And then she told her.

Pete sat in the warm cab of Duke's truck, watching the small screen of the wireless television Duke had propped up on the dash. This was the third channel they had tuned in, but the news was all the same.

"Attorney Gus Guttridge, lawyer for the defense in the well-publicized Oakvale zombie murder case, along with his wife and two children, ages nine and twelve, are missing and presumed dead after an apparent hate crime committed by living impaired persons...."

"They're differently biotic now," Duke said to the screen. "Get with the times."

Pete looked over at him over the rim of his Styrofoam cup. Duke took another sip of coffee and winked at Pete.

Pete turned back to the screen just as the photograph of his lawyer was replaced by a close-up of the zombie from the fake recruiting ads.

"...unidentified living impaired man allegedly responsible for the crimes was apprehended late last night, along with ..."

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"What's going to happen to Guttridge and his family?" Pete asked, not really caring who among the worm burgers would go down for his crimes.

Duke sipped his coffee. "You've heard of witness relocation? It's sort of like that."

"Why would Guttridge do that?"

Pete didn't think an attorney would be all that eager to give up his lifestyle in the name of zombie elimination. The Guttridge home was one of the largest and most opulent he'd ever been in, more impressive even than his dad's place out on the West Coast. Pete supposed he should have felt remorse for all the destruction he'd caused in the home--following Duke's orders, he and the other men smashed furniture and took knives to the trad figures of people in the artwork and photographs around the home. And then came the blood.

"We can be very persuasive."

"I guess you'd have to be," Pete said, watching the video Duke's people had released to the media, which showed a trio of zombies--really Pete and two of the men from the group wearing their masks--shambling from the Guttridge home. "Considering that there weren't any bodies."

The zombies were carrying what appeared to be a body wrapped in a blanket over their shoulders in the grainy, jumpy video. Long hair and a pale arm dangled from Zombie Pete's blanket, which in reality had been a blow-up doll and not Mrs. Guttridge. The "bodies," all four of them, were now deflated and folded in the tool chest of Duke's truck. Pete wanted to think about that even less than he did the buckets of blood that

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they threw around the Guttridge's bedrooms. Duke had assured him that it had been real human blood.

"Pays to have friends in high places," Pete said.

"The murder and abduction of the Guttridges is considered to be in retaliation for Attorney Gus Guttridge's role in exonerating a minor youth of murder in a zombie-related crime ..." the voice on the television informed them.

"Zombie-related crime," Duke said, snuffling with mirth into his coffee cup. "You popped that kid."

"... and for recent developments at the Hunter Foundation, which is alleged to be conducting experiments on the living impaired. Photos depicting an unidentified living impaired girl in a partially vivisected state have been circulating on the Web, where ..."

"Enough." Duke switched the television off. "Mission accomplished."

Pete grinned, admiring his easy confidence. Duke was a man who was fully aware of the power he wielded, sort of like a coach who could back up his talk with action on the field. After they'd vandalized the Guttridge home, they watched from the safety of Duke's truck as the white vans rolled up. The lead van had the FBI seal stenciled on the door. Duke told Pete about the special "Undead Crimes Unit" of the FBI that would be taking over the case.

Pete had thought that the outside world might think it was a little fishy that there just happened to be an FBI van nearby when the crimes occurred, but Duke assured him that no one was going to be all that interested in investigating those angles.

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"Is the whole FBI in on it?" he asked.

Duke held up his hand as he listened to the newscaster rattle off a list of crimes that Oakvale zombies were alleged to have committed.

"Sexual assault," he repeated, plucking the crime out of the ten or so she'd named. "Rumor spreads like cancer, huh? Now, what was it you asked me?"

"The FBI. Is the whole Bureau in on the anti-zombie thing?"

"The 'anti-zombie thing,'" Duke repeated, shaking his head. "You make it sound so respectable. The answer is, of course not. There isn't a single organization in America-- governmental, corporate, or otherwise--where all of its members are on the same page. Except, of course," and here he grinned, and switched on the ignition for the truck, "my 'anti-zombie thing.' Put the TV on the seat, will you?"

Pete did as he was asked. "Where are we going?"

"We're going to your house, so you can pack and say goodbye to your mom. The Wimp isn't home, I hope you don't mind."

Pete felt a nervous smile creep across his face. It pulled at the scar he still hadn't gotten fixed. "What are you talking about?"

"Youth ministry," Duke said, pulling off the shoulder and onto the road. "Your mother took a phone call from a very well-respected and important man last night, Pete. The good Reverend Nathan Mathers. He convinced her that the direction your life was taking was not a good one, and that you needed to