S.W. Tanpepper's GAMELAND: Season Two Omnibus (Episodes 9-11) (72 page)

Lyssa nodded. Yes, the government took away their free will, their lives. They took—

Let me repeat that: They. Are. Dead.

They took their dignity.

I'm talking reanimated, people! Undead.

She frowned at the radio and wondered what he was getting at now. He had to be speaking metaphorically.

I have just obtained proof of what I've been telling you all for over the past year. I have here in my hands a recording of an experiment conducted over two years ago in the laboratory of one Eugene Halliwell, a former professor at Royce State College and, let me tell you folks, this is some scary
BLEEP BLEEP
.

There was a long pause, a stretch of static so thick that Lyssa began to reach for the dial thinking she'd lost the signal. She jumped when the man began to speak again.

Still with me?

I want you to think about this, people: All the wars we fought overseas, the battles we won. Why do you think nobody wants to fight us anymore? Because the soldiers we were sending into the battlefield, into foreign cities, they weren't just mindless drones we could control remotely. They didn't just have their consciousness commandeered. They had it ripped ruthlessly out of them. The government implanted these people. They murdered and brought them back without a shred of humanity left inside of them.

This, my friends, is why there is no more conflict. But no more conflict doesn't mean no more fear. Or oppression. Or exploitation. It's just that nobody in the world wants to risk fighting these kinds of soldiers.

There was another pause, shorter this time, but in the lull Lyssa thought she heard a noise from the back of the house. “Cassie?” she called out, loud enough to be heard if the girl had woken from her slumber — which didn't seem likely, given the knockout pill Lyssa had given her — but quiet enough not to carry up to her bedroom if she was still up there.

There was no answer.

Why do you think they make them wear those masks and cover up their bodies? It's not to avoid sunburn, folks. Puh-leeez. It's so we can't tell what they truly are. The government has been hiding the truth from us.

“What truth?” Lyssa whispered.

The government thinks we're stupid. Or blind. But we're not. We all know what's happening. We can all see it. But we refuse to believe what our minds are telling us. We refuse to accept what we already know.

We've been told how wonderful this new technology is, that with it we can finally do something good with the so-called dregs of society. We can ‘reprogram' them into functional, useful, productive ‘citizens.' How great is that? Hallelujah for the great United States.

“Hallelujah,” Lyssa chanted, but she was still shaking her head. This discussion hadn't gone where she'd expected it to go.

From soldiers to slaves. What will we do with them next?

Somewhere on the fringes of her consciousness, she heard the sliding door open and then close again. She registered the fleeting crescendo of the crickets and toads outside, of the murmur of the breeze through the trees. But while she filed that information away, she was too rapt with what she was hearing. Her nose hovered not four inches from the radio.

That's why we need to find out why the government wants to raise taxes, people. Is it so they can fund more of these experiments? So they can figure out how to do the same with the rest of us? You laugh, but we're next. They'll find ways to control us all.

She heard a noise in the garage. She told herself she needed to check it out.

I don't know how much longer the government will allow me to transmit here. I don't know how much time I have, but I'm going to continue to tell the truth as long as I can. We need to stop what they're doing. We need to stop the government creating these things. It's not just a matter of holding onto our freedoms, but the freedoms of those we have cast away from us. It's about preventing something worse from happening.

“What?” she whispered. “Keep what from happening?”

Until next time, this is Jeremy ‘Jay Bird' Burt reporting to you live from Long Island. Good night, stay safe.

Lyssa straightened after a moment, as if waking from a deep sleep. The hairs on the back of her neck were prickling. She was suddenly certain she wasn't alone. Slowly, she turned.

The figure in the darkened hallway stepped forward into the light.

“I thought you agreed to stop listening to that bullshit,” Ramon said, a look of pure disgust on his face. “How can you actually believe half the crap he comes up with?”

Lyssa blinked at him, but didn't speak. She wasn't angry, not anymore. It wasn't his fault he couldn't understand the truth. It was the Stream. It was the government sending him messages into his brain, screwing him up, making him into one of those things. He was blind and couldn't see, not like she could.

He was weak, but she was strong. And she would resist.

“Where's Cassie?” he asked.

“Asleep.”

He stared at her for a moment, his eyes narrowed. “And the rabbit?”

“I buried it.”

A thump came from overhead. They both raised their eyes to the ceiling.

Ramon stepped further into the room and dropped his keys onto the table with a clatter. “I'm sorry I wasn't here,” he said, scratching the angry red spot on his cheek. “Sorry you had to deal with this on your own. But I'm here now. We'll get through this.”

“Through it?” she replied. “It's only just beginning.”

Another sound from above, a scrape and a clatter. Cassie was definitely up and moving about her room.

He shook his head. “Lyssa, you can't really believe—”

“What? What he's saying? Why not?”

“Well, first of all, you heard what he said. There's no such thing as zombies. Come on, Lyssa. You have to admit that.”

Zombies? Who mentioned zombies?

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“The government discovering a way to reanimate the dead.”

Lyssa frowned.

“The government,” he repeated, his voice rising in exasperation. “He said they created this technology that can reanimate the dead. He said the Omegaman soldiers are zombies.”

She stared at him.

“I was standing right here, Lyssa. You didn't hear him say that?” He looked concerned and reached for her, his eyes pleading. “I'm worried about you. Are you feeling all right?”

“He didn't say that. And even if he did, he was speaking metaphorically.”

“No, Lyssa, he—”

She jerked her arm out of his grip.

“I don't want you listening to him any more,” he warned, his voice turning hard. “You don't need this kind of bullshit right now. A smart woman like you—”

“A smart woman like me can figure out what she wants to believe in and what she doesn't. She doesn't need anyone to tell her.”

 

Ramon waited until she was out of earshot before pulling out his phone. The shiny black device, though more compact than his older one, had a nice heft to it. It packed a lot into such a small volume. Amazingly agile and easy to use, he was already hooked on the design and functionality, even though its access to content wasn't yet quite as good as the old Internet. Soon it would be. That's what the rep had assured him when he'd brought it over for him to test.

He quickly located the right identifier code and thumbed the button to ping.

“It's Lyssa,” he said, when the connection went through. “I'm worried about her, about what she might do. She seems very . . . . I don't know.”

“Agitated?”

“Vulnerable. Impressionable. I'd like to bring her in to see you.”

“Very well. I'll pencil you in for Monday morning.”

“You've got nothing sooner? I'm not sure waiting over the weekend is a good idea.”

“It's my first opening. Just do what we talked about. Don't fight her, guide her. And Ramon?”

“Yes?”

“It's not your fault. You did everything within your power. You did the right thing reaching out for help.”

 

The first siren woke her up while it was still dark. Lyssa lay in her bed and listened to it, wondering if it was getting any closer. The wail rose and fell and was joined by another and another until there was a full chorus of them, swirling through the night. They seemed to come no closer or go any further away. Finally, as if beckoned by them, she rose and went to the bedroom window.

Ramon stirred in the bed but didn't wake. How could he possibly sleep through the noise? As distant as the sirens were, she couldn't imagine them not reaching deep inside anyone's slumber for long without rousing them.

But she couldn't see anyone or anything in the narrow slice of view of the street afforded to her from the window. The lights in the neighbor's house, the Blanchett's, came on and she saw a shadow pass across the window behind the drapes. The material fluttered in the breeze, and she considered calling out to them.

The old man, Tony, was nice enough. She'd had many pleasant conversations with him. But his wife Edna was a sour woman. Everything about her seemed pinched and tight, from her clothes to her skin to the way she talked through her stern little mouth that looked as if it had been sewn on with thick twine. Watching her speak always made Lyssa feel itchy.

She decided she'd check on Cassie and turned from the window and began to slip across the room, her feet whispering along the carpet.

“What's going on?”

She stopped and sucked in a breath before answering. “I don't know. Might be a fire somewhere. I can't see anything from here.”

Ramon rose onto his elbows. “Must be a big one.” He paused and sniffed the air. “Not near, though. I can't smell anything burning. Come back to bed.”

“I'm just going to check on Cassie.”

“I'll do it.” He pulled the bed sheet off his legs and rose. “You rest.”

In the dim light, Lyssa could see the toll the past few years had taken on his body. She hadn't noticed it the other day at the beach, but now his skin seemed sallow, the muscles on his arms and thighs losing their once-youthful definition.

Their skin looks creepy.

He scratched the stubble on his cheek with one hand as he searched the floor for his shirt, his other hand scratching his ass, tugging his loose underwear beneath his expanding belly.

“Go back to bed, Lyss,” he repeated. He pulled a tee shirt over his head and ran a hand through his hair. It flopped back.

“I want to check the other windows,” she told him, and she didn't wait for him to finish dressing. She pulled her robe tighter about her shoulders and stepped out of the bedroom. Cassie's room was the next door down on the other side of the hallway. Lyssa's slippers made soft slapping sounds as she padded toward the half-closed door. It opened silently beneath her hand.

Shinji was a quiet, dark shape on the bed. He lifted his head at her and stared, his eyes glistening with moonlight from the window. The room had a stale smell to it that made Lyssa wrinkle her nose and pause, wondering if it was the dog, if he'd pooped again instead of asking to be let out. But when she heard Ramon come up behind her, she dismissed the thought. It wasn't that kind of smell. This was something else, something more earthy.

She realized she was probably just remembering burying the rabbit earlier that evening. The smell was an echo of that terrible time, her mind trying to purge itself.

She went in and slipped over to the window.

The lights were dark in Mister Locke's house, and she found herself silently cursing the man once more for what he had done that afternoon. She didn't care how much he'd paid for the laying hens. She didn't care that he was falling victim to the Stream. Nothing justified the brutality Cassie had been forced to witness when he'd beaten her rabbit to death.

From this side of the house, the sirens sounded even farther away, and there was no telltale glow in the distance to suggest a fire massive enough to require so many emergency vehicles. She turned and sidestepped past Ramon, who was in the middle of the room watching her.

“Nothing?” he whispered.

She shook her head. “I think it's east of here.”

“Might be the highway.”

She paused to consider this. Route
495
was a quarter of a mile away to the south. But she shook her head. The sirens, though inconstant, didn't sound like vehicles passing at a high rate of speed. “I just want to make sure it's not close.”

“Mama?”

They both turned their heads toward the bed.

“It's nothing, honey. Go back to sleep.”

“I wasn't sleeping.”

“Go on,” Ramon whispered to Lyssa. “I'll stay with her until she falls asleep again.”

Lyssa nodded and went and bent down over Cassie. For just a moment, the smell she'd noticed earlier filled her nose, making her gag. She staggered a moment against the mattress and caught herself by grabbing the headboard. But a moment later, the smell was gone again.

Just the change in my blood pressure
, she realized.
I should get that checked.

“Daddy's going to stay here with you,” she said, and kissed her daughter's forehead. After a moment's hesitation, she pulled a blanket off of her and shooed the puppy away. “You're too hot, honey. You're sweating.”

“I feel sick.”

“That's because you have all these blankets. You don't need so many.”

“But I'm cold.”

“Because you're sweaty and I just took the blanket off. Now,
shh
. Go back to sleep.”

She moved aside and Ramon went and sat on the edge of the bed and asked her if she'd like a story.
Not the stupid rabbit one
, Lyssa thought. Not after what happened today.

She went out into the hallway and checked out the back window, but she saw nothing to suggest a fire, just the usual faint rural glow of Syosset to the west and Woodbury to the east. The neighborhood where they lived straddled the line between the two towns. Where the twin auras converged, the night dipped down. Through it, to the north about three miles, was Oyster Bay.