Gravewalkers: Dying Time (23 page)

“
If you care about me you
will stop,” he beseeched her with the only tool he felt worthy of
his cause.

Carmen instantly released
her hold and then returned to sitting idly. “I’m sorry,” she told
him. “I wanted Clara to know what it feels like to be powerless
before the whims of someone stronger.”

Critias admonished her, “It
comes easy, doesn’t it?” He shifted his gaze to Danny who had not
made even the least effort to help his sister, “In that book The
Merchant of Venice, what did Shylock say was the value of a pound
of flesh he wanted from a man?”

“
It would not earn him any
respect nor could he trade it for money,” Carmen answered with a
paraphrase of Shylock.

“
Then it is nothing
compared to the starvation of others required to put a pound of
flesh back on a man,” Critias reflected.

“
You’re a wiser man than
you let on, Critias,” Jim observed. “You speak truly and I dare say
would perhaps make a fine King yourself someday. What a pair of
scorpions we agreed to carry on our backs across the river in their
time of need. These times have always been the ones I most despise.
Now you will see why the crown is so heavy. I’m not the frog; that
is my people, so how could I sit idly by and wait for their
sting?”

Clara rubbed at her bruised
throat, “What are you talking about?”

“
I am King Louie, as was
my father before me,” Jim revealed, “while you madam are a
treacherous witch; that is beyond all doubt if one only looks upon
this toad of a familiar you have created. Nevertheless, as with all
things, I need but look unto its nature. You won’t hesitate to
secure your own prosperity at the expense of anything. So long as I
keep you fed and safe from the ghouls, you will not do anything to
endanger your meal ticket. Your brother however is an ill-begotten
lout of no value whatsoever. For him I won’t spare so much as a
cracker from the mouths of those I love, to feed so loathsome and
inconsiderate a brute as you have raised.”

Danny cursed him, “You are
no king!” Spittle flung from his thick lips, “You’re no older than
I am!”

Jim commanded him, “Be
silent!” He looked to Vern, Bertram, and Nadia, “If I have
misjudged these two, speak up now before you become party to a
desperate act that falls on me as my duty to all.”

“
She is a medical doctor,”
Vern confirmed, “but I’ve seen many die for being unable to feed
that piglet of hers in exchange for her services.”

Bertram nodded in
agreement, “She preyed on everyone like a vulture, everyone but the
President and his men who she treated freely in exchange for the
protection of their armed goons. If she wasn’t personally involved
in the torture of their enemies, I’d be surprised.”

Nadia looked up with her
eyes red from tears, “Denver was a dungeon and there were so many
desperate people, so many who would have done anything at all to
survive one more day. Clara was no worse than many others were. I
hate to imagine what I might have done myself if the opportunity
had been available to me. I did do things that make me ashamed.
Unless you’ve been that afraid, that hungry, you would never
understand. I bear no grudge against them I would call actionable.
I want to forget it ever happened and have a new life.”

Jim faced Clara, “Only
because of Nadia’s noble heart and for no other reason I will spare
your life if I have your word you will never have your hand in
another cruel deed. If you will offer your skills to anyone who is
in need of you and do so freely in good cheer, then I will welcome
you as one of us; decide quickly.”

“
I promise to join your
community in good faith,” she pledged.

Danny squeaked as he
trembled in terror, “What about me?”

Jim confronted him with an
answer, “Your sister at least thought of protecting someone, her
own family in fact, and I find that a difficult matter to reproach.
As to you, my fat little friend, you seem to care about nothing at
all, not even her. You happily piled the resentment of others on
her shoulders so you could stuff your face like Henry the
Eighth.”

The boy blubbered, “You
can’t just kill me for being fat!”

Jim wondered aloud, “Is
there some greater sin in this age than being fat off the misery of
others? I think not. Carmen and Critias went outside this vehicle
to lead an army of ghouls away so that we could collect you and you
were not in the least grateful. When Carmen struck your sister, you
did not so much as whimper a complaint. If it were Vern or Bertram
whose heads were on the block, I doubt very much you would have
shed a single tear for them. I considered taking you to my city
then disposing of you quietly, but I see no reason to burden all my
people with your mysterious fate. I am King and so on me alone is
any guilt for your miserable misfortune. The crown has a will
greater than my own. Because of her great knowledge, I will risk
the likely treachery of your sister. She is at least capable of
loving something besides herself, which is more than can be said
for you.”

Danny begged her, “Please,
Clara, don’t let them kill me!”

Jim turned to her, “If I
didn’t already have a surgeon more skilled than you, and I promise
you that is no lie, you could threaten me as you have done to so
many others. It would have even worked. To provide my people
medical care they could not get otherwise, I would have no choice
but to submit to your extortion. Here and now, you are a mere
luxury that if lost will not be sorely missed. You can join him or
join me, but I will not feed this monster of yours so much as a
dead rat; that I swear to you.”

“
Do as you must,” Clara
disowned her brother’s fate. “I was at your mercy when I entered
this vehicle and remain so. I want to continue living.”

Danny pleaded, “You can’t
do this to me!”

Jim questioned, “Do? What
makes you think I need do anything? By what obligation must I offer
you my hospitality or feed you the food garnered by the hands of
the finest people this world has ever known? That is what of which
we speak. Like everything else, you assume all these things were
rightly yours just for the taking. You were as mistaken then as you
are now, as you shall soon see. I refuse to give to you what is
mine to give or withhold. In turn, all that is yours is yours and
you are free to go anywhere you please, just not with
me.”

He squealed, “Go where?
There is nothing out there but those monsters that will eat
me!”

“
And feast luxuriously at
that,” Jim added. “You would be a banquet of their dreams, I’m
sure. As far as you say, there being nothing out there; that only
shows more of your nature and my burden. Those most dear to me risk
all going out there to collect valuable things. I chose to come
after you myself rather than put those most preciously skilled
lives at risk. Critias and Carmen spoke before the whole city,
pledging to seek you out on foot if need be, because they had done
no more than tell you on the radio they would help you. They would
rather die out there than sacrifice their senses of honor and
compassion. The more you speak, the more you prove yourself
unworthy to eat the food my people harvest at the risk of their
lives. I suggest you keep watching out that hole as you have done
and decide where you want to get out. Then again, if you wait till
we are nearly home, I can push you out there so the ghouls can
fight over your body and give us more freedom to get in through the
gate.”

“
I’ve never seen you fuck
up before,” Hatchet complained rudely to Jim. He’d heard more than
he could stand and remain silent, “I told you that you should never
have come out here. Even the flipping President couldn’t manage
doing your job, turned his palace into an X-rated horror-flick. If
you get yourself killed out here doing this bullshit, what happens
to me? The whole city would turn Caligula. Why would you risk
everything over this ridiculous bullshit? You could’ve sent someone
else with us in your place. Shit, you could’ve sent any one of a
hundred people. This is about as close to you being a screw-up as
I’ve ever seen.”

Jim replied to the
accusation, “This is exactly why I came. No one but me suffers the
miserable obligation of deciding who is worthy to join us. You’ll
have to forgive me if I’m not as quick with the rejections of
hospitality as my father was in the Outbreak days when anyone you
let in the door was likely to shoot you just to take what you have.
I came along for the one and only reason of making certain that
untrustworthy newcomers never endanger my folk and that includes
Critias and Carmen. I need to see a person’s true nature while
under pressure to learn the worth of them. That’s why I don’t tell
people who I am until I’ve had my chance to take a measure of their
character. That is why you need to shut-the-fuck-up and drive so I
can be King.”

Hatchet laughed and shouted
in joy, “That’s my King Louie!” He could laugh in the face of
anything except losing his King again, which was the only thing he
feared.

“
I’ll do him,” Carmen
meant she would happily feed Danny to the ghoul-pack.

“
The hell you will,”
Critias shoved her. “What the fuck is the matter with
you?”

“
What?” she didn’t
understand. “If he has to go then he has to go.”

He challenged Carmen, “Name
one dark deed you have ever done in your whole life? Tell me
something even so small as cheating at a child’s board game. You
will never sully yourself with questionable acts. I forbid it
completely so don’t even think about it without running to me to
apologize. You may be a master of slaying ghouls, but you are
totally prohibited to spill human blood in anything but the direst
necessity.”

“
You’re not my master,”
she grumbled as she gazed down, already willingly submitted to his
wishes.

“
When it comes to things
like this I am,” he assured her. “I failed to raise you right from
the start, but that doesn’t mean I quit the job. When it comes to
things like this, I make the decision for both of us. You’re no
executioner and if you ever cross that line, you’ll be sorry for
it. I’ll beat it out of you if I have to.”

Carmen considered his
words, “You don’t want me to do things like that because you love
me?”

“
Exactly,” Critias
admitted without thought because it was true. When he realized what
he had told her, especially in front of Jim after their previous
discussion about her, it so frustrated him that he reached over to
unbolt the back hatch.

The cravenly-parasite
shrank away from the opening as if it was the proverbial gate to
Hades, “What are you doing?” Danny’s jowls trembled as he sobbed,
“You spoke of love and sullied hands!”

“
Love,” Critias repeated
the word as though he was unsure of its meaning anymore. “Love is
like gluttony,” he told Danny. “The joy is found in its proper
portions and too much of it makes a man into just another ghoul
like your sister.” He grabbed a fistful of the portly wretch’s
shirt then with the casual strength of his mechsuit shoved him out
the door into the waiting arms of the pursuing ghouls. “Let each be
among their kind,” he said of his ruthless act as he closed the
hatch then barred it once more.

Clara screamed as she
watched her brother fall to his certain but colorful
death.

Critias gave her a hard
gaze, “You can still join him if you’ve changed your mind about
becoming human.”

She was no stranger to
harsh measures so wisely fell silent.

Chapter 9: Soulless is
the Tyrant

The Rhino’s return to
King’s Tower was a tumultuous affair with umpteen ghouls that
followed the slow vehicle all the way home. A continuous firestorm
of flamethrowers made it possible for the welcoming crew to open
the gate for long enough to let the armored dozer inside the
barrier. Though the operation was entirely successful, it also
filled the whole surrounding area with ravenously agitated infected
who would not leave anytime soon. Only the uninterrupted absence of
human activity for many days on end would finally make the
creatures hungry enough to pursue their normal sustenance that they
derived by chasing scurrying vermin elsewhere.

After their standard
unconditional decontamination procedures, the survivors from the
Rhino and the crews that brought them in went down to Funland for a
victory celebration. The whole city had waited anxiously for their
return and had to see the rescued survivors themselves to put their
anxiety to an end.

Jim introduced the new
citizens with pride and the populace welcomed them with enthusiasm.
A proverbial rocket scientist, a surgeon, and a pilot were all
additions that could better the lives of everyone with their
skills, so the people received them as good fortune.

Saving his favorite for
last, Jim invited Nadia to join him as he stood on the Captains’
Table then he told the crowd before them, “I want you all to
welcome Nadia.”

Hatchet came up behind the
table on the kitchen-side to hand Jim a violin case, which Jim
transferred to Nadia with the words, “We have rescued many
treasures and not all of them were people. Would you accept this as
your own and play for us?”