Husk (34 page)

“Feel free to dig in and enjoy yourself, buddy,” he whispered in my good ear. “This is the last meal of the condemned. Confidentially, this is a crapshoot anyway. Fifty-fifty chance. But the old man is dead anyway. Without this, he won't make sundown. I fully expect to be unemployed in less than an hour. Either way, I retire a very rich man.”

I felt the last of my muscles quiver and weaken. I had no more reserves of energy. My barrels of willpower had been tapped of every last drop.

I gave up. If the wealthy sociopath wanted this, he could have it. I failed at life, might as well fail at death.

The doctor took one last quick survey over the machines, and then gave a nod to Simon. The nurses freed my bonds. On a count of three, a separate nurse taking each arm and leg, another tending to my torso, I was lifted, head held straight and true by Simon, and hefted across the space to Dixon's side. The medicos rotated me until my chest was aimed floorward, lifted me slightly, and then aimed my mouth at the bull's-eye on Dixon's neck.

I did not struggle. I could not have had I wanted to; I was the only thing in the room more debilitated than the emaciated supercentenarian.

My stomach, dragging on the ground beneath me, whimpered in anticipation.

I looked up into Dixon's eye while Simon pressed my mouth to the sweet spot. The old man was still awake, still hellishly aware. The area hadn't even been numbed with a local; blood pushed furiously through his veins, throbbing against the skin of my lips. Saliva exploded in my mouth, and I drooled over his flesh. I let out a mute sob of shame and threw wide my maw. My teeth pressed against his meat, my tongue lapped up his sweat.

Dixon threw me a wink.

In that one blink of a lid, I saw all his condescension, all his ego, all his madness.

Fuck this.

If there was any way to stop this, I would.

This was
my
gift, not his.

All of a sudden, I didn't feel like sharing.

I slipped my teeth across the hairs of his neck and clamped my mouth shut. Dixon's eye widened, and I heard a few of the background
beeps
speed up their rhythms. Smothered curses escaped the corners of his respirator.

I thought, hysterically, if Dixon would only die in the next ten seconds or so, all this would be for naught.

I ground my teeth together, cracking my canines, and I felt my molars begin to pulp into mush.

No teeth, no bite.

It was the only plan I could come up with.

The doctor leaned in for a look, then motioned to Simon for assistance. Simon stuck his chain-linked fingers between my lips and jammed the blade of his knife into the gaps between my teeth. As expert as an oyster shucker, he pried my jaws open and forced my incisors and canines into Dixon's insubstantial epidermis. My tongue retreated as his skin folded over the embankment of my teeth. Instructing the nurses to hold my head secure, Simon then slipped the palm of his hand beneath my jawline, and slammed my mandibles closed.

Dixon squawked beneath his mask as I tore in. The background sonar pings accelerated in pace, matching the alarming rate of his heart.

My body shuddered orgasmically as plasma spurted out over my taste buds, the severed meat already hurtling toward my stomach as my trachea convulsed in joy. The blood was rich, thick and wholesome, plainly not his own, and I had time to wonder at the high quality of his transfusion pool. If blood was cocaine, this was pure uncut Peruvian flake.

I gulped.

I chugged.

I guzzled.

I quaffed.

As Lambertus Dixon screamed and twitched I slurped back the entirety of his essence and gnawed at his throat. Simon held my head fast, refusing to let me crane forward and get a good toothy clamp on Dixon's tender pharynx. I made do with the musculature, and nibbled and sucked at whatever tendrils of raw fiber I could reach.

It had been so, so long.

After several lifetimes, the machines began to quiet, one by one, their cheery bells altering into long stretches of sustained tonal monotony until they silenced themselves. And still I fed, the wet clamor of my final repast filling the spaces until only chewing and swallowing echoed through the arena, accompanied by the occasional retch of a nurse.

“That should do,” the doctor said finally. Simon retracted my head and heaved me back gracelessly onto my gurney. I landed face first, the collision popping out my loose eye, the force of the throw swinging the bed back into a horizontal position. My leftovers of brain rattled about, and I could feel my good eye pull inward as my jouncing memory bank tugged at the optic nerve. The nurses quickly swung the bed away into a corner, abutting one of Dixon's wheelchairs. My feet brushed against Rowan's hip and she shuddered in revulsion.

I lay there, abandoned, already forgotten, my head dangling over the edge, my lips still smacking, tongue prodding every oral crevice for one last drop of life.

I had never felt so alive.

“What now, Doc?” Simon asked. I lifted my head for a peek and managed to slide my arm around to cover my free-floating eyeball and cut out its view of the floor. They had gathered around Dixon's body, the doctor inspecting the fishbowl to make sure the oxygen still flowed. Rowan and the nurses hung back while the doctor attended to the wires that had detached during Dixon's death throes. Simon's cannon hung from his hand, ready for the first quiver of post-death.

There was very little blood around the wound, I noticed; I had been quite efficient in my appetite.

Barely even needed a bib.

The doctor completed his checklist and took a position at the foot of the bed. “I'm calling it.” He checked his watch. “The death of Lambertus Dixon officially occurred at 11:27 a.m.”

He ordered the nurses to leave the room. They didn't need to be asked twice. As they quickly filed out, the two soldiers entered and stood at attention at the door, weapons at the ready.

“Now,” the doctor said to the room, “we wait.”

They stood back and waited. Every two minutes, the doctor would once again check over the machines and then intone, “Two minutes, no signs of reanimation . . . Four minutes, no signs of reanimation.”

At the fourteen count, Simon uncocked his pistol and blew out a lengthy puff of annoyed air. “How long is this supposed to take, anyway?” he asked, checking his watch.

“There have been variations in the viral response time,” the doctor said. “Some volunteers, if pricked in an area relatively distant to the brainstem, have taken weeks to succumb. But all test subjects, if bitten at approximately the same spot on the neck, adjacent to the brain, have died and experienced complete reanimation within an hour. Considering the severity of the bite, if all goes accordingly we should have twitching soon.”

“Do I have time for a smoke?” asked Rowan.

A light blipped on a computer screen.

Dixon's left foot trembled.

“Here we go,” the doctor said. “Fifteen minutes, signs of animation in the left leg. This is textbook; for some reason, the left side always revives first.”

The left leg jerked slightly, the muscles of the thigh convulsing. Then the muscles of the right constricted, raising the ankle off the bed.

Simon cocked the hammer of his gun and readied his stance, aiming at the skull. The soldiers hoisted their weapons.

Dixon's eyelids flipped open.

One of the soldiers barked in alarm.

The doc snapped a penlight on and pushed in close to the eyes. “Sixteen minutes, eyes open. Pupils are dilated and nonresponsive.” He cupped his hand to the fishbowl near Dixon's ear and yelled in. “Sir? Sir, can you hear me?”

The mouth cracked open beneath the mask. Viscous bog water ran down his chin. A whiff of the fecal escaped the fishbowl and graced our noses.

“Jesus, that's ripe,” Rowan said.

The doctor continued to address Dixon as the body started to shake. Rowan moved back, resting her rump against the lip of my gurney.

“Can you hear me, sir?”

The corpse looked the doctor in the eyes.

“Eighteen minutes, possible eye responsiveness to aural commands. Sir, can you hear me? Are you in there? Blink once for yes, twice for no.”

A wait, then one blink.

“Was that a yes?” Simon asked.

One blink.

The doctor touched Dixon's right arm. “Can you feel this?”

Blink.

“Try to raise it, please.”

The arm quaked at the effort, then lifted a few inches off the sheet.

“Nineteen minutes, definite signs of intelligence.” He looked up, ecstatic. “This is astonishing! We have never achieved any result remotely this successful, actual comprehension! Response to verbal queries!” The immensity of the moment overcame him, and he sat heavily on the bedspread, cupping his head in his hands. “Do you realize what we've done?” He looked up, delighted in himself. “I'm going to be famous!” he whispered. “The man who cracked immortality!”

“Not good enough.” Simon moved in and placed the barrel of his gun to the fishbowl, just above Dixon's temple. “I have my orders,” he said over the doctor's protests. “The boss speaks, or it ends here.” He looked into Dixon's eyes. “Sir, your orders were very specific. I will stand down when I have been issued the verbal password we agreed upon. Do you remember it?”

Dixon's eyes widened. He blinked, then nodded.

“It's not that simple, you oaf,” the doctor complained. “It took Funk hours to learn to talk, you cannot expect him to master it here!”

“Orders are orders. Mr. Dixon did not want there to be any doubt. He talks, or he never leaves this room.”

The doctor cursed, motioning Simon to stand down while he briskly removed the gadgetry from Dixon's head. The respirator released its grip on Dixon's mouth with a clammy sucking sound.

“Once again, sir,” Simon said, this time placing his gun directly between Dixon's eyes. “Password.”

Dixon's mouth opened, his lips pursed, forming soundless consonants.

The doctor placed his hands on the old man's chest. “Sir, you have to remember to breathe. Here, feel my hands. Breathe in, sir. Swell your lungs.”

The eyelids blinked once,
yes
, and then closed as Dixon concentrated. His mouth opened wide.

After a minute, his chest rose.

“That's it, sir. Now let it out, try to make a sound.”

The lips pursed themselves into an oval. The lungs deflated, and a draft of air from the filthiest outhouse in existence spewed forth. Simon gagged, but kept his weapon pressed between Dixon's eyes.

The lungs inhaled again, a little stronger, and then a lengthier exhalation.

“
. . .
whiskers
. . .
”

It was the first time I had heard the full bloodcurdling effect of utterances from beyond the grave from the point of view of a spectator. It was a multi-layered sound, its various aural strata proficiently assaulting the eardrums, intestines, and diaphragm. My chunks of rich elderly trillionaire struggled to stay put. Both soldiers whitened at the sound and began patting themselves down for their earplugs. One rushed to a corner and ejected his breakfast.

“I told you idiots to keep those in at all times,” Simon cursed. He leaned closer to his employer. “Once again, sir?”

Inhale, exhale. “. . .
whiskers
. . .” Inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale. “
The
.
Password
. Is. Whiskers.”

“Correct.” Simon stood up and holstered his gun. “Mr. Dixon has confirmed the password, Doctor. You are good to continue.”

“Whiskers?” Rowan asked.

Simon blushed. “The name of my first cat.”

Rowan sniggered. “That's adorable,” I said.

Simon swung a murderous look my way as the doctor helped Dixon into a sitting position. “You still with us? You'll get yours soon enough,” he promised, and began propping pillows behind Dixon's back.

Dixon took a few more cautious breaths and then began to speak, his phrasing a halting mix of pauses and words that sounded barely human. “It seems. Your theory. Was correct, Doctor. My thanks.” He looked about the room. “Extraordinary. I feel so. So strange.”

The doctor was walking past the computer screens and penciling marks on a clipboard, reading out his checklist. “Heart rate, nil. Blood flow, nil. Body temperature cooling rapidly.” He drew a stethoscope from his pocket and held the bell to Dixon's bare chest. “Confirmed, heart has ceased to function.” He clicked on his penlight and shone the beam into Dixon's eyes. “Please follow the beam, sir, as best you can.”

Dixon grabbed the doctor's hand. His mouth shaped a few keen words.

“Breathe in, sir. Remember.”

The old man focused, swelling his torso with air, the first time in decades his lungs had worked under his own power. “Get. That light. Out of my eyes. You idiot.” He shoved the hand away and motioned to Simon. “Help me. To my. Feet.”

The doctor protested. “Sir, we must take this slow. You haven't walked in over forty years. We have to be cautious.” He looked to Simon for assistance. “We need to get him upstairs. This is a significant achievement, we must document it thoroughly.”

Simon considered his options, looked to the living corpse, and shrugged. “He's the boss, Doc,” he said. “He wants to stand, we're going to let him stand. Move aside.” He moved his bulk to the bedside and slipped an arm beneath Dixon's legs. Placing a large hand protectively behind his head, Simon hefted the old man up and carefully lowered his feet to the floor. Wires and cables remained embedded in his skin, some detaching from the machinery, lending him a kaleidoscopic fringe.

Dixon wobbled on legs thin as reeds. Simon braced Dixon's shoulders, allowing him to find his balance.

Dixon lifted his right leg slightly and shifted it forward a few precious inches. “I haven't. Walked. Since. Nineteen. Seventy. One.” He shifted his weight to the right, swinging his left leg forward. Haltingly, in spurts and stops, Lambertus crossed the room and back. His frill of electric filaments jingled lightheartedly as he walked.