The Bone Puppets: A Hard SciFi Zombie Soldier Story Read online

  Delancey flinched. It was already too late for him to dodge. Elias sent the disk sailing like a yo-yo through the sky. It hit Delancey straight in the chest. Elias had meant for it to stick into bone. It had.

  Delancey shrieked. The Wall-Dogs stepped back, watching as he floundered against the wall, trying to swim in his own blood. Elias made him dance like a marionette puppet, suspended by string and blade. He teetered. The Blood City’s wall wasn’t more than 30 feet high, but the mote surrounding it was miles deep. The fall would be fatal regardless of the blade’s damage.

  Elias gloated over this. He clicked his tongue, reminding himself not to get too much vindication out of this. Once he’d left the torture chamber, he swore he would never go back. Not in body, not in mind, and certainly not in spirit. To do this, to torture and murder Delancey as Delancey had once attempted to do to him, would only make Elias just as evil as the people he’d sworn off. Where was the good sense in that?

  “Elias set him down gently for me,” said Yim. “The lady of the manor should be shown some respect, no? I want to speak to your lord. Where’s the bossman, Delancey, or whatever you call yourself? Surely you’re not the one.” Yim nodded to Elias, whose hands trembled in the cords tangles. It would be so easy to exact his revenge now with a swift downward jerk. Yet they needed this guy. How strange was the value of human life in a world where death had usurped the laws of nature! Life had become the forbidden fruit of this world. Elias would taste of it soon.

  Elias sighed. With a swift upward jerk he recalled the yo-yo disk blade to himself. The leather strap had a thick palm guard that stopped it from cutting his hand. He waved it in the sunlight menacingly. Delancey stood back up. Several of his guards rushed to his side, pulling him back into the safety of the wall.

  “Hey, kids. Let’s not follow my example. Violence doesn’t solve anything, does it?” Elias winked and flicked his hair out of his eyes.

  Delancey puffed. His hands wandered about his jacket, feeling the blood that poured from his chest out of small viper-bite sized wounds. Delancey coughed and jabbed a shaking finger at Yim. With his free hand, he pulled a Zippo from his pocket and fumbled to cauterize his wounds.

  “The boss of bosses hasn’t yet woken from his prep. First Street is in conditioning. You’ll be the first ones to taste his wrath when he comes out. Haul them in, dogs!” Delancey snapped his fingers.

  Wall Dogs ran to the hatches that sealed the parapet’s staircases off from easy escape. Their footsteps thundered through the ground as they came pouring down the spiraling staircases that were built inside the short wall’s landing, took a detour through a tunnel in the ground and came up a tiger trapdoor. They were now within a stone’s throw of Yim and her men. There would be no attempt at hand-to-hand combat or escape, even if they’d wanted to risk that.

  “Search them! This is the Road Queen, dogs!” said Delancey. “She’s got more than a few tricky cards up her sleeve. You have a reason for calling around here, don’t you? I’ll be to the bottom of it before you can blink.”

  Suddenly, Delancey’s clothes caught on fire. He’d been saturated in motor-oil from the city’s constant pollution rains. Shrieking, he tore out of his red/black camo uniform jacket and threw it into the wind. The chemical-laden air crackled with instant fireworks. Yim scoffed.

  “Ooh, that sounds frisky to me,” laughed Yim. “Did it sound a little fresh to you, boys?” She looked around at her men.

  “This little sawed-off SOB don’t know this yet, but we don’t swing his way!” Trent popped his knuckles.

  The Wall Dogs swarmed them. Elias closed his eyes and put out his hands. He was surprised when he was searched but none of his weapons were confiscated.

  “Not complaining, but don’t the heavies usually seize all firepower?” Elias raised a brow. A small girl Wall-Dog that couldn’t have been older than 14 looked up at him, licking her lips.

  “You seriously wanna call this firepower? Dude, you’re a fricken cave man!” The girl pulled the Jericho out of its holster and played with the hammer.

  “Don’t knock a classic until you’ve tested it yourself, little miss. You’re not old enough to remember a time before the Age of Blood and Roses, but every dog has his day.” Elias winked. It was weird that he felt strangely compelled to give the child guard a pep talk. Her face brightened with amazement.

  “Huh. The stories about you are true.” She wiped her mouth on her palm, laughing. She turned to Delancey and shot him a thumbs-up. “No nuke tech on him, boss! Must be something else they're after.”

  “Then cuff him and take him downstairs,” Delancey huffed. “First Street will be hungry for his breakfast shortly.” A few “medics” had crowded to his side to tape off the remainder of his injuries.

  “Ha, right.” The child guard turned around. She plucked a pair of EMP-powered manacles from her belt.

  “Don’t make this harder than it has to be. You were asking for it.” She beckoned with her index finger. Elias stuck out his wrists.

  “No complaints here, little miss. All of this is a barrel of laughs to me, anyhow. You get to meet people and blow things up. It’s a party.” Elias shrugged.

  “Aha!” A young male guard had crawled into the truck.

  “They’ve got pieces to a live Totem on here, boss. I think this was a sorry set up for some kind of rebellion!” The guard held the pinecone-shaped topper that went with the old TOPOL pieces high above his head. Delancey howled.

  “Bag ‘em and tag ‘em, dogs. This is pathetic. There’s stupid, then there’s Meredith Yim cheap-trick stupid. Let’s roll out.” Delancey motioned to the city with his thumb.

  “Ah, so what do they call you anyway?” Elias licked his lips, studying the kid guard. She eyed him curiously.

  “Who needs to know?” She spat in the dust.

  “Nobody, but it would be nice to have a name to go with a face. It’s not every day I get searched and actually get to keep my heirloom effects, you know?” Elias shrugged.

  “Madeline. You’re Elias Walklate. I know. Good, now that we know each other. Let’s get moving, shall we?” Madeline grabbed Elias by the manacles. She spun her whole body to where she marched behind him. He giggled. He was being escorted into hell by a teenage girl. It would have been embarrassing when he was younger but now it was just amusing.

  “Hey, Eli. Looks like we’re finally hitting it off with the ladies, right?” Riff winked. Three female guards surrounded him, goading him on with EMP-powered spears.

  Elias rolled his eyes. “Just keep telling yourself that, buddy. Wait for whatever comes next.” Elias held his breath. He had so much he needed to say to the kid. Whatever came next would indisputably alter the foundation of all they knew. Would there ever be time to reconcile the past? Was there even a future to alter or did they die here, in the infantile stage of their revenant struggle?

  Elias closed his eyes. If there was a future, even if that future was only 20 minutes ahead of him, he would find a way to get the truth from his brother. He would reclaim the soul of his family before the end. Knowing he had something more than soul-searching to strive for now gave him the strength to take those next thirty steps into Hell.

  *****

  Chapter 7

  “They still think we were trying to hack the mainframe! Baha! Oh, you are the woman, Yim!” Trent’s voice echoed off the iron shell walls.

  Elias woke up on his back. His ears were ringing. He blinked, trying to place himself. Could everything that happened just a while before have been an obscure dream? Where was he and why was he here?

  Elias closed his eyes. Into his mind flashed his mother’s faint image again. The sunlight was behind her. She always appeared in his dreams by some stroke of providence right before a turning point in his life’s tide. This was no accident. Elias swore by it. She was his guardian spirit, haunting him to save him. She lifted him up out of the ashes of his despair and spurred him on to whatever his destiny looked like.

  “That may
be, but you shouldn’t discuss it openly. See, the TOPOL pieces were a ruse and we want to keep it that was as long as possible. Delancey is a dunce. I could size that up when he spoke three syllables. He won’t know that the pieces they found aren’t bona-fide Totem casings. But First Street will make no mistake.”

  Yim sat in the shadow of this iron wall. Elias couldn’t move to look up at her yet, but he smelled cigarette smoke wafting from her direction. He shifted his feet. It would be a while before he came to himself in full. He’d been in a position like this enough times in his life to know the routine. He decided to wait for the surge of vertigo out and just eavesdrop.

  “Who is this First Street anyway?” Trent shrugged. He clicked the trigger of his unloaded rifle.

  “In the beginning, they found magic and science could be crossed. The rulers of the Crescent wanted foot soldiers to carry out their menial tasks, and so they created Bone Puppets,” Yim began.

  “And who would lead the Bone Puppets? Not only humans, for humans could betray their masters. But not other Bone Puppets, not in that day. They hadn’t developed technology to computerize what remained of their brains and remote-control their IM-suspended bodies yet. So they developed sentient corpse walkers. Suspended in animation intravenously rather than via intramuscular electric suspension.” Yim paused, blowing exaggerated smoke rings through the room. They floated past Elias’s eyes, saturating his breath. He choked, coming back to life under the harsh aromatic influence.

  “These intravenously suspended beings would require blood and carnage to remain suspended in animation,” said Yim. “They would be so intelligent because the more electromagnetically charged blood they devoured, the more former human consciousness and intellectual capacity they would retain. You could call them vampires if you wanted to. Yet the Crescent’s scientists decided to name them ‘Street-sweepers’ because they would harvest the streets for insurgents or anyone that violated curfew.” Yim tossed a pebble against the wall. Her voice took on a bitter tone.

  “Baltimore, Maryland was the first place they tested this creation. Whether it was due to a rise in rebellious crimes or just a stroke of lottery selection, no one remembers now. Each of the Street-sweepers that were released into the city was named after the street he or she was first assigned to. Naturally, the first of their race would be selected to conquer First Street, Baltimore. For this reason, the leader of the Street-sweeper pack was named First Street…

  “He has been awake since the beginning of the Crescent Empire. He has swallowed more blood than Hell itself, more than all the wars humanity waged before he walked the face of the deep. I don’t think he’s our primary threat. I can’t say much about his allegiance, whether he is conscious enough to know what he is doing or if he’s more of a highly-trained animal. But he is a formidable creature all the same. If we’re going to complete our mission, we’ll have to go through him first.” Yim’s voice quivered at the end of her sentence. Even she was afraid, thinking ahead about this task.

  Elias sat bolt upright. He flinched as his manacles shocked him.

  “He’s alive! Hello.” Riff inched closer to Elias. Elias’s vision focused. They sat on a smooth floor made of solid chalk. The dust cast up, clothing them in chalk. Mixed with their own sweat, they were now white as cartoon ghosts. Elias didn’t want to think about what the powder was actually made of.

  Elias looked up into his brother’s face. He felt the breath siphoned from his body and he shuddered. There was no ground to spring from. How did he begin to ask all the questions that he had? Had Riff known they were brothers for long? What had happened that had pushed him into the hands of Yim’s waiting vigilante brigade.

  Elias felt like he had been pistol whipped in the teeth.

  “Back me up if I’m wrong. We’ve known each other for round about seven years now, right? Have you known this whole time…that we…?” Elias couldn’t finish that sentence.

  It felt like Riff had betrayed him. He didn’t know if he wanted to strangle him or hug him. Finally, he’d been reunited with some family. Yet at what risk of intrigue, bargain and price had this fortune come?

  Riff was silent, contemplating Elias’s expressions. Elias cringed. Whatever the look on his face was like, it couldn’t be putting off hopeful signals to the wayward youth. Riff showed signs of terror.

  “I was afraid that Yim would use me to get to you. Manipulate you more than she already does. If…It’s one thing for her to hate me and want to kill me. I can take that. Truth is, Eli, she’s always been two steps from turning on you and selling you for her next big find. I think you know that…But you’re too close to it, you know, to the personality you’ve been forced to maintain for the cameras.” Riff’s clenched his teeth. Elias collared him.

  “Didn’t ask you that…I asked you if you knew…” Elias shook Riff. Riff clenched his teeth. His eyes narrowed.

  “Yes.” Riff swallowed. Elias drew him as close to his face as he could. He gnashed his teeth. Riff cringed but didn’t move.

  Elias felt his heart beat quicken. Only now did he realize the choke hold he had on his little brother.

  Little brother. He had never been able to say that in all of his years. Yet he had always wanted to. Little brother or little sister. Mother, father, cousin. Maybe even a wife or son or daughter. For so long now, Elias had just wanted a family. Some kind of anchorage in his empty world.

  “I think…I could forgive it all. All these years, lying to me by failing to come clean about that…” Elias swallowed, easing Riff to sitting. Riff straightened his shirt collar.

  “It’s not gonna be that easy, huh? What do you need to know? I’m an open book now that you figured it out on your own.” Riff smiled. A huge weight had been relieved from his shoulders. He’d been trying to tell Elias for years. Elias could see that in his eyes. He forgave him already, even though that was a little insane. His reasons were sound. If it had been the other way around, Elias would have done the same.

  Elias held his breath. He’d learned from practice. If he breathed even timed breaths once every three seconds he would never succumb to physical displays of emotion.

  “How did she die in the end?” Elias licked his teeth. He could barely remember his mother now. All the dreams he’d had about her and his sound faith in the ways of the spiritual world let him know that she was gone a long time ago. It was the only thing that made sense. She’d never been back for his few visiting hours.

  Riff fought tears. He cringed, greatly annoyed with himself. Looking over his shoulder to make sure Yim wasn’t paying attention, he turned back to Elias.

  “She-she was executed. She was hanged…from what used to be the Coca-Cola building’s top tower.” Riff hung his head.

  Elias felt like his stomach had been cut open. This pain didn’t come as much of a shock. He’d known she’d met a miserable end. If Elias was to be honest with himself, he knew that it could have gone far worse. It had gone far worse for him, in fact, he just didn’t die from what was done to him.

  But why had they killed his mother? It wasn’t like she had any power to control the political situation anymore. It wasn’t like she had any tricks up her sleeve that they wouldn’t have thought she’d pull.

  Unless…

  Elias stared at Riff. Thinking of him as a sort of ward all, this time, Elias had never paused to consider that Riff had a strategy. A method to all his youthful madness.

  “Even now, coming clean. There are still things you’re not telling me. Why would they kill our mother? They’d already made a prostitute slave out of her. She was nobody to them unless she rebelled in a way that could not be forgiven.” Elias looked down at his feet. He was panting.

  Riff cleared his throat and took his brother’s shoulders.

  “I’m sorry, man. See, it’s been a while since I’ve had someone I could trust. I might have told you sooner. But it wasn’t time yet. I just wanted you to have the chance to taste a little freedom before I saddled you with the burden that
I have to take to the grave.” Riff stumbled over his own words. Elias looked up. There was a desperation in the kid’s eyes that said so much more than fear would. It would seem easier for him to be entrusted with the fate of the world than whatever weighty thing was on his mind.

  “You can trust me now. Like hell would I betray my only living family member!” Elias cupped the back of Riff’s head, smiling. The boy calmed down considerably. He sat next to Elias. They both scooted back against the wall and looked up into darkness.

  “Our mom was furious about what Dad did to betray our city, Eli. I don’t know how well you remember mom.” Riff looked sidelong at his brother in the dark. Elias felt his chest constrict.

  “She got to visit me some at first. That stopped happening as I got more ‘popular’ if you will. I guess I was a little too good at surviving the psych punishments. Dad always told me that she gave up on me. That I looked so weak when it came to the Gladiator matches that replaced the Super Bowl, remember those? He said she just stopped coming, but I knew better…”

  Elias closed his eyes, fighting tears. It was dark enough here that he could cry if he wanted to without being seen. If he allowed himself the luxury of tears once, then he would never stop. He couldn’t afford to show any weakness now or ever. So he pushed it down one more time. It burned in his throat like swallowing acid.

  “Well, you really missed out, man. Because she loved you in a way that is insane and really can’t be compared to other mothers. They even say that other moms when their baby is threatened become like a lioness or a bear. Our mom made that description look weak. Even in her disgusting captivity, she never stopped fighting for you. She believed in you. She’d watch ever second that you were on TV for as long as she could and she made me watch when I could.” Riff’s voice trailed off. Elias felt his throat constrict. His next question was hard enough to even think based upon its context. But he had to know.