The Monster Read online

  Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Blank Page

  Prologue

  Harlan | 1

  Beryl | 2

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  Beryl | 8

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  THE MONSTER

  J.D. Palmer

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblances to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2018 J.D. Palmer

  All rights reserved.

  Illustrations by Judy Palmer

  For Gibson.

  PROLOGUE

  THERE ARE ELEVEN of them in all. Eleven pieces of thick white paper, covered with my handwriting, and all now carefully laminated. Eleven, one for each language that I know. A source of pride, although I worry that my French isn’t exact. Past tense versus present, something that has always confused me in the romance languages. Is it “killed everyone?” Or “killing everyone?”

  Not that it matters.

  They are spread out in front of me. Different squiggles and boxes, curves and arcs and runic devices, all detailing what I did. My confession. A brief, horrible tale that I almost didn’t sign. As if by remaining anonymous I could bypass any judgment reserved for me upon my death.

  Which should be soon.

  I tell myself that every day, though. Write down what you’ve done. The manipulation, the fear, the false reports. The blindness that led me to believe I was doing something great. Something to save humanity. The moment I suspected, then realized, what a horrible thing I had created. Write down why you released it before it was ready. Write it down.

  Write it down and then you can die. You can end your own life. Take the breath from a person who, out of all the billions, definitely deserves to be counted among the dead.

  But I don’t. I don’t know how. I crafted the virus that wiped out most of the world and yet… I don’t know how I should die. I feel like it should be different. Worse. I should suffer. But if no one sees it…

  Is it enough?

  I want to be punished. I know that. Maybe that’s why I have taken so long in writing these confessions. Maybe that’s why I walk outside every day, why I find someone to bury. One a day, sometimes two bodies, but never three. That would be rushing. Not taking the time to properly lay them to rest. To say I’m sorry. To tell them it wasn’t an accident, but that it could have been far worse. To cry and beg forgiveness. And then to fill in the hole.

  I look down at the documents in front of me. Carefully arranged so that they cover the whole table. The Mandarin is the most accurate, as it is my native tongue. The Russian is good, too. But the Swedish version… That one properly captures my lament. My anguish. Maybe there’s just more sadness in that language. Maybe there’s more poetry.

  I should make more copies. I can’t count on someone happening upon my lonely apartment in the middle of Beijing. I can’t count on an earthquake, or fire, or rats not to destroy these. I should make more. And bury more bodies. And perhaps, one day, I’ll be able to look someone in the eye and tell them my story. I can tell them how I thought I was protecting people. I can tell them that if I hadn’t done what I did, the world might have been subjected to something far more terrible…

  I can tell them that everyone they know and love is gone because of my foolishness. My blindness.

  Maybe then I can die.

  Except I don’t want to die. I want to be killed.

  HARLAN | 1

  I LET THE air out through my nose, bubbles of it rushing towards the surface as I sink lower into the freezing depths of Lake Tahoe. Silent and still. Almost another universe. I rub my hands over my face, across my chest and arms. Blood and ash and filth make a rust colored cloud in the water in front of me.

  I stay down as long as I can, letting the cold water clean the trials of the last few days from my body. My feet sink into the muddy bottom and I let out the last of my air. Stillness. Cold, cold and the beating of my heart. Sunlight diffused through lambent blue. A fish darts nearby, presenting its side so it can examine me with an unblinking eye. I barely move and it’s gone.

  I break the surface and heave in air. A crisp breeze immediately amplifies the cold of my wet hair. It’s a bright day but the sun offers no heat. Fall? I don’t know what month it is, I gave up trying to count the days that have gone by. Something tells me that it will be a hard winter.

  Another reason to hurry.

  I’ve always preferred the cold over heat. It seems to sharpen my mind, to bring everything into focus. And jumping into frigid water revitalizes the body in ways nothing else can. And gods, I stunk. We all did. Running and fighting and days of not changing clothes and sitting in a car. Our own blood and sweat. Other’s, as well.

  Theo is sick. Probably a result of swallowing an ocean and then not breathing for awhile. Snot and an ear ache and a deep cough that rattles and wheezes and doesn’t allow us to sleep. But even if he was well I know he wouldn’t wash in the lake. I fear the man will never approach another body of water again after his ordeal with the bridge. I don’t blame him. Beryl barely waded in past her knees, awkwardly bending over with a scavenged bottle of shampoo to wash her hair.

  But this isn’t salt water. Dark, fathomless depths containing who knows what. This is more akin to home for me. And I need it, I need to feel clean. At least on the outside.

  I trudge out of the water, gingerly stepping over the gravel beach towards a pile of fresh clothes. We will have to get more cold weather gear, especially for nighttime. If we have to sleep outside we are going to be woefully unprepared.

  “It must be pretty cold.”

  I resist the urge to cover my crotch as Sheila walks down the small path towards me.

  “It is.”

  She tosses me a towel. “No one wants to watch you air dry.”

  I accept it, grateful now that the wind has picked up. Grateful too that Sheila appears to not want me dead anymore. She strips off her clothes, uncaring of my presence, the hard planes of her sinewy body twisting and rippling in the sunlight. Her hand is still pretty gruesome, the bandages stained with blood and the serum of broken blisters. She won’t let anyone help her with it though. Almost as if she enjoys the pain. I guess I get it. It’s a reminder of Mickey. The pain a gift as she mourns him. As if sensing my thoughts she jerks her thumb back the way she came.

  “Beat your twinky somewhere else.”

  She wades into the water as I pull on my pants and walk away, and I smile as I hear her gasp at the cold. Pine cones stab at my bare feet, and I feel sticky pitch adhere to my heel along with pine needles and dirt. I don’t care. Ther
e are trees. Cold. Mounds bordering on mountains. Nothing compared to back home, the hills still yellow and stunted, barely escaping the death grip of the desert. But it’s close enough for me. The less I’m reminded of California the better.

  Theo sits on the the porch of the cabin, layers of clothes bundled around him. He is hunched over hot tea, holding it as if his life depended on it.

  “Is Montana colder than this?”

  His voice is distant, muffled as he speaks into his chest.

  “It’s colder.”

  I give him a grin as his eyes widen. “Don’t worry, soon as you get over your cough you’ll be fine. You might even like the snow.”

  He glowers at me. “I feel like you want me to die.”

  “Not yet. If it’s too cold up there we might not be able to find food. We’ll have to resort to cannibalism. And you, my friend, would be tasty.”

  I walk away before he can respond. I’m pretty sure he knows I’m joking.

  Inside the small cabin Josey prods at the smoldering coals in the fireplace, grimacing in pain as the movement pulls at the wound to his arm. He washed in the lake, same as me, and even took the time to trim his beard down to something manageable. Less of a mountain man, more of a starving artist.

  “Can’t get this fucker going.”

  I jiggle the handle for the flue. “Probably gummed up with branches and leaves. Leave it be, we need to get going.”

  His head drops and he runs a hand through his hair. “I thought we were going to get a day or two to, you know…”

  He trails off, and I don’t know what to say, so I walk away. I know everyone is messed up right now. I am. What we did, and what we saw. I know that the threads of our companionship will be pulled taut by the pace I’m setting. I just hope they don’t fray and break before I get home.

  The kitchen table is covered with boxes and cans of food on one side, an array of guns on the other. Beryl stands on the far side, surveying the assembly like some sort of apocalyptic Martha Stewart.

  “We find a new car?”

  She nods without looking at me. She has withdrawn into herself since we left San Francisco. Or what’s left of it. She no longer speaks unless she absolutely has to.

  “Let’s load this up, I wanna be on the road in an hour.”

  She nods, though a small crinkle appears between her eyes.

  “What?”

  She takes in a heavy breath, eyes looking into mine as if I should know. Which I do. She points at Theo.

  “You think we should stay longer?”

  She nods.

  It’s unlike Beryl to worry about the others… so much. Maybe that’s a good sign. Or a sign that I’m being an asshole.

  It doesn’t matter.

  “I wish we could. But we can’t. It’s time to go.”

  I gather up a couple boxes of food and head outside before she can argue. I’m being hard on them. Travel, brief rest, travel some more…

  But a magnet draws me north. And as much as I don’t want to push them away, I’m willing to leave them if it means getting home a day, an hour, a second sooner.

  Most of them.

  I wonder if I push the pace so that I can’t grow complacent. Can’t stop and pry at Beryl, bring forth a new smile, or a new whisper, or some new element of her past.

  I treasure those moments. Perhaps too much. The urge to put an arm around her. To sit in silence side by side at the lake instead of in a moving car.

  It doesn’t help that we sleep curled up next to each other, holding each other.

  “You okay man?”

  I was staring at the box in the trunk, gone. Josey waits for me to move before gingerly placing three rifles next to the box of canned goods, his Silver Pigeon Beretta on top. Gods, he loves that shotgun. He wraps them in a blanket to keep them from jostling around.

  “We’re going to need to find some fresh food soon. Ain’t shit after we pass Carson City.”

  I nod. “We should get new clothes, too. Warmer clothes.”

  He tilts his head, scanning the brightly lit area around us. “You worried about cold? It’s… Fuck. What month is it?”

  I shake my head. “No idea. But it can change,” I snap my fingers, “like that up north.”

  BERYL | 2

  WE STAY ANOTHER day. The side of Harlan that urges him home loses to the side that cares for his friends. I think he wanted them to show more anger. To scream, or throw a fit, or tell him to leave if he so desperately wanted to. So maybe he could. Their silence, and acquiescence, apparently made it worse.

  I pull the cords that constrict my hood tight around my face. My ears are cold. My nose is cold. I get cold so easily, much more easily than the men. Even Sheila seems to be less bothered by it. Though, in her case, she wouldn’t let the cold know that it bothered her. She’d be more likely to strip off her clothes and scream at the sky, daring it to try to do better.

  It’s cold.

  But so, so wonderful.

  At first, after leaving the monster’s lair, the world had been too much. My senses, nerves, mind, all overwhelmed by stimuli that had been denied to me for so long.

  But now, now I relish every new feeling. Every drop of rain and every gust of wind. Even when it means shivering.

  If cold and wet is the price to pay for freedom in this world, well… My soul is a bank to house whatever currency life demands, and my body will have to be content as a debtor.

  I pull my hood tighter and kick a pebble into the grass on the side of the road as I watch Harlan wade out into the water. I see him swim, and scrub, and do everything he can to wash himself clean. And he can’t. And he shouldn’t feel dirty in the first place.

  Not about John. Or Steven.

  Or Wing.

  I watch Harlan because he pushes himself so hard to look after everyone else, harder now more than ever, and someone should look out for him.

  He worries about too much. Getting home. His child and the woman, Jessica. He worries about our group, and if they’ll die because they are along for the ride.

  I try not to dwell on the future.

  But the past…

  The piece of paper sits on my lap, crinkled lines making a spiderweb of creases. At some point it got wet, the white now a variation of brown and tan. There is blood on it. How it got there, tucked away as it was, I have no idea.

  But the picture is still there. A wolf. Sitting calm and demure on top of a car surrounded by snarling dogs. Steven drew it for me. A joke about the first day I came to trust him. He said I didn’t look frightened. He said he was more afraid for the dogs.

  He drew this in the last days of Camelot. I asked him why he thought I was a wolf and he said it was something about my heart. I don’t know if he meant it regarding courage, or the cold-hearted way that we went about killing Don.

  I don’t think it was for any sort of strength. I’m afraid all of the time. A broad, all-encompassing fear. I’m afraid of losing what I never had. A family. A home. I already lost someone I privately thought of as my brother.

  Oh Steven.

  I trace the pattern of ink. He knew I couldn’t get a tattoo. I wouldn’t be able to bear the touch, or the needle, or the penetration. But he could tell, with that uncanny ability of his, that I yearned for something similar. A way to be marked. An imprint of an idea.

  To be seen.

  I never had a lot of things that I could call my own. The foster care system makes it hard. Especially when you moved around as much as I did. You didn’t get to keep the blankets they bought just for you. And you didn’t want to keep the pictures. Toys, also, were nothing more than a reminder. And the teddy bear you brought from one place is taken away by new guardians intent on instilling better habits.

  But I kept them all.

  As I’ll keep this.

  It’s not as easy as it used to be. And maybe it’s a part of me rebelling at returning to my sanctuary. The place that I locked myself into. But at least it’s my choice. Now. It didn’t used to
be.

  I close my eyes. When I open them my feet are in white sand. Small, slender, and lonely bits of green grass force their way skyward, becoming more and more numerous as I walk. A wind blows, cool and refreshing, tousling my hair and bringing my nose the gift of smells odd to this place. Vanilla and spruce. Lavender and wet rocks. Shucked corn and biscuits.

  There is a hill in front of me. Framed by light that is both dim and bright and everywhere at once. At the top is a tree. Far too large to be alone, but alone it is, aside from the small forest of grass at its base. The tree is long dead, a long white ribbon coils around the trunk all the way to its roots, the kiss of a lightning strike that I like to think was the death of my parents.

  I walk to the base and put my hand on the wood, taking a moment to say hello to all the familiar knots and grooves. The bark peeling in places and dried sap running like insignificant wounds long ago ignored.

  I slowly circle the lonesome monument, stepping over large roots, and all the while trailing my hand along burls and stubs, the texture of it so familiar. Pictures hang on knots. Some sit in the middle of the trunk, the old tree growing around the frames to embrace these parts of my essence as one of its own. Pictures that aren’t pictures. Windows, perhaps. A teakettle and small little cups. Snow glimpsed past a Christmas tree. A bike with black tassels.

  On the far side of the tree two roots veer at sharp angles away from the base to make a V. Steps have been chiseled out of the sandy floor, taking me down until I stand beneath the behemoth. A door is in front of me. Solid rock and no handle. Only a pair of handprints in the middle. I place my hands on the impressions, there is the smallest click, and the doors swing inward.

  I walk inside, pausing at the entrance. I cannot close the doors. Not this time. Not like I did before. I’m a different person, now. I do not hide. I do not lock myself away.

  The room is illuminated by the same dusky light from outside. A warm light, as if from a hundred candles caught mid-flicker. There is a couch, and a blanket, and a side table. A cozy nook for reading. Or for sleeping long past a time when you were supposed to be sleeping.