“Don’t overdo it,” I whisper to her as the truck slows to a halt under a glaring streetlamp. “Just act unnatural.”
I hear a door open and footsteps approach the truck. “Position and SSN?”
“Large transport pilot, acquisition assistant, guest combatant hospitality host,” Abram replies. “078-05-1120.”
“Assignment?”
“Three uncategorised Dead to Incinerator 2.”
I struggle not to react to this. Bundles of firewood indeed. I know burning the Dead is standard practice; I’ve seen oozing mounds of us doused in oil and turned into bonfires, a procedure the Boneys were fond of documenting in order to remind any deviators of their place in the natural order. But for a brief moment, this appeared to be changing. Goldman’s people were watching the situation in Citi with great interest. They were observing our integration with the Living, and as Corridor 2 neared completion and the merger neared signature, it seemed a real possibility that the change would spread. Can it be snuffed so easily by a few small minds with big guns?
“Pretty long haul for just three corpses,” the guard says. “You got room for a dozen in there.”
“Management’s rushing disposal for uncategorised. Worried about it spreading.”
The guard leans over to look at us, a scruffy man in a beanie and blue flannel instead of the beige Axiom jacket. One of Goldman’s original guards. “Zombies turning peaceful?” he says, studying my face. “You’re worried about that spreading?”
“They’re not ‘turning peaceful,’ they’re going into stasis. The plague’s evolving deception tactics. We don’t know where it’s going, so we’re playing it safe.”
“By burning them all?”
“Look, if you have problems with your enclave’s new guidelines you can take it up with Management but right now you need to open this gate so I can do my job, all right?”
The guard squints at me. I snap my teeth and release a soft, understated groan, the voice of a tortured soul trapped in a rotting body. It’s a role I’ve been researching for years, and perhaps I bring a little too much pathos to it, because the guard’s face contorts with guilt.
“You’re gonna burn them alive?”
“They’re zombies, you idiot, they’re not alive. Open the damn gate.”
The guard shines his light into our faces one by one. “I’m not sure about this. These guys don’t even look infected to me.” He pulls out his walkie. “I’m going to have to call Management.”
With a melodramatic and entirely unconvincing moan, Nora bolts upright and grabs his head, bangs it into the side of the truck and takes a bite of his ear. He staggers back, reaching for his gun, but Abram is already out of the truck and pressing his revolver against the man’s temple. “Drop the gun, drop the walkie, and open the gate.”
The guard lets the requested items clatter to the pavement and his lips begin to tremble as he reaches into his booth to punch in the gate code. By the time he’s finished and the steel door is moving, his face is wet with tears and snot.
“Just do it,” he whimpers, pressing his forehead into Abram’s gun barrel. “I don’t think I can do it myself and I don’t want to hurt anybody.”
Nora and Julie, who have been groaning and gasping like ridiculous B-movie ghouls, finally drop the act and dissolve into laughter.
“Chin up, soldier,” Nora says. “You’re not catching any diseases from me without buying me a few drinks.”
Abram throws the guard’s gun and walkie into the truck and hops in. I give the stunned, open-mouthed man a winning smile and Nora and Julie wave as we pull away into the city streets.
WE
WE WATCH ABRAM Kelvin drive away from the dome, and feelings rush through us. They are complex and contradictory—joy, sorrow, longing, love—but our feelings always are. They flood the halls of the Library like a rich and ancient liquor, infused with the memories of everything. It is rare to look at anything without imbibing this spirit, because everything is remembered by at least one part of us. Every tree has been a perch, every stream has been a bath, every stone has cut a paw or broken a window or been used to build a house. Everything on earth has meant something to someone, and there has never been a person whom no one ever loved.
So while even a stone has a few threads tied to it, a person has a thousand ropes, and the man in the truck is pulling us. A part of us begins to separate. A book slides out from our shelves. It’s a thin book, coverless and bound with red yarn, and it’s been badly damaged. Tears blur its ink. Blood blots its words. But the books in our Library can heal. They can grow. They can complete themselves.
A part of us emerges from our vastness. A part of us watches Abram and reads him, hoping to learn who he is. Hoping to recover a few of the pages that a heartless world ripped out.
We follow the truck.
I
INSIDE THE PROTECTIVE sheath of Corridor 2, I can almost pretend I’m in the old world. Smooth black asphalt with freshly painted yellow lines, entirely clear of abandoned cars and the wreckage of collapsed buildings. No bomb craters, no cracks, not so much as a pothole. And the ten-foot concrete walls effectively hide the mess outside, ensuring that nothing shatters this lovely illusion of municipal vitality. They also ensure, incidentally, that we won’t be swarmed and eaten by any of my less enlightened former friends.
Then the illusion evaporates. The walls dissolve into wooden pour forms and sprouts of rebar, and we’re on a standard street again, exposed to the city and all its lurking threats. Despite the countless benefits of a safe route between enclaves, I have no doubt one of Axiom’s first acts was to shut down the Corridor project, keeping its territory divided into manageable factions. When has a despot ever benefited from bringing people together?