Chapter 31 A Fan of Johnny Corpse
They left him and, passing through the next room, came to a closed door in the north wall. This, they agreed, would lead them to the super-heated area that Bits had taunted them about. The door itself was a hint, doors in doorways being a rarity in this underworld. This one looked new and had probably only just been hung, in order to keep the heat in. They turned on their suits’ oxygen and cooling apparatus, trying not to worry that they had no backups if the units should fail. As for their weakening helmet lights, they felt close enough to Goner House to hope they would only need them for another few minutes.
When Dignity opened the door, a scorching wind poured out, with thick smoke. Reason had no trouble believing that, without their suits, a few seconds of this would overcome them. She felt like an astronaut headed into the poisonous atmosphere of another planet. As they joined hands and walked forward, their diminished helmet lights did not help them to see much, and in fact they were so blinded that Reason was afraid they would blunder in the wrong direction in the labyrinth. But after a minute or so of stumbling forward, they came to another closed door and, passing through it, left the smoke and heat behind. Reason checked her suit’s thermometer and, finding the temperature tolerable, turned off her oxygen and cooling units and pulled off her silver head covering. When Dignity had done the same, they looked around at a typical Hadean room, bare and filthy.
It was not a house’s sub-basement room, such as they had been seeking, for it had no trap door in the ceiling and contained no Sin Nature Company furnace. Peering through the open doorways spaced around it, they saw only similar rooms. Reason consulted her map and decided that, if this was not one of the rooms under Goner House, which it might be, then they were—lost.
“This should have been it,” Dignity said. “I swear we came straight north through the smoke. Didn’t we? I think we—hey, your light just went out!”
She removed her helmet and looked at it. “I’m surprised it lasted this long. We were only supposed to need them for a few minutes. Your light is looking weaker, Dig. Better get out your flashlight.”
“I lost it in the water, remember? Better get out yours.”
“Negative. Chief Doohickey didn’t give me one.”
“Wh—what kind of planning is that?”
“We had three lights, Dig, and supposedly a very brief time that we would need them. From her point of view she overdid it.”
“OK, OK. But this means we’ve got to move fast. Which direction do we go?”
“I don’t know!”
“But the map?”
“The map is fine. I know where we were when we left the rooms under Malice House and entered the smoke. But all it takes is a moment of not knowing where you are, and then—well, we must still be near Malice House and Goner House, and the compass says that’s north,” she pointed, “but other than that, we’re lost.”
“But if we’re near, all we have to do is look around, right?”
Suddenly Dignity’s helmet lamp made a popping noise, tearing at their nerves, but it remained on. Momentarily it popped again and went out, leaving them in total darkness. Reason did not try to make a joke of this or say anything at all; this was just too deadly serious. They soon discovered that the lights of the tiny screens of their cell phones, besides being somewhat comforting to look at, were adequate to dimly reveal their close surroundings: they could proceed. But the effect of the Luminas had worn off, leaving them tired, lost, and afraid, so instead they huddled in a corner of the room, with cell phones off so as not to attract attention from all things evil.
Their plan, such plan as they had, was to rest and think. How were they to determine their location? They felt free to spend hours on this, for with their helmet lights extinguished, no other consideration need hurry them. They would try not to sleep. They would work out a method.
Dignity remembered that, in a similar situation, Tom Sawyer had explored the darkness in various directions while unwinding a ball of string, and then, when he found no way out, following it back to Becky Thatcher. But Reason had to point out, first, that they had no reason not to just explore together by the light of their cell phones; and second, that Chief Doohickey, who apparently had not read her Twain, had supplied no string anyway. She said these things as kindly as possible.
They were agreed that simply moving about might easily take them further from their goal. On the other hand, if while doing so they could happen upon any furnace room in the Sandhill neighborhood, they might use it as their egress to the world above. That was encouraging as far as it went. Mission a failure, and quite a surprise for whoever lived in the house above, but so what?
Then Reason remembered that Bits had said Goner House had been surrounded by super-heated passages. If true, that meant that, being now inside the circle, they could search around, while not passing any closed door (into super heat), and soon find the Goner House furnace room, the only one within the circle. When Dignity began to exult in this deduction, Reason had to add that it made the Hellites seem too simple minded. Why would they heat so many passages when they could just lock doors? Maybe they just loved heat? And who could believe anything Bits said? Nevertheless, they should explore.
Though they had reached a sort of conclusion about what to do, they remained where they were, seated with their backs against a wall, and presently Reason began to tell her cousin in some detail about the vision of the New City she had seen the previous afternoon. She even recited her rondeau. It was pleasant to think about the changes that would be coming to the world above, for with or without them, the City was going to be wonderful. When she had finished her account, they grew quiet again. They knew it was time to get up and find out whether they were completely or just slightly lost. But why hurry when this might be their last chance to believe they would soon see daylight again?
They did not stir. At length, Dignity asked Reason why she had changed her mind about coming on the mission, adding that he wished she had stayed behind.
“I wanted to back you up,” she said.
“Yeah, and thanks, but you could have just talked me out of it—easily! So I mean why did you think the mission was worthwhile?”
“Of course, I could say it’s the need to rescue Prayer,” she answered after some thought, “but the whole reason Prayer is with the Goners is because we wanted to do something for them, so it’s more than that.”
“Right, that’s why I sent her in,” he said. “So why all this effort for the Goners? Why did I send her, and why did we go through all that at Numb’s Place, and why come here this morning?”
Reason made a sound between a sigh and a rough laugh. “If I had to give an answer, Dig, I’d say this is just what we do. We don’t belong to the City anymore, so if we don’t do things like this, however dangerous, then who are we? Is that it? I knew I wasn’t going to contribute to Guiles’ downfall, and somehow I couldn’t remain neutral either. Maybe all that was left was to love him. Not that I feel anything for him, to be honest, but fear and revulsion.”
“Yeah, it’s the same for me,” Dignity said. “Not schmaltzy and warm—after all Guiles and his family are detestable—but nothing that happens quite manages to kill my goodwill toward them. I keep thinking that, even if they’re hopeless, I want to help them out in some way.” He paused. “Actually, if you try to analyze it like that, it just comes out loony.”
“Right, we’re mad as hatters. I couldn’t justify this to anyone.”
“But if this were a movie,” he said, “one of us would make an intense little speech about now that shows clearly how it’s all been worthwhile.”
“Yes, and that’s what we just tried to do. We muffed it.”
“Yeah, we did. So the audience goes away saying, ‘Well, that was pointless! What a downer.’ Just as well. Those noble speeches tend to come just before someone gets killed. So anyway, I—uh-oh, what’s that?”
&nbs
p; He had seen something. They whispered to one another, telling each other to keep quiet and still, for a light had appeared at some distance, weird and faint, coming from another room, and accompanied by a jarring, continuous sound, also faint, like raucous music. Reason fumbled for her gun and aimed it at the light, sensing that they were found, or soon would be, by the enemy. They would be killed. And yet she also sensed, to her surprise, that there could be no triumph over their dead bodies. She had never felt more sure that she was exactly where she was supposed to be and doing exactly what she was supposed to be doing. She felt vindication covering Dignity and her like a warm blanket, as if some horrible Enemy had suddenly inspected them, expecting to find them running from danger, or seeking compromise, or asleep, and had instead found them firmly at their posts, awake, and loyal. Madly and maddeningly loyal. And somehow, because of their madness, the Invasion was green-lighted, and the New City as good as built. Let the devil laugh then if he could! It could only be a very hollow, a very false laugh.
When the thing or being came into the room they were hiding in, streaked with pale death-fire and smelling of brimstone, they could see that it was made up of the streaks and of nothing else. But the streaks formed a weak, pulsing, and partial outline of a body that was short and narrow. It looked as though bullets would go right through it as easily as through air, and yet it somehow carried a dark rectangular object. Reason did not recognize it from the Heavenite bestiaries, but it looked to be some sort of demon.
The lyrics of the music, recorded rock, were clearly audible now:
God damn your law, your consequences too!
Nobody knows how deeply I can dive
Between the sowing and the reaping. Do
You even dream of taking me alive?
You’ll never even strap me in for that long ride!
There’s always darker, deeper, hotter yet,
Far underneath the palaces you rule:
The kingdom that all cleanly folk forget,
Dominion of the mocker and the fool.
Don’t look for me! I’m disappearing down that slide.
Mountains, mountains, fall on me.
I won’t look up at Jesus’ crown
Or kiss his feet. I’m going down
Where rustling roaches crawl on me;
No soul’s redeemed, no grace for free.
Rocks and mountains, fall on me.
You rocks and mountains, hide me from the sun;
You caves and caverns, welcome me within.
I know you won’t despair of what I’ve done;
You won’t take any notice of my sin.
By silence you’ll agree I’m doing very well.
I’ll really play the part: feel thirst like pain,
And gnash my teeth, and starve without a crust.
I’ll groan and weep and beat the walls in vain,
In this my chosen city in the dust,
Unholy haunted home. Don’t ever call it hell!
After the chorus had repeated and the music had stopped, Dignity spoke.
“Prevarica, what are you doing here?”
The thing jumped—Reason could see its fire streaks rise and fall in the jump—and the girl’s voice answered in fright, “Who’s there!”
Dignity was standing, pulling his cousin up with him. “Dignity and Reason, kid. What’s that you’ve got with you, your iPad?”
“What if I do? I have the right to do what I want here, don’t I? I thought I was alone. What are you doing here? You’re trespassing!”
“Yeah, I suppose we are, but we’re suffering for it in the ears. Ooh, what awful music! You didn’t pay good money for it, did you?”
“It’s Johnny Corpse and its number one!”
“But wait, hang on, if we’re trespassing,” Reason said, finding her voice, “then we’re under your house, Prevarica. Are we? We’re not lost?”
“You’re lost,” she said with evident satisfaction.
“But what are you doing down here?” Dignity asked again.
“Wouldn’t you, if your family made you carry water buckets from across the street? And they never have enough; I’ve gotta keep going back for more and more, like their slave.”
“So you came down here to hide? Nice choice! Why didn’t you just go in a closet upstairs? Or, wait a minute, since you’re invisible, you could hide anywhere. Oh, maybe it’s too cold for you upstairs without clothes? But it’s always plenty hot down here. But really, Prevarica, how do you stand it?” he pressed. “You don’t—you don’t like it here, do you? In the land of the dead?”
“This is the kind of place where the City says I belong,” she said in a whining tone. “I’m a Goner now. No, I don’t like it, but I—I find my balance here, my equilibrium. You wouldn’t understand.”
“Uh, Prevarica, you’re standing here looking—and smelling—like a puff of burning trash that floated out of hell, and you think I don’t understand?”
“Damn you!” she cried. “What if I don’t want to live anymore? This was my only place to go, but if I can’t hide even here, then I’ll kill myself.”
She ran into another room, bare feet pattering on the floor, and when they had followed, her own foul light showed them that she was picking up an object from the floor. Her iPad still hovered in the grip of her unseen left hand, but in her right, and now with its barrel pressed against the side of her invisible head, was a Moore pistol, no doubt the same with which Patience had armed her.
“Come any closer and I’ll blow my brains out!”
Reason made a swift mental review of the people who had been shot with Moore pistols two days previously, and found that, of all of them, Prevarica had witnessed only one. Wisdom had told her that Prevarica had seen the weapon’s effect on Chief Sordid, that is, the immediate effect. The girl must have concluded that the Chief had died. Either that or she was being a drama queen while knowing that the pistol would not kill her.
“I’m not bluffing! You’re killing me! Stay away!”
Both Heavenites had callously stepped nearer to her.
“Before you pull the trigger,” Dignity asked, “would you be a pal and point us the way to your sub-basement’s furnace room? I mean, sorry to be so cruelly practical, but in another few seconds we won’t be able to ask, and it’s really important to us, so—”
Zip!
By now Reason recognized the sound of such a pistol. Prevarica remained standing. She threw down the weapon.
“Piece of junk doesn’t work!” she said.
“Actually, I’m sure it did, Prevvy,” said Dignity.
“Oh, wait a minute!” she added in a different tone.
For several seconds a hummy sound escaped her lips, as if her brain were changing gear. Then she spoke in a softer, more slithery voice.
“Why don’t you both stop persecuting and tormenting me? Go away, or I’ll call the police, I will! I’ll get you arrested. Why did you follow me here? It’s because you want my iPad.” She laughed mysteriously. “But you aren’t thinking that I have problems, are you? Like, what would they be? Listen, I’m back in firm control of my life, and ready to excel right through college. Then I’m headed for the Mayor’s office, and I don’t mean to vacuum and dust it either! And hear me, I’m visible. Do you get it? It’s just so dark down here that you can’t see me. And I’ve got possessions you can only dream of, I’m so rich. You want my clothes and jewelry! That’s why you’re after me.”
For a few moments they could see little clouds of yellow burning gas moving in two orbs that marked the location of her eyes. A puff of the same substance poured from where her mouth must be and hung in the air glowing.
“You’ve been telling other people that I tried to murder Wisdom, spreading a wild story. So you’ve forced me to make war on you. I order your deaths!”
Both had stepped back from her. Reason said, “You know, my son has a kind of thing for you, but afte
r this I’m thinking I may have to steer him another direction.”
The girl huffed out a little more burning gas and then paced away from them through a doorway. They turned on their cell phones to provide a little light and followed her through two rooms to the sub-basement furnace room they had been seeking for hours. Prevarica scrambled up a ladder and through a trap door into the Goner House basement, leaving the door open behind her.
The sound of her voice descended to them, “Don’t you know who you’re dealing with? Why don’t you worship me? I’m going to rule the world!”
She apparently went away, for they heard nothing more from above. Then they noticed a round, little man seated in a corner of the room in a plain wooden chair. He was sweating in the heat, and tongues of deathly flame flickered around him. It was Guiles.