“I know what the rules are Steve,” Miles pleaded. “But can’t we just look the other way this one time?”
“I’m sorry,” Steve said, refusing to budge on the issue. “We’re going to have to report her.”
“Who’s going to know if we don’t?”
“That’s beside the point. The business is in enough trouble already.” Steve slid his letter opener into another envelope and sliced it open. Most of the mail so far had been bills, which wasn’t helping his sour mood. “If we were caught flouting the law a second time, that would be the end of us. There wouldn’t even be an investigation this time. They’d shut us down straight away.”
Earlier that morning, Miles and Adam had attended a job where an elderly Greek woman was found to have been keeping her zombie husband chained up in the basement. The laws regarding this were quite clear; Dead Rite were now obliged to report the woman for harbouring an undead being, and she would be fined, jailed or both.
The woman begged Miles and Adam not to take her husband of fifty-three years away. Like many people, she couldn’t bear the thought of a loved one being sent off to one of those giant zombie prisons, where she would probably never see him again.
“Look Miles, I don’t like the law any more than you do,” Steve continued, jabbing the letter opener in the air to emphasise his point. “But our personal beliefs on the issue are irrelevant. There are serious penalties if we don’t abide by the rules, and I’m not about to take a risk like that.”
“She was old, and she hardly spoke any English. I’m not even sure if she knew what she was doing was illegal.”
Steve gave Miles a skeptical look, then turned to Adam. “Is this true?”
“She knew what she was doing,” Adam said quietly. “She was just putting on that whole confused immigrant act. You saw how much artificial blood she had in there.”
As much as Miles wanted to believe the woman was innocent, deep down he knew that Adam probably was right. They had found bottles of artificial blood inside the house, which she had purchased over the internet and was pumping into her husband to stop him from wasting away.
There was an active online community dedicated to this practise, where thousands of people would share stories and advice on how to keep a zombie in your place of residence without getting caught. There had even been rumours of people continuing to live with their zombie spouses as husband and wife – and everything that entailed. No one seemed entirely sure how this was achieved, and most didn’t like to think about it too much.
These people were all breaking the law, but Miles didn’t believe they should be sent to prison for it. They were just doing what many others would do if they found themselves in a similar situation. While everyone was now aware of what the correct course of action was in the event of a loved one being bitten, no one really knew how they’d react until it actually happened to them. It seemed wrong to punish people just for caring.
Miles and Adam noticed that Steve had been silent for the past half-minute. He was reading the piece of mail he’d just opened.
“What is it?” Adam said.
“More fan mail,” Steve said, a mixture of anger and amusement in his voice.
He cleared his throat and read the letter aloud.
“Dear Pawns of Satan,” it began. “Enjoy what time you have left here on earth, because you are both destined to spend the rest of eternity wallowing in the fiery pits of hell. It’s bad enough that the plague of dead walking the earth was God’s divine retribution for the kind of sinful behaviour the two of you indulge in on a daily basis. But the fact that you are now profiting from it ensures that you and every other sodomite will feel the full force of God’s wrath when Judgement Day arrives.”
Steve and Adam didn’t appear to be all that upset by the contents of the letter, but Miles could feel his blood heating up. He had received similar correspondence from these far-right religious crackpots who preyed on vulnerable people by informing them that their loved ones had died due to the immoral behaviour of others.
Miles now disposed of the letters as soon as they arrived, tossing them into the garbage without opening them. Unfortunately, there were plenty of others who believed everything they read and chose to join the God Squad in their crusade against depravity.
Steve screwed the letter up and let out a barbed laugh. “We should show them our financial records,” he said as he lobbed the ball of paper into the wastepaper basket. “Then they’ll see that we’re not exactly profiting from the situation.”
“Maybe we should let them know that it’s been a while since we indulged in sinful behaviour on a daily basis,” Adam said.
“Adam,” Steve said quietly. “I don’t think this is the time or place to be talking about this.”
“Right, so we should just ignore the problems we’ve been having and hope they all go away?”
The temperature in the room seemed to rise slightly. Miles could sense that Steve and Adam were on the verge of another major argument, so he discretely slipped out of the room without either of them noticing.
A minute later he heard their raised voices echoing throughout the building, as another simple discussion descended into a pointless quarrel over nothing.
This kind of thing was happening more and more over the past few weeks. Tensions were running high around the office, nerves were frayed, and everyone was flying off the handle for the smallest of reasons.
Steve appeared to be under the most pressure. Elliott’s performance at the processing centre a few weeks back had resulted in Dead Rite being slapped with a quarter of a million dollar fine. Not that this came as a surprise to Steve; the chief investigator presiding over the case was a long-time associate and close personal friend of Jack Houston. As soon as he heard that, he knew they wouldn’t receive anything less than the maximum penalty.
Dead Rite now had ninety days to come up with the money. For Steve, this time frame was like an additional form of punishment. He wished they would just terminate their contract rather than dragging it out for another three months. He felt like a prisoner on death row, waiting to be put out of his misery.
Miles arrived home a little after ten. He avoided going anywhere near the lounge room after hearing Clea and her gaggle of friends camped out in there. He wasn’t in the mood to put up with their antics tonight, so he went straight to his bedroom.
He sent Shae a text message asking where she was, then switched on the TV.
The news tonight was dominated by the latest scandal involving a female government minister and the earth-shattering revelation that she’d been romantically involved with one of her staffers shortly after her first marriage had ended. The report delved into all the lurid details; he was nineteen, she was his thirty-three-year-old boss, and the implication that this affair cast doubt on her integrity and her ability to perform her duties. The reporting was so sensationalised and over the top that many viewers may have been left with the impression that some wrongdoing had occurred, instead of a rather pedestrian story of two adults who entered into a consensual relationship that had ended sixteen years ago. The whole grubby saga belonged in the pages of some trashy gossip rag, not as the leading story of a supposedly respectable news and current affairs program. It was low-rent entertainment disguised as news, and it was indicative of the depths to which journalism had sunk in today’s political climate.
It came as no surprise that The Daily Ink, Bernard Marlowe’s favourite newspaper, was the one to break the story, splashing it across the front page of that morning’s edition. It also came as no surprise that they chose to target a rival female minister, ignoring the many male politicians who spoke of “family values” and “upstanding morals” while embarking on extramarital affairs and visiting prostitutes. Marlowe himself has had to make several sexual harassment suits quietly disappear via secret payments and non-disclosure settlements.
Miles sent Shae another text, then switched the TV off and headed to the kitchen for something to eat.
One of Clea’s friends had beaten him to it and was helping himself to the contents of the refrigerator. Miles had never seen this guy before, but he hadn’t taken long to make himself at home.
“You Miles?” the stranger asked without looking up.
“Uh, yeah, that’s me,” Miles replied, somewhat surprised to have his reputation precede him.
“I hear you work for Dead Rite.” He spat out the words “Dead Rite” as if they were puppy-killing child molesters.
“Uh-huh.”
The stranger closed the fridge and turned to face Miles. His hair was dyed jet black and styled into a trendy mohawk. He had a nose ring and a goatee, and his torn black t-shirt and jeans were held together with tape and safety pins, like the punks used to wear in the seventies. The difference here was that this guy probably bought his outfit from a boutique designer store rather than the charity shops favoured by punks. In all, he looked like what the wardrobe department of a TV cop show thought a typical punk-anarchist might look like, right down to the studded bracelets around each of his wrists.
He also looked about ten years older than what Miles had first thought. The majority of the Zeroes were directionless youths in their late teens or early twenties. This guy looked like he was on the wrong side of thirty.
Miles immediately grew suspicious of his motives for joining the Zeroes. It may have had less to do with fighting oppression and injustice, and more to do with gaining access to a bevy of idealistic and impressionable college-aged girls.
Despite his appearance and his somewhat advanced age, he was still an unusually handsome man. He had a face so angular that it appeared to be made entirely of polygons.
“Kneel,” the stranger said.
“Excuse me?”
Miles was taken aback by this abrupt command. He worried this encounter was about to take a turn for the weird.
“That’s my name,” he said, pointing to himself. “I’m Neil.”
“Oh,” Miles said. “Hi Neil.”
Neil returned to the lounge with an armful of food and beverages.
“Your friend’s a bit weird,” Miles overheard Neil saying from the lounge.
“Oh, that’s Miles,” Clea replied. “He’s a Scientologist.”
Miles would later learn that Neil had caught Clea’s attention at one of her rallies. He made an impression by throwing a brick through a Starbucks window, then scaling a power pole and cutting the electricity to a nearby McDonalds store. The fact that this was an anti-censorship rally was irrelevant; Clea like his passion, and decided he’d be a valuable asset for their cause.
Miles went to the fridge and set about making a ham and cheese sandwich. He discovered that Neil had taken the last of the ham, so he was forced to use tofu as a substitute.
He heard a car pull up outside the house a few minutes later. He left his sandwich-in-progress on the bench and waited by the front door.
“Where have you been?” he demanded to know as soon as the door opened.
Shae let out an exaggerated groan. “Can I at least come inside the house before you interrogate me?” she said wearily.
“It’s almost eleven o’clock.”
“I’m well aware of the time, Miles. I was at a group meeting. I told you about it this morning.”
“You said it finished at eight.”
“It did finish at eight. Then a few of us went out for pizza.”
“Would it have killed you to call ahead and let me know?”
Shae shrugged her shoulders. “I didn’t think of it.”
Miles’ impatience was growing, and Shae’s dismissive attitude wasn’t helping. “I sent you about five text messages,” he said.
“We have our phones turned off during meetings. I probably just forgot to turn it back on.” Miles found this difficult to believe, since Shae could barely go two minutes without looking at her phone. “So if you’re done,” she said, walking away, “I’m going to bed.”
“Not so fast.” Miles put his arm out to stop Shae from passing. “I want to talk about you skipping school.”
Shae gave Miles another dramatic eye roll. “Some other time, please?”
“No, we need to talk about this now.”
“It’s no big deal. I just missed a couple of P.E. classes. It’s not like it was anything important.”
“That’s not the point. I don’t want you getting into the habit of missing classes.”
“This is such a first world problem.”
“Oh God, don’t you start with that.”
“Are you telling me you never skipped any classes when you were at school?”
“You’re right, I did. And look where it got me.”
“Don’t worry, Miles,” Shae said, pushing her way past. “I’m sure I won’t end up like you.”
Shae slammed her bedroom door closed for added emphasis.
If Miles’ experience of raising his younger sister for these past two-and-a-half years had taught him anything, it was that he was being punished for his own behaviour as a teenager. It seemed that all the stress and trauma he inflicted on his parents when he was her age was being revisited upon him tenfold. It was harder and harder keeping Shae on the straight and narrow now that she was going through her obligatory phase of teenage rebellion. Whenever he asked her to do something, she inevitably ended up doing the opposite. If he told her not to drink a glass of liquid nitrogen she’d probably do it just to spite him. He knew this was typical behaviour for her age, but that didn’t make it any less frustrating.
But what disturbed him the most was the influence Clea seemed to be exerting over her. Skipping a couple of classes didn’t really concern him all that much. As Shae had rightly pointed out, he used to do it all the time. But it was the reasons behind her cutting class that troubled him. It wouldn’t have bothered him if she was skipping school to go to the mall with friends, but she was doing it to hang out with a bunch of brain dead hippie stoners. He was afraid they were polluting her mind and leading her down a dark path.
It was fine for people like Clea and Fabian to waste their lives like that, since they both came from wealthy families and could afford to drop out for a few years. Shae didn’t have that luxury. The next few years of her life were vital, and if she messed up now she could irreversibly damage her future prospects.
He knew he was being overprotective, but he couldn’t help worrying about the people she was hanging out with and the choices she was making. The closer Shae became to Clea, the harder it was for Miles to get through to her. He didn’t know if Clea was doing it deliberately, but she was definitely turning Shae against him. The two of them were forever ganging up on him, and he always felt outnumbered.
More and more, Miles found himself disturbed by the way guys were looking at her now. It was a subtle thing, but it was definitely there. Their gaze would linger a second or two longer than it should. The endless parade of strange men that Clea allowed into the house, like that sleazy Neil guy he’d just encountered, did nothing to alleviate his concerns.
Miles returned to finish his sandwich. The doorbell rang a few minutes later.
He answered and found Elliott clutching the doorframe as if the whole house might collapse if he let go. If he wasn’t drunk, he was doing a pretty convincing impersonation.
“Heyyy, Miles,” he slurred.
“Where did you disappear to?” Miles said. “I’ve been trying to call you for the past two weeks.”
A few days after Elliott lost his job, Miles received a phone call saying he’d been arrested. The police suspected him of being part of an elaborate money laundering scheme after he was caught trying to deposit a fraudulent $200 cheque. Elliott didn’t help matters by being evasive and refusing to answer any questions. It was left to Miles to explain to the police that Elliott was trying to scam some money out of a Nigerian con artist, but it didn’t quite pan out the way he had envisioned.
“I’ve bin busy,” Elliott said, mashing his words together in such a way that they seeme
d to form an entirely new dialect. “I needed some cassh.”
“You have a new job?”
“Nope.” Elliott produced a small pill bottle from his back pocket containing several blue oval capsules. “I make money with theese.”
“Oh good, you’re selling drugs. For a minute there I was worried you were doing something irresponsible.”
“Relax baby, I’m not selling drugs. I’m taking them. It’s medication, and I’m getting paid to do it.”
“You mean like a clinical trial?”
“No, they given me theese pills to take, and then monitor how m’body reacts to it.”
“That’s called a clinical trial.”
“Oh. Right.”
“Aren’t they supposed to isolate the test subjects while they monitor them?”
“Not thish one. Anyway, thish way I cin do two at once.”
Elliott fumbled around for a second pill bottle, this one containing round orange tablets.
“So they’re testing two types of drugs on you?”
“No, thish one’s for a diffrint trial altogether.”
“You’re taking part in two clinical trials?”
“Yup.”
“At the same time?”
“I’m tellin’ you, the money’s real good.” Elliott smiled a broad grin, like he was exceptionally proud of himself. “You should do it, too.”
The frantic rush to develop a vaccine or a cure for the infection meant there was a smorgasbord of clinical trials available for anyone willing to risk their health and wellbeing for some fast cash. The pharmaceutical companies were sparing no expense in their quest, and some were conducting themselves less ethically than they might otherwise have done.
“But you don’t know what the possible side effects are!” Miles said.
“No one knows what the possible side effects are, Miles.” Elliott spoke slowly, as if he was explaining something complex to a young child. “That’s why they hafta conduct theese tests.”
Miles then noticed the small perforations and discolourations dotting Elliott’s arms. He then knew it was this, and not alcohol, that was the cause of Elliott’s odd behaviour.
“Have you been selling blood as well?” he said.
Elliott shook his head. “Yeaah.”
“How many times have you done it?”
“I don’t know,” Elliott shrugged. “Three times, I think. Or maybe it was three. My memory hasn’t bin so good lately, f’some reason.”
“Christ Elliott, you can’t keep doing that.”
“Sure y’can. You just hafta give a diffrint name when y’go in. They don’t check your ID or anything. Besides, I’m AB negative. They pay me more f’my blood because it’s rare.”
“Would you close the door please, Miles?” Clea shouted from the lounge room. “You’re letting out all the cold air!”
Elliott stuck his head inside. “Hi, Clea!” he called out in his friendliest voice. “It’s only me!”
“Oh God,” Clea said with disgust. “What is he doing here?”
“Goodness, Clive,” Elliott said. “Your wife seems to be in a bad mood tonight.”
“Look, it’s probably best that you don’t hang around here too much longer.” Miles attempted to usher Elliott out of the house before his presence caused a further scene. “You’re kind of persona non grata at the moment.”
“Uh look, Miles, the reason I came here tonight ...” Elliott paused as he tried to rearrange his jumbled thoughts into a coherent sentence. “I need your help with something.”
“Sure,” Miles said, picking up on Elliott’s sudden downbeat turn. “What’s up?”
Elliott took a deep breath. “My grandparents are zombies.”
Miles laughed. This revelation spilled out of him so quickly and without warning that he assumed Elliott was making some sort of joke. But the look on his face told him he was serious. He stepped out onto the front porch and closed the door behind him.
“What are you talking about?”
Elliott explained how it had happened. Earlier in the day he decided to drop in on his grandparents in the hope of scoring a free meal, having worn out his welcome at his parents’ place. But when he arrived, he discovered that he was too late. Both of them were now undead, sitting on the couch watching Judge Judy.
“When did this happen?” Miles asked.
“I just found them today. I went out to visit them, and I–”
“Wait, you drove out there?”
“Well I obviously didn’t walk that far.”
“No, I’m just surprised that you managed to put the key in the ignition, let alone operate a motor vehicle.”
“So are you going to help me or what?”
“Help you?”
“Help me take them to a processing centre, and, y’know ...” Elliott’s voice trailed off before he could utter the words “collect the payment”, but Miles knew what he was getting at.
“Are you sure that’s something you want to do?”
“Not really, but if we don’t do it someone else will. I’d rather it be me and you than have some chucklehead from Z-Pro knocking them around and helping themselves to the family heirlooms.”
Miles sighed. “I don’t know about this, Elliott.”
“Please, Miles. I can’t do it without you.”
Miles felt conflicted. Elliott was his best friend, and he was stuck in a desperate situation. But he had already gone behind Steve and Adam’s back once to do a job, and he didn’t think it was right to do it again.
“I mean that literally,” Elliott continued. “I can’t do it without you. I need a valid UMC licence to take them to the processing centre. Mine’s been revoked.”
Despite his deep reservations, Miles eventually agreed to help Elliott out. This would be a one-time thing, he promised, and he made it clear he was only doing this due to the exceptional circumstances.
They made plans to leave first thing tomorrow morning.
Chapter 17