Monster Island(51)

Gary had never imagined so many of them together in one place-it seemed impossible, as if the world couldn’t support so much weight. Their silence made them sphinxes, unknowable, implacable. No force could stand against them.

For the first time Gary wondered if Mael could actually pull it off. There were so many more dead people than living ones. The few survivors had stayed alive by out-thinking their opponents but if the undead were organized-if one person could lead them, well…

Mael raised the sword and pointed and the dead surged as a mob up and down the street, splitting as they streamed around the sides of the museum and into Central Park. The sound of their feet pounding the flagstones was like a war drum beating out a savage tattoo. Mael and the mummies fell in behind the throng and Gary caught up with them as they passed a statuary group of three bears modelled in bronze. Gary had seen the sculpture before but had always thought it had something to do with a children’s story. It looked like a totem now, an emblem of a conquering force.

For good or for evil, Gary, I do what I am meant for. It doesn’t matter what we choose. It simply matters what weare.

Though Mael stood only a few feet away Gary was surprised by the sudden entrance of the thoughts into his mind. In the rhythm of the marching dead he expected all words to be swallowed up.

Instead they seemed to echo. For good or for evil: two sides of the same duty. I used to fight to save lives, Gary had told the survivor Paul. Now I take them away.

The mud of the park boiled under the tramping feet of the dead, jumping up in great clods that Gary had to stumble through. They came to a great open space devoid of trees-it must have been the Great Lawn, once-and the dead spread out, forming a wide circular clearing in their midst, an open patch where Mael stood with the mummies. The Druid turned around a few times and finally scratched a mark in the soil with his sword. He gestured at the dead all around him and they went into action. From a distance Gary heard a great rumbling crash and a column of dust rose above the branches of the denuded trees to the south. A bomb must have gone off or a gas main exploded or-Gary had no idea what it was.

“What’s happening?” Gary asked.

The construction has begun. I must have abroch from whence to issue my orders.

Which wasn’t exactly helpful, but Gary soon understood. The crowd rippled at its edges and then the movement drew closer. The dead were passing bricks forward, hand to hand. Clumps of mortar stuck to the bricks, some of which were ornamented with fragments of graffiti. The dead must have pulled down a building-that was the crash-and now they intended to use the liberated building materials for Mael’s headquarters. One by one the bricks were laid down, the dead pushing them deep into the mud with clumsy hands. They swarmed around the spot where Mael stood like a hive of ants, totally focused on their task. This was far beyond what the dead were capable of in Gary’s experience, not without an intelligence organizing them from afar. Could Mael actually be controlling them all at the same time? The Druid’s power must be enormous.

Give me a chance, Gary. Work with me for one day. Maybe you’ll like it. Maybe you’ll feel at home being who you really are.

He had felt so much guilt over eating Ifiyah, because he had tried to live up to the standards of living men-in spite of what he had become. The euphoria that had followed his devouring of Kev had been the most natural thing he’d ever experienced.

Gary started to refuse but he couldn’t. In the face of so much concerted effort, not to mention Mael’s certainty, it seemed impossible to deny what was happening. “One day,” he said, the most defiant thing he could force out of his mouth.

Mael nodded, careful not to put too much strain on his broken neck.

David Wellington - Monster Island





Monster Island





Chapter Fourteen


Shailesh lead us to a good spot where we could lean against one of the station’s pillars. It was the best place to watch the speech, he said. I still had very little idea of what was going on. The lights dipped and the buzz of conversations around us dropped to a low murmur. We were seated looking at an empty patch of station floor. Above our heads we had a good view of the famous Roy Lichtenstein mural. In primary colors and thick comic book lines it showed a New York of the Future: finned subway trains blasting on rockets past a city of spires and air bridges. At the far right an earnest looking man in a radio helmet supervised the trains with glowing pride.

From underneath the mural a man appeared, smiling and waving at people in the crowd. Applause broke out and somewhere a violin started playing “Hail to the Chief.”