The Kill Society by Richard Kadrey
As always, the Magistrate is out front in his Charger. Daja darts in around traffic, staying up front with him, but sometimes veering off and exchanging hand signals with other vehicles, relaying orders from the big man.
I’m a few car lengths behind her dog pack. That is, until she falls back and cocks her head at me to follow her. I hit the gas and move up with the other bikes and muscle cars in a line behind the Magistrate. From what I can make out, there are eleven of them. Six women and five men. Am I supposed to be the new guy to bring the numbers even? There’s a good chance. A messiah needs twelve disciples.
Wanuri is up here. So is the earless, noseless, mutilated guy. I like that. If I’m part of the pack now, I won’t be the ugliest one.
I ride next to a young black kid whose dreads stand out straight behind him in the wind. His leathers are as road-rashed and worn as anyone’s, but he’s noticeable for one reason: he’s smiling. I guess damnation is working out for him. He’s handsome, like prom-king handsome. It’s unnerving in the middle of the havoc, where most of us look like we’ve been dragged behind a truck.
A few hours into the ride, Daja drops to the back of the havoc, then speeds up and exchanges signals with the Magistrate. A blue flare flies up from the Charger and the havoc begins to slow. When we’ve stopped, Daja does a one-eighty and peels out for the rear of the havoc. For everyone else, it’s a pit stop. We get off our bikes and stretch. Souls and Hellions climb from their cars and exchange beer and water, nursing their hangovers.
I go to Wanuri.
“What’s wrong?”
“It looks like something is up with one of the trucks. Probably snapped a chain.”
“One of the ones pulling the flatbed?”
“Yeah. It happens. Too often for my taste.”
“Old gear?”
“Maybe.”
I look at her.
“The Magistrate mentioned he has enemies. You think someone might be fucking with the equipment?”
“It’s one theory.”
“Any suspects?”
“A couple.”
I don’t need hoodoo to read her. She wasn’t trying to be subtle. Great. I’m already on the saboteur list. That’s probably why Daja wants to keep me close.
“You said it’s happened before.”
“It has,” says Wanuri.
“Then there’s no reason to blame, for instance, someone new. The fox is already in the henhouse.”
“Just because there’s one with us doesn’t mean they don’t have a partner.”
Okay. Logic isn’t working. Let’s try something else.
“Do you have extras or do we need to burn another town looking for one?”
She gives me a look. “Don’t worry your precious little head. We have plenty.”
“The Magistrate thinks of everything.”
“Everything,” she says. “Don’t forget it.”
The dog pack smokes and drinks around us. Wanuri looks to the rear of the havoc, then at me.
“We might as well get this over with. Daja usually plays social secretary, but she’s gone, so I guess it’s up to me,” she says. “Come along, buttercup. Time to meet the others.”
One by one, she introduces me to the other members of the dog pack. The mutilated guy calls himself Johnny Basher. He has an Aussie accent and Hellion runes branded all over his face, the mark of an escape artist, but not a very good one. Runaways in Hell get marked so the guards will know to keep an eye on them. Johnny’s got at least a dozen brands. Maybe he’s not smart, but you have to give him an A for effort.
Most of the others in the pack are the same forgettable assholes you meet in any gang. Loyal idiots with a chip on their shoulder, but a talent for following orders if you keep them simple like “Kick that guy to death.” There’s a toothless weather-beaten one-percenter with heil tattooed on one hand and “1488” on the other. An older woman with a Louise Brooks haircut who looks like she’d be more at home baking cookies for the PTA, except for the small panabas and butcher knives hanging from her belt. A square-jawed guy named Frederickson who looks like an ad executive if it wasn’t for the fact that the whole top of his head is crudely stitched together and looks like it might blow away in a strong breeze. Somewhere, sometime, someone scalped the fucker. I hope he did something to deserve it. The Mohawked Hellion woman who drove Traven’s truck one day is there. The sweat pig whose bike I stole after kicking him in the head. Billy. He’s looks utterly delighted to have me in the fold. Two of the women are twins with mismatched eyes. One has brown and blue. The other has green and gray. Everyone calls the handsome black kid Gisco.
“He sings like an angel, but don’t try talking to him,” Wanuri says. “He only speaks some gibberish. Old Greek or something.”
“Carthaginian,” says Johnny.
“That’s it. Something old as dirt. The Magistrate is the only one who can talk to him. With us, it’s mostly grunts and charades, ain’t that right, Gisco?”
He raises his eyebrows and makes a series of quick hand gestures. Everybody laughs.
“Same to you, sweetheart,” says Wanuri in a teasing way.
I say, “Gisco. You understand what these animals are saying?”
He nods.
“But they don’t understand you?”
He nods again.
I look at Wanuri.
“Interesting. At least I know who the smart one around here is.”
“Fuck off,” says Frederickson.
“Watch your mouth, mate,” says Johnny.
The sweat pig says, “Anyone can sucker-punch, faggot. Fight me face-to-face sometime.”
I say, “I don’t think I could stand looking at you that long.”
“That’s enough,” says Wanuri. “Yes. The kid is smart. That’s why we like having him around.”
“Was Megs smart?”
Everyone laughs at that.
“Is a dog smart?” Wanuri says.
“I don’t know, but one time at a carnival a chicken beat me at tic-tac-toe.”
“Megs couldn’t beat a rock at tic-tac-toe.”
“That why I’m his replacement?”
“You’re in because Daja says you’re in. Anyway, you’re not in yet.”
“Now you’re going to make me cry.”
“Soon, Sonny Jim, but soon,” says Johnny.
Apparently that was hilarious. Laughs. High fives. Fist bumps. Great.
I’m joining a community-college frat.
The little celebration is still going on when Daja rides up. She looks tired and annoyed.
“Truck’s fixed,” she says. “But since we’re stopped, they want to check the other chains and do some other repairs.”
I don’t want to hang around with the dog pack long enough to get into a brawl, but I don’t want to disappear and make people more suspicious.
I say, “When will we start moving?”
“When the Magistrate says,” she snaps.
Wanuri hands her a bottle of water. Daja finishes it. She points at me.
“You introduce the asshole to the pricks?”
Wanuri smiles.
“He’s been charming. We’re all looking forward to tea with him.”
“I’ll serve,” says Daja.
Daja puts her arm around my shoulder.
“You look like the milk-and-sugar type.”
“I don’t drink tea,” I say.
“Everyone drinks tea here. But you only have to do it once.”
Quick as a bunny, she swivels and plants an armored fist into my gut. I’ll admit it. She catches me off guard. It knocks the wind out of me, but before I can return the favor, the twins smash clubs into the back of my knees, knocking me onto the ground. Right. I get it. Teatime. Dog-pack initiation. It’s like getting knighted. The king or queen touches you with a sword and it’s the last time anyone can touch you with a weapon without having every other knight gunning for them. Sadly, the dog-pack version isn’t as classy. Basically, everyone in t
“Enough,” shouts Daja.
Everyone backs off. I open my eyes and start to sit up when Sweat Pig gives me one more good kick in the ribs. Without missing a beat, Frederickson swings a fist and bloodies Sweat Pig’s nose.
“What the fuck?” he yells.
“She called time,” says Johnny. “Open your ears, you lardy bastard.”
Sweat Pig wants to pop Frederickson, but he knows the rules. If he made a move, the rest of the pack would be on top of him and give him worse than they gave me. At least these idiots have rules. Points to them for that. First chance I get, I’ll use them against them.
Gisco helps me to my feet. I hurt all over, but I still have all my teeth. I wobble a little more than is strictly necessary, making a show of what rough customers they are.
Daja comes over with a bottle of the fishy whiskey.
“How was that?” she says, and hands me the bottle.
“My crippled grandma hit me harder from her deathbed.”
I take a mouthful of the flounder juice and hand her back the bottle. She drinks and passes it to the next person in line. It goes all the way around the pack.
“Welcome to the family,” says Daja.
I nod to everyone. They’re better about it than I expected. Hard, but friendly punches on the arms and chest. The twins get on either side of me and peck each cheek.
The PTA mom says, “Do you have a knife?”
I take out the little pocketknife I took off Doll Man.
She laughs and hands me one of the butcher knives from her belt. Wags a finger at me.
“Don’t go cutting yourself.”
“Yes, ma’am. Thank you.”
I slip it into my jacket, where I used to keep the black blade. Thing could cut through anything. Thinking about it makes me think about the world, though. This isn’t the time to start feeling sorry for myself. The rest of the pack moves off to smoke and argue about who got in the hardest shots at me.
I spit some blood on the ground, and when I look up, I spot Traven watching me from the back of his hellhound. He looks me over as I limp up to him.
“What was that about?” he says.
“I get to sit at the lunch table with the cool kids.”
“Is that what you want?”
“For now. And I wasn’t exactly in a position to say no.”
“I know the feeling,” he says, and I imagine him in Blue Heaven going through his library, deciding which books to save before the Magistrate ordered the havoc to burn the place to the ground.
“Listen,” I say. “I’m going to come see you tonight.”
He sits back on the hellhound.
“Is that wise? I’m not sure your friends would approve of you spending time with a librarian.”
“Fuck them. Have your bread and salt ready.”
“You’re going to let me eat your sins?”
“No. We’re going to bake brownies. Just have the stuff ready.”
“I will.”
He looks past me.
“I think your friends want you over with them.”
“I should go. Have you heard anything interesting from the Magistrate?”
“He’s very excited about finding what we’ve been looking for soon.”
“I bet he is. By the way, what’s under the tarp is a gun.”
“A gun?” he says. “That’s strange.”
“No shit. Also, rumor is there’s a rat around here sabotaging equipment.”
“It’s only a theory.”
“Well, some people think it’s me, so I’m going to try being a good boy for a while.”
“Good luck with that.”
“I’ll see you tonight.”
“I’ll have things ready,” he says, and rides his hound away.
I go back to the dog pack.
“Giving the old man a kiss good-bye?” says Wanuri.
“He’s a friend. I’ll talk to him when I want. Unless a bookworm makes you nervous.”
“Hey, the Magistrate likes him, so he’s all right with us. Just remember who your real friends are now.”
“How could I forget?” I say, rubbing the back of my neck. I take out my Maledictions, but the pack got crushed during my initiation. Fucking barbarians. I pull out a broken smoke and offer her one. She takes it and throws it on the ground. Takes out two of hers, hands me one, and lights both.
“Thanks.”
“Daja gave you those smokes, but remember: cigarettes aren’t a gift anymore. They’re part of your place with us.”
“Can I give someone outside the group a cigarette?”
“All you want. Anyone you want. Just be careful.”
“Why?”
She looks over her shoulder at the rest of the havoc.
“You might find you bought yourself a boyfriend or girlfriend you didn’t want.”
“That’s not the kind of trouble I want out here.”
“I heard that. Still, it’s nice to blow off steam every now and then.”
“I suppose. But what if steam’s all you’ve got?”
She pokes me in the chest.
“Then you need to find something more.”
“You’re right. What I need now is another drink.”
“Right this way. Drinks are part of who you are now, too. Whiskey, water. Whatever you want.”
“Hell, if I’d known that, you could have kicked me a lot longer.”
“Everybody says that.”
“But I mean it.”
“Trust me. We all did.”
Turns out that the truck repairs take longer than expected, so we dig in for the night. I sit in a circle with the dog pack. They pull camp chairs and even a beanbag chair from the trunks of the cars. If I’m not in Traven’s relatively cushy camper, this will do. It beats the earthmover.
Everyone shoots the shit at dinner. They ask me about my life back home, so I tell them the truth. I ran a video store. That gets some laughs. Then we move on to the inevitable What did you do to get here?
“I’m like all of you,” I say. “It was all a big mistake. I’m supposed to be playing Candy Land in Heaven with the baby Jesus.”
The dog pack finds that funny enough. All except Sweat Pig.
He says, “Fuck the baby Jesus. Fuck him like I fucked the preacher before I burned him and his church.”
I spit out a piece of gristle.
“Wow. You beat up a preacher. That’s like beating up, what, a math teacher?”
People look from me back to him.
“You never killed anybody, I bet.”
“Look at his face, you drongo,” says Johnny. “You don’t get a face like that just running a shop.”
I rub my chin.
“My mom says I’m the handsomest boy in the world.”
“Your mother needs glasses,” says the twin with brown and blue eyes.
“It’s true. She used to chase my dad around with a rolled-up newspaper thinking he was the dog. ’Course it was his fault for shitting on the carpet.”
The Mohawked Hellion hands me a beer for that one. Sweat Pig is the only one not smiling.
He throws down his plate.
“No more bullshit. We all told our stories, but this fuck gets to sit there cracking jokes. And you let him get away with it. I say he tells his story or he gets out. Or he fights me right now.”
“Calm down, Billy,” says Daja. “No one wants to hear that shit now.”
I push my food around with a fork, singing quietly.
“‘Jesus loves me this I know, for the Bible tells me so . . .’”
Billy jumps to his feet. I let him take one step toward me before I snap my wr
“Billy!” shouts Daja.
She points at me.
“And you. Get your chair and sit the fuck down.”
I pick up my chair from where Billy kicked it, and sit.
“And put the damned knife away,” Daja says.
I slip it back into my coat.
Billy is on his knees pulling on the fork and moaning.
The toothless old man with heil on his fingers brings Billy a bottle of whiskey.
“Drink this. All of it,” he says.
Billy upends the bottle and hands it back to the old man, who takes it and cracks Billy across the side of the head. Billy rocks back. While he’s still dizzy, the old man plants a boot on his chest and yanks out the fork. Billy howls again and falls forward onto his arms, cursing at the dirt. When he’s done, he looks at Daja. She’s on her feet.
“Get up,” she says.
He scrambles to his feet, knowing he’s fucked up.
Daja turns to me and says, “You too, slick.”
“You just told me to sit down.”
“Get up!”
I get up.
“The two of you are going to shake hands in a minute,” she says. “But, Billy, since you started the fight, you owe Pitts something. What are you going to put up?”
“I don’t have anything,” he says like a whiny kid.
“You know the rules. You better find something.”
He goes to the saddlebags on his bike and comes back with something cupped in his hand. When he hands it to me he says, “Don’t tell the others.”
It’s a Saint Christopher medal. Protector of travelers and children. I doubt that he knows that. He just saw the little kid and the old man and liked it. Probably thinks it’s Santa Claus. I wink and put the medal in my pocket before anyone can see it.