1
It was pain that brought Adam back to consciousness. The pain was red and pulsing and centered on the side of his head. It scooped him out of the black dreamless unconsciousness within which he had been comfortably ensconced, and hefted him pulse by agonizing pulse toward the waking world.
He didn’t want to go there. Everything was bad there. Everything always went wrong there. Everything had gone wrong. If he woke up he would have to deal with all kinds of terrible things he didn’t want to deal with. Better to just ignore the pain, then. Maybe it would go away.
Despite his wishes, the pain pushed him up and up, and consciousness slowly broke over the darkness like a cruel sun and illuminated piece by piece those things he wished would stay shrouded in shadow—the Marauders’ attack, Bob’s death, the explosion of pain as something smashed into the side of his head. And then there were fragmentary memories, the products of fleeting moments of semi-consciousness: Dagmar shouting something; cloth pulled tightly across his eyes, rendering everything dark; the smells of sweat and machine oil; large, strong hands gripping him and carrying him somewhere—and his disoriented, dream-like conviction that those hands were his, that he was carrying himself.
He opened his eyes and looked around. He sat with his back against a wall in a metal chamber about thirty feet square. A white hemispherical object attached to the center of the ceiling provided the room’s only—and rather dim—light. Adam couldn’t tell what this dome was made of, or whether the dome covered the light-source or was itself the light-source.
The chamber was unfurnished except for a metal bench that jutted from the left wall about two feet above the floor. Opposite him was a thick metal door with a wheel-shaped handle in the center. Dagmar sat slumped against the middle of the right wall, her eyes closed and her chin on her chest, asleep. Around her neck and wrists were manacles connected by chains to bolts in the wall behind her. Seeing this made Adam aware of cold metal pressing against his own wrists and neck, and looking down he saw that he too was chained to the wall.
The metal floor sloped gently toward a small round drain in its center. Around the edge of the drain was a thick crust of dried blood. Closer inspection of the floor and walls revealed a few faint streaks of blood that whoever cleaned the room had missed. Worse, on the sharp edge of the bench clung a chunk of flesh with a few strands of mid-length brown hair sprouting from it. The room smelled strongly of some kind of citrus-scented cleaning product, but still faintly detectable underneath that smell were the odors of blood and decaying meat. The odors of death.
Adam tried to stand up, but the chains were too short for him to do so. He grunted in frustration, then twisted around to take a closer look at his restraints. The chains were made of a silver-green metal he wasn’t familiar with. The bolts were steel and had been soldered to the wall. Mustering all his strength, and doing his best to ignore the way the pain in his head swelled from pounding to jackhammering with the slightest exertion, he thrust his arms out and forward until the chains were taut, and then pulled as hard as he could. The chains didn’t break. The bolts in the wall didn’t budge.
The rattle of his chains awakened Dagmar, who jerked her head up with a gasp as if she thought someone had come to kill her. When she saw that Adam was awake, she looked so relieved he thought she would start crying.
“I thought you might be dead,” she said.
“No. It will take more than a blow to the head and greater men than these ignorant thugs to kill me.”
Dagmar stared at him for a moment, then looked down at the floor, her eyes sad and distant.
“Where are the others?” he asked. “I remember Bob…I remember what happened to him, but what of the others?”
Dagmar heaved a wavering sigh. “Kukalukl—the Grottle cut his head off. It’s—I mean, I know he can heal from pretty serious stuff, but…”
“I…I am sorry.” Bob and Kukalukl? For a moment Adam felt the horrible, devitalizing grip of hopelessness close around his heart. He clenched his teeth and fists and denied it, forced it away. He had to maintain hope at least for Dagmar’s sake. “Still, he was a god, and many gods have returned from far worse.”
She gave him a small, humorless smile, as if she figured she should at least acknowledge his futile effort to rouse her spirits.
“Yeah,” she said, “but even if he can, chances are he probably won’t return in time to help us. Besides, they dumped his—they dumped him into that green gunk, and the Annihilator said something about how it’d eat the flesh off him before he could heal it up again.”
Adam decided to change the subject. “What about Maggie?”
“She ran off into the woods with those geeks on flying skateboards chasing her. I don’t know what happened after that. I just know I haven’t seen any of them since then.”
“And Freud? Did he find his way out of the ooze?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. I didn’t see him at all after the fight started.”
“Then it’s possible both he and Maggie are still free. Perhaps even Kukalukl as well. What time is it? How long was I unconscious?”
“I don’t know. After they captured us, they blindfolded us and tied us up and brought us inside Yoyodyne and threw us in here. After that, I screamed for help for a while, then fell asleep. I figure it’s been at least a few hours. Probably more, since I actually feel pretty rested. I must’ve slept a long time.”
Adam realized that aside from his head injury, he, too, felt well-rested. He knew his body and its vicissitudes quite well, and he estimated that he must have been unconscious for at least three hours, probably as long as four or five.
“I, too,” he said. “And that is good, for we shall need our strength to finish our task.”
She looked at him with her eyebrows raised, as if she couldn’t believe he thought she would buy such bluster.
“Surely you do not think this is the end,” he said. “We cannot give up now, when we are so close to achieving our goals.”
She held up her arms and shook them so that the chains clinked. “Hel-lo, chained and captive, remember? How’re we supposed to do anything when even you can’t break your chains?”
“Have you forgotten already that two of our companions are still at large? And Kukalukl may recover and come to our aid as well.”
Her face twisted about like melting plastic for a moment, and then she burst into tears.
Adam didn’t know what to say or do. He had never been very good at consoling people, especially children. He and Dagmar were chained too far apart for him to hold her, or even touch her. All he could do was stare at her sympathetically and say, “Everything will be all right. You’ll see.”
“No, it won’t!” she spat through her tears. “It won’t! Kukalukl’s dead, and—and—and Granite’s dead, and we’ll probably be dead soon, too.”
Adam was about to give up on the seemingly hopeless task of bolstering her spirits, but then he had an idea.
“That is no way for a queen to talk,” he said in a low, stern voice.
She looked at him, blinking.
“Do you not owe it to your subjects, to yourself, and to the memory of your parents, the former king and queen, to be strong and righteous?”
She continued blinking for a second, and then her face crumpled up, and she started sobbing again, harder than before.
What the devil had he said to set her off this time? He had thought that his words would remind her of her regal heritage, would straighten her spine and kindle the dignity in her soul as she herself had done after the incident in Happyvale.
After several minutes her sobs died down, and she just sat there, eyes downcast, looking more dejected than ever. Adam said nothing. He had no idea what to say anymore.
When several more minutes passed without a word from her, his thoughts rolled off down a different track, and he began to wonder why they weren’t dead yet, why the Marauders hadn’t just killed them when they were defenseless. The Marauders must have plans for them.
Perhaps they—
“I made it up,” said Dagmar.
His train of thought brought to an unexpected halt, Adam stared at her, unsure what she was talking about. Her eyes hadn’t moved from the patch of floor they had been fixed on ever since her last crying spree ended.
“What?” he said. “Made what up?”
“The stuff about being a queen.”
There was a long silence.
“What?” Adam repeated, convinced he must be misunderstanding her.
She gave him a sheepish look. “I made it up,” she said again.
“But…but how?”
She jerked her head back a little, frowning, as if it were an odd question, which he supposed it was. “What do you mean? I just made it up.”
“No, I mean…your story was so detailed. You…” He shook his head. “I find it hard to believe that none of it was true. So hard, in fact, that I am tempted to think you are lying now.”
“I’m not.”
“So…so there was no palace?” he said. “No Nanette? No—”
“Oh, well, actually there was a palace and a Nanette, but they weren’t exactly what I said they were. I sort of built the story out of a bunch of little true things, but just changed them around a bit. My parents weren’t a king and queen. They were cartoonists before the Cataclysm. And afterward, the village they were living in got attacked by orcs back when the orcs were trying to take over the area. The whole place got burned down and just about everyone got slaughtered, but my parents escaped and after roaming around in the wilderness for a while, they found a ruined palace. It was exactly like I told you about, except it wasn’t ours. I don’t know whose it was. It was just ruins.
“Anyway, it was really isolated, even from monsters, so they moved in and lived there. And then a few years later I was born.”
“What about Nanette?”
“She was a doll my mom gave me. It used to be hers when she was little. She and my dad would draw cartoons for me about the adventures of Nanette.” She smiled sadly. “Those were really funny. Since the palace was so isolated and I didn’t have any other kids to play with, Nanette was kind of like my only friend. I’d take her out into the garden and come up with my own adventures. I guess that’s why I’m so good at making stuff up. I didn’t have any real friends, and the world was too dangerous for my parents to take me anywhere, so I was stuck in the old ruined palace with just Nanette and my imagination.”
“But…but why did you lie to begin with?”
Her gaze returned to the floor and she heaved a big sigh.
“I don’t know. I just…it was just that everyone I met was somebody, you know? I mean, the Marauders, even though they’re a bunch of scumbags, they all had things that made them special—the Annihilator with his armor, and Skippy and Oscar with their flying skateboards, and the Grottle with its Grottleness. And then I met Kukalukl, who was a god. And then Kukalukl and I ended up chasing after you guys, and when you all came stumbling out of that building, I realized that you were all special too. Granite was a superhero. And Freud was a robot. And you were, you know, you.”
“Maggie could not have appeared so special.”
“Oh, yeah? You should’ve heard what they were saying about her in Sweetwater after you guys left. They said she was the only woman the Marauders went after who managed to get away. They said she made Skippy eat road-dirt.”
One side of Adam’s mouth curved up in a smile, and he emitted a soft laughing grunt.
“Anyway,” Dagmar went on, “it wasn’t even really something I consciously decided on. I just sort of blurted it out when you guys appeared. I don’t know, I guess I sort of needed to be someone important. It seemed…safer somehow. And once I started with it, there were times it actually felt true. Like I was becoming what I was pretending to be. You know what I mean?”
“I think so. Though I suspect that Freud would have much to say about it.”
She rolled her eyes and laughed briefly. “Yeah, I’ll bet.”
“Did—does Kukalukl know?”
Her smile faded, and sorrow once again clouded her face. She had caught his clumsy change of tense.
“I don’t know,” she said in a weary voice. “I never talked to him about it. He probably knew I was making it up, since I hadn’t mentioned any of it before we met you guys. But he played along because—because he swore he’d help me and protect me and—and—” She started crying again.
Once again, Adam was at a loss for words. He wondered how Bob would have handled this situation. He probably would’ve said something calm and soothing.
“All will be well,” Adam said in what he hoped was a kind, gentle voice. “All will—”
She shook her head so violently he felt her tears spatter his hand.
“Nuh—no it won’t. He’s dead! Just like my mom and dad. Just like everyone else. Everybody I care about always dies, and I can’t do anything about it ‘cause I’m just—just nobody. I’m just a stupid useless loser who can’t even help her friends.”
She drew her knees up to her chest and buried her face in them as her whole body shuddered with her sobs.
Adam gave a silent sigh of frustration. Kind and gentle wasn’t working. If anything, it seemed to be making things worse. Probably because Adam wasn’t by nature a kind and gentle person. Time to try something else, something he was better at.
“That is the biggest load of horseshit I have ever heard,” he said in a loud, stern voice. The words echoed in the small metal chamber.
It worked. Dagmar’s head shot up, and she gaped at him through her tears. Most likely it was only because of the profanity, the tactful use of which always makes a great impression, but at least he had her attention.
“I was not always as I am today,” Adam said. “I used to be a normal man. Several of them, in fact. Granite, too, was a normal man before the lab accident that granted him his powers. For that matter, one does not have to possess unusual attributes to be special. Maggie might be tough and courageous, but she was not always like that. She and her sister were little girls no tougher than you when I first met them. My creator was a man like any other, and though he could be too obsessed and short‑sighted at times, he was a genius at his work and achieved feats beyond those of any other scientist before or since. And his brother Ernest, Maggie and Anna’s father, had a great talent for government, which not only made him and his family wealthy, but improved the lives of everyone in his community. He helped more people and earned more gratitude in ten years than I have in all the years of my existence. And what of your own parents? Would you call them ‘big losers’ because they had no special powers and were unskilled at fighting?”
Dagmar, who had been staring at him with eyes as big as roc’s eggs, now frowned as if he had insulted her. “No! They were awesome. They were great parents. And you shoulda seen their cartoons. Those were so cool!”
“Very well, then. That proves my point. It is my belief that everybody has some aptitude or talent that they excel at and can do better than anyone else. But it often takes a long time for a man or woman to discover what that talent is. Once you do, however, you shall know it, and you shall excel at it, and you shall realize that your whining about being a nobody was premature and ill-founded.”
She gazed off into space, reflecting on his words. Then a big smile spread across her face, and she said, “You’re right!”
He nodded, smiling, happy for her and pleased with himself. His success at bestowing advice and inspiration gave him a wise, fatherly feeling hitherto unknown to him. It was a feeling he did not dislike.
“Yeah!” she continued. “You’re totally right! And I know exactly what it is I can do better than anyone else. I know exactly what my special talent is.”
“Oh? And what is that?”
For a moment she didn’t answer, still too transported by the ecstasy of revelation. But then she turned to him, eyes bright and happy, a huge eager grin on her face, and said, “I’m the best liar in
the whole wide world.”
Adam just stared at her with his mouth hanging open. This wasn’t quite what he had had in mind. He had been thinking in more benevolent terms. But her delight was so pure and strong and such a massive improvement over her previous gloom that he couldn’t find it in his heart to rain on her one-girl parade.
Still, she saw the look on his face, and cocked an eyebrow at him. “I had you fooled, didn’t I? Heck, I had all of you fooled. That has to take a lot of talent, am I right?”
He had to admit she had a point. But he refused to give her any encouragement beyond a reluctant, “Perhaps.”
His lack of enthusiasm didn’t matter to her in the slightest. She just kept grinning and grinning.
I may have created a monster, he thought. Then the irony of that idea hit him, and he laughed.
Dagmar, thinking he had finally warmed to the idea of her being the world’s number one liar, beamed at him.
“I know!” she said. “Isn’t it cool?” And she, too, started laughing.
Footsteps sounded beyond the door, and their laughter stopped. The steps stopped outside the door, and there was a metallic chack, as of a bolt or lock. The wheel-shaped handle turned.
Adam glanced at Dagmar. She looked scared, but was doing her best to keep it contained. Good for her. As for himself, he focused his thoughts on possible escape plans. He imagined the visiting Marauder, whichever one it was, getting too close and falling prey to Adam’s strong, neck-snapping hands. The Marauder would have the keys to their manacles on his belt, of course, and Adam would free himself and Dagmar from their chains. Then, loose in the complex, they would wreak havoc among the Marauders, and—
The door opened, and there stood a Marauder neither of them had seen before. He wore a white fencing suit and a mesh fencing mask. Two epees hung on his belt, one on either side like a gunslinger’s six-guns. In one hand he held an orange plastic cafeteria tray that bore two Tupperware bowls, two dented tin cups, and a pile of mostly clear plastic packages containing pairs of roughly cylindrical yellowish objects.
“Here’s your dinner,” said the Marauder.
He set the tray on the floor in front of the door, then picked up a wooden mop handle that had been leaning against the wall in the hallway outside, and used it to slide the tray across the floor until one edge was close enough for Adam to grab. It was a smart move, Adam reflected with grudging admiration: The mop handle never once came within Adam’s reach.
Adam let the tray sit where it was. He smiled as sweetly as he could—though even his best attempts at smiles wound up looking like hideous leers—and said, “There is really no need to be so afraid. You could have brought it inside by hand. We will not bite you.”
The Marauder snorted. “Yeah, right.”
He sounded nervous. And young. Adam suspected he was a recent recruit, one of the lowest men on the Marauder totem pole.
“Better eat up,” the Marauder said. “You’ll need your energy. The boss is planning something extra special for you two.”
“What do you mean?” said Adam.
But the Marauder was already pulling the door closed. It boomed shut, the wheel spun, the chack sounded again, and the footsteps receded.
Adam and Dagmar stared at the tray. They couldn’t see what was inside the bowls or the tin cups.
“I’m starving,” said Dagmar.
“As am I,” said Adam. “But the food might be drugged, or poisoned.”
“It wouldn’t be poisoned,” she said. “If they wanted to kill us, they could’ve done it while we were unconscious.”
“True. But it still might be drugged. They might be planning to put us to sleep the more easily to transport us to this sinister event he mentioned.”
“So? We gotta eat sooner or later. I mean, I figure we can either slowly starve to death or go through with this event thing. Frankly, I’d rather take my chances with the event.”
Adam nodded. That summed up his own feelings quite well.
He grabbed the tray and pulled it closer. The bowls contained brown broth filled with bits of squishy parsnips, limp greens of some kind, blobs of fat, and shreds of an unknown meat. The tin cups contained water that had an unpleasant mineral smell. The plastic wrappers sported the word “Twinkies” and a picture of an anthropomorphic Twinkie wearing a white cowboy hat and brandishing a lasso.
Having eaten nothing in over twelve hours, Adam and Dagmar were so hungry that every last bite of this questionable dinner tasted absolutely delicious. Especially the Twinkies, spongy cream-filled cakes that seemed amazingly fresh despite having been made and packaged before the Cataclysm.
When not a crumb remained to devour, Adam inspected the tray. He had seen plastic like this before and knew it could be broken into sharp dagger-like shards. He set it on the floor beside him, reserving it for later use.
Dagmar, he noticed, had leaned back against the wall and was quickly falling asleep. For a moment he was convinced that the food had indeed been drugged, but then he realized that he himself felt drowsy in a sated, non-drugged way. It was the normal sort of drowsiness that often came after eating.
He let it carry him off into sleep. After all, if the Marauders were planning some cruel event, he and Dagmar needed to be as well rested as possible if they hoped to have any chance of survival.
They slept.