“How in God’s name did you manage to survive?”
“After my submarine was hijacked and I was left on an ice floe to die, a fellow Mogul very kindly arranged for new transportation, courtesy of our French connections. You may know her, Lulu. I know Alice does.”
“Who?” Langhorne asked.
“Chandra Stevens, of course.”
“Of course” Alice groaned. “Another MoCo alum.”
Twinkling, Sandoval said, “Oh yeah. It’s a regular Old Home Day. But look at the bright side, honey.”
“And what would that be?”
“I did it all for you.”
Langhorne trembled and averted her face, fighting some inner turmoil. Without warning, she grabbed his head in both hands and pressed her face to his, snarling viciously. Alarmed, Sandoval tried to pull away, but she gripped him tight as a Xombie, her nails digging into his flesh, and in that frenzy she kissed him. He flinched in terror… then surrendered. And as he surrendered, so did she, so did we all. They melted together, tearfully, blissfully kissing like they were in a Hollywood movie.
When the kiss finally ended, Sandoval came over to me, and said, “Well, if it isn’t the unsinkable Lulu Pangloss.”
“Mr. Sandoval,” I said, “why did you never tell me you knew my father?”
He did an exaggerated double take. To Captain Despineau, he said, “No. You’re not the father of Lulu Pangloss?”
“Yes, I am… her father. Or at least I hope she will allow me to earn that fortunate appellation.”
Before I could respond, two other familiar faces arrived, one sunny with blond dreadlocks and the other darker and straight-haired. They both looked like they had been through a lot… as I suppose I did myself. We stared at each other for a second, trying to place the familiar faces. Then it clicked for me: Todd Holmes and Ray Despineau.
“Todd! Ray! Oh my God!”
“Lulu, you’re alive!”
“Where have you guys been?” I asked.
“Don’t ask.”
“I thought you were dead!”
“We thought you were dead.”
We laughed and cried, and then Captain Despineau came up behind us, and said, “Lulu, I want you to meet someone you should have met a long time ago. This is my son, Raymond.”
“Of course I know Ray.” My eyes went wide. “Oh shit. Your son? I knew that name sounded familiar! Ray, you are not my brother?”
He nodded sheepishly.
“That means Brenda is your sister? Our sister?”
His face crashed. “Yeah… well, there’s something you should know about that. Brenda died, Lulu.”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
“How do you know?”
“I saw her. While I was… one of them. You know no one ever really dies, right? Xombie or not.”
Ray and I hugged awkwardly. Then something broke loose, and suddenly we were both crying, gripping each other as if for dear life. Captain Despineau was weeping, too.
“I can’t believe I really have a brother,” I sobbed.
“And I have a sister,” Ray said.
“And I now have a son as well as a daughter,” the captain added, warmly clutching us both. “Tout comprendre c’est tout pardonner.”
Someone behind us said, “Bullshit!”
It was my ex-Ex-mother, Grace Pangloss. Here we go, I thought. As a Xombie, my mom had never spoken much, but even though she had only been human a few hours, Mummy was already back to being her former self.
“Grace,” said Captain Despineau stiffly. “I hope you are well.”
“Hello, Al,” my mother said. “Oh, I’m great. It’s nice to see you having this little family reunion with the children you abandoned.”
“I didn’t abandon them! You waited until I was at sea, and then you kidnapped them and moved to the States!”
“I had postpartum depression! I was suicidal! I was alone in a foreign country with no one to turn to, and we weren’t even married. You were my only support, and I couldn’t so much as call you on the phone for months at a time! I couldn’t take it anymore!”
“Yes, but then you also drive Brenda away, so the whole family is tant pis.”
“Don’t start about Brenda! Don’t you dare. Brenda was another one who needed you while you were out joyriding around the seven seas, so don’t even start with me about Brenda, mister.”
“I had my duties; I had no choice! Maybe if you had tried telling me this-”
“I did try! I tried till I was blue in the face, but you refused to listen. You’re like every man I’ve ever known: selfish, irresponsible, egotistical, obnoxious-”
“Somebody talkin’ about me?”
We all turned at the impossible gruff voice.
No. No. Come on.
But it was. Standing behind me was Fred Cowper. Head and body reunited.
At first I couldn’t believe what I was seeing… then I almost jumped out of my new pink skin. Fred was whole. More than whole-he looked twenty years younger, as if losing and regaining his head was the best thing that ever happened to him. I was too stunned to speak; all I could do was gape.
As if realizing it was her cue, Dr. Stevens leaped in. “Wonderful! Wonderful! So nice to meet you all. Come on, let’s go!”
Reeling from the shock, we allowed ourselves to be nudged aboard the carts.
As we took our seats, Dr. Stevens said, “I can’t wait to show you around.”
There were more reunions along the way. Moving on, we came to a neighborhood of Immunes, including the two girls who had traveled with Todd, Ray, Sandoval, and Chandra Stevens all the way from Providence: Fran and Deena.
As a Xombie, I had taken great interest in Immunes. In fact, they were the major reason I was here at all. Would I have continued so long with this absurd voyage if not for the dream of somehow liberating these doomed, forbidden beings? Unfortunately, they were not nearly as fascinating to my human consciousness-just regular people, after all.
Sandoval gestured at the door with a flourish. “Step right up,” he said.
We went inside. The room was empty except for a couch facing a bank of television screens. Each screen showed a strange mound like the one I had seen in Washington, with thousands of Xombies filing in, and the same black blimps suspended overhead.
A man in a space suit was sitting on the couch between Fran and Deena, his body wired to a fuse box. The two women were very happy to have company. There were hugs and introductions all around.
“Uri,” Sandoval said, “you have visitors.”
Miska shifted his helmet slightly to see us, which allowed us to see his blue face through the visor. “Hello, Bobby,” he said. “Hey, man, turn that frown upside down. Deena, could you be a sweetheart and get my friend Bobby a Yoo-hoo?”
Sandoval said, “Uri’s working for us now. He’s been very useful in maneuvering the Xombies wherever we need them to be, and as whoever we need them to be. For instance, I’ve been able to operate in several places at once. So has Miska. We’ve also been able to find all the X-infected Moguls in their hidden vaults and move them to one secure facility. Not so secure anymore, unfortunately, thanks to your visit, Lulu.”
“Sorry,” I said. “What the hell were you doing to them there?”
“Since Agent X cannot be ‘killed,’ and we have yet to find a means of treating five billion Xombies worldwide, it is necessary to isolate the threat. In this colony we have a certain number of Immunes who donate the blood factor we require to remain human. It goes into the drinking water here, so we all live together under the illusion of normalcy. Eventually, we expect to have fully immune children-a number of women are pregnant right now. But in order for human civilization to continue in the meantime, we have to deal with the existing Xombies. And we’ve decided that the best way to do that is by reducing them to a concentrated, crystalline form and converting that to organic biomass.”
“How do you manage that?” Langhorne asked.
“We pour it into the bay. The shellfish population is thriving.”
“Mr. Sandoval?” There was a woman in camouflage fatigues at the door. “Major Hammersmith requests you come to the Command Center right away. It’s urgent.”