Dead Mann Walking

Viagra. I tapped the rim. “Surprised you use the stuff, Mr. Green.”

“It’s for the guests. I’d offer you one, but they only make chakz tense. I have people working on that, though.” He pulled a bronze bowl from a shelf and held it toward me. It was filled with pills, too. They were the same oblong shape as the Viagra but bigger, and with more of a neon tinge.

I made a face.

“Can’t happen, right? Impossible? But I like a challenge. Chakz don’t have eye color, either, but Nell does, and they’re not contacts. She’s the first. That’s what makes things worth trying. Over and over and over, if need be.”

I waved off the bowl. “No offense, Mr. Green, but some people think doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result is the definition of insanity.”

He laughed. “Unless it’s something you like doing over and over.” He shook the bowl. “Think about what you and Nell could do over and over if they worked.” He took one of the pills, licked it, then held it out to me. “No?”

When I didn’t budge, with a shrug he tossed it back in the bowl. “They’re experimental anyway. Lots of side effects.”

“Headaches and nausea or erections that last more than three days?”

“Something like that. But I’m being rude. You were saying something about Nell’s head. It is one of her more interesting parts.”

This was my shot, so I gave it to him as simply as I could. “There’s a psycho in town calling himself Turgeon. He’s D-capping chakz accused of killing their spouses and, near as I can tell, keeping the heads. He’s already got two, Colin Wilson and Frank Boyle. Nell was executed for beating her husband to death, only she didn’t. That makes her one of three chakz left in Fort Hammer who fit this guy’s MO.”

He smiled. “And you’re another. Your wife, Lenore.”

That surprised me, until he pointed at a video camera near the ceiling. “They do amazing things with real- time facial recognition these days. You didn’t think you’d get in here without my knowing exactly who you were?”

“I try not to think at all when I don’t have to.”

He laid his long fingers on the desk, leaned toward me, and inhaled, like he was enjoying my smell. “I love chakz, Mann. You utterly fascinate me. I think you might even hold the answer to the biggest question ever asked.”

“Why is there always one sock missing after the wash?”

He snorted. “Whether the eternal soul exists. Are we just our bodies, turned on or off at will? Figure out whether a chak is still somehow the person they were and you have the answer. If they’re not, it’s the soul that’s missing. Is Nell Parker’s revived corpse still Nell Parker? Are you Hessius Mann, a detective? Or do you just go through the motions?”

“I can’t answer that, Mr. Green, except to say that you left out a possibility.”

He blinked. “What’s that?”

“That livebloods just go through the motions, too.”

He laughed in a way that didn’t make me feel like bonding. “That’s the other possibility, isn’t it? That none of us have souls. I admit the comment shows some intelligence. I’ve met higher- functioning chakz, but not many. Nell is one. Hell, I’d have to say she’s one of a kind. She’d wrap me around her finger if I didn’t keep her under lock and key. Yet I don’t even know if she’s real.”

I think that lock-and-key thing was a relief. “You keep her protected, then?”

He tilted his head. “Of course. I always protect what’s mine. But tell me about the decapitations, Detective. Any idea why your Mr. Turgeon would do something so extreme?”

Talking about Nell, calling me detective. He was playing me, testing me, poking around for an answer to his big question. I didn’t mind. For one, maybe he could tell me if I was for real. For another, I still had the crazy idea in the back of my head that if I could convince him Turgeon was real, he might help.

I went into my song and dance. “I don’t know. Maybe he’s a cross between Dexter and Batman; his daddy killed his mommy and now he’s getting revenge over and over.”

Green leaned back, looking professorial. “Interesting, but you said he kept the heads. Why would he do that instead of destroying them?”

“Not sure. Keep them quiet so they can’t identify him.” I flashed on what Turgeon said to me. We’ll talk later. “Or maybe he keeps them for . . . company.”

“So you think the heads can still talk? That’s not what the papers tell us, Detective.”

“It’s a big world. I saw a set of bones the other day that shouldn’t be moving, but did. And like you said, chakz aren’t supposed to have eye color, either.”

“The commissioner shared the story about the bones in the Bones,” he said. “Sounded like the Loch Ness monster to me, but your point is taken. None of that really gets to the heart of Mr. Turgeon, though, does it?”

“Past that, the best I have is that he’s a sick fuck, no offense.”

“None taken.” He picked up the bowl of Viagra. “Sociopaths and serial killers beg the same sort of question, don’t they?”

“Sorry, what was the question?”

“Souls. Do they have them?” He swirled the pills. “They say eroticism reveals our inner self, our true self. Serial killers are anything but erotic. If you’re right about acting out something involving his parents, maybe he keeps the heads around because he needs their approval?”

I furrowed my brow so fast, a flap of skin on my forehead cracked. “You mean like he can’t bring himself to destroy them?”

Green ran his finger through the pills. “It’s a thought.”

It occurred to me he was thinking a lot about Turgeon. They say that’s how he is about everything, like knowing where the walls’ marble came from, but I wasn’t sure. Either way it sure as hell sounded like he was taking me seriously.

“Mr. Green, do you think you could get the police to take a look? It’d be in your interests, right?”

He nodded. “It would, and I could. The commissioner is in one of the back rooms right now. Shall I tell you what he’s doing with who? It’d give you quite a bit of leverage. Married, you know.”

I shook my head. “Thanks, but I don’t need anyone else after my head. Will you talk to him?”

He leaned in as if to pat me on the shoulder. Instead, his hand lingered and squeezed. “Could you write it all down for me, Detective? Everything? In your own words?”

The conversation had taken a weird turn, but I wasn’t sure in which direction. Did he want the details for the commissioner, or was I being poked and prodded without benefit of dinner and a movie?

But what choice did have? I shrugged. “Yeah. I could do that.”

His eyes lit up, making him look a little too happy. “Excellent! Use my laptop.”

He rose, headed toward the door. The Reservoir Dogs fell in behind him. I didn’t care for how quickly they were moving.

“Mr. Green,” I called. I pointed to my head. “Not sure how much detail I can give you.”

He gave me a smile, practiced, deliberate, the way a snake would smile if it could. “Hessius Mann, do what you can. I’ll do as I like.”

Before I could so much as grunt, the door closed and the lock clicked.

What the fuck?

Maybe he just didn’t want me wandering around. Or maybe the whole chat had been a new way for him to jerk off over his big life question, and he liked it so much he might want to try it again. Or maybe something worse was going on.

If I was imagining things and I did anything about it, I could piss away my big chance for some help. I sat at the desk. There was some kind of form on the screen. Half of it was already filled out, including my name, address, and photo. It looked like he was collecting info for some kind of database, not a good sign. But I played along, adding what I could, doing my best to describe Turgeon without using the words baby or egg. As I hunted and pecked at the keys, though, I kept thinking about the door, getting more and more antsy.