Empire

17 Clown

It pulled itself through an opening in the west wall, jagged bits of fencing flaying open its back, and staggered onto an empty street. Most of its colorful costume still clung to the body, pasted there by grime and by fluids seeping through bloated skin.

The clown stood in the street and looked from side to side. Its red rubber nose was distracting; the clown pulled the nose off and felt most of what was underneath come away with it.

Rouged lips were turning gray and falling off as the clown idly chewed through them. The white grease paint covering its face was hardly whiter than the skin beneath; an orange wig crawling with maggots was stuck to its bald head. Kid gloves stained brown with old blood. Oversized shoes filled now with pus and rot that squeezed out over the laces with each heavy step. The clown stood in the street and looked for food.

Someone was coming now, but he wasn't alive. The clean man in his nice suit gave nary a look to the other zombie as he passed. The clown thought of following him, but a few seconds passed and he couldn't recall what he would be following, and where.

The clown walked down the street. Innards sloshed within its distended belly. A maggot squirming in the rotter's navel dropped past urine-soaked trousers to the ground and was pulverized by a red size 15.

Time passed; the zombie felt what might be a fracture grinding inside one of its legs. Then it heard a voice and stopped. The voice was coming from a nearby building.

Inside that building, inside the shelter, a young woman sat with her son. Kipp had been Wendy's foster child for a decade, and any boundaries created by their legally-defined relationship had been forgotten in short order. Kipp was desperate, not for someone to love him, but for someone he could love. Every day his eyes were alight with what seemed an endless affection. He was sixteen now, probably half that age in an emotional sense — Wendy wasn't qualified to make a diagnosis but she'd known from the beginning he was handicapped.

He was peering through the paper-thin space between slats in a boarded-up window. Wendy sat on a nearby cot fixing one of his worn sneakers.

"The circus!" He said softly, breathlessly. Wendy looked up and he smiled at her. Climbing down from his perch atop a broken radiator, he padded across the community room in his socks.

"Kipp!" Wendy called. "Don't go anywhere we haven't talked about. Especially without your shoes."

He nodded and continued out of the room. London followed Wendy's loving gaze. "He's a sweet boy."

"Yes, he is."

"What did you do before you ended up here?" London asked.

"I was — am — a social worker. I work with a lot of children like Kipp. He's actually helped me a lot with that — he always sees the brighter side."

"I think they've got it better than we do," London said, then blushed. "Sorry, that must've sounded awful."

"No, no, I think you're right," Wendy replied, "and we could probably stand to learn a thing or two."

At the shelter's front entrance, Kipp quietly moved the barricade back.

The clown stood out front now, listening intently. Its gloved hands tightened into hungry fists. A young boy's laugh floated through the door.

The door cracked ever so slightly and the boy peered out. The clown stood still, waiting to see what would happen.

Opening the door just enough to get his skinny body through, the boy came out, stood and smiled broadly. He was waiting too.

The clown opened its mouth. Its painted smile split like a wound to reveal the remnants of decayed teeth. It reached for him.

The boy screamed. He threw himself at the door, not thinking to try and squeeze through the space he'd made, his frail body useless against the barricade. The clown fumbled at his shoulders. Its hands were broken and numb. Carefully, it stooped so that it could reach the boy with its open mouth.

A woman's hand thrust out and slapped at him. "KIPP!!" The woman shrieked. The boy grabbed her arm, sobbing, and buried his face against the door. Other voices now. The clown was desperate. It grabbed a mouthful of the child's hair between its teeth and pulled back.

A man thrust a metal spike out, some length of pipe, spearing the clown's eye and sending the rotter stumbling back. The same man tore the door all the way open and grabbed the boy. The clown struggled with the pipe. It couldn't see straight, couldn't steady itself. Feeling was leaving its legs. It twisted the pipe around inside its brain and moaned.

Wendy seized Kipp from Shipley's arms, backing away from the door. The others crowded in to restore the barricade. Shipley stood silent, watching the child and his mother.

"Wait!" Came a cry from outside. "What the fuck??" Wheeler snapped. Oates shoved him aside and pried the door back. "Hey!"

There were three people, two women and a man, running across the street from Liberty Auto. The clown spun around and lunged at them. The blonde caved the rotter's face in with a brick.

Against Wheeler's mad protests, Oates opened the door wide and waved them over. The clown lay on its back, fists clenched. Watery discharge pooled around its mutilated skull, the pipe sputtered dark chunks — still the thing lived.

Oates slammed the door behind the newcomers.

Far from the writhing clown, far from Jefferson Harbor's last pocket of humanity, Baron Tetch listened to Aidan's slurred words and nodded. "All right, I understand. Go downstairs."

Uriel was at the study door. Tetch pointed at him. "Do you remember how to use the rifle?"

The afterdead responded with a blank stare. Sighing, Tetch rose from his desk. "Let me show you again."

It was time to take the city.