Apocalypticon (42 page)

“I have to admit, it’s pretty good,” Ben said, nodding approvingly. “I mean, I don’t want to say you were right. Because I would never say that. But we’re 50 feet from shore, and we haven’t drowned yet.”

“And the sun is shining,” Patrick pointed out.

“The sun is shining,” Ben conceded.

“The water is smooth.”

“The water isn’t awful.”

“And we won’t stop for anything.”

“Not for anything?” Ben asked, cautiously hopeful.

“Not for anything,” Patrick said. “I tell you, when this boat stops, we’ll be at the Florida coast or the bottom of the sea.” They shook on it. “And the wind! Oh, the wind, she is a-blowin’! A little bit farther, and we’ll unfurl the sail.”

The farther they paddled from land, the happier Ben felt. The sea breeze was really clearing his mind. “Man,” he said as they sliced through the water. “We should’ve done this from day one.”

“Yes,” Patrick agreed, pushing the water with the spade. “We should have taken one of those land boats.”

“We should’ve skipped Memphis and taken that speedboat all the way to the Gulf.”

“Aye, in hindsight, that would have gotten us here sooner. But think of all the fun we would’ve missed!”

“True. It was really fun to watch your hand get drilled by a railroad spike.”

“I hope you’ll recall my stoic bravery when you write the story of my life.” He estimated that they were now far enough from land to unfurl the sail. He hauled in the spade and secured it against the side of the boat. “All right!” he said, rubbing his hands together. “Time to move! Benjamin, please remove your feet from the bow.”

“Which end is the bow?” Ben asked, puzzled.

Patrick stared blankly at him. “Which end is the bow? The end with your feet in it, which need to be removed, you clod.”

“Hey, shut up,” Ben fussed, curling his feet back into the left ventricle. “It’s early. And there’s no coffee.”

“Don’t you dare talk about coffee,” Patrick warned. “Don’t you dare.” He scooted clumsily toward the front of the boat and began working on the sail.

“Why do they call it the bow, anyway? Why don’t they just call it the front?”

“Such things are not for us to question,” Patrick said, unhooking the rolled banner from one of the bungee cords. “It is simply the seafarer’s way.”

“Well, I got news for the seafarers. They’re dead.
Everyone’s
dead. The end of the world happened, and we’re still following the same old rules.”

“The world didn’t technically end,” Patrick said. “The world still exists.”

“Whatever. Semantics. The apocalypse happened, and we still kowtow to the old ways. You know what, Pat? We’ve been lazy survivors. We’ve been doing too much loafing and not enough remaking the world in our own image. Who cares if the front of a boat used to be a bow, or if the back of a boat was the brim?”

“Stern,” Patrick corrected. “Weren’t you ever a Boy Scout?”

“Whatever, who cares! That’s my point! There are only two people left on the entire planet who still discuss the right words for the ends of a boat, and only one of them knows the proper terminology. That’s only 50%. That’s not even a majority. I say to hell with tradition. I beat the apocalypse, so I get the right to rename the parts of a boat. That,” he said, leveling a finger at the front of the boat, “is now called ‘the point.’”

“The point of the boat?” Patrick asked, a little less than convinced.

“And the back is forthwith to be called ‘the ass.’”

“That is a horrible name.”

“Quiet. I’m nestling against the ass.”

Patrick finished rigging the sail and hauled it up with another bungee cord. It rose smoothly and flapped open in the wind. It caught a stiff breeze blowing in the right direction, and the heart tub lurched forward. “Success!” he cried. “We’re sailors, Ben! We sail!”

“It is no longer called ‘sailing,’” Ben said. “It is now called ‘hauling ass.’”

The little boat hauled ass for almost three straight hours, never waning in speed. The wind blew favorably, and the boat skimmed smoothly across the surface of the ocean. “If this wind keeps up, we just might make it by dawn,” Patrick said, studying the atlas. Of course, having never aquatically hauled ass before, he had no real idea how quickly they might cover ground. Still, he felt in his heart that with a little luck, they could dock by morning. “As long as the wind holds.”

He spent some time explaining the particulars of sailing to Ben, inasmuch as he knew them himself. These particulars basically amounted to raising the sail when the wind blew them forward, lowering the sail and paddling when it didn’t, and keeping the shore on the port side of the boat. “That’s the Benward side,” Ben insisted. “It’s on the side of Ben.”

The wind still blew toward the east when they broke into their vegetable stores for lunch. “This may be the sea air talking,” Ben said, tearing into a head of greens, “but I think I’m actually starting to like cabbage.”

“You’ve gone sea crazy,” Patrick said sagely. “The thrall of the open water has you now.”

The day’s storm came and went without much power. Rain fell heavily into the boat, but not in such great volume that they were in danger of sinking. Patrick pulled down the sail, and they managed to hold the boat steady and more or less on course as the waves rocked and tossed them about. And just as quickly as the little storm gathered, it disappeared. The sun broke back through the clouds and fog, the ocean calmed, and the point of the boat still faced east. They wrung out their clothes, Patrick raised the sail, and they were soon back up to speed.

The conversation drifted as they sailed on. They talked about Disney World, and pudding cups, and the medical benefits of ingesting embalming fluid.

“How fitting that it was those very chemicals that saved our lives!” Patrick decided. “It’s almost poetic.”

Ben groaned. “Don’t talk about it. I think I’m going to be sick,” he said, leaning over the edge of the Love Boat.

“It’s okay,” Patrick said, patting his back. “Seasickness is a natural part of life. It’s nothing to be ashamed of. But it’s also disgusting, so I’m going to have to push you overboard.”

Ben swatted him away and managed to keep his food in his stomach where it belonged. He leaned back against the Benward ventricle and closed his eyes and tried not to think about swallowing cadaver juices.

The boat sped on, the coastline slipped by, and despite the chill in the air, it was really a pleasant day. The tall banner flapped heavily in the wind. “
Jabalem twoja matkai
,” Patrick waved to the fish that splashed out of the water. “
Jabalem twoja matkai
to you all!”

And so they sailed through the Gulf, raising the sail when there was wind, paddling when there wasn’t, and closing the gap between them and the Magic Kingdom. Eventually, the sea air helped Ben forget about embalming fluid, and about their friends at Fort Doom, and by the time it was dark, he even found himself able to sleep.

21.

Ben awoke with a start when the boat slammed into the beach. “Wakey, wakey!” Patrick cried, leaping out of his ventricle. He splashed into the shallow water and pulled the boat onto the beach. Ben struggled to sit up and blinked sleepily at the world before him. They were docked on a mostly deserted beach, presumably somewhere in Florida. The glow of the sun was just breaking somewhere behind the eastern fog. 

“Holy shit,” Ben yawned. “We’re alive. This stupid idea was actually not that stupid of an idea.”

Patrick gave him a low bow. “A-thank you.”

“Did we make it? Where are we?”

“An excellent question.” Patrick turned toward a man who was either sleeping or dead farther down the beach. “Excuse me! Sir!” he called out. The figure stirred and sat up. “What’s the name of this town?”

“Hudson. Hudson, Florida,” called out the bewildered looking man. He had a thick eastern European accent. “You—you come here by boat?” he asked, confused.

“We do! We are in search of Disney World. Where might we find it?”

The man pointed toward the hazy morning sun. “One day’s walk,” he said.

“Huzzah!” Patrick exclaimed. “Thank you for your help.
Jabalem twoja matkai
!”

The man leapt to his feet and made an obscene hand gesture. “Fuck you!” he said in a thick Eastern European accent. Then he stormed off down the beach.

Patrick turned to Ben and shrugged. “I guess he doesn’t want safe travels.”

“He didn’t sound like he was from the Midwest, either,” Ben blenched. “He drinks dead people juices.”

After a quick breakfast of carrots and pearl onions, they gathered up their few belongings and bid farewell to the trusty sea craft. They hiked up the beach and into the town of Hudson, bearing due east.

The road to Disney World was unsettlingly quiet. After the man on the beach, they didn’t see a single other soul as they plunged into the heart of Florida. They picked their way through entire cities that showed no signs of life. The air was still, and the only sound was the occasional scrabble of rats against the rubble. The farther they walked from the water, the more thickly the Monkey fog settled back onto the earth. By the time they reached the city limit sign of Ardmore Gardens, they found themselves once again walking through the old familiar yellow blind.

The Florida landscape was different than any they’d yet encountered. The ground was marshy and wet, dotted with lakes and creeks and little swamps. The unsettling combination of wetlands and human desertion had a quieting effect on the two travelers. They talked little as they pushed deeper and deeper into the state, when by all rights they should have been growing more and more excited.

“I’m just going to say it,” Ben said after a few hours of near silence. “Florida is creepy as shit.”

“God, tell me about it,” said Patrick. “Why did anyone want to retire here?”

They were still walking when night fell. They had just crawled out the far end of a large swamp and entered a small, empty town. “What do you think? Camp here for the night? I mean, God knows how much farther we have to go. Want to call it for now?” Ben asked. “Patrick? Pat?” But when he turned, Patrick’s eyes were glazed over, sparkling with teardrops.

“I know how much farther we have to go,” he whispered. He pointed up at the highway, toward a battered road sign. WALT DISNEY WORLD NEXT 5 EXITS.

“Ho-ly shit,” Ben breathed. “We made it.”

Patrick shoved him playfully. “We made it.”

He shoved back. “We made it.”

“We made it.”

“
We made it
.”

“
We made it
.”

“We made it!”

“We made it!” Then bounced around the highway shoulder, laughing and dancing like idiots. They howled at the growing darkness, their excitement reverberating off the overpass and shaking the deserted buildings around them. They skipped around, delirious, until Patrick stumbled in a pothole and fell into the guardrail, shoulder-first. “Ow.”

“And that’s how Patrick died. Three feet from his destination.”

“Shut up.”

“You gonna lay there all night, or are we gonna go to Disney World?”

Patrick rolled to his feet. “To Disney World!” he cried, pumping his fist in the air.

“To Disney World,” said Ben. “Which park?”

Patrick stopped, his arms frozen out at awkward angles. “Come again?”

“Which park are we going to?”

“What do you mean, which park? We’re going to Disney World.
That
park.”

Ben shook his head. “You are the single worst planner anyone has ever followed blindly into a post-apocalyptic situation.”

“That reflects more poorly on you than it does me,” Patrick pointed out.

“You still have those maps from the zombie whisperer?”

“Maybe.” Patrick dropped his knapsack and dug through the pockets. “Ah! Yes. Here they are.”

“Right.
They
. Four of them. Four maps, four parks. Which one do you want to go to?”

Patrick frowned. He stared at the maps in his hand and tried to let the Spirit of the Illinois guide his decision. The Epcot map had a rocket ship on the cover, and he hated flying. So that one was out. The map for Hollywood Studios showed some doofus singing on an American Idol stage, so that one was
definitely
out. He tossed it over his shoulder. “This one looks promising,” he said, holding up the Animal Kingdom map with a huge, pissed off lion on the front.

“The lions are dead,” Ben reminded him. “The Animal Kingdom is an animal graveyard.”

“Right,” Patrick said. “Hm.” He stared down at the last map. The cover just showed a big, circular something-or-other with the words “Disney’s Electrical Parade” written in light bulbs. It didn’t exactly scream excitement. “You’re letting me down, Great Spirit,” he said. “Oh! I know! Hold on, let me see if I can get anything from this.” He produced the folded piece of paper from his back pocket and examined it closely. The tip of his tongue poked out the corner of his mouth while he read. “Yeah, no, nothing,” he finally decided. He folded it back up and returned it to its hiding place. He crossed his arms and cupped his chin in his hand. “Okay, Ben. So if you were a man--”

“I am a man.”

“--And you had to pick one park to see--”

“Complete with burned out baby skeletons.”

“--Complete with burned out baby skeletons, which would it be?”

“The one with the castle. Obviously.”

“The castle!” Patrick cried, snapping his fingers. “Of course!
Neuschwanstein
!”

“Neuschan-what?”

“
Neuschwanstein
. It’s the real castle that the Disney castle was modeled after. In Germany.”

“Seriously? It was designed after a real castle?”

“It was.”

“I don’t believe you. Google it for me.”

“I can’t.”

“Because you don’t have a data plan?”

“Because I have no idea how to spell it. German is hard. And that word is a holocaust of vowels.” Ben squinted at Patrick. Patrick squinted back. “Mm-hmm. I said it.”

Ben shook his head. “Okay. So Magic Kingdom.”

“Magic Kingdom!” Patrick leafed through the map, but it only gave the layout of the park itself, not the location of the park in the larger scheme of Disney World. “Okay, look. I know you’re bad at this sort of thing, but you’ve been here before, so I ask you. Can you get us to this Magic Kingdom? Despite your complete and utter ineptitude when it comes to cardinal direction?”

“Yes, ass. I think I can.”

Patrick placed his hands on Ben’s shoulders. “And here, at the final stretch, you begin to prove your worth at last.”

“When I write your life’s story, every chapter’s going to start with a reminder of how much of an ass you are.”

“I
knew
you were writing my life story!”

They hiked up to the overpass and entered Disney property. Ben led them along the highway, stopping to read each purple and red road sign that hadn’t given up in the fight against neglect. It was slow going in the dark, made even slower, in Ben’s estimation, by Patrick’s self-imposed (and self-accepted) challenge to concoct at least 50 Disney-themed innuendos before they reached the park (starting with “My pants are a magical kingdom,” “I’d like to tinker with her bell,” and “Those aren’t mouse ears”). But at last they came to a junction with a sign that read MAGIC KINGDOM NEXT LEFT. “That is where we find the castle. And without looking at a stolen atlas for help,” Ben said proudly. Then he added, “Suck it.”

They turned onto World Drive and began hiking the last stretch of road to their destination. As they walked, Ben was stricken by how little everything had changed, all things considered. Tall trees still lined the roads and masked the many secrets of the park. The entryway to Hollywood Studios, though empty and covered with debris, looked like it was one good sweeping away from being open for business. The fog and the darkness made it hard to see much, but Ben could still picture the Hollywood Tower Hotel looming above the trees in the distance.

The monorail track appeared alongside the road. It loomed starkly over them, floating in and out of view as the dark fog swirled above. Some sections had cracked and broken away, leaving mountains of concrete and steel along the roadway. They crossed over the shimmering lake, smooth as obsidian in the night, and passed the clean outline of the Contemporary Resort on the right. “If memory serves, the Magic Kingdom is just over yonder,” Ben said, pointing ahead and to the left.

“Yonder close?” Patrick asked.

“Yonder close,” Ben confirmed.

They turned down the drive that led to the parking lot. As they approached the park, Ben noticed something glimmering in the distance. Patrick saw it too. “Look at that. They turned the lights on for us,” he said, furrowing his brow. Ben peered into the brownish yellow evening fog. There was a second glimmer, and a third. Then more and more, until Ben counted eight points of light in the distance. They flickered and flashed in the air.

“Torches?” Ben suggested.

“Looks like it. Maybe they
are
still in business.”

Ben stopped walking. “I don’t like this. It’s not right.”

“No,” Patrick agreed. “It’s probably not.”

“Think we should wait ‘til it’s light out?” There was no mistaking the fear in his voice. “There’s still one more peril before we’re done. Bombastic Tom and--”

Patrick started. “
Ubasti
Tom,” he said.

“Come again?”

“Ubasti Tom. That’s what the old lady said. I don’t know why it just registered. Ubasti Tom and the Hollow Man.”

“What’s an Ubasti?”

“I have no idea.”

Ben frowned. “It doesn’t sound pleasant.”

“No, it doesn’t,” Patrick admitted.

An invisible hand of ice closed around Ben’s chest. “The old lady said we would make it to Disney World,” he realized aloud. “But she didn’t say we’d survive all the perils, did she? Specifically?”

“No,” Patrick said gravely. “That tricky minx, she did not. I had assumed we’d face all the perils
before
getting here, but...”

Ben shifted uneasily from one foot to the other. “What do you want to do?”

Patrick’s face became hard and unmoving, uncharacteristic and impossible to read. “She was right about everything. She’ll be right about this. Whether we go now or we go tomorrow, whatever’s gonna happen is gonna happen.”

“It doesn’t have to,” Ben insisted. “This isn’t
The Time Traveler’s Wife
. This is Disney World. We’re here; we made it. This is it. Hooray! Now we can turn around and go. Right now. Make your peace here, or hell, we’ll go to friggin’ Epcot. We don’t have to do this.”

“We didn’t come here to make a stand in the parking lot,” Patrick said, shaking his head. “
She
wouldn’t have just stood in the parking lot.”

“No,” Ben sighed. “She wouldn’t have.”

Patrick took a deep breath. The words of the fortuneteller rang in his head.
The bulldog or the mouse hunter must fall. You will choose
. “Ben--” he began, but Ben held up a hand and cut him off.

“Save it. I know.”

“No,” Patrick insisted, “you don’t.”

Ben gritted his teeth. “Well, let’s just say, if I don’t know, then I don’t care. This is the part of the story where you say something sentimental or heart-wrenching or some bullshit, thinking maybe I’ll go and let you go on alone to face the doom of a dozen sentient torches in the night. Right?”

“Well. Yeah. Something like that.”

“I’m not leaving. And anything you say can only make me regret not having the sense to leave, so save it.”

Patrick shook his head sadly. “If you were a superhero, your power would be loyalty.”

“I
am
a superhero,” Ben said, gritting his teeth. “And don’t no one forget it.”

They crossed into the grass and approached the line of torches, Patrick pulling the machete from its scabbard, Ben grasping the wrench. What the dark night’s fog couldn’t hide, the brilliant flames shining into their eyes did. “Oo-we,” called a voice from the darkness behind the row of light. “What do we have here?”
Wait
, Patrick thought.
I know that voice
. He stepped through the line of torches stuck into the grass and crossed onto the pavement. He squinted into the mist. A burly figure emerged from the darkness.

“Calico?” Patrick said. Bloom’s henchman gave him a smart little salute.

“Don’t sound so surprised, Yank,” he said, grinning his horrible grin. “I told ya I’d be comin’ for ya.”

“Technically, you wrote it,” Patrick pointed out.

“Oh, come on,” Ben groaned, his heart falling like a lead weight. “You tracked us all the way to Disney World? From Illinois? Are you fucking
crazy
?”

“Not crazy. Just determined,” came a low, even voice from the gloom. Patrick’s eyes were adjusting to the light of the torches, and at the edge of their halo he noticed a second man sitting on the asphalt. The man stood and walked toward the torches. “You cost me something very dear.” The man stepped into the light. Patrick gasped involuntarily. He recognized the cold, hollow eyes instantly.

“Bloom,” he whispered.

The left side of Bloom’s face was wrinkled and scarred. He noticed Patrick staring at it. “Gravel burn,” he explained, tracing a finger down the side of his face. “I wanted to thank you for that. And for the experience of drowning. That was new to me.”

“You look dry enough now,” Patrick said.

“I make a hell of a lifeguard,” Calico grinned.

Patrick swallowed. “Yes. Well. The scars look totally natural. A little concealer, and you’ll be fine. Nice catching up, but we should be going.” He grabbed Ben’s arm and turned on his heels, but Calico leapt forward, quick as a snake, and grabbed Patrick by the scruff of his neck.