A Boy and His Corpse Read online

  A Boy and His Corpse

  Richard B. Knight

  A Boy and His Corpse

  By Richard B. Knight

  The first chapter of Knight’s next novel, The Interdimensional Subwoofer, is attached at the conclusion of A Boy and His Corpse

  A Boy and His Corpse is © Richard B. Knight 2014. All rights reserved. Cover by John Dylewski III

  Necro Logo TM

  ISBN-13: 978-1500856366

  Acknowledgments

  Thanks to Dad for leaving all those writing contests on my bed and believing in me.

  Thanks to Mom for wanting to read everything I write, even when it sucks.

  And thanks to my wife, Rona, for being my best friend.

  Good people, all of you.

  Alan

  James Krompholz grunted and tightened his grip around the neck of the corpse. Alan Chandler watched as the semi-rigid neck began to stretch as James flexed his pudgy bicep.

  “Yo, loosen up on him, man,” Alan said. The basement walls grew fuzzy before his eyes. “You’re starting to give me a headache.”

  James looked over at his friend, but didn’t release his hold.

  “Yo…chill!” Alan demanded. His thick brow began to furrow.

  To say the ladies didn’t love Alan was an understatement. He was flabby and pimple laden and insisted on wearing baggy clothes that only made him look fatter because they were comfortable. The distinct funk of an ill-kept afro and deodorant-resistant BO always proceeded and trailed his movements. And he wasn’t an intellectual heavyweight, either. His grades made him look slow, at best. Alan Chandler was the kind of mouth-breather most people wouldn’t even want to sit next to on the bus, let alone be their friend, and he knew this. Good Lord, did he know this. If not for one discernible talent, James probably wouldn’t even want to be his friend.

  But Alan did have a special ability—he could control a corpse with his mind. He could even feel what it felt when it took damage. Alan’s father, Herbert, could do even more than that. Alan had seen it with his own eyes.

  “Come on, man. Don’t give in,” James said with sweat glistening on his beet red forehead. “If we’re ever going to get corpse wrestling off the ground, you’ve gotta get stronger with controlling Mort. Now, come on. Break my hold.”

  “You’re pulling too hard,” Alan said. His shoulders dropped and tears welled up in the corners of his eyes. “I can’t breathe!”

  “If you can talk, you can breathe,” James said. He raised his right eyebrow and smirked. “You also need to be able to take a blow. Like this!” He put his leg behind the dead man’s and fell backward with him. The blow of the corpse’s head hitting the ground made an audible chock sound on the cold cement.

  Alan screamed as he stumbled forward. Purple splotches popped behind his eyes and his chest felt like it had been slammed by a battering ram.

  “Alan,” James said. His voice sounded like it was underwater. “Hey, man. Are you okay? Just take a deep breath. Oh, man. I didn’t think you’d go down like that.”

  Alan closed his eyes as he collected his bearings. He took long, deep drags of dusty basement air before counting backward to himself. When he reached “one,” he re-opened his eyes and waited for the purple blobs to dissipate. When he regained his vision, his eyebrows shot up to his afro.

  “Dude! What the hell!”

  “Ok, calm down,” James said. “I’m sure it’s not as bad as it looks.”

  “You broke him!”

  “I’m sure he’s not broken. Just calm down.”

  James pushed himself up and dusted off his jeans. Alan rushed over to his pet corpse and stiff-armed James. He kneeled, raised the dead man’s head and inspected it. There was a wound on the back that looked like the dent in a cantaloupe.

  “Why the hell did you do that? You know my dad inspects him every weekend.” Alan dug his fingers into his hair. He shook loose a dusting of dandruff. “He’s going to kill me!”

  “Dude, relax,” James said, kneeling and turning the corpse by the shoulders. “That ain’t even that bad, man. He’s fine. Don’t worry about it.”

  “Shut up! I can’t even feel inside him anymore.”

  “And I’m sure you’d like that, huh?” James said, smiling wolfishly. “Well, how about now?” He pinched Alan’s fat arm and twisted.

  “YEEOOWW!” Alan howled, and the corpse sat up, wide-eyed and alert as if he’d just been given a shot of Epinephrine.

  “There,” James said as Alan rubbed his fresh bruise. “Good as new. I told you not to worry.”

  “What about this bruise, James? You think my dad ain’t gonna notice that?”

  “Just tell him that Mort fell down the stairs or somethin’.”

  “You gotta stop being so rough with him, man. My dad’s never gonna give me another corpse to practice with if I keep messing up Mort like this.”

  James shook his head. “I still don’t see why we don’t just dig up another one ourselves.”

  “I am not digging up a corpse,” Alan said. “You know how bad they stink? No, of course you don’t. You wouldn’t know the first thing about that.”

  “Well, we could just spray ‘em with that lemon stuff you got upstairs.”

  “That’s my dad’s spray. We can’t just take it. He’ll know.”

  James rolled his eyes. “What, does he weigh the can or something?”

  “Just drop it, James.”

  James groaned. “Well, why don’t you just ask the government for a new corpse yourself then? I’m sure they’re dirt cheap. Get it? Dirt. Cheap!”

  Alan scowled. “It doesn’t work like that either, James. So stop asking, alright?”

  “Yeah, well. It just seems like you’re making excuses for—”

  “Alaaaaaan!” a loud voice shouted from upstairs. The sound of his name echoing through the house made Alan and the corpse jump in tandem.

  Even James cringed. “What’s he doing here?” he mouthed to Alan.

  Alan’s brown eyes darted around the basement as the door creaked open upstairs.

  “You down here, boy?” Alan’s father asked from the top of the steps. As he walked down, his heavy boots made the wooden steps creek and pop. James turned left and right, but Alan shook his head. There was nothing either of them could do now. They were trapped.

  Alan watched his father’s boots, then his dirty jeans, then his black Army shirt, and finally, his face, descend the stairs. When he reached the bottom, Alan saw his father’s steely eyes survey the scene.

  “Krompholz,” Herbert growled. He inhaled heavily, forcing his barrel chest out.

  “Mr. Chandler,” James said, staring at the imposing, black man who stood a full head shorter than him, but was tougher and scarier than his size suggested. “I can explain.”

  “I thought I told you to stay the hell out of my house,” Herbert snarled. “Did anybody follow you here?”

  “No, sir,” James said. “I was actually, uh, just on my way out.”

  He tucked his head and tried to rush past the military necromancer, but Herbert grabbed his arm above the elbow and squeezed.

  “Look, boy, I don’t like you hanging around here. It’s bad enough that my dumbass of a son told you about our abilities. The last thing I need is for some other yahoo finding out about us. Do I make myself clear?”

  “Clear as day, sir. I won’t tell a soul.”

  Herbert flared his nostrils.

  “You better not, boy,” Herbert growled. When he released James, his wide handprint glowed red on the teen’s freckly, white arm. “Because if you do, then you might end up being a corpse yourself. And I better not see you wrestling with government property again, either. This is your last warning, boy. Next time, I’ll
have you put away in juvie. I don’t care if your dad’s a cop.”

  “Yes, sir,” James said, rushing up the stairs.

  When the door slammed, Alan winced. “Dad, I can explain.”

  “Get-down!” Herbert roared. Alan did just that with legs extended and his hands spread apart in push-up position. He knew the drill.

  “No! Diamonds!” Herbert ordered.

  “Aww, come on, dad. Please!”

  “Diamonds, dammit! Or I swear to God!—”

  He didn’t finish the threat as he didn’t have to.

  Alan moved his arms closer together until his thumbs and index fingers touched, forming a diamond.

  “Get Mort in position, too,” Herbert said, and Alan shook his head.

  “Dad, you know I can’t! My head.”

  “You think I give a damn about your head, boy?”

  Herbert grabbed his son by the back of the belt and lifted him up with one hand. He then dropped Alan face first on the cement and leapt down right in front of him, his stomach touching the floor, and his own hands in diamond position.

  “Get your fat ass off the ground now!” Herbert shouted, looking at his son eye-to-eye, “Mort, too. Diamonds!”

  It strained his brain muscles to do so, but Alan mentally sent a signal to Mortimer’s brain and made him pick himself up. He moved into the same front-leaning rest by Alan’s side. Both of them were ready to do push-ups, but only one of them ready to endure pain.

  “Now, down!” Herbert shouted, going down himself.

  Alan and Mortimer went down in sync. Alan’s thick arms began to shake. He felt pressure push at the front of his forehead and his ears rang like a fire bell. Controlling a corpse mentally was already hard, as he had to fill Mort’s brain with his own memories to get him to move. In doing so, Alan felt like he was inside the corpse’s rotted, lemon-scented flesh. He and Mort were one. It was an out-of-body experience, and he did everything in his power to stay connected.

  But since Alan didn’t exercise his brain muscles enough—“It’s like lifting weights in your head,” his father always told him. “Up the weight and lower the reps, and push, push, push.”—he had a low threshold for pain and couldn’t make Mort move very well. Whenever Mort walked, he hobbled about like a hunchback, as Alan had to control each limb individually.

  Simply moving Mort was hard enough, but controlling him AND exercising at the same time was nigh impossible for Alan. It was like patting his stomach and head while riding a unicycle backward. The melding of the two actions made Alan feel like he had to puke, but he dared not do it in front of his father. Herbert would make him do push-ups nose deep in vomit.

  “One!” Herbert shouted. “Say it when you go down! One!”

  “Oooooooone,” Alan repeated as he struggled back up. His legs and arms felt reversed, and a dull throb by his ears made his head feel like it had floated all the way to the top of the staircase. Mortimer opened his mouth wording “one” but no words came out.

  “Two!” Herbert shouted, and Alan and Mortimer repeated him. They did this twenty more times.

  “Now, give me five more!” Herbert said. He got up while his son had to remain in position.

  “Come on, dad!” Alan moaned as salty sweat stung his eyes and dripped into his mouth. “Please.”

  Herbert made a fist and Alan felt it in his chest. Unlike other military fathers, Herbert could use magic to discipline his child. Alan’s eyes rolled to the back of his head and his tongue wagged out. A sharp pain pushed into his jaw like a fist. He barely maintained consciousness, and only did so because Herbert made it so.

  “Five more!” Herbert shouted again, but Alan could only muster two. He couldn’t feel his arms anymore. He could only feel fire and pain.

  “Pathetic,” Herbert said. “You can quit for now, but I’m going to want ten more later.” Alan didn’t need to be told twice. He rolled over to his back and Mortimer rolled over beside him. Alan’s flabby chest rose and fell and he tried wiping the sweat from his eyes, but he couldn’t move his arms. Why did his dad have to be such a jerk all the time?

  Herbert got to his knees and put his face right in front of Alan’s.

  “And if I ever catch you two knuckleheads wrestling with Mort again, we’re going back underground, and that’s that. I don’t give a damn what your mother says. She doesn’t need to go back down.”

  He stood up, walked over to Mort, and put his hand behind the corpse’s head. The dead man sat there stupidly, his pruny face green and his eyes egg yolk yellow.

  “Do you think this is all a game?” Herbert asked. His eyes turned completely green and he waved his hand behind Mortimer’s stiff black hair. The wound healed up, good as new, and in doing so, the staggering pain in the back of Alan’s head cleared up a bit, too. “I asked you a question, boy.”

  “No…” Alan said between breaths from the floor.

  “No, what?”

  “No, sir!” Alan managed to shout. He bent his tired elbows and put his hands over his eyes. He wiped away the sweat and tears.

  “I’m tired of your crap, Alan,” Herbert said. “You need to start getting serious about your future. The Militia needs you, so stop with this wrestling garbage.”

  Herbert stomped up the stairs.

  When Alan was sure his father was out of earshot, he formed a fist and pounded the floor. “Asshole.”

  Mortimer sat at his side, and his dry lips mouthed a silent, “asshole,” too.

  Alan was tired of his father’s crap. James was right. He had to be a man and stand up for himself. As he stared at the ceiling and huffed and puffed on his back, he knew what he had to do. It wasn’t going to make his father happy, but it had to be done. Enough was enough. The Undead Militia could go to hell.

  Herbert

  Herbert Chandler collapsed into his favorite chair, exhausted from a day’s work and disciplining his son. He opened a newspaper, crossed his legs, and shook his head.

  What am I going to do with that boy?

  Herbert Chandler and his son were the only two people in the world with magical abilities, and the government needed them. Hell, the whole world needed them.

  “You’re the backbone of this country, Herb,” President Rosewater told him just a couple months back after a successful mission in North Korea. “We wouldn’t have gotten that scumbag without you.”

  You ain’t kidding, Herbert mused.

  It had been a masterful stroke of military genius, orchestrated by only 12 men. Navy Seal, Carl Ferminich, infiltrated the North Korean President’s highly fortified mansion while Herbert and 11 others watched through binoculars.

  Ferminich broke every last neck of the guards standing outside the mansion and snuck in through the back door. Only Hebert, who had a mental connection with the soldier, could see him then.

  “What’s he doing right now?” the head of the Undead Militia, Mr. Rovas, asked.

  “Shhh,” Herbert said. “I’m trying to focus.”

  Herbert sent a mental thrust over a mile away to the dead guards. Their corpses struggled up and staggered inside the mansion like zombies.

  Gunfire flashes could be seen in all the windows, but only Herbert saw and heard the true chaos inside the mansion. Every guard Carl Ferminich killed, Herbert resurrected and manipulated, and soon, every last guard was clamoring for the dictator, who ran into his room and shot himself.

  The whole skirmish lasted less than ten minutes.

  Shortly afterward, Herbert passed out into a four hour coma from moving so many corpses at once. He had been passing out a lot lately. Controlling corpses took a greater toll on his body now than it ever did before, and he feared that if he kept it up much longer, he wouldn’t live long enough to see Alan reach adulthood.

  It was only when he awoke that he found out that one of the members of the Undead Militia died after he set the mansion on fire and got caught by a guard Carl Ferminich missed.

  But, hey, it was still mission complete, right? The media surmis
ed that the dictator had met his demise in an accidental kitchen fire, as the mansion burned down with their remains. But only Herbert and a select few others knew the real truth.

  Herbert flipped a page, and a smile creased his stern face. But when he flipped the next page, his face soured again.

  On the page was a snapshot of Pakistani president, Armand Raad, smiling and waving. Without a doubt, he was the man behind the terrorist bombing of Israel just two days prior.

  He closed the newspaper and rubbed his eyes.

  If I was only a younger man, I’d get that son of a bitch myself. I must get Alan stronger.

  Just as he was about to head back downstairs and make his son do the ten extra push-ups he owed him, the basement door opened. Alan came up with his pet corpse, Mortimer, behind him.

  “Dad? I need to talk to you.”

  “Good, because I was just getting ready to come back downstairs and talk to you. The Militia—”

  “Okay, before you say another word,” Alan said, putting up his hands, but he left it that.

  Herbert crossed his arms and upturned his chin. “Go on.”

  “I know you’ve always wanted me to go into the Undead Militia, just like you.”

  “Yeah,” he said with caution. “And you will, because America needs you to.”

  “Yeah, about that.” Alan scratched the back of his greasy fro and looked down at the floor. “I’ve decided that I’m not joining the Militia.”

  “Oh, yes you are.” Herbert snarled.

  “No, dad. I’m not. I have dreams of my own, and I’m going to pursue them.”

  “Like hell you will,” Herbert said through gritted teeth.

  “No, dad, I will,” Alan proclaimed, looking him in the eyes this time. “I’m going to start an all-corpse wrestling league with James, and it’s going to be called the Undead Wrestling Federation. I’m even going to ask Mr. Rovas for another corpse to practice with.”

  Herbert lunged at his son with the urge to wring some sense into him.

  “What did I tell you about that wrestling garbage, boy? What did I tell you?” Spittle flew from his mouth.