Suspect Zero by Richard Kadrey

Author:Richard Kadrey [Kadrey, Richard]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Goodreads: 16075988
Publisher: Harper Voyager
Published: 2012-12-31T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 5

“If I’d’ve shot you back there, would I have become you?”

“You’d have become something. More than what you are, but no. You wouldn’t become me.”

Gabriel touched the sticky blood on his chest and legs.

“I don’t think I want to do this anymore. I want it to be over. Can you help me out?”

“Kill you? I’m afraid it doesn’t work that way. You want to sacrifice yourself, go feed the homeless for Jesus. I’m not interested in those who want to be taken. There’s others for that kind of thing. There’s no nourishment for me in suicides. For me eating suicides is like trying to eat the fog hanging in the empty spaces between the stones on a mountainside. There’s nothing to sink your teeth into.”

“If you’re not a ghost, then what are you?”

They changed lanes several times. The killer turned the truck off the local freeway and onto the interstate.

“Please. I’ve got to know.”

Suspect Zero reached up and pulled a cord, letting loose two long blasts from his air horn. He whooped with the sound.

“I’m a road shaker and a heartbreaker.” They hit a straightaway and he looked at Gabriel. “But most of all, I’m the toll taker.”

“What toll?”

“You asked me before if I was a ghost. I’m not. But I wasn’t always such a grizzled bastard either. Hell, for the longest time I didn’t have any form at all. You people called me all sort of nonsense back then. Devil. Old Wolf. Ogoun. Soo-oop-wa. Our Lord of the Flayed One. I grew two legs, two arms and two eyes. I walked on the ground because that was what I needed to do to be near you.”

“Are you an angel?”

“Shut up and listen. Over ten thousand years you’ve been coming here. You walked here over ice bridges, marched up from the South and beached your ships on the coasts. You came to me. To the dirt. The mountains and the lightning. The rivers and the dust devils tearing up the Mojave. You wanted my blood and built your lives and homes on my flesh. Now I’m in your pavement and wires, your concrete, subways and sewers. I’ve always been here. I am this place. And you, every one of you, owes me a blood payment. Get it, boy? It’s like this truck. It’s my home. It’s me and no one rides for free.”

“You’re God.”

“Don’t be stupid. But you’re not the first who’s thought that. I’ve been worshipped and exorcised. I’ve buried you people in blizzards and earthquakes. Cooked you in brush fires burning all the way from Mexico to the Yukon. I’m the price you pay for being here.”

“You’re all that and you still can’t kill me?

“I told you. I’m not an angel or your god. I’m not here to ease your pain. You’re a nice kid. I wish I could help you out, but it’s not my place.”

Gabriel nodded thoughtfully, trying to absorb it all. His head was spinning. He only understood a little of what Suspect Zero said, but it was enough.

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