Sharyn McCrumb - Zombies of the Gene Pool

"I find it interesting to see the valley exposed again after all these years." Giles nodded toward the mural of Breedlove Lake.

"I know," said Barbara earnestly. "It's strange, isn't it? Like digging up an old grave. I swear Jim's been having nightmares about the whole thing. He wakes up sometimes of a night in a cold sweat. He talks about water running down the walls."

Conyers frowned. "Probably indigestion," he grunted.

Barbara chattered on. "Still, I guess it's a good thing they did decide to drain the lake, because otherwise, you all would never have been able to recover your stories, would you?"

Lorien Williams nodded excitedly. "Isn't it wonderful about the time capsule? After all these years, new stories from Peter Deddingfield and Curtis Phillips! I've read everything they ever wrote."

Jim Conyers looked solemn. "I don't care much for myself. Barb and I are happy as we are, but maybe after all these years Dugger will finally get something published. Wish he could have been around to enjoy it."

Barbara sighed. "He would have been so proud of all his friends. They've all become so famous." Giles' frown reminded her that this was too sweeping an accolade. "And even the ones who aren't celebrities are doing real well," she amended. A glance in George Woodard's direction suggested that she knew better, but was going to leave it at that anyhow.

A new voice chimed in. "I wonder what Pat Malone would have thought of all this hoopla."

Giles turned to see the woman in medieval dress smiling up at him. There were lines around her eyes and at the corners of her mouth, but she had an appealing air of youthfulness about her.

"Angela Arbroath, Stormy," she said, offering him a much be-ringed hand. "I published Archangel. Remember?"

"Yes, of course," said Giles hastily, giving her an awkward peck on the cheek. "Archangel. Quite a nice little magazine, as I recall."

Angela blushed. "Well, it wasn't a patch on Alluvial, of course, but Pat Malone was a much better editor than I was. And of course, he could offer articles by Surn and Deddingfield. You wouldn't believe how much Alluvial sells for today."

Giles gave her a mirthless smile. "One dollar per issue, I believe."

"Oh. Of course. George still publishes something called that, doesn't he?" She paused for a moment, trying to think of something kind to say about that. Finally she blurted out, "Well, you certainly are looking well, Erik!"

"And you haven't changed a bit," he assured her. "And of course you were here the weekend we decided to put that time capsule together. You even sent us back a story, didn't you?"

"That I did," grinned Angela. "And if Bunzie is the magician he thinks he is, it'll keep me in my old age."

"Do you remember what you wrote?" asked Barbara Conyers.

"Not really. Something with a woman protagonist, I think, to annoy the guys. In most of their early works the women were like cheeseburgers-they were either trophies or dessert."

Erik Giles laughed. "Remind me to introduce you to Marion Farley," he said. "I believe you two are soul mates."

It was nearly ten o'clock. The supply of hors d'oeuvres had dwindled to a few selections that nobody wanted, and the champagne had been abandoned in favor of decaffeinated coffee, but the talking was louder and more animated than before, and frequently punctuated with laughter. As the reunion rekindled their memories of each other, the Lanthanides had pulled the couches close together, and they all sat around in a circle, arguing about subjects they hadn't cared about in decades.

None of these subjects concerned science fiction, science, or literature in general. In the years since the dissolution of the Fan Farm, they had resolved all their uncertainties about those subjects to their own satisfaction, and they were past the need to discuss such matters. What still rankled was the personal issues.

"I didn't know that was moonshine you kept in that mason jar in the bathroom. And anyway, it took the paint off my brush, didn't it?" After all these years, Woodard was still stung by Bunzie's old grievance. "Besides," he added petulantly, "I probably saved your life by using it up. Drinking that stuff can make you go blind. It gives you lead poisoning, I believe."

Giles laughed. "Speaking of that sort of lead poisoning, remember that issue of Alluvial that Curtis and Pat Malone put out when they were stinking drunk? 'An Interview with Cthulu.' And they filched a couple of love poems that Deddingfield wrote to Earlene Riley and put those in. I thought the post office was going to send the feds in after us when that issue went through the mails. Remember the verse about 'Your succulent nipples spark fusion in my teeming loins…' Ugh! And Deddingfield wasn't even embarrassed. He swore he wrote it from memory!" Hearing a silence instead of indulgent laughter, Giles looked up to see shamefaced smiles on the faces of the others. George Woodard had turned scarlet, and seemed intent upon a petit-four.

Finally Conyers said quietly, "Well, Peter always was an old lying hound, wasn't he?"

Erik remembered that George Woodard referred to his wife as Earlene. A glance at Woodard's red face told him that it was the same girl. Girl! She must be sixty now. They had met her at an East Coast S-F convention. He wondered if she still attended them.

To break the silence, Angela said, "Do you remember how much Dale hated Erik's jazz records! Pat told me that Dale wrote a story once contending that jazz was the sound of alien invaders fine-tuning their spaceships' engines."

Erik Giles looked puzzled. "I can't remember having any special fondness for jazz. Well, perhaps I did. I fancied myself a bohemian in those days."

"I remember you used to argue incessantly about whose turn it was to do the dishes," said Brendan Surn.

"We were always arguing incessantly about something," said Bunzie. "That's what adolescent intellectuals do. Bicker. Protest. Whine. Censure. But we laughed a lot, too."

"Dissent is the sign of an active and inquisitive mind," said George Woodard, for whom bickering had remained a way of life. "In Alluvial I welcome disagreement from freethinking individuals, exercising their First Amendment rights. Speaking of Al luvial, I'm planning to write this up in a forthcoming issue, and I'd welcome some guest columns. How about you, Angela?"

Angela looked away. "I'm not sure I have the time, George. I'll see. Okay?"

"I guess we ought to talk about the reason we're all here," said Bunzie, drawing a well-scribbled index card out of his hip pocket. "The business part of this reunion starts tomorrow. I thought we'd begin with an introductory meeting here at our hotel. Jim, I think you agreed to give the media people some background on Wall Hollow and the construction of the lake?"

"Yes. I did some research, and I can answer anything that isn't an engineering question. History, facts and figures, local legends, and so on."

"Good! Colorful anecdotes will make good copy for feature stories. I leave it to you." Bunzie consulted his notes. "After the introduction here, we will make our way down the hill, where several small motorboats will be waiting to take us to Dugger's farm. Expect to pose for pictures during this process. We have boots for all of you."

Tentatively, Lorien Williams raised her hand. "Excuse me, but how can boats get around out there if there is nothing left but mud?"

Bunzie's smile was intended to make her feel at ease. "Good question, Lori!" he beamed. "You know, the best thing we could have used would have been those hovercraft things they use in the swamps of the Everglades. What do they call them? Whatever. Anyway-" He shrugged. "Try to find those swamp boats in east Tennessee. Try to find a bagel. But rowboats they got. So we rented a couple, complete with outboard motors and navigators. The boats will stay in the original channel."