“Gone,” replied Topaz.
“Way gone!” shouted VaVa.
Aflo nodded. “Her remains, what’s left of them, will finally be buried next to your friends, Creature. Just where they belong.”
“Better late than never.” I pointed to the salt canister in her hand. “And that?”
“Seems the goddess had a few crates of it on the boat she arrived on,” she replied. “When it exploded, the contents went flying.” She aimed her pudgy finger to the front of the cabin, a large stack of charred but otherwise whole canisters sitting at the ready.
I laughed. “We only need one or two, you know.”
Topaz shrugged at my remark. “Better safe than sorry.”
“Good idea,” I allowed. “There’s been too much sorry and not nearly enough safe as of late.” I was now staring at Dara, a pit in my stomach at the lifeless sight of her, her eyes open, gazing into the nothingness, her body tightly bound to the seat. “Open your mouth, sweetie,” I told her. “All of you, open wide.”
And though I might not have been a goddess, at least not on paper, they obeyed just the same, one mouth after the next unclenching, hanging limp. Topaz and Aflo then helped me up before handing me a full canister. “All yours, sweetie,” said Topaz. “After all, you don’t have to watch for those nasty incisors.”
I nodded. “Again, good idea.” I turned to the tethered zombies. “Heads back everyone.” And to their best ability, heads back is just what they did. I then hobbled over, salt poured down Dara’s, then Lola’s, then Ricky’s throats. “Now come back to me,” I told them, rather pleadingly. “And please hurry.”
I heard the first cough a minute later, a second one quick to follow, a third, clouds of salt wafting through the cabin a moment after that, sparkling in the sunlight.
Dara’s eyes blinked, a smile inching northward on her face. “This the other side, hon?”
I shrugged. “If by ‘other side’ you mean Utah-bound, then yes, other side it is.”
Her smile quivered. “Utah? You mean no more drag queens? No more gilded statues? No more fabulous frocks and flowing wigs and towering stilettos?”
I paused before answering.
As to that, I’d already given it some thought, back when I was being held prisoner. I mean, a lot could be said for what the Libetians had created, oddly grounded in myth though it all might’ve been—that is to say, grounded in a bunch of drag queens who, in life, had far bigger livers than hearts. In any case, the islanders were just as trapped as we had been, surrounded on all sides by millions of zombies, and yet they’d managed to make metallic green shine as gold, to turn a veritable hell into a beautiful Eden. And so I gazed upon my love and stroked her cheek. “The stilettos, well, probably not such a swell idea, all things considered, but the rest . . .” I grinned, my mind already picturing it all. And what a pretty picture it was indeed. “Yeah, I think we can work on that.”
***
They left us as they’d picked us up: quickly and with fabulous aplomb, gowns blowing in the wind and kisses thrown as the plane door closed behind them. After all, they had explosives to get rid of, prisoners to incarcerate, libations to drink. Lucky humans. While we had marauding zombies to wait for, a potential war to fight once they arrived. Still, for the time being, New San Francisco was safe from harm.
After that, I gave our friends a quick tour. “So this is Utah,” said Lola, her hand in her husband’s. It’d stayed there since I’d reawakened them. “Any stages, costumes, fanfare?”
I grinned. “Nope, nope, and . . .” I pointed at the thousands of zombies on the other side of the fence, all of them loudly groaning. “That count as fanfare?”
She cringed. “We’ll have to do something about that.”
I smiled at her and then at Ricky and then at Dara, whose hand was in mine, also where it had remained since our flight back home. I’d taken so much for granted over the centuries, missed so many opportunities, but, more importantly, had come to realize that what currently was didn’t necessarily have to be. That is to say, it might’ve been Utah and might have been a salt factory, but that didn’t mean it couldn’t, in time, be so much more.
And time, of course, we had plenty to spare. Strangely, or maybe not, all things considered, that thought didn’t bother me nearly as much as it used to.
“Yes,” I replied to her, smiling widely. “Yes, we will do something about that. Might take a little paint and some wood and nails, a bit of elbow grease, maybe even a tube of Poligrip or two, but why should those Libetians have all the fun?”
Dara squeezed my hand in hers and laughed.
“What’s so funny?” asked Ricky.
“Let me guess,” said I. “You used to know a drag queen by that name? Polly Grip?”
She shook her head. “Actually, no,” she replied, pointing with her free hand at one of our minions. “At least not yet.”