"Not impossible. Not at all. And spilling nat blood now will save a lot of joker blood later."
Patty saw the attendants listening attentively. Alongside her, Kafka was rapt.
Bloat continued. "The reprisals will be brutal, in any case. I have my dream every night, Patty. The dream tells me that the nats are destined to taste the fruits of their own hatred and bigotry. To fulfill that dream, I need more than the jokers and ragtag gangs. We already have a few renegade aces and jokers with useful powers in residence. We can use more. You have some sympathy with our cause, even if you don't agree with my tactics."
He wouldn't let her speak. The diatribe poured out from him, gasping. "Oh, yes, Patty, I hear your thoughts. `The Oddity is different.' You're essentially lawful-you helped Hartmann, after all. You think that no one would want to endure the pain of being the Oddity"
Bloat grinned humorlessly. "They don't have to. David, the one whose body you're holding at the moment, our David and his jumpers can transfer people in and out, can't he?"
"Then why haven't you done it? Why haven't you left that." Patty gestured at the helpless, endless bulk behind him.
The head, so tiny against the body, wrinkled in a grimace. He didn't have to speak for Patty to know that he'd tried it, that it hadn't been successful. Bloat's face suffused with remembered anger. When he spoke, his voice was sharp-edged. "I already know that one new person can be in Oddity and the body still functions. Perhaps two can be gone, or even all three. Perhaps not. Perhaps at least one of the original components must always be in Oddity's mind. I don't know. But I will find out. I'll find out in any way I have to."
[John, Evan, what do I do now?] The silence inside her head was mocking and Patty felt frightened and very alone. The isolation hurt more than anything she remembered from Oddity.
Bloat had paused. In the silence, a soft and prolonged squilching sound reverberated across the lobby, like someone rolling across a half-filled water bed. Gelid, dark masses erupted from pores all along Bloat's body, which rippled around the large pipes impaling him. The black goo rolled, thickened, and then dropped from the slope of Bloat's flanks, leaving behind umber smears. The clumps piled around Bloat, and Patty saw that the tiles around the huge joker were hopelessly stained.
The horrid stench hit her a second later: the odor of concentrated raw sewage. Patty nearly gagged; around her, Kafka and the others struggled to remain stoic. Joker attendants wearing masks came from an alcove and scurried about removing the filth, shoveling it up and placing it in carts. Others toweled Bloat's side.
"They call it bloatblack," he told Patty, answering the question in her mind. "A body this large requires a corresponding amount of intake. The wild card has made it easier-I can digest anything organic. Anything at all. Kafka has made it simple; these pipes connect directly to the Rox's sewer system. But every body, no matter how efficient, has to excrete waste material."
Patty could not keep her thoughts hidden.
"You're disgusted," he said in his choirboy's tenor. "Don't be. It's what the wild card gave me. Is it my fault that this body needs so much, that I must take in everyone else's shit and spew it out again?" The voice had gone strident. He looked at Patty. "Yes. I'm trapped, trapped the way you were trapped in the Oddity. And I don't need your fucking sympathy, you hear! I'll stuff it back down your fucking throat!"
Patty choked and forced the bile back down. She lifted her chin defiantly to the joker. "We won't run Oddity for you. Not me, not John or Evan. Not for what you want it for."
"We'll see, won't we? Maybe we don't need any of you. Serve, or be served," Bloat commented, and suddenly giggled.
" I won't do it," Patty said flatly. "None of us would." Again Bloat's lids flickered down over the satin pupils. "David's the key, not you. He's only interested in his own ego, but I can convince him. From what I sense of John, he might enjoy life on top for once and kicking some nat ass. Evan… Well, maybe your friends will be interested. After all, David and his people supply rapture."
"I don't know…"
"Show her," Bloat said, gesturing to one of the joker guards. He came forward; on the doglike face, Patty could see that the lips, gums, and nostrils were stained blue. The joker took out a small penknife. He snapped open the blade and Patty took an involuntary step backward. The joker ignored her, however. Holding out his left arm, he plunged the blade into his forearm to the hilt and as quickly wrenched it out again. Blood pulsed sluggishly from the deep wound.
The joker grinned. He leaned his head back and laughed.
Patty gasped.
"Rapture makes everything feel good," Bloat was saying as she stared at the joker. "You could cut your own hand off and it would feel like the most wonderful orgasm. Every sensation is transmuted into bliss, at least for a while. With long-term use, unfortunately, it finally dulls the senses completely, until it is hard to feel anything at all, but that's hardly a problem for a joker, is it? Imagine Oddity's pain transformed into a nearly sexual pleasure, and then, slowly, slowly, deadened so you can't feel it at all. Would that be something you might like, or if not you, John or Evan?"
Bloat laughed and smiled grimly at the expression on Patty's face. "Yes, you're thinking it, too. Evan wants out, and I can offer him freedom one way or the other. Are you so sure now, Patty? No, I thought not."
[Evan…]
"You're terrified, aren't you, Patty? You hate the separation from your lovers. You listen and there's no one there. But you enjoy being alone, don't you? You wonder if you could stand being in Oddity once again. You wonder if you shouldn't do all you can to stay in David's body. Well, I tell you, you cant. I need David. But I'm not evil, Patty. I don't intend you harm at all. In fact, I've a gift for you. Kafka?"
Kafka nodded. Rustling, he scurried into an adjoining room and came back pushing a wheelchair. Seated in the chair was a teenager, dark-haired and rather pretty: Her eyes were open, but when Patty looked at her, it was like looking into the face of a dead girl. There was nothing behind her eyes, nothing at all. The body breathed, but whoever had once inhabited that shell was gone. Blackhead sniffed behind Patty; Runt gave a cry of recognition.
"I've been saving this," Bloat said. "The girl jumped a polar bear, which turned out to be an animated bar of soap. Unfortunate. But it has left us with an empty body."
Patty glanced at the body, at Bloat. She tried again to blank her thoughts, to make her mind as empty as the girl in front of her so Bloat couldn't steal her thoughts, but Bloat chuckled. [Evan, John… I'm sorry, but…]
"It is tempting, isn't it? Our jumpers could do it for you. Presto! There you are, a woman again. By yourself. And young, too. You wouldn't be so old."
"I'm not old. I'm only forty."
Bloat chuckled. "So easily offended. Think about it, Patty. We can do it right now. I help you; you help me. Think about it."
Outside the milky, translucent body of Charon, the green depths of the bay were revealed. [John, those are bones out there! Dead people
…] Down below, David only laughed. John didn't answer.
Oddity moaned. John had paid scant attention to Charon or the ride to Ellis, too intent on the interior struggle and the pain.
Evan could feel John tiring rapidly. Nothing of Oddity seemed to be Patty anymore. Her body was submerged and what remained seemed to hurt them more than ever before, as if they were both taking on the portion of the suffering that once was allotted to her. The boundaries between Dominant, Sub-Dominant, and Passive were growing weak and tenuous. Worse, like some residue of the transfer process, parts of David's memory were drifting loose.
[The killing was a kick better than crack man all the nats running and screaming through Times Square…] [Evan, this is what he'd do to us. We can't let him take Oddity.]
Evan wasn't listening to John but to David. [I can let you out Evan let you out and and free of Oddity I can do it…]
[What's he saying to you, Evan? He's trying to block me, but the shields are falling apar
t, too. I can almost hear him.]
Mockingly, more of David's reverie intruded. [With the priest I took the gun he had in his desk and made one of the nuns get down on her knees and suck his cock until he shot his holy wad in her mouth then I made the other one take the barrel in her mouth like it was a dick "make it come, too" I said and when it did it blew the whole fucking back of her head away and then I jumped when the cops broke the door down…]
[Just more of the same garbage. John, you have to listen to me. What if Patty doesn't want to come back in? What then, John? We can't keep David down forever. When he's Dominant, he'll make us do something, something awful, and then he'll jump. He'll jump and leave us with someone else, someone who'll hate Oddity, someone we don't know or love or even like.]
With the thought, their attention was brought back to the outside world. Charon was moving through the sunken graveyard. Many of the bodies still had ribbons of clothing, shreds of flesh. Fish swarmed around the cages of ribs, nibbling and biting; eels swarmed in eye sockets and wriggled from open jaws like obscene tongues.
And something, someone was pushing at them, pressing Oddity's back against the cold, clammy wall of Charon's interior, the flesh beginning to stretch around their back as Charon continued its slow passage. An invisible hand was thrusting at their chest, refusing to let them go any farther even though Charon plodded on. Oddity struggled weakly, but it would not let them loose. [Bloat's Wall Bloat's Wall…] David yammered from Passive. [It's you Evan, it's you.]
With the physical pressure, Evan could also feel a mental lassitude. He no longer wanted to go to the Rox. This quest was useless. Even if Patty were alive, it was futile. They could do no good there. John tried to force Oddity through the unseen barrier as they felt the cold waters through Charon's back, but Evan only watched from Sub-Dominant.
"Stop!" Oddity's broken voice shouted. Charon paid no attention.
[Dammit, Evan. Help me!] Charon's flesh was beginning to thin dangerously. The skeletons outside grinned mindlessly at them, waiting.
[This might be better, John. It would be over. Finished.] [No no no please Evan I'll get you out I will…] [You still want us dead. That's it, isn't it, Evan? That's what you're really saying.] Oddity struggled, took a step forward, but that barely made a difference. The back of their cloak was chill and damp. Charon's flesh bulged dangerously around them.
[You're just barely holding us together, John. I can't keep David back when you fall. He's strong and this time he'll be expecting the pain. He'll know that when it's too much for him, he can just jump.]
[If we're on the Rox, he'll jump back to his own body, Evan. Which puts Patty back with us.]
[I'll have Oddity initiated make you all jumpers so you can get out…]
[Is that fair, John? Are you so possessive of her that you'd punish her like that when she's free? What's betterto let this bastard loose again or to make the sacrifice? We can keep Patty free and take the SOB out with us. What's better, John?]
[I'm Dominant] And with that there was a flailing resurgence of will. Oddity managed two lurching steps back toward the center of Charon. The chill receded. [I'll stay Dominant until we find Patty.]
[And what then, John? What then? It's been sixteen years, John. Long enough.]
[John I'll help you too just don't let him kill us…] David's panic loosed adrenaline. Oddity screamed as John forced them forward once more, trying to keep pace with Charon's slow movement. Fish swirled away from their grisly feast, disturbed by the movement inside Charon's body.
Suddenly they were through. Oddity stumbled and fell as the resistance vanished. Outside, the skeletons were behind them; ahead there were weedy mud flats and the beginnings of a rise. Charon moved between piles of discarded ship ballast as Oddity's lungs heaved and the agony of change lanced through them all. David tried to rise from Passive once more; John only barely managed to keep him down.
He said nothing to Evan. Evan said nothing to him. Charon hissed. Bubbles rose around them and the body began to rise alongside a rust-stained concrete pier. John forced Oddity to its feet and pushed his way through the body angrily, hating the feel of the wet, cold flesh. There were corroded steel rungs set in the concrete seawall. Oddity swung out of Charon and climbed to the top.
They were waiting for him, a ring of jokers armed with a ragged assortment of weapons. Oddity howled in frustration.
"What an interesting mind," Bloat commented, but his tiny face was pained and drawn. "The pain makes it unpleasant even for me. Still, the complexity of a shared consciousness is fascinating."
"Where's Patty?" Oddity grated out. Their voice was barely more than a whisper. Most of John's concentration was utilized in staying Dominant against David's mental pushing. They looked from the guards-standing well back from Oddity-to Bloat, gauging distances as the cloak humped and folded over their madly changing body. Bloat chuckled.
"Oh, by the time you got halfway to me, they'd have shot you dead, but then you've already figured that out, haven't you, John? It is John, isn't it?" Bloat shook his head. "You should lay down the burden for now, John. It's David I want to speak with."
"No!" Oddity tried to shout; it came out more grunt. "Not until we see Patty."
" I don't think that's a good idea." [It's a stalemate, John. You see?]
[You give up too easily.] John's ego weakened with each moment, his hold on Dominant crumbling. Desperation colored his thoughts. Oddity gave a tremulous sigh.
Underneath both of them but rising, rising, David whispered only to Evan. [Look at all the bodies here you can have any one of them no need to play goddamn hero just let me past let me take Oddity and I'll set you free I promise don't let us die…]
"We'll see her," Oddity said, "or we'll see how close we get to you. You kill us or you die. It really doesn't matter. One way we get what I want, the other way what Evan wants. Either way, you lose."
Bloat sighed. "Such a waste." He sighed, then gestured with one tiny hand. " I didn't care to show my hole card so quickly, but I suppose it can't be helped. Bring her in," he said, then nodded to Oddity. "You need to understand the situation. Can David hear me?"
The fencing mask nodded under the hood.
"Good. It's important he does. David, even if you can, don't jump back yet. Ah, here she is…" Somehow, thinking of Patty alone in one body had given them a vision of her as she once had been: dark brown hair swirling around her shoulders and wearing the denim skirt she liked so well with a blouse of unbleached cotton. But the person who stepped from the side doorway was in soiled Levi's and a leather jacket. The body was distinctly male, a youthful, handsome face topped with blond and unruly hair.
"John? Evan?" he [she?] said, and the voice was deep. " I love you both. I miss you."
Patty said the words, and felt the truth of them with the tears they set off in her eyes. Behind her, rubber wheels squeaked against tile. She glanced back at the joker pushing the wheelchair with a young jumper's body. The bait. The temptation.
[Yours. It can be yours.] The knowledge tore at her, and she looked back at Oddity, remembering the pain and the hurt and the feeling of being imprisoned.
"Patty?" Bloat said, and her gaze went grudgingly to the joker. "I need to know. Now. Will you cooperate with me? Do it for yourself. Do it for all jokers. Do it for the rapture. Help me."
Patty looked again at the young woman, at the empty, wonderful body. She also saw Oddity watching and she knew that John and Evan could guess her thoughts as well. Faintly, she saw the fencing mask that was Oddity's face nod, as if in forgiveness. [Go on,] she could almost hear John and Evan saying. [We understand.]
Patty reached out and stroked the girl's face with a yearning wistfulness. The skin felt soft and smooth. She knew she would remember that softness forever.
She turned, trying to remember it all. Trying to pack into these few seconds all the sensations of being alone, of being one.
She shook her head.
"No," she told Bloat, not caring
that David's body was weeping openly now. "I hate Oddity, but I love Evan and John. You only want Oddity as a weapon, and I won't be a part of that. I'd rather be with my lovers again, as we were."
"I'd rather be with my lovers again, as we were." Patty's words startled all of them. Evan could feel the surprise loosen what little hold he had.
Oddity screamed.
All at once, everything inside the Oddity had become fluid. The mind barriers crumpled and went to dust. [John?]
[I've lost Oddity, Evan. You have to-]
The person in David's body was running to them, and his [her?] arms were around them, hugging them and not caring that the body was changing underneath the embrace. Oddity stood there, the arms half up as if unsure whether or not to return the embrace…
[Evan, hold David back…] [I'm trying, John.]
For a moment, Evan was in control of Oddity as Patty [David?] stared up into the bowl of the fencing mask. "My God, Patty…" he moaned. "We love you so much…"
"Evan? It's so lonely out here. I miss you, Evan, John. Please… I want back in." She was crying, clutching tighter to Oddity as the powerful, piebald arms went around her at last.
"But you're free," Oddity said, and the voice was slurred, confused. "I don't understand-"
[Hold him, Evan, hold him…]
[Now, Evan. Let me have Oddity] David insisted. David's will shoved at Evan's weak resistance. Laughing, David shoved past Evan and into the Dominant position. Immediately the Oddity groaned as the full impact of the pain hammered at the youth. Yet this time, prepared for the torture, David clung to Dominant.
Evan did nothing. Nothing.
He let David have Oddity without a struggle.
[You promised me,] he said to David. [Remember what you promised me.]
[Goddamn son of a bitch, Evan…] "Fucking Christ, Bloat, this hurts!"
"Davvd!" Bloat sounded pleased. "Good. Now that you control Oddity, I can say more." He looked down at Patty, who struggled in Oddity's grasp. "I'd continue to hold on to your body. I'd hate to see Patty damage it, which is what she's considering at the moment."