Reaching out, Chrysalis wrapped one short red curl around her forefinger. “So what’s the matter, Tachy?”
“This senseless gang war. Today an innocent caught in the crossfire. A joker child. I think he lives on this block. I remember seeing him on Wild Card Day last September.”
“Oh.” She continued playing with his short-cropped hair.
“Stop that! And is that all you have to say?”
“What should I say?”
“How about a little outrage?”
“I deal in information, not outrage.”
“God, you can be a cold bitch.”
“Circumstances have rather guaranteed that, Tachyon. I don’t ask for pity, and I don’t give any. I do what I have to do to survive with what I am. What I’ve become.”
He reared back at the bitterness in her voice. For she was one of his bastard children—born of his failure and his pain.
“Chrysalis, we have to do something.”
“Like what?”
“Prevent Jokertown from becoming a battlefield.”
“It is already.”
“Then make it too dangerous for them to fight here. Will you help me?”
“No. I take sides, and I’ve lost my neutrality.”
“Willing to sell weapons to all sides, eh?”
“If that’s what it takes.”
“What is it you’re after, Chrysalis?”
“Safety.”
He slid off the stool. “There is none this side of the grave.”
“Go be a fire-breather, Tachyon. And when you come up with something a little more concrete than an amorphous desire to protect Jokertown, let me know.”
“Why? So you can sell me out to the highest bidder?”
And now it was her turn to rear back, the blood washing like a dark tide through the shadowy muscles of her face.
“Okay, let’s come to order now,” called Des, delicately tapping a spoon against the side of a brandy snifter.
The shifting throng gave a final shudder, like a beast falling into sleep, and silence filled the Funhouse. Mark Meadows, looking even more vacuous and absurd in the image-distorting mirrors of the Funhouse, was conspicuous for his very normalcy. The rest of the room looked like a gathering of carnival freaks. Ernie the Lizard had his rill raised, and it was flushed a deep scarlet under the emotion of the moment. Arachne, her eight legs catching at the thread of silk being extruded by her bulbous body, placidly wove a shawl. Shiner, with Doughboy huge and lumpish seated beside him, jiggled nervously in his chair. Walrus, in one of his loud Hawaiian shirts, fished a paper from his shopping cart and handed it back to Gobbler. Troll leaned his nine-foot length against the door as if ready to repel any outsiders.
“Doctor.”
Des dropped into a chair like a discarded suit. As Tachyon stepped forward to face the crowd, he wondered how much longer until the old man was forced to enter the hospital for that final stay.
“Ladies and gentlemen, you’ve all heard about Alex Reichmann?” There were murmurers of assent, sympathy, and outrage. “I had the misfortune to stumble across that scene only moments after the Shadow Fists had made their hit and succeeded in killing not only their intended targets but one of our own. I’ve only been back a few weeks. I’ve heard the stories of intimidation and vandalism, but I thought I could stay neutral. In the words of another, and perhaps more famous, physician: “‘I’m a doctor, not a policeman.’” That drew a couple of laughs.
“But the police are failing in their duty to us,” Tachyon continued. “Not perhaps out of deliberate neglect, but because this war far exceeds their capacity to keep the peace. So I’d like to propose today that we form our own peacekeepers. A neighborhood watch on a grand scale, but with a twist. Many of you fall into that uncomfortable category of joker/aces.” The alien nodded to Ernie and Troll, whose metahuman strength was well-known. “I propose that we also form response teams. Pairs of jokers and aces ready to respond to a call from any concerned citizen of Jokertown. Des has already offered the Funhouse as the central axis, the switchboard, if you will, for incoming calls. People who agree to be part of this effort will turn in times they would be available, and their work and home addresses. Whoever’s on duty here will match a team to the problem spot and send them out.”
“Just a point, Tachy,” called Jube. “Those guys have guns.”
“True, but they’re also just nats.”
“And some of my … er, the Captain’s ‘friends’ are impervious to bullets,” piped up Mark Meadows.
“As are Turtle and Jack and Hammer—”
“So you propose using aces as well?” asked Des, a slight frown between his eyes.
Tach looked at him in surprise. “Yes.”
“May I point out that Rosemary Muldoon tried that back in March, and then it was revealed that she was a member of the Mafia herself. It’s left rather a bad taste in people’s mouths where aces are concerned.”
Tachyon waved aside the objection. “Well, none of us are likely to be revealed as secret members of the Mafia. So what do you think? Are you willing to work with me on this?”
“Where does Chrysalis stand on this?” asked Gobbler. “And is it a comment that she’s not here?”
“Well,” began Tach, shifting uncomfortably.
“Yeah,” called out Gills. “If Chrysalis isn’t here, it’s got to mean something. She may know something.”
Tachyon stared in dismay at the sea of faces before him. They were closing down like night-blooming flowers retreating from the touch of the sun.
“Chrysalis and Des have always been two of the top figures in Jokertown. If she’s not in on this, I don’t trust it,” cried Gobbler, his red wattle bouncing on his beak.
“What about me?” cried Tachyon.
“You’re not one of us. Never can be,” a voice called from the back of the room, and Tachyon couldn’t pick out the speaker. A grinding weight seemed to have settled into the center of his chest at the woman’s words.
“Look, we’re not saying it’s a bad idea,” said the Oddity. “We’re just saying that without Chrysalis it seems like we’re missing a major part.”
“If I get Chrysalis?” asked the Takisian a little desperately.
“Then we are with you.”
Digger Downs was trotting down the stairs from Chrysalis’s private third-floor apartments. Tachyon glared at him and nodded shortly. He noted that the journalist was carrying the current issue of Time with Gregg Hartmann’s picture on the cover and the caption “Will He Run?” and a copy of Who’s Who in America.
“Hey, Tachy. Des. What’s the good word?”
“Beat it, Digger.”
“Hey, you’re not still sore—”
“Beat it.”
“The public’s got a right to know. My article on Peregrine’s pregnancy did a valuable service. It pointed out the dangers of a wild card child.”
“Your article was a sensational bit of garbage.”
“You’re just pissed because Peri got mad at you. You never are going to get a crack at her, Doc. I hear she and that boyfriend are thinking about getting—”
Tachyon mind-controlled him and marched him down the stairs and out the front door of the Crystal Palace.
“I’d consider that an assault,” said Des.
“Let him prove it.”
“You don’t have a lot of sensitivity sometimes, Tachyon.”
The alien turned, leaned against the banister, and frowned down at the joker. “Meaning what, Des?”
“You shouldn’t involve aces in what should be a joker project. Or don’t you think we’re capable of handling it ourselves?”
“Oh, burning sky! Why are you so touchy? There was no implicit slur in my inviting in aces. I would say the more firepower we have the better.”
“Why are you doing this?”
“Because they’re hurting my people, and no one hurts my people.”
“And?”
“And Jokertown is my h
ome.”
“And?”
“And what!”
“You come from an aristocratic culture, Tachyon. Do you by chance view us as your own private fiefdom?”
“That’s not fair, Des,” he cried, but he knew that his hurt was tempered with a sudden flare of guilt. He climbed a few more stairs then paused and said, “All right, no aces.”
Chrysalis was waiting for them, seated in a high-backed red velvet chair. Victorian antiques littered the room, and the walls were filled with mirrors. Tach suppressed a shudder and wondered how she could stand it. And again felt a stab of guilt. If Chrysalis wanted to look at herself, who was he to judge her? He who in many senses was her creator. He frowned at Des, wishing the old joker had not raised so many uncomfortable emotions.
“So without me you’ve got no goon squad,” she drawled in her affected British accent.
“I should have known that you would have heard by now.”
“That’s my business, Tachy.”
“Chrysalis, please, we need you.”
“What are you going to give me for it?”
Des seated himself opposite her, hands clasped between his knees, leaned in intently. “Make a gift to yourself, Chrysalis.”
“What?”
“For once in your life put aside profit and margin. You’re a joker, Chrysalis, help your fellows. I’ve spent twenty-three years fighting for jokers, for this little piece of turf. Twenty-three years with JADL measuring my life by a few successes. Now I’m dying, and I’m watching it all erode away. Leo Barnett says we’re sinners, and our deformities are God’s judgment upon us. To the Fists and the Mafia we’re just so many consumers. The ugliest, most hateful consumers they’ve got, but consumers nonetheless, and our town is their central marketplace. We’re just things to them, Chrysalis. Things who stick their dope in our arms, and our cocks in their women. Things they can terrorize and things they can kill. Help us stop them. Help us force them to see us as men.”
Chrysalis stared at him out of that impassive, transparent face. The skull without emotion.
“Chrysalis, you admire all things British. Then honor an old British custom of granting a dying man his last request. Help Tachyon. Help our people.”
The Takisian held out his hand and twined his fingers through the fingers at the end of Des’s trunk. Drew him close and embraced him. Said farewell.
Concerto for Siren and Serotonin
IV
WHEN CROYD AWOKE, HE pushed aside mop handles, stepped into a bucket, and fell forward. The closet’s door offered small resistance to the wild, forward thrust of his hands. As it sprang open and he sprawled, the light stabbing painfully into his eyes, he began to recall the circumstances preceding his repose: the centaur-doctor—Finn—and that funny sleep-machine, yes.… And another little death would mean another sleep-change.
Lying in the hallway, he counted his fingers. There were ten of them all right, but his skin was dead white. He shook off the bucket, climbed to his feet, and stumbled again. His left arm shot downward, touched the floor, and pushed against it. This impelled him to his feet and over backward. He executed an aerial somersault to his rear, landed on his feet, and toppled rearward again. His hands dropped toward the floor to catch himself, then he withdrew them without making contact and simply let himself fall. Years of experience had already given him a suspicion as to what new factor had entered his life-situation. His overcompensations were telling him something about his reflexes.
When he rose again, his movements were very slow, but they grew more and more normal as he explored. By the time he located a washroom all traces of excessive speed or slowness had vanished. When he studied himself in the mirror, he discovered that, in addition to having grown taller and thinner, it was now a pink-eyed countenance that he regarded, a shock of white hair above the high, glacial brow. He massaged his temples, licked his lips, and shrugged. He was familiar with albinism. It was not the first time he had come up short in the pigment department.
He sought his mirrorshades then recalled that Demise had kicked them off. No matter. He’d pick up another pair along with some sun block. Perhaps he’d better dye the hair too, he decided. Less conspicuous that way.
Whatever, his stomach was signaling its emptiness in a frantic fashion. No time for paperwork, for checking out properly—if, indeed, he’d been checked in properly. He was not at all certain that was the case. Best simply to avoid everyone if he didn’t want to be delayed on the road to food. He could stop by and thank Finn another time.
Moving as Bentley had taught him long ago, all of his senses extended fully, he began his exit.
“Hi, Jube. One of each, as usual.”
Jube studied the tall, cadaverous figure before him, meeting diminished images of his own tusked, blubbery countenance in the mirrorshades that masked the man’s eyes.
“Croyd? That you, fella?”
“Yep. Just up and around. I crashed at Tachyon’s clinic this time.”
“That must be why I hadn’t heard any Croyd Crenson disaster stories lately. You actually went gentle into your last good night?”
Croyd nodded, studying headlines. “You might put it that way,” he said. “Unusual circumstances. Funny feeling. Hey! What’s this?” He raised a newspaper and studied it. “‘Bloodbath at Werewolf Clubhouse.’ What’s going on, a fucking gang war?”
“A fucking gang war,” Jube acknowledged.
“Damn! I’ve got to get back on the stick fast.”
“What stick?”
“Metaphorical stick,” Croyd replied. “If this is Friday, it must be Dead Nicholas.”
“You okay, boy?”
“No, but twenty or thirty thousand calories will be a step in the right direction.”
“Ought to take the edge off,” Jube agreed. “Hear who won the Miss Jokertown Beauty Pageant last week?”
“Who?” Croyd asked.
“Nobody.”
Croyd entered Club Dead Nicholas to the notes of an organ playing “Wolverine Blues.” The windows were draped in black, the tables were coffins, the waiters wore shrouds. The wall to the crematorium had been removed; it was now an open grill tended by demonic jokers. As Croyd moved into the lounge, he saw that the casket-tables were open beneath sheets of heavy glass; ghoulish figures—presumably of wax—were laid out within them in various states of unrest.
A lipless, noseless, earless joker as pale as himself approached Croyd immediately, laying a bony hand upon his arm.
“Pardon me, sir. May I see your membership card?” he asked.
Croyd handed him a fifty-dollar bill.
“Yes, of course,” said the grim waiter. “I’ll bring the card to your table. Along with a complimentary drink. I take it you will be dining here?”
“Yes. And I’ve heard you have some good card games.”
“Back room. It’s customary to get another player to introduce you.”
“Sure. Actually, I’m waiting for someone who should be stopping by this evening to play. Fellow name of Eye. Is he here yet?”
“No. Mr. Eye was eaten. Partly, that is. By an alligator. Last September. In the sewers. Sorry.”
“Ouch,” Croyd said. “I didn’t see him often. But when I did he usually had a little business for me.”
The waiter studied him. “What did you say your name was?”
“Whiteout.”
“I don’t want to know your business,” the man said. “But there is a fellow named Melt, who Eye used to hang around with. Maybe he can help you, maybe he can’t. You want to wait and talk to him, I’ll send him over when he comes in.”
“All right. I’ll eat while I’m waiting.”
Sipping his comp beer, waiting for a pair of steaks, Croyd withdrew a deck of Bicycle playing cards from his side pocket, shuffled it, dealt one facedown and another faceup beside it. The ten of diamonds faced him on the clear tabletop, above the agonized grimace of the fanged lady, a wooden stake through her heart, a few drops of red beside the
grimace. Croyd turned over the hole card, which proved a seven of clubs. He flipped it back over, glanced about him, turned it again. Now it was a jack of spades keeping the ten company. The flicker-frequency-switch was a trick he’d practiced for laughs the last time his reflexes had been hyped-up. It had come back almost immediately when he’d tried to recall it, leading him to speculate as to what other actions lay buried in his prefrontal gyrus. Wing-flapping reflexes? Throat contractions for ultrasonic wails? Coordination patterns for extra appendages?
He shrugged and dealt himself poker hands just good enough to beat those he gave the staked lady till his food came.
Along about his third dessert the pallid waiter approached, escorting a tall, bald individual whose flesh seemed to flow like wax down a candlestick. His features were constantly distorted as tumorlike lumps passed beneath his skin.
“You told me, sir, that you wanted to meet Melt,” the waiter said.
Croyd rose and extended his hand.
“Call me Whiteout,” he said. “Have a seat. Let me buy you a drink.”
“If you’re selling something, forget it,” Melt told him.
Croyd shook his head as the waiter drifted away.
“I’ve heard they have good card games here, but I’ve got nobody to introduce me,” Croyd stated.
Melt narrowed his eyes.
“Oh, you play cards.”
Croyd smiled. “I sometimes get lucky.”
“Really? And you knew Eye?”
“Well enough to play cards with him.”
“That all?”
“You might check with Demise,” Croyd said. “We’re in a similar line of work. We’re both ex-accountants who moved on to bigger things. My name says it all.”
Melt glanced hastily about, then seated himself. “Let’s keep that kind of noise down, okay? You looking for work now?”
“Not really, not now. I just want to play a little cards.”
Melt licked his lips as a bulge ran down his left cheek, passed over his jawline, distended his neck.
“You got a lot of green to throw around?”
“Enough.”
“Okay, I’ll get you into the game,” Melt said. “I’d like to take some of it away from you.”