Half the Blood of Brooklyn

  I wonder if putting a bullet in his other foot will get him to pay attention to me like it did when I shot that one off.

  Instead, I poke in a pile of trash on the floor and find a rat-gnawed chopstick.

  I hold it in the air before my face.

  —Count.

  Nothing.

  I whip it down and drag it through the circle of nonsense on the floor.

  —No! Nononononono!

  He draws the blade of the knife across his wrist, blood runs free as he scuttles forward on all fours and starts painting fresh the lines I’ve broken.

  —No, no, no, no, Joe! Joe, Joe, Joe, Joe, no!

  He freezes, studies the repairs, holds his wrist over the floor to drip the last drops as the Vyrus draws the wound closed.

  I tap the chopstick on the floor.

  —You’re not looking too good, Count.

  He points his gaze at me. His mouth falls open and he tilts his head back and laughs.

  —No, not looking too good. Hunh, hunh, hunh! Not too good, Joe.

  His teeth snap closed and his head drops down and he points the knife at me.

  —Hey, hey, Joe, Joe, Joe Pitt. Know what?

  —What?

  He cups a hand at his mouth, sharing a secret.

  —You gotta rep.

  —No kidding?

  —Know, know, know what it is, is?

  —Nope.

  He glances at Phil, leans closer, keeping his body within the lines of his circle.

  —You gotta rep, says you kill people.

  —Huh, go figure.

  He slaps the flat of the blade to his cheek, presses the steel against his filthy skin.

  —Wanna do me a favor, Joe Pitt?

  I shrug.

  —Won’t know till you ask me.

  He puts the point of the blade in his left nostril, the handle angled toward me.

  —Kill me, would ya? Please, Joe. Pretty please?

  I do think about it. About slapping my open palm against the knife and driving it through his sinus and up into his brain. But it wouldn’t kill him, not right away. The angle is wrong. It’d hurt like a fucker and turn him into a retard, but it wouldn’t cut the medulla.

  Of course, looking at him, it’s hard to say he’d be worse off.

  —Count, I need some information.

  His eyebrows jump.

  —Sure, great, a swap! Kill me and I’ll tell ya anything you want to know, huh?

  I rub my chin.

  —How ’bout a compromise?

  His eyes narrow, looking for a trick.

  —Like what?

  —How ’bout you tell me what I need to know and then I kill you, sound good?

  His eyes close. They open. He takes the knife out of his nose.

  —OK, OK, OK, but no funny stuff. None of your trickery, Mr. Joseph Pitt. If that is your real name.

  It’s not my real name. But the Count isn’t his. So who cares anyway.

  —Sure, no trickery.

  I keep my eyes on his and point the chopstick over my shoulder.

  —Get lost, Phil.

  —Lost? Like, for real or?

  —Go sit in the can and cover your ears and hum real loud so you can’t hear what we’re talking about.

  —Uh.

  —It’s not code, it’s literal. Go do it.

  I wait until I hear the bathroom door close and the sound of “Sweet Caroline” hummed nasal and out of tune.

  The Count’s eyes keep trying to peel away from mine. I clap my hands in front of his face and they pull back to me.

  —Yeah, kill me, kill me, kill me.

  —Soon enough, Count. Questions first.

  I point at a pile of textbooks and back issues of quarterly medical journals heaped within the circle.

  —Been keeping up on your studies?

  —Yeah, yeah, good question. Yeah, I have. More, more, give me more like that.

  I watch the pulse jumping in his neck at death-metal tempo; feel the heat coming off his body; smell the sweaty tang under the shit and blood that speaks of a metabolism careening brakeless.

  —When’s the last time you ate?

  He purses his lips.

  —Ooooh, toughie, toughie. Good one, stumper. But I can get it, I got this one, I got it. Uuummmm. Two weeks? A little more? Yeah, yeah, two weeks, a little more than two weeks. Maybe three?

  Two weeks, maybe three. Fuck. Two weeks with no fresh blood. And he’s been painting the place with his own. He’s beyond starving.

  I look at the closed bathroom door where the tune has changed to “Summer Wind.”—Why didn’t you drink Phil?

  He scratches his balls with dirty cracked nails.

  —Phil? Phil? Jesus, drink Phil? Who’d drink Phil? Guy’s a Renfield. Total Renfield. I don’t want any of that. Nononono.

  —Bull. You’re far enough to try drinking me.

  He gives his fingers a sniff.

  —Don’t wanna drink you, Joe. Don’t wanna drink Phil. Don’t wanna drink anyone.

  —When’s the last time you fixed?

  A shudder runs up his body, his bowels open and try to void, but nothing is left in them.

  He coughs.

  —Sorry about that. Pretty gross. Pretty impolite. Not myself today.

  —When’d you have your last anathema, Count?

  He bites the air, clacking his teeth.

  —It’s bad in there. The anathema is cold, man. It shows you things. I’m on the inside now, man. I don’t wanna be. I don’t wanna know. Want out. Gotta get out. No more on the inside. No more blood, no more blood. Out! Out! Get it out!

  He jabs the tip of the knife into his thigh, poking a few holes and watching a sluggish welling of blood before the Vyrus seals them, coveting what little it has left.

  I grab his wrist.

  —Cool it, man.

  He stops jabbing, looks at my hand, looks at the point where I’ve reached across his circle, tries to twist free.

  —You’ve broken it! It’s broken! Things get in! No more! Out! I want out! Get it all out! Get out! Get out!

  —I’ll get it out, Count, I’ll get all the blood out of you. Listen, cool it and listen.

  He jerks and twitches and the muscles in his belly writhe.

  —Listen? Listen? I hear it all, man, all of it.

  His skin is burning my hand. Air whistles over his teeth and down his throat. Starving the Vyrus, he’s driving it to the edge, pushing it into a corner, forcing it to defend itself. Anytime now, it’ll frenzy and attack.

  I put my free hand on the butt of my gun.

  —Hear this, man. I need to know, Is it possible? If someone had the resources, is it possible, could there be a cure?

  He stops twisting, just his stomach crawling beneath the skin.

  —A cure? A cure? Yeah, yeah, yeah, easy one, the old one. Just gotta get it all out, just gotta get the blood out.

  I pull the gun, show it to him.

  —Sure, gonna cure you, man, but tell me first. A cure? A real cure, could that happen?

  His eyes lock, his breath falters, his body goes rigid.

  I hear his heart stop beating.

  Fuck.

  —Phil!

  The bathroom door doesn’t open, but the humming stops.

  I stand, gun pointed at the Count.

  —Philip! Get out here!

  The door stays closed.

  —Um, kinda busy in here right now.

  I back away from the Count.

  —Philip, get your fucking ass out here!

  The door swings open and he comes out, tugging his slacks up over his skinny ass, a scrap of toilet paper stuck to the sole of his shoe.

  —What, what? Jesus, man, you send a guy to the john to meditate, you can’t blame him when nature calls.

  —Come here, Phil.

  He’s crosses the room, looking at me pointing my gun at the Count.

  —Jeez, you shoot him or something? Not that I heard it or know anything, seeing as w
here I was and all.

  He comes alongside me.

  —Why you still drawing down on him if he’s stiff?

  I hear something move in the Count’s chest.

  He jerks erect as if strings had pulled him.

  Phil takes a step back.

  —Oh, oh, shit, I gotta go.

  I reach out and grab the leather strands of his bolo tie and yank them up, hauling him to his tiptoes.

  He chokes and gurgles.

  The Count vibrates, his nostrils flare, his eyes find Phil’s stretched neck and stay there. He takes a step, a flicker, his foot landing outside the circle, and he howls. Another step, speed blurred. Another howl. He shakes all over, every spasm strobed by the impossible flood of adrenaline the Vyrus has released.

  I give the bolo a jerk and it scrapes Phil’s skin and the scent of blood hits the air.

  The Count comes for him.

  He’s too fast to follow, so I don’t try. I keep the gun aimed at a point he’ll have to cross to get to Phil’s blood, and I start pulling the trigger.

  Two bullets hit him before he hits Phil and drags him from my grasp, the thin cord of the bolo cutting twin stripes across my palm.

  Phil is silent, beyond screaming, eyes wide, mouth stretched, tongue stuck out.

  The Count ignores the holes in his stomach and opens his own mouth and lunges to bite out Phil’s jutting tongue.

  I shoot him twice in the back and he twists off Phil and flings himself at me, raking his nails at my eyes, wrapping his legs around my waist and squeezing, everything too fast for me to stop it.

  But some things the Vyrus can’t change. It’s made him strong and fast and desperate, but it hasn’t made him any more a fighter than he ever was.

  His elbow clips my shoulder and I feel it dislocate. Blood runs down my face. He licks it, finds it poison to him, and wails and spits. I wrap my left hand around his throat and squeeze and fall forward and land on top of him and jam my knee into his gut-shot belly and choke the air from him and he bucks and roils and tears half my left ear off. And I choke him and choke him and choke him.

  When he’s still, I get up and find my gun and hold it.

  Phil sits up, rubbing his throat.

  —Fuck! What the fuck was that? What the hell was that about, man? That wasn’t cool. That wasn’t cool at all.

  I look at the floor, find the Count’s knife and pick it up.

  —Yeah, well, I needed some bait to distract him.

  Phil is on his feet.

  —No shit! I got that. See, don’t know if you missed this part, man, but I was the bait you used. That was so far from cool. That was like, whatever the opposite of cool is, that’s what that was.

  I tuck the gun in my belt.

  —Uncool.

  Phil points.

  —Totally uncool!

  The Count makes a wet sound, blood sputters from between his lips.

  Phil takes a step toward him and stares.

  —Fucker’s not dead, man.

  He looks at me as I come over.

  —Better put a couple in his brain, man, fucker’s not dead.

  I look at the holes in the Count’s stomach. They’re not healing.

  —Yeah, not yet, but he’s close.

  I tap the blade of the knife against my thigh.

  —Hey, Phil?

  He’s trying to untwist his collar and his bolo.

  —Yeah?

  I bring the knife up.

  —Speaking of uncool, I really need him to live.

  He’s looking down, focused on the ends of the tie.

  —Hey, go ahead and First Aid away. Think you’re crazy, but do what you gotta do.

  I place the tip of the knife on his chest and he looks up.

  —What I gotta do, Phil, is I gotta feed him.

  His jaw drops, his head tilts.

  —No way, man. Seriously uncool! Seriously uncool!

  I grab his wrist and twirl the knife.

  —Stop being a pussy, man. I’m not gonna take it all.

  If it was just a matter of blood, I’d slash Phil’s wrist and stick it in the Count’s mouth and let him suck the fucker dry.

  Phil’s lucky it’s more complicated than that.

  He’s also lucky I had some blood yesterday and got a healthy stash at home. There’ve been times, after a scrum like that, I’d have tapped him dry. Not that I want to drink Phil’s blood any more than the Count, but the niceties go by the wayside when you’re hard up. As it is, I spill a couple pints in an empty takeout coffee cup and pour it down the Count’s mouth.

  No surprise, it rouses him.

  No surprise, he wants more.

  But I’ve kicked Phil out by then, a fifty in his pocket for his troubles. With nothing to eat in the room, the Count goes haywire and tries to jump out the window so he can get at all the blood he can smell down on the streets where the night owls are taking the air. I’ve got my boot planted on his neck and I throttle him and pistol-whip him until he settles down.

  Phil’s blood is keeping him in the game, the holes in his belly and back aren’t leaking anymore, but he’s a long way from out of the woods. And it’s not like more blood is gonna take care of everything that ails him. I want to get him talking straight, I’ll need him healed, fed and fixed. But the fix he needs, I don’t got. The fix he needs, I don’t got time to find. And I never will.

  And that leaves one option. Get him clean. And only one place to do that.

  —He was going cold turkey.

  Daniel casts his eyes on the Count’s body cradled in my arms, half-wrapped in the sleeping bag I stuffed him in before dropping it in the trunk of the cab that brought me to the West Side.

  —Really?

  He bends and looks at the Count’s crap-smeared face.

  He looks at me.

  —A friend of yours?

  —Hardly.

  He scuffs the floor with his foot.

  —Well. Bring him in.

  He brushes his fingers at the Enclave manning the door and it slides open, revealing the dark cavern of the warehouse.

  I stay on the loading dock.

  Daniel takes a step toward me.

  —Something giving you pause, Simon?

  I shift my feet, hating it when he uses my real name, but not wanting to get into it again.

  —Yeah, see, I need him alive.

  He raises the skin where his eyebrows used to be.

  —Alive. In truth, he’s rather close to actual life in this state.

  —Daniel, I need him alive in the usual sense. I need him alive and awake and able to talk to me in all the usual senses of the words. I need to know if I bring him in there you’re not going to decide he’s a pariah or some shit and drain him and burn his body and make the ashes into tea or whatever you do.

  A smile jumps across his face.

  —A pariah?

  —Whatever, I don’t know the lingo.

  A frown follows the smile.

  —You may as well bring him in, Simon. We won’t sacrifice him to our dark gods or anything. And it’s too late for you to do much else.

  I bring him in and pass him to the waiting arms of another Enclave and watch him carried away into the candlelit darkness. White shapes move deep inside the concrete-and-steel chamber. Bodies drawn thin by fasting, paled to ivory, shedding hair.

  I think of Evie.

  Daniel walks out and drops his mantis body on the edge of the loading dock, legs dangling, hands tucked beneath his thighs, a thin white poncho made from an old sheet draped over his shoulders hanging to his knees.

  —Nice night.

  I tug my jacket close.

  —It’s fucking freezing.

  He looks up at me.

  —Still a nice night.

  He pats the concrete.

  —Have a seat.

  I stay on my feet, light a smoke.

  Daniel looks away from me and to the gray glow above the rooftops.

  —What’s his name?
br />   —Calls himself the Count. Don’t know what his real name is. I told you about him before.

  —Did you? Hm, I’ve forgotten.

  I blow smoke and steam into the cold air.

  —You don’t forget shit, Daniel.

  He closes his eyes.

  —Don’t I?

  He opens them.

  —It seems to me that’s all I do these days. And what a relief it is. All the nonsense washing out on the tide. I’m a bit confused by the common perception that it leaves one cloudy, old age. I’ve found a great deal of clarity. The years refining my mind, focusing it on a single thought.

  I sidelong him.

  —A bit past old age, aren’t you?

  He swings his legs, bounces his heels off the painted front of the loading dock.

  —Well, it’s all relative. I’d be inclined to say that I’m pretty damn young as this all goes.

  He waves a hand at the universe.

  —But that’s a sorry cliché. Overused. And maybe not even accurate.

  I tap some ash from the tip of my cigarette.

  —How old are you, Daniel?

  He ducks his head.

  —Old enough to know better. At least that old. And old enough to forget. So remind me. The Count?

  I spit a flake of tobacco from my tongue.

  —Spy. Coalition spy. Got sent down to the Society to cause trouble. Terry flipped him. He’s got a load of money in some trusts. Terry flipped him to get at the money.

  —And the state he’s in?

  —I didn’t like some things he did. So I hit him with a heavy shot of anathema. Hooked him to the bad dose.

  The corners of his mouth drop down, drawing the skin tighter over his skull. If you can draw skin tighter over a skull when it looks painted there in the first place.

  —And the procurement?

  —Not my problem.

  Not my problem. The going out and finding some slob to infect, someone who the Vyrus doesn’t kill outright, and harvesting his infected blood and getting it to the Count while it’s still fresh enough to shoot, the entire manufacture of anathema, not my problem. But it’s been happening anyway. After I declined, Terry had to have someone doing it. Hurley, I’d imagine. Keeping the Count alive and on the bad dose, keeping access to his fat accounts open.

  Daniel keeps his frown.

  I drop my butt.

  —It bothers you?