Dealer's Choice

  On the floor, the stupid nigger squatted with one hand raised over his thigh, like a statue carved from ebony.

  The bodysnatcher had all the time in the world.

  He was an arrow of light, a burning lancet. He slid through the air with glacial slowness, floating toward the immensity that was Bloat. Tons and tons of smelly white jelly, his heart and lungs buried God knows where inside. But the governor’s head was still almost normal. That was where he’d start, the bodysnatcher decided. The eyes first. Then the ears. And only then the brain. He would make it last.

  Then Wyungare got to his feet and floated up through the blue gloom in front of Bloat. “Is it my turn now?” he asked.

  Coherent light… slowed. Halted. It was impossible.

  “My turn?” said the black man again. Wyungare smiled. He interposed his body between the bodysnatcher and Bloat. The light-form hung incredibly suspended in the blue spectral twilight.

  A physical impossibility.

  “Improbable, yes,” said Wyungare aloud, grinning hugely, teeth shining in the gloom. “Impossible, no.” He received the electromagnetic translations of words. converted them to speech forms.

  You will die now, nigger-man.

  “So?” Wyungare shrugged. His hands moved slowly through the air, as though performing the most delicate motions of an elaborate dance. “Dying is not the point of all this. Life is. Heating is.” The light-form seemed to convulse in the suddenly thick air, pulsed as though struggling to move, then slowly accelerated toward Wyungare and the immense being behind him.

  Burn, you asshole.

  Wyungare took away his hands, baring his breast, exposing his heart. “Need a target, my bodysnatching friend?”

  The light-form somehow picked up velocity in this energy half-world.

  The fury: I’ll barbecue you, you miserable jigaboo!

  Wyungare laughed. “Is it so important to you that my color’s not to your liking? That I’m what, in a better mood, you’d call black?

  “Then try this!”

  Absolute crimson preceded the light-form. Blue trailed out behind.

  And Wyungare became black. Literally. Physically. Spectrally.

  Black as space without stars. Black as the ace of spades. Black as.…nothing.

  And the light-form entered his heart.

  The fury of energy ravened for food, sought fuel to burn, fed on itself, began… with horror… to be absorbed.

  I cannot hold multitudes, thought Wyungare, and I cannot contain all of this.

  There are limits.

  He absorbed what he could.

  And the rest he let flare out harmlessly in every direction except toward the child. The young man. The being he recognized was newly mature. That being he protected.

  There was a need.

  Wyungare wished he could see himself.

  And was glad he could not.

  His last image in this world, in this time, in this body, was Cordelia.

  His final feeling was love.

  And then the energy simultaneously was absorbed, and consumed him.

  The Fist ace said his name was Herne. He proved to be a reliable, if sullen, guide. “It’s right through there,” Herne said sulkily after leading what was left of the team through a number of Bloat’s underground chambers. “Not that it’s likely to do you much good. The governor knows you’re here.”

  “He hasn’t stopped us so far,” Battle muttered. He took off his backpack and pulled a package from it. He tore away the wrapping paper, revealing a folded black leather jacket.

  Son of a bitch, Ray thought, he really did have Black Eagle’s jacket.

  “Our ace in the hole,” Battle said triumphantly. “Put this on after we enter the throne room,” he told Cameo. “Bloat will never suspect the presence of another ace. This will give us the edge we need.”

  Cameo looked at it doubtfully. “What are we going to do when we find Bloat?”

  Battle stared at her. “What we have to do.”

  “I’m not going to kill him,” she said. “I don’t kill. Period.”

  Battle smiled. Ray didn’t like the look of it. “We’ll see. In the meantime just think of all the extra protection this jacket will give you. It might make the difference of coming out of this dead or alive.”

  Cameo nodded doubtfully.

  Battle looked at Ray. “You’re a good soldier,” he said meaningfully. “You know what we have to do.”

  “Let’s stop talking and just do it,” Ray said. He pushed through the doorway and into Bloat’s audience chamber.

  They were on a little balcony that overlooked the chamber from a height of about ten feet. The first thing that struck Ray was the god-awful smell emanating from the monstrous white slug that was Bloat. It was one of the most hideous sights that Ray had ever seen. But there was something more, a sense in the room, an air that something had just gone terribly wrong.

  The bombardment had not been in vain. A direct hit had shattered the throne room’s crystalline dome. Pieces of the dome lay over the floor and Bloat both. There were gaping holes in what was left of the dome through which the stars looked down on a scene of carnage and confusion.

  Bloat’s joker guards lay dead on the floor like abandoned dolls. Bloat himself was dripping smelly, viscous ichor from a dozen small wounds. He seemed to be in shock as he stared at the loincloth-clad body of a black man who lay dead on the floor in front of him.

  “Something big just went down.” Battle said. “They’re all in a muddle.” He shoved the jacket at Cameo. “Now’s the time to strike.”

  She took the jacket after a moment’s hesitation and put it on. Battle smiled gleefully, Ray frowned, and Herne watched dumbfounded as Cameo’s face suddenly went slack. It remained unfocused for a long moment, then she screamed as if terrified out of her wits as her face twisted into an expression of pure, sadistic hate. Before, when she was Blockhead, you could still see Cameo underneath. Now all traces of Cameo were submerged, as if she’d fled to the deepest corner of her psyche to escape whoever it was who’d taken charge of her body.

  “Cut it up!” Battle screamed, pointing at Bloat. “Kill it and I’ll let you keep the body you’re wearing!”

  “Christ!” Ray whispered.

  Cameo’s shoulder drooped, as if her back were bearing an unendurable burden.

  “Listen to me,” Battle said slowly and distinctly. “Kill that mountain of fat over there and you can keep the body you’re in. You can live again.”

  Confusion was replaced by a look of animal cunning as the rider of Cameo’s body stared at Battle. She nodded, drool spilling from her twisted mouth. She approached Herne, who stood between her and the stairway that led to the throne room’s floor, and she began to whistle a familiar tune as her hands started to vibrate.

  “Get back!” Ray screamed at Herne. “It’s not Black Eagle. It’s Mackie Messer!”

  Herne stumbled backward, trying to get away from the reincarnation of the psychopathic ace with the buzz-saw hands.

  “You bastard!” Ray screamed, unsure himself whether he was addressing the lying shit Battle or the twisted ace advancing on Herne. He hesitated only a moment, then he moved. He leapt, lashed out with his foot, and caught Cameo’s body on the hip. He pulled the blow at the last moment, realizing that he was facing a double dilemma. Mackie Messer, who had once un zipped him from crotch to sternum, was in Cameo’s body. Normally, as he understood it, Cameo could control the psyches she channeled. But Messer was a twisted psychopath filled with such murderous rage that he must have momentarily overpowered her and gotten complete control. Maybe she’d be able to force her way back into the driver’s seat, maybe not. But in the meantime Mackie had her body and Ray had to stop him without injuring it. Last time they’d met he’d hammered the shit out of the little Nazi, and still lost. This time he had to take him out without damaging him.

  Ray knew he had to stop Messer. Ray wasn’t a deep thinker. He was a fighter, a living weapon who gloried in comb
at. But Battle had crossed the line by calling the evil little psychopath back to life. It was up to Ray to stop them both.

  Messer tumbled with Ray’s kick, falling down the short flight of stairs that led to the chamber’s floor. For a moment Ray thought that the fall might have stunned Messer, that Cameo could regain control, but they had no such luck.

  Messer looked at him with Cameo’s beautiful eyes. “I know you,” he told Ray. “You hurt me once.” And he was back on his feet, his hands a buzzing blur.

  Ray leapt down the stairs, landing on the chamber floor facing Messer. Messer stared at him as drool ran down Cameo’s fine-boned jawline. “But I hurt you even more,” he said, turned, and ran straight at Bloat.

  Bloat finally seemed to rouse himself from his deep stupor. He screamed wordlessly, but that only served to incite Messer the more. He called for his bodyguards, but they were all dead or fled. He was alone.

  Ray sprinted after Messer, but the hunchbacked ace had too much of a head start. He reached Bloat and sank his right arm to the elbow in Bloat’s slug-like side. He slashed, slicing a three-foot-long gash in the pulpy white flesh. Buckets of foul-smelling ichor pumped out of the wound. Bloat screamed. Ray gagged, but continued the pursuit.

  Messer whirled and slashed at Ray, who turned with the grace of a ballet dancer, barely avoiding the blurred hand. Ray switched direction again and came in low, swiping at Messer’s legs. Messer scuttled backward like an angry crab, waving his arms in Ray’s face. Ray feinted a lunge. Messer buzzed him and Ray pulled back, circling.

  “Let Messer kill the fat freak!” Battle shouted.

  Without looking, Ray shot Battle the finger. He tried to sweep in low and knock Messer off his feet, but the ace was too fast. He chopped at Ray’s neck. Ray dropped back, barely in time, as Messer’s hand caressed his cheek that suddenly became covered by a sheet of blood.

  Christ, Ray thought. How can I beat Messer without hurting Cameo? And then he had it. He didn’t have to beat Messer at all. He just had to beat the jacket.

  He reached down for the knife sheathed at his ankle, drew it, and pointed it at Messer.

  The ace tittered. “A knife? A knife against Mackie Messer?”

  “Let’s dance, motherfucker,” Ray mumbled, his tongue probing the gaping wound in the side of his face.

  He feinted a lunge. Messer chopped down with a blurred left arm. Ray went in over Messer’s arm and sliced the back of the jacket from the neck to the waist. Messer righted himself and took a sideswipe at Ray that missed.

  They were still in close quarters. Ray punched Messer in the gut and the air rushed from Cameo’s lungs in an explosive gasp. But Messer still swung reflexively at Ray as he arched backward, and buzzed through the agent’s jaw and cheek. Blood blossomed from Ray’s face, saturating the front of his fighting suit. Ray growled inarticulately as Messer collapsed, holding his stomach with both arms. Cameo’s body wasn’t used to such abuse and it sagged with the pain of Ray’s blow.

  Ray lunged forward again with the knife, slashing at the back of the jacket. It snagged momentarily, then cut through the leather. The jacket separated into two pieces and Messer suddenly seemed to realize what Ray was doing.

  He screamed as Ray grabbed both halves of the jacket. Messer twisted and connected again, slicing through Ray’s rib cage, but Ray was already winding up and he was pissed and he suddenly didn’t care if it was Cameo’s body or not.

  He whirled Messer by the jacket’s arms, hurling him into the chamber’s stone wall. Messer slammed into it with stunning force, bounced, and came back right into Ray’s arms. Cameo’s eyes were glazed as Ray ripped the jacket off her body and in a frenzy of strength tore it to bits before he threw it to the floor.

  Her eyes fluttered for a moment and when she opened them again they were Cameo’s eyes, unaffected by the sadistic violence of Mackie Messer.

  “You’re bleeding,” she said to Ray.

  He looked down at his side. “Yeah,” he said. “I do that a lot.”

  “Where’s the ambulance?” Tom wanted to know. His voice was edged with hysteria. “I called for an ambulance. We need to get her to a hospital, she needs help, a doctor, something —”

  “Take it easy, mister,” the older cop said. He was a beefy man with a crooked nose and a mop of black hair. He pulled Tom aside while his partner went to check out the bedroom. “The parameds are on their way. Probably took a wrong turn in the fog. Nobody lives down this end of Hook Road.”

  “She needs help!” Tom said. He was shocked at how shrill and crazy he sounded. He turned away, started to run his fingers through his hair, stopped when he saw the blood on his hands. What a sight he must be. He’d pulled on a pair of pants, but he was still bare-chested, still bloody where he’d cradled Danny, talking to her until he heard the sirens. No wonder the cops had looked at him funny.

  “You told the dispatcher your name was Tom Tudbury,” the cop was saying. “Our records show that Mr. Tudbury died three years ago. Suppose you tell me who you really are, and what the hell you’re doing out here.”

  “That doesn’t matter,” Tom said. “Just help her, okay? Where the fuck is that ambulance?”

  The cop was about to say something else when his partner emerged from the bedroom. He was a fair-haired kid with freckles. He looked green. “You’d better take a look, Al,” was all he said.

  Al went to look. His rookie partner stood by the bedroom door, staring at Tom. There was a strange light in his eyes. “What?” Tom said. “Don’t look at me that way.”

  “You son of a bitch,” the kid said coldly. “You fucking butcher. Why’d you do it?”

  Al reemerged with a grim look on his face. “Call it in,” he told his partner. “And get the coroner out here.”

  “No,” Tom said. “She needs a doctor. She’s not dead, she can’t be dead, you don’t understand, she’s an ace, she has… she has powers … powers and …”

  The two cops exchanged a look.

  Tom couldn’t take it anymore. “NO!” he screamed.

  The older cop was removing a set of handcuffs from his belt. “You have the right to remain silent,” he told Tom. “If you do not remain silent, anything you say can be used against you in a court of law.”

  Tom held his hands up in front of him, backed away, shaking his head. “You don’t understand,” he said. “It wasn’t me. It was Bloat. Those bastards out on the Rox. The dogs. She said dogs … the Hunt … her sister was with the covert team… they’re all the same person, don’t you see?”

  “You have the right to an attorney,” the cop continued as he started toward Tom, cuffs in hand. He grabbed him hard, spun him around, shoved him against the table. “If you can’t afford an attorney, one will be appointed for you,” he said as he pulled Tom’s left aim behind his back, cuffed him, reached for the right

  Modular Man’s leg was on the table.

  He reacted without thinking, grabbing the leg by the ankle, wrenching free with a strength he didn’t know he had, spinning, swinging. There was a sharp crack as the leg smashed across the policeman’s temple. He staggered. Tom shoved him to the floor, jumped over him.

  The kid cop had his gun clear of the holster. He swung it up, aimed it with both hands. “Freeze!” he yelled.

  Tom froze. Then the kid blew clear off his feet, right back through the window. Glass exploded all around him. He landed on the porch. Tom ran right past him. The dogs were barking as he plunged into the labyrinth of the junkyard. After a moment he heard running footsteps, then curses. The fog was his ally. A warning shot echoed through the night. Then the sounds receded.

  He was panting hard by the time he reached the shell.

  “Traitor!” Battle cried.

  Ray looked up to the balcony to see him pointing his rifle down at them.

  “Twisted genes will always show,” Battle intoned.

  “Fuck you and your genes,” Ray mumbled wearily.

  “I guess I’ll just have to take care of this by myself
,” Battle said, smiling gleefully and aiming his assault rifle at an again-comatose Bloat.

  “I think not,” a new voice said, immediately capturing everyone’s attention. It was the Outcast. He was hurt and bleeding and obviously dead tired, yet he managed to stand without help. “Put down your weapon,” he told Battle.

  Battle pouted as Herne snatched his rifle and turned it on the agent.

  “No!” the Outcast cried. “The killing’s over.” He looked down at the dead black man. “Everything’s over. He was our last chance. He could have saved everyone without more violence, without more death.”

  “What happened?” Ray asked.

  “He was killed by one of the jumpers.”

  “What exactly the hell are you talking about?”

  “He could have connected us with the shamans,” the Outcast told Ray, “powerful men and women who could have taken us to a place where we wouldn’t have to fight, where we wouldn’t have to be killed.”

  Ray was suddenly deathly tired. “That sounds good to me.”

  The Outcast sighed, then winced and tucked his elbow tight against a bleeding wound in his side. “It won’t happen now.,’

  “Because this guy is dead,” Ray said.

  “That’s right.”

  Ray looked at Cameo. “Maybe we can help you.”

  Upriver, the fog finally grew thin.

  He detoured around the Rox, its battlements still cloaked in mist. He could feel its presence even if he couldn’t see it. He knew they were there. Bloat and his demons. The jumper bastards who had taken Pulse and Mistral and used them to kill and kill and kill. The antlered hunter and his terrible hounds. All of them were down there, with Danny.

  He wondered what she’d been like, that seventh Danny, the one he never knew.

  North of the Rox, flying high above the fog, he angled out over the Hudson, and headed north.

  He saw the towers of Manhattan dimly through moving curtains of mist, scattered lights burning forlorn and frightened in the night. The fog had shrouded the whole island now. How far would it spread? Did Bloat’s power have a limit? Could he cover the whole city? The state? The world?