“That’s fast,” Kling commented, knowing it was expected of him.
“You bet it’s fast. That’s why he’s got to get in ten straight wins in the next five weeks. That’s my programme for him, and I’m not taking no chances with it. No chances at all.”
Kling nodded. “Why did you want to see me?”
“It’s like this. Ferdy will destroy Vic Rowan tonight, but because this is a big operation with a lot of heavy money involved, I’m handing you two K. For insurance, if you know what I mean.”
Kling fought to control the pounding in his chest. “You want Vic to throw the fight?”
“He won’t be throwing it,” Raphael explained with mock patience. “I’m generous. I’m giving you and Rowan a thousand each just to accept defeat gracefully.”
“It’s a waste of money,” Grumman said in a sullen monotone. “I’m going to turn Rowan’s brain into mush and let it run out of his eyes.”
Raphael waved him to silence. “What do you say, Sammy?”
Kling’s brain was analysing the situation with cryogenic efficiency. Rowan was going to lose, anyway. The last shreds of his reputation were going, and it was becoming difficult to match him. He was so certain to lose that there was no need even to tell him about the fix. And with two thousand monits in his pocket he, Sammy Kling, could quit the fight game and go into something which offered better returns and more security. The decision was easy to make.
“You’ve got yourself a deal, Tucks,” he said. “The figure was two K?”
“It’s all there.” Raphael took a long envelope from an inner pocket of his jacket and handed it to Kling.
“Thanks, Tucks.” Kling turned to leave and was almost at the door when Raphael called him.
“Sammy! Vic Rowan used to be good, didn’t he?”
“People say that.”
“Just remember,” Raphael said. “You and Rowan have taken my money. I’ve bought you. And if there’s any funny business tonight I’ll put you both through the meat grinder. Got it?”
Kling nodded silently and hurried out of the room.
Rowan brushed his hair, trying not to touch the nowburning lump, and turned to his wife. “Are you coming to the fight?”
“To help carry you out afterwards?” Jane exhaled a cloud of cigarette smoke. “No, thanks.”
“I’ve only been carried out once.”
“It doesn’t matter. Besides, I’ve heard how Grumman fights and I don’t want to see it.” She continued flicking the pages of a magazine with studied disinterest. Jane was always tense and withdrawn just before a fight, but this time something in her manner alarmed Rowan.
“You’ll be here when I get back, won’t you?”
“I’ve nowhere else to go, Victor.”
“I…” Rowan gave up the struggle to find the right words. He closed the door and went down the three flights of stairs to where Sammy Kling was waiting with a taxi. The little man looked perfectly normal but a vague signal from his exo-brain suggested to Rowan that Kling had things on his mind.
“All right, Sammy?” he said as he got into the waiting vehicle.
“I’m all right,” Kling replied gloomily. “A bit worried about you, though.”
“Why?”
“I don’t like some of the things I hear about Grumman. Listen, Vic, when you feel him getting the edge on you – don’t wreck yourself trying to stop him. Just bow out, huh?”
Rowan felt a stab of annoyance. “Why is everybody so worked up about Ferdy Grumman?”
“I don’t think you should risk getting your brains scrambled, that’s all,” Kling muttered. “It’s up to you, of course.”
“I know it is.” Rowan sat without speaking for the rest of the short journey to the stadium. He knew he was going to lose again, that he no longer had the vital drive to win, but some remnant of his former self resented being written off so casually. The perverse notion crossed his mind that it would be worth beating Grumman for nothing more than the pleasure of seeing Jane’s face when she heard the news.
At the amber-lit stadium he got the checking-in formalities over as quickly as possible, and was glad to reach the solitude of a preparation room. It was an important part of the system that dream fighters did not meet prior to a bout, especially in the final minutes when antagonism was high and control of their powers most likely to slip. He lay on the simple bed and half-heard, half-felt the occasional eruptions of cheering from the crowd in the arena above. Grumman and he were fourth on the bill, a good position, and the audience would be receptive when they went on. Lying perfectly still, scarcely breathing, Rowan made himself ready for the struggle ahead.
When the signal came – a double chime from the loudspeaker on the wall – he rose without haste and went along the corridor to the ramp which ascended to the arena. A strongly-built man he recognized as Grumman emerged from another corridor and reached the foot of the ramp at the same time. Rowan was instantly aware of his opponent’s chilling psychic aura, but he went through it, like a swimmer breasting an icy tide, and held out his hand.
“I’ve heard a lot about you,” he said.
Grumman looked down at the outstretched hand and conjured a piece of brown, smoking filth into it. The image was too close to Rowan’s sphere of influence to last for more than a fraction of a second before he blanked it out of existence, but the accompanying mental Shockwave had the force of a physical blow. Face unchanged, pale eyes staring, Grumman walked on up the ramp. Rowan followed him, barely aware of the reverberating announcements which boomed across the amphitheatre, cursing himself for having given Grumman the opportunity to take the psychological advantage.
At the head of the ramp, one on each side, were two low circular bases. Grumman went to the one on the left. Rowan turned right and was still a couple of paces from his base when there was an abrupt silence, followed by the sound of a woman screaming. He spun and found himself facing a thirty-foot-high demon.
A red light began flashing in the judges’ kiosk, to indicate that Grumman had made a foul play by leading off before the signal. Rowan’s senses were swamped by the reality of the beast towering over him. He had seen many monsters during his career, beings designed to inspire fear and thus weakness, but this one was in a class of its own. Its face was a compound of things human and things animal, and of things the earth had never seen. Its body was grotesquely deformed, yet true to alien symmetries – black, powerful, matted with hair in some places, glistening naked in others. And above all, the demon was obscene, massively sexual, with an overpowering realization of detail which had the intended effect of cowing the beholder’s mind. Rowan was closest to the apparition, and he took the full projected force of it.
He moved backwards, instinctively, and felt his way on to his base, filled with an intense reluctance to go on with the fight. It would mean entering a strange intimacy with the demon’s creator, and that was something which should not be asked of him. He considered quitting in that first moment, by stepping down from the base, then came the understanding that he was reacting exactly as his opponent intended, which was something a dream fighter should never do. That was what such contests were basically all about – the forces of nightmare, the conquering of minds by the use of no weapon but fear itself.
Habits developed over many years caused him to probe at the towering demon with intangible sensors, and he found the image hard. That meant Grumman was playing a one-shot, concentrating all his powers into a single protagonist with which he intended to win the contest. The discovery surprised Rowan, because it hinted at a lack of flexibility which was dangerous for any fighter trying to make the big time. He gathered his strength, opened the shutters of his mind, and put up a scaly, slope-shouldered dinosaur, equal in height to the demon but many times greater in apparent mass. There was a gasp of appreciation from the encircling terraces.