Brennan shook his head as he watched Jennifer sleep peacefully on the sofa. "You've done more for me than I could ever repay. I'll always be in your debt."
Under the high, thin shriek of Tach's screaming was the hideous wet sound of a power saw cutting meat. Fingers and pieces of flesh and bone were flying everywhere. The boy stood there, fine drops of Tachyon's blood spattering his face and arm and leathers with a sound like summer rain, all the time smiling, his mouth open just a little, tongue moving slightly across his lower lip.
It seemed to Jay like he was moving in slow motion. His hand came up, fingers sliding into the shape of a gun… Tachyon staggered back, blood jetting from the ragged ruin of his right hand. The boy's hands were a blur. A cop grabbed him by the jacket. The leather boy sliced off his arm clean at the shoulder like it was the easiest thing in the world and turned back to Tachyon. The alien had stumbled to his knees. The boy reached down for him, almost gently, as if he were going to caress his cheek, stroke that long red hair.
But Jay was pointing. No one heard the pop. Too many people were screaming. But suddenly Mackie Messer was gone.
Dazed, trembling, Jay was hardly aware of the big blond man who came crashing out of the crowd an instant later, glowing as yellow as a bug light and staggering almost in a circle as he punched at an assassin who was no longer there. "Who did that?" he shouted. All around them people were shouting, running into each other. The Secret Service had knocked down Jesse and covered him with their bodies. "An ambulance," a distant voice was calling. "Someone get an ambulance. Dammit, dammit, someone get an ambulance." Everybody was waving guns and Straight Arrow was holding a flaming arrow up over his head. TV cameras were circling like sharks. Jay heard someone say "Ackroyd," but he wasn't sure who. The policeman was still making a hideous noise, but Tachyon had fallen silent. When Jay reached him, the little alien lay on the pavement, still as death, his eyes closed, his right arm clutched to his chest. Blood still came in short, ragged spurts from his wrist, and the ruffles of his lace shirt were as red as his hair. Jay smelled something burning somewhere behind him. Then he was shoved aside, none too gently. Straight Arrow knelt over Tachyon. Dimly, from his own haze of confusion and shock, Jay watched. The man held his hands over the raw wet stump. Pale yellow flames leapt from his fingertips, and the smell of burning flesh filled the air. Tachyon's body thrashed feebly. The stump was black and seared when Callendar stood up. A couple of paramedics lifted Tachyon onto a stretcher. Jay wasn't sure when they'd arrived.
"Ackroyd," someone said. Jay looked around. Straight Arrow was talking to him. "Where did you send him?"
Jay couldn't think straight. "Yeah," he said. His hand was still clenched tightly in its gun shape. He flexed his fingers, ran them through his hair. "Oh Jesus," he said, patting himself to make sure he was intact.
"You!" someone bellowed at him. It was the big blond guy. He looked almost as young as the leather boy. "Who the hell are you?"
"Jay Ackroyd," Straight Arrow told him. "Private cop. They call him Popinjay."
"I had the bastardl" The blond guy made a fist, crushing a pack of cigarettes that he didn't seem to realize he was holding. Little bits of tobacco drippled down over his pants. "I could have turned him into Jell-O! Aw, fuck!" He threw down the squashed cigarettes and kicked them into the crowd. Suddenly Jay recognized Golden Boy. The reports of Braun's death were obviously exaggerated. Nobody ever told him anything.
"Where'd you send him, Ackroyd?" Straight Arrow asked. "Popped him…" His lips were very dry. When he licked them, Jay tasted blood.
The Mormon ace grabbed his lapels and shook him. "Where'd you send the assassin?"
"Oh," Jay said. "New York. The Tombs." Straight Arrow let him go. "Good."
But Golden Boy was a lot less pleased. "He walks through walls!" he yelled. He seemed to feel a need to scream everything. Jay was starting to understand why Braun had never made it as an actor. "He's out by now"
That made Straight Arrow very unhappy. The Mormon gave a long sigh, then turned and walked away. Jay followed him, leaving Braun alone with his histrionics. "Tachyon," Jay asked, grabbing Callendar by the arm. "Is he going to live?"
"Only God can answer that question, Ackroyd. Pray."
6:00 P.M.
Brennan sat in Father 'Squid's rectory, waiting for the dark. The priest was out on an errand for Brennan. Jennifer was still sleeping peacefully on the couch. Brennan had turned on the Father's small black-and-white television, and with the volume turned way down was watching with disbelief the day's events in Atlanta.
The highlight, shown repeatedly from every conceivable angle-and in excruciating slow motion-was Tachyon losing his hand. It was shown again and again until Brennan thought he was going to be sick. The latest word accompanying the footage was that Tachyon had lost a lot of blood and that he'd had such a severe shock to his system that the wound might prove fatal.
Brennan prayed that the little alien would pull through. They were friends and comrades, having fought both the Swarm and the Shadow Fists together, but also Brennan felt that Tachyon was one of the few people in the world who understood his motivations. Tachyon knew why he'd been compelled to fight Kien and the Shadow Fists. He had a sense of personal duty as deep as Brennan's.
As he watched the clip of Tachyon losing his hand for the nth time, Brennan suddenly recognized someone else in the scene. Popinjay was at Tachyon's side. What the hell was the PI doing in Atlanta? Had he abandoned Chrysalis's case, or had some clue taken him to the convention?
As Brennan was wondering about all this, Father Squid returned, carrying a gym bag and a large, flat-sided leather case. He put the bags down before Brennan and said seriously, " I don't know if I should be encouraging you in this, Daniel."
"You're not encouraging me, Father. You know that I'm doing only what must be done." He unzipped the leather case and took out his backup bow. The police had his other bow, and most of his arrows, but Brennan had some left. Enough, he hoped.
He opened up his gym bag and took out a black jumpsuit. He draped it over a chair and continued to wait for the dark.
8:00 P.M.
"I wish George was here," Blaise said.
For a moment Jay thought the boy was talking about George Bush. The hospital waiting room had two television sets, both tuned to the convention, and he'd been hearing a lot about George Bush from the commentators. He was about to tell the kid that the last thing any of them needed right now was a Republican when it dawned on him that Blaise meant his jolly old KGB uncle. "George is in New York," Jay told him. Mackie Messer was in New York, too, but he wasn't in the Tombs. Jay had phoned. Mackie had freaked out, turned a couple of his cellmates into Alpo, and walked right through the bars.
The carnage in front of the Omni kept playing and replaying in his head, like a bad splatter movie. Jack Braun was one of the champion weenies of all time, but maybe he was right, maybe Jay had fucked up, had inadvertently saved Mackie Messer by popping him away before Braun could get to him. Or maybe he'd saved Tachyon's life. He just wasn't sure. And whether Golden Boy could actually have gotten to Mackie or not, teleporting him into the Tombs had been a ghastly mistake. There were other places Jay could have picked, empty, deserted places where no one would have died. Mackie was psychotic, he knew that from Digger, he should have thought about what his reaction would be when he found himself in that cell. But there hadn't been time to think. Everything had happened so goddamned fast…