The jumpers were clustered together under the watchful eyes of Bloat’s demon guards. The bodysnatcher counted them twice, and came up with twenty-one. Twenty-two counting him. The world’s only middle-aged jumper.
He was taking a risk. Someone might recognize the Pulse body. But the bodysnatcher had made it hard for them.
He’d shaved his head, plastered tattoo transfers over his face. A death’s head moth spread its wings around his eyes. He was wearing a filthy pair of denims and a leather vest. Under the vest he was bare-chested. There was a safety pin through his right cheek, and another in his left tit. His nipple leaked blood like a mother leaking milk. That was all right. The pain kept him sharp. He didn’t think anyone would want to look at him too long.
Finally the huge gate swung open. Jokers on the walls stared down with contempt as they raised the portcullis. Outside, the bodysnatcher glimpsed men in uniform, trucks, a yellow school bus.
For a long moment, no one moved.
Then Juggler took a step forward. He was carrying a beat-up old suitcase in one hand, and the amnesty leaflet in the other. He looked back over his shoulder. “Let’s go,” he said.
The parade of cowards shuffled slowly out through the castle gate. Up on the ramparts, one of the guards unzipped and began to piss down on them as they passed, moving the stream back and forth as jokers and jumpers tried to scramble out of the way.
The bodysnatcher waited until almost the end, when the guard had run out of piss. Then he mixed in with a sorry bunch of jokers. Outside the gate a grizzled sergeant was directing traffic. “Jumpers left, jokers right,” he droned, over and over.
The trucks were parked to the right, military troop carriers, a double row of them. Uniformed soldiers were helping the jokers up inside. Father Squid was there too, tending to his flock. There were way too many trucks. The Combine had grossly overestimated the coward count. Off to the left, the jumpers were boarding a battered yellow school bus. The bodysnatcher studied the setup for a beat, then decided to go right, with the jokers.
He hadn’t taken more than three steps when two soldiers fell in beside him. One put a hand on his arm. “Excuse me, sir,” he said. “I think you want to go that way.” He pointed.
The bodysnatcher imagined all the ways he could kill him. “Where are you taking us?” he asked.
“Routine debriefing,” the soldier said.
The bodysnatcher went to join the other bozos on the bus.
The Outcast had orders for Modular Man. The Outcast was supposed to be Bloat in another form.
Which was certainly on a par with all the surrealism Modular Man had seen so far.
“We need to get some messages out,” the Outcast said. He held an amethyst-headed staff with the same casual, elegant sense of power with which a king held his scepter. “There are teams of jumpers and jokers we have waiting in the city and in Jersey. The only secure method of communications is by messenger.”
“The orders are important,” Kafka said. “We want you to carry them for us.” His mouth parts worked. “The governor has decided we need to take political action.”
“Political action?”
The Outcast gave an apologetic giggle that completely undermined his nonchalant air of authority. “Hey,” he said, “we’re gonna blow things up. Okay?”
“You’re certain?” Herne asked. “I mean, this is something you really want me to do, Governor?” His voice was eager, as were his thoughts — this was Herne the Huntsman speaking, not the daylight personality of Hardesty. The inner transformation had already begun.
“Yes,” the Outcast replied. He looked at the jokers gathered in the courtyard in front of the Crystal Castle. Bloat’s white body, snared in a web of spotlights, could be seen sleeping there, guarded as always by a few dozen jokers and a squadron of fish-knights. In the gathering darkness, the lights of the skyscrapers shone beyond the ebony stones of the Wall out in the bay. The Outcast raised his staff as if in benediction, the glittering rays from the amethyst touching the faces: Mustelina, Andiron, One-Eye, Squirt, Bumbilino, a handful more — all of their minds set and firm.
Angry.
Anxious.
“You want to know about Hartmann?” the Outcast said, and he let his power bleed into the words so that they sparked in the minds of the listeners. “You want to hear what I’ve heard in his mind? Let me tell you. Hartmann’s an ace, or he once was. A powerful ace and an evil one. He could make you dance to the strings of the power in his mind, and he used that power. He used it to get his kicks, to take pleasure from the pain of the jokers he controlled. He used us, his own little pet slaves. He used us to kill and maim and torment, and he let us be blamed for the things he made us do. Oh, Hartmann deserves this. Believe me.”
Herne pulled a handkerchief from his pocket. An ornate “H” was stitched on the cloth. He tossed it on the ground.
“Now,” the Outcast said to Herne.
This was a power the Outcast had never felt before. Most aces seemed to have powers that affected only their own bodies, made them stronger or faster or able to project energy in some way. Like Bloat himself. Hardesty/Herne affected the very shape of reality around him. As it had with so many others, the wild card had taken something from Hardesty’s mind and given it form. In the dark of night, Hardesty could become a figure from Celtic mythology: Herne, the leader of the Wild Hunt.
Herne took the battered silver horn that hung around his huge chest and inhaled deeply. He lifted the horn to his lips and winded the instrument. The note that emerged was pure and crystalline in the night air; as the sound lingered, storm clouds began to gather far above. A wind rose from the east, and the horn shimmered in the joker’s hand, the patina changing from tarnished silver to rich, polished gold, the dings and dents filling in until the surface gleamed and threw back the lights of the Crystal Castle. The Outcast’s skin prickled, the hair on his forearms lifting as if with static electricity. The long call continued to sound, impossibly loud and vast, like a celestial horn calling the end of the world.
But the world didn’t end. Instead, the heavens answered with a barrage of lightnings. As the mournful sound faded, it was replaced by thunder and wind and the wild howling of dogs. A mist rose around the courtyard, incandescent with its own light. The Outcast shivered, but Herne laughed, deep and resonant.
They came, the Hunt.
The mist coiled and folded; from the tendrils issued the shape of the Gabriel Hounds, fierce and glowing-eyed. Herne reached down and plucked the handkerchief from the ground. He threw the cloth toward the pack, and they pounced on it, sniffing and tearing, howling all the while. A lightning flash momentarily blinded the Outcast — when he could see again, Herne was leaping astride an enormous black stallion, and a herd of like beasts paced alongside.
Andiron clashed his steely fists like a gong against his chest and clambered onto the nearest steed, the other jokers alighting a few moments later. “Away!” Herne shouted. The hounds leapt and growled in response, the stallion reared underneath him. The others in the courtyard shouted with the Huntsman, and the Outcast heard his own voice join with them.
A great power here, one that tugs at you like an addiction.
The mindvoices raged like the storm, a cyclone of rage and fury and blood lust, all linked to the madness of Herne. The jokers, the jumpers — they howled like Herne’s beasts; they shouted and raised fists.
“Ride!” exclaimed Herne.
“Ride!” echoed the Rox, and dug their heels into the sides of their horses.
“Ride for Hartmann!” Herne exclaimed. His stallion screamed, the hounds bayed; like an onrushing stormfront, the Wild Hunt tore from the gates of the Crystal Castle, leaving the sleeping Bloat and the Outcast behind.