She drove her shoulder against the plate glass, again, again. Break, damn it, I need shard, sharp, weapon, silicon brittle edge, damn it, break! Bjorn kicked out hard and a shavehead slammed into the window next to Zoe, ass-first through the window, his arms and legs spread like a starfish. Above the crashing noise of the breaking window, Zoe heard a siren wail. She spun around and hoisted herself up onto the display shelf. The flesh of her palms parted on broken glass. She tackled the black mannequin and went down flat across its torso, her mouth pressed to the molded, elegant lips. One breath. Another. The total program, that's all you get. It's now or never, baby.
Zoe rolled away as the mannequin spun into motion. The animation leaped through the window, the gold and topaz necklace suddenly a garrote in inhuman, strong hands, looping around the shavehead's neck and twisting, twisting. The mannequin yanked back, hard, and the thug's head made a funny little jerk, as if he'd just heard someone say something really interesting.
Limp, the dead man and the mannequin sprawled over Bjorn's motionless body.
The Japanese tourist leaned forward and adjusted the focus on his camcorder.
♥ ♦ ♣ ♠
In the ambulance, while terse EMT's said little and worked hard, pounding on Bjorn's chest, Zoe realized what the tourist had been doing. He wanted a closeup of Bjorn's face, of glassy eyes staring into nothing.
And if he took his little recording to the police? From embezzlement to murder in two short weeks. Turtle would be impressed.
Something in the attitudes of the paramedics told her Bjorn was dead. She watched while the gurney bumped across the concrete with its limp burden, and the doors of the ER hissed open.
"Daddy, what do I do now?" she whispered.
The door closed. She did not enter.
Stay and face charges. Act like a responsible citizen. Bjorn would want her to do that. Or would he?
Running away can be the only good choice, sometimes.
She had used her ace and killed a man. Yes, but the man who had killed her father would never kill again. It didn't feel right. It felt wrong. Being a killer felt wrong.
Stay. Let the process of law decide her guilt or innocence.
But what is innocence in a time of genocide? They killed my father in front of my eyes!
Never again.
The embezzlement mess could wait. The "stolen" funds were frozen, and Subtle Scents hadn't lost a dime. Let the lawyers sort it out.
Anne was in Jerusalem by now, the home of the Twisted Fists. They killed five for one, and managed to live with it. Perhaps they had some things to teach a fledgling, angry ace.
If the cabbie noticed her hands were bleeding, he didn't say anything. He took her to Kennedy.
♥ ♦ ♣ ♠
Night flight to Jerusalem. Hassidim and their sober, beautiful children, a collection of Hadassah women chattering like magpies. Zoe followed the line through the corridor into the plane, heading for the Promised Land. She looked for her seat number, thinking, they haven't stopped me yet. The FBI isn't here. The cops haven't delayed the departure. So far, so good.
The lighting was dim. She sat across the aisle from a fairly handsome man, somewhat thin, with black hair, dark eyes, and a nose that would have been lovely if it hadn't had a marked bend toward the left.
"Hello," the man said. He yawned, reached into his jacket pocket, and pulled out what looked to be at least two pounds of chocolate-covered espresso beans. "Want one? They're Kona."
"Thank you, no," Zoe said.
The man began to munch on a handful. "Barely had time to get these before we boarded. I woke up in a cab and found I was an escort for a tour group to Jerusalem. Odd. What about you, young lady? Care for a bean?" He offered the bag to the person in the seat next to Zoe, a small person who seemed absorbed in a book. Useful Phrases in Hebrew. The child read by the light cast by her own eyes.
"No thank you, Mr. Croyd."
Zoe looked across the aisle and saw black and white jackets in the gloom.
"Hi, Jan," Zoe said.
"Shalom." Jan wriggled in her seat and pressed against Zoe's side like a friendly puppy.
The Color of His Skin
Part 7
There should have been a voice - Puppetman, or that nagging Jiminy Cricket who had manifested after Puppetman had died. There should have been someone else in here.
There was only himself.
And he despised the company.
He had run himself unconscious. He remembered streaking into the city after the murder of Rudo, managing to get headed roughly north and east to where Jokertown offered some hope of refuge. Somewhere near midtown, he'd blacked out, though ne'd had the impression that the body continued running. At least it seemed that his new form seemed to have the knack of finding a safe haven while on automatic pilot. Gregg had no idea where he was other than that it was dark and very ... fragrant. He also had no idea when it was, but he had the feeling several days, at least, had passed. It seemed there was a price to his hyperactivity, paid in lost time.
"Hey!" he said into the darkness. There was no answer, inside or out, just a metallic echo of that piping, high voice. He shivered. He sniffed, and took in a cornucopia of odors: the sewers. He was ravenous, too.
He tried walking, splashing through the black effluvium. He found that he could tell when he was about to hit something - a head sense that seemed to emanate from the silly clown-nose ears. "You'd have made a great cave fish, Greggie," he told himself.
No answer.
He was one. Only one.
A few hundred yards and two turns later, he saw sunlight streaming through the holes of a sewer lid. The finger-size shafts of light seemed like the glow from a dozen searchlights after the darkness. There were rungs set in the walls; he dissolved and ate the lowest one, just to take the edge off the hunger, then clambered up, discovering in the process that the body's multitude of legs seemed to have small, clinging suckers on the bottom pads.
Okay. Climbing wasn't a problem.
Gregg pushed at the sewer lid with his hands. It didn't budge. Gregg sighed, thought of his hunger, and ralphed up an enormous glob that splattered on the underside of the metal. He let himself fall; a few moments later, the lid sagged like heated plastic and clattered down beside him. He took a few quick nibbles of the feast and headed up.
He was in an alley, and it was either just after dawn or very near evening. From the odd collection of shapes and forms he saw walking along the street, he was also in J-Town.
What do I do now? Where do I go?
Silence. Unnerving, insistent silence.
Gregg padded out to the street, but discovered quickly that he wasn't going to find the anonymity he expected. He'd thought that he'd just be one of many there, another mishappen body in the midden of Jokertown; he'd thought that even those who might recognize his form as Battle's would ignore him. But ...
Even with his myopic vision, Gregg could tell that he was attracting undue attention, even from those who looked stranger than he did. A four-armed woman just down the street jabbed a companion in his chitinous ribs and pointed in Gregg's direction. They were upwind; Gregg could smell an odd, sour scent to both of them that suddenly intensified. The couple quickly ducked into the nearest storefront. Puzzled, Gregg went to the window of the store, lifting the front end of his body up so that he could look in. He squinted. In soft focus through the smeared glass, he could see the four-armed woman at the public phone. Her companion was looking out; when he saw Gregg, he tapped the woman on the shoulder.