He gestures to the warehouse.
—We don’t have much, but I do know how to use a pay phone.
I slip the paper into my pocket.
—Any tips on how I can get up there?
He stands on tiptoe to look into the pot, then reaches for a giant wooden spoon and gives the contents a stir.
—You could do what the Duke suggested.
—The Duke?
—Ellington.
—Yeah, what was his idea?
He smiles.
—Take the A train.
—Been saving that one up for a rainy day?
He shrugs.
I look at his skin, trying to find some evidence that he was ever anything but pasty white, ever a guy that could have been with the Hood. Can’t find it.
I point at the pot.
—By the way, what’s cooking?
—Bones.
—No kidding? Thought you guys already ate.
—One of us failed last week. We’ll crack his bones and eat the marrow tonight. You could stay.
—I’ll pass.
I leave him there, stirring his pot. At the warehouse door, I pause. I turn around and look back up at the loft. Daniel is at the top of the stairs, watching me.
I remember what else he told me, what he told me last time, after he told me that he’s failing. He told me someone would have to replace him.
Well, fuck that, that’s none of my fucking business whatsoever.
I haul the door open and walk out into the night, leaving the smell of steaming bones behind.
The A train. As if I couldn’t have figured that for myself. As if I haven’t been trying like hell to avoid it.
I come out of the Enclave warehouse onto Little West 12th and think about the A train. All this territory around here is no-man’s-land. This is the turf no one wants because it’s too close to the Enclave. I can grab the A at 14th, but that will put me right on the Coalition’s southern border. They’ll have spotters. Better I go to 4th Street and catch it there. Stay in no-man’s-land, where no one is watching. Once I’m on the A, I’ll have more than enough opportunities to get caught out.
The Coalition doesn’t like anyone riding the rails under their turf. The major stops, Grand Central, Penn Station, Times Square, Columbus Circle, you come walking out of one of those stations and you’re nailed. They got spotters living in apartments, watching over the exits. Slobs that never go out. They just sit there at the window all night, snapping pictures through telephoto lenses, changing videotapes in their cameras and flipping through face-books to see if they recognize anyone. Rent is paid by the Coalition, along with an allowance to cover takeout from the local diner. Once a week an enforcer comes in, picks up the video and the film and the logbook, and drops off a fresh pint. The smaller stops, they got guys there, too. May only be every other stop, but you don’t know which ones. Just like you don’t know which train one of their enforcers will be cruising, looking for interlopers. If I get on at West 4th and ride express to 145th, I don’t have to worry about those spotters aboveground. But from 14th to 110th, anywhere in there I could end up with an enforcer on the train. How do I know all this? Because the Coalition wants everybody to know. It’s their way of saying, Stay off the grass. Trespassers will be prosecuted. And if they let you know about the spotters and the patrols, that means they’re only the tip of the iceberg.
The A train. Thanks for the help.
I take a cab to West 4th to save time. I think about telling the cabbie to turn the thing around and take me uptown, but that’s a worse play than the subway. On the train I’ll only have to worry about the patrols, and there can only be so many. In a cab, going through rush hour traffic, there are too many chances of getting spotted from the sidewalk or another car. Too random. So the Duke Ellington Express it is.
I get out of my cab at 4th and Sixth. It’s dark and cold, but the lights inside The Cage are on and a half dozen guys in sweats are playing three on three. I stop and light a smoke and watch. I’m in a hurry, but this is a long fucking train ride and I can’t smoke down in the hole. There’s a small cluster of people standing next to the tall chain-link fence watching the showboating street-ballers inside. They whip no-look passes at each other or lob alley-oops. No one plays D. I finish my smoke and light another. 4th to 145th? Even on the express that’s a two-smoke ride.
It’s no-man’s-land. I can take the time for the smoke. No one comes onto this turf. No one risks walking across it, let alone hunting or doing business on it. No one risks doing anything that might offend the Enclave. Piss the freaks off and they come for you. End up eating your fucking marrow.
Eating your marrow?
Doesn’t it have something to do with blood? Shouldn’t they get sick if they eat another Vampyre’s marrow? I mean, even if you boil those bones, the Vyrus has been in there. Shit. That’s weird. And what did Daniel say? That again. What the fuck was that about?
Color me pensive. Color me lost in thought and avoiding getting on the train, lighting a third cigarette without even thinking about it, because that’s my story. That’s my excuse for why I don’t smell Tom until the fucker jams the barrel of his gun in my back.
—What is it, Pitt? Old dog syndrome? New tricks just don’t sink in? Can’t get it through your head to stop fucking around on my watch?
He shoves the gun a little deeper into my backbone, hurrying me east on 4th toward Washington Square Park and the Society border.
—Hadn’t heard no-man’s was part of your beat now.
—Fuck off. You know what I’m talking about. Shaking down pledged members on Society turf, going into their homes and grilling them on Society business.
—Where you get that?
—Think you’re the only one who can pump Philip Sax for information? Get out the rubber hoses and that pussy opens up and spills everything. Didn’t even have to lay in to him. We did anyway, just to teach him a lesson, but we didn’t have to.
He’s alone. Tom’s not the brightest bulb, but he knew better than to follow me over here with a troop. Enclave would have had his ass for that. But he’ll have partisans waiting across the border. We set foot on the far curb of Washington Square East and I’ll be bracketed by his boys right away.
—Not even Terry’s gonna be able to help you on this one, Pitt. Poking on our turf without our say-so. Poking into official Society business. And then crossing over to report to those assholes? Fucking-A, I knew you stooged for the Coalition, but Enclave? That’s just sick. Fronting for those mujahideen motherfuckers.
—Got your head on a swivel, Tom? Keeping your eyes peeled? One of those motherfuckers hears you talking about them like that, they’ll find you in your safe house and flay you alive with their teeth.
—Fuck off. Fuck off and walk.
I glance back at him.
—Seriously, you ever see them in action? Scary shit. Like Bruce Lee on speed. Only like if you had to cut off his head or something to kill him. Saw two of them spar once. One got his arm torn off, kept coming. Other arm came off, kept coming. Got his leg wrapped around the other guy’s neck, brought him down and scissored him. Squeezed the guy til his eyes about popped out. Whole time he’s spraying this white gunk from his stumps. That was sparring. Scaaaaary shit.
—Shut the fuck up.
I glance back again as we cross Washington Square West. His eyes are zipping side to side.
The light is against us at Fifth. I step off the curb as a battered and graffitied delivery van whips around the corner. Tom grabs my left arm and pulls me back into him, the gun getting pinned sideways between us. He knows right away he’s made a mistake. Poor him.
He tries to keep his grip on my arm while he gets the gun barrel jammed back where it belongs. And he is a strong fucker. But Mr. Two Pints In Two Days is stronger just now. And faster. I go left, twist my arm free and clip him with my elbow as I dodge into the street and around to the far side of a NYC Parks Department pickup sitting at the curb. He takes a couple steps aroun
d it to the right. I go right. He goes left. I go left. He shows me the gun, flashing it low and out of sight from the people on the sidewalk, reminding me who’s in charge.
—Get the fuck over here, Pitt.
—Why?
—Get the fuck over here or I’ll shoot you.
—Park’s full of undercover cops looking to bust the dealers in there. Pull the trigger and they’ll be on your ass in a flash. Throw you in a cell. That’s if you’re lucky, if the Enclave aren’t watching. Waiting to see if you’re gonna cause a scene.
—Shut the fuck up.
—Shit, Tom, don’t you ever bother to put together a plan? I mean a good one.
—Shut the fuck up.
—Know what Terry calls you behind your back?
—Shut!
—Halfcock.
—The!
—I assumed it was cuz you’re always going off that way.
—Fuck!
—But maybe he knows something I don’t.
—Up!
—If you get what I mean.
He gets it.
He comes storming around the hood of the truck, shoving the pistol into one of the huge pockets of his army surplus jacket, those dirty blond dreads flying behind him.
—Gonna kick your fucking ass. Gonna beat your fucking face like I beat it before.
He did beat my face pretty bad that time. I got a gap between two molars that used to be filled by a third molar before he knocked it out. That pissed me off. So when he comes toward me with his fist raised, I let him tag me once on the neck and grab his sleeve and pull him close so he thinks I want to grapple, and then I use my free hand to whip out the .32 that’s still tucked in the back of my waistband because he was too fucking stupid to give me a little pat-down when he got the drop on me, and while he’s trying to wrap his hand around my throat I press the barrel against the top of his thigh and pull the trigger.
The shot is muffled by our bodies, but the folks who were just slowing down to look at our little scuffle decide it’s best to keep moving along. Tom falls to the ground, hands pressed over the hole in his leg, and I turn around and start walking quickly back toward Sixth. I mix in with the folks a little farther down the sidewalk and listen for the telltale sound of running feet that would mean there actually were a couple cops in the park wasting time on the dime-bag dealers.
I don’t bother looking back to see what Tom is doing. He’ll be on his feet by now, but he won’t try coming after me with that hole in his leg. He’ll be moving as quickly as possible back toward the Society border, making for the partisans he has posted there, hoping like hell there are no cops around. Once he crosses onto his own turf there’ll be a safe house right around the corner, the place he was planning to take me.
I reach The Cage and walk past it and down the steps into the West 4th Street station, crossing my fingers that Tom didn’t get nabbed. I might get away with shooting him, but if he gets busted, if it ends up being that kind of scene, I may as well take this train to the end of the line and get out and start walking ’til I walk right off the edge of the island.
It’s just after six. The train is packed tight, the commuters squashed against each other in the aisles bitterly eyeballing the commuters squashed together on the seats. I press through the clot of bodies that always forms around the doors and find a little elbow room at the end of the car, the last car on the train. We pull out and everyone lurches.
We cover the distance to 14th in a couple minutes. A bunch of people spill out of the train to make a connection, but even more cram themselves on. The intercom buzzes static as the conductor shouts at the passengers, telling them not to block the doors. The doors close and we’re off. Across the Coalition border.
I stand a little taller than most of the bodies squeezed in here. I use the height to scan the faces. I don’t smell anything I shouldn’t, just the rank air and the sweat slowly starting to trickle beneath everyone’s parkas. There could be a Coalition Renfield on board, but I don’t see anything. Fair enough. The real danger starts at 34th, the first stop in Coalition turf.
The train zips through the local stop at 23rd. Somewhere in the middle of the car a man too short for me to see through the bodies is yelling at the top of his lungs, telling the passengers about how he was burned out of his apartment and how he needs ten dollars and forty-seven cents to have enough to stay in a transient hotel tonight. I think about Terry.
Figure Tom’s move one of two ways. Either he told Terry I’d been poking around and Terry rubber-stamped his play on me, or he invoked his security authority and made the move himself. Terry might have cleared it, just to keep from admitting that I was doing some clandestine shit for him. Just to keep a cover on whatever his angle is. Figure it’s more likely Tom did it on his own. After my lengthy chat with Terry, Tom’s smart enough to know something’s up. He sure as shit knows Phil is my number one snitch. He probably didn’t bother to follow me at first, just went after Phil. Once he beat everything out of him, he would have checked in with The Count.
We jerk to a stop at the 34th Street platform. I get some breathing room as the Bridge and Tunnel commuters pile off and make for Penn Station, but I lose it right away as the Midtown workers heading for Queens and the Bronx come on.
Figure Tom wouldn’t have to threaten The Count. Hell, The Count is one of his. Tom just has to ask him what I wanted, what I was looking into. Figure that was too close to the bone. Close to something anyway. Close to all these new fish popping up and the whole shooting the Vyrus thing. After that, all he needed to do was stake out my pad and tail me over to the Enclave. Fucker’s definitely got a bee in his bonnet over this shit.
42nd Street, Times Square. The train exhales a rancid mass of drones and sucks in a fresh mass of the same. The doors close. 59th Street and relative safety dead ahead. The A runs express from 59th all the way to 125th, inside Hood turf. After 59th, any enforcers riding the express will be taking a big chance.
Yeah, Tom’s definitely got some skin in this game. Then again, it could all be Terry. He might have sent Tom after me himself. Maybe I got too close too fast when I talked to The Count. Maybe Terry’s finally gotten tired of having me on Society turf and the whole thing is the start of his play to get rid of me.
Something tickles my nose.
Blood.
Someone in the car is bleeding. Bleeding fresh. Not menstrual blood, not an old cut opening up, but fresh blood. Someone just opened a small wound.
I don’t look up. It’s the oldest trick in the book, so I don’t look up. Could be a nosebleed. Could be a little kid’s tooth just fell out. Could be some lady got jarred by the train swaying from side to side and ran the sharp tip of her nail file up under her nail. Still, I don’t look up. ’Cause it just as easily could be someone just pricked their hand with a tiny lance and is watching everybody on the train, watching to see who jerks their face toward the source of the blood. The oldest trick in the book.
I keep my head down and scent the air. Someone has stepped in dog crap. A businessman had to puke after his four martini lunch and tried to cover the smell with a fistful of Altoids. Someone just bought a CD player and I smell the new plastic as they tear open the bubble-pack it’s wrapped in. Shampoo. Ink from the fat tip of a felt-tip pen as a kid tags a window of the car. Someone had sex just before she caught the train and semen dribbles down the inside of her thigh. Foot powder. Tiger Balm. A Hershey’s bar. French fries. A puff of deodorant released as someone unzips their jacket. Hair spray, hair gel, hair mousse, hair cream, hair wax. Over a dozen types of perfumes, twice as many lotions and creams. Once I focus on all of it, once I let that lizard part of my brain that deals with smells start sifting them all out and identifying them, it makes me want to vomit. I bite it back and take another whiff.
The stagnant menudo someone had for breakfast carried up from their stomach with a belch. The urine staining the adult diaper of a senior citizen. The mold caking the old paperbacks crammed into the sack car
ried by the homeless guy. The years of sweat soaked into the rim of a kid’s favorite baseball cap escaping as he pulls the bill farther to the side. The smell of spent fireworks clinging to my gun, the stale cigarette smoke that always surrounds me, last night’s bourbon still in my throat, the socks I didn’t bother to change today.
It’s awful. All of it. But nowhere in it do I smell the Vyrus. Nowhere but in my own blood. I try to stop, try to breathe easy and focus my mind on something else. I bring my head up and let my eyes bob and drift around, lazily taking in the faces around me. There is no trace of the Vyrus in here other than my own, but that doesn’t mean I’m safe. The bleeder could be a savvy Renfield, one trained by Coalition enforcers to look for a sniffer. Or it could be worse. It could be a Van Helsing. If it is a Van Helsing, if it’s a staker who knows enough to prick his finger and wait to see who takes an interest, he’ll be dangerous as hell. A Van Helsing that knows the game? Shit. He won’t care about borders and treaties and turf. A Van Helsing will ride this car with me all the way up to the Hood. I get off the train with a Van Helsing on my ass, bring that to Hood turf? There’s no punishment that covers that, nothing but getting tumored by the sun.
The train slows, pulling to a stop at 59th Street, Columbus Circle.
The Upper West Side types hurry off the train to rush home and meet their spouses, who are also coming home from work, so they can both kiss their trophy babies before their Jamaican nannies put the little ones to bed so they can go out to dinner and not talk to one another. They are replaced by the far upper Manhattan Caribbeans who have finished cleaning houses and walking dogs and working their shifts at Balducci’s and are heading home to fuck up their own children and not talk to their spouses. I watch them. I don’t bother with subtlety now, I watch everyone who stays on the train, looking for the thing that is not like the others.
The doors try to close and get caught on one of the overstuffed bags of the homeless guy. The conductor is on the intercom again, screaming through the static.
—DO NOT BLOCK THE DOORS AT THE BACK OF THE TRAIN!
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