Ground Zero rj-13

by F. Paul Wilson

  “Yeah. In fact, you gotta. It was a needle.”

  Hank turned from the window. “You’re a junkie?”

  “Naw. You know better’n that. It was back in Dearborn when I split from the old lady. I got this puny body, in case you haven’t noticed.”

  “Even punier now.”

  “Yeah, well, I started going to this gym and—”

  “Don’t tell me—juice?”

  Darryl nodded, thinking how stupid he’d been.

  “Yeah. For a price this guy would shoot you up with some kinda steroid—guaranteed to jack you in no time. I looked at some of his customers and, man, were they ripped. I figured that was for me. That’s the only time I had any needles since I was a kid. Had to be him. The sonovabitch must’ve been using the same needle over and over. That’s where I got it.”

  “You idiot.”

  “Hey, I was single again. Nothing like a cut bod to bring on the babes, right? So I signed on.”

  “You’d’ve been better off with a dog. And where’s this ‘cut bod’ you were supposed to get?”

  Darryl shrugged. “I never liked working out, so I hardly ever got to the gym. And I stopped the shots after two or three. But that was enough, I guess.” He pounded his fists on his thighs to keep from crying. “So fucking stupid!”

  “Can’t argue with that.”

  Darryl controlled himself and looked up at Hank. “So what’s the trouble you talked about? I mean, I know my trouble, but—”

  “The guys want you out of here.”

  A sudden rush of cold drove him to his feet. “What? They got no right! They can’t—!”

  “They’ve got no right, yeah—I make the call as to who gets to stay here. But they’re all pretty worked up and worried about catching something and I’ve got no good excuse for why I should be letting someone with AIDS hang around.”

  “You can tell ’em all to just fuck off, can’t you?”

  Hank nodded. “Yeah, I can do that, but that’s not the Kicker style, know what I’m saying?”

  Yeah, Darryl knew. Hank was the headman—hell, he invented the Kickers—but he didn’t want to look like the boss. Everyone treated him like he was, but he liked to pretend there was no boss.

  “Well, then, tell ’em if they don’t like it, they can move out.”

  He sighed. “Darryl, I need a reason why you should stay and they all should go. Got one?”

  Darryl’s mind raced. They couldn’t kick him out. He couldn’t let this happen.

  “I’m like your number-one assistant, right? So you’ve got to keep me here where you can reach me day or night. That works.”

  Hank shook his head and looked away again. “Afraid not. That ain’t gonna fly.”

  “Sure it is. It makes perfect sense and . . .” A realization sucker punched him in the gut. “Hey, wait. It’s you. You’re the one who wants me out!”

  “No, it’s them. But I gotta say . . .”

  “What?”

  He looked at Darryl again. “Working with a guy with AIDS gives me the willies. How do I know I haven’t caught it from you already?”

  “That’d be impossible, Hank. I don’t know much about it, but I know you need a needle or sex or something to catch it. It doesn’t just come out the air. You gotta work to get it.”

  “Yeah, well, so you say—”

  “That’s what everybody says!”

  “It’s not what your fellow Kickers say. They’re scared to have you around. In just a few hours you’ve become a major distraction. You’re all anyone’s talking about. And that’s not good. We’ve got an evolution to run and nothing’ll get done as long as you’re here. So . . . you’ve gotta go, Darryl. I know it sounds cold, but I’ve got to put the Kickers first.”

  “But I am a Kicker.”

  “That’s right. And you’ll always be a Kicker. You just won’t be living here.”

  Darryl fought back tears. His insides felt like they were tearing in two.

  “But where’ll I go? I can’t go back to Michigan.” He didn’t know a soul who’d want to take him in except the police—for a ton of missed alimony and child-support payments. “And I don’t know anyone to crash with here.”

  “Get an apartment. Get a hotel room.”

  “Ain’t got no money, Hank. I’ve been working for you here for next to nothin’.”

  “I’d hardly call room and board in this city next to nothing.”

  “I should have five grand in my pocket for finding Dawn.”

  Hank looked at the ceiling. “Let’s not get into that again. Yeah, you found Dawn, but is she here? No. She’s with the creepy guy.”

  Yeah . . . the guy with the eyes.

  “Maybe, but if he hadn’t taken her, we’d still have her. Not my fault she was stolen away. I still think I got something coming.”

  Hank sighed. “Yeah, well, maybe you do. I’ll dig you up some cash so you can—”

  “I don’t want money, Hank.”

  “You can’t stay here, Darryl. I’m sorry, but you’re too much of a distraction. You’ve gotta be out of here sometime tomorrow.”

  Tomorrow? Where was he gonna go? What was he gonna do? This was all he had, all he knew.

  “But I can’t—”

  Hank jabbed a finger at him. “You can and you will. Don’t make this any harder than it already is.” His voice softened. “I . . .”

  He looked like he really and truly hated what he was doing, and that made Darryl feel a little better, but not a whole hell of a lot. Not if he wasn’t going to change his mind.

  “Maybe I could—”

  “You’ll always be a Kicker, Darryl. Don’t you ever think otherwise. But you just can’t stay here.”

  As Hank started for the door, he half reached out to Darryl’s shoulder but then dropped his hand.

  He’s even afraid to pat me on the back.

  He hoped Hank didn’t stop on his way out because Darryl didn’t know how long he could hold back the tears that had begun slamming against the backs of his eyelids.

  “Remember,” Hank said as he closed the door behind him. “Gone tomorrow.”

  When the door clicked shut, Darryl sank back onto the bed, buried his face in his hands, and bawled like a goddamn baby.

  6

  “You look tired,” Gia said as she sliced Vicky’s everything bagel. “Did you get any sleep last night?”

  “Some.”

  Jack had grabbed a few hours of shut-eye, showered, and shown up at Gia’s door with half a dozen bagels—including two everythings for Vicky.

  He drained his mug of coffee and stepped to the counter for a refill. Gia’s super-strong Colombian was working its wake-up magic.

  “Ran into two blasts from my past yesterday—Eddie and Weezy Connell from good old Johnson, NJ.”

  Gia smiled her smile as she dropped the everything halves into the toaster slots. She was barefoot, wearing loose jeans and a tight pink sleeveless top. She had nice deltoids for someone who never worked out.

  “Weezy? As in ‘movin’ on up’ Weezy?” She grinned. “Does she live on the East Side in a deluxe apartment in the sky?”

  “She was Weezy before The Jeffersons.”

  “How’d this happen?”

  “Weezy’s got trouble. Stuck her nose into places where, apparently, people don’t want to see any unfamiliar noses, and now . . .”

  The smile disappeared. “Is she in danger?”

  As he reseated himself at the kitchen table, he glanced at the folded copy of the Post he’d picked up on his way over. The front page showed Weezy’s house engulfed in flames under the headline BACKFIRE! A brief, hastily written article inside told of three dead, unidentified gunshot victims found in the backyard, and how they’d been linked to a van containing firebomb materials parked out front.

  “Oh, yeah.”

  Odors of garlic and onion tinged the air as the bagel heated.

  “Can’t she go to the police?”

  “It’s complicated.” />
  “It usually is by the time they call you. Do I want to know any of the details?”

  “Probably not. It sounds pretty wacky, and all her reasoning may be way off base, but she’s definitely stirred up a hornet’s nest.”

  Gia pulled the bagel halves from the toaster and began buttering them with Jif Extra Crunchy. Jack shook his head. PB on an everything bagel . . . blech.

  “Vicky!” she called. “Jack’s here and he brought bagels!” She glanced at Jack. “Weezy and Eddie . . . were you close as kids?”

  “Yeah. As close to them as anyone. For years Weezy and I were best buds.”

  “You’ve never mentioned them.”

  “Do I mention anyone from those days? To tell the truth, I’ll bet I haven’t given them a single thought in the last ten or fifteen years.”

  Pounding footsteps on the stairs, then Vicky charged in.

  “Jack!”

  “Hey, Vicks.”

  She threw her arms around his neck and kissed him on the cheek, then darted to the waiting bagel.

  “Everything! Awesome!”

  She dropped into her chair and tore into it.

  “Human bites, Vicky,” Gia said as she placed a glass of milk before her. “You’re not a crocodile—human bites.”

  Jack leaned back and looked around as he sipped his coffee. Sun streamed through the open door from the small backyard as Gia wiped the bagel crumbs from the table and Vicky chowed down in lip-smacking joy.

  Hard to believe that relentless forces were at work to take all this away, to make a moment like this impossible.

  He couldn’t allow that to happen, yet had no idea how to stop it.

  But Weezy . . . maybe that unique brain of hers could help. Maybe if she added the contents of the Compendium to everything else in her head, she could come up with a solution, or at least point him toward one.

  A long, long shot, but not trying was not an option.

  7

  “Nu?” Abe said as his surprisingly dexterous pudgy fingers examined Jack’s Glock 19 with practiced expertise. “A cleaning it needs, but otherwise looks all right to me.”

  “It’s seen dead people.”

  “Seen?”

  “Okay. It made them dead.”

  “All by itself?”

  “It had help.”

  “From you?”

  Jack shrugged. “Yeah.”

  “How many dead people has it seen?”

  “Five.”

  Abe rolled his eyes. “Oy. All at once? Such a thing would be in the papers. It’s not.”

  “Two yesterday afternoon at Mount Sinai. Three more in Jackson Heights early this morning.”

  Abe’s raised eyebrows caused furrows in his extended forehead. “Five in twelve hours?”

  “Oh, and like you’ve never had a cranky day?”

  “Cranky like you, I don’t get. No one gets.” He turned his free hand palm up and wiggled his fingers. “Spill. Details.”

  Jack gave him a capsule version of Weezy’s troubles.

  Abe shook his head. “With old friends like her, who needs enemies?”

  “I hear that. But she’s good people.” He pointed to the Glock. “Anyway, that baby there can tie me to five corpses, so I need a replacement.”

  “All right. Lock the—”

  “Done.” He’d locked the front door on the way in. “Turned the OPEN sign too.”

  “Then let’s go.”

  He led Jack down to the basement.

  “Hey,” Jack said, indicating the dead neon loops over the stairs. When lit they quoted a sign from The Weapon Shops of Isher. “What happened to the sign? It worked Monday.”

  “Dead. And considering the times, I’d be meshugge to have it repaired.”

  The Right to Buy Weapons Is the Right to Be Free . . . no, that would raise a host of warning flags in these political climes.

  In the basement, Abe removed a box from a neatly stocked shelf and produced a new Glock 19. He swapped Jack’s old loaded magazine for the empty new one, and handed it over. Jack racked the slide to chamber a round.

  “Nu, I thought you liked—”

  “An empty chamber? Yeah, but with the way things are going these past few days, an extra millisecond could be the difference between . . . you know.”

  “You want I should set up a test fire?”

  “Nah. I’ll be fine. Hell, it’s a Glock.”

  He’d owned at least a dozen over the years. Hadn’t failed him yet.

  8

  Jack strolled east toward Central Park. The plan was to meet Weezy there around one. He’d considered Julio’s but decided against it. Easier to spot a tail if they stayed out in the open. The Compendium rested in the backpack slung over his shoulder. If Weezy wanted, he’d lend it to her for as long as necessary. He couldn’t imagine her turning him down.

  He realized he had time for a brew, so he stopped into Julio’s before heading for the park.

  To his delight he found Glaeken—no, make that Mr. Veilleur—sitting at his table, a half-empty pint of Guinness before him. He looked eighty-something, maybe ninety, with blue eyes, white hair, wrinkled olive skin stretched over high cheekbones. Slightly stooped, but still a big man.

  Jack held up two fingers as he passed the crowded bar—Julio spotted him and nodded. He knew what that meant.

  “Mister V,” Jack said, stopping beside him.

  “I was hoping you’d stop by,” the old guy said, remaining seated but extending a big, scarred hand. “I came looking for you yesterday, but when I peeked through the window I saw you were with an Oculus, so I moved on.”

  Yesterday? he thought as they shook hands. Was that all? So much had happened since then, it seemed like a week.

  “Figured that. She sensed you and went rushing out.”

  He nodded. “She no doubt saw me, but she wasn’t looking for an old man. She’s had an Alarm, I presume?”

  “Yeah. Something about a . . .” He concentrated on the pronunciation, determined to get it right. “. . . a Fhinntmanchca.”

  Veilleur frowned. “I haven’t heard that word in thousands of years.”

  Julio brought Jack’s Yuengling and pointed to the dwindling Guinness pint. Veilleur shook his head.

  As Julio left, Jack took his seat and sipped his lager.

  “Diana had no idea what it meant.”

  “No reason she should. It’s a legend from the First Age . . . a sort of Unholy Grail sought after by the Adversary’s forces back then.”

  “Grail?”

  “Figuratively speaking. It was supposedly a superweapon, imbued with the Otherness, that could destroy any living thing it came in contact with.”

  “You mean like John Agar in Hand of Death?”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about. What I am talking about is loosing something very destructive upon this world. But I’ve always believed it a myth, the equivalent of searching for the Philosopher’s stone.”

  “Then why is it in Diana’s Alarm?”

  Veilleur leaned back and took a contemplative quaff of his stout.

  “That’s the disturbing part. An Alarm is often open to interpretation, but if she heard the word Fhinntmanchca, then we have to assume that it might not be a myth, that the Adversary has learned how to create such a thing—and perhaps already succeeded.”

  “What’s the danger?”

  “Tradition says it will start the Change. The word means ‘Maker of the Way.’ It would allow the Otherness in so it can change this plane into a place more hospitable—for its own.”

  Jack shook his head. “Then why do people work for it?”

  “They think they’ll be rewarded, and kept safe. Perhaps they will be, but I doubt it.”

  “What about Ra—the Adversary?”

  “He’s different. He’s the One. If the Otherness wins and begins the Change, he’ll adapt to a compatible form. But his fellow travelers may not be so lucky.” He sighed. “This is not good. I’m meeting shortly with the
Lady. Perhaps she’ll know something. Do you wish to join us?”

  “The Lady? Sure. Haven’t seen her since just after the Staten Island mess.”

  For the past couple of years women of all ages and shapes and sizes and nationalities had been stepping in and out of his life. They all knew more about him than they had any right to, and each was unfailingly accompanied by a dog. He’d assumed there were many of them, but Veilleur had told him a while back there was only one. He’d avoided telling Jack who or what she was. Maybe if he could sit down with her she’d tell him.

  Veilleur pulled a pen from his pocket and wrote on a napkin.

  “Here’s my address. Between Sixty-third and Sixty-fourth. Meet me there at one.”

  One? Hell, he had to meet Weezy—

  An idea hit like a ten-gauge pumpkin ball.

  “Can I bring a friend?”

  Veilleur frowned. “I don’t think that would be wise.”

  “She’s already aware of the Secret History and she’s got a brain like no one else’s. I think she could be a big help.”

  “Why haven’t you mentioned her before?”

  “She was a childhood friend I haven’t given a thought to in years, and suddenly she’s popped back into my life.”

  “Childhood friend . . .” he said, stroking his beard. “That wouldn’t be Louise Connell, would it?”

  Jack stared at him in shock. “How could you . . . ?”

  “Yes, I believe Miss Connell will make an interesting addition.” He drained his stout and rose. “Can she be there at one o’clock?”

  “Yeah, but—”

  “Excellent.” He turned and strode for the door. “See you then.”

  9

  Darryl’s door swung open and someone said, “May we come in?”

  He looked up from where he was sitting on his bed to see fucking Drexler standing there in his fucking white suit. He wanted to charge the son of a bitch, knock him down, beat the living shit out of him.

  But Darryl wasn’t feeling so hot, and Drexler had his cane, and Hank was standing behind him.

  “You bastard,” Darryl said. “You sent me to that doctor and he told everyone. Ain’t that against the law?”

  “It most certainly is. And if you can identify the member of his staff who abrogated your right to privacy, I believe you’ll have excellent grounds for legal action.”