For the moment the mob had lost interest in chasing us, but they hadn't forgotten us. Guns flashed. Billy Ray grunted again as more bullets hit him.
I grabbed Ackroyd by the arm. "In the name of God, come on! There's nothing we can do!"
"They'll rape her!"
"They'll do worse to us if they catch us. Run, you idiot."
He flailed at me with his arms. I slapped his face. Then I took my own advice. He followed, weeping.
Lady Black was helping support Ray. The pain and sheer structural damage were taking toll. Another man would've been dead long since. He was still on his feet, if barely.
Yeah, he had his ace, that gave him strength and endurance and the power to regenerate damage - if that system hadn't been overloaded by what was done to him. What kept him going now had nothing to do with the wild card. It was guts.
Lady Black had them too. If I'd been her, and seen what was happening to my fellow female up the alley, I'd have taken off in huge bounds like a gazelle.
Oh, yes, we were a gutty bunch. Even Ackroyd, who'd stood his ground as long as any man ever did in the face of odds like that. The problem was those odds. Comes a time when they beat guts, every time.
- The pack was holding itself up in the narrow alley, fighting like hyenas over the spoils. Rape was gone from even their reptile brains by now - I hope. I saw one wave something white and slim above his head, brandishing it like a trophy. Damsel's right leg, I think it was....
Around the building, out onto the street. And after all we'd survived and sacrificed, we weren't home free: here came a fresh bunch around the next corner back from the alley, waving swords and clubs and cheering as if Tehran had just won the World Series.
Lady Black and Billy had fallen inevitably behind. Ackroyd and I looked at each other. In his eyes was raw hatred, but also raw determination. We turned and faced the mob, prepared to go down fighting.
Bearded faces opened in triumph. Clawed hands reached for Joann and Billy. Jay was popping the bastards, and I was running through magazines as fast as my piece would cycle.
It was all for nothing.
Lady Black let go of Billy and stepped to the side. She reached to the front of her baggy blouse, tore it open. Then she grabbed the neck of her protective black suit and pulled it down to her navel, baring her chest.
The sheer unexpectedness of it made the crowd falter briefly a few steps from her. Possibly they were admiring the prizes they were about to lay hands on.
White light exploded from Joann's face and chest. My vision went away for a moment.
When it returned, I could just make out a street filled with writhing bodies. As I blinked away great bright balloons of afterimage I saw that many had their faces seared and fingers seared away. Others lay still, blackened to motionless mummies.
Joann stood there with a faraway look in her eyes. "It's been building for a long time," she said. "Building and building."
I grabbed the hanging front of her suit and pulled it up. She nodded, absently, and started pulling it back into place. The pursuit was off our tails. For the moment. We turned and made what speed we could.
***
"Archangel One, Archangel One, do you have an answer yet, over?"
With a little room to move, we had found a three-story building with pointed-arch doors and windows and climbed up to the roof. Since our pursuers didn't know where we were, the risks of staying at street level outweighed the risk of being trapped up here.
Down in the streets they still hunted us. They'd broken into packs now, a few in vehicles, most on foot.
Joann bent over Billy Ray, who lay on his back with his head propped on the radio pack. The unit miraculously still worked. Jay Ackroyd sat with his head between his knees and just breathed. He had thrown away his kaffiyeh. His hair was in serious disarray.
"Stud Six, I'm afraid the word is negative, over."
"Negative on what? Fire support or pickup? Over."
A pause. Atmospherics crackled. I wanted to squeeze an answer from the microphone with my fingers.
"Stud Six, that's negative on both." Archangel One had the decency to be weeping openly. "We got the word. We're pulling out; Angels One and Three are already gone. It's over, man. Over."
I didn't think he was handing the conversational ball back to me. Nonetheless I grabbed it: "On whose orders?"
"This came all the way from the top." And in the sudden thunderous silence I barely heard him say, "Good luck, Stud Six. Archangel One - out."
"They're leaving us," Ackroyd panted. "The fuckers are pulling out and leaving us."
"That about sums it up," I said, throwing down the mike. No point in handling it gently any more.
He raised his head and looked at me and gave me a shaky smile. "Well, I guess I drew the short straw, didn't I?"
"How do you mean?"
"I pop you all back to Desert One," he said. "Then I guess I get to go play Twenty Questions with the Revolutionary Guard."
"No."
He stared at me. "Hey, do you think I'm a fucking moron, you tin-plated hero?" he flared. "I can't pop myself. Or are you such a stupid fucking military jock you didn't realize that?"
"I realize it," I said. "But you aren't popping me anywhere."
"What the fuck are you talking about?"
"I'm talking about, I'm not leaving you behind. I've lost three people already. I'm not losing more without a fight."
"You left Damsel quick enough."
"She was gone, Jay." I was surprised how quiet my voice was. I just didn't have the energy to get emotional. "There was nothing we could do for her without getting the rest of us killed. It was a command decision. I made it. I have to live with it."
"I know all about that," Joann said. She had torn her chador into strips and bandaged Ray as best she could with it. Now she moistened a fragment from a canteen and dripped water between the boy's bloody lips. He was breathing with a sound like the A train. I didn't think it was too good a sign.
"How did you do that back there, by the way?" I asked.
"All that energy I store up," she said, color draining from that handsome face, "it has to go somewhere."
She shook her head. "I'm going to see them every time I shut my eyes the whole rest of my life," she said, "those faceless men -"
I squeezed her shoulder. "It goes away after a while," I said. "Or at least, you don't get the dreams so often." She looked up into my eyes.
"I know, child," I said quietly.
I turned away. "Where's Darius?" she asked suddenly. "I haven't seen him since, since -"
"Since they nailed Harvey, back at the apartment," Ackroyd said. "Motherfucker ditched us."
I nodded. "I never did like cops much," I said, "especially secret ones."
Ackroyd frowned. "You mean - he wasn't just a bodyguard, was he?"
"No."
"He was SAVAK. A torturer."
"One of the worst, I suspect."
"When did you know?"
"Not for sure till he told me, up on the roof. But I suspected it the minute I laid eyes on him."
"You son of a bitch," Jay said. "You'd jump in bed with the fucking Devil himself, wouldn't you?"
"If it helped me accomplish my mission." I held up a hand. "Save the denunciations, Ackroyd. It's time to use your magic finger. Billy first."
"Hey -" the kid said, trying to rise. He had come back around at some point. "You can't - get rid of me. I won't go -"
Joann pressed him down with her fingertips. "You have no choice, Billy," Ackroyd said.
I hunkered beside the boy. "If you live, son - and I'm afraid you will, as tough as you are - you're going to need an ace name."
"What's the matter with ... Wolverine?"
"Your alma mater might sue. No, I have the name for you. I name thee Carnifex."
"What's - that mean?"
"Latin for 'Executioner.'"
He smiled and gave me the circled thumb-and-forefinger OK sign. And vanished.
"Just a moment." She stepped up, briefly held his face in both gloved hands. Then she did the same to me. I hugged her. I had to keep my head well back - she was taller than I. But I hugged her hard, and she hugged me back.
She stepped backward and was gone.
- I jumped, caught Ackroyd by the wrist, shoved his hand and pointing finger skyward.
"Try that again," I said, "and I'll break both your trigger fingers. Got that?"
A moment, and he nodded. I let him go, but kept a wary eye upon him.
"I didn't send them to Desert One," he said.
I froze in the act of stooping to gather the Kalashnikov magazines I'd made Lady Black and Billy carry, and relieved them of before Ackroyd popped them out. "We've been given the royal shaft," he said. "I don't trust anybody right now, least of all the military. I sure as hell wasn't sending them back to Desert One."
***
A moment. I nodded. "Smart move. Where'd they go?"
"The scoreboard in Yankee Stadium." He shrugged. "It's kind of a catch-all target for me."
I laughed. "You must be seriously suspicious, if you'd trust them to Steinbrenner instead of our own people. I wonder if the Yankees are playing at home tonight?"
I held out Joann's Kalashnikov. "Take this."
"No way. I don't have a clue how to use it." An ugly smile twisted his lips. "The recoil would probably throw my aim off so I'd shoot you."
"We don't want that, now, do we?" I drew my Tokagypt, reversed it, offered that.
"No." He held his extended forefinger up. "This is all the gun I need."
"If we get in the middle of it you and I might not be able to take everybody out, me shooting and you popping," I explained, choking down my impatience. "You have to know that by now, after what happened in the alley. We need to make them put their heads down. Pointing your finger at them just won't cut it."
"All right." He snatched the pistol away.
I let him lead off down the stairs, not my favorite tactical move, but I still didn't trust him behind me with the fickle finger of fate.
Halfway down the block a pickup truck with cracked and faded blue paint was parked. I smiled, tapped Ackroyd's shoulder, headed us toward it. "Pray it has fuel," I said.
"What, did you happen to bring a key?" I shook my head. "I suppose you re going to hotwire it, then?"
"Better. Got a penknife?"
He stuck the Tokagypt down the front of his pants and dug into a pocket. I winced. I wanted to remind him where the expression going off half-cocked came from, but this was no time to start teaching him to handle firearms with respect.
He looked past me then, and his eyes got wide. He grabbed the Tokagypt out of his waistband and aimed it at a doorway behind me. He had somehow gotten the safety off; the pistol barked as it came online.
I fell against the door of the truck, momentarily half-blinded and deafened. I smelled burning hair - mine - singed by the muzzle flash.
Panic sent a spasm into Ackroyd's finger. He pumped the trigger, spraying bullets wildly all over the front of the building until the last round went and the slide locked back.
I grabbed the gun out of his hands. "Jesus Christ, you idiot, what the hell do you think you're doing?"
He pointed. "Someone in that door. Pointing a gun at you. I - oh, dear God, no!"
He raced past me to the door, knelt down. When I came up with him, AKM at the ready, he was sobbing convulsively and stroking the cheek of the person he'd shot.
A boy of about eight, lying sprawled in the doorway. Curly dark hair, black eyes wide open to stars they'd never see again. One of those toy wooden Kalashnikovs lay on the steps beside him.
I took Ackroyd by the shoulder and pulled him away. He sat down on the curb by the truck, dropped his face to his hands, and bawled like a baby.
I laid my left forefinger on the curb and chopped the tip off with Ackroyd's knife. Blood spurted. I held the stump up.
"Our keys," I said.
Ackroyd stared horror-struck between his fingers. "Oh, God, you're sick, you're really sick."
I pressed the stump over the lock, felt my soul flow, become one with mechanism. I opened the lock unto us, then pulled my finger away. It came free with a soft sucking sound.
I slid my AKM in, climbed in after it. I shut my door, leaned across to open the passenger door. "Get in," I said, and put command into my voice.
Dully Ackroyd rose and walked around the truck. As he slid in and shut the door I pressed my severed finger against the ignition. The truck coughed once and started.
"Quarter tank," I said - I felt it, the way you have a rough idea how hungry you are. "Slovenly drivers here. Don't keep topped off."
"It was the gun," Ackroyd said in a voice of lead. "If I didn't have the gun, he wouldn't be dead."
"Yes he would. He looked like he was holding down on us. I would have dropped him myself. I told you, I'm taking you out of here. I exerted my will, and the engine coughed once and started.
***
We picked up an honor guard a quarter mile from the airport. A Nissan pickup, filled with authentic heroic Palestinian freedom fighters. Somebody must have passed the word; it was oh-dark thirty, and there were no streetlights, so they could not have gotten a good enough look at us to see our faces were paler than the Tehrani norm. But they passed us going the other way, whipped a U, and came on, blasting over the top of the cab with their trusty Klashin.
I put the pedal to the metal. The rear window blew in and sprinkled us with sugared glass. Ackroyd ducked.
"Can't you make the driver disappear?" I asked.
He gave me a hate stare. Then he raised his head, cautiously, poked his finger up over the bottom of the now-empty window.
I was splitting my attention between screeching down the narrow street at eighty miles an hour and the wing mirror. I saw the Nissan lurch to the side and hit a parked Paykan. Fidayin went rolling out like apples from a vendor's cart.
"Bullseye!" I cheered. "Well done."
He grinned and bobbed his head. Then he realized those bodies sprawled all over the street there were not dummies or stunt men. Some of them would be getting up again slowly, if ever. He turned his face forward and buried it in his hands.
"More company," I said, a few seconds later, looking in the rearview.
"You want me to murder them too?"
I shook my head. "Too many. If one gets too close, I may call on you. But save it."
"I don't believe I'm here," he said. "Why did they do this to us? Why would they set us up like this?"
"So we could take a fall on behalf of the wild card. We fail. Maybe the hostages back there die. Who's to blame? Aces, of course. President Jimmy, too, I guess - he's too soft on us wild cards to suit some tastes."
"And you went along with it," Ackroyd said.
I felt my cheeks begin to burn. "Yeah," I said, "yeah, that's right. I like the thought of dying. I like the thought of people under my command getting tortured and killed. I like being in charge of the biggest balls-up since the Mayaguez raid -"
No, I told myself, you don't have the luxury to snap now. You're good at handing out tough talk; it's time to shut up and soldier, soldier.
And count your losses later. I made my jaw clamp. It was much tougher than making the truck go where I wanted.
"I'm sorry," Ackroyd said. "That was cheap."
"Yeah. So please shut up for a while."
There was some more wild driving, bullets cracking past our ears - they don't whistle, they go faster than sound for the most part, make little sonic booms - and then Ackroyd said, "There's a chain link fence up ahead."
"Mehrabad International Airport," I said.
"Uh - don't you think you should slow down?"
"No," I said, "because then I couldn't do -"
I hit the fence. Metal broke with squeals of protest, and dragged sharp claws back along my body the truck like fingern
ails on a blackboard.
"- this."
"Jesus Keerist!" Ackroyd yelped. "You're out of your fucking mind!"
"If you don't quit saying that, you'll give me a complex."
He turned in his seat. "I don't know what kind of jackass scheme you have in mind, but it isn't working. They're still on our tail."
"No worries." I was heading toward a point I remembered from studying the aerial recon photos. "Look up ahead."
There they were, as advertised: the dark broken-nosed shapes of a pair of American-made F-4s.
"What are those?"
"Your tax dollars at work. Gifts to our noble ally, the Shah of Iran."
"What are you planning to do," he asked, "ram them and go out in a blaze of glory?"
There were a pair of men in flightsuits standing by the nearer Phantom, performing a preflight check. Or trying to. One of them was scratching his head under his helmet. The other was kicking the tires. Pilots hadn't fared so well under the new regime, either; these guys probably knew a lot more about Khomeini's book The Explication of Problems than they did about the flight manual on this baby.
The one scratching his head saw us. He tapped his buddy on the arm. He gave off bending to peer into the wheel well and turned to stare at us.
I steered right for Fric and Frac. They fled.
There were ground crew with their little carts fussing with the plane. Hoping some of them still had a clue as to what they were doing, I stopped the truck, stepped out and fired my Kalashnikov in the air. They joined their pilots in bunny impressions.
We'd extended our lead over the pursuit, but they were closing fast. I drew my Kabar sheath knife and laid my left hand on the tarmac.
"What the hell are you doing now?" Ackroyd demanded.
"Don't look," I said, and cut off my hand. It was not a neat process.
It hurt like the Devil, I have to tell you. Maybe I'm sick as that illegitimatus Battle, with that dumb stubbing-the-cigar-on-his-own-arm trick of his - I was surprised he didn't whip that out on poor President Jimmy.
"Climb aboard," I said, and started up the hook-on ladder into the pilot's seat. I only have so long before the blood loss starts to get to me.
Wild Cards 13 : Card Sharks Page 21