The kid was so terrified that white was showing all around her staring eyes. “No,” she whispered, “not me. Please."
Tom pulled her in close. His voice was suddenly unnervingly calm and quiet. “It's all right, dear. Everything's going to be all right. Just relax and we'll let you out a few miles down the road.” Somehow that was worse than the twitching. My skin crawled just listening to him.
Suzanne and I turned as one to look at Barry. He nodded and started moving silently toward the cashier's station, the only way out from behind the counter into the front of the store.
Frank didn't seem convinced that a hostage was the answer to the police cruiser squatting silently in the parking lot. “Tom, drop it. We're going to have to move fast, and she's just going to slow us down."
Tom's grin was slow and filled with menace. “Well, then we'll just pop her and drop her, if you get my meaning. When the time is right, that is."
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Barry round the end of the counter, accelerating.
At the same moment, Tom saw him and fired.
Missed.
Barry howled as he leaped across the remaining distance between himself and Frank, ten claws slashing.
Frank heard Barry's scream of rage and turned just in time to get a hand up. I swear Frank barely touched him, but Barry went spastic in midair. Then they collided and went down. Frank kicked himself free and stood, leaving Barry twitching spasmodically on the floor. All I could think of was something like jellyfish venom, but whatever it was, it didn't look good.
Tom threw the girl bodily back into the booth, walked over, and fired three times. He couldn't miss at that range. It wasn't as though Barry was still an active threat—it was just retribution for having dared to try something.
Frank's gun was minus two bullets. Tom's was minus six. The question was how many each gun had held to begin with. Six? Nine? Fifteen? Had any been fired in whatever had led to blood being on Tom's jacket? Obviously Frank had something potent, but did Tom have a significant power? Too many unknowns.
I took a deep breath and turned my attention back to the cop. The plate glass in the window had robbed Tom's bullet of velocity. The police cruiser's starred window had absorbed more. Each would have thrown off the slug's trajectory. No matter how carefully he aimed, the freak thing would be for the bullet to have actually hit the cop at all, much less kill him. I couldn't see the cop, so that meant he was keeping low, below the dash, probably calling for reinforcements. It was only a matter of time until help arrived.
But even if a small army of police showed up, they would have no way of knowing how many gunmen were in the restaurant. They would have no way of telling how well armed they were or what their intentions were. Even once the SWAT guys and negotiators showed up, it was going to take a long time for them to assess the situation and I wasn't sure that Tom's mental state was going to maintain its fragile balance long enough for the cops to hatch a plan.
Frank gave Barry's body a disinterested glance. “Tom, I think it's time to go to plan B,” he said.
Tom's eyes flinched in his partner's direction. “Plan B? What Plan B?"
“Hostages,” Frank said. There was no evidence of emotion in his voice. It was just a pragmatic response to a problem. “Everybody. Not just the girl. We'll shoot one every thirty minutes until they give us what we want—a clear way out of here, our car, and no pursuit. We'll start by shooting one immediately so they know that we're not playing games.” He scanned the room. Inevitably, his gaze came to rest on Suzanne and me, since we were the only ones still standing. Though he didn't say anything, his eyes locked on Suzanne.
Suzanne's face turned pale. It struck me as unlikely that murder and armed robbery had been covered in her how-to-be-a-manager course two years previously.
The customers? There were eight left alive, and none of them looked as though they were cut in the hero mold—with three lying dead on the floor, why die for the money in a faceless corporation's cash register? Let the cops handle it. They were paid to do that sort of thing. Either the killing hostages thing hadn't sunk in yet or they thought the cops would take care of the bad guys before their turn came.
I don't have lightning reactions, and I don't claim to have much of a killer instinct, but at that moment I faced the fact that it was time to take action. My one and only asset was that I was pretty fair at reading human nature.
I chanced a quick look around, taking inventory of what was within arm's reach. Not much. A rack half full of unsliced buns, a pair of tongs, and some condiments. Somehow, I couldn't see myself barging out from behind the counter, brandishing a spritzer of olive oil at them. Still, there were one or two items of interest.
“Listen, Frank, there's a back door,” I said. “Right now, there's only the one cop, and he's out front—"
“Dead,” Tom said confidently.
I didn't agree, but it certainly wasn't the time to argue the point. “Okay, but still, if you go out the back you can run across the parking lot, through the trees, and there's a motel there. Across the street from the motel is a car lot. Take one and no one knows what make, model, or color it is. You can get away clean, but you're going to have to move fast, before any more cops get here."
There had been enough signals that Frank was the thinking man of the pair; the dominant one. I had to seem reasonable, helpful, nonthreatening.
“So what's it to you?” he demanded suspiciously.
I held up my hands, palms out. Stage One. “Just trying to help, man. We all want to get out of this in one piece. This way everybody wins."
“Our car!” Tom yelled, taking the bait. “We want our car! We don't want no damned car we've got to hotwire."
“Where's your car parked?” I asked, moving toward Tom, maintaining eye contact, trying hard to look sincere. He seemed as puzzled as his partner as to why I was being so helpful as to plan their getaway for them. I passed Wendy, rounded the end of the counter, and began scanning the parking lot with my back to both of them, hands still in the air. “Which car's yours? Is the cop car blocking you in?"
I was out from behind the counter, in position, and they hadn't shot me. Stage Two, complete.
Frank came up on my right, pointing. “That one. The metallic blue Ford sedan."
“Damn. Blocked. Do you think you can go forward ... over the curb?” I pointed with my right forefinger, arm extended nearly full out.
Frank spoke from behind my right shoulder, close. “What if we get stuck? The front tires go over, but the bottom of the car hangs—"
It was now or never.
I slashed my right arm down suddenly, dropping the bottle of Tabasco I'd slid up my sleeve into my hand. With everything I had, I swung the bottle against the metal sill at the bottom of the window, breaking the long, narrow neck. Sweeping up, I jerked the raw, open top of the bottle over the top of my left shoulder, directly into Tom's face, broken glass, hot sauce, and all.
He shrieked as though all the demons of hell were tormenting him and dropped to the floor, clawing at his face. His gun fell from his hand, unheeded.
There wasn't time to grab the gun. I dropped the serrated bread knife I had up my left sleeve into place and whirled to my right. Frank was just beginning to register the Tabasco. His gut reaction was that I was about to try the same thing on him. He seized my right forearm with his free hand. Even through the fabric of my sleeve, a jolt of incredible pain rushed up my arm, through my shoulder, and into my chest. My knees nearly buckled, but I kept forcing my body to turn, pushing the knife toward where I knew his stomach would be.
He fired the gun just as we came fully face to face. At first I thought he'd shot himself. A few seconds of shocked delay and the truth came home, along with the pain. He'd shot me. We both collapsed clumsily to the floor, clinging to each other for balance and support like old friends.
But as we went down, I saw one of the customers coming up behind him, mayhem in his eye. I'd done enough. I let go and toppled backw
ard.
Stage Three. Complete.
* * * *
The three of us lived. All three of us acquired scars to show for the experience. Tom lost the use of his left eye. I can't say that I spend much time feeling guilty about it.
It turned out that the power Frank had was electric eel genes, not jellyfish. Given that they were on the prohibited list, he'd probably gotten his power on the black market. That, in turn, implicated his parents. It was all turning into a merry mess as the ripples spread and more people were dragged in.
I became a three-day wonder. They called me a hero—in my opinion, a much overused word. Local news personalities waited in line to interview me. Then the story went national, and another wave of reporters came in. They asked the same questions and made the same sympathetic noises at the same times when they asked if it hurt to be shot and I replied yes. It was like a succession of visits from clones clad in different skins. Their very predictability was disheartening.
In some manner, I became the darling of the conservatives. They lauded my “courage” and said that I was a “patriot.” They postured for the cameras and spouted all the usual clichés about the right to bear arms and how the police were outnumbered by lawless scum, etc, etc, etc. Nauseating, really. Paradoxically, the liberals also loved me because I had been a grunt in the lowest echelon of a megacorporation and had stood up for what was right—not corporate profits, but the safety of innocent people. That was closer, though still not on the mark. But no one asked about my motives and I, seeing the way the wind was blowing, didn't volunteer.
I felt unaccountably lonely after the reporters left. Given the restless irritation I'd felt during the interviews, this took me by surprise. Eventually, I faced the fact that it was the letdown I felt going from celebrity back to anonymity. That was so insulting that I had to give myself a good talking-to. I hadn't realized that I'd had that sort of vanity lurking inside of me and felt ashamed now that it had reared its ugly head. A little more reflection and I realized that I was also disappointed that I hadn't heard from the one person I really wanted to hear from.
That was rectified on the day I was to be released. There was a polite knock on the door to my room, followed by Suzanne tipping her head in. “Hi!” she said brightly.
I looked at the clock. It was just past eleven in the morning. “You're impossibly cheerful for someone who works the evening shift,” I grumped. “If you keep this up, I'll have a relapse."
She smiled—only the second time I'd seen her do so, but it was something I'd thought a lot about over the last few days. “Nah, you just need someone to complain to for a while. I've nominated myself as the complainee."
“You don't need to do that. I'm perfectly capable of feeling sorry for myself, by myself."
Suzanne came and perched on the side of the bed. “Considering that I've already got your belongings in the trunk of my car and have signed for you, you don't really have much choice."
I frowned. “How did you—"
“Let's be practical. There's no one to pick you up and take you home, right? So what were you going to do ... call a cab?"
“Well, I—"
“And cabs are dirty, and you might pick up an infection or something, so that's not really such a good idea, right?"
“But—"
“And you're going to need someone to change the dressings on your exit wound. Being on your back and all, it's going to be hard to get to, and it'll probably hurt a lot, and you might not do it right. So that's not all that great a plan, either, right?"
“Then—"
“And besides, it's not like it's all that much trouble. I don't think I got around to mentioning that I live in the same apartment complex as you, two buildings over, so I can get there in an instant if you need me and leave easily if you get tired.” She rocked back with her arms folded and a self-satisfied expression on her face. “Well? Can you argue your way out of that?"
I sat and sulked. Okay ... I tried to sulk, but it just wouldn't come together. Then I tried to get mad, but that didn't work either, so I sighed and said, “You win."
“Good. I'm glad to see that you can be reasoned with."
“Reason has nothing to do with it. I'm desperately lonely and having you coming in here being all cute and irrepressible is unfair and very unreasonable, and why are you doing this, anyway?"
She dimpled. “I could make something up, I guess, but the fact of the matter is that I think you're interesting, and I intend to get to know you much better. Besides, not like it's important to me or anything, but you saved my life, so I guess you could say that factors in there, too."
“Do you always talk this much?"
“Only when I'm nervous."
Which made me laugh, which in turn hurt like hell, which caused Suzanne to get all flustered, and things got a little confused for a moment. When it was over, I found that she was holding me—just for support, I suppose. Being temporarily overcome with an excess of nobility, I decided not to complain.
Once I was breathing normally again, she leaned back and looked me in the eye. “Look, Linus, can I ask you something?” she asked.
“Sure."
“At the restaurant, when you ... did what you did to Frank and Tom, did you use some sort of power? I mean, it was all over so quickly and everything. It looked like you were moving faster than anyone possibly could."
Turn about, fair play. I sighed. “Suzanne, I don't have any powers at all. Not a one. But growing up in a world where nearly everyone had some sort of edge on me, I had to come up with something to stay even. I learned to predict what people were thinking and what they were going to do. Everything I did was based on human nature. If you point at something, people will just naturally look at what you're pointing at, not at you. Frank and Tom wanted nothing more than to get out of there, so any possibility of escape would draw and hold their attention. Frank was the brains, but Tom was the most dangerous, so I had to take him out first. Once I struck at Tom, it was trivial to guess that Frank would turn into the knife I was holding. When you lay it out step by step, it's like Sherlock Holmes explaining his deductive process—it makes it sound easy. It's planning ahead and keeping all the steps in order in your mind that's tricky. It's just something I learned to do back when I was a kid. A survival skill."
She leaned back, looking into my eyes. “Well, since I'm playing Watson, there's still one thing I don't understand."
“What's that?"
“Why you did it at all. You could have waited for the police."
I shifted uncomfortably. “Uh ... not when they were threatening to shoot hostages. After killing three people, it didn't seem like they'd stop until they ran out of bullets. Since the cops weren't going to get there in time to stop them from killing another hostage, I thought I'd better do something."
“Actually, they had murdered four people. The blood on Tom's jacket was from someone they'd robbed and killed about thirty minutes before coming to the restaurant."
I shook my head. “I wish none of it had happened, but we're where we are and ... I guess it's time to fess up."
Suzanne's brows furrowed. “I don't understand ... what do you need to ‘fess up’ about?"
“I couldn't just stand by and let them use you for target practice. I ... well ... I was still working up the courage to ask you out. I needed more time."
Her eyes opened wide. “Oh, how sweet!” She clasped her hands and batted her eyelashes in an exaggerated manner. “My savior!” she exclaimed in a high-pitched voice. “My hero!"
I grimaced. “Just be sure you spell it with an ‘h’ instead of a ‘g.’ I've had about all the sandwiches I can stand for a while."
Copyright © 2006 Grey Rollins
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* * *
Exposure Therapy
by R. Emrys Gordon
Illustration by Bill Warren
* * * *
Opportunities seldom come without strings....
I
looked around for witnesses: an old habit and an unhealthy one. Zulu was in front of me, Tess to my side. Except for them, I was alone. Tess smiled encouragement and mouthed something I didn't catch. Looking around had been a mistake; I'd caught a glimpse of Zulu. He was slithering over his own coils, blank black eyes staring out of the front of his glass tank. My heart forced itself into my awareness, beating too fast. I held my hands very still and tried to breathe slowly.
I had two overwhelming fears that I had never been able to conquer. The second was the fear of anybody realizing that I was afraid.
“Do you want to try moving? Or looking at him for a whole second?” Tess had all the smug concern of the fellow who never gets seasick for the guy on the railing.
“Just a moment.” I attempted to lift my arm, experimentally. My hands started to shake. When I tried to clamp down, they wouldn't stop. Then the nausea began, and that made me shake more. I couldn't get sick here; Zulu was contraband—I couldn't get sick anywhere, because the mission heads would want to know why. And if they couldn't figure it out, I'd be quarantined, banned from going dirtside—and I wanted to go down to the planet more than I'd wanted anything else in my entire life. I was just terrified to do so.
“I'll try this later.” I backed out the door and sagged against the wall of the corridor. I rubbed my temples and felt the trembling begin to subside. The air in the hallway seemed cooler than in Tess's quarters. In a moment she appeared beside me.
“That worked well.” The sarcasm that Tess carried with her like a shield was grating on me after a month, but I could deal with that. The little tensions that sprang up in close quarters, the outgrowths of claustrophobia and discomfort that people came up with on a spaceship—those were my specialty (or part of it, anyway). I could deal with those.
“This sort of thing never works on the first try,” I told her.
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