King Henry and the Three Little Trips (The King Henry Tapes)

by Richard Raley

  “That mean ESLED giving me a cavity search or it just go straight to a spanking from the Lady?” King Henry kept on trolling as he handed over his mancer ID.

  Ranger Smith passed the ID to Rescue without glancing at it, like all his attention needed to be on King Henry just in case. So few brain cells, maybe it does. Rescue put down his magazine, but kept up with his ball scratching as he starting typing information into the computer with one hand. One handed typing, skill every man learns from the porn searching. King Henry had personally always appreciated the fact you could type in “Brazzers” with just your left hand. Can also type in “Star Wars” but “blue alien with tentacles” is a bit on the complex side.

  No doubt the computer Rescue used was networked with all the hardware in the Admin building. There were probably alarm bells and firewalls and security alerts going off in a dozen departments. Price is here! Hide the women! Hide the booze! Especially hide the laxatives and the waffle mix! Networks . . . look at me, learned a few computer terms from T-Bone. See, I do listen! Also, don’t hide the fish tacos or I’ll hunt you to the ends of the Earth and the ends beyond the Earth too.

  T-Bone . . . speed record or not, T-Bone and Vick would’ve been at the Coyote Nation compound for hours by now. What is it, 4PM, 5PM? King Henry didn’t want to try to pull out his phone on top of the wallet and send Ranger Smith into attack mode. You got a picnic basket, you motherfucker?!? Put down the pie, you hairy cunt!

  Even weighed against all his feelings and suspicions and the lingering animosity over Vega’s sidestep of blame over Master Zhou’s assassination attempt, King Henry hated to admit it, but Vega seemed to be playing them all straight now. Even if Vega wasn’t playing them straight, what did it matter?

  JoJo sure as fuck wasn’t going anywhere with his kid in her, probably didn’t even want to any more. Wasn’t in danger even. Gave Vega what he wanted at this time: an heir from a Poly-Shifter mate. King Henry tried to remember back to when he first came across JoJo and Hector Vega in Fresno, that slightly nervous but hard-nosed twenty-something woman who was fine with her messes. Outside of little almost microscopic flashes, that nervousness was completely invisible at the Ouroboros.

  No, it wasn’t all good between the Dog King and the King of Dirt . . . not after Zhou, no matter how pretty Vega’s words were . . . but the hate wasn’t as hot either. Against all the crazy fucking nutjob psychopathic killers in my life, a scumbag drug dealer only looking out for his kind ain’t too fucking high on the threat list. Small beans for results that weren’t interested in working themselves out. Bigger fish to fry and I ain’t talking tacos for once.

  So yeah, let Vick and T-Bone go into the Coyote den. Let them play peacemakers. Let T-Bone see everything Vega shows off though . . . cuz another name for diplomat is spy. Spy on your ally to keep the peace, that’s how it works in the real world, ain’t it?

  “Checks out,” Rescue announced before sliding the card over to Ranger Smith. Least he used the magazine hand to handle the card. The other hand went back to his pants, going for a two-finger triple-zigzag right between the boys. Somewhere out there, there’s a chosen one of ball-scratching, and this is the master he’s searching for.

  Ranger Smith read the mancer ID himself. “Price. Artificer. Hey, aren’t you the guy who killed that Sapa douchebag in Vegas?”

  So that’s how my life will be from now on. Shit . . . I like having to break down doors, what happens if they just all start opening up for me? “Yeah, someone had to,” King Henry played it cool, trying not to let his discomfort at fame show.

  Infamy . . . I like infamy, but fame? Fuck that sparkly shit.

  Ranger Smith handed the card back, eyes not so much glaring as lost in a glare. “Sorry about the threats. Everyone’s real nervous because of what happened. Why we got two of us here and now they’re putting in some security cameras all up and down the entrance roads next month.”

  “Always thought they should have a fence myself,” King Henry said, giving a sharp, canine grin as he pocketed his wallet.

  “Don’t want the attention, I think,” Ranger Smith said.

  “Yeah . . . attention is a cocksucker.”

  *

  From the gates there’s still a good chunk of driving to reach the Asylum proper. Mountains, trees, rocks, deer, bears shitting, all that stuff . . . Asylum owns too much nature for its own good. Few roads branching off to who-knows-where, camping sites where they could torture the Singles most likely, but for the most part it seems deserted enough. Occasional car probably full of Recruiters heading to Reno for a flight or a truck heading out to pick up supplies. King Henry used to sneak out of his room at night around 3AM and watch the cargo lines come in, one truck after another shoving food and toilet paper and a whole bunch of future shit or shit-wiper into the buildings. Didn’t have a warehouse, so the Asylum must have existed on a day-to-day basis for supplies. Good thing no one’s laying siege to it or some kiddies be going cannibal real quick.

  Deserted enough and then you push your way through a crevasse in the mountains and all of a sudden there’s a school campus that appears through the tree line. Multistory buildings one after another and then beside them the peak of the Mound like a great big pile of tree covered manure. King Henry slowed down a little bit, savoring the view. Home? More than Shithole Price ever was . . . not quite what the Shop is to me now, but fuck me are the memories almost knocking my ass on the floor and I’m just hitting the horseshoe.

  Employee housing up first on his left. Big ass apartment buildings mostly, since the Asylum liked the servants to be single if at all possible. Or related to someone already teaching at the place. They were getting ready to build another one of the things, King Henry noticed, land marked out and all that. Was still too cold in the mountains to be doing any building as of yet, but they were preparing for spring thaws.

  Cold felt good as far as King Henry was concerned. Felt right, a nice Asylum chill that made his geomancer’s coat comfortable for once. Was real winter up here, still with the storms and even a dusting of snow all the way into April. Today it was just chill, sun dipping, getting ready for an early enough night. Asylum proper sat on the west side of the Sierra Nevada, made for a hell of a sunset. It bathed everything in gold, made the shadows long and tired.

  Hall on his right up next, the Pools hiding behind it. No sign of the students. Must be last period before dinner and free time. Cafeteria on the left and Tri Intra Dorms on the right as he hit the horseshoe proper. Through the Cafeteria windows, he caught sight of a few lunch-ladies running around the empty tables, trying to pick up scraps of garbage that the janitors had missed from the post-lunch cleanup.

  Buildings disappeared on his right, making space for the flat expanse of the Field and then behind it the Mound in all its wooded, bench-dotted, Ultra-coveted splendor. On the left was the haphazard mess that was the normal classroom building . . . if it could claim to be one building with as many wings and additions it had suffered. So many tumors it ain’t even crafted by human hands no more, just a monstrosity of need and growth.

  Classroom windows facing the road were bright with light still. Wasn’t no Ultras in those rooms at this hour, just the poor Intras who got everything backwards, Mancy in the morning and Mathematics in the evening. Would’ve killed myself if all I had to look forward to during the day was ending it with one of the Dingle’s geometry tests.

  The horseshoe curved hard past the Ultra dorms, good ol’ common room and his graduate apartment up there somewhere. King Henry picked out a few uniforms on the stairwells open to the evening air. Cryomancer and two hydromancers . . . there’s some trouble right there. Shit . . . half the kids here I don’t even know. More than half, well past damn majority if you count the Intras in. Time of the Queens or the Eriksons or Leo and Sabine or even Vicky’s class was gone, same for Ultra ’09. July coming up would make it three full years. That long? one part of King Henry thought, while another countered with, only three years since the worst
I worried about was fucking over Welf and now all I’m worried about is blood gods and anima demons?

  The mass of Admin loomed before him, that clandestine block of building that hid more than it showed. Not the clandestine block of building I need though, this one is too well guarded, this one they’re expecting me to try. He wouldn’t find any of his answers at the Asylum. Seven years at the place and they still hid it all. Maybe he’d get a tidbit or two from Plutarch when they talked in an hour—after I get me some fish tacos—but not answers.

  Ceinwyn made that more than clear.

  If anyone would have, it would have been her.

  But she held the line.

  Won’t give them to me, so I got to steal them, and not doing it here, but you fucktards better know I’m coming for them soon.

  “You okay, Mini?”

  Much anima here, the steel block wrote.

  “Yeah, some of that is Plutarch’s fault. Got him a whole army of your kind spying on just about everyone.”

  Toymaker is very generous, provides homes for hundreds.

  Before Admin was a tight road off of the horseshoe. King Henry took it. Admin was a bit busier than the rest of the Asylum, even with the students distracted in class. Secretaries taking a breath of fresh air from whatever they did, a Recruiter or ESLED agent walking back to their homes after clocking out, even teachers with off periods running to their cubby-hole offices. I’ve seen them, ain’t anything special. Fucking small as shit, some of them even share two to a room. Decent place to fuck though . . . if you know how to pick a lock and happened to have a girlfriend who’s up for it . . . or even a crazy chick pretending to be your girlfriend. King Henry tried not to think about all the different rooms at the Asylum he’d fucked Isabel Soto in.

  It was . . . a lot.

  And not always with Isabel . . . wonder if Mrs. Dingle ever found the condom that Rosie Hale and me lost in her office couch?

  Sure hope so . . .

  . . . Cuz . . .

  . . . Eww . . .

  Even for me: double eww.

  The side road led around Admin to a parking garage. It too had security, but this time a rent-a-cop in place of the park rangers. “Took your time getting here,” the rent-a-cop told King Henry as he pulled up. Rent-a-cop . . . guy’s probably ESLED, just fuck-up ESLED getting the worst job in the entire agency.

  “Didn’t want to accidentally run over one of the kiddies, did I?” King Henry bullshitted the guy, playing a little nicer than he had with Ranger Smith.

  Rent-a-cop stuck out his hand, “ID.”

  And nicer faded away just like that. “Fucking again?”

  “Part of the new security measures.”

  “Fucking Curator,” King Henry mumbled as he pulled his wallet out. “Guys don’t have to give me a cavity search too, do you? Cuz I ate some habaneros for lunch and I don’t think it would be an enjoyable experience for either of us.”

  Rent-a-cop grabbed the ID, glaring at the name on it. “Think we’ll skip it. But if I did have to do it, it would all be your fault for that shit in Vegas, wouldn’t it, Price?”

  “What is it? No one was supposed to know about the Exhibition, so now everyone does? Called that shit before it happened,” King Henry said mostly to himself.

  Rent-a-cop appeared a few seconds later with both King Henry’s ID and a clip-on badge in his hands. “Personally, I’m surprised you actually fought the guy instead of drugging him beforehand,” he growled with a snarl.

  King Henry did some squinting at the rent-a-cop. Can’t remember his name, but looks familiar. “Shit . . . you were on the Erikson team in Winter War, weren’t you? I’d apologize for the waffles, but no one believes me when I do.”

  “Bryan Peterson, Intra pyromancer, and yeah, shit is the descriptive turn of that incident.”

  “Sorry?”

  “Fuck off, Price.”

  “Yeah, see, and it was just so sincere, Officer Pete.”

  Officer Pete handed over the ID and badge reluctantly. “There’s ESLED agents working as guards on the campus now, have the badge on at all times or they might think you’re doing something illegal. Even your short ass can’t pass for a student; even in those colors still . . . you know you look like some stupid jock in his letterman jacket at a high school reunion, right?”

  “Betting their letterman jackets don’t come with space to carry artifacts though. Cameras on the roads and now guards on campus . . . where’s the fun in that for the kiddies?”

  Officer Pete couldn’t help but grunt agreement. Every pyromancer had some rebel in them, even the ones joined the Man in ESLED. “Next time if you’re going to kill someone, kill the Curator, then things can go back to normal.”

  “Guess I could give it a try . . .”

  *

  “Mission accomplished, Mini, everyone knows we’re a bunch of BAMFs now,” King Henry told his steel cube as he picked it up from the passenger seat with a quick toss before catching it with his other hand. His convertible was parked in with all the usual Asylum cars, mid-class sedan luxury hybrids almost every one of them.

  Still unsure of this term.

  “Bad Ass Motherfuckers.”

  Sounds impressive.

  “Used to think so,” King Henry said as he picked up a backpack from the backseat and threw it over his back while trying not to fall on his backside. Had design documents in it and some materials for what would hopefully be a golem casing soon enough. Documents were worth more, except no one but an Artificer would place them as more valuable than the titanium, copper, and aluminum bars and tubes stuffed beside them. Poor Mini, might get to walk soon enough but gonna have to go through life without any bling.

  “Used to think being a BAMF was my goal in life, now I’m sort of here, and what’s it really matter? And look what they call me a BAMF for . . . stepping in some cage and killing a guy. Didn’t feel the least bit impressive to do . . . not nearly as impressive as the near miracle of surviving the Curator first time around or that lair with a blood god and half the Constructs on the planet killing each other. They didn’t give a shit about that, won’t believe it ever happened maybe. But Conan Sapa?

  “That shit they believe.”

  Must protect friends.

  “Yeah, not a bad first rule to have as they go . . . if you make the mistake of making friends.” King Henry pocketed his car keys and gave the convertible a pat on its side. “Stay! And don’t talk with the Asylum cars, cuz they’ll assimilate your pretty red ass and then you’ll be going door-to-door trying to get people to read the good work.”

  There is no fairy inside of your car.

  King Henry chuckled. “I know, but it’s a human thing. Not in the car, but you saying there are other fairies around, Mini?”

  Dozens.

  “Plutarch’s little spies,” King Henry grumbled, trying to focus in on his senses with the Mancy. Lot of metal around in the cars, but not nearly as much as it would’ve been decades ago. Concrete, asphalt, dirt under that, steel beams above his head. Anima flowing, untouchable to him in its natural element, but no blips of concentration that signaled fairies. “They’re hiding from me.”

  Mini’s writing wasn’t small but a running sentence like an old computer screen saver: Not from me. One makes oneself small as a pebble, not invisible. The Toymaker could teach you how to find them if you asked him.

  “Ask him? I was his student, why should I ask him after he failed at his job the first time around? Shit, didn’t even do it on accident either, did it on purpose cuz the Learning Council told him to only give half-truths.”

  He will not see it that way.

  “Yeah, well, his little spies can watch all they want and if one of them wants to tell their master that I’m having myself some fish tacos before I visit him, whenever I get around to it, they’re more than welcome to fuck off from the peep show.”

  A few have left.

  “Makes a fellow want to strip naked and masturbate in the middle of the Park just to
dissuade the prying eyes . . . except the whole ending-up-on-the-sex-offender-registry aftermath part.”

  Mini didn’t give a comment on that one. Probably trying to figure out what a sex offender is. Sure as fuck knows what masturbation is if he’s been spying on me for the last nine months. King Henry put the steel cube in his coat pocket. Usually his coat would’ve been overstuffed with artifacts, now it was only marginally full. Stupid ass Sebastian Rojas going up in flames with all King Henry’s artifacts had been problematic at first, a great loss it looked like, but now King Henry looked on the whole thing as an opportunity. Time to rebuild and remake and not half-ass his gear. SDR Mk IV was about as good as it would ever get, so it sat on his ring finger, but a lot of the rest? Time to revamp and reroll that shit.

  Whole bunch of pockets to fill up, normal ones and secret ones.

  SDR, Anti-Vamp Hot Cuffs, and Cold Cuffs. That was it that he’d remade. Poug’s glass-metal knife too, never leave home without your vampire sucky-sucky dagger, but he had left the World-Breaker in its usual hiding spot. No GOB, no HSK, wasn’t even sure he’d rebuild them all . . . might just put them in the scrap pile with the aero-fan and the “sword” and tons of other inefficient designs. He didn’t even bring a single Magic Little Ball. Except for the two next to my Magic Little Shaft.

  . . . More like a Magic Average Shaft really . . .

  King Henry cleared his throat as he strolled by Officer Pete’s station, showing off the fact his visitor badge was in place. Price, King Henry. Artificer. Graduated, Class 2009. Where they find a picture of me smiling like that? Must have been drunk . . . or lost a bet . . . or both.

  ESLED agents as guards. More security. More cameras.