by Jean Rabe
Interesting. He’d seen her before. Where? An alley? He preferred traveling in the alleys, hugging the buildings and embracing the shadows. Only the alleys, he’d been told, travel only in the alleys. And the sewers. Sometimes he broke with that, at night and when it was especially dark and rainy.
The stranger loved the storms, and he did not fear the pink lightning. The fancy lightning made the world a little more interesting…God willing, it might make his own self more interesting. The notion that a tiny thread of it might give him wings or a third eye set his heart thumping in anticipation.
He sniffed, picking out the awful scents permeating this particular alley. There was a restaurant side door directly across from his crevice, and he’d been waiting for something tasty to be tossed out. The lunch crowd was still feasting, so it was only a matter of waiting a little longer.
Where had he seen the elf? So familiar. Too familiar. Think think thinkthinkthink.
Where where where?
Ah! With the crowd that had gathered to gawk at his latest killing, the girl in the red dress he’d slashed. Was she significant, this elf? Something about her niggled at his brain. She’d went under the yellow strip, looked at the body. He would make a point to remember her, and if he saw her again, he would know she truly was significant, was a prier, a meddler, someone to be dealt with. Her and the invisible man she talked to.
The restaurant door banged open, and a thin Asian in a greasy white apron brought out a biodegradable box, which he carried to the trash.
Lovely, the stranger thought. His stomach rumbled in agreement.
Six
Right Cross
“This is a bad idea, if you ask me.”
“Good thing I’m not askin’ you, Mordred.” Ninn left the alley, pausing at the corner of One Hundred & Thirty Proof because she had that prickly feeling someone was watching her again. “See any eyes on us—human, metahuman, or otherwise? Anything?”
Mordred clicked and whirred, not a noise necessary for his scans, just something the AI seemed to do out of annoying habit. “Nada. Niets. Niente. Wala-lang. Ekkert. Netchego. Klum. Gornischt. Nope. Why? You notice something I don’t? ’Cause I’m seeing through your eyes, not mine while I’m a box, and so I’ve got zip. But if you’d unbox me, I could—”
“Not happening.” Ninn took a long glance in all directions, but saw no one or nothing that stood out, no obvious surveillance device. Still…. The feeling passed after a moment, and she went inside. “Guess I’ve got wala-lang, too.”
“Bummer, 2024, starring Satchal Rotreguese, shot in 4D.”
Overall, the place looked appealing and on the upscale side, and she wondered why she’d not bothered to visit before, as many years as she’d lived in the area and as much as she liked eating out. The RighteousRight flyer would have been a turnoff, though.
The main room was long and narrow, a polished wood bar stretching a full half of its length. Stools looked like real wood with padded leather seats, next to a brass railing. Mirror beveled at the edges, bottles arrayed on shelves underneath, two big tappers visible. Booths along the opposite wall, also wood, padded red vinyl seats made to look like the leather ones on the stools, cracked along a few edges. Tables were wood too, or an approximation so close that a cursory glance didn’t reveal them to be otherwise. Instrumental jazz played softly from speakers that nested next to obvious surveillance equipment…meaning there might be more surveillance equipment she couldn’t pick out. It smelled of floor polish, something pleasantly musky, and over all of that were the spices used to prepare the food. Ninn thought if she had those expensive nose filters she could have picked up far more.
The ЯɌ coat-of-arms at the back of the room, next to a sign with an arrow that pointed to the restrooms, was disconcerting. The size of a large platter, it was made to look like a medieval shield, crossed swords beneath the raised ЯɌ that was painted gold.
Only five men in the place, one of them the bartender. Two drinking at the bar, middle-aged, casual clothes, ruddy skin, looked local, sat one stool apart, no risk of touching that way—manly, phobic, whatever. They sounded local too, from the slang they were using: smackers, yakkers, dag, bludge, fair go. The two sitting at a table dined on fried shrimp and egg rolls, and they weren’t talking. Nothing in the bar’s appearance to hint that it doubled as an Asian restaurant, but it certainly smelled like it from the odor of oil and spices.
The two diners glanced her way, then returned their attention to their shrimp. Might be tourists, their skin fairer, both in jeans, high-end sandals, one in a muscle shirt—though he didn’t have the muscles for it—the other in a T-shirt advertising a band she’d never heard of.
No obvious cyberware, no visible weapons on any of them. Food must be good, the way they shoveled it in. They were close to finishing.
“Bad idea,” Mordred said. “Being here is a bad bad bad bad bad idea.”
“What do you see that I don’t?” she whispered.
“Box, remember? I’m looking through your peepers.”
“What am I missing?”
“Reading your vibes, Nininiru. And that tells me this is a double-bad notion. I could see better if you took me back out, your Keebler peepers alone—”
“—are serving just fine, thank you,” she subvocalized.
“Help you?” The bartender looked in her direction.
“Late lunch,” she said.
“Menu’s on the table.” His accent was thick Australian, probably legitimate, didn’t sound feigned. The men at the bar looked up from their drinks, one with a wide face studying her longer than was comfortable.
Ninn glided to a table midway in the room, taking the far seat so she could watch the men at the bar and the two diners, while keeping the front door in sight.
“You’re hungry? Really?” Mordred asked. “You ate a big breakfast. A good eight hundred and seventy-four calories. You could’ve been an extra at Breakfast at Tiffany’s. All the extras.”
“Huh?”
“1961. George Peppard. What about skipping lunch, not threatening the seams on your jeans, and visiting the spot of victim Number One’s demise? Dinner after.”
“That alley’s not going anywhere,” Ninn whispered while eyeing the menu, pleased that the lunch specials were in effect until 2:30. She had a half-hour to spare. Hot Spicy Shrimp, Basil Chicken, Pepper Steak, Mongolian Beef, Mixed Vegetables, Zucchini Lamb, probably the real fare, judging by the prices. She ran a finger down the offerings, listening to the duo at the bar, boosting her audio receptor when the two at the table finally started talking, not recording anything…no need to take up memory with obvious tourist chatter.
“—That was good shrimp. Haven’t had this good of shrimp since we were in Kokopelli’s Cave Bed and Breakfast for our honeymoon,” the one said. “Though that was cave shrimp, not sea shrimp. There’s a difference.” He had an overlong nose, with a scar on it like he’d had a skin cancer spot removed.
The other man snorted. “We never took a honeymoon. Didn’t have the nuyen for it, spent too much on the fraggin’ wedding, fed all the guests and put up the out-of-towners. Then the kid came. This’s our first trip we needed a passport for.”
“Ha! Ours was simple, the wedding. Spent our money on travel, you know. We like to travel. A vacation every year. Going to the zoo tomorrow,” the long-nosed one said. “Wife will have enough of her shopping fix today, signed up for the whole package, ferry ride to the zoo, antique cable car. You zooing, too?”
Must have come in together with a tour group, seemed to know each other reasonably well, Ninn decided, but definitely not best friends. Both talked with an eastern States accent, maybe Boston. “Car” had come out “cah.”
“Didn’t sign up for that package, taking the one-day to the Blue Mountains, though. My son wants to hold a koala before they go extinct. Wife’s gonna do more shopping.”
“Guy on the plane said they don’t let you do that no more, carry koalas.”
Long-nos
e snickered. “If my boy wants to hold a koala, he gets to hold a koala.”
“Chicken fried rice,” Ninn said when the bartender came over. He was human, and as he set down the water glass and she spotted the ЯɌ tattoo on the inside of his wrist, she knew he would be tech-less. “No onions, extra egg.”
“Haven’t seen you in here before.”
“Haven’t been in here before,” she replied. “Nice place, like the wood. Homey. Feels comfortable, you know.”
He stood there, his face blank, but his dark eyes intense, made no move to write down her order. Maybe he had a good memory.
“Yeah, this place is comfortable. The neighborhood doesn’t feel so comfortable, though,” Ninn continued. “Heard there was another murder last night. Not too far from here. Know anything about that?”
“Hadn’t heard,” he said, eyes seemingly getting darker.
“I think the lumpers are looking at the RighteousRight. That’s the talk on the sidewalks and—”
“They’re not involved.”
“They’re,” not “we”—interesting, his words giving him a little distance. “How’d you know that, when you hadn’t heard about the murder?”
“That all you want? Fried rice?”
“No onions. Toohey’s Bitter Red, too, and one eggroll.”
“With Six You Get Eggroll,” Mordred said in her head.
The bartender—Albert, according to his nametag—studied her a few seconds longer before heading toward the back.
“That tattoo is not good news for someone like you, Keeb. There’s a reason only humans’re in here. Did you see the ЯɌ on the shield? On his wrist? Well, of course you saw them. Are all the ЯɌs tatted? Take me out of this box. It’s—”
She disconnected the smartlink, not wanting the gun’s distracting banter. She watched Albert walk into the kitchen, a few beats passed and he came back out, went behind the bar and leaned close to the two patrons. He nodded toward her.
They turned and slid off their chairs, the one with the wide face stopping at the tourists’ table. “You should leave, mates,” he said. “This is gonna get messy. Don’t worry about your bill; it’s on the house.”
The pair pushed back from the table, nervously looked at Ninn, then headed to the door.
“Real messy,” the man repeated.
Ninn tried to size them up, but it was already too late.
The wide-faced man was surprisingly quick, pulling a baton from his waistband. He was on her in two long steps, slamming it down on the tabletop and setting the condiments dancing. The other man, thin, tall, and with a bald spot that gleamed from the lighting, pulled an Ono Arms Steadfast from his pocket and held the weapon close. The pistol looked oddly small in his big hand, but was still fairly concealable. The way he stood, the surveillance system would have trouble catching it.
Which meant she better not draw one of her guns. It would only take six seconds to unfold Mordred, a lot less to pull out her Praetorian, but she didn’t want to be snagged in a recording shooting one of these goons. AISE already had her in its crosshairs, the lieutenant had made that clear in the alley. Waller would use any excuse to lock her up.
“I’ll leave,” she said. “Don’t need no trouble.” Want it? Yes. She’d like to put these fraggin’ drongoes in their place. The one with the Steadfast had a navy blue ЯɌ tat on his neck, the other had them on the back of each hand, but more obvious than that he wore a T-shirt with RighteousRight printed horizontally and vertically to form a big Christian cross. Apparently the members didn’t mind broadcasting their affiliation. “Just wanted some fried rice with no onions and a Toohey’s. And maybe a little conversation with the bartender over there.”
“Like I said, she’s the one that’s been out on the street asking too many questions about the Right,” the bartender called. “Trying to link the Right to the entertainers that got geeked. Trying to cause trouble.”
Hmmmm, so news of her questioning some of the locals had bounced here already. Quite the lightning-fast network the RighteousRight had in the Cross.
“Don’t like your kind,” Wide Face said.
“What, elves?” Ninn noted the Steadfast had even scratches on its barrel. Victory notches? “Or you don’t like people who ask questions about the Double-R?”
“Both,” Wide Face said.
Ninn rose and took a step back to give herself room. “Where’s my lunch?” She looked around them to the bartender.
“It ain’t coming. Don’t serve your kind,” the bartender said. He’d picked up a rag and was wiping down the bar, but kept his eyes on her.
“Would that be elves?” she said, “Or would that be—”
“Both, you skankin’ Keebler. We said both.” The one with the Steadfast wrinkled his nose. “This place is sacred. Got no right to be here. Lookit her eye, Johnny. She’s got a cyber—”
“And I’m keeping it,” Ninn lowered her left hand and pivoted, a distracting move to take their attention from the follow through; a long swinging uppercut to Wide Face’s jaw. It was a move she learned in a boxing class she took years ago in Chicago. Living in Kings Cross, she’d had reason to keep in practice. Her reaction enhancers helped, a few vertebrae that had been replaced in her spinal column made her quicker. It had been cheaper and less painful than the wired reflexes the doc tried to sell her.
She connected, feeling the jolt all the way to her shoulder, and his head snapped back and he wobbled, but he caught himself against a table and didn’t topple.
“She’s big trouble.” The Steadfast was pointed at her chest. “Back off, Keebler. I’ll plug ya and pluck out that cybereye. Gut you for whatever else electric’s hooked up inside ya.”
Ninn moved away, intending to leave and keep this from escalating. But the bartender had other ideas. He’d come out from behind the bar, blocked the front door, and thumped a baseball bat against his open hand. “She’s not going anywhere, mates. Not until she’s learned some manners. I cleared it with the cook. He says have at her. Toss what’s left down the sewer.”
“Right we will. She started it!” Wide Face had regained his balance. “You saw, Albert! She threw the first punch. You tell the cook it’s all on her.”
“I did start it,” Ninn admitted. Maybe shouldn’t have done that.
“I’ll finish it,” Wide Face continued. “Don’t shoot her, Hank. I’m gonna tear this bloody blow-in from top to—”
I started it, Ninn thought. I might as well finish it. Her left fist slammed into his wide chin, a power shot crossed over her right. She drew back and jabbed again and again, keeping a left foot forward stance. It was a typical boxing punch, and she followed it with another jab, then a hook and an uppercut, all fueled by ire and aided by her muscle augmentation, cables woven to enhance her strength. She heard bone snap, and registered that she’d broken his jaw. Teeth, too, as several pinked against the floor. Then he fell, and took a table over with him.
The other man shot, but his hand was shaking and his aim was off. Ninn was on him before he could fire again. One good thing about RighteousRight members was they apparently eschewed anything like dermal plating or bone lacing, relying solely on what nature gave them…which was basically nothing in Ninn’s eyes. She cocked her right hand back to provide extra extension, and then drove it forward in a wide, semi-circular hook fashion, all the power in her muscle augmentation behind it. Putting that much effort into one punch left her open, but she had nothing to worry about.
He dropped like dead weight, more teeth hitting the floor, another jaw cracked.
Ninn looked to the bartender. “Okay if I leave now?”
He held the bat down to his side and with his free hand opened the door for her.
“This’ll come back on ya,” he said as she passed by. “Ya’ll pay for this and for pryin’, for accusin’ us. And it’ll cost dearly, elf. We promise ya. It’ll be expensive.”
“We” this time. We promise.
Ninn laughed. “It’ll cost me? Just make su
re the Toohey’s Bitter Red is cold the next time I stop in.” She was convinced there was more than a good bet that the RighteousRight was behind the slayings in the Cross, and that she might be coming back to this hole to do more digging.
Out on the sidewalk, she felt a gentle rumble of thunder under her feet. Ninn turned on the smartlink.
“Keebs, what happened?” Mordred’s questions tumbled through her mind. “Where are we—”
“We’re going to the spot where Victim Number One was killed,” she cut in. “Isn’t that what you wanted to do?”
“Yes. And where is that?”
“Another alley. Behind a dance club called the Forum.”
“A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum,” Mordred said. “Zero Mostel and—”
“Yeah, well it wasn’t too funny, my failed attempt at lunch,” she mused, “not too funny to the choobs in that bar, anyway. I’m still hungry.”
Seven
Mana from the Heavens
She was halfway down the block when a thin bolt of bright pink lightning shot across the sky just beneath the cloud cover, accompanied by a wild, keening scream. Then there was silence.
Absolute silence.
She tried to ask Mordred: “Did you hear that scream?” Knew she said it. Her lips moved, but no sound came out. Her feet stomped against the pavement, nothing. She clapped her hands. Nothing. She tried shouting. John Milton had penned: “Accuse not Nature, she had done her part…” What if that part was to steal all sound from the world?
Wala-lang.
A few paces ahead, a woman who’d been shopping dropped her packages, looked up and appeared to cry out—mouth wide in terror, hands held to her head like the famous Edvard Munch painting. She whirled and darted into a store.
“Keebs?” Mordred’s thin voice reverberated inside Ninn’s head. “I don’t hear anything ’cept my awesome self talking. Nada. Niets. Niente. Wala-lang. Ekkert. Netchego. Klum. Gornischt. Zilch. Squat. Nothing. El-zippo. And since I’m using your expensively modified ears, I can tell you don’t hear anything either. Not a good sign.”