“Hold on.” Batface shakes Niko again and Niko yells louder. “Clearer, how bout,” the gargoyle requests.
“Fly me down,” yells Niko.
Pignose leans toward Niko until his head fills Niko’s vision. He grins and Niko becomes quite aware of the human gore slathered on the gargoyle’s granite teeth. “Tell you what,” Pignose says. “Since you’ve had the bad manners to yell somebody’s true name to everyone here, I’ll fly you all the way to the far wall.” The pigsnouted head turns right. “Asmodeus. You still got that slingshot?” And turns back. “Now what is it going on about?”
“It says,” says Batface, “This has been willed where what is willed must be.”
Pignose’s granite eyes narrow. “Oh for crying in the sink.”
“Look, what’s this all about?” says Batface. “Do I toss it back or do we make it a crispy critter? My arm’s getting tired.”
The others laugh and Ramhorn calls him a pussy.
“It’s a bad angle,” Batface insists, and they laugh again.
Pignose purses stone lips at Niko. “Go ahead and put it down. That this has been willed stuff is one of the old keys. It’s mortal.”
“Mortal.” Batface holds Niko before him and frowns as he inspects him like a new kind of Ken doll. “No fooling.” Shaking his head he sets Niko on the parapet.
Niko starts to say something to Pignose but the gargoyle holds a finger up for him to wait and turns his attention to the man wearing Niko’s clothes who has apparently passed out from the pain of trying to tear his hair out of his scalp to free himself. Now Pignose nods at Batface who draws the limp clothed figure back while Pignose takes a deep breath—
Again Niko shouts Stop, stop.
Batface lowers the man and inclines his monstrous head at Niko. “It’s really starting to get on my nerves.”
Pignose glares at Niko, cheeks bulging enormously. He lowers his head and spews his noxious fiery breath. Screams renew from the dead below and an awful smoke and bacon smell wafts up.
Pignose wipes his gleaming chin. “What is it now?”
Niko points. “Those are my clothes. He stole them from me.”
“Do I look like a cop to you, meat pie? I don’t give a fat rat’s ass if they’re the Pope’s pajamas.”
“Please, I’d like them back.”
“Ooh, please it says,” Ramhorn says to Pignose. They curtsy and bow to one another like courtiers and then Pignose grins unpleasantly at Niko. “What are you willing to do to get them back?”
Niko hesitates.
“Guess he don’t want em that bad,” says Batface, dangling the unconscious dead man.
“What do you want me to do?” calls Niko.
The gargoyles frown thoughtfully and glance among themselves and shrug. Then they grin and set the clothed man down on the parapet. “Wake him up,” Pignose tells Batface.
Pignose turns to Niko and smiles. “You’re going to fight him for your clothes.”
THE FAR SIDE of the Battlements is a sudden raw dropoff that could be two hundred feet or two hundred miles, Niko can’t tell as he gazes over the edge because a pure and famished darkness swallows the face of the cliff below a hundred feet. To his left the warm red river vomits from the arch to become a spraying frothing bloodfall that disperses into fine red mist to rain upon whatever horror lies below, ferrying its tumbling voiceless cargo to some lower deeper fate.
A ramp is carved into the Ledge. It begins on the near side of the arch and angles down until it disappears into the bleeding dark. A sick parade of thoughtless dead marches downward without end, so many dead no floor of ramp itself is visible, so many that they spill over the edge of the ramp and tumble down the sheer face of the Ledge. Ravenous darkness swallows the ramp as it descends. The blind abyss is filled with screams and earthen rumblings and a distant thunder, the deep arrhythmic grinding of a factory of despair.
The Battlement wall is twelve feet thick and solid rock so far as Niko sees. He takes his time because it’s about to become his arena as he fights a dead man for his clothes. The dead man is awake again and naked now. Niko’s clothes are draped across an embrasure near the waiting gargoyles. Jacket shirt pants and even underwear but not his shoes and socks. Niko insisted the clothes be removed so he can meet his opponent on equal ground. And why fight to get them back if they’re torn to uselessness by the fight itself?
Niko stretches out and gazes down the far side of the wall, covertly sizing up his opponent. The man is not some kind of bruiser. He’s tall and bony and welldefined, which is even worse. Tall and bony guys are hard to fight. For one thing they’ve got range. It hurts to block them. It hurts to hit them. It hurts a lot when they hit you. Then there’s the fact that Niko can’t kill the man because the man is already dead.
Bony just stares at Niko without expression as Niko stretches out. Pale blue eyes and thinning brown hair. Scalp encrusted with blood where he tried to pull his hair out to escape Batface’s clutch. Smoker’s teeth in yellowed disarray. He doesn’t look afraid or worried or eager. He probably just doesn’t care. After all he’s been through down here this is probably a resort massage.
Niko’s heart is pumping madly and his palms are sweaty and he’s breathing way too fast. The man’s indifference is more worrisome than if he were chomping at the bit. Niko makes himself take long deep breaths. His thirst is unbelievable. He feels his very skin demanding water. Even his eyes feel dry.
The gargoyles lean against the merlons and wager on the outcome. Niko’s not sure he wants to know who’s favored or the odds.
The gargoyles are becoming impatient. Before they can yell at him Niko straightens from his hurdler’s stretch and gives Pignose the nod and says Let’s dance.
“Bout time.” Leaning against the wall Pignose folds his burly arms. “No rules, boys. Come out swinging till ya can’t swings no more.”
Ramhorn mimes pulling a bell cord. “Ding ding,” he says basso profundo.
Bony walks calmly to the middle of the parapet and looks Niko in the eye and extends a hand. “No hahd feelins, mite,” he says in a thick Australian accent.
Niko takes the hand to shake and Bony yanks him in and unloads a left hook to the side of Niko’s head. Or where Niko’s head would have been if he hadn’t gone with the pull and ducked. Niko continues the motion and pushes up on Bony’s hand to raise the Aussie’s arm and glide under it and turn away from him as he does. He straightens quickly and turns the arm to lock it and bend Bony over and then comes down hard on the upturned elbow joint with his own elbow. Bony yells but the joint doesn’t break so Niko tries again. As he comes down Bony lets off a kick to Niko’s shin that glances off but doesn’t exactly tickle and then Bony jerks free.
They square off.
Bony stands a little hunched with hands up to protect his face and upper body, left shoulder leading. A boxing stance. Niko’s arm-bar has hurt Bony’s elbow but not enough. He’s probably acquired a stratospheric tolerance for pain.
Bony sees the way Niko’s sizing him up and he grins pure enjoyment. “Yer a goer then eh? Cmon then. Cmon.”
Niko waits in his stance. Bony’s a boxer, he’s Australian, and there’s something oldfashioned about him. Niko’s willing to bet he never saw martial arts in his life or since. Which means there’s a lot he won’t be expecting.
Niko assumes a boxer’s stance.
Bony nods. “That’s it mite. Now cmin eer an get slapped loyk a gull.” Bony begins to circle, still grinning as he bobs and weaves and feints and jabs. He’s out of range, just trying to intimidate. He fights flatfooted, European style. As Bony circles he begins to spiral in toward Niko, slow and subtle but the taunting jabs are getting closer. Niko hasn’t bothered to block any yet.
“Not much chance a gettin the sun in yer eyes, eh?” Bony feints and bobs right. “You look loyk ya been out in the sun ricently. Eh? That royt?”
And Niko realizes Bony hates him for his mortality.
Bony jabs again and rushes in t
o unload a right cross. Niko stops him cold with a sidekick to the knee. It hurts like hell because the sole of Niko’s foot is so cut up from running from the mulchosaur. He tries to follow through with a backfist to the head but Bony sidesteps and dances back. Niko’s kick had been an inch too high. Probably charliehorsed Bony’s quad pretty good but Niko doubts a charliehorse is going to send the Aussie running home to momma.
The Aussie looks surprised at the kick and perhaps as well at the way Niko moves. “So that’s how you ply, eh? Leave it to a Yank ta kick loyk a sheila.” He spits into his hands. “Bloody septics.”
On the last word Niko fakes a backfist to the head and Bony’s guard comes up. Niko leg-sweeps Bony’s front leg out from under him and Bony lands hard on his naked tailbone and Niko drives down a left punch. Bony rolls enough to take it on the shoulder and grabs Niko’s arm and pulls him down with him. Now it’s a grappling match and technique is out the window. Gouge and scratch and bite. They might as well be two cats tied together in a bag going over a waterfall. They roll around on the parapet for ten seconds before Niko gets away, bleeding from a cheek and an earlobe and from his forehead where he butted the Australian in the mouth. An eye got gouged in the fray and he’s bruised where Bony grabbed his balls and tried to pop them like grapes. His shoulder wound and the bite on his thigh have opened up again. Bony’s bleeding from the forehead and chest and lip. Left eyelid swollen and two fingers broken.
They face each other once again. Both men panting. Bony wipes his split lip with a forearm. “That’ll get the old pump wuhhkin, eh?” And he jumps in to do it again.
Niko sidesteps and roundkicks Bony in the solar plexus. He hits him with his big toe instead of the ball of his foot and goddamn if he doesn’t sprain it on the son of a bitch’s skinny chest. But at least Bony says Whuh and doubles over.
Niko dances in to finish Bony off but his bleeding feet skid on the stone. Bony mulekicks at Niko’s groin and catches the fresh bite gouge on his thigh. It feels like a branding iron. Niko yells as he falls. He rolls and comes up in a fighting stance and then the leg collapses under him. He tucks tight as Bony stumbles to him and tries to stomp him. Niko’s leg piledrives Bony’s shin.
“Oh that smaahts,” the Aussie yells. His savage grin remains.
Niko stays down. The stone is warm against his naked ass. Bony can’t get in on Niko while he’s made himself a little fortress like a turtle. But like a turtle he is roadkill if he tries to pick up and go anywhere. Stalemate.
It’s been about thirty seconds since they started in on each other. Plenty of time to cause a lot of damage in an unprotected fight. Niko now sees he’s at a serious disadvantage here. Maybe Bony was a Boy Scout Leader in his earthly life, though Niko doubts it because the son of a bitch is enjoying this way too much, but since then the Australian has experienced decades of true and utter ruthlessness. He’s lost the governors that hamper most people. He has no instinct for selfpreservation because he’s already dead. And Niko’s holding back that little bit that’s going to let the Aussie beat him.
Bony makes a third attempt to kick Niko while he’s down. Niko tries again to kick Bony’s kneecaps. The gargoyles decide things have gotten boring and it won’t improperly influence the wager to let the mortal get back up so the boys can finish up their little dance.
The moment Niko’s on his bleeding feet the Aussie goes for broke. Jab and jab then slide up jab and here comes a right with murder in its eye. Niko kicks him in the side and feels a rib break beneath his heel. Bony flies back and hits a merlon. Niko catches him on the rebound and takes him down and slams him facefirst onto the bare rock parapet and smashes his nose like a stewed tomato. The Aussie bucks once and then lies still. For a moment Niko’s sure he’s killed the man and then remembers that’s not possible. For insurance Niko folds the Aussie’s right leg until the heel is against the buttock and then sits down on the upturned instep.
“Finish it,” says Pignose from his makeshift throne of an embrasure.
“How the fuck am I supposed to do that?” The Australian suddenly struggles beneath him. Niko keeps pressure on the leg. “I can ’t kill him.”
“Make him say uncle.”
“Are you—” Niko frowns. He supposes one word’s just as good as the next. He glances at the man beneath him. One skinny arm is struggling feebly to find purchase. Fuck it.
“Say uncle,” Niko says.
“Oh uddy ay.”
“What’s he saying?” complains Batface.
“He says no bloody way,” says Niko.
They sit there a moment in a strange tableau. Wrestlers on a Grecian urn.
“Ood thot, ite.”
“Thanks,” says Niko. “You got me some good ones yourself.”
“Orry out ya glothes. Oodnt elp oyself.”
“Way it goes,” says Niko.
“Look, I want subtitles or something,” says Ramhorn.
“He said he’s sorry about my clothes. He couldn’t help himself.” The gargoyles laugh.
“Well isn’t that sweet,” says Ramhorn. “Maybe if you let him go you two can kiss and make up.”
“I don’t think so,” says Niko.
“Ont tink oh,” the Australian agrees.
“Over the side with him then,” says Batface.
“That side,” adds Pignose, nodding at far side of the Ledge. Niko leans close to the Australian. The naked contact is unnervingly intimate. “Give. There’s no shame.”
“Uck oo, ank.”
Niko sighs. “Where’s my guitar? And my shoes?”
A pause. Beneath him the Australian hawks and spits out teeth and blood. “Lemme ub an I’ll tell ya.”
“I don’t think so, Cisco.” Niko glances up. The squareteethed edge of the parapet is only a few feet away. One sudden rush will heave the Aussie over the side like last week’s garbage. Harder without clothes to grab onto though. Niko must have missed the class where they showed how to fight naked against people who are already dead.
“Loyk to thang ya for the divuhsion. Bit of a chinge from the old ruh-tyne, yknow.”
Pignose strides over to them and glowers down. “If you don’t throw him I don’t collect.” His textured stone wings spread. “And if I don’t collect, you don’t get your ride.”
“Go on, mite. Oyve had my fud an ya bead me fair an zguare. Oy got nothin left to lose unda thize bastids.”
Pignose casually reaches down a massive hand and grinds the Aussie’s mashed nose against the parapet. The Australian screams.
Niko takes a deep breath. All right. He bends the Aussie’s right arm sharply up between the protruding shoulderblades and lifts. The downed man rises as if levitating. Niko moves the arm forward and drunkwalks the Australian toward an embrasure. Smooth, steady, don’t stop. Remember you won’t be killing somebody.
It’s still not easy to find it within himself to hurl someone over the edge of a cliff.
He relaxes just a bit on the arm and the Australian immediately comes nearly upright and Niko yanks down and lifts to throw him overboard and son of a bitch if the Australian doesn’t whip around as he hits the embrasure and grab Niko by the both forearms to pull him over the side along with him. Niko drops to the parapet but he scrapes forward until his bleeding shoulder hits an embrasure and he’s wedged against the inside wall. The Australian is leaning out from the Battlement with both legs braced against the outside wall, deathgripping Niko’s arms and pulling for all he’s worth. Niko braces a leg against the embrasure and manages to keep the Australian from pulling him over the edge, but he has no leverage to force the man back. He can’t hold this position very long.
The two men look at one another across the width of stone. The man’s pale eyes are bloodied and his lip is gashed and he’s missing front teeth. His nose is a swollen shapeless ruin dripping blood. And he’s grinning.
Niko’s arms feel as if they’re wrenching from their sockets. His face is hot and his head throbs as if he’s about to blow an artery. “Let go.�
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“Not on your loyf, mite.” The Australian strains at Niko’s arms like an angry dog on a leash, each leg on a merlon and holding onto Niko in the gap between. He’s standing sideways above an unfathomable space of writhing darkness, the hiss of the bloodfall loud below. He’s a son of a bitch but he’s a brave son of a bitch.
Niko strains his arms inward to make a narrow X and slowly draws big outward circles, turning his wrists up as he does. For a moment it looks as if he’s making a handshadow of a bat as he follows the direction of the grabbing thumb in a slow elaborate shrug. He tucks his elbows toward his ribcage and brings his hands back toward his own shoulders. The Australian now holds on by little more than thumb and forefinger and it’s not enough. For the first time Niko sees something like alarm on the man’s face. He feels the grip weakening and he pushes his elbows forward to increase the angle.
Now the Australian’s grin holds a different edge. He concedes with a nod and never takes his eyes off Niko. “See ya in ell, mite,” he shouts above the torrent.
Niko moves his elbows outward and the grip slides off and the Australian falls away. He kicks out from the wall, upturned like a man backswimming toward the misty bloodfall far below, and silently he stares at Niko until he’s swallowed by the deeper darkness far below.
Niko turns and slides down to lie against the wall and rubs his burning forearms and looks at Pignose holding an upturned claw out to the rest of the gargoyles. No one else seems to have bet in Niko’s favor.
“O ye of little faith,” Niko mutters, and then he’s still for a good long while.
“PULL.”
Niko wakes to orange light. A weight of stone looms somewhere high above him. He can feel its pressure overhead. Yet he also feels a fragile sense of lying on a slender rampart jutting out into an immense open space. Vertigo assails him and he shuts his eyes. The back of his head is pounding and he’s covered with scabs and dried blood. His knuckles are bruised and swollen and his big toe feels broken. His testicles are lead weights. His arm and leg muscles burn. A tic in his cheek and his thigh. His gums are swollen and his tongue is thick and his breath feels like shimmering waves of heat should be rising from his mouth. His heel is bruised and his feet are cut so badly he’s afraid to stand. How good it is to shut his eyes and sink into the primal mud of sleep. To feel himself drift away from himself.
Mortality Bridge Page 17