One Eyed Jacks

by George R. R. Martin

  "Tachyon, I'm willing to be understanding. This is all very sad, but it doesn't alter the relevant, dangerous fact. Blaise is a sociopath, maybe even psychotic. People are going to continue to get hurt."

  "I am willing to take that risk."

  "Fine! But you don't have the right to place others at risk."

  "What can I do! With his mind powers do you really think he's going to submit to analysis?"

  A new, worrisome thought intruded. He watched it etch itself momentarily on her face. Concern rose in the back of his throat, snatching the breath from his lungs, and Tachyon realized it was her emotions he was feeling. She was afraid for him.

  "Tachyon, you can control him, can't you?"

  "For now."

  "What does that mean, for now?"

  "As he matures, he gains power. I've taken to maintaining shields against him constantly."

  "How hard are these shields to…?"

  "To break?"

  "Yes."

  "Exceedingly," he soothed. "I'm afraid."

  "Don't be. I will protect you." Her hair was soft against his fingertips as he brushed it back from her forehead.

  Sharply. "I don't need your protection!"

  Startled, he pulled back. "I meant no offense. I assumed you would be a shield to my back as well," he stuttered, backpedaling frantically. The militant light died from her eye.

  "Damn it!"

  "What?"

  "It's so damn hard to hold my own against you."

  "Why must you?"

  "Because you're too fucking seductive. Too glib. Too polished. Too attentive. I won't-"

  She whirled and was out of the lab as if every ancestor ghost in her pedigree was on her heels.

  The bright June sunlight spilled into the gloomy interior of the Jokertown Dime Museum and set dust motes to spinning. Blaise liked that. Had they been there all along, he wondered, just waiting in the darkness for his coming? Or had his arrival created them?

  Do other people think those kinds of thoughts? Blaise mused as he sauntered past the "Hideous Joker Baby" display and the Jetboy diorama. Cody was standing in front of the waxwork figure of his grandfather. Blaise felt a flare of irritation.

  The woman thoughtfully stirred her cup of Italian lemon ice and took a bite.

  "How young he looks," Blaise heard her say.

  "No different than now," said Dutton, owner of the Dime Museum.

  The joker was standing behind her, hands hidden in the folds of his cloak. The hood was back, revealing the death's-head. Blaise wondered if the man was trying to shock Cody, or if this was a measure of how well accepted she had become?

  Cody was speaking again. "No, that's an illusion. When I look at him, I see every one of those forty-three years etched in his face."

  "You care for him," suggested Dutton.

  "I'm fascinated by him," Cody corrected, then added: "It's the face of a dissipated saint."

  "I'll leave you to a contemplation of a face for which you care

  … er… with which you are fascinated."

  "What lovely grammar you have," said Cody dryly as Dutton retreated back into his office.

  The stones were a sharp, hard pressure against his thigh. Blaise cupped his hand protectively about the bulge and moved swiftly to intercept Cody as she moved to survey the Syria diorama.

  "Hi, Cody."

  "Oh, God, Blaise, you startled me."

  She had pressed her hand against her throat. He could see where her tan ended and the milk white of her breast began. He noticed she was wearing a thin gold chain. He liked the way it echoed the gold of her skin. Maybe colored stones didn't suit her? Maybe she didn't like them? Oh, God, I love you so much!

  But what he said, in a voice jumping with nervousness was, "I got something for you."

  He dug into his pocket, the supple leather of the pouch was soft against his hand. The knobby bundle pulled free and Blaise tugged open the drawstrings. With a sound like hail on glass the gemstones spilled across the surface of the diorama console. Emeralds formed a drift about the button controlling Sayyid. A diamond skittered hysterically toward the edge of the console, and Cody automatically caught it. Her fingers closed tight about the jewel. Slowly she raised her hand to eye level and cautiously unfolded her fingers, as if fearful of what her hand contained.

  Blaise frowned down at the rainbow spill and worried his lower lip between his teeth. The sapphires looked almost fake-too blue. The rubies weren't bad, but the topaz was best. The boy swept up a golden topaz the size of a small robin's egg and held it against the hollow in Cody's throat. A nervous pulse was hammering there. Blaise liked that.

  "Here, this suits you best. I know it's only semiprecious-"

  "Where did you get these?"

  Her voice was rough, commanding, not the breathless excited coo he had expected. Blaise flinched, felt stomach acid starting to churn.

  "You don't ask about a gift, you just accept it."

  The jewels rattled as Cody began sweeping them into a pile. She twitched the leather pouch from his hand and began shoveling in the gems. "Blaise, you're in big trouble. Tell me where you got these. Maybe we can work out something without your grandfather having to find out. You are a minor-"

  "Cody! They're for you!"

  "I don't want them. I don't want stolen gifts."

  "I just wanted to make you happy," said Blaise. "Well, you've managed to achieve just the reverse."

  "Cody." His voice was a plaintive whine. "I love you." Her hand was soft on his head, the fingers stroking through the rough short ends of his brush cut. "Every kid feels that way. I feel madly in love with my high-school history teacher. It's something we do when we start to notice there's a difference between boys and girls. When you're a teenager, everything seems so insecure. If we can fall in love with an older person, it helps give a sense of order to a very uncertain world."

  "Don't talk down to me!"

  "I'm not. I'm trying to show you that I do care. I do understand, but understanding is not permission."

  His power was beating against the confines of his skull. His entire body was one great pressure-filled ache. He wanted to explode, to lash out.

  "I love you." The words had to squeeze past clenched teeth.

  "I don't love you."

  "I can make you!"

  For the first time he saw a reaction. A flicker of alarm in that single dark eye. But her voice was cold and dead level as she said, "That's not love, Blaise, that's rape."

  His arm executed a wide, uncontrolled arc. "It's him! It's him, isn't it?"

  "What are you talking about?"

  "I'm better than he is. Younger, stronger. I can give you everything. Anything you want I can give you. I can take you anywhere."

  He began to pace, long agitated strides that carried him across the narrow confines of the aisle and back again. Cody was so still it was frightening.

  "Anywhere in the world," he continued. "Off the world. And Chris is okay, he can come, too. You don't want him pawing at you. You don't want the stump rubbing your boob, or feeling you up-"

  The blow was so unexpected that it stopped the words in his throat and rocked him back on his heels. Cody slowly lowered her hand. Blaise could feel the stinging imprint of her palm on his face. A pressure was building in his chest as if all the unspoken endearments, curses for Tachyon, descriptions of prowess were piling up like cars on a gridlocked beltway.

  "Now, you listen, and you listen good! I have allowed you to ramble on in this very silly and very immature fashion out of concern and love for your grandfather, and out of consideration for your youth and folly."

  Each word struck like a lash, and Blaise writhed under the withering scorn in the deep, husky voice. His love was curdling until it lay like an oily foul-tasting slick on the back of his tongue.

  Cody continued. "But I'm out of time, and I'm out of patience. Somewhere out there"-her arm swung in a wide arc encompassing the city-"there's a lovely young girl who's learning to prove g
eometry theorems, or cut out a dress pattern, or play tennis, and someday the two of you are going to meet and be very happy together. But that girl isn't me."

  She hefted the pouch of jewels and stared sternly down at him.

  "Now, tell me where you got these, and I'll see if I can keep you out of reform school. And you keep your mouth shut to your grandfather. I won't tell him what a fool you've been if you'll work with me and we get these jewels back to their owner."

  "I hate you!"

  A mocking little half smile curved her lips. "I thought you loved me."

  He backed away, held out a shaking hand. "I… will… show… you."

  The Tachyon waxwork was directly opposite him.

  Blaise coiled and lashed out with a spinning back kick. The head flew off the wax figure, and it toppled to the floor. Then quickly and methodically he kicked it to pieces. Dutton ran out of the office.

  "Hey!"

  His voice trailed away as he looked from Blaise to Cody, who was standing as still as one of the waxwork figures surrounding her.

  "I'll… show… you," Blaise said again, and strode out of the museum.

  "It should have sounded silly and melodramatic. Hell, it did sound silly and melodramatic, but frankly it scared the pee out of me."

  Tachyon pressed a glass into her hands. Folded her chilled fingers about it.

  "And when he kicked that waxwork to pieces…" Cody took a long swallow of the brandy.

  Tachyon returned to the bar and poured himself a drink.

  "Are you sure you are not overreacting?" he asked. "No!"

  He held up a placating hand. "All right."

  Cody tugged a pouch from her purse and flung it down on the coffee table. It landed with a sharp crack. "And I know for damn sure this isn't an overreaction."

  Tach shook out the contents and stared in amazement at the multicolored gems that glittered against the crimson of his glove. His eyebrows flew up inquiringly.

  "I called the police and pretended to be a journalist," Cody said. "Nobody has reported a jewel theft."

  "I will handle him," said Tachyon. "You need be afraid no longer."

  Cody joined him on the sofa. "Tachyon, you moron. I'm not worried about me. I'm worried about you. What I saw in Blaise's face was-"

  She broke off and bit down on her lower lip. Tachyon tried to reschool his features. He sensed that he looked like a stricken deer.

  "He hates you."

  There it was-bald, ugly, stark, the truth. He had been hiding from it for over a year.

  Her shoulder was close. He laid his head against it. Cody's arm went around his shoulder.

  "What am I going to do?"

  "I don't know"

  Like a shadow's vomit. Children in the darkness. Following. Watching. Blaise whirled, lips drawn back in a snarl. They retreated. For an instant he considered reaching out with his power. Coercing one of them. Shredding his mind. Finding the answer. Who are you? What do you want? But one thing life with Tachyon had taught himcaution. There were too many of them. He might hold eight or even ten, but their sheer numbers would beat him down.

  Blaise ducked into a Horn and Hardart. Bought a sandwich and coffee. Cody had kept his jewels, God damn her. But maybe that wasn't so bad. He had taken them for her. Let her keep them and consider what she had rejected. She'd pay soon enough.

  And money was better than jewels anyway. He had mind-controlled a limousine driver and the elegantly attired passenger. That had netted him almost a thousand bucks. He could go a long time on a thousand bucks. But the jewels would have been better.

  The turkey sandwich was dry, the bread forming a soggy expanding mass on the back of his tongue. Blaise choked it down and wondered again where the fat old joker news vendor had come by a fortune in precious gems. Maybe he should go back to Jube's apartment and make him tell?

  A slim form slid onto the stool next to him. Blaise tensed. Studied her out of the corner of his eye. He didn't bother to slide a hand down to the. 38 tucked into the waistband of his pants. His mind powers could subdue her faster than a gun could fire.

  The girl was young. Fifteen, sixteen with spiky multicolored hair, deliberately tattered blue jeans, unlaced high-top sneakers.

  "We've been watchin' you."

  "Yeah, I know. Any particular reason why?"

  "You look like you need a place to go."

  "I've got plenty of places to go," said Blaise.

  The girl popped gum. "What are you gonna do when you get there?"

  "Take care of myself."

  "Think you can?"

  "Know I can." And there was something in his face that made the girl edge as far away as the stool would allow.

  "I'm not sayin' you can't," she said. She thrust out a hand. Blaise noticed she had bitten the cuticles into the quick. "Molly Bolt."

  Blaise ignored the outthrust hand. "What do you want?"

  She pulled back her hand, thumb rubbing lightly across the tips of her other fingers as if she were startled to find the hand at the end of her arm.

  "Just this. You need a place to go. You ever need a team… people to handle something;.. come to pier eleven on the East River. We'll find ya."

  The cold coffee had a slick oily taste. "I'll keep it in mind."

  "Fine."

  She was gone as quickly as she had appeared. Suddenly the well-dressed businessman seated a table away stood up, unzipped, pulled out his cock, and pissed down his own leg.

  Blaise left. The food wasn't very good. And he'd lost his appetite with the realization of just who or rather what he had been dealing with.

  Jumpers.

  Jumpers were after him.

  "Would you stop worrying? Go already. Go to Washington, and bring back that grant. Mama needs a new laser surgery center."

  The connection on the car phone was terrible. Cody sounded like she was calling from the center of an electrical storm. Tachyon pictured her: hair brushed back, one hand thrust into the pocket of her lab coat, knee jiggling as she longed to get back to her patients. For an instant his concern and fear for Blaise receded. He laughed. "What are you chortling about?" Cody's voice was sharp with suspicion.

  "You. How many times per second is your foot tapping?" "You are interrupting me."

  "Take the time. I'm worth it."

  A slight choke of laughter as he threw her words back at her.

  "Prove it to me," Cody said. "Get down to Washington, and lobby like hell." She added, "It really is a shame about Senator Hartmann. He might have been a loon, but at least he was our loon."

  The missing hand flared in agony as Tachyon remembered the bite of the assassin's buzz-saw hand. An assassin sent by Senator Gregg Hartmann, Democratic presidential candidate. Or at least the candidate for a day until Tachyon had destroyed forever Hartmann's political ambitions. But Cody did not know-could never knowany of this.

  "Tach, are you still there?"

  "Yes, yes, sorry. Take care of yourself. I'll see you Monday." He started to hang up, then hurriedly added, "Please, please, be cautious. Be careful."

  A disconnected buzz was all he got back. Had she heard? Did she understand? Tachyon stared out the windows of the gray limousine at the city like a jeweled ship sailing away from him in the darkness. Blaise was out there somewhere.

  The thought chilled him.

  Troll was propping his nine-foot length against the front reception desk, chatting up the Chickenfoot Lady when Blaise entered. The joker straightened abruptly, his face twisting into an expression of surprise and concern. It looked like tectonic plates in motion.

  "Blaise, your granddaddy's been worried sick. Where the hell have you been? I ought to whip your ass." Troll suddenly turned, lowered his head, and ran full tilt at the far wall. He struck with a sound like a cannonball crashing into a fortress battlement and went down in a heap. Chickenfoot let out a hysterical cackle and ran through the big double doors leading to the emergency room.

  Blaise walked on, brows knitted in a frown of concent
ration, hands thrust deep into his pockets.

  Cody wasn't in her office.

  She wasn't in surgery. Finn was, and he shouted from behind his mask about the sterile integrity of the room and advanced on dancing pony feet on Blaise. Blaise didn't fuck with Finn's head. He kind of liked the pony-sized centaur.

  Cody was in the morgue. What appeared to be an enormous wasp was on the table. Blaise watched as she carefully cut open the joker's chest cavity and surveyed the lungs. Cody then leaned over a small tape recorder. Her voice was so low he couldn't distinguish the words, just the soft, husky timbre like a chuckling brook. The sound made him shiver, but whether with anger or desire he couldn't say.

  Suddenly Cody looked up and stared directly at him through the tiny window in the morgue door. Blaise jumped, hating that she had thrown him off balance. He stiff-armed the heavy door, and it flew open. She didn't retreat before his furious entrance. And that, too, made him angry.

  "Hello, Blaise. Had a good time for the past week?"

  "I've come for two things. My stones and you."

  Her smile was crooked and a little hateful. "Your problem, my son, is that you've always thought your stones were bigger than they are."

  " I can make you love me!" Blaise cried.

  "No, you can make me hate you. Love you have to earn."

  Cody was standing stock still. A pillar of ice and darkness. Blaise ran his eyes down that slim tall form. Noted her hand tucked into the fold of her lab coat. The glint of the scalpel between her fingers. He smiled.

  "Cody, you're so stupid," Blaise crooned. The scalpel fell from nerveless fingers. "I don't give a fuck how you feel."

  The coat fell with a sigh to the linoleum floor.

  "Because I can…"

  The blouse joined the coat on the floor. ". make you…"

  She stepped out of her skirt. "… love me."

  Had it connected, the blow would have ruptured a kidney.

  But Blaise's karate training gave him a split-second warning. The young man spun away from Tachyon's thrust kick and caught his grandfather by the ankle. Floor met chin with head-ringing force, and Tachyon tasted blood as his teeth snapped shut on his tongue. He rolled to the side. Blinked in consternation as the heel of Blaise's boot slammed into the floor where his head had rested only a second before. Tachyon got his legs beneath him and bounded to his feet. Blaise charged, and the older man fended him off with the artificial hand. The digits couldn't be bent to form a proper spear hand, but the hard plastic fingers still managed to sink a satisfying distance into the teenager's solar plexus.