Roderick Thorpe - Nothing Lasts Forever

"Powell, where are you?"

"Right here, Joe."

"Not exactly. I'm right here."

"We can't go that way, Joe."

"What was wrong with the idea?"

"Put yourself in our position, Joe. We can't yield sworn responsibilities to you, no matter how good a job you've done for us so far. Joe, we want you to withdraw from the battle. You've had enough."

Leland was on the stairs, going down; he was thinking of something else. He pressed the "Talk" button. "Can I talk to Kathi Logan?"

Silence.

"Are you kidding me?" Leland. "I told you how bad the situation was! You wouldn't believe me! Your people are dead because you wouldn't listen to me! You guys are really beautiful — what are you trying to do by this, patch up your image?"

"Now, Joe..."

He was buried by another transmission, clear and booming. "From here it looks like they're really fucking you over, cowboy." It was Taco Bill. "They had it on television. We saw you throw a note down. Boy, you really are some kind of a mess. After all the work you did for them, they don't want to work with you? Well, they sure can kiss my ass. You want to talk to your girl? I'm looking at her right here on television, and I can patch you to her myself, if they have a CB."

"You think you can reach San Diego?" He knew the answer; he was out on the thirty-third floor, moving toward the office with the television set, keeping low.

"Well, that's a kick in the head," said Taco Bill. "She's right here on this screen, and some slicker just handed her a portable CB. Can you hear me, honey? You talk into this microphone, and I'll pick it up off my TV and relay it to your friend."

"Thank you very much." It was Kathi, almost as if she were in the room with Taco Bill.

The whole floor was destroyed, but the television set was still playing, and there was Kathi. He boosted the volume, but not too much.

"Hi, Kathi," Here we go. "Bill, boost me up if you can, she looks like she's having trouble hearing me." He was moving away from the set, toward the east side of the building. With all the glass gone, the winter sun flooded the floor with white light. "Can you hear me? You look great."

"Just a minute, Joe." He was watching her from the next office through the broken glass of the partition. She turned off the two-way radio, then reached forward and turned up the volume of the television set. "The network is picking up and relaying your signal," she said. "I can hear you perfectly."

So can I. He almost giggled as he kept moving away. Tony would be wise to this, but it wasn't Tony, Leland was after. Bozo had taken the unlucky staircase. Leland figured Tony had simply turned around the two who had just stopped by the police helicopters — Tony had sensed something. He was that smart. He was like an animal. Maybe he already knew that Bozo was dead.

Leland pressed the "Talk" button. "Kathi, let me know that you understand what happened here."

"I do." He could hear her in both ears, from the television set and his radio. He dialed down the volume of the radio; it wouldn't affect the level of his transmission.

"You see," he said, still backing up, "there's a lot on my mind, and I want to get it said before I don't have any more chances. I don't know what you saw of the last few minutes, but it looks like I've run out of luck."

"Don't talk like that," she said.

He was almost to the east side of the building. Except for the kiss, there had never been anything but the most casual, even plastic interaction between them. Maybe even the kiss. Four or five panes of unbroken glass stood between the television set and him. This was going to take a lot of dead reckoning. He felt another failure of nerve. He pressed the "Talk" button. "Listen — can you hear me? Say so."

"Yes." Now he was beyond the range of the sound of the television set. At least Taco Bill was still patching the signal into the Citizens Band channel. Leland saw that he would be giving himself away if he told Bill to stay with it.

"Pretend we're alone," he said into the radio. "I want to pretend there's nobody listening but you and me. The worst thing in the world is one human being using another." He lowered his voice. "It's an awful way to start a relationship. Do you understand what I mean?"

"Yes."

"Don't just listen, talk. I want to hear your voice." It would give him the chance to move around. He thought he had heard something, a cracking sound like somebody stepping on broken glass.

"I understand what you're doing, Joe," she said. He lowered the volume on the radio a little more, then switched to channel nineteen. It was silent. He wished he could hear the television set. He went back to nine. "It's very important for you to remember that the rest of us out here know and believe that what you're doing, as unhappy as it is, is for us all."

He was supposed to say something. "It weighs on you. They're hardly more than kids." Now talk — keep talking. He turned back to nineteen and strained to hear what was happening in the room. Another crunch of glass. Leland was almost on the floor, like a turtle, trying to get closer.

"Nein! Nein!"

Leland could hear it near and far, Little Tony's voice, on two radios; but then, in the next second, as if the act had been too far along to be stopped, a machine gun went off. Leland pulled himself up and poured the full clip through the windows in that direction. As the glass fell like snow off a roof he could see the guy's shadow briefly, spastically dancing in the impact of the rounds hitting him. Before Leland moved forward, he inserted the remaining half clip. He picked up the radio and pushed the "Talk" button, "I'm doing you a favor, Tony. I'm letting you know I'm alive."

"You stupid braggart..."

"Tony, I'm looking forward to killing you."

"That remains to be seen."

"Ah, well, I have other calls to make. It's Christmas, remember?" He turned to channel nine. "Kathi, can you hear me? You'll have to talk into the radio now."

"Yes, yes, I can."

"How about you, Bill?"

"I'm all ears. I'll show you sometime. How are you?"

"Okay. Kathi, I'm sorry, truly sorry. I meant what I said about using people, but I had no choice."

"I knew what you were doing. Now I'm beginning to feel it."

Leland shuddered: he had stretched his luck again. "Credit yourself with a third of an assist, Bill. The other third goes to Billy Gibbs..." He was looking at his ninth victim. He had killed nine young men and women since nine o'clock last night. This one had three in the chest and one in the cheek below the right eye. The face was twisted out of shape, but the blood was still spreading. The guy was alive — Leland felt sick. He took out the Browning and administered the coup de grace. Again he had tested his luck — he had a bad feeling about himself, an awful feeling.

"Billy always knew how to keep a guy alive," Leland said into the radio, but absently, as if to himself.

"He says to return to base, Joe." It was Powell. "Why don't you listen to him?"

"You're the one who's talking."

"Do you want to talk to him?"

Maybe Billy didn't know that Steffie was in here. He could say something that would let Tony know who she was. "No, I don't want to talk with him. I'm all right."

"The mayor is here, and the president of the company."

"Tell the mayor I'm not a constituent, but I appreciate his interest. As for the other guy, tell him that my liability insurance doesn't cover acts of insurrection or war."

"Joe, please..."

"Not yet."

"That's right, Mr. Leland," Little Tony said. "Your daughter wishes to speak to you."

"Daddy!" Steffie urged. "Listen to him!"

"I'm listening," he said, heading downstairs again, kicking his left leg out in front of him, almost hopping. With three left, whether they knew it or not, they were like a monster with its arms at the top and bottom of the building, and its head on the thirty-second floor. He had to go for the head. This was the last chance for the hostages to get away.