George Martin - Deuces Down

Topper looked, then shoved his sketchbook into his hands, standing up and rushing from the booth. Or really, attempting to. Sam felt a tug on his tail, and realized that when he’d tucked it under himself for safe keeping, he’d taken Topper’s along with it, the cloth ones on her coat. The antique wool snapped back like a pair of suspenders in a vaudeville act, and Topper screeched, over-balancing on her stiletto heels, clawing to save herself, grabbing the tablecloth. Silverware, glassware, and the prodigious greenness of Hastet’s tentacled appetizer clattered down atop her as Sam forewent chivalry to protect his sketchbook, springing back out of the way and halfway atop the booth.

There was, as with all such accidents, a swift silence, followed by even swifter sarcastic applause. Then Takisian Three Musketeers extras were helping Topper to her feet and offering words of solicitous concern while Fetish Girl crossed Starfields’ star-spangled foyer, pushed open the nebula-frosted glass panels of the entrance, and made her exit. Topper gave a strangled shriek of protest, attempting to evade the well meaning interference of the wait staff, and sprinted for the crack in the stars as fast as petite legs in stiletto heels could carry her.

Sam struggled across the wreckage of tablecloth and hors d’oeuvres and was faced with a snap decision: He could stay, finish his work, and try to explain the mess to Hastet, or he could follow Topper. It was an easy choice. Besides which, Hastet was Takisian, and as such, she knew that chivalry had its demands, as did attractive women in fishnet stockings. And while Sam wasn’t tall, he was taller than Topper, and he caught up with her just as she passed through the doors. He leapt through the gap in the nebula after her, his tail pinging the edge of the glass, then it was down the stairs, no waiting for the elevator, and out to the sidewalk.

Topper took three steps outside and looked up and down the street, then back at him. “Where is she?”

Sam looked too, taking in the bustle of Park Row and trying to spot a latex-clad supermodel in a vintage top hat, then shook his head. “Gone. I’m sorry, I-”

“Do you have any idea where she went?”

Sam shook his head again. “No.” Then he paused. “Or actually, yes. I’m pretty certain I do. Follow me.” Topper looked ready to grasp at the slimmest hope, and Sam gave it to her. “ Taxi! ” he shouted, jumping out into the street and flagging one down.

Sam went into chivalry overdrive, opening the door for Topper, who piled in, with him following.

The driver had a beard and a turban and a wide smile. “What is your destination on this fine night, oh most-” The man stopped, goggling in horror at Topper, as if she’d just sprouted an extra head.

Sam looked. She had. Well, actually no, but the effect was remarkably similar, one of the cephalopod confections caught in her curls, staring at the driver with the same wide-eyed expression, like Father Squid being subjected to an unexpected proctology exam.

It was against Sam’s better judgement, but if he’d learned one thing growing up in Jokertown, it was this: Sometimes you had to freak the nats. Plus Hastet expected him to taste her creations, not just draw them, so the time had come to bite the bullet, or at least the squid.

Sam removed it from Topper’s curls and popped the pirouline into his mouth, biting down. It was crunchy and spicy-sweet, a little like Japanese spider roll, mixed with the dry caraway flavor of kimmel cracker. Then his eyes began to water. Takisian Surprise was right! Hastet had spiked the guacamole with wasabi or some otherworldly equivalent.

Topper looked at him. “Edible?”

Sam swallowed and thumped his chest. “Like Candy Mandy’s fingers.” He wiped the tears with the back of his glove. “Girl I knew back at Jokertown High. Edible fingers. Really.”

There was really no response to this, and Topper didn’t try to make one. Half the Jokertown stories were ‘No, really’ bullshit, and the other were unbelievable, but still true.

The driver was still staring his own rectal-examination stare, and Sam had a bad feeling in his own tail, but pressed ahead anyway, smiling as if nothing could be more natural. “Jokertown, please. Club Chaos.”

At last the cabby’s expression changed, going from a mask of shocked horror to righteous indignation. “This cab, by the Light of Allah, does not go to the abode of the unclean!”

“What if we gave you some unclean money?”

The mask faltered for a moment. “How much?”

“Five hundred bucks,” said Topper.

“Let me see it.”

“Fine.” Topper took her hat off and started to reach inside, then stopped. “Oh shit-I left my wallet in my other hat.” She looked to Sam.

He shrugged. “Don’t look at me. I don’t carry that sort of money.”

“Can’t you…” She wiggled her nails and gestured towards Sam’s sketchbook.

Forge five hundred dollars on the fly? And without the right paper? “I don’t think so.”

“Get out of my cab. Allah spits on jokers and liars.”

Sam thought, remembering the rantings of the Nur, who’d glowed as green as if he’d swallowed a Lite Brite set, which seemed pretty close to a joker by most people’s definitions. “If I remember correctly, Allah thinks aces are just spiffy.” Sam stripped off his right glove and brought five beads of Nur-green ink to the tip of his nibs, luminous poison green, the color he’d always associated with malice. “See these, dickweed? Allah gave me poison claws, and if you don’t take this fucking cab to Club Chaos before I can say ‘ Allah Akbar ,’ Allah tells me I get to poison your ass dead.”

“ Allah Akbar! ” the cabbie agreed fervently and Sam nearly got whiplash as fast as they took off down the street.

Topper stared at him, and Sam didn’t know whether he’d just crossed the line to become her knight in shining armor or a dangerous psychopath-likely something of both-and he wondered how long he could bluff a religious fanatic with what amounted to a handful of fountain pens.

Topper turned to the cabbie. “I’ll also have you know that I’m a federal agent, or at least I used to be. You move so much as a finger towards that gun under your seat, I’ll drop you before poison boy here even gets in a scratch.” She had one of her stiletto heels off in her hand, pressed into the vinyl in back of the cabbie’s seat. “That okay?”

“ Allah Akbar! ” the cabbie swore, turning left on Chatham Square and into Chinatown, and left again with a squeal of tires onto Confucius Place.

Conventional wisdom said it took only three minutes to get from the Village to J-Town, but Confucius said that men fearing for their lives could get there in less than two, even when all they were threatened with was stiletto heels and fountain pens. “With the grace of Allah, we are here!” They screeched to a stop in front of Club Chaos. “Do not harm me, oh most beloved of Allah!”

“Stay where you are,” Topper told the cabbie, opening her own door, and Sam did the same with his, wiping his nails clean on the headliner as he exited, leaving the cabbie with the message, in elegant sihafa script, Allah says you’re a dickweed . Actually, it was probably something more like, Allah, the compassionate and most merciful, says you’re a putrescent camel penis steeped in mint-fennel sauce , but most of Sam’s Arabic came from falafel house menus.

The cab sped off the moment the doors were shut and Topper grimaced. “Idiot,” she said, balancing flamingo-style as she replaced her shoe.

Sam didn’t know if she were referring to him or the cabbie, and didn’t ask. “Did we just commit a felony?”