Jason Frost - The cutthroat

"Duck, Trace," Eric shouted, echoing his plea from a couple days ago when they were still happily on their canoe.

Only this time she didn't argue. Tracy twisted away from the door just as Angel's wrist snapped, flicking a spinning star across the room like a tiny buzz-saw blade gone berserk. The star thudded into the oak door, splintering the carved face of an English hunter chasing a fox. A second star followed almost immediately, this one pinning a lock of Tracy's hair to the door. The metal points fanned out just two inches from her left eye.

"Enough, Angel," Eric said, drawing the bow string back to his cheek. The tip of the arrow quivered slightly as it pointed at her small body.

Angel's smile was faint. A dare, he thought. She had more confidence in her perfect body's agility than she did fear of Eric's arrow. Suddenly she grabbed the ragged blanket from the bed and flipped it into the air toward Eric. He'd hesitated, not wanting to kill her until she'd reproduced Alabaster's map, but the ghosting blanket startled him into releasing his grip. The arrow plunged into the blanket like a missile, pulling the whole thing high over their heads, finally nailing the blanket to the wall.

But Angel had already cartwheeled over the bed, bouncing to her feet in time to fling two more stars. The first took a glancing bite out of Eric's thigh, chewing off a hunk of denim and skin before dropping tiredly to the floor. The second plunked below Blackjack's collarbone, lodging between bones.

"Damn," he yelled, more from anger than pain, struggling to pluck it out of his body. It wouldn't give.

Angel's hand found the door knob.

Whoomp!

Tracy whirled around with her cane and smacked Angel in the lower spine. She was off balance because of her hip, so she wasn't able to put much power behind the blow. But the effort yanked her hair free, leaving a lock of her hair still stuck to the door under the throwing star.

Angel's body arced backward from the impact. She dropped to the floor, her hands still clutching the door knob. Weakly she tried to pull herself back up. Too late. Eric grabbed a handful of her long black hair and jerked her backward onto the floor.

Blackjack pressed the saber against the hollow of her throat, denting the skin slightly.

"At last, Eric, you have come to finish your assignment of so long ago." Tears of pain spilled from Angel's eyes, but otherwise she showed no emotion.

"That was another planet, another man," Eric said, kneeling beside her.

"Yes," she said, squinting into his eyes, studying him. "You are changed. I see something of our old friend in you now. Something dark behind the eyes. A tint of Fallows, perhaps." She smiled. "He bragged to me that he would turn you or kill you. I see he has succeeded."

Eric smiled. "If that's true, Angel, you have much to fear from me. N'est-ce pas?"

"Out of the way, asshole," Griffin said, shoving the large drunk out of his way. The big man bounced into the wall, scraping his nose on the Italian Renaissance tempura-on-wood painting. In his stupor, he thought the woman in the painting resembled Betty, his ex-wife, as he furiously snatched it from the wall and spun around to clobber Griffin with it. Griffin swung the heavy metal butt of the crossbow around, clipping the drunk on the temple. The skin didn't break, but a discolored splotch of blood pooled into a dark full moon on his forehead as he sank to the floor, unconscious. Kelly Furst stepped over the body as if nothing had happened. Richard Danton kicked the unconscious man in the crotch as he passed by and giggled.

Few in the crowded corridor seemed to notice. And those that did notice, didn't care.

Somebody reached out and touched Kelly's dreadlocks as she walked by. White people were always doing that, so she ignored it and kept walking.

When they finally bullied their way to Angel's door, Griffin took a deep breath, rolled his eyes in expectation, and knocked.

There was a pause, so he knocked again, using the butt of the crossbow. A chip of carved wood with a fox's tail flew off.

"Who is it?" Angel asked.

"Benny and the Jets, who'd ya think?" Griffin answered. "Cap wants you down in his room, pronto."

"Okay," she said. "Come in."

"How about that?" Griffin said to the others as he turned the knob. "For once she doesn't bite my head off."

"On the floor. Move!"

Griffin stood paralyzed for a moment, taking it all in. There was more time in a crisis than people realized. Like when he used to quarterback, fading back with the ball, looking for an opening to run through or a free man to pass to. He'd look at the line and see about eight tons of padded beef charging at him, those black antiglare semicircles under their eyes making them look like zombies. Their hands would be groping toward him like claws. But he didn't panic. He waited, looked around, made his move.

And that's what he did now. He saw that Ravensmith bastard yelling at them, his hand anchored at his chin with an arrow riding the drawn bowstring. He saw the fucking nigger giant with a dumb sword in one hand and a.38 Dan Wesson Model 15-2 VH in the other. He saw the pretty bitch kneeling on the floor next to Angel, a knife pressing into her throat. Three of them against four of us. But the nigger had the gun.

He felt the adrenaline swirling through him. Just like the state championship game against Clayton. All they needed now was fucking cheerleaders. He thought of how angry Rhino would be and what he was like when he was angry. Then a funny image popped into his mind from nowhere. It was a picture of Sylvester Stallone in the ring facing another nigger. Sly was giving him the cold stare and saying, "Go for it!"

So that's what Griffin did.

He nudged the safety on the crossbow as he zagged off to the side, hearing Kelly and Danton following his lead. He pivoted toward Blackjack, wanting to take out the gun first. But even as his finger tensed around the trigger, he heard the loud popping sound and the tugging at his chest as the bullet burrowed through his heart. The last thing he saw was his arrow whacking into the ceiling. Then he felt his sphincter muscles weaken and his bladder open, his pants filling with warm liquids. He knew he was dying and wanted to say something memorable as his last words, but all he could manage was, "Shit." It didn't matter. No one heard him anyway.

Danton was giggling as he hefted his spear, not sure who to throw it at. Before he decided, Eric planted an arrow in his chest. Danton dropped heavily to the floor, his eyes open and still startled at the suddenness of death.

Just as Eric released his arrow, Kelly Furst snatched the Remington.41-caliber rim-fire derringer from her pocket and squeezed off a round at Eric. The bullet chopped through the bow before whizzing past Eric's ear. Before she could fire the second round, Blackjack's gun jumped in his hand again and Kelly was flipped off her feet and into the wall, her head thudding with a dull echo.

Angel didn't struggle, didn't make a move. Tracy kept the blade's edge snug against the windpipe, discouraging any involvement.

"Let's go," Blackjack said urgently. "Security will be here in a couple minutes to investigate the gunshot. You remember what BeBop said?"

Eric ignored him, walking quickly to Griffin's prone body, prying the stiff fingers from his crossbow. He grabbed the arrows too. "Okay. Now we can go."

" 'Hold the pickles, hold the lettuce, special orders don't upset us…' " Tracy was lying on the 400-year-old bed, her hands clasped behind her head, trying to remember jingles from television commercials. If she closed her eyes, she could clearly see the happy teenage faces marching behind the counter of a Burger King.