George Martin - Dead Mans Hand

The Motel 6 sign loomed ahead. "Sara's there, too," said Tachyon.

It took Jay a moment to place the name; Sara Morgenstern, the reporter who accused Hartmann of being a monster, the one Mackie Messer had tried unsuccessfully to snuff. "Jesus Christ. You got the whole New York Philharmonic there? Maybe the Dodgers?"

"This is no laughing matter."

"No shit. Punch it, buddy. Everything she's got."

The cab gunned down the street, veered into the motel lot on two wheels. They were out before it stopped. Jay threw his last ten at the driver and ran, his broken rib screaming with every step as he dashed across the asphalt.

The door was opened by a dark, round-faced man in his sixties. Behind him on the bed, a pale blond woman clutched a pillow as she watched the tube. The Russian backed up quickly as the three of them rushed inside. Jay slammed the door and locked it. Tachyon went straight for the blonde and yanked her to her feet. Blaise hugged the Russian.

"No time to explain," Tachyon said breathlessly. "Hartmann knows. There is someone after us." He grabbed the front of the girl's dress and ripped it off her with a single sharp yank.

Sara gave a shriek and tried to cover herself with her hands, looking at the alien like he'd gone nuts. "Into the shower," Tach said, pushing her toward the john. She was wearing nothing but a little lacy bit of bra. Her pubic hair was the same pale blond, Jay noted with interest. "Don't come out, and by the way, you rent by the hour." Tach got the bra off on the run. Jay had to admire his manual dexterity.- Footsteps came pounding down the hall outside.

The Russian took it calmly. "There's no time," he said, holding Blaise.

"Yes, there is," said Tach. "Jay will get you out of Atlanta. For the god's sake, Blaise, move!"

The Russian disentangled himself from the boy. "Open up! Open the goddamn door!"

Jay knew the voice. Carnifex. "Now!" Tachyon urged.

Jay shrugged, pointed at the Russian. There was a pop. All of a sudden they were short a Slav. Tach grabbed some vodka off a dresser, clutched it to his chest, and dove onto the bed.

The door shattered with a crack. Billy Ray stepped through the splinters, brushing aside a jagged shard of wood with the back of his head. He had a gun. A big gun, one of those Dirty Harry jobs. The white gloves he wore as part of his fighting togs made it look even bigger and blacker. He pointed it at Tachyon, which was fine with Jay. He hated guns, especially when they were pointed at him. "All right, where is he?" Ray wanted to know. "Where the fuck is he?"

"Huh?" asked Jay.

"Assholel" Carnifex shoved at him contemptuously with the flat of his hand. Jay sat down hard. Carnifex looked around, spotted the closet, and acted like he'd made a discovery. He ripped the door off its hinges, grabbed handfuls of clothes, flung them to the floor. There was no Russian in the closet. Ray grimaced, dropped to his knees, peered under the bed. There was no Russian under the bed. He got up, swung toward the bathroom. "Get out of there. Nowl"

"Wal, sugah, how many you boys there gonna be?" Sara called out from under the shower, in the worst Southern accent Jay Ackroyd had ever heard.

Frowning, Carnifex stepped into the bathroom. They heard him yank back the shower curtain. They heard Sara scream. They heard a slap. Ray came out of the bathroom with a red cheek and a wet costume, looking dour. "He was here. That goddamn Russian was' here."

"Russian?" Jay looked at Tachyon, shrugged. "I don't see any Russian. Do you see a Russian? And sweetcheeks in there sure don't sound Russian. Russian costs you extra."

"Why did you try to get away from me?"

Tachyon took a long drink. "Because I was afraid you were the press, and I didn't want to be found visiting a prostitute."

"You always take a kid?" He gestured at Blaise with the. 44.

"Could you put the gun away? It makes me nervous when you wave it around like that. Most fatal shootings are accidental, you know"

"This wouldn't be an accident. Answer the fucking question."

Tachyon cleared his throat. "Well, that is the matter in a nutshell. It's time the boy learned." He glanced about the motel room. "This lacks the ambience that I could wish, but she is very good. I tried her myself last night. Of course, nothing can compare with the woman my father gave me on my fourteenth birthday-"

Disgusted, Carnifex bulled out through the broken door. Jay looked at Tachyon with new respect. "Fourteen?" he said. "No kidding?"

"Oh Ackroyd, please!"

Brennan carried Jennifer, wrapped up in his denim jacket, down into the sewer line. She seemed to be getting worse. Her skin was feeling cool and feverish in turn, and she was murmuring gibberish that Brennan couldn't make heads or tails of.

He moved as quickly as he could through the semidarkness of the sewer. He had to stop every now and then and put Jennifer down in order to climb to the surface to check his route, but Brennan had a good sense of direction below as well as above ground. It led him with only a few false turns to his destination. Our Lady of Perpetual Misery. He carried Jennifer back up to the surface and over to the small rectory attached to the rear of the church. He kicked the door several times with his foot. Father Squid opened the door after a moment, his look of annoyance quickly turning to one of surprise and concern.

"Merciful Lord," he said, "what happened?"

"I'll tell you in a moment, Father," Brennan said, pushing past the priest. "Right now we have to get a doctor. One you can trust to keep his mouth shut. Know anybody that fits that description?"

"Well, there's Mr. Bones-"

"Get him."

"He's not a real doctor-"

"Is he good?"

Father Squid nodded. "The people around here swear by him. Sometimes I think he knows more about joker physiology than Tachyon."

Brennan nodded. 'All right. Get him.'

Father Squid bustled off to his bedroom to make the call, while Brennan set Jennifer down gently on the priest's beatup old sofa and then flexed his tired arms. He knelt down by her and felt her forehead. It was cold again, although sweat was beading up and running down her forehead and high cheekbones.

As he held her hand it began to turn ghostly in his as she phased in and out of her material state, uncontrollably and unconsciously.

"Jennifer!" He tried to wake her up, but she didn't seem to hear him. He was afraid to shake her, afraid to move her at all.

Her skin was white as death, her breath infrequent and shallow.

Father Squid came back into his neat little living room, bringing a blanket that he gently draped over Jennifer. "He was in. He'll be here soon. Now, tell me, my son, what's going on here?"

" I guess I owe you that," Brennan said. He settled down tiredly on the floor next to Jennifer, refused the priest's offer of coffee, and told him what had happened that day.

While he spoke, half of his mind was condemning the obsession that had put him and Jennifer in this desperate situation, and half was wondering about the palace and Chrysalis's downstairs neighbors, and how he could get by the police surrounding the place.

When he finished the tale, there was a slow, measured knocking on the rectory door. Father Squid went to answer it and let in a tall black man who looked like a resurrectionist out of a Boris Karloff movie. Mr. Bones was old, thin, and gaunt. He wore a white shirt and an old black suit that was clean and neatly repaired, but much too short for his long, lanky limbs.

This joker wasn't severe as things went. In fact, the two feathery antennae growing out of his forehead were rather attractive. They twitched like ferns blowing in a gentle breeze as Father Squid introduced him to Brennan.

"This the patient?" Bones asked as he knelt down before Jennifer. He stripped the blanket off her. As he took her pulse he bent very close to her and moved his head up and down her body. His antennae twitched and rotated like sensitive radar receptors.