Rob Thurman - Doubletake

I removed the safety clip and pulled the pin with my teeth. It looks great in movies. In real life it hurts like a mother and can screw the hell out of your teeth, which was why this was the first time I’d done it. With one hand swinging a sword, I didn’t have much choice. “I’ll think of you next time I’m drinking sake,” I said, then turned and ran. My path was paved with bodies of prejudiced paien, but that didn’t slow me down. Once I released the spoon on the grenade, I had about six seconds. I had enough left in me to be standing up on the street hailing a cab in six seconds.

Or that’s what I thought, until I checked behind me and saw how fast that thing was coming up behind me. Too fast and too close. In six seconds I’d be dinner and half-digested. I let go of the grenade’s spoon, counted to three, whirled, and threw a homer.

It hesitated at the blow of what had hit it and flew through several layers of tentacles to embed itself there. That’s what I hoped, that curiosity would kill the Kraken. I didn’t stop to check. But while three seconds was enough to stop the thing before it reached me—fingers crossed—it wasn’t long enough for me to reach the arch to hide behind its six-foot-thick walls. Niko was starting back, to throw his martyred self on top of me or to kick my ass for not exercising more, running more, running twice the hours every day to be faster. Robin grabbed him around the chest, yelled my name, and pointed to the side.

I blinked and thought, What the hell? If it didn’t work, it was that much more convenient.

One second later, the grenade blew. I tumbled over and over until I lost count. If I was in a wreck and the car rolled, it would feel like this, but without a seat belt. I had my hands over my ears, but I thought I heard the splat of exploding Jell-O. It was my imagination, more likely, as I heard nothing but ringing when I lifted my hands away.

Dizzy, I was trying to get enough equilibrium back to tell up from down when Niko threw open the lid of the coffin. He said something. I didn’t know what. I couldn’t hear a thing, but it would be along the lines of, “Are you all right?” “That was the bravest thing I’ve seen.” “You were Indiana Jones, Han Solo, and Batman combined.” “I’ll do the laundry for the next year.”

The ringing began to clear as he helped me out of the black steel coffin with its plush red-cushioned interior, and repeated what he’d said. It wasn’t what I’d thought. “You idiot . A three-legged turtle dying of leprosy could run faster than that.” He gripped a handful of my hair and gave my head the lightest possible of shakes. I had a headache already and he’d know that. “I’m going to run your lazy ass every day until I think there’s a remote hope you could make a preschool track team.”

“Jesus. Fine. I didn’t get eaten. Doesn’t that count?” I didn’t wait for him to give the inevitable no. “I thought vamps weren’t into the coffins these days?” I asked Goodfellow.

“The majority of them aren’t, but there’s the old-school. Too old and set in their ways to give them up. And the younger ones who are growing up now. They’re about fifty, the equivalent of a human fifteen-year-old. Some of them are into Voth—vampire Goth. Idiotic, isn’t it?” Goodfellow wasn’t waiting on us. He was leaving through the arch. Many bodies were still twitching and alive. It was a good decision. “Goths derive from death and vampires and now vampires have developed Voth from the human teenagers.”

“If they’re vampires wouldn’t they already be that way?” I knew I was talking too loudly, but my hearing wasn’t completely back. “Well, not now, but wouldn’t it be more retro than made-up?”

“Hades, no. Vampires never dressed like that. Capes and black makeup, huge fangs more likely to bite off your own tongue than anyone’s neck, long black nails. That’s no way to blend in with your prey. And if you don’t blend in with your prey, you don’t eat.” We were up the stairs now, Niko smashing the head of one last blood leech under his boot.

“Which reminds me,” the puck said, “I’m starving. Who’s up for Chinese?”

Goodfellow had been serious about the Chinese. We had a cab drop us off at Canal Street, right in the middle of Chinatown. It left us standing in front of a small greengrocer with a red-and-green awning as the sky darkened to night. Fruits and vegetables were piled in bins for people on the sidewalk to pick up and examine. An orange and white cat stared at us from inside through the window of the store itself. It knew what cats dragged in and that it would look much better than we did.

“I don’t cook. Unless they sell corn dogs in there, there’s no food here,” I grumbled.

A fiftyish small man with slicked-back black hair and a wide grin of white teeth except for one silver one that flashed cheerfully greeted us. “ Luō bīn xiansheng, wõ hěn gaoxìng zàicì jiàn dào nīõ. Nín zuò wõmen de róngxìng yuõ nín de guanglín. Nīõ shentīõ haõo ma? ”

The smile disappeared and the brown eyes drooped as he took in our scratches and cuts, and my shirt covered in dried blood. “ A, wõ kàn yěxuõ bùshì .”

“He is asking about my well-being. Something that would’ve been nice to hear from the two of you after I faced a god that hates my guts.” Goodfellow answered the man in Chinese. “ Zhè shì yīgè feicháng jiannán de yītian, Liú xiansheng. Wõ shì lái yòng le yīduàn shíjian wõ de fángjian, rúguõ zhè shì nīõ méiyõu bùbiàn. ”

The owner responded in English for politeness’ sake. “Of course, your room is prepared as always, Mr. Fellows. Come inside. Welcome, welcome.” He led us to the door, through the tiny store and the door at the back. We went down the stairs, passed through a room where knockoff designer bags were being produced among giggling and impossibly fast chatter, to another door, more stairs, and finally a subbasement. He took us to the largest room, which still qualified as small, but with expensive, comfortable furniture, a computer, and a TV squeezed into it. “I will have my great-grandmother bring you food, medicine, hot tea.”

Robin collapsed on the overstuffed couch. “And, Mr. Chen, alcohol, please. A great deal of Baijiu. You know what I like.”

The man bobbed his head. “Of course. Only the best for our friend and benefactor.”

“You’re genuinely going to send your great-grandmother down those stairs? You still don’t trust me with your daughters?” Goodfellow drawled.

“I will help her, and no, Mr. Fellows, I do not trust you with my daughters.” The sad eyes brightened again, the skin wrinkling around them in a laugh. “I also do not trust you with my wife, my grandmother, or my lucky cat that sits in the window to watch for the police.”

The great-grandmother must’ve mainlined ginseng, because she and the owner were back by the time we had all picked out a place to collapse. She looked a hundred and fifty years old, but her feet moved at the speed of light as she balanced a tray on either hand. “I will ring the buzzer if the police come,” Mr. Chen said. “Haters of capitalism that they swear by, tsk , but I fear there is no way out down here.”

“You can say that again.” The puck sighed, referring to our situation rather than a lack of a basement door. “Thank you. You are a true friend.”

Mr. Chen had carried a large box loaded with clothes, bandages, and ointments, as well as a more modern first-aid kit, and balanced on top of all that was a tray with six small ceramic bottles and smaller cups that reminded me of the kind you served sake in, but shaped differently. Goodfellow lifted the tray out and placed it on a low, black lacquered table and started pouring. “That’s a lot of alcohol?” I snorted. “If we had a teddy bear we could have a tea party.”