Charlie Huston - No Dominion

I start another smoke.

– How you know all that about Luther?

He sighs.

– I cut the man’s hair din’t I? Now switch off that lamp.

I switch it off and we sit in the darkness. Just some light coming from the luminous dial of an old clock on top of the TV and from the tip of my cigarette.

– You stay up an’ smoke you want to. Gonna get me some sleep.

He settles deeper into the easy chair.

– Percy?

– Huh?

– What’s your end in this?

He turns his head to face me.

– Shit, boy, I’m Enclave. Just doin’ a solid for Daniel.

I study his black skin by the glow of my cigarette.

– You don’t look it.

– Well, theys Enclave and theys Enclave. Man can be a Baptist without he got to be no holy roller.

He closes his eyes and turns his face away.

– The can is down the hall you got to take a piss.

– Pitt.

– Hmmn?

– Wake it and shake it. It time.

– Hn?

I feel like I just closed my eyes. I open them.

Percy is sitting on the edge of the couch. I boost myself up.

– What?

– It time. Here.

He hands me an unopened pack of Pall Malls and a book of matches.

– Now doan forget what we talk about.

– OK.

– Things ain’t always what they look like they is.

– I know.

– When the man give you a proposition, you take it. Right?

– What?

– Take the proposition.

– What?

He glances at the door.

I hear them.

I’m off the couch and down the hall. Behind me the door is kicked in. I’m past a bedroom, past the bathroom. Ahead, there’s one more door. I open it and a vacuum cleaner falls out. Footsteps are behind me. I turn around.

Timberlands is coming down the hall followed by the two rhinos from last night. I reach for the switchblade in my pocket.

Percy yells from the parlor.

– Careful, he got a knife.

Timberlands pauses as I pull the switchblade and pop it open. He puts his hand in the pocket of my own fucking jacket and pulls out my own fucking.32 and points it at me.

– Gonna put a hole in yo ass, you doan drop it.

I drop the knife.

He steps to the side to make room for the rhinos. I try to fight them, but they make me stop. They drag me back down the hall and through the parlor.

Percy is talking.

– Take you long enough. How long a man supposed ta entertain the white boy?

Digga is standing in the open doorway.

– Just as long as it take, Percy.

– They not happy with you, Pitt.

I’m sitting in the backseat squeezed between the two rhinos. Timberlands drives. Digga sits in the front passenger seat.

– Why’s that?

– Could be cuz they had ta go down like that. Had ta take a rap on the back of the skull from the one-armed man. Not the kind of thing a man likes gettin’ ’round. Course, it ain’t gettin’ ’round.

– No?

– Shit no. What gettin’ ’round is how you fooled they asses into openin’ the door and then took ’em both. That the story gettin’ ’round. An that the real reason they not happy with you.

– Too bad.

– Too bad for you, they get a chance to dance on you.

I look from one rhino to the other.

– I like dancing.

Digga turns himself around and looks at my face. He points at it.

– Not done yet. Mark him up a little more.

The rhinos toss a couple quick elbows at my face. My lips split open. A knot starts to grow over my right eye. My nose breaks for about the twentieth time in my life. It’s OK. Pain is relative. You never stop feeling it, but have enough of it inflicted on you and you get kind of accustomed to it. It’ll all heal. If they don’t kill me.

– Enough.

They stop.

– See what I mean, Pitt. They just not happy with you.

My right eye is swelling, closing up. I squint at Digga.

– What about you, you happy with me?

– Me? Well, I say this, you playin’ yo role.

I spit blood onto his upholstery.

– Still happy with me?

Digga snaps his fingers at Timberlands.

– Pull over.

– Know what that is?

– A park.

The Hummer is pulled over on Morningside Avenue at 123rd.

– Look like a park, don’t it?

– Yeah.

– But it ain’t. That a outpost. That a Coalition outpost.

The park is overgrown and abused. Dirty snow from our last big storm is dotted with unclaimed dog crap.

Digga points.

– Look.

I look. He’s pointing at the paths that climb up the park, climb up a cliff face like the one that backs Jackie Robinson. But it’s different here. At The Jack, the cliff is native stone, raw and worn from when it was first cut. Here, the heights of the park are defined by a massive barrier. Huge blocks of dark stone are masoned into a wall topped by an iron fence. Two paths cut back and forth across the park, climbing to two great staircases, one at either end of the park.

– See what they got up there?

Morningside Drive runs atop the wall, lined with luxury apartment buildings and a tower of Columbia student housing.

– That was part of the treaty Luther made when we got independence. Had to leave them this turf. They settlement. They Gaza Strip. They presence up here so no one forget this was all theirs once. All those sweet blocks around Columbia, that still Coalition turf. That where it comin’ from.

– What’s that?

– That shit. That poison they pumpin’ into our blood. That shit you say croppin’ up downtown, too. You think that a coincidence? Some dangerous-ass new drug, only drug can get a Vampyre hooked, just happenin’ to drop on Society an’ Hood turf? That sound likely to you, Pitt? Or it sound like a conspiracy?

I look behind us to the east, where the sun will soon be rising.

Digga grabs my face and turns it back toward the park.

– Don’t you be worryin’ ’bout that sun. It rise all on its own. This what you came up here for, ain’t it? This what Bird sent you to look into?

– Nobody sent me. I’m here on my own.

– Uh-huh. Up here investigatin’ this shit cuz you got a social conscience.

– I care about the little people.

– Uh-huh. A’ight. That good to know. Mean you won’t mind doing a little service for yo black bruthas and sistas. Let’s stretch our legs.

Timberlands and the rhinos stay by the Hummer while Digga leads me to a bench.

– Percy talk to you?

– He said some things.

– He one alchemical niggah.

– If you say so.

– Trust me on that, he is. So, you got a little picture ’bout the political climate up here?

– Volatile.

– Volatile. You got some words on you, son. Yeah, volatile. Right now, it more volatile than usual. That because of you. Word out you on the loose. I put that word out. While you rappin’ with Percy, I been talkin’ with Papa Doc, tellin’ him how you busted out. Now he say you a Society agent. Cross Coalition territory without no passage, come up here with an enforcer on yo ass; do all that to create friction when he be wantin’ ta make peace with our neighbors to the south. Wants to call Dexter Predo, tell him we got nothin’ to do with somethin’ nasty happened to his man. Wants to call Terry Bird, tell him we want compensation for the trouble you cause us. Whatever you up here for, Predo and Bird? Neither them muthafuckas gonna be happy with you. But don’t worry, I talk Papa down. Told him. First things first: got to find the muthafucka. Then we can worry ’bout who first in line to fuck yo ass. Now, ton tons macoute out looking for you. Ton tons macoute. Named for the secret police down in Haiti. Bad news. Man ’tween a rock an’ a hard place, he be glad he not you right now.