Part 25 (2/2)

Tom grabbed him and yanked him into the air, upside down. ”Where the f.u.c.k are you, Tudbury?” Joey screamed. ”Cut it out, you dork. Lemme down.”

Tom imagined two huge invisible hands, and tossed Joey from one to the other. ”When I get down, I'm going to punch you so f.u.c.kin' hard you'll eat through a straw for the rest of your life,” Joey promised.

The crank was stiff from years of disuse, but Tom finally managed to roll down the Packard's window. He stuck his head out. ”Hiya kids, hiya, hiya, hiya,” he croaked, chortling.

Suspended twelve feet from the ground, Joey dangled and made a fist. ”I'll pluck your f.u.c.kin' magic tw.a.n.ger, s.h.i.+thead,” he shouted. Tom yanked off his boxer shorts and hung them from a telephone pole. ”You're gonna die, Tudbury,” Joey said.

Tom took a big breath and set Joey on the ground, very gently. The moment of truth. Joey came running at him, screaming obscenities. Tom closed his eyes, put his hands on the steering wheel, and lifted lifted. The Packard s.h.i.+fted beneath him. Sweat dotted his brow. He shut out the world, concentrated, counted to ten, slowly, backward.

When he finally opened his eyes, half expecting to see Joey's fist smas.h.i.+ng into his nose, there was nothing to behold but a seagull perched on the hood of the Packard, its head c.o.c.ked as it peered through the cracked winds.h.i.+eld. He was floating. He was flying.

Tom stuck his head out of the window. Joey stood twenty feet below him, glaring, hands on his hips and a disgusted look on his face. ”Now,” Tom yelled down, smiling, ”what was it you were saying last night?”

”I hope you can stay up there all day, you son of a b.i.t.c.h,” Joey said. He made an ineffectual fist, and waved it. Lank black hair fell across his eyes. ”Ah, s.h.i.+t, what does this prove? If I had a gun, you'd still be dead meat.”

”If you had a gun, I wouldn't be sticking my head out the window,” Tom said. ”In fact, it'd be better if I didn't have a window.” He considered that for a second, but it was hard to think while he was up here. The Packard was heavy. ”I'm coming down,” he said to Joey. ”You, uh, you calmed down?”

Joey grinned. ”Try me and see, Tuds.”

”Move out of the way. I don't want to squash you with this d.a.m.n thing.”

Joey shuffled to one side, bare-a.s.s and goose-pimpled, and Tom let the Packard settle as gently as an autumn leaf on a still day. He had the door half open when Joey reached in, grabbed him, yanked him up, and pushed him back against the side of the car, his other hand c.o.c.ked into a fist. ”I oughtta-” he began. Then he shook his head, snorted, and punched Tom lightly in the shoulder. ”Gimme back my f.u.c.kin' drawers, ace,” he said.

Back inside the house, Tom reheated the leftover coffee. ”I'll need you to do the work,” he said as he made himself some scrambled eggs and ham and a couple more English m.u.f.fins. Using his teke always gave him quite an appet.i.te. ”You took auto shop and welding and all that s.h.i.+t. I'll do the wiring.”

”Wiring?” Joey said, warming his hands over his cup. ”What the f.u.c.k for?”

”The lights and the TV cameras. I don't want any windows people can shoot through. I know where we can get some cameras cheap, and you got lots of old sets around here, I'll just fix them up.” He sat down and attacked his eggs wolfishly. ”I'll need loudspeakers too. Some kind of PA system. A generator. Wonder if I'll have room for a refrigerator in there?”

”That Packard's a big motherf.u.c.ker,” Joey said. ”Take out the seats and you'll have room for three of the f.u.c.kers.”

”Not the Packard,” Tom said. ”I'll find a lighter car. We can cover up the windows with old body panels or something.”

Joey pushed hair out of his eyes. ”f.u.c.k the body panels. I got armor plate. From the war. They sc.r.a.pped a bunch of s.h.i.+ps at the Navy base in '46 and '47, and Dom put in a bid for the metal, and bought us twenty G.o.dd.a.m.n tons. f.u.c.kin' waste a money-who the f.u.c.k wants to buy battles.h.i.+p armor? I still got it all, sitting way out back rusting. You need a f.u.c.kin' sixteen-inch gun to punch through that s.h.i.+t, Tuds. You'll be safe as-f.u.c.k, I dunno. Safe, anyhow.”

Tom knew. ”Safe,” he said loudly, ”as a turtle in its sh.e.l.l!”

Only ten shopping days were left until Christmas, and Tach sat in one of the window alcoves, nursing an Irish coffee against the December cold and gazing through the one-way gla.s.s at the Bowery. The Funhouse wouldn't open for another hour yet, but the back door was always unlocked for Angelface's friends. Up on stage, a pair of joker jugglers who called themselves Cosmos and Chaos were tossing bowling b.a.l.l.s around. Cosmos floated three feet above the stage in the lotus position, his eyeless face serene. He was totally blind, but he never missed a beat or dropped a ball. His partner, six-armed Chaos, capered around like a lunatic, chortling and telling bad jokes and keeping a cascade of flaming clubs going behind his back with two arms while the other four flung bowling b.a.l.l.s at Cosmos. Tach spared them only a glance. As talented as they were, their deformities pained him.

Mal slid into his booth. ”How many of those you had?” the bouncer demanded, glaring at the Irish coffee. The tendrils that hung from his lower lip expanded and contracted in a blind wormlike pulsing, and his huge, malformed blue-black jaw gave his face a look of belligerent contempt.

”I don't see that it's any of your business.”

”You're no d.a.m.n use at all, are you?”

”I never claimed I was.”

Mal grunted. ”You're worth 'bout as much as a sack of s.h.i.+t. I don't see why the h.e.l.l Angel needs no d.a.m.n pantywaist s.p.a.ceman hanging 'round the place sopping up her booze . . .”

”She doesn't. I told her that.”

”You can't tell that woman nothin',” Mal agreed. He made a fist. A very large fist. Before the Day of the Wild Card, he'd been the eighth-ranked heavyweight contender. Afterward, he had climbed as high as third . . . until they'd banned wild cards from professional sports, and wiped out his dreams in a stroke. The measure was aimed at aces, they said, to keep the games compet.i.tive, but there had been no exceptions made for jokers. Mal was older now, spa.r.s.e hair turned iron gray, but he still looked strong enough to break Floyd Patterson over his knee and mean enough to stare down Sonny Liston. ”Look at that,” he growled in disgust, glaring out the window. Tiny was outside in his chair. ”What the h.e.l.l is he doing here? I told him not to come by here no more.” Mal started for the door.

”Can't you just leave him alone?” Tachyon called after him. ”He's harmless.”

”Harmless?” Mal rounded on him. ”His screamin' scares off all the f.u.c.kin' tourists, and who the h.e.l.l's gonna pay for all your free booze?”

But then the door pushed open, and Desmond stood there, overcoat folded over one arm, his trunk half-raised. ”Let him be, Mal,” the maitre d' said wearily. ”Go on, now.” Muttering, Mal stalked off. Desmond came over and seated himself in Tachyon's booth. ”Good morning, Doctor,” he said.

Tachyon nodded and finished his drink. The whiskey had all gone to the bottom of the cup, and it warmed him on the way down. He found himself staring at the face in the mirrored tabletop: a worn, dissipated, coa.r.s.e coa.r.s.e face, eyes reddened and puffy, long red hair tangled and greasy, features distorted by alcoholic bloat. That wasn't him, that couldn't be him, he was handsome, clean-featured, distinguished, his face was- face, eyes reddened and puffy, long red hair tangled and greasy, features distorted by alcoholic bloat. That wasn't him, that couldn't be him, he was handsome, clean-featured, distinguished, his face was- Desmond's trunk snaked out, its fingers locking around his wrist roughly, yanking him forward. ”You haven't heard a word I've said, have you?” Des said, his voice low and urgent with anger. Blearily, Tach realized that Desmond had been talking to him. He began to mutter apologies.

”Never mind about that,” Des said, releasing his grip. ”Listen to me. I was asking for your help, Doctor. I may be a joker, but I'm not an uneducated man. I've read about you. You have certain-abilities, let us say.”

”No,” Tach interrupted. ”Not the way you're thinking.”

”Your powers are quite well doc.u.mented,” Des said.

”I don't . . .” Tach began awkwardly. He spread his hands. ”That was then. I've lost-I mean, I can't, not anymore.” He stared down at his own wasted features, wanting to look Des in the eye, to make him understand, but unable to bear the sight of the joker's deformity.

”You mean you won't,” Des said. He stood up. ”I thought that if I spoke to you before we opened, I might actually find you sober. I see I was mistaken. Forget everything I said.”

”I'd help you if I could,” Tach began to say.

”I wasn't asking for me,” Des said sharply.

When he was gone, Tachyon went to the long silver-chrome bar and got down a full bottle of cognac. The first gla.s.s made him feel better; the second stopped his hands from shaking. By the third he had begun to weep. Mal came over and looked down at him in disgust. ”Never knew no man cried as much as you do,” he said, thrusting a dirty handkerchief at Tachyon roughly before he left to help them open.

He had been aloft for four and a half hours when the news of the fire came crackling over the police-band radio down by his right foot. Not very far far aloft, true, only about six feet from the ground, but that was enough-six feet or sixty, it didn't make all that much difference, Tom had found. Four and a half hours, and he didn't feel the least bit tired yet. In fact, he felt aloft, true, only about six feet from the ground, but that was enough-six feet or sixty, it didn't make all that much difference, Tom had found. Four and a half hours, and he didn't feel the least bit tired yet. In fact, he felt sensational sensational.

He was strapped securely into a bucket seat Joey had pulled from a mashed-up Triumph TR3 and mounted on a low pivot right in the center of the VW. The only light was the wan phosphor glow from an array of mismatched television screens that surrounded him on all sides. Between the cameras and their tracking motors, the generator, the ventilation system, the sound equipment, the control panels, the spare box of vacuum tubes, and the little refrigerator, he hardly had s.p.a.ce to swing around. But that was okay. Tom was more a claus-trophile than a claustrophobe anyway; he liked it in here. Around the exterior of the gutted Beetle, Joey had mounted two overlapping layers of thick battles.h.i.+p armor. It was better than a G.o.dd.a.m.ned tank. Joey had already pinged a few shots off it with the Luger that Dom had taken off a German officer during the war. A lucky shot might be able to take out one of his cameras or lights, but there was no way to get to Tom himself inside the sh.e.l.l. He was better than safe, he was invulnerable invulnerable, and when he felt this secure and sure of himself, there was no limit on what he might be able to do.

The sh.e.l.l was heavier than the Packard by the time they'd gotten finished with it, but it didn't seem to matter. Four and a half hours, never touching ground, sliding around silently and almost effortlessly through the junkyard, and Tom hadn't even worked up a sweat.

When he heard the report over the radio, a jolt of excitement went through him. This is it This is it! he thought. He ought to wait for Joey, but Joey had driven to Pompeii Pizza to pick up dinner (pepperoni, onion, and extra cheese) and there was no time to waste, this was his chance.

The ring of lights on the bottom of the sh.e.l.l threw stark shadows over the hills of twisted metal and trash as Tom pushed the sh.e.l.l higher into the air, eight feet up, ten, twelve. His eyes flicked nervously from one screen to the next, watching the ground recede. One set, its picture tube filched from an old Sylvania, began a slow vertical roll. Tom played with a k.n.o.b and stopped it. His palms were sweaty. Fifteen feet up, he began to creep forward, until the sh.e.l.l reached the sh.o.r.eline. In front of him was darkness; it was too thick a night to see New York, but he knew it was there, if he could reach it. On his small black-and-white screens, the waters of New York Bay seemed even darker than usual, an endless choppy ocean of ink looming before him. He'd have to grope his way across, until the city lights came into sight, And if he lost it out there, over the water, he'd be joining Jetboy and J.F.K. a lot sooner than he planned; even if he could unscrew the hatch quick enough to avoid drowning, he couldn't swim.

But he wasn't wasn't going to lose it, Tom thought suddenly. Why the f.u.c.k was he hesitating? He wasn't going to lose it ever again, was he? He had to believe that. going to lose it, Tom thought suddenly. Why the f.u.c.k was he hesitating? He wasn't going to lose it ever again, was he? He had to believe that.

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