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backing you up in a firefight.
You've got to be able to trust every man in your squad with your life or one
of you doesn't belong there.
Too bad we found out about you after the fact."
"Don't lecture me about trust, Mouse. We were trusted to follow orders and we
broke that trust." I
winced as Chalice pulled my shirtsleeve away from the wound and fresh blood
began oozing from my torn flesh. "If there was any betrayal, it was when you
abandoned protocol and started your cowboy shit.
I answered the questions I was asked truthfully and honestly. It's bullshit to
think that company honor required that I lie for you."
"High-handed talk, Sparks," the little man retorted. "If you're so righteous,
tell us why we're still working for the government while you're on their Most
Wanted list?"
"I'm on the government's Most Wanted list?" It had been awhile since I had
been inside a post office, much less checked the mug shot posters.
Of course, the real question was "which" government were we really talking
about?
"Too bad it ain't 'dead or alive,' " Mouser added, reaching for the front of
my jacket.
"You know, the sad thing is," I told him, "all these years I thought you were
a cowboy; I never figured you for a Nazi."
Mouser's hand jerked to a stop. "Huh?"
"A Nazi, Mouse. In your case, more like a Schutzstaffel."
"What are you talkin' about?"
"I'm talkin' SS Stormtrooper, Herr Rat! I'm talkin' about genocide and gas
chambers!"
Instead of grabbing my gun he shoved me back against the counter. "Why're you
trash talkin' me like this?"
Faf laughed. "The Mouser is just a foot soldier, Sparks. He don't know policy,
he just follows orders."
"But you're a smart guy, aren't ya, Faf? You know what I'm talking about,
don't you?"
He shrugged. "I hear things. I can add two and two."
"Only we're not talking addition, here, Bucko. We're talking subtraction and
in the millions."
"What are you talkin' about?" Mouse demanded to know.
"I'm talkin' about your mama, Herr Rat. How old is she?"
He shoved me again, jump-starting a lawnmower of pain in my arm. "Shut up
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about my mama, man!"
I focused past the renewed agony and said, "The people you work for are going
to kill her, Mouser.
The general is using these facilities to manufacture a virus that's designed
to kill the elderly."
"Naw, man; you got it wrong," Fafhrd drawled. "The general is going to solve
the race problem, old and young. Got nothin' to do with the Mouser's mama, she
bein' white. She is white, isn't she, Mouse?"
Mouse suggested that Fafhrd look no further for sexual intimacy than his own
genitalia.
"It's both, bozo." I pointed a trembling finger at the little man with the
gray teeth. "Your general is collaborating with vampires to produce and
disseminate viruses tailored to kill blacks as well as the elderly of any race
or ethnicity." I heard Chalice gasp behind me as I turned back to the big bald
guy.
"Which means your mama, Mouse!"
The Mouser turned to his partner. "Is this true, Faf?"
Fafhrd answer was cryptic. "Urk!" he said.
Or something to that effect as the lab door flew open and smacked the little
man back into the wall.
"What the f "
Mouser never finished his query: I had spun on the balls of my feet and
grabbed his throat with my good hand, my fingertips digging into the flesh
over his carotid arteries.
"Nobody move!" I yelled. "Drop your guns or JoJo's Adam's apple winds up
across the room.
"Suits me fine," said a familiar voice.
Fafhrd contributed another "urk" to the conversation.
I turned and saw William Robert Montrose standing in the doorway. He was
holding the door with one arm so that it continued to pin Fafhrd against the
wall. Although the old vampire didn't seem to be exerting himself in any way,
cracks were appearing in the plaster, radiating out from behind the door.
"Hurry up and feed!" he said. "We've got to get out of here."
"Feed?" I echoed. I was suddenly aware of Mouser's dead weight and the strain
on my good arm from holding the unconscious man by the throat.
A brown hand closed on my wrist and helped brace my arm. "What's this about a
virus designed to kill blacks?" Chalice hissed.
"I'm a little short on the details," I answered, "but a pattern is starting to
emerge."
"What do you mean?"
Between the dreams, the countess' historical MO, a fortune-teller's vague
prophecies, BioWeb's sinister projects, and that conversation downstairs
between Bloody Báthory and General Goebbels
Goering, it was just too difficult to explain.
Especially under the current time constraints.
"Later," I promised. I saw movement behind Count Bubba. A kid squeezed past
Montrose and into the room.
He was probably sixteen or had been when he died. But he looked younger,
smaller because of the suit that he wore. Or, rather, it wore him. Electric
blue, it was strictly forties era and very zoot. The pants were crotched low
with reet pleats and bluff cuffs. Above, he wore a racket jacket with a
drapeshape and wide lapels. His keychain, in the hepcat lingo, was "long with
links." On his head was a wide-brimmed dicer with a hatband that matched his
Windsor-knotted choker. On his feet were two-tone barkers and I was guessing
under the saggy baggy striders argyles held up by old-style garters. This was
my first look at an actual, honest-to-God, zoot suit outside of old photos,
and the whole package was totally killer-diller.
"Wowsers!" I said. "Beat me, Daddy, eight to the bar!"
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"This him?" the kid asked incredulously. "This the one they're all bumping
their gums about?" He turned to Montrose. "What's the wire on this Joe? He's
still breathing!"
As if that was some kind of social blunder.
He turned back and peered at me, squinting his eyes. "He still has a
heartbeat!"
"Which is mostly the point, I suppose," Count Bubba replied.
Fafhrd made another urky sound. The Mouser was unconscious and silent.
"You gonna eat that or play with it some more?" the kid asked.
I dropped Commando Cruddie and glared at Montrose. "You didn't tell me you
were babysitting tonight."
"Hey!"
"We don't have time for this," Montrose said. "J.D. meet Chris Cséjthe.
Cséjthe, J.D."
"Charmed," I said.
"More'n I can say about you."
"Now," my undead doorman continued, "take a few swallows of blood before you
fall over. . . ."
"I'm fine."
"Casper the Friendly Ghost has more color than you," he retorted. "And neither
of us is keen on the idea of carrying you. What's the matter? Squeamish?"
I nodded. "I knew this guy a dozen years back. I wouldn't have let him handle
my food then. What makes you think I would consider making him my food, now?"
The kid shook his head. "Besides being finicky about the torpedoes here, I [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]