Punktown: Shades of Grey (3 page)

He crouched down behind the barrels with her, gun in one hand, mask in the other. “Just keep quiet,” he hissed. He shot a look over his shoulder. “Not that it matters, huh?” he added bitterly. “They know we’re back here.”

“Who?” managed
Zandra.

“Who?” He glared at her. “The N’r’j. Who do you think?”

“What do you want from me?” She heard her last two words decay into sobs.

“Nothing. I’m not here for you. You’re just in the way, you and your friend.”

“What did you do to her?”

“What did I do? I didn’t kill her…your long-haired friends did her.”

“Killed? Aileen?”

“Yes. Aileen. Whoever. She’s dead. They got her. I shot one of them and the rest backed off. You two were fools to be here this late. Fools to be here at all. These things are devils. They don’t appreciate what you’re doing for them.”

“Who are you?”

The human regarded her for a moment, and them smiled darkly, amused and perhaps proud. “You’ve figured it out. You know someone’s been killing N’r’j that stray into the neighborhoods…”

“Oh my God,” Zandra said. “Oh…no…”

“Oh my God what? Listen…behind this back wall a block over is one of the oldest, nicest spots in Paxton, preserved from the Choom town that was here before Earth folk set down. Cobblestone streets.
Quaint little shops.
Beautiful stonework, iron balconies.
Rents are high. It’s a tourist attraction. And at night, for eight years now, N’r’j delinquents have been venturing there more and more. Begging by day…scaring off tourists. Getting bolder. Robbing people, mugging them, at night. Even murdering people.” The human lifted his gun, read its ammo counter, switched off the luminous numbers. “So…concerned citizens who shall remain nameless sought out an individual who would deal with this matter.”

“Please don’t tell me,” Zandra begged, desperate. “I don’t want to know…please just let me leave…I won’t say anything, I swear to God!”

“You think I’m going to kill you, don’t you? Well, that’s not my job, sister. You are a nun, aren’t you?”

“No, just a volunteer,”

“How sweet. How naive.” He poked his head up to peer over the stained and dirt-caked barrels. “What’s your name?”

“Zandra.”

“Choom name?” She didn’t answer until he looked at her.

“It’s Greek. It means ‘friend or helper of mankind’.”

“How convenient. Or…is that not your real name?” He obviously recognized her hesitation. “It’s not. Well, friend of mankind, since I’ve been so generous with information, what’s your real name?”

Zandra hesitated once more, then: “Shlet.”

He pretended to wince at its ugliness, amusing himself. “No wonder. I can hear the comments from the kids in school now. Shit. Slut. Now…that
is
a Choom name, isn’t it?”

The Chooms were the native people of the world Oasis, one of the most human of races Earth colonists had encountered, leading to theories of humans seeded on other worlds by more advanced beings in Earth’s ancient past. If so, the Chooms had adapted since then. The greatest feature that differentiated them from Earthly humans was their wide mouths, extending
ear to ear
, and filled with multiple rows of strong molars. The Chooms had never become great hunters or even herdsmen, instead subsisting almost entirely on a vegetarian diet…until the colonists arrived. Perhaps because of this, they were a peaceful people, and there had been very little opposition to the colonization when it came; just isolated instances of violence from individual malcontents. Indeed, the Chooms had welcomed the Earth humans. They embraced the imported cultures. They learned the various imported tongues. They even became so self-conscious of their queer dolphin-like mouths, so envious of the Earthly countenance, that it was not unknown for Chooms to have themselves cosmetically altered so as to look more like the Earth people. Black skin was alien to them, thus particularly glamorous; they might dye their skin. And they might have great mouths made small and their jaws made less heavy with teeth…

“Isn’t it?” the assassin persisted. “You’re a Choom.”

“Yes,” Zandra admitted, sitting up straighter, propping her back against the building’s wall, and in so occupying herself, averting her eyes from the stranger’s intent gaze.

“What was wrong with being a Choom that you want to be one of us? Chooms are fine by me. They’re no worse than anybody. Not like these monsters here.”

“I…just like the way Earth girls look.”

“It’s more than that. Are you ashamed? You think you’ll get treated better? And the people you work for, they’re a church, right? So you even adopted one of our religions, and you’re spreading the good feeling to the poor and destitute with all that new convert’s zeal. You shouldn’t hate yourself like that, Shlet, you know? You seem like a nice girl…”

Zandra’s eyes flashed at him. “My nane is Zandra. Legally.”

“Shh. All right, whatever.” He stole another glimpse of the courtyard over the drums,
then
scanned the roof tops, gun gripped close by his face. “I’ve never actually come into their camp before tonight. I always concentrated on the ones that strayed outside. They knew about me before, I’m sure…and now they know I’m here in their territory. I hadn’t planned on getting pinned down like this…but I couldn’t leave you vulnerable after what they did to your friend.”

“Assassin with a heart of gold, huh?”

The killer grinned at her. “We’re getting a little braver now, huh? I’m not a monster, dearie. I don’t take every job I’m offered. I have beliefs, opinions,
my
own code of ethics. I feel for the people in this area. This isn’t rich against poor like you think. Tourists get mugged, and people from less expensive neighborhoods just come to shop, and they aren’t wealthy necessarily. The N’r’j are animals, plain and simple. They don’t give half a damn about you and what you’re doing…they probably laugh at you. Inside. They never laugh on the outside. They left their kids here. On their world, they do nothing but war and kill each other…they get along so poorly with their own, let alone anyone else, that they live in little clans and tribes of extended family more than real towns, and they don’t have any real countries or unified government. You want to make them like you? It will take more than a mouth job, Shlet. They’re evil.”

“No people are inherently evil. Evil is…subjective.”

“Oh, yeah. That is true. We should respect that one group may commit genocide on another, or cut off a woman’s clitoris so she can’t enjoy sex, or hack off a kid’s leg so she can be a more effective beggar. Just because it’s not the way we do things doesn’t mean we should pass judgment…”

“You’re so passionately concerned about terrible things, for a hired killer.”

“That’s the spirit, dearie. Insult a hired killer with a gun. Good. At first, there, I thought you were just a little jellyfish.” He checked the view again. “Speaking of which, that big beastie is amazing, huh?
Beautiful, really.
He lights up the whole courtyard.”

Zandra found herself staring at his pistol. Dare she try to seize it? When he twisted back around she flinched, as if he might catch her gaze upon the weapon.

“I feel kind of…dopey, watery. Do you feel that way, or is it just psychosomatic?”

Zandra wasn’t going to reply, but realized suddenly that,
yes,
she did feel weak, drained—even sleepy. They were so close to the apparition’s emanated aura. “I guess,” she admitted. “Look,” she said, then paused, then continued, “I know you killed Aileen. Why would they suddenly kill her, when she was helping them for months? Why suddenly tonight, coincidentally the first night you came over the wall?”

“Well I think they saw me. So I think they were excited and on edge, and got bloodthirsty, and came back here thinking they’d get me and found her instead. And would have got you, too, if I hadn’t stepped in.”

“But you were wearing a mask. You looked like them.”

“Yeah, true. And pretty convincing, isn’t it?” He held the face up by its long hair. “It should be; it’s real. A trophy from an earlier excursion.”

“Oh…Jesus!” Zandra turned her own pretty mask away as she heard the skinned face drop with a nauseating rustle. “You’re…sick…”

“They must’ve seen my gun. They may have thought I was one of them, betraying them, or maybe even my great disguise didn’t convince them. But I noticed they were starting to move around like they were alarmed… I would have aborted and gone back over the wall, really, if you and your friend hadn’t run into trouble first. But I didn’t kill your bleeding-heart friend, Zandra. I wouldn’t.”

“Not for free, anyway. And your heart must bleed, too. For rich shop owners. And for pretty girls…”

“Oh, modest, aren’t we? You think you’re pretty now that you look like an Earth girl, huh?
Such sad vanity.
I’m sure you were pretty even with that big old Chew-’em grin.”

“I don’t believe you didn’t kill Aileen.”

The assassin’s good humor was replaced by flashing dark menace. “I told you, I didn’t kill her! Why, then, haven’t I killed you? I may have got her killed indirectly…by agitating the N’r’j…and I’m sorry you got caught in the middle. But I don’t want to hear that again…”

“Or you’ll kill me?”

“You
are
brave,” he croaked, directing his hot glare elsewhere as if to divert his anger. “They’re smart, they’re hanging back. Waiting to ambush us. It’ll be a long night but I suggest we don’t move until light, when they get more sluggish. Then I’ll get you over the wall.”

“You’ll let me live? After I saw your face, and you told me everything?”

“It’s blown. So what? I’ve made good money on it; I’ll make money somewhere else. I don’t have roots here.”

“Do you feel so passionate about all your jobs?”

“No. But these parasites are easy to hate. You superimpose your good intentions on them. Look at them with naked eyes some time. And I don’t mean their ugly faces. That’s of no consequence. The real horror is inside.”

“It sure is. Because you’re pretty good-looking, on the outside.”

He swivelled around to smile at her, his good mood restored. “Why thank you.”

“It was really an insult.”

“I know. But I’m enjoying your company anyway.”

Zandra blinked hard several times in an effort to crack the heavy weights that seemed to be solidifying on her lids. Her body felt like a loose bag stuffed with stones. Though she couldn’t see the Monster from this position, she saw its violet illumination on the tiled wall and the buildings around them, and against the phosphorescent air the occasional dark bubble of a voracious blastula.

“You’re the vain one,” she murmured. “You couldn’t resist showing off to me what you do. Trying to impress me, and yourself.”

Apparently more confident that they would remain undisturbed so long as they did not compromise their position, the assassin moved from his crouch to sitting on the ground nearer to Zandra, his back against a drum. With his free hand he rubbed at his eyes. “You’re so cruel, after I saved you.”

“I don’t believe they’d hurt me!”

“They’re not you, dearie. Not everyone and everything is you. You can’t convert them, because they have no souls to save. Some beings are only shadows of life…if you weren’t some little Choom rube from some insulated hick town you’d have learned that already. You thought coming here and putting on a small mouth would make you fit into this place? You should have left your own soul back home, little girl.”

“You’re very superior for a murderer,” Zandra retorted, but she was disturbed by how easily he saw through her transfigured flesh, guessing even that Punktown was as new to her as extradimensional creatures were. She supposed that a lifetime in such a city would indeed heighten one’s perceptions. It would be a matter of animal survival. The drive for survival made people do ugly things, that much she would concede. She rested her forehead on her knees, which she wrapped her arms around against the late autumn cold. “You’re the parasite. You’re robbing the shopkeepers, too. You’re like those…things on the Monster.”