Wild Cards V (81 page)

Croyd fell flat on his face. His limbs twitched uncontrollably.

The android dove at maximum speed. The gun went off like a clap of thunder. A heavy slug caromed off Modular Man's metal substructure and tumbled away into the night. The bullet's energy began to spin the android. Unable to stop himself in time, he smashed through the guardrail and zoomed over the Hudson. He stabilized the spin and began to loop back toward the fight.

Ambulance lights flashed bright across the pier. Below, the package was inflating automatically at the touch of the water. A rubber raft.

Mr. Gravemold, still moving with unnatural speed, danced away from Croyd's bodyguard. The young man had difficulty tracking with the heavy gun. He fired twice and missed both times.

Mr. Gravemold raised his fist. “No!” Modular Man shouted.

The temperature dropped again. Croyd's bodyguard staggered and fell, the gun falling from his hand.

It worked, the android thought numbly. Then he realized that Mr. Gravemold's abilities didn't fire cold, but rather stole heat. With energy going out rather than in, the bodyguard's talent had nothing to work with.

Modular Man did a loop in air, came down on the albino, seized Croyd by collar and belt. Brakes shrieked as the ambulance came to a stop. Jokers in biochem suits spilled out. Laughter boomed from behind Mr. Gravemold's gas mask.

The android rose into the sky with his shivering burden and accelerated. Puzzled jokers, their face masks giving them tunnel vision, peered at the sky, trying to see where he and Croyd had gone.

Modular Man shook Croyd like a rag doll.
“Why did you blow me up?
” he shouted.

Croyd's teeth were chattering so hard it was difficult to understand him.

“Seemed like a good idea at the time.”

Buildings sped beneath them. Fury raced through the android. He shook Croyd again.
“Why?”

Croyd began to thrash. Modular Man suppressed the albino's uncoordinated movements with ease.

He had won, he realized. Carefully he tried to cherish the feeling.

Croyd was shivering uncontrollably as Modular Man lighted on a rooftop and took off the emergency pack he'd strapped to his back in the clinic. It contained a biochem suit, a blanket, a canvas tarpaulin, a sack, and some cord. The android wrapped the albino in a blanket before stuffing him into the biochem warfare suit.

“Who are you working for?” Croyd's teeth chattered louder than his voice. “The Mafia? The other guys?”

The android screamed at him.
“Why did you blow me up?”

In the darkness Croyd's eyes were the color of blood. “Seemed like a good idea then,” he said. “Better idea now.”

A shivering fit struck him, and his teeth began to chatter like castanets. The albino's skin was a vivid turquoise, the same color as Travnicek's. He seemed barely conscious. The android closed the face mask and put a cloth flour sack over Croyd's head. He then wrapped Croyd in the canvas tarpaulin and tied him securely with the nylon cord. Even a person of unusual strength, the android thought, shouldn't be able to fight his way out of something that gave him no freedom of movement.

The android picked up his burden and flew on, spiraling down onto Travnicek's roof next to the skylight. Light shone upward through cracks in the black paint. He reached for the skylight.

“Over here, toaster.”

Travnicek was standing naked atop the pointed roof of a water tower on the next building. His voice no longer came from his mouth, which seemed to be sealing up; one of the organs around his neck, one shaped like a speaking trumpet, had taken over that function. His middle-European accent had come through the transformation untouched.

“That's the Croyd person, yes?”

“That's correct.” The android took his burden to the next roof and lowered it to a tarred surface still warm from the summer sunlight. Travnicek leaped the thirty feet from the top of the tower and landed effortlessly next to the bound figure. He bent, his organ-lei rustling as it focused on the albino. The sound of chattering teeth came from beneath the flour sack.

“I can
see
the viruses in there, right through that bag you've got over his head,” Travnicek said. “I don't know how just yet, but I can see them. The wild cards are very alive, very eager to enter my body and … subvert my programming.” A laugh floated from his speaking-trumpet. A mental chill flowed through the android at the noise, at how inhuman the laugh sounded without a throat to generate it.

Modular Man bent over the trembling figure of Croyd. “I will open the hood and mask. If you lean close, sir, and inhale, you should get another dose of the virus.”

Travnicek laughed again. “You're a fool, toaster. A fool.”

What rose in the android was not despair, but a bleak and hopeless confirmation of despair. “You ordered me to bring him. You
wanted
to be reinfected.”

“That was before I realized what I was.” The laugh came again. “I'm strong, I'm youthful, and I perceive the world in ways that no human ever dreamed were possible,” He turned his back on the android and walked to the parapet. He stood on the edge of the roof and let the lights of Jokertown play on his azure skin. “This city is so
tasty
,” he said. “I can
feel
the light, perceive motion and wind.” His organ-lei rose toward the sky. “I can hear the stars singing. My senses range from the microscopic to the macrocosmic. Why should I want to lose this?”

“Your genius, sir. The genius that created
me.
If you don't regain it…”

“What good did it ever do me? What pleasure did it bring?” He laughed. “Years of bad food and no sleep, years of listening to voices babble in my head, years of no friendships, of fucking cheap tarts in alleyways because I didn't dare let them into my workplace.…” He gave a snarl and turned to the android.

“It's gonna change, blender. I'm gonna have a real
life
now. And the first thing, you get me some money.”

“I—”

“
Real
money. A couple hundred thousand for a start. Just walk into a bank vault and grab it.”

The android gazed at the garland of yellow eyes. “Yes, sir,” he said.

“And get rid of that Croyd person. Where he won't bother anyone.”

“Yes, sir.”

Travnicek walked from the parapet to the iron base of the tower, then jumped six feet and clung to the side of the tower with hands and feet. He walked deliberately to its pointed crown and crouched, looking at the city.

“The world's my oyster,” he said. “You're gonna open it for me.”

The warm June night had gone cold. Croyd kicked and gave a yell. Modular Man picked him up and flew into the night, heading for the clinic.

A trumpet-flower laugh followed his silent ascent.

Travnicek, dressed in new custom-made clothing, stood with a woman on the observation deck of Aces High. Her hair was blond and curly, her dress light and low-cut and very nearly transparent. She wore white plastic boots. Travnicek leaned toward her, blue tongues lapping from his organ-lei, making wet tracks on her face. She shuddered and turned away.

“Fuck this, man. You're not paying me enough.”

Travnicek reached into a pocket and pulled out a roll of bills. “How much
enough
do you want?” He held up a hundred-dollar bill.

The blond woman hesitated. Her face set into lines of determination. “A lot more.”

Hiram wandered past like a ghost, his eyes tracking over the restaurant but seeing nothing.

“Jesus.” A customer's voice drifted over the sound of the crowd. “Hiram never used to allow that kind of thing.”

Modular Man winced and turned away. His seat near the window of the restaurant, within listening distance of the platform, gave him a far better view of Travnicek than he wanted.

There were some experiences he could not bring himself to cherish.

Kate looked over her shoulder at the twosome and lit a cigarette. “Quite an approach.”

“It seems to work quite well.”

She looked at him. “I detect a certain edge in your comment. Do you know the guy?”

“I have made his acquaintance.”

“Okay. I won't ask.”

Travnicek, laughing, handed the woman a roll of bills. His tongues, or whatever they were, continued to explore the woman. There were sounds of disgust from the bar.

Ignoring the fuss, the red-haired waitress stepped to the table. “Dessert?” she asked.

“Yes,” said the android. “The crostata, the orange tart, and the chocolate sabayon pie.”

“Yes, sir. And anything for the lady?”

Kate looked at Modular Man and stuck out her tongue. “Not for me. I'm counting calories.”

“Very well. Coffee?”

“Yes. Thank you.”

Kate tapped cigarette ash into an ashtray. She was a small woman, with straying brown hair and warm Jeanne Moreau eyes.

“I'm not sure even Epicurus would approve of all this gorging,” she said.

“My days are numbered. I want to try everything.” He smiled. “Besides, I don't gain calories.”

“Just amps. I know.” She reached out and squeezed his hand. “Are you all right? Now that you've fallen from Olympus and are living among the mortals?”

“I think I'm getting used to it. I'm still not certain I like it, though.”

“And your creator?”

“His genius is gone.”

“So you're on your own.”

“No. I'm still compelled to obey him. Also to fight enemies of society in my spare time.”
And break into safes
, he thought, though he didn't say it.
Wearing a disguise, so no one recognizes me.

She looked troubled. “I wish there was something we could do.”

“There appears not to be.”

“Still.” She took a drag on her cigarette. “You could learn physics. Metallurgy. That sort of thing. It could keep you going.”

“Yes. I could enroll in night school.”

“Why not full time?”

He shrugged. “Why not?”

Kate laughed. “They can bar a person from the classroom for not paying tuition. I don't know about a machine.”

“Maybe I'll find out.”

The android looked at his partner. “Thank you. You've helped me get things in perspective.”

She smiled. “You're welcome. Anytime.”

Someone's head appeared above the observation deck balcony. Wall Walker's. The android started, remembering Mr. Gravemold. Why would someone disguise himself as a joker?

The young ace stepped over the balcony and entered the bar.

The waitress brought the dessert tray and a pot of coffee. Kate, looking balefully at the desserts, pushed back her chair. “Time for a bathroom check. And then”—she sighed—“I've got to get back to Statius and company.”

The waitress moved the dessert tray to allow a customer to pass. The android recognized the nondescript brown-headed man who had been in the restaurant the day he'd spoken to Wall Walker. He nodded at the man but spoke to Kate.

“Thank you for joining me,” he said. “I kept expecting an emergency of some sort to interrupt the dinner. An alien invasion, an ape escape, something.”

Kate looked surprised. “Oh. You hadn't heard about the ape?”

The android's heart began to sink. “No. I hadn't.”

“He's not an ape anymore. He—”

Modular Man raised a hand. “Spare me.”

The lanky brown-haired customer looked at them. “In fact,” he said, “
I'm
the ape.”

The android looked at him. The man held out a hand. “Jeremiah Strauss,” he said. “Pleased to meet you.”

The android allowed his hand to be shaken. “Hi,” he said.

“I don't do the ape anymore.” Jeremiah Strauss seemed eager for company. “But I can still do Bogart. Watch this!”

The ex-ape began to concentrate. His features slowly began to rearrange themselves. “I'm not gonna play the sap for you, sweetheart,” he lisped. His face looked like Bogart's must have looked in his coffin.