When he had failed Blythe.
After so many years, the sense of loss had not abated. It wouldn't stay hidden at the bottom of a bottle, it couldn't be obscured by an unending parade of the finest lovers. Only the work he did at the clinic ever seemed to give him some kind of comfort, inadequate but better than nothing at all.
His gaze met Fortunato's and he recognized the look in the other man's eyes. "Power calls to power and sorrow to sorrow." He gave Fortunato the barest of smiles. "We have all lost something precious to us in this battle against horror. But still we must go on, go on and turn back the darkness. If we can."
Fortunato didn't return the smile. Everything seemed to call for one of his goddamn fucking faggot speeches. "Yeah, sure," he said roughly, turning away. "Go up there and kick some ass, you and me and what army?"
Tachyon reached for the telephone. "We'll have to call them out."
The cop actually threw a net over him. It was so startling that he reverted to human form, bruising elbows and knees and scraping his flesh as he rolled over and over on the sidewalk. The cop was laughing even as he pulled his gun out and stuck it through the net.
"Don't get any ideas about changing back," said the cop, "or I'll have to put you out of your misery. Jesus, wait till they check your action up to the Cloisters. I can hardly believe it myself."
He shivered in the net, unable to take his eyes of the barrel of the pistol. The cop really would shoot him, he didn't doubt it. Silently, he cursed himself for not being content with simply sailing over the city enjoying the lights and scaring the piss out of the occasional rooftop couple. How many people could say they'd been buzzed by a pterodactyl-lately?
The cop bundled him into the back of his car and drove through town, still snickering. "I don't know what the Astronomer'll want to do about you, but you'll probably amuse the hell out of him. You make the smallest tyrannosaurus that ever was."
"Ornithosuchus," he murmured, swallowing hard. Another dinosaur-illiterate with a gun. He wasn't sure what to be more afraid of-the gun, this Astronomer guy, or his own father, who would shortly discover he wasn't up in his room asleep. He was only thirteen and he wasn't supposed to be out this late on a school night, especially in the form of a fastrunning flesh-eater of the Triassic period.
"Come here, my dear. So I can see you better."
Jane hesitated. The aura of evil that her dreams had hinted at was too definitely present around the old man in the wheelchair. Moisture began to bead lightly on her face and neck. She looked to Kim Toy but the woman's attention was on the Astronomer, just like everyone else's in the great hall. Whoever they all were. Masons. She recognized the man who'd brought her in-Judas, Roman had called him. Roman was seated at a computer terminal off to one side, near a low brick wall that seemed to have been attacked with a pickax. Spray-painted on it in metallic gold was the legend EAT ME.
"You have a great power, my dear," the old man said. "One that would be greatly useful for the visitor bearing down on us from the stars. TIAMAT" He paused, waiting for her reaction. She stood uncomfortably under his gaze. The extra illumination they had brought in and tacked up so carelessly had only made the shadows at the far corners that much darker. She had a sense of horrible things waiting there for a signal from this Astronomer to crawl out and devour her. EAT ME. She put one elbow in her fist, pressing the other hand against her mouth so she wouldn't start laughing and never stop.
"Are you familiar with that name? TIAMAT?" prodded the Astronomer. Jane pressed her hand tighter against her mouth and shrugged awkwardly.
"Well." The old man leaned forward slightly. "It would be helpful if we could have a demonstration of your power. Aside from what you did on the street with the fire hydrant." He squinted at her. "Or are you doing it now, my dear?"
"Oh, really subtle," said the bleakly thin man standing at the Astronomer's right. His eyes made Jane think of tombstones. "Just what we need, an ace whose big power is heavy sweating. World domination, here we come."
The Astronomer chuckled and Jane thought it was the most evil sound she'd ever heard. "Now, now. We all know she's capable of much greater feats. Aren't you. Yes. For instance, you could conceivably remove all the water from a body, leaving-well, not much." He gestured at the rest of the people and chuckled again at the look on her face. "No, I thought not. The only one you might care to use it on right now is myself, and I'm immune." He nodded to Red, who vanished under one of the brick arches. A few moments later, he reappeared, guiding two men who were pushing a cage on wheels into the middle of the room. Jane blinked several times, unable to believe her eyes in the bad light.
There was a dinosaur in the cage. A Tyrannosaurus rex, all of three feet high.
As she watched, it bared its ferocious-looking teeth and ran back and forth behind the bars' its little forearms cuddled up close to its scaly body. One dark reptilian eye regarded Jane with a glitter of intelligence.
"Vicious creature," said the Astronomer. "If I were to let it out, it could snap your leg off in one bite. Kill it. Withdraw all the water from its body."
Jane lowered her arms, her hands still curled into fists. "Oh, come now." Another of those evil chuckles. "Don't tell me your heart is touched by every stray dinosaur that comes along."
"There's someone in there," she said. "You want a sample of my power? Here's a close-up!"
Something almost happened. She had focused on an area just in front of the Astronomer's face, intending to dash a gallon of water into his eyes. The air blurred momentarily and then cleared. The old man threw back his head and roared with laughter. "You were right, Roman, she breaks out with bravado at the oddest moments! I told you, my excellent dear, that your power won't work if I don't want it to. No matter how much power you have, I have more. Isn't that right, Demise?"
The skinny man stepped forward, ready to obey some order. The Astronomer shook his head. "There's another waiting for us, much more receptive. She won't try to throw a bucket of water in our faces."
Jane wiped her own face without effect. Water was beginning to pool around her feet. The Astronomer watched her, unmoved. "To have real power is to be able to use it, to be able to do certain things, no matter how awful you may find them. There is more power than you can imagine in being able to do such things, or in being able to make someone do them." He gestured at the cage. Jane followed the movement and then had to clap both hands over her mouth to keep from crying out.
The tyrannosaur had been replaced by a boy no more than twelve or thirteen years old, with sandy brown hair, gray-blue eyes, and a small pink birthmark on his forehead. He would have been startling enough, except that he was also completely naked. He crouched at the bars, doing his best to cover himself.
"There is no more time to try to court you, my dear," said the Astronomer, and all pretense of kindliness was gone from his voice. "TIAMAT is very close now and I cannot waste even a moment trying to lure you in with us. It's too bad; your killing a child even in the guise of a dangerous dinosaur would have bound you over to us, traumatically but completely. If I had but a few more weeks, you would have been ours painlessly. Now it's a matter of choosing between your life and your brave little ethics. You have as much time to decide as it takes for me to cross this room. I have no doubt which you'll choose. May your ethics sustain you in the next life. If there is one." He gestured at the skinny man. "Demise-"