Ray pulled at his uneven chin. “And you want me for this team?”
Battle nodded.
“Who else do you have?”
Battle held up a hand without looking back and the guy in black reached down to a briefcase at his feet. He fumbled with it for a moment and finally handed Battle a three-ring binder. Battle opened it to the first page and flopped it down on Ray’s desk, facing him.
Ray looked down. The first page was a glossy eight by ten candid shot of a black guy in a cape clinging to a wall. Ray flipped the photo over and read the info on its back and nodded. Then his eye was caught by the photo of a very attractive blonde on the next page. She was young and very cute. He turned the page to read the stats on the photo’s back, and saw the picture of another attractive girl. He checked her vitals. “Cameo,” he said aloud. “Never heard of her.”
“She’s new,” Battle said, “but we’ve had our eye on her for a while. Not much gets past us.”
Ray nodded and flipped by an unimpressive-looking oriental guy, then stopped at the photo of the man in black standing beside Battle. The only information on the back of the picture was the name “Bobby Joe Puckett: Crypt Kicker.”
“Ah,” Battle said. “You can meet one of the team right now. This is Special Agent Bobby Joe Puckett. Shake hands with the man, Bobby Joe. Leave your glove on.”
Puckett… the name was familiar, Ray thought as the agent slowly put his hand out. Ray took it cautiously. The smelly guy had a strong grip, but Ray did too. He put a little more into his handshake and Puckett answered right hack. Ray fought to keep the surprise and pain off his face. He put all the strength he had into his grip, but Puckett, seemingly unimpressed, bore down on his hand with overwhelming pressure. Ray clenched his jaw, determined not to give in, but knowing that this guy was way stronger than him. What would happen, Ray wondered, if! kicked the stinking bastard in the face?
“Now, Bobby Joe,” Battle intervened, “don’t hurt the man. He’s going to be working with us.”
Puckett let go instantly and Ray took his hand back, determined not to rub it. “He’s strong all right,” Ray said. “But can he fight?”
Battle laughed. “Oh, that he can, can’t you. Bobby Joe?”
“That’s right, Mr. Battle, with the strength of the Lord.” Puckett’s voice was slurred, difficult to understand. He spoke with a southern drawl, but also had a bad speech impediment. It was as if he’d had a stroke or a wound that had damaged his throat.
“So who’s leading the team?” Ray asked, making a surreptitious fist in an attempt to get some blood back in his hand.
“I am,” Battle said.
Ray looked at him carefully. “Are you an ace?”
Battle drew back with a look of distaste. “I don’t need twisted genes to fight that scum. I have something they don’t.”
Battle didn’t seem aware that he’d just insulted someone he was trying to recruit for a dangerous mission, but Ray couldn’t resist asking, “What’s that?”
Battle pointed a finger at his temple. “Superior intellect backed by an unbreakable will.” He saw the skepticism that flashed across Ray’s face and smiled a narrow little smile. “You don’t believe me?”
“Well —”
Battle’s smile fixed and he pulled back the sleeve of his suit coat to show an expensive watch and a muscular forearm splashed by a number of pale circular scars.
“Watch,” Battle said. His smile still in place, he puffed at his cigar until the tip glowed a bright red. Then he jabbed it right into his forearm, still smiling.
Ray watched in horrified fascination as the flesh on Battle’s arm blistered, blackened, and puckered into a raw circular crater under the cigar tip. The stench of seared meat speared the air and Ray sat back in his seat Battle removed the cigar tip from his forearm and proudly displayed the wound to Ray. He held his arm steady and his voice was unshaken. “Will,” he said. “That is all a man needs to survive, not an unclean genetic heritage.”
Battle, Ray thought, is deranged.
Battle’s smile turned to something of a grimace as he wrapped his handkerchief around the fresh burn on his forearm and pulled the sleeve of his jacket over it. “I’ll have that attended to later,” Battle said. He caught Ray’s gaze with his own. “Are you in or out?”
Ray hesitated. The guy was a geek. No normal person hurt themselves like that just to impress someone. He looked at Battle. “I’m in,” he said, unable to deny the overwhelming need for action that drove him every minute of his life.
Battle smiled and shot to his feet. “Good! I knew I could count on you. Let’s get going.”
“Where to?” Ray asked.
“You have some recruiting to do. Two of my prospects haven’t committed themselves firmly to the team yet.” Battle flipped through the book until he came to the picture of the oriental guy. “Him,” Battle said, stabbing the picture with his forefinger. Then he turned to the back of the hook and a photo Ray hadn’t noticed before. “And him. I want you to have a word or two with both and convince them of the desirability of joining our group.”
Ray glanced down at the second photo and barely repressed a groan. It was that smartass P.I., Jay Ackroyd.
“All the information you need is in the book,” Battle said. He stood and strode from the office, Puckett lumbering after him.
Ray sat at his desk, watching them leave, realizing suddenly that he’d never, ever be able to eradicate the stench of burnt flesh from his office.
Wyungare had been rather impressed by Cordelia’s coolness under fire. It wasn’t every European woman who could have gathered her self-possession and her clothing after being caught naked and impassioned, astraddle her Aboriginal lover, by the doctor. Wyungare wasn’t even sure that a woman of the People would have remained so calm under the circumstances.
The lights were on now, and Dr. Finn fussed about the ’gator avatar of Jack Robicheaux. Troll, the clinic’s head of security, hulked against the wall just inside the door and looked vaguely embarrassed. Cordelia and Wyungare stood by the head of Jack’s bed: the black cat rubbed against their ankles. Their clothed ankles.
Finn glanced at Cordelia and smiled faintly. “Your uncle does need his rest, you know.”
Cordelia winced. “Okay, I deserve that. Now let’s get back to the point here. Wyungare went directly into Uncle Jack’s mind. He found my uncle staked out on the ground. That was when the cavalry came in with all four feet.”
“Now” Finn started to say, shaking his mane indignantly. His palomino colors seemed to shimmer iridescently.
“Okay, Doctor Cavalry,” said Cordelia. “Christ, you spend a couple hundred thou in medical school and you think you deserve respect.”
“Just settle down,” said Finn evenly. “Is your Australian, um, friend there a trained psychotherapist?”
Cordelia’s voice turned fierce and Wyungare smiled. “He’s spent the better part of his young life in the dreamtime, you know? He’s lived in other people’s heads. He can navigate the brain like you can find your way uptown on the A train.”
Finn’s eyes narrowed. He opened his mouth, but whatever he was going to say was aborted as another doctor entered the increasingly crowded room. This one was male, short, and bland-looking. It seemed to Wyungare that the physician’s short blond hair must be prematurely thinning. There were no wrinkles in the man’s face.
The new doctor glanced from face to face, frowning a little. Then he turned to the bed. “So, how’s my patient today?” he said to the large reptile. Jack the Gator slumbered restlessly on. The doctor glanced at the digital readouts, tapping one meter when he apparently didn’t get the numbers he wanted at first.